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beautifulletdownfics · 4 years

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Nothing To Him - A Harry Styles One Shot

Harry Styles is a liar.

He lied your whole relationship.

He promised to love you forever and then he walked away.

A lovers to nothing break up fic feat. blisters, heartache & two sides to one story.

Word count: 15k (Sorry! You’re going to want to open this little pal in a browser window probably. Eek)

Story Playlist:

The First Lie: Damn This Love - Thirsty Merc The Second Lie: Do You Remember - Jarryd James The Third Lie: Nebraska - Oh Wonder The Fourth Lie: I Saw You - Jon Bryant The Fifth Lie: Here We Go - Emily Hearn The Sixth Lie: Crying Dancing - Nina Nesbitt , NOTD

MY MASTERLIST.

The first lie was that you were different.

Harry felt different with you.

You just slipped into his routine and his life. You didn't buy into the spectacle of it all. You told him on your first date that you didn't play games, and that it wasn't often you connected with someone on an intellectual or emotional level. Harry sat there and listened to the woman across from him say she didn't expect to finish the date still attracted to him.

And he fucking loved it.

The next morning he called you at quarter past eight, because he figured you either started work at eight-thirty or nine o'clock, so he'd catch you on your commute or just before you walked into the office. You answered your phone like you would a business call. He teased you for it, but really he was just glad you answered at all. It felt like getting test results telling Harry he was in the clear.

The truth was when Harry first met you at the birthday party the night before he'd been angling towards you being a hookup. He saw you across the bar as soon as he arrived, gaze zeroing in on your legs in That Dress, his ears leaning to the sound of your laugh pulling eyes from around the room. Harry wanted you, and he'd been through a bit of a dry spell. You radiated the kind of energy Harry could get drunk on, the sort of body he wanted to lose himself in for a night.

It was almost an hour before he managed to edge into the same circle of bodies as you. You knew the birthday girl the same way he did; through work. Harry caught early on that you didn't still work for his record label, but did a few years before and stayed in touch with everyone. You seemed like the kind of person who collected people, who everyone wanted to keep in touch with. Harry just wanted to touch you.

Two tequilas in he got you to himself.

You were good at flirting, which excited Harry initially. You had a quip for everything or an interesting addition to each story he told. You were well-read and well-travelled, and you weren't hesitant in showing Harry that you had opinions and ideas of your own. Over the years he'd become good at getting people to talk, good at asking questions that make someone share themselves because the alternative—Harry sharing himself—wasn't something he could do. But something about you and the way you framed questions made Harry feel like it was safe to share a little more, you'd disarmed him quietly, and by the time he noticed Harry didn't feel the need to protect himself anymore.

"That's bullshit," you'd told him when he said he wasn't all that into contemporary fiction. You hated the artsy elites who listed off the Hemingway's and the Kerouac's and the Vonnegut's as though the only literature worth mentioning came from lifetimes ago. Your hair swished back and forth at your cheeks as you shook your head emphatically, "You're being lazy. Imagine saying the same about modern music."

Harry's lips ticked up into a smile, and he raised his eyebrow in concession, "That would be bullshit," he agreed, thinking of the album he'd just released and how he wanted to know if you'd listened to any of his stuff. (Very quickly he decided he probably didn't want to know because it stuck Harry the answer would be no.) His eyes couldn't pull away from watching your lips as you spoke, admiring the shade of lipstick you wore.

"Right," you continued, "Modern fiction teaches me about myself, about my life. It gives words to what my friends and I are experiencing. The classics are amazing—don't get me wrong—but I don't see myself in them."

"Seems like your criteria stem from narcissism," Harry was sure he had you there. He grinned at you happily.

"Exactly," you agreed without hesitation, "Maybe 'Hills Like White Elephants' is genius, and as a woman, I should be grateful to Hemmingway for horrifying his audience in 1927 with a normalised view of abortion but … I don't think he wrote that for me. He was challenging ideas then. I feel more connection and loyalty to an Instagram poet who's painting the world that actually matters to me, the world I'm trying to survive now."

Harry hums into his drink and says nothing. He expects you to back away a little, or ask him some question that watered-down your view and opened up the table to his. But you don't. You let your view sit on the slice of the bar between you and don't apologise for it.

"There's a reason artists burst out of every generation," you add, sitting forward on your stool. "If the classics were the perfect form, the perfect commentary of humanity, then there'd be no need for anyone after them to bother trying to put the world and life into words, or pictures, or music. You can't just dismiss a generation of voices because some smelly, old, white, university hasn't decided to name a building after them yet. I don't think being published as a little orange Penguin Classic is the singular hallmark to good literature."

He didn't entirely agree with you, (he thought it was vital to learn from the past, thought those great authors you reeled off and dismissed set the benchmark artists today should aspire to) but Harry liked hearing your thoughts and seeing the passion burst out of you. He liked seeing how you didn't second guess yourself or try to soften your opinion by asking for his. You just said what you thought, and that was always one of his favourite characteristics in a person.

That night you met him, you were the designated driver for a few of your friends. He should have noticed the way you switched to pineapple juice after you finished your first drink, but he was too busy trying not to look at the curve of your thigh when you crossed one leg over the other. Trying to ignore the smell of your perfume or how you kept licking your lips and he wanted to taste them, desperately. Harry didn't like to say anything when he offered to buy you another gin and dry. Still, when it eventually came out in conversation—that you were strictly only having one tonight—he felt his excitement deflate. His warm buzz suddenly felt pervy and presumptuous.

"Well, that's bloody annoying, isn't it?"

His response surprised you, "Me getting my friends home alive?"

With his hand comfortably resting over your knee, Harry shook his head, "I was hoping to go home with you."

"Oh."

You blinked at him, not having expected him to be so bold. You didn't hate it though, you felt the twinge of realising you were going to miss something that could have been good. Could have been great, probably. The last time you had sex had been … sad. And disappointing. Still, you hadn't come out to meet anyone tonight, why the sudden rush of despondency? These were old work colleagues you rarely saw, and you figured it would be a night of catching up before six months of not seeing each other because life got in the way.

Then Harry asked for your number. Asked if you'd go out with him the next night. He didn't beat around the bush with it, he wanted to see you again and told you so. The way you said you would filled him with relief but also fear. Harry knew he'd need to really deliver with you, he couldn't half-arse it. He was terrified he'd overshoot it and lose the change to be someone who impressed you.

He settled on a Sunday evening picnic where the two of you ate takeaway on a beach towel at the top of a park halfway between your houses. Something told Harry you would be happier with him underplaying the date than you would be getting taken to an expensive, showy restaurant. You wore jean shorts and a long sleeve jumper which churned his body more deeply than the dress with the split from the night before. He was hooked.

"Do you not like olives?" Harry asked, sucking the oil off his fingers after just depositing one into his mouth. You instantly loved the way the inflection of his words rose at the end of his sentences, and you'd mock him for it your whole relationship.

You looked at the plastic container sitting between you, you'd been picking at the cheese and crackers, the antipasto was not your thing, "They don't seem like something humans should eat … Salty and rubbery with a tiny stone on the inside? No, thanks."

A laugh burst out of Harry's mouth as he picked up another green olive, "More for me then."

"I'm happy about the rosemary in these though," you held up a cracker before digging it into the hummus, a plastic-stemmed wine glass with a dry rose in your free hand, "You got the fancy ones."

"Only the best," Harry returned with a smile and then went on trying to playfully wedge more information from you about the secret poetry Instagram he was convinced you had. He was already feeling buzzed from the wine, but more from the way you kept looking at him and he couldn't catch a hint of you being anything other than yourself.

You didn't go home together that night either, despite The Kiss at the end next to his car. Despite Harry's hands on the back of your thighs as things got heated. The way the tips of his fingers feathered against the elastic of your knickers, just slipping under before pulling away. Your chests heaving together in a rhythm you'd never found with anyone else.

He felt like he had just auditioned for a part he wasn't sure yet that you were going to give him. Wine always heightened his anxiety, so Harry also wanted to appear controlled and measured. He wanted to be as thoughtful as you were. As connected to himself as you were to all your wonderful opinions and facts. There was some part of him that feared taking you home too soon might risk that being the only night Harry got. So he pulled away, kissed your cheek and promised to call you later on.

Somewhere along the line, Harry decided he wanted more than a little bit. He was greedy. Harry wanted the whole pie all to himself.

That was a theme, him wanting more. Even now, months since you've seen or heard from him. Harry always knew how to get you to take that one step out of your comfort zone, take that little bit extra risk. Letting go of him in one way felt like small release valve finally letting go. A tiny bit of your safety net tucking closer around you. A little quiet moment to take stock and check every part of you was still connected, still there. A deep breath in. A short pause of calming silence. Like getting your heart back … But then finding it didn't fit in your chest the same way anymore.

So you found it particularly cruel to have received a follow-up email from his assistant this week, checking to see if you were able to attend his show tonight.

The show that six months ago Harry drew you a mock ticket for and hand-delivered to you sitting outside in his garden with a tea and a biscuit. Even then, even as his girlfriend, you'd feigned not knowing if you could say whether you would attend. Now it felt foreboding, the way you'd pulled your features together thoughtfully and told Harry you'd have to see closer to the date. You waited just long enough for him to switch over into thinking you were serious before you laughed and told him of course and where else would I be?

Where else would I be, was right, in a sense. Because this is still your city, and you're here tonight. It's not his anymore. He moved soon after you broke up … Relocated to one of his—what was it you used to mockingly call them?—" location" homes. Houses you never saw in person. Places he never took you. Either Italy or France. Somewhere he could hide, be creative, recenter himself. All three of those things filled you with dread for different reasons.

Were you really going to go tonight though? Walk in through the front door of the venue with a ticket and barcode on your phone, sit in a crowd and listen to Harry for two hours? Look at him from across the room and just take it on the chin?

It certainly seemed you were dressed for it. And you were out of the house with time to get there. Would you get off the train at the stop though? Would you walk down the street with the bright sign his name lit up? Would Harry even know if you didn't go?

Part of you wonders if his assistant didn't mean to email you. Maybe she forgot you were no longer in Harry's life? Perhaps it was a scheduled email she forgot to stop? Probably it was Harry just being fucking nice, and polite, and worrying about how you'd feel if you were uninvited. Or if he didn't check in on you while he was here.

You accepted the reminder too easily and scolded yourself for it. His team was expecting you. Harry was expecting you. And now, sitting on the train and counting down the stops you felt caught. Felt like he had you again, even if it was just winning whatever tonight was.

Harry did always enjoy the chase. Admitted it himself, admitted to loving the beginning of meeting someone. Loving the audition process, the figuring each other out, the get. The Catch.

You wonder now if it was the chase he liked back then. Was it a thrill having you make him feel as though he had something to prove? Or was it Harry experiencing for the first time not having the upper hand, not having even the tiniest amount of weight around who he was count for anything. Now it felt like Harry was nothing but upper hand.

Whatever it was—the Chase, or your endless facts, pancakes on a Sunday morning—the part of Harry's lie about you being different that hurts the most is the way you bought into it so proudly. Wore it later as his girlfriend like a badge of honour. As though it signalled to others you'd been hard-won, and Harry was lucky to have you.

Different turned out to be such a dirty word.

Different turned out to mean nothing. To get you nowhere.

All different got you was Nothing To Him.

The second lie was that he saw a future with you.

Harry didn't shy away from talking about it. He made plans for you both.

Sometimes it was in the moments right before you both fell asleep at night, or in the final seconds before the kettle finished boiling. Always in some small window where his mind drifted and sat comfortably stagnant when all there was to think about was the next holiday you'd take together. Or what breed of dog you might have one day. Whether you wanted your kids to be close together in age or have larger age gaps between them. What you thought about silent retreats in Thailand.

He stored your answers away in the file full of you in his head or added them to the note on his phone with ideas for gifts for people or things going on in their lives he wanted to remember.

"My family have always had cats," he told you one night, fingers drawing circles around your bare kneecap, your naked thigh resting across his stomach, "When I'm settled I'd want to get a few of my own."

It was one of those hot summer nights no position felt comfortable for sleep, you raised your arms up over your head and stretched out further on the mattress, fingers dangling off the edge of the bed to feel the cold stream from the air conditioning unit above, "I don't trust cats. Isn't there something about them being evolutionarily build to hunt their owner?"

Harry turned his head to face you, "A fact for everything," he recited fondly, his common quip for your always having an answer for everything, "I'll let the cats hunt me, you'll be spared."

"As long as I can name them," you murmured, your eyes finally closing.

Close to three months later, an hour into unsuccessfully putting together a flat-pack shelving unit in Harry's garage, you heavily plopped yourself down on the concrete floor and hailed defeat. You tossed the small, silver Allen key onto the floor in Harry's direction and rested your chin in your palm.

A few minutes of watching his embittered attempts passed before he spoke.

"Hey Sulky, I can feel you looking at me," Harry was frowning at the short piece of timber in his hand, he was holding it next to what was supposed to be the base of the structure. This was your second attempt at pulling apart the shelves and starting again while you cursed the entire Swedish furniture empire. You were enjoying seeing Harry's stubborn frustration immensely.

He could be such a man sometimes.

"Yeah, 'cause you're hot," you said, mocking him dreamily.

"Ha ha," he drawled, rolling his shoulders back to try to regain his focus.

When he paused a moment later and looked up at you, his arms dropped as his brow softened and he let out a breath.

You grinned at him, "I'm pretty cute too, right?"

"All this shit is going to end up living on the ground because you're sabotaged the assembly!" He gestured wildly at the tools and spare paint colours for the house lying around you. His bike parts and the weird assortment of garden tools Harry collected were leaning against the wall waiting to be put on their new home as well, the shelf neither you nor Harry were skilled enough to put together.

"Baby," you began, but Harry waved you off, and you saw genuine frustration start to emerge on his face, "Okay! Okay, I'm sorry," you stressed, "Are you sure we're looking at this thing from the right way around? Maybe the designer meant for it to be wonky?"

He rolled his eyes at you. As if the mere thought anyone would design anything to look like the mess currently on the floor was purely preposterous—his temper for small frustrations on full display.

"Don't be rude!" You admonished, "It's a fucking shelf, we can do this, Harry."

It took you another hour and a half, but when it was done, Harry draped his arm around your shoulders, kissed you on the head and told you that you were the person he wanted by his side of all his future crisis. Someone to say to him, whatever the challenge was, it wasn't beyond him, wasn't something he couldn't handle or wasn't capable of.

You felt like you were floating that night.

It was one of those few times you could see your imprint on his life. See some evidence of it. There were shelves in his garage only there because you told him he needed storage there, and then you pushed him to keep trying assembling them. It was some proof you'd been in his life. An impression of your influence. A memory that would hover in his garage forever.

Two days after putting the shelves together, you and Harry had an argument about the plastic tubs he went off on his own to buy for all the loose bits and pieces he wanted to go on the shelves. You were annoyed he didn't purchase wooden ones, and he couldn't understand why it mattered that they were white plastic which would apparently be impossible to keep clean.

It's a garage, he thought, who's cleaning their garage?

And because arguments always dredge up things that they aren't supposed to, you made a jab about your relationship being secret.

You said something like, If I'd been able to come with you, we wouldn't be having this row!

Harry knew what you really meant straight away. You'd been together for more than nine months at that point, and nobody knew about it: nobody but your families and very very closest friends. There were no photos of Harry having lunch with you at a cafe, or of you walking a few steps behind him at the shops. Nobody had snuck a picture of you backstage at a show of his. He'd never appeared on your social media, even by suggestion, and Harry had never taken the risk including you on any private Instagram Stories.

Those photographs didn't exist, because those circumstances never had. There wasn't even a celebrity paper trail linking you to knowing Harry, let alone dating him. Harry didn't dedicate performances to you, or even to an unnamed significant other. You never got a song or an album dedication. Harry was so adamant on nobody getting wind of the relationship that sometimes it felt like … Like he enjoyed the sneaking around. The having a secret. (Later on, when you reflected on the relationship once it was over, you really weren't sure how there'd never been even one instance of you being seen coming or going from Harry's house. Hindsight made that feel suss to you.)

Most of the time you liked it, though, liked not having any fuss or interruption to your life but sometimes—a lot of the time—it felt like something silently eroding you from the inside—a silent acid eating your spirit.

But you'd never tell Harry that. Then anyway. Now … You're not sure what you'd tell him now.

The truth was a lot of the time you weren't sure how you'd managed to keep it going so long. Part of it was obvious, maybe, like not being in public together. But still, surely after being together months and having arguments about shelves you could afford a platonic appearing coffee trip or going for a run at the same time, together?

Instead, you'd gear up and run in opposite directions down his street. Or Harry would stay in the car while you went in for the coffee. You'd sit in a nosebleed seat if you went to a show, sneaking through some fire exit and into the main hallways of a venue with the public to get to it. You looked like a sad woman attending a gig on your own, not the girlfriend of the star.

Nobody would know you even knew the man up on stage. That you had something in the slow cooker at home for you both to eat when you got home, or that he'd stolen a tube of your favourite lip balm and had it in his blazer pocket for his set. Nobody would guess you made him late for the soundcheck with just a smile and the undoing of a zip.

Seeing him tonight would be just like it always was, you and Harry from across the room. But then not like always, because Harry wouldn't see you tonight. You wouldn't have the taste of a good luck kiss on your lips. Or the sound of Harry's warm-up in your ears. Yours was always an invisible connection that was kept invisible by design, and now being broken up, it looked no different than together. Not really.

Tonight though it would only be you seeing Harry. Like you see him on late-night talk show promotions and billboards. Like the times you get into an Uber, and his song is playing. How strange it feels, to have your heart crack in your chest again while also lifting somehow. Singing along with a song about you. Or hearing his laugh or even just Harry speaking, and being able to picture the exact expression that would go along with it.

Every raised inflection. Ever breathy giggle. Every brow crease at a thought that Harry was chasing or somehow unable to articulate. All of those turning into you picturing what he looked like every time he knew he was disappointing you. Every whined sorry and all the instances of him loving on you to move your mind away from his deficiencies.

"What's the plan for Y/N?"

If your relationship with Harry was a t-shirt, that would be the slogan across the chest. Those would be the words under the cartoon impression of you banging your head against a wall Harry's standing on the other side of.

How will Y/N get in? Who's staying behind with Y/N? Where will I meet up with Y/N?

There was always a question. Always a plan for you and it was decidedly separate to the plan for Harry. His team organised a second car or an earlier flight for you. A back entrance or some other smokescreen to keep you concealed. In the beginning, it felt like a kindness, but in the end, you were embarrassed by it. The bother, the way what started as a careful consideration for your wellbeing turned into something rotten that painted you a different colour to Harry and his public inner circle, the circle you were never invited or initiated into.

It was exhausting. But Harry assured you it was for the best.

You wonder what the future he saw for you really was though. How much further did Harry see a life like that going? A life with you perpetually operating under cover of darkness. A life of you decidedly not existing. Not really.

So when he said he saw a future with you, you're really not sure what Harry meant.

Did he mean one day he saw himself lifting the veil and telling the world he had a Someone? Or did he mean that he saw himself forever hiding you, forever living that lie?

Maybe he actually saw nothing.

Sometimes you could be convinced the fact Harry hid you was an action pointing to a more profound truth.

That the future he saw was an imagined indulgence; a convenience, and a comfortable lie. Comforting on a temporary level, like bowling alley bumper rails or the plastic covering on a new watch face. The fake sense of security—of protection, of immaculacy—was just that, artificial and temporary. It ceased to exist the minute you plucked the corner and pulled back the protective layer. Crashed as soon as the bumpers were flipped down.

You were a secret only Harry had any power over. He led from the front because you didn't know there was any other option. And in letting yourself be that, you made yourself easily dispensable.

Disposable. Replaceable. Erasable.

Which is precisely what happened when he left.

Harry left, and the You of the two of you ended. But more than any other relationship ever could, the silence that followed felt deadly. It wasn't just a relationship that once was, it was a relationship that never was. A year of your life made no imprint on his. Nobody looking at him could know there was anything—anybody—missing, and maybe that was the whole point.

Maybe that was the design of it.

The third lie was that you could tell him anything.

Harry's golden rule always was honest communication.

There's no such thing as an overshare, he'd say when you naturally hesitated.

He was all about that. All about hearing what was worrying you, or the mundane things that were going on in your world. Sometimes you felt like maybe it was an act because nobody had ever found your family, or your friends, or your life in general as interesting as Harry seemed to. He was always telling you he loved hearing the funny text conversations going on, or who was having a row and why, or what each of your friends was stressed about in their jobs or relationships or themselves. And Harry always said he loved hearing it from you the most.

(Now, that struck you as a strange thing to say. Where else would he hear anything about you? Harry was the only line connecting you back to him. You didn't have mutual friends or people who'd known you both before you dated each other. There was nobody for Harry to hear anything from. It's not like your friends were going to reach out to him with gossip about you. Not like how you could sneak a look at update accounts or read about his performance online while he was away.)

Still, you loved the stories he told from the road, ate them up. The missing coffee mugs where everyone got their caffeine fix served in wine glasses and lemonade tumblers for almost two whole weeks. And then the tour t-shirts accidentally ordered in bulk in children's sizes that Harry hand-delivered them to a local children's charity. The crumbs of gossip Harry picked up about who in his team was sweet on who (he loved a setup, loved watching crushes silently and awkwardly orbit around each other).

Your secrets were safe with him, he promised. He wouldn't ever judge you. Wouldn't dismiss your feelings or what kept you awake at night next to him. So you did it. You believed him. And you slowly drained everything inside of you into him. Harry got all your stories, even the ones you vowed to leave exactly where they sat in your past. Even the ones you felt like might kill you to dredge back up. The ones that made you look like a shitty friend or sister or daughter. He got them all.

And even now, he's still got them.

"What's the biggest lie you ever told?" He asked you one night in his kitchen, both of you elbow deep in making dinner. Harry rolled out the lines of gnocchi and cut the inch long pieces while you pressed them over a fork to decoratively indent them. (Although Harry likes to tell you how when he was in Italy he learned in patterns weren't just aesthetic—it was all about soaking up more of the sauce, For the sauce, of course! He'd sing out in an Italian accent, proud of himself.) "Like, a proper lie," he clarified, "Not like how you told my mum you didn't take sugar in your tea when you first met her."

You hinged your knee out to attack his calf for the teasing comment but then rolled your lips together in thought, "I lied to my parents a lot growing up," you told him honestly. "I think about eighty per cent of the time I wasn't where I told them I was. Definitely wasn't with who I said I was with."

Harry shook his head as he rolled out the next lump of dough, "No, I mean like … Like a lie."

A moment passed as you thought more deeply about the question, travelled around your memories until you landed somewhere suitable, "I lied to my boyfriend at university," you begin. "A pretty bad one, I guess."

"And the lie was …" Harry prompts.

"I told him I was a virgin before him."

Harry eyes raised, and then he nodded, accepting it, "I think that's probably a common one, really."

"I thought he'd like me more if I said it," I admitted quietly, pausing the work with your hands. "Wasn't too proud of losing my virginity in a tent in the sixth form … And I mean, at that age you just so desperately want to be the version of you that you think the people around you will like the most. A whole group of us went camping at someone's grandparent's farm during the summer holidays. Not sure how our parents let us, to be honest. Anyway, I had awful, painful, embarrassing sex in a tent with a guy named … Dylan Fraiser."

You were surprised by how long the name took to come to you. Years ago, that was such a defining event in your life. Now it hardly mattered at all anymore.

Progress, you thought.

"A tent," Harry winced.

"Really came back to bite me in the arse when my uni boyfriend went on to tell a group of his mates he was my first and—

—Tent Guy was one of them?" Harry guessed. Correctly.

"Yep. Small towns are a curse."

"I promise never to have sex with you in a tent," Harry teased, grinning at you over his wine glass and then leaning over to kiss your temple. He looked down at the line of gnocchi pieces you'd made together proudly, "We're alright at this."

"Hmmm," you hummed, now lost in the past, "I told that uni boyfriend him I loved him … I didn't though," you say without thinking, shrugging as the words came out, "I thought he was boring. But it was cool to have a boyfriend, so I didn't break up with him … Guess I've told more whoppers than I thought."

Harry gives you an understanding look, "I've said I love you to protect someone's feelings too. Thought it might come a little later, that I was just not feeling it as quickly as them."

It should have made you question whether Harry meant I love you with you. But it didn't. He was speaking in the past tense, and you were imaging that version of him being younger than the almost thirty-year-old you were dating. Now though … You wonder what love meant to Harry when you were together. Whether your wires were crossed by different definitions. Even now, you couldn't vilify him. Not completely. He was too thoughtful in general, there'd be a reason for it. There always was with Harry.

"What's your biggest lie?" You turned the exercise back on him, smiling as he refilled your wine glass and skipped a few songs on the playlist. These were your favourite moments with Harry. The end of the day, where you were the only thing on his to-do list. There wasn't a lingering work call, or a meeting to prepare for, an email to reply to. Harry was just finishing his day with dinner and some time at home. With you.

Harry gave you a withering look, "I think you know already."

"I don't," you said because you really didn't, "What was it?"

"There's no way I'll ever do anything else with The Band," he said tonelessly as he turned to rinse his hands in the sink, unable to look at you while he said it. And even then, Harry didn't admit to the lie. Didn't name it. He just said what the truth was instead.

"Why wouldn't you?" You asked, instead of what you were sure Harry thought you'd ask.

You weren't interested in why he told that particular lie though, the answer to that was pretty apparent to you: he cared about his fans—they all did—and didn't want to disappoint them. And they probably hadn't been able to deal with thinking about the ripples ending it completely, right off the bat, would have caused. Saying you were taking a break was a much nicer way to let a world of fans down. An easier pill to swallow than 'We're done' straight off the bat.

You gave Harry time to respond. He fiddled with the gnocchi pieces in front of him, waiting for the water to boil in the pot behind you both, "Not sure, really."

He was lying now, and you could tell. He was ashamed of the truth.

"You're not sure?"

"I just wouldn't, there's no one reason. No big thing. It's not like I hate them all or anything, I just …"

There was one big thing, though. And it was typical Harry to not be able to name it. He was always so in denial about his own arrogance, about what it was that drove him. Harry thought he was above them. His success since The Band far outweighed anything any of the others had done. Going back to that would be diminishing for Harry's career. Wouldn't help him any. He was stronger on his own, more successful. More widely appreciated. That chapter of his life was done, it had been a stepping stone—yes, a life-defining one—but Harry had moved to bigger and brighter stages on his own.

"It's not what you think," he told you lowly when you didn't ask anything further.

It was so typical of Harry to not see the forest for the trees. To not see how he, yet again, was blurring and confusing the lines between a business decision and an emotional, personal one. He was speaking about The Band emotionally, but his reason for distancing himself from it was all to do with business.

"It's not?" You asked plainly.

"I don't think I'm better than them or some shit," Harry said, "I just … That part of me is done. I'm not who I was back then, and I don't want to go back to that person."

"You also wouldn't get anything out of it," you prod, knowing that you shouldn't have. But it was true. So much of Harry's life was a business decision. Everything was so carefully done, so deliberately set into place by him and his team that results and his successes were almost guaranteed.

At the time, you didn't understand how he couldn't see it. Or you couldn't believe that he didn't. He was so calculating, and he hated you telling him so. But he was. He liked to say he wasn't defined by his job, but Harry's whole life was defined by his career, by the who he was.

He loved to spout off his public shit about staying grounded and having a life away from being Harry Styles ™, but he didn't let anyone see even a skerrick that life. The only thing Harry ever let be projected about him was his job, that was all was ever on the table for discussion. And so it was hardly surprising that became who he was away from the cameras and lights as well.

Hiding you was a business decision, you figured out in the aftermath of The End. It was his way of keeping the narrative about his music and career on track. As soon as there was a You, Harry's private life would distract from his real focus and goal, his career. And you mean, it's not like it didn't work for him. Because here you were, standing outside in the chilly night looking at his name up in lights.

Harry's name always looked so good up on billboards and the fronts of stadiums. You always used to tell him even the letters of his name were visually pleasing, they looked good together, like they fit. So you stand on the street across the road from tonight's venue and take it in—HARRY STYLES, SOLD OUT—for several minutes.

You don't know that you're ready for this. Seeing him. You've so perfectly avoided it until now. Until you felt like there was a promise you made lifetimes ago you now can't break. Even if you felt like he'd broken a thousand promises between the two points in time.

Where else would I be? you'd said when he first drew that stupid mock ticket.

Where else, indeed.

You scuttle across the street and sneak between people to get yourself in through the doors. Dodging lenders selling merchandise and ticket holders excitedly covering their painstakingly planned outfits with t-shirts Harry—aided by his perfectionism, you were sure— probably spent months deciding on.

The barcode won't scan though. And the usher at the door doesn't appreciate you pulling your phone back and trying to adjust the backlight, as though that will help the loud, angry sound his scanner is making each time he aims it at the email on your screen. He eventually reads part of your email and then tells you that you need to stand off to the side, barks something gruffly into his walkie talkie and dismisses you in favour of getting through the backlog of people behind you. You're filled with a white-hot embarrassment as you shuffle over and stand under a neon EXIT sign. A moment later you step forward and ask him to try again, but that doesn't get you anywhere different, and you think you're going to get in some kind of trouble when he insists Just stand back over there for a moment.

Your feet have already started hurting in your too-tight boots when finally the wall behind you opens up, and you very quickly come face to face with Harry's assistant.

"Y/N," she smiles, "I thought I said in the email to call me when you got here?"

You're dumbstruck, you didn't read the email, not properly. "I … I …"

"It's good to see you again," her smile hasn't moved, and it's genuine. She reaches one hand out towards you and deposits a VIP lanyard around your neck, "Follow me."

You get halfway down the emergency exit, and she sidesteps a security guard through a doorway, leading you into the veins of the backstage area where there's a familiar buzz of busy people you'd not realised you missed being around until now. Your heart is racing because you weren't prepared for this. You'd been deliberately dragging your feet getting here, and you've arrived barely fifteen minutes before Harry's due to go on stage. She's walked you right to the side of the stage where there's a curtain just to your left and scaffolding all around. You can hear the audience, and you know that one step through that curtain will take you to the pit side of the stage, where you'd seen Harry's family stand during shows before.

"He wanted to say hi beforehand but," his assistant looks at her watch, "But it's a touch too close now so are you okay if I leave you here for just a second? I'll be back in …" her eyes go back to her wrist, "Probably about twenty-five?"

"That's fine," you nod dumbly. "Are you sure this okay?"

You're looking around wondering if this is where Harry meant you to be. Really, you're sure this isn't where he intended you to watch his show at all. A few people are milling around but nobody you recognise, and you figure the majority of them are probably venue employees. Harry and his band would only walk through here at the very last second. He didn't like standing around beforehand with anyone who wouldn't be on stage with him. Harry got in his zone and needed to stay there.

When you look back at his assistant she's giving you a look you don't want to read too deeply, but it almost looks like pity, "Of course," she tells you, "I'll be back by the end of the first song."

"I might go stand through here now," you point to the curtain, preferring the thought of standing in the dark by yourself than waiting for Harry to walk straight past you during his thirty-second countdown. "Is that okay?"

You get a nod, and she tells you to grab a drink off the table behind you. Leaving you with your heart rattling and the heaviest lanyard you've ever worn burning through your shirt to your chest.

Finding a spot to watch the show was easy. You picked the furthest side of the pit, under the concrete overhand of the seats above, and stand in the shadows, only half the stage in your line of sight. It felt like a little cave almost, and you lean your back against the cold concrete and tap your boots together on the ground below you.

The area starts filling around you as members of Harry's team finish their part in preparing him for the show. There are a few women wearing belts with makeup brushes and combs peaking out of them, and two familiar faces from Harry's executive team. They don't see you, though, and you're glad. You watch the roadies' torches flash on the dark stage as they neaten up leads and manoeuvre over amp boxes double-checking the guitars are in the right order for the sets.

There's a movement in your periphery that draws your attention back, the group of people who joined you in the pit all gravitating towards something back at the curtain. And it's not until one of them steps to the side that you see the floating head that's poking through the dark material.

Harry.

He's staring right at you: no expression on his face, just his searching, green eyes that stop when they see you standing in the dark as far from him as you can possibly be. He takes half a step forward, and the shoulder of an expensive suit peeks out. You hear in your head echos of a moment in Harry's living room unpacking a delivery from Gucci, the way you nearly choked on your tea at the cost of a tailored trouser and his half frustrated dismissal, 'It's nothing, that's standard for me.' You felt small at that moment, thinking about how one of Harry's suits could pay for your education for a year, and that would be nothing for him.

You feel small now too. This isn't the space you're supposed to occupy.

The shadow of a frown barely cross his features, but then Harry tries to pull his dimples up to give you a small smile. But it's testing, it's not a confident smile or one he looks sure he's giving. Like he's smiling at someone he's not sure will smile back.

There's no way I'll ever do anything else with the band, he'd said.

But that wasn't the biggest lie he'd told, just the most public, the widest.

His deepest, biggest lie was you.

The fourth lie was that he loved you.

Harry was the one to say it first.

It came out like a compliment. A response to a fact of yours he'd particularly liked. A sort of well done, that was a good one.

It was nearly two months since you'd met, and what started as three or four dates a week morphed into you staying at Harry's house most nights. You spending your weekends off work trailing around after him on his errands or to work things, or hanging out alone at his place until he returned from them. A couple of times, you went to the same exercise class, which involved the two of you going separately and not interacting at all. Still, you'd peek at him from across the room and have to hold your giggles for later when Harry spent the hour concentrating beyond anything you'd ever seen just to stay in the seat of the spin bike.

Saturdays and Sundays he started taking off too though, around a month into dating you. No more 6am weekend PT sessions or midday conference calls with creative teams. The only work Harry allowed himself to do on weekends was housework. Laundry. Food prep. Touching base with his mum.

"Did you know blueberries are actually false berries?"

"No, I did not know blueberries are actually false berries," Harry parroted back to you. You catch the half rolling of his eyes at you where you're sitting up in your favourite spot on the bench next to the hob, peering at him keeping careful watch over breakfast: blueberry pancakes. He was wearing just his pants, chest bare and cool in the autumn morning air. You were rugged up in leggings and a sweater, unsure how he could stand being in such a state of undress.

"It's true," you reaffirmed your tidbit, popping a false berry into your mouth while Harry—with far too much concentration for the job at hand—dropped the small round berries on top of the batter sizzling in the pan. "Berries by definition are fleshy, pulpy ovary fruits that have their seeds embedded on the outside. Blueberry seeds are on the inside. So they aren't really berries."

"Ovary fruits?" He questioned, with a look of mild distaste.

Your shoulders dropped as you realised Harry knew less than you thought he did, "All fruit are ovaries, Harry. Think about it."

He does for a moment, and you can practically see the cogs turning. Harry thinking about how fruit grows on their plants and bushes and shrubs. The fact of what an ovary is when it comes to basic anatomy. And when he comes to the full circle of it, he groans, "That is so weird."

"I think it's cool," you grinned. "Like a little bit cannibalistic in a way."

He barked out a laugh at that, "I don't think that's what it is."

"Well, maybe not technically," you conceded, "But it's something … Really makes you rethink eating eggs."

"Oh my god," Harry was truly laughing then, "Stop, please."

"Sorry," you peeped with a cringed look, tossing back half a handful of the small, round fruit in front of you.

He was shaking his head at you, laughter bubbling out between his perfectly straight teeth, and then it just slipped out, "Fuck, I love you."

The words didn't bump over any hesitation. I love you, Harry said.

Your stomach dropped instantly, but the fond happiness dancing across Harry's face didn't go anywhere. He didn't look back at the pancakes or to where your hands were wringing together on your lap. Harry held your gaze and didn't dodge away from what he said at all. Like he knew you'd need a moment with it, that you weren't expecting him to just come out with that.

"I love you," he repeated after a moment, smiling when he saw your lips start to turn up, "I mean it."

Hearing him yell the same words through the microphone from stage sizzles your heart a little, like the pancakes that day crackled in the pan as Harry pushed himself into you on the kitchen floor. You remember the feeling of his hands under your clothes, your leggings barely halfway down your thighs before he was claiming you in a wave of lust, pushed by the new, invisible force in your relationship—love.

The floor under you now vibrates as everyone gets to their feet to join Harry dancing through his first song. You stare at him, daring him to look over at you but knowing he won't. The longer you stand there, the more you thaw out to it, the more you find yourself with a smile on your face and a slight sway to your hips. His music is fun and familiar and feels like clicking into place.

It's mesmerising. He's mesmerising.

You don't like admitting you'd forgotten how good at this he was. He has the whole crowd eating out of the palm of his hand. Even his crew around you are grinning ear to ear and singing along. Sharing private jokes between them and cutting dance moves in small groups as they watch the show. It's fun. And it reminds you that so much of your relationship with Harry was like that. That there were countless nights spent dancing in the living room or screaming at laptop screens doing board game nights with his family.

You'd forgotten that you could laugh so hard your belly hurt and that Harry was one of the few people who'd ever been able to get you to that point of joy. Watching him throw joy off the stage now at thousands of people was reminding you how very good Harry was—used to be—at making you feel like the only person in the world to him.

"Babe," his giggles filtered down the hallway and into the bathroom where you were plucking your eyebrows, "Babe! Come … Come see this."

You rolled your eyes as you put the tweezers down and padded into his living room, not at all surprised to see Harry pretzeled on his yoga mat in a fit of laughter. He did this a lot, called you away from a task or from work for something hilarious that ninety-nine per cent of the time wasn't hilarious at all. You'd end up snorting out laughter of your own though, at him.

Now, Harry had one of his feet hooked behind his neck while the other was prostrate on the floor behind him.

"You're doing great, baby," you condescended lightly, tilting your head to the side and frowning at his position. It looked awful and not at all calming, let alone comfortable. He wasn't a very good advertisement for yoga at all.

"They say this one's great for—great for," he giggled too much to get the words out, his arms holding his torso back so his legs would do what he wanted them to, he took a deep breath, "It's meant to be the yoga colonic."

Harry was heaving with laughter as he finally got it out, his position faltered, and you watched as his limbs all fell back to the mat as he leant forward cackling. You were grinning too, amused by how amused he was.

"Been feeling backed up, have you?" You asked him, crossing your arms as you hitch one hip out.

He rolled over on his back and wheezed out the final string of laughter, one hand holding his lower tummy as if it ached from the whole spectacle, as his other hand reached out for your ankle, "Come down here with me."

"Hmm," you hummed, pretending to be unhappy to be dragged down on top of him, your hips resting on his thighs as your chin propped up on your hands at his chest, "It's very entertaining how entertaining you find yourself," you mused.

Harry rubbed the tears from his eyes and then settled his hands on your back, breathing in the pleasant weight of you there, "I just—I was thinking about what they think the yoga colonic is going to do." His giggles started again, "Imagine being in a class and it literally working? Everyone just—everyone just shits themselves!"

You can feel his laugher, his bones pushing yours up as his whole body fills with his happiness. The stream of tears coming from the corners of his eyes start again as he squeezed his eyes shut while the sound of Harry's deep, uninhibited laughter filled the whole house again.

The memory brings back a smile, like so many with Harry do.

But there's still the Too Fresh Sting of your final moments with him, your last moments with him. You've not seen him since that evening months ago where you both yapped at each other things that couldn't be unsaid, unhappinesses that couldn't be reverted or unadmitted. It wasn't like the fights you had about Harry's casualised view of money and how he'd drop thousands of pounds on seemingly nothing without thinking how small it could make you feel. Or the times you'd snap in frustration when Harry tuned out of you complaining about an issue with your friends he deemed as superfluous or rooted in something silly or not as essential as the Important Thing He Was Planning. He could be so dismissive when he didn't think something mattered highly enough on his scale of measuring things.

The Harry dancing around on stage in front of you wasn't the man who said you were independent like it was a dirty word. Yelled across the kitchen that it was too easy for the two of you to be apart, you didn't miss him enough. The man who told you he didn't feel like you needed him, thought you were always standing with one foot out the door the whole time you were together. And you can remember being flabbergasted (still are, really) by what he was saying because it just wasn't true at all. You? Too independent? You spent every night at his house, and were at Harry's beck and call the whole relationship. And you can hear all the times you said 'what would I do without you?' when he talked you off a ledge or had answers to questions you believed to be unanswerable.

You can see how it was another classic example of Harry telling a non-truth to cover up what was really there. To distract from his own shortcomings. He accused you of what he was feeling, of his flaws. Making them your problem meant he didn't have to be vulnerable. Didn't have to take a risk his business manager hadn't guaranteed. Didn't have to gamble on your future together.

In the relationship, he always had the upper hand. And maybe you did have one foot out the door emotionally, but that was only because you had to. Harry never invited you in with him completely. You were always on the outer. After nearly a year of dating you were still The Girlfriend He Didn't Have.

But I fucking love you, he'd said when he sensed where that night was going. Like Harry had a list of grievances, and it wasn't until he got to the end of reading them out to you that he realised where it landed him. He told you he loved you as though it would erase all the things about you he seemed to dislike so much. Things about yourself you apparently couldn't see.

Hindsight has taught you that if anyone was too independent, or hesitant to commit fully in that relationship, it was Harry.

Halfway through his set, Harry's assistant comes over to check on you, and you end up chatting for a few minutes about how you've been. She speaks to you like there was some club you were a member of and she missed your meetings. Although neither of you references the breakup, or acknowledge in another life you had a lot more to do with each other, the unspoken things weigh on your chest. You find yourself wiping away a quiet tear when she walks back over to the main group watching Harry.

Of course, that's when he teeters over to your side of the stage and looks straight at you. His expression falls instantly, and you're sure that he only meant to glance at you in passing, but what he sees has him doing a double-take and fixing his gaze on you for two lines of the song he's midway through. He tugs on the collar of his shirt and Harry's eyes are desperately trying to read what you're thinking, just like that day he told you he loved you at the end of the breakup, as though you'd forget everything that came before it.

You stick your thumb out to him and give him your best fake smile. Like he might be led to believe you were crying about something else. As if you hadn't just pulled his attention from a room full of people who'd paid for his attention tonight. At that moment you think the fact there's a secret love and life between you must be too obvious to everyone else. There's a connection, something whirls around the room between you and it feels threatening and perilous to how you've been trained to think things have to be.

You wait until Harry turns and goes the other way across the stage before you push off from the wall and walk out.

At first, love was an encouragement between you. It was approval, a showing of appreciation. Love was a promise that was just for the two of you. A declaration that validated everything you were doing together. Love was a feeling that proved what every action meant.

Then, love was a bandaid, was a line used in desperation to fix something unfixable, and you walk the world with skun knees now because of it. Love was never just love. It was used to fix the wrong things.

And in the end, nothing healed at all.

The fifth lie was that he'd always fight for you.

Harry promised you that the two of you would make it work.

You'd make up after every argument, big or small. The little ones that were those tiny bickerings in the car which somehow roared into yelling matches. Or when one person's grumpiness from the day leaked into your evening together. You always expected his call or the long sigh that would precede his apology. You never got halfway home to your house if you left his after a row. He'd call and beg for you to come back, that nothing was worth you physically leaving being near him. You left knowing before the night was done the two of you would reconcile.

Until it was That Fight you were leaving after. The one that began The End.

It started because Harry was overseas for a few weeks. While he was away, you suggested the two of you going on a holiday together during the summer. An anniversary trip. From the other side of the world, it was easy enough for Harry to worm his way of out of it. He went off on a tangent about there being no holidays (rest) for the wicked and then got you talking about something else until you forgot how you'd been sold on the idea of lying on a beach with him for a week.

When Harry got home, you had it stored in an unhappy little pocket in your mind. Top of the agenda for when he returned.

"Can we talk about the holiday thing again?" You asked his first night home.

He sighed against you, his body gearing up for a reunion that didn't involve speaking, lips attached to your neck while his hands danced around the band of your bra, "Do we have to right now?"

"Well," your instinct was to back away from the tension rising between you, "I'd like to."

Harry pushed his hair up off his face and briefly looked at the ceiling, "I don't see how we can, babe. It's too hard, logistically. Just take a week off work and stay with me here."

"I already stay here," you counter, "I'm talking about a holiday somewhere. A beach. Or a ski resort. Something fun and different."

"Those places are all busy," Harry complained, his hands off you. He started to pack the dishwasher from dinner.

"I just want to go away with you, do something normal, you know?"

He clipped the side of the sink with a dinner plate and swore angrily under his breath, "Fuck."

"Don't get angry."

"I'm not fucking angry," he growled, tossing your forks into the plastic crate, "I just fucking got home, and you're straight into this. No 'I missed you so much' or 'It's so great to see you'… Just straight into going on a holiday as if I have endless time to mess about."

"What do you mean? We've just eaten dinner together, you told me all about your trip. I said I was happy to have you home!"

"Yeah, well, feels like you just don't give a fuck that I'm back."

You frowned at him starting to get annoyed yourself, "I cried on our FaceTime call on the weekend because I missed you! You have a lobotomy since then?"

"Don't yell," Harry instructed quietly like he was chastising a child for not controlling themselves.

"What's this about, Harry?" You asked. "Why is it such a crime for me to want to go away with my boyfriend?"

He sighed again, "It's not."

"Right," you crossed your arms over your chest and wondered how many times he could wipe down the chopping board.

Probably one more time.

"So …"

"So what?" Harry repeated, "What do you want from me?"

His words and their harshness shocked you, and that was the exact moment you started worrying this was going to turn into Something Else. Not just a Normal Fight.

"I want you to tell me why you're so annoyed by this?"

It would have been so easy for you to break down and scream about how insane it was that you were talking about celebrating your first anniversary with him and the relationship was still a secret. How badly you wanted to throw that out there, but there was a wise fear in you which said that would be a death wish. (That fact haunts you today, how you knew he'd never step out with you. There wasn't any hope in you or promise from him it wouldn't always be that way. You knew your place and where the boundary line was, don't push past this point. And you always behaved. Never peeped out of your box.)

"It's like you don't even need me," Harry said bitterly, "You're so fucking independent. What's the point?"

"What are you talking about?" You gushed, nearly swallowing your tongue when he turned back to look at you for the first time.

"You don't need me," he accused, "You've always got one foot out the door."

"I don't," came your defence, but you both knew it was the truth. You were halfway out the door because you hadn't been invited all the way in yet.

"You don't want this life with me," Harry shook his head, "You've never been happy where we are. Relationships don't work that way, you can't just keep demanding the same thing hoping you'll wear me down. That's not fair."

Tears shake out of your eyes slowly as your body catches up with what he's saying, "Harry."

"It's not fair!" He repeated loudly. "You can't keep on about it."

About what? You want to ask him because you hadn't mentioned a holiday until the week before. That's not what he was really angry about. He was talking about The Secret. And his guilt was showing. His anger was misdirected, aimed at the wrong thing. He muttered something to himself you didn't hear.

"I didn't hear that."

"I said," Harry looked up at you, and when your eyes clicked together you saw surprise rise and then quickly disappear as if he hadn't expected to see you there. "I said, I don't think we can keep doing this."

"You don't think we can keep doing this?" You repeated it because the words hardly sounded like English the first time you heard them.

I don't think we can keep doing this.

Harry stood across from you with no expression on his face. And it took a few moments for him to own up to what he said, but he does. He nods his head once, awkwardly, and then nods again.

"We can't keep doing this," he tells you, sounding defeated, and then his voice rises again—in pitch, not in volume—"But I fucking love you!"

But I fucking love you.

As if that was enough.

It was days of you expecting a call, and a make up that never came. Expecting the fight for your relationship Harry promised you he'd always put up. You wanted him to prove that you were someone he couldn't do without. You hated the thought of him walking around his house and not feeling the absence of you as some impossible weight he couldn't bear.

"Y/N!" Your name sounds out behind you, but you keep walking, an instantaneous decision that pretending not to hear her might work.

Unsurprisingly, it doesn't.

Harry's assistant keeps chasing you down the hall she initially led you through, calling your name and eventually getting you to stop and turn around because, well, you can't keep pretending she's not there forever.

"I'm just finding a loo," you lie.

"There's one this way," she points over her shoulder, in the direction you both came from, "Harry said if you tried to leave I had to go with you, which, for my own dignity I'd really prefer not to have to do."

You find yourself scoffing, "Who said he's in charge of how long I stay?"

Her expression softens somewhat, "He just wants to see you after."

How dare he think he can control this still, you think.

You know she's not the person to be frustrated with. You should be frustrated with yourself first, for coming, and then with Harry for deciding he could orchestrate this … This whatever it was. Still, you find yourself biting out your reply, "He saw me from stage," you tell her bitterly.

"And he'll have seen that you're not there anymore," she replies patiently,, "It'll throw off his focus if he's worried you've gone home halfway through."

You fall into step beside her but can't give him the win, "Quite frankly, it's not my concern or responsibility anymore if his focus is thrown or not."

She wordlessly points out where the bathrooms are just in front of you. You're trying not to make eye contact with anyone who's in these backstage hallways. They feel like ghosts from a life that's not yours anymore.

The first time you met any of Harry's People you'd felt absolutely mortified. The whole thing felt awkward to you, meeting assistants and managers and creative directors. Putting faces and humans to jobs done for Harry. He was a lot of people's boss, and it made you uncomfortable because you'd not seen that side to him before. You knew things like how hot he liked his showers and what yogurt he liked on his muesli in the morning.

That first—and only—step into his professional world, was in a venue just like this one where Harry was filming a music video for a few days. The stage was set up like it was for live a show, and you overheard someone saying setting up for a shoot was more involved than for an actual performance. Harry wanted you to see what this part of his world looked like and despite them not fitting in either of the Friends or Family categories you'd laid out for People Allowed To Know About You, his "Team" were people Harry felt safe introducing to you. (NDAs were a powerful thing) He led you through the hallways by the hand and stuck his head into every room with a cheery, 'Hullo, just bringing Y/N around to meet everyone.'

You remember one person declaring they were happy to be meeting you. Harry was too young to be married to his job, they said with a relieved tone, That it was good he'd found his Someone. Harry beamed at that, looking down at you as if thinking, Yeah, I have found my Someone.

Now you stand back in the pit side of stage, and Harry looks down at you with a hesitation that makes you more uncomfortable than when you were watching him film that music video. His assistant has brought you back to where his team are standing, and you feel more than one set of eyes take stock of you returning, a shared glance between a manager and the girl shadowing you. A wide-eyed exchange that says, That was the last thing we needed. When Harry comes to the side of stage between songs, he's hunting for a bottle of water, but you can see he's come to that side because his eyes are focused on hunting for you.

When he sees you've returned, he slowly takes a sip of water, eyes not leaving yours. You feel like he's admonishing you in his head, seeing how weak you were, that you ran away after a little eye contact. There's a distaste there, you think, and as he's putting the cap back on the bottle, Harry opens his mouth like he's going to try to say something to you, but he stops. He frowns at his hands as he puts the bottle down and then turns away, bringing the microphone back up to his lips and slipping back into entertainer mode.

"In a lot of ways, I hate this next song," he starts slowly, speaking over the band as they begin to slow down the tempo of the night. A smoke machine whirls to life and pumps out a few big clouds, shrouding the stage behind Harry. "I really hate it."

He pauses. And your insides freeze in your chest. You're hanging off his every word, just like every other body in the room. Harry stands right on the front of the stage, toes almost touching the drop off. He's looking out at the audience and lets the microphone hang at his side. Makes no move to keep talking. Was he looking for someone out there, or was he running over what he was about to say in his head? Rehearsing it, making sure it was exactly what needed to be said.

Where you used to see thoughtfulness you now see calculation.

Give nothing away. Sell only the product. Push the song. Let people come to their own conclusions.

"This is a song about," he says carefully, a crack to his voice that sends adrenaline shooting straight down your legs, "About regretting that you've hurt someone. And about the helplessness of wishing you could make them forget what you said, but … Knowing you can't take it back."

You watched Harry trail around to the upright piano on stage and sit himself down on the stool. He stares at his hands hovering over the keys for a moment too long, but you're sure Harry's audience would let him take a hundred more. You see what perhaps they don't—the hesitation. You'd witnessed it enough to spot it, even across the stage in the dark from thirty feet away.

He's not sure about playing the song.

You think about contacting him by telepathy. Saying, I'll leave so you can go back to your show. You don't have to pretend I'm not here, I'll just go. Like I wanted to. Like I tried to.

But he plays it.

You've not heard it before, but the rest of the room has, and they sing along with him. You hear a couple of thousand people sing with your ex-boyfriend about him regretting the way he treated you. And you're almost able to talk yourself out of believing it's about you, you can nearly reason with yourself that it's kind of vague. Other than naming the cafe he'd sat in the car park of a hundred times waiting for you to return with a takeaway, it could be about anyone, really.

But he sings out a line and looks straight at you, and his eyes say it's yours. The song. The apology that's not been said yet.

I get the feeling that you'll never need me again.

His voice cracks again as he sings it. And the hurt part of you says it's just a vocal technique Harry's trained to call on at any time. It doesn't speak to anything other than a creative choice on his part. But the vulnerability is hard to ignore, the low hanging, remorseful unease in the room. He fumbles a string of notes on the piano as he sings and you're hit by the overwhelming need to make him stop.

Witnessing whatever he's currently feeling with this song is more uncomfortable than you've ever been, and a switch in you to protect him flicks on. You look around at his assistant, his manager, trying to see if there's even a hint of anyone else feeling like this moment needs an intervention, needs to be stopped.

The song ends. And you're glad.

Harry takes a few moments on stage to get ready with a guitar for the next song. He doesn't come over to your side of the stage for a drink, or to ask the roadies for anything. Instead, he flies straight into the next section of the set. Seemingly recovered from the heavy moment you felt as though you nearly drowned in. He'd never sung about you before.

Nothing remotely personal about your relationship ever left Harry's house.

And you find yourself wishing it would all just go back there.

The sixth lie was that he wouldn't break your heart.

Harry did though.

He broke your whole life.

So when he comes off stage at the end of his gig, there's little in you that wants to hang around. As soon as the lights go down and you see Harry's silhouette cross the back of the stage and hop down the stairs to the floor, your gut churns, and you wish you were one of the people in the rest of the venue. The ones now turning and slowly filing out of the building. Going back to their lives peacefully.

Instead, you're ushered behind the curtain again, into the small area that's immediately buzzing with life. You watch Harry as if he's moving in slow motion though. As soon as his boots hit the concrete floor somebody is tugging the suit jacket from his shoulders and swapping it for a grey hand towel that he uses to wipe down his face. His hand pushes his hair up over his head as he smiles at a handful of people, and then his eyes find yours. The smile drops, and he takes a steadying breath in.

"Y/N," he says loudly. Straight. Without expression. It's a statement, but also you sense a question there too. As if you might not turn out to be the person who was standing there. He holds your gaze over and through the people walking around and in front of him. He's handed a bottle of water and offered a second one which he takes, "Y/N," he says again, pulling his head back to beckon you over.

You roll your lips together when you've made it to the vacant space in front of him. Harry passes you the extra water bottle and cracks the lid off the one he keeps for himself. You grip yours with both hands but don't make any move to open it. Standing in front of him didn’t feel like you thought it would. It’s less of a kick I in the gut, and more a reinforcing of things that you’d figured out since being without him.

"Hi," he says hesitantly, briefly looking at someone behind your left shoulder. Then, you feel his eyes back on your face.

You speak to his forehead, not ready to have things inside you unlocked by eye contact, "Hello."

"This way," Harry says after a moment, running the towel down his sweaty face again.

He leads you down a hallway, wiping his face on the towel two more times as he walks. Harry continuously looks over his shoulder at you to make sure you're still following him, as if there was somewhere for you to hide in the concrete hallway. When he gets to his dressing room door, he kicks it open and holds his arm out to let you in first. The room smells like his cologne, a whiff of his final moments before going out on stage and a time portal back to mornings you'd spritz it on yourself before leaving the house, it was your scent then too. There was a small sofa and table, a long mirrored table with his laptop open next to a stack of papers, his screen saver bouncing back and white photos across the locked screen. His overnight bag and its contents were sprawled out over the floor in the corner next to where you can see his phone charging.

"You look good," is the first thing he says to you. Trying to pull your attention probably. Maybe hoping to get on the front foot charming you. You could tell him he looked good as well, particularly in the cream suit they had him in tonight, but you were sure there were no shortage of people who already had.

"Your show was good," you deflect away from the personal, eyes tracing the bottles in the corner of the table, "Great setlist."

"Needs a shakeup, if we're honest. Getting stale," Harry shrugs, and you see it in the mirrored wall. He's still standing by the closed door, watching you walk into the centre of the room and take stock of what's around you. "How have you been?"

"Fine."

Harry coughs uncomfortably, "Thanks for coming, wasn't sure you would."

"I wasn't sure either."

You sense Harry realising this conversation was going to be exactly as difficult as feared it might be, he nods his head and moves over to the sofa but doesn't sit down, "Did you want a seat?"

"I'll sit here," you perch yourself on the chair in front of his laptop, crossing one leg over the other and hitching your elbow at the back so you're facing Harry. Keeping the room between you.

Harry sits on the arm of the small, burgundy sofa, and tosses the towel onto the seat next to him, "Looked like you were a little upset there for a moment."

"My boots are new," you quip, kicking your top foot out towards him, "Blisters."

He sighs again, and you start to feel chastised, but there's a more substantial part of you that stubbornly bunkers on down to playing this role, taking power when you'd never had it with Harry before. He knew it wasn’t blisters that had emotion welling up in you during his set. But just the same it wasn’t his place anymore to be privy to your feelings. And you weren’t going to let him gallantly try to take it. You weren’t old friends who could pick up where you left off. You were broken lovers.

"I just thought we could do with talking," Harry says finally.

"You could have uninvited me, you know, I assumed—Well, it's not like I've been expecting to still attend any of your shows the last six months. This one didn't have to be different."

He almost looks hurt, "You live here."

"How was Italy, Harry?” you turn the conversation around abruptly because you didn't like where it was going, and he was starting to frustrate you. You didn’t need him pointing out you lived in this city alone now since he left. As if you didn’t know.

Where watching him on stage hit you with longing and heartbreak, memories you found yourself irrevocably attached to, being in the same room as him now is only making you see the real Harry. The one who's so good at rearranging the energy in the room to make you feel you need to give more of yourself. The one who's an expert at asking a leading question and relying on the other person to be vulnerable first, lead the charge out the gates.

The man who lied to hide you every day for nearly a year, even when it was hurting you more than protecting you. The hurt from him was worse than the invasion of your privacy would have be. The distrust you felt didn't counteract the security you were still afforded by anonymity. The way you felt you still had something to prove—something to earn from him—and that you just needed to earn the right to your place in Harry's life.

"I've missed you," he said finally, "Just …"

"You've been lonely?" You raise your eyebrows at him.

"What?" Harry's defences click into place, "No, it's not that—obviously yes, I've been lonely—but also I just—I miss you."

You start nodding, and your gaze drifts around the room, "Yeah, I … What exactly do you miss, Harry? Because—I mean, it was kind of shit, don't you think?"

"Shit?" he looks horrified, "What was shit?"

"Harry," you say simply, telling him to cut the bullshit with your expression. "Come on."

"I loved you," he declares loudly, proudly, “We had a great time together. I don't think it was kind of shit at all."

That's when you feel tears come to your eyes. Of course he didn't think it was shit. He still didn't see where the problem was. Couldn't see it. He would go right back to That Fight and keep going the way you had been if he could. Harry would keep living that life with you, he would have kept on going the same way. You'd still be the secret. A fight about a holiday would have resolved itself with compromise and make-up sex, and you would have gone right back to sneaking out of venues and pretending not to know him in crowded rooms.

Your lips turn up in a smile of sorts as your tears beg to fall but don't, "You haven't changed," you state with a small, incredulous laugh, "You've not figured it out. Nothing's changed," you repeat, shaking your head.

Harry's confusion is plain, and if he thought your tears were because you miss him there's something like a flicker of doubt, as if he's reading what's in front of him again and maybe getting a different story.

"You can't have a life with someone who doesn't want anyone to know you're in their life," you state simply.

And that was it, really. That was the nuts and bolts of it.

The secrecy eroded any meaning your relationship with Harry had. The doubt that cast. The burden on you to continually prove yourself, to audition for the role every day only to never graduate from understudy.

You watch Harry's throat constrict tightly as he thinks about the words that come from his mouth, "I loved you," he repeats, "I didn't want anything outside of us to fuck us up."

"You can't control the world that way, Harry," you're observing him carefully, "You definitely can't control people that way. I get why we started that way, but a year in, Harry? A year."

He looks at his feet, and it's the first bit of remorse you've ever seen him show over it.

"I know you loved me," you keep going, "But you can't use that as some bandaid for the lying, for the hurt that was. You can't erase the consequences because you thought you were protecting me or us or yourself. The truth doesn't cancel out the hurt of the lie."

Harry's still starring at his boots, "You could have said something."

You blink once.

"Fuck you," bursts out before you can stop it, and Harry's eyes snap up to yours, you laugh at his nerve and rise to your feet, "Fuck you, Harry. I couldn't have. I felt like I had to earn it. Like maybe I was one gold star away from getting there. And then when I did push it, you ended it."

"That's not—

"—It is," you insist, shaking your head at him, "You put all your insecurities and shortcomings on me and then had the nerve to tell me you loved me as if I was the defective cog in the wheel. As if you saying you loved me put all the onus on me spoiling it."

"I'm a private person—

You put your hand up to silence him, turning on your heel to face Harry as your pacing halts, "Stop. I don't … I don't care," you breathe out simply, "I really don't. Our relationship wasn't The One. It's one we'll both learn from for the ones that are coming. I hope you learn from it," you add quietly, "Because I have."

"Y/N," Harry says your name like it's an idea he's unsure of.

"That song wasn't about me, was it?" You ask because on stage he said it was about regretting hurting someone and there's been no hint of a 'sorry' from Harry since.

His brow creased, "It is. I am. I wanted you to hear me play it tonight. It's for you."

You smile, the idea that you've grown beyond this situation blooming inside you, "You've not said it."

"What?"

"You haven't said you're sorry," your head shakes again, a fresh wave of your new perfume—the one that's just yours—filling your nose, "You've said you missed me. And that I look good, but you've not said you're sorry. You can put an apology into the song on stage, but you can't admit you were wrong to the person you wrote the song about."

His shoulders sink, just the slightest amount, and you know that you've seen enough. You've said enough. He's not going to have an epiphany on this, not in this conversation with you. You've gone as far as you can with this. As far as you're willing to.

"I'm going to go," you take a step forward, "Thanks for the song, your voice sounded really nice on it."

And you walk passed him with just a final wave and the slightest touch to his shoulder. He doesn't move from his seated position, but his neck cranes and he watches you leave. Eyes hunting your back for answers, like the manuscript for what just happened might show up there. But it doesn't, and you slip out the door, the clip from your shoes fading from his hearing quicker than he wanted it to.

Your insides are shaking by the time you make it out onto the street. No part of you wants to turn back and look up at his name in lights again. You're done with seeing the best of everything in him. Harry's one of the shitty boyfriends you'll tell someone about one day in the future, and they'll call him a dickhead with anger dripping from their tongue, promising to never treat you the same way.

And they won't.

You'll both have bumped and bruised your way into each other's lives, and there'll be a satisfying click with them there wasn't with anyone else. You'll have journeyed through all the maybes and not-quites, and you'll land in that forever place with the person who wears the badge of Yours with a fervour nobody before them has.

And Harry … You'll go and be Nothing to Him.

My inbox is here

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junicai · 3 years

Text

painting.

| summary | Aria moves into the 127 dorms, and does a little bit of bonding with her new leader.

| word count | 1.5k

| warnings | none

| era | circa. 2016

13. “The paint’s supposed to go where?”

Aria groaned in exhaustion as she bent forwards, various objects falling from the precarious stack she had carried in her arms previously. They bounced and rolled across the floor, one canister of hairspray coming to meet the tip of a man’s shoe from where he was leaning against the open doorway.

Taeyong coughed out a chuckle at Aria’s folded form, pushing himself off the doorframe to make his way over to her. “Need a hand?”

Aria waved him off with a forced air of nonchalance, still panting heavily despite her best efforts to get her rapid breathing under control, “No, no I’m good. The stairs just tried to kill me that’s all.”

Taeyong snuck a glance at the closed doors of the elevator, blocked off by a single piece of red signage reading “Out of Order” in bold font. The lift had coughed and spluttered it’s way through the last two months, and had finally given out on its last stand yesterday evening, almost leaving Jaehyun and Winwin trapped inside if they hadn’t decided to take the stairs down.

How unfortunate it was, that the following morning was the day that Aria was due to move in.

In hindsight, Taeyong probably should have gotten some of the other boys in to help them carry the boxes that Aria had shoved her things into; the sweat was beading at his forehead by the time they had dragged the cardboard through into the living room, and Aria had pulled off her sweater to allow herself to cool down.

She leant against the wall, breathing through her nose as she chalked up the distance between the living room and her new bedroom to be too far to continue for the time being.

“Oppa?” the word still felt unfamiliar on her tongue, unused to the honorific. It had been at Taeyong’s request that she used it in the first place, him wanting her to feel comfortable around him; but Aria was still finding her ways around the Korean honorific system, and found herself stumbling over her words more often than not.

The first time she had tried to use honorifics had ended in Aria having extremely red cheeks, flushed with embarrassment, and Mark trying to explain to her that hyung was the name he used for the older members, and oppa was the one she was to use.

It had gone a little like this.

“Ari- Ari, you gotta, like, you gotta use oppa not hyung, ya’know? Because hyung is like, an older brother to a brother, but oppa is an older brother to you? Because you - you’re a girl? An’, and then you’d use unnie for the make-up nooans but I’d use noona, like I just did. So to you, they’re the make-up unnies, and to me they’re the makeup noonas. Johnny hyung, Johnny oppa. Does that make sense?”

Aria had looked at him with the most bewildered face, eyes widened and lips parted slightly.

From across the room, Taeil had bit his lip to stop himself from laughing, before swooping in to offer an out for poor Mark, who was beginning to delve into another convoluted explanation.

“Yeah, Aria?” Taeyong’s voice came from across the room.

Aria looked up, searching for the taller man and her eyes found him shuffling around in the kitchen, two glasses of water on the counter top.

“There you go,” he pointed towards one of the glasses. “If one of the others aren’t back soon to help, we might have to drag the boxes in ourselves,” he smiled ruefully. “I knew we shouldn’t have let Jaehyun go out today.”

Aria thanked him, before picking up the glass with her two hands and turned to the side to drink.

The silence was buffering, and ate away at whatever comforting atmosphere Taeyong had tried to create.

It wasn’t that Aria was uncomfortable around him - no not at all. It was just the fact that she knew the boys were being more than accommodating for her, she knew that Yuta was sharing a room with Winwin now because they insisted on her having her own space, she knew that she was toe-ing a barely there line between intruding and just being downright entitled.

Having voiced these thoughts during the early hours of the night to Donghyuck almost a week ago, Aria knew exactly what kind of spiel she’d be on the receiving end of should she protest the room changes - but that didn’t stop the little pool of guilt from settling in the bottom of her stomach when she snuck a glance around and saw the empty bedroom’s door partially opened, all of Sicheng’s things having been moved out two nights ago.

“Oppa,” Aria tried the honorific out again, finding that it still felt fumbled out, but from Taeyong’s affirming hum she must have sounded less stilted than the last time, “Do you think you could help me move the box of paints into my room? I can carry the rest, but that box is really heavy, and I don’t want to drop it.”

Taeyong turned around to her, “Yeah no problem, Aria. Which one is it?”

Aria pointed to the singular plastic box among the cardboard ones; spattered with white and yellow and various other colors. The pair of them made their way over, hands curling around the lip of the box.

“On three?” Taeyong nodded.

He counted them through before Aria was heaving up her side of the box and Taeyong was slipping his arm underneath it to hold some of the weight steady. They paused momentarily once they had the box in the air, finding a good balance and ensuring nothing inside had tipped over, before Aria began her shuffle backwards.

“Mind behind you,” Taeyong warned, and Aria lifted her feet over the box that would have tripped her otherwise.

The small steps they took to bring the paint box into her room felt never ending, and by the time they passed the threshold, both Aria and Taeyong’s arms were shaking lightly.

“The paint’s supposed to go where?” Taeyong’s voice was breathless, anticipating the moment when he could give his arms a rest.

“Maybe - just in the corner? Over there, out of the way.” Aria jerked her head towards the far corner, on the opposite side of the room of the bed and empty desk.

The box was placed down with a thud, and Taeyong straightened up - shaking out his arms. Aria sat down harshly on the bed free of coverings, legs beginning to burn from the numerous flights of stairs she had climbed earlier on in the day. Taeyong joined her after a moment, sitting down beside her.

“You need a hand taking in the rest of your things?” he questioned, turning to look at her.

“Nah,” Aria shook her head. “I might wait a while and get Hyuck to drag them in for me.”

Taeyong snorted slightly. “You know, I think you’re the only person who can get that boy to do something he doesn’t already want to do.”

“Jokes on him, I just convince him that it was his idea.”

The silence settled again, less acidic this time.

It was broken after a second by Taeyong. “I didn’t know you could paint?”

Aria cast her gaze over to the stained box in the corner. A dry paintbrush was sticking out the top of it, the bristles clean but the wooden handle covered in splashes of colourful paint - intermittent with streaks of white and black and a mixture of the two.

“Yeah,” Aria hummed. “I don’t know when I started, I just. Always have, I think.”

“Did someone teach you? Your parents?”

Aria coughed to hide the laugh that threatened to break from her chest. “Oh no, no. Youtube taught me most of what I know, I won’t lie. And I’m not, very good - it’s just, therapeutic? Like poetry, but you don’t have to concentrate on finding the right words.”

Taeyong nodded knowingly.

Aria supposed he would understand the sentiment; given the hours he spends doing what it is he does in the practice rooms or the recording studios for hours after their ‘official’ days end. She supposed that there has to be hundreds of wordless messages hidden in forty second tracks on the USB stick he keeps on his keychain.

“You know, Ten is really artistic,” Taeyong begins again. “I never really understood it much - the colours and the images you pull out of nothing - but he seems to. A lot more than I ever could. He gets it a little bit more, I guess. The whole, unspoken words thing. I’d love to know how he did it.”

His eyes had shifted into something sincere now, and he was gazing down at Aria. She got the sense that they weren’t just talking about painting anymore.

“I’m just saying that, if you ever need someone to talk to - about painting - then I’ll always have an open ear.”

Aria supposed Taeyong didn’t quite understand what those words meant to her just yet.

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iceeckos12 · 3 years

Note

what if... for the prompts... “you’re cold, come here” for gerrymartin... as a treat... (thank you please drink some water)

sorry i know it’s been a few days ;_; however i have been UNABLE to get pre s1 gerrymartin out of my head since you sent this ask

putting this beneath a read more since it got kind of long alskdjfskf;

Martin stood at the bus stop, wearing his beat-up old headphones, staring into the middle distance, still coming to terms with the fact that he’d had to drop out of school a few weeks ago. He felt as though he’d be digesting that one for a while, like missing a step on his way down the stairs and tripping over his own feet, over and over again.

He’d asked for more shifts at Tesco’s, but it didn’t matter whether or not they were approved. The bills kept coming in, the sums adding up higher and higher, to numbers that may as well have been astronomical for all he had in his bank account.

This wasn’t sustainable. But what could he do? He was only seventeen, he had no degree, no -

“Need a cigarette?”

Martin almost leapt out of his skin at the sudden interruption, too surprised to do anything other than look mutely over. If he hadn’t already been stunned into silence, the sight that greeted him would’ve done the job.

The teen was tall, a little disheveled; there was a mean looking scrape across one side of his face, like his head had been shoved into pavement. His hair was dyed pitch black, dirty blond roots peeking out around the roots. Eyes the color of the cold, grey ocean stared back at Martin, stealing his breath right out of his chest.

The silence stretched on, but the teen didn’t speak, or take back the proffered cigarette. He just waited, expectant, endlessly patient, the same way a lighthouse waits, lonely but resolute.

“I - “ The words choked and stuttered on their way out. “I...I don’t smoke.”

“Hm.” The teen shrugged and took the cigarette back, setting it loosely between his teeth. Martin watched the movement, mesmerized by the shine of his black lipstick. Then he added, almost as an afterthought, “You looked like you needed one.”

Martin let out a high, embarrassed laugh. “That obvious?”

He hummed in agreement, the sound coming out through a thick cloud of smoke. Suddenly Martin wished he’d accepted the cigarette, if only to see if he could capture the same feeling this teen seemed to exude in waves. The poet in him wanted to smooth that midnight black hair behind one ear and ask what’d happened to make him look so tiredly sad.

“That’s your bus,” the teen said, jerking his chin toward the incoming bus. “Wouldn’t want to miss it.”

Martin turned, then realized that yes, that was his bus. He paused, realizing that he’d never told the teen - but when he turned around, the stranger was gone, almost as though he’d never been there in the first place.

-0-

For years after, Martin wondered if he’d imagined the whole incident. A mysterious, handsome stranger offering him a cigarette at a bus stop before disappearing into the ether? That sort of thing didn’t happen outside of the movies.

Until he saw the man at the Magnus Institute.

The first time he saw him, he had to do a double take, sure he’d imagined it. But no, there was a familiar person with poorly dyed black hair sitting on the front steps of the Institute, blowing cigarette smoke into the sky. He was in all black, from his combat boots to the shiny obsidian of his lips.

Martin wasn’t sure how long he’d been staring at the man’s lips. Too long obviously, because when he looked up, he met cool, ocean grey.

The man quirked a dirty-blond eyebrow, a small, almost experimental smile twitching at the corner of his lips. Martin, mortified at having been caught looking, ducked his head and almost ran the rest of the way up the steps.

They ran into each other on and off after that. Martin sometimes saw him wandering around the Archives, coming in and out of Gertrude’s office regardless of the time. He always seemed to be able to tell when Martin was watching him; after a few seconds, he would perk up and turn around, smiling that small, experimental smile.

Martin started to accept that he had a massive crush on this gorgeous, unattainable stranger. He decided to get the fuck over himself and wave instead of running away like a coward, which made that experimental smile turn into a true, genuinely pleased one.

And it was....safe. Good. Martin admired from afar, enamored of the man’s tattoos, his grey eyes, the quiet tragedy he carried with him like a shroud.

Ironically, the first real conversation they ever had was at the bus stop in front of the Magnus Institute.

It was late, later than Martin usually went home. It was cold too, unusually so for the time of year, enough so that Martin was wearing his warmer jacket. He was lost in thought, staring far into the middle distance, composing a poem about Indian summers and unusual chills and the way weather balanced finely between them -

There was a click from somewhere behind him, a muttered curse. Another click, and then a low, relieved sigh. Martin frowned and turned around, because no, it couldn’t be -

But it was.

The man looked up as soon as he felt Martin’s eyes on him, his cigarette hanging loosely out of the side of his lips. He’d gotten a new set of piercings since the last time Martin’d seen him, two shiny studs in his bottom lip that made Martin’s mouth go dry.

“Hey,” the man said. He sounded exactly the way Martin remembered.

“Hi!” Martin squeaked, clutching his bag closer to him nervously. Oh god, oh god, the inspiration for half his poetry from the past few months was standing right in front of him. “Um - hi. Hello.”

The man’s grin widened, like he found Martin’s frantic stuttering endearing. “Hey.”

Fuck. He was doing this all wrong.

“I’m Martin,” Martin blurted. Almost went to shake the man’s hand but decided against it last second.

“Gerard,” Gerard said, the glowing tip of his cigarette dancing in the dark. “But you can call me Gerry.”

“Oh,” Martin said faintly, his heart fluttering too-fast in his chest. Then, just because he could, said, “Gerry.” Rolled the word around in his mouth, tasting how it felt against the back of his teeth. Decided he liked it. “Nice to meet you, Gerry.”

Gerry’s grin widened, his teeth very white under the curve of his painted black smile. There was a gap between his front teeth, and Martin felt almost dizzy with the knowledge of it. “And you.”

Then unexpectedly, he shivered so hard that his teeth clenched around his cigarette. It was only then that Martin realized that the man was only wearing a thin black jacket over his graphic t-shirt, and that he must be absolutely freezing.

Martin was acting before he could think it all the way through, rummaging through his bag and removing his scarf from its depths. It was a heavy, woolen thing that he’d knitted for his mother’s birthday but - she hadn’t wanted it, muttered something about it being too itchy.

“You’re cold,” Martin said absently, brandishing the scarf in front of him like a weapon. “Come here.”

Gerry stared at the scarf, his grey eyes stretched wide, then looked to Martin, then back to the scarf. Surprise didn’t sit quite right on his face, like it was an emotion he wasn’t used to wearing. “Um. I’m...that’s okay. You don’t have to...”

“Nonsense,” Martin said, ignoring the little voice in the back of his head that was gibbering mindlessly at his boldness. “You’re hardly dressed for the weather, and it’s not like I’m using it.”

Gerry opened his mouth - paused, a strange light entering his eyes. He looked at the scarf, and his surprise faded into a blank, neutral frown. Then, “That was cruel of her.”

Martin frowned. “What?”

“Okay,” Gerry said, and took the scarf from Martin. He stared at it for a moment, studying the simple pattern, before wrapping it around his neck. He looked warmer at least, and that made something in Martin’s stomach settle, relaxed the part of him that wanted nothing more than to nurture. “Thanks.”

“Sure,” Martin responded, still feeling a bit off-kilter by the strange comment, like Gerry had known what his mother had said to him and disapproved. “Anytime.”

They stood in silence for a couple more seconds, the atmosphere strangely charged with anticipation. There was something Martin was supposed to say here, something important, but he wasn’t sure what it was.

And then the bus came.

Martin stared at it for a second, disappointment a sour taste in his mouth. His window of opportunity was steadily closing, he could feel it, but he was lost, grasping at the tail end of something strange and unknowable.

“That’s your bus,” Gerry told him gently, and when Martin looked over, he was holding the scarf close to his neck.

“Will I see you again?” Martin asked in a sudden burst of confidence.

Gerry froze almost imperceptibly for a moment, but Martin had been learning to read body language ever since his father had left home. He looked away, that clear grey gaze focusing on the sidewalk in front of him, studying the cracks in the concrete. “If you like.”

“I’d like to,” Martin responded firmly, then deflated as his confidence faded and his uncertainty returned. “If you would.”

That small, experimental smile twitched the edges of Gerry’s lips again. Martin was suddenly struck by the fact that it didn’t sit quite right, as though it wasn’t an expression he was used to making. The thought was as endearing as the rest of him. His voice was unexpectedly low, unexpectedly shy, as he said, “I would.”

#gerrymartin #tma #my writing #iceeckos12 writes #local-eldritch-abomination #ask

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wolf-and-bard · 3 years

Text

Proper Procedures for Wooing Witches

for @littoraly-art because you are amazing and I already said this, but I hope you have an awesome birthday <3

Pairing: Yennefer/Jaskier

Word Count: ~2.2k

Rating: T, some explicit language

„My darling Yennefer,“ Jaskier calls out as he swoops into his Oxenfurt apartment with a flat carton wedged under his arm. It already nicked the lavender mesh overlay of his newest doublet, but for once, he absolutely cannot be bothered by that. It’s too nice of a day. “Hello?” He kicks off his shoes.

High noon’s just gone by and Jaskier doesn’t expect Yen to be up yet – which means she will hex his ass if he wakes her. His giddiness outweighs his fears though, heart warming, as he takes in the cluttered entryway. Several pairs of shoes are strewn about, his and hers mixing on the ground. Yen’s all look like they could double as a lethal weapon and are some variation of black and white (though one pair is tinged brown from blood that crusts the bottom, he doesn’t want to know). It’s awfully domestic, a product of the temporary living situation they are in.

When Yen requested to use his rooms for a week or so, she explicitly asked for Jaskier not to be there, but, well, he is weak, he wants her, he couldn’t have stayed away if he tried. Yen’s been snippy from the moment he welcomed her with open arms and the prospect of sharing a bedroom, snippy to the point of grumpiness. That’s fair, Jaskier supposes. It’s also fair that she slips out at the most random times of day, coming back only when Jaskier’s gone to the academy for lectures or the pub for drinks with his colleagues. All fair and good. He catches her about once a day which is more than he can say for most of the year. Fair, yes. Nice, even though Yen is rarely, if at all, impressed with his affection for her. A bard can dream.

“Yenny,” he shouts again and whistles to himself as he slides through to the main room. To his surprise, she lounges at his dinner table by the window, one hand curled around a steaming mug, the other holding up one of his most beloved poetry collections (not only because he wrote several of the entries). Her hair falls in rich raven curls that cover her chest, barely concealed by the sheer black dressing gown she wears. It’s the only thing she wears, Jaskier notices, gulping heavily. Yen doesn’t look up from her reading, her lips are pursed and her tone clipped as she replies.

“For every time you call me that, bard, your balls will grow the tiniest fraction until, one day, they will explode, never to grow back.”

Jaskier considers it. Directs his attention downward. They do feel a bit strange, don’t they? But that’s only because he’s thinking about them. Right.

“I shall not be fooled,” Jaskier says, grinning. “But if you so insist, ‘beloved’ will do just as well. I brought you a gift.” Brushing past his dusty bookshelves and cluttered desk, he struts towards the table and drops the carton on it. It lands with a thud and swirls up more dust – how is it this dusty already, Jaskier could swear he cleaned the place, like, last month?

Yen licks her finger to turn the page which makes Jaskier laugh out loud. He rounds the table to glance over her shoulder, but immediately has to retch. There, catching Yen’s precise attention, is Valdo’s vomit-inducing sonnet about his first time taking a tumble with what Jaskier assumes was a professional. It has to be, no self-respecting person would bed the man free of his coin. Jaskier makes a mental note to spread another rumour about Valdo and various sexual diseases, then plucks the book from her hands and lets it drop to the table. She sighs softly under her breath and allows him to put a hand on her shoulder. Is that… does she lean into him? The tiniest bit? Oh, dear.

“That better not be a dress,” Yen says, reaching out. Her fingertips trace the edge of the carton as if she’s in deep debate on whether to pop it open. This is a game they’ve been playing excessively, him bringing her gifts, her making a show of whether to accept them or not. On the few occasions that Yen invites him for a drink or gives the acoustic properties of his lute a small magical boost, Jaskier fails to reciprocate her cool attitude. He’s too in love to feign indifference and it’s not like she would believe him either.

“If we’re using dress in terms of the precise cut it implies then no, no dress,” he replies, thumb rubbing her skin through the slippery material of the gown mostly to work through the tightness in his throat. It hurts sometimes because this farce makes him think she doesn’t want him. Hell, most things Yen does are aimed at making him think she doesn’t want him. But then there are fractions of admittance like this, like when her gravity shifts towards him or he finds her in his rooms, barely dressed, that make him think there might be more there. Jaskier simply has to practice patience.

“Julian, do I seem like a woman easily impressed with shallow gifts of clothes? In case you hadn’t noticed, I have a very particular style.”

“Oh, I noticed. Trust me, Yenny, you are very much one of a kind,” he replies, mesmerized by her fingers dancing on the cardboard. She loses no time in jabbing back.

“And yet you revert to common courting techniques? That’s pathetic and you know it.”

“Bold of you to assume I am courting you.”

“Bold of you to claim you are not. If I remember correctly, the last time Geralt was with us you got drunk off your ass and asked him for his permission to woo me. Which was sweet but not at all his place to allow. Then you continued to exert yourself into my life on every possible occasion with flowers and picnics and awful love songs. How else am I going to interpret all this?” Yen asks, craning her neck to look up at him from under dark lashes. Gods, she is gorgeous.

“Touché. But do not think I would waste the efforts of my best tailor on just anyone. This is advanced courting, dear.”

“I fail to see its distinguishing qualities.”

“The difference is that these clothes are hardly a gift and more a means to an end.” Jaskier winks which has her eyes narrow, fall back to the carton.

“You want to take me somewhere” Yen asks and, of course, she untangles his intentions immediately.

“Not just somewhere. My cousin’s forwarded me an invitation to a ball put on by some countryside nobleman or other. His work keeps him in Kerack so I’m to go in his stead. That is to say, I’d hoped you would go dancing with me.”

Yen looks up once more and Jaskier starts a little. He will never get used to the vibrance of her violet eyes, how they see through him. Once, she said it took no effort at all to pick at his thoughts, that she always feels as though he’s screaming them right at her. So, he does.

Please, he thinks, mouth twitching into a soft smile. Please, just this once. It would mean the world to me.

Yen huffs a small laugh and shakes her head, then draws the box towards her. Inside, she finds a slim-cut blouse made from the finest black cotton in the city, complete with white lace trim down the front and flaring out at the cuffs and collar. With it, Jaskier had the tailor make a white corset belt and a pair of deep black pants that have applications of the same lace. It would look precarious, almost edgy, on anyone else, but on Yen… the thought alone makes Jaskier’s chest tighten with adoration.

“Jules, this is beautiful,” Yen murmurs as her fingers trace the line of the seams on the blouse. Jaskier puts his other hand to her shoulder and holds on for dear life as his ear twitches. Was that? Did she just? Oh, how he itches to make a quip about the nickname. Because it’s funny, yes, but it also gives him palpitations. He feels like a lovesick puppy trying to befriend a wild cat. Which also means that any violation of trust can ruin what they have. It’s just so fucking precious, this whole affair, and if he were on the outside of it, he would squeal in delight and write a whole novel about it. He still might.

“I’m glad you like it. And it will look absolutely stunning on you. You will look stunning in it. Ah, not implying that you don’t usually look stunning. What I am saying is, the other attendees will be stunned.”

“You’re ridiculous… and stupid too. Are you certain you want to take me to the ball? I’m not exactly popular with the local nobility.”

“Quite the tragedy,” Jaskier says and because he feels daring, he bends down and kisses the top of her head. Then, he saunters over to the stove, pours himself a mug of tea and takes the seat next to her. “And yes, I am certain. In fact, there is nothing I’d love more. Let the people talk.”

“I don’t give a shit,” Yen says on another sigh. “Not about what they say or think or do.”

“Which is part of what makes you so damn sexy.”

Yen rolls her eyes and folds the clothes back into the carton.

“These are lovely, but I will not wear them to the dance,” Yen says. Which means she will go with him at least. It’s not enough, Jaskier is dying to see her wear what he picked out, dying to show the world that such a brilliant woman would choose to spend the evening with him. Most of all, he wants to make her happy. “Trust me on this. You have a reputation to worry about and bringing me along already risks that. Bringing me along in that can and will mess with your career.”

“Trust me, when I say that it won’t matter. I’m already famous and folk love to gossip about famous people. Probably more than they love my songs. I could imagine worse truths to be spread about me. Besides, didn’t you just say you don’t care what people think about you? Why then would you worry about what people think about me?”

"Well I never," she says, but her lips soften into a smile and her hand rises to fiddle with her pendant. Jaskier gently pries it off and brings her knuckles to his lips.

"I don't care either," he whispers. "I just want to go dancing with you."

"I'll portal to my rooms in Kaedwen and get one of my old dresses.” Her face is all smiles, but an edge has stolen into her voice which makes her sound forlorn, sad even, and her eyes flicker over to the folded clothes in the box. Jaskier’s throat tightens.

"Why are you so stubborn? It’s obvious you want to wear them. You don’t need to start giving a fuck now.”

"I'm trying to do something for you here, Julian. I don't usually go out of my way to attend stuck-up parties with peacocks such as yourself."

“Please,” Jaskier says. He still holds her hands in both of his and because he has no shame, and because this really does mean the world to him, he sinks off his chair and onto his knees before her legs. Yen’s eyes widen a fraction. “For me.”

-----

They dance. Oh, how they dance. Jaskier always considered himself a great dancer, he has music in his veins and has flirted and whirled his way through every ball room and banquet hall on the Continent, and it’s clear that Yen is no stranger to this art either. They are exuberant, relentless, they laugh and pirouette and demand their ground, much to the detriment of those with lesser skills. The lack of a dress doesn’t subtract from their flair, if anything, it allows for a broader range of motion

"The only way we could draw more eyes is if we'd brought Geralt along,” Yen giggles. Fuck. She’s so carefree it brings tears to Jaskier’s eyes.

"Gods no," he laughs. "He would ruin all the fun with his growling and brooding. If you're looking for more attention however..."

"Jules-"

Jaskier twirls her and, in that motion, catches her around the waist and dips her low, pressing a chaste kiss to her lips which are parted on a yelp. Before he can tug her up again, her hands come forward to cup his face and she presses into him, grins into the kiss.

“You’re absolutely ridiculous,” she whispers.

“Admit it,” Jaskier drawls as he brings her back upright and they fall into an easy basic waltz, closer to each other than the dance strictly necessitates. “You love me.”

“That is awfully presumptuous of you.” But she laughs, and kisses his cheek, and Jaskier thinks that maybe one day, she will. “Don’t bet on it, bard.”

#the witcher #witcher #jaskier #yennefer #yennefer of vengerberg #yennefer x jaskier #yenskier #I'll reblog with ao3 link later #ficlet #my writing #fluff

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screambirdscreaming · 3 years

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mmn. this blog’s been around long enough now that there’s stuff i wrote years ago that turns up in my notes that makes me wince. and then a whole lot more that I don’t strictly disagree with but wish I’d been a little less bold in claiming - wish i’d made more explicit mentions of the sides of things I wasn’t getting into or addressing. not really any way to unsay what’s been said on the internet. and of course the things said most stridently and with the least nuance are what travels farthest fastest. and they’re also what sticks around.

I guess it goes in cycles - thinking you have something to say that’s worth sharing, and then realizing you don’t know shit actually. and when people say the things you’ve shared have been helpful to them, broadened their perspectives - that’s a net gain, hopefully, right? people learning collectively in increments together, that’s better than no one saying anything for fear of not saying it perfectly and ending up going nowhere at all? but the counterpoint - that i might just be spreading my own biases and misconceptions - isn’t something to take too lightly either.

It’s a little easier in person. the people i’m talking to are more likely either strangers - who put no particular weight on my perspective - or people who know me, and are familiar with my background and my foibles. The particular parasocial relationship built up around a blog is the worst of both - a blogger you follow is familiar enough to be credible, but vague enough you can fill in whatever context is necessary to justify why they’re posting about things like an authority on the subject. (I’m sorry, I just talk like that. the easiest way to put an idea to words is to say it like i’m sure about it. it makes for good poetry but shit prose. i’m working on it.)

anyway, I’m trying to be online a bit less. there’s some stuff I kind of want to write and post about - ways of constructing knowledge, colonial land concepts and learning to recognize them in your own thinking - but. I’m afraid of getting them wrong. I know I will get them wrong - or not exactly right - and i just don’t know if it’s worth doing anyway. If there’s a way I can express that these are just thoughts I want people to build on and not take too seriously or literally. It’s possible that tumblr is just entirely the wrong medium for this. It’s been kind of incredible to see things i’ve written read by so many people - but also, kind of terrifying. nothing has gotten to a point of people harassing me about ill-thought-out posts, but I’m definitely feeling like it might be best to quit while i’m ahead on that front.

I’m probably not abandoning this blog just yet, but... it might happen. Reach out if you want some other way of contacting me, I guess.

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reidecorating · 4 years

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Waking up Slow

Requested: Nope, this is just what happens when I decide to avoid studying for physics

Pairing: Matthew Gray Gubler x Female Reader

Word Count: Around 2k

Summary: It’s been a dream of mine to wear Gube’s alien shirt and make him food and just have a good old yarn with the man so I decided to write about it. This is just a whole lot of flirting and banter and making out on a Sunday morning

Warnings: None, a lil spicy but pretty SFW, might mistake this for a pillow though, with the amount of fluff

Rays of impatient late morning sun poured in through the gaps in the curtains, which were hastily shut the night before, as they failed to meet in the middle. Matthew never minded sleeping with them half open. Some nights, he would squint and try to make out constellations in the cosmos as his whole world lay curled up beside him, her ear against his heartbeat the way a young child would listen to the ocean through a shell. Other nights, when they would both lay tired and out of breath, she would call him moonlight as her fingers danced along his collarbones, shimmering in the star shine as the thin veil of sweat painting them was the only evidence of what they had been doing previously. However, now, while the two of them remained entwined, the white sheets appeared to glow yellow in the wake of the stars which had collected into one, hours ago. She woke up to Matthew’s arm draped around her waist, having found its way under the fabric of the shirt that scantily covered her, in an attempt to share the warmth of her skin. Stretching and letting out a yawn, she debated falling back asleep, seeing as her only interlocutor was still doing the same. Craning her neck over the pile of poetry sitting on the bedside table, obscuring her view, she made out the small digital numbers reading just before midday, and turned to face the dozing man beside her.

Her eyes brushed over him in all his sleeping beauty, head resting against the supple skin of his upturned palm, brown hair brighter in the morning light, pixie nose tilted up towards the headboard. His eyelashes fluttered against his cheeks at whatever he was dreaming of, and she wanted, so badly, to taste the pink of his parted lips, to join his dreamscape by breathing into his lungs. A large portion of the sheets had been stolen by her in the middle of the night. While she was bundled up like a cinnamon roll, Matthew lay exposed to whatever monsters and ghosts he claimed reside in his house. His bare chest rose and fell with each breath, but her eyes trailed down to where the waistband of his pyjamas hung temptingly low on his hips, leaving very little to the imagination. Catching her off guard, he pried open one eye, the murky waters of a pond spilling into her view. “It’s rude to stare,”

“Not at art, it isn’t,” she combated his teasing. He groaned theatrically as he stretched out across the span of the bed before regaining his position. “I won’t take sugar in my coffee then, you’re sweet enough,” he smirked. “Oh no, could you please move, I’m actually trying to look at the portrait behind you,” she teased. “Evil,”

“But you love me,”

“I do.”

He removed his arm from where it rested, a little too low on her body, to tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear, letting his hand linger on her cheek, absentmindedly stroking his thumb against the slight flush of her face. She tilted her head slightly to delicately graze her lips against the inside of Matthew’s wrist, making his breath hitch. “Kiss me?” She asked, giving into the adoring look in his eyes. “Your wish is my command, m’lady,”

“Wow, a magician and a genie, I really hit the jackpot with you,”

“You’re really going to leave bodybuilder off the list? With muscles like these? I’m built like…Dwayne Johnson. Did you know they wanted me to be in the Fast and Furious series? But they actually thought I was ‘too buff’ and ‘too macho’ and all my sex appeal would distract from the plot, so they had to settle for Dwayne.”

Laughing into his chest, she pulled herself up and straddled his waist, bringing the blanket with her as if it were a cape. “I’m not joking, Y/N, my net worth is sixty thousand dollars per muscle,” he continued, one hand behind his head and the other now resting on her bare hip, tracing light circles on the skin where her giant shirt had ridden up, revealing the black band of her underwear. “Essentially, what you’re saying is that I could sell you on the black market and make a lot of cash?” She asked him raising an eyebrow and toying with the mess of his hair. “You could, but then you would miss out on this.” He finally kissed her, slow and tactile. Resting on her forearms, linked together above his head, she let her hair drape down and tickle the sides of his face. He swiped his tongue along her bottom lip, at a painstakingly low pace, his hands now caressing her jaw and dabbling with her hair. She breathed him in while he continued to gently suck at her lips, then jaw, then neck, eliciting faint moans from her. “We’re hungry,” he spoke, halting his actions, removing her from her reverie. “Matthew, don’t stop,” she whined semi-facetiously. He gave her a smug look, eyebrows raised. “Fine, I’ll make you food - only because you did it yesterday - but we’re not done here,” she huffed, making him chuckle as she crossly got off him, and out of bed. “It looks nice on you, pumpkin,” Matthew chirped. Tilting her head in confusion, she looked down and realised he was referring to his whimsical alien shirt she had stolen the night before. The buttons that were undone torturously left Matthew craving her skin, as she gave him a glimpse of his favourite view each time she bent down to slide on a sock. “Considering it is a woman’s top…”

“Hey!” He threw a pillow at her, “I thought it looked nice, something a space cowboy would wear during his leisurely time,” “I didn’t say it didn’t look nice!” Her hands went up in surrender, suppressing a smile when she threw the pillow back in his direction. Making her way towards the kitchen, she left him starstruck and staring at the ceiling, smiling to himself like a teenager in love.

Eyes getting tired of reading the words of Robert Frost, when his stomach grumbled loud enough to genuinely frighten him, he placed down the book and followed the enticing aroma wafting into his room. When he saw her, she was humming to herself, swaying to the rhythm of whatever song was playing in her head. He admired her bare legs as the hem of his shirt skimmed the tops of her thighs. Gazing at her tied hair swinging to and fro, giving him snippets of the back of her neck, he became eager to pick up where they had left off. “Hey there lover of mine, wasn’t it you who told me its rude to stare?” She beamed at him, turning around cradling a giant bowl of some sort of mixture in one arm while sporting a giant wooden spoon with the other. He realised she must’ve heard him shuffling around, he wasn’t the most graceful person alive after all. His heart melted at the smile she sent his way, tucking his lip beneath his teeth to avoid grinning back so hard he would sprain something. “You’re so beautiful, Y/N,” he glanced down at his feet from where he leant against the doorframe. She still made him nervous. However, the man never failed to make her fall past the point of no return each day, so they were even. “I’m so in love with you, Gube,” she shook her head and laughed, facing the stove again. He stepped forwards and slunk his arms around her, planting a kiss on her cheek before dipping a finger in the batter to taste it. “I tried making us heart shaped pancakes,” she muttered sheepishly. “Key word, tried.” He stifled a laugh, looking at the piles of pancakes on their plates, decorated in berries and cream. “Maybe if you squint and look at them from really really far away they look a little bit like hearts…”

“Do you have a warrant for all this pancake slander? Because I wasn’t aware that you were the geometry police,” she poured the last of the batter into the pan before piling up more dishes. “The proportions in my paintings can speak to that,” He pointed to his latest work in progress leaning against the wall, its newest layer drying in the spring breeze which was fleeting past the rickety handles of the kitchen windows. “I’m glad Picasso came and went when he did, poor man’d be facing some real competition if he was still around,” setting down his warm brew in front of him as he dug into his - what was now - brunch, she continued to tantalise him. “Are you mocking my curvaceous abstract cockroach? It actually came to me in a dream once,”

“Matthew, you did not just use the adjective ‘curvaceous’ in regards to an insect,” she chuckled, “but a dream? Really?” She pressed on, wondering, one, why he was dreaming about the revolting beasties and, two, whether she should leave him while she still could. “No, I lied, I just saw your face and felt inspired,” he winked. “Hurtful,” she scoffed. “All the artistic recognition is getting to your head, fame changed you Gube,”

“What’s a man without his roach?” A fake western accent glossing his words as he made a gesture of stroking a bug between his hands made you throw your head back in laughter. “Well, I’ll be damned, a roach-less man!” She chimed in, sounding almost as Texan as he did, making it his turn to laugh.

They ate in a serene silence, aside from Matthew’s odd compliments to the chef, both enjoying the view from opposite sides of the kitchen counter. “So, aside from finishing that horrid thing,” she tilted her head in the direction of his painting, “what’s on the agenda for the one, and the only, Salvador Dali, today?” Matthew breathed out a laugh in response to her comparison. “Would you still love me if I grew out my moustache like his?”

“Bold of you to assume I love you even without the moustache,” A false and dramatic look of hurt found its way onto his face as she teasingly blew him a kiss from where she stood at the sink. “Anyway, now that you’ve completely destroyed my self confidence and broken my tiny, fragile heart, to answer your question… You are, actually,” he spun around on his bar stool. A sea of scarlet rose up her neck and made a home in her cheeks at his simple remark. “Well… I’m glad, because you’ve been at the top of my ’To Do’ list for a while now.”

She placed their cups in the sink and made her way over to where he sat, the seat of the stool resembling a bottle cap. “Is that so?” He smirked, now wearing the same shade of blush she was, as she stood between his knees, letting her hands snake up around his neck. “Mhm,” she gently planted her lips on his, “and you’re one thing I’m not going to procrastinate on getting done,”

“You’re killing me, Y/N,” he breathed against her mouth. “You’ve always wanted you be a ghost, haven’t you?” She felt him smile against her as her lips glided over his. She placed one hand, still warm from the coffee it had been cradling, on his chest while the other inattentively played with the wiry tendrils of hair at the nape of his neck. The effect she had on him hadn’t changed with time, even after two years, she realised, his racing heartbeat evident beneath her palm.

This time, when their lips met, it was slightly more desperate, the need for one another gushing from both of them. She captured his bottom lip beneath hers, gently biting down before drawing back for air. Matthew gazed at her devotedly, eyebrows furrowing together when she kissed him again. While her tongue traced over his lips, enchanting him, his hands travelled down to her thighs, gripping each of them firmly before standing up and lifting her onto the counter. Their lips separated with a small smack as she gasped at the contrast in temperature between the granite and her skin. His nose skimmed hers when he made his way back down along the same path he had travelled earlier that morning, this time, unbuttoning the remainder of the shirt she wore, the heavenly sounds she was making leaving him in a trance. He adored seeing her this way, unguarded and sinking in his touch. “You’re sensational, Matthew,” she sighed, tugging at his hair and craning her neck back to allow him more access. He nipped at the column of her throat, smiling to himself at the comment. She had no clue what she did to him. “Angel, I don’t often get dessert after breakfast, but do you think you can make it happen for me today?”

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pluviophile-bookworm · 3 years

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High School Musical: The Musical: The Series: The Rewatch pt. 5

Technically, I shouldn't be doing this right now. But who are we kidding? I miss my Wildcats and this seems like the only thing I can do to see them again right now. So here goes

1x8: The contractually obligated emotional rollercoaster

This episode sure is a lot... I don't know if I'm ready. But it makes no sense to skip this one. I never skip through stuff I love, even when some parts are borderline traumatising. Plus I remember this episode having a bunch of hilarious moments that are definitely worth it.

'I'm really not sure what to say' — Me neither, Miss Jenn, me neither. I'm just sitting here watching this and I know I'm supposed to comment, but I just can't think of what to say. Sometimes the silence just speaks for itself.

'The Lucky Ducky Puppet Pavilion' — I can never overlook that line. Not when I know how much it took for Matt to deliver it. Fun fact: one of my cats is called Lucky, so when his siblings were about to be born, I briefly considered naming them Ducky, Puppet and Pavilion as a joke.

Ah, the El Rey. The place where Miss Jenn totally did not suffer a professional heartbreak. Things are about to get real here. And by real I mean... real dramatic.

I've got to say, I love the duality of Big Red (well, I do love everything about him so that was a no-brainer, but still): doesn't know how to hang a light, but sure does know how to light up a room; amazing with power tools, but took three weeks to make a paper-mache basketball because he kept gluing his fingers together (that last part is far more relatable than I care to admit). I just love him, ok?

The way Carlos acts about Miss Jenn's box of production notes... honestly, I totally get it. I feel like if there's one person at that point who cares about the show much more than anyone else, it's him. And I fully understand why that is. That poor boy has been lonely for too long, and this show is giving him the chance to be part of an accepting community for what feels like the first time in a long time. Just... give my boy Carlito all the hugs.

For a place that allegedly hasn't been used in so long, the El Rey is not nearly dusty enough. I mean, you should see my room if I forget to hoover for longer than a week. And we're talking about years here. There's allegedly mould in that place, but I don't even see dust. Oh well, maybe I would, if it weren't for that lighting — or lack thereof, more like.

'Whatever it says in Miss Jenn's audition file, I am me, and that is the only me I need to be.' — A beautiful sentiment, my dearest EJ. Now maybe hold on to it for a while... just a suggestion.

'Lacks emotional connection to the material' — well, I do have to agree. My first impression of EJ when I was watching the first couple of episodes for the first time was that he was 'too polished to be Troy'. Too much Technician, too little Performer. And I do love my Performers over my Technicians.

Wait, is that a Redlyn background moment I see? I mean, everything is super chaotic and fast-paced, and my two ginger babies are just sitting together on the side of it all. Bonding, I assume. Good for them.

Seb being the only one to know why Natalie is absent, along with the two of them sitting together in 1x1, makes me think... Natalie and Seb are totally besties! I mean, he's basically besties with everyone he ever talks to, so... what can I say, that boy is sunshine incarnate. He deserves all the love and appreciation.

'I know how to hang... out' — gosh, I love this one. And I can only hope everyone was laughing with him, not at him. Because there's nothing to laugh at. My boy got dragged into this whole crew stuff, it's not his fault he doesn't know everything. He's more of an on-stage person than a backstage person anyway. Maybe put him in the spotlight next time and prepare to get your socks knocked off.

No, Ash, your baking club is not at all irrelevant! Honestly, I have nothing but immense admiration for how Ashlyn manages to be in the top two students most dedicated to theatre and do all those other extracurriculars. And she probably has a 4.-something GPA, too. I don't know what the Caswells are feeding their children, but I need it this instant.

'I just don't know how to make things light up' — 'You walk into a room?' — I just... this is one of my favourite Redlyn moments in the history of Redlyn. See, the thing about Ashlyn's line here is the tone in which she says it. She doesn't mean it as a compliment, but as a statement of the absolute truth. You can hear that in her voice. And with good reason, too, because she isn't lying at all. My boy Reddy sure does light up a room by walking into it. Both of them do, really. They're soulmates, you know.

'This place is not creepy at all...' — Yeah, and things between Ricky and Nini are not totally awkward at all, either. I'm living for this.

'I can do Troy!' — Sure you can, Eej. Sure you can. Emotional connection to the material and all.

Ok, but this entire scene... Carlos marking Gabriella's lines completely flatly, EJ emoting like he's in a freaking telenovela and also chopping onions... Carlos' reaction to the latter... I'm living for all of this.

Big Red just suddenly appearing next to Miss Jenn has me rolling... and also kind of wishing he could appear like that next to me too. I mean, it's not like I've visualised that so many times... certainly not every time I have to pass by a stray dog, or give a blood sample, or talk to people, or whatever... why do you ask?

'I never really loved the name Nina anyway' — listen, I relate to the sentiment of not being super fond of your given name, but... what was that stuff in s2 about, then? I mean, I do understand that too, but the two just seem to clash a bit, I reckon. That's all.

Also, can we talk about Rini's chemistry and how it's sometimes there and sometimes nowhere to be found? I think I've figured it out. Every time the chemistry is there, they're talking about or doing things that are not necessarily inherently romantic. Reminiscing about kindergarten, how they gave each other their nicknames, 'the ribbon in your hair, the secrets that we shared, the way that you would stare at me across the room' (yeah, I went there, and for a good reason)... see, Ricky and Nini have that kind of thing going on where, however hard you try, you just can't be indifferent to the other person. It's obvious that they love each other so much, but whenever they try to make it romantic, something goes south. What I'm saying is, when you're really good friends with somebody and you try to force it into something 'more', or better said, something else (because romance is not inherently 'more' than friendship and you can pry that out of my cold dead aro hands), and the operating word here is 'force', things are bound to go wrong and even reach toxic territory. And Rini are living proof of that. Some people are just better as friends, and sometimes the entire 'I don't want to ruin our friendship' trope is very valid. I just want them to be best buddies, is that too much to ask?

Bless Steph for pushing Kourtney forward when Miss Jenn needed someone to sing! Honestly, it's moments like these that make me feel like the background characters are criminally underrated. I realise not every character can be equally central to the plot, but with this cast, I kind of want them to be. I have the feeling that most, if not all of the one-line characters in this show are people with just as much talent and potential as the main cast. They deserve recognition, you know.

Going off of the above, Dara Reneé is living proof of the point I just made. You know how Kourtney was supposed to be a one-scene wonder with two lines? And then Dara showed up and hiding her in the background was instantly out of the question. I wonder how many more hidden gems there are in the show, just sitting in the background, delivering their single line and waiting their turn in the semi-metaphorical wings.

'I just need a minute, or a vacation, it's not clear' — Me, all the time. Especially after I read chapter 11 of @redlyncentral's Let It Go. That ending broke me. And this line by Miss Jenn just reminded me of that feeling, even if what she's feeling right now might not be the exact same thing I went through with that chapter the other day. That being said, everyone go check out my lovely friend's writing right now, I promise you it's worth every second.

'We're going to take a... long five' — What, no 'thank you, five'? I was expecting that. But I guess everyone is a little bit too distraught for that now.

I have to hand it to Carlos — even when he's very obviously uncomfortable and lowkey scared of some people, he just goes up to them and calls them out. I wish I could ever be bold enough to do that.

Wow, not EJ thrashing Carlos' 'forest of boys' idea. Again. I don't get why everyone dislikes it so much, I think it's brilliant visual poetry and should have been given a chance. I said what I said.

You know, everyone has been calling the show out for saying HSM premiered in the cinema, not on telly like it did in real life; and I have been agreeing with that sentiment. But notice how Miss Jenn said 'the Utah premiere' and how there were family and friends in the audience? What if that was some sort of semi-private screening for cast, crew and their family members? It would make sense. And of course, it was held in Utah because that was where the show was filmed and where the majority of background actors, dancers and extras are from. Idk, but it makes sense to me. Note that I have very limited knowledge of how the period between post-production and the release of a movie works.

Isn't Ashlyn the best, though, always noticing when someone is not ok, hearing them out, helping them... I wish I could be half as good a friend as she is. She and Big Red are totally soulmates in that, too. And they deserve each other more than anyone else deserves them, honestly. I just love both of them so much, both as individuals and as a couple, and I cannot be made to shut up about that just yet.

I've got to say, the entire 'me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me' - 'you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you' thing was super funny. And it makes me love Rini — strictly as friends — even more. You know, I think I used to ship them during s1 because the script wanted me to. Exactly like I didn't notice Big Red until midway through the season because the script didn't want me to. Sometimes the script, the acting, the directing and other stuff has immense power over viewers' perception of a show's plot and characters. And that is, as I always point out, what rewatches are for — noticing things that may have escaped you the first time over.

Yeah, so Nini was Ricky's first crush. So what? Many people have had crushes on their best friend at some point or another. That doesn't necessarily mean they're better off as a couple than they are as friends. The opposite idea is just amatonormativity speaking. I mean, sometimes it's nice and it works out; I love me some well-written best-friends-to-lovers, but that's just not always the case and the media should stop pushing the idea that platonic relationships are in any way inferior to romantic ones.

I've got to say I really don't like it when someone interrupts two people's romantic moment (and Big Red is not exempt from my frustration in such cases even though I love him so much — just think of the In a Heartbeat scene), but honestly, bless Reddy for not letting Ricky and Nini kiss. I mean, I know full well they do kiss later on (and how!), but it's just nice to have semi-platonic Rini for a while. If and when we get season 3 (manifesting!), I really hope we get more of them putting some stuff behind them and just being best buddies.

Kourtney and Seb's friendship is honestly goals and I really wish we'd got some more of it. Just another thing to add to my season 3 wishlist. Along with, you know, an actual season 3.

EJ saying all those nice (and very true) things to Carlos has my heart (or, well, he's renting it temporarily from Redlyn and Seblos, but you know). And Carlos really was like 'A for effort, C for execution', and I adore him for that. But EJ is seriously growing. He's pretty much reached EJ 1.8 at this point, and I love to see it.

Say what you want about the Lucas Grabeel dream sequence, but I love, love, love it. Completely unironically. I mean, he's kind of my favourite OG cast member. And the 'I'm more of a Glinda' comment referencing Kate Reinders actually being one of the BWay Glindas? Here's a note from when I first watched 1x1: The drama teacher won’t stop spilling her coffee and I love her. Also, her actress was Glinda on Broadway, so I stan. See, I didn't even know Miss Jenn's name yet and I already loved her. But then she went and did some stuff in s2 and ruined all of that. Add 'proper Miss Jenn redemption' to my s3 wishlist, I guess. But I'm getting off-track (when am I not?)

I only just noticed that all of the iconic BWay leads mentioned in the song (sans Glinda, of course, but that wasn't even a proper part of the song) start with an E. I wonder if that was on purpose or a lucky accident...

'And you never know when you'll get a cameo...' — If anyone in the HSM franchise knows anything about making the most of a cameo, it's Lucas. I'm referring to his post-credits scene in Sharpay's Fabulous Adventure, of course. That is one of my absolute favourite scenes in the entire movie. Well, that and The Rest of My Life. I very unironically love that number.

Another thing on the list of things I very unironically love — the transitions both into and out of this scene. I just think they're neat.

Have I mentioned before how much I love it that Carlos' response every time someone asks where he has to be is 'Broadway'... it just reminds me a lot of Seb's 'Friendship!' — that's some soulmate stuff right there, if you ask me.

'I just... almost did something really stupid' — Yes, Nini, yes it was very stupid. And you're going to do it anyway. You wouldn't if I had any say in this, but I don't and so here we are. In a world where Rini are a romantic thing, Redlyn get 5 minutes of screentime in s1 and two major moments demoted to post-credits scenes, Seblos haven't even properly discussed their issues, and Portwell didn't even kiss on screen. I lowkey hate it here. Still, I feel like things are going in the right direction. If we get a season 3, that is — and we better be getting it, or I will riot and I know I won't be the only one.

No but... just imagine if Kourtney hadn't called YAC for Nini, but for herself. There's so much potential there... and I think Kourtney and Ashlyn deserved that spot every bit as much as Nini did, and then some. I said what I said.

Well, this was 1x8. This post is already way too long, plus I want to do a double feature of the last two whenever I get to rewatching them, so I'm ending this here. It was just as much of a journey as I remembered it being, and not nearly as negative as I had the feeling it would be. I absolutely loved it, you know. And with good reason too.

#hsmtmts #hsmtmts: the rewatch #ricky bowen #nini salazar-roberts #ej caswell #ashlyn moon caswell #big red redonovich #carlos rodriguez #seb matthew-smith #kourtney greene #hsmtmts miss jenn #redlyn

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nazyalenskyism · 3 years

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Sankt Nikolai Day

Summary: Sankt Nikolai's day is celebrated on the darkest day of the year, and so the king and his friends have a little celebration of their own this year. ❤️❤️ A/N: Just a holiday Zoyalai fic! I hope you enjoy! “No!” Genya exclaimed, batting Zoya’s hand away from the tray at the center of the table, “this one’s so much better.” Zoya stared at the snowflake shaped pastry that she was trying to grab as Genya placed a glimmering dessert on her plate. It was a soft golden yellow colour, complete with gilded edges, a beautifully crafted star. She shot Nikolai a look across the table, he’d ordered all the dishes served tonight, it had to be intentional, but she was the only one who knew about the star-shaped scar that sat directly atop his heart, a result of his ordeal in the fold. His eyes flicked upwards and he caught her gaze, shooting her a coy wink before turning back to his heated conversation with Tolya about how best to prank Tamar or something along those lines.

What did the pastry mean, did it mean anything? Was she simply reading into something that wasn't there? She shook her head, looking back to her plate, he was even more insufferable tonight than usual, and she couldn’t figure out why. The whole day had been spent at bonfires, a banquet luncheon, sledding, all leading to this private dinner in Nikolai’s chambers with just the seven of them, maybe he was simply unburdened today. Either way as insufferable as he was, it was nice to see him happy. It wasn’t like he truly showed how stressed he was, but she could always feel it. It was a consequence of all the time they spent together, she would be doing a bad job if she didn’t know him as well as the back of her own hand, and Zoya refused to do anything poorly. There had been a few moments today though where she felt like he was acting even more different than usual, the looks he’d given her were puzzling to say the least. After dinner they sank to the floor around the fire where they passed around drinks and stories that they rarely shared. Flushed with liquor and contentment, they moved on to yet another tradition of Sankt Nikolai’s day, the swapping of presents. Genya and David had gifted him a pair of fur-lined boots, Tamar and Nadia had given him a red wool coat, and Tolya a pair of woolen gloves, all the gifts Sankt Nikolai had received in the old saint story. They’d also presented him with bottles of cherry wine from that street rat’s club in Ketterdam, something he apparently enjoyed, but when a goblet had been passed to Zoya, she had to admit that it wasn’t terrible, it was actually quite good.

As her turn drew closer, Zoya toyed with beading at her cuffs, she was starting to doubt her gift again. Her gift to Nikolai would be the last one opened tonight, and she worried that maybe it was too bold . She wasn’t sentimental, but she wanted to express her thanks to him. A thank you for the peace, the quiet, the companionship for the last three years, and since she couldn’t say it she wanted her gift to communicate it. But as it got closer and closer to the time Nikolai would open her gift she felt more nervous, a feeling that was very uncharacteristic for her. And that wasn’t even the only thing bugging her. When it was time for the king to present his gift to her, he just smiled innocently and said, “Nazyalensky’s gift isn’t ready yet, she’ll get it later.” What was that supposed to mean? . Maybe she should do the same, and just pretend that she didn’t bring it to their little party-- but no, that would never work, it was clearly sitting in the middle of their little circle. “Thank you, Tolya,” Nikolai said, his eyes glinting as he embraced his friend with one arm. At his feet lay a bound volume of poetry maybe, but it had Nikolai’s name on the cover. “Wait,” she gasped, diving over Genya to scoop up the big book, “is this your poetry?”“Nazyalensky, give it back.” Zoya shot him a look in response and he sank back, “fine, you can read one, just ONE.” She pushed her shoulders back, channeling her inner Nikolai, in all his theatrical glory. “This one is called--”“Not out-loud!” “Think of this as my gift, since you clearly forgot mine.”=“I didn’t forget your gift, it’s just not ready yet.” “That sounds exactly like what someone who didn’t get me a gift would say!” He scrubbed a hand over his face, “fine. You can read one. Just one, commander.” Tamar let out a sharp laugh, “I can’t wait to hear this.” Zoya cleared her throat, “it’s called, ‘the harpy...’ really your highness?” At the cheering of Genya and a very tipsy David and Tamar, she continued, ignoring Nikolai’s pointed eye roll. “floodlit break of day a perfect, warm beauty fills pushing away the dark a brilliant ocean a royal, sharp blue invites calling to the eyes twinkling nighttime a radiant kiss softly against the fingers” ”Zoya frowned, “this wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. What is it supposed to be about?” “Are you kidding me?” Nadia blurted out, “Zoya mmfmfm--” Tamar’s hand clamped over her mouth, keeping her from hearing the rest of Nadia’s sentence. “What?” “Oh Zoya, maybe you’ll get it one day,” Genya laughed, throwing an arm around Tolya, “try to work it out tonight. And with that, we need to get to bed, goodnight!” And with a flourished bow, she and the others had collected their gifts and closed the door behind them, leaving her and Nikolai alone, his poetry book still in her hands. She swapped it for the gift box she’d wrapped earlier in the day, the idea of presenting the items in it to him still making her stomach flutter. “Here,” Zoya thrust the package at his chest, spinning on her heel and tailing towards the door. She didn’t want to stick around and see his reaction, giving him a gift had been embarrassing enough for this lifetime.“Nazyalensky, wait,” warm, calloused fingers grasped at her wrist turning her back around. Nikolai had a strange look on his face, he looked a little confused, a little amused and a little exasperated all at once. “You haven’t gotten your present yet.” “Wasn’t the poem my gift? We have lots to do in the morning and I have to get to sleep.” She tried to tug free, but the king’s grip was like iron. “You know it wasn’t, and no, we don’t. Sit.” She sighed indignantly, strutting over to the armchairs before the fire, her back as straight as a rod, every muscle in her body tense. She really didn’t want to be here for this. Zoya hadn’t put this much consideration into a gift since she’d bought things for Liliyana, and it felt like she was exposing some innermost part of herself by doing it, she could only hope that Nikolai wouldn’t realize just how much time she put into putting the present together. Nikolai settled into the chair beside her, slipping something under it before she could discern what it was. Odd. “Your wrapping skills are a seven, good, but clearly not as good as mine.” “A seven ? As if. My skills are a ten, and even if you have absolutely no taste, you would know that they’re at least a nine and a half.” “Fine. A seven and a half.” “A nine and a half, take it or leave it.” “Whatever you say, commander.” His nimble fingers carefully pulled the paper apart at the seams, and Zoya waited with bated breath. This was a mistake, “Nikolai--”“Oh,” he said softly, holding up the miniature to the light from the fire, “oh.” His fingers trailed over the blonde hair of his mother’s portrait, tracing the golden hair that matched his. “Oh,” he turned his face away from her for a second, quickly scrubbing a hand over his features before he turned back to the box in his lap. ‘Oh indeed.’ Next he pulled out a framed piece of fabric, the flag with a red hound that had flown on his boat-- the Volkvolny. Thumbing the fabric, thoughtfully, he turned to her, “how did you get this?” “I can’t reveal my secrets,” she replied, nodding at the box again, “there’s more.” She wasn’t about to tell him how enamored she’d been by the ride on his ship to Kerch, how it’d reminded her of what Liliyana used to tell her on their journey to the little palace. How she was surprised by his abilities as a captain, and how she’d enjoyed the trip so much, she’d charmed the crew into giving her the flag as a memento. Not tonight. “More? You’re spoiling me Nazyalensky.”“Just get it over with.” When Nikolai turned back to the box, Zoya quickly made her way to the door, scooping up the real present from Tolya’s arms before quietly closing the door behind her. “Zoya, is this meant to fit me?” He held up a small loop of ribbon threaded through a delicate bell. “Well,” she began, holding the squirming kitten out towards him… "if you don’t want her, Tolya said he would take her.” Nikolai blanched for a moment, and Zoya felt her heart stop again, what was he going to say? But then, he was lifting the cat into his own arms, ��does she have a name?” Zoya blanched, wasn’t the person whose cat it was supposed to come up with the name? “I can’t do everything for you, your highness.” “Any suggestions?” “You can name her if you take her.” “Of course I’m taking her, Nazyalensky.” He rolled his eyes at her, setting the kitten on the floor where she curled up at his feet. “But why a cat?” She shrugged, “cats have nine lives, they always find a way to stay on their feet, they’re excellent at keeping their balance, and they’re aloof, and you seem to have experience in dealing with aloof personalities.” Zoya clasped her hands together as she slumped back in her chair, “not to mention that you seemed a little bit lonely-- you know, given with the broken engagement and all.” “I think I’ll name her Lisa.” “You want to name your cat… fox?” “Yes.”“Well, if that’s all,” she began to stand. “Wait, we haven’t done your gifts yet,” Nikolai protested, “I promise I got you something.” He reached under his seat and pulled out a perfectly wrapped rectangular box, placing it gently in her hands. “I don’t want to overstep, but I hope you’ll at least think about the things in here.” She arched a brow at him, but he was quiet while she pulled the paper apart. “Are these my beads, from my keftas?”“You drop them more often than you’d think.” She turned the clip over in her hands, the silver sparkled in the light, and with it’s curved pattern it reminded her of illustrations of a gust of wind, fine lines of sapphire stones intertwined with silver beads. Zoya let out a startled laugh, her fingers pressing into the beads, she hadn’t received something as personal as this in a very, very long time, and here she was taken aback by a pin of all things. “May I?” Nikolai asked, holding out his hand expectantly. When the confused look stayed on her face, he leaned forward and plucked the clip from her hands. Before she could protest however he was directly before her, his fingers brushing back her hair. Zoya wasn’t thinking anymore, hell she wasn’t sure if she was even breathing anymore. All she could feel was Nikolai’s hands against her hair, pushing her hair back, the barest warmth from his breath by her ear, the determination in his bright eyes. “There,” he whispered as the clip clicked into place, but he made no move back to his seat. Instead his hand trailed slowly downwards, resting at her cheek. Her eyelids fluttered against her will, and it took everything in her to stop herself from shuddering. Nikolai’s thumb grazed her cheekbone, and the next thing she knew, his lips were pressed against hers. Zoya reacted instantly, her fingers curling into his shirt, pulling him closer. Saints, she hadn’t realized how badly she’d wanted this, she was barely known she wanted it at all, but in this moment she couldn’t remember wanting anything but this. She leaned in against his touch, her forehead resting against his when they broke apart. “Zoya?” “Hm?”“There’s more inside the box.” She let out a little sigh, her head still spinning, the enormity of her actions still not sinking in quite yet. Maybe it was the alcohol or maybe it was her own way of surrendering to this feeling, but she couldn’t find it in herself to care either way, she had wanted to kiss him, and so she had. And now, she wanted to do it again. “Nikolai, this is a piece of paper.” “A piece of paper with words on it.” “The harpy…” she hesitated for a second, letting the words wash over her. “That poem was about me?” “Yes, Nazyalensky.” “And the mornings and nights-- those parts were about me locking you in at night and coming to unlock you in the mornings?” “Yes, Nazyalensky.” His fingers threaded with hers and she settled her head against his shoulder, leaning into his embrace, “what did the star pastry mean?” “It didn’t mean anything, I was only trying to see how oblivious you were.” “Take that back,” she threatened, jabbing a finger at him, “I am not oblivious.” “Fine,” he amended, raising his hand in mock surrender, “not oblivious, just too scared to admit how much you actually liked me.”

“I’ve never liked you,” she scoffed, “I’ve been tolerating you for years, there’s a difference.” “So when you kissed me, that was you tolerating me?” “You kissed me!” “Hmm sure, dear.” Zoya huffed at this, grabbing at his collar with one hand and pulling him in for a kiss. “Will that shut you up?” “No, but you can keep trying.” “Fine, I will,” and she did.

#zoyalai #zoyalai fic #kos #kos fic #nikolai x zoya

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not-close-to-straight · 4 years

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Cartier (Stony)

A commission for @littlemissstark who wanted Post Endgame ABO Stony, fluffy goodness with Omega!Dad!Tony and Alpha!Papa!Steve and of course, a complete rewrite of what happened in Endgame because Canon what? We don’t know her.

Enjoy!

And THERE’S MORE STONY ON MY MASTERLIST!

*************

“I am inevitable.” Thanos was grim, was resigned, was triumphant in his terrible choice, resolute in his self imposed rightness, perhaps even smug in the coming victory.

“I am inevitable.” the Titan lifted the mighty gauntlet and snapped his fingers and the clank echoed across the bloody, violent battlefield like a clap of lightning, like a roll of thunder, like the crack of a whip that arced out and struck--

--nothing.

“I am Iron Man.” Tony hurt, the Omega hurt, every inch of his body and every hair on his head. There was fire in his veins and unleashed power screaming in his head and it was the hardest thing he’d ever done to close his fingers in a snap.

Dimly, he heard Steve roar in fear and anger, saw the Alpha lunge for him and grab onto his hand to share the gauntlets force. The Rescue suit rocketed out of the sky and left a dent in the earth where Pepper landed, and her grip on his wrist was desperate and terrified and Tony screamed--

“Daddy!” It didn’t seem possible for a bed to bounce quite so much when the bouncee was only five years old, but Morgan treated the springs like a trampoline as she scrambled up the mattress and right up close to her dad. “Daddy! You’re night-maring again! Wake up!”

Tony broke from the dream with a gasp, sucking in a pained breath and grabbing automatically for his baby girl, cuddling her up close into a relieved hug and letting Morgan’s sleepy morning scent calm his heart again.

“Hi, Bug.” he managed after a moment. “How did you know Daddy was night-maring again?”

“You hold on to your wrist.” she said matter of factly, every bit as observant as Pepper despite being pint sized. “The one Papa Steve grabbed. You hold it when you’re scared.”

“I do that, huh?” Automatically, the Omega reached for his wrist. Not the one the stones had almost destroyed but the other one, the one with his Alpha’s fingerprints seared into his skin. When Steve had grabbed for him on the battlefield, the gauntlet’s power had shocked from Tony’s veins and surged right into Steve, burning the Captains fingerprints onto Tony’s wrist before tearing through his body and sapping a measure of super serum right from his bones.

Six months later Tony was branded and Steve had aged up to at least forty five before his system settled again. Bruce had ran test after test for weeks to be sure the Alpha wouldn’t just age right out of existence and now—

“Are you still sad about the bad man?” Morgan’s eyes were very wide, her tiny hands very soft as she patted at Tony’s belly. “Is the baby sad too?”

“No no honey, the baby isn’t sad.” Tony leaned back in the pillows and swallowed hard, covered Morgan’s hand with his own and forced a deep breath in and then out again. It was just a dream, just a dream, it had been six months and a whole lot of good things since that day with Thanos and it was just hormones bringing everything back up in his dreams. “And neither am I. I’m not sad, Bug, everything’s okay. What are you doing up so early?”

“I was thinking!” Morgan snuggled into the Omega’s side and patted at his tummy again. “Ask me what I was thinking!”

“What were you thinking?” Tony asked obediently and Morgan wriggled in excitement a few times before blurting, “I want to tell Papa Steve about the baby first!”

“Is that so?” Tony tried and failed to hide a smile. He loved so much how excited Morgan was about being a big sister, loved that she was nearly vibrating with the effort of keeping it a secret, even though it had only been a secret since late last night when he’d whispered it as he was tucking her in to bed.

“How do you want to tell Papa Steve about the baby?” he asked after another moment. “Cos I have an idea how to tell him too.”

“My idea is better.” Morgan insisted immediately, so much like her Mama Tony couldn’t help laughing out loud. “It is! It’s better!”

“Well now, I don’t know about that.” Lately Tony had been exhausted, moody and nauseous but he pushed it all away so he could Morgan just a little closer and relish a moment where it was just the two of them... cos in about seven months it wouldn’t be just the two of them anymore.

There was a little box on his side table wrapped in bold Cartier red, a ridiculous choice in this post-snap world but one Tony couldn't resist making. He loved Cartier, loved the pomp and circumstance and the sheer lack of necessity in each purchase and he knew Steve would laugh and laugh at the ridiculous wrapping and roll his eyes over his mate getting him a present at all.

But Tony knew his Alpha would get soft and serious and sweet when he said thank you, and Steve would unwrap the red paper extra careful like he did every time Tony gave him anything. Then the Alphas blue eyes would go very very wide and if Tony was lucky, the Captain would faint dead away in sheer shock and he could hold it over his mate’s head for at least the next five years.

Nothing put an Alpha on the floor like finding out their mate was expecting, and after Thanos, after Steve had aged ten years in just a few minutes, after Tony and Pepper had dissolved their bond and Tony and Steve had decided to give the relationship that hadn't survived the Civil War another chance…

… well Tony would bet good money the positive pregnancy test and ultrasound picture in the ostentatious Cartier box would knock his mate flat out unconscious.

But it was just as important— maybe even more important— that Morgan was excited about the prospect of a sibling, that she was excited to call Steve Papa.

Tony and Pepper had made the split as easy as possible on Morgan, the Alpha still had a room in the cabin and she kissed Tony goodnight and good morning like she’d done every day when they were bonded, shared her coffee and slapped the Omega’s hands away when he tried to take too much food from her plate. When she went to the city to help with restoration and charity projects sometimes Morgan went along too, but it was never a matter of choosing between parents it was just a question of hanging out with Mommy in the city or staying at the cabin with Daddy and the revolving door of various Avengers and everyone else who seemed to hang out at the lake.

… and of course, Steve.

The Alpha had sat at Tony’s beside as he recovered from the gauntlet, had tip toed around Pepper in the beginning and fallen head over heels for Morgan and her antics. Only after Pepper and Tony had talked about the truth of Tony’s still present feelings for Steve and parted sweetly, amicably, and still wholly loving with each other did the Captain finally make his move.

He’d swept Tony off his feet into a whirlwind courting that had involved ridiculous amounts of flowers, chocolates, terrible but achingly tender poetry, hand drawn pictures that painted the Omega like an angel... all things Steve swore he should have done years ago.

So now there their life was Pepper who made every inch of their cabin a home, Steve who gave his shield to Sam and spent the days training with Bucky and the newest team that had stepped up to fill the gap, Tony who had been relegated to house Omega and was thrilled with the chance to simply be home with his baby and tinker in his new lab, and Morgan who apparently couldn’t wait another second to shriek about how she was going to be a big sister.

“Daddy!” the five year old practically howled when Tony didn’t answer for a long minute, baring her teeth and trying her best to growl in frustration. She was a long way from being Alpha anything, but she sure was determined to act it. “Can I tell Papa Steve or not!”

“Yeah baby.” The Omega finally relented. “You can tell Papa Steve. He’ll be really excited about it. How are you going to tell him?”

“Shoes!” Morgan exclaimed. “I’m going to give Papa Steve shoes!”

“I can actually feel how proud your Mama is by that choice.” Tony said dryly. “What sort of shoes, Bug?”

“These ones!” Morgan scrambled out of the bed with a hilarious amount of wriggling, then reappeared with an equally hilarious amount of wiggling before proudly presenting Tony with a pair of bedazzled sneakers in a precious size two. “They used to be mine and I found them in my closet! I can give them to Papa Steve for the new baby!”

“Well what if the baby is a boy?” Tony asked very seriously and Morgan replied very seriously, “Boys can be bedazzled too, Daddy.”

“Ah. I stand corrected.” The Omega picked up the little shoes. “Alright then. You can tell Papa Steve with bedazzled shoes. I think that’s a really good idea.”

“Yay!” Morgan grinned up at him. “How are you going to tell Papa Steve?”

“I’ve got an idea or two.” Tony said vaguely and dropped a kiss on her forehead. “Go wash up and I’ll make breakfast. When Papa Steve comes home you can tell him first.”

“And then we’ll tell Mommy!”

“And then we’ll tell Mommy.”

***************

“Tony?” Steve shut the door to the cabin and called for his Omega mate, stretched his arms up over his head and grimaced when the muscles in his back pulled. He didn’t know if he’d ever get used to being older, to being in his mid forties and sore after a hard work out with Sam and Bucky.

He was still a long way from average, he was still a long way from normal but now the Alpha looked older, felt slower, felt human and despite the sore muscles, Steve was grateful for the change.

He and Tony never would have worked after Thanos if Steve was still super powered and eternally thirty while Tony struggled with getting older every day. In fact the Omega probably would have turned his court down flat if Steve was still Captain, so giving up the shield and complaining of an achy back was worth every second so long as he got to come home at the end of the day and do this.

“My mate!” Steve raised his voice a little and listened with a grin for the sound of tiny feet rushing down the stairs, and the slower steadier trod of Tony’s shoes as he and Morgan came to greet him. “Where’s my family at?”

“Here, Papa Steve!” Morgan dashed forward and held her little arms up so Steve would swing her into the air and the Alpha did exactly that, laughing out loud at her shrieks and giggles. “I’m here! I’m here!”

“Oh, maybe let’s not do that high enough to bonk heads on the rafters.” Tony scolded only mildly. “Not all of us have unbruisable skin, Papa Steve.”

“These days, even I bruise like a peach.” The Alpha set Morgan down gently and ruffled up her hair, then moved to pull his mate up close and bury his nose in the curve of Tony’s neck, inhaling the Omega’s sweet scent with a grateful sigh. “Hello, sweetheart. I missed you today.”

“Alpha.” Tony tipped his head to the side and purred in contentment when his mate nuzzled at his throat, scratching sensitive skin with the prickly edges of his beard. “Long day?”

“Don’t know how you do the normal human thing.” Steve confessed, the words muffled in Tony’s shoulder since he was loathe to leave his mate’s embrace even long enough to talk. “I stubbed my toe today and thought I was dying.”

“Didn’t you have a passel of health issues before the war?” Tony laughed at his mate, then wheezed when Steve tickled at his side in retaliation. “I feel like stubbing your toe isn’t as scary as consumption or diabetes or weighing ninety pounds as a full grown Alpha.”

“It’s equally as scary.” The Alpha maintained, and it was good to laugh again, good to smile again and to smile specifically with Tony. There’d been a time after the Battle for New York when the Alpha and Omega had drawn close and then closer still, and those days Steve laughed more than he ever had. But then there had been Ultron and the Winter Soldier and Siberia and Thanos--

--anyway. It was good to laugh again, and it was better to be laughing with the sweet scent of his mate in his nose and the comforting weight of Tony in his arms.

“I love you.” Steve whispered into the Omega’s ear and Tony trilled back softly, “I love you too.”

“Papa Steve, I have a present for you!” Apparently done with watching her dad and step-dad canoodle and far past the patience allotted a five year old, Morgan pushed her way between the mated pair and held up a messy yet enthusiastically decorated box. “Open it! Open it!”

Tony would never be over the way the big burly Alpha melted into the name of Papa Steve, and he didn’t bother hiding his grin as an expression three shades past adoring passed over Steve’s face as he very carefully took the package from Morgan’s hands. “Thank you, Bug. I’m real excited to open this, but first tell me, what’d you get me a present for?”

“Just open it and see-ee-ee!” Morgan cried, dancing around excitedly in place. “Open it!”

“Honey?” Steve raised his eyebrows towards his Omega, but Tony only shrugged and motioned towards the box, so Steve smiled down at Morgan again and started to pull the hundred or so pieces of tape off the present.

“...wait.” the Alpha held up the tiny, shiny shoes and scrunched his brow in confusion. “What-- what are these for, Morgan? Is this your way of saying you need new shoes, cos these are at least four sizes too small for you.”

“Not for me!” Morgan shook her head impatiently. “For the new baby! Boys and girls can be dazzled so the baby can wear them no matter what!”

“The new baby.” Steve repeated. “What um-- what new baby? Who is having a baby?”

And then with wide eyes and something that looked an awful lot like disbelief when he realized Tony was pressing gently gently at his own stomach-- “Omega?”

“Surprise.” Tony held up the bold red and white Cartier box and bit at his lip to keep from blurting out everything as the Alpha stared down at the shoes, over at his stomach, then at the next box. “Go on. Open it.”

Steve opened the Cartier box just as slowly and carefully as Tony knew he would, and damn if anyone knew the same Captain that jumped through walls and hurled motorcycles at baddies could be so delicate with a present…

“My mate.” Steve held up the ultrasound photo and pregnancy test in shaking fingers. “Is this-- are you-- are we-- really--?”

“OH NO PAPA STEVE!” Morgan shrieked as two hundred plus pounds of Alpha dropped to the floor in an unconscious pile. “Daddy! What happened?”

“Captain America has been laid low by a black and white photo.” Tony sighed affectionately as he went to get a pillow for Steve’s head. “Red, White and Super? More like Red, White and Unconscious.”

“Does unconscious mean Papa Steve is happy?”

“Yeah, Bug.” Tony lifted Steve up enough to slide a pillow between the Alpha and the hard floor. “It means he’s very happy.”

“I don’t fall over when I’m happy.”

“You definitely don’t, and we definitely can tease Papa Steve about it once he wakes up.”

******************

Pepper Potts was one of the busiest people in the world these days, the Alpha working non stop alongside other influential companies and organizations to bring life back around to something normal after Thanos had been wiped away. There were school to reopen and roads to fix, neighborhoods that had been mostly dusted then completely abandoned to revitalize, scholarships to fund and food banks to stock now that half the world was back.

Even when she was home at the cabin Pepper was working on one project or another, here in the city she attended non stop meetings and conference calls and right at this moment the beautiful Alpha was talking on the phone in one hand, signing a pile of checks with the other, and carrying on a muted conversation with her assistant as they hurried down the hall.

But everything stopped when Pepper caught sight of Steve outside her office with a hopeful smile, a small gift bag and a bouquet of roses.

“Steve!” Pepper finished up her phone call, pushed away the checks and held up a finger so her assistant would wait as she hurried over to the other Alpha and threw her arms around his neck. “Hi! I wasn’t expecting to see you today!”

“Hey Pep.” Most Alpha’s shook hands or grasped each others elbows in greeting, but Pepper and Steve had been through far too much together--not to mention loving the same Omega-- for that sort of formality, so Steve held Pepper tightly, carefully, for a long minute as they hugged. “How are you?”

“Honestly thrilled to see you.” Pepper decided, and ran her fingers lightly through his beard. “You know, I don’t think I’ll ever be used to seeing you my age, Steve. I’m so used to thinking you’re baby faced despite being at least a hundred. I like this look, you seem distinguished instead of scrappy.”

“Scrappy.” Steve laughed and opened the door to Pepper’s office, motioning the female Alpha through first. “I appreciate that.”

“Ohhh you smell like home.” Pepper stepped close and sniffed at his neck again. “I miss the cabin and Tony and Morgan. I thought trading in my power suits for books on compost heaps was the hardest thing I’d ever do, but as it turns out getting back into those suits to try and put the world back together is way more difficult.”

“I don’t think anyone’s surprised that saving the world is harder than fertilizing.” the Alpha said dryly and Pepper wrinkled her nose at his sarcasm. “When will you be home again?”

“Not for a few more days.” Pepper sighed. “I’m going to call Tony tonight but it’s not the same as being home with you guys and Bug. What brought you all the way into the city, anyway? Has Tony blown up the garage? Drained the lake for some ridiculous reason? Oh no did Morgan have her first broken arm?”

“Morgan and Tony are fine.” Steve was quick to assure her, but a little less quick to place the gift bag on the table and pull out the little shoes. “But… we have some news.”

Pepper picked up the shoes with a smile and turned them over a few times in her hands. “Oh I remember buying these, Morgan was too small to even walk when we got them! Tony accused me of trying to start a shoe obsession early, but then he was the one to put them on her at least three times a week, wacky Omega. Why do you have them, though?”

“Bug gave me them as a present.” Steve said slowly, quietly. “A present for the new baby.”

“The new baby.” Pepper echoed, confusion furrowing her brows for a few seconds before realization had her slumping back in her chair. “...oh my god. You and Tony--”

Steve waited with bated breath, hands clenched and heart pounding. Out of all the conversations he’d thought to have one day, telling his mate’s former Alpha they were expecting a baby hadn’t even made the list.

“You and Tony.” Pepper said again, and then she smiled, a hand over her heart as her scent swelled warm with affection. “That’s amazing, Steve.”

“Really?”

“Tony and I didn’t think it was possible a first time, and after Morgan we never thought to try again.” Pepper ran her fingers over the rhinestones on Morgan’s shoes and her smile softened even more. “Congratulations, Captain. I’m very happy for the two of you, and I’m sure Morgan is thrilled to be a big sister. But why are you here telling me when I’m sure Tony has some no doubt extravagant way of announcing it to the entire team?”

“Well um--” Steve cleared his throat and clasped his hands between his knees. “Pep, I know we don’t have a traditional sort of relationship-- you and Tony dissolving your bond but still co-habitating, Morgan calling me Papa while still calling Tony Daddy and you Mama, three adults helping raise one kiddo-- it’s not a normal sort of relationship.”

“Mmm-hmm?” Pepper waited and the other Alpha cleared his throat one more time before continuing--”

“Getting to know and love Morgan has been one of the best things about the last six months. She calls me Papa Steve and I never thought I’d care about that sort of thing, but now it’s my favorite thing in the world right next to Tony calling me Alpha.” Steve reached across the desk for Pepper’s hand and squeezed her fingers lightly. “I want this new baby to know and love you like Morgan knows and loves me. Want him or her to have three parents and a big sister and a house full of love and--”

His throat closed up as Pepper’s eyes filled with tears. “--I guess what I’m saying is that I’d be honored if you stayed with us. Not just honored-- thrilled. I want you to stay with us, Pepper. It’s probably not even my place to ask you to keep calling the cabin home, but I’m here doing it anyway. You and Tony aren’t mated anymore but he loves you so much. You’re Morgan’s mom and have been a constant presence in my life for fifteen years now and it just-- it wouldn’t feel like family without you around, Pep. That’s all there is to it.”

“Oh.” Pepper wiped at a few tears as they dripped down her cheek. “And here I thought you’d ask me to move out so you can repaint the bedroom walls for the baby.”

“Tony is already drawing up plans for an extra room for the cabin that is roughly the size of most people’s houses.” Steve sighed and Pepper laughed through her tears at him. “Plus, I’ve only known for most of a day and I’m already overwhelmed, Pep. All those times you joked about being the one who keeps Tony’s world together-- not really a joke, right? I don’t know how you did it all those years.”

“Sure you do.” she murmured confidently. “All it takes is loving that Omega until your heart hurts with it, and everything else comes along easily.”

“Well, it would come along easier if you were there too.” The Alpha stated. “Please? Stay with us.”

“It would be awfully inconvenient to move all my clothes from that big beautiful closet Tony built me.” Pepper teased and Steve’s big shoulders relaxed in relief. “I appreciate the sentiment Steve, but with or without this beautiful new baby, I have no intention of moving out of the cabin. It’s home no matter what, whether it’s home to just us and Tony or us and Tony and Bug and a new baby and the several dozen people that seem to consider it a free for all restaurant on Friday nights.”

“I love you, Pep.” Steve grinned, and she scrunched her nose just like Morgan always did and replied, “I love you too, Captain. Now then, can I give you some advice?”

“Please, God yes.”

“Spoil Tony for the next few months.” Pepper picked up her phone and scrolled through a few pictures before turning the screen so Steve could see it. “With Morgan we never got to do the fun things expecting Omega’s go through-- the maternity shoots and the baby showers and all that. The world was in chaos and Tony didn’t feel right making a big deal about anything, but this time around--”

Steve took the phone and looked through the pages and pages of different pictures and lists. “This was my idea board for when we were expecting Morgan. I looked up photographers and studios, all sorts of organic creams and stretch mark lotions, overpriced novelty items beautiful clothes...” Pepper’s smile was wistful. “Spoil him this time. Give him all this. Tony deserves it.”

“...I feel like a pregnancy boudoir photo shoot would be more about spoiling me.” The blond Alpha paused over a rather... risque... photo of an expecting Omega, his eyebrows flying up high. “I mean... wow.”

Pepper laughed at him again. “Well I’ll be home soon to celebrate with everyone, but until then kiss our unorthodox little family for me, okay?”

“Always.” Steve leaned over the desk and kissed the pretty Alpha on the cheek. “Thank you, Pepper.”

“Take it from an Alpha who’s been there with Tony? You’ve been gone four hours and if you aren’t home soon with sea salt chocolates and something with a ribbon on top, your pregnant Omega will lose his mind.” Pepper said authoritatively, and Steve yelped in alarm, grabbed up the little shoes and dashed from the office.

“Good luck!” she called as he ran, and once the door was closed, Pepper decided to put off her afternoon meeting for just a few minutes more so she could start shopping for baby shower gifts.

She and Tony weren’t mates anymore but they were best friends, and she had every intention of giving the Omega everything he’d wanted last time around and wasn’t able to get.

“Baby bibs in Tiffany blue and onesies in Cartier red?” she mused, and clicked ‘add to cart.’ “Oh, I think those are entirely necessary.”

*****************

Dinner at the cabin the following Friday was attended by more people than usual. Carol and Nebula had returned from… well from wherever they went in space, Harley had driven up from college and picked Peter and Ned up on the way. Sam and Bucky were back from training new recruits and apparently intent on eating Tony and Steve out of house and home, Scott had brought Hope and Cassie, Bruce had to sit on the porch and talk through the window, Rhodey and Happy flew in with Pepper who was still doing paperwork on the helicopter as it landed in the yard. Even Clint and Natasha made it in from the farm, Natasha still a little too pale and a little too weak after the events at Vormir had been reversed, Clint a little quieter than he’d ever been before as he held tight to Tasha’s hand.

The cabin was full and the tables were groaning under the weight of all the food, the teenagers and Scott shrieking about some video game in the living room while Sam and Bucky argued about everything from whether or not string cheese counted as actual cheese to who looked better with the shield on their back. Pepper had her arms happily full of Morgan, Rhodey was listening warily to Tony’s latest story about an attempted invention and the house was loud right up until Hope shrieked in alarm when Harley and Peter got a little too carried away and a video game controller winged out from the living room and nearly hit her.

It was snatched away by a web a split second before Hope ended up with a bloody nose, and the room went quiet when the two barely presented Alphas peeked around the corner with guilty eyes and even guiltier expressions.

“Alright, there are officially too many kids in here!” Rhodey decided loudly. “Boys! You’re banished to the yard! You too, Scott!”

“Aw man!” Scott whined. “I’m like forty, you can’t just banish me!”

“Son, tou’re like four.” the Colonel retorted and Pepper hid a smile in Morgan’s hair. “Get out there with the boys and wreak some havoc by the lake!”

“Calm down, platypus.” Tony stood on his toes to kiss Steve and in the same motion stole most of his mate’s food away. “This time next year Morgan will be big enough to build explosive things and you’ll be wishing for Harley and Pete’s mess once you’ve got Mini Me blowing holes in the-- oh crap.”

The Omega swayed on his feet and nearly fell over, and Steve grabbed him up tight. “My mate? Okay?”

“It’s nothing, just a little lightheaded.” Tony forced a smile that quickly turned to a grimace when Carol offered him some of the veggie and ranch dip. “Nope, can’t eat that. The smell of ranch makes me nauseous and I’m pretty sure the baby is making me allergic to all things dairy. And my allergies are super bad right now-- this kid just hates my nose.”

“Uh, which kid hates your nose?” Carol asked, and then with a quick look down at Tony’s stomach. “Are you eating for two right now!?”

“Tony!” Rhodey’s plate slipped and fell from his hands, splatting unnoticed on the floor as he gaped at his best friend. “Are you serious?”

Belatedly, Tony realized what he’d said, that their secret was out in the open before he and Steve had even talked about how to tell their extended family, but before he could back pedal or clarify or anything, Nebula cried out in excitement and Clint whooped and pounded at Steve’s back and Carol put her fingers to her lips and whistled at the top of her lungs and the room descended into sheer chaos, round after round of congratulations and excitement and cooing and pressing at Tony’s belly while the mated pair were bombarded with questions.

“Oops?” Tony offered his mate an apologetic half smile. “Didn’t mean to announce it quite like that.”

“Well, I guess this is as good a time as any to give you your present.” Steve whispered to his mate, and pulled an envelope from his back pocket. “And by presents, I mean the first of at least a hundred I’m going to get you for making me the happiest Alpha in the world. Here you go, sweetheart.”

“Oooh presents!” Tony tore open the envelope, and his eyes widened when he saw the gift certificate inside. “A boudoir photo shoot for when I’m further along? Captain Rogers! How forward of you!”

And then with an entirely cheeky grin, “I love it. Thank you.”

“I uh--” Steve cleared his throat and tapped at one sample picture specifically, where the expecting Omega was swathed in sheer red and gauzy blue material and laid out on a lounge. “I like that one.”

“No, we should do them outside and naked!” Tony’s scent lifted sweet and happy and Steve rumbled in immediate approval. “And I want a milk bath! And I want one while I’m wearing expensive jewelry! And one where---”

Tony kept talking excitedly and Natasha sidled up next to Pepper to ask under her breath, “Pep, are you okay?”

“Of course I’m okay.” the Alpha smoothed Morgan’s hair back from her forehead and asked, “We are very excited about the baby, aren’t we Bug?”

“You’re excited for your former mate to have a child with his new mate.” Tasha asked pointedly. “Really?”

“Oh Tasha.” Pepper smiled when Steve bent Tony over into a long kiss in the background. “I love Tony to death, but trust me when I say Steve can have this round. I intend to eat popcorn and drink wine and watch Steve fret himself bald over this whole thing.”

“Is Tony going to be that high maintenance?” Natasha finally smiled too, unable to help it when the room smelled like happy and content Omega. “I wasn’t around much with Morgan since the world had just ended and all. Was he terrible?”

“Oh my god.” Pepper laughed out loud. “Trust me, Tasha. That Alpha has no idea what to expect when Tony’s expecting. This is going to be a ride.”

“Somehow I think the Captain is up to the challenge.” Natasha tilted her head and watched as Steve hand fed his mate a piece of garlic bread. “Yeah, I think they’re gonna be fine.”

*************

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softyoongiionly · 4 years

Text

La Grande Maison: A Mystery in Three Acts 🎠

The rooftop is your safe haven. It’s your escape from the woes of the world below and, you and your best friends take every opportunity you can to visit this special place. It’s here that time slows down, that all your problems seem to fade away...

But when one of you goes missing, not even the rooftop can save you from the nightmare that has yet to unfold.

Pairing: Jimin x Reader (but also this one is mainly about good ol fashion friendship)

Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Word Count: 25k

Warnings (please read me!!!): angst (like seriously chief this one is ROUGH), alcohol use (not excessive), drug use (not excessive), violence, mentions of murder/crime/kidnapping, swearing (excessive), mentions of death, character death (not major), SMUT (18+ only please).

A/N: hello yes. It is me. This one is ALOT my friends. Like holy freaking heck. I am honestly so incredibly excited for you to read this and, I can’t wait to see what you think of it. It’s my actual baby and, I’m kind of nervous cause, I’ve never written a fic like this before so, I really really really hope you like it. If you do, please let me know, feedback means everything to me.

Please Note: Bolded text indicates when characters are speaking Korean

Regarding Taehyung’s French scenes (yes our boy is fluent in french in this fic), I did my best. My french isn’t perfect so, if there are mistakes I am super sorry.

Please please please let me know if you liked it!

I love you all so much, please enjoy.

Act I- Sur La Grande Maison

The rooftop is a place you often end up.

It’s a little cliché, you think: a bunch of misfits corralled onto a dodgy high-rise building in the middle of the city, cigarette smoke wafting in the air.

But you and your friends aren’t delinquents.

The worst any of you has ever done is get a speeding ticket and that only happened because, one of you had dared Hoseok to go over 100 miles an hour on the highway: Hoseok never turns down a dare.

But no, the rooftop is a quiet place despite the shady motel it rests upon and, it’s a place you and your group of friends cherish for different reasons

Jin likes it because; he can spot new street food vendors from the massive height of the building. He’s made all of you try some interesting shit but, most of the time, it’s delicious.

Namjoon has perfect view of the river and, sometimes he separates from the seven of you to write poetry while gazing down at it.

Yoongi doesn’t always join you but, he finds himself dragging himself out of the house to listen to the underground rappers that perform in the club next door.

He thinks he can do better.

He’s probably right.

The rooftop gives Hoseok the space to dance; he doesn’t have it downstairs in the room he rents and, he can’t afford a practice room. So, he brings out his old speakers and amuses the rest of you while he moves fluidly around the concrete.

Taehyung loves to paint the skyline and, the roof allows him a view that he can’t get anywhere else. He’s painted it a hundred times but, he hasn’t used every color; not yet at least.

Jungkook brings his dads old polaroid up every time you guys meet. He takes unflattering pictures of all of you and, you know it’s just for fun but, what you don’t know is that he’s made a collage on his wall of all of them and, he smiles at them each morning as he heads to work.

And Jimin well…

Jimin has a lot of reasons why he loves the rooftop:

His friends of course; he can’t imagine his life without all of the late nights/early mornings he’s spent huddled up with his best friends, laughing so hard he can’t see straight.

The view is amazing, it makes Jimin feel like he lives in a penthouse despite him working three minimum wage jobs just to keep a shitty roof over his head.

But all of those things pale in comparison to his favorite thing about the rooftop: you.

You’ve been friends since high school but eight months ago, he started realizing that the little crush he had is actually full-blown LOVE and, that he should probably tell you soon before he loses his shit.

Luckily for him, you reciprocated.

It wasn’t easy at first, Jimin’s a jealous man and, he let his trust issues get in the way but, after a few stupid fights, he decided he needed to grow up and knock it off.

The rooftop saw it all, the fights, the making up, the making out and, one night when everyone fell asleep, Jimin made you cum three times underneath the blanket the two of you were sharing.

It’s a little filthy he knows but, he gets kind of primal around you, he wants everyone to know you’re his.

But he knows when it’s appropriate to do so and, he’d never try to control you.

Unless you two were in bed together then, there are times when you give him that control.

He always brings you down nicely though, he always kisses your forehead...

You think you might fall in love with him a little more each time.

“Y/N?”

A voice brings you out of your thoughts and, you look up across the makeshift bonfire to see Hoseok smirking knowingly at you.

“There’s an old mattress over by the chimney if you and Jimin need to relieve yourselves...”

There is a small echo of laughter that moves through the group and, you cock your head in confusion, “What are you talking about?

Jimin throws a cigarette butt at him, wrapping an arm around you, “Fuck off. She doesn’t realize she does it...” You feel him tuck a bit of hair behind your ear, smiling fondly at you, “Don’t worry about him, he’s just mad he doesn’t have a girl looking at him like that.”

You turn towards the rest of your friends, “Wait what do you mean? What did I do?”

With chaos in his eyes, Jin takes the cigarette Namjoon passes to him before nodding to you, “You were eye fucking your boyfriend.”

“Shut uuuup.” You answer immediately, burying your face in Jimin’s neck which prompts a pleased round of laughter to move past his lips.

You didn’t realize you were doing it but, you don’t protest his observation.

It’s been nearly a month since you’ve had a night off, meaning you’ve gone without your boyfriend’s touch for way too long.

He tugs you closer to him and presses a kiss to your head whilst everyone else laughs at your expense.

As the night breeze rushes in to move between the eight of you, Jimin holds you even tighter, tugging the old knitted blanket around your body.

“Give her a break, she’s been without dick for a long time...it’s been like a month since we met up.” Taehyung interjects, taking a drag of the cigarette before passing it to Jungkook.

Cigarettes are nearly $10 a pack, so they share one at a time and, pitch in when the supply runs low.

You don’t smoke but five of them do and, you’re kind of thankful your boyfriend isn’t one of them.

“So? Do you guys not meet up in between? Y/N has a studio, plenty of privacy...” Jin waves his hand between the two of you, judgement in his eyes.

Jimin tenses up beside you, not really enjoying the way the conversation has shifted, “We both work 3 jobs hyung, you know that.”

“You’re right. Sex is probably quite straining for you...” Jin smirks, enjoying the annoyance in Jimin’s eyes.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Jimin’s eyes are narrowed and, you are quickly coming up with a plan to distract your boyfriend from Jin’s teasing.

His not exactly a good candidate for roasting; he’s far too sensitive for that.

“You know cause it’s...” Jin positions his fingers in such a way that suggests that Jimin has a small dick

“Jin-” Namjoon groans in warning but, Jungkook and Hoseok have already started snickering.

You expect your boyfriend to pop off, guns a blazing, eyes alight with offence but, instead he just smirks.

Letting his hand curve around the ball of your knee, he says something that nullifies Jin’s insult,

“You don’t have to have a big dick to be good in bed hyung...”

Jin isn’t phased and he raises his eyebrows as he holds the cigarette to his lips, “That’s something people with small dicks say.”

Hoseok and Jungkook snicker again, enjoying the drama and Taehyung grins from behind his phone, shaking his head.

Jimin’s smirk widens as his hand continues to trail up your thigh, “Do you think I’m bad in bed?”

His question is spoken into your ear and, his breath against your skin causes a shiver to run through you.

“No.” You giggle, leaning into him and, he’s quick to tighten his grip on you, his lips quickly finding the side of your head.

“Now, Y/N...every good relationship is built on trust. You two will never last if you continue to lie.” Jin’s laughter escalates to a full-blown windshield wiper volume and, surprisingly enough, it’s Yoongi who shuts him down

“Your fiancé made you sleep on the couch with me the other night because, you were too drunk to get it up so,” Yoongi tilts his head as if he’s wagering two options, “you're not really in the position to be talking shit.”

Everyone’s face turns up in surprise as Yoongi, or Mouse, as they like to call him, puts Jin on blast without even looking up from his phone.

“Mouse just ended your whole life bro.” Hoseok cackles, throwing back a bit of vodka as Jungkook leans into him with the weight of his laughter.

Jin waves him off like the unbothered king he is and, gestures to the vodka bottle in Hoseok’s hands, “Mouse’s have tiny dicks too so, he’s just jealous.”

Namjoon literally cringes in his seat, looking at Jin with incredulity, “Mice not mouse’s...”

Taehyung laughs at that, leaning forward a bit to warm his hands around the fire. He looks exhausted but, then again, so do the rest of you.

But it speaks volumes doesn’t it?

That you’re all hear together, on your only days off, soaking up every bit of time you have.

Roasting aside, anyone can see that there is nothing but love between the eight of you.

If you had it your way, you’d spend every night up here.

Jimin reminds you with his lips, just how long it’s been as he places a few kisses against your cheek, “Come play with me.”

You giggle, turning in his grip to meet his grinning face, “You sound like the twins from The Shining...”

Jimin’s eyes wrinkle with his laughter but, he’s quick to place a searing kiss to your lips along with another sinful phrase, “Please? I haven’t seen you naked in a month.”

You shake your head, tucking hand behind his neck to pull him closer to you, “I’ve sent you nudes...”

Jimin’s quick to kiss you again but, his lips pout further and, you notice the scent of after shave lingering around his face.

That shouldn’t turn you on but, for whatever reason, it does.

“Yes you did and, trust me when I say, I put them to good use-” He kisses you again, nudging your nose as he does, “but I want the real thing.”

“Let’s go then.” You whisper against his lips

He kisses you once more before, getting Hoseok’s attention, “Yah, I need your key.”

Hoseok lives on the 8th floor of the motel you’re currently loitering on and, his room is a place you and Jimin often end up during nights like these.

Most people would be weirded out by it but, for you guys, it’s normal.

You don’t bat your eyes at the seedier sides of life, you’ve all lived through it in some way.

Hoseok just smirks, reaching into the pocket of his jeans, “Stay off my bed unless you plan on inviting me this time.”

Jimin just flips him off, grinning fondly at him before taking your hand and, tugging you towards the door.

“Don’t be too long, we wanna play poker!” Jungkook calls after the two of you and, although Jimin has a mission in mind, he responds anyway.

“With what money?”

“We’re playing for bragging rights obviously, that shit means more to you heathens than actual money.” Namjoon smirks, taking a swig of the vodka before passing it to Yoongi.

“That doesn’t apply to me; I would sell all of you for an even $500.” Yoongi remarks, taking a big gulp and, bearing his teeth as it burns his throat.

The rest of you just laugh but, before you can add your two sense, Jimin is tugging you behind the door.

He has you pressed up against it immediately, his hands finding your waist whilst his plush lips kiss you with everything he’s got.

You’re quick to reciprocate as your hands slide around the curve of his neck. Delicately, your fingers tangle into the hair at the nape of his neck and, it spurs Jimin on even more as he groans into your mouth.

“Christ, what are you doing to me?” He laments against your mouth, causing laughter to bubble past your lips, “It’s not funny...” He laments but, he’s grinning as he does, walking you backwards towards the elevator, “I’ve only been kissing you for ten seconds and, I’m already so hard.”

You tug him through the elevator doors the collar of his t-shirt all while trying to keep your lips connected, “Should I only expect you to last for ten seconds too?”

Jimin grunts in protest, his brows furrowing cutely as he shakes his head, “Don’t make fun of me, I missed you...” He whines playfully, smirking when you hitch a leg around his waist.

“I missed you too.” You breath and, you always marvel at young Jimin can make you feel.

You’re fully grown, sexually active adults and, yet here you grinding into one another like a bunch of hormonal rookies. The denim of his jeans pressing against the soft cotton of your panties hits you right in the pit of your stomach and, you’re honestly a little shocked by how wet you are.

Jimin slides the key card through Hoseok’s door several times before it finally works.

This motel is not a featured business on Yelp.

“Fucking door- ugh Jesus I don’t know how he gets this open when he’s hammered.” Jimin laughs, pulling you close to him as soon as he shoves Hoseok’s door shut.

“I have found him sleeping in the hallway before.” You point out but, the importance of your reply dies on your tongue when Jimin steps back to pull his shirt off.

You don’t hide your reaction either, letting your eyes wander over the masterpiece that is Jimin’s body.

He’s slightly tan from his days working at the pool, his sinewy muscles protruding tastefully against his smooth skin; it’s enough to make you drool.

But to center yourself, you comment on something tangible before you literally start begging for him,

“Your tattoo is healing nicely.” You nod your head to the black ink scrawled across Jimin’s ribs

The word ‘nevermind’ has never looked so good on someone's skin before.

He just smirks, “Yeah, it’s still a little sore though.”

“Oh?” With a tilt of your head, you let your eyes scan over it again, “Should I kiss it better?”

Your question doesn’t get answered because the next thing you know, Jimin has you on the couch, sat astride on his lap with your shirt half way up your torso.

“I want you naked- I don’t give a fuck if they’re waiting on us...”

All you can manage is a nod and, Jimin quickly tugs your shirt over your head.

He connects his lips to the crook of your neck, sighing into your skin as if the taste alone soothes him.

“You missed me too right?” He mumbles causing you to gently tug on the black tendrils of his hair so he’ll face you.

“Of course.” You peck his lips once before pushing him back against the arm of the couch, “See?”

Jimin nearly busts right there when you lean back to pull your skirt up, exposing the dampened material of your panties.

Your boyfriend has a panty fetish that nearly warrants concern. For months, he would beg you to leave your panties with him after the two of you had sex until finally; you were down to your last 8 pair.

He bought you more of course but, that didn’t stop him from begging all over again.

“Fuck these are my favorite...” He winces at the sight, letting out a shaky breath before his darkening irises find yours again, “Leave them on.”

You smirk, letting your skirt down and, pecking at his lips once again, “I thought you wanted me naked.”

He bites down on your bottom lip, pulling it for a moment and, letting it snap back in place,

“I changed my mind. I wanna cum all over these pretty little panties you’re wearing instead...”

Jimin makes good on his promise.

Sex with Jimin is something else.

The pleasure he brings you is so intense it’s almost painful.

It’s almost painful because, you hardly see each other and, if you had it your way, you’d be in his lap all the time.

But, life doesn’t work that way.

So, you take what you can get.

He makes you cum twice on his dick, with his thumb pressed firmly against your clit.

He whispers dirty secrets in your ear and, somehow manages to make you feel both filthy and beautiful all at once.

Prodding another weakness of his, hickies, you help him reach his own release and, within 10 minutes he’s attaining the orgasm he’s been craving so desperately.

“Fuck, I missed you so much...” He croons into your neck, nuzzling his nose there for a moment as you run your fingers through his hair.

“I missed you too.” You smile, kissing the shell of his ear

The two of you stay like that for a moment, kissing on one another, relishing in your reunion.

When the time is right, the two of you will share a place one day but, for now, you have to continue working hard and saving money for the things your future.

And speaking of making money...

Your phone buzzes in the pocket of your skirt and, you sadly drag your attention away from your boyfriend to see a text from your boss at the nursing home

Xander: Christian called out tonight :/

Xander: you want to work a double?

Night shifts pay time and a half and, it would be another 8 hours on this next paycheck...

It’s like a punch to the chest really.

Because, you have to leave.

One your one night off in nearly a month.

You feel like crying but, you know that’s ridiculous.

Jimin’s face falls as he sees the text on your phone but, he knows that his disappointment will only make you feel guilty and, he really doesn’t want that.

So instead, he curls a finger underneath your chin and, kisses you with a tenderness that he doesn’t often display.

Not that he isn’t sweet with you, it’s just that his lips are sinful and, normally they are working you into a frenzy.

The time you two have together is so limited that everything always feels so rushed but, in this moment, he takes the time to kiss you slowly.

And as he brushes a thumb across your cheek, he makes a promise to you, “I promise, we’ll get our break someday and, when that day comes, I’ll be kissing this pretty mouth of yours every chance I get...”

You smile, leaning into his hand, “I’ll make you breakfast every morning…and we can decorate together our place together and-“

Jimin interrupts your fantasy with a kiss, grinning fondly into your lips, “Anything you want.”

You wrap your arms around him once more, tucking your face into his neck, wishing desperately that you can stay here with him all night…

“I love you.” You whisper into his skin

“I love you too.” He replies, kissing the side of your head

Jimin walks you downstairs to the exit of the motel and, he tries his best to swallow his disappointment.

Your car is in the shop so; you’ll catch the bus right up the street and, try to remind yourself why you’re working so hard.

With a tight and lingering embrace, Jimin says his goodbyes to you, pecking your lips a dozen more times.

“Text me when you get home tonight…” He requests with a soft voice and, you nod, kissing him once more before stepping outside.

Jimin leans against the stained glass, watching you with love in his eyes as you turn to wave frantically at him.

It brings a giggle to his lips as he waves back, feeling an ache in his heart as you disappear into the crowd of people.

Jimin knows he’s never loved another person the way he loves you.

He knows he wants to spend the rest of his life with you.

But what Jimin didn’t know is that the agony of watching you leave after only a short time with him is nothing compared to the pain he has yet to endure.

Because tonight is no ordinary night.

Tonight, is the night you go missing.

Kosei Police Station, Thursday 6:24am

It’s been 54 hours since your friends heard from you.

Xander called Jimin, your emergency contact, when you didn’t show up for your shift Monday night.

The group promptly blew up your cell phone, trying any means necessary to reach you.

When there was no reply, they showed up to your apartment and much to their horror, the property manager has no recollection of you returning home.

“How long has she been missing?”

Jimin wants to scream at the uninterested clerk behind the desk.

He wants to scream in general.

The police station should be in full chaos at the news of your absence.

They should be on the phone with every available resource, repeating your name and details over and over.

But it’s not.

It’s eerily calm and, he doesn’t understand why.

“The last time I saw her was on Monday. She was supposed to work that night but, her manager said she never showed up.”

Jimin doesn’t recognize his own voice.

He feels like he’s outside of his body.

“Mhm…” The man drone behind the glass, casually typing a few things into the computer, “And what was her name again?”

Jimin’s blood boils over and, thank god for Namjoon because, he immediately intervenes.

“Y/N Y/L/N. She’s __ years old, she has __ hair, __ eyes and, she was last seen at the Paybrook Motel, Monday night. This isn’t like her to disappear. What is your protocol for these kinds of things?”

The man enters the information before shrugging at Namjoon’s question, “Uh we’ll send a squad car out to do some ground work but, uh honestly most cases like these are resolved pretty quickly, I wouldn’t worry too much about it.”

Taehyung arches a brow, leaning in towards the bulletproof glass, “You wouldn’t- you wouldn’t worry too much about it? Our best friend is missing…”

The man nods immediately, as if he’s amending his mistake, “Of course, I just mean- she’ll probably turn up you know, most people do.”

Jimin’s eyes are stinging, he’s trying his best to keep it together but, the fluorescent lights are blinding him, the stale scent of old coffee makes him want to vomit, he feels like he’s losing his mind.

“Y/N isn’t most people…” Jimin spits, his eyes honing in on the man, “She wouldn’t just vanish like this, something must have happened to her, this is an emergency. Why aren’t you sending someone out right now?”

“Sir, this is the inner city, no offense but, people like her disappear all the time…”

Jimin’s eyes narrow, “People like her? What the fuck does that mean?”

“Jimin.” Yoongi murmurs, wrapping an arm around him and urges him away from the desk before things get out of hand.

Surprisingly, Jimin follows but, not without sending a warning glare towards the clerk.

Long story short; the police are no help.

They don’t understand the gravity of the situation.

They don’t seem to grasp the pain the seven of your friends are feeling.

Even if they did, it doesn’t appear that they would care either way.

But the thing is, your friends are used to this.

They are used to being let down by the people who they’re supposed to trust.

Their hardships cultivated a unique ability within them each of them.

And that ability was to fend for themselves.

So a plan is made to spread out and search for you on their own.

With heavy hearts and fire running through their veins, Jin, Yoongi, Namjoon, Hoseok, Jimin, Taehyung and, Jungkook leave their responsibilities behind to search for their best friend.

Act II- Sous La Grande Maison

Jimin- Chillzzz Ice Cream Parlor, Black Swan Brewery and Pub, Cozy Acres Retirement Home

Thursday 7:38pm-10:01pm

Jimin spent most of the day retracing your steps like a mad man. He went back to the motel and, walked along the path you would have taken to the bus stop, he showed your photo to every person who would give him the time of day. He spoke with subway drivers, businessmen in suits, homeless people but, no one spoke up, most of them wouldn’t even look at him…

He cried beneath the awning of the motel, not even noticing the judgmental looks that were thrown his way.

For good measure, he calls you and texts you another 50 times as he tries to swallow the acidic taste of fear crawling up his throat.

Where the fuck were you?

He visits your boss at the ice cream store but, she says she hasn’t seen you since your shift Monday morning.

He makes his way to the dive bar you wait tables at but, they have the same story except they haven’t seen you since Sunday night.

Everyone at both locations says the same thing though…

“It’s so unlike her you know? To just disappear.”

“I really hope nothing happened to her.”

“Whatever you need, just let us know.”

Jimin feels like he wants to pass out.

He feels like he’s been dropped in the dead center of a nightmare.

But, he knows he has to act quickly

The city has a habit of swallowing people whole and, he’ll be damned if his girlfriend falls victim to its clutches.

He makes a final stop at the retirement home you work in to speak with Xander.

Xander shows his concern for you in a big way; it makes Jimin slightly uneasy.

“Oh my god what are we gonna do? The police aren’t on it? How are they not taking this seriously?

“Jimin, we have to find her man, I would be devastated if something happened to her.”

“She’s my best employee, she’s absolutely precious…”

Jimin has half a mind to tell him to ‘shut the fuck up’

This is his girlfriend.

His everything.

Not Xander’s.

But Jimin knows he’s sensitive right now and, Xander’s behavior is a nice change of pace.

At least he gives a shit.

With all of his leads coming up dry, he decides to visit the one person who just might be able to help.

Someone who always assured him that they would be there should he need absolutely anything.

Someone who just might have the means to operate above the incompetence of the police department.

“Come here.” Lady’s voice is tender and, reassuring as she quickly pulls Jimin into her chest.

He collapses into her arms, an abrupt sob leaving his lips as he clutches the satin of her blouse.

Lady is a special person.

Jimin started working as her pool boy just over a year ago and, she quickly welcomed him into her life.

She was becoming the mother Jimin never had and, in this moment, in the wake of his misery, he needs her more than ever.

“I don’t understand-“ He cries into her neck, her perfume is far too strong for his liking but, he remains close to her anyway, “Where is she? She never does this, she always gets back to us I- fuck…what if something happened to her? What if someone ki- ki…oh my god.” He wants to throw up, he can’t even get the word to pass his lips because, the thought of you being harmed literally sickens him.

“Shhh shhh shh, honey it’s ok, just breathe for me alright? Just breathe…” She coos, rubbing his back gently, her face tight with sadness, “I already have my guys working on it. They got started this morning once the news broke. I’ll put flyers up at the country club as well; everyone I have at my disposal is out there looking for her alright?”

Jimin just nods, he isn’t able to say much through his tears but, her words do calm him slightly.

Lady has resources that Jimin doesn’t have and, for the first time, he is going to accept her help.

She’s offered to assist him many times in a myriad of different ways:

Rent money, tuition assistance, money for textbooks, a new car…

But Jimin’s turned them down all the same; he never wants to feel like he owes someone for something.

He accepts the free food and, the occasional fancy clothes she gifts from her deceased husbands closet and, if anyone thinks of judging him for strutting around in dead guy clothes, Jimin would promptly remind them that he is wearing Gucci and, they are not.

This time though, Jimin doesn’t protest; he will take all the help he can get from anywhere he can get it…

��Let's get you a cup of tea or something, c’mon...”

Lady ushers Jimin to the rich color of her lignum vitae dining table and, she even ensures she pulls out a chair for him to rest easy on.

Jimin practically slumps into it, his body helpless.

Lady already had a pot ready for him and, although Jimin tries to act like he doesn’t enjoy it, she knows Lavender is his favorite...

“The police have her vehicle information in their news report, I’ll have my guys searching for her civic in no time.” She murmurs, pouring his tea and, eyeing him carefully.

Jimin winces, watching the steam rise from his cup, trying to hold onto reality, “Her car is still in the shop.”

“That’s right my goodness,” Lady puts a hand to her chest, shaking her head, “Do you think the person who cut her cables had something to do with this?”

His heart sinks but, he hesitates a moment before responding, dread filling his chest once again, “I- I don’t know maybe? It’s not impossible. It’s been in the shop for the last two months though, it wouldn’t make sense for them to wait so long. Oh god, unless they have been watching her? Do you really thinks that’s possible?”

She brings him into her arms again, the pads of her fingers rubbing gently against his lower back, “There are sick people in this world Jimin. But I promise you honey, we are going to do everything we can to bring her home.”

Jimin leaves Lady’s house with a slightly better outlook.

Slightly

You are still missing of course but, at least he has someone powerful on his side.

Lady is an incredible person and, without her, Jimin thinks he might lose his mind.

Jin- The Night Market, Friday 8:22pm

You all like the rooftop for different reasons, Jin likes it for the landscape of the night market: The neon lights illuminating the different food carts, the bustling movement of all of the patrons eager to try the next deep fried delicacy. As he walks along the wet cement, he smiles to himself, remembering all the times he used to drag the seven of you down here. He always saved his tips from the restaurant, and once a month, he would splurge, buying everything in sight. The complaints would soon cease as he shoved fried cheese in your faces, the desire to eat like royalty overcoming the group. And you would, you’d eat until you couldn’t walk anymore and, Jin would feel warmth blooming in his chest as he watched all of his friends, whom were more like family, eating well. He’s the oldest, he would think, it was his job to watch over the people he loves. It’s in this moment, as he’s reminiscing that he feels despair tear through his heart.

He had failed.

Because, one of you were gone.

One of you weren’t safely tucked under his mother-goose gaze.

Your smile comes through his subconscious then and, it feels like a thousand tiny needles scurrying up his cheeks to prick at his eyes.

You always laughed at his puns, no matter how stupid they were

You always tried whatever food he put in front of you, no matter how strange or spicy it was, you’d humor him.

With a heavy hand, he wipes the tears from his eyes before they can spill over.

He doesn’t have time for pain right now.

Because, tonight he’s at the market for different reasons.

Tonight, he was here to investigate.

The Night Market vendors are an interesting crowd, most of them were older, just trying to make ends meet by selling their creations but, there were a few newcomers that Jin’s noticed over the years.

They were lured in by the neon, the paper lanterns, the money…

They didn’t understand the culture of this place and, Jin resented them for it.

“Yah! You’re the money man yeah? Are you buying me out tonight? Where are your friends?”

Jin is forced out of his inner thoughts and, he meets the eyes of an older gentleman who owns the Mandu stand; one of his favorites.

“I’m not here for much tonight, my friends are busy but,” He selfishly scans the selection of dumplings, plump and ripe for the taking. He points to a pork and vegetable one to the right of the case, “I’ll take one of the pork ones for the road. Is it ok if I ask you a few questions?”

The man wrinkles his brow in confusion, “Me? I guess so, what can I do for you?”

With a deep sigh, Jin pulls out his phone, with a photo of you as his home screen. He swallows back the bit of misery in his throat as he sees your face, before showing it to the vendor, “This is my friend. She went missing three days ago and, she was last seen up on that rooftop over there, “ He gestures to the motel, “She left alone and, she would have walked right past here on her way home. Did you see her at all?”

As he pushes his glasses up his nose, the man squints at the photo, trying to make sense of it. After a moment, he shakes his head.

“Sorry. I haven’t seen her.” His eyes flit over the image again, a bit of darkness lingering in his eyes, “Pretty little thing though…”

Jin immediately rips his phone from the man’s view, disgusted at his comment but, he doesn’t want to make a scene and risk his line of information being cut off.

“Thanks. If you remember anything let me know. I’ll be around for a bit.”

He grunts in response, his interest waning as another customer walks up to his stand.

Jin feels an immense amount of frustration; why the fuck does this man think its ok to gawk at you despite what he’s just told him?

Does he have no heart?

Raking his hand through his hair, Jin takes a deep breath. He doesn’t have time for his emotions right now, he needs to push forward.

He moves throughout the stands, showing your picture to every familiar face that will give him the time of day.

The chorus of no’s that echo back at him, slowing chip away at his resolve and, he feels himself growing desperate as he nears the end of the market.

He hates how suspicious he feels.

He hates that this place, which is home to so many happy memories, is now shrouded with a kind of darkness that he’s only ever read about in books.

He feels sick with the thought of coming back without you; he doesn’t think he ever would.

There is a few stands left, which Jin moves through without success before he finally reaches the Tteokbokki stand.

It’s his favorite and, normally he’d be shoveling an entire tray of it into his mouth.

But tonight, the smell of the sauce makes his stomach turn.

“Excuse me, have you-“ Jin begins wearily but, he’s quickly cut off by the man beneath the umbrella.

“You’re here about the missing girl right?”

The man’s brow rises but, it does nothing to smooth out the valleys of wrinkles between his eyes.

“I am…” Jin crosses his arms, reluctant to continue the conversation as the man smirks salaciously in his direction, “How did you know?”

His smirk grows when he holds up a yellow walkie-talkie, “Word travels fast. I’m guessing you’re here to ask me if I’ve seen her and, I would tell you that I have but, unless you have something to offer me. I’m afraid that’s all I plan on telling you.”

Jin’s face immediately flushes red. Anger floats up beneath the surface of his surprise but, he knows that if he reacts in the way he that wants to, the man will shut down.

“What do you want?” He mutters through the tension in his jaw.

The man’s gaze travels over Jin’s figure before settling on the pocket of his jeans, “Buy me out for the night and, I’ll tell you what I saw...”

A quick scan of his cart shows Jin roughly 3 dozen trays of Tteokbokki. Even if he had an appetite, he doesn’t have the stomach or the means to consume that much food, nor does he have a way to get it back to his apartment.

“How much is your cart worth?”

The man tilts his head, squinting his eyes in thought, “Well, its 3 for a tray and there’s 47 on the cart…you do the math.”

Jin finally does send a glare towards the man; enraged that he’s capitalizing off of his grief but, he types in the calculations none the less.

“$141…” He concludes, showing him the number on his cell phone, “I don’t have that much.”

With a shrug, the man gives Jin a look of faux disappointment, “That’s a shame, I guess my memory is a little hazy then. Maybe I saw her, maybe I didn’t- have a good night.”

“Wait- please I…” Jin takes a deep breath, pulling out a wad of cash from his pocket, “I only have $100 right now but, I can get more. I work at the sushi restaurant up the street, I’ll bring you all of my tips for the next week.”

The man eyes him suspiciously, mulling over his offer, “The next two weeks…”

Jin’s never been so angry in his life and, part of him wants to flip over his cart and, leave him to clean up the mess but, he knows he has to bargain with him.

He has no other choice.

“Fine.” He throws the money onto the counter with a stern look, “Keep the food, just tell me what you know.”

The man takes his time, counting the money greedily, smirking with satisfaction as he tucks it into his shirt pocket.

“I saw your friend leaving that motel you always hang out at. The one across the street-“ He nods to the ratty building, “She left and walked along the road for some time before a man approached her.”

Jin’s heart picks up, “A man? What man? What did he look like?”

“I didn’t get a close look. He was tall and dressed in some fancy ass suit. They walked together all the way up the road until I couldn’t see them anymore. She didn’t look uncomfortable; in fact…it kind of looked like she knew him.”

As the man tells his story, Jin writes all of the details down in his phone but, the last bit confuses him.

He didn’t know you knew anyone that owned a suit.

Suits are a luxury that neither he nor any of the other guys can afford.

So who were you with then?

“That’s all? Anything else you remember?”

The man shakes his head, “That’s all I got for you. Thanks for the cash, I look forward to seeing you again with the rest of it.”

A chorus of snickering comes with his last comment and, Jin finally decides he’s had enough of him.

With a roll of his eyes, he walks away, leaving the hustle and bustle of the night market to slowly fade behind him as he makes his way up the street.

He begins typing a message to the group chat, informing everyone of what he found.

He sees your icon at the top of his screen whilst he does and, it triggers the tears collecting in his eyes to finally spill over.

Namjoon- The Marquee River, Friday 9:54pm

Namjoon loves the rooftop for the view of the river. He loves the way the sun and moon expertly change the color of its surface from a crystal blue in the daytime to an inky black in the evening. He loves the way people congregate around it. It’s such a stark contradiction to the city. Everyone always looks so happy and so patient with one another. Families are sprawled out on picnic blankets, friends are laughing and sharing homemade dishes, lovers walk along the river holding hands…

It’s a magical place.

Well, at least Namjoon thinks so.

The boys tease him for it, they call him Namstradamus and, say he concerns himself with hypothetical situations far too often.

But you get it though.

You’ve sat with Namjoon on many nights while he smokes a cigarette, watching the interactions with the same fondness he does.

You laughed as he did little voices for the people he saw and, listened eagerly as he created stories for each of them.

You told him he should be a writer and Namjoon felt a satisfaction that his imagination could entertain you.

Deep down, being a writer is something he’s always dreamed of.

He wishes he was on the rooftop with you now, laughing and bullshitting.

He wishes he could see your smile when Jimin shouts a raunchy compliment your way and, makes a comment about how Namjoon is trying to steal you from him.

Its all for fun though.

Namjoon doesn’t love you like that but, the way he loves you makes tonight’s task so much harder.

He loves you like a sister and, his sister is gone.

Vanished.

And he has to figure out why.

Namjoon is wearing his father’s coat; it’s the only thing warm enough for this weather he tells himself but, really he wears it because it’s the nicest thing in his home.

It makes him feel capable, even though he’s never felt more inadequate in his life.

There isn’t many people left at the river tonight, the cold weather is keeping everyone inside along with the news of your disappearance.

Namjoon has someone in mind though.

Someone who is always here: the groundskeeper.

Namjoon notices him emerge as people begin packing up their things but, he doesn’t approach him just yet.

He stands back and observes his behavior, carefully planning what he needs to say.

But, Namjoon doesn’t get much time as the groundskeeper has noticed him too.

“What is it you seek madam? I can do anything…anything you wish.”

The voice of the groundskeeper is ominous; it makes the hair on the back of his neck stand at attention but, his words confuse him even more.

“Uh excuse me, I’m really sorry to bother you but, I was wondering if you’ve seen my friend. She went missing a few nights ago, I have her picture here…” Namjoon goes to pull out his phone but, the man stops him with a laugh.

It’s not a pleasant sound, it’s crazed and dismissive, it doesn’t mirror the laughter he normally hears from the river.

It makes his stomach turn.

“I know what the princess looks like madam, I’ve seen her looking down at me many times.” The moonlight shines upon his face then and, it’s enough for Namjoon to make out his features.

He looks filthy, skin alight with grease, hair matted with the same substance, his eyes are blue and unfocused. A giant scar interrupts his features and, Namjoon does his best to remain composed despite his appearance.

“So have you seen her? She would have walked right passed here on her way home.” He flashes the picture towards him anyway but, it only prompts another ridiculous laugh from him and, Namjoon feels himself growing irritated.

“Yep! That’s the one! The princess marked for slaughter, oh but she runs from her fate doesn’t she? She runs and runs and runs runs…..she runs a lot. It’s no use madam, you’ll always catch her in the end.”

As he hears the word slaughter, Namjoon feel his blood boil over and, he quickly grabs the snickering man by his shirt, “What the fuck are you talking about?”

The man falters with a gasp but, his laughter continues, his breath fowl and unkempt, “She is gone forever. Left to destiny…left to rot…”

Namjoon feels his heart jump in his chest and he tugs at the man’s shirt again, harder this time, “What do you mean gone? Did you do something to her? If you touched her, I swear I’ll fucking kill you, my friends and I will tear you apart!”

Tears don’t aid in Namjoon’s attempt to look tough but, he can’t help himself.

His grief is unbearable and, all this man can do is laugh…

“I have nothing for you madam…what’s done is done.” He seethes, bearing his grimy teeth as he smiles

“Why do you keep calling me madam? You know who I am, you’ve seen my friends before. What the fuck is wrong with you?”

The man responds by placing a dirty hand against Namjoon’s cheek, leaning in towards his ear, “You are…a work of art madam, it was a pleasure to serve you…”

With this, the man shoves away from Namjoon’s hold and rushes back to the trashcan, muttering to himself all the while.

Namjoon feels unsafe around him, especially as he notices how empty the river has become so, he decides to get out of there.

He wipes his tears as he moves through the trees back towards the noise of the street.

There is nothing but utter anguish inside of him now.

One of his best friends is missing and, his only lead is a raging lunatic.

He sends his findings to the group chat anyway, praying that someone has more information than he does, praying that this nightmare will come to an end.

Yoongi- Ginseng Night Club, Saturday 12:04am,

Yoongi hates clubs. There’s too many people, they’re too loud, everyone is drunk and stupid. He doesn’t really see the point in them. However, Ginseng has a vibe he can appreciate. It’s a little more laid back, a little less expensive and, it’s major upside is its showcase of underground rappers. Yoongi’s never had the courage to get up on stage but, he likes to listen from the rooftop. He judges the contestants from a far because, let’s face it, most of them are trash but, he enjoys their enthusiasm. Some of them are actually pretty good though and, a lot of times Yoongi has to swallow the avarice he feels when he hears them. He can rap too but, the only people who know about it are his friends.

They tell him he’s good enough to make it big but, Yoongi never believes them.

He misses freestyling on the rooftop though and, tonight he’s missing your reactions in particular.

You were always pushing him to perform and one day, drunkenly, you had managed to convince him to promise you that he’d perform at Ginseng on his 26th birthday.

That date is steadily approaching and, although he was terrified of keeping that promise, he desperately wishes that were the reason he was pushing through the crowd at Ginseng right now.

But it isn’t…

Tonight, he’s here to deal with bleaker matter: your disappearance.

Ginseng is cheaper for a reason and, that reason happens to be the crowd.

It’s known for its cast of shady characters: drug dealers, con artists, underground fighters, etc.

He thinks it’s a little pointless, walking into a room full of potential criminals, hoping one of them has the heart to spill any information regarding his missing friend but, he had to try.

Yoongi decided on all black for the evening; it makes him feel bigger and, prepares him for the onslaught of human interaction he’s dreading.

Immediately, his chest is met with the hammering base from the speakers, whilst his nose is met with the stench of cheap liquor and, all eyes are on him.

He’s an unfamiliar face in a club that profits off of regular attendees but, he swallows his anxiety and, soldiers on, heading straight for the bar at the back of the club.

“What can I get for you?” A short haired woman barks over the music, sending a mild glare Yoongi’s way.

He notices the tattoos adorning her neck and arms and, he feels intimidated by her presence but, he responds none the less.

“Whiskey neat.” He mutters, sliding a ten her way and, she eagerly strips it from the counter, shoving it into the register.

“You’ve never been here before.” She notes dryly, grabbing a bottle of Jack from the shelf.

Yoongi nods, shifting on the barstool, “Yeah, I’m here to see if anyone’s seen my friend. She disappeared on this street the other night…”

The woman smirks, nodding her head towards the crowd of people, “Do these people look like they’d be up for snitching?”

He glances back momentarily, “No but, I thought I’d try anyway. I have a picture of her…” He pulls out his phone, flashing the image of you towards the bartender.

She gives it a once over before shaking her head, “Haven’t seen her. I’d remember her if I had. Girlfriend?”

“No…” He clicks the side of his phone, shutting the screen off, “Do you know if I could talk to someone who comes here a lot? Like a regular or something? I’m not trying to cause trouble but-“

“These people aren’t gonna tell you shit unless you speak to Jaebeom first and, I don’t know if he’d be willing to talk to scrawny little thing like you.”

Yoongi has to swallow back the feelings he gets from her insult, feeling smaller and smaller under her gaze.

“Who’s Jaebeom?”

“The owner.” She pushes the drink Yoongi’s way, spilling some of it onto the dirty countertop, “He only does business in Korean…”

“Call him up then,” Yoongi retorts sternly, growing annoyed with her attitude and the carelessness with his liquor, “, that’s my native language. Or tell me where he is…”

“He’s a busy man… I don’t know if he’ll have time for you…”

“Ask him anyways.”

There’s a bit of a stare off lingering between the two of them but, Yoongi doesn’t falter, his confidence waxing.

He’ll be a dick if he has to, he doesn’t care; he has to figure out where you are.

She rolls her eyes, grabbing the receiver from underneath the bar before muttering something into it. Something causes her to raise her brows in surprise and, she looks a little disappointed as she passes the receiver to Yoongi.

He takes it, holding it up to his ear,

“What do you want?”

Moving the receiver to his lips, he responds clearly, trying to mask his nerves, “My friend is missing and, I want to know if you’ve seen her. Or if you know anything about her disappearance.”

The man chuckles deeply on the other end of the line, “Am I a suspect?”

“Everyone is. But I’m not a cop; I’m just here to see if anyone has seen anything.”

“And the police? Do they know about your little friend?”

Yoongi grasps the receiver firmer, attempting to amp up his toughness as he responds, “The police are fucking useless. Look, just let me show you here picture, if you haven’t seen her, I’ll leave.”

There’s only a bit of silence but, it’s enough to get his heart racing before he finally gets a reply, “Second floor, room 632. Don’t make me wait for you.”

Yoongi obliges, pounding his drink and rushing off to meet the man behind the voice.

Jaebeom seems to tower over Yoongi despite the mere inches he has on him and, he looks more intimidating than Yoongi ever could.

Three facial piercings, arms wrapped completely in tattoos, loose tank top adorning his muscular figure; if Yoongi were in a different world, he’d be wishing he was meeting this stranger in his room for different reasons.

“Let’s see it then…”

Yoongi shows him the photo of you and much to his surprise, Jaebeom nods, pointing a finger towards it, “I’ve seen her before, not recently though. She came in a few months ago and bought a bottle of Midori from me. She’s your girlfriend?”

Yoongi shakes his head, “No, she’s with my other friend but, you’ve seen her? Did she come in alone?”

The room smells of marijuana and as Jaebeom lifts a joint to his lips, Yoongi can see why.

He nods, blowing out a billow of smoke, careless to where it ends up, “She was alone yes, I didn’t speak to her much. She was polite, left me a tip, batted her eyes a bit and left. She’s cute, it’s a shame she’s taken.” He smirks, lifting the joint to his mouth again, “Both literally and figuratively….”

Yoongi takes a deep breath through his nose, attempting to calm down, “You haven’t seen her since?”

“No. Honestly, why are you here? Do you really think my guys are into kidnapping? There are plenty of hot woman downstairs. No one is looking to steal. You’re on the wrong side of town for this shit. “

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Jaebeom flicks the ash onto the floor, nodding to the window beside him, “You should be asking questions in the Upside. They hunt poor bitches like that for sport.”

Yoongi’s anger floods his brain before he can process everything he’s said, “Watch your mouth. She has a name and, I suggest you learn it before I-“

With a puffed out chest, Jaebeom steps toward Yoongi, “Before what huh?”

Yoongi moves back, shaking his head, “Nothing I-“ He sighs, holding his hands up, “I’m sorry. I’m angry, its been a long week. My friends and I just want her home.”

Jaebeom deflates a bit, scanning over the smaller man in front of him, “My sister disappeared two years ago. Same street. Like I said,” Jaebum plops down in his arm chair, sadness flashes through his eyes, “You’re in the wrong part of town…”

He nods, biting his lip at Jaebeom’s admission, “Did they ever find her?”

“They might have…” He takes a hit of the joint, blowing it out with a scoff, “if they fucking looked.”

Yoongi’s blood runs cold then, seeing the similarities between the two situations.

No one cares about the people who disappear from this part of town.

He leaves Jaebeom’s room, feeling worse than when he had arrived but, he reports his findings to the group chat anyway.

Maybe Jaebeom was right, maybe him and his friends were looking on the wrong side of town…

Jungkook and Hoseok- The Paybrook Motel, Saturday 7:07am

Jungkook and Hoseok are newer to the harshness of the city. They come from sweet families, with good intentions. The lack of financial resources is compensated with a lot of love and encouragement. Their lives were similar: simple and sweet. They didn’t have too many run ins with childhood trauma or absent parental figures; they loved their home life, probably to a fault. But given their lack of money and their love of their friends, they also found reasons to love the rooftop. Hoseok uses the concrete as an affordable practice space and Jungkook uses the view as the main muse for his photography.

You’re running through their head as they approach the motel.

Hoseok feels a pang of sadness in his chest as he remembers all the times you would cheer him on from your lawn chair, calling him the b-boy of the year, smiling from ear to ear even when he fucks up his choreography.

Jungkook remembers showing you an album he made of the summer the eight of you had. He remembers you growing teary eyed as he neared the end and, telling him what an amazing photographer he was. He swallows back his tears, gripping Hoseok’s hand as they approach the entrance to the motel, taking a deep breath.

“Maybe we shouldn’t-” Hoseok looks uneasily toward their connected hands, his teeth tugging on his bottom lip. “I just don’t want them to say anything to you.”

Jungkook looks down, his chestnut irises narrowed in confusion, “But, we’re just friends hyung...”

Hoseok nods, sending a sweet smile towards his pure friend, “I know Kook but, they don’t know that. I promise I’ll hold it as soon we leave ok?”

And Jungkook really has to act like this doesn’t further his misery, sniffling once as he finally nods, pulling away from his best friend, naïve to his reasons for ending their platonic affection.

Hoseok pats his arm before swinging open the stained-glass door to the motel, allowing Jungkook to step in front of him.

There is a woman sitting behind the counter, staring intently at her computer screen, not even bothering to look up at the two men that have just entered.

“Good morning.” Hoseok sends a watery smile her way, which she doesn’t reciprocate.

In fact, she doesn’t even look his way but, instead she shoves a piece of paper across the wooden countertop, “Fill this out, there’s only two rooms available- “ At this point, she does eye the two of them with a judging glance, “single beds only.”

“We don’t need a room mam we-” Hoseok begins, feeling rather annoyed but, Jungkook cuts him off and, practically shoves his phone over the counter.

“This is our friend, her name is Y/N and, she went missing four days ago and, the last place we saw her is here. Have you seen her? Do you remember if anything suspicious happened?”

Jungkook’s voice is reedy, full of desperation to the point that he grows a little out of breath.

Hoseok had a plan with a little more finesse but, he knows how desperate Jungkook is to find you.

He feels the same way...

The woman looks affronted by his sudden outburst but, she glances at his phone anyway. It’s only for a moment before she brings her attention Hoseok’s way, not bothering to address Jungkook.

“Nope. I’ve never seen her, sorry.”

The dismissiveness in her tone surprises Hoseok. He was expecting her to keep her responses to a minimum but, her lie takes him back.

“Wait are you serious? I live on the 8th floor, my friends come in here all the time. There’s no way you’ve never seen her before.”

He steps closer to the counter and, the way the woman looks up stirs something inside of him.

It’s unsettling and insidious.

It’s as if she’s deceiving them and, she wants them to know she’s deceiving them.

“I’ve seen you here before,” She shrugs, conceding with part of his point, “but I’ve never seen her. Although, I’m surprised she doesn’t rent a room here too, she looks like the type.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Hoseok feels the venom in his tone and, although it’s unlike him to lose his temper, something about this woman enrages him.

“Hyung please...” Jungkook’s soft plea paired with a hand to his lower back is enough for Hoseok to back down for the moment but, his nerves are still alight with suspicion. “Mam, we’re really sorry, we’re just worried about our friend. She’s been missing for a while and the police aren’t really doing anything. Are you sure that you’ve never seen her?”

The woman seems to soften a bit momentarily but, as something on her computer seems to move suddenly into her view, she toughens up again, shaking her head.

“Never. Is there anything else we- I can do for you?”

Hoseok grits his teeth, restraining his urges to throw her glass of iced tea into her face.

“No, I guess not.”

She offers a thin smile, that doesn’t reach her eyes, “Have a nice day then. Thank you for visiting The Paybrook Motel.”

Before Hoseok can throw an insult her way, Jungkook offers a pleasant goodbye before practically dragging his hyung out of the lobby.

“Yah! Why were you so easy on her? She’s obviously lying! Did you see the look on her face? She knows something Jungkook, I’m telling you she does...” Hoseok is ablaze with frustration, moving quickly to the end of the awning that decorates the front of the motel.

He’s waiting for Jungkook to join him but, instead he sees his friend moving aimlessly towards him, tears in his eyes.

The sight makes Hoseok’s heart ache.

“Hyung...don’t you get it? No one wants to help us.” His voice is wavering through his sadness, doing it’s best to keep afloat, “Even if she knows something, she doesn’t want to tell us. The police won’t help, the signs we put up are all in the sewer by now- no one gives a shit that she’s gone.”

At this moment, Jungkook breaks down, his tears finally streaming down his face. He stops in the middle of the walkway, disregarding the confused looks from the patrons heading into the building.

“Shit Kookie, don’t cry ok?”

Hoseok rushes over to him in the midst of his hypocrisy, because he’s crying too.

He hasn’t cried since you disappeared but, seeing his best friend break down and, knowing that life would never again be the same crushes him in a way he can’t handle.

“Come here...come here. Hyung is here ok? Ok? We gotta pull it together.” He sniffles, pulling Jungkook into his arms, placing a kiss on top of his head.

Jungkook doesn’t let up and, continues to cry silently into Hoseok’s t-shirt.

“I just want her to come home hyung...”

Hoseok nods immediately, tilting his head back to slow his tears. It’s a useless endeavor but, he tries anyway until a man’s voice interrupts their moment.

“I saw her.”

Hoseok and Jungkook are quick to pull away, turning their attention towards the voice in question.

It’s obvious the man is a security guard of some kind but, Hoseok has never seen him before.

“Excuse me?”

The man nods to the rooftop, “I saw your friend the night she left here.”

Hoseok approaches the man, noticing the way he seems to shrink away from his presence, “What did you see? Did you see anyone with her?”

He nods, “Yeah, that small dude you hang out with, the messy hair...he was wearing a yellow shirt?”

Jungkook moves to stand behind Hoseok, “That’s her boyfriend. He’s one of our friends too, he walked her out that night. He came right back up though, did you see anyone else?”

The security guard smirks, “Hm that’s interesting.”

Hoseok narrows his eyes, “Why?”

The guard nods to the street parallel to the conversation, “Because she met up with someone else...”

Jungkook and Hoseok make eye contact then, a bit of shock running through them.

“Who was it?”

The guard chuckles, shrugging his shoulders, his indifference insulting the two of them, “Listen, I’m new around here alright? I don’t know names or shit like that, I just know that after your friend was kissing on one guy, she met up with some dude in a suit, you can do with that what you will but, that’s all I got for you.”

“Jin hyung said something about a suit too.” Jungkook mutters beside Hoseok prompting a nod from him.

“Thank you. We appreciate it and, uh listen if you hear or see anything else. I’m on the 8th floor. Room 26.”

The guard nods, tipping his hat toward the both of them, “Will do. Be safe out there, this city is uh, an interesting place.”

As the man moves back towards the motel Jungkook turns to Hoseok, bewildered by the information they’ve received.

“Hyung do you-” Jungkook hesitates, the words not wanting to leave his tongue, “-do you think she left on her own? She wouldn’t do that right?”

Hoseok keeps an eye on the guard as he disappears behind the stained glass, a sick feeling looming in his stomach.

“No Jungkook, she wouldn’t.”

Taehyung- La Petite Galerie, Saturday 12:46pm

Taehyung's been painting since he was a child. Adopted into a French family, he learned his two favorite crafts from an early age: painting and charisma. He was the star of his elementary school, wooing his classmates with the use of his second language and, wooing his teachers with his painting abilities. Consistently, he placed first in his school’s art fair. He was labeled as a prodigy and, selected for all of the finest performing arts schools in the city. However, prestigious art schools come at a price his family couldn’t afford. So, he had to stay behind with the rest of his classmates, whilst his parents begin saving money. He’s so thankful that he did though because, high school is where he met his second family. The family who he’s met on the rooftop since he was 15 years old, the family who’s helped him through his darkest days, the family who’s recently been torn apart...

He’s missing you as he walks into the gallery.

It’s one of his favorite parts about the rooftop along with the view of the city skyline.

You and Taehyung have sat together many times, admiring the well-dressed people walking into the gallery.

You would always say that they were simply apart of a different world and, that you never hated them for their riches.

Taehyung admired that about you because, he wishes he could say the same.

But, he knows he’d be lying.

One day, Taehyung had been brave enough to come into the gallery and, he actually made friends with the owner.

Taehyung makes friends with everyone.

But this woman, Clementine, had a particular soft spot for his French abilities and, gave Taehyung discounted admission for all of his friends.

Eventually, Taehyung brought the eight of you in with him and, much to his surprise, you all enjoyed yourselves.

He remembers that day as he steps under the warm glow of the gallery lights...

Jin made puns about the paintings

Namjoon endlessly dissected the potential meanings behind them

Yoongi had admired them quietly, murmuring observations that no one could hear

Hoseok laughed way too loud at the statue bestowing a marble penis

Jungkook kept to Taehyung’s side as he expertly explained the stories behind the artwork

But the image that hurts Taehyung the most is the way you looked at Jimin as he stared in awe up at the paintings.

Taehyung had never seen someone so enamored with another person before and, he realized why so many artists use love as their muse.

He felt happiness in his heart that you and Jimin were so happy, so much so, that he didn’t even bother thinking of his own romantic future.

He was content.

His family was here, admiring art in their own way, just as it was intended.

A bit of panic rushes through him at the thought of never having you all together again.

But determination comes along with it, reminding him why he’s visiting the gallery today.

“Excusez-moi, j'ai rendez-vous avec Clémentine aujourd'hui (Excuse me, I have an appointment with Clementine today).”

The woman behind the ivory desk smiles pleasantly at him, “Ah oui Monsieur Kim, asseyez-vous et je sais qu'elle est arrivée.” (Ah yes, Mr. Kim, have a seat and I’ll let her know you’ve arrived)

He bows his head slightly, sending a tight-lipped smile her way, “Merci.” (Thank you)

Taehyung takes a seat on the upholstered chairs near the entrance, thankful that the crowd level is mild today. It’s unexpected for a Saturday but, he doesn’t complain, he doesn’t think he can handle excessive human interaction.

He waits for roughly 10 minutes before a nimble woman with auburn hair comes bustling out of the back room, arms opening wide as soon as she sees him.

“Taehyung, ma chérie viens ici, viens à Clémentine...” (Taehyung, my darling come here, come to Clementine)

Her pink lipstick accentuates the pout in her lips as she ushers Taehyung into a tight hug, her fake breasts providing very little comfort but, he accepts her affection anyway.

He needs it.

“Bonjour Clementine, (Hello Clementine)” He pats her hips respectively, smiling warmly as he pulls away, “Merci de me rencontrer... (Thanks for meeting me).”

She scoffs, waving him off as she eagerly pulls him into her office, “Non-sens, je n'accepterai pas de gratitude de votre part pendant cette période.” (Nonsense, I will not except gratitude from you during this time)

Taehyung offers her a half smile, adjusting his coat and stepping through the archway.

Clementine’s office is tasteful, covered in various shades of pink and her most favorite pieces she’s hand-picked from the gallery.

It’s a little loud for Taehyung but, he agrees that it’s uniquely Clementine and, he feels content enough in her presence to deal with it.

She rushes around her desk, plopping down on her pearl encrusted office chair, “Asseyez-vous ici mon doux garçon...” (Sit here my sweet boy)

Her face stays firm with pity as she places her manicured fingers on the marble, “Dis-moi, ont-ils entendu quelque chose?” (Tell me, have they heard anything?)

Taehyung left posters at the gallery the day after you went missing and, Clementine was all too eager to post them all over the building’s exterior.

He shakes his head, settling into the crushed velvet beneath him, “Non. La police n'a rien. J'ai peur qu'ils ne la recherchent même pas.” (No. The police have nothing. I’m afraid they aren’t even looking for her.)

With a tsk of her lips, Clementine shakes her head, “Inutile.” (Useless) She spits the word, leaning back into her chair, “Avez-vous trouvé quelque chose? Je sais que tu as dit que tes amis regardaient.” (Have you found anything? I know you said your friends were looking)

“Nous avons entendu quelques choses, mais nous n'avons pas encore beaucoup de pistes. On se retrouve demain soir pour faire un plan.” (We’ve heard a few things but, we don’t have many leads. We meet tomorrow evening to make a plan.) He feels the disappointment in his heart, wishing he was giving her a different answer, his predicament leaving him helpless.

“Desole.” (Sorry) She replies, pouting her lips and tucking her auburn hair behind her ear, “C'est dégoûtant de voir comment cette ville est dirigée.” (It’s disgusting how this city is run.)

A humorless laugh leaves Taehyung’s lip as he nods, “Oui. Oui ça l’est. C'est pourquoi je suis venu vers toi clémentine.” (Yes. Yes it is. That’s why I came to you Clementine.)

She looks a little flustered by his comment, scooting closer to the edge of her seat, placing a hand to her chest, “Moi? Qu'est-ce que tu as besoin de moi?” (Me? What do you need from me?)

Taehyung feels a little dirty at his next move but, he does it without a second thought.

Smiling, he extends a hand towards Clementine, catching her gaze with his, “Nous venons de mondes différents oui?” (We come from different worlds, yes?)

Against her better judgement, Clementine places her hand timidly atop Taehyungs, nearly shuddering at his warmth, “Oui, mais ça n'a pas d'importance.” (Yes but, that doesn’t matter)

Taehyung pretends to be surprised by her answer, “Non? Pouvez-vous voir au-delà de cela?” (No? Can you see beyond that?)

She leans towards his voice, allured by the way it caramelizes in the air around her, “Je ne vois pas ces choses. L'argent, la couleur, l'âge, ce n'est pas important.” (I don’t see these things. Money, color, age, they aren’t important)

If he were in a different situation, he would notice the ignorance in her statement. But instead, he begins rubbing his thumb over the back of her knuckles, smiling prettily all the while.

Clementine is melting beneath his touch, her body subconsciously slouching in her chair.

“Vous vous souciez de moi malgré ces choses, n'est-ce pas?” (You care for me despite those things, don’t you?)

Eagerly, she nods, licking her lips before tucking her bottom lip between her teeth, “Oui mon amour.” (Yes my love.)

Taehyung leans closer to her, mustering up the best smolder he can manage, “J'ai besoin de savoir ce que vous entendez dans votre monde chéri.” (I need to know what you hear in that world of yours darling.)

Bless her, Clementine really is doomed.

“Mon monde? Que voulez-vous dire?” (My world? What do you mean?)

Taehyung delights in her confusion, taking a moment to seal the deal as he raises her knuckles to his lips, “Vous êtes au country club de Chamomile oui?” (You are in the Chamomile Country Club yes?)

As he asks his question, he presses a few kisses to her skin, keeping eye contact with her all the while.

Clementine lets out a shaky breath, placing her free hand to her chest, “Mon dieu...” (My god...) She mutters under her breath, fanning herself before responding to his original question, “Oui, Je suis.” (Yes, I am)

He grins, still kissing over the expanse of her knuckles, “Dites-moi, entendez-vous quelque chose d'étrange lorsque vous assistez?” (Tell me, do you hear anything strange when you attend?)

“Étrange?” (Strange?)

“Oui, etrange. Quelque chose que vous n'êtes pas censé entendre.” (Yes, strange. Something you are not supposed to hear.)

Clementine’s eyes shoot back and forth across the room, looking unsure of her response, “Mon amour, tu sais que je veux t'aider mais je déteste les potins. C'est désagréable.” (My love, I really want to help you but, I hate to gossip. It’s distasteful)

Taehyung pretends to smile fondly at her, stopping at her middle finger, dragging his lips up the length of it, “Il n'y a rien de désagréable chez toi bébé.” (There is nothing distasteful about baby) As he gets to the base of her hand, he parts both her middle and ring finger before licking right between the two digits suggestively, “En fait, je parie que vous avez un goût incroyable.” (In fact, I bet you taste incredible)

Clementine’s pink lipstick is smudging with the amount of times she’s licked her lips but, she does it again anyway for good measure.

“Vous avez une langue en argent Taehyung, prévoyez-vous de l'utiliser sur moi?” (You have a silver tongue Taehyung, do you plan to use it on me?)

The deep timbre of his chuckle sends goosebumps up Clementine’s spine and, her body is stretched across her marble desk in a rather uncomfortable way but, she doesn’t care.

All she wants is Taehyung.

“Voici ma proposition: vous utilisez votre langue pour parler et quand vous aurez terminé, j'utiliserai la mienne pour goûter. Comment cette sonne?” (Here is my proposal: you will use your tongue to speak and, when you are done. I will use mine to taste, how does that sound?)

Clementine’s legs part subconsciously beneath her desk, the pink satin of her underwear stained with her arousal.

With her hand still in Taehyung’s grip she clears her throat, tilting her head innocently, “Le Country Club, que tu dis?” (The country club, you say?)

Taehyung smirks, sending a nod her way, “Oui.” (Yes)

“Je me souviens avoir entendu quelque chose de mal le mois dernier.” (I do remember hearing something wrong last month)

He kisses the back of her hand sweetly before returning it to the desk and, allowing her the proper head space to recall information.

Because, who in their right mind would be able to tell a story whilst Taehyung was kissing on them like that?

Clementine seems to deflate a bit, attempting to compose herself as Taehyung gestures for her to continue.

“Quand j'étais dans le salon de thé, je pouvais entendre les costumes parler de quelque chose qui me faisait un peu peur.” (When I was in the tea room, I could hear the suits talking about something that scared me a little)

Taehyung’s brows furrow, “Les costumes?” (The suits?)

She nods, biting her lip in hesitation, “Oui, c'est ce que les membres appellent les propriétaires du country club.” (Yes, this is what the members call the owners of the country club)

He’s watching her intently, nodding as she explains, “Qu'est-ce que tu as entendu?” (What did you hear?)

She seems to crumble under his gaze like a paper swan; torn between her desire to please him and her desire to remain proper.

“Mon amour, c'est vraiment une chose terrible…” (My love, it’s really a terrible thing…)

Taehyung’s quick on his feet, taking her hand yet again, throwing a yearning look in her direction, “Clémentine, s'il vous plaît ... mon cher ami est absent. Vous pourriez être le seul espoir que mes frères et moi ayons pour la ramener à la maison en toute sécurité. Quand elle reviendra, je te couvrirai de mille baisers pour te remercier de ce que tu as fait.” (Clementine, please…my dear friend is absent. You could be the only hope that my brothers and I have for bringing her home safely. When she returns, I’ll cover you with a thousand kisses to thank you for what you have done)

Clementine sighs dreamily, her hand limp in his grip, her legs parting further at the baritone in his voice,

“Un millier?” (A thousand?)

Taehyung gives her a thin smile, “Un millier. Maintenant s'il te plait, ma rose, dis moi ce que tu as entendu.” (A thousand. Now please, my rose, tell me what you heard)

Clementine shrinks again, looking warily around the room before she finally answers, “Je les ai entendus parler de meurtre.” (I heard them talking about murder)

It’s then Taehyung feels the hot fiery sting of fear stabbing its way into his gut, “Meurtre?” (Murder?)

She senses his uneasiness so; she tightens her grip on his hand as she continues, “Ils ont dit qu'ils prenaient le travail d'un homme important qui allait au-delà de ce qu'ils avaient fait auparavant. Ils étaient inquiets de se faire prendre.” (They said they were taking a job from an important man that went above and beyond anything they’ve done before. They were worried about getting caught)

Taehyung shakes his head in disgust, hoping desperately that you aren’t connected to the conversation she heard.

“Quoi d'autre?” (What else?)

Clementine shakes her head, “C'est tout ce que j'ai pu entendre, mon thé est arrivé pendant leur conversation.” (That’s all I could hear, my tea arrived during their conversation)

Taehyung holds back his anger as he’s reminded of the kind of person Clementine really is.

She’s sweet sure but, she’s tragically selfish.

She’s well off and, only cares for matters that concern her; otherwise she is uninterested.

All he can muster is a tight lipped smile as he suddenly stands from the crushed velvet, “Je vois. Merci de votre temps, appelez-moi si vous vous souvenez d'autre chose.” (I see. Thank you for your time, please call me if you remember anything else)

Clementine rises with him, rushing around her desk, “Tu es en train de partir? Je pensais que tu resterais un moment, tu ne devrais pas être seule en ce moment chérie.” (You’re leaving? I thought you would stay a while, you shouldn’t be alone now honey)

Taehyung gives her the fakest smile he can muster, brushing his thumb across her rubbery cheek, “Je reviendrai te voir. Merci pour votre aide, vous êtes un saint.” (I’ll come back and see you. Thank you for your help, you’re a saint)

She rubs her face against his hand like a cat in heat and, whines for him in a similar fashion, “Mon dieu, nous sommes comme Romeo et Juliette…” (My god, we are like Romeo and Juliet…)

He’s disgusted by her lack of awareness but, he plays the part anyway, tucking a finger underneath her chin, “La séparation est une si douce douleur.” (Parting is such sweet sorrow)

With a brush of his lips against hers, he quickly departs, leaving Clementine alone with her desire.

Taehyung rushes through the afternoon crowd of the gallery, feeling grateful for the crisp air that greets him when he pushes the doors open.

His mind is racing; this is the third mention of the suits and, although it isn’t much, it’s the only solid lead the seven of them have.

They need to re-group as soon as possible because, the likelihood that they fill find you alive wanes with each hour that passes.

Taehyung feels horrified at the thought that passes through his brain:

What if they are already too late?

Act III- Tuer La Grande Maison

“Jungkook, pass me a cigarette…”

Jimin mumbles from across the fire, the light drained from his eyes.

Jungkook’s first instinct is to question him; Jimin quit smoking two years ago.

But, he stops himself just as the words crawl up his tongue and, instead he nods silently.

“Here you go.” He practically whispers, passing the cigarette to Hoseok who then moves it around the circle.

“Thanks.”

There is a stale bit of silence that rushes through the group and, everyone seems to look at Jimin to start things off.

But Jimin doesn’t look up, he just uses his shaky hands to light his cigarette. He takes the first inhale, his eyelids flutter as the nicotine infiltrates his senses.

Through the smoke, Jimin shoots a dead gaze across the circle, “I have nothing else to report. Lady says she has her best guys on it but, I don’t think it matters…”

Yoongi interjects, “Aren’t you wondering about the suits? I mean they have to have something to do with this. It’s not a coincidence that three of our sources mentioned them…”

Jimin lets a humorless laugh leave his lips, “The suits,” He shakes his head, “They sound like a bunch of fucking DC villains.”

Namjoon and Jin exchange something wordless between them before Jin decides to speak up,

“Jimin, I know this is hard for you. It’s hard for all of us but, we need to keep at it. We have good information; we just need to keep digging.”

Jimin feels his eyes burn with the promise of tears but, he just doesn’t have it in him to cry right now.

He’s too exhausted.

With another drag of his cigarette, he meets his hyung’s eyes with a hopelessness that shakes Jin to his core, “We don’t any money hyung, that’s all this town cares about. Maybe that’s all she cared about too…”

Yoongi is known for his tepid disposition.

He’s known for being the careful one, the collected one; so much so, that in high school Jin and Namjoon used to call him Mouse and, sometimes they still do.

But right now, Yoongi is angry and, he’s not angry for the same reasons he was yesterday…

“What are you insinuating?” Yoongi’s tone is clipped and, the intensity of his stare is enough to garner Jimin’s attention.

He flicks the ash onto the ground, “I’m just saying…maybe I should consider the possibility that she left town on purpose.”

“You should consider?” Yoongi bites back and, the tension between the two men immediately disperses throughout the group.

Jimin glances to the side before looking back at Yoongi, “Yes. It’s been almost a week. The police aren’t interested in finding her, no one seems to want to speak more than they have to and, the only lead we have is that she met up with some man in a suit. According to all of your reports, she looked comfortable with him. So, what if she was? What if she was tired of being in this filthy fucking town?” He scoffs, bitterness in his tone, “I wouldn’t blame her honestly, I just wish she would have disappeared before making me fall in love with her. That would have been nice…”

“What the fuck is wrong with you?”

Yoongi stands up, another rare occurrence, and glares at Jimin over the fire, “Do you realize how selfish you sound? You aren’t the only one who lost someone Jimin, she’s like a sister to us. She’s not the type of person to just run away from her problems and, you should be ashamed of yourself for suggesting that she’s that much of a coward.”

Jimin is a respectful man, he honors the age hierarchy amongst his friends but, he disregards formalities in this moment and fights back.

“She isn’t a coward. It’s a brave move to leave your family behind to pursue a better life, I just wish she would have left a note or something.”

“Jimin,” Namjoon interjects, trying to keep the peace as he places a hand on his thigh, “Y/N didn’t run away. She wouldn’t do something like that. C’mon you know her right? She loves you, she loves all of us.”

Jimin crosses his arms defensively, “Did she? I mean…from what I’ve gathered Namjoon, you don’t abandon the people you love. But she left me anyway…”

Yoongi moves closer to him, throwing is own cigarette into the fire, his brow furrowed with his growing frustration, “Why do you think your relationship with her is more important?”

Before Jimin has a chance to respond, Yoongi interrupts him.

“Because you two fuck? Is that why?” He glares at his best friend, with a level of fury that stifles Jimin’s martyrdom, “She taught Jungkook how to drive, she stayed up with Jin and Namjoon for six weeks straight when they were studying for their exit exams, she took Hoseok to work for months while he was saving up for his car. She gave up her studio for Taehyung’s family and, slept in her car while their house was recovering from last year’s flood. She- “ Yoongi starts out with a strong voice but, it slowly begins to falter as he gets to his addition to the list. His black hair moves fluidly with the breeze and, he looks away from Jimin. “She was there the night I- when I was…”

The sentence is loaded and, thankfully for Yoongi, he doesn’t need to complete it.

They all know what he’s talking about.

Jimin feels an enormous amount of guilt wash over him as he sees his calm and collected hyung, fight the tears in his eyes.

“Just because she’s your girlfriend doesn’t mean you get a bigger stake in grieving over her, she’s important to all of us, not just you.”

The heaviness is enough to crush the seven men sitting around the fire.

Yoongi is frozen in his spot, staring down at Jimin with the authority of the second eldest but also, with the desperation of a friend in need.

Jimin finally lets the sting win and, the tears fall unceremoniously down his cheeks as he tries to meet Yoongi’s gaze.

“I’m so sorry hyung.” He’s ashamed of his behavior and, he expects Yoongi to scold him further but, instead he kneels down beside him, placing a firm hand on his leg.

“We are going to find her.”

It’s all he says but, it prompts to Jimin to pull him into a hug and, the two of them share a moment before Jungkook says something that shifts the course of the evening.

“Hyung…” He begins, looking up from his phone, “How does your friend know what kind of car Y/N drives?”

“My friend?” Jimin sniffles, wiping his tears with the back of his hand, “What friend?”

Hoseok looks uneasy beside Jungkook as well, staring intently at Jimin as he awaits for an answer.

“Lady. The one you work for, how does she know what kind of car Y/N drives.”

Jimin just shrugs and, with a nod he requests another cigarette as Yoongi returns to his seat,

“She said it was in the news report the police published. I thought it was weird too especially since her car’s been in the shop but, the police have access to that kind of information so it makes sense.” He replies with a narrowed gaze, jerking his chin in his direction, “Why?”

“There’s nothing about her car in the papers.”

With Jungkook’s response, time almost freezes as a few members of the group seems to realize something dreadful.

“Wha- How do you know that?” Jimin hasn’t caught on yet but, he knows his friends well and, there is a change in their posture that he notices, “Why does that matter?”

Jungkook turns his phone in Jimin’s direction as a demonstration and, his voice begins to shake with his realization, “I searched everywhere hyung, it hasn’t appeared in a single article. How would she know something like that? Her car has been in the shop for two months…”

Jimin’s reaction is immediate denial but, something crawls up his throat; something he doesn’t want to acknowledge.

“Are you really thinking Lady had something to do with this?” He guffaws, taking another hit from his cigarette, “You know she’s like 70 right?”

“Have you ever mentioned that she drives a civic before?” Hoseok chimes in, a look of concern on his face.

Jimin shrugs, annoyed by their inflated reactions, “I don’t know? I wouldn’t remember telling her something like that but, I wouldn’t doubt if it came up especially when her cables were- “ His mouth parts then, cutting off his own sentence, “When her cables were cut…”

“What are you talking about?” Yoongi pipes up and, everyone seems to lean towards the center of the circle subconsciously, growing closer without even realizing it.

“When I was…” Jimin’s eyes are lit up with a thousand emotions as he tries to gather his thoughts, “When I was talking to her about Y/N she asked me if I thought it was the same person who cut the cables on her car. But- I don’t remember telling her why Y/N’s car was in the shop.”

“Why didn’t you tell us this?” Hoseok rushes out, nearly tripping over his words.

“I- I didn’t make the connection, I just thought she was trying to help… oh my god.” Jimin brings his watery gaze around the circle, “Oh fuck. Do you think she knows? Do you think she knows what happened to her?”

“Jimin…” Taehyung finally breaks his silence, “I think she is what happened to her.”

And he wants to protest, because Lady is like a mother to him. She’s always there, helping him through his difficulties; she even gave him advice on how to confess to Y/N properly…none of this makes sense.

“Think about it,” Taehyung continues, “She’s the wealthiest person in town, she knows everyone, she’s always checking up on you…don’t you think it’s a little odd that she’s so involved?”

“I don’t know, I just thought she had connections, that’s why I went to her in the first place.”

Jimin feels weak at this development and, Jungkook quickly takes his hand to soothe him.

“What are we waiting for then? Lets go.” Yoongi stands with a firm look of determination but, Namjoon stops him.

“Wait, we can’t just go busting into an old woman’s house and accuse her of kidnapping our friend. We have to have enough evidence…”

“We have enough evidence.” Hoseok inserts, wearing a similar expression to Yoongi, “And old woman or not, if that bitch has our friend-“

Jin comes through, intervening as things get intense, “Namjoon is right. We can’t do that. Look at us, she’d get one look and, call the police and, then we’d be the ones in handcuffs.”

“Hyung, we literally just established a solid reason to be suspicious of someone.” Jungkook asserts, confusion evident on his features.

Jin rolls his eyes, “All we’ve established is that Jimin may or may not have told her Y/N’s cables were cut. Lady owns half of the city, she’s more than capable of finding out what happened to Y/N’s car. This isn’t a lead, it’s odd yeah but, it’s not enough to accuse her with. She probably looked into Y/N’s vehicle information as soon as she went missing...”

With Jin’s reasoning in place, the group seems to deflate a bit and, Jimin feels slightly relieved that he doesn’t have to suspect yet another person he’s supposed to trust.

“I don’t know.” Jungkook’s small voice asserts, “I still think it’s weird.”

With pursed lips, Hoseok nods along with his statement, looking longingly at the now empty back of cigarettes, “I agree.”

“We don’t have to drop it completely, if anyone has any ideas on how to figure out more information, we should do that. Every lead is worth pursuing.” Namjoon murmurs

“What do you think we should do?” Jungkook’s Bambi disposition is privy to Namjoon’s opinion and, he often turns to him in times of stress.

“I have an idea.” Yoongi speaks instead, running his hand over the back of his neck, “I think I need to go back to the club. Jaebeom said the police might have found his sister if they had bothered to look for her, it kind of made me think that he had an idea of where she ended up...”

“I’ll go with you.” Jimin replies, throwing his cigarette into the fire

Yoongi shakes his head, “I should go alone. He was kind of an asshole when I went the first time, I don’t even know if he’ll talk to me again.”

Jimin chews on the inside of his cheek, wanting to protest but, he trusts Yoongi’s judgement.

Besides, he can’t handle anyone’s attitude right now.

“Anyone else think they need to revisit their leads?” Yoongi surveys the circle with cat-like precision, already crafting his future conversation with Jaebeom in his mind.

Namjoon has glanced towards the direction of the Marquee River several times now and Jin, who is so tuned in to his mannerisms, notices.

“What is it?”

Namjoon purses his lips, “I think I need to speak with the groundskeeper again…”

Hoseok wrinkles his nose in disgust, “The crazy guy with the bad breath?”

He sighs, finally pulling his attention from the direction of the river, “What if his rambling actually meant something? He kept calling me madam…”

“Namjoon,” Jin begins, placing a hand on his thigh, “he’s obviously sick, he didn’t even know who you were. How are you supposed to get anything meaningful from this guy?”

“I don’t know. But, I think I should try…”

“I’ll go with you hyung.” Jungkook vows, his eyes wide with his faith, “If that guys tries anything on you, I’ll kick his ass.”

Jungkook’s very serious statement elicits something that the rooftop hasn’t heard in a while: laughter.

They all laugh for a moment, basking in the tiny bit of innocence still left in their complicated world.

And as the laughter dies down, Taehyung offers a sentiment that they can all agree on,

“Let’s go find our friend.”

After a few more cigarettes and a swig from Hoseok’s bottle of vodka, they all part ways.

Namjoon and Jungkook head to the Marquee River whilst Yoongi prepares himself for a second visit to Ginseng. Jin and Taehyung head back to the night market to see if any of them have more information and, Hoseok finally convinces Jimin to get some rest.

He’s been up for three days straight but, he hasn’t slept a full night since Tuesday.

It’s hard but, after a bit more vodka, he finally passes out on Hoseok’s sofa.

His torn between wanting to dream of you and, praying that he won’t.

He wants to see your face but, fuck, it hurts so bad to do so.

Namjoon and Jungkook- The Marquee River, Sunday 5:49pm

Thankfully, the sun is just on the brink of setting when Namjoon and Jungkook arrive at the river. On Namjoon’s last visit, the moon was out and, very little people were left which left him more vulnerable. Now, not only does he have daylight on his side but, he also has a very vigilant and very protective dongsaeng to keep him company.

“I’m just gonna stand back and, let you do your thing hyung but, if things get a little heated…I got your back ok? You just say the word and I’ll lay him out.” Jungkook vows, puffing his chest out as they approach the area Namjoon last saw the groundskeeper.

He chuckles, patting Jungkook on the shoulder, “Thank you. I appreciate you coming with me. We shouldn’t be too long, especially if he starts rambling again.”

Jungkook just nods, keeping close to his hyung, resisting the urge to hold his hand.

He really wishes platonic hand-holding was more acceptable.

Namjoon tenses up as he spots the groundskeeper near one of the trash cans but, he takes a deep breath and jerks his head in his direction, “There he is…”

Jungkook nods, his expression tightening a bit as he prepares for the worst.

“Hello?” Namjoon calls out tentatively

The groundskeeper is dressed in slightly cleaner coat but, Namjoon still tenses up regardless.

“Good evening gentleman.” The man turns around, smiling brightly, a rake grasped firmly in his hand, “What can I do for you?”

Namjoon is confused.

Is this the same man?

He looks the same but, cleaner?

And he isn’t laughing...

What the hell is going on?

“Uh good evening um...” Namjoon’s eyes flit to Jungkook, “Do you uh- do you remember me?”

The man cocks his head, narrowing his eyes for a moment before shaking his head,

“No, I’m so sorry I don’t. Have we met before?”

Namjoon nods immediately but, for a moment he wonders if the experience he had the other night was some sort of stress induced hallucination.

“Yeah, I came here the other night. I asked you if you had seen my friend?”

For good measure, Namjoon holds up his phone, showing your photo and, the man pushes his glasses up his nose and leans in.

He still has the scar but, his face isn’t greasy.

His hair is combed to the side and, he doesn’t smell like slow death.

Namjoon’s heart picks up at the thought of his own sanity slipping from him until the man finally seems to remember something.

“Oh my-” He pulls back and shoots a wary look Namjoon’s way, “I do remember you. My goodness, I am so incredibly sorry, I probably scared the daylights out of you.”

Namjoon’s polite nature causes him to chuckle uneasily but, he keeps his distance, not fully trusting this guy’s demeanor.

“Yeah you uh, you definitely did. So uh...”

The man cuts him off, placing a hand on his shoulder, “I suffered a head injury two years ago. The damage to my brain causes brief bouts of psychosis and, unfortunately I didn’t have enough money to refill my prescription.” The man extends his hand towards Namjoon and Jungkook, “My name is Nestor, please forgive my behavior. I can imagine it was quite shocking...”

Namjoon and Jungkook were raised to be polite men so, despite their hesitation; they shake his hand, bowing their heads as they do.

“I see. I’m sorry to hear about your accident.”

Nestor chuckles and, something flashes in his eyes that Namjoon can’t quite decipher, “Oh it was no accident son, I was attacked.”

Jungkook narrows his eyes and, although he claimed he wouldn’t speak, his curiosity gets the best of him, “By who?”

Nestor looks to the side for a moment before glancing back at them,

“I can’t remember.”

“That’s awfully convenient.” Jungkook can’t help but observe with a pouted mouth and, Namjoon lightly smacks his chest.

“Sorry but, you don’t remember?”

Namjoon’s intricate brain is searching for ways to connect the dots but, the man is offering him very little information.

“No, the doctors said I was attacked and, left for dead. I suffered damage to my hippocampus and, this caused a pretty bad episode of amnesia. I couldn’t remember who I was or how old I was, the only thing I could remember is my cat’s name...” He chuckles and, the clouded film over his eyes adds to the pain that flashes through them, “Which is quite funny you see because, my cat’s name is Cognac so, when I kept asking for Cognac, the nurses would try and explain to me over and over that I couldn’t have alcohol in my state.”

Jungkook and Namjoon offer their condolences in the form of breathless laughter but, their level of empathy quickly absorb Nestor’s sadness.

“Anyway...” Nestor gestures to Namjoon’s cellphone as a means to change the subject, “I have seen your friend before but, I don’t remember the last time I saw her. I’m terribly sorry...”

Jungkook pipes up, “It’s ok sir, we understand, your hippo is damaged, that’s not your fault.”

Namjoon’s mouth opens in disbelief and, he wants to correct Jungkook’s mistake but, he has more important matters to attend to.

“I hope this isn’t too much for you but, the last time I was here- “ He hesitates, glancing over at Nestor, “-last time I was here, you kept calling me madam. Is there any significance to that?”

“Oh...” Nestor chuckles, tucking a bit of his gray hair behind his ear, “I’m sure I was talking about my wife. It’s common for me in those episodes to ask for her. She passed away two years ago.”

This is something Namjoon has been waiting for.

Two years ago, this man was attacked.

Two years ago, his wife passed away.

Two years ago, Jaebeom’s sister went missing.

There must be some correlation.

“It was lovely meeting you gentleman. Unfortunately, I have to get back to my duties,” He gestures to the multi-colored leaves littered on the ground, “, these leaves aren’t going to rake themselves.”

Namjoon understands of course and, they quickly shake hands again but, just before the two men turn to leave, Jungkook’s randomized curiosity strikes again.

“What happened to your cat?”

Nestor seems to search his brain and, his features almost crumple with a bit of desperation,

“I don’t- I don’t remember.”

Jungkook just nods, offering him a small smile before him and Namjoon move through the trees towards the street.

Yoongi- Ginseng Night Club, Sunday 8:37pm

As Yoongi enters the club for the second time, he carries himself much differently. He ignores the looks from the patrons littered on the couches, he ignores the bass vibrating in his bones, he ignores the jabs from the bartender as he asks to speak with Jaebeom.

His anxiety is replaced with determination.

When Jaebeom swings open the door a second time, he’s toned body is only covered by a pair of jeans.

With another joint between his fingers, Jaebeom smirks down at Yoongi, “Are you here for business or pleasure?”

Yoongi shamelessly allows his eyes to move over Jaebeom’s figure, admiring it but, also noting that his skin is littered with more than just tattoos.

Nail marks run down the length of his abdomen, purple bruises congregate on the left side of his neck and, his lips are swollen with evidence of kissing.

“Looks like you’ve had enough pleasure for the evening.” Yoongi notes in Korean, forcing his gaze away from Jaebeom’s body, “I need to ask you a few more questions.”

Jaebeom’s smirk never falters as he pulls the joint to his lips. With a jerk of his head, he ushers Yoongi inside, shutting the door behind him, “Make it quick, I have company coming…”

Yoongi wants to make a comment but, he knows it’s not important enough so, he starts with his first question, “I know this might be hard to talk about but when I was here last night, you said something about your sister going missing.”

A noticeable change runs through Jaebeom’s body as he takes his seat, “Yeah, what about it?”

“I thought it was odd that they- my friend and your sister,” He elaborates, “went missing on the same street and the way you spoke about it, it was like you knew something about where she went…”

Jaebeom tenses up with the subject change but, he sees something in Yoongi that he likes, there is an honesty to him that Jaebeom fucks with, “I have a feeling, yes, but I could never prove it.”

Yoongi offers silence as a way to encourage him to continue and, Jaebeom obliges despite his hesitation.

“Her and her boyfriend used to come in to the club every Thursday night for Happy Hour. They had been dating for a while and, things seemed to be going all right. But one night, she came in alone and I asked her where he was and, she told me they were taking a break.” Jaebeom’s expression shifts again and Yoongi, being the empath that he is, senses the onslaught of negative emotion. “She wouldn’t tell me what happened. She just kept begging me to stay out of it and, she made me promise her I wouldn’t confront him. He came in to the club later that night and, some of my guys told me they got into a huge fight-“

Yoongi interjects, “Did you see anything?”

He shakes his head and, before he elaborates, he takes another hit of his blunt, “No, I was up here doing a deal but, the next thing I know, my friends are coming up here and, telling me that my sister ran out of the club, crying and shit. I tried to call her, I even went out on the street and, asked everyone if they saw her but…” His voice tightens before he blows smoke from his lips, “…nothing. I blew up her phone for the rest of the night but, she never responded. I went to the police the next day and, surprise surprise, they were fucking useless. They kept saying that ‘girls like her runaway all the time’ and ‘she’ll be back before you know it.’ I was so angry. I couldn’t believe they didn’t care. I did the same thing you and your boys are doing, I started my own investigation and, I didn’t get very far until, I found her cell phone in the club’s dumpster.”

Yoongi surprise is evident on his face and, it prompts Jaebeom to comment on it,

“Yeah I know right? You’d think that would have helped but, it only made everything more complicated. I looked through her messages to try to figure out what happened and-“ He blows a heavy breath between is lips, shaking his head, “Her boyfriend was cheating on her but, it was with some old chick, like his boss or some shit…I don’t know.”

“His boss?”

He nods, “Yeah, he worked the Upside as a pool boy.”

Yoongi’s heart drops then, down to the pit of his stomach and, he literally feels the sweat collecting in the wells of his palms.

“A pool boy?” He has to clarify, just so he’s sure he heard him right

Jaebeom nods and licks his lips, “Yeah, my sister found out he was fucking her; at least that’s what I got from her texts.”

“My friend works as a pool boy too. It’s his girlfriend that missing.”

Jaebeom’s brows rise before shaking his head, “Shit…” He takes another hit, “That’s a hell of a coincidence.”

“I don’t think it’s a coincidence.”

Yoongi and Jaebeom regard each other for a moment before Jaebeom’s mouth turns up in a smirk, “I guess you have an old lady to visit then. If you see my sister’s boyfriend, slap him around a little bit for me heh…”

Jaebeom seems to gulp the pain he feels down his throat before finishing off the blunt and throwing it in the ashtray.

“Wait, did he disappear too?”

He nods, “Haven’t seen him since that night. I just assumed he was living the high life, I mean, I don’t blame him…I’d suck on some old lady titties too for that kind of money…” Jaebeom quickly replaces the blunt in his hand with a the bottle of beer he had sitting on his side table. He takes a swig before holding out to Yoongi, “You want some?”

Yoongi doesn’t understand his attitude towards his sister’s disappearance. If he knew where her boyfriend was, why wouldn’t he go talk to him?

But he takes the offer, throwing back a bit of stale beer, letting the slight warmth from the alcohol soothe the rawness in his chest.

“Why didn’t you go up there? If that’s where he is?”

“I don’t have contacts up there. There was no way they’d let me in, look at me…” He chuckles, gesturing to his rough appearance, “Besides, I don’t know where that bitch lives and, honestly, it’s probably for the best. I don’t know what I’d do to that guy if I found him…”

A few more words are exchanged before Yoongi decides he needs to leave; he has a lot to report and, he feels as though time is running out.

As he’s moving to the threshold of the door, Jaebeom get his attention.

“Hey-“

As Yoongi turns around, Jaebeom leans forward in his seated position, placing his elbows on his knees, “What’s your name?”

Yoongi’s lips twitch, “Yoongi.”

Jaebeom grins, nodding his head in consideration, “Yoongi. Alright then, well if you ever want to take a night off from your detective work and, uh you know,” He nods to the bed, “have some fun, you know where to find me.”

Desire stirs in Yoongi’s stomach and, he’s flattered honestly, that such a handsome man could take interest in him but, he knows he couldn’t take a night off if he tried.

He’s got a friend to find.

“I’ll keep that in mind.” He sends a smile towards Jaebeom, bowing his head slightly, “See you around.”

“I hope so.”

The information they have accrued is once again exchanged amongst the group and, there is only one conclusion that everyone continues to arrive at:

They have to get inside Lady’s house.

So, putting their heads together they concoct a plan that just might work.

The plan is simple.

Jimin, Jungkook and Taehyung will take Lady up on her offer of a home cooked meal.

Thankfully, Taehyung’s closet is full of clothes that look far more expensive than they actually are; working at a thrift store has its perks.

Jimin is dressed in a gray and black suit, covered in a gaudy brocade pattern.

Jungkook choses a floral blazer and black slacks, complete with a simple white button up he borrows from Taehyung’s father.

Taehyung donns something slightly less subtle; a black and silver blazer with a similar brocade pattern to Jimin’s suit jacket.

They take time on their hair, doing it up as if it were each of their wedding days.

When it’s all said and done, the three men walk out of Taehyung’s room looking like they came straight out of Interview with Vampire.

Yoongi, Hoseok, Namjoon and Jin are dressed in all black.

They will serve as a distraction during dinner to enable the younger men to explore the property undisturbed by Lady’s security guards.

It’s not an easy task but, they are more than ready to attempt it.

An invitation to dinner is of course incomplete without a gift for it’s lovely host.

Tonight, a bottle of champagne is clutched in Taehyung’s grasp as he strolls up the cobblestone walkway.

However, this champagne is slightly modified to fit this evening’s itinerary.

“Doxepin, it's what I take for insomnia. This shit is strong, I only have to take one and, I’m out like a light in 30 minutes...” Yoongi had explained, pushing his prescription bottle towards Taehyung, “Slip that bitch 3 or 4 and, she’ll hit the floor. When she wakes up, just tell her she passed out for a few minutes…”

And so it was.

Lady's home is massive.

It’s the biggest house the men have ever seen.

Jimin has stood in its immensity before but, Jungkook and Taehyung are almost disgusted by its grandeur.

The white paint seems to stretch upwards for miles, the greenery of the vines decorating it in such a way that it almost looks serene.

Nothing could be farther from the truth.

The lawn is immaculate.

Carefully trimmed hedges sculpted to perfection line the walkway that leads to the dark oak that encompasses the front door.

They aren’t here for a lovely dinner inside this massive house.

The true nature of their visit is simply to gather more information.

They aren’t sure how but, Lady is connected to your disappearance.

Tonight, they will gather enough evidence to warrant an investigation.

Maybe then, the city below them will finally pay attention to their cries for help.

Lady doesn’t greet them at the door but, another intriguing person does.

“Noah...” Jimin greets the suited man with a smile that is far too sweet.

But he delights in the man’s surprise and, Jimin connects another piece of the puzzle.

Noah is a classmate of theirs.

He was fortunate enough to land a job in the Upside after graduation.

He was fortunate in that his family had money and connections that pushed Noah ahead of his fellow alumni.

Noah knew you well.

Noah is dressed in a suit.

Noah works for Lady.

It seems there is a connection but, instead of pummeling Noah like he wants to, Jimin simply bows his head as he steps through the threshold of Lady’s home.

“Wh-What are you guys doing here?” Noah stutters, trying desperately to compose himself.

Taehyung offers the same smile adorning Jimin’s mouth, “We’re here for dinner. What are you doing here?”

It’s a loaded question and Noah knows it but, he’s helpless to act on this knowledge because, he is required to treat Lady’s guests with respect.

“I work here.” He mutters, gesturing towards the dining room, “She’s uh...she’s right in there.”

“Aren’t you going to offer to take our coats?” Jimin feigns innocence, nodding to the coat rack beside the door.

Noah nods and with shaky hands and, he accepts each of the coats before hanging them up.

“Enjoy your evening gentleman.”

The three of them walk away with a sense of satisfaction but, they are also sick with the knowledge of where one of their former friends ended up.

Money can create the most dastardly of monsters.

“Oh my goodness you’re here! Come in, come in.”

Lady appears at the archway, dressed in a red satin gown, her grey hair piled elegantly atop her head.

Time has been kind to her, Jungkook thinks, she doesn’t look 70.

But then again, age seems to be less of an issue when you have millions of dollars at your disposal.

“Lady these are my friends, Jungkook...” He gestures to the man on his right, who bows respectfully offering a boyish smile.

“Thank you so much for having me Lady Noona, you have an incredible home.”

Lady is already flustered; she can’t believe Jimin has friends as handsome as he is.

“And Taehyung...” Jimin continues, smirking at Jungkook’s acting skills.

Taehyung, takes her hand, keeping eye contact with her and lowering his lips to her knuckles, “Enchanté, votre maison est belle oui mais pas aussi belle que vous.” (Enchanted. Your house is beautiful yes but, not nearly as beautiful as you.)

Lady’s face rushes red and, she giggles like a demented schoolgirl, fanning herself as Taehyung releases her hand.

“Oh mon dieu tu l'es aussi. N'hésitez pas à continuer...” (Oh my goodness, you are too much. Please don’t hesitate to continue.)

“My lord Jimin, you didn’t tell me your friends were so handsome and, that one of them speaks French- “ She eyes Taehyung teasingly and he responds by winking.

“He was adopted when he was younger by a French family, he actually doesn’t speak English very well.” Jimin lies, strolling into the dining room and, beginning his search for something incriminating.

She nods, her eyes alight with intrigue, “I see well,” She leans into Taehyung’s frame, lowering her voice slightly, “Ne t'inquiète pas je n'aurai aucun mal à communiquer avec toi.” (Not to worry, I’ll have no trouble communicating with you)

Taehyung chuckles at that, bringing his lips to her ear, “Bien sûr, vous en avez déjà dit beaucoup.” (Of course, you have already said so much)

Lady is floored and, enlightened with desire.

So much so, that she arranges for Taehyung to sit right beside her.

The dining table, Jimin remembers, is smaller to create a more intimate setting.

Jimin takes a seat across from Lady who sits at the head of the table whilst Jungkook and Taehyung settle into the two middle chairs between them.

The first course is a salad topped with fancy ingredients the men barely recognize but, they dive into it anyway as Lady begins the conversation.

“Any word about Y/N?” She ventures solemnly, giving her best look of concern.

Jimin smiles, saccharine as ever, “Nothing so far but, I’m sure your men will give me an update soon.”

Lady nods mid-chew, pouting her lips slightly, “Of course sweetheart, they send me updates whenever they have something.”

Taehyung interjects, “Ne parlez pas encore d'elle, ça ruine mon humeur. Je t'ai apporté quelque chose. L'homme du magasin a dit que c'était sucré, peut-être que nous pourrions l'avoir avec un dessert?” (Don’t talk about her yet, it ruins my mood. I brought you something. The man at the store said it was sweet, maybe we can have it with dessert?)

This surprises Lady of course but, as Taehyung hands her the bottle of champagne adorned appropriately with a twist off cap; She smirks salaciously and nods.

“Tout ce que vous voulez...” (Whatever you want...)

Taehyung arches a brow, leaning in towards her once more, “Tout ce que je veux?” (Whatever I want?)

This is part of the plan of course, to disarm her and, Taehyung is doing an incredible job.

“Oui.” (Yes.) She practically coos in response, shameless to the presence of the other men.

He chuckles darkly and, beneath the table he places a hand on her thigh, “Et si je te veux pour le dessert?” (What if I want you for dessert?)

Jimin wants to hurl a little bit because, although he can’t understand what they are saying, he knows something inappropriate is going down.

“Jimin, your friend is going to make me misbehave.” Lady giggles, licking her lips as she eyes Taehyung hungrily.

He plays it off though, this is part of the plan.

“I’m sorry about him. He’s a shameless flirt.” Jimin chuckles lazily, eyeing Jungkook from over his water glass.

“No apology needed.” She smirks, flushing a further shade of red as Taehyung sends a wink in her direction, “Now, tell me Jungkook, what is that you do?”

Jungkook smiles brilliantly, looking eagerly at her, “I work as a paralegal for a law firm a few cities over but, on the weekends I work as a personal trainer.”

The lie is so well executed, Jimin and Taehyung want to cackle but, they hold it together, sticking to their script.

“Oh that is so impressive. I hear Law careers are increasing by 18% over the next 5 years, it’s an incredible industry to get into.” She compliments, stabbing more of the lettuce onto her fork.

“I’m glad you think so Noona, I can imagine someone as successful as you has a lot of wisdom for someone like me.” Jungkook’s Bambi eyes are on full display as he stares longingly in Lady’s direction, licking his lips.

His words have a double meaning and, Lady knows it, she wonders how she got so lucky to have two handsome men flirting with her.

“I know my way around sure,” She remarks with a smile, “I can introduce you to some of my colleagues, many of them work in your prospective field.”

“Really?” Jungkook beams, “That would be an honor Noona, thank you so much.”

Lady nods and places a well-manicured hand over his, “Of course, any friend of Jimin’s is a friend of mine.”

She turns to Taehyung, who hasn’t taken his eyes off of her, “Et vous, quel est votre métier?” (And you? What is your job?)

Taehyung pouts slightly, eyeing her in a way that suggests embarrassment, “Je suis un artiste. Je vends mes tableaux. C'est un travail très difficile mais, je l'aime tellement, je ne peux pas imaginer faire autre chose.” (I am an artist. I sell my paintings. It’s a very difficult job but, I love it so much, I can’t imagine doing anything else.)

Lady melts at his words, a longing sigh leaving her lips, “Bien sûr. C'est tellement admirable que vous poursuivez ce qui vous passionne.” (Of course. That is so admirable that you pursue what you’re passionate in.)

Taehyung smirks, eyeing her as he takes a sip of his water, “Merci. Je suis curieux maintenant, de quoi êtes-vous passionné?” (Thank you. I’m curious now, what are you passionate about?)

Before she can answer, the second course is served: roasted beef with a béarnaise sauce on a bed of microgreens.

Rich people shit, Jimin thinks but, he smiles graciously none the less.

He isn’t hungry, he hasn’t been hungry for the past week so, he pushes the meat around the plate as he continues to survey her dining area.

There is nothing out of place but, then again, he isn’t sure what he’s looking for.

The only thing he can do is wait for dessert…

Once Lady is out, they will be able to search for what they need.

“Lady, do you live here all alone?” Jungkook feigns concern, tilting his head.

She smiles sadly and nods, dabbing her lips with a silk napkin, “Yes I do. My husband, Nestor, died two years ago of an aneurysm. I’ve been alone here ever since, well minus my guards of course. I’m sure you saw them outside but, they don’t live here full time.”

Jungkook has to stifle his shock.

The name Nestor, isn’t a common one.

In fact, he’s only ever heard it once before...

Jungkook kisses his teeth, pouting his lips slightly, “Oh noona, that’s terrible. I’m so sorry.”

She pouts too, mirroring his expression, soaking up all of his sympathy, “That’s alright dear. I manage just fine, I have to admit though, it’s so wonderful having company. It gets lonely up here.”

The youngest smirks, “Oh of course Noona, I can only imagine…” He places a hand on her thigh beneath the table, rubbing gently over her dress, “A woman like you should never be lonely.”

Jimin and Taehyung have to physically repress their reactions to Jungkook’s acting abilities; it’s a side of him they have never seen.

Anger is something Jungkook doesn’t encounter very often.

But as he looks into Lady’s face, he feels rage coursing through him.

Because, he knows she isn’t genuine.

He knows there is something off about her.

Jungkook would normally never dream of harming another person but, when his friends are getting hurt, his morals begin to loosen.

“Oh my, you boys make me feel young again.” Lady chuckles before taking a bit of her beef, “You know…I have the resources to assist you, I tell Jimin this all the time but, he’s just so modest.” She winks at him and, Jimin pretends to shy away from her compliment, “I could really help you with your chosen career paths. Taehyungie,” She turns to him, flashing the pearl white of her dentures, “Ma sœur Clemtenine possède une galerie au centre-ville, je suis sûr que je peux lui faire acheter une partie de votre art. Je sais que j'aurais certainement adoré en acheter ...” (My sister Clementine owns a gallery downtown, I’m sure I can get her to purchase some of your art. I know I’d certainly loved to buy some)

Taehyung’s stomach drops at her statement but, he remains composed and arches his brow, “Clementine? C'est un nom tellement intéressant…” (Clementine? That is such an interesting name…)

Lady giggles once again, “Oui, nos parents étaient des gens excentriques.” (Yes, our parents were eccentric people.)

“Ils étaient probablement beaux aussi…” (They were probably beautiful too…)

Taehyung winks again and, he must admit, he’s getting off on how easy she is to trick.

She fans herself through her uneasy giggle, nudging his knee with her own, “Oh arrête de me flatter, je suis sérieux, je pourrais vraiment t'aider” (Oh stop flattering me, I’m serious, I could really help you.)

Taehyung pretends to be touched as he places a hand to his chest but before he can reply, a loud voice rings in through the intercom above the dining table.

“Mam this is Noah. There is a disturbance down at the main gate, we have to leave to go check it out, are you alright in there?”

Lady rolls her eyes, unbothered, “Of course Noah, I’m with my friends. Go take care of it, update me when you’re done.”

Anxiety swims into the stomachs of the three men; phase one is complete.

The guards are due to be distracted and, all they can hope is that Yoongi, Hoseok, Namjoon and, Jin stay safe in the process.

“Is everything alright?” Jimin tilts his head, glancing towards the speaker.

She smile reassuringly, waving him off, “Of course, this happens all the time. It’s probably just the homeless, poor things, they beg at my gate sometimes. I don’t engage with them though, as much as I want to help, I don’t believe in handouts you know? It teaches them nothing.”

This both confuses and enrages Jimin all at once.

She has no problem offering her resources to the three of them because, lets face it, it’s obvious she is partial to their good looks.

But he’s disgusted with her way of thinking.

Everyone deserves a fair shot.

He can’t understand how people, especially fortunate people like Lady, could have this outlook.

But then again, without the abuse of the working class, how would people like her make all of their money?

“I’ll drink to that.” Jimin smiles, raising his glass and, the rest of the table follows suit, sipping from their crystal goblets.

Then, something peculiar happens…

Beneath their feet, against the expensive lacquer on the wood varnish, there is a banging sound.

Lady tenses up but, deflects immediately, her surprise quickly smoothing out of her features, “Forgive me, I’m having a wine cellar built beneath the dining room, they’ve been measuring all morning so, it looks like they are getting started on the construction.”

Jimin’s expression shifts and, he stares across the table like a snake honing in on his pray, “Oh? That’s so weird, I didn’t notice any construction trucks outside.”

Lady smiles gracefully, “They have been working for quite awhile, part of their team left to gather more supplies. I’m so indecisive, I changed my mind about the interior several times…” She turns to Taehyung, feeling uneasy under Jimin’s gaze, “Que pensez-vous du marbre noir?” (What do you think of black marble?)

Taehyung’s eyes light up, “Ah, marbre noir? Excellent choix, si séduisant.” (Ah, black marble? Excellent choice, so seductive.)

She entangles her fingers with his beneath the table cloth, shooting him a suggestive look that makes Taehyung sick to his stomach, “Oui, vous l'êtes…” (Yes, you are.)

All Taehyung can manage is a smirk and, a thumb over the back of her knuckles.

His patience is running out.

“L'heure du dessert?” (Dessert time?)

He nods to the kitchen and, Lady immediately blooms with excitement.

“Oui, oui…” She smiles, craning her neck towards the kitchen, “We’re ready for dessert now, what’s taking so long?”

Crème Brule is served alongside a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream and, Taehyung whispers something in her ear about her being similar to the French dessert.

With flushed cheeks, Lady giggles (for the millionth time) and, begins eating.

“Chérie, es-tu prêt pour le champagne que j'ai apporté? Il ira bien avec ce dessert…” (Darling, are ready for the champagne I brought? It will go well with this dessert…)

With her approval, Taehyung pours the bubbly liquid into each of the flutes, smirking devilishly at his friends as he does.

Taehyung watches her like a hawk and, picks up her glass, getting dangerously close to her as he lifts it to her lips, “Boisson. Dis-moi ce que tu penses.” (Drink. Tell me what you think.)

Like saucers her eyes widen and, she’s so enthralled with Taehyung, she doesn’t notice another round of banging beneath the floorboards.

But the rest of them do.

Her eyes flutter as she sips some of the bubbly liquid but, Taehyung isn’t satisfied.

“Ah ah…Avale tout pour moi.” ( Ah ah…Swallow it all for me)

She obliges, practically spluttering at his double entendre.

“Bonne fille.” (Good Girl) He chuckles darkly, his heart thumping in his chest, he likes this.

He has to admit.

There is something so satisfying about fooling an opponent.

He’s turned on by it.

She gulps as she continues to stare at him, completely captivated.

“C’est delicieux.” (It’s delicious) She finally manages, dabbing her lips with the silk once again.

“Tu fais un bon show…” (You put on a good show) He remarks, smirking before pretending to sip some of his own champagne.

There is a bit of silence that moves throughout the table before Jimin takes the reigns once again,

“Lady, I really appreciate you having us tonight. We needed a night off; things have been so difficult lately.”

Lady immediately smiles, forcing her eyes away from Taehyung, “Of course sweetheart. You know I’m always here for you.”

Another sound is forced against the wood below and, for whatever reason, this startles Lady.

“Goodness, they are loud…” A nervous laugh leaves her lips and she attempts to stand up before faltering a bit, eyeing Taehyung immediately as she seems to stumble.

Taehyung reacts, standing with her and, holding onto her waist, “Qu'est-ce qui ne va pas chérie?” (What’s wrong darling?)

She mumbles something incoherent which prompts a sadistic grin to appear on Taehyung’s mouth, “Vous sentez-vous un peu endormi?” (Do you feel a little sleepy?)

She nods, clinging to him helplessly as he guides her to the settee beneath the window,

“C'est bon chéri, dors pour moi. Je promets que je serai là quand tu te réveilleras.” (It’s ok darling, sleep for me. I promise I’ll be there when you wake up.)

Lady’s eyes are growing heavier when Taehyung lays her down and, as he does, he places a kiss atop her forehead, “Si jamais tu le fais…” (If you ever do…)

Her eyes widen at his threatening tone but, before she can process it fully, she passes out in his arms.

Taehyung, Jungkook and, Jimin all look at each other for a moment before, they spring into action.

They shove the dining table aside, disregarding the sound of the expensive china as it crashes to the floor.

There is a Persian rug that covers the sound and, that is quickly shoved aside to reveal something that makes their stomach turn.

Because, beneath the dining table, there is a cellar door.

Jimin swallows his fear and with shaky hands, he leans down, “Hello?”

Silence.

He tries again, his chest numb from the force of his beating heart, “Is there- is anyone down there?”

Nothing.

Jimin frantically looks for a way in but, the hatch is sealed with a padlock.

“It’s locked, we need a way to-“ He begins but, a voice interrupts him.

A voice he is longed to hear for what seems like eternity.

“Jimin?”

The men look at each other with such heightened emotion that it could power the entire city.

Because, that voice belongs to you.

“Y/N? Baby? Oh my god…” He clutches the wood, banging on it without a reason why, “Baby? Is that you?”

Down in the cellar, beneath the big house you were taken to, you begin to cry at the sound of your boyfriends voice.

You must be dreaming you think.

He can’t be real.

Is it possible?

Is the nightmare finally over?

“Jimin!” You cry weakly, using all the strength you have.

The woman who forced you down here hasn’t fed you since your arrival.

She’s just left you down there, along with the rest of her secrets.

The room you’re in isn’t very big.

It’s constructed crudely and made of stone.

There are only two things to keep you company:

A pile of bones and, a pile of money.

When the woman laid you beneath her home, she said only one thing to you,

“You will die down here. You will die beside the life you will never have and, while you do, I’ll make sure he gets everything he could ever want.”

Jimin chokes back a sob as he pounds against door yet again and, he doesn’t notice that Jungkook is already scanning the room for solution.

“I’m right here baby, I’m right here, I’m going to get you out ok? Just hang on…”

You cover your chapped lips with the palm of your hand, sobbing into it.

You couldn’t believe it.

He found you.

He actually found you.

You didn’t know how and, it didn’t matter.

You just want to go home.

“Jungkook and Taehyung are here with me, we’re going to get you out!” He calls and, as if on cue, Jungkook appears beside him with hammer, “Watch out.” He grunts, determination in his eyes, “Y/N! I’m gonna break the door in ok? I need you to move aside so you don’t get hurt!”

You laugh in disbelief at the sound of your friend’s voice, “Use that brute strength of yours Kookie! Show that door who’s boss!”

He chuckles at that, tears collecting in his eyes, “I got you Noona, just make sure you’re not in the way!”

Taehyung is smiling too, trying not to lose it at the sound of your voice.

He keeps a careful eye on Lady, who is still passed out on the settee.

If he hated her before, he wants to kill her now.

Taehyung knew she was involved yes but, he never suspected she had you locked in her fucking cellar.

Jimin is itching to get you in his arms, he wants to claw through the wood himself but, instead he stands back and, lets Jungkook hack away at the cellar door.

You can see it.

The expensive wood slowly splintering above, light pouring in through the jagged cracks.

The only light you’ve had down here is a single bulb hanging from the ceiling.

It’s been torture.

But, none of that matters to you right now.

The only thing you can focus on is the sight of your boyfriend’s face as he tears the remaining wood away from the frame.

“Jimin…” You whimper, ignoring the weakness in your body before crawling your way up the stairs, wanting nothing more than to be in his arms.

Jimin breaks down, reaching out for you…

You’re still in the same outfit he last saw you in.

“Baby, come here…come here…” He pulls you into his arms, his body shaking with his cries as he holds you so tight, it’s almost painful, “I got you, I got you. You’re safe now, you’re safe…”

You’re face in his neck, sobbing whilst your fists clutch his blazer.

You don’t fully understand what’s going on, or why they are here dressed like little princes.

But, you’re not in the headspace to ask.

You just want to stay in Jimin’s arms and, never let go.

“We’re so sorry…” Jungkook sniffles, wrapping his arms around you and Jimin.

Taehyung follows suit, letting his tears fall, “We’re going to make sure they pay for what they did to you.”

Time seems to stand still as you relish in the affection of the people closest to you.

“Don’t ever be sorry. Look what you guys did…you found me. You saved me.” You whisper weakly, your face remaining in Jimin’s neck.

“Jimin? Taehyung? What on earth is going on?”

The sound of her voice makes your blood run cold…

Lady is sitting up, disorientated but before she has a chance to process what’s going on, Taehyung grabs the carving knife from the dining room table and holds it up to her neck.

“Funny, we were going to ask you the same question.”

Lady’s mouth parts in shock, her eyes widening in fear, “I- I-“ She glances around the room before she spots you and, her heart stalls, “I can explain…”

Jimin wants to freak out on her, he really does but, he doesn’t want to let go of you.

“Lady…” He spits from the floor, setting his piercing gaze on her, “Why the fuck is my girlfriend in your cellar?”

She hesitates and, Taehyung can tell she’s looking for a way out so, he presses the knife into her skin, “Answer him.” He hisses through his teeth

Jungkook stands as well, prepared to back him up should he need it.

“Jimin please, you must know. I was only looking out for you…women like her, they ruin men like you. I was trying to protect you.”

“Protect me?!” He barks, shaking his head in disbelief, “By murdering the only woman I’ve ever loved? By putting my friends and I through the worst week of our life?!”

Taehyung holds the knife steady as he jerks his head towards her, “Stand up…”

She obliges, mouth parted in disbelief, her hands up in front of her submissively, “You’re working three jobs to support yourself, I’ve been trying to help you but, I knew you wouldn’t accept it unless you had no other choice. I knew she…” She sends a glare your way, “…would always be in your ear. She was all you ever spoke about, I needed to get her out of the way so, you could start focusing on you.”

“She has a name you crazy bitch…” Jimin lets out a humorless laugh, helping you to your feet, “She has a name and, a life and, people who love her and, you…” He points a finger in her face, “…you tried to take that from her. How many people have ended up in your basement huh?! How many lives have you ruined?!”

Her expression shifts to one of pure malice, a devilish smirk appearing on her lips, “Why don’t you ask your little girlfriend?” She turns her gaze towards you, “Tell him, tell him how many skeletons you found beneath my house.”

This angers you.

Initially, you didn’t understand.

You didn’t understand the significance of running into Noah that night.

You didn’t understand why he offered to call you a Taxi.

You didn’t understand why the driver intentionally missed your turn.

And after you were knocked out, you didn’t understand why you were brought to this place.

The big house.

But now, it makes sense.

This pathetic excuse of a woman, gets off on kidnapping the less fortunate.

She breeds new monsters in the process, taking their loved ones and capitalizing off of their grief.

She takes them in and, turns them to stone.

“You wanted them to think I was dead…so you could convince them to leave their lives behind.” Your voice isn’t a hundred percent but, your gaze is steady as it pierces into her.

She chuckles despite the knife being pressed to her throat, “Hmm so it does have a brain. I knew I couldn’t convince Jimin to work for me unless I broke his heart first. Men are much easier to manipulate when they feel like they have nothing left.”

Taehyung practically snarls, “Let’s waste this bitch, we can tell the police that-“

Lady’s cackle is abrupt, her eyes crinkling with delight, “The police! Ha! The police work for me, why do you think they never looked for your little friend hm? They knew where she was, I pay them a pretty penny to keep their mouth shut.”

Another almost cartoonish voice interrupts the conversation as it crackles over the intercom, “Mam is everything alright in there? We heard a commotion.”

Shit.

It’s one of the guards.

Jungkook is prepared to fight, he looks around for a weapon and, grabs the hammer from the floor.

“Noah! No everything is not ok! It seems as though my guests have overstayed their welcome…” She seethes before another smile appears on her lips, “Kill them…”

Jimin grabs you immediately, pushing you behind him and, Taehyung’s grip tightens on Lady’s waist, keeping her in place.

“Uhhh yeah I don’t know who the fuck Noah is but, uh- oh wait! Yah, Hoseok! Isn’t Noah the one you hit with the Range Rover?”

The voice morphs again and, you actually laugh at the sound of Yoongi’s voice echoing through the speaker.

“Holy shit…” Jungkook chuckles in disbelief

“That scrawny little blonde dude??” Hoseok’s voice literally warms your heart as it reaches your ears, “Yeah he’s out like a light sorry, anyone else you’d like to speak to?”

“Who the fuck are you?” Lady hisses, panic settling into her senses, “I’ll have the police here in minutes, you’ll be thrown in prison for the rest of your lives!”

“Ouch, we were afraid you’d say that. See, but the thing is, we destroyed all of your fancy ass cameras but, we left the audio running so…” Jin’s voice chimes in next, explaining her demise, “the only thing the police will hear is a taped confession, you wrinkly ass bitch. And let me just say my dear, you look like your pussy is covered in dust and, that’s why you’re going down, all because you thought you might get some dick...pity.

Jin’s insult causes laughter to move through the four of you and, you can’t help but, feel moved at how dedicated your friends are.

“You filthy bastards, you better get your grimy hands off of my cars before, I add grand theft auto to your long list of charges.”

They laugh hysterically on the other end of the line before; Namjoon speaks up, “Ok boomer.”

In the next moment, Lady takes advantage of the distraction and, quickly lunges at you, her hands going for your neck but, before she can reach you, she’s knocked out of the way by Jungkook.

It’s an instinctual reaction but, it does the job

Because instead of landing on you, Lady falls down the hole in the floor to the cellar.

The four of you rush over to the entrance to see her body laying still at the bottom of stairs.

There is a bit of silence before you speak up, staying close to Jimin, “What do we do?”

He smirks, wrapping an arm around you, “Leave her. Let her die alone with her all nice shit.”

Yoongi, Hoseok, Namjoon and, Jin rush in finally and as soon as they spot you, they sigh out in relief.

“Oh my god.”

“You’re ok.”

“We knew we’d find you. Fuck, we missed you so much.”

“If you ever get kidnapped again, I will beat your ass.”

You just smile, giggling at their comments, holding them close.

“Thank you for looking for me. I love you guys so much.”

Yoongi nods to the cellar door and, him and Jimin exchange glances, “Here.” Yoongi tosses him a small black hard drive which Jimin catches seamlessly, “Throw that down there too. It’s the audio from tonight…”

The rest of you aren’t sure how they managed to do it.

But, those questions are reserved for later.

Right now, you just want to get out of there.

Jimin smirks, standing over the edge of the hole in the floor before dropping it in, relishing in the sound it makes as it clatters down the steps.

“Should we call the police?” Hoseok asks, slightly breathless from all the excitement.

“Why would we?” Yoongi grins, shrugging his shoulders, “Girls like her disappear all the time…”

“Good point.” Jin nods returning his grin, and everyone’s eyes are still trained on the hole in the floor.

You aren’t sure if she’s dead but, you’re hoping she isn’t.

She deserves to spend the rest of her life suffering for what she did to you, for what she did to so many others…

“What happened to the guards?” You ask, lacing your fingers with Jimin and, he responds by tightening his grip on your hand.

“We knocked em out. They’re tied up in the garage.” Namjoon remarks coolly

“Let’s get out of here. We need to leave town for few days until the police figure everything out.” Taehyung says, finally dropping the knife to the floor.

“Good thing we have a ride then…” Hoseok holds up the keys to the Range Rover and, the eight of you are giddy with the promise of freedom.

Jungkook stays close to Namjoon and, as rest of you exit the house; he spots movement in the corner of his eyes.

Near the coat rack, sits a long-haired white Persian cat.

Jungkook can’t help himself.

If he isn’t going to kill this terrible woman, he’s at least going to take her cat.

Hit her where it hurts you know?

“Hyung…” He stops Namjoon and, he looks confused for a moment until he spots what Jungkook is pointing out.

Jungkook doesn’t wait to reach out to the furry creature, “ Here kitty kitty.”

The cat rubs against his hand, tiny purs erupting from it’s mouth and, Jungkook smiles as he takes it into his arms.

Namjoon smirks fondly at the two of them before his eyes light up when he sees the name engraved on the cat’s golden collar.

“Cognac.” He breathes and, he and Jungkook share a moment as they exit the house.

The eight of you pile into the Range Rover, with Jin in the driver’s seat and, immediately, you find yourself beside Jimin.

“I thought I lost you…” He whispers desperately, placing a few kisses to your lips.

“I’m not going anywhere.” You whisper back, smiling into his lips before leaning forward to make an announcement to the rest of the car, “Hey guys uh…I think I have a way we can leave town for a bit.”

“How?” Hoseok furrows his brow, leaning around Jimin to see you.

“With this…” You grin and, from the middle of your bra, you pull out several bundles of money, each of them labeled $20,000.

You left the bones in the cellar for the police to find.

But the money?

The money, you took with you.

The police wouldn’t need it for their investigation right?

The seven of them look at you in shock before Yoongi lets out a sound you’ve never heard him make before; it’s pure unfiltered joy.

“Oh fuck yeah…”

Plage de Maeva, Tahiti- Two Months Later

Justice came in pieces.

It started with Cognac and, the massive fortune Lady left behind; both of which were returned to their rightful owner, the man at the river.

Then came Jaebeom; the eight of you dropped off a few thousand for him at the club, along with your findings.

A different precinct responded to the distress call from Lady’s home.

She survived the figurative fall yes but, the fall from grace that would soon follow completely destroyed her.

She was brought in on 9 counts of first degree murder, 7 counts of kidnapping, stalking, conspiracy to commit fraud and, a myriad of other charges.

The suits were brought in as well and, suffered similar fates.

Between them, 293 years of prison was to be served.

The staff at the motel, the patrons of the Chamomile Country Club and, even Clementine herself were all publically humiliated when the news broke of Lady’s true nature.

She had been paying them all for their silence.

No charges were brought against them but, their statuses as pariahs seemed fitting enough.

The news came to all of you quite late because, you were far too busy enjoying your own personal victories…on an island called Tahiti.

520,000 was certainly enough to get you out of town and, by the looks of it, you may never return…

“Every second, every minute, man I swear that she can get it Say if you a bad bitch put your hands up high, hands up high, hands up high Tell 'em dim the lights down right now, put me in the mood I'm talking 'bout dark room, perfume Go, go!”

Yoongi’s voice echoes loudly with the help of his microphone as he raps the lyrics to a rather befitting song by Kendrick Lamar.

It was karaoke night on the rooftop of your resort and the eight of you, along with your loved ones are enjoying every second of it.

Hoseok rushes on stage with Yoongi, laughing as he does, “I recognize your fragrance (hol' up!) You ain't never gotta say shit (woo!) And I know your taste is A little bit (mmm) high maintenance (ooh) Everybody else basic You live life on an everyday basis with-“ He holds the mic out and, the rest of you scream the lyrics with beaming smiles.

“POETIC JUSTICE, POETIC JUSTICE- IF I TOLD YOU A FLOWER BLOOMED IN A DARK ROOM WOULD YOU TRUST IT?”

Jimin is behind you, with his arms secured around your waist, giggling through the words.

He’s euphoric at the moment, he’s never been so happy in his entire life.

Namjoon hits the stage next, and the song continues with the help of your friends and the crowd,

“I mean I write poems in these songs dedicated to you When you're in the mood for empathy, there's blood in my pen Better yet where your friends and them? I really wanna know you all I really wanna show you off Fuck that, pour up plenty of champagne Cold nights when you curse this name….”

Jungkook and Taehyung are at the front of the crowd hyping them up whilst Jin sings loudly with his fiancée.

The next part Jimin croons into your ear, tightening his grip on you as the words have so much meaning:

“And anytime…” He sings, kissing into your neck, “You can get it, you can get it, you can get it, you can get it- And I know just know just know just know just what you want…poetic justice, put it in a song, alright.”

You turn in his arms then, kissing him deeply, pouring everything you have into it.

“You kept your promise.” You whisper, grinning against his lips.

“My promise?” He giggles, kissing you back, his eyes deep with emotion.

You cup his cheek, biting your lip as you hold back your tears, “The night I disappeared, you promised me, we’d get our break…”

His smile widens and, rather than use his words, he just kisses you again.

Because, he can.

Because, you’re safe.

Because, you’re his.

The rooftop is a place you often end up.

It’s a little cliché, you think: a bunch of rich kids corralled onto a fancy ass resort building on a tropical island, the waves crashing in the background.

But you and your friends aren’t ordinary rich kids.

The worst any of you has ever done is rob an old lady’s house, push her down the stairs, leave her for dead and, then ruin her life but…

To be fair…

That bitch deserved it.

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