#getting fucked up by the descent on a monday evening

[octuscle]

I went to the Nations of the World party and I drew the UAE. Could you help me get into that culture and be big and sexy for the party?

Everything Arabic is currently incredibly in demand… I don't have much choice anymore… But I think I have just the thing here. Just activate. Activation takes three days, transformation will end automatically on 03 November at 08:00. You should still be able to have some fun after the party.

Monday night… A bit early to activate the costume… The party is more than two weeks away… But you can't wait. Every nine hours now, one of your ancestors from your great-grandparents' generation will become of Arab descent. At first you don't feel anything… You spend the evening as usual in front of the television. Everything is normal… You go to bed earlier than usual. At 22:00 sharp. And at 05:00 the alarm clock rings. Your new routine. Breakfast, jogging to the gym, an hour at the weights, jogging home and then second breakfast, shower and off to the office. You're at your desk even earlier than usual. And fit as seldom. You get plenty of compliments. Colleagues ask you if you were on vacation. Fuck, the costume seems to pay off. At lunchtime you go out for falafel. Your mother grew up bilingual. What the fellows behind the counter speak is everything, but not customer-friendly. You've already learned that much Arabic from your mother… You say goodbye with "'ayuha al'iikhwatu, lays hunak nasihat lihadha alealaji." The two fellows stare at you with open eyes. That was better than tipping them.

In the evening you cook your dinner, prepare your breakfast, eat, read a little bit and go to bed at 22:00. You dream wildly and wake up at 5:00 a.m. drenched in sweat. Hair grows on your chest. On a well-built chest. When you finish your training, you are the son of a Syrian mother and an American father. You grew up bilingual. Fluent in Arabic. And still a Christian. Your father prevailed. Sure, your mother told you a lot about the Koran, but religion doesn't interest you much anyway. Your church is the gym, your communion is the protein shake. In the office, all your colleagues ask you about the situation in the Middle East. How you see it. You were once on vacation in Tunisia. These are your experiences with the Middle East. What do you know about that?

At the end of work at 5:00 p.m. your genetics change. You have more Arabic than European roots. You can see it in your body hair. In your eyes. You notice it because you want to smoke a shisha at the end of the day. Everyone knows you in the café. You all speak Arabic to each other. You are still the infidel Christian. But all those who have not yet sucked your uncut dick don't know that. Ahmad, whom you just fucked in the toilet, for example, knows.

Wednesday morning. Prayer times are always good in the winter. You're done with your workout before you go to sunrise prayer. Training and prayer set the rhythm of your day. It is good that you are your own boss. Importing and exporting various things. Exporting cars to the Middle East. Importing… Well, whatever comes along… All kinds of things… By noon prayer, you've lost your American passport. You are a proud citizen of the UAE. There was once a Swedish great-grandmother. But it doesn't show on your face. And you don't notice it yourself.

After the sunset prayer, the transformation is complete. Purebred Arabian. A true Arabian hot-blooded stallion. You have been in the States for five years now. A good and permissive life here. Your mother should not know about this. But this is sex, drugs and rock'n'roll. You're looking forward to the Halloween party in two weeks. Costume? You don't need a costume. You just show up…

Inspiration found @fitbearcatcher

#male tf #muscle tf #reality change #chronivac #male transformation #muscle transformation #race change #halloween tf

[transhitman]

It's 2AM but Mon Fucking Dieu. Ok. I think how bad Harry was before the game is sort of up to interpretation but for me sooo much points to him being truly miserable and toxic like. Jean's opinion of him is so low, and even Judit who is sympathetic was willing to leave him when he told them to fuck off despite how obviously unstable he was. Like there's an Esprit De Corps passive where it's implied that Jean legit thought Harry would just give up and go home after they left. As if Harry has had episodes like that and threatened suicide before to the point that his friends don't take it seriously anymore. He's worn them down. That's just how he is. All the angry outbursts he had during his bender. The fact that he had Dora's NEW number committed to muscle memory, implying he has called her a lot, which is fucking yikes. Even if he's not working for la Puta Madre the fact that people think he is says a lot about how ruthless/corrupt he might have been. The case where it says he beat the shit out of a guy for a minor infraction while drunk/high. And like. Obviously he's extremely depressed but there's also this spiteful overtone of "it would hurt the people who love me if I killed myself," implied if he threatens suicide in front of the Hardie Boys, and stated EXPLICITLY in the Finger on the Eject Button thought. ("Think how much they'll *miss* you.") Even after his memory loss there's nothing inherently good about him. Like he can hit Cuno, he can KILL Cunoesse, he can be a fucking asshole, he has the capacity to be a straight up fascist and say racist/sexist shit. Most of this descent into fascism seems to be a result of bitterness towards Dora -- how alone he feels and how he wants someone else to blame for his misery -- and if barely-remembered heartbreak can make him do that, what else has that bitterness driven him to do? And then you get to the contrast of how Jean sees him vs how Kim sees him, both extremely biased. Jean doesn't realize how fundamentally he's changed because of how consistently awful he used to be. Kim jumps to his defense and doesn't realize how toxic he was because all he knows is the version of Harry who wants to be a better person -- at least in the ending I think most people consider canon. They're both entirely justified in their perception but there's no correct answer. Idk it just makes me feel deranged to think about. The whole thing with Dora and the line about "Mourning someone who's still alive." The way the game opens up on a death-like void. The way Half Light says "Monday morning. The moment you arrived in this reality," as if Harry didn't exist for the last 44 years. The way loss of self and memory is framed as akin to oblivion. The way you as the player can effectively kill the old Harry and replace him with something new, even down to his name. Raphael Ambrosius Cousteau. Tequila Sunset. "I don't want to be this kind of animal anymore."

#suicide mention // #disco elysium #harrier du bois #I'M NORMAL.

[trashideas]

Hiking/ Gaming Streamer Joonghyuk and resident cryptid photographer Dokja

Joonghyuk stumbles across Dokja halfway up a tree and is very obviously struggling to do something. Dokja is spread awkwardly between three branches, but his arms are stabilized to hold his camera that's pointed at another tree.

Joonghyuk, a streamer who does not feel like recording a man kill himself, decides to yell up to ask if the man is okay.

A few trees away, a flapping of wings and a flutter of feathers is heard. Dokja lets out a series of swears before stumbling down the tree. While the descent was rushed, it was also smooth as fuck. The lowest branch was maybe around 4 meters, yet Dokja dropped smoothly into a roll that protected his camera.

This was practiced.

“You fucking asshole do you know how long I had to sit there?”

“Uh-”

“Hours! Hours! me, with no upper body strength, had to hold myself in that tree to wait for the hawk to land! Do you understand how rare it is to get a picture of those fuckers on the ground?”

“N-”

“You don't! How could you possi-” Dokja noticed the go-pro camera strapped to his shoulder. “Ah, a streamer.” and then had the audacity to turn around and walk off into the woods as if were a normal Monday.

Joonghyuk was perplexed. What just happened and what did he just see?

Joonghyuk decided to try to apologize to the man. He understood how hard it was to get perfect shots. But when Joonghyuk pushed aside the bush that the other man walked through, he found a near sheer cliff of loose dirt.

When Dokja had walked through the brush with no problem, he made no noise of being startled that the ground was no longer there. Even stranger, there was no evidence of him going down the cliff. No scuffs in the dirt, no path, nothing. It was as if he had just disappeared.

His comment section seemed to agree that he just met some cryptid of the forest.

....

After the stream and getting back to his hotel room, Joonghyuk decided to ask around some of the local restaurants about his encounter.

Equipped with his camera, he first asked the restaurant owner if he could record their conversation for his video. With their permission, Joonghyuk first asked about the forest and the trails, if they got many tourists.

After a series of questions to lead up to his big one were answered, he finally asked: “Have you met any strange people in the forest?”

To which the owner, Han Sooyoung, started busting out laughing. “You-” she cut herself off with another fit of giggles that sounded more or less insane, “you met Dokja.”

“And who is Dokja?”

“Kim. Dokja.” she stressed, “and he’s our resident cryptid.”

Oh so he was right. Perhaps there was some sort of “supernatural” explanation to his existence, at least then he could make a debunk video. Those seemed pretty popular.

“Dont be getting any ideas. He is a local photographer. Just that's enough to make him crytpid. Even worse, he knows the forest like the back of his hand. Don't be surprised if he disappears. He does that. Thinks he looks all cool and mysterious.” offhandedly- she added, “reads way too many novels.”

“Oh? What does he take pictures of?”

“Animals and fauna mostly. He submits papers to... Somewhere. He somehow gets money. Wouldn't be surprised if he somehow is connected to the mafia.”

“Interesting... Do you know where-”

“Where you can find him? Your guess is as good as mine. If you walk around the forest long enough, I'm sure you'll see him again.”

....

Han Sooyoung was correct.

It was currently 4am and the sun was just starting to rise. The morning dew sparkled through the smoky fog while soft light filtered through the leaves overhead.

It painted a beautiful picture.

It seemed that Joonghyuk wasn't the only one to think of filming in the beautiful brisk morning. Because there sat Dokja at the edge of an overhang looking over the forest with camera in hand.

Dokja had his camera up to his face, snapping quick pictures at different angles. He was precariously close to the edge of the overhang. By precariously close, Joonghyuk meant that the other man was literally sitting with his legs kicking over the ledge. He hummed softly to a tune Joonghyuk didn't recognize.

Joonghyuk decided not to disturb the other man. He was taking photos of the sunrise.

However, the pathway did pass by where Dokja was sitting, so when he walked closer to see the sight Dokja was capturing, he couldn't help but bring out his own camera and start snapping a few pictures.

It just so happened that Dokja stayed within each frame. The sunlight painted him in beautiful shadows while lighting the rest of the picture up. There was even a photo Joonghyuk got where the glare of the sun made a lovely rainbow halo around Dokja.

When Dokja finally turned around, he didn't seem surprised to see Joonghyuk. He gave Joonghyuk a cunning smile, “I get to take pictures of you next. You don't get any freebies just because you're pretty.”

Joonghyuk almost scoffed. It most definitely wasn't him who was pretty.

After a moment of hesitation, Dokja added, “Ah, if you want to I mean.”

So he wasn't just a sauve and mysterious asshole. Curious.

“Oh, so I can keep my photos for free?”

Dokja rose to the bait immediately, “Absolutely not you bastard. You still owe me hawk pictures.”

“Of course.”

....

And so that's how it went. Nearly everyday, Joonghyuk went out on a morning walk to set up a basic idea of where he was taking his stream and nearly each time he would find Dokja in increasingly worrying places.

One time, at around 3:30am when the sun wasn't even up, he found Dokja three quarters the way up a tree- hanging upside down- on a branch that did not look like it could support his weight.

It took all of Joonghyuk’s willpower not to scream at the mentally ill photographer.

Dokja was taking pictures of something on another branch and Joonghyuk knew if he disturbed the other, then it would be Joonghyuk regretting his life decisions.

Joonghyuk had developed an easy habit of waiting for the photographer to move his camera away from what he has been focusing on, that's when Joonghyuk is allowed to get his attention by flashing his phone light at him.

It gets his attention pretty quick.

Dokja sits up on the branch and it bends a worryingly amount. Joonghyuk holds his head in his hand as disappointed worry overtakes him. “Get down here.”

Mirth sparks behind Dokja’s eyes, Joonghyuk said the wrong thing, “No.”

“Kim Dokja I swear you are going to die one of these times.”

“Okay. And? I'm getting good pictures.” he lowers himself to a sturdier branch- thank fuck- “Wanna see the bat picture I took! I have one of the little guy yawning.”

And just like that, Dokja went from being at the top of a tree to in front of Joonghyuk, showing him pictures of a bat he just took.

...

Another time Joonghyuk found Dokja was after a late stream. Joonghyuk got a little lost as he went his usual rounds through the trails. Someone had changed one of the signs to screw up hikers like him and he winded up on the wrong path.

Despite not knowing where he was, Joonghyuk hadn't panicked once during the stream. His viewers were none the wiser. They didn't know of his predicament.

It was late when Joonghyuk finally ended his stream with a promise to make it home on time. The sun was already down and he was on the familiar path by a creek.

He could hear the gentle trickle of the water in the distance.

What was not a normal sound was the string of familiar curses.

Of course Kim Dokja would be out right now. Joonghyuk changed his direction from the path to cut through the forest to the creek. He fumbled over his person to take out his phone to use the flashlight function.

Now feeling like he was playing a 1st-person horror game, Joonghyuk carefully picked his way through the foliage to finally find a drenched Kim Dokja.

“Joonghyuk?”

“What are you doing in the water?”

“Taken’ pictures.”

“Uh huh, where's your camera?”

Dokja huffed.

“Come here, it's cold.” Joonghyuk shrugged off his backpack to take out his emergency blanket.

Dokja got out of the water and shuffled over to Joonghyuk. The man was shivering.

“Take off your shirt.”

“We aren't that close-”

“Here,” he shoved the blanket in the other man’s arms, “be cold for all I care.” it was obvious to the both of them that he cared.

“I didn't know your camera had night vision.”

“It doesn't?”

“Then why are you still streaming?”

Joonghyuk took his camera off his shoulder. He must’ve bumped the button while looking for his phone. It's late. There shouldn't be many people watching the stream anyways. He would just delete the video quickly.

...

The next day, all people could talk about was the mysterious figure. Some people had already connected the dots that the blacked-out figure was the elusive photographer that his fans still didn't know the name of.

However, they knew plenty about the photographer's strange personality. Joonghyuk didn't see him often during his streams and even when he did, he would simply wave to the man in passing. Usually they never exchanged words on stream.

So the fans took his clip of his out of breath- “take off your shirt” way out of context.

That short clip was all over the internet. Joonghyuk couldn't escape it.

Even worse, there seemed to be a ship going on between him and the photographer. It would have been fine if the artists weren't amazing. They captured Dokja in a way that Joknghyuk didn't see often. There were even... More heated artworks that Joonghyuk most definitely did not look at.

He did not look at them.

...

The next time Joonghyuk encountered Dokja wasn't in the woods.

It was at the bar that he first started asking questions at.

Kim Dokja was at the bar counter with his camera, showing pictures to Han Sooyoung with a large smile on his face.

Did Dokja look that happy when showing pictures to Joonghyuk?

Joonghyuk took the bar seat next to Dokja, patiently waiting for the photographer to notice him.

When Dokja did, that smile was turned to him. “Ah- Joonghyuk!” he turned to the famar bartender, “Han Sooyoung, this is Yoo Joonghyuk.”

“We've met.” Joonghyuk answered.

“Yeah, came in asking me about you and where be could meet with you again. Seemed pretty despite to catch another glimpse of you.” she elbowed Dokja with a wink.

“I'm sure,” Dokja responded with a deadpan tone before turning back to Joonghyuk, “wanna see the wolves I saw today?”

Worry spiked in Joonghyuk, “You saw wolves?” he checked to make sure Dokja had no new scratches. For a moment, Joonghyuk almost asked “did you die” before stopping that question mid-thought.

Dokja nodded, “yeah! They travel the woods pretty frequently so they aren't always in one area. But they know me well enough to not run if they see me.”

“Run if they see you?”

Dokja stared at him. “Oh please don't tell me you think they're vicious creatures.”

“I don't.” he did.

“Here I have a video.”

And Dokja proceeds to pull up a video of a white wolf right up to the camera. And its growling. Deep and guttural. It sends shivers of fear up Joonghyuk’s spine.

In the video, Joonghyuk catches a glimpse of a hand going through the wolf’s fur.

“Kim Dokja.”

He hums.

“Are you petting it?”

“Yes?”

“Kim Dokja.” he has to stop himself from strangling Dokja, “its growling.”

“Yeah,” he answers as if it were a normal answer to an absurd question. “She does that,” he adds as an afterthought.

“Kim Dokja it sounds like she is about to rip your throat out.”

“And you sound like an uncaring bastard, yet here you care caring. Don't judge a wolf by his growl.”

It's Han Sooyoung that steps in, “Dokja, don't pet wild animals. I still need you as my editor.”

“She isn't a wild animal. She responds to Biyoo.”

“Oh no, he named it.”

“Biyoo is just very vocal. She wants cuddles and pets though.”

“Oh I'm sure, Dokja.” Han Sooyoung gave Joonghyuk that obviously asked “what do we do? He is going to kill himself one of these days.”

Joonghyuk could only shrug at that.

....

“Kim Dokja what are you doing?”

“Catfishing”

This time, Joonghyuk actually sighed. Even he didn't know if it was disappointment or not.

Because here Dokja was, in the middle of the woods, with a padded cat carrier connected to a string. The carrier even had treats in it.

“Why?”

“Because one of the kids lost her cat in the woods and I told her I'd find it.”

“So you resort to... catfishing?”

“Well yes, it's the most logical choice.”

“Dokja,” he could only say exasperatedly.

...

“And that's how I got free help on making posters and getting together a search party for finding a cat. We found the little guy behind the restaurant on day 3 of the search.”

...

It was nearing his time of heading back home.

Joonghyuk had an amazing month-long journey, but his hotel needed him out of the room by the end of the day because they were fully booked. Joonghyuk had already asked if they could extend his stay, but they couldn't.

Joonghyuk had explored pretty much all the trails had to offer and his view count on his hiking trips seemed to be nonexistent unless there was a certain photographer in sight.

Joonghyuk lived a few hours away and he really needed to get back to streaming gaming content- otherwise he would be breaking his contract.

Tornaments and whatnot were also approaching, and he hadn't touched a gaming console in nearly a month. He spent practically all day everyday out in those woods with a certain photographer always somewhere nearby.

Joonghyuk had forgotten about his responsibilities, he had fallen for the charm of the forest and the gremlin that inhabited it.

He had decided to go to the bar one last time before leaving tomorrow morning.

He found Dokja at the bar. Curiously, while Dokja was found at the bar quite a few times, Joonghyuk had never seen him drink alcohol.

So it was strange seeing the man nursing a glass. When Joonghyuk took the seat next to him, he could smell the strong scent of-

“Don't tell me you're drinking vinegar.”

Dokja didn't respond.

“Are you drinking vinegar?”

“It's watered down.”

“Dokja what the fuck”

“Don't knock until you try it. Besides, we're all here to drown out something. Doesn't matter what we do it with.”

Joonghyuk took the shot glass away from Dokja. “What are you doing here?”

“Heard that our resident asshole was leaving.”

“How’d you know?”

“While I spend a lot of my time in the forest, I do still have access to basic technology.”

“So you've looked me up?”

“Who wouldn't?”

Han Sooyoung cut in, “stop flirting at my bar, you idiots. Just ask for each other’s numbers and go fuck somewhere.”

Oh. Joonghyuk had never thought to ask for the other’s number.

Before he could even ask, Dokja had his own phone out and had an outstretched hand opened, waiting for something to be placed in his palm. He was looking down to his phone, opening some apps.

Joonghyuk’s sleep deprived mind blanked and he simply took the hand in his own.

“Damn that's bold.” Han Sooyoung commented.

While Joonghyuk immediately regretted his action, if he pulled away then he would loose against Han Sooyoung. So instead, he fished his phone out his pocket with his other hand and handed it to Dokja. All the while, he kept eye contact with Han Sooyoung.

He did not see the harsh blush overcoming Kim Dokja’s face.

Dokja quickly inputted their numbers into each other’s phones. It was a little clumsy, as his dominant hand was currently being held captive by the powerful bastard’s grip, but he managed.

“Stop eye fucking each other. You're making the other patrons uncomfortable.”

...

To be continued?

#orv omniscient reader's view point #orv au #kim dokja #yoo joonghyuk #long post #snippysnippet

[lieutenantabrudas]

I Know You

wrote a thing for the shrimp skwad monday game prompt that ended up WAY longer than one message, lol. the prompt was:

Your blorbos meet their younger selves due to Comsic Bullshit™️ - how does that go? Is it bittersweet? Do they take a moment to feel proud of how far they've come?

hilariously everyone took bets on which of 3 possibilities i was most likely to do. unfortunately for them now i'm gonna do all three, for fun :) the correct guess that i was already working on tho was exdiff desolas, now 90 years old as of mid-itlog, talking to his younger self maybe a few weeks prior to wake me when it's over. couple references are made to that fic, but it's not required reading, you can guess pretty easily what's being talked about.

Fandom: Mass Effect Character(s): Desolas Arterius Warning(s): Alcohol (mentioned), suicidal ideation, severe depression, loss & grief, very brief but graphic memory of gore Word Count: 1,189

It was true, he guessed. From a distance, he really hadn't aged a day.

Up close, he knew, there was a difference. His plates were cracked, his eyes had never recovered quite that brilliant electric blue, his nasal plates would never sit straight again. General Arterius was beautiful in his heyday, but it had been a very long time since Desolas was young.

It had to be a dream, that was the only explanation. He didn't think he was dying, not unless something had crept up in his sleep, and he didn't recall drinking anything in a few months.

He certainly hadn't gone to bed in his grandmother's old apartment building, either.

The rooftop he'd opened the bedroom door to was like an old friend. An old, toxic friend who just kept dragging him down no matter how bad things got, but an old friend nonetheless. The six-pack of flavored horosks was another one, sitting right next to his younger self like he could step right into his old body and have a drink.

He'd only ever come up here for one reason. He sat down next to himself instead.

The eyes sunken into the haggard face that turned to glance at him were too tired to register much surprise. Young Desolas - Dei-Dei, that's what his parsaepat had called him, and Titaup too - looked him up and down, taking him in, then returned to the dizzying drop ahead. His legs kicked faintly against the brick. "Dream."

It wasn't a question. Desolas nodded, hiked one knee up to rest his heel on the ledge, watched the traffic below right with him. "Dream," he confirmed.

Dei-Dei rocked slightly. How far off was he, at this point, Desolas wondered - was this the start of his descent, or the night before Parmat barely stopped him in time? Maybe it didn't matter. The days had all blurred together, back then. "How old are you?" he asked, voice small and broken, still in pieces after his screaming. Recent, then.

Desolas tipped his head. "Does it matter?" He remembered the little pink thing bumbling past, maybe - a little old drake with three boxangk loose in the backseat, or had that been the single mom?

Dei-Dei scowled. Had he really been so angry? "How long do I have?"

Ah. Desolas flicked one mandible. "Ninety, next harvest."

Dei-Dei rumbled and rested his chin on his knee. "This is gonna be some trite it gets better shit, huh. 'Don't jump, it'll all work out in the end, it's gonna be okay,' just fuck off and leave me alone."

His heart jerked in his chest. It was odd, hearing his own voice out loud instead of through vibrations. Desivius might have been Valis's shadow, but he'd gotten his old man's voice. He took a deep breath. "Yeah, yeah. It getting better later don't mean it doesn't hurt now. I know." Old, far-off, unhappy things scratched at the door he'd closed them behind, and he let his eyes flutter shut. "Nobody knows what to say to make it stop hurting, 'cause nothing can."

He got a low, snuffling inhale in response. Guess he and Saren had had that in common, even if he'd hated to admit it back then.

They sat in silence for a little while, just watching the traffic buzz past, until Dei-Dei mumbled, "So, does it?"

Desolas paused, then opened his eyes and turned to regard him. For a heartbeat, just the barest blink, Dei-Dei's face was stained red again, and he could feel the batarian's throat between his teeth, his intestines beneath his claws. Then his gizzard twitched, and it was gone, leaving just the broken husk of a child the man he'd become had been forced out of before his time. He sighed. "It does, kid, but it's gonna get a whole lot worse before it does."

Dei-Dei blinked, then looked up at him, eyes popping open. "You're not supposed to say that," he scolded, baring his teeth.

Desolas snorted quietly. "Nah, but it's in-character, ain't it? You're fucking depressed and need help you're refusing to get, your vision of your older self ain't gonna be all sunshine and rainbows." He waved a hand. "Just listen, stupid."

Dei-Dei drew back, offense ringing through his subvocals, but after a moment, he grudgingly settled, curiosity winning out. Desolas shook his head and continued. "Shit's gonna suck, okay? And I mean really suck. This ain't gonna be the last time you think about ending it, I promise you that. The galaxy's gonna chew you up, spit you out, and come back for another round, again and again and again. You think you feel like shit now? Kiddo, this is just the beginning. This is gonna be the closest to normal you feel for a long, long time."

Dei-Dei's nasal plates flared and his brow plates dropped, but Desolas raised a hand. "But," he warned, "but it's not the end, and don't you fucking dare give up on it, got it? Mal, Lup, Heavy - you haven't been answering their messages, but they keep texting, yeah? They care about you. They're your fucking friends. Life's gonna take you guys down different paths, but they're your ride-or-die, friends to the bitter end. And they won't be the only ones. Hate to break it to you, but that snot-nosed little brat downstairs is gonna make one big fucking splash, and before you know it, you're gonna be watching his star shoot across the sky. You're both going down in history, and you have to stay alive to see it happen, yeah?"

The words were catching in his throat, so he paused to breathe for a second. "There's gonna be some officers, some who believe in you like nobody else will, who're gonna see who you can be, not just who you are now, and want to be there to see you become him. And... and there's one more." Golden plates flashed in his mind's eye, and he took a deep breath. "You'll know her when you meet her, believe me. Bitch hits like a fucking freight train. But she's gonna come along, and you're not gonna get along at first, but you're gonna sleep right again with her, and she's gonna be there to catch you when you fall. She's your ticket back out of this hole, do you understand me? She's gonna offer you her hand, and your stupid, self-centered ass better fucking take it, 'cause nobody's gonna believe in Desolas fucking Arterius quite like she does, and you're gonna need every ounce of strength she's got in those big fucking biceps to pull you out of here."

Dei-Dei recoiled from his intensity, but his eyes shone with something Desolas knew damn well would never appear there again for a very long time. He was quiet for a little while, then managed a hoarse, "When?"

Desolas blinked. "When do things start getting better? Eh..." Shit, he'd never been good at math. "You're gonna have to get outta the hastatim, kid. But when's the rope getting thrown down?" He considered, then lifted one mandible. "Your next stationing's on Taetrus. Go for gold, kiddo." 

#mefanfic #masseffectfanfiction #desolas arterius #writing

[lovecolibri]

What’s interesting is a few blogs that are like ‘this is what the ga likes! Fandom is too small for a difference’ and we brought this on ourselves. Which okay, yea we did a little with buddie but I’ve been looking through a few different sites and I’m seeing a small crowd of ‘oh I loved it all and I love the new li’s’ and a much bigger crowd of, LS had a much better finale, who are these chicks, what is buck doing, it was rushed, and so on.

I’m just so tired of hearing well it’s not about you little fandom out there on tumblr and twitter crying, it’s about the millions of GA’s. Well the GA is speaking out and they may not be crying over a couch theory but they aren’t very satisfied what was put on our screens Monday evening. Just need others to stop saying they actually know this is what the ga wants and understands, that we need to stop crying, and nothing is going to change with abc. Omg.

Sorry for the rant. Just had to get a little off my chest bc I am so tired of others basically being happy that buddie shippers were let down and that we don’t really matter to what happens to the show. Like you said earlier, fandoms keep shows alive when it really comes down to it.

I get you, Nonnie! And while yes, I did see some WILD takes about where people were saying things were going for Buddie when I happened to peek at Twitter that I felt were a reach because the build-up we should have seen if Buddie was the direction this season wasn't there, but even EYE was shocked at that ending! Also, the GA isn't out here making tons of comments online so it actually baffles me when shows or people talk about "what they GA wants" because like, how do we know? Yeah the TV might be on and counting for viewers but are they happy with the show or is it playing in the other room while they're making dinner or answering emails? If they aren't the ones making their opinions known because they're not online how can anyone say "this is what they want"? IDK. I just think that if they WEREN'T concerned at all with how the online fandom would react, they would have dug in and had a descent build-up to the LIs for Buck and Eddie and given them a romance their characters are worthy of like they did with all the other ships on the show. But forcing it in at the end while not actually telling us ANYTHING about these women or why the guys like them or how they are good for them and fulfill what they've been looking for, just tells me that they couldn't afford to alienate the online fanbase earlier in the season which in turn tells me that they DO listen more than people have said they do. Does that mean they'll actually make Buddie canon? Not necessarily, but it does say that my post about shipbaiting was on track in that they made sure to do enough to use the online fandom to hype things up for them and couldn't risk losing that fanbase before the end of the show. Which is a dick move and I think it's perfectly acceptable for people to call them out on it being a dick. fucking. move.

#my sweet nonnie friends #911 #911 spoilers

[homeofjonicles]

The Jonicles - Entry 7

Note: This is the seventh entry of The Jonicles, hence why the date does not match when this is being posted. This was written back in June of this year before I started this blog, and there will be errors or developments in how this series was being written. Please enjoy (or don't enjoy) the seventh entry of The Jonicles!

(^^ dayum jon looks HAWT) It is currently 11:00 pm on the 7th of June, 2022 on a Tuesday. We are past the day of reckoning, and I find it funny how so far I've never made an entry on a Monday (bad timing, i suppose). It's also day #20 of my Jon Arbuckle hyperfixation! A definite sign of my descent into madness.

Two image entry as the first one ('Jon Snaps') is the primary focus, yet the drawing of Jon being tackled by an officer was too good not to include. What crime did he even commit, anyway? My bets are on vehicular homicide for sure.

Anyway, Garfield Gets Real is a weird movie. A really, really weird, bizarre and odd movie that I had the fortune of watching as a really young kid. The old, outdated CGI, the mismatch in style with characters like Eli and the director contrasting Garfield and Jon, Bonita and her weird sythe head that still haunts me to this very day, it's wack.

But what if I told you, the hypothetical reader of this journal, that within this very movie lies a peculiar detail that at first, is very hard to spot on your first viewing, but if you do notice it, is incredibly vulgar and may even ruin (or enhance) your childhood just a smidge?

That comic I attached is a reference to something the character Samuel L. Jackson says in the movie 'Pulp Fiction', which I haven't watched but have heard is pretty good. It's a fan edit of another Garfield comic with the added punchline of Jon snapping and threatening to fuck his own cat while also dropping the motherfucker bomb. It's pretty funny, but what does this have to do with Garfield Gets Real, you might've asked?

Well, what if I told you that this very comic in it's pure, completely uncensored vulgarity ended up in this movie? And no, it's not anywhere super obvious. You gotta look for it.

In the scene where the Garfield and Odie try to win the hearts of executives to prevent their comic from being cancelled, there's this part where the two GIANT HUNKY PETS roll in and start SHOWIN' THEIR MOVES as Garfield and Odie hide behind a sign with them on it.

But there's something else on that sign too. And it's this comic. The camera is juuuust close enough for a viewer with a very sharp eye to make out, but not too close for this movie to end up with an MA15+ rating.

I'm telling the complete truth. This comic seriously did end up in this movie. Go check for yourself. Look up a clip that scene I mentioned and go to 1:19 and 4:25 and pause. You'll see it clearly near Garfield's horrifying human foot on the board.

Still in disbelief? Jaw dropped? Hyperventilating? In shock? Good! That's how I felt when I found this out too. In fact, I was in so much shock that it didn't wear off for a good 20 or so minutes. I still can't fucking believe that actually slipped through. No one noticed it - they wouldn't have. It would be near-impossible unless they were paying an inhuman amount of attention to every little detail in every scene when reviewing the film for a rating. And don't forget that because of the film's canon in having comics be "filmed" and published for the real world to see, that means Jon saying motherfucker is canon in Garfield Gets Real, which could in theory also make Garfield Minus Garfield canon as well. Bonkers.

But it gets deeper. There are so many unanswered questions. Who did this? Seriously, who the fuck put this in? Was it a random person working on the film? A disgruntled animator? Could it have been Jim Davis himself? Why was it put there? Did he mean for it to be there? Was it put there as a joke? Did Davis specifically state for that one to be put in? Did someone just look up "Garfield comic" on a late night working on the film and pick it without reading it and put it there? But they would've had to have seen it, right? I'm guessing the word motherfucker wouldn't be too hard to miss if you're up close and personal working on the film yourself, correct? If it wasn't Davis, how it'd slip by him? Did he look at the comic and go "Huh, which one is this?"? Does he know? What does he think of the idea of Jon threatening to fuck Garfield? Will we ever get a statement from the man himself? So many questions...

In short, this scene broke me, and added another layer of weirdness and hilarity to this movie that I didn't even think was possible. I just think it's really funny that I lived out my whole childhood having no idea about this little detail, I swear, Garfield is so surreal sometimes...

Last edited at 11:34 pm. Jon Arbuckle could easily Jon Arfuckle you up if he wanted to, mark his word.

Note: That last bit isn't an innuendo, I meant that Jon could beat someone, that someone possibly being you reading this, up, hence the wording. Though now that I mention it, the readers probably didn't think that was a dirty joke and now see it that way and wont be able to unsee it... Welp... (Also, the entry says "two image entry", but I only included the most important one in this post, which made the "dayum jon looks HAWT" comment make no sense. However, I may exclude extra images for later entries that are being posted from now on as there's no need to repeat posting the same image for certain entries. You're gonna love the image I use for the next one, trust me. He looks "hawt".)

So yeah, this is the scene I mentioned in the last entry that broke me. This entry's pretty short, don't have much else to say here other than the fact that 'Jon Snaps' will never not be funny to me after this discovery I made back in June.

UPDATE: EMERGENCY DISCOVERY REGARDING THIS MOVIE! In this video of the first scene in the movie at 3:11, a comment pointed out that there is a shot where when the books are being tilted off the shelf like dominos, there is a very quick sighting of a Death Note to the right of the shelf. This is very awesome and cool for the producers to slip in and it adds yet another layer to this movie I never knew about before. It's not 'Jon Snaps' levels of bizarre, but it's still a weird, unfitting yet very cool easter egg.

Cheers,

Your Local Jonnoisseur

Posted on the 21st of July, 2022 at 8:30 pm.

#jonicles 7 #this discovery was seriously so cursed #garfield gets real.... maybe a little too real.... #deth note momenmt #god this movie is so layered i'm gonna stare at every detail now for hours and point out every one of them #i've lost it i think

[anthonysstupiddailyblog]

Anthony’s Stupid Daily Blog (55): Sat 7th May 2022

 It rained pretty hard last night but apparently we’ve seen the worst of it and starting Monday it should be clear skies and hot weather. I’m going to try not to let this shitty weather ruin the holiday for me (and I’m trying even harder not to let the fact that the day after we leave for home it’s nothing but hot sunny weather for about a fortnight ruin it for me. I won’t deny the urge to kill is there but I’m trying my best to drown it out by constantly eating delicious Italian ice cream so I get a massive brain freeze which will then make me forget about the weather situation). This disappointing weather got me wondering if we will ever got to a stage where we’ll develop a way to actually control the weather. Imagine if at some point in the future we found a way to control what the weather was like. If some nerd could just push a button on a computer in a lab somewhere and it would make it sunny for the entire day. How awesome would that be? We’d never have another rainy day in the UK again. Well I imagine we’d need a few for the crops and stuff like that but we could have one week of every month where we push the rain button to let the crops grow and then for the rest of the year it’s just sun (Maybe press the snow button for Christmas Day to keep the kids happy). However after thinking about it a little while longer I realised this could end up backfiring on us because suppose one day a weatherman has a Joker-style nervous breakdown, locks himself in the weather room and cranks up the heat to 1 million degrees and fried the whole country? Although I guess you could prevent this by putting a limit on the top temperature the machine can be turned up to. Anywho it turned out that I’d been daydreaming this ridiculous garbage for so long that it had stopped raining and we could go for a walk at last (and even though that weather controlling stuff was a load of bollocks I can still try and sell it to the makers of Black Mirror to use it for the plot of an episode). We passed a church and even though I’m not religious I still like walking around churches to look at the artwork. One of the statues in the church was a guy in a purple and gold robe and I like to imagine this was the first ever coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. I also saw a statue of Jesus and it made me realise that there are lots of statues showing him like this, i.e in a long robe. All of these statues presumably depict him after he was killed so if he’s constantly wearing a robe that means heaven must be fucking chilly. Seriously why else would he be wearing bulky clothes if not to keep himself warm? If I did believe in religion then the knowledge that heaven was chilly would seriously put me off wanting to go there. It would be more reassuring if churches were adorned with statues of Jesus wearing shorts, a t-shirt and carrying a surfboard. Although she’s been acting up and misbehaving for the whole trip so far Luna was really quiet inside the church as my sister told her we weren’t allowed to make noise in church. When we got out she started up again and I tried to tell her that Italy was basically one big church so she would have to be silent for the rest of the trip but she wasn’t buying it. Luna wanted to go down to the seafront which was at the bottom of the cliff so we had to walk down 10,000 stairs and through a bunch of caves to get there. When we got to the bottom it was all just docks and there was maybe a five foot square patch of sand that was cordoned off by a metal fence anyway so the descent was all for nothing. We walked along the dock for a little while and Luna spotted some jellyfish swimming in the mankey water. She wanted to stay and watch them but my sister told her we had to go and Luna started screaming and continued to do so all the way back up the cliff. By the time we got back to the hotel my neck was killing me and so were my eardrums from Luna’s screaming. But hey, at least we got to look at some sand so I guess I was worth it right? Back at the hotel Luna continued acting up so I slipped out to go for a walk to clear my head (my sister and Mam were still in the room I didn’t leave her by herself I’m not a monster). I went to the same ice cream place we went to yesterday and while I was tempted to get another tub of Oreo flavour I switched things up and went for Butterscotch this time. I’m a creature of habit and stopped trying new things when I was about 12 but on this trip I’m going to try and experience new foods I’ve never had before and this butterscotch ice cream was fucking sublime. Living in the UK I’ve come to the realization that when it comes to food flavour doesn’t really matter to us as we just like our foods as greasy and salty as possible to help us cope with how shitty the UK is. However in Italy they clearly take pride in their food and like to give people as much choice as possible. I swear there are so many flavours in this one store you could have a different one every day for a couple of months. Another thing I’ve noticed is that the vast majority of the eateries in this town are actual restaurants where you have to sit inside and eat. Also in the supermarkets there are hardly any microwave or cook at home foods. I’m guessing this is because they are so well known for their freshly cooked food that they don’t want people eating pre-prepared shit at home they want them experiencing the real stuff in actual restaurants (kind of like how Las Vegas hotels don’t have televisions or WiFi because the owners don’t want you staying in your room they want you down in the casino pissing away your money). Although takeaway food is convenient because you can eat it in bed while you watch a film, sometimes this experience distracts from the food. I think maybe there are no take away shops in this country because they don’t want you to take the food away they want you to sit and enjoy the atmosphere they’ve created as they realise that part of the enjoyment you get from food comes from the venue you’re eating it. Later on we booked our trip to Pompeii on Thursday. Mam and Lauren want to go on some other trip too but fuck that. I want to do this one trip just so I can say I did it and then I want to spend the rest of the trip by the pool listening to music. After dinner Mam and Lauren went into town for a walk but I was knackered so went back to the room for an early sleep. Also as my mate Peter Willis pointed out recently I look a bit like Phil Collins and I don’t want a bunch of drunk Italian blokes coming up to me for selfies and asking me to sing In The Air Tonight (genuinely had to Google “List of Phil Collins songs” because I know fuck all about Phil Collins).

[swarmkeepers]

is it scarier to fall into the cloudsea if it’s as dark as a night sky and the ocean abyss

or is it scarier if it’s the brightest light blue, a color that people shouldn’t be able to disappear into but they do, and when you can’t see them anymore it’s because they’re so so far away that just light refracting off air is more powerful than the image of them

or is it scarier to fall into a white sheet of cloud, completely placid and deceptively inviting but once they pass through it they’re just gone

#sola said #getting fucked up by the descent on a monday evening #do you ever look at photos taken from a plane above the clouds and just. the overview effect is for astronauts but you don't even need to go #all the way into orbit for the sense of Perspective to really hit #anyway i know that nobody saw nyx's body get taken by the being because nobody but eris Knows still but like #did they watch her fall. how far did she fall before she disappeared into the void. did they watch her disappear. #is it worse to watch the descent all the way down or for your view to be interrupted by cloud or darkness or magic and just. #there's an uncertainty technically but also you Know. but also you don't. but what if. #wandering isles

[drawlfoy]

detention, retention, and draco malfoy being a little shit

masterlist request guidelines

pairing: draco x reader

request: no not really

summary: golden trio friend y/n y/l/n tries to extract information out of draco malfoy after being placed in detention together.

warnings: swearing, panic attack kinda stuff, just the dark war things that would come w having the task that draco does

a/n: ayo so i started this as a fic i was originally planning on writing in a week. i discontinued it bc i didn’t think anyone was that interested, but i’ve written for it on and off. it’s about 16k words right now standing, but i’m reposting this as a 2 part series. here are the first ~12k words....enjoy :) IMPORTANT: if you’re like “hey i started reading this in october why tf are you reposting the first two parts” just keep reading ok lmao i promise there’s more there’s about through part 6 in here hehe. i just wanted new readers to be able to pick up on it without being turned off by the fact that it was part 3. this will b e 2 parts and at least 20k words

word count: 11.6k

taglist: @gruffle1 @missmultifandommess @cleopatera @hahaboop @accio-rogers @geeksareunique @eltanin-malfoy @war-sword @cams-lynn @itsivyberry @ayo-cowbelly @nerd-domland @yesnerdsblog @shizarianathania @evanstanfanatic @strawberriesonsummer @hariosborn @night-ving @straightzoinked @imintoodeeptostop @naiomimoonshard @jejegu @ophelia-enthusiast @alwaysbeanunknownfan @nearly-memories @litty-dumb @callieclearwater @malfoy-wife15 @charlenasaxen @belladaises @fiantomartell

happy reading y’all

For legal purposes, the york pudding she lobbed at Pansy Parkinson’s head on Monday evening was simply meant to be a joke. She didn’t know that her aim was bad enough that it was going to get in Snape’s hair instead--honestly, it wasn’t even supposed to get past the Ravenclaw table, much less veer to the left to make a beeline for the professors--but no matter how much she tried to explain this to McGonagall, her sentence remained the same: detention every Friday. For two months.

Her life was ending for sure.

“I honestly don’t know what you were expecting,” Hermione told her as she gently wiped off the nib of her quill later that night in the common room. “Even if you had hit your mark, that’s still technically assault.”

“Did you even hear what she said to me? She told me that I looked like the type of kid that bit people in primary school,” complained Y/N. “I didn’t even think she knew what primary school was!”

Hermione snorted. “How long ago?”

“Two days. I’ve been waiting until there was something throwable on the dinner table.”

“How very analytic of you.”

“I’m going to hit you.”

“And you wonder why you’ve got detention.” Hermione tsk-ed at her, her face stone serious but her tone light hearted. “Maybe take this as an opportunity to, I don’t know, do your homework for once? So you won’t have to have a breakdown over the next Potion’s essay and beg me to write it for you?”

“I’m going to go to sleep and think terribly mean thoughts about you.”

“Have fun.”

~ 

Detention.

Something that Y/N wasn’t completely unfamiliar with--she’d done her time organizing Snape’s cabinets, just like every other Gryffindor--but it was different when it came to McGonagall. An impressive old lady, she thought that McGonagall saw something in her. She was always the first to chuckle at Y/N’s jokes and hesitated to reprimand her stupid behavior. And she never gave Y/N detention.

Until now, she supposed. 6th year was changing a lot of things--even their Potions professor--so McGonagall turning a new stone shouldn’t have been anything shocking.

At least, not as shocking as the first thing Y/N saw as she walked into her house head’s office.

“Malfoy?” she spat.

The platinum blonde didn’t even bother to look up from his desk.

“Miss Y/L/N,” Professor McGonagall chided. “I think we would all prefer if you restrained yourself from getting into any more physical altercations with Slytherins.”

She huffed, plopping down in the chair furthest away from that foul git and reaching for her satchel.

“I’ll be back in two hours,” said the elderly professor. “If I hear anything, and I mean anything, other than the sound of studying, consider your sentence doubled.”

With a swish of her robes, McGonagall was gone, leaving her with Malfoy. 

“So what’d you do to get in here, huh? Did the administration finally get a hold of that video of you licking Voldemort’s toes?”

“What the fuck does that mean?!” he snapped, whipping around to glare at her.

“‘s just a joke,” said Y/N. “Like--how everyone says your family houses him and everything--but whatever. I can tell it’s a sore spot.”

His gaze, never withering in intensity, remained trained on her face. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Apparently so. What’re you here for?”

He exhaled sharply. “If I tell you, will you shut up and let me think?”

“No promises, but maybe.”

“Late work. I forgot to turn in the Transfiguration exam last week.”

She made a tutting sound as she lazily shuffled through the crumpled parchment in her satchel. “I expected more from you. Aren’t you gonna ask me how I wound up here?”

“No. I am going to ask you to stop talking now, though.”

~

“That’s terribly unfortunate,” Hermione said over breakfast the next morning. Ron and Harry were nervously chit chatting at the other side of the table over the Saturday Quidditch game against Hufflepuff--supposedly it was supposed to be quite a high stakes match. Not like Y/N cared much, though.

“Yeah! And the worst part was that he won’t even tease anymore. Like, he just sits there all broody and woe is me. We’re all witnessing our nation’s descent into war--he’s not special!”

“Who are you talking about?” asked Harry.

“Oh, just Malfoy,” said Y/N. “We have detention together with McGonagall. He’s such a nasty little greaseball, don’t you think? I mean, look at him right now, glowering over his cereal.”

“Wait! That’s it!”

“What’s it, Harry?” Hermione asked.

“It’s genius, really,” he said. “Y/N has to spend time with him alone every week, and we know that something is up with him. Malfoy is absolutely a Death Eater and has connections to You-Know-Who, but I just need to find a way to prove it.”

“I vaguely forecast where this is going, and I hate it already.”

“Listen, Y/N. It’s not for that long, and it’s for the health of the wizarding world. If you just get to know him--”

“Ick!”

“If you just get to know him, maybe get him to trust you and find out his secrets...we’d finally have enough to turn him in and throw him out of Hogwarts for good.”

“Is that really necessary, Harry?” Ginny butted in from her seat further down next to Dean. “Malfoy’s probably just exhausted like the rest of you. 6th year is difficult, and we have no solid evidence that he’s a Death Eater. I’m sure being stuck in a room with him for 2 hours is hard enough without pretending to be nice to him.”

“But what if Harry’s right?” said Y/N. “What if he is actually a Death Eater? What if he’s an active danger to the student body?”

“Exactly!” The joy written across Harry’s face at the prospect of someone else finally agreeing was infectious. “So will you?”

“Er…” She dragged her spoon across the top layer of her porridge. “In theory, sure. In actuality, I’m not sure how I could do it. Malfoy doesn’t want anything to do with me, either.”

“Love potion?” offered Ron.

“I don’t care how much of a prat he is, I’m not roofying him.”

“I rarely agree with you, Y/N, but I think you’re right. If you want to do this, you need to get him to trust you for real.”

“Your back-handed compliment skills never disappoint, Hermione. Do you think you could help me out with a plan?”

A slow smile spread across the girl’s face as she nodded. “That’s my strong suit.”

The plan they laid out over the remainder of the day was ambitious but at least do-able. Each week was split into different subtasks, the end goal being a somewhat tentative friendship between the two. 

“If you can flirt with him and get him to have a crush on you without scaring him off, you’d be in the best possible position,” Hermione told her as they walked back from the Quidditch pitch among the screaming Gryffindor fans. They’d won--yet again. “Obviously I don’t foresee that being likely, but if you pull it off somehow he’d probably be willing to tell you anything. The fact that you’re a pureblood is going to carry you through this whole ordeal. He’ll at least be accepting of your existence in the wizarding community.”

The bitter edge in Hermione’s tone made Y/N’s blood boil. There was no reason for Malfoy to be as prejudiced as he was--he’d spent his adolescence in Hermione’s academic dust. She was obviously smarter than him. 

“You got it, ‘Mione,” she said. Her voice barely carried over the cheers of her peers as they ascended the steps to the common room. “We’ll take this little ferret down. I can’t wait.”

“Don’t get too cocky, now.”

The Gryffindor after-party was crazy...per usual. The charmed self-filling goblets, the blasted playlist of Wizpop pumping through the air, and the buzzing energy of the room was giving Y/N a giant headache. She stood with Hermione and Harry by the edge of the crowd, watching Ron get hoisted up on the shoulders of the chasers. 

“No wonder the Slytherins think we’re Neanderthals,” Y/N mused. For once, Hermione didn’t respond. “Hermione? Is everything okay?”

The second she turned away to look at her best friend, gasps and whistles filled the room. She whipped back just in time to see Lavender Brown, a sweet but slightly ditzy girl in their year, pull away from a kiss with Ron.

“Oh shi--Hermione!”

Harry and Y/N shared a glance before darting after the witch--who had impressively already made it to the door. 

“Hermione, wait!” Y/N called as they jogged after her, throwing open the common room entrance and finding her sat by the tapestry on the other side of the hall, knees to her chest.

“‘Mione, what’s wrong?” asked Harry.

“Don’t be daft, Harry,” said Y/N. “You saw exactly what the rest of us did.”

“I don’t understa--”

“Harry.” Her voice was taut. “I know you’re just trying to help, but I think that it might be best if you let us be. Go back and enjoy the party.”

He gave her a tight, grateful smile before darting back through the door. Y/N wasted no more time in walking over to Hermione and throwing her arms around her shoulders.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, hugging her tight. Hermione made no move to detach them, so she continued. “Ron is an idiot. You deserve so much better--your first kiss was Viktor fucking Krum, after all. You’re hot stuff and this place is just unfortunately running dry of men who are impressive enough for you. Once you’re out of here and working in the Ministry, you’re gonna have the time of your life with men actually in your league.”

Hermione managed a sniffly laugh as she wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “It’s just so fucking embarrassing, you know. Like, I have a crush on him because I think he understands me and I smelled him in my Amortentia and I thought he’d like me back, but…” She hiccuped. “Then he goes off and kisses Lavender Brown, of all people. There’s nothing particularly wrong with her or anything, but she’s so different...I’m so bookish, and she’s so girly and everything I’m not…”

Y/N took the opportunity to tuck a lock of Hermione’s hair behind her ear as she listened.

“And it can’t help but make me think--was I ever anything to him but a friend? If the girl he ends up choosing is the opposite of me?”

“Girly, don’t think like that,” murmured Y/N. “He’s a teenage boy. They don’t think of love the way that we do--to them it’s a game of availability, not of choice. At least for Ronald. You intimidate him, and by extension, you’re not available.”

“That shouldn’t matter!”

“You’re right. It shouldn’t.” Y/N drew a long breath. “So you should find someone who always has you as their first choice--someone who isn’t intimidated by your intellect. They’re out there. I promise.”

Hermione managed a shaky smile. “Thanks, Y/N. I mean it. Do you mind if I have some alone time? I don’t think I’m ready to go back to the party but I just want some quiet.”

“Of course. Let me know if you need me,” she said, brushing herself off and making to walk down the hall.

“You’re not going back to the party?”

“Nah. It hurts my head and I want fresh air. If I’m not back here in a half hour, assume that I’ve been kidnapped.”

With that, she started her walk. She wasn’t planning on going on a long stroll--there was a small balcony that she often went to when she needed to clear her head. It was beautiful, especially on a snowy night like this.

But the walk was creepy.

There was only one way in and out--a narrow, damp hallway that had absolutely no light fixtures. If Y/N really wanted to, she could cast a quick lumos, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted to see what lived on the walls. The stairs were steep, too, but she managed to bound up all 40 of them in record time. 

“Who’s there?”

The sudden voice ripped a scream out of Y/N’s throat as she reached the top, catching a glimpse of the shadowy figure at the edge of the balcony that spoke. She clasped her hand over her mouth and she crept forward to the opening, getting a better look at the person that was in her secret spot.

The clouds shifted in the sky to allow more moonlight to cast a soft glow on Malfoy’s face, hardened with irritation.

“Malfoy?” Y/N asked, rather dumbly.

“What stellar observational skills,” he drawled. 

She felt her cheeks grow hot. “What are you doing here? This is part of the Gryffindor tower. Shouldn’t you be...I don’t know...playing hide and seek with the sewer rats in the dungeons?”

“Very funny.” His flat tone exposed the fact that he did not, in fact, find it very funny. “There’s no rule barring me from coming up here.”

“But why? This is my spot!”

“Because I wanted to get out. Now, I was here first, so unless you want your detention extended, I suggest you leave.”

Y/N bit the fiery comebacks on the tip of her tongue as the memories of her plan with Hermione began floating back to her. 

Week 1 -- Hold one neutral, civil conversation with Malfoy.

“I’ll be quiet. You won’t even know I’m here,” Y/N decided upon. leaning up against the balcony. The rogue snowflakes that made it past the overhanging roof melted on her cheeks. 

“That isn’t a suggestion,” said Malfoy. “I’m demanding you leave.”

“Beautiful night, isn’t it?” Y/N asked, pointedly ignoring his words. “I’ve always loved the snow. It’s so quiet.”

“And it would be even quieter if you left.”

“Aren’t you the conversationalist?” said Y/N.

“If you don’t leave, I will hex you,” Malfoy told her through gritted teeth. 

“I just love how the moonlight reflects off of the snow,” continued Y/N. “It’s so...pure.”

“Please leave.”

On her walk back down the dank stairwell, she allowed herself a little smile. 

Task 1? Technically done.

~ 

The first week went largely as planned. Malfoy was cold and certainly suspicious of her, but he wasn’t completely venomous when Y/N asked where he got his quill from in Potions. It was silver, charmed to shimmer with flecks of forest green. He told her Barnaby’s in France, and that was that. She walked away from his table with all of her limbs attached. Perhaps that was all the progress she was going to make in the next few weeks, but the task at hand certainly made the prospect of her lost Friday afternoons more bearable. 

Harry was going completely batty, rambling on about how Malfoy was behind the mysterious cursed objects that had been floating about the castle without explanation. 

“And why would Malfoy bring cursed objects to Hogwarts if he has aspirations other than being expelled?” Hermione would ask over their books.

“You don’t understand, Hermione! You girls need to be careful walking around at night--especially you, Y/N. I don’t want you going missing after detention because of that slimeball.”

Y/N always gave him a laugh, berating him for his slight misogynistic commentary and turning back to whatever her task was, but the truth was that she was worried for him. The mental weight of the impending war and the fact that he couldn’t do anything about it was certainly getting too difficult for him to bear. It was heartbreaking to see the vivacious boy she’d grown up with crumble under the responsibilities of something he should never have to worry about in the first place.

Friday came much sooner than expected, and Y/N reluctantly left her friends in the common room to trek to McGonagall’s office. The walk was frigid and the wind bit at her cheeks as she rounded the last outdoor hall.

Why was this castle so dark?

A thump behind her made her jump, and Harry’s words came floating back to her. 

Remember all those cursed objects? What if there’s someone just...stalking the school grounds, waiting for someone like me to snatch?

She shivered, throwing herself at the office door and slamming it behind her.

“Miss Y/L/N,” Professor McGonagall greeted, her eyebrows raised in amusement. “Something giving you trouble?”

“No, Professor,” she answered, setting her bag down on the desk next to Malfoy. He sent her a curious look as well. “It’s just cold outside.”

She chuckled. “I need to go speak to Headmaster Dumbledore. I expect that, upon my return, you both are in one piece and alive.”

“I’m not sure if I’m the one who needs to be given that speech,” said Y/N, bored and testing the waters.

“She’s right, Professor,” added Malfoy. “There’s no projectiles here.”

McGonagall exhaled a long, shaky breath before brushing herself off. “Please. Behave yourselves.”

“You got it, boss,” she said as she watched her Professor walk out the door. “So, Malfoy. How was your week?”

“I don’t know what you’re up to, but I’d way prefer if you didn’t speak to me,” he said, refusing to make eye contact.

“I’m not up to anything! We’re in detention together and, I dunno, since I see you sometimes at balls, I thought it’d be nice to be on good terms.”

“Good terms?” He scoffed. “You’re a Gryffindor. I’d rather you be a bloody Hufflepuff.”

“How about neutral terms?”

Even though he wasn’t looking at her, she could catch a glimpse of him rolling his eyes. “If neutral terms mean you being quiet, then, yes. Please.”

“I’ll be plenty quiet. After I hear about your opinion on what happened in Potions today with Brown and Weasley. When Snape yelled at them for holding hands.”

He let out a sharp sigh. “Believe it or not, I actually have better things to do than keep up with whatever stuff your house does.”

“But…?” Y/N pressed. She may not’ve spent her time at Hogwarts as Malfoy’s best friend, but she had grown up with the boy, and she could tell when he was holding back.

He stared blankly at her.

“Come on. I’m literally the only person in my house who’ll openly admit that they’re disgusted by that dynamic. I’m begging you.”

She wasn’t sure if she was imagining it, but she thought she saw a flicker of amusement dance across his face for a moment. “Your house sounds more like a cult than a student group.”

“Oh, says the one from Slytherin,” said Y/N. 

“We only act like that because our families are close. What’s your excuse? Hormones and Quidditch culture?”

“Touché.” As much as she wanted to fight back, she bit her tongue. Whatever she was doing was making progress, and quicker progress than she was expecting. Her next task was to make him laugh, and she was emboldened by the fact that she could potentially be able to kill two birds with one stone. 

They sat in silence for a little bit, but this time, it was a comfortable silence. Malfoy wasn’t staring at the clock on the wall or rolling his eyes at her every move, so she had time to plot.

On one hand, she could make a fool of herself--drop her inkwell, say something stupid in class, fall down the stairs--but she had a sneaking suspicion that her sorry attempts at slapstick humor wouldn’t land well with Draco anymore. He’d become so serious lately, so solemn. This was the most light hearted she’d seen him, even compared with how he acted with the rest of his Slytherin lackeys. 

On the other, she could try to sell out her friends. She could confide in him how “big” Hermione’s teeth were (they weren’t even big) or tell him that Ron smelled of eggs (true, but that was a low blow). Something told her that this would be much more successful, but she wasn’t willing to turn to that so quickly--she was already a week ahead as it was. 

“What is it?” 

Malfoy’s bored drawl cut through her flurried thoughts. Her cheeks turned pink as she blinked, noticing that she’d been staring at him for far too long. “Nothing. Sorry. I just spaced out.”

“Sure,” he mumbled, giving her another suspicious look before turning back to his work. “Can you maybe space out somewhere other than my face?”

“Where’s your vanity, Malfoy?” she pressed as she leaned back in her chair, hair swinging over the back. 

“Shut up,” he snapped. She could tell that whatever connection they’d had in the fleeting moments beforehand was being burnt by the second, but her embarrassment and pride drove her forward.

“Merlin, what’s got you so wound up?” she prompted, noting how deliciously unraveled he looked at this. “Where’s my cool, collected Slytherin?”

He slammed hands on his desk at this, whipping around to glare at her. “What’s your angle, Y/L/N?”

“What?”

“Why are you bothering me?”

“Because I want to.” She beamed.

Malfoy ran his fingers through his hair, mussing up the usual neat manner in which it normally laid on his head. “Compelling. What do you want from me?”

“What do I want…?” She tilted her head at him, narrowing her eyes. “What?”

“You never talk to me,” he explained. “Obviously, I prefer it like that. I can’t help but wonder why suddenly you want to be making small talk. So, what is it you want from me?”

“Malfoy,” she said. “I think you’re a spoiled prick who thinks far too highly of himself and drives me insane. But I also think that you’re funnier than what my friends give you credit for. Granted, you’ve always been annoying, but I don’t want anything from you. I just want to, I dunno, make these next few months less insufferable.” Somehow the lie slipped through her teeth easier than any of her previous bluffs. 

He frowned, his mouth opening once before firmly screwing shut into a scowl. “Oh.”

“No offense, Malfoy, but what else can you offer me other than your dazzling personality?” she teased. “You know my family. I don’t need to blackmail you to pay for jewelry I’ve had my eye on or anything.”

He scoffed. “As if I’d say yes.”

“Exactly my point. It’d be fucking weird. Merlin, I’m not trying to butter you up to buy out Borgin & Burkes for me. Do I give off gold-digger vibes? Is that what this is about?”

“Fucking hell.” Malfoy turned to her in disbelief. “Do you ever shut up?”

“Answer my question. Or better yet, pull out your wallet. Wait, did I say that out loud?” She mimed surprise and covered her mouth. “Oh no! What will my mother say now that I’ve squandered my last chance of hitching you? There’s no way I can go home for Christmas break now.”

He rolled his eyes so hard she found herself worried for a moment that they were going to just permanently get stuck in the back of his head. “Hate to break it to you, but you didn’t really have a shot to begin with.”

Ouch.

She huffed and dramatically flopped over the back of her chair, hoping he couldn’t see that she’d flinched. “So you don’t think I’m pretty??” 

“Y/L/N,” he snapped, his voice a low warning. “Can I please just work? What is with you today?”

Y/N sent him a sour look before giving her Charms work another look. Malfoy was awfully quiet, and when she snuck any glances at him later on, he was angled to face away from her. 

Why did she feel like such shit all of a sudden? She cataloged the past events, trying to pinpoint the exact moment that her stomach dropped. It all made sense when the words “You didn’t really have a shot to begin with” echoed around her head once again. She’d failed Harry. She’d failed Hermione. There was no way that she was going to be able to get him to reveal his secrets now--it’s not like he was confiding in even his closest friends as Harry made apparent when he explained how vague his statements were to his fellow Slytherins on the train. Her only chance would’ve been to somehow get him to fall for her, and that wasn’t going...great. And it had been a pipedream to begin with.

When McGonagall swished back into the classroom to dismiss them, Y/N shot out of there without even looking at Malfoy again. It felt like something was lodged in her throat and she was not going to cry in front of him. No, no. She had to make it to Hermione to tell her what was going on. 

“Y/L/N?” 

Malfoy’s voice made her pause in her flee as she nearly rounded the corner in front of her, but she refused to look back. It was far enough away that it was possible she didn’t hear him.

“Wait!”

She was up the stairs and speed walking as fast as her legs could carry her to the Gryffindor tower before he even saw which way she went.

~

“I don’t think you understand,” Y/N wailed by the fire as Hermione rubbed her shoulders and Harry sat awkwardly perched on the couch. “I can’t do this. The only way this was going to work was if he had a crush on me, and I don’t think he ever will. I fucked it up! The one time you guys need me, I fuck it up! I let you down!”

Hermione’s left hand stopped its rubbing to rest firmly on her shoulder. “Please don’t be upset. You didn’t let us down. Plus, you’re only, what...two weeks in? You don’t need him to like you to make it work. Just getting him to trust you will be enough, and you’re good at that.”

“I don’t think so,” continued Y/N. “Harry said that he wasn’t even that open on the train when he overheard him talking to all of his friends. And those are purebloods that he likes! That he’s trusted and known for years and years! I’m a friend of you guys, and he knows it. I think he’d figure it out quick.”

“We should take every chance we can get,” said Harry from his spot a few feet away, his eyes lazy and unfocused on the fire crackling in front of them. “You won’t let us down if you can’t get anything, Y/N, you know that! But if you got anything from him, it’d be incredible. It’s a win-win. I don’t understand why you’re so upset.”

“I’m not upset,” she said, her tone becoming defensive. “I just...don’t want to mess this up. I know how much it’d mean if I succeeded.”

“So just try!” Hermione said. “There’s nothing wrong with it. I’m sorry he was kind of mean to you today, but I don’t think that should bother you too much. He should be more afraid of what you’d say if you didn’t care about being a good person.”

“Fucking right on there,” she said, wiping away the frustrated tears. “If I was honest with him, he’d leave crying. He should be grateful that I’m taking this bet so I actually have to be nice to him.”

“That’s the spirit.” Harry leaned over to smack her back like he did his Quidditch teammates after a winning match. 

After they’d parted their ways with Harry, Hermione and Y/N made their way slowly up the stairwell to the girls’ dorms. 

“Y/N?” Hermione asked, breaking the silence. 

“Yeah?”

“Do you think, er…” She paused. “Do you think you were really upset about failing us today? Or was it something else?”

“What do you mean?” Y/N furrowed her eyebrows. “I don’t see what else it would be.”

“I’m sorry,” responded the bright witch. “Forget I ever asked. It was a stupid thing to wonder about.”

“Weirdo,” she teased as she waved her a goodnight and made her way to her dorm.

The next morning, Y/N busied herself with revising her Charms essay over her breakfast--a cup of tea and a half-buttered piece of toast--while Hermione leaned over her shoulder, nodding or grimacing at the corrections she made. 

“Did you work during detention? Like, at all?”

“‘Mione,” moaned Y/N. “It’s too early for this. I don’t want a lecture. I just couldn’t focus.”

Her warm brown eyes narrowed as they bore into Y/N’s face. “Why were you distracted?”

“Oh, I, uh…” She stumbled over her words as Hermione drew closer. “Merlin, Hermione. I told you last night. I just felt like I was letting you all down.”

“Mhm,” was all she got in response before her best friend tilted her head back down to the parchment in front of her. 

Y/N sat, completely puzzled. What was Hermione on about? She’d been straightforward with what was hurting her--she didn’t want to mess up the only task the Golden Trio had ever given her--and, even if she hadn’t been, Hermione was smart enough to deduce things for herself. So what was she thinking about?

Her eyes drifted over to the Slytherin table where the usual 6th year pureblood gang loitered about, drinking black coffee and sulking--but Malfoy was not to be seen. She jumped when her eyes met Parkinson, her dark eyes burning into her soul as a deep scowl was written across her face.

“Malfoy, what the fuck do you want?” Ron’s voice pulled her back to reality to see him glaring somewhere behind her.

“I wasn’t here to talk to you,” a familiar voice drawled. 

She turned to see Malfoy standing behind her, a sneer written all across his stupidly pretty face.

“Miss me already?” asked Y/N as she raised an eyebrow and cocked her head to the side. 

“For fuck’s sake, stop doing that,” he mumbled, reaching into his pocket and throwing a box at her. “You forgot your quill. I took the liberty of properly storing it, because it seems like you lot like to just throw them in your bag. Makes me physically ill to watch.”

“Oh.” Y/N studied the intricate box in her hands before tucking it away in her knapsack. “Thanks? I guess?”

He nodded curtly, contorting his face into one last scowl to send to Ron before turning and leaving,

“So,” Hermione began, cutting her omelet at a much brisker pace, “I think we need to have a little chat. About...all of this.” 

“Why?” 

“Not right now,” she said, her voice low and her eyes flicking at Ron and Harry sitting across from them. “I don’t think it’d benefit us for them to hear.” 

“Ok?” She cautiously took a bite out of her toast and continued staring Hermione down. “You’re scaring me.”

“It’s...I don’t know. I thought I was crazy for thinking this, but it seems like we need to talk about it anyways. For this little mission of yours to work, we need to be totally open and honest with each other.”

“Sure.” Y/N took another bite. “I honestly have no clue what’s got you so on edge, though.”

“Who’s on edge?” Harry asked, leaning over the table and stealing the croissant on Y/N’s plate. 

“Hey!” she exclaimed. “Do you not see the entire plate of them over there?”

He laughed, sending her an easy grin and dunking a piece into the hot chocolate in his mug. “Finders keepers. Say, Y/N, are you busy next weekend? Ron and Lavender are going to Madame Puddingfoot’s together, and I know Hermione isn’t going to want to take a weekend off studying to go to Hogsmeade, so I thought that maybe we could go cause some trouble at the Cauldron.”

“If you stop stealing my food we can talk about it,” replied Y/N, the corners of her lips tugging up into a grin. 

“Deal.”

Hermione tugged at her arm. “I just realized I need to get something out of my room before we watch the Quidditch game. Will you come with me, Y/N?”

“Sure!” said Y/N. “Gee, I’m rolling in invitations today.”

Once they exited the dining hall, though, it immediately became evident that they were not actually heading up to the dorms. Hermione dragged her into the nearest bathroom before casting a quick silencing charm.

“Myrtle! Are you in here?” Only when she was sure silence was the only response to her question, she seemed satisfied to turn to Y/N and begin talking. “When were you going to tell me that you have a thing for Malfoy?”

“I’m sorry, what?” Y/N felt the heat that had risen to her cheeks from the last quill-encounter re-emerge.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” said Hermione. “Are you seriously going to expect me to believe that you nearly sobbed over some random pureblood git telling you you never had a chance with him because it might slow down your progress with helping us? Actually? I’ve seen you look more ecstatic about hearing that your dear granny passed away.”

“To be fair, she had really good life insurance,” Y/N cut in. “And she was an old hag. Never had a nice thing to say to me.”

“Life insurance or no life insurance...you can’t seriously expect me to believe that you were just upset about not being able to help us as much. That was ridiculous. I don’t buy it. And the way you blushed like crazy when he came over to talk to you--the way you try and pretend like you can flirt...please. Y/N, it’s clear as day. I know you, and I know you have a crush on him.”

“Hermione!” hissed Y/N. “You have no clue what you’re talking about!”

“Yes, I think I do,” she pushed. “And you need to be honest with me if you want to be of any help right now.”

Her bossiness lit a fire of rage in Y/N’s chest, but she sucked in a deep breath, shutting her eyes before releasing it. “Believe me when I say I haven’t ever acknowledged any feelings I may or may not have towards him.”

“Ok.” Her face softened. “I know it might take time, but I honestly do think I’m right. Please just...be careful. This is a really odd situation to get caught up in if you actually have feelings for the other person. You’re trying to manipulate him, for Merlin’s sake.”

“And if I have these feelings for him, I’ve done a pretty damn good job of suppressing them for however long they’ve been here.” 

Hermione sighed. “That’s true. I’m just saying that spending this much time with him is probably only going to make things worse. Will you please tell me if anything changes between the two of you?”

“Anything changes?” Y/N’s voice was dripping in disbelief. “You’re joking. Even if I was obsessed with him I don’t think there’s ever a chance of hell in anything ‘changing’ between us. He said it himself.”

“You know what I mean, Y/N,” responded Hermione. “Just promise me, ok?”

“Ok,” said Y/N. “I promise.”

That seemed to satiate Hermione as she nodded approvingly at her friend. “I think it goes without saying that Ron and Harry shouldn’t hear about this.”

“There’s nothing to hear about, but yes.” She shuffled her feet before meeting Hermione’s eyes again. “Er, I’m sorry for this being a weird question, but would you mind coming along with me and Harry to Hogsmeade? I don’t really see him like...that...and I don’t want to read into it too much and reject him if he is doing it just platonically, but just in case. Y’know.”

“Sure,” said Hermione, even though her face took on that curious expression yet again. “Anyways, you actually did forget something--you’re not wearing a single piece of Gryffindor colors for our game today. You should probably run back to your dorm before Harry and Ron notice.”

After they said their goodbyes, Y/N found herself turning over the things Hermione had said to her in her head. Did she like Malfoy? No, no fucking way. But a part of her really did think he was funny. And of course it was natural to feel rejected when anyone insinuates that they’d never consider you as a romantic interest without jest. 

Once she’d made it up to her room and grabbed a few scarves, Y/N made to put her red cloak into her satchel. Her fingers ghosted over the box that Malfoy had given her and scoffed once she saw the Malfoy crest engraved into the rich wood. 

Narcissistic snot.

Her curiosity got the better of her as she reached over to open up the elaborately decorated box. What met her was not just one quill but two--one of which was most certainly not her own. 

She took them both out, tossing the old one in a pile with her other trusty familiar white feather quills and picked up the other one. It looked familiar--identical to the quill that she’d complimented Malfoy on in Potions about a week ago. Butterflies began to flutter like crazy in her stomach as she turned it over in her hand, watching the gray and green glitter together and the magic sparkles cast a gentle light over her bed. She generally avoided dipping into her family’s pockets to get school supplies any more than she had to--it’s not like it made her friends feel good about themselves when they were reminded how rich her family was--but this might be what she could consider to be an exception. She hadn’t even liked his quill all that much when she first saw it in Potions--but it was one of those things that was so noticeable that it made sense to compliment him. 

She gave it one last look before tucking it back away into the elaborately decorated box. Perhaps she had spoken too soon when she’d told Hermione all hope was lost. 

~ 

When Monday morning Potions class with the Slytherins rolled around, Y/N wasted no time. Malfoy was alone--even his Slytherin lackeys seemed to know not to bother him. Just what she needed.

“Malfoy,” she greeted, setting her bag down on his table and looking him dead on. He raised to meet her eyes, his eyebrow raised.

“Can I help you?”

“I just wanted you to know that I also really like your immense fortune,” she said. “And your manor.”

“Well, a lot of people do,” he mumbled as he looked away to dig through something in his bag. If she didn’t know any better, she would’ve thought he was blushing.

“I’m just letting you know,” she continued. “In case you were wanting to give them away. It worked for the quill, so I thought, well, why not?”

He exhaled, a deep and annoyed sound escaping his lips as he rolled his eyes up to the ceiling. “I knew I shouldn’t have done that.”

“You really didn’t have to.”

“I was getting sick of it,” he told her. “I never can stick with one quill for too long, and I thought it’d be a shame to toss it. I thought it’d be better to be charitable--it’s not like your family could get an appointment at Barnaby’s if they tried.”

“Hey!” Y/N said indignantly. “You don’t know that!”

“I’ve heard your parents try to speak French,” he said. “If you’re anything like them, you'll be barred from ever entering the country.”

“Malfoy!” 

His lips turned up into a smile, a soft laugh escaping his lips. Y/N suppressed the urge to grin in return. Task 3? Done. “What?”

“I can’t even argue with you,” she said. “It’s tragic.”

She stared at the empty stool next to him, wondering if she should just take the leap and sit with him. Malfoy seemed unbothered by her presence as he opened up his Potions book and set it next to his cauldron. “Do you want a partner?” The words left her lips before she could stop them.

He cast her a curious look before glancing at the empty stool. “It depends. Are you going to be annoying?”

She gasped in faux-offense. “What makes you think I could ever be annoying?”

“On that note, I think you better get back to Potter.” He motioned with his head towards the side of the room where most of her Gryffindor friends were chatting. Harry was staring at her, his fists clenched by his side.

Y/N smirked and sent him a wink. 

“On that note,” she said, careful to imitate Malfoy’s drawl and sending him a smug grin, “Maybe I better sit here.”

“Hm.” He awarded her one more uninterested look before rolling up his sleeves and setting out the ingredients for the potion they were brewing--Amortentia. 

She tried not to make it too obvious that she was staring at his left arm, but there was nothing on it like Harry had told her. It was just pure, unblemished pale skin that shimmered under the light. Before he could catch her looking, she quickly sat down and started pulling out her own things. After a short pause, she decided to take out the silver quill. She’d left his box back in her room--she wouldn’t be caught dead with something that had the Malfoy crest on it--but she’d wrapped it in a pouch with her own family’s emblem on the front, shimmering in gold and red.

“Why don’t you just buy your own charmed quills?” asked Malfoy after they had chopped all of the gillweed. 

“You already know. We’re an abomination to the French. We aren’t allowed entry.”

“That’s not what I mean.” His tone was meant to read as exasperated, but his words still seemed good-natured.

“I...well.” She frowned. She’d never confessed this to anyone, but she supposed that Malfoy wasn’t going to find a way to use it against her. “I don’t like to flaunt my family wealth. I think it makes people, at least in Gryffindor, like me less. I learned that pretty early on.”

He hummed something in response before sliding all the gillweed into the cauldron, turning the clear liquid into a bubbling forest green. 

“Why are you being so nice to me all of a sudden?” she asked. 

He took his time finishing the note he was jotting down before he answered. “I’m not being nice. It’s just called being civil. You said it yourself, we see each other at balls sometimes.”

“We probably won’t anymore, though,” she mused. 

Malfoy’s eyebrows shot up, but his voice remained low and steady. “No. I suppose that we probably won’t. Is your family part of the Order?”

“Hm. Are you a Death Eater?” she asked brazenly. He had no business asking her something like that, and he knew it. Especially not with his family connections.

“What do you think?” he drawled, waving his bared left arm in front of her face.

“Bullshit. That doesn’t mean anything after we learned Glamour spells last year.”

“Guess you’ll just have to trust me, then,” he responded, focusing intently on the bubbling liquid in front of him instead of her face. 

“I guess so,” she replied. The weight of her Glamour comment began to sink in--she was right, after all. How had she not thought of it before? 

But he was right when he told her she just had to trust him. Could she? Y/N rested her chin in the palm of her propped hand as she watched him work. A piece of disobedient moonbeam blonde hair dangled over his forehead as he diced up the unicorn tail, his eyebrows furrowed in focus.

“Is this why you want to be my partner?” he finally asked after a few moments of silence. “So you can just stare at me while I do all the work?”

“There’s the vain Draco I know,” she said, grinning as she leaned over to punch his shoulder. 

He rolled his eyes again, scooting out of arm's reach before flipping back to Amortentia in his book. “You’re insufferable. And it’s Malfoy to you.”

“Fine, fine, Malfoy,” said Y/N. “What do you want me to do, then?”

He shoved his cutting board towards her, the half-diced unicorn tail staring up at her. “Finish dicing this and then stir it in. 9 times clockwise. I did almost all of the work, but it should be finished after that.”

Y/N sent him another glare before doing as he said. The glittering quill kept catching her attention from the corner of her eye, and she couldn’t help but notice that Malfoy was writing with just a plain white quill for the time being. HE really did just give it to me. 

After the final ingredients were diced, she began to stir, each rotation around the cauldron turning the potion to a different color. It began as the bubbling green, then a deep sea blue, then a royal purple, a crimson blood red, a glimmering gold--before settling into a pale silver.

“Wow. It’s beautiful,” she breathed. “It’s like...liquid starlight.”

“All thanks to me,” said Malfoy. “You didn’t even have to crush the Mandrake root.”

“You’re such a gentleman, Malfoy.” Her voice dripped in fake sincerity. “So, what do you smell?”

Y/N was expecting him to scowl at her and tell her that it wasn’t any of her business, but he actually leaned over the cauldron and shut his eyes. 

“I’ve never been good at explaining what things smell like.” 

“Fair.”

Once he leaned back, she took his place, shutting her eyes and breathing in a tendril of the beautiful potion. “Whoa.”

“What’s it for you?”

“I don’t...know,” she admitted. “It’s not something I can describe note by note. It kind of reminds me of something, though.”

“Something with Potter, I presume?” he said, casually twirling his generic white quill around his fingers.

“No,” she answered, surprised at how honest she was being. “It’s…I’m trying to think. Er, it’s very lavish. It reminds me of when I was younger and my parents would drag me to galas and balls and whatnot.” 

He stared at her in silence.

“What about you? Does it remind you of anything?”

“Yeah.” Malfoy reached forward to put a lid on the cauldron, effectively shutting out the steam from reaching either of them.

“Ooh, have you figured it out yet?” she teased, crossing her legs and turning to face him head on. “Let me guess. Is it someone like…”

She paused, a wicked smile stretching across her face. “Oh my god, is it Hermione? Or Luna? Or...help me out here!”

“No.” His voice was sour. 

“Ah, it’s Parkinson then, isn’t it? Tell her I’m sorry for throwing food at her if you ever have the chance. Make sure to add the part where I’m more sorry that I missed.” 

“Y/L/N!”

“It’s okay. I’d be a little let down, too.”

“Can you please just…” He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Please just stop. I haven’t figured it out. Okay? Happy now?”

“I’ll leave you alone,” said Y/N. “Under one condition. You give me a hint. I’ve given you everything I know! This isn’t fair.”

“This doesn’t have to be fair,” he hissed.

Y/N kept the easy smile plastered on her face while she waited, her eyebrows raised in anticipation.

“You’re not going to let up until I tell you, are you?”

“You’d be right on that,” she said, sugary sweet.

“Fine. It’s something kind of floral.” 

“How descriptive,” she snorted as she slumped back in her stool, thinking hard. Where had she smelled it before? Y/N shut her eyes, leaning her head back and trying to immerse herself into the memory that had surfaced. It smelled like grandeur, like an open ballroom full of guests wearing expensive perfumes. She could feel spinning, spinning like she was with a dance partner. Who was it? She couldn’t quite remember--the last ball she’d been to had been years ago--but after she leaned forward and smelled the Amortentia once more time, she came to a conclusion.

“I had to have danced with him at a gala before,” she announced to Malfoy, who was looking quite unimpressed. “So I know it’s no one from Gryffindor.”

“Interesting,” was all he said before turning to his parchment and jotting something down.

Late that night, while Y/N was settling into bed, a strange idea struck her. Sure that the thought that was nagging her was completely fruitless, she had no trouble with reaching into her desk and pulling out the Malfoy box. She just had to check if she wanted to sleep well.

Here goes.

She closed her eyes, imagining the expensive scent of her Amortentia. Then she opened it, stuck her nose into the fabric, and breathed in.

Well, fuck. 

~

The internal debate going through Y/N the next day at the breakfast table was intense. On one hand, she really, really wanted to just tell Hermione that Malfoy had been in her Amortentia and she was completely fucked, but on the other…

She glanced at the witch next to her as she methodically sliced her toast into perfect, equivalent squares before dunking them in jam. Y/N liking Malfoy was not going to fit into her toast cubes. If she said anything, she would lose her excuse to talk to her about him. And her excuse to try and get close with him. 

Perhaps I can figure it out tomorrow. 

When tomorrow came, she still hadn’t made progress. Y/N was beginning to think that her so called “revelation” after they brewed Amortentia was truly just complete and utter bullshit. So what that his quill box smelled like it--all rich people kind of smelled the same at some points, and so did their houses. There was a reason why she couldn’t immediately pin the scent to anything--it wasn’t like she even knew what Malfoy smelled like.

But the truth remained that she was still attracted to someone who happened to be a rich Slytherin--so naturally, her mind began to wander. There’s no way it was Zabini--his mother owned a fragrance line, and she would’ve instantly recognized the cologne that she knew Mrs. Zabini made him wear--and there was absolutely no way that it was Crabbe or Goyle, so the only other Slytherin it left was...Nott? But that didn’t make sense either--she’d never spoken to him before in her life, even less than Malfoy. So perhaps it would be better if she didn’t think on it.

The next day of potion brewing came on a stormy Wednesday. Malfoy and Y/N worked silently together to brew a Draught of Dreamless Sleep. She was surprised to see how practiced his movements were--he didn’t even have to reference the book to recite the exact measurements and directions.

“Do you have bad dreams or something?” she asked, mostly as a joke. He didn’t seem to pick up on the light-heartedness and stiffened up.

“No?”

“Gee, you’re talkative today,” Y/N said, trying to ignore how her hand brushed his by accident when she added the scoop of anjelica. 

“Excuse me for not entertaining you,” he drawled. “I wasn’t expecting to have such a needy potions partner today.”

“I am not needy!” she gasped, smacking his arm. “I’ve sat in silence for a full hour!”

He rolled his eyes (he was always rolling his eyes) and gave the potion one more final stir before setting the lid on the cauldron. “Think you can do that again? It needs to simmer for that long.”

“Just because you’re so sweet to me,” crooned Y/N before pulling out a heavy book from her satchel. Her Charms exam was tomorrow, and, naturally, she had decided to save all of her revising work until the night before. The textbook stared back at her as she jotted a few notes onto a previously blank sheet of parchment. The quill in her hands was light and glided across the paper like the tears of Merlin, something that she had forgotten quills could do. All of her familiar basic quills were okay, but they were prone to skidding and breaking. This nib hadn’t worn down in the slightest, still at a smooth and defined peak.

Y/N couldn’t believe that, out of all people, the person to give her such a thoughtful gift was Draco Malfoy. She tried to sneak a glance at him then, moving her curtain of hair away from her face. It took all she had in her to not be startled at the fact that he was already looking back, a slightly concerned expression etched into his face.

“Is something wrong?” 

He snapped out of it the moment the words left her lips, his face hardening. “No.”

“Forget I ever asked,” she responded, turning away from him for good and focusing on her textbook. No, there was no way he could be what she smelled in her Amortentia. She liked to think that her subconscious wasn’t secretly a masochist.

~

Friday evening swung around again, much to Y/N’s dismay. She’d had a talk with Hermione later on in the week, confirming that no, she did not smell Malfoy in her Amortentia, and that yes, she was still abiding by the plan that Hermione had so carefully laid out for her. It did bother her a bit that she could be lying to her on both fronts--but at the end of the day, she was going to get the answers that Harry wanted, no matter what. 

She just had to get through the scary ass castle first. She’d forgotten how spooky Hogwarts was after her previous sprint to the door, and this time she was positively trembling by the time she turned another dark corner on her way to McGonagall’s office. Yet another cursed item had been found in the girl’s lavatory on the 3rd floor, right by some of the classes that she had taken earlier in the week. The fact that whoever was out there was capable of dark magic and actively wanted to hurt people terrified her, all that Gryffindor bravery be damned. 

So when she heard footsteps suddenly right beside her, it was no wonder that she jumped feet in the air.

“Fuck!” she sputtered, turning to see a very familiar blonde in Slytherin robes. He was frozen in place, curiously looking her up and down.

“Am I interrupting something?”

“Malfoy,” Y/N said, resisting the urge to melt into a puddle of relief at the sight. This wasn’t right--wasn’t he a suspected Death Eater? “You scared me.”

He scoffed, digging his hands into his pockets. “You’re supposed to be the brave ones, right?”

“Huh?”

Malfoy motioned to her Gryffindor jumper. 

“Oh.” Heat rushed to her cheeks as she realized what he meant. “I dunno. I just get jumpy around the castle at night.”

“No shit.” They’d begun to walk now, side by side. Y/N couldn’t remember ever walking with him before--she’d always been late. “Do you think I forgot the way you screamed when you saw me at the tower?”

“Shut up,” she grumbled, reaching over and giving him a healthy shove. 

They walked in silence together. Malfoy moved noticeably slower than he normally did so he wouldn’t leave Y/N’s shorter legs in tow. McGonagall seemed pleasantly surprised to see Malfoy hold the door open for her.

“I’m glad to see you two getting along,” she said, giving Y/N a hesitant nod before grabbing the stack of papers on her desk. “I’ll be back momentarily.”

After she exited the room with a swish of her deep maroon robes, Malfoy turned to her. “Are you scared of the dark or something?”

She turned, ready to send a biting retort his way, before she noticed how gray his pallor looked...and how big the circles under his eyes were. “You look like shit, Malfoy. Is everything okay?”

He rolled his eyes. “Don’t change the subject.”

“Oh. Um…” Y/N pause before deciding that the little tidbit of information she was about to reveal wasn’t that important anyways. “I’m just on edge at night at Hogwarts is all. Especially with all that weird shit going on with all the cursed objects. So I kind of hate walking to and from detention.”

Malfoy let out something that sounded like a strained laugh.

“You didn’t answer my question. Is everything okay?”

“None of your business,” he snipped. “I just had a bad night.”

“Do you have trouble sleeping?” she asked, unable to keep herself from prying.

“Something like that.”

“Have you tried lavender?”

“I’m sorry?” He frowned.

“Lavender. Like the essential oil. It’s nothing magical,” she explained. “I just like to spray it in my bed sometimes before I sleep. Or I’ll use a few drops in a diffuser. I have trouble sleeping too, all the time, actually.” She shut her mouth before she had any chance to ramble further.

“It sounds a bit too floral for my taste.”

“Here.” Y/N dug around in her satchel, searching for the tiny spray bottle she kept with her at all times. “Borrow this and spritz your pillow with it before you sleep, and then tell me it’s too floral. I promise it helps.”

He glared at her. She extended her hand with the white bottle that was covered in purple decor, raising her eyebrows expectantly. “I won’t tell anyone that you have it if that’s what you’re worried about or whatever.”

“Fine,” he snapped, snatching it from her hand and dragging his fingers over her palm for just a second. “Don’t expect me to actually try it, though.”

“Just give it a sniff.” 

He huffed, but to her surprise, he actually uncapped the top and held the spray hole up to his nose, inhaling in once.

The effect was immediate. Malfoy’s face completely drained of color, becoming even grayer than he’d been when she first saw him under the light. The briefest expression of surprise fleeted over his face before he wiped it off, replacing it with something unreadable and tossing it back at her. “I’m not using this.”

“Why not?”

“Not quite my taste,” he spat.

Y/N was shocked by the sudden outburst, watching as he continued to glower at his desk. “I don’t understand. It really does help you sleep. I know it seems stupid, but I...really think you should try it. Just once, if anything.”

“Why does it matter so much to you?”

“Because I--” Y/N stopped herself before she let her mouth run without check. “I know what it’s like is all. I feel like shit if I don’t sleep. Plus, I have to spend time with you every Friday. I imagine that you’ll be slightly more tolerable if you sleep more.”

“Hm.” He sent her a particularly venomous glare. “Thanks for your concern. Consider me uninterested, though.”

“You break my heart,” she teased, pulling back her hand and placing the bottle on the corner of her desk. An idea struck her.

“And just what are you smiling about?” Draco said. His lips were turned into a sour frown. 

“Nothing, nothing,” she responded, her voice adopting a sing-song quality. All she had to do now was wait. 

He exhaled, a deep and exasperated sound. Then he turned back to whatever was in front of him.

McGonagall entered the room a few minutes later, nodding cordially at the comfortable silence the two students were in. What she didn’t know was that Y/N was waiting, just waiting for Malfoy to dig through his satchel and stop paying attention to his quill.

She got her opportunity a few minutes later, when McGonagall called him up to look over his latest Transfiguration homework.

“Mr. Malfoy, I’m happy to see that you’re taking more initiative in getting your assignments done...I have to say that you had me a bit concerned…”

While her professor kept Malfoy occupied, Y/N darted over and grabbed his quill. 

Ha.

Malfoy frowned down at his desk when he returned, giving Y/N a suspicious look.

“What is it, Malfoy?” she said, hoping her voice conveyed nothing that might hint that she took something of his.

“Nothing.”

“Hm.”

The rest of detention passed without any more discussion. Y/N was eager to run up to her dorm and set up her plan to be carried out the next morning, but she calmed her bouncing leg and forced herself to keep a straight face when McGonagall dismissed them.

“Got somewhere to be, Y/L/N?” Malfoy’s voice called after her as she sped down the hall towards the Gryffindor tower. 

“What’s it to you?” she fired back.

He didn’t respond. Instead, he picked up his pace until he was walking next to her.

“Aren’t the Slytherin dorms the other direction?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Are they?” 

She allowed herself to be amused by the way words flowed out of his mouth when he was slightly out of breath. “Why are you walking with me?”

“You said it yourself.” He kept his eyes cast on the cobblestones below them. “You don’t like walking alone at night.”

“Uh...oh.” Against her will, her feet froze and she was glued to the ground. “You’re joking, right?”

If the lighting wasn’t so dim, Y/N would have good reason to believe he was blushing with how intently he was studying his fingernails. “By all means, I can be.”

“No! No, I didn’t mean it like that,” she said, the words tumbling out of her mouth. “Er...I’d like you to. If you want to, that is.”

He shrugged, an elfish expression spreading across his face as he took in how nervous she was. “Well, come to think of it, you didn’t ask me to. I suppose I better get back to the Slytherin dorms anyways. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere near the Gryffindor Tower right now.”

“Why?” she squeaked.

“Oh, you know, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that most of the cursed things showed up on your side of the castle, yeah?”

She gulped.

“I gotta get going. Don’t want to stand around here too long. This place gives me the creeps.” With that, he turned and began walking away.

“Malfoy?” She hated how timid her voice sounded. “Consider this me asking you to walk with me.”

He slowly faced her, a sly grin plastered all over his face. “Oh? Did I hear that correctly? Do you want me to?”

“I’m only going to say this once,” she said, putting her hands on her hips and trying her best to look intimidating. “Walk with me. Please.”

“I guess I’ll take it.” Malfoy glided down the hallway to her in just a couple steps, sending her yet another smug look.

“You made up that whole ordeal about Gryffindor Tower being targeted, didn’t you?” asked Y/N as they rounded the corner to reach the staircase leading up to the common room.

“You bought it, didn’t you?” 

“Who says I didn’t just want you to walk with me?” pushed Y/N. This was as close to flirting as it would ever get for her--but it looked like, somehow, things were falling into place. The heat in her cheeks must’ve been from the excitement of making progress. 

Malfoy’s toe caught on the first stair and, if it weren’t for Y/N’s steady grip on his arm, would’ve made him go sprawling across the stone steps. 

“Merlin, Malfoy,” she said, immediately dropping her grip from his shoulder. “What’s gotten into you?”

He responded with an unceremonial snort and a withering glare. The rest of the walk was done in silence, and Y/N noted how careful his footwork became around the Gryffindor steps.

“This is me,” she finally said once they reached the tapestry for the Gryffindor dorms. He seemed surprised, and only then did it strike her that he’d probably never seen the entrance himself before. “Thanks for being such a gentleman.”

“I live to serve,” he drawled.

And just like that, he was gone.

~

Her plan was simple. She had located an extra monogrammed pouch in her cabinet, a rich mahogany color with her family crest in a vivid gold, and placed both his quill and the lavender bottle. She would corner him after breakfast or follow him out of the Great Hall and show him then.

However, it was becoming increasingly obvious that Malfoy was not coming to Saturday morning breakfast. Many people didn’t, but Y/N had never known him to miss it. His normal spot was vacant, and it certainly wasn’t a house-made decision as all of his Slytherin friends were present and accounted for. Y/N couldn’t say for sure, but she could see Parkinson turning her head to the entrance every time the doors thudded open before glancing back to Malfoy’s empty seat when it turned out to be someone else.

Where was that loser?

“Excuse me,” she said to the trio as she stood up and brushed off her skirt. “I think I’m going to go get some fresh air. I have a bitch of a headache.”

Hermione and Harry expressed their sympathies while Ron gave her a characteristic mumble through his mouthful of bread, and she was off with the pouch secured in her cloak pocket.

It was a clear November morning, clearly Mother Nature’s attempt to slowly move the world from the crisp autumn to a cold winter. The sky was clear and the sun’s rays warmed her skin at a slanted angle, casting weak shadows across the courtyard.

If I were Malfoy, where would I go to sulk?

The obvious answer was either the Slytherin common room or his own dorm, but that was without a doubt out of question for her. She wasn’t even sure if she possessed the knowledge to guess which corridor the entrance was in, much less work out the password herself. Beyond that, just getting into the common room and waiting would be...She shivered. It would be a terrible idea while she was clearly wearing a cloak in Gryffindor red and gold trim. 

As she continued her aimless wander around the castle, she heard the slightest sound from the girl’s bathroom on the second floor. It wasn’t ever really in use--no one came in there to actually use the loo unless they wanted Myrtle to materialize and tell them her supernatural troubles while they were in the middle of their personal business--but it was often the source of strange happenings. 

Like the cursed objects she thought to herself, her nails digging into her palms. But did she care about that right now? Surely cursed objects seemed somewhat...suspicious. Dark magic was difficult to hide, and to a pureblood eye that grew up around magical objects, cursed things shouldn’t be impossible to spot. 

And, plus, it was Malfoy she was looking for. None of the students had died from the curses so far, and if she was able to break through and learn something, or at the very least gain his trust, the reward to the Order would be more than worth it.

She stepped in, expecting to see an entirely empty bathroom with perhaps a ghost rattling around at the sink. Instead, a different sight awaited her.

Draco Malfoy was clutching the edge of the cracked sink basin in front of him, rocking himself back and forth and shaking. From her vantage point, she could see that he was dressed in his normal garb--a black ensemble--but his hair was unruly and messy, sticking up in the back like he’d hurriedly tugged something over his head.

A strangled gasp grounded her and halted her curious observations. Malfoy began to make these awful sobbing sounds, like he could barely manage to breathe. 

Y/N was frozen in place as she surveyed her options. If she stayed and tried to talk to him, he might react in anger or hurt her. But if she just left him, like this, all alone...She swallowed once before stepping forward.

“Malfoy? Are you okay?” Obviously he’s not, you bint said a voice deep in her brain. She pushed it aside as he swung around, his wand raised and his eyes blazing. “Whoa! I’m not going to...Put your wand down!”

He stared at her, his eyes wide with horror as he continued to shake, so much so that his wand slipped out of his hand and clattered to the floor. Without thinking, Y/N reached into her pocket and flung her wand away, holding her hands up.

“I’m not going to try anything. I promise.”

As she drew closer, she could see the remnants of tears on his wet cheeks and the way that his silver eyes were rimmed with a bloodshot red. 

“You shouldn’t be here,” he hissed, his voice weak and cracking. 

“Neither should you. This is the girl’s bathroom.”

final a/n: ok so lmk if you guys wants me to continue. i really did not edit the last half fjkdsal;f also kinda made this an au where malfoy tried to assassinate dumbledore. with more than one cursed object but dw it’ll all make sense ill clear that up 😭

#draco malfoy #draco x reader #draco malfoy x reader #draco imagine #draco malfoy imagine #draco x you #draco #draco malfoy x you #draco x y/n #draco malfoy x y/n #draco x oc #draco malfoy x oc

[kingdaddydaichi]

Phoenix (Chapter 1) 🎀 AU Divorced!DILF!Renji Abarai x f!reader 🎀 Slight NSFW

I don't care what the rest of y'all are doing (I'm such a liar, yes I do), but I'm celebrating Renji's August 31st birthday all week long by posting a chapter of this new fic every day, Monday-Friday. I want to drink this long, tall glass of crimson-haired Shinigami all the way down to the last drop. Here's to the birthday boy - Kanpai! 🥂

Monday, August 30th - Chapter 1

Tuesday, August 31st (Renji's Birthday) - Chapter 2

Wednesday, September 1st - Chapter 3

Thursday, September 2nd - Chapter 4

Friday, September 3rd - Chapter 5 (finale)

Word Count: 850

You’d met and started dating Renji during your first year of high school. He was a year older than you, and a grade higher. The following summer, you lost your virginity to one another. In the months leading up to his graduation, you'd both swore to stay together when he left for college. The plan was that you'd go to him after you graduated - move in with him off-campus, get a job, and most likely get married and start a family someday. But that’s not how things had turned out.

During his first year of college, there had been too many arguments about what the other was doing, getting jealous of who you were each hanging out with and where you were going when you weren’t together. During one of his frequent visits back home, you and Renji had your biggest fight ever, by a long shot. You’d accused him of cheating on you and he’d fucking lost it. He could not believe after all you’d been through together and how much he loved you that you’d think for a second that he’d stoop so low as to betray you. You were his best friend. It genuinely broke his heart. And your relationship. But not your love for one another.

When he graduated college, you’d been thinking about reconnecting with him, but a mutual friend told you that although he was moving back to the area, he would also be getting married in a few months. So you'd backed down.

You'd still see him from time to time, usually with his pretty wife, Rukia. You and they were polite and cordial whenever you'd see them together. But when it was just Renji, he was warmer and less distant towards you. Still, neither of you crossed any boundaries or did anything inappropriate, until one night in his 5th year of marriage…

You’d both been at a mutual friend's house party. Renji was flying solo, as were you, but word hadn’t reached you yet of his recent separation from his wife.

You'd spent the better part of the evening enjoying each other’s company, catching up, laughing, not a little tipsy from the drinks you'd had together. You'd been talking on the balcony for about an hour when the cool night air made you shiver. Without missing a beat of conversation, he took off his zip-up hoodie and casually put it over your shoulders, the thing hanging almost to your knees. You laughed together at how it fit you like a child compared to his 6’2” frame.

The two of you resumed your playful banter as he moved to stand behind you, wrapping his strong arms over yours before folding them around your waist, nonchalant as ever. It was only natural for his large hands and fingers to intertwine with yours as he pulled you back against his chest. "'s so fuckin' cold out here", he said nuzzling the side of your neck and pressing his hardening length against your backside. Feeling him like that after so many years made you heady, swaying back against him in response, your eyelids slowly slipping closed.

“Renji-“, your wispy voice trailed off when he slid his large hands beneath your shirt, caressing the warm, tender skin of your belly. His long fingers began their slow, measured descent, trailing their way down and into your jeans. "What’re you doin’, Renj?", you said, smiling, the full gravity of what was happening slow to hit you in your stupor.

He kissed the side of your neck, the feeling of his smirk apparent against your skin. "Just tryin' to keep my hands warm, (y/n)", he slurred. He'd almost reached the source of your moistening heat when you stepped forward with a gasp. This was wrong. He was married.

The jolt was sobering. "Renji, I- I really want to, but this is so wrong. Not now, not like this-"

He cut you off, “I’m getting divorced”.

You stood there with your mouth open, flooded with so many emotions at once you didn’t even know what to say. "Renji. I’m so sorry". You reached for him, but he took a step back and shook his head, eyes averted to the ground.

“No, I’m sorry”. The weight seemed to hit him all at once and he kicked the brick exterior of the house. “Shit!”

“Hey-“, you spoke in a soothing voice with knitted brows, trying to calm him down and talk to you.

“No, I fucked up, (y/n)! I’m sorry, I have to go”.

“Renji, wait!”, but it was too late. He’d already shut the balcony door, his long strides leading him to the front door of your friend’s house and just like that, he was gone. As much as you wanted to go after him, as much as you wanted him, you knew it was best to just let him go. The man you’d loved for years was hurting, his life was being torn apart, and you had no business giving him the comfort he sought. Warm tears pricked at the corners of your eyes. You’d missed him dearly and for a few cruel moments, it had felt like you belonged together again.

#love my virgo men #💋💋💋 #happy birthday renji #you beautiful man #i wanna kiss yo mama #renji abarai #abarai renji #renji love #renji #renji imagine #renji x f!reader #renji thirst #bleach renji #renji x reader

[batarella]

3 birds 1 stone - chapter 9

‘Dick, Jason, and Tim. Supposed brothers 'till the end, until all three fall in love with you. Who wins your heart?

The man who earned it, the man who stole it, or the man who always had it?’

A/N: The first part of this chapter includes the whole scene of how the reader lost her leg, and it does get pretty violent and explicit. I also have to warn that the cause of the accident can get pretty heavy and heartbreaking. This series, as it isn’t already obvious enough, is just about as frustrating and angsty as other love triangle stories there are.

WORDS: 11,923 WARNINGS: violence, building caught on fire, 3rd degree burns, bone fractures, survivor’s guilt, heartbreak, death

MASTERLIST | 3 BIRDS 1 STONE MASTERLIST

-----

‘Falcon Saves the Commissioner’ ‘Gotham Times’

‘The long beloved heroine has stolen the hearts of many as the vast criminal ring in the undergrounds of Gotham City has once again been interfered. Commissioner James Gordon, who had been reported missing the past two days, was kidnapped from his own home by the masterminds of Harvey Dent and Oswald Cobblepot, also known as Two Face and Penguin respectively. The City of Gotham has been in the state of panic since reports first arrived and a search party taking place in different parts of the city.

However, hope has since been restored and the safety of Gotham no longer as compromised as the vigilante Falcon, with the help of her known crimefighting partner Red Robin, had swooped in and saved the Commissioner, who was held captive at the top of Gotham Plaza. Reports of the heroine literally flying to the rescue, with her trademark wings helping her glide all the way from the building opposite the scene of the crime, have astounded the citizens with her will and bravery.

The Commissioner has thanked the crimefighting duo for their rescue and has been released from Elliot Memorial Hospital Monday night. No severe injuries have been reported and he has since returned to work as the head of the Gotham City Police Department. Gotham has joyously thanked the heroes, especially the young Falcon, for their service to the citizens. They continue to patrol the crime-ridden city and have grown increasingly popular, with the people calling them the fearless heroes we don’t deserve.’

----

“You made the headline!”

Red Robin probably shouldn’t be on his phone reading some news article when two other things were happening right then. One, the runaway that was speeding so recklessly was down the wrong lane and would have definitely hit a few headlights if it hadn’t swerved and narrowly missed a few pedestrians, and that if you weren’t to catch them, it might mean another night of painfully waiting for another robbery to happen just to catch these fools. Two, none of your hands should have been free enough to hold a damn phone at all, not when you and Red Robin were heavily relying on a single grappling gun each to hold your weight, flying past the empty skyscrapers as if it were any leisure.

“Tim, put your phone down!”

“I’m serious!” You both reached a rooftop and already you were on the way to the next one. The car frantically swerved again, this time almost running into some pizza truck. “People love you.”

“Maybe because I’m the only bird in the family who actually has wings,” you snorted.

And at that, you lived up to your name.

You, the Falcon, grappled up a nearby tower and ignored Red Robin’s cry. You were fast, and in such little time you’d reached the top, the cold mist breezing your lips like newly melted ice rode up to your skin. And when you did, you let out your wings.

Then you soared.

Maybe if you weren’t in some high-speed car chase, you’d have closed your eyes and enjoyed the slow, stagnant hover, when you weren’t descending just yet. You’d either fly even higher up in the sky, your ears thanking you violently in the process, when you’d shift your wings and stay in this calm, where you weren’t moving up nor downward. It was then when you felt that peace, as if miles away from the nearest conundrum.

You tilted to the side when you felt that slow descent, and below, you saw Red Robin frantically trying to catch up with you.

You laughed, then dove down, right to where you saw the worn-out red car was heading for, at an intersection where dozens of other cars would have been hit.

You pressed into your communicator. “Tim. I think he’s heading for the docks.”

“I think this is a hoax.”

“You think their boss is trying to give us the goat they’d sacrifice?”

“Might be part of their plan to distract us.”

You shifted your wings, then you landed onto a rooftop rolling to keep your balance, then you were running, Red Robin at your side.

“We’ve got the lead. Wait for them by the boardwalk.”

“Copy.”

Red Robin went over to the fishing port, all the way over to the other end, and you jumped over the ledges, swung by a lamppost, and let your boots completely obliterate this shed’s skylight to break your fall. Knee on the ground, and the room you were in eerily silent, you peeked over the door to see what was outside.

They’d be here in a few seconds.

There. A post holding up the phone wires. You grappled up to the top, crouched over, and waited for the car to drive over to the corner.

And these idiots slowed down, thinking they’ve lost you.

At the sharp turn, you leapt off to the post as if gravity was nothing you’d fear. And with your boots, your wonderful, padded boots that made you jump over larger heights and not hurt even your toes when you landed so harshly, dented the car’s roof and you had to hold tightly onto the metal just so you wouldn’t be thrown off by the sudden swerve.

Then it was Red Robin’s turn. From over to the fishing port, his grappling gun fired right into the roof of the car, and it shattered the windshield right where the driver was at. Left. Right. Then Left again. The driver was going nuts, and you only had so much time. You took out the one at the passenger seat and Red Robin the driver. From out the side windows, you shattered the glass, pulled them out from their collars, and got out of the car just before it crashed into the boardwalk.

And it wouldn’t have been pretty, with it drifting off the slippery wood and not stopping until the vehicle finally fell over the edge onto its untimely death deep in the ocean floor.

By then, you had the two robbers flat against the drenched cement, faces to the dirt and their teeth forcibly gritting from how hard you were both holding them down.

“Fuck!” The one beneath Tim growled. “Alright, alright, you got us!”

“We surrender!”

“Then it shouldn’t have to hurt so much when you tell us who you’re distracting us for.”

“What?!”

You slammed the noisy one’s forehead against the road.

“You know what he means,” you whispered.

“We don’t know about no distraction!”

Red Robin got out his bo staff and pressed it against his skull, just enough to hurt his temple.

“I told you. It shouldn’t have to hurt so much. Doesn’t mean I won't do it.”

Your knee holding down his back, you pressed it harder down his spine until you heard a yelp.

“Talk!”

“I told you! We don’t know nothin’!”

“What don’t believe that.”

The one beneath Tim was shivering down his toes. “Some guy on the phone told us about the bank and promised us a car and some guns if we give him a cut! That’s all I fuckin’ know I swear- ah!”

Tim held his face further down against the ground.

“Does this guy on the phone have a name?”

“I don’t know! Swear! Seemed sketchy and all but who are we to pass up on a free car?!”

You looked at Tim. A distraction still seemed likely, otherwise whoever hired them would have just robbed the bank himself with his own goons instead of hiring some amateurs who thought that 1994 Honda they probably stole from a junkyard was something they couldn’t pass up on. That or their boss was even more stupid than they were.

You grabbed your guy by the neck, hauled him up, then growled to his ear.

“You must be stupid to think we’d believe that-“

“Piss off if you don’t!” He dared scream at you, then you rewarded him with a smack of your knee down the small of his back.

“Who hired you?”

“We don’t fucking know-“

“Falcon.”

Red Robin’s finger was up to his ear, and he was staring intently at the ground. Batman.

“We got our answer.”

“Oh,” you sighed. “No need for these guys then.”

“What the fuck do you mean -“

With one swift move, you grabbed them both by the hair and slammed their faces together, teeth clattering to the ground, and they lied unconscious. Tim went on to listen to Batman bark orders at him while you tied them up by the lamppost and called the police.

Tim nodded at you, pointing to his ear. You tuned in your communicator to listen to their line with Bruce.

“…About ten robberies staged. High and low profile. It gave Lynns and his men time to set fire to three fire departments all over Gotham…”

“Lynns?” you said. “Garfield Lynns?”

“Firefly.”

“I’ll send you all the coordinates. Signal, Black Bat, and Spoiler. You three handle the one in Bristol. Robin, Batgirl, and I will take Otisburg.

“Nightwing, Red Hood, Red Robin, and Falcon. You four handle the fire in Cauldron. The fire goes on for two blocks.”

“I’ll send you all the coordinates,” Batman told his team. “I expect a call afterward.”

His way of telling you all not to die, to promise him that you wouldn’t die, that you’d be alive by the end of it so he’d yell at you for an hour over the smallest things you missed.

You heard everyone voice out their nods at Batman, then you and Tim grappled up to the tallest portside shed nearest you, then you were heading for the coordinates.

“Looks like we’re alpha team for once!”

You felt your heart joyously leap when you heard that familiar voice. Cheery and bright. Already, you felt that rush to work even harder than you were expected to.

You pressed onto your communicator when you jumped across a narrow gap between two buildings.

“We’re not exactly team alpha, Nightwing.”

“Well. There are four of us. And we’re handling the biggest fire.”

“Batman’s always alpha,” you laughed. “Maybe he’s handling the most important fire.”

“You can't possibly think there’re arson cases more important than the others?”

“It depends on what’s on fire,” Tim interrupted, and you shot up a tower and let the air take you to what you could now see was a large black cloud in the distance, spanning across almost the whole avenue and growing as tall as a plaza-wide mushroom.

“I see it.”

“I see it, too.”

Another voice. Deeper. Muffled.

“You there, Red Hood?”

“Well, hey there, pretty bird.”

Even in the air, gliding between the concrete jungles of the city, you managed to roll your eyes beneath your mask. You could tell Tim let out a groan, which you heard from your communicator.

“It’s Falcon, you ass.”

“Nah,” Jason laughed. “I like pretty bird.”

“Falcons aren’t very pretty.”

“Yeah,” you heard Dick’s voice again. “But you are.”

The lack of response from both Jason and Tim’s line told you Dick had blocked them off just so he could say that.

Your feet landed onto the concrete of the building just a few more minutes away, and you had your lip too harshly bitten. Maybe it was from the impact on your soles. Maybe because that rush up your skin at Dick’s remark made you want to leap even further off the edge of that building.

You fled to the site. Jumping. Running. Gliding. And at the sounds of screams, sirens, alarms, you went faster.

Tim had caught up to you. Poor thing was panting, and he rushed up to your side.

Then Nightwing came into view, also running across the gaps of rooftops just a few yards away. Black and blue suit, still as light as day even under the moon’s not so generous shine. You smiled at him.

All the way over to the other side, on the roads underneath, you heard the harsh thunder of a motorcycle battling the cries of the uncontrolled flames. Red Hood wheeled up so he could drive past a blockage on the road, which you hadn’t known was from Flynns or the police themselves, but people were surrounding it, and at Jason’s warning, they made way for him to drive past the blockage, actually leaping with the vehicle in the air until his wheels slammed onto the cement.

You could do this. Two. Maybe even three blocks worth of fire.

If it weren’t from suspicion from a hallucinogen or some mirage from how large the fire had become, you could have sworn you saw three duplicates of Firefly, aiming their flamethrowers at the many windows of wood, stone, and steel.

“Firefly has goons now?”

“Seems so,” Nightwing said. “You guys got a plan?”

You and Tim stuck your grappling hooks onto the last rooftop’s ledge and jumped off the building. When you were on the ground, on the street right in front of the fire department that had your skin, eyes, and hair feel like it was burning down to your bones, Nightwing landed gracefully on your side, and Red Hood carelessly drifted on the road, jumping off his seat to join the rest of you and assess this rather difficult situation.

“There are people still in there,” Red Hood said. “I can see them.”

“We have to go save them first.”

“Firefly’s men-“

One of them, who had a fucking jetpack identical to the crazed pyromaniac’s, hovered over the four of you standing on the side of the road, and it was going for the next building.

“About fifteen civilians inside.” Red Hood finished his scan.

“I’ll save them,” you said. “The rest of you take care of those flies.”

“Absolutely not.” Nightwing’s voice was stern. Not something you wanted to argue with. “You need someone to go with you. None of us should be left alone.”

“I’ll go with her.” Red Robin, always your partner, stepped to your side. “We’ll take care of the people. You and Jason fight off those fireflies.”

Jason clicked his guns. “Promise I’ll play nice.”

Dick eyed Tim. A solid, knowing glance, then he turned to you.

“Be careful.”

“You, too.”

“Everyone.” Tim picked up his Bo staff. “Move!”

Your wings wouldn’t be of any use. Not when you’d have to work in a building aflame. Your wings weren’t very fireproof. So with your skintight, cape-less suit looking similar to Dick’s, you and Tim both flung yourselves up from windows and lampposts until you reached an entryway that didn’t burn you at first contact.

You scanned the place. There. A few rooms away. Two bodies huddled together. You went straight for the door until Tim grabbed you by the back of your suit and pulled you away.

Just in time, before a wooden beam from the ceiling came crashing down the burnt foundation, tearing a hole on the floor where you were standing just then. You stiffed. “Thank you.”

“I said be careful.”

Tim then expertly jumped over the beam, on top of the fallen debris that had fallen to the floor that wouldn’t crumble under his weight or would burn his palms when he pushed himself up, spinning in the air to get across the room. You followed right behind him. If you ignored the smoke you desperately tried to keep off your lungs or your skin about to be burnt off, it wasn’t so different from your vault back at home. You were faster, swifter. Your feet were off the ground for a few good seconds and the rush that went with your movements both cooled down your skin and made the fire around you worse. You caught up to him and soon you reached the end of the room seconds faster than he did.

Red Robin nodded, already trying to pry the door off its damaged hinges when he landed. You helped him.

“Dick-“ he grunted. “-taught you well.”

“Thanks.”

The door broke off, and you surveyed the room. The two bodies. Still breathing. But barely. You and Tim went up to them and he covered their heads with his cape.

“Come now,” you said, and you realized one of them must have been ten years old. He was shivering. The other, not much older.

You and Tim got them out of there and not a patch of their skin had to be burnt off. Hopefully, it’ll be the same for the rest.

Then you went in again. In that building alone, there were three more people inside.

Tim broke down a door with his foot, then you vaulted yourself up on beams to reach places Tim couldn’t, and you came out with a five-year-old girl in your arms. She’d been hiding under her bed. Not the brightest idea. But apparently, fire drills need to be done even at this age.

“Tim,” you coughed through the growing smoke. The poor girl was unconscious but breathing. You covered her head with Tim’s cloak. “Why are there so many kids?”

“Orphanage.”

You wanted to skin Firefly’s burnt flesh. Alive.

An orphanage just a block away from the fire department. And still, it was torn down in flames. You helped the kids out, then went on to the next building.

This one was burning so much more than the last.

The fireflies were here.

As you and Red Robin reached the window, the only available entryway, the wall to your left exploded from the other side and Red Hood broke down that very wall with his weight, landing on his back with the worst profanities that would even make Satan blush spurt out of his mouth.

“A LITTLE HELP HERE?!”

Tim got his staff, and as the menacing, horribly burnt creature flew into the room, a mock-up of wings strapped to his back and even more flames spurting out of his jetpack almost completely obliterating the floor underneath, you used what was left of the wall to your side, pushed both your feet against it so you were flying sideways, then your foot slammed on his head. With him stunned, Tim tore his staff right against his jetpack, unlatching it.

Then you flung it across the room so Jason could shoot at it, exploding before it even reached the ground.

“Where’s Dick!?” you asked.

“Third floor.”

Almost as if on cue, the ceiling above you collapsed, and with the boards and slabs of wood that fell through, a body landed painfully on its back. You ran to the site, looking up. Dick was there.

“Nightwing!” You screamed. “Be careful before you hit someone!”

“Sorry!” Then Dick disappeared.

“Where are the civilians?” you asked.

“Over there.” Jason pointed at a hallway. A quick scan told you the bodies were all over the place. In different rooms.

The windows behind you suddenly burst into flames and eventually detonated. You shielded yourself. Tim and Jason to the ground. When you turned around, another one of Firefly’s goons had their thrower pointed right at your face.

“Falcon!”

You leapt out of sight just in time, and you used the beams to fling yourself up, at the destroyed wall that had now let the colder air in.

A risk, but you took it valiantly. Just like a vault. Nothing different from a vault. You ran, hands to your side, let the wind take you. And you only wished the floor was stable enough, because wishing was all you could rely on. You ran. Then you flipped and your hands were to the floor, placing all your weight to your palms, spinning. Then it was your feet again.

Just at the last ledge, in your true gymnast fashion, your hands pushed you further up in the air, as high as any human could jump up to, then you spread your wings when you reached the peak and soared, right at the combatant that shot his eyes up at the sight of you flying straight at him.

You grabbed him by the throat, wings entangling with your own, then you were a flying mess in the air. His jetpack was already malfunctioning, and you directed it to land straight back to the floor where you came from.

But as soon as you got him back on the ground, the firefly had grabbed you by the shoulders and pinned you down so overwhelmingly strong, you needed Tim to smack his head and throw him all the way over to the floor.

“We can't handle these guys alone.”

“But-.”

“Even Jason here’s having a hell of a time.”

“Don’t worry,” Jason snorted. “I’m fine. I’ll try to hold these guys off. Go save everyone.”

He then shot the fly’s jetpack with his explosive bullets, and the light detonation threw him towards a wall.

“Jason!”

“He’s still fucking breathing!”

You panted, the surging nerves, the numbness of your fingertips still there. Jason took care of the fly and hauled him out of sight.

“Come on.”

You went to the rooms, broke down the doors and walls almost with just your foot alone. Two. Three. Four people. A college student. A lone middle-aged man. And in a room far too small for anyone to possibly, humanely live in, a single mother cradling her baby she didn’t even know was still alive. So close to having the smoke take over her lungs, you grabbed the baby with one hand, her arm over your shoulder with the other, then she limped with you as Tim held a small child in his arms, carrying them all out to safety.

The fire was getting worse, and from above, you heard Dick’s screams from being thrown around above you.

You won't have much time before this whole building gives out.

Then, just as you thought you’d cleared the last room, you heard a cry from one of another one of the rooms, the one at the farthest end that had no scans of a body just minutes ago. Now, you saw there was.

And the body was too small for you to notice the first time.

You turned up your scanners, really looked around, for anything else you might have missed. Anything small.

Shit. Another. To the other end of the hall. It looked like an adult, curled up in the corner of his room under a table. Why would he hide under a table in a fucking fire!?

“Falcon!” Tim came up to your side. “You see anyone else?!”

“One there. And another on that side. Let’s take that one first,” you nodded at the door with the child behind it.

“No. There’s no time.”

You both dodged a piece of a ceiling that had fallen in just a foot away from where you stood. Dick. Being mauled too close to death just above you.

“I take him,” Tim said. “You get the child.”

“Tim, I’m not going to leave you alone.”

Another piece of wood from the ceiling. Gone. The wall near you had burnt to a crisp, which made it hurt less when Jason was flung to the ground by another firefly just where the wall used to be.

“We don’t have time to come back for both.”

“And if we don’t, we die!” you said. “I can't leave you alone, Tim.”

“Everyone should be saved. I’ll be fast, then I’ll be right there with you. I promise.”

Tim pushed you to the door, and already he was on the way to the end of the hall. “Be careful!” he screamed at you. With your fists clenched, hoping this wouldn’t backfire on him anytime tonight, you rushed for the child.

“You fucking mosquito son of a bitch!” Jason yelled as his guns went into this uncontrollable frenzy. All over the walls, the floor, anywhere. Just so he’d finally put that flying bastard to the ground. It shot its thrower at Red Hood’s face and so narrowly did he dodge the flames.

He rolled on the ground, eyed the attacker like it was a bomb to defuse. Another shot from his flame thrower, just one good shot, and there will be no other way for him to turn to but even more fire, and it’ll possibly collapse the whole room.

So Red Hood shot at his gun, at his arms. Finally, he got it to drop the weapon to the ground.

Jason grabbed the firefly by the throat as soon as he’d shot down his jetpack, and he flung him across the other side of the debris to trap him, the barricades, to the hallway of rooms where you’d gone into. He stays there long enough and he’d definitely catch on fire. And even if it didn’t, he needed it to be kept away. There were more flies for him to take care of. And they were, quite literally, flying towards him like moths.

A thud, coming from the ceiling above.

Up a floor, Dick wasn’t handling it any better.

Nightwing smashed his escrima sticks against a firefly’s temples, then gave it just enough voltage to stun him. He kicked him off his body, smashing his back against the already charred wall that broke upon impact, but it didn’t take him down. Not yet. Just his ability to fly.

The firefly stood up, snarling much like an animal, then clicked his thrower to point it at Dick. He was leaping, swiftly and gracefully around the smoke-infested debris just to not get burnt.

Dick was finally close enough to grab him by the collar, flinging it over his shoulder, smashing his body against the weakening ground.

But the firefly was too strong, and not long after, he had Nightwing choked to the floor. He had him held down. Dick landed a hit to his face, or what he could see of his face through the mask, then the firefly hit him back. Another. Another. Each time, the floor started to break underneath.

Outside, all alone because he insisted, Tim had safely made his way through the flames.

Always. Every night, by your side. You never left it. Not when it meant his life. Tim was outside, cape to his nose, and he left the building so he could take the nearly unconscious man to the safety grounds away from the smoke. But when he’d come back, pieces of wood had fallen in the hallway where you’d go into and had barricaded the way. You were on the other side. He’d left you alone.

Alone, amid the worst fire you’ve ever had to work through, you coughed out even more of the smoke, tears in your eyes, then broke down the last door in three slams against your shoulder. You were weak, flailing, your chest twisting at the heat and the smoke. But you do not fall. Instead, you push yourself further. Harder.

But it wasn’t anything at all you thought you could handle. You didn’t think you’d be alone in the room where the fire had started. The epicenter. The one so fully engulfed, there was almost no place at all for you to walk on.

You grabbed the child’s unconscious body. He might have been dead by then. He felt lifeless. But as you were on your knees, you almost could not stand. Your weight was too much, and the fire too close to your skin. For a moment, when the pain in your throat and chest came to the very worst, your body started to give out.

At that moment, three things happened. Three things that should never, ever have happened at the same time.

One of the fireflies, the one Jason had thrown right at you and had trapped behind the barricaded debris, picked himself up and saw you from out the hallway. You heard him growl despite the scorching flame.

The ceiling, already so charred, broken, burnt, mists of wooden shards falling right down to your hair. The fighting that went on upstairs was causing it. You couldn’t stay there long. You had to get out before the ceiling collapses. Fast.

And, on top of all that, with the fire that grew worse, your chest twisting, a child almost lifeless in your hands, you were alone. No one was there to help you.

You gained enough consciousness to push the last of your strength. You could do this. You knew you could. If you could just hold on a bit longer, with the child in your arms, and go out the same way you came in, it’d be fine.

But just as you pulled yourself up your feet, the firefly was lunging straight for you.

The child was dead. A boy of six. You were sure of that when something so much larger and stronger than you, that very man who no longer looked like a man, who looked more like a burnt corpse dressed as a moth without wings, lunged at you and grabbed you by the neck. You dropped the child’s body, and the way its limbs were so twisted when he hit the floor, it almost hurt as much as when you were slammed against the wall.

Flashes of red, white, yellow, and even black, the color that scared you the most when it came to circumstances like these, it was all you could see past the gritted teeth that exposed themselves so horribly to you when his mask had been taken down. He was wounded, yet he had the strength to do this, to squeeze your throat so rigidly that in the matter of a few minutes, at least to you, it lasted a few minutes, you were as blue as the night sky. A horrible color when it came to skin.

You wanted so badly to scream, but even if you did, it wouldn’t be of any use. You were alone. And with so much holding you back from just being able to breathe, you couldn’t hear a thing. Not your limbs squirming about, not the man holding your throat crying to let out the smoke from his own lungs, not the fire nor the collapse of the walls. No one had found you yet, and your bones and muscles alike had barely enough will in them to do so much more than just flailing so meagerly. Your lungs, your neck, your throat. It wasn’t enough that you were choking on smoke and debris, his clutch on your flesh gripped on as if none of the flames had any sort of effect at all.

Then.

Then there was the ceiling.

Whoever was up there, he was getting beat up. Hard. And it was making it break even worse. You felt the wood’s dust fall to your eyes. You had to move out of the way, but you couldn’t. No one to help you. No one to help you flee.

Just before that horrific flashes of black and surprisingly inviting, riveting flashes of white overcame everything else your eyes could still pick up, just before that tightening in your neck became less of a pain and felt more of a descent, a slow, painful descent, it all stopped.

You could see color. You could see the flames. The charred wood. The scattered cement from the walls. You could hear it all again. That scorch. That rage. The screams from the onlooking civilians. And the pain was gone. You could breathe. There wasn’t a hand on your throat any longer.

And it all lasted not more than a second. Half of it. A quarter of it even. Still, you felt it, not knowing it might have been your last.

The ceiling above you collapsed.

So did the wall you were being slammed against.

Huge slabs of wood, beams for support, floorboards from the level above, it all came crashing down as if apologetic for the delay, because they weren’t unforeseen. They were expected. You just didn’t get to move away in time.

It hit the firefly’s head the second the first slab tumbled down, and the rest of it followed. With how you fell, and the wall behind you breaking as well, your back was on the floor. But that wasn’t what hurt. Not even a little.

No.

Not when a sizable wooden beam in flames, one that held up the ceiling before it collapsed, fell in and crushed the bones of your leg.

You’d never forget it.

You never thought it was possible for there to be so much pain, not even when it was necessary. And a lot of the time, all the time, in fact, it was necessary. This time, it must have been. It must have been for a purpose. To defeat a foe. To save a life. It had to be.

Because the way that immeasurable weight hit your shin, breaking your tibia in half and twisting it in a way that was far too horrific for any onlooking eyes, you saw it. You saw everything. And God, have you never seen anything so horrifying before.

Then the flames from the beam had spread to your leg. Your suit. Your flesh. That, you felt for a short, agonizing few seconds.

Then, the pain from the burn completely disappeared. Your skin had gone.

Your scream right then, a deathly, ghostly scream, was the worst thing that could have ever heard in your life.

And that scream was what saved you. Otherwise, no one would have known you were there.

Otherwise, not Red Robin, Nightwing, nor Red Hood would have found you, even when it was far too late.

“FALCON!”

“Y/N!”

“NO!!!”

-----

Even in such a drug-induced, near unconscious state, you were aware.

Even with your eyes closed, and your brain playing lighter, less heartbreaking scenes for you to go over in your sleep, you were aware.

Even with everything being nothing more than a blur, the sounds, the lights, the chattering included,

Somehow, you were aware.

You were aware enough to know you’ve been here, on this very bed, for more than a week, and that since then, you haven’t opened your eyes, much less muttered even a syllable for anyone to hear.

You were aware that there were people around you. Sometimes just one, two, mostly three. Three men? Unclear. Often, lots of times, there were more. Different color hair. Different voices. Some sweet. Some deep. Some roughed up and husky. Some nothing more than a whisper.

All of them bearing the same guilt, pity, sadness.

You were aware things weren’t looking so good. Not with a cast over your neck, when you couldn’t even turn to your side when the bruises hurt as much as a tight squeeze. And because of that, when you did manage to open your eyes to some extent, you couldn’t see what went on below your waist.

And judging from what you could see on the ceiling, the murmurs around you, the occasions when you could see the looks on the visitors’ faces, straps holding up your elevated leg, you knew it couldn’t possibly be what you’d expect.

You weren’t awake yet. But you knew where you were. You were aware of what happened. Sometimes you could hear the voices so clearly you felt so close to just talking back. But that couldn’t be, because you were unconscious.

Damn everything.

Damn it all.

Why couldn’t you just be asleep enough to not witness any of this at all?

The last thing you saw, before your eyelids were weighed down by some unimaginable force, was the slightly matted window on the door where you saw Tim’s head facing his brothers’. They were talking.

You couldn’t hear what they said.

But if you could, it wouldn’t have made things at all better.

Tim couldn’t keep his eyes away from you, looking into that window to save his own life and watching you get lost in this illusion of peace, this illusion that taught the people around you that nothing was screaming at all, when in fact you hadn’t stopped screaming since that beam fell. He saw the cast, no longer the shape of a foot, and it hurt all the more to keep seeing it absorb itself into reality.

Jason was right beside that door. He visited just as much as the rest of them. Them being Tim and Dick. But he couldn’t look at you. Not for a second. He hasn’t even turned his head at your direction for more than what he needs to. And he rarely needed to, so he pressed his back against that white wall and let his weight slump him down. He hasn’t talked much. He hasn’t spoken at all.

Dick stood in front of the two, facing the door. He had his arms up to hug his chest. He did not sleep. Not for many nights. He was as bad as Tim now. His once so mesmerizingly bright eyes now stared so dimly and emptily at the white paint, he must have thought to say something, anything, to let out what everyone was thinking right then.

But instead of a word, the first word that day, he ended up catching Jason’s eyes, who glared back the minute he caught Dick watching him for too long.

“The fuck you looking at?”

Dick shook his head, then he let his attention get drawn away yet again by the floor.

“Fuck,” Jason mumbled, then his hand was too harsh on his hair. “Fuck this. I’m tired.”

Dick scoffed at that. “Go ahead. Go home and disappear for three weeks.”

“I meant that I needed to sleep after staying up the past thirty hours, shithead.”

He didn’t face Jason despite him and his nerves popping out of his skin like he desperately wanted to squeeze his eyeballs out of his sockets.

Tim, on the other hand, didn’t even do so much as look at his brothers when he heard them bicker. He just stared at you, how silent and peaceful you looked. Still unknowing.

“How…” Tim swallowed. “How did we let this happen…”

Jason watched the dark corner of the opened supply closet nearby. Dick turned his head the other way, eyes seemingly closed as he listened to the cart being wheeled right past them. That, the scent of ethyl alcohol, the chilling white paint, the flush of cold, and the beeping sound coming from somewhere down the hall, it was all anyone could sense, especially when in so deep in thought.

“We should have… I should have-” Tim finally brought himself to look away from the window. “I should never have let her out of my sight-”

Dick pulled on his shoulder. “Tim-“

“Don’t tell me it isn’t my fault.”

“But it isn’t your fault.”

“I said don’t tell me that!”

He swatted Dick’s hand away and placed his deep into his hood where no one would be able to touch him.

“You think that, too,” Jason chewed on his cheek. “Don’t you Dick?”

“Don’t I what?”

“Blame him?”

He was probably so close to just lunging at Jason just then but he didn’t. Not here. Dick just snarled at him. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“You do,” Tim said. “I know you do. You look at me and Jason like we’re poison.”

Jason shrugged. Dick didn’t know what to say. “Like you two don’t look the same at me.”

“Admit it,” Jason stood from the wall. “You blame us for what happened.”

“I never fucking said that,” Dick growled.

“Good,” he said. “Because so do I.”

“You blame us?”

Jason had his teeth gritted so much they would have broken.

“We all blame something. It’s too hard to admit. But none of us should have to,” Tim whispered. “It was an accident.”

“An accident that wouldn’t have happened if not for us.” Dick chewed on his knuckles, and Jason stood taller, sighing and raising his hands like this ‘point proven’ sort of gesture.

Tim looked back at you again.

“She’ll never forgive us.”

“She wouldn’t have to,” Jason said. “She’ll blame herself.”

“That makes this even harder,” Dick hissed when his teeth dug into his flesh too much. “She has to blame us. At least. It’ll be better for her.”

“Maybe she should be blaming us because we are to blame.”

The silence that followed after was sharp enough to cut glass. Tim grabbed all the hair in his head and pulled, grunting, hissing, gritting his teeth, letting the tears slowly seep.

“Tim-“

Tim laid against the wall. He wasn’t as tired as the two. Staying up for two days wasn’t so much as a change for him. So he had the energy to cry, while Dick and Jason could barely hold themselves up, no matter how much they looked like they wanted to break down themselves.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” Tim held his head. “I let this happen to her. I left her alone-“

“Tim, you have to stop-“

“Are you convincing him that it wasn’t his fault, Grayson?” Jason stammered. “Or are you talking to yourself?”

“Jason, will you just shut up-“

“You wanna live in this delusion?” He cried. “Go ahead. But you're not doing anything better for him.”

“I am trying to make sure our brother doesn’t beat himself up for something he didn’t do

“And what do you know about what he did? You weren’t there. You were all the way up on the third floor not having a clue what went on.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Todd?”

“You know what. I’m saying this,” he raised his arms and turned from Dick to Tim, then back again. “I’m done keeping silent. That beam fell on her leg because you were up there making the goddamn ceiling fall in.”

“You son of a bitch-” Dick pushed Jason’s chest.

“She even told you to be careful up there,” Jason said. “You didn’t listen.”

“What the fuck do you want from me?!”

“So you’d know you’re not the only one who knows all that.”

“And why is that, huh?” Dick stood him off, chin up high. “Why’d you bring that up? To lighten the weight on your chest? Tell yourself it wasn’t just your fault and that fucking firefly you threw right at her?”

Tim had been silent since Jason mentioned the wooden beam, but by then, his face had shot up and he was staring at the two squaring off.

“You might as well have handed Y/N right into his clammy hands. You threw him over that barricade he couldn’t escape from. Right after you told her you’d keep them off.”

Jason looked like he could break stone with the ghostly look he gave his brother.

“I didn’t fucking know she was there.”

“Then where else would she have been? You told her to save everyone in the building. And you knew she and Tim needed your help keeping them off.”

Jason shoved Dick in the chest. “You don’t think I fucking know that you-“

“Wait.”

Tim’s voice stayed soft, though it was solid. When he looked up at his brothers, faces flushed and just as full of shame as it was so full of rage for the other, Tim stuttered.

“You two caused this to happen?”

What should have been apologies, or mutters, reasons, excuses, fights to be right again, convictions for their truths, perhaps even lies, Dick stared back and his mouth fell shut. Jason got his hands off him, placed them on his sides. He was silent, too.

“Why didn’t I know about this?”

For once, Jason looked at Dick and it wasn’t so murderous.

“Dick-“

His big brother. The one closest to him. He should have been the one to tell him everything. He might have expected this from Jason. But not Dick.

But they had the same silence, the same guilt-stricken, awfully dark, hooded eyes.

Dick started. “You didn’t… You…” He looked around to make it easier. “You were taking all this harder than the rest of us.”

“Clearly, so should you!”

Tim has never raised his voice before. That wasn’t even much of a scream. But his voice cracked, and there were tears at the ends of his mouth.

“Tim-“

“I thought I was the only one to fucking blame,” Tim stammered. He wouldn’t say this. Not when he was calm. Not when it didn’t involve you. He was always so quiet. The one at the corner finding a place to take a nap. Not the one to accuse. To point fingers. To lash his anger out on others.

“I almost went fucking insane the past week. Now you tell me you two were the root of it all?”

This shouldn’t have to be what he felt. This was just his own guilt taking control. He wouldn’t burden others with such blame to lug around.

“Listen, I-“

“The beam that fell, and that fucking goon that held her down from escaping-“

“Tim, it still would have been a hell of a lot better if you were there,” Jason said.

“If you weren’t there at all, none of this would have happened!”

“Oh!” Jason cried. “Okay. It’s all my fault because I did exactly what was agreed on by the team while you left her alone when she shouldn’t be?!”

“Jason -“

“Everyone knows Y/N almost never leaves your side in combat. She always had you. She was better as your protector, which means she’ll never willingly leave you alone.”

Tim’s tears had fallen to his chin. It was too much out of his control. Too much out of anyone’s control.

“I swear if you don’t shut up right fucking now-“

“You’ll what, Grayson?!” Jason pushed Tim aside and eyed Dick down. “Fine. Blame me. If it does you any better, salvage whatever light she’ll see you in, give you more of a fighting chance with her, huh?”

Dick never looked so badly like wanted to tackle Jason to the ground. He never told Jason about you. He shouldn’t have known, but of course, he knew. “You can't possibly allow her to look at you like you cut off her fucking leg-“

Tim was giving Dick that same look. Dead. He was dead to him.

“This has nothing to do with that-“ Dick pushed him back.

“You caused that fucking beam to fall that snapped her bones and burnt off her flesh-“

“Because that fucking firefly you lead to her held her down! She could have escaped!”

“I told you-“

“You didn’t know where she was?!” Dick cried. “She wasn’t anywhere around you. She only could have been in one fucking place. Behind the barricade. In the apartments. You knew she was there. Maybe you thought you killed that firefly when you threw it off. Maybe you thought it wouldn’t reach her. Or, maybe, you just didn’t care. You didn’t think about how she’d be able to handle it. And even if it did cross your mind, you probably thought she could fight it off on her own!“

“Don’t you fucking tell me what I thought in the middle of a fucking fire.”

“Then don’t patronize me ‘cuz I didn’t have fucking pillows around when I got mauled by a bug and not break the ceiling! Or Tim for thinking saving a life was worth risking their own!”

“WELL THEN, I hope you two think it was fucking worth it.” Jason pointed at the window, at the sight of you so motionless on the bed.

“If I didn’t know how much of a pain in the ass you are when your guilt is eating you up, Jason-” Dick stuck his finger against Jason’s temple and he pushed it aside. “I wouldn’t let you hear the end of this.”

“Is this a threat, Grayson?”

“Do you want it to be?”

“Dick, stop-“

“Stay out of this, Tim.” Dick pushed him aside, and Tim shoved him back even harder so he’d hit the wall. Even Jason looked surprised at him.

“I’m not a kid, Dick.”

Even more so would they have fought, right in that very hallway in Elliot Memorial, if not for Bruce Wayne stepping out of the room, only in his sweats, and he shot every single one of them the dirtiest look.

He blamed himself, too. Otherwise he wouldn’t be here so much. Not when you weren’t one of his adopted kids, not when he had to sit in that room for hours with your own parents nearby, crying, wondering what happened, not having a clue who their daughter even was.

This wasn’t the first time. Even when you weren’t his child, it was the same as when Babs got shot in the spine.

He never let himself hear the end of it. Bruce blamed himself.

Bruce blamed himself for ever trusting Dick, Jason, and Tim to make sure you’d be ok.

“She’s awake.”

The three of them stood still, staring back at Bruce who couldn’t give them a colder look. One so full of hidden resentment, one he tried to hide. But it was all clear, even from those two words alone. He might as well have spelled it out for them.

‘You are all to blame. All three of you. Even if just one of you wasn’t so careless, this wouldn’t have happened.’

He might as well have said that. He should have said that. They needed that kind of reality being thrown right at their denial. They needed that push.

When he left, already it had shifted.

They were going to have to face you now, actually look at you in the eye, and you wouldn’t have to be told. You already knew why this all came to be. There wouldn’t be any use in an argument, evidence, technicalities, bickering. All that shoving and yelling. It’ll all be for nothing.

Because at the end of the day, no matter how much the brothers wouldn’t want to accept this kind of spilled blood anywhere near their skin, it’ll always be true. The only person they blame the most, more than the others, will always be themselves.

Dick, for not even thinking of being so careful with the collapsing floor, even after you told him to. He should have taken it to the second. Maybe on the street.

Jason, for letting that firefly loose, because he was too confident you’d be able to handle it on your own.

And Tim, for not just letting you go alone, but insisting that he not go with you even when you pleaded. Because he thought he’d stop at nothing to save as many lives. He didn’t think about you.

Being in the midst of fire won't cut it.

Dick broke the silence first.

“I’m sorry…”

Tim and Jason couldn’t look at him. Jason faced his own feet. Tim at the door. His face was soft. No longer so rageful.

Tim spoke next. “I’m sorry, too.”

This was about as much affection, affection as it was, that they’d ever shown each other. Jason tried to brush it off by rolling his eyes, keeping his face out of view so no one would see his face trembling.

“Yeah… sorry…”

This was all there is. Guilt.

They can blame whoever they want. It’ll all stem back to their own self-blame that was chipping their flesh away like maggots.

Tim took the first step to the door, heading into the room, and Jason and Dick followed right behind him.

They couldn’t go anywhere near you. Not like this. Not even when they were the boldest. They couldn’t. The cowards they were stood the farthest, lined up a few feet away from the foot of your hospital bed.

They couldn’t possibly face you, not when just minutes after you’d woken up, already your cheeks were soaked and your cries eerie and painful. Your eyes were swollen, neck held back with a cast.

Barbara held you in her arms. Barbara. Of course, it would be Barbara. The only one in the family who knew what it was like to wake up in a hospital and so suddenly lose a bodily function, something so simple as to walk, and not be able to do it just like everybody else. Not being complete anymore. Not be whole.

She was a few of the lucky ones to find that clinic in Africa that gave her that implant. You, on the other hand, probably won't be so lucky.

You. You woke up in that bed, and you didn’t have to hear anything from their conversation outside. You knew exactly what they talked about. You were aware. You didn’t have to hear any part of it or even see the expressions they bore.

That moment you sat up, just enough so you could see just how much damage had been done.

Your right leg had burns. Red marks, scattered all over your skin and ones you knew wouldn’t heal so lightly. You’re to see them for the rest of your life, and you’ll never escape it. The burns went all the way down your toes.

But not even that worried you. You couldn’t care any less about your skin. At least, you actually still had toes on your right leg.

The left one.

The left leg.

You didn’t have one anymore.

You had two thighs.

You had two knees.

One shin, one calf behind it.

Five toes at the end. Burnt as they were.

And the other.

Nothing. Air.

A stub. A useless, ugly stub, sticking out just three inches from your knee. You couldn’t even feel it sting, not when you could obviously see just how much had to be cut off.

Then.

You screamed again.

From a few feet away from the foot of your bed, Tim was in tears, wanting so badly to come to your aid and hold you. Jason looked smaller, despite being the tallest in the room. Right then, he shrank himself from the shame. And Dick. He was shaking. For once, he didn’t know what to do.

Barbara’s soft arms held you so tight, but none of it could muffle your cries.

-----

Could one blame you?

If they’d just known the whole story?

Even after two years, two horrible, spectacular, overly eventful years that passed by all too slow and too fast,

Even after you’d gotten over the nightmares that came and went when you couldn’t sleep without feeling that flame surge past your flesh,

Could you even blame yourself? For not knowing who to trust? To open up to?

Could anyone blame you for being so god-awfully confused, now that you admit to being confused, and so indecisive? For not knowing what, or who would bring you to that eventual happiness?

Could anyone blame you for wanting some kind of release to let all this go, and find that release as yet another option to oblivion? Could you blame yourself for being so desperate, stupid, so careful, just to allow yourself to move on, at the same time convince everyone else that you had?

The only thing you had for yourself after all that were your paints and canvases. They could only have done so much.

But now, with you in front of the Wayne Manor’s staircase fixing up the last of your canvases on a presentable easel, it had gradually felt like it was, in fact, enough.

Tonight, at almost six in the evening, you’d set up twelve of your newest works, the best you’ve ever made. Gotham skylines. Portraits of unknown faces. Hillside landscapes. Action shots you’ve taken from around the city and copied.

You fixed the last one, just as Bruce came up to the foyer with an outstretched smile the moment he saw what you’d fixed. That man rarely smiles.

He eyed them all, more carefully this time, paying attention to detail. You explaining those details when he didn’t catch them. You explaining each of your pieces. Him nodding approvingly.

“This will be a great for everyone, Y/N.”

A smile. “Thank you.”

“And it’ll be amazing for the children most of all.” Bruce kept his eyes on the portrait of an unknown woman with beautiful dark skin. “Will you really give everything away?”

“Everything,” you said. “I won't keep a cent. This is what the auction’s for.”

Bruce beamed at you with so much pride, probably just as much, maybe even more, than he’s given his own children.

Not long after, he left and had Alfred help you out with putting everything back in your satchel. You were smiling. You hadn’t stopped smiling for a while.

You placed the first easel and canvas back into the bag that you’d laid in the staircase just as you heard rumbling footsteps coming from directly above. And just as you thought they’d get nearer, they stopped.

You looked up, and it wasn’t anything you hadn’t expected, nor prepared for.

Dick, however, looked surprised in the least. His hand on the railing caressed the gentle wood as well, motionless the moment he caught your eye. You were calm, serene, and somehow, that smile didn’t even leave when you met his gaze.

His mouth parted open, and by then you didn’t want to just stand around. You nodded at Dick, silently, then you went back to the second easel.

“This dastardly thing,” Alfred muttered. You laughed and started to walk over to him, if not for Dick and his strides longer than yours.

“Here, Alf.” He helped the old man with the knob. It folded right away. Alfred rolled his eyes. “I can take it from here,” Dick said.

Alfred raised his hands, landing harshly at his sides. “I never could work any of those contraptions.” You found yourself feeling warmer at that sight of how gently he’d helped him and handled the knobs. You worked in silence. He did, too. He did not speak. Neither did you.

But even after such a high-strung chain of events, and the drastic way it all had to culminate, with you right back to where you started, there wasn’t at all a feeling of torment, awkwardness. Sure, it wasn’t all the same. You weren’t as close. The laughs felt a bit off. You didn’t hold his hand anymore and maybe you didn’t let your gazes linger for too long when he was so brightly lit by the sun or even just a single bulb. But you were friends. You were there. It was more, so much more, than how it could have ended.

You twisted the knob for the last easel, crouching down, but the base wouldn’t stop hiking up from the ground. You pulled your hair back, squinted, then as a shadow blocked your light, you looked up. Dick was there. He was smiling at you and he held the top of the easel down so it wouldn’t move when you unhooked the knob.

You smiled at him. Softly. Sweetly. He smiled back at you and it kept with the current of that growing peace. He held the easel, and you the canvas, when you went over to your satchel to stick it inside.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”

You placed the satchel at the side of the staircase, away from the steps. Dick watched you with his head down intently. Then when you made your way up, hand on the railing, you heard him speak just when you thought he had nothing else to say.

“I’m watching Bruce Almighty tomorrow morning.”

You turned to face him, and that bashful grin made you want to chuckle. You allowed yourself to.

“I’d love to join you.”

Another nod, silent, then you went up the stairs. You heard him go to the parlor.

Peace. This must be it. Peace.

Four months of peace, since any other incident happened. This was what you needed. Time to think. A chance to know what things were, what you were.

Because all there was that replaced that hurricane beneath your chest was this bright, breezy whirlwind that instead cooled down those very thoughts.

You reached Tim’s room, knocked three times, and stepped in immediately taking off your sweater.

Tim was leaning against the headboard and had his laptop resting uncomfortably on top of his lap.

“Tim,” you groaned. “You're not working are you?”

“Nah. Among Us streams.”

You snorted and picked your phone out of your pocket, scrambling to his side. Tim shifted, giving you some room, then when you settled beside him, he laid his head on your shoulder. He kept his eyes on his laptop and you made sure he didn’t change so much as a tab. Four months of seeing his sleep schedule back on track, his coffee a tenth from before, and his workload split in half, it calmed you to see him this way. It even made his skin glow.

As he kept his eyes on the screen, you pulled out your phone, with that expected twinge of disappointment when you saw you haven’t a message, the same for so many weeks.

You opened your texts anyway, just to make sure.

You: ‘Hey. It’s been a while. Call me?’ (12 weeks ago)

You: ‘Jason. It’s me. You didn’t change your number again, did you? (11 weeks ago)

You: ‘I guess you did. I’ll keep texting anyway. No one’s heard anything from you in so long.’ (9 weeks ago)

You: ‘Hey. Call me? We heard it got bloody in that raid yesterday. I hope you're alright.’ (6 weeks ago)

You: ‘Hey.’ (2 weeks ago)

That was it so far. You didn’t want to bother him. He didn’t want to be bothered.

But, just today, you let yourself annoy him. Even for just that day in August.

You: ‘Happy birthday, Jason.’

Peace. With everyone. With yourself.

You needed those months to know what it was like to not have any of them at all. To just be a friend. Not a lover.

You let your head fall on top of Tim’s.

A few hours later, you jumped at a ring on your phone. You glanced at it, eyes squinted. It was almost midnight.

Jason: ‘Thanks.’

So much of a smile, and a gentle spike up beneath your chest, when you stared at that message for so many minutes. Partly to let that warmth linger. Mostly out of surprise.

Peace.

Peace.

You knew there was peace.

But peace did not mean fulfillment.

You still couldn’t tell anyone what you needed, what would hurt less, what choice you were supposed to make.

Because it wasn’t about that anymore.

This was you. This was time for yourself. Four months of not even pining or thinking about boys, working on your pieces, not mulling over your unrequited love or your broken heart or your broken memories or that sheer memory of what happiness used to mean to you. You never needed that. It was you, and every unfortunate event that life had forced into you, that made you so confused.

You still couldn’t make a choice right now, but you weren’t confused anymore. It wasn’t about what you needed, and you didn’t need any of them. Those four months told you so.

But you did want to have love. Eventually. Soon. One that lasts.

Eventual happiness, the ones that can only come from loving and being loved by another, from family, you knew could only be found within them. Dick, Tim, and Jason. You knew it was one of them. For so long as you could think, you knew you couldn’t find that kind of happiness elsewhere. You couldn’t imagine loving another.

Which means, with the peace you had in you now, calming the once tyrannic tides you’ve been forced to reckon with, you knew your heart was there, with one of them. The challenge will be to find out who.

And from now on, you knew you had to choose, and actually think about who to choose, and no longer will it be about whoever lessens the pain, to give in to pressures, to the overwhelming declarations, the to release that pent up whatever’s. This time, in your state of peace, you will figure out who you loved and will stay in love with for the rest of your life. Solely. Wholeheartedly.

You will choose for love.

No longer to just go with the tides.

The tides, you realized, had been there since that very night. That night you had to get your left leg amputated because so much of your flesh had been burnt and your bones were beyond repair.

The tides, you realized, had stemmed from not just your hatred for yourself, for that blame that inevitably crowded your already populated mind, but had stemmed from their guilt. All three of them, because of how much they blamed themselves and how much they let it destroy them just as much as it destroyed you. Because of that, of how they let their resentment for each other and themselves get the better of them, drive them to do so many things they wouldn’t be so proud of, which made that start of the year so hellish. It was all of you. Your anguish for yourself. Their resentment for their self-blame.

Dick not knowing how to treat you right after, treating you differently, treating you like you couldn’t care for yourself. Almost getting married, then later not. Spending too much time with you, then not making a move. You assuming what was worst, then so suddenly, him pouring out his heart just before he was asked to leave town and not see you again.

Jason keeping his distance, staying away, not even calling in the holidays when he wasn’t around, and only ever calling any of you when he absolutely had to or felt like it. Knowing what his brothers felt, and knowingly inching himself closer to you when he saw you hadn’t chosen either just yet. Taking advantage of your vulnerability to quench his desires. Almost using you to get back at them. Then breaking your heart.

Tim trying too hard to make it up to you, buying so many of your paintings even when it wasn’t so necessary when he knew you wouldn’t decline. Confessing his love that night after Dick’s wedding, when you hadn’t a word to say back. Confessing his love for you again, kissing you on Christmas Eve, even after how much he’d hurt you before. You unknowingly choosing him, only for him to make that decision for you and drive you away, even when he thought it was best.

But then, of course, there was more. So much more than just that.

These vicious tides, caused by a disturbance, an accident that wasn’t so often deemed an accident, were not alone, it not for the chilling breeze that went with it, the moon that pulled them that was silent and beautiful, the shoreline that remained unmoving, warm to the toes when it needed to be. The rustling of trees. The ones that surrounded the tides, overpowered them.

Dick not wasting a moment when he saw you upset, filling so many of your days with the kind of contentment you could never bring to yourself. Never missing the littlest things that so much as caused a smirk up your lips, and bringing those details to life to earn that smile. Supporting you the most, with your passion for artistry, your hobbies, the things you loved to do, he pushed you to do. Watching you, caring for you, giving you everything you wanted all for the sake of seeing you happy, even when he should or shouldn’t. Even when you were never his to begin with.

Jason knowing exactly what it was like to be you, understanding that, letting you know that he understood, that you weren’t alone in any of this at all. Knowing he didn’t have much of a chance, stopping himself from falling in too deep for his own sake, but not when it was you who needed him to fall. To at least be with him. Giving you that solitude, letting you know that he, too, wanted to treat you well, wanted you to feel just as beautiful as he thought you were, even when it pains him in the end.

Tim loving you from the moment you met. That sweet, fairytale love story of when you were friends first, and his love that grew from that. Best friend turned lover. Your love story, how you came to be, could all be a novel on its own. Caring for you, staying even after a relationship that hadn’t worked out the first time, knowing you needed him more than anything and anyone there could possibly be. Your partner as heroes, your partner now. Albeit friends or lovers. It didn’t even matter. And after then, even when he loved you so much, still kept your best interests in mind, only ever thought about what was best for you, or what he thought was best for you, all for the sake of you no longer being hurt the way you used to.

That was what surrounded that cruel tide that pulled you back miles away from the shore you just wanted to land on. That tide. That night. The guilt. The blame. The loss. The regrets. Those were the tides, and everything else, it was beautiful.

So now, what will it be? Other than to place it all to the side, forgive that night for what it did to you. move on. No longer will you let it pull you with its current. No longer will you let it get in the way of your happiness. Of their happiness. No longer will you let its lingering darkness settle for too long before it settles for good. No longer will you let the loss of your damned leg cause the loss of your whole life and happiness.

Because of course, they weren’t to blame. Blaming yourself, or someone, would mean they were solely responsible for the penalties that stemmed from what they did, intentional or not. They weren’t responsible. Not even a bit. For what else would it be, other than an unfortunate arrangement and timing of events, something far beyond the control of even the strongest deity. That if the same things done were done differently, would at all be the same. No, they weren’t at fault. They weren’t to blame.

And if you did believe that they were, even in the slightest, then it would be why you’ve been how you had been, how you just couldn’t know, or admit to yourself, who you were to give your heart to. Why you couldn’t open up, afraid that somehow, deep within your own crevices, you hadn’t forgiven them.

But it wouldn’t matter. You have forgiven them, at least now, if they had done anything at all that was to blame. And you didn’t think so. You couldn’t bring yourself to think so. Not when you no longer let that loss be the cause for further pain than it’d already rooted.

No longer, not with who they were, and how they loved you.

Dick, who always had to love you from afar, and never let that love falter despite it being so painful and tempting.

Jason, who had to fight against that love thinking he hadn’t a chance at making you as happy as he knew you could be.

And Tim, who won your heart the first time and gave you these wonderful years as a soul who couldn’t be more perfect beside yours.

They were selfless, gentle, caring young men, who’d bend the world for you if they had to.

One of them, you were sure, will ultimately, wholly, have your heart.

-----

MASTERLIST | 3 BIRDS 1 STONE MASTERLIST

-----

A/N: The next parts definitely won’t be as heavy as this one, but to those who stayed behind and leave the loveliest comments, know that I’m here at all because of you guys 🎉

MAIN TAGLIST:

@everyartistwas-firstanamateur, @sarcasmismyfirstlove, @damned-queen-of-gotham, @idkmanicantenglish, @wunderstell, @birdy-bat-writes, @get-loki, @everyday-imfangirling, @comic-nerd-dc, @multifandomgirl-us, @icequeen208, @offendedfishnoises, @egdolan, @xemiefx, @arkhamtoddler, @elsenthal, @mythicbitchx, @lucy-roo, @roseangel013bf, @loxbbg, @reclusive-chicken-nugget, @l-inkage, @http-cherries, @river9noble, @zphilophobiaz, @annoylinglyaries​, @knightfall05x​, @hyp-oh-critical​, @satan-s-ass​, @1-800-starmora​, @flowersgirl02, @nahcho​, @thatonecroc​, @trixie-bb​, @daddyissuesmademe​, jasonsbitch, @shadowsndaisies​ @jaybirdbooty​ @writing2sirvive​

SERIES TAGLIST:

@spaceservicestation​, @thedeadlythoughts​, @vanessafabricius​, @pinkforest05​

#dick grayson #jason todd #tim drake #dick grayson x reader #jason todd x reader #tim drake x reader #nightwing #red hood #red robin #bruce wayne #batman #batfam #batfamily #batboys #batboys x reader #reader insert #3 birds 1 stone #3 birds 1 stone series #batarella #batarella series

[cptnbvcks]

Honestly ANY goofy prompt with Javier

dripping (javier peña x reader)

words: 5.5k

prompt: goofy — with food

summary: javi brings you something to take the edge off during one of colombia’s heatwaves

warnings: smut smut smut, sticky situations (literally)

a/n: this was too long for any kind of drabble and i hate myself for it and this was significantly prompted by my childish urge for snow cones mid-february. this is also half unedited filth lmao sorry

You always thought that Miami was hot during the summer, but Colombian summers felt like the devil himself had turned on the fucking broiler and left the entire goddamn city of Bogota to roast.

Every window of your apartment was pushed open, beckoning any hopeful gust of damp breeze to uselessly relieve the drowning humidity that was swelling within the cramped one bedroom home. If you could have stuck your head through the burglar-proof bars and hung half your body out onto the street, that’s probably how Javier would have found you when he slid the spare key into your front door and let himself in. 

Instead, Javi found you half-sprawled on the living room floor, dressed in nothing but a pair of cotton shorts and a thin tank top with your legs stretched out languidly across the cool tile. A half melted cup of ice lingered in a pool of condensation as you sat in front of a struggling electric fan while also clutching another hand-held woven fan that you had obtained as a wedding favour from some distant older cousin on your mother’s side of the family. 

You only opened one eye to peer up at him as he entered your field of view. 

Javi chuckled at the sight.

“News says the heatwave’s not supposed to let up until Monday,” Javi informed with a playful tease to his voice, as you closed your eyes to groan pathetically, “But, I brought something that might take the edge off.” 

When you opened your eyes again, Javi was lowering himself to a squat infront you. Your eyes drifted from his amused eyes to his out stretched hands, both of which held a small styrofoam cup filled to the brim with a sad looking dome of syrup covered and half-melted shaved ice.

“Snow cones?” You snort humorously, a smile quickly spreading across your face at the sweet gesture. You grabbed the cone doused in red syrup, swapping the cup from one hand to the other as you noticed the mess the melted ice was making around its container. Javi’s hands were covered in it. “I haven’t had these for years. Are they from—?”

“The vendor across from Maria’s, yeah. You should have seen the line of kids. I’ve seen smaller mobs at election campaigns,” he said, lifting his messy hand to his mouth to mindlessly clean off the sticky syrup residue. He let himself fall back heavily on the floor across from you, his back propped up by the island cabinets and legs splayed on either side of yours, “I was on my way over and I saw that he was out today — thought of you.” 

Your eyes followed his motion of his tongue, dragging thoughtless motions over the webbing of his fingers as he drew back to speak. A bead of sweat marked its way across the side of your temple, its path mimicked by the trickling ice running over the cup’s rim and collecting around your overheated hand. You blink back to attention as his throw-away words drag your heat-weighted brain to attention. 

A smile as lazy as the heat teased at your mouth as you brought the cup to your mouth, using your lips and tongue to scoop into the side of the dwindling dome of shaved ice. You hum around the treat, eyes glistening mischievously as you watched him sip at the edge of his cup. “You thinking about me, Javi?”

“Don’t let it get to your head,” he grunted back, his brow furrowed with small focus as he looked from the snow cone to you. His eyes lowered to your mouth when you purposefully ran a pink-dyed tongue over your lips. 

You hummed an affirmation under your breath as you tapped your bare foot into the inner portion of his thigh to watch him jump at the contact. Javier circled his free hand around your ankle, squeezing in small warning to behave. 

A drop of watery syrup hit the top of your foot as the calloused pad of his thumb rubbed a broad circle against your skin. 

“Mmm, too late.”

There’s a moment of silence that passes between the two of you, eyes locked on one another from across the narrow space between the kitchen counter and the island. Javier’s fingers stroke mindless patterns around the prominent bone of your ankle as you watch him manoeuvre around the snow cone, quietly noticing the way his baby blue shirt clung damply to his chest in spite of the first few buttons being undone. 

Your eyes follow a small bead of sweat across the tendons of his neck, watching as it soaked into the collar of his shirt. 

The snow cones didn’t stand a chance in this heat. 

“You’re dripping,” Javier pointed out, the drag of his voice drawing your thoughts sluggishly back to attention. You raise a brow as he lifts his half-melted cup, raising a finger around it to point at your chest. 

Tipping your chin, you notice the raspberry syrup stains that sprawled in messy drips over the front of your camisole. You laugh, because you know where your attention had been, and it hadn’t been on the cup of melting ice and liquid sugar.

“Oops.” 

The word drops coyly from your lips, molasses thick and just as sweet. 

Javier’s fingers twitch on your foot and his eyes don’t move any higher than the swell of your breasts, or the sheer top that no longer escapes his attention. 

Your eyes are on him again when you tilt the styrofoam just a little more.

Another drop of syrup and ice falls. This time, it lands on skin. 

Javier grips you beneath your shin and inhales lowly as your nipples visibly harden at the cold trail the spill leaves behind on its path down your cleavage. It’s icy cold even at its melting point but it does nothing to quell the wet heat that clings to your skin.

“Mala,” Javier breathes, the word dragging through the haze of the room. Bad.

You tap your foot against his thigh again, but this time you twist the appendage out of his grip with a quick roll and hook your leg over his thigh. Javier’s eyes don’t miss the not-so-subtle parting of your thighs as you scoot forward, both legs spreading and coming to a bend on either side of his hips until you sat squarely between his thighs. Your head tilted forward, tempting to bridge the small gap that existed between your faces.

 At this distance you could see the speckling of sweat that peppered the length of his neck. You licked your lips and suppressed the urge to taste his skin. 

Not yet.

There was pleasure in the denial, in the oppressing swelter. So you told yourself — not yet. 

“Yeah?” You purred, watching the way he worked his jaw in small resistance. 

Javier could feel the warmth radiating from you — sauna hot and hotter still in that sinful space between your clothed cunt and his crotch. Trying not to smirk, you purposefully shift onto your knees, straddling him as you set one hand on his shoulder as stretch your torso up and set your cup onto the counter behind him. The movement centring your tits right up to his face, close enough that you feel his breaths fan out warmly across your sternum. 

“Maybe I’m just trying to cool down, Javi. You gonna blame a girl for trying not to overheat in this weather?” 

“Is this your idea of cooling down? Putting your tits in my face?” Javi asked, the words hushed as he followed the impulse to lean forward, his mouth opening and his tongue pressing a searing swipe along the remnant trail of syrup. 

Sweet and salty and so fucking soft when he drags his free hand up along the back of your thigh, squeezing for the sake of feeling the plush give of your flesh in his sticky hands. He goes for the straps of the camisole next, his manners non-existent when he yanks the thin strap down your arm and digs his fingers into the neckline of the stretchy polyester to expose your left breast to the humid air. 

You laughed at his impatience, one hand dropping to cup the back of his head and card through the damp strands that clung to the base of his neck. 

“Something like it,” you say, the words sighing on the edge of your laughter as you hold his head to your chest, a soft noise muffling itself behind your lips as he sucks a raspberry hued bruise into the top of your breast. 

His mouth is cold and it sends a deep shudder along the valley of your spine that clenches vice-tight between your thighs. You know that you could get off on this alone, with his mouth bruising your breasts in red and blue patches — hell, he’s made you do it before (much to your own surprise). 

“You taste so good, baby,” he murmurs, his teeth catching flesh and pulling a weak noise from your throat as he circles his free hand around your lower back, pressing your thighs harder into his torso while you remain poised taller on your knees. You don’t miss the way he sneaks a finger against the crotch of your shorts when he grabs your thigh from behind. “Come here.” 

You grunt a response as you sink your hips back down into his lap before he can finish his path to your nipple. The edge of the styrofoam cup bumps your thigh as Javier mindlessly grabs for your waist, having forgotten the melted treat entirely from the minute you parted your legs to taunt him. 

The cup tilts in his distracted grip, allowing the remainder of the dwindling ice hill to slosh out and land with a wet splat on your bare thigh. The shock of the temperature earns a startled shout that makes Javier laugh deep in his chest. 

“Javi!” 

“You’re making a mess, mina,” Javier taunts, mouth against your throat and a chiding pique to his voice that almost sounded like tutting. The spill runs berry pink streams over the flesh of your thigh, rivulets of its melt curving a slow descent to your inner thigh. 

“I’m making a mess?”

“Yes.” 

He punctuates the syllable with a soft growl as you begin to lean away from his prying mouth, forcing his lips to chase you as you arch out of his reach. You allow him the distraction of the chase, stealing the now half-empty cup from his hand before he eagerly uses his new found freedom to grip at your thigh. 

His hands smears across the mess he made, spreading it across your skin when he reaches for your half-exposed breasts to finish tearing down the other side of your shirt.

Javier cups his hands under your breasts, pressing into your ribcage as he squeezes them together and watches in rapture as they fall back into place. Your breath comes shaky when he drags his palm across your hardened nipple, the syrup slick on your skin and dying your flesh in streaks of sweet magenta. 

It’s cold and your skin burns and you’re thinking it has something more to do with the DEA agent fondling your tits and less so with the swimming heat that’s swirling through the apartment.

Javier brings his mouth to your nipple, tongue pressing flat and teeth scraping achingly over the swollen flesh as your hips instinctively roll into his. He groans into your chest when you repeat the motion, arching into his mouth as your fingers press into the back of his head to hold him tight. 

You can feel the sweat beading at the nape of his neck, the slickness of his skin that makes you wonder just how messy things can really get. 

“Javi,” you moan softly, your shoulders hunching slightly as a high note leaves your throat when he begins sucking another hard bruise into the side of your breast, just beneath your nipple, “Javi.” 

Javier doesn’t pull back until he knows your skin has bloomed the same shade of crimson as the syrup, the kind that turns violet in the hours after. Your exhale is already wrecked when he releases his grip on your left breast, guiding his clean fingers to the cusp of your shoulder and throat. 

Your skin is sweat and syrup and he uses his other hand to paint you to his liking. 

The next noise you make is the soft grunt of a constricted moan when he squeezes gently. It’s brief, but lingers long enough to make you rut your aching core against him like a bitch so far in heat that not even the melted ice running down your leg could sequester.

The air is heavy with more than humidity and every gulp feels like sucking down water, growing worse yet when Javier’s fingers move to the back of your neck, gripping tight into the muscle there. 

Your cheeks burn with flustered anticipation when he cups your jaw with his other palm, sticky fingers spreading a layer of coloured sugar over your cheeks and chin. His thumb coats your bottom lip with it, skin tugging at that tacky stick of drying sugar.

“Open your mouth, baby.” 

Your eyes are half lidded, heavy with the weight of your own desire, as you look down at the man. It’s not his order that gets your submission; it’s the demanding press of his thumb between slackened lips that jerks your mouth into motion. 

Javier watches as you tilt your head as best as you could, your neck and head held securely between both of his hands. Your jaw works with each suck as you taste the artificial raspberry flavour of his thumb. 

Javier helps you along, pressing his thumb into your tongue as you drag it over the sensitive pad of his calloused fingers. The act earns a tight squeeze to the back of your neck as he softly mumbles to himself more so than to you, “That’s it, mina. So good for me, aren’t you?” 

Tipping your chin in a weak nod, you pin him with those achingly soft eyes with blow out irises and droopy lids that makes his cock twitch between all the layers of clothes. His thumb disappears from your mouth and leaves you gasping for air. 

You grind into his jeans again and hear yourself moan his name. Fuck, at this point you weren’t even sure anymore if that dampness between your legs was from the melted snow cone. 

“I thought you were cooling down,” Javi smirks, the words rough and dragging slow on his tongue like his thoughts were moving just as sluggishly as everything did in this weather. He manipulates your head in his grasp, tilting your head down as he drags his spit-dampened thumb over the heel of your chin. 

“I am,” you hum, your body undulating slowly over the hard ridge pressing incessantly from within his jeans. Your fingers grip at the cup that you had forgotten was still sitting in your strained grasp, the styrofoam punctured in spots from your nails digging into the sides. Your lips curl with a mischievous smirk. “Spilling that snow cone all over me really helped.” 

You take him by surprise when you press your palm to his chest and shove him backwards, the movement demanding of his obedience and his shoulders hit the cabinet with a wooden clatter and a spare grunt. 

His eyes are starved and the way his lips pout on the remnants of his kisses make you want to sink further down and press your lips to his until you forget where your breaths become his.

Javier stares up at you as your index finger dips into the deep part of his button down, pulling until the button gives.

Slowly, you lower your head to ghost your sticky lips against his, your exhale warm over his chin. Your eyes watch as his flutter closed, his head tilting to slot his lips against yours with only the small hesitation to prolong the moment. His fingers twitch against the back of your neck and jaw, domineering but tenderly supportive as he kisses your berry lips until he tastes the salt of sweat that had gathered on your upper lip.

Javier doesn’t see when you pull his shirt away from his chest by the crook of your finger — doesn’t see when you tip the cup into the space and let the coldness of it jerk him out of his moments reverie. 

“Jesus Christ!” He hisses, jerking back as his hands release your head to pull his soaked shirt away from his skin. 

You laugh, loud enough that the sound might have floated through the open windows and down into the streets below. 

“See? Cooled you right down.” 

The laughter doesn’t linger long before he’s pushing you down onto the tiles, the temperature change that slaps against your lower back makes you arch uncomfortably as your thighs spread around his hips. 

Javier cages you in, his mouth finding yours in a kiss that’s more tongue and teeth and frantic urgency. Your lips part on the heel of a grin and he takes the opportunity to drag his tongue against the roof of your mouth. 

The humour turns foggy in your thoughts when his fingers tangle into the roots of your hair. 

“I’ll get you back for that,” Javi speaks against your chin and you shiver at the damning sound of his belt unbuckling. That’s your cue to set your hands into the part of his shirt and pull until the buttons pop free, shoving the ruined article over his shoulders as he leans up to aid its removal.

“You promise, Javi?” You purr back, dragging your nails over his stained and sticky chest and drawing a lazy circle over his left nipple with your index finger.

He shudders and grabs your wrist, his fingers circling easy around the thin bird-like bones when he pulls your hand to his sternum in a silent demand to touch him. His eyes are dark and set heavy when he pins you with a look that makes you painfully aware of the profound empty yearning growing between your thighs.

You let your eyes follow your fingertips down the expanse of his chest when he leans back on his knees to tug his belt out of its loops. His eyes wander — over your heaving, food-colouring stained breasts to the way your thighs part eagerly over his thighs. They hang loose enough that he can see the blush of your cunt through one of the leg holes. 

Javier growls deep in his chest at the sight. 

Mindlessly, his hand trails through the remnants of the spill he had made on your thigh and carries the mess up into the open leg of your cotton shorts. 

Your head falls back into the tile and your body coils achingly tight when he flattens his fingers across your pelvis and draws the coarse pad of his thumb over the seam of your pussy. Your knee jerks against his hip, your fist clenches in the hem of his jeans, and the noise that bubbles from your lips is just as heavy as the mid-heatwave air. 

“F-fuck, Javi, baby—” you whimper, lower lip quivering when he presses his thumb past your slick folds to find that little bundle of nerve endings that make your back arch high and your thighs threaten to snap closed. His fingers are coarse against your flesh and you pull hard on his jeans when he presses quick, purposeful circles into your clit just to watch you squeal eager nonsense beneath him.

“Right there, baby?” Javier tilts his chin and watches as you shiver in spite of the swelter, your muscles quickly losing their coordination when he drags your clit with a single rough sweep of his thumb. Your thigh jumps, threatening to shut tight in instinctive resistance, but he presses a broad palm over your inner thigh and holds you open. 

The noise you make, just like your laughter, reaches the taxi-lined streets below.

“Ye–yes— Javi, Javi! Please, baby!” 

Javier swears he might have cum right fucking there if you called his name like that again.

You sob into the humid apartment, gasping down a lungful of wet air when Javier pulls his hand out of the leg of your shorts. Your thoughts lag behind your reaction as he hooks his hands beneath your thighs, pushing them to your torso before hooking his fingers into the damp fabric, guiding it over your thighs and calves. He does not touch the camisole still wrapped around your hips when he lets your thighs limply fall open around him again.

You swear the room gets a few degrees hotter without your clothes on, and even more so when you catch the way his eyes fall to your exposed cunt, surely just as glistening and damp as the rest of your fucking body. 

“Please, Javi,” your voice is smaller now as your fingers find themselves back at the fly of his jeans, pulling until the button pops open. The sound of his zipper lowering and the soft drag of your voice is enough to get Javier just where you need him. You feel as much when you raise your shoulders to lower your hand into his jeans, biting back the teasing smirk at his convenient lack of underwear. Batting your eyes as innocently as you can, you draw him from the constraint of his pants to circle dainty fingers over the base of his cock. 

There’s a heaviness in his eyes as he stays on his knees between your thighs, watching your honey-warm eyes droop with lust when his hand wraps around yours, tightening your grip with a soft exhale. You begin to guide him, cock first, towards your core. 

For once, Javier’s speechless, swallowing thick in the heady air as he lets you guide him.

“Please, fuck me, Javi.” 

The laze breaks when you whimper his name like that, desperate and shameless, sweetly polite while saying the most impolite things. 

His fingers dig divots into the flesh of your thighs as he spreads you further, squeezing your palm beneath his, trapping it there as he drags the smooth head of his cock through your folds. 

He doesn’t catch the way your eyes flutter when strokes himself against your clit, but he feels the way your ankles squeeze against his thighs when he draws back, angles proper, and stretches you open on his length.

“Fuck, baby,” Javier curses and your refuse yourself the pleasure of shutting your eyes just so you can look up at the way his head lowers, the tips of his hair hanging heavy and damp into his forehead while his brow furrows deeply at the sight of your hand beneath his as your pussy clenches tight and eager around the first few inches of him. 

Even this wet, the stretch aches deep in your body with a small pinch of pain that you’ve grown to savour every time he comes home and loses himself between your thighs. 

“I’ll never get tired of this pussy,” he growls, hearing the soft effortful noises that swim through the air between your parted lips when he circles his arm beneath one bent knee and uses the leverage to yank you forward, forcing you to take him completely, “Never, mina. Never.” 

His head lifts then, catching the way your eyes wrench shut, the way your mouth purses together at the sharp strain and full pleasure that hits you too deep to completely fathom. 

Your coy one-liners die a brief death before resurrecting again the moment your hand, previously wrapped around his cock, to your aching clit.

“You— better not,” you grunt, the words jerking out of your throat in uneven gasps as Javier rocks his hips into yours with determinedly shallow thrusts, working you open. He pushes your thigh further into your chest and you swear the air leaves your lungs when he hits that familiar spot that knocks the vocabulary straight out of your head.

Your walls squeeze around him and the heat he feels inside of you is blinding; fevered from the inside out and it brings sweat beading across his forehead when he slumps his body down against yours to bury his face against your shoulder. You whine, high and loud, when he pins your knee against your chest, trapping your fingers between his pelvis and yours when he circles his hips and grinds deep. 

It’s sweaty and sticky and your skin clings to his when your tits push into his chest. Your free hand curves up the muscles of his back, feeling the way his shoulder blades shift under the press of your fingers when he sets his forearm on the ground beside your head and lays into you. Your nerves light white-hot and you squeeze him with every fucking muscle in your pelvic floor with each press of his hips that sends your fingers harder against your clit.

“Tightest little— thing I’ve ever fucked, sweetheart,” Javier groans, his mouth at your ear and his fist clenching around the spill of hair beneath your head, his words jagged and rasping with every steady thrust. His nose brushes against the patch of skin between your ear and jaw, his lips trailing down to the beating pulse of your throat and sucking another hard bruise right there.

You moan like a whore for him, his words coiling something deep and fucking feral in the pit of your stomach. You think you’re babbling, something along the lines of harder, Javi, please, please. 

“Christ, baby, you’re a fucking mess.” 

The closeness burns you up, even more so when he draws his hips back, dragging heavily through your soaked walls. You try to chase his movement, aching and squeezing around nothing until he’s inside of you again with a thrust so hard it tears the cry from your lips and sends your back skidding sweatily against the kitchen tile. 

Javier tightens his grip around the underside of your thigh, and it hurts but you can’t process anything but the way he’s rutting into you like he means to fuck you straight through the floor and into your downstairs neighbour’s apartment. 

Your eyes feel damp and you can’t tell if its tears or sweat or a little of both, much less if it’s your sweat or his.

“I’m close,” Javier’s voice echoes somewhere in the haze, gravelly and tight as every syllable vibrates across his chest, “Do you want me to—?” 

“No!” A particularly solid thrust jerks the word abruptly from your chest and Javier almost laughs when you drop your hand from the back of his shoulder to the base of his hip, squeezing hard to urge him forward, “No, please, Javi. Cum inside, fuck— cum inside me.” 

The demand falls to unintelligible cries as his fingers sink beneath your head, pulling your head from the floor as he fucks into you with little regard for the heat or the sweat or the layer of sticky sweet syrup that’s only getting stickier with each thrust of his body into yours. 

You bury your head into his shoulder and cling to him as tight as you can, your fingers working quick circles over your clit until your muscles strain and shake before everything uncoils, slick and hot and all at once like someone just pulled the proverbial fucking rug out from under your body. 

You gasp for air but the humidity of the apartment renders you breathless, even with a lung full of oxygen. 

The reaction is far too familiar to Javier. He’s fucked you enough times to memorize the way you hold onto him when you cum — like your arms were made for nothing more than squeezing him into your body while you sob his name over and over until your throat goes dry and hoarse. Just like you’re doing now. 

Javier tightens his grip in your hair as your cries hit their peak and your nails bite into the valley of his spine, your body going taught as you cum hard enough that he swears you manage to take him a few inches deeper into your fluttering cunt. He curses deep from his chest and swears he’s hit the limit of you when you gasp and threaten to instinctively draw your hips back and away from the pressure.

His hips stutter hard as your cunt gushes warm around him, muscles spasming rhythmically despite the stretch of him filling you to your limits. You choke on his name and your final gasp when he stiffens in your arms, his cock jerking into you once, twice — and then he groans something sinful and raw into the flesh of your shoulder that he has caught between his teeth. 

You feel the warmth of him when he cums inside of you, the sensation drawing your addled attention to the weight of him nestled deep at home in your body. 

Javier doesn’t move, only letting his forehead drop heavily against your shoulder as he kisses the marks his teeth had left in your glistening skin. 

Slowly, your hand manages its way out from between your bodies, fingers slick with your own cum when you reach for his jaw and force his face from your shoulder to press your lips shakily against his. 

He relaxes his grip on your compressed thigh, moving his hand to rest against the forgivingly cool tile as you let your leg slump boneless and open against his hip.

“Javi,” you sigh as he exhales softly against your mouth, the kiss stirring him just enough that he manages to push past his own overstimulation to give a lazy thrust. Your thigh trembles when he kisses you again, his tongue tasting that raspberry flavour still lingering in your mouth. He nudges his damp forehead against yours when he draws away to kiss your cheek, then your eyelid. 

He laughs when his lips meet your forehead, tasting the sweat of your skin and the radiating heat of you on his lips. Javier lowers his lips to kiss you between your brows when a sudden booming brap brap brap makes the both of you jump in each other’s arms and jerk your heads towards the front hallway door.

Javier’s response was immediate, trained and instinctual, covering you while also recoiling one hand to where he usually kept his gun in the belt of his jeans — only to realize his pants were around his knees and his gun had been safely discarded on the hallway table. 

“Oye!” A muffled voice, elderly and warbling, shouted from the other end of the front door. You felt Javier’s body slacken against yours, his brow furrowing as the woman rapped on the door again, “Mantenga sus ventanas cerradas, por el amor de Dios. Podemos escucharte desde el porche. ¿No sabes que hay niños aquí afuera?” 

Javier’s brow furrowed as the neighbour rapped on the door four more times, the sound clearly coming from a cane and not from her fist. 

You laughed, breathless as you raised your voice, “Lo siento, Miss Rosa!” you giggle out, sliding your fingers into Javier’s hair as he shakes his head with an amused look in his eyes. Your voice lowers as the woman’s muttering fades into the distance, “Lo siento.”  

Javier shakes his head as you card your fingers through his sweaty locks, pulling his head down to press your lips to his chin and the corner of his mouth.

“You’re pissing your neighbours off again,” he murmurs.

“You’re pissing them off, Javi—” you hum out, but his only response is to press himself into you again, watching the way your lips still part in a small gasp despite having already softened inside of you, “—because every time you come here, this always happens.”

He laughs and the sound is easy and you know that his walls are lowered, though never completely down. 

“What do you say we piss off Miss Rosa a little more, hm, mina?” 

“Javi,” you warn, but his lips are already pressing slow trail of kisses down the cusp of your throat and over your chest. You hiss softly as he draws out of your pussy, leaving you suddenly with the distinct overflow of his cum when your walls squeeze achingly around nothing. 

A sharp yelp of surprise bursts from your lips when the man grabs your sides and pushes you further up the kitchen tile, your hand flying up over your head to prevent the crown of your skull from colliding with the cabinets behind you, “Javi!”

He takes advantage of the new found space to lower his face to the apex of your thighs, drawing one hand under your leg as he presses a kiss to the side of your knee. Your cheeks redden when you catch him lowering his gaze to your pussy, all soft and pink and terribly fucked out. 

You swallow roughly when he presses his mouth further down your thigh, pausing at the patch of dried syrup. His fingers grip your flesh, holding your leg still as he drags his tongue over your skin, closing his lips around your skin and sucking an easy bruise right there. He doesn’t stop until he pulls a moan from your chest. Only then does he press another kiss to your thigh, inching lower and lower.

This time, your voice is low, tinted with laughter and flustered when you press your hands to his shoulders and half-heartedly push, “Javi, don’t—”

“Keep saying my name like that and I’ll fuck you right here until we both get heatstroke,” Javi warns, the amusement in his voice clear as he looks up at you to ensure his permission to continue despite your half-hearted protests.

He lowers his head again. This time, his gaze doesn’t deviate from your face until your eyes slowly slip closed, your brow furrowing as a bead of sweat slithers its way down the side of your temple.

You whimper. 

“Javi.”

—

Tag List

@sophiria @imspillingcoffee @plumbuck @romqnofff @sexygaypalpatine @elisaa-shelby @readermia @the-dream-catch3r @pinkmoontribe-blog @madkingcrowley @whenimaunicorn @petalduck @fairylightsandchai  @osejn @mandowhoreian @letdecemberburninflames @chickens-are-velociraptors @naiomiwinchester @peregrinestook  @space-helen @virtuousburden @daddehhmando @thechampmylove @kiame-sama @knightheartcd @lustriix @deviantloving-detective @headsindreams @sebastianstanslefteyebrow @sgtbookybarnes @celestiaalbliss @coonflix @thetrappednerd @brooklymw @the-omni-princess @sav-a-nna @actuallyanita @equalstrashflavoredtrash @claynarwale @pedrolovebot @mermaid-seachelle @sasha1005 @kausmic@otherthingsinhead @maia-hocane @thatoneemosithlord @whenimaunicorn @fictional-thoughts @lilli-chae @spottedlekkudancer @mijachula @djjarindin @murdermewithbooks @justagarbagecompactor @itzagoodthing @i-like-those-oddss @awhiskeywithawinchester 

#whew #happy valentines day babies #javier peña #javier pena #javier peña x reader #javier pena x reader #pedro pascal #narcos #narcos fic #javier pena smut

[legends-live-in-memories]

“How Did All This Happen?”- A Memoire by one Marinette Dupain-Cheng 2

wow. okay. so first off i dont have an update schedule but im on winter break starting next monday so i just have a lot of time on my hands. if this progresses into next year updates wont be as frequent. hell updates probably wont be as frequent next week either. who knows not me. Also i have a few spots left open on the tag list for those who were wondering.

Part 1 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

without further ado 

People Fucked Up and Now It’s All Marinette’s Mess to Clean Up II

Marinette knew how she ruined the eastern coastline, but for all that is magical she could not fathom how that team of hero proteges managed to completely decimate the western side. She knew they were capable of it though, Constantine had warned her that they had an interesting habit of bending, if not outright breaking, the rules and legislation of the UN. He had also warned her that the group of Justice League mini-me’s had a unique calling card. The symphony of everything going to total shit in the background was the declaration of their presence on the island. She hasn’t even seen them from her new cliffside perch but she knew they were there by the distinct sounds of explosions. God, she hoped that super son wasn’t there. And she really hoped he didn’t get his indestructible hands on the magical dagger and destroyed it. It was one thing to return from this mission empty handed. It was an entirely different kettle of fish to return and join her grandfather in having “Broken a magical artifact” added to her list of crimes against the universe. Adrien would never let her live it down. No, Chloe would never let her live that down. She probably would put it on her headstone or something. 

Deciding she has wasted enough time, Marinette began enacting one of her contingency plans in hopes of salvaging this night. She had brought the Tiger, the Horse and the Cat miraculouses for this mission, fearing that a Ladybug Cure would bring too much attention to her and her family. She was right in that fear because reconstructing two coastlines would not fly under international radar.

She called upon the magic of the Tiger, camouflaging with the scenery as she made her descent back to where Kobra himself hopefully still was. 

She found him making his escape from the hellfest that was once their base of operation, followed by two other members. Marinette begrudgingly gives her thanks for the intruding hero team who distracted the cult from her presence and created enough wreckage that forced the cult members into separating. Sneaking up from behind, she jumped on the shoulders of the one furthest back. A swift jab to his throat, and Marinette was using his falling body as a springboard to kick the second cultist. At this point Kobra was aware of her presence and tried to attack her. Keeping the magical dagger on his person, he moved to grab Marinette by her hair. Extending the claws from her panja bracelet, Marinette slashed Kobra by his outstretched hands and used her semi-sentient tiger’s tail to retrieve the dagger. Before Kobra could regain his bearings, Marinette merged the Tiger and the Horse and made a hasty escape to her hideout.

She was greeted to the sight of her grandfather who Marinette believed was entirely too relaxed, enjoying some mint tea as he watched the night sky be curtained by smoke mushrooms from the nearby island. He was reclined in one of the couches in their AirBnB back in Trinidad. She dropped her transformations, Roaar and Kaalki flying to the kitchenette. Plagg slowly came out of Marinette’s purse and pointedly avoided her gaze. So the hellcat did have a guilty conscience, she lamented. Who knew? Apparently accidentally sneezing from the sand on the beach of Santa Prisca, and leaving behind a new cliff, was not one of the Destruction god’s finer moments. If he had any. 

“Don’t tell Tikki,” he began. And look, actual names, he must have been really embarrassed if that’s how he’s referring to his counterpart. 

“Don’t tell me what?” The answering scream Plagg released was actually comical and Marinette decided to be merciful. “Don’t worry Tiks, just a hiccup in the mission but all is well now.” Plagg looked at Marinette like he was about to lay worship to her for not selling him out. He took it in stride and joined the other Kwamis on the counter, already with a cheese wedge in hand.

“You did well, Mei,” her grandfather began. “I will report to Constantine and we will discuss further in the morning. For now get some sleep.” That was a dismissal if Marinette ever heard one so she placed the panja bracelet and the glasses, the tiger and horse miraculouses, back in the box and retreated to her room. A quick shower and a call to her parents later, Marinette was left awake in her room. Bored.

Plagg soon joined her, and despite his earlier reservations, he was brimming with chaotic energy. He had an idea and nothing spelt trouble faster than Plagg’s ideas. Apparently Plagg was curious about what the other young heroes were even doing on the island and wanted to know more. Now Marinette had half a mind to tell him to go by himself and leave her out of it. But she was kind of curious too. They weren’t after the dagger, that much she figured, or else Constantine would have had them go for it instead. So why were they there? A voice that sounded painfully like Kagami in her head told her not to be bullheaded and leave well enough alone.

Ignoring that advice, Marinette went to the den to retrieve the Tiger and the Horse again, the two most suitable for reconnaissance missions. Plagg, of course, would still be accompanying her for it was his shitty idea anyways. 

“Going somewhere?”

The two turned to come face to face with Wayzz, Tikki and Master Fu, all wearing matching faces of disappointment but not surprise.

“We were just going to stake out the island again, figure out what the other hero team were up to.” Marinette was not going to quiver under their gazes. No. Nope. Her maman may not have been an assassin, but she still didn’t raise a weak bitch. Hell, she shadowed one of the most feared assassins for her more formative years. She. Would. Not. Break.

“Why?”

“It was Plagg’s idea.” She broke. 

“HEY!” No offense to Plagg, but he was the only one out of the two of them that was immortal, he could survive Tikki’s ire. 

“It’s not a bad idea, Master,” bless Kaalki and all their endeavors. “If the hero team were not after the dagger, but still after the Cult of the Kobra, investigating would provide valuable insight to what plans the cult had for the dagger in the first place. And perhaps, allow us to put in cautionary measures to prevent the cult from finding other magical means to meet their ends.”

“Yeah, what they said.” Marinette wasn’t all in favor of extending the mission if they did find anything concerning, but she committed to this idea and she’s going to see it through. Logical rational and self-preservation be damned. 

Taglist:

@deathwishy @neakco @ virtualreading @f-rget-lt @your-resident-chicken-nugget @nathleigh @toodaloo-kangaroo @irontimetravelflower @trippingovermyfeet @t1dwarrior-of-earth @tip-tap-tired @fidget-eep @thenillabean @officiallydarkgeek 

#badass!marinette dupain cheng #maribat #marinette x damian #daminette #damimari #guess im back #idk what to tag this as #hdath #almost forgot that one

[kayluh1915]

Beautiful People

Paring(s): Pedro Pascal/Female Reader

Words: 5,378

Warnings: Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety Disorder, Medication Discussions, Insecurities, and Panic Attacks.

You and Pedro have been secretly dating for a few months now after a chance meeting. You both agreed that it was time to reveal your relationship to the public and chose to do so by accompanying him at The Oscars, but your anxiety does a great job of making you think that you don't deserve it.

DISCLAIMER!

This story is based on the song Beautiful People by Ed Sheeran & Khalid, but this IS NOT a songfic. It just gave me this vibe of Pedro walking down the red carpet with someone who doesn't quite feel like they belong and he comforts her by saying he doesn't really belong either and proceeds to list why they're better off because of it. I dunno, It just sounded sweet.

As always, comments are welcomed and encouraged.

You can also follow me on Twitter if you'd like. My life is boring, but I might be able to make you laugh if I’m lucky.

Enjoy!

(PS: Pepe is a real person. He was my Spanish teacher my first semester of college... and yes, he really went to Cincinnati every Friday to gamble)

Read on AO3

My Masterlist

The frigid February air was like icicles on your skin, sending a full-blown shiver down your spine as you hurried out of the Science building and towards the dining hall. It was nearly noon and you’ve had only had a banana and a bottle of water this morning, so lunch sounded pretty great right about now… maybe a cup of hot cocoa as well.

The dining hall was about a three-minute walk from the Science building, more than enough time for the cold to seep through the layers of your coat and deep into your bones. The possibility of a cup of cocoa turned into an inevitability, you running for the hot beverage machine as soon as your student ID was swiped.

You sat at your usual spot, hanging your backpack on the back of the chair before taking a greedy sip of the hot drink. The warmth was a godsend, the sugary beverage warming your icy hands with a pleasant hum tumbling from your lips.

“You make noises like that in bed?” Someone asked, snapping you out of your warming daze. It was your roommate and closest friend, Lauren. You snorted at her remark, almost spitting out a sip of your drink.

“I thought you had Spanish class at noon?”

“Nah. It’s Friday, remember?”

“Oh yeah, gambling day.” Like you, Lauren was a music student. It was how you had met nearly four years ago. Like most music students, you both used the extra humanities credits you had earned in high school to bail you out of the required foreign language credit until university. You were doing fairly well so far, but it was because you had a decent teacher. She wasn’t the best, but she was alright.

Lauren’s was just… something else.

On the first day of class, he told his students to call him “Pepe” because he didn’t do the “formal shit.” He also said that there would never be a class on Friday’s because he goes up to Cincinnati to gamble with his buddies. Why he didn’t just put down that his classes were only on Monday and Wednesday were beyond you.

“Yeah. Whatever, though right?” Lauren continued. “I’m not complaining about one less day of class.” You smirked mischievously.

“No, but your Spanish is…” Lauren scoffed, only causing you to laugh harder into your cup.

“Bitch, you shut the fuck up. You can’t speak the damn language either.” You shrugged.

“You’re not wrong, but at least I’m learning more than you are with Pepe.” Lauren groaned.

“Fuck you. Come on, let’s grab some grub.” You stood up and grabbed your backpack, throwing away your empty drink cup to grab something to eat. You settled on your usual favorite and sat back down with Lauren who had somehow already made it halfway through her plate.

“God, slow down.” You teased as you hung your backpack back on the chair.

“I didn’t eat breakfast this morning. Cut a bitch a break.” You shook your head, digging into your own plate, but at a much slower pace. You both sat in comfortable silence, enjoying your meals as the indecent chatter of the surrounding students and meme music playing from the jukebox continued on.

“So,” Lauren said, breaking the silence as she sat down her drink. “What are you doing this weekend?” You froze at her question but played it off the best you could. Any hint of hesitation would send her into a frenzy of questions that you weren’t prepared to answer.

“I’m going in to see Mom. Maybe stop by my Mamaw’s too.” Lauren’s shoulders slumped.

“Damn, that’s too bad. Devon invited us over to his Oscar watch party tomorrow night. Figured you might want to come along since you’re into that sort of thing.” 

You swallowed hard at the mention of The Oscars. Just play it cool… don’t. fucking. panic.

“Normally I would, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen Mom. You know how she gets when I don’t come to visit for a while.” Lauren nodded her head in understanding, knowing full well of how your Mom was after living with you for two years.

Little did she know that you had just seen your mother last weekend.

“I understand, boo. I’ll let him know you can’t make it. When are you leaving?”

“As soon as I’m done here. I packed my stuff this morning so I could just go. Trying to beat the traffic as much as possible.” She nodded in understanding.

“Well, I hope you have a good time with your Mom. Say hi to her for me, will you?” You internally sighed a breath in relief. How your big mouth managed to keep him a secret all this time let alone this was beyond you, but you managed to pull it off somehow.

“Yeah, sure.”

After you finished eating, you hugged Lauren goodbye and went back to your dorm long enough to drop off the books you didn’t need and pick up your suitcase. You went through your mental checklist one last time and locked your door behind you as you left.

You unlocked your car and threw your stuff into the backseat, making your way towards the interstate as soon as you left the college.

Home was about a two or three-hour drive down south, but where you were really going was about a 40-minute drive north. You put on some music as you cruise down the interstate, your nervousness slowly increasing the closer you got to your destination.

Your hands shook on the steering wheel, you bounced your left knee furiously, and you were biting your lip… pretty hard. You thought about reaching into your purse for the “take as needed” anxiety medication your psychiatrist prescribed you but decided to hold off on it a little longer. Maybe it’d taper off when you got to the airport.

It didn’t.

You had flown before, but that had been years ago when your micro home town had some kind of festival thing and gave free airplane rides. This commercial airline stuff was something entirely new to you which was already nerve wreaking, but the unexpected bustle of such a smaller airport made it worse.

Weeks before when you first booked the flight to Los Angles, you did as much research as possible to make sure that you knew the “norms” and guidelines of all the airports you were going to since there were no direct flights available. You were as prepared as anyone could be, but you were still extremely nervous and all the foot traffic only made it worse.

You went through security without any qualms and took a seat to wait for your flight to begin boarding. You pulled out your phone and texted your Mom and Lauren before someone walked up to you in your peripheral.

“Excuse, miss?” You looked up from your phone to come face to face with an older gentleman. He looked to be in his early 50’s with salt and peppered hair and a kind smile. He asked you your name and you confirmed with a nod.

“Sorry to disturb you, but your private flight is prepared to depart whenever you’re ready, Miss.”

...Excuse you, what?

“P-Private flight? But I-... I paid for an American Airlines flight.” The man nodded.

“Yes, but Mr. Pascal has sent a private jet to retrieve you. He was fairly insistent to make sure that you boarded.” You sighed heavily. You told him that a two-stop economy flight that you paid for was more than fine, but the thought of you doing anything like a normal person seemed to bother him for some reason.

“Okay. I-I guess I’m ready to go then.” The man smiled.

“Of course, Miss. May I take your bags for you?” You hesitated.

You had never been waited on like this before and you weren’t quite sure how to feel or respond to it. You were perfectly capable of carrying your own stuff and this guy probably wasn’t getting paid enough to carry some lucky college student’s stuff, but was it rude to say no even if you did so in a polite manner? So, you just agreed and handed him over your suitcase and backpack.

You followed him outside and over to a small commercial jet, a woman who looked to be around her mid 30’s standing right by the entrance of the aircraft.

“Welcome aboard, Miss. I’m Kendall Bishop and I’m your captain for today. If you’ll go ahead and take a seat and buckle your seat belt, we’ll depart shortly. I do ask, however, that you remain seated and keep your seat belt fastened until Mr. Clements informs you that it is safe to move about the cabin. Do you have any questions for me before we begin our descent?”

You smiled politely at her and shook your head.

Upon entering the cabin, you were at a complete loss for words. It was easily the fanciest thing you’d ever seen. Leather seats, stocked alcohol shelves, an endless assortment of snacks, a TV, even a fucking bed of all things. The man, Mr. Clements you assumed, gestured towards the seat closest to you. You sat down and buckled your seat belt like you were told to do.

Mr. Clements then reached into his pocket and pulled out an envelope, gesturing for you to take it.

“Mr. Pascal requested I hand this to you as soon as you board.” You took the envelope out of his hands, looking down at it with a curious gaze. On the back of it had your name scribbled onto it in familiar handwriting. You’d know it anywhere after reading so many letters from him.

“Please enjoy your flight and let us know if there’s anything we can do for you.” You thanked him with another nod, turning the envelope around and tearing it open. The plane prepared to take off as you read.

Mi Abeja,

I know you wanted and paid for a normal flight, but the academy offered to fly you to me privately last second. I was going to ask you if you were okay with it, but you were in class and your phone was off and I had to let them know something before my table read this morning. You work and study so hard and deserve to be pampered so I told them yes. They reimbursed what you paid for your ticket and I’ll give that to you once you get here.

I hope the unexpected change didn’t spike your anxiety too much. I know you’re nervous about this whole thing to begin with and I probably just made it worse. I’m sorry if I did.

 I’ll be there to pick you up as soon as you land at LAX.

Love you,

Pedro. <3 <3 

Your heart soared at his words, leaning back in your seat and looking out of the nearby window just in time to watch the plane lift up from the runway.

________________________

Four hours later, Mr. Clements informed you that you would be landing shortly. Your heart leaped up in your chest as you put your phone back into your backpack and fastened your seat belt.

It had been a few weeks since you’d last seen him and you were nearly vibrating with excitement by the time the wheels touched down on the runway. Mr. Clements offered to take your things again. You still weren’t sure if it was rude to turn him down or not and you didn’t want to ask and risk looking like a moron, so you agreed and handed over your backpack.

The captain opened up the door and exchanged pleasantries with you as you stepped off the plane, but you barely heard her over the pounding of your own heart. As soon as you looked up from the ramp, you saw him. He was there just like he promised he’d be, standing by his car and wearing his favorite pair of sunglasses all while smiling at you with that blinding smile.

Your sneakers barely touched the tarmac before you were sprinting for him. He held out his arms for you and made a small sound when you collided with him, wrapping your arms around his neck and laying your head on his chest. One of his hands caressed the back of your head, holding you to him tightly as the other one held on to your waist.

“I’ve missed you so much, Abeja.” He muttered against the crown of your head. You let go of him long enough to reach up and kiss him, tangling your hand into his dark curls. “Did you have a good flight?” He asked after you pulled away.

“I did. I was a little nervous at first, but I’m okay now.” Pedro gave you a saddened look.

“I’m sorry. I know it was unexpected and didn’t mean to hike you up, I just figured yo-” You put your hand over his mouth.

“It wasn’t your fault, Pedro. I’m just… not used to this… any of it.” He placed a gentle kiss to your fingers, taking your wrist into his hand and gently taking it off of his mouth.

“Please tell me you at least ate something.“ You nodded.

“I ate with Lauren before I left for the airport. She actually invited me to an Oscar watch party this guy named Devon is hosting. I played it cool just like we practiced, but it took everything in me not to freak out.” Pedro giggled, pressing a kiss to your nose.

“Isn’t she in for a surprise?” You barely smiled, nodding gently. You’ve been trying not to think about it, but the idea of you being on display to the entire world made your stomach churn and your knees weak. You were just a first-generation college student from the middle of nowhere, yet here you are in the arms of Pedro Pascal about to walk down the runway of the most prestigious award show in less than 24 hours.

“... Yeah.” You eventually answered. Pedro noticed the change in your demeanor and frowned, placing a kiss on the wrist he was still holding and caressing it gently with his thumb.

“We don’t have to go through with this if you don’t want to, you know? We can always go with plan B.” You shook your head vigorously.

“No, no, no! I-I want people to know… I just… all so new.” Pedro smiled at you sympathetically, brushing a stray piece of hair away from your face.

“Just promise you’ll let me know if it ever becomes too much for you. I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s going on.” You look up into his mocha gaze, the butterflies in your stomach making you forget about your self-doubt if only for a few seconds.

“I promise.”

________________________

That evening you were curled up with Pedro in the hotel bed, empty take-out containers discarded onto the nearby nightstand as you watched The Shining together. He was fully engrossed in the movie, his fingers idly playing with your hair. You had tried to focus on the movie. You really did, but you’ve seen the damn thing a million times. Laughing at memes on Reddit sounded more appealing so that’s what you were doing.

“You know, I really miss you when you’re not with me.” Pedro said after a while. You looked up from your phone and up at his face.

“I miss you too. Music school sucks and I can’t cuddle Lauren… well, I can but it would be awkward.” Pedro laughed, caressing your cheek with his knuckle.

“Tomorrow, our stylists will be here around noon. I know you’re going to be nervous all day and will probably avoid eating, so I’m going to make sure you get up with me and eat a proper breakfast.” You groaned quietly.

“You won’t let me sleep in? Even on a Saturday?” You fake-pouted. Pedro tapped your nose gently with his finger.

“Not when tomorrow is such an important day. I don’t want you nervous on an empty stomach.” You both went back to what you were doing for a minute.

“You did bring your medication, didn’t you?” You hesitated before nodding.

“Yes.”

“Good. You’ll have something in case it gets too intense. Getting you to take it will be another story, though.” You didn’t say anything, favoring instead to raise up from your reclined position to swing your leg over his waist to straddle him. His hands instantly went to your hips, gently caressing them with his large hands.

“You’re so beautiful, Abeja.” He said after a while of looking you over and running his hands over your body. You smiled at him and leaned down to give him a kiss. It was pretty standard as far as kisses go, but when you pulled away you were both looking at one another with a fiery intent and slowly went back in for another. This one searing and far more passionate.

Pedro groaned deep in his throat as your tongues collide, the kiss deepening far beyond your original intent.

You weren’t complaining.

________________________

Pedro’s alarm going off scared the living hell out of you. You had been awake since 4 am, trying your best to go back to sleep, but it just never happened. When you finally gave up around 6:30, you grabbed your backpack and sat at the desk the hotel provided and did your weekend homework. You hadn’t realized that you were that engrossed in it until his alarm buzzed you out of it.

He groaned quietly and reached over to silence it, rolling back over and reaching out to the other side of the bed looking for you. When he noticed that you were gone, he raised up from the sheets and looked around the room. His hair was an absolute nightmare, sticking up in various directions as he stretched out his back and yawned loudly.

“Thought you wanted to sleep in.” He teased after he found you at the desk.

“You said you were going to wake me up early. Figured I might get some work done.” Concern then donned on his brow.

“Honey, how long have you been up?”

“Not long,” you lie. “I wanted to get some work done so I just got up at my usual time.” Pedro got out of bed and padded over to you, rubbing your shoulders and placing a kiss atop your head.

“You work too hard. You should take a break while you can.” You lolled your head back, Pedro’s hands rubbing your shoulders feeling absolutely amazing.

“I’ll do whatever you say as long as you keep doing that.” He laughed, kissing your cheek and heading to the bathroom.

________________________

You didn’t want to question the professional, you really didn’t. But after the third layer of concealer, you just had to.

“That’s a lot of concealer.” The makeup artist laughed.

“I know, I’m sorry. Use some cream for those bags next time and I promise you won’t need as much.”

You didn’t speak after that, allowing the hair and makeup artist to finish you up while they gossiped back and forth with each other. They made other side comments like that to you here and there. They weren’t necessarily rude so you couldn’t really say anything, but they did little for your already rock-bottom self-esteem.

The artist put a dark shade of lipstick on your lips, making a triumphant noise when she finished.

“Didn’t have the best canvas, but you look fabulous sweetheart! Smile with your mouth closed and you’ll be a knockout!” The makeup artist and hairstylist gathered up their things, leaving you sitting there in your robe staring at the floor and hoping they leave fast.

When they finally left, you got up from the bed and walked over to the full-bodied mirror. You showed your teeth and started looking over them. You never thought they looked too bad. Sure, they were crooked and had some spacing, but they were okay. Braces were expensive and playing a brass instrument with braces is a death sentence for lips.

What if you were wrong about them looking okay all this time? Maybe you should have taken out that loan and a semester off to fix your teeth…

Your stylist came in shortly after. He was quieter than the others had been and much nicer which you were thankful for as you changed into the white dress they had picked for you. When you came out, the stylist smiled and hooped.

“You look gorgeous!” You finished off your look with matching jewelry and a clutch purse, sitting down on the bed to put on your heels.

“It took me forever to find a pair of acceptable wedges for you, sweetheart. I don’t know why you didn’t just tough it out for one night, but hey. I get it. Country girls don’t like heels and that’s okay! It worked out.”

Again, not necessarily rude… but damn.

________________________

You were waiting in the lobby for Pedro to come out, bouncing your leg nervously and trying to remember not to touch your eyes or bite your lip because of the makeup. When you saw him step off the elevator, your breath caught in your throat. His hair was slicked back and his facial hair neatly trimmed, the black velvet suit hugging his broad shoulders perfectly.

“Wow…” He muttered, looking you up and down. “You look absolutely stunning, Abeja.”

“You don’t look so bad yourself.” You replied, playing with his bow tie.

“Hey, hey, no. Don’t touch it. I don’t know how to tie it back if it comes loose.” You laughed and shook your head.

“Fine… I’ll unwrap my present later.” Pedro’s own breath caught as you winked up at him. He cleared his throat and composed himself, offering you his arm.

“Ready?” You swallowed and nodded, taking his arm for him to escort you.

“As ready as I’ll ever be, I guess.”

________________________

You were in line for the red carpet, the flashing cameras of the paparazzi already blinding and you were still pretty far back. Your stomach churned, a wave of nausea rising up but nothing happening. Pedro took your shaking hand into his and squeezed it gently.

“You okay?” He asked, noticing how tense you were and only grew worse the closer you got.

“... fine.”

“Plan B’s still an option if you need it, Abeja. You have your medicine you can take too.” You shook your head, looking back at him to flash him a smile.

“I’m good.” You could tell that he didn’t buy your bullshit. Not even for a moment. He didn’t say anything, though, opting only to lift your hand and press a kiss to the back of it.

“I’ll be right there beside you the entire time, honey. If at any point you feel uncomfortable or need to leave, you let me know.” You nodded at him, accepting a kiss from him before looking back out the window of the limo.

Your turn came up way sooner than you would have liked, the greeter opening up the limo door as soon as the car stopped and allowing Pedro to step out into the public eye. The photographers went nuts, the flashing lights and screams from fans intimidating you more than you thought they would.

What the fuck were you thinking? You’re just some tired ass music student. You don’t belong here with all these people.

You almost chickened out and stayed in the car but when Pedro turned towards you and offered his hand you took it anyway even though your mind was screaming for you not to. Just the gentle touch of his calloused hand on yours grounded you enough to carefully step out of the limo, making sure that nothing happens to your dress.

You could hear the sounds of the crowd die down for a moment as they all started muttering to themselves. Your hand was shaking in Pedro’s larger one, the photographers gasping as soon as they saw your face. They started taking pictures faster than they ever had. The bombardment of flashing lights blinded you for a moment, but you adjusted to them quickly.

Pedro let go of your hand and put it on your back, gently leading you where you’re supposed to go.

“Okay?” He asked as he wrapped his arm around you and brought you close. You nodded. You weren’t comfortable in the slightest, but it wasn’t the worst thing ever. While both of you posed for pictures, people from the group of photographers said a lot of things to both of you. Some were kind, others were funny and got a good laugh out of you. There were also a few who were very rude, but they had been pushed aside by the others.

Overall, it wasn’t nearly as bad as you were expecting… but you were glad it was over.

________________________

You were standing aside checking your phone while Pedro did an interview with some of the press. He had offered you to be with him, but the red carpet had been more than enough fame for you. Your phone was on “do not disturb” mode, but you could still see all the notifications coming in. Your Mom, Dad, Lauren, and other friends bombarding you with messages basically asking what the fuck. You didn’t have the time to reply, so you didn’t open any of them.

Once Pedro was done with his interviews, he escorted you into the main hall where he introduced you to some of his friends and colleagues along the way. You considered it an honor to meet the people most only ever dreamed of, but you knew you didn’t deserve it. Someone else should be here, not you.

When you found your seats, Pedro offered you his hand. You took it and allowed him to seat you before he took his next to you and wrapped his arm around the back of the seat. The show started shortly after.

________________________

“And the Oscar goes to…” You held onto Pedro’s hand tightly as they opened up the envelope, your shaking hands encased in his. He had told you when he had been nominated that he didn’t expect to win it, but you could tell he had some hope as he tensely watched them read the card.

“Pedro Pascal.” You jumped up with Pedro, hugging him tightly as the audience broke out in cheers.

“You deserve it!” You told him, breaking away to give him a quick kiss. You watched him run up stage and accept the golden statue, walking up to the microphone with a few chuckles as he looked over the award.

“Wow, this is uhhh… this is incredible. Truly amazing.” He started. “I’d like to thank the Academy for this honor, my Mom and Dad who worked hard to raise me right and who supported me. My brother and two sisters for being there for me, mi Abeja for loving me unconditionally, and just… so many others. There are so many people in my life who have helped me get to this milestone and if I were to thank all of you, we’d be here all night. I love you all so very much and this truly… a dream come true. Thank you.

The crowd stands up and cheers loudly. You wanted to, but you were too busy trying to make sure your makeup doesn’t run down your face with a tissue from your clutch. Eventually, you give up trying and decide to go to the bathroom just to make sure everything still looks fine.

Your makeup looked just as flawless as it had before. You wish you would have known that the artist had used waterproof makeup so you could’ve properly celebrated Pedro’s achievement, but oh well. While you were there, you decided to use the bathroom. You didn’t have to go that bad, but might as well take care of it while you’re here.

While you were relieving yourself, you heard two other women come in.

“-ld for her. He needs to settle down with someone like us and around his age. Not some college student.” You froze solid when they realized that they were talking about you.

“I know. She isn’t even that pretty. Did you see her teeth? Do they not have braces where she comes from?”

“For real. Her body’s not that great either. Looks like she comes straight from the shack or something.”

“Wonder if that’s where he found her?” They both giggle.

“Either way, she doesn’t belong here.” You knew they were right, but you just couldn’t bare to listen anymore, pulling your underwear back up and fixing your dress after you flush the toilet.

You then run out of the bathroom, not even looking to see who the women were. It didn’t matter, though. They were right. You should have never came here and you couldn’t stay any longer.

You walked back to your seat and gently tugged on Pedro’s sleeve.

“C-Can we go… Please?” You ask, your voice shaking just as much as your hands. Pedro got up instantly when he saw the look on your face, grabbing his trophy, coat and your clutch. He didn’t ask questions as he placed his hand to the small of your back and began to escort you out of the theater.

By the time you got back into the limo you felt like you couldn’t breathe. The voices around you sounding like water as your vision became black around the edges. Oh God, is this what feels lie to die? You couldn’t die. Not now! You had so much to do, so much t-

Something extremely cold suddenly touched your face, the blackness around your vision fading slightly as you looked up to whoever had put something so damn cold on you.

You were instantly met with the warm eyes of your boyfriend, concern laced on his brow as he gently dabbed a cold washcloth over your face. You could see his mouth moving, but you couldn’t make out what he was saying over the pounding of your heart, but it eventually calmed down enough to where you could begin to hear him.

“There we go, bee… that’s it sweetheart. Nice and easy.” Your breathing slowly calmed down, Pedro cradling you in his arms as your panic attack faded.

“I should have never come here…” You muttered. “I don’t belong here. All these fancy dresses, the flashing cameras, nice cars… I don’t deserve any of this.” Pedro placed a kiss to your forehead.

“Don’t say things like that, Abeja. You deserve this just as much as anyone. And as far as not belonging, trust me when I say I don’t either. And, frankly, I’m fine with that. All of these designer clothes, the mindless gossip, the broken homes, being surrounded by so many but still alone? That’s not really a life worth living. The world of Beautiful People is a lonely life, one that I would rather not live.”

You wasn’t sure what to say, so you just didn’t say anything, curling up as close as you could to him.

He made you take a dose of your anxiety medication when you got back to the hotel, taking it with a swig of water before laying down and curling up close to him. You laid your head on his shoulder, the sounds of his breathing and the gentle feeling of his hand caressing your own shoulder lulling you.

Right before you doze off, you heard him say:

“No matter what any of them has said, you’re perfect the way you are and deserve everything.”

________________________

You wake up the next morning still wrapped up in his arms. You lay there for a while just talking and enjoying one another’s company before he finally got up to use the bathroom.

You reach for your phone on the nightstand, turning off “do not disturb” mode for the first time since yesterday afternoon.

Your phone was overloaded. Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, everywhere was flooded. You didn’t even know where to begin.

Eventually, you just give up trying to put a dent into anything and returned Lauren’s list of missed calls. She answered on the second ring.

“You tell me every little detail, you sneaky bitch. And I mean everything!”

#kayla's ramblings #pedro pascal #reader insert #my fanfiction #beautiful people