#ice hockey player james

[vmwaffles]

Figure Skater Regulus AU

“Regulus closes his eyes and focuses on the music. He breathes, slowly, feels the beat and starts skating. Without a practiced routine or choreography. 

Just him, the music and the ice. He moves the way his body tells him to. This. This right here, right now is where he feels the most free. The most himself. He wishes it could always be this way.

If only he could always feel this way.”

- All That Glitters Is Not Gold by reggiethedestroyer on Ao3

#regulus black #james potter #regulus arcturus black #james x regulus #jegulus #starchaser #ao3 #figure skater regulus #ice hockey player james #fanfic #marauders #marauders fanfic #archive of our own #wolfstar #dorlene #sirius black #remus lupin #figure skating au #atging #all that glitters is not gold

[kquil]

JAMES POTTER | 04:01 ⏤ALWAYS SAFE

SUM. : you bring james his lunch that you cooked yourself and almost get injured

G. : fluff ; modern au ; muggle au ; ice hockey player james ; girlfriend reader ; very angry james ; protective james ; team training ; drill accidents ; reader being caring and sweet ; reader is wifey material ; james is husband material

LENGTH : 0.8k

NOT PROOFREAD OR EDITED

“James!” you shout across the rink, standing by one of your boyfriend’s coaches, Richard, who’s become like an uncle to you. The hockey captain doesn’t stop, however, unable to hear past the whistling wind by his ears atop his thick and sturdy headgear.

“Gonna have to shout louder than that, little lady ,” the older man chuckles, adjusting the cap on his head of silvering hair. 

You ponder to yourself for a moment before smirking, which makes Richard arch a curious brow at you, “Darling!” The instant you call across the ice rink, you see James’ head whip towards you before he grins widely behind the front guard of his head gear. Behind him, the rest of his team come to a skidding halt and also look over to your waving and cheering figure. You’ve become quite familiar with all of his teammates and they love to tease their captain for being so head over heels for you so the team begin snickering to themselves, some even cheekily whistling and nudging at James who pays them no mind, his sole focus fixed onto you.

“Baby!” he cheers, delight and excitement evident in his voice before he speeds his way over to you. Richard whistles for the rest of the team to run short drills while the ‘lovely couple’ have their lunch. 

“I’m sorry for being late,” you gnaw at your bottom lip regretfully, a guilty look taking over your expression as James hurriedly takes off his headgear and gloves, revealing his sweat-soaked locks matted down and clinging onto his forehead, “Richard told me you didn’t eat anything-” because you wanted to wait for me…

“Don’t worry about it,” James says gently, his smile just as bright but much softer as he takes in your sweet expression. There’s so much love in his gaze, you feel your own heart bursting at the seams to attempt at reciprocating his adoration. James brings a finger under your chin and lifts your gaze to meet his kind stare; even though he appears sweaty, dishevelled and rugged from training, he’s just as handsome as ever, “you sounded really excited over the phone about cooking my lunch for me,” a heat crawls up your neck and explodes across your cheeks as James grins, his eyes staring lovingly at you, “and I was just as excited to eat what you so graciously cooked instead of the canteen food here,” James giggles to himself, dopey and carefree, “you cooked it just for me~ I’m so lucky~” 

You returned his wide grin and felt yourself losing your will to hide his surprise. He didn’t know it but you were only late because you went and bought his favourite treacle tart from his favourite bakery across town.  

“Actually~” you begin to reach down so that you can present the bakery take out box when you suddenly see James pull back, his spine fully erect as his eyes and ears become fully alert. The words were on your tongue, ready to question his odd behaviour when he suddenly shoots his arm up to the side; just as you were beginning to register a faint whistle in your ear, it was followed by a resounding WHHHIIIIP!

In James’s stretched out hand was a hockey puck. And it was on a one way course of high velocity towards you. Seeing this, anger flares up like the fuse of an explosive ready to violently detonate in James’s eyes.

“SHE’S! MY! FUCKING! GIRLFRIEND! WATCH IT! YOU FAT FUCK!” James’s booming voice cuts through the air and silences all activity on the rink, not only that but he was easily able to narrow down the perpetrator of the hazardous stray puck, “...WELL?!! SAY SOMETHING YOU DICK!” you look past James’s figure and lock eyes with guilty brown pools, likely the offender of your potential accident.

“S-sorry,” you hear his teammate stutter, which you accept with a small nod and place a gentle hand on James’s arm, attempting to calm him down and bring his attention back to you. As he slowly turns to you again, James slams the puck to the ground and kicks it away with his ice skate. 

“Are you okay, angel?” James asks, his voice soft and kind, a complete contrast to the booming, angry shout he just projected. 

“I’m perfectly fine,” your warm voice visibly soothes the hockey team captain and he rests his forehead against yours with a sigh of relief, “...accidents happen James, please don’t lash out on the poor g-”

“Accident or not, hurting you— almost hurting you is deserving of a beat down from hell,”

Looking into his hostile but worried hazel eyes, you silently express your objection alongside some appreciation too. You’re thankful for his worry, his aggression over your safety even makes your heart flutter but he’s better than any violence. It takes a moment but James finally sighs and nods, a silent promise to watch himself and stay civil. 

Smiling softly, you lean up to kiss his lips, “thank you for saving me,” his lips smile against yours. 

“You’re always safe with me, princess,”

NAVI.

A/N : im a bit rusty on writing since i haven’t been able to write for a while from stressful home stuff but here’s me trying to get back into it with another ice hockey james au (inspired by another tiktok). hopefully, this will get me in the headspace to write good requests from my milestone event.

TAGLIST : @melinajenkins @aastonishment @until-i-found-you @corp0real @celestcies @lovelydoveval @inlovewithremusjohnlupin @calums-betch @futurecorps3 @hihihi1112 @simpingforthe80s @yrluvjane @neeezza101 @chaosofmanyfandoms @storyofaromance @loving-and-dreaming @somewereinthegalaxi @chullu-bhar-paani @ghostgardn @rosalyn-s @seungtelevision

#james potter x reader #james potter #james potter x you #james potter imagine #james potter fluff #ice hockey player james potter #james potter fic #james potter fanfiction #𐂂 : timestamp #hp marauders #marauders fic #the marauders

[ashepluto]

On thin ice; ice skater x hockey player jegulus au

Regulus loved this part of the day. It was the only time he could really feel like himself. No one needed to be impressed and he didn't have to put on his best persona. Here, just before the rink closed, Regulus felt safe. Only him, the ice and the music blasting in his ears.

It had become a normal routine for the figure skater to spend an hour or two skating around, practicing different jumps and steps. There was something soothing about being able to escape from the world around him, especially right before the championships. His coach had been pushing Regulus to a new level this year, harder and longer training sessions.

There was however no second thought that Regulus didn’t love skating. It had become his one and only love even when he was a little kid. His mother may have been the reason he even began skating. However, he had always loved the way the skaters flew weightless through the air and admired the way everything looked completely effortless. It was hard work but it was worth it in the end.

“Hey, you there!” a voice shouted all throughout the rink. Regulus, who had been in the middle of a jump, fell startled onto the hard ice. Hitting it with a loud thump, hissing at the contact.

“Shit, I am sorry,” the voice continued, except it was no longer screaming. There was something else in the voice, something you could mistake as genuine regret. Which it should be, because whoever shouted just made Regulus fail a critical jump. He mutters a quiet fuck under his breath as he stands up, feeling the bruise already form on his right leg.

“Are you okay?” the voice asked carefully.

“Yeah I’m fine,” Regulus snapped back, regretting it the minute his eyes met the other boy's green ones. There, right in front of him a taller boy was standing. Jet black hair covered by an enormous helmet and tamed skin skinning through the helmet cage.

“Well, I’m sorry I asked,” the boy scoffed .

“No, I just.” Regulus sighed before continuing. “You kinda fucked up my routine just then. Maybe in the future let me finish the routine before shouting at the top of your lungs.”

“Yeah, whatever. I’m James by the way and you are?”

“Regulus.”

#james x regulus #regulus black #james potter #jegulus #james potter and regulus black #writing #ice skater x hockey player #ice skater au #hockey player au #writing prompts #harry potter #the mauraders

[gncrezan]

happy valentine's day!! as a fellow nickmancer i could not let it slide without saying happy valentine's day. thank you for always being so kind and wonderful, your art is beautiful and so is your mind :)

HI QUILL OMG!!!!! a little late to valentines in my timezone BUT i can't believe u sent in this ask cause projecting onto nick and kiran (it's totally possible to do both) has been how i've been getting through my dissertation, and it gives me the lovely excuse to throw these at you :") ignore that the wisemans have been transforming into my own ocs in some kind of tiktok book-esque move on my part 😭 I HOPE YOU HV BEEN DOING WELL!!! i miss being on IF tumblr i hate university so much it is unreal :') i hope to post more of these two sooner or later (and more art in general!!!)

#the incomprehensible doodles are from my insane college au that's based totally off a dream #where i was andrew garfield's spidey and mj was an ice hockey player #(crazy that a spidey dream had my gender going awol btw) #so of course here that has translated to some kind of insane photographer kiran and ice hockey nick #nik wiseman #agent kiran #my art #ft. kiran's bestie who is a girlboss in a nb sort of way. which i swear is a tag ive used before #BUT SERIOUSLY!!!! GOOD TO HEAR FROM U <3 #in this incredible college au all my wisemans are crossing over. nick and nik have dressed up as jessie and james #buttons are wobbuffet and meowth :) #also it means a lot to me that all nicks have like a 10 step beauty routine that they dont admit to and its like 50% the ordinary products #lots of effort goes into looking like a cis man <3

[auras-moonstone]

Hi, I love your work so much!! How about some hockey player!ethan and figure skater!reader? Maybe some enemies to lovers? Have a great day<3

everything has changed — ethan landry

word count: 2,150

pairing: hockey player!ethan landry x figure skater!fem!reader

summary: as punishment for his suspension, ethan is forced to become y/n's skate partner for a few weeks

Y/N AND ETHAN STOOD STILL INSIDE THE OFFICE AS THE INFORMATION SINKED INTO THEIR BRAINS. Their coaches looked at each other, wanting to ran off the room as to not deal with the eventual fury that would come from the teenagers that everyone knew despised each other.

"No fucking way!" Y/N finally exclaimed, harshly, as Ethan said at the same time, "I'd rather tore my ACL."

The boy's sentence earned him a glare from his coach. "Don't even joke about it, Landry."

"Y/N, it’s the only option. Unless you have someone else in mind who can replace James."

The girl’s shoulders slumped—she didn't, and as much as she didn't like Ethan, he was kind of perfect for the part. He skated flawlessly and he lifted weights twice as heavy as the girl, so he would have no problem lifting her for the tricks. But there was this tiny detail—Ethan Landry was the most infuriating, annoying and self-centered guy in the whole university. And now she needed him, which made him even more frustrating.

Y/N's skating partner broke his arm and the competition was five weeks away, and if she wanted to compete, she had to push her hatred aside for a few weeks.

"And I wasn't asking you, Landry. It is an order. Consider it your punishment, learn to be professional." his coach said in a determined tone.

Ethan sighed and covered his face with his hands. He had been suspended from hockey for three games after beating the opposite team's defense player almost into oblivion. The ice had been tainted scarlet and his knuckles still hurt, even he knew he had crossed a line. But after the player said the nastiest of things about his family, he couldn't think straight. And here he was now, forced to become a figure skater for three weeks with the girl he loathed the most in the world.

"After you, my love." Ethan said in a sour voice, holding the door of the office open for her. He had a smile so false that Y/N was tempted to slap it off his unfairly pretty face. He loved pushing her buttons, so when he saw her face of annoyance he wanted to infuriate her even more. Y/N rolled her eyes and walked out the room, with the tall boy on her tail. "Wow, no ‘Thank you, Ethan! You're a real gentleman’?"

"Must have been hard not being an asshole for a whole second, right? It didn't give you an aneurysm?" she matched his false smile.

"No, but working with you for sure will." Ethan retorted. "On a positive note, I'll get to see you in sexy leotards."

"Pig" she muttered under her breath. "And I'll get to see you on leggings."

Ethan stopped walking and inspected her face, looking for any signs that told him she was joking "Wait, what?"

She smirked, enjoying the moment. "That's what figure skaters wear, genius."

"I won't wear that."

"Yes, you will, pretty boy. Don’t be a baby about it.” she said, and he flipped her off. He hated her so much. “See you tomorrow."

“Unfortunately.” he said loud enough for her to hear. She rolled her eyes as she walked away, she hated him so much.

THEY HAVEN'T EVEN GOT INTO THE ICE RINK AND ETHAN HAD ALREADY PISSED Y/N OFF. He had been inside the locker room for fifteen minutes now, and didn't want to step out. Y/N was two seconds away from kicking the door down.

"Landry get your ass out of that room right now! We are wasting our time!" she banged on the door furiously.

"You don't understand! I can't wear this, Y/L/N." Ethan yelled.

"Every skate figure wears leggings, Landry. There is nothing to be ashamed of."

"Yes, there is. This leggings are too tight, Y/N. Too tight."

Y/N sighed. "Let me see."

"No way!"

"Stop testing my patience, Landry. Let me see or I'll go in."

A few seconds later, she heard the turn of the handle and the door flew open. The air got stuck on her throat and a strangled sound left her mouth. The rumours going around the university were true, she couldn’t help thinking.

"Holy mother of God" she said loudly, gaze fixed on the problem. "That's too tight"

"That's what I've been saying for the past fifteen minutes!" he yelled frustrated.

"I thought you were exaggerating."

"Are you talking to me or my dick?" Ethan frowned, seeing how she wasn't looking at his face, gaze fixed on his huge bulge.

Y/N was brought back from the shock and finally looked away. "I'm so sorry! That was not okay of me, it's just... shocking."

"That I have a big dick? Ouch, I'm wounded."

"No! I mean- not that I ever thought about it. But I didn't expect I would ever find out" she couldn't have been blushing more. As much as she hated him, she wasn't stupid. Ethan Landry was the most attractive boy on college.

"Whatever. What am I going to do? I can't practice like this."

"Just put your gym shorts above the leggings. And hurry up."

She turned around to leave when he called her name. "I'll never get tired of seeing you in a leotard" Ethan winked at her before closing the door of the locker room.

What was his obsession with leotards? Y/N asked herself as she rolled her eyes. And as she made her way to the ice rink, she tried to ignore the fact that her whole body had turned warm after his words.

While putting his skates on, Ethan watched Y/N going over the routine. There were very scarce the times where he saw her without a scowl on her face or firing insults at him, and that was only when she was on the ice. Her face glowed and she was completely hypnotic. She moved around so flawlessly and elegantly that it was impossible to look away from her, you could tell that she truly loved being on ice. As much as he disliked her, Ethan couldn't deny that Y/N was beyond professional and one of the best skaters he had ever seen.

“Are you ready?” Y/N asked him, sliding towards the edge of the rink. Ethan got out of his daze and nodded. “Okay, so obviously this is not the same as hockey, but I’ve seen your moves and I don’t think you’ll have problems doing this routine. But if you don’t understand something, speak up and we’ll work on it.”

Ethan nodded. “Wait, what do you mean you have seen my moves?” he asked as they got into position.

“I’m a huge hockey fan, and I don’t miss any of Blackmore’s matches. So yeah, I’ve seen you play countless times.”

“Am I your favourite player?” he asked with a smirk.

“Let’s get to work.” she rolled her eyes. But the answer, even though she would never ever say it, was yes. And he knew it.

Objectively speaking, of course, Ethan Landry was the best hockey player Blackmore had. Probably better than the rest of the New York’s university players. On the ice, he was a force to be reckoned with and he was a hard-worker, he cared for his team and for the sport. He was a true captain. And that’s exactly why it shocked her to the core the way he had reacted on that final match.

“That’s a yes, I know it.” he smiled widely, making her sigh. He wasn’t making fun of her anymore, he was genuinely happy by it. And then a frown appeared on his face. “I hope I still am, even after what happened.”

The vulnerability in his voice melted Y/N’s walls. “You still are. You are not the first player to get suspended, and you won’t be the last. It has nothing to do with your skills or your commitment to the sport.”

“That’s not what coach says” he laughed dryly.

“Coach is furious because he lost his best player, but he doesn’t mean it. Everyone in this university knows how serious you are about hockey, okay? Don’t doubt yourself over one wrong action.”

They smiled at each other, for the first time ever, with sincerity. But then he ruin it with his smugness “Do you want my autograph?”

Y/N pushed him away playfully “You’re such an asshole”

“Oh sorry, would you prefer if I gave you my jersey?” Ethan sent her a teasing glance.

“I’d prefer if you shut up and start warming up.”

“Anything for my number one fan.” he winked at her and she almost melted. God, was he charming—annoying, but charming nonetheless.

“I despise you.”

But there wasn’t any hatred reflected on those words anymore. That day, they entered the rink expecting practice to be dreadful and filled with insults. They left laughing and hoping the next day would arrive quickly, because they had actually enjoyed it. There had been insults thrown, but they were the playful kind, insults that weren’t meant to hurt the other. Everything had changed that day for them.

Y/N HAD ALWAYS ENJOYED SKATING AND COMPETING, BUT DOING IT WITH ETHAN MADE IT EVEN BETTER. It’s ironic, when her coach told her he was to be James’ replacement, she thought it would be the worst thing ever. But now, that the three weeks were over, she knew she was going to miss him.

“So, that’s it, then.” Ethan spoke up as they left the arena. Today had been their last practice together, as James had already recovered and Ethan’s suspension had ended.

“That’s it.” she nodded. “It wasn’t half as bad as I’d imagined.”

“It wasn’t.” he agreed. His chest felt heavy, which was silly. It’s not like he wouldn’t see her again. They practiced the same days on the same place, and they even shared some classes. The truth was, he was scared it was the end of their newfound…friendship? God, no. Friendship wasn’t quite right, they had something more going on.

“Are you going to the competition?” she asked shyly, cheeks turning red.

God, she was so cute. It was hard to believe it was the same girl that was constantly bickering with him. “Do you want me to go?”

“I mean, I guess it’s kind of your routine too now, so I figure you’d like to see the outcome.” she said nervously.

Ethan took a step forward, so that she had to look up “That’s not what I asked. Do you want me to go?”

“Yes.” her tone was a bit unstable. His closeness made her insanely nervous, so she cleared her throat before replying again. “Yes. I want you to go. But no pressure, it’s okay if you don’t want to.”

“I’ll be there.” he assured her. “My game is on the same day, a few hours after your competition ends.”

“Oh, shit! That’s right. Maybe you shouldn’t come, you need to rest.”

Ethan shook his head. “I’ll be there.” he repeated. “But I want you to go to my game”

“I never miss one.” she said.

“Perfect. You know which number to use” he said, giving her a knowing look.

“Of course, I’ll wear Meeks’.” she teased.

Ethan clenched his jaw. “Use one that isn’t mine and see what happens.”

“You sound a bit mad there, Landry. You sound almost—” she stood on her tip toes, her mouth nearly touching his. “jealous.”

“You’re killing me here, Y/N/N.” his tone was pleading. He had never wanted to kiss someone so badly.

“What? You want me to kiss you?” her words left in a whisper and he could feel her breathy voice against his lips.

“I’ll give you three seconds to take a step back, if you don’t, I’ll kiss the hell out of you.” he warned her.

Y/N smiled. “One.” she set his hands on her waist. “Two.” then she wrapped hers around his neck. “Three.” she looked him in the eyes. “Still her-”

Ethan’s lips captured hers. The kiss was like their relationship—it started wild and aggressive and then it slowed down, becoming sweeter and softer but still holding an insanely amount of passion.

“You drive me crazy, did you know that?” Ethan laughed, pressing his forehead to hers. “In the most frustrating and loving way.”

“If a month ago someone told me I’ll be kissing Ethan Landry I would’ve laughed and then throw up in disgust. Now, there’s no other thing I’d rather be doing.”

“Aw, that was kinda sweet. You still have to work on your compliments, but you’ll get there.” he pressed kisses all over her face. “I’m so fucking glad I punched that guy.”

Y/N laughed. “I dare you to repeat that in front of coach.”

“I don’t have a death wish.”

“And you’re too pretty to die.” she pecked him on the lips. “Did I just make Ethan Landry blush?!”

“Shut up!” he laughed in such an adorable way that Y/N was surprised she didn’t melt in the spot. “I really like you, Y/N.”

“I really like you too.”

#ethan landry #ethan landry fluff #ethanlandry #ethan landry angst #ethan landry x reader #ethan landry smut #ethan landry x y/n #ethan landry x you #ethan landry oneshot #jack champion oneshot #jack champion #jack champion fluff #jack champion x reader #jack champion x y/n #jackchampion #jack champion fanfic #jack champion imagine

[ameliora-j]

ur the only person i trust who can give me a filthy but soft smut of james potter fucking y/n in his ice hockey jersey

i’m honored 🥹

𐐪𐑂 it’s twisted tuesday! send in ur requests ᵕ̈

content: soft dom!james, cnc, hockey player!james, pr manager!girlfriend!reader, humiliation, degradation, oral (f!receiving), daddy kink, jamie talking to ur pussy, impact play, unprotected piv, creampie, THIS IS AN 18+ BLOG MDNI

“james…” you groan, trying to push him away as he has you pressed up against your desk in your office. “cut it out!” you groan as he kisses down your neck.

“oh baby” james chuckles, shaking his head. james towers over you, and his ice hockey jersey are purposefully tailored to be longer and bigger on him so that they can fit over all his gear—thus causing every single one of his jerseys to be a dress on you. this—accompanied by a pair of thigh high boots—was your signature game day look. “you’re wearing the jersey, you’re asking to be split open on my cock and you know it” he chuckles lowly, nipping at your ear.

you whine, shaking your head as you push him back once more. “stop james. i’m serious, i’m not fucking you” you huff softly.

“uh huh baby… whatever you say” he murmurs, sinking to his knees and pushing your legs apart. he pushes his jersey up over your hips and tuts his tongue, shaking his head softly. “and look at that… you don’t wanna fuck but this little cunt is nice and uncovered for me” he hums, noting that you’d foregone panties—and james knew you expected this.

“my poor girl’s gonna be so cold on that ice tonight” he pouts softly, shaking his head as he rubs a thumb over your slit.

“james!” you squeak. “i’ll be fine” you shake your head.

“hush baby, do your work. ‘m talking to my girl” he chuckles softly. your eyes widen and heat rises immediately to your face as you realize james is speaking to your pussy, not you. “‘s okay pretty princess… i’ll make sure you keep warm tonight” he whispers before leaning in and pressing a kiss to your little clit.

he hums softly, his eyes rolling a bit at the taste before he wraps his mouth around your cunt, wiggling his tongue through your sticky folds. “that’s right princess, knew you wanted daddy” he whispers to your cunt, leaning back and spitting on your pulsing hole. “‘s okay… daddy’s here. gonna clean you up baby. make it all better” he hums to your pussy before diving back in.

“j-james… james!” you moan loudly, reaching back and pushing his head closer to your needy cunt. he chuckles against you, slapping your ass.

“i knew you’d come around” he mumbles, standing and beginning to undo his pants.

“n-no… no james i’m not fucking you! i’m trying to tell you we need to go” you whine, shaking your head insistently.

“yeah princess, i hear you” he nods, running his cock through your slit a few times. “there’s my girl” he groans as he feels your wetness soaking his cock. “it’s okay, i’ll give it to you… no need to cry” he chuckles lowly as your pussy drips down onto his cock.

he groans lowly as he slowly pushes into your cunt, practically whining as he bottoms out. “oh you’re so tight” he breathes, holding your hips.

“j-james… jamie stop” you whine as he begins to fuck you. his pace is slow but intentional, his hips angled to hit your gspot head on each time he slams his cock back into you.

“oh baby, you’re begging me to stop but my princess is begging to cum” he murmurs, gently rubbing your clit as he fucks you slow and hard. “it’s okay pretty girl… if you want daddy to stop all you have to do is cum” he taunts, holding you close to him as he fucks you slowly.

you whine, shaking your head as it falls back against his shoulder. “your pussy is crying for me… squeezing around me. oh baby she wants to cum so bad” he mocks, beginning to rub your clit faster. he keeps his pace slow, but pounds your gspot mercilessly as you cry out his name along with profanities.

“daddy!” you whine as you gaze at him with wide, glossy eyes.

“oh there’s my pretty princess” he hums softly, smiling lovingly at you as he leans in and gives you a kiss. you whimper softly, meeting his thrusts as you kiss him back. “‘s my good girl. take my cock so well” he mumbles, kissing across your shoulders.

“daddy… i wanna cum” you whimper, your eyes rolling as you clench around him.

“i know baby… i know daddy’s right there” he mumbles. “why don’t you milk my cock baby?” he hums, kissing your cheek. “cum for me… squeeze daddy’s cum from that big cock” he groans lowly.

you let out a long, loud moan, your head falling back against his shoulder as you cream on james’ cock. he sucks in air through his teeth, fucking you through your orgasm as his hips begin to stutter until he paints your walls with his cum. “what do you say baby?” he mocks as he rides out his orgasm, fucking you full of his cum.

“thank you, daddy” you moan quietly, smiling lazily at him.

#twisted tuesday! #nsfw.nani #dark.nani #james potter #james potter x reader #james potter x yn #james potter x you #james potter x y/n #james potter smut #james potter blurb #james potter fic #james potter drabble #hockey player!james potter #hockey player!james #james potter fanfic #james potter headcanon #james potter dialogue #names potter fanfiction

[jaylver]

HOW YOU GET THE GIRL — P.JS

SYNOPSIS: Beach parties are supposedly fun and exciting, aren’t they? Wrong. Experiencing college parties is rare for you, but you decided to give this one a go after your best friend’s constant pleas. Things were alright until everything turned sour when trouble found you and eventually you were roped into a fight alongside the campus’ famous hockey playboy. As if that wasn’t enough, the devil himself conjured up an idea that you found yourself being entangled in. It was all fun and games up until confusion arose, feelings being confessed and played, in the end, Jay had to learn how to get the girl, his girl.

PAIRINGS: ice hockey player!jay x afab!reader

GENRE: strangers to frenemies to lovers, fake dating au, college sports au, romance, fluff, angst, secret pining

WARNING(S): drinking, parties, profanities, slight violence, possessive jay, mentions/hints of cheating, miscommunication, slow burn-ish, a pinch of suggestiveness

WC: 21k

AUTHOR NOTES: yes, the title is based on taylor swift's song, the story is lowkey inspired from it hehe! i also included a scene which was inspired from "sleet kitten" so credits to that ;) PLEASE LEAVE A FEEDBACK! it would mean THE WORLD to me <3 hope you enjoy!

part 2 of 'no competition' series | series masterlist | masterlist

© jaylver 2023

“WHY AM I HERE?”

You found yourself asking your best friend, Minji, only after barely ten minutes of setting foot into the party. Look, you didn’t wish to complain, but a beach party basically equaled sand in shoes, which you absolutely hate and despise, yet you were stuck here against your will.

It all started on a random stroll across campus where Minji brought up the night beach party hosted by some rich frat boy, typical. Being the anti-party person you were, you brushed the idea away initially. Hey, staying in bed with a cup of tea was miles better than having sand in your shoes and frat boys trying to get into your pants, yuck. But eventually, you gave into the idea of relaxing and letting go for once after a horrid chemistry test. How you absolutely regretted that choice now.

“You’re here to enjoy yourself,” Minji hissed through her teeth, holding onto your hand as the two of you walked past strangers. “What’s wrong with getting free booze and some hot hunky beach boys?”

“Everything is wrong with that. Their booze sucks and the beach boys hide at night,” you huffed, hugging your body tight as the wind blew across your face, the smell of sea lingered in the air.

“There are still some cute guys here,” Minji kicked at the sand lightly, staring around where people were littered in groups here and there, a small bonfire alighted in the middle of the beach. “The hockey guys are here,” she nodded at the loudest bunch in the area.

You knew a part of them since you did occasionally stop by to watch a few major hockey games, but definitely not well enough to pair their names to their faces. You spotted the captain first and the one with freshly dyed white hair, who you recognized was also his usual partner on ice, then there was the player with a really odd number, 99. Was it Jason, James or Jeremy? All you could remember was him being number 99 and having a J name, not to mention, an interesting reputation to his name.

"They're cute, don't you think so?" Minji nudged you and you shrugged.

"Cute but fuckboys, and I need them to step up during major games too,"

"You should ignore the hockey part about them. It'll hurt less when they lose," Minji's head turned and she pointed to another group. "The footballers are there too. Trust me, they're bigger fuckboys,"

"Oh, I can tell," you spotted many of them already having a girl by their sides, whispering and giggling while they poured each other more drinks. "This is why I'd rather go back to the dorms,"

"Maybe, maybe not. Something entertaining will eventually happen at these types of parties,"

"I feel like you'll jinx it,"

Minji threw her hands up in defence, raising her eyebrows and shrugging. "Don't blame me, blame the system,"

"There's no system," you shot back, suddenly feeling the need to walk away for a moment as the beach slowly overwhelmed you. (you hated the beach, can't you already tell?) "I need to stop by the restroom for a while, look after my drink, will you?"

You were practically racing to the nearby restroom, finally escaping the area and being able to breathe freely without drunk college students bumping into you. The restroom was basically just a single cubicle, so you were squeezed tightly and you felt uncomfortable as each second passed. You were praying to God that you get to leave this place pronto. 

Leaving the cubicle made you feel slightly more grateful about the beach, but upon only a second from exiting, you started hearing shouts coming not far from where you were. At first, you wondered if you’ve reached the point of hallucination, but following a few more grunts and yells, you knew you weren’t. Your body tensed immediately considering it's a distance from the main area. What could even be happening here?

You knew this was how horror movies usually start, but your curious mind just had to wander off further into the abyss and bring your leg along, so you chose the stupidest decision and followed the distant commotion.

'I'm not dying tonight. I'm not dying at a beach. I'm going to be fine' were the affirmations you repeated in your head, though you felt quite the opposite of that.

"Fuck you, are you banging my girl?"

That was when you stopped in your tracks completely, thrown absolutely off guard, eyes widened and lips forming into an 'O'. It wasn't a murder case, but from the way the conversation sounded, it was about to be one.

"I didn't bang your girl, who the fuck are you?" Another voice spat back and you inched closer, hiding behind the other cubicle and you peeked your head out, shocked at the sight before you. 

There was already a small crowd surrounding the commotion, who wouldn't want to miss a free show anyway? But the bigger matter on hand was the centre of attention, the two guys were the campus' well known hockey player and footballer. 

You recognized the footballer at once, remembering the time where Minji practically shoved his Instagram profile into your face. Yoon Keeho. Star player paired along with his amazing features, he was a popular figure who had a popular girlfriend from the dance team, Karina. They were basically every comics' perfect couple.

Then there was the hockey player, your jaw could only hang lower in plain shock. Mr 99, hockey star and infamous playboy, you knew he was trouble, but this kind of trouble? A little unexpected from him.

"Look man, I know people say I fuck around a lot, but I never fucked her!" It was obvious Mr 99 was starting to get heated, but the footballer was relentless in egging him on.

"Oh fuck off man, I know you did it!"

This back and forth had you rolling your eyes, eventually getting bored from the “no I didn't”s and “yes you did”s thrown back and forth, so you slowly crept back, trying your best to avoid tripping over rocks and shells.

'Crack' 

You spoke too soon. Way too soon.

"Hey!"

You took a few cautious steps ahead. Maybe if you just pretend nothing happened and continue walking, it would be fine. Maybe if you walked away, he wouldn't notice—

"Hey!"

You squeezed your eyes shut, contemplating between immediate death or a quick dash away, but neither could be decided when the voice kept on calling after you, ruining your patience completely and you whipped around, looking like a deer caught in headlights. 

"Yes?"

Mr 99 stared back at you, a sinister look in his eyes. From the looks of it, he had something evil brewing in that head of his and soon, you were about to be the victim of his dodgy plan.

What came out of his lips next definitely made you wish you were home instead and simultaneously, wishing you had the freedom to strangle him. This fucker—

"That's my girlfriend there, she can vouch for me," you heard him telling Keeho, a smug smile on his face. Girl … friend? Gasps were heard and all eyes were on you in an instance. "Come here, babe, I've been looking for you!"

You blinked, your body absolutely rigid and unmoving as if paralysed. This couldn't be happening, right? Please wake me up from this dream. I'm just hallucinating—

"Babe, come on," your brief dissociation had you completely unaware that Mr 99 was now in front of you, dragging you by your wrist towards the scene of commotion. 

"What are you doing?" You whispered harshly into his ear, making sure it wasn't loud enough for the other couple to realise from a distance away.

"Play along, please, I'll pay you," he pleaded, desperation clear in his voice. Who were you to say no to free cash? Nevertheless, you still hated being the centre of attention, and Mr 99 here was only making matters worse.

"I don't even know you,"

"I'm Jay from literature, so technically now you do. Just help me for a few minutes," he grunted through his gritted teeth, flashing his best version of puppy eyes that failed to execute its purpose. 

“Do you even know my name?” you hissed lowly, glaring pointedly at him. He could only sigh in exasperation. He had the audacity to seem annoyed while you were literally the one who’s getting dragged to her demise. 

“You’re Y/N from English literature. We have the same classes and I’m not a douche for not knowing my classmates, okay?” you were slightly pleased, but not enough to be someone’s fake girlfriend for show. Against your free will, you and Jay were finally standing face to face with the couple. 

"So you're his girlfriend?" Keeho had an eyebrow raised, a sense of accusation and suspicion in his gaze. He was so not buying this.

You glanced at Jay, face twisted in uneasiness, not loving the idea of this, but instead, he shot you an encouraging look which was screaming 'go on, tell him'. "Y–yeah. Girlfriend,"

Keeho was unconvinced and you couldn't blame him, you were doing a shit job at pretending to be someone you weren't. "Where was your boyfriend yesterday at night? Was he out?"

"He—" the words got stuck in your throat and Jay raised his eyebrows at you, mouthing some random words you totally couldn't decipher. "He went out on a date with me,"

"To?"

"Baskin Robbins …?"

Keeho remained unamused, his girlfriend holding onto him snickering silently under her breath, and you, on the other hand, got naturally defensive.

"What's wrong with ice cream? At least my man cared enough to bring me out for ice cream dates instead of letting me cheat on him freely. Just saying,"

"What?"

Now it was Keeho and Jay's turn to stare at you with their jaws hung low. Karina's face gradually grew scarlet, her lips twisted into a snarl. "What do you even know about my relationship? Keep out of my business, you bitch,"

"Hey, who the fuck are you to call her a bitch?" Jay stepped in front of you, an arm shielding you and Karina cowered away. Damn, he was good at this.

"Don't talk to her like that, you fuck," Keeho spat at Jay, daringly pushing Jay on the chest and he stumbled slightly into your arms. 

Jay scoffed, brushing his front and adjusted his shirt, shaking his head a little. "You're such a dick, Yoon Keeho. You're the prime example why I hate footballers,"

"And you hockey players are the reason why you're dragging the school's name to the ground,"

"Save the talk, we literally won the playoffs while you and your team could barely crawl to the top—"

You gasped, and so did everyone else watching. Keeho had thrown a hard punch across Jay's pretty face, which meant Jay's aggravation unfortunately worked a little too well on the footballer. 

To your surprise, Jay took the hit better than you'd expected. He did seem taken aback at the start, but then he started laughing instead. Was he secretly psychotic?

You would be lying if you said you weren't shell shocked initially, but after a moment of recovery, you peeked over his shoulder, staring at his face for any obvious bleeding or bruising, unaware of how close your face was to his.

"You okay, big man?"

"Took it like a champ," he muttered back, a smirk pulled at his lips, seeming as though nothing had even happened. "Permission for me to punch him back, girlfriend?"

"He's all yours. Go beat his ass, boyfriend,"

Jay shrugged nonchalantly, rubbing the side of his face roughly and in a flash, he threw a punch back at Keeho and panicked whispers broke out in the crowd.

"Look man, this is a misunderstanding, I totally didn't fuck your girlfriend," Jay panted, his eyes narrowing at Karina. 

"Don't look at me like that," she snapped back, but her voice wavered, giving away the fact that she was obviously hiding something and was intimidated by the way Jay could see right through her.

"Oh come on, fess up, I'm pretty sure I saw you with Yeonjun," 

Karina stilled, her eyes beginning to twitch. Bingo. You didn’t sit through a boring psychology talk once for nothing.

"You don't know shit about me,"

"Okay, say that to Yeonjun the next time he finds you," 

Maybe you did regret having too big of a mouth. You just had to blabber on and agitate the mean girl and now you were reenacting a scene from one of your favourite high school rom coms. 

Before you could even register what's happening, you felt a sharp tug at your hair and pain washed over your whole head. Getting bald wasn't the thing you wished for upon reaching here. You screamed on instinct, reaching over to grab Karina's hair in defence, invoking a loud cry from her.

Jay and Keeho were left stunned at the turn of events. Hell, you were stunned at the attack yourself. Who would've thought you would be sacrificing strands of hair to Miss Dancer? They eventually came to their senses (thank heavens) and tried to pull you and Karina off of each other. It was strenuous work just trying to break you two apart, your hand was unwilling to let go and neither were hers.

She might’ve been a dancer, but you’ve experienced more fights than this. Jay managed to rip you off of Karina and you were left dishevelled, heaving heavily, Jay's hands wrapped around your chest from the back.

"Calm down. Breathe. You're so close to ripping all her hair out," he whispered into your ear, his breath fanning your ears. If you weren't so out of breath and adrenaline spiked, you would be weak in the knees by now. 

"Good. She was the one who laid her hands on me first," you spat, glaring straight at her and she did the same, hair and attire equally as messy as yours. 

"Look man," Jay called out to Keeho, grabbing his attention away from his murderous girlfriend. "I might fuck around a lot, but I swear I didn't touch your girl. I never stoop that low and you know it. Go ask her for the truth yourself, I'm leaving now,"

Jay got ahold of your hand and pulled you away from the wandering eyes and lingering attention. You almost got a whiplash, unable to even yourself completely together and digest what even went on before he dragged you towards the main area. 

"Woah, woah, wait," you yanked your arm away, stopping abruptly which made Jay turn around, a questioning look on his face. Why is he looking at me like that? You thought as you crossed your arms.

"Look, you might've saved my ass from Miss Crazy over there, but the part where you dragged me in your stupid drama, so not cool," 

"I know, I'm sorry, okay? You were just coincidentally … there,"

"Wow," you exclaimed in disbelief, face scrunched in slight distaste. "Girlfriend, huh … I hate to burst your bubble but there were people there and if—" you poked at his chest and he stared at you, a slight smirk on his lips, "—people actually believe we're dating, I'll beat you up,"

"What's so wrong about me?" He whistled, leaning down to meet your challenging gaze, a sarcastic grin wide on that devilish face of his. Maybe if he wasn't this annoying, you would've found him pants-dropping hot.

"I hate you," you continued your journey back, brushing past him and he could only let out a laugh at your words.

"Oh, come on," he caught your wrist and pulled you to him, making you land on his chest with a soft thud. If only someone could take a picture of this, it would be something straight out of a 2000s classic romcom.

"You're ridiculous, let go," you tried to get your hand out of his, but he persisted in holding onto you. 

Pushing and pulling was something you hated. Whether it was in relationships or just whatever this was, you wished it was gone, because in the next second of tug of war, one of you decided to lose balance and fall to ground.

To your biggest nightmare and headache, you ended up lying on top of Mr 99, Jay, the devil in disguise. The beach was already a nightmare for you, but a fucking man under you? You wished you could disappear now.

"Do you always like this position?" 

"If only I could choke you to death in it, then sure,"

"Kinky. You're really romantic,"

"I know," you gritted out, finally mustering all your energy to push yourself up and away from Jay, almost losing your balance in the process. You definitely wouldn't want to fall on him again.

You dusted sand off of your shorts, peeking slightly at Jay, who remained on the ground, his hands behind his head to support him as his stare remained on you, a small smile on his face. You truly wondered what was running through that head of his. Knowing him, it was probably nothing good.

“Do you think we’ll meet again after this?”

You scoffed, a frown etched on your features. “You’re acting like I’m cinderella. I’m on the campus,”

“I mean, we both might be on campus, but that doesn’t mean we’ll cross path,”

“It sounds like you’re trying to propose something—” Jay opened his mouth to respond, but you continued off, not letting him interrupt, “—whatever it is, it’s a ‘no’ from me, okay?”

“Alright, rude,” Jay pushed his body up from the sands, sitting cross legged paired with an offended look. “I’m not trying to propose anything. What’s that dirty mind of yours thinking? I was simply wondering,”

You squinted at him, doubt in your gaze and your face scrunched, humming softly. “Let’s leave our next meeting to fate again. I’m afraid if I keep seeing you I might—”

“Fall in love?”

“Explode. Close enough,” you grimaced, shaking the sand off your shoes. "Look, I'm leaving now. Good luck on not getting beat up again," you turned to leave, but halting once Jay spoke again.

"Will I be seeing you at my matches?"

You pondered for a second, then shrugged. "Depends. I'm not a big hockey fan, but who knows?"

You heard a small chuckle from Jay, rolling your eyes a little. "Fine by me. Let's see how fate sets us up then, Y/N."

You wished fate didn't set you and him up. You wished fate would never ever do so. You didn’t wait for another minute and quickly dashed away, finding your way back to the main area that (thankfully) wasn’t far from where you were. It seemed that the fight didn’t reach the main area where everyone was from the way they were all dancing and drinking like normal.

“Where were you?” Minji pulled you close to her once you had managed to locate her amongst the bunch, concern laced in her voice. “And what the fuck happened to you? Why’s your hair messed up? Wait—” the worry in her gaze soon turned into suspicion. “You didn’t have a secret hookup right?”

“What? No!” you shrieked, glancing around in slight embarrassment at your voice rising unintentionally. Just thinking about what had happened just now gave you a first degree burn of embarrassment, it was going to be your first and last experience, never again. “I … got into a fight,”

“You what?”

“Listen,” you placed a hand on Minji’s shoulder, trying to calm her down while inching closer and making sure to keep your voice down. “I stumbled upon a messy couple related drama and somehow I got roped into it. It’s all Jong Seong’s fault, okay?”

“Jay? What did he do?”

“Accused of fucking Keeho’s girl. It would be funny to witness the whole thing without being apart of it, honestly,”

“I need more context,”

“He called me his girlfriend so that I could vouch for him and I said something bad to Keeho’s girlfriend so we … kinda got into a tussle,”

Minji was stunned to say the least, but there was still a hint of amusement from the way she smiled.  “I won’t directly say she deserves it, but she does,” she let out a small laugh and you two shared a look before bursting out laughing, having to hold your chest from the random jokes she threw in between.

“So, time for us to leave?”

“Fucking finally, I was waiting for you to say this,”

“No girls trips to the beach in the future, huh?”

“Nope.” you mumbled, letting Minji wrap an arm around your waist as the both of you start making your way to Minji’s car. You strangely felt a pair of wandering eyes pinpointed on you and you turned your head slightly to the right, meeting Jay’s playful gaze among his group of hockey guys. It was barely a second before you were dragged away anyway, leaving you minimal chances to process anything.

Park Jong Seong, please don’t ever drag me into your schemes ever again. Fuck it, let’s never cross paths again.

IT SEEMS THAT FATE HAS PLAYED ITS ROLE ONCE MORE IN TORTURING YOU.

In what way was ‘never getting involved with Park Jong Seong’ so hard to understand, huh, fate? You found yourself having an angry internal monologue on the way back to your dorms, your coffee threatening to spill out of the cup with the aggressiveness in your walk. It all started out like this: you just got your donut for the morning, walking to lecture with your earphones blasting your favourite music, what could possibly go wrong? Everything.

You were just walking as per usual, until a girl tapped you from the back, and like every normal person does, you stopped and turned around, a confused look on your face. Who’s this? You wondered. That’s the last thought you could form before everything started crumbling eventually.

First, she asked whether you were dating Jay. Eye roll. You knew this was bound to happen. So, you said ‘no’, which was a reasonable answer since you were, in fact, not dating him. But the girl thought otherwise. You turned to leave, halfway to shoving back your earphones in when she grabbed hold of your wrist. Woah. 

“I know you’re dating him, everyone do after he made y’all official during that party,”

“Okay…?” it was no use trying to fight back with her persistence, so you just went along with it, not knowing what you were even getting into.

“You do know he fucked me before right—?” TMI much. “Can you tell him to come over and get his stuff? It feels wrong having a man’s stuff around knowing he’s in a relationship,”

“Oh,” was all you could muster out. This whirlwind of information being smacked into your face at 10 in the morning was something you hadn’t expected. “You can tell him that yourself. I’m … busy. I have to go,”

Like any sane person would, you dashed away, possibly leaving the girl in a confused daze but you couldn’t care less, pulling out your phone to angrily type Jay’s Instagram handle and sending him an annoyed text message.

you: a girl just told me she fucked you and she felt it was wrong that you left your stuff while you’re ‘dating’ me. can you please sort this out? istg i’ve been asked too many times whether i’m dating you today fr

Not even after a minute of sending that, Jay replied back at once. 

jaypjs: how did you know what my Insta profile is?

You rolled your eyes, your fingers working hard but careful to not accidentally break your screen with the vigour you had whilst typing.

you: is that so important right now? can you at least answer my question?

jaypjs: just ignore it, it’ll pass soon, i swear. ttyl i have practice ;) 

Jerk. 

As much as Jay had asked you to ignore it, it seemed to have backfired instead. At the library, cafeteria, girl’s restroom, you were bombarded with the same question over and over again. ‘Are you dating Jay?’ You swore if you had a dollar everytime someone had asked you this question, you would’ve been a billionaire by now.

Evening soon fell upon the campus grounds, students were rushing around to find a place for dinner, but the hockey team were still remained in training, and being you, you just had to impulsively barge into the arena, practically rushing down the stairs to the glass panes, spotting your target at first glance. 

You would be lying if you said you didn’t find him mesmerizingly attractive in that split moment. He reminded you of someone that had just appeared straight out of a scene from ‘Top Gun’, except on ice. He had his helmet in his hand, his hair wet with sweat, his eyes trained on his coach as he lectured the team on that and this.

You thought your staring had gone unnoticed, but that’s when one of his teammates pointed at you, his gaze turning to you now, a hint of curiosity and surprise in his face. If only he knew you were actually there to murder him.

“Y/N?” You heard his muffled voice through the glass as he skated towards you right after his coach had dismissed them, inching closer and closer until there was barely any distance, only a singular glass pane separating you two apart.

“Jay,” you started, pushing down whatever volcano that was close to bursting inside you right now. 

“Did my girlfriend miss me so much until she decided to give me a surprise visit?”

“If I hear that word one more time today, I think I might jump down the nearest building,” you snapped, poking a finger on the glass threateningly. “Look, I’m here because we need to talk—why does this sound like an actual couple conversation—whatever, just get your ass out here immediately,”

“Fine, fine,” Jay threw his hands up in defeat, sensing the seriousness in your voice, you did not come to play. “I’ll be out in a second,”

He disappeared out of sight, and to your dismay, that left his teammates a great opportunity to approach you. Just your luck, huh?

“You’re dating Jay?” the captain, Heeseung, shouted over at you, waving his hockey stick in the air in an attempt to grab your attention.

“It’s complicated,”

“Friends with benefits?” the one with a head of freshly dyed white hair, Sunghoon, chimed in. You recognized the both of them from the party, what are the odds?

“Non-physical type of complicated,”

“That does sound complicated,” Heeseung hummed, practising passes with Sunghoon. “Played with your feelings?”

“I don’t know if I can count it as that…yet,”

Heeseung and Sunghoon shared a brief glance at one another. “Jay might be a playboy, we all know that, but he’s a softie at heart. Hear him out, he might not look like it, but he’s the best at talking,”

“That’s why he’s so good at picking up girls—” Heeseung slapped Sunghoon’s head, giving you a small reassuring smile while the other winced in pain, not appreciating that one bit.

“I’ll hear him out, don’t worry,” you said rather begrudgingly, sitting down on one of the empty seats now, rubbing your hands for warmth as you awkwardly waited for Jay.

“Stop pestering her already, damn,” Jay’s footsteps were heard thumping down the stairs in the empty arena. “Go wash up,” he slid into the seat next to you, now in clean clothes, a towel hung around his neck, his hair wet and messy, his shirt hugging his body and biceps tight. Lord, give me strength.

“Hey! I’m the captain!” Heeseung shouted, but abided, pushing Sunghoon along and out of the rink, leaving you two to yourselves in the ambiance.

“So, what did you want to … talk about?” Jay stared at you expectantly.

“Us? I suppose, if there’s even an ‘us’ in the first place,” you gestured between you and him. “It’s just everyone’s thinking we’re together and all your past fuck buddies are up my ass for it. So—” you tried to put on the nicest smile you could muster. “—could you please, somehow spread it around that we’re not together?”

“But what if I don’t want to?”

“Jong Seong!”

“Government name and all, it’s serious,” he murmured under his breath, suddenly seeming anxious. “You’re going to kill me for this—”

“As if I’m not going to already,”

“Let me finish,” he pressed a hand on his forehead, running it further back into his hair and he let out a distress sigh. “I know you’re going to hate this but I need your favour in this. I have this hockey event next Saturday, a charity event, and I need a plus one,”

“You’re asking me out on a date basically?”

“Kinda? But not really—this is so stupid—but this event will be after a home match, so our opponents and many others from different schools will be a part of this event. The thing is…our opponent, one of their players, is dating my ex,”

“And?” you raised an eyebrow at him, urging him to continue on, his cheeks gradually turning red in embarrassment.

“They’ll be there together, and I was hoping—since we’re already in this mess—to bring you as my plus one, to try and prove to her I’m way better off without her,”

“You’re kidding,” you breathed out in disbelief. “Give me one reason why you need to prove to this girl about you being happy and taken,”

“She cheated on me multiple times while we were dating…the guy was one of them and they’re still together surprisingly,”

“Damn, I’m sorry about that,” you swallowed, a little taken aback from the fact that the infamous fuckboy had his heart broken in the past. Maybe that was the starting point of his fuckboy journey. Gosh, everything felt so cliche, you thought you were in a web series by now. “So…you want me to fake date you?”

“Why are you saying it as if the idea of dating me is an offence?”

“Jay, this isn’t some 2000s romcom, for fuck’s sake,” you snapped, your frown deepened and your blood pressure heightened. You swear you might actually explode soon.

“I’m aware,” Jay sighed, a small whine in his voice. He did seem desperate, and you wondered why out of a hundred girls that were practically lining up for this man, you just had to be the one that had to be a part of this mess with him. Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Worst of all, you were about to agree to something as dumb as this. “Help me out this once?”

“And what will I get from this?” you crossed your arms, hesitatingly giving in slowly and gradually.

“You like Juyeon don’t you?” Jay questioned all of a sudden, his features remained stoic and serious as he watched you experiencing another whiplash, cheeks turning into a shade of light pink at his bombarding question.

“W–where did you get that information from?” you demanded, completely thrown off. Look, you did say you liked him a little from his sweet smile to his nice style, and not to mention, his athletic side, but it was to Minji, not Jay. How in hell could he have this information?

“I’m not wrong am I?”

“Am I being blackmailed?” you gasped and Jay rolled his eyes, leaning further back into his seat. He wasn’t making this easier by looking good. “I don’t like like him in that type of way, I just think he’s kinda cute,”

“So, you’re interested,”

“You could put it that way, I guess?”

“How about I help you make him jealous,” 

You choked out a laugh, Jay surely succeeded in always surprisingly you with the way his mind turned. “Dude, I literally only know him from that one Chemistry class, and we were partners once. We barely talk now except some greetings,”

“That’s better than nothing,” he mumbled, his lips pressed in a flat line. “Hey, I know him more, okay? He goes to parties and so do I, I can help you get closer to him,” Jay raised his eyebrows, as if trying to convince you that was the smartest plan ever.

“You’re an idiot,”

“I don’t hear a ‘no’,” 

“Don’t push your luck,” you poked his forehead gently, letting out a deep sigh as you contemplated for a second. Future you was going to kill the present you. “Fine. But honestly, I don’t care about Juyeon,”

“I’ll try my best to repay you either way,” Jay beamed, his whole demeanour changing entirely compared to the nervous and shaking version from earlier. “So, what ground rules should we set to make it at least quite convincing?”

“No kissing, unless we are pressured into one,”

“You’re not completely objecting the idea of kissing me,”

“Believe me, I’d rather have virgin lips than kiss you,”

“Ouch,” Jay held onto his chest, feigning hurt. “Wanna try practising?”

“You have other girls to practise on anyway, no thank you,”

“But you’re my only girl now,” he shrugged, staring down at his fingers and avoiding your stare. Was he shy? You would be lying if you said he didn’t make your heart flutter slightly with his words, but you forced yourself to push those thoughts down, denying them instantly.

"Shush," you rolled your eyes, the man opposite you snickering instead. "Maybe a soft launch might work,"

"I literally called you my girlfriend in the middle of a fight, I don't think that's any part of a soft launch,"

"You're right, we've already skipped that part," you tapped at your chin, pondering thoughtfully before Jay interjected.

"You have to come to my matches,"

"Every one of them? I don't watch hockey much,"

"Just be there for show, most of the teammates' girlfriends are there and trust me, they don't care much either," he glanced over at the rink for a brief moment, then turned back to meet your eyes. "You'll fall in love with me the moment you watch me play,"

"Alright, hotshot. When's the next match?"

“This Friday,” he winked, resting an arm on the seat and casually leaning a little closer. “But before that, wanna come to a party? It’s pretty much a ‘pregame party’, that’s what they call it, but I’m sure it’s a lame excuse to just have a party in general for every week. I can pick you up though, we'll get to have our second hard launch,”

“You’re lucky I’m not feeling murderous anymore,” you snapped back, still in disbelief at yourself that you actually agreed to all this. “Pick me up at 7,” you mumbled begrudgingly, watching a smile stretched on Jay’s face.

“Say less.”

“YOU’RE DATING WHO—”

Spilling the tea to Minji on a random Wednesday morning was a chaotic decision. You couldn't help yourself from letting loose all of the information that was bottled up internally. She took everything in rather calmly and fairly, that was until Jay's name was mentioned.

It was just a day before the party, and you couldn't lie, you're starting to panic. What if you didn't know anyone there? What if you're under dressed? What if you're overdressed? What ifs stormed your mind, you were a natural overthinker after all.

"Fake dating," you corrected, cringing once the words left your mouth and you realised how ridiculous it sounded.

“I didn’t know you liked Wattpad cliches so much,”

"Shut up," you muttered half-heartedly, pursing your lips slightly. "Do you think I'll regret this?"

"Will you end up falling for him?" Minji shot back and you hadn't expected that. 

"God forbid," you chuckled, though rather nervously. Chances were low at the moment, but it wasn't completely impossible, and that was the problem. 

“This won’t be like those movies where they pretend to date and actually end up falling in love,” you laughed, trying to play off the hidden horror you had.

"This will come back and bite your ass," Minji said simply, not noticing your wide eyes and panicked gaze.

"Don't jinx it, hello!" 

"My bad," Minji shrugged nonchalantly. “How did he even convince a non party goer like you to attend one?”

“He wants to ‘hard launch’ us for a second time,”

“Cute?” Minji mused, nudging you softly, wiggling her eyebrows. "Any outfits planned?" 

"Nope," you regretted saying this because in the next second, you noticed a menacing grin on Minji's face. If there's one thing you know about her, it's that she loves dress ups, and you were about to be her next model.

Minji dragged you back to your dorm, pushing you onto the bed and ripping your closet doors open, rummaging through intensely.

"This won't do," you heard her mumble quietly before pulling out a mini skirt and a simple crop top. "Bingo,"

"You can't be serious," 

Turns out, she was. Both of the pieces have yet to be worn in a long time, so you didn’t know how it would fit you, leading up to the moment when you tried it on, you instantly felt your head pound. The skirt was God forbiddingly short, the crop top hugging tight against your body. The entirety might've looked plain, but it was a slutty plain.

You were already running late, panic and stress in your system giving you slight adrenaline as you finished up some last touches on your makeup. If Minji wasn't out for a dinner date, you would've been strangling her for the outfit and for the untimely lack of support. 

“You took quite a while in there,” Jay said the moment you entered his luxurious sleek black Mercedes. You knew he was loaded, everyone did actually, but it still managed to shock you somehow.

“I was giving myself a pep talk to not try and run away from this party,” you flashed him a sarcastic smile. 

“Haha,” Jay replied flatly, unamused. “It’ll be an easy party, don’t worry, you won’t get mauled. I’ll just introduce you around and then you go have some drinks, soon we’ll be back before you know it,”

“You’re not drinking right?”

“You think I’d like to be charged with a DUI?”

“Have you ever thought about that when you drive multiple girls home after parties?”

“It’s not nice to slut shame,”

“Whatever you say.”

The car ride to the house was quick and loud. It was calming when you and Jay were vibing to some music along the way up until the two of you started fighting over who was the best rapper in the industry, that eventually led to debating which genre is the greatest. The debate continued on even after entering the threshold, but nervousness washed over you once you were met with unfamiliar faces. 

“Pop is not even considered in this deb—”

“Jay, hold my hand,”

“What—”

“Hold my hand,” you repeated firmly, and he listened despite being in a daze, intertwining his hand in yours, instinctively pulling you closer. “We have to make this convincing, remember?”

“Right,” he squeezed your hand lightly, unknowingly giving you a hint of reassurance. “Stick by me, some of the people here are not the best,”

“Thanks, I can’t wait to get out of here,”

Jay only rolled his eyes at your words, a slight grin tugged at his lips. He held onto your hand tightly, pulling you further into the crowded house, occasionally turning his head back to check on you. “There, my hockey boys,” he nodded towards a small group by a small makeshift bar, instantly recognizing them from that day at the rink.

“What if I told you now that I have social anxiety,” you whispered into his ears, trying to give him your best pleading eyes. 

“It’ll be a little too late now,” he returned a knowing stare, clearly unfazed by your tricks. Smart bastard. “Come on, you’ve already met them anyway,”

“Y/N!” Heeseung was the one who spotted you first, waving his hand enthusiastically, Sunghoon following suit. You returned a small wave, but you tensed, feeling Jay removing his hand from yours, sneaking onto your waist instead. You were not strong enough for this, you were a woman with desires at the end of the day.

“Hey,” Jay greeted them, resting his hand on your hip, your hand unconsciously travelling to his back, his smirk at your touch going unnoticed.

“So, Y/N, is he still in ‘complicated’ status?” Sunghoon brought up, eliciting a small laugh from Heeseung, meanwhile Jay was equally confused and unimpressed at his teammates’ unseriousness.

“Don’t worry, he has upgraded,” you prodded him, passing a pleased smile to the other two.

“Will we be seeing you at our games?”

“Maybe,” you said vaguely, feeling Jay’s hand leaving your hips and sneaking lower towards the hem of your skirt and slowly pulling at it. You turned your head, meeting his eyes and at that moment, you felt something you denied over the last week. You were weak, you were definitely not God’s strongest soldier. It was bare minimum, but you still appreciated the little things. 

“Let’s go walk around,” Jay suggested, leaning close to you, his face only inches away from yours, his hand squeezing your hip gently. Who knew he was this good at acting?

“Don’t be too protective over her, Jay boy!” Sunghoon called out as he dragged you away from his friends, earning a soft laugh from you and grudging mumbles from him. 

“They tend to be quite a handful sometimes, sorry about that,” Jay said apologetically, leading you to a room full of people playing beer pong and some other drinking games. 

“Don’t worry about it, they seem fine,” you brushed him off, pressing yourself closer to his side in caution as your eyes scanned the whole room. “They don’t look like they believe the fact that you’re actually ‘dating’ someone though,”

“They once said they would be married by the time I found someone,” he scoffed, pulling you into an unoccupied coach. “Which isn’t true,” he continued, placing a pillow on your exposed thighs. “I just haven’t found the one, or just not yet. Maybe I already did and I just didn’t know, ”

“Take it easy, loverboy,” you softly punched his shoulder, making him grin a little. He was cute, you couldn’t lie about that, but your heart continued to. “You’re still young, you should be worrying about it only if you’re 35 and single,”

“You’re right,” he nodded solemnly, his attention averted away. "It's Juyeon," 

At that moment, Juyeon walked into the room, greeting some of his friends and welcoming hugs from them, the atmosphere in the room became noisier. Your gaze followed his figure, blinking quicker than usual as you suddenly felt an overwhelming sense of alarm.

"Don't drool," Jay clicked his tongue, his eyes turning fierce. What's up with this guy now?

"I'm not," you gritted out, your heart dropping slightly at the sight of Juyeon interacting with other girls. You were lying when you said you didn't care, maybe you did.

"I don't get why you like him anyway, he's a jock, a football jock," he said the last part in distaste, making it seem as though footballers were the worst on earth.

"It's called being interested, dumbass. Having someone to admire makes college life fun," you fought back, caving into Jay's touch when he draped his arm over your waist. You shouldn't be liking this skinship. You mustn't.

"He's coming over, he spotted us," Jay mumbled, flashing his smile at Juyeon's approaching figure. "Act natural,"

"Thanks for the advice," you gritted out dryly, shifting around uncomfortably.

"Yo Jay," Juyeon called out to Jay, dabbing your supposed boyfriend up, a friendly smile on his face that blinded your vision and made your heart eyes appear. Fuck.

"Sup," Jay greeted back, breathing out a quiet laugh. “Oh, this is—”

“Y/N,” Juyeon finished Jay’s sentence at once, his gaze shifted onto you now, causing you to shy under his stare. “Partner from Chemistry?”

“That’s me,” you beamed at him, clapping your hands together, absentmindedly leaning further into Jay’s hold. 

“I don’t normally see you at these type of parties,”

“Not a big party person,” you scratched the back of your neck, the feeling of awkwardness creeping up on you. You were never the best at meeting new people, though Juyeon wasn’t exactly a total stranger, but he wasn’t someone you were close to either. 

“Right,” he paused for a moment, peering back and forth between you and Jay, a slight raise of his eyebrow. “So what brings the two of you here? You’re Jay’s date for the night?”

“She’s Jay’s girlfriend, actually,” the man himself spoke beside you, his hand on your waist pulling you closer to his side, a tight smile on his face. "My girlfriend,"

You could feel heat crawling up the back of your neck, choosing to avert your attention away and see what Juyeon’s reaction was. Turns out he was grinning, he was fucking grinning? 

“Jay with a girlfriend? For real?”

Jay let out a scoff, seemingly offended by everyone’s surprise. Hell, if you didn’t know him and found out he had a girlfriend, you’ll be surprised too. “Yes, dickhead, surprise,” he grumbled, earning a chuckle from the footballer, who clearly loved irking Jay.

“Chill, good for you, man. About time,” he lightly slapped Jay’s shoulder and you sat quietly, not knowing what to say either. You really wanted to leave. “I’ll be at tomorrow’s match, see you,”

“Yeah, yeah, bye,” Jay bid a half-assed goodbye to Juyeon while you just waved at him instead, a tight lipped smile on your face. Once he was out of the picture, your head whipped to stare at the hockey player next to you, an impatient plea to leave this party written all over your features.

“Fine,” he sighed, letting you slip your hand in his. “How was all that?” he asked coolly, but you noticed a hint of displeasure in his tone, yet you waved it off again.

“I don’t know, he’s … okay, I guess,” you shrugged, truly confused about your current feelings. The thought of Jay stormed your mind. Juyeon? That’s the last J name of your concerns right now. But will you ever admit out loud that you were thinking about Jay, the man who constantly gives you headaches? Fuck no.

“Just ‘okay’?”

You hummed in response, sensing that he was a little bit more at ease after hearing your answer. He was easy to read, too easy.

“Does that make me better than him?”

“Woah, don’t get too ahead of yourself, Park,”

“Don’t hurt my ego like that,”

“Am not,”

“Come on, say I’m better, hotter and funnier than him,” he egged on, inching closer to you, a teasing grin stretched on that stupid face of his. 

“Zipping my mouth shut,” you gestured at your lips, deadpanning at him.

“You’re too afraid to admit it,”

“Whatever you say, big head,” you bumped his shoulder and he stumbled a little, narrowing his eyes at you, a challenging smirk plastered on his face. Oh no.

In the next minute, Jay swept you off your feet and threw you over his shoulder. You let out a sharp yelp, unable to process everything at once, hearing Jay’s playful laugh fill the streets in the quietness of the night. 

“You’re so dead,” you seethed, hitting his back with your utmost might, but he only cackled in response.

“Whatever you say, pea brain,” Jay mocked, earning him another hard punch on his back and this time, it actually made him wince. Choosing the safest route for himself, he kept his mouth shut.

Thus, you had no choice but to give into hanging over a hockey boy’s shoulder as the two of you ventured into the night in search of his car, not realising the mess you’ll be facing soon.

IT’S OFFICIAL. YOU'VE REACHED THE STAGE OF REGRET.

It was the next day, hockey game day, you turned up at the arena and copped a good seat. You might be wondering, ‘what’s so bad about a hockey game to the point you start regretting everything’, well if you could trade places with anybody in the world right now, you would, and that said a lot. 

Jay had greeted you for barely five minutes before the game, rushing away immediately once he saw the time, giving you an apologetic hug that almost had you convinced this was real. What he hadn’t prepared you earlier, was the fact that there was a fucking kiss cam. One look at the jumbotron and you knew you were doomed.

‘KISS CAM’ was written clearly on the screen, the music in the arena was drowned out completely and you felt your heart drop. It might’ve seemed overdramatic for you to react like this, but in reality, kissing a stranger was terrifying. Your first kiss was already a nightmare, let alone kissing someone you don’t know, what would make it better?

“Nothing will happen,” you assured yourself over and over again, unaware that somebody had just slipped in the seat beside you.

“Hey,” 

You flinched, brought out of your daze and you met Juyeon’s eyes. Good-fucking-bye to the world right now. His smile distracted you, having you muted and malfunctioning. Cool. This was cool. You’re cool. 

“Hi,” you gave him a small smile that turned out more awkward than you thought. 

“Supporting Jay today?” he nodded at the rink where the team was currently practising, your eyes wandering over to Jay’s figure.

“Him and the team. School spirit, you know?”

“Yeah,” he chuckled. “I heard about the kiss cam—” he pointed towards the screen and you wanted to close your eyes instead, but basic courtesy mattered. “—apparently for raising funds,”

Raising funds through a kiss cam? What was this? ‘The Kissing Booth: hockey edition’?

“That’s … interesting,” you uttered, nervousness laced in your voice. 

You were saved from the awkward tension just as the game started, secretly wishing you had Minji with you instead of a mouth watering football player next to you. The game was intense, effectively grabbing your attention away from your surroundings, but the flash of the kiss cam starting its quest on finding couples was distracting.

As the game progressed, you grew confident that your mind was just playing games in making you anxious and nothing would happen. Your mind eased as you joined in the cheering when the home team finally scored a goal, watching the team celebrate had you grinning, staring down at a specific number 99. 

The high soon died down and you chose to glance up at the jumbotron, the kiss cam focused on a cute couple who were weirdly making out instead of just simply kissing. PDA, yucks. It then swiftly moved on to another pair, thankfully. They were probably strangers, but being good sports, they shared a quick peck, earning some ‘awh’s from the crowd. Another change, your eyebrows furrowed, a frown tugged at your lips, was that—

It was. Your nightmare has come. For a moment you wondered if you were hallucinating, but a couple of beats later, you came to the realisation you were not. The kiss cam was focused on you and … Juyeon. When you said you were interested in him, you didn’t mean this, nope not at all. 

Embarrassingly and reluctantly, you avoided the footballer’s gaze and shook your head, feeling tripped out as you stared at your own self on the screen, catching some disappointed groans from a few people. “I have a boyfriend,” you mouthed, trying your best to seem apologetic, but Juyeon didn’t look like he wanted to back down.

“You don’t want to kiss me?” he murmured, attempting to seem as lowkey as possible. 

“I have a boyfriend, sorry,” you pressed your lips into a flat line, not enjoying this for a bit. The kiss cam swerved away to pinpoint another pair, but Juyeon was persistent.

“Come on, don’t pretend you don’t want to kiss me,”

You glared at him, your features turning sour, in disbelief at what you’ve just heard. Was he serious? “Excuse me?”

“Forget about Jay, I know how you were looking at me that night,” he whistled lowly under his breath and you scoffed, but you were caught off guard almost immediately when you saw the kiss cam lighting up in the corner of your eyes, and it zoomed into your face again. FML.

“He’ll never know,” he arched an eyebrow, welcoming the idea hugely. Scumbag. 

“I don’t stoop that low you fuck—”

Before you could jump Juyeon and curse him out, a loud crash startled you and everyone around. You jumped in your seat, your head turned towards the direction of the noise. Jay was in front of you, his fist against the glass, helmet in hand. If looks could kill, you would’ve been dead. 

Wet strands of hair stuck onto his forehead, his eyes narrowed into a death stare as it trained on Juyeon. “Fuck off,” he yelled through the glass barrier, his fist clenched. “Back off,”

The blood in Juyeon’s face was completely drained, obvious embarrassment and shame washed over him, but knowing him and his ego, he played it off, pretending as if that didn’t happen. “Whatever,” he got up from his seat and stormed off. Deserved.

You hid the small smile forming on your face, your sights redirecting towards Jay, your heart beating wildly against your chest the moment you met his eyes, softening when he mouth ‘you okay’. You nodded back at him and you could tell he instantly loosened up, returning a half smile before turning away and joining the team.

Moral of the story: don’t fall for playboys, which sounded pretty ironic considering the situation you were currently in.

The game had thankfully ended in a win for the home team, and honestly, that whole experience seemed to be years instead of just a few hours. Never again. You were glad to see Jay and everyone else cheerfully exiting the rink, taking that as the cue for you to chase after him. 

Upon arriving outside the locker room, you found yourself standing awkwardly as you waited for him to appear, greeting his friends half-heartedly when they were on the way out. Your patience was thinning and only until then, he only decided to appear, a little shocked that you were there.

“Congrats on the win,” you joined his side and walked together, letting his shoulder brush against yours softly.

“Thanks,” he mumbled, a lollipop in his mouth. You didn’t enjoy this questionable tension between the two of you, noticing his rigidness. 

“Hey!” You cut to the chase, snatching the lollipop from his lips, finally getting his attention as he turned to stare at you with wide eyes. “What was that for?” 

“Nothing,” he shrugged it off, and you didn't understand why, you could tell he was blatantly lying.

“You're acting really weird,” you narrowed your eyes at him in accusation.

“Am I?”

“Ask yourself that,” you huffed, instinctively putting the lollipop into your mouth, not bothering to care anymore. “Anyway, I think mission Juyeon is officially cancelled, he gives me the ick, didn't know he was such a big douchebag,”

“Told you so,” he shrugged, his gaze wavering from your lips to your eyes. Woah. “Keep the lollipop, I have loads,” he gulped, avoiding your eyes. 

“Drop me off?” You suggested, putting on the most convincing, sweetest smile, which somehow worked since it got Jay to grudgingly mumble a ‘yes’.

“I would give you a kiss right now if I could.” You skipped on, leaving Jay to tail behind you, your words ringing in his ears.

Maybe somewhere inside, he did wish you would.

“SEE? I TOLD YOU HE WAS A JERK,”

Minji continuously flailed her hands dramatically as you and she made your way through the campus. It was the week of the hockey event that Jay had mentioned, meaning another restless week of frat party, dress shopping, hockey match and then a fancy event. 

“Yes, yes, I know, you've made your point,” you grumbled annoyingly, having not one but two people saying the same to you. 

“It's quite cute that Jay stood up for you though,” she nudged your side, her eyes glinting. You knew what she was indicating.

“Fake dating, fake. Not real,” you threw your hands up in defeat, but internally, you were beginning to second guess if you even wanted to call it fake, maybe deep down, you didn't want it to be.

“Whatever helps you sleep at night,” Minji mumbled, but you were able to catch onto it, huffing in denial next to her. “Anyway, when are you going shopping? The event’s this weekend already,”

“Fuck, I forgot,” you brushed your hand through your hair, having another headache to add on to. “Do you have any nice fancy dresses? I'm sure Jay is ready but I'm not,”

Minji flashed a knowing smirk, she definitely had something up her sleeve. “You know I do. I'll bring them to your dorm and we're going to have a whole makeover,”

“You're not going to burn my hair this time right?”

“We'll see.”

A few days had passed and it was your second hockey pregame party, repeatedly cursing that your Thursday night was ruined once more, but seeing Jay’s pleading eyes at your doorstep, you just had to give in again. How did he have that effect on you?

“She’s going to be at the party,” Jay noted casually on the way to the house. 

“Oh,” you pursed your lips, not knowing what to say next. “What’s her name? You’ve never mentioned,”

“Sujin,”

“Her?” you gasped, eyes widened in plain shock. Out of all the girls he could’ve had his heart broken by, it had to be the infamous Instagram blogger who was known to play around. Look, you've always been a supporter of every woman's rights and wrongs, but she was way beyond any defending. 

“Yeah …” Jay sighed, his fingers drumming lightly on the steering wheel. “We were high school lovers, but things went sour in college,”

“Well, forget about her, you want to prove her wrong right? Then prove her wrong,”

“You're oddly over confident today,”

“What's wrong with confidence, Park?”

He glanced over at you briefly, a wide grin on his face as he shook his head. “Nothing. I just like to see confidence on you,”

You rolled your eyes, but something inside you twisted, finding yourself ignoring whatever feelings that sparked internally. “Are you ready for Saturday?” 

“Suit’s ready, but me? So so, I guess,”

“You sound pessimistic, don’t tell me you’re starting to regret all these,”

“Hey, now you’re just putting words into my mouth,” Jay grumbled, putting the car into park right outside of the familiar frat house. “I won’t ever regret you or this whole thing, now come on,”

You weren’t left a single second to even process the fact that he said he won't regret you. Yes, you, not just this stupid scheme, but you. Upon entering the threshold, you were met with a cup of beer thrusted into your face from a passing Heeseung, your other hand occupied by Jay’s, trying your best to make it past the crowd without stumbling over. Everything was a whirlwind.

“Fuck, she’s here,” his hold on you tightened and you followed his line of sight, your gaze landing on the over dressed Instagram model, her skirt a little too small and her heels a little too high.

“Just act normal, Jay. You said you’re over her, then you should act like that,” you yanked him close to you, walking over to the mini bar, pouring yourself a drink. “That’s her boyfriend?” you nodded at the taller man towering beside Sujin, his face contrary to the one you had in mind.

“Yeah, that’s Intak,” he said quietly, aware of the lingering ears around the two of you. “Seeing him every time we have a game against his team is revolting, I can’t believe I have to see him here too,”

“Then look away,” you pushed his face softly, earning a huff of annoyance from him. “Come on, it’ll be over in an hour,” you rubbed the side of his arm in comfort, his lips twisting into an endearing smile.

“You’re right,” Jay sighed, blinking harshly, his gaze flickering between you and your surroundings. “I’ll go find Heeseung and Sunghoon for a moment, is that okay? Will you be alright alone? You can come along too. If you want—”

“It’s fine, Jay, really,” you laughed, putting your hands up to stop him from blabbering on. “Go find them, call me when it’s time to leave,”

“I’ll come find you once I’m done,” he held onto your shoulder, pressing a hasty kiss on the top of your head before turning away to another room in search of his hockey teammates.

Safe to say you were able to find yourself a company, who turned out to be a girl you knew from your literature class. Why was she there? She didn’t know either and you thought the best was to not question further, grateful that you were not alone in this house of strangers. The clock was spinning fast, soon it was already past midnight and Jay was nowhere to be seen. You were praying that you weren’t in a remake of ‘Scream’.

The feeling of unease crept up on you and you couldn’t handle it any longer, standing up from the couch and storming into different rooms of the house, all occupied and filled with people, none of those were Jay. The last option you had was the upstairs, which lied the unimaginable behind those rooms that you were not about to explore, thank you very much!

Wandering the upstairs of a rather large frat house all alone was quite a challenge, especially when you were trying to hunt a 5’10 hockey jock, adding onto the fact that you literally and physically bumped (crashed, actually) into said hockey jock’s enemy in the corridors, shit was turning upside down.

“Fuck—sorry,” you coughed out, regretting your last sober choice of bringing your beer cup along.

“Shit—it’s fine, no worries,” Jay's enemy/ex’s boyfriend, Intak, reassured, dabbing himself off with some napkins that were miraculously lying on a table nearby.

“I feel bad, if you need it cleaned I can help,” you frowned, leaning over to see the damage you’ve caused: a yellowish stain on his once perfect white tee.

“No, it’s completely fine, shit happens,” he laughed, waving his hand, an awkward silence filling the air momentarily. “So, why are you even up here?”

“Oh—I’m finding … someone,” you gave him a tight-lipped smile. 

His eyes lit up. “Me too, actually. I can’t leave the party without them and gosh, I’m getting a headache already,” 

“Twins, I think the beer is getting to me soon,” you clapped your hands, glancing around for any signs of Jay.

“Before that happens, may I know your name first?”

You raised your eyebrows. “It’s Y/N,”

“Nice to meet you, Y/N, I’m Intak,” you accepted his handshake, trying your best to be friendly and not seem awkward. "I play in a hockey team, the one that's playing against yours for tomorrow,"

"Right," you nodded as though you hadn't already known that prior to this. "I would wish you good luck on normal occasions, but since it's against the home team … I need to keep my school spirit,"

Intak let out a small laugh. "Totally understandable," he met your eyes, a hint of sheer curiosity in them. "Do you have a date for tonight—"

"Intak?"

"Y/N?"

You, together with the hockey player, turned around to find each other's partners standing down the corridor next to one another, a look of confusion written on their faces. But you, you had anger and an obvious "what the fuck" painted onto your expressions, and it was clear that Jay had noticed it too when he came close.

"Uh—we're leaving now, bye," Jay murmured, grabbing a hold of your wrist and dragging you away, giving you only a brief second to say goodbye to Intak.

You didn't and couldn't understand what was happening, just hating the way Jay was acting. You kept your mouth shut until you were completely out of the house and walking towards the car when you yanked your hand out of Jay's hold, causing him to look back at you in a daze.

"God, you're such a dickhead!" You seethed, breathing heavily.

"What?"

"'What' was all you could say? Jay, you left me in that party alone for God knows how long and then you disappear on me just for me to find you running back to your ex? Make it make sense,"

"I didn't run back to her, Y/N, for fuck's sake," Jay ran a hand through his hair, his lips pressed into a thin line. "She pulled me away and started claiming weird shit that never happened, I wanted to leave but she kept persisting until I managed to break down the fucking doorknob,"

Silence fell between the two of you, the dark of the night consuming your thoughts and the moon was staring down at you, your mind and soul in a daze. You couldn't understand why you were feeling this way, after all, it was fake, it wasn't real.

"I believe you," you sighed, gulping down the anxiety building up within you. "Forget it, it's fine, sorry for being so worked up, it's not like we're really dating, right?"

You looked at him, noticing his eyebrows furrowed and eyes glinting with something unreadable, his mouth opened then shut, wanting to say something but nothing came out, heaving a small sigh. "You're right, it's not real anyway."

As much as you wished to forget it, you couldn't. The way he wasn't even fighting and being in denial, his words stemming sadness into your heart and reminding you again and again that it was never real to begin with. 

Fake dating was meant to be fake, wasn't it?

“I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU'VE BROUGHT ME HERE FOR EMOTIONAL SUPPORT,”

Friday night hockey was something you loved, but after what happened yesterday, you dreaded coming. 

You still remembered the tension filled air on the way back to your dorms, the silence in the car and the quiet exchange of "goodnight" haunted you. Crashing into Minji's bed having a breakdown definitely made you two come to a conclusion that you were indeed harbouring something for Jay. Were you going to straightforwardly admit it? Never.

Now, you had zero balls to be at the game alone, choosing to drag Minji along and you knew even if she was vocally complaining, she was actually enjoying the hot hockey players secretly.  

"Did you talk to Jay after yesterday night?"

"No,"

"Will you?"

"Maybe,"

"I think that's a 'yes',"

You stared pointedly at her and she shrugged, resuming her watch on the hockey players practising. You watched along as well, your eyes instinctively following Jay's figure, but then you noticed Intak on the far end as well. Somehow, you knew that this match wasn't about to end well.

"Is this seat empty?" A voice startled you from your internal monologue, snapping your head just in time to see little miss ex standing over you.

"Oh—yes," you said uneasily, grabbing your phone immediately to text Minji.

you: it's her

jiji: who

you: the girl next to me!!! that's jay's EX.

jiji: YOU'RE KIDDING

you: i wished

You exchanged a wary look with Minji, playing it off as natural as you could as you sensed Sujin sitting next to you, elbowing Minji in panic and she does the same back to you, making it look wild and weird from a third perspective. You stopped the frenzy nudging war with Minji, swallowing thickly and hoping nothing happened, but actually, something did, hooray!

“You’re Jay’s girlfriend?” you heard her asking and you turned your head slowly, meeting her blinking eyes and curious gaze.

“Yes,” you tried your best for it to sound convincing, and it seemed to have worked.

“Cool.” she whistled under her breath, returning her gaze back to the arena and you resisted rolling your eyes, biting back a snarl.

The game started in a haze, both teams trying to break one another’s defence and score a goal, yet it all failed in the end, turning it into a tie for two periods straight. You and Minji sighed in disappointment, watching the home team giving their best to not collapse there and then. Sujin, on the other hand, looked nervous throughout the game, occasionally standing up and clapping.

The third period approached in a blink of an eye, two teams eager to score and win, the tension was high and you could tell they were sweating heavy loads. It began in a peaceful and lowkey attack, but shoving and punches were seen here and there, earning entertained jeers from the crowd. You sighed, both in exasperation and stress, hoping nothing would land Jay a bad game. But everything proved you the opposite once more.

Your eyes widening in the next moment, noticing two players shoving each other and throwing gloves onto the ice, punches almost thrown but was interjected by the referee and teammates. Lord, it just had to be Jay and Intak, it was basically written in the stars, wasn’t it?

Once the game had ended, you couldn’t care less about the scoreline, listening to Minji’s brief rants on how not to fumble your emotions about Jay and stopping her halfway through, pointing to the clock as your time ticked. You were attempting to squeeze your way out when you heard a cough behind you and to your disappointment, it had to be Sujin.

“You’re aware of who I am, right?” you heard the sneer in her voice, holding in the urge to rip her hair out and instead, remained facing away from her.

“Don’t worry, I do. You’re Jay’s dumpster ex girlfriend,”

“What—”

Timing was right and you took the chance to slip away, thanking the world that you were finally miles away from Jay’s dusty ex. All of that didn’t matter though, the important aspect was finding Jay now, awkwardly speed walking to locate Jay’s whereabouts.

Upon arriving at the front of the familiar locker rooms, you patiently waited, feeling a sense of deja vu. That wasn’t all. Your anxiety was at its highest point. What were you about to say to Jay? Can you even face him? What if you pussied out and ran away—

“Y/N?” speaking of the devil …

You whipped your head around, Jay’s curious eyes meeting your panicked ones, your whole body frozen to the spot as he approached you, taking a cautious step at a time. 

“Are you alright? Were you hurt?” you couldn’t help it, after seeing the minor fight on ice, your first natural instinct was to ask him this. Jay lowered his head, hiding a smile that was threatening to appear. A small sense of relief washed over you.

“I’m fine … thanks. Just a small conflict,” he muttered, then proceeded by a brief moment of silence, where you swore it felt like forever considering how it was just quiet stares and exchanges of friendly smiles, and you couldn’t really handle it much longer, being the one to break first.

“Jay, I—uhm—yesterday, the party thing, I’m sorry about it, I don’t want that to make things awkward between us,” you gesture wildly at the space between you and him, his eyes following your movements. “And it’s wrong for me to say those stuff,”

“It’s partially my fault too. I’m the one to blame to ditch you,”

“I’m the one who accused you of shit and I feel really bad for assuming something I don’t know. I just got worked up, I’m sorry,”

He took hold of your hands, grasping onto them tightly as though he was fearing you’d run away. “Y/N, do you trust me?”

Do you trust him?

In a heartbeat, the answer was an obvious ‘yes’. You had to admit, you did initially find him annoying and a total fuckboy that you knew would break your heart, but as time passed, you couldn’t care anymore. Even if it meant your heart was on the line, at least you knew Jay was genuine about you; at the very least, there was someone who would stand up for you, listen to your rants about music, and put you first. 

“Yes,”

Jay pulled your hand, practically yanking you towards him, landing on his chest with a thud and a heart thumping crazily, butterflies swarmed your stomach and you could feel heaven getting close, aka you dying in Jay’s arms. He pressed his head on the top of yours, feeling his heart beating against your chest, his cologne no stranger to you now. 

“When I said you’re my girl, I meant it, it doesn’t matter if it’s fake or not, I’ll always care for you, and I will never ever hurt you, so please—” an underlying mix of desperation, hurt and care were laced in his voice, and you were weak, weak for him. “—trust me, and even if it means I need to earn it or whatever, I will,”

“Jay…” you faltered, resting your chin on his shoulder, arms wrapped around his waist. “I’m sorry for not trusting you, I should’ve heard you out, of course I do trust you,”

Jay was silent for a second, whispering a quiet ‘thank you’ and pressing a swift kiss on your forehead, which didn’t get completely unnoticed by you, but you decided to not say anything about it, letting yourself melt into his arms. Internally, you were conflicted, torn between whether your feelings about him were mutual, you were scared, petrified that you’ve already broken the first and most important rule of fake dating:

Do not catch feelings.

jayjay: DUMPSTER EX? you’re soo foul for that

you: truth hurts unfortunately :/ you never told me what happened that day

jayjay: it was stupid, he just started attacking me, for OBVIOUS reasons, so i couldn’t help defending back :( 

you: i’m glad you didn’t get your ass beat

jayjay: gasp you have zero confidence in me!

Tossing your phone to the side was a hard task considering how Jay was basically spamming your message inbox, ranging from panicking about the event that was happening at night to gossiping about exes, he was certainly experiencing many emotions. You were similarly distraught, having a hard time choosing between a black dress or a red one, placing them in front of you for evaluations that just ended up failing.

“By the time we’re done I think the party would’ve ended,” Minji groaned from her side of the room, lounging on her bed as she watched you glancing between the two dresses.

“Not helping,”

“I literally chose the black one and you told me, in your words, ‘what if I looked better in red’ girl, that’s your problem now,”

“I'm indecisive and you know that,” you mumbled sourly, picking the black dress in the end. You were grateful for the fashion Gods, the dress was an absolute banger and you didn’t understand how you even picked it out, you just knew. 

“See? I told you,” Minji whistled, manhandling you to do a forceful 180 turn for her, and from the way her face morphed into a smile, you could tell she was pleased. "Jay would drop dead when he sees you," she squealed.

"God I hope not," you joked, squeezing onto your clutch tightly.

jayjay: im outside :)

"He's here," you hissed, becoming frantic all of a sudden, double checking everything at the last minute before slipping your heels on, making sure to give Minji a small kiss on the cheek too and off you went dashing towards Jay's car, noticing his figure faced away, leaning against his car as you got nearer.

"Hi," you panted, masking the fatigue and exhaustion from the amount of panic and stress you went through in those 5 minutes.

You could see Jay glancing up from his phone, then shoving it into his back pocket and turning his head around, his burning eyes locked with yours. A smirk slowly stretched onto his lips, a mischievous glint in his gaze as he sweeped your figure. You were no better, eyes shamelessly boring into him, scanning his attire and you swore your legs were shaking.

Him in a plain black suit shouldn’t be affecting you, but it was. The prada tie hung around neck was equally distracting, how was he making something so simple seem breathtaking? You hated him for it, yes, you absolutely do. His hair was styled back and a single loose strand hung over his forehead, practically challenging the Zayn Malik look.

“Hey,” his hand instinctively reached for your waist, bringing you closer to him. “You look amazing—you’re amazing,” he breathed out, completely transfixed.

“You look great too,” that’s a lie, he looked more than just great.

“Getting complimented by you for once? Honoured,”

“You should be,” you snickered, letting Jay guide you to the passenger side and adoring the way he opened the car door for you. Although it was a small gesture, you appreciate it greatly considering how literally no man had done this for you before. Known fuckboy Park Jong Seong was proving you wrong day by day.

The drive there began quietly and you knew it was going to take a while since it’s quite a distance away, fearing it would be awkward silence once more, but the moment Jay had switched the radio on, the music discourse started, then it progressed into movies. 

“I can’t believe you hate rom coms!” you gasped, staring at him in horror as he fumbled to defend himself.

“Look, I didn’t say hate, but it’s just pointless,” 

“You’re telling me you’ve never watched the classic rom coms before?” you dramatically leaned away from him, earning a huff.

“No,” he grumbled.

“That’s criminal,” you exclaimed, a little evil idea forming in that brain of yours. “I’m making you watch them,”

“You’re so not,”

“Oh, I am,” you beamed, clapping your hands together. “There are ‘How to Lose a Guy in 10 days’, ‘Notting Hill’, ‘Pretty Woman’, the list goes on and on and Julia Roberts is literally a rom com legend—oh my God, please tell me you’ve watched Mamma Mia before,”

“Of course I did! I’m not that bad,”

“I’m glad,” you let out a sigh of relief, sinking into your seat and making a mental note to write down a list of rom coms to watch with Jay. A rom com marathon date with Jay, cute. The rest of the ride, you listened to Jay’s hilarious rants about the pizzas he tried and the interesting stories from his trips abroad.

The venue was absolutely spacious and screamed sponsored. It was at some five star hotel, the parking was already a clear indication that it wasn’t a hotel to be taken lightly in consideration. Even Jay was surprised, his head twisting and turning to look at the small details of everything, his hand in yours and it genuinely felt like you were dragging a curious child around.

“Didn’t know the hockey associations had this in them,” he cooed, entering the ballroom of the hotel, a big hockey banner hung at the stage, round tables littered here and there, a huge space in the middle for the dancefloor and as for the cherry on top, a wide array of food and drinks displayed freely. Maybe you didn’t fully regret coming.

Despite all that, you only managed to recognise one or two people from the hockey team, but the rest of them were plain strangers, players from different schools that only Jay could probably recognise. You simply felt uneasy.

“Remind me what this is for again?”

“Literally nothing, it’s the same as the frat party but classier I suppose,”

“Real charming,”

“Come on,” Jay said quietly, his hand resting on the small of your back, guiding you towards your designated table, actually glad for once when you saw the hockey team, including Heeseung and Sunghoon. “It’s going to be over soon and hey, you can always talk to the guy’s dates,”

“Will I be seeing their dates the next time?” you arched a quizzical eyebrow at him, knowing their reputation, you wondered if this was a one night exclusive kinda thing, but you weren’t there to judge.

“Hard to say,” Jay frowned.

“Wait—” you paused, placing an arm on Jay’s shoulder. “What about us? This whole deal was for tonight, but what happens after?”

“I don’t think it’s the right time to discuss this right now, Y/N,” Jay glanced back and forth between you and his friends at the table, making sure his voice was extra hushed. “Let’s just survive tonight first, and we’ll talk about the rest after. Capiche?”

You nodded, but deep down, you could tell that talk was already dreaded by the both of you. You’d hate to admit it, but after being with Jay for a while, you were not willing to let go. What if he didn’t feel the same and you’ll just end up being those clingy girls he dated before? It was such a wrong time to think about all these when you’re in the middle of some stupid event, but your mind has its way to put you off, always.

“You okay?” Jay was close, his eyes scanning your face for any signs of emotions. It definitely helped in snapping you out of your daze, and it took your utmost willpower to not shy away or kiss him at that exact moment, he was so pretty, painfully pretty when he was up close for you to be able to capture his every feature. 

“Yeah,” you breathed out, squeezing his shoulder lightly before looping your arm around his. “I’m a little hungry,”

“Me too,” Jay groaned, his head turning over to where the buffet was, evidently displaying heart eyes. “I’ll go get us some, you should join them first, and save me a seat too, please,”

“‘Please’? That’s a first from you,”

“Do you want your food or not?”

“You’re so romantic whenever you threaten me,” you shooed Jay away, forcing him to fetch some food while you trudged your way towards the table, Heeseung and Sunghoon nodded at you when you caught their eyes.

"Y/N," the two hockey players regarded you, their dates giving you friendly smiles and you took a seat next to Heeseung's date.

"Heeseung, Sunghoon," you raised your eyebrows. "And the ladies," you have to admit it, at least they had great tastes.

Heeseung and Sunghoon introduced you to their dates, one was Chaewon and the other was Kazuha, both of them being the nicest people you've ever met and you swore you were about to ditch Jay for them instead.

"Hey," Jay finally appeared, his hands were occupied by two plates and thankfully, he was smart enough to fill them up to the brim. He slipped into the empty seat next to you, acknowledging his friends and their dates.

“This is a first,” Heeseung noted thoughtfully, catching both you and Jay off guard.

“Hm?” Jay hummed, passing you the utensils.

“Don’t ‘hm’ me. This is literally my first time seeing you treat a girl like this,”

Jay stared back at his friends as if they were insane, you just stayed amused. “You’re making me sound like I’ve treated other girls like a dickhead,”

“You know what I mean,” 

You didn’t. But it seemed Jay did, silently sighing underneath his breath and shrugging Heeseung’s words off, turning to you instead. “I got you some strawberries, I remembered you mentioned loving them once,”

There was a tug at your heartstrings, it was your absolute weakness: people remembering your favourite things; Jay most definitely had a great way to get into your heart and mind. He was slowly but surely ticking off the boxes on the list you’ve created in your head, titled ‘things Jay is forbidden to do so that I WON’T end up liking him’ and he was proving you wrong by checking them off one at a time, damn it.

The food wasn’t the best but the company surely did help. The whole of the hockey team was cracking jokes around the table, you were laughing until your stomach was hurting, the atmosphere high and wild, you were too busy trying not to choke at the jokes to notice that you were practically leaning onto Jay’s side, shoulders touching and you could feel the warmth emanating from his body.

What’s a fancy event without a speech at the end of the night? Other than that boring part, you were relieved to hear there was at least a dance to end the night off on a high with, since the dance floor was there for a reason. The team around the table started dispersing in pairs, until it was only you and Jay left. 

“Were you waiting for me to ask?” Jay teased, his eyes lingering on you.

“Isn’t that how it’s supposed to go usually?” you mused, raising an accusing eyebrow at him and he stifled a laugh. 

“I’m playing with you. I was waiting for the other’s to leave first so that I could be alone with you—” he bumped your shoulder gently with his, “—and ask you personally,” he stood up from his seat, the soft glow from the lights shone across his face, alighting his delicate features, he looked like a fantasy, too good to be true, and maybe he was. “Would you like to dance?” 

“I would love to,” you accepted his hand, allowing him to lead you to the dancefloor and you suddenly felt nervous, hoping you wouldn’t end up tripping or stumbling, or worse, stepping on Jay’s toes. Somehow, he would always sense your distress and this time, it was the same. 

“Don’t be nervous, I won’t start hoisting you up like those Disney shows,” he said with his recognizable playful smile that you’ve grown used to. 

You were facing him now, his hand not leaving yours and only tightening its grip, pulling you in closer and closer until you were only mere inches away from him, noses almost touching. The other hand of his rested on your waist, yours on his shoulder, eyes not leaving one another. The lights were dimmed down, slow music was playing in the background and you swore you saw something sparked in his gaze as you two started moving to the rhythm. 

“I might’ve said it earlier already but genuinely, you’re absolutely breathtaking,” Jay whispered, his voice low and his gaze piercing.

“Have my love potions finally worked?” you smiled, hoping and praying that Jay wouldn’t notice the slight tinge of pink rising to your cheeks.

“I think they did,” Jay nodded slowly, biting his lip for a moment before leaning even more closer, space was basically nonexistent between you two now. “I might want to keep you forever now, keep you by my side and never let you go,”

Could this be his answer? An answer to your countless doubts and thoughts that piled in your mind. This was stupid, he was stupid. Stupidly handsome and charming it had you going insane and you thought hockey jocks wouldn’t have this effect on you, guess you were wrong all along.

“Really?” you breathed out, barely audible, but expectant. 

“I don’t think I was ever joking,” 

“I—”

“Jay!” Sunghoon’s voice boomed through the crowd and you could see the hope drain from Jay’s face, his eyebrows furrowed and features twisted into annoyance. “Dude, I heard there’s some free booze that costs thousands! Can we please go check it out—am I interrupting something here?”

“You think?” Jay seethed out, taking off his suit’s blazer and placing them over your shoulders. It was something small, maybe even insignificant to others, but to you, it meant a lot, and you were hoping no one noticed your slight shyness after. 

“It’s fine,” you placed a reassuring hand on Sunghoon’s shoulder. “You can whisk him off for the night, but don’t make him drunk,”

“Got it,” Sunghoon showed you two thumbs up, throwing his arm around Jay's shoulder. 

“I’ll see you later? Call me if you need anything,” 

“I’ll be okay, I have Chaewon and Zuha here,”

Jay only silently nodded, begrudgingly following his friend but making sure to turn back and take a last peek of you before fully disappearing away. You were left alone standing in the midst of the dancefloor, feeling a pair of eyes on you and you knew exactly who it was, Sujin.

Maybe this whole plan worked too well, it had you totally forgetting its original objectives and you couldn’t tell if it was a good or bad thing. All you knew was that you needed a long and deep talk with Jay and whatever he said earlier definitely had you on the edge all night while he was somewhere getting wasted. Hey, someone had to be the responsible one, and it happened to be you.

“You’re telling me Heeseung spilled a drink over a girl a few days ago?”

You found yourself giggling and messing around with Chaewon and Kazuha, the three of you sharing odd stories of one another and it evolved into gossiping about your own dates. Chaewon turned to you, a cheeky grin wide on her face.

“You and Jay are dating right?” she nudged you playfully, Kazuha followed with a smile.

“I guess so?” you threw your hands up, sipping from a drink you didn’t really like but still endured.

“You seem unsure—oh wow, did he never confirm it between you two?”

“No, not that—” it was that, it was complicated. “It’s just something’s bugging me,”

“What is?” the two girls leaned in closer. 

“Just, the other day at a party, I saw him coming out of a room with his ex and I got mad—”

“Rightfully so,” 

“I heard his explanation and I felt bad for jumping to conclusions,”

“Oh, honey, it’s our first instinct, you don’t have to beat yourself up for it,”

“Yeah, I know, I do trust him, he didn’t seem to look like he had just freshly made out with her or anything, but something in me just doesn’t feel like I’ve fully made peace with this whole thing,”

“Which means?”

“I don’t know exactly, I think I’m either super paranoid or simply scared something bad might happen,” 

“I might’ve not been with Sunghoon for long enough and I don’t even think we’re a thing, but I’ve hung out with him and Jay included, and it’s enough for me to say that Jay is a good guy. He might be a well known fuckboy at first encounter, but the more you got to know him, you’ll realise he’s actually the sweetest and nicest guy ever,”

“Excluding his reputation,” Chaewon added thoughtfully.

“Excluding that,” Kazuha repeated. “But he probably changed, I don’t see him at many parties anymore after he got with you. It’s cheesy to say but I think you might’ve changed that man,”

“Mhm,” Chaewon nodded along, placing a hand on your thigh and giving you a comforting pat. “Please don’t let some ex overwhelm your thoughts and sever your relationship, I’ve been there and it sucked, believe me. I see the way he looks at you, I can tell he likes you a lot, I really don’t wish anything to happen between you two,”

“Plus, the three of us needs to hang out more, go on dates together, it’ll be fun,”

“Agreed,” 

You broke into a smile, laughing softly and leaned into Chaewon’s embrace. “I know we’ve barely met but would it be too soon to say I love you guys?”

“Never,” the two girls snickered in unison. 

The night gradually passed without your knowledge, time practically nonexistent when you spoke to your new found besties, only noticing how late it was when you saw people slowly making their way to the exit, hand in hand with their partners, and you thought of Jay. Please don’t be high or drunk somewhere, or just both in general.

“God, look at the time, should we go find them?” Kazuha pointed out, Chaewon stretching her arms out beside her while you readjusted yourself uncomfortably in this dress. 

“We really should, they’re probably drunk or something. Come on,” Kazuha pulled you up and it took your utmost strength to not collapse from the pain, all thanks to your killer heels you were now wincing everytime you walked. Beauty is pain indeed.

It didn’t take long for the three of you to spot the hockey guys, distinguishing Sunghoon’s glorious silver hair that shone particularly brighter under the lights from the mirrorball. Although they seemed sober still, you could tell they were beginning to be at their wits end, but forget about them, Jay was nowhere in sight and you couldn’t help feeling unease.

“Where’s Jay?”

“Oh, Jay?”

“Yes, Jay,” you folded your arm, staring expectantly at them.

“He got a call or something just ten minutes back, he said he was supposed to be back soon, as in right now, but he’s not here,” Heeseung said, trying to take a swig of his cup before it was swatted away by Chaewon. “He did go that way,” he pointed at the door that led out to the terrace.

“I’ll go get him,”

“Do you need any of us to help?” 

“I’ll be fine … for now,” you gave them a smile of assurance, but you yourself were far from being assured.

Trudging your way past the dispersing crowd, you were wondering where Jay was, silently cursing him out as you continued your way even if your shoes were killing you. Never again. The terrace was a nice place to getaway, the open space looked out to a night sky that was illuminated by skyscrapers and stars, plus the cool night breeze made it even better. 

The area was wide, tables and chairs littered here and there, but there was no five feet ten hockey player anywhere. You decided to walk around a little bit more, pulling your phone out and dialling Jay’s number, praying he was somewhere near. There was no way this would be a second reenactment of the party at the beach except this time it’s actually a real scary movie, right?

Wrong. 

The moment you rang Jay, you managed a sigh of relief once you heard a ringtone sounding from a distance away, so as anyone would, you followed it, turning around a corner and you saw Jay’s back, elation filled your heart, but before you could even shout his name, your perfect bubble burst.

Jay wasn’t alone, no, he was with someone, a girl. You squint your eyes and you swore your knees turned into jelly in that second. Sujin, the dumpster ex, pulled him into a kiss. A mix of countless emotions swelled in you, whether it was anger, shock or sadness, all you knew was that you needed to get out right now. You couldn’t believe it, Jay, the guy you actually considered was doing this. Maybe trusting him was the worst idea you could ever conjure up your entire life.

“Fuck me,” you cursed out, maybe a little too loudly because it definitely did make Jay stumble back from his ex, turning around to meet your eyes and you could tell he was not expected you here, hell you weren’t even expecting yourself to be in this foolish position.

“What—Y/N?” Jay somewhat looked too disoriented, unaware of what was happening as though he had just woken up 10 years later. But you couldn’t care less, you were hurt and you weren’t about to pretend nothing had happened and start acting jolly good. No, you weren’t going to stand there to let the scene before you swallow you whole, no way, you were going to leave this situation, this stupid event and this entire agreement. 

You stormed away, not daring to look back, mustering every bit of courage you had to swallow down a sob and remain prideful, even if it meant you had to fake it till you made it. Hurt wasn’t a stranger to you. You’ve experienced hurt in many forms. Physically, when you fell down on the rough rocky road; emotionally in terms of family, friends, love. But this was a hurt that resembled a deep cut, the feeling of being stabbed in the heart haunted your soul.

“Y/N, wait,”

Fuck, not here, not now, not when you were inside and standing in the middle of the room. Even though there was barely any one here by now, the guys from Jay’s hockey team remained, including Heeseung and Sunghoon, you were not ready to confront or be confronted.

“No, Jay, no ‘wait’,” you put your hand out, distancing yourself away from him, but you could still smell the alcohol in his breath. You wished and hoped he was sober enough for this, because in the next hour you were going to be the one drinking to death instead. 

“I can explain—”

“Can you?”

“What?”

“Can you explain this time? Is it just a drunken mistake? Is that what you were going to say?”

“For fuck’s sake, Y/N, we aren’t even dating,” 

Heads turned, you could sense people’s attention on the two of you now, but you were far from caring about that, not when Jay’s words felt exactly like a dig at your already fragile heart. God, you were so so stupid and naive.  

“Say it again,” the words came out in a whisper, your lips trembling. “Say it again, say how we were never real, how all of this was just a fucking scheme to get back at your ex, and ha—!” you threw your hands up, swallowing down a lump in your throat, “it worked, didn’t it? I ended up falling for your tricks and I ended up falling for you too, funny isn’t it?

Jay’s face twisted upon digesting your words, but you went on.

“I should’ve known that you were using me all along just to get back with her…” you faltered, your voice eventually failing you.

“Y/N, come on…” he said weakly, but you just shook your head.

 “Go back to her,”

“Don’t you get it? Fuck, I’d choose you over her, any day, any time. I’d choose you over everyone God damn it. Can’t you see that?” 

Your mouth fell open for a second, but nothing could come out as a response.

To say that you were bewildered was an understatement indeed, you were absolutely stunned speechless. The man before you, despite looking in a daze from God knows how much alcohol he had consumed, showed that his eyes said otherwise, staring back at you with desperation, longing, pining and sadness. Your heart could only take so much.

“Goodnight, Jay.”

What pained you more was the fact that he didn’t even try after that. No, he didn’t call for you nor did he stop you from leaving like those scenes from your favourite rom coms, he just decided to let you go. 

At one point, you really wished someone would come out and yell ‘this is a prank’ at you, but obviously, no one did. This whole thing was basically a reenactment of Cinderella, except it was a modern day and much more angsty version of every kid’s favourite movie. 

Of course, you happened to be Cinderella and he was Prince Charming, the clock struck midnight, you were leaving him in a haste and he was left stranded alone in the middle of a dance, how ironic. 

Oh, how you wished you were able to hide away from your own Prince Charming like the old mediaeval days.

“ARE YOU GOING TO CONTINUE CRYING OVER ‘HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN 10 DAYS’?”

“Leave me alone,”

“It isn’t a good coping method,”

Somehow, it was already almost a week since that night. You remembered calling a cab in the dead of the night (dumb idea) and phoning Minji the whole way sobbing till the point where the driver had to pull over. You were pathetic and even a stranger could tell so, but you know what, he was nice about it and that’s the positives you’d take from that.

“And it’s ironic how I actually did somewhat lose a guy too,” you tried laughing, but it only sounded like a choke, Minji shaking her head sympathetically at you. 

Speaking about Minji, she definitely wasn’t pleased to hear what had happened. Knowing her, you knew she was about to say ‘I told you so’ but seeing you in your pathetic state, she kept her mouth zipped and quiet, letting you into her bed and having a sob session. It was a crazy night.

“When will you hear him out—did you even hear him out in the first place?” Minji eyed you accusingly and you began cowering under her intense gaze.

“No…”

“Y/N,” Minji sighed, shifting closer to you. “I know the whole picture is super messy and totally off putting, but what if it was an accident?”

“Him kissing his ex is a pretty clear picture to me, how would it be an accident?” you wrapped your blanket tighter around you, mumbling disheartedly.

“What if he fell on her or something?”

“Now you sound absolutely ridiculous,” you scoffed.

“What I really mean is, you should go and talk it out with him, if not, this thing will just drag on and you’ll hurt more,”

“I don’t think I’m ready, the wound’s still fresh,”

“I get it,” Minji placed her head on your shoulder, snuggling on your side. “It takes time, and I don’t think he’s ready either.”

Jay wasn’t ready, in fact he thinks he’s never going to face you again.

The moment he watched you slip away from him that night, he knew it was best to just let you go. Or so he thought. Best believe he got an earful from both Heeseung and Sunghoon, not to mention their dates. He could still remember the bursts of disbelief from them, the amount of ‘it was fake?’ and ‘what did you do?’ rung through his head till now, where he stared blankly back at the rink, sitting silently on one of the seats in the stands.

“It’s barely 24 hours and it’s also a Sunday, what are you doing here?” the team’s captain boomed through the empty arena, approaching Jay and eventually taking a seat next to him.

“Taking my mind off … things, what are you doing here?” Jay regarded Heeseung for a moment.

“I figured you’re here,” 

Jay nodded at Heeseung’s words, silence eventually filled the space between them. It was one of those moments where they knew something was wrong, but no one wanted to speak up about it.

“Are you not going to tell us what happened? Or did you simply decide to kiss your ex?” Heeseung broke the ice, coming off slightly harsh, detesting the silence from Jay. He knew this wasn’t the best friend he trusted his life with, the Jay he knew wasn’t a cheater, even if the relationship wasn’t real.

“Would you even believe me?”

“I would, I’ve known you for years, there’s no way you’re doubting my trust for you,” Heeseung rested his hand on Jay’s shoulder, giving him a reassuring squeeze.

Jay ran his hand across his face, blinking momentarily before sighing deeply. “I wasn’t the one who kissed her. I don’t know what happened to lead up to that, but I swear she suddenly turned me around and pressed herself onto me. I was just chilling outside for fresh air,”

“You’re kidding,”

“If I was I wouldn’t be here at all,”

“Have you confronted Sujin?” 

“Kind of? If you count screaming at her and telling Intak about it as a confrontation, then yes,” Jay was fidgeting with his fingers, his eyes trained on the rink. “I think Intak broke it off with her after,”

“Deserved,” Heeseung mused, a small smile on his face, karma truly worked wonders. “Now that’s settled, what about Y/N? I still can’t believe you roped her into a fake dating scheme just for that event,”

“Alright, alright, I’ve done some dumb shit and this was one of them, I know,” Jay admitted, throwing his hands up in defeat. “And I know I’ve hurt her … a lot, that’s why I don’t know how I can ever face her again,”

“I don’t understand why you didn’t chase after her that night,”

“I admit I did pussy out a little—”

“‘A little’?”

“Shut up,” Jay narrowed his eyes at his captain, who stared back, equally unamused. “I thought letting her go was the best choice, I was scared of hurting her more,”

Heeseung’s gaze softened, remaining quiet as he listened to his best friend opening up. Heeseung had these types of deep talk with Jay many times before, but this time, it was different. Being the one who stuck alongside Jay since his first breakup to now, he was the clearest when it came to Jay and his feelings. Over the years of witnessing Jay and his casual one nights, Heeseung expected it to last until the very day Jay retires from hockey, but your sole existence proved him wrong, and it definitely proved Jay wrong as well.

“Jay, do you like her?” Heeseung said after a while, catching the latter off guard.

“I–I–” Jay stammered, his body rigid and thoughts were circling in his mind. He didn’t just like you, he knows he’s fallen for you, you were the first girl to ever caught his eyes way before he even got to talk to you. 

He remembered it clearly, you were the one who called hockey stupid in front of his face, oblivious to the fact that he played the sport. He was injured at that time, sitting in the stands and watching his team play when he heard your voice complaining, your then boyfriend next to you. Offended Jay was once he heard the insult, though he was fascinated by you, but it was just his fuckboy side talking and he ended up staying silent instead.

Next thing he knew, he was all recovered and you were in the crowd, your face blank, the seat next to you was empty. Jay assumed it was a break up, something in him was giddy and he went on to score a hat trick that night. After all that, people might assume he would’ve gotten your number already, right? Nope. He never had the guts to and you stopped coming to games, only appearing once in a few months, until that fateful night at the beach.

“I do like her, fuck,” Jay threw his head back, leaning into the seat and his hands on his face, swallowing deeply as if he was in trouble, maybe because he was. How was he going to tell you he liked you and confront you about that night? There were two big stones thrown at his head. "I like her so much till the point where I think the amount of denial I had is turning into delusions instead,"

"So, you've reached insanity, got it," 

"God, I haven't been romantically in love with many girls before, but I'm pretty sure this is what being in love feels like, right … ?" 

Heeseung stared at Jay's pathetic expression, sighing deeply, clapping his back. "It's different for everyone but I can guarantee that you're on the right track, buddy,"

"Okay," Jay said breathlessly and nodded blankly, seeming as though he had just freshly figured out his feelings, putting the missing pieces into his puzzle. "Got it, but how do I apologise to her now?"

"What do you mean? Just go up to her and talk, say sorry and explain," 

"I feel like that's not enough,"

A sudden spark alighted in Heeseung's eyes, a shiver equally went down Jay's spine when he witnessed that before him. Lee Heeseung and his ideas were a mix of trouble and sometimes success, mainly trouble. “You know, Sunghoon pitched this idea to me yesterday, he said something about this is how you get the girl,”

The mention of Sunghoon's name and his idea didn't help at all.

“Write her an apology on our jumbotron,”

“You're insane,”

“And we happen to have access to it,”

“... tell me more.”

YOU WERE REGRETTING YOUR CHOICE OF AGREEING TO HEESEUNG AND SUNGHOON’S INVITE.

Hockey games were never up your alley, they knew that, but somehow they still managed to pull you into attending their game, even after what had happened. They did offer to bring you out for a luxurious buffet and you guessed it was their way of an apology, not passing up on it either.

“This better be worth it,” you grumbled under your breath, settling into your seat, glancing down at the rink, making it a strenuous effort to not stare at him. Ladies, do not chase, attract. You were not about to go running after Jay, nope, never.

No matter how hard you tried suppressing the thought of Jay, it lingered nevertheless. You wondered when he would talk to you again, or if he ever would, and being the most stubborn person you were, you weren’t going to confront him despite the need of an explanation clawing at your deepest desires. 

The first and second period rolled by mindlessly and you were starting to be at your wits end, reminding you why you barely ever attend hockey games after your ex, but at least the home team was leading. The third period was slightly more thrilling thanks to the small fight between two players, enraging you and the crowd, but once the puck landed on Jay’s end of the stick, everyone was on their feet, watching him zoom past the defensemen.

Without saying, Jay scored the game’s winning goal, the crowd going wild. You couldn’t help smiling, the whole team engulfed him wholly, making you let out a small giggle, and you had to admit, times like this where teams win crucial games do make you happy. Meanwhile, what you hadn’t noticed was the fact that Jay was glancing up at the crowd, his eyes searching for your figure. 

On the other hand, what you did notice was the jumbotron. A video of Jay doing his celebration flashed big on the screen, a giant ‘GOAL’ next to his head, but there was another line of words under that caught your attention at once, knowing it was directed at you. ‘I’m sorry and I miss you. I’ll wait for you, even if it’s a lifetime. Please come back to me.’ Totally not heartbreaking and gut wrenching for you! 

Screw being a cold hearted girl boss, all you wanted was to run back to him. 

Slinging your bag onto your shoulder, your mind was in a mess as you made your way out, squeezing past people and mumbling apologies in return. You mentally made a list of things you were going to do. First, run back to the dorms. Second, cry. Third, figure shit out. Just to make matters messier, your journey out wasn’t the smoothest, especially when you had to bump into Jay’s dumpster ex. What great timing this was.

“Y/N?” Sujin was shocked to see you, but you were clearly unimpressed.

“You still have the guts to turn up in front of me? In here? In a school you don’t go to?”

“I–I just wanted to talk to you,” 

“Me? What’s there to say?” you crossed your arms, staring expectantly at her. 

“Look, Jay didn’t kiss me, I kissed Jay, you get it?” 

You blinked. Were you supposed to get it? As much as you wished you didn’t, you did, and your mind turned into a worse state of mush. God rest your soul, you were about to pull someone’s hair out.

“What?” you exclaimed incredulously, furiousness crawling into your system. “So, you’re telling me you basically threw yourself onto him?”

“I suppose?”

“Wow, you really are a freaky ex, not freaky in a good way either,” you gestured at Sujin, a sick feeling in your stomach. It was never Jay’s fault, but his dumpster ex, and maybe all along he was trying to explain his side, yet you didn’t listen. Now, you felt like an idiot and an asshole. “You can stay in the dumpster and never return. You’re sick and twisted and I hope you’ll never turn up and harass Jay ever again, you got it? Or else I’ll curse you into being single forever,”

“I—”

You didn’t let her finish, you couldn’t bother to do so, instead you turned away, speed walking towards the locker rooms that unknowingly became yours and Jay’s meeting spot. Heart beating quick, your feet stumbling from walking too fast, your breath heaving, you were getting anxious. By the time you were standing in front of the locker room, sweat was trickling down the side of your face, whether it was from pure anxiety or just walking, you didn’t know. All you knew was that you needed to talk to Jay.

“Y/N, what brings you here?” Heeseung had his hands in his pockets, headphones around his neck, looking fresh off the shower as he greeted you. “I know Sunghoon and I invited you for dinner but I don’t think it’s tonight—”

“Where’s Jay?”

“Jay?” Heeseung repeated, he didn’t seem like he was believing what he had heard. You resisted the urge to roll your eyes to the back of your head. 

“Are there other ‘Jay's' that you know?”

“Uh—no,” Heeseung stammered, shaking his head as if he’s trying to shake his dizziness away. “Jay left already, Y/N,”

“Oh,” it was obvious how deflated you became, the drop in your voice and disappointment written all over your face. Heeseung gave you an apologetic smile, but you could only manage a small wave of goodbye and a quiet bid of goodnight before turning back to the original path to the exit. 

To say you felt frustrated, embarrassed, sad was an understatement, those words would never amount to the real emotions you were feeling. You were a mess, your love life was in a big distress and practically crumbling apart. The walk home couldn’t be more depressing than usual, can’t it?

Taylor Swift playlists to sob to, a tub of strawberry ice cream, a random rom com were all going to be your biggest hug of the night.

“GODS, THIS IS MISERABLE,”

A tub of half eaten ice cream sat sadly on your bedside table, a 90s romcom remained playing in the background. You couldn’t help frowning at the sight of the two leads falling in love, everything felt pathetic at this point.

You truly did stick to your words. Arriving back to an empty dorm room, courtesy to Minji for staying over at her boyfriend’s place, you practically had the whole dorm to yourself, meaning a space of free self loathing, you ran to your bed and plummeted into it. It took everything in you to not let out a blood curdling scream, instead you just took your laptop out and put on your favourite movie.

It was still early, midnight was barely approaching, so you were glad to be able to stay awake longer. It began raining heavily outside, a perfect sign for you to be in your sheets, reading your unfinished book that you’ve left hanging since months back. The whole scene of you being in bed on a rainy Friday night truly reflected a part from a romcom, how ironic it was.

In the midst of ‘16 Candles’ playing loudly on your laptop, the doorbell rang out of the blue. You froze, pausing the movie, slight paranoia creeping onto you. Right, being alone in an empty dorm room with a thunderstorm happening outside definitely wasn’t a common plot from horror. At first, you planned to ignore it, but a second ring prompted you to muster your courage to open the door.

‘I’m going to be fine’ chants were circling your mind as you approached the front door, one hand on the door knob, eyes glancing back and forth at the kitchen knife, you weren’t going down without a fight. A turn of the door knob and a pull of hand, the door swung open to a man. Wait. Not just any man—

“Jay?”

His name naturally rolled off your tongue, but your eyes couldn’t believe he’s actually standing right in front of you. 

Jay stared back, equally startled, as though he hadn’t expected you to open the door for him. He was standing there like a ghost, fully drenched from head to toe, shaking from the rain. His face was impassive, but his gaze showed otherwise, a hint of sadness and desperation painted in his brown irises.

“Are you insane?”

Jay glanced down at his attire that was basically soaked to the core, a small sigh escaping his lips. “We need to talk, Y/N,”

You nodded wordlessly, your eyes unknowingly avoiding his piercing gaze as you slowly backed away to the kitchen, grabbing a dry towel. “Here,” you handed Jay the towel, your hand shaking a little. 

“Thanks. Can I—” he took a peek over your shoulder, “—come in?”

“I—yeah,” you were slightly alarmed, moving to the side for him to enter before shutting the door, making sure to draw in a big breath to calm your nerves.

 “Y/N, please let me explain—”

“Jay, I’m really sorry—”

The two of you halted, realising that you’ve spoken in unison, the silence dawning on the both of you. Jay broke into an awkward smile and you felt yourself grinning just a little. Jay gestured at you to continue, so you did, letting out the things you’ve bottle in for days.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know what happened and I just jumped to conclusions, which was wrong for me to do but—” you swallowed, blinking hard, “—but it was heart wrenching for me to see you kissing someone else, especially when it’s your ex, and it’s stupid, it’s so stupid that I’m feeling this way when we’re not even a thing!”

“It’s not stupid, Y/N,”

“It is,”

“It’s not,” Jay repeated, taking a step closer, a look of pining in his eyes as he searched for yours. You didn’t realise how much you’ve truly missed him until you saw him close. “I never intended to kiss Sujin, you know? I went out because she called me saying she needed help, and she took the chance when I was confused to kiss me. I know I’ve asked for you to trust me before, but if you don’t, I’ll get it,”

“I do,” you said at once, eliciting a small look of surprise from him. “I spoke to her,”

“What?”

“She admitted it to me, and I wanted to find you after the game but you were already gone, then I realised how much of an Idiot I was,” 

“Ah,” Jay said softly under his breath, combing his fingers through his hair, seemingly trying to digest everything in. The beat of silence was suffocating you gradually, uneasiness hung in the cold air of your dorm. It took you everything to pour the words you’ve been holding in your heart out.

“I trust you, I do, but what are we, Jay? What are we doing?” you breathed out, chewing anxiously on your bottom lip. “If you want to end it here, then say it—”

“We can be anything you want,”

“I want you, Jay,” you blurted out, it was too late to turn back and run now. “I don’t want you to need me, I want you to want me, just as much as I want you,”

Jay stepped closer, testing the waters between you and him before sensing the green light from you to continue further. Space was practically nonexistent, you were inches from him, letting his hand wander from your face to the back of your neck, naturally leaning into his warm touch that reminded you of the feeling of fire on a cold night. The hand resting on the back of your neck pulled you in closer, one wrong move and you would be kissing him. 

“I do want you,” Jay said quietly, the minty scent laced in his breath entering your senses. “I like you, Y/N. There’s no doubt about that, I know it. I’m aware that this whole thing started out fake and I expected nothing from it, but when I realised I felt something more for you, I was scared you would leave, especially since I had a history of—”

“Being a fuckboy?”

Jay rolled his eyes, grinning at the unamused look on your face. “That. So I thought letting you go after that night was a good decision, that my feelings would eventually disappear and you wouldn’t be hurt anymore, but God, I ended up hurting you instead and you have no idea how I had lost my mind,”

“Jay…” you were quite literally speechless, his words didn’t just had to tongue tied and had rendered you wordless completely, it made your insides twist and turn in the most childish way, it made you feel like you were a teenage girl who had just talked to her crush for the first time, you were giddy. 

“I choose you, my love. Any day, any time, anywhere. It’s always going to be you, only you,”

You were resisting the urge to break into the cheesiest smile ever, Park Jong Seong was about to be the death of you. “I like you too, big head. If you don’t kiss me now, I might change my mind,”

“You’re going to be the death of me,” 

Jay finally closed the space between you and him, pressing his lips on yours feverishly, your honey flavoured melting onto his lips and his cologne swarmed your senses, this was heaven. His hand travelled back to rest on your cheek, while yours was having a field trip travelling up his chest and into his hair, giving a slight tug which resulted in a groan from him. You tilted your head, feeling Jay part his lips and deepening the kiss, his other hand on your waist to pull you much more closer, your body now pressed up against his.

“Y/N,” he mumbled against your lips as you gently pushed him towards your couch. 

You hummed in response, feeling his body fall onto the couch with a thud and you followed suit, falling onto his lap, his arm wrapped tightly around your waist. You opened your eyes, pulling away to meet his heavy gaze that was staring back with equal desire.

“Be my girlfriend?” his voice came out in a whisper, but your ears perked up at those three words, a teasing grin pulled at your lips and your hand instinctively reached for his cheek to squeeze, earning a look of annoyance and endearment from him.

“Only if you take me out to dinner first, big head,”

“You’re such a tease,” he chuckled, pressing a haste kiss on the side of your lips and you giggled, brushing the strands of hair from his forehead.

“I’d be crazy to say ‘no’ after all this, you idiot,” you flicked at his forehead, eliciting a sharp hiss and a piercing glare from him, reminding you of a black cat. “So, yes, I’d like to be your girlfriend,”

You watched the man before you smiling wider than the time he won the championship with his team last season, his eyes shining bright and face beaming. Gosh, he was such a dream. One hand cupped your cheek, pinching it softly, “Don’t worry, I’ll treat you like my wife instead,”

You rolled your eyes at his words, deadpanning at him. “You’re too cheesy, Park Jong Seong,”

“And you love me for that.” he said in a sing-song tone before bringing you in for another kiss, this time softer and gentler, as if Jay was scared he would shatter you if he had kissed you too hard. 

If you had the choice to stay just like this for the next few hours, you would gladly take it. You were relieved everything was well now, even if it meant Jay's wet pants were staining your couch, but you're sure Minji would understand.

Just as Taylor Swift would say, you believe you were entering your 'Lover' era, and you couldn't wait to be with your hotheaded hockey boyfriend. Yes, boyfriend, with no space.

“SO … YOU’RE TELLING ME YOU’VE ALWAYS BEEN INTO ME ALL ALONG?”

It has been a few months since you and Jay made it official together. To top off the unforgettable experience, Minji came home the next day to see you and him cuddling in bed, not missing the chance to get a picture and proceeding to give Jay a humble Ted Talk during breakfast, but it was all good after. 

Jay did stick to your request and bring you out for dinner, but Heeseung and Sunghoon unintentionally beat him to it first by dragging you to the buffet they promised before Jay’s fancy dinner night, and he was forced to follow begrudgingly. Breaking the news to Heeseung and Sunghoon was definitely an interesting occurrence, including the usual bro talk and the crazy ship names, but in the end, they were glad you were finally together with Jay and was miles prouder of Jay for finally working up the courage to confess. 

Now, here you were, on a Saturday night at Jay’s apartment enjoying a glass of wine, a random rom com in the background as promised of a marathon, and listening to your tipsy boyfriend spill about his first impression of you, which led to him unveiling the part where he laid eyes on you during the hockey game. 

“Not always, don’t get ahead of yourself,” Jay cut you off, raising an eyebrow at you. "I still can't believe you called hockey stupid,"

"It was a moment of hatred, okay?" You tapped his chin, swirling the wine glass in your hand. "Now, I'm a big hockey fan,"

"You're stupid," 

You feigned a dramatic gasp, punching his shoulder softly. "You're stupid … stupid,"

"Yes, yes, I am," Jay eventually gave in, closing in and pressing his lips onto yours, tasting the familiar taste of the red wine on your tongue. "I'm so grateful to have you with me, lovely. What would I be doing without you?"

"Fucking other girls?"

"You've ruined the mood,"

You laughed, pressing a kiss on his cheek. "I'm kidding. You would be in a ditch without me,"

"You're not wrong," Jay's thumb was grazing against your lip, his eyes half-lidded, the alcohol in his system overpowering. "God, I love you,"

"I love you more, big head," you said, feeling a swarm of butterflies fluttering wildly in your abdomen. Jay was perfect, too perfect that it intimidated you, but what you didn't know was that he felt the same way about you too. "Are you turning red, Jong Seong?"

"What? Pft, it's the wine," he waved your words off, turning away to hide the obvious that he was becoming a shade of pink and maroon. You snorted at his ridiculousness, pushing his face to face back at you.

"Kiss me again?"

"You make me such a happy man, you know that?" Jay grinned, saying nothing more and pulled you in, abandoning his wine glass.

Jay couldn’t help but smile against your lips, being the happiest man in the entire universe at this moment, because he knew he finally got the girl, his girl, and there was no way he would ever lose you again. Never.

#fic tag! how you get the girl #enhypen imagines #enhypen fanfics #enhypen fanfiction #enhypen fluff #enhypen scenarios #enhypen #enhypen soft hours #enhypen smau #enhypen x reader #enhypen reactions #enhypen drabbles #enhypen headcanons #jay scenarios #jay x reader #jay enhypen #jay imagines #enhypen jay #enhypen jay x you #enhypen jay x reader #enhypen jay imagines #enhypen jay park #park jong seong imagines #park jongseong #jay headcanons #enhypen jay drabbles

[fourmoony]

heyyy read you're looking for requests so here's one! james coming from hockey practice (i love hockey player james) and you tell him that a guy from uni has been hitting on you and stuf. he doesn't get mad just queasy, but then he needs reassurance too!

thanks for requesting, angel!

cw: insecurities, language, unwanted advances

1.4k, modern au, ice hockey James

The tell-tale sound of James' bag being abandoned haphazardly by the door alerts you to his presence. The door clicks shut soon after, followed by a heavy sigh. He's likely exhausted - always is after practice, especially if he and Sirius get caught mouthing off and are punished with bag skating.

James rounds the corner into the living room at the same time you pause your show and sit up to greet him. He doesn't acknowledge your abandoned plate from dinner or the pile of unfolded washing on the arm chair to his left. Instead, he gives you a tired smile and collapses into a heap beside you on the sofa. "Hi, bug." He mumbles, chin tucked into the neckline of his hoodie. Exhaustion seeps from his voice.

"Hi, handsome." You soothe, hand reaching out to toy with the curls at the nape of your boyfriend's neck. They're still damp from his post-practice shower, the smell of his body wash sweet and heady in your nose. "How was practice?"

He lets out a long suffering sigh, leans into your touch, "Stressful. The team isn't where we need to be for the playoffs. Coach made sure to let us know how angry he is about it."

You hum softly, scoot closer to James on the sofa until you're practically in his lap. James likes touch, he likes the connection, the intimacy, the weight of your body on top of his. You're happy to indulge him, the flowers that your boyfriend brings about your rib cage blossoming as his arm wraps around your middle, hoists you fully onto his lap. "What does he expect, you know? Half of his team graduated out, last year. He only has a couple of you guys left and the rest are freshmen." You try to justify James, but it seems the reminder only further sours his mood.

"Yeah, try telling him that. He thinks everyone is just born to be in the NHL, that these guys should already be up to standard, that they don't need the same exact training and coaching that we got." James' voice is thick with coiling tension, even if his muscles seem to be relaxing under you.

You smooth the baby hairs under your fingers, tilting your head until his eyes meet yours, "You're their captain, baby," You smile, "I bet they'd listen to it a lot better coming from you. They like you, look up to you. You be their coach if coach isn't going to step up."

Your boyfriend smiles, the sun peeking through storm clouds. A glimpse of your Jamie. He leans forwards, lips soft and gentle as he presses them to yours. He hums into the kiss, hands squeezing your hips. "Thanks."

"Anytime, handsome."

"How was your day?" James asks, feet stretching out to sit atop the coffee table.

You'd scold him if you weren't so busy quelling the beating of your heart. Any kiss from James sends you reeling, has done since the first time in freshman year. You don't think you'll ever get over the fact that he's your boyfriend. That he loves you as you love him, that you'll grow old and grey together. It never quite feels real.

"Good. Productive. We have a project due for McGonagall's class on Wednesday so I just worked on that most of the day." You don't feel the need to mention that you pointedly worked alone on your half of the project, but James frowns at your words and you know he's going to ask.

"You worked alone?"

"Yeah." You should probably say more, but James has a shorter fuse than Sirius does in general when it comes to you and you don't feel like unleashing all two hundred pounds of ice-hockey muscle onto the arrogant asshole who won't leave you alone.

James' thumb rubs steady circles into the fat of your thigh, his brows hooked upward in the middle a blatant sign of his confusion, "Your group have left you to do all the work?"

"No," You shake your head, "It was just easier to do my part on my own."

James doesn't say anything, but it's clear that he's waiting for you to go on. You sigh through your nose, head falling to rest on your boyfriend's shoulder, "One of the guys in my group has been hitting on me pretty regularly."

"What?" James asks around a swallow, voice hoarse. His muscles tense under you, his thumb pausing it's soothing measures on your thigh.

You shrug, "He keeps saying how he'd treat me right, how a 'pretty girl like me' deserves better. It's all bullshit, so I chose to work myself and just send the rest of the group my sections."

"Right."

It's odd, the way your body reacts to a single word as though it were a slap in the face. Your stomach sinks because you realise James isn't angry. He isn't itching to pound the guy's face into the ground and he isn't insisting you allow him to fix the problem, himself. You remove your head from James' shoulder, find him pale faced and distant. He looks lost, nauseous. "Jamie?"

James shrugs, eyes cold, "What?"

"'Right.'? That's all you have to say to that? What's wrong?" You ask, drawing further away the colder the look in James' eyes gets.

"What would you like me to say? That he might be right?" There's a clipped edge to your boyfriend's voice that you've never heard before, that jolts your body into fight or flight mode quicker than you'd care to admit.

You remove yourself from James' lap, confusion evident on your face as you settle to face him on the coffee table. His feet meet the ground with a thud as he moves to stand. Your hand flies out, a firm grip on his knee that begs him not to move. James gives you a sad look as he complies, fidgets with the draw strings on his jogging bottoms. "You think he has a point?" You ask.

James nods, lips pursed, eyes avoiding yours so evidently it angers you.

"Why?"

Your boyfriend shrugs again, tips his head back and lets out a groan, "You know at the end of this year I'm going to be drafted, right? I'm going to have to move across the country, probably, I won't have a choice in the matter and neither will you."

"We've had this argument before, James. I'm going wherever you go. I don't care where it is! It could be fucking Antartica and I'd still go." Your voice sounds less stern than you'd intended, but James softens slightly at your words.

"But you shouldn't have to just pick up your life and move because of me. You deserve someone who can give you stability and all of their time. I can't." James leans forwards until his elbows are resting on his knees, his face so close to yours you can feel his breaths.

It's an age-old argument, one you and James used to have often in the beginning. Before you knew that you wanted James in your life forever, back when he was trying to push you away with everything he had because he didn't want to risk falling in love with you and having to leave you, one day. The argument lessened the longer you were together, decisions made. You'd made up your mind the day James told you he loved you that you'd follow him anywhere, that you'd give up anything and everything to just be with him.

"I don't want anyone else. I don't care where we are in this world, James. I want you. That's all." You reach for him, thumbs swiping under his eyes in steady motions.

He takes a breath, closes his eyes under your touch. "I can't help but feel I'm asking you to sacrifice more than I'm worth."

And that just won't do. You clamber back onto his lap, legs on either side of his hips and chase his eyes. They're dark in the dim light of the living room, a deep brown filled with fear. "You're worth everything, Jamie. Everything." You tell him. And you mean it.

James swallows, nods. His arms wrap around you, pull you to him until he's falling back into the softness of the couch. "I love you." He tells you, vulnerable as you've ever heard him.

Flowers bloom all along the crevices of your rib cage, pull taught until you're so overflowing with love and happiness that all you can think to do is kiss him. He chases your lips when you pull back, a smile toying at the corner of his mouth. "I love you too, Jamie."

"So you're not gonna leave me for that guy in your Psych class?" He asks, a twinkle in his eye that lets you know he's kidding.

You laugh, loud and obnoxious and your boyfriend swallows it with a world-ending kiss.

#marauders #james potter #ice hockey!james #fourmoonys asks #james potter fic #james potter imagine #james potter oneshot #james potter x reader #james potter x f!reader #james potter fluff #james potter angst #marauders era #marauders fic #marauders imagine #sirius black #remus lupin #fourmoony #angst #love #fluff #smut

[pretty-little-mind33]

Ice hockey!James Potter x fem!reader

Summary: James tries to teach you how to Ice Skate.

Genre: Fluff, smidge of hurt and comfort

Warnings: muggle au, swearing, James is an asshole sometimes, arguments, jealousy, insecurities

James Potter can be a complete prick. He never means to, not really, but he can be.

You had told him you'd never been ice skating, and he had been visibly appalled. "You're dating a hockey player and you've never been skating?" he'd reprimanded, as if dating him was your one mission in life.

You'd rolled your eyes for the fifth time that day, already annoyed by his attitude, but as he ties the laces of your skates now—his shaggy dark hair falling in front of his eyes—you hide a smile.

He looks up, patting your skates, and grins. "There you go, all done," he stands and pulls you up with him. You wobble shakily on the blades, and James smiles at you fondly. A few of his friends chuckle as you hold onto his arm as he moves towards the rink.

"Honey, don't bend your ankles," he says.

You shoot him a glare. "I'm not doing it on purpose," you say, continuing to hide a smile as you hold onto him tighter, "prick." James laughs as he gently guides you out onto the rink.

The very moment your blades hit the ice, your balance becomes all wonky, and you panic, almost sliding from under James's arms. It's his turn to hide a smile as he pulls you up and glides effortlessly in front of you.

He takes your hands and slowly skates backwards as he looks down at your skates. "Okay, don't you worry, darlin', I won't let you fall," he turns to watch as his friends step onto the ice easily, "Here, look at how Lils does it."

Lily Evans skates next to you, her auburn hair falling over her shoulders, and you watch her. She looks so elegant, and jealousy sits in your stomach. You try to mimic her movements for a while with James being as patient as ever.

Occasionally, he catches you a few times so you don't fall, and you feel hopeless at this. You feel even more helpless when James's teammates and friends call out to him and ask him to skate with them.

They tease him, and he turns to them with a smirk, holding your hands, but you know he wants to join them. "You can go, Jamie, I'll be okay," you say, and you mean it. James looks unsure.

Lily adds, "I'll watch over her, Potter."

Finally, James nods and skates over to his friends. He wraps his arms around them as they act like little schoolboys on the playground. You're truly fine with James having his fun, and anyway, you don't have time to worry about him as you almost trip on your blades, and Lily catches your arm.

It feels like hours pass as your feet start to ache. You've gained a little more confidence and have moved away from the wall, but you still grip onto Lily's hand as she skates with you.

Sometimes, James sneaks up on you to twirl you around. When he does this, you smack his chest as you steady yourself and warn him not to do that again. He didn't listen, and by the third time, it wasn't funny anymore.

You really, really didn't want to fall.

Suddenly, you hear laughter before large hands grip your waist and scoop you up, higher than the previous times. James's laughter drowns out Lily's protest as you squeal. Your boyfriend turns you around, and with a little too much momentum, drops you on the ice again.

You gasp as your feet slide under him, and his smile disappears as you crash to the ground. James spreads his legs so he doesn't hit you with his blades, and you slip forward, almost crashing into the wall behind him. You hear amused laughter from James's friends.

"Shit, are you okay?" James asks quickly, his voice small, as he skates up to you again and this time helps you up with gentler hands. Your own hands hurt from the ice, and your eyes water as you feel everyone staring at you.

It was embarrassing enough to be so bad at something so important to someone you love, but this was humiliating.

Luckily, you'd fallen close enough to the exit of the rink that you could grip the wall and pull yourself out. Quickly, James is behind you as he attempts to take your hand as you walk towards the bench. Your jeans are wet, and when you sit down, you wince from how much your ass hurts.

Silently, you start to unlace your skates as the tears fall. James kneels down and covers your hands with his as he tries to stop you. "Honey, I'm sorry," he says, but you just glare at him. If he had puppy ears, they would be fully laying on his head now.

"I asked you to stop," you sniff sadly and wipe at your tears, "Why didn't you listen?"

James's heart aches, "I'm sorry," he whispers again and looks at you sincerely. "I am so sorry. That was a jerk move, love. Please, come back out onto the rink," James is begging now, and you shake your head.

"No," you say. James looks crestfallen. You look up and see that his friends have gathered around the entrance to the rink and are staring at you both. That makes you feel worse as you drop your skates and slip on your sneakers. You don't even lace them as you stand and rush out to the car.

Tears sting your eyes when you remember you'd both taken James' car and it's locked. Hopelessly, you lean against the passenger door and bury your face in your hands. A few minutes later, you hear a familiar beep as James unlocks the car.

You look up. James is carrying his skates in his hand as he walks over. His friends aren't behind him, and you feel slightly shitty as he walks up, pops open the trunk, and slides his skates inside. He doesn't speak when he closes the trunk and comes over to you. He wraps you in his arms.

You melt into his touch, cheeks burning as you press your nose into his chest. James cups your cheeks. "I'm a prick. I'm sorry. You're allowed to be mad. You told me to stop, and I didn't listen to you," he says as he strokes your hair. "Can you forgive me, lovely?"

You pull away and look at your incredibly stupid, adorable boyfriend. You want to be madder than you are, but it's so hard to be cross with James when he's wrapped his strong arms around you.

You chew on your lip, "I just wanna be good at this—like all your friends," you confess, "I thought you would like me more if I was," you finish and look away.

James frowns and takes your chin in his hand again, "What did you just say?"

You continue to chew on your lip, "You'd like me more if I was. You'd take me on cute ice skating dates, and we'd look cute and—"

James cuts you off with a loud laugh. "What are you on about, Y/n?" he runs his thumb over your lip and then kisses your nose, "Your ice skating skills have nothing, and I mean, nothing to do with why I like you. Why I love you."

Your head snaps up at the words. I love you. You hadn't said I love you yet, and your heart starts pounding in your chest. "You love me?" you whisper, wanting confirmation.

You half expect James to backpedal, to become flustered and panicked, and make up some elaborate excuse as to how his brain had forced his mouth to utter words that sounded like I love you.

Instead, he nods and cups your cheek in his larger hand, "Mmhm," he smiles fondly, "I love you." You feel warmth spread in your stomach, and all your frustration towards him disappears.

You fully melt in his arms now. "I love you too," you say after a moment, and James's shoulders visibly relax.

"I was scared you weren't gonna say it," he mutters, sounding genuinely concerned. You roll your eyes at him but lean up to kiss his mouth anyways.

"You're an idiot," you tell him in between kisses, a wide smile on your face, "But you're my idiot."

Yes, James Potter can happen to act like a complete prick, but at the end of the day, that never matters because he's yours.

Your love.

The person you love the most and who loves you the most.

#james potter #james potter x reader #marauders #james potter fluff #james potter smut #marauders fic #james potter fanfic #james potter fanfiction #james potter x you #marauders imagine #james potter x fem!reader #james potter fic #james potter x y/n #the marauders #marauders era #the marauders era #maraduers harry potter #marauders harry potter #harry potter fanfiction #harry potter #mauraders #hp marauders #hp fanfic #harry potter marauders #marauders fanfiction #marauders fanfic

[theemporium]

i would love a crumb of hockey!james who sees you in the stands wearing his jersey with a hickey from the night before and he gets so Distracted

thank you for requesting!🫶🏽

.

James was usually very good at keeping his focus on the game.

His eyes would sometimes wander through the crowd in the bleachers on the off chance he would see someone he recognised. Sometimes it was his parents. Sometimes it would be his friends that weren’t on the team. Sometimes it would be fans he recognised over the countless games he played. 

He never expected to see you. 

Your relationship with the hockey captain was new, if you could even call it a relationship. You were wary, and James understood why. Hockey boys had a notorious reputation for their dating lives—or lack thereof—and you would rather not have your heart broken by the James Potter of all hockey players. 

So, it was new and it was fun and it didn’t really have a label. Not that James minded all that much, he was downright obsessed with you and he would do whatever he could to make sure you knew that. 

And as much as he wanted you at his games—as much as he wanted you to be there when he scored a goal or to see you when he walked out the locker room after the game—he didn’t want to push your boundaries. He wanted to respect the space you created between the two of you.

So, when he was skating up and down the ice with a puck on his stick, the last thing he expected to see when he lifted his head towards the crowd for a short moment was to see you standing in the bleachers, grinning from ear to ear once he caught your gaze.

You looked radiant. James could barely pay attention to anything else in the arena because his girl was standing in the crowd, and his heart was fucking soaring. And just when he thought he was able to wrap his head around everything, you were turning around and he saw his name and number plastered across your back.

You were wearing a jersey—his fucking jersey.

“Woah, dude, what the fuck?” Sirius laughed when James skated right into his back, but the boy was too dazed and lovesick to even properly apologise. “Prongs, you good?”

James turned to him, a giddy grin on his face. “I feel fucking great! Let’s fucking do this!”

Sirius raised his brows but didn’t question his captain. 

Nobody had ever seen James so hyped up and eager to leave the locker room after the game ended. They won—completely thrashed the opposing team—and knowing his girl watched all three of his goals made James feel like he was buzzing.

He practically skipped out the locker room after Coach’s talk, his eager eyes glancing through the crowd of people waiting outside in the hallway until his eyes fell on you. He didn’t care about the other eyes on his as he made a beeline towards you, his arms hoisting you into the air and spinning you the second he was close enough.

“James, put me down!” You laughed as you wound your arms around his neck on instinct. 

He listened but he didn’t unwrap himself from you. “You came.”

“I wanted to surprise you,” you murmured with a grin.

“Consider me fucking surprised,” James grinned, opening his mouth to make a comment about how pretty you looked in his jersey when all of a sudden he saw the purple bruise on the side of your neck. He raised his brows, his thumb brushing over the mark. “You usually cover them.”

You almost looked a bit nervous. “Maybe I wanted everyone to know who gets Captain James Potter in their bed.”

James bit back his grin. “Yeah?”

“Yeah, baby,” you murmured and smiled widely when he leaned down to press his lips against yours. 

“I’m gonna show you off to everyone,” he muttered between frantic kisses. “Gonna show the whole world that I have the prettiest girl.”

“Maybe you can do that after we celebrate, Mr Hatrick,” you whispered, your fingers playfully tugging the hair at the nape of his neck. “Don’t you wanna see what’s under this jersey?”

James let out a small curse before grabbing your hand and pulling you towards the exit. “Let’s go home.”

“James, what about—”

“They can cope without me for the night, my plans are all booked out, princess!”

.

#james potter #marauders #harry potter #hp #james potter x reader #james potter x you #james potter x y/n #james potter fic #james potter one shot #marauders x reader #marauders x you #marauders x y/n #marauders fic #marauders one shot #harry potter x reader #harry potter x you #harry potter x y/n #harry potter fic #harry potter one shot #hp x reader #hp x you #hp x y/n #hp fic #hp one shot

[kquil]

JAMES POTTER | NO MORE HOCKEY PLAYERS!

REQUEST. : I think this might be too vague but can I request IceHockey!James x Reader angst with fluffy ending. I'm acc in love with the way you write him 🤍🤍 ⏤requested by anon

LENGTH : 1.9k

TAGS : modern au ; muggle au ; ice hockey player james potter ; enemies to lovers? but not really? ; enemies by association to lovers? ; protective james potter ; precious reader ; oc!andrew ; reader in a bad relationship ; james being the knight in shining hockey gear ; angst with fluff ending

WARNINGS : toxic relationship ; mentions of mistreatment in a relationship

You knew what was coming. It was something you were used to seeing, to dealing with in the two years you’ve been dating Andrew. As captain of the Ice Hockey team at Imperial College London and playing the Right-Wing Forward position, he was oftentimes compared to his more prominent, more celebrated counterpart, James Potter. 

James Potter was the Ice Hockey captain of his team at UCL and also played the Right-Wing Forward position. Through this similarity, they were often compared and Andrew was beyond irritated by the fact. Irritated and fed up. James never appeared to mind the comparisons, however. In fact, he took it in stride because, in his eyes, the results of a fair game will put the constant equating to rest. 

Andrew was passionate about the sport, he really was, his position as Captain was evidence of that dedication, however the constant comparisons in his ear made him highly aggressive on top of his already present anger issues. It wasn’t like this in the beginning, he was once very sweet and caring towards you, aware of your needs and was as much of a best friend as he was your boyfriend. Yes, you weren’t exempt from the occasional disagreement or shouting competition but it’s been so much worse as of late. 

Just a couple of months ago, he lost a game to James’ team and finally snapped to the point that he managed to make the usually grinning and charming James Potter flush red with anger and commenced a screaming match that inaugurated an infamous rivalry between the two. That one win against him was also the tipping point for all the whispers comparing the two to sharply peak in favour of James. Now, there was always an undertone of James being viewed as the better one of the two. More charismatic, more diligent, more empathetic, more resilient, more consistent, more respectable… more handsome. All of which fanned the flames of your boyfriend’s anger until it reached dangerous levels. 

The matches against them were, now, much more exhilarating but also much more aggressive. It frightened you the first time you saw them play against each other after that horrific encounter the previous game. This wasn’t a good display of sportsmanship. They were like two lions going after each other’s throats, pushing and shoving and colliding at top speeds, baring their teeth menacingly but neither side conceding defeat – they refused to surrender; one had to fall for the other to rise. It was horrifying to witness. You worried for Andrew but you also worried for James. They were both equal in brawn and stature so anything could happen to either side and they weren’t the least bit shy in making their belligerent intentions known. Bruises and sore limbs were expected from the sport but you feared that something more serious could be anticipated in the conflict between the two. 

Your heart was almost ready to burst out of your chest when each game began and ended. It didn’t help that you were a frequent witness to Andrew’s harsh criticism towards his own team. Due to his frustrations and boiling anger, he demanded more of himself and, by extension, demanded more of his teammates as well. Many times, you tried to remind him of the fact that he wasn’t going about disciplining or encouraging his team in the right way. A familiar confrontation once became a huge fight that his teammates had to get in the middle of, worried for you, who they had come to think of as part of their own and, vice versa. Gradually, his support from the team dwindled, which meant that, during his combative encounters with James in the rink, he was slowly being left on his own with no one to assist him. He was playing at a higher risk each game and it hurt you to watch. Your love might have dwindled during Andrew’s self-destructive tirade but that didn’t mean you didn’t care for his well-being. 

The result was inevitable. Owing to the lack of support from his own teammates and having to counter James’ antagonistic plays by himself, Andrew’s anger and jealousy grew and grew. It was a slap to the face when, at every re-match, his self-sabotaging behaviour led to James and his team’s victory. It was predictable, even for you, but you supported Andrew through it all. 

At the end of the match, Andrew sulked in the locker rooms while the rest of the team hurried away, disgruntled by their captain’s pathetic plays, selfish agenda and mistreatment towards them when pinning all the blame for their loss solely on their lack of collaboration when, truly, he was the only one to blame.

“It’ll be okay, Andy–” 

“Shut up!” his roaring shout bounced off the walls of the empty locker room. His voice echoed with mourning, betrayal and burning hot rage. It made your shoulders tense from the rising tension. 

“Andrew, the way you’re acting i-it isn’t right–!” you tried to reason with him despite his hulking form and much larger frame intimidating you. He didn’t even have to look into your eyes for a shiver to run down your spine; the slamming of his locker door, the throwing of his clothes and the reckless handling of his equipment was enough to make you flinch each time. 

“YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO TELL ME WHAT’S RIGHT OR WRONG!” he argues through clenched teeth, pushing the locker room doors open and letting it swing back, almost hitting you as you scurry up behind him. 

“Well, you should, at least, try!” In a moment of bravery, you puff out your chest and glare at him, your eyes shining with thinly disguised disappointment and fear. He wasn’t like the Andrew you knew at all… this horrible, violent person was nothing like the Andrew you fell in love with two years ago, “I know you can be a great captain but you’re running yourself and your own team into the ground! Learn to put your ego aside for once!” 

“WHY YOU!-- WHO GAVE YOU THE RIGHT TO LECTURE ME?!” his large hand raises and comes swinging down. It’s too late to react, you can only pinch your eyes closed and wait for the impact to come with clenched teeth. 

“WHAT RIGHT DO YOU HAVE TO HIT HER?!” 

The hit never came. Instead, your eyes snap open to stare in shock at James Potter gripping the wrist of your boyfriend and pushing him away as he tucks you behind him. Too shocked at the situation and the sudden appearance of your boyfriend’s counterpart, you can’t help but just gape at the situation. 

No no no! This isn’t meant to happen! You should have left the argument in the locker room! 

“She’s my girlfriend! Dipshit!” Andrew snarls and tries to reach for you again but James steps in the way, blocking your view. He’s a solid mountain between you and your irate boyfriend. For the first time in a long time, you felt safe. 

“That gives you even less of a right, not that you had any right to hit anyone to begin with,” James pants lightly, his heightened anger making him feel as though he’s run a mile, “If she’s your girl, you should treat her better! Acting like this after a loss is pathetic but pinning it onto your lady is disgusting!” James can handle rough play on the rink because he’s trained for it and he’s grown the thick skin to endure all kinds of impacts. But, when he sees violence like this outside the rink, it’s beyond infuriating, it makes him see red, it makes him want to throw all manner of good will out the window and go charging in like a stubborn bull.

“Fuck! Off!” Andrew shoves him away and grabs your upper arm, tugging you away without any regard for the force in his grip. It happened much too quickly that you couldn’t comprehend everything until you felt a stinging pain bloom in your arm under his grip. 

“Ow!… Andrew, stop, please! You’re hurting me!”

“I don’t care! Hurry! Up!” he gives another aggressive tug and you squeal from the pain, willing yourself to suppress it so as to not anger him further. But your cry of hurt was enough to set off an unbelievable chain reaction.

There was a dull but harsh THUMP as James’ clenched fist collides with Andrew’s face, sending him sprawling as two gentle hands come up to your shoulders and gently pull you away from the scene. Those same two hands turn you around and carefully move down to press against your lower back, acting as a guide to lead you a safe distance away. The girl introduces herself as Alice, the girlfriend of Frank, who was the goalie of the UCL team. She leads you with a sympathetic smile past the rest of the James’ teammates, who face forward and grit their teeth at what they were just the witnesses to, some even stepping forward. Whether they wanted to join in or not, you didn’t find out but one was tall with mousy brown hair and the other had dark black hair against pale paper skin and grey eyes – the left defence and the centre of the UCL team. 

“You’re okay…” Alice whispers softly, hurrying you along as the sound of punches begin to echo through the hallway, “I’m so sorry, sweetheart,” 

As tears slip past your lash line, a shaky whimper escapes your bitten lips and you accept her comfort with a small nod.

Suffice to say, you and Andrew broke up. And for good reason. Many people couldn’t even fathom that someone as soft-hearted and sweet as you would ever give someone like Andrew the time of day when you deserved so much more. What they don’t understand is that he was never like that when you first met… but, you suppose, he finally showed his true colours. But thanks to that, you’ve sworn off dating hockey players ever again! 

“Oh!” a happy acknowledgement sounds and draws your eyes up to see a handsome, boyish grin beaming down at you, “It’s you!” His freshly washed locks drip with water and he moves to close the locker room door behind him when his words bring the attention of curious eyes from the rest of his team, all peaking a glimpse of you around his frame.

“Yeah…” you smile softly, nerves shaking anxiously as your hands clasp together for some stability, “sorry for suddenly showing up,”

“It’s alright,” James’ beaming smile doesn’t fade the slightest bit as his eyes shine with relief, “I’m just glad you’re looking okay,”

“Yeah, all thanks to you,” the compliment makes him flush bashfully as a large hand comes up to rub the back of his neck. For a guy with a bear-like frame, he pulls off the adorable puppy look pretty well.

“Did you watch the game?” he hurries to change the topic and instead of answering, you hold up a cutely wrapped batch of homemade cookies. Andrew was once the only person who had exclusive access to your home baked goodies but he lost that privilege a long time ago. It’s time to associate your baking with something (someone) more positive and deserving. 

“Wow! Thanks!” James eyes your offer with wide eyes and was already drooling from the sugary scent in the air, seducing him into taking it and having a bite. You smile at his moans of gratification and allow his free flowing compliments to boost your confidence, “will you be coming to our next game?” he suddenly asks, catching you off guard. 

“Uhh..--”

“Please come,” his eyes plead with you but when you don’t answer, he bargains, “I’ll win it for you,” 

No more hockey players be damned.

A/N : i love writing hockey player james potter too~ he's just so dreamy! ahhhhh! it's probably one of my favourite aus of james potter! (,,o // o,,) thank you so much for the request, anon-darling! im so sorry for taking so long, i hope you enjoy the read!

NAVI.

TAGLIST : @melinajenkins @aastonishment @until-i-found-you @corp0real @celestcies @lovelydoveval @inlovewithremusjohnlupin @calums-betch @futurecorps3 @hihihi1112 @simpingforthe80s @yrluvjane @chaosofmanyfandoms @storyofaromance @loving-and-dreaming @somewereinthegalaxi @ashreblogsficshere @cassandra-nerezza-black @stray-bi-kids @ttkttt @notasadgirlipromise @desikudisworld @volturissideslut

@arilxup88 @fallencrescentmoon @topaz125 @xxrougefangxx @starchaser-lily @probablypossesedbysatan @agent-tempest @veryberryjelly @th3-st4r-gur1 @sousydive @delusional-4-fake-people @linaax @girl-detective16 @riaa-moony @ericityyy @ghostgardn @rosalyn-s @seungtelevision

#james potter x reader #james potter #james potter x you #james potter imagine #ice hockey player james potter #📝 : request #marauders #james potter oneshot #james potter fluff #james potter fanfiction #james potter one shot #james potter fic

[buckrecs]

2023 𝙗𝙪𝙘𝙠𝙮 𝙗𝙖𝙧𝙣𝙚𝙨 𝙛𝙞𝙘 𝙧𝙚𝙘 4

masterlist | ✨- fav fics | status - updating

All Of Them are COMPLETED Series

1. Finding Home by @jobean12-blog

Bucky x Reader Animal Rescue AU

You meet Bucky while he’s out walking Alpine in the city. It’s love at first sight and to make it even better he just opened up an Animal Rescue, Shelter to Solider.  But will his past stand in the way of him finally finding his home. 

2. Welcome Home… Soldat? by @winterarmyy

Winter Soldier!Bucky x Reader

Y/N had make a habit of greeting Bucky a warm 'welcome home' everytime he came back from his missions, but there was one particular day when she unknowingly greeted someone else.

3. Winter Makes Ice by @subwaysurf45

Bucky x Hydra Experiment!Reader

you’re captured after a brawl at the Avengers building, Bucky and others must save you before Hydra makes a new Winter Soldier out of you, Bucky has given up that title.

4. ice ice baby by @endless-summer-soldier

College Hockey Player!Bucky x College Figure Skater!Reader

Bucky is a college hockey player, Y/N is a figure skater without a partner. What's happens when these two opposites start sharing the ice...

5. Right + Click + Save by @syntheticavenger

Bucky x Reader

Working from home has it’s perks, especially when it comes to helping a technologically unsavvy super soldier try to navigate a dating site.

6. Lonely Night by @marvelouslizzie

Roommate!Bucky x Reader

Your crush on your roommate gets out of hand. His smile ruins you in a way you never expected.

7. Like Breathing by @bucky-fricking-barnes

Bucky x Shifter!Reader

Bucky’s life in Cove is far from perfect, mostly because Cove’s residents want nothing more than to scare him away. Luckily for you, Bucky isn’t easily scared off.

8. Where Dreams Go To Die by @insomniumstella

Bucky x Avenger!Reader

Steve’s silly joke happened to inspire the best, or possibly the worst, idea Wanda had ever come up with — send James Buchanan Barnes and y/n on an all-expenses-paid honeymoon in Hawaii. the problem? they cannot stand to be around each other.

9. Make the Wave by @lostgirlmuseum

Bucky x Reader

You invite both your best friend and your boyfriend to a three-day weekend getaway at a beach resort. This trip was meant to be relaxing, but tensions and jealousies rise as both Miles and Bucky fight for your attention. 

#bucky barnes fic rec #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x f!reader #bucky barnes smut #winter soldier x reader #bucky barnes series #bucky barnes fluff #bucky barnes angst #winter soldier!bucky x reader #bucky barnes modern au #bucky barnes college au #athlete!bucky #bucky x hydra!reader #roommate!bucky #best friend!bucky

[luveline]

𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐨𝐟 𝐚𝐥𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 | 𝐣𝐚𝐦𝐞𝐬 𝐩𝐨𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫

You and James have found more than friendship on the ice. When you’re afraid to flub a jump and take the leap with him into something more, he finds a way to convince you. [4k]

hockey player!james, figure skater!reader, shy!reader, fem!reader, fluff, friends to lovers, mutual pining, confessions, first kiss, idiots in love, james is tall pretty and extremely in love, sometimes shy!james <3 requested here 

･:*:｡･:*:･ﾟ

You're used to the skin tight costumes of figure skating, and have accepted the fact that they show the entirety of your thighs— that's sort of the point. What you're not used to, however, is having the hockey team see you in said costumes.

James is thrilled. "Look at you, angel! You're in costume!"

He holds the sides of the rink in his hands, leaning his weight toward the ice. You wrap your arms around yourself self-consciously. 

"I was hoping you wouldn't see me," you admit, though you can't help smiling at him anyhow. 

You're usually very happy to bump into him, and your body reacts like it's been conditioned to. James leads to good feelings. 

"I bet you were," he says. 

James reaches out for you, and you skate to the end of the rink despite yourself. He doesn't touch you when you're close, you weren't really expecting him to, only inclines his head inward to tell you something quietly, all secretive like. 

"Your skirt’s tucked in a little bit. On the left," he says. 

"Oh, how," you grumble, twisting your torso to try and see what he means. A leaf of your skirt has managed to fold itself into the fabric that covers your butt. "That's so embarrassing." 

You were likely trying to unstick a slight wedgie when it happened. It's mortifying, but James probably doesn't know how it happened… probably. You yank the skirt out and hope he can't read what you're thinking off of your face. 

"Thanks, James," you say quietly. 

You say his name with altogether too much affection, considering you're friends. Acquaintances, even. You know James within these walls and nowhere else, like work colleagues, and you'd die if he knew how close you felt to him. In fairness, you both spend the majority of your free time within these walls, but still. 

He's probably the best friend that you have. Which is pathetic. But between skating and your nervous disposition, this is as good as it was ever going to get. And you don't mind. 

All of the time. 

"You're welcome. If I knew we were dressing up today, I would've worn something nice." He has his jogging bottoms on and not his big bulky kit. You try not to stare at the more tight-fitting form of his hoodie sleeves, but it's hard. His biceps are ridiculous. "Are you staying?" 

Sometimes, if the boys are practising you'll stay. It's free entertainment — and it is incredibly entertaining to watch. James and his friends are a semi-professional team, which means they're a mixture of good and fun. They play because they love it, and they all have their night jobs to go back to after. It makes it easier for you and James to get along: you're semi-professional too. You're never going to the Olympics, you know that. You skate because you love it. 

There's a clock steadily ticking down on your skills. Every year you get older, heavier, a little more inflexible. The more intense sportsmen and women fight this, revile this, but you've accepted it completely. Skating is for fun. The competitions are to see how far you can go, and it sucks to lose, but the chance that you might win means you keep trying. 

If James and his friends are doing laps, it's a mock punishment from their coach. In half an hour they'll be playing a friendly match against one another like nothing happened. 

"I have to go take this off but… yeah, I'll stay. Is Sirius here today?" 

James leans back and you follow his turned gaze to a lean figure across the way. As soon as you spot him, your ears tune in to his raucous laughter. 

"You won't let him see me, will you?" you ask gently. "He'll never let me hear the end of it."  

James shakes his head. "Of course not. I'll go distract him, alright? You run away." 

You give him a very grateful nod. James turns away. You almost miss it, the double take that he does, like he wants one last look. 

You skate off to the other side of the ice where your skate guards, water bottle and hoodie sit waiting. The guards snap on easily. You throw your hoodie over your arm and make a break for the changing rooms, Sirius’ incredulous voice tailing your retreat at the last second. 

Once you've changed out of your costume and packed it away neatly in your locker, you walk back to the main auditorium, freaking out as gently as you're able to. You keep having conniptions about James, because James keeps looking at you like he has something to say. You've never been the object of a pretty boy's affections. You're worried that it's all in your head, and that you'll make a fool of yourself if you try to flirt back, but his face when he'd seen you in your costume gives you a terrifying new confidence. 

James had been ecstatic. His eyes had roved all over you and he hadn't tried to hide it. His smile was huge and one hundred percent genuine: appreciative. Like he couldn't be happier to see you. 

Is it wrong, then, to assume he likes you? No. You’ve known for a while. 

"Oof," you mutter to yourself, stepping back into the general chill of the rink and its surrounding stands. 

As you predicted, laps are over and the boys are in the thick of it, protection on, sticks shivering across ice with a sound like sharp blades. You stand behind a plexiglass screen and follow James' darting figure from afar. He's recognisable to you from the way he pulls back his arms, and the slight lean of his torso when he's standing still. You've spent too much time watching him. 

Too much time, and yet the rules are still complicated in your mind. James and Sirius are arguing with Frank on the opposite side about icing, passionate enough that James pulls his helmet off and begins throwing threats at his friends. 

"Mate, I'm actually about to drown myself," he warns, laughing through each word. "Are you listening to me? Take the penalty before I scream. Good god, man." 

You laugh. James' head almost snaps clean off his neck with the speed at which he turns to look at you. 

Sirius' head follows. 

"Hey!" Sirius calls immediately, abandoning his skirmish to skate towards you. "What the fuck! I wanted to see the dress, you let James see it! Go put it back on right now." 

"How'd you even know I was in a dress?" 

"How did I know? James lit up like a Christmas tree, that's how I know. He's disgusting all the time and it's your fault." 

"It's not really a dress," you say. Sirius is as nice as James but he's intimidating where James isn't. He's less smiles, more barking laughter. Less compliments, more playful chastisement. It's not his fault in any shape or form that you find his personality hard to respond to, but you do. "It's a bodysuit with a skirt. But sometimes… sometimes the girls do wear dresses."

"Yeah? I think he might pass out," Sirius says. Then, with a neater smile. "He told me to be nicer, I didn't know I was being mean, sorry. I really do wanna see your 'bodysuit with a skirt'. A little to make fun, but I bet you look good." 

James sweeps in and promptly knocks Sirius sliding sideways. "She looked amazing, now stop antagonising her." 

"I wasn't flirting, Jamie, no need to worry–" 

"Be gone, you beast." James' voice is tight with an emotion you can't name, lest you have another ruinous conniption for all to see. "Fuck off." 

Sirius snorts. There's a commotion, their unprofessional coach shouting about idiocy, a lack of commitment, and more laps if there isn't an improvement in team cohesion. James rolls his eyes at you as the coach drones on. You feel guilty for giggling. 

"Sorry for Sirius." James puts his hand on the top of his stick, bottom lip sticking out a touch as he grimaces. "Sorry for me, I'm sorry. I was hoping he'd use, like, a modicum of subtlety, but he's a dickhead and I know that. He's also a sweetheart. I should've guessed he'd rush to apologise." 

"No, don't be. He doesn't need to be sorry for anything, and you don't have to be sorry for looking out for me." 

"I'm not. Definitely not sorry for that." 

James pushes a curl behind his ear. His hair is lusciously shiny under stadium lights, dark dark dark and curled, sweet and thick. 

"You're in trouble." 

James looks over his shoulder toward his coach's booming disbelief. "What, with him? We're in the off-season right now, he needs to relax… I'm sorry, I feel like I'm not talking like a real human being right now." He laughs, awkward and charming at once. "Do I sound weird to you? Don't answer, that'll make it worse," he adds, his voice dipping into a genuine sadness. "Awful. Well, I'm going back over there to finish. Can you stay?" 

Not do you want to. Can you? It feels incredibly intimate, his easy assumption without a lick of expectancy. If you said no, he'd frown and throw his chest back, hand over his heart like he's been shot in one of his dramatics, but he’d understand.

"I'm staying," you say. 

"Brilliant. Okay." 

James Potter visibly flusters, tucking that same rogue curl behind his ear. You want to offer him something, a tight braid or one of your headbands from your bag. He skates off and you don't get the chance. 

You're a vestibule of conflicted emotion. James has been acting so unlike himself lately. He's shy at odd moments and quick to fluster, scratching at his neck or his biceps or his nose in what you've identified as his nervous tic. And you might be shy yourself but you're not stupid, he's practically a mirror.

Knowing James has a crush on you and accepting it are wildly different tasks.

What if you date and he realises it's a mistake? You'll lose your only good friend. No more practices with James on the sidelines shouting stories across the rink for you to hear. No more pep-talks on hard days, a big hand on your shoulder and his lilting superlatives in your ear. You're going to smash it, shortcake. No more half sandwiches when he forgets his lunch. No more laughing until your stomach hurts. No more of his cologne lignering on your shirt from a quick hug, the smell indescribable even now. Sandalwood? Dewberry? Something sweeter, fuller, bourbon vanilla?

James clatter off of the ice after a tremendous loss with high spirits. His helmet under his arm, mouth guard in hand, he walks on his skates to your bench and sits down with a smile. “That sucked.”

"It was a good game," you say. 

"Can't win them all. You going home now?" 

"Work. Gotta work my arms out too," you joke weakly, curling your arm inward. 

"Can I walk you? I can change quickly." 

"You don't have to–" 

"Please?" he asks. 

"Yeah," you say, feeling sick. "Yeah, okay." 

James guards up and leaves for the changing room. You sit on the bench tapping your knees together, wondering why it feels so awful to like him so much. Sirius and some other friends pack up soon afterward, and a few of them are nice enough to say goodbye as they pass. 

"See you tomorrow," Sirius says warmly. 

You grimace at him. You'd been attempting a smile, but that hadn't really panned out, meekness and nerves combined pulling the corners of your lips down. 

He wavers. 

"You know," he says, paused half a foot from you, "James is a big boy, he can handle rejection. He wouldn't be cruel to you, if you weren't interested." 

"That's not it." 

"No?" he asks, slim eyebrows raised. 

"It's the opposite of that. He's my friend." You admit it to yourself as you admit it to him. James is not an acquaintance. "Do you know what I mean? I don't want…" to lose him. 

Sirius nods. "You won't." His teeth flash as he smiles goodbye. 

James looks gorgeous when he emerges, his brown face framed by thick, dark hair, the strands closest to his face damp from a quick face wash. 

"You could put your hair up," you say, standing. "It's getting so long now." 

"Is it awful?" he asks, hand moving to the longest pieces at his neck. It's above his shoulder, but only just. 

"No… no, it's not awful." 

You both start walking towards the exit without another word. You should've said how you really feel about his hair —how it's gorgeous, and you'd like to run your hands through it, feel the softness for yourself and see the look on his face as he's touched with care— but you're worried one thread of honestly will pull at the rest, unspooling your innermost thoughts for him to see. You aren't ready for that. 

James puts a hand behind your shoulder as you pass out of the exterior glass doors and into the street. The rink isn't far from your work, only a ten minute walk, and the first two pass in silence. 

"You really looked lovely, in your costume. When is that, the competition?" 

"A week and two days." 

"Are you travelling?" 

You nod. "Not far, but." You wrap your arms around your front to stave off the cool chill of the whipping breeze. James' hair gets pushed into his eyes. "I have a bobble if you want it." 

"I can't do anything with it. It's not long enough for a ponytail, and I can't plait to save my life. I wouldn't know where to start." 

You're glad to be looking at the pavement in front of you rather than his face as you say, "I'd do it for you, but…" 

James' shoe hits a pebble. 

"I know," he says. "We're going down a one way street." 

"Right." Your heart soars, your chest lightens, so glad he understands where you're coming from. "If we keep going on like this there isn't a way to move back if it doesn't work, and I just… don't want to lose you. I can't, James. You're my– you're my only real friend. I like you," you confess, heart pounding in your throat, under your tongue, all the worst places it could stand to be. "I do. And I know you'd still be nice to me if I didn't. Um…" 

You flush with heat, realising what you've admitted, and what he hasn't. 

Like he can read it on your face, James' walking slows, and he turns in to face you.

"I like you, too," he says. "I'm a bit mad for you, actually." 

You'd known that. Hearing it is something else. You hadn't realised how strong the pull would feel after he said it aloud. You look up from his broad chest to meet his eyes, and see the magnetism you feel reflected in his gaze. His hand breeches the gap between your two bodies first, his fingertips and then the flat of his nails smooth as they slide across the top of your thigh. Careful, slow. 

James puts his hand on your waist. 

"You're worried we won't be friends, if we try to make whatever this is," —he smiles gently— "work, and we can't."

"Exactly. I… you're…" 

James takes your upper arm into his free hand. "I promise it will work," he murmurs. He looks at you with a steadiness bordering on stern. "Why are you so sure it won't?" 

"I'm worried," you say. 

"You're always worrying. But…” His hand flexes around your bicep. “You told me before, the reason you keep skating in competitions even though you don't win many anymore, do you remember that? You said you keep trying because the thrill of almost winning is nearly as good as the real thing." 

James' smile turns sheepish. "I'm supposed to say that I don't know if this will work. That the thrill of almost making it together will be worth it if we don't, but I already promised you we will." He leans in a little. You don't think he means to. "And won't that feel better than almost?" 

You look up into his handsome face, feeling your heart reach flat out, might as well be running full tilt speeds of beating. Your breath catches. 

"I don't want to end up alone," you confess on an exhale. 

"You won't. I'll make sure you won't." 

Wind curls his hair into his eyes. 

You reach out, your shaking index finger skirting over his brow bone as you tuck the runaway strand behind his ear. 

His grip grows tighter at your waist. Never cruel, but insistent, desperate almost, in the way that his thumb shudders across your hoodie. You can’t feel his skin over the thick layer of cotton and polyester but you can feel the heat, like a star blistered against your hip bone, like a begging wish. You want him to touch you more than you can stand — you’re pleading with him in your head to do what you can’t do. 

It must show in your eyes, the pained pinch of your brow. 

“We’ll take things slowly,” he says. “We won’t do anything we can’t undo. All you have to do is trust me. If… if you want to.”

You lick your lips. Taking things slowly. You can’t kiss him, can’t trick yourself into the gratification of having someone so darlingly gorgeous put his hands on you. If he kisses you now, you’ll forget all the reasons why this is a bad idea. You won’t be able to test the waters. If you kiss him, you can’t take it back. For either of you. 

James’ hand smooths down the length of your hip as he pulls it back. The other falls toward your hand. Your mourn the loss of his touch, but he’s offering you his hand, his long fingers separated, gaps waiting to be filled. 

“Slowly,” you say, putting your hand in his. 

He gives your joined hands an experimental squeeze. “We’ve all the time in the world.”

James starts walking back the way you came, pulling you with him down the road.

“James, where are we?”

“I told you. We went down a one way street by accident. Or, I tried to tell you, but you started talking.” His smile says he knows exactly what’s happened, the nature of your misunderstanding. “You were distracted.”

You’ve confessed on the basis of a misunderstanding. “This is the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to me,” you utter.

James swings your hand lightly. 

“And the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” he says. “Since you’ll be late now anyhow, maybe we could go get a hot chocolate.”

You gawp at his pleased smile. What have I gotten myself into? you think. And then, louder, Wow, he looks so happy. 

—

James strangles the neck of a bulging bouquet in his hands, green stems wrapped in cellophane choked between two stressed palms, ten rigid fingers. The smell of fresh pollen and something sweeter awakens at his abuse, but James can’t make himself put them down. 

You may not care if you win or lose the competition today, but he does. He hasn’t actually ever been with you during one, and he wasn’t supposed to be here today — he had a game, and as soon as it was over he piled into Sirius’ car with his kit on and had his friend break a couple of road rules (read: not laws, but guidelines) involving trampling a garden and a precarious not u-turn. (Sirius may have broken a law or two, but they were daft laws, and James didn’t get anybody hurt.)

He knows it doesn’t matter. He said you’d take it slow, and you are. He hasn’t even kissed you yet, and he doesn’t mind nearly as much as he worried. It’s enough to know you’re his, exclusively if tenuously, that he can find you at the rink or walk you to work and not need a reason anymore, because he wants to see you, and that’s enough. He’d even taken you out on a date, a proper one after the hot chocolate, with nice clothes and wine and champagne at a weirdly intricate restaurant that served foie gras and played classical music in the background. It was cute, and James adored being able to pull out your seat, take your jacket off of your shoulders, kiss your cheek goodnight just a little further in than a friend might. 

You’ve finished the jumps in your program now, and James is relieved and gutted at once. Relieved, because they hadn’t quite scared him so much on TV, and gutted, because you look beautiful every time. It’s insane to see your body twist and turn, land and leap with that level of precision. All that's left for you to do is dance. He likes the way it looks, eyes focused on the pull and fall of your arms, how you smile, and in that last moment, where you pull your body in as tight as you can and spin until James is sure he’d see stars. 

You skate to the centre of the ice and bow to the judges, and you don’t notice James is standing there waiting for you until you’re off the ice completely. 

“Oh,” he sees you say rather than hears. When you’re just close enough to hear, you say, “Jamie, hi. I thought you had your game,” and throw your arms around his shoulders. James is very tall and very wide, and there’s a bouquet of flowers between you, but it’s a great hug.

He hugs you so hard you start to bend backward under his weight, the soft material of your bodysuit so soft it feels wet under his hands. Your face is hot, and you're still trying to catch your breath after your program, quick breaths like small gusts of wind against his neck. He feels your arms tighten incrementally, impossibly, and he closes his eyes for a lavish second of burying his nose in your hair. 

“I played, we lost, it was good fun. Now I’m here to watch my girl win big.”

You laugh and pull away, your eyes shimmering with joy, post-competition adrenaline. “I flubbed my first jump, did you see? I almost hit the ice.”

“You pulled up amazing,” he says. 

He spies your coach (who isn’t so much your coach as a friend, Mel, from the rink who goes with anyone who can get far enough into competitions to need one) with your jacket standing a little ways away. 

“Hey, Mel, could I have that?” James asks.

Mel gives him a knowing look. She hands it over and he shoves the flowers at you without waiting for a reaction, wanting to get you wrapped up warm again as fast as he can. You slide one arm at a time into the sleeves and don’t say a peep when he zips it closed. 

“James,” you say. Your cheek dips a touch toward your shoulder. Fondness lined each seraphim feature. “Sirius is calling you.”

He frowns. He’s been hoping for a little thank you kiss (cheek or chin, whatever you could reach), and Sirius is neither. He turns to where you’re looking at Sirius standing a ways away with some other spectators. 

“You have absolutely no game!” Sirius shouts. “None!”

“What’s your problem?” James shouts back. 

“You’re supposed to kiss her now? You twit!” he shouts, vehement. 

James turns away from him, “God, I’m sorry, he’s such a fucking idiot, he…” 

You’re looking at him. Quiet, face turned up and eyes squinted, eyelashes kissing in the corners, your glossy lips turned up like you want to be kissed. He feels it like a cheesy movie and he doesn’t care, every moment spent with you condensed as his hands come alive and cradle your face of their own accord. 

He isn’t expecting you to lift up on your skates and kiss him first. 

He does get fireworks, thank you very much. James Potter has been waiting to kiss you since the very first time he saw you, on ice, curling out of a tight spin with a deliriously happy laugh. It feels like an explosion, and the crowd cheers behind you for a jump he can’t see and it doesn’t matter, it fits, it makes perfect sense that a whole room of people would be up on their feet as he presses his lips to yours. 

“You looked so pretty,” he tells you, nose sliding against yours as he holds himself back. 

You kiss his bottom lip, another burst of floral scents erupting between you as you try not to slip back on your skate blades. “Thanks, James.”

He smiles into your mouth, melts into your hold, and takes another heart-thrumming kiss. 

You’re runner up in the competition. You’re the only girl who isn’t on the pedestal that gets a bouquet of flowers, and likely the only one who doesn’t care, not one bit. You smile at James like you’ve won the gold on the way out of the centre, your hand latched firmly around his. 

“Sirius.” You stop in the car park, flowers pressed to your chest. James stops beside you with your skate bag swung over his shoulder. “What happened to your car?” you ask. 

Sirius kicks a new dent. “Friendship,” he says grimly. 

James leans toward you, his lips at your ear. “Bender. Best not to ask about it. He’s sensitive.”

“Oh,” you murmur. “Okay.”

He kisses your temple. “Thanks, angel.”

･:*:｡･:*:･ﾟ

thank you so much for reading! please reblog if you enjoyed, it makes such a difference for me <3<3<3<3<3

#james potter #james potter x reader #james potter x fem!reader #james potter x y/n #james potter x you #james potter fic #james potter fluff #james potter blurb #james potter drabble #james potter imagine #james potter fanfic #james potter fanfiction #james potter scenario #james potter oneshot #the marauders #marauders era #marauders

[moonstruckme]

helloooo, i have a request if its possible♡

since we got figure skater! Sirius..... Do you think we could get hockey player! James x figure skater! reader? Maybe they go to the same place but the place where they practice its kinda shitty so its literally kinda like an across the hallway situation where the hockey practice happens on one ice rink and when you leave you can walk thru the ice rink of the figure skaters that its on another section of the place IDK I'M NOT AN ARCHITECT SORRY

BUT THE POINT ITS, that one day James leaves practice later than usual and he's walking to get out but he heards his favorite song playing and he goes to see whats up because its his favorite song ever! and goes to the other ice rink and sees the reader practicing and inmediatly he has the biggest crush ever and its almost dreaming about a house and three kids with that cute girl

idk i think i explained myself like sht but hope you like the idea! cause i think it would be soo cute

Hi lovely, you explained yourself perfectly! Thanks for being so patient with me, I hope this is alright <3

hockey player!James x figure skater!reader ♡ 718 words

James’ entire body is pleasantly sore, and he’s very much looking forward to going home to a nice, hot shower. 

“Do you and Moony want to go get breakfast tomorrow morning?” he asks Sirius as they leave the locker room. The two of them had taken longer than usual changing out of their gear, Sirius filling him in on the absolute hell week Remus had at his new job. To hear Sirius talk about it, all the other professors are simply jealous of Remus. James is sure that’s partly true, but he’d bet they need less reason than that. Somehow, James had thought leaving school would mean emerging into a more mature world, but adults seem just as petty as teenagers. Maybe pancakes and a good, uplifting chat would do something to take the sting out of Remus’ first week and help prepare him for the next. 

Sirius cuts James a sideways look, gray eyes narrowed. “Breakfast at what time?” 

“I was thinking six, six thirty.” Sirius scoffs, and James grins. “Only joking. How’s eleven?” 

“Still too early,” Sirius grumbles, “but we’ll go.” 

James bobs his head, pleased to have a course of action for helping his friend. “Ask Moons where he feels like going, and just…” He hears a faint, familiar melody. “...just let me know.” 

“Sounds good.” Sirius pushes open the door, but James has stopped. He’s looking back towards the rink, intrigued. “Coming?” 

James waves him off. “In a bit. See you tomorrow.” 

Sirius makes an amused sound, not unused to James’ diversions, and goes. 

James follows the sound of his favorite song, unabashed about bopping his head to the beat as he approaches the rink. He knows figure skaters sometimes use the rink after his hockey practice has wrapped up, and he absolutely has to see who’s choreographed a routine to this. He comes to a stop near the edge of the bleachers, and watches through the tempered glass as one lone skater launches into a turn. 

This wouldn’t be the track James would have thought of for a figure skating routine, but frankly, you’re doing it justice. Your movements are springy and nimble as you glance across the ice, one complicated-looking move to the next to the next. It seems like both skates are never touching the ground for more than half a second. There’s a lot to be said, probably, about your skill, your technique, but James is a philistine. All he can think about is how pretty you look. 

You’re gorgeous. Stunning. Graceful in your movements and seraphim in your countenance. A wisp of hair has freed itself from the confines of the rest and whips about your face, but you don’t seem to notice it, your gaze steady and lips just slightly pursed in concentration. 

James would never tell his friends because they’d mock him to hell and back, but he does believe in love at first sight. Only under particular circumstances, though. The sight has to be good enough—meaning, he has to see some aspect of who that person is behind a pretty face. You certainly do have a pretty face, and you’re dancing to his favorite song, and James doesn’t understand how he could ever be expected to not be totally enamored with you after this one spectacular look. He worries that if you glance over, you’ll see him with giant cartoon hearts boinging out of his eyes on springs. 

The song ends, and you spin to a stop. James’ breathing stops, too, as your gaze lands on a point not ten feet to his right. He wonders if he’s being creepy. It’s not like this is a private rink, and James wouldn’t be weirded out if he spotted someone watching him running drills or something (actually, if it were you he’d be over the moon about it), but he’s been told not everyone feels like he does about that stuff. And though he hardly thinks of himself as intimidating, James is also a big guy. He wants to woo you, not spook you.

You skate to the edge of the rink to restart your music, and James slips out. He hears it blaring softly behind him, and he probably looks like a total idiot when he grins and dances out the front door. An idiot in love.

#james potter #hockey player!james #james potter x reader #figure skater!reader #hockey player!james x figure skater!reader #james potter x you #james potter x y/n #james potter x fem!reader #james potter x self insert #james potter au #james potter fanfiction #james potter fanfic #james potter fic #james potter fluff #james potter drabble #james potter imagine #james potter scenario #james potter oneshot #james potter one shot #marauders #marauders au #marauders fanfiction #marauders fandom #hp marauders

[cosmossoleil]

Figure Skater Regulus this, Hockey Player James that-!

NO!!

Hockey Player Regulus and Hockey Player James, being on completely different teams that raze each other and having that enemies to lovers trope, they bicker and argue but end up finding love and solace in each other. Give me them skating on the ice, circling each other as they throw flirty insults to each other.

thank you for coming to my TED talk.

#regulus black #james potter #jegulus #marauders fanfiction #marauders #marauders fandom #james x regulus #sunseeker #starchaser

[sc0tters]

In The Break | Mat Barzal

summary: the Barzal house is at its breaking point without their key member their to save the day.

request: yes/no

warnings: swearing, grammar that I think a four year old would use.

word count: 2.09k

authors note: this is officially probably one of my favourite (soft) things that I’ve written. Like I can’t get over how cute everyone is. But like weirdly enough I can’t tell if I acc like this so I’m just going to how that it had the luna stamp of approval.

You didn’t think would had ever been more excited to have Mat back home as you were in that moment.

Tilly had been teething and James wanted his father at every waking moment.

Your energy was practically nonexistent as your one year old wasn’t sleeping through the night and that meant that you weren’t either.

It seemed that all three of you were at your wits end and as both kids were sat in the playroom with Tilly sporting her red swollen cheeks. James had gone on about how he couldn’t wait to see his father you knew you were being stupid but it hurt you hearing his praise as he had done nothing but spew the negative words that were in your four year olds Arsenal.

You tried to brush his hair wanting to get him ready for the day “I’m home!” Mat called out as he opened the front door making both kids turn their heads in the direction of him.

Before you knew it you were shoved to the ground as they both seemed to finally behave as they stopped their negative moods “hi baby!” Mat cooed as he crouched down and wrapped his arms around the boy.

Tilly waddled after her brother causing her father to gasp at her improved abilities at walking “where is mama?” The hockey player’s eyes lit up as he saw you tuck your hair behind your ears.

A smile formed on Mat’s lips as he so effortlessly held the children to his sides “hi pretty lady.” It seemed that he didn’t take note of the dark circles that lay under your eyes “was thinking we could go get ice cream with them?” His words cause the kids to cheer as Mat kissed your lips.

That was honestly the last thing you needed to hear. Both kids had won the battle of avoiding nap time until their father got home “Til hasn’t had her nap yet.” You pointed out with a sigh.

You weren’t expecting any shut eye during this time as Mat had been gone for two weeks and you did miss your husband. But you knew that if both kids didn’t try for their naps you would be the one to truly pay the price later on “they won’t be that bad.” As all three sent you a smile you couldn’t help but sigh as you nodded conceding defeat.

It was almost like you could have been a fortune teller. Tilly had cried herself to sleep as she was so grumpy without her teddy that not even Mat’s arms could put her mind at ease.

And your sweet little James had been sat on his fathers lap with every chance he could get.

So now you were not only sleep deprived but you were also feeling neglected.

Mat loved seeing how his kids looked up at him but as he held James in his arms and had Tilly in the carrier as you walked ahead of them to the front door.

Getting Tilly to sleep was easy as you simply placed her in her cot where Mat offered to take over in changing her into her pyjamas. James on the other hand began to have a fit as he realised that his father was nowhere in sight as you sat down on his bed with a book “daddy daddy daddy!” He complained kicking his legs “J daddy is with Tilly right now.” You sighed opening the book.

Yet that seemed to aggravate your son further “I want daddy not you.” Again you knew that James didn’t know the gravity of his words but in that moment you wanted to just break down.

You tried to ignore him as you began reading “I hate you momma where’s daddy!” Having children was another moment of learning how to bite your tongue and you had been doing so much better “you think I want to be here either!” You yelled back finally letting your anger go “I’m tired and for the last two weeks you have treated me like I’m not here!” As James flinched your eyes went wide.

Not once in the four years of being his mom had you ever raised your voice “J I’m-” before you could reach out to apologise Mat walked in “daddy!” James cheered.

Mat sent you a look of concern as you got up “think he wants you to read this.” You mumbled shoving the book into his hands as you let the door shut behind you “momma always said this was a book huh?” Mat smiled as he nestled into the mattress as James rested against him.

Guilt drowned you as you sat with your hands around your knees letting the warm water from the shower land on your back before the droplets slowly dripped down your skin. Tears painted your cheeks as you so badly just wanted to wake up and see that this was all just some bad dream “baby?” Mat called out as he walked into the bedroom.

It didn’t take him long to realise that you were in the shower “shit y/n!” Your husband didn’t care that he walked into the shower with all of his clothes still on.

In one quick movement Mat helped you up before he pulled you into a hug “Mat!” You cried as the hockey player reached behind you to turn the shower off.

Your tears soaked his shirt as you realised all the things you are frustrated about, not being able to make Tilly feel better as she teethed, James deciding that he hated you and how you let it get to you. But most of all how Mat came in and ruined the schedule you set with the kids.

Usually you wouldn’t have cared if they missed a day but you were tired and felt unloved and for that you let it irritate you today.

So you pushed Mat away as he handed you a towel “baby?” He was surprised to see the glare you sent him as you wiped your eyes.

Mat stood there with wide eyes “you went against me today.” The only rule you had about being parents was that you two had to remain united and that’s kind of hard when he ignores your scheduling.

He remained silent as you continued “how am I meant to keep it together here when you come in and play god or some shit becoming their favourites all over again.” You knew you were being stupid but it made you want to cry as you thought about it when your throat grew tight.

The hockey player scoffed “sorry that when I don’t see the kids for two weeks I want to go do something fun with them!” He felt like your statement was beyond aggressive as it quickly turned into a screaming match “Mat I told you that they needed to sleep and you still went with what you wanted!” Before he could even think about his rebuttal the baby monitor went off.

Tilly’s cries pulled your attention away from your husband “I would go but I’d hate to fuck with her sleep schedule.” Mat’s words had you rolling your eyes as you wrapped the towel around your body “fuck off Mat.” You spat shaking your head as you walked out of your room and down the hall to hers.

Her eyes grew full as she turned her head to see you “hi my love.” You cooed picking her small body up letting her head rest against your shoulder.

Usually you weren’t one for picking her up and rather just showing her that you were there but tonight you needed a hug from someone who seemed happy to see you.

So you two stood like that for fifteen minutes as your gentle swaying of your body caused her to finally settle “good night my girl.” You placed her back into her crib before you brought your fingers to your lip kissing them before you let them press softly on her forehead.

The darkness of the hallway back to your room reminded you of the state that of chaos that you had left Mat in.

You nervously chewed at the inside of your cheek before you took a final deep breath and pushed the door open.

Mat seemed like a shell of himself as he had the baby cam in his hand as he replayed the footage of you humming some random rhyme as Tilly fell asleep “I never know how you do that with her.” Mat blurted out as you were always the one to save them when the kids woke up in the night.

It was a taken that Mat could never even fathom as he tried everything but most of the time their own tiredness would come back and bring them into a deep sleep.

Wanting to discard the towel you found one of Mats shirts that you had folded that morning so you put that on instead of your own clothes. You remained quiet as you brought the towel to the bathroom unaware of how Mat followed you “I don’t mean to always play good cop with them it’s just that I’m not always around in the season and-” Mat rambled on as he ran his fingers through his hair.

Now your guilt about lashing out at him came out “it’s fine babe.” You shook off his thoughts as you turned to face him “no it’s not.” It was clear that the hockey player wanted you and the kids around more than he got to see you “you’re their great mom and an even greater wife to me.” His hands wrapped around your neck as you hugged him.

Somehow that contact felt different to the one from thirty minutes ago. This time it was with love and care as he watched you smile when his lips pressed against your head “you deserve to be treated better than you are.” Mat had tried coming up with the lecture for James but he didn’t know how to do it without getting angry at his son.

Sure two years ago James was a total momma’s boy who refused to be with anyone who wasn’t you but Mat knew that if James spoke to him the way he had spoken to you, Mat would have lost it.

Maybe it sounded stupid but you had both gone through your insecure moments with the kids and you were now realising that “can we go to bed then?” You yawned finally wanting that sleep that you had waited so long for.

Mat laughed as he nodded “let’s go.” He watched as you pulled him out of the room back into your bedroom where your bed was a sight for sore eyes.

The next morning you woke up to the sound of giggles and Bluey blaring through the speakers of the tv downstairs. Mat wasn’t next to you so he had obviously woken up to spend time with the kids.

You yawned stretching out as you smiled to yourself letting your back comfortably rest on the mattress “momma?” A soft voice came from the door causing you to look up.

James stood there with his plushie that Tito had brought him back from Vancouver over the summer “hi J,” before you could say anything more your eldest was running into your room as he jumped onto your bed and quickly into your arms.

The sight warmed your heart “what is it my baby?” You cooed running your fingers through his hair “I love you,” James looked up at you with tears in his eyes causing you to frown.

Your finger wiped at his cheek “I love you so much love why are you crying?” You didn’t mean for your words to come out confused as you tried to soothe the boy.

James fiddled with your bracelet, a habit he picked up watching you do it when you were nervous “sorry I yell at you in room.” Your mom had told you that you were going to have moments where you knew you were a good parent and this felt like it was that.

You gave the boy a squeeze as you kissed the top of his head “I’m sorry too.” You mumbled with both you turning to the door as you heard someone walk up the stairs “you two got room for two more?” Mat asked as he pressed a kiss to Tilly’s cheek drawing a giggle from her lips.

The sight gave you so much joy as your heart felt full “always.”

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