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ladamedusoif · 3 months

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Visiting - Chapter 12: If I Must Have A Future

(moodboard by @agentjackdaniels)

Pairing: Professor!Ben (College AU) x OFC Lydia/fem!Reader (reader POV/2nd POV)

Summary: Seeking a change of scenery after her life falls apart, Lydia crosses the Atlantic and arrives in a small New England town, to spend a year expanding her intellectual horizons as a visiting professor of art history at a small liberal arts college. Her growing friendship with Ben Morales, professor of Hispanic literature, forces Lydia to confront the fallout from her past - and raises unexpected questions about the future.

Chapter summary: Spring break comes to Barrow, and with it a European trip with major consequences for Ben and Lydia.

Word count: ~18k words (I'm so sorry but HEY LOOK THEY'RE BACK!)

Rating: Explicit (18+, MDNI)

Warnings (chapter specific): Smut; quite a lot of smut really; oral sex (M and F receiving); unprotected but safe PiV sex; fingering; praise kink; very mild submission kink if you squint; self-esteem and body/weight insecurity; anxiety; angst; family dynamics; strong language; alcohol consumption; references to past instances of emotional abuse; fluff

A/N: Oh, boy. This was a labour of love. An incredibly important part of their story, and one that took me ages to get ‘right’. This is not the end of Visiting - I’m planning about three more chapters, which will not be as long as this one. So there is still more to come from Ben and Lydia.

I wanted to say a huge thank you to everyone who was so kind and excited about the little Christmas one-shots I wrote for this pair - sometimes I feel like my dorks are the last kind of characters people want in this fandom, and it was lovely to see that they have readers who actually care (and even miss them!). Thank you too to everyone who voted in the poll about the chapter length. You wanted the full-on 18,000 words - you’re getting it.

And a special word for @agentjackdaniels, who screamed with me when we got one of the most Benergetic red carpet looks I’ve ever seen at the Emmys, who made my gorgeous new header image, and who has helped me see more times than I’d care to admit over the last few months that I matter and make a difference, especially around here. I hope I have done the same, too.

See the Series Masterlist for an outline of Lydia’s story and background.

Chapter 11 - Chapter 13

Cross-posting to AO3 (and if you’re reading on there, too, and yelling along in the comments, love you!)

Further A/N at the end of the chapter.

The title of this chapter is a line from the Fontaines DC song “I Love You”, which is not terribly romantic, all told, but I heard it over the holidays and this lyric hit me hard: If I must have a future/I want it with you.

Taglist: FYI I’m retiring taglists as they are giving me so much trouble with people not getting notifications - follow me on @ladameecrit and turn on notifications. But just in case: @agentjackdaniels, @tessa-quayle , @vermillionwinter , @iamskyereads , @tieronecrush, @perennialdoll247 , @love-the-abyss, @javierisms, @fuckyeahdindjarin , @littlemisspascal , @khindahra , @pedrostories , @readingiskeepingmegoing , @rhoorl , @red-red-rogue , @princessanglophile , @katareyoudrilling @survivingandenduring , @trulybetty @fictionismyreality @sunnywithachanceofjavi , @joeldjarin , @lahoozaherr, @s-u-t, @its-nebuleuse

“We will shortly be beginning our descent. Please return to your seats and fasten your seatbelts.”

You have never been one for sleeping on planes. Ben, on the other hand, has been snoozing away for the last two hours, the thin airline blanket comically small on his broad frame.

You put a hand on his arm to gently rouse him. “Love? We’re almost there.”

He blinks awake, eyes sleepy and hair askew, and stretches out his arms. “Mmmmfff. Hi, Lyd. You excited?”

“Yeah, I am. I’m really looking forward to seeing them.”

You’d mentioned the trip shortly after Valentine’s, during a conversation after dinner about plans for the spring break.

Your spring visit home had been booked since well before Christmas. A few days at home, visiting your family and catching up, and then to Paris for a week of tying up loose research ends and some vacation time.

It sounded blissful at the time. Now, your anticipation was tempered with disappointment at the prospect of leaving him here.

“So, uh, what are you doing for spring break, love? You going west, or…”

He shrugs. “Ordinarily I’d try to get a few days in San Francisco. But everyone’s got plans and is out of town on various trips, so there’s no point.” He looks a little resigned. “So it’s time catching up on work and my reading here, I guess. Maybe do some prep for directing the student play after the vacation. When are you back from your trip?”

There’s a nervous knot in your stomach. Just ask. Just do it.

“Could you take your reading and directing prep on the road?”

He looks perplexed. You take a deep breath.

“What if you came with me?”

Ben’s eyes widen. “Come with you? To see your family?”

Oh, fuck. You’ve pushed your luck. This is too weird.

“No, don’t worry about it.” You stand up from the table and pick up your plates. “I just knew I’d miss you but it’s probably too much. It’s fine. Forget I said it.”

He follows you into your tiny kitchen and leans against the doorframe. “What if I wanted to come?”

“Wanted? I mean, you seemed totally stunned that I’d even ask.”

He shakes his head and smiles gently. “Not stunned, as such. Surprised, maybe? But not in a bad way.”

“Why surprised, then?” You cross the small linoleum floor and wrap your arms around his waist. He blushes, tucking his chin against his chest bashfully.

“I dunno. Just that you want to bring me home with you? It… it means a lot to me.”

“It means a lot to me just to ask you, love. But you don’t have to come if you don’t want to.”

He looks at you with those big dark eyes and you feel your heart swell. “But I think I’d like to. As long as that’s okay with your family, of course? I don’t want to be in the way.”

You laugh and raise your eyebrows. “In the way? I think they’d be more excited about seeing you than me.” You rest your head against his chest, listening to his heartbeat. “You know they think you’re great, you’ve been on the video calls. My mother asks me more about you than she does about myself.”

He wraps an arm around you and kisses the top of your head. “It’s different in person, sometimes.”

You shake your head. “Mmmm, I don’t think so in this case. You haven’t been dealing with daily queries about the welfare and wellbeing of Ben Morales. And no, she doesn’t yet seem to realise she can just call you by your first name.”

He chuckles and holds you closer. “Guess I’d better go book some flights, huh?”

Ben pushes the luggage cart towards the sliding doors and out into the bright, bustling Arrivals area, where families wait excitedly at the barrier to greet their loved ones.

“LYDIAAAAAAAA!”

You immediately spot your parents, standing right in the centre of the barrier, aligned with the sliding doors. It’s still very early in the morning and you wonder how long they’ve been here, waiting at the perfect spot to see the two of you emerge.

You give Ben’s arm a reassuring squeeze as the two of you walk towards your excited family. “You’re not a stranger, love. They already love you. Remember that.”

Ben has barely exited the arrivals area when he’s enveloped in a warm embrace by your mother, who seems to have forgotten you entirely. Your father puts an arm around you and smiles widely while your mother coos over Ben. “And Ben Morales! Welcome, welcome. We’re so delighted to have you.”

Your mother has had her hair done and is dressed in an outfit that feels somewhere between “weekday lunch at a nice restaurant” and “Sunday best”. She’s also using what you and Kate refer to as her “telephone voice” when she speaks to Ben, more clipped and flatter than her usual tones.

“Mom, he knows what you sound like normally, you don’t need to put on the fancy accent.” You hug your father tightly and notice that his eyes are shining. He’s similarly neatly dressed, wearing a nice smart-casual pair of pants and a matching shirt and v-neck light sweater.

“I am talking normally!” your mother fires back, followed by a tinkly laugh as she tilts her head and smiles at Ben. He smiles broadly, though you know he’s shattered, and your mother gives you a look that says “See? Ben likes me.”

Your father shakes Ben’s hand before embracing him. “The two of you must be exhausted,” he says, arm still wrapped around Ben’s shoulders. “Let’s head to the car.”

Ben and your dad lead the way, your mother reaching for your hand and giving it a warm squeeze as you walk companionably a few steps behind.

“Welcome home, pet. I’m delighted he’s here too. We’re so happy for you.” She looks ahead and appraises Ben’s broad frame as he pushes the luggage cart and chats to your father.

“Grand big man, isn’t he?”, she says approvingly. “Don’t look at me like that, Lydia!”

“There’s milk there and bread and tea and coffee and a few biscuits and butter and a couple of bags of crisps and -“

“Mom, we’re fine. We’ll take care of ourselves. Okay?”

Your mother throws up her hands in resignation. “Alright! Just wanted to make sure you didn’t starve.”

Kate, Marc, and their little girls have taken over your parents’ house for the duration of renovation works on their own home, and in the interests of space (and your sanity) you’d booked a small holiday flat in your hometown for the visit. Now, with Ben in tow, the privacy of the flat was even more welcome.

“Thank you. I mean it. Now, can we please go and get some rest?” You hug her tightly and she kisses your cheek, before looking in Ben’s direction.

“Of course. We’ll see you later, though? For something to eat? Kate and Marc and the girls are that excited to see you, I think they might burst.”

You stand beside Ben, bringing your hand to the small of his back, and wave your parents off as they return to the car. They’re not even out of earshot when you hear your father saying “He wouldn’t let her lift a single bag! Not one! Helped her all the time. Lovely chap. Very nice. Far cry from the other fucker…”

Subtlety has never been their strong point. You just hope Ben is too jet-lagged to have heard what they said.

A relaxed family meal, she said. Nothing special, she said. Come over in the early afternoon. It’s just like a Sunday lunch, she said.

Your mother is reading Ben a list of menu options that’s longer than in some restaurants. His eyebrows rise and fall as he takes it in and considers the possibilities.

“Honestly, Mrs -“

“MARIE. I told you.”

“Honestly, Marie, I’ll just have whatever everyone else is having. It all sounds great. Do you need any help in the kitchen?”

“I most certainly do not. You can have whatever you want. You are the guest.”

“Seriously. Whatever’s easiest.” He looks nervously at you and speaks in a low voice. “What is easiest?”

You shrug. “Probably the beef.”

He beams at your mother and tells her he’ll have some beef. She tilts her head, smiles delightedly at him, and does that tinkly laugh again before returning to the kitchen.

The meal is delicious but, inevitably, chaotic. Your three-year-old niece Cora, who had insisted on sitting between you and Ben (Benjamoo, as she persisted in calling him), realises quickly that the family-style service meant she could help herself to her favourite sides as and when she wanted, chubby little hands rapidly making a mark on the mashed potato and carrots. Your mother keeps asking if the food is hot enough. Kate and Marc try to talk to Ben while corralling little Evie and making sure she gets fed.

Your father, meanwhile, veers between talking delightedly to the little girls and engaging Ben in a rapidly-shifting conversation that covers San Francisco, transatlantic flights, whether Ben liked sports, and a detailed description of the plot of a film he’d watched the week before. You couldn’t work out which film it was, but you knew it had Kevin Costner in it. Mostly because your dad kept referring to him as “Kevin Costner”, rather than by the character’s name.

You rest a hand on Ben’s knee, under the solid dining table your father had made for the family home when you were barely two.

“You doing okay? I know we’re a bit much…”

His warm hand covers yours and he smiles softly.

“I’m great, Lyd. And you haven’t been to a Morales family meal yet - now that’s a bit much. Just you wait and see.”

You grin and lean your head affectionately on his shoulder for a moment, winding your fingers through his, never noticing the conspiratorial, knowing look exchanged between Kate and your mother.

You and Ben insist on clearing the dishes, making short work of loading the dishwasher before your parents can tell you off for letting the guest do the chores. Through the kitchen window you see Cora running towards her little plastic play house, on temporary loan to your parents’ back garden while Kate and Marc’s building work is being completed. Kate follows swiftly behind, waving a soft fleece jacket at her daughter.

After wrangling Cora into her jacket, she appears at the back door. “Cora wants to know if Ben can come and visit her tea shop. Not you, Lyd. She was very clear about that. Only Benjamoo.”

He smiles happily and puts down his dish towel, before making a sympathetic face at you and kissing your cheek. “Sorry, Lyddie. I guess I better take up my invitation.”

It’s a hilarious and adorable sight: Ben, sitting cross-legged on the mat beside Cora’s house, hair a bit messy and eyes still a little tired behind his glasses, broad-shouldered in his grey Berkeley sweatshirt and decidedly out of proportion to the pink-and-white plastic cottage. You can hear him giving Cora his order and talking rapturously about the “tea” she serves him in a little pink cup, while she giggles and claps her hands.

Marc and your father arrive in the kitchen, your brother-in-law carrying little Evie in his arms. “Evie thinks she’s missing out on the fun with Ben and Cora,” he announces, opening the back door. “And we want to make sure Cora doesn’t try to force-feed mud cakes to your boyfriend.”

You’d been so nervous about this - not because you thought your family wouldn’t like Ben, or vice versa, but because by definition the first visit to your partner’s family feels a little like an audition of some kind. It has the potential to go horribly wrong, no matter how well prepared you are, or how many video calls you’ve had over the last couple of months.

But here he is, now, integrated happily into your close-knit family of origin, getting on famously with your parents, sister, and brother-in-law, and making your beloved little niece laugh like a drain as he pretends to drink from her toy teapot. Like he was always here. Or always meant to be here.

There’s a surge of emotions in your chest: deep love and affection, above all, but with it a reminder that your future together is by no means assured. Assuming, of course, that he wants a future together.

“He’s good with kids, isn’t he?”

Kate’s voice startles you. “Where did you come out of?”

“I’m stealthy when I want, Lyd. Anyway, you haven’t answered my question.”

You throw a bombastic side eye in your younger sister’s direction. “I know what you’re getting at.”

Kate shrugs, the picture of innocence. “I’m just observing.”

“Ben is a wonderful uncle. Just as I am a wonderful aunt. We like that. And that’s one of the things I love about him.” You lean on the kitchen counter, voice quieter. “So…what do you think?”

Kate arches an eyebrow in your direction. Your mother arrives in the kitchen with impeccable timing, as ever.

“What do I think of what?”

“You know what. Who. Him. Ben.”

Your mother laughs as she fills the kettle with water and puts it on to boil for some teas and coffees. She turns round to face her two daughters. “Well, Kate, I don’t know about you, but - he wouldn’t be for me.”

Your jaw drops. “Excuse me?”

Kate opens a cupboard and starts to take out some mugs. “I know what you mean, mom. Not really for me, either.”

“You know yourself, Kate,” your mother adds, finding a carton of milk in the fridge and filling a small milk jug, “Just not my thing at all.”

Anger spreads hot and warm across your face. “Good, because he’s not your fucking ‘thing’, he’s my thing and I can’t believe how two-faced you’re being. All sweetness and light and then saying he’s not really for you and -”

Your mother holds out a hand, expression deadpan. “Lydia, not everyone wants a man who’s kind and funny and genuine and clearly worships the ground his girlfriend walks on.”

“Exactly,” Kate chimes in. “Just because you love someone who’s really smart and nice and good with kids and is actually kind of cute in a dorky way doesn’t mean the rest of us do.”

For a moment, your confusion and anger doesn’t quite let you hear what they’re saying. “I’m not asking you to be in love with him, I’m just - oh. Oh.”

Marie and Kate burst out laughing.

“Well, fuck the two of you. Forty-two years and you’re still winding me up.”

Your mother wraps you in a warm cuddle. “Ah, poor Lyd. We’re sorry. We just couldn’t resist.”

“He’s so lovely, Lyd,” Kate adds, embracing you from behind. “I mean it. Marc thinks so, too. I know I said at Christmas that he looked like he’d been engineered in a lab for you and it looks like I was right. And Ben’s even cuter in the flesh, not that I notice such things.” She coughs for dramatic effect. “What with being a married mother of two.”

“And he loves the bones of you, darling girl,” your mother whispers. “And sure, why wouldn’t he?”

“I don’t know about you, love, but I’m shattered.”

Ben glances over at you and wraps his arm around your shoulders, bringing you in to nuzzle against his chest. He holds up his copy of the script for Samuel Beckett’s Endgame, multicoloured tabs fluttering like tiny flags.

“I’m just going to work through one more scene, is that okay?”

You hum contentedly. “Of course, love. How’s it going, anyway?”

He flicks through a few pages, scanning his notes and annotations. The comparative literature students put on a play every year, towards the end of the second semester, and Ben had to step in at short notice as director after a colleague in French fell ill. “It’s a relief we’re doing it in the English translation, put it that way. I just don’t know why Jen thought I could take this on, after Michèle went on sick leave.”

You idly rub his tummy and kiss his side through his old shirt. “Because she knows you’re great and talented and the students love you, Mr Director.”

He huffs a laugh, marks up another section, adds a tab, and closes the book before taking off his glasses and shuffling down the bed and wrapping his free arm around you. He kisses the top of your head and holds you tight.

“Thank you for bringing me home with you.”

You open your eyes and glance up at him. “Sure they haven’t put you off?”

“It would take a lot to put me off, Lyd. Anyway, they’re great. It - it meant a lot, to be welcomed like that, by the people you love.”

He looks down at you, and you place a light kiss on his jaw, smiling at the bristle of his beard against your lips. His gaze is solemn and intense as he reaches for your hand.

“I’m serious about this, Lyd. About us. You know?”

“I know. I’m serious about us, too. Deadly serious, in fact.”

He smiles, eyes shining, and kisses you, soft and slow, pulling you closer and working a path of kisses down the side of your neck as your body writhes against his. Tiredness is forgotten, for the moment, as you slip your hand inside the waistband of his loose boxers and tug them down, fingers wrapping around his cock. Ben sighs against your chest as you stroke him, his mouth finding your nipples as his long fingers trace the wetness building between your legs. With one leg hitched across his, you angle your hips just so and guide him inside you as he whispers your name against your ear.

After you’ve made love, Ben falls asleep mid-cuddle, and you tuck yourself against him and close your eyes. But sleep doesn’t come easy. You should be delighted, after the beautiful day you’d had. But there’s an anxiety building in the back of your mind that you can’t quite shake.

Serious this relationship may be, but spring will soon turn to summer, and with it the prospect of being separated indefinitely by an entire ocean and several time zones. Kate was wont to remind you that you “could just do distance for a while”, and she meant well. It was intended to reassure you.

The problem was, the more you thought about what that option would actually mean, the less comfort it provided.

Over the next couple of days, you introduce Ben to the world of your hometown, to the places and people that shaped you. It is strange, at first, to see him, whole and present, in the spaces that defined your childhood. But it is a beautifully intimate thing, sharing memories with someone you love. You lay yourself even more bare before them, revealing the you that was before they knew you.

The two of you have, of course, shared so much about yourselves and your pasts with each other in the time since you met. But this was different. Walking with him, pointing out your old schools, old haunts, swapping memories and stories, introducing him to random relations you meet in the streets: you are quietly knotting the strands of your past - with all its love, loss, joy and sorrow - with the man who, you hope, represents your future.

Kate and Marc insist on bringing you to dinner one night. “It’d be wrong not to,” Marc had explained as you sat in your parents’ living room, Ben playing peek-a-boo with Evie while your mother looked on approvingly. “Sure we have built-in babysitting while we’re staying with Joe and Marie.”

Your mother’s expression shifted instantaneously, shooting daggers at your brother-in-law. “Cheeky.”

Your hometown is not known for haute cuisine, but Kate booked a table at the nicest restaurant in town and it has been a perfect evening: good food, decent wine, and the pleasure of seeing how well Ben, Kate, and Marc are getting along. You and Kate go to the bathroom at one point, and she eyeballs you as you top up your lipstick, side by side, in the mirror.

“Think he’s passed the audition, Lyd.” She pouts and blows a kiss at her reflection. “Oh, and guess what? We’ve got a special immersive cultural experience planned for the rest of the night.”

You swivel and glare at her. “And what does that involve, exactly?”

Kate picks up her handbag and does a little shimmy on the spot. “The Roxy, Lyd. The ultimate method of integrating your lovely Benjamin into your native place.”

“You have got to be kidding me.”

The Roxy was once the town’s cinema, built in the 1940s and made redundant by the coming of the multiplex in the 1990s. Its owners had moved swiftly, though, and transformed the Roxy into a nightclub. It was a site of memorable nights out dancing with your friends, of crying in the bathrooms when you realised your crush was interested in someone else, of bad kissing, of telling random men to fuck off when they told you to smile, of screaming with glee when “Hey Ya” came on.

If the Roxy was a taste, it would be peach schnapps and orange squash. Its smell, meanwhile, had lodged permanently in your memory: old cigarettes, sticky carpets, cheap aftershave, vanilla musk body spray.

She was not kidding. You and Kate sit on some banquette seating in a corner of the Roxy’s lounge - which was just a separate floor with slightly better, more old-school music - and take in the completely incongruous sight of Ben, followed by Marc, weaving his way through the habitual crowd of locals with your drinks in hand.

“Vodka tonic for Lyddie, gin and tonic for Kate.” Ben places the glasses on the table and nestles in beside you, giving your thigh a little squeeze. He reaches for his bottle of beer and raises it slightly. “Uh, cheers, I guess?”

Kate enthusiastically clinks her swimming pool-sized glass of gin and tonic off Ben’s drink. “Cheers! Now, you have to promise me you’ll dance. Otherwise it’s not full assimilation.”

You groan audibly and stir your drink with the straw as Ben chuckles. “C’mon, Lyd, you’ve got moves.” He raises an eyebrow at you mischievously.

You manage to stave off the inevitable for a while, finishing your first vodka tonic and about to suggest you go to the bar when a familiar opening melody sends Kate leaping out of her seat, excitedly grabbing her husband and beckoning to you.

“AS IT WAS?!? COME OOOONNNN LYYYYD!” Kate bellows back to you and Ben from the tiny dancefloor, where Marc is already showing off a move you can only describe as “rhythmic shuffling” while mouthing Harry Styles’ lyrics.

You look at Ben. He stands, removes his jacket, and offers you his hand, smiling expectantly. His hand rests gently on the small of your back as you join your sister and brother-in-law on the dancefloor, and he pulls you in to whisper in your ear.

“We can do better than them, can’t we?”

You laugh, leaning in as he wraps an arm around your waist, takes your hand, and helps you exorcise all those demons of heartbreak long past on the dancefloor.

As she clambers into a taxi in the early hours of the morning, Kate turns and yells “I’m telling mom you’re bringing a boy home with you from the Roxy!”, before collapsing in hysterics as Marc takes her hand and pulls her into the car. They grin and wave at you and Ben as it disappears up the street and back towards your parents’ house.

You lean against Ben as you walk back towards the little flat you’d rented for your stay at home, sighing contentedly as he drapes an arm around your shoulders.

“She’s right, though,” you giggle, “I’m actually bringing the hot boy home with me from the Roxy. I’ve come a long way from endless rejection and the odd bit of bad kissing.”

Ben huffs a laugh as you open the main door of the building and climb the stairs to the apartment. “Well, fuckin’ good.” He adds a sassy little head movement for emphasis.

“Excuse me?”

“Fuckin’ good. Because what would have happened to me if you’d been swept off your feet by one of those bad kissing boys back then?” He follows you into the little entrance hall and, for all his joking tone, there’s a vulnerability lurking in his beautiful eyes.

You cradle his face in your hands. “I’d have found you one way or another, Benjamin.” A coy smile crosses your lips as you take him in - danced out, hair mussed, and so stupidly sexy you still can’t quite believe he’s real.

Your fingers hook inside his waistband as you pull him tight to you, leading him into the living room and pushing him against the wall as you bring a hand to his crotch. “And I’d like to make the most of bringing the hottest man home from the club for once in my life, if you don’t mind. Especially seeing as he was worth the wait.”

Ben’s eyes widen and he half gasps, half chuckles as you undo his jeans and slip a hand inside his boxers, stroking his cock as you pepper his throat with tiny kisses. He leans down slightly to bring a hand under the skirt of your dress, hitching up the fabric and slipping two fingers into your panties to play with your clit as he kisses you: hungry, urgent, wanting.

But you’ve had something else on your mind all night. You break the kiss and begin to sink to your knees, hands around Ben’s waist for balance.

Your eyes flit up to meet his. “Let me make you feel good, darling.”

His breath hitches as he takes you in: hair a little messy, eyes wide and wild, lips slightly parted, the soft flesh of your tits rising and falling with your breathing.

“Fuck, Lyd, you’re amazing.”

“That a yes?”

He swallows hard and nods rapidly. “Fuck. Yes. Yes. Please.”

You lick your lips and smile as you carefully tug down the waistband of his boxer briefs. Your mouth presses into the softest, most sensitive parts of him: a kiss, a lick, a little nip to his belly; a course plotted down from his abdomen to the hardening cock you hold in your hand. You take him into your mouth, tongue swirling gently over the tip as you stroke him, revelling in the sensation and the moans of pleasure you’re pulling from the gorgeous man above you. Ben rests his hand on the back of your head and leans back against the wall, panting harder as you find your rhythm.

The ache between your thighs builds with his every grunt and groan. Your fingertips find your clit, rubbing little circles over it in a fruitless bid to find some relief. You ease his cock out of your mouth with a pop and Ben helps you to your feet before you take his hand and guide him to the couch.

You slip off your panties and encourage him to lie back on the sofa as you gather the skirt of your dress around your waist and straddle him. “Need to fuck you, my love.”

He grips the flesh of your hips and thighs, fingers pressing into your body as you take him inside you and begin to ride him, relishing the slow drag of his cock as you come undone. He looks beautiful underneath you, eyes wide and shining as he watches every move of your body.

“Fuck, Lyd,” he pants, smiling up at you. “You look incredible.” He reaches up and pulls down your neckline, groping your breasts and gazing at you like you’re the sexiest thing he’s ever seen: head thrown back, eyes closed, and vocal.

He begins to thrust up into you, finding a rhythm that complements yours, intensifying the sensation so much that you can’t help but cry out with pleasure.

“Yes, baby…fuck, that’s so fucking good, Ben, that’s fucking it, fuck!”

“Take it, Lyddie.” His dark eyes stare into yours, hands still gripping you firmly. “Ride me, take what you need…fuck, good fucking girl. I’ll give you whatever you need, whatever you want.”

And he knows what you need, in that moment. His thick fingers slip between your thighs and find your clit, circling it over and over as you keep on fucking him.

You come hard, the last flutters of your orgasm still working through you when Ben follows suit. He’s still inside as you bend forward to kiss him, trailing your hands over his beautiful face and through his damp hair. You rest on his chest and let the sound of his breathing start to steady you as he holds you close for a couple of moments.

“I love you so much, Lyddie,” he pants quietly, chuckling to himself. “You’re a hell of a woman.”

For your last day, Ben suggests that he might make dinner at the flat, as a gesture of thanks for your family’s hospitality. You suggest lasagne with some sides as a general crowdpleaser, borrow some dishes from your mother, and Ben gets to work while you lay the place settings.

The lasagne is cooking away happily when your mother arrives with Kate, Marc, and the girls. You look puzzled.

“Where’s Dad?”

Your mother rolls her eyes as Cora goes tearing off around the flat, Kate following swiftly behind. “He insisted he had to go to the football match tonight. Of course. Anyway, he said he’ll be here shortly.”

Ben emerges from the kitchen, clad in a navy and white striped apron you’d used back when you (briefly) did home economics at school. He kisses your mother and Kate on the cheek and hugs Marc, before bending down to give a delighted Cora a high five.

“I made you a present,” she says quietly, suddenly shy.

Ben brings himself down to her level. “A present? For me? That’s amazing.”

Kate rummages in her bag and produces a rolled-up piece of paper, handing it to Ben. “She did it all herself. Mostly.”

You stand beside him as he unfurls it and Cora looks down at her toes. The drawing features a large figure with a mop of dark wavy hair and a wide smile - “Benjamoo”, Cora points out helpfully - standing close beside a slightly smaller figure immediately recognisable as you. “Auntie Lyd,” she adds seriously, in case you weren’t aware.

The figures’ stick arms are touching. “Holding hands,” Cora says.

Ben looks at Cora, then up at you, and back to the little girl. “This is the best art anyone’s ever given me. I’m going to put it on my wall when I get home.” He stands, and reaches for your hand, noticing the tears threatening in your eyes. “Auntie Lyd will help. Won’t you?”

You nod and squeeze his hand. Cora starts to giggle and points at you and Ben.

“See? Holding hands.”

Ben and Marc pop out to the nearest supermarket shortly afterwards, when you realise you had neglected to buy garlic bread. You sit in the open-plan kitchen and dining area with your mother while Kate plays with her daughters in the living room.

“You alright, love?” Marie notices how you fiddle with the place settings and rub your fingers together, sure signs that something’s on your mind.

“Mmm? Sorry, I was miles away. Yeah, I’m… I think so.” You exhale. “I don’t know.”

Your mother gives you a little breathing room, waiting to see if you’ll open up more.

“It’s just… fuck. I don’t know. I - what the fuck are we going to do?”

She sighs softly and pats the back of your hand. “You and Ben?”

“Me and Ben. It’s spring break. And there’s no clear pathway about what we’ll do when my year in Barrow ends and I have to come back to my job over this side of the ocean.”

“Well, I mean… I know you hate the thoughts of it, Lyd, but have you talked about it? Kate’s right, you could always do long-distance for a while, until you knew what you both really wanted.”

You put your head in your hands. “We’ve said that we’re very serious about the relationship.”

“So then! There’s your answer. No?”

You look up at her mournfully. “Yes and no. Yes, we’re serious about each other. No, that doesn’t mean we have any idea how to manage the distance.”

Marie adjusts the salt and pepper cruets in the middle of the table. “People do it, Lyd. It’s a commitment but they make it work.”

You nod slowly. “I just don’t know if that’s what I want, at this stage in my life. We see each other every day. We’re practically living together.”

Your mother fans herself in mock horror. “And not a hint of a ring on the finger, goodness!”

You roll your eyes good-naturedly. “Forty-two, mother dear. But yeah. I don’t know if I could go from that to not seeing Ben for weeks or a month or more at a time. Not now.”

“So what does that mean?”

You swallow hard. “I don’t know. One of us moves. He moves for me. I move for him. But that means trying to find a permanent academic job and in both places that’s like finding a needle in a haystack.”

“And if there’s no job? Distance as a temporary measure?”

You bite your lip. “But what if that’s still too hard?”

“So move.”

“But that means him giving up his life for me, or me uprooting for him, and being so far from all of you and from here and…” You look up at your mother, feeling like a scared little girl again.

“I love him so much, Mom. I never thought I’d love anyone like that. Never thought I’d even meet someone like that. And for him to love me in return…fuck.”

Marie shifts closer and wraps her arm around your shoulders. “I know, love. I know. You love the bones of each other. And it’s real love. Everyone can see it.”

“What do we do?”

“Lydia, I can’t tell you what to do one way or the other. Only you know what’s right for the two of you.”

You lean your head on your mother’s shoulder and she gives your hand a squeeze. “I know. It’s just - fuck, why does it have to be hard? Don’t I deserve things to work out, for once?”

“You do, pet. Of course you do. No one deserves it more.”

“Sometimes it feels crazy, y’know? This time last year I didn’t know Ben existed, and now -”

“Now it’s like you’ve known each other forever? Like you can’t imagine life without him?”

You turn to face her, and smile. “Exactly.”

“That’s love for you.” Marie purses her lips, thinking. “I’m only going to say one more thing. Your happiness.”

“Huh?”

“Lyd, for years you prioritised someone else’s happiness over your own. I know, I know, that fucker moved for you when you got the job away, I know that. But apart from that…it was all you. All you, trying to keep someone else happy and cracking under the strain.” She inhales and exhales, trying to curb the fury that still burns in her when she remembers how you were treated.

“All I’m going to say is this: don’t worry about anyone else, Lyd. Not me, not Dad, not Kate, Marc, the girls, your job - nobody. Well, worry about Ben. But above all, prioritise your happiness. We have ours over here. It’s time for you to find yours.”

You hug her tightly. “One final question.”

She nods and waits.

“What does Dad think of Ben? I know it wouldn’t change my feelings but given everything from the shitshow, I’d like to know he doesn’t absolutely loathe him.”

She looks at her phone and pushes away from the table, walking into the living room and opening the door of the flat. “Ask him yourself, Lyd. Here he is now.”

Your father comes into the kitchen, talking about something that happened at the local football match he’d attended that afternoon and eyes already locked on the kettle, his mind focused on making a cup of tea.

“Joe? Lyd wants to ask you something.”

You roll your eyes at your mother. “It’s not a big deal.”

He turns around, tea caddy in hand. He’s been to this flat twice, you think, and he knows exactly where all the tea-making equipment is kept.

“Alright. Ask away, Lyd. Are you alright? Is everything okay?”

“It’s fine. Everything’s fine. I just - Dad, what do you think?”

“What do I think of what?”

“Ben. Me and Ben, specifically. But also just Ben.”

Joe switches on the kettle and leans against the kitchen counter. “Sure, my opinion isn’t what matters. What matters is how you feel. Isn’t that right?” He looks to your mother for backup.

“I said that to her, but she said she wanted to hear from you.”

He takes a mug out of the cupboard and drops a square teabag into it. “Lydia, is everything okay? Are you having any doubts about him, is that it?”

You laugh and shake your head. “Not a one.”

“And you don’t think he’s having any doubts about you? Because if he is I’ll fucking -“

“No, Dad. He… he’s very clear about how he feels.”

Your father nods in satisfaction. “Well, that’s reassuring. Would be strange if he wasn’t, given how he is with you. At least, what we’ve seen here.” He pours the freshly boiled water over the teabag and opens the fridge in search of milk. “But the point stands. You love each other, don’t you?”

You aren’t sure if your father has ever been so open or explicit with you in asking about a romantic relationship. Perhaps, you wonder, he regretted not being more honest about his concerns over the years of your longest one.

“We do.” Your eyes fill with tears, unexpectedly. You swallow hard. “We love each other very, very much.”

“Okay then.” He stirs his tea vigorously, the metal of the teaspoon clinking off the stoneware mug.

“But I still want to know what you think. It matters to me. Especially - especially after the last time.”

Joe pulls out a chair and settles at the table, your mother reaching automatically for a coaster and sliding it under the mug. “Lyd, you know what I’ve always said. There’s not one person walking this earth who deserves our lovely Lydia. Not one.”

Your heart sinks a little, and you nod. You’ve heard this a lot since your ex cheated and fucked off. You never really believe it.

“But.” Your father pauses and sips his tea.

“But?”

He looks at you and reaches out to touch your hand. “But - that lovely man you brought home definitely comes very close indeed.”

Right on cue, the front door opens and you can hear Ben and Marc chatting companionably and laughing together. Marc does a silly little dance into the kitchen, waving the garlic bread around like glow sticks.

“Now, please don’t destroy the garlic bread before it’s even gone into the oven, Marc!”

As your mother grabs the bread and sneaks a peek at the lasagne, now browned to perfection, Ben pulls you in for a quiet word.

“Lyddie, are you okay? You look like you’ve been crying.”

You lean against his chest as he wraps his arms around you. “I’m okay, darling. I just needed this. Needed you.” The oven timer pings and you look at him. “Time for Professor Morales to serve us his delicious lasagne. C’mon, we can plate up before my mother takes over.”

You thought goodbyes would get easier the longer you worked away from home, but the opposite turned out to be true. Your parents are doing their usual brave face routine at the airport: Joe clearly trying not to cry, Marie overdoing the levity to distract you and stave off her own sadness at seeing you go.

“Paris in the springtime, Lyd! It’ll be gorgeous. She’s a great tour guide, Ben, she knows it all.”

“She’s brilliant, Marie. But you knew that before the rest of us found out.” He reaches for your hand, holding it tightly as you start to feel the tears prickling.

He only lets go as you both embrace your parents in turn, Ben thanking them repeatedly for their kindness. Then, his fingers curl around yours again, holding you strong and steady at the entrance to departures.

“I love you both so much, you know? We’re so grateful.”

Your mother can’t hold back her tears any more, and her wet cheek presses against yours as she pulls you in for a final hug. “We love you so much. Both of you.”

She pulls away and holds your gaze. “Both of you. Remember what I said to you, Lydia. Remember that.”

You nod and give Ben’s hand a little squeeze. “We should probably head on through. Safe home - message me when you get back, okay? We’ll see you soon.”

You keep waving back with every sharp turn you take in the queue for security, until eventually your parents’ faces are obscured by the crowd behind you, and you face forward into the security area, still holding Ben’s hand.

“Paris par train ou Paris par bus?”

Ben shrugs as he pushes the luggage trolley. “You’re the expert, Lyddie. What’s easiest?”

You summon up the mental map of Parisian transport options that is always ticking over at the back of your mind. “Train is quicker but involves a change at Châtelet Les Halles - ugh - and then again at Bastille. Bus gets us to Opéra which means we can get right on to line 8.”

“Bus?”

“Bus.”

Ben stacks your bags carefully in one of the Roissybus’s luggage areas and exhales as he takes a seat beside you. “You know it’s been almost thirty years since I was in Paris?”

“Excusez-moi?”

He chuckles. “Came up on a very poorly-thought-out visit with some friends while I was on exchange in Málaga. Overnight trains, hostels, no money, cheap wine. I barely saw the Eiffel Tower, let alone anything else.”

The bus pulls out of Charles de Gaulle Airport and onto the motorway. You squeeze Ben’s thigh affectionately. “Isn’t it a good thing that you’ve come to Paris with a ready-made guide, then?”

He smirks and arches an eyebrow suggestively. “Oh, I’m really looking forward to doing some, er, exploring with her.”

“Is that so?” You move your hand ever so slightly up his thigh, smiling with satisfaction as Ben gasps a little and shifts in the seat. “I always like to try out new pleasures here, you know?”

A wiggle of your eyebrows has you both giggling, leaning against each other as the bus makes good progress towards the périphérique, the motorway that rings the city, and into Paris proper. You start to point out landmarks, locations, shifting into a stream of consciousness that spans history, personal memories, places to visit, and random observations.

Ben smiles to himself as he watches and listens, delighting in your joy and excitement as you prepare to see your old friend - to walk her streets, listen to her voice, and write another chapter in your long love story.

The advantage of Parisian connections: your friend Sophie offered you her apartment in the 11th arrondissement for the duration of your stay, as she was away in the south of France. You meet her upstairs neighbour outside the narrow, early nineteenth-century building on a quiet street just off the rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine and collect Sophie’s key, taking note of the door codes.

“Holy shit. Look at this place!”

Ben has carried the bags up the stairs - thankfully, Sophie’s flat is on the first floor - and followed you into the little apartment. You turn and grin when you notice how entranced he looks, staring up at the wooden beams in the tiny hallway, peeking out into the communal courtyard, tilting his head this way and that to check out the books on Sophie’s shelves.

“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” You pick up your suitcase and lead the way into the bedroom, sitting on the end of the bed as you take off your shoes and wriggle your toes happily.

“It’s incredible. Exactly what you might imagine a Parisian apartment to be.” He drops his own bags in the corner and joins you on the bed, flopping back onto the mattress and yawning.

You lie back and turn to face him, resting a hand on his stomach. “Let’s do some exploring. I know we’re tired, but I want to show you around, get some dinner, buy some wine…”

The featherlight touch of his fingers, working their way under your denim blouse and stroking the soft skin of your waist, sends delicious shivers through you.

“We could do some exploring here, right now…?” he asks, eyes twinkling and a smile on his lips.

“You know how tempting that offer is, Benjamin, but let’s restore our energy first, hmmm?”

Dinner is Vietnamese food from a tiny restaurant just around the corner, a staple favourite from your time living in the city, followed by a walk around the neighbourhood and a stop at a nearby supermarket, to stock up on some essentials and a bottle of wine. As you climb the stairs to the apartment, the fatigue from a day of travel and the underlying, gnawing anxiety about your future starts to hit you.

You should just say it to him. Ask him outright what he wants to happen.

You push the thought down, down, as deep as it will go as you settle on Sophie’s tiny sofa and watch Ben uncork the wine in the coin cuisine, the little kitchenette tucked into a corner of the living room. You spot a portable speaker tucked on one of the bookshelves and connect it to your phone, scrolling through your playlists until you find what you want.

“Never let it be said that you don’t cultivate an atmosphere, Lyd,” he says, handing you a glass of the purple-red wine and joining you on the couch. “Let me guess: this is a Paris-specific playlist?”

You hide your face behind one hand and peek at him through your fingers as he laughs, leaning in to kiss your cheek as Serge Gainsbourg’s ‘La chanson de Prévert’ starts to play.

He rests his head on your shoulder as you listen to the song together. It’s a favourite of yours regardless, but tonight, with the man you love so deeply but still fear losing nestled in beside you, Gainbourg’s plaintive melody and lyrics about lost love are like a punch to the gut.

“Lyddie?”

Ben is sitting up, looking at you with concern. “You look so sad, all of a sudden - you okay?”

“It’s just the song, it’s so –” You halt yourself. No. Time to say it.

“I guess I’m just really feeling how close I am to the end of my time in Barrow, that’s all.”

His chocolate-brown eyes soften and he wraps you in a warm embrace. “Still got plenty of time, Lyddie.”

“And then?”

“And then…?”

“What happens? To us, I mean.”

He looks surprised at the question. “We’ll be okay, one way or the other. Right?”

But what does that mean?

You’re too tired to ask the question, you tell yourself. In truth, you’re too scared to - not because you fear his reaction, not at all. Rather, it’s because you fear that your concerns might upset him.

Ben’s head has barely hit the pillow before he’s sound asleep, one arm draped loosely around your waist. For you, though, sleep is elusive, arriving only as the dawn starts to break over the city of light.

You wake, exhausted, to the aroma of fresh coffee brewing and the sound of Ben pottering around the apartment, humming the melody of “La chanson de Prévert” to himself. With a groan, you remember you’d planned to do some research today and force yourself out of bed.

“Bonjour, la belle Lyddie! Du café?” Ben waves a little espresso mug at you and you nod weakly.

He is bright and cheerful as he moves around the kitchenette, pouring the coffee and joining you at the tiny dining table that acts as a kind of divider between the kitchen and the rest of the living area.

“Did you sleep okay?”

You look up, and his face falls when he spies the telltale redness in your eyes. “I’m taking that as a no. What’s going on, Lyd?”

A fortifying sip of the strong coffee. You sit upright and look at him, studying his beautiful face. “Darling, I meant what I said last night. About how anxious I am, how scared of what comes next, the…uncertainty of it all.”

“But we know we’re serious about each other? We talked about it,” he replies, sipping his own coffee. “You know that. Don’t you?”

“I do. I really do. And we are, but -” you pause to gather your thoughts. “But that doesn’t mean there’s an answer for what happens when I have to go home, and that’s eating away at me.”

He looks at you kindly, but you can see the confusion written all over his face. “What do you mean, exactly, Lyd? Surely we can see if circumstances change over the summer, and if not then we do distance until stuff gets figured out. Right? Things are going to be just fine.”

It’s so tempting to smile and agree, but you can’t. You owe him honesty, as much as you want clarity.

“Is that really what you want?”

“Distance? It’s not ideal, but if it comes to it I think we can make it work and - Lyd?”

You have closed your eyes, fearful of tears falling.

Say it. Say it. Be honest with him.

“I - I don’t think I want a long-distance relationship.”

Ben makes no effort to hide his shock. “You don’t want a long-distance thing?” He shakes his head in amazement. “Even if that’s the only option for the moment?”

“I just want certainty, not constantly saying everything would be okay or we’d see what happens when we don’t know that things will be okay, or what’s going to happen. I want you, love. I want a life with you, you know that. Don’t you?”

“But you don’t want long-distance with me.” His brow furrows and his jaw ticks as he stares at the floor.

“I don’t know, I mean I just want what we have now, I don’t know if I could cope with the implications of that kind of distance and -”

He exhales sharply, exasperated, and reaches for his light cotton jacket. “So it’s all or nothing. You would rather have no relationship than even try distance, is that it?”

Fury and sadness mingle and build in your chest. “Ben, that’s not what I fucking said.” Your hands fall to your sides, defeated. “I’m just - fuck, I’m not finding the words right now.”

“Well, if you find them later let me know.” He opens the door of the apartment and pauses for a moment. “See you, Lyddie.”

You sit staring into space for a good half hour at your appointed desk in the print room at the Bibliothèque nationale, before you open the grey archive box of lithographs you’d called up for the day.

The ritual of research is familiar and soothing, a useful distraction from the memory of the argument that morning. You set out your camera and prepare your customary scraps of paper inscribed with the call number of the collection, to make it easier for you to match up images with notes when you return to the materials at home. Wherever the hell “home” is supposed to be, now.

Assess each print. Study it. Immerse yourself in the details before photographing it and writing up your observations on your laptop. Repeat over and over, add to your research materials and stave off the metaphorical wolves circling in your brain.

Your stomach starts to rumble just before one o’clock. The garden courtyard outside the building that houses the print room is busy, with researchers and visitors taking an al fresco lunch and chatting over coffee. Salad consumed, you take your phone out of the transparent plastic briefcase you are required to use inside the library.

No message from him. Nothing.

You decide to make a call. She should be on her lunch now, too.

“Lyd! How are you? How’s Pareeeeee?” Kate’s voice is cheery and comforting, and exactly what you needed to hear.

“Hiya… um, can you talk for a few minutes?”

She immediately knows there’s something wrong and her tone shifts. “Of course, always… Lyd, what’s happened? Are you okay?”

Deep breaths. “Kate, I think I need to make a decision and I’m fucking terrified.”

Kate pauses, aware that she doesn’t need to ask you what this is about. “Okay. Talk to me. Let’s work through it.”

BEN: When do you think you’ll be finished for the day? We should talk. I’m so sorry about this morning x

LYDIA: Probably by 4.30 or so. Do you want me to come meet you?

BEN: I’ll come to you. You want food? It’s a nice day for a picnic dinner.

LYDIA: It is. Dinner is your choice. Meet me at the rue Vivienne exit at 4.30 or so? x

BEN: You say that as if I know where that is… I’ll find it. See you soon, Lyddie. Love you.

Ben Morales leans against the railings of the Bibliothèque nationale and looks at his watch. He’s early, so he meanders across the street and wanders into the Galerie Vivienne, admiring the fine detail of the mosaic floors and brass light fittings that adorn the nineteenth-century covered arcade. He pauses at an antiquarian bookstore and print shop, perusing the selection of vintage postcards displayed in wooden crates outside.

He’s standing at the entrance to the arcade when he looks up and sees you coming through the gates of the library, somehow managing to carry a backpack, tote bag, and small cross-body handbag all at once.

You don’t notice him at first, instead turning your head in both directions as you look for him. Ben’s heart soars when he sees you, in spite of the nagging ache he’s felt in the pit of his stomach ever since the argument you’d had that morning.

He calls out to you from across the street, raising his hand in an enthusiastic wave, and a warm, delighted smile spreads across your face when you realise he’s there, waiting for you. He’s as impossibly handsome as ever in his navy blue shirt jacket, white tshirt, and jeans, tote bag slung over one shoulder.

You keep Kate’s words from your lunchtime conversation in the forefront of your mind. “You know what you want, Lyd. You know what you need to do.”

“Sorry, I got delayed on the way out of the print room and then it always takes longer to pack up than I’d anticipated and then I thought I should pop to the bathroom before I left and then -”

Ben interrupts your explanation with a kiss and a hug. “I’m so sorry, Lyddie. I’m sorry about this morning.” He pulls away and holds out a small, flat brown paper bag. “A peace offering.”

The bag contains a selection of vintage postcards of Paris, postmarked in the early years of the twentieth century: Notre-Dame, photographed from the Left Bank; the place de la Bastille; the facade of the Bibliotheque nationale you’d just left.

“Some of your favourite places, right?”

You reach for his hand and lean in for a kiss. “You know me so well. Thank you, my love, they’re beautiful.” You spot a larger brown paper carrier bag in his other hand. “Dinner?”

Ben smiles, holding out the bag for your approval. “I ended up getting a selection of stuff from one of the Asian takeout places near here. And I picked up a bottle of chilled white wine, and some paper cups. Sound good?”

“Sounds perfect. Let’s go, Benjamin - dinner at the Palais-Royal awaits.”

“I have to admit, I did wonder when you said we were going to a royal palace. Didn’t seem very…Lyddie.”

Ben quirks an eyebrow in your direction. You giggle as you reach into the bag of takeout and retrieve boxes of rice, steamed buns, gyoza, and nems.

“I mean, technically it was a royal residence. But the gardens - where we are now - were public, as were the arcades and shops.” You set the boxes of food on a green metal park chair, serving as a makeshift table in front of your bench. “And it was an important location in the revolutionary period, so…”

He grins and opens the bottle of wine. “Ah! There it is. That’s my Lyd.”

His Lyd. Affection surges in your chest, and you place a hand on Ben’s knee, giving it a light squeeze as he pours some of the white wine into a paper cup and hands it to you.

He raises his own cup in your direction. “To my clever, revolutionary girl.”

You swap stories about your respective days as you dig into the food: Ben describing his informal solo tour of literary locations on the Left Bank, you talking through your finds in the print room. He shows you photos he took of Richard Wright’s apartment building, of the original site of Sylvia Beach’s Shakespeare and Company, and a selfie of himself looking completely perplexed at the plaque on the rue du Cardinal-Lemoine that refers to James Joyce as a “British writer of Irish origin.”

You burst out laughing at that one. “I’m so glad you found that. It annoys me every time I see it.”

“I sent it to Evan. He was not impressed.” He slips his phone back into his pocket and reaches for another spring roll. “And then I went and sat in the Luxembourg Gardens for a bit, worked over a little more of the play, thought about Beckett in Paris, watched the world go by. I remembered you said it was one of your favourite places to just sit and think.”

He smiles softly, almost shyly, at you, and with a pang you remember that some serious conversation lies ahead, no matter how tempting it is to sit here forever in the Palais-Royal, eating your picnic dinner and drinking your wine surrounded by the ghosts of writers and lovers and revolutionaries long past.

Lemon-scented wipes remove the residual traces of nems and dipping sauces from your fingers, and Ben stacks the empty food containers in the brown paper bag before topping up your paper cup of wine. You rest your head on his shoulder, and he wraps an arm around you to hold you close.

He sips his wine and takes a deep breath. “I wanted to talk about earlier.”

You raise your head, turn to him, and nod. He rests a hand on your thigh, tracing circles with his index finger on your leg.

“I’m sorry if it ever felt like I was dismissing your worries, Lydia. I - well, I guess I was avoiding the issue. Like if I kept saying things would work out, they’d just… work out.”

You smile gently and reach for his hand. “Without having to make the hard call.”

He squeezes your hand and nods. “Exactly. But I did a lot of thinking about that today. About the future, about what I want - what you want.” He gives you a nervous glance.

“You were right, Lyd, long-distance couldn’t give us…I don’t want long-distance with you, either. I couldn’t, Lyd. I want what you said you want - a life, us, together. Like now.” He caresses your cheek with his thumb. “I can’t imagine anything else.”

You bring your hand to rest on his and close your eyes, feeling tears prickling against your eyelids.

He takes a deep breath. “Lyd, look at me.” Your eyes meet his, dark and warm and serious all at once. “Lyd, I - I want to spend the rest of my life with you. That’s all I want, and - fuck, I think I’ve known I wanted that for a while now.”

You open your mouth to respond and he shakes his head gently. “Lyddie - Lydia - I want to be with you, no matter what it takes.” Another deep breath. “And that’s why - if you want, of course, only if you want - I’ll move back with you at the end of the year. I’ve got some job alerts set up, I’ll find something, you know? I - I just want to be with you.”

“You can’t give up your whole life, darling.” Your voice is quiet as you take in the significance of what he’s telling you, what he’s offering. To his astonishment, you burst out laughing.

“What’s funny, Lyd?”

“I did a lot of thinking today, too. You know you’re all I want, don’t you?” You look at him expectantly, and he nods. “And I was going to tell you that - if you wanted - I would try to stay in the US, so that I could be with you. So that we could make a life together, plan our future.” You turn to him and grin. “But now it seems we’re still going to be on opposite sides of the pond, just with swapped continents.”

Laughter rises from Ben’s chest, emerging as a bright, wide smile and eyes crinkling with delight. He cups your face with his hands and kisses you, over and over, before pulling away abruptly.

“Wait. You said I couldn’t give up my life, but you want to give up yours? And you know Barrow doesn’t do partner or spousal hires…”

“I mean, it wouldn’t be giving up my life. It would be living the life I want to live, with the man I adore. That’s better, no?” You reach over to brush an errant curl off his forehead. “Anyway, I can look for a position within commuting distance, right? I’d rather that than feel I had got a job I didn’t really deserve.”

He blushes slightly and looks at you from under his lashes. “Even so. I meant it, I would follow you anywhere. I’ll go wherever you want me to be, wherever you want to be.”

“Okay. How about this?” You sit up a little straighter, hands resting on his. “We’re clearly both prepared to move. So…we both start looking for jobs, you near my place and me around Barrow, and whoever gets an appointment first - that’s where we go.”

Ben looks into the middle distance and nods, turning over the proposal in his head. “That sounds like a plan, baby.”

“Then it’s a deal?”

He grins and kisses you softly. “It’s a deal.”

The evening is bright and warm as you meander hand in hand through the narrow streets of the Marais, heading east, homeward bound.

You spot a buzzy corner café and nudge Ben. “How about a drink, darling? Something bubbly, maybe?”

He smiles, and you know his eyes are sparkling behind his sunglasses as he squeezes your hand and follows your lead towards one of the small round tables arranged outside the café. The server is typically Parisian: efficient, polite but not overly familiar, and they take your order and return promptly with two glasses of champagne and little dishes of olives and mixed nuts.

“À nous deux, Paris!” Ben clinks his glass to yours and you giggle as the first sip sends bubbles bursting on your tongue.

“Quoting Balzac in the original French?! Where were you all my life, Benjamin?”

He shrugs and smiles to himself. “Could ask you the same question.”

Long, thick fingers begin to rub circles on the flesh of your thigh, feeling the heat of your skin through the light fabric of the button down sky blue shirt dress you’re wearing. You echo the gesture, tracing patterns on the back of his hand, and your expression becomes more serious, more intense, your voice quieter.

“I love you, Ben.”

He squeezes your thigh gently. “I love you, Lyd.”

Sipping champagne and nibbling on the snacks, you watch the world go by, content and cosy in the little bubble that is just you and him. You’re checking your appearance in the bathroom mirror when a realisation sweeps through you. Your eyes widen, mouth forming into a little “o” before stretching into a happy smile as you ascend the stairs from the basement to the main café and rejoin Ben at the table.

“So something occurred to me.”

He chases the last olive around the dish with a cocktail stick. “Mmmmm?”

“We’re doing this, aren’t we? We’re going to spend the rest of our lives together. That’s what we’ve said we want. Right? I didn’t imagine that?”

Ben lifts his head, puts down the cocktail stick, and looks into your eyes with a bemused smile on his face. “No, you didn’t. And yes, we are.” His eyes crinkle as he smiles broadly. “And isn’t it fucking wonderful?”

You nod excitedly and a surge of laughter erupts from both of you, quietened only by a warm, passionate kiss. You break away and run your fingers through the messy strands of hair around his forehead.

“I know people might think it’s soon, love. But… it’s not. I know.”

“I know too, Lyddie. When you know, you know.” He reaches for your hand and brings it to his lips. “And to be honest, I don’t think anyone who knows us will think it’s too soon.”

The server returns to take the empty glasses and dishes. “Autre chose?” [Something else?]

Ben winks at you mischievously and orders two more glasses of champagne.

The walk back to the apartment should have taken about twenty minutes. Or at least, it would have had you not both been tipsy, incredibly happy, and unable to keep your hands off each other.

It takes just under an hour for you to get from the Marais back into the heart of the faubourg Saint-Antoine, stopping here and there along the way to indulge in some making out in quiet side streets and passageways.

“I’m so glad there’s only one flight of stairs,” you hiss theatrically, Ben trailing a hand over your ass as you reach the landing and the door to the flat.

Once inside, you pull him tight to you and move swiftly in the direction of the small bedroom, fingers already hooked inside the waistband of his jeans as he holds your face in his hands and kisses you deeply, tongues sweeping over each other and lips pressed together so hard you swear they’ll be bruised by morning.

“Sit on the end of the bed, baby.” He nods and follows your instructions, undoing his jeans as he watches you standing before him.

You start to unbutton your dress, keeping your eyes on him as you ease it off and let it fall to the floor. Ben’s eyes roam slowly over you, mouth falling open slightly as he takes in the floral print of your panties, the light blue lace of your bra, the softness and curves of your body.

You move closer to him, standing between his legs as he wraps his arms around your lower back and buries his face against your breasts while you languidly trail your fingers through his hair.

You pull back and look at him, immediately giggling. He still has his glasses on, and those coffee-brown eyes are half-hidden behind a fog on the lenses.

“Let’s take these off, shall we, Professor Morales?”

The combination of champagne and a decision about your future together has made you joyful, more confident - and more direct.

“You’re so fucking hot, you know that, baby?”

Ben raises his eyebrows and his ears flush pink. “I don’t really think…uh…”

You kiss him, his hands moving to grab the flesh of your ass and pull you tight to his body.

“I think you’re hot as fuck, Ben Morales, and I’m going to tell you. And show you.” You wrap your arms around his neck and encourage him to move backwards a little, so that you can straddle him. “Lemme show you how gorgeous you are to me, my love. Hmmm?”

He grins, nods, and moans as his mouth passes over the velvet skin of your heavy tits. You help him out of his white T-shirt, and pause to take in the sight of him: your thighs framing his hips and waist, his hands resting on them; his tummy, somehow both broad and solid and yet soft, pressed deliciously against your own belly; his beautiful face, eyes filled with desire, and mouth begging to devour and be devoured.

The temptation is too strong, your hands moving to caress his face as your lips meet his again. You keep your forehead pressed to his as you break the kiss and whisper to him, murmuring about how his dark gaze can make you ache for him, what it feels like to have his lips pressed to your body.

Your hands move slowly across his shoulders and down his back, feeling the warmth of his golden skin, the strength underneath the surface. “This beautiful body, baby,” you murmur, placing tiny kisses to his collarbone. “When you’re above me, fucking me, or about to, and I look up and see you so fucking broad and solid…”

His breathing hitches as your mouth works its way down his chest and towards his tummy, lips and tongue picking out those little patches of freckles that you love so much, teeth sometimes scraping lightly over his warm, solid middle as you carefully move your body off his and onto the floor between his legs.

“You know how fucking sexy this tummy is, baby. Told you the first night we were together.” He looks sceptical and your hands roam over the warm softness of his skin, your cunt positively aching with need at the sensation.

“I’m serious, Ben. It’s so fucking hot, the way your body looks, the feeling of your tummy against mine…” You whine as you roll your hips and clench your thighs, and he sits up slightly to drag down his jeans and underwear, a hand wrapping around his cock as he seeks some relief of his own.

You reach for his other hand, holding it gently as you suck each finger in turn. “I love these hands, baby.” You kiss his palm and he gasps. “I love the sight of them, the feeling of them on me, in me, the things they do to me.”

His eyes are wide and dark with lust and adoration. “Fucking hell, Lyd, you’re incredible.”

And then your fingers join his, working the base of his cock and making Ben gasp with sheer pleasure. He moves his hands up to grope and caress your breasts, long fingers slipping under the lace of your bra to play with your nipples.

“Touch yourself,” he hisses, hands full as he massages the soft weight of your tits. You obey the instruction, keeping your eyes locked on him as you bring one hand to part your soaking folds while the other continues to jerk him off.

Ben watches for a moment as you rub small, firm circles over the aching bundle of nerves while pleasuring him simultaneously. “Fuck, baby, this is so fucking hot. You’re so good to me.”

You’re on your knees, now, and your mouth is actually watering at the sight before you. “Can I suck your cock, baby?”

He grunts his consent. “This…” You flick your tongue over the tip. “This is fucking gorgeous.”

“Please, Lyd.” You look up at him and he whines a little, completely turned on by the sight of you between his legs, one hand now caressing the firm muscles of his calf and the other holding his cock in place. You oblige, expertly trailing your tongue along his full length before beginning to take him, bit by bit, inside your wet mouth.

Ben cries out your name as you continue your ministrations, looking down at you with his eyes blown wide. “I‘ll come if you keep going, baby,” he hisses. “Wanna fuck you, please. Please. Need you.”

You swirl your tongue around the tip one last time before releasing him, bringing your hands to rest again on his legs, fingers massaging the muscles of his thighs as you hum in satisfaction.

“C’mon, Lyddie.” He gestures with his head and you stand. He pulls you to him with one hand, palm and fingers splayed across the small of your back as he tugs down your panties with the other. Two thick fingers slide into you with ease, and his eyebrows quirk with surprise.

“You’re fucking soaking?”

The tone of his voice makes you laugh, and he chuckles against the warm softness of your belly before kissing it, over and over, as your fingers wind through his curls.

“I told you, love, you’re so fucking hot. Don’t even have to touch me and I’m ready for you.”

Ben grins wickedly as you push him back onto the bed and straddle him again, reaching down and stroking his cock a couple of times before you ease him into you and sink down, moaning loudly as he stretches you, fills you, takes you. You’ve had each other so many times now, and yet the sensation of him inside you remains new and thrilling.

You start to move, shifting and rolling your hips in a careful, deliberate rhythm that has the two of you sighing and gasping with deep, delicious pleasure. You lean forward to come closer to him, desperate for his touch, for the warmth of his chest against yours. He eases down the straps of your bra a little and caresses your tits as he starts to fuck up into you, meeting your movements.

He lifts his head up, greedily seeking your lips. His hands trace the curve of your back down to your hips and ass as he watches your bodies moving together, and he smiles wistfully as he brings a finger to your clit. “God, I love fucking you, Lyd.”

You giggle and cry out at his touch, riding him harder still as you edge closer to coming. His finger draws firm, tight circles over the swollen bud, tracing the familiar path he has carved out in you so many times. “Fuck me, baby - gonna come, don’t fucking stop - you gonna come?”

He closes his eyes tightly as the fingers of his other hand press hard into your thigh, breath hitching and voice raw. “Mmmmhmm. I’m so fucking close. Hold on, can you?”

You nod and try to temporarily quell the orgasm that’s been building in you since you got him home, Ben slowing his finger’s steady movements over your soaking clit.

And then the pace increases again, and you’re there, and he’s there. Together.

Morning announces itself with a rustle of paper and a delicious, buttery aroma. Eyes blinking open, you become conscious of Ben’s soft lips on the nape of your neck - and aware that the enticing smell is right under your nose.

“Bonjour, Lyd.” Ben is holding an open paper bag just under your nose. “Croissant?”

You turn to face him properly and sit up in bed beside him. “Hi, darling. How long are you up?”

He reaches into the bag and takes out a croissant, before placing it on a plate and handing it to you. “Not that long. You looked so beautiful and content, I didn’t want to wake you.”

The flaky, buttery pastry melts in your mouth as you sigh with pleasure. “Jesus fucking Christ. Nothing compares.”

Ben stops just as he’s about to bite into his own croissant, throwing you a cheeky glance. “Nothing? Nothing compares? You’re sure about that?”

You rest your head on his shoulder, the cotton of his long sleeved T-shirt soft and comforting against your face.

“Nothing compares… in the world of baked goods.”

He nods, satisfied, and takes a mouthful of the golden viennoiserie.

“Oh, fuck. Maybe you’re right, Lyd.”

You giggle. “Thanks for these, love. You’re so kind.”

Ben shakes his head. “As if you wouldn’t have done the same.” He chews thoughtfully on the pastry. “Anyway, I feel like I still need to make it up to you. Yesterday morning, I mean.”

“You apologised, love, and we sorted things out. It’s fine.”

He shrugs. “I just feel bad. I shouldn’t have made you feel bad. Should have known by now that you struggle with this kind of uncertainty.” Ben reaches for your left hand, bringing it to his lips. “I’m sorry, Lyd.”

“Thank you, Ben. But we’re fine. I mean it. That’s what makes a relationship work, isn’t it? Learning about each other and knowing when we need to learn or listen more.”

He nods. “Exactly. And that’s why I’m so excited to spend the rest of my life with you. No matter where that is.”

The rest of the week is spent partly in research libraries, at least in your case, but mostly in the streets and cafés and galleries and museums of the city you love so much with the man you adore.

You watch with quiet joy as he sees Manet’s Olympia in real life for the first time, shaking his head in admiration and awe as he takes in the painting. He steps back and folds his arms.

“She’s really something.”

“She sure is. I’d be that confident too, if I was as gorgeous as her.”

He arches an eyebrow and looks at you. “You are. Much more so.”

You huff a laugh as you link his arm and wander off to see Courbet’s Burial at Ornans. “You want me to pose like one of Manet’s French girls, Ben?”

“Wouldn’t say no, Lyd.”

At Harry’s New York Bar, the legendary cocktail bar near the Opéra, you cuddle up in a cosy corner of the piano lounge in the basement, and drink French 75 cocktails while the resident pianist plays Gershwin late into the night. You follow your own tailor-made walking tours, spotting literary landmarks and movie locations. A night in a Saint-Germain bar ends with a visit to the late-night bookstore L’Écume des Pages (and an inevitable bag full of newly-purchased books). Ben oohs and aahs over the bouquinistes’ boxes that line the walls overlooking the Seine, unable to resist a quick perusal of their selection of rare books and vintage magazines. You share a Paris-Brest pastry from Angelina, moaning appreciatively as you devour the delicious dessert. Together, you drink coffee and sip wine and talk and laugh and people-watch to your heart’s content.

You could never tire of Paris. Even so, Ben’s wide-eyed excitement and enthusiasm makes everything new: the landmarks, the streetscapes, the food, the drink, the sounds and smells.

And you. He has made you new, too.

You feel it in the way he looks at you when you wave your hands and wax lyrical about god knows what painting or book or historical event. It’s in the reassuring weight of his arm around your shoulders as you wander through the narrow back streets, feeling like you’re ten feet tall. It’s there in the hundreds of little opportunities he finds during each day to touch you: the small of your back as you enter a building, the back of your hand as you sit together on the Métro, the side of your mouth as he brushes away an errant croissant flake.

It is in the moments when you stop on the street and pull him to you for a kiss, unconcerned by the Parisians tut-tutting as they have to walk around the two of you. It’s in the moans he pulls from you, and you from him, when you are tangled in bedsheets at night, or in the morning, or even - after a lunchtime trip to the movies that escalated into some heated back-row kisses - in the middle of the afternoon, languidly stretched out naked for him on the bed.

Just like one of Manet’s French girls, he joked.

Most of all, it’s there in the light that always seems to be shining in your eyes whenever you look at him, knowing that he is yours and you his.

“You’re a tolerant man, Ben Morales,” you say with a chuckle as you walk through the imposing gates of Père Lachaise cemetery one bright morning. “Willing to hang out in Parisian cemeteries with me as I fangirl over the tombs of people no one has cared about for a hundred years or more.”

Ben looks at the list of names on the cemetery map and smiles at you, squinting slightly behind his sunglasses. “I rather like your Gothic side, Lyddie. And I appreciate this too, you know - I want to find Balzac and Proust’s tombs, while we’re here.” He drapes an arm across your shoulders as you climb steadily up one of the winding paths leading through the oldest part of the cemetery, stopping here and there to look at some of the more unusual tombs and memorials.

There’s a certain part of Père Lachaise, its highest point, where you can look out and see the city unfolding below. You lead him there and sit on a bench, keen for him to take in the view. Other visitors and tourists meander past with their maps, chatting in various languages about Oscar Wilde and Jim Morrison or any number of the luminaries whose remains lie alongside those of many more ordinary Parisians in this leafy enclave.

And then it’s just the two of you, side by side, contemplative. Little birds chirp and chatter in the trees, their song a moment of peaceful stillness in the bustling city.

Paris has a tendency to look particularly magical when you’re entering into the final hours of a visit. This evening, the fading spring sunlight cuts a path along the street below, gleaming off the windows and shop signs that line the ancient thoroughfare.

“My heart always breaks a little when I have to leave.”

Ben finishes combing back his hair, still damp from the shower and curls starting to form at the nape of his neck. He turns from the mirror just inside the door of the apartment, adjusting the collar of his white shirt.

“This isn’t the last time, Lyddie. Not for you, not for us.”

You nod sadly, picking up your purse and slipping into a pair of dark red patent ballet flats. “I know. I’ve been telling myself that for twenty-odd years, but it never gets easier. Stupid, huh.”

He shakes his head as he reaches for your hand. “Not stupid. You love this place, and twenty-odd years is a long time to be in love.” He looks you up and down admiringly. “You’re all fancy.”

You cock your hip and strike a pose as Ben laughs. “I like to dress up for my long-term lover, the city of Paris, Monsieur Morales. Anyway, you’re all fancy too.”

“Not like you, I’m not. You look…” He exhales as he takes you in. “You look like you walked out of a perfect French movie.”

Even you have to admit he’s got a point. Sure, the outfit had been a bit of a splurge, a treat to yourself from the BHV department store. But a classic, knee-length little black dress would never go out of style. At least, that’s how you justified it. That, and the fact that it hugged your body just so, working wonders with your curves, somehow narrowing your middle and accentuating your tits and hips in a manner that was impossibly elegant and incredibly sexy. It was a marvel.

For once, you got a flash of what Ben always told you he saw when he looked at you. It made for a pleasant change.

This evening you have accessorised with a vintage brooch and chunky brass earrings, the gold necklace Ben gave you for Valentine’s Day a permanent fixture around your neck. The spring evening is warm enough for you to get away with a dark red pashmina shawl in lieu of a jacket, though you worried bare legs might be a step too far and decided not to forego your black hold-up fishnet stockings.

Ben slips into his olive green suit jacket and you squeeze his hand. “Thank you, my love. You look beautiful, too.”

He does. But then, he always does: his beauty is easy, natural, effortless; as obvious to you when he’s bleary-eyed and bed-headed in his old t-shirts and pyjama bottoms as it is now, with him suited and booted and looking every inch the debonair Parisian intellectual in his clear-framed glasses.

For an instant you wish you could travel back to your broken-hearted self all those years before, to tell her that a better day would come, that real love would find you when and where you least expected it, and that it would arrive in the form of a man as beautiful on the inside as he is on the outside.

Most people would say the two of you are a little overdressed for your dinner destination. But then, you aren’t most people.

You catch a glimpse of the two of you reflected in a shop window as you walk along boulevard Henri IV. You, black dress and red accessories; Ben, green suit with his top shirt buttons undone, hair combed back and starting to form soft waves a little as it dries. The fact that you are both wearing sunglasses only enhances the sense of slightly retro European chic.

“Look at us. Not bad, hmmm?”

Ben stops, puts down the wicker basket he’s carrying, and winds his arms around your waist, kissing the side of your neck. “Perfect.”

You stroll past a little park near the river, pointing out a reconstructed bit of the Bastille to him, and wander in the direction of the Pont Marie and onto the Île Saint-Louis. It’s a little out of the way for where you’re going, but you have a good reason. He asked you a couple of days ago what your favourite view of the city was, and you intend to show him.

The evening sky is streaked with a palette of pale blues, pinks, oranges and reds as you reach the Pont de la Tournelle and stop to lean on the parapet of the bridge.

“This is it.”

He stands beside you and rests his hands on the parapet, following your gaze westwards along the river, taking in the silhouette of Notre-Dame - still obscured by scaffolding - painted against the vibrant canvas of the sunset, and the curve of the quaysides as the Seine splits around the Île de la Cité.

“This is my spot. When I stand here I feel as though I could wrap my arms around the city and as though it wraps its arms around me.” You look at Ben, a little embarrassed. “Sorry. That’s a bit weird, I know. I am aware that it is a city and I cannot hug it, please don’t run away.”

He looks at you with affectionate bemusement. “You know how beautiful that is, to have those feelings and be able to articulate them like that?” He reaches for your hand. “It isn’t weird. It’s you, and it’s wonderful.”

You rest your head on his shoulder and squeeze his hand. “The first time I came to Paris after…everything, I came here the first night. I stood here and I looked at the cathedral and the city.” You pause as the memory resurfaces. “And then I had a massive cry. See? Weird.”

Ben shakes his head and chuckles, pulling you close to him. “Not weird. Catharsis.”

“I guess it was. I was still here. Notre-Dame was still here. Paris was still here. It gave me a sense of hope, I think, for the first time. Like, I knew things would get better.”

“I’m so fucking proud of you, you know?” He kisses your forehead and leans in to murmur, cheekily, in your ear: “So did things get better?”

You wrap your arm around his waist, slipping it under his jacket so you can feel the strong muscles of his back under his shirt. “Eh, I guess you could say that.”

Dinner is simple: a baguette, a selection of cheeses and charcuterie, and a bottle of champagne. But you’ve made the effort to bring proper glasses and plates from the apartment, and you can’t fault the location: watching the river from the Quai Saint-Bernard on the left bank, waving at the people on the big tourist boats - the bateaux-mouches - as they pass.

“Hell of a view,” Ben muses in between mouthfuls of baguette and Brillat-Savarin cheese.

You gaze across the river at the Île Saint-Louis and smile contentedly. “It is perfection.”

He chuckles and leans in to kiss you. “I was talking about you. But Paris isn’t too bad, either.”

He looks back at the river, a smile playing on his lips, and you take a moment to admire a perfect view of your own: Ben’s handsome face in profile, hair moving gently in the breeze, the light tan he had acquired after a week of wandering in Parisian spring sunshine complementing the patches of grey-white hair at the hinge of his jaw.

You can’t help but marvel a little at how fucking gorgeous he is. Well done, Lyd. In that instant, as you take him in, you concentrate on the wonderful feeling of calm and safety that suffuses your body when you’re with him.

You’d only realised after the abrupt end of your last relationship that you’d spent a decade and a half walking on eggshells, constantly anxious and never wholly comfortable - even with someone who claimed to love you. You feared suggesting the simplest thing: a movie, a dinner, a holiday, lest it prompt a negative reaction or criticism.

With Ben, though? Even with the ongoing uncertainty about where, exactly, your future would be, you had never felt anything other than safe. With a clearer path ahead agreed together, the residual anxiety faded, too.

It was a new and marvellous feeling.

As the evening draws in, a little group of musicians set up nearby on the quay, accompanied by a cluster of couples who immediately began to dance to the band. Ben turns and smiles at the spectacle.

“They do this as soon as the weather gets warm here,” you explain, smiling widely as the dancers move around an open area on the quayside. “Sometimes it’s French classics, sometimes American big band, sometimes Latin, sometimes a more contemporary mix, like tonight.”

Ben stands up, dusts off his pants, picks up the picnic basket and extends his hand to you.

“Would you like to dance, Lyddie?”

How can you refuse, when he’s looking like that and asking you in that voice and smiling at you with such love and affection?

“I’m not good at this sort of thing, Ben, I warn you.”

He rolls his eyes affectionately. “Bullshit. Now: dance with me, Lyd.”

You get to your feet and he leads you in the direction of the makeshift dancefloor, leaving the picnic basket to one side as he brings you into a dance hold and begins to move, pulling you close to his body as the band and its female lead singer begin a cover of Mitski’s “My Love Mine All Mine”.

The rest of the city falls away as you dance with him, nuzzling against his neck as his hips sway gently, rhythmically against you in time to the slower tempo of the music. Ben’s lips press softly to the top of your head, and you hum in absolute contentment.

“I love this song, you know.”

He chuckles. “I do. You sing it very beautifully in the shower, sometimes.”

“I doubt it’s beautiful.”

“Trust me. It’s beautiful.”

You nestle against him and sing along, joining in with the lyric that always made you think of him, of how he had broken through your sturdy defences, smoothing and healing the jagged, broken pieces of your soul: “My baby, here on earth/Showed me what my heart was worth”.

You sing the words quietly against his chest, feeling the vibrations from your voice meeting the rhythm of his heartbeat in a curious music made of two lovers. As the song draws to a close, Ben tenderly lifts your chin and kisses you, enveloping you in those strong arms. Cologne, coffee, bread, paper, something that is just his: his scent, the scent of love and safety.

His big hands skim appreciatively over your figure in the new black dress as he inhales your own perfume, nose buried in the crook of your neck. “Delicious, gorgeous girl,” he murmurs against your velvet skin. “You look incredible tonight, you know?”

Ben pulls your body even tighter to his and you whine softly, the press of his broad form to yours enough to send a rush of wetness to your core.

“I think we need to get back to the apartment, my love.”

Ben sits at the end of the bed, wearing his shirt and boxers, watching as you take off your jewellery in front of the bedroom mirror. There’s something fascinating about the ritual: how you take out your earrings and put them in their box; the way you tilt your head forward as you remove your necklace.

He still can’t believe it, sometimes, the kind of love he has with you. He’s been desperate to get you home ever since you danced close and slow on the riverbank. That fucking black dress. Driving him slowly crazy all night, every time he looked at you. It’s the way it hugs your hips, accentuates the ample, full curves of your tits, and reveals just enough of your skin to make him want to ease it off your soft, welcoming body.

His cock twitches at the thought.

He stands up and crosses the floor, standing behind you. His hands gently caress you as you smile at the reflection of the two of you in the mirror.

“I love this.”

Ben kisses the top of your arm. “I love this, too.”

His lips find their way along the line of your shoulder until they reach the crook of your neck. A little tug to the zipper of the dress and his mouth moves downwards, kissing and sucking at the back of your neck, hands roaming over your body and grabbing handfuls of you as he goes.

He’s pressed against your back, murmuring your name. The extent of his desire is already very much in evidence.

“Fuck, Lyddie.” His breath is warm and urgent against your neck.

“Mmmm?”

“I’ve wanted to take this off since the minute I saw you in it.”

You chuckle. “Looks that bad, huh?”

Lips still on your neck, he caresses your breasts as he shakes his head. “Looks too good on you.”

Ben licks a stripe up the side of your neck and you whine with pleasure, closing your eyes and reaching to caress his face.

“Can I take it off, my love?” His voice is lower, smokier.

You nod, locking your eyes on his. A frisson of excitement courses through your body as Ben eases down the rest of the zipper and eases you out of your little black dress, letting it pool at your feet.

“Oh, fuck me. These new?”

When you bought the dress, you’d bought new lingerie, too. A bra in caramel and black lace whose delicacy belied its incredible construction, supporting your breasts perfectly. Matching underwear, high-waisted and full but completely sheer, made out of the same black lace that trimmed your bra.

And of course: the stockings.

You nod and close your eyes, trying to avoid seeing yourself in the mirror. You looked alright in the dress, but you still can’t quite face the body underneath it. Ben’s breath ghosts across your shoulder blades as he fondles your tits and kisses the top of your spine.

“Open your eyes, Lyd.”

You hesitate.

“Lyd. Open your eyes.”

You obey. But you keep your gaze fixed on him, afraid of your own reflection, of a body that you still cannot believe anyone like him would ever really want.

“Lyddie, please look.” Ben’s voice is firm but pleading. “Look at your beautiful face. Look at this gorgeous, sexy body.”

He trails a finger along the contours of your breasts, tracing the lace trim of the bra. He brings his hands to your waist, to your hips, pulling you back against him ever so slightly so that you can feel how hard he is.

You don’t think you’ll ever love your body. But, watching Ben drinking you in with his eyes, running his fingers over the black Parisian lace that clings to the most sensitive and sensual parts of you, you understand that you love the way he loves your body.

“This is what you do to me, Lyd, and I will tell you every day for the rest of our lives that you are the most beautiful fucking thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” You turn to face him, his hands cupping your face as he kisses you deeply.

He breaks away and looks into your eyes, dark irises searching yours. There’s a vulnerability there, a hint of doubt, lingering in spite of his words.

“What is it, Lyd?”

You shrug, fingers lightly caressing the curls and waves that cluster around his ears. “I love that you think I’m beautiful. I… still don’t know if I ever will.”

He kisses you again, softer this time. “Can I at least try to convince you? Show you?”

You smile against his lips and wrap your arms around his neck. “I’d like that. Could… could you, like, take charge? For tonight?”

He quirks an eyebrow and returns your kiss, humming against your mouth. “Take charge?”

You feel embarrassment rising in your throat. You’d never really felt able to just ask for what you needed like this before. Old habits die hard.

“Ben, I never felt safe enough to ask a partner to take the lead like this…not before you.”

His expression softens. “I’d give you anything, Lyd. Anything you want.” He wraps his arms around you and pulls you to him, chin resting on your shoulder. “And I feel safe with you, too.”

You tilt your head to kiss him. “So…?”

“So, I’m going to take charge and show you exactly how fucking beautiful you are, how sexy you are, how fucking happy I am that I get to be with you.” He pauses to kiss you again. “And if I have to, like I said - I’ll do this every day for the rest of time, if necessary, until you see what a perfect goddess you are.”

Another, deeper kiss; the sensation of his broad hands on the soft skin of your tits and belly, pulling you tight to him, the press of his erection against you as he guides you to lean back against the wall and slips his fingers under the crotch of your panties, parting your folds and working your clit and pussy until you’re panting with desire and need.

For a moment, you think he’s going to fuck you. But then slowly, steadily, Ben sinks to the ground in front of you, mouth and teeth and tongue finding the softest, most yielding parts of your body as he works his way to his knees.

Ben looks up at you, eyes glittering with lust and adoration. He is a supplicant before you, ready to worship, to seek and give a pleasure as sacred as it is profane. He venerates your body with his mouth. His tongue traces the outline of your hips, his lips kiss the softness of your lower belly, his teeth scrape across the thick flesh of your upper thighs. He tugs the panties down completely, parting your legs and helping you out of the garment.

“I want you to keep the stockings on, okay?”

You nod your assent. Those perfect dark eyes find yours, a flash of mischief crossing his gaze as he gently pushes a finger inside you before placing both hands firmly on your hips, pressing into your flesh.

And then he tilts his head, just so, and you cry out as he brings his lips to your wet pussy, mouth and tongue working your entrance as his nose rubs with precision against your clit. You buck slightly against him but he holds you in place, grunting and groaning with pleasure as he goes down on you. The warmth of his breath against your core makes your cunt clench around nothing, desperate for him.

You wind your fingers through the soft waves of his hair, holding him in position and throwing your head back as you revel in every lap of his tongue, every brush of his beard against the sensitive skin of your inner thighs, every nudge of that beautiful nose against your clit. He’s eating you out like you’re his last meal, your moans and writhing body seemingly only serving to spur him on.

Even so, Ben senses that you’re holding back. The position is incredible, the sight of him, the sound of him, the feel of him making you want to come harder than you’ve ever done before. But you worry about whether your legs will give way - whether you’ll hurt him if you fall forward.

“I’ve got you, Lyd,” he murmurs, face still buried between your thighs. “Let go. I’ve got you. You’re so close. Come for me. Want you to come like this.”

With his fingers fucking you and his lips sucking and licking at your clit, your body yields and you cry out as you come against his face.

He stays on his knees as you ride out the orgasm, thumbs rubbing a gentle circle against your hips, before scrambling to his feet and wrapping you in his strong arms. Your legs are still trembling as you lean in and kiss him like your lives depend on it, tasting yourself on his lips. He manoeuvres you to the bed, laying you down with the utmost care.

You look up at him as he shifts into position above you, the low light catching the traces of your release that glisten across his face and his beautiful eyes flitting greedily over your face and body. You reach up to unbutton his shirt and he shucks off his undervest. An electrical current of desire courses through you as you rake your hands over his broad shoulders and down to that soft tummy you love so much. His eyes are warm and wanting: your darling, your lover, your partner. You are safe in his hands, and you are ready to give yourself entirely to him.

A little smile quirks at his mouth as he lies down beside you, turning on his side and trailing his long fingers across the velvet skin of your tits, still enclosed in the delicate lace of your bra.

“Do you know how much I want you, Lyd?” he murmurs, mouth working hot, needy kisses across your breasts.

“Tell me.”

“Want you all the time.” You can feel his cock hard against you. “Want to have all of you, want to touch and kiss and fuck every last inch of you. I’m going to use my mouth on you now, baby, okay?”

He nips and sucks at the soft flesh of your belly as you moan, pussy aching for him. “And the more I have you, the more I want you.” He finds your soaking folds again and drags two fingers through the slick, bringing them to your lips so you can suck them clean. “I love you. And I can’t get enough of you.”

You let out a half-laugh, half-groan as he pulls you to him and quickly takes off your bra, mouth finding your breasts and tongue swirling over your nipples. You slip a hand between the two of you, tugging down his boxer briefs and wrapping your fingers around his cock as you stroke him, feeling him becoming fully hard under your careful touch.

“Do you think you have another in you, my love?”

You nod.

“Use your words, Lyd.”

“Yes. I think so…fuck, yes sir.”

He groans loudly against you and slips his fingers back through your soaking folds, chuckling a little at the whine of pleasure you let out as his warm breath ghosts against your ear. “Fucking hell, Lyd. You look so fucking beautiful. Such a beautiful woman.” He hooks his fingers against the perfect spot inside you and you buck against him, hand still working his dick. “And such a pretty pussy, so tight and so wet for me.”

He eases you into a different position, your back against his chest as his erection nudges against you. First his hands, then - with a shuffle down the bed - his mouth caresses the plump flesh of your ass, lips and teeth scraping over the sensitive skin as you whimper. He shifts your leg up and nestles himself into position.

“Can I have you, darling?”

You whine into the bed, feeling your orgasm building and building. “Please, baby, I need you inside me - fuck, baby, please…”

“I thought I was in charge?”

His voice is low, honeyed, hot as he whispers in your ear. It tips you closer and closer to the edge.

“You are… I just want you so fucking much.”

“You want me to fuck you, is that it?”

“Please. Fuck me, my love. Hard as you want to.”

“Fuck, Lyd.” With a groan and some muttered expletives, Ben sinks inside you, pausing for a moment to enjoy the sensation. “Always feels so incredible inside you, baby,” he pants, one arm holding you around your tits and the other against your belly. “Just - oh, fuck - just perfect.”

It is perfect - perfect angle, perfect feeling of him stretching you, of his hands on you. He drags himself out of your cunt slowly, steadily, making you whimper at the loss of him. A snap of his hips and he’s buried inside you again, beginning a hard rhythm that has you crying his name into the bed as he fucks you, fast and deep, the softness of your ass cushioning his thrusts as he showers you with praise. His good girl. His beautiful woman. His love.

His. His. Only his. Repeated. Possessive. Perfect.

He shifts his hand from your belly to your pussy, working tight circles over the swollen nub of your clit as you get closer and closer, mouth sucking on the delicate flesh of your neck, never letting up the rhythm until you cry out and come on his cock, the wetness audible as he fucks you through it.

“Good, baby?” He pulls out as you’re still coming down, easing you onto your back and settling himself on top of you, carefully parting your legs.

You look up at him, cockdrunk, seeing stars, and with no way to express how you feel other than a satisfied whine as you pull him to you for a hungry, sloppy kiss. Ben smiles and chuckles against your lips as he reaches down to gently hook an arm under your knee as he sinks back into you with a guttural moan.

He picks up the pace again quickly, taking you harder now, rougher, even, and gripping the headboard of the bed with his free hand. His hair is dishevelled, errant short curls falling over his brow as sweat runs in rivulets over the freckles scattered underneath the hollow of his throat and lips finding yours as you start to babble to him incoherently, surrendering to the sensation.

He drops his hand from the headboard to find yours, pressing your hand and arm into the mattress as he holds you down while he fucks you.

“Talk to me, Lyd. Tell me. See how much I want you? Tell me.”

You mutter filthily about how deep he is, how big he is, how you love having him inside of you, how much you want him - need him - to fill you up. But then you look at him - at his beautiful face, screwed up and teeth gritted as he makes love to you - and another urge takes over, displacing the dirty talk with something no less intense, but softer, all the same.

“I fucking love you, Ben - fuck, keep going, that’s so good, fuck…”

He groans and reaches for your breast, groping it as he nears his own release. “You’re mine, Lyddie. All mine.”

“Yours, Ben. Every bit of me. Yours, forever, like you’re fucking mine.”

“My woman…my - oh, fuck - my good fucking girl.” You know he’s really close. “Keep talking, Lyd. Want to hear it.”

“You’re mine, baby - oh god, Ben, that’s so fucking good - all mine. I’ll give you anything. Everything.”

Ben rests his head against your neck, panting and moaning as his rhythm falters. “I’m all yours, Lydia, always - f-fuck, I’m gonna…”

You hold him tight, hands across the breadth of his back. “You’ll never be alone again, baby - fuck, Ben! - gonna take care of you, gonna be our own little family…”

He positively growls as he comes inside you, your head knocking against the headboard as he snaps his hips against yours before collapsing against your body. You hold him tight, gentle, slow, one hand winding through his curls and the other reaching for his hand as you plant soft kisses along his hairline.

He eases himself out of you with a final kiss and flops back onto the mattress beside you, still trying to catch his breath and with the most beautifully blissed-out expression on his face.

“I’m just going to clean up and take these stockings off, my love,” you murmur, shifting your body to the edge of the bed. “You okay?”

Ben grins and giggles to himself as he looks at you. “I am fantastic. Don’t know my name or what year it is, but I am fucking fantastic.”

You pad back from the bathroom as quickly as you can, discarding your stockings and climbing back into bed beside him. He’s reaching for you before you’ve even settled your body on the mattress, broad hands gently rubbing your belly, your hips, the line of your breasts. His breath is steadier now, face and body completely relaxed in the gorgeous afterglow.

“You are such a beautiful man.”

Ben opens one eye and meets your gaze. “Hmmmph?”

“I said, you are such a beautiful man. Don’t dare deny it.”

He smiles softly, closing his eyes again as your fingertips trace the line of his nose, brush against an errant curl, find the outline of the little bare patches on the side of his jaw. Your thumb swipes gently across his lower lip, fingers seeking out the texture of his moustache.

You go to speak, and stop yourself.

“What were you going to say, Lyddie?” His voice is heavy, sleep beckoning him.

“Nothing, I was just - no, it’s stupid.”

“Nothing stupid could ever come out of your pretty mouth.”

You giggle quietly and bring yourself even closer to him, resting your hand on his chest. He reaches up to hold it.

“It’s just that… I don’t know. When I look at you like this, at all the little things that are just uniquely you, it feels like everything fits. You know?”

He opens his eyes again. “Everything fits?”

“It’s like, ‘aha. Yes. That.’ Like I was always meant to be looking at this face. Like there was a bit of me that I didn’t even know I was missing and it just was…it was you. Even if I didn’t know it.”

He smiles and leans in for a soft kiss. “And now everything fits.”

He wakes her with coffee and kisses, knowing how much she hates prising herself from the warmth of their shared bed. A little incentive, a way to help her avoid panic later in the morning, one of those tiny acts of love they perform for each other every day.

She orders a taxi for a couple of hours’ time and strips the bedsheets, casting an eye over their shared luggage waiting for departure as she joins him in the living area. Having put the sheets on a wash-dry cycle, her hands rest lightly on his broad shoulders as she quickly kisses him on the cheek and heads for the bathroom to shower. Instinctively, she gathers all but their essentials - toothbrushes and paste, shower gel - and slips them in a ziploc bag, ready to go into one of their cases.

Once he’s showered, they continue their seamless little ballet of co-operation and partnership as they prepare to depart: a reminder to empty the trash here, an almost-forgotten phone charger spotted there, last few belongings squished into their hand luggage, and a final check on their passports and tickets. She checks every drawer and cupboard one more time while he places their trash bag in the small communal dumpster in the building’s courtyard.

It is a banal ritual: unthinking, unrehearsed, instinctive. But there’s something in the way they slot together so neatly, the way they complement each other, the easy, naturalness of it all, that speaks to a sense of partnership that works as well in the routines of everyday life as it does in the bedroom.

He carries the cases down to the main hallway as she checks the apartment’s small windows and locks up, following him downstairs after she drops off the key to Sophie’s neighbour.

He’s outside, standing with the bags on the pavement outside the building. The G7 taxi pulls up almost immediately, and he can’t help but smile with pride when he hears her confidently chatting away in French to the driver as they load the trunk with their luggage.

Her hand finds his in the backseat, head resting against his shoulder. Partners. A team.

As the car heads northwards towards the edge of the city, he casts a glance at his phone. Two new job alerts, for positions at institutions in Europe.

He resolves to check them out properly once they get home. For now, though, just a squeeze of her hand, a kiss to the top of her head, and a silent resolution that he’d follow her to the ends of the earth.

*******

Further A/N: I'm going to make a separate post with more details on the music, the locations, and the food in this chapter...

#visiting fic #visiting masterlist #mr ben snl #mr ben au #mr ben x ofc #mr ben fanfic #professor ben x ofc #professor!ben #professor!ben x ofc #pedro pascal characters #pedro pascal character fanfiction #pedro pascal character fanfic #pedro pascal #pedrostories

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indiaalphawhiskey · 6 months

Note

fake fic title! "crescent moons fix broken hearts"

would love it if it could be hl? 👀

Sorry this took so long! I really needed to write something today to flex the muscle, I hope you and @awesomefringey (who submitted the t-shirt pic) like it. 🥰 (I tried to post this twice with a moodboard but Tumblr wouldn’t let me. 😒)

🌙 Crescent Moons Fix Broken Hearts

Sitting in the en suite of the lavish hotel room, the soft lighting of the vanity illuminating the planes of his face, Harry let the radical irony of what he was about to do wash over him.

It was a weird thing, he realized, this feeling of waiting for a moment your entire life – preserving it, building it up – only to have it finally, finally come in a form so different it was almost laughable.

Not almost. Harry did laugh.

Half because he caught sight of his ridiculously nervous expression in the mirror, and half because apparently, one minute someone could be the perfect pure, virginal (if a little sexually frustrated) Omega groom-to-be fitting their bespoke wedding suit in at a highly exclusive designer shop, and three days later, be that very same Omega, revenge and wildly expensive tequila shooting through their veins as they booked their would-have-been honeymoon suite to have raunchy sex with an Alpha they’d hired specifically to finally deflower them, once and for all.

Turns out getting dumped in a Saville Row dressing room because one’s ex-fiancé thought they were quote, “an uppity, frigidly cold fish who he probably had no sexual chemistry with anyway”, unquote, really lit a fire under one’s arse.

Harry flared his nose in anger, his thoughts murderous as images of his beautiful, wasted wedding invitations danced back into his mind, haunting him. His cheeks began their now familiar pinkening with his remembered humiliation, and then…

A soft knock unfortunately interrupted Harry’s montage of fantastic daydreams of running over every single one of his ex-fiancé’s prized watches to the intro of Led Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song.

“Come in,” he called out gently – or as gently as one could through gritted teeth.

As the door slid away, the unfamiliar, unassuming coolness of rosemary and sage rolled in slowly. Harry wasn’t used to it; accustomed to sharing spaces with the scent of warm whiskey and leather layered with that wretchedly expensive cologne Harry had always hated.

But back to the sage.

Sage, and rosemary, and cedar, and… he let the last note tickle his nose as he tried to name it.

“Are you okay?” Louis Tomlinson asked.

… and soap, Harry realized, oddly comforted even as he wondered whether the name was a pseudonym; wondered if it was standard procedure to print such a convincing alias on a discreet calling card that would eventually be passed across an elegant brunch table at the Dorchester.

(‘Niall, don’t be absurd,’ Harry had sniffed, trying his best to push the card back towards him without making a scene. ‘Jesus, just be normal and introduce me to one of your investment bankers, or something.’

Niall had given him a long, silent, and completely unimpressed look in response, glancing down at the engagement ring Harry was still wearing, if only to make a point. Ouch.

‘Harry, trust me. After this shitshow, you of all people deserve an orgasm on the first go. Treat yourself.’)

“I’m alright.” The polite platitude was out of his mouth accompanied by a reserved smile through the mirror before he could stop it.

It wasn’t like he could tell the truth anyway; not like he could say, ‘No, actually. I’m fucking livid, because a week ago I was about to be married, and today my financial manager called to ask if my credit card had been stolen because there was a suspicious charge from RoyaLT Enterprises for a ‘Platinum Package – All Inclusive’ on it when I was assured this service would be discreet, goddamnit!’

He bit his tongue, mostly because Harry didn’t tell Louis about the jilting; had decided against it the moment he had clicked ‘Platinum’, the description reading ‘two-week session with certified heat coach (Alpha) focused on scent familiarity, building sexual rapport, and discussing intimacy needs in addition to agreed heat cycle partnership.’

A virgin who had saved himself for marriage only to be jilted a week before his wedding because he was, in fact, a virgin, paying for sex and intimacy, trapped in a room with someone who really shouldn’t be as attractive as he had turned out to be… It had all just felt a little too humiliating.

Which, speaking of…

“Sorry,” Harry blurted out softly now, slowly coming to his senses. He turned to face Louis, his eyes widening. “We’re… we’re on the clock, aren’t we? Am I… I’m wasting your time?”

Louis chuckled softly – kindly, really – and casually leaned against the door frame, crossing his ankles. He was shirtless, Harry only now realized, as he watched him slip both hands into the pockets of his silk pajama bottoms, making them ride dangerously low against his happy trail.

Louis shook his head. “You’re supposed to take your time, get comfortable with me.” He raised his hand to gesture to himself – what he was wearing, and then the space between them. “This is all part of it.” He grinned wide, and Harry had noticed he was handsome when they’d met, but the genuine warmth of his smile is what made it. (Well, his smile, and his abs, and the still respectable but no less impressive hint of a bulge in his pajama bottoms…) “It’s called the boyfriend package for a reason.”

Funny, Harry thought then, feeling just a little bit… well, a little bit wet. He’d never had a boyfriend who looked quite like this.

Niall’s wise words began to reverberate in his mind: ‘Treat yourself.’

Harry bit back a cheeky smile. He intended to.

— Or, When Harry Styles did things, he did them right. Why should losing his virginity be any different?

#fake fic titles #fake fic #iaw drabbles #I just really needed to write something today #because I missed it

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fanboyswhore9 · 2 months

Text

This Girl

Moodboard by: @mshistorylover

Pairing: Pairing: Mickey “Fanboy” Garcia x Fem!Aviator!Reader, based on the song, This Girl by Hunter Hayes.

Summary: Mickey and Y/N have been dating for eight months but haven’t expressed their love in those famous three words. They confide in friends for advice and courage, culminating in Mickey dedicating a song to Y/N during a karaoke night.

Sequel to “Addicted to Love”

—————————————————————————

Eight months into their relationship, Mickey Garcia and Y/N had formed a bond that neither of them could deny. They were deeply in love, but the words they longed to say remained unspoken, hanging in the air between them like a sweet, tantalizing secret.

Mickey, known for his charismatic personality and unwavering dedication to flying, had found someone who captured his heart in ways he couldn’t have imagined. Y/N, with her infectious laughter and unwavering support, had become the missing piece to Mickey’s adventurous life.

One sunny afternoon at the Top Gun Academy, Mickey found himself in the company of his close friends from the Dagger Squad, including Rooster, Hangman, Coyote, Bob, and Payback. They had gathered on the Academy’s rooftop, a quiet and serene spot overlooking the airstrips. The clear blue skies stretched endlessly before them, offering a sense of peace amidst the rigorous training and challenges they faced.

Mickey took a deep breath, looking out at the horizon as his friends sat in a circle, sipping on their beverages. He couldn’t help but let out a sigh, prompting Rooster to raise an eyebrow. “Everything okay, Mickey?” Hel shifted his gaze to his friends, a hint of uncertainty in his eyes. “You guys know I’ve been with Y/N for a while now,” he began, his voice tinged with emotion. “But I haven’t told her that I love her, and it’s driving me crazy. I don’t want her to think it’s too soon or that I’m not serious.” His friends exchanged knowing glances, realizing the weight of Mickey’s unspoken words. Jake leaned forward, his voice supportive. “Dude, you’ve got to tell her how you feel. It’s the only way she’ll know.”

Meanwhile, not far from the rooftop gathering, Y/N found herself sharing her thoughts with her closest friends since their Academy days, Natasha “Phoenix” Trace and Callie “Halo” Bassett. They sat under the shade of a tree near the dock, the gentle rustling of leaves providing a soothing backdrop to their conversation. Y/N spoke softly, her eyes reflecting the vulnerability she felt. “You know, I care about Mickey so much,” she confessed. “But I’m scared to say it. What if it’s too soon, or what if he doesn’t feel the same way?” Natasha and Callie exchanged understanding glances, their support unwavering. Natasha offered comforting words. “Sometimes, Y/N, you have to take a chance and let your heart speak. You’ll regret it if you never tell him.”

As the sun cast a warm glow over the Academy, both Mickey and Y/N carried the weight of their unspoken feelings, unsure of when and how to bridge the gap between their hearts. Despite their shared love and deep connection, Mickey and Y/N had yet to find the right moment to express their feelings. Each passing day only intensified their longing, and they began to seek solace in the advice of their friends.

———————————————————————————

As the weeks went by, a unique opportunity presented itself at the Top Gun Academy. It was a warm summer evening, and the Hard Deck, the iconic bar owned by Penny Benjamin, was hosting a lively gathering. This was a rare moment of respite for the pilots, a chance to relax and unwind in a setting that held a special place in their hearts. The Hard Deck buzzed with laughter and camaraderie. The bar’s rustic charm, adorned with aviation memorabilia, added to the atmosphere. Penny, a familiar face to all, greeted everyone with a warm smile and a sense of belonging.

The Dagger Squad and Y/N’s friends from the Academy found themselves together at a corner table, enjoying the vibrant ambiance. As the evening progressed, Mickey couldn’t help but glance at Y/N, who sat across from him, her eyes sparkling with mirth as she shared stories with Natasha and Callie. Payback, sensing his friend’s internal struggle, leaned in and nudged Mickey gently. “Tonight’s the night, buddy,” he whispered. “You’ve got to tell her.” Mickey nodded, his determination growing. “You’re right. I can’t let fear hold me back.” Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, Y/N sat amidst her friends, feeling Mickey’s presence as a comforting beacon. She took a deep breath and glanced at Natasha and Callie, who exchanged encouraging smiles.

As the night went on, Penny decided to host a karaoke competition, a surprise twist to the evening’s festivities. The crowd erupted with excitement, and friends egged each other on to participate. Mickey’s heart raced as he realized this could be the perfect opportunity. He leaned over to his friends, a determined look on his face. “I’m going up there,” he declared. Rooster, Hangman, Coyote, Bob, and Payback exchanged knowing glances and offered Mickey their full support. “Go for it, dude!” they chorused.

On the small stage, Mickey took a moment to compose himself, his heart pounding with anticipation. The spotlight bathed him in its warm glow as he looked out at the audience. He cleared his throat and adjusted the microphone, feeling the weight of the moment. Before he began singing “This Girl” by Hunter Hayes, Mickey spoke into the microphone, his voice filled with emotion. “I want to dedicate this song to someone very special. To the one who’s stolen my heart and made every moment unforgettable. Y/N, this one’s for you. Hopefully this song tells you how I feel about you.”

His heartfelt dedication hung in the air, reaching Y/N like a warm embrace from across the room. Her heart skipped a beat as she gazed at him, feeling a rush of love and gratitude. With that dedication, Mickey poured his heart and soul into the song, making it a truly unforgettable moment for both of them.

He began to sing the familiar lyrics of “This Girl” by her favorite artist, Hunter Hayes, pouring his heart into every word. The room seemed to fade away, leaving only Mickey and his heartfelt message.

🎶 “I love this girl watching that throwback movie with a glass of wine,

My real deal girl with her hair up, guard down

Telling me what’s on her mind

Call me crazy, but I don’t think I’m

Ever gonna have a hard time learning how to love this girl.” 🎶

As he sang, Mickey’s eyes locked onto Y/N’s, and she couldn’t tear her gaze away from him. The connection between them felt stronger than ever as the room filled with the sincerity of his words.

🎶 “My paradise is that bedhead beauty with the sleepy eyes

My best night is anyone that ends with her

Yeah, I swear that I’d trade everything I’d change

You could take it all away

Long as I get to love this girl.” 🎶

Mickey’s voice soared through the room, and as the final notes hung in the air, he stepped down from the stage, his heart pounding with hope and anticipation. The applause that followed Mickey’s performance was thunderous, and his friends from the Dagger Squad cheered for him with pride. Mickey, however, had only one person on his mind as he navigated through the crowd to where his girlfriend stood in the crowd. He couldn’t wait any longer to express what had been in his heart for so long.

Reaching her side, Mickey gently took her hand and looked deeply into her eyes. The world around them seemed to blur as he began to speak, his voice filled with emotion. “I love you, Y/N.” Her eyes welled up with tears of joy as a radiant smile spread across her face. She had been waiting to hear those words for what felt like an eternity. With a voice choked with emotion, she whispered, “I love you too, Mickey.”

In that tender moment, their unspoken words had finally found their voice. Their love was now out in the open, stronger than ever. Without hesitation, Mickey cupped Y/N’s face in his hands, and they shared a passionate kiss, sealing their love with a promise of a future filled with adventure, support, and boundless affection. Their friends couldn’t have been happier for them. The room erupted in applause once again, with their fellow pilots and Academy friends celebrating their newfound happiness. As the night continued at the Hard Deck, Mickey and Y/N danced together, reveling in the newfound freedom to express their love openly. The Dagger Squad and their friends watched with affectionate smiles, knowing that this was a moment to cherish.

#Spotify #danny ramirez #mickey fanboy garcia × reader #mickey fanboy garcia #mickey garcia #mickey garcia x reader #fanboy top gun #fanboy x reader #fanboy imagine #fanboy garcia x reader #fanboy x you #top gun fanboy #fanboy #top gun maverick cast #top gun fanfiction #top gun maverick #top gun fandom

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look-at-the-soul · 8 months

Text

Look at the soul- Part 10 There you’ll be

Cillian Murphy x OC

Series master list

⚠️ Grief (but the comfort afterwards compensates)

🎭 Special thanks to @heidimoreton for creating the most perfect and beautiful moodboard for this part! 🥰✨ I’ve been saving this for so long, this chapter holds a very special place in my heart since it was one of the very firsts scenes I had in mind, I didn’t know how I’d get there, only this had to be part of the story… as Cillian realizes that in order to be able to enjoy something new, he needs to let go first of what’s keeping him locked.

Word count: 3,840 (without the song)

Song: There you’ll be by Faith Hill

“Adria!” Enda shouted from behind, people walking on the street turned to look at him but he simply didn’t care. Cillian followed him in silence.

Marianne blushed as she heard him calling her by her character’s name several times until he reached her.

“On a trip to fulfill your coffee addiction?”

“Better than yours.” She pointed at the cigarette between his fingers.

“Touché.” Edna chuckled looking at Cillian, she had been getting better at keeping up with his sense of humor and sometimes she got a better comeback.

“Turn it off man, it’s bad for her lungs.” Cillian asked him politely.

“I’m curious what do you have in there?”

Marianne looked at the tote bag Enda just pointed.

“Got a few books at the café, I’m planning to start it this Friday.”

Enda looked at her with a shocked expression. “How old are you? Eighty two? Marianne this is Ireland, you’re by yourself and no one knows you here, should be going out until four in the morning, pass out… have a great time.”

“Reading a book with a glass of wine it’s more like my kind of night.” She replied shyly. “And it’s a great plan by the way.”

“Live, woman… go out and live life! That’s why you’re single.” Enda joked. “Both of you.”

“Don’t be rude mate.” Cillian tried to defend.

“Just telling the truth.” He shuddered. “Hopefully you’ll get someone thanks to the play.”

“Enda!” Marianne opened her eyes wide.

“What? Could be a good opportunity to make a casting or something for you.”

Reaching the steps of the Olympia theater, she shook her head slightly.

“Don’t listen to him, it’s a consequence of his age, he’s losing the filter.”

“Aye, you’re not getting any younger.” Enda patted Cillian on the back.

“Doesn’t matter you’ll always be older than us.” He gave Marianne a small wink.

“Go on stage now, before I start the audition right away.”

As everyone took their place, the lights tech started to make some adjustment, the cast began the rehearsal.

“Stop, stop.” Enda asked interrupting the scene going on stage. “We need the lights off just as Adria reaches the top step, all theater lights off, this light on her.” He explained and then took off his glasses, the big opening was around the corner and this was the most important part.

“Every body keep your counts right.” Heidi called over the microphone.

Marianne positioned herself close to the bar again, her eyes and ears on Enda to follow his instructions.

“Cillian on your count.”

As the cast started moving around and a bright light was focused on Adria, the screenplay writer walked towards his friend.

“Holy fuck.” Enda exhaled loudly as they both watched the scene unfold on stage.

“I know man.” Cillian crossed his arms against his chest without moving his eyes from Marianne.

Even after weeks of rehearsals, it kept taking them by surprise once she got into character, dress and characterization included. They were both holding their breaths as she looked back, over her shoulder towards them. Her emerald eyes boring into their souls.

“Is this one of those stories they love to portray in movies right?”

Cillian looked at him confused.

“I’ve known you since you were a noisy teen, don’t try to fool me.” Enda adjusted the glasses on his nose. “You have fallen deep for her and I don’t blame you to be honest… I mean, who wouldn’t?”

Cillian’s eyes moved around the theater without locking eye contact with Enda. He remained quiet, letting the words sink in.

“It’s alright to move on, it’s been a while. You just have to make peace with you-know-who first, close the cycle they call it.” Enda squeezed his shoulder. “Go home man, think about it.”

Cillian looked back on stage, finding Marianne there turning her face around, over her shoulder. The realization feeling heavier on his shoulders.

There was no use to try to deny it now, Enda only gave his own thoughts a loud voice.

Was it a proper time to move on?

How are you supposed to do that?

Would Marianne feel the same about him?

Slowly, day by day she found a way to make him smile, she gave him back the strength and need to be on stage. To do what he loved the most and without even noticing, made herself earn a spot inside his heart.

Grieving doesn’t come with a manual, there are no instructions to know if you’re taking the long way or the short route. Words of support come and go, but the only thing that sets the pace it’s your own heart.

As a few rain drops started to wet his face, Cillian shuddered, not because it was cold, but because this would represent a major change in his life, he couldn’t even come close to measure the impact this would bring into him.

Could he take this chance after losing his wife?

Could it be Marianne the one helping him heal his heart? Did he really stand a chance with her? Even after being in his forties?

For the first time he felt self conscious about his age, he wasn’t the young lad he was once…

And besides that, moving on after a breakup or a divorce is completely different than starting all over again after being a widower. He had now developed several mannerisms over time, he had an already built in life, an ongoing list of things he could no longer tolerate, in-laws that were looking at the time were he would make the slightest mistake and last but not least, his sons… but above all of that he was just a lonely man and without an ounce of being pretentious, he thought he deserved to give love a second chance.

He wanted to be happy, to feel alive again…

Was he ready to let go of the memory of his late wife to take a chance to be happy again? Fall back in love?

He had to give Marianne credit because she lifted him up when he needed it the most, she had been there as a lifeline for him the moment he met her on that bus and ever since she had been holding a candle to light his path back to theater among other projects.

That wasn’t entirely a surprise, because deep down she had this internal light that could bright even the darkest room.

It had been a while since the last time he went there, the atmosphere suddenly felt dense, he wanted to apologize for not coming sooner, he didn’t even paid attention of anything around him on his way there.

The day he met Marianne on the bus exactly, that was the last time he had been there visiting his late wife’s urn, after that he stopped completely, something had been keeping him away.

Someone more likely.

“Hey,” his voice cracked a bit, “I’m sorry I haven’t been here lately, loads of things going on, the kids are alright growing up so fast. Andrew is even taller than me already,” he chuckled looking at his late wife’s name engraved. “Truth is I don’t have a valid excuse… I’ve been working on a play, yeah it’s a great script and it’s been a massive therapy for me, the only thing that keeps my mind off but you already know that right? There are days where I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing, losing you forced me to be around the boys completely and we didn’t had the phone line for like a week because I forgot to pay the bill once, you took care of everything… but I’m trying, for the boys, for me… for you.”

Cillian let out a heavy sigh, feeling embarrassed suddenly.

“But that’s not what I came for…” he cleared his throat.

His hand trembled when he touched the cold stone.

“One of those nights after you left, I was lying in bed unable to sleep and reality hit me hard, my mind started bombarding me with these thoughts ’is this how it’s going to be from now on?’… I know you’re not coming back, and you’ll always be the mother of my kids… but I met someone a-and I don’t know how she feels, but I wanted to let you know that I decided to give it a try… is that alright? To rebuild my personal life and have someone by my side?”

In my dreams, I'll always see you soar above the sky

In my heart, there'll always be a place for you for all my life

He could feel the wedding band around his finger burning, of course it wasn’t real, it was just a thing made by his mind, but he needed to do it. The lump in his throat growing.

I'll keep a part of you with me

And everywhere I am, there you'll be

“I promise you I’ll help the boys keep your memory alive in some way… I better go, have to make dinner for those beasts.” He added with a small chuckle.

Everyone carries grieving in different ways and to him everything is valid, or at least that’s what he wanted to think because as he stepped outside one of the classic Irish rain started to pour down as if somehow the rain came to wash over his pain, his grief and also the guilt of thinking about a brand new start with someone else.

Cillian couldn’t find a single word to describe how he felt, but the weight on his shoulders was definitely lighter this time around.

The shadow of mourning finally stopped wrapping its coat around him.

Arriving home later, he left his shoes by the steps. Walking across the corridor he was met by the familiar sounds of his sons and dog, but he stopped on his tracks as a photo of his late wife dressed in her wedding dress all those years ago stared at him from the shelves.

This was his way of saying goodbye, of letting go finally of the woman who had been his partner for the last eighteen years.

Rolling the gold wedding band between his thumb and forefinger he took a moment to rub the edge, the symbol of their marriage, their vows, the dreams they once shared.

And I always will remember all the strength you gave to me

Placing his wedding band next to the photo, he gave her one last look. “Thank you for giving me my boys.”

He was ready to open up his heart again.

“Hey Da.” Andrew, his eldest son greeted him as he walked into the kitchen.

“You’re studying, guess that’s why it’s raining.” He joked.

“Yeah, I don’t understand anything.”

Part of his abilities as an actor was learning things for the role he was portraying, but school assignments were a pain in the arse for him.

“Sorry buddy, you know I suck at this but if you need some help…”

“Are you gonna call aunt Orla? No thanks, last time she confused me more.”

Cillian couldn’t help but chuckle at his son’s statement. But he had someone else in mind.

“Do you want help or not?”

“Ya.”

Cillian saw Andrew groan defeated, resting his head on the book. So he quickly took his phone and opened a new text message.

Heyya’ are you busy?

Hello! No, why?

I know you love numbers, interested in doing some tutoring? SOS it’s for my son. He wrote back.

Of course, come over.

And just like that she was able to brighten his day in mere minutes. Even if it was the darkest night.

“Pick up your stuff, we’re going. Benjamin! We’re going out, are you coming?” He shouted from the first floor.

“Can I drive?” Asked Andrew.

“Do you’ve a license?” As his eldest shook his head, Cillian tilted his head. “Then the answer is no.”

“No, can I go to TJ’s house? He invited me to play video games.”

Cillian nodded and passed Ben’s jumper, after waving Scout goodbye, he left his youngest at his friend’s house and drove away with Andrew to Marianne’s place.

“Who did you get?”

“Marianne, she’s part of the cast of the play but she’s really, really good with numbers.” Cillian explained.

“Cool.” Was all his son had to say.

It was a short and quick drive, Cillian pulled in front of the townhouse, the property seemed to be remodeled and held several apartments independently.

After pressing the buzz, Marianne opened the door for them.

“Hello again, this is my kid Andrew… thanks for doing this by the way.”

“Dad I’m not a kid anymore. Hi.” Andrew looked at Marianne, making her swallow a gasp by the similarities with his father.

“Hey, please come in.” She welcomed them with a smile.

Cillian mimicked Andrew. “He can’t stand when I call him that.”

Suppressing a giggle, Marianne guided them towards the small kitchen. She decided to avoid commenting the obvious that they looked so alike. “So, your Dad says you’re studying applied mathematics?”

“Yeah but so don’t understand my teacher.”

“Oh before that, we brought hamburgers for dinn-” Cillian started to explain, but quickly found himself staring at the stove. “What’s this? Smells fantastic.”

“My special chicken.” Marianne explained, she had prepared it for the traditional tacos night with the girls the following day, but judging by Cillian’s glances, she thought of changing it. “You can have some if you want.”

He wanted to say no, it would be a terrible thing to take away her food, but the smell was incredible and by now it was evident, it was mouth-watering.

“It’s fine really, there’s enough.”

“I swear they’re good, but this looks and smells delicious.” Cillian praised again. “How about we exchange?”

“It’s fine really, there’s enough.”

“You sure?” Cillian asked again, to which Marianne replied with a nod.

“Would you like some too Andrew?” She asked looking at the boy.

“Nah, the burger is fine. Thanks.”

“Your loss ‘cos this is awesome.” Cillian shuddered taking another bite.

It felt somehow strange to have Cillian and his son in her kitchen.

“Did you know Marianne's studying her master in Finance?” He raised his eyebrows, making evident his admiration. “Trinity College.”

“Oh yeah? The campus is grand.” Andrew stated.

“It is, loads of buildings, but now I’m taking a hybrid method so I’m not always there.” Marianne explained before thanking Cillian for her dinner.

“Hmmm.” Cillian was lost for words, he never imagined the explosion of flavors in his mouth. “This is perfect.”

As Andrew excused himself to use the bathroom, Cillian continue praising her cooking skills.

“How have you been feeling?” He asked studying Marianne’s face, his gaze was penetrating.

“Everything’s fine, the new inhaler works like a charm.” She replied, getting busy with the dirty dishes.

“You could try going outside for a walk put all these trees to good use.” Cillian added taking the plates from her.

“Heidi told me I’ve to go to the Blarney Stone, I’m planning to visit on Sunday.” Cillian’s fingers brushed against hers accidentally, but it was enough to make her heart skip a beat.

He noticed a small blush in her skin, or it was the kitchen light perhaps? Why was this suddenly feeling like a perfect domestic scene?

“Just avoid kissing it please.” He made a disgusted face.

“Why? I’ll loose my good luck shot.”

“Just… don’t kiss it, trust me.”

“What? The Blarney rock?” Andrew laughed. “It’s full of piss… gross.”

“Andrew.” Cillian warned with his eyes and voice tone.

“Wha? ‘S true.”

“Are you guys serious?” Marianne asked in disbelief.

But after watching them nod profusely, Andrew told her locals usually pee on the stone among other disgusting things so she decided to trust in their words. And avoid kissing the stone at all costs.

While Cillian finished with the dishes, Andrew got his book and notebook.

“Oh I remember these.” Marianne took a moment to read through the notes and exercises. “Just let me grab my glasses. At this hour I can’t see without them.”

“No offense, but you sound just like my Da.”

Marianne laughed, but Cillian moved so quickly to slap his son in the back of his head.

As Andrew hissed and rubbed the spot with his hand, Marianne waved at Cillian.

“It’s fine, after you cross your thirties you’ll start making Dad jokes without even having kids and wear glasses too.”

Cillian smirked, pleased. “That was a nice comeback, smooth.”

Andrew groaned and shook his head.

“Okay let’s start with this example, you need to find the ‘x’ value. And differentiate 3x-7.” She read the first part of the instructions.

“But I only have ‘y’.” Andrew frowned confused.

“Yeah you’ll have to find that first and then use that value to find the ‘x’.” Marianne started working on her own sheet to show him, in a few short steps she solved the problem.

“Woah!”

Cillian chuckled from the living room where he had picked a book from Marianne’s shelves that caught his attention. Lying on the couch he watched the scene before his eyes, the domesticity at its finest and he felt so comfortable that the mere sensation from it forced to question himself if he was allowed to feel this good.

And his son was even smiling from solving the problems correctly. To him that mean everything.

Since he left the theater he hadn’t been able to stop the thoughts about Marianne and the positive impact she had brought along the way. He was constantly relying on her not only about his professional projects like the play or his production company, but on a personal level as well, she had seen him at his worst, on a negative attitude and managed to help him ground again. She had a very particular sense of humor and her face was so transparent that he could see every emotion there even when she wasn’t speaking. He also enjoyed way too much teasing her when she couldn’t get a word right.

If he could use one word about her, it was admiration, there was no other way to describe his feelings. Because seeing her on stage, transformed into this fearless character, dominating the entire theater with her presence in a foreign language when she didn’t have an acting background but she worked so hard so you wouldn’t notice that. It was something that slowly made him fall in love not only with theater again, but with her as well.

He had to admit her physical beauty attracted loads of attention, he had seen first hand the way people stared at her when they were out for a coffee or walking towards the theater, there was something about her that made you turn around or steal a glance and she didn’t seem to notice, she never seemed to be pretentious or rude to anyone. No, all the opposite she was always kind to everyone.

But could all of that transform or evolve from the daily interactions to something else? How would she feel if she knew that he was falling for her?

Endless questions had been on his mind lately, it was frustrating to not have the answers.

How could he be so sure that this was something genuine and not because they worked together?

How could he even start all over again in his personal life?

“There you go, be careful with the-,” she stopped talking as she saw Andrew answer by himself, “yes that’s correct.”

Leaning back on the chair, she looked in Cillian’s direction finding him laying on his back, on her couch as if he always belonged there. Dragging her eyes quickly from him before he could notice.

Lee’s words resonating in her mind over and over.

But looking at Andrew wasn’t much help because he looked just like his father in every possible way, the only difference was that he had short hair and less freckles and the other one was the colour of his eyes, as Andrew’s looked more like blue-grayish, but she could easily imagine this is what Cillian looked like when he was younger.

She needed to stop these feelings to grow further because they still had to hit the road with the play and by the end of the dates she would end up with a broken heart.

“How did I do?” Andrew asked pulling her away from her thoughts.

“Let’s see,” tilting her head she check over at the numbers, a soft smile appearing on her lips, “you did it!”

Offering Andrew a high five, she encouraged him to continue, helping the boy every now and then when he had questions but he did it mostly by himself.

“How’s it going?” Cillian asked joining them in the kitchen.

“I finished the work.” Andrew stood with pride oozing from him. “Thanks.”

“Thank you.” Cillian added looking into her eyes. “Really appreciate this.”

“Happy to help.” Marianne gave them a quick glance.

“I won’t see you tomorrow, will be around scouting for locations to film the video and arranging stuff.” Cillian took the keys of his car and handed them to his son.

“Oh… okay.” Marianne stammered adding a nod. Unsure of what to say.

“Can I drive?” Andrew looked at his Dad who was standing behind him, with his hands on his shoulders.

“Ya.”

“Grand!”

As Andrew stormed out from the flat with his belongings and the keys, Cillian hid his hands inside the pockets of his jeans.

“You saved me from a headache and him for his test.” Cillian picked on his lip nervously and forced Marianne to look in a different direction.

“You just want an excuse to keep me working.” She joked with a smile that reached her eyes.

“Of course, you don’t deserve a day off that’s why I asked for the tutoring tonight and then you appearing in the music video.” He replied in the same light tone as her.

“I was just kidding,” she assured him feeling like a fool, he probably just wanted to go home and she was trying to make small talk.

“Thanks for the budget by the way, it helped me a lot.”

She had already finished the budget for the rest of the year and managed to give him all the quotes to film the music video, she even added a small percentage for what she called the just-in-case. And the numbers looked good, the group’s manager approved it already.

Marianne nodded and added in a playful tone: “Someone has to keep your spending on track.”

“I’ll have to start thinking of the next project.” Cillian ran one of his hands through his curls.

“Enda mentioned you left the rehearsal early because you felt rubbish.” She loved using that term now. “How are you feeling?”

She asked a simple question oblivious to the real reason behind Cillian’s absence from the rehearsal. In her eyes, he found she was genuinely worried about him.

Leaning in with a smile, he kissed her cheek as goodbye. “Never been better.”

Cillian stared into her eyes for a few seconds, taking in the feeling he had been experiencing since they arrived there; for the first time he was able to see her properly without the veil of grief blurring his vision.

***

Part 11

🍀🇮🇪Visit Ireland: Blarney Stone, I recently read about it in a book and man, 😂 the stories I’ve heard ever since…

A/N: If you like this, remember your feedback is the best tip you can leave 🫙✨♥️🎭

Tag list: @lyarr24 @gypsy-girl-08 @cillmequick @zablife @prettylittlehoneyeyesxoxo @kettlechips3 @heidimoreton @forbidden-forest-witch @kaitebugg03 @thenattitude @forgottenpeakywriter @onlydeadcells @babaohhhriley @lonelyweeb0044 @lovemissyhoneybee @ange-thoughts @already-broken144 @shelbydelrey @cutecurly-hair @winchestergirl22 @moral-terpitude @ironpen @elenavampire21 @lespendy @kittycatcait219 @stevie75 @esposadomd @sloanexx @shaddixlife @rangerelik @peakyscillian @woofgocows @cillianlove @imichelle-l-rigby @emmanuelle19 @sydneyyyya @cljordan-imperium @mrkdvidal1989 @flippittygibbitts @adaydreamaway08 @pono-pura-vida @elk96 @shelundeadxxxx @kmc1989

#That’s what Cill said #cillian murphy fiction #cillian murphy fic #cillian murphy fanfiction #cillian murphy imagine #cillian murphy oc #cillian murphy x reader

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cheesybadgers · 3 months

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Narcos Fic: Old Habits Die Hard (Chap. 22)

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, Chapter 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16, Chapter 17, Chapter 18, Chapter 19, Chapter 20, Chapter 21, Chapter 23, Chapter 24

Read on AO3

Masterlist

Pairing: Javier Peña x Horacio Carrillo

Words: 6,985

Summary: As Horacio's and Javier's stay in Manizales comes to an end, Elena has some words of wisdom and an unexpected offer for their future.

Warnings: 18+ ONLY. Discussions of coming out, grief, parental loss, canon-typical violence, religious themes, brief non-explicit sexual references, smoking, swearing.

Notes: As promised, here's the second half of their Manizales adventures. I'm still wrestling with editing chapter 23 at the moment, plus life has been kind of busy/stressful lately, so not sure when it will be ready to post. But the finish line is definitely within touching distance now ❤️

Thank you once again to anyone still reading/commenting/making moodboards and playlists or drawing, I'm blown away when my fic inspires others to create. I'll be making a proper masterlist once the fic is finished, where I'll link to everything people have made or have suggested playlist songs etc., plus there'll be my own playlist and moodboards.

Feel free to drop me a comment, whether it's about the new chapter or an older one, I'm always happy to chat 😊

I’ve also added to my OHDH trivia post to cover this chapter if anyone is interested.

Chapter 22: Past, Present, Future

The early morning mist transformed into drizzle in the time it took Horacio to run around the farm boundaries, the spray cooling his clammy skin as he worked up a sweat. He left Javier to wake and shower at his own leisurely pace, a routine they had settled into since arriving here. Although two mornings ago, both Javier and Alejandra were suspiciously worse-for-wear, and Horacio didn’t see much of either of them until after lunch.

Today, they planned to join one of Fabián’s tours, which included a coffee-tasting session. So, even if the exercise hadn’t woken Horacio up, the caffeine certainly would.

The rain eased off once back at the finca, sunrays now straining to break through the low clouds as Horacio showered and dressed, somehow still beating Javier.

Tempting aromas from the kitchen let Horacio know his Mamá was already up and about after making the children breakfast before Alejandra dropped them off at school.

As he sat down at the kitchen table and poured himself a glass of orange juice – his usual coffee would wait for later – both cats, Caturra and Bourbon, took turns rubbing themselves against his legs.

“You and Alejandra loved that stray cat when you were young,” said Elena, who had appeared from the larder with her arms full of eggs, chorizo and arepas. “What was her name?”

“Estrella.”

“She was the next best thing to a jaguar, and you were desperate to see one back then.”

“I remember. Never did, though.”

“Not many get the privilege these days.”

“Can’t say I blame them for keeping out of sight.”

Horacio remembered his Abuela Margarita telling him stories of how the jaguar, snake and condor were the original creators of the world and how the jaguar was tricked by man into parting with its power of fire. The feline creature was forced to survive on its cunning and strength alone, prowling around the mountains and jungles of Colombia, waiting patiently to exact revenge.

For too long, Horacio had stalked, clawed and mauled his prey all over Medellín, seeking vengeance on those who betrayed his country and its people. He was an apex predator maintaining balance and order in the food chain, not out of choice but necessity. A reluctant warrior backed into a corner until a palpable sense of duty kicked in when the threat was too real to ignore.

But whatever the unseen truth was, jaguars gained a reputation as ferocious killers, feared by humans until they became the hunted rather than the hunter, gunned down and chased into hiding and a life of solitude. An act of cowardice by the jaguar on the face of it, but these days, Horacio liked to think of it as an evolutionary advantage, the opposite side of the fight-or-flight coin.

“It’s understandable, yes. But a life in the shadows has its drawbacks.”

“True. But there can be a certain kind of freedom in the dark. Especially when those with flares want you dead.”

“Not everyone offering light wants that, Mijo.”

Horacio, who had focused on the floor for most of the conversation, finally looked up, hazel eyes mirrored back at him with extra shades of wisdom. His dour expression softened, and his shoulders sagged in concession. “I know.”

“Whilst I’ve got you here…” Elena trailed off, disappearing upstairs before returning with a small wooden trinket box.

She sat down at the table and extracted a gold chain from the box. “He’d want you to have it.”

Horacio stared at the pendants that swung back and forth like a pendulum clock as Elena held them out towards him. His cheeks hollowed, and his lips formed a sharp pout from how tightly he held his jaw in place. “Mamá, I can’t. Not after everything. Not after I ran away.”

“What are you talking about?”

“After I was injured, I went into hiding...in Laredo, Texas. And I quit.” He grasped his hands together and bowed his head as though in prayer, but he wasn’t sure even God could help him now he had confessed his sins. “I’m sorry I kept it from you. And I know you’re probably wondering why I went –”

“Javier.”

Horacio froze, undecided if he was caught off guard by the mention of Javier’s name or how he could hear his Mamá’s smile as she said it, as though it was the most glaringly obvious response anyone could ever have given.

“It’s okay, Mijo. You don’t have to explain yourself. He told me about the ranch whilst you and Alejandra cleaned up on your first night here.”

“That’s how you knew?”

“Well, not only that. I might be older these days, but I’m not blind.”

Elena chuckled, but Horacio could tell it wasn’t at his expense. So, he allowed his jaw some leeway, unclenching his teeth and facial muscles, almost appreciating the ache left behind. A chain reaction surged through his body, tension unknowingly carried for decades ebbing away now the secret he once believed would follow him to his grave was not only out but wasn’t being held against him.

And so he threw caution to the wind and let the floodgates open. He told his Mamá about Madrid and working on the ranch, about their plans for the future, about life in Laredo and even the crucifix, just in case she had noticed its absence and assumed the worst.

Talk of the crucifix prompted Elena to take one of Horacio’s hands in hers, where she deposited her gift of gold before he could refuse. “Take it. Please.” Her hand formed a dome over Horacio’s, fingers gently squeezing.

Once Elena withdrew, Horacio unfurled his palm and stared down at his very own El Dorado. “After my injury, I’d dream about this sometimes. And the stories you and Abuelita Mirabel told us about Bochica. I wish it’d been as easy as striking a staff to stop Escobar.”

“Bochica might have saved his people from drowning, but he couldn’t save them from the conquistadors and their gold-digging.”

Horacio rolled his eyes and sighed. “I know you don’t approve of Madrid, Mamá. And I know I’m no Bolívar, but –”

“Mijo, what are you talking about? I know you had your reasons for Madrid – even the second time. That’s not what I meant. And no one’s asking you to be Bolívar.”

A salient monument dedicated to Simón Bolívar stood in the centre of Manizales. The statue was half-man, half-condor, each entity synonymous with the other as national symbols of freedom and sovereignty. It still stung for Horacio to be reminded he had worn the Colombian coat of arms on his uniform sleeve every day, the proud condor flying above the motto Libertad y Orden (Freedom and Order) with Dios y Patria (God and Country) sworn beneath. But unlike Bolívar and Bochica, Horacio was unable to liberate his people.

Instead, he had sought refuge in two countries that had interfered the most with Colombia's autonomy. He had made a home on the land of the former Empire and used the gringos to his advantage when it suited him, never mind allowing one of them into his heart and bed.

Elena pressed her hand tenderly to Horacio’s cheek, the conflict in his mind apparently written all over his face. It was an action he had been on the receiving end of throughout childhood, but one that still had the power to soothe him as though no time had passed since.

“You’re also forgetting Chibchacum’s role in Bochica’s story,” she continued. “He was the one punished to carry the world on his back for creating the flood in the first place. Bochica did the best he could in terrible circumstances, and that’s all anyone could ask for.”

Memories re-surfaced of Abuelita Mirabel sitting between Horacio and Alejandra on the sofa, a blanket spread across the three of them, where she told of how every time there was an earthquake in Colombia, it was the weight of the world shifting on Chibchacum’s back. Little did Horacio know that would become a feeling he was all too familiar with when he was older.

But his Mamá was right; he wasn’t Chibchacum or Bochica. And he certainly wasn't Bolívar. But neither was his Papá.

So, he took a deep breath and raised the chain to unclip the fastening. From there, he attached it behind his neck, letting the deity and the angel finally rest against his skin.

“Beautiful,” Elena said, her eyes suddenly glossy and the corner of her lips twitching.

“Thank you.” Horacio held his Mamá’s gaze until it was necessary to look away and clear his throat. “What else is in there, anyway?” He swiftly motioned towards the box.

Elena passed it over to Horacio so he could look for himself. Nestled inside were his Papá’s wedding ring and lapel pins, his Abuelo Ignacio’s St. Michael’s cross, rosary beads, an old pack of Deportivo Independiente Medellín trading cards, a postcard of an orange grove with handwriting Horacio recognised as his Mamá’s on the back, and a black and white photograph of a young boy draped in a police jacket that was far too big for him. Behind him stood his father in the rest of the uniform the jacket belonged to.

“Is that Papá and Abuelo Ignacio?”

Elena laughed. “Of course!” She got up again without explanation, re-appearing with a photo album this time.

She flicked through it until she found what she was looking for. “Where do you think we got the idea for this from?”

She was pointing at an almost identical picture. The two boys in the photos had the same thick dark hair and charcoal eyes, a resemblance that would carry through into adulthood – although Horacio built up more muscle than his father ever did.

Horacio smiled. “I remember that being taken. It was my first day at school.”

“It was his idea before you set off for school, and he set off for work. He made sure I was ready with the camera when you came downstairs in your uniform.”

“I never knew it was his idea.” The dejection was evident in Horacio’s voice, even if he tried to hide it.

“He might not have said it much, but he was so proud of you, you know. And so am I.”

Horacio swallowed hard with his eyes shut, anything to hold himself together. “I used to take this when you weren’t looking,” he managed to get out, gesturing towards the photo album. “Same with some of the other old albums we had. Well, I kept a couple of them, actually.” He chuckled at the thought of the albums currently residing on a shelf in Madrid. “I always went back to the photos and his uniform for some reason.”

“You didn’t have to hide it from me.”

“Neither did you with us.”

“I know. But you were both so young. You didn’t need that burden on top of everything else.”

“You could never be a burden, Mamá.”

“You and Alejandra were busy forging your careers. I had to stay strong at work, helping people worse off than me. So, I saved most of it for my prayers and Día de Todos los Santos.”

Horacio remembered attending Mass and his Papá’s grave every Día de Todos los Santos. But it was different to Día de Muertos. They weren’t welcoming his Papá home; they were praying for those in purgatory and heaven. And as much as he liked to think his Papá was a saint, there was always a part of him terrified that if he didn’t pray hard enough, his Papá would never be cleansed of his sins.

“I was in Laredo for Día de Muertos. Javier’s father – Chucho – had a box like this for Javier’s mother – Mariana. He used it to make an ofrenda for her.”

Another piece of the puzzle seemed to click into place for Elena in a look that combined realisation with sympathy. Another loss, another parallel, another explanation.

“A beautiful tradition,” she concluded.

“Yeah, it is. One that remembers the people we’ve lost as we knew them and welcomes them back home.”

“A bit like this, you mean?”

“Something like that.”

“Whilst we’re here…there’s something else I’ve been meaning to talk to you about.”

“Go on.”

“Money from the house sale in Medellín has been sitting in a bank account since I moved here, along with some left over from your Papá. The plan was to split it between you and Alejandra when I’m gone, but…why wait?”

“What? But Mamá, that’s your money.”

“Technically, half of it is your Papá’s. But he’s not here. And who better to put that money to good use than his children?”

“Even though I wouldn’t have children of my own to return the favour one day?”

It was a question that had lingered on the tip of Horacio’s tongue since arriving here. A question he had tried to ignore for a long time before that, if he was honest. He learned of Juliana’s first pregnancy from his Mamá, who had heard the news from a friend of a friend. That was all she said on the matter, but Horacio was never sure whether he imagined the traces of disappointment in her voice that it wasn’t his child.

“Horacio, do you really think that matters to me?”

There was no disappointment in Elena’s tone now, just incredulous confusion that made Horacio regret his words.

“Even if I wasn’t surrounded by my amorcitos every single day, I would want you and Alejandra to make your own choices. Live your own lives. If that doesn’t involve children for you, then so be it.”

Horacio nodded, his lungs expelling a freeing breath he hadn't been aware was trapped in the depths of his rib cage. “Have you spoken to Alejandra about the money?”

“Not yet. But I know the farm needs repairs, and they’ve always got plans for this place. Same as the ranch.”

“I don’t own the ranch, though, Mamá.”

“No. But from everything you’ve told me about Chucho, he obviously trusts you with his business. And I don’t imagine you and Javier will want to live in a guesthouse for the rest of your lives. Visas don’t come cheap, either.”

Of course, she was right on all three counts. Horacio had a lot of on-the-job training ahead of him. He would effectively be starting from scratch again. But Chucho had welcomed him with open arms into his home and livelihood. It wasn’t implausible that if Horacio had ideas for the ranch, Chucho would take them on board.

They hadn't discussed living arrangements yet, but Horacio was confident neither he nor Javier had envisaged the guesthouse as a permanent solution. And then there was the small matter of Horacio’s visa. The paperwork upon which their future in Laredo hinged. He tried not to think about all the different ways it could go wrong or what they would do if it did. But that was a problem for another day. A problem that would no doubt be made easier with extra money in tow.

So, he ignored the whispering ghosts of his ancestors because his Mamá was right; he wasn’t doing this for his Papá. And he certainly wasn’t doing it for the people of Colombia, past or present.

“Okay,” he said in the end. “But only if Alejandra agrees to it, too.”

The sound of a throat being cleared caught them off guard and drew a temporary line under the conversation.

“Morning,” Javier greeted as he hovered by the kitchen door. “Hope I’m not interrupting.” Of course, he knew he was and an apology with his eyes was all he could offer Horacio for the time being.

“Good morning, Javier. And on the contrary! How do you feel about calentado?”

Whatever Javier had been expecting Elena’s response to be, for some reason, it wasn’t that. He looked towards Horacio for the slightest hint about what he had walked in on.

Horacio wanted to explain everything – and later he would – but for now, he ushered Javier to sit down.

“Er, sounds perfect, thanks,” Javier told Elena as his foot found Horacio’s under the table.

And as the three of them chatted and helped prepare breakfast, Horacio had to admit Javier was right.

------------------------------------------------------

The coffee tour took up the rest of the morning. It was no wonder Horacio had always been particular on the subject when he knew which were the best beans and blends to be found in Colombia. He still had occasional pangs for his former life, but the weak instant shit the gringos brought with them to Carlos Holguín wasn’t one of them.

Naturally, the heavens opened before the end of the tour – bad for the tourists but good for the soil – and by the time they had returned to the finca, another shower was required.

They showered together, the finca empty for a change. Plus, they had nothing to hide anymore – at least not with the people that mattered the most. That hadn’t quite sunk in for Horacio even after he told Javier everything. Even when his last defences buckled, and he broke down in Javier's arms, letting himself be held. Even when he was kissing Javier, slow and deep, in his family’s bathroom, their breaths heavy and desperate in such a confined space.

One thing could easily have led to another as Horacio pinned Javier against the cold tiles, bare skin seeking out bare skin, emotions running high. There was no doubt they wanted it to, and in almost any other circumstance, it would have.

“Not here,” Horacio whispered, his voice shaking and his forehead falling against Javier’s as he was hit by a sudden clarity of thought. “I’m sorry.”

Javier hushed lightly, cradling Horacio against his shoulder. “Hey, it’s okay.” He kissed across damp hair, running his fingers through thick strands that always became curlier when wet. “We don’t have to do anything.”

Light strokes soon morphed into lathered hands as Javier washed and rinsed Horacio’s hair, massaging the shampoo into his scalp and soothing away stubborn remnants of tension.

Although a niggling knot remained, an unspoken question and an uninitiated conversation. “When I was talking with my mother earlier…” Horacio began, closing his eyes and tilting his head back to let the hot jets cascade down his neck and shoulders.

Javier hummed in encouragement, his lips following the water droplets, enveloping Horacio in a blanket of warmth from all angles.

“She reassured me she wouldn’t be disappointed if I never had children.” Horacio let his words hang in the white noise of the shower, giving Javier time to adjust to the change of subject.

“Did you think she would be?”

“It crossed my mind. So much has been passed down through the Carrillo side of my family. From my Abuelo to my Papá. From my Papá to me.”

“Don’t know if you’ve noticed, but four of your nieces and nephews are around here somewhere.”

Horacio let out a light huff. “Like I could forget. But…they’re Alejandra’s, not mine.”

“I know. But I think you’re forgetting the real question here. Would you be disappointed?”

“Back when I was younger, when I was with Juliana, I might’ve said yes. More out of expectation than anything else. But with you…I think we ripped up and threw away the rule book a long time ago.”

“Thank fuck for that. We’ve never been very good at following rules anyway.”

It didn't take long for them both to laugh at such a flagrant understatement.

“So, you do feel the same then?” Horacio asked in earnest.

“I was less than an hour away from getting my very own white fucking picket fence. If I’d wanted it, I could’ve had it. But that wasn’t my idea of the American Dream.”

Horacio turned in Javier’s arms, and the last seed of doubt was finally plucked from his mind. His lips captured Javier’s again, a statement of intent for their future. A future they no longer had to hide from their families.

------------------------------------------------------

Javier seated himself in the large wooden gazebo at the end of the garden, which doubled as a viewing platform over the steep valley below. For once, sunlight had won the battle against the mist, and the sky was a brilliant shade of blue. It made it possible to see for miles, giving the illusion of being high amongst the surrounding trees alongside the raucous birdlife living in their branches.

It was their penultimate morning in Manizales, upon which Javier had changed a habit of a lifetime by getting up with Horacio. They had penned in some sightseeing of the city later. But for now, Horacio had gone for his usual run, and Javier started the day with possibly the best coffee he had ever drunk.

“May I join you?”

Javier looked up from his cup and cleared his throat. “Oh, er, of course.”

As Elena sat down, the sun glinted off the silver jewellery bonded to Javier’s chest, making them squint at its reflection. He instinctively brought a hand to his neck in a fumbled effort to shove the crucifix beneath the open collar of his shirt.

“You don’t need to do that, you know.”

Fuck. He'd been busted.

However, Elena's voice contained no traces of judgment, and it quickly put Javier at ease. He lowered his hand to his knee, giving a brief bob of the head before taking another sip of coffee.

“I still wear these.” Elena raised her left hand, showing off a sparkling diamond ring above a plain gold band. “The amount of awkward questions about the whereabouts of my husband these have caused over the years. Yet I still can’t bring myself to take them off. Although…”

With her right hand, she took hold of the top ring and wiggled it off her finger, then did the same with the second ring, with more force required this time.

Javier wasn’t sure what was happening until the dappled morning light fell on the inside of the ring he held up to his face.

Suerte que encontré a mi media naranja

(Lucky that I found my soulmate)

“It’s beautiful.”

“Eduardo wasn’t a man of many words, but he had his moments.” Elena’s smile took on a wistful appearance as Javier passed the ring back.

“My Pops is the same with his wedding ring. He insists on wearing it every day, which isn’t really compatible with the day job.”

“I can imagine. I hear it became Horacio’s day job, too?”

“Yeah,” Javier said with an involuntary grin. “I know it might be hard to believe, and I know it’s not what he expected, but it suits him.” Literally as well figuratively, he managed to stop himself from blurting out.

“I can’t remember him ever saying he wanted to be anything other than a police officer. My parents ran a textile business, and Eduardo’s mother was a nurse. But Horacio followed his father, who followed his father like it was their birthright. I always worried about Eduardo, especially if he was running late or was called to an emergency. Then it was the same with Horacio, too. So much blood spilt on our doorsteps, on our streets, in our churches.”

Elena promptly picked up her cup, the balm of hot fruit tea required before she could continue.

“Whenever the phone rang – or I heard a knock at the door – I prepared for the worst. It happened to so many friends and neighbours. So why not my husband or son? Of course, it was Eduardo’s heart in the end. But once Search Bloc made Horacio a walking target, it was only a matter of time. I’d spent years expecting it, but what I hadn’t accounted for in all of my fretting, pacing, and prayers…was you.”

“Me?”

“He told me what you did. How much trouble you and your partner got in for it. How you got injured yourself. How…you saved my son and his men.”

“We couldn’t save them all,” was Javier’s sole response to the lashings of praise he still wasn’t convinced he truly deserved in light of how the ambush came about in the first place.

“You saved more than your superiors were willing to, by the sounds of it.”

Javier scoffed. “Well, I can’t argue with that.”

“Good. And as for the ranch…he’s always liked to keep busy. Just like his father, he could never sit still and relax for long. I can see it. I bet he looks the part.”

“He does, actually.” That was allowed, Javier told himself.

“I thought something had changed after his injury, even if he wouldn’t tell us much. I hoped he’d seen sense, but I knew he was prepared to die for that mission of his – that obsession. I’d almost accepted it, to be honest, especially without Eduardo around to stop him. So, when he told me he’d quit, you were the only reason that made sense.”

“Ever since my Mamá passed, I tried to change things – or control them, at least. Anything to not feel that…helpless again. But it didn’t work like that. Walking away was the only choice left.”

“But it was a choice you both made. That can’t have been easy. I may not have known you very long, but it’s already clear to me you’re good for each other.”

“Even though I’m a gringo?”

“We all have our flaws.” Not only did Elena catch the humour in Javier’s eyes, but she matched and surpassed it with her own. “But to answer your question properly…I would say the complicated histories of our homelands have more in common than meets the eye.”

Javier hummed as he had flashbacks to high school of learning about Laredo starting life as a Spanish colonial settlement before a bloody tug-of-war between Mexico and America – and independence from both – had broken out. There was no denying he had benefited from certain privileges of owning an American passport, and he’d always accepted the gringo label without much pushback. But deep down, he knew it was only half the story.

“You’ve shown each other new paths,” Elena continued. “Safer and happier ones. And that’s what counts.”

“Not quite sure what my new path is yet, to be honest. I’ve spent so long running away from Laredo. I’ve forgotten what it means to live there.”

“It took me a long time to accept my place was here now rather than Medellín. Whenever there was a bombing, or a shooting, or a kidnapping, I had to stop myself from getting on a plane. But Horacio worried I’d be a target because of him. He didn’t want me there. And what could I have done anyway?” Elena let out a self-deprecating huff at the mere thought.

“You wanted to protect your son.”

“Yes. But it wasn’t just that. Medellín was my home and my work. And many of Eduardo’s friends and colleagues were killed. Their wives were sisters to me after his death. But I couldn’t return the favour from down here. Not in the same way, at least. I sent cards, flowers, food parcels, even money sometimes. But it never felt enough.”

“It never does.”

“No. It doesn’t. But I did what I could. And being there for Alejandra and the kids made me feel useful. I got involved with the church again. Worked for a small charity. Even though we’ve been protected from the violence here, the repercussions of it spread far and wide. So many displaced families in need. At least I was making a difference somewhere.”

“I thought I was making a difference. And maybe sometimes I was. But I don’t think it was ever really my fight.”

“Perhaps not. But maybe it helped lead you to the right one.”

“Maybe.”

Javier’s mind drifted back to the family history his Pops told him over the phone in Madrid, not just about his Mamá but his grandparents too. Not to mention all his Pops had done for the local community over the years. He thought of the stories Señora Romero had shared and the kindness she had shown him and Horacio. They had all made a difference in their own ways. And they had done it without leaving their cities, let alone their countries.

As Elena excused herself to ensure Mateo and Sofía weren’t starting another civil war in the kitchen, Javier nursed his coffee cup and surveyed the meandering scenery below. For the first time since he told Stechner to go fuck himself, he could see the outline of a path emerging in front of him. He wasn’t exactly sure where it was leading yet, but at least it was something. Something closer to home.

------------------------------------------------------

Their last day in Manizales came faster than Horacio had expected, presumably a side effect of waiting for the other shoe to drop any minute. Miraculously, it never did.

“Knock knock.”

Horacio looked up from the bed where he was wrestling with the zip of his suitcase – and currently losing. “Morning.” Another tug, but it wouldn’t shift. “You just gonna watch me?”

“Because you’re usually so good at accepting help.” With a dry smile and shake of the head, Alejandra came to the rescue with less heavy-handedness than her brother, unjamming the zip in seconds.

“I’m better than I was.”

“Can’t argue with that.”

“And thank you, by the way.” Horacio stood up, lifting the case from the bed and bringing himself face-to-face with his sister. “For everything.”

Alejandra nodded, maintaining eye contact with Horacio long enough to be distracted by the sunlight dancing across the gold chain around his neck. “It suits you.”

“Thanks. Better than it collecting dust in a box.”

“I don’t just mean the necklace.”

The subtle glow of Horacio's pupils mirrored Alejandra's before he stepped forward, pulling her into a tight embrace. “Take care of yourself, okay?” He leaned down and kissed her on the top of her head.

“You too. And don’t leave it so long next time.”

“We won’t. I promise.”

“If it helps, I can sweeten the deal with a stay at one of the hot springs around here. They’re always giving me freebies for supplying their coffee. One of them has private thermal pools and everything.”

“You don’t have to bribe me to visit.” However, the thought of it being him, Javier, and a jacuzzi was enough for him to re-think his position on taking bribes. “Plus, I wanna see what you do with the place.”

“So you can take inspiration?”

Horacio rolled his eyes. “You wish. If you think you can handle the Texan climate, you know where we’ll be.”

“Don’t worry, I can and I will.”

“We about ready?” Javier appeared in the doorway with the rest of their luggage, pausing at the threshold. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to interrupt.” Again.

“It’s okay; your boyfriend was just inviting us all to the ranch.”

It had only been an innocuous comment, but Alejandra managed to stop both men in their tracks with one word, a bashful look passing between them at the novelty of it.

“Oh, er, that’s great. The more the merrier.” Javier recovered just in time, although the flush in his cheeks showed no sign of abating. “My Pops always makes enough food for the population of Texas, so you’d be more than welcome.”

“Likewise here, Javier. As long as you bring more aguardiente next time.” She winked and drew him in for a hug.

“I think that can be arranged.” Javier broke away first so he could look at Alejandra properly. “And thank you…for everything this week.”

Alejandra gave a bob of the head once more, her smile widening as she glanced from Javier to Horacio, the depth of their gratitude beyond words but written all over their faces. “It’s what big sisters are for.”

------------------------------------------------------

After eating enough breakfast to last them for most of their journey to Medellín – the rest supplemented by Elena’s homemade empanadas and cocadas – they were stood back on the front porch again.

There was a chorus of goodbyes this time, ones that didn’t have the foreboding air of finality about them as they had done in the past.

Horacio allowed his Mamá to clutch him with all her strength, the scent of her perfume transporting him straight back to childhood.

“You take care of each other, you hear? And keep me updated on your visa. You know where I am if you need anything.”

“Don’t worry, Mamá. I will.”

“Y no olvide su español.” (And don’t forget your Spanish)

“No lo haré, Mamá.” (I won’t, Mamá) Horacio barely managed to suppress a tone of amused exasperation, given that he had been surrounded by almost as many Spanish voices in Laredo as in Colombia.

“Javier, you heard all of that. So, don’t let him forget.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Javier received the same treatment as Horacio with a bracing hug.

“Don’t be a stranger, Mijo. And don’t fret about finding that path. Just remember to follow your heart.”

------------------------------------------------------

The light was fading fast, leaving behind a watercolour blend of ambers, yellows and reds that blazed against a backdrop of purple haze and the ethereal silhouette of ancient mountains. The glimmer of city life below felt distant, as though they had left this world altogether and now lived above the clouds.

Which was fine by them as they caught their breath; Horacio draped over Javier’s lap in the passenger’s seat, the culmination of their release glistening across their stomachs.

“Just like old times,” Horacio panted as trails of kisses became interspersed with heady laughter.

“Well, not exactly.” Javier’s thumb and forefinger delicately held the silver and gold pendants at their chests before untangling the chains that had become knotted during their tryst.

“No.” Horacio brought his forehead to meet Javier’s, an instant tonic to the painful twinge gripping their hearts as memories of their last visit to this spot resurfaced. “I told you we’d make up for lost time this past week, though.”

“Yeah, I figured you meant in the hotel. Or even back in Madrid. Not the minute you parked up in Medellín.”

“Like you were complaining.”

“Fuck, no, I wasn’t. Less likely to be overheard up here than in the hotel anyway.”

Once Horacio had regained enough feeling in his limbs to dismount and sit back in the driver’s seat, Javier reached for the glove box. He took out their emergency stash of cigarettes and lit up.

Horacio attempted to clean himself up as best he could and did the same for Javier. “So, this is why you brought those with us.” He nodded towards the cigarettes.

“Obviously.” Javier took a long drag and exhaled with a deep sigh, his body latching on quickly to the nicotine, his mind still blitzed.

They passed their shared smoke back and forth in comfortable silence, basking in their afterglows and the aftermath of the last few days.

“You still like it up here then?” Horacio asked after stubbing out the butt in the ashtray between them.

“Yeah, I do. Don’t think I’ve ever seen it looking so beautiful.”

“Me neither. Funny how the same view can look completely different in a new light.”

Javier hummed in agreement, their gaze now fixed on each other rather than the windshield, the irony not lost that they were back in the same spot where it could easily all have ended.

"I can think of a way to make it even better, though.”

“Go on.”

In a flurry of movement, Javier zipped up his jeans, pulled on his shirt and got out of the car. He rustled around in the trunk until he retrieved a couple of spare towels they had packed for emergencies, along with their jackets. It wasn’t quite the thick blanket from the ranch, but at least it was a mild night.

They sprawled out on the grass behind the car, lying atop the towels and wrapped in their jackets. Javier propped his head on a folded sweater with Horacio resting against his chest at an angle that allowed them both to take in the cityscape below.

“How about we just stay here forever?” Javier rasped between slow, sensual kisses.

Horacio moaned against Javier’s lips as he went back for more. “Don’t tempt me. At least we didn’t book an early flight tomorrow.”

“Good point.” Another string of kisses, each more addictive than the last.

“Although,” Horacio began once they had calmed down, his fingers tracing patterns across Javier’s torso, "we’ve got a lot to sort out once we’re back in Madrid.”

“I know. But at least we ripped off the band-aid.” One of Javier’s hands found Horacio’s and slotted their fingers together.

“I spent so much energy worrying about this trip; I was almost expecting something bad to happen.”

Javier raised their linked hands to his mouth and brushed his lips over Horacio’s knuckles. “But it didn’t.”

“No. In fact…I think I know what I want to do with the money.”

“Oh yeah?”

“If you and your father agree to it, that is. And I can find a good lawyer.”

Javier lifted his head slightly and turned in Horacio's direction, urging him to continue.

“I was thinking….what if we bought the corn farm? The three of us, I mean.”

“Are you fucking serious?”

“Yeah. I think I am.” Horacio couldn’t help but laugh now he’d said it out loud. “Like I said, I’d need to check everything with a lawyer about my visa first. But there is an option for investors. And you still have some of your money from the ranch, right?”

“Yeah, I do. And obviously, you can count me in. But…shit, Horacio. Are you sure? I mean, it’s your inheritance.”

“It's nothing Alejandra isn't doing with her share. And well, if your father bought it outright, an empty cottage would go to waste on our doorstep. Last I looked, it needed a bit of maintenance, but it wasn’t in bad shape.”

Now, it was Javier’s turn to laugh. “Got it all figured out, huh?”

“Something like that.”

“It’s funny, ‘cos, er...I’ve been thinking, too. About something your Mamá said.”

“About what?”

“About looking closer to home for a new path. And I think I might have found it.”

------------------------------------------------------

They only meant to stay until they got too cold, but their shared body heat let them doze until sunrise. The watercolour skyline re-emerged from behind the mountain tops, gradually bathing Medellín in a heavenly half-light, stirring them awake as it reached their hideaway.

The plan was to freshen up and have breakfast at the hotel before dropping off the hire car and heading to the airport after lunch. But there was something Horacio needed to do whilst the city wasn’t fully awake, whilst the low sun felt like a gift from God Himself.

As they pulled up a stone’s throw away from Horacio’s old family church – a few blocks down from his childhood home and former apartment that Trujillo had cleared after his hasty exit from Carlos Holguín – Javier hesitated, unsure if this was something Horacio needed to do alone.

“Come with me,” Horacio said after stepping out of the car as though he had read Javier’s mind. “Please.”

That was all the confirmation Javier needed to follow.

They walked silently along a well-kept pathway that forked off in multiple directions. It was maze-like and disorientating, but Horacio took purposeful strides despite how long it had been since his last visit.

He halted at a large marble slate engraved with a crucifix and the CNP emblem. There were some dried old flowers in a vase at the base of it, where Horacio knelt down and swapped them for the fresh bunch of marigolds he’d carried from the car.

“A gift from Mamá,” he whispered. “She’ll be back again soon.”

Horacio remained on the grass and brought his hands up to the back of his neck, where he unhooked the gold chain. He studied it between his fingers, then clasped it in his palm and bowed his head.

The cemetery was empty at this time in the morning, the loud rustling in the trees drowning out the murmur of traffic beginning to burst into life.

Javier watched wordlessly a few feet behind Horacio, almost beginning to feel like he was intruding.

“Pray with me.”

“Are you sure? What if someone –”

“I’m sure. No one’s here but us.”

Javier checked around them once, then twice, just in case. Even if someone did happen to come by, two men praying over a grave wasn’t exactly the most compromising position they could be found in. But it was better to be safe than sorry.

Once satisfied, Javier joined Horacio on the grass. They couldn’t get away with how they had done this in private, but Horacio dropped his right hand to the floor beside him, palm outstretched.

Javier took the hint and discreetly placed his left hand over the top, encasing the gold necklace between them.

With heads lowered and eyes closed, they prayed. An unspoken acknowledgement of all they had lost and how it had led them here. They honoured memories made, those that would never be, and those they could still make together despite everything.

Horacio’s eyes fluttered open as the sunlight fell on the headstone above him, forcing him to blink away a glassy sheen. His hand stayed connected with Javier’s on the earth, his present and future by his side, giving him strength to finally make peace with his past.

He rose to his feet and made the sign of the cross on his chest before running his fingers along the embossed letters of his father’s name. “Te quiero mucho, Papá.”

Javier gave as much time as was needed until risking a gentle squeeze of Horacio’s shoulder. “You ready?”

Horacio looked from the gravestone to Javier, the charcoal of his irises burning with the fire of conviction. “I’m ready.”

#Narcos fic #Narcos #Javier Peña #Horacio Carrillo #Carrillo #Javier Peña x Horacio Carrillo #Pedro Pascal #Maurice Compte #Narcos fanfic #Narcos fanfiction #Narcos fan fic #My Fan Fic #My Narcos Fic

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burninlovebutler · 1 year

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1,000 Follower Party 🥹

when i came back to tumblr, i never expected to have the experience i’ve had or make the connections & friend’s i’ve made - friends that i consider some of my best friends now.

i also didn’t expect the love i’ve received for my writing, it has been truly overwhelming (in a good way obv) - my numbers aren’t the highest but i am so grateful for my time here & the people i’ve met - thank you for all the laughs, cries, screams lol they make me so happy. you all have shown me a kindness that is such a bold reflection of elvis 🥺 it’s so beautiful & it just makes me wanna pay it forward

and thank you for accepting me & letting me take up some space here 💗

**since i do get quite overwhelmed easily with asks (bc my adhd) i can’t guarantee that i’ll be able to do all of them or that they’ll be done quickly but i will try my best to do most!**

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ALSO - specify if you have spotify or not!

🦋 - Moodboards

similar to ^ playlists

send me A or B [+ the respective details] & i’ll make a 3-6 pic mini moodboard for you 💓

👀 - My fics

-ask me about any of my fics! send me one of my fics & talk/ask me anything about them like how i got the idea / ideas for certain plots or scenes or my writing process or my fav lines/plots/scenes or anything really idk

- or hints out of context 🤭 i love doing those

👽 - Head Cannons

-ask me about a specific fic of mine OR elvis/austin under a certain setting / trope / plot / pairing & i’ll share/make some head cannons for it

🌸 - Recommendations

-recommend some things for me! movies, shows, music, makeup!!/skincare!, tarot decks, books, anything & i’ll answer w some of my own 💓

since my writing process is rather lengthy & intricate i don’t like to write blurbs or take requests etc. so unfortunately i can’t be like y’all that can write/post a million lil stories effortlessly ☹️ i so wish i could, i’m just not built like that 😭

HOWEVER it seems just wrong for me to not include some sort of fic component in my celebration since i am mainly a fic blog SO

i decided i wanted to do a lil contest ??? idk lol

🦋winner will receive a imagine/one shot with the plot request of their choosing🦋

TO ENTER:

- make sure you are following me lol

- like & reblog this post

- comment 🍉🥀 on this post

- comment something that made you happy today 💓

- bonus entry: reblog this w proof that you took a drink of water when you read this 💗 (empty water bottle/cup or something!)

that’s it!

💗whenever the winner is chosen i will convene with them directly on what sort of fic they want & i will write one for them (tho it may take some time lol) 💗

✨contest will be open for the next 2 weeks & the winner will be chosen at random around then! [04.07.23]✨

tagging some of my fav people i’ve met through this blog/fandom 🥰

@cryingabtab @lllsaslll @presleysdarling @loving-elvis @samfangirls @bisexualwvtson @troubleinapinksuit @karamelcoveredolicity @lindszeppelin @succsessions @steph-speaks @luluthesandgoose @ab4eva @softsatnin @elvisfatass @homerow99 @michellelv @flwrs4aust @powerofelvis @elvisabutler @sournatromanoff @jelliedonut @sagesolsticewrites @fangirlwithasweettooth @thatbanditqueen @purejasmine @slowsweetlove @areacodefan @generoustreemystic @golden-kiwis

and so many more 😭 anyone whom i’ve inevitably missed due to my overly medicated rotting brain 😭

again i love you all so much 🥺 thank you for letting me be a part of this beautiful little family 🥺💗

-mel xx

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acopenhagenarmy · 10 months

Text

PART 9

Pairing: Namjoon x Reader

Warnings: bad words and such, a shit ton of fluff as usual and some angst because why the hell not...

Wordcount: 2,2K

/ Moodboard / Teaser / One / Two / Three / Four / Five / Six / Seven / Eight / Nine / Ten /

Taglist: @purpletaehyung92 @just-call-me-trash-can @undiscovered1personality

His eyes could light up the room, he looked content, happy in this moment. Food splayed out around you, the two of you completely relaxing as you told him all your life had played out so far. It was nice.

He too told you about him and his life, the dream of rapping and being able to live off of it at some point. Him and the boys struggles when they first started out and the life he had now.

You cleared off the bed when you finished the food, and laid down, head on his chest as he cuddled around you, resting his head on yours as he played with your hair.

The first thing that happened was his heartbeat began to beat a little faster than it had just a minute before, and then you felt the sadness that he felt.

You gave him a minute or two to just dwell in his emotion, think about what he wanted to say before you started to question him.

“Do-” he sighed. “Do you think you’ll ever be able to forgive me?” he said.

It was only a whisper, but you heard it. The emotions his voice held almost broke your heart in that exact moment.

“Forgive you? What for?” You asked as you tried to stop the overthinking and anxiety from kicking in.

“For me, not finding you earlier” this time around his voice almost cracked under the pressure of the fear that slowly creeped in.

It was obvious he had thought about this throughout the day, maybe even before the two of you met. But he hadn’t had the chase for the feelings to really manifest to the degree where you would be able to feel them. That was until now.

“Oh my love” you said as you tried to drown out his sadness with the love you already had for him. “There’s nothing to forgive”

“Are you sure? Cause I felt your sadness that monday you know? The loneliness, the fear of never finding me, and I just… I never wanted you to feel like that. And if I hadn’t been so preoccupied with my own dreams and aspirations I might’ve been able to feel you earlier, search for you”

You sat up and gave him a small peck before you took his hands.

“Our mark isn’t ideal, there’s no saying if either of us would’ve ever noticed. But I’m pretty sure that if it wasn’t for this job, these dreams of yours, the two of us would’ve most likely never met. I wouldn’t have heard your song, I wouldn’t have called Hobi, and we would’ve never met”

He sighed as he hid his face behind his hands. “I know, I just, I don’t like I’ve caused you pain”

“Just focus on me, in the darkness just the two of us is enough” You answered which earned you a giggle as he pulled you in for a kiss.

“What?” you asked in between the sweet pecks he plastered all over your lips and cheeks. But he refused to give you an answer straight away.

“You just quoted lyrics from one of the songs I’ve written about you” he kissed you between each of the words in the sentence. He smiled while he did it, and it made your heart flutter.

You fake gasped. “So ‘forever rain’ wasn’t the first song dedicated to me?”

“Nope! now come here and cuddle me, we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow, might be best if we get a little rest”

It didn’t take long for the two of you to drift off, and being here, in his arms, was the best feeling in the world. You had never felt more safe or more at home.

The following morning Namjoon had decided that he wanted to surprise you with breakfast in bed. He had no intentions of leaving the hotel room the next couple of days. All he wanted was to get to know you better, especially without the eyes of the world, resting on the two of you.

Speculations about him finding his soulmate were all over twitter. Someone had spotted him and the boys as they left your school, finding it peculiar just what they were doing at a place like that, so close to one of their concerts.

That, in combination with the small hints of complete happiness and love from his speech at yesterday's concert, had made army analyze every little second of his performance.

He had a takeout box in hand as he filled it, and many others to the brim with breakfast for the two of you.

“You think you’ve had enough pancakes?” Jungkook laughed.

Shortly after they all heard a loud *smack* followed by a loud and dramatic “ouch” from their maknae.

“Let him live, Jungkook. Something tells me the two of them are gonna need all the carbs and strength for the day that they have planned” Star said as he passed you all by, just before drowning her ginger shot.

He couldn’t help the blush that painted his cheeks. The boys instantly started teasing him. But Jin stayed silent.

It looked like he was in a trance of sorts. Daydreaming about something that seemed important.

“You okay?” Namjoon asked.

His eyes were shining like little stars, he looked happier than he had in a long time. And that’s when he spotted it. A small piece of a round pink confetti in his hair.

“Ohhhh” it was like a lightbulb went off in his head.

“Yeah,” Jin answered, unable to say anything else.

“Oh wow!" So she knows who you are? Hell she even biases you?” Namjoon had completely stopped what he was doing, all he could think was how lucky Jin was.

This made it much easier for the two of them to come into contact with one another. You knew how she looked, and hopefully the two of you had exchanged more than just formalities in the midst of everything.

“I really hope it’s her Namjoon”

“I’m sure it is, congrats bro!” He sat down the boxes and gave him a giant hug which the older man quickly returned.

“Ah fuck… If this is a dream I better wake up before I have her in my arms, because otherwise I don’t think I’ll be able to recover.”

You woke up in the dark room, with just a small light source from the borders of the curtain. You smiled and stretched your arms over your head, unable to see even those in the dark room.

“Goodmorning love” you said with a groggy voice.

You slowly stretched out your arms in the hopes of reaching your soulmate. Morning cuddles, well cuddles in general, were really something you enjoyed. And waking up with him meant daily cuddle sessions.

But there was nobody next to you, the bed was completely empty beside you.

You felt anger, sadness, depression and anxiety come crashing over you, all at once.

It was all a dream, he’s not here, he’s not real…

Your thoughts overpowered every kind of rational thought you might’ve had in that moment. Instead of getting up, looking for him, you drew the covers over your head. In hopes of shutting the memories of what you thought were your dreams, out.

You did what you had done so many times where you had dreamt of him, or the mere idea of him. You shut down and hid in the dark, hoping that someday, the dream would become reality.

Namjoon talked to the boys after he had collected all the food he loved and hoped you liked too. He tried to figure out just how many days they could stay in the city with time off, without it ruining too much of the schedule.

He could almost see the emotions that were about to hit him, creeping in on him like dark clouds, filled with thunder and sadness. The hit of it almost knocked the air out of him.

Your loneliness was more severe than he had ever felt, and the feeling of tears staining his cheeks were not to be mistaken. He couldn’t understand why you were feeling like this, weren’t you happy?

And then it hit him… She thinks yesterday was a dream.

He quickly threw the take away boxes on the table without a care in the world. And then he set off and ran as fast as his feet could carry him.

Through corridors and hallways, up the stairs and finally he was there in the room with you.

His heart broke by the sound of your muffled cries. He didn’t even take the time to turn on the light, in a second he was in the bed right beside you, pulling you close, freeing you from the covers and the dark void that was your anxiety.

“It’s okay, it’s okay, I’m right here” he said as he rocked you back and forth, repeating his words, over and over like a prayer.

You clinged on to his t-shirt, as you cried, every second inhaling more of his perfume. His arms that held you felt so real, and when you finally had the courage to look up, he was there.

He took your face in his hands and used his thumps to dry away the tears. “I’m right here, it wasn’t a dream. I’ll never leave you, okay? Never. It’s you and me my love, you and me”

His voice pulled you back to reality.

“You’re here?” It was meant to be a statement, but in the end, it sounded more like a question than anything else.

“I am,” he said.

The two of you sat there for a while, just staring at one another while embracing. You didn’t want it to stop, you wanted to memorize him like this. The fear filled eyes, that still had that spark of love and adoration. You wanted to get lost in them, drown in them, bury yourself in this feeling.

“Do you need anything?” he asked as he removed a strand of hair from your face.

“A glass of water maybe?”

He responded by kissing your forehead, and then went to pick a cold water bottle out from the fridge.

“Here” he said as he threw it your way.

Your man was perfection, he was made for you, there was no doubt. But he could not throw anything, maybe not even if his life depended on it. The water bottle missed the bed by an entire meter, and the hard drop on the floor made the lid fly off of it.

There was nothing you could do except laugh. And seeing you smile was contagious, and before he knew it, the two of you were laughing together.

It was perfect, and lifted your moods without the need to talk through the episode right away.

“Remind me never to do that again” He said in between laughs.

“Are you always that clumsy?” You asked as you tried your best to get both the laughter and your breathing under control

“Well the army calls me god of destruction…”

The absurdity of the nickname made you giggle, just as the two of you had stopped laughing.

“How many things do you break, for it to be a nickname your fans have given you?”

“A lot…” He smiled, dimples on display.

You sighed and took his hand, not ready for him to go take care of the mess he had just made.

“I’m sorry I scared you… my fears and anxiety got the best of me I think”

He gave your hand a squeeze. “Please, don’t apologize. I’ve had dreams of you before as well. And waking up from that is terrible.”

“I’m glad I wasn’t the only one who’ve missed you over the years”

“Trust me, you weren’t.”

He bent down, toilet paper in hand to clean up his mess as you watched him. He hummed a little melody, and impressed you once again with his talent. How did I get so lucky?

Oh wanna hear some good news?” he asked.

You liked this. The feeling of having someone who didn’t judge you for how you felt. The feeling of being able to communicate every feeling and thought you had, was everything you had ever hoped and dreamed to have in your partner.

“Tell me” you said as you hugged one of the pillows on the bed.

“The girl you met yesterday, the one who dropped the confetti, we’re pretty sure she might be Jin’s soulmate”

You couldn’t help the way your heart swelled with happiness.

“Oh my god! You’re kidding!?” You said with as much excitement as your voice would allow you.

He couldn’t help but smile at your excitement. It was nice to see you were as excited for his brother as he was. Even though you’d only met him yesterday. She’s complete and utter perfection.

“How do you know?”

“Well he woke up with confetti everywhere, he had some stuck in his hair when I met him at breakfast.” Namjoon laughed.

His laugh was slowly becoming your favorite sound in the entire world.

“That’s amazing Joonie. But damn I should’ve asked her, her name, or at least gotten some kind of information”

He got off the floor and gave you a peck before trying, and failing, to throw the paper in the bin basketball style.

“Don’t worry too much about that, how would you know? How would any of us?”

You nodded along, that was true. “I do have some info though”

#bts #bts fanfic #bts fanfiction #bts fluff #bts angst #bts smut #Namjoon fanfic #namjoon fluff #namjoon angst #namjoon smut #bts namjoon #kim namjoon #namjoon x reader #namjoon x y/n #namjoon soulmate au #kim namjoon soulmate au #bts namjoon soulmate #namjoon soulmate #bts soulmate au

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cljordan-imperium · 2 years

Text

You have entered the domain of the all powerful AUTHOR GODDESS...AKA...Your Eccentric Southern Gothic Creole Auntie who is full of sass and isn't afraid to tell it to you straight. *blows kiss*

She/Her

48 - Female - Mother of 1 - Work Full Time - Published Short Stories

I am a female writer on the Gulf Coast of the United States, currently residing in the state of Mississippi near the amazing city of New Orleans. I have lived in both Louisiana and Mississippi and the culture of the bayou areas runs through my blood. I have one adult son, who is the light of my life, and a cat who thinks she is the goddess of it. The stories that are currently being published to Tumbler are the continuation of roleplays and solo writing that I have been writing for over 20 years; and that I decided to continue sharing with everyone. Some characters have intricate and elaborate backstories which I will unfold for you. Some are new and you will learn about as they reveal themselves to me. I hope you all enjoy.

Some call me a free spirit, I call me...me. It took me years to become comfortable in who I am, so I judge no one else. We all have our own journeys. I am here to support everyone else on theirs, so maybe they won't have to take as long to be able to love themselves. I prefer not to talk much about my disabilities because I don't want them to define me, but am also open about them when asked or to help others come to terms with their own.

I love purple and sparkles, and I'll probably die petting something I shouldn't. Being as I live on the Gulf Coast, I might also be eaten by it, and that is fine. Life is a circle and we're all part of it.

Feel free to visit my inbox and ask box. I promise I do not bite unless asked.

GENERAL TRIGGER WARNINGS - I am going to post this here and also on appropriate stories where they happen - Also, not all of my characters are meant to be liked or sympathetic. Feel free to literally hate them and let your opinions change if the characters do, some of them WILL evolve over time.

All of my stories are FICTION and NOT REAL.

There are themes of: fantasy, evil, demons, angels, religion, blood, viscera, evisceration, gore, swearing, slavery, manipulation, ptsd, emotional manipulation, dv, sa, abuse, death, hell, torture, violence, war, fighting, anger, injury, emotional abuse, verbal abuse, physical abuse, guns, police, witchcraft, .

~may be updated later if I think of more that fit~

Please know that I have 14 Active WIPS here (not including the individual stories in The Imperium Chronicles)

MASTER LIST - Updated 4/16

The Imperium Chronicles

NOT STORYLINE

Flash Fiction Friday 3.3.23

3/10/23 - Flash Fiction Friday - Celestial Bodies

April Fool's In Imperium

Meeting Jasper

Moodboards of Characters

Back To The 20's

HISTORICAL

GET TO KNOW MY OC

THE PALACE

CASPERIUS & MARTENIQUE

DARTAN & AMAYA

GRAE & ADALICIA

ASHER & KAYLIN

MARCELLUS & SORINA

DEZ, PHAEDRA, & THINIUS

UFFERN

LEANDRE & YAEL

CASSANDRA & LUCIFER

KARLEN

ADRIEL & ANNABELLA

DELILAH & TALON

PUSTOTA

FUN STUFF

Character Theme Song

OC Name Meaning/Reason Tag

Writing Questions Tag

Characters as Comfort Foods

Fav Character(s) to Write

Magical Objects in Imperium

WIP Drinking Game

Foretelling/Prophecy in My Writing

Government in My Stories

Types of Side Characters

THE ANDROMEDA EFFECT

@the-andromeda-effect - In Greek Mythology Andromeda was sacrificed by her parents to save their kingdom from Poseidon's wrath after her mother offended him, but Perseus saves her from death by a Krackon and takes her to his kingdom to be his Queen. Mircea (Meer-cha) Kalavati wasn't sacrificing his wife to appease a god, or bring peace to his clan, he was doing it to start a war with another. His mistake when he hired Caliban Andros was lying to him about why he wanted her rescued, then killed to look like those who had kidnapped her had done it. Never lie to your hitman. Now, like Perseus to Andromeda, Caliban has rescued Riona Kalavati and something is drawing him to the woman. He will kill to keep her safe, and her husband is going to regret that lie for what remaining life he has left. Now as Adira Andros, she is definitely Caliban's Queen, and his "army" has rallied around her.

BATTLEGROUND OF DREAMS

@battlegroundofdreams

BAYOU WITCHES

@bayouwitches (Heaven & Arthur Shelby belong to @call-sign-shark)

BEHIND THESE MASKS

@behindthesemasks - Melania LaVeau is a professor at LSU in Baton Rouge. She is also the grandaughter of Ambrose Meyers, one of the most powerful men in the country and the daughter of Marie LaVeau...yes THAT Marie LaVeau! Old money, going back to when the Gautier family came over from France to settle in New Orelans, there isn't much that goes on in Louisiana or Mississippi that they don't have their hands in. Meyers Worldwide, a tech conglomerate is a cover for underworld activities that will eventually come to light. What happens when someone decides to cross the most powerful, and immortal, Queen of Voodo and threaten one of her children? Will New Orleans be left standing? If you are a fan of Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider, or The LIbrarians, the story is in the same veign. All of the characters are human, but there are supernatural occurrences around them

BENDING THE LAW

@bendingthelaws - Colin Masterson is the Cook Count State's Attorney. He has been on a mission to take down the head of a Chicago crime conglomerate that is headed by Constantin Rakeovich. Now someone has kidnapped his intern and is sending her back to him in tiny pieces. Is it Constantin? Is it another one of the people that Colin has crossed? Now he and those he trusts are going to have to figure it out before someone else disappears or is hurt. Complicating matters is that his brother, Colton Masterson is Constantin's defense attorney. The brothers have never been close, but in this situation, things take a much darker turn. Will Colton stand by his brother or his client? And what happens when something bigger happens and puts everyone Colin cares about in the crosshairs? If you are a fan of Law & Order, or any of those types of shows, this is much in the same vein and will involve more than just the lawyers. All characters are human. There is no supernatural beings or magic. Some places are going to be fictional, but the main setting is the city of Chicago.

DEVIL IN THE DETAILS

@devil-in-the-details-ay - When Lucifer's daughter Yara gets bored and wants to intern for the Lord of Death, Astaroth, her father agrees. After their first meeting, the Devil changes the plans once more. Deciding to make Yara someone else's problem, she is now to be Astaroth's wife. Navigating this challenge, and those who will come against them both will reveal a lot about each other, and themselves. Is the Princess really as spoiled and entitled as she seems? Is Astaroth really the iceberg incarnate that he seems? Is she even who she believes herself to be? And what happens when someone decides to try to interfere in their relationship?

MAGICAL MISTAKES

@magical-mistakes-vm - Vollrath, the Master Warlock of the local Coven, encounters Mahala (Mah-HAY-lah) preparing to do a ritual on his land. Her mistakes in not being careful in preparations allowed him to find her, but it also set up events in the future that they will need the help of his best friends Baldur and Elmar to deal with. A witch that has no clue what she is and a Master Warlock who is not used to letting people close have to navigate revelations that will change both their lives, and possibly even the Coven. When his brother, Balor, an equally powerful warlock within the Coven who he has been at odds with for years, also shows up and it is clear will be needed, it just adds one more complexity to the situation. Can they all get along to keep each other safe, or will one of them fall to those who are coming against them?

MYSTS OF TIME

@mystsoftime

NIGHTMARE MAGIC

(MAGICAL MISTAKES X BATTLEGROUND OF DREAMS)

@nightmare-magic

PRINCESS OF THIEVES

@princess-of-thieves-id - Princess Inara is set to marry Prince Diyan the next day, a man she has never met or even set eyes on. Ever defiant, that is the last thing she is going to do. Deciding to thwart her father's plans, the Princess slips out of the castle and sets to escape. Little does she know that the Prince's family sent Arik, the Prince's best friend and a trained assassin, to watch over her, fearing more that she would be murdered by enemies rather than escape. One thing that Arik knows is that Diyan doesn't want to marry Inara either, so instead of stopping her, he helps her with a promise to keep her safe if she stays with him. They make it to the next town, which is a port and aboard a vessel that is just preparing to depart in an effort to stay one step ahead of the soldiers now searching for Inara. Unbeknownst them, they have just become stow-aways on a pirate ship. Complicating things further is that Arik and the Captain of the ship are not strangers, and when a romance develops between Inara and Arik and the Captain deciding he would like her for his own, things become even more complicated. Not to mention all three of them are being hunted by multiple kingdoms. Nothing like a quiet day on the sea, right?

SEHNSUCHT RISING

@sehnsuchtrising

Tapperhet

@tapperhet-em - When Princess Meeri's father is deposed by his brother, he believes she was part of the coup, and disowns her as his family flees the country. Lucky for her, she is found by one of the knights she befriended in childhood and is still loyal to her, Einar, before her uncle did. A members of nobility, he and three of his friends spirit her off into hiding where they can plan to figure out who set her up, help her rebuild a life apart from royalty, and decide how to bring about justice. Can the seeming unrequited love of Einar for Meeri turn into more? Or will one of his brothers in arms, cut him off from that possibility? And how close was/is the traitor to Meeri? Sometimes safe isn't as safe as you think...and destiny, it's more than just a lofty ideal. She is a bitch sometimes, and she will find you.

WHILE YOU WAIT

@whileyouwait-dm

Support, Trigger Warning, and Separation Banners on this and all side/reblogs are work of @cafekitsune. I try to credit them as I go, but crediting here as well in case I forget.

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tessa-liam · 1 year

Text

Marabelle

Chapter 3 - Falling

Book: Choices - The Royal Romance, an AU series

Series Premise: An American teenager from New York City is introduced to the world of a small European country and its society of royalty, nobles, and commoners. How will her life story be transformed? Will this new adventure bring her happiness...or regret?

Catch Up: Marabelle Masterlist

Main Pairing: Liam Rys v F!OC (Sophia)

Other Pairing: Maxwell Beaumont x M!OC Daniel

All characters belong to Pixelberry, except Sophia Taylor, Bethany Beaumont, Melanie Smithson, Tyler Gregson.

Rating: M*🔞Warnings: this series will have NSFW material, crude language. Not Beta’d: Please excuse all errors.

Category: Alternate Universe/on-going series/angst/fluff

Words: 2149, Read 10 minutes

- 3 – Falling

Chapter summary: Marabelle is settled in her new home at the Beaumont stables. Sophie starts to prepare for the start of the social season that begins with the Beaumont Bash.

Music Inspiration: The Climb - Lucy Thomas (Sophie’s FC)

Falling - LeBlanc And Carr

A/N1: This is my submission for Choices March Challenge @choicesmonthlychallenge @lovealexhunt Prompts, Sunrise, Talking to Animals & art commission/moodboard #choicesmarchchallenge

A/N2: This is my submission for @choicesflashfics Week #25, Prompt #3 - "I haven't laughed like this in a long time."

A/N3: Bethany Beaumont, Maxwell’s mother, is originally from the US; is Barthelemy Beaumont’s 2nd wife. Annabelle Beaumont (deceased) was Bertrand’s mother.

A/N4: Melanie Smithson is a love interest for Drake. Tyler Ericsson is Prince Liam’s personal assistant.

A/N5: Social season in this AU series refers to a traditional period in the spring/summer for royalty and members of the court to take part in balls, dinner parties and charity events.

🐎🐎🐎

Beaumont Estate

“Good morning, Auntie Bethany.” Sophie sing-songed as she entered the huge country kitchen of the Beaumont estate.

“Morning, sweetheart, you are up early this morning.”

Sophie nodded, kissing her aunt’s cheek. “Breakfast smells so good! What are we having today?”

Maxwell smiled, already seated at the table, “my favorite...blueberry pancakes with maple syrup and bacon.”

"mmmm...sounds good!" After pouring herself a cup of coffee, Sophie took a seat at the table across from her cousin as the waitstaff began to set down breakfast plates of food.

“So, Sophie, tell me what happened yesterday? Maxwell mentioned that you found a horse.”

“Yes, I did!” Sophie was beaming. “Oh Auntie, she is beautiful! Her name is Marabelle, and she is a retired Derby winner. She is black with white socks and has a star on her forehead.”

“That’s so exciting, my dear! Maxwell tells me that she will be arriving this morning with the other horses that Bertrand bought yesterday.”

“Drake and Melanie should be arriving very soon. I think I will get changed now to get ready to go help.” Maxwell finished his coffee and stood up.

“Are you coming out to see the horses, Mom? "

“Oh, definitely, but I’ll let the horses be settled first, though. I don’t want to get in the way.”

“Sophie, I will see you outside.” Maxwell grabbed one more piece of bacon and winked at his cousin. “I know Sophie won’t wait!”

Sophie giggled at his comment. “Try and stop me, Max.”

Bethany paused and looked at her niece, noticing the look of happiness and sparkle in her eyes.

Unbeknownst to Sophie, Maxwell had already mentioned to his mother that it was Prince Liam who had arranged for Sophie to ride Marabelle for the first time.

“What’s that look for?” Sophie asked her aunt, noticing her grin.

“I am delighted that the boys found the horse for you so quickly. And, I hear that a certain ‘gentleman’ also had a hand in the find?”

Sophie blushed furiously, “Yes, well, actually...”

She hesitated, then blurted out, “It was Prince Liam.”

Bethany looked pleased and patted her niece’s hand, “Well, that’s certainly a nice surprise. Prince Liam must think very highly of your riding skills to suggest a prize winning champion for you.”

"I was thinking of thanking him with a small gift. I could present it to him the night of the Bash."

"That's a lovely idea, my dear."

"Auntie Bethany, for the Beaumont Bash this weekend, I am not sure what I should wear. Talking to Bertrand, he says to wear a formal ballgown. When I asked Max, he said to wear a party dress.

What do you suggest?"

"First of all, you will look lovely in anything you choose. Second, if I had to choose between the two dresses, I would choose the party dress. It looks more modern than the traditional ball gown."

"Max invited the princes, shouldn't I dress more formal?"

Bethany chuckled, "No dear, I am pretty certain that the princes would prefer a more casual evening. I tell you what. Tomorrow, I am taking you up to the Capital to find your dress. We can pick up a gift for Liam as well."

‘...I may not know it

But these are the moments, that

I’m gonna remember most, yeah

Just gotta keep going...’

🐎🐎🐎

It was an hour past sunrise, as Drake maneuvered the long horse trailer into the driveway and then through the side gate of the Beaumont Estate grounds. Stopping alongside the horse stables, he texted Maxwell to come out and unlock the doors for the new arrivals.

Unhitching the trailer door, Melanie stepped up into the long horse trailer and entered the main compartment. Upon seeing Melanie, many of the horses started to whinny.

“It’s all right, this is your new home,” she spoke soothingly as she walked down the row of horses. Melanie loved talking to animals, especially the horses; she understood that they were social creatures and could display a wide range of emotions. They were definitely anxious, at the moment.

“Good morning, Mel,” Maxwell, wearing casual jeans, jacket and boots, called into the trailer as Drake followed in after him.

“Beaumont, there you are; I just messaged you.” Drake tapped his shoulder and began to also prepare the horses for their transfer to the stables.

“Morning, Max,” Melanie called back, the horses nickering softly.

“My two stable hands are ready for them.” Maxwell stated and started to help Drake.

“Perfect Max, thank you.”

The stable hands entered the trailer and began untying the horses from the railings. They led each horse inside the stable and settled them into their individual stalls.

🐎🐎🐎

The Tavern Beer Garden, Capital

Later into the evening, Bastien had positioned two royal guardsmen discreetly inside the beer garden, well before Leo and Liam were set to arrive.

Drake and Rashad, already sitting at a table, watched as a black SUV rolled to a stop at the entrance of the beer garden. As Leo and Liam stepped out of the vehicle, Bastien approached them, “Your Highnesses, please follow me.”

Leo didn’t waste any time in ordering a double scotch as soon as he sat down at the table. Liam greeted Rashad with a handshake, while Drake slid a cold beer over to Liam’s seat.

“Why so wound up, Rys?” Drake looked over and questioned Leo with a smirk.

Can you say M..M..Maddy?”

Leo scowled back, clearly annoyed at his comment, answered, “Don’t go there, Walker.”

The less time Leo had to think about Madeleine the better. Since she is betrothed to Leo, and rumors were circulating that King Constantine was planning to relinquish the throne sooner than expected, Madeleine had become unbearably obnoxious. She felt that she was more than ready to assume the role of Queen now and made a point of reminding anyone and everyone in the Kingdom that would listen to her.

Liam shook his head, knowing that his brother was agitated, and rightly so. His father’s announcement to his sons last week that he was gravely ill was a shock. News of his potential early abdication explosive. The tension of having to face an arranged marriage for Leo, palpable.

“So, Liam, will you be attending the Beaumont Bash this weekend?” Rashad asked, trying to change the direction of where this conversation was going.

Leo glanced at his friend, silently thanking him for correctly reading the room.

“Yes, let’s see what Bertrand and Max have planned for this year,” Liam confirmed.

Both Princes Leo and Liam were expected to attend, since King Constantine and Queen Regina were stepping back from some royal duties, letting the princes represent the monarchy.

“I am assuming that you will be attending this year? I know that your father has asked Regina for assistance in finding you a marriage match.” Liam questioned grinning.

Sighing, Rashad nodded yes. His parents were adament that he take a partner this season. “I hear that there are several new faces joining the social season this year. Anyone interesting?”

Smiling knowingly, Drake joined the conversation, “one of the young ladies caught Liam’s attention yesterday. Isn’t that right Li?”

Liam’s smile was huge, as he remembered his day with Sophie on the trail at the polo club and horse ranch, when she asked...

'I bet you’re used to putting everyone else first.'

'And why would you say that?'

From the short time that they had talked earlier, she already had an accurate insight of him. She asked about his thoughts and feelings, showing a genuine interest. They were having a heartfelt and sincere conversation. She had just met him!

Gathering his thoughts into words, he began...

“I have never in my life met anyone like her. We connected on so many different levels. She is incredibly sweet, interesting funny, and had a great sense of humor. I could talk to her for hours. ‘I haven’t laughed like this in a long time.’”

Rashad chuckled, “well, that answered my question.”

Liam nodded, looking delighted, continued. “Sophie was more concerned about why the horse she was riding was startled that morning at the ranch, than about herself; she was fearless.

...and when she found out about me being a prince, it didn’t change anything for her.

‘No one’s ever seen me as just...me. No one’s ever listened to me the way she did.’

She brings a new, fresh and exciting perspective to everything.

…and her eyes, I could stare into those beautiful blue eyes forever! She is absolutely gorgeous, inside and out.”

As Leo listened and watched his brother speak, he remained silent. He mentally erased his current thoughts and ordered another drink.

🐎🐎🐎

Beaumont Stables

Drake and Melanie had already left to drive the trailer back to the horse ranch.

Maxwell was speaking to the stable hands when Sophie entered the stable to see Marabelle.

"Hi guys, good morning," Sophie greeted.

"There she is, ready to ride Marabelle?" Maxwell smiled.

"Yes, yes," Sophie exclaimed, excitedly.

The stablehands led Sophie into the stall where Marabelle was standing.

"Hey girl! Come here," Sophie cooed as she stroked Marabelle's neck.

Marabelle nickered happily in return, nuzzling her cheek.

"Come on then, let's get you saddled up. We're riding today."

🐎🐎🐎

Sophie rode Marabelle down to the winding stream, that was adjacent to the vineyard of the estate.

Memories flooded back of her time with Liam.

'We walked together hoping forever, please don't let go of my hand,

cause I'm falling, woah, I'm falling in love with you'

⚜️using my tag list, please let me know if you would like to be added or removed

#choicesmarchchallenge #choicesflashfics #choices fic writers creations #liam rys #the royal romance #trr #trr fanfic #drake walker #leo rys #trr liam x oc #prince liam

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dbnightingale24 · 1 month

Text

My Little Decoy

A StevexReaderxBucky Messy Triangle

Another story for Patreon! So, for this one, I'm a bit anxious (when am I not?), because this definitely took off in the complete opposite direction of what I initially planned. That being said, I hope you all enjoy it!

Thank you as always to @fuckingbye for the amazing moodboard, I love you to bits for literally everything you do! I was in the middle of updating three other stories when this idea came to me, so please just work with me! (I'm so sorry I'm like this.)

Anywho, here we go!

Word Count: 34,776 (I'm not even gonna apologize anymore)

Warnings: Honestly, this entire fucking story. SMUT (MINORS DNI 18+ ONLY), Threesome, Lying, Infidelity, Emotional Cheating, Swearing, Drinking, Infertility, Family Drama, Angst, Lusting, Daddy Kink, Running Away, Tie Play, Cuff Play, Crying, Fluff, Best friends to lovers...that's all I can think of? They're honestly so many.

Song(s) That Inspired This Chapter: Don't Look So Blue, You Should've Seen Right Thru, I'm Using You, My Little Decoy

Summary: You truly do have the best intentions when you try to move on and suppress your feelings for your best friend Steve, and try to move on with Bucky. Unfortunately, life doesn't give a damn about intentions. Neither does love.

I do not give consent/permission for my stories/works to get posted elsewhere. I do not condone this type of behavior, this is for entertainment purposes only.

You wonder how the hell it got to this point in the first place as you lay in Steve’s soft bed sheets. What feels like it should be a quiet moment of peace is juxtaposed with your current reality; Bucky pounding on the front door and you and Steve conspiring to think of some kind- any kind- of excuse.

You truly don’t understand how it got to this.

It all feels like it started so long ago. You didn’t even know 6 years could feel so fast, much less pass so quickly. You look around at where you are now, at Steve, as you listen to the shaking of the front door against Bucky’s fist as he continues thumping away. Fuck. What if memories lie? Maybe it is that long ago.

6 Years Earlier...

“Babe, you ever had a night out in the city?” Bucky asked as you took off your gear.

Training was brutal and everyone was looking for a way to relieve stress. You knew The Avengers were all planning to meet up at some club downtown, but you had other plans.

“I have, and as much fun as it can be, I have other plans,” you laugh as you take your hair out of the tightest ponytail you’d ever had it in.

“Oh? What are you getting into?” Natasha laughs, making her way over with Bruce holding onto her as if he’d lose her.

“My friend’s band is playing tonight. I promised her I’d go if we finished up early enough.”

“Oh, this I gotta see!” Bruce chimes in as you laugh and shake your head. “You never let us have a peak into your personal life!”

“God, I haven’t been to a show in forever,” Natasha chimes in with raised eyebrows.

He wasn’t wrong. You played everything so close to the chest; wanting to keep those you love and care for the most safe...wanting to keep yourself safe. Since none of them were relenting (not to mention they’re the damn Avengers), you finally agreed and told them to meet you outside of your room at the compound in about two hours.

“Is it too late for me to get in on this?” Steve asks just as the group was about to disperse.

“There you are!” Bucky interjects before anyone has a chance to say anything. “Y/N is giving us a peak into her personal life! We’re all meeting at her place in two hours and going from there,” he laughs patting his best friend on the back.

Steve looked at you with a cocked eyebrow and you just laugh and nod, giving him the ‘OK’ to tag along. Unbeknownst to the others, you and Steve hung out the most. No, he’d never been privy to your personal life, but you two spent a lot of time watching movies and listening to music together on the weekends. Occasionally, Bucky would get in on the action, but it was mainly you and Steve. You and Steve had a certain level of comfort that you didn’t have with the rest of them. It was more of an unspoken, private thing and that’s how the both of you preferred it. You both understood each other, and neither of you ever made the other feel sad or out of place for things that had gone wrong in each other’s past. You both had wounds you were still healing from, and you gave each other the space needed for that to happen.

You’d always had a thing for Steve. He kept himself at a distance, so it was difficult for you to tell if he ever felt the same. After a while, you’d stopped trying and just accepted him as a friend. He told you that he’d wanted to go back and stay with Peggy, but he was too afraid to leave Bucky on his own again, so he’d come back instead. He wasn’t even sure if Bucky would ever be okay with being alone; Steve just stayed without asking him. It seemed like the right thing to do, and he didn’t hate the current timeline too much.

Soon enough, everyone is in your small little complex, drinking and laughing as you put together the last bit of your outfit. The thought of Steve joining all of you had you more anxious than you cared to admit, so you chalked it up to the normal anxiety of inviting your work colleagues into your personal life.

Which was more than fair.

“I’m sure you look amazing, lets go! I’m too excited for this!” Natasha hollers as she makes her way into your bedroom.

“Nat!”

“Oh, they’re all in there drinking away! You’re fine,” she laughs, closing the door behind her. “Well shit!”

“I swear to God, I’ll change right now!”

“No! You look amazing!” she promised as her hands covered her mouth. “None of us have ever seen you out of work clothes, and babe...you look amazing,” she laughs in shock.

“Should I change? I don’t want to give anyone the wrong idea-”

“If you’re comfortable, who cares. No one wants to interfere with your personal life. I think we’re all more afraid of pushing you away,” she laughs.

“You really think it’s okay?”

“I mean, I think you’re hot as fuck,” she laughed as you rolled your eyes, “but I think you look amazing.”

“You sure?”

“Get enough alcohol in them , they won’t even notice when you leave for the bathroom,” she laughed.

Even though you laughed along with her, you knew better. James Buchanan Barnes kept his attention on you almost as well as Steve, but you never thought anything of it. It always had a more platonic feeling than with Steve, almost more familial.

When you came out, Steve was the first to look at you. His mouth slightly agape was enough to make you wanna go back, but Bucky was quick to chime in-

“Someone is ready for a night out,” he laughed.

That’s all it took.

Soon enough, you were taking shots and laughing with everyone else. Even Pepper and Tony were excited and joined you all. Your life was something so foreign to them, and you could tell that they all felt extremely excited that you trusted them enough.

In all honesty, you felt more comfortable because Steve was there. You knew he’d never let anything happen to you, and you’d never let anything happen to him. If you were being completely honest, you’d only wanted to invite him out. How it spiraled, you’re still not sure but it did. It The only thing that felt off was letting him see you dressed as you were. It was weird for all of them to see you dressed as you were, but Steve couldn’t take his eyes off you.

You were in red plaid crop top, with tight fighting black jeans that hugged your hips in just the right way, and black low top heels. You put your hair in loose curls, and finished it off with eyeliner and mascara. After a brutal day of training, you really didn’t wanna spend forever doing your makeup, because you knew you’d wanna come home after everything was over and go right back to sleep. Yeah, everything was hugging your body in just the right way, but you weren’t about to change.

You were introducing them to your life.

Before you all left, Thor filled three flasks with his mead from Asgard for himself, Steve, and Bucky and you laughed pretty damn hard.

“We wanna enjoy this night too,” he winked at you as you rolled your eyes.

The walk was easy enough, but it felt like it took forever. People kept asking for pictures with the OG Avengers, they had a million questions, and of course they were all happy to be as kind as possible. It’s not that you minded all that much, but you really missed your best friend. Work had been kicking your ass, she had been extremely busy, and was in the middle of planning her wedding. Nights off were extremely rare, but actually getting to see her and her friends perform? It had been forever.

“You made it!” she squealed once you were finally inside the club with everyone, almost knocking you over with how hard she hugged you.

“I told you I’d show! Even if I would’ve only caught the last song,” you laughed as you hugged her back just as tight. “We still on for drinks after?”

“Fuck yes! Your tits look amazing in this top, we’re definitely getting free drinks out of it,” she beamed with a wink and you burst out laughing. “Okay, I’ve seen all of you on TV, but I still wanna officially meet everyone,” she smiled at everyone. “I’m Meg.”

As everyone went around introduced themselves, you made your way to the bar, to grab your signature Jack and Coke.

“Hell yes! You made it!” Meg’s finance, Paul, beamed as he made your drink.

“Why is everyone so shocked that I’m here?!”

“You haven’t been to a show in years!”

“Blah, blah, blah,” you muttered as you reached behind the bar and grabbed his pack of cigarettes.

“You bring the Avengers with you and you dare to steal from me?” he sneered sarcastically as he handed you your drink.

You laughed as you reached across the bar and kissed his cheek, “I’m sure our friendship will survive it.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. Dude, I had no idea the place would be so packed tonight.”

“I have a feeling everyone here had a long ass Friday.” “Yeah, well they better treat my baby right.” “You two!”

He rolled his eyes as he flipped you off, “enjoy the show!”

“Thank you, Paaauuullll,” you sang out as everyone joined you.

You looked up to see Steve staring at you intently, and he quickly turned towards the stage when he realized he was caught. Before you could allow yourself to think on it or feel flattered, you heard your best friend yell from the stage as she started to make her guitar scream.

“We’re ‘Flowers of Cinnamon’, and thanks for spending your Friday night with us!”

From that moment on, you were barely paying attention to your surroundings. With the exception of your drink, you didn’t focus on anything other than your best friend rocking the fuck out. It had always just been a hobby for her, but she had always been so damn good at it. You envied how effortlessly performing came to her. The band was a cross between Paramore, The Bangles, and All Time Low, and they were just as amazing as you remembered. You wouldn’t have been able to stay still even if you’d wanted to. You sang and danced along to every song, bouncing around, and screaming your head off. You had no clue that Steve had been watching you with the biggest grin on his face, Bucky had been watching your chest bounce up and down, or that Tony had been recording your reaction to your best friend’s music, smiling so hard at your happiness.

Every other song, your best friend made eye contact with you and laughed, and nothing else seemed to matter. Thinking back on it, you wished it had, because maybe things wouldn’t have gotten so fucked up, but you were just so damn happy. The more drinks got, the more you danced and sang around, finally feeling comfortable and happy, even with your new set of friends watching you.

“Okay, this is gonna be our last song for the night,” Meg smiled into the microphone and she laughed at amount of “boos” they received. “Listen, I wanna get fucked up too!” she joked, gaining laughs from the crowd. “Okay, so tonight is extremely special because my best friend on the entire planet is here and brought her friends with her! Thanks babe! So, our last song is gonna be a cover of one of her favorite songs ever,” she winked at you as you cocked an eyebrow.

As soon as you heard the first cord of ‘Decoy’ by Paramore hum out of the speakers, you screamed so loud that everyone in your group (and Paul) started laughing.

‘Close your eyes and make believe that this is where you wanna be

Forgetting all the memories, try to forget love cause love’s forgotten me

Well hey, hey baby, it’s never too late

Pretty soon you won’t remember a thing

All I’ll be distant, the stars reminiscing

Your heart’s been wasted on me’

You sang along so effortlessly as you started to jump up and down.

‘You’ve never been so used as I’m using you, abusing you

My little decoy

Don’t look so blue, you should’ve seen right through

I’m using you, my little decoy

My little decoy’

You linked arms with Nat, who clearly didn’t know the song, but was more than happy to sing and dance along with you. You glanced around and it made you so happy to see everyone else happy and having a good time. It’s not like you were a stick in the mud at work but, you never let loose. Even when it came to holiday and birthday parties, you were pretty damn reserved. The only person who can claim that they’ve seen you fucked up is Steve, and even then it was just you being wine drunk on the sofa while you two listened to albums and discussed work.

No, this was you letting lose and everyone accepting it. Accepting you. You looked over at Steve and he a look of pure love and adoration in his eyes, and it made your heart swell.

God, you wished you would’ve paid more attention to the way both he and Bucky looked at you that night, but you were just so damn happy and having so much fun.

If you could turn back time...

“Am I still okay at singing?” Meg asked once she finally made her way over to all of you.

“Dude, you’re still fucking amazing!” you beamed as you wrapped her in a tight hug and she laughed. “That was so good! Thank you for playing ‘Decoy’, almost making me cry!”

“Aha!” she teased before she looked at everyone else. “What about Earth’s mightiest heroes? Were you all able to tolerate it?”

“That was amazing,” Tony laughed, Pepper nodding in agreement.

“Why don’t you do this full time?” Nat asked as you waived Paul down and got another drink for both you and Meg.

“If I did this full time, I’d be so stressed all the damn time,” Meg laughed, “I’m much happier painting.”

“What do you paint? Do you have a studio?” Clint inquired and a smile came to your face.

Things were going better than you could have ever imagined.

As everyone got acquainted, you snuck to have a smoke. A few moments later, a smile came to your face when you saw Steve come out after you.

“You said you’re quitting those,” he nodded towards the cigarette in your hand.

“I stole Paul’s,” you laughed, standing a little further from him so as to not get the smoke in his face.

“I can handle it,” he laughed as he placed his black leather jacket on you. “You’re pretty...exposed and I don’t want you getting cold.”

“Well, aren’t you just the sweetest man?” you teased before you inhaled your cancer stick. “Who else knows about this? I’ll call the ‘New York Times’” He snickered as he shook his head, “quiet you.”

“Are you having fun tonight?”

“I am, I like you seeing like this.”

You scoffed, “crazy?” “Happy...content. Secure.”

You felt your cheeks heat up at his words, and the look he gave you along with it, had butterflies appearing in your stomach.

“We should get back inside,” you smiled at up at him as you ashed the last of your cigarette and threw it in the nearby trash bin.

And maybe that’s when it started.

You just missed all the signs that night, because you were convinced Steve didn’t want you.

He convinced you he didn’t want you.

When the two of you got back inside, Paul had just finished up his shift and the guys had finished helping Meg back up her equipment which she had decided to lock up in the manager’s office for the night.

“Dancing! We need dancing!” she whined once her eyes landed on you.

“Hell yeah we do,” you laughed as you linked arms with both her and Nat.

Once again, you didn’t notice the way Bucky ogled you or the way Steve kept a close eye on you. When you all reached the next bar, you instantly ordered more drinks and pulled Nat and Meg onto the dance floor with you, still wearing Steve’s coat. He leaned against the bar, talking with Tony and Pepper, but still kept an eye on you. As Janet Jackson’s voiced filled the giant building, you danced around with the biggest smile on your face (at some point Meg had put her sunglasses on your face), smiling and waiving at Bucky when you saw his eyes glued to you.

Well, glues to your ass.

By the time everyone was ready to call it a night, you were drunk as shit.

“You’re not coming back to the compound?” Nat asked as she stumbled out after you.

“Nah, I wanna sleep in my own space tonight. It’s closer,” you giggled as you started giving out hugs.

“I can take you,” Bucky offered with a slick grin.

“I can take her, she’s on the way to my house,” Steve countered, and Meg cocked an eyebrow at you.

You just started dancing and walking.

“Goodnight everyone! Get home safe! I love you all!”

You were drunk, tired, and in no mood to figure out whatever that was about. You just wanted to go home and get in your bed. You honestly don’t know why you didn’t go back to the compound that night, but it just felt right to go to your own home. You already spent so little time there to begin with. A few moments later, you heard the hurried footsteps of someone behind you, but you kept looking ahead.

“You’re impatient when you’re drunk,” Steve laughed as he came up beside you.

A small smile came to your face at the fact that Steve was the one to walk you home.

You giggled as you leaned into him, “my feet hurt.”

No sooner than you said it, he scooped you up.

“Steve!”

“You weigh nothing, don’t worry about it, darlin.” “It’s a 30 minute walk!”

“I’m very well aware of where your apartment is.” “Steve-”

“Hush.”

You pouted but did as you were told, leaned into him, and took in the scent that was all his own. Something between woodsy and fresh cut grass. In your drunken state, he felt like home.

“Why didn’t you want Bucky to take me home?” you asked after a few moments, not missing the way he stiffened a bit.

“He’s a little buzzed and he gets a little handsy and flirty at times. I didn’t want him to bother you.” You giggled as you took in more of his scent, “you’re literally carrying me, Steve.” “You said your feet hurt.” “Are you a little buzzed?”

“I definitely don’t feel sober,” he chuckled softly and you softly sighed at the comfort of rumble in his chest.

“Do you wanna sleepover?”

“I’ll order a car service once I drop you off.”

“Why not order one now?”

“It was weird...everyone hanging out tonight. I feel like we haven’t hung out alone together in a while.” “Then why not sleepover?”

“Cause I should go home. I don’t wanna accidentally wake you up or something. You worked hard today and you need rest.” “So did you.” “Y/N.” “You’re so weird sometimes, Steve,” you huffed as you laced your hand with his.

“What are you doing?”

“Holding your hand like I’ve done a million times before. What’s wrong?” “Nothing.”

You rolled your eyes and mumbled, “alright weirdo.” “I’m not being weird.”

“You’re not being normal.”

He let out a frustrated huff, “did you have fun tonight?”

“So much fun, I’m so happy you came out.”

“I’ve missed you, darlin.” “I’ve missed you too. Steve?”

“Hmm?”

“Sleepover.”

“Y/N-” “See? You are being weird. You’ve slept over my place a ton before, in my bed, and it wasn’t weird. What’s so different about tonight?”

He muttered, “so many things.” “Like what?”

“It’s just been a long night.”

“Fine, whatever. Go home, see if I give a fuck.” “Hey!”

“You’re being weird and you won’t tell me why. You know I hate when you do that shit.”

“I just think I should sleep in my own bed, darlin’. I’m not trying to be weird or make you upset.”

He sounded so strained and you couldn’t read his facial expression, so you couldn’t see how torn up he was. You couldn’t tell how much he was at war with himself.

You couldn’t tell how much he wanted you.

He chuckled when you didn’t say anything, “don’t get quiet on me now.”

“Can you at least stay until I fall asleep? It won’t take long.” “Everything okay, darlin’?”

“Yeah Steve, I just miss you,” you confessed softly.

“We’ll do a sleepover tomorrow, alright? We’ll have it at my house.” “Fine.” “Don’t be upset.” “I don’t care.” “You’re also a giant brat when you’re drunk.” “You’re saying that you miss me, but won’t spend time with me!”

God, you sounded like a brat to your own ears. That was a huge part as to why you’d never let him see you so inebriated. It’s why you never wanted anyone from The Avengers (or S.H.I.E.L.D for that matter) to see you so drunk. It became harder for you to suppress your feelings for Steve, and he’s all you wanted when you were drunk. For reasons unknown to you (at the time), Steve wanted to go home. That should’ve been enough, but your drunk wanted to hold him all night.

You were going out of your way to start an argument.

He let out a heavy sigh as he reached your complex, “I’ll stay-”

“Don’t do me any fucking favors-” “Will stop arguing with me? And stop with swearing, you know I hate it.” “Well maybe I hate you.”

He scoffed hard at that, “no you don’t.”

“You don’t know that-”

“Yes I do, so stop saying it. I’ll stay, okay?”

“And you’ll sleep next to me?”

“Yes darlin’, I will sleep next to you.”

You pressed a soft kiss to his neck and you felt his grip on you get tighter, “thank you, Steve!”

“Anything for you, sweetheart.”

That night, he was good to his word and slept next to you, letting use his chest as a pillow and you were asleep almost instantly. The next day, he was back to normal and you didn’t think anything of his behavior from the previous night. You had no reason to. However, from that day on, things did slowly start to change more.

It started with Bucky coming around more, especially when Steve was with you. You couldn’t sense it, because has always been entirely too good at hiding his emotions, but he slowly became frustrated. So much that he basically stopped coming around all together.

“Hey, are you busy?” you asked timidly as you approached his office one day.

“Yeah, unfortunately.” “Oh...okay then-”

“What’s wrong?”

“No, you’re busy and I don’t wanna take up your time...”

You could feel your eyes welling up and didn’t know why. Steve always had a way of making you so damn soft and vulnerable, and you truly hated it.

You still hate it.

“Darlin’-” “Please stop calling me that. The guy who started calling me that doesn’t seem to exist anymore. If he does, he’s making sure to stay away from me.”

“He still exists-” “Then what’s going on? Why are you staying away from me?”

He sighed as he threw down his pen, “nothing-”

“Alright, if you’re just gonna lie to me-” “I’m not lying!”

“Steve, you saw me walking with Bucky yesterday and literally turned in the other direction and walked away.” “You guys are just hanging out a lot now and I don’t wanna third wheel-” “You wouldn’t third wheeling! We’re just friends!”

“Y/N...” “Steve, why are you just abandoning me? You’re the one I’m closest to and you know that. You’ve always known that,” you sobbed as you closed the door behind you.

“Please don’t cry-” “Then why are you abandoning me?! What did I do wrong?!”

“Nothing-”

“Then what the fuck?! You’ve been acting so strange, but you’re saying I haven’t done anything! If I didn’t do anything, what the fuck is going on with you?!”

He let out another frustrated sigh and just stared at you, clearly at war with himself.

“Fuck this and fuck you, I give up,” you sobbed as you dried your eyes.

“Darlin’”

“Stop calling me that! I’m just Y/N and you’re just Steve. I can’t do this with you anymore!”

After you stormed out, things only got worse, because you’d never felt so low and alone in your life. Unless it had to do with a mission or training, you barely even looked his way. The farther you got away from Steve, the more Bucky swooped in. In fact, the more you look at how everything happened, you realize that things wouldn’t have gotten so bad if you’d just shut things down with the both of them.

However, it’s not as if thinking with a broken heart ever lead to a good thing.

You cried a lot and Bucky was just there for you. He was sweet, he listened, and let you keep your secrets. Sure, he asked what happened between you and Steve (everyone was), but he dropped it when you told him you wouldn’t be talking about it.

You can’t explain what you don’t know.

“Hey doll, we’re goin’ out tonight. You wanna come? Invite Meg!” Bucky asked one night after you let him in your apartment on the compound.

“Nah, I’ve got a hot date with a black and white French film and a few glasses of wine,” you smiled weakly.

“You can’t stay in here forever.”

“I don’t. Sometimes I go home.” “Babe-”

“I just wanna stay in, Buck,” you sighed as someone else knocked on your door. “I guess I’m just the most popular girl in the world.”

When you opened it the second time, Steve stood there looking just as upset as you felt. Instead of even trying to attempt to hear him out, a rage flared up inside you and you had to force yourself to not shove him. As far as you were concerned, he had a lot of fucking nerve to show up at your place after all the shit that happened in his office.

“What?”

“I wanted to know if you’re coming out tonight-”

“No.”

“Well, can I come in and we can talk? I know I owe you an explanation-”

“I don’t want an explanation anymore, Steve,” you lied harshly, “I just want you to leave me alone. I stood in your office and cried like a fucking dumbass...that was a month ago. Now you wanna talk? Just leave things as they are.”

You truly wish you hadn’t spoken out of anger because none of it was true. You cried over him whenever you were alone, you missed hanging out with him, you missed falling asleep next to him...you missed Steve. Your Steve.

You’ve always been a hot head.

“Darlin-” “What have I told you about that?” “Y/N, just give me a few minutes-”

“No, go away. Unless it has to do with work, we don’t have anything to talk about.” “You don’t mean that,” he more pleaded than told you.

“I’ve never meant it more!”

“Y/N-”

Bucky sighed as he came up behind you, “she just needs to cool off, Pal.”

If you hadn’t been so upset and hurt you would’ve laughed at how wide Steve’s eyes got.

“We’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?”

“I thought you were coming out. It was your idea in the first damn place,” Steve snapped.

“I don’t wanna leave Y/N while she’s this upset. She shouldn’t be alone right now.”

Steve opened his mouth to say something, but all that happened was he clenched his jaw and looked away before he stormed off, punching the wall on his way out.

You should’ve spoken to him. You should’ve gone after him. Instead you pushed past Bucky and made yourself your first glass of wine of the night.

“Babe-”

“Buck, if you’re gonna stay here tonight, please no lectures. I just wanna be upset, okay?”

He just nodded solemnly, “I get it. No lectures, just drinks and weird French movies,” he smirked and you quietly laughed.

Here’s the thing: it’s not that you never found Bucky attractive, you just never thought about him. You were always thinking about Steve. However, at that time, thinking about Steve brought you too much pain and you didn’t want to feel anymore pain for a while. You just wanted to feel numb. You’d rather have nothing, the void, than hold onto the pain Steve’s brought on.

You rested your legs on him when he sat next to you, not thinking anything of it. When he started stroking your leg after the third glass of wine, you still didn’t think anything of it. You only started to pick up on his actions when he squeezed your thigh a little.

“Buck?”

“Yeah doll?” “What are you doing?”

“Trying to help you relax and feel better.”

“Buck-”

“I’ve never seen you this upset, babe. I just wanna help.”

The thought and the offer were tempting. You couldn’t remember the last time you had gotten off to something other than your vibrator. Of course you’d made subtle advances towards Steve, but he’d clearly turned you down. Plus, the women around the compound did talk. While Bucky had a reputation for being a skirt chaser, he also had a reputation for wearing women out in the best way.

It’s not like you were looking for anything. You just wanted to forget for awhile.

He tested the waters a bit more by sliding his hand further up your leg, waiting to see how you’d respond.

You placed your wine glass on the ground and opened your legs for him a bit, “you just wanna make me feel better?”

“So fuckin’ good, doll,” he husked, as he reached between your legs and easily ripped your panties off, “just lay back and enjoy, baby.”

His movements were slow, but his kisses were desperate. It felt good, but off. Not to mention you felt more guilty with every kiss he gave you, like you were betraying Steve.

‘Fuck Steve,’ you told yourself mentally, ‘he had his chance and he clearly didn’t want it.’

You closed your eyes in a vain attempt to shut out any thoughts of Steve, but that only made his face come to mind. You let out a sound between a moan and a frustrated grunt as you pulled Bucky’s hair.

“Please!”

“Tell me how bad you want it,” he smirked, his hot breath lapped at your pussy.

“So fucking bad, please! Need it!”

“Love seeing you like this,” he cooed, before he dipped down and dove in and his lewd moans filled the room.

This was the moment Bucky became your “decoy”. You didn’t want him in the same way he wanted you, but part of you felt like he didn’t actually give a shit. Since he’d lost Nat to Bruce, Bucky wasn’t ever really looking for a relationship. He liked to play around, entertain a woman (or two) for a few months, then he’d move on. As far as you were concerned, that night was only supposed to be a one time thing.

“F-fuck!” you moaned, doing your best to be in the moment as you lulled your head back while he fucked you with his tongue and massaged your clit with his thumb. “Feels so good, Buck!”

You weren’t lying completely. It’s not as if Bucky was bad at eating you out, he just wasn’t the one you wanted doing it.

You felt him smirk against your folds, and started to grind your pussy against his face, forcing yourself to focus on all the pleasure you felt instead of everything else.

‘Steve doesn’t want you. Steve doesn’t want you. Stop thinking about Steve!’ you told yourself mentally.

When he switched up and started sucking on your clit, he easily pressed two fingers into your soaked folds. You felt the knot in your core tighten and snap.

“FUCK!” you cried out as you came hard and a few tears escaped your eyes.

You hated how the tears weren’t from pleasure, but you masked it well enough as he fucked you through your high.

“Take off that fuckin’ shirt, baby. Let me fuckin’ see you,” he husked as he took off his own shirt and started to undo his jeans.

You were quick to do as he said, taking all of him as you ignored how uncomfortable you felt being so bare beneath him as his mouth glistened with your juices.

You were doing this to feel better, so why weren’t you feeling any better?

“Waited so fuckin’ long, baby,” he groaned as he dipped down and worshiped each of your breasts while his thumb made little circles on your clit.

“Bucky!”

“I know baby, I’m gonna take care of you, gonna take such good care of you,” he moaned before you felt his tongue on the side of your neck, licking up little beads of sweat.

You took a deep breath and told yourself you wanted it as you felt him at your entrance. You wanted Bucky. You just needed to let yourself relax.

“Jesus, you’re fuckin’ tight!” he grunted as he pushed into you.

“Oh fuck!”

“I know you can take me, baby! Your wet little pussy is squeezing me so tight, baby!” “Please don’t stop,” you whimpered as you wrapped a leg around his waist, trying to hang on to him as he fucked into you hard and fast.

You wanted this. You agreed to this.

He pushed himself up with his metal arm and looked down at you adoringly, “wanted you for so long, doll. Waited for...ah fuck!”

To avoid feeling anymore guilt, you wrapped an arm around him to pull him close and kissed him passionately, moaning into his mouth when you felt him fill you to the brim. He rode out both your highs before he rested his forehead against yours.

“So good, baby. You tired?” he asked, breath still coming heavy.

You just closed your eyes and shook your head no.

“Good girl.”

Bucky kept at it for a while, not feeling any real pleasure until he brought you off (which you had to fake half the time). There was nothing wrong with him. You found him attractive, and you knew that he wanted you, but it just wasn’t what you wanted. All of it felt so hollow and emotionless on your end. You felt like you were acting and Bucky was working his ass off to please you; to make matters worse, your phone kept going off and you knew who it was.

Steve would’ve hated you if he knew what you were doing and who with, but a part of you felt like he already did. When you both were done, Bucky was a gentleman. He pulled your shirt over your head, carried you to bed, and held you close until you both fell asleep.

You didn’t cry until the next day when you woke up alone in an empty apartment. You ignored calls from both Bucky and Steve, and eventually Bucky was the only one texting you.

Something in you knew that Bucky had confirmed his suspicions, and you just knew he was furious. You and Steve both knew Bucky wasn’t a bad guy, he was just a player and Steve never wanted that for you.

Eventually you cracked and called Meg, and cried while you told her everything.

“Well...fuck,” she muttered once you finally got everything out. “Are you sure Steve knows?”

“His calls and texts were incessant until they weren’t. He hasn’t done either in the last 3 hours.”

“Oh yeah no, he definitely fucking knows. Bucky?”

“Bucky went from every 30 minutes to every other hour.”

“Well, what’s wrong with him?” “Nothing...”

“Except?”

“He’s not Steve.”

“Yeah, but Steve passed up on you, and he was kind of a dick about it. He waited a month until after the office situation? You’ve been showing him your available for how many years? I know you love him, but-”

“I don’t love him.”

“Yeah, cause that’s you’re crying to me about him instead of the skirt chaser that fucked your brains out?”

“Meg.”

“I’m not being insensitive, I’m being honest. Bucky was there last night, clearly wanted you, was with you all night, and all you could think about was Steve. Today, even though Bucky is still texting you, you’re more upset that Steve isn’t because you know he knows. If I were you, I’d be more worried about the guy that’s used to fucking around breaking my heart, than the guy who isn’t,” she sighed.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Steve had his chance, I need to let him go. I’ve been in my room crying all day...I have to stop.”

“Can you?”

“I don’t have much of a choice do I?”

“Babe, if you could end up with Steve, I’d prefer that, but that’s not really an option. Even if he came back, he gave you the run around for a bit. Just focus on you for now and what you want. You always want to make others happy, and you need to focus on you.”

“You’re right. I know you’re right.”

“Do you need me to come over?”

“No, being alone is good for me right now.”

“Alright, I love you, Y/N. It’s gonna be okay.”

You let out a heavy sigh as you sobbed, “I love you,” and hung up.

You ignored Bucky for the rest of the day, feeling guilty about it, but knowing it was for the best. You’d done enough wrong and you truly did need to focus on you and what you wanted.

However, before you fell asleep, you broke down and checked all your texts from Steve.

O Captain, My Captain: Darlin, please just talk to me. I’m so sorry.

O Captain, My Captain: I’m not going out tonight, please just answer me.

O Captain, My Captain: Don’t do anything with Bucky. He’s my best friend, but he’s not worthy of you. He won’t treat you right and you know that.

O Captain, My Captain: Please just answer me.

O Captain, My Captain: If I could take back my actions, I would. I’m so sorry. If you’d just talk to me, I’d be able to make you understand.

O Captain, My Captain: Please talk to me. I miss you so much.

O Captain, My Captain: I’m going to sleep, but give me a call whenever.

O Captain, My Captain: Seriously? All night and you’re still not talking to me?

O Captain, My Captain: Baby, please just talk to me. We’ve never gone this long without talking, and I fucking hate it.

O Captain, My Captain: Y/N...please.

O Captain, My Captain: Bucky just left. You’ve made yourself loud and clear, and fine. I got it.

O Captain, My Captain: Do whatever the fuck you want.

When you woke up the following day, you had the biggest headache from crying, and the last thing you felt like doing was facing either of them. You had a job to do though, and criminals didn’t stop being criminals just because you had a broken heart. Even though you were slower to dress than usual, you were still on time for training, and God, it was brutal.

Bucky kept looking at you, Steve wouldn’t even look your way, and you couldn’t focus. You’d never had a day so bad, and all you wanted was to crawl back into bed. During the meeting after, you just leaned against the wall, barely listening to anything Nick had to say. The one time you bothered to look up, you looked over at Steve and was glaring at you.

God, you really fucking hated yourself.

“Doll, wait up!” Bucky called after you once the meeting was over.

You’d practically run out of the room.

“Bucky, I really just want-”

“What did I do wrong?” he breathed once he caught up to you. “Everything seemed fine on Saturday, I thought we both enjoyed it.”

You didn’t miss the way Steve quietly scoffed as he walked past the both of you.

“Bucky, I just-”

“Did I hurt you? What...I really like you, Y/N. I have for a while and I just...was I too eager?”

You honestly hadn’t expected that.

“Wait...what?”

“I never said anything, because I thought you and Steve had a thing going, but that’s clearly not happening. You were just so upset on Saturday and I wanted to make you happy, and I’ve wanted you for so long...what did I do?”

Trash. You felt like absolute trash.

“I need to get to my room.” “Y/N-”

“Just...I’ll talk to you later, okay? You didn’t do anything wrong, I promise. I just have a lot going on in my head. I just need to be by myself for a while.”

“Please just-”

“I’ll talk to you later, okay? I’m sorry.”

You can read the rest here.

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nemo-of-house-hamartia · 9 months

Note

Dear Nemo, so nice to see you back! for the meme game, can you make one for Jacob and Dottie as a ship? I miss seeing them on my dash.

Hello Hello Duckling! So nice to see you in my inbox! I was so happy to see your ask! (and sorry for taking so long in answering! I appreciate your patience! I hope you don't mind but I took the chance to make this meme for Jacob and Dottie a bit farther ahead in their story than what I usually draw/write.)

✨JOTTIE (JacobxDorothea)🎩

MOODBOARD

PLAYLIST:

"Temple of Thought" - Poets of The Fall

"Amaranthine" - Amaranthe

"My Love Will Never Die" - Claire Wyndham

"Dancing on Broken Glass" - Poets of The Fall

"Jealous Gods" - Poets of The Fall

"War" - Poets of the Fall

QUOTES

“If I had a flower for every time I thought of you...I could walk through my garden forever.”

― Alfred Tennyson

“I would rather share one lifetime with you than face all the ages of this world alone”

― J. R. R. Tolkien

“You make me thank god for every mistake I ever made, Because each one led me down the path that brought me to you.” ― Pablo Neruda

“I choose to love you in silence… For in silence I find no rejection, I choose to love you in loneliness… For in loneliness no one owns you but me, I choose to adore you from a distance… For distance will shield me from pain, I choose to kiss you in the wind… For the wind is gentler than my lips, I choose to hold you in my dreams… For in my dreams, you have no end.” ― Rumi

THEIR AESTHETIC:

A walk along the Thames in the dead of the night with the stars as their companions and protectors; an impromptu dance on cobblestone and the beating of their hearts as the sole music that gives them rhythm; a sweet song he hums with his low voice; a glance that alone speaks of years spent together, of hardship fought and conquered, of peace finally found; low laughter shared at a memory of the family they created; a morning spent in bed, cuddling and laughing together; the perfume of orange blossom and smoked pipe; a stack of letters neatly preserved if a little worn out for all the times they had been read; a violin playing and a voice singing the song of their hearts, just for his ears alone; warm tea sipped together in front of the fireplace; a soft blanket shared together; falling asleep on a worn-out sofa in each other's arms, the only place where they feel safe enough to let go of all worries; hearing the beating of his heart, strong and steady, just as he is; hearing her breathing while asleep, safe and sound in his arms.

#assassin's creed #assassin's creed syndicate #jacob frye #dorothea starrick #my oc #Aesthetic Meme Game #Duckling #thank you for sending this request #it made me so happy #I always get a little emotional when I write about Jacob and Dottie #they have such immense part of my heart

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exouniverse · 7 months

Text

Dance With Me

Pairing: Lay x gn reader

Genre: fluff, birthday fic

Warnings: none

Summary: Yixing thought he would not see you the day of his birthday due to an already scheduled concert that day, but you had already planned a meticulous surprise to dance with him at this concert and celebrate his birthday.

Word count: 1.3K+

A/N: Here we go with another birthday fic. I really hope you like it. Happy birthday Yixing!

MASTERLIST | MOODBOARD

“I miss you.”

Your reaction was immediate; you bit your lip before you could tell him about everything you had planned. You had never been that extra for anybody; it had taken a lot of energy to even talk to so many people. He just couldn’t know that you were closer to him than he thought, not yet.

The hours were running so slowly that it was feeling almost urgent to let him know, but you had to be more patient. You contained your excitement and let the words out, “I miss you too!”

“Agh! I’m so dumb, I forgot to schedule a break on my birthday and now I’m about to go do the sound check without you here.”

“You are not dumb!” You protested, “a little distracted perhaps, but you were too busy and probably managing way too much at the same time—“

“Aw don’t lecture me, please,” he begged, almost too cutely to really let it go, “I know, I’m sorry, I keep trying to do everything all by myself.”

“You’re so cute, Yixing! I’m not lecturing you, you do you, as long as you’re healthy and happy.”

“I’m happy and I have you, so that’s the greatest bonus.”

“Aw stop it birthday boy, go work hard and make you and your fans happy.”

“Will do, I can’t wait to see you.”

“See you, happy birthday, sheep!”

You had held your laughter for so long, and even Yixing’s concert producer next to you joined in the laughter after the call. You really went all out with this surprise. Yixing had sent you so many videos of his new song’s choreography. The music video had just been released about a month ago before the small tour had started, but you knew every step even before it came out. You watched the release of the MV with him and he had made a comment that sparked an idea in your mind: “I love this choreo so much, I wish I could’ve danced it with you.”

You’re no dancer; he knows that, but he has said that he wants to dance with you the choreographies of his songs so many times that you have lost count. You’ve danced together, of course, but at some parties you’ve gone to and in the comfort of your home, just being silly. However, this is something bigger and completely different from random dancing, people are going to see you dance under the spotlight. This is definitely something you just do for love.

“How is he so easy to surprise?” The producer asked.

“Don’t ask me. And I’m really not good at acting so…”

“Well, this will be smooth landing. Let’s get you ready.”

The entire crew that was assigned to you followed both you and the producer to the practice room that was available near the venue for you to do the last rehearsal. Yixing had a whole community of dancers, but not all of them were dancing the same songs or the same parts. You didn’t need many anyways. Four dancers, a makeup artist, two people from the lights and sound crew, and an assistant producer were what they assigned you. Luckily, you had planned to only dance to the bridge and the dance break of his new song, so the last rehearsal only took about forty minutes, and the dancers and the lights and sound crew managed to leave on time for the sound check. Next, it was time for you to get clean and ready so after showering, the makeup artist did your hair and makeup and helped you with your clothes.

The assistant producer was fast; she got you to the venue in no time. The concert had already begun as planned. Yixing wasn’t supposed to see you around, so you had to be there after the opening act’s last song. You did have to manage not to be caught when Yixing came backstage to change his clothes so you remained in the green room during those couple of moments.

Myeon: Y/N Y/N when r u coming on stage?

You: just 2 more songs! Keep your cam ready 🙈

Myeon: oooooh we’re all excited! are you nervous?

You: oh hell yeah 🫠

Junmyeon sent you an audio message. It took you at least a couple of times to listen clearly because of the music and fans singing in the background, but you managed to hear Baekhyun, Sehun, Minseok, and Junmyeon encouraging you and cheering for you. The laugh that they brought out of you relaxed you enough to take a deep breath and head backstage to the little elevator at the center of the stage.

The last song before your surprise began, nerves fluttered in your stomach. The four dancers you had practiced with joined you backstage to prepare for the next song. They swiftly changed into their outfits, matching your own and Yixing’s, ready to blend in on stage. Sooner than you could realize, the dancers signalled you it was time. You inhaled deeply, trying to steady your breathing, and followed them to the elevator. Suddenly, the melodies became even more familiar than before, each note and bass drum beat ingrained within you. The small elevator began lifting you up in perfect sync with the music. Your first step faltered momentarily under the lights, but the dancers skillfully guided you into position, ensuring a smooth transition.

As planned, the choreography brought you closer to Yixing for the bridge, and with an intended pirouette you managed to face him. He froze in his tracks, a mix of confusion and surprise gradually transforming into a radiant smile. For a moment, it was just the two of you, lost in each other’s gaze. His body kept moving through muscle memory alone, but his eyes remained fixed on you in disbelief, as if he had been daydreaming about you dancing beside him.

The dance break was originally supposed to be a way for him to go change outfits one last time for the last songs of the concert—including the encore—but tonight, the crowd roared in surprise as cake and flowers were brought up on stage. He took the flowers from one of the dancers and looked at the audience, but as you grabbed the cake from the assistant producer, you started singing “Happy Birthday” and his bewilderedness was now directed at you again.

“Look at the camera for me,” you signed to the audience where the guys were filming all of his birthday surprise. He was even more excited to see his buddies, yet even more confused at what was happening, but he still waved at the camera that Junmyeon was holding.

“Happy birthday, Yixing! I couldn’t wait to see you, so I just took the first flight and managed to enter from backstage,” you joked.

“Really? How… when did you…?” He asked, which made all of the people aware of the surprise laugh.

“No, baby, I had it all planned,” you sweetly smiled at him and you heard the roaring crowd cheer, “thanks everyone for allowing us to celebrate Yixing today. I’ll let you enjoy the rest of the night.”

“No, wait a second,” he held your forearm, stopping you, which almost made you drop the cake. One of the dancers took the cake as Yixing grabbed your hand. Yixing beamed at you and pulled you close, “dance with me again?”

You positively nodded and the lights turned back to the set for the bridge and dance break once more. Yixing smiled at you and took his place next to you. As you started the choreography, the crowd cheered and your friends continued to film just the two of you dancing up on stage. Yixing couldn’t be more happy to see you move to the beat of his song, with the moves he choreographed and had been so excited to someday dance along with you.

#happy birthday lay #happy birthday Yixing #exo #exo lay #lay yixing #yixing x reader #zhang yixing #exouniverse #birthday fic

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thesweetnessofspring · 6 months

Note

!!!boo!!! (trick or treat)

any hcs of how everlark spends halloween / autumn in general? (and / or a moodboard emulating their autumn season vibes, if u want :o)!!)

One thing I keep thinking about the apple trees on the edge of the forest and the apple tree that had been in Peeta's backyard. So sit back (and put on this song if you'd like) for a drabble on the Everlark family apple picking.

I take a deep breath in, the air of autumn cool and invigorating as it flows into my lungs, while the afternoon sunlight bathes us in warmth. After a spring of dandelion salads and a summer of berries with cream comes my favorite season of all: apple season.

“Careful, baby!” Katniss rushes over to our son who starts climbing up the tree trunk.

“Mama, I can do it!” he protests and scrambles up higher in the branch. Katniss lets him be but keeps an eye on him, hovering near the edge of the branches.

“Daddy, my basket’s full,” Our daughter leans backwards as she totters forward with a basket full of the red and gold apples. I catch the basket wider than our girl and lift it up and away from her.

“There’s lots more up high,” our daughter says.

“I can get them!” Our son drops an apple into Katniss’s waiting apron.

“As long as you keep your feet on that tree,” Katniss says. “If you dangle like a monkey, you’ll be back on the ground.”

“You stay there,” I say. “I’ll get Mama and Daddy’s tree.”

“I’m getting the ladder for mine!” Our girl scurries to pick up the worn wooden ladder and swing it toward her tree.

“When’s mine gonna have apples?” Our boy asks.

“Any year now,” I tell him, reaching up to the highest I can to pluck from the crown of the tree. “You’ll have to be patient and wait until the tree is ready.”

“It’s not fair,” he says. “All the other trees have apples.”

“I had to wait nine years for mine!” Our daughter says, hand on her hip, the ladder perched against her apple tree.

“How long did you and Daddy have to wait, Mama?” Our son tosses two apples down at once to Katniss.

“For this first one? I think it must have been…ten years. Right, Daddy?”

“Ten years,” I confirm. I’d started sprouting the seed from some of the wild apples at the edge of the forest, but only planted the tree a year later when things between Katniss and I got settled and I moved in with her. From there, it took ten years of care before we got any fruit out of the first tree.

“What about your wedding tree?” Our daughter asks, a new basket perched on the ladder step above her and filling up with more apples.

“Eight years,” I say. “It gave fruit right along with the first one.”

“I hope mine is only eight years,” our son says. “I want apples from my tree next year!”

“Maybe you will,” Katniss says. “All you can do is wait.”

Our son groans and I hide a smile by turning my face to the rustling green leaves and small, round apples. Now in Panem, kids can’t wait to grow up and ours are no different. There’s so much to do and experience and they don’t have the patience to wait and appreciate life as it is. Now in the fifth decade of my life, I know better than to wish for any moment with my wife and children to go by faster.

As our baskets’ capacity for apples has been met, we sit down on a blanket in front of the plucked trees and eat the crisp, sweet fruit. The taste reminds me of an apple tree I used to spend my falls gathering fruit from, my brothers and I competing for who could pick the most and our father showing us how to peel and cook them into the goods we’d sell, but sneak us each a slice to taste.

Just like my family did then, we’ll take these apples and make some into pies or apple butter, others we’ll eat fresh, and some we’ll preserve in cans to use in the winter when the world rests from all of its work to nestle in with those we love. And its taste will bring with it the memory of this golden afternoon, forever ours to remember.

#everlark drabble #everlark fanfiction #thg fanfiction #everlark family #everlark family fanfiction #thg trick or treat #thg trick or treat 23 #toast babies #everlark

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unluckyhoneybee · 2 years

Text

The Handsome Artist. 16. (Daniel Ricciardo)

I know a place. The pieces finally fall together.

MASTERLIST. Moodboard and Playlist.

Previous part: Santa Monica.

I know a place by Muna because that song gives me lots of Abi&Danny vibes.

Note: this is long af but it's worthy. I promise.

Warnings: +18 (finally smut); penetrative s*x, oral (for both)

His hand felt perfect on mine. Daniel was like a little kid. He was looking around and talking about all the rides. He wanted to try all of them.

"Have you ever been here?"

"Nope"

"What?"

He chuckled.

"It's true. I've gone to other places though."

"Oh, Danny."

He laughed and hugged my shoulders before kissing my temple.

It felt amazing to be here with him.

"I told Charlotte to call Molly in case of emergency because I don't want to get this fucked" I told him and he smiled.

"There is no way this can't be fucked. Really. I will fight anyone"

This time it was me who laughed.

The night was amazing. I was on the clouds. I couldn't belive we were there together. Happy and enjoying the afternoon so much. We had gone to all the hard and cool rides. And now he was dragging me around the different games. I simply couldn't stop laughing.

This is how it's supposed to feel. This is love.

"Hey mate. Another try, please"

"Nah"

"C'mon. My lady here wants the koala"

"I see she has a type"

I bit my lip and try to not laugh. Daniel was arguing with the guy to get a free try. Another free try after 3 failed attempts.

"Danny, love. It's fine"

"No, honey. I'm getting it. It's a pride thing"

"Dude, pay or nothing. 5 buck, 3 attempts"

"Listen. If I fail this one, I pay all of them"

The guy look at Daniel for long seconds. They were having a war. Danny was frowning and had crossed his arms.

"Fine"

"Yes. Thank you, mate"

Then Daniel looked at me.

"Watch this"

"C'mon, boy. I trust you" I said patting his arm.

Somehow, doing all of this with him made me feel more connected. It was the same feeling I had in Colorado. It was like I belonged here with him.

He took the ball, looked at me and kissed it.

"Dan! You don't know who touch that!"

"It will be worth it"

He looked at the tower and focused on it. Then he threw it and BAM.

"Yes!" I lifted my arms and laughed.

"Awesome! Did you see that huh?" He said pointing at the guy.

I laughed, hugged his waist and kissed his shoulder. He looked down at me.

"See? I got you a koala"

"My hero"

He smiled.

"Here, mate. Enjoy you koala, lady" The guy said putting on his best Aussie accent.

I smiled.

"Thank you very much"

"See you, mate." Danny said turning around.

I smiled at the guy.

"Honey, I wanna go to the ducks one"

"Sorry, he is like a kid high on sugar" I said passing the guy his five bucks. "Have a good night"

"Honey!"

"Yeah, yeah".

I ran to him, finding my place under his arm. He kissed my cheek for the millionth time in the night.

"Hey, this is super nice"

"I'm so happy you enjoy it. Molly and Charlotte helped with the idea"

"Say thanks to them"

We arrived to the ducks game.

"Look at those little toys" I said pointing at them. "You should get them for the kids"

"Should I? Mind helping?"

"How?"

"Play with me. Let's be all cute and cliche together"

I giggled.

"Fine"

It was a couple of dogs, one in gray and the other golden, together on a little bag.

"Hi, Um... Can we have a try?" I asked the woman in charge.

"Yeah, 3 dollars 2 attempts."

"Fine. We only need one"

"Danny, that's how you jinxs things!"

"Trust me"

He had told me that on every game and every ride and somehow it was hard when he had that look on his face. Not a trust worthy face. A face that would get you on problems for cheating in games or kicking a little boy out of the best seat on the ride.

"Fine. It's your fault if we fail"

He hugged me from behind, the little koala waiting patiently on the counter. With his hands on mine and laughing nervously, I tried to get the duck.

"Oh fuck" I said after failing.

"C'mon. You can do this. Isaac and Izzy will get so happy when I tell them you got it for them"

"Don't put to much pressure, Daniel"

He grabbed my waist and pressed himself on my back. It only made it more difficult.

"A bit to the right, baby" He whispered.

I bit my lip and tried. And voila...

"Yes! Holly Mac n' Cheese. That's my girl. Did everyone see that?"

"Ha! I did it! DANNY! Look!" I said lifting the duck.

He hugged me and kissed my cheek and neck while laughing.

It was just perfect. Everything was. I was so sure about my feelings, about his, what I wanted. I was so sure of Danny.

"Look at that, the kids will get so happy"

Walking away together with the puppies and the koala, I felt the happiest woman alive.

"What now? You choose, love"

I blushed. It was so hard to get used to the nicknames. So so hard.

"Okay. Um... I love the Ferris-wheel. I can see it from my bedroom. It's quite far but I can see it at night with the colors and everything. They say the sunset it's amazing from there. And..."

He looked up at the sky.

"Okay. Cute and cliche. Let's watch the sunset on the Ferris-wheel. Like two kids in..."

He looked at me panicking and I could only bit my lip.

In love, yes Daniel.

He licked his lower lip, probably deciding to leave the words for later. Then he cupped my cheeks and leaned, capturing my lips in the sweetest kiss someone had ever given to me. So soft, so gentle, so slow. The kind of kiss that makes you feel loved.

When we pulled away, I could only smile.

"I'm super ready for all of this." I said putting my hand over his heart. It was beating hard.

"Yes?"

"I am."

"Good. Because I'm ready too"

I kissed him this time.

"Let's go" He whispered on my lips.

Hand in hand we went to the Ferris-wheel and took our seats. What I wasn't expecting was him to let a squeak out when the ride started moving and lifting us in the air.

"What?" I said looking at him.

"Nothing"

"Daniel"

He seemed more nervous than before.

"What is going on?"

"I don't like heights"

I gasped and instantly grabbed his hand.

"Why didn't you told me?"

"You were all happy talking about this and... I could not." He was blushing and picking his nails.

"Danny... Is it too bad? Are you too scared? I can yell them to stop"

He chuckled.

"No, love. It's not that bad. I just hope it's not windy up there" He said giving me a soft smile

"Oh Danny"

I cupped his cheek and kissed him.

"Okay, I'm feeling better. Can I ask for kisses if I get nervous?"

"Obviously" I said blushing but smiling.

"Fine. It's cute. To finish the date. The last ride before having dinner and head home"

It had been so amazing that I had just forgotten about time.

"Wow. I didn't know it was so late" I said checking my watch.

"Yeah. It has been funny. I've loved it"

He said and wrapped his arm around my shoulder. I leaned my head on his shoulder and cuddled the plushies harder on my chest.

"I'm loving every second of it, Daniel" I told him.

Molly had said that just as I needed love and reassures, he would need them to. She talked about how scared he was while the panic attack. I wanted him to feel loved and wanted to. I knew how was the other side. I wanted him to feel all this happiness I felt whenever he made something for me.

"I am too, honey. I am too."

I laid one of my hands on his abdomen. The sky looked so beautiful.

"Can I ask something?" He said.

"Yes" I looked at him.

"When you say you are ready, do you mean it in an I'm ready for continue to get to know you or an I'm ready to date you. Like for real. Date like officially. A couple. Boyfriend and girlfriend." He said slow and with a low voice.

I gasped.

"I'm in love you you" I said without thinking. "I'm so in love with you. Do you want to be my boyfriend?"

He panted and looked at me with big eyes. So big, expressive and surprised. I loved the way his face showed emotions. He couldn't hide anything.

"Yes. Yes. I want to. I'd love to. I want to be your girlfriend... Boyfriend. Fuck. I want you to be my girlfriend, Abigail." He said.

It made me laugh in awe.

"Daniel..."

"I'm in love with you too. So in love"

It brought tears to my eyes. It was the way he said those words and how much he felt them. His eyes were so bright and his face was flushed pink.

He cupped my face and kissed me. And oh fuck. It was so intense, so deep and passionate. I tried to grab into his clothes, clutching the toys on my chest so they won't fall. The seat moved and he pulled back, panting on my mouth and groaning.

"How much longer will this take?"

"I think we are going down."

He smiled and stole a kiss.

"You are my girlfriend, Abigail Hopper"

I laughed in pure happiness.

"I am. You are my girl-"

He covered my mouth.

"Don't start being a little cheeky shit now that we are together"

I laughed, getting it muffled by his mouth.

Daniel smiled and took his hand away.

"You make me happy"

"You make me happy too, Daniel"

"We are so sappy."

"Disgusting, actually"

"Honeymoon phase, baby" He said winking at me.

We didn't notice the Ferris-wheel had stopped moving until the guy in charge popped our bubble.

"Hey, there is people waiting"

"So rude." Daniel said.

We walked away, laughing and holding hands.

"Well, girlfriend"

I smiled.

"Sounds good"

"Sounds perfect" He corrected me.

"Okay, okay"

"What can we have for dinner?"

"Nutella crepes?"

"Oh baby, you are so special. This is why I said yes"

I laughed and kissed his cheek.

Luckily, there was a crepes place not far from Pacific Park.

"Charlotte and I always come here on special events. Birthdays, Christmas..."

"I see why" He said taking a big bite and getting Nutella on the corner of his mouth.

What if...

I cupped his chin and kissed the stain, licking softly and cleaning it. I pulled back and look into his eyes. He was shocked.

"Baby..."

I humed.

"We can go back to the studio and have a beer or... Something" He said looking down to my lips and licking his. "Only if you want. No pressure"

His voice was different. It sounded deeper and oh boy. It was too hot.

"Okay"

"Okay?"

"Mhm"

"Finish that crepe" He said before stealing a hot and deep kiss from my lip.

We finished our dinner like two kids, giggling and trying to get the chocolate on the other's face. People were looking at us, but I couldn't care less. I was with Danny and that was everything that mattered.

Then, we went back to the cute vespa and when I wrapped my arms around him, he took them and pushed it to his chest. I smiled and leaned over his shoulder. My heart was beating so hard. I completely knew what would happen. I was so ready for it. I wanted it. I wanted Daniel.

When he stopped in front of the studio and grabbed my hand, I pulled it to my lips and kissed his knuckles. He guided me inside.

"Okay, you can leave your things here. I'm gonna get a couple of beers, okay?"

I nodded.

Daniel walked to me and grabbed my hips, giving me another of those deep kisses he gave. I hummed on his mouth and caressed his cheeks.

"Go upstairs, baby" He whispered on my mouth.

I walked out in the terrace and the warm humid air of Los Angeles hit me. The summer was almost here and it was more suffocating each day, but tonight the breeze made it more bearable.

I leaned on the railing and looked at the street. The place was beautiful, the terrace was perfect, the lights from the street under me made the shadows bigger and it felt so intimate. But my heart was beating fast. I wanted this so much. I was so eager for it. My cheeks were burning and I had goosebumps on my skin.

Then, some bulbs around the terrace lit and I smiled. It was cute. I could have never imagined Daniel was hiding this place here.

I heard his slow steps but didn't move, I just waited for him to do something. Soon his hands found their way around my waist.

Daniel's touch was soft but intense. He liked slow movement, he liked to feel me under his hands, sometimes gripping with those long fingers or neading my skin. He pushed me to a deep trance in the moment I fell him traveling around my lower body.

"Can I do something, Abi?" He whispered on my ear.

I nodded slowly. His hands made me turn around and pressed me back against the railing.

"I have been getting peaks of it... I have been wanting to properly see it since I did it... On the lagoon I was dying to touch you."

I swallowed and observed his eyes as he spoke. I knew what he was talking about. I let him doing whatever he wanted.

Slowly, he popped the buttons of my shirt one by one. He was keeping his eyes on his work. And suddenly, when he reached the button on my belly, he gasped.

"You really have to be the prettiest girl around, right? You can't leave a poor guy alone. You have to come and look like this, tell me you ar win love and pretend that everything is fine" Daniel talked slow, his eyes moving from my chest to my eyes and back to my chest. His whole aura had changed from the hyperactive kid in the amusement park to this man ready to do and give everything he had. "It wasn't enough with this beautiful face. You also have to wear the prettiest lingerie ever and look like an angel." He opened the last button and grabbed my waist with both hands. I gasped. Felling the skin on skin contact was too intense. "You had to come to my studio, ask for my tattoo and then walk around with it as if you had just run away from the fucking Louvre"

Well, that was probably one of the most intense things someone had ever told me. He had just called me a pice of art. Like that.

All my life, I had been used to be an ok, not bad. Now, he was looking at me as if I was the only one in te world. Jennifer always reminded me how you had to love yourself without the opinion of others. But it felt so good to be reminded sometimes. It felt so good to be the only one. I wasn't scared to show myself like this.

"I can really see everything, Abi..."

I smiled proudly because yes, I had dressed like this knowing how I wanted the night to end.

I lifted my hand to his, the rose one. Slowly, I dragged it from my waist to my breast without breaking the eyes contact. I saw how his breath stuttered and how his pupils dilated. He wanted me. He fucking wanted me.

Daniel brushed his thumb over my nipple and the simple touch made it harder and pook against the see through material.

"Do you believe me when I tell you you are really, really pretty? Like, the prettiest?"

"I do, Daniel" I said smiling.

"Fuck, I love how you say my name"

With his free hand, he finally cupped my face and kissed me. I moaned when his toungue slipped in my mouth, with no warning but gentle. My own hands flew to his face, cupping it and kissing him even deeper. He pinched my nipple and I moaned again, which made him smile.

Daniel looked into my eyes and massaged softly my breast, playing with my nipple. I whimpered and he bit his lip.

"Beautiful".

I smiled and kissed him again.

"Where do you want to go, Abi? Where's the limit?"

I looked into his eyes.

"I want everything, Daniel" I whispered.

He smiled big and bright and pinched my nipple again.

"I can give you that" The way he spoke was probably enough to make me come undone. His hands spun me and he pressed himself to me. I felt his whole body, warm and strong against my back.

I closed my eyes and got lost on the feeling of his lips in my cheek. He was sweet at gentle. He left small pecks on my skin before pushing my hair out of my neck. His kisses changed. It was hot and he was sucking on my skin. My head was turning and I felt dizzy. It was delirious.

Daniel nibbled the skin on my neck and hummed in delight.

"Delicious"

It made me smile.

His fingers moved over my waist, my abdomeb and cupped my breasts. I gasped at the convination of his hands and lips. I had never felt so desperate to be with someone. I only wanted he to touch me and make love to me. I wanted to feel him everywhere, to touch him and feel touched by him. I reached back and ran my fingers over his hair, which made him sigh.

"You are perfect. I've wanted you since moment one" He whispered on my neck.

"Did you?" I asked with a shaky voice.

"The moment I saw you, I thought you were the prettiest woman alive."

I turned my face and kissed him. He pressed his body against mine and left me trapped against the railing, feeling him hard on my ass. I had this euphoric feeling. It was moving all over me, telling me to do all of this stuff that I would be to afraid to do with someone else. Here, on this hidden terrace in West Hollywood, with Los Angeles' traffic right under us and Daniel with me, I felt so free.

"Can I take this off?" He said playing with my belt.

I nodded slowly and looking into his brown eyes.

"Remember when we slept together in Colorado?"

"It was only a few days ago"

He pushed my trousers down only a bit and left them right under my ass. His hands moved around my hips, waist and upper tights, avoiding the place I needed him the most.

"Danny..." I whimpered.

"Tell me, sweetheart."

"I need you"

"What do you need?" He said kissing the corner of my mouth.

I took a deep breath as his fingers moved over my crotch, brushing my clit through my underwear.

"Your mouth" I whispered.

"Yes?"

"Yes, please"

"Good girl" I would have never imagine that those words would make my legs shake.

He kissed my neck and knelt behind me, making me gasp and grab harder into the fence.

Then he easily took my sandals off and then carefully pulled my trousers down. I felt my skin crawl.

Daniel kissed my hip, keeping his hands on my thighs and then bit my ass cheek. It made me moan.

"Fuck baby, you sound... Fuck. I can't wait to have you under me. I bet you'd make the sweetest sounds when I fuck you."

I whimpered and clenched my fingers around the railing.

Daniel pushed me a bit so I was leaning forward, my hips closer to him now. I gasped. Wow. Even through my panties, the touch of his tongue made me shiver.

"Da-Danny"

He hummed. I felt his finger pulling the panties aside and then, finally, his wet and warm mouth made contact with me. I gasped. It felt too good.

Daniel kept leaving wet kisses, using his tongue and literally devouring me. He was simply too good at this. His fingers were digging on my flesh, parting my ass cheeks and giving himself more access.

"O-oh fuck... Danny..."

I loved it like this. I really did. But I wanted to see him. I wanted to see how his pretty face would look between my legs. So I reached back and ran my fingers over his hair, gently pulling back and turning around. He was panting, looking at me with wild eyes and really really flustered.

"Baby..." He groaned.

"Like this, please... I wanna see you" I said barely in a whisper.

He smiled.

"I love you. All cute and shy after beging me to eat you out"

I blushed even harder than before.

"I love you" He whispered before diving in again.

He went deeper than before. It had been ages since I hade done anything with anyone, and the last times hadn't been so great. Now, Daniel was here, using his tongue as his life depended on it. His plump lips were around my clit as he stroked it with his tongue. I had lost my mind a while ago. I didn't care a fuck about anything. I just had my hand on the back of his neck as I rode his face. And he was humming in delight. He was loving it as much, caressing my legs and giving everything to me. His nose, beautiful nose, nudged on my clit with every movement, his eyes were closed and he was fully concentrated.

"Danny... Danny please..."

I couldn't say anything else, the orgasm washed over me as a wave and leaned back on the railing.

"Fuck... Daniel... Oh fuck..." He hadn't stopped. He only digged his fingers deeper on my ass and sucked harder. "Fuck"

Then it became too much.

"Enough, Danny enough" I pushed him away, breathless and smiling.

The smile then turned into giggling when I looked at him in the eyes. He smiled too and cleaned his mouth. And then the giggling turned into laughing. He broke into laughs too, groaning when he got up and his knees cracked. Then he hugged me and lifted me from the floor. I wrapped my legs around him and kissed his cheeks. I felt so happy. Happier than ever. He moved around and soon we fell to the bed and it squeaked under us.

"OH fuck..." He said put of breath and laughing on my neck.

I ran my fingers over his hair and made him look at me. We were both smiling like kids.

"This is the best I've never been with someone, Danny" I told him.

He kissed my lips and grinded his body down on me. I whimpered.

"Is it?"

I nodded.

He gently caressed my face and kissed me slowly.

"I'm glad to hear that because this is the best I've been with someone too"

I kissed him again. Little pecks all over his face, lips, nose, cheeks... I felt so comfortable with his body covering mine.

"Can I take your clothes off?"

I felt his smile.

"Of course, baby"

He pulled back and sat back on the sofa. I got up and he bit his lip while looking at me.

"You look so pretty, my love"

My love...

I leaned and kissed his lips before grabbing the edge of his shirt. I slowly lifted it under his intense gaze. My hands were shaking because eof the excitement. I couldn't believe I was doing this. I peeled it of him and lef it fall next to me. He breathed deaply and looked into my eyes.

His trousers were low on his hips, showing a happy trail that scraped from them. I bit my lip. He was hard and by what his tight jeans showed, not small. My mouth watered.

"Like what you see?"

Cocky bastard.

"A lot" I whispered.

"I'm all yours"

"All mine?"

"For as long as you want me" He said nodding.

I leaned and captured his lips on a passionate kiss. This felt better than anything.

I reached to his face, caressing his skin and traveling down his neck and chest. His skin felt so warm under my hands. I gave myself the pleasure to start moving my lips on his skin too. First his cheek, pressing kisses on the little freckles and then to his neck, nibbling the skin over his pulse point. He sighed and kissed my check.

I decided then that the taste of his skin would be my favorite flavor in the world. I spent a good time on his neck. I sat on his lap and his hands fell on my ass. I smiled and looked into his eyes. Fuck. He is so perfect. I gave him another kiss before kneeling on the floor, right between his legs.

"Baby..." He said reaching for my face. "You don't have to"

"You have just done it"

"It's not the same"

"How?"

I asked smiling. He brushed my lip with his thumb and I bit it softly.

"Oh fuck. Okay, okay..."

I kissed the palm of his hand and fully opened his trousers. He lifted his hips and I pulled both, his trousers and boxers down.

"Wow, Abi. Desperate?"

"Mhm"

And there he was, hard for me and laying against his abdomen. I breathed deeply and then took his shoes off. I pulled the clothes and left him fully naked in front of me.

"You are beautiful, Daniel"

"Am I?"

"So beautiful"

I ran my fingers up to his thigh, the tattooed one.

"You like it"

"I love it. I... I didn't know it reached this high" I said moving my palm over it. My fingers frushed his hip and he tensed.

"I need you to do something"

I bit my lip and leaned forward. I locked my lips and kissed his hard member.

I didn't want to think much about the nerves. This was Daniel and I would make him feel good. That's all that mattered. I really wanted to do this.

"Oh okay... You like to tease"

I giggled and left another kiss, lower this time. He groaned. Then another one even lower. There was a wild look on his eyes. Last, I licked a long stripe from his balls to the tip and took him on my mouth sucking slowly and moving my tongue in circles.

"Oh fucking shit, that sweet mouth, Abi"

I felt satisfied. It was working. I was making him feel good.

And as I sucked him off, slowly and giving myself the sweet pleasure to enjoy, Daniel started coming more and more undone. His chest got covered in a thin layer of sweat. His head was thrown back, his eyes were closed and his lips were open. And oh the sounds he made. He was vocal, he wasn't afraid of wither swearing or moaning, the groaning and gasping. It was too beautiful. A sight to be seen. But as his breath got faster and his voice louder, he made me pull back. I was panting and gasping for air. A thin stripe of saliva connected my mouth and his member and he smiled.

"I don't wanna cum just jet. I'm getting old and I don't want my girl to wait"

I giggled. He ran his finger over my lips, cleaning the saliva and observing my mouth.

"You are not that old. I bet you can't take at least two rounds"

He chuckled.

"I definitely cum. If you are gonna make my cum tonight I just want it to be while I fuck you"

I gasped. He took the opportunity and kissed me deep, so deep. His tongue moved over mine and his hands kept me in place. Then he pulled back and bit my lip.

"Sit up here. I will bring condoms"

And like that, he got up, running in a quite funny way on his full naked glory.

I sat on the bed and try to collect myself. This all was really happening and it still felt like a dream. The best dream I'd ever had.

Then he came back and stopped to look at me. He smiled and showed me a bunch of condoms.

"Will you relly be able to used them all? Or are you two old"

"You little shit. Maybe not today because I want this to be nice, slow and romantic, but maybe tomorrow or the next day... I'm really gonna show you what I am capable of"

"Hey, it was you who said it, not me" I said lifting my hands.

He walked closer and kelt next to me, letting the condoms fall on the bed as he kissed me deep.

"I fucking love you so much"

It made me giggle.

"I love you so fucking much too"

Between kisses, Daniel climbed on me, dragging his fingers down my stomach and pushing them through my underwear. I whimpered.

"Let's get you ready for me, okay?"

I nodded, grabbing into his arm.

"okay"

He rubbed circles over my clit and I moaned. He kissed me over and over again and soon his fingers were moving hard and deep against my g-spot as his palm rubbed my clit.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck" I was panting and gasping for air, digging my nails on his skin as I felt everything around me dissappear. I was so lost in the pleasure I couldn't think about anything but him.

"That's it pretty girl. Cum for me."

And I did. I came for the second time and collapsed against him, who wrapped me on his arms and he kept fingerling me slower.

"Good girl" He whispered. "Now, can we get you out of this clothes?"

I nodded slowly.

Daniel was so careful when he got my underwear off, leaving me bare naked but smiling softly. His eyes were so warm yet so hungry. He was looking at me as if I was a gem, a precious gem.

"Oh baby"

He pushed me so I was laying. Then his thumb moved over my ivy and I gasped. I felt so sensitive, the nerves flourishing on my skin.

"Beautiful" He left kisses all over the tattoo, brushing his nose over the underside of my breast and finally trapping my nipple between his beautiful lips.

"OH fuck, Danny, baby..."

"What?"

"Fuck me"

"You wish is my command."

And like that, he knelt on the bed sitting on his heels

"Come here baby"

I bit my lip and climbed on his lap. I hugged his neck and shoulders and looked down. He put the condom on and looked into my eyes.

"Ready?"

"Yes"

I lifted my hips up a bit and he positioned himself on my entrance, then I sank down slowly.

We were looking into each other's eyes, our noses were touching and we were basically breathing the same air. Just like in that lagoon in Colorado. We couldn't get any closer.

"I love you." I whispered.

"I love you" He simply answered.

And just as he had said, it was slow, deep and romantic. We were moving at unison, we were hugging and grabbing into the other, probably leaving marks for the next day, we were caressing the other's skin, kissing lips and cheeks, brushing noses and whispering things. My hands we on his hair and his waist, helping myself with the movement as I rode him slowly. I could feel him so deep and thick in me. He was so perfect. He was made for me. His hands were on my back and ass and his lips wouldn't leave mine.

"OH fuck, you feel like heaven"

Then we both came and I couldn't move from his lap. I was just there, feeling him kiss my chest and dragging his lips over my sternum and sitting on his lap, caressing his hair and with him still fully hard in me. It made me smile. I kissed his temple and he looked up. His nose brushed mine.

"Why are you smiling like that?"

"I'm just... I'm very happy to be here with you. To be doing all of this. The date, Colorado, the tattoo, the coffee dates... I'm glad it's you"

He cupped my cheeks and kissed me.

"I'm so happy Molly dragged you to the shop that day".

I bit my lip and nodded.

"I'm happy too".

And at the end we had to move. I got up and my legs were shaking, which made him smugly grin.

"Shut up"

"I didn't say anything"

I rolled my eyes. He reached for my hand and played with my fingers.

"If I knew I would end up like this today..."

I reached tk him, standing between his legs and cupping his cheeks.

"I'm sorry it took my this long. I didn't want you to wait too much but..."

He pressed a kiss between my legs.

"It's fine. Really. I just bit my knees to the point of bleeding but..."

"OH no"

"I'm joking"

"Idiot."

"You idiot"

"Mine"

I kissed his forehead.

We went to the bathroom and then he gave me a hoodie that felt to big and warm on me, but he had a cute smile and pink cheeks when he saw me with it so it was okay.

"We can sleep here on the sofa or go upstairs and sleep on the terrace"

"The terrace" I said pulling his hand.

Once he sat on that terrace bed, wearing also a hoodie and underwear just like me, I sat between his legs. He hugged me and I laid on his chest facing the sky. His face was right next to mine and I was drawing the ink lines on his thigh.

"Do you feel as if you were dreaming?" He asked.

"I do"

"Nice. I hope we wake up a here together tomorrow. If I wake up alone again I'm gonna throw up"

"You are so dramatic"

I was so mesmerized by the tattoo on his thigh. It was so perfect and beautiful.

"Why Ham&Avo? I understand the Ham, but the Avo?"

"A kid once called me Daniel Avocado. Lewis wouldn't stop laughing and talking about it. Then we were thinking about a name and it was kind of obvious"

I smiled.

"It's cute."

He chuckled.

"You are lovely"

I blushed and turned around, hiding on his hoodie and closing my eyes. He kissed my forehead.

"Tired?"

"These days have been exhausting"

"I'm sorry it happened. I didn't want to. I just wanted to ask you to be my girlfriend after the weekend. It was perfect. I felt truly myself with you in there. And today. I had this feeling on my chest. It was telling me to do it. But I didn't want to push you too hard. I'm sorry it happened."

"It's not your fault, okay?"

He nodded and kissed my lips.

"I will meke it up to you"

"You already did. By not running away, I mean. Someone else would have freaked out"

"I did. But I couldn't leave you because I love you too much"

I closed my eyes and hugged him harder.

"I want you to come with Molly, Charlotte and me to the beach. We always do. As a family. I want you there"

He let a shaky breath out and whispered an I will. Then I fell asleep.

.............

"Okay. I'll pick you up"

"Do you really want to go grocery shopping with me?"

He happily nodded.

"I want my favourite snacks for the beach day"

I smiled and leaned to kiss him, but I hit my forehead with his helmet.

"Ouch"

He was laughing like a kid.

"Idiot"

"You love me".

"They are not opposite things"

He rolled his eyes.

"I have to leave, Abi" He said pouting. He had appointments for today, had woken me up in a hurry and I almost had a heart attack, but then he had kissed me so softly and yeah, he was the cutest so it was forgiven.

"See you"

This time I was more careful when I pecked his lips.

"Bye bye"

I saw him leave on his green vespa, covering my eyes from the sun, and then I went upstairs.

I opened the door and...

"OH my fucking God!" Molly jumped at me.

"Is she back?"

"Yes! And she fucked!"

"Shit Molly"

"Look at my girl! Look at that smile!"

"You didn't sleep here, you come with the same clothes obviously and look at that mark on your neck!"

I blushed and touched the sensitive skin.

"Is he good?" Charlotte asked.

"Is he a head giving God or something? That nose and lips..."

"I hate you both" I said laughing and walking past them.

"Is he or not?" Charlotte insisted.

"He is" I admited blushing even more. But yeah, it was true. It was the best sex of my life.

"Yes!"

They were celebrating as if they had won the lottery but suddenly stopped.

"Wait, did you asked him?" Molly said.

A smile broke down on my face because yes, Daniel was my boyfriend now.

"I did"

And by my happy laughing, they knew the answer. Both women jumped to me and hugged me. After all this time and pain, I was finally happy.

So much to say about this chapter. So special to me, really. I loved it so much and I hope you do too.

Next part: The Hoppers.

Taglist: @controsnes @thybulleric @ln15 @lcuppo @priylodhasstuff @shadowbowgirl13 @txtflxx @scotlynaurora @chxrryrose @f1-incorrect-s @yearsof-war @earfquak3

#daniel ricciardo #Dr #the handsome artist #Smut #Fic

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