#let me express to u perhaps The frustration of my life

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

#let me express to u perhaps The frustration of my life #i like to learn. it is perhaps my favorite thing. new information. more more more constantly #but. my fucking brain is the fucking worst. because im not fucking stupid if i can focus and process the words being said i can understand #many things. i like to learn about math and physics and chemistry and biology and anatomy... ect concepts #but the focus and the processing of words is where we have problems. because i cannot focus for more than like 5min #i blink and suddenly ive been spaced out for a sec and need to reorient. i cant prioritize what to do 1st and im constantly bouncing betwee #tasks so nothing ever gets done and im too intimidated to start learning things. and when im trying to learn we habe the processing words #problem. like my reading comprehension is so fucking bad. like i will read a book on paper and maybe retain 25% of the info if im not #hardcore trying. for a class where i had to do a ton of paper reading. i had to read everything out loud to myself. highlight important #info. write myself a summary based on the highlights and then read the paper again before i could even begin to feel comfortable in #discussions. it was so fucking frustrating and miserable. ppl will give me physical books and im like thanks i cant fucking read sorry #too fucking dyslexic. read and listen they say. u have to read and listen at the same time bc i cant pay attention and i cant read #so if i do both then maybe the info gets in. thats y i have to read aloud but i hate it and still get distracted #i mean. i probably just have an attention problem. its also really annoying that my short term working memory is so awful #bc in order to make things make sense i have to draw or write them out. i cant judt go off the top of my head or i get stuck saying thr sam #thing over and over and over. its like my ability to think is extremely shallow. but thrn i read papers and recognize concepts from classes #i took years ago and im like. fucking y cant i know what i know? my head feels so empty but info is in there somewhere #its just so fucking frustrating that i love understanding systems so much. complex annoying little systems that fit together like a puzzle #and my fucking brain refuses to accept the information im trying to get in there. so i return to a remark left on my dyslexia assignment: #intelligent when not constrained by language or time. thanks. unfortunately language is how ppl communicate #also i freak out under time pressure lol. anyway ive just been reading papers for fun this weekend and remembering y i dont: bc its agony #but also i fucking love the concepts so much and i need a good understanding of photosynthesis before August when i join a photosynthesis #lab lmao. ugh. i love learning but my brain was not buildmt #built for it. if only if only someone could podcast about the obscure things im interested in while reading directly from the source #unrelated #also its like 105 degrees plus. its too fucking hot out #thats like 40 degrees C. the sun is like a death ray

[spacedikut]

Derek would ask Spencer to explain how he feels about u to try and get him to understand that he’s in love with you but Spencer would just be like... is that not friendship?

god this idea is so fucking good but. i didn’t do it justice cause i went down a way more serious route :p 1.4k words, gn!reader

the team have been trying tirelessly to get spencer to just... see. what the rest of them see. the longing, lingering looks and requests to work together, the subtle touches that are so sweet in themselves but, with the added knowledge that spencer is Spencer, its...well, the team knows what they see. spencer is just lagging behind a little.

they try a whole plethora of methods. everyone talks to him and spencer either doesn’t connect the dots or simply says “we’re just friends!” and emily gets so frustrated she flicks spencer on the forehead and leaves a mark (i ask you picture pure, innocent spencer sat at his desk, watching emily’s retreating form with nothing but a puppy-dog confused expression and a red dent in the middle of his forehead).

penelope is at her wits end, so derek decides to step up and retry a very basic method: talking spencer through how he feels for you. surely he’s self-aware enough that he’ll hear himself and hear how un-friendlike it all sounds and... tada! love.

but it’s never quite as easy as you’ll think it’ll be, is it?

spencer should’ve known something was amiss when derek asked him if he wanted to hang out and let him choose where they would go - spencer? being allowed to choose where to hang out after work? have you ever heard of something called a red flag?

so spencer chooses a cafe which - immediately, the second they step through the doorway - spencer has a joy to him, telling derek about the last time you and him came here and what you ordered and what you thought of it and all these details that even the most attentive best friend wouldn’t think were anything more than trivial matters. he remembers the shape you tore your napkin into, for goodness sake. in what realm is that friendly behaviour?

then, to make matters worse, spencer, mid-walk to a table in the corner by a large window, abruptly changes directions, making derek almost spill his coffee. spencer apologies, then says they can’t sit in that booth cause that’s where you and spencer sit and - well. that’s your and spencer’s place, you can’t disrupt that! friends! friendly things and friends doing friendly stuff. friendship.

derek gives this scoff that spencer is so used to he barely reacts. when they sit, spencer is acutely aware that derek is staring - furrowed brows and this intense, firm gaze that only appears when he’s thinking. spencer’s only slightly intimidated. 

he’s never been able to lie to derek. he’s never been a good liar, period. he’s good at omissions and burying himself and his emotions but, god, if someone asks just the right question, he’ll fold like the cheap deckchair he truly is.

and derek... derek knows spencer better than he knows himself sometimes.

(is there anyone else that has similar qualities? no. of course not. only his best pal derek and not a colleague/very pretty person known as You)

a question. a question is all it takes.

“so, you and y/n come here a lot?”

derek’s starting light and spencer is so enthralled at the mention of you every worry he had about why he’s here with derek and why derek is looking at him like that flies out the window. 

“we do! actually, it’s the perfect meeting spot; the most convenient distance between our apartments and we both have favourite drinks here. we’ve become regulars, actually, so we make a habit of coming at least once a week at a minimum-“

and he keeps going, sweetly reminiscing about the first time you visited to the silly games you’ve created - because you’ll spend that long here, sitting opposite each other and just each other - and derek wonders how spencer doesn’t see it. doesn’t see the way he lights up at the mention of you, rambles like you’re a statistic spencer’s known for years and can’t help but bestow on everyone at every opportunity, not to mention the physical reaction he has to you. you’re not even present and spencer is wide-eyed, rosy cheeked, permanent curl to either side of his lips that looks involuntary.

he’s in love with you. his entire self, from head to toe, from mind to soul. everyone can see it, except you and him, apparently.

“they make you happy, huh?”

“well, obviously,” spencer hehs, “they’re my best friend.”

there’s an opportunity here, shyly gleaming from the corner of the conversation and derek digs it out. “you got a definition for best friend, reid?”

spencer’s taking a sip of his drink, but is happy to share his knowledge. he’s not quite as bright when he’s saying it. “a best friend has many definitions. friendship itself is usually defined as a relationship of mutual affection between people - it is a stronger form of interpersonal bond than an association, and has been studied in multiple academic fields-“

derek hums, encouraging him to keep going. he’ll get there.

and he does, after delving a little too far into the nature versus nurture debate.

“id consider you a best friend. jj, too. and garcia, of course. except... except with y/n it’s- it’s different.”

derek pretends to be shocked. “how’s that?”

“well... they have all the qualities id want in a friend - honesty, generosity, empathy...humour-“ spencer smiles to himself, small and intimate, remembering an inside joke between the two of you. “but they’re more than that, too. they’re there for me - not-not that you guys aren’t there for me too-“ derek just raises an eyebrow. “but...it’s different, with them. it always is.”

the shift of topic from friendship to you has spencer unfocused on his surroundings, eyes glazed over as he stares to the side of derek, who feels like he’s intruding - he rarely understands what goes on in that big head of spencer’s, vast in it’s knowledge and memories and self-perception, but right now he’s confident he does. 

it’s you. he’s thinking of you, the moments you have together - perhaps in this very cafe - that are reserved for spencer and spencer alone, a side of you derek will never know because it’s not his to know; it’s spencer’s, just as spencer is yours.

his voice is level but distant, the warning signs of that magnificent mind finding the pieces and putting them together. “i think-i think about them often. how they are, what they’re doing, if they’re thinking of me too. i know they’re only a text message away or-or, on cases, a few feet away... i guess i don’t want to seem clingy. or desperate.”

“they’d never think that. you know that, right?”

“i know. i-i know that. but-i don’t... i can’t.. i don’t want to risk losing them, i guess. one wrong move and they’ll realise what a-what a complete mess i am. ill unravel and they’ll see all the dark inside and they... they don’t deserve that.”

derek goes to interrupt, because god is spencer wrong, but he doesn’t have the chance.

“they deserve love and laughter and everything i can’t give them if they... if they get too close.” now, spencer brings himself to look derek in the eye. there’s a seriousness there, a solemn stand that spencer doesn’t often take. “i can’t lose them, morgan. i can’t.” his hands tighten around his coffee cup. “i want them here, with me, for as long as i can convince them to stay. i don’t want to be selfish, i don’t- i don’t mean to be, but. i want this. i want them. every day for the rest of my life, i want them. i choose them. im just terrified they’ll see me and... they won’t choose me.”

there’s an expected silence that befalls the two of them, the busting background noise of the cafe the only moving piece. does he get it now? does he understand what has motivated every thought and feeling? every worry and action?

“reid,” derek says, softly, in a tone that has spencer straightening his back. “that’s not... that’s not just friendship. you know that, right? you can see that?”

spencer blinks. 

no. you’re friends - close friends, yes, but friends nonetheless.

but he thinks back to what he’s just said - 

he’d say the same for jj, right? for penelope, and for derek. even gideon, perhaps.

except... no. he wouldn’t. it’s for you, he’s for you, all of it and all of him.

and then the picture is as clear as day. no fog, no obscurity, no hesitance - and spencer’s relieved. relieved that finally, finally, he can put all of his feelings into one simple sentence.

“im in love with them.”

“yeah,” derek says, leaning back against the booth. “yeah, reid, you are.”

#headcanons #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x y/n #spencer reid x you #criminal minds x reader #spencer reid fanfiction #i did not.. expect this to be over 1000 words my deepest condolences #mine #i hope at least one person likes this #india if u see this im sorry u had to put up with my breakdown over this woukd u like me to send u flowers #q

[ijustwant2write]

The First Boyfriend-John Shelby x Reader

(GIF credit to @ilovna​)

Requested by anonymous: ‘Hey when u have the time can you please do a John Shelby imagine where they are married they have been since they were young and Katie their oldest child she’s like 14 or 13 she want to bring a boy to meet her parents and y/n has to calm John down and tell him to give the boy a chance and they they do finally meet him he seems ok but then he starts being all Percy towards y/n and John gets protective and y/n gives him permission to kick him out . Hope it makes sense 😂❤️’

Characters: John Shelby x Reader (Married), Katie Shelby x Reader (Daughter)

Meanings: (Y/N)=Your name

Warnings: Swearing, age gap between teenagers, violence, inappropriate touching, fluff

                                      *~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

I groaned as I heard a thump come from upstairs, the kids screaming at each other as they bickered. Looking down at the washing up, I decided to leave them for now, they could sort it between themselves. That was, until there was a louder thud, and all of them were screaming. I dried my hands on a tea towel, checking on the pie in the oven before stomping my way upstairs. That always freaked out the children, they knew they were in for a telling off.

“Right,” I announced my presence in the boys room, where the younger girls were also playing,“what is all of this racket?”

“He snatched the toys away from me!”

“She hit me!”

“She said a naughty word!”

“He pulled my hair!”

Everyone shouted over each other, meaning I got nowhere close to an actual answer.

“Alright!” I snapped.“Before you all yell at me again, this is what we’re going to do. Girls, go back to your room, boys you stay in here. You will wait in those rooms until I call you for your baths.”

They all groaned, none of them ever liked bath time, it took valuable time away from their playing. 

“I will have none of that, do as I say.” the children made an act of slumping around, the girls dragging their feet as they walked past me.“I love you all.”

They murmured ‘I love you too’ before the doors to their rooms shut, and I laughed under my breath. They certainly had their father’s dramatics and unfortunately, both of our stubborn tendencies. As I headed back downstairs, the front door opened, John waltzing in and smirking as he spotted me.

“Now this is a pleasant greeting.” he cockily said as I got to the last step, wrapping his arms around my waist.

I cupped his face in my hands, leaning down to welcome him with a kiss.“Thought you would be at the Garrison.”

“You say that like I’m there every night.”

I raised an eyebrow at him, before we both laughed.“Just got to bathe the children, then we can eat.”

His eye line was at a perfect height to stare at my breasts, and he made a point of it.“And what’s on the menu tonight?”

I scoffed, raising his chin to look me in the eyes.“Pie. And that’s it.”

“We’ll see about that.”

The door opened again, this time Katie walking in. She made a disgusted face at the sight of her parents showing love for one another.

“Ah good, you’re back on time for once. You can help me with you brothers and sisters.”

“Alright.” she replied, intending to head towards the front room when I stopped her.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“What? Nothing.”

“There must be, you didn’t protest or huff at me when I asked you to do something.”

“Come on, spit it out.” John pushed.

“It’s nothing, really!”

“Katie, we can do this all day. Perhaps you should have less time out with your mates-”

“Fine!” Katie quickly gave in, which was unusual for her.“I...I have a boyfriend.”

“You what?”

“His name is James, he’s really nice! I’ve been seeing him for a while-”

“How long’s a while?”

“Uh, three weeks, maybe four.”

John’s jaw dropped, looking at me with wide eyes before going back to Katie.“Three weeks?!”

“I said maybe four.”

“Well it certainly won’t go to five.”

“Dad!”

“No Katie, he’s just a crush.”

“He’s not! I promise I really like him!”

“But how much does he like you? How do you know what his intentions are?”

“OK police inspector,” I patted him on the chest as I stood between them,“calm down, both of you. Now, Katie obviously like this boy, so we have to respect that. But Katie, you know you have to be careful around boys.”

“Yes, I remember you saying. I was wondering...could he maybe come round for dinner one night?”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah, he liked the idea too. It’ll mean you can get to know him, then you know I’m safe.”

“I think that’s a lovely idea Katie.”

“What?!” John exclaimed.

“John.” I warned him.“You arrange it with him, perhaps sometime next week?”

“Thanks mum!” Katie beamed, giving me a quick hug.

“That’s alright darling. Now, go get your brother’s and sister’s ready for their baths whilst I draw it.”

I kissed the top of her head before she rushed past her dad and up the stairs. I just laughed at John’s shocked expression, wondering how on Earth that all happened before him.

“Oh, Katie!” I quickly shouted.

“Yeah?” her head popped around the corner.

“How old is James?”

Her face dropped. She was still hiding something.“Um, he’s...he’s seventeen.”

“Excuse me?”

“He just turned seventeen! Got to go and do as you asked me!”

Right, that wasn’t the answer I was expecting. I slowly turned to face John, who had an extremely angry expression on his face.

“Seventeen?” he scowled.

“Yeah, I’m not happy about that either. But let’s give him a chance.”

“He’s fucking seventeen! He’s taking advantage of a fourteen year old!”

“Darling, calm down. Please, let’s see what he’s like. Not everyone was like you at seventeen.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“They weren’t all as charming as you.” I quickly saved, though he knew what I meant.“If he’s a little shit, we can stop her from seeing him.”

“Or stop him from seeing her.”

“John, do not traumatize that boy.”

“No promises.”

John had not been in a great mood for the rest of the week. He was constantly fussing over Katie, questioning her left, right and centre about anything he could think of. She was getting frustrated, she couldn’t even pop out to buy us bread without John asking if she had seen James on the way. I tried to stop him, but he was so persistent. He was only being like this because he wanted to protect his little girl, he knew what boys were like at that age. I was worried about the age gap. It wasn’t much, but Katie was still so young, only just becoming a teenager, whereas this boy was a year away from being an adult. I only hoped he would prove us wrong at this dinner.

We had scheduled the dinner for the following week, and the day was already upon us. Katie and I had been preparing a meal all day, feeding the kids before us so they wouldn’t act up or take my attention away. Katie was dressed in her best dress, hair pinned back with a nervous smile on her face. However, John was no where to be seen. He had been gone all day, he was at work, but I hoped he hadn’t been snatched away for Blinder business. Katie stressed over this, sitting by the window on the lookout for him. 

“He’s here!” Katie announced, dashing through to the kitchen.

“Your dad?” I asked, wiping my hands on my apron.

“No, James! Why does dad always have to ruin everything?!” 

“Hey, look at me,” I grabbed her by the shoulders,“it will all be fine. Let him him, we will start talking and just excuse your dad. He will be here Katie.”

I pushed her towards the door, taking off my apron and making sure everything was in order; when really, I was stopping myself from rushing out and bombarding the boy.

“Mum,” Katie called me, and I stepped out of the kitchen,“this is James. James, this is my mum.”

“Pleasure to meet you Mrs Shelby.” he politely took my hand, and I thought he was going to shake it, but instead kissed it, keeping eye contact for a little too long.

“You too James.” I smiled, wondering if he was just trying to make a good impression.“Katie’s dad isn’t home from work yet, but we can sit in the front room whilst we wait.”

We engaged in small talk, me asking about his life and if he had a job. He was a good speaker, no stuttering or wondering what to say next. So far, so good. Katie hung onto to his every word, it was a wonder her cheeks weren’t hurting from smiling so much. However, some things James said were a little...I didn’t know how to put it, but the way he spoke was as if he was wooing me, he would sometimes wink, or make a suggestive joke, which would fly over Katie’s head. I was starting to side with John, this young boy made me uncomfortable.

Another hour passed, still no sign of John, and if we didn’t eat soon, the food would burn. I tried waiting for a little longer, but I could tell Katie was starting to worry again. So I suggested we start eating without him, not having to explain why John was late. James would have to be an idiot to not know who her father was. We had only been eating for ten minutes when the back door opened, John walking into the kitchen as he took off his Peaky cap.

“Couldn’t wait for me then?” John said, no humour in his voice.

“It’s nice to meet you Mr Shelby.” James stood respectfully, ready to shake John’s hand, but he didn’t take it. I wanted to scold him for that. 

James hesitantly sat back down. John took off his coat, hanging it on the back of the door, making a show of unbuckling his jacket, which revealed his guns in the holster. I rolled my eyes, this boy was only seventeen, and not one his enemies. He sat down beside me, which happened to be opposite James, a stupid mistake I should have seen coming.

“What have I missed?” John asked as he tucked into his food.

“I’ve been getting to know James, so he’s probably going to have to repeat everything again to you.” I joked.

“Go on then.” 

Silence.

“Go on, tell me what you told my wife.”

"Dad." Katie hissed.

"It's alright Katie." James placed his hand over hers, and I caught the sight of John tensing up, nostrils flaring."I was just explaining how I'm working now, earning quite a bit actually. Finished school too, so I'm not an idiot."

"My brother, Katie's uncle, didn't finish school. You calling him an idiot?" John leaned back in his chair.

"N-no, Mr Shelby. I just meant that-"

"You just meant to keep your mouth shut."

"John, a word."

I stood up from my chair, walking towards the door and waiting for John there. He stared at James as he slowly got up, reluctantly following. I shut the door after us, shoving John towards the front room.

"Whats wrong with you?" I snapped.

"Why did we leave them alone?" he realised."Make it quick, he could be doing anything to her in there."

"Oh my god, John. They're teenagers but they're not stupid. Could you just give him a chance? Please?"

He huffed."I don't trust him."

"Of course you don't. He's the first boy Katie has brought home. She might end up bringing more-"

"No. No she won't."

"John, can you just relax? If we get through this dinner quick enough, he'll be gone."

"Let's just get back in there."

I moaned to myself, quickly going after him. We sat back down, Katie and James had been silent when we walked in. I cleared my throat as the silence continued, starting to ear again and hoping the others would copy. Luckily they did, we were able to make small talk, though John didn't participate.

Once we were done, I collected the plates with Katie, telling her she didn't have to help with the washing up. I thought she would be able to spend time with James (and keep her father away from the poor boy), however, James offered to help me instead. At first I was about to tell him that it was nonsense, until I saw John waiting by the front room, his eyes still set on James as Katie tried to drag him away. 

“I’m sorry about my husband. He’s very...protective of his children.” I said as I passed him a plate to dry.

“I understand Mrs Shelby. He’s got a beautiful family to look after.”

“Aw, that’s very sweet of you to say.”

“A very beautiful family.”

I didn’t like the way he was looking at me. The comment before was lovely, but now he seemed to be suggesting something. Being almost an adult, he was the same height as me, if not slightly taller, and I wasn’t sure how to continue the conversation.

“I could instantly tell where Katie got her looks from, though I must say, the original is always better than the copy.”

Who did this little shit think he was?

“Honestly James, you don’t have to be stuck drying the dishes. Go spend time with Katie.”

“I’m quite enjoying myself here, actually.”

This was weird. At first, I thought maybe he was being over friendly, knowing that his girlfriend was a Shelby and her father was a Peaky Blinder; or perhaps he had some alcohol to fuel his confidence. But now I could sense he was here for something else, as if he ever had a chance.

“Oh, this one is still a bit dirty.” he pointed out.

He walked behind me to place it on the other side of the sink to be cleaned again, however, he pushed his body into mine behind me, and I froze at the action out of shock. His breath was fanning on my breath as he slowly placed the plate down, hand sliding up my arm to my elbow, before tracing across my lower back as he moved away again. I dropped the plate I was washing into the sink, picking up a knife beside me and pointing it at him.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?!” I snapped under my breath. It pissed me off that he didn’t look bothered by my threat.

“Just appreciating what’s in front of me.” he cockily replied.

“You have no respect for anyone, do you? I want you out of my house, now.”

“And break Katie’s little heart? Don’t think she would be too pleased by that.”

“She’ll be happy to know I got rid of a pervert. You;re never to go near her again.”

“You sound like your husband. Katie has been complaining about you two for weeks. She’ll only listen to me, and I’ll deny whatever you tell her. And how would your husband feel knowing we had this moment?”

“He’ll want to cut your balls off.”

“You know, I wasn’t sure if I was absolutely into you when I walked in. You’re beautiful of course, but the foul language...I don’t know, something about it is quite exciting.”

I chucked the knife into the sink, storming past the bastard and out of the kitchen, until I noticed the door was slightly open. I hadn’t left it like that. Continuing on, I took a big, deep breath before walking into the front room. John (unsurprisingly) had a glass of whiskey in hand as he sat in his chair, Katie sitting on the longer sofa, seeming upset.

“You saw, didn’t you?” I asked her.

She nodded, her eyes glued on the floor, they were glassed over.

“Did he touch you?” John snarled.

I sighed.“He...he did but-”

“That’s all I need to hear.” 

He put down his drink, making a beeline for the kitchen. I stood in the doorway of the front room, shielding Katie from what was about to happen. James yelled out in protest as John roughly dragged him out of the house. I watched as he literally threw the boy outside onto the street, people wanting to watch but also not wanting to be involved. 

“You stay the fuck away from my family. You’re lucky I don’t cut you, or do something worse. Watch your fucking back boy.”

Although I enjoyed the fear in James’ eyes, I wish he had the same look when I dealt with him. John slammed the door, causing the pictures on the wall to shake. Katie ran upstairs, upset that the boy she liked wasn’t as respectful or lovely as she thought he was. I decided to leave her for the time being, everyone needed to calm down.

“Are you alright?” John asked me, still breathing heavy.

“Yes, thank you for getting rid of him.” I sighed, wrapping my arms around him.

He embraced me, trying to calm himself down.“I love you. I won’t ever let anyone else touch you like that again.”

“I know you won’t. I’m sorry I didn’t listen before.”

“Nah, I was being over protective. He just turned out to be a twat.”

“But he’s gone now. And he won’t go near Katie again. Just know, she might be crying for a few days.”

“I’ll let you deal with that.”

#john shelby #john shelby imagines #john shelby imagine #john shelby x reader #john shelby one shot #john shelby fanfiction #john shelby fan fiction #john shelby fanfic #john shelby fan fic #peaky blinders #peaky blinders imagine #peaky blinders imagines #peaky blinders x reader #peaky blinders one shot #peaky blinders fanfiction #peaky blinders fan fiction #peaky blinders fanfic #peaky blinders fan fic

[implexedactions]

Penance is a virtue

Yandere!Enji Todoroki x Reader

Enji Todoroki is many things; kidnapper, lover, sadist, hero, villain, husband. He is many, many things. But he isn’t delusional.

Beta-Read by best person: @absolute-flaming-trash

Warning: Yandere content and themes, Angst, Heavy emotional themes, Suicide, Stockholm syndrome, Kidnapping.

---

You wake up, eyes dashing to the clock.

5:55 AM - SUNDAY

Okay, good, you hadn’t slept in. Enji always wanted you to wake him up. He got...mad if you didn’t. You turn over to him in bed, expecting to find him still sleeping.

Teal eyes stare back at you instead.

“Ah!”

His face takes on a sorrowful expression.

“Did I frighten you? Sorry. I could not sleep.”

Not leaving you time to respond, he pulls you into his chest, under the covers. He sighs in content, and you press into him, not wanting him to forget your devotion.

After some time, he pulls you up to his face, kissing your forehead gently.

“Thank you. For everything.”

“U-uh, what do you mean? Are you okay?”

Enji sighs, failing to meet your gaze.

“I never do compliment you that often...”

---

He carries you to the breakfast table, adorned with pancakes, your favourite.

“What’s going on Enj- I mean, dear. I’m meant to make you breakfast?”

He fails to answer you, instead sitting down with you on his knee. He takes a fork and puts some pancake on it.

“Eat.”

And so you do.

When you finish, he moves to wash up.

“W-what are you doing? You told me that was my job.”

Your memory wanders back to your first few months here, when you disobeyed his every command...and received due punishment for it.

“Are you going to punish me again?”

It escapes your lips before you can stop it. The thought of being punished again, like before, makes your veins cool with fear.  Your breathing increases and you move down on your knees onto the cold kitchen floor.

“P-please, I swear, I’ll do whatever you want, just don’t-”

“Stop.”

He walks over, his thighs the same height as your head. You move to undo his belt, but a hand puts a stop to that.

“There is no punishment. I am just doing an acceptable act for my spouse.”

The words “but you never do that” get stopped in your throat. You instead swallow and try to weakly smile. Looking up at Enji from your position on the ground, sunlight bathing him in a warm glow, to contrast the unsettled expression on his face.

---

He places you on a stool while he washes up. You fiddle with your hands, nervous. This isn’t how Enji usually acts. He’s so...vulnerable. In all honesty, it’s scary.

“Do you like the sunrise, my sweet?”

You look out to the orange glow emanating from the windows.

“Do you want me to like it, my sweet?”

Enji simply sighs and continues washing up.

“I’m sorry you cannot enjoy it. One should always appreciate what they have...”

---

After breakfast, he walks silently to the study. You follow behind him perfectly, like he trained you to.

He walks into the study, sitting down at his writing desk, and you take your place in his lap. He pulls out pen and paper, and you avert your eyes. 

It isn’t for good spouses like you to read.

He spends the better half of 6 hours writing. You entertain yourself by tracing the pattern of the wallpaper. This evolves into focusing on Enji’s breathing, noticing how he breathes in more, not less when he becomes frustrated with something on the page. You eventually move on to thinking about all the things you miss from the outside world, like ice cream, and human connection. You finish out the last hour by thinking about how angry Enji would be if he knew such a perfect little spouse were thinking such nasty little things. 

Shuffling about, he motions for you to hop off his leg, and then stands and leaves the room without speaking to you. You get the feeling he’s coming back, though; he left the door open.

You’re worried. You’re scared beyond belief. This isn’t like him, this entire day is wrong. You’re hoping he’ll burst in and start yelling, the anticipation feels worse than any potential punishment. You consider that maybe this is the punishment and that you should perhaps just start apologising regardless. He didn’t take well to that before though.

This day has made little sense. Enji is acting so far out of his usual behaviour that it doesn’t just scare you because he might hurt you. It scares you because you don’t know what is even happening. It takes you back to the days you first came here—a blurry, hazy mess. You struggle to even remember it. You remember bits and pieces. Chains, fire, the cold, the scent of sex. Small things like that.

You turn your head to the papers on the desk, intrigued by what took up so much of his time. Before you can look away, you see what they are. Letters, addressed to countless people, your parents, Shoto, Rei, Hawks, various news stations.

You glance towards the open door...surely what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him right?

You pick up the letter to the Hawks. 

 Keigo, I write this letter to you as a mentor, and I presume a father figure. I know that in some capacity, you looked up to me. You were just a scared kid, and I helped. That said, if what I have done becomes public knowledge, do not defend me. I do not know how much you know of my dealings, but for the sake of your future, throw me to the dogs. Do not say that I was perfect, or that I did no wrong. When I turn and look at my darling, I see my mistakes for the damning judgments they are. You will be a fine no.1 hero, just let go of your predecessor. Please.

 That alleviated little concern. Undeterred, you move onto the letter to the media.

 To all the news channels and gossip rags that haunt this city like the festering ghouls you are, I detest you. You created division, turned heroics into a popularity contest, seeded doubt during a time where we needed hope, and fought so hard to bring us all to our knees. I know my story will vilify me, so I accept my place in the burning flames of hell. Just know that when you get down there, I will be waiting to enact justice.

 You are practically hyperventilating now. You grab the letter to your parents. You don’t know what these letters are, but they seem like-

The letter is snatched away from your hands. It appears you forgot to watch the door.

Turning around, tears in your eyes, fear in your veins, half-baked excuses running rampant in your mind. You expect to see vengeful Enji with a glint in his eye, telling you it is time for your punishment. Instead, you find an apathetic Enji, eyes soft and watery, stance broken and exhausted.

“I did not want you to see that. I am sorry that you did.”

Enough is enough, you want answers. Pushing against your instincts, you stammer out a question.

“W-What is going on? Why...why are you like this?”

He seems taken aback, eyes opening wide. This minor act of defiance, of speaking out when not spoken to, is enough to break you. Falling to your knees, you look away from him. Aghast that you even thought of defying his wishes.

“I’m sorry! Please, forgive me! I didn’t mean to question you like that! Or read the letters! Please! I didn’t- I don’t-”

A calloused hand grips your shoulder.

“Please. Stop.”

You look up to see Enji’s eyes, dull and watery again.

“Sorry.”

“Trust me, I am sorry too.”

---

The afternoon is spent on the couch, watching TV in Enji’s lap. He seems to notice your nervous disposition, as he slowly envelopes you in a hug the more the hours go by. Eventually, he gets up to make dinner by himself, much to your unvoiced dismay.

You simply stare as he makes it. Both of you silent. He occasionally looks over to you, as if to make sure you haven’t merely vanished into the ether. You feel like you might vanish into the ether, honestly.

You move to the dining table, and a couple of minutes later, he brings out dinner. Silent, he sits down beside you, but a hand stops you from eating.

“Tell me, do you remember when we first met?” he sounds...hopeful.

“Is...Is this a trap?” you ask cautiously. This entire day has put you on edge.

“No. Quite the opposite, in fact.”

“I...I can’t remember it, really. Most of those months are...blank, I remember a few pieces of my first couple of months here. They’re admittedly not pleasant memories.”

“I see.”

“I mean, I appreciate that you did those...things you did to me! If you hadn’t, I wouldn’t be any good at my job.”

He turns to you and raises an eyebrow.

“Your job?”

“Yeah, loving you, being your spouse.”

“Ah.”

Both of you go quiet. You wait on the signal to start eating. It doesn’t come.

“It was a gala event. You told me how much you hated them, and I laughed and agreed.”

“Ah. Gala’s sound so wonderful, don’t they though? Being outside, getting to dance, to listen to beautiful music.~”

You sway slightly thinking that you could have once been permitted to be a part of such a magical event.

“You may eat now.”

Enji’s command breaks you out of your daydream. He watches as you take your first bite, and follows in kind.

---

When you finish, he seems restless. He gets the plates and puts them in the sink. He then takes you to the living room. He fiddles with a speaker for a couple of seconds, before classical music emerges.

“You said you cannot remember our first meeting, and by extension our first dance. I was wondering, would you like to dance with me?”

Confused, but delighted, you join Enji in the embrace. Softly dancing around the living room, you try to imagine what it was like meeting Enji for the first time. He must’ve seemed so sweet, right? That’s how Enji would come off to a stranger, right?

You lose yourself in the moment, allowing yourself to imagine a life outside of these walls. You would’ve met Enji at the Gala. He would’ve laughed. He would’ve given you his number, the gentlemen that he was. He would’ve taken you to a fancy restaurant for your 1st date. You could’ve shown up at his agency while he was buried under paperwork once, and it would’ve made his day. You could’ve kissed him under the rain, snickering as you pulled away and saw droplets evaporate on contact with his blushing face. He would’ve proposed in a quiet place, with a brilliant ruby. You would’ve met Shoto, and figured out what his deal was. You would’ve grown old together.

But this life is just as beautiful, right?

Enji leans down during the dance and kisses you. Softly, unlike all those times before. It’s beautiful to you. And based on the silent tears running down his face, it’s beautiful to him too.

He pulls you down onto the couch, staring into your eyes as the soft music plays.

“I’m sorry, my love.”

“What for?”

“For a lot of things. For kidnapping you. For...training you. For punishing you. For breaking you, beyond belief. For so many, many different things. You are not the person I fell in love with, you are hardly a person. I broke you, I gutted your personality until all that was left was a shell, echoing any command I gave it. You do not have a soul anymore.”

He pauses, seemingly debating over this next part, ignoring your shaky and scared reassurances.

“And I am also sorry for the poison in our food tonight.”

Your world shatters at that.

“The fatal effects should kick in soon enough. It will not be a nasty death. Even in death, I intend to remain dignified. Or at least, I wish to preserve your beauty.”

You cannot vocalise anything, your mind is failing you. From either the poison or situation, you are unclear.

“There is an antidote on the kitchen counter. If you can get there and drink it, you will live. And if you are feeling ever so generous, you may even give some to me.”

He turns and looks you in the eyes.

“My only command is that you do not get that antidote.”

“Wh-what?”

“You heard me. Disobey me, and save yourself. Or obey me, and die.”

He shrugs.

“I did say I was sorry.”

“I-I...why?”

“Like I said. You are a shell. If you get the antidote, maybe I have not entirely broken you, maybe you can still be saved from my conditioning. If you do not get the antidote, I get to make Dabi just that little bit happier.”

You try to get up and into the kitchen. You really try. Your arms try to push up. You try to move off the couch. But...that feeling of fire licking at your body...it’s paralysing.

You instead collapse back onto the couch, and Enji sighs.

“Can you hold me?”

“Sure, my sweet.”

His arms pull you into his body. You feel yourself getting more and more tired.

“I’m sorry...I couldn’t be...what you wanted...”

“I am sorry I could not be what you wanted either...”

#yandere #yandere enji todoroki #enji todoroki #reader insert #yandere enji x reader #gender-neutral reader #boku no hero x reader #enji todoroki x reader #enji x reader #yandere enji #boku no hero academia #yandere endeavor #endeavor #ImplexedWriting

[jusananimehoe]

can u write something for feitan finding scars from self harm on his s/o? he enjoys torture and pain and its interesting to think how hed react to something like that one someone he cares about/loves

This turned into 1700 words, fucking hell, I got too carried away, but this subject hits very hard with me, so hopefully I did it justice. I absolutely believe Feitan is capable of caring, even loving, but it’d be a very different kind of love than what most would be used to. 

So, enjoy, hopefully xxx

warnings for blood, blood kinks, self-harm mentions, mentions of general mental health issues. 

Also; feel the need to mention that if any of you are suffering in any way, shape or form, my askbox is always open xxxx

How did I get here? You sighed, sinking further into the empty bathtub, trembling from head to toe as shame threatened to drown you, the horrible, but familiar ball of disgust was swirling wildly in your chest as you eyed the door nervously, praying he wouldn’t find you, like hell. You bit down on your lip as the doorknob turned slowly, you’d locked it, though you’d also known it wouldn’t keep him out, when had anything ever kept him out?

You allowed the smallest of smiles as your mind wandered, to all those months ago when he’d first come over your balcony, on the twenty-fifth floor at your apartment complex, eyes a little wild, hair a little windswept, aura radiating malicious intent. He’d smirked at you like some kind of deviant, eyes raking over your form, taking in the way your legs trembled, barely holding you up, enjoying your fear, perhaps a little too much, but gods, he’d looked so beautiful. Had you fallen in love with him in that very moment? Perhaps, perhaps it had been later, with how patient he had been, how willing to take things at your pace he had been, the space he had given you, it had all been such an experience, especially since you were well aware, he was a complete and total sadist.

He’d wanted to hurt you, you knew he wanted to hurt you, even to this day, and sometimes you even went willingly, more often than not these days, it was you who went in search of him, desperate to feel the stinging bite of his whip, or the wet, burning pain of his claws raking through your skin, like butter. He’d been more than willing to oblige you, of course, losing more and more control as you gave more of yourself to him with every passing day. You were grateful, you realised, laughing softly at the absurdity, grateful that he’d stolen you away in the middle of the night, and locked you up inside this place he sometimes called home, to be his own personal little toy, but what a life it had been so far.

And now I’ve ruined it all.

You whimpered softly and hid your face, pressed firmly against your knees as the door opened slowly, allowing the dark-haired man to slip inside without a sound, eyes locking on your form instantly. You couldn’t see his eyes burning into you, but you could defintley feel that loaded gaze, and a tremor racked your body as you sniffled quietly. It had been a moment of weakness on your part, a lapse in memory of exactly why you had always been so careful, though he’d seen you stripped down on many an occasion, you’d always dutifully covered the hideous marks up with the make-up that he’d supplied you with when you’d asked. The shame that wracked you now was deep, all encompassing at your own stupidity. He’s going to throw me away, no doubt about it

The scars on your legs had not faded over the years, mostly because you were a repeat offender, despite trying to get help multiple times, nothing had really ever made a difference, and you had tired of people always looking down on you, with their pitiful eyes, “oh but we understand what you’re going through”, or, even better, “why would you do something so revolting to yourself”? The scars had eventually just become a normal part of your body, and since you were too riddled with anxiety to ever really connect with anyone, they’d never been an issue, until him, of course. You’d been tired, too tired to remember your morning routine, and now here you were, hiding in a bathtub as he walked slowly towards you, you fought the urge to cry, or laugh at how pathetic you were.

Stupid, stupid, stupid!

The smallest ones were just pale lines across your upper thigh, the worst, the ones you had done in your most extreme episodes of self-hatred, were raised, bumpy, purple lines, that stood out a mile away, and you shook and cried quietly at the thought that he’d seen them, ghosted a finger over them, even, before your mind had screamed the realisation at you, which, in turn, had led to your very undignified bolt from the bedroom you’d recently begun sharing with him.

A soft touch against your throat had you shivering and biting your lip hard enough to draw blood, will he just get rid of me, or maybe even kill me? The gentle finger trailing down your neck forced a tiny little whimper from your throat, and a low growl rumbled from his chest in response as he swung into the tub with you, landing silently, to sit behind you. His hot breath on your ear had your eyes fluttering as he pulled you back against his cool chest, hands gripping tightly at your thighs even as you made a choked noise of distress at the action. A hot tongue ran slowly over the sensitive skin along your jaw, and you gasped quietly, leaning into him further as his teeth bit down harshly, eliciting a shaky little groan from you as you felt something wet dripping down your neck. His tongue ran over it instantly, shuddering as he cleaned the stinging wound carefully, nails drawing slow circles over your scarred skin even as you watched shakily.

He nuzzled into your throat then, and you turned slightly, before finally lifting your head to meet those eyes you loved so much, shivering at the intensity you found there, shivering when he leaned in to claim your mouth in a slow kiss, tongue surging forward into your mouth as he pulled you closer, tugging you around to straddle his slim waist, nails turning to claws, digging into your hips with a grin as you groaned against his hot mouth, shuddering against him as he clawed at your skin, slowly, with patience, and a care you knew he showed only to you. His eyes burned as he gazed down at your soft figure, eye twitching as he battled with his own self-control, tongue swiping over his lip as he squeezed the bloody claw marks.

His eyes snapped back up to your face then, and seemed to read the uncertainty there, the indescribable terror, at the thought of being abandoned by the only person you’d ever met who seemed to understand your need to be punished, to be hurt, to be pushed to the very limit of consent. His forehead touched yours gently, stormy eyes locked on yours as you breathed him in, comforted by the tangy smell of copper and blood that clung to him, strange to others, comforting to you. You bit your lip and took a risk, eyes flicking down so you didn’t have to see his reaction.

“I’m afraid that if I let you see every side of me, you’ll be disgusted”, whispered so softly you almost hoped he wouldn’t hear it, but judging by the tightening of his grip, the way his claws dug further into your supple flesh as you shivered, he’d heard you just fine. A warm mouth pressed against your jaw then, before moving up your face, across your cheeks, over your nose, pressing against your mouth, before tangling his tongue with yours again, slowly, like he was mapping out the inside of your mouth in intricate detail, leaving you gasping against his mouth when he finally pulled back to look at you, expression unreadable.

His eyes fluttered, his mouth turned down in a slight grimace before he opened it slowly, “I-“, he cut himself off, appearing frustrated by his inability to find the correct wording, his left hand moving up to card his now soft hands through your hair, lost in thought for a moment, considering carefully as you waited with bated breath, body trembling against him even as he tugged you closer, hands running up and down your arms to address the little bumps now appearing on your skin, when had it got so cold?

“I-“, he began again, still looking a touch uncertain as he tilted his head, eyes focusing on you with a seriousness that knocked all the breath out of your chest, “I-like-broken-things”, he managed to say, voice as monotone as it always was, and yet, you could feel the sudden emotion behind it, his desperate desire to get this right. ” Find-them-interesting”, he continued before shaking his head swiftly, looking annoyed with himself, “beautiful”, he amended quietly, “find-them-beautiful”. You trembled, nose brushing against his as your pressed closer to him.

“Maybe-that-is-why”, he began slowly, face scrunched in concentration, eyes a little wider than usual, “why-i-find-you-beautiful”, he finished, averting his eyes instantly, clearly uncomfortable. You shivered, arms trembling as you sat in his lap, hands running slow up and down his bare chest, eyes wet with unshed tears as you took it all in, he wasn’t leaving you. Your mouth found his a moment later, nails digging into his back and raking down his skin as he hissed underneath you in pleasure, claws returning to your hips again.

He claimed your mouth hungrily as you ground slowly down against him, moaning loudly into his mouth as he grabbed your ass, sharp claws breaking the skin with ease, pressing hard enough to leave a scar, for sure. “Only-me”, mumbled against your bare shoulder as he bit down, hard, drawing a desperate little squeal from you as you tugged on his dark locks pleadingly. “Only-I-hurt-you-now”, he finished before biting down viciously again, groaning as the taste of blood filled his mouth.

Your head collapsed against his as you trembled and gasped, body like a live wire against him as you went boneless, too enraptured in all the emotions, all the pleasure surging through you to really pay much attention, though you forced your brain to form a coherent sentence, knowing he’d be expecting a confirmation.

“Yes”, whispered softly against his hair as your breathing grew more laboured, “yes, only you”, enjoying the contented little hum against your stinging shoulder as he smirked slowly against your bloody skin, already bruising a dark purple under the sharp bite of his teeth.

“Only you, Feitan”.

#feitan #feitan x reader #feitan smut #feitan portor #phantom troupe #hunter x hunter #hxh #some fluff maybe #slightly soft feitan #but not really #fluff #smut

[mourntheantagonist]

#HarringroveApril Day 7: Daisychain

***

“Mr. Harrington? Who’s your favorite student?”

The question came about at least once every year without fail, and he’d always answer in the same, textbook way.

“I don’t have favorites. I love all my kids equally.”

And, deservedly so, the whole class would grunt and moan because they knew just as well as he did that it was a load of bullshit. Steve loved every one of his kids, that part wasn’t a lie, but… he also definitely had his favorites.

For the graduating class of ‘90 when he was only a teaching assistant his name was Daniel. He was the youngest in his class because he started early, and he was incredibly bright. He could count higher, he could read quicker, and his mind just worked in ways that no adult could possibly understand. But it wasn’t the textbook intelligence that made Steve fall for this kid. It was his emotional intelligence. He was funny and he was kind and five year olds were cruel, but he never let that get to him. He had an outlook on life that Steve was jealous of, so when the other kids would turn him down for a game of checkers, Steve would happily join him, because Steve saw it as his job to keep that kid kind.

For the class of ‘91 it was Christopher. He was nothing like Daniel. He was held back and was repeating kindergarten, and that was evident in the way he walked through life. He was quiet and would voluntarily remove himself from the rest of the class. He’d sit by himself and read a book and get frustrated when he didn’t understand one of the words, he would swing by himself and he always tried to sneak off with the first graders when it was time to line up. And Steve perfectly resonated with that feeling of watching all of your friends move on without you. He was left in the dust too. When all his classmates moved on to college or hightailed it out of Hawkins, Steve was left there by himself, working at Family Video with his only friend in the grade below him, and it took her leaving him as well for Steve to finally get his shit together, haul his ass west of the Mississippi, and enroll in a community college and work towards his teaching degree.

And he did it, against all odds and obstacles in his way, he did it. It took extra work and the support of his best friend who he followed, and he did it. He saw himself in Christopher, and he wasn’t going to make that kid wait as long as he did to realize that setbacks don’t define his future.

Steve usually took a liking to the quiet kids, and that only changed in ‘93 with the girl named Amy and the familiar last name. She was loud, vibrant, and everyone loved her. Her smile was contagious and she could be the sweetest little girl at times, but she also wore her heart on her sleeve. She cried quite a bit, just the littlest thing could set her off. A boy accidentally knocking over her blocks, not knowing how to spell a certain word, accidentally coloring outside the lines. She didn’t throw tantrums like he saw in the other kids. She would just bow her head and cry and it would break Steve’s heart every time.

But other than those few moments, she was bright and charismatic and with the last name, the blonde curly hair, and the big personality, Steve really should have put it all together much sooner than he did.

He didn’t put it all together until he saw Billy Hargrove in the soup aisle at the local grocery store wearing a chain of little daisies on his head like a crown, and he knew exactly where it was from.

It was from the little girl named Amy Hargrove who frolicked in the field instead of playing on the playground, collecting flowers that she meticulously made into bracelets and crowns and anything else she put her mind to. She gave them to friends, she even gave one to Steve, and of course she would give one to her dad too.

He looked so different, and yet exactly the same. He still had the damn mullet, just dragging the eighties with him as far as he could, he was a little more cleaned up but still had a similar style to what it was in highschool. Still with the same denim jacket, denim jeans, Canadian tuxedo type deal. In a side by side picture situation you wouldn’t really be able to tell the difference. It wasn’t his dress or his hair or anything physical about him that made him look so different, it was the way that he carried himself. It was the relaxation and the eyes that didn’t droop and the smile lines that didn’t used to be there that made him almost entirely unrecognizable from the Billy Hargrove who pushed freshman against lockers and drove his car too loud and too fast and had cigarettes for three meals a day. Not the kid who ran off to California as soon as the hospital released him with only his Camaro and a small suitcase and a large sum of money the government used to keep his mouth shut, leaving just a note for Max on the fridge that didn’t get any more specific than that about where he was going, not even leaving a phone number for her to contact him with. He also didn’t look like the kid they all pictured in their heads after basically the whole town found out about exactly what Neil Hargrove did to his son behind closed doors.

Steve wanted to go up to him in the store, but he stopped himself. Because Billy left. Without a trace or a word, and who was Steve to think that Billy having to be reminded of something he voluntarily abandoned without a second thought would have any sort of positive outcome?

So he turned down the aisle and kept his distance from the man in the flower crown because he was scared. He wasn’t scared that Billy would see him and turn back to his old ways and hurt him again, he was scared that he’d turn back to his old ways and hurt himself again.

Because he’d been hurt enough already.

Steve successfully avoided Billy until parent teacher conferences had rolled around, and instead of seeing Amy’s mom on the list of names he’d be seeing that day, it was Billy’s.

Steve would be lying if he didn’t think about calling in sick and sending his TA in his place. But he still had to be her teacher for another six months, he just had to get the interaction over with.

Many of the parents that came before Billy had to have known he was on edge about something considering he excessively tapped the table with the eraser of his pencil and stuttered his way through conversations. His organized folders and notes of talking points had been entirely thrown out the window and he was an absolute nervous wreck. And he could only anticipate it being ten times worse when the cause of said anxiety walked through his door with the long hair and the leather jacket. It was only with the help of the little girl in the sunflower dress and daisies in her hair skipping from the entrance to the chair in front of him that calmed his nerves just a bit.

But Billy had just stayed at the door, no movement, and any hope that Steve had that perhaps his new haircut and the glasses on his face would be enough to keep Billy from noticing the obvious vanished when Billy snapped his fingers like the lightbulb in his head finally flickered on.

“I knew it couldn’t be a coincidence.”

Steve just held out his hand to shake like he did with any other parent, unsure how to gage the situation because Billy’s words could go either way and his facial expressions didn’t give him anything to go off of. It would be weird to introduce himself, he didn’t know what to say.

“Hi, I’m Amy’s teacher. Should we start?”

Billy looked a little confused, but he sat down in the little kindergartener chairs anyway. This meeting was almost more organized than the ones prior, likely because he was trying to go as quickly as possible and get it over with. Steve showed Billy some of her artwork and commented on how her reading comprehension was great but she could work on her spelling a little more. He didn’t want to bring it up, but he brought up the crying and it hurt to see how him bringing it up set her off again. The same bowing of the head and quiet sniffles into her sleeve.

But Steve thinks he just fell in love a little watching Billy comfort her. With one hand rubbing circles into her back and the other holding her small hand. Steve feels like shit watching her cry because of him and is also semi-fearful for his life because he already knows he can’t take Billy in a fight.

“Baby, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with crying. It’s okay.”

“You’re dad’s right Amy. I think it’s very healthy. Crying is good for you.”

She looks up at Steve with those big blue eyes and tear stained cheeks when he says that.

“Really?” she asks.

“Yeah! I’d say it even makes you more mature. Even some adults I know don’t let themselves cry and it’s not good.”

“My daddy cries a lot too.”

Steve looks at Billy who’s eyes widen when she says it, then tries to laugh it off like she didn’t just say that.

“Hey Amy, you wanna go and play while your daddy and I talk for a minute?”

She just nods her head and wipes away her remaining tears and quickly hauls the bucket of Lincoln Logs off the shelf.

“So. It’s been a while. Hasn’t it?” Steve starts.

“Yeah it has. So, you’re a teacher now.”

“And you’re a father. That’s crazy.” Steve was fiddling with his hands, trying to make the conversation less awkward. “She’s wonderful by the way.”

“Yeah. She doesn’t get it from me.”

Steve just shakes his head. “No. I don’t think that’s true. She has your charisma, and it appears you found a better way of channeling your emotions since last we saw each other. She’s a lot like you.”

“Thanks.” Billy blushed. He actually blushed. “I don’t know if this is allowed considering you’re her teacher, but would you want to catch up sometime? Maybe dinner or something?”

There it was. That was the olive branch. And Steve would be an absolute fool not to take it.

“I’d love to.”

Before they could come up with a time or a place, Amy was running over to the table with loudly stomping feet.

“I almost forgot! Daddy! show Mr. Harrington what I brought him!”

Billy reached into his pocket upon her demand and pulled out a little bracelet made out of little daisies and honeysuckle and handed it over to Steve.

“Thank you Amy! It’s lovely.”

“Daddy show him yours!”

Steve looked to Billy’s wrist where he slowly lifted his sleeve to reveal an almost exact replica to the bracelet in his hand.

“Looks like we’re matching.”

#harringrove #stranger things #billy hargrove #steve harrington #mandi writes tresh #ficlet #harringroveapril #this one will probably get a part 2 but who knows #it got too long and I ran out of time !!

[monsterfloofs]

Wyrn x Reader (Anonymous Protagonist) Sfw

(A sleepy demon and a lil sassin protagonist eeeee♡♡♡♡ )

You know you could have it worse off, thank goodness you didn't have to deal with Barbeus, who was known to have a smoking hot temper, or Zelle. Zelle. He was the one who ran the medical district. You’ve heard all sorts of rumors about his workers and what insane things they were tasked to do at odd hours of the night.

But he was going to drive you crazy- You knocked on his door for what it felt like the one hundredth time this morning. "Sir? Are you awake yet? There are at least five people who have asked for you, and I have a summons here for your brother Oren-- Hello?"

Silence.

That does it, you grind your teeth, fighting with the door knob above you before storming into his room. You are met with an enchanted sky full of stars and a dreamy swirling cosmos-- no wonder this guy can sleep his life away. 

Wyrn was sitting on top of his round bed, meditating peacefully. His pale blue skin almost shimmering underneath the strange sky that filled his room. The eye on the middle of his forehead opens to regard you. "Good morning," He intones with his sleepy musical voice. 

"Morning?" You echo in disbelief-- "Morning was three HOURS ago!" 

You grab the heavy curtains and pull them aside, sunlight flooding into the room and making his eye crinkle as it squints from the sudden burst of light.

"I'm sorry sir, but I don't think this is a good time to meditate when there is so much to do," As you talk he takes the parchment from you, his middle eye glancing over them and folding it up as you continue to talk, trying to impress the importance to him about what has been going on. He flops over on the bed and his other eyes flutter open to gaze at you. "But I'm lazy." His expression is deadpan as he watches you. Your voice catches in your throat, "Ah-" You splutter, attempting to regain your composure, flabbergasted as he blinks at you with a steady gaze and bored resolve. H-how are you supposed to respond to that???

You grumble and chew on your cheek pacing the hall as Wyrn gets ready for the day. Finally. Working with him you have felt like a babysitter at times, he could be so childish!! There was one day he dozed off in the middle of one of his own speeches! You almost hadn't realized until a hushed murmur went over the crowd. You had been frantically trying to wake him up by tugging on his pant leg behind the scenes. That was a fiasco!! You can still feel your stomach curl in on itself as you think back to it. 

But the most irritating thing of all. . . was despite his lax carefree nature, he usually was paces ahead of everyone else. No matter how much he sleeps in or slacks off, he is extremely intelligent and is usually patiently waiting for everyone else to catch up. Things were usually done quickly, precisely and orderly. You couldn't place how you felt about him, your emotions ranging from pure frustration to awe. You give a drawn out exasperated sigh, there was also this nagging feeling, in the back of your head that he could read minds or something, he would smile at you like he knew some little secret-- as if you didn't have any more cause to be nervous! You shake your head, you didn't know what to think of Wyrn at all. . . he was an enigma. 

Your hunch about his punctuality was correct, as soon as he left his room, those tasks you had bombarded him with were yet again all done. You squint at him suspiciously but all he offers you is a knowing smile.

"My younger brother is showcasing his flower festival today. . . would you like to accompany me after we have had our tea?" 

You look up at him and frown, finding the offer strange, "Ah. . . n-no thank you, I have some things I have to do here still." You wag your finger at him pouting, "Unlike you-- I have to do things the hard way! I can't just magic my way out of doing work! Mr. Lazy!" He smiles at you good naturedly, a large hand settling on top of your head, patting you affectionately. "I am sure the work can wait, but if that is what you wish. . ." 

You rub the top of your head pouting again. You don't even know why he has an assistant if he can juggle everything himself just fine. You almost wonder if it was inspired by his younger brother, who also had a human working along side of him. . . But at least they worked together and got along! You find yourself alone in the hallway, as Wyrn had left to visit his sibling. You catch your breath and sigh, crossing your arms and squinting off into the distance. You snort and huff as you busy yourself with completing your tasks. Trying to get that kind smile out of your minds eye. Just what was he up to? Asking for you to come along? You give a grin, tapping your forehead, “Jeeze. . . He was probably trying to find a way to lose me in the crowd! And then he’d just go back to napping!” You snort and roll your eyes, trying to ignore the warmth of your cheeks. 

When you had the time to peek up at the clock you found that time had flown by faster than you had realized. You were hurrying to gather your things and put them away-- no doubt your boss would be back soon. You had your back bent over some papers, flipping through them as you double checked the dates, making sure they were in order You were lost in your thoughts when Wyrn calls your name. It was almost so soft you didn't hear it at first, your head snapping up in surprise as you realized he was trying to get your attention. As you look up you are greeted by a bouquet of delicate blue and white flowers. You start to say something but you end up just staring instead, looking from the flowers to the demon.

Wyrn smiles softly, a clawed hand taking yours and gently setting the flowers into your hand. "This is my thanks for putting up with me as much as you do. I know I can be frustrating at times. I shall try not to fluster you so much. . ." You feel your face go hot as he rises back to his full height and walks away. The only thing your mind vaguely comprehending at the moment was the echo of footfalls down the corridor. You blink and shift from foot to foot, staring down at the pretty arrangement of flowers. 

". . . . . . . . . . . . .,"

You let your head sink, the soft petals brushing against your cheeks. 

He had taken you by surprise yet again. When you think you finally have figured him out, he would find some way to surprise you with something new.

There were still days when it was the same old shenanigans, he would rise late and you would huff and fume, telling him off for being lazy. He would take your criticism gracefully, but there would be a playful glint in his eye when he would smile at you. You had never noticed that before. You found yourself being tied up in his mysteries again, he had gotten into the habit of bringing you little gifts whenever he would have to leave. He would offer for you to accompany him, but you would turn him down. You would wonder if those little gestures meant something more than kindness. You managed to snap yourself out of those daydreams! Pushing away those thoughts until the next morning, and the next.

It was morning yet again, and curtains of sunlight streamed in through the windows. Wyrn has yet to rise today, and you had the age old task to wake him. But you had a bounce in your step this morning, looking up at the bundle of blankets as you grin evily, your hands grabbing a fistful of the airy summer blankets, with all intent and purpose in your wee gremlin heart to throw it off of him and give him a rude awakening.

But alas! Your plans are thwarted. Your eyes grow wide as you are picked up and carefully settled down onto his bed. You freeze your shoulders tensing as you stare at him. Wyrn rests his hand on his cheek, smiling lovingly at you, “Good morning,” He muses in his soft musical tone. “Y-you weren’t asleep--” You splutter in horror, and he shakes his head. “That is correct.” you puff up, indignantly, “W-why--” Wyrn smiles with amusement tilting his head, “Why? I wanted to beat you at your own game.” You feel your cheeks prickle with warmth, you stammer, your expression becoming huffy. Wyrn chuckles warmly and smiles, “Besides. . . I wanted to talk to you.” You snort, “You could have just talked to me when you got up! Why do it this way?”

A clawed finger carefully sweeps a lock of hair from your forehead, “I wanted to talk to you alone. . .” he purrs softly, “I wanted to tell you. . . that I enjoy your company, and our playful banter,” You sweat inwardly, you might have felt a little too fired up at times to consider it playful. “You know. . .,” He murmurs softly, “I do not have much interest in the everyday goings on, as you very well know. I tend to keep my eyes to the stars. . . and my head in the clouds. . . but then you came along, and that changed everything.” You chance a glance in his direction, your eyebrows knitting together, “B-but why?. . .” Wyrn blinks sleepily, thinking for a moment. “There’s a lot of reasons, some that I may not be able to entirely explain in words, perhaps it is something to do with fate. That destiny has bound us together. But ever since you came. . . I wished to be a part of your world..” He laughs, “But perhaps it’s more simple, working with you, and getting to know you has been a delight. You are so energetic and animated I don’t know how you can have so much energy.”

Your heart was hammering rapid fire into your throat, and you scoot away from him. Flustered and frazzled, staring at him. “I don’t get it. . .”

“Mm?” Wyrn’s swishes back and forth lazily, “I suppose I am asking. . . in a round about way. . . if you would take me as your one and only. Or if you would consider it. . .”

Your eyes go wide, “Wh-what?” the way his pale yellow eyes stared into you made your throat tighten. “Th-that’s really corny-- you’re teasing me aren’t you?” You stammer, Wyrn frowns softly and shakes his head. “I do mean every word of it. . .” You look down and fall quiet. When you don’t respond, he starts to get up, “You do not have to feel as if you are forced to feel the same way. All I wanted to do was to tell you how I feel, and I do mean every word of it. What you choose to do with that information is entirely up to you dear one. . .” 

You reach up, your hands fingers splayed. “W-wait. . .” You bite your lip, your mind hesitating for a moment before you sit up on your knees, giving him a little kiss before you fluster. Wyrn blinks slowly before he smiles. “I also. . .” You murmur slowly, “like being by your side. Even if I’ve felt frusterated at times. . .” “Frusterated?” He teases you gently, carefully nuzzling against you, “When have you ever felt that?” You grumble something softly in response and he laughs. “I shall try to be more conciderate,” He says sweetly, smiling at you as his eyes crinkle up. Carefully leaning down to place a kiss on your forehead. “I am sure there is a lot to do today, just like every other.” He sits up and stands, stretching his arms up and back as you slide off the bed. You allow yourself a shy smile and nod, “At least you are up in time for breakfast this morning. . .” Wyrn perks up and smiles. “You shall join me for morning tea then?”

You nod again, following him quietly out of his room, stifling a yawn of your own.

#monster x reader #monster x human #exophilia #fluff #sfw #demon x reader

[genshin-scenarios]

i had this thought out of nowhere but; what if childe gets so frustrated with reader/traveler (because they won't open up to him, since U know he did with his siblings and everything) that even fighting with them doesn't bring him joy anymore. spare angst/romance crumbs pls 🤲🏻🤲🏻🤲🏻 it could be anything, from headcanons to oneshot just gimme 🤲🏻🤲🏻🤲🏻🤲🏻

A/N: I’m sorry if this doesn’t make too much sense (it’s an ungodly hour and my brain wants sleep) - I may edit this later on but here are some headcanons for now!

On one hand, Childe can’t really blame you for staying an arm’s length away. He is a Fatui Harbinger after all, and considering the things he did it’s reasonable for you to be wary of him.

But on another… People are allowed to be selfish and stupid at some points, right? So he’s not about to put down his frustrations as if they shouldn’t exist - he’d much rather steam over it and take it out through combat.

Childe’s annoyance with the situation is mostly a buzz in the background. He doesn’t let it affect his daily life or work, or even his interactions with you - just does as he wishes, sharing what he wants (domestic details, really. Nothing political, unless you counted his attitude at times) and giving you an opening to do the same, if you so wished.

...You often don’t, prompting a small, disappointed sigh from the man. He usually doesn’t prod after that, but sometimes finds himself voicing the musings in his head.

“Are you still that wary of me?” 

“Even scraps of vague answers in return would be better than just silence, you know?” 

“...Do you truly see me for my job title rather than my person?”

“Or perhaps… Do the memories from the Golden House cling like a reminder whenever I speak with you?”

Childe knows that most of these are probably false, but it’s clear to anyone that he was just rambling without much of a filter to his words. Maybe he’s grown tired and impatient, maybe he’s had a drink or more, or perhaps… He was simply in the mood for a bit of lashing out, even if it’s in a muted manner compared to his daggers and arrows

“...It’s funny, huh? Sometimes when we spar, I feel like you’re even trying to hide your tells and expression from me.” He tilts his head at you, mouth twisting into a small smirk, though it is without mirth. “I suppose I should be flattered, for having gained such a diligent adversary.”

#genshin impact #genshin impact imagines #genshin impact headcanons #genshin impact childe #genshin impact reader insert #genshin impact writing #genshin impact x reader #genshin impact scenarios #genshin impact x you #genshin impact childe x reader #genshin childe #genshin imagines #genshin headcanons #genshin reader insert #genshin x reader #genshin impact requests #gi imgines #gi childe #gi headcanons #traveler wishes #soft dreams

[fandomsnfluff]

May I request 8 (scenarios) with Diavolo? It can be with anyone it just seems like something he would do (●´ω｀●)

OMG U KNOW I HAD TO DO THIS ONE WITH LUCIFER 😭

tickle prompts/scenarios

8: tickle hugs

◦◦,`°.✽✦✽.◦.✽✦✽.°`,◦◦

Diavolo never came off as a particularly needy person. Except in this instance, when for some reason he just couldn’t stop bugging Lucifer.

The two of them were in a meeting in a room of the prince’s castle, and it was only supposed to last for about half an hour. However, a heated debate had started and never really ceased between two leaders of clubs at RAD about how the extracurriculars were going to get more resources, and the two of them had wasted at least forty-five more minutes of other speakers’ times by chiding in and interrupting each other when they proposed their own ideas.

At this point, Lucifer knew Diavolo well enough to be able to almost read his mind. It was clear that the demon prince was becoming restless; every few minutes or so he would kick at Lucifer’s foot or squeeze or prod at his knees and thighs, even leaning over to press his shoulder or even his face against the side of his arm. It took every once of energy for Lucifer to hold back from snapping at him in the middle of the meeting, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that anyway; he could never imagine getting angry at his closest friend. Frustrated and annoyed with him, yes, but never outwardly angry.

After a few more moments, finally, the near two-hour-turned meeting ended.

Once he left the room, Lucifer grabbed his things and prepared to head back to the house; he only told Mammon that he would be gone for a little more than half an hour, and his skin crawled at the prospect of him getting into any kind of trouble.

A hand grabbed his forearm, and he whipped around to meet the soft golden gaze of the demon prince.

“Lucifer?” Diavolo’s voice came out small, almost shy. “Would you...would you like to come up to my room, just for a moment?”

Lucifer was so, so close to denying the offer; he really didn’t want to see the shit that Mammon had gotten up to when he was away. However, seeing that endearing, desperate look in the demon prince’s usually harsh golden stare sparked something within him, and he found himself smiling softly at him.

“Oh, all right. But let’s make it quick.”

With that, Diavolo instantly took his hand and nearly pulled him up the stairs to his room, the speed at which he was moving surprising Lucifer quite a bit. As soon as they arrived in the demon prince’s room, he closed the door and sat on his bed.

“Okay, what’s this thing that you wanted to show me?” Lucifer asked.

Instead of pulling out a shiny crown or a new article of clothing, Diavolo stood up and began approaching the black-haired demon, a serious look on his face. Lucifer blinked, wondering if he should stay put or back away; he had never seen such an expression directed at him and only him from the demon prince. Was he in trouble for something? Was it something that he said or did recently or during the meeting? He couldn’t stop himself from swallowing, feeling the sweat form on his forehead.

But the demon prince didn’t do quite what he was expecting. Instead of leaning down to stare him in the face, pin him against the wall, or even strike him, he had reached forward and enveloped him in one of the softest, most comforting hugs he had ever received in his 5000+ years of living. Of course, he would never, ever admit this verbally, not even to Diavolo, his closest friend.

“You looked like you needed one of these,” Diavolo mumbled, his voice muffled by Lucifer’s clothing as he pressed his face into his shoulder.

“Are you sure it wasn’t just because you wanted my attention?” Lucifer asked, recalling how touchy the demon prince had been during the meeting.

“Maybe.” That was the only response he got. Lucifer awkwardly wrapped his arms around the other’s shoulders and gave a slight squeeze, but after a few moments he began to feel a bit awkward from all the contact.

“O-okay, Diavolo, that’s enough,” Lucifer commented after a few moments. But the demon prince didn’t respond, and it didn’t feel like he was letting up, not even a little bit. In fact, it felt like his grip was becoming a bit...firmer, as time went on.

Then Lucifer had to bite back a gasp as Diavolo straight up squeezed him, feeling a stab of alarm. He tried to squirm away, but Diavolo was faster and stronger, so Lucifer could only really resort to begging at this point. “Okay, Diavolo, that’s en-- mMMPFH!!”

There really was nothing Lucifer could do to bite back that horribly embarrassing half-squeal kept back just enough by his sealed lips as he suddenly felt fingers jabbing and poking at his sides. A fresh wave of alarm made its way through Lucifer’s body, accompanied by goosebumps and a tingly sensation at the contact, and it only rose as the touches continued. He fought with all of his being not to laugh at the tickles, but it was becoming increasingly harder as he was almost being forcibly pressed against Diavolo’s chest.

However, he lost the fight, the dam breaking as soon as the demon prince playfully nibbled at the side of his neck. The Avatar of Pride quickly lost his composure and broke into breathy giggles, squirming as much as he could in Diavolo’s arms as he fought for breath through his laughter. It wasn’t fair; Diavolo knew how sensitive his neck was! But this was the Diavolo, the demon prince who, despite his upbringing as the future ruler of the Devildom, loved to have his cake and eat it, too, poking fun at his closest friends whenever it was appropriate. And, of course, Lucifer was no exception. Perhaps he was his favorite target because of his strict, unforgiving, intimidating stature?

But he couldn’t think about that now. All Lucifer wanted to do was get away from the relentless demon prince and his tickly fingers. He gasped and let out a sudden squeal of alarm when Diavolo’s hands moved from his sides to his hips, squeezing at the bone and allowing his fingers to trace the curvatures of his pelvis. He really couldn’t do this for much longer; why did he have to be so sensitive to Diavolo’s touch? Why hadn’t he known he was this ticklish before? He could do nothing but laugh and squeal with mirth as the demon prince trapped him against his chest, torturing two of his most sensitive spots mercilessly as he refused to let Lucifer go.

“Dihihiahahaha!” Lucifer cried, his voice coming out as an embarrassingly high-pitched squeal of mirth. “Lehehet gohoho!”

“What’s the magic word?” Diavolo teased, bringing one of his hands up to spider his fingernails against the side of Lucifer’s neck, making him outright shriek and jerk so hard that he crashed into Diavolo’s chest, nearly bowling him over onto the ground.

“Plehehehease!” There was no hesitation in the plea; there were little things that tickled more than those torturous fingernails the bare skin of Lucifer’s neck. As the incessant fingers finally eased up, he could finally pant and sigh in relief. Lucifer wasn’t the kind of person to exaggerate; he genuinely felt like he was going to die during that.

“You all right?” Diavolo asked, but there was an uncanny note of laughter in his voice.

“No.” There was no hesitation in Lucifer’s response. “It was all torture.”

“Was it, though?” Diavolo cocked his head to the side. “I don’t even remember the last time I hugged you. You sure you didn’t enjoy it just a little bit?”

“The hug was fine. I do not, however, appreciate being mercilessly tickled like that.”

“Then why don’t I just hug you without any tickles?” Diavolo offered.

Lucifer glared at him. “You’re planning something, I know it.”

“No I’m not!” the demon prince protested, opening his arms wide. “I promise you.”

Lucifer hesitated for a moment, unsure if he should trust Diavolo. Unsure if he should trust Diavolo. Shame washed over him as the thought echoed back to him. This was the person he had bestowed his undying loyalty to in perhaps one of the most desperate and devastating times of his entire life. Of course he trusted Diavolo; he promised him to do so in every move he made.

So that was what influenced his decision. Walking towards the demon prince to meet him, he was embraced by not only a warm, comforting, soft hug around the shoulders, as if Diavolo wasn’t going to let go of him, but also of any internal warmth that spread all throughout his body and made his heart expand to fill his entire chest. Was this what true, undying loyalty felt like? Was that what Diavolo was trying to convey to him in this very moment?

Lucifer couldn’t tell outright what the demon prince’s motivation was in that moment. But what he did know was that the two of them would be inseparable, bound by their undying loyalty to one another, until the very end.

#obey me #obey me fanfic #anime tickling #my posts #ask #anonymous

[l33hyunjaes]

"ANYONE WHO HURTS MY HYUNJAE WILL SEE MY FISTS" ADJKDJSJ i'm laughing so hard at your tags AHAHA. and yes it's so booring not having a crush but... guess that's why we're here 🤡 the bermuda line appearance was just me being self indulgent but i see it worked on u hehe

alsooo do you have enough data to pick a fave(s) from my works that you've read? i wanna know what kind of elements you enjoy in writing (and pls... don't say hyunjae... LOOL)

FLSKDJFKLDS yes I ... expressed pretty much everything that came across my mind in those tags HAHAHA

Oh yeah I definitely live vicariously through fics when my own life is boring lololol and yes the Bermuda line appearance definitely worked on me hheeheh

Ohhhhhh a fave? HM wait let me see ... ok it's definitely more than one lol but!

If the lipstick matches (maybe don't wear it): Y/N thinking that Juyeon would be really that stupid to not recognise them is just too funny! Of course, I loved the setup of the situation in the first place, and all those lab moments were so precious <3 (Also loved the teasing of Hyunjae - and yes, I say this from the version of me that didn't even know who Hyunjae was when I read the fic for the very first time!)

The regular dilemma: sometimes I just think about the part where Juyeon 'inspects' the uh ... latte art ... 😂 The humour in this one is top-tier, personally! Also Juyeon's persistence in actually coming despite Y/N giving him the wrong number is just too cute~ Omg just realized that this also features the rest of Bermuda line slkjdfklsdjflksj hahahahahaha

Bad at being bad: yeah I know it's a Hyunjae fic but in my defence! I didn't really know who he was until way after I read this fic HAHAHA (and look where we are now 🤡). Also the opening lines take on a whole new meaning nowadays HAHA! I really liked the 'duality' of Hyunjae in this fic, and also how every single time Y/N heard about his 'bad boy' persona, they had actually in fact been there when the incident happened (and he was definitely NOT a bad boy lol).

Offend: I love the teasing in this hehehe from both Sunwoo and Hyunjae! I know this was more like a drabble but I think it has a great amount of potential! (I also looooovveeeeee enemies-to-lovers tropes lskjdflksdjfls)

Take a hint: I loved the rollercoaster of emotions that this took me on as a (semi-frustrated) reader - like the miscommunication trope! The best friends to lovers trope!

(sldkfjskldjfl I already tried to stop myself from naming all the fics of yours that I've read and describing what I liked most Hyunjae in each of them HAHA)

Hm I think common thing that I like about your fics is definitely - comedy! Seems like the ones I really like all have quite memorable comedic relief moments! Perhaps because they make the fics seem a bit more realistic? Like not everything goes well / perfectly, and there are always awkward moments in life hehe - I guess these moments also make the characters a bit more relatable too. I also know you said that you've realized you use a lot of dialogue in your fics hahaha but! I personally really like them, and I think a lot of your iconic fic lines are from dialogues! (Also I love college!aus a lot HAHAHAHA)

Hm also in general, I really like it when you describe their confessions / kisses - they seem very romantic, and you take your time to describe them, which I really like (gives me lots of butterflies!). The way you describe them like they hold the whole world in their hands or something ... you know, it's just so poetic! ❤️

#the boyz #gracefulweather

[marshieee]

We just changed

Timeskip Osamu x fem! Reader

Warning⚠️: angst

Part 6

A/N: this is where i get in lmao😂, thank you again to this angel @iis4d for proofreading this❤️ imma be watch jjk and make u fic don’t worry

Am i the pathetic one? Or you? I want my love to change...

It has been two months since that awful night, since that last heated argument and the last time you saw him face to face.

You’ve been doing fine unlike the past month, trying new stuffs and focusing on yourself. You got a part time job as a tutor so that atleast helped the two with the bills, futakuchi and aone was helping you with all their might which you definitely appreciated.

Futakuchi didn’t mentioned that he met your ex, it wasn’t that important so why would he? He’s still keeping his promise more like a declaration to osamu that he’ll make sure that you’re gonna be ok, you’ll be fine under his care and he plans to keep it that way.

“Oho~ what did you just say? You’re going to tokyo?”

You rolled your eyes at the irritating remark from your cousin, as much as possible Futakuchi wanted to volunteer on going to tokyo on your behalf again, but you insisted.

“Yes i am and don’t worry tokyo is big it’s not like I’m going to bump to my ex anytime soon”

That’s what you thought, you were at a shopping district trying to buy cheap things that caught your attention and to be honest it’s not like you’re gonna use them anyways but hey wasting money is fun.

But your attention was averted to a certain girl, you would have just ignored her but no, something caught your attention and it was the person who’s she with.

And without any second thoughts your feet unconsciously went up to them and now, now you are infront of them.

“Can we help you?”

“Um yes uh can i talk to you for a moment?”

They looked at each other before turning to you, before her partner was about to say something.

“Sure, baby can you wait here this will be quick i promise”

“Alright then”

She dragged you to the restroom which was miraculously empty, you don’t know what’s going on your mind yet you were to focused on wanting to talk to her.

“So? What do want to talk about?”

“What happened to you and osamu? Did you two broke up?”

It was a bit sudden but certainly you caught her off guard by those questions.

“Ahh~ so you’re the girlfriend”

She had an amused smile plastered on her face as she scanned you, pursing your lips you hesitated to answer nevertheless you still did.

“Yes but—“

“Hold on judging your from your expression it’s ex girlfriend now huh?”

You nodded slowly, she just scoffed and the way that she looks, she looks a bit offended.

“Right before anything else I’m Aj”

She offered her hand which you awkwardly accepted with a forced smile.

“Y/N, nice to meet you”

“So what was your question again?”

“Did you and Osamu break up?”

“We weren't even dating in the first place”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me”

Shocked as you try to process that one sentence she just said. They weren’t dating? How come? They were just fine the last time you saw them, they even look like they were.

“You two...weren’t dating?”

“No.”

“How come-“

“Ah so you saw us? Figured.”

Aj sighed, she was expecting that you’ll eventually catch them red handed, she was surprised that you hadn't lashed out on her already.

“Osamu and I were just fuck buddies, no strings attached.”

This was confusing to you, they were so intimate, you assumed that they were dating behind your back. Aj caught up with the expression on your face and immediately knew what’s going on.

“We met at the bar, he approached me and started flirting to which I flirted back of course...”

She clicked her tongue and looked away, it was clear that she was irritated talking about that.

“I’ve always wanted to meet you, you know.”

“What?”

She looks at you with guilty eyes, was she guilty about stealing Osamu from you? Does she want to apologize to you? You never blamed anyone for this, especially not her.

“I... I didn’t know Osamu had a girlfriend”

This left you dumbfounded, so she never knew about your existence? You should have expected something like this because it hurts hearing something like this from her.

“When we met at the bar I had asked him if he was seeing anyone, of course if he had said yes, I wouldn’t be flirting back, I would have immediately said no, I’m not that kind of a person who’s going to fuck someone that's already in a relationship heck even someone that's married! I’m not that fucking low.”

You could tell that she was serious, frustrated even. You just stayed silent waiting for her to continue.

“He told me that he was single.”

Aj mocked the word single as she rolled her eyes remembering that horrible memory.

“So I flirted back as i never knew that he had a girlfriend of...?”

“S...six years”

And with a scoff Aj sarcastically laughed, unbelievable that asshole cheated on a girl he’s been dating for six fucking years?! What a joke! What a fucking joke!

“This is the worst am I right?”

“Yeah”

“So..anything else? what do you want to know?”

“How long have you been...fuck buddies?”

Aj was hesitating if she should answer that question or not, either way both are painful options so she just choose to answer your question.

“Two months”

Two months, he’s been cheating on you for two months which means those I love you's and kisses were already shallow, those hugs and I miss you's was never genuine.

“Two months...I see”

“I’m sorry”

“No don’t be, it wasn’t your fault”

“But-“

Aj chose to shut up, this is not the right time to argue if she was at fault or not since you were trying to process the information she just gave to you.

“Just awhile ago you told me you wanted to see me..why?”

“Well that’s because I became aware of your existence”

“Someone told you about me, who?”

“I don’t know who but he was tall and got this slanted eyes.”

The first person that came into your mind who fitted Aj’s description.

“Rin”

“He came to me and told me about you.”

It was the same day Osamu left her apartment early in the morning.

“How can i help you?”

“Leave Osamu alone or just don’t involve yourself with him anymore”

“Um excuse me?”

Whoever this man is he got the nerve to say that to her early in the morning.

“Ok mister whoever the hell are you, what’s your relationship with him anyways? Why are you telling me to not get involved with him anymore?”

Before suna could react AJ suddenly gasped.

“ARE YOU PERHAPS G—“

“No I’m not gay! And no I don’t like Osamu in that way! I’m just.........a colleague”

“Huh then can you tell me why did you say that earlier?”

“Because Osamu has a girlfriend”

“What?”

And then suna told her everything, right after that she decided that the next time she and Osamu will meet, she’ll end whatever things they had.

Apparently when she and Osamu met again, Osamu was also thinking the same thing.

She looked at the man infront of her clearly didn’t have the energy to even look at her.

“So you have a girlfriend”

That’s when osamu’s eyes shots at aj, he did consider the possibility of aj knowing about you but he didn’t expect that she would have known this early

“How—“

“So you were lying?”

“Aj..”

“You were right?”

“Yeah”

Aj pushed her hair back and clicked her tounge, unbelievable fucking unbelievable! So she was fucking someone who’s already taken? Great! Fucking great.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“....”

“Oh now you’re not gonna answer?”

“Alcohol...”

“Oh yeah? You were pretty sober to me that time osamu”

He avoided his gaze,

“Ok sure let’s say you were DRUNK at that time....how come you still kept it a secret for two fucking months?”

“I..i—“

“Oh! So you were playing with me? Sure i fuck everybody but i will never fuck someone who’s in a relationship osamu and you FUCKING know that”

“Yeah i do”

“Then why?!”

“I...i don’t know”

Aj scoffed,

“You don’t know? You don’t know? Hahahaha BULLSHIT I don’t believe that you did not know, that's bullcrap osamu”

“I was just caught up in lust and—“

“Fuck you”

Osamu lowered his head to avoid her glare, right..fuck him and his life he deserves this.

“Let’s end this bullshit osamu”

He nodded in agreement.

“Yeah...you’re right”

Aj was about to leave but one last time she turned around to face osamu again.

“Just one more thing before I go”

Aj instantly slapped Osamu hard on the face, Osamu on the other hand didn’t do anything.

“Asshole.”

“I know.....I’m sorry.”

She couldn't believe that she was deceived by some jerk, she never really wanted that to happen if only she had known about Osamu’s relationship.

“Thanks to that jerk my trust issues are way worse now”

“Tell me about it”

Aj patted you on the shoulder and gave you a small smile.

“I’m sorry that happened and I’m glad i got to talk to you”

“Thank you for telling me Aj”

“Might be too late though but you did deserve to know the truth."

You just nodded and returned a small but genuine smile, you were both victims of the same man, she didn’t do anything wrong, she just knew nothing.

“Funny huh?”

“What is?”

Aj looked at you with a small smile.

“We’re both been lied to by the same guy”

“Victims of the same guy”

“Yeah...”

You two stood there a couple of minutes before AJ turned to the sink and started to wash her hands.

“Well i think I already told you what you wanted to know.”

She started to wipe her hands then looks at you.

“I’m glad you broke up with Osamu, you deserve someone better”

“Thank you, you too.”

“Oh darling hahahaha...I’m not planning on finding the right person yet.”

“O-Oh?”

She gave a wink then turned her heels and walked out leaving you all alone, you heard her shout.

“TERUSHIMA! BABY!”

You were relieved that she’s doing fine after all of that, you saw your reflection and frowned.

“Good for her, I guess.”

Well it’s just two months no wonder she’s alright already unlike you, you need to cope with the lost 6 years of relationship.

‘You’ll be alright' you mindlessly reminded yourself

“I’ll be fine”

Part 7

#haikyuu scenarios #haikyuu oneshot #haikyuu!! #haikyuu #haikyuu angst #angst #oc #author aj #osamu #timeskip osamu #osamu fic #osamu scenario #osamu x reader

[daisies-write]

And he said “nope” - Part 2

Deal with the Devil

Hisoka x weak!reader; soulmate AU

Ok so we decided to go with a light and fun story! I suppose it isn’t what’s expected of a Hisoka x reader but with Ari we had so much fun imagining different scenarios where both are forced to work together, it just started to take life on it’s own! I hope it won’t be disapointing for you and that you’ll like this serie as much as we do! @kuuredere​

-Yasu

Previous chapter / Next chapter

TW: none

Writer: Both of us ! (Ari and Yasu)

Word count: 1965

    This is how your "contract" began with Hisoka, with one simple deal: to continue with your life without being disturbing each other, as if you two never met. You would never work together anyway. You had morals and Hisoka was�� Hisoka.

    But strangely, since then your life had seemed to take an ominous decline and you were starting to wonder if the Universe had something to do with it. Too much had happened in too little time: losing your car, having your apartment infested with cockroaches, and finding out that your partner might be having an affair. Well… it couldn't be worse, after all.

    " You are fired. "

Ah. It could, actually.

    You were sitting on a bench somewhere in a park, with a big box full of your things lying at your feet, trying somehow to reach your partner on the phone. After the fifth call, you gave up. They must have been busy ...

    You clapped your hands over your eyes, sighing loudly, twisting in your head everything you could do to find a job that paid as well as your last but there were very few options and the remaining ones didn't appeal to you one bit. You weren't desperate enough to striptease yet, that's for sure, and going back to babysitting was a big no.

    "Maybe they were right in the end," you mumbled in your despair. “I'm not meant to be a Hunter and I'm not made for the big city.” A sad chuckle escaped your lips. “A real little peasant, haha. "

    As if trying to mock you, the sun and the sky were extremely bright that day. Or maybe it was to support you...

    " Well! I got this! I will not be discouraged for so little! "

    You got up on your feet, determined, and then sat down again almost instantly.

    "I have nowhere to sleep."

    You expressed yourself with yet another long sigh. If only you hadn’t met this Hisoka, if only you hadn’t gone to see that damn battle at Heaven Arenas with your friends, if only you had said no, your life surely would have just as chill, like it used to. Seeing in color was fun but not necessary.

    "I don't like pink," you thought as you saw a kid make a big bubble with his chewing gum.

    "My, it looks like my kitten is doing badly ~," said a voice you recognized all too well.

    Slowly turning your head to the side, you could finally confirm your fears: Hisoka was looking at you with a big smile, a hand on his cheek and mocking eyes.

    "Hey, Satan," you answered instinctively.

    He laughs at your words.

    "I’m pretty sure I’m even worse, but thank you nonetheless."

    “Go away. I don’t have time to mess with you. And like, don’t you have a fight today?”

    Hisoka shrugged.

    “The guy isn’t worth my time, that’s all.”

    “So you thought about stalking me?”

    “I thought about watching children play but I found you like you would find a wart,” he said nonchalantly.

    You just started at him, genuinely creeped out.

    “Get out of here, pedo.”

    He laughed again.

    “Make me.”

     “The sexual innuendo of this sentence is way too big so you better stop using it unless if you want to bang me,” you said, unphased. “But there’s a hint: you ugly.”

    “Wow!” Hisoka placed a hand to his heart, a pout on his face. “You didn’t seem quite so aggressive last time. Something bad happened?” His eyes found your box and his smirk came back. “Fired?”

    You said nothing, but the displeased expression gave him confirmation.

    “Your fault.”

    “How’s that? Oh, let me guess,” his finger taping his lips in the most frustrating exagerration of his excessively dramatic self. “You couldn’t stop thinking about me and got distracted from your work, so of course, your boss told you to never come back because of your  uselesness. Tragic love story!” He sighed. “But then again, who could resist me? I feel sympathetic for you. <3″

    Your disgust grew just at the thought of being in love with Hisoka. He annoyed more you at every word he spoke, at every breath he took but you wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing this. You prefered playing his game and use your sarcasm to counter his and perhaps, distract yourself from your harsh reality.

    “Well, if you’re so sympathetic, you could buy me a house-”

    “Nope, <3″

You tried, at least!

    “My apartment have been infested with cockroaches, so honestly, I really need a house. If you know a place, tell me.”

Hisoka eyed you for a second.

     “Are you really unclean to the point of having cockroaches in your whole apartment?”

    “What ? NO!” you yelled.

He just laughed again, shoting his head back. You bite your lower lips in embarassment as you saw the eyes of everyone else in proximity glaring at you. Your cheeks burned in fluster.You’ve been too loud.

    “I have an idea!” you said to Hisoka after chacking your burning face away. “We could swap houses! That way, you could live with your family!”

His laugh died and he looked at you, pleased that you started playing with him.

   “They said they missed you, you know? That you shouldn’t have run off and left them without saying anything,” you continued.

   “I,” started Hisoka through a shit eating grin, “hate you so much and I urge to kill you but it would be no fun with you.”

    “I think one of your brothers at my house is called Steve. Steve really, really misses you.” You smiled. “I feel like you two were very close.”

    You liked insisting on each and every word of your sentence.

    “Impossible. I’m too sexy to be related to Steve.”

    “You’re sure? I thought you were twins. I could barely tell you apart!” Your voice sounded more and more amused with each syllable leaving your mouth. It felt so natural. “Wow.”

    Honeslty, playful bander with Hisoka was fun. A real game, a match one of you had to win; he was never phased by any of your words so you kept sending sly insults back and forth in this oddly lively and convivial disgust you shared for each other.

    Unfortunatly, everything must come to an end, right? You stopped quick in your teasing when you saw a familiar number appearing on your phone. Your smile vanished in less than a second and the atmosphere wasn’t so light anymore. Your partner was calling you, but in all honesty, you didn’t want to answer now. Or more like you didn’t have the heart to. 

    Hisoka raised one eyebrow.

    “Lover?”

    “I guess.. They’ve been cheating for a while, so no, not really anymore,” you said, trying your best to seem nonchalant about it.

    “And you’re okay with that? You don’t seem like the type who’d have an open relationship.” His voice sounded like he took great joy in your suffering.

    “Well, they found their soulmate. I know them,” you gulped. “I know them more than I know myself. It’s been hard on them and they aren’t ready to talk about it but I’m aware of what they’re doing at night. I saw their messages by accident.” You shrugged. “I’m only waiting for when they feel like it’s time.”

You stared at the number until it disappeared.

    “Liar.”

You looked over to Hisoka again, slightly disoriented.

    “You can dump them since you found your own soulmate.The break-up wouldn’t be so hard on them if they knew this.” He chuckled. “You’re just slowing down the inevitable fate of your couple. You don’t want to be alone and that’s all there is to know.”

    You glared at him, now. Your heart was beating loudly against your chest, in pure anger. How could he read through you so easily? You didn’t like that one bit and you were disappointed in yourself for oversharing. He’s your soulmate, yes, but he’s still Hisoka.

“Please. Not now.”

“Sucks to be you, love.”

    An awkward silence fall upon you both, or at least upon you. While you were frantically texting your best friend to ask for a place to stay, only to be met with a lenghty apology, you searched for other ways to find a place to sleep tonight. The motel rooms prices were way too high and you didn’t know how long you’d need to stay, nor how much it’ll cost to have your appartment clean again. You couldn’t face your partner and you were too ashamed to call your family. Your pride would end you but you prefered sleeping in the streets than having them look at you disapprovingly. Your whole world was falling apart and you blamed it all on Hisoka. And yet...

    Hisoka’s eyes didn’t leave your figure. His mind was racing and it seemed like it was the only thing it did since he met you. He didn’t speak when he saw you frown and sigh and type desesperatly on your phone, swipping through your contacts, hesitating over a room price, checking over and over again if anyone could help you. His mind was still racing when he told you:

    “I guess you can come to my place for a while.”

    You were utterly speechless and goggled at him for a few seconds. It isn’t like Hisoka at all to propose help. He had something in mind, you knew as much, but you couldn’t help but feel floored.

    “Who are you and what the heck did you do to my soulmate-?”

    “Awww, you refer to me as your soulmate, that’s adorable.”

    “ANSWER-” Honestly, you didn’t care about the volume of your voice at this point. You were too shocked. 

    Hisoka just laughed it off and looked at you, openly condescending and still smiling. Does he ever stop doing so ?

    “I will have to take on a mission so I won’t be at Heaven Arenas for a while.” He pointed at you. “You can take my room there while I’m gone.”

You were too confused.

    “But why? You gain nothing by doing this!” You frowned and wrapped your hands protectively against your body. “I won’t have sex with you!”

    “Don’t worry, I’d rather die,” he rolled his eyes. “I let you take my room because whatever happens to you if you sleep on a bench in the parc happens to me as well. And even if I’m pretty sure I can manage, I don’t want to wake up in the morning with a hole in my belly. You got it, darling?” 

    “Wait, what do you mean everything that happens to-’

But he didn’t let you finish your sentence: he took your box and walked away without giving you any other explanation.

    “Hisoka, wait!”

    Well, at least you got a rather interesting piece of informations. You didn’t know everything about soulmates but you sure knew that even if you were linked by fate, Hisoka wouldn’t do this without solid motives. Everything about him screamed to you to never trust him but you needed your box and you needed a roof over your head. You wouldn’t let your guard down for now. You probably couldn’t beat him in a fight but he didn’t seem like he’d kill you so that was already a good point.

    You made a mental note to look more deeply into all of this and untangle the mystery of his help and quickly followed your jerk soulmate. 

    “I said wait, asshole!”

    “What, miss me already? Do you want a goodbye kiss?”

    “Don’t say such repulsive things,” you replied, gagging. “I’ll need the room’s key.”

    “Here,” he tosses it to you before adding “just don’t go looking around my stuff too much~”

This was going to be... interesting.

#hunter x hunter #hxh #hxh x reader #hisoka x reader #hisoka morrow x reader #hxh hisoka #hunter x hunter imagines #hunter x hunter x reader #hisoka imagine #hisoka morrow #hisoka morow x reader #imagines #hxh 1999 #x reader #hxh 2011 #hxh imagines #soulmate au #imagine a soulmate au w/ a weak s/o

[yeoldontknow]

The Edge of Summer

Author’s Note: happy birthday @kyungseokie​ !! this has been sitting in my wips since january when i attempted to write this for his birthday. and that...came and went like a lightning bolt so here we are. im finally tossing this into the wild! wanted this up an entire hour ago but my internet died so T~T HAPPY BIRTHDAY I LUV U! Pairing: Kyungsoo x Reader (oc; female) Universe: this is an installment to the Did You See universe however Kyungsoo does not have a full story. this will be the only story centering on him | you do not need to read the other stories to understand, enjoy, or appreciate this one Genre: friends to lovers; fluff; romance; angst; au Summary: As summer comes to a close, your friends make the annual trek to the lake house for one last hurrah. You’ve done this before - countless times, but this year Baekhyun brings his new girlfriend along with him and this, of course, means some plans have to change. You just have no idea how much will change by the end of the trip.  Rating: PG-13 Warnings: some strong language; a lot of lust; baekhyun being the worst wingman to exist; it gets pretty spicy by the end but like..only if you squint? just playing it safe yall Word Count: 13.1K

It is only when Kyungsoo’s hand falls delicately into his lap, fingers grazing your thigh with the aimless of touch of nonchalance that you decide:

If you make it out alive, you are going to kill Baekhyun.

Three hours into the road trip, and you think the conviction of this decision carries with it the bitterness of gunpowder and the relief of satisfaction, two distinct feelings entirely befitting the situation you have found yourself in. A five hour journey is long enough on its own, time blurring seamlessly around you in the close confines of a car - but, when pressed against Kyungsoo like this, against the strong muscles of his arms and thighs, feeling the heat of his warm skin radiating into yours, five hours is centuries of pining. These hours are too long for anyone to survive, the weight of yearning compressing your lungs into phantoms of their former glory, breath too quiet, and too slow, afraid of disrupting the fragile pretense of peace.

Being this close to him, this close to the embodiment of your pining, carries the same impact in your bones as a cataclysm, and so you grimace in dismay, silently aware that you might not even live to make good on your silent promise. Baekhyun will live another day and you will wither amongst the remainder of your desire, buried with yet another promise you failed to keep.

Somewhere in an alternate universe, you are happy, and this happiness comes easily. In a different life, you are comfortable, riding in Chanyeol’s car with him, his girlfriend, and Yixing, listening to the playlist Chanyeol had enthusiastically curated for the journey. You would be laughing, talking, teasing - or, perhaps, none of those things, instead luxuriating the jovial warmth that always seems to bloom in their company, the kind that overtakes you without warning, mind unfocused and hazy with thoughts of freedom.

Instead, your back presses into the middle seat of Junmyeon’s old car, knees and thighs aching with the effort of making yourself small between Kyungsoo and Yixing. Glancing to your right, you eye Yixing’s placidly neutral expression, his unfazed smile as he teases Sehun, reaching forward to ruffle his hair from behind the seat. Briefly, you envy him, his loud laugh and the way things are always uncomplicated for him - the way he always gives over out of love, even if he has the briefest moments of internal protest.

At 8AM, Baekhyun insisted he bring his new fling on this vacation. It was important, he said, his eyes pleading with you and Yixing, the puppy dog expression you'd grown used to fixed securely in his cheeks and pout. Chanyeol’s car would be the couples car, and so it was important he be there to set the mood. Yixing had eyed him amicably, biting the inside of his cheek with an endeared sense of amusement, complaining only because the plush seats of Chanyeol’s car were far more comfortable and because it would insight a brief riot in Baekhyun that served only to amuse him further. 

And he conceded almost immediately, an ever supportive wingman, winking at Baekhyun before excusing himself to gather his things. 

You, however, protested valiantly, arms crossed over your chest and heart unmoved. Baekhyun pleaded, promised french fry dates and to do your dishes for a week - even though he does not live with you, even though you actually enjoy doing your dishes, and, still, you protested, lips pursed and eyebrow cocked in disdain. 

But, standing gracefully in the doorway, the sunlight gliding over his shoulders, craving an angle against his jaw you found almost holy, far too magnificent to be human, Kyungsoo laughed. The deep honey chocolate of his tone brought gooseflesh to your skin, teeth biting down on your tongue to keep your spine from trembling; your favourite laugh, and one he so rarely gives only to you. Behind him, Chanyeol’s tall frame lingered by his car, calling for anyone to get in so he could make his departure, and you think Kyungsoo’s bemused, affectionate smile is really what you agreed to. 

Hours of his smile, even if it was put out, even if it was a barely there glimmer of fond annoyance, even if it faded almost as quickly as it came - this is what you agreed to. 

Even if it meant letting your own heart break, and mend, and shatter once more, chest tight with the burden of proximity.

‘I can feel you looking at me,’ he mumbles, just softly enough that only you can hear the dulcet nature of his voice, teasing and sharp.

Shifting beneath your gaze, his arm nudges gently into yours, soft and supple and smooth, the cotton of his white shirt reduced to little more than rough muslin in comparison. He keeps his head turned as he looks out the window, one hand in his lap while the other holds his chin in its palm, trees and grass streaking past beneath an endless expanse of blue sky. Sunlight pours through the window onto him, casting shadows along his jaw and cheeks that somehow make the curvature of his lips ever more pronounced in profile. 

Around you both, conversations live and die, the rippling cadence of Yixing’s laugh losing its edges as you continue to stare, unblinking, at the hard edge of Kyungsoo’s jaw. 

‘Is there something you want?’ At this, he directs his attention to you, your dry mouth and unwavering gaze, hand still cradling his chin as he regards you expectantly. 

His eyes move over you slowly, taking their time getting acquainted with your features in this light. You feel him where you never feel anyone - all over you, yet ephemeral and nowhere at all, this kind of touching a mystery that runs deep. In a single moment, he is both above and beneath you, walking over the map of your skin and treading just below the surface, the blood in your veins rushing to your heart in celebration. The air in the small car becomes thin, lungs tight and breath constricted. Your hands curl into fists, pressing nails into the muscle of your mount of Venus, but it is not in frustration or fear, rather, instead, the only way you know how to suppress this insurmountable adoration.

By stopping the surrender before it starts, you do not even have the choice to give in.

Perhaps, in the same life in which you are riding in Chanyeol’s car you are also bold, brave enough to give him the best words, the most beautiful words, the ones you keep perpetually beneath your tongue, waiting. How would he look in the aftermath of honesty? What smile would you be given? Would you even survive? You’re unsure, the aspects of such a reality hidden from you now, and so you swallow thickly, giving moisture to your voice to ensure you can speak, even if it is not entirely brave.

‘You’re blocking the window,’ you lie, surprised that you sound so confident, so calm, when the border between your bodies has been so ruefully challenged.

Eyes squeezing closed, they press into crescent moons as his cheeks rise up along the bones, and Kyungsoo laughs, genuinely amused by the absurdity of your statement. So unlike the booming force of Chanyeol’s laugh or the high pitched delight of Yixing’s, Kyungsoo’s low and deep giggle is a thunderclap in the center of your chest, an endless roll of electric pleasure along your nerves. The force of it has him jostling into your side, shoulders vibrating through the humor, and you feel yourself bristle, wholly unprepared. This moment of contact brings with it the absence of thought, the absence of protest, running far deeper than you imagined it could. In a single moment, your longing threatens to unmake you, wanting more of his pleasure, more of his joy, certain nothing is as sacred or magical as this.

Offering you a sardonic, yet amicable smile, he leans back into the seat, making himself as small as possible to take up the least amount of space. Tucking his arms into his sides, he moves away from the window entirely, and releases a hiss of breath through his nose. One eyebrow cocked in question, he pouts, the fullness of his bottom lip sticking out childishly.

‘Is this better?’ he asks through grit teeth, though his smile is tucked in the corner of his lips as a secret; dawn just about to break over the warm glow of his skin.

In this position, his shirt becomes constricted and stretched over his chest, shoulders, and abdomen, revealing the deep contours of his torso. The mid-morning sun casts him in gold, making a home of the pores of his skin and revealing amber flecks in the chocolate of his eyes. Immediately, your tongue becomes heavy, the taste of light filling your mouth, the taste of him and the heat of your unbridled wanting. Even with the smallness of space he has created, gaps between your bodies revealed where he has since retreated, the warmth between you both is a fire that refuses to die, and, in the aftermath of his simple question, you feel yourself flush.

‘Yes, much,’ you nod, hoping your expression is cordial and unmoved. Because it is true. You find you enjoy this view far more than the one before. ‘Now, if only you can stay like that for two more hours.’

Once more he laughs, enjoying your teasing banter as he relaxes into his previous position. All over again he relaxes into you, comfortable and content, strong muscles of his thighs vibrating into your legs as the car bounces over a bump on the highway. It frustrates you how swiftly the butterflies in your stomach wander into your heart as you watch him, stuttering in its rhythm as a stubborn reminder there is no escape, no fail safe to liberate you from this craving. If anything, the closeness you must endure over the length of this trip is only furthering your desire to shorten the ever present distance between your hearts.

‘Why did you give Baekhyun such a hard time this morning?’

His question interrupts your thoughts, words soft yet his tone carries with it a deceptive bite.

Narrowing your brow, you almost snort in surprise. ‘Because it’s ridiculous. Changing everything around at the last minute,’ you explain incredulously. ‘It’s ridiculous.’ Settling back against the hardness of the middle seat, you stare straight ahead, casting your unfocused gaze out beyond the windshield. ‘I can’t believe you’re even asking, as if you wouldn’t do the same.’

In the years you have known him, there has never been a moment where he allowed Baekhyun to get away with anything - not least without an argument or some form of protest. Moving Kyungsoo from one opinion to the next requires a fair amount of convincing and explaining, and, usually, results in his profound frustration until he gives over just to end the conversation. This morning, Kyungsoo said nothing, and his laugh, his smile, and his acquiescence is more out of place than your childish protesting.

Chuckling, he turns back to the window beside him, nodding slightly. ‘You’re not wrong,’ he muses in agreement.

Silence befalls you both, one that does not contain walls or barriers but is gratified. Kyungsoo comfortably nestles into his position, ready to maintain this pose for several more hours, and you turn to look at him, bewildered.

‘That’s it?’ He seems both completely satisfied with your answer and disinterested in continuing the conversation, and your mind races with a confusion so thick you think your hands could break it. ‘That’s all you wanted out of that?’

Tossing you a placid smile, he nods once more. ‘That’s it.’

Searching his face for answers, you translate his words over and over, breaking them down into their smallest pieces to grasp at what lies beneath. ‘Did you ask just to get a rise out of me?’

He keeps his eyes on the world outside, basking in the gold of daylight. It refuses to let him go, the sun, like always, pretending it is you. 

‘Maybe so.’

It’s after you’ve dropped your bags in your large room, the one with the bay window overlooking the lake, that Kyungsoo asks you to help him make lunch. 

You’re not entirely sure where the others have gone, and you find yourself in the open kitchen hugging yourself, looking around the mess for some way to busy your hands. Too many insulated bags and groceries line the counters, the chaos of them inciting a productive sort of stress, the kind that makes you ready to sort and fix, in your veins. Kyungsoo moves around the room with a confident ease, and for a moment you envy him; the answers already seem to live in his actions, not a single moment of question as he clears space and makes room. 

Outside, you hear the deep baritone of Chanyeol’s gleeful howl as it heads towards the lake. Baekhyun’s voice follows, higher in pitch but just as eager, and in the silence of the room you hear Kyungsoo chuckling to himself. The smallness of his smile is betrayed by the light in his eyes, his own happiness a private paradise he shares only with those who choose to look. 

And even before you had any control over it, before your mind could remind you that you value yourself and your solitude most, you had chosen him. You will always choose him. 

‘Do you want to help me cut the vegetables?’

He doesn’t look at you as he asks the question, unloading the set of knives he brought for the week with careful motions. The silver blades seem to gleam in the midday sun, and you recognize them as the ones you bought for his birthday the year previous. He hadn’t asked for them, hadn’t even suggested you buy him anything, but as you passed the culinary shop window, mesmerized by their sharpness, their danger, their promise, you wondered - would they be a present or a plea? An offering of his happiness or yours, a moment of union between you both in which he would feel joy and you would be the cause of such magnificence. 

They’re well worn now. Even from where you stand, you can see the streaks along the blades from multiple sharpening sessions, and as he holds them you can see the hidden strength that lives in his hands. His hands, rough and powerful, yet still more fine than sand and warm as maple. You have never told anyone about your admiration for the elegant length of his fingers, the peaks and valleys of his knuckles, and the way they seem to hold you, transfix you, satisfy you simply because they are proof beauty is not a face or a voice, but an art inherent to all things living. You suppose you will never tell anyone, his hands a poem for you alone.

Peering up at you curiously through the length of his lashes, he patiently waits for your answer and, for the second time today, you feel him. He is becoming an invasion, your defenses drawn down over the many hours beside him, the length of your thighs still tingling from his touch, and you are so aware of him the ripeness of this attention causes you to shiver.

‘Why are you asking me?’ you ask softly, taking a few tentative steps towards the island where he stands. Everything about your motions, your words, is careful, tender, mindful that this kind of question is fragile. ‘You never let people help in the kitchen.’

He stills as he lifts his head to appraise you, unabashedly taking you in and holding you under the ferocity of his gaze. Any other man and you would call this entrapment, but you are used to giving him everything, used to his penetrative stare and the way he always, without fail, seems to witness every flawed and contradictory piece you try to keep buried. 

‘Because I want you to,’ he says, as if wanting anything is simple.

Aimlessly, you nod at his response, scanning the island counter as you approach with your arms hanging limply at your sides. You’ve surrendered to him without your own permission, but you are not terribly dismayed by this. He asks for help and speaks of wanting as though it’s an easy request, yet the tension at the back of his throat, minimal and almost imperceptible, implies this is something big and bold and frightening for him to say. For as long as you’ve known him, you both have been difficult, anxious, battling yourselves more than you battle the world around you, and so you do not comment on this ask - do not comment on the emotion of it - because you could still be wrong, and he could still take it back.

‘Aren’t you the one with the chef’s license?’ you tease, coming to stand beside him, unloading the food and organizing them into piles to be moved to their respective cupboards or shelves. ‘Wouldn’t my peasant hands ruin your julienne?’

‘Har har.’ The sound of his sarcastic laugh makes you blush, looking over your shoulder as you tuck unneeded cold things into the refrigerator. ‘And no,’ he continues once you’re beside him again, ‘I don’t need things to look pretty today, I just need them to taste good.’

Handing you a knife that fits perfectly in the palm of your outstretched hand, your eyes meet for a moment that is long enough to generate a spark. It blossoms within your blood, the mark of friendship and the mark of love blurring together the same way grief so often follows joy, weaving together to create something tender and something reverent. You look at him, and this moment feels eternal.

‘Besides,’ he mumbles, moving to guide a bunch of scallions, some tomatoes, and freshly peeled garlic on to the cutting board he has laid out for you. ‘Sometimes the most beautiful things in the room are the ones with flaws.’

Entirely unsure what to say to this, you simply bob your head with a noise of interest, a feigned motion of understanding. He does not seem to notice the way his words pierce you, cutting at wounds you have long since done your best to hide from him, and you are glad his smile endures. From the corner of your eye, you watch him carry on, cutting into an onion with little pomp and circumstance, the ghost of his words a phantom that chooses to haunt only you. Your hand trembles only slightly as you move the garlic into position, and you grip the handle tightly to keep your motions steady and even, gathering all your strength to root into the base of your joints.

Moments slip past you freely, moments where you are silent save for the deep inhalation of breath that fills your lungs as you watch him cut. Your friendship with Kyungsoo is still relatively new, in your eyes - two years on and still there are details of his life, his history, his character that elude you. Still, you know him well enough, likely somehow have always known, that he is complicated and oftentimes impossible, unfathomable, thinking too hard about every nuance and detail that colours his choices.

But when he cooks, when he is in the act of creation, making a whole reality to be touched and tasted with his bare hands, you find he has never been so certain of anything. As he turns the onion, halving it swiftly before quartering it, there is no doubt in his actions, no hesitation, and he seems to relax into this confidence, mind wandering freely because there is no room for its criticism.

‘To The Lighthouse or A Room of One’s Own?’ he asks, unprompted.

Tugging your bottom lip between your teeth, you begin slicing the garlic into small pieces as you consider his question. ‘To the Lighthouse.’

You're unsure who started this game, the habit of asking one another questions on your preferences, something that feels so fundamental to your relationship you imagine it is genetic to the very fabric of its existence. It no longer matters who started it, you think, only that it has persisted without ever fading, something you look forward to whenever you're together. Baekhyun finds this game rather comical, often wondering why you even bother when you both know so much about one another at this point old topics must be rehashed. But each time, every time, he says this Kyungsoo simply looks at you with an expression that could stitch together the stars and you know, together, that he is wrong.

Even if a topic is revisited, the answer is always different. In this way, you ensure that you know one another and you still never stop knowing.

Kyungsoo hums at your response. ‘Why?’

This is yet another unwritten rule of the game: for whatever you choose, you must offer a quote or a reason, the one thing you cling to that makes the choice feel superior over the other.

Three months ago, he loaned you both these books, and you had finished them rather quickly. The day you returned them, your fingers grazed as he took them from you, the resulting tremor of this touch leaving your hands caught in a fire that would not cease for days. He didn't ask what you thought beyond if you'd enjoyed them. You suppose he'd been saving it for this moment.

Pressing your palm into the flat of the knife, you compress a clove of garlic and dig deep. You'd given your answer automatically, on impulse, and hadn't truly considered the fact that you must quote the line that made your breath catch and your very bones quake. It hits you now that he's read these words, felt this kind of swooning even if there is distance between your twin heartbreaks; eyes kissing the same page long after one another has departed.

‘It was not knowledge, but unity she desired,' you begin, focusing intently on chopping so as not to lose your will, 'not inscriptions on tablets, nothing that could be written in any language known to men, but intimacy itself - which is knowledge.’

His knife falters in cutting the onion, the blade slipping against the wood of the cutting board as you finish speaking. Glancing out of the corner of your eye, you watch the juice spread beneath his perfect slices, his lips parting slightly as he takes in a slow hiss of breath. Steadying himself, he gathers his composure and begins chopping once more, nodding in agreement.

It is your turn to ask a question, but you take this moment of silence to watch the light from the wide kitchen window nestle between his cupid's bow, understanding with your whole chest why the moon fought so hard to claim the sun.

‘Are you okay?’ you murmur, keeping your tone quiet and gentle, concerned yet distanced, not wanting to embarrass him.

‘Mhmm,’ he hums, flippantly avoiding the question.

‘Dexter or Supernatural,' you inquire, moving your pile of minced garlic to the corner of the board as you gather the bunch of scallions.

‘Dexter,' is his confident reply.

'Have these already been washed?' you divert, and he glances to your hands, nodding. Lining them up, you continue.‘Why?’

Sighing, he unwraps a large cut of fish from its paper packaging, considering his choice. ‘We all make rules for ourselves,' he quotes. 'It’s these rules that help define who we are. So when we break those rules, we risk losing ourselves and becoming something unknown.’

Amidst your meticulous slicing, you feel yourself bristle. In the choice between the two, you agree - Dexter would be your first choice. Yet, you had not expected him to pick this quote, this particular choice carrying with it the weight of your identity. Your understanding of yourself and your needs has always been wrapped up in these few lines, your desire for rules and control the very thing that allows you to relate to the world. Everyone you know finds things both disruptingly and disturbingly true about themselves through their relations with other people, through their relationship to their surroundings.

You relate to yourself and to them through the rules you have cultivated, based on your experiences of others rather than their integration into your life. You want to break free from this, aware that this is only yet another way you stand to complicate your understanding of everything, but you rely on it.

And, it seems, so does he.

He is soft and sensitive, and yet conversely so rigid, operating within his own rules. To step outside would be a great unmaking, and, for one blissful moment, you find there is no space between where you end and he begins. In this understanding, you are both slinking toward a new reality.

Glancing down at your cutting board, you pout. The scallions will be uneven.

Kyungsoo swallows with a low cough, clearing his throat. ‘Neruda or Siken.’

A wide smile blooms across your features, this question perhaps one of the easiest he has ever asked. ‘Siken.’

Using your knife, you push the chopped scallions to the top of your cutting board and slowly roll a few of the tomatoes down to the center. Your smile falters, already picturing the mess of squashed pulp that will come from this. Years of cooking for yourself, but still your hands are too heavy for delicate things. With a small sigh, you angle your knife over the ripe curve, the skin so smooth you think your knife might slide right off without any incision at all. 

As you start to press your knife down, Kyungsoo stops you.

‘Try like this.’

Coming to stand behind you, he takes your hands in his, joining you in holding the knife and holding the vegetable, the touch from his fingers feather light and, conversely, heavy as steel. Your breath halts its journey in your lungs, blood too warm and stagnant in your veins, your heart faltering amidst this disruption. The heat from his chest radiates into your back, meandering down your spine and into your legs, all over your nerves until you wonder if there is anything left of you, any part of you he has not touched. 

He makes being near him feel like a season, full years and days lived in the wake of a breath; your every breath heavy with him, and the things your heart yearns to offer him. Every second full of an exhale transmutes into the precipice of a life well lived, because he is there and smiling and sharing the world with you even if he is not sharing the ardor in your lungs. Kyungsoo is the fifth season, a season unto you, an oncoming wind between the border of summer and autumn, between the heat and the chill, neither a warming nor a cooling but a possibility of both all at once.

You know this. You have always known this. But, recently, in the days you find yourself absent from him, your heart unmakes the memory of these small euphorias, unpossessed and eternally lonely, unwilling to cling to that which it cannot keep. And so you are whelmed and unmade by the totality of him, forced, now, to stitch yourself into someone entirely new, someone who knows how it feels to be close.

He guides your right hand forward, easing the knife slowly along the tomato until the base is what presses into the skin, not the middle.

‘Why Siken?’ he whispers, and he is close enough his breath tickles at your ear, cascading down your neck and into your shoulder. He spills over you, and you tremble, knowing he feels you but he says nothing, polite enough to maintain your pride.

He asked you a question. You know he did, and it takes work finding words when he is doing his best to consume you like this, your eyes watching as he, and you, together, slice a tomato into thin circles. The rhythm he creates with your twin hands is steady, even, almost musical in the way you can anticipate the sound of it, and it grounds you just enough to remember you are about to give absolutely everything away.

If he does not know yet, if he has not known, you suppose he will know now. But he asked. And so you will tell him.

‘Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us,’ you whisper, matching the volume of his voice. You know he will hear you. You wonder if he will feel you. ‘These, our bodies, possessed by light. Tell me we will never get used to it.’

Kyungsoo eases the knife down one last time, and keeps it there, pressed against the cutting board as the slice drops mutely against the other pieces, the juice from the vegetable seeping deep into the wood. His thumb moves slowly over yours in small circles - you’d like to call them reassuring, but as he steps closer behind you, as his other hand moves his fingers over your knuckles, you wonder if there is any reassurance to be found here. 

In love, in lust, the solidarity you have found in your hobbies and your, almost selfish, avoidance have dissolved, leaving you exposed to the full extent of his soul. No, there is no reassurance in this liminal space, the moment in which you will either become unbreakable or tragically unrecognizable threatening your very sense of self. Had you known when you met him that it would feel this way? Had you known that loving him would be not unlike a benediction? 

The problem, you think, is that even if you had known, nothing would have stopped you. In every life, in every choice, you love him like a beginning and an ending, your heart incapable of knowing much other than craving him.

His hands drift away, peeling off your skin, slowly, as though he is reluctant to leave. Turning until his nose is tucked into the hair just above your ear, he inhales deeply, hands coming to over just above your hips. The energy between you is a live wire, your mouth running dry and your tongue coming to wet your lips, feeling yourself grow parched. Kyungsoo takes a long breath, filling his lungs with nothing but you, before he exhales and whispers into the shell of your ear. 

‘Can you handle it?’

You’re not sure if he means the quote or the rest of the tomato, not sure if he means if you can handle this, with him, or the rest of your existence without him. You aren’t entirely sure of much other than the force of your attraction, the sheer power of it, and the way you think it will fuel your every thought until your bones become ash, this love a windmill in your chest.

‘I think so,’ you mumble in affirmation, glancing over your shoulder to offer him a small expression of encouragement, hoping you look convincing.

His eyes have grown dark, the chocolate of his irises tempered with an impenetrable black, and a flush spreads across his cheeks so warm and pink you would think he’s been sugared. Immediately, you regret seeing him, the lust in you becoming a sea, the swell of it so deep and so strong, you fear you might drown in it, in him.

‘Actually, I’m feeling a bit warm.’ Side stepping along the island, away from him and out of his orbit, your words are rushed and hurried. Running a hand through your hair, you look at him, pleading. ‘Are you okay to take it from here?’

‘Yeah, are you okay?’ he asks furrowing his brow, concern evident in his voice.

‘I’m fine,’ you nod, looking everywhere but his face. ‘It’s fine. I just need to dip my toes in the water to cool off. Text me if you need me to come back?’

He laughs, watching you affectionately as you turn away from him, heading to the sliding door that leads to the brilliant green grass of the back yard. ‘Okay,’ he calls, his voice following you out.

You know that he will not. 

You know that there is a barrier that stands between grief and loving, a door to walk through in which there is a boundary between the knowledge of love and the acceptance of it. He opened the door. You stepped through, momentarily basking in the reverence of it, only to leave, shutting it behind you, likely forever, to wallow in the ever comforting loneliness of wanting.

‘Are you joining me?’

Chanyeol’s girlfriend sits on the dock, leisurely swinging her feet in the water as she cranes her face into the sun to watch your approach. Covering her eyes with her hand to block the sun, she offers you a curious smile as you slide off your sandals and sit heavily beside her. Leaning back on your hands, you let the sun warm your neck and chest in contrast to the cold lake water that laps lazily over your feet and midway up your calf, pressing your fingers into the rough oak. The water’s chill walks up your skin, soothing the tension in your nerves that lingers from Kyungsoo’s breath, smile, lips, and voice.

In the distance, Chanyeol’s laughter mixes with Yixing’s and Baekhyun’s. Just beyond their small circle, Sehun and Jun canoe in amusement, the paddling of their oars a relaxing rhythm amidst the chaos that surrounds them. Baekhyun’s new girlfriend swims close by, her laughter jubilant yet reticent, still testing the limits of her comfort. Eyes still closed, you tilt your head to the side, remembering how you felt the day you were integrated into this group - shy and uncertain, the closeness of the bonds surrounding you both frightening and awe inspiring.

Chanyeol made it easy, as he always does, but, strangely enough, Kyungsoo made it easier. Even without loving him, without the intense desire to be near him, you would have chosen his company over all the rest. He said your name like it was something special, like he was careful with it inside his mouth - like it mattered. He wanted your opinion on everything, wanted your thoughts, wanted your voice first. You’ve lost count of the parties, the gatherings, the movie nights, the drinking games, and as a result all the times you’ve wound up next to him, tucked into a corner just talking and just learning. 

Kyungsoo made it easier than all the rest, simply because he demanded you at his side.

Opening your eyes, the light seems to sparkle in the places where it kisses the water, putting a glimmer against your skin. 

‘How did you do it?’The words taste bitter and heavy against your tongue, and you find yourself grimacing as you speak.

Chanyeol’s girlfriend, the Countess as he likes to call her, turns to face you. You feel her eyes move over your profile, patient despite her confusion. ‘Do what?’

‘Tell him you loved him.’ Chanyeol dives under the water only to break through the surface behind Baekhyun, dunking him with a gleeful howl. Would it have been easier to manage your feelings with someone so vocal? Someone with such little restraint? Sitting up, you press the base of your palms into your eyes and release a mournful sigh. ‘How did you own up to it?’

‘Well, I didn’t have to do much,’ she laughs. Looking at her, the expression your features decide to wear feels plagued by uncertainty but she does not see you. Her gaze has drifted to where Chanyeol swims, to his broad form and his musical laugh, her own expression softened beyond measure. She smiles as she speaks, unbridled in her admiration. ‘You know Chanyeol. He’s the least discrete person and also not terribly patient.’ Tossing you a knowing grin, she giggles affectionately and you cannot help but laugh, her happiness naturally contagious. ‘The beauty of those things is he figures out what he wants immediately and then acts on it only after he’s decided it’s to his benefit. He’s very discerning that way.’

Humming, you glance down at your legs and lean back on your hands once more, pouting. ‘Did you know, though? All that time, did you know?’

‘No,’ she shakes her head. ‘I suppose, looking back, there were always signs,’ she concedes quickly, ‘but we’re so similar, I would go between thinking it was just our way of communicating and connecting to thinking it was flirting, but only when I was alone. When I was with him, I just wanted to enjoy being with him.’

‘How?’ You don’t mean to sound so incisive or desperate, but the feel of Kyungsoo’s hands still nestles deep within your skin, and you can sense him there even after he has departed. You are certain that you will spend the rest of your life with him pressing against parts of you long dormant and long ignored. ‘How do you do that? How did you not lose your mind being so close to him?’

‘That’s giving me far too much credit,’ she laughs, body jostling against yours in her amusement.

On instinct, as though the very sound itself is a siren call, Chanyeol ceases his movements and turns to see her, the teasing smile he’d been sporting with Yixing fading into one of contented devotion. In a single instant, the mere sight of her smooths away all his edges. There is something unspoken, yet eternal, lurking in the depths of his eyes, his yearning a boundless loyalty that declares her as his treasure. 

‘I always wanted to be close to him, and I was always on the edge of my sanity. But..’ her speech dies slowly, voice tight with emotion. Considering her words, she holds his stare and refuses to look away, seemingly adrift with him. Instinctively drawn to him, she leans forward slightly, the bones and the core of her pulling her to him as best they can. ‘He makes me happy. In the purest, most simple sense of the word he makes me happier than I’ve ever been able to really...attain, if that makes sense.’

She looks away from him then, turning to regard you rather seriously. ‘Happiness has always been a choice I have to make, but it’s also something that is elusive.’ All too easily she adopts the austere tone she so often uses when giving you advice - words stern and slightly cold, though still doing her best to remain supportive and encouraging. ‘When I’m with him, he sustains it. I’m not stressed and I’m not anxious, I just get to be. You have no idea how unbelievably peaceful that is. If I spend my time with him overthinking, it rushes me to a feeling, to a place we don’t need to be in. I don’t want to overthink, I just want to be with him.’ 

She takes him in once more, all the tension seeming to leave her muscles as her eyes touch what her hands cannot, visibly comforted. ‘More than anything, I just want to be with him’

Fundamentally you understand her statements, your heart responding and reacting to the sentiment with little input from your mind. A language has started to develop within you, the kind that seems to be spoken by Chanyeol and the countess, a language that exists where words fail entirely. There are no words to describe the way you yearn for Kyungsoo, not a single syntax that could contain his grace, his imperfections, the breadth of his very soul. There are no words, yet you comprehend all of it - you feel all of it, the very act of this understanding a transgression against your sense of self.

Shaking your head, you groan, doing your very best to stay the same, to stay guarded. ‘That’s too much to think about.’

Chuckling, she pokes you in the shoulder. ‘I know this is about Kyungsoo.’

Waving her hand away, you hurriedly hush her with a loud hiss, looking to the group and back again. Running your fingers over your arm, you massage the slight pain with a small frown. ‘They might hear you,’ you whisper, aghast.

She snorts. ‘They’re too absorbed in whatever competition Chanyeol has created. And it’s not like this is a big secret. But okay. I’ll be quiet..er.’

The blood in your veins seems to chill, matching the temperature of the water at your feet. Eyes wide, you whisper, ‘People know?’

‘Yes,’ she nods, like nothing has changed, like this single fact is the most inconsequential thing in the world. ‘I’m pretty sure everyone knows, except for Kyungsoo which is shocking.’

With a groan, you fall back onto the dock. Heated by the direct sunlight, the wood sends heat through your shoulders and spine, an otherworldly compassion that does its best to ease your tension. Draping your arm over your eyes, you sigh. ‘Must you always tease me?’

‘Yes. It’s my duty.’ Patting your leg gently she offers little condolence, her voice a sarcastic lament. 

In the ensuing quiet colours move amidst the darkness behind your eyes, sunlight infiltrating the small gap between your arm and the bridge of your nose, and providing a kaleidoscope of purple and green. Lilacs and lilies are carried in the rustling breeze, the opposite side of the lake decorated with a field of flowers, its tall grass and array of blossoms just as dense as the hunger in your blood. If you were alone perhaps you would weep over this, the inward nature of this secret desire fueled by the feel of his fingertips and his laugh and his breath on your neck - it is enough to consume the very heart of you, leaving nothing in its wake.

To give in to this would be to render yourself unrecognizable.

‘Have you ever wondered who you would be if you weren’t trying to think your way through feelings?’

A groan of discontent bubbles in your chest, her question simultaneously full of good intentions while still demanding you confront the change occurring within you. Like always, she insists that you take control of it, that you become a participant in your very unmaking - that you surrender to it, as though the only thing you must endure is yourself. How much of this can one survive, you wonder. How much of a person can survive the devastation of wanting?

‘That’s not entirely helpful.’ You know that you are whining - you can hear the cadence of your unease seep through the last of your syllables. But this cannot be helped, you think. Your great resolve has been terribly weakened.

She inhales, preparing to reply, only to be interrupted by the sounds of splashing water making its approach. Removing your hand from your eyes, you lean up slightly and squint through the changing light to see Chanyeol, his arms breaking through the water as he swims to the dock. Pressing his hands onto the wood, he lifts himself up to linger between his girlfriends legs, getting both you and she wet. You roll slightly to the side in surprise, doing your best to avoid more water getting on your clothes, but she just leans forward, the stars and the moon shifting through her eyes she takes him in.

‘My love,’ she giggles, kissing his nose. As she pulls away, he follows after her, leaning forward for more, but she is already looking behind him, brow furrowed. ‘Aren’t you in the middle of some kind of challenge?’

‘Yeah,’ he laughs, folding his arms on the dock and resting his head as he gazes up at her. ‘We’re trying to see who can knock Jun out of his canoe first.’

Cocking an eyebrow at him, you smirk. ‘Isn’t that dangerous?’

‘He’s got a life jacket,’ he shrugs, entirely nonchalant. ‘Anyway, I need a good luck kiss.’

Running her hands through his hair, she lets her fingers toy with the tips of his ears as she speaks. ‘You know you’ll win even if you don’t get one.’ 

His eyes flutter closed under her thoughtful touching, swooning into her orbit as he hums. They stay like this for a moment, awash and enraptured with one another. Their world is foreign to you, a place of belonging where they live only with each other, and more vulnerable and brave than you could ever comprehend. 

When he looks at her again, there is a silent communion that passes between them, words and conversations living and dying on their breaths without any speech at all.

‘Still,’ he pouts, and she understands, instantly pulling him up as he raises.

The prelude to this kiss is just as intimate as the act itself, and you look away, gazing over your shoulder back to the house, back to where Kyungsoo cooks, alone and possibly lonely, abandoned because you have not yet learned how to truly hold the sun in your hands. In truth, you are too fond, too enamored, too lost in him to remember yourself when you are with him; and you are too comfortable, too in control of your emotions to forget yourself, remembering all your flaws and the way they will inevitably be highlighted, all the light in the universe culminating in him and illuminating everything, including you.

Chanyeol swims away once he is satisfied, and you swallow the words that have threatened to rise in the back of your throat. In considering Kyungsoo, you have once again considered the reality of love - they have made you consider love, and there is something easy about the conversation you had before he arrived, so you do your best to return knowing, depressingly, she will not let you escape.

‘You both are assholes you know?’ you tease, nudging her gently. 

She watches him hungrily, lips red and swollen, before she looks at you once more, distracted. ‘I meant what I said.’

‘You’re not helping,’ you groan, exasperated.

‘Only because you want to apply logic to your feelings.’ Having collected herself once more, her spine straightens, words full of authority. ‘Sometimes, feelings don’t make sense and sometimes they just are. Who are you when you aren’t thinking about how you feel?’

‘I don’t know,’ you shrug, defeated. ‘I can’t know because I don’t even understand what you’re saying. What do you mean by don’t think about how I feel?’

‘Yes, exactly!’ she says, far too enthusiastic for such a non-committal answer.

‘You know I understand even less now, you know this right?’ you murmur flatly, looking back to the water.

Gaze unfocused, your friends are a blur of action far away from you. Their colours merge and mix while you try to surrender your conscious mind in favor of feeling. Every breath you take is full of him, every inhale and exhale an ode to the way you both see and feel him without ever looking at all. The first summer you met him, everything was pure happiness. July was oppressive in the way it kept you perpetually warm, but you thought you would forget him, that the feeling would fade - this kind of craving dies with summer, the twilight of the season bringing forth a reality too harsh for summer’s fruit. 

But he has not left you. Not once. Not even a little.

‘How does he make you feel?’ she tries, taking a different approach to her questioning. ‘Don’t think about why you feel it, just think about what it is.’

To you, the question is inherently frightening, the tendrils of it dripping down into the cage of your ribs and tightening, finding all the places the ache in you is the most special and the most tender. The question is frightening, but it bears an even more frightening answer - a frontier and the unexplored desert of truth.

‘Safe,’ you admit, acknowledging, horribly, that while you are safe with yourself, you are, perhaps, even more safe beside him; his aura, a temple. ‘He makes me feel safe.’

When you look at her once more, you’re certain you are something pathetic, but she simply takes hold of your hand and squeezes it, the reassurance of her touch a threat to the dam of solitude locked inside your chest.

‘Then,’ she begins, almost too soothing and too sweet for you to stand, ‘the next time you’re with him, let yourself be safe and nothing else. I think everyone wants to know who they are when they’re safe, without question.’

The problem, you think, is that you have always known who you would be if you let yourself go. The problem, you think, is that you have known and done your best to spirit it away, aware that to feel as much as you do, about everything, would render someone monstrous.

To be free and open and safe with him is to be hungry - not the absence of yearning, but the sheer, irrevocable abundance of it.

'Listen, the Baroness needs your room.'

Baekhyun corners you in the hallway long after the sun has set. Cheeks flushed and eyes glassy, the wine from dinner and the beer from the fire pit still linger in his bloodstream, giving him the sort of dazed, sleepy appearance that usually makes you soften towards him. Leaning against the wall for support, his closeness allows you to smell the smoke and ash from the bonfire on his clothes, and if he had posed any other question, said, quite possibly, anything else, you would have ruffled his hair and given him a hug, wanting to be close to him.

Instead, you rear back slightly, so bewildered you are certain you have mental whiplash.

'What?' The word comes out quickly, more an exclamation of sound than an actual word. ‘The who?’

Baekhyun shrugs, sheepish. ‘You know how Chanyeol calls his girl the Countess, Jongin calls his Duchess.’ He sways as he speaks, a sign of his drunkenness or a sign of his shyness at the question, you cannot be sure. ‘I’m trying this one out for mine.’

Humming, you nod. ‘That’s very nice. And no.’ 

'Come on,’ he pleads, already starting to whine. ‘You can share with someone else, but she really needs your room.'

Crossing your arms, you mirror his pose and lean against the wall. The dim light of the hallway puts shadows under his eyes, making his expression look far more forlorn than it likely is.

'Absolutely not,’ you say, sternly. Twelve hours later and you are in the same position as this morning, protesting against the unfairness of his requests. ‘I paid for that room out of my own pocket. She can't just come on this trip and freeload. Besides, didn't you bring her on this trip to get laid? What are you going to do, astral project through walls?'

'No, not really, I mean maybe but not exactly,’ he stammers, doing his best to piece his argument together. Too tipsy to mask his meaning with the smoothness of words, all he can do is suffer the truth of his emotions. ‘It’s not exactly like that but I can't make it that obvious.’

Rolling your eyes, you sigh, exasperated. 'Baekhyun, it's already obvious.'

'Don't you know there has to be finesse to this?' The barely restrained emotion in his voice dismantles the playful tone he has done his best to adopt, the intensity of his desire not something to be trifled with.

But so too are you unafraid of a challenge, your mind already made up, your heart already enclosed in your room with the lakeside view.

'What are you, seven?’ you laugh, incredulously. ‘I think she knows exactly what you're looking for out of this, it's why she's here at all.'

'It's not that obvious,’ he pouts.

'Literally, why would anyone agree to go on a vacation with a bunch of strangers and one guy they only kind of know?’ you challenge, unable to fathom any other conclusion. Even in the beginning, when Chanyeol would invite you out, your proclivity for quiet nights at home always had you leaning toward spending the evening with a book until he would mention Kyungsoo’s name. The sound of the word alone would draw you out, his name dissolving the essence of your loneliness if only for one night. ‘She's here for the same thing as you, just get it over with.'

'I don't just want to fuck her!' he exclaims in a loud whisper, both your eyes widening at his admission.

In the aftermath of his outburst, there is a looming silence in which you are uncertain what else there is to be said. It weighs down on you, on your shoulders and on your heart, the uprising in him so unlike his usually soft and sweet demeanor. He has never been one for committing, never been one for avoiding what he wants either, and so this limbo between wanting her to be his while also keeping her at arm’s length puts a throb in the center of your temple.

Squeezing your eyes closed, you dig your nails into your arms. 'I'm so confused about what's happening here.'

'I really like this girl.’ It’s the most careful Baekhyun has ever spoken, as if he is just as perplexed as you by the sheer tenacity of his emotions. Hearing himself say the words seems to put a colour in his cheeks, deepening the shade of his blush beyond alcohol, beyond the kiss of the afternoon sun. Baekhyun grows almost weary in his relief, glad that he has said it out loud, to someone. ‘I don't want to just make it about that one thing.' 

Resting a hand on his shoulder, you offer him a sympathetic smile. Over the years of your friendship, you have watched him fall in love several times a day, with so many different things, his heart an atrium that endlessly nurtures romance and affection. It’s rare for him to settle on one single person, and even more rare for him to act on it.

'I respect you,’ you say slowly, pressing your thumb into the strong flesh of his arm in solidarity, ‘but I still paid money for that room, so it's not happening.'

'I'll pay you back for it,’ he tries, starting to sober beneath your perpetual refusal.

'Baekhyun -'

'Kyungsoo's room has two twin beds,’ he blurts out in a rush, all his words condensed on a single breath. Feeling yourself pale, the axis of the world seems to shift beneath your feet, your vision suddenly blurred and unfocused, dizzy,  and he takes your surprised silence as volition to speak. ‘It's like a pleasant surprise! You can share with him.'

Even in the dark, you can see the mischievous glimmer in his eyes, the sparkle of an ulterior motive lurking in the depths. It would not be the first time he attempted to be your wingman, would also not be the first time he would fail at such an endeavor, and your hand slides away from his arm, falling limply at your side. You watch him, slack jawed at the horror of it all, stomach dropping all the way down to your toes.

'Baek, no.’ It is your turn to plead, amazed your voice even makes a sound with how dry your throat has become.

'Oh, come on!' Baekhyun has the audacity to laugh, slapping your arm congenitally as if his encouragement is enough to placate you. 'I'm trying to help you!'

Sarcastically, you snort. 'You're helping yourself and clinging to the hope that it would ever be about me.'

Somehow immune to your admonishment, he simply wiggles his brow salaciously. 'You know you like the idea.'

'Fucks sake, I should never have told you about this,’ you hiss, crossing your arms over your chest once more. ‘I got drunk one time and now you think you can play matchmaker.' 

Baekhyun sighs, shrugging his shoulders. 'Listen, I already told her she can have your room -'

Rearing back, you blink rapidly, appalled and bewildered. 'What the fuck?'

'And Kyungsoo already agreed to letting you stay in his,’ he continues, ignoring your seething disdain as though this is simply a negotiation about where to go for breakfast.

Blood rushing away from your cheeks, running to service your overactive heart, you simply stare off into the distance, beyond Baekhyun, beyond the house altogether, to a time in history when you would not have to spend the evening sharing his air. 'I hate this.'

'I know.’ It’s his turn to rest a hand on your shoulder, his expression somehow far less sympathetic than yours had been. ‘But if this is the only way for both of us to get what we want, then someone has to put some fire under your ass.'

Shaking your head, you do not allow him to come into focus, mumbling with scathing contempt. 'Wow, I actually hate you.'

'You move at a glacial pace.’ Assuming the conversation is over, he removes his hand from your shoulder and turns away, no longer giving you any opportunity to complain. ‘At least now we all can say we tried.'

Hurriedly, you follow after him, pushing off the wall and gathering the strength to move your things from your lakeside room to Kyungsoo’s, the phantom memory of his skin on yours awakening once more. 

'Why are you still talking?’ you call after him.

But he just tosses you a sly wink over his shoulder, laughing to himself as he heads down the stairs.

‘I can hear you overthinking from across the room.’ 

The light from the moon creeps in through the sheer curtains covering the window, Kyungoo’s voice filling the space, dancing on the rays, with a tired rasp. He’s worn himself out - laughing, yelling, drinking. Somehow, the sound is thick and heavy, sinking down and deep into places long left untouched, your body wired by the sound of him alone. 

'Just go to sleep,’ he chastises, turning over in his bed. 

It is only the two of you contained in this small space, twin beds side by side, close enough you can hear his breath. Pressing your head against the pillow, your mind has become divided in two, living in two places at once - this moment, and your time spent with him in the kitchen, doing its best to rationalize the difference. Cooking with him, he was all over you, hands on yours and chest against your back as if he was learning how to make a home of you. It was different then, almost too tactile to comprehend but the sun through the kitchen and living room windows somehow made the world seem wide. 

His touch had a distance, a space - even if you could not see it, you could sense it, the light finding its way through, reminding you there is a line between your body and his, a line between simply touching and truly feeling.

Now, in the dark, everything, even the gap between your mattresses feels close - too intense, too raw, to real. The darkness is oppressive, like that, a brief moment in time in which you are aware of the edge of things. Resting in the center of your bed, you are aware of the edge of your limbs, the absolute limit of your body. In the room, you are aware of the edge of your bed and the way there is just enough distance between yours and his for a single person to stand. In his bed, you are aware of the edge of his lips, and the way his breath cascades over them, facing the window to kiss the moon. 

And you are aware of the edge of your resolve, threatened and thinned to breaking by the way the light casts him in silver, illuminating all the parts of him you find sacred.

‘You’re wide awake too,’ you say to the ceiling, not allowing yourself to see him. ‘I guess that makes us even.’ Biting your lip, you close your eyes and sigh. ‘I’m not the only one who can’t fall asleep,’ you finish quietly.

Kyungsoo laughs, warm and rich, utterly intoxicating, no trace of irritation in his words as he speaks. ‘Okay,’ he muses. 'How about this.’ 

You hardly have time to knit your brow together in thought before he begins singing, the rich honey of his tone turning the room into amber. He doesn’t often do this, a talent he likes to keep to himself. Sometimes, when he is drunk, he can be convinced to be the start of a song, not the result, but even this takes an equal amount of convincing as it does bottles of beer. But you have found, over time, that the talent itself is not so secret - hidden, but not entirely forbidden. 

When he is with you, somehow you always hear his music, your ear always finding and listening to his voice first. You have found there is not a single moment he is without music, the way he speaks a melody unto itself, but when the sun goes down and the others go to bed, and it is just you and just him, and the dying embers of a fire that blazed too high, he sings with you. 

He sings, often, just to make you smile.

'Oh, dear god, is that supposed to be better?' you laugh, skin tingling with adrenaline and a down turned corner of your cheeks as though you are saying goodbye to a time in your life when things were safe.

Kyungsoo interrupts himself, and even though you do not see him, even though you cannot yet bring yourself to look, you know he is beaming. 'I'm not going to stop until you sing along.'

He continues singing and the joy in you sets itself free, liberated like a terror. You would be frightened if this moment were perfect, would feel the world dissolve around you, his voice a nightingale leading you to perish. You would retreat from all of this, except -

'I hate this song,’ you sigh, flopping your arms atop the mattress to signal your unrest.

'I know,’ he persists, turning in the bed to face you. The darkness does little to hide the intensity of his focus. If anything, it feels heightened, the angles of your profile burning beneath his scrutiny. ‘But you know it.'

In spite of yourself, you close your eyes and let the bliss send shivers through your veins. When you are not looking, held in the darkness of your own making, your body becomes otherworldly, something entirely outside of yourself, someone you don’t recognize. How far have you crossed? What line have you transgressed and ignored, blithely meandering into the irresistible territory of passion? It’s all over you now, your smile full of teeth and your mind empty, save for his melody and the advice of Chanyeol’s girlfriend:

Who are you when you are not trying to think through emotion?

It happens in the limbo between who you are and who you want to be, the room suddenly a cathedral devoted to your wanting. With your eyes open, your love takes a verbal form, this voice yours yet better, enhanced and empowered, and you sing because you no longer can help it. Nowhere near as confident or stable in your notes, your voice does its best to hold onto the words, finding the center of the notes almost too late before it’s time to move to another, but, strangely, you don’t find yourself blushing. It is not, you think, that the darkness has made you less inhibited, rather that with a song you hate and a smile at your lips, you simply don’t have it in you to mind.

'There it is!' he celebrates, raising his arms off the mattress and clapping.

Pressing a hand to your forehead, your shyness in the dark somehow even more amusing, you cackle. 'God, this is terrible.'

Adjusting his pillow, he hums. 'Exactly.'

The aftermath of your twin voices seems to reverberate around the room, long after you both have fallen quiet, the echo bouncing off your skin. This kind of euphoria could only be brought by him - his intelligence, his stubbornness, his perceptive intuitiveness. With only the echo and the memory sustained, your breath becomes unsteady, reminded that this place, this room, will no longer just be a place but a sanctuary and you will no longer just be you, but you will, forever more, be his.

'Sometimes,' you begin, words a whisper that you know he will still hear, 'you're funny.'

'It's just something I'm trying.' Such a simple statement, one full of humor and sarcasm but one with a texture that makes you press your tongue to the back of your teeth as he says it. He sounds tired of running - from himself, from all the great complexities he finds in the world, but not from you. 'Just something I want to try for a little while.’'

'All the time.’ Your own words are abrupt, clipped at the end of their syllables as you rush them out, needing him to hear the correction - to not miss it, not for a second. 'You're always funny, all the time.'

For a long while he considers your statement, and, in the absence of sound and conversation, the air in the room becomes thick, sluggish in your lungs. Your fingers curl into the sheets, eyes staring blankly up at the ceiling because now, if ever, it would be terribly dangerous to turn to face him. At least, you presume, he finally knows. He must know, the layers of this confession wholly befitting the hallowed energy that lingers between you. 

Swallowing thickly, you let him take his time, forcing yourself to be patient. The darkness has brought everything together, the gap between your beds somehow closed, as though he is right next to you, even unreachable as he is.

'You're the only one who sees me that way,’ he says finally, and you hear the care laced in his voice, doing his best to articulate his appreciation.

You want more of him, more of this sound, more of everything he keeps tucked away where prying eyes cannot follow. You want all of him, his very existence an addiction. 

'It's because I see you.' This time, you are more brave, more confident, and there is a pleasing dissonance to your voice, the old you starting to become devoured by the new.

Tonight tastes different on your tongue. Something about the moon and something about the sun, about the way you have spent too long in the light with your private luxuries shrinking ever further away, has allowed you to gather blossoms of starlight, their twinkling mysteries putting a hope in your joints that has never dared to trespass until this moment. All your life, the darkness has been a shroud and a veil, a cloister keeping you contained only with your yearning thoughts and your inadequacies, an invasion that has wormed its way within you for too long. It leaves you now, spilling outward and shimmering in the moonlight, leaving you free and empty, with room to nurture a burning flame.

Kyungsoo remains completely still, and you have the passing thought he does not move for fear of causing your retreat. 'And what do you see?' he asks softly.

Fingers pressing deep into the feather comforter, you hum. 'It depends.'

A low chuckle rumbles through his chest, the very sound a ripple of thunder in the night. 'That doesn't sound reassuring.'

Taking in a deep breath, you hold it in until your lungs hurt, smothering the doubt, the fear, and the inexplicable notion that this will fail until you can convince yourself you are indestructible. 

'It depends on how long I let myself look, and depends on what you feel that day.’ Furrowing your brow, you tuck the inside of your cheek between your teeth. This should be sufficient, but he is so much more than a summation of looking, a summation time. He is something that is held without time, something you wish to behold eternally, even long after you are dust. 'It's not that you're mercurial,’ you continue, doing your best not to cringe at the clarity in your voice, ‘it's not that you're not consistent. I think I just see other things because I take my time looking.'

How would he look if you said these things to him in the daylight? What would the midday yellows and oranges reflect if he looked at you, and let himself be seen? Would you tell him your looking extends beyond admiration, beyond mere affection, and into the shuddering truth of love? To say all this in the sunlight, what would become of you?

You think it’s for the best that you will never have the answers to these questions, the night the only thing clinging tenderly to your pride, protective and secure.

'And do you like what you see?' 

His voice is full of bashful apprehension, the rustling of his own sheets a symphony to accompany his tentative questioning. He shifts restlessly, hopefully, and you feel the sound with your whole body.

Licking your lips, you press onward, getting used to breaking the darkness - getting used to feeling raw and open. 'That also depends.'

'On what you see?'

Unable to help yourself, you finally turn to your side and look at him, eyes adjusting almost instantly to trace the nuanced details of his face, the moonlight painting silver shadows along his features. You’ve been lured to him, driven to see him now that he is asking to be seen, wanting your eyes on him; the very question begged you to look, and to take your time looking. Incrementally your longing grows, a swell in your chest that challenges the very depth of the lake, rushing through you until it cannot be contained.

'On whether you want me to like it,’ you clarify.

Leaning up to support his head on his hand, he looks at you and the hunger painted over his expression is enough to have your fists curling into the mattress. It stirs in you the need to be consumed, to be loved by his mouth and the palms of his hands, the greed in you not unlike an uprising. The flush in your neck spreads over your chest, your shirt constrictive and tight, suddenly no more room for you and all this impossible craving. Even still, Kyungsoo still remains calm, a king in the world of pleasure, looking at you as though you are a gift for feasting.

'I think people always want to be liked in some way, don't you think?’ 

A low growl lurks in the back of his voice, tone dropped down an octave to find gravel you have never heard before. All month, the nights have been uncharacteristically cool, heralding the slow death of summer as it bleeds into autumn, but you are heated. His gaze lives beneath your skin, now, a fire that refuses to burn out. 

‘And,’ he carries on, as though you remain unlit, ‘I also don't think your opinion of me should depend on me. That's for you to make.'

Lips parted, mouth wanting to take him in, you mirror his pose and lean up on your arm. Slowly, you shake your head. 'That's not what I meant.' 

The rasp in your voice surprises you both, and he smiles at the tension he has created, excited at the prospect of snapping it.

'Then what did you mean?' he presses, and you would rejoice at the sensuality of it, at the way the fullness of his lips shapes the words, but the appetite within him is like a hand at the center of your throat.

'I meant whether you want me to like it...' The admission drifts away, the choir of blood in your heart on fire with the weight of honesty. But you are glad for this burning, the fire that eats at you every bit his as it is yours. 'Whether my opinion matters.'

'Your opinion matters.' Kyungsoo doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t allow room for ambiguity or dishonesty. His eyes narrow, penetrative and demanding, keeping you still. 'You matter.'

Unfurling your hands, your fingers press into the sheets as though they are his shirt, his hands, his skin. The angular brutality of him has unmade the careful concealing you have spent years constructing. Hours ago, you had admitted that Kyungsoo makes you feel safe but now you are realizing the peril of letting him in - realizing you are the torment and the danger, little more than the ghosts of your desires. Now, you are starved for him, your tongue a desert aching to be drenched.

Tossing the sheets to the side, Kyungsoo moves his legs over the bed and rises to a stand, taller than you’ve ever seen him stand. Steel keeps his spine straight, shoulders rolled back in pause as though his mind is catching up with his limbs, before he crosses the small space and comes to sit on your bed. You don’t trust yourself with him this close, not anymore. Not after you have learned to love, not only him, but the very act of loving him. 

Shifts closer to you, close enough he could touch all of you, not just your legs, your hips, your waist, your chest, but so too your face and your lips - close enough you can taste him on the air. With your lips parted, every breath you take is full of him, tongue wet and heavy with his flavor.

‘What are you doing?’

‘We aren’t like the others,’ he says plainly, fingers toying with the sheets beside your hands.

Your eyes drop to his hands, avoiding the power of the intimacy you find in his expression. It feeds into the room, your tongue coming to lick your lips and he takes in a shuddering breath, the very sound sending a jolt of desire between your thighs. Taking your silence as permission, he continues to speak, the very anguish of his words exhausted at the prospect of not having you. 

‘We don’t…’ Taking a deep breath, he glances around the room, searching. ‘Flirt,’ he settles, though even this word does not seem to satisfy him. His gaze on you is hard, urging you to look up and see him, to meet his eyes and witness him. When you do, you’re certain you could smell his very heart, your blood suddenly full of his seductive magic. ‘At least, not like they do. I don’t make speeches and you don’t surrender, not unless you’ve been given explicit proof that it’s safe. That you’re right.’

It’s as though he looks down into you, deep enough that his gaze means to caress your ribs, your bones, wrapping himself around your spine until all your senses belong to him.

‘You see me.’ His teeth glide roughly over his bottom lip, nipping it quickly before releasing it, the blood beneath the skin rushing to make it more plump than it was before. ‘And I see you. I have never stopped seeing you. I’ve not wanted to stop seeing you, finding you, learning you since the day I met you.’

If you are the devil lurking in the dark, the hungry one with eyes of greed then he is the lust, the one who has torn through you and pulled out the language you have only just started to understand. The moment that follows is enormous, a moment in which you realize love is not only the act of feeling but the act of seeing, of being seen. He describes you as though he knows you, as though he knows the clawed and ugly parts of you that threaten to tear the fabric of your existence apart, and as though he loves even what he sees in those. 

You don’t think you’ve ever been so aware of gravity, of the way language is not only a syntax but a physics, and of the way he has slowly inched closer and closer, your vision full of only him. With your eyes adjusted to the dark, you come to see yourself as a hawk, able to find yourself in his eyes, able to see yourself as he sees you - pupils dilated and not allowing you the privilege to remain invisible. In feeding on him, you feed on yourself, and so, too, you suppose does he feed on you, on himself, on the carnal savoring of your longing, united.

‘What are you saying,’ you whisper, certain he hears you, certain he hears your plea to be explicit.

‘I’m saying,’ he begins, lifting his hand to cup your chin. He holds it in his hand and pulls you close, his breath on your lips a fever, the feel of his bones pressing into yours sparking a voracious desire to be devoured, ‘if you are thinking of taking a risk, you are safe.’

His truth is a dawn breaking over your skin, spirit sanctified by the permission he grants you. Before you can even comprehend your actions you press your hands into the mattress and give yourself the momentum necessary to close the distance between your lips. The sheer force of the kiss gnaws at you, his free hand coming to wrap around your waist to pull you close. Flush against him, you think you are powerful enough to eat the moon, to eat the sun, to have him and keep him buried beneath your tongue. 

He moans against your mouth, the sound of it shuddering against your chest and vibrating through you. Your own arms wind around his neck, fingers toying with the soft hair at the nape of his neck, unable to mind that this new position is awkward and difficult to sustain. You have managed much worse, have contained whole stars in the center of your chest for years and still have survived - you think you can manage the slant of your waist as he holds you against him, unforgiving. 

Running his tongue along your lips, he asks for permission you are eager to grant, slipping his tongue against yours in a tentative stroke of possession. In your mouth, he is the blunt edge of a knife, cutting you deep enough that you think no other hands, no other lips will have their fill of you - no one else will have their fill and still find themselves engorged with an unconquered thirst. Sucking his bottom lip between your teeth, you nip the flesh to a swell that feels warm and plump. 

He smiles against you, pulling his lip away and you smile too, his voluptuous mouth a blessing. 

‘You’re wrong,’ you murmur, grazing his lips as you speak.

Insatiable, he kisses you again, stealing what he can of you until you are breathless. ‘How so?’

Moving one hand from his neck, you cup his cheek and laugh, a sound he eats with his own chuckle. ‘We are exactly like the others.’

Author’s Note v2.0: i do not own the quotes from Virginia Woolf - To The Lighthouse; Dexter, the TV show; or Richard Siken - Scheherazade

tag list: @yehet-me-up​ @wonderlustlucas​ @junkfoodwriting​ @taestfully​ @heatofmyexoheart​ @majci​ @ahgishaman​ @softly-savage-mint-yoongi​ @lamichellee​

#kyungsoo x reader #kyungsoo x you #kwritersworldnet #exosnet #exowritersnet #d.o. x reader #d.o. x you #kyungsoo romance #kyungsoo fluff #kyungsoo angst #d.o. fluff #d.o. angst #d.o. romance #kyungsoo fanfiction #kyungsoo fanfic #d.o. fanfic #d.o. fanfiction #kyungsoo scenario #d.o. scenario #kyungsoo au #d.o. au #exo romance #exo fluff #exo angst #exo scenario #exo fanfiction #exo au #doh kyungsoo

[stanharu]

Totally random, but I didn't understand a thing about this recent chapter. Could u give a tldr on it? Cause the vibes I was getting kinda made me feel like Haru was toying with legosi? But I do get that legosi is a bottom to herbivores 😅

ugh i’ve been mulling over this ask literally all day, i would’ve answered sooner but i had ~responsibilities~ to take care of. anyway,

i’ll admit chapter 195 was a bit difficult for me to completely wrap my head around as well, and I’m not very good at analysis, but I’ll give my own interpretation on the chapter. tho this’ll prolly be longer than a simple tldr lol

also a disclaimer: im typing this the night before ch196 releases in japan, so any musings or thoughts i write in this post may be different once that chapter releases, but i wanted to write my thoughts down about this chapter on its own.

so in my “review” of ch195 i thought “good for her” bc it seemed to me that haru was trying to like, idk, reclaim some power or st from legosi by “scaring him” with suggesting divorce. perhaps she is toying with legosi, and honestly i think he kinda deserves it for leaving my girl out of all the action lol. haru should be allowed to scare him! 

i think looking back to some past chapters may help explain haru’s logic:

in ch173 she mentions how powerless she feels bc she can only express her love in small ways, and not in these big dramatic ways that legosi’s been doing bc she’s not a big strong carnivore.

and it’s also been established that haru has pretty low self esteem and is also kinda... passively suicidal. so i think her actions in 195 are tied to that. in ch166, she mentions that before meeting legosi, she lived as if she was just “one out of 500 million rabbits”. no one special or unique. no one worth fighting or risking your life for. easily replaced. no one who would be especially missed.

so i’m sure legosi coming in and saying she’s special and how much he loves her gives her hella whiplash. i think these feelings make a resurgence in 195.

haru notices legosi’s newfound confidence & gets irritated bc she feels like she just doesn’t compare. what could such a radiant wolf see in her, a one in 500 million rabbit? 

i also think that, even tho haru also loves legosi, if she just goes along with him, it sorta enforces their roles as “predator” and “prey”. it’s a wolf pursuing a rabbit, though it’s romantically rather than out of a desire to eat. 

so if haru simply agrees to a happy life with legosi, it’s as if he “won“. the wolf got the rabbit. the predator got his prey. and aren’t they trying to surpass those roles? so haru defies that. she finds her own way to “win“. to not just simply be “prey“. so that’s why i think she wanted to scare him. it’s one of the few ways she can hold power over him.

she wants their relationship to be as equals. not as a “herbivore” and an “carnivore” but as haru and legosi.

so i interpreted haru’s “proposal” not as “let’s get married Right Now” but more as like, a promise that they’ll keep working to make their relationship... healthier i guess. 

perhaps this is wishful thinking on my part bc it’s obvious they’ve still got issues to work out w/ their relationship but this chapter made me hopeful that these issues would actually get addressed and solved. tho at the same time im also rather frustrated bc this is the 2nd to last chapter, and it feels like they’re Just Starting to work out their relationship issues. rly hoping the last chapter leaves things rather open ended & doesn’t try to pretend that everything’s all sunshine & roses for them now.

#beastars #beastars spoilers #legoharu #beastext #legosi #haru #i hope this makes even a little sense lol #gladiodaddyo #i typed and retyped this like 3 times my thoughts are so scattered sdjflskjdkfj

[annabethy]

“don’t lie to me” + percabeth if u are up to!!!

“Don’t lie to me.” Percabeth teacher au!! <3

Annabeth couldn’t think of a better way to spend her mornings than with Percy. He was always so sweet and warm when he first woke up, making him the perfect person to snuggle up to in the middle of a New York winter.

The ride to work was no less lovely with her sitting in the passenger seat, a steaming cup of coffee that Percy had made “with love” in her right hand, and her left hand intertwined with his. Watching the snow fall in a comfortable silence was so delicate and magical, and it’s truly the best way to start her day.

As she’s walking into the school with him, hand in hand, she leans closer to him, using his arm as a buffer from the biting wind. Percy just gives her a lopsided smile, something akin to adoration in his eyes, and pulled her into his side. There weren’t many students around this early in the morning, so she doesn’t bother trying to separate herself from him. She doesn’t even know if she could because he’s acting as her personal heater, and that may be too good to give up.

“You look adorable,” Percy comments as he holds open the door to the school. “The red nose really tops off your whole look.”

Annabeth sniffles, trying to subtly wipe her nose with the hand that’s still holding a travel cup of coffee. “Don’t make fun of me.”

“I’m being serious,” he whispers playfully, bumping her arm with his elbow and prompting her to roll her eyes fondly. He guides her through the halls of the front office, reaching for her hand and lacing them back together. “You always look pretty, but right now you look so huggable.”

She can feel the flush still on her cheeks, but she doesn’t know if it was from the cold or his kind words. Almost a year of dating and he still made her feel just as giddy as she did on day one. “I love you.”

“Couldn’t possibly love me as much as I love you,” he quips, but he presses a kiss to her temple before changing the subject. “So, I was thinking. After work, cuddles and a movie?”

“Only if we can get snacks first,” she says, biting her lip in a smile. If there’s anything she loves more than waking up next to the love of her life, it’s getting to spend Friday night with just the two of them. There were no kids to bother them or tests to grade. It was a time for the two of them to just exist with one another, and she cherished every week when she got to go home with him.

“We can stop for snacks, but then we’re watching Finding Nemo.”

“What’s with your obsession with the ocean?”

“I think clownfish are cute,” he answers, because of course he thinks clownfish are cute. “All fish are cute. That’s why I teach marine.”

Annabeth expected nothing less of him, and she decides to humor him. “Did you know I once had two goldfish and I named them Ren and Nephr?”

“Unique names,” Percy says, sidestepping a kid frantically making their way down the hall.

“They both mean kidney.”

“You would, Chase.”

“I also had a fish named Ornith.”

“That means bird,” Percy states.

“I liked the irony,” she tells him, taking a sip of her coffee. It’s still steaming in the cup, and it burns her tongue slightly. “Regardless, I think your obsession with the ocean is alarming.”

“At least I don’t go around screaming law of cosines,” Percy says, pointedly looking at her. “I didn’t even know what that was until you started crying about how stupid they were last week when you were grading papers.”

“That’s because they are stupid, I swear to god. They were all I-don’t-know-when-to-use-law-of-sines-versus-law-of-cosines like it’s hard!”

“I’m sure it’s so easy,” he says, but his laugh gives his sarcasm away. “You just have to accept that you were a fluke in the system, and no one will ever be a smart as you.”

Annabeth smacks him upside the head with her cup of coffee lightly but she’s still smiling. It’s moments like this that really get to her. She could just be herself around him, and they could tease each other but know that they love those things about each other at the same time.

She loved him.

Annabeth bites at the inside of her cheek, loving the way he looks at her out of the corner of his eyes, before she slowly pops the lid of the coffee off to try and get it to cool down faster.

Percy’s arm is snug around her waist, so she doesn’t look up as she continues walking. She blows around the rim of the cup, the steam swirling up in the air. It smells mouthwateringly delicious and it’s starting to cool off, so she brings it to her lips just as they round a corner, and—

Someone slams into them, and suddenly the only thing Annabeth can register is pain.

“Shit.” The scalding coffee seeps through her shirt almost immediately, and her skin feels like it’s on fire. The cup falls from her hand, the rest of the contents splattering on the floor, but she can’t be bothered to care as she tries to break the shirt’s contact with her blistering torso.

“—you okay?”

Annabeth’s mind comes reeling back as Percy’s voice reach her ears, and she can pick up the frantic edge to it.

“Annabeth,” he prompts again, his hand sliding down her shoulder. “Are you okay?”

Instead of answering him, she glances to the person cowering in front of her, and her skin is on fire for a completely different reason.

Octavian stares back at her, terror clear as day on his face, and she is about to explode. This kid was always the center of something, causing problems with every single breath he takes. He had no shame, and he always had the audacity to do whatever it is he wants to do, and now he’s ruined her favorite part of the day, and she can’t breathe.

“Octavian,” she says tightly, scrunching her nose in mock politeness. “Did you maybe think it would be a good idea to check where you’re going?”

The kid stammers.

“It would be smart not to go running around the halls and bumping into people carrying hot drinks,” she says, her voice dangerously steady. “God, you’re so—” There’s so much she wants to say, to scream, at him, but even in her heightened sense of rage, she knows she can’t, so she clenches her fist hard enough for her nails to indent her skin and she pauses for a second before she storms off in the direction of her room.

She doesn’t look to make sure Percy is behind her, too busy trying to hold back rising tears, and she really doesn’t know why she feels this way. All she knows is everything was perfect, and now it’s not.

As she unlocks her classroom door, Percy’s hand is settling over the dip in her waist. She steps inside the room, and she doesn’t know what exactly she was going to do except perhaps have a meltdown, but she never got the chance because Percy wastes no time before pulling his sweater over his head and holding it out towards her.

“What are you doing?” she asks miserably, still forcing back her frustrated tears.

“Take it,” he says, gazing at her earnestly.

Annabeth bites her lip, her eyes glossing over. He was too good for her. “I’m sorry,” she chokes out. She doesn’t know how to express what she was sorry for, but she has a feeling he knows.

“Don’t be sorry.” Percy’s arms seek out the bottom of the sweater so he can help her into it. He slides it over her and once it’s on, he reaches forward to tilt her head towards him so he can give her a forehead kiss. “It was an accident.”

“Octavian was an accident,” she whimpers, dropping her head against his chest.

She doesn’t understand why she feels so upset. She just knows that she doesn’t like the hole in the pit of her stomach or the tightness of her throat.

“Why are you so sad?” Percy asks, cupping her cheeks and pouting.

“Today was going so well,” she complains, wincing away from his fingers that go to wipe her tears.

And maybe she does know why she’s so upset. Mornings were her favorite time of day because she got to be with Percy. She got to see him in ways that no one else did and listen to his words that he doesn’t say when anyone else is around. When they’re at work five days a week surrounded by children, he didn’t get to show her affection in the ways he does outside of school. Morning was her chance to see that.

Never had something interrupted those perfect moments before. Not until now.

The moment had been so perfect, so private and loving, and it was destroyed.

“You told me I looked adorable,” she says, sniffling. It was the only way she knew how to explain the torrent of emotions she was feeling. “Now I have a big coffee stain on my shirt, and I look disgusting.”

“You still look adorable.”

“Don’t lie to me,” she chides.

“I’m not lying,” he says softly. “You always look adorable.”

She just drops her forehead back against him pitifully.

“You’re the prettiest person I’ve ever seen,” Percy says. “I tell you that all the time.”

“You’re a big fat liar.”

Percy’s lips tilt up in a smile. “I’m not. In fact, you actually look even better right now, all cute and warm in my hoodie.”

Annabeth looks down as though for the first time realizing she was wearing it. It was too big on her, but it smelled like him, the picture of a sunny day at the beach, warm on the sand.

“You’re so so so pretty, especially when you’re wearing my clothes.” Percy’s arms wrap around her squeezing tightly, and she feels secure in his embrace. “Don’t let this ruin your day. Octavian’s stupid. This isn’t new information.”

“But our morning is ruined.”

Percy squeezes her tighter, slightly swaying back and forth. “Lucky for you, it’s Friday. We can go home and pretend it’s morning again and take lots of naps.”

“And watch Finding Nemo?”

“Oh, yes. That part’s nonnegotiable.”

Annabeth’s lips pull up at that as she nestles deeper against him. “I love you.”

Percy’s response is an affirmative hum and a kiss on the top of her head.

So maybe her morning hadn’t gone quite as planned, and maybe she was overreacting just a bit, but there’s always tomorrow, and there’s always their Friday night snuggles.

As long as she has Percy, she figures everything would be alright.

#percy jackson #percabeth #annabeth chase #pjo #percy jackson and the olympians #my writing #anon #asks #teacher au