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#living breathing person should have a choice in regards to their own body)
calltomuster · 2 years
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Disabilities exist in Star Wars. Period.
This post is dedicated to certain specific people who say they are not be able to reconcile service animals in Star Wars, especially Jedi, since the Force and technology exist. These people seemingly have never seen Star Wars, where disabilities not only exist but feature prominently in many cases — yes, even in Jedi. So let us prove them definitively wrong here.
From the very beginning, disabilities have existed in Star Wars. In fact, one could argue a feature of a disability is one of the most iconic things about Star Wars. Even people who aren't Star Wars fans, or who haven't seen the movies at all, know the sound of Darth Vader's breathing. Darth Vader -- Anakin Skywalker -- is unable to breathe on his own and needs to be constantly hooked up to a life-support system simply to stay alive. This in itself is an answer to the argument that the Force compensates for everything. Perhaps you might want to say it is the Force that lets him stay alive beyond what would kill someone else, but still it cannot take the place of functional lungs, or grow back missing limbs, etc. Anakin Skywalker is one of the most powerful Force-sensitives to have ever lived, and yet he can still be disabled and need assistance. (Also, because sometimes I see people making the argument that because of all the pain that Anakin is in, he should be forgiven for his actions, let me say this: Anakin Skywalker can be disabled and still be villainous and make choices that hurt untold billions of people. Being disabled does not absolve you of your bad decisions. Disabled people are people too, and all people make choices and that is what determines the kind of person they are. But that's another post.)
Another example of the Force not compensating for everything is Yoda. We see Yoda using mobility aids multiple times throughout the OT and the PT, from a cane to a hoverchair. He is known as one of the wisest and most powerful Jedi ever, and yet he still uses mobility aids. "Yeah, well," you say, "he still fights with his lightsaber and does all those flips, so that doesn't count." This is the same stupid argument that people make against ambulatory wheelchair users. Needing to use a mobility aid does not mean you need to use it all the time. Total paralysis is not the only thing that makes people need to use wheelchairs or similar mobility aids. Often, people are technically capable of walking or moving around or even fighting and doing backflips in Yoda’s case, but the amount of pain and decreased function that such actions would cause are not worth it except for short amounts of time or in dire circumstances. This does not make them less disabled, or mean that they are faking it. 
“Must be a Jedi thing,” you say. What about Chirrut Îmwe or Kanan Jarrus, who are both blind (or become so). The Force does not give them their sight back (aside from a certain final scene in Rebels). “It’s only for Force-sensitives, then,” you try next. Try looking at Saw Gerrera, who needs oxygen assistance and wears a pressurized suit over his body. Or how about 99, a disabled clone who helps in brothers and is commended as “a true soldier” upon his death? The clones are excellent examples, for that matter. Wolffe is missing an eye, Gregor has a traumatic brain injury, Echo uses extensive cybernetics to function, among many others. 
Maybe still you want to argue that sure, someone might have a limb chopped off or whatever, but technology has come so far in Star Wars that they're not really disabled. Hear me now when I say: having accommodations that help you function in everyday life does not erase a disability. Go back and read that a few times if you need to, because it’s important. 
Now, to be clear, I’m not at all saying Star Wars always has amazing disability representation. I know that’s not the case in many, many regards, and I will link below references that discuss it in more detail. But to say that something like a service animal does not belong in Star Wars is, frankly, extremely idiotic and ableist and ignores the long history of disability in the GFFA. Disabled people have always existed in Star Wars and other sci-fi/fantasy media and they always will. 
Further reading and other perspectives:
Disability in Star Wars
Blind Warriors, Supercrips, and Techno-Marvels: Challenging Depictions of Disability in Star Wars
How Star Wars: The Bad Batch delivers the disability representation the franchise needed
Twisted and Evil: Ableism in Star Wars
This post was written largely in response to a comment left on a fic in the Service Animal Boga AU, so if you would like to read fics about disabled Obi-Wan with a service animal, please consider supporting us there. :)
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mausarchive · 11 months
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I thought you were somewhat a feminist and now i see you are anti abortion? Fucking really?
i am pro-responsibility, when talking about having sex recreationally; i don't think the first resort of anyone in that context should be abortion, i think it should be being intelligent enough to use common sense, whether that be through your male partner getting a vasectomy or whatever form of contraceptive you are comfortable getting (you're not a child im assuming so i feel no need to list them here). celibacy and abstinence are two things i will never not promote, they are what is ultimately the most effective form of birth control. i am anti hookup culture, i think it is the death of love and commitment and i think one of the wisest things you can do as a woman is be abstinent and keep yourself safe from men interested in nothing more than what you can offer them for 30 seconds. on that same token i think men that are pro-abortion are misogynists; of course they're pro-abortion. they don't value women or the gift of children so they want to have sex without consequence, as much as they want, with as many women as they can. note i said pro-abortion, not pro-choice.
as someone who is heavily involved in the lives of multiple children that i have helped raise from birth, i will never regard a pregnancy as a disease or a child as a "tumor". nobody asks to be born, or conceived. you are responsible for your body, your sex life, your womb. it is wrong to punish a life that never asked to be born. and that is my ultimate opinion. i see them as human beings, not burdens.
when it comes to pregnancy as a result of rape, i obviously would not ever vouch to force a woman to carry a baby that is a product of rape. i think that is the choice of the individual and not one i feel i could ever speak or decide on unless it was in my own case, my own experience. but i do think forcing that is wrong.
in short i promote healthy mindfulness when it comes to sex and reproduction. i wouldn't say im ardently anti-abortion. i think it is important to take things on a case by case basis. but if you are a casual sex having person who gets abortions as freely as someone might pop breath mints, i think you are a misled woman who needs to do some serious self-reflection and thinking on why, exactly, men would promote abortion so strongly, why anyone would, and why they want you to see children as abominable little burdens, and why you also having that point of view directly benefits them.
does this make me anti-feminist? i don't know. do i care? no. i don't identify with that label, i am not your friend, i do not care about you. i am my own person with my own experiences and opinions. if you don't like them, or they even deeply offend you, that's fantastic. do us both a favor and block me if you feel the need to do so.
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sugarpsalms · 6 months
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all this on the heels of him and Vader experiencing (in my obscure reading) ibbur so. Big day for Luke. Hope he got a good nap
No one asked for me to elaborate but it's going to bother me if I don't so! Let's talk about ibbur for a moment. Tossing this under a cut because this is a very niche topic, and also long. I will spare y'all a scroll. Unless you're interested. In which case, you know what to do.
For those unfamiliar, ibbur a positive form of possession in which the soul of a departed righteous person overtakes the body of someone living, either to perform a mitzvah it can't complete without a physical form or for the benefit of its host. With regards to Luke & Vader at the end of ROTJ, either motivation could apply. Helping them out of a tight spot is definitely a mitzvah (one that critically, imo, hinged on it being one another that physically did it, so corporeal form 100% necessary here), but it's also expressly benefiting the hosts so. Reader's choice on that front.
The aspects of this that I find most interesting is when it occurs and the potential reasons as to why from the departed's POV; the departed being Yoda and Obi-Wan, as Luke & Vader's mentors respectively, who have the best understanding of their capabilities/needs.
In Luke's case, I see this being a very quick & clean process in which Yoda only occupies his body for the couple of seconds following Luke (literally) disarming Vader. When he's got him on his back, primed to have his head taken off, but just kind of. Stands there, all the violent energy from moments before sucked out of him. I imagine Yoda's spirit slipped into Luke's body right here for the sole purpose of just forcing him to stop and breathe, to break out of reactive rage and actually consider what he's doing. That, at this point in his development, is all the help Luke really needs. He's got a really strong sense of what he should/shouldn't be doing, a clear vision of how he wants to engage with adversaries, and (most importantly) isn't interested in hurting Vader, considering Palpatine both of their actual enemies.
He doesn't need a protracted, come-back-to-the-light ordeal; he just needs a little scruff pinch at a pivotal moment, where he can see the result of his frenzy so far and sit for a second with the knowledge of what he was about to do. Perfectly sobering, light touch of a redirection. Possession complete!
By virtue of his mind and spirit being more of a mess, Vader's would need more cook time. I imagine it starting the moment Luke's ends and running right up to the moment before he tosses Sheev like a laundry bag. And all of that time, Obi-Wan's spirit is picking through a thick nest of thorns—Luke attacked him, Luke's dangerous, Luke's unturnable, perhaps it's better if Luke dies; Luke spared him, Luke keeps calling him 'father', Luke's refusing to replace him; but Sidious wants Luke, wants to replace him, Vader's probably dead if Luke isn't, so maybe it wouldn't be so bad to let Sidious fry him. He has another child after all, and he could try again.
On and on and on, mind looping back, with Obi's assistance, to that very private feeling Vader experienced when he first learned his child had survived. Back to every moment, selfish or otherwise, where he considered snapping Sheev's neck. Wouldn't it feel so good to be free of him now? To throw the chains off for a selfless reason, to get to have his son see him do something good for a change? Obi thinks it would, thinks that if Vader were in a stable state of mind, that he wouldn't hesitate. But since it isn't at all stable, oh here, just let me soothe it for you, let me put you in a position to do what you know, deep down, that you should.
In both cases, the possession would need to end just before the actual task is complete, because a big part of the process of 'helping' here is empowering both of these men to do The Right Thing themselves. No outside influence in the moment of action, just their own clear reasoning and desire, because it's not a satisfying hurdle jump if someone else does too much of the work.
Obi-Wan, like Yoda, would have to leave Vader at the critical moment, hoping that, given a chance, he finally strikes down who he's supposed to. A little bigger of a gamble, but NOTHING for it!
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As many of you know, being from eastern KY, I was raised and live in an extremely conservative environment. Abortion discussions here do not happen. It is unanimously believed abortions are anti-God, and that is that. Abortion is one of the many places I’ve departed ideologically from my family and neighbors, and the recent happenings regarding abortion have reawakened some of the thoughts and feelings I’ve had on the subject for years. I just thought I would share some of the things I had gone over in my own mind back when I was making the painful transition out of the heavy indoctrination I was brought up under.
The first arguments that convinced me were the obvious ones regarding bodily autonomy: It is a fairly well-accepted idea in our society that no human being has the right to use another human’s body against their will, not even for their own survival. Even if you are the only person in the world who could donate a kidney to me, I cannot take it without your consent. Even if you died, it is considered unethical for me to take it from your corpse without your explicit prior consent. Nonetheless, a woman is to be expected to lend her entire body to another without consent. All this, and a fetus is not even sentient! It is alive and human, but it is not a person. The fact that a fetus lack sentience should make it a no-brainer that it shouldn’t get more rights than any other living, breathing, sentient human being to such as to usurp another’s body against their will. Why are we affording non-sentient fetuses more rights than women? Why are we affording corpses more rights than women? I understand that the fetus did not intentionally invade another’s body. The fetus did not intentionally do anything, again, because it is not sentient enough to have intention. However, this changes nothing. The manner by which a person comes to rely on another is irrelevant. You still do not magically get the right to usurp their autonomy, even if it wasn’t your fault or choice to be in the situation that would require you to do so. The fact that there was a choice to have sex is likewise irrelevant. Choosing to have sex =/= choosing to be pregnant, or to allow another human to utilize your body for 9 months. It is also a core idea within the concept of consent that it can be withdrawn at any time and for any reason, and that includes pregnancy.
Though I don’t think it should be a core argument, because it is highly philosophical, I think it is still an important one: a fetus is not a sentient person. The very idea that people would force fully realized, sentient human beings to undergo something as emotionally and physically scarring as a state-enforced involuntary pregnancy for the sake of a potential person is sickening. Back when I was indoctrinated, I was pro-life. I know the arguments and the sentiments. I KNOW that none of you all actually believe a fetus is the equivalent to a walking, talking person. If you had to choose between allowing an embryo to develop or allowing five year old girl to continue living, there would be no difficulty and no hesitation in that choice. You KNOW the difference. Plus, you don’t actually treat those who have had abortions like murderers. If a woman had an abortion and later became pro-life/expressed regret, you’d welcome her with open arms and probably even try to make her a major voice in your communities. If a woman who murdered her two school-aged children later said she regretted it and wanted to advocate for children’s safety, you’d slam the door in her face and likely call the police. You know the difference.
Other arguments I considered were more practical ones, such as health concerns. For one thing, pregnancy is not benign. There are serious health risks associated with it. These risks increase when you are disabled, chronically ill, or part of marginalized communities. People may have to discontinue chronic medications that had kept their conditions in check previously. If I became pregnant, I would have to stop the medications I require to keep my disease in check. Due to the nature of my illness and the list of medication I have already failed, I would have no alternatives to take during pregnancy. I would have to stay unmedicated for 9 months and pray that I survive it. It is NOT the place of any state to force me to take that risk on for the sake, again, of a POTENTIAL person. Furthermore, people may develop new medical problems as a result of pregnancy. Patients may suffer long term complications from surgical interventions during delivery. They may die as a result of certain conditions or complications. Pregnancy is not just lending your body out for a few months. It is a huge undertaking that changes a person forever. It is not the place of any church or state to force a person to undergo these permanent risks to their physical and mental health, or to take on the role of a physician.
As many have said before me: you cannot outlaw abortion. You can only outlaw safe abortion. A person will always do what they must to preserve their own autonomy, so the choice becomes clear: would you prefer one dead body, or two?
Financial concerns: Pregnancy is expensive with frequent appointments and hefty hospital bills that could lead someone to financial ruin, especially if they have a complicated pregnancy. Even if a baby was born as a result of this pregnancy, many would be born into poverty. As a nation, we do not have the support networks in place to adequately respond to the financial, social, health-related hardships that would result from large scale state-forced, involuntary pregnancies. Debates and legislation focused on forcing the birth of these infants without also working on legislation to secure stable, healthy environments for them reveal how little pro-life camps actually care about these babies as people. I stead, they are just symbols to them, easily discarded and forgotten when their use has passed. At the end of the day, most pro-lifers I have interacted with are deeply passionate about preserving these precious babies but don’t care about the mother or about what happens to these precious babies once they are born--and certainly not once they grow up! Most are not just ignoring efforts, but oftentimes actively opposing efforts, to create the socioeconomic safety nets necessary to give these children stable and healthy lives. We have so many children right now--living, breathing, sentient children--who are suffering because of cyclical poverty. I may not be religious the way that I once was, but I highly doubt God appreciates you ignoring the plight of these children while waging war for non-sentient fetuses you intend to politically abandon the moment the cord is cut. A reassessment of priorities is badly needed here. 
So there you have it. Those are just abbreviated versions of some of the many points I went over in my head all those years ago. I am posting these in the hopes that others in a similar situation to what I was in--raised a certain way, but open to questioning--may see them and find them helpful.
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leam1983 · 1 year
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The Whale - Thoughts
This is a long one, and it touches on topics some might find sensitive. See the appended tags for content warnings.
One of the leading lines of thoughts on here is that Charlie's character has tinges of fatphobia. As someone whose boyfriend is a self-admitted chonker, I'm used to hearing derogatory comments aimed at him, and I know how - in-context - it can feel demeaning or crippling.
That said, this is a movie. It's a movie, yes, but also a movie rooted in a play, which itself has some lived experience scaffolding its structure. It might be uncomfortable to see a big guy wracked with guilt as he caves in and snarfs a bucket of KFC on his own, but it doesn't mean that morbidly obese people can't be subject to bulemia or to other eating disorders. Fat acceptance goes a long way, sure, but the human body is like any assembly of struts bolted to a foundation: it has a certain stress tolerance that varies from person to person, and some of us shouldn't allow themselves to gather too much body habitus.
Let's dial things back down, for perspective. My BF is verging on three hundred pounds. He's five feet six, so he feels quite obviously rotund, at that weight. He dresses it well, having a yen for Business Casual that doesn't drop, ever - not after hours and not on weekends. Walter feels naked without a vest and necktie, he loves flashing his fob watch, and honestly asks me which cufflinks he should wear for this or that meeting at the office. He doesn't have an ounce of shame in regards to his weight, and even has surprising levels of cardio, being known for short straight-backed sprints down his floor's main hallway whenever he forgets to bring a document or two over to the meeting room. He, in his own words, knows he's obese, and he's never let that slow him down.
The main issue is that since we've officially started living together, his increased happiness more or less translated into an increase in appetite. He was about 260 when we first took drinks together and redid his entire wardrobe last year. That's a little over five years since, with three of them marking a notable slackening of his dietary habits.
He still doesn't mind it, or so he tells me. He's still the same cheerful and chipper guy I fell for, the same faux snob who's actually really glad to speak of his more highbrow interests to whoever'll care to listen, from high-end audio to unique pieces painted by local artists that he wants to acquire.
The problem is that he gets drowsy at an increasingly rapid pace. He keeps himself alert at work with a little radio piping Big Band standards practically every day, but the occasional serious traffic jam can sometimes result in my needing to nudge him awake once the coast clears. He also hasn't managed to be active during evenings in about a year, now. We settle in for some after-hours TV or rounds of light discussion, and there's always a point where Walt's chin dips, his breath deepens and then transitions to soft snores. If I let it go, he'll eventually rip-roar himself half-awake with a bonafide Cartoon Snore. He's been given the CPAP talk by his GP, but refuses to consider it. I've always known he had a bit of a napping fetish, but what involved charming little kips before meal prep now sees him sink quite deeply.
I've made it clear on multiple occasions that while I wanted to respect his choices, I didn't feel like losing a loved one on the cusp of their sixties. I'm lucky, in that he understands I'm not interested in Walter George the Suited Six-Pack-Packer; I just want the same old warm, kind and decent man I've fallen for to last for at least a decade or two.
His response is almost always the same. He smiles, pulls me in closer, and kisses me; pulling at my lips a few times.
"It'll be okay," he then tells me. "The moment I feel like I'm losing control, I'll take the necessary steps."
He tells me that, and falls asleep mid-sentence a few hours later, at barely a few minutes past 7 PM.
I'm not blind, I know what Sleep Apnea is. Dad has it, and he, at least, sticks to his CPAP regimen. He's also cut back on salt, reduced his red meat intake, and used the dog as a handy excuse to get out more.
Walter just sits there and pulls the William Taft card. "It's just how I am," he says, his smile radiating warmth and love even while I can recognize the telltale signs of sleep pulling at his mind: the slow eye-squints, the malapropisms, the occasional sentence that goes nowhere, the marred recipes with one or two ingredients missing when a foodie like him would not have allowed himself to omit details; the now-frequent nights where I feel like I'm lying next to a beached whale gasping for air even while he swears that he's really, seriously, super comfortable...
That, in essence, is what The Whale is referring to. Fatphobia would involve heckling someone who, despite their weight, has a clean bill of health or easily manageable quirks. Telling your morbidly obese boyfriend to be a bit more careful is not fatphobic. Brendan Fraser's character has it even worse: he's bulemic! Food is his single coping mechanism for a gaggle of real and imaginary personal flaws, and he's entirely aware that he's digging his own grave! How can it be fatphobic to have such a character realize that he needs to move forward and make amends in order to find enough courage to save himself?
If anything, Charlie's progress is slow, hard - and indubitably noble. His own white whale is a return to the life he destroyed in shutting everyone out and finding solace in food, in his working past his own self-loathing. It's not my place to keep badgering Walter on his own flaws, but there's a point where you have to admit that in the absence of a divulged weight gain fetish and in his added weight being a constant product of dietary negligence - as opposed to concerted efforts to gain weight - "how he is" is a really pithy excuse for something else. Depression, avoidant behavior or some weird form of call for help - whatever it is, something's clearly at play.
The problem is I'm not Walter. Because I love him, I can't force him to act. I can try to get him to open up, sure, but I haven't made much progress in that regard. Because I love him, I owe him to at least make it clear that I'm trying. If he wants to go down in a stroke after gaining so much weight his suits become impossible to afford, I'll be right there alongside him.
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splittinghares · 2 years
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01. HARE vs THE DISTRICT ATTORNEY.
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for a little while, i've been debating how to word my explanation regarding hare's origins — or, rather, clarification as to what they are not.
my personal views on who the viewer character is canonically tend to waver back && forth. it's possible that part two of iswm will give us more information on this — it's possible it won't. but, for the sake of this blog && for the sake of how i have imagined the narrative of the viewer within it, i would like to take some time to discuss who hare is, && who the district attorney was.
this is going to be a bit of a long one, so i'm going to tuck it under a read more. however, for simplicity's sake, i will place a brief summary here beforehand:
TL;DR — hare/the viewer, within the confines of this blog, was never the district attorney, insofar as the district attorney was their own person && the person hare was, was not them. hare experiences the story that preludes the actor's descent into literary madness through the district attorney's eyes, but the district attorney did not become the viewer.
there is a definitive difference between the events of who killed markiplier? (and, by extension, damien && wilford 'motherloving' warfstache) && the events of date, heist, && space. this difference, which has been referenced by hare within the canon on this blog, is this:
hare is incapable of making choices within these stories. the viewer is a passive audience, incapable of choosing a rabbit hole within which to burrow. they can only follow the path shown, or witness events that answer further questions.
there could be many reasons as to why choices are left out of these stories. i am not claiming to fully understand exactly whatever narrative importance mark put upon these tales while creating them. i can, however, explain why i interpret these events how i do, && how i believe they create something compelling on this blog.
though i haven't been able to explore it quite as deeply as i might've liked thus far, hare experiences a great deal of turmoil regarding the events that set these stories into motion. damien, celine, && william are not characters — they are living, breathing individuals, not ones crafted by pen. date, heist, && space all consist of people mark has written into existence (save a few), but these people were real. these people are real, && their suffering serves as the catalyst for everything else that comes to pass.
this is why it makes further sense, to me, that the district attorney is someone else that hare can feel such sympathy for. another casualty. another person hare has to watch fall victim to markiplier manor && its more twisted occupants. furthermore, should the district attorney be a separate person, it would make sense as to why hare cannot dictate the path they walk through the events of who killed markiplier?: these are the district attorney's decisions, not hare's.
the story of who killed markiplier? is a prologue. a prologue is, naturally, essential to fully understanding the plot, hence hare's role extending to reliving it. it is not, however, a story that is meant to be particularly accessible nor enjoyable: it is an experience, rather than something a viewer is meant to impart themselves upon. frankly, i don't know that mark consciously desires for hare to see these particular parts of himself. but there's other forces at work.
there's other smaller reasons i feel like the distinction between the district attorney && hare is valuable. the district attorney, after all, is the person whose body dark currently occupies — it would follow, at least to me, that said body && hare's body could not be one in the same.
additionally, i feel as though the relationship that characters like the actor && dark have with the viewer is more significant when viewed separately from relationships had with the district attorney. the tragedies of the district attorney && the viewer stand well on their own, in my opinion: the district attorney's is a tale of love, betrayal && intrigue — whereas the viewer's tale is one of futility, desperation, && identity. there are parallels, yes, but not enough for me to feel as though they need be put together.
in that same vein, continuing with the discussion of their relationships — i feel as though the viewer's kinship with dark && their struggle with the actor takes on new life when not conflated with the district attorney's. while they both have reasons to be drawn to dark, && they both have reasons to be furious with the actor, i feel like their differentiation creates more rich interaction && further depth of emotion for both the district attorney && for the viewer, as i believe they can both be given more narrative space to experience their traumas && pains.
this is growing very rambly, but i hope it made sense. i might elaborate further here if i feel so compelled, but i do feel like there's enough information here for people to hopefully understand why i feel the way that i do / why i write the way that i do, here.
for clarity: as far as 100% canon goes, i'm not sure if i genuinely think the viewer && the district attorney are completely different people. i feel like the argument can be made either way, especially when discussing the mirror && its ability to function as a "window" into mark's stories. however, for this blog, i have chosen this line of thought, as i feel like it makes hare's story more interesting / takes it down the narrative path i would like to walk.
if you read this far, i want you to know that i appreciate your enthusiasm for my interpretation of the viewer, && that i'm grateful for your interest. thank you <3
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For every person voting it is imperative that you realize an unborn child is not viable without the mother. Having a heartbeat or developing eyes, arms, ears etc. doesn't mean the the child is a separate person yet. It is only after birth when they take their first breath (which occurs the first time they cry) that they are truly a separate being. It is so sad that people confuse Pro-Life with defending the unborn rather than supporting the population that is already here on this earth.
The heart cycles to oxygenate the blood that circulates through the body and is essential for health, but the lungs are vital organs and without oxygen the baby will not remain viable. While inside the mothers womb it is her oxygen and the umbilical cord that the growing fetus utilizes. In fact the lungs are bypassed in the early stages of development itself and without the mothers heart beat there is no viability. The lungs aren't able to be completely efficient on their own until at least the 24 - 26th week of pregnancy, and even then, outside the mother's womb they may not make it.
That said no woman or family should allow any government control over reproductive rights. Our next door neighbors pregnancy is not our business unless they share the news with us and overturning Roe vs Wade is a sign of ignorance I believe since the case concerned an individual matter that has been over since the judgement was ruled on decades ago. It was applicable to one pregnancy and for the courts to overturn it seems another waste of time and money since the outcome has no real bearing on all other women and men since or even before the case.
Hearing the court systems speak and act as if they are doing their duty on behalf of God like the Alabama case recently is heartbreaking. They have no personal connection or responsibility to the mother, child, or family unit. Morally speaking with regards based on principles of what is good vs bad or right vs wrong is an individual choice for all people. Outlining consequences for a person convicted of murdering a living human being is one thing but to try to add on the same statutes or consequences for an unborn child is beyond political scope. It is and will remain a private matter that each person will have to deal with their whole life.
Developing laws to help assure the majority of people follow social norms so we can live peacefully is a huge job in and of itself. Taking on the job of Morality Patrol is not required. There are reasons people seek abortions and very few are related to simply birth control. Even a miscarriage is consided a spontaneous abortion since abortion on means the expulsion of the fetus from the uterus and lifespan is based on the viability of the fetus.
This isn't a Democratic or Republican issue it is a human issue and for goverment or church or any other person or persons to interfer with everyday life as though they have the right to do so is unreasonable.
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knowles25skou · 2 years
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Greatest Fitness Tips For Men
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jingyismom · 3 years
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Time for more sex-cursed Lan Wangji!
a messy, self-indulgent spree imported from twt and lightly edited
explicit, wangxian, 9k, canon divergence fix-it
mild dubcon because of the nature of sex curses (but like, they do their best to communicate around it), and cw for brief thoughts of self harm, no other warnings
This curse's origin is mysterious, perhaps politically guided. Someone is trying to throttle Gusu Lan's alliance prospects by removing Lan Wangji's stellar marriageability after Sunshot. It works, after a fashion.
Wei Wuxian is in the Burial Mounds, farming and hardening his heart as the resentment worsens his health, subsisting on memories of Lan Wangji's single visit.
Lan Wangji is at home in Gusu, pining away while they rebuild the Cloud Recesses.
One day, he begins to burn up with unexplained fever.
The healers examine him quickly and thoroughly and determine first that he's been cursed. This is not entirely shocking, but it of course angers the entire sect. Next they test for the curse's nature. It turns out to be a very classic, very coarse type of love curse.
The afflicted will burn up, losing all their sense and senses, and eventually die, if their body's “needs” are not satisfied by the one it craves most.
The healers are disgusted. Lan Xichen and Lan Qiren are outraged. But Lan Wangji becomes very calm at the news.
Before, he felt anxiety. The urgent desperation of a dying man waiting to be told how to live.
Now he is just waiting to die.
For you see, the choice between throwing himself at another human being—no matter who they may be—and meeting death with dignity, is an easy one.
Everyone else privy to this information disagrees. The argument that follows is short, but heated:
"Well, Wangji?" Lan Qiren begins once the initial furor has died down. "How do you wish to...go about this?"
Lan Wangji, over-warm and aching, looks up at him from the examination bed. Gusu Lan funeral rites are ancient and immutable. He does not understand the question.
Lan Qiren purses his lips and glances around. "We must find the person first," he prompts.
Ah. The person responsible. Yes, Lan Wangji does have business with them before he dies. He stands, only swaying slightly. "I am well enough to exact justice. Let us cast the rebound."
Lan Xichen steps forward then, and gently pushes him back to sitting. "It has been cast. However, justice can wait. Your health must come first."
Lan Wangji looks between his uncle, his brother, and the one doctor allowed to be present. Surely they would not be joking at a time like this.
"I do not understand," he says.
The three exchange a look. "Breaking the curse must be our priority," says Lan Xichen.
Lan Wangji is not sure he heard correctly. But it would be cruel to give him unfounded hope. "I was unaware there was another way."
"...There is not," says Lan Xichen, his gentleness unfailing.
Lan Wangji experiences a moment of deep confusion before the horror sets in.
"You cannot mean this," he says through his shock. "Surely you cannot mean to cast aside so many disciplines at the whim of a base villain."
"The disciplines are a guide," Lan Qiren says, hands behind his back, looking into the distance, "to ensure a life well-lived. They are not meant to inspire martyrdom."
Lan Wangji's mouth falls open. He stares at his uncle, mute with betrayal. He has never heard of any such leeway before, not in regards to disciplines of such a serious nature.
"You can understand, can't you?" Lan Xichen says. "That no rule is more important than your life.”
Lan Wangji disagrees vehemently. "I would not buy my life with such behavior."
Lan Qiren huffs in irritation. "We may perform a marriage in haste, if you wish."
Lan Wangji balks at him. That his uncle should speak so flippantly of...such a thing. It is unimaginable. And besides, forcing a marriage on Wei—on anyone in this way is surely only adding insult to heinous injury.
"I refuse," he says.
Lan Xichen exchanges a look with the doctor, and sits beside him. "Perhaps the other person should be allowed part of that choice."
Ridiculous. "There is no such person." Preventing this course of action is worth one lie, Lan Wangji reasons.
"With respect, Hanguang-jun, if that were true, the curse would not have been able to take hold," says the doctor.
The use of his title feels uncomfortably ironic from a woman who helped deliver him at birth. He glares at her. She smiles tiredly in return.
"Wangji," Lan Xichen says. His tone is beginning to grate on Lan Wangji's raw nerves. "You will at least try, won't you?"
Lan Wangji stares at him in disbelief, in anger, in righteous indignation.
"Never," he says.
A hand slaps his shoulder. "Apologies," says the doctor, and the world goes dark.
-----
Lan Wangji wakes to dark wood beams dappled by lacy sunlight, and a faint smell of char in the air. His head is heavy, his limbs full of lead. He swallows around the dry thickness in his throat.
"Water," comes a familiar voice.
With effort, Lan Wangji sits up. His stomach is roiling, his mind fogged from the coma and the curse both. The doctor, crouching beside him in the carriage, offers him a bowl of water.
He takes it, and asks, "What have you done?"
She sighs.
"My duty," she says, "with the help of your brother."
She draws back the curtain at the carriage entrance, revealing a sea of black, twisted trees and gray tumbled walls.
Lan Wangji's blood freezes in his veins. He just barely stops himself from asking how they knew.
"Why," he asks instead, a much safer question.
She considers him. "Your brother said if he was wrong, he would beg forgiveness afterward. But it couldn't hurt to have an expert in resentment and curses look at you anyway."
A stab of sick embarrassment makes Lan Wangji’s stomach clench.
Has he been so obvious? Is he such a lovesick fool that anyone with eyes can see his shame?
The doctor pats his shoulder gruffly and he flinches, expecting more needles.
"Ah he's your brother, he's bound to know things you don't want him to," she says. "Come on. Out you get."
He allows her to tug him out of the carriage and onto solid ground. The air is stifling with resentment, but he is glad to be free of his bonds. Now he can look for his chance to get away.
There are six Lan disciples flanking them. He eyes them warily, wondering what they know. When the doctor pulls him out of earshot, and pitches her voice low, he is satisfied that they have not been fully informed.
"Your family and I agreed to give you a chance first," she says. "You have 24 hours to take care of this yourself. After that, I will personally tell Wei-gongzi of your brother's message. I have been assured he will not jeopardize your well-being if fully-informed."
Lan Wangji gapes at her. He does not know what he expected to happen, but it was not this...this...mercenary attempt at...forcing...
The curse has weakened him such that he cannot fly his sword. He can hardly walk in a straight line, let alone run. He has very little recourse now that everyone in his life has gone absolutely mad. His heart is racing with the adrenaline of upheaval, of fear, of impending death.
He wrenches his arm from her grasp and stalks off of the road, into the brush. She calls after him, but he does not mean to escape. He cannot manage that alone. Instead, he sits. He takes a deep breath. He sinks into meditation.
"Hanguang-jun," she calls. She approaches, hands on her hips. She sighs. "Well, if it's like that, then there's nothing stopping me from telling him right now."
She turns, and Lan Wangji feels a lurch of helplessness, when a new voice rings clear through the fog.
"Tell what to whom?"
Lan Wangji's eyes snap open. Wei Wuxian is standing on the other side of the carriage, the child A-Yuan in his arms, eyeing the Lan delegation with suspicion. Wen Ning is with him, and the Lan disciples shift nervously just looking at him, but Wei Wuxian sets A-Yuan in his arms, and he leaps away up the mountain.
"Might I assume this little party has come for me?" Wei Wuxian goes on, twirling his flute. His eyes are shrewd and cold, similar to the way they had looked when he had first returned during the war.
At the sight of him, at the sound of his voice, the curse...reacts.
A horrid, uncomfortable shiver of need runs through Lan Wangji's body alongside his own simple relief and joy at seeing Wei Wuxian again, looking relatively well. He fights it, keeping still among the weeds, hoping against hope to go unnoticed.
"Yiling Laozu," the doctor greets him with a deep bow. "We have indeed come to humbly beg your aid."
"I see," he says. "And what will you give me in return?"
The doctor hesitates, clearly discomfited by the context Wei Wuxian is currently unaware of. "We may...discuss that. Once we have informed you of the details."
Wei Wuxian hums, considering. Cold. Detached. "And if I am disinclined to—"
He breaks off. The doctor has moved so that she and Lan Wangji are both in Wei Wuxian's line of sight. Lan Wangji closes his eyes rather than see the moment of recognition, rather than feel the weight of Wei Wuxian's eyes on him, like this.
"Lan Zhan?"
Lan Wangji clamps his jaw shut. It is a struggle not simply to crawl to him.
The renewed ice in Wei Wuxian's voice when next he speaks makes Lan Wangji aware of the warmth with which he had said his name. His curls his shaking hands into fists on his knees.
"What have you done to him?"
The doctor sighs. "We have done nothing. He has been cursed, which is why we brought him here. If you—"
"Daifu," Lan Wangji interrupts, his voice thin.
She stops speaking.
Lan Wangji opens his eyes, but does not look at Wei Wuxian, not yet. If he is careful, and uses his remaining strength correctly, he can perhaps...perhaps guide the situation. Toward escape. With Wei Wuxian's help.
He may have to lie to him. He hopes he will be forgiven, all things considered.
Lan Wangji stands slowly, carefully, considering each movement so as not to reveal the state he is in.
"I will speak with him," he says to the doctor.
She eyes him. "24 hours," she says.
He does not acknowledge this. He thinks they both know it will not come to that, though his idea differs greatly from hers. He judges, from the time they have allotted and his own weakness, that he has perhaps a day and a half, total, to wait them out. Doable, if he is careful and intelligent about it.
He can manage.
He walks over to Wei Wuxian, careful to keep two arm's lengths between them. This close is already too close: a fine, constant tremor has made a home in all of his tightly-locked muscles. He feels the moment his fever begins to rise further. The sides of his throat hurt, the interiors of his ears. He wonders if his hearing will go first, or his eyes.
"Allow me to explain," he says to him.
"Of course," Wei Wuxian answers.
He sounds strange. Cold, still. Lan Wangji wants to look at him, and almost slips, but manages to stop himself. He follows him up the hill, past the wards, through the resentment that clings to them both, now. He keeps his careful distance, following behind.
"What happened?" Wei Wuxian asks, as they walk.
"A curse," Lan Wangji says carefully. "Origin unknown. The rebound has been cast. I did not wish to burden you with this, but they are...they will not listen to reason. Wei Ying, if you would but help me, I would deal with this on my own."
"Oh?"
"I...wish to seek justice. They will not allow it. But you understand. If there is another path off the mountain, if you would show me the way past them, I could—"
Wei Wuxian stops dead, and Lan Wangji, with his eyes in the ground, runs into him. 
For a blazing, agonizing moment, he is touching Wei Wuxian, clinging to him, every element in his body sighing and crying out at once in satisfaction, in the torturous need for more.
He tears himself away, stumbling back, almost falling. Wei Wuxian reaches out as if to catch him, but falters.
"Lan Zhan, you can hardly stand," he says, alarmed, "and you want to go and fight someone?"
Lan Wangji draws himself up taller again, trying hard to stop his shaking. He cannot look at him. He cannot look. He is already dying, now, just from not looking. "It is my right."
"...It is..." Wei Wuxian says at length, watching him closely. "And it still will be once you're well again. Your doctors really couldn't tell what type of curse it is?"
Lan Wangji says nothing, trying to think past the way every inch of his skin feels as if it is burning clean off. The pain of it screams through him, worse than anything he has ever felt. Wei Wuxian is still speaking, but it is hard to make sense of it. When Wei Wuxian begins walking again, slowly, it is all he can do to both follow and stay away from him. This, here, now, is worse than death. If it lasts, he certainly will not be sane when the end finally comes. He lets go of any thoughts of a dignified death.
Fortunately, by the time they reach the cool dark of the cave Wei Wuxian calls home, the pain has subsided to a distant roar. Unfortunately, he hoped never to reach this point. He tries his only play again, unable to think of any new tactic.
"Please show me the way off the mountain," he says without preamble.
Wei Wuxian is quiet for a beat. "You really don't want my help that much?"
Lan Wangji is so confused by this question, and then struck by the irony of it, that he almost begins to laugh. A shivery, jittery feeling fills his chest, and he leans against the nearest solid surface. He wishes he were wearing a loose outer layer over his blue travel robes, the better to hide his shaking. He does not know how to respond.
"You haven't so much as looked at me once since you got here," Wei Wuxian goes on, digging through strange pots and objects on a table, "so I get it. But you'll have to forgive me if I disregard your objection to the kind of work I do, when it comes to your life."
"My life, my life," Lan Wangji mocks, accidentally out loud. Why is everyone suddenly so obsessed with his life? He was ready to give it freely in the war, but chance let him keep it. What difference does giving it now in the name of keeping himself clean of shame make? Why will nobody allow him this choice?
"What shame?" Wei Wuxian asks.
Lan Wangji buckles at the realization that he has said all of this out loud. He goes to the floor, to his knees.
"Nothing," he says. "The shame of not having warded off such a simple attack."
"Lan Zhan...you want to die because you didn't defend against a curse you didn't know was coming?"
Lan Wangji lapses into silence. He has said too much already. He does not know how to get out of this. He can only...he can only stay quiet. Refuse to speak or move.
"Lan Zhan...I feel like I'm missing something here. I only want to help.”
Lan Wangji grits his teeth and stares hard at the floor in front of him. He has rarely ever felt so trapped, so utterly helpless. The extended, full-body pain is dulling his mind by the moment. The hems of Wei Wuxian's robes come into view, and it takes everything in him not to fall forward into him, to plead, to beg. His breath is hitching at random intervals now, his heart tripping as it prepares to fail entirely.
There is a soft gust of air, and an odd prickling sensation across his face.
"Now let's see—oh," Wei Wuxian says. "I...oh."
Lan Wangji wilts at his stilted, awkward tone. He knows now, surely. Can see him truly.
"So that's why you want to leave, and why they won't let you. They want me to find another way to break it, to stop you from...ah."
Lan Wangji sorts through the words, trying to comprehend them.
"Sorry," Wei Wuxian goes on. "I...it's unbreakable, otherwise. A very old, airtight spell. You...will Gusu Lan start a war with me if I do just let you go...ah, handle this the old-fashioned way?"
Comprehension dawns. And with it, a way out.
Lan Wangji rushes to agree. "They—" He cuts off. Will they? If they think Wei Wuxian has willingly let him die, rather than...
He takes a breath. Another. Forces his mind past the endless litany of pleas for relief.
"Show me the way " he says, his words breathless and short, "and then tell Lan-daifu what you have done. And why. But give me time to. Get away. And you will be safe."
Wei Wuxian pauses. "How...ah. How far—how much time?"
Lan Wangji tries hard to come up with an answer for that. His progress will be slow. But he need only find a place to hide.
"Half a day," he hazards.
Wei Wuxian seems to vacillate. "Are you sure you can make it on your own?"
Lan Wangji wants to rage. To weep. To curse himself to the heavens for being so depraved toward so endlessly kind a man. His heart hurts, even as his body strains toward him.
This lie may be the worst he will ever tell.
"I will be fine,” he says.
"Alright." Wei Wuxian sounds unconvinced. "I trust you."
Lan Wangji nearly convulses, holding back a sob. How will he ever be forgiven?
He cannot think of it. Only this, only what comes next. Only keeping Wei Wuxian safe from this mess.
"Lan Zhan?"
"Mn," he manages.
"Would you look at me, now? I haven't...used any demonic cultivation on you. It's safe, I promise I won't. I just. Can't we say goodbye properly?"
Lan Wangji has not moved from the floor. He does not move. He should try. A parting gift. Just one look.
But if he is going to leave. If he is going to succeed. He cannot.
"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian says again, frustrated now.
Lan Wangji does not look. He is so close to freedom from the horrible pull, from the way his very veins are trying to tear themselves free to wrap around Wei Wuxian.
Wei Wuxian steps forward, and Lan Wangji's breath leaves him all at once. Suddenly, there are fingers beneath his jaw, kind but firm, tilting his chin up. He has no choice but to look.
(Inspired by this art.)
Wei Wuxian is there. Tall and strong and perfect, tiredness mixed with something bittersweet on his lovely face. Lan Wangji's entire being melts toward him, a deep, sharp tug from inside his bones, a mindless, helpless, straining need that pushes a low, wanting sound from his throat.
Wei Wuxian snatches his hand away and backs up half a step, staring at him.
"Sorry," he says, blank. Confused. "I thought it was...I didn't realize...sorry."
Lan Wangji, now that he has looked, cannot look away. He has overbalanced without Wei Wuxian's support, fallen forward onto his hands, but he cannot stop looking at him. He will look at him, and keep looking; he prays Wei Wuxian is the last thing he sees before he dies.
The most shameful part of this is that none of it is the curse twisting his thoughts. None of this is. All the curse is doing is making the way he always feels impossible to ignore.
"Wei Ying," his voice implores. He does not mean it to.
Wei Wuxian takes another step back and looks down at the bowl of powder in his hand, confused. "I was certain it was that curse," he says to himself. "If I was wrong, then maybe I could break it..."
Lan Wangji tries to scrape his composure back together. He tries. He tries. His fingers scrape on the rough stone floor. He does not reach out for him. That is something.
Wei Wuxian looks at him again, then hastily away. Lan Wangji does not ever want to know what it is he sees.
"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian says, as Lan Wangji shakes, and shakes. "Where...where were you trying to go? I thought you...I thought you were, ah, thinking of a certain someone."
Lan Wangji's arms are weak. They are going to give out. He cannot answer him.
"I'm confused, and I...may have made a mistake," Wei Wuxian goes on, still backing away slowly, "but I just want to help. Can you tell me what was happening before, and what's happening now?"
Lan Wangji shakes his head, and the motion shatters his fragile balance. He falls, and curls tightly around himself in the dirt.
"Lan Zhan!" Wei Wuxian says, suddenly close.
Lan Wangji sees his hand reach out, then pause, and he can't stop himself from taking hold of it, just to be touching him. His body screams for it, and he gasps raggedly at the contact.
Wei Wuxian wrenches his arm free. Lan Wangji wishes he were dead.
"Fuck," Wei Wuxian mutters to himself. "I...I'm sorry. I made this so much worse, I..."
"No," Lan Wangji rasps. He cannot hear Wei Wuxian berate himself thus. His dignity has now died, and he himself will soon follow. This is all that matters. "Not your fault."
Wei Wuxian huffs, crouching beside him. "It is...at least partially my fault, at this point, I'm pretty sure. You wouldn't be...reacting. Like this. If it weren't. Is...can I...do a few more tests? To check what I got wrong, and maybe—"
"You were not wrong."
He does not mean to say it.
His need to reassure has overridden his sense, and his mind is too slow now to piece together what it will mean before it leaves his mouth. The regret once it does is instantaneous. He tries to curl himself yet smaller in the dirt.
Wei Wuxian is silent. Lan Wangji cannot stop making small, pitiful, pained sounds in the back of his throat. Everything hurts. Everything.
"I don't understand," Wei Wuxian says quietly.
Lan Wangji lies shivering on the floor, arms locked around himself to prevent any more untoward behavior. He cannot take it back. He cannot try to explain. There is nothing he could say, regardless.
"Lan Zhan...but you..."
He can hear Wei Wuxian thinking, but it only registers in the far back of his mind. The rest of his consciousness is taken up by pain, and by ruthless restraint.
"You wanted to leave to get away from me," Wei Wuxian says, finally.
Lan Wangji does not answer. He wishes he had his sword. He would use it now to end this.
Wei Wuxian begins to back away again, and Lan Wangji’s body moves without his permission. He grips the skirt of Wei Wuxian’s robes in his fist and drags himself closer, pressing his cheek to Wei Wuxian's knee.
Shameful. Wanton. The small part of himself that is still aware berates the action. But he cannot let go. He cannot move away. The only part of him that is not howling with pain is the side of his face pressed to coarse fabric.
"Lan Zhan, you…," Wei Wuxian is trying to gently pry Lan Wangji's fingers from his hem. "You wanted to leave, remember? You don't want...you don't."
"Want," Lan Wangji croaks, pressing closer. "Wanted to spare you."
"Ah, Lan Zhan...I...I'm still not sure it's that specific curse, it could...there could be other..."
"It is," Lan Wangji says, half-crawling up Wei Wuxian's leg. He wants to stop himself. It is impossible.
"Lan Zhan...you...you shouldn't—"
"Stop me," Lan Wangji pleads, nuzzling against Wei Wuxian's thigh, "Wei Ying, I can't...please. Stop me."
There is a long near-silence filled with harsh breaths, in which Lan Wangji is almost certain he imagines the light touch of fingers brushing his mussed hair back from his forehead. Then Wei Wuxian speaks.
"No," he says. "You'll die, if I do. Lan Zhan. I won't let that happen."
He touches Lan Wangji's face. Lan Wangji whimpers into him.
He knows this will break the fragile repairs they have made to their friendship. He will likely never see him again, at least not on good terms. The thought makes him feel ill. He should protest. Refuse. Flee. He can do exactly none of these things. He reaches for Wei Wuxian's wrist, to hold his hand to his face, but Wei Wuxian flinches away.
"You can't...Lan Zhan. I'm going to help you," he says, "but you have to...you can't...you can't touch me."
Lan Wangji feels another tight clench of shame. He nods against his leg. He understands: he knows any small part of this is too much to ask, let alone bearing his unwelcome, curse-fevered grasping.
"Okay," says Wei Wuxian. He slides his fingers beneath Lan Wangji’s chin again, tipping his face up.
He looks so uncertain. So beautiful in the dim light. Lan Wangji wants to weep with it.
"Lan Zhan, I know it doesn't count for much like this, but you have to tell me. You have to tell me what you need."
Lan Wangji turns his head, pressing his face between Wei Wuxian's thigh and stomach, trying to reach into him, to feel more of him, to stop hurting just enough to think. It does not work.
"You," he breathes, into the scent of earth, and stringent soap, and Wei Wuxian.
A harsh, uneven breath ghosts across his hair, and Wei Wuxian's hands grip his shoulders. He thinks he is about to be pushed away again, but instead Wei Wuxian pulls him up, pulls him close, folds him into his embrace.
Lan Wangji sobs into his shoulder, trying at once to get closer and to hold himself apart, instinct demanding, even now, that he try to conceal his obvious, disgraceful hardness. His muscles quake under the strain of doing both and neither, and Wei Wuxian smooths one hand down his back, pressing him close, pressing them flush. Lan Wangji chokes back a shocked sound.
"Shh," Wei Wuxian soothes. "It's alright."
It is not alright. It is the end of the thing Lan Wangji holds most dear.
But he does not have it in him to argue. He is shifting against him, his overheated body begging for touch, indeed for ravishment. He is mindless with it. The pain is not subsiding but slipping sideways into something more, something different, something necessary.
He is on his knees on hard stone, breathlessly held in the arms of his beloved. He has dreamt this: sweetly, hazily, with and without hope. But never like this. Never sick with remorse, with need, dying and demanding and defiling. His deepest desire twisted into a nightmare.
He whimpers again, his lips finding the soft coolness of Wei Wuxian's throat. Wei Wuxian jerks away again, and Lan Wangji fists his hands tighter at his sides, trying, trying not to overstep again.
"I—sorry," he gasps out. He will never be able to apologize enough. But he will try.
"Don't apologize," says Wei Wuxian. "I—"
He cuts himself off. Lan Wangji does not have enough sense to wonder why. In the same moment, one of his thighs gives under the strain, and he falls against him heavily. They tip over, to the floor, and he reaches out on instinct to brace them both. When he is again conscious of himself, Wei Wuxian is lying on top of him, breathing hard, both of Lan Wangji's wrists pinned to the floor in one hand. Lan Wangji arches against him inadvertently, and turns his face into his own bicep.
"Sorry, I...so sorry," he pants, his hips flexing, searching for friction. "I have...no control...”
"I know," Wei Wuxian says, "I know, I shouldn't have..." he swallows hard. "I'm going to keep you like this. Can I?"
Lan Wangji nods frantically, his eyes shut tight. He does not care. Anything that he can do to make this any less invasive for Wei Wuxian, he will do.
Wei Wuxian pulls away then, his hold still firm on Lan Wangji's wrists. Lan Wangji squeezes his eyes shut and tries to stop moving, to stop searching for touch, to stop making such a disgusting spectacle of himself, but to no avail. What feels like centuries later, he hears the telltale sounds of talisman activation. He is too far gone in his pain to look up, to see what they are. He simply lies there, pinned and writhing, his breath catching in his throat. The sounds it makes are small, pitiful, desperate.
Just like him.
Eventually, Wei Wuxian leans back over him, a considering look in his eye. His hand hovers at Lan Wangjis belt.
"I—should I..."
"Yes," pleads Lan Wangji.
He needs Wei Wuxian's skin on his skin. He does not know how discerning the curse is about what happens now, but it feels as if he will die without it. Wei Wuxian takes what looks like a fortifying breath and unties the belt. Lan Wangji, unable to help, instead hinders the process with his ceaseless movement. But Wei Wuxian manages it with deft hands, and immediately unties each layer of robes in quick succession until Lan Wangji’s chest and stomach are bare.
The cool air of the cave does not soothe his burning. It burns like ice instead. Lan Wangji shivers, an ugly whine escaping him.
"What," Wei Wuxian asks, pausing, "what is it?"
Lan Wangji shakes his head. He will bear it. He will not make demands.
"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian says, "you need to talk to me, I...I don't want to make this even worse, or, or draw it out longer."
Something small and dark crumples in Lan Wangji's chest. He does not want that either. He will need to speak. To ask.
"Hurts," he says, rough and thick.
"Where?"
"...Not...not touching me."
Wei Wuxian makes a distressed noise and lays both his palms flat over Lan Wangji's ribs. Lan Wangji groans, pressing up into them.
"Please," he whispers, helpless. "Please."
"Oh, Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian murmurs, something sad like regret. He leans closer and slides one hand down. Lan Wangji shudders under him. "I'm just going to..."
Lan Wangji nods again, holding his breath to stop the whines from escaping the back of his throat.
Wei Wuxian unties Lan Wangji's trousers and slips his hand inside. Clever fingers wrap hesitantly around him, and he bucks up into them with an obscene moan. It is minor relief from the most consuming pain he has ever felt, and it is simultaneously the most intense pleasure he has ever experienced. All of these sensations, coexisting in his fallible human body, feel likely to rip him apart.
"Wei Ying," he moans again, when Wei Wuxian moves his hand.
He gasps for air, his body twisting into it, his whole being searching for Wei Wuxian. He makes another piteous sound, the torment of it all overwhelming. Wei Wuxian leans down against him then, his own robes open, pressing them skin to skin.
Lan Wangji sobs. It is something. It is something. The pain abates somewhat, and he sighs, turning toward him, his mouth brushing Wei Wuxian's hair. He has the wherewithal now to fight the urge to kiss his head properly, his face, anything he can reach. He holds himself still beneath him instead. And Wei Wuxian touches him, and touches him. The incomprehensible pleasure builds, and builds, until Lan Wangji cannot breathe. But it does not break.
Something almost like soft lips brushes his throat.
"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian says into his ear, "this, is this...will this be enough?"
The pleasure is just another kind of pain, now. Lan Wangji shakes his head as sweat rolls off of him, as he tries and fails to get enough air to speak.
Wei Wuxian clears his throat. "What, then?"
Lan Wangji's body knows what it needs. But he does not want to tell.
"Come on, Lan Zhan, after all this? Don't get shy on me now."
He misses the joking tone he is aiming for, but the pure, unmistakable Wei Wuxian-ness of the tease sends a surge of genuine desire through Lan Wangji. He wraps his legs around Wei Wuxian's hips and pulls him down. Wei Wuxian breathes in sharply.
"You just...you want...but only..."
"Please," says Lan Wangji, barely voiced. "In—" he cannot say it. "Please."
"Ah," Wei Wuxian whispers, into his skin. "If—are you sure?"
Lan Wangji whines. He wishes he were not so very sure. He wishes he were not asking Wei Wuxian to do something so intimate, so extreme. He wishes Wei Wuxian had let him die before it ever came to this.
"Alright Lan Zhan, just hold—hold on," he says, and is gone.
Lan Wangji clamps his mouth shut on a scream as the agony slams back into him, worse even than before.
Not soon enough, Wei Wuxian returns to divest him of his boots, socks and trousers. Lan Wangji fights him without meaning to, trying to keep his knees curled up to his chest, trying to minimize the hurt. Wei Wuxian is briskly patient, handling him with aching care he does not deserve.
And then he is upon him, chest and stomach, hips and thighs, smooth and hard and exquisite. Lan Wangji almost forgets the pain in the rush of gratitude, of solace. Their robes trail off them both, gathering dust as they move together in halting fits and starts.
"Don't let me hurt you, Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian grits out, a strong hand lifting one of Lan Wangji's thighs by the back of the knee.
It is nonsense. He could not hurt Lan Wangji any more than this. And Lan Wangji could not stop him now if he did.
But the kindness. Even in this. Tears prick at Lan Wangji's eyes. He will miss him. He will miss all of Wei Wuxian with all of himself. He will never stop missing him. He will never move past this regret as long as he lives. How could he? Every breath he draws will be by the grace of Wei Wuxian.
Suddenly there is slick pressure against him, against his most private of places, and he gasps, loud and wretched. Wei Wuxian exhales, uneven and deep, and pushes in, in, in. Slowly. So slowly. Lan Wangji bites down hard on his lip to keep from begging for it. His arms are pinned, as are his hips, Wei Wuxian holding him steady, holding him still. Lan Wangji loses all sense. There is only the weight of Wei Wuxian, the full, stinging press of him, the searing pain, the devastating euphoria of being this close, and yet so very far in every way that counts.
Ages pass before Wei Wuxian is fully seated inside him. By then Lan Wangji's breaths are wet and shallow; scraping, desolate things. He does not know any longer what hurts and what feels good. It is all one and the same. He only knows he needs more, in some primal, wordless way.
He asks with the arch of his back, the squeeze of his thighs. He tries, somehow, to keep quiet, but fails more often than not.
"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian says tightly, "try to relax, I'm going to move. Tell me if it...if it's right."
Lan Wangji manages a loose nod, though he barely understands.
And Wei Wuxian moves. He rolls his hips against him, shifting inside of him, and Lan Wangji groans. Each deep, short thrust pushes air from his lungs, and he lacks the strength to catch it again. It is beyond pleasure. It is ecstatic. To have Wei Wuxian around him, inside him, panting above him. A deep, villainous part of him wants it never to end. The rest of him howls for release.
He is dripping now, steadily, onto his own stomach. He can feel it pooling on his belly, unpleasantly cool. He whimpers between desperate, panting breaths, beyond words.
"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian says, breath shivering across Lan Wangji's collarbone, "I can't...can't keep this up, you feel too—" his breath catches, and he pauses. "I'm going to finish. You need to come."
Dimly, distantly, the idea that Wei Wuxian should derive pleasure from this, no matter how perfunctory, gives Lan Wangji a perverse sort of satisfaction. It snuffs out like a candle at the nebulous thought that perhaps in another world, they could have had this for real.
In this world, the fact remains that this has gone on far too long. But Lan Wangji can do nothing about it. He meets Wei Wuxian's thrusts, leans into the pleasure, tries to gain the momentum to go over the edge. He should be able to. It should be easy. He has been so hard for so long, has been given more now than in his absolute wildest and wettest of dreams, and yet he hovers, scant inches away.
Wei Wuxian loses patience, his head dropping to Lan Wangji's shoulder. He grunts softly and fists Lan Wangji's wet cock, quick and merciless. Lan Wangji cries out, shuddering violently with the extended, expansive stimulation, worked both inside and out, helplessly, utterly unmade by Wei Wuxian's touch.
And still he does not crest. He is sobbing steadily now, ugly and jagged, and Wei Wuxian kisses his shoulder, his throat, his cheek.
"Were we wrong?" He asks, breathless. "Lan Zhan please, tell—show me, I...I can't...you...I can't lose you. Lan Zhan?"
Exhausted, Lan Wangji turns his tearstained face toward him, blindly seeking. Perhaps they were all wrong. Perhaps he will die now, like this. And perhaps it is selfish of him, but having heard those words, he finds his regret to be less than it should be. Everything, everything hurts. But Wei Wuxian will miss him, too. Of course he will. They are zhiji. This, miraculously, will not erase that. It is more than he deserves. Wei Wuxian has always been more than he deserves.
Lan Wangji heaves, and writhes, and cries.
Wei Wuxian kisses him. Soft, gloriously cool lips on his.
An odd, fleeting, hollow feeling.
The dam breaks. The pain goes suddenly quiet. Roaring to fullness in its absence is the killing swell of such a long-delayed climax. It is possible that he calls Wei Wuxian's name. It is impossible to know.
The world, again, goes dark.
-----
Lan Wangji wakes to gray light and distant birdsong. A sharp edge is digging into his shoulder. He shifts, then goes still at the deep ache in his entire body.
He remembers.
"Hanguang-jun should drink this," says a brisk voice to his right.
Wen Qing sits there, watching him. His heart skips a beat and he looks down. But he is fully clothed once more.
Her smile is wry as she holds a cup out to him. Laboriously, he sits up to take it. It is bitter, but familiar. A restorative. He thanks her formally.
She shakes her head. "No need.” She turns to go.
"Wen-guniang," Lan Wangji says. She pauses. "How long has it been gone?"
She turns to stare at him. He knows she knows what he means.
"How? When?"
She looks away. "You'll have to ask him."
The pang of loss he felt upon waking with Wei Wuxian gone speaks for him. "Will he let me?"
 He lies on the slab of rock that serves as Wei Wuxian's bed for too long. It is difficult to tell the passage of time in the Burial Mounds, but it seems slightly brighter than it had...before. He reasons that it could well be the next morning. He wonders if Wei Wuxian slept beside him, then tosses the thought away as gross indulgence. He wonders instead, as he has many times since his last visit, if Wei Wuxian sleeps at all.
First, his excuse to tarry is meditation. He works at it, simultaneously restoring his drained core and healing himself, until the discomfort fades from his every movement to just a specific few.
Once that is done, he has no reason to be idle. But the voice in his head, Wei Wuxian's blisteringly cold one that had called him his proper name all those months ago, keeps him in place. He hears it saying all manner of things in response to seeing him now.
"What more could you possibly want of me?" Wei Wuxian sneers in his mind. And he would be right to do so.
But Lan Wangji does not intend to ask anything of him ever again.
And there is the other thing. The fact that his robes should be uncomfortable, filthy, but they have been cleaned, dried, and arranged back onto his body properly. Comfortably. Almost as if—
He dares not imagine. But at the very least it does not speak of utter contempt.
So he rises. He follows the path Wen Qing told him of. And he does something foolish. He hopes.
After no short while of walking, he comes to a slightly darker, more silent corner of deadened forest. He rounds a bend and sees Wei Wuxian crouched a little ways off, and then hears high, lilting notes as if through water. The energies are strange here, and Wei Wuxian is speaking to with them in their own language.
Lan Wangji approaches until he sees Wei Wuxian go still. He says nothing. Wei Wuxian drops his flute from his lips.
"Are you well?" He asks without rising or turning.
"I am."
Wei Wuxian nods. "Your people are waiting for you."
It is a dismissal. Lan Wangji recognizes this. But he will impose just a little bit longer.
"Your core," he says. Wei Wuxian stands abruptly, still facing away, gripping Chenqing. "Can it be replaced?"
Wei Wuxian whirls to face him, anger and fear warring with the questions on his face.
Lan Wangji has other questions, too. But they do not matter. He is intelligent enough to piece together the cold, empty space where Wei Wuxian's core should be, the tired guilt on Wen Qing's face, and...
"Your scar," he says, dropping his gaze to the scorched earth.
He should not know of it. But he does, now, and he also owes a greater debt than he can ever repay. Wei Wuxian does not respond. How dearly Lan Wangji wants to see his expression. But he will not infringe on any more of his privacy.
The wind howls. He waits.
"You won't tell anybody," Wei Wuxian says uncertainly.
Lan Wangji stiffens. "I will not."
"Nobody told you?"
"Nobody.”
Wei Wuxian pauses, momentarily satisfied.
"You're not going to ask how? Or when?"
Lan Wangji would like to. He would like to know everything of Wei Wuxian, even his sorrow, his pain. But he is not entitled to those things. There is only one point that matters.
"Can it be replaced? Can the procedure be reversed?"
Wei Wuxian sighs. Lan Wangji can tell he does not wish to speak of this.
"So single-minded, Lan Zhan," he scolds, then shakes his head. "The chance of success would be small; the chance of finding a donor, much smaller."
But this is all Lan Wangji hoped to hear. It is enough. He goes to his knees, arms circled in front of his chest.
"Allow me," he says.
"Lan Zhan!" Wei Wuxian darts forward, trying to pull Lan Wangji up from the ground. Eventually he gives up and goes to his knees in front of him, pushing at his arms. "Lan Zhan, stop this," he says, panicked. "Don't be stupid, stop—Lan Zhan, you can't be serious."
"Please allow me," Lan Wangji repeats, eyes downcast.
"Stop this!" Wei Wuxian shouts. "It can't be done, and I wouldn't take it from you anyway!"
Lan Wangji flinches bodily. He had not considered...but yes. Everything in him is sullied. He bends at the waist, bowing further.
"Apologies for the offense," he says, then snaps his mouth shut. His voice is too obviously strained.
"Lan Zhan?" Wei Wuxian says, still alarmed.
Lan Wangji needs to leave. He has already overstayed. But he...he has not tried hard enough.
"This debt is too great to repay in one lifetime," he says. "Please inform this one of what he may do to begin."
Wei Wuxian sags, dragging one of Lan Wangji's wrists with him. "Lan Zhan, there is no debt between us."
Lan Wangji only just stops himself from glancing up. He does not understand.
"I owe you my life and more," he says. "You took great pains to save me, even as the situation proved me unworthy of it. I owe—"
"You owe me nothing," Wei Wuxian insists, shaking Lan Wangji's arm. "There were no great pains. Nobody is unworthy. Well...you aren't."
Lan Wangji opens his mouth to protest, but Wei Wuxian speaks over him.
"People have...desires, Lan Zhan. There's nothing unworthy about it."
"But you—"
"Stop," he says. He sounds so, so tired. "If you hadn't been...dying. If we—" He stops. "Just keep my secret," he says, and lets go of his wrist. "And live well."
Lan Wangji closes his eyes. The thought of going back to his home, his life, after this, had not yet occurred to him. It sinks him from his knees to the ground. How can he do this? How can he leave him this way?
"Wei Ying," he pleads. "I must...I must do something. I cannot...I..."
"Why, Lan Zhan?" Wei Wuxian asks, not unkindly. "You have responsibilities. People to protect, just like me. Live well, and count things even between us. Why not?"
Lan Wangji’s chest caves in. He does not make the sound clawing up his throat.
"You...truly, you must know why," he says. "After... you must know. I would not leave you in need. I could not."
"Ah, Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian says sadly. He shuffles forward. Lan Wangji startles at the feel of fingertips on his cheek. "You're too good. But all I need is," he huffs, "political asylum for me and 40 friends? It's not your burden."
Suddenly yet slowly, like the first burst of sunrise, an idea reveals itself on the horizon of Lan Wangji’s mind. It is unorthodox. And likely unwelcome. But it is all he has.
"My uncle made a suggestion," he says. "When my affliction became known. It is true that he did not know what it would mean, but I would hold him to it. If it is not...hateful, to you."
"I don't know what you mean," Wei Wuxian says warily.
Lan Wangji steels himself. "You are perceived as the head of a sect. A proper alliance could protect your people, and Gusu Lan is in need of hands for rebuilding. The person who cast this curse upon me has given the perfect excuse, and made themselves scapegoat. If you would...I would not ask anything of you, if you agreed. It would be a marriage in name only, as you wish it."
Wei Wuxian's silence turns to spluttering. "M—Lan Zh—marriage?? What—how—"
"If the idea is odious, I will not mention it again. But as I said. My uncle suggested it. And under the circumstances, he cannot refuse."
"Your—he—Lan Zhan. Lan Zhan, look at me. Look at me, please."
Lan Wangji looks at him. His eyes are wide. Disbelieving. Concerned.
"Your uncle would qi deviate if you even hinted at such a thing," he says. "Gusu Lan is in a precarious enough position, you don't need...I have nothing to offer in return." He pats his lower stomach, empty of spiritual energy, emphatically. “Nothing. Don't be ridiculous."
"It is not ridiculous," Lan Wangji argues, certain now that he is right. "You can offer more protection for us, and we can offer legitimacy. The person who cast this curse can be seen to have forced our hands. Has—has forced our hands."
He stops himself. He should not push this. Wei Wuxian is looking at him as if he does not know him.
"You don't want to marry me, Lan Zhan."
This gives Lan Wangji pause. It is a confusing objection, to say the least. He stares, trying to comprehend. He clears his throat. Takes a breath.
"If you are under the impression..." he stops. Drops his eyes once more. "...that the...impetus of the curse. Is the whole of the way I—”
"Demonic cultivation," Wei Wuxian interrupts. "It would be unhealthy. For you. And your elders! They wouldn't let me, not if I were...attached to your sect. To you.”
A fair concern, and one Lan Wangji has been turning over in his own mind as well. "Is this your only objection?"
Wei Wuxian casts about. "Ah..."
Lan Wangji takes one last plunge. "The elders can be reasoned with, compromises can be made. I am not concerned for my health: being near you could never be harmful to me." He hears himself, then, and amends, "Though you need not. Be near me. That is not a condition."
"You would defend this?" Wei Wuxian asks, bemused.
"Defend what?"
"My cultivation path. You..."
Lan Wangji resists a sigh. "I understand the reason, now. And I believe...if you did not object. We could work toward making it safe, without stripping you of what your hard work has created."
"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian says. He reaches out, then stops.
Lan Wangji stares at his hand, hovering between them. His heart is beating so hard he can feel it in his eyes, in his tongue.
"Wei Ying."
"You would let me, though?"
His tone is gently mocking. His head is cocked to the side, the edge of a smile playing across his lips. It knocks the breath from Lan Wangji's chest.
"Let you?" He asks, dazed.
"Be near you."
Lan Wangji's heart stops. It is a moment before he can respond.
"I would. Always."
Wei Wuxian takes his hand, and sighs. "You don't owe me this," he says again.
"I do," Lan Wangji counters, off-kilter. "I owe you. And I want to. I would want to, even if—"
He loosens his tight grip on Wei Wuxian's hand. He is saying too much, taking too much, being too much. He settles himself. Finds the words that matter.
"It would be a thing happily given, with no strings attached, should you wish it."
Wei Wuxian laughs strangely. "Lan Zhan, you really..." He shakes his head. "I'd marry you in an instant, you know," says.
Lan Wangji's neck hurts from the speed with which he looks up at him. Hope, warm and liquid, blooms through his limbs.
"But I can't make this decision on my own," Wei Wuxian goes on. "It's not just my life. We have to talk it over with everyone."
"Yes," Lan Wangji says, surprised, and eager now that he sees the possibility of success. Of doing something of use.
"Alright," says Wei Wuxian, a smile hidden in the corner of his mouth. "I can't promise...but it...it could work."
"It will," Lan Wangji says, certain that the strength of his conviction alone will carry them through if need be.
He feels strange and dreamlike, confused but heartened by the turn in this conversation. That Wei Wuxian can stand the sight of him, let alone wish to ally with him personally, seems too wonderful to be true. Another Wei Wuxian hallmark.
"But Lan Zhan, no more talk of strings," Wei Wuxian says.
Lan Wangji sobers and nods. It is unseemly. Of course their understanding must be a tacit one, now.
But his hand is suddenly in both of Wei Wuxian's.
"You need to stop feeling guilty," Wei Wuxian says, looking down at it. "If I were your husband...if I were. We could try all that again, but without the impending doom. We could try it again any way we like, any time—all the time—and we'd—"
"Wei Ying," Lan Wangji interrupts, strangled. His heart is in his throat. He cannot comprehend what he is hearing. His ears, his face, are on fire.
Wei Wuxian smiles down at their hands, one part shy, one part mischief. "I think we could get really good at it, if we had the chance, don't you?"
Lan Wangji stares at him. "You..."
"Mn," says Wei Wuxian, meeting his eyes.
He shines so bright, even without any core to speak of. He takes Lan Wangji's breath away.
"I take it back," Wei Wuxian says, his voice suddenly urgent. "I like strings. Mine is that if this happens, I want to be your real husband. In name, in practice, in bed, and in your heart. Because you would be, in mine."
Lan Wangji's voice sticks in his throat. He feels...he feels unreal. He does not know what to do, to say. Perhaps they never broke the curse at all and he has simply gone mad. But Wei Wuxian's fingers stroking his palm, the root-knotted dirt beneath his shins, are real. He sways, unbalanced.
Wei Wuxian reaches out. Catches him. Folds him into his arms for a second time. Lan Wangji's breath shudders out of him.
He is on his knees, breathlessly held in the arms of his beloved. He has dreamt this many ways. But never has it been so real, so full of hope. He wraps his arms around Wei Wuxian in turn, buries his face in his shoulder.
Wei Wuxian huffs. "Jiang Cheng is going to be so angry."
Lan Wangji comes back down to earth. It is true he had not thought of this. He makes to pull away. "How should—"
Wei Wuxian clutches him tighter. "I don't care," he says, "I don't care, we can manage him." He pauses, then speaks more softly. "Maybe...I could see shijie's wedding after all. Or—no. It's too soon, I—"
"Yes," says Lan Wangji. "You will. We will go together."
Wei Wuxian takes a deep breath, and lets it out into Lan Wangji's hair.
"Together," he says.
It takes several serious, and at times uncomfortable, discussions, but in the end, Gusu Lan’s Second Jade is indeed thoroughly removed from the marriage pool of the great sects. The curse caster is found and punished. And everybody else lives happily ever after.
The end.
-----
(Thank you for coming on this wildly self-indulgent journey, I hope you enjoyed it. If you’d like to read some actually nicely-polished, fleshed-out fics by me—including another sex-cursed LWJ—check out my AO3.)
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wincore · 4 years
Text
runway (m) | jung yoonoh
pairing: model!jaehyun x fashion designer!reader
words: 18.7k
summary: there are some things that come with dedicating your life to fashion: a taste for finer fabrics, a splash of love for art, and an appreciation of the human body. none of these are supposed to include the hottest model you have ever laid eyes on, or the fact that you completely, utterly hate his guts. 
genre: enemies to lovers, angst, fluff, light smut, comedy-ish
warnings: sexual content, mentions of anxiety
a/n: woohooooooo she’s finally here!!!! i cant believe this!! everything aside, i do not have first hand experience working in the fashion industry so please do take this with a grain of salt. i’m also going to pass out. good night <3
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A list of things you appreciate: colours, satin, comfort.
A list of things you do not appreciate: Jung Yoonoh. Jaehyun. Whatever.
The hum of the car engine has little effect on you; you travel like this almost every day. Tall buildings, scorching pavement, the blare of traffic—it’s Seoul, after all. You sigh, more of a short expression of annoyance, scrolling down with your thumb and back up again. Since when did he get permission to post pictures from pre-fittings? And one of your works, no less. 
His feed is so messy. You click your tongue. For a model, that is. 
You open the story again and consider messaging him. It’s your cherry red coat, or rather the collar of it, golden thread sewn in swirls of patterns, and a sheer floral shirt extending all the way up to cover Jaehyun’s neck. You frown. It’s meant for showcase, not teasers. Even if the picture extends just from the curve of his shoulder to his parted lips, you can’t stand the sight of it on him. It’s not bias, you try to tell yourself. This is business. You tap your fingertips rapidly against the back of your phone. This is obviously business. 
Seoul Fashion Week is the height of your anxiety, which means you have little regard for anything else decorated around you. With a new frenzy arising in every minute of your day—you don’t have time to think, a sense of madness in the way you keep busy. Your Elixir collection is more than what you had hoped for it to be, a twinge of satisfaction sitting at the pit of your stomach. It nicely puts together everything rich and extravagant, humanity’s first love—everything you despise really, so Jaehyun wasn’t a bad choice for a model. 
You backspace on your text. Is this rude? Should you care if you’re being rude? How unprofessional, you imagine his voice saying. It wouldn’t be the first unprofessional thing you’d done.
The final text reads ‘Glad you’re enjoying my designs, but they were not meant to be publicly displayed before the official show, as common sense predicts.’ 
No, of course you’re not trying to be snarky. It’s perfectly formal. All that time writing professional complaint letters to companies for ripping off your designs paid off, you suppose.
You exit the Uber, thanking the driver quickly before you rush into the building, checking the time on your watch. It’s sunny, and hotter than you anticipated. You can only hope it’s cooler tomorrow so the heat doesn’t suffocate your models.
The company building is another madness in its own. Joohyun greets you with a quick smile, a bunch of fabrics being handed to her before she can make any conversation with you, and the rest of the workers bow in greeting before getting back to their own individual windstorms. You step over a few boxes on the grounds, beelining to your workspace so you can settle down your bag.
You’re team leader, you tell yourself, a short breath tumbling out of your mouth. Even so, you don’t do very well under several pairs of eyes on you at once. Some part of you is still the timid fashion designer, packing your entire identity into a small sketchbook.
The sunlight is blaring out of control in the place—it’s meant to be spacious and sunlit, of course, but the heat makes you adjust your collar before you can move forward. The bustle of the style and design team along with the production team in the same place is akin to a nightmare, and you trace your steps quickly.
“Guys,” you begin, fidgeting with the leather strap of your watch as you continue, “Firstly, good job.”
There’s a bunch of short cheers and clapping to interrupt before you can continue. 
“As for tomorrow…stylists, I need you to touch up the collars in all the Western-style coats. The detailing needs to be kept clean and sharp. I want the audience to be able to see it.”
You pause, your tone still neutral. “And let’s not start again on the lacing. We had that discussion yesterday.” 
There’s some nods and sounds of affirmation. 
“Production team…I don’t think I can say much to you without Doyoung getting on my case.”
There’s collective laughter and you crack a smile. With a few more rapid words, you dismiss yourself, walking over to your colleagues to help them out. You’re team leader, the one with the final say in all the designs, but you can’t possibly imagine completing it without Joohyun or the others. 
“Good pep talk there, (name),” Joohyun says, walking over to you as her hands sharp and steady as they go through the clothes rack. 
“They think I’m an asshole,” you say, breathing out. You know your words are too direct. Drunk co-workers on a Friday night are not the best place to discover facts about yourself. Sometimes even you think you sound bossy. You check the key parts for each item, knowing you’ll be doing this once again before the show.
“We wouldn’t be going anywhere without direction,” Joohyun responds, laughing as if you’d said something silly. “We’re all glad you’re here, (name).”
Words like these are so easing for a mess like you, not that you’d admit it. Joohyun has always been a sort of mother figure to you after you entered this company, followed by Doyoung. A good few years senior to you, she started out as a model before she moved on to designing. 
It’s her last year working in this place. But of course, it’s a given when she’s starting her own label (mom clothes and children’s apparel, she’d called her clothing line, rolling her eyes) and one of the most well-known names in South Korean fashion not having her own label is sacrilege (according to your colleagues anyway). She’d said to contact her when you start your own family, and maybe she’ll send a congratulations package for both you and your baby. You’d laughed. Out of all the insults you could ever receive, that was perhaps the loveliest one.
Ridiculousness aside, you’ll miss the comfort of her presence. You were still in school when your designs led you to a showcase in New York Fashion Week, your sponsor more than generous. You stepped into it too soon, too eager. It was breath-taking and awful all at once—and the first time you saw a world outside of your own. It was overwhelming. There are few people in this new world as kind as Joohyun.
The sound of your notification snaps you out of your thoughts. You swear you kept it on vibrate, a little irked at having to search for your phone when your hands are full. The notification itself brings on a stronger wave of vexation.
_jeongjaehyun:
My manager told me it was good publicity
But I could take it down for you
The ‘for you’ adds an unnecessary effect, you think as you hold back a scowl. And what does ‘could’ mean? A miscommunication with the sales team isn’t even on the list of things you need to worry about. Honestly, you don’t have time to fight him, quickly typing out a ‘whatever. it’s okay’ before looking back up.
You jump, the look on Joohyun’s face a little suspicious for what might come out of her mouth.
“It’s not a crime to text people.” She shrugs, shuffling through the rack one more time to take the clothes for transportation. 
You’re quick to jump to your defence. “I have nothing to do with him.”
Joohyun looks at you, amused. “He’s not a bad person, you know? How long are you going to keep hating him for one thing he did?”
“It’s not one thing,” you groan, averting your gaze to the clothes so as to help her. “I just- he’s so- so- oh come on. You know how I feel about him.”
“I’m just saying you don’t have any reason to. Everyone’s different from what they appear to be. Especially in this line of work.” Joohyun balances the clothes you give her across her forearms.
“So he’s fake. I hate that even more.” You sigh, pulling out the blue silk overcoat, the colour matching Joohyun’s work dress.
“You mean unreal? Models tend to be that way—don’t be so harsh on him, honey.”
You simply shake your head, words entering one ear and out the other. Joohyun presses her lips into a line but lets it go soon enough. She knows you’re capable enough to separate professional from personal and that should be enough. You’re not keeping a tab on something as warming as spite. 
You can’t believe you’d ever been within five feet of him without turning your nose. You can’t believe you’d smiled at his jokes once, even if it was just that one night. He was the godsent Prince Charming, just perhaps not yours. Paris surely had a distressing effect on you that year. 
You don’t make the same mistake twice.
You walk back to your desk to take a seat and scavenge through your belongings, most of the people already outside. Fashion Week, which once upon a time was a faraway dream, now is part of life—exciting and exhausting. It’s almost always over in a flash, your love for it whisked in peaks of bittersweet. (“You work your ass off for six months and it’s, what, fifteen minutes long?” your mother had asked after you’d brought her to one of the shows.)
This line of work is a nightmare without mental preparation. You have a degree, you have experience and yet it doesn’t feel enough, confidence easier to drain in a person than blood. And you’re not very fond of pale cheeks.
It came to asking yourself if you really have it in you for a few months—a test of sorts everyone puts themselves through at least once in their lives. At that time, your favourite professor, a bald man nearing his retirement years with the wrinkliest face you’d ever seen, had asked you just one question. 
Do you love it? 
Of course you fucking do. 
You couldn’t say that to his face, sure, but you know he saw it in you—either the effort you put out every day of the semester or the way your hands moved across fabric like a machine, your designs made with the persistence of nature. Your final year project landed you an internship at one of the largest clothing brands in Seoul and your internship landed you a job at the same. Your job, well, lead you to Jaehyun, among many other things. 
You scowl at the image of his face that appears when you close your eyes, massaging your forehead—it’s hard to not see it everywhere already, from Cosmopolitan to Vogue.
While you were biting your nails in New York, Jaehyun had flown out to Paris with Saint Laurent, one of the younger male models to show his face for the first time. He’d taken the whole place by storm, you had heard from a friend. To say half the world had fallen in love—either with his dimples or his confident walk—would be an understatement. A privilege, to be gold-plated in a mercenary world.
You’d briefly made eye contact at the airport the first time you saw him, a year later, when you were arriving in Incheon and he was leaving it. It was London, that time. For him, Milan. As much as you couldn’t believe living a fashion student’s dream, Jaehyun’s face was truly, unironically much more unrealistic. Your classmates’ gabs and gossip in sewing class had suddenly made sense. You taught yourself to not be swayed by faces, even if they look like they’re stitched together by Aphrodite and Apollo with their bare hands—friendly advice from seniors at the orientation night ‘party’. 
You’d met him formally in Paris, after you’d graduated from fashion school. He was certainly the most beautiful face in the room—and you weren’t the only one aware of it. The entire night you’d been starting conversations you couldn’t relate to, till he came along with his charming dimples and a faux connect. You were naive, and a little tipsy. The attraction was obvious, and it had been you by the bathroom pulling him in for a drunk kiss till he’d snapped out of the daze—as if it were some joke you’d been playing. He’d apologized before leaving, like it wasn’t a big deal, with silken lips parted in a gesture of remorse and a short, firm bow. It didn’t settle very well alongside the merlot in your gut.
You. You’re a big deal. 
You were alone in a room full of painted faces and he sat atop the throne they worshipped. Why had you expected any more from him—in the understanding nods or the few kind words that escaped his lips? You felt stupid. He made you feel like smiling for the first time that night and you hated him for it—you’re sure he doesn’t care either way. Or maybe he does, with the wonderfully irked responses he graces you with. 
Jaehyun made something out of himself in these nine years, just as you have. Runway supermodel to the face of South Korean men in fashion to an entrepreneur, he might as well have a documentary on him—and he would if he didn’t evade paparazzi and reporters like his life depended on it. Enigmatic, the articles wrote. You scoffed. Conceited, more like. After the initial years, he decided to settle in New York, frequently flying to Seoul and other fashion capitals for business and contractual events. Some of those occasionally include your shows.
Having Jaehyun gets more attention but it’s not like you’re a new, doe-eyed kid. Your works have been featured for popstars and foreign celebrities, and you’ve been invited to several interviews with big magazines. You’ve gone global (albeit under the brand’s name) and you’ve been to places you’d only seen pictures of in the very same magazines you looked up to. They can describe your work as unique all they want—and you don’t mean to sound fucking pretentious—but your job is nothing more than an expression of the self. It’s a part of you; you first started sewing patches onto things simply because your closet lacked colour. And eventually, you found yourself searching for more—colours, fabrics, dreams. You’re devoted to your job because you love it, you want to do it. You’re allowed to be a little arrogant about it. 
If only trying desperately to be arrogant did something about your insecurities.
You hope your works redefine themes, your need to stand out contrasting with your fear of it. Eye-catching is always your forte; this time it’s fairy tales and royalty in a mix of East meets West. 
D-1. Same feeling, new season.
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The press is here, you take note. Photographers. Models. Students. Vloggers. It’s a burst of colours down there.
You hate running late, rushing down the stairs to the plaza through the crowds of people. Some recognize you, as they make their way to you but you end up walking a little faster to minimize your presence.  You curse yourself for wearing the jacket. It goes nicely with the rest of your outfit and March isn’t supposed to be this hot. You wipe the sweat from your hairline, hoping the makeup is waterproof like it said.
You consider stopping at the café for a fix of coffee but stop when you notice Joohyun holding a bunch of cups by the venue. She doesn’t look too happy about the sun, or the burdening errand of fetching coffee. You adjust her little red beret at her request, smiling at her annoyance but trying your best to keep it hidden. You don’t want to get cussed out by Joohyun. 
“Someone tell Doyoung to get his coffee,” Joohyun complains. “I’ve been waiting for half an hour.”
“I’m sure that’s an exaggeration,” you say, sipping your coffee. The taste fills your senses with a pleasant dose of energy and you hum out a satisfied note. “Why are there so many students out here? Influencers? Did we sponsor this many kids?” 
Joohyun shakes her head.  “Jaehyun just got here.”
You suppress an eye-roll. “Wonder why he still comes back for Seoul when he’s booked full for New York.”
“It’s his hometown.” Joohyun shrugs. “I’d come back too. Even if I’m paid more out there.”
You finish your coffee and duck into the fitting room, much to Joohyun’s displeasure as she’s left alone again. Doyoung’s in for an earful, you chuckle thinking about it.
It would look like a hell of a mess to anyone not accustomed to this. Everyone is a flurry by themselves alone but if you mix them with the eclectic crowd you find at a Seoul Fashion Week backstage, it’s more of a disaster. A colorful one, at the very least. 
New York was worse. You were too young, in a world that was too big. It’s a miracle you even received an opportunity from so big a name. But, you suppose, it hardly matters now.
You no longer live in a world where Seoul is far from Paris. Fashion and art are things unmarked by place of origin.
It’s easy to spot Jaehyun in a corner, two people adjusting his coat for better fitting at the waist. His makeup’s done, you notice as you get closer. Good, you think. If any makeup were to get on the fabric, you’d go feral (although you do have full confidence in the makeup artists here and their choice of product).
“Jaehyun,” you greet. Your co-workers give each other a look before excusing themselves. You raise an eyebrow, too late to stop them. They didn’t finish the looping of the belt properly, you take notice. You wrinkle your nose. Sloppy. 
“(name).” He responds with an equal lack of amusement. 
You pull the belt at his waist, Jaehyun stiffening at the contact.
“What are you doing?” he asks, looking down at you with a raised eyebrow.
“My job? What do you think, genius?”
Jaehyun presses his lips together and lets you complete the altercations. The chiffon shirt allows you to see the hazed definition of his core, a rather flustering thing to be exposed to for anyone with eyes. When you look up in a moment’s mistake, you’re reminded of why his face is everywhere. Flawless, almost. You hate it. Averting your eyes, you fix the collar so the pattern stands out more. You can feel his eyes over your outstretched hand all the way to your face, subtle as ever. If Jaehyun thinks you’re bothered by it, he’s an idiot for believing so. 
You take a step back to analyse the coat. The golden threads are flawlessly detailed, spiraling in patterns of different flowers and vines around the collar, gradually getting larger as they twine at the base of the neck. They meet the polished rhinestone buttons a little lower. You almost smile. You’d sewn each thread and each button in yourself the first time. It hardly looks the same now.
Bright red is an eyesore if you look at it longer than five minutes, you realize. The frown that’s been itching to show up finally does. Suddenly, you’re glad Jaehyun is modelling this piece. You shake your head and look back at his face, from his deep-set brown eyes to his full, tinted lips before pausing. The little Swarovski pearls line strands of his hair in a starry display, perfect in every angle of it. It’s easy to appreciate the human beauty when you see his face, and even if you claim your vehement dislike for him, you’re not a liar nor an idiot. 
How infuriating it is, to let things be. Bad blood can only dry to an ugly, unusable brown.
You narrow your eyes at the thinning layer of glitter on his peach-blushed cheeks. He doesn’t exactly need much more of it but the unevenness bothers you.
“Your makeup needs retouching,” you say, frowning. “Did you touch your face? I thought you were a more...professional model than this, Jaehyun.”
“You walked in,” he replies, casually. “I was distracted.”
You feel your cheeks colour. “That’s- that’s not a reason.”
He smiles politely. “I suppose I’ll leave you then. You must have other work to do.”
You hold back a biting remark. His playfulness doesn’t sit well with you; he’s polite just enough to annoy you and straightforward just enough to make you want to throw something at him. He could’ve directly told you to fuck off maybe—but oh no, it’s Jung Yoonoh, seamless and radiant, with only the sweetest collection of words on his tongue. You think of the first time you met, something warm in the corner of your heart. You’d mistaken it, of course. 
He didn’t care for you, or any of the people trailing after him and his silver flute, or the rest of the shallow carcass of a world so undeniably obsessed with him. It didn’t hit you till he’d left you hanging, mangled memories of something close to hurt. You’re glad you didn’t kiss him. You wouldn’t be able to get over the embarrassment, the blow to your pride had it escalated any further.
And of course, the one thing he did to make you absolutely certain of his distaste—was simply choose another designer’s work over yours when given a choice. It seems silly, unprofessional even, but the lack of response to your Fall/Winter ready-to-wear collection had been embarrassingly low, someone else’s designs sold out at an equally awful rate. You—your insecurities—wanted to blame your own failings—maybe it was the lining of the coats, or the colours maybe— the fabric? Perhaps, you hadn’t focused on comfort all too well. But it was clear, a word from Jung Yoonoh could change the minds of a fashion-forward youth as easily as his face and physique scored contracts with the biggest brands and labels. And it was clear he didn’t like you very much.
You walk over to the other models, eyes scanning down to the T. You glance over one of Joohyun’s designs, a modern men’s hanbok. The blood red paired with yellow is certainly easing on the eyes, though the shades vary from top to bottom, like a sunset. The dark grey chunky shoes fitted under dark tights complete the entire future oriental look you suppose she was going for. She’s only showcasing two of her designs this year and they’re just before the centrepiece. You shake your head, clutching the fabric of your jacket sleeve. You hate seeing other designs before a showcase, even if they’re a friend’s. 
You turn your head to make eye contact with Jaehyun across the room. It takes a few seconds but you snap your head in another direction to break the spell. 
How strange. You haven’t had nearly enough coffee to feel jittery under his gaze.
You’re forced to take a breather away from this jungle of liveliness. 
The amount of people outside the venue gives you yet another headache. Excited college students and fashion vloggers stand outside expectantly, and you give a short bow and polite ‘hello’ to anyone who approaches. You desperately want to be left alone. Even if it’s for a few seconds.
You walk quickly, your feet soundless against the floor. Your mask performs considerably (and surprisingly) well in hiding you. You consider visiting the Design Market to enjoy a seat alone and charge your phone before it’s show time.
Open spaces. You need open spaces. Suddenly, the DDP seems to be suffocating you despite its tremendous size.
“Hey!” You’re greeted with a sudden force to your right side, an arm wrapping around you. You look up to see Johnny, a wide grin on his face and you let yourself mirror it, shaking your head.
“Big day,” he says. “Want me to take some pictures? I’ve got some time between shows—lovely outfit, as usual.”
It’s strange how Johnny’s the photographer and not the model—you’ve heard he receives a lot of requests to get on the other side of the camera though he always refuses. He doesn’t visit Seoul as often, but he has much to do in uplifting the mood with his strangely effective sense of humour. The coffee-coloured shirt he’s wearing goes well with the plaid grey coat, reminiscent of Fendi’s Spring collection, and sometimes you wonder whether a job as a fashion photographer ever had much to do with his style. Johnny has always been effortlessly impressive. 
You politely decline, your mind still focused on the smooth running of things. Nothing’s ever on time when it comes to Fashion Weeks—yes, it’s called fashionably late but it just makes you annoyed. You consider ducking back to your venue, adding some final final touches and any more last-minute altercations. Years have passed and you’re still not used to it, fingers itching to do something about everything. You’re grateful the company gives you your creative space but it only makes you wonder just how far the limits are. 
Johnny accompanies you to the charging station till he’s distracted by some of the children in the latest Fendi kidswear and you make a mental note to never bring your kids to Fashion Week, if you ever choose to have them.
You breathe in and out for a few moments, feeling lightheaded before the sense of reality touches on you. People walk in and out of the stores lining the pathways, a soft buzz of conversation in the air as your eyes follow their movement. You wonder if you’ll have your own stores opened in plazas like this—here, in Seoul, and on brightly lit streets of the world outside. After all, colourful dreams are the hardest to get rid of. You sit quietly till you get a text from Doyoung asking you to get your ass over there quickly with several exclamation marks. You smile to yourself. Joohyun might have had a sour effect on him.
You arrive back at the venue, trying to tear your eyes away from anything that might want to make you fix it. You avoid Jaehyun’s eyes even more so, like you’ll jinx something right before it’s showtime. 
The buzzing reaches a peak before everything is drowned out.
The show finally starts. And it’s over. Twenty-two minutes, this time.
That’s the way it goes. You hold your breath till you’re sure it’s safe to let go, blind to everything that goes on in between. Sometimes it’s underwhelming, sometimes you can’t give a fuck when you love doing this anyway.
You breathe a sigh of joy when everyone gathers backstage, Johnny making all the models pose together for one giant group photo. It’s like a ritual for him, always finding time for a backstage picture with the models goofing off.
Jaehyun looks at you instead of the camera, a nervous shiver running through you. His gaze is not something of inconsequence, eyes piercing into you with words hanging in the air that you don’t care enough about. You think he sends you a smile, cockier than you’d like. Despite your efforts, you have to look away.
Now, what should your dear Fall collection look like? You exit by yourself, relief humming through your veins when you think of getting back to your apartment, papers to be sketched on in your hands, soft fabric to be sewn on your table. Maybe they’ll display your works in the front rows of the stores, maybe you’ll even have displays outside of Seoul. You’re not a student anymore and your job has taken you enough places. 
Even so, Paris and Milan sneak into your dreams often. You used to dream of them so much that it was hard to consider them reality—finding yourself in those streets, in between all those beautiful picture-book monuments.
You prefer Seoul, you decide after conscious thinking. You don’t have to worry about the world outside. 
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Afterparties are not your thing. 
You somehow still find yourself in them, hoping to catch a drunk video of Doyoung for blackmail or make eye contact with an attractive stranger only to stop at exchanging numbers because you never find the time. 
It’s a social event. You’re supposed to be doing social things. It’s exhausting.
The last person you expect to bump into is Jaehyun, drinks in hand as he looks down at you with a greeting of surprise on his tongue. He’s wearing a simple dark Oxford button-down, two buttons at his chest undone, and tucked neatly into his pants. His hair looks untouched since afternoon, parted in messy waves, minus the pearls. The music changes to something with slower beats as you stare at each other for a few moments.
“What are you doing here?” You raise an eyebrow. There are other afterparties he could be attending. Big ones.
Jaehyun tilts his head, cracking his neck before smiling. “Charming, as always. I’m here because I want to be here, obviously. So does everyone, I’m sure.” 
“Fucking narcissist,” you mutter to yourself. You think Jaehyun might have heard you because you get a dirty look thrown your way, masked with the signature apathy across his relaxed lips.
“That’s a little rich from you,” he mumbles.
The muscle by his mouth twitches but he doesn’t say anything more. This is probably the most emotion he shows, you think. Wouldn’t his lovestruck magazines relish seeing him riled up like this? They’d still find a way to fall in love with him.
You could have, too.
No way. You tell yourself that’s ridiculous. 
You’re aware he’s booked for at least three other shows this week. It’s a miracle he agreed to yours, considering your mutual distaste for each other. You suppose it had more to do with his agency than himself but it wasn’t like you were the keener one. Jung Yoonoh is the face professionals look for and your company loves the publicity, although you keep telling yourself your designs would still shine without him. 
Jaehyun excuses himself before you can get on with any unpleasant conversation you might have. At least you have something in common—that is, trying to avoid each other as much as possible.
A few minutes (and uncomfortably snaking through swarms of bodies) later, you find Doyoung, unfortunately sober and intending to remain so, people congratulating him with claps on the back for securing the position of PR Head. You think it was supposed to be a secret, but someone higher in the ladder must have spilled early. Joohyun never attends these, and honestly, good for her. 
Afterparties are not your thing.
You shouldn’t have taken those shots but you’re on the dance floor now anyway—what more could happen? It’s easier when you’re not paranoid about all the eyes on you, dancing against a stranger with a lion tattooed against his neck. Maybe you’ll go home with him, maybe you’ll leave at the first signs of attraction. Romance isn’t quite on your to-do list, but an occasional intoxication with the skin works just fine. You could live like this for a few moments.
Your back runs into someone else’s rather forcefully and you turn around, apology bubbled up to your tongue already, mixing with the alcohol.
“Oh look.” You roll your eyes. “It’s the prince of high fashion. What can I get you today, sire?”
Jaehyun drives his tongue over his lips, quite definitely over your antics. Soft breaths leave his mouth in a rhythm irrelevant to this box of laughter and blaring music called a party. You love how he never knows how to respond—what new words will he choose to keep false dignity? If you think about it, he’s the embodiment of why you always thought everything was so out of your reach—big names, exclusive parties, not for kids like you. They were never for fashion students too honest to know their own worth.
“Jealousy isn’t a good colour on you,” he says, just loud enough for you to hear.
You scoff, a pang of annoyance sizzling through you. “Jealous? Of who? You?”
You sneer at the last part, Jaehyun’s frown deepening. Some days you just like to think you’ve won. A few moments pass between you two, the sound of pop music filling in the gaps. 
Jaehyun presses closer to you, your chests almost touching as your breath hitches in your throat.
“Do you know what makes success?” he says, head dipping lower to look you in the eye. The smell of alcohol disturbs you for a second before your heartbeat gets loud enough to drown it. You try to not focus on how his mouth is so near yours—and perhaps if you were drunk enough, you might commit a mistake against the very core of your being, something you’d been dangerously close to once.
You stay quiet, the pulsing in your ears too loud in the shallow distance between the two of you. You swear it’s always the two of you pressed up like this once you’re drunk enough, the dislike growing stronger and stronger with every breath exchanged. You’ve intertwined each other into a strange garden of contempt, easy to forget when you're facing him. Jung Yoonoh has the prettiest face in the industry, and the only one you can’t bear seeing. 
“It’s confidence,” he answers, as slow and steady as ever. “And there’s a thin line between confidence and arrogance I intend to keep. I’m not so sure about you.”
The rest of the night passes without conflict and you retire early, Jaehyun’s breath still hot against your face. Only when you collapse on your bed do you get an urge to shout, yell, anything that doesn’t make you call him up and scream at him. You have your precious dignity too, something he seems to look past. The effect he had on your breathing, the crawling over your skin—God, you hate him. You’re too stubborn to not continue doing it.
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“What’s this?” you ask, your eyes darting in between the director of design and Lee Taeyong.
To say you were surprised to see him would be an understatement. You note the simple dark rimmed glasses in contrast with his light dyed hair, the mellow blue of his cashmere sweater sporting his own label’s logo—Lee Taeyong is a household name. You feel yourself shrink the tiniest bit.
This industry’s all about names, you think miserably. You meet people and you remember the ones who can get you ahead. It’s tiring.
Taeyong started his career even earlier than you did, and before he had changed his major to fashion. He’s a little older than you, though he doesn’t look it and he had begun with working exclusively on jackets. Several rejected designs later, he had popped up as one of the designers to look out for in Seoul Fashion Week. Now he has his own global label slowly turning brand, several worldwide stores and everything dreamers in the same place as you look up to. You think you’re fine here, you tell yourself despite that.
The director smiles at you, her hand gesturing rapidly at you to come forward.
“You’re going to be so happy,” she says, signalling Taeyong to continue.
“Uh, hi,” he greets.
A little awkward for a world-class designer, you think.
“I’m Lee Taeyong. You might have heard of me—”
“I know who you are,” you interrupt, ignoring the disapproving look of the director.
“Oh, that’s good!” He smiles. “I’ve seen your work—I’ve been following your work for a few years now…and, well, I’d love for you to work under my label—in a collaboration of sorts. You’ll have full creative freedom, of course! I’m just there more or less for supervision, really…”
You think you feel your heart stop for a few moments, Taeyong’s sudden stream of information fading out. The pinnacle of your career, you believe, had been Paris Fashion Week four years ago and you’d been dreaming of it ever since. This is a business contract, you’re sure, and you don’t know if you have a real choice but maybe you could take that step forward you’ve always wanted to.
“Isn’t that great, (name)?” The director interjects. “You get to work under the Lee Taeyong label. And…surprise! You’ll have your work presented at New York Fashion Week in September. They’ll hit the stores a week later.”
You freeze. 
“New York?” you manage to squeak.
“Yep!” Her voice a notch away from annoying. She’s not the first person you’ve met who sounds so goddamn manufactured. “Pack your bags, darling. You’re flying next weekend.”
You must be looking like a deer caught in the headlights because Taeyong opens his mouth to say something, alarmed. You speak before he does.
“Okay,” you say, more to yourself than them. It should be a good thing. It’s supposed to be a good thing. Even so, you feel the anxiety in your ribcage threatening to overgrow into thorns. 
“I’ll- I’ll do it,” you clarify. Looking from your manager’s bright yet stern face to the hopeful smile on Taeyong, you don’t think you have much of a choice.
New York, huh. How long has it been? You shudder at the memories, your focus a little off for the rest of the day.
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Joohyun visits you a day before you leave. She places the box of chocolates on the coffee table, that Doyoung apparently sent for you. 
“You know, I’m really happy you’re getting this chance,” Joohyun says, crouching down beside where you’re splayed, trying to count the travel essentials and everything else on your messy checklist.
“He gets promoted and now he can’t even come visit me, huh?” you say, shifting to grab the box and tear off the clear wrap.
Joohyun laughs. “He’s certainly enjoying his duties. I can’t wait to boss him around again after I leave.”
Your shoulders hunch, a sigh leaving your lips. “Great. You’re leaving. Doyoung’s too busy to annoy. And now I’m a part of this godforsaken project for almost six months.”
Joohyun softens a bit, running her hand through your hair. “I heard you accepted it. All by yourself. You’ll do just fine, don’t worry.”
You feel yourself turn pink, a feeling of warmth you’ve been missing for a week. It’s cozy in your apartment, always the right temperature with a tinge of happy memories. You wish you could find comfort in people as easily as others do. Everything happened so fast, you can barely remember the conversation you had with Lee Taeyong. A few moments pass, Joohyun and you picking out chocolates before you can rummage through your suitcase again.
“I hate New York, Joohyun. Just what else can you throw into the mix to make me hate it even more?”
She freezes for a fraction of a moment, pressing her lips together before clearing her throat. “Oh. Uh. I probably shouldn’t tell you what I was about to tell you then.”
You turn your head to her, eyes narrowing. “What?”
She shrugs, eyes not meeting yours. “You know. New York. Fashion capital of the world. Lots of things to love.”
“What are you not telling me, Joohyun?”
She sighs, defeated. “A certain someone might be on the same flight as you. I was about to give you his number in case you needed help.”
You pause to think, curling your lips. “It’s Jaehyun, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
You groan, dropping your head back and yelping when it hits the coffee table. Joohyun moves to rub your head and ease the pain as you let out a stream of complaints.
“You really thought I’d call him for help?” you yell. “Him? Of all people?”
“I think you’d rather have a known face there. Besides, he’s a good kid,” she reasons, looking you in the eye. “And stop yelling.”
You quieten a bit at her glare, gulping. She adds the number to your contacts, saving it with a professional ‘Jung Yoonoh’ before she helps you clean up, advising you on how to manage your finances abroad. You know she’s trying to ease you, but how could she—after dropping this awful news on you like it shouldn’t matter at all? She doesn’t even know what happened—almost happened in Paris, or the fact that your honeyed feelings had turned bitter so easily. She’s worked with him before, you know this, when he was a much younger model and she trusts him more than you ever could. 
But maybe, just maybe she can’t see what you see—after all, she’s also part of the elite, crème de la crème of this industry, more so in this country. It’s frightening, and so vague what goes on up there, at the top of the chain; and whatever you have—it might never be enough. 
You’re you. Sometimes, that isn’t enough.
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You jump at the water rushing from the shower, too cold for skin and scramble to twist the knob the other way. This time, the water’s too hot and you yelp, shutting it off altogether.
You press your hand against the shower glass, breathing heavy. You’re trying—you’ve been desperately trying ever since you landed a week ago. Change is not something you can take lightly. You miss the dim lights of your apartment in Seoul that Joohyun always warned would get you some brand new prescription glasses. You miss walking down the streets to your favourite convenience store at three in the morning to get honey butter chips. You miss picking fights with Doyoung over which detail to scrutinise during your project discussions. This project seems to have torn apart several things that belonged to you.
You can’t seem to get your head into it either—even spacing out during the meeting you had with Lee Taeyong among several other things. You can’t remember a single design detail he’d specified or what the theme was even supposed to be—a bunch of bright foggy lights replacing whatever fuzz was growing in your head. A twenty-something-year-old shouldn’t be letting homesickness affect them like this. 
You finish the rest of your shower with a heavy heart and a clouded head. 
Taeyong booking a luxury suite for you was a bit…much. Not that you’re complaining, but it gives more fuel to the profound sense of emptiness you keep drawing. There’s no intimacy to this place, no love. It’s a little hard to create things without love, and comfort.
Still, you grit your teeth and get dressed into something more comfortable for the night. If not today, then tomorrow. Something will have to give, even if it costs you—whatever the hell your parents keep telling you when you’re going through problems. What if you don’t want to be cost things? Compromise isn’t as delicate as it sounds. You try to comfort yourself, rocking yourself on the much too large couch, hugging a pillow close and trying to think of things that don’t immediately make you want to throw up.
The memories of your first visit are a little less than pleasant. You think you cried after the entire ordeal because you thought you did a bad job of talking, socializing, the most ordinary things. There are some people who are good at wearing masks—good at making copper look like gold, good at shining under dim lights, and good at using words that don’t have much meaning to their existence other than being pretty. 
You were not one of them. 
The intense need for everything to be perfect was still there, even when you couldn’t possibly have achieved it. You wanted to make things and show them to the world—what was so wrong with that? Why did being there make you feel like you could never even touch your dreams? You were so out of place, feeling completely out of touch with yourself. There were people from the top there, established and famous. It felt out of your grasp. You felt fake.
The city lights twinkle with life but there’s no sound, the windows shut tight. The ambience of the room is kept to a caramel minimum—the best you can do to honour your sweet little home back in Seoul.
The hatred for everything pretentious was born with your first step into this place, into the game that the big boys play. It showed in your designs, your choice of fabric, your distaste for certain people. You wanted reality—you wanted a taste of life in your everyday clothes. You wanted that flavour you feel on your tongue in a room full of strangers or the one on a quiet night by yourself at your apartment rooftop. You didn’t want dignified fur coat ensembles, you wanted the naive chaos you feel every day and you wanted to make it look good. It’s driving you insane just how much you feel like you’re losing now.
You take out your phone after what seems a few minutes of contemplation. 
Jung Yoonoh. Your finger hovers over the call button. What would he say if his night is interrupted by your voice?
You’d met at the airport after landing, though you were only two seats away in the plane. You’d made no error in acknowledging his presence, browsing through the inflight magazine half-heartedly. Truth be told, sometimes you couldn’t really seem to get over him. Sometimes the thought of him made you so pissed, you had no idea what to think of it. 
“Welcome to New York,” he had said shortly after you’d exited, a giant crowd of people greeting out-goers, holding up placards with names of people, in numbers you’re unaccustomed to. Or, used to be accustomed to.
You hadn’t talked since—and really, you weren’t expecting to.
You press your home button, any lingering thoughts of him vanishing at the force with which you tell yourself it’s not worth it. How is Jung Yoonoh better than anyone else you know here? He might have been living in New York for quite a few years now, and he’s probably the only one you’d feel comfortable enough to swear at—that doesn’t mean you’d actually ask for help. That doesn’t mean he’d actually help. Joohyun must have had her hopes far too high to have convinced you for even a moment.
The couch feels colder all of a sudden, and you turn down the air conditioner. This place will never adjust to you, and your stubborn little self won’t either.
You think of Jaehyun from the afterparty, loose shirt and knowing eyes, and you wonder if he feels just the same frustrated agony, if not more. You think of his parted lips and breathing words close enough to be provocative, discomfort growing at the base of your stomach. Who does he think he is? He might have the airs and dignity of someone way up in the hierarchy of society but you know what people can be like. You know envy, you know malice, and you know lies. He has to fit in there somewhere—and perhaps you would have hated him less if he did.
Even if you’d scoffed at the idea of jealousy, that might very well be the closest to what you feel, what you keep hidden in the darkest corners of your locked chest. When you first met at that star-spangled dinner, you’d felt what it’s like to watch a fireworks show or a big musical opening; but the fireworks are being blocked by skyscrapers and you’re only the helping staff at the theatre, watching from a balcony at the very back. Jaehyun was impressive with barely any words. It annoyed you so much and somehow, the only solution you arrived at was the tremendous need to understand him, pick him apart and see what made him.
No. That’s wrong. You were annoyed because you still wanted to kiss him after he’d pushed you away, his dislike steaming clear. It strikes you as gently as lightning that the only reason someone would have to hate Jaehyun is being attracted so violently to him. God, you hate making a fool out of yourself.
You pass the night in quiet contemplation, promising yourself a better tomorrow. After all, no one else is going to do it. 
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You walk with your chin up as if you don’t feel the weight of the world on your shoulders. You picked out your black Harrington jacket to look at least a little more professional, but you might have miscalculated the size and the material in the equation because you look completely and utterly ridiculous in it. No one would look at you and think you even work in fashion, much less be competent in that line. 
(To be fair, you wear the same beige sweater and black corduroy pants to work and if your coworkers choose to judge you, you wouldn’t blame them.) 
It’s only been a month and somehow, it translates to forever to you. You think you’re adjusting better now, and you pat yourself on the back for it. It’s not raining today at the mercy of the skies, a tidal wave of sunlight splashing through the buildings every time you take a turn. The city doesn’t scare you all that much anymore. It’s a good day, for once.  
You lean your head against the car window, eyes trailing up and down the reflective blue of each skyscraper. You can barely see any clouds, and the sky’s endlessly the same, comforting blue. Just like back home, you think for a moment. Your eyes move back to the sidewalk, people passing by—mothers with their babies in strollers, kids clutching the strap of their school bags as they run, men and women in all levels of professional clothing. No one stops in this city. Except the fucking traffic apparently.
You sigh, glancing at your watch. Only moments ago, you were moving and yet again, you’ve stopped. The cycle keeps repeating and you’re trying to keep patience focusing on things around you that you can appreciate. 
Maybe you jinxed it when you said it was a good day.
You reach Taeyong’s studio just in time (not that you’d get yelled at or anything, he’s too nice of a guy). Your eyes fixate on the numbers that light up on the elevator one by one till it finally reaches the first floor.
You walk right into someone’s chest, an apology tumbling out of your lips as you bow out of habit. 
“(name)?”
You look up to find Jaehyun in the elevator of Taeyong’s building, a casual white shirt clinging to his frame that’s tucked into his jeans to look somewhat formal. A pink overshirt hangs at his forearm and from the windswept styling of hair and his perfected dark locks, you’ll assume he’s here for a shoot—even without it, he looks like something from a teen magazine, someone people would see and instantly daydream of. Best known for high fashion, Jung Yoonoh is still a spectacle in casualwear. 
“I can’t believe I have to see your face here too,” you mutter, getting into the elevator. You’ve had your share of moments with him.
“Good to see you too,” he says, bemused. 
You make a sound of acknowledgment, taking out your phone to turn the damn notifications off so you don’t feel it vibrate in your pocket every few minutes. You feel eyes on you for a moment and snap your head to the side.
Jaehyun has his eyes focused on the door, quiet breathing fresh against his lips and you hesitate before concluding you might have been mistaken in your perception. 
“You’re here for a shoot?” you ask, curious about his relationship with Taeyong. 
“What else can I be here for?” He says nonchalantly. 
“Sarcastic. Very nice.”  
“It’s a little weird, you trying to make conversation with me. You’re usually raving about me too much to actually talk to me.” He smiles, the dimples provoking and eyes the familiar beguiling brown. 
“I’m not trying to make conversation,” you hiss, crossing your arms. “I’m sorry, I forgot you’re only a person in front of cameras.”
Jaehyun takes a sharp breath before turning to you, a not-so-happy look on his face despite the calmness over his features. You’ve seen it enough times.
“How long are you going to keep up the pretentious this and pretentious that before you face it, really?” He looks at you with tight lips, poisonous implications in his question. “Why you love to get up in my case all the time?”
The words take time to settle in. You shake your head when you realize, a sardonic laugh leaving your lips. Of course he’d think that.
“Oh my god,” you scoff. “You’re so full of yourself. You think I’m interested in you? Don’t let what happened years ago get to your head.”
“That’s not what I—”
“Oh, what did you mean then? Pray tell.”
“First of all, stop cutting me off,” he says, taking a step towards you. A certain feeling of uneasiness runs through you when you detect annoyance in his quiet statement.
“Secondly,” he says, taking a another step forward just as your back hits the wall of the elevator, “Stop treating me like I’m the bane of your existence. I have nothing to do with you.”
He’s right, of course, but the words sting where they hit. Asshole, you think. He has no business telling you what to do and what not to do. But in this moment, you can’t fish for the correct words—you don’t have the strength to when you’re so close to each other like this, the scent of his cologne syrupy and sickening. His tall stature is intimidating, with his straight shoulders and proud jawline.
The elevator dings at the seventh floor, Jaehyun stepping away from you without a glance or care, striding out just as smoothly as on a runway.
You take a moment to breathe, unsaid words burning holes into your tongue. You wish you could’ve said something better, anything that didn’t make you feel so pathetic. Maybe you should’ve told him to stick his words up his ass, sounding vulgar being the least of your worries. You wait patiently to reach the last floor, each ding souring your mood little by little. 
You are so glad you didn’t call him that night. To think he’d ever help you knowing it’s mutual, the whole hating each other’s guts. You just can’t believe the audacity of him—to accuse you of, what, romantic feelings? In an industry where you can’t tell apart gold from copper? Where all the people warming up to you are fair weather friends and competitors? He must have let all that attention get to his head. Runway faces aren’t as easy to fall in love with as he thinks.
“(name)! Come quick!”
Taeyong’s voice urges as soon as you enter and you settle your bag down, rushing to him. His smile drops when he sees your seething figure place your bag on the desk with a loud thud. You turn to him, without a hint of sweetened formality and ask him the day’s schedule.
Taeyong gulps before responding, undoubtedly afraid of your lips, a twitch away from a scowl, but he explains nicely nonetheless.
“Can you do a rerun of these designs for me?” he says, arranging the papers on the desk. That’s how he says these need improvement. No wonder the interns love him.
Taeyong’s in his usual attire, still too chic for you but strangely comfortable to look at. You nod, immediately scrutinising them, your (almost pointless) years of training trying to give you hints as to where you went wrong. You’re not really expecting to find big flaws or anything—just details you can enhance. You’ve learned enough about Taeyong in a month and it’s that his sense of style encompasses comfort, even in the most abstract of concepts. You respect him for that. It doesn’t change the fact that you think it’s a little overdone maybe.
Taeyong laughs, breaking you out of your daze. You raise an eyebrow.
“Is- Is something wrong?” You look at him, perplexed.
“It’s just that- It’s just you remind me a lot of the fashion students.” He smiles at you.
Your shoulders droop. Amateur. New. Unprofessional.
“Oh.”
Taeyong rephrases himself quickly, waving his hands about. “I don’t mean it as a bad thing! It just means you still…love doing it.”
It sticks with you longer than you’d expect, as you work throughout the day. You think Taeyong is too nice to criticize you properly but he eventually gets the point across—stick to the theme, written in Taeyong’s dainty handwriting and pinned to the softboard. 
Secrets. 
What an atrocious concept. Firstly, it makes no sense apart from sounding like a fucking lingerie collection. Secondly, when you went over Taeyong’s designs with the layers and patches, you supposed he wanted to focus on the inside of things because everything he’d drawn was inside out. Thirdly, when you heard him explain it, you were a little taken aback to hear it was going to be all about you, us. The designers, the models, the photographers, the magazine editors—there are millions and millions of people working to make sketches come to life, for a few items of clothing in someone’s closet. It feels nice to hear that from him. You promise you’re going to perfect it. 
And perfection is your dear old friend. 
It’s what you always strive for, but end up with something else that’s a little less beautiful. You take slow breaths, removing and adding details (after all, art is in the details). But perfection can easily grow tiresome. It makes you increasingly frustrated and you don’t think you have the heart to tell Taeyong everything in his studio stresses you out.
“So, you’re working with Jaehyun?” you ask, trying to look less antsy.
Taeyong blanks out for a moment before responding. “Yes. Why? Is he- Is he making you uncomfortable?”
Uncomfortable wouldn’t even begin to explain what he makes you feel. 
“No,” you deny. “Just curious.”
Taeyong smiles. “We usually work on summer shoots together. It’s like tradition.”
“That’s…nice,” you say, trying to reciprocate his smile.
“Oh, but we’re having terrible weather so the shoots keep going longer than planned. That’s why I’m having to compromise planning time with you. Sorry about that.”
You try to keep your posture despite the mild annoyance brewing at the back of your head. Great. Now you have to see Jaehyun’s unbelievably annoying face every time you walk in. Maybe if you plead enough, you’d get permission to leave early and not want to throw some insults at him. 
You decide to walk, despite Taeyong insisting his driver help you get home. He doesn’t act like it but he’s a busy man, with side projects and interviews coming up so often you lose count. It’s no wonder he had to, and you hate using this word, hire someone for the label’s next venture. You think articles like Lee Taeyong loses touch and hires designers instead of doing his job would make him upset but he seems to genuinely not let it bother him. It’s about ideas to him. His label, almost large enough to be a brand, is for ideas; what a pretty thing to base your business around. While you thought you were a big shot back in South Korea, you’re almost nothing more than Lee Taeyong’s co-designer—assistant here.
You feel drops of what you felt years ago trickling down your throat. Overshadowed. Powerless. Imposter. Something about New York makes you want to pull all your hair out. You wish you hadn’t been here in the first place, maybe then this would seem more of a fun trip than memories weighing you down. But then if you hadn’t been here, you might not have even started.
You hug yourself at the sudden downpour, clouds kind enough for it to be nothing more than showers but you’re soaked anyway. Kind, but still a little cruel. Running under the eaves of a store, you curse yourself for not bringing an umbrella the only day you needed it. You stand there for a while, just breathing.
Real life is never like movies, is it? Cameras lie. Pretty faces lie. Sometimes you end up stuck in New York rains without an umbrella or a friend to call or a lover to protect you. You end up getting an Uber, taking awfully long to arrive due to the traffic the rain had ensued and try your best to ignore the disgruntled driver mumbling about you wetting his seats.
You still don’t know how the goddamn shower works. 
You manage to complete without either scorching your skin off or freezing it to Greenland and back—a feat much more successful than whatever you had going on for today. You slip into the absurdly soft mattress, pillows and covers swallowing you into a state of sleep.
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You start the day almost pouring coffee onto Jaehyun’s spotless white shirt. And you might have were it not for immense self-restraint, and the fact that Taeyong’s eyes were trained on the two of you.
“So…are you two…a thing or something?” he asks, eyebrows furrowed.
“No,” Jaehyun responds calmly while you sputter it out.
Taeyong apologizes, a laugh following. “You seem to have worked together before. Jaehyun, you never told me that.”
“I…I thought you knew,” he answers, leaning back against the tabletop.
“Ah, well,” Taeyong shrugs. “Thanks for helping me out with this, (name). Maybe- maybe we can draw some inspiration for the collection from outdoors.”
“Of course,” you say as you smile wide, trying hard not to break the coffee mug in your hand.
If you’re being honest, you had a gut feeling you’d be asked to help with Taeyong’s (apparently) infamous summer shoot. He walks into his studio every morning with hair in a disarray, talking to more people than he might enjoy and the entirety of New York weather against him. There’s only so much time a man can have and under pressure, he’s going to have to choose. It’s easy to feel sorry for someone like him.
This should be the stylist’s job. Jaehyun stands with his chin up as you adjust the fitting, smoothing out creases and making sure the cerulean shirt is pinned right, satin feeling cool and nice under your fingers. Sleeveless is back in trend this summer, and so are low-cuts.
“Careful there,” he says when you hand brushes a little lower, just below the full-grain leather belt.
You hope your face isn’t steaming from the rush of heat but you manage to limit your emotions to a sound of discomfort, remembering the horrendous accusation he’d thrown at you. “I don’t care about your dick, twit.”
Jaehyun laughs, bending a little to whisper. “I wouldn’t mind if you did.”
“You look like you’re having a wonderful time making me uncomfortable.”
“You’re just so easy to work up.”
His dimples are getting on your nerves. You reach up to button his collar, perhaps a little too harsh because he chokes, an uncharacteristic sound leaving his mouth as he winces. You suppress a smile, glad you managed to do something about the look on his face.
The sunlight over this park feels like Christmas come early, with the way Taeyong is flitting from model to model and stylist to stylist with the intensity of a five year old after an ice-cream truck. 
“Is he- Is he usually like this?” you ask, eyes on the makeup artist getting directions from Taeyong.
“I just assumed all of you are this way,” Jaehyun, responds looking at the same sight.
You roll your eyes. “We’re not all crazy.”
Jaehyun raises an eyebrow.
“Okay, maybe a little bit,” you correct yourself, watching Taeyong almost trip over someone’s bag in order to greet the magazine’s style director. 
Jaehyun chuckles, eyes meeting yours for a moment before the two of you go about your own business.
You like magazine shoots for the most part. You never find a glass of water anywhere, but some intern or the other will definitely be there to fetch you Starbucks. There’s at least three people fussing over each model and at least two exasperated photographers trying very hard to snap clean shots. The stylist and designer look as though they might explode any minute, although the relief on their faces after it’s all over is something worth looking at. The skies are so bright and blue, you think, for a cosmopolis. The trees and shrubs lining the park are in a state of tranquility compared to the chaos it encircles.  
Magazines might not be as important in an age of social media advertisement, almost part of nostalgia now—but maybe some of you are not yet willing to deny kids the thrill of reading a magazine under their blankets in the middle of the night. It often gave hope to little boys playing dress up and little girls sewing their own clothes. 
You’d forgotten just how exhausting shooting with magazines is. The models must be having it worse but their masks don’t come off easy. If you had ever underestimated their job difficulty, it comes back to throttle you at full speed every time you’re at a shoot.
 Looking good in front of a camera is pretty damn hard. 
They don’t even get to keep the clothes, unless some asshole of a designer decides to pay them in apparel instead of actual money. Most models leave New York in debt. Men are paid even less than women. You’re surprised Jaehyun is as celebrated as he is—or the fact that he was clever enough of a businessman in launching his own high fashion-themed restaurant. You’ve heard he barely visits it, like a careless afterthought. But you’re not one to get carried away by sketchy articles on the internet. All you’ve needed are more reasons to hate him.
You sip the iced coffee, its effect pretty much worn out during humid afternoons. It’s time for a break, but no one’s willing to break momentum. You find yourself feeling a little awkward, as nothing more than a guest with creative advice, and so you sit under the comforting cool of the giant green umbrella at one of the tables. You could sink into your chair were it not so damn uncomfortable.
Jaehyun takes a seat right beside you to your surprise, offering you a box of diced mango before you fervently decline. You still think he’s an asshole. It doesn’t make any sense—why accuse you of unsaid affections and then flirt with you like he never said it? It’s not like you’re even friends, how ridiculous. There are quite a few jerks you’ve met in your life, but Jung Yoonoh really takes the cake.
“What?” you snap when his gaze gets on your nerves.
“I didn’t say anything.” He raises his hands defensively, eyes still on yours. “You don’t seem to be enjoying yourself.”
“I enjoy the air conditioned suite Taeyong booked me more than this, yes.” You sigh, leaning back. “I don’t really have anything to do.” 
“I’m assuming he booked you the luxury suite on the fifteenth floor,” he says, chuckling.
You furrow your eyebrows. It’s not impossible that Jaehyun knows Taeyong’s favorite suite to book for guests.
“The view’s pretty nice from there, right? Oh, and you must be enjoying the silence.”
“I actually like the outside sounds,” you defend. “It’s calming.” 
“Not when you’re on the third floor,” he says, shoving a piece of mango into his mouth with a fork. “All you hear is middle aged men screaming.”
You rest your elbow on the table, placing your chin against your palm. The shade is separated from sunlight by a thin line against his chest, pale blue satin glimmering where the sun meets it. Jaehyun’s eyes shine a darker hue of honey under the shade, moving to the box in his hands occasionally before trailing back to the background noise again. Taeyong really does love pretty fits, but this might just be one of the most gorgeous pieces you’ve seen this summer (and you’ve already been through all the ready-to-wear lookbooks you possibly could). A thought passes you in a breeze, that maybe it's the model making it seem that way.
“You’re talkative today,” you note quietly, the sun harsher on your cheeks than before.
Jaehyun shrugs, hurrying to finish all the pieces. He suddenly pulls a face, one you don’t see very often in high fashion websites and Instagram pages. It’s almost cute. 
“Sour.” 
You find yourself laughing, a gentle influx of peace filling the inside your chest. You quickly recover, looking back up to see Jaehyun simply staring at you, breathing. He looks caught off-guard, no camera to warn him. You straighten, your cheeks flushing with heat.
“Is- Is something wrong?”
He immediately shakes his head, more to himself than you. There’s a pause before the two of you are happily distracted. The style director appears to be gesturing at him from the other side and Jaehyun responds with a curt wave.
“You’re doing two different concepts today?”
“Three, actually.”
You raise your eyebrows. Well, they’re definitely taking advantage of the good weather. They could just photoshop it, in your opinion, but authenticity is everything when it comes to magazines nowadays. 
“Well, don’t let me hold you back,” you say, your tone dismissive. “Go get changed into whatever pretty shirt Taeyong has up next in his collection.”
“The next shoot doesn’t have a shirt,” he says, the corner of his mouth quirked upward.
You almost choke on your coffee, blaming the heat for your weak state of mind. You’re just having one of those strange days—just that, nothing else.
You finish the rest of the coffee, cup resting in your hand till you find the energy to get up and find a trash can.  
Jaehyun was right. This time the shoot’s a little too wet and a little too much skin for you to enjoy. The only thing added to Jaehyun above the waist are a dainty red scarf knotted over his neck and a small, flat hoop earring on his left ear. The velvet fingerless gloves, although you’re not very fond of them, complete a rather rugged yet soft look. You didn’t expect Taeyong to come up with something like that. 
Jaehyun’s well-developed physique, while you’ve seen it in other shoots and online articles, is completely different when you’re a few feet away from it. The dark blue cargo pants, silken, are a signature style of Taeyong but the details don’t distract you easily enough. Funny, this is the first time you’re feeling somewhat flustered in a place full of half-naked models. 
You suddenly think of reds and oranges, lilac shrubs and a hint of Burberry men’s perfume. In a way, it reminds you of the strums of the guitar your roommate used to play while you stayed up late, coming up with concepts. Cherishing, soothing—and special, just enough. The corner of your lips twitch and you take out your pocket sketchbook. It’s never too late to add a design to the collection, right? After all, you have secrets too. Maybe Taeyong was right about the outdoors for inspiration. 
Something sets into motion, subtle but sharp.
The next time you walk into Taeyong’s studio, you feel the sun on your face better. Everything seems to be fitting into place, as you smooth through designs at a pace your student self would be jealous of. When Taeyong praises your work, you feel a rush of pride smearing the inside of your chest and you finally feel like everything’s not falling apart. It feels good. It feels like you’re someone.
The days go by in what seems like barely seconds—you know what they say about New York minutes. The mustard cloth draped over your desk to the cottage blue of your curtains, the colours around you change as quickly as the wind. Sometimes they’re abstract—and other times, well, they have more to do with a stranger’s eyes, or the swirls within a coffee cup. It’s the way in which transition occurs around you, that you often forget it moves something within you too. 
You’ve put together some samples with Taeyong, most of them by yourself; the process of making is ever comforting, fabric even more so. You’ve sent the revised designs for production, feeling giddy about whatever is to come like it’s something new. (It shouldn’t be.) 
You fucking hate how different this is. Seoul is nothing compared to New York. The anxiety is nearly ten times worse, the streets are far more attractive when it comes to inspiration and the figure of Jung Yoonoh is no longer as easy to ignore. 
Even after the summer shoot’s over, Jaehyun often comes by to hang out at the studio, dressed in what you would call the simplest fucking thing you’d ever seen and still managing to look just as gorgeous. He blends in well with university students, often wearing the ugliest baseball cap you’ve ever seen, and the look of his face feels much, much worse than ever before. It’s at ease, smug even, but never failing to smile at you when you’re trying to focus. You don’t care how good of friends Taeyong and Jaehyun are—you want to tell him to leave. 
But you just can’t bring yourself to. It’s not that you don’t trust yourself, you certainly do, but whatever New York has done to you, includes making you feel a different way about him. Sometimes you find yourself pressing your legs together harshly, stiffening at any proximity with him and a pool of warmth at the base of your stomach you’d rather not feel.
It’s embarrassing to even think about it—the fact that he makes you feel that way, so hot and bothered like it’s your first time. You blame your lack of going out these few months because after all, anyone could fall in love with runway faces. It doesn’t have to mean it’s him you want. You carry on doing what you’ve been doing for the most part of your career, your best to avoid him. There are more pressing matters, and your head might just implode if you keep on worrying about things (a man, of all) you need not. 
Time passes even faster when all your thoughts revolve around the same thing.
One month. D-30. Whatever the hell you call time before the end of the world.
Your palms sweat a whole lot easier here. It’s a little weird, considering you don’t find much difference in humidity between Seoul and New York. Your heart often catches up in your throat too. Not a great feeling, your heart choking the breath out of you, but you’re used to it. You cope and you learn, that’s what it means to be human.
You pull your hand down before it reaches your teeth. The day ended in a meeting with Taeyong’s production team—everything’s running smoothly so you need not worry, he said. 
Why are those the words that make you worry the most? 
You check the time on your phone. 23:05 and a whole month to go. You better get some sleep for all the meetings you have scheduled tomorrow. You close your eyes and for a while, everything falls quiet.
You dream of New York Fashion Week. People come here to feel included. Everyone wants to be a part of something they don’t understand.
The models walk down the runway in increasingly uncomfortable outfits. You didn’t design any of them. Where are the ones you worked on? You can’t move from your seat, or turn your head from the runway, anything at all. Something’s wrong, everything’s wrong. You don’t belong here. Thunder strikes outside the venue and you wake up with a gasp caught in your throat, and the clock on the bedside table flashing 2:14.
You’ve had enough. You swear you’ve had enough.
You get up out of bed, pacing the giant bedroom, the empty spaces making you feel more and more miserable. The city twinkles with innumerous stars beyond your window, curtains half drawn so they can comfort you whenever you need—but these lights don’t shine for you, or anyone else. They shine for themselves. That’s what it means to be in New York again. 
What time is it in Seoul? Could you call your mother? Joohyun? Everyone must be busy right now—you don’t know what to do. It’s been a long time since you’ve felt so helpless. There’s a reason you’ve been avoiding New York for this long and now it’s come crashing down on you. 
This was a mistake. All of it was a mistake.
You look down at your phone, the light hurting your eyes despite being set to the lowest brightness. You think a little, and then some more. There’s no one else you can call. Even if he’s busy charming all the other employees whenever you see him, even if half the world is in love with him, there’s no one else you can call. This time you don’t stop yourself.
You tap the call button beside the Jung Yoonoh saved neatly. Tapping your foot against the floor nervously, your mind goes blank for a few seconds or so. He answers when you’re just about to hang up, breath hitching in your throat at the sound of his voice.
“Hello? Hello? If this is a reporter—”
“It’s me, Jaehyun.”
The line goes quiet for a moment and your voice overlaps his before he can begin.
“I- I didn’t mean to call so late. Sorry…uh.”
You scrunch up your face at your own voice. This is not getting you anywhere.
“Is everything okay?” he asks, voice lower.
You fall silent, unable to answer without breaking down into tears. You did not call Jung Yoonoh for that. 
“Yeah,” you choke out. “Fine. Completely fine. I just…”
You trail off, trying to get yourself to breathe.
“I’ll send you an address. Be there in an hour.”
You blink back tears, confusion adding to the burning pile of worries inside your head. 
“What?”
“Address. I’ll text you. Be there. One hour.”
“I’m not stupid, Jaehyun,” you snap, strength refilling your voice. “Why?”
“I’m not answering questions, just be there.”
With that, the line goes flat and an embarrassing amount of ‘hello’s get you to realize that he hung up. A notification pops up a minute later and you’re too groggy to decipher it, logging it to Maps instead so you can follow. It’s fifteen minutes away, you realize with a sigh of relief, so you can at least present yourself within the given constraint. 
You can’t grasp what you feel in the moment, the night air and warm streets beckoning you to leave the clamped apartment soaked in fear. You think this is unlike Jaehyun, what he’s doing, but you’re too shaken to care. You need some respite, even if it comes from somewhere you can’t picture.
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“You…wanted to meet me at a Korean barbecue restaurant?”
Jaehyun’s ears turn red, as they often do when he doesn’t know how to respond to you.
“I-It’s not that I…Never mind,” he tries to explain, fidgeting with the cloth over his shoulder. “We can go somewhere else if you want.”  
We? You think, eyes scanning his face in confusion. If you want? Where’s the uncaring Jaehyun you’ve known, foreign eyes and impassive lips? He hardly looks the part he’s meant to play—a billboard face with a confident jawline and nothing more behind it. Outside of work—you don’t even know what else to call this—Jaehyun looks hardly intimidating, or abrasive. He seems different, gentle almost, although the dark circles under his eyes might have something to do with it. Maybe he’s too tired to say anything more and that’s it.
But he still came all the way here.
“Aren’t you a little…overdressed?” 
There comes the remark you were hoping to not hear. You just wanted to look nice; you’d hardly call this overboard. The loose, mustard-colored chiffon shirt cinches at the waist, paired with your nicest (only not faded) pair of light blue jeans and shoes that haven’t seen the light of day since you arrived here. You barely ever design clothes for yourself anymore but you thought you looked good in this.
“No,” you defend quickly, feeling your face grow warm. “You’re underdressed.”
You say that, but he clearly looks good in anything he wears. Could you expect any less of  a supermodel? He doesn’t seem to have dressed in as much a hurry as you had. Clad in a plain black T-shirt that’s half tucked into skinny jeans, he’s added his hideous baseball cap and a pair of navy blue shades which looks just as ridiculous as it sounds. You really think he shouldn’t be leaving his house without the help of a stylist. 
“I…I just mean you don’t wear anything other than the same sweater and pants combination to work, so… please excuse my surprise.”
Jaehyun's eyes flicker over your figure before masking it with an awkward cough. You reach out and pull the shades over his head, the look bothering you more than anything else. He doesn’t respond to it, at least not in a way that’s obvious, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world to do—you fixing his hair and unquestionably awful sense of style.
“There’s a soju place a few blocks ahead. Or if you’re not into that, there’s a noodle shop just at the edge of K-town,” Jaehyun rambles on, not meeting your eye. “If you’re looking for something inexpensive—"
“You came all the way here to give me directions?” You raise an eyebrow. You might even be enjoying this, although your inner voice bites back at you, denying it.
Jaehyun shakes his head, the red in his ears pulsing back up. “No. I…I needed some fresh air.”
“You…have someplace to be then?”
Jaehyun might not realize it, but the answers he gives always have room for teasing. Aloof. Vague. Yet somehow sweet.
“And you’ll go alone? At this hour? No, I’ll accompany you,” he says out loud, trying to play off the sudden vocal inflection. You sigh. Boys will be boys, as they say. Even if they’re twenty-six.
You let him keep you company. Though the first few minutes are painfully quiet, neither of you knowing quite what to say without starting a disagreement, you continue your walk through a city that never sleeps. It’s awkward even, being side by side without you seething at his charming, (undoubtedly) fake smile. He feels real, for once, and you don’t know how to react. There seem to be some gold-tinted cracks appearing in your reality, slowly but surely, and you’re not very good at patching anything other than fabric.
“You know, it’s actually a little relieving to see Korean letters here,” you say, sighing. You never thought you’d be so corny, but it really does feel good being here. 
Or is it him? 
“Thanks,” you add quietly, hoping he doesn’t hear. No, maybe you do. You can’t tell at this point.
“I…I know what it’s like,” he says, so softly that it almost gets carried away by the wind. He clears his throat, an ‘ah’ escaping his lips as he stops abruptly.
“We…We missed the turn,” he declares, a little sheepish as he scratches the back of his head.
You look at him in disbelief. “Jaehyun, how long have you lived here?”
“Oh, I was born here actually,” he says, tilting his face to look at you, blunt sarcasm evident on it. “How many times have you lost your way to the convenience store in Seoul?”
“Literally zero times.”
Jaehyun puffs a cheek before going back to normal and turning a hundred and eighty degrees down the street.
“Hey, wait up!” you huff at his increased pace, half jogging to keep up.
You reach the acclaimed noodle shop, your breath barely within your lungs and swearing at Jaehyun who looks like he wasn’t bothered one bit. He reaches his hand out to help you and you swat it away, chest still heaving with your hands on your knees.
“Dickhead,” you hiss.
“I don’t think I deserved that,” he responds with a widening smile. 
“Asshole,” you say, standing up straight to glare at him.
“What would Seoul say hearing their beloved designer swear like this?” Jaehyun looks almost amused, as if you hadn’t shared an awkward time together, like two teenagers who were forced to walk home together from the bus stop.
“They can go to hell,” you retort. “As can you.”
Jaehyun laughs, a strange sound to hear and you blink a few times, unsure of what to do. You wonder if it’s the night playing tricks or if Jaehyun really is an actual person, not the basket of preprocessed insults you were used to. The cracks are widening—you’re not sure if they’re meant to be patched.
Perhaps you were a little eager to enter someplace warm, but you feel immense relief in this little shop, despite the smell of chili paste and noodle soup wafting through the air. It’s a little empty; in fact, you two seem to be the only people there apart from some students at the other corner, but you sit there in your own bubble, talking with Jaehyun of all people about which singer is better. He laughs occasionally, still managing to catch you off-guard with how honest it sounds and you wonder for a moment, how nice this feels. For the first time in a month, your heartbeat seems to have settled at a normal rate.
“What?” you enounce, a little offended. “What’s so wrong about my love life?”
“You just- You just don’t seem that type,” he explains, his ears as red as the bowl.
“I don’t have time for commitments, Jaehyun,” you sigh. “It’s what happens when you’re good at your job.”
Jaehyun nods, something akin to agreement in his response. 
“So, your, uh, what is it? Training camp? What’s that about?” you ask, in between blowing your food.
“You could really Google things once in a while, you know?” he replies, bringing his chopsticks close to his mouth.
You roll your eyes. “I’m sorry I’m not one of your creepy stalkers, Mr. Jung.”
“Nothing to do with that,” he says, shaking his head. “It’s for kids interested in fashion, modeling, photography—stuff.”
“Oh? How so?”
“I just sponsor them. You know how difficult it is to get noticed in…this industry,” he explains, like it’s not a big deal. Nothing ever seems to be a big deal to him.
You nod, unable to help the smile. Maybe it isn’t a big deal, but you’re sure now that you were mistaken. Just a little bit. 
“I was lucky,” you mumble. “I can’t believe they saw those ugly embroidered patches and decided to sponsor me, oh my god. That sweater was hideous.”
Jaehyun laughs loudly. “They saw me cleaning outside my school and decided to pick me up and ship me straight to Paris.”
“Nothing’s worse than the first day.” You take another mouthful, the taste savoury and filling. 
“You know, I’m pretty sure they photoshopped my ears out in the first magazine shoot I had.”
You laugh, leaning in a little closer. “Your first year was rough, huh?”
He hums, his eyes flickering from your nose to your lips. It makes you a little self-conscious, blood rushing to your cheeks at an unexpected pace. Who knew Jaehyun could have such an effect on you? 
Your eyes flutter over his face once again.
He’s handsome. But it’s the sort of handsomeness that tells you, you don’t know much beyond it. You look back at your bowl, sobering up and completing the rest of the noodles.
It’s still midnight blue in the faraway sky as you walk down the streets. Most of the people you see out and about are those drunk off their faces from club hopping or a particularly enthusiastic group of tourists. The watermelon soju, while better with budae-jjigae and arguably the best soju flavor, somehow had little effect on you with the bitter aftertaste still settling in. The crowds in other places would make for great people-watching but you walk in a lonely street that calls for proximity. Beside you, Jaehyun sneezes, the sound of it making you jump on the quiet sidewalk.
“Jesus Christ, Jaehyun,” you huff, wincing at the sound, “you sounded like a fucking tractor.”
Jaehyun laughs, looking down at the pavement. When he looks back at you, the circles underneath his eyes seem to have darkened and you wonder if yours are the same. Yours can’t possibly be as important as his, though, and you wonder if it’s appropriate to laugh at how dorky he looks.
You find yourself not wanting to walk back into the safety of your suite. Jaehyun has a look of calm across his features, drawing over the landscape around you. New York lights don’t faze him, they only reflect in his eyes. 
The way his soft breaths fan out against his lips remind you that he is human, after all—he has a soul and body, thoughts and its beautiful intricacies. When he turns back to you, you feel those criminal feelings all over again, except this time it’s even louder. It feels so wrong, and yet you can’t help but think of the liberation that could come with his lips on yours. 
You could swear out loud, all the colorful words ready at the tip of your tongue.
“Your collar’s…”
Jaehyun’s voice trails off, his hand moving to fix your flipped collar, and when the heat of his skin brushes your neck, you try to not think of where else his hands could be, his lips could be. 
In fact, there’s a moment within where it’s perfectly reasonable for him to kiss you, the taste almost on your tongue. But Jaehyun moves away, an indecipherable look across his face.
“I should get going,” he says, “I have a- I have a shoot early tomorrow—today.”
You nod, cheeks coloring at your own unsaid thoughts. Just what have you done to yourself? Why is your skin searing, why does your stomach feel upside down and why were you so ready to give in to him? To Jaehyun? You’ve never felt want like this before, this need to press skin against skin in a manner so illicit. 
You part with a short goodbye, the sudden loneliness in your path making you want to backtrack, ask if you can go somewhere else again—maybe there’s a club nearby so you can see him through a round of shots as you usually do. Maybe the bitter feelings will return then. 
When you think of the words you exchanged over the course of so unusual a night—your former unforgiving words contradict you. You hate the realization but being so obscure in front of a camera doesn’t have to mean he’s pretentious. Maybe you were wrong. Maybe someday you’ll even admit it.
You feel a flash of heat in your face. You are not running to Jung Yoonoh—what an embarrassing thought. If the very core of your being isn’t repulsed by it, there’s something wrong with you. 
There’s something definitely wrong with you, love.
You breathe sharply, trying to organize your thoughts. As if the paparazzi wouldn’t have a treat out of this meeting you had with him if they got to know. You’d better limit it to the only one.
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You bite your nails out of force of habit. It’s not going to help. You know. But there’s hardly anything else to cool your nerves.
Front row tickets to New York Fashion Week—the most mortifying dream out of all the ones you’ve ever had. The way Taeyong fidgets, you want to believe he’s in the same boat as you—it makes you thankful even. 
Even outside of New York, Lee Taeyong is known for booking out exclusively intimate spaces. There are some props for the pre-show photography, including inked sketches on giant vertical banners stuck to the walls and tables with a messy collection of coffee cans, pencils and a sewing machine. Diverse types of fabric roll off the table in long strips, gently lining the floor till they end midway to another table. It’s a mess—a mess you made look good.
You’d left that and the backstage behind now. All eyes are on the sparsely lit runway, your aspirations coating the air in a thick veil. Are you ready? You won’t know till the first model steps out and till you can elicit a response from the audience.
Jaehyun’s at another venue—career before friendship, or, heaven forbid, attraction. You’d seen the fitting, cape skirt doing daringly well with his long legs clad in black pants, and a classy vest over a ruffled white shirt. You hate seeing other designs before a show, but god, were you glad you’d visited Givenchy to meet Johnny. 
But you’re relieved even, that Jaehyun isn’t here. You don’t have the strength to face him anyway, all your energy directed into this chasm of whatever you’d call six months of effort. You want to call yourself accomplished. You want to be proud of yourself.
So this time, you remember all twenty-six minutes of it.
God, they look so beautiful up there, when they’re being looked at, seen for what they are—you’ll never get over it. There’s still hardly much to remember, except this time you’re happy to do it all over again. Effort only exists if it’s acknowledged.
It settles in quite a while later, the weight of all you’d done. You could almost cry, but that’s better left to pillows and the unrelenting skies above a midnight-coated rooftop. This is your moment. For once, you’re anything but afraid. 
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Afterparties are still not your thing. 
However, you had your nicest outfit picked out and Lee Taeyong’s fancy, themed afterparties are something notorious among your colleagues. You’ve heard designers tend to go all out, wearing the best things they’ve designed even if it makes them a little embarrassed to be wearing their own work.
You feel a sigh leave your lips as you finally find a place to sit, your earlier conversations leaving you drained of social energy. You don’t feel alien—it’s strange—and their compliments feel almost warm. The music playing over the speakers is something, you’re sure, from a 60’s American movie, and while it has its own strange allure, the champagne gives you a larger dose of relief. 
In fact, if you’re not mistaken, it’s quite like the ballroom in Paris, although significantly smaller. Burgundy wallpaper and lit up crystals hanging in hexagonal shapes across the ceiling—it’d look lovely on a dress too.
Taeyong’s speech, of course, gives you a spike of anxiety with the sudden announcement of his label’s future, a brand now. He smiles on the small podium, everyone admiring his radiance when suddenly he gestures at you, the glass in your hand feeling hotter and hotter.
“…I couldn’t do this without the only designer I felt was up to this—the first designer to work under my brand, as of now…” 
You try not to blush under all the pairs of eyes that turn to you. 
“(name), thank you.” 
Success feels good. Gratitude feels even better.
Everything feels natural, as if a dream gone right. You’re no longer afraid of the world you stepped into, or the accumulation of feelings that molded you into the person you are now. The confidence you so chased after as if it were morphine, you’re going to be keeping an eye on it before it can run away again.
There’s still one little problem to your night of triumph, though. 
Jaehyun hasn’t taken his eyes off you ever since you entered, a conversation yet pending. You already know he looks good in the plainest of T-shirts, so it might be a no-brainer that he looks absolutely stunning in a suit. The crystals lining the lapels of his coat glimmer amidst the crowd he’s gathered. It’s hard to come in contact, however. He’s magnetic, almost formidable in the way he attracts attention, and you know it’s something that comes with being a man of few words. 
“You’re not enjoying the party?” you ask, taking in Jaehyun’s figure on the veranda overlooking the garden. He sits on one of the mahogany chairs, swirling the glass of champagne with a look of indifference coating his eyes and lips.
“I am,” he says, turning to face you. “Needed a short break.”
“I suppose being the most attractive man in the room needs a break,” you say, taking a seat beside him.
A wry laugh leaves his lips, as he lays his eyes on you. “You don’t seem bothered by it though?”
“I believe that pretty is as pretty does,” you say, your lips twitching.
Jaehyun smiles, furrowing his eyebrows yet still. “You think multimillionaire companies are built on things like inner beauty?”
He’s right. What’s inside is beautiful—it’s too idealistic a phrase. You sigh, adjusting your sleeve. It’s a difficult life, walking the runway no one dares to step on. 
I think you’d make that cut too, you want to tell him.
“You know the best thing I got told today?” you ask, diverting the stream of conversation. You think he’s a friend. Even if it could be the champagne talking. Even if you want something more than the innocence of friendship. 
Jaehyun raises an eyebrow. “Did Cristóbal Balenciaga’s ghost show up to compliment you?”
“No,” you emphasize, laughing at his pronunciation. “It was this girl. A student. Said she wrote an essay about me.”
Jaehyun hums, dimples marking his cheeks. “I didn’t know a student could get you so giddy.”
You laugh, looking down at your hands before resting your gaze on him again. He leans forward in his seat, strands of hair falling over his face from the rest and a contemplating look over his features. He looks much, much different from when you first saw him, and even handsomer, if that were possible. He’s grown up from the awkward boy you saw in the press release pictures of the Saint Laurent Fall Collection—he looks sharp and valiant on front covers, his shoulders broad and his eyes darling. Jaehyun is still unironically the most breathtaking man you’ve ever met. He might even be one of the sweetest, inside out. 
You look to his lips, full as ever. Perhaps you have something to confess. Secrets aren’t meant to be kept so long.
“Jaehyun,” you call, bringing his attention before faltering. It’s not like you’re the only one fawning over his smile. You get up instead, excusing yourself. “I’ll see you inside I suppose.”
“You know I like you, right?”
You turn around. “What?”
Jaehyun gets up, brushing his suit and fixing the lapels. The gentle night haze and the contrasting calls of the brightly lit party inside brush over an effect you’ve never felt before. “I…I like you. It’s pretty straightforward, I think.”
You deny it, or rather, some repressed little emotion inside you denies it vehemently. “Jaehyun, really. I admit I was a complete asshole to you and- and...it was…kind of you to accompany me that night but—”
“Stop. Don’t- Don’t call that kind. You’re not seeing the full picture.”
You stand there, unsure of what to do as you feel your chest grow warmer. Jaehyun turns his head upwards, letting out an audible breath. You can see conflict on his face, the struggle of someone still mulling over the perfect words.
“I don’t hate you. I never really hated you even if I wanted to.”
You suppose it wouldn’t be the right time to say that you might have indulged in that.
“I did,” you confess. “I hated you for a very, very long time, Jaehyun.”
“I know,” he whispers, looking straight at you. “I didn’t mean to leave you hanging—”
“Jaehyun, I don’t care about that,” you say, your voice rising, “You told me you felt suffocated in bow ties and laughed when I asked if you wanted to run away with me. I just ended up thinking you were a goddamn liar.”  
“Fine,” he says quietly in his baritone timbre, sounds of the chatter from inside numbing away. “Then let me be honest.”
“When I met you, I thought there was someone like me doing just the same—so…suddenly in the midst of everything. Even if you were a complete asshole to me. You were still real.”
He phrases it delicately, lilting, as if that hasn’t been your whole purpose here.  He’s only a breath away from you, but you don’t want to push him away this time. There’s a moment’s pause.
“Between work and myself, which is more important? For once, I thought I could answer that question.”
Your breaths are soft and shallow as they fall, trying to understand his words.
“And then you just fucking stopped. You stopped flying out and I’d barely see you outside of Seoul like you- like you gave up or something. I didn’t understand—what happened to you?”
Jaehyun looks at you with a hardened expression, ears turning red as if he hadn’t expected this outburst of truth. He gulps, Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. It’s not like him to open his mouth and let out words that are raw and honest; it makes you feel the weight even more. You were still kids that night. You’re not anymore.
“Jaehyun,” you whisper before reaching your hand out and placing it against his cheek.
It’s so hard to not take in the details. The prominence of the muscle by his mouth when he speaks, the fine lines by his nose which appear sporadically or the look of complete reverence in his eyes when he’s staring at you like this—everything those runway shots can’t possibly capture. Your eyes trail to his lips, your own drawn to it with a desire you don’t know how to comprehend—and don’t quite wish to, either.
You want to believe he made the first move but you give in so easy, it’s alarming. Your lips move against his in a rhythm new and frantic, his hands gripping you with full strength at the waist and you part your lips to allow a deeper kiss. Your hands are free to roam his perfectly styled hair, tousling it in a fashion that makes him groan, only to push you harder against the wall. 
“I should’ve- I should’ve let you kiss me that night,” he mumbles against your lips. “Maybe I…I wouldn’t have made you hate me.”
“Maybe you should shut up and kiss me right now,” you respond, your tongue pressing against his, effectively doing the job.
It’s not difficult to see stars when his hips press against yours, his hand resting on one thigh to pull it up slightly. You feel the impact of it head-on, almost moaning out loud when his fingers press harder against the back of your thigh.
“Tell me- Tell me you want this,” he breathes out when he breaks the kiss.
You respond with reconnecting your lips, your tongue sliding against his in fervent affirmations. You’ve already forfeited your modesty, there’s no reason to stop.
You leave early, getting into the car you’d booked for the night. It would be far more embarrassing were it not for the separation between the front and backseats, when Jaehyun’s hands are up your clothes and his lips rough against your neck. The lip colour has smudged by the side of Jaehyun’s lips, a short giggle escaping you when you notice. It’s not enough to halt the kissing, or feeling each other up —something that feels long overdue. You try to keep your sounds to a minimum but Jaehyun seems to not care about things as worthless as shame, at least for the moment.
“Well, you’re about as graceful as a sea lion when you’re off the runway,” you hiss when Jaehyun’s teeth prick your skin.
“I haven’t done this in a while,” he responds in a low tone, the rest of his retort pushed away by his lips against your mouth.
You don’t have time to take in the details of Jaehyun’s apartment because he’s already carrying you to the bed, your legs around his waist and continuing to kiss you as if making up for something. All those years, you could have been doing this. Maybe you do have some regrets.
The material of his dress shirt feels expensive but clothes are not what you need right now. His phone rings once but he drags a finger over it to reject the call, his mouth still pressing against your collarbone. The only sounds you hear are rugged breathing and you fumbling with the buttons of his shirt as you pull it over his shoulders. The city lights below you reach through the drawn curtains, all the unrelenting complicacies left behind in those faraway streets.
Jaehyun makes a sound of annoyance at the phone ringing yet again. He breaks apart from you, receiving the call while his fingers massage his temple.
“Hyung, I’m fine. I’ll talk to you later—”
“I was just wondering where you disappeared and you don’t even grace me with a hello?” Johnny’s voice rings clear in the all too silent bedroom.
“Hyung—”
“Wait a minute.” There’s a pause within which Jaehyun seems to tense up. “Are you fucking? Like did you leave the party to get la—”
“Hyung. I’m hanging up.” 
The coral pink spread over his ears is almost as pretty as the look of pure annoyance over his face.
“That—”
“Didn’t happen,” you complete, giggling. If someone were to tell you’d be seeing Jaehyun like this a few months ago, you wouldn’t know whether to be embarrassed or exhilarated.
You place your hand at the nape of his neck, pulling him into another kiss.
Sex is barely ever beautiful—even if it’s Jung Yoonoh over you, planting kisses from your mouth to jaw, neck to chest and whispering sweet, delicious words against each part. He certainly knows how to use that tongue of his, better than you’d expect from a boy so pristine.
It doesn’t matter if it’s not beautiful, when it’s just like a slow dance—in shared solace and love out of time. You bite your lips to stop smiling too often for it to feel as serious and indifferent as all the other times. Sometimes you feel Jaehyun grinning into the crook of your neck, the giddiness of love taking over the movement of your hips against his. The perfect anatomy of his, paired with his candied words makes you think that maybe you do fit together.
Jaehyun pushes into you at a steady pace, your fingers digging into his back and over his shoulder blades only to draw out sounds more pleasing to your ears. You let someone else take charge for once, his praising whispers of ‘that’s my baby’ or ‘you just look so good’ far too teasing but he follows through, your body barely able to respond apart from shaking and shuddering till you reach your high. 
The sound of skin against skin dies down well into the night and you get cleaned, still blissed out from making the summit of all your senses. It’s warm inside, despite turning the air conditioner on.
“Jaehyun,” you call, lowering yourself to press a quick kiss to his lips. 
“Hm?” He gives you a drowsy smile, arm under his head and hair sticking to his forehead funny.
“Did you really not hate me? Not even once?” You rest your cheek against your palm as you lie beside him.
Even under the dim lights, it’s not hard to spot the blush on him when he positively glows. Jaehyun reminds you of warm auburn and the touch of cool satin—it’s easy to make things, find inspiration in love.
“Oh my god, you were lying!” you accuse, sitting up straight. “There’s no way you didn’t hate me. I called your modeling as good as a coconut’s!”
“As you so love to remind me,” he mumbles.
There’s a brief moment before the two of you crack up, his deep laughter perfectly mismatched with yours. There’s hardly many sounds on the eighteenth floor, but maybe you’ve always been yearning for this privacy—this proximity in shared laughter and warm touches. 
“No, I didn’t,” Jaehyun answers your question after it’s quiet once again. “I thought...I think you’re…”
Jaehyun trails off, his eyes flickering over your face before fixing on your lips as his own tug into a smile. He gulps. “I think we’d be in trouble if the paparazzi saw us throwing choice words at each other, don’t you think? You were barely out of school then.”
“Me?” You laugh. “You were thinking about me?”
“And a little bit about me.” 
You fall asleep against Jaehyun’s chest with the certainty of kinder tomorrows, a thing he teaches you through whispers against the pillow and fingers playing with your hair. There’s something private in the way he holds your face, something delicate and homely running from his long fingers to his flushed knuckles and the rest of his hand as it presses against your cheek. It’s warm here, and safe, and maybe home is where the heart is, after all.
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“Really? You’re not even a little bit sad I’m leaving?” you ask, placing your hand over your heart. “Who’s going to help you when you’re getting bullied in the workplace now?”
Doyoung huffs in annoyance, placing the box down beside the moving truck. “You’re the only one who bullies me in the workplace.”
You adjust the ugly baseball cap on your head, the one Jaehyun had pulled over your head in an attempt to stop you from complaining about his messy apartment. You hadn’t realized you’d worn it all the way to Seoul till the articles about your questionable choice of accessories had surfaced.
“Your boyfriend’s calling,” Doyoung says, making a face as he picks your phone up from the box near him. “I can’t even believe this. All those years of flirting and—”
You snatch it from him, glaring at him for the choice of words. He raises his hands defensively, rolling his eyes at your sudden movement.
“Are you sure you don’t want me flying to Seoul?”
“Unless you’re planning to work in a truck rental.”
You hear Jaehyun laugh on the other side of the line. Is it normal to have blood rush straight from your chest to your ears at the sound of laughter? You hope that doesn’t change.
You’d visited him a day before your flight. It hasn’t been all that long but Jaehyun certainly makes it out to be, just so he can use his cheesy one-liners. You try not to smile thinking about how he had flung his hair band out, immediately tousling his hair back into a pretty mess and struggling to keep a straight face when you’d visited out of the blue. Jaehyun wakes up at one in the afternoon when his schedule is empty and it had appalled you enough to help him out with basic chores before you left. (It didn’t end well. He kept putting his chin on your shoulder and sneaking his arms around you while you did the dishes.)
“(name)? (name), are you daydreaming again?” 
You sigh. “You can’t wait three more days, Jae? It’s, what, one in the morning there!”
“Do you want me saying something cheesy?”
“Absolutely not.”
“I don’t think I can sleep without waking up to your face.”
You pinch the bridge of your nose, unable to grace him with a response. The dreamy languor in his voice is more than recognizable and if you’re not mistaken, he’s going to be saying something highly inappropriate.
“Do you know what dream I had last night?” he asks, the smile almost evident with how suggestive it sounds.
“Jaehyun, no,” you warn before lowering your voice. “I swear if it’s another dirty dream—”
“Come home and I’ll tell you all about it. With demonstrations.”
This time you can’t help the laughter, trying to mask it with a cough only to fail. You push the back of your hand against your cheek in order to soothe the involuntary blush. Your perfume smells just like him, and you realize suddenly why he’d gifted it to you.
“That definitely makes me want to leave faster,” you quip.
“I certainly hope so.”
It’s different now, especially if you remember your feelings just last February. Change feels easy for the first time in your life. You check off your list of items, counting the boxes as they’re lifted onto the truck. It took a good amount of thinking, and a bunch of fights before you could decide. New York isn’t so bad. Not when you have reason to be there. You’d like to call it love.
A list of things you do appreciate: Jung Yoonoh. Jaehyun. Whatever.
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wiipes · 3 years
Text
The Blood God's Sacrifice.
(I decided to write a blurb on the hadestown talk with techno 👉👈 @bloodgoddarlin)
-----
Fearsome, bloody gruesome.
Insanely loyal.
Loving to a fault.
You committed the memory of your lover to your brain, tried to savor the memories of late mornings, hazy moments of life-or-death choices, feverish kisses after weeks of not seeing each other.
Tried to remember the face, you knew, that loved you. "Wait for me, my love, I'll see you later," you had told him, telling him to hold on to breakfast. To wait for you to come back.
But you knew what you had to do.
He was going to blow L'manburg to smithereens. And as much as you loved that man, you couldn't let so many people die. Couldn't stand by and let them get hurt.
Approaching the forest that sprung up a while back, you take a seat in the middle of suspiciously arranged boulders, praying with your mind and soul.
There has to be a way.
You called upon the only person who could help you.
"I didn't expect to see you so soon, but then again, I have just the smallest window before… a lot of souls will have to be escorted." You turned on your knees to crane your neck to look at the goddess leaning against one of the boulders.
"That's.. that's what I called you here for." You shifted on your knees, pulling yourself to stand and she's approaching slowly.
"Oh, y/n, I can't stop this. What is going to happen will happen, we both know this." She regards you with a face already resigned, with the combined efforts of your respective lovers and the help of a madman, she would be overwhelmed with helping people.
"And what if I offered myself? In exchange for their protection, the people of L'manburg." You put your hands together, wringing them as you stared her in the eyes.
"Taking you in exchange for thousands of souls? You must know that's a deal I can't make."
"Yes, but I am Techno's… the Blood God's devoted worshiper, his lover, the one person he cares for other than Phil." You make a bold guess, but with the way her foot stills in the air as she thinks it over.
"The only one to die is the one person who's close to Technoblade, the God of Blood… y/n, you do know what this means, don't you?"
"I might never see him again but… there will be families and children and so many people who are worth dying for."
"If you come with me in exchange for the souls and lives for the people in L'manburg, you would have to leave with me now, to interrupt the flow of paperwork and cast protection spells over those you bargained for, you won't get a goodbye with Technoblade. And you will be leaving to the Underworld, you're aware of all of this, and you're absolutely sure?"
Tears welled up and a sob choked it's way out of your throat but you rub your eyes in your fists, clearing your vision before letting out the last words you'll say in the land of the living.
"I am sure. I'm ready whenever you are."
After escorting you down to her office to wait while she grabs your file, she summons one of Philza's crows, knowing they are almost done with the preparations for Doomsday.
"Let him know where their body is, they should be able to hold a small funeral for them."
With a flash of feathers and wings, the crow was gone and she had paper to fill out and figure where you'll be held.
As they arrive back at their cabins, covered in ash and gunpowder, he half expected you to be waiting for him, sitting at the table with Ranboo while playing a game of poker.
But you weren't there. Weren't in your shared bedroom. Not in the bathroom. And not in the basements. (He even checked Tommy's raccoon hole. Still no.)
You weren't anywhere, even your bowl from this morning's soup is still in its place, colder than the weather outside of his home. He couldn't imagine you'd be gone this long, where would you have gone that's so important? But you had so to wait for him to wait for you, so obviously, it shouldn't have taken you this long.
Closing the door behind him, he goes up to Phil's door, about to knock on it when it opens with harsh movements as the blond man grabbed his arm and led him down the stairs.
Techno saw the forest. Saw the ominous amount of crows surrounding the roof of the forest, but over a particular part of it. "She said… but why would they…" Phil kept mumbling to himself and refused to elaborate with him.
They found the place with all of the crows. They surrounded a meadow with a ring of boulders lining said meadow, a particular amount of vines and flowers covering something, a bulge in the dirt that was clearly not natural.
Phil rushed over and kneels next to them leaving Techno by himself, outside of the ring.
Phil's head sinks as it examines the peculiar thing, hands limply hanging by his side. Sliding his arms beneath the lump, Phil lifted them into his hold, before turning to Technoblade and stealing both of their breaths.
"No.. it can't be-" Technoblade rushed over, several strides and he was in front of his dearest friend.
He chokes on something, reaching to cusp your lifeless face, a peaceful expression holding your features together before he pulls his hand away and takes you into his arms.
He turns around, fully planning on taking his rage out on whoever did this to his lover when Phil's hand rested on his shoulder in the split second he turned. "Kristin sent me a message, they… they left on their own, traded their soul in an exchange."
Phil kept talking.
For the people of L'manburg, you traded your soul. But that wasn't your choice, you hadn't relished the blood that spilt, in the aftermath with smoke filling his senses and all he could see was a crater.
But now all he could feel is the emptiness in his arms, in your stiff body. You were gone.
You had gone and died and you had died alone. The one thing you… the one thing you had told him that scared you. You died alone to pay for his sins.
His knees sink. He hears a scream distantly, not entirely aware of the moment. He couldn't tell if it was him or not.
But before he knows it, he's back on his feet, rushing back home. He has to set you down, lay you down before he leaves you for the last time.
He has work to do.
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starshipsofstarlord · 3 years
Text
Woof Woof
Pairing | Tyler Lockwood x reader
Summary | you were the last person alive that Tyler ever saw himself confiding in. But when the pair of you were the only sober ones at an outdoor party, he has no other choice. Though, he finds himself to be surprised to find out how serious you can really be in the moment.
Warnings | angst, mentions of death, tiny smidge of violence, swearing, implied smut
Requested ☑️
Quick link to my masterlist, if you’re interested in reading more of my crap 😬
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“Fetch.”
A football rolled at Tyler’s feet, him being unimpressed by the insulting sentiment. The brown and white seamed material became the affections of his prying glare, and if he were a witch, it was undoubtable that he’d have burned the item right on the spot, reducing it to nothing more than ashes encrusted in the encrusted and dead green leaves.
It was summer, which meant, before the new year at school began, there would be woodsy bonfires, and a bunch of teens drinking despite the legal age limit. Matt was tending to the kegs, of which he had bargained with the owner of the grill to sell to him, illegally of course. It seemed that deal had worked out fine, considering that many had drinks in their hands. But today, he didn’t need the mockery meddling with his mind,one day of peace was all he wanted, though seemingly, he was never permitted such a luxury.
With his intent full eyes, he found a you staring at him, a mischievous taint to your irises, you was messing with him; nothing dissimilar to the normal. It was the natural of order of things, and he had rather grown used to your ever so laughable shadow prowling behind him, making up all those stupid jokes, having the heart to return the comments in one way or the other.
The weight of returning to school was already upon his shoulders, adjoined with the priority to keep himself controlled and not kill anyone. That meant, he particularly was not in the mood for your mind games, even if they were not supposed to have that
That part, was what you inclined your humour towards, brashly and bluntly making copious amounts of jokes directed towards his animalistic nature, reminding him that he could never live the life of a normal boy again.
“Maybe I should throw it back far enough so that you’ll be searching for it all night.” The Lockwood sneered lightly towards you, softly kicking the ball away from himself, heading to turn away from where you were trudging over, not wanting to pull an expression that would set off your terrible puns.
“We could get out of here, away from all the noise. I get how much it must be hurting your head, with all the new canine tricks you’ve learnt.” Gulping, Tyler watched as you bent down to pick up the sporting item, twirling it in your hands, as you awaited an answer out of him.
The werewolf nodded, walking ahead of you, as he abandoned the scene that he had once thrived in, now feeling like he no longer belonged around normal people, who were oblivious to the truth, and free of his curse. Not to mention, the truth that you were nothing more than a human, that despite knowing the realism that ran on through the town, killing many people, whether they were passers by, or long term citizens.
And as per usual, they were regarded as animal attacks; and because he killed someone, he had to live in the paws of a wolf. “Good boy.” You snickered at his competence to lean obediently into your words, going to ruffle his brown locks, though his fast and vigilant hand caught yours before you could proceed with the action.
Your other hand released the kick ball, as you focused on how his grip tightened, pulling you closer as his angered expression moved closer to your face. There was no point in trying to pull away, he was far too strong, as all the other lurking supernatural creatures were, and you were not sure whether you should be relieved or not that he was not a vampire.
These woods had a history for disappearances, and deadly attacks, but this time, you felt safe moving away from the grand population of your school, because Tyler was with you. Tyler was strong, and protected the people he cared about, despite what others may think. He was gullible to the premises of relationships, he saw someone caring as him as nothing more sexual intent.
And that was a chore you carried, and another reason that you happened to tease him so. Not only was he an easy target with all these new changes making his bones crack, but he, deep down was a sweet and lost boy, that you were falling for, but you’d never admit that. Not even to Bonnie, who said she was able to see the future or some witchy psychic shit like that.
But perhaps, he was the one that you were supposed to be scared of. A wolf was deceiving, they prowled among the sheep, picking out the weaker ones of the flock, dragging their limbs away to satisfy the contents of their supper.
“You’re hurting me Lockwood, let go.” You winced, feeling how the bone shifted beneath the rough, human skin, and the inability that you had to heal made you fear the pain furthermore. As your eyes flickered up to his, you saw a wrenching gold splinter his irises, their black outlines painting lines around his waterline, making your body tremble. “Tyler, it’s me.”
Still, he seemed mute to what he was doing. You knew he wasn’t meaning to bring pain upon you, but that fact didn’t make it hurt any less. As you huffed your breath out in whimpers through your nose, your eyes filled with tears. And then you did something you’d deny ever dreaming of, you kissed him, suffocating your noises of displeasure upon his lips.
Soon, you felt his hold on your wrist loosen, dropping it suddenly, trying to pull away, scared that he would hurt you again. But with your unharmed arm, you reached up with your hand, tugging him back, as you extended the kiss for a few more seconds, finally disengaging, to your relief, seeing his usual brown hues.
“I hurt you.” He whimpered, feeling guilty. Moving your wrist around, you rotating it, grimacing at the feeling for a moment, but relaxing him a little as he heard no broken bones. “Y/n...”
“I’m fine, it’s just a little sore. Now shut up and kiss me Fido, or I’ll find some other guy that isn’t as pathetic as a castrated dog, and will-“ before you could finish your sentence, Tyler suffocated your mouth with his own, sinking his tongue through the parting of your lips, as he walked you backwards, pinning you up against the trunk of a tree, peeling your jacket from your arms, and discarding it upon the ground.
“You know I’m up against a tree right?” You snickered, earning an annoyed glare from the werewolf, who sighed, knowing that he had to ask the importance of such a thing.
“So?”
“Bark bark.” He shut you up with his mouth, unamused by your constant puns, instead wanting to fathom the dancing of your tongue rather than the words that actually fell from it.
Your hands raked down the back of his head, your nails pinching into his skin, as you mumbled his own name into his mouth, losing speech as he began to suck at your tongue. “Is this what wolves do, fuck in the woods?” Tyler rolled his eyes at you, raising his arms to slip his shirt off, the sight silencing you, as you ran your palms over his exposed chest.
“Shut the fuck up.” He growled, mushing his lips back onto your own, biting your lip, and pulling at it, leaving you certain that you’d have a bruise left upon it later on. Your hands began to tug at his belt, multitasking with the suffocation of his mouth, as you slightly opened your eyes so that you could find the buckle.
“I don’t think I’m going to do that, all things considered.” You smiled, dipping your hand into his pants, plucking at the material of your boxers, licking your lips, as you earned a reprised moan out of the dog boy.
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Text
you're the pink in my cheeks (i'm a little bit soft)
summary: "and i know we'll never grow old together / cause you'll never grow old to me / you're the pink in my cheeks / and i love that it means i'm a little bit soft / you're the pink in my cheeks / and i love that it means i'm a little bit soft"
- "monster," marceline (adventure time)
(OR: 5.4k of soft domestic lesbian!analogical, featuring lesbian!moceit, trans male!remus, trans female!roman, and Gay Shenanigans)
a/n: huge thank you to dandie for beta'ing this fic!
i just wanted to write wlw is that so wrong of me? no. no it is not.
CW: alcohol mentions, a few sex jokes, swearing, one implied instance of potential sexual activity (although it doesn't go any farther than making out; if you want to skip that part, skip the section that starts with "Did you get the right kind of popcorn?")
word count: ~5.4k
read it on ao3!!
“I think I may be going insane,” Logan says, squinting at her laptop screen. Virginia, hanging upside-down in the armchair, looks up from her phone and blinks.
“And why is that?”
“Because I am starting to agree with Rosie’s anti-Florida agenda.”
“I didn’t realize that there was an anti-Florida agenda.”
“Rosie has one, and I have always thought it facetious. However, if this laboratory does not start sending me my requested samples and information in a timely manner, I will be forced to concede that Rosie may have . . . a point.”
“You, agreeing with a lit major? I never thought I’d see the day,” Virginia teases. Logan initially resists the urge to stick her tongue out or flip Virginia off, because that would be childish, but then she remembers that Virginia does not care about her childishness, so she sticks her tongue out. Virginia snorts with laughter, and Logan feels warm, fizzy pop-rocks bursting in her chest.
Her phone buzzes next to her, and she picks it up. There’s a new message blinking for her attention on the screen.
[from: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
a, b, or c
[to: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
. . . What?
[from: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
*rolls eyes*
[from: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
i need you to make a selection, logan. a, b, or c.
[to: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
I am confused. What am I selecting between?
[from: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
wouldn’t you like to know, weather boy
[to: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
Yes. I would like to know. That is why I asked you.
[to: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
Also, I am not a meteorologist. Or a boy.
[from: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
it’s a meme, i’m sure v will be happy to show you the og. but first: make a choice
[to: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
Option B, I suppose?
[from: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
vodka it is!
[to: snesbian (snake lesbian)]
Wait, what?
Her phone buzzes again, another text thread lighting up, and Logan abandons the now-fruitless conversation with Jan to see that her wife has texted.
[from: soda poppy]
y is jan fillin a thermos with vodka and sayin u gave her the go ahead? >:(
[to: soda poppy]
I am unsure. She texted me asking me to make a choice between “a, b, and c” with no context given. When I eventually selected “b,” she excitedly mentioned vodka and logged off.
[from: soda poppy]
her an remy r going 2 a pta meeting tonight an i guess they’re goin drunk
[to: soda poppy]
Is that a . . . normal occurrence?
[from: soda poppy]
sadly yeah
[to: soda poppy]
Wait, is she even allowed to attend PTA meetings? You two don’t have any children?
[from: soda poppy]
she’s on the school board so she has the right 2 attend. idk if she’s supposed to or not but its never stopped her b4
“Everythin’ good over there?” Virginia asks.
“I believe I may have just enabled Jan to attend a PTA meeting drunk.” Virginia snorts, swiping at her phone.
“Good for her, honestly. The only reason she and Poppy live in that neighborhood is so that Jan can flaunt her wife in front of all the capital-s Straight people, because she’s a petty fuckin’ bitch.”
“That is a strange word choice for your best friend.”
“I hate Jan, she’s a bitch,” Virginia says, smirking fondly at her phone. Logan knows her girlfriend well enough to know that this statement is disingenuous, so she stands up, stretching her arms above her head, and leans down to drop a kiss onto Virginia’s forehead.
*~*~*~*~*
Logan blinks awake slowly, feeling for the position of her limbs. She’s on her left side, left arm tucked up under her pillow to cradle her head, wrapped in the thick comforter of their bed. Her right arm is slung across Virginia’s body, and her girlfriend is pressed up against her, head tucked right under Logan’s chin and face nestled into her neck and chest. Virginia breathes, slow and deep and even, and Logan hums, huffing out a soft exhale.
She carefully wiggles out of bed, tucking the comforter around Virginia’s curled-up form. Virginia grumbles when the cool morning air slips against her skin, because she is a foolish woman who insists upon sleeping in short shorts and a spaghetti-strap tank top no matter the current weather patterns. Logan wraps her up, making sure that she’s shifted into the middle of the warm divot of body heat, and Virginia settles in, asleep again in a heartbeat.
Logan turns to the corner chair, where her early-morning outfit is already laid out: athletic leggings, a sports bra, a moisture-wicking quarter zip jacket. She changes quietly, lights off, and tugs on a pair of ankle socks before slinking into the bathroom. Once the door is shut, she flicks on the soft lights over the vanity and carefully undoes her sleep braid. Normally, Virginia does Logan’s hair, because Logan is not good at dealing with her wavy, tangled, curly mess, but she won’t wake up her girlfriend for that. She can, at bare minimum, pull her hair up into a high ponytail for running purposes.
They live in a small town only a short walk (and even shorter bike ride) from the beach, full of little two-story brightly-colored beach cottages. Logan steps off her front porch, pulls out her phone, and quickly shoots a text.
[to: ginny <3]
I am headed to the beach for my weekly run. I will likely return before you wake up, but in case I do not: I will be back before 9 AM.
[to: ginny <3]
I love you <3
Logan kicks up the kickstand on her bike, runs her fingers over the glossy dark-blue paint flecked with white and silver and gold to mimic stars, and swings one leg over the bike seat. She carefully pedals out into the narrow road and heads for the beach. The cool early-morning air whips past her face, and she chances a glance up at the dark-blue-turning-light-blue-grey sky and smiles.
She’s always been an early-morning morning person, anyway.
*~*~*~*~*
Logan’s sneakers dig into the hard-packed wet sand along the water’s edge as she runs. Seagulls scatter in front of her, and the podcast Virginia recommended hums in her ear. The sun creeps up, up, up onto the horizon, coloring the blue-grey into streaks of brilliant pink and orange and gold, light reflecting off the water in resplendent diamond sparkles.
Logan runs half a mile down the beach, turns around, runs back to where she started and then runs half a mile in the other direction before turning around and running back to her starting point. By the time she’s bent over, hands on her knees, huffing out breath while her legs burn pleasantly, the sun has emerged fully from the ocean, and Logan is beginning to wish she had worn a visor.
She takes a moment to appreciate the sensory experiences of being on a nearly-abandoned beach: the scent of salt water, the sound of waves crashing against sand, the errant cries of gulls squabbling over fish. Their little beach is not nearly pristine enough for a tourist attraction, and too far north along the Atlantic coast to be warm year-round. Still, Logan loves it, and cannot imagine living anywhere else.
She hunts along the water’s edge as she walks, briefly, a cool-down before the bike ride home. She finds a few things worth photographing, a few crabs to shoo back into the ocean, and a few things worth gathering: an intact clam shell whose smooth curve runs unbroken from the heel of her palm to the tip of her index finger when she lays it flat in her hand, a light gray rock worn smooth by the waves that turns dark-gray-almost-black when wet, a small spiral shell that she thinks may have broken off of the top of a snail shell. Logan wraps all three things carefully in a small handkerchief from the little bag she keeps in her bike basket, pulling out her phone to note the time (8:37 AM) and the message notification flashing at her.
[from: ginny<3]
dunno why you insist on being a morning person. stop by the dunkin on your way back and get us breakfast?
[to: ginny<3]
You had Dunkin for breakfast three times this week. You should consume something healthy.
[from: ginny <3]
>:( >:( >:( >:(
[from: ginny <3]
counterpoint: you bringing me dunkin is better than me not eating breakfast at all. which is the alternative because i do not want to get up and prepare anything
[to: ginny <3]
Your womanly wiles will not work on me in regards to Dunkin breakfast.
[from: ginny <3]
bitch (affectionate)
[to: ginny <3]
Would you like me to make you breakfast on my return, beloved?
[from: ginny <3]
. . .
[from: ginny <3]
will you make me an omelette? with all the cheesy goo an shit?
[to: ginny <3]
I will make you an omelette with some degree of “cheese goo.”
Logan slides her phone into her pocket, huffing out a laugh at her girlfriend’s behavior, and hops onto her bike again.
*~*~*~*~*
“Your omelettes are always so much better than mine,” Virginia says, moaning as she sinks her teeth into an enormous bite of egg and cheese. Logan, calmly dicing bell peppers to mix into her own omelette, smiles.
“All food tastes better when it is prepared by someone who is not you.”
“You’ve clearly never had anything the twins have cooked.” Virginia takes another bite, pops a multivitamin into her mouth, and chases it down with a gulp of milk. “Besides, it tastes better because you made it.”
“I am not the most accomplished chef in the world, certainly, but I am glad you enjoy my cooking.”
Virginia laughs softly. “Lo, I like your food because it’s prepared by someone who loves me. I can taste the love in everything you make for me.”
Logan turns back to her peppers to hide her blush. “Love is not a measurable ingredient when cooking.” Virginia laughs again, louder this time; when Logan sets the knife down, she hears Virginia’s chair scrape out behind her as she stands, feels her arms wrap around her waist, feels the cool skin of her face press into her neck.
“Love you.”
*~*~*~*~*
“Stressful day at work?” Logan asks, hearing the door slam.
Virginia kicks off her flats, sending them flying into the wall with a clatter. Logan sets down her crochet project and moves toward the entrance of their house, where Virginia is shrugging off her rainjacket to reveal a mint-green Peter Pan-collared blouse and dark gray dress pants. “The stressiest.”
Logan takes the jacket and shakes it out on the tiled entranceway before hanging it on the hook. “I am sorry, beloved.”
“Lots of assessments, lots of parents who don’t understand why I’m assessing their kid, lots of parents insisting that there’s nothing wrong with their kid, or that there’s no way their kid could possibly have the deficits that I’m seeing. Like, I wouldn’t make this shit up, you know? Literally, let me help your child. You came to me, remember? I’m not in the habit of imposing myself onto people.”
“That sounds very stressful,” Logan says. She tries to picture a life where she spends all her time interacting with people she doesn’t know on a regular basis instead of her little corner of the university biochemistry lab where she only has to interact with three or four known people and her immediate supervisor, mostly by email. It sends icy fingers skittering down her spine.
“It is, I hate it. I mean, Kitty’s my supervisor until I get my C’s, so if I have problems I can consult with her, but like . . . why are people the way that they are.”
Logan stretches up and presses a gentle kiss to Virginia’s cheek. “I love you, Ginny.”
Virginia exhales and folds herself around Logan, draping her body over her girlfriend and going limp and boneless. “I don’t wanna be a real person for the rest of the night.”
“That can be arranged.”
“But it’s my night to make dinner.”
“I do not mind switching and having you make dinner tomorrow,” Logan says. “This is an acceptable deviation from the routine.” Virginia pushes her face into Logan’s neck, and Logan nuzzles the side of her head, and she sighs like the entire world has lifted off her chest.
*~*~*~*~*
(This is how it starts:
Logan, taking a class on British literature in her sophomore year because she needs to meet her core requirements. Logan, meeting Rosie, disagreeing with her on almost every single point she raises in class, hating when they’re paired up for their midterm project but earning the best grade in the class overall. Logan, seeing a text from Rosie about how her housemate needs people to participate in a research study for extra credit. Logan, making the long trek down to the health sciences building and seeing Virginia for the first time, thinking that she’s pretty and not knowing that she’ll be thinking that for the rest of her life.)
*~*~*~*~*
“Hello, gorgeous,” Virginia hums.
“Are you talking to me or to the mint plant?” Logan says, aggressively stabbing her pointer finger against the Delete key. It clacks loudly, and she mutters an insult under her breath. “I am going to set myself on fire. I swear to god, I am.”
“Obviously the mint plant,” Virginia says, turning and dropping a kiss on Logan’s head. “You okay, honey?” Logan grumbles more and shoves the laptop away from her with a disgruntled noise. Virginia moves the laptop away and leans over to kiss her forehead.
“I am trying to politely word an email whose essence boils down to, ‘If you do not send me my fucking samples in a timely manner, I am going to be forced to commit an Atrocity the likes of which this earth has never seen’,” Logan says.
Virginia laughs so hard that she sits down on the tiled kitchen floor, wiping tears from her eyes. “You are so funny,” she wheezes. Logan feels her irritation fade a little under the brightness of her girlfriend’s joy. “Let me see the email, I’m good at professional bullshitting.”
*~*~*~*~*
“Braid my hair!” Rosie says, throwing herself down onto the couch. Logan lifts her laptop up just in time to keep Rosie’s head from slamming into the keyboard.
“Ginny is your best bet for braids, Rosie. I have limited experience.”
“It doesn’t have to be fancy, It just has to be off my neck.”
Logan saves her document and sets her laptop on the coffee table, poking at Rosie’s ribs until she slides onto the floor and settles cross-legged between Logan’s thighs. “A comb and some hair-ties would be appreciated.”
“REMUS!” Rosie shouts.
“WHAT?”
“BRING ME A BRUSH AND SOME HAIR BANDS!”
“GET YOUR OWN!”
“I’m going to kill that man,” Rosie mutters, rolling to her feet. There are suspicious muffled thumping noises from the other room for a few minutes before Rosie emerges, victorious, hair somehow even messier than it was in the first place.
“You are the single loudest person I have ever met,” Logan sighs, taking the comb and the hair ties and beginning to drag it through Rosie’s curls. Rosie winces, just a little, at the pull of the comb, and Logan tries to be more gentle.
“Thank you!”
“I did not say that was a compliment.
“Hey!”
*~*~*~*~*
Logan tugs her sweatshirt sleeves down from where she’d rolled them up previously, shivering a little. Part of her wishes that she had worn leggings instead of capris as she drags the folding chair a little closer to the bonfire, toes dragging through the still-sun-warmed sand. The speaker set up on the food table blasts some sort of current pop music, and Rosie and Poppy dance around each other, chanting the lyrics at each other. They are both very loud and very off-key and, Logan suspects, fairly drunk as well. Remus is in the ocean (definitely buzzed, potentially naked) and Jan is standing at the edge of the ocean, watching to make sure he stays alive.
“Hey,” someone says, low and rumbling in her ear. Logan does not flinch (just barely) and turns to see Virginia, holding a plastic cup with a poorly-drawn sketch of the state of Virginia on it. Her hair is starting to come loose from its messy bun, and her sweater sleeves keep sliding down over her wrists and nearly dunking into her drink, and her breath smells sweet and alcoholic. When she lifts her hand to Logan’s cheek, her fingers are cool, and Logan shivers.
“How’s my girl?” Virginia asks.
“Cold,” Logan answers honestly. Virginia laughs, tipping her head back and exposing the long strip of her neck. Logan wants to lick it.
“You’re adorable,” Virginia says, leaning in and pressing her mouth against Logan’s ear. Her breath is warm and slightly damp. “So pretty, my Logan, and so smart. I bet you know exactly what chemical compounds are making the flames turn that color, hmmm?”
Logan can feel her face burning hotter than the bonfire, but Virginia just sits languidly in her lap, feet propped up on the armrest. Her toes are painted pale purple, and the glitter sparkles in the firelight.
“How many drinks have you had?” Logan asks.
“Enough to feel all tingly,” Virginia says, swirling whatever’s in her cup. “How many have you had?”
“None,” Logan answers honestly. Virginia leans her head against Logan’s shoulder, and her wispy frizz tickled Logan’s nose. She sneezes, and Virginia giggles in the high-pitched, superficial way she only giggles when she gets really, really drunk.
“You sound so cute when you sneeze.”
“I do not.”
“Of course you do,” and now Virginia is looking at her, eyes glowing warm in the firelight. “You sound cute when you do anything. You’re cute when you exist. You’re cute no matter what. I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone.”
Logan hates the taste of alcohol, but she leans in and kisses Virginia anyway.
*~*~*~*~*
“Lo.”
“Hmmm?”
“Pick a color.”
“What?”
“I’m painting my toes again. Pick a color for me.”
Logan flops over onto her stomach, staring at the neat row of creme polishes sitting on their ottoman. Virginia’s bare feet are propped up in front of them, spread apart awkwardly with neon lemon gel toe spreaders, and she studies the nail polish like she’s trying to determine which vial isn’t poisoned.
“I like that one,” she says finally, pointing to a pale pink polish the color of the flowers Virginia brought her on their first date. Virginia hums, picking the bottle up and tilting it critically in the light.
“Not the one I would have picked, but I said you could pick, so I guess we’re doing it.”
Virginia tosses some bottles of toppers (or “tacos” as she calls them, slang from one of the YouTubers she likes) onto the bed while she paints her toes, and Logan sifts through them to settle on a blue-yellow iridescent one.
“I do not know how you can get behind wearing something called a Unicorn Skin,” Logan says. Virginia just shrugs and plucks the bottle from her hand. Their fingers overlap - Logan’s warm from where they’ve been tucked under her body, Virginia’s cool from where they’ve been gripping the glass bottle. Impulsively, Logan lifts Virginia’s fingers and kisses the tips.
“You’re going to smear the polish,” Virginia mutters, even though she painted her fingers earlier today and they’ve been dry for a while. She doesn’t bother to yank her fingers away, either, so Logan kisses them again.
*~*~*~*~*
“Logan!”
Logan is fully aware that the only thing keeping Poppy from crashing into her like a floral-sundress-covered cannonball is the casserole dish in her hands. She counts her blessings and steps aside to let Poppy in.
“Where’s Jan?”
“Getting something from the car! It’s my turn to drive us home, so she brought something to drink.”
Jan primly kicks the passenger side door shut with her heeled ankle boots, a bottle of wine grasped by the neck in each hand.
“I hope you do not intend to drink both of those in their entirety tonight,” Logan says. Jan rolls her eyes and offers one of the bottles to her.
“This one is a gift for you and Ginia. The other one is for me.”
“None for Poppy?”
“Poppy is the designated driver, so she will not be drinking. And I know she already told you that.” Logan rolls her eyes, and Jan flips her off. “Are you going to invite me in or not?”
“What are you, a vampire?” Virginia shouts from the kitchen.
“Only one of us dresses like the undead, darling, and it isn’t me,” Jan calls back, stepping into the house. “Are the twins here yet?”
“They cannot attend. Remus has orchestra practice and Rosie is teaching a dance class. You already knew both of these facts, because you are in the group text.”
“I am not.”
“You responded to a message in the group thread fifteen minutes ago.”
“That was the NSA agent assigned to monitor me.”
“You are a liar.”
“What else is new?”
*~*~*~*~*
groupchat name: be gay do crime
soda poppy: hey every1! DONUT 4get to make ur bakesale goodies and drop them off at r house by 7 am on fri!
lo tide: Please use normal words. I am begging you.
snesbian (snake lesbian): then beg.
lo tide: I do not recall asking for your opinion.
snesbian (snake lesbian): and yet i give it to you anyway. am i not generous
virgin: if you don’t stop making fun of my gf i swear to god
virgin: also remus if you don’t stop changing my name i’m gonna end you
virgin has changed their name to gin(ny) and tonic!
gin(ny) and tonic: much better anyway
violets are blue rosie is me: i believe you meant anygay
gin(ny) and tonic: i said what i fucking said
ace attorney irl: you changed your name :(
gin(ny) and tonic: every day the Lord regrets giving all of us mod powers in this chat
snesbian (snake lesbian): i have no such regrets
lo tide: Can we circle back to the bake sale, please?
soda poppy: Whatchu wanna kno???
lo tide: I assume it is school related?
soda poppy: yep!
soda poppy: fundraising 4 this year’s art club field trip! since im the faculty advisor im in charge of approving and setting up 4 the fundraisers
lo tide: I see. And why, exactly, is it our responsibility to make things for this fundraiser? Should it not be the students’ responsibility?
soda poppy: they r makin stuff 4 it but also i gotta make sure some of the stuff will b edible yknow
lo tide: I see.
gin(ny) and tonic: listen i know that jan is like. a professional pastry chef an shit. but i’m not making anything fancy like a cheesecake or smthn
gin(ny) and tonic: i’m making like. fuckin brownies
snesbian (snake lesbian): smh don’t you care about the Children at all?
gin(ny) and tonic: no. they’re not my kids
ace attorney irl: i will make cookies
soda poppy: u cannot make them inappropriate shapes
ace attorney irl: :(
violets are blue rosie is me: do not worry, i will make sure they are an appropriate shape
violets are blue rosie is me: i’ll make cupcakes!
lo tide: I believe I have a recipe for lemon squares that I can make. Will lemon squares be sufficient?
soda poppy: yeah! just keep ur stuff free of common allergens like tree nuts
gin(ny) and tonic: so my plan to just yeet you a bag of reese’s peanut butter cups and call it a contribution is out then
*~*~*~*~*
Virginia throws a box of brownie mix into the cart and dusts her hands off. “There. Done.”
Logan raises an eyebrow.
“Don’t give me that look, we have the rest of the ingredients at home. We have tap water, we have oil, we have eggs, we don’t need anything else. What do we need for your lemon thingies?”
“Lemons, presumably.”
“You’re a comedian,” Logan deadpans. Virginia flips her off, and then leans in to kiss her cheek. “I do need lemons, though. Lemons, more eggs . . . I have a list in my phone.”
“What phone?” Virginia says, dangling Logan’s galaxy-patterned case above her head. “I think you’re too short for this, Lo.”
“Give me my phone,” Logan says, rolling her eyes. Virginia wiggles it above her head, laughing.
“Maybe you should give me something in return.”
“Like what?”
Virginia grins. “Like a kiss, perhaps?”
Logan rolls her eyes again, but she leans in and kisses Virginia gently, swiping her phone back when Virginia lowers her hand to cup her face. “Thank you for paying the toll, sweetheart.”
“You are ridiculous,” Logan says. It doesn’t stop her from gently kissing Virginia’s cheek before pushing the cart down the aisle again.
*~*~*~*~*
groupchat name: be gay do crime
lo tide: What time did you want us to drop off the baked goods, Poppy?
soda poppy: if ur gonna b in the area, u can just drop them off at my house!
ace attorney irl: i made some of the shapes inappropriate but those ones r 4 u and jan
soda poppy: what did u make 4 the bake sale?
ace attorney irl: . . .
soda poppy: what did u make 4 the children, remus.
ace attorney irl: nothin’ too crazy! jan had some normal summer shapes - suns, flip flops, etc. etc. used those
soda poppy: :D thx remus!
ace attorney irl: made some fishies too! but the octopi are just for u an jan.
ace attorney irl: i . . . may have painted dicks on them
soda poppy: well at least u warned me right
*~*~*~*~*
“Did you get the right kind of popcorn?” Logan asks.
“If by ‘the right kind’ you mean ‘your favorite kind,’ then yes, I did,” Virginia says, coming into the living room with a large yellow bowl full of fluffy popcorn. “What are we watching tonight? It’s your turn to pick, isn’t it?”
“Gay fish,” Logan says.
Virginia sets the popcorn on the coffee table and blinks at her. “That is . . . quite the description of Finding Nemo, sweetheart.”
“Not Finding Nemo, Ginny. Luca. It’s new, and it’s not explicitly gay, but there is a very obvious queer reading. I thought we could watch it together.”
“Anything with you sounds wonderful.”
“Sap,” Logan mutters. She leans in to kiss Virginia’s cheek, but Virginia turns at the last moment and presses their lips together.
“Are you sure you want to watch a movie?” she says. “We could just make out instead, if you want.” She pushes gently on Logan’s stomach, guiding her to lay on her back on the couch. Virginia lays on top of her, gently sliding a hand to rest warm and heavy on her stomach. She leans forward, pressing a gentle kiss to Logan’s neck, and then her jaw, and then rubbing their noses together.
“Tonight is movie night,” Logan says. Virginia presses their mouths together, and Logan hums, gently pressing up into the kiss. “We should be watching a movie.”
“Are you sure?” Virginia says. “I think we should pursue this avenue a little further.”
Logan squirms a little. “I - I would not - um - no, thank you.”
Virginia’s eyes, which were hazing over with something, clear as she blinks. “Okay, sweetheart.” She leans back, sits up, pulls Logan into a sitting position. “Are you alright?”
“I’m okay,” she says. “I just - I am not in the mood for that tonight. If that is okay.”
“Of course it’s okay,” Virginia says. She holds out a hand, and Logan takes it. Virginia kisses the back of it before settling herself on the couch. “I am so proud of you for expressing a boundary and telling me you were uncomfortable. I know that expressing boundaries is something that we’re both working on, and you did a wonderful job. Tell me what you want, Lo. Please?”
“I would like a kiss,” Logan says. “Just one. And then I would like to cuddle, and - and I would like us to watch Luca together. Is that acceptable?”
Virgil nods. “Of course, love. Come here, hmmm?” Logan settles next to her, and Virginia gently cups her cheek and presses their mouths together. “I love you, Logan. So much. Of course we can watch Luca now.”
Virginia lays an arm along the top of the couch, allowing Logan to cuddle up against her and rest her head on her chest. “I love you,” Logan says softly.
“I love you too, sweetpea.”
*~*~*~*~*
Logan rolls over, yawning, and feels a small weight displace itself from her thighs. She blinks awake slowly, lifting her head and pushing her curtain of curls aside to reveal a black cat mewing at her grumpily before settling into a sushi roll beside her.
“Did I wake you? I am sorry, Galileo . . .”
Galileo settles against her, purring softly, while the ash-grey cat at the foot of the bed pads slowly up to curl on Virginia’s back. “That’s your favorite spot, isn’t it, Andromeda?” The cat emits a soft “mrrrp” before settling back down to sleep. Logan yawns, smiles, and gently strokes her hears. “What should we do, girls? Shall we stay awake and be productive members of society?”
Neither cat responds, and Logan looks at Virginia. She’s haloed in the morning light, eyes tightly shut, mouth hanging open, drool leaking into a puddle on the pillow. She snores a little - one, two, three snorts before settling back into a deep sleep.
“No,” Logan decides, “we shall not.” She lays back down, gently nudging Galileo a few inches over so that she can snuggle up to Virginia. Galileo stretches out, pressing a paw directly into Logan’s cheek. Logan shoves her, and she resettles onto Logan’s feet with an indignant noise.
“You can sleep by my face when you do not kick my face,” Logan mutters, curling into her love.
*~*~*~*~*
groupchat name: be gay do crime
soda poppy: r u all comin 2 the bake sale 2morrow?!
lo tide: I was under the impression that we were only providing the baked goods. Is it not for the students at the school?
soda poppy: we got waaaayyyy more stuff than we thought so we r havin a 2nd bakesale 2morrow 4 parents an stuff!
soda poppy: we r gonna need sum help with setup though . . .
lo tide: Poppy, please do not even -
soda poppy: 🥺🥺🥺 p l e a s e
lo tide: Poppy.
snesbian (snake lesbian): logan
lo tide: If I agree to stop and pick up coffee for everyone, will that motivate you all to turn out?
violets are blue rosie is me: i’m always a slut for free coffee
lo tide: I’m sorry, where did I say that this would be free?
violets are blue rosie is me: D:<
ace attorney irl: eh i’m down for it. where you swingin’ by?
soda poppy: there’s a panera p close 2 where the bake sale is!!! it’s gonna b at the morning girl’s basketball game
lo tide: Does anyone have any issues with Panera coffee?
violets are blue rosie is me: nah. large iced coffee, add three ounces of half and half, two pumps of sugar syrup, two pumps of vanilla, and caramel drizzle.
ace attorney irl: complicated bitch much?
violets are blue rosie is me: why must the cain instinct betray me like this
ace attorney irl: the cain instinct started when we stole each other’s genders in the womb
violets are blue rosie is me: this is true this is true but you’re still a bitch
ace attorney irl: large hazelnut coffee, two sugars, please
snesbian (snake lesbian): large dark roast, black
soda poppy: medium decaf coffee, two ounces of almond milk, and two pumps of sugar syrup!
gin(ny) and tonic: large caramel latte
lo tide: You . . . are going to ride in the car with me to pick up the coffee, we can order our own coffees. I do not need your order, love.
lo tide: But I appreciate the information <3 <3
*~*~*~*~*
“We come bearing gifts,” Virginia announces loudly. “And by gifts, I mean we bought a baker’s dozen of cinnamon crunch bagels for everybody.”
“Well, there are twelve cinnamon crunch bagels and one plain bagel, bagged separately, for me,” Logan corrects, expertly balancing two coffee trays with a bagel container. “Also, we made more brownies.”
Poppy looks up from where she’s instructing two high-schoolers on how to hang a sign properly and grins, waving brightly. Jan is leaning on the table, hand on her head, sipping at a water bottle.
“Vodka or whiskey?” Logan asks dryly, handing over Jan’s black coffee. Jan blinks at her, flips her off, and drains a long swig from her cup.
“Water. Partied a little too hard with Remy last night, and now I’m hungover as shit.”
“We suspected as much, which is why we brought you an extra coffee.”
“Lifesaver,” Jan says, knocking back another long drag of coffee before taking a sip of her water bottle. (Logan suspects the bottle is actually Poppy’s, due to the sun-shiney stickers plastered all over it.) “You and Poppy both. But if you tell anyone that, I’ll gut you like a fish."
“No, you won’t,” Logan says, turning to hand Rosie and Remus their respective drinks. “You never do.”
Jan flips her off, but Virginia comes up behind her and leans her forehead against her shoulder. Logan turns, kissing her forehead, and smiles.
Life is good today, she thinks. Life is good.
(screen names!
virgin -> gin(ny) and tonic; ginny <3 = virginia (virgil)
lo tide = logan
snesbian (snake lesbian) = jan (janus)
soda poppy = poppy (patton)
ace attorney irl = remus
violets are blue rosie is me = rosie (roman) (thanks to @rosesisupposes for letting me borrow your screen name for this!)
117 notes · View notes
Note
Kali took Blake's hentai out of her room and is now openly watching it in the living room, with Blake and other people still in the house.
The point where Kali should feel ashamed of what she’d done? Come and past - probably right around the time that the animated wolf faunus with the light gray hair, gray wolf ears and large, equally light gray eyes tried to speak around the length of cock pistoning in her mouth with little regard to the fact that this was the woman’s mouth and not, in fact, the pussy, that the human male was pounding relentlessly with spit flying everywhere.
“Iff shfo glurff muffar!” Indeed.
But truly, who could blame her? After years of dealing with her daughters absence, suddenly having Blake willing to live with them was a new experience and one she probably wasn’t dealing the best with. After all, most mothers wouldn’t dream of snooping the way she did. But for all that Blake Belladonna, one of the eight 24 year old “Heroes of Remnant”, inspired awe and hope in the people of Remnant and even more in the faunus community, well...Kali remembered the little girl who’d once seen a package of fruit snacks with red gummy fish, promptly ripped it open and devoured the bag before rolling on the floor, spitting chunks of the fruity treat while disgustedly proclaiming “cherry flavored!” over and over again.
Charismatic, impassioned leader of the Faunus Civil Rights Coalition or not, there was a distance between mother and daughter created by the latter’s 12 year absence in her mothers life.
They tried of course, but Blake was used to her freedom and Kali was a creature of habit, perpetually uncaring of what many called “the line” but still desperately trying to reconnect with her daughter.
So the fact that Kali scoped out the usual spots for teenage contraband when she cleaned her daughters room really shouldn’t come as a surprise. Ghira certainly hadn’t been when Kali had, giggly as she approached, revealed the contents of a lock box Blake hid under piles of increasingly tiny and intricate undergarments. Granted it was just old photos of them together, a cheap plastic ring with a cartoonish lion heard stretching down to the knuckle and pieces of fabric that smelled of the two of them rather than anything else, but it was the thought that mattered.
She of course neglected to mention to Ghira where she had found it, amidst of a sea of panties, thongs and even a g-string or two. Where she was curious, Ghira would have been ill.
So she’d kept snooping, impressed not just at the collection of underthings her daughter owned (and very amused that her own predilection for the sexier, the better had been passed onto Blake), but at the false bottom that had been discovered and...well, novelty might be the right word for things like the crotchless panties she found there.
Then she’d found other things. A collection of muscle magazines hidden carefully behind a dresser that had seen use judging by the crinkled paper, but not recently given the finger shaped spots on the otherwise dusty covers. Lube carefully stacked behind her books.
A chest full of devices, from dildos to wands to toys and more than a few strap ons. And while Kali was surprised at the amount, she was less so when she remembered that her daughter was in a relationship with a rather...well, the polite term would be ‘generously well endowed’ blonde who was openly vulgar about what the two of them got up to behind doors; when it was just Yang (said blonde) and Blake, in what they thought was the privacy of an empty room.
The collection of nearly three dozen cases advertising Mistralian hentai hidden in a crawl space however had thrown Kali for a loop. And, well, you know what they say about curiosity and cats.
And so Kali stared wide eyed at the covers depicting cutesy anime girls, most of them faunus, in various poses and stages of undress. There was Faunus Fuck Frenzy, vol. 32 - where apparently three faunus best friends were captured in a jungle and fucked into full blown ahegao faces by tribal looking, human natives if the cover was anything to go by.
Watashi no kōkō no tōnamentoāku - a dog faunus with short brown hair, floppy bloodhound ears and breasts the size of beach balls in nothing but a pair of spandex shorts and biceps, abs that were intimidating in their intensity...but was covered forehead to navel in semen, the bodies of unconscious teenage boys and their cocks of varying size left defeated on the ground in the cover’s background.
Others, too. One where the blue haired bluebird faunus was a loli and surrounded by leering men. Another where a golden haired, golden eyed snake faunus had her faunus feature, her exceptionally long forked tongue, wrapped around a penis that was closer to the size of arm and was bulging with veins with her curvaceous body on all fours. A bushy tailed squirrel faunus bound, gagged in a contortionist’s nightmare with the shadow of a grinning man behind her.
By the time Kali saw it - it being what she was watching now, a lonely single faunus mother checking out a sex club while her children were being babysat - it was too late. Blake had arrived with her girlfriend Yang, Kali’s personal assistant, the ex-terrorist Ilia, Yang’s sister Ruby and her not-a-boyfriend Oscar Pine and the blonde, suit clad boyfriend of the Schnee heiress, Jaune Arc.
So Kali had used the kind of speed that made her a popular choice for stealth missions back when she was in the White Fang and put every single case back in the crawlspace and had all but teleported into the living room, smiling and nodding as Blake mentioned that the group was going to go discuss something-something-faunus-something-something-SDC-something-something-if-you’d-make-us-some-dinner-that-would-be-lovely-thank-you-love-you-bye.
Kali’s breathing had returned to normal even if her heart still pounded and she’d pulled Amongst Sheep from behind her back and stared at the lonely MILF, stunned at her daughter’s kinkiness. There’d been exactly 41 films in the crawlspace and aside from the muscular bloodhound faunus who’d apparently fucked her way through at least 11 different teenage boys to claim some sort of victory, each and every cover seemed to depict faunus getting dicked down by human males. Or the occasional female, sometimes simply female and other times with a dick dangling between their thighs. The faunus in question seemed to love it and almost seemed subservient to the ones doing the fucking.
While Kali was amused at her daughters apparent kink especially in light of her place as a faunus rights spokeswoman of great fame, there was a much larger problem. Staring at them all had made her unquestionably horny to the point of wetness. But Blake, her girlfriend and her friends were home. Ghira was in the kitchen just two rooms away, making a large meal for their guests happily after she asked him to do so. There were workers in the back of the house, rebuilding their back wall after Ghira had hip tossed an assassin of the rapidly dwindling White Fang remnants through it last week.
A reasonable, sane woman would have hid it and enjoyed it in the privacy of her own room later that night. Maybe give Ghira a ride while she watched it after convincing him she rented it over the scrollnet for added fun. But the idea of watching it in her living room, a living room that was open to all of the house with no doors, her husband far enough away to know she was watching something but not what and her daughter, her friends only a single floor up? With her room right above the living room?
The disc was in, Kali’s legs were spread after removing her hakama and her modest breasts were exposed to the warm air, her fingers immediately tracing her slick folds.
The plot had gone from 0 to 60 in what seemed like record time (but was probably only 20 minutes or so), the mother surrounded by horny human men while her fellow faunus were in various poses of submission. The mother partaking in the orgy and rapidly spiraling from a stereotypically sweet woman with the kind of body only art could give, to a sex crazed lunatic thanking her “master” for fucking her mouth even as her makeup ran, her dump truck of a rear was being molested by a faceless human behind her and her gargantuan tits bounced from the force of the careless facefucking all while she squealed, even as the humans made crude and rather disparaging remarks about faunus women.
Ghira: [From the kitchen] Enjoying yourself, dear?
Kali’s breath hitched as her fingers pushed in deep and she grinned, curling them as a jolt ran up her spine as the wolf faunus - Lupa, she remembered - squealed once more, her cheeks puffing out like a chipmunks at the deluge of jizz firing impossibly from the human.
Kali: Oh of course, darling! There’s a program about human-faunus interactions that’s just fascinating!
She heard no response but could practically hear her husbands indulgent chuckle. As Lupa now hoarsely begged for the man who’d been fucking her mouth to “shut his stupid dog right back up!” the floor creaked and someone moved around a bit. Kali bit her lip, eyes catching the closed window and the worker carrying tools by. Her left hand had since been massaging her right tit for some time now and she tweaked the brownish nipple on her olive skinned titty, moaning harshly as Lupa suddenly screeched! The man who’d been squeezing her cheeks had pushed her face down into a puddle of spit and spunk and forced himself in an ass that not even she could compete with! She watched as the warbling moans of the anime MILF grew in intensity.
Kali: [Sputtering] And now we’re even getting to see a faunus tribe and how they survived in the Grimmlands!
Ghira: [From the kitchen] That’s nice dear.
Kali: So nice! Really Ghira, you would not believe some of their customs!
Or her own, at this point throwing any concern of being caught out of her mind. The floor had creaked as if someone had tossed themselves on Blake’s bed, likely Blake herself after hashing out a particularly tough point. The thought of Ghira finding her was exciting, of her husband’s disbelief that she’d be so bold. One of the workers? Well, Ghira would likely punish her for giving them such a show but the idea of teasing them so cruelly, knowing that they would remember this for quite some time but never be able to do more than furiously jack their cocks off to the memory of it and just how hard Ghira would give it to her, pushing her face in a pillow as he flattened her exceptional cheeks with his angry downstrokes. Blake and her friends? As a third finger entered her lightly squelching pussy - as Lupa followed an order and lapped up at the puddle as her nearly yoga ball sized cheeks rippled in constant motion - and her palm started slapping against her clit, she squealed at the sudden increase in pleasure.
Blake would be beyond humiliated. At her shameless mother, at her own filthy little secret being discovered by anyone other than perhaps Yang. Not to mention that both Oscar and Jaune would commit this site to their memory banks, perhaps even as their flush faced friends lambasted them for their obvious erections!
The floor creaked more, as if they were moving and Kali twisted her nipple, watching as the MILF on screen started wailing from the anal assault, the man having both hands in her grey hair and pulling her head back. As the animation gave way to the light grey eyes rolling towards her nose as her tongue flopped out, Lupa’s face got steadily redder. In return Kali gasped at the mixture of pleasure and pain coming from her right tit, using her left hand to awkwardly do the same to her left and moaning as a shadow passed the window behind their television.
Ghira: [From the kitchen] Dear? Is something wrong?
Kali couldn’t help it. The thought of being caught was too good, the knowledge that this was what her daughter liked - something so disrespectful, base and diametrically opposed to her own beliefs - and the way she was handling her own body made her let out a louder groan.
Lupa: [Television] “...myself that day, lost the woman who put her children first... to big. Fat. Yummy. Human. COCK!!!! AIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!”
Kali: Oh no, Ghira! Just a quote from another bigot!
Kali’s fingers were now a blur, an eye on the window where no worker stood and an ear on her husbands response, the sound of a load of cum being pumped into an animated faunus whose face showed no signs of intellgence as a faceless human filled her anus with his release, squeezing each asscheek so aggressively he was clearly holding booty fat between his hands.
Ghira: [From the kitchen] You know how it is, freedom of speech. Is it at least handled...
She knew what he meant. Is the documentary at least attacking the negative opinion, showing how wrong it is?
Lupa: [Television] “--aaauuuuuwwwwsho good~” [giggling drunkenly]
She was close. Her heels clunked lightly against the table in front of her couch as she adjusted her legs, opening them wider as she now alternated between full thrusts and thumbing the clit, beneath her thick patch of black pubic hair. The scene changed several times, to Lupa’s ankles and wrists bound as a man pumped her full of cum. Another where a group of university aged humans were busily raining down an amount of cum only possible in hentai as Lupa serviced two cocks, one with her mouth and the other with her hand. A married couple sandwiching Lupa between them with Lupa’s cheeks being squished by the human taking her in doggy, excess ass fat bunching up as Lupa screamed into the man’s wife, her hairy human cunt. Another where Lupa sat on the counter of a sandwhich shop as an older, balding man stood between her legs as her eyes fluttered and the slick sound of her sex, of unexpected squirting. One final scene showing Lupa lying upon her shoulders, legs spread in a perfect split as a muscled man fucked down into her as she screamed “Master!” over and over.
To a final scene where a school bus pulled away and Lupa, in a white turtleneck and nothing more, leaned around a corner and had a warm, motherly smile on her face.
Kali: [Strained] Absolutely, Ghira!
Her palm made heavy clopping noises as she fingerblasted herself to that warm motherly smile staying in place...but only because it had frozen there, drool leaking from the corners of Lupa’s mouth as her eyes were all but rolled back in her skull as a random human steadily slammed into her from behind, the only sounds being the wolf’s cheeks clapping and the wet plap! of semen pouring from her currently-being-fucked pussy.
Human: [Television] Take it all, Ms. Lupa!
And then the abnornal sound of jizz being pumped into the drooling faunus and her dripping pussy, Lupa’s eyes gone pure white as they rolled back into her skull and an overlay of the action inside her happening; a sea of thick white swirling inside her and then a flash of light from an egg indicating pregnancy.
Between the two workers clearly arguing over tools outside their window but clearly not seeing her, being in conversation with Ghira and the threat of being found out, Kali felt it build.
Several things happened at once. Lupa showed up on the screen staring down at a human baby with brown hair and her eyes, before turning away smiling softly. She entered a room where an unfamiliar human sat on her bed, a member that nearly reached his own chest pointing towards the ceiling. Lupa dropped to all fours and fastened a chain to a black leather collar she was wearing, muttering “master” over and over again as she crawled forth.
Kali scraped three fingers against her g-spot and ground her palm against her clit and exploded in release.
Kali: No doubt, it’s marvelously done!
Her pitch considerably higher as she lost her fingers to the repeatedly clenching hole, knees shaking as her orgasm crashed through her like waves upon the beach.
Blake: [Shocked] Mo-ther! [Strangled] No Yang, don’t look!
Ruby: [Stammering] Y-y-y-you either, O-oscar!
Ilia: Why must the world be so cruel!?
Jaune: Mad that another hot cat faunus is taken?
Blake: [Squeals] Jaune!
Ilia: Yes!
Blake: [Squeaks] Ilia!
Yang: I mean, can you blame ‘em? I can see where you got it from, babe.
Blake: [Squeaks, chokes, growls] Stopitstopitstopit!
Jaune: [To Ilia] Same.
Blake: Butwhatno--NO! You have Weiss!
Jaune: Appreciating the view is not cheating.
Ruby: Yes it is!
Jaune: I am happy in my relationship with my fiancée. I will never cheat on my fiancée but I have no control over Blake’s mom fingerbanging herself to...whoa.
Yang: [To Blake] Heh, told you it was a bad idea to keep those here! Ooh, is that Amongst Sheep!? [Respectfully] She’s got good taste.
Oscar: Blake watches hentai?
Ruby: A-ack! Y-y-you saw!? Dammit Oscar!
Ilia: [Fumbling]
Blake: Wha-no-it’snot--
Kali breathed heavily, removing her digits from her pussy and feeling much better and with a glance at her sticky fingers, cleaned them with a quick schlup! of a noise.
Blake: AAAHH! Mother, no!
Kali: [Exhausted] Sorry sweetheart. But that collection of yours, oh my.
Jaune: [To Ruby] Okay, now I’m feeling a little guilty.
Ruby: You should!
Ilia: [Stops fumbling] Collection? She has more?
Blake: Moth--
Kali: Over forty.
Ilia: And they’re all... [gestures]
Kali: Except for one with a female dog faunus.
Yang: That’s mine. [Blake screeches in horror] Blake wanted me to ‘expand my horizons’ or something. I think Blakey just wanted me to be a perv too.
Oscar: Wait. Dog faunus? Watashi no kōkō no tōnamentoāku with Tawni Bumpus as Rei-chan’s seiyuu?
Yang: Heh. Yeah, you’ve seen it?
Ruby: Wha--
Oscar: Have you seen Tawni Bumpus?
Jaune: And now I’m uncomfortable.
Yang: Chow-Chow faunus, right?
Oscar: Yup. She’s -- a-ah... [trails off in embarassment and fear for his life at Ruby’s glare]
Yang: [Snorts] Has an ass that makes the Bellabooty look like Weiss in comparison?
Jaune: [Eyes narrow] I’m letting her know you said that, top heavy.
Yang: [Flinches, irritated] I’m sending you a picture of her. She’s got cake for days, Arc.
Oscar: Well, a-ah, the point is Tawni is very p-pretty [panics] b-b-but not as pretty as Ruby and she really does have a captivating voice.
Jaune: [Staring squintily at Yang, speaks at Oscar] Riii~iight.
Blake: Alright, stop! No more talking about my porn!
Ruby: Ah, so the degenerate admits it!
Ilia: Huh. I mean I can see Yang, maybe. But Blake?
Yang: One, rude. Two, it’s a power dynamic thing. She doesn’t really want to be treated like an animal and collared by humans all the time, but sometimes she’s in the mood and I’ll put on the strap and the things that’llmmmphh!!!
Blake: [Hands on Yang’s mouth, panting, red faced] No. More.
Kali: [Covering her chest back up, crosses legs] Dear, it’s perfectly understandable. You’re a powerful young woman with not just skill unmatched in the sword but your Shadow Clones were key in your final battle with Salem! It’s perfectly understandable wanting to surrender yourself to a strong girl like Yang! You trust her and really, Lupa’s descent into a plaything was as masterfully done as it was--
Blake then ran away screaming, hands over her face and seconds later a door slammed. Yang winces.
Kali: Perhaps that was a bit too much for her.
Ruby: [Eyes narrowed] She just discovered her mom’s a superfreak.
Kali opened her mouth, saw that despite the time passed that both Oscar and Jaune were not looking directly at her and were both at full mast. Ilia was quietly cursing at her scroll phone, which the chameleon had been aiming in her direction prior to making herself decent. Clearly cursing her poor reaction time and missing a photo op.
Kali: Hmm. I suppose that might be a fair assessment.
Ruby: [Angles her body to hide Oscar’s boner] You got problems, lady.
Kali gave a nonchalant shrug, still feeling too good to give 100% to caring.
Jaune: [Claps hands] Well, not that this hasn’t been just a blast, but I think I should go tell Weiss exactly what happened here before somebody [glares at Ruby who glares back] texts her.
Yang: [Scratching her head, staring at the stairs] Heh, you just want Weiss to “punish” you. Never met a guy so ready for a girl standing five foot nothing to take him to poundtown in the Amazon position.
Jaune: [Reddens] Then clearly you have no idea how hot Weiss is when she’s mad.
Yang: [Blinks] Huh. All that time spent around Nora and me’s doing you good, Jaune.
Jaune said nothing and turned away. Oscar was trying to engage a depressed Ilia in conversation while avoiding Ruby’s death glare, the reaper herself irritated at her “not-a-boyfriend” being a pervert. Yang stood contemplating how to handle Blake and Kali just sighed, uncrossing her legs and wincing at the stickiness and the slight sound of it as she stood. As she clapped her hands lightly, intending to try and make this better, it happened. A platter of spaghetti and meatballs hit the floor.
Ghira: What in the garlic-oregano-noodley fuck is going on here!?
The room froze. Kali gave her husband a sheepish little smile, standing with her kimono top done up poorly and missing her hakama pants, shapely legs on display. Ilia had reaimed her phone at Kali’s legs even as Oscar had a hand up to block the view, his other over his stiffy. Yang’s mouth hung open in shock and Jaune had frozen, his own hands dropping to hide evidence of his own hard on. His daughter was conspicuously absent.
The most damning thing was the menu screen on the teleivsion, showing clips of Mistralian hentai that wasn’t exactly kind to faunus. Jaune spoke first.
Jaune: [Urgently] Yeet me out the house Xiao Long and I won’t tell Weiss about the crack you made on her ass!
A flash of white aura protecting the Arc occurred and Yang grabbed him by the arm and threw him through the wall. Ruby grabbed Oscar’s hand at the same time and the two disappeared into a swirl of roses out the same hole, a distant “ouch” being heard as they likely collided with Jaune. Yang was halfway up the stairs and Ilia stood frozen, scroll aimed at Kali’s legs. Ghira glared and Ilia eeped. She glanced at Kali who gave a smirk that was unapologetic and much to Ilia’s dismay, sexy.
Kali: It’s exactly what it looks like, darling. [Purrs] Is my big strong husband going to spank his naughty wife?
Ilia’s scream of terror was muffled as Ghira’s hand clasped around her face and then faded into the distance as she was chucked from the Belladonna household.
Jaune: [Barely audible] Dammit, stop running into me! Respect the healer!
Ilia: [Barely audible groaning]
Ghira: You will explain yourself, wife.
Kali: [Flutters eyelashes, purposely ignores him] Will you promise to spank me if I don’t?
Ghira growled, angry at the situation but knowing he’d get nothing out of her now and with a grunt, threw his laughing wife over his shoulder and stomped grumpily to his room. Really, he loved this woman to pieces but why did she find it so enjoyable to test his every last nerve!? He ignored the frantic sound of what sounded like his daughter opening her secound floor window and muttering something about “not again” and threw his smirking wife on the bed, growling as he ripped his armor, his clothing off.
On the ground floor, a rhino faunus and his crocodile faunus friend gaped at the hole in the front of the house.
Rhino Faunus: Oh, what in the actual shit is this!?
Crocodile Faunus: Rich people, man. Rich people.
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