#missed it and asked if she knew where I could find the recording | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ja3yun · 1 month

Text

Melting Point | P.SH | CH.7

brother's rival!sunghoon x fem!reader warnings: smut (mdni), unprotected sex, oral (f. rec), fingering, spitting, dirty talk, praise kink, petnames (good girl, baby), anything else lmk. ch. 7 synopsis: minhee comes to you with the missing pieces of information you need, leading you to find the courage to speak to sunghoon, hoping you can reconcile. wc: 14.9k previous | masterlist | next a/n: hi! this chapter is filled with plot and answers to questions so i am hoping it all makes sense. again, thank you for the love on the last chapter! next week is the penultimate chapter so everything is starting to tie up so please enjoy <3

Scanning the next customer's shop, your shoulders are heavy with sadness. It’s not ideal to be working the day after you just lost the love of your life but reality doesn’t stop for your problems. If you weren’t in desperate need of the money, you would have just neglected to show up.

You haven’t slept, your eyes are a darker shade than before, and the smile you couldn’t stop plastering over your face the past couple of months is non-existent.

Last night, you went home just like Coach Lee had instructed but you don’t know if it was the best idea. The journey home with your mum was filled with her yapping about how true love never existed and how she knew his plan was this all along. There was no sympathy from her, not a surprise considering her face yesterday looked like she just won the lottery.

Minhee, on the other hand, sat silent, fizzing from head to toe. Honestly, you expected him to be fuming since Sunghoon was the factor in your current drift from one another, however, you did expect an undertone similar to your mothers gloating; he should be telling you ‘I told you so’ but instead he seems less boastful and more resentful.

"Your total comes to £54.35," you murmur in a monotone, extending your hand for the payment from the elderly woman. As she counts out each pound coin, you find yourself retreating into your thoughts once more, replaying the events over and over again.

Sunghoon looked so sincere when he told you it wasn’t him on the recorded phone call. The biggest question that twirled in your mind was how your mum got the audio in the first place. Sunghoon's assertion that he was only friends with Jay and Jake, who wouldn't betray him, seemed plausible, he hadn’t ever mentioned anyone but them in all the times you have spoken. So, who could have provided it to her?

That’s what you should have questioned when you had the chance, instead of letting your mind loop in on itself and confuse you to the point you didn’t even hear Sunghoon out.

You want to reach out and ask him to meet you but it wasn’t just you that got hurt yesterday.

If there’s one image that’s sticking in the forefront of your brain right now, it’s Sunghoon’s face when he found out you lied to him. Perhaps you should have questioned everything then, considering how shattered he appeared. Someone who set out to betray you wouldn’t look so devastated that you hurt them, would they?

You're also gripped with anxiety that getting in touch with Sunghoon would make things worse and he'll reveal Minhee's actions to the National Board. It scares you to think of your brother losing his chance to skate and being disqualified from competition.

Space might be just what you all need.

But finding that space is proving to be a challenge when your mind is consumed by these thoughts incessantly. You feel utterly overwhelmed, your mental state crumbling, leaving you feeling helpless.

The old lady hands over the money, and you mechanically carry on with your shift.

Once it's over, you contemplate your options for where to go next. Normally, the rink would be your refuge, but it feels too loaded with memories right now. Rina's occupied with her anniversary date with Allen, leaving you with no one else to turn to. The library, despite being open 24 hours, holds no appeal; the idea of sitting in silence, trying to study, feels like torture.

With a tired yawn, you realise there's only one place left to go: home.

______

Kicking off your shoes at the door, you trudge up the stairs, each step feeling like an effort as exhaustion weighs heavily on your limbs. The lure of your bed grows stronger with each passing moment as if it's calling out to you louder with every step.

You notice that your mum's bedroom light is off, signalling that she's already asleep, while Minhee's room emits the usual blue glow of his computer screen. If it weren't for the ache in your heart, this could easily pass for a typical Wednesday night.

Entering your room, you're greeted by an unexpected sight. It's not as you left it; the bed is neatly made, your stuffed toys lined up by the pillows, your desk reorganised the way you like it, and all your clothes tidily put away. Someone has cleaned for you, a rare occurrence unless you're sick.

The one prominent feature of your newly organised room is the gleaming glass trophy on your windowsill. It stands proudly, displaying your achievement to everyone as they enter the room.

This had to be Minhee’s doing, your mum would never go to these lengths.

Unfortunately, the award just serves as a memory to Sunghoon rather than yourself. It was the night you became officially his, the night you threw all guilt and caution to the wind so you could claim him as yours.

Taking the trophy, you toss it in your top drawer and shut it roughly, not caring about the damage you could cause it.

With no energy to shower, you change into pyjamas. It’s a bad idea to slip into one of Sunghoon’s hoodies but as it envelopes you in warmth on the cold night, you don’t think about it twice. The smell of him still lingering as you put up the hood punches you in the chest. You miss him, it’s as simple as that.

As you sink into the welcoming embrace of your bed, the weight of the day gradually begins to lift from your shoulders, only to be replaced by a hollow ache that settles in the pit of your stomach. Closing your eyes, you attempt to banish the tumultuous thoughts swirling in your mind and drift into sleep.

You toss and turn, trying to find a comfortable position, but your mind refuses to quiet down. Images of Sunghoon's smile and the warmth of his hugs dance behind your eyelids, taunting you. Every time you close your eyes, it's like you're transported back to happier times.

For what seems like hours, your heart and brain fight with one another, much like the night before. Your heart aches to be with Sunghoon, to trust him completely while your head rationalises the evidence presented to you by your mother.

Just as you begin to resign yourself to another sleepless night, a soft knock at your door interrupts your thoughts. Minhee's concerned voice cuts through the silence, drawing your attention, "Y/N? Are you still awake?"

With a frustrated huff, you turn your back to Minhee, a silent declaration of your anger and hurt. Acting this way may seem childish, but this is how you’ve always acted towards him when conflicts arise between you, like you regress back to being kids.

Minhee sighs, walking to the edge of your bed before helping himself to a seat beside you, “You don’t have to speak to me but you can listen.” He looks down at his hands, wondering how to broach the situation, the words aren’t coming so easily, “I…I know I did something really shitty, okay? I shouldn’t have fucked with his skate like that, Mum just…”

When he pauses, your intrigue is piqued and you twist your head to look at him. You can see his internal battle whether to tell you something or keep it to himself. The rooted anger towards your brother grows a little, “This is the only opportunity I’m giving you to explain yourself,” you warn him with a hidden urge for him to continue.

He breathes out slowly, his voice carrying the weight of a burden, "Mum just put so much pressure on me to win, like all she’s spoken about was how I need to place first,” his words quiver slightly, a reflection of the self-doubt flooding his body.

It's astonishing how one woman can make both her children feel so worthless.

As you turn to face Minhee, his expression mirrors the familiar blend of anguish and self-doubt that you've seen on Sunghoon's face countless times. It's a painful reminder of the weight their mothers' expectations have placed upon them.

"Mini, you could easily beat Sunghoon at Nationals. You didn't have to listen to Mum," you offer, your voice laced with both empathy and frustration.

The issue has never been Sunghoon or Minhee; it's always been their mums.

Minhee takes a deep breath, steeling himself to reveal the truth that he's been carrying with him all this time, "Listen to me," he begins, his voice tinged with bitterness, "Mum needs me to win."

Your confusion deepens, leaving lines of bewilderment etched on your face as you struggle to comprehend his words, "What?" you ask, all tiredness suddenly leaving your body.

"The odds of me winning aren’t in my favour, so she put on a bet. She'll get shit tons of money if I win. She put basically all her savings into it, all my money too," his jaw clenches as he recalls the conversation they had.

Your confusion escalates further as Minhee's revelations continue to unfold before you. "Since when was Mum into gambling?" you ask, the disbelief evident in your voice.

Minhee sighs heavily, his frustration palpable as he struggles to find the right words, "There's so much you don't know about her, Bubs," he admits, his tone tinged with regret, "The gambling isn't even above board. It's all underground-type shit with high rates. I swear I didn't know anything about any of it until she guilt-tripped me into going along with her scheme."

There was no denying your Mum was a little secretive, especially after your dad left, but this is not anything like you could have imagined. You had always wondered where your Mum got the money to support Minhee’s skating but his brand deals were good enough to keep you all afloat, so you just presumed it was that.

Minhee sees you calculating in your head and decides to continue, “Once she told me, I started practising like crazy, I trained almost every day just to be in with a chance but she wasn’t confident enough so she told me-”

"To break Hoon’s skate," you finish his sentence for him, the pieces of the puzzle snapping into place with a chilling clarity.

You knew something was off that morning - the way your Mum was extra harsh on him, telling him to make sure he ‘gets it done’. It was such unusual phrasing that you should have clocked on to it sooner.

This is exactly why you didn’t want to tell Sunghoon about it. You wanted to get to the bottom of it all because you were filled with suspicion from the get-go. The thought of your own mother putting Minhee in a position like this fills you with a mixture of anger and disbelief.

“Why did you go along with it? If she doesn’t get the money, that’s her problem, no?” you query, trying to tie every string of this situation together for your own peace of mind.

Minhee sucks his teeth and looks away from you, “You know how much effort and time she put into my career, she sacrificed everything for it, her old job, money, even the breakdown of her marriage was because of me. I owe her this.” He’s withholding some information, using this as the sole his sole reason for helping, but there is more to it, you can tell that much.

Your chest fills with hurt as you speak, “The divorce wasn’t your fault, Mini. Mrs. Park started that rumour and it drove Dad to leave. That has zero to do with you. Plus, she pushed you to go professional when you were a child, you didn’t exactly beg her to let you compete. You owe her nothing.”

You know for a fact it’s her words that have made him believe he is the route of all her problems. If only you paid closer attention to what was going on, maybe you could have counteracted her venom with something, anything, to help him believe he wasn’t tied to her like this.

Taking one of his hands, you scoot closer to him, the warmth of his presence a balm to your troubled soul. Resting your head on his shoulder, you feel the weight of the world pressing down on both of you. "You should have told me, Minhee. I could have helped you."

He shakes his head before encircling an arm around your back, pulling you closer to him as if seeking solace in your embrace, "I wanted to protect you. She would have dragged you into it as well if she could," he confesses, his voice tinged with regret, "I regret it. I wish I just didn’t let her manipulate me into doing that to Sunghoon. I can’t tell you how relieved I was when I saw him at the rink that day we were doing the peer reviews."

It shocks you to hear him say that, considering he’s usually cursing the boy's name every time he was forced within 10 feet of him.

There was one thing that didn’t add up though, “Wait, if mum put the bet on, wouldn’t the bet be just to beat him? Why did she try and knock him out altogether with the skate? Surely that would cancel out the bet and she wouldn’t win the money?” you query, hoping your brother has the answers.

He shakes his head, “She never wanted him out of competition, just to injure him enough that he wouldn’t be able to compete to his usual standard, y’know? I would be in with a chance of beating him then,” he tells you, stroking your side, “It was touch and go for a minute, I don’t know what she would have done if he couldn’t compete.”

Underneath your head, you feel his shoulders tense up again, causing you to lift your face to look at him, concern etched into your features. "Is there more?" you ask, dreading the answer but knowing you can't avoid it. He knows more than he is letting on, you can tell.

“Look, I’m going to say something that sounds so batshit crazy, okay, but you gotta believe me,” he says, his tone urgent, “And you know I’m not Sunghoon’s number one supporter, so you know I wouldn’t lie to make him look good.”

"Oh my god, Mini, just tell me, please," you plead, unable to bear the suspense any longer.

"The phone call was fake," he confesses, gingerly meeting your eyes as you give him a look of astonishment

Your mind reels at his revelation, struggling to comprehend the implications of what he's just said, "Fake? How? Don’t tell me you were a part of this too?"

“Fuck no, I was as shocked as you were,” Minhee protests, taking a deep breath before divulging what he knows, “I went searching after it all didn’t add up. Like, who the fuck records conversations like that in the first place, never mind sending them to Mum?”

You have to agree with him, the question also did come to your mind once you calmed down.

As he takes out his phone, Minhee's expression darkens with seriousness, his fingers tapping across the screen to reveal a series of emails. He shows you the correspondence between your mum and someone named Soohyun, highlighting the transactions and agreements outlined within.

"She paid him money to use some sort of AI to make it sound like Sunghoon was saying all that stuff about you and your relationship," Minhee explains, his voice laced with disbelief and anger, "It was one last attempt to fuck with him before the competition. She really needs that money, Bubs."

Shock courses through you, a tidal wave of disbelief crashing against the shores of your consciousness. The realisation sinks in slowly, each email adding another layer to the intricate web of deceit woven by your mother, "I-I can't believe this," you stutter, struggling to process the enormity of what he's just revealed.

Minhee gently takes the phone from your hand, returning it to his hoodie pocket with a sigh, "I know. It's like something out of a bad TV show, but it's true," he admits, his tone heavy with resignation. As his hand finds yours, a sense of solidarity washes over you, his touch offering a small measure of comfort amidst the chaos.

"To be honest, I had kinda knew it was fake," Minhee continues, his words slow and measured, "Don't get me wrong, I was livid at the idea of anyone using you that way. But on the drive home, I realized, this is Park Sunghoon we're talking about. He wouldn't dare to do that to you."

Confusion clouds your features as you furrow your brow, struggling to make sense of his words. "Huh? What are you talking about?" you ask, your voice tinged with uncertainty.

Minhee's expression softens as he meets your gaze, a faint smile tugging at the corners of his lips. "He liked you for so long, like for years. You were just so oblivious to it," he explains, his tone gentle yet matter-of-fact. "If he has the chance to date you, he's not going to take it for granted, and certainly not use you just to mess with my head."

As Minhee's words sink in, a flicker of realisation dawns upon you. Memories of Sunghoon's lingering glances and subtle gestures flood your mind, painting a picture of unspoken feelings that had gone unnoticed for far too long, "Do you know he asked me for permission to date you when we were like 15 maybe? I can't really remember exactly…but anyway, I told him to get lost," Minhee adds with a wry grin, his words punctuated by a hint of nostalgia.

Now this was new information. All you knew was that Sunghoon had knocked you back when you asked him out about that age.

“I had my reasons.”

His voice echoes in your brain as you recall what he said at the ice rink on your first date as an official couple. All this time, you had believed Sunghoon's rejection was solely his decision, unaware of Minhee's influence behind the scenes, “You told him to say no to me? Did you know I was going to confess?” Anger rises within you, not real anger but the one that siblings have for each other when one steals the remote control or eats the leftover food they were saving.

"Whoa, yeah, okay, but you have to understand I was protecting you. I don’t even know what Mum would have done back then if you started dating him, especially because it was so close after Dad left," Minhee's voice is laced with remorse as he hangs his head. "I know I had no right to tell him to leave you alone, but…"

The anger in you subsides as you see him slump a little.

"You're the most important person in my life, Y/N. You're my little sister, my best friend," he continues, his voice trembling with emotion, "He took championships and brand deals from me, fine, but if he took you away from me, particularly back then, I think I would have died." He avoids your gaze, his admission laden with shame at his insecurities.

His words weigh heavily on your heart, the depth of his love and fear for you leaving you speechless, “I’m your sister, Mini. He could never tak-”

“Hasn’t he?” His interjection silences you, “You stopped coming to my practices, we don’t hang out anymore, it’s like I barely see you,”

His words strike a chord, piercing through the haze of your own emotions. Suddenly, the gravity of his words sinks in, and you realise the toll that recent events have taken on your relationship with Minhee. You were so caught up in yourself that you hadn’t factored in how the distance would affect him.

Being caught up in your newfound relationship, you inadvertently left behind the one person who had always been there for you, the one who needed you the most. Guilt washes over you as you realize the depth of Minhee's loneliness and isolation in your absence. You and Minhee had been each other's rock for so long, but now, it feels like you're drifting apart, and you can't help but feel responsible.

A heavy silence envelops the room, thick with unspoken regrets and untold truths. You feel the weight of Minhee's gaze upon you, his eyes pleading for understanding.

"I... I didn't realise," you murmur, the words catching in your throat, "I didn't mean to drift away from you, Mini. I just... I got caught up in my own guilt, and it was easier to avoid you altogether."

Minhee listens quietly, his understanding washing over you like a soothing tide. His empathy is palpable in the gentleness of his gaze. "I'm sorry for putting you in that position. I guess I hadn't realised that trying to keep you from him was actually doing the opposite of what I thought it would," he admits, his voice filled with remorse. Bringing you closer to his side, he rubs your waist in a gesture of comfort. "I pushed you away and blamed it all on Sunghoon."

"You'll always be my number one, Mini. You don't have to worry about that," you assure him, offering a heartfelt smile in return.

If there were such a thing as twin flames, you and Minhee would surely be just that. In every universe, you both burn together, facing every trial and tribulation that comes your way. You're deeply thankful to have him as your brother.

“Did he actually like me this whole time?" You can't help but beam at the thought of the Ice Prince harbouring feelings for you all these years.

With a groan, Minhee pushes you away playfully, "Ugh, yes. He would NOT let it go either. Even asked me if he could take you to prom," he recalls with a mixture of exasperation and amusement.

“PROM? He wanted to take me to my prom?” You squeal at the thought, imagining Sunghoon awkwardly mustering up the courage to ask Minhee for permission to take you to prom. It's a surreal image, but one that fills you with a strange sense of warmth, “I had no idea he was that into me back then,” you idly play with your hair, trying to stop yourself from reverting back to your 14-year-old self as you imagine Sunghoon crushing on you too.

Minhee shrugs, a mischievous glint in his eyes. "Probably just desperate, to be honest," he teases, earning an annoyed gasp and a few playful slaps to his shoulder. "Ow! Look, just because I’m not against you dating him anymore doesn’t mean I want to hear you gushing over him, okay?"

Your eyes widen in surprise at his revelation. "You... you aren’t against it?" The words feel fake as if you've stepped into an alternate reality where Minhee's acceptance of your relationship with Sunghoon is not only possible but welcomed.

Minhee sighs, raking his fingers through his hair, “I’m still not happy that you lied to me about it, and I am not his biggest fan,” he starts, eyes pointed at you with annoyance, “But he makes you happy and that picture you accidentally sent me was…well he clearly loves you,” It burns him to say it, you can see it in how his mouth cringes, “And after everything that’s happened, maybe I should let go of some of the grudges.”

You might have to clean out your ears to make sure you’ve heard correctly.

In one swoop, you hug him tightly, “Thank you, Mini,” You hadn’t realised the weight that you had been carrying all over your body regarding this whole secret boyfriend situation, but it’s finally gone.

“Don’t thank me just yet, you need to make up with him first,” Minhee says, “That should be easy though.”

Ah, there was that little hiccup, “It’s a little more complicated than that,” you say sheepishly as you scratch the back of your hand. Your brother stares with questioning eyes, “When we argued at Belmore I might have accidentally told him you broke his skate and that I knew,” your shoulders rise as you speak, face spreading with awkwardness and guilt.

“You’re so fucking stupid, Y/N. Why would you tell him that?!” He is exasperated by you, his hands rubbing up and down his face to exhibit his frustration with you.

“It slipped out! Come on, I could have told him well before yesterday. Give me some credit,” you argue back.

Both of you stare at each other, and the room’s silence quickly fills with your outburst of laughter. The tension dissipates as laughter bubbles between you, the weight of the conversation lifting momentarily. Despite the gravity of the situation, there's something strangely comforting about being able to find humour in the midst of it all.

"Okay, okay, fair point," Minhee concedes, a grin tugging at the corners of his lips, "But seriously, you need to sort things out with him, if he tells the board I’ll never be able to skate again,” you look at him incredulously to which he just laughs, “Yeah, I am aware of the irony, okay? Just please sort it out. If not for me, for yourself.”

Nodding, you cross your fingers, “I will.”

“I love you, Bubs,” Minhee stands and kisses the crown of your head, smiling in relief that he has his best friend back, “Tell him if he hurts you for real, I’ll break his legs next time.” Your mouth hangs open as he walks away shrugging.

The weight of the situation settles over you once more, but this time, you feel a renewed sense of purpose. You just hope you can fix this.

______

You find yourself standing at Sunghoon's doorstep, your hand poised to knock, yet inexplicably frozen in place. Why has the simple act of chapping on his door suddenly become so daunting?

A nagging voice echoes in your mind, whispering doubts about whether he'll even care, convinced that the damage has already been done. The weight of the colossal secret you've kept from him bears down heavily, compounded by the regret of not believing him when he insisted the audio wasn’t him.

Yesterday, confusion clouded your judgment, leaving you unable to think clearly, grasping onto every detail at face value. But amidst the chaos, you failed to afford the same trust and belief in his earnest pleas and declarations of love.

Now, the fear grips you tight: What if he doesn’t want to mend things? What if, because of some senseless scheme concocted by your own mother, you've lost the love of your life?

But you’re a big girl, you have to face this no matter the outcome.

With that mindset, you finally chap the door, breathing out slowly as you do so. The nerves sit in your throat as it dries out, the idea of losing him was just inconceivable.

The door swings open to reveal Jay, clearly just awake. His hair is sticking to one side and he hasn’t bothered to put on clothes, boxers being the only thing keeping his dignity. You suppose turning up to the flat at 6am on a Thursday would grant some disturbance.

“Y/N? What are you doing here?” Jay asks, one eye still closed.

“I need to speak to Sunghoon,” you try to convey the urgency in your voice but it comes out breathlessly. You hadn’t realised you were holding in the air until you spoke.

Jay's sigh echoes in the room, his gaze drifting upwards as he considers your request. "I don’t think it’s a good idea, Y/N, he's kinda pissed," he cautions, his tone tinged with concern.

You understand Jay's apprehension, but you can't let the rift between you and Sunghoon deepen any further. The longer you both remain trapped in this mess, the harder it will be to mend your relationship. Time might heal some wounds but it won’t fix them.

“Can I just talk to him? I need to explain,” you plead, tapping your fingers together, you avoid his judgmental gaze.

Jay's response is swift, his conviction clear as he defends Sunghoon's character. "You didn’t actually believe your mum, right? Like anyone with a clue can see how much he loves you. He wouldn’t do something like that," he states, offering a comforting gesture by rubbing his shoulder slightly. It's evident that Jay is trying to rebuild Sunghoon's image in your eyes, a testament to the unwavering bond between him and his best friend.

As you stand there, you can’t explain your thoughts during your fight with your boyfriend because you still can’t make sense of them yourself; however he was right, you should have seen his love past the lies of your mother.

Nodding with a hint of shame, you admit, “It was all just too much to process, and I handled it poorly. But I have to fix it.” Despite the weight of your guilt, a steely determination underlines your words.

Jay sees it, he understands you didn’t want to hurt Sunghoon the way you did. Maybe he’s a bit more understanding of your own grief because his best friend neglected to mention that you lied to him about Minhee and his skate.

When Sunghoon arrived home, Jake and Jay greeted him eagerly, anticipating news from his check-up. However, their excitement quickly turned to concern as Sunghoon stormed in, slamming the door behind him with such force that it caused shelves to rattle.

Concern etched across their faces, his friends inquired about the situation with genuine worry as Sunghoon recounted the events involving your mother and the recording. However, he purposefully omitted any mention of the skate. He didn't want to tarnish your image in the eyes of his friends with his own anger-induced bias. He understood all too well that they might harbour animosity toward you for your deception, and the mere thought of it was unbearable to him.

So he didn’t bother to spill it, still protecting you even amidst his fury.

"I heard him leave this morning. I think he went to the rink, like he usually does to clear his head," Jay offered, unsure if he should disclose this information but feeling a strong intuition that both you and Sunghoon needed it.

Your expression softens with gratitude as you look up, "Thanks, Jay," you say, appreciation evident in your voice.

As you begin to turn, preparing to make your journey back to your side of town and into Belmore, Jay's voice suddenly pierces the quiet morning air, halting your movements, "Wait there, I'll give you a lift," he calls out, his offer catching you off guard.

Before you can even muster a response to decline his kind gesture, Jay is already striding purposefully back to his room to get dressed.

Left standing alone in the tranquillity of the early morning, the absence of Jay's presence allows your mind to wander freely. You had prepared yourself to talk to Sunghoon at this very moment but now you have a whole 40-minute drive to contemplate his reaction all over again. It’s scary, the idea of this being the end of you both.

When Jay finally emerges, dressed and ready to go, he motions for you to follow him as you both make your way to his car. You don’t know why he’s doing this but you’re thankful for the saved time, the time to get here was already long enough, never mind making the same painstaking journey back.

The drive begins in silence, the gentle hum of the engine merging with the rhythm of your own racing heart. Jay's quietness feels unfamiliar, a subtle shift in the energy between you since your last encounter, though not entirely unexpected.

With some courage, you figure talking to Jay might help you later on when speaking to Sunghoon, “I think deep down I knew he didn’t say it.”

It’s a simple confession but one you had to say out loud.

Jay spares you a quick glance before keeping his attention on the road, “He’s doted on you, like literally obsessed with you. Do you not see that, or?” There's a hint of irritation as he speaks. He can’t fathom why you would ever believe one shitty phone call rather than your boyfriend who would drop the world at your feet if you asked.

He hasn't witnessed every facet of your relationship, but from what he has seen, he can't help but envy it. He longs to experience the kind of connection Sunghoon has found with you, hoping to find someone who reciprocates his feelings in the same way. What frustrates him about the situation is the apparent disregard you show for his best friend's love. It's as if you fail to grasp the profound depth of Sunghoon's affection, while there are others out there yearning for even a fraction of such devotion.

You angle your body to face him before speaking, “I know. There was just a lot going on and…you should have heard it, Jay. It sounded so fucking real,” you almost plead with him to see your side.

Even Sunghoon had mentioned how authentic the audio sounded, so Jay knew what you were talking about. He simply nods to acknowledge you, his expression showing understanding, “What was it then? How did she do it?”

"Some AI guy. She hired him to grab snippets from Hoon's interviews and make the audio," you tell Jay, omitting any mention of the gambling or other family drama

Jay's eyes widen in surprise. "Damn, seriously? She stooped that low?" he says, his astonishment visible in his tone. All you can do is nod, aware of how absurd and unsettling the situation is, "AI is so fucking scary, man," Jay says, shaking his head in dismay.

You agree wholeheartedly, a shiver running down your spine at the thought of the lengths people would go to manipulate technology for their own agendas, "It’s so bizarre," you murmur, still trying to wrap your head around the whole ordeal.

The silence that settles between you both now feels different, no longer heavy with tension but rather mutually comforting. Each of you understands the gravity of the situation and the complexities it entails.

In this shared moment of understanding, surrounded by the quiet of the morning and Jay's silent support, you feel a sense of calm wash over you, in stark contrast to the turbulence that has plagued you since Tuesday. If Jay understands your side of the story, perhaps Sunghoon would as well.

Pulling up to Belmore, Jay stops the car at the entrance, “Y/N,” he pauses, collecting his thoughts, “You’re good for one another, and Jake and I like having you around, so fix this, yeah?”

You nod, determined and empowered by his words, “I will.”

_____

As you step onto the rink, your eyes lock onto Sunghoon, gliding with so much velocity that it sends a shiver down your spine. You can't help but feel a pang of worry, knowing he's pushing himself to the limit, risking injury once more. As you approach, beads of sweat glisten on his face, his hair clinging to his skin, a visual confirmation of your concerns.

He propels himself into a jump, the sharp sound of his skate slicing through the air, reverberating across the arena. However, his landing isn't smooth; his ankle bends awkwardly, causing him to fall onto the ice.

"Sunghoon, be careful!" you call out, running to be by his side. Ignoring the impracticality of your footwear, you shuffle onto the ice and kneel beside him, "Are you out of your mind?"

Much to your dismay, Sunghoon’s ankle is thumping, a superficial heartbeat pulsing through it. He might be able to go back on the ice but he’s over-exerting himself. He doesn’t look at you, focusing on his ankle, but he also doesn’t push you away, letting you undo the bandage to assess the damage.

Seemingly, his ankle is okay, nothing torn or hurt beyond what was already there, the bruise from a few weeks ago dying into a faded yellow, a promising sign but it still pains you to see.

Standing up, you offer him your hands for support but he shrugs you off, opting to stand on his own and skate over to the exit of the rink, “What are you doing here? Come to mess up my other skate?” His tone is sharp and accusatory, indicating that he’s still angry.

“It wasn’t me and you know that,” you defend yourself, slowly walking behind him trying not to slip.

You both successfully make it off the ice, Sunghoon plonking himself onto the bench outside. Going back to his ankle, you kneel and start the process of re-wrapping the bandage tightly, again with no protest from him. Hopefully, that’s a better sign of forgiveness compared to what his voice is suggesting.

Carefully, you discard his skate to the side and gather the bandage, your cold hand sparks a jolt in Sunghoon as you hold the start of the wrap to the back of his ankle. You take your time to eliminate any cause of discomfort which for the most part you succeed in.

“You kept it a secret, Y/N. Lied to my face,” he says through gritted teeth which you don’t know if it’s from anger or pain, possibly a mixture of both, “Everything wrong in my life seems to be because of your family.” The words sting because you know it’s true. As much as you would love to be excluded from the accusation, you know he’s right.

“I know,” You say lowly, putting all your attention on his ankle.

Looking at you, Sunghoon sighs, his body heavy with mixed feelings. Just looking at you now he wants to wrap you in his arms and tell you everything is okay, that he forgives you, but he can’t do that without some sort of explanation.

“Why didn’t you just tell me?” he asks softly, staring at you as if trying to reach into your brain and pull the answers out himself.

Adjusting the bandage with a gentle twist, you offer your explanation, “Honestly, I thought I was protecting you. You had so much going on; not knowing if you would make nationals, the argument with your mum, there was just never a right time.”

Sucking his teeth, he nods, “Feels like you were protecting your brother.”

“I was, in some ways. There was something so strange going on I wanted to try and figure it out before I told you. I wanted an excuse so you wouldn’t blame him for it,” you explain your thought process to him but he won’t get it, not unless he was you in that situation.

Yet, to your surprise, Sunghoon grasps the sentiment perfectly. Protecting your brother is second nature, ingrained within you, even on the first day when everyone discovered they would be combining the rinks, you tried to protect him from doing something stupid.

The only thing he doesn’t understand is why Minhee did it.

“Did you ever find an excuse for him? Or can I blame him for this?” he points to his ankle with his other foot so you see it. You haven’t looked at him once since you started to tend to his injury.

“You can blame him for it,” you start, pausing your actions as you wonder whether you should tell him what transpired, why Minhee did it, “Minhee…My mum put him up to it, to get you injured for Nationals so Minhee had a better chance of winning.”

“Shit, okay.”

Knowing Sunghoon, he’s trying to piece it all together to save you the explanation, but this is far too complicated for him to work out on his own, “This is going to sound so crazy, but I need you to listen. My mum is struggling to make ends meet and she got into some gambling scene. She put loads of money for Minhee to win, specifically to beat you and if she wins, it’s like thousands of pounds, enough to get her out of the debt she’s in. I don’t know how it works but it’s shady. She didn’t trust Minhee to get the job done on his own so…” You trail off, hoping he’ll put the puzzle together now.

Taking the safety pin, you secure the wrap and pull down his trouser leg, yet, you still don’t look at him, scared of his reaction. If you were in his shoes, you would not believe anything about what was just said.

But unlike you, Sunghoon knows what crazy sports mums are willing to do for their kids to succeed, his mum being a prime example, “Y/N, seriously, you should have told me.”

“I didn’t find out about the whole gambling thing until last night when Mini told me. Sunghoon, please believe me when I say he didn’t want to do it, he just…he thinks he owes our mum like he’s the one that put us in debt for chasing this dream, that he’s the reason for a lot of things outwith his control.”

“Sweets,” Sunghoon breathes out, grabbing your chin, forcing you to finally look at him, “I get it, I mean, I’m not particularly chill with it since my career could have ended but the way Minhee is feeling, I do understand.”

His eyes hold yours like they’re hugging you, trying to pull you from your worries and somehow it works. You feel a little lighter, his hand now etching its way to your cheek to cradle it. Instinctively, you lean into his touch, seeking his comfort.

“I’m sorry, Hoonie,” you state solemnly, angry and hurt that he was just a pawn in your mother's game, the relationship between you both strained because of her and yet you were the one apologising on her behalf.

You’re sorry for your own mistakes, but nothing was as bad as her tricks.

Sunghoon offers you a small smile, ushering you to sit next to him on the bench so he isn’t looking down on you. The symbolism of you feeling lesser is evident to him and he can’t stand it.

He turns to face you as you take a seat next to him, his hand resting comfortingly on your leg. “That phone call, I didn't say all that. That wasn't me, you have to believe me" he begs you to trust him.

"Yeah, I know," you respond with a bitter scoff, recalling the manipulative tactics of your mother. The skater's expression shifts to confusion as you continue, "My mum did that too, another thing that’s going to sound even crazier than breaking your skate."

You recount the incident with the AI recording, detailing your mother's desperate attempts to win her bet and her willingness to destroy your relationship in the process. With each sentence, his bewilderment deepens, his eyes widening and narrowing, and his mouth opening and closing in disbelief.

"Wait, seriously? It was AI?" he interjects once you've recounted every bizarre detail.

As he grapples with the revelation, you seize the opportunity to provide some comfort, gently wiping the sweat from his brow and pushing his dishevelled hair back from his face. The tension seems to ease from his features.

You pout at him, the weight of guilt settling heavily in your chest. "I'm really sorry for not believing you when all of this came out," you admit, your voice tinged with remorse.

He reaches out to take your hand in his, his thumb brushing lightly against your skin, "No, no, Sweets, it's okay," he reassures you, his tone soft and understanding, "She even gaslighted me for a second,” he suddenly starts to chuckle, “I thought my biggest worry was people making those ‘If Sunghoon sang Chase Atlantic’ AI TikToks.”

You laugh with him, knowing what he’s talking about. One day he came to you and showed you a video of him singing Slow Down which creeped you out and impressed you all at once.

The moment of laughter dies down, the break in tension creating much-needed relief for both of you. This whole scenario is so fucked up it’s hard to believe, you’re just thankful Sunghoon is so understanding.

“What about Minhee?” he asks suddenly, passing the confusion to you, “Like, how is he in all of this?”

Sunghoon’s concern for your brother, whether big or small, makes your love for him pound in your chest. Even after everything, he was still asking about Minhee which meant he might not hold a grudge, and more importantly, not go to the board.

Is it selfish to think that right now? To still be concerned about Minhee’s career?

Your boyfriend sees your eyes twitch, his telltale sign that your mind is racing, “Sweets?”

He breaks your thoughts, “Oh, he’s uh, he’s just stressed I think. I need to properly speak to him at some point and figure out what he wants to do,” you shake off the idea that Minhee won’t get to achieve his dream, scared that you might manifest it by accident.

Sunghoon nods, sighing deeply as he sheds any of the weight that was held over him. He wishes you would have trusted him when you heard the audio, but he does understand. Sometimes, he can be too understanding and he knows this, but it’s so easy to forgive or find reasoning for your actions.

Which will help you with your next request.

"Please don't go to the board," you finally confess, your voice barely above a whisper. It takes every ounce of courage you possess to voice the plea, but you know you have to ensure your mother hasn't irreparably damaged Minhee's chance at the Olympics. You need to see him succeed - he deserves it more than anyone.

Pressing his forehead against yours, he smiles, the warmth of his breath mingling with yours, "I won't, I promise. For you though, only for you."

The weight that's been pressing down on your shoulders suddenly lifts, replaced by an overwhelming sense of relief. You almost cry at how patient and understanding Sunghoon is, you wonder if you’ve ever met anyone like him before.

There’s a comfortable calmness in the air, his nose nuzzles against yours as he smiles contently, happy to have you back beside him. The past two days felt like weeks. It made him realise just how important you are to his life. He can’t live without you and never wants to be apart.

“So is Minhee…cool with us?” he asks gingerly.

Your face lights up as you lean back, “Actually, he’s completely fine with it, well, he said he still doesn’t like you but you make me happy. That’s all he wants.”

Minhee and you will forever prioritise each other's happiness above all else. These recent events have underscored that sentiment, even if it took some time to fully grasp. Ultimately, you both want nothing but the best for each other.

Sunghoon appears genuinely surprised by your declaration, his eyebrows shooting up, "Really? No resentment or anything?"

"Really," you confirm, observing his reaction closely. "He... he actually told me about forbidding you from seeing me all those years ago," you add, realising his astonishment at the news about your brother being on board with your relationship likely stems from the years of Minhee pushing him away from you.

Flushed, Sunghoon shuts his eyes, “No, he didn’t,” he winces at the idea of you finding out about his long-term crush on you.

“He did. Told me how you begged him to let you take me to prom too,” you gloat, a massive triumphant smile on your face, “You loooved me all those years ago, you have to admit it now,” you joke and his face turns even redder.

Typically, Sunghoon is being chased, so to have this hanging over his head in your relationship, he knows you’ll never shut up about it. He will admit though, that the look of delight on your face is almost worth the embarrassment.

“Okay, yeah. But blame Minhee for making us miss so many years together, okay? He was shit scary back then. I thought he was going to skin me alive,” Sunghoon recollects asking him if he could ask you out to the cinema, an innocent tiny date and Minhee, the scariest 14-year-old there was to ever live at that point, well to Sunghoon anyway, practically ripped his head off.

Prom was a mistake, he was simply asking if you had a date to prom. Yes, he was going to ask you if Minhee said no, regardless of what your brother would say, but the fire in Minhee’s eyes wasn’t one to be messed with and by this point, he was a gym-attending 19-year-old with an extra protective layer over you. Enough said.

You giggle and take his hand, offering him a sympathetic smile, “He was scared to lose me.”

"Who wouldn't be," he responds without hesitation, his tone serious and sincere.

His immediate reply catches you off guard and you do a double take, surprised by the sudden intensity in his voice.

Sunghoon wasn’t just saying it; he was petrified at the thought of losing you, especially after your mother's deceitful phone call. The look of betrayal on your face had cut him to the core, a pain he never wanted to inflict upon you. He loved you too much for that.

As you process his words, you realise there's a deep emotion behind them that you hadn't fully grasped before. Sunghoon's admission hangs heavy in the air, revealing a vulnerability. Your heart clenches with empathy, knowing that his dread of losing you is deep. You softly squeeze his hand, silently expressing your empathy.

You felt the exact same way about him - terrified of losing one of the people who means everything to you.

"I'm sorry," you say quietly, your voice full of regret, "I never want you to feel like you're going to lose me."

Sunghoon's gaze softens as he meets your eyes, a flicker of emotion dancing in the depths of his own. He brings your hand to his lips, pressing a tender kiss against your knuckles, "I know, Y/N," he murmurs, his voice filled with reassurance, “I’m not letting you go anyway, you’re stuck with me now.”

You laugh, shaking your head. There's a silent vow between you both to cherish and reassure each other whenever you have to, “Can we start again?”

“Yeah, of course, Sweets.” He plasters a genuine grin on his face, elated with the idea of putting all the negativity and lies behind the relationship and starting fresh.

You stretch out your hand, teeth showing as you smile, “Hi, I’m Y/N Kang. I’m your biggest fan.”

Sunghoon’s heart pounds loudly, you are his fan but to him, you’re more like an extractor fan. If you don’t have one of those, things go rotten and that’s exactly what it felt like without you. He needed you to such the poison and pain from his bones, he selfishly needed your love to make him feel alive.

He wants to provide you with that same feeling.

Taking your hand he smiles widely, mirroring your enthusiasm, “I’m Park Sunghoon. I am your biggest fan.”

________

The bleacher seats are your makeshift study space, textbooks and notes scattered haphazardly around you as you bury yourself in preparation for the looming winter exams. The chill of the air contrasts with the warmth of your determination; you had an award to uphold after all.

Meanwhile, your boyfriend is focused on a different kind of preparation. With just four days until nationals, he's dedicated himself to ensuring his ankle is in peak condition. Despite having twisted it just a few weeks ago, he's pushing himself hard, determined to perform at his best on the ice. When he pushes himself a little too much, you’re there to pull him back, or rather nag him to be careful

You steal glances at him whenever you can. Despite the injury, he moves with a fluid grace, his dedication evident in every precise movement. If you didn't know better, you wouldn't even guess that his ankle had been injured at all.

As you bury your nose in your books, a sense of admiration washes over you. His resilience and commitment inspire you to push through your own challenges. Granted, yours is a little less intimidating, the exams you’ll take will be confined to a week inside a study hall whereas Sunghoon is skating in front of thousands and being broadcast on TV.

Lost in your studies, you're suddenly jolted back to reality by a soft tap on your paper. Glancing up, you're met with a warm smile from your boyfriend, his eyes twinkling with affection, “You’re so serious when you’re focused,” He laughs, leaning over the barrier of the ice rink.

“Are you done?” You ask enthusiastically, hoping to get out of here and get the dinner he promised you 3 hours ago; your stomach wasn’t prepared to be denied food for so long that it started to speak to you about an hour ago.

"Just about, baby. You wanna go for Italian?" Sunghoon suggests, his eyes twinkling with mischief. His suggestion makes you smile; you've been raving about gnocchi for the past two days, and he's clearly been paying attention.

As you agree, his grin widens, and he leans in close, "Great, I'll go get changed and be right out," he declares, excitement bubbling in his voice.

Leaning over the barrier, Sunghoon puckers his lips in anticipation of a kiss to which you gladly oblige, pressing your lips to his in a sweet, lingering kiss. The brief moment of affection leaves you both with a warm, fluttering feeling in your chests. With a final smile and a promise to meet you outside, he disappears to change, leaving you to gather your books and laptop.

Packing the last of your highlighters into your bag, you hear the entrance door open. Peeking over the seats, you see a familiar face walking down with his gym bag slung over his shoulder and earphones in.

"Minhee?" you question, hoisting your bag onto your shoulder before walking over to him. "Mini?" you call out louder, ensuring he hears you.

Your brother jumps a little, clearly not expecting to see you at the rink. "What are you doing here?" he asks, a hint of surprise in his voice.

"Sunghoon's taking me for dinner. I was just studying while he trained," you explain, hoping to alleviate any concerns he might have.

Your reasoning earns a thoughtful hum from Minhee. It's still strange to talk about Sunghoon so casually with him, especially after keeping your relationship a secret for all those months.

"Is he here?" Minhee glances around, searching for any sign of Sunghoon.

"He's getting changed," you reply, nervously biting your lip. Despite Minhee giving you the green light for dating, there's still a lingering apprehension about them being in the same room together, especially after "skate gate," as Sunghoon dubbed it in an attempt to lighten the situation.

There is still some part of you that dreads them in the same room together, apprehensive to what they’ll do. Minhee is overprotective of you and Sunghoon is, well, he’s got a wrap on his ankle thanks to your brother.

Suddenly, the door to the dressing room swings open, and Sunghoon emerges, looking refreshed and ready for your dinner date. His expression is bright, his tunnel vision for you renders Minhee nonexistent to him. It’s not until he gets closer that he notices your older brother.

Once his eyes shift to Minhee, Sunghoon’s smile falters ever so slightly. He also doesn’t know how things will pan out but he knows he doesn’t want to make you uncomfortable.

“Minhee,” Sunghoon nods towards him which Minhee returns, “Are you training tonight?” You appreciate the civilness your boyfriend is trying to engage in, you know he’s doing it for you but hopefully, later on, he’ll do it because he and Minhee are actually getting along.

You can only dream of the day.

“Yeah,” he says sharply but there’s a wave of something in his eyes, something that happens when he’s thinking, “Actually, since you’re here can I talk to you? Privately,” Minhee glances at you as he says privately, indicating that he no longer wants you in the conversation.

Sunghoon looks to you for approval which you grant him obviously, hoping he’ll tell you what Minhee wants during dinner, “Sure. Coaches office is free,” he suggests, pointing with his head.

Your two boys stride over to the office and lock the door behind them.

Now, you could eavesdrop, and make sure no one throws a punch, but you’re trying to be optimistic about their relationship, so you leave them be.

Taking a deep breath, you remind yourself to trust in their ability to handle the situation maturely. After all, both Sunghoon and Minhee care deeply for you, they wouldn’t want to make this any more uncomfortable for you.

Fighting the urge to pace, you take a deep breath and try to distract yourself with thoughts of the upcoming dinner. Maybe you’ll have a glass of wine with dinner tonight, and try something new. You could get dessert if you convince Sunghoon to cheat on his meal plan for a night.

Who are you kidding? All you can think about is what is going on in that office, no attempt at distraction will help you now.

It’s increasingly difficult for you to resist chapping the door and pestering them to let you in on the gossip. What could be so important they couldn’t talk about it in front of you?

15 minutes pass but it feels like an eternity as you anxiously await their return. If one of them comes out with a black eye, you’re ditching them both, leaving them high and dry. You really hope it doesn’t come to that.

Finally, the door to the coach’s office swings open, all limbs and eye sockets intact, which is a good sign at least; however, their expressions are unreadable as they walk towards you. There's a subtle shift in the air, something lingering between them, though they try to maintain a facade of normalcy.

"Ready to go?" Sunghoon asks, his tone gentle as he kisses the top of your head lightly.

You nod and look between both of them, “What did you guys talk about?” There’s no grace of subtlety when it comes to you and your curiosity; you know it has something to do with you, you just wanted to know what.

Minhee and Sunghoon exchange a knowing glance before your brother answers, “Just giving him some brotherly warnings…right?” he says it so casually but his tone is cryptic. You know there is more to it than that.

Linking your fingers with his, Sunghoon grips your hand tighter, offering you some reassurance amidst the swirling thoughts in your mind. He knows you're probably considering every possible conversation they could have had.

"Nothing to worry about, Sweets. Minhee was just swinging his big brother ego around," Sunghoon says, his voice gentle but firm. There's a playful twinkle in his eyes that eases your nerves, if only slightly.

Rolling his eyes, Minhee sighs, "Whatever, Park. Remember what I said, yeah?" he tries to pass it off as banter, but there's a serious current weaving through his voice, catching you off guard.

Sunghoon nods in acknowledgement, a silent knowing between them, "I got it," he replies, his gaze locked on Minhee with a sense of respect and understanding. This newfound dynamic between Sunghoon and Minhee is unfamiliar, and you can't quite decipher whether it's a positive or negative development.

"Enjoy your dinner, Bubs. Make sure he pays," Minhee points to Sunghoon before waving you both off and heading to the changing room.

As Sunghoon pulls at your hand, leading you out of the arena, the silence hangs heavy between you. He doesn't offer an explanation so easily, much to your dismay.

"Your brother is a shark, can I say that in the most respectful way?" Sunghoon finally speaks up, breaking the silence with a hint of amusement in his voice.

You chuckle softly, nodding in agreement. "Yeah, he's super protective," you acknowledge with a touch of pride in your voice.

"He really is. He’d do anything for you…" Sunghoon trails off, his expression thoughtful. You want to ask what he means but you resist the urge to pry further.

"Are you guys okay? You didn’t fight or anything?" you venture tentatively.

Sunghoon offers you a reassuring smile, his eyes warm with sincerity, "I think we're besties now," he quips, trying to lighten the mood. You can't help but smile at his attempt to ease your worries, "C'mon, let's go eat, I'm starving," he suggests, kissing you quickly as you reach his car.

You are grateful they managed to have one discussion without throttling one another, even going as far as to make lighthearted jokes and playful jabs.

Baby steps, you suppose.

_____

Emerging from the restaurant and making your way to Sunghoon's car, your face radiates with laughter, tears glistening in your eyes.

"Did you genuinely believe she was asking for your autograph?" you tease, barely able to contain your amusement.

Sunghoon rolls his eyes, “Baby, it isn’t that funny. She literally ASKED me to sign it.”

“Yeah, the bill because you used your card,” as you say the words, another heaved laugh comes out, “You were so confident to think she was your fan.”

Crossing his arms, Sunghoon huffs playfully, feigning annoyance, but he can’t stop the smile from creeping on his face as he looks at you. With your face so bright and that beautiful song of your giggles, Sunghoon can’t stop looking at you, admiring you in this moment.

As your laughter subsides, you catch him staring at you intently. "What is it?" you inquire, noting the uncharacteristically serious expression on his face, devoid of its usual sarcastic pout in situations like these.

"I just love you so much..." he trails off, halting by the passenger door of his car, his voice tinged with vulnerability, "The thought of losing you was terrifying."

Sunghoon understands that you've both overcome the misunderstandings and manipulations caused by your mother, and you're in a better place now. Yet, the prospect of almost losing you because of it still haunts him.

You pout at his words, bringing your hands up to stroke the apple of his cheeks gently, “I hated it too. You’re so important to me, Hoonie,” you whisper, eyes softening at his words.

The months you’ve spent with him have been the best of your life, you could never deny that. Your relationship with him hasn’t been easy, interference from too many outside parties threatened to ruin it all, to rip you from your soulmate, but you will never let it happen again.

You place a timis kiss on his nose, “I promise that nothing will ever take me away from you again, okay?” you look at him with sincere eyes, hoping he truly listens to your promise.

He nods, closing his eyes with a serene smile, his graceful hands enveloping yours, imparting a comforting warmth. Foreheads touching, he savours the moment, soaking in the palpable connection between you both. He just wants to feel your love.

Never in Sunghoon’s life did he ever imagine finding love like this. Although he always knew he loved you, he didn’t know how intense his feelings were until suddenly you weren’t there anymore.

He smiles, eventually opening his eyes to look at you, your gaze holding nothing but love, “Will you come back to mine?” he asks as though this is the first date and he’s testing the waters to see if you’re interested.

“Actually,” you smile, pulling away from him slightly, your hands trailing down to fix the collar of his coat, “Minhee went out with Jungmo and my mum’s recently been going out at night so…”

Sunghoon's heart skips a beat at your implication, "Are you inviting me over?" he asks, his ears buzzing with anticipation.

You nod, a hint of nerves sneaking through as you bite your lip. "Yes, if you want to."

Considering the offer, he weighs the options carefully.

On the downside: it's a risk with your mum potentially returning home soon, the early morning departure could be awkward if he encounters your brother, and there's the potential for discomfort in the morning.

On the upside: it's a shorter drive to your place, he's curious about seeing your room, and it's the only location where he hasn't fucked you yet.

"Alright, let's go for it," he grins, the allure of the last pro eclipsing the rest.

Sunghoon opens the door for you and you settle into your seat and fasten your seatbelt while he slides into the driver's seat, starting the car.

As the car glides down the dimly lit streets, Sunghoon steals glances at you, a mixture of excitement and nervousness flickering in his eyes. The anticipation within him builds with every passing moment, the silence between you thick with unspoken desire.

With a playful smile, you break the tension, "Why do you look nervous?"

Sunghoon chuckles, his fingers drumming lightly on the steering wheel, "Not nervous, excited,” he corrects you.

You eye him up and down, “Okay then, why are you excited?”

Sunghoon lounges back as you hit a red light, taking the chance to look at you, “It’s like I’m entering enemy territory, like on those video games Jake plays all the time. I’m entering the red area, risking my life while I got on stealth mode,” he explains, getting even more giddy as he speaks about it.

“Hoonie, no one else will be home, I’m hardly sneaking you in.”

“Shhh, it’s no fun if you put it that way,” he chuckles, placing a hand on your thigh, “When I forward roll into your entrance, leave me be,” he plays.

Luckily for you, when you both arrive, Sunghoon refrains from spy rolling into your house like he’s an elite operative. Instead, he is waiting to be invited in like Stefan Salvatore.

“Baby, come on in, nothing gonna bite you,” you giggle as you take off your shoes.

Following your orders, he walks in and takes a look around the familiar entranceway. Nothing has changed since he was last here, just before your ceremony; aka, he’s noticed not one of your award pictures has taken pride of place next to your brothers.

You hadn't shown your mother the pictures, nor did she inquire about how it went. Her indifference was something you had learned to accept, albeit reluctantly. It wasn't the ideal situation, but like Sunghoon, you had found solace and love in other places where your mother left a void

Coming to that acceptance was cathartic.

You lead him up to your room, a bright smile on your face. It was surreal to have this opportunity to have him amongst your creature comforts, like finally all the pieces of your life have come together.

Sunghoon stops you as you go to reach for the handle, “Wait!” he rushes out. Inhaling deeply as he jitters around like a boxer about to walk into the ring, each little jump and hand tremor making you laugh. You would mistake it for nervousness again if he wasn’t beaming at the door like an idiot

“Will you calm down, this isn’t anything spectacular, It’s just my room,” you shake your head, looking at him as he continues his jumps of glee. Nothing you could say to him would stop him from acting like a child on Christmas morning, “You’re such a dork,” you snort, placing your hand on the handle.

Before opening the door, you mentally hope you tidied up before meeting him today. To your relief, the room is cleaner than you recall, albeit with a stray sock and some shoes strewn where your wardrobe is. You signal for Sunghoon to come, and he enthusiastically skips inside, looking about with inquiring eyes.

His attention moves across the shelves filled with books and trinkets, the cosy bed with its assortment of plushies, and the desk cluttered with papers and pens. Sharing this space with him creates a sense of intimacy and vulnerability, as well as elation among you both. Having him here feels like you can finally call this your home.

Sunghoon's smile widens as he takes it all in, his eyes sparkling with delight, "This is nice," he remarks, his voice soft with appreciation.

You nod, feeling a surge of happiness at his reaction, "I'm glad you think so," you reply, watching as he moves further into the room, exploring every nook and cranny as if it holds some secret treasure.

Just looking around your room is giving him further insight into your life. As your boyfriend, he knows a lot more than most, yet, seeing your soul laid bare in these four walls is opening him up to understand you deeper.

From the 2 minutes he has spent in your room, he has just found out that you collect far too many earrings, your favourite highlighter to use is pastel pink, you had an emo phase that you neglected to tell him, and you’ve been to 4 fan signs for TO1. It’s tiny, insignificant details, but Sunghoon wants to know it all.

His eyes happen to fall on a picture of you and Minhee when you were kids, “I remember this!” he exclaims, fangs showing as he twists the picture to show you as if you don’t see it literally every morning, “This was the Youth of Skating competition when we were 13,” he reminisces.

"Wasn't I just adorable?" you remark, playfully cupping your cheeks and flashing a wide grin as you try to mimic your younger self captured in the photo.

With a laugh, Sunghoon gently sets the frame back on your desk, nodding in agreement, “The prettiest one in the crowd by far,” he murmurs in a soft tone, mirroring your joy. It's as if your face radiates sunlight, and he basks in your vibrant glow.

Closing the distance between you, he replaces your hands with his own, leaning in to kiss you. His lips are tender as they meld with yours, his touch gentle as he affectionately squishes your cheeks, “You’re still the most beautiful person I have ever seen.”

Your heart quickens as he whispers sweet nothings into your mouth, his words mingling with the gentle exploration of his tongue, "I don't buy it," you tease, playfully pushing his hands away from your red cheeks, "You'll have to prove it to me," you challenge with a mischievous glint in your eyes.

A playful smirk dances across Sunghoon's lips as he accepts your challenge, his eyes sparkling with determination. With a soft chuckle, he gently captures your hands in his, intertwining your fingers as he pulls you closer.

"Oh, I intend to," he murmurs, his voice husky with desire. Leaning in, he presses another lingering kiss to your lips, his touch sending shivers down your spine. Slowly, he trails his lips along your jawline, leaving a trail of feather-light kisses in his wake.

He takes off his jacket, tossing it on your desk chair all the while he’s nipping at your neck. As his hands swiftly remove his t-shirt, revealing his sculpted bare chest, your eyes are drawn to the faded hickeys scattered across his skin. You had really done a number on him a couple of weeks ago, the purple still tinting his pecks.

Before you can fully appreciate the sight, he bends down, effortlessly scooping you up, his lips showering kisses all over your face. Your breath catches at the warmth of his touch sending a flush to your cheeks, "Sunghoon," you gasp, feeling his urgency mirrored in your own desire.

Laying you gently on the bed, his chest pressed against yours, he trails his hands up and down your body, igniting flames of longing with each touch, "I know, Sweets," he murmurs, his voice laced with possessiveness, "You want me to fuck you, yeah? Prove to you that you’re the most gorgeous girl?"

“Yes,” you huff out desperately.

“Then be a good girl. You can do that for me, baby, can’t you?” he whispers into your neck, licking a stripe up your vein.

His words dance down to your pussy, arousal pooling between your legs as you eagerly nod in agreement. His confidence mixed with his praises only fuels your desire, the promise of being his good girl setting your pulse racing.

In a flurry of movement, his trousers and boxers are discarded, and he wastes no time in removing your jeans and underwear, leaving you bare and exposed to his hungry gaze. As he kisses up the tender skin of your inner thigh, his proximity to your centre sends waves of anticipation coursing through you.

“My beautiful girl, you’re all mine,” Sunghoon’s voice is low and smooth like butter.

The vibrations from his words send a jolt of need straight to your core, the ache for his touch almost unbearable. As he teasingly presses a delicate kiss to your clit, you whimper in longing, your body yearning for the fulfilment only he can provide.

His hands slide up to the top of your thighs, holding them down and apart as he nibbles gently at the sensitive skin of your inner thigh. A shiver of anticipation courses through you as your hips instinctively push up, yearning for the touch of his mouth where you need it most.

Sunghoon responds with soft, warm kisses across your core, each one sending waves of pleasure rippling through your body. Then, with deliberate slowness, he traces his tongue upwards, sending a shudder of delight through you as he explores every inch of your pussy.

Kneading your hands through his hair, you grip tight as you beg for more and Sunghoon has no problem granting your wishes, kitten-licking your slit as he laps up your wetness.

When he is going down on you, he is like a man possessed but now it’s much worse. He hasn’t tasted your essence properly since the breakup/makeup. Your boyfriend doesn’t like to go too long without your taste on his tongue, so here he is making up for lost time as he lays his tastebuds flat against your cunt, savouring every drop of you.

You pull his head back by his hair, eliciting a moan from him as you do so, the sensation of each strand being in your command causes his dick to jump in, “Fuck, Sweets,” he hisses, licking his lips clean as he looks up at you through hooded eyes, “Tell me what you want.”

But he already knows what you want, because, without your answer, he’s gathering saliva in his mouth before spitting it on your throbbing pussy, his fingers lathering you in it, “Go on, tell me,” he mutters onto your clit, digging his teeth onto it just enough for you to buck your hips onto his face.

“Fingers, Hoonie, I want your fingers. Please,” you plead, holding your hips up to his mouth in a desperate attempt to get some release of your friction.

“Not only are you gorgeous,” Sunghoon’s fingers find their way to your entrance, circling it teasingly, “You’re my obedient, perfect girl.”

Sunghoon smoothly slides his fingers inside you, opening you up and filling you with a sweet sensation. His attention never leaves your face as he looks for your reactions, making every movement pleasurable for you.

He sees your lips falling wide and your head cocking back in ecstasy as an indication to continue. His fingers hook into you, gliding back and forth in a smooth and luring pace that matches the rhythm of your desire, and caressing you just the way you like it. Each stroke sends waves of pleasure through your body, creating a fire of passion that becomes hotter with each enticing movement.

You're a moaning mess as Sunghoon expertly finds your sweet spot, thrusting his fingers harshly as he works it with precision, "Let it all out, baby," he encourages, his voice sending your head into a tizzy, "Show me how I'm making you feel."

His words alone could send you tipping over the edge, but it's the sensation of his tongue flicking your clit and the gentle suction that has you screaming his name loud enough for the whole neighbourhood to hear. Sunghoon doesn't stop you, revelling in the melodic sound of his name falling from your lips like a symphony of desire.

"That's it, angel, you're doing so good for me," he praises, his words only spurring you on further. The two fingers inside you continue their relentless rhythm, driving you to the brink of ecstasy with each delicious stroke.

Your hands instinctively push him further into your cunt as you ride his face, Sunghoon's skilled ministrations bring you closer and closer to your climax, and his tongue and fingers dance in perfect rhythm, driving you to contentment with each delicious motion. The overwhelming sensation clouds your thoughts, leaving you lost in a haze of pleasure that makes your mouth water with anticipation.

With a final, electrifying thrust of his fingers and a gentle nibble at your clit, you hit the edge of release, your chest and tummy tightening. And then, with a guttural moan that bounces throughout the room, you finally succumb to the overwhelming wave of pleasure that crashes over you, leaving you trembling and breathless in its wake.

Sunghoon continues to worship you with his mouth and fingers, guiding you through the aftershocks of your orgasm with tender care and devotion. Each touch, each kiss, each whispered word of praise only serves to deepen the connection between you.

He sucks and swallows your juices, smiling as he does so. Your walls have trapped his two digits inside you as you squeeze him tight, “Baby, relax for me,” he kisses up your stomach in an attempt to get your body to yield but your orgasm is too intense, “Shh, Y/N, breathe out for me beautiful,” he whispers as his face meets yours.

Opening your eyes, you see his gentle smile and etch a blissful one onto yours, his adoring gaze instantly rippling through your bones, helping your muscles to unknot themselves. The power he has over you is crazy.

"Told you I would prove it," Sunghoon chuckles softly, pressing a peck on the tip of your nose as he finally frees his hand from you. Shaking your head with a satisfied smile, you exhale deeply, prompting him to tilt his head inquisitively.

"Oh? Have I not done enough?" he questions, his expression filled with amusement.

"Nope," you reply smugly, popping the 'p' for emphasis, "You could do more to prove it."

Sunghoon feigns contemplation, his lips quirking to the side in mock thought, "I see, hmm…" he muses, his gaze scanning you from head to toe before he suddenly sits you up and onto his lap, taking your useless top off.

His favourite playthings are now sitting directly at eye level and Sunghoon feels spoilt for choice of what one to show attention to first. Left has always been his favourite, there wasn’t a particular reason as to why, he just instinctively went for it every time.

Before he can delve his mouth to attach to your perky nipple, you surprise him by gripping his shoulders with one hand while the other strokes his cock between your bodies. In reaction, his shoulders and back hunch over, his head now buried between your mounds.

Your slicked hand pumps him at a vicious pace, yet the gentleness of your hand causes no discomfort. After all these months together, you know how he likes it, fast and rough with extra attention to his tip; so that’s what you do, after every fourth stroke you swipe your palm over his head, the soft skin now tinted red with need.

“Sweets,” he murmurs between your breasts, his tongue licking the valley like a helpless dog, “Let me be inside you, fuck I need it so bad,” he almost whimpers as you squeeze him.

Part of you wants to keep going and tease him but your heat is leaking for him, crying out to be stuffed by his cock.

You lift your hips and guide him to your entrance, slowly sinking onto him, “Jesus,” you hiss out, his cock stretching you much wider than his previous fingers.

The pace you set is deliberate and unhurried as you savour the feeling of his thick shaft piercing into you, battering your cervix each time you slam down onto him. Sunghoon groans at the way your channel is enveloping him, moulding around him like a perfect fit.

With each withdrawal, the tip of his cock catches on your entrance, teasingly, before he plunges back in, eliciting desperate pleas for more from your lips, "Hoonie, please, faster," you beg, your desire driving you wild.

It’s time for Sunghoon to take charge, his hands clasp around your back as he pulls you further into his chest, gripping onto your skin as he goes at you relentlessly. He delves so deeply inside you that the sensation becomes overwhelming, a heady mix of pleasure and need. Sunghoon's hand moves from your back to brush against your overstimulated clit, sending jolts of electricity coursing through your body, causing you to writhe on his lap, "Sunghoon, please," you whimper, your voice laced with desperation.

"What is it, baby?" Sunghoon's voice, soft-spoken and tender, stands in stark contrast to the force of his thrusts, each one pounding relentlessly against your core.

"Close," you gasp out, the intensity of your impending climax threatening to overwhelm you once again. If it were any other time, you might feel embarrassed by how quickly you're reaching the peak of ecstasy, but you know Sunghoon would understand. And he does because he feels the same way.

Both of you have tangled in sheets for long enough that you both know one another’s body like the back of your hands. That, added in with the withdrawals, of course you were both cumming quickly. Neither of you particularly minded since it wasn’t exactly a hindrance but rather served as just another notch to add to the endless list of climaxes you could potentially have.

The day that one orgasm halts your sexcapades for the night, is the day Ghostface will stop being hot. Never.

Sunghoon spits on your folds, his movements primitive but intentional. His fingers rubbed saliva into your delicate skin, focusing their attention on your swollen clit, pushing you to the verge of your high. These sensations are almost too intense to take, with his rough touch on your bud and the power of his cock ramming into your walls battering you in the most delicious way possible.

The other hand on your back trails its way to your left hand, clasping it in his as he intertwines your fingers, kissing your knuckles as he stares at you, love shining through, “I love you so fucking much,” he whispers out, his hips faltering slightly as he declares his adoration for you.

Nodding, you bite your lip, prying your eyes open to look into his, “I love you too, Hoonie,” you confess back to him, hips also losing their rhythm as you struggle to focus on anything other than the coil in your stomach.

You bring your lips to his hand, mimicking his earlier actions, “Cum with me, Sunghoon,” you whisper into the back of his hand, your lips parted as you suck in a deep breath, ready for release.

Your body convulses with pleasure as waves of ecstasy wash over you, leaving you trembling and breathless in their wake. Sunghoon holds you close, his touch gentle yet possessive as he guides you through the aftershocks of your climax with tender care.

Sunghoon kisses you hungrily, his lips engulfing yours in a passionate embrace as your words push him over the edge. With feral zeal, he releases his seed in you, the white strands of his desire flying straight into your depths and blending with your own release.

Your bodies melt together in the heat of passion and you both cry one other's names along with a stream of curses, lost in the throes of pleasure and need. Sunghoon punctuates each passionate proclamation with two simple utterings of "I love you," ensuring that his words are conveyed sincerely

As you come down from the euphoric high, you find yourself enveloped in Sunghoon's embrace, his love and adoration surrounding you like a warm blanket on a cold night. In this moment, with him by your side, you feel truly complete, knowing that you are loved and cherished beyond measure.

Laying you down, Sunghoon, slides out of you gently, making sure he doesn’t hurt you, “Sweets, where is your bathroom?” he asks but you’re still too fucked out to comprehend his question, leaving him to figure it out on his own, “Stay here, baby, I’ll be back,” he instructs, putting on his boxers and tucking his semi-hard cock into them.

Leaning an ear to the door, Sunghoon assesses if anyone magically came home while you two were going at it like animals. The silence he hears elicits relief into his body as he opens the door, confident no other member of the Kang family will see his practically naked figure.

Opening a few doors through trial and error, he stumbles into Minhee’s room. The curiosity within him leads him to look around, hand searching for the light. Once he switches it on, he sees exactly what he was expecting, a clutter of mess placed in every corner. It’s similar to his room, decor-wise, but there’s one thing that he notices, standing prominent on Minhee’s nightstand.

Sunghoon reaches for the picture of you at 3 years old, sleeping next to your older brother, hugging one another tightly. You’re wearing matching pyjamas and smiles with no cares in the world. He knows your bond with Minhee is strong, stronger than most siblings; he thinks perhaps that’s why it was so easy to forgive you for lying to him. Seeing this picture now only punctuates his thoughts.

And after his conversation with Minhee today, he knows you would both do anything to protect one another.

“What are you doing in here?” you ask, hugging him from behind. Your eyes stare at the picture in the frame and you laugh, “Oh my days, Minhee and I were so young back then,” you fondly pout.

Sunghoon wraps an arm around your shoulder, “I was looking for the bathroom to get you cleaned up but I came across his room,” he admits sheepishly, rubbing your shoulder.

“Hmm,” you acknowledge, taking the frame and placing it back on the desk. You pause your motions as you look around his desk. It had been a long time since you had been in your brother's room, possibly 2 years, but you don’t remember all of the clutter on his worktop.

Picking up the paper fortune teller, you can't help but laugh at the whimsical relic of your childhood, "I didn't know he kept all this stuff," you say wistfully, your fingers tracing the faded creases of the paper. Memories flood your mind as you recall the countless hours spent crafting these simple yet cherished treasures with your brother.

Your gaze then falls upon the painting, a colourful masterpiece that holds a special place in your heart despite its simplistic charm. "And look at this," you remark, your voice tinged with nostalgia. "I remember making this in nursery. It was supposed to be a house, but I’m clearly no Picasso," you chuckle, the memory bringing warmth to your heart.

Putting it back, you see the picture you sent him from your award ceremony, sitting proudly next to his mouse, “He printed this out?” you ask no one, “I thought this would be the last picture he would want to see every day.”

The picture didn’t just represent your achievement, it represented the lies you sat in for months without Minhee knowing. This picture was amongst the bunch that had you and Sunghoon sitting happily in love, an accidental click that exposed your deceit.

Sunghoon kisses your temple, “He’s proud of you, baby,” he says, trying to ease your tense shoulders, “That night, sure, the aftermath was a shitshow. But you still achieved something amazing, and he’s proud.”

His words lighten you a little, a smile creeping on your face as you put it back. Shaking your emotions away, you look up at your boyfriend, “Let’s get out of here, I’ll show you where the bathroom is.” You push him out of Minhee’s bedroom, closing the door behind you.

“While you’re up,” Sunghoon follows you, hand in yours, “Why don’t we just take a shower?” he suggests, wiggling his eyebrows mischievously.

You roll your eyes and open up the bathroom door, “Fine, but only quickly, last time I started to shrivel up like a prune with how long you kept me in there,” you joke, turning the light on.

Sunghoon smirks, “I promise, I’ll be quick,” he leans down to your ear, “I’ll just make sure I go at you rough and hard, hmm?”

taglist (closed!!): @heelee-01 @zerasari @beomgyusonlywife @iwaplant @monstanctiny21 @chiiiiiiiiis @minniejenseo @run2gyuz @jngwnlvs @haelahoops @capri-cuntz @nctislifue @jaehoonii @weyukinluv @skzenhalove @enhypenlovre @cherriruto @bambangan @who-tf-soddhi @nxzz-skz @nshmrarki @hotsforikeu @enhastolemyheart @erehkinnie30 @judeduartewannabe @neosexual @fakeuwus @positivelyinlovewithjungwon @tobiosbbyghorl @kimsunoops

#enhypen smut #enha smut #enhypen x reader #enha x reader #sunghoon smut #sunghoon x reader #aj writes #melting point #enhypen angst

406 notes · View notes

sturnioloskies · 5 months

Text

Too Damn Long // C.S.

by 💋Natalie💋

summary: chris hasn't jerked off in six weeks and desperately wants to get off

mentions: @oversturn ily 😝💋🤭

warnings: SMUT / mommy kink / sharing is caring / minors dni

DISCLAIMER: these stories are fictional :) we do not actually legitimately think matt and chris would share a partner.

text - reader

text - chris sturniolo

text - matt sturniolo

Word Count: 4318

--------------------------------

It had been far too long for Chris’s liking. Six weeks and two days too long, to be exact. Of course he had enjoyed his time on tour with his brothers, he loved getting to travel the country and make all of these wonderful memories with the people he loved the most. The excitement had died down after the first few days, though. Not that he wasn’t enjoying his time or ungrateful for anything at all, he was just tired and missed the comforts of being at home. The car and late night rides with his brothers, his bathroom where he could take showers for as long as he wanted, his bedroom, his bed…he craved it. Being away from home for too long drained him of all of his energy.

Being back home was like a breath of fresh air. But being back in LA after their month and a half of touring didn’t eliminate anything in their busy work schedules. From recording videos, to designing merch, to meetings and sponsorships, the boys continued to stay booked and busy.

“I’ll be back in a few hours.”

Chris looked up from his phone as Matt trudged over to the couch, leaning down to be eye-level with his girlfriend. She looked up from her phone as well, a smile finding its way onto her face when she made eye contact with Matt. “Okay, can you get me a couple things while you’re out?” She asks, earning an eye roll from him in response. His hands rest on the couch on either side of her, his weight being shifted as he leans closer to her and presses a soft kiss to her lips.

“So needy. Text me a list,” he tells her. He looks over at his brother for a moment. “You need anything?”

Chris went to speak, but was cut off before he could even start.

“Pepsi, yeah yeah I know. Is there anything you NEED?”

Chris shrugged, leaning back and hooking an arm over the back of the couch as his gaze switched back down to his phone. “If I think of anything I'll let you know.”

Matt rolled his eyes again. A swift smack to his chest and his attention was back on the beauty in front of him. “Be nice,” she warned. “You’ve been at each other's throats all day,” she reminds him in a much more hushed tone.

“This is me being nice-“

“Matt-“

“I’m being for real,” he laughs.

“Matthew Bernard.”

“Okay, fine.”

Chris pretended like he hadn’t heard what she said, he bit the inside of his cheek to hold back the smirk that threatened to blow his cover. “Yeah, be nice,” he parroted, his gaze still locked on his phone. Nobody ever said anything about it, but they all knew who wore the pants in that relationship. Matt would crawl on hot coals if she told him to. Chris always teased him and gave him shit about being a simp. He used that facade to hide the fact that he would do the same.

Matt shot Chris a warning look, not in the mood to deal with his childish antics tonight. She rested her fingertips on Matt’s cheek, gently turning his head to face her once again. She leaned toward him, pressing a delicate lingering kiss to his lips. Matt caught himself from falling forward a bit when she pulled away, not wanting the kiss to be over with so soon. His girlfriend smiled at him, a soft laugh escaping her. “Go before you’re late. I’ll text you, and I’ll see you tonight.”

Reluctantly, Matt pushed himself back to an upright position. “Fine. I’ll see you in a bit. I love you,” He states, grabbing his keys and wallet off of the coffee table. His girlfriend repeated the last statement to him, a smile creeping its way onto Matt’s face.

Once Matt had finally left the house, Chris put his phone down on the couch and looked over at the girl sitting only a foot or two away from him. She wouldn’t agree, but Chris always thought she looked the prettiest like this; her messy hair up in a claw clip, loose hairs framing her face in long blonde waves, no makeup besides the sharp black liner that seemed to be almost engraved in her skin by how often she wore it, the comfy clothes she wore around the house when it was clear that she had nowhere to be anytime soon.

And neither of them had anywhere to be anytime soon.

“Wanna watch a movie?”

—————————

Chris wanted to be invested in the movie, he really did. But it was proving to be much more difficult than he thought it would. The smell of her perfume was driving him wild, he wanted nothing more than to just bury his face into her neck and suffocate himself in the sweet velvety scent. How he missed her soft skin against him and her gentle touch, the sound of her voice purring his name when she spoke to him. It had been so long since the last time, too long.

Normally he could control himself and keep his composure, normally he would be the one taking care of her whenever Matt was out of the house. But Chris had needs too, and those needs hadn’t been met in six weeks, two days, and eighteen hours.

The sheer glimpse of her nipples and the valley of her supple breasts through her shirt had Chris’s heart lodged in his throat. The blood rushed to his cheeks, his face feeling hot. He couldn’t help but stare at her chest as his mind flooded with many thoughts, all of which would grant him a one way ticket to hell.

He scooted closer to her, resting his head on her shoulder. She smiled, wrapping her arm around his shoulders to pull him in closer. Chris obliged, leaning into her and nestling his face into the crook of her neck. Every inhale had him floating in a pool of rose petals and strawberries, he could drown himself in the scent. Her shoulder was cold, and Chris prayed that she couldn’t feel how hot his cheek was against her skin. The bridge of his nose brushed against her neck, his lips ghosting over her soft, pale skin. The blood rushed straight to his cock as he thought about biting and sucking marks all over her, the sounds she might make if he found a particularly sensitive spot.

“What has gotten into you tonight?” She asks, running her fingers delicately through Chris’s hair, her nails gently dragging along his scalp. A shiver ran down his spine, his cock twitched in his pants, he felt his jeans beginning to grow tighter at the crotch. ‘Six weeks and almost three days is what’s gotten into me,’ he thought to himself.

What the fuck do I say? I haven’t jerked off in over a month? I ruined three pairs of boxers in my sleep because of the dreams I had of you? I’d get bricked if I heard you on the phone with Matt? I’d meet hundreds of people and the whole time I would only be thinking about you and how I'd kill to bury myself in you?

Chris opted on keeping his mouth shut and just nudged her with his nose again. He smiled to himself when he heard her laugh, his eyes subconsciously fluttering closed as she continued to play with his hair.

The tightness of his pants began to grow uncomfortable. His face scrunched up at the much too familiar ache, his breathing growing heavier as he did everything in his power to not touch himself right then and there. The sweet temptation of grinding his crotch up into the palm of his hand was taunting his mind, his cock throbbing, begging for any kind of friction. He buried his face deeper, trying so hard to ignore what he was feeling.

“Chris?”

Oh her voice was like honey, and the sound of his name rolling off her tongue made his cock twitch once more. He loved when she said his name. Especially when he had himself buried deep inside of her. Nothing in the world sounded sweeter to him than his name falling blissfully from her lips while balls deep in her.

Oh he missed that. Nothing satisfied him more than his brother’s girlfriend’s tight pussy. Just the thought of her pretty, drooling pussy on display for him made his dick ache. How something could be so slick and so tight at the same time, he had no idea. His cotton boxers became dampened by the precum leaking through the fabric. He spent so many nights dreaming of her thighs hooked over his shoulders, the bridge of his nose buried in her heat. Teasing her, tasting her, pleasing her.

A shaky breath escaped him. Chris brought a hand to his crotch, trying to stay silent as he adjusted himself. His cock stiffened even more at the contact, the friction sending waves of pleasure through him. Unable to stop himself, he began to stroke himself through the fabric of his pants. Slowly, not wanting to get caught. Fuck, how embarrassing would that be? But fuck…it’s been too long and it felt so good.

Chris’s head was clouded with sinful thoughts. The sounds she would make, the way she tasted, the passion, the heat, the excitement. He knew this wasn’t the time to be thinking about those things, it was just so hard not to with her right there. He let out another shaky breath as he continued to touch himself, warmth flooding his body with each pleasurable stroke. His face was flushed with a deep red blush, thank god they had decided to watch the movie with the lights off.

“Ma?”

“Hmm?”

“H-Have I been a good boy t-tonight?”

The question had her at a loss for words. It wasn’t unusual for Chris to act childish around her, everyone always joked that Matt and his girlfriend were practically co-parenting him. But it was rare that he wanted to be called a good boy, never mind refer to himself as that. However, it had been a long day of unpacking, meetings, scheduling, and creating more content for the three of them. He’s gotta be exhausted and probably doesn’t even know what the hell he’s saying.

She continued running her fingers through his soft hair. “Yeah, you’ve been good, Chris.”

He let out a dissatisfied whine, brushing his stubbly cheek against her shoulder. It took everything in him not to bite at her soft pillowy skin. He twitched a little, his dick aching for more. Sweat began to form on his brow, the slow movement of his hand wasn’t enough anymore. He needed more, he needed so much more.

“J-Just wanna be a good b-boy for you,” he confesses. He couldn’t help it, he needed more. He sped up his strokes; not by a lot, but enough to satisfy the uncomfortable ache. Another shaky breath passes his lips. He couldn’t think straight, all he could think about was her and how badly he needed her. “M-Mommy.”

Her eyes widened a bit, her own cheeks becoming flushed and pink. Chris didn’t pull the ‘mommy’ card very often, but it drove her absolutely insane whenever he did. Normally he liked to be in charge, he liked to call the shots, he liked being in control.

That was clearly not the case tonight.

“You’re such a good boy for me, Chris.” She cooed.

The sluttiest of whimpers fell from his lips, though it was muffled against her neck. She smiled to herself when she felt his lips placing soft kisses to her skin. “M-Missed you s-so much.” His voice was unsteady, breaking a little at the end as another whine escaped him.

Her attention was no longer on the movie still playing. How could it be under these circumstances? She looked over, her breath getting caught in her throat when she saw what Chris had been doing. His hand strained, muscles tensed, veins exposed. She watched him for a moment as he fisted at his painfully hard cock through the thick denim of his jeans.

“Aww, did you miss me?” She asked, earning yet another whimper from Chris, his hair tickling her cheek as he buried his face impossibly closer into her neck. “You were gone for a long time, huh?” she continued, dragging her fingertips along his arm.

Chris froze. Fuck, there was no way she didn’t know what he had been doing. A wave of humiliation and embarrassment hit him like a fucking semi truck, and he covered his crotch with his hands as an even deeper blush rose to his cheeks. “I’m so sorry-“ he barely whispered, closing his eyes tightly, begging and praying to any of the gods that he’d wake up and this all would’ve just been some really weird wet dream.

“For?”

His cock jolted at the sound of her voice. God this was just getting worse and worse. He was digging himself a hole and every word or action was just making it harder for him to get out of it. Sorry for borderline beating off in front of you, I went six weeks without touching myself or you and my dick just couldn’t take it anymore.

Her touch left goosebumps along his arm, his breathing became more uneven as she dragged her fingertips all the way down to his hand. “I-I didn’t mean t-to-“

“It’s okay, pretty boy. It’s been a while for you, huh?” She asked, applying some pressure to where he craved it the most. Chris moved his hands, granting her access to whatever she wanted from him. His breath caught in his throat as her fingertips dragged slowly over the length of his aching, throbbing cock. Yet another whimper falling from his lips.

“I asked you a question, Christopher.”

“Y-Yes, been so long,” he whined. A wave of pleasure ran through him as her hand began to stroke him through his jeans. His hips subconsciously lifted to meet her touch, desperate for more friction, more pressure, more anything.

“Did you go all that time without jerking off, Chris?” She asked him, a knowing smirk growing on her face as she continued to tease him. He nodded, unable to form words as she kept touching him. His brain felt cloudy, all he could think about was how good she made him feel and how badly he wanted to feel her around him.

He didn’t have a shred of dignity left. He didn’t care either. He hasn’t felt this desperate to get off since he went through puberty. His balls ached, heavy with arousal. His cock sensitive, any movement made him shiver with pleasure. “P-Please mommy. I’ve been s’ good. P-Please help. It hurts,” he moaned softly, kissing her neck while she toyed with him.

“Do you want me to help you, pretty boy?”

He nodded desperately, grinding his hips up into her hand once more. “Y-Yes, i’ve been so good, mommy. Need it s’ bad,'' he whined, nipping at her soft skin.

She removed her hand from his crotch and Chris lifted his head out of the crook of her neck, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Did I do something wrong? Fuck, is she not into the mommy thing? Fuck, what did i do-

“Take your pants off, sweet boy. Let mommy take care of you.”

He didn’t need to be told twice. His hands shook as he struggled with his belt, huffing a little in irritation that his belt was choosing NOW to be a pain in the ass. “F-Fuck,” he mumbled under his breath.

“Easy, tiger.”

Her soft hands rested on his, steadying him. She helped him with his belt, and once it was undone he finished unbuttoning his jeans, lifting his hips up to push them down to his knees. He leaned back against the couch, sighing in relief. His cock, now only restrained by his soft cotton boxers, pressing up against the fabric, begging to be let out. He whimpered when he felt her hand on his crotch again, hissing in a sharp inhale when he felt her thumb massaging his clothed tip.

“Poor baby. Were you gonna wait until I realized you needed help? Or were you gonna ruin your boxers right here?” She purred, feeling the wet stain of his arousal. He let out a soft moan, her words making him lose all sense of his surroundings, his brain clouded with pleasure. She let out a quiet chuckle, removing her hand from him once more. “This isn’t gonna work if you don’t use your words, Chris.”

“F-Fuck, please ‘m sorry,” he looked over at her, his eyes full of desperation. His lip quivered as her fingers ran along his thigh. His cock twitched as her knuckles grazed his crotch, his jaw going slack as he let his eyes flutter closed. “D-Didn’t wanna bug ya, Ma. I-I’m sorry, sh-should’ve been more quiet,” he confessed.

“Don’t be sorry, baby. I’m happy to take care of you,” She whispered, pressing delicate kisses to his face. “Don’t hide from me, tell me what you want.”

“A-Anything,” he replied, his voice wavering a little as her hand inched closer to his crotch. He pursed his lips, choking back another whine. His head fell back against the back of the couch. He looked over beside him, admiring the woman next to him. “P-Please, do whatever you want, I need it so bad, mommy,” he breathed out, their eyes locking as he spoke. “Saved it all for you, mommy. It was so hard b-but i wanted t-to be a good boy for you,” he whispered, a surprised moan interrupting him as he felt her hand beginning to stroke him through his boxers once more. “F-Fuck.”

She smiled, watching the way his face scrunched up as she gave him the friction he was begging for. She leaned closer to him, still pleasing him as she pressed a gentle kiss to his cheek. “Oh Chris, you’re such a good boy for mommy, hmm?” She purred, to which he replied back with a whimper, the word ‘please’ incessantly falling from his lips. She chuckled, kissing his cheek again. “So polite. How can I say no to that?”

“C-Can I kiss you?”

She laughed softly at his question. He knew he didn’t have to ask in moments like this, but he always did anyway. Although he loved the time he got to have with her, she wasn’t his and he knew that. The guilt would eat him alive if he did anything during these moments to make her uncomfortable.

“You know you don’t have t-“

“Please?”

Her free hand gently touched his cheek and he looked up at her, his eyes full of dumb bliss and desperation. She leaned in, her nose gently brushing against Chris’s, her lips ghosting over his. “You wanna kiss me, pretty boy?” She whispered, lips brushing ever so delicately against his as she spoke.

“God yes,” he replied. “Havent k-kissed you in s’ long.”

“I know, baby. It’s been too long,” she agreed, though she still didn’t kiss him. She traced his bottom lip with her thumb, her other hand still massaging his stiff aching cock.

“Fuck, I-I’m fuckin’ begging you,” he panted softly, his hot breath fanning against her skin. A bead of sweat rolled down from his temple. “Please, I miss your lips, m-mommy.”

That was enough for her to close the gap between them, pressing her lips to his. Chris wanted to be good, he wanted to let her have control, but it had been too fucking long and he was desperate to be as close to her as possible. He kissed her back hungrily, his cock twitching at the sound she made. Something mixed between a whimper and a gasp. It drove him absolutely fucking crazy and he was dying to hear it again. Chris let his hands rest on her thighs, slowly trailing up to her waist.

She was surprised by his sudden confidence. She always loved whenever Chris took control. But tonight was different, and he needed to be fully aware of that. Just as his hands had made it up to her breasts, she pulled her hand away from his crotch, a frustrated whine escaping him. She brought her hand up to his neck, wrapping her fingers around his throat. His cock jolted, Chris could feel the precum drooling onto his pelvis. He panted as she pulled away from the kiss, her lips ever so lightly brushing against his. She was so close but so far at the same time, and every time he attempted to close that gap between them again, she pulled away further. “Tsk tsk, what happened to being mommy’s good boy, hmm?”

He gulped, heavy uneven breaths being all he could get out for a solid twenty seconds. “F-Fuck, ‘m sorry Ma, i just got carried away,” he panted. “J-Jus’ missed your lips s’ much.”

“Naughty boys don’t get rewards, sweetheart.”

“Fuck, p-please,” he choked out, eyes glossing over as the ache began to grow unbearable. “Please ‘m sorry, Ma. I-I’ve been so good, d-didn't touch m-myself all that time. I-I just got excited, ‘m sorry. F-Fuck, please d-dont stop. I’ll be a good boy, I'll be good-“ he rambled on, pleas continuing to spill from his lips, desperate for her to do anything. Her hand around his neck tightened, just the tiniest bit, and Chris let out possibly the filthiest sound she had ever heard from him.

She smiled. She was in control again. She hooked her leg over his lap, straddling his waist, hovering over him. “You like when mommy does that, hmm?” she cooed, earning a whimper from him in response.

He couldn’t focus on a damn thing. When she straddled him his cock throbbed, and he prayed that she would sink just a little lower, just so he could feel her on his lap. Just so he could feel her roll her hips against his. Just so he could feel the outline of her pussy through the thin fabric of the plaid pajama bottoms rubbing against his aching erection. He spent so many nights thinking about her on top of him, missing the feeling of burying himself deep in her tight, wet cunt. Nothing could satisfy him anymore, only her.

“God i’m fuckin begging ya, ma. I’ll do anything, p-please just- fuck,” he moaned, his eyes fluttering shut as she tightened her grip around his neck once more, his brain feeling foggy, his face growing hotter. “Anything you want, mommy. P-Please, I’ll be a good boy. Your good boy. J-Just wanna be good for you, mommy. I-I-I wanna be good.”

“Oh but you are, sweet boy,” she purred in his ear, watching in amusement as he shivered at her words. She lowered her hips, seating herself onto his lap. His breath hitched, trembling hands grasping her waist. She bit her lip, he was painfully hard. Even through the fabric between them, she could feel the throbbing. His hips lifted to meet hers, desperate for more. “You really missed me huh?” She hummed.

“You have no fucking idea.”

“Give me an idea then,” she tested.

“Couldn’t get you outta my fuckin’ head, Mama.” He whispered, opening his eyes to look up at her. “Missed you so much. Your pretty face ‘n your sweet lips. You’re beautiful tits ‘n how you look when I play with your nips when you’re all stoned ‘n fucked out,” he spoke, his voice raspy, his accent growing thicker with each confession. “Couldn’t get your pretty pussy outta my head all fucking month. Every fuckin’ day, all day-“ he was cut off by her hips rolling against his yet again, pleasure running through him.

“So hard for me already, I’ve barely even touched you,” she teased, grinding against him yet again.

He felt that all too familiar feeling in his stomach, his hands holding her still on his lap. “Fuck, ‘m gonna cum if y-you keep going,” he mumbled, his chest rising and falling with uneven breaths.

“Isn’t that what you want, sweet boy?”

He hummed, pursing his lips. His eyes were hooded as he looked at the beautiful girl on top of him. “S-So bad,” he nodded.

“Let me take care of you then, baby.”

“Wanna…last…” he breathed out, head falling back again as she rolled her hips against his. His hips bucked up, the unexpected reaction causing her to let out a high whimper. “D-Don’t want it t’ be over yet,” he continued, though that was proving to be difficult as he could feel his orgasm inching closer and closer.

Chris felt her move closer to him, his face heating up even more as she pressed kisses to his cheek, eventually her lips ghosting over his ear. She was so close, her perfume swirled around him, his brain getting clouded with the scent. “Oh we’re not even close to being finished, pretty boy,” she giggled, dragging her hands slowly down Chris’s chest. “We’ve got a lot to catch up on.”

He choked out a soft cry, warmth flooding his body. He brought his hand down to his crotch, stroking himself through his boxers to ride himself through his orgasm. His lips parted, soft pants escaping him. “F-Fuck, mommy,” he whined, a high pitched moan following his words as he reached his high. His hips subconsciously bucked up, his load shooting into the fabric of his boxers, his lower abdomen slick with his cum.

She continued pressing gentle kisses to his face. “That’s it, such a good boy. You earned this, pretty boy. You did so good for me,” she praised him, talking him through his first orgasm of the evening. She trailed kisses down to his lips, smiling to herself as he tried to catch his breath. “That’s it, baby. Let mommy take care of you tonight.”

-------------------

a/n: i already have three other parts lined up ready to go for this story

#chris sturniolo #christopher sturniolo #matt sturniolo #nick sturniolo #sturniolo #sturniolo fanfic #sturniolo fanfiction #sturniolo imagine #sturniolos #chris sturniolo smut #matt sturniolo smut #sturniolo x reader #chris sturniolo x reader #sturniolo triplets #sturniolo smut #smut

637 notes · View notes

avatar-anna · 3 months

Text

Assistant! Reader x Harry Styles Masterlist

April 2016

“Thank you for meeting me.”

Y/n settled into the seat across from Harry. Her hands curled tightly around her mug, apprehension seeping into her bones. “Of course.”

She had been surprised when Harry called her, asking to meet at the Beachwood Cafe. She hadn’t heard from him in months, not one call or text, not even an email. Not that Y/n really expected much when One Direction finally went on hiatus, but after zero communication, she wasn’t quite sure why he’d called her all these months later.

“How are you? I haven’t seen you in ages,” Harry asked.

Y/n’s eyebrows raised a bit, but she answered him anyway after taking a sip of her coffee. “Fine, I guess. You?”

“Good!” Harry said excitedly. “Taking a break the last few months has been…I don’t know. Peaceful, but odd, you know? I’ve never had so much time to myself before.”

“Must be nice,” Y/n said, trying to hide the irritation in her voice.

“Yeah, but I realized that I kind of miss it,” he said. “I knew once we decided on the hiatus that I wanted to do my own thing, but I thought I would take a longer break, but I feel like I’m…itching to get back to work.”

That definitely seemed like Harry. Y/n had worked for him for years, and even when there were breaks between tours, he was hard at work—writing, going to Fashion Week, collaborating with other artists, vocal training, even trying new recipes in his state-of-the-art kitchen, which led to a phone call at one in the morning where Harry asked Y/n to come over and see if his macrons tasted "fluffy enough." It seemed only right that he rested for mere months before starting a new project. She could practically picture him at either of his homes in LA or London, scribbling in his leatherbound journal or playing new melodies on his guitar or piano (and the occasional late-night pastry party). As long as she’d known him, Harry had been a hard worker through and through. A little on the wild side when he had some tequila in him, but when it came down to his career, he was focused, determined.

“Good for you,” Y/n said, meaning it. She always thought he was capable of more. “So what comes next for you? Have you recorded songs already?”

“Not quite. I’m planning a trip to Jamaica to write and record there. It’s remote, serene, a good place to get away. So we’ll have to start booking flights and places to stay and—”

“I’m sorry, ‘We?’” Y/n asked, her brow furrowing with confusion.

Harry matched her look of confusion with one of his own. “Yeah, I mean—I need you. I can’t do this without you.”

The sentiment warmed Y/n’s heart for a moment, but his immediate assumption that she would drop everything just because he asked her to brought the irritation swarming back. “Mr. Sty—Harry, you know I don’t work for you anymore, right?”

“What do you mean? Are you talking about the hiatus? I just thought we could all use some time off, but…I guess I just thought—”

Harry didn’t finish his thought, but his cheeks were flushed with embarrassment. Y/n would’ve found it cute if he hadn’t been so dense. Resentment still circled around her like a fog, and she wouldn’t let it go so easily, she couldn’t.

“I was employed by your management, Harry. To be an assistant to a member of One Direction,” Y/n explained. “I was let go. I had to quickly find another job doing something else.”

“Oh.”

Y/n supposed she should’ve anticipated being fired, but she didn’t. There was a lot of information that she was privy to that most people weren’t, secrets that were tightly bound by an NDA when she was first hired, but talks of the hiatus was very hushed. She knew to suspect that somewhere down the line the boys would finally take a break, but it came a lot sooner than she was prepared for, and she was left jobless before she had the chance to line something else up. Y/n thought that Harry would give her the courtesy of a warning, but he said nothing about it to her, didn’t offer much except a side hug after One Direction’s last performance.

So yeah, she was a little bitter.

“I’m—I’m really sorry, Y/n. I know it doesn’t make up for…all of this and everything you went through, but I am truly sorry.”

“Thank you.”

Y/n believed him, believed that he was sorry for everything that went down, but it still hurt to know she wasn’t someone he was close enough to talk to about all of this at the time. She was Harry’s assistant, she knew that, but they’d been through a lot together. But he was ever the professional it seemed, and it was her job to remember that, not his.

When she realized her coffee was finished, Y/n stood up. “Well, it was good seeing you, Harry. Good luck on your next project. I’m sure it’ll be great.”

“Wait, but—you’re not—you‘re leaving?”

“I have to run a couple errands before work," Y/n explained. She rested her hand on his shoulder and squeezed gently. “But really, no hard feelings. I wish you all the best.”

She left Harry at the table, heading for the front of the cafe and toward the busy street beyond. Her heart felt heavy as she walked away, but she tried to shake the feeling that she was walking away from more than just her boss. Former boss. Like her mother always reminded her, she couldn’t be a personal assistant forever.

“Wait!”

Y/n turned on instinct, eyes widening as Harry jogged after her, his little bun bouncing with each step. He skidded to a stop in front of her, green eyes wide and searching. For what, she wasn’t sure, but the heat of his gaze was enough to make butterflies stir in her stomach.

Putting on her best front, she raised her eyebrows, waiting for Harry to say whatever he needed to.

“I wasn’t kidding earlier. I need you, Y/n,” he said. “I—You’re the only one who really knows me, who I know will have my back no matter what. I need a familiar face in my corner.”

I need you, Y/n. Those words were her kryptonite. Year after year, Y/n heard Harry's voice over the phone as he roused her from sleep, read the text messages while she was getting her nails done or watched TV in her hotel room, or on the rare occasion she went on a date. But she had to hold strong. Y/n had been devastated by her sudden layoff, but now she had a life, and she didn't want to get sucked back into Harry's very alluring web of charming smiles, cheesy jokes, and endless adventure. That was his life, not hers.

“I have a job, Harry. I can’t just drop everything and quit because you suddenly want me to—”

“What are they paying you?”

Y/n’s brows furrowed. “Excuse me?”

Harry pushed on. “What are they paying you? I’ll double it.”

Scoffing in disbelief, she said, “It’s not about the money—”

“Triple,” he countered. Harry took her hand in his and squeezed it. He looks desperate, Y/n thought.

“I can’t just quit my job because you remembered I existed,” Y/n said quietly, pulling her hand out of his. She clung to her resolve, hoping Harry would make this easy and just let it go, let her go. “I—I deserve more.”

More of what, she wasn’t sure, but Y/n knew it was true. Harry only reached out because he needed something from her, and that hurt more than she cared to admit.

“You’re right. I’m sorry,” Harry said, looking down at his shoes. A pair of scuffed Chelsea boots he wore practically everywhere. Y/n had bought him a pair of Vans one year, an attempt to switch up his wardrobe, but he still chose the boots nine times out of ten. “Just—At least think about coming to Jamaica. Please?”

“Harry—”

“Not as my assistant. As a guest. A friend,” Harry amended. “We’re planning on staying at a huge villa, and I want to make up for being an idiot. Just—Just think about it. Please.”

Despite everything, Y/n found herself wanting to say yes. It was that magnetic pull she felt toward Harry that had kept her working for him for so long. He was an important person in her life, and up until he’d all but ghosted her after the hiatus, she thought she was important to him too. In spite of his misgivings, Y/n still wanted to believe that she was.

It was so stupid, but it felt good to be wanted by him. She was an idiot, she knew that. But her friendship with Harry was legitimate, he'd just acted like a complete idiot. She'd known him long enough to know he was very capable of acting like an idiot. So even though she shouldn’t, even though she had carefully lined up her reasons not to in a little line, she started to cave.

But she couldn’t make the decision now. Not when Harry was looking at her with pleading green eyes and his sad little puppy dog face, his cologne dizzyingly lovely. No, she owed it to herself to really think about what she wanted. If getting sucked back into that whirlwind was worth it. Worth getting her heart properly broken when she knew he would never feel the same about her.

"I'll show up at work, you know," Harry said. "I'm not above it. You might think I am, but I'm not."

Y/n had no doubt in her mind that he would. Along with being an idiot, Harry was very stubborn, and very persistent. She had years with him to know that. Did she really need Harry Styles showing up at her place of work?

“Fine, I’ll think about it,” she finally said, trying to pretend like her heart was screaming to just agree. But her heart was an impulsive little shit that was bound to get her in trouble.

Harry’s face broke out into a wide grin, one that displayed those famous dimples and lit up his entire face. It was hard to feel like he didn't think she was the only person on earth to exist when he looked like that, like he was convinced she’d already said yes. “I’ll take it.”

#harry styles #harry styles x assistant!reader #harry styles x reader #harry styles blurb #harry styles fanfic #harry styles oneshot #harry styles imagine #harry styles writing #harry styles fluff #harry styles x you #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles one shot #harry styles fic

387 notes · View notes

outsideratheart · 3 months

Text

A Return Worth Celebrating (Fridolina Rolfo x reader)

A/N: Here’s a little something to celebrate Frido’s return to team training!

Monday’s had the reputation of being terrible but not this Monday. No, today was a good day. Today was the day that Fridolina Rolfö, your girlfriend, returned to team training.

“You ready?” You ask as you walk out onto the field together.

“As I’ll ever be” the blonde wore a smile on her face but you knew deep down that she was nervous. The two of you had spent the night previous cuddled in bed discussing what the blonde was feeling and why she was feeling it.

Before you reach the group you wrap your arm around her waist, pulling her close as you place a gentle kiss on her hairline.

“You’ve got this. You are strong and you are powerful”

“What? I’m not beautiful today?” Fridolina knows the mantra well, you had made her say it to herself whenever she was having a bad day.

“You, Miss Rolfö, will always be beautiful in my eyes. Now let’s get going. I’ve haven’t been late once this season and I won’t have you tarnishing my impeccable record” you jog off towards your team mates.

“Right because I’m the bad influence out the two of us” the swede says sarcastically. Everyone knew it was you who corrupted her.

The session goes better than Frido expected. Her passes were accurate, her movement fluid and much to her surprise her fitness wasn’t far off from where it was before. It did come as a shock to find your cubby empty as she entered the locker room. She assumed you had gone for a shower until she saw a note sitting in her locker.

I had to go. See you at home.

I love you, always.

Y/N.

“What no celebrations for your return?” Ingrid asks.

“Looks like she had a meeting or something. We discussed our schedules on Friday and she didn’t mention anything. It must be something last minute” Frido defended your actions even if they had hurt her.

She had been so excited to be back on the pitch for numerous reasons but being able to play with you again was top of that list. You seemed so happy for her this morning and she automatically assumed you would do something together to celebrate.

Little did she know you did have plans to celebrate. Your celebrations were a little bit more intimate than what was planned with the team.

As on queue, Frido walks into your shared apartment just as you finish setting the table.

When the blonde walked through the hallway she smelt home, more specifically a home cooked meal. Then, as she turned the corner, she saw you standing next to the candle light table.

“Baby, i’m so proud of you”

She was rendered speechless.

“Say something, please” you ask politely.

She says nothing. She lets her actions do the talking and you don’t complain at all. You loved moments like this when it was just the two of you. When you could express your love with kisses and other displays of affection.

“Is that my —“

“Kött” you pull away from her hold to read the name of the meal of your hand “Köttbullar”

Frido pulled your hand towards her to see if you had really written down the name of the meal. Lo and behold, you had.

“I think I did it right. I was this close” you pinch your thumb and index thumb very close together “to going to Ikea and buying some”

You follow to the take and pull the chair out for her.

“For you, m’lady”

“Why thank you” she kisses your cheek as a show of appreciation.

You watch nervously as she takes a bite of the meatball. It mimicked the nervous energy you feel as you watch a team mate take a penalty. She takes her time and it feels like she chews it 100 times before giving any indication of whether it’s good or not.

“5 stars” Frido does a little happy dance in her seat “who knew this is what you were preparing for when you ate my Mamma’s Köttbullar by the bucket full”

“It was all apart of my master plan” you raise your eyebrows playfully.

“Is that right? What else does this master plan entail?” Frido asks curiously.

“Stick around and you’ll find out”

You had a lot planned for you and Fridolina. Some things had been ticked off, some were in motion and others were due in the future.

#fridolina rolfo x reader #Fridolina Rolfö imagine #Fridolina Rolfö one shot #Woso x reader #woso one shot #woso imagine #barcelona femeni x reader #barcelona femeni imagine #Barcelona Femeni one shot #swedwnt x reader #swedwnt one shot #swedwnt imagine

385 notes · View notes

solarsturniolo · 5 months

Text

Too Damn Long // C.S. pt1

by 💋Natalie💋

summary: chris hasn't jerked off in six weeks and desperately wants to get off

tags: @oversturn @flowerxbunnie @mattsd0ll please reblog and share ☺️🫶🏻

warnings: SMUT / mommy kink / sharing is caring :) / mentions of drugs and smoking / minors dni

DISCLAIMER: these stories are fictional :) I do not actually legitimately think matt and chris would share a partner

text - reader

text - chris sturniolo

text - matt sturniolo

Word Count: 4,318

“I’ll be back in a few hours.”

“So needy. Text me a list,” he tells her. He looks over at his brother for a moment. “You need anything?”

Chris went to speak, but was cut off before he could even start.

“Pepsi, yeah yeah I know. Is there anything you NEED?”

Chris shrugged, leaning back and hooking an arm over the back of the couch as his gaze switched back down to his phone. “If I think of anything I'll let you know.”

“This is me being nice-“

“Matt-“

“I’m being for real,” he laughs.

“Matthew Bernard.”

“Okay, fine.”

And neither of them had anywhere to be anytime soon.

“Wanna watch a movie?”

—————————

The sheer glimpse of her nipples through her shirt had Chris’s heart lodged in his throat. The blood rushed to his cheeks, his face feeling hot. He couldn’t help but stare at her chest as his mind flooded with many thoughts, all of which would grant him a one way ticket to hell.

“Chris?”

“Ma?”

“Hmm?”

“H-Have I been a good boy t-tonight?”

She continued running her fingers through his soft hair. “Yeah, you’ve been good, Chris.”

That was clearly not the case tonight.

“You’re such a good boy for me, Chris.” She cooed.

“For?”

Her touch left goosebumps along his arm, his breathing became more uneven as she dragged her fingertips all the way down to his hand. “I-I didn’t mean t-to-“

“I asked you a question, Christopher.”

“Do you want me to help you, pretty boy?”

He nodded desperately, grinding his hips up into her hand once more. “Y-Yes, i’ve been so good, mommy. Need it s’ bad,'' he whined, nipping at her soft skin.

“Take your pants off, sweet boy. Let mommy take care of you.”

“Easy, tiger.”

“Don’t be sorry, baby. I’m happy to take care of you,” She whispered, pressing delicate kisses to his face. “Don’t hide from me, tell me what you want.”

“C-Can I kiss you?”

“You know you don’t have t-“

“Please?”

“God yes,” he replied. “Havent k-kissed you in s’ long.”

“I know, baby. It’s been too long,” she agreed, though she still didn’t kiss him. She traced his bottom lip with her thumb, her other hand still massaging his stiff aching cock.

“Fuck, I-I’m fuckin’ begging you,” he panted softly, his hot breath fanning against her skin. A bead of sweat rolled down from his temple. “Please, I miss your lips, m-mommy.”

He gulped, heavy uneven breaths being all he could get out for a solid twenty seconds. “F-Fuck, ‘m sorry Ma, i just got carried away,” he panted. “J-Jus’ missed your lips s’ much.”

“Naughty boys don’t get rewards, sweetheart.”

“You have no fucking idea.”

“Give me an idea then,” she tested.

“So hard for me already, I’ve barely even touched you,” she teased, grinding against him yet again.

“Isn’t that what you want, sweet boy?”

He hummed, pursing his lips. His eyes were hooded as he looked at the beautiful girl on top of him. “S-So bad,” he nodded.

“Let me take care of you then, baby.”

--------------------------------

a/n: alrighty, here I go re-uploading! It probably won't receive as much attention as it did on the sturnioloskies account, so reblogging will really help :) thanks so much for all of the support I love every one of you

#sturniolo triplets #christopher sturniolo #matt sturniolo #nicolas sturniolo #sturniolo fanfic #sturniolo imagine #sturniolo smut #sturniolo x reader #chris sturniolo #chris sturniolo x reader #chris sturniolo smut #matthew sturniolo #chris sturniolo imagine #chris sturniolo fanfic #sturniolo #christopher sturniolo smut #smut #gnawing at the bars of my enclosure #i need him in a way that is concerning to feminism

288 notes · View notes

xxblairexxss · 10 months

Text

Jibber-jabber

Pairing : Mason Mount x reader

Theme : Fluff

This was so so so cute I had a blast writing it!

Your relationship with Mason wasn’t a secret amongst his fans. Two years ago, Mason asked you to be his girlfriend and a few months later, he uploaded a picture of you on his Instagram story which proved all those rumours that has been flying around to be true. His fans had found your social media way before Mason posted or confirmed anything and it was only because they saw Mason following you, a random girl with no more than 1000 followers and never missed to leave a like on every posts of yours though he never left any comments.

ynusername

Liked by masonmount and others

ynusername 🥐☕️

ynbestfriend miss uuuu

masonmmupdate you are soooo pretty

footballwagssoon mason’s gf??

rebeccaa__19 are you mason’s girlfriend? 🥹

﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎

masonmount has added to their story

12th June

ynusername has added to their story

2nd July

Even though everyone knew you were together and that you were no longer an unfamiliar face amongst the fans, you chose to keep it as private as you can. There would be an occasional pictures of you guys holding hands together or showing off your matching socks or a 2 seconds view of him in your Instagram story to which the fanpages would cut the part of the 15 seconds video and reposted it with the slow motion effect. It wasn’t because you were trying to hide anything or trying to be mysterious but it was because you wanted to use the social media platforms as your personal diary and no one stayed on one topic in their diary.

You had been staying at Mason’s house a lot this month as he tried to sort out his contract which meant he wasn’t at home that much so you would occasionally treat yourself on a solo date where you would took a stroll near the park or got yourself a coffee at the new coffee shop you came across. It was therapeutic sometimes to spend time with yourself.

But today, it was different. Mason asked you out to buy some stuffs at a department store. You told Mason that you wanted to do a vlog and that he didn’t have to be in it. He didn’t mind, of course but what he didn’t knew was that it wasn’t actually a vlog.

You already had your phone recording when you did your makeup earlier so as you talked thorough all the products that you were using, you decided to talk about the plan as well but in a whispering tone now. Not that Mason could hear but just to be safe. “So, we’re going out and I wanted to prank him. I’m gonna chatter about 20 random topics I could think about at one time and none of it are gonna make any sense. I’m not sure how he’s gonna react because he never gets annoyed with me so…”

“Babe, you ready?”

“Yeah!”

﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎﹎

“So, I went to this one bakery the other day, yeah?”

Mason had his hand on your thigh, like he always did whenever he drives and nodded to your question. Your phone was propped against something on the car dash to record both you and Mason. You had asked him once again if he wanted to be in the camera and he said of course he wanted to be seen in the camera with his girlfriend.

“And I asked the worker which one was the best-selling and she said it was pain au chocolat but they had a new menu that made them won the— Oh! Do you know the history of pain au chocolat?”

Mason blinked, trying to catch up with you before shaking his head. “No, I don’t know but babe, what about the new menu?”

“Mase, listen! So August Zang..”

“Wait, who’s Zang?”

“The one who brought pain au chocolat to France! This is why you should listen.”

“Okay, baby, I’m listening.”

“Oh! And there was this cute dog that passed by—”

“Was it Zang’s dog?”

“….what? Mase…” You gave in and cackled at his question. “That doesn’t even make any sense!”

“Oh, yeah, tell me about it, princess.” He pinched on his furrowed brows, didn’t find this whole thing funny, in fact, it was kinda stressing him out but were you gonna stop? Not yet, of course so you continued.

“Then I felt like getting a green tea but there was a stranger that walked past me and the smell of coffee from the one that she was holding— the new menu was something to do with cranberry I think.”

“Okay, babe, are you okay?” He teared his eyes away from the road as the traffic light turned red and placed his hand on the side of your face.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Do you…want me to stop talking?” You leaned into his touch and trailed off.

“No, no. Keep talking. The topics are kinda complicated but I’ll manage. So, you were talking about the dog, yeah? No? Was it the coffee? Cranberry? Zang? Which one do you want start with?”

“I want to talk about the street art I saw…” You forlornly returned his gaze.

“Okay, I don’t mind adding one more topic. Let’s take it slow, okay? What about the street art?” Mason stroked his thumb against your jawline and took your hand in his. To him, you looked the most adorable when you talked. He had a hard time catching up, sure but he didn’t mind. The sight of you blabbering, the way you bit your lips to think off the next topic, the way your hands moved randomly with every words you said. He sworn he wouldn’t trade this moment with anything else. He was listening attentively but he also couldn’t stop gazing at you full of admiration. His precious girl.

To you, he didn’t look annoyed, didn’t look irritated. Of course, you wouldn’t be able to read his mind but the public could be the one to decide on that when you posted the video on your Tiktok.

#football imagine #football imagines #mason mount #mason mount blurb #mason mount x reader #mason mount x y/n #mason mount imagines #mason mount fluff #mason mount fic

700 notes · View notes

inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 2 months

Text

Napoleonville [Chapter 9: Clarence House]

Series Summary: The year is 1988. The town is Napoleonville, Louisiana. You are a small business owner in need of some stress relief. Aemond is a stranger with a taste for domination. But as his secrets are revealed, this casual arrangement becomes something more volatile than either of you could have ever imagined.

Chapter Warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), dom/sub dynamics, smoking, drinking, drugs, Adventures with Aegon (ft. Sunfyre the Ferret), Willis Warning, infidelity, kids, parenthood, and no more hints for you, start reading!!!

Word Count: 8.9k.

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

Taglist: @marvelescvpe @toodlesxcuddles @era127 @at-a-rax-ia @0eessirk8 @arcielee @dd122004dd @humanpurposes @taredhunter @tinykryptonitewerewolf @partnerincrime0 @dr-aegon @persephonerinyes @namelesslosers @burningcoffeetimetravel-fics @daenysx @gemini-mama @chattylurker @moonlightfoxx @huramuna @britt-mf @myspotofcraziness @padfooteyes @targaryenbarbie @trifoliumviridi @joliettes @darkenchantress @florent1s @babyblue711 @minttea07 @libroparaiso @bluerskiees @herfantasyworldd @elizarbell @urmomsgirlfriend1 @fudge13 @strangersunghoon @wickedfrsgrl

Only 1 chapter left!!! 🥰🧁

He returns in an afternoon of inescapable golden sunlight, hot and muggy, bumble bees and ladybugs wheeling lazily above tall grass, cumulus clouds like tufts of cotton in a sky the color of Aemond’s eye. You hear him talking to Cadi—she’s out in the front yard making mud pies, earth for sugar and sprinkles of stray pelican feathers—and then the weight of his footsteps on the sinking, sloping porch. He opens the door, never locked, and walks through the living room into the kitchen. From behind, his arms circle around your waist; and you’ve missed him so much—dreaming of waves and storms, chains and blood—that you have nothing for him but softness, gentle smiles and a voice hushed with relief.

“How was Norway?” you ask as you roll out dough on the counter. You’re making a buttermilk pie.

“Fine,” Aemond says, resting his chin on your shoulder. But he sounds tired, low.

You turn around to look at him, raising your fingertips to his unscarred right cheek; he won’t tolerate you touching the left. You leave a dusting of flour across his skin like snow, which you have never seen in person and likely never will. The air conditioner is humming. The little pink Panasonic boombox is playing Africa by Toto. “Did something happen?”

“I just missed you.” Then he brightens. “But I was greeted by some very welcome news when I got back to the house this morning.” He’s wearing his neon teal duffle bag. He drops it to the floor and unzips it; inside you glimpse several Nintendo game cartridges, presumably for Cadi. And you think: I’m always here making things, he’s always bringing them from far away. Aemond takes two small dark blue booklets out of a pocket in the inner lining of the duffle bag and gives them to you. On the front of each is embossed in gold lettering, along with an emblem of a bald eagle: Passport, United States of America.

“…Aemond?!”

“There’s one for you and one for Cadi. I submitted the forms a month ago, but even with expedited processing it took this long. Ridiculous. What does the government do all day besides hunt down social programs to defund?”

“But…but…” You open one of the booklets. A photograph of your own face gazes back at you, serious and serene, taken against the white wall of your bedroom before you knew about Aemond being a Targaryen, or Christabel, or Amir’s exodus to San Franscisco, or the profound futility of everything, it seems. “How…?”

“I took the pictures, obviously. The rest was easy enough to find. You store birth certificates and social security cards the same place where you keep the business records that Amir showed me. Typically people have to go to a passport agency in person, but Criston and I have ways around that. Your signature might have been forged on the applications…but I suspect you won’t be filing any police reports.” Aemond grins, pleased with himself. “I wanted it to be a surprise.”

“It’s definitely surprising.” You stare down at the passports, amazed. “Aemond…this is a lot. But you already know that.”

“The whole time I was gone, I was wishing you could be there too. And now I can take you anywhere.”

Your heart is pounding, helpless childlike exhilaration. “Where are we going?”

“Clarence House in London.”

London: it’s another world, a distant planet, a constellation whose name you don’t know, the lost city of Atlantis.“Clarence House? Is that a hotel?”

“It’s a royal residence,” Aemond says, amused. “It’s officially the home of the Queen Mother, but the whole family goes to Balmoral in Scotland every summer, and while they’re gone they often rent out one wing to guests, not just anyone, trusted people like distant cousins or longtime, aristocratic friends. And the Targaryens…”

“You’re marrying Christabel, and she’s nobility. So you’re basically nobility now too.”

“Yes,” Aemond admits, a little guiltily, perhaps. “But you’re the person I’m inviting.”

“And Cadi.”

Now he’s genuinely puzzled. “Of course. We couldn’t leave her behind.”

Maybe I can handle this. Maybe I can make this work.

And you climb onto your tiptoes to circle your arms around the back of his neck, embracing him, thanking him, thinking: Christabel will have his ring, his last name, his family’s mansion, his acquiescent kiss at the altar of the Chapel of Saint Honoratus of Amiens…but I have what he’s made of, dreams, soul, bones in the abyss of an ocean of blood. Maybe that’s enough.

Maybe.

~~~~~~~~~~

First class, cheerful stewardesses, an array of magazines purchased from a gift shop in New Orleans International Airport: the National Enquirer and Food & Wine for you, The Face and Smithsonian for Aemond, and National Geographic Kids and Zoobooks for Cadi. The Zoobooks animal this month is the eagle, how quintessentially American. You are served antipasto Italiano, shrimp cocktail, Perrier, and champagne (Cadi gets a Shirley Temple) over the Atlantic Ocean. Aemond shows you and Cadi how to chew gum to pop your ears as the pressure builds to pain. When there is turbulence and he leans in close to tell you everything is fine, Aemond smells like Wrigley’s Doublemint, cologne, Marlboro cigarettes like the logo on his red and white jacket. You press your palm to the cool window, and clouds float by through the gaps between your fingers. The world is older than anything you could fathom; the world is brand new.

There is a black limousine waiting outside Terminal 3 of Heathrow Airport. The driver gets out to load the sparse luggage: Aemond’s teal duffle bag, a frayed and battered rolling suitcase that you borrowed from your mother, a Super Mario Bros. backpack that you found for Cadi at Kmart. Aemond doesn’t have much time to spare, only 4 days, practically a long weekend; but it feels like an eternity stretches out in front of you as the limousine zooms through the narrow, winding streets of downtown London, Starship’s We Built This City piping from the radio. You have never had more than a few uninterrupted hours with Aemond before. Now you will have a hundred.

The London air is cool, grey, misty; fresh rainwater bleeds into puddles, dark pools of mirrorlike reflections. With the windows rolled down and clean slate-colored air unfurling in your lungs, Aemond points to the landmarks you pass: Gunnersbury Park, Chiswick House and its gardens, cathedrals, museums, shopping districts, centuries-old cemeteries, stations of the London Underground, the River Thames, Hyde Park, the Ritz Hotel, Buckingham Palace, Saint James’ Palace, and at last Clarence House. It is a boxy white four-story townhouse with columns at the entranceway that remind you of the Targaryens’ estate on the shore of Lake Verret, the beautiful yet temporary home they call The Last Desire.

Aemond says that the entire first floor will be yours for the duration of your stay. There is the Lancaster Room, red and gold, and the Morning Room of creams and weak watery blue. There is the Library, the Dining Room, and the vibrantly pink Horse Corridor named for its ample equine paintings and sculptures; Cadi immediately proclaims this to be the best part of the house. She lingers in the hallway examining the art pieces as you and Aemond proceed to the Garden Room, which looks out upon a sea of lavender and shrubs meticulously shaped into a maze no higher than your waist. It has a golden harp and a grand piano, and a vast bed large enough for at least five people, in your estimation. I wonder if Aemond has ever tried that, you think distractedly. I wonder if there are temptations I can’t satisfy for him.

“You and Cadi can have this room,” Aemond says. He keeps wincing and bringing his hand up to the left side of his face; you doubt he’s even aware of it. “I’ll sleep on one of the couches.” Of course he will; Cadi thinks you’re just friends, and she’s aware he’s getting married to someone else. He knew exactly what it would mean when he bought a passport for her. “Queen Elizabeth and her husband Philip lived here before she ascended to the throne. They loved it so much that at first they refused to move to Buckingham Palace, which is the traditional residence of the reigning monarch. But their insolence was worn down. No one gets to break the rules.”

I shouldn’t be in this place, you keep thinking as you gaze around at the portraits on the wall, the stiff unnatural photographs of royals, the vases, the chandeliers, the fireplaces, the plush intricate rugs, the garden on the other side of the windows. People like me don’t belong here. “Aemond, are you alright?”

“It’s my eye,” he confesses with an uneasy, apologetic smirk. “Sometimes flights…the altitude changes…it aggravates the nerve damage. It’s like needles in my skull. But I’ll be okay.”

“You fly a lot for work, don’t you?” You hurt yourself for Viserys, in body and soul.

“I do,” he agrees. He unzips his duffle bag and produces a bottle of Percocet. “Why do you think I carry these around?”

“Take one,” you say. “Lie down, rest. Cadi and I can entertain ourselves for a few hours.”

He’s relieved, he’s grateful. “Are you sure?”

“Absolutely. You can even borrow the bed.”

“Back between your sheets, huh?” Aemond says, in pain but smiling through it. He draws a semicircle from the part in your hair down to your chin, a weightless sweep of his fingertips like a kind breeze. “You are incurable. You can’t resist me.”

“I have my own scheme in mind.”

“Do you?”

“Yes.” You grab the front of his Marlboro jacket, appropriate for the overcast London weather. He belongs here, this house, this city, this way of life. He wasn’t made for the primordial heat of the swamplands. You fold into him, close enough to tease, to quicken his heartbeat and momentarily clear the wounded furrows from his brow. “I want my pillows to smell like you. I want to breathe you in all night. It’s how I sleep best.”

“I’ll try not to disappoint,” Aemond says, a little stunned; but he’s elated too. For a moment, you’ve distracted him from his suffering entirely. “I’ll roll around all over them. I will mar the bedding irrevocably, the Queen Mother will never invite me back.” And he watches as you leave, his gaze transfixed and meditative and—more than anything else—hopeful.

“Hey, honey,” you say when you find Cadi in the Horse Corridor, poking a 100-year-old oil painting that she is definitely not supposed to be touching. “Let’s go explore and grab some dinner. Aemond isn’t feeling great, but we’ll hang out with him later.”

“Is it his face?”

You are startled. She knows so much. “Yeah, actually, it is.”

“He showed me,” Cadi says casually, still peering up at the horse; and you remember the day when he took her out to the front yard after she said she wished you were more like her friends’ mothers. “He even let me touch it. Radical, right? It’s so gross, but super cool too.”

Aemond couldn’t stand for me to see how he was maimed, but he forced himself to endure it for Cadi. “What did he tell you?”

“That I should appreciate having a good mom, because not all parents treat their kids right. He said his dad let his eye get crushed. And he told me he’d bet $1 million that you’d snap someone’s neck if they hurt me like that.”

You reach out to skim your fingers through her dark disheveled hair, smiling faintly, fondly. Cadi doesn’t seem to mind. “He wasn’t wrong.”

“Can we get fish and chips?”

“Totally. I have 50 British pounds in my wallet, I assume that’s enough for dinner.”

“Wow! How much is 50 pounds in dollars?”

“I have no idea,” you say. “Let’s go spend them.”

~~~~~~~~~~

In the evenings, you, Cadi, and Aemond gather around the television in the Lancaster Room and help yourself to the extensive VHS collection stocked for guests. You let Cadi pick: Raiders Of The Lost Ark, The Terminator, Firestarter, the Karate Kid, Aliens. You make popcorn in the extravagant kitchen in the basement of Clarence House and the three of you devour bowlfuls of it as you giggle on the couch, engulfed with throw pillows and playfully kicking at each other beneath the blankets. One night at Cadi’s request you bake Betty Crocker’s Party Rainbow Chip cupcakes with mix purchased at a Tesco down the street; on another you make hot chocolate to sip from antique tea cups. Each day, Aemond has new destinations picked out to tour. You ride the Underground like true Londoners to the Hampton Court Palace, the British Museum, Westminster Abbey, the Natural History Museum, Big Ben, Trafalgar Square, Tower Bridge, the National Gallery, the Kew Gardens, Imperial College where Aemond received the petroleum engineering degree he never wanted.

As he shows you the classrooms where he attended lectures and seminars—you aren’t sure what the difference is, though you can sense that there is one—Aemond doesn’t talk about math or oil drilling. Instead, he tells you and Cadi about the people he learned about in the history classes he managed to slip into his exacting schedule like splinters into flesh: Sir Harold Gillies who pioneered plastic surgery in his treatment of World War I veterans, Phillis Wheatley who was enslaved as a child and became a renowned poet and abolitionist, Boudicca who led a rebellion against the Roman invaders and upon her defeat succumbed to some tragic, enigmatic doom. Aemond loves stories like this, you can see the light that sparks into the crystalline blue of his right eye. There is nothing he deems more heroic than people who took circumstances beyond their control and made something worthwhile out of them.

The night before the flight back to New Orleans, you’re staring at the crown molding of the Garden Room as Cadi snores softly from the other end of the massive bed and silvery moonlight covers the world. You can’t stop your thoughts from roiling like the North Sea; you can’t stop thinking about desks and chairs and books and clever blue-blooded girls jotting down in their notebooks not cake orders but mathematical equations or dates of conquest. When you breathe in the smoke and cologne Aemond left on your pillows, it tastes dark and forbidden. You climb out of the bed, roomy Bob Dylan t-shirt, pink cotton shorts, hair loose and wild, bare feet.

He is outside pacing around the sundial in the center of the garden, puffing on a Marlboro cigarette and pondering the full moon. “Can’t sleep?” Aemond asks, exhaling smoke as he glances over at you.

“You must think I’m stupid.”

“What?” He stops pacing. “Why?”

“Imperial College,” you say. “And the sorts of people who go to places like that. You must have known a lot of women who could recite Shakespear and name all the kings of England, all of Jupiter’s moons. Things I never learned. Things that I have no use for. I don’t write books or design machines or study the secrets of the universe. I bake cupcakes.”

“And they’re brilliant,” Aemond says, smiling. “I don’t think you’re stupid.”

“No?”

“No,” Aemond insists. “I think that if you’d been born where I was, you would have done far more with it.”

“Aemond…” You walk across the wet cobblestones to meet him by the sundial. It’s been raining again. The night air is chilly, foggy, painting you with goosebumps. “You still have time to become who you want to be.”

“No. I don’t.”

It’s coming from somewhere, distant but still audible, a parked car or a nearby building: Kyrie by Mr. Mister. Aemond chuckles, flicks the end of his cigarette into the lavender bushes—surely against the rules—and takes your hands in his.

“I remember this,” he says as he dances with you slowly, clumsily; you don’t know the steps. Still, you don’t want him to stop. “In your kitchen.”

He remembers everything. “Right before we went to Olive Garden for the first time.”

He sighs, pretending to be exasperated. “Of course that’s the part you committed to memory.”

“I’ve held onto a few other details too.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Like how small the back seat of your Audi Quattro is.”

“A limousine would be far more comfortable. I should invest in one.”

You laugh as he twirls you and you trip over your own feet; he pulls you upright before you can fall to the slick cobblestones. And you think: This is real. No matter what happens between him and anyone else, what we have is safe and extraordinary and real.

“I’m glad you’re here, Cupcake,” Aemond murmurs through your hair, holding you without seeking more. “You and Cadi.”

You want him again, or you’re so close to wanting him that the line is less of a boundary than a quagmire, indistinct edges and quicksand that can drag you down to drown in it. “I never knew that this was possible. Thank you, Aemond.”

“It can be like this all the time.”

Not all the time, you think, knowing that there will always be Jade Dragon, the Targaryens, the stock market, the world, the past and the future, Christabel. But some of it.

Is that enough?

~~~~~~~~~~

Willis agreed to you and Aemond taking Cadi out of the country on one condition: that you return her to him the second you arrive back in Napoleonville. It’s late Tuesday afternoon when the plane’s wheels hit the runway and squeal to a halt. Aemond has left his red Audi in the Park-and-Ride lot. You collect the car and soar west on Route 10 into the red-gold horizon, chasing the setting sun.

“Daddy!” Cadi bellows when she throws open the front door of the Assumption Parish Sheriff’s Office, waving his gift bag excitedly. Inside is a refrigerator magnet, several packages of McVitie’s Digestives in different flavors, and a miniature red-coated Queen’s Guard to keep on his desk, perpetually covered with disorganized papers and crumbs from innumerable desserts. From her poster on the wall, Heather Locklear simpers at you. At the center of the dartboard, poor Tommy Lee is impaled in four different places.

“Comment ca va, cherie?!” Willis opens his arms to hug Cadi when she barrels into him. He guffaws, his eyes are shiny; he has missed her. “Ya had a real good time, I reckon?”

“It was totally tubular. But I’m glad I’m home now. Can I get a horse? His name is Patches and I love him.”

“Huh? What the hell ya need a horse for?” He peeks around Cadi to look at you, a curious blue gaze beneath the thick dark bangs of his mullet. “What’s she talkin’ ‘bout, sugar?”

Beside you, Aemond groans irritably. Then you hear a voice from one of the holding cells, almost always empty: “Hey, cake lady.”

“Aegon?!” you and Aemond say at once, and sure enough, when you check the last holding cell there he is: unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt, blue shorts, rainbow flip flops, hair like he’s been in a hurricane, a new eyebrow piercing.

Aemond asks Willis: “What did he do?”

Willis picks up a clipboard from his cluttered desk and begins reading. “Possession with intent to distribute cocaine—”

“I told you, I wasn’t distributing anything! It was for me!”

“Aegon, shut up,” Aemond pleads.

“Possession with intent to distribute marijuana, possession of drug paraphernalia, possession of methamphetamine less than 28 grams, operatin’ a vehicle while intoxicated, possession of MDMA, possession of alcoholic beverages in a motor vehicle, operatin’ a vehicle with a suspended license, resistin’ an officer…” Willis flips the page. “Speedin’, reckless drivin’, disturbin’ the peace while in an intoxicated condition, possession with intent to distribute Xanax, theft—”

“What the hell did you steal?!” Aemond demands.

“Burritos. I forgot my wallet at home.” Now Aegon is indignant. “But I saidI’d get them back! They didn’t need to call anybody about it!”

“Aegon, Taco Bell does not offer payment plans!”

“I can release him to ya, I guess,” Willis tells Aemond in a slow drawl.

“I really appreciate that. I’m so sorry about him, I’m absolutely mortified, I’ll pay whatever fines you want—”

“Wait, no,” Aegon says, panicked. His hands are gripped around the iron bars. “I don’t want to leave.”

Aemond stares at him. “You’re asking to stay in jail…?”

“I can’t go home. Stephanie’s there.”

“Of course she’s there. You knew she was flying in for the wedding.”

“Please let me stay here until she goes back to Monaco.”

“Definitely not. How’s everything else?”

“There’s something wrong with one of the Lake Verret rigs. Viserys mentioned a…a…I don’t remember, a dirt dump or something.”

“A mud pump?!”

“Yeah! That’s it. That’s what he said. It exploded.”

“Fuck,” Aemond hisses, then remembers that Cadi’s still there. She gives him a sly grin. You messed up, she means. Aemond looks to you, apologetic, disappointed. “I’m going to have to drop you off and then head straight home. There are messes to be mopped up.”

“No,” Aegon moans as Willis unlocks the holding cell and then wrestles him out of it when Aegon resists. “No, I’m a felon! I’m a danger to the public!”

“Don’t,” Aemond snaps, and this time his brother listens.

You say goodbye to Cadi—she barely notices—but as you go to follow Aemond and Aegon out of the Sheriff’s Office, she has a question. “Aemond?”

He stops. “Yeah, Cadi?”

“Can I go to the wedding?”

“Weddin’?!” Willis exclaims. “Already?!”

“Not mine,” you say.

“You really want to go?” Aemond asks Cadi with some reticence. But he seems to be considering it.

“Well, yeah. Mom said she and Amir are going. You’ll be there. Lots of cake will be there. And I’ve never been to a wedding before. I want to see what it’s like.”

Aemond turns to you, then to Willis, searching for permission. “It’s alright with me,” Willis says. “As long as someone there is keepin’ an eye on her.”

“It’s your choice,” you tell Cadi. “If you’re interested, I have no objections. But you have to be nice to Christabel.”

“Christabel?!” Willis says.

“That’s Aemond’s fiancée.” And there is a collective uncomfortable silence: Willis nodding slowly as he squints at you, Cadi chewing on her thumbnail, Aemond looking down at his Adidas sneakers, Aegon staring vacuously at the Heather Locklear poster on the wall.

With Aegon squeezed into the back seat, Aemond drops you off at the home Cadi calls the Fall-Down House. The new house hasn’t closed yet, but probably will in the next week. The adolescent gator is sunbathing in the last of the daylight in one corner of the yard; you can hear the pink Panasonic boombox inside playing Another One Bites The Dust.

“Ho, you’re back!” Amir cries, jubilant. He hugs you energetically, staining you with the flour on his hands; he’s been watching the bakery while you’ve been gone and keeping every cent of the profits in recognition of his labor, as agreed upon. “How was London?”

You give him his souvenir: a purple t-shirt with Princess Diana’s face on it. “Rainy. Wonderful.”

“Did you have any kinky sex in the royal grandma’s bed?”

“No,” you say, laughing. “But it was…I don’t know how to describe it. Calm. Normal. Easy. Like we could live that way forever.”

“So you’ve decided to be his Camilla.”

“Some moments I have. Other times I haven’t. But more and more, I just…” You try to decide what you mean. “The thought of giving him up feels impossible. And Christabel…they’re so distant with each other, so disconnected, so platonic. Their relationship doesn’t feel real. Maybe I can ignore it. Maybe this is the best I can hope for.”

Amir pushes his tortoiseshell glasses up the bridge of his nose and raises an eyebrow. “It might feel more real in three days.”

The rehearsal dinner is on Friday; the wedding is only 24 hours later.

~~~~~~~~~~

“You really should consider writing a cookbook, dear,” Alicent says from where she sits across from you. The dining room table is covered with flickering pink candles, bouquets of wildflowers, drinks garnished with cotton candy and Pop Rocks. Balloons bump against the ceilings, their long ribbons streaming down like the tentacles of a jellyfish. The stereo is thumping out Caught Up In You by 38 Special. Everything is pink and red: the colors of love. Yet just like at the engagement party, no one is talking about the couple getting married tomorrow. You could almost forget that there’s going to be a wedding. That makes it easier; and if denial is the terrain you live on now, so be it. That is far less agonizing than the alternative.

“Oh, no,” you demur, taking a sip of a cotton candy cocktail. You exchange a glance with Aemond, sitting several seats down from his mother. He is in a suit—black and white, fitted, faultless—and smiling, proud of you. “A book?! I couldn’t. Not in a million years.” I never even finished high school English.

“But all of my friends from home are captivated by your recipes, darling, and it would be so much easier if I could simply send them a copy of a cookbook rather than trying to describe every dish to them! Please consider it. Do you promise?”

“That I’ll think about it? Not too taxing a commitment. I suppose so.”

“Good,” Alicent chirps, then turns to whisper something to Criston, who drapes an arm briefly across her shoulders and gives her a reassuring little embrace. Amir is chatting with Aemond about San Franscisco. Christabel is talking to Helaena, who has been forced into a voluminous, magenta taffeta dress that she clearly despises; her chameleon Dreamfyre lurches around the table, occasionally stealing tastes of people’s food. Daeron, with Tessarion perched on the back of his chair, is trying to discuss something called seismic testing results with Viserys but getting ignored. Viserys is deep in conversation with Christabel’s father, the marquess, a large loud man whose booming voice drowns out everyone else. The two of them seem delighted, celebratory, very much in their own world. Their schemes have come at last to fruition. Christabel has several younger sisters in attendance—her bridesmaids—but no mother. You gather from pieces of dialogue you’ve overheard that her mother died when she was a child, a terrible and irreparable loss. Otto is so bored he’s flipping through a picture book about Kiribati. Aegon’s wife, Princess Stephanie of Monaco, is a headstrong, charismatic, and rather critical woman with short dark hair. She notifies Aegon each and every time he fails her, which happens frequently: You’re using the wrong fork. You missed a button on your shirt. You haven’t fucked me properly in over two years. You didn’t send flowers to my grandma’s funeral. This is evidently Aegon’s worst nightmare; he has disappeared upstairs in an effort to escape her.

Dinner is finished, and dessert has been brought by the servants. It turned out more like a crepe cake than a Napoleon cake—the layers of puff pastry didn’t want to fluff up as much as they should have—but no one seems to notice. This time, you and Amir knew the dress code expectations. You are both wearing black to fade into the backdrop like shadows, like distant memories. You are invited guests, but you are also locals, inferiors, recipients of charity.

“Where’s Aegon?” Helaena says. “He has to try this cake, it’s delicious! The cherry jam cuts the heaviness of the cream and pastry dough and makes it a perfect dessert for summer! And the color is delightful! It looks just like blood!”

“Where the hell is he?” Viserys demands, looking around, twisting in his chair. “It’s his brother’s rehearsal dinner, for Christ’s sake. One night of this importance and he can’t handle it? I swear to God, if he’s snorting or smoking anything up there I’ll have him committed to an institution—”

“I’ll find him,” you offer as you stand from the table. You have to visit the bathroom anyway, too many glitzy pink cocktails; two birds, one stone. You depart from the table and Aemond’s gaze follows you, a low heat that is building towards incineration, a baiting promise of dark euphoria that you can no longer pretend you don’t want desperately, defenselessly. Christabel gives you a sweet little wave. She is dripping in gold—dress, heels, jewelry—and seems happier tonight, more self-assured. Perhaps with the wedding so close, her trepidation concerning Aemond’s commitment has evaporated. Surely it is too late to call off the ceremony now. Tonight they feast, tomorrow they recite their vows, and then…

But no, you don’t think about the honeymoon. You will not allow yourself to. It can’t exist to you, and that is how you’ll survive this. Christabel will be in one universe, you in another, two timelines that never cross like something out of Star Trek. And the way she and Aemond interact is so impersonal, so untactile, that it is not so difficult to treat anything beyond chaste pecks on cheeks as an impossibility.

At the top of the staircase, Vhagar is lurking. She wags her long twiglike tail when she sees you and licks the knuckles of your left hand. You give her a pat on the head—and then several more when she whines as you try to leave—then at last she lopes off down the hallway.

Aegon is exactly where you’d assumed he’d be. He’s in his bedroom hunched over his computer and hammering furiously at the keyboard. There’s white powder on his fingers and in his thin mustache. On the screen, bizarrely, is what appears to be neon green grass and an ox-drawn wagon like the ones from the pioneer days. Sunfyre the ferret is stretched out across the bed napping, his angular face resting on his paws.

Aegon whirls around to face you. He is wearing a lime green satin suit but has forgotten to put on a shirt under it. “What? What? What do you want? I’m playing Oregon Trail. I have dysentery.”

“You have what…? Never mind, it’s not important. You need to come downstairs and eat some dessert. People are wondering where you are.”

“I’m busy.”

“If you don’t make an appearance on your own, Viserys will come looking for you. Also there are some Cap’n Crunch treats I left on the kitchen counter that you might be interested in.”

“Consider me tempted. I’ll be down momentarily.”

“You better be,” you tell Aegon, then retrace your steps back to the kitchen. Amir and Christabel are both there getting cans of Pepsi from the fridge and making very cumbersome small talk…or perhaps only Amir thinks it is that much of a burden. Christabel is chattering blithely away about different types of wildflowers. He gives you a look like Oh thank God, an excuse to escape and wastes no time heading back to the dining room.

“Did you notice what’s playing now?” he asks you just before he vanishes, then points towards the stereo in the grand foyer. You listen; it’s Money For Nothing by Dire Straits. “You think they know this song is about class warfare?”

“You should tell them,” you joke.

“Yeah, if I want to end up on Unsolved Mysteries.” Then Amir is gone.

“How are you doing?” you ask Christabel to be polite. You open the refrigerator and start hunting for your own can of Pepsi. “Excited? Nervous? You seem a little more relaxed than the last time I saw you. Are the wedding jitters finally dissipating?”

“They are,” she says, and when you glance back at her she is wearing a bashful sort of smile. It’s not an expression you can read. You resume digging through the refrigerator for a can of Pepsi; Amir and Christabel might have taken the last ones.

“That’s good,” you say noncommittally, hoping she’ll leave. But Christabel doesn’t leave. She seems to have something she needs to say. Just as you spy a lone can of Pepsi at the very back of the refrigerator and lean in to grab it, she proceeds to unburden herself.

“Well, you know, I was so concerned about me and Aemond before. I had no conviction that he especially liked me, and we never had anything to talk about, and he was so dreadfully undemonstrative…I was just beside myself, truly. I didn’t know what to do. But I feel much better about everything now. Norway was so good for us.”

Norway?

You close the refrigerator, your ice-cold Pepsi can clutched in your hand. You’re going cold all over. Slowly, you turn towards Christabel, glittering in her gold dress.

Norway???

“He took you on the North Sea trip.” You hear the words, but it doesn’t feel like you’ve said them. They sound flat and dazed.

“It’s a bit of a secret,” Christabel says; and again, her smile has no cruelty or sharp awareness in it, but her cheeks are pink. She’s blushing. What does she have to be embarrassed about? “My father doesn’t know. He wouldn’t approve. But I just felt…I felt ready, you know? I’m sure you understand what I mean. You aren’t so clinical and aloof about everything. I had to know if Aemond and I really had something between us before we got married.”

“You felt…ready?” Ready for what? Ready for WHAT, Christabel?

“I asked Aemond to take me with him. I begged, actually.” She giggles. “I won’t try to be proud about it! And finally he said yes. We stayed at a lovely hotel in Bergen, and during the day he would have to fly by helicopter out to the rigs, but at night…”

You’re staring blankly at her. You can’t believe what you think she’s going to say. Surely it must be something else, anything else—

“It wasn’t my plan to ever be intimate with a man before marriage, but sometimes…things change. Minds change, circumstances change. And I knew I wanted it. And it went so well! Now what do I have to be nervous about? All the uncertainties are resolved. Now we just sign the paperwork and start our lives together.”

He took her to Norway.

He slept with her in Norway.

“I hope it was just as good for him,” Christabel muses, a compulsive sort of oversharing. But she has had a few cocktails and she thinks you’re nonjudgemental and there’s probably not a single other soul she feels she can be truthful with…so why not the girl who got knocked up at prom and had a baby at seventeen? Surely she’s in no position to judge. “It’ll be even better once we can…you know. When we’re officially trying for a baby and there’s no need to worry about any precautions. I want Aemond to enjoy himself as much as possible. I want to be a good wife to him.”

You feel dizzy; you feel violently ill. And now you see everything: Aemond kissing her with his mouth open and ravenous, his hands between her legs, his hips pressed to hers, peeling off her clothes and learning how to make her moan, make her wet, make her come, and you think of how careful he must have been with her, a girl with no past, no ex-husband, no childbirth that nearly killed her, no stretchmarks and no baggage, just a smooth pristine rivulet of flesh that was so pure and uncontaminated it was weightless, and you can hear—though you don’t want to, though it feels like it will kill you—how tender he was, how encouraging, not a dominant who drinks down fantasies like a vampire sustained by blood but just a man, and a man who has at last found a woman he doesn’t need to grab, bite, bruise, handcuff to a bedpost to feel satisfied with.

He took her to Norway and he never told me.

You are saying something, and Christabel is nodding appreciatively, accepting the sage wisdom of a tarnished life. Your words don’t matter. They are folktales and charms, the croaks of bullfrogs, the whispers of the wind through Spanish moss, the Morse code of ripples in the water of the bayou. You are a novelty and your counsel is a souvenir; one day when she is living in California or Argentina or Australia or Alaska or her ancestral castle back in the U.K., Christabel will tell Aemond’s children: Once I met a nice single mom from Napoleonville Louisiana, and she told me to follow my heart and not let anyone shame me for wanting to be close with my soon-to-be husband.

Vhagar trots into the kitchen and begins nudging her massive head against Christabel’s bare knees. “Hi, big girl!” Christabel coos as she pets the blue merle Great Dane, clearly accustomed to this. “Who’s a giant gorgeous girl? You are!”

What did I expect? I knew they were getting married. I knew they were going to sleep together.

Yes, you knew it, but you hadn’t felt it, and now you have.

I can’t do this, you realize. I thought I could but I can’t.

“Christabel?” Alicent is calling like a windchime. “Darling, there are just a few more things we have to discuss before tomorrow, will you come back to the table please?”

“On my way!” Christabel replies obediently, and she gives you a quick, impulsive hug before vanishing.

I’m going to be sick. I’m going to have a heart attack. I’m going to drop dead right in the middle of this fucking kitchen.

Leaving your can of Pepsi forgotten on the countertop, you escape to the living room and then out the French doors into the garden. You run past the pool all the way to the pond full of multicolored fish you once hadn’t known were koi. You drop to your knees, then lie down on the cold cobblestones, and when it hits you again—Aemond touching her, Aemond loving her—you rupture into sobs that are breathless and shuddering. You try to stifle the noise with your palms; you clasp them over your mouth and smother your wails. It feels like you’re being ripped apart; it feels like you’re in labor, but there is no end, no consolation of a new life, no point at which your body chooses whether you live or die. It is only a razored wheel that turns in you again and again and again, shredding muscle and splitting bones.

There is a hand on your shoulder; someone is patting it awkwardly. You look up to see Aegon standing there. “Sorry,” he says. “You look…not good.”

“I’m really not good. I’m fucking terrible.” Your face is soaked and stinging with tears, your voice is strangled.

“Do you want some coke?”

“No, Aegon.”

“Do you want a ride home?”

“From you? Yeah, for sure, getting impaled by a stop sign would be a great next move for me.”

“I’m totally fine to drive.”

“Can you just pull Amir aside without anyone else noticing and tell him to say his goodbyes and then meet me in the driveway, please? He drove me here. I need him to take me home.”

“Okay,” Aegon says, and then: “Thanks for the Cap’n Crunch Treats. Thanks for remembering something I like and caring enough to bring more. No one really does that around here.” And he’s gone before you can think of a reply.

To get to the driveway without going though the house, you climb over a 5-foot wrought iron fence swarmed with rosebushes and ivy, no easy feat in a black Kmart dress and matching ballet flats. You acquire a dozen shallow gashes on your hands and forearms, but make it to the Ford Escort just in time for Amir to meet you under the full, cloudless moon, tossing his car keys from one hand to the other.

“What did—?” Then he sees your face. He gasps, knowing how bad it is. He’s never seen you like this. He didn’t know it was possible for you to look like this. He unlocks the Ford Escort and joins you inside, turning the key in the ignition. “What the fuck did Aemond do to you?!”

“I have to go home. It’s over, it’s over, I can’t do this.”

Amir is spinning out of the driveway. “Did he hurt you, did he—?!”

“He fucked Christabel in Norway,” you say, sobbing uncontrollably. “And I know I have no right to be jealous, I know we don’t have a conventional relationship, I thought I could handle this but I can’t. I can’t stop picturing him with her, and hearing it, and I…I…I don’t understand why this hurts so goddamn bad.”

“Babe,” Amir says gently, a palm on your trembling thigh. “You’re in love with him. That’s why.”

“This is killing me,” you whisper. You’re shaking all over. You feel like you’re battling for every breath.

Your best friend—your only friend—is quiet for a long time. “Don’t go tomorrow,” Amir finally says. “You don’t need to see the wedding. You shouldn’t put yourself through that. I’ll go, I can handle the cake alone, especially if Cadi’s with me to help with carrying plates and stuff.”

You don’t say anything. You stare out the nightscape window and mop tears from your face with McDonald’s napkins you find in Amir’s glovebox.

“Did you hear me? I don’t think you should go to the wedding tomorrow.”

“I won’t,” you agree hoarsely. “I can’t watch them have my wedding.”

“Willis is dropping Cadi off in the morning, right? I’ll pick her and the cake up from your house and bring her back when it’s over. You can tell her whatever you want…you have another cake order to work on, you’re sick, you’re injured, your mom needs a ride to the doctor, whatever.”

“Okay,” you whimper.

“Hey, look at me.”

You do, sniffling, shivering, in agony.

“You don’t deserve this. You deserve better than this.”

I don’t think I do. I think if I did, it would have happened by now. But you know Amir will not accept this answer. “Okay,” you say again, trying to make yourself believe it.

In the gravel driveway of your sinking house, Amir asks if you want him to say. You tell him no, you want to be alone, you have to think, you have to plan. Really, you just don’t want anyone to see you this shattered. It’s humiliating, it’s like you’re an animal, like something less than human needing to licks its wounds in a dark place. You walk into the Fall-Down House and flip on the kitchen light, artificial yellow luminance. You don’t start the air conditioner. You don’t touch the Panasonic boombox. You stand there mindlessly in the sounds of the bayou: cicada screams, owl hoots, the far-away hissing of gators. The wedding cake is in the refrigerator, banana bread, cream cheese frosting, a kaleidoscope of wildflowers painted by Amir’s expert hand. He’s leaving. Aemond’s leaving. Everyone is leaving.

There are tires crunching on gravel in the driveway, there are footsteps on the sloping porch. He is able to yank the door open because you never lock it. He blows in like a storm that kills.

“What the hell happened?!” Aemond shouts. “Why did you leave?! You didn’t even have the decency to say goodbye to me—”

“You took her to Norway.”

Aemond’s face goes from furious to lost. “Why would she tell you that?”

Not That’s not true, not Let me explain, not It didn’t mean anything. Your stomach sinks, a basket full of stones. “Because she thinks I’m her friend.”

“It wasn’t…” Aemond sighs. “It was a last-minute thing, and it was her idea. She really, really wanted to go to Norway, and I figured…you know…what’s the difference between the wedding night and a few weeks before it? So yeah, it happened—”

“Oh God,” you whisper, starting to sob again.

“And then I came home to your house, to your doorstep, because I missed you the entire time. The entire time, every hour, every minute, and there are no exceptions, okay, are you listening to me? I took her to Norway because I had to. I took you and Cadi to Clarence House because I wanted to. What I do with her is a reflex, an obligation, I’m on autopilot, I’m thinking of you to get myself hard, I don’t know how else to express to you how completely different these situation are in every single goddamn way.”

“She said it was good,” you say huskily, tears snaking down your cheeks that are raw from trying to dab them dry.

“Of course it was good for her!” Aemond flings back. “I’ve had a lot of casual sex, I know how to make women come, it’s a math equation, it doesn’t mean we’re soulmates!”

“I know I have no claim to you, but I…” You gaze out the kitchen window, dark and still, nothing to see but stars and lighting bugs. “I can’t do this.”

Aemond asks, kindly now: “What do you want?”

I want to not have to beg you to choose me. “I want this to be over.”

“No,” he says, panicking. “No you don’t.”

“I do.”

“You’re going to give this up as soon as it gets painful? I’m not worth fighting for, what I can do for you and Cadi isn’t worth a little pain? Because I’m no stranger to it either. You think I’m not hurting, you think nothing ever keeps me awake at night?”

“You could leave your prison any time you want to. But instead you built a brand new one around me.”

“You don’t understand what the kind of responsibility I’m beholden to feels like.”

“Yeah, a town named after Napoleon is the right place for you,” you seethe, enraged. “You’ve felt so fucking small your whole life that now you’re starving for what it tastes like to be in control. But I can’t let you destroy me. I can’t let my daughter grow up watching me settle for less than I need from a man. She’ll learn to live the same way.”

“I can’t believe you’re doing this.”

“Aemond,” you say, and you wait until he looks at you. “Do you really want children?”

When he answers, his voice frayed and his right eye misty. “I love Cadi.”

“That’s not what I asked. Do you want children of your own with Christabel?”

“I have to,” he says, miserable.

“No,” you plead. “You cannot have a baby with that girl. You can’t, Aemond. You are going to ruin so many lives, not just your own.”

“I have to,” he says again.

“Then get out. Viserys owns you, and Viserys wouldn’t want you here. He would want you back at the mansion impregnating your child bride.”

“She’s a legal adult, she’s 19, and she wants me, she begs for me, I’m not twisting her arm—”

“Then go!” you roar, striking him hard, both palms to his chest. Aemond doesn’t budge. “Get out, go home, go have kids you won’t give a fuck about just like Viserys never cared about you. Go repeat the cycle all over again. I’m done. I can’t be a part of it.”

“I won’t be like him,” Aemond swears.

“You will be. You already are.” You shove him again, but still, Aemond doesn’t move. You know what he’s waiting for, you know the right word to say. But you can’t get it to launch from your lips; it catches in your throat like a blade through the windpipe. “Get out!”

Your fingers hook into the lapels of his black suit jacket and stay there; you can’t let go. You’re both breathing heavily; you can hear it, you can feel the heat in the air. You keep his jacket gripped in your hands, he can move no closer, no farther away. When he leans into you, you breathe in his smoke and cologne; when his hands cradle your face, you feel the benevolent power that once gave you peace.

I want him. I need him. Not forever, no, I understand that’s not possible. But just for right now.

You look up at him and Aemond kisses you, his lips and tongue claiming you like untouched land; he puts down roots, he slits the jugulars of trespassers.

Here. Now.

You drag him down with you. When you drop to the floor, you strike the back of your skull against the scuffed, sloping wood and bite back a yelp.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Aemond says, though it isn’t his fault; he reaches for your head and cushions it with his right hand. “Are you okay?”

“I’m okay.” You’re tearing open his white shirt; tiny translucent buttons go flying in every direction. Your palms glide over his chest, up to his throat, to his jaw, to knot in his hair. He reaches beneath your dress to slide off your panties, then buries his fingers between your legs. You moan helplessly, needfully, spreading your thighs wider for him. No man has ever been able to do this to you before: to make you forget everything, to make you feel—if only for a moment—beloved, worthy, chosen. He’s kissing you like he knows this is the last time. You’re touching the left side of his face and he doesn’t even notice, he won’t realize until later that there was a time when he was cured.

Aemond pulls his wallet out of the pocket of his suit pants, flips it open, and roots through it until he finds a condom. He starts to rip it open, moving with desperate speed, dire impatience.

“No, don’t,” you say. “Please don’t. I want all of you.” And I won’t get another chance.

He exhales in deep, ecstatic relief; he wants it too. You’re soaked, you’re ready, you’re aching for him like mending bones. He eases himself into you, gasping, and you are stunned by how good it feels already, how close you are, every rope of nerves and muscle glimmering with an opening heat that builds higher and higher, the reverse of a tornado finally touching down on earth. His hands are linked with yours and pinned to the floor above your head; he’s kissing you, he’s moaning into you, he thrusts deeper and harder when you beg him to do it.

Aemond untangles one hand from yours and reaches low to stroke you. Your fingers find his again and catch him, capture him, bring his hand back to the floor where it can be entwined with yours and his weight can hold it to the scraped wood. “I don’t need it, I’m close. Stay here. Stay with me.”

“I’m here,” he whispers, panting; and the friction of his body against yours overtakes you, and when you come it is blinding, bone-breaking, a whirlpool that traps you for what feels like over a minute, soaring highs punctuated by the illusion of fading over and over again until you think you can’t stand it, and only then does it end, Aemond collapsing on the floor beside you covered in your sweat and your wetness, you feeling the remnants of him bleeding down your bare thighs.

You drag yourself upright—muscles sore in your belly and back and thighs—and roll onto your knees so you can stagger to your feet. You tug on your panties so he doesn’t drip out of you onto the floor. Then you straighten the skirt of your black dress, turn on the little pink Panasonic boombox—it’s a U2 song, Where The Streets Have No Name—and begin washing a muffin tin that was left in the sink.

Aemond stands up and runs a hand through his hair, getting his bearings. He looks down at his pants and fixes his zipper and belt. He tries to close his shirt and then remembers you tore off the buttons. They lie scattered across the floor, useless.

As you scrub the muffin tin, you hear Aemond’s footsteps behind you. His palms begin at the small of your back and then skate around your waist to encircle you.

“Stop,” you tell him; and immediately his hands fall away. Aemond waits for you to say more, but you don’t. You don’t even look at him.

He walks to where the kitchen becomes the living room—you can tell by the creaks in the floor—and again, he waits. After a while he says: “I’ll call you when the new house is ready.”

“No. Have Criston handle it. I don’t ever want to talk to you again.”

“You get that I’m in love with you, right?” Aemond forces out, and when at last you turn to him there is the metallic glistening of tears on his right cheek. “I never feel this way about anyone. I don’t know how to handle it, I didn’t even know it was possible. But it’s true.”

“It’s not enough,” you say simply, and resume scrubbing the muffin tin.

He waits in silence, thirty seconds, a minute, two minutes. Then the door opens and shuts—like the jaws of a beast—and he’s gone.

#aemond targaryen x reader #aemond targaryen #aemond x you #aemond one eye #aemond x reader #aemond #aemond fanfiction #hotd aemond

213 notes · View notes

justtwotired · 5 months

Note

Hello ! I hope you’re doing well. I was wondering if I could get an ask for Sam and Colby. Maybe reader (female or gn neutral pronouns are fine !) is invited to go with SnC exploring an abandoned place but she’s been struggling with body image (I’m kind of in the slumps rn :/) so she’s cut back on food. Through the trip they notice her lagging behind and getting tired easily. She ends up fainting due to exhaustion and lack of food and they take care of her when she comes to. Preferably Colby pairing and lots of angst ! Only if your comfortable writing about this thank you xx 🫶🏽

Why hello there, I am so sorry for posting this rather late, I wrote a part of it, then got busy and forgot about it and just finished and edited it, so hope it’s alright!

I really like this request! Mostly because I can really relate to reader, this is always chill because then I can write five that actually make sense ya know.

I did write some angst but not LOTS, because angst is one of those things I still find difficult to write, but I hope you still like it<3

“What’s up guys it’s Sam and Colby!” Colby started. “Today, we are at an abandoned manor in the woods right behind us. It is quite a walk, but I think we will survive!” Sam told the camera.

“Also, we brought someone with us,” Sam then pointed behind him where I stood rather awkwardly, wearing a huge hoody that I may or may not have stolen from Colby’s closet.

“This is Y/n, you guys know her of course, we had lots of questions to bring her back to the Chanel, so we did of course.” Sam explained before turning the camera fully on me.

I sucked in an unnoticeable sharp breath. Did I look alright? Was that pimple I hid under makeup this morning still invisible? Did the hoody hide my body enough?

“So, N/n, are you excited?” Sam asked and I gave the camera a genuine smile. “I am actually, this place is not too far from my home town and I’ve been wanting to go here for a while, but I didn’t want to go alone, so now I have these two idiots to come along.” I joked and Sam pointed the camera at Colby.

“Did you hear that, dude?” He said in fake sadness. “I thought you where coming with us?” Colby said also jokingly hurt. “I’m still stuck on the fact she called us idiots.” Sam said and pointed the camera at himself.

“Seems like we have to change the channel name to ‘Y/n only’ because she is taking over.” He said and I chuckled. “Oh yeah, definitely, and I’ll give them weekly uploads instead of your monthly shit.” I said and Colby grinned.

“What you’re going to the conjuring then? Staying a week there?” He asked and I pursed my lips. “Well I didn’t say that.”

The two laughed and Sam shut off the camera. “Heading to the forest, then?” He asked and we nodded. Suddenly my stomach made a growling noice and they stopped.

“We could get something to eat first?” Colby suggested and I shook my head. “Nahh, it’s fine, I’m not that hungry really,” I waved it off and kept walking.

“Are you sure? You haven’t eaten breakfast yet and it’s almost two in the afternoon,” Colby said and I just chuckled.

“I’m fine, really,” I smiled at him and kept walking, not missing the look the two of them exchanged before following me.

Truth to be told, the last time I ate would be the crackers from the day before, as I had just a bit in the afternoon after almost passing out.

Colby walked in the back, having taken over the camera from Sam and he recorded as we entered the forest.

I knew the walk would be about 20 minutes, so it wasn’t that bad, but I felt myself stress out when I became light headed.

Oh no, please, please not now.

Passing out has become normal now, the lack of food I’ve been consuming has been taking a toll on me. I never tell anyone, it’s my little secret, I didn’t need them to worry about me or feed me lies of how I was ‘beautiful’ because I know I’m not.

I stumbled and almost fell but steadied myself. “You alright there?” Sam turned around with a small grin and I gave him one back. “I’m fine,” I lied and we kept on walking, Cole shutting the camera off.

When the building came in sight he started it up again, and of course, as if fate had planned it, I fell and I noticed my consciousness slip away.

The last thing I felt was two arms around my waist and I was out.

I heard someone calling my name from afar and my eyes slowly opened.

“Oh, thank god, Sam! Sam she’s opened her eyes!” Colby called out. I slowly sat up. I was laying in the grass and I noticed Sam jogging over with his phone in his hands.

“Are you alright?” I looked at Colby who had a concerned look on his face and I nodded, trying to stand up but he put his hands on my shoulders.

“Woah, lets keep sitting down for a minute, love,” he said and I sat, rubbing my head. “How long was I out for?” I asked and Colby looked at his watch.

“Five minutes at least.” He told me. “Yeah, I tried calling for help, but there’s no service,” Sam said and I gave him a weirded out look.

“What help did you try to call?” I asked and he shrugged sheepishly. “Your mum, I thought maybe this had happened before,” he said and I sniffed.

“It happened a few times, but my mum doesn’t know, and don’t even think of telling her,” I said and the exchanged glances.

“You know what’s happening then?” Colby asked and I sighed. “I haven’t eaten in a moment, that’s probably it.” I confessed and Colby sighed.

“I told you that you should it this morning- when is the last time you ate?” He questioned. “Uhh, yesterday, some crackers,” I said and he clenched his teeth slightly.

“A decent meal,” he clarified and I bit my lip thinking back. “Tuesday, I think?” I said a bit uncertain. “That’s five days ago, Y/n!” He scolded and pursed my lips.

“Sorry,” I said in a small voice. Sam got his backpack of his shoulders and started to rummage trough it, pulling out an apple.

“Eat this,” he said and I took it from him, frowning at it a bit. “N/n,” he said and I sighed taking bite.

They made me sit for about ten minutes, and demanded I tell them why I wasn’t eating. With a bit of reluctance, I told them about how I felt, how I hated how I looked and that I felt like I was to fat.

The next twenty minutes where spent with them telling me all the things they liked about my look and my personality, giving me reasons to eat and demanding we go to a restaurant after this so I could eat a decent meal.

They also demanded I ate a desert, encouraging me to continue eating and not worry about my looks, because in their opinion, I looked beautiful.

At the end of the conversation, I had tears in my eyes, and I wiped them away, and I reassured them that it’d be fine to still film the video, as we all wanted to continue.

#sam and colby x reader #sam golbach x reader #sam golbach #sam and colby #colby brock x reader #colby brock #xplr club #xplr

277 notes · View notes

faithshouseofchaos · 3 months

Text

Secret identity

Miss Americana and the heartbreak Prince— Prince Carlos sainz x reader part one

Tagged— @moss-on-tmblr @toasttt11 @ladymarvel27 @darleneslane @csainzoperator @carlossainzwho @ashy-kit @astraeaworld @a-casual-romantic @alwayzbeenale @bblouifford @badassturtle13 @bbtoni @charlesf1leclerc @crashingwavesofeuphoria @dark-night-sky-99 @dudenhaaa27 @eugene-emt-roe @f1ln4dr3cl16mv33 @faithm120701 @hollie911 @ironcowboycopnickel @lollypop90907 @laura-naruto-fan1998 @natailiatulls07 @norrisleclercf1 @vellicora @venusisnothere @vivwritesfics @purplephantomwolf @lightdragonrayne @hrts4scarr @nikolaros22

as much as Carlos loved being a prince he also hated it. Soon he’d take over and become king, something that Carlos couldn’t wait for and dreaded. Carlos always saw being the king as soul-sucking and stressful. It wouldn’t be so bad but his mother, his beloved mother, had been going through suitable candidates for a future queen. Carlos didn’t have much of a choice in the matter.

That’s how Carlos found himself here in his room packing bags and making arrangements to leave Spain to live a somewhat normal life while he still could.

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” Carlos’s sister said, sitting on her brother's bed.

“What could possibly go wrong, it's just a couple of weeks” Carlos says.

“Everything could go wrong brother”

“Your paranoid”

“I’m not paranoid where are you even going to go hmm?”

“I found a roommate far away from Spain”

“What are you talking about?”

"Far away? " the sister questioned Carlos with curiosity and suspicion

"America" Carlos responded

"America ? You ? You're crazy you'll never actually be able to fit in there you're royalty "

Carlos let out a small smirk he could already tell why this will be a fun trip

"That's precisely the reason I'm going sister"

"What are you gonna tell our parents ?" his sister asked concerned

"That's the beautiful part" Carlos responded with a smirk

"I'm not telling them"

"You can't just leave and not tell them where you're going" his sister exclaimed

"Oh I think I can..." Carlos replied confidently "and for the record I'm not planning to be gone forever this is just a little break I need "

"You realize you're missing the coronation party and the chance to meet your future Queen" his sister pointed out

"I'm aware sister" was all Carlos could say in reply

"You're not serious right?!?" his sisters eyes widened and mouth dropped

"I'm very serious" Carlos responded

"You do know what's gonna happen when they find out"

"Of course I'm aware " Carlos replied in a calm manner

His mind was made up regardless of the repercussions

"You know that the chance of me actually liking a queen or even just tolerating her is close to none and besides that I just want to live a normal life like everyone else for awhile"

"There's a huge difference between living and existing you know " he added

"You're so stubborn it's ridiculous" the sister stated as she shook her head

"I suppose that's a trait I'll carry forward to the throne" Carlos said in a joking manner

"Yeah right if you ever sit on that throne in the first place. They'll probably throw you to the wolves if not worse" his sister said mockingly

Carlos smiled amused at his sister sarcasm

"Just promise me you won't tell mom and dad where I'm going " Carlos said to his sister

His sister looked at him and let out a sigh

"I promise not to tell them but I'm not lying for you in case they find out about this " she stated

"I'll take that chance" Carlos said and they both knew he would

And so it was settled Carlos was going through with this whether or not his family supported it.

The sister left the room and Carlos continued packing. He had his bags almost filled now as he paused and took one last look around his room

"Just what am i getting myself into" he said to himself

But a little voice in him knew he would be okay. A little adventure was just what he needed to brighten his spirits and clear his head from all that's been bogging it down.

After an entire life spent in the upper echelon of society, being waited on hand and foot by maids and butlers, being given anything and everything he wants, finally Carlos was getting the chance to live a somewhat normal life for a while.

It was a bit scary but also exciting.

He’d finally be able to learn how to do basic tasks, be responsible for himself, and appreciate the simple things in life.

And he had a feeling he may even meet someone special along the way.

He made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare so he spent the next two hours just sitting and watching people walk by.

Some of the people walking by looked completely overwhelmed by the airport's constant noise and hectic atmosphere, and Carlos couldn't blame them, but at the same time he couldn't help feeling a bit nervous himself. All of this was going to be very different from his previous lifestyle.

Finally his boarding time came along which snapped him out of his trance.

He still had a slight sense of uneasiness but it was quickly outweighed by the excitement of starting a new chapter in his life.

Carlos waited in line for his plane and got on board.

At that point he officially had left his old life behind and he was already picturing things playing out in his new one.

This was going to be his new normal for as long as he wanted it to last and he felt strangely content.

Time really flew by during the flight and Carlos spent most of the duration of the flight napping.

When he awoke it was almost time for them to land.

The plane was coming in for its descent and Carlos couldn't help but feel a little bit nervous.

He was only hours away from beginning a new chapter in his life but at that very moment it felt more like a leap of faith.

Soon the plane was safely on the ground and after an uneventful exit Carlos was officially on American soil.

It was a surreal feeling for him, but he couldn't help but feel a sense of joy and optimism for this new chapter of his life to begin.

Carlos just felt that his whole life had been leading up to this moment, and now that he was finally here he was ready to start his new adventure.

And he had no idea what adventures lay ahead of him….

182 notes · View notes

woso-dreamzzz · 3 months

Text

Reunion

Charli Grant x Reader

Summary: Your girlfriend moves to Spurs

"You've got a spring in your step today," The media girl laughed as you came bounding into the reception area," What's up?"

"My girlfriend's joining today," You said with the widest smile you could muster on your face," Did you know? I'm so excited! Charli's amazing, you'll see!"

You bounced into the changing room with an extra pep in your step.

"What's up with you?" Grace asked as you got changed in record time and stood by the door, rocking back and forth impatiently.

"Charli's here today," You replied, not taking your eyes off the door.

"Didn't you see her earlier today?" Grace rolled her eyes in amusement. "I mean, aren't you guys living together?"

"We will be," You confirmed, still waiting by the door," But she crashed at Kyra's place last night. They were having a catch up. It's her first day anyway, it's fine to be excited."

"You're probably more excited than Charli is."

"Who's more excited than me?"

You leapt into your girlfriend's arms instantly. Her hands naturally curled around you, supporting your weight as she wandered over to her assigned cubby.

As she let you down, her lips followed you. Kisses were pressed all over your face as you helped her unbutton her shirt and pull on her new Spurs training top.

Grace whistled behind you both, a low sardonic note as she stared with raised brows. "Oh god," She muttered to Martha," Look at them. They're codependent!"

Your cry of," We're not codependent!" was somewhat dampened by the way that you helped Charli into each of her boots and then helped to tie her hair back.

"You look codependent."

"We're not codependent!" Both you and Charli exclaimed and you inwardly chuckled.

Oh yes, Charli would fit in well with your team.

You missed her a lot while she was in Sweden. You used to play there too which was where you met her. You'd been picked up by Vittsjö almost as soon as you'd left the Spurs academy at eighteen.

At the time, the Spurs team was stacked and they didn't need an inexperienced player like you. You'd received a few offers from teams that weren't in the WSL but when Vittsjö came knocking with more money than you had ever seen and guaranteed game time, you'd gotten on the first plane to Sweden you could find.

You'd been pretty settled in the team by the time that Charli joined, with her good looks and Aussie charm.

It hadn't taken a long time at all for you to couple up. You'd been moved in with each other within the week of your first date (a total cliche, you knew) and were sharing clothes within the hour.

Charli was practically your dream girl in everything she did or said and you were very happy to hang off her arm or be encased in a hug by her if it meant that you just got to soak in her attention just a brief moment longer.

It was the hardest moment of your life a year and a half ago making the move back to England. Spurs were your dream club though. They had been your aim for years now. It crushed you when they didn't want you after you finished your academy training but it was probably the best thing that happened to you.

It brought you Vittsjö and it brought you, more importantly, Charli.

You hadn't thought that Spurs was still watching you until you received the offer to play for them again. It felt like ripping your heart straight out of your chest when you read over the email with the contract.

It was Charli that convinced you to go. She had sat you down one night, listened to how you sobbed over the decision, agonising about leaving her but still wanting to return to England to play for Spurs.

She was the one that spurred on your decision.

She was the one who drove you to the airport and pressed one last lingering kiss to your lips.

It wasn't a goodbye.

Just a see you later.

You flew out to Sweden every chance you got. You curled yourself into Charli's arms whenever you could.

And, now that she was at your club, you could do it at any time you wanted.

Maybe Grace was right.

Maybe you were a tad codependent.

But, honestly, you would have it any other way.

#woso x reader #charli grant x reader #charli grant #woso community #woso fanfics #woso imagine #woso

341 notes · View notes

abybweisse · 2 months

Text

Ch209, Spoilers part two

⚠️ updated text ⚠️

Then we are back to what just recently happened -- Doll and Finny fighting over who's the enemy and who's the friend.

He's got all these opposing ideas in his head about who killed whom and why... and was it deserved... and why was he offered these chances? Those sorts of thoughts, though I know there's stuff missing in the quick translations by @bitterbutlr , but that's the gist of it.

Even Sebastian pointing out our earl's bad table manners at Lau's place is a fond memory for Snake, at least sort of. It is a time of determination, to not just step aside to his young master's older twin, who has usurped what our earl has gained.

Then the memories turn into cinematic records, as all these flashbacks were just Snake's life flashing before his eyes.

We don't even learn about the mysterious place he thinks he's from. I'm wondering if that information came from some of the snakes and doesn't actually apply to him.

He apparently was human (at least partly), born to a human named Sarah Campbell (or a similar name). She was an actress. This also comes from @bitterbutlr and maybe one other person on Discord.) The NEW! reaper notes nothing worth adding, and then there's the tamping sound of the "COMPLETED" stamp.

What I don't get is why this reaper looks at Doll holding Snake's body and doesn't think there's anything else to note. Ronald once said he couldn't tell who was the bizarre doll -- Ada or Layla -- without checking their records or catching them in the act of behaving like the first bizarre dolls they saw (on the ship). He needed to see Layla attack Baldo before he knew for sure it was her.

So... is this reaper going to leave the scene without confronting Doll? Doll doesn't look normal at this point... but perhaps this reaper just plans to stick to the basics...? William says it's all just a formality anyway, right? 🤔 🤨

If so, that really leaves it open for her to ask Undertaker to make a bizarre doll out of Snake.

He has a lot of memories about what he wanted in life -- mostly to find a family to belong to, where he can live in harmony with them. However, he also has memories where he's specifically and severely angry with "Smile" and "Black" and wants revenge on them. Undertaker could cherry pick the right memories to serve as episodes that make Snake loyal to real Ciel, or at least to Doll. If that happens, we might see Sebastian destroy Snake anyway, just like he warns about in ch51... for any Phantomhive servant who turns against their young master....

114 notes · View notes

daughterofcain-67 · 2 months

Text

𝙾𝚞𝚝 𝚘𝚏 𝙾𝚞𝚛 𝚃𝚒𝚖𝚎 (pt. 9)

(Soldier Boy x Female Reader)

(masterlist)

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: Your main goal while you’re riding with Butcher is to make sure you can get Ben back no matter the cost. After getting to Grace Mallory’s last known residence, you hope you can find what you’re looking for. The sooner you’d find Ben, the better off you’ll be.

𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: cannon level violence, nothing to explicit. Alternative ending to the final episode of season three in a way, or an alternative version of the aftermath rather. Hope you all enjoy!

You could hear the way Butcher was grumbling obscenities to himself all throughout the car ride to get to Grace Mallory’s home. You didn’t catch all of it but you knew Butcher wasn’t exactly thrilled to be going back to a place where he was unwelcome. It surprised you since you assumed he got used to the feeling of being unwelcome considering his record.

“You know, you aren’t the only one in the car. You sound like a psychopath talking to yourself when I’m right here.” You said as you continued to look out through the windshield.

“I just don’t get why you’re going through all this trouble for a guy who’s willing to kill children like Ryan just to get to his goal. What kind of heartless bastard is he?” He asked, glaring at the road and you shrugged a little.

“And you were completely fond of Ryan when you found out he was the spawn of your wife’s rape? A spawn of Homelander? Don’t tell me the thought hadn’t crossed your mind, so that argument is kind of unfair to Soldier Boy.” You commented and you heard Butcher continue to grumble.

“That’s a different bloody story. Becca didn’t ask for any of that shit to happen to her. She went missing for so many years and I had no fucking clue what happened to her. Hell, there were times I thought she was dead.”

“Soldier Boy is my Becca. You went a handful of years without her. I’ve gone decades without Soldier Boy. And he didn’t ask to be taken to Russia, didn’t ask to be robbed of the opportunity to raise his own son. Who knows, if Soldier Boy really did raise Homelander, maybe he wouldn’t have turned out to be such a dick.” You continued.

“I hardly think Soldier Boy is really as helpless as Becca was though.”

“That’s not what I’m saying.. Yeah he’s strong and for the most part he can take care of himself if you take the damned Novichok out of the equation. No, he’s not as helpless as your wife was. And I’m sorry for your loss and I hate to hear what happened to her. Maybe that wasn’t exactly the best example.”

“You think?” Butcher muttered as he started to turn on a certain road.

“Okay, okay. Bad analogy. Maybe it would be better like this… The same love Becca felt for you? The way she loved you is the love I feel for Soldier Boy.”

“Oh now you’re comparing me to Soldier Boy? Thanks, that’s such a bloody compliment to be compared to the cunt.” He said and you sighed.

“Well, all I’m saying neither of you are perfect. You both have your flaws. Like a shit ton of flaws and no one in their right mind should care for either of you. Both of you have blood on your hands whether you wanted it or not. But Becca accepted you, flaws and all. She knew you’re far from perfect and she wasn’t blind to the fact that you’re not exactly the greatest guy on the planet, but her love for you was still strong and unconditional. And I love Soldier Boy even with all of his flaws and mistakes.”

Butcher was silent for several moments while his gaze remained transfixed on the road ahead of the two of you. You turned your head and looked out of the passenger window.

“He really wasn’t a bad guy in the beginning. Arrogant, sure. But he never wanted innocent people to get hurt. He just got suckered into Vought’s trap like a lot of Supes do. They say the road to Hell is paved with good intentions after all. And after a while, I guess he, like most supes, lost a lot of their morals somewhere along the way…” You said.

“He was telling me about that. Just before we were on the way to fight Homelander.” Butcher finally spoke again.

“As much as I don’t like what Annie said about Soldier Boy, and as much as I think she grew a little bit self centered for it, I’m still glad she stepped away from Vought when she did.” You spoke as you remembered that Annie was still the one that gave you that unreleased photo of Soldier Boy.

“I can tell her heart is still in the right place, so there’s hope for her yet. She’s just got a bit of growing up to do.” At this, Butcher only hummed.

You sighed a little, ready to get out of the car. It felt like you had been driving for most of the day, but really it’s only been about two or three hours, “How much longer ‘till we get to Mallory’s?”

“Won’t be too much longer.” Butcher said, starting to get short again.

When you glanced over, you saw that he wasn’t in the right shape and you noticed that something seemed to be leaking from his ear. Your frowned a little.

“Is that from the temp V you’ve been taking?” You asked and pointed at your own ear.

Butcher glanced at you and he touched his own ear. He glanced down at his fingertips and muttered a curse as he wiped the residue on his pants. Lovely.

“Yeah.”

“You must’ve taken a lot of those doses, huh?” You asked.

“Eh, mistakes have been made. I’m just glad the Kid didn’t take anymore. It would’ve killed the little fella.” He insisted.

“So… what made you protect him? Isn’t that kind of out of your character?” You inquired, which caused him to shoot a glare at you.

“I’m not that bad of a guy either ya know. I’m doing this with the whole, Hell with good intentions thing you were talking about.” He commented as he looked back at the road.

“But anyway.. Hughie reminds me a lot of somebody I knew.” He finally answered your question after a few minutes. You smiled a little to yourself, knowing Butcher couldn’t have been that bad of a guy deep down.

“Friend?”

“Family member… brother.”

You frowned a little, getting the feeling from the way Butcher went stoic with his facial expressions that something bad must’ve happened. You glanced down at your hands, “I’m sorry.”

“Ain’t nothing to be sorry for. Only thing that can fix anything is a Time Machine at this point.” He told you, though the comment didn’t make the frown leave your face.

“So how long do you have left?” You asked, getting the feeling the temp V may just be costing the man his life.

“Doctor’s say I’ve got about 18 months, that’s if I’m lucky. Which so far in life, I haven’t been so lucky.”

“I’m sure Hughie may be able to help you find some kind of cure. Plus you’ve got Frenchie who’s apparently one Hell of a chemist.”

“I haven’t told the lot of them yet. And I don’t plan on it.”

“You know Hughie’s going to be crushed if you don’t say anything to him and he finds out some other way.” You reminded and Butcher shook his head.

“I got him wrapped up in this mess from the start. I’ve dragged all of them through the trenches, so most of them may even be glad to hear I’ll be dead and out of their lives for good.” Butcher said.

“That’s awfully pessimistic of you.” You replied and he gave a slight shrug.

“It’s the truth though. Not much helpin’ that one.”

You looked out of the window again when the conversation didn’t go any further. But then after a few minutes, the two of you made it to a house that must’ve been Mallory’s. Butcher pulled into the driveway and the both of you got out of the vehicle.

“Look’s like she’s not here.” Butcher said when he noticed there weren’t any vehicles, and he remembered this was the last place she was when she was still looking after Ryan.

“Still, she’s bound to have some sort of notes, maybe even a computer so we can look through her emails and see what we can find. If she’s not here, there are always other ways to find out where she’s keeping Soldier Boy.” You insisted, hearing Butcher sigh you walked up to the door.

You noticed there’s a padlock on the door and you lifted a brow as you tried to think of what sort of codes to try. As you started to press some of the buttons, you heard the shattering of glass. You stood upright and looked around, but the next thing you knew, Butcher was opening up the door from the inside so you could come in.

“You’re in a rush, right? Let’s get this over with. Pressing buttons and solving puzzles won’t get you anywhere fast.” He said and you smirked a little.

“Let’s see what we can find.”

Ben woke up yet again feeling drowsy as Hell. He honestly had no idea at this point how long it’s been since he’d been taken. He stopped counting the hours, especially since he couldn’t when he was blacked out some of the time because of the damned gas or whatever they were putting in him.

He felt drained, but at this point it wasn’t a new feeling. It was still a humiliating feeling though. When he finally opened his eyes again and glanced down ward, he saw someone was drawing blood from him. As much as he wanted to move his arm away, he couldn’t because they put more restraints on his arms as a precaution from last time he was able to get one of his arms free.

“What have the results been so far?” Ben could hear a familiar voice question.

He slowly looked over and saw Grace was standing behind the woman taking his blood. The bitch looked even worse up close. He couldn’t say anything though. Mask and all.

“Nothing. I’m getting to understand why the Russians just put him away. Pretty much nothing can kill him and we aren’t making much progress with finding any other weaknesses.”

“And you’re taking his blood, why?” Mallory inquired.

“We’re hoping to see what kind of genetic weaknesses he could have and we need his blood to do some tests for that.” The doctor said.

Ben winced when he felt yet another needle in his arm and he assumed they were taking more blood from him. He tried to jerk his arm away but that did nothing to help him.

“What other procedures will you be performing in the meantime while you wait for the blood tests?”

“We’ll be seeing different ways the Novichok and maybe some other vapors can effect him. Maybe we can use that to kill him rather than using the radiation like they did in Russia.”

That sounded like it would be a painfully slow process. All the Novichok did was make him feel sleepy, almost like an anesthetic. But if he were to die in his sleep, Ben supposed he’d take that over a painful and torturous death.

“You know, maybe we can save some of the blood. If we can use his genes, maybe we can make a different hero. One that’s better than Homelander. Raise him up to take Homelander down.” Mallory suggested.

“Work for us? They’d be labeled as just another super terrorist or supervillain or whatever the term is. Are you sure that would be a good idea?”

“If we can shut down Vought once and for all, then anything would be worth it.”

Ben couldn’t stand for it. He wouldn’t let his DNA be used for someone else’s experimentation. Especially not after the last child turned out to be such a damned disappointing excuse to be called his son. He wouldn’t let that happen again.

“No…” He managed to speak and Mallory looked over at him.

“No what? I don’t think you have much control over what we do here.”

“Do not.. make another kid. Not like that bitch Homelander…”

Mallory heard the comment coming from Soldier Boy. She was almost amazed that he could even gather up the consciousness to form a sentence with how much Novichok they were gassing him up with. She hoped he wasn’t growing some sort of immunity to it. That would be disastrous.

“Trust me, Soldier Boy… if we do find a way to make a child from your DNA, the last thing we want is another Homelander.” She said, but she could tell the thought wasn’t comforting to the fallen hero. Not that it was intended to be a comfort anyway.

“It won’t be like you or Homelander. Maybe it’ll be even stronger than Homelander’s so called son, Ryan.” Mallory shrugged and that was when her phone began to buzz.

She pulled her device from her pocket and looked down, realizing there was an alert from her last residence.

Her eyes widened when she saw the security footage. It was not only the familiar face of Butcher breaking one of her windows to get into her house, but he was working with none other than Quake.

Grace could see from the phone they were looking for something. When Grace watched you look through her office area and she saw you open up her laptop, her stomach dropped. She didn’t know how quickly you’d be able to find this lab, but Mallory knew it would only be a matter of time before you’d be on your way here.

“Keep him sedated.” Mallory said as she turned on her heel while she was about to walk out of the door.

“What’s happening? It’s not like he’s going anywhere.” The doctor said and Grace looked back at Soldier Boy.

Once they made eye contact, Ben knew something must’ve happened. He smirked when he saw a glimpse of weakness in Grace’s eyes, a glimpse of fear.

“We may need to move him. My last location’s been made.” Grace said and walked out of the room.

The smirk remained on Ben’s face as he looked back up at the ceiling. If his assumptions, his hopes even, were correct… you’d be there to get him out of this Hell-hole in no time.

You saw the information on the laptop screen and you smirked before you looked over at Butcher who was just looking over your shoulder.

“I take it you’ve found it?” He asked.

“Yep. Let’s head out. If I know Mallory and her security plans… she may already know we’ve been here.” You commented and wrote down the address. Then you folded the paper in your hand and stood upright.

“We need to move now before she tries to move Soldier Boy.” Butcher nodded before he turned on his heel and headed for the door that’s been left open.

With that, you and Butcher both left the house and rushed to the car because the two of you could hear sirens in the distance. Mallory must’ve sent some kind of security to her home or something because of the break in so now it was time to haul ass.

Neither of you really bothered to buckle up and Butcher started the car and drove off. Meanwhile you grabbed your phone and started typing in the address on the GPS so Butcher could head that way.

You could tell Butcher was speeding with how you felt like you were about to sink into the seat as he took off. The sirens were close for a moment but as Butcher drove the sirens started to sound like they were getting further and further away.

Once you put the location in the GPS and put the phone on the little phone stand, you looked in the passenger mirror, “Do you think we lost them?”

“Ain’t no tellin’ so we may have to take advantage of our other precautions… check the glovebox.” Butcher told you so you opened it up and saw a gun.

“Let’s hope we’ve lost them.” You said, not sure of your aim with a gun and if you could get their tires or if you’d end up missing them and hitting someone else. Boulders you could handle, guns? Not so much.

But unfortunately, you could hear the sirens again and they were gaining on you pretty fast. You looked in the passenger mirror again and you felt a little uneasy.

“Quake, you’re gonna have to use that bloody thing if they get any closer to us. And from the looks of it… they’re coming pretty quick.” Butcher said and you looked down at the gun in your hand.

“Aim for the tires and you should be fine..” You whispered to yourself and you made sure the safety was switched off and you carefully got out of the seat and tried to steady yourself, though it wasn’t so easy since the road was starting to get a little bumpy.

You leaned out of the window and faced behind you. Sure enough, some cars were gaining speed behind you. You tried to steady your breathing while you lifted the hand that was holding the gun and aimed forward for their tires.

You pulled the trigger the first time and flinched when you heard both the gunshot and the tire blow on the first car. Your eyes widened when you saw the first vehicle struggle to keep control and they went off the side of the road.

“And you thought your aiming was bad. Now knock the dust off those other cunts.” Butcher said from the driver’s seat and you nodded to yourself and you pulled the trigger again, then again, taking care of the other two cars. You saw as the front of the two cars met and you could tell they were totaled with the way the airbags went off.

You felt a hand at the back of your shirt to pull you back in, though you realized it was just Butcher. You thanked him and switched the safety back on the gun and put it back in the glovebox. You ran a hand through your hair before you glanced over to the phone, looking to see how long it would be until you’d get to your destination.

“You think Soldier Boy will still be there if Mallory knows we’re on the way?” You questioned, trying not to doubt now of all times.

Butcher shrugged, “We’ve already made it this far. We won’t know if he’s there until we get there.”

After about ten more minutes, you finally arrived at your destination. Butcher went for his little black bag and you knew the V was in it. You put a hand over his and he looked at you.

“What?”

“You’re already dying. Don’t make the process speed up. The only supe that’s in there is Soldier Boy and he’s incapacitated.” You said and you reached into the glove box and pulled the gun out.

“Stick around for Hughie for as long as you can.” He looked at you with an oddly soft look, uncharacteristic of him and you didn’t like it but you could tell he was at least trying to let your words set in. You knew he cared for Hughie a lot, and he was kind of the only voice of reason Butcher seemed to have. It kept Butcher human in a way.

But you couldn’t be sentimental much longer after that.

The both of you got out of the car and they already knew you were coming. Some of the guards were already holding up their weapons and you raised up your hands as a wall of rock and dirt appeared between you and Butcher and the guards. Then with a pushing motion, the wall you created plunged forward and knocked all of the guards down.

When that happened, you already started to feel a little lightheaded. You supposed you weren’t completely at full capacity after the incident at Vought’s tower. But you couldn’t focus on that right now. You had to get Ben out of there. The sooner, the better.

You lifted a boulder and you threw it into the door, breaking a gaping hole into the building and you and Butcher came in. Butcher started shooting at even more of the guards. It was nice to know that even if he didn’t have much of a choice in this matter, he still had your back to a certain extent.

When you caught a glimpse of some people rushing down the hall across your path and you had a feeling you ought to follow them. You bit down on your bottom lip before you started running into that direction.

“What’s happening?” You heard someone call.

“It’s Soldier Boy. He’s trying to break free again. He’s already snapped the leather straps on one of his arms again.”

“Who the hell was watching him?!”

You didn’t care to hear the rest of that conversation because you knew they’d try to get Ben back into that vault. So you followed them and you slammed your fist against the floor.

“W-What was that?!”

“Quake! She’s here!” One of the scientists said and when you looked up you saw the look of terror on their faces. You smirked a little before you put your hands in the crack in the floor you created before you pulled your hands apart, thus splitting the floor open and they fell into the hole. You left it opened so they could at least try to get out on their own.

Then you ran to the other end of the hall, desperately looking for any sign of Ben.

You could feel something tickling your nose and rolling down and as you ran, you lifted a hand to your nose and looked down. You noticed the blood. “Fuck, not now.”

You shook it off and you rubbed your nose before you continued running. That was when you ran past a window where a light was beginning to glow. You opened the door and you saw that some scientists were frantically trying to keep a mask over Ben.

“Ben!” You exclaimed and you caught a glimpse of his gaze. Your eyes locked and then you diverted your attention to the scientists who were working but some of them went to you and they were coming towards you.

They were trying to corner you and you glanced around to see what exactly you could do but then you saw a scalpel. You picked it up and you started stabbing the scientists. As they cried in pain while gripping their arms or sides, you lifted another hand and twisted your wrist a little to try and take a chunk of the wall closest to them and you pushed them out of the room.

The last two scientists that were once hovering over Ben were coming at you. But then your vision was starting to get blurry no matter how hard you were trying to focus as they were coming at you. One of them tackled you to the ground and you were trying to fight them off with the scalpel.

One of them managed to take the scalpel from you and they held it up against your throat but then before you knew it, they went flying somewhere and you thought you heard some kind of crash. Sounded like one of them landed on a table or something, but you couldn’t really be sure.

But when you looked up, you saw Ben was the one hovering over you.

“Y/N, come on. Wake up. You can’t black out now.” You could hear his voice, hearing a twinge of concern and you knew he was right. This wasn’t over yet.

You could tell from the slight strain in his voice he must’ve gone through some sort of Hell of his own these past couple of days. But you couldn’t focus on that right now. It was getting harder to focus on anything but you started to get up and you felt Ben’s hand grip your arm as he basically dragged you up from the ground.

“How are you feeling?” He asked you and you nodded your head slightly, not wanting to move it too much because you felt like your head would explode if you did.

“Fine. Let’s get out of here.” You said and as you were rubbing your eyes to try and get them to focus again, Ben must’ve taken one of the doctor’s scrub pants because when you opened your eyes again, he had a pair of those light blue pants on and some poor guy was sitting there with nothing to cover his lower half.

You and Ben rushed out of the room and you could hear some gunshots.

“Come on, we have to find Butcher.” You said.

“Wait, you brought that asshole with you?” Ben asked.

“Ben, I had to. He was the only one that I could get to tell me where Mallory lived so I could even find this place. Can we talk about that later?” You said.

The two of you began running and that was when you saw a glimpse of Mallory trying to get out of the building and you glared, “Oh Hell no.”

Just as she made it outside, you rushed outside as well. Then you lifted your hands and several boulders appeared from the ground and you used them to crush each and every car that the woman could have possibly used to escape. There were about six vans, three cars, and two cargo vans that must’ve been used for the equipment they used to torture Ben. Every one of them were nothing but useless car parts now.

You saw Grace look back at you before she tried to run off and you clenched your fist and pulled your hand to yourself. Just as you did, the earth rose up and grasped Grace before pulling her to yourself. You rotated your wrist and the earth moved to make the old woman face you.

“I thought of all people, you’d know how much Soldier Boy meant to me. You even worked with me to bring Vought down just to prove they were the ones behind his whole so called death charade. To think you’d be one of the ones that would try to take him from me again.” You said and Mallory looked at you.

When we figured out what we needed to, we would have given him up.” Mallory said and you scoffed.

“If it were up to you, you would have given me a rotting carcass.” You continued.

“How far did you get, huh? What exactly have you found?” You asked and she shook her head.

“I haven’t found anything other than the Novichok because of Frenchie.” She said and you glared as you tightened your fist, causing the earth to act as an iron maiden, threatening to pierce the old woman’s body.

“I swear! Radiation does nothing but strengthen his energy blasts. Vapors just act as an anesthetic to keep him stabilized. That’s all I know.”

“Good… that’s the last thing you’ll ever find out about him.” You promised and with a snap of your fingers, the spikes went through Mallory’s body. She didn’t even have the chance to scream before the life left her eyes.

When you released the earth’s grip on her body, she plopped to the ground almost like a sack of potatoes. She was nothing but a bloody mess with holes in her clothes where her wounds were.

“Y/N! What did you do?!” Butcher called out.

When you turned around, you saw both Ben and Butcher walking forward. But everything that’s happened in the last several moments took a lot from you. The blurriness returned and that was the last you remembered.

Ben’s eyes widened when he saw you start to fall and he started running to you.

“Fucking Hell.” Ben said as he caught you just in time, knowing you must’ve overdone it. Your recovery time must’ve gotten longer since the tower. This whole rescue thing didn’t help at all.

“She bloody killed Mallory!” Butcher exclaimed and Ben glared.

“Like you’ve never killed anyone before.” Ben reminded.

Ben noticed Butcher went over to the woman and watched as Butcher sighed a little.

“She was ready to see her family though. She’d been ready for a long time.” Butcher said and Ben just let out a hum, not really interested as he looked down at you.

He put his hand on the pile point in your neck and let out a breath of relief. Then, Ben looked over at the building that had kept him the past several days. He carefully laid you down on the ground for a moment before he focused his energy to his center again. Afterwards, the next thing he knew there was another explosion and the building and everything inside was destroyed.

“You’ve gotten better at that, haven’t you?” Butcher said and Ben looked over at the man in the coat.

“I guess.” He said before Ben turned his attention back to you. He knelt down at your side before he took you into his arms again and he stood up. He felt the way your body leaned into his chest and he was honestly glad you found him. But he needed to get you some place safe so you could recover.

“You think she’ll be alright?” Butcher asked as he walked over but Ben could sense the sort of caution Butcher had.

“You know I’m not a ticking time bomb, right? Yeah, she’ll be okay. Just need to get her somewhere safe so she could rest up.” Ben said.

Butcher rubbed the back of his neck. A part of him didn’t want to help Soldier Boy since he would have killed Ryan if he had the chance, but aside from the threat you made, you were alright for a supe he supposed. You weren’t his favorite person in the world, but you did promise to keep Soldier Boy accountable and you said you’d stay away from everyone’s families if you got Soldier Boy back.

“Come on… I know a thing or two about stealing cars. I’ll give you a card and you can get her to a hotel to rest up.” Butcher said.

Ben looked up at Butcher, almost wondering if this was some kind of joke or if this was some trick. Could you blame him for being hesitant when the man turned on him back in the tower?

“Why? I didn’t kill Homelander and Y/N killed your little friend.” Ben said.

“If she can keep somebody like you in line when you can’t be killed, then we need her around. The world does. Just don’t let anyone here catch you around. Especially MM. He still wants to kill you.” Butcher said.

“Now are you coming or not?”

Ben was still skeptical about this whole thing, but he knew he didn’t have any other choice. So he nodded and he carried you out to Butcher’s car and the three of you rode somewhere to try and steal someone’s car from some gas station or something.

Ben was sitting down beside you on the bed while you rested. By that time, Ben had already used the card to buy himself some clothes so he wasn’t wandering around in scrub pants. He was wearing some t-shirt and some sweatpants and he had some socks on his feet.

Other than that, he hadn’t left your side. He wanted to make sure he was there for you whenever you’d wake up. Although he knew it may take a little longer than he wanted to. Still, it had been several hours since the both of you left Mallory’s little lab or whatever. It couldn’t be too much longer now, could it?

He gazed at your figure and he reached out to brush a stray hair away from your face. Then he moved to reach for the remote on the night stand so there would be some kind of background noise rather than the silence.

Ben looked over at the television and noticed some trailers for some new movies were out. He rolled his eyes a little. There were times where he got really tired of seeing supe movies. So Ben used the remote to try and find something worth watching. Then he saw a black and white film, something that took him back in time.

He recognized Clark Gable and Doris Day on the screen and it made him smile when he was able to at least recognize those faces, even if they weren’t exactly his favorite actors. The movie was apparently called Teacher’s Pet when he saw the title on the screen before it flashed away.

Ben started growing a little more interested in the old movie, there was something about it that felt more familiar to him. Maybe it was because it was something from a familiar time.

“You know, I loved Clark Gable back in the day.” Ben heard a familiar voice say and when he looked down, he saw your beautifully colored eyes opened and on the screen.

He smiled as he turned the volume down since the television switched to some adds now and he turned to face you, “You’re awake.”

“How long was I ou-“ He interrupted you with a kiss, unable to wait any longer.

He could hear you chuckling against his mouth and he slowly pulled away and he looked down at you, “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing…. I’m just glad to see you too.” He heard you say and he grinned before he cupped your face in the palm of his hand.

“You over did yourself again.” Ben stated.

“Twice.” You answered.

“I know. You wanna tell me about the tower?” He asked and you shook your head a little.

“Not much to tell. You went out the window, I went to panic mode that switched to some kind of rage mode. I’m surprised I was awake right after. I looked for you but realized I hat to run. Found some abandoned building to crash in and I crashed there for a while. The first two days I felt like I’d puke if I even thought about standing. By day three I was able to at least walk.” You said and Ben sighed.

“You really shouldn’t use your powers for a while.”

“Since when did you become a doctor?” He heard you ask and he saw your smile.

“I’d make a pretty shit doctor. But I’d rather not watch you black out again.” He admitted and you nodded before he felt you move closer to him, so Ben wrapped an arm around your smaller frame.

“What about you? How are you feeling?” Ben heard you question and he smiled a little. But then he remembered some pain killers or whatever other kind of drugs Butcher handed him before he went back to his little group.

“I’m fine. A hell of a lot better now that I’m away from that place. But here, take this. Butcher said it’s supposed to help with whatever migraine you might get.” He said and handed you some water and a couple of pills.

He watched you sit up and you took the pills before you started drinking some water.

“How long have I been out?” You finally asked him and Ben shrugged a little.

“Several hours.”

“So… what do we do from here?” He heard you ask and he chuckled a little.

“I thought you would have thought about it a little more. What’s the situation with your house? Couldn’t we just go back there?” Ben asked but then he watched you shake your head.

“No, Vought got to it and destroyed pretty much everything. Honestly, I think our best bet may be leaving the country.” You admitted and Ben frowned at that idea.

“You really think we have to go to that extreme? Mallory remained off the radar for several years and so did you, and you were able to stay in the states.” Ben stated, you hummed a little.

“Yeah, but I’m not sure if I can go into hiding again so soon. Who knows if Vought has people all over the country looking for me. Maybe even you if word were to get out that you’re alive.” You said.

“You act like Vought’s got a shit ton of snipers crawling all over the place.” Ben sighed and you shrugged.

“Who knows… you never know what Vought has up their sleeves. And I really don’t want to stick around and find out.” You said.

“If we’re out of the country for at least a year, maybe two. That way Vought thinks we’re out of the picture and it opens some sort of door for us to come back. You know they’re all about their fake deaths for supes they lose or force into retirement. Until then, maybe we can travel. It could be really fun.” You continued.

“Traveling.. might sound alright for a while. At least until things quiet down a bit. People already think I’m dead because of Vought I’m sure.” Ben commented and he watched you nod, confirming his statement.

“So where do you think we should go first?” You asked and Ben felt you place a hand on his own, causing him to grin as he intertwined your fingers.

“As long as we aren’t in Russia, I’ll be happy.” Ben reminded.

“Well, I kind of figured that would be a given… what about Ireland?” You suggested and Ben thought about it for a moment.

“You know what? I think that sounds like a great idea.”

Ben watched the way you smiled softly and he leaned down and placed a soft kiss on your forehead while you snuggled closer to him. He looked down at you, loving the fact that you were in his arms again.

“Thank you.. for coming and saving me.” He whispered and you hummed softly.

“Ben, that’s not anything to thank me for. When you love someone, you’d do anything to make sure they’re safe. I lost you once when you went out of the country, then again at Vought when Queen Maeve pushed you out of that window. I couldn’t lose you again after I just got you back.” You insisted.

Ben’s gaze softened. If he wasn’t mistaken, that may have even been the first time you said you loved him, even if it was in some sort of descriptive way. He knew you loved him based on the letters you’ve written him over the years, but he’s never heard you actually say it.

“God, you’re nothing like Crimson Countess, are you?” Ben chuckled and you rolled your eyes.

“I don’t think I could hate you nearly as much as she did.” You replied, he hummed as he looked down at you, observing your features.

“My world would crumble if you hated me half as much as she did. Then it would completely disappear if anything were to happen to you, if I lost you.” He admitted.

There was a change in the dynamic between the two of you in that moment, a shift in the atmosphere in a way. It was something the two of you hadn’t been able to sit and relish in ever since he came back. The two of you had been so preoccupied with his mission of killing the members of Payback, then the Homelander fiasco, then you rescuing him from Mallory’s lab.

“You know… when I woke up and heard the TV… a part of me wondered if everything that’s happened this past week and a half has been a dream.” You admitted.

“How do you mean?” Ben said gently.

“I mean… You’ve been gone for so long… I spent years in my house writing all of those letters. I’ve spent countless nights dreaming of what it would be like if you were to come back. This whole endeavor… A part of me thought after Mallory’s lab, that was just the end of another dream. A part of me wonders if I’ll ever get over the surrealism.”

Ben chuckled, “You really must’ve worn yourself out if you’re still thinking it was all a dream after this whole time.”

“Well, Ben… why don’t you show me how real all of this is?” You asked him, then a smirk started to appear on Ben’s face.

“With pleasure.” Ben said as he leaned down for a kiss. A kiss that would surely take your breath away and show you that this was reality. That this would be your new reality for the rest of your life and that you’d never lose him again.

After so many decades of being away from Ben, you knew what it was like to wander the earth as if you’d lost your other half. You knew how it felt to be so alone for so many years. You’ve felt out of place for so long but with Ben in your grasp again, you felt whole, complete. It was a happiness you hadn’t felt in so long and you were glad you finally had the man you loved beside you again and you couldn’t wait to see how the next several decades would treat the both of you.

It would certainly be an adventure, one you were more than eager to share with Ben for the rest of your life.

Tag List:

@deans-spinster-witch @roseblue373 @nancymcl @jackles010378 @hobby27 @chriszgirl92 @lyarr24 @wirdbeimaufhebengebunden @prettyinplaid94 @globetrotter28 @suckitands33 @capricxnt @k-slla @david-tennant-obsessed-blog @deangirl96 @mimaria420 @ashdoctor @muhahaha303 @angelbabyyy99

#jensen ackles #soldier boy #soldier boy jensen #soldier boy x you #jensen ackles soldier boy #soldier boy the boys #soldier boy x y/n #soldier boy fanfiction #soldier boy ff #soldier boy fic #soldier boy x reader #the boys ff #jensen the boys #amazon the boys #the boys #the boys amazon #jensen ackles the boys

81 notes · View notes