#rather leave me in the dark and tell me later than just fucking!! communicate with me!!!!! just fucking take 5 seconds and tell me!!!!!!!

[dr-trafalgar-law]

Trafalgar Law X CisFem Reader

3

"These aren't half bad for a pastry chef." Law smirked picking up another rice ball from the night before.

You didn't respond, gnawing on your lower lip distractedly.

'I need to see you.'

What does that mean? Did something happen? Had you been caught?

"F/N." your fiancé called startling you from your thoughts.

"Hm?"

"Would you like to go back to bed?" he offered assuming your distant demeanor was a side effect of last night's events.

"What? No, I'm fine." you raised your gaze to meet his.

He looked more curious than concerned, "Care to tell me why you're about to chew your own lip off?"

You halted your nervous habit once attention was drawn to it.

"Just still a bit off from yesterday I guess." you lied.

He didn't believe you but accepted your answer for now taking a seat at the table with you.

"Was there anything you wanted to do today?" he felt weird asking.

The two of you never participated in joint activities and he had no clue what you enjoyed doing when you weren't working.

"I'm so used to being up to my eyeballs in work. Just sitting around sounds kinda good." you shrugged.

"Then sitting around it is." he declared.

You glanced at him sideways. Was he planning to spend the day with you? When you suggested sitting around you assumed he would leave you alone, it didn't really seem to be his style to lay about and watch TV.

An hour later you'd constructed a nest of blankets and pillows on the sofa with Netflix cued up. Law strolled in placing his laptop, a medical journal and a comp book on the coffee table before taking a seat on the floor.

"Comfortable?" he watched you settle and turned back to the TV picking up the remote.

You hummed as he pressed play and went about his research.

It seemed he'd had no interest in watching your shows with you, but still felt the need to keep you company. You glanced between the television and your fiancé frequently. He studied diligently, citing medical articles and highlighting passages in the journal. Eventually, he stopped to take a break joining you on the couch. Rather than watch the baking show you were now six episodes into he leaned back and closed his burning eyes. It was quiet but comfortable unlike the night before. At some point, you both fell asleep.

                                                                                                    ___________

Buzzing on your nightstand jolted you from slumber. The room was still dark as you felt around for the device, squinting when you unlocked the screen nearly blinding yourself.

2:56 AM

"Fuck." you whispered settling back and opening your texts.

Law: I won't be home tonight. The on-call is overwhelmed and we're short on nurses.

It had been ten days since your episode. Before that Law probably wouldn't have bothered to tell you he wasn't coming home, you didn't share a room, it didn't matter to you. But you both agreed to communicate more even if you weren't quite ready.

Me: Your food is in the fridge.

Law smirked and pocketed his phone lying back on the cot in the on-call room. The staff insisted that he sleep for at least an hour, so he caved just taking the time to not be standing and interacting with people. He enjoyed that you were cooking dinner when you had time and that you even bothered to save him some. Cooking seemed to soothe you and he was reaping the benefits.

Your phone buzzed again earning a groan from you. What else could Law have to say?

206.555.4524: please.

The last message had gone unanswered, you even deleted it. Now you sat up wide awake slapping your phone across your thigh.

206.555.4524: I'm there. I'll wait.

You cut the engine after parking behind the house to be a little more inconspicuous.

"There" as it was referred to, was the Newgate lake house. You'd spent many summers there with the family and snuck away to have many nights alone with Marco. His truck was hidden around back next to yours, just like old times. You couldn't help the paranoid thought of it being a trap, but Marco would never do that to you.

Gulping down a few unsteady breaths you exited your car and walked up to the back door. Before you could knock the door opened and you were yanked inside colliding with a familiar torso. The light scent of burnt mesquite and chamomile wafted across your face instantly bringing a sense of ease over you. He held you for ages burying his nose in your scalp before you realized you weren't returning the affection. Your arms hung at your sides, you hadn't made a single move to bury yourself further into the blonde. The moment was so surreal and unexpected that you didn't hear him softly calling you.

His left hand moved to tip your chin up and meet his gaze, a heavy blush staining your cheeks. How could someone look so intense and nonchalant at the same time? His sapphires smoldered soaking up your flustered expression. It was exactly the reaction he wanted even if you didn't hug him back. The look on your face always gave you away.

"I shouldn't have come here." you stepped away.

Marco frowned, "But you did come, yoi."

"It was a mistake. You're married and I'm matched. People can't see us together even if it doesn't mean anything."

That hurt.

"Don't make it sound like we were nothing." his glare pierced your very core.

"That wasn't my intention. I'm sorry," you sighed pinching the bridge of your nose, "why did you call me out here? I thought something happened."

His shoulders dropped as he let out an exasperated sigh, "She's pregnant."

Your churning stomach worked quick sending stinging bile up your throat. You ran to the kitchen and spat into the sink. Marco followed offering a comforting pat between your shoulder blades.

"I'm ok." you muttered catching your breath, "Congrats is what I should have said."

Why did you come here?

"Yeah, I guess." he rubbed his neck.

"Why call me out in the middle of the night to tell me this?" you turned leaning against the marble countertop.

"I don't think it's mine, yoi."

The front door that led directly into the kitchen swung open startling both of you.

"Trust me no one ever comes out here babe." Ace stumbled in guiding a curvy brunette.

"Shit."

#trafalgar d law x reader #trafalgar law #closure #one piece #x reader #fem reader #lyndsyh24 #slow burn #mdni

[cryolyst]

:/

#i feel like a baby for whining about this but like im so disoriented rn #like my dad left me in way too many fucking things to worry about right as i was waking up from a nap #and then fucked off to bed. like what the hell did white shirt in kitchen mean. what the fuck am i meant to do #from the bottom of my heart. i want to fucking kill myself. #i feel like no one is fucking communicating with me. like can you fucking work with me. my fucking god. #how hard is it to just respond to me in a clear way. why did it take *** six hours today to fucking respond to me #is a fucking 'yes i will' so hard. did you have to give me anxiety for all 6 of those hours. you literally admit you read it and you'd #rather leave me in the dark and tell me later than just fucking!! communicate with me!!!!! just fucking take 5 seconds and tell me!!!!!!! #and then my dad had to get on my case yesterday about ****** ********* right after i said i was in the middle of taking care of it #like did you even fucking listen to me!!! i literally just answered what you asked!! leave me alone!!!!!!!!!!! #im actually so sick of everything right now. i gekhdbdjjdbdbbfbjsgvehbdbndnfb #FUCK. FUCK. FUCK!!!!!!!!!!! #oh great and i just remembered *** wanted something else from me tomorrow so i will have to do it again tomorrow 🙃🙃🙃🙃🙃🙃🙃 #ignore this

[ghostofskywalker]

On a Warpath

Harley Quinn/Reader

Fictober Day 18 of 31

Words: 811

Summary: In an attempt to find out when your girlfriend would be back from her latest mission, it becomes apparent that you're a lot more like her than you thought you were.

Harley Quinn Masterlist

You walked with purpose, a look on your face that gave off one very specific message: do not fuck with me. Having just gone through a rather tiring and intense twenty four hours prior, the last thing that anyone wanted to do (if they knew what was good for them) was piss you off.

And right now, you were aiming that anger and annoyance at the government, or more specifically, the army. To get even more specific, you fully planned on taking your fury out on the people who had sent your girlfriend off on an extra-dangerous mission and then decided not to tell you about it.

You understood that the government still viewed her as a criminal and that the assignments she went on were often of the utmost secrecy, but you worked in the same building as Amanda Waller and Rick Flag, and you thought that some of that secrecy was a little much. You had just as much combat training as half the men on this base, and just because you worked in the administrative side of things didn’t mean you should be kept in the dark.

Rick Flag’s office was closer, so you stepped in there first. He was sitting at his desk, doing something on his computer. Recently he’d taken a different role in the jobs and missions that these unorthodox teams went on, and that meant that he knew more than he used to, and didn’t usually have to risk his life as much. “Where’s the jet?” you asked as you stepped through the door, not even bothering with any kind of pleasantry.

“Look, we really can’t say anything about-” he started to say, as if he knew that eventually you would be in here sniffing around for information.

“Save the corporate bullshit,” you said, cutting him off. “I was told they would be back last night, and they’re not. What happened?”

“There were some complications-”

“Rick, come on. You know I won’t go around saying anything.”

He sighed. “I know, but-”

Okay, now you were getting annoyed. “Listen-”

“Y/N-”

At this point you had reached the end of your patience, and you decided to communicate in a manner that you knew he would understand. You pulled your gun from its holster and trained it at him. He looked shocked, but he really shouldn’t have been. Your girlfriend was missing, and you would go just as crazy for her as she would for you. “Are you listening?” you asked, all of the worry and fear for your partner was coming out (albeit in a way that was much more violent than usual).

He had recovered from the initial shock of having a gun pointed at him in his office, and sighed before responding. “I’m listening, I promise,” he said. “And I wish that things were different, but I can’t say anything.”

“I just want to make sure Harley’s alright,” you said. “I don’t need an exact location, but I just need to know that she’s still alive.”

There was a silence that settled over the space, and eventually Flag nodded. “We received a communication from the team a little while ago. There’s still more they have to do, but it sounded like they were almost done. According to the computer, Harley’s neck chip is still active. But I’m not the head communication for this team, so that’s all I know.”

You breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that she had at least made it this far. “Thank you for telling me,” you said, putting your gun away and turning to leave. “I’m sorry I threatened you.”

Flag just laughed. “You’re more like her than you realize, you know that?”

***

Your eyes were just beginning to close later that night when you heard a small shuffling noise and then the door to your room opened. “I’m hoooooooome!” The very recognizable voice of your girlfriend filled the room, and you smiled as she flipped the lights on.

the next thing you knew, you had gotten out of bed and wrapped her in a hug, despite the fact that she was covered in dirt (and what you knew was probably blood). “I’m glad you’re okay,” you said leaning in to kiss her.

“I heard you threatened Flag with a gun!”

Your mouth fell open in shock. “He told you?”

She just laughed. “Yeah, and I couldn’t be more proud of you! I’ll have you robbing banks with me in no time!”

Now it was your turn to laugh. “Why don’t you go take a shower and then we can sleep for a little while. The banks will still be there in the morning.”

As the night winded down once more, and Harley fell asleep beside you, there was only one thought running through your head, and it was just how happy you were that she was back. 

- the end -

i no longer have a taglist! if you're interested in being notified when i post, you can follow my library blog @ghostofskywalker-library and turn on notifications!

#ghostofskywalker.fictober #harley quinn #harley quinn x reader #harley quinn x gender neutral reader #harley quinn x you #harley quinn fanfiction #the suicide squad fanfiction

[anukkuna]

Vincent's Ring

Alright people... I got headcanons on Vincent's ring but most of them are a bit tragic! My mushy brain can't decide what it likes best... and I'd love to hear if any of you got similar ones?

(trigger warning: mentions of mental health and family issues & suicide as well as a spoiler warning for the latest episodes)

1. It's a wedding ring, but V's spouse passed away

Meaning: Vincent is a widower. In my hc V was married (maybe legally, maybe not; it might just have been an informal ceremony, doesn't matter) to another queer/enby/trans person but their spouse died. I felt like V was quite affected by Dirk's choice to jump at the End of "Abrgund"... maybe because their spouse took their own life (which can be quite hard on the one who feels left behind). They might feel guilty, like they didn't watch out for their spouse enough or like they weren't good enough. That might have been part of the trauma Vincent had to work through. (Might also explain why V was so angry with the manipulative culprit in "Gott des Bankrotts" for how the guy pressured all these people to take their lives). Anyway V loved their partner and always wanted to keep them close to heart.

Part of that hc for me is that Vincent's spouse's biological family wasn't supportive of them at all... neither as a person nor of their relationship with Vincent (like: very queerphobic and maybe religious parents) and Vincent tried to be their rock but ultimately their spouse decided to leave this world anyway.

Because Vincent had to deal with someone leaving and feeling so bad about it once before... well, Adam leaving just hit the same spot. On the one hand V's is like 'oh fuck, not this again, why me, why can't I be enough, why didn't I see the signs, why didn't I help him more' - on the other hand they're like 'I know, if someone really wants to leave there simply is no way to stop them and I have to respect their choice'... so Vincent already has some tools to deal with the feeling.

2. It's a (dead) family member's ring

I actually like this hc better than the first one because it's a little less dark, but since Vincent kissed the ring in "Abgrund" I'm not so sure... anyway: here the ring would belong to a family member like a parent or a grandparent.

Maybe, Vincent had a grandpa or grandma who loved them dearly and was always supportive of them, even though they were by far no ordinary or gender-conforming kid. The respective spouse (so, depending on what you choose the matching grandma / grandpa) was grandpa's one true love. Grandpa is very romantic and was maybe the odd one out himself as a kid... but he encourages Vincent to always be himself. Grandma was his one true love and when Grandpa dies, Vincent keeps this ring to remember him and how he believed in him - and in true love.

Another version of this hc is that the ring belonged to a parent gone missing or passed away. More likely V's mother... and when their dad remarried, Vincent asked for the ring to keep her memory.

3. The self-love head canon

A bit strange, maybe, but the most positive one. Here, Vincent's family was quite religious and V was supposed to marry rather young (maybe someone was picked from the religious community, maybe there was not specific partner picked at the time, dunno). However, V realized that they couldn't live this life any longer and they ran away from home and only took the few belongings they had with them. They ended up in Berlin, maybe graduaded there, studied psychology but later decided to become a cop to stand up for those in need (and ofc at some point in Berlin Vincent met Adam Schürk).

Now, why would Vincent wear the ring around their neck and even kiss it? After all, it was supposed to be a wedding ring for a forced marriage. Well, V keeps it as a reminder to always love yourself, to listen to what your heart tells you and to free yourself if needed.

4. Vincent is actually a Hobbit and on the road to Mordor

Selfexplanatory... and V certainly has the hair for it. (And have you seen the Gollum rendition... Queen, I cannot...)

Sooooo... what did I miss? Which headcanons are already out there??

(Gerne auch auf Deutsch und ich kann's auch auf Dt. nochmal erläutern, falls Bedarf ist.)

#polizeiruf świecko #polizeiruf frankfurt #polizeiruf 110 #vincent ross #vincents ring #headcanons #this escalated quickly #thx for listening to my ted talk :')

[sidestepping]

Snippet. No Punch Pulled.

DISCLAIMER: Everything belongs to Malin Rydén and Fallen Hero. This one’s on the Retribution time-line (which you can wishlist on Steam etc etc). CONTEXT: Apparently I’m posting twice in three days, what the fuck. The Daniel POV faucet Hath Been Open. WHAT TO EXPECT: Daniel and Ortega discuss less than civilly about a roof-punch (Retribution’s open alpha spoilers ahead). 

2020.

Under the ice pack, my eye still smarts, all the way down to the jaw. Of course it’s not that big of a deal, and I guess I deserved it a little; at least if you count unbridled violence as a communication style.

I don’t, for the record. But I understand how one can get there. I should have known; she’s always trembling with it.

I grasp too late how bad a refuge the break room is. As the pain just starts to wane, the door opens. Ortega throws me a glance and snorts. He takes the time to grab a beer in the fridge before he snarks:

“Rough morning?”

Under his laughing gaze, my pride smarts worse than my face.

“Just a little,” I mumble.

Shit. I would rather not tell him, but she’s going to, isn’t she? These two don’t share anything but the secrets of others. There will be no mercy for me, not from her, I’m sure of that. That means hiding it now will only come back to haunt me later.

“How’s the other guy?” Ortega adds on the tail of a generous gulp of beer.

“Unscathed. Una is the one who decked me.”

The next gulp goes down the wrong pipe.

“What?” he sputters.

“It’s m…”

“What the hell did you do to her?”

Oh, that’s rich. I bristle, cut to the quick. Of course he’s jumping to conclusions. Maybe he’s not wrong, but come on! He could have hesitated for one more second. It’s not like she’s a paragon of self-control.

“What?” I retort, “why would it be my fault?”

“Isn’t it?”

“I just wanted…”

“What did you do, Daniel?”

“Will you let me speak?”

“Will you stop justifying yourself and get to the point?”

I put the ice-pack down and breathe. I hope against hope that I’m not pink and blue and red and flushed. I feel cotton-headed and chest-boiling. I hate, I hate when he talks to me like I’m a disobedient little kid. When will he get it? I’m his ally, not his burden.

“I wanted to talk about Heartbreak, since nobody here will tell me anything. I flew her to a roof so we would be out of earshot from anyone…”

Oh. The silence that follows is much worse than his impatience.

The silence breathes with ozone.

When I look up, I’m greeted by a glare so dark I hold my breath. I stay seated, but my feet leave the floor, discreetly—anticipating the blow this time.

“Let me get this straight,” he says at last, voice very soft, soft enough to grate. “You flew a Heartbreak victim to a Los Diablos rooftop in the hopes that she would tell you, a perfect stranger, about the traumatic experience that lead to her almost-death?”

“I…”

“You do know she threw herself out a window and crashed on the ground several stories below, right?”

I wince. The image hurts me in the teeth. He looks like he relishes it: a savage scratching of a purulent scab, dirty nails deep.

“Ortega, I… She wasn’t…”

“She wasn’t WHAT?”

The scream comes from nowhere and hits like glass shattering. I haven’t seen him like that in a—a while. I wish I could disappear into thin air. This is worse, this is much worse than a punch. In front of me, Ortega has turned on his heels and paces up and down the room, tensed from nape to fists. My vague grasp of Spanish unlocks only fragments of his hissing:

“Can’t believe this… for months… and now this little shit… ruin everything?!”

Fine. I get the gist.

“She’s fine!” I plead. “She’s completely fine. She’s not going to vanish out of nowhere.”

“Shut up,” he snaps back to me. “Just because you collect Sidestep comics doesn’t mean you know her. If she does vanish, it will be your fault and your fault only.”

I clench my jaw. Yeah, I’m sure it won’t be about the obsessive nosing around he’s doing on his own free time. Pot, meet kettle.

“She won’t vanish,” I repeat. “She wouldn’t have agreed to train me otherwise. We’re meeting up again next week.”

That flies better than my apologies. He stops in his tracks, face tilted.

“Training? Training for what?” he looks at me vulture-eyed.

“For fighting, of course.”

“Una agreed to train you? She’s retired.”

“So? She was still the best fighter on the team, back in the day.”

“Second best. And it was seven years ago.”

I arch an eyebrow. What is he getting at? He’s stopped moving now, and his stillness makes me itch. This is no casual conversation.

“She still landed a punch on me today. Like riding a bike, I guess.”

“Only if you keep at it.”

“Fine,” I groan. “I’ll work more consistently.”

He dismisses me with a wave of his hand. Not his point. Silly me—why would I ever be his point?

“What did she say about training? No—how did she hit you? How was her stance? How was yours? Was there any force behind the blow? Describe the scene to me.”

Oh, he wouldn’t dare, would he? Of course he would. Of course. This time I don’t avoid his gaze.

“Are you shitting me right now?”

“What?” he barks, hackles raised.

“You’re trying to sniff out intel on her five seconds after ripping into me because I did the same? Get lost, Ortega!”

“Oh, get off your high horse! It’s not the same!”

“You’re right,” I throw back. “At least I asked her to her face.”

This one lands wrong, I see it on his moving face; but insults are less important than the bone he’s trying to gnaw at. He doesn’t let up:

“Tell me.”

“No.”

“If you think you’re helping her, you’re not. She needs me. What she doesn’t need is a little shit-stirrer clinging to her skirts.”

Getting better and better. Shit-stirring advice from the shit-stirrer in chief. Did he forget he can’t catch flies with vinegar?

“I’m not going to be your spy, Ortega,” I seethe. “Maybe try having a conversation next time.”

“Why, thank you for the suggestion,” he coos, poison-honeyed. “What do you recommend, kidnapping?”

It takes a lot not to clench my fists.

“Don’t be jealous,” I snap back. “I know you wouldn’t hesitate if you could fly yourself.”

I didn’t notice the space closing, not until he smacks his hands on the table between us and looms above me. I’m still seating, and I curse myself for not standing, earlier. Rookie mistake. There’s nothing I can do now but feel like a scolded brat, facing a resentment so cold I could shiver.

“You need to stop running your mouth about things you don’t understand.”

“You could make me understand,” I say, trying to summon my defusing voice, and failing. I’m still seeping anger, and his face is a locked box.

“You can’t. Back off. Just stay in your lane and don’t bother her again.”

“I’m not—”

He turns away. He’s done with me now. The dismissal is as disrespectful as his anger.

“Enjoy training, Daniel,” he throws over his shoulder, one last dart to ensure his victory. “You need it.”

Behind him, the door closes like a fist.

#notebooks #fallen hero: rebirth #fallen hero: retribution #herald #charge #una

[astrovagrant]

its kind of hard for me to codify myrrha's Extremely Bad Ritual for tes bc it's much better suited to my fantasy-ish worldbuild at this point but like. imagine a 16 year old very well educated but very sheltered girl is desperate to avoid a 'marriage' (read: basically just being sold off for political favors at that point) to a stranger who she's met twice and a future she never planned on - and now she's poring over her asshole mage father's extremely restricted books, she finds something she thinks can help her, she goes as far in her research as she feasibly can - but she cannot share this with anyone, cannot ask anyone's opinion or guidance. she wants to, she really does, but she is sooooo paranoid that even her friends (who are all her father's indentured servants, again bc he's an asshole) will rat her out because that's how the world works.

ok i'm actually putting a cut in a post for hte first time in years bc i realized this got longer than intended. anyway ummm body horror ig

the ritual is a meditation on pain, and how pain can empower the caster with greater willpower blah blah blah, your only admission fee is a lot of your own blood, turning your body into a ritualized canvas, and swearing fealty to [entity] (in this case i do think molag is the best fit, because this ritual was absolutely a trap, all things considered) - it's meant to take place over months. she doesn't have that much time; she does it in one fucking night and nearly exsanguinates herself. it Works... obliquely. it does indeed cause something to happen, she does talk to the entity, she does communicate her wishes and a deal is struck - she is too young to have a real grasp on what she's doing, here, but she has a chip on one shoulder and desperation on the other.

her blood payment was rich with suffering and would serve nicely, but power wasn't really the problem here - the suitor was. wouldn't it be better if he was out of the picture? what if [entity] took care of him for you? she agrees, half-unconsciously, because she assumes this entity would take care of it for her without any further action on her part. i tells her more payment would be required later, when she was in a better state, and next thing she knows she is waking up from her bed like the whole thing was just a bad dream. there's no blood, no wounds in her skin, nothing that would indicate the hours-long ritual that nearly killed her the night before.

she's dressed up and made presentable for the wedding, half delirious with joy that her problem is solved - any moment now, someone will come and tell the terrible news that he's dropped dead - and then half-stricken with terror that the entity's end of the deal is not being upheld as the hours tick down towards the ceremony. the music swells, the doors open, the bastard is standing there waiting for her, and all her fear and desperation and anger and hatred broils to the surface and whatever glamour was cast to hide her actions is broken - blood is seeping through the white wedding dress from every now-visible wound she put in herself, every carved ancient letter (in tes, daedric obvs) in the sacred geometric invocations. something vile and black takes over, heaving up and out from her ribcage, spreading along her limbs with the trails of blood and leaving her changed - she rips him apart with hands that no longer look like her own, rips the priest apart, rips any and all wedding guests apart, rips the servants apart, til her wounds are more filled with their blood than her own.

those who managed to flee are screaming bloody murder outside, and the dawning horror that's washing over her combined with the amount of blood she's now lost means that the haze breaks, she is back in her own body rather than the grotesque, elongated facsimile of it she was in just a moment ago, and she flees, trailing blood into the darkness.

it takes her months to successfully leave the country, and she has to kill at least a few more people before she gets her shit together enough to learn how to avoid people altogether. she's exhausted and weak and terrified, and the ritual wounds she carved into herself just keep bleeding - she has to cauterize them with magic to get them to stop, making their already ugly appearance more exaggerated and permanent. her magic runs out so quickly, now, and she has no idea why - it's like it's all running right out of her, and she can only have and use as much as she can catch in her cupped hands, where before there was a whole lake, undisturbed. she can't sleep - she goes days without it, and passes out for a terrible few hours at a time only to see spindly spectres standing over her when she wakes in fits of sleep paralysis.

eventually, she makes her way to a neighboring country, and lays extremely, extremely low. every inch of her life she claws back is 95% done without her magic, because it's next to useless in those first few years after the ritual. her nightly rest continues to be fucking terrible, and she often remembers fleeting moments after sleep that seem like she's a tourist in someone else's dreams, but she'd rather remember nothing than have the vivid and extremely gruesome nightmares she sometimes has - almost all of which are centered around the wedding night, and what she did. but to her knowledge, she's never become That Thing again, and she's never killed anyone else due to it, so that becomes a weary sort of consolation prize.

then myrrha lives the next decade or so of her life by continuing to pursue knowledge and slowly building up a reputation as an appraiser and restorer of artifacts - for legitimate or illegitimate reasons, she doesn't care as long as she's paid. after about five years or so she starts venturing out on archaeological trips for clients, as well, and eventually does additional ones for her own benefit/interest. her magic is still relatively weak, and seems worse at certain times than others, but she's found no real reason or pattern to it. she learns to store extra magic/energy in mineral specimens and occasionally other objects for her to use later, and that expands her options a bit as far as her magic use goes. it's not foolproof and it's not always convenient, but it's better to have that option instead of completely running out.

she DOES want to solve her problem - she wants to 'fix' herself, rid herself of the deal she's made, but all of her subsequent attempts to contact the being that she made the original deal with have resulted in failure, up to the point that she's almost at the point of giving up by the time her father finds her and yoinks her back to her home country/morrowind.

anyway. dumb bitch but also she's valid. can turn into a super scary monster but has thus far avoided whatever cocktail of triggers that made it happen in the first place, and does Suffer from it, generally, but not in ways she fully understands. she covers her ritual scars as much as she can because she doesn't care to answer questions or be scrutinized, and also because looking at them in Full raises some bitter combination of regret and self-hatred in the back of her throat that takes days to dissipate.

#i'm refitting some tesh stuff here bc i don't really ever plan to pull tesh out of star wars #and this is already very close to how myrrha's wedding went anyway. just added some spice for more consequences later in her life #but whereas tesh is brimming with power myrrha is mysteriously emptied of it #makes u think

[messers-moony]

Nothing Left | R.B

Paring: Regulus Black X Wife!Gryffindor!Reader

Summary: Everything crashes within seconds and Sirius doesn’t know where to go. 

Everything went downhill so fucking fast. How was that even possible? Everything was perfectly fine a year ago, but it seems that within that year, everything had collapsed onto the helpless boy. It was like being beneath a crumbling concrete tower that fell with no warning. Like being slapped in the face unexpectedly. Like getting doused in freezing water on a Sunday morning. 

In retrospect, it sucked. 

Sirius Black would know first hand. His entire life had been a screw-up from the beginning. It started with his parents, who - at the start - loved him. But when he turned out to be the child they never wanted all that love had vanished. They tortured him, broke him piece by piece, they built up trauma that took years for him to express to his friends. It wasn’t until third year when they heard him crying alone in his four-poster bed and asked what was wrong. He could remember the comforting embrace James Potter had given him. 

Nevertheless, it never ended there. The summer going into his sixth year, Sirius decided it was enough after too many Cruciatus Curses and body binding curses; enough was enough. His hands were trembling after enduring just ten minutes of the torture curse, and it was a struggle, but he packed everything he could. His heart broke at inevitably leaving his little brother behind. He could only hope that Regulus would understand. 

It took a Knight Bus trip to the Potter residence in Godric’s Hollow. The sky could’ve resembled how Sirius felt. Back at Grimmauld Place Twelve, the sky was always cloudy and rainy. Godric’s Hollow allowed the sun to shine past the fluffy clouds, but tonight was different. The sky was dark and thick, black clouds covered the stars. Rain poured from them, and it pittered on the stone roads. Sirius was instantly drenched when he stepped off the Knight Bus. 

Hesitantly he made his way to the door, where he knocked softly. The house was two stories and was a relatively big family home - not bigger than Grimmauld Place - but an average family home. The house was a mixture of grey, dark purples, and brown. It reminded Sirius of Remus’ patched jumpers. Sirius could hear movement from behind the plum door, and it opened to reveal a familiar face. James Potter with his messy hair, hazel eyes, and long limbs. James was muscular, but he was also tall, not Remus tall but taller than Sirius. 

James didn’t speak and ushered him inside. The following morning at breakfast, Euphemia - Mrs. Potter - had given Sirius the excellent news of his new forever home. The Potters would never forget the way Sirius lit up and how a smile had taken over his face. Sirius didn’t remember being this happy except for when Regulus was born. 

But his forever home was not forever. 

In seventh year, James’ parents had died, and nobody had comforted Sirius except one person who attempted. James had Lily, and that was enough for him. Perhaps it was selfish to think that James should be comforting him. It was definitely selfish. Sirius was doing really good at hiding how he felt until he crumbled behind a tapestry near the dungeons. 

Sirius didn’t know if it was good or bad luck that Regulus - his prefect Slytherin brother - had found him behind that tapestry. Regulus had pulled back the fabric slowly with his wand lit. His face had softened at his older brother sobbing with his knees to his chest. Regulus allowed his wand light to extinguish before sitting in front of him in the same position, allowing their socks to touch at the tips. 

They sat there for a couple of minutes before Regulus moved closer, albeit hesitantly to sit beside Sirius. Regulus had his back against the concrete, and Sirius curled up onto him while the younger Black brother rubbed his older brother's back. Sirius cried harder and harder. It took an hour before he subdued to sniffles and whimpers, but Regulus took it as his time to speak. 

“I know they meant a lot to you,” Regulus stated, still rubbing his older brothers back, “And I don’t blame you for grieving them.”

Sirius sniffled, “I ought to be grateful for them, really.” Regulus released a sound that sounded like a chuckle, but it was so foreign to Sirius he couldn’t tell, “They kept you safe. Kept you away from mother and father. They gave you a home where you could finally be you.”

“And no matter how mad I want to be at them for taking you away from me,” Regulus admitted, “I just can’t be because they gave you everything you wanted, and I’ve never seen you happier in my life.”

Regulus didn’t stop talking, “You know… I- I found my own James Potter.”

Sirius looked up at Regulus with flushed cheeks, but his facial expression was baffled, and Regulus presented him with a small smile, “Okay, maybe she isn’t my ‘James Potter’ per se because I don’t see her as a sister but rather she’s my girlfriend.”

“What’s- What’s her name?” Sirius croaked; his throat was so raw from crying. 

“Y/n L/n.”

“A- A Gryffindor?”

Regulus made that sound again, “Yeah. A stupidly brave one too. Even worse.”

Sirius smiled, “I know her.”

“Don’t tell me she was one of your conquests.” Regulus grimaced, and Sirius chuckled, snuggling back into Regulus’ chest, “No, she wasn’t. It turns out she has the hots for the other Black brother.”

Regulus smiled, and they allowed the silence of the castle to consume them. It was dark in the corridor on the other side of the tapestry, and Regulus could see the faint moonlight peaking out. He could also imagine the stars glittering beautifully in the midnight sky. He could see the star Sirius shining brighter than ever, and he just wanted his brother to feel the same. 

“I plan to marry her.” Regulus said before he could stop the words from falling from his mouth.

“What happens then?”

“What do you mean?”

“Mother and father will never approve.”

Regulus scoffed, “I’m done with their bullshit and have been for quite a while.”

Sirius met his brother's eyes again, “I left right after you. It turns out there is no more heir to the Black family name.”

The older Black brother smiled brightly and tightened his grip on his younger brother. Regulus couldn’t remember feeling this warm since they were little boys running around the backyard. Sirius was practically on top of him, and that was okay. For now, everything seemed okay again. Maybe Euphemia and Fleamont were gone, but even in their deaths, they managed to benefit Sirius’ life. 

Now it all seemed fruitless. 

Only a couple of months later, Sirius and Regulus had gotten into a huge kerfuffle. It ended with screaming, raw throats, tears, and flushed cheeks. Sirius could remember how Regulus playfully mocked his and Remus’ relationship. He didn’t know exactly what happened, just that he was pouncing for his little brother, and Remus was holding him back. Sirius had yelled some very awful things that he couldn’t take back. 

She hadn’t done anything. She didn’t even know that an argument had happened. Y/n had been reading in the common room when the book was flung out of her hand, and she was pushed against the stone wall of the Gryffindor Tower. Y/n met eyes with stormy grey ones, not unlike her lovers, but these weren’t her lovers. These were his elder brother's eyes, and he had lifted her off the floor against the wall until James had pulled Sirius off her. 

Y/n hit the floor with a thud and repeatedly coughed, hands on her throat. James had stormed into the boy's dormitory with Sirius with him. She didn’t even understand what was happening not until she met up with Regulus in the prefect dorm, and he saw the marks on her neck. Sirius had taken it too far, and Regulus was furious. They were no longer on speaking terms. 

Now Sirius had someone entirely different to grieve. 

Sirius had felt like his heart hit the floor when he was forced to move out of James’ house with Lily due to Harry being born. Remus had moved away to take care of his sick mother and asked for privacy. The funds that had previously been in Sirius’ account had been squandered, and now he was paying the price. 

He had absolutely nowhere to go. Truthfully, there was one place he could go, but he didn’t think he’d ever be accepted there. He had said unforgivable things, but James had given him enough confidence that it would be okay. Reluctantly, Sirius Black took the Knight Bus to the suburbs in London. The community felt so modern and new. It was different then Godric’s Hollow which had been around for so many years that it began to weather and erode. 

The deja vu was hitting him like a brick. Their house was a mixture of grey, black, white, and maybe blue - Sirius couldn’t tell in the darkness if it was white or pale blue. Perhaps he’d find out tomorrow if he was even welcomed inside. Sighing and shivering, Sirius knocked on the door. He could hear little squeals of delight that sounded much like a child. He also heard talking, but he froze when the door opened. 

Regulus Black, at the age of twenty-two, looked good. His hair was to his jaw, and it was wavy at the ends, whereas Sirius’ was much more straight. His eyes had turned silver over the years. His cheeks looked much fuller, and he looked a lot better. Regulus was no longer looked underweight, but he was still slim and skinny. Black family genes, Sirius supposed. Sirius couldn’t meet his brother's eyes. 

“What do you want, Sirius.” 

His name falling from Regulus’ mouth instead of a nickname hurt more than he expected, “I had nowhere else to go…”

Regulus scoffed, “James finally kick you out, eh?”

“Yeah, he did.” Sirius sounded so distant, “Perhaps it was about time, and here I am, at your doorstep.”

“Come on, Sirius.” Regulus motioned for him to come in, and Sirius did. 

The house was much cozier inside. The floors were dark wood, almost black. The living room - on Sirius’ left - was a darker turquoise color with grey furniture. The dining room - on Sirius’ right - was a light grey. The furniture was a marble table, white wood chairs with cushions, and a beautiful light fixture. Regulus led him to the kitchen, which was straight ahead in the hallway. 

It was a beautiful mint green color with black and white furniture. The appliances were primarily black and the furniture primarily white, but regardless, it was beautiful. They had another table in the kitchen that was a grey wood instead of the shiny marble in the dining room but nevertheless screamed elegance. Sirius sat at one of the barstools at the L of the counter. Regulus slid him a cup of tea. 

“Your house is beautiful.” Sirius complimented, and Regulus placed the cup back into the saucer, “Thank you. My wife picked everything out for the most part. I either built it or painted it.” Regulus smiled. 

“Your wife?”

Regulus hummed, “Y/n Black. Ring any bells?”

Sirius swallowed, “Yeah.”

They both took a sip of tea, “I have two kids too. Both boys.”

“Two?!“ Sirius nearly spat out the liquid he had just taken a sip of. 

“Twins. Fraternal, thankfully.”

He placed the cup down, “What’re their names?“

“Perseus Regulus Black and Leo Alphard Black.”

“Perseus and Leo, huh?“

Regulus blushed, “It wasn’t my idea. It was Y/n’s.”

“I like them,” Regulus looked up at him, “The names. I’m sure they fit them too.”

“Thanks.”

It wasn’t long until footsteps began to echo coming down the steps. Y/n had grown up too. Her face was sharper and her curves more defined. If Sirius was honest, she didn’t look like she had kids at all. To be fair, he wasn’t really staring at Y/n but more so his brother. Regulus had a starstruck expression as his wife walked towards him. He had a dopey smile on his face and stars in his eyes. Regulus really loved her, and Sirius could tell, hell, anyone could. 

Y/n stopped in her tracks at seeing Sirius, “What’s he doing here?” 

Regulus placed an arm around her waist, “He came looking for a place to stay. While I was waiting for you, I decided to catch up with him for a little.”

Sirius looked guilty, “Ultimately, I’m leaving this decision up to you.” 

Y/n sighed and looked at both brothers. She thought of what he did back at Hogwarts. She thought of how Regulus had cried and ached for his brother, wishing for their relationship to be back the way it was. She thought of her two children who always asked about their Uncle Sirius, who was never around. 

“Sirius,” Y/n began, and Sirius held his breath, “Where will you go if I were to say no?”

Sirius looked at his lap, “The streets.”

He couldn’t hear the footsteps that approached him until soft hands lifted his head where he met soft e/c eyes, “I’m willing to look past everything that happened at Hogwarts for the sake of my children. They deserve their uncle. But I need you to show me that I can trust you and that you won’t cause trouble.”

“I’ll do anything.” Sirius complied, and Regulus smirked, “Don’t say that. She’ll have you remodel something.”

“You’re an asshole.” Y/n whirled, and Regulus continued to smirk, “I told you to use magic, and you said we should do it the Muggle way.”

He shrugged, “We got good memories out of doing it the Muggle way.”

“If getting paint all over me counts as good memories, then sure.”

“It does.” Regulus smiled, “Your face was priceless.”

“Dickhead.” She muttered. 

Sirius grinned, “Well, Sirius. If Y/n lets you stay, then you’re welcome here. What I did back at Hogwarts was uncalled for, and I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have mocked you and Remus.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“It is.” Regulus countered solemnly, “Had I not done that; then we could’ve had a better relationship. For that, I’m sorry.”

Sirius stood up and hugged Regulus tight, “New beginnings?”

“New beginnings.” Regulus smiled. 

Regulus led Sirius up the wooden stairs up to the second story. It seemed to have had four bedrooms and two bathrooms, one in the master bedroom, one in the hallway, not including the one downstairs. On the end of the left side was a door leading to the master bedroom. On the right end was a cabinet and two doors across from one another. Then in the middle of the back was a door leading to another bedroom which Regulus had opened. 

The bedroom was spotless and beautiful. It was painted a grey with purple undertone with a queen-sized bed. Most of the furniture was white, and the bedding was black. Sirius had brought his trunk to its normal size and placed it at the end of the bed. Regulus smiled as Sirius looked around. 

“This is yours for as long as you want it.” Regulus stated softly snd Sirius had tears in his eyes, “Thank you.”

Sirius hugged his brother again, “I really mean it, thank you.”

“I love you, Sirius.” Regulus confessed, “You’ll always be my brother. The one who held me during thunderstorms. The one who sewed up my teddy bear when it had gotten ripped. The one who took the blame so I wouldn’t get punished.”

Sirius was gripping the back of his shirt tightly, “That stuff doesn’t just go away.”

They parted, and Regulus smiled, “Get some sleep. I’m sure you’d like to see the boys tomorrow, yeah?”

“Yeah. I’d like to meet my nephews.” Sirius admitted smiling brightly. 

“Get some sleep, Siri.” 

“You too, Reggie.”

#regulus black #regulus x reader #regulus x you #regulus x y/n #regulus black x reader #regulus black x y/n #regulus black x you #sirius black #sirius black imagine #sirius black x reader #Sirius Black x you #Sirius Black x y/n #the noble house of black #remus lupin #remus fluff #remus lupin fluff #remus lupin x reader #james potter #james potter x reader #Harry Potter #harry potter fanfiction #harry potter imagine #marauders #marauders fluff #marauders imagine #marauders x reader

[nightowlwriting]

summary: steve is acting weird. avoiding you, being snippy and mean, leaving the room when you enter. all you want is your boyfriend back, but all he wants is to pretend you don't exist. when he's almost hurt on a mission, you do what you're made to do.

word count: 11k

reader specifics: no race/gender/sexuality/body type mentioned, no pronouns for reader used, powered!reader, insecure!reader

warnings: steve is mean to the reader in the beginning, heavy angst, hurt/comfort, canon-level violence, brief ptsd symptoms, slight description of blood, brief mention of racism in the '30s & '40s

brief mentions of: reader's parents being toxic, homelessness, past accidents, ableism in the past & present

note: this one hurt me lmfao. idk why this went the way it did but i'm not mad at it // also i am a queer, trans, disabled american. i have fundamental disagreements with things that marvel/the mcu as it stands for and some of the more nuanced things that you might not notice unless you're looking for it. this will take place in my writing because i cannot separate myself from the lens in which i consume/create content.

title credit: lil nas x

mobile masterlist - request - support my work? - ao3

Falling in love with Steve Rogers went against every instinct you had. You knew that he was going to hurt you from the first moment your lips touched his. Sure - he’s clever, righteous, courteous… You can’t forget he’s also drop-dead gorgeous because every trashy gossip magazine in a three-state radius of New York doesn’t let you forget. Neither does the sight of him waking up in your bed every morning. (Well, actually, maybe that would remind you if he was still fucking doing that.)

But lately, you’ve had to rely on the fucking tabloids to catch a glimpse of your super-hero boyfriend. The university class you had picked up on a whim at the end of the summer - Life & Times of the ‘30s and ‘40s - avoids any mention of Steve Rogers and the Howling Commandos. Not that your classmates do because, Christ on a bike, those magazines manage to catch pictures of you and Steve in moments that you don’t even remember. Plus, you’re an Avenger too. It’s bound to catch some attention when you waltz into a college classroom.

You’re sure if you were an undergrad trying to fill a gen-ed requirement and were sitting next to someone who could kill you without blinking but also dating Captain Rogers you’d be a little distracted too. You try not to blame your classmates too much, but they do make it hard to concentrate with their -really dating Captain America?- and -wonder if I could get an autograph- whispers. None of that matters because you’re learning, really studying, in between missions and missing Steve and believing that maybe the gossip reporters are right.

Maybe he’s forgotten about you.

You grit your teeth and push the thought away. It does you no good right now, while you’re training with Peter. He’s working his way up to bona fide missions and, because you’re the only one on the team who has experience with real-life teenagers outside of saving their lives, it’s up to you to get him to the level that he needs to be. Plus, the mission where he’s going to get his gills wet is just you, Tony, Steve, Nat, and Bucky. You’d much rather be the one to train him because you won’t traumatize him.

Right now, though, you’re just kicking his ass to try and get rid of some of the tension in your body. You feel a little bad about it, but when you started as his mentor you told him point-blank that you’d never go easy on him. That meant if you were having a bad day he either needed to up his game or he’d have a bad day too. It appears he’s taken that to heart as he struggles to dodge the hits you’re throwing his way. He lunges out of the way when you try to land a right hook but practically walks into the leg sweep that sends him crashing to the ground.

“Awe,” Peter groans, letting his guard down. You take the momentary lapse of focus to grab him by the collar of the hoodie he’s wearing and haul him to his feet, jerking one fist back to cold-clock him but he beats you to it. You hear the sound of your nose cracking before you feel it but then the pain rushes you all at once. You’ve had worse but coming from Peter, the move surprises you. You don’t yell out but he does when you push him away from you and call the fight off. Peter practically yelps your name, hands up by his head as he watches you bend at the waist, both hands over where your nose is absolutely gushing blood. “I am so sorry, I just reacted-!”

“It’s fine, Pete,” You shake your head and stand straight again, the blood beginning to leak through your fingers, “Just go get me a towel, okay?” Peter practically trips over his feet to get something for your nose and as you track him on his way into the locker rooms, you see Steve, Bucky, and Nat. The latter are looking your way, eyebrows raised like they’re asking you if you’re okay. Steve hasn’t even broken stride in his conversation so you wave them off with a bloody hand. Peter’s back in a flash, pressing a wet towel into your grasp and snapping you out of your self-pity party. “It was a good hit,” You compliment as you wipe your face off, “I just wasn’t expecting it. Prob’ly wouldn't have landed it if I had.”

He wrings his hands, shifting from foot to foot. “I’m sorry-”

“It’s a good thing, Peter, means you’re getting better.” You deadpan, checking to see if your nose has stopped bleeding yet, “I don’t think you actually broke it, but I’ll go down to medical to check later.” You do your best to clean up your hands with the wet towel, but it’s so soaked with your blood that it mostly just smears it around. You grimace and shake your head. “Well, I should go now before our sparring match ends up looking like I murdered you.”

“I’ll go with,” He offers, “I’m the one who broke your nose.” You let Peter walk you down to medical even though you were originally going to refuse. Perhaps petty, but it was the way that Steve didn’t even look your way as you left that made you let the teenager walk you the two floors to where you’d be able to clean yourself up. He hums in the elevator and you know that he wants to ask you something - it’s the way he holds his mouth when he’s prying for information or keeping a secret that tips you off. Finally, just before the elevator opens, you sigh and turn to him.

“What, Peter?” He grins but then it falls when he has to skitter after you down the hall. Maybe that’s why it falls - the question he asks next nearly sends you to your ass.

“Is everything okay with you and Captain Rogers?” He easily catches up to you when you stop in your tracks, ignoring that you’re still bleeding a little bit down your face and you might be dripping blood everywhere from where it’s run down your arms.

“What?” You do your best to look confused like everything is fine, but Peter is perceptive. He may fumble around and be pretty awkward, but those are really just teenager things that he’ll hopefully outgrow. You should have known that when someone caught onto how bad things are on your end, it would be Peter. (You wonder if Nat or Bucky has brought it up with Steve, considering he’s spent more time with them in the past week than he’s seen you in the past month.) “We’re fine.” Your words are stilted as you begin walking to the medical wing much faster than before.

“I just thought I’d ask, well, because I’ve sort of noticed… Something just seems off, you know? Like, you two used to spend a lot of time together, and maybe it’s the recon mission coming up, but I was just thinking that you two really barely look at each other even when you’re in the same -”

“Peter!” You say his name much louder than either of you expected and both of you jump. “Peter,” You say softer, looking at the glass door to the medical wing instead of him, “Just leave it, okay? It’s nothing you have to worry about, kid.” Peter ducks around to open the door, forcing you to look at him. “He’s just focused on his stuff and I’m focused on getting you whipped into shape for this mission. We only have two days.” Once you’re inside and surrounded by the medical crew Tony keeps on staff, he thankfully drops it. You love Peter, you do, but it’s a lot like having a little brother. You can only love them so much before you want to fucking strangle them. Eventually, as the doctor checks to make sure he hasn’t broken your nose, you have to order him away to go study or something. “I’ll join you later,” You promise him as the doctor prods at your tender flesh, “I have an essay due soon.”

That’s another thing that’s been bugging you that Peter surely picked up on. Nearly everybody knew you were taking a course at the local community college, but nobody knew what it was about. You’d wanted to keep it a secret until you told Steve, but the day you had registered he’d flown out for a two-week mission without telling you or saying goodbye. After that, you decided it didn’t really matter if anyone knew what class you were taking, and keeping it a secret sort of spiraled from there. If they wanted to know they could look it up. Maybe it was petty, but you just wanted the class to be over and done with so you could forget that you really only picked it up so you relate to your boyfriend more.

If you can even call Steve your boyfriend anymore. You’re not so sure where you stand and, honestly, you’re really close to giving up on the relationship as a whole but you can’t do that. Before you were dating, you were friends, and Steve… He never gave up on you. Not once. How could you repay him by giving up on your relationship? The one that you thought was The One? Even if it hurts, even if you’re unsure more than sure these days, how could you? Somewhere, though, you know you deserve better. You don’t deserve the sinking, dark feeling that lingers in your gut for most of your days now or the way that you second-guess every move you make - even in the field. It’s dangerous but you can’t do anything to fix it.

You’re too scared. You know that eventually, it will happen, he’ll break up with you, but you’d like to put that day off for as long as possible. To relish in the love he once had for you, how pure and powerful it was. You’re sure that you’ll never experience anything like that again.

Hell, you might never fall in love again.

Those thoughts don’t do anything to help you, though, so you try not to have them. You get clearance from the doctor and get cleaned up as much as you can without taking a full body shower. The idea to go back to your room and take one crosses your mind but you know that Steve’s probably done training, probably heading back for his own shower, and you don’t want to open that can of worms. Instead, you go to the common room and drop into the couch between Peter and Tony. They’re talking about something something science something something, but you pull your stack of books and notebooks out from the shelf underneath the coffee table and continue outlining your essay from where you left off. The assignment was focused on how the end of WW1 changed American life and then how life changed leading up to and during WW2 but that had hit a little too close to home for you, so you’re writing about the racial tension and overall racism of the times. Tony and Peter keep talking over your back and then you hear footsteps heading toward the common room.

You barely look up when they enter - Nat and Bucky - because it’s fine. It’s normal. They’re just two of Steve’s best friends, that’s all, nothing to be jumpy about. You don’t even register that emotional pain that hits when you realize that, yeah, you’re not one of his best friends anymore. You doubt you’re even considered a friend in his book.

You groan and lean back into the couch, bringing your study materials with you. Peter glances over, skimming over your page and a half of shorthand, and gags. “Jesus, can you write like a normal person?”

“Oh, sorry,” You say lazily, not looking up as you continue to scribble in your incomprehensible code, “I do forget that some of us had privacy at home.” You lift your lips just a little bit to let Peter know you’re kidding, looking up at him through your lashes as you slouch next to him. He looks red in the face. “Besides, once you have to start doing mission reports you’ll be begging me to learn my shorthand and use my stenography machine.”

“I keep telling you that I can update that ol’ thing,” Tony draws your attention. For the first time, you realize that Nat and Bucky are on the loveseat looking at you expectantly. Steve is standing in the corner over their shoulder reading a book from the bookshelf in front of him. His back is tense and he looks like he’s not reading, just listening. You force your eyes back to Tony on your right and shake your head.

“No, because then you’d know my shorthand and it makes me too happy to see you spend hours trying to decipher it.” His eyes wander to your essay again, trying to find any patterns that he can use to figure out what the hell you’re writing on anything ever. He’s opening his mouth to make a smart-ass remark that will no doubt lift some of the weight off of your shoulders when another voice speaks up.

“Wow,” Steve doesn’t even look at you even as he says your name sardonically, “Way to be a team player.” Your mind comes to a screeching halt, trying to figure out what the fuck he’s playing at. Even Bucky and Nat look surprised at the cold way he spoke to you, Tony and Peter both gasping from your side. You can’t say anything, throat tight and burning with tears as you stare at your boyfriend with raised eyebrows. What do you say to that? How do you respond? You know it wasn’t a joke because he’s not laughing, not smiling, not even looking up from that fucking book in his hands. You can’t tell if you’re more hurt or embarrassed, but either way, you don’t want to stick around for someone to get the nerve to say something.

Instead of replying, you slam your textbooks shut and bundle everything into your arms. You doubt Steve even notices that you’re making such a hasty retreat but if he does, he doesn’t say a fucking thing. You feel like you’re in high school - practically running through an empty hallway with your notebooks and textbooks pressed to your chest, trying not to cry. It’s ridiculous. You’re a trained assassin, you’re an Avenger, you are strong and powerful and yet… And yet. You’ve given so much of your heart and soul to Steve Rogers that he can knock you down eight pegs without even trying. Without even looking at you. You can’t wait to go on this fucking recon mission, where you can put all of your focus on making sure Peter is doing okay and gathering the intel. Where you can stop thinking about how easily Steve Rogers seems to be pushing you to the side.

You spend the next two days writing your essay, ignoring almost everyone, and working on your essay. On the day of the recon mission, you’re running out the door for your eight a.m lecture, printed essay in hand, and reminding Tony that he promised to pick you up on campus after class for the mission.

You’re lucky that you went, too. You hadn’t counted on the professor making everyone stand up and tell the class the subject of their essays - didn’t realize that it would be twenty-five percent of the grade on the paper. You’ll never understand college professors and the weird shit they do, but the class is informative and entertaining. He goes around the room, starting on the opposite side of you, so you’ll be last. Great.

Several students did their papers on the propaganda of the time, one student was brave and did her essay on the ethical dilemma of the super-soldier serum and eugenics, and most of the other students focused on pop culture and how it changed. When your professor looks at you it’s almost like he’s expecting you to have done nothing but fawn over Steve and Bucky, considering you know them personally. He looks surprised when you clear your throat, stand and say: “I focused on the casual and institutional racism that faced non-white Americans at the time.” You almost preen when he looks impressed and then the shame fills you. It’s just… You want Steve to be proud of you. You want him to congratulate you on going back to school, even if it’s just for one class. You want him to be happy and surprised that he was the inspiration for taking the class.

Though, lately, the class has been more for you than for him. You like learning new things, pushing the boundaries of assignments, making people uncomfortable with the truth of the times you’re studying as told to you by two people who lived it. It’s nice. Normal.

Everyone needs a little bit of normal.

But, honestly, normal is fucking boring. By the time your class is over and you’re handing in your essay it’s like ants are crawling over your skin. A combination of nerves from the upcoming mission, a head full of fog from whatever is happening with Steve, and a little bit of fear at the thought of taking Peter into the field has you bolting for the door the moment your essay is taken from you. You’d worn your tac-suit underneath a pair of baggy sweats and a loose hoodie, so you don’t even bother slowing down as you head toward the car that Tony has waiting for you. He’s in the front seat, grinning at you from underneath his aviators and Peter is driving.

You slip into the backseat without thinking or looking at who’s there, tossing your bag in the back and peeling your hoodie off. “God, Tone, we’re goin’ to die before we even get to the mission with Petey driving.” You toss your hoodie back to join your bag and finally see who’s sitting next to you.

Of course, it’s Steve. He’s looking at you - but not really. He’s looking through you, like he can’t stand that you’re both crammed in the backseat of Tony’s electric car. His gaze catches you and holds you in place. Everything around you goes cold and fuzzy, making you miss Peter’s indignant complaining that he has his license so he should be able to drive… And then Steve scoffs and looks out his window, ignoring you. It stings but you have a job to do. You make some witty retort back to Peter, but it falls flat as you struggle out of your sweats. This is what life is, you think. Relationships aren’t meant to be forever - you learned that at a young age.

Until your accident at fifteen, you had watched your parents run out of helium, their relationship expanding and cooling in arguments, in days spent not talking, in trips to your grandparents without the other, in passive-aggressive computer searches for divorce attorneys left open for anyone to see. Then, after you were trapped between those machines - after you spent hour after agonizing hour with electricity pressing between your atoms, being torn apart and rebuilt as a young god - after that day you watched them expand against each other before the neutron core of their relationship collapsed on itself and the resulting supernova sent you to the streets. But then Fury found you. Then Tony, then Nat, then Steve.

Your parents exploded out from each other and the shockwaves ruined your life. At least now, your relationship with Steve is ending silently. There’s no explosion, no collapse, no rapid expansion to take over your cosmos. Your relationship with Steve is simply approaching the event horizon, where it will hang in the air until one of you takes the final step and you both become frozen, two collapsing objects on opposite sides of the universe. Maybe that’s what you already are. You feel so far away from him in the back of Tony’s car - like he’s eons and light-years away from you - and you feel so cold. Frozen, down to the bone. It makes you stiff in your replies to Tony and Peter, slow on the uptake when the car pulls up to the quinjet, nearing stasis and unable to respond when Nat asks if you’re okay.

Finally, you turn to look at her, nodding. “Fine,” You clear your throat, “Been a rough day.” You do your best to smile at her, but your face feels heavy. Your chest feels cold and tight, making you worry about your performance on the upcoming mission. When Peter shakes his head next to you, discreetly telling Nat not to press, you’re focused on Steve and the electricity humming in the most base part of your body.

He scoffs and rolls his eyes. You turn away and force yourself to smile, throwing a weak and numb arm over Peter’s shoulders. “Are you ready for this, Pete?” You jostle him back and forth, leading him toward the sitting area behind the cockpit. “Gonna get your ass kicked?”

“Please,” He shoves you off, nervously laughing, “Not with the skills you’ve taught me.” He mimics throwing webs, making hissing noises under his breath, and you bark out a laugh, shaking your head.

“You’re payin’ my medical bills when I have to save your ass, Spidey.” You shake your head and strap in next to the wall, Peter taking the seat to your right. Tony, from the aisle across from you, points a thick finger your way.

“You don’t pay medical bills anymore,” He waggles his finger, “So you’ll just have to make him do your homework for a week.”

“Mister Stark!”

“He’ll have to earn shorthand to do your essays,” Nat chimes in from between Bucky and Steve, who are both doing their best to not look at you - or anyone really. “You willing to share that with him?”

You lean back in your seat and jab at Peter with your elbow. “Hell no, so I guess Spider-Boy better do his best.” The arachnid in question grumbles, crossing his arms and slouching in his seat.

“No pressure, right?” He complains, “Not like I’m already nervous or anything.”

“You’ll do fine, kid,” Bucky pipes up, drawing your eyes back to Steve, “It’s goin’ to be a cakewalk.”

“Don’t jinx it, Barnes,” You warn half-heartedly, tucking in on yourself, “We need this to be easy.” From the look on his face - everyone’s face, really - you know that they heard you loud and clear when you were really saying I need this to be easy.

After an uneasy laugh from Bucky, a claustrophobic silence settles over you all as the jet begins to take off. You’re in for an hour ride and plan to spend it going over battle plans with Peter when harsh whispering catches your ear. It’s Bucky and Steve nearly crushing Nat between them until she gets up and sits across from Peter, rolling her eyes. Still, you try your best to run him through the actions you both had planned - the names, the setups you needed to execute them, everything. If something happens to Peter, you’ll never forgive yourself.

And then, cutting through your soft promptings to Peter and his equally soft replies, Bucky’s voice. “Leave it, Steve. Until after this mission.” Even Tony looks up from his tablet, curiosity piqued. Their faces are both red, set hard and angry at each other and your stomach drops. What the hell is going on that Steve ‘Till The End Of The Line Rogers is fighting with Bucky You And Me, Pal Barnes? You must shift, or lean too far into Steve’s eyesight, because for the first time in what feels like years he is looking directly at you - and seeing you, too. It makes your pulse jump and, almost instinctively, you want to reach out and ground yourself on the rubber of the seat underneath you.

You don’t get the chance, though, because Steve speaks. “No, why should I? This is clearly affecting the team.” He’s still looking - glaring - at you like you’ve done something wrong. “What’s the point of waiting? I’ve been waiting to talk about this.”

“Bo, I don’t think this is the time,” Bucky looks over his shoulder at you, then, and you know what’s coming. You know that it’s time, that Steve is about to break up with you in front of your teammates. Your friends. Your family. You steel yourself for the anguish you’re about to feel and then jerk your chin out, hardening your resolve.

“Buck, it’s fine. If Steve wants to address something, he can.”

Natasha says your name, a low warning over the hum of the quinjet. “I think he should wait.”

“Well, I’m not goin’ to wait!” Steve unbuckles himself and stands, “I have tried waiting, and look at where that has gotten me.” He puts his hands on his hips and puffs out a breath. You unbuckle and stand, too, unsure of where this is going. “You need to,” He holds one hand out, pointing at you while his voice shakes. You notice his hand is shaking, too, but fractionally. If you didn’t know Steve as well as you do you may have never noticed it. “You need to get it together.”

“I need to get it together?” You question, eyebrows nearly hitting the ceiling with how fast they shoot up. You’re not totally sure you’ve heard him right because what do you have to get together? The broken shards of your relationship? The information and research for your final paper? The awful way you’ve let yourself be treated for what seems like forever?

“You heard me,” Steve says, at the same time Bucky leans his head back and groans deep in his chest. “What? Someone had to say it.”

“We should wait for this,” Nat speaks up again, but lifelessly. She knows now that you and Steve are both on the warpath, neither of you are going to stop. (That’s also why the two of you work together as a couple so well. Very rarely are you both so worked up about something that you can’t back down, so the other is always there to meet you halfway and get you back to earth.)

“No, no, no,” You say, near hysterically, “No, he wants to do this now? Before a mission? Instead of the fuckin’ weeks we had to hash whatever crawled up his ass and died out? Be my guest. He’s already dragged everyone into this by treating me like a pariah.” You’re not sneering, but your teeth are gritted so tightly together you can hear them scraping and feel a tension headache beginning to bloom in your temples. Bucky looks… Almost incredulous at your statement. Like putting the blame on Steve is a dick move or something.

“Oh, so I’m the bad guy here?” Steve is curling his lip, glaring at you. There’s something behind his eyes, but he’s buried it so deep that you can’t reach it and figure out what it is. “I’m the bad guy, right. Right, right, right.” He scoffs, shakes his head, and then he’s running his fingers through his hair like he really can’t believe what you’re saying to him.

“Well, what else am I supposed to think?” You throw your hands out to the side and let them slap back down on your thighs. “You ignore me, you make me feel like shit, you talk down to me like I’m some insignificant foot soldier. How else am I supposed to take that, Steve?”

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe ask me what’s wrong? Maybe ask me why I’m acting like this, instead of ignoring all of your problems like a child?” He mirrors your moments, but the sound his hands make when they hit the outside of his suit is more powerful than yours. Fueled by anger, you think. Anger and whatever the hell was in the serum Erskine pumped into Steve.

“Ask you?” You repeat, near-hysterical, “Ask you? Oh yeah, let me get right on that. Hey, Mister Rogers? Mister Captain America? Mister Ignores-His-Partner-For-God-Knows-Why? Hey, just why are you doin’ that?” You’re surprised that you’ve said something so snotty, but you don’t back down. (Steve looks surprised, too, and Bucky has stood up next to his friend like he’s about to start berating you as well. At least he looks more cautious about it, like he’s not totally sure that this fight should be happening.)

The more surprising part of your fight is how fast it’s shut down. Tony and Nat stand at the same time and exchange a glance like they’ve surprised each other. “That’s enough,” Tony starts.

Nat cuts him off. “I don’t care if you fight this one out instead of talking, but if you do it before this recon mission you two are going to blow it. Do you understand me?” She looks dangerous, the sharp edge of a knife spiraling through the air. You force yourself to look away from her, from Tony, from Bucky, from Steve. She’s right. You know she’s right - especially on this mission. Peter is there, going to be in real danger even though there’s not supposed to be one Hydra agent in a four-mile radius. You have to clear your mind and focus on protecting him.

Steve seems to think the same thing because he stands down. When you watch him collapse in on himself, Bucky’s arms around his shoulders, into the little quinjet seats your everything aches. Heart, lungs, eyes - everything. Even though you don’t know what’s going on, what could have possibly happened to make your relationship sink this quickly and out of the blue, you still love him. He’s still The One for you. You still want to be the one to comfort him and make him feel whole when he’s struggling.

But you can’t. You can’t and it kills you.

The heat of battle makes a lot of things fade into the background. Important things like why the fuck are there Hydra agents here? and Steve is going to break up with you when you get back on the jet and Tony swore on the fucking limited edition AC/DC vintage tour poster he has in his office that this would be an easy in/easy out information mission. None of that matters, though, because you’re in deep shit. There are seventeen of them, all primed to the teeth with weapons made to take your team down permanently.

You’re practically glued to Peter, calling out commands and plans for him to initiate. It’s when all of your plans fall through that you take a hit from a heavy fist on purpose, hitting the ground hard. “Plan F, Spidey, Plan F!” You cover the instruction with a groan and then you’re back on your feet, working your way toward him.

“Plan F?” Tony says, somewhere above you in his suit. Your comms crackle ominously as another heat-seeking grenade is launched, interfering with the radio waves your tech relies on. You don’t worry about it, because you know Tony is on it. He’s your eyes in the sky.

Peter is the one who answers his question, watching your close hand-to-hand tilt out of your favor briefly. “Plan Fuck It, Mister Stark.” He grunts as he webs up a Hydra agent, jerking him away from where he was about to slip a knife up and under Natasha’s kevlar. You finally drop the guy in front of you, ignoring Steve’s disappointed Language! and toss one of your knives toward Nat for her to use. Tony is still laughing in your ear, wheezing as he drops down and snags the rifle from one of the snipers and then takes back off.

What your little protégé failed to mention about Plan F is that it’s not just chaos, but controlled chaos. You let loose, letting a soft current cover every inch of your skin as Peter switches to his conductive webbing and takes special care to not web any of his allies. Except for you - if you’re in the way and he catches you in a web it doesn’t matter because you’re you, alive with electricity that drops the men that get caught in the web, too. You rip out of the webs and turn the current off when one of your teammates gets too close.

More Hydra agents are pouring out of the woods, topping out their numbers around twenty-five. That’s twenty-five too many in your opinion, especially when you can see Peter getting tired, his anxiety spiking, his moves having more and more hesitation behind them. You need to get this over with quickly, but you don’t have the options to do that. Steve, Bucky, and Nat are really the heavy-hitters - you, Pete, and Tony are the only ones without serums despite all of your individual abilities. Desperately you reach out for a web that’s still connected to Peter’s arms, pulling him out of the way of a baton that’s about to come down on the back of his neck.

The baton the agent is wielding glints in the coming dusk, freezing you as Peter scrambles past you with a quick apology. You’ve seen that before - seen it, felt it, know it like the back of your hand. There’s no way that you could ever forget that weapon. The man stumbles when his hit doesn’t connect but then rights himself and searches for a new target.

A long, black baton that splits into two prongs at the end is heavy in his hand. Electricity crackles between the bulbs at the end, flashing in the setting sun and your memories. The man only has one, but if it was hooked up to a machine, spinning. If there were four, five, six. If you were pinned between them, screaming in the pain as they rewrote your DNA… You’ve only felt it once, but you’ll never forget it.

And now, you’ll taste it again. On purpose this time. The man holding the stun baton is going for Steve’s back - his strong back, the one that protects people, the one that holds the weight of the world, the one that lays in your bed, the one you see whipping out of rooms as you’re entering just so that he doesn’t have to look at you - and you can’t let that happen. It only takes ten amps to kill a regular human, but you know those things are cranked up to twenty minimum. You don’t want to see how many amps of current it will take to stop Steve’s heart. You’re between the baton and Steve before you can think about what you’re doing or what comes next, the hard bulbs settling unyielding into your side and cranking out maximum power for maximum damage as soon as the current is connected and able to flow from one bulb to the other.

The pain hits you and your throat catches on it. It burns through your body, setting everything on fire - your chest hurts as your heart protests the electrons and then your powers kick in, sweeping them into your very atoms and cells. You’re a live wire now, ears humming and body thrumming with power you’ve only dreamed of. It hurts, and it burns, and you feel tears rising in your eyes because you’re back there - back begging for death or for life or for God and god at the same time - but then it’s over. The man sees that you’re not seizing up, not dropping dead in front of him, and he takes three steps back.

It’s not far enough.

You’ve only felt like this once before - right after you were unhooked from the machine that changed your life and brought you to your new family. You remember how you looked when you were put in front of a mirror with all of the pent up electricity circling your body - how your eyes were filled to the brim and dripping with bright and blue electricity, the way it was jumping across your body, how you didn’t need to breathe because your body was fully saturated with pure, unadulterated power. You wonder if you look like that now and assume you do because you can see the bright blue reflecting in the terrified eyes of the Hydra agent.

Your suit, unlike everyone else’s, is not grounded. It’s metal, metal, metal. You’re made to conduct, born for it, and the earth beneath you comes alive with bright white as you release all of the energy, the power, surges down and out. You’re practiced. You can reach out and feel the synapses and neurons of every human being in the clearing, know exactly where your teammates are standing, and know exactly how to target everything but them and the pitiful amount of electricity their brains carry. You grin, something truly feral and unhinged, and you can see the fear in the Hydra agent. Then, you let go.

You know that everyone is going to be pissed. (Maybe not everyone.) You’re not built for this, not made to take down nearly twenty fucking people at once. As you let go, you feel what they feel. The seizing muscles, the stopping of their hearts, the inside of their bodies crisping against their bones. At that moment, that delicious moment, you see the universe.

You become God. You become everything - your mother and your father and God and god and anyone else who’s watching your life from the ether. You become the judge, jury, and executioner of souls that you don’t know from Adam. You become lightning, and thunder, and exposed nerves of the cosmos at the same time. The world bends to your will and you relish in it, taking that power in your fist and wielding it to protect the man you’ll love for the rest of your life and the family that you’ve made. You will stop at nothing to end this, even if it means turning yourself inside out to do it.

You damn near do turn yourself inside out too, but that doesn’t matter, does it? The blood spilling from your ears, nose, and eyes feels like heaven. It’s hot, and thick, and it’s proof of the power that your body holds. You’re a temple and a sanctuary, a war-room and a bunker, a field of flowers and a sun-dry desert. It does not matter if Steve doesn’t love you at that moment, because you are love and hate wrapped into one package. You are everything and nothing, spread thin at the beginning and the end of time.

And then none of that is true. You are just… You. Standing in a clearing, surrounded by twenty-something dead Hydra agents and your terrified, terrified family. It hurts to breathe and you can taste blood in your mouth, but that’s an afterthought. Steve is still standing behind you, but he is alive. That is what matters.

This is what love is, you think.

Pain and pleasure.

Even if he leaves you, you will always love him.

Pain and pleasure.

You’re weak at the knees when he finally turns to see you - and you’re a sight. Struggling to stand, fingertips blackened with soot but not burnt, blood pouring from your nose, ears, eyes… You look like death, but you feel like life. Someone says something behind you - Peter, maybe? Or maybe Tony, in your comms? - but you don’t hear it. Everything tunnels out, your weak knees finally collapsing as you keel backward.

Steve bears down upon you almost immediately. You’re halfway to unconsciousness when he wraps you up in his arms, keeping you from falling in with the pile of bodies around you. He’s saying your name, harsh and soft and then in a voice like he’s ordering you to wake up. You loll about as he drops you down onto a patch of clear grass, hands searching your body for wounds. When he skims over your side, where the baton has burnt through your suit and your flesh, you surge back toward being able to have cohesive thoughts. The pain brings you back, hands wrapping around Steve’s arm and calling out his name. “Steve! Fuck, that hurts!”

“Honey,” He breathes, “Fuck, we have to get you back to the jet.” His jaw ticks, hair dirty and loose from its normal style. “Why’d you do that?” Steve doesn’t wait for an answer from you, ordering Peter to web something up to carry you over your protests.

“I’m fine,” You argue, only slurring slightly, “I feel fine.” But you’re going to let Nat and Bucky load you up on the webbed stretcher anyway because it’s the first time Steve has cared for you in a long time. You want to relish in this moment, the way that he didn't say your name but called you honey.

Well, and because Natasha slides a thumb across her neck over Steve’s shoulder in a silent threat.

You groan when Bucky accidentally grabs your calf where there is an absolutely awful stab wound, but you wave off his apology. “How could you have known?” To be honest, you hadn’t even known it was there until his Vibranium hand was slipping against it and sending shockwaves of pain through you. Peter is next to you the whole time that you’re being carried back to the jet - Tony staying back to begin scanning the bodies of the Hydra agents for the information you need and any other information they may be carrying. The poor kid is nearly at a breakdown, so you reach out to him and shake his arm when his fingers twine with yours. “Chill out, kid, I don’t know how you got it into your head that this is your fault, but it sure isn’t.” He sniffles, but hands back with Steve as Bucky and Nat get you situated in the small medical room of the jet. They transfer you and then make to leave, only Bucky hesitating near the door.

“Stevie’s goin’ to be here soon and… I don’t know what made you do what you did but you have’t explain it to him. He’s bendin’ over backwards to figure it out, and we don’t have’a clue. Came out’a nowhere.” He looks at you for another moment before shaking his head and stepping out of the room. Your head is spinning, partially from what Bucky just said and partially from the pain and stimulus of electricity. You wait there, then, because this is it. This is the event horizon. You wait there, eyes closed, until you hear footsteps approach the med room, and then the door slowly opens. Steve says your name, holding all the finality and weight of an atomic bomb. You don’t open your eyes until he swings a chair next to the stretcher and lays a hand on your calf.

“You don’t have to do this,” You finally say, pushing yourself up onto your elbows to watch him. “I know that you don’t want to.” Steve only scoffs and begins to wash the stab wound using a packet of soap and a water bottle. You say his name twice before he looks at you, something between hate and hurt curdling into a glaze over his eyes that stops you in your tracks.

“Just let me do this. It is the least that you can do.” His words are painful and stilted, like it’s taking force to push them past his teeth. You lay back down and close your eyes, content to just feel the pain of Steve beginning to stitch you up and then dress the wound before you feel the pain of Steve leaving you like you knew he always would. (Falling in love with Steve Rogers went against every instinct you had. You knew that he was going to hurt you from the first moment your lips touched his.)

When he’s done he sits back and puts his elbows on his knees, head in his hands. He heaves a heavy sigh and then shakes it off, “I’ll dress your burn, and then we’ll talk.” And normally, yes, you would agree but this is too important. You want to get it over with so you can lick your wounds metaphorically and dress them literally - and then you want to go home, you want to pack your bags, and you want to disappear and remake your life somewhere else.

Some far-off place where everyone you know won’t take one look at your face and know that you’re still painfully, deeply in love with Steve Rogers, end of your semester be damned. Family you’ve made be damned. You can’t sit around and be in love with him like a neon sign on a dark highway while it’s painfully clear that he hasn’t had a sign on his highway in a long time.

So instead of agreeing, you swing your legs over the stretcher and swallow your flinch when the burn pulls tight. Steve opens his mouth to argue but you give him a tight-lipped shake of your head and his jaw snaps shut. “No,” You say, voice not giving in to the emotion swirling in your chest. “I have let this go on long enough.”

It’s the wrong thing to say because Steve fucking scoffs again and looks away from you. “One day was long enough.” He says, cutting straight to your core. Okay, ouch. You take a deep breath and shake your head to try and bite back the tears that are inevitably rising in your eyes. If one day was long enough for him to realize he doesn’t want to be with you, why did he let it go on for nearly a full year? Why did he spend so long leading you on, pulling you by a thread before garroting your heart with it? What was the point?

“If you want to leave me, just say that,” You reply harshly, standing and wobbling away from him. He just watches you go, watches the way you struggle past the lead weights your muscles have become, the way you’re starting to feel the stab wound on your leg, the way the skin on your burn is beginning to blister and only just now losing its heat. He just watches you, where the Steve that loved you once upon a time might have helped. You turn your back on him, hands on your hips so that you can hide the way that you’re crying and your hands are shaking.

“If I want to leave you? If?” He says. You hear the scrape of his chair as he stands, “I think after what you’ve done, it’s not an if, sweetheart.” The way he says it tastes like iron. Steve never calls you sweetheart like he never calls you by your name. It’s always honey, lover, dovie. You don’t turn to face him because you’re struggling to keep yourself above water. “I spent so long thinkin’, wonderin’, askin’ myself - God damnit, will you look at me?” You turn slowly, not because you’ve never heard Steve speak like that but because his voice is desperate and raw. When you turn, you’re not sure what to expect. Maybe him, standing in front of you, broad-shouldered and disappointed like in those PSA’s he had to film once. Maybe he’d be angry, hands clenched at his sides and eyes narrowed like he gets in meetings when he doesn’t agree with something but he’s out-voted. But you never expect to see him crying, lip wobbling, folded in on himself like a young boy instead of the strong, invincible man you’ve come to love.

He looks so different.

It hits you, then, that you’re not looking at Steve Rogers. Not really. He's not Steve Rogers, not Captain America, not even Captain Rogers. You see him as he was - before America spat it’s untruths all over him and injected him with a serum that changed who he was, is, will be. He’s not the able-bodied man that you know, not strong and unreachable, not the heartthrob that overshadows the team during press events. He’s not America’s Darling, not really. Not where it counts.

You’re looking at Stevie Rogers. Stevie Rogers who, for all intents and purposes, was supposed to die before he made it out of toddlerhood or soon thereafter. Stevie Rogers who the doctors said wasn’t supposed to survive. Stevie Rogers who grew up sickly, rattling painful breaths and never playing ball with the neighborhood boys. Who couldn’t walk until middle school when he got his braces off. Who never had a partner because Bucky, strong and handsome and tall Bucky, was always deemed the better option. Who believed in his country so much that he tried to sneak into the second world war, subjected himself to a painful medical procedure so that he could change his very DNA to be what the world wanted him to be.

Captain Steve Rogers. Captain America. Strong, blond, patriotic, resilient.

You’re sure that if men don’t want to go to therapy now, in the modern age, they certainly didn’t want to go in the ‘40s. So where did that leave Steve, your Steve, standing in front of you and looking small, and broken, and sad, and alone? Did they expect him to take his new, taller, working body and run with it? Did they not think about how he would lose a part of himself in the process? How did they expect him to go from disabled to abled without some disconnect?

You think about the You That You Were Before and the You That You Are Now, and how you lost a part of yourself when the accident gave you your powers and how you’d lose yourself if someone figured out a way to take them away. You Before formed your identity around being normal - living in a shitty home with shitty parents, sure, but normal - and You Now form your identity around your powers, your team, your job, your love. If you lost those things, what did you have left? Who would you be?

When Steve lost his identity and became everything that America wanted everyone to think that America was, what did he have left? Sure, he could tell himself that he represents America - strong and patriotic and just - but it must have conflicted with everything he knew about himself before that. You know that disabled people now know that American society is unjust, unfit for them with abled people not willing to make room to allow them to thrive. You can only imagine what it was really like for Steve in the ‘20s and ‘30s and ‘40s. What he had to do just to survive. (Medical experimentation, you remind yourself. Did they know it wouldn’t kill him? Did they know his body wouldn’t rip itself apart with the new sinewy muscle they were packing on? Did they care? Or was he just a body they saw as broken? A project to fix? To turn him into something more like them and call it patriotism?)

You shake your head at him, still filled with despair, and try to figure out what he’s talking about. “Stevie,” You start, pet name easily replacing what you had been calling him because it’s not fair to shoe-horn him into a body that doesn’t feel like his own. You wonder if he still expects the bone-grinding pain that he used to tell you would happen when it rains. He raises a hand, a strong and family hand, shaking his head.

“I just need to know why I wasn’t enough for you,” Steve looks sad, slouching in on himself like he’s expecting to get his ass handed to him in another alleyway and hope Bucky is there to save him. “I need to know why you wouldn’t just break up with me if you wanted to see other people so badly.” You suck in a shocked breath because, okay, that’s not what you were expecting. Between that and the paradigm shift you’ve had on how Steve must view his identity, body, and self, you’re stunned. Steve continues like he doesn’t even register that you look shocked and pale and now you’re crying because he thinks you’re cheating on him? “And I get it. I get it. You have no idea how much I understand. If I were you, I wouldn’t want me either, okay?”

You cut him off there because what the actual God damn fuck is he talking about? “No, Stevie, I’m not cheating on you.” You shake your head again and this, your statement, lights a fire in him. He still looks like Stevie rather than Steve, but there’s anger there. You imagine that’s what it might have looked like moments before he got himself in trouble back before he was serumed. “I’m not.”

“Oh, yeah?” He challenges, jaw ticking and chin jerking up, “Oh, yeah? You can’t lie to me. I know, okay? The act is up, it’s over, I know, okay? You can stop pretending.”

“Steve, I do not fucking know what you’re talking about but I”m not cheating on you!” You raise your voice, not really angry but more out of necessity. You need to get it out of his head that he is anything less than everything you want - that you could possibly love anyone more than you love him.

“I wanted to clarify something for you,” Steve says like he’s reading an old script from when he was just a beefy, red/white/blue stage prop for the American military, “I am excited to meet with you, but there are some rules. Do not talk about Captain Steve Rogers. I don’t want to hear about him,” As he continues to recite something that has clearly hurt him, you go lax. You know exactly what’s happened - your fists unclench, your jaw drops a little bit, and it feels like someone has gutted you, “I think it is wise to keep work and pleasure separate, and it’s a rule I will enforce heavily. I look forward to seeing you again.” He’s sneering at the end, tears falling down his ruddy cheeks.

“Steve,” You try again, but he cuts you off.

“Am I just work for you?” His voice is shaking more than you thought possible, and so are his hands. You’ve never seen Steve so off-kilter, so thrown, and it breaks your heart that yes, technically, you’re the cause of this. Before this, before this horrible misunderstanding, your relationship with Steve was the paragon of trust so neither of you cared if the other read emails or texts. You remember the email - the email from your fucking college professor - because it had made you so angry that he’d referred to your relationship with Steve as something as simple and base as just pleasure - like you could even put words to the galaxy of a relationship you had with Steve - that you’d gone to the gym to work off some of that irritation. You hadn’t wanted to take it out on anyone accidentally. When you came back from the gym, Steve was gone on that two-week mission that he’d left on without saying goodbye.

Oh, God. You feel sick to your stomach as the paradigm of the way that Steve’s been treating you shifts violently to the left. You have to physically hold yourself up and try to speak past the lump in your throat. Steve looks… Brokenly smug. Like he knows he’s right, but he’d rather gnaw his own legs off than be right.

“No,” You croak, “No, Steve, you’ve got it all wrong.” You want to reach for him, but it feels like the room is closing in on you. You’re second-guessing everything now - especially what you’ve just said. How many people said the exact same thing to him pre-serum because they said something meant for Bucky to him? How many times did he hear that when he was getting a new diagnosis, hoping for the best? How many times had his own mother said it to him when he told her something someone had said, fresh-faced and not yet used to the way that abled people sometimes treated disabled people? You think you might be sick. “That email was from my professor, Steve. I’m not cheating on you, I’d never.” He laughs darkly and sits back down in his chair, head in his hands again. You try to gather the strength to move toward him when you see his shoulders shaking, a telltale sign that he’s crying.

“A professor,” He says with a watery laugh, “Right.”

Finally, you realize that he needs you, needs to know you love him, that you’d do anything for him. You can iron out the kinks later - figure out why he didn’t want to come to talk to you past the original hurt, why he treated you so coldly, why he didn’t trust that you wouldn’t do this to him - but now, you need to show him that you’re here. That you choose him. That you’ll always choose him.

You make your way to him and set a shaking hand on his shoulder. For a brief second you think he’s going to shake you off but then Steve’s hand shoots up and latches onto where your hand is resting, dipping his head to press against your arm. “Stevie, please,” You say, unsure of what you’re asking him to do, “I picked up a class, just one, and it’s… I picked it up for you, it’s about the ‘30s and ‘40s and…” He looks up at you and he looks so broken - face ruddy and wet with tears, lip wobbling, chest heaving as he tries to not sob. His brows are knit and he looks confused, “I just wanted to be able to understand you better. You had to leave so much of yourself at the door when you joined the Avengers, had to leave so much of yourself in the ice… In Erskine’s lab… Stevie, I just wanted you to be able to be you when you’re with me. I wanted to know the you that you were before you became Captain America.” Your voice is shaking, knees knocking together, and honestly? You feel like you might blackout.

“What?” He rasps, “What?”

“He sent that email because too many kids signed up for his class thinking that they’d be able to look at pictures of you and Buck for a semester. Emailed me directly because he knows we’re…” You choke on your words, shaking your head because you’re not even sure there’s a we anymore, “Because he knows I’m on the team. Didn’t want me walking in and making his class about just a few years in the ‘30s and ‘40s rather than the culture of the time.” You don’t know how else to explain it to him, but Steve isn’t saying anything - practically isn’t moving or breathing- so you continue to try and explain what’s really happening as best as you can, “And - and that email made me so angry because he singled me out, didn’t email anyone else about it, and I left to try and work some of that out; I didn’t want to take it out on you, or let it spoil - let it spoil… But when I came back from the gym, you were gone. You were gone for two weeks and I didn’t know why.” You’re crying harder now and pretty sure that within the next sixty seconds you’re going to collapse if you don’t sit down.

Steve shakes his head, still looking like he doesn’t understand. “What?” He says for a third time, “A class? A college class?”

“I just wanted to feel closer to you,” You confess, “Just wanted to understand a fraction of your life without making you do the heavy liftin’ and teachin’ me. Shouldn’t have’t do that,” You’re sobbing, barely biting out your words as you realize that something you’ve done to strengthen your relationship with Steve has destroyed it, “Shouldn’t have to explain a whole different time just to feel loved, Stevie. Should be able to be with someone who understands without you havin’ to explain.” You’re not sure you can say Peggy’s name out loud, and you hope he understands what you’re saying without making you actually say it, “Should’a been able to have love with someone who knew, and I know I’m nothin’ compared to what you should’a had, but I want to be. I want to be in the same ballpark instead’a watchin’ from the stands.” You wipe your face with your free hand and look away from Steve when he stands in front of you. You don’t want to see the look on his face - what he’s thinking about what you’ve said.

He says your name and you glance at him, but his expression stops him in your tracks. Where Steve looked broken and hurt and fuming with anger to hide the anguish, now he looks stricken. You shake your head, “No, no. I didn’t say that to make you feel guilty-”

“You think that I care about whether or not you can understand the ‘40s?” He cuts you off, hands moving to curl around your biceps, “You think that I care whether or not you can relate to a time in history when you weren’t even thought of?”

“Of course I love you. I love you more than anything in this world, but you shouldn’t have to not care, Steve,” You argue, shaking your head, “That’s what I’m trying to say. You should be with someone who understands without explanation. I just wanted to give that to you - didn’t know that this would happen.”

“I should be with someone who loves me,” He argues back, “If you love me, that’s all that matters. My past be damned.”

“But your past is you!” You try to pull away from Steve, but he anchors you there. You’re dizzy from being so close to him after this long, but also because of how many different twists this situation has taken. You can barely keep up with how bad your communication with Steve has become - barely keep up with how you need to fix it, or how to fix it. “Your past is you,” You repeat when you realize that Steve isn’t going to let you go. “And you shouldn’t have to give that up so that someone will love you.”

“But you love me,” He says desperately, ducking his head so that he’s nearly nose to nose with you, “You love me, right?”

“More than anything,” You say, closing your eyes and relishing in the feeling of being so close to Steve, “I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone. I don’t care about what anyone else thinks, or anyone else. I’ll even stop goin’ to class if you want me to - Steve, I just can’t do this anymore. Can’t do this thing where you don’t talk to me about what’s botherin’ you.” You’re choking up, barely whispering, but you know he hears you. YOu can feel his warm breath on your face, “Nearly fuckin’ killed me.”

“I thought it was goin’ to be easier,” He breathes, nose bumping yours, “When you eventually decided to leave me for him. Thought I was savin’ myself some trouble.” You can practically taste his tears as they fall again, “Buck and Nat tried to tell me that you weren’t - that you wouldn’t - but I just couldn’t believe them.”

When you open your eyes, his are closed. This close to him you can see the soft freckles that are blooming over his eyelids, his soft eyelashes kissing his cheekbones. You can feel him breathing, feel him nearly pressed against you in a way that feels hauntingly nostalgic and terrifyingly fleeting; like you’ll be able to feel his warmth for years to come, but he’s about to disappear. “That’s okay,” You finally whisper, “It’s okay that you didn’t believe them. That you thought what you thought. It’s okay.” He shakes his head against yours, opening his mouth to protest, but you refuse to let him feel guilty about feeling this way - you have plenty of time to sit him down and talk to him candidly about the way he acted because of these feelings, anyway. “If I would have been in your place I’m not sure I would have believed them.”

“I treated you so badly…” He shifts and wraps his arms around you. It’s almost immediate - you relax into his arms and wind yours around his waist, keeping him pulled against you as he presses his face into your neck and you press your cheek against his chest. “So awfully.”

“We’ll talk about that, okay? But later. Right now you just need to know that I love you, Steve. I love you more than I can tell you - more than I can express.” You want to kiss him, but you can’t. Can’t kiss him, you need to wait for him to kiss you, for him to close that gap and show you that he still loves you like you love him. “We’ll have to have a talk, a long and hard conversation about this, Stevie, but for now… For now, I’m just content to be with you, okay? MIssed you so much.”

He sighs, nose pressing against yours again. “Missed you too, dovie. Missed you more than I can even say,” His voice breaks as his lips brush yours. Your relationship is not without its flaws and problems - Steve’s actions when he thought you were cheating on him are proof of that and, well, the fact that you didn’t realize what was happening, why it was happening, or a large part of your boyfriend’s psychological makeup having an impact on your relationship while it went unknown by you… There is a lot of work for the two of you to do, a lot of work to do, a lot of communication to be done… But you’d do it all for Steve, over and over again.

When he presses forward and presses his lips gently to yours, you know that he’ll do it all for you, over and over again, too.

#steve rogers imagine #steve rogers/reader #steve rogers x reader #marvel imagine #mcu imagine

[robininthelabyrinth]

🧿🤠🐇🍲🍯: Lan Wangji does not think it’s safe to raise A-Yuan in Cloud Recesses after the Lans participated in the killing of his zhiji and the entire Burial Mounds community (or more accurately that it’s not safe while he himself is in seclusion and can’t watch over A-Yuan, at least) so he delivers A-Yuan to the one person who he knows did not stand against Wei Wuxian (and got away with it, bc this person has never stood against anything, since standing takes effort): Nie Huaisang.

Little Side Door - ao3

Nie Huaisang’s rooms in the Unclean Realm had a little side door that no one but him ever used.

They hadn’t originally. The Unclean Realm was a fortress, designed to maximize protection and defense; there was no better place for keeping things safe by locking them away. While it had its fair share of boltholes and escape routes, they were not common and universally difficult to access lest the enemy learn of them and use them to their advantage. Even the layout of their open spaces were carefully planned lest the attack come from the sky, a concern that only cultivators had, and not about how they themselves could escape – after all, weren’t they all Nie, ready to die rather than endure dishonor?

The little side door that led to Nie Huaisang’s room opened onto a small rock garden, left to grow wild with weeds rather than reveal its presence to more people. It existed only because his brother had ordered it constructed by those he trusted most, all in secret in the dark of the night. He had never explained why he had gone to such lengths to create such an unwelcome and inauspicious place, but then, he hadn’t needed to – Nie Huaisang had been there, too, when his father had descended into madness and they had been trapped in the familial quarters with no way out that did not take them through him. If his brother had been the one to brave his father’s rage directly, Nie Huaisang had been the one stuck in a small space that was only not claustrophobic because it was so painfully familiar.

Now, though his father was long dead and gone, Nie Huaisang had a little side door.

A little side door, and a little garden that almost no one knew about; in combination with the saber that his brother forced him to learn and the golden core he had so begrudgingly formed, he now had a way to reach the sky and the illusive freedom it represented – the freedom to flee and leave his home behind.

If it ever happens again – his brother had said once, the closest he had ever come to speaking of it.

He did not finish his sentence, as Nie Huaisang had thrown his plate into his face and stormed off, steaming mad and close to tears. He did not raise the subject a second time.

Nie Huaisang did not often use his little side door.

Although he enjoyed gardens, he preferred the aviary he’d constructed, or one of the myriad of well-tended gardens in the main part of the sect; even the vegetable gardens out back beside the kitchens were far more welcoming than that sparse straggle of land. He’d only ever spent time there when he was a child and in desperate need of some quiet, wanting to avoid adults with their arguments and their miseries; he’d taken some friends there because he thought it might impress them, but it hadn’t, and anyway his brother had put a stop to that soon enough.

He didn’t even think about the little side door, most days. It was just a part of the room, a small tucked away corner with nothing in it. Nothing to think about.

And then, of course, years after he’d put it out of his mind entirely, there came a terrible banging noise at that little side door, like someone was kicking at it furiously from the outside.

Nie Huaisang nearly fell over sideways in his scramble to get up, and then once again when he realized where the noise was coming from – almost no one knew about his side door and its little garden, and so no one had ever come to him through it. Who would be knocking now…?

He opened it.

Lan Wangji, white robes stained with blood and cheeks bright with fever, shoved something into his arms. “You have a child now,” he said through bitten lips. “Congratulations. He is called A-Yuan. I entrust you with his care, for my sect cannot be trusted with it.”

And then he turned and staggered away, mounting up on Bichen and flying off before Nie Huaisang could say anything – before he could even finish searching his memories and recalling that yes, in fact, Lan Wangji had been one of the friends he had shown the side door to, years and years before, and thus knew how to find it. Before he could even start processing the thousands of thoughts that had spring to life, fully formed, at all the information he’d just received: the bloody robes, the desperation, the reference to the Lan sect – the Lan sect! – being somehow untrustworthy…

He looked down at his arms.

“Congratulations,” he echoed blankly. “I have a child now.”

The child blinked up at him, and then smiled.

-

“Da-ge!” Nie Husiang howled, rushing into the sect leader’s study where his brother was doing work – luckily it wasn’t receiving hours and he wasn’t in the main hall, as that would have been unfortunate. “Da-ge, you have to help me! I have a child now!”

His brother stared at him, expression blank and mouth slightly agape. The brush in his hand dripping ink onto a now-wasted piece of paper.

“Huaisang,” he said after a moment. “What the fuck.”

Nie Huaisang nodded furiously.

“Where did you get – how – who – what did you do?!”

“I am currently unable to disclose any details,” Nie Huaisang said promptly even as his brother tossed aside the brush and got up, striding over with a storm brewing in his face. “All I can say is that I have to raise this child now. By which I mean, you have to help me raise this child now; I can’t raise children! I’m not mature enough to raise a child!”

“No kidding! Why would someone entrust – to you…” Nie Mingjue trailed off, looking down at the child with a frown that shifted from disbelieving irritation to concern. He pressed his hand to the child’s forehead. “Huaisang, this child has a high fever. We need to get him to the medical wing at once – is that blood?”

“Not his, I don’t think?”

“I don’t want to know,” his brother decided. “Move.”

Some time later, they were both sitting next to the bed in one of the spare rooms in the family quarters; Nie Huaisang thought it might even have been the same one that he’d used when he was very young. A-Yuan was sleeping, and Nie Mingjue was still holding his little hand in his own, having been clocked as the oversize comfort animal that he not-so-secretly was from the very first moment A-Yuan laid eyes on him.

The doctors had declared A-Yuan’s fever to be very severe, but they had applied plenty of medicine – the Lan sect might have more esoteric healing techniques, but there wasn’t anything like the Nie sect when it came to standard medicine for injuries and illnesses associated with the battlefield, and despite A-Yuan’s tender age Nie Huaisang would be willing to bet that his injuries were from a battlefield. They were confident that A-Yuan would make a full recovery, body and mind both intact, although they warned that his memory of the past might be impacted.

Nie Huaisang had thought about all that blood that wasn’t his, of Lan Wangji pale-faced and wild-eyed, and decided that a little bit of forgetting might not be so bad after all.

“Are you going to tell me anything more,” his brother said after a while. “Or should I just give up now?”

Nie Huaisang leaned over and patted his knee. “It’s good that you know your limitations.”

His brother rolled his eyes.

“I can’t believe this is my life,” he remarked.

“What part?” Nie Huaisang asked, curious. “The fact that we have a kid now, because obviously we’re keeping him? Or the fact that someone gave a kid to me?”

“Both,” his brother decided. “Definitely both.”

-

“His name’s A-Yuan,” Nie Huaisang said. “Apparently.”

“Well,” his brother said. “Obviously that won’t do.”

-

Nie Huaisang had the ability to be sneaky when he wanted to be. It wasn’t a matter of stealth, he had explained to his brother, but sneakiness– a completely different concept. Stealth suggested that he was doing something to conceal himself and required skills and talent, or else a lot of practice, and obviously Nie Huaisang was not going to go in for either of those.

Sneakiness, though…

He didn’t need people not to be able to see him in order to be sneaky. He just needed them not to care about him, or wonder where he was.

“Psst,” he said, knocking on the window to the rooms where Lan Wangji was purportedly practicing seclusion. “Psst! Lan Zhan!”

Lan Wangji had given him a child. They were definitely past the ‘Lan-er-gongzi’ stage.

“Lan Zhan!” he rapped at the window with his fan. “We need a courtesy name!”

There was some sounds from within the jingshi, mostly stumbling around. Nie Huaisang waited patiently, and after a few moments the window opened and Lan Wangji stared out at him. He was as pale as a ghost with lips as red as blood, and very clearly not in seclusion at all, but rather in the midst of healing whatever wounds had left him bloody – he probably shouldn’t have gotten out of bed to answer.

Oh, well. Too late for regret now.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Lan Wangji said, voice dull and eyes blank as he stared at Nie Huaisang. It was unclear if he meant in the Cloud Recesses generally, or here in particular, interrupting his ‘seclusion’.

“Didn’t you hear me?” Nie Huaisang said, scowling at him. “We need a courtesy name! A courtesy name for the child, you hear me? You know, of course, that Qinghe Nie don’t use personal names, not even for children – certainlynot for children older than their first year. It’d be a complete giveaway that he’s not organically ours if we call him something like A-Yuan.”

Lan Wangji raised a hand to pinch his nose. “Please go away.”

“Courtesy name, Lan Zhan. I mean, I may be the one who’ll be raising him, but please think carefully: do you really want meto be the one naming him?”

“…call him Sizhui.”

“Sizhui,” Nie Huaisang repeated. “With the characters…?”

Lan Wangji nodded.

“Uh, no,” Nie Huaisang said. “I need a bettercourtesy name. Are you joking?”

“Nie Huaisang. Go away.”

“But –”

Lan Wangji slammed the window shut.

“…fine,” Nie Huaisang said to the closed window. “Be that way, see if I care. Not like we don’t need to build up a decent coparenting relationship or anything eventually.”

He thought he heard a choking sound from behind the door and smirked.

“Don’t you think you can baby-trap me and just walk away, Lan Zhan,” he said in his best ominous tone. “If you wanted someone to raise your kid without ever consulting you again, you should’ve dropped him off in the Lotus Pier with Jiang Cheng, who’d probably be too busy being confused to even question where he came frome – but no. You came to me. I don’t make decisions in the best of times, least of all good. I have questions. A lot of questions.”

He thought about it for a moment.

“Not about how you got him or anything like that,” he said. “I’m not stupid, I can tell a secret when I see one. But, you know, other types of questions. Parenting stuff. Are you a ‘go sit and think about what you’ve done’ sort of parent? Or more traditional discipline, with copying lines and occasionally strikes when they’re naughty? Do you want him to learn the Lan sect rules along with the Nie sect principles –”

There was a muffled sound from inside the house.

It sounded angry.

“…we can talk about it later,” Nie Huaisang decided. He might’ve pushed his luck a bit too much. “Talk later!”

-

“You have a…what?” Lan Xichen asked, his smile a little fixed and stare a little wilder than normal.

“A nephew!” Nie Mingjue gushed. “Isn’t he wonderful?”

“Nephew.”

“He’s so well behaved, too! He plays quietly by himself most of the time, drawing and even writing a little, and Huaisang’s already teaching him how to play the dizi –”

“When you say nephew, do you mean Nie Huaisang’s child?”

“Do I have other brothers?” Nie Mingjue rolled his eyes at him. “He’s obviously not yours. Anyway, I know Meng Yao is expecting one, too, but he wouldn’t be dressed in Nie colors if it was his, would it?”

“Yes, but…are you telling me that…that Nie Huaisang…”

“It’s a battlefield child, Xichen,” Nie Mingjue said patiently. “Obviously. Someone entrusted him to Huaisang.”

“Oh,” Lan Xichen said, looking relieved. “Yes, that makes more sense…wait.”

Nie Mingjue waited.

“Someone entrusted him to Nie Huaisang?”

“I know, right?” Nie Mingjue said, and Lan Xichen didn’t notice how strained his grin had suddenly become, or how thoughtful his eyes were as he surveyed Lan Xichen as if trying to find an answer to a question. “I would’ve assumed they’d go for someone more responsible, like you. Guess you never know…”

“I guess you don’t,” Lan Xichen agreed, looking down at the child with a bemused expression. A battlefield child, entrusted to Nie Huaisang… “They must have been truly driven to desperation.”

“Perhaps,” Nie Mingjue said, and then changed the subject to little Nie Sizhui’s accomplishments, of which he could list many at great length and very great enthusiasm. By the time he was done with that, Ln Xichen was so overwhelmed that he didn’t ask a single other question.

-

“So I’ve got an idea on how to do this whole co-parenting thing,” Nie Huaisang said, cracking nuts to eat. He was sitting next to Lan Wangji’s bedside, and dropping the shells straight on the floor, too, staring dead-eyed at Lan Wangji as if daring him to say something – which he wouldn’t, of course. “Since with Sizhui starting classes soon it’s become much more urgent, on account of me needing you to attend meetings with his teachers and discuss his progress.”

Lan Wangji looked deeply long-suffering. He’d only invited Nie Huaisang inside because Nie Huaisang had threatened to start shouting out his business loudly on account of oh but Lan Zhan, how was I to know if you could hear me in there, I just had to raise my voice just in case because I wouldn’t want you to miss any of the extremelyimportant news –

It was all Lan Wangji’s fault for being born earlier than Nie Huaisang, Nie Huaisang thought virtuously. It was merely Nie Huaisang’s lot in life to fulfill the role of annoying younger brother to everyone.

“See, it’s the music,” Nie Huaisang continued. “You do music, right?”

Lan Wangji’s ice-cold glare suggested that he did, in fact, ‘do music’.

“So your brother has been playing this song for da-ge on a regular basis,” Nie Huaisang explained, ignoring the glare entirely. “And when he’s not available, which is most of the time nowadays, he’s been sending san-ge instead. Even though, of course, poor san-ge’s so busy back at Lanling all the time…ughh, it’s so unfair, you know! Poor san-ge has to do all the work of being the heir and gets none of the benefits, and they pile even more work on him on top of that – really, he gets no respect.”

Lan Wangji’s expression suggested he didn’t care.

“And think about the inconvenience to us!” Nie Huaisang sallied forth, undeterred. “People coming and going all the time, da-ge having to interrupt his schedule of spending quality time with me and Sizhui – and sect leader work, of course, though that’s less important – in order to march over to greet them and host them and listen to them…what a pain it is!”

Lan Wangji appeared on the verge of suggesting that Nie Huaisang consider getting to the point.

“So you should come do it instead.”

Lan Wangji’s expression cracked, suggesting that Nie Huaisang had actually managed to make an impact.

“You remember,” he said, voice low and a little hoarse from all that refusing to speak he’d been doing. Really, if Nie Huaisang wasn’t around to goad him into it, he might’ve lost the voice entirely – he didn’t even have little Sizhui around to force him to speak! “That I’m in seclusion. Right?”

“You’re horribly lonely is what you are,” Nie Huisang said briskly. “You require company. Therefore, coming to take up a semi-permanent posting in the Unclean Realm to play the Song of Clarity for my brother morning, noon, and night is clearly the finest way to solve all of our problems, and for you to see little Sizhui as often as you like.”

Lan Wangji visibly wavered. “My brother,” he said, then coughed. “My brother will never believe it.”

“That’s your problem,” Nie Huaisang said. “Find a way to sell it.”

He stood, shaking the remaining shells onto the chair.

“See you in Qinghe soon, Lan Zhan..!”

Lan Wangji was trying to kill him with his mind, Nie Huaisang thought happily as he wandered off with a whistle and a vaguely silly expression. Good – he’d been inside for too long. He needed the stimulation.

-

“Truly,” Nie Mingjue remarked, strolling around their gardens without any apparent notice of the small child perched on his shoulders, giggling wildly at the feeling of being tall, “I feel far better than I did before! One can scarcely compare it – night and day, really. Your Lan sect’s Song of Clarity is a marvel, even if it does take a while before it kicks in.”

“Mm,” Lan Wangji said, walking slowly with his hands behind his back. He was still unsteady on his feet on account of the absolutely horrific injuries he’d incurred – but if the Lan sect’s response to everything was seclusion, seclusion, seclusion, then the Nie sect’s equivalent response was exercise. These little excursions through the gardens were the result.

Thus far, they were still only doing laps around the main gardens, but Nie Huaisang had plans to eventually force Lan Wangji to go even as far as his own little side garden. He’d made it through his side door once, after all; why not a second time..?

At any rate, Nie Huaisang still wasn’t quite sure how Lan Wangji had talked Lan Xichen into allowing him to come to the Unclean Realm, but it really did make the whole co-parenting business a lot more convenient. And his brother had had so much fun making Lan Wangji stiff and awkward over all his thanks and praise for his decision to come ‘help out’ with Nie Sizhui’s raising until finally, at last, Nie Huaisang had taken pity and revealed that Nie Mingjue knew perfectly well whose battlefield child this was.

Both in terms of who had gifted him to Nie Huaisang, and who’d adopted him originally, and of course even his original surname – The little tot’s been through enough adoptions to make anyone’s head spin, his brother had said, his voice gruff as always. There’s no point in thinking back too far, is there?

Lan Wangji had been very relieved.

“Run, bobo!” Nie Sizhui cried, pointing over at a bird. “We need to get it for Sang-gege!”

Nie Mingjue snorted like a bull but obediently quickened his feet and left the rest of them behind, heading in full charge straight at the wild pheasant that was far more likely to end up on Nie Huaisang’s plate than in his aviary. It was about even odds which one Nie Sizhui meant, anyway.

“Nie Huaisang,” Lan Wangji said, his voice low, and Nie Huaisang looked at him. “The Song of Clarity does not take time to work. These effects should have happened at once.”

Nie Huaisang opened his fan, hiding his face as he frowned. “How odd,” he said. “And after san-ge put in all that hard work.”

“Perhaps he played it wrong.”

“Odd,” Nie Huaisang said again. “When san-ge gets so very little wrong…has your brother sent any word on the Xue Yang issue?”

“…he has not.”

“He’s going to need to pick a side eventually.”

“He does not want to make things difficult for his sworn brother.”

“Does he have only the one?” Nie Huaisang asked archly, and Lan Wangji averted his gaze. “It’s awkward for us if he doesn’t back us, and is a bad look besides…truly, it’s a wonder that san-ge managed to squeeze out the time to come here.”

Lan Wangji’s frown deepened. “Indeed,” he said. “One would think his father might be tempted to stop him.”

“Wouldn’t you just?” Nie Huaisang said. “Wouldn’t you just…you know, maybe when you’re feeling better, we should go visit Lanling ourselves.”

Lan Wangji glanced at him, arching an eyebrow, and Nie Huaisang smiled, fanning himself casually.

“I’m not the only one with a little side door,” he said. “Let’s go knocking and see what we find, shall we?”

#mdzs #nie huaisang #lan wangji #lan sizhui #nie mingjue #lan xichen #my fic #my fics #little side door

[sapphicmsmarvel]

WM: Goofy

 masterlist

-the team was surprised to find out you two were together 

-You were this bold, blunt, dirty minded person and while Wanda was like that, you two were different than they expected. 

-What they also didn’t expect: was for you two to be so goofy with each other

-Pranks ensued a lot with you two, never too serious because you guys hated pranks that were like “breaking up with my girlfriend” pranks. They weren’t pranks, that was emotional abuse. 

-It was minor stuff that managed to push your guys’ buttons. 

-For example: Wanda moved everything slightly to the right to mess with you. 

-She would always call you “nerd”, “loser”, “bitch. You guys would always cuss each other out for being idiots together. 

-But, if anyone but her called you those things, she was doing the head tilt. 

-You two have a copious amount of inside jokes. 

-And a Lot of telepathic communication with each other. 

if you wanted her attention you'd just scream inside your head “Wanda can you hear me?” 

“Yes, what’s up?”

“You look hot as fuck” 

She laughed, the raspy sound filled your head. “that’s what you have to tell me?”

“oh and your eyeliner looks really good. But it would look better streaming down your face as I fucked you.”

Your words did what you wanted them to. They made her blush bright red. 

-She was the same in a way. She’d leave filthy notes places where she knew that only you would find them. 

-Your underwear drawer for example. She’d leave notes on her favorite pieces. 

You pulled out a dark purple lace panty and on the sticky notes she wrote, “wear this today. i wanna rip it off of you with my teeth later.” And then she’d end the note with a kiss mark in her lipstick shade. 

-For your father, Tony’s very popular halloween party you two dressed up as each other. 

-You were the Scarlet Witch, and she was The Stark Slut. (i know that sounds bad, but read my Stark Slut one shot for this to actually be a cute thing? I guess?) Complete with the “slut” mesh shirt, black bodysuit and thigh high sparkly boots. 

-You guys call each other unconventional nicknames. 

her: “hello my wet sock”

you: “i would much rather have you call me a slur than that ever again.” 

you: “hi twinkie”

her: “as long as you fill me with cream i’m fine with that.” 

Tony: “WHY MUST YOU DO THIS.” 

you: “hello my used tampon”

her: “why is it used? of all the things?”

you: “you’re a redhead.”

-She smacked your butt a lot. 

-All. The Time. 

“I can’t help it! It’s so smushy!” 

-You’re her biggest fan. 

-You have Scarlet Witch merch that someone made on etsy, you have her on your phone case. You always rep her merchandise. It makes her blush. 

“Am I….on your shirt?” 

“Yeah! I thought why not cheer my girl on whenever I can.” 

It makes her happier than you can even know. 

#wanda maximoff #wanda maximov #wandavision #wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maximoff x you #Scarlet Witch #scarlet witch x reader #scarlet witch x you #Elizabeth Olsen

[tarosin]

the not so great adventures of y/n tommy tubbo and ranboo

this is an extra episode to the great adventures series -

people included: platonic! jack/tubbo/ranboo/tommy

please read what is written in bold

this is an “alternative ending” around 15 years into the future and is heavily inspired by bo burnhams song ‘goodbye’ this doesn’t mean this is actually how the series is going to end im writing it now and including it as part of series as their friendship is already established i can confirm y/n and the group are going to have a happy ending when the series eventually comes to an end this also does not mean the series is anywhere near the end i plan on continuing the series as vlogs come out. i’m sorry HOWEVER i am currently writing how y/n made friends with everyone so you have that to look forward to. i am sorry to the new people who requested to be on the taglist as this is the first thing you’re being tagged in

cw: angst, cursing

it had been around 14 years since ranboo moved to the UK, a year after the day you all met, to be with you tommy and tubbo. you were all thriving; you were living with your best friends, were all some of the most watched creators, you were constantly making new memories with everyone. you even had a wall full of photos of you all from every adventure you had been on with a picture of ranboo poorly edited into the background which made you laugh as you passed the wall every day. almost every evening you would all watch something on the tv, often re watching your favourite tv shows. the past few months had been pretty rough, there were days you didn’t even want to leave the house. you and tommy would fight over the smallest things. for example, a few weeks ago you were both arguing about who was responsible for forgetting something whilst out shopping.

“you were supposed to remind me to get it!”

“i told you to make a fucking list tommy, how is this my fault?”

“because i told you to fucking remind me but you were too focused on playing around!”

“you’re not making any sense tommy!”

“oh fuck off, y/n! i don’t even want to look at you right now!”

“so long tommy i’ll see you when i see you!”

and with that you left to stay with jack until you were ready to go back home, it was around now you lost your love for streaming, however jack encouraged you to stream for a little while so you fans don’t think you’ve left them in the dark. 20 minutes into the stream you felt like you were slowly loosing power even though it hadn’t even been an hour into your stream. A week later you were still with jack, that’s when you got the notification from tubbo.

bo: y/n... we’re sorry we tried our best to make him stay

boo: y/n come home as soon as possible

*tommy has left the chat*

*tommy has blocked tubbo, ranboo, jack and y/n*

bo: he blocked me??

jack: and me

boo: ...yeah

jack offered to drive you back home, which you gladly accepted. the ride was silent, the pair of you still trying to process what just happened, your friend of over 14 years had enough and left you all, until you finally spoke up your voice shaking as you tried not to cry.

“so this is how it ends heh?”

“well at least i’ll save fuel driving taking us all on adventures.”

“youre really joking at a time like this..”

“i was only trying to lighten the mood.. you know you’re being rather selfish not everything is about you. you’ve always been like this.”

“jack, i know you’re upset, i am too, please don’t take this out on me.”

“get out the car.”

“well stop the car then for fuck sake, i’m not getting injured because of you.”

as soon as jack pulled over, you got out and began the walk home, your vision became blurry due to the tears forming as you watched jack drive away. you ended up sitting in a cafe for a while to calm down. none of this felt real you pinched yourself, hoping to find out you were stuck in some nightmare. jack must have returned by the time you made it to the cafe as the community was now spamming questions on twitter asking why jack has now left and unfollowed everyone, followed by your mods telling you to check twitter. your fan base were hurt as their favourite streamers were falling apart and blocking each other. followed by them asking why you’ve not been streaming, you felt like you were going crazy as everyone else was able to stream and enjoyed doing so but you were struggling to stream with no one laughing in the background. you ended up sending a dm to your discord announcements knowing that they’ll share the news.

y/n: so long, goodbye for now. you guys have been extremely supportive over the past 15 years. however there is a lot going on right now (i’ll spare you all the details) i’m going to be taking a break for a while. after all does anybody want to joke when no one’s laughing in the background? i’m sure we’ll meet again, until then my loves!

10 minutes later you decided you should probably go home to the others, after all they’re all you have left.

“i promise to never go outside again.”

as soon as you walked into the house rather than being met with tubbo asking if you were okay, you were met with a notification.

*bo has left the chat*

he stood with his bags near the door

“this is all your fault, i can’t look at you anymore”

“you’re really joking in a time like this...right?”

“you were looking for a reason hide again.”

“trust me buddy i found it.”

ranboo pulled you as close as he could crying into the crook of your neck, you wrapped your arms around his waist as tubbo left the house. it felt like he took the happy memories with him. as soon as ranboo let go, you ran to your room locking the door trying to hide away from the situation, ranboo sat on the other side of the door not wanting to be alone.

“am i going crazy? would i even know? am i right back where i started 14 years ago?”

“y/n let me in.”

you unlocked the door and practically fell into ranboos arms, once you felt strong enough the pair of you sat on your bed, nothing could separate the pair of you right now, you both lost the people you cared about.

“i swear to god all i ever wanted was a little bit of everything all of the time. i’ve finished playing and i’m staying inside.”

“y/n i’m sorry..”

“im sorry too, ranboo, i guess this is the it.”

“at least we have each other.”

“and that fucking photograph wall.”

“that’s a problem for another night..please get some rest.”

it took a while but eventually you fell asleep in his embrace. you may have lost the others but at least one of your best friends stuck around.

taglist (sorry guys)

@dumb-chaotic-bi-energy @uselesssapphickitten @l0ver0fj0y @etheriaaly @xx-smiley-xx @hawarun @kylobensgirl @cawcaw-pretty-thing @reverse-iak @renleicrashed @c1loudee

#mcyt x reader #mcyt angst #mcyt fanfiction #mcyt writing #mcyt imagines #mcyt imagine #mcyt reader insert #tubbo x y/n #tubbo x you #tubbo x reader #tubbo imagine #tubbo angst #tommyinnit x y/n #tommyinnit x you #tommyinnit angst #tommyinnit x reader #jack manifold x reader #jack manifold x you #jack manifold x y/n #jack manifold imagine #jack manifold angst #ranboo x reader #ranboo x y/n #ranboo x you #ranboo angst #ranboo imagine

[kay-diggle]

The Promise Ring

Summary: Some promises are broken, some promises remain intact, and new promises are made.

Pairing: Jungkook x Female Reader

Genre & Rating: Angst, Smut, Hint of Fluff, 18+

Warnings: oral (m. recieving), somewhat dom!jungkook (he’s actually a big softie) sub!reader, hairpulling, mentions of jealousy, overstimulation, vaginal intercourse, unprotected sex (pls pls pls stay safe guys!)

Length: 4.2k

Notes: I apologize that the first fic I post in months is so terrible (it highkey feels like it’s all over the place but that’s okay!) If you somehow enjoy this... please let me know! I’m still kinda in hiatus bc of school btw :( {Requests are closed}

Kay-Diggle’s Ultimate Masterlist

.

.

.

Before 

“It’s so pretty out here tonight,” you commented on the beautiful scenery in front of you. You were laid across your boyfriend’s lap while he leaned back, both taking in the view. 

 For your four year anniversary, Jungkook took you out to a clearing that overlooks the city. You had a late night picnic, eating your favorite foods while sharing some of your favorite memories from the past four years you’ve been together. 

“Yea… but you’re prettier.” 

“Ugh, corrrnnyyyy,” you whined despite feeling yourself begin to blush. 

“Yea, but you love it,” he placed a sweet kiss on your forehead. “And I think this is the perfect time to give you your anniversary gift babe!” 

“No! I definitely told you I did not want a gift this year.” 

“Well that is definitely too bad because I got you one anyways,” he countered, playful as ever. 

He sat up, reaching into the pocket of his jeans. It was hard to see since it was dark outside, but when you clearly saw the velvet black box, you felt a rush of all different types of emotions exploding within you. Upon seeing your shocked face, he stupidly grinned before opening the box, confirming your suspicions about what was inside. 

“Jungkook….” your jaw dropped as you looked at the most beautiful diamond ring you had ever seen. 

“Y/n,” his hand found yours, “I love you so much baby. These past four years have been…. just, so amazing that it’s kind of hard to put into words, ya know? But the one thing I can tell you for sure is that we were meant to be together. You were literally made for me -- my handcrafted destiny. And I promise you that will never change. I promise that I will never stop loving you, I’ll never hurt you. I promise you that I will never break your heart.” 

Nothing could stop the way tears pooled into your eyes at his heartfelt words. You were speechless, only being able to mouth the words ‘I love you’ while Jungkook began laughing at you while wiping away your tears.  

“I know what you’re thinking but it’s not that, so don’t freak out! It’s a promise ring,” he took your left hand, placing said ring on your finger. 

You couldn’t even focus on his words, you just wanted to hug him. And so you did. As soon as he slipped the ring on your finger, you were wrapping him in your arms and tackling him to the ground, crying while laughing at the same time while he laughed with you. 

“Did you even hear me just now?” he chuckled. 

“Yes, not a proposal, but a promise ring,” you nodded. 

“Okay. Just keep in mind I will ask you to marry me one day,” he smirked. 

"And I, Y/n, promise you, Jungkook, that when that day does come, I'll say yes. If you would've asked me tonight I would have said yes with no hesitation." 

“Well then, I can’t wait for that day, hm?” 

“Yeah, me neither.” 

And that night, the two of you made love outside, underneath the stars. 

Now 

When you walked into the room you felt your stomach drop. Seeing your ex-boyfriend’s face months after the worst break up you’ve ever had instead of his best friend who you were planning to meet up with was not what you were expecting when you opened the door. 

“You’re not Namjoon,” a deep frown set on your face. 

“I know. I asked him to get you here. Y/n, please… just hear me out.” 

“No Jungkook,” you shook your head. “I believe you said enough the last time we saw each other, yea?” 

You turned, placing your hand on the doorknob and turning it. Before you could fully open it, you felt a force push it back closed with Jungkook’s strong presence behind you, his hand pressed against the door above your head.

“Y/n. Stay.” 

He whispered it in your ear and although he said it in a commanding voice, his voice was strained almost as if he was begging. You stood completely still for a moment, your heart and mind battling against each other even though you already knew their fight was pointless. In the end, your heart always made you cave. 

You turned to face him, realizing that you were completely trapped between him and the door, you quickly became uncomfortable. Fuck your stupid heart for not being able to resisit the man who broke it. 

“What do you want?” 

“I miss you.” 

You scoffed at that. 

“Well that’s something you could have communicated over the phone rather than creating this whole elaborate plan with Namjoon and getting him to lure me all the way to this hotel.” 

“You realize that you blocked me… on everything, right? I can’t communicate anything to you,” he rolled his eyes. 

“Yes, I realize that. And I did that for a reason. What part of ‘I never want to hear from you or see you again’ did you not understand from when we broke up?” 

“Oh I understood that shit perfectly and I still think it’s fucking bogus.” 

“Yea of fucking course you would. You know that was always your problem. You never see things from my point of view.” 

“Oh and what point of view would that be? Starting arguments over nothing because you’re bored to the point where we had to actually BREAK UP?” 

“Bored Jungkook? Really? I assure you that if I was really bored I would’ve found better ways of occupying my time than arguing with your ass over the same shit.” 

“Oh get real Y/n.” 

“No, you get real!! Your head is so far up your fucking ass that eight months later you still can’t see what you did wrong.” 

“There’s nothing to see! I didn’t do anything!!” 

“Jungkook I fucking told you on multiple occasions that I didn’t appreciate you entertaining that girl when she flirted with you! You know, the one who was only supposed to be a close FRIEND?!?” 

“Jesus Christ y/n, you act as if I FUCKED her. I didn’t even flirt back!” he stepped back from you, crossing his arms under his chest. 

“IT DOESN’T FUCKING MATTER! Do you understand how it made me feel?? How she would whisper with her friends, talk shit about OUR relationship and I just had to sit back and listen. OH but the ONE time I get drunk and flirt with Taehyung in a moment of weakness, suddenly I was the villain. Suddenly I destroyed our relationship and was all types of whores and sluts. Honestly Jungkook, you can go to hell.” 

“You flirted with my BEST FRIEND y/n.. Basically offered to suck his dick. I’m sorry, was I not supposed to get angry?” 

“No but I definitely wasn’t expecting you to disrespect me by calling me out of my name Jungkook!”

“I APOLOGIZED! I apologized as soon as I realized what I said. And I’ll apologize again if that’s what it’ll take to-” 

“No you don’t have to do shit. I’m leaving. I can’t believe I even stayed this long. Ugh, this is my problem. I’m always too nice to people who don’t deserve my kindness,” your words came out venomous. 

Jungkook bared his teeth, visibly upset before he walked towards you, forcing your body back into the wall. 

“No your problem was you never wanted to fucking talk. It was ALWAYS arguing with you. EVEN NOW! I invited you here to have a conversation and look at what you started!” 

“No YOU started it!” you poked your finger into his chest. “You knew exactly what would happen if we saw each other again which is exactly why you got me here under false pretenses. This is all your fault,” you screamed. “Everything. Was. Your. Fault.” you poked his chest with each word. 

Jungkook grabbed the finger you kept poking him with and it made you audibly gasp. He stared down at you with a look that came across as angry but having been in this position with him before, you could also notice a slight hint of lust in his eyes. 

He let go of your finger before gently pushing his palm into your chest, making your back hit the door and grabbing your wrists, holding them against the door. 

“Listen. To. Me,” he spoke slowly. “I am not putting up with your attitude tonight so stop.” 

“Make me.” 

It was like clock work, the way the two simple words you uttered set him off. He let go of one of your wrists to wrap his hand around your neck, choking you lightly and bent down to whisper in your breath. 

“Stop fucking playing with me Y/N. You already know what happens when you do that shit.” 

“Hmm… well it has been eight months. Maybe you need to refresh my memory?” you challenged. 

Jungkook grunted out of frustration before tightening his grip on your throat and kissing you. The kiss was rushed and furious, much different than the ones you’ve shared with him in the past. No matter how upset he was with you, his lips were always gentle on your skin, but this was completely different. He forced his tongue into your mouth and bit on your lips so hard you were worried he would draw blood. 

His other hand let go of your wrist, trailing it up your thigh to squeezing your waist and ultimately groping your ass while giving your lips a break to attack the sweet spots on your neck instead. 

“Fuck….” you moaned out when his hand began squeezing your breasts, brushing against your hard nipples. 

“You like when I play with your tits?” 

“Nope,” you spit out. “You’re barely doing anything for me right now.” 

“Hmm well you wanna know what I like? When you can’t talk. How about we shut you up.” 

He shrugged off his jacket, placing it on the floor before pushing you to your knees. Having been in this position before, you reacted automatically, rubbing his length through his pants a little. You unbuckled his belt and undid his pants before pulling them and his boxers down just enough to reveal his semi hard dick. After finally seeing it again after months, it would be a lie to say you didn’t miss it. 

“Suck. Now.” 

At his command, you looked up at him while wrapping your hand around his base, letting spit drip from your mouth onto him to make him wet. You moved your hand up and down his length a bit before finally taking him into your mouth, You let your tongue run on the underside of his dick from base to tip before wrapping your lips around his tip and lightly sucking, just like you knew he liked. You looked up at him, covering your teeth with your lips and taking his length further in your throat. One of his hands found purchase in your hair, guiding you up and down his length while his other was spread against the door as if using it to hold himself up. You felt him twitch in your mouth before there was a knock at the door. 

“Jungkook? Y/n? I just came to make sure you guys didn’t kill each other in here,” Namjoon joked wearily. 

“Yup! All good,” came Jungkook’s hasty response when he felt you take in his length completely, deepthroating him. 

“I see you’re acting out for Namjoon,” he whispered looking down at your teasing face before using your hair to push you further down and hold you there. 

After a few seconds he let you up, coughing up spit while gasping for air loud enough that Namjoon could hear. 

“Jungkook what was that? Where’s y/n?” 

“She’s here. She’s fine. We’re working it out. Bye Namjoon!” Jungkook made you go back to sucking his cock after letting you get a few breaths. 

“Maybe I should come in and mediate….” Namjoon contemplated, completely unaware of what was happening on the other side of the room. 

“Unless you want to see her choking on my dick, maybe now is not the best time Namjoon,” Jungkook was starting to get annoyed. 

“Oh… in that case.. I’ll just get going I guess…. Glad to hear you two are.. Working it out?” Both you and Jungkook could hear Namjoon taking off in the opposite direction of the room. It made you giggle a little bit, vibrating against Jungkook’s cock. Nearly cumming down your throat at the feeling, he slapped his hand against the door before using your hair to pull your mouth off of him. 

His hand wrapped around your arm, pulling your body back into a standing position before capturing your lips in a heated kiss again. 

“Fucking Namjoon….” Jungkook trailed off, his hands now exploring your body again. “And why the fuck were you coming to see Namjoon dressed like this?” He asked, referring to the tiny black dress you were wearing that barely covered your ass. 

You replied with the most petty thing you could think of. “I don’t know. Maybe it was so that I could finally fuck one of your best friends, like I was accused of doing.” 

Jungkook gritted his teeth, yet again visibly annoyed with you. “And how should I fuck you fuck, hm? Should I fuck you against the door? Make you scream my name? Make sure everyone in this hotel knows how much you’ve fucking missed me?” 

His fingers traveled under your dress and pulled your soaked panties to the side, easily slipping a finger into you and then adding another beginning to fuck you

“Ah, shit!” 

“Answer the question.” 

“Fuck! Yes, fuck me wherever you like” 

At that, he quickly ripped your underwear off your body and pulled your dress off, wanting as much access to your bare skin as possible. He pulled the rest of his pants off as you tugged his shirt off and threw it across the room. 

He pushed you completely against the door and raised one of your legs to wrap around his waist. Taking his length in his hand, he slapped it against your clit a few times, smirking at you as you whimpered at the feeling. He rubbed his length against your wet folds until you couldn’t take it anymore. 

“Jungkook,” you were annoyed. 

“Yes?” He looked at you with a sly smile on his face. 

“Just put it in!” 

“Beg me first.” 

“You’re so goddamn irritating.” 

“Now Y/n, is that any way to talk to someone who can give you what you so desperately need?” His condescending tone of voice only worked to aggravate you further, but you not wanting to waste anymore time, you gave in. 

“Please Jungkook! Please fuck me. I can’t wait anymore, it’s been too long. Please i-  I need you!” 

He pressed your waist further into the door before finally sliding inside of you. 

“I don’t want to hear anything out of your mouth that isn’t you begging or my name,” he whispered in your ear as he began to fuck you, his movements made easier by your wetness. “No talking back.” Hard Thrust. “No smart ass comments.” Hard thrust. “Nothing.”

When he began pounding into you, you lost your footing, almost slipping. With a grunt, Jungkook grabbed both of your thighs, hoisting you up against the door and trapping you under his body. With this new position, he spread your legs further, now being able to go deeper within you. When you felt his tip repeatedly nudge the spongy spot within you, you let out your loudest sound yet, a combination of Jungkook’s name and a moan. He apparently thought it was too loud because he covered your mouth with the palm. 

“Be quiet” he whispered in your ear harshly. 

You wrapped your hand around his wrist, moving his palm so that you could speak. “‘I’m sorry, it’s just so good, ugh fuck.” 

“Yea, bubby? Did you miss me fucking this tight pussy? Missed me pounding into you just the way you like?” 

The cute pet name he used to call you when you were in a relationship completely flew over your head. The only thing you could focus on was the way his cock felt sliding against your walls, throbbing inside of you. 

“God, please! Please make me cum.” 

“You wanna cum? You missed cumming all over my cock right?” 

“Fuck yes! God,” you cried out when he went harder, your body banging into the door with every thrust. 

Jungkook was too busy holding your body up so he could fuck you properly, so you one of the hands that was gripping his shoulders down to your throbbing clit, rubbing it so that you could bring yourself to your end. Jungkook’s eyes traveled down to where your fingers were working, biting his lip at the sight. 

“Mmhmm, yes bubby. Rub that little pretty clit of yours. Are you gonna make yourself cum, hmm? Be a good girl for once and make yourself cum for me?”

“Yes.. yes, I’m gonna cum so hard Jungkook, just for you! Ahhh, fucckkkk” You were spewing so many words in your moment of bliss that you couldn’t even recall what you were saying.Your legs trembled while your hands wrapped around Jungkook’s wrist as he fucked you through your high. Your entire body felt overwhelmed as you came, especially when Jungkook kissed you while you were still shaking all over his dick, making it even harder for you to breathe. 

Disconnecting your lips so you could both catch a breath, jungkook asked “You came so hard, can you take more?” 

“Yes. Please, I need more.” Jungkook could see in your eyes how fucked out you were. The look you gave him had his cock throbbing so hard that he felt he could cum in that exact moment. 

He carried your limp body to the bed on the other side of the room, placing you down on the edge and instructing you to move up towards the headboard, holding back a laugh as he watched you struggle to crawl with your worn out legs. 

He joined you on the bed, sitting on his knees between your spread legs, touching himself at the sight of your post-orgasm face and glistening wetness. Watching him bite his lip and touch himself while looking you dead in the eye had your worn out pussy whimpering for him again, demanding more, and you couldn’t wait. You wrapped your legs around his waist, prompting him to hover over you, hands right beside your head to hold himself up. 

“Do you want it?” 

You quickly nodded your head. 

“Words, bubby.” 

“Yes Jungkook.” 

And then you both watched as he slid his length back inside of your cavern. Compared to his fast and rough thrust earlier, these were slower and more calculated. He was grinding into you in a way where you could feel his pelvis brush against your clit every time he moved deeper into you. You cried out to him again from the overstimulation. 

“You okay y/n?” he questioned, not stopping his movements. 

“Yea, just sensitive. Please don’t stop,” you begged, 

“I promise I won’t. I don’t ever want to stop….” 

You couldn’t focus on his words while he moved inside you. All you could do is let the moans roll out of your mouth that hung wide open. And all Jungkook could do was watch, thinking about how much he missed this. How much he missed you. 

He lowered his body so that he was basically laying on top of you, one hand gripping your waist while the other gripped the sheet next to your head. He rolled his hips into you at a faster pace and you couldn’t help but fling your arms around him, holding on tight. He dropped his forehead to yours and you finally looked at him, really looked at him without the lust clouding your eyes. You were still able to read him the same way you always could. You finally noticed the drop in his earlier dominant persona and how he became softer with the way he touched you. 

You felt his love radiating through you. He was making love to you. 

“Fuck y/n, I’ve missed you so much.” 

“Jungkook … please, please don’t. Please just fuck me,” you begged. You couldn’t do this. You weren’t ready to face your feelings. 

“I can’t just fuck you. I want more. I want you.” Both of his hands found their way to yours, locking your fingers together while looking each other in the eye. “I only want you. It’s all I’ve ever wanted. I love you, bubby. I’ve never stopped… ugh, I promised I never would.”

His sudden confession made all of the emotions you thought you had locked away for the past eight months come back. You were crying. You were sobbing under the guise of pleasure.. It was all too bittersweet. Jungkook was simultaneously making your body feel good but your heart feel so sad. 

You couldn’t speak. You didn’t have the words. You just clamped your walls around him, pushing you both towards your climaxes. He squeezed your hands when he felt his balls tighten and cock throb, kissing you and groaning against your mouth as he came inside of you. He left open mouthed kisses on your face and down your body. This time, it was his fingers on your clit that brought you to your second end, all while whispering sweet, meaningful words in your ear about how beautiful you were and how much he misses you. It made your orgasm more intense, your feelings overriding your senses as you spasmed around his now soft cock inside of you. 

When he finally pulled out, he kissed you deeply for only a second, hugging your body closer to his and wiping your tears away as you both tried to catch your breath yet again. When the stickiness of your lower body began to feel as heavy as your heart and to Jungkook’s dismay, you got out of the bed and went into the bathroom, taking some time to clean up and silently sob into your hand before splashing water onto your tear stained cheek. You weren’t prepared for what would happen when you walked out the door and faced your ex lover again, but you knew you couldn’t avoid it either. 

Exiting the bathroom you saw Jungkook already dressed and  you scanned the room for your clothing which was mostly by the door. Jungkook silently watched as you dressed yourself and when he saw the look on your face when you turned around, he shot out of the bed and rushed towards you. 

“Marry me.” 

Your jaw dropped. “Jungkook…. What? Are you insane?!?” 

When he brought his hand into your line of sight, you recognized the item you threw at his chest eight months ago as you packed your bags and prepared to leave him. The cursed promise ring. 

“Do you remember when I gave this to you? I promised you that one day I would ask you to marry me. Well today is that day…... Do you remember what you promised me?” 

“Jungkook… “ 

“What did you promise me y/n?” he was desperate.

“I promised- I promised that I would say yes when you asked,” you mumbled, eyesight being blocked by fresh tears. 

“Well I’m asking,” he got down on one knee. “Y/n, will you marry me?” 

“This isn’t fair,” you sobbed. “I said that when we were still together. Things have changed Jungkook.” 

“Oh really? What’s changed y/n? We haven’t been together for a few months, but who cares. The only thing that matters is that our feelings haven’t been affected by our time apart. And they never will be. We’re always going to be in love. I promised you that.” 

Jungkook was crying himself at this point, and it broke you. Your head and heart were once again at war, but that didn’t matter. Nothing else could matter to you when the love of your life was on one knee in front of you, professing his undying love for you and asking you to spend the rest of your life with him. Your heart and your mind ultimately knew that he was right. Your feelings for him never changed, and they never would. There was no point trying to fight it. And yea he might have broken a promise or two, but he was making good on them now, and that was all that mattered. 

You took a deep breath and closed your eyes, before mumbling out a small “Yes.” 

When you opened your eyes, your new fiancé looked dumbfounded with the brightest smile you had ever seen on him. He cried out in joy before coming off his knee, lifting you up in his arms and twirling you around before trapping your face in his hands and kissing you as if his life depended on it. You couldn’t help but laugh as you wiped both his and your own tears away. 

“Was this your whole plan? To propose to me tonight?” 

“It was,” he grinned. “Now that I know what my life is like without you in it, I’m never letting you go again. And that’s a promise.” 

#bts #bts smut #jungkook smut #jungkook #jungkook imagine #jungkook fic #jungkook fanfic #jungkook oneshot #bts oneshot #dom!jungkook #sub!reader #jungkook x y/n #jungkook x reader smut #jungkook x reader #jeon jungkook

[petesvodka]

together

request from the lovely @silkykitten69-1

Hi!!! Could you do a oneshot of pete davidson and an actress dating? You’ve been dating for a couple of months and he decides he wants to move in together in their own apartment?? Id appreciate it!!

word count - 1.2k

warnings - there aren't any :)

authors note - this is such an adorable concept, i really hope i did it justice. i'll be honest, it was a tad bit rushed, so i might end up editing it later on. anyway, if you've got any thoughts on the story or a request, feel free to send them my way! :)

⁂

Sweet early morning air drifted in through an open window, tugging you closer and closer to reality from your comfortable slumber.

You realize something's off when you can't feel the warmth of his body next to yours, and that's enough to get you to sit up and rub the sleep from your eyes.

Something's different today, you can feel it. When you glance at the alarm clock on the nightstand, red digital letters reading 8:23, you know something's up.

In the months you've known and dated Pete, he's never managed waking up before 10 or 11.

Slowly, you stretch the sleep from your bones before swinging your legs over the side of the bed, sliding on a pair of slippers before standing up. You hear pans clatter to the floor from the kitchen, followed swiftly by a rush of curses, and you smile softly to yourself.

Making your way from the bedroom, you're greeted with the rich smell of freshly brewed coffee, a smell that only grew stronger and stronger the closer you walked to the kitchen. Music played quietly from his phone, and you recognize it to be something by Kid Cudi.

You can't help but smile when you see him, back turned to you, with what you assume to be a spatula in hand as he attempts to make scrambled eggs. He's never really made you breakfast before, mostly because the boy can't cook anything other than poptarts and ramen. But for you, he'd at least try.

"G'morning," You say

"Fuck!" Pete whips his head around quickly to look at you, and you chuckle softly to yourself. "Jesus, Y/N, you scared the hell out of me." He says, but he's already smiling

You return the smile, although softer, as you slowly make your way to him. Your arms loop comfortably around his waist as you look up at him. He still smells of sleep, hair still beautifully messy.

You don't bother with an apology because you know he doesn't expect one. Instead, you want to know why he's up so early.

"You sleep okay?" You ask gently as Pete looks down at you, dark eyes studying your face with a strange mix between a smile and a frown.

"Oh, yeah." His hands go to your hair, playing with a piece so he doesn't have to maintain eye contact. Your gaze doesn't leave his face, though.

"Why are you up so early?" You ask, getting straight to the point. He twirls your hair around his long, slender finger, and you can see him coming up with either an excuse or an explanation.

He leans down, softly connecting your lips with his own. "How 'bout I finish up making breakfast. Then I'll tell you."

You sigh softly as you gaze up to him, stealing a quick kiss. "Fine... But I'm helping."

. . .

With the two of you working together, breakfast was ready quickly. But you had to admit, the kitchen was too small, even if it was just the two of you.

Still, though, that wasn't exactly something you were paying much mind to. Rather, you couldn't help but notice how oddly Pete seemed to be acting.

He was still his lovely, goofy self, but something just seemed off. Like he wasn't all there with you.

As you sat down at the kitchen table, a tiny thing by a window, just barely large enough for three people to comfortably sit, the smell of french toast and coffee filled your nose.

Pete sits across from you, setting down a plate that mirrored yours exactly, his face being illuminated by warm rays of morning sun.

He doesn't look down as he brings a mug of sweetened heavily coffee to his lips.

You start eating your syrup-drizzled french toast, watching him carefully as you wait for him to speak. He knows you're waiting, too, which is why he tries to look everywhere that isn't you.

"Pete..." You finally say, reaching over and taking his hand into your own. Your thumb traces over the boney ridges of his knuckles, and he bits his bottom lip.

"I've been thinking a lot..." He finally says, and you frown a bit. He cracks a small smile. "I know, I know, that's never a good way to start a sentence, but it's true."

He takes a deep breath, his chest dramatically expanding and falling. His eyes, illuminated into a sweet honey brown by the sun, meets your gaze, and he hesitates.

You know whatever he's about to say is important, so you try your best not to rush him, but fuck, you can literally feel your pulse in the back of your throat.

"I... I think we should get our own apartment. Together." Pete says, and he frowns slightly as if in preparation for a negative reaction

You feel your jaw fall open slightly, and you see fear in Pete's eyes before a large, impossibly bright smile curls to your lips.

"Wait- really?!" You ask, sheer excitement seeping into your tone. Pete's reaction begins to mirror your own, a bright smile pulling to his pink lips as he nods.

"Yeah, I mean," He allows for his fingers to trace small circles on your hand, "This place is great and all, but it's not meant for a couple."

You're absolutely beaming as you stand up, fingers interlocking with his own as you made your way to his side of the table. Standing between his legs, your hand goes to his cheek as he looks up at you, smile still radiant on your lips as his hand goes to your waist. You kiss him softly, tasting the sweet coffee on his lips as he pulls you closer.

"I love you," You say against his lips, and you can feel him smiling.

"I love you more," He says, and you know he means it as he gently pulls you onto his lap.

"What's your opinion on New York city?" Pete asks, holding you close to his body

"I don't really have one. Why?" You ask, finger twirling a lock of his dark hair as you looked down at him.

"Well, I told you I've been thinking a lot about this." He smiles softly as he looks at you, and you can feel the love radiating from his gaze. "New York City is fantastic when it comes to auditions, you wouldn't believe the number of opportunities there."

You look at him with a glint of astonished bewilderment in your eyes. You realize, in that very moment, that even though you have only been with him for a few months, you are fully confident you were made for each other. Cut from the same cloth, formed from the same stardust.

The love you feel for him swells throughout your entire being, and you can't help but think how glad you are to have him. Someone who doesn't just support you, but who also cares.

Just from the adoring look in his eyes, you know you don't have to say anything else. Sometimes the two of you go beyond what words could communicate.

In all honestly, Pete truly couldn't care less about where the two of you lived.

As long as he was with you, he was home.

#pete davidson #pete davidson x reader #pete davidson x you #pete davidson fanfiction #fluff #request complete! #mars writes

[anna-kendrick]

holding my breath ('til i can say all of the words i wanna say)

Beca goes home with Chloe for thanksgiving.

For @beca-mitchell​

Read on AO3, or below.

Chloe regrets asking the moment it comes out of her mouth.

“Come home with me.”

It's not that she doesn't want to bring Beca—her wonderful and loving girlfriend of over a year—home to visit her family, it's more the fact of how do you tell your wonderful and loving girlfriend of over a year that you didn't actually tell your parents that you two were dating because they're homophobic.

Yeah, she has a slight problem.

Chloe wasn't even sure if Beca would even say yes to begin with. It's her third year at Barden, and her third thanksgiving that she'd be spending on campus. Rather than taking a trip back to Seattle to visit her mother, Beca had explained that she prefers her alone time in the comfort of her room, away from all the reminders of her rocky childhood. Chloe gets it.

But more selfishly than not wanting to leave her girlfriend back in Atlanta alone—aka with most of the Bellas and very much not alone—Chloe didn't want to spend a week away from Beca. That's what brings them to this very moment.

Beca’s clearly taken aback by the question, and Chloe finds the slight blush that's creeping across her cheeks absolutely adorable.

“You're serious?” This is her out, Chloe thinks. Make it sound less appealing, tell her the truth, or just completely take back the offer and—

“Totes serious.” Well fuck.

The smug grin that grows on Beca’s face is enough to vanish all her worries for the moment. Chloe’s quick to reflect one back as Beca pulls her in for a kiss, a version of a ‘yes’ in her own, sweet language.

When Beca mumbles an “I love you,” against her lips, Chloe feels her knees go weak.

***

She doesn't bring it up.

It's sitting in the back of her mind at all times in the weeks following, but she doesn't bring it up.

Beca's seemingly excited to go on this trip to Portland. She says she's never been, and Chloe finds herself looking forward to showing her all of the places where she grew up. She ignores it when Beca tells her that she's excited to see her parents again, and jokingly teases her that she thinks they like her better.

Beca really has no idea.

It's on their final descent when Chloe realizes her mistake. She feels Beca’s hand squeeze in her own, looking over to see her wearing a soft smile—one of comfort and warmth—as if Beca could read her mind. She wishes it were true, it would make things so much easier.

But Beca simply mouths ‘you’re okay,’ and attributes Chloe’s nervous energy to flight anxiety. That’s truly the least of her worries right now, honestly the plane crashing to the ground seems like it could be a better scenario to what she’s going to have to do. Easier, and chances are less painful, too.

Beca squeezes her hand again, waiting for Chloe to squeeze back—their own little form of communication, a way for Chloe to say ‘I’m okay,’ without saying it aloud. Chloe shakes herself from her morbid thoughts, and kisses Beca’s cheek instead, before nuzzling herself into Beca’s shoulder. She feels herself relax slightly as Beca drops her head onto hers, and lets out a quiet hum.

She knows she's messed up. She goes over all the possible outcomes in her head as she watches other passengers deboard the plane. It's the one where she breaks Beca’s trust, and her heart that sticks out the most to her.

Beca never lets go of her hand as they walk off the plane. Chloe can hear her speaking, probably talking about all the new music ideas she thought of on their long flight over, but she can't make out any of the words—she's too lost in her own mind.

“Chlo?” She’s snapped out of her non stop reel of scenarios when Beca stops in place, tilting her head in concern. Beca knows her so well, it makes her want to cry. “You okay?”

“Yeah, just tired.” She lies, and offers a smile. It seems to satisfy Beca, who grins back and squeezes her hand again gently before going to resume their trail to the baggage claim.

This is it. She has to do it.

“Bec, wait—” Her voice catches in her throat when Beca looks back, eyes full of questions and concern—so patient and so loving. She thinks she might throw up.

She lets go of Beca’s hand.

“They don't know you’re my girlfriend. Please don't tell them, I’m sorry.” Chloe takes a deep breath, fighting back her tears, because God forbid she cries in the middle of this damn airport.

One glance at Beca’s face and her heart feels like it's being crushed inside her chest. She can't say anything else, she can't even look at her.

“Um— Our bags, lets go get our bags.”

***

They meet Chloe’s parents outside of the airport about a half hour later, the silence that had been deafening between her and Beca finally breaking.

Alice greets Beca with a smile and a tight hug. “We’re so happy Chloe was able to talk you into coming home with her.”

“She didn’t have to say much, I’m glad to be here. Thanks for letting me stay with you guys.” Beca says it so sincerely, it only makes Chloe feel worse.

“Please, Beca, you know you’re a part of the family. You can visit anytime, even without this one here.” Dale points to Chloe, giving Beca a wink and one of his signature Beale smiles. Beca giggles and looks over to her Chloe with a soft smile.

Chloe turns to look out the window instead.

The drive to the Beale family home is longer than Chloe remembers—louder too, as her dad sings along obnoxiously to the songs on the radio, and her thoughts continue to echo inside of her head. Beca’s more silent than usual though, and Chloe takes the risk of glancing over to check on her.

Beca’s the one peering out the window now, headphones plugged in as she listens to her own music. It almost makes Chloe smile, just seeing Beca next to her, as they drive through her hometown. The feeling is fleeting however, as Chloe takes note of Beca chewing the skin on her thumb—a nervous habit most likely brought on by all of the shit Chloe sprung on her at the airport. She wants nothing more than to reach over and pull her hand away, entangle their fingers together and squeeze Beca’s hand tightly.

She meets her mothers gaze in the mirror, and immediately realizes how bad of an idea this was.

***

It’s later that night—after Chloe had spent ten minutes convincing, more like begging, her mother to let Beca sleep in her room upstairs and not in the basement

(“It’s freezing down there. I’ll just make a bed for myself on the floor.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Chloe.”)

—that Beca finally broaches the subject.

“Chloe?” She hears Beca whisper through the dark. She lays silently, debating whether or not she should answer, or pretend to be asleep and hope that Beca lets it go—she already knows what she's about to ask.

“Baby, I know you're awake.” She could insist that she is asleep—continue to hold her breath and fight back the tears that are already pricking from behind her eyelids—but she knows that Beca knows her better than anyone else, knows that Beca’s worried about her from the way that her hand now softly brushes through her hair.

“Chlo—”

“Yeah, I'm awake.” Chloe whispers, rolling around to face her girlfriend. She feels the guilt swirl in her stomach immediately with just one look at the sad eyes in front of her.

She knew it was coming, but when Beca mumbles “Why didn't you tell them? I—I don't mean to pry, I’m sorry, I just—Are you okay?” tears immediately spill from her eyes, and she has to choke back the sob that threatens to come out.

It makes her heart clench to think about how far her and Beca have come since that day at the activities fair. It had taken so long to get Beca to open up to her, to even just accept a hug from her. It makes her sick to think about how disappointed her parents would be if they walked in on the two of them at this moment—their daughter wrapped up in her girlfriends arms as Beca continues to rub her back soothingly.

She feels so fucking guilty. A disappointment to both her family, and towards the woman she loves. She hates herself for it.

Beca's hands feel so soft against her cheeks as she holds them and lightly brushes her tears away. It's dark in the room, but she can still clearly make out Beca’s features in the moonlight that spills in from the window. Beca looks beautiful, she looks sad, but she’s so beautiful.

“I didn't know how to tell you.” Her voice sounds unrecognizable to her own ears, it's raspy with tears, and she can hear the lie within her own speech. It's not that she didn't know how to, it's that she didn't want to.

How was she supposed to tell her best friend—her girlfriend—that her parents would hate her? How was she supposed to explain that yes, they had met her before and treated her like a second daughter, but as soon as they found out Beca was more than just a friend, they'd look at her with pure disgust and detest? How was she supposed to bring that up in a conversation where Beca’s telling her that her father has been putting more effort in, that he's happy for the two of them and that he’d like to have both over for dinner one night?

She's never wanted Beca to feel as if she was a secret, that their blooming relationship was something that Chloe was ashamed of. And now, Chloe doesn't even know why she invited Beca here in the first place, because while reserved, Beca’s the proudest of their relationship, and she can see it in her face right now how much she's hurting.

Chloe knows it's her fault.

“I'm not mad at you.” Beca's smiling softly at her—a sad smile—one of encouragement, or one to try to deter the situation, because she knows that Chloe’ll be upset if Beca shows that she’s upset, Chloe doesn't know. She doesn’t really care either, she just wants to go home. Atlanta home, away from this life she had so happily left behind.

What she does know, is that Beca is one of the most patient, and selfless people she's ever met. She knows she doesn't have to say anything, that she could simply ignore the situation entirely, tell Beca that she's tired, and it'd get dropped. She knows Beca wouldn't push her if she wasn't ready to tell her.

But she also knows that Beca deserves an answer.

“They would hate me if they found out, Bec.” She realizes that it's been a while since she admitted this dark secret of hers aloud. Not since her first year at Barden, when she confided in Aubrey over a bottle of cheap wine.

“It's not that I'm not proud to be with you, I promise. It's just that— I’m scared to lose them. I don't want to lose you, but I can't lose them either, Beca. I'm so sorry.”

She's crying again—she doesn't know if she ever really stopped—but Beca’s soft lips are soon pressed against hers; familiar, comforting, safe.

“You'd never lose me.” Beca whispers against her lips in between kisses, and it's like a blanket of warmth courses through Chloe’s body. It's still crazy to her how in the midst of feeling so sad and confused, Beca can make her feel so loved, make her thoughts that had just moments ago felt so jumbled, suddenly so clear.

“I will tell them.” She states, breaking apart from Beca’s kiss, nodding her head in affirmation.

“You don't have to.”

“I will. Eventually, I will. Maybe not this week, but one day I will.” And Beca’s smile in response is enough for her to know that she’s supported, that Beca will hold her hand through it all.

“I think you're really brave, Chloe.” She doesn't expect that as a response, and she's ready to open her mouth and argue against Beca’s words—tell her that she doesn't feel brave at all—but Beca beats her to it. “No, you really are, and it's one of the things I love most about you. Thank you for telling me.”

There’s something about Beca Mitchell that Chloe finds so captivating. Perhaps it’s the way she smiles so genuinely and so lovingly at her, before she breaks out into a cheeky grin and pulls Chloe back in for another kiss. Maybe it’s the trust that she seems to give Chloe unconditionally, something that she’s seen Beca struggle with so much over the course of knowing her. Beca’s passion, loyalty, determination… Perhaps it’s just Beca’s big heart, that tends to tug on her own, and make her feel weak in the knees.

“You know I love you, right?” Chloe can tell Beca’s getting tired by the pure laziness that’s beginning to leak into her kisses, her heavy hands that are no longer roaming, but holding her close and still against her.

“You’ve told me a few times. I love you, too. I’m fucking exhausted, your family is insane. Sorry that was—”

“Bec, it’s okay.” Chloe laughs softly squeezing Beca’s hand that continues to lay softly on her hip. “They really are, you’re right. But I have you, I think I’m pretty lucky.”

“Oh, my God—you’re gross. So gross. Go to sleep or I’m moving down to the basement.”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Watch me.”

#bechloe #beca mitchell #chloe beale #pitch perfect #anna kendrick #brittany snow #au #i'm so nervous anytime i post stuff like this it makes me wanna vom #but theresa ily and this is for u #ignore the fact that they look like whole ass 30 year olds in this gift when they're supposed to be pp2ish era #anyway.. *logs off* #my writing #edits #mine #mine:au #mine:fic