#scribbled down their like. general likeness. real quick

[bacchuschucklefuck]

they look like this I think .

#fhjy #fantasy high junior year #adaine abernant #gorgug thistlespring #figueroth faeth #kristen applebees #riz gukgak #fabian seacaster #scribbled down their like. general likeness. real quick #actually really struggled with gorgug's hair for a good while lmao. until the literal moment I remembered abt his goggles #like everything immediately made sense when it was added its crazy #anyways.

[gimmehyuck]

try again | j.jh

summary. jaehyun remembers the night he met you, and even after that one night he often thought of you and wished things would have been different, but by a weird twist of fate he gets to see you again, except this time... you're not alone.

or alternatively:

jaehyun gets to try again, for real this time.

pairing. idol!jaehyun x teacher!yn

words. 19.8k-ish

genre. somewhat of a second chance romance? lots of cute things going on, and it wouldn't be a gimmehyuck fic if i didn't have something angsty

warnings. there's not much to warn about tbh? jaehyun not believing in love at first sight but then essentially does, there's a one night stand (nothing explicit), and also a child (gasp i know), alcohol is mentioned as well as pineapple on pizza, a wild blue haired haechan makes an appearance, johnmark being the best, jaehyun is generally unhappy with being an idol at this stage of his life, idk but y'all can thank my friend ruby for this getting finished, she was on my ass about it... happy late birthday jaehyun lmao

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this was completely and utterly unlike himself, jaehyun thought over and over as he laid in your bed listening to you breathe. he wasn’t a one-night stand kind of man, he was too busy to let himself fall into these kind of temptations. he was a man, he told himself, and yeah, he liked sex, but the middle of tour? he shook his head at himself as he stared at the ceiling.

his mouth spoke on his own when he saw you, your beauty catching him entirely off guard. dinner at 6 with johnny was only supposed to be a quick get-out-of-the-hotel-for-a-bit thing, forty-five minutes tops. but the second you walked up and asked if you could start them off with any waters, or if they preferred beer, he was enamored. forty-five minutes turned into double that and johnny could only smile at himself at the very obvious flirtatious exchanges and when you wrote your number on the receipt you had placed on the table with a scribbled note that said ‘i get off at 11, call me if you want :)’, johnny was more than supportive.

“man, just live a little.” johnny had told him in the taxi to the hotel, and jaehyun was still on the fence about it but when it was 10:53 and he still couldn’t get your smiling face out of his head, his fingers moved entirely on their own. you responded to him at 11 exactly, and even though he had just ate and wasn’t hungry, he agreed when you asked if he’d be up to get something to eat with you. twenty minutes later he found himself in your presence again, baseball hat tugged as far down as it would go and a mask tugged slightly down to rest on his chin and he couldn’t help but listen to things about yourself and he realized he wanted to know more and more with each laugh you let out.

he wasn’t a love at first sight kind of man, but he could understand that thought behind it because, damn, you were funny and kind and absolutely beautiful.

“sorry, i’ve been going on too much about myself, haven’t i?” you asked, face turning a little sheepish when you realized he hadn’t said much of a word the last fifteen minutes but you noticed his smile never fell from his face. he shook his head in answer and picked up a fry from the shared pile on the table, “no, i’m enjoying hearing all about you.”

“well, let’s change it up some, tell me about yourself. you from around here?” you asked, copying his movements and munching on a fry yourself.

“mmm,” he thought for a moment. he didn’t want to be secretive, but he wasn’t comfortable turning the conversation into a long winded one about his group and his fame and although he was thankful for all of that, he noticed it had slowly started to wear him down. no, he genuinely was enjoying just being himself with you, not having to be anyone else. “i’m from seoul, and i work… in entertainment.” he finally decided on.

not a lie, not exactly.

“oh, that sounds really exciting! do you get to meet a lot of famous people doing that?” you asked tilting your head slightly as you did so, genuine curiosity on your face.

his smile grew, oh if only you knew. “i have here and there, they’re just people even if they’re famous.”

you nodded in response to that and your lips twisted slightly in a frown, “i always feel a little bad for celebrities in that sense. i can’t imagine worrying about how my next sentence will be dissected and twisted into something else.”

the more you spoke, the more you surprised him. no one really thought about them in that way, usually jumping directly to the misconstruing of his words or actions as something else entirely.

“yeah, i imagine that’s pretty difficult.” he agreed with you knowingly, then asked, “so do you enjoy being a waitress?”

your smile faltered a little, and you sighed, “i mean, yeah. i like meeting new people but i’m only doing it for another semester and then i’ve got my degree. it took me longer than i’d like to admit, since i’m almost twenty-four now but i had to work enough to make the money to pay for my tuition and well, yeah. so i’ll have my bachelors in a few months’ time and then i’ll be done with the restaurant.”

“oh?” jaehyun asked, reaching again for more fries. “what are you getting your degree in?”

“teaching!” you said with a brilliant smile on your face. “i want to teach, but lately i’ve been leaning towards teaching english overseas and i think you were my sign to do just that. i’ve been debating between korea and japan.”

jaehyun laughed a little at that, “well not to be biased but i can vouch for korea. it’s a really beautiful place.”

and the conversation continued like that, asking questions back and forth. you answering him honestly and jaehyun answering you as honestly as he could without turning the conversation into the direction he didn’t want it to go. the food was gone and the conversation was still going but you had invited him to your place which wasn’t that far away and jaehyun thought he’d hesitate to say yes but his answer was so immediate it startled him a bit. the constant back and forth went on even still at your apartment and he felt like he had known you for a long time, much longer than just a few hours at least, he felt at ease and comfortable and it was a feeling he didn’t realize he was missing. when you suddenly kissed him midsentence he froze, his entire face blank as his brain processed what had just happened, unsure how to exactly to proceed next and you blushed brightly at him, your confidence unwavering.

“sorry,” you giggled a little nervously at the way his face was in shock, “i don’t have any expectations of tonight, but i wanted to kiss you at least once. you’re so cute, especially your dimples. i’m sorry if i made you uncomf – mmph!” his lips effectively silencing you in the same manner yours had him.

except he didn’t pull away, and you wrapped your arms around him and the night carried on, each kiss leading into a touch, and then a gasp. you led him into your room and kicked the door shut with your foot, hands frantically removing clothing in a trail to the bed. small giggles were shared between gasping breaths within the breaks of kissing and the gasps slowly transformed into sounds of pleasure and while you fell asleep against him after, jaehyun couldn’t turn his racing mind off.

he didn’t regret anything, he didn’t regret his actions. he didn’t regret you.

he regretted that he couldn’t stay.

and so when he knew you were fully asleep, when your breathing was the deepest, he got up from your bed and slowly replaced his clothes one by one, dragging out the moments he had in your presence. his hat was the last thing he found on the floor and he tugged it on, sighing softly to himself, pulling out his phone to read that it was 5:20 am, and with one last glance over his shoulder he left you there in the bed sound asleep. a deep guilt he couldn’t shake making a home for itself in his chest.

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                              aug 9

9:33 am you: hey! everything ok?

9:35 am you: wanna go get breakfast? :)

12:42 pm dimples: i’m sorry, i just saw this. i had work things to take care of. how did you sleep?

3:30 pm you: that’s ok! i slept alright :)

3:31 pm you: are you busy tonight? wanna get food?

4:45 pm dimples: if i get off in time, sure. i’ll let you know.

7:02 pm you: you alright?

7:28 pm dimples: i’m sorry, again. work is kicking my ass, how did your day go?

7:32 pm you: it was fine! started working on an essay i had due, you know. the fun stuff, how about you? busy?

7:45 pm dimples: you have no idea haha

7:49 pm you: you can tell me about it if you want? believe it or not, i’m a great listener

                                       read 10:45 pm

                           aug 13

2:43 pm you: sent attachment

2:43 pm you: saw this and remembered how you

2:43 pm you: sorry, thumb hit send lol. you mentioned you liked this band, and i thought of you

2:44 pm you: hope you’re ok

                           read 12:01 am

                           aug 19

11:01 pm you: y’know, i’m not mad at you or anything i did say i had no expectations lol. just kinda hoped this would have been different, you know? it kinda felt different to me…

11:02 pm you: but that’s alright lol i hope you’re ok

                                     delivered

                          aug 31

7:49 am you: jaehyun

7:50 am you: look, i need you to respond

7:50 am you: please

7:51 am you: i’m freaking out

7:51 am you: idk what to do, and i’m scared

                                                 not delivered

7:53 am you: what the fuck??

                                               not delivered

7:55 am you: fuck. you. jaehyun.

                                               not delivered

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five years later.

although the years had passed for jaehyun, it was all so quick that the night with you still felt fresh to him. he often thought of you and how you were, often thought of if you graduated and were teaching. if you got to do everything you had confessed to him that night in the extended lengths of the conversations had.

he often thought if you were here in korea with him like you had planned and he just had no clue.

if you were, you hated him, he was sure.

his manager had caught him checking his phone that night with an unsaved number on it, had sneakily read your messages over his shoulder and absolutely lost it on him. he went on and on about his idol image, his career, his future and repeated ‘what if this got out? what if dispatch found it?’ and jaehyun couldn’t say anything back but ‘okay’. the feeling he had when talking to you, the small feeling of being himself again, smothered in an instant.

when you had sent him a picture of a vinyl record of one of his favorite bands, he wanted so badly to respond to you. he had even typed out a response when he finally was able to read it, but he knew it wouldn’t help anything at all if he did. he really did think it was better to let it lie, and so he turned off his read receipts.

the last message he saw from you, made him gnaw on his bottom lip, and the next day he left the country going back to korea and his number was changed.

he wanted to be different for you, he had barely met you but he knew you, it wasn’t a coincidence to him. but what kind of life would a long-distance relationship be with someone who would be so busy some days or even weeks that he couldn’t respond? he knew you’d always be worried, or hurt when communication was so small. he thought of it a lot. and he was thinking of all those things, when he was sure, he had ultimately decided, that you probably didn’t actually want to be with him.

he would have just… liked it if you had.

maybe if he weren’t famous he would have dated you.

maybe it would have been like one of the cheesy romance movies taeyong liked to watch, maybe he even would have fallen in love.

and maybe… maybe he would have even married you if his daydream let him get that far, if his life would have followed the cliché movie plot, but that was all a what if to him now. something he liked to sit and think about if only just to make sure the guilt never left him.

“jaehyun?” his name being called pulled him out of his memories and his head jerked up to look at who had called him. his manager was staring at him with drawn eyebrows, and at jaehyun’s confused expression he breathed deeply out of his nose.

“what do you think?” this time it was the PR manager asking, the person who had asked him, johnny, and mark to come to the conference room to go over their schedules for the next couple of days.

“about what? sorry, i was…” jaehyun trailed off.

“he thinks it’s a great idea.” mark answered for him, giving jaehyun a concerned look. “he loves kids.”

“okay, then it’s set. the kids are unaware they’re meeting you all, and they probably won’t really realize you’re famous but it will be filmed for content with permission from the schools principal already. It’ll be good for the groups image, everyone loved the last time you guys sat with kids.” and with that the meeting was done, it wasn’t really to ask them if they wanted to participate but to tell them what they would be doing. jaehyun didn’t mind this that much because it was true. he did love kids.

once the managers had left the room, johnny turned in his chair to give jaehyun a scrupulous look.

“dude, why were you spacing out so bad?” mark asked, slouching in his chair as his chin saw in his palm and his elbow rested on the table. to this date, johnny was the only other person who knew about you and his night he had spent with you. johnny nodded at the quick eye contact, understanding immediately.

“dunno, i think i’m just tired. i didn’t sleep much last night.” jaehyun brushed off mark’s question with a shrug and mark sighed at that.

“well, you better get some rest tonight. those kids aren’t going to chill out just because you’re tired.” mark said as he stood, his hands shoved into the pockets of his sweats, shooting one last look at jaehyun before leaving the room.

“you know, it’s been a few years but maybe she’s thinking of you too. why not try reaching out?” johnny whispered to him, and jaehyun gave johnny a not-quite-there smile that was really just a grimace.

“nah, it’s fine. she’s probably changed her number since then, and besides, even if she didn’t she definitely hates me now. i know i would.” johnny frowned then as his friend got up and left the room, the big glass door swinging closed softly behind him.

something had changed in jaehyun that night when he came back, it wasn’t a huge, drastic change but johnny noticed it nonetheless. he wasn’t always distracted by his guilty thoughts of you, but on several occasions jaehyun had gotten drunk with him and started talking about you and everything about you that he knew.

by this point johnny felt he knew you just as well as jaehyun had.

and about sixty percent of those occasions, johnny had to console him and reassure him that you probably didn’t hate him but would probably just be upset at him, and that he was sure you’d forgive jaehyun if he explained the situation.

johnny was never confident in that though. five years is a long time to go on thinking about someone you spent one night with.

and, johnny often thought, five years was a long time to dwell on all the anger left from waking up alone from someone you spent one night with.

and although if it was only supposed to be just one night… even johnny knew it was more than that.

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mark was bouncing on the balls of his feet, his hands contained in his pockets but jaehyun couldn’t help the smile that grew at the younger mans energy. there was always something about children that brought out the kid side of the younger members and that was always contagious and within minutes, jaehyun was smiling just as brightly as mark had been.

they were told to wait until given the signal to come out, as all the kids were now sitting in different circles in the room. the four-year-old class wasn’t very large, and they had come to the SM building to take a tour.

in recent years SM had opened its doors to field trips for younger kids, usually it was elementary ages but after some strings were pulled, they allowed the class going in to kindergarten to be included if they would allow them to be part of the youtube series SM had going on of ‘idols with kids’.

this wasn’t the group’s first event with kids, the group was large at this time and they had rotated out and didn’t have to do it often, but it was their turn and it was a nice break, jaehyun thought.

certainly better than another photoshoot.

johnny tapped jaehyun on the shoulder, the signal had been given and the three men entered the room full of energetic children. there were only about twelve of them total, and jaehyun noticed the teachers stood off to the side, two women leaning against the wall with their masks up and covering their face.

jaehyun paid them very little attention as he went to his assigned table to sit down with the kids. he took his place at the circle table and folded his legs underneath him, sitting as the kids were.

the kids grew quiet at the presence of the adult man at their table, and he noticed his table had two girls and two boys. the little girl that sat closest to him had big bright eyes and her little hands brushed her bangs away from her eyes.

he noticed her little pigtails had little fuzzy clips in them that matched her dress and his heart melted at how adorable she was. she seemed to be the boldest of the group as she was the only one to look him in the eyes.

“hi everyone, my name is jaehyun.” he said kindly, trying to make the kids feel at ease.

“hello, mister.” the cute girl with pigtails said and when she spoke, small dimples formed at the corners of her mouth and he was intrigued at how much they looked like his.

“hello, miss.” jaehyun nodded and replied easily and the little girls smile grew as did her dimples. and then a thought visibly appeared across her face and she turned to her other friends at the table.

“it’s rude to not say hi,” her lips were in a pouty frown as she looked at them. she was a bossy little thing, he noticed but her friends immediately chimed in with quiet hello’s. that seemed to make her happy and she nodded dramatically. jaehyun knew the only thing they had to do while they were here was color with them, and talk to them for the camera’s sake, and so he did just that.

the little girl next to him asked him which page he wanted to color first, and he reached forward to slide a piece of paper with the outline of a bunny holding a carrot and then she asked her friends which ones they wanted. he noticed she chose last and his heart melted even more at how utterly sweet the little exchange was.

“what are your names?” he asked the table as a whole, putting on his gentlest smile, which wasn’t hard for him to find. the little boy to his left spoke up this time, starting to get comfortable with jaehyun’s presence.

“my name in jiwon, and he’s seojun… she’s heeyoung, and,” he said pointing out each person one by one dramatically as he finally landed on the little girl who sat beside him. “her name is yeoruem.”

“oh you all have pretty names,” jaehyun commented and the boys seemed to swell with a sense of pride by being told they had nice names from a stranger. he noticed the kids start talking a little bit, but they mostly focused on their coloring. yeoreum sat beside him, a crayon gripped tightly in her hand and her tongue stuck between her lips and she concentrated on her page, she had chosen a big teddy bear and she was coloring it purple.

she was getting a little frustrated he could tell with how she kept huffing and puffing and finally she put her crayon down and put her cheek in her tiny hand dramatically, and the cute pout made jaehyun chuckle softly.

“what’s the matter, yeoreum?” he cooed at her gently.

“i like to stay in the lines and i messed up.”

“well let’s see if we can fix it, hmm?” and he picked up her crayon and offered it to her. she took it in her hand again and he proceeded to point at a small spot, his arms wrapping around her and helping her hand move just right and she took his direction with a grin. when she finally got it she pushed his hand away.

“thank you mister jaehyun, i want to try and do it now myself.” and jaehyun held up his hands in surrender.

“you’re a very independent little girl, yeoreum.” jaehyun commented to her as he went back to coloring on his bunny, picking up an orange crayon to fill in the carrot.

“thank you!” she beamed, not taking her eyes off of her teddy bear. “my mommy says the same thing.”

“your mommy is a very smart lady,” jaehyun replied and she looked up then. her face twisting in an scowl that was too cute to be remotely threatening considering she was four.

“no,” she argued, greatly offended. “my mommy is the smartest lady. and she’s one of my teachers too, she’s right over there.”

and it was in that moment that several things happened simultaneously.

yeoreum pointed at the wall to one of the women jaehyun had barely taken notice of when he walked in. his eyes looked up in the direction that her tiny hand pointed in and as he looked up, the woman turned her face away from him to say something to the other teacher so he couldn’t see her face but at the same time one of the kids from johnny’s table screamed dramatically.

“miss y/n!” the little boy wailed, and jaehyun felt his heart leap to his throat, and his stomach plummeted as if he were on a rollercoaster while he watched as the same lady who had turned away rush forward to see what the little boy needed, but jaehyun couldn’t even focus on that. he felt his world around him slow to a grinding halt, his eyes solely focused on you. on the small parts of your face he could visibly see due to the mask you wore.

but he was unsure how he had missed you when he walked in. yours was the face that he dreamt of, and he was sure his jaw was dropped. his eyes drifted slightly from your face to johnny whose expression probably matched his own, his eyes flickering between you and jaehyun.

jaehyun felt his mouth go dry in the next second as another realization hit him. he whipped his head to look down at the little girl next to him and she was intently focused on where her mom stood at the other table. jaehyun tried three times to swallow before he was successful.

“yeoreum?” he asked, voice shaking slightly.

she tore her eyes from you and looked up to make eye contact with jaehyun. “yes, mister jaehyun?”

“miss y/n is your mother?” he asked, face searching this little girls who, the more he looked, the more he found himself staring back.

“no, she’s my mommy.” she answered smartly.

“ah, yes. she’s your mommy…” he trailed off, eyes flickering back up to see you standing back with the other woman and you were pointedly avoiding eye contact with him, instead staring at yeoreum who was still looking at him.

“and yeoreum, how – when is your birthday?”

“may first,” she chirped and he dragged his eyes away from you to look down at the little girl and his face drained of all color entirely.

“um… mister jaehyun? you look like you don’t feel so good.” she said worriedly, and he gulped again, trying to calm his nerves. his mental math couldn’t be that wrong, could it? there’s no way, was there? no, those dimples were undeniable evidence.

someone somewhere had pity on him, because right when he felt that he may pass out or throw up or do a combination of both, their manager came out and called the session with the idols to an end, the cameras folding up then and were put away and the other teacher called everyone to come stand with you and her.

yeoreum stood up and patted her dress, and she reached down and pulled on jaehyun’s hand to have him stand up with her.

“c’mon mister jaehyun, i want you to meet my mommy so you can see that she’s the smartest lady in the whole world,” and as jaehyun slowly stood to his feet, yeoreum waved her hand to have him bend down to her level so she could whisper conspiratorially in his ear. “but don’t tell miss jisoo, she may get upset.”

jaehyun could only nod as she pulled him over to the other kids and you, and he braced himself for disaster.

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you had fought tooth and nail with the principal of your center about going to SM. you knew the chances of jaehyun being one of the idols to work with would be slim but you didn’t want to take that chance. however when she had asked you the reason why you were so adamant against going to the entertainment company’s headquarters, you couldn’t very well give her the reason that your child’s clueless father works there. it would open up more questions and you had done well the past five years keeping it under wraps that no one knew who yeoreum’s father was, not even your mother.

you had realized after he had blocked your number of who he was when you did a google search of ‘jaehyun korea entertainment’ to see page after page of his face, and you realized he was a common name in korea. it made a little more sense then as to why he suddenly started ignoring you.

you thought he may have been different based on the hours of conversations you both shared, but since he was a celebrity, you assumed you were just another person on his list of hookups throughout his tour stops.

and so when you saw him walk in with two of his other members, you felt your heart jump. and then when you saw he sat at your daughter’s table your heart immediately sank and you felt your body get hot, the same feeling you felt when you found out you were pregnant.

you stood at the back with your co-teacher, hiding in plain sight. you were thankful that you had made it to the end, the interaction between them going well even if he didn’t know.

he seemed to almost have an instant attachment to her and you couldn’t help the way your heart swooped when he bent around her to help her with her coloring. it was a few moments after that that she noticed yeoreum point her tiny finger in your direction and you almost cursed aloud.

you quickly turned your head to look at jisoo, trying to find any random question to ask her to start a conversation to avoid his eye contact but when you heard one of your students, a little boy named yunho, screaming for you across the room you only allowed yourself three seconds to panic before you crossed the room to see what was the matter.

you briefly made eye contact with the man, you had learned his name was johnny after researching jaehyun’s group, and he looked like a deer caught in the headlights. you ignored him after that, understanding that he must have known about you and that somehow both angered and embarrassed you.

“what’s wrong, yunho?” you asked as you crouched next to the crying boy.

“min-minhee,” he hiccupped, big alligator tears falling down his face. “minhee took my crayon and i was still using it!” and you patted the young boy’s head affectionately.

“minhee…” you started, voice slightly scolding and the other boy mentioned was purposefully looking away from you. “is that true?”

minhee turned his head further away from you and you couldn’t help but laugh slightly, “minhee, you know that isn’t nice.” after a few seconds, and another glance up at johnny who was now looking at the table behind you, eyes wide.

minhee finally turned around and gave yunho back his crayon and apologized after you prompted him to do so. crisis averted, you took a deep breath and stood up, purposefully avoiding the table your daughter sat at but when you reached the wall, you felt his eyes on you but instead you noticed how your daughter stared up at him, eyes already full of adoration.

the cameras were put away and jisoo called everyone’s attention. you were focused on the other children gathering up, doing headcounts one by one until you heard a soft, “mommy?” from behind you.

“what is it, baby?” you asked turning around, expecting to see your daughter but instead came face to face with jaehyun who your daughter had in tow.

“this is mister jaehyun, and i wanted him to meet you so i could show him how sma – show him my teacher.” she fumbled over her sentence and you furrowed your brows at her choice of words.

“hello miss y/n,” jaehyun choked out, and you noticed his face was very pale. you wanted to laugh and tell him that it served him right, but you wanted to pretend that you didn’t know him, even though you clearly did.

“hello,” you greeted, overly formal as if to create distance between you two.

“yeoreum… yeoreum tells me her birthday is in may. is that true?” were the first words to tumble out of his mouth. you noticed jisoo had rounded up the kids and started to lead them out of the room.

“yeoreum, sweetheart, go stand with miss jisoo, okay? i’ll be right there.” you said as you looked down, cupping your little girls cheek sweetly and she smiled up at you.

“okay mommy!” she said, running off to walk with the class who was leaving the room.

you felt the presence of two more people walking up and you glanced to see johnny and another man, mark you thought his name was, walk up to stand awkwardly a few feet away. johnny definitely seemed to know, but mark looked clueless as to why they were there.

“is that true?” jaehyun pressed again, and you turned your full attention to him now, ignoring the other two men in your vicinity.

“yes, her birthday is may first.” you replied, voice a little sharp and you saw jaehyun visibly wince at the tone.

jaehyun didn’t even care that mark was here now, listening in. his mind was racing with so many questions and he just wanted to know the answers to them regardless of who was around.

“that’s nine months…” he trailed off then.

“yes, it is.” the same tone didn’t falter.

“i… i… is she mine?” he finally asked then, heart bracing for the answer but then you laughed and it was a cold laugh, much different from the happy ones he recalled in his dreams, and he recoiled slightly.

“you’re not on the birth certificate,” your lips were flat, turning pale from the pressure of keeping your anger at bay.

“that’s not – no, please, y/n. is she mine?” he pressed, his hands ready to beg you for an answer.

“is she your daughter? yes.” you answered him in an angry whisper. “but she’s not yours, she’s mine.” and jaehyun flinched again at how harsh your words were.

jaehyun was silent for a long moment and you scoffed, turning away from him then to go meet up with your class.

“have you told anyone?” he asked, and he wasn’t sure why he even asked that question because he knew if you had, it would have made headlines. you froze then, and he could have sworn you were visibly shaking. you turned and glared at him, such an angry look he didn’t know it was possible to feel so small from just a single expression.

“no, jaehyun, i haven’t.” you spat, your anger making your skin flush in how hard you tried to control your voice and your temper. “so don’t worry, you can go back to living your golden life without any responsibilities. i won’t be asking you for money, i won’t be coming back here, and i won’t be going to the press. but not for your sake, oh no, i couldn’t give a fuck. only for hers.” you turned and walked away, your hand stilling on the doorknob when you heard him call to you.

“no, wait! y/n that’s – that’s not what i meant, please. can – can i meet her? spend time with her?” you didn’t turn around, your hand on the knob tightening its grip for a moment, you lifted your head to stare at the ceiling and you sighed, the anger draining from you and just leaving you exhausted.

“you just did, and i think that was enough, don’t you? i don’t want you to decide the next morning that she’s not worth your time.”

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

the door closed behind you as you left and all three men were stunned into silence at what had transpired. jaehyun had known you’d hate him if you saw him again, he knew that, he really did. he would have never pushed you to spend time with him after the way everything went down but now it was different.

he was a father now, or well, he had been a father the past four years and had no clue but now he was aware and he couldn’t just not try and be one. this had changed his world, how could he go about pretending that this hadn’t happened?

“dude… i am so confused right now. what the actual hell just happened?” mark finally spoke up, eyes darting between the two men standing with him. johnny didn’t look away from jaehyun to answer his question, nothing but extreme concern for his friend who looked like he had his whole world shaken up.

well, johnny thought almost comically, he did.

“i, um…” jaehyun started, eyes still not drifting away from the door you had just left from. “when we were on tours four years ago, um… johnny and i went to dinner, i don’t know if you remember? we had asked you if you wanted to go too, but you were already going with haechan and taeil.” jaehyun finally broke his trance he had on the door and turned to make eye contact with mark, who still sported the look of someone utterly bewildered. mark answered with a nod, not daring to open his mouth so he could listen to the rest of what jaehyun had to say.

“well, we went. just us two. and she was our waitress and she was, she is, so beautiful and she was flirting with me and so when she put her number on our receipt, johnny told me to go for it and… and i did. we talked for hours, and – and one thing led to another, and fuck.” jaehyun breathed out and then let out a humorless laugh at his word choice. he ran his hand through his hair roughly, the newly dyed blonde locks, tugging on them as he did so. “i left. i mean, i couldn’t have actually stayed with her, we had a show in another city and we had to leave and so i left. i tried to keep talking to her but… i stopped.”

mark blew out a hard breath at jaehyun’s explanation. “well, did you let her know? that you had to leave and that’s why?”

jaehyun shook his head, and johnny spoke up for him then. “our manager saw and lost it, he couldn’t reply to her because he was scared since it had been so long and then we left and our manager had his number changed when we got back.”

“did you still have her number though?” mark questioned, eyebrows coming together. jaehyun nodded hesitantly.

“dude, that’s so fucked. you should have explained to her then, she would have understood.” jaehyun hung his head, he was used to johnny consoling him in the assumption that he’d never have to see you again. he wasn’t used to his mistakes being so openly berated.

“poor y/n,” mark said then, turning to look at the door you had left out of. “having to raise a baby on her own like that, i don’t blame her for being as angry as she was. and then for you to ask –.”

“god, mark, yes. i know. i know i fucked up. but i have a kid… i have a daughter. i don’t want to be one of those dads, i don’t…” he trailed off, the way he felt sick dissipating, slowly being replaced with the dread of having his daughter grow up and have to tell people her dad was just absent when he knew about her now.

“then don’t.” johnny’s reply was simple. both jaehyun and mark turned to look at him. johnny shrugged as if it were easy.

“but she doesn’t –.” jaehyun went to say but johnny shook his head, the look he gave him shutting him up instantly.

“then don’t, jaehyun. you’re an adult. you made a mistake but it’s not eighteen years too late to try and fix it, just five. if chen can do this and end up just fine, you have just the same amount of chance that he does. you don’t wanna be a deadbeat dad? then don’t. easy as that. y/n isn’t going to like it at first but, she’ll come around if. you. make. an. effort.” mark was smiling at johnny’s answer, nodding along as he spoke and jaehyun stared open mouthed at him.

“you think it’ll work?”

“it doesn’t hurt to try,” mark chimed in. “plus, i saw the way she was watching you earlier, i kinda thought for a second she was going to be one of those weird stalkers but this makes so much more sense now.”

“how can i do this though? i don’t have her number or anything,” jaehyun asked, and he wanted so badly to get to know yeoreum, and to get to know you again. he wanted to see if things were that different, or if it was the years of anger building up. he couldn’t blame you at all for the things you said and for the way you reacted. he can imagine he’d do the same.

“am i gonna have to do everything myself?” johnny joked and jaehyun gave him a confused look.

“she works at the school that was just here. we have the principals contact information. therefore, we have her information. and if nothing else, we know where she works. you show up, you make a genuine effort, and you keep making an effort until she knows you’re serious. and you keep trying because that’s your daughter. you literally can’t deny her, she looks exactly like you.” jaehyun nodded, absorbing all the information that johnny had readily available in his brain. he hoped it was because he was an outsider looking in in this situation and not that jaehyun was just that dumb. maybe it was a bit of both.

“guys? come on, we have another schedule to meet in forty-five minutes,” their manager called, his head momentarily visible from the doorway. the three men made their way to exit, jaehyun’s mind reeling with what he was going to do and how he was going to do.

he had a daughter.

he was a father.

that thought alone was enough to make a grin slowly grow on his face.

“also,” mark spoke up suddenly, turning around to look at his friends. “do i need to have a talk with everyone about the importance of condoms?”

johnny snorted out a laugh, and jaehyun groaned loudly.

“yeah… i think i’m gonna at least text the dreamies. maybe ‘wrap it before you tap it’ or something like that. god, can you imagine jisung with a child?” mark’s face looked horrified, but his joke effectively broke the tense feeling jaehyun had held for the past twenty minutes and johnny laughed, clapping mark on the shoulder as he and jaehyun exited the door.

“jisung is an adult, mark. he’s a grown ass man. they don’t need ‘the talk’.”

“yes they do, they can be forty and they’re still going to be children to me!” mark yelled as he followed them out.

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

jaehyun couldn’t remember the last time he had butterflies this bad since maybe his debut. his heart hadn’t stopped racing since johnny handed him a slip of paper discreetly at practice later that night, and when jaehyun unfolded the paper he saw an address and a phone number scrawled in small letters.

“maybe go to her work, instead of calling first.” johnny had whispered to him rather conspicuously in the far corner of the room.

“wouldn’t it be better to give her a heads up though? i don’t want to ruin this before i even really get the chance to get to know yeoreum.” jaehyun said, the desperation for this to work out evident on his face. he wasn’t sure when he had ever wanted something so badly, but his thoughts had been consumed by this little girl that he had no idea existed until twelve hours ago.

“sure, it might seem a little creepy but this way she can physically see you’re serious and won’t block you immediately out of spite,” johnny shrugged at his friend. “i know i'd block you.”

jaehyun gave him a deadpan look, “that’s very comforting, thanks.”

a sudden pair of arms throwing themselves around jaehyun’s shoulders made his eyes grow wide but seeing johnny unconcerned made him relax a little.

“so who is blocking jaehyun hyung immediately?” haechan asked from over jaehyun’s shoulder.

jaehyun fished for a response, trying to think of an answer and johnny beat him to it with the most basic of answers.

“your mom.” johnny said, a wide grin growing on his face at the offended look on haechan’s face that jaehyun couldn’t see.

“you better not be texting my mom!” haechan argued, voice rising an octave directly in jaehyun’s ear making the man wince sharply. “she’s married and i don’t want a step-dad this late in my life.”

johnny pushed away from the wall and jaehyun was thankful for johnny’s distraction, because as he walked away haechan moved to follow him, arguing with the taller man even if it started out as a joke.

this gave jaehyun the time to stare down at the folded piece of paper that had been crumpled in his hand, he memorized the number on it like the paper would disintegrate if he didn’t and as he moved on to the address he attempted to formulate a plan.

the plan may have been half-assed in hindsight, jaehyun realized as he stood out in front of the pre-school you worked at, staying out of sight of any passerby who may recognize him. he was sure he wouldn’t be noticed that easily as his hood was up, mask secured over his nose but he was so nervous of someone saying something to ruin his one shot at getting you to listen to him.

he distracted himself with scrolling through his phone, flipping between different social medias while he waited, and his heart skipped a beat when he heard your voice calling a goodbye to your coworkers as you exited the building.

“mommy, can we go get some ice cream? i got a green smiley on my report today from miss jisoo, you know i was good today!” he heard yeoreum ask cutely, and you turned the corner to walk in his direction and he watched as you looked down at her. you held her hand and your smile was so gentle he couldn’t help but get lost in it for a moment.

you were going to respond but you noticed his presence at that moment, looking up and staring harshly at him, he could see you bristle. you didn’t immediately recognize him, jaehyun noticed with the way you tugged yeoreum to stand behind you and jaehyun raised his hands in surrender, tugging his mask down so you could see his face and you released a breath, relaxing instantly.

“mister jaehyun!” yeoreum cheered from behind you, bouncing forward with her hands holding on to the straps of her little yellow backpack. jaehyun crouched to be level with her, his elbows resting on his knees and his dimpled smile was an exact replica of hers.

“hi yeoreum, i heard you say you were good today in school. if your mommy is okay with it, do you think i get you that ice cream you wanted?” jaehyun asked the little girl, but his eyes were looking up at you and your mouth was pressed in a firm line. yeoreum whirled on the spot to look up at you.

“oh please, mommy? mister jaehyun will pay for it so it’s free!” yeoreum pleaded, adding information that wasn’t exactly given yet and jaehyun couldn’t help but laugh at that detail. you clearly debated on it for a moment, but the hopeful look on your daughters face was already giving you an answer.

“sure, sweetie.” you said softly, eyes cutting up to glance at jaehyun, trying to figure out what he was getting at. yeoreum pulled you by the hand, and then she boldly grabbed jaehyun’s hand as well, leading the way to the convenience store you often made stops to on the way home from school.

you didn’t say a word as you walked, jaehyun keeping a conversation going with yeoreum, asking her about the things in school she liked and it went on like that for a few minutes until you entered the store and you greeted the elderly woman who ran it politely. yeoreum darted to the ice cream section and you finally had a moment without her present.

“what are you trying to do here, jaehyun?” you asked coldly, and his smile never wavered, his mood too high to allow it to come down.

“i’m trying to get to know my daughter that i didn’t know existed until yesterday.” he answered you, his voice hushed as to keep the store owner from eavesdropping, but you didn’t detect any obvious lies in his statement.

“i told you –.” you started, and he cut you off.

“i know what you said, believe me. i heard you loud and clear, but please y/n,” and your eyes widened at the sincerity in his voice, he was seconds away from begging dramatically. “please just give me one chance. i want to be in her life, i want to be there for her.”

yeoreum skipped over, holding three ice cream bars in her arms.

“look mommy, i got your favorite. and mister jaehyun, i got you my favorite. you’ll like it because it’s the best!” she said with such confidence that jaehyun chuckled at her as she walked right up to the counter.

“well you’re in luck because that just so happens to be my favorite, too.” jaehyun offered and the girl beamed at him.

“mommy likes this flavor,” she pointed to the only one that was different as the elderly woman scanned the three items. she motioned for him to come to her level, and when he bent down she cupped her hands cutely to whisper in jaehyun’s ear. “and don’t tell her but it’s really yucky.”

the more time jaehyun spent around this little girl the more he felt himself getting wrapped around her finger. he brought a finger to his lips conspiratorially and he turned to make eye contact with you and your eyebrows raised.

“hey, what’s with the secrets?” you frowned in confusion, head tilting slightly and at the motion jaehyun felt his heart skip a beat. he recalled the same exact motion five years ago, and he had to swallow hard to pull himself out of the memory.

“oh, nothing. yeoreum just told me a funny joke.” he answered, giving yeoreum a wink and she giggled at the secret that they now had, her hand coming up to cover her mouth as she laughed.

“hmmm,” you responded, accepting the ice cream bars and thanking the woman as you exited. the park was only a short distance away and that’s where you headed, sitting down on a bench as you opened yeoreum’s ice cream and she dove in immediately.

you allowed them to talk easily, and you felt your resolve slowly chipping away with every smile they shared with each other. you recalled one of the many conversations you had had with friends, one most recently being your coworker and friend jisoo. she had suggested for the umpteenth time that you should reach out to the father and give him the option to be in yeoreum’s life.

“i don’t want him to get tired of her, it would be devastating for her, and me too.” you had argued then and jisoo’s look was unamused.

“you haven’t even given him the chance, you have no clue if he’d even do that. you can’t make that assumption, time changes people.”

you were realizing she was right as you watched her giggle over him dripping ice cream on his shoes, yeoreum commenting how it’s not that hard to not be messy and jaehyun laughed at her disappointed sigh.

you had made up your mind by then, the ice cream finished and you noticed the time was getting a little late, knowing you’d have to get her ready for bed.

“come on, ‘reum. we gotta get ready for bed soon.” you said softly, interrupting their conversation and yeoreum nodded, hopping off of the bench she sat on with jaehyun. she walked over to stand beside you but she turned to jaehyun.

“mister jaehyun, will i see you again?” she asked and her voice was so hopeful that jaehyun looked to you for an answer.

“one chance,” you mouthed to him seriously, holding up one finger to emphasize your point over yeoreum’s head and jaehyun’s eyes shone with relief as he made eye contact with yeoreum.

“i’d love to, i’ll come see you anytime.” jaehyun nodded and yeoreum clapped excitedly, turning to look at you as she did so and you couldn’t help the answering smile that crossed your face. you took her small hand in yours and you began to walk in the direction of your home and she paused, turning around and waving enthusiastically goodbye to jaehyun who was still seated on the wooden park bench.

“see you soon, mister jaehyun!” she called and then she was pulling you away; jaehyun watching you both leave and he felt at peace knowing this plan went so much better than he could have ever hoped it would.

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

you had just put yeoruem to sleep in her little princess bed, she had talked nonstop the entire way home, all through dinner, and then during her bath until you finally got her to sleep, about mister jaehyun.

the idea of her getting to know him brought on two strong emotions and they teetered back and forth in your mind, an eerily well-balanced scale.

on one hand, you were excited for her to get to know her father, she deserved to have both parents who loved her.

on the other hand, you were terrified of how this would play out fully. would he leave once people found out? would he pretend she didn’t exist?

your thoughts ran in circles over and over, and you didn’t get anywhere productive. the only thing you had settled on was that until you knew for sure where this would go, you would make sure jaehyun wouldn’t mention a word of being her dad.

you didn’t want to have to pick up the pieces of her small heart if he shattered it.

your phone dinged and it pulled you out of your thoughts, you paused the show you had barely been paying attention to so you could focus.

9:31 pm unknown: hello… do you have plans tomorrow?

9:32 pm you: depends on who’s asking...?

9:33 pm unknown: oh, yeah my bad. this is jaehyun, johnny got me your number from your boss

9:34 pm you: ok… that’s not weird at all… but no. no plans besides work and yeoruem. why?

9:35 pm he who must not be named 💀:  how do you feel about coming over? i can cook for you both, or maybe order pizza. whatever yeoreum wants to eat haha

9:37 pm you: she’s not picky, but i guess i won’t mind. will your members mind?

9:38 pm he who must not be named 💀: ah, right. well, see i’m telling them tomorrow so they won’t really have a choice.

9:40 pm you: … don’t make this weird for us, jaehyun.

9:42 pm he who must not be named 💀: i’m not! i won’t, i’ll send someone for you tomorrow at 6?

9:47 pm you: we can get there, just give me the address and i’ll see you then

9:48 pm he who must not be named 💀: [current location]

you audibly sighed, staring at the phone showing the address, you clicked it to see that he didn’t live too far from you and you just shook your head, you were going to leave it at that, but your thought from earlier hit you again and you typed a response.

9:55 pm you: i have a request for you

10:01 pm he who must not be named 💀: ask

10:02 pm you: i’m not going to keep you from getting to know her, because it makes her happy and she deserves that. but i don’t want you to mention anything to her about you being her dad

10:05 pm he who must not be named 💀: and that’s because…?

10:06 pm you: i just wanna be sure. i’d rather you be some cool man she spent time with if you decide differently

10:07 pm he who must not be named 💀: okay and when you see that i’m not gonna ghost my own daughter, is there a statute of limitations on this or what?

10:08 pm you: i’ll let you know

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

jaehyun paced back and forth in the living room, he hadn’t heard from you since you assured him you’d be coming by at 6 like agreed. he had went a little overboard on the pizza, considering there were now five different boxes on the counter and he may have went on a shopping spree at a small children’s toy store.

now all eight of his members sat in different spots in the too large living room as he walked back and forth, stopping to check on his phone and then once he saw there wasn’t a notification from you, he went back to his path he had made.

“you’re gonna wear a hole through the floor,” johnny deadpanned and jaehyun ignored him.

“hyung?” it was haechan this time trying to get jaehyun to stop moving and jaehyun did, looking up to see what the youngest wanted.

“this isn’t your first time meeting her, right?” haechan seemed genuinely confused.

“no, this is the second, technically third time now.” he answered, forgetting about his phone in his pocket for a moment.

“okay, then why are you freaking out?” haechan asked, resting his chin in his palm.

“well…” jaehyun was at a brief loss for words. “y/n is unsure about me being around her already, so i guess i’m worried she’s going to… stop.”

“stop what?” taeyong asked from the other side of the room and jaehyun turned on the spot to face him.

“stop letting me see her, stop responding to me, just, stop altogether.” jaehyun looked crestfallen as he waved his hands around but a snort from his left made him glare at yuta.

“what? like you did to her?” yuta smirked at the stressed man, and jaehyun threw his arms up, throwing his head back as he stared at the ceiling for a long moment.

he hadn’t expected this kind of reaction at all when he called a group meeting in the living room hours earlier; he had told mark and johnny he planned to tell everyone because he had wanted you and yeoreum to come to the house and they had only nodded and helped him gather everyone. mark and johnny purposely sat on the couch in the corner of the room so they could watch it all unfold.

jaehyun had started the whole thing by clearing his throat three times before he even opened his mouth.

“i-,” he began but yuta narrowed his eyes at him and twisted his lips for a second.

“you got some girl pregnant, didn’t you?” his question was so blunt it took everyone off guard, mark almost falling out of his seat on the couch entirely. haechan, who sat on the arm of yuta’s chair, shoved his shoulder roughly. jaehyun, however, was stunned into silence, mouth agape and yuta laughed at his reaction.

“jaehyun, he’s joking. now why did you call us all here?” taeyong said, shooting a stern look at yuta before turning his full attention to the man who stood in the center of the room. keeping the peace like he always did, but jaehyun was so much more nervous now after yuta’s comment, regardless of how correct it was.

“okay, so,” jaehyun began and went through the entire story again. something he had kept to himself all these years, and he was finally letting everyone in on his tiny, but impactful, moment of freedom he had with you.

“and so when we filmed our content for the youtube segment, the one with kids, you know?” and when everyone nodded, all but three mouths were hanging in stunned silence. “this little girl was at my table, and she was adorable and smart and highly independent but like, some kids are like that. until she pointed out her mother to me, and –.”

jungwoo gasped dramatically, leaning so far forward in his chair as he listened to jaehyun that he was practically on the floor. “no fucking way!”

“yes, way.” mark answered for him, and jaehyun continued.

“y/n, yeah. y/n was her mother, and yeoreum was born exactly nine months after, and yeah. i… i have a daughter that i had no clue existed but i want to be her dad, i haven’t wanted something this bad since we debuted, and… yeah.”

“okay… okay…” taeyong repeated, seemingly in shock as he processed everything that was just said.

“okay?” jaehyun asked, wanting someone to say something.

“okay.” taeyong replied, making eye contact with him. “well, we’re not going to let you be a shitty father.”

“anymore.” haechan said under his breath and yuta snickered with him.

“i had no clue!” jaehyun argued in defense of himself.

“how do you even know she’s actually yours?” taeil asked, his posture was relaxed in his chair, recovering from the shock of the news more quickly than the others had.

“she -.” he started but doyoung butted in then.

“how do you know she’s not using you as a way to get money? she could have slept with someone else.” doyoung seemed even less convinced than taeil was.

“oh no, wait til you see her,” mark said from his spot in the room. “he can’t deny her even if he tried.”

“what? i won’t believe it until i see the test results.” doyoung said, and taeil nodded.

“she hasn’t asked me for anything,” jaehyun argued, feeling a little defensive over you then.

“yet.” taeil murmured, and johnny chose then to speak up.

“you weren’t there in the room, neither of you. she didn’t want anything to do with jaehyun, and she very, very clearly stated that she didn’t even want him around her.”

“and she asked me to refrain from even mentioning that i was her dad.” jaehyun tacked on, and taeil didn’t seem convinced nor did doyoung. silence stretched on for a moment.

“so when do we get to meet yeoreum?” haechan asked then, and jaehyun checked his watch.

“in about three hours,” he replied and everyone jumped as if they had been startled.

“what?!” came at him from all directions of the room.

“nothing in here is childproof!” taeyong exclaimed, jumping to his feet.

“she’s five, not two, she’s not going to go stick her finger in light sockets,” mark chuckled and taeyong relaxed slightly.

“she’s four, but yeah, same thing applies,” johnny corrected him and then silence fell over the room again.

“i will say, i can’t blame y/n,” yuta spoke up then, his eyes trained on the floor for a long moment. “if i were her, i wouldn’t have even given you the option. she’s a lot more forgiving than i would be if you knocked me up, ghosted me and then suddenly by a coincidence showed up again.”

“well that’s because you’re a scorpio,” jungwoo said. “and it feels kinda like fate to me.”

“that’s exactly what i said!” mark laughed, pointing at jungwoo animatedly.

and the conversation carried on like that up until he started pacing, jaehyun had been grateful that they all, well almost all, took it in stride and were supportive. but the jabs from yuta were making him even more anxious, and no matter how many times taeyong glared at yuta and told him to shut up, he couldn’t relax.

and then his phone buzzed in his hand.

6:15 pm pizza hut: um, sorry we’re a bit late, the train was delayed but uh… security guy won’t let us in

“shit,” jaehyun whispered, and he was halfway towards the door when your next text came through.

6:16 pm pizza hut: and it’s raining, so we can go home it’s not a big deal

his panic he felt while pacing came back full force and taeyong called to him.

“what’s going on?”

“security guard won’t let her in,” jaehyun rambled quickly.

“that’s all?” he replied, and taeyong pulled out his phone, pressed a few buttons on the screen and had his phone to his ear in seconds.

“hi, mr. choi? yes, can you please escort our guests to the elevators. yes, we were expecting her. no, don’t leave them out in the rain any longer. yes… thank you. have a goodnight.”

taeyong hung up the phone, and gestured to the door, “she’s in the elevator on their way up.”

jaehyun exhaled deeply, for the first time since he woke up that morning. and while he could breathe easily, the entire room held their breath at the sound of a gentle knock against the door.

jaehyun all but lunged at the door and opened it wide. the other eight men in the living room didn’t move a muscle.

“mister jaehyun!” yeoreum squealed excitedly when she saw him filling the entrance and their smiles were exact replicas of each other and jaehyun gestured you both inside.

“yeoreum, shoes baby.” you said softly, and the members had yet to see any faces, but smiles broke out on their faces as they heard a quick, “right! sorry mommy!”

jaehyun led you both out of the foyer and into the living room and you froze when you saw eight men staring at you both when you entered the room. you had prepared for this, expecting it to be awkward but being this… intense wasn’t exactly how you pictured it.  

yeoreum stepped in between you and jaehyun and you looked down to see her bow to the room.

“hello, my name is yeoreum and i’m four years old.” and you peeked up to see the intense stares break out into wide grins.

yeoreum stood up straight and then tugged on your pants.

“mommy, you said it’s rude to not introduce yourself to people who you don’t know.” she said it so seriously, but you and several others in the room chuckled at her respect for manners. at least she paid attention to you when you spoke.

you didn’t bow as yeoreum had, simply dipping your head as you introduced yourself.

“happy?” you said to yeoreum, poking her in the nose and she giggled in response. you heard faint gasps from deeper in the room but you ignored it as your daughter stared into the room and the men must have realized that her comment applied to them as well.

the first one to cross the room was a face you faintly recognized. he knelt down to be on her level and his smile was gentle.

“hi yeoreum, i’m mister jaehyun’s friend. my name is taeil.” and yeoreum nodded, and she smiled at every one who introduced themselves to her and you. she recognized johnny and even gave mark a high five. the last one was haechan, and he was the most energetic of all to meet her.

“hi!” he chirped to her, and she parroted back to him the same exact way, and he continued, his voice filled with a joking kind of pride. “my name is haechan, and i’m the coolest one here.”

“is that why your hair is blue?” yeoreum asked, tilting her head to the side cutely.

“yep, only the coolest have blue hair.” he replied, shaking his head playfully and yeoreum’s laugh filled the room again.

“also, do you wanna see all the cool stuff mister jaehyun got you?” haechan asked, and finally gestured to the couch that held different plushies and toys that the older lady at the shop had suggested for kids her age. yeoreum stared at all the toys then turned around to stare up at jaehyun.

“all of that is mine?” and even you were in shock and the sheer amount of toys piled on the couch.

“yep, all yours.” jaehyun replied, crouching down to be on the same level as yeoreum and haechan.

“but that’s… so much.” she whispered loudly, peeking again at all the toys.

“if you don’t like them all that’s okay, i just wanted to get you something,” his smile was gentle and reassuring. she looked at you for permission and when you nodded at her, she went to the couch and looked at all the plushies. she looked at them, and then at everyone in the room, then back at the toys staring intently.

and one by one, she pulled a different stuffed animal from the pile and handed it to each man in the room. she started by giving haechan a blue teddy bear, and continued on until every grown man was holding a small soft plushie, and she beamed with happiness.

you knew they couldn’t say no and jaehyun could see their wariness melting with each toy she gave. and even though he knew he probably had no right to feel it, he felt a sense of pride in her generosity and he knew she could have only learned that from you. he was the last one to receive a toy and it was a fluffy orange cat.

“thank you, yeoreum. that’s very sweet of you.” he told her sincerely and she blinked at him as if it weren’t something out of the ordinary.

“there’s a lot to share,” she replied and then she remembered something and it lit up her entire face, her voice raising in her excitement. “mommy said you got pizza!”

“yep,” he answered her question that wasn’t a question. “i didn’t know which kind you liked so you have a lot of choices.”

yeoreum picked the same pizza to eat that jaehyun had, which didn’t go unnoticed by everyone in the room as he was the only one to actually like pineapple on pizza. she had made herself at home easily, not missing a beat to pull half of the men into the living room to play with her and the toys jaehyun had gotten for her.

you had been there for a total of thirty minutes before you had been made to feel somewhat welcome. you enjoyed watching the members spend time with yeoreum, as she didn’t have many men in her life to really associate with, and the boys in her class didn’t really count.

you had to bite back a smile at the conversation you had overhead moments before.

“yeoreum is a pretty name, it’s unique too.” mark said, sitting cross-legged where she had instructed him to sit.

“thank you, mommy said she did it so it would be easy because my english name is summer.” yeoreum replied somewhat distractedly in english, causing all eyes to blink slowly at the sudden change in language.

“but she was born in may?” jaehyun looked at you, and you shrugged.

“i was on drugs and in pain, i at least had the right idea.” which caused a few laughs to echo around the room.

after that, you seemed to be fairly content with just observing. you leaned against the kitchen counter, chewing slowly on a piece of pizza as you watched her try to win a tickle fight with mark and succeeding with the way his laughter didn’t come out as forced.

you didn’t speak much with the other members, mostly enjoying being a presence in the room, that is until you felt a body move close to your side and you turned to face the new person, remembering his name was doyoung. when he didn’t say anything to you, you turned away and went back to watching how the tickle fight was absolutely being lost by mark then.

“i have reservations about this,” doyoung said to you then, his voice hardly above a whisper.

you turned again to face him but he looked forward, eyes trained on the guys sitting around enjoying the little girls antics. realizing he wasn’t going to face you for this conversation you went back to your previous position, this time bringing the pizza to your mouth again.

“and?” you asked him, voice matching his tone and doyoung shifted forward to rest his forearms against the counter. he waited until your mouth was full of pizza before he spoke again.

“and jaehyun’s so excited about this, he went on and on about it and he doesn’t even know if she’s actually his.” doyoung’s blunt words made you defensive, even though you had expected something like this, it still made you react, but doyoung continued before you could swallow.

“i think he needs to get a dna test before he gets too attached.” doyoung said, finally turning to face you and you narrowed your eyes at him as he did so.

“what? you think i’m lying?” you said through gritted teeth, but doyoung’s stance didn’t change.

“i’m not going to judge you, i don’t know anything about you. i’m just trying to protect one of my best friends. especially if you decide to rip this whole ‘being a father’ thing out from under him.”

“exactly, you don’t know anything about me.” you said shortly, your temper’s fuse quickly reaching its end. you pushed yourself away from the counter then before you continued. “and there’s nothing to protect him from, i don’t want anything from him. he tracked me down after i told him to leave me alone. he asked to see her, not me. we will be just as we were before he made his grand appearance, should he decide the father life isn’t for him.”

doyoung searched your face while you spoke, but you abruptly changed the conversation when you asked him where the bathroom was. doyoung gestured down the hall and watched as you left, when the shadows in the hall swallowed you he turned his attention back to watch the scene unfold.

haechan and mark were getting to be children again as they played some sort of mock game of house with yeoreum, using the plushies she had gifted them.

jaehyun was sitting next to her, his back against the couch as she made him in charge of holding the rest of the plushies, doyoung heard her mention that he was the house and so he had to be really, really still.

“where’s your dad?” haechan asked, his voice exaggeratingly deep for his character his bear was playing.

“i don’t have one,” yeoreum said, and she moved her plushie away from haechan’s but every man in the room froze. doyoung’s eyes darted to jaehyun’s face to judge his face, but he couldn’t quite read it.

“wh-what do you mean, yeo?” mark asked using his little lion to carry on the game for her.

“mommy said daddy is a really busy man,” she said matter-of-factly, she didn’t notice how all the eyes in the room were trained on her, and how the air seemed to still in preparation for her answer. “she said he’s a busy business man who flies all over the world and she said that a lot of daddies and mommies do that and that it’s okay!”

she was still happy as she spoke, still involved in her game of house she had roped them into playing with her.

“it really is okay,” mark said softly, forgetting his role for a moment.

“yep! it’s super okay because my mommy is really strong and she got so strong so she could take care of me all by herself.” yeoreum’s tiny body puffed up in all the pride a four year old could muster.

“but don’t you miss your dad?” haechan’s bear asked yeoreum’s little white fluffy bear.

“well yeah, all the other kids dads come and pick them up from school but mommy says that just because my daddy has a lot of stuff he has to do first, it doesn’t mean he doesn’t love me.” and then, for the first time, yeoreum’s voice became a bit quieter. “i don’t know my daddy, but i hope mommy’s right.”  

doyoung’s eyes had danced back and forth between her and jaehyun, noticing the more she spoke, the more jaehyun’s face seemed to fall and it wasn’t long before doyoung though he saw the man tearing up.

“of course your mommy’s right, ‘reum,” jaehyun said softly behind her. she twisted around in her spot on the floor, looking up at him and she tilted her head at him when she saw his tears spill over, confused on why he was so sad. she shuffled forward to get closer to him and she frowned, bringing her arms to wrap around his neck tightly and jaehyun felt the tears hit him harder and he didn’t even care that everyone else in the room was witnessing this. his arms wrapped tightly around her little body, and he used his palm to try and wipe away some of the tears from his cheek.

“mommy said it’s okay to cry, and that hugs are a good bandaid,” yeoreum said, voice taking a knowing tone.

jaehyun nodded against her head, his eyes drifting to the hallway where he could see you standing there. your expression was unreadable to him, but your lips were pursed tightly.

 “your mommy is right,” he repeated again, pulling her small hands away from his face then. “about the hugs and that your daddy was really busy but he definitely loves you.”

“do you know him?” she asked, pulling away from his neck to look at him earnestly, and jaehyun’s eyes crinkled at the edges, pulling away from your form in the hallway to look at his daughter again.

“i do, yeah,” jaheyun answered, “and he missed you so much.”

“can you tell him i miss him too? can you tell him that he can come pick me up from school?” she said excitedly and you chose that moment to interrupt. you couldn’t be sure where the rest of the conversation was going, you didn’t know if jaehyun would keep his word about not saying he was her dad and you could see her getting her hopes up too high, and you knew you had to be the bad guy.

“yeoruem, baby. it’s time we go home now, we have school in the morning.” you called softly, walking over to your little girl and she pouted up at you, but she didn’t argue, she just slowly got to her feet, hugging her teddy bear tightly to her chest.

“say thank you, they were very nice to play with you,” you nudged her softly and she did as she was told, genuinely happy to have been able to play with her new friends. you both started walking to the door and she turned suddenly, running to hug jaehyun once more before she left.

you saw she had whispered something to him as she pulled away and you saw jaehyun break out into a smile again.

“i will,” he said to her and with a happy nod yeoreum was back with you again.

with yeoreum’s shoes finally on, you both exited the door and were halfway to the elevator when you heard a door close and footsteps thumping towards you. you were both surprised and… not at all surprised to see jaehyun behind you, a new gleam in his eye as he tugged on his hood and put a mask into place over his nose.

“i would feel more comfortable if i took you home since it’s late.” he said nonchalantly. “i can drive us, if you want.”

“i don’t have a car seat for yeoreum,” you replied and jaehyun shrugged easily. “walking you home it is then.”

you were going to protest but yeoreum had already put her stuffed animal in your hand before grabbing your other one and one of jaehyun’s, tugging you both towards the elevator.

she had started chatting away about something you couldn’t even pay attention to, too entirely focused on the way jaehyun’s hand enveloped hers, your eyes trailing from his hand to his face and you weren’t sure what it was about it. maybe it was all the moments pulled together, primarily the past hour alone, but you felt an unmistakable skip of your heartbeat at the way he smiled down at your excited little girl.

you were too busy gazing up at jaehyun to even noticed the eight heads poking out of the doorway almost comically as they watched you three enter the elevator, being led by a headstrong four year old.

“they make a cute little family,” jungwoo mentioned, only pulling his head inside once he heard the elevator doors close; the members immediately talking animatedly about the new niece they seemed to automatically claim as their own.

no one noticed doyoung walking to his room, the tiny cup that yeoreum had used in his hand.

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it took all of three minutes into the walk home for yeoreum to yawn loudly and rub her eyes sleepily.

“did you get tired from playing with everyone?” you asked her and she nodded, all the cheerful excitement ebbing away from her slowly. you went to pick her up to carry her the rest of the way but jaehyun stopped you, eyes asking permission before he made a move and after a brief hesitation, you nodded to him with a smile.

“i got you, ‘reum, come here,” he said soothingly, picking her up and holding her close. she instantly laid her head down on his shoulder and you snorted at how quickly she closed her eyes. you cooed at how sweet she was, and jaehyun visibly glowed at how she seemed to relax with him instantly.

“you know you don’t have to do all of this,” you said to him after a few moments of yeoreum’s slow breathing. and jaehyun sighed deeply.

“look i know you think i’m this really shitty person who just ditched you, and i know that that’s how you must have felt but it wasn’t my intention. my manager saw our messages, you know. and even though I was still an adult then, we didn’t have nearly as much freedom as we do now. he yelled at me for an hour about being reckless with my career and all that. even though it doesn’t change anything, i didn’t do any of it on purpose or maliciously. and i’m sorry you had to do this alone.” he said, looking down at you the entire time he had been talking, wanting to see your face through his shortened explanation.

“it was really hard, at first, and i’ve been angry for awhile.” you said, voice soft and vulnerable after you thought a moment before deciding to give him honesty. “i had no clue what to tell any of my friends, and when i googled you i almost threw up, but i think that was from the pregnancy and not the news of you being famous. it made sense then to me what all had happened, but i couldn’t tell my parents the truth and so i had to say i didn’t know who the dad was. mortifying, really. my parents still haven’t spoken to me since then. and i love yeoreum more than anything, but i really… i think i hated you this whole time.” you don’t make eye contact as you confess to him a snippet of what had happened, a glimpse into how you felt.

jaehyun was stunned at all he had learned about you, he knew you probably had hated him, and he was right on that. he was horrified to learn that you really, truly had been alone through all of this. he didn’t know why but he had assumed, since he had learned of this at least, you would have had your parents to help support you, and it made his stomach turn knowing it was the opposite.

“but i don’t hate you now,” you admitted softly, looking ahead at the crosswalk sign, waiting for it to give you the okay to cross.

“oh? one day was all it took?” jaehyun asked a bit hopefully with a playful smile, his heart leaping in his chest at the statement, and he couldn’t quite place his finger on why it made him so excited to hear those words. you didn’t respond right away only rolling your eyes, and pulling a set of keys from your pocket and jaehyun realized you must be close to your place.

“but don’t get too excited, the statute has only been bumped up, not removed entirely,” you teased, and you unlocked the door that sat in the wall surrounding your house, entering the front yard that came with your house. it was small, but jaehyun noticed it was just enough for the two of you to live in and it seemed cozy.

you closed the door behind you, it automatically locking and you led the way to the front door of the house, unlocking it and kicking off your shoes. jaehyun shuffled nervously a bit, not knowing what he needed to do but toed off his shoes anyway just to be courteous.

“would you like to tuck her in?” you asked him after switching on a light in the room, and jaehyun blinked as his eyes adjusted. “if you don’t want to, that’s okay, i can.” and you reached for yeoreum but jaehyun tightened his hold on the sleeping girl.

“i can do it,” he stressed and you grinned, holding up your hands in surrender.

“okay then, ‘mister jaehyun’,” you joked, motioning for him to follow you down the hall into the room he could only assume was yeoreum’s if the little moon nightlight glowing and the soft peach paint on the wall were anything to go by.

he noticed she didn’t have an overabundance of toys, maybe a handful of plushies on her bed but he realized it was because she had a little table in the corner stacked with coloring books, crayons and markers. he could see her wanting to be an artist when she grew up, she had told him that already. as he was taking in the room, you had already folded back her blankets and you were waiting for him expectantly.

he very gently tucked yeoreum in after taking off her shoes and gave her the plushie he had gifted her and she cuddled into it immediately. it caused his heart to ache looking at her, realizing he had missed so many things. jaehyun followed you out of her room and you closed her door until it was just a crack.

“um…” jaehyun went to ask, not knowing how to really phrase the question he wanted.

“are you thirsty?” you asked him instead as you headed into your kitchen and he hovered in the entrance.

“not really, thank you, but i was wondering, if you’d be okay with it…” he trailed off, and your eyes darted to see him looking somewhat nervous.

“with what?”

“do you… maybe have pictures you could show me? or videos? i just know i’ve missed a lot and if you were okay with it, i’d like to see the moments i wasn’t there for.” your heart softened, as did your smile.

“yeah, i think i can do that for you.”

so jaehyun stayed with you until late that night, sitting at the kitchen table as you showed him pictures and videos of yeoreum. moments like her first steps, and her first words, which you were pouting when you told him wasn’t “mama”, but instead was “no”. he got to experience your laughter as yeoreum had brought a frog inside the house, and her subsequent scream as it jumped out of her hand then chased her. he got to see pictures of her and he felt like he could have been there.

should have been there.

and as he flipped through picture after picture, he noticed that his heart picked up in speed each time he came across a picture of you in it. he watched as you spoke about each picture, the excitement in the nostalgia as you flipped through each one and you explained to him what was going on.

he felt like he was back in your apartment five years ago, he felt at peace with you here.

he missed all of this, and he was going to make sure he wouldn’t miss anything else.

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New Tweet notifications for NCT 127

NCT 127 @NCTsmtown_127 [idols with kids] episode 11 with JOHNNY, JAEHYUN, and MARK

🖍️😺🍑🦁🖍️

#NCT127 #NCT127_IDOLSWITHKIDS #IDOLSWITHKIDS

@lovej43 replied to NCTsmtown_127

i can’t with jaehyun smiling at that little girl like that :(

@127valentines replied to lovej43

right??? she looks a lot like him too, so cute

@markinmiami replied to NCTsmtown_127

mark accidentally breaking his crayon ㅠㅠ the kid gave him a mean look

@bananasoutforjohn replied to NCTsmtown_127

dude looked FLABBERGASTED when the kid started crying

@myloveforjae replied to @127valentines

no ur right tho, she resembles him a lot more than just the dimples 🤨

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you knew that sm would post the video to their youtube channel, but you didn’t realize how anxious reading the comments would make you.

you weren’t aware that the video had posted until jisoo showed you that yeoreum was trending on twitter because of her interactions with jaehyun, and then you went to youtube to read the comments there and every time you read one that mentioned their resemblance it made your stomach flip uncomfortably.

you had a little under a month to prepare for that moment and yet, it still surprised you. you were just pleased that the overall theme for reactions was how cute your daughter was and that made your heart rest just a bit easier.

while reading the comments on your phone, your eyes instantly darted to the text notification that popped up.

3:43 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: did you see they posted the video? everyone is commenting about how cute ‘reum is

3:44 pm you: yeah, and they’re also saying how much you look alike…

3:46 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: well, she’s my daughter so i’d hope so

3:47 pm you: i don’t think you get what i mean

3:48 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: you mean that she also gets her looks from you? i agree

your eyebrows rose at that comment, he had been mildly flirtatious for the past week but now it was becoming blatantly obvious.

3:50 pm you: i mean yes, but that wasn’t what i meant

3:51 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: if it’s not that, then enlighten me

3:52 pm you: aren’t you concerned people will figure it out?

3:54 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: i don’t think they’ll be able to figure it out from just a twenty minute video on youtube

3:55 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: besides, they’d probably doubt it considering how beautiful you are

you simultaneously blushed at his very obvious flirting and sighed at his nonchalance. you were growing accustomed to jaehyun’s presence in your life, and you were finding yourself looking forward to seeing him and spending time with him. it made you feel as if you three were a family but the overwhelming dark cloud of the public finding out loomed over you and shadowed the fluttery feeling you felt in your chest when you talked to him.

you didn’t want to let this get to you but it was turning into somewhat of a fear for you, and it wasn’t really that people would find out.

it was the aftermath; the most negative version being the source of your fear.

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jaehyun stared at his phone waiting for a response from you a bit longer than he should have, but when he felt a shadow hovering to his left he quickly locked his phone. his shoulders instantly relaxed when he saw it was doyoung, but the look on doyoung’s face made jaehyun instantly concerned.

doyoung refused eye contact with him, shifting uncomfortably as he leaned against the mirrored wall of the practice room. everyone else was sat in various spots on around the room and although jaehyun didn’t mind doyoung deciding to spend his break with him, his awkward behavior made jaehyun tense.

“i’ve been putting off talking to you for a week now.” doyoung said to the ground, his arms crossing over his chest.

“what about?”

“i…” doyoung started then stopped, he waited a few seconds then began again. “look, just remember i did it to protect you, you know, just in case.”

he was purposefully being vague and jaehyun pushed off the wall, turning his body to really face doyoung. “what did you do?”

“it’s – i – when y/n came over the first time, even though you were convinced, i wasn’t. so… i had a dna test done.” doyoung’s response made jaehyun’s skin grow hot, he wasn’t why sure anger was the first emotion that bubbled up first but it came on strong enough to surprise even him.

“why would you do that?” he said from between gritted teeth. the idea that yeoreum might not be his never crossed his mind, he had been so sure from the moment he saw you near her.

he just knew.

“you didn’t know, you were just going off of y/n’s word alone. i wanted to give you proof.”

“no, you wanted to rub it in my face that she had lied. you wanted to be right.” jaehyun couldn’t hear how his voice was raising, he could only hear the blood rushing in his ears.

“you would have went your whole life possibly raising someone else’s kid if i hadn’t had the test done!” doyoung was defensive now, and he couldn’t understand why jaehyun would have just blindly believed you like he did.

“i wouldn’t have cared either way!” jaehyun hadn’t realized he had gotten closer to doyoung until a hand came to push against his chest, pulling him back and away from him.

“keep it down unless you want the whole building to know your business,” johnny said lowly to jaehyun, eyes darting to the choreographer across the room, who seemed to be mostly unaware of the situation since he had headphones on.

“he went behind my back and had a dna test done, without asking me first!” jaehyun argued back, angry eyes not leaving the apologetic ones of doyoung.

“if it makes you feel better, she’s yours.” doyoung said, guilt apparent in his face even if he was trying to maintain his stance that he had done nothing wrong.

“i knew that already!” jaehyun actually yelled that time, and he went to take a step forward – to do what he wasn’t sure but johnny’s palm held him firmly in place.

his phone choosing that moment to vibrate, pulling him away from the moment; he had an incoming call from you. he took a moment to shoot doyoung a seething glare, then took a calming breath before turning away to answer.

“hi,” he breathed, his anger slowly dissipating.

“hello,” you replied, but your voice was a bit strained and he picked up on it right away.

“everything okay?” he questioned instantly.

“yeah,” you said and he heard you pull away to speak to someone else before coming back to the phone. “my friend and coworker, jisoo? she was there that day with me, she got injured at work and i’m the only one able to take her to the hospital. will you…” another quick word to someone else. “i need you to be there to pick up yeoreum from school, please.”

jaehyun’s mind was racing thinking of his schedule for the day, he had practice for another few hours, and he told you as such.

“i know you’re busy, but this is something that comes with being a parent. you make adjustments.” you said, and your voice was panicked as you heard someone call for you, and he heard you address the doctor.

“please jae, she has a key on her backpack. you get to pick her up from school and be her dad. this is what you asked for… and what she has always wanted.”

“i’ll be there.” he answered, his mind made up before you even had started to speak. “what time does she get out for school?”

“5, thank you so much, jae. i really appreciate it.” and when someone called your name again you sounded rushed once more. “coming! bye jae, i’ll see you later.”

you hung up the phone, and even though jaehyun was still feeling angry towards doyoung, he couldn’t help the smile that grew on his face at the opportunity you gave him.

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jaehyun was thankful that the lady at the front counter seemed to be too old to stay in tune with media as she didn’t even bat an eyelash when he gave his name to her and told her that he was there to pick up yeoreum. he refrained from saying the term ‘my daughter’ aloud but your rules couldn’t stop him from thinking it.

when the lady called over the system to tell the teacher that it was time for yeoreum to go home, jaehyun leaned casually against the wall while he waited.

he wasn’t thinking about how he had lied to get out of the last few hours of practice. he wasn’t thinking about the argument yet to be resolved with doyoung.

he wasn’t thinking about the other parents coming in and seeing him, recognizing him.

all he could think about how long the minutes seemed too stretch on for yeoreum to be released from her class… and he wouldn’t lie and say he wasn’t also thinking about you. specifically, the last time he saw you, which was three days before.

you had invited him over on sunday night, stating that yeoreum had asked about him and if she could one day make cookies for mister jaehyun. you had told him it was so out of the blue for her to ask that and when you had questioned her on it, her simple response was ‘if cookies makes santa come, maybe it will work for mister jaehyun too’.

you didn’t have the heart to tell her no, which led to the phone call. jaehyun was there in twenty minutes, knocking on the door to which you answered with flour splattered across your face, with a giggling four-year-old right behind you sporting flour in her hair. jaehyun’s grin was painful for his cheeks as he took in the scene, and he couldn’t help but laugh with you both before even saying hello.

“are you supposed to be wearing the ingredients?” jaehyun asked as he stepped inside your house, following you both as you made your way into the kitchen.

“mommy started it!” and you feigned a gasp, a floured hand on your chest.

“i did not!” and she giggled once more, waving her tiny hands for jaehyun to bend down so she could whisper in his ear. jaehyun’s dimples were deep as he listened to her and your thoughts straying to how handsome he was running through your mind before you even registered. jaehyun turned his head to nod excitedly with yeoreum and you narrowed your eyes at them both.

“you better have told him how you threw first,” you warned playfully.

“oh she did,” jaehyun agreed, moving slightly to the left and it didn’t click that he was suspiciously close to the bag of flour. “she also said we should be on a team.”

“wha – oh don’t you dare!” but it was too late, as jaehyun had already pinched some flour and flicked it at you, and as you stood there with a shocked look on your face and flour now decorating your hair, jaehyun and yeoreum shared a giggly high five. you crossed your arms childishly and stomped your foot, turning away from them both dramatically, taking a page directly out of your daughter’s book.

“oh no, ‘reum… we’ve made your mommy upset.” jaehyun theatrically whispered and you had to bite back a laugh.

“i know what will cheer her up!” yeoreum whispered back, and they were both suspiciously silent and then you heard feet shuffling behind you; yeoreum popping up in front of you suddenly, and then there were not one, but two sets of arms wrapping around you in a tight squeeze, yeoreum’s head resting on your stomach and you froze at the feeling of jaehyun’s cheek resting on top of your head.

you felt the heat rise up your neck and the butterflies were back; you couldn’t tell if this was part of the joke or if he meant the hug the way it felt to you but you quickly pushed that train of thought to the side, giving yourself two more seconds in the embrace of them both before you broke the moment by clearing your throat.

“so, did we still want to make mister jaehyun cookies?” yeoreum blinked up at you cutely and nodded her head, you ran your hand through her hair gently, still very aware of jaehyun at your back and you tried to ignore it but failed.

jaehyun noticed it took only five minutes of trying to cook for yeoreum to get bored and ask if she can go color instead, so it left only you and him in the kitchen, and the first few minutes were spent trying to fill the awkward silence with comments and small laughter.

you had just started to mix up the ingredients when you heard him move, his feet shuffling just a bit.

jaehyun leaned a little closer into your space, feeling his body heat on your back; his hand braced against the counter to the left of your hip and you weren’t sure if your heart raced or slowed, but all you knew was that you were hyper aware of his presence as you were minutes before when he had hugged you.

“do you need help with that?” he asked lowly, his voice near your ear and you could almost feel his breath on your cheek. you turned your head and he was as close to you as you had thought he was, and it made you take a slight step away. you knew he could see the rising blush on your cheeks and a smirk made its way to his lips.

“no, i got it,” you said, but then realized that his close proximity allowed you to get a little revenge. “i am capable, thank you very much.” it was your turn to flick flour at his face, and he only blinked at you in shock, his expression comical and you wished you could take a picture of it.

a small gasp at the entrance of the kitchen made you jump away from each other as if you had been caught doing something wrong, and you both had quickly fumbled with an excuse, neither of which had made any sense but you had seemingly gotten away with it.

the memory brought a smile to his face and that look was the first thing yeoreum saw as she walked through the door to see him waiting for her.

“mister jaehyun!” she exclaimed, running up to him and hugging him around his legs and god, he loved this little girl. when she let go, he bent down and went in for a proper hug, picking her up in the process and they left the building.

yeoreum spoke to him animatedly, telling him about her favorite part of her day and then she asked him about his favorite part, his answer being an immediate, “getting to see you, of course.” which only made her beam at him in a childlike sense of pride.

“what about mommy?” she asked innocently, and he blinked.

“well, of course you and her both are my favorite part.” yeoreum’s loud giggle made him smile but she shook her head.

“no, i mean where’s mommy?” and it dawned on him that he had told on himself to a very observant child.

“oh, she had to take her friend to the doctor. she isn’t your teacher, too?” jaehyun asked, playing it off in a way he thought was smooth enough. the question sparking another conversation about how she gets to change classrooms like she’s in real school but not a whole lot just sometimes and it’s definitely really fun, and jaehyun could only nod as she chattered away, finally arriving at the front gate to your home and yeoreum wiggled her way out of his arms so she could get her key.

“i wanna do it, mommy lets me!” and jaehyun nodded as he let her lead the way, really just letting himself enjoy being a parent solo, and after hours of dinner, bath, and then bed, he realized it was fairly exhausting and he told himself to remind you when you got home how impressive he thought you were.

jaehyun sat on the edge of her bed, she had requested him to tuck her in and he had but then she had started crying and he was on the verge of panicking.

“’reum, what’s the matter baby?” he said, taking a tip he got from you and running his hand through her hair to try and soothe her, she wasn’t hysterical but she clutched the plushie that he had gotten her tightly, big tears rolling down her cheeks as her bottom lip quivered.

“mommy always sings me a song and kisses me goodnight every night… when is she coming home?” she sniffed, and jaehyun’s eyebrows furrowed in concern. the last text update he had gotten was an hour ago when you had said that jisoo was going back for x-rays and that it shouldn’t be too much longer.

“she’ll be here soon but i can do that, too.” he offered her gently and her eyes looked a little less sad at his offer. “what song does she sing?”

“i don’t know the name,” her lip wobbled again and fresh tears sprung in her eyes.

“that’s okay,” he assured her soothingly, “can you hum it for me?”

yeoreum sniffed twice before humming the tune of a song jaehyun knew well, and it made a small smile tug at the corner of his mouth. as she hummed, he did the same right along with her until he started to sing softly to her, his hand continuing the motions from before, gently moving through her hair.

“so whenever you ask me again, how i feel… please remember…” and yeoreum wasn’t humming anymore, her small voice drifting away as she watched jaehyun, completely entranced by his voice, her young mind in awe at how he knew the song her mommy would sing to her.

“my answer if you,” jaehyun continued to sing, his finger tapping on her nose gently which finally earned him a small laugh. a sound he missed, and while he was glad to be present for even the times she was upset, he preferred her happy and smiling.

yeoreum didn’t say anything for a long second, and then in a small and unsure voice asked, “mister jaehyun?”

“yes, miss yeoreum?”

“if… if my daddy doesn’t ever come back from his business trips, if he’s still too busy for me…” jaehyun’s heart broke at the mention of that, his smile slowly disappearing from his face. “do you think you could be my daddy instead?”

“oh yeoreum…” he started and he saw a bit of panic welling up in her eyes, and she scrambled to sit up.

“i’m really good, i promise! mommy says so and santa does too, i get presents every year.” she pleaded, her eyebrows so furrowed they were nearly touching, and jaehyun’s eyes softened.

“yeoreum, sweetheart. i am y-.”

“”’reum, i’m home.” jaehyun nearly jumped at the sound of your voice, his head whipping around to find you staring at him in the doorway. he couldn’t quite place the emotion there; it wasn’t necessarily anger but you didn’t seem happy in the slightest.

“mommy!” yeoreum called, her tears forgotten at the sight of you in her room. you walked over to kneel at the edge of her bed, motioning for her to lay down again and pulling the blankets up to her chin.

“did you have fun with mister jaehyun?” you asked her, brushing her hair back away from her face. you heard everything said, and the feeling that you were letting her down sat heavy on your chest.

“i did, we had lots of fun,” she replied, finally letting out a long overdue yawn – the worry of you not being home the main thing that kept her awake.

“tell him goodnight, okay?”

“goodnight, mister jaehyun.” she murmured sleepily and you stood up then, motioning for jaehyun to follow you as you closed her door behind you. you moved away from the door, heading into the kitchen and jaehyun couldn’t help the feeling that he was in trouble somehow.

“i thought we had a deal,” you finally said, turning to face him as you leaned against the kitchen counter.

“what?” jaehyun was a little confused, he was trying to figure out where this conversation was going before it even started.

“the statute of limitations weren’t up yet, i still don’t want you to tell her you’re her father.” your voice was stiff, and you didn’t make eye contact with him as you spoke.

“i wasn’t going to…”

“i heard everything, jae. she already loves you so much, and if you decide to walk out it’s going to wreck her and i’ll be left to try and fix what you broke.”

jaehyun wasn’t sure why, but he felt the telltale sign of his anger rising. he felt it on the back of his neck, and the way his teeth ground together.

“i thought i made myself clear that i wasn’t going anywhere.” his voice wasn’t curt, but you still heard the tone.

“you did, but that’s when things are relatively easy. who’s to say-?” and he cut you off.

“say about what? what could anyone possibly say to make me leave?”

“me, when i say i think it’s best you kept your distance for a little while. you’ve made things complicated for me.” and to say jaehyun was shocked speechless would be an understatement.

“how?” was his only response, he was biting on the inside of his cheek to keep from getting really upset.

“we were fine,” you started, crossing your arms in front of your chest. “we were fine on our own, and then you waltzed in our lives and shook everything up and now i don’t know which way is up and which way is down. i think you’re confusing yeoreum… and me and… and i don’t know how to feel about any of this.”

“this was fate and you know it.” and your answering scoff only spurned him on. “i don’t believe in coincidences and neither did you last i checked. you moved here so she could learn about her heritage, and of the millions of people in korea you still manage to run into me, she still found me.”

“yes… well we had our life just fine on our own – just me and yeoreum. what right-.”

“i’m her father!” his voice raised just enough to make you finally look at him, to see the hurt in his eyes as he spoke. “that’s what right. you’ve given me this… this incredible gift, something i didn’t even know i needed until a month ago and i refuse to let you take it away from me. i thought you and i were getting closer, but if you want to continue to hate me that’s fine, but i want to be in my daughter’s life and you can’t keep me from doing that.”

his eyes were glassy, as if he was keeping himself from crying over the situation as a whole and his breathing was heavy. you broke the eye contact you held with him, instead focusing on the rise and fall of his chest.

his response was answer enough for you.

answer for this entire thing you had been fighting off for the past month while you got to know each other again, while you got to spend time together as a family. you saw yeoreum smiling and laughing, jaehyun usually the cause of it. their dimples coming out in the exact same manner, and it was like within the month you felt your heart warm up in a way it hadn’t in years at the idea of it, the idea of him.

you realized you were happier around him too, and although you really were trying to protect yeoreum, you realized in that moment that you were also trying to protect yourself.

and that wasn’t fair to yeoreum, jaehyun… or you.

“i don’t.” you said softly, finally giving him a response he found cryptic.

“what?”

“i don’t hate you.” you clarified for him and he inhaled deeply.

“then why are you acting as if i’m an asshole when i’ve done nothing but try and prove to you that i’m not… that i care about you both.” his hands were thrown out at his sides in exasperation, finally realizing that it wasn’t anger he was feeling but fear.

“because it won’t just be her heart you’ll break if you decide to leave.” you gnawed at your lip, unsure of how he was going to respond to this.

“what do you…” he asked and his voice was softer now, taking a small step towards you.

“you’ll be breaking mine, too.” you said, and you finally made eye contact with him again and he could see it there.

the fear.

of rejection, of being hurt, of being left alone after becoming so quickly used to having another person be there with you. he understood then.

he closed the gap in a few steps, and he stood in front of you, his hands hesitating before he allowed them to rest on your arms.

“i know… i know this hasn’t been easy for you. that you’ve had terrible things said to you because i wasn’t there, and i can’t guarantee that when people find out, more things won’t be said. but the difference is that i’m here now. i’m here and i’m not going anywhere, and…” he trailed off for a moment, eyes searching yours before he finally continued. “i know there were no expectations five years ago, but i have them now. i know you feel this too, i know you do. and if i have to convince you every day that i’m not going anywhere, then i will.”

you didn’t realize you had started to cry until your tears started to burn your eyes and you wiped them away with a watery laugh.

“oh come on, i can’t have both my girls crying in one night.” and jaehyun swore his heart stopped when you looked up at him like that.

“then don’t say sweet things to make me cry.” you said, tone a little pouty.

“well if that’s what it takes,” jaehyun shrugged easily.

“yeah but,” your sentence was then interrupted by jaehyun’s phone vibrating incessantly in his pocket. he dug it out, ready to ignore the phone call but the name that popped up made him hit accept instead. you didn’t hear any of the other side of the conversation, only jaehyun’s.

“oh, really?” followed by a, “yes, that’s true.” and then, “not to be disrespectful, but i don’t care.” his eyes then jumping back to yours when he said, “then we’ll figure it out, this is more important to me.” before saying, “okay, i’ll see you tomorrow.” and finally hung up.

“what was that about?” you asked tilting your head to the side, your curiosity getting the better of you.

“that… was everyone finding out.” he said easily and your eyebrows shot up over widened eyes, “and as you heard me say – i don’t care. we’ll figure it out one way or another, all i know is that you, yeoreum… this family is far more impor – mmph!” and you didn’t give him the chance to finish his sentence because you threw your arms around his neck and kissed him.

the action familiar to you, recalling the way jaehyun had done the same all those years ago. jaehyun wasn’t one to miss an opportunity and so he kissed you back, his arms wrapping around you tightly and pulling you closer to him. the moment was one he had been wanting for weeks now, ever since he sat with you at the table and you showed him all the pictures.

and he didn’t waste a second, kissing you until you were both breathless and you finally pulled away.

“i’m sorry, i just…” you trailed off, finally seeing that happiness in his eyes again.

“don’t be, because i’m about to do it again.” he said with a smirk before closing the distance once more, this kiss much sweeter than the first. his palm flat against the small of your back, his other hand resting on your hip and everything about that moment with him felt right.

his lips, his warmth, his smile that you felt against your lips that fully interrupted the kiss.

“what is it?” you huffed playfully, and his smile turned into a small laugh.

“i just remembered something.” he said, his dimples appearing then.

“and that is…?”

“try again, huh?” he joked before planting a quick kiss to your lips, muffling your groan.

“it was the only thing that would stop her from crying as a baby.” you defended weakly.

“that’s my girl.” he said, nothing but pride in his voice, and you smacked him gently on the chest.

“our girl.” you corrected him easily, and the smile that lit up his face was breathtaking.

“our girl.”

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

[b side: epilogue]

a year or so later…

a family outing is what jaehyun had called it when he woke up one morning asking if you wanted to go to the gardens that had a christmas lights display and you didn’t even get the chance to decide because yeoreum overheard as she stood at your doorway and was immediately excited.

“that settles that then,” you teased.

“as if you ever had a choice,” he said to you with a wink, calling a good morning to the sleepy girl who jumped into bed and cuddled with you both.

your little family had a lazy day in bed before you all finally rolled out of it to get ready for the lights, making sure that yeoreum – who was adamant that she didn’t need help picking out clothes anymore – bundled herself up in her puffy jacket, you pocketing her gloves that she had forgotten. jaehyun purposefully matched jackets with her, and you sighed knowing you had to do the same.

“we look like a little marshmallow family,” you commented as you walked through the gardens, the lights reflecting off of your face.

“yes but a cute one,” jaehyun retorted, teasing being his way of flirting and something you noticed never slacked off even after you had officially started dating him.

you hadn’t realized you had walked ahead of them and then you noticed neither of them were right behind you, you turned around to see jaehyun smiling brightly as he kneeled to whisper suspiciously to yeoreum, something that had been their thing ever since the beginning.

“really?!” yeoreum gasped aloud, eyes pleading with him to not be joking. you narrowed your eyes at them, desperately hoping jaehyun wasn’t telling her they would get the hamster she had been begging for. when jaehyun nodded in answer to her question, her entire body radiated with excitement and then his eyes pointedly looked from her to you a few times and yeoreum giggled.

she turned on her heel and skipped over to you, motioning for you to bend down so she could whisper in your ear – letting you in on the secret. as she whispered, your eyes widened slightly, and they softened as they easily found his.

you could feel yours slowly starting to tear up and you held them at bay for as long as you could. instead of saying anything aloud, you kept with the spirit of their game, their thing they shared, you whispered to yeoreum. you figured she’d skip back over to jaehyun to give him your response but instead she jumped up and down, turning to face jaehyun.

“she said yes!” she exclaimed loudly with her hands cupping around her mouth, squealing with enthusiasm. looking at jaehyun’s soft smile, eyes full of love for you and for the little girl you shared, the answer was obvious.

as if you could have possibly said no.

#gimmehyuck #masterlist #nct127 masterlist #nct 127 #nct 127 au #nct #nct 127 fic #jeong jaehyun #jaehyun au #jaehyun fic #jaehyun x yn #jaehyun x you #jaehyun fluff #jaehyun angst #i wrote out a bit of my daddy issues with this one lmao

[danses-with-dogmeat]

Y is for -- Yes Man

Yay! Golly, who doesn't love Yes Man? He's just such a sarcastic little sweetheart and I'm not immune to his adorable, securitron charms. So, here's this!

I hope you all enjoy!

And with this, that's it!!

Thank you all so much for being a part of my lil 2k celebration! It was so amazing seeing everyone's reactions to these prompts, and literally SUCH a treat to write for some of these more "unfamiliar" characters! Love you all, and thank you so much for celebrating with me!

Next event updates will be coming... very soon 👀 So stay tuned for that! ❤️😊

And here is the 2k event masterlist, for your browsing pleasure!

--

Pair: Yes Man & Reader

Dialogue: “Promise me you’ll still be here when I wake up.”

Word: Yours

Rating: SFW

Category: Hurt/Comfort

Word Count: 1.7k

You paced back and forth around the hotel room, the only sound the scuffling of your slippered feet and the scrawl of your pen over the legal pad in your hands. 

“Is it enough, though? Did we even cover the–” Your eyes narrowed as you looked over your scribbled notes, trying (and failing) to blink the sleep from them as you attempted to decipher the chicken scratch upon the page. “The Boomers? What’re we doing about them when we take power, I mean, I haven’t even met with them yet, what if I get–” 

“Yep, we sure did talk about them, Six! Remember? In the first meeting we had today! The one at 4 in the morning that you insisted on! You remember now?” 

“The one… oh yeah, I do now.” You chuckled, flipping through the papers on your pad to the notes you’d taken-- what was it now, ten hours ago? 

My handwriting was much easier to read this morning, that’s for sure…

“‘Send a securitron with a note…' oh yeah, that was a decent idea.” 

“Sure was!” Yes Man agreed with that same dopey, optimistic smile permanently etched upon his face. 

After so long a day, the smile became much harder to believe. 

“Definitely get your best ideas after having slept a full night, don’tcha boss?” 

“Maybe…” You bit your bottom lip at that, catching his meaning through the words easily. 

Time for bed, boss. 

He’d never give you a command outright, you knew he couldn’t. It’s not what… what Benny designed Yes Man for, after all. Still though, suggestions he gave rather often. And this suggestion, most often of all. 

How many days has it been since I let myself sleep? And here? Probably never…

Well, not since that first night, anyway.

“Six? Still thinking of some wonderful ideas, or do you want me to go and get your pajamas for you?” 

“Still thinking right now, Yes Man.” 

Though, you allowed yourself the small reprieve of sitting on the edge of the bed. The mattress gave generously as you sat upon it, the plushness of it overwhelming you after so many nights spent down in Freeside at the Wrangler. 

“Might head out pretty soon, here.” You told the bot, with the knowledge that he could easily guess where you meant to go. “You can stay here tonight though, if you want to. I’ll be back early enough, I’m sure.” 

“Sure boss, sounds like a swell idea!” Yes Man paused, but you could tell he wanted to say more, you didn’t quite know how you knew that, but something about his tone, or maybe even his expression–

I really am starting to lose it, huh? 

Yes Man’s expression doesn’t change.

Guess this is what happens when you get 3 hours of sleep a–

“Yes. I think it makes total and utter sense for you to walk to the Atomic Wrangler through the strip and Freeside– which is known to be quite dangerous– at two in the morning without me by your side to help you! And then to come back here in the morning, likely as early as four a.m. to chat with me some more! I’m so glad we’re going to have someone as dedicated, dependable and quick-witted as you leading all of New Vegas real soon! You seem completely equipped for the stresses that’ll bring!” 

You pursed your lips as he spoke, your tired gaze resting on the dull, pulsing glow of his screen lighting up with each word, casting a green-tinged gleam over the carpeted floor of the Tops' hotel suite. 

“I don’t know what to do, Yes Man.” You admitted with a small voice, and heard the turn of his wheel as he scooted closer to you to better hear your words. “I… I can’t stay here, can’t sleep in this room, after Benny…” 

With a sigh, you laid back on the bed, your body aching and pleading for a rest, even as your mind cast the sensation of a thousand ants crawling over your skin at the feel of the familiar sheets. The smell of the room, the décor, even the sounds; the dull conversations and jazz music that were all blaring far down stairs, the squeaky whine of the elevator moving along its vertical track, footsteps pattering through the halls… Anytime there was quiet, any time you weren’t moving, thinking, that Yes Man wasn’t talking, you were sucked back into your memories of this place. Your first time here, with him. 

That wretched man who tried to kill you. The asshole, who talked his way into your heart through the span of one night, who made you feel… singular. Like you could conquer the world, and run the whole thing, with him at your side. 

Just give him the chip… Just stay the night… 

Do what he said, and he would give you the world, and his heart, all at once. 

You kicked yourself every night at the thought that you ever believed him. 

But what could you say now? At the time, you were scared, you were alone and angry, and then… Then you were in love. Quickly, yes, but still, you were.

And for what?

You raked your nails down your face painfully, and a deep groan escaped you as you were caged by your own memories in this wretched room. 

“Well, Benny… Well, that guy’s gone!" Yes Man piped up, "It’s just you and me now, Six! You don’t have to worry at all–”

“I know he’s gone, Yes Man! That’s the fucking problem!” You sat up suddenly as you shouted at him, and the bot backed away from where he’d started to approach you. “He and I were supposed to do this together! Not just me and– and– fucking you.”

You were on your feet now, and Yes Man was caged in against the opposite wall as you stalked towards him, with nostrils flared and teeth in a snarl, you continued.

“You were the enemy. You told him how to follow me, knew the best place for him to fucking shoot me and leave me buried in the dirt, you were meant to plot with him from the start, and now? Now... why? Why the hell do you care what happens to me? Why are you planning all this without him? Benny was the one who made you, programmed you, what… What the hell are you doing with me, when… When you’re his.”  

There was no malice in the end, it had all escaped you in the first bouts of shouting. Now, all that was left was a somber sort of curiosity. Honest, but dejected all at once. 

Even now, I’m still holding onto a part of Benny…

“Because, Six, well… I’m not his anymore. I’m yours! I like planning this hostile takeover with you, and I like the meetings and the way you ask my opinion!” 

You looked up from where your gaze had rested on the dull, red carpet, your eyes now meeting Yes Man’s optimistic screen, and lighting up with the glow of it.   

“Benny may have asked for me to be made, and programmed the way I am, but then… Well, he left both of us, didn’t he?”   

Was that… a bit of anger and, even, a touch of sadness in his upbeat voice?

Maybe I am just losing it…     

“He was my boss, but now you are! And even more than that, you’re my friend!” 

You blinked at him, feeling your throat swell up with emotion at the word he used. 

Friend. 

“Y-you really mean that, Yes Man?”

“Sure do, pal! We’re closer than two buildings snugly adjacent to one another! And I mean it!” 

A laugh couldn’t help but pry itself from you, and you nearly fell over from the force of it. Until you felt one gentle, metal hand brace on your shoulder. 

“Don’t know why you found that so funny, friend, but I sure am glad you did! I like to see your smile! And I’m not just saying that to be nice! I know it can be hard to tell when I mean something because of the way Benny programmed my voice, but I really do mean everything that I said! And what I said right now!” 

“Okay, okay!” You were still falling over, holding your stomach as you laughed until your eyes watered. “Thank you, Yes Man, I believe you, I do.” 

Somehow, you were back on the bed, sitting with Yes Man’s hand still on your shoulder as you fought to catch your breath. 

“A-alright…” You spoke, once you’d calmed down. “I… might be able to sleep here tonight. Maybe.” 

You bit your lip again, knowing damn well you were one bite shy of making it bleed with all the nerves coursing through you. 

“Just… Can you promise me something?” 

“Sure can, once you tell me what it is!” 

“Can you just… promise me you’ll still be here when I wake up? I know it seems silly, but–”

“Yes, Six. I promise I’ll still be here when you wake up!” 

A smile touched your lips at his words, and even with that feeling of foolishness at the forefront of your mind, you felt… reassured; like the sustained, comforting pressure of his hand on your shoulder. 

“Thanks… Friend.” 

“Sure thing, Six! And, I want you to know, I’m not just promising that because I have to agree with everything you say! I would promise it either way!” 

You laid back, finally feeling the fatigue in your body and mind take hold of you and force your eyelids to close and your muscles to relax into the mattress below. Still though, even in your exhaustion, you found it in you to broaden your grin at Yes Man’s words.

“Glad to hear it.” You told him, “And… goodnight, Yes Man.” 

“Goodnight, Six!” His voice was quieter, as he wheeled himself back into his corner of the room and dimmed the lights down, “I’ll see you in the morning!” 

It was almost a whisper, but still, the comforting words rang through you as you finally felt sleep take you into it’s comforting arms and lull you into a pleasant dreamland.

#2k event #2k celebration #secret event #fallout #fallout companions #fallout npc #fallout new vegas #fallout nv #fonv #fnv #fallout new vegas companions #yes man #yes man fonv #courier six #benny fonv

[harleyshahas]

16, 7, 30!

(Is ecto :>)

7. What story/headcanons do you feel the proudest of?

If I had to pick, the story I'm most proud of - even though it's certainly not my most popular by and means, and it desperately needs to be rewritten and edited - has to be Futuristic Lovers. It's basically a love letter to Treasure Planet and Anastasia, two of my absolute favorite movies when I was wee, and it took me almost 8 years to write. I honestly wouldn't recommend it to anyone because the first ten chapters are baaaaad, but I'm proud of it nonetheless if only because it's a monument to me that, hey, I can finish a project given enough time and the proper enrichment lol

16. What fanfic tropes do you avoid writing for?

What fanfic tropes won't I write? I don't really know here, I'm kinda blanking on this right now... I've been writing fic a long time, reading it even longer, so I know what I like to read and what I'll avoid, and I that kinda goes for writing, I guess. I can say for certain what genres I like and don't like, which very much includes tragedy. Don't like tragic and unhappy endings. I'm all for whump and angst trains, as long as the payoff is cathartic, but for me, I like a happy ending at the end of a bad day. Tend to avoid major character death, so I don't know that I'll ever write that unless it's already canon.

Over-Flanderizing a character is also extremely aggravating, as well as the incorporation of therapy speak in fics. Also hate when there's an overabundance of "consent is kinky" in any given fic. It's one thing if it's just a shameless pwp, it's another if it's a moment that takes me out of the fic. I like to keep my characters as in-character as possible, and that tends comes with a lot of Not Asking for Permission.

30. Do you write down all your ideas? What makes you decide to write one versus the other?

When I was still a tween, I used to write down any and every idea that popped into my head - had a dedicated ideas notebook and everything. Between then and now, after 14+ years, I've since lost that habit, but I've been trying to pick it back up. I try to at least jot down a general prompt idea in a dedicated notes folder on my phone now to at least revisit at a later date. If I have a scene haunting my every moment for more than a few hours, that tends to get scribbled down real quick, too, especially if it's for a wip I'm trying to work on.

Honestly, whatever winds up actually being written is what I happen to be vibing with at the time. Right now, I desperately want to write Blackice Hades/Persephone AU because I just saw some gorgeous fanart and Sefikura molestation in the back alleys of Wall Market cuz I've been playing FF7 Remake, because if I have one very specific kink, then it's boy's in skirts and being extremely uncomfortable about it (I'm not at all projecting, I swear).

#thank you for the ask! #always love to answer these things! #harley answers #asks #my writing

[allagogtoreblog]

Marry Christmas

Eddie x Reader

Word Count: 500

Warnings: No gender or descriptions - although the reader does celebrate Christmas, no use of Y/N

----oo----

You grin as Eddie hands you an envelope, eager to see its contents. Rather than buy generic, commercialized crap (his words), your boyfriend preferred to make you cards for every holiday, and you cherished every one of them – even the dirty ones he made for Valentine’s Day.  

As you pull the homemade card out, your smile becomes a laugh when you see the same demon head from the Hellfire Club logo - a Santa hat covering the left horn and the sword and mace replaced by flaming candy canes.

“Dork,” you mutter affectionately, your heart swelling at Eddie’s dimpled grin in response to your teasing. Your eyes drop to the words scribbled above the demon’s head, the letters alternating in green and red colors.

“Marry Christmas?” you read off bemusedly. “Eds… You know that’s not how you spell Merry, right?”

He snatches the card from your hand and looks down at the word before cursing softly. “I stayed up late to draw this last night, and I guess I was more tired than I thought.” He stands up and darts towards the kitchen. “Lemme fix this real quick.”

“Eddie!” you yell after him, “you don’t have to –”

“Two seconds!” he yells back.

“It really wasn’t a big deal,” you gently chastise when he reappears, triumphantly waving the card over his head.

“Nope,” he says, with a shake of his messy curls. “Gotta be perfect.” He hands the card back. “Now, is this better?”

You roll your eyes at his dramatics before returning your gaze to the card. Your brow furrows when you realize that, instead of fixing the error, he’s crossed out the word Christmas and written a different word above it. “Marry Me? Eddie, what…” you trail off when you look back up to see Eddie has dropped down to one knee, a ring box in his hand, and a nervous look on his face.

“Remember when you asked me what I wanted for Christmas a few months ago?”

You nodded hesitantly, too stunned to speak.

“Do you remember what I told you?”

Your mind immediately flashed back to the (what you thought was a) cheeky response he had given you at the time.

“Just you, sweetheart.”

You whispered the words out loud, your voice choked up with tears.

“So what do you say,” he continued, a fragile hope blooming in his chocolate-brown eyes as he opened the box and revealed the ring within. “Will you make my Christmas wish come true?”

You flung yourself at him, knocking him to his back and screaming, “Yes!” repeatedly in between planting kisses all over his tear-stained cheeks before landing on his plush lips.

Eddie pulled back from the kiss, murmuring, “I love you,” against your lips.

You repeated it as you felt him reach for your hand, followed by the sensation of cool metal slipping over your ring finger. He pulled your hand towards his lips and softly kissed the small gemstone.

“Merry Christmas, sweetheart,” he murmured.

“Merry Christmas, Eddie.”

------oo------

To everyone who has made it to the end, hope you all have a happy holiday and a great new year! Thanks so much for all the likes and follows. :)

#eddie x reader #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson #stranger things #eddie munson fluff

[nightlight-writes]

Caffeine (Sonny Brisko x Dense!Reader)

Coffeeshop AU

Warnings: none

Notes: I should really write something happier next time, seeing as it’s only a few weeks until Christmas…

DISCLAIMER: This story is meant to be a work of fiction. Any resemblance to the real streamers is not intended.

Tonight was the coldest, chilliest night you had experienced at your shift. Moderate winds blew through the air, carrying along with them the cries of crickets and the croaking of toads. The streets slowly grew dimmer with every streetlight that went out. Your last customer had left you a generous tip, which was sitting on a small, circular tray on the counter. After a few minutes fiddling with your pen, you decided it was time to close shop.

However, it seemed that it was a bit too soon to do so. A figure could be seen beyond the glass door. His bright blond hair stuck out among the relative darkness of the surroundings. Icy, indigo eyes peered through the glass door, silently asking to be let in. You unlocked the door and watched as they made their way towards the bar.

“Is there anything you’d like to order, Sonny?”

“Just the regular.”

Each night, the young officer would come and request a black coffee with chocolate donuts in the shape of a lion’s mane. The order was quick and easy to prepare; it only took a few minutes to complete.

“Your order is ready.” you said, “I assume you know the price already.”

After paying for his order, the policeman ravenously savored his meal.

“Y’know -munch-, it’s rare to see nobody else -slurp- here at this time.”

It was a running joke among those few customers that bothered staying after closing hours that one could see his soul simply by looking into a cup of black coffee. Of course, some would take the jokes seriously and claim that the esteemed policeman had secret connections with the local mafia.

“Considering what they say about you, I’d say it’s a good thing.”

Sonny laughed. “You don’t understand, hearing everything they come up with is funny as hell.”

He then pulled out a notepad. Scribbled on it were various quotes from customers poking fun at him. Only a few pages were left unmarked.

“I really like this one that says I’m a time traveller from the future.” He sighed, “If only I was that cool in real life.”

Those people must be crazy, you thought. Time travel was something you’ve only heard of at the movies; you had never witnessed someone pull it off in person.

“But if you were a time traveler, how would that change anything? I say you’re still pretty cool without it!”

Sonny kept silent for a few minutes, contemplating your answer.

“Well, it’s not that serious to me.” His laugh had quieted down to a mere chuckle, “Normies just don’t understand those who are different.”

You could only nod in agreement.

Sonny regained his composure, “Well, according to my watch, it’s time for me to go now.”

“Thank you for coming by!”

Just before Sonny had walked out the door and disappeared into the night, he said some words in a sweet tone.

“By the way, that movie we talked about last night is premiering tomorrow. Should we go together?”

Oh god, you DID forget about that movie! You didn’t know why Sonny wanted to see it with you specifically, but you were in no mood to decline. It was already 12:00, and you needed to make sure you didn’t fall asleep halfway through, so you called it for the day.

#nijisanji #nijien #sonny brisko #sonny brisko x reader

[non-bionical-mecha-dude]

pls write a 2012 tmnt x artist reader who likes drawing them little things and self portraits. maybe even paintings or anything else!! thank you so much ur so cool

Aww, you're cooler!! Ask and you shall receive!! I apologize if you've requested something but I haven't replied yet, I've been having a lot of problems with my mental health, but I hope to get back on track, and maybe even write some stuff from the TMNT Bayverse movies (I'm obsessed with them right now)

2012 TMNT X ARTISTIC READER

💙🐢Leo🐢💙

Definitely taken a back

But very impressed

He couldn't even draw a stick figure, but he finds it so cool you can draw

Has definitely asked you to draw the captain from space heros before

Sometimes when he gets in his funny heroic poses, you like to do quick sketches of him

Definitely saw you one time, and stayed still just so you could draw him

Definitely a dork

When you drew him one time, you swear you could see stars in his eyes

He thought he looked so cool as a drawing

Definitely felt a confidence boost after that.

You've definitely used him to draw fighting poses

If you ever paint, he word remind you to put newspaper or something down so you don't get the dojo messy

He knows you'll be careful, but you never know what might happen.

You painted a beautiful Sakura tree in traditional Japanese style (which was really hard when you just have acrylic paints and not the special paint specifically made for that kind of painting.) With a light blue sky behind it.

When he walked in to check on you, he thought it was so amazing.

He had never seen an actual cherry blossom in real life, so, this shocked him (before S2)

He loved how you drew the petals, how the pink flushed against the shades of magenta and red.

He loved the simple branches

He felt as though he was in Japan just by looking at it.

He loved it so much, he showed it to Master Splinter, who was also impressed

Leo loved it so much, that he asked to keep it

He hung the painting on his wall, to stare at whenever he felt down

You both definitely have days where he'll chill on the couch watching Space Heros, and you'll be next to him, drawing whatever came to mind, wether it be a still life, figure posing, cartoons, facial expressions, or just practice drawing in general

He enjoys the quiet times together with you

❤️🐢Raph🐢❤️

Doesn't admit he likes it

Constantly says how art is dumb, but secretly, he loves your art work

You tried to convince him, saying how art can help get rid of negative emotions, and he called it stupid

But secretly, whenever he got super mad one day, he draw scribbles and circles, and harsh marks on the blank page, and even though the art wasn't all that great, he did feel a bit better after wards

You definitely caught him doing it when he went in his room mad, but came out a bit calmer and graphite smudges on the side of his hand and fingers

If you ever draw a portrait of him, he will say how you didn't capture his coolness right, but in all honesty, he thinks he looks so much cooler as a drawing, and stares at the drawing for an ego boost

Sometimes when he practices, you draw poses he does and his fighting stances, he rolls his eyes when you do this, but secretly, he enjoys it

Definitely asked you to draw Spike one day, so that he can keep a small photo with him when he goes on missions

But he'd never tell you that, he would just say that Spike would like it, and then say how it went missing from Spike's tank one day, but, he actually has it tucked away in his shell

When he walked in on you painting, he expected you to be drawing something dumb, but he actually was kinda shocked at what you painted.

A red sunrise over the black buildings of New York.

Sure, it wasn't anything major, the buildings were made with black sharpie and a ruler, and the red was just in the background going from red to a gradient yellow on the horizon, but he loved the simplicity of it

It wasn't anything to big or to small

It wasn't anything to complicated or to simple

And it was a picture he could understand the beauty of it.

Definitely complimented the painting, which left everyone's jaw on the floor since Raph would rather be caught dead than to compliment something

But, he just felt like he needed you to know he actually, genuinely, thought it was good.

💜🐢Donnie🐢💜

Very impressed.

Brags to the others that his S/O is so artistic

Melts at any drawing you may give him

Keeps all your little drawings on a cork board in his lab

He finds it cool when you draw people since he can only draw machines or blueprints

If you ever draw him doing a pose as a reference, he will stop until you're done, and then beg you to see the finished product

He thinks everything you make is beautiful

If you ever make a portrait of him, he will be so confused

He doesn't believe he looks as good as you made him look, and says stuff like "I don't look nearly as cool as that!" Or "Woah, I look alot cooler as a drawing!"

Poor baby

You definitely have to show him how cool he looks another time

Will lay his head on your shoulder while you're drawing

Very clingy

If you ever get frustrated with a drawing, he'll help you take a small break, so that you can relax, and have a better outlook on the drawing so that you can fix it later

He doesn't like to see you stressed

One time, when he's going over blue prints and ideas, he sees you painting something on a canvas on the floor

When he's done, he looks over to see what it is, and he literally gasps outloud.

It's a monochromatic purple painting of a calm library (monochromatic means it's one color, but with lighter or darker shades of that one color for those who don't know)

The painting shows dark purple bookshelves stacked way up high, and a lone lighter desk, with a lamp shining on an open book.

He thought the painting was gorgeous, considering he's never been to an actual library, that painting makes him want to go to one

Is gushing over it all day

Showing it off to his brothers

And even his father

Keeps the painting in his lab, right next to the cork board, so that anytime he may be stressed or frustrated, he can look at your art work, and feel at peace again

🧡🐢Mikey🐢🧡

Definitely a bit of a graffiti artist himself

Understands alot of art terminology oddly enough

You both give each other tips and compliments on each other's drawings

He draws more cartoons and stuff

If you ever draw something realistic, he'll say how he thought it was the real thing on a piece of paper

If you don't have a flat surface to draw on, say no more, because he'll flop on top of your legs, so you can lay the paper on his shell while you draw, so it's a win win, he technically gets to cuddle up in your lap, and you get a flat surface to draw on

If you ever draw him when he's in a wacky pose, he'll notice and do more wakier poses, to throw you off, until he does something that's super flexible like, and you give up trying, which he giggles at

Has definitely tried to get you into graffiti

But it's a lot harder than you thought it would be, your fingers got tired often, and so would your arms from holding them up above your head, the the paint seemed to be either to pigmented, or not pigmented enough, and sometimes, the paint would drip, or dry weird, so, you'd definitely leave graffiti to Mikey

One day, while he's goofing of, you decided to draw a still life of ice cream kitty

It was definitely more difficult than you thought, you had to constantly put him back in the freezer, and sometimes he'd get hungry and need an ice cream snack, and sometimes you couldn't get the colors right, but after some long long hours, you were finally able to paint the still life

Mikey had eventually came over to see why you kept staying in the kitchen and hanging with ice cream kitty. But when he saw it, he said "woooooahhhh" out loud

It was just a painting of ice cream kitty, shading and highlights and everything, you had even put a orange background behind him, so the canvas wouldn't look to blank.

He is freaking out, he's bouncing around the walls, saying how cool it was, asking a million questions per second, showing ice cream kitty even tho he's already seen it, and it just super hyper about it.

Is hugging you and spinning you around because of how much he loves it.

Definitely hangs it up in his room, so he can keep it forever.

Art buddies

#headcannons #fanfiction #memes #fanfic #self insert #tmnt #tmnt headcanons #tmnt leo #tmnt raph #tmnt donnie #tmnt mikey #2012 tmnt #tmnt 2012 #2012 donnie #2012 leo #2012 raph #2012 mikey

[corpsoir]

art tips??? that's a broad subject but if you have any to share it would be cool :>

get a sketchbook where you just doodle with zero pressure of it having to be good. this is your sketchbook for rough ideas, practicing and just doodling if youre bored or need to try out new techniques or new pens! i use my sketchbook like this for things like notes and writing down rough ideas or just doodling when i have an idea and need to sketch it out real quick ao i dont forget it

i have so many of these and flipping through them to see your skill evolve and improve over the months is really cool and rewarding!! this is probably the best tip i have for people who are new to art or just want to improve in general but feel stuck whenever they try to start something new

oftentimes i would feel like i couldnt use a sheet of paper unless it would turn out perfect, and thats a silly mindset to have because you cant improve unless you practice. just get a sketchbook made for scribbles that arent gonna look perfect!

ALSO practice drawing without looking at the paper. eye-hand coordination is really useful and not looking at what youre drawing and using only one line for it forces you to stop thinking about what you KNOW an object looks like, and makes you focus on what your eye is currently SEEING.

#hope this helps!! #art tips #ask

[izzyfitzes]

isabelle “izzy” fitz. twenty-six. nightmare baby. 

the clinking of ring clad fingers. containing multitudes. “girls who lived with their grandmas are real.” falling in love with strangers. the gossipy hairdresser stereotype personified. owner of at least sixteen pairs of sunglasses. chain smoker. sex as self harm. laughs because if she doesn’t she’ll cry. never not running from something.

isabelle fitz’s parents were not ready for children. they could barely handle themselves, spending most days after their twins were born ashing cigarettes into empty baby bottles and assuming that things would be “just fine.”

izzy’s brother noah was a colicky baby. the twins were with their parents in the rundown house in chicago for two months before noah’s crying got to be too much and the two were promptly shipped off to their grandmother’s small farm home in glen ellen. she lived there alone, largely dismissed as a crazy old lady. she spent most of her time feeding her sheep and tending to her garden. 

izzy and noah were incredibly different children. izzy could talk to a brick wall. she was excited by most things, bounced off the walls, and could generally have fun anywhere. noah was quiet, usually letting his sister talk for him, and would much prefer to sit in his room and read than go to any of the wild parties his sister would attend. 

when izzy was seventeen, the farm house burned down. it was a whole to-do, and was determined to have been an intentional fire. most people assumed it was set by noah. he was an easy one to blame, and he never denied it.

[redacted]

when high school came to an end, izzy didn’t really know what to do. she wasn’t very good in any of her classes, would’ve much preferred to marry rich and settle down in a gorgeous mcmansion in some quiet suburb and raise three kids, who she’d lovingly name mason. all three of them. 

so she went to cosmetology school. she found a real love for hair and style, and stuck with it, which she very rarely does with hobbies and tasks. she works at tres beux now.

personality wise, izzy is super outgoing, personable. loves to be loved, generally speaking, and will go to great lengths to feel liked, or even loved. sometimes she’s not sure who she really is any more, because she’s so focused on being who she thinks someone else wants her to be. sometimes she gives off an almost manic pixie dream girl vibe in a more chaotic way just to appeal to those around her. she’s volatile and impulsive, doing whatever feels good in the moment with little regard for the later consequences. a lot of this includes heavy substance abuse and a lot of sleeping with people just to feel loved.

she hasn’t seen her parents since she was twelve. they sometimes send her birthday cards, but they’re usually about a week late and hastily scribbled on. a quick “have a good yr” at most. her grandmother died two and a half years ago, celebrated by a small funeral and leaving to izzy her flower beds and about twenty dollars. she lives in a trailer now.

i am a mess for wanted connections im so sorry but i love to brainstorm. also i’m sorry this is nawt my best work but my brain is scrambled eggs trying to put izzy into words. iykyk. 

here’s her pinterest. here’s her playlist. here’s her musing tag. here’s her wc inspo tag.

#bludsintro

[belethlegwen]

What's Henry's most embarrassing moment from his past?

Oh I loooove this question

Henry's MOST embarrassing moment from his past would be that, back when he and Daniel (Captain Grant) were still friends, they had an ongoing bet as to who could collect the most notes from Peter (Commander Martellis).

Peter would write notes about everything. When you had a question that seemed remotely important, he'd walk you through the answer and then to be sure, he'd write you a little a jot-note and then tear it out of his book and hand it to you. Or, if he was just trying to plan something you'd get a note that said "Lunch, second call, discuss dressage practice" or whatever it needed to be. He was ALWAYS carrying journals that looked they'd almost gone through a woodchipper. People always asked, and he'd just say he needed the pages for something more important, but only the people who saw him regularly knew what was actually happening. Very few people left an interaction with Peter without a piece of paper in their pocket with something scribbled on it.

That said, he was the one with the real brains when they were all in Academy, he was just a bit hard to keep on focus and keep on track. He found the notes as helpful to himself as he assumed they were for other people. Daniel would later turn out to be fabulous at keeping him on point, basically replacing his notebooks, but before that they abused the man's general forgetfulness and the ease at which he could be distracted to just... harmlessly collect notes. Their goal with the notes? No idea. I'm sure there was originally some grand scheme to bind them back into books and present them to Peter as a joke-gift or something, but those plans got tossed to the wayside pretty quick.

Daniel was really good at prompting Peter without Peter catching on. He knew precisely the kind of tactical questions that Peter would be most likely to write a little note for. The problem was that Peter wouldn't do it for the same question twice, especially not with Daniel because Daniel was pretty competent. Daniel, also, was pretty prideful and didn't want to appear stupid and like he forgot something like that.

Henry, on the other hand, would kick his own pride's ass if he thought it would stop him from losing a bet. So Henry got a handful of notes by asking the kind of questions Daniel asked but found that it was almost a waste of time, especially if Daniel had already asked it. The three of them being friends, Peter would nonchalantly just dismiss him with "Oh, I drew Daniel up a note if you need it", which just kind of put salt in Henry's wound.

Then one day, as a test, Henry and Peter were getting ready for mounted drills and Henry decided to put his saddle on backwards. He goes through all the motions, he continues to get ready, they're literally about to mount by the time Peter notices. Peter wasn't incredibly perceptive, so when he points out that Henry's saddle is backwards, and Henry pretends to not understand, Peter legitimately believes the man has been riding with a backwards saddle forever.

Peter helps him fix it, gives him a note.

Next time they go to mount up for something, Henry does it again. Peter tries to refer him to the note and Henry practically pulls every muscle in his body with the stretches he's making to try and justify why Peter's directions did not help.

Peter helps him fix it, draws and gives him a diagram.

Henry manages to pull this one more time and gets Peter to make a VERY detailed, almost idiot-proof diagram. But it was enough. His plan was in full motion. Peter began watching Henry like a hawk from that moment onward to make sure Henry hadn't ALWAYS been doing something noticeably wrong, and every time he saw something the sweet man would immediately jot out a note, usually a little diagram, and hand it to him.

Forbes and Neilson loved this. Gibson thought it was a bit shit, but he put money down on who was going to win between Henry and Daniel all the same, so he was hardly about to throw stones from his glass house. Neilson suggested Henry move on to smaller things, like wearing his boots on the wrong feet, gloves upside down and on the wrong hands, lacing his shirt and trousers wrong. It was Forbes though, the utter shit, that suggested he do them all one at a time so he could just keep rotating 'wrong things' to the point that Peter could never remember what he had already given Henry a note for.

This went on

for literal

months.

Henry literally started piling his notes into little stacks based on what specific incident they were for, and he was constantly jabbing Daniel with how many more notes he had. The bet couldn't last forever though, so they agreed that it would only be for the introductory semester of Academy; until they were transferred to their chosen branches of service. With only a few weeks left, they both decided to really work for it.

Daniel and Peter spent so many hours discussing tactics and protocol, history and law, literally anything Daniel could think of, that he was sure they both deserved something akin to several Doctorates by the time the bet was over.

Henry, on the other hand, had a brief moment of worry that he was legitimately forgetting things like what was the correct way to put on a vest, before he realized that winning was more important than knowing how to dress yourself and continuing on with his brilliant, incredible strategy.

The week before their preliminary training period was set to end, they were all officially assigned their own readying-areas for drills and such for when they were transferred to their respective branches. The readying areas were like a little, personal locker-type area with pegs to hang your gear, coats, a bench for getting ready on, a series of cabinets of organizing things, and a tiny writing desk and a small wooden stool for end-of-the-day journaling or letter writing. These were pretty big deals, most people getting nice nameplates done up for themselves, and decorating their little spaces how they wanted.

Peter wanted to surprise his friends and help them celebrate.

For he and Daniel, he had ornate nameplates done up for their areas.

For Henry, he had a large, mounted poster made.

A poster that contained every diagram that Peter had felt the need to draw for him.

Henry walked to his readying area the first day of his Naval Officer training, proud as a peacock with a pocket full of formerly-Daniel's money, and then came face to face with a horror that everyone in that room or walking past had full, brilliant view of.

Everything from detailed writings as to what end of a horse you should be facing when you ride, to the fact that socks go on before your boots, just there. On his wall. In the open.

His friends-- Forbes, Neilson and Gibson-- were elated. They encouraged every rumor that sprung forth from this mysterious, gorgeously made and mounted poster that had wound up in the Naval Staging Room, and even when Henry had finally managed to get the thing off of the wall, one them had managed to save it from the trash and tuck it somewhere for safe keeping, though Henry never did find out who.

All the way up until he and the boys quit to become privateers, the same thing would be said about Henry by everyone in the Naval Training Groups:

He was a brilliant sailor

which was so good for him

seeing as he didn't know which was the right end of a horse.

#gt #g/t #giant/tiny #g/t author #giant tiny #gtauthor #author thoughts #g/t writing #Henry #Captain Grant #Commander Martellis #Background nonsense

[i-fondued]

Fellow ADHD ghestie I am humbly on my knees begging for your outlining secrets /how/

My brain just nopes the fuck out every time I try and I have so many stories that are just not getting written because my brain is three fucking squirrels in a trenchcoat arguing about who’s driving the bus

so. short answer, you gotta push through the blog with whatever does it for you and just write the scene that is in your head down even if it looks like you were drunk in the middle of the night and scribbled nonsence. I also never sleep more than like 6 hours a night these days but i do not recommend that ahahahaha

the long version of the answer is under the cut because I didn't want to clog up people's dashes and I know I have always be curious on other writers process and as an ADHD girlie I get feeling completely at mercy to the squirrels in their trench coat at the end of the day.

So my main advice for ADHD girlies who love to write but can't focus is go with whatever your current hyperfixation [for me its obvi ghost] and use that as the scene and characters of your fic. Even if its a tiny fandom, who cares. You are doing this for you and for fun and serotonin damn it! Fuck the algorithms, this is about you having FUN first and formost.

I'm going to use 'Yule at the Abbey' [refered to as YatA going forward] as my example for this whole thing because a) I can't use SiS without spoiling it LOL and b) its the most recent thing I've worked on thats already out.

Step One: Let the intrusive fanfic idea run wild when it first appears

What I mean by that is that YatA was born while I was driving to work listening to MCR's cover of All I Want for Christmas is You. It just popped in my head like hey girl how about a christmas special?? So I let the plot bunny lead me while I drove. I thought about what Christmas or Yule would look like at the abbey, and what about how cute it would be if Terzo was trying to set up Sister and Copia with mistletoe. Let my brain go WILD while I was able too, once I got to work I scribbled down and quick blurb in my notes app on my phone before I took my morning meds and the plot bunny would have vanished.

Step Two: Write out an outline, either real focused or vauge, of start to finish of the story.

Let me show you what I mean by that. This is a real example of how I outline before I start writing anything [this is part of the outline for YatA]:

Even if you have to go back and edit your thoughts just. get. it. down. Obviously for those of you who've read the christmas special, you know that the first bullet point is not how that went down exactly, and thats okay. The first step in the process is just getting whatever idea that is in your brain down on paper EVEN IF IT IS SHIT!!

I do this with everything I write now, I never used to outline when I was younger and everything turned out fine but now I'm old with more things that homework to worry about and I can't always remember the direction I want to go in so everything is written down, even if its edited later. For my own connivence I have both a notes app and google docs on my phone since thats what I do all my writing on, it also makes it easier for me to do some writing on the go if i have any time.

Step Three: Use headphones or a space where you can focus at all times when writing

My husband doesn't love it but when I am in real writing mode, especially with something long like Sinners, but this is a typical night in our house during the writing nights; i come home from work, we put the kids to bed, and then i curl up on the couch with my airpods and listen to music and ignore everything around me LOL. i have like 400 playlists i use to set the scene in my head, like smut ones for smut or romance ones for fluff. I have a general vibes playlist for sinners but I also have just a general writing playlist i use to focus myself. this is the same tactic i use at work so it makes sense i would then use it when i'm writing something

and finally...Step Four: Try to remember that when it starts feeling like work or not fun anymore, then its time for a step back and maybe reevaluate what you're writing

i know, I KNOW, that this is the hardest one to follow but when i get overwhelmed or writers block i honestly pause what i'm writing and either just go and do something else i enjoy or work on another story. i learned in my creative writing class in school something that has always stuck with me. Steven King will write a whole draft and then stick it in a drawer and leave it for like six months while he works on something else and then comes back to it to proof read and make changes to it with almost fresh eyes. i try for a sped up version of this [with the exception of sis because i do not have time to wait and i had the whole outline done by chapter 5 lol] and work on little ficklets between sinners updates like a little reward, or even work on what is my next big project after sinners.

So yeah, thats the best advice I can give for other neurodivergent girlies trying to keep themselves focused on their writing. its not easy and there are times i would rather chuck my laptop out the window than work on writing, thats when i take the time to just enjoy tumblr and maybe read others writing because useally seeing other people's work really inspires me to work on my own.

you've got this ghestie, i believe in you 💖

#i-fondued asks #anon i am so sorry i totally went off on a tangent about my process but hopefully it helps? #feel free to ask me any follow up questions or anything and i'll be happy to explain to anyone who wants to know more <3

[honeysucklebuttons]

just dropping by with some questions if you don't mind , for how long have you been drawing and do you have any tips for drawing humans ? (i've been drawing for a while but i am used to only drawing animals , but your's and others art has insipired me to go out of my comfort zone and try to draw humans)

Hello!! I apologize for the delayed response, I hope you don't think I was ignoring you! (Mother's Day at a flower shop is insane haha)

But!

I have been drawing basically my whole life? What started as stick people slowly turned into chubby chibis with enormous heads, which turned into slightly more human-looking people in a mix of cartoony anime style, and then taking art classes and majoring in art helped grow my style into still more human-looking people (lol), which is a general mix of cartoony-anime and somewhat realistic?

I'm gonna sit and think really hard and long on good tips for you!!!

Draw from pictures: Still photos have the advantage of allowing you to focus on something unchanging, so you can study one thing in unwavering detail

Draw from life: Watching how bodies shift and move, how muscles contract and stretch, how emotions change the whole posture - all of that will train your eyes to grasp a more loose gesture of the whole picture, the body as a whole

Study human anatomy: bones, muscles, skin - how does it all connect? Knowing what's inside an arm will help you understand how to build an arm from nothing

People watch!! So many body types! So many ways people hold themselves and walk! So many hairstyles and clothing styles! People with walkers and wheelchairs and prosthetics!

Break it down: Basic lines turn into basic shapes, which build up into more and more complex ideas until you have planes of a face, muscles weaving in a thigh

Gesture drawing: Quick studies of the way the body fits in space! Exaggerate it like animators do, stretch and pull the body to make it more fluid and expressive! Practice mode: Time yourself. See a pose, scribble it down loosely in 10-30 seconds. NEXT!

Figure drawing: Drawing a real person in front of you is probably the best way to get used to drawing bodies (I know it can be awkward, but they don't have to be naked, although that does help if they're cool with it! You can even watch your roommate or family member from across the room and go from there.)

Get obsessed: Sounds silly? Well, if you get seriously invested in someone cute you know, or a character you really like, then take it to the next level and DRAW THEM OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

Draw yourself! In the mirror, your hands, from pictures, the way other people see you

Get models: You can totally hire models, or go to a local school who has figure art classes, but you don't have to! There are people around you who can model for you, poseable art models in plastic and wood, you have options!

Watch cartoons/anime/animation: Watch what the animators/character design team choose to accentuate and highlight in a design, what makes them look more human or not

Similarly, study other artists' work (in general): See how art has evolved over time and how different artists express the human body visually! Every artist does things differently, and there's stuff to learn from everyone!

Be okay with literally learning all the time. No experience is wasted, no piece "trash" just because it doesn't replicate what you see. Artist eyes are always working and creating things in our heads, and little "oh!" moments will hit you when you least expect it. The way someone's collarbone curves suddenly. The way someone's smile is shaped, but you never noticed before. Little things.

Websites: There are websites for quick pose studies, for expressive movements, for manipulating your own little model, for all sorts of things!

Literally the bottom line is to draw. Like. The more you draw, the more you will find what you want to change about your style, or what you really like about it that might make it unique! Draw lots of people! Don't get discouraged! Draw scribbly people and mystery people and people in colored pencils only and old people and people made out of shadows only! The hardest thing is choosing what to draw first, but if you're already an animal artist, translating that over to people might be easier than you think!

Also, I know the list is long but I'm chatty and want to help! I hope it's not overwhelming, and don't expect things to change immediately. Let yourself grow and bloom organically and over time.

Draw on, friend!! :D

#art talk #art advice #? #anonymous #ask meh

[whatifut]

Since people liked part 1 I wanted to see where I could take this chapter. Hope you guys like this.

If you like bittybones stories in general, maybe consider a follow.

I'm pretty busy at my day job, so a little feedback would make my day, if you want to see more.

Fair warning, most of the stories I do are drabbles or chapters and I won't guarantee that they will be finished but I will say if I actually discontinue something for good. I hope you can take what I can share for what it is, as a short glance into the fan multiverse of undertale inspired by a whole lot of utmv stories I read.

The characters I write about are own interpretations of utmv characters and I don't claim to own any of them. I generally enjoy utmv content, especially about bittybones and I hope you're getting something out of this.

-----‐------------

Chapter 2

Dust facepalmed “Oh, you know, being happy won’t make the LV flares and episodes go away for good. We’d just be burying our real emotions until we…”

Their little spat was interrupted when the door creaked open.

"Mornin'" the big lump yawned as he entered, not looking at the two who had frozen mid sentence to instead directly shuffle over to the coffee machine.

Noticing the coffee had already been made he remembered he hadn't been in charge of breakfast in a while.

Checking the calendar revealed this had been going on for months now.

Taking a pen Horror scribbled a small black moon in the corner of today.

‘Huh, Friday again..’

The weeks tended to just fly by since the treaty. Well, or it was just easier to tell time since nightmares realm had become more of a neutral AU with actual night and day cycle instead of the constant gloomy darkness they had for a long time.

Pouring himself a cup of coffee Horror moved over to the table, looking at what was on the menu today.

That's when he noticed dust was still standing there observing him like he had something to say but didn't know how.

"'Sup, Dusty?!"

Horror asked,  standing next to dust,  casually sipping on his coffee.

Unbeknownst to them, nightmares goop reacted to dusts rising anxiety as dust pondered whether and how to fill in his giant companion.

Having his fate decided for him was something nightmare dreaded in general,  seeing his enormous underling in front of him didn't help.

So, as nightmare quickly drank down dusts rising insecurity,  he had enough energy to sprout some legs.

A fact dust unfortunately caught on way too quickly.

Making a dash off dusts palm and onto the table nightmare ran towards the edge of the table where he would be able to jump down and merge into the shadows.

As he approached the corner of the table he heard dust growl "not so fast" before he found himself in front of a row of blue bones.

Not wanting to chance running into a bone as dusts lv and the damage he dealt were pretty high, he did a quick turn aiming for the side of the table.

Seeing his goal made nightmare feel relieved.

But it was short lived.

Just before the corner of the table a hack knife was slammed into the table just in front of him.

This time however he hit it face first, holding his skull as he writhed on the ground.

Realization sinking in, the indignity of the situation as well as the consequence of being seen quickly replaced the minuscule pain he felt.

Looking up nightmare had just enough time to prepare for being grabbed by a giant hand, on one of his tentacles no less.

Stifling the urge to hurt the impudent fool who decided grabbing him after giving him such a spook was a good idea,  nightmare strained his neck to look up at that familiar but terrifyingly giant face.

Part of nightmare was wondering if the giant would have just gulped him down like a small squid, had he been first at the table today.

That wouldn’t have gone down well for either of them..

thinking about it though, horror knew how to check if something was edible.

"Careful" Dust admonished, quickly approaching, as nightmare was brought in front of that giant red line eyelight of the usually gentle giant.

The red orb scanning nightmare before quickly moving to the approaching dust,  then back. Like the hunter nightmare knew Horror was,  he didn't lose sight of him for long enough for nightmare to be able to escape.

Observing the small creature as well as his approaching teammate,  Horror relaxed his shoulders not wanting to spook the small being more.

As dust told him to be careful Horror just hummed,  slowly lowering the small slimey nightmare onto his other hand, low enough for dust to easily reach.

Horror looked at dust again, then back to mini nightmare, gently nudging his skull.

"Does boss know we got a bitty? You think we can keep 'im?"

Horror addressed dust, who suddenly went very silent as Horror kept nudging the small goop with his pointer finger,  adorably tilting his head.

Despite his hunting instinct Horror had a thing for adorable creatures only fueling nightmares indignation more as he was nudged and talked about.

Horror was also the only one who could get away with such a display of blatant disrespect without being brought back to reality the hard way.

Still dust couldn't help but be terrified for the big guy for a second.

When Horror noticed the bubbling goop of the small nightmare, who magically got bigger, he paused for a moment,  then looked to dust.

Seeing dusts eyelights extinguished, horror finally connected the dots.

He wanted to get a closer look at the bitty version of their boss to make sure, but when he looked back down at him he quickly rejoiced.

The small goop skeleton had his eyelight extinguished as well, his mouth set in an all to familiar scowl.

With a presence and voice to large for such a small body, their boss ordered the biggest one "PUT. ME. DOWN"

Too fazed for words, horror quickly nodded,  carefully but quickly lowering nightmare to the table.

When nightmare stepped off his palm, horror pulled his hand away as though he had been burned.

Their boss hardly ever used his power to lecture them anymore, certainly not on horror.

"S.. sorry, boss." The big lug mumbled sinking in on himself in shame.

Nightmares goop bubbled again,  though this time he didn't grow.

Sighing nightmare was at a loss.

Of course he couldn't let his underlings literally toy around with him, but seeing horror sink in on himself was the very thing he didn't want to happen.

"Just.. don't get unnecessarily grabby again.." Nightmare mumbled, sitting down at the corner of the table feeling the emotional and magical strain from being discovered.

Holding his head for a moment, Nightmare looked up at his underling as he didn’t receive a verbal answer.

Horror nodded.

To which Nightmare let his shoulders droop.

Looking to dust revealed that he had calmed down as well,  his eyelights almost back to their regular size.

Only a few sweat drops on his skull showing how tense he had been.

All of horrors acquaintances, including nightmare, knew horror was sometimes slow to catch on. Horrors quick reflexes are only barely able to hide the fact his big head wound robbed him of the capability to keep up with his own observations at times.

None of the others blamed him, not even their boss.

As the situation became more awkward due to nobody knowing what to say the door swung open another time. Chatter filling the room quickly, announcing the appearance of the two missing team members.

As the chatter stopped nightmare dreaded what would follow. Fair enough, as he looked over, cross looked shocked, while killers smile just notched up a bit higher.

"No way!" An obnoxious voice rang through the room.

"You’ve actually caught him"

Killer excitedly ran up to his diminished boss and started to poke him in the cheek.

As everybodies emotions tipped more towards amusement with an undertone of confusion and worry, nightmare started to feel nauseous, the only one who pushed that aside a little was dust.

Nightmare could feel dusts anger flaring up towards killer, quickly shoving him aside.

“You knew?!” he scolded the other.

“Psh, call me the sensitive one.” Killer grinned back.

Dust snarled “You’re calling that sensitive.” he pointed towards nightmare “Letting the one who gave us all a second chance starve?!”

At that word all of them looked towards horror, who looked towards nightmare in shocked realization.

Killers emotions flipped at that insinuation as well, his ringed eyelights appearing for a moment, focused on dust as his expression changed into a manic grin. “Hey, you know that ain’t fair, dusty” he sing-songed. “I would appreciate you trying to use that sad empty skull a little more before making such accusations”. While killers eyelights disappeared he held dusts glare.

Dust scoffed.

He knew Killer was right, the manic skeleton was the first to want to break the treaty.

And even though one could easily chalk that up to him being bored and wanting to mess with people, none of them could deny that killer was nightmares second in command and the most loyal of all of them.

But that was also the reason dust was upset, maybe there was another solution and they could put their skulls together.

Nightmare cleared his throat, the ebbing temper of his two underlings mellowing out the nausea a little. “I asked him not to tell.”

Dust grumbled, knowing full well nightmare would have done the same with him if he and Horror hadn’t caught him.

An undernote of betrayal tasting much too sweet to nightmare as his starving corruption absorbed what it could, making nightmare feel bad for taking that away from dust.

The negative emotions in the room seemed to mellow out far too quick for everyone involved, leaving a sort of emotional void for a moment.

Cross, far more used to emotional whiplash as he now was allied to both dream and nightmare, recovered the fastest, asking the question everyone must have thought about at least once “Isn’t there anything we can do?”

Nightmare tasted an undernote of guilt in him, surely because his soldier was also loyal to dream. But there was also that dreaded undernote of hope there.

Now, nightmare had overstayed his welcome already, making him feel tired again.

He wanted to do nothing more than to melt back in the shadows and sleep it off.

Cross’ worry spiked at seeing him this tired… “What if.., what if something similar to dream happens if we don’t find a way?!”

Nightmare snarled at the mention of his darkest past, all their fear spiking for a moment.

“Do Not Speak Of That Blasted Event Like I Will Allow A Repeat Of That To Happen.!”

Now, none of them logically feared nightmare under normal circumstances, but his starved corruption enhanced his negative aura in a way that made it feel like their biggest fear.

Horror was the first to swallow back that fear as he understood the ravenous hunger that must be driving their boss right now.

Also, at the same time horror understood how hunger chipped away at ones sanity.

“What about t’ Village?” Horror mumbled, ravaging his broken skull to find a way to feed their boss?

Nightmare looked up at him puzzled but also exhausted.

Horror carefully moved closer, getting on his knees and looking at his boss.

Nightmare wasn't surprised by this as he felt the neutral emotions horror was consciously broadcasting as well as his big eye scanning him.

At this point nightmare was too tired to argue as horror carefully approached him with one of his hands. It was obvious what horror intended, even though he didn't know where he would end up he knew to trust the big guy. So nightmare stepped onto his hand, hoping for a good place to rest.

Scooping nightmare up, horror brought him to dust.

Horror had noticed in the way the manic skeleton reacted more hostile than usual that he was becoming uselessly unstable.

Without asking for permission Horror let nightmare climb into dusts hood, neither dust nor nightmare refusing the handling.

Feeling nightmare latch onto his cervical vertebrae made dusts insecurity flare up again, but it was quickly sucked up by nightmare.

Just like the voices in his head seemed to quieten down after a while making thinking straight so much easier.

Dust took a deep breath, sighing a thanks and sitting back down in his usual seat.

If he faintly felt nightmares content rumble against his bones, it was no ones business but theirs and if he sent killer a smug satisfied grin nobody saw.

Horror nodded. Pulling Cross next to Dust “You two keep watch.” knowing full well these two had the hardest time managing their negative emotions.

If killer picked the seat opposite of dust to keep an eye on nightmare, it would definitely not be because of his raging jealousy.

Horror didn't try to interrupt their usual spat, knowing nightmare would suck the idiocy right out of them, instead pouring them their usual drinks.

“Lets eat first, boss needs a nap and the food is getting cold.”

#lost #undertale au #fanfics #nightmare #drabbles #minigoop #untertale mv #bad guys #nm gang #shrunken nm #continuation #maybe family #truce

[tonguetiedraven]

This is more a question for everyone, but what do you like to do while writing? Is it grabbing a quick snack or eating a whole dinner? Laying in bed or sitting at a desk? Listening to music or do you prefer to have a quiet work space? (Of course, don't stay limited to the questions I asked, just say what you like doing most.)

I polled my writer friends (from the aoex writers server), and the consensus seemed to be yes to music, but everyone has a specific sort of music they like to listen to (some even having specific playlist for specific scenes/fics) while a few preferred calm and quiet with just a few ambiet noises.

Desks won as the preference, but beds and late nights were also quite popular.

Snacks were not generally used (too distracting) but sometimes enjoyed for refulling to get that final burst of energy for a scene or used post writing as a kind of reward.

It did seem like writing late in the day was the general preference.

As for my own preference, I will do quite literally anything while writing. Eat, walk, sit, lay, crochet/knit/weave (yay for voice to text, lol). I even have an exercise bike for really wet days that I'll type on (can't do it on a real bike or I'll crash, lol.) I don't tend to do it a lot while I'm eating a full meal because messy fingers or easy spillage do not go well with keyboards or phone screens. (Sometimes I get an idea and will frantically try and scribble it out on a napkin.) However, I'll totally snack or drink (tea for the win!) while writing.

If I'm laying in a bed, then I'll use my phone (I don't like to use laptops on beds unless I have something under them because blankets/sheets/pillows can all make laptops overheat) and I will usually only write on my bed later at night after I've wound down and found myself hit with a sudden idea I know I won't remember in the morning. I don't have a desk at my house (funnily enough), and I have a laptop, so most of my writing is done in my living room. Sometimes I'll use my dining table for writing or drawing.

I struggle hard writing in silence. I like to use music (lofi or scores), but most of the time I have some YouTube videos playing while I'm typing. Some times they're lets plays, sometimes they're video essays (typically literary analysis, scary game or scary movie analysis), sometimes they're crafting videos, and sometimes they're funny video compilations. Sometimes I'll even watch something that goes with what I'm writing, but mostly they're more random than that, lol.

I also tend to have two or three wips open at a time when I'm writing so I don't feel pressured to stick to one story if the words won't come for whatever I started with. I don't typically edit as I go--unless it's a big misspelling--because that always takes me out of a creative headspace. When I do edit, I usually do a read over in the doc, and then another read over on ao3 because the different layout makes it easier to see my goofs. (I still miss a lot because beta reading is not my strength xD )

I like to use different doc and font colors when I write, because it makes it easier to pick my docs out in google, and the colors make me feel more creative. Plus, weirdly, the unique color palettes help me get in the headspace for certain stories more easily.

Hope that answers your questions ^^ let me know if you have any more <3

#writing #my favorite is typing away on stormy nights while something a little spooky is playing #and i really don't know why #tea will always be my go to beverage #pringle #popcorn #and carrots tend to be my snacks of choice #i try to make my doc colors match the story #like i have an icy blue for frost bite #a fiery red for avidya #a gray and green for spellbound #etc #i am very good at typing on a keyboard #but phone keyboards make me feel slow and clumsy so i don't use them a lot

[senatushq]

NAME. Lucian “Kay” Ames AGE & BIRTH DATE. 30  & September 22nd, 1993 GENDER & PRONOUNS. Male & He/Him SPECIES. Halfblooded ( Dhampir ) ABILITIES. Fire Manipulation OCCUPATION. Marshal & Writer FACE CLAIM. Dylan O’Brien

biography

( tw drug use, arson, death ) “In front of this window, before you can even glimpse any of this, there are these damn curtains. They’ve always been there, floor length and billowing. If you sit on the window seat, they enshroud you like some kind of translucent grey funeral veil. If the window is even cracked a little, wind takes to them and they’re all around you. It’s something mystical, at least that’s what mother used to tell me. The room was practically hers, she sat on that window with a book and a cup of tea every single morning and let herself be tangled in them. Let herself be thinly concealed from the rest of the world. She refused to tie the damn things down. If I had it my way I’d have tied them back with some kind of ribbon in that godawful fucking color and it would have choked the sheer material like a noose.”

The assignment had been to ‘’describe a presence within your house (a person, an animal, a piece of furniture, an illness, a secret, anything really) and use the five senses heavily” and his teacher had scribbled ‘nothing is too detailed’ with an exclamation mark beside it before copying and printing the page to be sent out. And he’d delivered what he considered to be his magnum opus. Because he spent eighteen years in that house and over a decade later, he doesn’t think he’s ever really going to shake what it felt like to be in it. To be afraid to talk to people for fear of them finding out what he was. Dhampir, son of a strigoi that had fled Europe to hide her offspring in the supernatural hub of Chicago. They were supposed to be hiding in plain sight and yet he often felt like he just sat there watching the world pass him by with no siblings, no father, no friends. It’d been a challenge to even get into public school and even then, he was supposed to go and come straight home. It was no wonder a lonely child became an angry teenager. He’d once thought his mother was doing what she could to protect him, that people were out to hurt them, that he’d never truly be accepted for what he was and therefore he needed to be hidden away. He sat and he seethed and he read and wrote and bided his time until he could leave the confines of that brownstone in the city.

“I was hardly a teenager when I set those curtains ablaze. It started small, a flicker of orange right at the bottom of them, right at the seams edge. It traveled along the stitching, climbed upwards towards the window seat. The grey was quick to turn black, to begin to curl in on itself. It spread to folds in the fabric, creating holes that varied in length like some kind of deadly moth eating away at it. It was beautiful and I just stood there and watched it happen, half of the left curtain twist and writhe in the gentle breeze as if it were trying to escape the flame.” His first taste of blood was at nineteen, he’d built up enough trust with his mother over the years to constitute him taking college classes, he’d snuck out to a party. With most of his social skills being mostly crafted by movies and books, he’s surprised he had any game at all, but he and a boy slipped away. What’d started with lips had ended with teeth and the moment they’d scraped delicate skin and he tasted metal, it was over and done with, he walked away. It’s not like he didn’t know what he was, it’s not like he didn’t know what it meant, if anything that’s all he knew. He’d grown up spoiled and paranoid, he’d consumed every nugget he could about what being a dhampir meant, what he could do. And then he’d moved onto vampires in general, learned everything he could about them, consumed media and books both fiction and non and frankly, he thought he kind of got the short end of the stick. Fangs but no bloodlust, no real allegiance to a bloodline, cut off from a community. His teenage years had been spent journaling, researching the creature he could have been to the point of obsession and yet when he’d been presented the opportunity to indulge in a way a vampire could, he’d fled. It was all downhill from there. The woman he called mother, the one who had coddled him and preached about his safety for nineteen years was found dead in their home. He’d come home to her body after class and there’d been no time to grieve because they’d planned for this. He had to go, he had to take money, a packet in a safe in the basement, whatever he could carry of his own belongings, and he had to get the hell out of Chicago. A fake passport gets him to France to stay with an ‘Aunt’ and once he’s there he experiences what Trent Reznor calls ‘The Downward Spiral’. Because there’s no safety net anymore but he’s also off the leash for the first time in his life and it is too much and not enough at once. Years have been spent curating this person he hasn’t gotten to be out in the world and that person loves the socialization of a party, needs a few drinks to really get talking to people, but once he does it’s all so easy. Too easy almost and alcohol and cigarettes turn into much worse. The supernatural is sought out, he finds vampires, he realizes they both get something out of them biting him and the hole to Wonderland just never quite seems to end. It’s like that for years, some kind of barely controlled chaos. He goes out all night, he takes care of college under a fake name, he’s got dozens of them, he gets a degree in creative writing. But mostly he goes through France, he goes through London, he works retail to support his habits and he keeps moving, always moving, just a boy robbed of a proper childhood drowning in paranoia and liquor. Until he starts sinking his fangs into things for real, until he’s high enough one day to try it and the body pressed up against the wall, the partner he’d been kissing, tastes different. There’s the usual tang of metal but there’s something more, there’s this high that he’s never experienced before and when they kiss again, the blood is all he can taste. It all tastes different, the blood. He finds willing partners in bars, in corners of parties hosted by artsy friends he’s managed to keep. It feels good aside from the high to bite and feed like he thinks he was supposed to but the consequence of the high is the low that takes him from the top of the world, an apex predator, to a ball curled and shaking on the bathroom floor of his shitty apartment. He isn’t stupid, sheltered he might have been but he’s always been far more clever than anyone would give him credit for, he’s far more than an addict. He’s a writer, he’s a passionate person, he is handling himself. That’s what he tells himself in the mirror every day before he leans down to do a line off the counter. The bits and pieces of the supernatural world he’s weaseled his way into he loves. He applies what he knows of their politics, he realizes that technically he’s a halfblood, that it’s a wide category of people that are all in limbo, just like him. He’s stuck up for vampires, he’s stuck up for lycans, but ultimately he’s fought for himself, kept an eye on Cloe Omaira over the years and her constant campaign. There’s a brief period he gets better and he knows healing or addiction or whatever isn’t linear, but his recovery to relapse ratio, if put on a chart, would look like a fucking yo-yo on a string. Cloe Omaira, a young woman he’d met back home, becomes Senator Omaira while he’s in a bar in Berlin of all places and it’s probably the cocktail of drugs and alcohol in his system that really convinces him to pack his bags and go to Rome. Because Cloe is a friend, the only one he has ever really had and she’d done it. He goes and he cleans his act just enough to march into Canal Cakes with a resume that’s decorated in retail positions, freelance writing, and a long list of all the research he’s conducted on the supernatural over the years, all of the activism he could do under the radar. It is stupid, but he is passionate, he arguably is very good at talking himself in and out of things, all things considered. He gets the job, she needs marshals, he likes to think she is proud of him. “The fire was snuffed out by water that made the now burnt fabric cling to itself, made it heavy, made it darker. They were ruined, at least the left one. The right curtain was left unscathed, had been made to watch it’s counterpart wither. My mother fussed over them, but not me, not ever again. I never bothered them after that day. They were replaced, the grey now a sheer white that was tied back with a silver rope on either side. The old grey ones hang in my room now, more for show than anything. I couldn’t let them be disposed of. I go home, I lye in bed, and I can reach over and feel that tattered and charred edge of my own doing…”

He looks back on that paper, the recount of the day that the flame ate away at what was left of that lonely boy in that house. It’d gotten him a passing grade and warranted a trip to the school guidance counselor. Such was life. 

personality

+ sarcastic, passionate, analytical  – calculating, arrogant, stubborn

played by m. cst. she/her.

#takenm #takenc #takenhalfblooded #the susceptible

[honeymoononvenus]

JEEPERS CREEPERS

“Happiness is only real when shared” 

Famed words that were found scribbled in the margins of a Boris Pastemak book belonging to Christopher McCandles, a mere three weeks before his untimely death, alone in an abandoned bus. 

For those unfamiliar with the haunting true story compiled in the John Krakenur book “Into the Wild”, Chris ( or Alexander Supertramp as he liked to be referred to ) walked away from his seemingly comfortable, privileged existence in exchange for a gruff life on the road while making his way through the American wilderness. 30 years after his now infamous death, the irony of the ideal solo journey ending with such a polarising epiphany has not been lost. 

While I personally didn't follow Chris’ path precisely - as in , pack up in the middle of the night, not tell anyone I know where I am heading, leaving only a conspicuous trail of crumbs that link to any sign of my existence - I still did find myself somewhat foolishly romanticising the mentality that it takes to do such a thing, only to be harshly reminded of the reality an endless odyssey does have. 

To any outsider, I fit the extrovert mold perfectly. I'm charming, confident, able to talk to anyone about anything, and have no problem being the center of attention; but deep down I crave a much more subtle intimacy than my perceived extrovertedness would let off . My outer shell is merely a coat of arms to stop anything from penetrating through and the possibility of being seen as ‘vulnerable’, or god forbid.. human. 

So naturally, any time I feel my armor being prodded a little too much for my liking, I run. I suppose that's how I ended up in Italy. Or London. Or Thailand. Or just about any place that I’ve found myself having to quickly acclimate to after a hasty purchase on whichever destination held the cheapest flights the day before. I simply hop on the first thing that will take me far away from whatever it is that is hurting me and refuse to look back. 

I’m a regular Jutin Long, just attempting to outrun some form of emotional jeeper creeper. And don't get me wrong, for a while, miraculously this worked! Some of the best times of my life have been found in the sporadic choices I made. When your ‘creeper’ hasn’t quite figured out where you are yet or how exactly it can lay its talons on you, my GOD what a wonderful time that is! Truly, its all sex, drugs, rock n roll and half naked parties on tropical beaches in the moonlight. Life is pure ecstasy, and totally pain free. 

These days though, it feels as if as if my creepers are becoming fitter, smarter, always always one step ahead, lurking around every corner ready to remind me of the unbearable pain of existence that I thought I had been oh so clever in escaping. No amount of foreign capades can camouflage you from the ominous reality of your own suffering. 

But what does this have to do with some dreamer kids elusive quote? 

Well, when you live life on the whim as much as I, when you continuously throw caution to the wind and insist that geographically moving is the best and only thing to do - it gets really fucking lonely.

 I don't stay in a place long enough to put down solid roots, and roots, as I have found, are generally needed to have a sense of stability.  Don't get me wrong - this doesn't mean I'm a shallow person; strangely enough it's quite the opposite. Since I'm aware enough to know that my quick trigger response is to run away,  I’m also aware that means I probably won't be around a place long enough to root, so I'm able to wear my heart on my sleeve and really throw all of myself at whichever poor sod thought I was enthralling enough to share a beer with at the hostel bar. 

I kind of just hope that by throwing some version of vulnerability out there into the world, it would magically just fill my deep desire for it without actually putting in the work it takes to build a relationship with depth and integrity. At heart, I crave deep intimacy abundantly, but am much too terrified to see what happens if I stick around long enough for it to be reciprocated, so I panic and either completely self-sabotage (typically in the form of word vomit so vile I come across as an absolute nut ) or I run. And spectacularly for me, usually it’s a grand combination of both. 

One thing that no one tells you about being this free spirited spinster, is the guilt that you feel. The guilt that you are missing the important things from the home that you so hastily ran from; nephews' first birthdays, grandparents last birthdays, friends' weddings. The guilt you feel for all of the potential great romances you extinguished before you could truly let the fire of desire light you up inside since the price of pain that we must pay for love seemed too high a sacrifice. The guilt you feel when you're walking around some of the most beautiful places in the world, experiencing first hand the art and culture and food and music that others will never in their life get a chance to; and STILL feeling severely empty and morose. THAT guilt is the worst guilt. It's one thing to just feel numb, it's another to feel totally culpable about the emotional paralysis. 

Mix your new found need for connection, the shame and guilt that’s eating you alive, with the creepers catching you, and THAT'S the moment the Chris McCandles quote can be felt deep within your bones, like the wake up call that you’ve snoozed 16 times already; 

HAPPINESS IS ONLY REAL WHEN SHARED. 

I feel this when I'm sitting and watching the most breathtaking sunrise in the world, only wishing I had a friend with me. I feel this when I'm at a brilliant party surrounded by phenomenal people, but wish that just one of them could see past the facade I’d become so accustomed to putting on. I feel this when I catch a couple sneaking a kiss in front of a monet, after yet again rejecting a budding fling out of fear of my own inevitable sabotage. 

But the best thing is.. I don't HAVE to feel this anymore. None of us do. 

 I mean, take it from the guy who once thought the way to inner peace and happiness was to seclude himself completely and die alone in a van in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness; We simply do not heal in solitude. The only way to heal and begin to feel truly happy is through acceptances of our innate need for human connection. We heal when we let love in even if our entire instinct is to run away as fast as we can. We heal when we call a trusted friend to speak of our loneliness instead of buying another bottle of whiskey to fill the hole. We heal when we admit defeat to our creepers; we put down our weapons, take off our running shoes and let the creepers in. We give them a familiar hug and softly ask them what they can teach us about ourselves, THAT'S when you can finally begin to learn that rooting yourself to places and people is not so scary after all. 

Or , take it from me. Submit. The only way out is through. It’s time to go home. 

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PHOTO: Kenne Gregoire /// Chris McCandles