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#so you get (1) benefit of the doubt
bahoreal · 10 months
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every time i read a fan analysis of the ted lasso final that adds beautiful meaning and depth to his character journey im like damn
i wish thats what they intended to do but i really dont think they put that much thought into it
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chipjrwibignaturals · 11 months
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anyway! one of the jobs I applied and interviewed told me today they’re going w someone else which sucks but like. Ah well, it be like that sometimes.
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crimsonblackrose · 1 year
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I dunno, I feel like if your place has a drainage problem you probably shouldn’t be renting it out to strangers via airbnb. There’s something mildly horrifying about a tub that doesn’t drain and then realizing later that when it does drain it manages to leak and soak under the tiles which never fully dry and squelch every time you step into the bathroom making the bathroom a highly unpleasant location.
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uncledrifter · 2 years
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hi there! i saw your post about eris morn and i've been meaning to do some fanart of her recently but i really don't want to fall under that trap of white-washing her, and this is a genuine question but what ethnicity do you see eris as? i want to make sure i get it right
okay wait I'm going to stop you there.
I think something must have gotten lost here because I really don't think that there is a "right" ethnicity to draw eris morn as. Her origins have been left intentionally ambiguous by Bungie, something that they have done with many other guardians as well. Whether or not this is a good move in terms of storytelling and representation is a conversation that I don't feel well equipped to have, so forgive me if I gloss over that aspect of this.
Its not uncommon for people to see a character that looks like them and then make content for that character which is informed by their own culture. This is one of the really cool things about fandom - getting to see different interpretations of a character from new perspectives and learning about other people's cultures through their art and headcanons is a GOOD thing*.
*(as long as the race of a character does not matter to their story, and you are not taking away representation from another group. Which in regards to Eris Morn and most Destiny 2 characters, I think is the case.)
However I am a white person and I do not have that kind of attachment to the character, so the idea of sitting here pondering Eris Morn's race based of off nothing much other than her physical features makes me feel kinda gross. So I'm not going to do that. I also don't think it matters in this context - whitewashing in fandom has its roots in colorism, which affects people regardless of race or culture.
Lots of people have spoken about colorism in fandom before me and done a very good job of it. I'll provide some links to further reading at the end of this.
Anyway, what I'll do is share some tips that I use myself.
Don't use gifs and other people's images as references. Its very common for both official promo art and fanworks to be doctored in some way. Many of the images being passed around of a character might look like the 'original' but in reality, the image has probably been lightened or filtered already. Whenever you can, collect your own resources straight from in-game screenshots. Youtube videos of cutscenes also work - these are usually not color-corrected.
Don't hide behind limited palettes and bright lighting. This isn't to say that you shouldn't use bright/weird colors in your art, but do be aware of how people's skin actually absorbs light and let that inform your colorwork. The light from Eris Morn's orb is not going to completely wash out her skin, not everyone turns pastel when you put them under a lamp. Luckily most of this falls down to basic color theory, so you can kill two birds with one stone here and get better at art AND avoid whitewashing characters.
Don't give them plastic surgery. Its natural for artists, especially beginner artists, to draw people based on their personal aesthetics of what they find attractive. But you really need to be careful and make sure that your aesthetic preferences don't start overwriting a character's unique features. For example, giving a character a smaller button nose because you don't like the way their naturally big nose looks is… well its racist. look within and work thru some biases if that's where you're at.
Colordrop responsibly. Yes absolutely grab colors from screenshots and other resources, but do be aware of context. Pay attention to the range of midtones, highlights, and shadowed areas on the face. You don't want to pull the lightest skin tone on an image and pick just that one for your canvas - start with a mid range and go from there. Also mind the lighting of the image - if you're drawing eris morn in a dark, creepy hive cave, you don't want to reference that shot of her on Mars, that has the absolute harshest lighting in the game.
But anyway as long as you don't draw her literally pastel, you'll be leagues above the other artworks out there.
Okay here's the links I promised under the cut:
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trying not to be overly negative about season 2 but GOD the occasional uncomfortable moments i had in dungeons and daddies season 1 are fucking MAGNIFIED in season 2. this shit sucks. like, we get it, you think your weird cishet male experiences from 2002 are universal or what-fucking-ever but treating this weird teen girl vs. teen boy binary as real (even for the sake of comedy) is, like, not fun to listen to lol
#like i get it maybe you were a fucking incel in high school but not all boys are like that and its really fucking tiring to hear about#like. maybe im just oversensitive or some shit but i personally dont find that funny#i find it threatening and dehumanizing!#maybe i want an escapist comedy podcast that DOESNT remind me of how cishet men will see me as some object for them to look at#i get so uncomfortable being in spaces where im the only girl or only not-guy there#because im CONSTANTLY worried the people around me are making me into some fucking manic pixie dream girl#or 'not like other girls' gamer girl#just because i play VIDEO GAMES IN THIS COLLEGE VIDEO GAME CLUB#like. AGH#to anyone who hasnt listened to dungeons and daddies but was maybe thinking about it—dont let this put you off of it!!!#the setting for season 2 is a high school setting and all the player characters are teens/teen archetypes#so this is why it's cropping up right now i think#im gonna give them the benefit of the doubt and hope it gets a little bit fucking better as they settle into a groove in this season#(since as im writing this im only on episode 4)#and anyways season 1 of dungeons and daddies is genuinely the funniest podcast of any genre ive ever listened to. ever.#but i think im just surprised (and maybe shocked and a little hurt by realizing some of these cast members just dont have the#awareness to realize this stuff isnt cute its actually really annoying and is making anyone who's ever been on the receiving end of this#behavior is just. not gonna be having a good time#like theyre absolutely not condoning it—theyre making fun of it! but its still not funny to see EVERY SINGLE MALE CHARACTER thirst after the#girl characters. bc this kinda says a lot about what these hosts think real teen boys act like#when i can assure them their high school experiences (that i know theyve grown out of and regret; and i respect that growth bc it actually#does show) ARE NOT UNIVERSAL!!!!!! NOT FOR TEEN GUYS AND NOT FOR ANY OTHER TEENS. LOL. its just not the default!!!!!!#and THAT is whats making me feel all icky.)#god these tags are a mess#will campos youre my only hoe#he (and beth for the most part) are the only ones not on my shit list about this xjshdfnjkndks#ANYWAYS once again dont let this deter you from the podcast#i just needed to scream about season 2 feeling a little weird so far#dungeons and dads#mine
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capslocked · 2 months
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PASCAL
male reader x karina & irene
part 1 of two roses, by every other name
28k words
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It goes without saying that Karina’s reputation is flawless. 
Irene’s is remarkably not.
You're not even staunchly a romantic or anything. You just can’t be assed to manage the distinction between desire and distance. So when the dust settles, the best case scenario is the three of you going around telling people, "all of this is actually a true story by the way."
-
You don't need the extra helping of moody and foreboding, but the wind picks up enough to chill you to the spot.
It blows some of the longer, darker strands of Irene's hair into her eyes and she shivers, too, against the cold as she tucks it behind her ears. You’ve got both hands balled into your coat pockets, watching her pretend like she isn't about to say something you absolutely do not want to hear. Then, a sigh - the length of which is probably unwarranted. You can feel the frost on the air burning through your teeth as you face back out toward the taxi stand. 
It’s gotten late and you're still waiting on an empty cab - you’re realizing there was never a conversation to be had in the first place.
“For what it’s worth,” Irene says, and there’s an indecent proposal just in the way she glances at you. “I had my eyes on her first.”
It’s all on account of some sort of moral quandary, or whatever nonsense Irene pretends to believe every time it comes up. A gross power imbalance; an issue of innocence and entitlement; a threat of abuse. Something, another thing, patriarchal expectations, blah, blah - she fudges around the details, but never ever cares who gets hurt. Not really.
And it’s doubtful Irene believes what she says, not to mention she’s skeptical anyone is even capable of zipping their way down Karina’s denim, working a pair of hands up the contour of her long legs, and making her pant and gasp hard enough that she forgets to breathe.
Well, supposedly - that is anyone, save the two of you. Nevermind the fact she’s always, always been off-limits.
The bottom line is she's a whole decade younger than either of you. This just for starters - only legal for alcohol by some narrow margin. Because between you and your fiancée there are all these rules: no coworkers, no labelmates, no close mutual friends, no personal assistants, no jealous ex-lovers, and absolutely none of her juniors. It’s in poor taste, among other things.
Also, just as straightforward: crossing any number of those lines has its own kind of appeal.
"Okay,” you say, “then maybe you should be the one to tell her we’re taking her home."
Irene's arching her eyebrows at you like a silent rebuttal. She smiles after a laugh, quick and easy, because it's what she's good at. It's what she knows. “Like you weren’t hoping she’d be here, too."
The ash Irene taps off the end of her cigarette falls to the ground like snow. Hitting the pavement as if it might punctuate the thought. That's a rare first mistake from someone like you, and then a second one from her: she thinks she’ll need to defend herself with an explanation, like she’d ever need to justify anything to you.
“Besides, she’s not waiting for me to ask.” There’s a curl to her mouth - and then, she adds, for your benefit, "she'd follow you anywhere."
The twisted irony is that the two of you could pick up any woman, anyone at all.
"I think it’s a discussion for another day," you tell her, serious. She laughs out loud.
"Which one? Who Karina wants, or that you're aching every bit as much as I am to spread her out on our bed and fuck her? Because I'm pretty sure we can both agree that at this point-"
Your palm curls around the nape of her neck with a touch of on-your-feet-thinking: one of these moments that lets Irene sit with the knowledge of how small she really is against you, her head against the collar of your coat, chin angled just so to look up at your face. And there's only a beat that passes between your fingers in her hair, tugging gently as her hand releases to your waist, her teeth clipping against the press of your lips, before a cab pulls up right next to you. You kiss her hard. It probably looks cinematic.
If for nothing other than to give Karina one less thing to overhear when she comes back outside to join you.
"Really not the time," you whisper right into the subtle twist of her grin. Her cigarette's gone out in the snowy mess, but Irene smirks deeper in response before throwing it onto the wet concrete. She grinds it beneath her boot like a reminder, her hand still firm on your hip.
"What, you don't think it’d make her day? Don’t think she'd want to hear all those kinds of thoughts running together through our heads?"
You pull Irene in closer. “She’s not you.”
-
For context - only so you’re aware how it all starts - it wasn’t actually New Year’s Eve, even though everyone had been drinking like it were.
Also for context, it’s not something you were strictly invited to either. Irene’s company holds this holiday party at the end of every year where all of their employees show up (read: idols; Irene likes to argue about work sometimes - to which you have never contested the value of her labor - but your brain tends to fuzz out in the middle, and instead you mostly just watch her pretty mouth in motion). All of the high-up executives and department heads bring their uptight wives and girlfriends to some restaurant ballroom for a cocktail reception that only really functions for name dropping, or influencing the media, or placing side bets on who is sleeping with the CFO - or whose mistress might show up unexpectedly and meet someone's wife face-to-face for the very first time.
It happens to someone Irene knows, once. You pray every year it will happen again.
Be that as it may, there are a plethora of other terrible ways to spend an evening and a half, but it’s all laid bare in Irene's contract - attendance being mandatory; enjoyment excessively optional.
And sure, it’s taken time, but you have gotten used to it: the industry, all of its excess, the inevitable display, the million and one things required of Irene that you, on the other hand, will simply never be able to relate to.
The machine’s so fine-tuned and tightly wound, like clockwork.
"Yeah, whatever," she had said, leaning her hip against your bathroom sink earlier in the day. Her dress laid out neatly across your bed, already pressed, set with her heels and jewelry, everything set on schedule to the point of absurdity.
And so it goes.
You can hear her brushing her teeth through the open door - and see her profile through the hand-swiped-fog on the mirror. She drags the toothbrush to the corner of her mouth: "And before you even ask, yes, you have to come. That's the deal. That's always been the deal - bored, or busy, or trapped talking to some social climbing board member who’s realized the liquor flows fast and free - I don’t wanna hear about it. You’ll be there."
"Uh-huh," you say, eyes fixed on her reflection in the mirror.
"Look, I hate to be the bearer of bad news,” she adds, spits, and lets the faucet run, “but this one’s shaping up to be a really long night.” 
You watch the meticulous effort to pull her dark hair back into a low, neat bun as she turns and comes back into the bedroom, tossing her hair clip onto the bed to reclaim later. 
“So I guess, pace yourself or something.”
"Ever the salesman, Irene," you say, facetious.
"Um, saleswoman, thank you." Her words are slightly muffled by a silk tank top pulled on over her head, then down the flat length of her body until it hits the tops of her thighs. 
It’s not a matter of opinion that she'll look gorgeous in the stilettos, the dress - those earrings that catch light wherever it dares touch her. She'll smile her practiced grin. It'll probably taste sour after the hundredth person asks how long it's been and she tells them she can't remember. But then look - Irene here, still perfectly disheveled: her damp-darkened hair sticking to the porcelain skin of her neck, skin washed free of makeup. She’s beautiful. In a plain and simple way, simple-but-good. Even with the tight little scowl she shoots your direction. It’s a look she has to know could launch a thousand ships; could start a real, actual war; though you're far too charming to know how to fight - you’ve never seen the appeal.
Irene's teeth tug at the corner of her lip like she knows you'd probably end up dying in it. She puts forward this unassuming, nonchalant, “hey.”
She muses it right into a laugh. Covers her genuine smile with her fingers.
"Hey," is how you answer, always.
You’re noticing, now, the strap of her top has fallen just down the petite slope of her shoulder. You want to get your fingers beneath it. Maybe get her back in the shower. You’re never too picky.
And here: an unspoken demand, the thing that always gets you about her - while Irene stands in front of you, her finger looped between the top buttons of your shirt to draw you close. The bow of her lip perked ever-so-slightly, this soft pucker - all pretty in pink. "Before I slip into this dress, you’re going to push me against something sturdy and kiss me until I'm dizzy," she instructs, calm and methodical.
"A lot," you continue for her. You nod seriously, for a moment. "Dizzying."
She closes her eyes and leans in, and you lean into her, too. "Yeah, exactly," she ends up murmuring under a hot breath. "So, get to it.”
And so it goes, and so it goes.
-
"Have a drink," someone keeps saying.
As a matter of fact, they all do: four shots together - or one old-fashioned, or two vodka seltzers, or three of these mystery concoctions that come in a tall-stemmed glass you didn’t actually catch the name of, and jesus, it fucking reeks of prosecco. You pace yourself, within reason. You really do.
Irene gets elusive under the surface, which is to say, she doesn't change at all - not even at the edges.
And though everyone is here to be seen, only a few actually do any of the talking. Irene has it covered - you do your time.
Happy New Year, sorta. You wait it out.
-
She tastes like everything sweet, strong on her heels and sharper on her tongue - and sometimes, it’s not the best mix, given all you can manage is the touch and scent of Irene without actually getting at the insides of her thighs or that tempting stretch of skin under her ear, her neck, down to her chest.
This much, and she has no complaint - hardly seems surprised or inconvenienced - to you stepping her into the wall like it's a matter of instinct.
She just sighs, a short huff. "Don't miss these kinds of parties," she then confesses, right into your mouth, her warm exhale filling you whole. The sounds of people laughing and champagne glasses clicking nearby, a new song starting up, it's all an unnecessary backdrop, and Irene isn't distracted by a single bit of it.
Character, setting, scene; it’s all rather textbook, no? 
You know what the sounds mean, the soft hums, the lingering touches, the firm press of your palm into the dip of her waist or the slender line of her back. She knows where all the cameras are because she knows everything that anyone could possibly ever want to know, such as the fact that this empty stairwell is a perfect place to start, that there isn't a real plan as to where this might go - or when it should end.
And you should know where not to press - or bite or grab or leave a mark - not in some liminal space, nor some vacant practice-room, not beneath a desk, not behind a curtain. No, not here, cloaked in shadow and secrecy, another scandal in the making. Not that the knowledge stops you from testing out the lines, from drawing little patterns up Irene's waist, slipping one hand along the barest skin where her dress has hitched up along her thigh. To a boundary, the low pitch of her voice, some suggestion like, "not here, are you serious?" mumbled across your lips like it really doesn't matter what gets said or does not.
She’s pinned so properly, so precisely, that the discord between her gentle coaxing, and your hard, bruising edge - that sheer incongruity between what you should do and what you should not - can make the adrenaline spike.
She kisses you harder - and harder, and harder. She catches the small sigh you let out. She kisses you breathless.
You can’t shake the feeling that you’re wasting an opportunity, given that you’re both dressed to the nines and are usually more homebody than anything else. Isn’t that the irony of fame? You sign up for an escape, and spend your life running away.
Irene eventually sinks back into the soles of her heels, wiping her mouth with the back of her wrist, and she smiles so easy. She tugs at the cuffs of your jacket, sets your collar flat and proper.
"I'm thinking," you hear her say, taking stock for herself, the flush high in her cheeks, the tousled sort-of-curls now bared, "in half an hour, if you feel like leaving early, we could, oh, I don't know - escape?"
Escape to a bed with a door that locks, you assume she means. Irene wants; you deliver - however she'd like.
“Sounds tempting,” you tell her. She laughs against your shoulder. "Are you waiting on someone else to sweep you off your feet, maybe? Another offer?"
"Uh, always," she scoffs. It's the little things, confidence, and certainty, the honest-in-practice; how her palms sit soft and secure, cupping the angle of your jaw, one hand, now, toying with the knot of your tie like she's contemplating just how it might fall off of you later. Irene shrugs, leaning her weight back against the wall.
She taps a finger to her lips. Ends up saying, very solemn: "Thirty minutes."
As if you had any intention of absconding without her.
-
Irene holds true to her word - she catches you on the second to last pass around the banquet room. Some executive with a slack mouth is just launching into what sounds to be a spiel about a merger - it's unimportant, not well-versed, so Irene sidles up to you, and immediately steals your attention. It doesn't bother you in the least. She curls her finger into the cuff of your jacket sleeve, and without really being prompted or asked - and only, probably, due to the clear discomfort she has being there with anyone else - she begins dragging you out of the room; you, her ticket out of hell.
"I'm so sorry," Irene dons the industry smile and is probably charming. It's difficult for you to tell. You follow her blindly. "So sorry," she tells someone else as you exit, just before you both disappear entirely, "We're leaving. But, we'll see you next year, promise!"
A real celebrity.
The two of you suddenly a duo - and for everyone’s safety, the way it should probably always ought to be - here’s how it’s all supposed to go:
You, standing almost amidst a bank of snow gathered at the curb, your coat fanned out around Irene, shivers racking up her slight frame. All hidden just enough that if anyone were to notice where your hand ends up arriving at the narrow of her waist, they might think: 'it's not really any of my business,' and look away.
Her, curled beneath your touch - even the single press of your fingers over the small of her back as a stranger pulls a car up to the curb; or, the pull of you that ensures the driver can't actually see what you're both up to, what you're hiding; the little reach she makes into your pocket for a lighter, smiling appreciatively as she presses her cold face to the crook of your arm, your jaw, the juncture of your neck; a safe space.
“So.” Irene will look up at you, pale moonlight gathered in her lashes. She’ll make another face: this thousand kilowatt grin or her brow raising - sharp, quick, there-then-gone. She'll turn the lighter over in her hand once, twice, and say, “how long has it been since we’ve done anything social?”
You’ll know it’s not what she means, but you’ll offer her the out anyway: "could go downtown - there's a place you've probably never been to. Might even play your style of music, if you're really lucky."
Irene will arch her eyebrow as she raises the cigarette to her mouth, lit up before you know it.
"Is that right?" she'll say, dismissive, a smoky tendril curling up over city neon and catching starlight.
You're no stranger to what’s actually being suggested - an unspoken sort of arrangement. All because Irene sees herself as being above, hiding her intentions in euphemism, tact; in long, slow drags; in lilting lashes - while she's fully and shamelessly aware there's nothing virtuous about it.
Who the hell else could make it sound dignified, pretty even: ménage à trois.
Then, you’ll do your part. You’ll help interpret: another girl, gorgeous and probably unclothed, another bad decision, or two, the three of you finding yourselves back in your apartment where Irene will not hesitate to run her tongue up the side of a sweat-glistened neck, to tilt her head and whisper out a mantra of, honey, sweetie, anybody ever tell you how good you look between a woman’s legs? Or, fuck, let’s get you out of those jeans, let me take you all in, how the fuck have we not gotten our hands on you before?
Which means the question you really ought to be asking sounds more like, “maybe we can invite someone over?”
You’ll meet her eyes as they flick up - a lazy expression, easy to read. "Bingo," she’ll say, blowing smoke and even more caution to the wind.
Almost to a fault, everything she does draws attention. Every fool with a blog and a camera posted outside of an event will have her labeled on-sight. You can already see the headline - because the only thing worse than everyone thinking you're the antagonist is looking the part. The imagery, red carpet, sexy evening dress, sultry, regal. The caption, Bae Joohyun - they use her government name like they really know her - sulking in smoke, or thirty flirty and thriving? below a thumbnail of her holding the cigarette, with your suit jacket draped over her shoulders. She's a total tabloid darling. Irene the temptress, or Irene, ice in her veins, or Irene - "How does she look so fucking gorgeous without makeup?!" or "Do I wanna hate her, or wanna be her? @RedFlavor_ROYAL," or "In every shot I feel like Irene has me staring into her soul."
Add that to the fact the girl’s utterly shrouded in myth.
Everyone running amuck with speculation; she's the girl-next-door, she’s the fantasy-in-real-life, she's someone everyone could see themselves fucking - she’s the heroine they say, the villain, the perfect wife, the one-that-got-away. They never do decide.
Though there’s only one opinion she’ll concern herself with, and only on occasion: yours.
Her fingers will come in the dark to trail feather-light from your collarbone, between the rise and fall of your shirt buttons, before pressing open palmed to your chest to still right there, and she's such a pretty thing in the plain black dress, all yours and very much in the mood - which you'll already have reason to know, in part from having felt your way around her no more than a hour prior, but also just the way Irene's been looking at you from beneath her dark lashes all evening, that subtle predatory gleam in her eyes.
You’ll hold her close. Irene will have the audacity to comment, “love you,” in this delicate little whisper, quiet like it could go either way - affection or gratitude. Maybe a touch of both.
A car will shortly arrive, pulling up to the curb with snow melting under its tires, headlights in your eyes, and then finally, in no particular order, your heart hammering: the click of the lighter, the falling ash, the sweet easy laugh, the crunch of ice under foot as she steps down beside you, the soft sweep of your arm.
You have no complaints about the proposal. A lack of argument or dispute is basically the same thing as consent, isn't it? For all intents and purposes, as a whole, it's really kind of a win-win:
Irene needs variety, which you're well aware of. It's only natural for someone who can have anything they want. And, sure, you happen to be a willing participant when it comes to satisfying the occasional whim.
So - the conversation will follow you right into the backseat of the cab, simply to iron out the details. 
“Tall. Beautiful. Soft, soft, soft - like cashmere, a luxury brand," Irene will have one heel off and her knee braced up into the back seat while the other leg extends across your thighs, fingers running along your coat collar to make idle circles against the exposed skin there. "Or, at the very least, someone with a little more bend to their character - you know how those prim and proper types always get a bit lost in you.”
"And wouldn’t you know."
It’ll sound smooth, probably. Irene will roll her eyes.
“So, okay,” you'll return to her, right after instructing the cabbie how to get to Irene's place. None of the implications here are lost on you. “You have anyone particular in mind?”
"Hm, I’m thinking."
You can picture it, roughly: Irene's whole body sunk into the dark corner of the seat - one leg idling over the other. Her foot bouncing at your thigh. She has her heels in one hand, earrings in the other.
She’ll look wistfully out the window; the intermittent flashes of city lights casting her face in different hues. The curve of her jaw; the stately line of her nose; her thick black lashes - composition and subject. It's this kind of attention to detail that the cameras scramble to pick up. It’d be better if they got it for the right reasons.
You’ll pull out your phone. Start the usual scroll from the top of your contacts. The girls you know, the girls you don't, the ones who might be awake or who definitely are, regardless of time of day or night.
Irene will finally perk up, gleaming.
Someone cute, she might say, only because she'd rather not admit, someone like me. There's limits to her vanity insofar as her taste - in all sorts of things.
But she does like the idea of it. Someone young and pretty and impressionable; someone naive, or tiny and helpless; it's never difficult to find the girl who will fawn over her - all wide-eyed and doe-faced the instant Irene floats her fingers across her collarbone, smirking - when she starts at the zipper at the back of her neckline and says, "we’re going to see how wet I can get you," without missing a beat. Someone who will eventually say please when Irene gets a little stern and tells her, "ask me what I'm gonna do to you," in a rasp so smoky that it would make the cigarette seem blasé.
But that, you suppose, is the nature of Irene. A touch domineering. A little more than just a pretty face.
She always takes, but she takes gently - a push here, a pull there, she knows people will give her anything.
It will be more obvious when there's a small voice trembling between the two of you, twisted up in your sheets and simpering with the gentle sort of affection that Irene deals so expertly: two fingers sliding up, pressing down. Curling, beckoning. Slow and tender, without giving up that she's looking for any soft spot; a weak point. Some vulnerability to exploit.
It'll be right after whichever plaything of the hour pulls her lips off yours, off the length of your fingers - or when she unfastens her mouth from the hard shape of your cock with an obnoxiously loud pop: "do you guys do this kind of thing often?"
And Irene, without even an ounce of hesitation, will rip right into the sheer of her stockings, letting out an aggressively casual laugh. She’ll plant a kiss somewhere deep. Say, "oh, honey," as she nuzzles into the crease of her thigh. "We're pretty new to this too."
Everyone, just - believes her. For the same reason you suppose they believe she's perfect. She’s good, really good at all this.
In the taxi, Irene's foot will continue to tap against your leg, until you're stopping her by covering her knee with your hand. As for now, the evening will remain all but written in stone. You'll run a hand through your hair, you’ll lean an elbow against the window - the whole while, ignoring the sudden itch between your shoulder blades at the thought of something else. At the thought of all the other girls who'll take an instant liking to her. Who wouldn't. 
The light will change. The intersection will empty. The radio will turn to static.
You'll eventually offer up a name like, "Jennie Kim," among others. Moving alphabetically down your contacts list. Taking you a long while to make it through the 'K's.
"Hm." Irene's soft hum of disapproval, non-committal. "Are you asking, or telling?"
The difference won't matter. "I'm suggesting," you'll say.
You’ll watch how Irene turns the name over in her mouth a few times before smiling - how she knows, there's the smallest part of you that has her held in a certain light. "Maybe," she'll say, tapping her phone against her cheek in the contemplation of whether or not this is a tentative no or a provisional yes - when really what she'll avoid an answer with is, "aren’t we a little tired of Jen?"
Tough to say.
Good, sweet, and just naive enough to get twisted up between you, in her case. Oh, Jennie’s the type of girl - you'll stuff your cock in her pretty little cunt while leaning into her, taking her arms and pinning them to the base of her spine, so she can't reach and can't claw and can't make an utter fucking wreck of herself. The two of you have known Jennie for too long, is what will strike you then. And a moment later, the idea of sinking into her ass from behind with your palm flat and warm against her hip and your voice husky and deep in the way she likes, and saying, god, fuck, Jen, you’d let me do anything wouldn’t you, you’d let me cum in here too.
And - she would, really.
She wouldn't even complain. Her face would be pressed so firmly against Irene's thighs, and she would whimper, not beg. Even though you know it’s what Irene might prefer; how it makes her look real cute - cheeks stained crimson as the syllables roll around her tongue before being forced out into the open.
"I think she's great," you might say out loud, lowkey.
And in a voice that is louder than strictly necessary, Irene will cut in: "she lets you finish in her ass, and then not even three minutes later she'll say it was the best lay of her life, of course you do."
It’ll make the cab driver clear his throat.
"What you’re saying is ‘no.’"
Irene will frown, thoughtful, but not conceding anything - perhaps she means hold onto that thought for now. If nothing else sounds particularly enticing, we'll call it a maybe. "I’m saying: Jennie is. I don't know."
You can hear the end of her sentence: not quite good enough. Not this time around, but someday, sure, someday soon.
"And for the record," Irene will follow, casual, with a dismissive hand wave. "Just because you got to her first doesn't mean she's ever liked you more."
The few that fall afterwards will never make the cut. Irene will turn them all down. Jisoo - no, sorry, look, she's so, so pretty, Irene will be trying to explain, gesturing in a way that's hard to interpret. "But a little too stuck up for my tastes."
You've been speaking in code for years. She means: way, way, way too straight.
"The blonde though," Irene will try right after that. “Daisy, or Lily, oh god something or another, what was her name-”
"Um, do you mean Rosé?”
“Yeah.” Irene will sink back into the leather, sipping down a memory or two and shifting her skirt up the top of her thighs.
You'll consider the angle. Your options: Rosé on her knees right inside the foyer of your apartment, Irene's hands wrapped tightly in her hair, controlling the rhythm. The way she gets her fingers spread under Irene's knees and draws her forward, pushing up with her eager, prying mouth - licks and licks, nosing against the heat of Irene's pussy until she’s gasping and locking her hands around the younger girl's head to steady the jerk of her hips.
Then, you'll laugh out loud. Because you know, Rosie isn’t anywhere close to straight enough. 
And the back-and-forth of what-ifs and could-bes will follow. An endless string, a laundry list. Where Irene makes a face for every name, every suggestion: too messy, or too innocent, or too sweet, or too boring, or not nearly shy or gullible enough, or whatever other bizarre caveat she finds to slot between all of her impassioned criticisms. The cabbie will be shaking his head at some point too, because the question hangs over the taxi at large: 
What exact criteria could possibly be good enough for the distinguished tastes and sensibilities of Bae Irene?
-
(The truth is: it doesn’t go like that at all.)
-
Enter then, Yu Jimin.
The run-in starts there, downstairs, out standing in a pool of warm, yellow light. The snow flurrying about in the glow of a street lamp - melting into where her smoothed curtain of jet-black hair spills over her shoulder and trickles down her sleeve. She looks a little cold, but not noticeably shivering. There's a red flush to the exposed length of her legs, between a pair of knee-high boots and the short hem of the coat itself. The stockings underneath offer little in the way of wintery protection - nor do the little bows that rest at the the bands of elastic around her soft, pale thighs - though it's obvious to anyone who's looking why she'd choose to wear them.
An assay into form over function. She's never cared for pragmatism.
But the lines around her are pristine, a clean-cut of shadow and substance; you take a step onto the curb, feeling yourself fall right into the foreground.
Look: you know Karina. You both do. Enough to recognize where it’s calmest before a storm.
Irene eventually calls out her name into the silence, and there is a split-second where her fingers reflexively wrap around the crook of your elbow. Almost possessive.
A car rushes by. Karina turns with her ungloved hand holding her cellphone to her ear and she's fucking gorgeous as can be, always pinning you with these big, unapologetic eyes - strikingly and somewhat deceptively innocent beneath her sharp brows. A breathy huff in response; she's otherwise unaffected.
Her shoulders shrug in easy dismissal; a quirk of the corners of her mouth. She slips her phone back in the pocket of her pea-coat. "Oh, how we all doing?"
Not for long, the question lingers.
"Fine," Irene finally replies, though her voice doesn't rise above a disinterested murmur.
"Easier, right? To fight for breath down here than it is up there," she says, pointing her gaze up high into the rafters of the building, and in a lot of ways, you realize, she's just like Irene - sweet, charming, this uncanny ability to make you think she's close, when she isn't actually looking to share anything. When she hasn't exactly decided that she likes you or anything at all.
You squint slightly. Take in where her silhouette appears darker against the backdrop of city lights, blending with the velvety black, bleeding into the ink-smudged night sky.
"There's certainly something to be said for flying under the radar at these things," she continues, taking one step closer towards you as if for comfort. Or privacy - to guard against anyone who might walk by.
"You've still got it easy," Irene says, "that, and everyone thinks you're too pretty to go after. No one even seems to consider the idea, it’s insufferable."
"Jealous?" Her tone is playful. There’s a smirk she’s suppressing - until she can’t hold it in: an unexpected, stunning smile, dimple and all. This incongruously kind face.
Oh, and listen, no one gets it better than Irene.
"No," Irene exhales, hot. “Not at all.” You can see where the thin plume of her breath hangs over her like a cloud for a moment, thinking, before dissipating against the harshness of a frigid December breeze.
"Really." She smiles at you again. Makes a sound that could be a laugh, you don’t know, the wind takes it, far away.
"Are you out here waiting for someone?" you have to ask. 
"Loaded question." Karina purses her lips for a moment. Her long eyelashes blink once, twice. "Because, I dunno, aren't we all?"
"Some of us more than others." Irene speaks quietly, moreso to herself than anyone else - but somehow her voice carries.
"Cheeky," Karina says, and this time she does laugh. "No. I'm waiting for a cab. I've had one hell of a night, and no interest in spending the rest of it in some rising socialite's bed, doubters excluded, because - look, I'm happy for you guys, I guess? You're gonna get married," she claps slowly, slow and mocking, slow enough that Irene rolls her eyes, "-or, the two of you will make a statement saying that you are - either way it sounds fucking exhausting - congratulations to you both. But seriously, congrats."
This is sorta how you've always known her. 
Faintly-hinted secrets, flirty half-truths. Her love life is an utter wreck, but that’s not something you’re supposed to know. So that's all she gives, which is more or less how everyone knows her. It's the only way to survive, probably, in a world of glitter and glamour, when everyone's vying to look, to feel, to take, and take, and take. Irene knows how suffocating it can be - she doesn’t lie about it, not to you, which is the only reason you're so well-versed.
Point being, no one wants to admit to any cracks in the fantasy; the gold too shiny, the surface too slick, the mirror too smooth for that illusion to slip.
"So go grab a guy with a half-decent smile and get him to buy you a drink about it," Irene suggests, derisive, "arch your back, push your tits out, get creative. I doubt it'll be much trouble at all."
Karina looks down, back up - with a slight chew of her lip, saying, "you just have me beat in all the important ways, I suppose. You got it in the bag, no real competition."
Irene is smiling, but her expression is unimpressed; it doesn’t mean much, really, to be her friend, her colleague, or worse, her opponent. Irene is calm like an evening in July, a low, cool, languid feeling. "I don't mean to be a prick, but, aren't you a little young to be so jaded?"
"Gosh," Karina’s grin doesn’t change, but does turn a touch wicked, like she's biting back. "I'd hate to be around when you do mean to be a prick, but maybe we'll find out - you know, down the line, someday.”
Irene tuts softly. It sounds patronizing. "Please, you'll have to forgive me - for mistaking you for someone more aware of how the rest of us work."
“You're one to talk, Irene."
“Careful,” Irene warns.
"What, you gonna set me straight?"
"Right." The way the word rolls off Irene's tongue, slow, thick, bitter, like molasses; like the coffee she has when she's tired, like the cigarette she swears left and right she’s cutting out and the vodka she needs you to reach for in the upper cabinets, like the person she is after midnight when you've let her keep drinking to find the limits to her inhibition. You understand Irene too well. And no matter what anyone says, you will not have the facts wrong.
There's no kindness to the way she laughs. None.
She tilts her head to you, grinning: an honest grin, her favorite thing - inimitable, unique, and hers alone; her version of cruelty is what will always have them doubting. You hold her gaze as she adds, "of all things, right now - wouldn’t you just love to set her straight?"
-
Depending on who you ask, you’ll get different results.
Irene insists you kissed Karina first, probably out there in the snow - god knows how cliche would that be.
She also insists that it was you who suggested that “there’s a lot more sense in splitting a cab,” and then minutes later, “please, it'd be no trouble, just let us pay. Our place is five blocks that way," and Irene - being Irene - mentioning it's actually quite a bit further, but hey, it isn’t worth splitting hairs over. And it's not worth explaining - she shuts you up with another kiss, pressing her weight hard up against you, the arm she slings around your neck.
Then in a sort of mythologized version of the timeline, it's you who makes the proposition - invites Karina upstairs, with the charm that Irene knows is usually reserved for her benefit alone: that slight tick of the brow, the delicate slant of your mouth, the confidence you seem to have in thinking no one will ever say no, no matter how brusque the invitation-
"You two are unbelievable. Is this really your standard procedure?" Karina asks, once you're through the door, or maybe during a bout of smalltalk in the kitchen. Something flirtatious; and suggestive, and maybe a little offhand. A pointed glance downwards, back up. All it really will take. "You get some girl into your home and they're just so overwhelmed and dazzled and in love, they can't even make eye contact for longer than a second? Because that's quite a line," a soft huff, the exhale that seems to carry the faintest note of a sigh. You could call it wistful. Just this side of romantic; very attractive.
“That’s more or less the gist of it,” you offer.
“You’d be surprised.” Irene is lingering on it, back against the counter beside you, laughing. "Some people are more than happy to be swept off their feet."
"Imagine that. If that's how this is meant to go, then tell me," and Karina lifts her chin, a breath drawn slow and deliberate, "what exactly do prince and princess charming do next?"
Consider that Karina’s interpretation of events is closer to reality: no pretense. She is not drunk, and in this story, she never will be.
But it's the slow-burn thing, the rivals-to-lovers thing, the sexual-tension-through-conflict thing, the white-hot-blistering-rage matter gone awry. Not a series of happy accidents, but a result of intentional circumstance - this slow arc of descent. She knows exactly how Irene is tightly wound, and which thread to pull to make everything start to unravel. She'd flirt with you right under her nose - say things in this obnoxiously girlish tone, pout a lot, lean into so much innuendo it becomes impossible to miss the meaning, or the sincerity behind it.
If you had to guess - Karina’s been pining since forever, since Irene accidentally etched her DNA into the girl upon saying, carelessly, that she’d always seen some part of herself in Karina. Probably around the time Irene wrapped a palm over an expanse of bare thigh, just beneath the hem of her skirt, telling her, you're getting way too pretty for your own good.
Doesn’t matter who you are, that’ll fuck you up for real.
And it's not just how she looks at Irene when she thinks no one is watching either; swings and roundabouts, Karina probably can’t keep the thought of you sprawled out over Irene’s petite little frame, or Irene kissing you hard while wrapped around you tight. Your hand, her hand, intertwined and picturesque, sliding down Irene's stomach. Together - and so very without her - fingertips stroking lightly over Irene’s clit, gently dipping inside her.
Irene is not stupid. She picks up on everything, and there's a lot to unpack:
"Can you believe it? Minjeong just asked me if I've ever kissed a girl before," Karina had said to you once, ages ago, between a workout or dance practice, something or another - she was wearing a loose-fit tank top and very intent on showing off. She seemed then to be taking mental note of the face Irene put on, the look of someone trying to hold in an aneurysm.
“Well,” you played along, because you’re not really without blame here either. "Have you?"
"Oh my god." Karina knew what she awas doing, the playful slap to the chest, the lingering touches she’d have on you every chance she could get - total fucking coquette - anything to get a rise out of you, your fiancée. She hushed her voice down to this strategic whisper that Irene could just overhear: "of course not."
You better believe Irene broke her composure not soon afterwards, after Karina made her exit. 
"Do not fuck her," she demanded, firm, "I don't care how good you think she might be in bed, or what she would probably let you get away with."
You remember the knit of her brow.
“Do not.”
You’re sighing, profoundly. The memory - not to mention its shocking clarity - has put a smug sort of satisfaction into your bones, indulging. The nip to Karina's jaw, a hot, open-mouthed kiss to her shoulder. A hand tracing down the curve of her hips, under the guise of helping her settle between the cushions of the couch. You feel like you catch the color flooding her cheeks. Then, Irene, her pretty little shadow: the steady presence over her other shoulder.
"What." Karina sounds defensive when Irene pulls her lips away, but the hand she has buried in Irene's hair doesn’t appear to be going anywhere. "Are we going to pretend for a minute I don't see the way you're both looking at me right now?"
"Don't be stupid, darling, of course not." Irene leans up close again. Kisses up her neck, behind her ear, and coos, "the two of us, you just seemed like you were needing someone, that's all," and then whispers the words, barely audible: "I mean look, who wouldn't want the three of us right now?"
Karina hums. "Ah, so - you think I deserve to have a little fun."
"Maybe," she draws it out a little longer.
Your hands dip below her knees, running over the silk-slick surface, tugging at the frills lining her thighs - feeling up over the outline of where her body curves under her dress. Over the dark pattern printed across the front.
Karina swallows visibly, her head dropping back against the armrest, the couch cushion; by the way she shudders slightly and starts breathing, you realize that it's probably been a while since she's had much experience being in a position this helpless. You draw your fingers lightly across the bareness of her skin, right as Irene finds that sensitive spot just where her neck slopes to her collarbone. You trace along the fabric until you have her squirming beneath you both.
She sucks in a breath as Irene drags a touch right over the obvious seam, across the expanse of her hip, and despite your fiancée being a tad forward -
"Both of you should know I'm not that type of girl. Who puts out so easily-"
"Likewise," Irene practically sneers, not missing a beat and threading her fingers beneath her jaw, feeling her pulse against the pad of her thumb.
"Yeah, well. If this isn't a setup, then, what-"
“A setup.” Irene breathes the word out, contemptuous, which is almost as if she says yes, you figured it out, and she starts to lean in closer - the distance between the two of them now negligible as her mouth tightens with her derision. "That is awfully conceited of you."
"Ha."
You choose right there to run your palm between her thighs and cup at the front of her pussy through the skirt of her dress, squeezing tightly. There has to be an element of good cop, bad cop to this whole routine, and you'd be remiss not to participate in the former. Irene's glare is starting to become pretty intimidating.
"The way I see it," you begin, and it's so gentle. Easy to slip through, but easy enough to grip - no threat, or indication that she should stop rocking forward to the motion of your fingers, toying idly. "There's no catch. Only: Irene calls the shots. If you end up with a crush, or worse, think you're in love," a light squeeze to illustrate the point, the dig of nails, not too rough, but definitely drawing attention. "You've gotta walk it off.”
Karina just runs her tongue across her lips, sighing.
“No strings attached, no special treatment. Or anything."
"Oh." Karina is looking straight at you, dazed - as your fingers work harder, picking up where her hips started rolling a second before. She licks her lips. "You're telling me that I'm going to get fucked so thoroughly here, that it's gonna be a problem."
"Actually," you pull away, pushing her dress up so you can touch up ever higher this time. Rooting between her soft thighs. "I can't make any guarantees. You'll need to convince us first."
There's a laugh, from a spot inside her diaphragm - and yeah, there's no denying the reality here. She's nervous; or excited; or nervous-excited. Karina just lets it pass, an exaggerated sound in her throat, before gasping on an exhale of breath: "convince you to fuck me?"
"Between us, we've kissed our fair share of pretty girls in the heat of the moment," Irene supplies.
Karina laughs. Starts saying, "in that case, can I start by confessing that this whole exchange has left me pretty fucking wet-" 
You slip one finger down the rise of her panties, this lacy little number she probably picked out with sordid fantasy in mind. 
"Oh god," she says, voice drowned in her throat, husky, and sultry - it’s really hard not to appreciate the girl, like this - and then she closes her eyes, saying it again, "oh, yeah, like - like that. Okay, thank you."
Irene puts a hot kiss into her lips, and a subjugating silence stills over the living room, softening around her small voice, her breathing. Everything comes together so seamlessly, so effortlessly: 
The click of Irene’s heels against hardwood, these soft sounds of wet tongues twisting and bodies grinding, Karina's face, buried somewhere under Irene's chin, letting out the cutest moan. Irene's helping the rest of the dress up over Karina's ass, then up past her waist, pulling down the scalloped elastic of her stockings. She grabs hold of her hips, feeling the draw of her curves there - you watch how your other half does the thing she does best, the thing where she strips a girl down to nothing like she's doing them a favor.
"Pretty," Irene appraises her naked body - not her face, not her mind, not her ambition or the strength of her determination, or god forbid, something banal like her personality, but, "fuck, look at you, look at this figure," her palm skates along the plane of her stomach, "so pretty."
It could be the insinuation: Irene is ready to reduce the girl down to a heap of jumbled nerves; to tears, probably - given half the chance. Like she's telling her a body as flawless and well-manicured and sweetly receptive to being toyed with as hers needs to get absolutely wrecked, among other things.
(Fucked so deeply, and to the point of utter exhaustion - the point is that she forgets her own name.) 
Irene knows just by looking, her eyes tracing down each and every one of Karina’s curves like they’re taking inventory. It could be as simple as a handprint seared into her ass, a stinging red stain etched into her soft, creamy white skin, marking the insides of her thighs, her beautiful fucking tits - oh, the things the two of you could do.
"How do you want it, exactly?" Irene's eyes are dancing around her face, in her stare, darting down, then back up. "How, baby."
Karina smiles against Irene’s lips like she knows the answer, the perfect one. She must already have the script prepared. It's no stretch of the imagination: "anything, as long as it means you both keep looking at me."
Because maybe it's down to the pure physicality of it all. Something Karina's been waiting to feel, desperate to have, for some time - as you set into action, dismantling any pretense that you weren’t about to devour the heat of her aching cunt, from running touches all over her slick pussy. It’s a strong theory, you figure, from the visceral response you get when you get start to fuck her, when you slide a finger inside: tight and snug, and so unbelievably wet. 
“Oh,” she breathes out, and it sounds sated and needy all at once.
You make sure to glance at her face before pressing another into her. All the way past the knuckles. She looks lost to the feeling, the pleasure; her expression gone hazy-eyed as you start fucking into her with a few steady pumps of your wrist - slow and then faster, then faster again - fucking into her with increasing urgency.
Just to keep her gasping, panting.
Like a woman starved for it.
"God," Irene kisses softly into her mouth. Her hand tangled in Karina's hair, twisting strands between her fingers and tugging just shy of something painful, "you're really sensitive, aren't you?"
Karina nods, slightly. It’s all she can manage.
You have a soft spot for girls who will spread themselves open like they can't wait, but still end up flustered over how your lips ghost across aching flesh. Who can't even form the words - asking for this, and that, and a million little things; and look at Karina - blushing, her eyes fluttering closed, and digging her nails into the couch the moment you finally put your hot mouth on her. Her entire body is drawn taut like a live wire.
"Relax," you coax, speaking more to the muscle - her legs tensed, and knees pulled tightly together. You know just where to place your lips to make her go to pieces, but it's worth suspending pleasure - your own, and Irene's, who won't admit that this sorta turns her on too - so Karina's face might open up, so the tilt of her brow can slack, and the twist of her expression can soften. Like it's the only chance she'll ever get.
When you place your palm across Karina's stomach to steady her and look up, Irene has started peeling off her own clothes, down to nothing but the little panties underneath. That garter-belt thing that makes her ass look like she was sculpted straight out of clay - a reminder she's always worth your time, no matter what mood she's in, or whether or not she'll eventually let you take the lead. She's lifting herself on the couch to throw off the little slip of a dress, the high heels. “Baby," she purrs, teasing, maybe to distract from how she’s gone from dragging circles with her fingernails across Karina’s collarbones to kneading roughly at her tits. And she might even insert something she's never actually had a chance to confess out loud, or even consider much, like: she's been dying to know what Karina's face will scrunch up into, or what her eyes will look like, tears stained across her lashes while you fuck her within an inch of her life. The image you’ll find when you find all those spots that drive a girl wild.
Your mouth drags over the slick, her lips, her clit, and down again - as if to illustrate the point.
"That feels - so," she starts, and bites off the rest of the words.
Irene grabs hold of Karina's hands. Presses their mouths back together, and bites Karina's bottom lip. Kissing the words out of her, the sentences that start in half measures and stifled gasps:
"- so, good, oh. Do - ah, fuck. Oh, god-"
-and vanish somewhere in Irene's mouth.
"-oh, do that again. Oh my god. There. Just - lick- please, keep fucking, exactly that-"
And pay close attention, because here now is how she slips: from the image she maintains for the cameras, the audiences, her admirers, her competition, her detractors, the ones who mean it, the ones who don't mean a damn thing; the girl who shies away from anything overtly sexual, or sensual, or remotely hedonistic; and doesn't act as though she too, just as much as anyone else, needs someone to fuck her stupid - as if it's an eventuality of her own humanity, instead of a concept she's learned to scorn.
Irene picks up on the distinction, all too familiar with the look filling out across Karina’s angelic features.
She ghosts her thumbnail across Karina’s nipple. Tries out: "why don't you make her cum, baby, right here, on the couch.” A look at you, a quick tilt of the chin. Then, her tongue peeking from behind her teeth, and her voice dropping, "just so you can tell Minjeong, or whoever ends up asking - 'you have no idea how good they fuck.'"
And just like that - with Karina’s body laid out beneath Irene’s hands, your mouth - you simply fucking ruin her. 
You both do. 
Until it's only a mess of whines and shuddering limbs and that lovely look: pure agony. So helpless. So utterly exposed.
Karina hiccups something incoherent - you’re doubling down. You’re working your touches through the torrid mess between her legs. Her pussy is shimmering wet and hot and every bit as pretty as she is. Then, the motion of your tongue, the slow, heavy flick back and forth, relentless and constant - dragging back and forth, keeping her right up, riding the wave. Back and forth, back and forth. 
"Oh my fucking god." Karina can only gasp, jaw-slacked open. 
Overwhelmed and blissed-out and suddenly awash in this searing and wondrous sensation that the only real way she's able to make sense of is by twisting her hands in your hair and pulling you flush against her cunt while she cums on your lips.
"Ah - you're fucking kidding me. Please, don't stop, please don't-" Karina has her head turned. Voice pitched right into Irene's shoulder. You fuck her on two fingers until she’s got the heel of her palm pressed firm into her forehead, and she’s starting to jerk her hips into your face. Stutter her breathing, her words: “I, I, I- fucking - what the fuck, you’re making me - jesus fucking christ."
Like some delicate and intricate piece of her had just been irreparably snapped. Broken. You hear her expletive-laden screams - and think, better her, than either of you.
And all the way through every last part of it, cresting, waning, quivering, the tremble of her thighs snapped shut against your ears, the grind of her teeth, and each little choked out gasp-
“I'm… fucking cumming.”
Karina spends the entirety of her first orgasm between the two of you, heaving.
The look on her face alone, just from what parts you can see, has your lower gut clenched - it goes from anguished pleasure, mouth pulled wide and brows wound high and tight, all the way to calm and cathartic, the pretty bow of her lips settling into something manic. Eyes softening with a luster, half-closed. A mask, the afterglow: blissed-out and smiling dreamily.
How anyone could say no to a picture like this, you're unsure. Though not particularly willing to test the theory, naturally.
"That was mean," Karina finally huffs, letting a moment pass to even out her breaths. "Both of you, so mean."
"You said to," is all Irene says, amused. 
Karina looks down; lifts her head just slightly - as you bring your own mouth off her, catching her glance. Not even your palm and your fingers covered with the evidence - it's her lips that give her away, the swollen, pouting, bright pink lips of her pussy, still radiant with her climax.
She breathes, "god. Irene."
It sounds an awful lot like she's begging for mercy.
Irene hums softly. Leans in for a kiss, with her slender hands cupping Karina's face. Manages to say: "you just look so fucking hot when you're struggling. Can’t fault us for that." She reaches down, and digs her fingernail into the line of Karina's cheek - near the center, just short of the outer curve where her dimple naturally settles. She works her lips to a very soft, "ow."
"Listen," Irene says, "is there anywhere else you've been considering going? Because in the event you're looking to stay for the night-"
Karina replies, "only everywhere I still haven't gone."
Her smile looks honest. Her cunt seeping and slick - there's abundant honesty there, too. And you manage to catch the wicked glint in Irene's eye, like she's a bit obsessed with all that glisten, and what it means - that Karina hasn't felt a real, good dicking in ages. Maybe, probably, never. That she's slept with everyone and filled her quota of playing pretend: of someone just going through the motions, dragging their mouth or tongue or cunt along the most obvious, conventional routes.
It’s written all over her face: the girl between you needs to be touched everywhere, and by someone who knows how. Needs it deeper, more. Has to feel the pressure everywhere all over.
Irene asks her, plainly, “how might we get you moaning like that again, hm? We're both dying to know."
She puts her hand under Karina’s chin, tilts her face towards hers, and kisses her long and deep. Until the both of them are having trouble catching any breath. Until they have to break, only so one can take another in: inhale, exhale, and back in her mouth.
"Maybe." Karina lets go of Irene's lower lip. She sounds almost bashful, "you'll need to let me get my hands on that cock of his. Let me get it inside, want it real fucking deep inside. Tell you if I'm just, you know. Really fucking horny. Or maybe I have some hangups about sex I've never told anyone - and we have to work past that," she takes Irene's mouth into her own again.
It's the short consideration of sure, mm, why not? until the next suggestion is: "he should be on his knees, in bed, those hands around my waist, behind the small of my back and pulling me into every stroke."
“Oh,” Irene agrees, “I love that. Should I play with myself while I watch him fuck you senseless? So hard and rough - you'll start seeing stars. I wanna see him completely railing into your dripping pussy from behind, fucking you so goddamn well until you're screaming so loud it’ll wake the neighbors."
Karina sighs. “Well I’d hate to get all the way here and half-ass it.”
You barely catch it, but there's a lovely note in Karina's voice. It’s saying, and don't you dare treat me like glass, like I’m fragile.
All in all, a filthy, filthy way for a girl with virtually no ill-reputation or ill-gotten gains - no record whatsoever - to describe how she wants you to fuck her, until she’s biting down on the consonants in your name, moaning loud and unmistakably clear, and-
“-sorry, whose cock?” Irene has no intention of letting her off easy.
You draw away from the meat of her thigh, licking your lips clean, and insert mid-conversation with a husky-voiced, "hmm?"
Karina just shoots you a sharp-eyed look. "You heard."
"Only," you play dumb. You run a hand between her legs, using your palm as you go, so you can pull more sound out of her throat; the pleased sighs, a hum. Another. "The part where you want it 'real fucking deep inside,' I think I heard."
"I mean, wouldn't you?" Karina looks satisfied with that. Lets out an easy laugh and turns to Irene. "Besides, I need to know if it’s more than just pretty eyes and a handsome smile that you’ve gotten yourself so hung up on."
The tilt of your fiancée’s brow above her is noticeable and apparent. Not a twinge of surprise; more like recognition. It's Irene looking haughty - beyond the usual - wrapped up in the afterglow. It's the confidence, and not at all humbled by the reality that she is no stranger to fucking a girl this downright gorgeous, knowing the danger inherent in allowing that kind of damage, but if Irene has you figured - she's figured Karina even better: someone willing to push through the burn. Someone, she’s betting, with the capacity to handle pain like it's an artform.
“Karina,” Irene says, and she's really leaning into it, "you really ought to be more careful with that smart-mouth of yours.”
It's the absolute worst way to proposition someone; maybe second only to what Irene whispers straight into her ear:
"If I had to guess, it’s your sweet, pretty face that has everyone bending over backward just to let you fuck them, hmm?” 
You’d anticipated this much. You watch how your beautiful wife-to-be eases forward and leaves a slow kiss into Karina's throat, before adding the worst, most awful thing she can manage, “they're eating up this adorable, innocent facade of yours just as soon as you let it slip - letting you straddle their waist, and slide right on, and chase some clout out of oh, she must have this tight little cunt, or how good it would fucking feel to ruin a load just slamming these perfect tits, or. The best of the best, when it comes to pretty things with brains and mouths on 'em: 'fuck, I bet Karina has a face like an angel, she's the kind of girl who probably really, really loves taking it raw - filled and fucked as deep as she can manage'."
“She’s insinuating you’re a slut,” you offer on the next beat, down from between Karina’s knees. “Or something.”
"I put that much together." Karina has that teasingly pragmatic tone in her voice, matching Irene's level. "Your point?"
The joke is that even Irene - after she has the chance to drag her thumb across Karina's lips - looks mildly impressed.
"Sweetheart," the corner of Irene's mouth quips, as if the reason is so, so very obvious, "let’s say you’re just like me, total hypothetical. You're going to have to let us know which part feels better: the praise, or the degradation. I know it’s what makes you tick: all the attention. I know you need it. The same way I know that I could eat this perfect pussy out for hours just to get it slick, and wet, and wanting, and the thing I’m still not sure you’d be ready to learn," she tells her, a light in her stare that flicks upwards, eyes going from Karina's cunt and back to her eyes, her own mouth, and then hers, "the really good sex? Isn’t always pretty."
There isn't room for misunderstanding, let alone any mercy in it. Irene's face is dark; dangerous. Like, seriously. Karina knows better. Everyone does. You know exactly what she's doing. You know what comes next, but this time, you can't shake the feeling like-
Like Karina wants you to look.
She has her fingers on her cunt, spread, presenting - and a small shrug; her response is so fucking coy: "I guess I can't really help it. Besides, it’s common knowledge, isn’t it? The brattiest girls always turn out to be the best fucks. Honest, I get so wet sometimes, you know and then god, I can't think straight.” 
She laughs at the premise. 
“I dunno, what's a girl to do?"
You can feel the room starting to tighten up, just barely: Karina’s breath still heavy, her chest heaving, the way Irene holds her still, how her arm curls across her stomach, palm flat under her tits; that pose in particular, the power to entice.
And maybe it's the fact Irene is still making eyes at you from Karina's shoulder, the cruel bite to her upper-lip, showing how she's working at the soft skin of her neck - a smirk, before pressing into another kiss there. Your insides are running hot, a shudder racing up your spine. There’s no mistaking what she's getting off on, not just some pretty-as-paint newcomer. There’s your Irene, your fiancée - and her beautiful, adorable, awful little shadow.
-
So what if, by some pure hypothetical, this all spirals out of control?
You don't know the consequences of taking home what amounts to a coworker and screwing her with a certain reckless abandon. There’s power harassment, a toxic workplace environment, boundary issues, sexual-fraternization. So on, so forth. It's all relative, but watching Irene and Karina make their way up the stairs and admiring the things that only a woman's hips can do, swaying this way, and that - and, following the path from one tight little ass, the other, all the way up their spines - there are no such qualms to contend with, because there's absolutely zero chance that’s the thing that’ll be keeping you up all night.
Irene laments and hopes in the same breath. 
She has two pairs of panties in one hand, Karina’s fingers laced into the other, explaining with a quick squeeze, "don't tell me, baby, I already know," a wink, a laugh. She’s such a sweetheart when she means to be; charming, wooing, the coy girl Karina seems to have gotten so drunk off the idea of getting mixed up with. And yeah, when she drops them on the floor, and pushes Karina gently against the wall. Traces her finger up her jaw, then her cheek, and leans into the crook of her neck, into that same spot from earlier; yes, Karina can count herself lucky, or whatever.
"So, don't stop now, baby-" Karina's huffing - the line of her throat so taut and exposed. "You should really fucking try harder if you want me to beg."
"Honey," is how Irene responds, leisurely.
There will come a point in their intimacy, in all things considered, where this act no longer plays itself: Irene, the seductress, and Karina, a deft and innocent prey; of course you, the hammer to a nail, pushed and pulled in one direction, the next. The moments in which her lips leave the crescent of Karina's mouth - hot, hazy, and half-wet with their own spit, their tongues twisting, the muted click, and the telltale wet drag of a body pushing and straining up against her own-
Maybe in her bones, she is begging for it. Maybe, Irene hopes, she'll have to: eyes turned up, watering, tears coming hot, streaming down her flushed cheeks as she cries it from her lungs.
"I wouldn't have you beg for anything."
It's true that Irene is ninety-nine percent grace, one percent child-like wonder; she's easy to read when the mood hits her. The lines of their bodies tousling, twisting and tangling in moon-lit-darkness. There's some irony to it, only a few steps away from the bedroom. At the base of the staircase. In front of the tall windows covered with frost that serve, now, primarily to remind Karina that she's in a part of town she could never afford, in an ostentatious apartment she could only dream of; but most importantly, that the woman in front of her - with her fingers dipping down between her thighs and up again, tracing over her navel and the rise of her hip and her cleavage - can have anyone she likes, without limitation.
Karina can't deny it's everything she wants.
"Karina, I'm curious." You're easing into that spot, where the two of them have coiled themselves up - you’ve got your cock in your hand and you’re stepping out of your pants - in the hallway, the frame of the door, a heavy, long shadow cast: Karina has Irene pinned now, a wrist over her head, against the other side of the wall where the white paintwork is starting to run thin. "Didn't you say something before about how hard you wanted it? Raw, deep, I believe was how you put it."
Irene smirks. It's just the slightest sneer, until she has her hands reaching over the curves of Karina's hips and pulling her fingers into her soft ass. Spreading her cheeks. Touching up, then down, back in the same groove, this slow rhythm that builds - like they were both expecting this exact sequence of events.
You watch Irene whisper something into the girl's ear, and - fuck - the light catches her expression at just the right moment, head lolled to the side.
"Hey," Karina drawls. She lets it come out breathy - on the note, the middle and upper registers of her voice, hitting something near a perfect alto. "How about instead of having some heart-to-heart, and making me out to be some naive-ass kid, you stop asking questions and get to fucking the life out of my little pussy."
She ends it so charming.
“Oh,” you tell her, feeling how fucking drenched she is right at the end of your cock - sliding her slick up and down the length of her cunt, and knowing the feeling will likely stick to your skin and drip to the floor, all of it - "well. If that's all."
Your hand arrives on the lithe stretch of muscle between her waist, right along the ridge of her hip bone, your cock pressing onto the heat of her cunt. Karina turns her head over her shoulder so you can see it all in profile: that pout. That look. That everything.
"There you have it." Irene squeezes the flesh she's got cupped in her palms, drawing circles. "If only everyone else got to hear that sweet, sharp edge you've got underneath, hm?"
Karina opens her mouth with some clear quip to needle, but stops herself, a catch in the center of her throat, her brows shooting up. The pull of her voice is somewhere out and over.
“God, fuck-” she can just manage to sputter. “You’re- ah, ah - your fucking cock-”
Oh, it has you cursing too. You're pushing so far into her tight little cunt - the soft airy moan, that pretty sound, riding back on every last stroke until you've filled her right to the hilt.
“I know, I know - that feels so good, right?” Irene coos.
You just pull her all the way back onto your cock, thrusting deep. Base to tip. So goddamn fucking deep.
Karina probably doesn’t even mean to whimper, but the press of your hips, slowly snapping in and in, has her lungs constricted, as the pressure slides through every hot, slippery inch inside of her - this glide of agonizing intensity.
“I bet you want to just cream all over that cock,” Irene says, fine eyebrows knitting into something like contentment. “All filled up and feeling full, and just fucking letting it go - he’ll take such good care of you. He’ll fuck you so good you won’t ever get that warm, hazy, blissed-out feeling out of your veins ever, ever again, if he has his way-”
All while the head of your cock works over every fucking sensitive part of her, dragging out to thrust all the way into her soft cunt, the round of her ass bouncing back to meet each stroke. Again, and again, until you've worked through that wet stretch of muscle. And the motion isn't exactly elegant. Karina's mouth hangs wide open, catching short breaths that curl inwards when you reach the line of her waist.
“It’s so fucking good,” Karina’s sighing out. She’s all fluster, no bite.
There’s no lack for juxtaposition in the way Irene dotes on her either - these small beguiling bits of praise like, baby, you’re doing so good, these tits of yours are just, you are - just gorgeous. Mouth quirked into a tight grin as her fingers pull and twist around her nipple. The sharp yelp that comes after. The fact that she's kissing the words into her mouth on the very next whimper: “a girl like you needs the time, and patience, and opportunity to have her insides completely, totally, catastrophically ruined.”
Irene had it exactly right on the first read. She’ll say, “I told you so,” when Karina’s washing the cum off her chest or out of her eyelashes in the shower. It’s the praise; it’s the degradation; it’s you leaning down, your hands finding her hair, curling in, and getting her right up against your lips to say it quiet, low, intimate - like a lover, like she hasn't already heard it before, “such a good little slut for me.”
And the girl absolutely fucking keens.
You grip onto her hips. You pull her hair tight. Her throat bobs under your thumb and you can feel the anxiety start to throb, her pulse hot and heavy in her cunt. How it soaks the base of your cock. Jesus, you’ll fuck a load right into her. So easily. Her pussy is so snug, so unbelievably wet. Perfect enough to know if you fuck into her any faster, any harder - it’ll be just that: you'll paint right up to her cervix; you'll fill her to the fucking brim.
"Fuck, Karina, this pussy is such a fucking dream," is what you're making sure she knows, and at that, Karina just finds that bend. Arches more of herself to you, until her ass is slotted into the plane of your stomach, the head of your cock prodding, testing the limit where her cunt is hottest and wettest. "God, this has to feel incredible. Your ass bouncing on my cock" - Karina goes slack on the force, leaning forward - "as I rail your tight little cunt."
If anything, Irene is there to catch Karina's tearful, thankful gaze when she finally starts fucking crying, a litany of yes, fuck yes, yes-yes-right-there, please fuck, and a wet, dazed little "you're goddamn - you're ruining, fucking - fucking, ruining me," every other syllable broken by her shuddering breaths.
"Aw, you're going to cum again, huh? Baby-" Irene's got her head at an angle - their gazes locked, watching - and maybe Irene really gets it: how much of a big, bad crush this gorgeous fucking woman's had on the pair of you all this whole time, with all that faux-romance, and lust, and envy wrapped up inside her - but if she wasn't so obsessed with the shape of Irene's mouth, the contour of her jaw, the lean and sleek lines of her frame and the soft, round swell of her ass - she’d still be left with the shape of your cock, where it’s pounding her apart. Fucking her and fucking her up.
It's more than worth the breath to remind Karina what she came here for. Irene's fingertips brush the line of her lips, part them just so. 
“All over him, baby, let him make a mess of you. Just a total fucking mess. We'll fill you up, and fill you up, until your poor, aching pussy is full of cum," and it's probably as well: Karina does what comes most natural to her - with you three, the whole number. Her eyes flutter and go dreamy. There's not even a moment of hesitation:
"-until it's leaking down these fucking thighs-"
"You're doing so good, babe," is your supporting role in all this, murmuring encouragement straight into her ear as you fuck her to pieces. Your breath fans out against her cheek. And then, your hands make a grip under her thighs, holding her steady, making her mouth fall open - this keen, wobbly, vulnerable thing that exposes the naked girl she is, behind all the makeup, and the heels, and her seductive and all-consuming appeal, everything.
“Just so you know: it’s the best fucking part, Karina. I mean, the look on his face.” Irene laughs with her whole body, until the rich, raspy sound of it fills the hall. “The way he bites his lip when he's close, his eyes clenched - and god, I fucking love when he finally cums. It's so good, watching him. Letting him have his way. Feeling his cock throb and spill into you - hot, and still, and just pumping inside you - just so, so good.”
"Fuck, ah-" the little gasp is like she's starting to hyperventilate. 
"Because baby,” is the final nail in the coffin, hammering home, “he’s fucking you just like he’d fuck me.”
"Fucking, please, god-."
Irene's hands have her breasts in their grasp and are playing at where she’s sensitive, then pushing into the soft, delicate space beneath, thumbing the indents. "He's so fucking good, isn't he? Are you going to cream and cream all over his hard fucking cock?"
Then - and because it comes so instinctually to her. Because, actually, your Irene has a slight propensity for evil:
She slaps Karina, right across her tits. "Fucking cum on it."
One.
Tugs hard on a nipple. "I swear, every single bit of you is so goddamn beautiful-"
Two.
"That body is built, perfect. So easy to ruin. And god - what a perfect little pussy you've got-"
Three.
Karina struggles to breathe. Her voice is torn, frayed. She barely manages to utter out a very shaky, very desperate, "harder, fuck- you’re fucking making me so- you can, harder-"
Four.
The cruel contact of Irene’s palm pulls this deliciously hedonistic sound in Karina's throat, a loud moan; like she just hit the sweet spot inside that's all her nerves coming alight. Irene plants a quick peck in Karina's hair. Her temples, the ridge of her brows. Slides her thumb across her eyelashes, brushing them clean from whatever tears had sprung free. You don't even want to try, not at that moment, to try and endure the quiver of slippery muscle all over your cock as she shudders into her orgasm. It's simply too fucking much. She's too fucking tight.
"Aw, shh shh, shh," and then Irene's soft hushes are coming down from the other side of her head. Irene kisses her full, straight on her mouth. Karina is shaking, convulsing and caught and fucked from head to toe - and what she needed was someone like the two of you - to watch her cunt swallow your cock like some magnificent and unbelievable sight, taking the whole damn thing. Irene is telling her, "it's okay. You can let it go."
The silhouettes alone. From the end of the hall, and where the afterimage lingers: the smoke-frosted windows, the dim lights, their bare, beautiful forms - this picture that will stick in the center of your head, will probably haunt you-
"God, I can’t, just- ah.”
“Breathe,” Irene says.
"I'll cum again, it's too- I'm so-" Karina can only plead and sigh.
Irene shushes her one more time. "It's a lot. It's alright, baby. He's going to keep fucking you until he's ready to pull out, until he has a whole mess just painted onto your ass, and thighs, and I'm going to make sure that little pussy gets so wrecked, fucked, stretched on every last inch- until the thought of sex hurts, and then we're going to make you cum again, and again- over, and over-"
You're leaning over her, nose buried into the waves of Irene's hair, the curve of Karina's back, and the flush of skin in contrast. That's when you feel the coil in your chest come loose - unspooling, and bursting - when Karina's lids roll into the back of her head and her lips fall open with a pleasured gasp and a stammer, "y-you're, ah, both, you're so, both- oh god."
You're about to just pull her down and absolutely cream her, stuff her full - a mess.
And she wants you to-
"That feels so fucking good," she lets slip out on the cusp of a shiver, just as her inner muscles are spasming, milking your cock with the pressure from one pulse through the next, squeezing.
She’s right. It does. Her, coming undone. You, at wit’s end. 
Another breath, and Karina is managing out between these small hiccups - not as much out of breath, just dumbstruck - simply muttering, "I’m cumming, I- oh my god." 
You barely manage it; you unbury your cock from her cunt; you’re cumming all over her ass. 
A shot of white that streaks right down to her bare-slicked skin, before it gets painted down into the crease of her pussy, all swollen - wrecked and raw.
Just the way it feels on her skin is enough to earn another hushed moan from her, this sweet little whimper as she can hardly stand up straight. She lets her knees buckle, but Irene is right there, to catch. Her eyes are closed, eyelids clenching, as Irene tilts Karina's face her way, to lay one, two, three soft, adoring kisses on her mouth, the angle all wrong. 
“Mmm.” The smack of her lips. The pull of whatever breath she still has to give - right out of her heaving chest. "Sore, that, ahhh- um, thank you."
You fiancée wraps a slender hand right around Karina's wrist, and starts whispering to her, unbridled, "just had to. Had to see how you look-"
It’s wicked, for one thing. More than that, it's seamless:
While Irene still has the girl's voice caught in her throat, she reaches around the curve of Karina's hips and drags two fingertips through the puddle of warm cum that sits right at the base of her spine, glistening all over her ass cheeks and inner thighs, slipping and rolling off her cunt, down the center, running in rivulets. Your cum between her fingers is so filthy, so obscene - dripping hot - right off her reddened skin, and Irene can't possibly help it; not after a display as indulgent as that. The trembling that remains in Karina’s thighs does nothing to hide how her legs now jitter and shake under Irene's touch.
“That’s my good girl,” she whispers as her fingertips hover across the apex of her puffy lips. Over and over again, with more force, and more, until you're almost positive it's Karina that leans in a moment later, kissing the rest of her soft assurances right off her tongue.
Listen to her: this incoherent string of words pouring from her mouth, like they can't move fast enough, tripping over each consonant, "are you, oh, oh - oh, fuck."
No one else could make that kind of overstimulation feel so heavenly, you figure, the way she just properly melts. You take a step back, just to let Irene work. Just to watch. To appreciate the craft.
You absolutely get it. 
How to touch, how to tease. Firsthand experience has you know she'll ride your cock until you're throbbing and spilling cum and she'll just shh-shh, let you have it - it's okay, sweetie, just let go - until she's rolling her hips just right, or reaching a hand back to massage your balls, or stroking your inner thigh in that exact kind of spot; some method that keeps her all the way on the end of your cock, but not quite off the edge, and your cum leaking down your shaft, spent.
She’ll bite into her smirk. She’ll tie up her hair. She’ll get that serious look on her face because she knows: you’re all hers for the taking.
So she'll sink onto it, again and again, until she's fucking you with the slippery friction only your own spill might provide. "Just a little more," she'll tell you, which is absolutely a lie, "come on, just a bit harder, I'm so close." Irene does this thing - she's had years to refine and perfect - and her voice gets a husky edge to it as her teeth graze the shell of your ear; she makes a small, pained groan into the curl of your hair and breathily hums it: 'I'm almost there.'
Who stands any chance to resist?
And she's always asking you - the same way she's coaxing and promising Karina the world with just the movement of her fingers, this delectable in and out, in and out, pushing that filth up into the red-soaked lips of her pussy - "now, what did I ever do to deserve someone like you?"
Karina blinks, once - a sleepy-lidded draw that leaves her lashes, lush and long, and fanning her flushed cheeks. 
The sound between her legs is wet, squelching with your cum, with hers, the barest hint of slapping her tender skin. The beat of Irene's wrist against her thighs - like that's where she needs it most - a deep, primal rhythm, like the last thing she wants is to take a breath. It's fucking hot; her head is tilted, her jaw clenched, and Irene has the tips of her fingers twisted between Karina's legs, swirling your cum right back around in her slick cunt - those plump pussy lips that you've watched stretch out on the first press, the first and the second and the third, as Karina finds what gets her there fast, fast-fast-fastest-
"You can cum for me too, baby."
It’s not a suggestion. There’s nothing but expectation in Irene’s voice. 
“Just cum.”
You watch it knock the architecture right out of Karina's legs.
-
Indulgent, just isn’t quite the right word for it. Careless, reckless, clumsy even-
Look - the tumultuous tangle you three make is all over the fucking place.
One moment, you're at an angle, moreover twisted-limbed with Irene bent over her dresser, then propped up on top of yours the next, your forehead landing against hers, feeling the soft cradle of her shoulders, her legs around you. She has her hands wrapped in Karina's, in that muddled in between: it's a collision of sorts.
There's the chair in the corner of your bedroom that really has only ever known one purpose, a plush rug, all these surfaces, horizontal and vertical for you to take the two most breathtakingly beautiful people in the world on and let your bodies settle into the shape they've needed to ever since your fingertips met Irene's in the cab, ever since she blinked her heavy lashes at you with Karina in-tow, just shy of smiling.
And boy, do you learn that Karina likes to watch herself get fucked in front a mirror. Specifically, the tall one beside Irene’s closet. It's hard to blame her. When you hold her hips tight, and really, truly fuck her, you can’t keep your eyes off how her face twists with the pleasure; or, when you drill the length of your cock into her sopping wet cunt: the wide, glossy rim of her pretty lips pulling back into a wince - and your eyes dropping past the reflection of her shoulders, her collarbones, down to her perfect tits.
The back and forth, the up and down, the way they fucking wobble in their beautifully buxom blur.
Though the eventuality remains unchanged, spread out across your bed. Karina takes a moment, hand pressed to the mattress experimentally like it's all running through her head - this is where Irene gets all that fairy-tale-inspired romance from, really - a quick pause where your future-bride is up on her elbows and staring, watching - your finger sinks in slowly, between where she's soft and warm and wet. She's thinking, you can just read it off her face, 'oh. So that's what you'd do, huh?'
Just for demonstration’s sake, you fingerfuck her in all kinds of ways - show-off and performance and dirty and mind-blowing. Because even better than the whiny, gut-wrenching moan it gets out of Irene, Karina can't get enough of how it’s all presented.
"Ugh," she slides up next to you at the foot of the bed, helping you turn Irene on her side, "why does she have to be so pretty, it's annoying, she's- she's like, made it so fucking far by playing the girl everyone wants to wife, huh?" She's talking directly to you, even while Irene rolls her neck to press her head against the pillow. "Inspirational."
You're drawing circles into her clit. Thumbing the dip, circling in the opposite direction. Karina has her nails biting right into the crease where your knees touch. In tandem, you’ll help your fiancée reach the top of that first wave. 
Karina presses, all cheek - a very dry, "cute."
It’s so simple: you eat Irene’s cunt. You hold her down. And Karina slides her tongue lazily against the tight pucker of her ass.
The three of you know she deserves nothing less.
“Oh, christ, you have no idea,” Irene is murmuring into the pillowcase, head tilted at an awkward angle, looking at the wall, almost distant; but her legs are split wide and her hands are reaching forward to rub a circle into your cheek, "you know how sensitive-? Yeah. Like, really, super. Super, super fucking sensitive, okay? So - if you'd keep doing, uh, oh- oh…”
Simultaneous, then slow, and easy - kisses landing right onto Irene's clit. So much so, you can't help but turn a little, smiling right up at your girl as she digs her toes into the duvet and threads a hand into Karina's hair.
The thing is, with Irene: facades fade fast.
Karina gets to measure that fact up close - where the details of Irene's composure are not only sharp, but also readily and openly and emphatically pound to dust by the time the last loose curl of Irene’s hair falls over her collarbone; she ends up on all fours, spread out over Karina - pressed along the length of her stomach, spread over your duvet and fitted sheets, your hand at the base of Irene's waist and tightening into the divots. She’s so small beneath you that when you bury your dick inside her- 
“Fuck.” Her cunt is so wet. Her breath uneven - and her words are starting to slur. There’s the gooseflesh on her back that lets you know it’s all already over for her. “Okay,” she tries to steady the ache in her stomach, “okay, okay, just- right there.” 
The drag through her pussy is fucking extraordinary. It knocks the wind out of both of you; so soft to the touch, like velvet - she’s unbelievably tight. You pull her hips into you and it opens her right up. Then when you end up balls deep inside your girl a second, third, fourth time:
She simply shudders apart.
Even though you fuck her so slow, so easy - her cunt clenches and squeezes on you like Irene detests the very idea of letting you go. You don’t even need to rail her lithe body to complete and utter ruin just to feel the familiar pent-up tremor starting to build in her muscles, how she rolls her hips back just so-so. How your hands fit that round and pert little ass of hers so well, and when your fingers finally sink in, you’re pulling it all apart to get a good look where your cock shimmers with her slick before disappearing right into her tiny cunt.
Karina mutters something in her ear. It pulls on some thread, somewhere - you feel her wind like a spring, further, and further; your cock edging her so close. The smirk Karina saves for you over your fiancée’s shoulder makes you think she’s figured her out- 
“Irene, look-” 
Well, at least she’s tuning in on all the right frequencies.
"Aren’t we all about being thorough?" Karina raises a perfectly trimmed brow. She drapes her arm across Irene's neck, their lips sliding together again, and that kiss is drawn-out and languid, albeit needy. "So, say," it gets muffled against the seam of their lips, and comes up, and comes out like a slurry, "are we gonna use everything else too? Your mouth, your perfectly tight ass?"
Irene can hardly muster out, "fuck- fuck- yes, fucking, god," as she takes it, so deep. There’s enough there to make both of you cum, you’re sure.
“Who could’ve guessed - like there’s ever been a more perfect cocktease than bae-fucking-Irene," Karina coos, all lips. She plants a row of kisses along Irene's exposed throat. The tilt of her hips, as she pushes closer - as you press the head of your cock as deep as it can go. "Go on. Cum, baby. Be a good girl, a good hole to fuck, just do it. All over his big fucking cock. Let him fucking have you."
Which is probably about the same time you realize that you, Irene and Karina are all well enroute - becoming this one mind, a single unit. This plurality you know there’s no coming back from.
You look down, with a little more focus, and Irene is being pulled apart in every which way - your cock stretching her out, over and over - Karina’s fingers right under her clit, every circle making her whimper. She’s all sharp edges and delicate angles, but manages to be soft for you in just the right places.
“God, you’re so fucking tight,” you tell her, shifting your hips; pulling her ass flush and filling her completely. Your grip tightens on her waist and she doesn’t flinch a bit. "It's so goddamn easy to cum in this needy little pussy of yours. All wet and slick, and, hah- just pulsing-"
Irene lets out this wanton sound, desperate.
“Oh, right there, huh?” Karina asks. It’s not quite mean, but it’s getting there, fast. “Is that how he’s going to make you cum?”
You thrust on the same angle again, the same depth - you’re hitting all her nerve endings, all her sensitive spots. There isn't even room, now, for some imaginary head-to-head, some verbal volley, the banter; what comes forward is her tiny, broken moan.
How many times had Irene done the exact same, after all. Fucked you without holding back? Fucked you over? The flood of sweet-nothings as you started to approach: honey, you're so perfect, we can go slow, you just have to ask, and if you feel uncomfortable at any point, if you want me to stop-
“Just say please, doll,” Karina tells her.
If Irene told you a quarter of what made it out of the side of Karina’s mouth, you’d have never believed it. "I can't wait to feel what that arrogant mouth of yours will do when he cums inside this cute ass-"
You watch Karina spank her. Hard. There’s a red stain in the round of Irene’s cheek, and her skin is so pale that the imprint of all five fingertips looks stark, glaring.
"Just," Karina presses the rest of herself against Irene's skin and steals a quick glance at you - this half-coy smile pulling on one corner of her lips, "thought I'd do that in the name of-"
"Mmph," Irene’s groan is long, loud, "yes. Fuck, yes- please-"
Karina immediately looks away. An effort to hide the smug satisfaction. She fiddles with the auburn locks behind Irene's shoulder.
You’ll finish the sentiment: "-being thorough," and drive your cock to the hilt. Irene collapses forward onto Karina’s lap.
The sound she makes you swear is a sob. See - for Irene, it’s only about getting control in so far as it is about getting off; she’ll take whatever comes her way so long as it’s directly to her benefit - the theatrics of being pinned, the willingness for surrender, for subjugation, for the sake of telling you, yes, push my knees, spread me apart, hold me there; look at the things you do to me - it's the Irene everyone imagines, when they see the dresses, the gltiz, the glamour, just the brief flash of her grin, or the way she holds her fingernail between her teeth. Everyone wants to put her on her heel and feel a bit powerful. To have you watch the supple arc of her neckline bend, to hear the humility slip off her lips: the notion goes beyond simple kink-
It steps out into pure necessity.
She really, really needs it, and it's written into every muscle and tendon - it's on her breath as it shudders through her whole body. The beautiful, harrowing sound. "I love the way you two fuck me," she murmurs, head buried into the crook of Karina's neck. It's the sort of line, coming from someone like her, you know could raise a few blushes - if either of you was still in the business of such things.
"Honey," her voice wavers. Then, it falters: "please."
The desperation is thick, husky, almost. Karina seems like she's breathing her in, nose tucked against Irene's forehead.
You watch how she runs her nails up Irene's sides, a hot whisper sliding over her skin. You feel it, and so does Irene, this white hot pleasure singing up from the tip of her clit and spreading throughout the soft curves, the sensual lines of her body, this tangible current, a hum, a whine. You see her strain the lean stretch of muscle connecting her neck to her shoulder.
Until her face is tucked under Karina’s jaw, with a hand reaching back and hooked around your wrist and keeping you fucking, filling her, your hips drawn tight against hers, like a second home.
In and in and in.
Fucked-out and outright to the extent she goes completely silent. Almost completely still. The moment she cums all over your waist. Mouth hung open, like she’s in pure disbelief.
It doesn’t really matter, how often or how precisely Karina has imagined the whole thing. It's still a fucking revelation the first time she gets to watch Irene cum.
“No way,” she’s almost laughing, holding Irene’s jaw with both hands. “No fucking way. All the times you- what? No. Nuh-uh. You better fucking explain why this face, you- it’s not fair, the perfect face- I swear, even mid-fucking-orgasm, you are such a fucking doll-"
There's the sheer intimacy - Karina holding Irene's lips open, dragging her thumb down along the center. Quiet and sordid curses slipping from her mouth. And the obvious, her free hand already running down the curve of Irene's spine, her ass: all this sensitive-touching, admiring, appreciating-
"Hey," Karina says, voice raspy and drunk on the sex, the premise, "do me a favor, and tell me this feels as amazing as it looks. Or maybe, for once - just for the sake of fucking argument, is it actually better for the both of us, hm?
Her eyes are half-lidded, heavy, sultry. She's arching up into Irene's warmth - until her palms are spread out against her chest, thumb sliding right over everything sensitive, and she leans right to pull the other breast to her lips, and start all over again. It's clear what she means, spreading her legs as far as she can, pinned beneath the orgasm you're still fucking into Irene. As much as her petite frame will allow.
And in case you missed the point:
"So. What are we waiting for," is what she says a breath later, matter-of-fact, not at all expecting denial. “Or am I not as fuckable as our princess here?"
There's so much wet spill around the base of your cock, and the sound Irene's pussy makes when you finally draw free - all her creamy slick mixed into your mess just fucking leaking around your shaft. Karina holds herself open for you like that, spread wide. All your attention to her pink, raw cunt; you slip right inside. 
Karina lets her arms go slack on the mattress, her chest shivering, lips locked around Irene’s panting breath.
And so it goes, and so it goes, and so it goes.
-
(To anyone taking notes - chemistry, by definition, is the sum total of a certain process; where and when energy becomes matter becomes another.
More relevantly perhaps, it is that race and rise you feel inside your chest. 
Nothing about the sensation, it seems, is too exclusive either - Irene, and now Karina, the pair of them equally devastating, all over and again. It has you in communication with a different kind of contentment: to fall apart inside their embrace in particular, and kiss them with enough breath and time to waste until the morning.)
-
“Jesus,” Karina laughs out loud, “you really believe that? You corrupting me?" she makes another scoff, both hands buried somewhere in the pockets of the sweatshirt you've lent her. "At least do me a favor and cut it out with the solemn tone."
You're leaning over your apartment’s balcony, watching an emergency plow make the slowest grind of progress up the road. It's late. And cold. Or actually - it’s early. The sky is the kind of dark midnight navy you see after all the snow and stars have run through the horizon. Time ticks on, and Irene’s inside sound asleep. A woman that small has no right to snore like heavy machinery.
So,
You and Karina happen to be two things at once: very tired, and very awake.
"What I mean is: I'm sure your manager, or your parents - fuck, someone - would fly off the handle," you say, pulling a cigarette from the pack and offer it begrudgingly. She takes the end and slips it between her lips, a little unsure. You then draw a lighter and offer it, too, and Karina puffs with all her strength. She's no expert, but it looks like the end catches and turns bright. 
A bit of color.
"My parents?" Karina flouts, sucking at it, pulling deeply from her chest - smoke pours from her nose.
She finishes with a cough. And says again:
"Um. Your girlfriend had her fingers in my ass - your cock down my throat - and we're worrying what my parents might think?"
Well. She's got you on that count.
"Not to mention: who the fuck thinks they're so virtuous-" a small chuckle as she passes it back. The cigarette is lit, bright. You take a drag. Watch her tap her feet on the snow. "That they need to do that to begin with. It's more trouble, telling me what to think and feel, as if that hasn't just the opposite effect."
“Irene’s protective, albeit in her own sorta peculiar way. So, you know, by extension, she worries-" you pull, and exhale, the smoke blowing past Karina. It gets caught in her fringe, in the wisps. You offer it back when you see her shiver. "That some shit happens, after."
"Your concern is heartwarming, truly - if you want to let me think on it, I might go and write a nice little diary entry tonight. It'll have sparkles and glitter - if you're that worried." 
Karina reaches in. Lets her fingers graze yours. Her skin is cool. 
“Besides, I don’t need a lesson in image from Irene of all people. She’s her; I’m me.”
She holds onto the cigarette between two long acrylic fingernails, tapping the end so the ash flits out onto the ice. You're caught staring, probably - the dark hair framing her face, all messy and soft, falling about her cheekbones. How that pretty pink blush in her skin seems to never go away.
Your eyes drop to where her mouth is red, a bit swollen - well-kissed; it is snowing again, after all. And it’s easy to be kind of transfixed.
"You're not, I dunno, say embarrassed?" you ask, after a beat.
"Nope." Karina swallows. Brings the cigarette to the pucker of her lips again. You watch how she holds the inhale, holds her wrist up and slacked, head tilted back a little. This exaggerated fashion-model exhale follows, all smooth.
“Because I'm not the type.”
The heavy stream of smoke then blown right into your face.
"Really, I think - sorry, I have always wanted to do that. It felt like a movie. Look," she coughs on the next breath. "I get your dilemma. But also, um-"
There are some quiet moments too, here and there: the heat between your thighs, her pressed up close. She smells like Irene's shampoo and bodywash and that just confuses your head some.
"Who’s to say I’m not just looking out for you," you offer. Every good lie is rooted somewhere in the truth.
"Don't bother," her words hit you square on. "It's about getting off right? You invite me to your bed; I’m so starstruck and enchanted by the very concept of it - Irene and her charming, intoxicating husband. Fuck, I dunno - the way the two of you kiss, look, feel: the experience that you will let me be a part of," she stops and makes another face of amusement, so fucking confident, "you let me play, too, just once, and we're all just a little happier. My version."
“We’re not married,” you correct.
“That’s the part you’re hung up on?” Karina leans over, her upper half across the balcony, staring right up at the sky. “Same difference.”
The moon finds her smile bright like nothing else. It's something infectious. Immediately, it reminds you: of Irene.
"Trust me," she goes on to say. The cigarette slips back into the space where you are connected - the lines of her fingers, her knuckles. "I had a wonderful time, but the sun will rise here, and I'm not gonna stick around to blow you while Irene burns three omelets and finds a spot for me in her fucked up game of house or whatever."
She makes you laugh, free and easy, like a gust of cold air. Something genuine and natural. And as the laugh shakes, Karina makes it impossible not to crumble farther. Not to fucking simper there like an idiot.
“I really thought she was going to make me call her mommy or something, I swear-”
"Hey, I'm sure if you had asked." A spark catches you. The flash of her canine, and those eyelashes. “She’d have done you the favor.”
"Oh, shush." The touch of Karina's fingertip against your hand is delicate, careful - unassuming. But, god, everything with her is just the right amount of heat - it melts you; and when it stops, her touch: that feeling is so cold that you just chase her out of impulse.
"What about New Year's?" you ask. There are still boundaries you really shouldn't be crossing, but here you are, straddling yet one more.
Karina's grin cracks like an old fault line. "You're not allowed to ask me out like that," she insists, batting you away - trying her hardest not to lead with the obvious. You look out on the view, watching a guy in a parka trudge over to a garbage can, a handful of newspaper bundles, then a glance back-
The slightest flush has bloomed up Karina’s face, right underneath where the makeup's been rubbed bare. It's utterly irresistible. "Go wake up your fiancée and ask what her New Year's Eve looks like. Doubt it involves me and my dumb friends."
She’s probably right.
"Karina," you start, watching her push open the balcony door with her foot and walk slowly, lazily, back into the apartment. The window rattles, and she looks back over her shoulder. The bob of her ponytail, the sweeping lashes, that perfect slow-burn smile. That’s how you end up with a title as ridiculous and reductive as ‘original visual’ or ‘the human cg’.
"You’re really going to let them in on what we all got up to?"
"Oh," she makes this low, delighted hum - it sounds so dreamy, how her voice gets the richest sort of rasp, "every last detail."
-
On Monday: the holidays are officially over.
There's a bunch of stuff on the to-do pile. A lot of loose ends you have to clean up, a ton to catch up on. Irene is judiciously ignoring all of it. She's wearing her glasses - the ones with the big round frames that should look entirely obnoxious - which means she's already decided she's not leaving the apartment; Karina's still wrapping the world at large around her finger and has everyone convinced that she's all femme, no fatale; and you - well, you're back to thinking about how to climb the ladder and maybe how to stay there.
You head downtown with a cup of coffee in one hand and a musing mood in the other.
On your phone, some more choice text messages arrive in the late AM: had a great time by the way, stay out of trouble, this sweatshirt is actually just mine now, duh. 
The selfie alongside it is pretty suggestive, but just vague enough to flirt with indecency.
She sends one more at lunch where she's gotten out of the shower, or a hot pool, or maybe a long workout - her breasts squeezed between a towel and an arm - she has the camera all zoomed in and framed tight, almost full body. If her intention is to mess with you, that's what she gets. The texts: ah, fuck off and did you have a nice date with your left hand then, thanks for reminding me, the hotel wifi is shit lmao.
The messages just keep on coming and there's really no better descriptor.
And Irene, later, in a way that's neither diplomatic nor nuanced: jesus, don't let her catch you by yourself. For simplicity’s sake. She interprets being alone with a handsome boy as carte blanche to do absolutely whatever she wants and she's vapid that way.
There’s a chance it fizzles out into nothing. An even greater chance it all goes sideways. You'll have to see what becomes of you three.
-
Okay, right - new year, new you. The resolution for the past couple remains unchanged, and unfulfilled - less takeaways and eating out; more meal prep, less calories, healthier decisions.
Irene has this cute little apron over her sweater that is fixed extra tight, the belt trailing down the tops of her jeans to accentuate her nice round hips and slim waist. She knows the nature of her charm, her sex appeal. How it occurs, almost, as if by accident.
You say something that will get right under her skin like, “looking real domestic, Joohyun,” as she slides a chopped onion from a cutting board to a bowl.
She presses her hips out just a smidge, just enough. Turns a bit as she opens up the fridge, and the smirk she has for you, that sidelong glance-
“Don’t you Joohyun me,” is her lightest rebuke. 
She twists her way onto her tiptoes to fetch at the highest shelf. The crochet corner of her sweater rides up a couple of inches, flashing a hint of the fair, bare curve of her lower back. "You can help me by grating the parmesan, hm? Into that," she gestures back at the table, pointing with the bottle of olive oil.
And so you're ten, fifteen minutes into helping with dishes, with the grunt work - with the realization that Irene is going to chop her fucking fingers off if you leave her to it unchecked.
"Actually, here," you say, "can I?"
She tilts her head, skeptical - still, a quick nod of permission - and her slender fingers surrender the knife and wooden chopping board to you. She's tapping away at her phone, finding the playlist you're both always secretly listening to.
"Wow," Irene says, low, as you start dicing mushrooms, a stalk of celery. "So brave. There’s no way I could do that. Is it safe? Are we, like, in nuptial bliss now, do you think? I fancy you, I fancy you-"
It's always this sorta-delicate dance with her: how much should you step up; how much should you put out of hand; how much she accepts versus how she pushes you aside and gets through you all the same. You're too proud, really - both of you - but fuck. She's adorable; the apron adds insult to injury; and it makes the switch in your head simple.
“I always forget how much I love this song,” she’s saying; the rolling pin she’s grabbed is a reasonable surrogate for a mic. When she’s through singing a verse, she shoves it in your face. You don’t know any of the lyrics. 
She doesn’t really care.
You have to laugh at everyone who's ever wasted the effort to theorycraft who she is behind the smoky lashes, the lowered chin, the downturned glance. All the characters and archetypes she'll wear and cast off as she needs.
"Here." She sidles up and tucks her hair behind her ear, the side of her hip grinding into your thigh until she’s pressed firm into the line of your leg. Because she needs to tell you that's way too much garlic, and she's not going to kiss you if your breath is trying to kill her first. She uses the word "pungent" a number of times, just for good measure. Go on - she’s murmuring - taste; right off her finger. If anyone caught this you’d be embarrassed for weeks
“I think, definitely, should open a bottle of wine-”
That’s how you earn all the responsibility for getting the both of you fed; she gets distracted looking through the recipe book.
But there's the way she looks up at you from the opposite of the kitchen island, face held up between her hands, fingers folded underneath her chin. "What?" she asks. 
She’s totally caught you staring.
The truth is: Irene only looks this gorgeous when it's just her. When she forgets that she's supposed to stick to a script.
You tell her as much when you end up fucking her right there on the counter.
It's so slow, atleast at the onset. Her panties pushed aside, jeans spilling off an ankle - the fucking apron managed to make it to the floor but her sweater got kinda stuck on the way up. So you're reaching through some overpriced fabric blend to pull down the wire of her bra and get your palm where she most prefers it.
"Say it again," Irene sighs into your neck, clutching to the back of your shirt - white-knuckled at the seam. "Come on, you can be so charming when you want something."
"I wouldn’t push your luck," is all you choose to tell her. 
You're hitting all the spots she wants you to hit anyway: her pretty pink cunt, slick, all wet for you already. Everything clenching as she arches her back, until she's hanging off the edge of the marble. You find it’s just enough leverage to fill her completely with your cock - stretching her out and open until her thighs bracket around your waist at the perfect angle.
"Or what?" Irene is out of breath, but hardly at a loss for words. "I know. You'll have to remind me how much smaller I am than you, right? So easy to keep pinned."
Well, if you really wanted: "Hah, ah - right." You get right next to her ear, muttering the words as deep as your chest can go - then take hold of her waist to put her in a spot she can't escape. And, by Irene's usual logic, once that happens, that's as much a victory for her as it is for you. You're being compliant, aren't you? The in and out: fucking her, filling her up, pulling your messy cock out of her pussy and slapping her clit just so she can hear how fucking soaked you make her, merely as a reminder-
"I wonder if she was even half as desperate," she moans against your jaw. "Her heart probably stopped the second you, ah - told her, what? About all of this?"
You stop fucking her, halfway.
"I’m sure you wouldn't be referring to Karina, right?" is where you glance at her. “I remember us both agreeing to chalk that up as a total absolute mistake. That was that.”
Irene just swallows, looks off somewhere over your shoulder. No one wears a blush better than her.
But she won't say it. Her honesty is such a privilege. The prodigy-type. Or at least, that's the word Irene chose. Then again, there’s you and your uncanny ability to turn a blind eye. 
To the vice, the virtue, and everything in-between.
"So, can I ask," you press your lips together, finding the point of her chin with a gentle tap - you have her looking you straight back at you. The moment could let you drive back inside and fuck her brains right out, right there, like that - right through, instead: you watch her try not to squirm. 
The tension in her upper chest, the rising heat that settles between her thighs, her weight struggling where you spread her knees, as far open as her body can allow. “How long exactly," you choose your words, careful and pointed, "are we going to pretend that she isn't texting both of us?"
You bury the question deep where she’s practically molten - hot and wet and so incredibly needy.
You do, again, and again. You pull her against you, watching that pretty brow scrunch and un-scrunch as your cock bathes in that soak. And hell, Karina had sent her a selfie today, is what she's explaining when you slow down enough - a bit of red, on her cheeks and her lips, and a lot of black, all the rest - the part about a midnight flight that's on hold until tomorrow morning. And then another, an hour later. To you both: her tits, the lace lingerie - so heavy, and soft, and easy to see yourself getting lost in-
Irene gasps at how fast you find all her favorite spots, then repeats - twice and again - hey, Karina said you're "such a cutie," and she sees her as the perfect mistress-material, don't you think? Wouldn’t it be ideal? The perfect fantasy? The perfect toy-
Obviously, that is morally bankrupt, even for the two of you. And you’re making sure she hears about it.
You ask her, point-blank: "are you really so selfish? So callous." It's ground out, slowly, against her hip, into her cunt. You've got Irene dripping wet, she's running everywhere, and you're telling her, "and this is your roundabout way of asking me to validate your twisted little ego?"
Don’t get it too confused: Irene lives for this shit; that sharp, hard-hitting tone - it drives her up the fucking wall. 
"Duh. Tell me - just a guess," she presses her hands further back, arching into each push. The slim curves of her chest are bouncing, just under her sweater. "You like to feel so guilty and morose but I bet-" she chokes off mid-sentence, you know exactly how, the exact motion that has her wanting. She gets a leg over your shoulder with no effort at all, and your fingers find their place, digging into her hips as she locks into your thrusts. 
Like fucking her is the only thing the two of you ever do.
Your whole body buzzes, it hums in resonance with where her gasps conflagrate to moans - you're pulling her slender frame down into every sloppy thrust and she takes you so fucking well.
"I bet it all sounds like, ah, the prettiest fucking music - in your head-"
“Fucking god, Irene-”
“Mhmm?” she fucking coos.
Because the things she wants to hear never actually leave your lips - your girl, fucking relentless.
Because the line between you fucking her and her fucking you becomes less distinct every time she rocks back and takes you deeper. Or when her mouth catches your next kiss a bit lazily. She takes over to swivel and slide her cunt up and around your length. So good that you have to keep her there. Hand locked onto her throat, digging a bruise or two in her collarbones, fucking her senseless against the countertop-
"Irene, fuck.” Your voice comes out thick, like gravel, and practically as an aside, “you’re going to make me-.”
Irene cuts you off, nodding, shh-shh’ing you into silence. “I know, baby. I know.” This total sigh of agreement - a hushed yes, or maybe uttering something she knows will sink right into your core, two words that sound a lot like “good boy.”
What, is that tacit approval? Probably. It’s hard to think straight.
So you bury yourself inside her, instinctually. Irene tips her chin up when she feels you paint her fucking womb. Every throb - with a fistful of her ass and your face pressed against her chest, sucking and biting and marking her anywhere, everywhere - right through her sweater. Fucking her so full that your mess is dribbling out all over the fucking floor, drip, drip, drip, and-
"Hey, I want you to know that I" - she sounds so amused as she cards through your hair, pressing a kiss to your forehead - "really couldn’t ever ask anyone except you."
(All is fair in love and war, is an adage Irene takes to its logical extreme, tangled in your sheets or with a dress puddled at her ankles. A silk stocking rolling down her leg, the crochet thrown into some dark corner.
You never say yes. You never really have to.)
This all before setting her down, off the edge, back onto her feet and taking another half-step forward and having the awareness not to completely flatten her under the full weight of your body, so she can run a hand down between the two of you and her fingertips can start gathering up all the cum you've pumped inside her. Irene tells you in her sweetest lilt to pay attention as she leans back up against the counter and gathers as much into her mouth as it will allow-
The sight alone.
When her head tips back, tongue passing over her knuckles, and she swallows-
"You are so," you sigh into her temple. Her cheek. You've settled the rest to the space in between. “Absolutely unbelievable."
She reaches out and trails the tips of her fingers lightly along the rise of your cock - her softness up against your hard lines. Her eyes flash when you twitch on the fucking spot. It's so tender all coming from her.
And there, a moment or two more. You can see it in the way she has her lips tilting, dreamy. You've always known what you were signing up for - how she's thumbing the nape of your neck - what her ideal outcome was, is. There's nothing and no one in front of either of you to bar the way.
You’ll make your vows like any other.
"Well, hey," she finally says, slow and husky and curling toward you with a smug self-satisfaction.
You push her hair behind her ears, the dark brown locks. Some part of you understands, unequivocally, that she is the absolute limit of how far you would go for any other person on the planet. No questions. In a heartbeat, without hesitation.
The kiss to the corner of your jaw is unironically chaste - before she’s telling you, "shouldn’t we get a move on it, chef? There’s food to eat, recipes to ignore; aren’t you fucking famished?"
-
The bolognese reduces down to a scorch in the cast iron. Too much heat, or too long, you got too preoccupied, who knows - there's a moral lesson to ignore here if you're so inclined. So it ends up being over a tray of sushi delivery that Irene explains to you her working theory like it's high-stakes political intrigue.
"Listen," she's got her chopsticks pointed at you, "for one, Karina, to her core, is a total seductress; and she's told me already, more or less to my face - she gets off on the chase, and hates the other shit. To be involved, or invested."
“Okay then why all the go-around; the wait-and-see; what’s her endgame?”
“What’s anyone’s endgame?” Irene shrugs. “Validation." She slips a tuna roll into her mouth.
"I think you might be projecting."
"Or, I'm simply an extremely empathetic person," her sarcasm hits harder through chewing - she almost gets you, and finishes swallowing to say, "look, she's like us if we were pretending to care, okay? Just more, like - explicit about her lack of intention. So. Doesn’t matter if it's to piss her manager off. Or it's like a revenge-slash-extortion-thing against someone she either had or is having an affair with."
"An affair," you repeat, skeptical.
"It's not like it’s an unheard-of workplace hazard, come on," and then the final confirmation: "she’s just into it because it sounds dirty and sexy, okay, like everything else-"
"And you figure we should be the ones to dole it out."
"What I figure," Irene says, doing that same mental calculus she did the first time: how, where, why - it's clear. A dozen different kinds of naked are an old, tired song by now. "I want us to fuck her. However she likes, whenever she likes, for however long she likes. Let her think she’s won something, or think she has you totally fucking hooked - I don't really care. Because it would be so much more satisfying to hear you tell me about it - because the idea of you two being like that for me. It's," her words pitch up a touch. 
"That's the fantasy."
And Irene dives into the details. She explains what it could look like, all the more raunchy and ridiculous. This very specific arrangement. It makes no real sense, the conversation alone, and that, you decide - what can't be rationalized - is how she'll take it: by fucking both of you. That's the objective fact. That's the demand.
You listen until it feels less and less like the decisions have already been made.
“Okay, babe,” she’s presenting her case. “Hear me out.”
And she keeps going until you both can see it materialize: "if Karina thinks she can handle both of us, then both of us it'll be." It’s how her fingers end up buried in your boxers and around the throb of your cock. You hear the gentlest laugh Irene has as you start fucking softly into her grip, and she runs her thumb over your weeping slit until she finds you that much more malleable to the suggestion. Effortless almost, she lures the primal part of you from its confines and teases and prods at its wants and desires. Which is also how some charged vocabulary gets thrown in for good measure. Because no, no, no - she's murmuring into your mouth, tipped back, plush lips right above yours - it's not a cuckquean situation, or an open relationship, or anything like freeuse or whatever else might justify the concern. It's not even cheating, Irene’s explaining, strictly speaking, because who said you and I wouldn’t be doing it together?
(Lying by omission is the story you both live - and the difference: she's pathological. You’re just now getting the hang of it.)
"Fuck," is what you exhale out as she opens her fingers, offering. Her thumb glides across the expanse of your head, a trail of pre-cum drawn underneath a nail. And you know all the things her nails can do - can rip your heartstrings. "I mean. God damn. There has to be, like, terms."
There's still sushi sitting on the coffee table, and Irene is placing these kisses into the slope of your shoulder, your sternum, making a show of the movement, how she's traveling down, downward - to her knees. Where she finds the seat between your thighs and tugs your shorts, the fabric gathered down your leg-
"Let me handle it," she tells you, and there goes the cut of your t-shirt, shoved up to your chest. Her grip runs flat, down from the rise of your hip, fingers wrapping around, touching - the flat of her tongue laving across the tip of your cock until she decides to lower her jaw.
"Just think right now. How I want to fuck her and how I'd want you to fuck her, too-" 
Right in her warm, wet little mouth.
Jesus, her tongue too-
She has it gliding up, around and against the swell of the underside. Rolling to where you need it, the places she knows you’ve died before. Lapping up the mess she's already gotten out of you-
Like this, Irene's looking at the way that the idea strikes: you and you and you; the only person in the whole goddamn world that can handle her; you fucking know it too - it's the most perfect, hopeless kind of thing. Like the feeling that catches at the apex of your lungs. It burns in your stomach and grips in your gut. She's gone and cut out the nerves - there's the crown of your cock caught in a velvet grip between those pretty pink lips and her fingers twisting at the bottom. 
She breathes deep. Sinks her lips so slowly to the base. Anything, everything you want: to put your hands to the side of her head, to weave your fingers through her hair, and coax her, fuck her mouth like it belongs to you, all slow and hard and measured.
To hear all those wet sounds she makes as she chokes on the end of it. The gags as you force your cock into the back of her throat, holding her head tight, her hair pulled up into a fist, to have that mouth hanging around the length of you, tongue stuck to the bottom of her chin as you move her, your fiancée, your toy. To be looking her in the eye and watching her look the fuck back while she revels in every filthy second of it, not a single damn drop of hesitation or doubt.
"Really think," Irene urges, and she's all innocent when she tips her head to kiss her way up your cock.
She’s trying for some grace or finesse, or both - trying, you think, to make a point; instead, you end up watching her gulp and spit into her palm, just to obscure the sensual curl of her tongue with the sloppy-hard rhythmic stroke of her fist. "How hot it would be if you watched us both choke on your cum. Her face fucked stupid - the perfect little fuckdoll, is that not an image for the ages-"
You get a glimmer of that catlike grin - the one you would kill for a picture of. Something for the wallpaper, or the wallet; you've never met a boundary she hasn't challenged. The most depraved ideas in her head are just, as she is, a masterpiece. And so the answer has never changed - there has never been anything she's not been allowed-
"Trust me baby," she presses her cheek against your shaft. You feel her turn and run that mouth all over. The tip of her nose. Her eyelashes. The wet heat of her breath as she nuzzles the length. "Karina's all ours to share."
Her pout, right there, waiting.
You can't stop yourself from grabbing her face, the crook of her jaw, her neck and the tips of her shoulders. Until it all comes with a good, hard pull. The sound of her mouth on your cock, the blowjob she's been perfecting for years. It's starting to fill up the room, her lips wrapping your shaft - the sound of her being so obedient, the most receptive, sweet, pretty thing: letting you guide her pace until she has a steady motion going. Taking the thick base in her hands and working it over between her fingers. There's only enough room for that before you’re all the way inside her, in and out, again: the tip of your cock brushing over the softest curve of her throat.
When you take her at face value, it's fucking wild: your fiancée kneeling before you. Her chin and neck wet with her effort, lips wrapped so pretty, stuffed, used-
There are no questions. This is simply Irene, doing what she loves.
She pushes a hand between her legs and holds herself together as your hips tilt forward, meeting her halfway-
Just letting you get yourself off in her mouth like it's no big deal. It's her throat - it's her goddamn cunt and ass, and whatever else - because you fucking asked, right? Because you gave her the permission, the choice, the agency.
"Hey, where should I?" you’re muttering as you push the hair out of her face, already half-drunk on her slick lips and realistically only a few seconds away from doing some real damage.
There isn't a need; but you want her to tell you, to use her words. In her mouth, on her face, in her palm, you’ll go without thinking. You’ll cum straight onto your own stomach if it’s what Irene says. Even if she’s acting like you already have.
"Make sure you give her,” is what she garbles out around the hard line of your cock, and it’d be impossible to understand if you didn’t know every nuance to her, if you didn’t - you know - fucking love her. To have and to hold - to hold on tight and for better or worse, and this is pretty much as bad as it gets. 
The syllables come in-between hollow breaths, all wet and sticky. When Irene wrenches the fuck out of it, the base of your cock- “hm, that same sort of courtesy when, agh, I'm not around-"
Because the image alone is what matters. There, getting your cock sucked like you've earned the privilege - it doesn't have to be real, it just has to look like it's a new truth to believe in. The little motions in her wrist are just - hah, fucking unreal - and the way she sinks down lower on her knees for each stroke, from base to tip - lips pressing over the knuckles she has wet, and squelching, and twisting up and down and up-
She places a hand under your balls, the gentlest cradle, and something of your restraint finally breaks - it snaps - her insistence is ruthless.
"Yeah, god, okay- I’m just gonna go ahead-" 
There are these images in your head, of Irene: the upturned brows, the hollowed cheeks, and that slutty-as-shit smirk - and then of Karina: doing the exact same thing. Fuck, your cock is heavy, absolutely leaking cum: you can feel yourself leaking into the press of her mouth. It fills up her cheeks as she blushes into the fuck. Her lips become flush and go soft against the ridge of your shaft - her jaw slack in anticipation. 
"Your fucking mouth, Irene" you breathe out, “I'm going to cum-” 
Just at half the sentence, you're there, sunk into your fiancée's throat. Fingers across her ears and into her hair and watching her own hands pulling you, guiding you-
It’s all flexed in your back. Every muscle. Every fiber.
Irene hums onto a simple, satiated note. She always does, when she tastes it. When you dump a hot load of cum all over her tongue and straight into her throat.
(And yes, some might claim this is the death knell for all kinds of reasoning, but you’ll go ahead and admit it’s so, so worth it.)
"How thoughtful," she says, low and slow, once she's through swallowing the entire fucking thing.
The corner of her mouth tilts up. Because you're finished: two steps left in the brain from falling out of consciousness, a mess on the couch. You get to watch as she pulls you into sorts and slots each piece back to where it's meant to sit. The underwear, your pants. It's with such careful attention. Your soft cock gets cleaned with a tissue and wiped dry. A tiny parting kiss for the tip, her mouth full-on puckered, like she's kissing out anything you have left.
Though it's a pleasant daze. She prefers you soft like this, really.
All you have left to say is: "fuck me, baby." It sounds sloppy and open-ended as hell. "I guess I'll leave everything to you."
If that's a cue or sign for the evening, the only right thing: it isn't exactly misinterpreted.
-
The actual logistics don’t arrive for a handful more weeks. You find it surprising they ever happen at all.
// Karina 10:41 pm > i'm bored.
// Karina 10:42 pm > suggestions?
// 10:49 pm > have you tried looking into an incognito tab?
// Karina 10:58 pm > lol, and what is it i'm supposed to be finding?
// Karina 10:58 pm > help a girl out here.
"Send her a picture of your cock," Irene says, like it isn’t a joke. She looks up from the smutty-dash-of-romance-porn novel she's got herself wrapped in, with her best faux-serious expression. The pair of readers that usually are in her top desk drawer have made a new home perched low on her nose. "God knows she hasn't stopped leering since she found out what I'm marrying into."
"Please," you tell her, because she's full of shit. "I'm not sending her a dick pic."
Your laptop is warm on your thighs as you huddle on your side of the bed. That's the point of balance where it feels like Irene isn't trying to look. Though she clearly is. You flick up through a couple tabs just to drive the point home.
// 11:01 pm > sorry. i'm not in the business of just handing out freebies
// Karina 11:07 pm > really
// Karina 11:07 pm > thought we were making progress here
// 11:11 pm > you're funny
"Ask her if anyone's home with her." Irene dogears the page she’s reading and sets her book down. "Or ask if she's, like, tied up or something. Something edgy."
"Something edgy," you deadpan.
"Do you want me to put the readers away," Irene offers. She's wearing the sort-of smirk you always need to be wary of.
"No," you say. “God, no.”
"Ask her where she keeps her lingerie. Tell her she should be thinking about what it'd look like: all naked except a thong. With the straps digging into her. Tied up all nice and pretty-like."
// 11:13 pm > u alone right now?
"What the fuck?" Irene slugs a pillow at you. "That is the creepiest way you could've sent-"
// Karina 11:13 pm > yeah. i am :/
You and Irene are both struck a little dumb by that. 
“Sheesh, she must have had her finger hovering over the reply button.”
"Yeah," you say, eloquent. “Who could blame her, though.”
"Uh-huh." Irene exhales, staring a bit pointedly.
// 11:16 pm > cool if I come over?
// Karina 11:17 pm > and… do what?
Irene nudges you with her heel, a questioning glance: the window has just been left there wide open and hanging. She whispers like Karina can somehow hear her through the phone, "you are terrible at sexting."
“Can you fucking leave it-”
Irene rolls her eyes.
// 11:18 pm > do you need ideas
// Karina 11:19 pm > got a couple. i wouldn't be against hearing something that lets my imagination fill in the gaps though
"Text her that you're into her throat and want her to show you her tits," and Irene actually cracks a laugh as she has the audacity to make the request. She's in good form this evening; in nothing but her favorite silk camisole - the navy blue one, which pairs great with all 5’2” of the rest of her. Like the soft curves she wears and everything else isn't bad for your heart. "Seriously, I want you to-"
"How am I supposed to end it?" You ask. The tone is purely sardonic. "Babe. Baby. My future wife. Tell me. You do realize you're basically asking me to bait her, right?"
Someone will eventually put their cards on the table, and Karina, Irene, and ostensibly you will realize you’re all currently having a mental break from reality. Or something along those lines. "I mean. Could that really be a negative," she wonders with an eyebrow quirked and another gesture of her arm like she wants to showcase the night sky beyond the bedroom windows.
"How, what - babe."
"You could promise to let her sit on it."
"Is the cockslut routine an act? Like," you lower your volume, "do you really have a playbook, here?"
"So mean." Irene reaches a hand over. She has her head propped on an elbow, the rest of her sprawled and comfortably positioned on the bed. And you wonder why the fuck you feel compelled to argue a point that so obviously has already been lost. "Just go fuck her already, god damn, I dunno."
Right. So. This was the part that was kind of inevitable - and Irene's impatience aside, you probably were about to win a lottery when you showed up at her door - that golden little interaction: "hey it's me, your rival at work's future ex-husband, I guess - I'm so horny and I think you're so beautiful and wouldn't it be so crazy if we, like, boned, haha, what?"
"Just- have sex. Tell me about it after."
The novel beckons Irene back toward it. She makes herself the picture of someone perfectly comfortable with you walking right into the next most uncomfortable predicament.
The sigh. That long, heavy thing. A leadup you do so often.
The simple idea of sending Karina that sort of message sends heat, low - just under the band of your sweatpants, and right where you've got yourself in the palm of your hand and you're already wondering how this is the result, why your cock is coming to a rise already - god damn - why every thought of Karina's face, and Karina's ass, and Karina's everything, every moment her lip is caught in between those teeth is becoming impossible not to touch. "Okay," you huff, "fine. I'm getting up, I'm going now- I mean it, right now, just give me a minute, I am putting my clothes on."
"Wait," and she's saying, "wait. Wait."
And when you turn around, Irene has this cat-that-ate-the-canary grin all stretched on the canvas of her face. She takes off her readers - her elbows thrown into her lap as she goes to the very edge of the mattress, pulling your shoulders for balance. "Babe-"
"Mm."
Irene likes to get you at a low simmer. The way she runs her thumb pad along your bottom lip. And all those questions - a look into her eyes - it's hard not to fold or break - when she's holding onto that sort of expression, unwavering; no matter how her mouth seems to get soft and curious.
Her lips move onto yours, asking - a push. And your eyes - a brush against a shoulder and you've already gone a whole mile from anywhere decent. There's the touch of her tongue between your parted mouths.
"You'll be good right?"
"I mean, sure," is what you manage, watching her lips close.
"You'll fucking wreck her, and do it exactly how she needs it done." And her brow, knit. She can tell your brain is busy jumping ahead to a hundred different scenarios. "Stop worrying."
There's a brief nod of reassurance. Her fingertips dust down your chest and the rest of the way. You hear Irene tell you to-
"And give her an extra hello from me."
"Okay, I love you, but also you're insane, like certifiable."
"Shush, I know you," and Irene gives your hair a little tousle before pushing you out the door.
-
You're standing there at the front door of Karina's apartment a little after midnight, bathed in dim, orange wicked fluorescence. Like it knows your sins - past, present and future. There's no obvious answer when you go knocking, and for a half-moment, you're thinking, okay, it's alright, this is how I let someone down easy-
Until she answers and leans out, pulling open the door. It takes you by surprise-
"Well, I'd normally let you in," you hear Karina say, and a smug smile starts to cross her face, "but..."
It's about the degree to which she looks hot and a little off kilter in this tight t-shirt - a snug pair of panties around the sway of her hips - that almost sends you spinning. There's not an ounce of self-consciousness; it's like a punch to the gut.
"Aeri's date went south and she's drunk. She's passed out on her bed, like, right now, I don't think-"
There's no bra. It's hard not to get fixated on every detail. Like her nipples, practically standing out. You have an irrational desire for her to take a step back, further into the room, further out of your vision's reach-
"Uhh," you croak. And you do have the mental faculties for, uh. For telling her. "Maybe, you know, later, could be better, yeah, maybe call me."
Though, unfortunately, the suggestion falls short on delivery.
"No, no." Karina has her hands searching up and underneath your sweater. Her fingers dance flat up, right over your stomach - teasing as she hikes you back inside. Right past the threshold. Your mouth is half-caught and stupid under her, the gentle hum and pressure on her lips. "It means we need to be quiet."
She drags you another step forward, with just the hot flash of her gaze. 
"Shut the door behind you?"
"Locking it too," you tell her.
The laugh she makes into it, this one little scoff - it's an acknowledgment: an agreement. It's one of the worst fucking sounds, and the whole damn thing gets to you. Like her ass wasn't the perfect fit for the palm of your hands- like you don't want to trace your fingers under the elastic of her panties.
As if it wasn't fucking clear enough. It's the tongue in your mouth and the hands in her hair. She's kissing you soft, she's kissing you deep; her weight rests and pulls back with each swell of your ribs, pushing her fingertips down until they're skating, slow, low into the grooves of your spine. Like she's getting familiar with you again.
"Okay," you breathe. She laughs on your lips and presses forward - pulls you back, farther- "uhh. Okay."
She must see the confliction you're in-
"Hey." Karina keeps going until you've got her backed against a wall, until your thigh has pressed into the crux of hers and your hand is in her shirt. You don't miss how she lets her head tilt back when her eyes shut. It's her. There's no disputing the reality. "Whatever you want to do to me. That is all I've been thinking about. Do it."
"I- don't really-"
She makes a decent show of crossing her wrists and tugging her shirt right over her head. Tosses it someplace safe enough. "So are you just gonna leave me in suspense, or do you need my explicit, enthusiastic permission?"
Your lips draw themselves a blank on anything useful, while your heart rate accelerates.
"Here try this: you’re going to fuck me until I beg you to stop. Then you’re going to fuck me some more. Or whatever- then we can go somewhere, I don't care," she offers with a half-whisper. In all her goddamned glory - barefoot, almost bare chested - it's not like it could be any other thing.
-
You’re not exactly supposed to end up on your knees for this.
This isn't quite how you pictured-
Okay, fuck, Karina's making the prettiest noises where her spine is curling up against the wall; those sounds you couldn't even make up. How it feels like the easiest damn thing, because there isn't a question to why. Every inch of you is pressed to every inch of her. You know what you'll taste on your tongue, which of these breasts belongs in your palm and the fingerprints in the dips of her waist - her lips on the curve of your jaw - every mark and bruise on her skin, every hint of it is real; it's fucking you up because you're kissing the woman that Irene picked, the woman you met - it's how you pull yourself away-
Karina, for the longest few seconds, is shocked into stillness.
Because you could, of course, decide to give this one last shot, your head between her thighs and eat her out until she was so fucking wet your cock wouldn’t even enter the equation. This is not actually a new idea; the possibility has run through her mind enough times already.
"Yeah. That would work."
Like it's no big deal-
"Do you need instructions? I can get a bit graphic."
"Actually, you know what?" you choke a little, and - "trust me."
You stand straight up for a moment, a second, an extra fraction. You slip your cock inside her hot cunt, and, yeah. She collapses right into you. You’re holding up her just enough to fuck into - she's starting to breathe deeper, harder; you've got her pinned like that - a hand on her neck, fingers sinking into everywhere she's softest: her tits, her ass, her waist, her throat, and there is nothing that isn't some version of fucking glorious about Karina's weight grinding, heavy onto the tip and onto the ridge and down the thickest length of you-
And her face, jesus christ, her fine brows upturned, the tears heavy in her dark lashes, the little gasping-sobbing sounds that spill across her wobbling lips - this is the both the easiest and the hardest part: seeing her get absolutely fucking ruined-
(You know, god help you.)
-
Irene doesn't even have to ask. There are hickies and bruises shadowing in on your neck, your chest - these marks you never remember Karina giving you, and a ton of scratches all up your back.
"You know I was going to offer to make you breakfast," Irene says, smug, "but I'm wondering if Karina got to you first."
"What the hell do you think?" you say, dumb.
There are eggs burning on a skillet that are never going to be salvageable, no matter what Irene says. She has no respect for the process. And her voice is full of that infuriating smile: "was it everything you hoped?"
"God," you mutter, trying to mask the embarrassed laughter in your words. You can hardly move an inch on her behalf.
"At least tell me something fun, you insufferable tease," she presses her nose into your hair and tickles the spot on your side, just to be a pest.
You lay it all out for her. Everything she wants to hear.
-
Surprisingly, there’s still plenty to learn about each other; days to weeks to months. The first real thaw of the year comes, and you’re quick to fall into this odd rhythm.
Karina won't actually join Irene on set or production very often - too much heat. It shouldn’t have taken so long to figure out the two don’t belong in the same room together, and if they’d asked you, they’d know - but no one ever really does ask you. However she does spend more and more time around the apartment. In and out of your personal spaces. And maybe a bit in between, or a little underneath too: how she seems to slot herself right into every possible fold whenever Irene’s away.
Always traveling for this reason or that.
And god, the perfect powder keg Karina is - ticking, short-fused, all ready to explode. It’s ironic, you think, she’s drawn to scandal the way Irene will do anything to avoid it, and here, she's found her ultimate indulgence.
The quick lay, the time and place you know you can be patient in pulling her apart, the everything in between. 
In fact, you’ve taken to calling her "babe" just so she doesn’t think twice when she gets your cum pooling deep in her cunt, all hot and sopping. Looking like the picture-perfect centerfold. The fucked-dumb face - all twisted in your grip, flushed-red; and the musky scent of sex; the noises and her presence alone. You fuck her, and fuck her, and fuck her, rubbing a thumb across where the mascara runs thick.
To be the gorgeous girl, cock-drunk and fucked-out in your lap - so simple - so natural: Karina finds her way over more often than not.
After your shower, after your nap; your work, the bar - Karina’s never more than a text away. And you'll keep a hand around her waist as she stands around in the kitchen, stealing Irene’s leftovers out of the fridge. Karina ends up straddling your thigh right there at the breakfast table, holding onto the wood for support as she cums all over you.
The long and short of it is: 
She's fucking you. She's fucking your fiancée. She sees no problem in having her cake and eating it too. The only caveat is: Karina thinks neither of you know what's actually going on.
“You gonna say hi to Irene for me?" she's teasing one day, snapping her bra back into place. The t-shirt pulled over all that glossy-dark hair, the shimmy of her hips just to get back into the world's tightest jeans. She presses a fleeting kiss to the corner of your mouth. It's such a stark, clinical goodbye - ending with a flick of a thumb across a screen. "And oh, let her know if she ever wants me to teach her a trick or two. Anytime."
“Yeah, I’m sure she’d love that.”
Karina does the most insipid thing. She fucking winks. “I’m sure she would.”
-
"Uh, are you kidding me?" you ask Irene. 
It's late one night, and Irene is standing in the kitchen in her pajamas with a welt the shape of Karina’s lips kissed right into her jaw. A couple drinks in your system have given you both a false sense of clarity, and also an ill-timed desire to solve all your goddamn problems. You lower your voice. "In her ass?"
Irene has that all-triumphant and dopey grin that makes your heart ache for her. There's a soft curl of her hair loose, thrown across a shoulder. "I’m serious, pull her hair right, hold her wrists until her back has to be arched. Pin her to the bed," she continues to illustrate, "it's all in the finer points of how much. Tell her to count, even. I'm not joking-"
She takes another spoonful of yogurt between her lips.
"-she'll let you do anything, promise."
“That’s fucked up.”
“I know.” Irene wags the spoon at you. “It’s great.”
-
It's not only the hypothetical-homewrecking that gets Karina so torridly wet for the whole affair; when she's pinned beneath you with her legs spread and her toes pointed skyward, or perhaps later - the same day even - riding Irene's face in a locked dressing room and crying out - "ah, hah, jesus, please-"
In her head, she has you both at her beck and call. Forget semantics - Karina is a fool to her own illusion. Because in her head, not only has she managed to go toe to toe with the industry's reigning monarch, she’s managed to win.
-
You don’t exactly know how Karina ever intends to keep it casual. Because things are damn near constant:
It’s a weeknight, and the moon is high above the windows, casting a crisp rectangle onto the hardwood; it doesn’t actually matter, as far as Karina is concerned.
Irene’s on television again, the sequin in her dress clinging tight, and she’s found the gaze that never breaks for the cameras. Found the flash of her most practiced smile - that little chime of laughter she has that sounds like striking pure gold.
Then Karina: sitting cross-legged at the very end of the sofa. One leg thrown over your thigh, she’s got these nylons on her feet and she’s poking a toe into your ribs. "Isn't she stunning," you hear her muttering, "honestly. Doesn't it, like, turn you the fuck on?"
Her foot grazes your lap, all casual at first; the impossibly soft-curved heel of her sole. There are so many ways she'd prefer to pass the time and they almost all involve getting under your skin, if not just outright getting into your pants.
“Elaborate.”
"I mean listen, in your case, just knowing your fiancée is up there looking like a total angel and at the same time, thinking about you; how she’s got to be considering every which way she’ll unwind just after the showcase - at least, that’s what I’d be doing." She licks her lips, teeth. "Hell, I’m only imagining how pretty her eyes are when she can barely keep them open, and that’s enough to ruin my panties."
"Are you really."
She shifts her weight. Puts that ankle to good use. Rubbing it into the crease between your legs. "Tell me," her lips curl. She’s looking at you dead-on. "How does she usually prefer it, hm?”
Like a wildcat, you suppose, your Irene - a pretty, little predator. You could tell Karina everything, but you don’t. Instead you let her wander into the lair of her own making. Her eyes: light and curious; it’s written in the lines of her face how she's picturing it all so plainly.
“I’d guess she lets you go slow. Or hard. Or maybe a little rough and then you make her cum, and then maybe, just maybe, after the teasing; after the edging, I guess, that's when she comes in hot. I would hope."
Karina twists her foot around, swings her weight onto your lap, and sucks in a sharp breath when you reach out and grip the lean lines of her hips. It’s as easy to hold her still as it'd be to drag her across the couch and under the rest of your body, fuck the goddamn tension until there was no longer any room left for the pretty smirk in her lips. And her gasp would probably sound a hell of a lot better - than all the needling quips - a much louder and much less-pretend whine when you could throw those thighs open and really pound her wet, aching little cunt-
“Easy,” she chides when you end up taking two handfuls of her chest. "Shouldn’t you be more supportive? For god’s sake, it’s your fiancée’s moment in the spotlight, you know-"
There’s nothing stopping you from popping off the buttons of her dress, one by one by one - and kiss right there, into the swell. Your voice feels all the rougher when you respond, "and what a moment."
Her fingertips skim over the places she's been kissing you, where she's been marking and claiming and trying to, at least, to stamp you like her personal property - when the look is that serious. All cold-burn. Right through to the bone.
“So.”
You can feel her touching into your pants. The heat in her soft, silky thighs; she sits above you, keeping a leg on each side. A part of you feels trapped; another is confused why you aren't turning the tables right now - flip her and ride out her cunt on the couch. Some passing thought, or just a fraction, the only one that matters in that particular instant, wonders what Irene would do, will do - has done - in your situation. How her hips would roll. How Karina’s moan might sound when she dug a nail right into a sweet spot.
You push Karina's skirt a little farther up her body and try to gauge the moment she's finally decided she doesn't mind.
“How about you keep your eyes on her, and I'll suck your cock while you do," ends up being the short and not-so-sweet of it all. “-or maybe you can get off between my tits.”
She wraps those fingers around your base and pulls gently. It's not a decision, but merely a continuation, a culmination: a gesture made entirely to pull the response: the hitch to the throat. Her nails skim that ridgeline as her eyes track across the cut of your features. It makes you groan into her next kiss, to say, "if you wanted it so bad, babe, you could’ve just said. Would save us a lot time-"
"Are you complaining?" she husks, pulling your pants down your thighs. Your cock is in her hands and she smiles like a cat - licks her teeth when it twitches at just the slightest touch. "Yeah, I didn't think so," is how the breathless laugh leaves her lips.
You catch the quirk of her brows, her tone: straight-up, like nothing. You’re almost buying into that until she's got your shirt on the floor, those lips of hers in the divot of your collarbone, and her tits wrapped around the base of your cock, and, well, fuck-
She actually wastes no time - none at all. A couple feet away, Irene covers her laugh with one hand. There's a brass award in her other. And the television casts this soft, pale glow.
Karina tips her head, and a curtain of her dark, silken hair spills across the ridge of her breast. She runs those big eyes over you, all wide and round and vaguely-deviant. There's the perfect amount of motion, of squeeze, just a light-bit of pressure, and she's got a face smug-arrogant in an instant, knowing. Fuck, her hands on either side start pushing into the line of her cleavage as she bounces and rocks and draws every inch of your cock up through her soft tits and back down again.
"Fuck," is the harshest exhale she's ever dragged out from you.
She hums a low sound, all self-satisfied when it's her own namesake: your body wants her, like you know the full weight of her needs, your touch, how badly she's fucking craving to get off and still not admitting to anyone it might be more than sex. Like it's really as easy as her next breath, the flutter of her lashes: Karina wants your eyes, the weight of your attention and she's not going to beg for a fucking thing. The feeling, you think, is mutual.
"Irene," she says, her smile as open as it could ever get. "She's just so gorgeous, right?"
On one hand, she’s speaking between the lines. A perfect tincture of deceit - the bawdiness-by-nature: watch me, look at me - is what she might as well say - look what I can fucking do, the whole lewd display. And, god, how she knows every way to make a guy want it, like she wants you to remember it.
Because on the other, the movement is so, so direct. 
Karina twists herself in an upward tilt, just an easy, practiced thing; she lets her tits spill around your cock and through her fingers, full and soft - and her lips part, mouth slacking alongside yours, matching the sounds out your chest with her own. Like she knows exactly which slide of slippery friction will make you moan, or which pull and drag will send your teeth straight into your lip.
"Isn't it crazy," she lolls her head a little, letting her own saliva drip down the center, onto your weeping slit. "How much I want your cum filling my cunt, even knowing she's the one you'd rather put the ring on," the drag and drag and drag - her tits are fucking incredible, and she knows it. She pushes up with her fingers and gives you a long draw right through the press, right where the nerve endings run electric, right where she keeps moving, up and down, and up and down- 
“-it must be hard, I mean, jesus christ. Here I am, needy and hot. Begging you to wreck me and my only sin, hm - the sin of being second best, right-"
"Holy fuck, you're-"
"Obsessed," she says, and drops her tits against your waist again. "I know, I know. How could I not be?"
You're left muttering into the titfuck alone, watching her rub your precum up between their soft shape, feeling the slight give, how her skin goes warm. The act itself: such a simple-thing-bordering-on-the-absurd that you notice how you coil and flex beneath her curves, how she feels so soft and warm. The slight pucker of her lips every time your cock escapes her cleavage does little to help. It's probably the fault of the brain-fuck but the wet of her mouth is practically everywhere you look. You could eat her alive right here, spread her legs on the coffee table and finish with a bit of screaming, groaning and tearing, and no one would ever stop you.
But instead,
"-it's a good color on her, really; but then every color is a good color on her, isn't it so unfair?" She's taking your cock into her tits, deeper on every rock forward and back, holding them close - a gentle lock of those long manicured fingers keeping it all together. "Even wearing no color at all; you must just love how all the freckles are so easy to see," she murmurs, squeezing tight. The sound is wet, messy. A filthy chorus between her dirty words and the dirtier action, and just that glimpse of friction when she strokes down again is maddening. You're all slippery. So sticky-slick, so tight.
Of course there's not a fucking inch of a reaction out of her; you want to get off so bad-
"You could close your eyes," she tells you. "She would still be there. The sound of her laughter. The image. In that dress or not," and her mouth furls into a half-smile before she pauses. Reaches down, pulls her tits around you impossibly tight. "Just so damn pretty-"
You cum just like that: 
"Babe," is what you let her have. The soft, undercurrent hiss. "Fuck."
You shoot clean up, all thick, hot splatter.
Well, mostly up - along the expanse of her neck and throat, coating where her breasts sit so pretty against the lines of your thighs. Across her sternum and the hollow of her neck - her body's covered in your shared mess: slick-filthy-hot, all strewn across her perfect tits.
"Jesus, Karina, baby you’re-"
"Completely covered in you." She's still smiling. That deep-cut and perfectly symmetrical curl of her lips. The gorgeous fucking shade, and her chin, how her cheeks flush, just a little - they've always turned pink in the most specific places when she gets fucking cum-soaked. “I know, just look.”
And her hands slide across her chest, trailing a path through the thick of your release, spreading the glaze all down her front. Making it messy, making the exact look a guy sees once and is driven to the ends of his sanity - just to spill his load out onto her. To get her all used, and trussed up: just how she likes.
(Sanity is being generous, considering.)
You can't do anything other than what's expected: take her up in a kiss, breathe into the mess you've made on her skin. The gasp is full, surprised - just enough, maybe, to count as genuine.
Such a mess - she murmurs - um, come on then, you can do a girl a favor. Bath bomb, bath towel, bath robe - and really it doesn't have to be a suggestion.
You’ll pin her down and fuck her right over the lip of the tub if that’s what she really wants. Just being in her company is indulgent and excessive and begging you to make a terrible habit of it. Have some self–restraint, she has this tone in her voice sounding more and more like a dare. There's just enough there in her hands: one reaching for you and the other reaching into the porcelain, swirling up the lather - and that look on her face, as if to say, can't believe you have me waiting, like some desperate, depraved pervert - only it’s more explicit than that. Only it feels worse - and her mouth is moving again, speaking into the air that already feels stifling hot, words cutting through the steam: you're not very nice, I mean really, it should come as no surprise how she turns out, having this jerk for a fucking boyfriend- 
Nevermind. Not a dare, it's a challenge. She was right the first day you undressed her, the brattiest girls always have the worst kinds of fantasies, the darkest little tendrils of self-destruction. How she's laying there, asking and telling, pushing and pulling; and how she thinks she's so clever too.
Though that is no reason, she laughs, for you to think she won't love having her pretty cunt cockwarmed and spoiled for an evening or more. - And so it goes, and so it goes, and so it goes, and so it goes.
-
(Really, to Irene’s credit, she had Karina pegged right from the jump. A character study in, well, herself.
She's seen as an ingénue by the press, and an outright savant to the executives. They know her as the obvious successor. They give her the runway, they watch the leggy-girl-turn, the model-posture, chin held high and aloof, looking down at the gathered throngs of photographers.
The protégé, the goddamn heir-apparent:  
But her favorite game - that bit of innocence served on a platter, ingenuous when it comes to spinning a flaw to gold, and the deception too - Karina loves and loathes every second she spends upstage from Irene's own, hectic, international production. Because if anyone asks her, that girl would claim it's never been a competition in the first place. 
So you see, if you and yours have both decided to ruin her-
It is a disaster-in-the-making, isn’t it.)
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ambrosiagoldfish · 2 months
Note
Can you write more Adam fics plz there so freaking good
Benefit of the Doubt PT.2
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Adam x 3rd Spouse! Reader
Viewer discretion is advised
Warnings: Hurt/Comfort, Fluff to Angst to comfort, General Adam TW’s, Reader lowkey-highkey has a complex about being loved, Panic attack (I’m not even sure if this is correct term or not), Adam is afraid of heights (makes sense in story) This is set way before the show, and Gn! Reader (Y/n is once again not used lol)
Part 1 Part 3 Part 4
Request Box: Open
Word count: 3136
A/N: Hi! I’d like to Thank you all for the love and support on Part 1! It means a lot that you all enjoyed it as I loved writing it! I’d also like to apologize for this being a week late, I honestly had 0 idea on how to start this one and then a bunch of stuff in my life happened, so it was a mess.
So as an apology I tried to make this one longer than the first! (I seemed to go a little overboard but it’s fine)
Anyways I hope you all enjoy part 2 to ‘Benefit of the doubt’ and as always, if you do, please tell me if want another part in replies/requests/DM’s!
Proofread but of course could have missed something
Tags: @tired-of-life-86
To think love could feel this good.
You were made for it, to give it, receive it… You’ve waited your entire existence for this love, This closeness. It doesn’t even feel real now, even as you’re walking down the golden lined streets of heaven with his arm wrapped around you, all while you’ve been showing him around. The best places to eat, entertainment, or just a nice park. You made sure to show him all of it.
He kept his wings tucked to his sides, the gold contrasting with the white of his robe. The feathers at first glance looked sharp, but now, being so close to him, you could see each of them individually and how soft they must be.
“Hey Sweetcheeks, my eyes are up here”
You jump slightly “Sorry… Adam.” You avert your eyes away from him and focus them in front of you.
Adam laughed “I didn’t say you had to fuxkin’ to stop”
His wings truly were beautiful. It was hard to keep your eyes off them. Adam had only got to heaven recently, it made you wonder if he had the chance to use them yet. You remember when you were first created, wings took forever to get used to. You crashed and fell so many times before you figured out how to use them
Properly.
“Ok seriously, you keep staring, what the fxck is up with you?”
“It’s nothing, just…. Have you tried out your wings yet?”
“Uh, yeah totally, they’re rad as hell” Adam’s voice drifted off, the LED eyes of his mask looking away from you as you both walked. Was he… lying? Why would he lie?
You quickly walked in front of Adam, leaving his warm embrace, gently you took his hands as your wings picked you off the ground. The gust of wind with each flap softly blew around you.
“Well, come on, it will be faster than walking.” Your voice was soft and airy. Slowly, so very slowly, you lifted yourself higher from the ground, Adam’s hands locked firmly in yours, as he was pulled with you in the air.
“W-Wait a- shit- Wait a- motherfuxking second“ Adam yelled strand after strand of curses as you both lifted further and further into the air. His body flailed and his legs kicked against nothing. You pull him to you, his arms quickly snake around your waist, holding on for his dear After-life.
“Adam… did you lie to me?” Your voice was still so soft, so calm, so sweet.
“Fuck- yes I lied, I’m sorry, so put me the fuck down you crazy asshole-“ Vulgar as ever, his voice had fear in it, the LED eyes were forced shut and his grip around you was getting tighter and tighter.
Your arms wrapped around Adam’s head as you laid back, letting The wind breeze from the air pull and push you along its path with your wings soaring through the clouds..
“Adam, it’s ok, I promise you’re fine, all you have to do is open your eyes.”
You pet the back of his neck trying to sooth him which seemed to work after a few seconds. Adam didn’t want to, he really didn’t want to open his eyes. But the longer he kept them close, the more you would whisper soft words of encouragement to him. Eventually, his eyes slowly but surely opened.
“See? There is nothing to be scared of. I’ve got you.”
You hold him closer in your embrace. Adam looked below, the white vastness of heaven’s clouds beneath you both felt unreal, but as amazing a sight it was, Adam’s grip on you didn’t loosen.
“So… I’m guessing you don’t know how to fly yet?” You laugh a little, rubbing a spot on his back, just between his wings comfortingly.
Adam huffed and looked away “oh! I couldn’t fxcking see that!”
You held him close to you. The embrace seemed never ending, and you loved every second of it. Feeling the warmth of his plump body next to you was like a dream come true.
“Here let me just…”
You moved your hands slowly down his arms, caressing the soft flesh as they moved to eventually be at his hands behind you. You began to leisurely undo the grip he had around you.
“What do you think you're doing-“
“Shhh, relax, just trust me, ok?”
With each finger being removed from you, the grip lessened bit by bit, until eventually his hands were fully in yours. Your face leaned closer to his,
“Come on, just give your wings a good flap, trust me.”
“Ugh…. Fine but I swear to god if you let go-“
“I won’t.” Your voice was firm, yet still remained reassuring.
Adam didn’t want to do this. He really didn’t want to. But what other choice did he have? He gruffs and extends his wings from his body. The wind brushed and tickled at his feathers. The way the light hit them caused a glare of gold to be cast from them, enveloping you both. Then, he gave two hard flaps of his wings, he lifted up slightly before quickly falling back to where he was.
“There you go! Now keep doing that.”
Adam continued, his wings slowly pushing him up and up before being sent back down when he stopped. This repeated for a few minutes until he finally got a grip on it. The entire time, you were laughing. Pure unadulterated laughs of joy.
Truly, to think love could feel this good?
“See? You're a natural!”
“Of course I am! I’m the Original Dick, obviously I’d… be good at this… flying… shit.” With all the parading he was doing he kept forgetting to use his wings causing him to fall. ‘A natural’ may have been an overstatement on your part, but hey? At least he hasn’t fallen flat on his face yet!
Gently, you led him through air, giving him reassurance every few feet you flew, never letting go. Seconds turned to minutes, minutes to hours. Before you knew it a brisk orange sunset encased you both with its hue. That’s when you realized just how long you both had been flying.
“You must be tired with sightseeing all day… I think it’s time we go home and rest, yeah?”
“Home?” Adam’s voice sounded for a moment genuinely confused. Had he not been told he’d have a place to live in heaven? As much respect you had for Sera, you’ll have to file a complaint to avoid this with future souls.
You gripped his hand and opened your wings letting the wind lead you through the clouds and above the city. The angels below look like ants at the height you both were. It was peaceful, the flight back home. But it did seem… off? So… quiet? You couldn’t put it together, at least not at the moment, But Adam hadn’t spoken a word since you both left.
Adam, while yes, he was initially confused, it made sense to him, why wouldn’t heaven have a place for its people, a place for each of them to relax, to feel safe, happy, at home.
Home was such a weird word for Adam. Has he ever felt like a place was his ‘home’? The closest thing to it was the Garden of Eden but even that proved to be anything but a home for him. Ever since that snake entered his garden.
No. He can’t think about that now. He doesn’t want to have to think about that again. But oh-do thoughts love to worm their way back into your mind when you least want them to. He’s snaps out of his thoughts when your voice picks up
“Ok, we’re here! Just get yourself settled in and I’ll go make us something to eat. I didn't really know what food you’d like so I mainly just have junk food… I hope that's ok.”
Adam nods his head nonchalantly
You smile, waking him over to the small, plush couch in the living room and handing him a blanket and some pillows. Telling him to wait a second as you fetch some food, leaving him alone.
Adam thought your house seemed welcoming enough, ‘well… our house’ Adam thought. The living room was dark aside from a few luminous lights around the room as well as the small blue gleam from the windows from the night sky.
The couch was comfortable and the pillows just as much. And the blanket you gave him was soft and warm. This really was heaven, huh?
His thoughts are, once again, interrupted by your voice, “Ok here we go, I’ve got snacks and some soda” you say, handing him some of the many food you ravaged from your fridge and sitting beside him, wrapping yourself in the shared blanket.
Grabbing the remote lying next to you, you flick on the TV flipping through the channel before ending on a cheesy sitcom, you keep the volume low wanting to enjoy any conversation with Adam. Except… he never started one. So that’s what felt off.
The entire time you flew back home, got snacks and found something to watch. He hadn't said a word. You may not have known him long but even you had already picked up that he was an advid talker in a conversation.
“Is… everything ok Adam?” You whispered, not want to scare him with your random words.
“What kind of question is that, I’m fxcking fine… I’m fine.” His voice trailed off at the end almost getting as quiet as yours.
“Are you sure cause-“
“I said I’m fuxking fine!” His voice roared through the dark room. Gritty and callous, but you could tell it was meant to hide something. Something he didn’t want you to see.
“I’m sorry…” you paused. What did you want to say from here? What could you say? You took a deep breath and tried to continue. “I… I know I said this earlier… when Sera left.”
Adam’s LED mask looked away from you half shut eyes and a frown forming a scowl on it, but still he let you continue.
“But I’m going to say it again anyways cause… I mean it. I’m really happy to have you here. To finally have you home” you place your arm around Adam’s back rubbing it soothingly as let your head slowly lax onto him, gently cuddling close to him.
That word again… home. That’s all he could think about ever since he first heard you say it. Why? Why couldn’t he get it out of his head? His breathing was becoming unsteady with each new thought and image his brain made. Lilith and Eve, they were made to be apart of his home, for him to be apart of their homes. So why? Why did it end that way?
Suddenly Adam leap from the couch as fast as he could, the shear force knocking you to the other side of the couch, sending the food to scatter and drinks to spill to the floor.
“Adam!?” Your voice was frightened at the sudden movement. Adam looked just as frightened as you, at least from what you could tell through the LED mask. He suddenly began running, where? he didn’t know, the rooms in the house looked the same. But all he knew is that he needed to be away from you. You followed quickly behind him and pleaded for him to tell you what was wrong, but eventually he ran into a room and locked the door.
He looked around, already out of breath. He was in a bathroom. He felt his knees give out under him as he tried to slowly sit down by the tub. His breath heavy, it was hard to breathe, this stupid mask. He needed it off. But just as he went to do so,
*rattle rattle rattle*
The doorknob began to move followed by frantic knocking on the door.
“Adam! Are you ok?!” Your voice pleaded through the wood of the door.
“Fuxk- I'm fine! How many times do I have to tell you that shit” his voice cracked a few times followed by a strand of curses leaving his lips.
Home. The word repeated like a mantra in his head. Like it was mocking him. Was he not meant to have a place he called a home? To have someone to return to, who would tell him “welcome back!” Without even being told to?
Lilith hated him, Eve betrayed and hurt him like no one else before, ever. They were made to be with him, one was literally made to be his other half. The garden, his home, was taken from him because of something, someone he couldn’t control. it all comes back to him. That albino snake in the grass.
Lucifer, ‘The dreamer’… was this some sort of game to him? To toy with his emotions, treat him like some kind of plaything to mess with, to screw over? What kind of life was it? To have every opportunity and opening be broken down by him, And Adam being powerless to stop it?
“Adam! Please open the door!” Your voice was even more frantic now, knocking every few seconds before it quickly quieted down. Your body slumped against the door.
“Adam… I’m sorry if I hurt you or… or if I was going too fast… I didn't mean to… I’m so sorry…” your breath hitched with tears.
And then there was you.
You have been nothing but kind to him since you met him. You showed him around heaven, taught him how to fly and welcomed him home without having being told to. You were so different. So, so very different. Adam figure that out a while ago now. But in reality, it’s exactly why he was terrified.
To have someone who loves him so... unconditionally.
*click*
The sound of the door unlocking drew your attention and was followed by it slowly opening from Adam on the other side, still on the floor.
“Adam!” Your voice was low, already tired from crying. You crawled your way toward him before stopping in front of him, tears still falling from your face, “I’m sorry Adam, I’m sorry-“ you were cut off by a quick movement.
Warmth enveloped you, clouding your senses as a soft weight laid onto you. Arms wrapped their way around you in an embrace.
“Shit- it's not your fault, it was never your fault…” Adam’s voice was surprisingly soft, a stark contrast to his regular tone. Sincerity evident with each word. All you could do was hide into his large frame and cry at the words.
Adam was never good at comforting people. He himself was never comforted, so the concept was more than a bit foreign to him. But even still, he tried. Slowly he helped you both up from the bathroom floor and made your way back to the couch.
The floor was covered in the discarded food you both left behind. The spilled soda is now dried and sticky. Crumbs everywhere.
“Here.. let me get a mop and broom-“
“No just sit down, I’ll clean up the shit I made” you lay down on the couch and watched as Adam swept and mopped the mess from the floor. The entire time the silence hung in the air by a thread. Neither of you wanting to be the one to snap the string and speak.
Finally Adam got done cleaning the mess and made his way to the couch. He sat down and gestured for you to come closer. Crawling over to him, he wrapped the blanket around you both allowing you to snuggle into him.
“Do…” your voice barely audible “Do you want to talk about it?”
Adam looked hesitant but nodded.
“You know about everything, right? About… what all happened in Eden?
You nod against his chest content on listening.
“When… When Lilith left me, I thought I didn't care as much as I did. I thought she was a bitch and that was that. And it didn’t help that as soon as she left, I got Eve…”
He paused
“Then, when I found out about that shit between Eve and Lucifer… I didn’t care then either, but I didn’t understand why…” his voice hitched “but when I ate that damn apple… I realized how hurt I should have been. All the concepts of right and wrong, good and evil, learning all of it through that fruit, I realized one shitty truth… that the one I loved betrayed me.”
You hugged him tighter softly, your hands caressed his stomach as some form of comfort before he continued.
“For the same person- Both of them for that snake…”
“Adam… I’m so sorry you had to go through that.”
“And that’s why… I’m scared. Scared that I will fuxk up again and get… attached to you. Because every. single. time. He ruins it. And I don't want to see that happen with you.”
Your heart ached for him, the saddening look of his LED mask as he talked only furthered your emotions. Slowly your hands made their way to his face, he looks at you confused, your fingertips crept under the mask before his hand shot up and held your wrist slightly, carefully not holding it too tight.
“Sorry fuck- I’m.. I’m not ready.”
You smile and nod understanding “Adam. I love you… with all of my heart. And I would never do what those two done to you. “
Adam thought for a moment deciding what to say.
“Promise?” was all he could think of, his voice, mind, and body were all too tired to speak more about it.
You slowly remove your hands from his mask, instead taking one of his hands into yours.
“I promise, I would never betray you, let alone talk to that man” ever-so lightly, a soft golden glow burned between yours and Adam’s hands, the gold flame was warm and comforting to both of you as it rose and grew in strength.
From the flame, a string wrapped and warped itself around both yours and Adam’s pinky fingers. The string tightened and loosened as it moved, before finally melting away leaving only two solid gold rings behind, One on Adam’s finger and the other on yours.
“What the hell was that?” Adam’s voice was filled with bewilderment
“A deal- or I guess a promise. In this case”
“Shit, You didn’t have to do that-“ this time it was your turn to interrupt him. You bring Adam’s hand to your lips, and give a kiss on his newly formed ring before lying down and cuddling into Adam.
“I know.”
For once in his life, Adam felt at ease with love. How easy it was to fall for you.
Is this what home feels like?
1K notes · View notes
fangswbenefits · 9 months
Text
Sweet Girl
Summary: Miguel isn’t all that excited about you joining spider society, so why and how does he enter a spiral of maddening obsession?
Pairing: Miguel O’Hara x spider-woman!reader
Miguel POV. Obsessed Miguel. Soft/inexperienced reader. Pining.
This is more an of an introduction to my current series Frustration. You don’t have to read the first 3 parts to enjoy this.
Miguel crossed his arms as he stood on the lowered platform.
He was waiting.
And he hated being kept waiting.
Tense minutes went by until a swirling flash of light tore through the space continuum right in front of him.
Jessica Drew stepped out first, followed closely by Peter B. Parker.
And you.
You seemed so out of it, that Miguel wondered how a spider person could have been this badly affected by a mere dimensional travel.
As you tumbled out of the portal, you immediately lurched forward. “Oh, I’m going to be sick.”
Without further warning, you emptied the content of your stomach onto the floor.
Amazing.
Arching an eyebrow, he glared at Jess who was patting your back reassuringly.
“It’s her first time, Miguel,” she frowned lightly, helping you straighten up.
Peter offered you a tissue. “Oh, I remember my first time. My intestines were not the same for a week, and I do-”
Miguel immediately cut him off, not at all interested in hearing about Peter Parker’s bowl movements. “Welcome to Nueva York,” he stepped out of the platform, extending his hand to you. “I’m Miguel O’Hara.”
You cleared your throat and shook his hand. “So… you’re the boss.”
“I’m the boss.”
Miguel saw your eyes scanning him him up and down, widening slightly. “You’re… big.”
Peter snorted and Jessica chuckled.
But he could only roll his eyes. “You’ll eventually get used to your portal jumps.”
You scanned the room with curious eyes. “That portal really needs stabilisation,” you then mumbled, adjusting your suit. “The motion sickness…”
He scoffed. “You’re a spider-woman. I’m sure you can manage motion sickness.”
“Well… it’s not the same as swinging around in your web,” you retorted with a light shrug.
Jessica patted your shoulder. “That’s why we recruited you. Your intel might be able to helps us with some of these… instabilities.”
You immediately smiled brightly. “Oh, sure! I can’t wait to get started. This place looks so cool.”
Miguel groaned inwardly. Amateurs.
He had scanned your file thoroughly and had been against your recruitment initially, but Jess had brought up valid points in your favour, despite the fact that you had only been bitten less than six months ago.
Inexperienced and ambitious.
These two hardly ever worked together, but your vast knowledge in tech compounds had made him give Jess the benefit of the doubt.
“Follow me. I’ll have to draw blood to run some tests and Lyla here will fill you in later on other procedures.”
The hologram popped in obnoxiously by your shoulder. “If he asks nicely, that is.”
Your mouth dropped open in absolute bewilderment. “Woah! AI? That is really, really awesome!”
“Thank you, pumpkin,” she grinned with a wink.
Miguel paced through the long halled that stretched out towards Lab 1, with you following close by, as Peter and Jess flanked you.
From the corner of his eye, he saw you glaring out of the tall windows, completely transfixed by the the countless skyscrapers that sprawled out as far as the eye could see.
“You built this?” your voice echoed in sheer wonder.
“Yes.”
“All of this?”
“Miguel is really gifted with technology,” Peter chimed in proudly.
“Woah…”
That tingled his ego nicely.
As the four of you walked inside the lab, the surrounding spiders at work glanced over, voicing their greetings.
“Take a seat.”
You immediately did as he said with Jessica standing next to you, hand on your shoulder.
Miguel put his gloves on and readied the material for the blood testing.
“Give me your arm.”
“So you’re a tech guy…” you started, and he gripped your forearm, rolled the sleeve of your suit up with fingers probing for a vein. “What else?”
“A geneticist.”
“Nice! So you’re like a two for one type of deal?”
Once he found what he was looking for, he aligned the tube with your skin. “This will sting a bit.”
Before you could reply, you let out a gasp at the sudden intrusion.
“And you work at the lab, too?”
“Do you always ask so many questions?” Miguel said, waiting for the tube to fill in.
You nodded with a warm smile. “I just like to know what I’m getting myself into.”
You had no idea, but Miguel was testing you, trying to gather as much of your personality as he could. He enjoyed piecing people together like puzzles. It stroked his sense of control.
“I thought Jessica had briefed you.”
“I did,” she immediately said.
“Yet you’re the one drawing my blood,” you chirped happily, your eyes fixed on his.
Well, maybe you had an idea.
Miguel felt the corner of his lips turn into a faint smile.
Good.
He needed perceptive people around.
He pulled away from from you slightly and pressed a cotton pad to the small puncture.
Sliding open one of the drawers nearby, he grabbed a watch, never letting go of your arm.
“This is a dimensional travel watch,” he explain, snapping it snugly around your wrist. “Keep it with you at all times.”
He let go of you and you seized the moment to inspect it closer, fascination never leaving your face.
“Let me guess… you also built this,” you said with a chuckle, pressing on the screen a few times.
He reached out his hand to stop you. “This is not a toy. Lyla will inform you on how to properly use it.”
You nodded firmly.
“Welcome to spider society.”
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It didn’t take long for Miguel to start walking in on you sleeping in the lab.
For the fourth time.
He was all too familiar with the riveting excitement that came with scientific progress that often led to many sleepless nights.
But he still couldn’t allow this to keep happening.
Halting a few inches away from you, he took a moment to access the situation: you sat hunched over the lab table, head resting on folded arms and a string of drool dangling from the corner of your mouth.
A heavy sigh parted his lips.
He tapped his foot once on the leg of your chair, causing you to jolt upright with a yelp, nearly falling back from the loss of balance as the chair swayed dangerously.
But Miguel was fast enough to prevent that by steadying you with a firm grip on your shoulder. You then leaned forward, panting and clutching at your chest.
“Good morning.”
You turned your head to stare at him, deep bags under your eyes and sleep lines covering your face. “Miguel! Oh — hi! I’m… oh my… that was such a scare!”
His crimson eyes narrowed slightly. “It’s the fourth time this week.”
Trying to regain some composure, you straightened your clothes and wiped the string of drool trailing down your chin with the back of your hand.
“Right. I was… uh…” you paused abruptly and looked around, as if momentarily disoriented. “Oh. Yeah! I am — was working on running some diagnostics and must have dozed off waiting for the results… and-”
He clicked his tongue and spun your chair around, effectively silencing you, his eyes boring into yours. “This isn’t going to happen again. You need to rest.”
You swallowed. “I was resting…”
Miguel didn’t have neither the patience nor the time for this.
“You need proper rest,” he pressed on with a scowl. “Jessica scouted you for a reason, and if you’re too sleep-deprived to work, you’re of no use to us.”
You broke eye contact with him, lowering your head. “I’m sorry…”
The sincerity in your voice took him slightly aback, and he relaxed his face, wondering if he had perhaps been too harsh.
You were chewing on your lip, staring down at your entwined hands.
He had no idea why, but his heart skipped a beat.
Probably stress.
“Look,” he tried again, softer this time. “I know what it’s like to want more. To do more. I’ve been there,” he then crouched, so he could eye-level with you. “But you can’t keep pushing yourself like this. We have time to figure this out.”
You looked to the side, hesitating at first. “I… was talking to other spiders and some mentioned they feel the side effects of motion sickness if they use the portal more than twice a day,” you went on with newfound confidence, gripping the pad on the table and lighting up the screen. “I’m close to getting the chips to work and ther-”
Miguel pinched the bridge of his nose. “Stop. Stop.”
You did.
“What part of me saying you need to sleep didn’t you understand?”
“I don’t mind sacrificing a few nights of sleep if it means I can help other spiders,” you said, a flash of defiance crossing your eyes. “Seriously, Miguel. I need to get this done… I need it.”
Miguel’s strictness shattered.
He then saw a reflection of himself staring right at him.
So much of your determination and persistence reminded him of his early days as a scientist. The struggle, the hunger for results, the need to achieve something that could help so many…
“I know you’re looking out for me,” you went on, placing one hand on his shoulder and giving it a soft squeeze. “And I’m grateful, but science and progress don’t wait. I know I can be helpful, so let me.”
For the first time in a very long time, Miguel O’Hara was left speechless.
“Please don’t fire me,” you laughed nervously.
He blinked a couple of times and stared down at his watch.
6:14AM
“You can come back in twelve hours.”
Your eyes widened in sheer excitement, lips parting into a wide smile.
He quicky lifted one finger. “If you try to sneak in, I’ll know.”
Your smile faltered, as he saw right through your intentions.
“And I’ll have you sent back to your dimension faster than you can say Nueva York. Got it?”
You lifted one hand in a salute and nodded.
He scowled. “And… stop hanging around Hobie.”
Dropping your hand, you bolted forward from your chair to hug him, wrapping your arms tightly around his neck. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”
The sudden motion nearly caused him to topple over and you immediately let go of him, as he rose to his full height again.
“Oh! Sorry!” you stepped away, patting his arm apologetically.
He blinked.
Then, grabbing your pad, you began tapping rapidly. “I’m uploading all the data to your watch, so please take a look.”
He blinked again.
You gathered your backpack and threw him a final warm smile. “If you find anything important, please let me know!”
Miguel nodded curtly, but remained rooted in place, as you hurried across the lab and past the sliding door.
His heart skipped a beat for the second time that day.
Then it dawned on him: the last person who had hugged him had been Gabriella.
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Miguel should probably call himself a hypocrite.
He was heavily against you or any other spider dozing off in the lab, but he had been indulging in this quite often as of late.
By the time he rose from his slumber, and sat back on his padded chair, he realised something soft had been placed around his shoulders.
He tugged on it and was met with a blanket covered in tiny prints of Peter B. Parker’s face.
This was definitely Mayday’s.
“What…” he drawled out, blinking a few times to adjust his eyes to the brightness that poured in from the windows.
The clock on the wall marked nine in the morning.
He stared down at his desk to find a handwritten note next to a plate of… empanadas?
“Hi~
wanted to wake you up, but you were sleeping so soundly and I didn’t want to disturb you. I found Mayday’s blankie on my lab desk — I suspect Hobie is sneaking her around to pull a prank on me hehe xOx
P.S. Jess told me you like empanadas, so I tried making some for you. Hope you like them~ (I’m crossing my fingers)
P.S. 2 You need proper rest :)”
You.
It had been you.
He glared at the plate containing the pastries, and grabbed one.
His heightened senses allowed him to immediately get flooded with an overwhelming delicious smell.
Taking a bite, he fluttered his eyes shut, allowing the overwhelming combination of flavours to take over.
It tasted so, so good.
It tasted like home.
He rose to his feet and walked out, scanning the lab for traces of you.
But he was met with Jessica instead who had just walked in.
“Oh, you look terrible.”
He swallowed what was left in his mouth. “Thanks.”
Her gaze dropped to your hand. “Oh! Did she make those for you?”
“Uh… yes.”
He felt ridiculous for having mumbled it like that.
The two of them paced along the corridors and into Lab 2, where you were sitting, back turned to them, visibly engrossed in your tasks.
“How’s she been doing?”
He took another bite. “Good. She’s persistent and focused. Those are good traits to have in this field.”
“She reminds me of yourself.”
Miguel wasn’t surprised in the slightest, because it was an undeniable fact.
“Hopefully, she won’t make the same mistakes I did.”
“Oh, I’m sure she’ll make some along the way,” she shrugged casually. “And she’ll learn from them, as you did.”
Miguel kept his gaze fixed on you and felt a strange need arise in him.
To look after you.
He took the last bite and savoured it in silence, as Jessica eyed him curiously.
“She really is a sweet girl,” she ended up saying lovingly. “She asked me what your comfort food was.”
Sweet girl.
He let the name replay in his head, and determined he liked the sound of it. It was fitting.
“Go on. Say it.”
Miguel arched an eyebrow at this. “Say what?”
Jess threw him a smug look. “That I was right for recruiting her. That you were wrong.”
In truth, Miguel hated having to admit to his mistakes, and it wasn’t even related to his ego or inability to take criticism.
As he had come to learn the hard way, his mistakes would usually lead to catastrophic consequences.
But when it came to you, he had no problem admitting he had been in the wrong. You had proved to be quite capable of handling a multitude of tasks.
… and now you were starting to grow on him.
“Yes. You were right, Jessica,” he mumbled, his eyes fixed on you. “She really is… something.”
She patted his back a few times. “Are you turning into a softie, Miguel?”
He scowled. “No.”
“Go ahead and thank her, then,” she said with a smile.
Miguel didn’t like being told what to do. He had every intention of letting you know he was grateful for your efforts.
But it had to be in his own way.
He parted ways with Jess and mad his way to you.
“Hey.”
You turned in your chair, bearing that kind smile he had grown so accustomed to. “Hi! You’re awake.”
“Cearly,” he grumbled with a shrug.
“Did you like the empanadas?”
He nodded. “They tasted amazing. Thank you.”
Like home.
“Great!” you beamed, your smile never wavering. “You looked really adorable while sleeping. Sorry for not waking you up.”
Adorable…?
He felt a lump form in his throat. Your energy was contagious, and he considered embracing it.
But he didn’t want to cave in…
He was a stubborn man by nature.
But he also didn’t want you to think he was too cold and distant like many in Nueva York thought.
“I want to show you something,” he said, tapping on his watch.
You waited expectantly and the screen in front of your flickered momentarily before a video started playing.
File: Gabriella.006
He didn’t even bother staring at the screen. He already knew by heart its content, and he didn’t want to revist the pain today.
No.
His eyes were fixed on you, instead.
He knew Lyla had already mentioned the event that led to him deciding to protect the multiverse.
He knew you knew of Gabriella.
Of what he had done.
Your smile dropped as the video went on, even though the sound of giggles and splashing water echoed around you.
“I’m not showing you this for you to feel bad for me.”
You shook your head, parting your eyes from the screen. “That didn’t even cross my mind.”
He paused the video.
“Right.”
Your eyes held kindness and your voice became softer. “I know why you’re showing this to me.”
He highly doubted it, but he waited for you to go on.
“We take care of each other here,” you began, twirling your chair to fully face bim. “And that means being open to showing vulnerabilities.”
He remained silent, digesting your words.
“Am I wrong?”
Partially, but he wouldn’t tell you that. The justification he had settled for in his head didn’t come close to your own.
And his heart skipped a beat.
He grown used to it happening whenever around you, but this time it felt more alarming.
More urgent.
“Miguel?”
You were eyeing him with concern, your hand reaching out to touch his arm.
He snapped out of his thoughts, and took a step back. “Send me the files you were working on yesterday. I need to check the coding.”
You gave him a nod, and he saw understanding soften your expression. He had expected you to press him on for an answer, but he was grateful you hadn’t.
“Oh, and… thank you, again. For… you know…” he drawled out as he ran a hand through his hair.
“You got it, Miguel,” you said, smiling sweetly.
Sweet girl.
His sweet girl.
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It took Miguel one week to start dreaming about you.
At first, it would be a conglomerate of nonsensical blobs with your face or voice here and there. But as days went by, some began to take shape.
Your shape.
Nowadays, it would be your face and voice that would keep him company after tiring missions.
He had gotten quite fond of it.
Until things took a turn.
And he would wake up with a throbbing ache in between his legs, begging for relief.
That was when he knew he was letting his admiration for you get the best of him.
As he rose from his bed and walked to the tall window in his bedroom, he saw the sun lighting up the horizon line, bathing Nueva York in rays of orange and yellow.
He had built all of this in the hopes of a better future.
But now he started longing for one that had you in it somehow.
As a fellow spider.
A fellow scientist.
A friend, even.
He squinted as his sensitive eyes became increasingly sore from the intense light, so he moved to his bedside table and grabbed the peace of paper you had left him days ago.
Your handwriting mirrored your personality: graceful and captivating.
Maybe he should have tossed it away, but he couldn’t bring himself to do so.
Walking into his living room, he booted up the screens on the wall.
There was this crescendo inside him that urged him to look for you.
He tapped through various sections of the lan, but he found you near the refrigeration area, tapping on your chin with a pencil, as you glared at the screens in front of you.
He wanted to call you.
To hear your voice first thing in the morning.
To commend you for being up so early already and committing to your duties.
Suddenly, he saw your lips turn into a soft knowing smile, and he knew you must have figured something out.
Of course you had.
Your perception and tenacity were unmatched.
As much as he wanted to talk to you, he decided against it.
In his mind, he was too undeserving of anything more than a friendship with you.
He convinced himself that he was not good enough, and that he was meant to watch you from afar.
You were just like a flame. Too close and it burns. Too far away and it freezes.
He grazed his thumb across the screen, close to you.
His sweet, sweet girl.
It would be better off this way. Not for him, of course. He was already in too deep. But it would be better for you.
You deserved better.
But he still craved you.
Miguel recognised the feeling that was started to seep into his heart and mind. He had almost forgotten how suffocating that felt.
He couldn’t tear his eyes from your face.
He couldn’t tear his heart from your hold.
The level of despair was unmistakable and he knew exactly what this feeling was.
Frustration.
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stxrvel · 3 months
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the house (2)
hi guys! i felt so inspired that i was able to write part 2 soon and that's a very rare thing for me. thank you so much for all your comments and notes! they made me very happy. see you in the next one!
summary: Azriel wasn't gonna give in so easily with Rhysand, but he had to do everything he could to ensure his mate's well-being pairing: azriel x f!reader words: +3.5k warnings: bad words and fights and angst and a lot of anger. also English is not my first language so sorry for any mistakes!
part 1: the cliff
part 3: the court
part 4: the routine
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“... what the fuck is wrong with me? No, what the fuck is wrong with you?”
“Az, I had no idea-”
“What does that fucking power works for if you're not gonna use it right?”
Cassian stood back from the commotion, with Nesta and Mor on either side of him watching from head to head as words crossed. Azriel was raising his voice and snarling at his own High Lord, and Cassian was almost surprised to see the way Rhys only dropped his shoulders, looking at his brother with sunken eyes as he claimed him. He had no intention of defending himself, Cassian could almost feel how embarrassed and remorseful Rhys was from a distance.
Azriel had a right to be angry, everyone knew that. And no one would stand in the way (unless the situation turned violent) because they understood the lengths you could go to just to safeguard your mate's well-being. Rhys would do it for Feyre. Cassian would do it for Nesta. Cassian always believed that this was how he would see Azriel defend his mate, right when he found her, and he was grateful that Rhys understood that his cries came from beyond rage and anger. There was anguish there, pain, guilt… Cassian had never seen Azriel so upset.
Returning to the Town House was torturous. Azriel wouldn't leave his mate's side and wouldn't allow any of his brothers to get close either, but she wasn't willing to go to a place she didn't know at all either, even if her mate accompanied her. Cassian had to watch his friend be more cautious and careful than ever with someone he never thought he had to be: with himself and Rhys. The sight was bleak as Azriel's shadows swirled around him and his mate, almost as if erecting a wall between the four of them. The looks Azriel sent them were like daggers and just by sharing a glance they knew that this was something the Shadowsinger wasn't going to overcome out of thin air, even if hundreds of years of friendship gave him the confidence to do so.
Azriel had to make a promise with her to convince her to leave, because he wasn't willing to let her disappear from his sight and she wasn't willing to just go with them for the sake of it, when one of the men in front of her was the one who pushed her off the cliff.
Cassian noticed several times Azriel watching the tattoo with crystallized eyes. Beyond everything, the hostile and distrustful context of the whole situation caused him pain.
Arriving at the Town House, they were all assembled. Without wondering too much without Rhys having spoken to Feyre (which he surely had), Cassian ran into the kitchen where Nesta was with her sisters and enveloped his mate in a tight embrace. Within seconds he heard movement around him and knew Rhys had done the same. Neither of them would ever be able to forgive each other for what had happened, if Azriel ever forgave them first.
“Az, I'm truly sorry,” Rhys stood behind his desk, the only thing that allowed him distance from a heated Azriel, besides Feyre's presence which the Shadowsinger respected even within his rage. “I was careless with the inmates. And you're right, it was easier for me to have simply looked inside her head. It had been a long time coming and I think I became confident of the reality of the situation, that whenever I saw inside them I knew what they were. I didn't give her the benefit of the doubt. I'm sorry, brother.”
“Your apologies are worthless,” Azriel spat, his face almost red from the way he was trying to contain his emotions and his hands resting on the table. Rhys lowered his head in front of him, running his hands over his face. “How are you going to fix with your words what for years broke under your nose? How can I come to look at you with respect when my mate is terrified to see you?”
Cassian felt Nesta's hands wrap around his right arm and he lowered to look at her questioningly. She had reserved her comments from the moment Cassian had told the two sisters what had happened. Feyre had escorted Rhys to his office after their effusive hug and Cassian had stayed with Nesta and Elain in the kitchen, talking. With Elain it had been a little easier, her face looked mortified and she had run after Rhys and Feyre barely understood what had happened.
Nesta… she tried not to show what she was thinking, but Cassian knew there was something that made her feel upset and insecure.
Cassian tugged at the bond, trying to get her attention and Nesta had to drag her gaze from Azriel to look at her mate. Cassian felt the air rush out of his chest when he noticed the tears under her eyes. He didn't waste a second in leading her out of the room, moving into the giant living room in complete darkness, despite it being barely noon. The maroon curtains lent a more somber look to the situation.
“What's wrong?”
Nesta closed her eyes as Cassian's hands cradled her face, letting out a pair of tears that furrowed the border with her cheeks. A ragged breath left her and Cassian felt the agony of her nervousness shake his body.
“I had already seen her,” she whispered, her eyelids tightening. Cassian frowned, but didn't interrupt her when she came up for air again. “I once accompanied Rhysand and Feyre to the camp. Feyre had told me that Rhysand had some business to take care of on the mountain. I heard… I heard her voice…”
Cassian pulled his mate closer by the shoulders, pressing her against his chest as her voice broke off.
“I heard her voice begging Rhysand to believe her,” Nesta continued, trying to still the sobs that were born in the ache in her chest. Cassian shared the sentiment, the end of the bond in his chest twisting with his mate's wailing. “She was so scared…”
Nesta wrapped her arms around Cassian's torso, sinking her face into her mate's neck. Cassian moved from side to side, trying to send warm sensations through the bond, trying to calm her down a bit.
Nesta's revelation left Cassian almost frozen. The last time Rhys had gone to the mountain had been ten years ago.
-
Azriel hadn't expected that to be the way he would meet his mate, much less would he have expected her to be terrified to be around his brothers and almost himself and, of course, much, much less had he expected to hold so much resentment against Rhysand.
His mate hadn't left the room Azriel had left her in, as far away from the others' rooms as possible. With the tattoo burning his skin, Azriel had not only promised her that she would be safe in the Town House, but she had also made him promise that her interactions with his brothers would be next to none. With the watchful eyes of his friends from centuries ago upon his back, Azriel agreed. He had to make sure to provide for his mate's physical and mental health, especially when he knew that the time she had spent with the Ilyrian soldiers had to have been traumatizing.
And of course, there was also the issue of the bond.
His mate couldn't or didn't know how to control the flow of emotions that traveled through the bond and Azriel felt it all. At the moment she was relaxed, calm inside the room away from everyone, but Azriel was losing his temper in the living room. His friends were gone, they had left him a moment alone when he had finished yelling at Rhysand, as he tried to control his emotions and those of her mate, who had surely been listening to everything and so was sending distressing sensations through the bond.
But even with all that space to himself he still felt like he couldn't breathe.
He didn't know how things were going to be from now on. The mere thought terrified him to the bone. He didn't know how he would deal with the fact that he wanted and was dying to be near his mate, to hold her, to comfort her, to support her, to protect her just a step away from him, but he couldn't, at least for now. The need consumed him and tormented him. Staying behind had never been an option, especially if it was his mate, but what could he do if that was what she wanted? He would have to get used to the pain, the emptiness he already felt in his life even though it had barely been half a day since he had found her.
Ah, Azriel didn't know how much guilt and pain he could carry until his knees failed.
He closed his eyes for a couple of minutes, laying his head back on the couch, his face settled in the direction of the ceiling. He tried to relax his muscles, stiff from the tension and stress, from the speed with which everything had happened in the last few hours. Maybe then he could get some sleep. He didn't know how it would be now that he had found his mate.
Azriel was beginning to feel his body going numb, the inattention to his senses and the lightness of his limbs, when a pair of light footsteps entered the room. They would've gone unnoticed by anyone, but not him. He lifted his head attending to the sound, finding you on your feet, frozen, all around the entrance to the living room, hands clasped together twitching in nervousness.
Azriel didn't know what to do. His heart skipped a beat at the sight. But he also felt the fear and nervousness coursing through the bond from the other end. He tried to send calm through his end, hoping that and the shadows crowding at her feet, which hadn't left her since they found her, would allow her to relax a bit.
“I'm sorry… for interrupting,” you looked down and Azriel had to stifle the urge that went through his body to get up and go running to your side. His head filled with the memories of his dream, cruelly comparing the happiness that was in them and the sadness that now engulfed you. Your voice was barely a whisper.
“It's okay,” Azriel stood up carefully and quietly, catching your attention. From the way you brought your hands to your chest, still clasped together, Azriel made no attempt to move closer.
“I need to ask you something,” you fought with the words until you finally told him and a current of panic ran through the bond, so strong that Azriel had to hold back the grimace on his face.
“Whatever you need.”
You looked at him again and Azriel felt something in his chest blossom. He sent that feeling through the bond, hoping it would counteract the anxiety on your end, but only received a frown in response.
“I need to contact my parents,” you asked, shifting your feet a little closer and Azriel quickly caught the pleading expression you were trying poorly to hide.
“Sure. Where are they? I can take them a letter, if you want,” Azriel offered, but your reply wasn't welcome as a spasm of pain ran through his chest.
“No… I-I-I don't want that,” you shook your head, lowering your head. The way you moved your intertwined fingers made him question how much courage you'd had to muster to come out of your room and ask him that. You must've wanted it badly. Surely it was all you could think about for all the years you were on the mountain. Azriel moved his hand from side to side across his chest, through the fabrics of his clothing.
“We'll do what you want, then. Tell me where they are.”
“Adriata,” you whispered, eyes glittering.
Azriel choked. Of course, former prisoner of the Summer Court. How would he get across the border if he had a blood ruby in his desk drawer? Rhysand and he were still mortal enemies of the Summer Court.
“And how do you want to contact them?”
“I want to go back.”
“What?” he coughed, his body tensing and the calm evaporating from his body in a second. Surprise narrowly prevented him from noticing your crystallized eyes.
“Azriel,” you implored, taking long strides towards him, frozen in place, electricity coursing through his veins from the way you said his name. “I don't even know how long it's been since I last saw them. Please, please. That was all I've ever wanted since I was captured. I just want to see them and let them know I'm okay. Please.”
Azriel stood there on his feet in front of you, barely acknowledging the fact that you had moved so close to him that from just raising a hand he could run down your cheeks. Your request had torn at his chest and he was sure he hadn't been able to keep some of that emotion from traveling through the bond, because now you looked more disgruntled and nervous than before. Now you wanted to… leave? And you were asking him to let you do it, as if he had any right to keep you here, as if you owed him anything?
The Shadowsinger clasped his hands at his sides, trying to contain his emotions behind the line, trying to keep them from affecting you too much. He had never felt such pain, not even something he could imagine, nothing that had ever hurt him before could compare to the pain of that moment. He hadn't had a moment with her and he had to let her go already.
“You want to go back… to Summer Court,” Azriel murmured, trying to confirm the obvious, as if you repeating it made it more real, as if he needed it to be sure.
“Yes,” you shook your head in assent and Azriel's heart crinkled as he noticed your desperation. Of course that would be the first thing you would want to do, how could he have been so selfish as to not even consider it before? How could he not have suggested it from before?
“You… I don't… I mean-”
“Azriel,” you took another step, hesitant, he could tell by your body language, but trying to keep the assurance on your face. “I need to see them. Please.”
“All right. Just… wait,” Azriel moved to the side, trying to clear his mind and think rationally even though your closeness was suffocating him. “There's something you should know.”
“I know the Night Court and the Summer Court aren't on good terms,” you shook your head, as if to tell Azriel that it was a silly problem that should have no bearing on your return.
“Yes, but that's not all,” moving his hands away from his already sufficiently tousled hair, Azriel looked at you in anguish. “If you go back to Summer Court now, I don't think you'll be able to come back again.”
You frowned at him, tilting your head in confusion.
“What do you mean?”
“Rhysand has held the Summer spies captive for…. many, many years. Tarquin has tried to negotiate their release, but Rhysand is not open to negotiating with him, or even seeing him again,” Azriel tried to explain, not overlooking the way you flinched when he mentioned the high lord's name. “If you leave now… If your parents declared you missing… Tarquin's not going to let you go out again. And they won't let me in either because the moment they see me they'll try to kill me.”
The silence that followed his words was agonizing. Azriel was terribly frightened. It didn't calm him to know that the doubt in your eyes was minimal; the desire to see your parents again was greater than the possibility of never seeing your mate again. The mere thought made him shudder, but if that was the case, there was nothing he could do about it. Nothing.
“Why… why wouldn't my High Lord let me come back?”
“Fifteen years ago the high lord forbade his people to return to the Night Court. Fifteen years ago no person from the Summer Court has gone beyond the mountains of Day.”
“Fifteen years?” you stammered, an expression of incredulous surprise taking over your face. “I'd been there for more than fifteen years?”
Azriel halted his movements, barely noticing how you succumbed to gravity and plopped down on the couch where he had been a couple of minutes earlier in complete stupefaction.
“Y/N, I'm really sorry-”
“I can't stay here,” you looked at him again, shaking your head in refusal and sending a current of panic through the bond. “I don't want to. I need… I need to see my parents. I want to be with them.���
Azriel shuddered at the desperation he saw in your eyes. He wasn't going to deny you that, ever. But he couldn't deny that he wanted to show resistance because, if you left right then, when would he ever see you again? They wouldn't even have time to talk about the elephant in the room, but, at the same time, it didn't seem like the most important conversation at the moment.
Azriel wanted to cry.
“It's okay. Don't worry. Of course you'll go see them,” he finally spoke, facing the reality he would have to live in from now on.
“Thank you,” you cried and Azriel felt each tear pierce his heart, even though the feeling of relief reached all the way to his chest, your relief, mixed with his hopelessness. “But, you… you won't be able to go.”
“No.”
“We won't be able to see each other.”
“No,” Azriel exhaled sharply and shook his head slightly. “But I'll work it out. Somehow.”
“You can't go near there. Tarquin would hurt you!”
Azriel felt the worry reach from the other end of the bond to his chest and was a little glad to know that you at least cared about him the same way he cared about you.
“I'll make an agreement. Whatever I have to do, I'll do it. I promise.”
You nodded in his direction, convinced of his words, convinced of his shaky assurance and confidence.
“And you… will you accompany me?”
You frowned when he shook his head, but quickly added, thinking he'd be mad and damned if he'd let you spend the return trip all alone after all you'd been through, “I know a faster way to travel.”
“Okay,” you nodded, calm finally ruling in your body. “So when do we leave?”
-
Everyone in the house had gathered to receive Azriel's announcement and things were breaking down just as he expected.
No one had said anything for several minutes after the Shadowsinger announced that he would be going to the Summer Court with you, to return you to where you belonged, to your true home.
“I'll do it,” Mor was the first to speak, to Azriel's right, watching him confidently. She turned to look at Rhysand, who hadn't looked up since his brother finished speaking, deep in thought with a hand on his chin. “I'll request a meeting with him.”
Cassian stirred at Azriel's left side, sweeping his gaze over everyone present. He could almost imagine what was going through his friend's head, helpless at not being able to join him, just as it must've been going through Rhysand's mind. Azriel knew the only reason his High Lord was still thinking was that. If it was risky for the Shadowsinger to go, it would be worse if it was both of them.
“I can go too,” Feyre spoke to Rhysand's right and the aforementioned raised his head in a second, beginning to shake his head in denial.
“For no reason should you ever step near that Court again,” Rhysand stood up, resting his hands on the desk and leaning towards his mate. His face contracted, contrasting with Feyre's warm gaze.
“Rhys, don't you think it's time to get this over with?” Feyre reached up to cradle his mate's face, Rhysand leaning in almost on instinct, betrayed by his senses.
“You want me to overlook so easily what he did to you?” the High Lord frowned, closing his eyes under Feyre's gentle touch.
“Not easily, Rhys. It's been fifty years.”
“You know fifty years is nothing to us,” Rhysand snorted, straightening his back.
The Shadowsinger clicked his tongue.
“It was too much for Y/N.”
No one in the room had to look twice to know that Azriel was tense, hands clasped behind his back. Rhysand turned to see him, his wary look of apology over his friend's stony expression.
“You know I didn't come here to ask your permission, Rhysand,” Azriel almost spat, dragging the words out between his teeth.
Mor shuddered beside him, following Cassian's gaze. In so many centuries, there had obviously been trouble between the Inner Circle for some time, but in this moment it felt different, deeper and more painful. The anger and rancor in Azriel's gaze was unmatched and to earn that facet of the Shadowsinger you really had to be a son of a bitch. Mor hoped she was wrong.
“It could be dangerous for you,” Rhysand warned and Azriel had to stifle a wry chuckle. The way his High Lord's features contorted gave him to understand that he had understood the twitch in his muscles all too well.
“I don't care what you think,” Azriel bellowed, clasping his hands at his sides. “I'll go with her, and since Mor offered I'd greatly appreciate it if she'd accompany us.”
Rhysand didn't respond, settling for sharing a glance with his brother, trying to reach a part of him that was minimally willing to forgive him. Azriel sensed his intrusion and angrily erected a wall of obsidian in his mind, miles away, forcibly pulling Rhysand out of his head. The aforementioned barely staggered to his feet.
“Fine, but I'd like to be kept informed of everything that happens,” Rhysand nodded looking at Mor, who barely returned the gesture and left the office to manage the meeting as soon as possible.
When the doors rattled and the room fell silent again, Rhysand looked at Azriel pleadingly.
“Az-”
“If that's all.”
Without giving him a chance to respond, Azriel turned on his heels and stormed off. Cassian followed close behind, barely sending a glance at his high lord, his brother, saying with his gaze how sorry he was that it had all happened and ended like this.
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st4rtar0t · 14 days
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Your love story and the movie it resembles
With your future partner
ever wondered how would your love story be with your future spouse? and what movie would it be similar to? I will be honest as someone who romanticizes love this question as kept me awake on many nights and has made me daydream a lot. SO as a result I have decided to make a pac on this topic. I hope you enjoy this reading and support my blog so that I can come up with more interesting pick a cards.
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These pictures belong to their rightful owners.
please like and reblog, I worked hard on this one
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Picture 1
Okay so as soon as i started this reading i got the message that most people who chose this picture may not have had an actual relationship in a sense that you might have felt as if something was always lacking or you may not have been treated right in a relationship. And i do see that you have a unexplainable fear that maybe the person you will fall in love with wont fall for you? or you may doubt their affection for you as you seem to have severe trust issues. You may be the kind of person who doubts love but is also dreaming about it. you may show as if you don't believe in love or that money matters more for you but you know deep down that is not true.
I also sense that this group is divided into two subgroups as this group seem to have two similar yet different love stories.
group one : you guys may be a Virgo, cancer or Sagittarius sun moon or rising. You guys can have medium to short curly hair. you may have a mole on your arm or right shoulder. You may have a small friend group consisting 3-4 people including you. one of your friends can be of different race or religion. Some of you may be in high school or 1st-2nd year of collage. Pumpkin and grapes may be significant for you.
your love story : There may be a sense of "saving the other" in your love story. you know how a person is suffering and the other person comes into their life and saves them that is the vibe that I am getting from your love story. Your future spouse may enter you life when you will be dire need of help or when you will be suffering or vice versa. You may be the damsel in distress, but i see that You wont ask your future spouse for help intentionally. You are someone who wont ask for help no matter how much they are suffering and your future spouse is someone who WANTS to help other no matter what but they have been used by a lot of people because of this. They are well aware of the fact that people only approach them because of their personal benefit and this makes them quite upset. But but but i also sense that they would want to help not financially but emotionally. They would want to help you with everything they can and this may be the one of the majors reasons why you will fall for them. They will help you find purpose in your life again. They will make you fall in love with life.
SO the movie that resembles your love story is EK VILLAIN. This is an Indian movie and I would suggest you to watch it. i wont spoil it for you if you have not watched it yet, but leave out the parts that don't resonate with you.
Group two : You guys can be a Taurus, Leo or Aries sun moon or rising. you may have a mole of your back or on one side of your neck. You guys may have long dark hair or dark brown hair that reaches past your armpits. You may have a fear of lizards or any kind of reptile. i sense that some of you may be studying business or you plan to start you own soon? You may have gold jewellery that you wear regularly.
Your love story : As I said earlier both these groups will have a similar yet different love story and the sense of "saving the other" is also present in this group but the only difference is that you will be the one who will save your future spouse/partner. They may be really popular or into music because i see that they have a good singing voice. You guys can also work in the same field or profession. I see that you guys will encourage them to give their best when they may feel low or when they may doubt themselves. I see that you will be their biggest supporter and this will make them fall deeper for you. They will admire how passionate you are about what you do. If you are in a creative field, they may use you as their muse. I also sense that they will be writing songs and poems for you because they seem to have a talent for writing. You guys will work together and earn a lot of money and fame.
So the movie that resembles your love story is AASHIQUI 2. This movies was released in 2013.
Noticed how the actress in both the movies is same? so you may have something in common with her.
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Picture 2
This is the group of misunderstood people lol. I see that people always try to find flaws in you or blame you for the things that have nothing to do with you. But i also sense that you someone who jumps into conclusions and overthinks their situation. Things may not be as they appear. You are someone who has lost a lot of people that were close to you and you don't want to go through the same pain again, so as a result you have put a wall between you and other. And now you don't care if people misunderstand you or spread rumours about you. I also sense that you are independent, you don't like asking anyone for help, You would rather do the things by yourself than ask for help.
Okay so for the people who chose this picture I see that and your future partner may not have a good first impression of each other or there may be some past experiences that you both share that are not so ideal. Or you guys may meet in an environment that is not to ideal for a first meeting? but whatever it may be I sense that you guys will remember your first meeting and laugh out loud.
Do you guys have a one sided love story or have you ever been in this situation? because I see that most of you have liked somebody who already had a girlfriend/boyfriend or somebody they were talking to OR I see that you had a huge crush on one of your friends and he/she were already into somebody so you thought is would be better to forget them.
I am getting friends to strangers to friends to lovers. Its really complex and complicated. But yes it seems as if somebody else was involved in your love story and no I am not talking about third party situation. its more of a "yes I like this person and I am talking to them" from their side and "you are my friend and I like you but wont tell you because you like somebody else so I wont tell you" OR "yes I like you but wont tell you because I don't want to ruin our friendship" from your side. But I sense that they will realise their feelings a lot later and when you wont be talking to them. I also sense that you may move away from them to forget them or you may even move to another country for job or education.
But we all know how the universe works in strange ways that you may have never considered. So you will end up meeting them again but in a different way as compared to before. And they will be the one to express their love for you and will do everything to win your heart.
So the movie that resembles your love story is KUCH KUCH HOTA HAI and a little bit of DDLJ. Both these movies have the same acter and actress. But the plot is not same its similar with slightly different storyline.
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Picture 3
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Some of you may also be interested in Picture 1
Are you sure you are interested in this love reading? because your energy is telling me otherwise. I am shocked to see you reading this because it seems as you are starting to hate the word love, and honestly I don't think you are at fault because if I was going through the same things that you have been through/are going through, I would hate it too. You have experienced love and I am not talking about romantic love, I am talking about platonic love. The kind of love you are supposed to receive from your family and friends. And now as a result of that, your perception of love is completely messed up.
But I have a good news for you, you have been blessed in money sector of your life and this abundance in money sector will be the love you yearn for. Now you are only focusing on your work and career, you are taking all the required steps to achieve your dreams and goals. And while you are focused on this sector of your life you wont notice how the universe will bless your love life with a partner that will move mountain for you. And the most beautiful thing is, YOU NEVER HAD TO ASK FOR IT. yes there were times when you cried yourself to sleep because you could not feel loved but unknowingly it all made you stronger.
Now lets talk about your love story with your future, So as I have already talked about how you will meet them when you will focusing on yourself and your dreams. And I also see that they will be the first one to fall in love and realise their feelings. And the most interesting thing is they will make all the efforts needed to prove their love for you. They wont approach you with a love offer first and wont shove their feelings into your face as in "Hey i love you, lets get married" no it wont be like that, in fact they will approach with the offer you helping you or being your friend first. They will admire how sweet and caring you are despite the things you have been through, You will fill them with inspiration and hope that there are still nice people in this world who make this world a better place with their existence. They will support you in you work and offer new ideas. Some of you are really intuitive so you will know who person may be or will be. Your future partner will admire the way you handle tough situations and problems thrown your way with ease. You are someone with hard exterior and really soft interior and this will intrigue your future partner as it is really hard to find genuine people with good intentions these days.
You love story gives me the trope of black cat and golden retriever energy with you being the black cat here and them being the golden retriever. Its honestly so cute!! and I am so happy for you guys. You guys deserve the world. okie I think i am getting distracted, so lets get back to the reading, Your love story will be something that will remind people of a fairy-tale.
So the movie/movies that resemble your love story is RAMAIYA VASTAVAIYA 2013 and GHAJINI 2008. Yes as i said this wont resonate 100% with your love story but there will be similarities.
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jupitermoontarot24 · 2 months
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🤍What Make You Beautiful? 💋
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HI GUYS!!💗
Come Check Out Why You're Beautiful Inside and Out!
💋REST OF THE READING FREE ON MY PATREON💋
Pile 1 💕
Hello pile one welcome to your reading.
First things first I feel like What Makes You Beautiful is that you are very generous. Everyone who meets you can honestly say that you are a very generous person. I feel like you're also a gangster. Like you keep it real but you're nice and generous so it's a very good balance. I feel like a lot of people enjoy this part, enjoy this duality of you. I feel like they know that you have very strong boundaries and that you're not going to take certain things or situations. So when people are with you they're like I know nothing will go down pile one is not going for it, they have it covered. Like there's no disrespect around here for you. Also Because of this I feel like a lot of suitors or people that you're involved with romantically they see you as a perfect match. They even see themselves going through ups and downs with you so that's like arguing with you some people romanticize arguing with you, or you telling them off and them being like I'm sorry you're right because it's sexy seeing you be assertive. People see you as wifey / hubby. Like you’re the type of person you want to be your spouse. I feel like when people think of a spouse they think of somebody who has balance. who has Duality somebody who can stand up for themselves. because at the end of the day whether you're feminine or masculine if something happens to your partner and they can't be at 100% they want somebody who can pick up some of that whether it's emotionally mentally or whatever and that’s you. What Makes You Beautiful is people feel like you do have a conscience, a great conscience. So it's not like you just tell people off. You give people the benefit of the doubt and you give people chances especially if you love them but when it's time to cut the cord, you cut the cord. but it's all because of valid reasons. you can also be very nostalgic like you give 2000s Vibes you could give Lizzie McGuire vibes. You could have a bob. You can even give off Pi Syrian energy because I know Hillary duff is a Pisces LOL. Basically What Makes You Beautiful is that you are a beautiful heart soul mind body, face you are beautiful you give unapproachable nice hot girl. that girl that you see in the hallway that you might not say anything too because she’s mesmerizing. She's gorgeous and she's nice and anybody who's ever talked to her is like yes she's actually so nice she was so nice to me but she's just majestically beautiful. like when you walk through the hallway there is wind blowing through your hair and sunlight beaming directly on you and your skin is beautiful and you're wearing a beautiful outfit and your hair is luscious and beautiful and your smile is gorgeous like literally in a movie scene pile one.
The Carters-LOVEHAPPY
continued....
Pile 2 🤩
Welcome!
Do you not know you're beautiful? LOL. Pile 2 I feel like you're very humble and you might just be focused on more worldly things like being stable or being committed to whatever it is that you are committed to. and because of that I feel like you have slept on your looks way too long. I am here to get on you lol spirit is calling me to get on you! stop sleeping on your looks pile two!! they want me to yell at you. you need to be using the pretty privilege that you have. higher power God whoever you believe in didn't make you that beautiful for you to not do anything with it. it's like if you were given a beautiful voice it would be to sing that's not something that should be hidden. your body, Your Vessel, your face was created specifically for you to pursue your dreams with. looks are not everything yes but you look a certain way for a specific reason so remember that!!  I feel like also because of this you might stay with people that are beneath you or people that's not in your league because you don't see how beautiful you are. that could be inside or out but I feel like because of that people can give you/have been giving you the bare minimum and you let it slide for a little bit longer than you should have. Yea people giving you things of physical material matter is cool but at the same time these people need to be stroking your ego too pile 2. you need your ego stroked, you need somebody who's going to tell you you're beautiful. That you're the most beautiful girl that they ever met, the most beautiful person they've ever met. inside and out!  That you can have anybody you want to and That you deserve the world because you do!. you should be surrounded by people who say stuff like that to you, stay away from ppl who try to humble you. Your partner should say stuff like that to you x100 fr because you can forget. People giving you money, feeding you, and taking you places is not enough, that is literally the basic needs of a humans. you need more emotional and mental stimulation from people, somebody who waters you spiritually too as well. it’s more in this world than just physical things I hope you realize that. so listen! Usually I’m not yelling in my readings lol but I feel like I have to be a little bit more aggressive with you pile two, you might be stubborn. this could be my fixed sign pile lol. My taurus and Aquarius ‘s heavy. I feel like you're like this because you've been through a lot of things. I don't think that you expect things from people. at this point I think you've had to be independent and build a name and your own stability on you own. because of this you don't really depend on people to give you things like mental stimulation or physical stimulation or money you don't expect things from those people. so when people do come in and do those things for you, you can feel like it’s enough but it's really not you should be getting much more. What Makes You Beautiful is that you are very self-sufficient. you are a one man woman show and you're okay with that. you don't blame anybody for your problems You Don't Stray away from your problems either you sit and Ponder on what you should do next and then you do it. you will never let anybody keep you down or be the reason why you didn't become the person who you wanted to become. you are amazing pile 2.I want to tell you that you are an inspiration to people you will have the type of story that is looked at as a testimony almost like Jesus Christ. I got that I channeled that but that type of energy where it's like you have a testimony of your life if you read the Bible not to get all religious because I'm not but if you read the Bible Jesus went through a lot of things like his life was not perfect At All by any means and that's what you give pile 2. So ask for more from people !! and if they don’t give you that drop them!!!  Please use that information wisely.
My love is that shh….-something for the people
continued.....
Pile 3 💗
What Makes You Beautiful pile 3 is you always know where it hurts. your hands could be certified they're golden. like your touch is very spiritual. you have healing hands so know that. you are so cute pile three I feel like your inner child is very beautiful very sweet. What Makes You Beautiful is that you're not afraid to feed your inner child and let them come out. What Makes You Beautiful is that you like to make memories, you're very adventurous and you and other people can find themselves in all different types of situations when they're with you. you're fun, you're funny and you have charisma. you're like people's favorite person to spend time with, people know that they will always have a good time with you. time could go really fast when people are with you because you're having so much fun. people will spend everyday with you if they could. this could be a specific person if that resonates. I want to say this person but ppl too want to have kids. What Makes You Beautiful is that people see you being a really good mother/father. people see you being a great partner, a great spouse, a great parent. What makes you beautiful is you are a great addition to anybody's team. Everybody wishes you were on their team. What Makes You Beautiful is that people feel like you're their soulmate. Your love feels Cosmic. feels spiritual, something that is not worldly or Earthly. something that a lot of people have never felt before. Your energy gives a roller coaster like it might seem intimidating when you get on it then you just laugh the whole time and it's thrilling and it's fun. and you get off and you tell everybody about it because it was so liberating. That's how you feel, that's how your energy is. You could have a purple I'm getting Orange maybe some blue aura. you're made of Stardust! You are so easy to love pile three!!  you might notice a lot of people fall in love with you easily that's why. I'm about to fall in love with you pile 3 LMAO myself You giving me the heart eyes xoxoxo
Cascade-Stokley
continued.....
Pile 4 ❤️‍🔥
Hi pile 4. I smiled as soon as I started thinking about your pile. You could smile when you talk Idk if you know that's a thing or people know what I'm talking about but some people show their teeth when they talk so it looks like they're always smiling you could do that. What Makes You Beautiful is that you're a very supportive and loyal person. People can depend on you and know that it's not because you want to gain from it but because you genuinely care to do it. You can move out of a certain chakra a lot. So this could be your heart chakra or your sacral chakra or another one. It's different for everyone. You might want to research and see what chakra you operate from and see if it's overactive as well. so you don't overuse it. you can have Virgo placements. You can fix everybody's problems if you want to pile four. You could have water and Earth placements that make you more susceptible to helping people and figuring out their problems. so focus on yourself going forward and not what other people need help with. You can be going through a breakup or a cheating scandal. That's for some people. If you did just get hurt by someone you are very beautiful, know that, it has nothing to do with who you are as a person or your looks or anything. certain things just don't work out because they're not meant to. That doesn't mean that you're a bad person or this person is a bad person but if spirit wanted y’all to happen it would happen. What Makes You Beautiful is that you are a lovely person and you would be a really good parent. you are a really good girlfriend, boyfriend, sister, friend, daughter so you name it!. make sure you are loyal to yourself as well. What Makes You Beautiful is that you are creative. You can create new looks through your wardrobe and new styles for your hair. I feel like your house would be really creative and Chic and minimalistic at the same time. you have a specific aesthetic that nobody can recreate. you give very ethereal fairy energy. you could look really good in blue. you also look cute with your glasses if you have them. you look cute in dresses, anything that is dainty you look very attractive in. What Makes You Beautiful is that you never ask for help. you are able to separate yourself and dedicate yourself to other people. you have a true Pure Heart pile 4. You are an Earth angel. I just hope that you give that much love to yourself at the end of the day. You are the type to hide a body with somebody and never bring it up again and not judge them for it also.
TheCarters-FRIENDS
continued....
CHECKOUT MY PATREON EXCLUSIVE TOO JUST DROPPED!!
YOUR CELEBRITY LIFE!!!!! ROMANCE AND FANS INVLOVED
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THANK YOU GUYS!!!!!
SEE YOU THERE!!! XOXOXOXOXO
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ash-says · 2 months
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Tips for Dysfunctional Family Girlies Part 2:
1) Get your basics straight. Education. Boundaries. Financial independence. Further breaking it down and linking it if you get proper education at some point you are bound to get an awareness of this world, if you are able to adapt and improvise yourself and develop your emotional intelligence and get your boundaries straight you will save yourself a lot of unnecessary drama and problems. Education (formal and informal) both will help you in gaining opportunities and if you are financially independent, you are holding the power to make your own decisions.
2) Develop thick skin. Your mom is calling you names. Slut, whore and what not. Your dad doesn't trust you and abuses you physically. So, what now? Are you going to let them define what you are or internalize the anger and use it as a fuel to become successful? Choice is yours.
3) They say you don't owe an explanation to anyone. Sorry to burst your little bubble. Actually you do. We live in a society and have relationships that we need to maintain for survival. This hyper independent stuff is only good to read. We have responsibilities that we need to fulfill. If you don't owe an explanation to anyone then don't cry about a closure from someone too. If you can live by this go ahead and practice it.
4) Stop isolating yourself. That's it. That's the point.
5) First kill the fear inside you. Being a rebel outside the house is no good. Be disciplined. Know how to manipulate your family members in your favor and if you can't just find the weak points and threaten. I know it's difficult to implement but you learn through trial and error. Plus something is better than nothing.
6) Stop glorifying people who treat you with kindness and love. That's the bare minimum. Just because you didn't get it served in a silver spoon doesn't mean it is not served in a silver spoon. People can have ulterior motives and even if they don't fix it in your brain that's normal. No rose colored glasses allowed.
7) Don't be afraid of indulging in your sexuality. No I am not saying go and have sex with people. I mean it in a deeper sense. Connect with the repressed sexual side and try to find healthy outlets. Don't dim yourself to fit in others'expectations or to ease someone's insecurity. Be unapologetic about your wants and desires. Know yourself. It's a powerful energy source if you know how to use it positively.
8) Cry, cry and cry. Wail like a child. No need to keep it all in. No need to act like a macho woman BUT only in front of your god or your belief system. Max in front of your truly trusted people.
9) Question everything as easily as breathing. Doubt every thing. Every action. Every person. What proof do you have to not doubt ? Stop giving benefit of doubts. Stop looking for excuses on how they could be good and instead look for ways in which they can harm you. That's your lottery to be poised and composed. It's just what it is.
10) Obsession. We have it in loads. That's natural to us. So the trick here is to be obsessive. Hella obsessive but about things, topics, goals, subjects, inanimate things,etc. God forbid but never be obsessive about a person. Not even over your dead body. Why? For that I need to make another detailed post I think.
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g1rld1ary · 2 months
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you never disappointed me - part two
part one part two part three part four
➻ synopsis: luke castellan x aphrodite!reader ; percy and beckendorf's plan to set you up with luke is in motion, but you're extremely resistant to any advances (10 things I about you AU)
➻ word count: 3462
➻ warnings: swearing, ooc/kind of loser!luke, ooc silena, she/her pronouns used for reader, sexual innuendos
➻ thank u so much for all the love on part 1 I am such a happy gal!!!!! also, have my first day at uni tomorrow (so pls wish me luck) and sorry if updates slow down!
TAGLIST: @myxticmoon @wicca-void @leeknows-wife @thekittyxo-blog @number-onekidqueen @instabull
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It turned out that getting you to go out with Luke was harder than he’d originally anticipated. Eager for the whole ordeal to be over and for him to be 50 dollars richer, he’d hopped down from his spot on a fallen log and hurried to meet you by the volleyball courts when your match ended. You, unaware of Luke’s agenda, were fanning your face to combat some of the sweat that had accumulated, quickly tightening the messy ponytail you’d tied. Luke watched you in your own world, unbothered by anybody watching you, unlike the rest of your siblings. Sucking in a quick breath for confidence he approached you.
“Hey there, girly,” He smiled, “How’re you doing?” You looked up at him, inquisitive for a moment but ultimately unimpressed.
“Sweating like a pig actually, and yourself?” You were barely looking at him, skulling an impressive amount of your water bottle quickly. He stared at you, not expecting to be dismissed so easily. He recovered smoothly, not prepared to give up so soon.
“You really know how to get a guy’s attention, huh?”
“My mission in life,” You shot him a cloying smile, now giving him your full attention, unable to help being slightly interested by his boldness. “But obviously I’ve struck your fancy, so you see it worked. The world makes sense again.” You‘d figured out his motives now and had no interest, so began the walk back to your cabin. He followed, much to your dismay. Couldn’t men ever take the hint?
“So I’ll pick you up Friday then?”
“Oh right, Friday, uh huh.” You kept your eyes ahead, dodging a few younger kids as Luke trailed after you, annoyingly optimistic still.
“The night I take you places you’ve never been before,” He said, and you looked at him in disbelief. The ego on this kid!
“Right, like the makeout clearing in the forest? Do you even know my name, Castellan?” Luke could tell that you were mocking him, but he still had high hopes.
“I know a lot more than you think.” He smiled then, a lopsided thing that would have been somewhat charming if you’d actually bothered to look. Instead you were already walking away, calling out a “Doubtful. Very doubtful,” over your shoulder as you picked up into a run, presumably to go tell Clarisse about the bizarre experience you just had. Luke watched you go, dumbstruck in the middle of camp.
Percy and Beckendorf watched the exchange from the porch of the Hephaestus cabin, the latter putting his head in his hands dramatically.
“We’re screwed,” He groaned and Percy winced slightly.
“I’m sure it’ll all be fine, dude. Luke has faced a lot worse than a teenage girl.”
When you sat at dinner that night, desperately avoiding the eye contact Luke seemed desperate on initiating, you almost told Silena about your bizarre day. You’d opened your mouth to start the story when you realised that she’d only be encouraged by Luke’s antics, pressuring you into going out with him for her own benefit and quickly shut it. She’d noticed your odd behaviour and searched for meaning in your face. Panicking for something to replace the conversation, you zeroed in on the necklace sitting nicely on top of her camp one.
“Where’d you get the pearls?” You asked, already dreading the answer. Silena only confirmed your fears, claiming them as your grandmother’s with a coy smile.
“So what? You’ve just been hiding them the last three years?” You were always closest with your grandmother, and you were sure she wouldn’t leave her favourite pearls for Silena over you.
“Daddy found them in a drawer just before summer.” Silena shrugged as if you weren’t sitting across from her, cheeks a blotchy red in your upset. “Besides, they look good on me.” Your hands itched to hit her as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ears, knowing exactly how much she was pissing you off.
“Trust me, they don’t,” You spat, quietly glad when Silena stalked off in a huff, amongst the first to leave the meal. You didn’t know how much longer you could argue with her before starting to cry, which you really didn’t want to do in front of the whole camp. You thought you were safe for the rest of the meal when Drew began speaking instead.
“You could try being nice sometimes, you know, people wouldn’t know what to think.” You rolled your eyes aggressively.
“You forget, I don’t care what people think,” You replied, taking in a spoonful of food.
“Yes you do. Everyone does. You know, with a new look you could have some serious potential.” You ignored her last statement.
“No, I don’t,” You emphasised, “You don’t always have to be who they want you to be.” You knew that wouldn’t impact Drew in the slightest, but you hoped it might resonate with some of your younger siblings — encourage them to nurture their internal beauty rather than accept the vain stereotype Aphrodite children were forced into. You pushed yourself out of the bench you were sitting on, needing a break from your insufferable siblings. As you dumped your dishes where they needed to be you saw Luke beginning to follow you and turned to make dead eye contact. Knowing you’d only scream at him (or worse) you gave him a dangerous look, accompanied with an almost imperceptible shake of your head. Not enough for anyone else to know you’d even acknowledged him, but enough to tell Luke to back off. He was smarter than you thought, as he held up his hands in a show of surrender, redirecting his action to innocently collect up his own dishes.
You may not have had any interest in knowing the boy, but you did appreciate that he knew when to back off. Or so you thought.
You were proven not-so-free from Luke Castellan the very next morning. It was the Aphrodite cabin’s day to check all the storerooms, and you’d volunteered to do the one which held all the weapons and armour near the sword fighting arena. You knew none of your siblings would come near if they could help it, mostly against weapons and the violence that surrounded the area, so you’d get a whole morning alone. It was peaceful attending to the chore, and you were allowed to use some of your Aphrodite eye for beauty. Of course, stacks of swords and assorted weapons could only be made so pretty, but you enjoyed organising them into neat rows, making it look as nice as possible — not that you would admit that to Silena or you’d be in her vanity chair receiving an unwelcome makeover in seconds.
You were just admiring your own sword, which you’d taken the time to polish while you were taking care of the others, when you felt a presence behind you. You didn’t react, assuming it was just some camper coming for a weapon, until he spoke.
“Nice sword, vintage hilt?” You tensed as Luke’s voice infiltrated your peace.
“Are you following me?” You disregarded his statement, an unimpressed frown present on your lips.
“I was training in the arena and needed to polish my sword. I saw you come in a while ago and not leave, I came to say hi,” He explained, and you raised an eyebrow. You weren’t friends, why would he come for a chat?
“Hi.” You promptly turned back to your task, shoving the cloth into the intricate designs of the hilt.
“Not a big talker, huh?” He persisted.
“Depends on the topic. My sword doesn’t exactly whip me into a verbal frenzy.” That wasn’t strictly true — the sword was a gift from your mother, with gold twisting around a blood red ruby in the centre of the hilt. After you’d made it clear that you weren’t going to just sit around during your time at camp she gifted you the sword, her way of saying that if you were going to fight, you should at least look good doing it. You’d had several conversations with Clarisse gushing over the intricacy of it, and profusely thanked Aphrodite for the gift in your offerings. You didn’t quite care to share this with Luke, being a relative stranger.
“You’re not afraid of me, are you?” He asked, and you were somewhat taken aback by the earnest tone of his voice.
“Afraid of you? Why would I be afraid of you?” You couldn’t help the incredulous laugh that crept into your sentence.
“Most people are.” He gestured subtly towards his scar — gnarled and twisted against his otherwise tanned skin. You put a hand on your hip, resigned to conversation now.
“Well, I’m not.”
“Ok, maybe you’re not afraid of me, but I’m sure you’ve thought about me naked.” You were pretty sure Luke was going for smooth or charming, but you thought in this moment he was entirely lame. The wink didn’t help his case.
“Am I that transparent? I want you, I need you. Oh baby, oh baby.” You put on your best Drew impression, nasally and whiny, before handing him the cloth he needed to polish his own sword and turning to leave. There, quickly approaching the door, was Ethan. Seeing you he put on a disgusting smirk and blocked the doorway, effectively caging you into the storeroom.
“Gods, what is it, asshole day?” You asked, not caring that both boys could very clearly hear you. “Do you mind?” You gestured to his blocking the exit. He simply looked down at you, clearly doing his best to appear sexy (and failing miserably).
“Not at all.” His stupid smirk was going to kill you, and not in the good way. You scoffed, giving him a last chance to get the fuck out of your way. Then, sparing a fraction of a glance back to Luke pretending to mind his own business, you slammed the hilt of your sword into his foot, wishing it was the blade instead. You watched him crumble to the ground, holding his foot with both hands.
“You bitch!” He yelled, voice cracking pathetically in the middle. You forced your smile to stay contained.
“Oops,” You feigned innocence, one hands covering your mouth strategically. “You might need some ambrosia for that…” With that you side-stepped him, eager to leave the situation. If you’d have looked back, you would have seen the gleeful, disbelieving smile on Luke’s face, probably the biggest one he’d worn in a while. Although he didn’t get the date he’d entered for, he was beginning to think you were a little more interesting than you let on.
“Did you just cripple Ethan?” Silena shrieked as you entered your cabin to grab your things. “He’s a model, you can’t do that! Has it escaped your notice that you’re completely psychotic?” You pretended to think for a moment, then shrugged nonchalantly.
“Guess your long walks on the beach are gonna have to wait,” You sighed dramatically, leaving Silena to wallow in her pity alone. It wasn’t like it was really your fault — if Ethan had learned how to respond to words or learn the meaning of ‘move’ he wouldn’t have gotten himself into that situation in the first place.
Meanwhile, Ethan and Luke were having a similarly emotional conversation after Luke had — very reluctantly — helped Ethan over to the infirmary to get his foot checked out.
“When I shell out fifty, I expect results.” Luke sighed, could this boy get any whinier?
“Yeah, I’m on it,” He said through gritted teeth, resisting the urge to hurt him.
“Watching that bitch obliterate my foot doesn’t count as a date. If you don’t get any, I don’t get any, so let’s get some,” Ethan said, running a hand through his ridiculously styled hair. Luke couldn’t believe his nerve. First of all, obliterated? He would be left with a bruise for a few days, if anything. Secondly, this whole things was Ethan’s idea, Luke had never given any indication wanting to ‘get some’, especially not with someone so clearly resisting his advances. Just as Ethan left, giving the Apollo girl treating him a douchebag smile, Luke hardened his resolve.
“I just upped my price,” He said, loving the way Ethan’s eyes widened like a cartoon character. “A hundred bucks a date, in advance.”
“Forget it,” Ethan grumbled, moving to leave again.
“Forget her sister then.” The two boys stared at each other, one significantly more amused than the other. Luke knew he had the upper hand in the dynamic, something he revelled in. Then, after the intimidation tactic clearly wasn’t having any effect, Ethan reached for his wallet, Luke admiring the crisp fifty he was handed.
“You better hope you’re as smooth as you think you are, Castellan.” Luke just watched him go, confident tilt of his head conveying his outlook on the situation.
Luke had taken his usual spot overseeing combat training, but his usual thoughts were long gone. Instead, he was entirely preoccupied with you. He didn’t know how to get you to go out with him when you could barely entertain a conversation, and he twirled his cigarette between his fingers as he pondered.
Percy and Beckendorf saw his internal conflicts, slowly moving closer to him under the guise of a very chaotic fight between the two. Finally Luke gave them attention, knowing Percy’s skills would never have him running all over the place like that. He raised an eyebrow, a sign for them to get on with whatever they were angling at.
“We know what you’re trying to do, for Beauregard,” Percy said, and Luke appeared almost startled.
“And we want to help,” Added Beckendorf helpfully, shying away when Luke’s eyes bore into his.
“And why would you do that?”
“Beckendorf here has a major crush on Silena—”
“Gods, what is it with this girl? Does she sweat nectar?” Beckendorf opened his mouth to protest when Percy spoke over him, knowing it would be more beneficial to let Luke lead.
“Look, I think we can both tell that Charlie’s love is pure, well-intentioned, better than, say, Ethan White?” Luke sighed, catching on.
“I’m in this for the cash, that’s it. Who Ethan wants to bang is of no interest to me.”
“There will be no banging!” Beckendorf cried as Percy pushed him behind. He was no use in a delicate situation like this.
“Ok, Luke, it’s just that we’re the masterminds behind this whole thing. We set it up so Beckendorf can get the girl — Ethan’s just a pawn.” Luke paid closer attention suddenly, intrigued by the chess match he’d been pulled into.
“So you two are gonna help me win her over?”
“We’ll do research, find out what she likes. We can be your guys on the inside.”
“In a strictly non-mission type of way,” Beckendorf added helpfully, nervous of the legends he’d heard about Luke’s failed quest. Luke chose to simply ignore that comment, and Percy filled the silence before he could get angry about it.
“Let’s just start here: the Apollo cabin is throwing a party on Friday night, it’s the perfect opportunity.”
“I’ll think about it,” Was all Luke said, a clear signal the conversation was over. Percy and Beckendorf returned to fighting, slightly more regulated now they had gotten what they’d wanted, and Luke brought the cigarette back up to his lips, new thoughts clouding his mind.
Meanwhile, Ethan had found Silena where she was known to hang out by the rocks near the lake. He was hovering next to her, providing snatches of shade as he performed pose after pose, claiming he had a modelling job lined up when he left for the year.
“So which do you like better?” He asked, moving his hands fractionally to the left of his chin.
“The second,” Silena giggled, tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ear. “It’s more… pensive.”
“Damn,” Ethan kicked the sand softly. “I was going for thoughtful. So, you going to the Apollo party on Friday?”
“Maybe.” She produced her best coy smile, looking up at him from behind her lashes.
“Good, ‘cause you know I’ll only bother if you’re there.” Silena smiled, getting up from her spot on the rock.
“Bye.” Her voice was airy in the way she knew drove boys mad. She walked away leaving Ethan wanting more, her specialty. You scoffed, catching the end of the exchange. You and Silena made momentary eye contact, tension thick between the two of you.
As Beckendorf approached Silena, fishing for more information about you, Ethan had caught you in his sights and wasn’t going to let you go so easily.
“You sister is so cute,” His voice infiltrated your bubble in a way that made you want to hit him so desperately. “Doesn’t have your bite though, a feisty woman is so sexy.” You knew he was just trying to get a rise out of you, but it was so close to working.
“Come any closer and I’ll show you just how feisty I can get,” You snapped, braid almost whacking him in the face as you turned to face him. You could have sworn Ethan looked afraid for a second before he covered it with bravado.
“One day you’re gonna realise that all of this hostility is just your sexual repression. Don’t worry, babe, I’ll be waiting with open arms… And legs.” You almost threw up.
“Gods, can’t you just leave me alone, asshole?” You yelled, trying to push past him to get anywhere else.
“C’mon, don’t be a prude,” He whined, and you were really close to taking him to the ground — not in the way he wanted.
“You heard the girl,” A voice called from behind you, and instantly Ethan took a step back. “She wants you to leave her alone.” Luke appeared behind you, a respectful distance away whilst still making his intentions clear. Ethan shrunk back into himself, making a lame excuse as to why he had to leave, hurriedly fleeing the beach. Reluctantly, you turned to face Luke.
“I’m not going out with you just for that,” You said plainly, daring him to try again.
“You think that low of me?” He laughed, dark eyes sparkling with mirth. You forced yourself not to notice. “I don’t have to want something from you to know that Ethan White isn’t worth your time.” It was your turn to be embarrassed at that, feeling slightly narcissistic for assuming that was the purpose of the conversation (it was, but Luke sure as hell wasn’t going to ruin his chances because you were in a mood, justified or otherwise).
“Oh.” You stared at his shoes. “Well, thanks, I guess.” You moved to leave but Luke stopped you, hand not quite touching your arm, unwilling to have it bitten off.
“So you do have a heart!” He joked, signature grin on his face. You wondered why you were seeing so much of it lately when he’d been so dour since his quest.
“Ha! You wish.”
“Don’t try to hide it, Beauregard, you’re warming up to me.”
“I’d sooner fuck Mister D,” You replied, actually taking your leave.
Luke watched you go, chewing his lip between his teeth. There was more to you than you let on, he was sure of it. He wouldn’t say it was any fondness, but he was starting to have a curiosity attaching itself to this scheme, and he knew that going out with you would satisfy it. He should have known having any personal stakes involved — sentimental or otherwise — would get dangerous.
Your own thoughts had barely budged on Luke. He was still a pain in your side and you figured you knew what kind of guy he was — not the type you had any interest in. Still, you couldn’t deny that you were appreciative he’d saved you from Ethan (and the inevitable washing up duty you’d be punished with when you beat him up), so maybe he wasn’t quite as despicable as you’d initially judged him to be. Close, though.
part three
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hisunshiine · 10 months
Text
Seven Days Masterlist | JJK | complete
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🗓️ pairing: nurse!jungkook x teacher!reader 🗓️ au/genre: non-idol au, brother's friend au, fwb, age-gap(reader is older), f2l, fluff, angst, smut 🗓️ series rating: M 🗓️ total wc: 34,413 🗓️ series warnings: emotionally constipated pairing, reader is older, adult worries, growing older, dating younger, time passing and not hitting milestones everyone else is, biological clock ticking woes, angsty argument, feeling like being emotionally cheated on despite being single, parents with toxic viewpoints, judgemental people, self doubt, explicit sexual content: each chapter will provide specifics, but in general, there will be sex in every part, each one showcasing jungkook and reader in various types of sexual situations including sleepy sex, oral sex (m & f receiving), light bondage sex, quickie sex with one partner not breaking off another night, drunk sex (dubious consent but neither feels taken advantage of), make up sex, and semi-public sex.    🗓️ an: please, please, please, blame @colormepurplex2 for this. It was not something I planned to do, but she talked me into it (she did not have to try hard, let’s be honest) and she is 100% right. This story needed to be told. Leah also helped me create the banners, so if you like them, it’s because of her creative input!  @downbad4yoongi also deserves blame now, but in the best way, for helping to expand the characters depth, and @heathfritillary-blog for her writing knowledge helping me find the motivators and reasons for the characters, challenging me to be a better writer. @mrsparkjimin18, @peachiilovesot7, and @abitjess, thank you for all that you do, hyping me up and helping me to piece together this story! 🗓️ an 2: reader being a teacher plays no real role in the story other than to help link the characters, it is summer break, so school is not in session! 🗓️ series summary: “Leave you with that afterglow, show you what devotion is, deeper than the ocean is…” Jungkook has been your best friend since you met him when he was still in college thanks to your younger brother, Yoongi. Despite your age gap, he easily fell into your world, your life, and your bed. Forced to confront the growing feelings as the pressure to meet adult milestones like your friends grow stronger, you struggle to be honest with yourself. “What you waiting for, better come and hit ya goals.”
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Monday - wind it back, i’ll take it slow
wc: 1,741 summary: “Wind it back, I’ll take it slow, Leave you with that afterglow…” Jungkook has been your best friend since you met him when he was still in college thanks to your brother, Yoongi. Despite your age gap, he easily fell into your world, your life, and your bed… 
posted: Monday 7-24-23 @ 9 am
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Tuesday - “lemme swallow your pride”
wc: 3,629 summary: “Open up say ahhh, Come here, baby, let me swallow your pride…” Jungkook comes over for an impromptu movie night that triggers some internal angst. You share a little, and he shares a lot... and your angst turns a little green. To change the topic when it gets a little too deep, you deepthroat him.
posted: Tuesday 8-1-2023 @ 12 am
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Wednesday - “it’s the way that you can ride”
wc: 4,622 summary: “It’s the way that you can ride, it’s the way that you can ride…” Picking an outfit for a wedding is hard enough without your friends with benefits turning you on. Especially when he makes a tie look so sexy, you can’t help but use it to get him right where you need him to be. Ties make great reigns, and Jungkook is willing for you to be the leading lady, in more ways than one.
posted: Wednesday 8-2-2023 @ 12 am
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Thursday - “so break me off another night”
wc: 3,596 + text messages summary: “So break me off another night” might be what he says, but after a day full of meddling parents, a quickie, and meddling friends, some things come to light, and there might not be another night for you to break him off...
posted: Thirstday 8-10-2023 @ 12 am
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Friday - “i must be favored to know ya”
wc: 5,665 + text messages summary: “I must be favored to know ya.” Having Jungkook in your life is so much sweeter than you ever thought. It would be great if you could just tell him, but showing him is as good as it gets for now…until you slip up and let the cat out of the bag. But it turns out, you aren’t the only one who has feelings for him, and you definitely aren’t the only one who wants to ride him. When your biggest fears come to light, knowing Jungkook the way that you do might become a thing of the past. 
posted: Friday 8-18-2023 @ 12 pm
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Saturday - “i kiss your waist and ease your mind”
wc: 6,323 + text message summary: “i kiss your waist and ease your mind.” The only thing that could make you feel better is the same thing that made you feel worse. You and Jungkook are both confused with your emotions, but two different stories help you both see a bit more clearly. The only problem is that when the two of you get around each other, clarity goes bye-bye. don’t let these soft lyrics fool you; make up sex doesn’t actually solve any issues if sex is the only communication that happens.  
posted: Monday 9-4-2023 @ 10:57 am
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Sunday - “i'll be loving you right, seven days a week”
wc: 8,837 + text message summary: “i’ll be loving you right, seven days a week.” Yoongi's wedding has brought up a lot of feelings, but with so many things left unsaid, it's hard to know where you and Jungkook stand. Can the two of you wrap around each other and bring life to a relationship?
posted: Sunday 10-8-2023 @ 10:01 pm
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↣ all rights reserved © hisunshiine 2023. please do not repost. translations & modifications are not allowed.
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ao3commentoftheday · 5 months
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As a volunteer, do you have anything to say about what the OTW did to bjorn?
To begin with, I’m going to speak in generalities instead of specifics. This is for a couple of reasons. 1) I’ve been on hiatus from the OTW since August because my life got extremely complicated and volunteering wasn’t something I could continue doing right now. 2) As a result of my hiatus, I was not present for any of the events that transpired. This is simply my own opinion based on the available information, so you can feel free to disagree.
Now, as to your phrasing. You say “what the OTW did to bjorn” and I ask, “What did the OTW do to them?” From the meager information I’ve seen, all of which has been provided by bjorn themselves, they left the OTW of their own accord because they were unhappy with being talked to about their behaviour. This behaviour occurred in the OTW’s chat space which, for those of you who don’t know, is the OTW’s workspace. As a fully online organization, that platform is the equivalent of their office. 
bjorn was in that shared workspace, and they set their name to include the phrase “Palestine will be free.” Later, they changed it to “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” They were told that the first phrase made some people uncomfortable but that they were allowed to continue using it. They were told the second was unacceptable and that they should stop using it. bjorn chose to continue using the second phrasing.
Why is the second phrase seen as unacceptable? A quick google took me to the Anti Defamation League’s explanation of its antisemitism. That same google also provided me with Al Jazeera’s explanation of its complicated history. As a person who is neither Israeli nor Palestinian and as someone who hasn’t spent years studying the history of the region or the complexities of the conflict there, I’m comfortable with the idea that it’s a nuanced issue that different people will see in different ways, and I have personally decided that I should probably avoid using an expression whose interpretation varies so wildly.
Here, I will digress to remind everyone that the OTW is an international volunteer organization. That means there are volunteers there from all over the world - including Israel and Palestine. As far as I’m aware, bjorn is not from that region of the world.
So we have someone using a controversial phrase in a workplace setting where there are people who are immediately affected by the current conflict. My assumption is that they were not doing this to be intentionally aggressive. While I do recognize their name, there are nearly 1000 volunteers at the OTW so I’m afraid I don’t remember this one individual. I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt here, however, and assume that they were not calling for the eradication of all Jews.
I can also, however, understand why anyone who has seen this same phrase used as a justification for terrorist attacks would have difficulty doing the same. 
From what I saw in the original post, bjorn was given a warning about their behaviour and then a more formal letter when it continued. CCAP (Constructive Corrective Action Procedure) has a pretty dystopian sound to it, but it’s basically just a conversation between a manager (Chair) and an employee (volunteer) when the employee has kinda messed up a little bit and the manager wants to get them back on track. If the CCAP goes well, then the volunteer is back in good standing and the situation can be put behind them. It’s only if the volunteer and their Chair are unable to get things back on track that the volunteer will be asked to leave the Org. As far as I know, that’s only happened a handful of times (but I’m no expert, and I’m still on hiatus so I can’t go and try to look things up)
bjorn apparently chose option #3, which is to leave the OTW rather than go through that process. That’s a perfectly fine decision to make, and I’m sure they’re not the first volunteer to do so. It was their choice, though. The OTW didn’t kick them out. The OTW didn’t force them out. The OTW told them “this is inappropriate behaviour in an international workplace setting,” and bjorn decided to leave rather than change that behaviour.
I have nothing against bjorn, and I hope their post-OTW life is a good one. However, I've seen posts that have been using bjorn's situation as a way to claim the OTW is a “Zionist organization.” I would like to remind everyone that the OTW is an organization dedicated to the preservation of fanworks. What role do people expect the OTW to take in an international negotiation between Israel and Palestine? How many international policy volunteers do people think they have, and which committee do people think they belong to? Technical Support? Communications?
I’m trending towards sarcasm here but it’s only because I can’t quite believe that there really are people who seem to believe that the OTW - again a fanwork preservation organization - is attempting to do anything at all with regards to an international conflict. 
If anyone out there hates the OTW, I encourage them to avoid OTW’s various projects and to decline the biannual opportunities to donate, but please don't generate or share conspiracy theories. There are more than enough of them going around already.
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