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#there are no weapons or laws against him

emdeerm · 7 months

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Idea!

Whomst???

So, let's take canon Danny Phantom. We can even take the AGIT, that would only make him canonically 16-17is for this scenario. (Btw, poor Val. I'm seriously so sorry for her)

Danny is flying around the Infinite Realms to familiarise himself with it better. Look, if he decided to be the Bridge, he has to learn more about the Ghost side of his life. Their customs, quirks, limits, world... from someone who isn't a Fruitloop or his parents. He is still ashamed that it took meeting Dairy King to finally realise that not all Ghosts are evil.

He got to a section of many, many, MANY, natural portals that led into completely different universes. Most of them even had Heroes!!!! He was so exited!

He visited many in the next few months. Made friends, confused the heck out of locals. Made some enemies, cause that's just his life.

Spiderman was cool! Iron Man was so fun to prank, the guy was a billionaire and hilarious.

Even if he never was able to speak with the vast majority, those Japanese Heroes with cool superpowers were awesome. He was kinda glad his world was normal-is tho. Call him judgmental, but come on, look him in the eyes and tell him that you wouldn't be weirded out by some of the mutations.

And now, he spotted his new target. From what he gathered, they were an urban legend of the gloomy as heck city. Robins,... bats? or something. Time to make friends!

And close the leakage of the Raw, unfiltered ectoplasm into here. He had only been around one for an hour and he saw how problematic it was.

Aka

Danny is a gremlin in canon. He found cool portals. He will make it other's problem.

Yes, he keeps his identity hidden. No, he doesn't stay invisible all the time. Only initially to get some info. After that? You'd spot him openly bothering the superheroes. And rogues. Can't let them be left out.

What are they gonna do? Kill him? They can't even touch him most of the time.

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nsomniacsdream · 2 years

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I have a hard time talking about American law enforcement, because I have ptsd (like a therapist told me this and everything) from my own experiences with cops and because it's so balls quaking insane.

Like, a cop in the United States can pull you over for any reason. Which is a nice way of saying no reason, because literally anything can be used after the fact as justification. A cop can say its cuz you looked at him, or didnt look at him, or it looked like you were holding something, or looked like you were driving too perfectly for it to be natural. It's insane.

There are apparently no circumstances where a cop can't just kill you. The line the courts have applied is "reasonably believed" you were a threat, but that's such a nebulous nothing limit that people get shot for reaching for their license, having their phone in their hand, you're running away with no weapon, not being able to follow conflicting commands, like anything. And cops are almost never charged, because every court is going to believe he could "reasonably believe" he was threatened. Fuck, if you give me enough time, I can make any situation seem juuuuust plausibly threatening enough to pass that bar. It's insane.

A cop can just rob you. Like tell you to give him your wallet, take all the cash out, and just walk away with it. Exactly like you would imagine getting robbed in an alley would go, except no one can help. And he doesn't even have to hide it, he just drops it in a box at the station and they put it in their bank account. It's legal. You can't prove it wasn't drug money. I can't prove any money wasn't at some point drug money. It's insane.

If a cop just walks in your front door and says "I'm here to kill you and your entire family" YOU ARE GOING TO PRISON IF YOU STOP HIM. There is no positive defense for assaulting a police officer in the United States, and doubly so if you kill him. You have effectively no defense against a homicidal cop, which happens same as any other job. Unless for some reason you have cameras all thru your house and clearly caught the audio of him saying that he's there just to kill you, you have zero chance of not going to prison, probably for life. And that's assuming you aren't killed "resisting arrest" while being taken into custody. It is a crime, in this country, for you to defend yourself under any circumstances if the person you're defending yourself from is a cop. That's insane.

You don't have civil rights if a cop says so. You have the right to have a gun, right? A lot of states have open carry. A cop can shoot you if he sees you have a gun. Doesn't matter if you have a license and everything. So you effectively don't have the right to bear arms if a cop can shoot you for exercising it. You have the right to protest. Unless a cop tells you to stop. He doesn't need a real reason to tell you to stop. And if you don't stop, you can be arrested or shot. So you don't really have the right to protest, do you? A cop cant just search your car or house, right? Unless he claims he heard something, or smelled something, neither of which can be proven. So a cop can search whatever he wants, as long as he pretends there was a "reason". So you dont have protection from unreasonable search and seizure, do you? These are no longer rights- they're things the cops allow.. for now. But legally, those rights have already been found to not actually be rights, because any random cop can decide to take that right from you, for any reason. It's insane.

These aren't like crazy things that I'm just making up, these aren't some weird twisted way I'm looking at something, these are all very real things that we all just.. ignore? Police abolitionists and the media bring these things up all the time, and the overwhelming response to it is: so what? Don't break the law and it won't matter. Blue lives matter. More police funding. Cops should have tanks. It's insane. And I always feel like im just rambling and sound insane when I say this kind of stuff because if you wrote a book and had the dystopian government doing the stuff that the police in this country do every single day, those same people who "back the blue" would line up to say stuff like "*Books government* wouldnt have a chance before us real americans stopped them" on twitter and not even get a hint of the irony.

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deadsetobsessions · 3 months

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What Do You Have There?

A knife!

Danny plunked the butter knife in its pedestal of importance. The nice thing about having a billionaire vigilante for a... foster is the amount of money Danny was allowed to drop on his hobbies. For example, his extensive collection of souvenirs.

They're not just any old regular souvenirs. No, no, no. That would be so boring! No, these souvenirs, he obtained from the various muggings, knife fights, and various other situations he's been in ever since he was dropped ungraciously into Gotham.

The butter knife? Damian. Precocious, stabby Damian who he had startled into the stab instinct. A point of pride, really. Danny knew Damian was good at fighting! It was practically, in ghost terms, a super enthusiastic hello! Yes, the butter knife would be kept in the well lit part of the wall. Alfred had told him to stay home today to recuperate. He didn't need it, since the wound would heal in an hour or two, but he'd take staying at home any day.

A couple of hours later, well into the afternoon and right before what Danny knew to be their patrol hours, Danny had a visitor.

"Danny."

"Oh, hey, Damian! What's up?" Danny turned around to see Damian hovering awkwardly near the door.

"I am here to... check upon your wound. It is imperative that it gets proper treatment."

Ancients, Damian was exactly like those alley kids. He just ate a thesaurus instead of the drawling accent the alley kids picked up. Which meant Damian endeared himself to Danny pretty quickly. Like a little ghostling.

"Oh, I'm good. See? No blood is leaking out of the wound." Danny held up spotless bandages.

Danny watched Damian step into his haunt- his room- with a pleased hum. Damian inspected the bandages and stepped back with a sharp nod of approval. His eyes flicked to the wall that Danny was rearranging (again) and did a double take at the butter knife in the middle.

"Is that the butter knife I stabbed you with?"

"Why, yes, it is!" Danny beamed.

"Why on earth would you display that?"

"Because you stabbed me with it?"

"That makes absolutely no sense, you simpleton! When someone stabs you, stab them back!"

"That would be mean!"

Damian spluttered. Danny tugged the kid closer to the wall, cheering inwardly as Damian didn't shove him away. It might be because he was exaggeratedly wincing as he moved his "injured arm" but Danny has learned to take a win where he could find them, especially with ghosts. Not that Damian was a ghost, but he sure acted like one.

"Do you want to see my collection?"

"Your collection?"

"Yeah!" Without giving him time to answer, Danny barreled ahead. "So this is the knife you stabbed me with. Which, by the way, was an awesome show of strength and accuracy."

Damian grimaced. Danny continued blithely, secretly memorizing Damian's reactions to laugh at later.

"And this is the knife those guys stabbed me with that one time Cass found me. And this one is a bullet someone shot at me down by the docks. I think I interrupted some kind of meeting?"

Damian's jaw had a slight tick to it that would have been a baffled frown on anyone else.

"And when was this?"

"Oh, like a week ago."

"What? When did you go to the docks?!"

"At night. I couldn't sleep."

"And you went to the docks?! How did you even get there?!"

"Walked," Danny lied, like a lying liar. He floated, obviously, but none of them knew that. "Anyways, this is a law book! Someone threw it at my head!"

"Hey, guys! What're you doing?"

Danny and Damian turned around.

"Richard? Brown? What are you doing here?"

"Oh, Bruce wanted me to come back for the weekend," Dick said. Danny knew it was code for "something's going down and we need back up." Man, he still couldn't believe they didn't know he knew they were crime fighting vigilantes.

"Same!" Stephanie said. Danny was glad to see that her wounds from "cartwheeling in the manor" were healed.

"I see. Danny was showing me his collection of... objects people have used as weapons against him."

"What?!"

"Yeah!" Danny beamed, completely innocent. "Come on! I'll show you!"

With that, Danny continued to ramble. He just knew that the way Dick's and Stephanie's smiles strained would give him a good laugh for weeks to come. "And this is the glass bottle a drunk tried to shank me with in Crime Alley, and this is a knife the Red Hood himself threw at me."

Dick interrupted, face stiff. "Hood threw a knife at you?!"

"Yeah, but that was because my kids broke into his safe house and I was trying to get them to stop looting the place. And he didn't know I was a kid too, so he aimed a gun at my head. He shot at me too, but I couldn't go back to get the bullet, or else it would have joined my collection." Danny grabbed a box and shook it, metal rattling inside.

Dick smiled sweetly, Stephanie and Damian inching away from it.

"Oh, wow, I see!"

----

In his apartment, Jason shuddered. He grabbed his guns.

"Something's wrong. I just know it," he muttered to himself.

----

Danny smiled innocently as he described the horrific, near death events he got his souvenirs from.

"This is my bullet box! Man, Gotham has a lot of gun fights. I got shot so many times!" Danny complained, shaking the box like a rattling toy.

"Did you know Danny snuck out to go to the bay?" Damian snitched immediately, like a snitch.

"The Bay?! Danny! You know that's where people dump bodies, right?!" Stephanie poked him in the arm.

"Yeah, but like... I wouldn't die. And besides! I missed my friends!"

"You mean the minions you made in Crime Alley?" Steph asked. Danny pouted, eyeing the way Dick's gaze roved over his souvenirs and paling the more he realized how often Danny "got hurt."

Damian bumped a shoulder against Dick's arm. Danny returned to the conversation.

"If anything, I'm their minion." He said, remembering the times the Alley kids sent him on food runs.

"Fear Danny, the overlord of street rats."

Danny snorted. And- "Oh! Yeah, there was like a weird owl looking guy? And then they stabbed me with a finger and I kept it because woah, cool talon looking thing, right? And then they threw a bunch of those tiny knives at me? And then they just kind of vanished? Gotham is so weird."

And now, with all of them pale and stressed out of their minds, Danny swung a devastating blow called guilt trip.

"And that's the batarangs!" Three heads swung over to the line of batarangs. "Those vigilantes kept throwing them at me! One of them even hit me in the arm. Those things are sharp, man."

"Uh. Which ones?" Stephanie asked.

"Hm?" Danny hummed obliviously.

"Do you know which vigilantes?"

"Oh, it was like... the purple one. And the sword one? And like the one with the yellow insignia in the middle. And... all of them, I think? Except for signal. That guy's cool."

Stephanie and Damian had matching veiled looks of guilt. Dick shot them a sharp look. Danny decided to deal the last bit of damage to Dick.

"I'm glad you guys are way less stabby than the general Gotham public though, butter knife incident aside. At least I don't have to worry about you guys getting into danger, right? If you guys got hurt like my family did... I don't know..."

Danny smiled-squinted at them, channeling Cujo at his cutest and saddest: when he doesn't get to eat off of Danny's plate. So, pretty sad and pathetic.

"Uh, yeah." Dick said, guilt splayed all over his face. "Alfred said dinner was almost ready."

"Yes," Damian cleared his throat, looking away. "We shall partake in Pennyworth's hard work."

"Ahaha!" Stephanie laughed, nervously. "Welp, let's go bother Tim!"

Falling into step behind them, Danny grinned.

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celtic-crossbow · 9 months

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Skin You With My Tongue

Pairing: Daryl Dixon x Fem!Reader

Setting: Alexandria

Warnings: Poorly written smut, p in v, fingering, oral (fem rec), brief hand job

Summary: What has gotten into Daryl? It doesn’t matter because you like it!

A/N: I haven’t been feeling great but I wanted to finish this before taking a break. Then I’ll work on my last request. Once again, I don’t think it’s great but ah well. I’m trying to just be thankful to be writing again. I hope some enjoyment comes from it!

You had no idea how you’d ended up in your current predicament: flat on your back, naked, with an equally naked Daryl Dixon devouring you like a man starved. You weren’t complaining by any stretch of the imagination. Though he had claimed to have little experience, the man deserved medals for the sounds he was wringing out of you with his tongue.

Anyway, back to the question of how did you end up here?

The day had started like any other. Your group was still new to Alexandria. While most had been given jobs, you and Daryl had not yet been set to work by Deanna. So, Rick had easily agreed to letting you both go hunt. Daryl had refused to give up his crossbow when you had first arrived in the community, but you had to sign out a weapon.

“Bullshit.” Daryl growled from where he leaned against the doorframe of the armory. You couldn’t say that you didn’t agree with him.

Regardless, you played by the rules, got your gun, strapped the weapons to the back, and climbed onto Daryl’s bike. He had decided the two of you could go further out today, not having much luck the past couple of days in the direct vicinity.

Daryl was your closest friend in your tight knit group and had been since you all had been forced to wander around in the cold before the prison. He was difficult to read and his emotional walls were high and thick. Somehow, you had been able to scale those walls, if not shatter them completely. You accepted him without question but you didn’t take any shit from him either. You weren’t afraid to call him out. In fact, the first time he had willingly come to sit next to you by the fire was just after you had asked him if he was “violating the Georgia sodomy law by having his head that far up his own ass.” You’d been close ever since.

You wrapped your arms tightly around his stomach and rested your chin on his shoulder, making kissy noises at him when he glanced back at you.

“Stop.” He grumbled before starting up the motorcycle. You simply gave his midsection a squeeze and could practically feel him roll his eyes as you headed through the gate.

The first part of the day was uneventful. Daryl stashed the bike before you walked and walked, finding nothing to track. About midday, the two of you came across a gorgeous lake. The water was clear and having only crossed two walkers on your trek there, you decided that a swim was an excellent idea after lunch. You didn’t ask Daryl, truly figuring he wouldn’t mind and that, hell, maybe he’d even join you.

You didn’t look at him as you stripped down to your bra and panties, mismatched as they were. If you had, you would have seen him comically fumble and drop the piece of dried meat in his hand.

“The blue hell ya doin’, girl?” He snapped after righting himself.

“Cooling off.” You gave him a smile over your shoulder before mimicking his frown with added exaggeration. “Maybe you should do the same, you old grump.”

He scoffed, keeping his eyes averted. “You’re bein’ careless. Careless gets ya dead.”

“I’m not going in unprotected!” You spun toward him, drawing his gaze toward you before pointing to the small knife tucked securely between your breasts. You couldn’t help but laugh when his face reddened and he looked away so quickly that you could swear you heard his neck crack. “I won’t be long.”

And you weren’t. Barely twenty minutes later, you were sitting down next to him, fully clothed albeit damp, but feeling much better.

“Ready to head out?” You asked cheerfully.

He did not share your enthusiasm, scowling as he stood and secured his crossbow to his back. “Been ready.”

“Well, aren’t you just a bucket of sunshine?” He had already stalked off by the time you gathered up everything. You had to sprint to catch up.

After a couple of hours, Daryl finally caught the trail of a deer and began tracking it. You followed quietly, watching his methods and learning everything you could. You knew how to hunt, thanks to him, but you were always eager to sharpen your skills. When the animal was finally within sight, the archer kneeled after signaling for you to stand still just beside him. He was lining up the shot when something caught his eye to the right of where you stood.

“Get down!” He whispered sharply, grabbing your arm and pulling. The sudden jerk caught you off guard and you were thrown off balance, crashing into him. He fell flat on his back with you on top, your palms on either side of his head with your chest almost directly in his face. With half a dozen walkers shuffling into the area, you couldn’t move lest you be detected.

The deer sensed the danger and ran, the group of undead following mindlessly. As they passed where you and Daryl hid, you instinctively lowered, feeling his breath against your shirt. It took several minutes for the threat to move far enough away that you felt comfortable to lift yourself up and sit back, effectively placing your ass on his stomach.

“Well, that sucks. That was a big doe.” You complained. When he didn’t comment, you looked at him. He was propped up on his elbows, looking anywhere but at you. His face and neck were flushed all the way to the tips of his ears. “You okay?” You queried with general concern.

“M’fine. Can ya get offa me?”

“Oh. Right.” You stood quickly, as did he. His back was quickly turned to you.

“We’re done. Let’s go.”

Your head tilted, brow creased in confusion. “We’ve got hours of daylight left. Shouldn’t we—”

“Said we’re done.” He was already walking away, leaving you staring at his back and wondering what you’d done wrong.

The ride back was tense and silent. You even chose to just lightly place your hands below his ribs and keep some space between your bodies instead of how you would usually have a tight hold on him.

When you entered Alexandria, Daryl parked the bike and got off, leaving you there, confused and more than a little upset. He passed Rick by without a word, the former sheriff turning to look at you with an eyebrow cocked. You gave him a shrug.

“I have no idea.” Shaking your head, you grabbed the gun from where it was secured to the back and went to sign it in before returning to the home you shared with Daryl and Carol. He was nowhere to be found on the first floor, leaving you to assume he had retreated to his room in the basement. With a heavy sigh, you went upstairs to shower.

Evening was upon you before you knew it, the sun having only set a few minutes before Carol invited you to walk to the other house for dinner with the group. You weren’t feeling all that hungry so you told her you’d be there in a few minutes. It was a lie. You had no intention of leaving your room.

Turning over onto your side, you closed your eyes. You had just drifted off when there came another knock. “Ugh.” You groaned and threw back the blankets, remaining in just your tank top and underwear since you didn’t plan on leaving with her. “Carol, I really don’t—” Once the door opened, you screeched to a halt, meeting the impossibly blue eyes of your favorite bowman. “Daryl.” You blinked at him blankly.

“Hi.” He nearly whispered. “Can I, uh—?” He gave a vague motion toward the inside of your room.

“Right. Uh, yeah, right, sure.” You stammered while stepping aside. He stepped in and you turned to push the door closed, a gasp leaving your mouth when you felt him press himself against your back. “D-Daryl?”

“First, the lake. Then your tits in my face when the walkers came. An’ now—this?” His finger was tracing the outline of your panties over your hip.

“What? I didn’t—”

He growled, a low sound in his throat, as he spun you around and pressed you back against the door with his body. He grabbed your chin to force your gaze on him.

“Didn’t what? G’on. Tell me.”

“Daryl, I didn’t mean anything by any of that.” You gulped, though you weren’t afraid. Exactly the opposite. Heat and wetness was pooling at your core, your skin feeling electrified where he was touching you. Nevertheless, you couldn’t lie to him. “I really wasn’t trying to fuck with you, I swear.”

There was an instant change in his eyes and it broke your heart. He released you with a muttered “shit,” his hand rubbing at the back of his neck. The dim light of your bedside lamp was enough for you to see his face reddening and the slight tremble to his frame.

“Y/N, I—fuck—m’sorry.” He quickly attempted to sidestep you and reached for the doorknob, but you were faster and blocked his path. His head shot up, eyes wide and panicked. He had absolutely misread the day’s happenings but he wasn’t wrong on one thing.

“I wasn’t intentionally fucking with you.” You repeated, your tongue snaking out to wet your lips before you continued. “But I would have if I had known it’d end with you here like this.” His arm dropped away from the knob and you entered into his space, pressing your chest against him to hover your lips over his. “I’ve wanted you for so long, Daryl Dixon.”

And now you were here.

“Fuuuuck!” You moaned, pressing the back of your head into the pillow before raising it to look down at the man between your thighs. Your fingers twisted and tugged his hair as your hips rolled, grinding your cunt against his tongue. Daryl growled against your clit, the sound vibrating against the swollen nub. His large hands pressed down on your inner thighs, holding you open while also effectively rendering you immobile.

A whine slipped past your lips when his tongue once again pressed tightly against you, sweeping up and down before he closed his lips around the bundle of nerves and sucked. You tried to lift your hips but he pressed down harder, his nails biting into your skin. He removed his mouth from you, dark eyes glaring from just above your mound.

“Be still.”

His gravelly voice was even lower, darkened with lust and demand. You found you couldn’t help but obey. Breathing through your nose, you nodded eagerly. He kept his gaze locked on your face while his right hand lifted from your thigh, fingertips whispering over your flesh to dance down to your core. He ran a single digit through your slick once…twice, never breaking eye contact.

Your hands left his hair and fisted into the sheets of your bed, but otherwise, you remained frozen in place, panting through the pleasure of stretching around his middle finger breaching your opening. He slid in to the first knuckle, then the second, pausing only briefly before pushing in all the way. The sound that left your throat was positively sinful. You dropped your head back to the pillow and focused on not moving.

“Good girl.” He praised you, rewarding you by drawing his digit almost all the way out before sinking back inside, thus beginning a steady rhythm of which he continued. When you remained unmoving, he lowered his head once again to lavish attention onto your clit.

Who was this man? This was a completely new Daryl. In control, demanding, vocal, and positively panty-dropping. A new part of him for you to accept and adore. A part of him that, to your knowledge, only you had seen. One that you definitely hoped you would see again and again!

“Daryl, fuck!” You cried out when his index finger joined the first. You shivered almost violently when you felt him smile against your pussy.

“In a minute.” He purred, pumping into you faster.

Your hands moved from the sheets to the headboard, palms flat to keep the thrusts of his hand from pushing you upward. The moans and cries were constant, his mouth and fingers igniting a fire low in your belly. The knot was twisting tighter and tighter, and you grit your teeth when you felt the sparks of it begin to shoot down to your toes and up into your chest.

“Nngh, Daryl! I’m—” You panted, eyes screwed shut and legs trembling. He curled his fingers, driving them against that soft spot inside you mercilessly while his tongue and teeth tortured your clit. Just when you thought you might die from the pleasure of it all, that knot in your belly pulled taunt and snapped. Wave after wave of euphoria traveled through you, broken moans of his name tumbling from your lips like a mantra. You had grabbed his hair again at some point, holding him against your center with your thighs attempting to trap him there. He didn’t seem to mind, too busy eagerly lapping at the nectar you spilled while riding your high.

When you went limp against the mattress, he pulled his fingers from within you, leaving you to whine at the emptiness they left behind. You were still pulsing with the aftershocks of your orgasm when he pressed one last kiss against your sensitive clit before sitting up on his knees. You blinked away the haze in your vision to watch him suck on those two fingers that had just fucked you senseless, your juices still glistening on his face.

You weren’t sure what came over you but you dove forward almost clumsily while he wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. He caught you easily with the other arm and pulled you against his chest, your arms encircling his neck to pull his lips to yours. The kiss was desperate, all tongues and teeth. The absolute need to be close to him in that moment was something you couldn’t explain. When you pulled back to look at him, your pupils blown wide and lips swollen, it was as if he understood before your sex-addled brain could form any words.

“I gotcha, girl.” Daryl said softly, a contradiction to how he had commanded you only moments prior. You nodded and let him kiss you again. It was tender this time, slow and deliberate. The archer began to lay you back. He caught himself with one arm while the other stayed behind your head to control your descent until you were once again on the pillows.

His mouth left yours and began to roam across your jaw. He nuzzled his cheek against yours in a way that you found absolutely adorable but then he was pressing open-mouthed kisses below your ear. Large hands traveled to your chest to cup both of your breasts, calloused fingers exploring the supple mounds before settling to roll your pebbled nipples between them. He kissed his way down, that sinful mouth eager to take over worshiping that part of you.

“Daryl,” you gasped, arching up into him when his mouth closed around your right nipple, “mmmm, Daryl, please!” You could feel his erection against your thigh, hot and hard and yet completely ignored. “Please—” you tried again, the plea coming out more like a pathetic whine.

“I know whatcha want.” He murmured against the skin between your breasts. He latched onto your left nipple with his teeth while his left hand took over stimulating the right. “Whatcha need.” You did the only thing you could and twisted your fingers into his hair, drawing your bottom lip in between your teeth with a quiet whimper. His touch left you suddenly and you opened your eyes to find him directly above you and lowering down until his lips were just barely touching yours. “But I wantcha to say it anyway.” You felt every syllable against your mouth, the simple action enough to make your cunt clench around nothing. Goddamn, this man knew how to play your body like an instrument.

His fingers were ghosting down your left side only for his hand to maneuver between your bodies. Grasping his cock, he slid it through your folds, gathering your juices in agonizingly slow strokes. Each time the tip of him grazed your clit, your back arched from the mattress with a cry on your lips.

“Say it.”

“I want you, Daryl.” You whined, anchoring your legs around his hips. You dug your heels into the skin just below his ass in a desperate attempt to pull him into you. Too bad he was much stronger than you.

He hummed in response but only began to stroke himself, spreading your slick along his shaft. “Tell me whatcha want me to do, girl.”

You couldn’t take it anymore. You were going to literally combust if he wasn’t inside you at that moment. You weaved your arms underneath his and pulled at him. “Fuck me, Daryl. Please, please, fuck me!”

He chuckled. The asshole actually chuckled but you didn’t care because he then immediately entered you in one fluid motion, burying himself to the hilt. His arms nearly gave out as your wet heat welcomed him, stretching and molding to his cock as if your body was made just for him. He groaned, dropping his head to your shoulder but you were too far gone to notice. The pleasurable burn of accommodating him brought you to new heights. You almost came right on the spot.

“Fuck.” He breathed against your neck, fighting to keep himself in check.

After you both had a moment, Daryl pushed himself up onto his forearms, drawing back his hips slowly before snapping forward and earning a broken moan from you. The feeling of him moving inside you was overwhelming, the push and pull driving every thought from your mind to leave only the ability to feel. And you wanted more.

You clawed at his back, each thrust forward tearing a cry from your throat. You barely registered that his mouth was on yours, but responded immediately, craving the taste of him. The smoke and pine mingled with the taste of your cunt on his tongue and you couldn’t get enough. You swallowed his delectable moan when your hips came up to meet this thrusts, the sound of wet skin slapping echoing off the walls of your room. Bringing a hand to his hair, you pulled his head back, pussy clenching when the action made him hiss between his teeth.

Teeth met his skin, biting down just above his collar bone. The salty taste brought a moan into your throat. You marked him there, sucking hard until you brought blood to the surface and then you released him. “You—feel so good.” You panted before your mouth was back on his. He pulled back suddenly and you whined at the loss of his weight but then he was sitting back on his knees, grabbing your hips and fucking into you so hard that you saw stars. It was just on the good side of painful, your cunt spasming around his cock as the familiar heat began to build in your belly.

Daryl didn’t stay that way way long. He released your hips and leaned forward to use the headboard as leverage, pounding you with such force that you again had to brace yourself with your palms. Your cries mixed with his moans and grunts and you prayed that Carol was still away. The angle was intense, each thrust had his tip pressing roughly against your sweet spot, building your pleasure at a pace you wished would slow.

“Daryl, I’m—I’m gonna—” you couldn’t get the words out between breaths and moans, but he knew from the way you tightened around him that you were nearing the precipice. And he was determined to throw you over the edge first.

He released the headboard and grabbed your arms, yanking you up while he sat back on his heels. You grabbed for his shoulders and then encircled his neck, resting one hand on the back of his head and the other on his shoulder blade. He moved his hands to your hips, helping you to bounce on him, spearing yourself on his cock and driving it deeper. Your moans became pleas and then a chant of his name, mouth hanging agape between words and breaths and eyes screwed shut.

“Cum for me.” He grunted against your jaw and that was all it took. You were almost certain you screamed but you couldn’t hear it, vision blacking out as euphoria swallowed you. You came back to yourself as the waves began to ebb, Daryl continuing to fuck you through. Your body felt heavy and uncoordinated and you pulled back a bit to clumsily seek out his mouth, greedily drinking down each sound he offered as he chased his own release. His grip on your hips would leave bruises, but you couldn’t find it in you to care.

His movements grew sloppy and you could feel him beginning to twitch and pulse inside you. You pulled your mouth from his and watched him until he pulled you from his lap. You moved quickly, aware of his actions, and wrapped your hand around him, pumping him fast and hard. He pressed his forehead against yours, his hands gripping your thighs while he fought to breathe through the sensation. His teeth were clenched and his eyes tightly closed, sweat shining on his skin and you were sure it was the sexiest thing you had ever seen.

Half a dozen more strokes before you twisted your hand and he cried out, muscles freezing and face contorting into a grimace of pure ecstasy. He breathed out your name, hips jerking and ropes of cum painting your hand and both of your thighs. No, that was the sexiest thing you had ever seen.

You pulled his mouth to yours before he could come all the way down, relishing each twitch of his muscles. When you pulled away, he finally opened his eyes and swayed on the spot. He seemed dazed but when his gaze met yours, he leaned forward to kiss you. It was gentle, almost hesitant. As if he didn’t know whether or not you’d welcome it.

“That was amazing.” You whispered, finally catching your breath.

“Yeah.” He replied quietly.

You brought a hand to the side of his face, watching all the courage melt away. His already flushed face was growing impossibly redder. You couldn’t help but smile. He had been dominant and commanding only to morph right back into the Daryl you had fallen in love with.

Your eyes widened.

Shit.

You were in love with him.

You were actually in love with Daryl.

You didn’t move when he got up to grab a towel, slipping on his boxers while he was at it. You still didn’t move as he cleaned you up, his mouth moving once he was done but no sound registering. He snapped his fingers in front of your face and you flinched.

“What’d you say?”

“Ya okay?” His brow was drawn inward in concern. He looked so, so nervous and you just wanted to pull him onto the bed and hold him.

“Yeah, I’m great.” You beamed.

He nodded and worried his bottom lip between his teeth, glancing over at his clothes. “Guess I should go.”

Your face fell as he reached for his pants. “Why?” Daryl froze and looked at you, head tilted. “You could stay. Here. With me.” You offered, your own face reddening. He stayed in the awkward position of halfway reaching toward his shirt but was obviously considering your words.

“Ya want me to stay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I really do.” You smiled sincerely. He nodded and straightened, coming back around to the other side of the bed. He sat stiffly against the headboard, chewing his lip again. You started to lean against him when there came a soft knock at the door. You both looked up and then at one another.

Busted.

You both scrambled to get dressed and it would have been comical had you not been thinking of who could be on the other side of the door. Carol. Rick. Michonne. Oh god, Carl! You looked back at him just as he pulled his shirt over his head, an apologetic expression on your face. Turning the knob and pulling the door open, you smiled innocently at—

No one.

“What the—” You leaned out and looked down each hall to find them empty. However, at your feet were two wrapped plates of food. One with a note addressed to Daryl and the other to you. In Carol’s handwriting.

You looked around for the woman once more while picking up the plates and stepped back into the room, kicking the door shut. Eyebrows raised, you crossed the space to hand Daryl his and then placed yours on the bed, removing the note and unfolding it.

“Good for you. Now tell him that you love him.”

You almost laughed but held it, simply folding your note and putting it in your bedside drawer. Daryl was looking at his own with a raised brow before he folded it and put it in his pocket.

“M’starvin’.” He announced, plopping onto your bed while unwrapping his food. He watched you smile and follow suit, gaze lingering just a moment longer than necessary.

His note?

“Don’t be stupid, Pookie. She loves you too.”

#murda writes #daryl dixon #daryl dixon fanfic #daryl dixon fanfiction #daryl dixon x reader #daryl dixon x y/n #the walking dead #daryl dixon x you #daryl dixon smut #daryl dixon x female reader #Spotify

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reiderwriter · 12 days

Note

hii I absolutely love your writing!! I was wondering if you could write a one shot with gun kink? maybe not really something *aggressive* but just gun kink in the plot !! and please smut with no angst, also maybe aftercare in the end? it's totally okay if you're not comfortable. im loving your kinktober one shots! have a good day :)

A/N: This being one of like... three gun kink requests I've received, we are all not seeing the pearly gates lmao. If you enjoy reading this, even 50% of how much I enjoyed writing it, then I'm happy 😚

Warnings: Undercover FBI Agent reader, gun kink, interrogation room sex, oral (f receiving), unprotected sex, creampie, some BDSM themes, Spencer has to 'rough up' the reader etc.

Masterlist

Being rough-housed by a group of FBI agents and pushed against a wall before being handcuffed was never your idea of a fun Tuesday night. It wasn't exactly high on the list for any night of the week, really, but here you were.

“Caitlyn Grant? You're under arrest for being an accessory to a felony and evading law enforcement, whatever you say…” You drowned out the rest of the statement. It was nothing you didn't have memorized.

“You're not the usual drug crew, and you don't look sturdy enough to be on most of the other teams either. What part of the Bureau are you in?” You asked the lanky man currently pinning you to the wall as he made sure your handcuffs were aptly tight.

“You have the right to an attorney, if you can't afford one-”

“I waive my rights. It's not human trafficking. You wouldn't be working this case if you were human trafficking.”

The man just stared at you in vague disapproval as you grinned back at him. His closeness meant you could see every detail of his face up close, the five o'clock shadow, the dark circles from lack of sleep. On most of the agents you'd encountered, it had the effect of making them look older, a little haggard, and depressed. On this man, it was honestly very hot.

He started your pat down by spreading your legs, though honestly, if he'd asked nicely enough, you'd have done just that for him. You near enough told him just that as he reached the two pockets on the ass of your jeans.

“Watch it, Agent, my bite is worse than my bark.”

“Turn around.”

You pouted at his solid resolve, wondering what it would take to get the man to crack a smile or even a frown. Something that wasn't just disinterest slapped on a face and called a day.

You did as he asked, making sure your body pressed nicely up against his the entire way until your shoulders were resting on the wall and he was feeling along your waist.

“Come on, what kind of weapon are you going to find there?”

“Standard protocol, please let me do my job.”

“Standard protocol is calling one of your female agents over here to maintain the boundary, Agent. This feels more like you're just trying to cop a feel.”

Those words finally got a reaction. The subtle clench of the jaw as his hands tightened slightly on your waist had you suddenly regretting your decision to be put in handcuffs. Your hands should've been free to tuck the stray lock of hair that had fallen in his eyes behind his ear, free so your fingernails could trace a path down his face and neck and chest.

His gaze landed on the simple silver chain you wore around your list and he delicately pulled it out of your shirt, careful not to touch you (and avoiding you even as you arched your back into him).

With a quick tug, he pulled the necklace clean off your neck, not pausing to bother with the clasp at all.

“Clever boy. I'll see you in the interrogation room, shall I?” He said nothing as the female agents you'd mentioned earlier stationed themselves on either side of you as you walked away. You didn't break eye contact until the doors to the police van closed behind you.

Six months undercover on a case, and this was the first time you'd stepped foot in a police precinct since you'd ditched your real name and life.

The interrogation rooms hadn't changed in that time, at least, still grey and depressing. Time felt void as you waited for company, and thankfully, you weren't waiting long.

“Agent Y/N, sorry about the arrest, we wanted to make it look as real as possible while pulling you out.” The woman who greeted you obviously held the authority, and while you wanted to respect that, the sight of the man trailing behind her actually caught her full attention.

“Pleasure to meet you….?” You let the question hang open for both of them but kept your gaze fully focused on the man, who stood himself next to the door, keeping surprisingly quiet.

“I'm Unit Chief Emily Prentiss, this is Doctor Spencer Reid, we're from the-”

“Behavioural Analysis Unit, of course. I was close, you know, earlier. A face like yours wouldn't last five minutes in cartel land. I almost guessed cyber, but you looked a bit too bookish. Doctor Reid, hmm.”

“This interview is taking place with Agent Prentiss. Please direct all your questions to her.”

“Oh shit, sorry, where are my manners. I didn't mean to disrespect you like that, Agent Prentiss. It's just been a long few months.”

The other woman just chuckled and shook her head, leafing through some documents to pass you over the information on the case they needed assistance on.

“We think there's a serial killer in the drug ring you infiltrated,” the woman explained, passing over the files with the case details. You took a moment's breath before opening to the crime scene photos, steeling yourself for what you might encounter.

“There are probably a lot of serials in the organization. It's a drug ring. What makes this one worse?” You said, just as you flipped the file open and answered your own question.

“Shit- Okay, that's what makes this one worse. He can't be more than 15, right?”

The answering grimace on the two agents' faces suggested you'd been generous in your estimate. “Okay, how can I help?”

xxxxx

A few hours passed in the interrogation room, and you'd walked them through all of your up to date information on your case and cover. The chair wasn't exactly comfortable, but you were glad to be finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. The interview was ending, and you could see an end to your undercover work swiftly following too with the BAU's assistance.

You weren't looking forward to having to acclimatize back into the real world. You'd gone from pushing papers at a desk 9 hours a day to rubbing shoulders with drug dealers and junkies, a lot of whom were kids, young people like you who had no other options than the streets and crime.

You made a mental note to give a few warnings to the younger kids on the streets to stay alert and then started getting back into character.

“Thanks again for your help, Agent. We appreciate your time.” Prentiss nodded at you as she gathered the folders, getting ready to leave.

Spencer Reid stood, too, stretching himself out as he rose from the chair, giving you quite the show as your eyes dragged from his face, down his chest and down further still as you appreciated the view.

The last few hours had been strictly professional, and you'd enjoyed bouncing ideas off of him, running through theories. Now, trying to get back into your ‘lusty barmaid’ persona, you thought instead about how much you'd like to bounce on him yourself, possibly while running your hands through his hair.

A girl could dream.

“Hold on a second, I'm still in cover, I can't go back out there looking this pristine, it's too suspicious,” you said, the two agents turning back to you curiously.

“What do you mean?”

“Someone needs to throw me around a little. Rough housing, you know, a few bruises will do it.”

Prentiss looked at you, caught halfway between impressed and amused. The good Doctor however seemed to darken slightly, covering his shock with a tensed jaw.

“She's all yours, Spencer,” Wmily winked at the man, turning the door handle and beginning her exit.

“What? Why?”

“I don't hit women.”

“And I do? Emily, wha-”

But the door to the interrogation room has already closed with a small cackle, and you're already being drawn closer to the man like a moth to a flame.

Turning to face you, you see the shock of the situation on his face before he looks away in a flash, refusing to meet your eyes as he keeps himself close to the door.

“Doctor Reid, I'm not actually a criminal, you know?”

“I thought you wanted one of us to treat you like a criminal now.”

“You make a good point, shall we begin?”

He signed and rubbed his temples as you advanced, letting you get a little bit closer before holding his hands up in surrender.

“Wait, wait, tell me first, what should we be doing?”

You took a deep breath and expelled it, then took the time to think about it.

You would need some visible marks of the FBI's unkindness - wrists red, a bruise or two on your knees, maybe, from falling. The problem was, you couldn't think about how to get the marks without driving yourself insane.

There was a quick and easy way to get tender knees, an even easier way to mark up your neck and chest, but you couldn't figure out how to ask Spencer Reid to do those things without spreading your legs and letting him do whatever he wanted. You weren't sure you wouldn't do that eventually, anyway.

“Let's start with my wrists. You were too generous with the handcuffs earlier - just grab them really tight, pin me against the wall if it helps.”

He nodded and took a hesitant step towards you, thinking for a second, before grabbing one wrist and spinning you around. Before you could even process the action, he had you pinned, chest against the wall, arms above your head.

“Is that okay?” He asked, his grip tight but not bruising yet.

“A little tighter, I want the marks to last a while. Why is my face against the wall?”

He gripped tighter, the pain sending a jolt through your wrists that trailed all the way down to pool between your thighs.

“I thought you'd be less uncomfortable like this.”

“With your dick pushed up against my ass? Yes, Doctor, great decision.”

He let out a cold, quick laugh, leaving you flushed as he pushed your upper body into the wall, too, finally getting to the grip strength he needed to get attention.

“I'm sorry to disappoint, Y/N, but that's my gun,” the words whispered in your ear were the last straw as you shuddered in his grasp, his hands releasing your wrists as he stepped back a little.

You shook out your hands a little, trying to momentarily relive the stiffness in your joints.

He took a few paces to the desk and upholstered his weapon, placing it on the desk before joining you again.

“So you don't get confused again,” he explained at seeing your raised eyebrow.

“Oh so next time, it will be your dick?” You whispered, moving back to the desk and sitting yourself on the edge or it, picking up the gun and studying it for a few minutes.

“Y/N, put it down.”

“Ooh, possessive, are we?” You giggled, aiming it at him for a second before grabbing it by the barrel and holding it back out for him to grab.

“Hold it, point it at me or whatever. Maybe it'll help you rough me up.”

His brow furrowed, but he grabbed it anyway, not immediately slipping it into the holster as he stepped forward.

“What now?” He asked, and you shrugged.

“Whatever feels natural. And looks visible, I guess.”

It took him a few minutes to decide, surveying your body like it was a puzzle. Professionally, of course. You were about to speak up and urge him to get on with it when his hand shot out and wrapped around your throat.

You tried to gasp, but the grip was firm, and boy, was it driving you crazy. Your legs had naturally parted as you sat yourself on the edge of the desk, and he walked into that space now, his free hand still holding the gun.

Your body pushed forward into his, suddenly awash with arousal as your chest heaved with tiny breaths, lungs burning.

“Are you enjoying this, Y/N? Or is it Caitlyn Grant that's enjoying this?”

You felt the gun touch your thigh gently, and you moaned, just as he softened his grip on your throat.

“Answer me, please. This is an interrogation room, after all.”

You met his eyes, checking to see how far he would take this, how far you could push back.

“I'll admit, I'm not against mixing pain and pleasure.”

His gaze flicked down, slowly pushing his gun up the skin of your thigh, raising your skirt with the barrel to catch a quick glimpse of your panties.

“I can tell.”

If it weren't for his grip on you, you'd have lunged for him right then and there. The cool metal against your thigh had you shuddering against him, growing wetter by the minute.

“I read somewhere once that we can't pretend to be someone else without actually becoming them in some small way. You've been a cartel whore for six months, I wonder if this is a lasting effect.”

He was so close now all he needed to do to close the gap was change the angle of his head, but he kept you in place with that gun, pointing up from your pussy, flush against your stomach.

“I'll tell you a secret - the part of me that's aroused right now definitely predates this cover.”

His lips drop to yours, tongue clashing with yours furiously as he grabs the back of your head to angle you better.

Letting his hand drop back to your thigh, he gently coaxed you further open, skirt riding up. Putting down the gym momentarily, he pressed a wandering finger against your pantie-clad pussy, feeling your arousal before he used it to coat his fingers.

A second later and the offending pair of underwear lay discarded on the floor.

“Fuck, Spencer,” you said, gasping for breath as he again picked up the gun.

“You wanted this so badly, didn't you? You've been needing someone to treat you like this for months now. It didn't even have to be me.”

He traced circles on your thigh with the gun, and you twitched, years of training not letting you relax around the weapon and months of sexual frustration, making you desperate for something to touch you.

“Yes, yes, please touch me.”

The hand at your throat slid down to your chest and pushed gently urging you to lie back and let him do whatever he wanted with you. The desk was cold - metal biting at your bare skin - and it only sent more shivers down your spine as he lowered himself to his knees and parted your legs for his tongue.

The first touch was heaven, a state of bliss you'd been without in what felt like forever. His tongue danced across your folds as he tasted every inch of your exposed cunt, grip still strong on the gun pointed now to your chest, pinning you between the machine and the table.

You tried to be as still as possible, to take the pleasure he gave calmly, but you couldn't. You writhed, moaned, chest heaving as you tried to hold off the first orgasm you'd achieved with someone else in probably a year.

Like a man on a mission, Spencer Reid did not care. He gladly suffocated between your thighs as you squeezed them together, wrapping them around his head so you could keep feeling the insurmountable pleasure of his tongue on your pussy.

“Spencer…Spencer, fuck-” you said as he finally pried your legs apart, lifting them just slightly so his tongue could reach further inside of you, curling with each wave of passion. Your hands fisted his hair, desperate for something to ground you to the moment as your pleasure spilt out of you, orgasm jolting through you in tiny sparks of pleasure.

The gun moved first, coming level with your chest as you untangled your fingers from his hair. Spencer stood, wiping his face with the back of his hand as he kept the gun on you.

“I think this turns you on even more. You've been ruined by this cover, Y/N, you're so used to being in danger that you can't even get off without someone threatening you.”

You attempted to scoff, to brush off his words somehow, but his hand was suddenly back around your throat, picking you up off the desk and pulling you instead towards the room's one-way window.

“Look at yourself,” he said, again twisting you around so you were pressed into the wall, wrists above your hair, raising your shirt to expose the cold skin underneath. He ran the barrel across the fresh skin, leaving a field of goosebumps along his path.

“I don't think it would've mattered who came in to rough you up. I think you'd just as happily have convinced Emily to fuck your little pussy raw, right Y/N? As long as there was a gun…”

Your moan was the only response as he used the weapon to spread your legs. You naturally arched your back and kept your hands in place as he holstered the weapon momentarily to unzip his pants and let his cock free.

You couldn't see it, but you saw his reflection in the mirror as he slowly stretched you out with it, mouth dropping in a lustful ‘o’ as he fed his dick to you, hard and thick.

As soon as it was in, the gun came back out, this time to rest against your temple.

“Get yourself off,” his voice was so low it was practically a growl. “Use my cock, and pleasure yourself.”

Your body listened immediately, beginning to move back and forth on his cock as he held himself in place. His moans and groans were all the encouragements you needed, the gun at your temple was just made the pleasure more profound as you approached your release.

But he kept you pinned to the glass, your full range of motion limited, and you whimpered in frustration that you couldn't feel every inch of him.

“If you need something, use your words, Agent.”

“More, need more, please..please,” you gasped, breathing ragged.

The hands at your wrists released, and he fisted a hand into the flesh at your hip, your wrists resting on the glass next to your face as he took over your thrusting.

“Can't even do this anymore, what a spoiled little whore,” he said as his hips began snapping into you, reaching that spot deep inside you as you drooled against the glass, wondering if anyone had just happened to step into that room and what they must think about you.

“Cum for me, Y/N. Cum on my cock,” he said it, and entranced, your body did just that, your orgasm taking the last breath of strength you had as he too plunged himself deeper and stilled there, his cum coating your walls.

Neither of you moved for an eternity, but the first sign of clarity returning was the careful return of the gun to the holster.

Pulling a handkerchief from his pocket, Spencer minimized the mess you made together, cleaning you up as he slipped out of you. Discarding it momentarily on the floor, he pulled your clothes back into position and led you back over to the chairs. Just as he moved to sit you down, though, you turned and wrapped your arms around his waist, pulling him into a hug.

His arms hung suspended for a minute or two before he let them rest on your back, stroking your hair.

“Sorry, it's been… it's been lonely, and I didn't realize how hard it had been until-”

“It's okay. Take your time,” he said, sitting down in the chair and letting you curl up in his lap, burying your head in his neck

“We’ll catch this guy, and then you're out, okay Y/N? We'll come back and get you out soon.”

Lifting your eyes to his, you nodded, pressing your lips to his with a smile as you again worked yourself back into character, regaining your earlier composure and lifting yourself from the man's too comfortable arms.

“Well, Spencer, what do you say we get me back into panties and handcuffs and cut Caitlyn Grant loose?”

#spencer reid #criminal minds #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid fanfic #mgg #spencer reid smut #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds fandom #spencer reid criminal minds #dr spencer reid #spencer reid x reader smut #spencer reid x you #spencer reid x y/n

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dcxdpdabbles · 7 months

Text

DC X DP: The Summoning Conditions of the Ghost King.

Danny Fenton is new to his title.

It's been about two years since he defeated Pariah Dark and inherited his seat through the right of conquest. Now Danny knew, on some level, that Pariah was King of Ghosts, but in all honestly, he had been preoccupied with getting his town back from the zone and keeping his friends and family (and the rest of the town, he guessed) alive.

The victory had been just within the lines of a fair fight, only because a dew ghost argued that his shifting his dad's ecto-skeleton suit was a form of armor only after his power ran over it.

If Danny had fought in the ecto-skeleton suit without doing so then it would not have been considered a fair fight as it wasn't his own strength, and thus, he would not won the right of conquest.

But he did. And now Danny was crowned Ghost King. Which came with all sorts of responsibilities and proper conduct for someone of his new stature.

Many ghosts were willing to teach him the way- Princess Dora, Clockwork, Frostbite, Ghostwriter, and even the Observants- but Danny struggled to adjust. He had no idea being King meant he had to play diplomat to the literal multiverse- as the Ghost Zone or Infinite Realms touched every possible world at every possible time- and follow specific rules of being a Ghost.

A vampire could not entire a home without being invited in.

A fae could not take control over a human without knowing their name.

And a ghost could not make a chance to the living plane without meeting requirements, like an agreement on a contract.

That was why the Ghosts never passed Amity Park's limits and why Pariah Dark had chosen to take the town into his domain instead of expanding his attack. The Fentons have unknowingly created an open contract with anything that could get past their portal by opening it up and claiming themselves the protectors against ghosts kind.

If a ghost could defeat everyone in the Fenton household- as the ground of where the zone was open and the beings calling that location a home- then they would become the portal's rulers and be able to leave the city. Thankfully, that contact applied to Danny, and he had never lost, no matter who challenged him.

His ghost sense activated the contract, alerting him of a new challenger. After finding his family contract, Danny had thrown a fit in the Ghost King's Keep. Thankfully, he could close it with the help of Clockwork, who agreed to be his final challenger, and once he won, the portal was forever closed.

Danny then discovered he had to create his own Ghost Conditions as Phantom, The Protective Spirt of Amity Park, and Phantom, the Ghost King. He argued with the Infinite Releams council, something he installed to help him rule and to lowkey have them continue to govern themselves with his own laws, keeping them from killing each other- until his core began to deteriorate the more he neglected his Ghost Conditions.

Clockwork has to intervene, telling him in little words to write up his Ghost Conditions and have them ready in a month or experience his soul being ripped apart by nature.

Danny agreed to write up the Conditions as soon as he could....and then did what any sixteen-year-old teenager would do with a work assignment. He procrastinated until the night before it was due.

Panicked, he sat down in front of his laptop to write, telling his parents he had a big essay due and could not answer any calls until late.

At three am of the following day, Clockworked appeared for his Ghost Conditions which outlined his limitations and certain requirements for Danny to operate.

He worked hard on Phantom, The Protective Spirt of Amity Park, to allow him to live everyday human life and shift into a ghost to protect his town whenever he needs to. He ensured that he could not be used to cause human death by a weapon in a mortal war, and his condition for working on behalf of a human was to have a recommendation letter from both FrostBite and Clockwork out of both ghost-freewill.

He figured it would make it practically impossible to make him a weapon or make him do anything against his will. He didn't want to end up like Ember or Desiree, who relied on mortals to get power, but he also did not want to be so obsessive about protecting something he forwent everything like Sculker or Walker.

He spent so much time on it that he forgot to leave time to work on the Phantom, and Ghost King lists until his eyes were dropping closed and Clockwork was messaging him that he was on his way to both lists.

Danny panicked and wrote something down- hoping he would redo the assignment later on- just to have something to turn in. The lack of sleep and stress caused him to not think clearly.

When he woke seven hours later, he realized this wasn't just some English assignment he could ask his teacher to let him redo. This was set in stone conditions and said conditions had already been passed around the multiverse. Some of his work even appears in his timeline, in some ancient civilization, thanks to Clockwork flinging copies of his Ghost Conditions into time portals.

Thank the Ancient Cores that Danny had copied and pasted the parts of about not making him a weapon for mortal wars or mindlessly killer. He hoped that it wouldn't come to bite him in the ass.

It bit him in the ass a week later when an alien threat so big the Heros of the Justice League were so desperate for a counter-attack they allowed Batman to attempt to summon the Ghost King even at the Justice League Dark's warning.

Batman had known about the Ghost King's Summoning Conditions from his time with Ra's Al Ghul. It was, after all, Ra's civilization that had been the one to find Danny's list from Clockworks time portals.

Danny knew this because one of the conditions was letting him know of the human's intention before they could summon him. He honestly heard whatever Batman was thinking and whatever the man could hear.

"Bats, this is baty even for you!" A disembodied voice hissed. Danny was startled so hard on his bed, having been scrolling on his phone when the British man spoke.

"If we can convince the King that the lives of Earth are at risk, he will aid us in the battle. He can not kill humans, but the aliens are not human." Batman answered, and Danny felt his core drop. Oh no. a loophole.

"Or he could kill everything around in a fit of rage!" The other man yelled. "No one understands the Ghost King! His Conditions were so open-ended anything could happen!"

Hey, Danny thought they were pretty solid, actually.

"Doesn't matter. We are out of options." Batman replied, and between one moment and the next, Danny was floating above a summoning circle, still wearing his snowflake pajamas- complete with a large holding- his phone in the same lying on his stomach position.

Thankfully, he was in his ghost form.

"What-"

"Phantom, Ghost King, I call upon you for aid. The lives of all human life are at risk of destruction." Batman said, his thoughts silent like the grave, and Danny had no idea what he was thinking.

Danm. Danny's wording of "Knowing a human's intention before summoning the King" meant that he could not hear the human's intention once the summon happened. Maybe his language was too open-ended.

"Ugh." He slowly sat up in a cross-leg position, eyeing the gathered heroes. It looked like all of the Justice League was present- all looking worse for wear. Whatever aliens were, the League wasn't kidding when they sent out an emergency shelter notice. "Um, that is...Well, you see, the funny thing is you have to pass some trials before I can help you. Batman Sir."

The Dark Knight showed no outward emotion as he nodded even as a few heroes seemed confused by Danny's nervousness. "I will undergo them."

Please disagree. Danny wanted to scream, flushing a bright green. He wrote those trails in two minutes. They are embarrassing!

Instead, he heard himself say as if speaking from his frozen ice core. "You must pass all my trails. The first shall begin right now and you must have opponents of those you cherish the most. They must be someone you love so much that the thought of them hurting will destroy you. They must take part now or drop dead if they refuse."

A glowing green snowflake appears under the feet of five individuals in the crowd. Nightwing, Red Hood, Red Robin, Orphan and Spoiler.are dragged to the front of the crowd, to stand next to Batman in the Ghost Kind's trails.

Batman froze and a man in a trench coat swore. "I warned you!"

"Wait!" Flash yelled, but it was too late. The Ghost King Trails had already begun. Danny wanted to scream, but he felt his body move one arm up, creating a sizeable frozen slate of ice to hover over the heroes.

A familiar song filled the air as smaller slates appeared before each hero. Words slowly carved across the large and small ice, much to the confusion of everyone present.

"Is...Is this Kahoot?" Red Robin dared to ask, watching the words finish being made, and the Kahoot music continued to count down.

Danny wants to hide his face in his hands, but he instead shouts, "The first to twenty is the victor and shall be the one I shall give my aid to! Now time is running out, humans, pick your answer for... Question one...According to the Ghost King, which Gotham hero has the best ass?"

Ding.

Everyone turned to Orphan when she quickly pressed B. on her ice tablet. Since she was the only one who moved in time before the timer ran out, her answer was displayed before all eyes.

She chose correctly. B. for Red Robin.

Orphan shrugs at Red Robin's gape. "His Highness' eyes did a slow up and down when they spotted you. It wasn't hard to guess."

Danny thought making a Kahoot was fast, and no one would be able to guess the answers to questions about himself. He thought it was foolproof.

He was wrong.

"Question two: Which is the prettiest star in the Milky Way!" Danny shouts in a pompous tone that contradicts his embarrassed frown and glowing green blush.

The heroes of Gotham stare at him before they all press A for Sirius.

"How!?" He asks when all of them get the answer right. Right now, Orphan is winning, so she is the closest to his contact dealer.

"You're wearing the star on your nightcap," Red Hood deadpans.

"Q-Question three.....What is the Ghost King's favorite Holiday?"

Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding.

Nightwing, Red Robin, Red Hood, Spoiler, and Orphan picked D. for Halloween but only Batman chooses correctly with B. for Valentine's Day.

He does not explain how he knows that, and Danny is starting to worry the greatest detective in the world is going to figure all his answers out, and he will end up serving them.

Sweating, he moves on to the next question as John Consistent watches on, wondering if he indeed was an Occult expert as he thought or not because none of what was happening was what he thought would happen.

They may stand a chance yet.

Master Post Link

#dcxdpdabbles #dc x dp crossover #The Summoning Conditions of the Ghost King #ghost king danny #crack taken seriously #Danny's trails are what you expect from a procrastinator #The bats are literally the best detectives ever #They are breezing through trail one #John Constantine would kick his Occult degree in the trash if he had one after this #Dead tired

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grandline-fics · 28 days

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hi could i request something for zoro law shanks and mihawk to them harming their s/o from an enemies devil fruit power like they got possessed/controlled and when the sitstuoon was handled they gain consciousness and realize what they’d done? thank you have a lovely day !!! i love your writing 🫶

DESCRIPTION: They hurt you while controlled by a devil fruit

WARNINGS: angst, descriptions of injury, hurt to comfort

CHARACTERS: Zoro, Law, Shanks, Mihawk

WORDS: 2,782

A/N: haven't done some angst in a while so heres some. hopefully you liked what I came up with for this request.

*REQUESTS ARE OPEN*

MASTERLIST

———————

ZORO

The last thing Zoro remembered was his opponent managing to get within touching distance, a stupid move he’d thought but then they dropped their weapon to slam their hand against his chest. It felt like he was drifting asleep, his limbs were becoming heavier and his vision with blurring and darkening. Before all his consciousness slipped away the words of his opponent echoed in his head. “Find your Captain and kill him.” He should have laughed at that ridiculous order, should have told them they’d regret the words from even passing their lips. But he didn’t. He couldn’t. There was only darkness and the absent feeling of his fingers tightening around the hilts of his swords, ready to take up the hunt.

He didn’t know how long had passed, but slowly the haziness began to lift and Zoro began to process his surroundings. If he felt like he was waking, why didn’t he feel rested? Why did he feel sore and tired. His fingers flexed and he frowned to only feel one sword in his hand. Zoro blinked and looked around in confusion. He no longer stood in the room he had been in and his opponent was nowhere to be seen. Instead he was now standing at the top of a staircase, his gaze drifted to the bottom of the steps and his heart stopped in terror to see your limp form lying there with his sword pierced through your stomach.

It was all a blur after that, racing down the steps and yelling as loud as he could for Chopper. Zoro remembered crouching near your form with hands shaking for the first time in a long while. What was he to do? What had he done? Was this how he’d lose you? He felt sick. This couldn’t be happening.

The next thing he knew he was on the ship, a day later and sitting at your bedside wishing for you to open your eyes. He glared at his hands as he replayed everything. Being told that he was like a man possessed, set on finding Luffy to kill him. How you intercepted him and drew his attention long enough to fight while the others tried to find a way to snap him out of whatever power was controlling him. They’d been just a little too late it seemed. It sickened Zoro to see the bandages around your form, knowing the damage that lay beneath them. If it hadn’t been for your own skills he would have certainly killed you.

“Stop…” Zoro’s head snapped up to see you weakly turning your head to stare at him. The pain was evident in your eyes but he was shocked to see you weren’t looking at him with the hate he deserved. Sluggishly you placed your hand on his. “Stop beating yourself up for this…it’s not your fault.”

“The hell it isn’t.” Zoro growled getting to his feet but he couldn’t bring himself to step away from the bed or remove himself from your touch. “Those wounds are my doing. I nearly lost you.”

“But you didn’t. I stopped Sanji from being the one to fight you. It was my decision and I held my own against you. You only won because I didn’t know the stairs were behind me.”

Zoro knew what you were doing. If he voiced any pity for you and your injuries or blamed himself it would be an insult to you as a fighter. With a long sigh he sat down again and curled his fingers to tightly squeeze your hand. Leaning down he pressed a long kiss against your hand, his good eye slipping closed when your free hand settled on his head. Zoro found it comforting and shocking that even with what you’d endured because of him, there was no hesitancy in your actions. Even with the pain you were in, keeping him calm and reassured came to you so naturally. “I swear I will spend the rest of my life proving that I’m a man worthy of your love.” He vowed vehemently against your skin.

LAW

As a doctor Law was very good at severing emotion from his work especially when it came to performing surgery that one moment of hesitation could mean certain death. This however was something he didn’t think he’d ever have to do. His hands shook as he tried to force his mind to focus and separate his feelings but it was impossible. It was you, heavily injured and slipping closer and closer to the brink where not even he could save you. He knew what needed to be done but he couldn’t shake the feeling that his hands were tainted, that he shouldn’t have the right to touch you ever again. After all it was his fault you were in this state.

He’d gotten cocky when he was fighting a rival group of pirates and in that moment one had gotten the better of him and used that weakness to retreat, leaving Law to turn on his crew. He saw those closest to him as frightening enemies and he attacked with the intent to kill which was evident by the injuries he’d given you. Had you been anyone else, if you hadn’t been as strong as you were the attacks would have killed you. Law couldn’t help but shudder at the thought. For now he had to keep every ounce of his mind on you because he would not lose you, he couldn’t.

When you woke, the pain and heaviness on your body was unlike anything you’d felt before. More importantly you felt fear. You were alive and as you looked around the room you saw that you were alone. You knew how serious your injuries were and if you were still breathing and Law wasn’t with you, had he don’t the unthinkable? Had he used his ultimate ability of his Devil Fruit to grant you life while extinguishing his? Just as you were about to get out of bed and find someone the door opened and relief flooded you to see Law enter.

Now knowing you didn’t need to worry you sank back against the pillows and let out a small breath only to groan when the action caused pain to flare in your body. Immediately Law was at your bedside and at first you were going to smile but it faltered when you saw the coldness in his eyes as he checked you over. Doing only what was needed of his as your doctor and nothing more. Your eyes zeroed in on the surgical gloves he was wearing. When you opened your mouth to speak, he got in there first, cutting off your attempt. “Save your energy, you’ve only just woken up. Now that your condition is stable, I’ll let one of the others take over for your general care.”

“I refuse their care.” You answered immediately, you might have almost died but that wasn’t going to kill your stubbornness. When Law looked up to glare at you, you smirked in satisfaction to see his ‘heartless and distant’ facade had slipped momentarily. “I only want you or no-one at all.”

“No you don’t.” This time Law’s voice was hollow, the shame of what had happened finally coming to the surface.

“Don’t tell me what I want.” Your tone softened but the force of it was still there. You needed to reassure him that you didn’t hold him accountable for when he was under another’s control. Reaching forward you took his hands into yours and pulled off the gloves, smiling to finally see his tattooed hands exposed. “There that’s better.”

“What I did-” Law began to protest but stopped when you lifted his hands to lightly press a kiss against his knuckles. How could you show such adoration to his tainted hands?

“You saved my life.” Your answer was simple but clear that you would speak no more about it. “Come and lie beside me, you know I can’t sleep without you.” Law gave a small, shaky smile and settled down beside you with the utmost care so that his actions caused you no discomfort whatsoever.

SHANKS

“You really don’t remember me?” The barmaid pouted playfully at Shanks as she set his drink in front of him. He kept his expression its usual one of friendliness and gave a small shrug to the woman and shook his head. He was an explorer and adventurer, he’d visited countless islands and met many many people. To remember every single person was practically impossible, even for him. “Aw you’re going to make me cry.” The woman was joking of course and for Shanks it was a relief that his lack of memory didn’t cause her any genuine upset. Quickly his gaze flickered across the crowded bar to meet your stare.

You only grinned in amusement at the attention he was getting. He was a handsome man and it was a daily occurrence that people would throw themselves at him but the outcome was always the same, he’d let them down gently and it was you he’d share his bed with. Still though outside of the long term members, not everyone in the crew knew about the two of you and you were both content with that. “Can I refresh your memory?” Shanks blinked and watched the barmaid slide into the open seat beside him. “I think once I tell you, your life will change completely.”

Shanks had to admit, that was an interesting opening line and he wasn’t really one to back down from a statement such as this one. So he smiled and gestured for the woman to continue. The barmaid’s eyes lit in excitement and she leant forward, her hand settling against his wrist and the second her hand made contact, Shank’s body became rigid as he peered into the woman’s eyes. “Three years ago you killed the love of my life. Now I’m going to teach you the pain of such a loss. Kill your lover or if you don’t have one then the member of your crew you care for the most will do.” Simultaneously the woman stood and left the table the same time that Shanks’ gaze locked onto your form again.

When Shanks finally came to his senses, the crew were back on the open seas all of them knowing that their Captain had been under the influence of a Devil Fruit. As the last thing he remembered came to his mind, panic set in and he hurried to find you, fearing that whoever that barmaid truly was had succeeded in making him do the one thing that he’d sworn he’d never do; cause you any sort of harm. Finally he came to a stop in the doorway of the medical room. His heart sank to see you lying in the bed, bandages visible and he dreaded to think what lay beneath them and your clothes. Worst of all was the thick band of bruises around your throat. While he felt sickened at what he saw, he could only find some small sense of comfort that he hadn’t taken his sword with him to the tavern that night otherwise he might have truly killed you. “I’ll leave you two alone.” Hongo told him softly before leaving and closing the door behind him. Alone, Shanks approached your bedside.

“Oh, love what did I do to you?” Shanks sighed tiredly and heavily, flinching when your eyes opened and you looked at him calmly.

“Not…you.” You managed out, your usual cheerful and soothing voice came out as a painful rasp. Shanks sighed, of course you wouldn’t blame him. It was the woman and her unnerving ability that did this.

“I was careless though.” Shanks told you, becoming deadly serious which was a rarity. “That’s not going to happen ever again. We’re going to track that woman down and show her and the world what happens when they dare to target the one I love.”

MIHAWK

You knew Mihawk was a force to be reckoned with, the very first time you’d met your now lover had been an intense fight so you had firsthand experience at how formidable an opponent he could be. However after all those years you’d never expected to be pursued by him so seriously again and it didn’t seem like seducing him or appealing to his better judgement would work in this occasion. You’d both suspected that a few new recruits to Cross Guild were actually spies and had been proven right when you’d confronted them. Together you and Mihawk had taken down most of them but one managed to escape by using their Devil Fruit on Mihawk who was closest. Simply telling him “I’m not your enemy, they are.” While pointing straight at you was enough to make the swordsman set his sights on you.

While you were strong you knew you had no way of taking him on in this intensely determined state. After all you’d seen this man slice a ship in half from a measurable distance away, you weren’t going to risk getting too close. Your only tactic was to keep your distance, block and defend if possible and hope there was a time limit to this annoyance of an ability.

As you ran down the street you looked back to see Mihawk was still hot on your heels but it was a relief to see he wasn’t targeting anyone else. The last thing you wanted was for your lover to snap out of this state and realise he’d killed anyone who was an innocent bystander to it all. At least if you got hurt you had enough strength of will to endure it. You felt something change in the air and you turned sharply to see Mihawk reeling back to launch an attack and you recognised that stance all too well. You swore at the position you’d found yourself to be in. To lessen the force you had no choice but to throw an attack of your own and brace yourself.

Mihawk had never felt shame as a swordsman, not until he was finally in control of his body again to see the destruction of the surroundings caused by his attack clashing with yours. When he saw you lying bloodied amongst the debris of what was once a building he felt like never lifting his blade again. Hurrying to your side he felt only some consolation to see your chest slowly rising and hear your faint heartbeat. Taking you carefully into his arms he set for Cross Guild’s base and was for once glad of the amount of money Crocodile put into hiring the best doctors for the group. However the second he had you handed over to the medical team, he retreated to his room. It was because of him you’d been brought close to death, to sit by your bedside seemed like he was making it about him when you were to be the priority. Besides he wasn’t a healer, he would have just gotten in the way.

When you’d finally woke and asked for him, the task of refusing to visit fell to Buggy as messenger. You rolled your eyes, you’d expected no less from your lover. He might have seemed like a mystery to many, but to you he was an open book. So you decided to sluggishly pulled yourself out of your bed and set about continuing your work. By the time you made it to your room and looking through bounties Mihawk appeared, angered that you were up and out of bed.

“Are you trying to reopen your wounds?” he snapped.

“Don’t worry yourself about it.” You replied, forcing your voice to sound light and unbothered but the strain of moving so soon was taking its toll. “A building fell on me, no big deal.” You shrugged and regretted it, letting out a gasp of pain.

“It very much is a big deal.” Mihawk spoke through gritted teeth as he took a few steps closer, while you continued to look through the papers in front of you. “Please go back to bed.”

“Only if you stop blaming yourself and stay with me when I ask to see you.” Finally you looked up to Mihawk and smirked to see he was finally in touching distance. You knew your actions were drastic but you had to be sometimes to snap him out of his worries. Mihawk let out a long sigh and gently took you into his arms, relishing the simple feeling. He would never risk losing you again, even if he had to destroy all of the Marines to make sure you stayed safe.

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warrioreowynofrohan · 28 days

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Reading Tolkien’s annotated translation of Beowulf, and learning all kinds of things about LOTR and the Silm from it!

First:

Leave here your warlike shields [from Beowulf]

[Tolkien’s commentary; bold mine:] Note the prohibition of weapons or accoutrements of battle in the hall. To walk in with spear and shield was like walking in nowadays with your hat on. The basis of these rules was of course fear and prudence among the ever-present dangers of a heroic age, but they were made part of the ritual, of good manners. Compare the prohibition against drawing a sword in the officers’ mess. Swords of course also were dangerous; but they were evidently regarded as part of a knight’s attire, and he would not in any case be willing to lay aside his sword, a thing of great cost and often an heirloom.

This gives me some perspective around Tolkien’s probable intended tone for the moment in Meduseld in The Two Towers where Aragon strongly protests against being told to leave Andúril (a sword of very great value and ancientry, and very much an heirloom) with the door-warden. From a contemporary perspective it’s easy to read it as Aragorn being unnecessarily prideful and combative, but this passage strongly indicates that Tolkien intends it to be Théoden who is being unreasonable in that event, an indication - along with many others in the scene, prior to Gandalf dislodging Saruman’s influence - that Théoden is being discourteous and behaving in a manner unworthy of a king who is recieving heroes offering aid. (The fact of Meduseld being a ‘golden hall’ like famous Heorot in Beowulf may be deliberate to strengthen the parallel.)

Second (immediately following the above commentary):

But against this danger [from swords] very severe laws existed protecting the ‘peace’ of a king’s hall. It was death in Scandanavia to cause a brawl in the king’s hall. Among the laws of the West Saxon king Ine is found: ‘If any man fight in the king’s house, he shall forfeit all his estate, and it shall be for the king to judge whether he be put to death or not.’

This adds context to the incident in the story of Túrin in The Silmarillion where Saeros taunts Túrin in Menegroth and Túrin responds by throwing a heavy drinking-vessel at him and injuring him (it’s indicated the injury is serious, so I’d take it along the lines of him giving him a broken nose and knocking out some teeth.) It is stated in at least some versions of the story that death is the punishment for drawing weapons in the king’s hall, in line with the historical customs mentioned here. This gives a further emphasis that what actually happens - Túrin is not punished at all and Mablung strongly reprimands Saeros for provoking him - illustrates that Túrin is, Saeros’ behaviour notwithstanding, in very high favour in Menegroth. (Saeros as the king’s counsellor is also in roughly the same position as Unferth in Beowulf, who taunts the titular character - Beowulf responds heatedly but without violence. Tolkien may be setting up a deliberate contrast here.)

Third:

The word hádor is an adjective meaning ‘clear, bright’…it is almost always found in reference to the sky (or the sun or stars). But that association is in description of brightness…

This was one a lightbulb moment: oh, in the name of Hador Goldenhead (the ancestor of Húrin, Túrin, and Tuor in The Silmarillion), ‘Goldenhead’ isn’t an additional name/epessë so much as it’s a glossed translation of ‘Hador’! The guy with bright, golden hair.

Fourth: Going back to the Rohirrim - Edoras, the name of their capital city/royal court, is basically just the Old English for ‘courts’:

under was very frequently used in describing position within, or movement to within, a confined space, especially of enclosures or prisons, ‘within four walls’. Cf. in under eoderas (eoderas being the outer fences of the courts), ‘in amid the courts’….‘eoder’ means both ‘fence (protection)’ and ‘fenced enclosure, a court’.

I’m also learning a lot about Beowulf - Tolkien’s notes are clarifying a lot of tone and nuances, not to mention the political/diplomatic relationships between the different kingdoms, which were confusing me - but it’s amazing how much it reveals about ways that Tolkien’s knowledge informed his legendarium!

#tolkien #the silmarillion #the lord of the rings #rohan #aragorn #theoden #turin #hador #edain #beowulf #translation

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nina-ya · 5 months

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Ways That Zoro Wordlessly Says "I Love You"

Luffy Zoro Sanji Law Kid Shanks Pairing: Zoro x reader CW: Drinking. Overall just fluff WC: 862

Wandering through the lively markets of the island, Zoro stood by your side, his hand always finding a firm grip on any part of you within reach—whether it be your hand, your waist, or your arm. It was his way to ensure that you would not slip away into the crowd.

As you paused to admire a colorful display of exotic fruits, Zoro instinctively drew a little closer, his gaze scanning the surroundings. A persistent merchant approached, eager to haggle you. Meeting the merchant's eyes, Zoro narrowed his gaze and firmly placed a hand on the hilt of his sword. The unspoken threat was enough to make the merchant back off.

You continue to peruse the market with Zoro by your side.. His protective instincts kicked in as he guided you away from anyone who seemed sketchy, positioned himself between you and the crowd, and kept a watchful eye on potential threats. These acts of protection serve as a reminder that he wants you to be safe no matter what. You know Zoro loves you when he goes out of his way to protect you.

A rare moment of calmness settles over the Sunny as it sails through the sea. The sun bathes the deck in hues of soft pinks and warm oranges as it sets. Zoro's muscular frame leans against the ship, arms crossed, and head lowered as he sleeps.

You approach the peacefully sleeping swordsman, noting the subtle signs of restlessness in his stirring form. Gently, you sit beside him, and he fully awakes, a reflection of the perpetual alertness that has been engrained into his nature. Softly, you encourage him to go back to sleep, grabbing his arm and pulling him down to let him sleep in a more comfortable, lying down position. Zoro complies, opting to settle on your lap, your thighs serving as a comfortable pillow. As you stroke his hair, the familiar rhythm of deep breathing returns, and he once again falls asleep.

Hours pass, and the scene remains unchanged. Zoro continues to sleep soundly in your embrace, undisturbed by anything that would normally wake him. Napping like this is a small and intimate moment that you two have grown to share over the time of getting to know each other. You know Zoro loves you when he feels safe enough to sleep in your embrace.

The unmistakable sound of a sword being unsheathed rings through the air as Zoro's voice calls out, "Come here." You approach him, and he places the hilt of a sword in your hand, unsheathing another one for himself.

Your desire to learn the art of swordsmanship has led to training sessions with the marimo. As you grip the sword, the weight and balance feel different from any other weapon you've held. Zoro insists that his swords are the only suitable ones for you to practice with. His explanation that the swords in the armory are "not good to practice with" seems somewhat dubious, especially since he doesn't extend the same courtesy to others. You, it seems, are the sole exception to this rule- being able to handle his swords when others can’t.

Under Zoro's watchful eye, the training session begins. His instructions are informative, and his demonstrations are precise. The clash of steel against steel fills the air as you follow his lead. He would oftentimes opt to focus on your form, gently grabbing you from behind and positioning you in different ways. He encourages you through proud smiles, motivating words, and small rewards such as a kiss every time you overcome a new feat. Training with Zoro is something unlike anything else. You know Zoro loves you when he lets you handle his swords.

The crew gathers for a celebratory banquet after a victorious battle. Laughter and music fill the air, but Zoro notices a subtle change in your demeanor. Sensing that something is wrong, he decides to take action.

Spotting you sitting alone, Zoro grabs a bottle of his favorite sake and makes his way over. Wordlessly, he holds the bottle to you, a silent offer of comfort. Your eyes meet his, and without a word, you accept the gesture, taking a generous swig from the bottle.

Zoro takes a seat beside you and the two of you pass the bottle back and forth. As the sake flows, so does the conversation. Zoro pays close attention to you, encouraging you to share your thoughts and making attempts to cheer you up along the way.

The more you drink, the more you seem to relax. As the night progresses, the sake starts to work its magic, fostering a playfulness between the two of you. His hand finds yours, fingers intertwining in an affectionate gesture.

The crew continues to celebrate around you, but in that moment, it feels as if the only thing that matters is the two of you. Zoros gaze never leaves you, the sound of your shared laughter rings through the air, and subtle yet affectionate touches are exchanged between you two. The world fades away when you and Zoro drink together, giving way to intimate moments between you and the swordsman. You know Zoro loves you when he only thinks of you when drinking.

#one piece #one piece x reader #one piece fluff #roronoa zoro #roronoa zoro x reader #zoro x reader #zoro

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gojoidyll · 2 months

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There is No Law that Emperors Must be Fair

Emperor ! Jing Yuan x Princess ! Reader

Chapter 1 | All Must Begin and End

Summary | You are set to marry the Emperor, Jing Yuan. In order to break the engagement, you stage an accident and fake having amnesia. But now, you own cruel, cold, and distant fiancé, who seemed to not want anything to do with you, is now acting all lovey dovey!

Warnings | age gap (y/n is around 20 - 22 yrs old), y/n stages an accident, y/n gets hurt, jing yuan is mean in the beginning, y/n is referred to as princess and with she/her pronouns, implied that jing yuan messes around with maids, grammatical errors, etc.

Fic Masterlist

“The only thing granted to all is an unfair reality, and I promise, by surrendering to me, you can guarantee a long prosperous life.”

The emperor held his weapon to your father’s throat with a steady hand. Your father, in his weakened state, could only kneel to the ground. All the while, you, dressed in your frilly dress, could only peek around the corner of the door and into the thrown room as the scene unfolded. You see, your kingdom was originally at war with the Emperor and his grand nation. However, five years later and your nation was nothing but dirt and corpses as the Emperor let lightning rain down and scorch the ground.

There was nothing your nation could do to annex yourselves out of the Emperor’s tyranny, and any little freedom you did have was now squashed underfoot.

“A long and prosperous life,” your father muttered out, “let’s face it dear Emperor, the only thing left for me and my people is death now that you have laid out your judgement.”

Jing Yuan let his blade fall from your father’s neck, “then how about we come to an agreement?”

Your father finally looked up and Jing Yuan continued, “your nation’s land, trade, commerce, and wealth all belong to the Xianzhou, and all you and your people have to do is live peacefully and quietly under my rule.”

Your father scoffed, “that is basically the same deal as before this war was started!”

Jing Yuan glanced over to where you were hiding behind the corner, the moment your eyes met, you made a small, surprised yelp before hiding fully behind the wall. Jing Yuan looked back down to your father, “then how about a marriage proposal. You have a daughter, don’t you? With a marriage between the Xianzhou and your nation, you can guarantee that you and your people won’t fall to despair and resort to another war. And I can promise you, if you decide to rise up and rally your forces against me again, then this nation truly will be no more.”

“You- you really expect me to give away my only daughter?”

“The choice is yours.”

Your father bowed his head, his lips quivering, “Alright, but what type of life will my daughter be living?”

“As of today, your land, your wealth, and even your daughter is no longer yours to concern yourself with. The moment you agreed was the moment you let everything go.”

Everything after that was a blur. A complete and utter haze that has left you wondering how it all came to be this way. When the war started five years ago you truly thought everything was going to work out as your father has promised, but now? Five months after the war and you find yourself preparing for a wedding with a man who doesn’t even want to speak to you or acknowledge your existence.

“Princess?”

You glanced away from your window, the room you were staying is was vast. Your bed was filled with fuzzy, warm blankets with pillows as fluffy as can be. The carpet was soft and expensive looking. The dresses in your closet smooth as silk and. Your dresser filled with various jewelry that you didn’t even know existed. It was a luxurious room.

“Yes?”

The one who had entered your room was your own personal guard. His “name” was Blade. You knew that that wasn’t his real name, and when you asked about it, well, he didn’t seem too keen on sharing anything with you. So, you were forced with calling him that tacky name.

“Do you plan on staying here all day again?”

“I do.”

“Fine, then I will be off training. If you want to go somewhere, call on me to escort you.”

“I will.”

He left without another word.

And you did feel a little sad when he left, but only because he was one of the few people in this country that ever talked to you. Everyone else always kept their lips shut anytime you would pass them by in the halls.

It was a luxurious life, but you couldn’t help but to miss everyone back home.

“Maybe it’s time I try to break out of this engagement…”

In the past five months, you learned that Jing Yuan was as cold, distant, and cruel as the rumors made him out to be. He didn’t care for you at all. Not to mention that anytime you did run into him or speak to him he always had a beautiful and busty maid by his side who was all handsy with him. Your mother, of course, warned you of this. She warned you how men would prefer the excitement of being with someone they couldn’t have. So, it was no surprise to you when you would catch a maid being too close and familiar with him.

Not that it mattered.

Because you had a plan.

It was dangerous, and it would hurt, but it would be worth it.

Calming your nerves, you stood up from your windowsill, the gardens below becoming too boring to look at any longer.

Your plan consisted of accidentally running into one of the maids and falling down the long flight of stairs and that led into the main hall. There was no doubt in your mind that you will get hurt. But you were counting on it. In fact, what you really wanted was to either get amnesia or fake getting amnesia. Which is exactly why you were thankful Blade was already gone. Because before, the silent man would always be by your side, if you so much as trip he would already have an arm around your waist in order to steady you. It was annoying. So when it became apparent that you would stay in your room all day for the past two months, Blade gradually started to leave you alone which was exactly what you had wanted.

“Now, if I remember correctly, today is laundry day and the maids will be rushing around with big baskets around this time. If I time it perfectly, then…”

You smiled, it took a lot of time to get the schedules down, but you were sure this was going to work. Getting injured, faking amnesia, it was the only way you could think of breaking the engagement off. Well, it was that or running away. However, Jing Yuan made it clear that you would be executed if you ran away…

Steadying your heart, you opened your door. Blade was nowhere in sight and the maids could be heard down the hall.

“Perfect!”

You put your plan into effect.

The moment you hiked up your dress and started running down the hall, you were glad to see the maids already rushing about. But you couldn’t run into one of them right now. No, your goal was the stairs. Running a bit further, you could already see the railing making you smile.

This is really going to hurt, but I would rather be hurt than being married to that man!

“Excuse me Princess!”

“Watch out!”

“Ahh! Princess!”

And soon everything went dark. Your vision, your mind, you could feel the first fall and the way your head slammed into the first set of stairs, but other than that – you were swiftly knocked out. Though, before you fully lost consciousness, you could only hope that you wouldn’t have to fake amnesia when you woke up. Because you knew Jing Yuan was sharp. And acting wasn't your specialty at all.

There is No Law that Emperors Must be Fair taglist | @danae-misfortune @frogsasfrogs @openthenyoor01 @zuhaine @ughlostmyotherac @joyfulnightprincess @howtiring @thechibifoxcub @n1ghtmare-2 @fabi23zuni @ceaether @satanisasofties @thetwinkims @yanrandom @honeybunbunn @superdonkeypatroleggs @ohmyfinggod @baboon-milk333 @zareri @kclremin @rains-mae @vash-yuu @yccoffeesimp @bloomiesty @gilbertisbestboi @moon-taffy @sylockk-m0ndsch3in @leaf1224 @butt44rr @superdark-soul @pinkismyfavcolor @kuraichycoochie @isa-l0v3r @rymrum @its-astrotea-love @unstable-kuro @toki-mekii @angelofdarkness2 @reapersan @junephantom21 @erisfayred @hanabanananana

#hsr #honkai star rail #hsr jing yuan #jing yuan #jing yuan hsr #jing yuan x y/n #jing yuan x you #jing yuan x reader #honkai star rail jing yuan #hsr jing yuan x reader #hsr jing yuan x you

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sprout-fics · 5 months

Text

First Day of the Rest of Your Life

(TF141 & Reader Old Guard AU)

Call of Duty Masterlist

Rating: 16+ Wordcount: 4k Tags: Old Guard AU, Immortals AU, Newly Immortal Reader, Angst, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Open Ending, Rescue Missions, Shadow Company, Major Character Death (non permanent) Warnings: Forced Drugging, Character Death (and revival) A/N: A silly little idea that I won't be continuing, but others are free to build off of

They’re not known by anyone but themselves.

Things like them shouldn’t exist. It goes against all laws of nature, to rise from dirt and to return. Yet somehow, the men you come to meet defy death itself, unable to be killed, to die a death that lasts long and forever.

And…

You come to realize you’re just like them.

But first, you have to die.

A “Shadow”, you’re called. One of many, under the authority of Commander Phillip Graves and his company. It’s a reluctant job, one that you took with little other option to settle old debts and to escape from a life that haunts you even now. Even so, you share a camaraderie with the men and women around you, bonds forged under mortar fire and bullet wounds.

Graves himself takes you under his wing, reluctant as you are, makes a point to check on you after missions, to tease you when he can, needling you and trying to make you roll your eyes at him. He likes getting under your skin, cracking jokes so your mouth twitches up as you suppress a smile. It’s hard not to like him with his charisma, but you can’t even shake the little bit of guardedness that remains ever present when you’re around him. You’re not friends, but you certainly aren’t enemies either. Comrades, perhaps.

That changes when you die.

You’re supporting SAS forces in their hunt for a known AQ leader, in a remote village, when your squad is ambushed. The desert sun bores down harshly on you all, and you find yourself squinting upwards when the first shot echoes out.

Graves is not far behind you as bullets begin to rain down on your position, leaning into his comms and barking orders. His eyes are focused with trained intent, finger on the trigger of his weapon, and when you catch his eyes he shoots you a wild grin.

You spot something out of the corner of your eye as you return fire- a woman and a child, hidden behind a low wall as she tries to cover him from the firefight. Her eyes are different. Scared, full of tears, her shoulders tight as he holds back her cries.

You shout for cover, instantly on your feet moving and diving for the pair. You shield her as you aid them both to safety, only for one of your squad to shout for you a moment too late.

The bullet goes straight through your heart.

You fall forward into the arid earth, watching the woman and her son be quickly escorted to shelter. The pang of relief you feel is stifled by the agony that laces through your veins, wet and viscous and much too warm. As you gasp, dying and bleeding out, the last thing you see is Graves’ face hovering over yours, steely and grim as your life gushes out onto his hands.

“Breathe, darlin’, breathe.”

You can’t. With every pulse of your heart you feel the sickening ooze of red spill from the gap in your chest. You wheeze, try to speak, but it’s too late. You hear him call for you as you go under, and your last thought is that you wish just had more time.

There’s a flash of something then- brief and vague, like the shimmering outline on the horizon. Four figures standing tall, turning to gaze at you before it all goes dark.

You wake up in the infirmary an hour or so later. Staring up at the medical tent and trying to process the fact that you’re alive.

Remarkably, you feel…fine?

A hand smooths over your chest, and you find no bullet hole at all. No gaping wound where your life force bled out of you. Perfectly healed.

It doesn’t make any sense, and you try to reconcile the sudden, agonizing pain and darkness with your unscathed state. You died. There’s no way you should be alive right now, much less without a horrible, life altering injury.

Graves pushes aside the tent flap and paces to your bedside with long strides. You expect him to look relieved, to smile and offer a joke to cover his concern. Instead, he appears guarded, cautious, like he no longer trusts you.

You flinch.

Graves watches you with wary eyes, and when you ask him if perhaps you dreamt it he doesn’t show any indication of shock. Instead, he crowds closer, gets in your personal space, and asks you what you remember. You tell him. You died…and then…and then…

Nothing.

This doesn’t satisfy him, and you can tell by the harsh light in his eyes. He smiles anyways, but you feel something curl in your stomach at the fact that it feels so sinister. Graves pats your shoulder and tells you to rest up, offers a little murmur of relief that doesn’t reach your ears.

You’re too busy looking at his eyes.

On his way out of the infirmary, Graves whispers something to the medic, who pales and tries to protest. Yet then Graves goes icy cold, and you feel a shiver run up your spine. He vanishes after that, and after a moment the medic appears with a syringe.

“This should help with the pain.” He offers with a wobbly smile.

“But…I’m not in pain.” You offer, brow knotted in confusion, but before you can offer anything else he holds out your arm and presses the needle to the inside of your elbow with practiced ease.

“W-wait-”

You look at the medic in confusion as he pulls back, and somehow when he presses on your shoulder you go flat on the bed with sluggish limbs.

“What-” You try, feeling something dark and liquid descend over your senses slowly.

“I’m sorry.” He offers, face pinched. “Please don’t die.”

You grab at him then, recognizing the injection too late for what it is, a lethal dose. You try to raise your voice, try to beg, but the soldier above you hushes you, murmurs apologies even as the newly familiar grip of death settles over you.

…And then, you wake up again

This time, however, you’re restrained. Your arms are above your head, shackled to the metal bars of the infirmary cot. There’s a dull ache that colors your senses, and when you try to raise your hand to rub at your head you find it immobile. Panic instantly rises within you, doubled by your prone position.

As you panic and struggle Graves appears and hovers over your bedside

“Feel like talkin now, soldier?” He asks, gaze cold.

He had you killed, you realize. He sent the medic to drug you, to test this newfound ability of yours to come back after apparent death. Now, he has you trapped under his mercy, eyes dark as he scrutinizes your restrained form.

You try to tell him you don’t know, you don’t understand, but you know he doesn’t believe you. Even after your babbling protests and attempts to explain, he remains unmoved.

At last, he sighs in frustration and turns away to the medic once more.

“Put em’ under.”

Terror grips at you. You scream, thrash, a primal fear screeching through your veins as you’re approached by the grim faced medic.

Then, the medical tent shakes with the force of a nearby explosion. Graves spins, eyes wide. Instantly, the base alarm begins to roar, nearly deafening the instant chatter of his radio. Graves is moving, barking order, growling at the two shadows who stand nearby.

“Prep for transport. We’re takin’ em to the general.”

Shepherd.

They’re moving you. They’re going to give you to Shepherd because of…whatever this is. Your instincts scream danger, and it only renews your effort to escape, thrashing at your restraints and screaming with all your might.

The two shadows press down on your struggling limbs- a hand snaking up to cover your mouth. You plead with teary eyes, desperately afraid, whimpering as the medic pushes the needle down into your arm once more. The overly warm rush of morphine slinks through your veins, draws your eyelids heavy against your will.

It’s at that moment that you see them.

Four armed figures sweep into the tent, and as the two soldiers spin and reach for their weapons. They're taken out before they can even shout for aid, two of the men instantly subduing the two guards, choking them into unconsciousness with heavy, muscular arms. A third points a weapon at the medic, growling as the man cowers.

A face hovers into view- Brown eyes a deeper color than his skin, warm gaze concerned even as he smiles. He’s handsome, a delirious part of your brain realizes as unconsciousness begins to descend over you.

“Nice to meet you, mate.” He tells you as you begin to fade. “Name’s Gaz. Don’t worry, we’ll be here when you wake up. We got it from here.”

You try to ask him what he means, but you’re gone before the words can pass your lips.

- - -

“I’m getting kind of tired of this.” You think as soon as you wake up for the third time in twelve or so hours, flat on your back and looking at the ceiling of a plane.

There’s a jacket covering you, and as you sit up your groan, feeling the remnants of morphine clear from the uncomfortable haze of your brain.

“Easy.” A gruff voice tells you, and your eyes dart up to take in the sight of a man sitting on a bench beside you, the airplane rattling around you both. “You’ve had a rough go of it, take it slow.”

“Who…?” You manage to ask, pressing a heel of your palm to the center of your eye to dispel the lingering headache, looking around to take in the other three men who sit in various stages of alertness. You take them in one by one, starting with the man beside you with the beard and the hat. He looks older than you suspect he is- the age showing in his eyes.

Beside him sits a man in a mask, the hard plastic of it in the shape of a skull. He blinks at you slow like a cat, and with his arms crossed he seems to take up so much space on the tiny aircraft.

Across from him sits a younger man with a mohawk, blue eyed and bright. He smiles at you, gaze twinkling as you blink in confusion.

Your eyes land on a familiar face. “...Gaz.” You offer uncertainly, and he beams at you.

“Right’o.” He tells you, and then nods to the man beside him. “And Soap-” The man in the mohawk gives a grin and a wave. “Ghost-” The man is the skull mask, arms crossed, regarding you coolly. “And Price.” The man who sits beside you, elbows on his knees, blue eyes staring keenly down at you.

You reply with your name purely out of politeness, but are unable to stop the tensing of your limbs as you slowly and cautiously press away from the four men who have kidnapped you.

The questions pour out of you before you can stop them. Who are they? Where are you? Where’s Shadow Company? Where are they taking you? How did you get here?

…Do they know you died?

The men before you exchange some looks of concern, before at last it’s Price who moves and settles on his haunches before you with a reassuring smile. He sits just out of reach, trying to respect your personal space as much as he can in the tiny plane.

“You’re safe.” Is the first thing he tells you, voice firm but soft. “We’ll make sure your commander can’t find you, so don’t you worry about that.”

“The rest will have to wait.” He goes on, offering you a hand to stand and helping you to a seat beside Gaz. “We’ll wait until we’re at our safehouse to tell you the rest.”

You swallow nervously, hands bunched in the jacket draped over your lap. Your mind desperately tries to understand what has happened, how you could have ended up here.

“He…killed me.” You manage shakily, remembering Graves standing over you as you woke up from the lethal rush of morphine. “Graves.”

Price looks grim as he nods silently.

“But…” You trail off, confused, scared, trembling. You look at him, wrapping your arms around yourself for comfort. “I’m…alive?”

“That you are.” Price replies with grave seriousness. “And you’re not dying anytime soon.”

You find out later that ‘soon’ doesn’t begin to describe what your life will become.

You have no option but to trust these men, you realize. You think about running, but you have no idea where you are, where they’ve taken you. As you’re gently escorted off the plane on an abandoned runway somewhere in the desert, you think about climbing back aboard and forcing the pilot to take you home.

There’s nothing back there for you, you realize. Not with your outstanding debts and mistakes, not when Graves will be able to track you down.

You curl into a corner of the safehouse- skittish and forlorn as you lose yourself in your thoughts. The others busy themselves disposing of their gear, talking in low voices, and you ignore the sympathetic looks they offer you.

Gaz settles in front of you, pushes a steaming mug of something warm into your hands, and you manage a grateful glance.

“Where are we?” You ask him quietly, and he gives you a worried little smile.

“A few hours outside Cairo. A safehouse. An old one.”

You hear Soap sneeze in another room, complaining about spiderwebs. It summons a weary smile to your features.

“Will you tell me what’s going on?” You ask quietly, and Gaz stands, offers you a hand so you rise with him.

“Of course.” He tells you, and places a hand on your shoulder to guide you in the direction of the brightly lit kitchen. “But first? Dinner. Can’t have you starve to death.”

“Will that actually kill me?” You think, but offer no other reply

Dinner is a mix of MREs and canned fruit from one of the cabinets. You watch as Ghost passes his pineapple pieces over to Soap, who swallows them down happily. Price leans over to murmur something to him, and Soap huffs a little sound of amusement around his fork. You observe them, realizing that there’s a warm familiarity between all of them, a trust that runs inherently deep and profound. It summons a little pang of longing inside you, wishing that maybe you might find something similar one day

You pick at your dinner, not really hungry. The food sits uneasily in your stomach with your anxiety, and as the plates lay scattered across the table the others finally turn to you.

“You died.” Price begins, startlingly direct.

“Yes.” You tell him breathily in return. He nods, pauses before his next words.

“So did all of us.”

You blink at that, trying to process- before Soap finally chimes in.

“Aye, your commander shot me straight in the neck, the bastard.” He grins sunnily. “Shoulda seen his face when I got right back up, fit as a fiddle.”

You do smile at that, imagining Grave’s utter shock at a dead man walking. It fades as you fidget with the cooling mug in your hands.

“So…what?” You ask quietly. “I’m some kind of…immortal?”

The silence that follows is deafening.

You look up, meet the blank stares of the men before you, and feel your stomach turn to ice.

“You’re kidding.”

Price shakes his head slowly, and you watch as he reaches for a cigar in his jacket.

“Those’ll kill you.” You want to tell him, but you wonder if it truly is a moot point.

“We were all like you, once.” He sighs as smoke spills from his mouth. “Soldiers, young, trying to do some good in a war we didn’t ask for.”

They tell you their stories, and you sit transfixed as the tale of their lives unravel before you.

Gaz and Soap are the ‘youngest’ they claim, both in age and in the time they first died. World War 2, they tell you. Gaz was a pilot shot down in France, and Soap was an infantryman only a few hundred miles west.

“Price found me.” Gaz tells you, smiling fondly at the older man, who returns the expression.

Price tells you of the vision he had- of Kyle terrified, tugging at his straps as his plane burned and spiraled out of control, only to wake up completely unscathed in a pasture. Of course, he’d been killed twice over by German forces before Price managed to find him. Gaz had been the same as you- flighty, scared, uncertain. Price had hauled him to an abandoned farmhouse, had explained to him the same they explain to you now- that one day you just stop dying. You don’t age. You can’t be killed. You blackout, bleed out, and then you just wake back up.

“Soap had it less easy.” He nods to the Scot, who grimaces. Ghost tilts his head in Soap’s direction.

“You want me to tell em, Johnny?”

Soap grumbles, and explains the story of waking up downriver, having drowned, with his entire squad dead after a charge across the Rhine. He tried to find his way back under the cover of night and found a man in a mask instead. He thought he was the reaper coming to collect his soul, but when Ghost started trying to explain immortality and becoming ageless, Soap had stared at him in complete disbelief- and then ran.

“You pitched a fit when I finally caught you.” Ghost remarks smugly, and Johnny’s frown deepens.

“Couldnae help it.” He grouses. “You did a shite job of explaining. Plus-” He jabs a finger in his friend’s direction. “You shot me.”

You blink at that, looking at Ghost, who shrugs, completely unrepentant.

“You tried to escape.”

“But still-!”

“And they’ve been trying to kill each other ever since.” Gaz adds cheekily as the two bicker.

“No killing each other.” Price reminds them sternly, and it quiets down the squabbling.

“Wait-” You try, looking to Soap and Gaz. “So you’re…what, like 100 years old?”

“Give or take a few years.” Soap offers. “I’m the older one.”

Gaz snorts. “You are not.”

“I got found first.”

“I was literally born before you.”

“By eight months.”

“Still counts.”

You turn to Ghost. “So then how old are you?”

“I stopped counting.” He replies plainly. “16th century.”

Your jaw drops. Ghost looks smug at your expression as you try to run the numbers.

“You’re leaving out the part where you were in the Anglo-Scottish War, Simon.” Soap bemoans, displeased. It sours Ghost’s expressions as he turns to the Scot.

“I didn’t even know you yet.” He remarks, mildly annoyed, and it does little to ease Soap’s vague irritation.

“So then Price found you too.” You comment, and Ghost turns back to you.

“After years of chasing him.” Price interjects. “There’s a reason we call him ‘Ghost’.”

You learn later about the things Ghost doesn’t tell you- about being buried alive by his enemies, of suffocating and dying over and over as he clawed through the dirt on his way to freedom. An inevitable, stifling death where he didn’t understand how he kept coming back, only to suffocate once more.

All eyes then turn to Price, who regards you with a knowing smile.

“Old.” He responds to your wordless question. “Too old.”

You want to press him, but there’s a twinkle in his eyes that makes you bite your tongue.

“So…do you…we…” You correct slowly. “...get sick? Starve? Drown?”

“Can’t say I’ve ever been sick.” Ghost provides. “Been starved and drowned, though.”

“Starving is a fool’s death.” Price says, oddly grim. His cigar burns down to ash, and he sighs.

There’s a solemn silence that settles over the safehouse then, and you feel the heavy weight of unspoken words sink between you all.

“There’s rules for us.” Price states then, once more reigning in his air of authority that draws you all a little straighter, attentive.

He goes on to tell you the rules that these men live and die by.

Don’t be seen. Don’t stay in one place for more than a few years at a time. If you die, move on. Stay together. Always communicate. Never leave a man behind.

They’ve spent decades, centuries trying to find ways to use their time to the best of their ability- and the only thing they’ve come to is to stay as soldiers, trying their best to scrub the scum off the face of the earth so the world stays clean. Illegal drug trade, weapons smuggling, extremism, genocide, doing whatever they can to help the innocent and the blameless from violence, and dying to do so.

What else is there to do with all the time? They tell you. Money, luxury, empires, it doesn’t matter when you live forever. So instead they fight, do what they can to save humanity from itself. It’s not an easy job, but it must be done.

They’ve seen things that haunt the shadows of their eyes, witness to the worst villainy and grotesqueness humanity has to offer. They’ve all had to take years off when the burden of the world became too heavy for their souls.

You don’t learn of the time when one of them, and they’ll never say who, tried to give up entirely, had become lost as he desperately tried to rid himself of his immortality. They don’t speak of the decade it took to bring him back, to mend his soul back to fullness once more. It’s a gift, they’ll tell you, but you too will come to learn it’s a curse.

The silence is broken by Soap.

“Can be fun, sometimes.” He offers. “Kyle and I have a runnin’ bet over who dies first in whatever year we’re in.”

“No killing each other.” Price reiterates, scowling at Soap and Gaz, who look guilty. “Not even for fun.”

You make a note to ask about that story later.

“And most of all…” Price goes on, voice grave. “Don’t get captured.”

You remember the infirmary, the cuffs, Graves standing over you with his cold, calculating gaze as fear mounted higher inside you.

You shudder, and Soap lays a warm hand on your shoulder in reassurance.

“They won’t find you.” Ghost provides, and his voice is softer, eyes kinder. “You’re with us now.”

“Simon is right.” Gaz adds seriously. “We’ve been doing this for decades. Your commander has nothing on us.”

You offer him a grateful smile, and remember his warm eyes in the moment you first met him.

“We’ll be here when you wake up.”

These men saved you from a fate that was out of your control. They rescued you, kept you safe, and refused to leave you behind. They brought you to safety, comforted you, and even now they take care of you from your own fear of the future.

“You’re one of us.” Price offers quietly, strangely tender. His hand settles on yours, squeezes it hard for just a moment. “We don’t leave behind one of our own.”

You smile at him through the tears, more grateful than you can express. You’re still scared, and in the years to come you’ll still have nightmares of the man who killed you twice over, who had once been your ally. His betrayal sits in your heart as distant terror, and when it becomes too much your new family holds you, comforts you once more.

You’ll grow with them, fight with them. You’ll hold them as they breathe their last, cry with them over the things you couldn’t accomplish in your never ending fight against the worst of humanity. You’ll lament the agelessness between you all, but will help each other to stand once more. You’ll stand beside them for the centuries to come, and you’ll die alongside them.

And then you’ll wake up.

#cod x reader #cod x you #cod x gn!reader #cod x y/n #141 x reader #oneshots #old guard au

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xxsabitoxx · 10 months

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My Personal Hashira 🍆 Size Ranking

Warning: if it ain’t obvious, this contains smut lmao — therefore Muichiro is 100% not included in this. We’re talking about 🍆, length, girth, all the fun stuff. So if PPs make you uncomfortable keep on scrolling babes </3

A/N: these low key stress me out cause I feel like people can get pretty defensive over these types of Headcanons. Especially if my own thought differs from yours. Regardless, these are just my personal takes/HCs. My word is not law so do not be upset if my HC does not match yours / don’t feel the need to change how you HC these things to fit my POV. This is why I refrain from describing size in my fics, I want y’all to imagine it in a way that you like lololol

Lastly, idgaf if you see some of this as unrealistic, these are fake, fictional drawings of men, if I wanna give Gyomei a 44ft long 🍆, I can and will (I didn’t but you get the point.) Anyways enjoy my personal thoughts on this matter

1. Himejima Gyomei

Is anyone fucking shocked that this 7’2 (220cm) man is packing the biggest schlong among the male Hashira?

I mean let’s be logical real quick, his dick is as big as the rest of him. This man’s dick is dragging on the floor.

Soft: 11.2

Hard: 12.3

Call it unrealistic idgaf this man is LONG

Girthy too, he’s fucking beefy all over

This man’s dick will feel like he’s shoving his wrist up in there ong bro

It curves downward slightly when hard, I mean shit that thing is heavy, it stands no chance against gravity

2. Uzui Tengen

Again, the man is 6’6 (198cm).

Height comes into play when it comes to our two tank Hashira

Therefore none of you should be surprised that they are the top two

Soft: 9

Hard: 10.3

Your guts are getting rearranged, he knows the length he has but often underestimates how far he can go…

He’s long but doesn’t have a crazy girth to him, which thank fuck it doesn’t take as much prep to take him

He’s pretty straight when hard and manages to flex it and keep it up (he totally does dick tricks & you can’t convince me otherwise)

3. Tomioka Giyu

I’m standing by my “big dick Giyu” head canon. I just know this man is packing a weapon down there

What’s crazy is he wasn’t even aware of how good he had it until he overheard other corps members chatting

Soft: 6.3

Hard: 7.4

He’s got a decent girth and as weird as it may sound, it’s pretty, like really pretty to look at

When hard, it curves upwards and stands at attention which makes him a bit embarrassed

He knows how to use it, because of that he’s pretty confident in that aspect which is wild for him

He will also rearrange your guts unintentionally (or intentionally hehe)

4. Shinazugawa Sanemi

I don’t wanna hear one PEEP from any of you that Sanemi should be above Giyu.

My man is forth on the list but that ain’t mean shit, he’s still got a lot going on down there

Soft: 6

Hard: 7

He’s girthy, will tear you up girth, needs thirty minutes of prep minimum because of how wildly he fucks girth

He sticks straight out, no curve in sight and honestly looks like he defies gravity.

He’s like Tengen, can do dick tricks. But unlike Tengen he doesn’t make that known / show you lmao.

He’ll break your back, he may even hurt you (fully unintentional) if he gets too into it. That thing is fr a weapon

5. Rengoku Kyojuro

He’s fifth on the list but trust me he’s not lacking

He’s second smallest, but he’s not small, if you get what I mean. It’s kinda like how we rank the Hashira weakest to strongest but regardless they are still the strongest in the corps… that make sense?

Soft: 5.8

Hard: 6.8

He curves upwards, very prominent veins running along his shaft (heh, shaft)

Girth wise, he’s about normal. Not too intimidating but def offers you a good stretch, forgoing prep is real bold tbh

He’s a quick learner so he quickly masters how to fuck you

He will strive to go as far as your body will let him, so expect to be bruised / sore

6. Iguro Obanai

My king. He may be “smallest” among the Hashira men, but that doesn’t mean shit.

He’s not self conscious of his dick, he knows how to use it. He’s also pretty content with it’s size

Soft: 5.6

Hard: 6.5

See? You can’t come for me cause he ain’t even SMALL

Obanai’s dick is pretty, too. It curves upwards slightly, since he’s pretty pale, his veins are prominent

He’s got an average girth, he doesn’t need to prep you forever to get you ready. Which works in his favor cause he likes to “punish” you with no prep & going in raw

He can and will abuse your cunt, he’s not satisfied until you genuinely can’t walk without limping for a few days

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starsstuddedsky · 9 months

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What? Like It’s Hard?

gn reader x soonyoung

summary: With the help of a little bit of bleach, Soonyoung is certified legally blonde–complete to last minute-dedication to scoring as high as Elle Woods on the LSAT. While he has no interest in law school, he’s notorious for never turning down a dare. So how does a frat bro in serious danger of failing his senior year get a 179? He asks the smartest person he knows.

Or, studying for a law test has never seen this much chemistry.

genre: fluff, angst, non-idol au, uni au, friends to lovers, opposites attract

warnings: swearing, drinking, food, arguing, a couple sex jokes, one spicy scene at the end but no actual smut, refusal to acknowledge feelings, what's the word for beyond oblivious????

full wc: 24.3k

playlist! - i'm not very good at this but i tried to add songs alternating between yn and soonyoung :)

a/n: hello!! first of all, sorry this so long! it's been a very very busy summer. thank you to everyone who has continued to show interest in the story, it's really kept me going. i honestly have no idea what this is anymore but i hope it does not disappoint :) as always i appreciate feedback of any form <3 thank you again for reading and have a lovely day! finally, happy scoups day :)

a/n2: a special shout out to @chocolatemilk139 for being my beta and for helping me fact check... why do i keep writing about lawyers when i know absolutely nothing about the field.......

“Nope.” You grab your backpack, shoving your laptop inside, but he gets to your water bottle before you can reach it.

“Come on.” Soonyoung pouts his lips.

“I won’t do it,” you say.

Soonyoung hugs your water bottle hostage against his chest, dark blue hiding in the crook of his elbow, bright against the pale pink sweater he wears. It’s an unusual choice for him, normally clad in baggy jeans and loose t-shirts. Still, the color highlights his new hair, blonde bordering on white. Hardly the first time he’s done something insane for a bet.

“Please! I’m desperate!” He cries again, stepping closer, though he keeps a firm grip on your water bottle. You never should have told him how emotionally attached you are to it; you should have known it would be held against you.

“No,” you say. You sling your backpack on, just in case he gets any other ideas. The other students shoot dirty looks at you, actually in the library to study (like you were, until Soonyoung arrived). So you grab him by the arm, rolling your eyes at how he jerks the water bottle out of reach.

“Walk and talk, we’re not doing this here,” you say, folding your arms over your chest.

“Come on, how hard can it be?” Soonyoung asks. “It’s just a test.”

“Just a test?” You snort. “Soonyoung, you are aware that most people don’t apply to law school on a dare?”

“I don’t have to get into law school!” He says, “just get a 179 on the LSAT.”

As if that makes it any better. You eye Soonyoung and his tight grip on the plastic. Maybe it’s a lost cause and you should just swing by the bookstore to get a new one instead. But that water bottle has butterfly stickers that have survived since freshman year and a dent from the time Jun tried to use it as a weapon in a fight against Jihoon (that was declared a draw when the bottle busted open and doused both of them equally); it holds memories better than water and you’ll be damned if you let Soonyoung hold it hostage.

“That’s actually harder,” you mumble. From the corner of your eye, you can see him tucking the blue bottle under his right arm, farthest from you. This won’t be easy, especially since you saw the poorly disguised thirst trap of him and one of his frat bros at the gym: those arms are not to be underestimated.

“I’ll pay you!”

“With what money?”

Soonyoung pauses. You’ve reached the exit by now, sunlight warming you through the glass doors. He turns to the sunlight, and you know he’s pretending to be a main character from an artsy film (not that he’s ever seen on). He takes a deep breath, as if he already regrets what he has to say next.

“Okay, I’ll offer you the only services I have.” He turns to face you, eyes on the floor.

“Oh my god, Soonyoung!” You shove his shoulder. “You are not selling your body for a test!”

“But it’s all I know!” He says. He pokes your arms. “You could have so much muscle if you lifted just twice a week.”

“Oh.” You blink at him. “You meant working out?”

“What did you think I meant?”

You feel heat rush into your cheeks. You push the door open, praying Soonyoung doesn’t notice. “It doesn’t matter,” you say, not daring to check if he’s following. “I don’t have time to workout.”

“Then what do you want?” Soonyoung asks. He stays just out of reach, adjusting his grip so that the water bottle hangs from his hand. “Please, I’ll do anything!”

“Why do you need me?”

“Because you’re the smartest person I know,” he says without hesitation. In the three years of your friendship, you’ve learned that the only time Soonyoung isn’t serious is when he flirts.

“You are,” he insists. “Plus you’ve already taken it, so you’re my best chance. My only chance, it’s not like I have a good track record with tests.” He gives you a lopsided smile as he tries to pretend like he’s joking. But Soonyoung has always been easy to read. You see the sparkle in his eyes dim, and you remember freshman Soonyoung–when he failed the midterm and holed up in his room in the frat house for two full days, not even venturing out to drink. It’s that damn sparkle that gets to you. He isn’t paying attention anymore, water bottle hanging loosely from his hand, but you can’t bring yourself to snatch it.

“You can pass it,” you say with a sigh. “It’s about studying correctly.”

“I don’t know,” Soonyoung says. “I’ve never really studied.”

“Well, that’s what I’ll teach you.”

Soonyoung freezes, grabbing your arm. “Seriously?” When you turn to face him, his smile is so bright it warms you from the inside out, hotter than the actual sun on your skin. He throws his arms around you, wrapping you in a hug so tight he lifts you off the ground. Your heart does this strange thing where it hops into your throat. Your arms come up as a reflex but his embrace is too tight for you to even hug him back.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” He shouts. He doesn’t let go, even when he sets you back down. He loosens his arms just enough to look at you, the full force of his smile directed at you. “I swear you’re welcome at the frat house any time, I’ll buy you anything you want when I have money, I’ll drive you wherever you want if I can get Seungcheol’s car, I’ll do whatever, just thank you, thank you, thank you.”

You know you should answer, or say something, but thinking is too much when he’s so close you can smell the strangely sweet combination of laundry detergent, cologne, and sweat. You push out of his arms, snagging your water bottle on the way out.

“It’s whatever,” you mumble. Though his arms aren’t around you anymore, you feel strangely hot, like your blood is boiling, and your heart still pounds.

“It is not whatever,” Soonyoung declares. “I swear, whatever you want, I’ll do it.” He holds a hand over his heart and if it was anyone else you’d think they were joking but it’s Soonyoung: he’s deadly serious.

You can’t handle his gaze anymore, turning to study your beat up sneakers. “Really? You’ll get my first edition copy of Pride and Prejudice from Jun?”

“I’ll get that book back.” He glances at you. “It is a book, right?”

“Yeah,” you say. “Though there’s been some good adaptations.”

“That’s the one with the zombies?”

“Zombies?” You frown. “Oh my god, do you mean Pride and Prejudice and Zombies?”

“That’s not the original book?”

“No,” you say, laughing. “The original is Jane Austen, in the 1800s.”

“Oh,” Soonyoung says.

“I’ve actually never seen that one,” you say. “It’s the only adaptation I haven’t seen.”

“How many movies are there?”

“Well, there’s the 1940 adaptation, the BBC series that’s widely regarded as the most faithful adaptation, the 2005 Kiera Knightley movie that’s iconic, plus the Lizzie Bennet Diaries, which is a vlog-style Youtube adaptation. Then of course there’s Jane Austen’s other works, like Persuasion, which, the new one, for the record, was a terrible adaptation.” You stop when you realize you’re dangerously close to going on what Jihoon calls ‘an Austen tirade.’

“I liked the movie,” he says after a pause. “I don’t know if it was that good, or close to the books. But it was fun.”

“I’ll have to watch it, then,” you say. “I know it’s the obvious choice, but Pride and Prejudice really is my favorite Jane Austen novel. Good luck getting it back from Jun though. He’s studying abroad this semester.”

“He’s the friend from your history class?”

“No, that’s Jihoon, my roommate,” you say. “Jun was in my language class.”

“I thought you hated everyone in that class.”

“Oh, I did,” you say. “But Jun is friends with Jihoon, so he sort of just became my friend too.”

Soonyoung hums, saying nothing else. You don’t recognize the song, though you tend to mostly listen to classical music when you study or whatever Jihoon blasts from his room, so it’s not that surprising. The melody is nice, though. Well, Soonyoung’s voice is.

“I really am grateful,” Soonyoung says. “I know I was begging, because I don’t think I can do this without you–well, I don’t know if I can do it with you, but you’re my only hope and–I’m rambling again.” He flashes a smile. “The point is, thank you.”

You shrug, feeling shy under his gaze. “It’ll help me study anyways,” you say. “You learn a lot when you teach.”

“I thought you already took it?”

“I only got a 150,” you say, sighing. “I need at least a 165.”

Soonyoung nods, forehead creasing like it always does when he’s lost in thought. “Thank you anyway.”

“Well, you swore to do whatever I tell you,” you say, desperate to change the subject. “Don’t think I won’t abuse that.”

“Oh, YN,” he says, “I’m counting on it.” He even winks.

You cough, choking at the outright flirting. Soonyoung hasn’t tried a line on you in so long you thought he’d used them all. He isn’t serious–it was engraved in his DNA the second he became a fully fledged member of Sigma Beta Tau but it’s not like many people flirt with you, so it’s hard to stop your heart from jumping.

You check your phone, unable to look him in the eyes. It’s 2:18 now, prime naptime if you can get back to your apartment before Jihoon gets back. But if it’s past two, unless he lied to you at the start of the semester, that means Soonyoung should be in his data ethics class. “Hey, don’t you have class right now?”

Soonyoung glances at the time on his phone. “Shit.” He takes off, sprinting across the grass, dodging three picnics and narrowly avoiding getting rocked in the back of the head by a frisbee. He pauses at the edge, turning back around to wave wildly at you.

“Thank you!” He shouts. The picnickers glance between you and him and you can feel the blush returning. Soonyoung doesn’t notice all the eyes on him, waving like a goofball one final time before sprinting off again. Like a whirlwind, he’s gone again, leaving you to stroll across campus and wonder what you just signed up for.

Soonyoung’s brow furrows into a frown, lips pulling together in a pout. He rests his chin on his hands, looking up at you from the table like a puppy that knows he’s in trouble. “That bad?”

“Your analytical reasoning was good!” You say, not wanting to destroy him just yet. “The logical analysis wasn’t that bad either, you just need practice.”

“Wasn’t there a third section?”

“The score for reading comprehension was pretty bad.” Horrendous, actually, but you can’t tell him that, not when he’s deflating faster than a balloon at a knife throwing contest. He sits back, head knocking lightly against the back of the stiff library chairs.

“We can work with this! It’s really not that bad,” you say. You reach out instinctively, wrapping your hands over his hands. Your thumb rests against the soft smooth skin of the back of his hand, the rest of your fingers brushing lightly against his calloused fingers. You jerk back when you realize what you’re doing, patting his hands once and grabbing the workbook in front of him as if it’s what you meant to do all along. You study the upside down words, not daring to look at the disgust that’s probably painted on Soonyoung’s face.

“You can start with practicing the logic problems,” you say, flipping through the work book. “I’ll figure out a strategy for the reading portion.”

Soonyoung heaves a sigh, sitting up and hunching over the workbook. You flip open one of your old workbooks and try to pretend like you’re not trying to melt away from embarrassment.

“This isn’t very much teaching,” Soonyoung says without looking up. “Lots of problem solving.”

“I don’t really know what I’m doing either,” you say. “I just watched a lot of youtube videos when I was studying last year. I should have known better than to take it over the summer, though.”

Soonyoung glances up. “How come?”

You chew on your lip. You’ve known Soonyoung for a while now, but you’ve never talked to him like this, mentioning any real things other than complaining about roommates. Soonyoung would listen, probably say the ‘right’ things, but it’s a study session, so you just say, “Just not good timing.”

He nods, returning to his humming. You turn to your own workbook, trying to figure out how to get Soonyoung to actually read the passages for the reading comprehension. Twenty minutes pass in an instant and Soonyoung drops his pencil, sliding his journal with the answers back in front of you. You flip to the answer key, scanning between the two.

“When are you taking it again?” Soonyoung asks while he waits.

“Just before Halloween,” you say. Exactly 38 days from now, according to the IMPENDING DOOM countdown clock on your phone.

“That soon?”

You shrug. “I wanted to give myself time to take it again in case I bomb it and it had to be before midterms, so, yeah.”

“Is it really that bad to take all your tests at once?” Soonyoung asks.

“I mean, finals week pretty much kills me every semester. I actually thought I was cutting it close with only two weeks between it and midterms.”

“Is November cutting it too close?”

“Depends on when in November you plan on taking it,” you say, “though you probably won’t be able to take it again if you don’t like your score.”

“Not a problem for me,” Soonyoung says. He doesn’t waver against your raised eyebrow. “I’m getting that 179, first try.”

“You’re that confident?”

“In you.” He winks. “Also the bet is off if I don’t get it on the first try.”

You nod. “Yeah, that makes more sense.” You glance at your calendar. “

“November 18th.”

“That’s not too bad, you dodged between midterms and finals, there should be plenty of cram time.”

Soonyoung shrugs. “I just scheduled it so that I would get the results before the Christmas party.”

“I didn’t think you would be the religious type.”

“Oh, I’m not,” he says. “The frat has this annual post-finals party before people go back home for holiday break, usually on the last day of finals. There’s no way I’m letting Seungkwan get away with my hard earned Playstation, and there’s no way he’d miss the party.”

“You can’t just buy your own game?”

“It’s a console actually,” he says, “and that’s not the point.” You prepare for some lecture about honor or frat code or something overly dramatic and inspired by any of the countless war propaganda movies he loves, but he closes his mouth.

“I guess it doesn’t really matter,” you say. You turn back his sheet, half the answers marked with a dark blue X because red feels too cruel. “You’re clearly committed.”

He sighs at the answers, flipping back to the first question and frowning. You think the conversation is over, but without looking up from glaring at the right answers, he says, “You should come.”

“To?”

“The Christmas party.”

You stare at the top of his head but he doesn’t seem to notice. You wonder how he manages to keep his hair so blonde without ruining his scalp but you don’t see any dandruff. “Me?” You finally say.

“You said you’d come, like, freshman year,” he says. “You never did.”

You did promise, back when you saw him for class every day. But frat parties weren’t your scene back then. They aren’t your scene now. Nothing about blasting music and binge drinking appeals to you, and yet Soonyoung peeking at you from his notebook makes you feel guilty anyways. He looks at you like he really doesn’t understand why you wouldn’t want to go.

And that’s the worst part: for Soonyoung, you would go. When he looks at you with the damn Soonyoung Sparkle, you’d do anything.

“I’ll… think about it,” you finally say.

He looks at you for a moment longer, then nods, like he didn’t really expect you to say yes. You try not to feel like you’re letting him down.

“Can you explain this one to me,” he asks, turning the book so you can see it from across the table.

You skim the question, which turns out to be a series of questions about stained glass windows. You take a moment to glance between Soonyoung’s answers and the correct ones.

“Walk me through your process,” you say.

“Okay, I start with…”

“Soonyoung, are you even listening?”

He blinks at you, lifting his head from his arms. “Something about strategies? For reading?”

You snap the book shut, shaking your head. You open your mouth, speech on responsibility and studying on the tip of your tongue but one look into Soonyoung’s Sparkle Eyes (patent pending) and all the words are gone. You really need to figure out how to get around that super power.

“Come on, it’s so nice out,” he says. “We should be outside.” He grabs your hand. “This is not studying weather, this is dating weather.”

“Soonyoung your test is in two months, you seriously want to skip?” You don’t dignify the second part of his complaint with a response. The idea of Soonyoung on a date makes your stomach flip.

He sighs. “No, but it’s October, we won’t get many more nice days, so can we at least go outside?”

You hesitate a heartbeat too long and Soonyoung jumps up. He closes the workbook, knocking loose papers off the table and sending highlighters of every color flying in every direction. The chaos earns a couple side eyes from the people around you and a full on glare from the person directly next to him, but Soonyoung, as Soonyoung as ever, doesn’t seem to notice. He picks up the papers and highlighters, shoving them into his backpack without a folder and slinging it over his shoulder. You can only follow him, grabbing the drinks before he tries to carry them along his laptop. When it comes to Soonyoung, mixing liquids and technology is more dangerous than mixing alcohols. You haven’t forgotten The Coffee Incident, flooding his backpack at 8 in the morning.

He drags you out of the library, though you don’t put up much of a fight. Soonyoung makes you want to relax, just a little, and when he smiles back at you as soon as he steps out of the sunlight, you find you don’t regret a thing.

Soonyoung pulls his emergency blanket out of his blanket, passing it to you. He’s more prepared for naps than any class he’s ever taken but the thin fabric is soft so who are you to judge? He heads straight for the quad, which is already filled with people, some groups of friends, too many obvious couples with heads in each other's laps or arms wrapped around each other. Soonyoung settles down in a relatively unpopulated corner, taking the blanket back to shake it out the blanket a few times before laying it flat on the ground.

Soonyoung groans when you pull out the workbooks as soon as you sit down. “There isn’t anything more fun to study?”

“Soonyoung, it’s the LSAT,” you say. “It’s not really meant to be fun.”

“But–”

“You’re the one that wanted to go outside,” you remind him, tapping his arm with a pen. “If you’re too distracted we’ll have to go back into the library.”

He gazes at the other people laughing for a long moment before turning to face you again. You raise your eyebrows and he takes the workbook from your hands, flipping it open to the sticky-note bookmark.

The next twenty minutes are relatively quiet, the only noise coming from the chatter of the people around you, too far away to clearly hear, and Soonyoung humming while working through practice problems. You’re not sure if he even realizes he’s doing it, though he bobs his head slightly. You wonder what Soonyoung is like when he isn’t trying to get out of studying–even outside of the party invites you’ve avoided, you rarely see him on campus (because you aren’t on campus when you don’t have to be). You almost went to dinner with him to celebrate passing the business class freshman year where you met him, but you got food poisoning and he never rescheduled.

It’s for the best, though. Even like this, tutoring him minus payment of any kind, you can tell that spending too much time with him will be dangerous. He flirts so easily it feels genuine, and even though he can be ridiculous, he’s never been anything but lovely to you. And it doesn’t help that he’s hot. He glances up, as if he can feel you staring, but he just flashes a smile at you and ducks his head again. Damn frat bros with endearing charms that melt you like the perfect grilled cheese.

Perfectly blue without a cloud in sight, the sky is an empty canvas above you. The air is just the right temperature, just between hot and cold, the sun ensuring that it never dips into the latter. Just the slightest breeze kisses your skin, lifting the edges of the papers but never flipping them. Soonyoung was right: the perfect date weather.

“Soonyoung?” You turn your head to see a dark haired man standing over you. Wearing a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off and sides ripped open, you figure there’s a 80% chance he’s one of Soonyoung’s frat brothers.

“Seokmin?” Soonyoung frowns.

“You were actually serious?” Seokmin asks, gesturing to the books. “You know Seungkwan said it as a joke, right?”

“Yeah, but a bet is a bet,” Soonyoung says. “And I really want his Playstation.”

Seokmin snorts. “You know he only said it because he knows you can’t do it.”

“I’m not like I’m losing anything by trying.” Soonyoung sets his lips in a sharp line of determination (which you recognize from the dining hall when he sweet talks his way into free cookies). Seokmin raises his eyebrows at his aggression but eventually decides it’s not worth the fight. Instead, he plops down on the blanket, making a little triangle between the three of you.

“You must be YN,” he says, extending his hand. His easy smile and the way he sat down without waiting for an invitation reminds you of Soonyoung. Unlike the faux blonde, it feels foreign and you shift a little closer to Soonyoung instinctively.

“It’s nice to meet you,” you lie. Seokmin’s eyes curl into little half moons when he smiles, apparently not noticing your awkwardness. You can’t help but feel like he’s intruding as he turns to Soonyoung and asks him to explain what he’s doing. Soonyoung explains it well, though it helps that he was working on the analytical reasoning section.

It’s because he’s interrupting Soonyoung’s studying. That’s why it bothers you that he’s here, even though Soonyoung doesn’t seem to mind and Seokmin seems genuinely interested. Unfortunately, the revelation doesn’t stop you from wishing Seokmin would just leave.

“I don’t know how you do any of this,” Seokmin says after Soonyoung explains the next problem.

“It’s easy!” Soonyoung says. “Half the time the answer is in the question, you just have to know where to look!”

“Quoting me?” You raise your eyebrows.

“Well I did learn from the best!”

“So cliche,” you mutter but the compliment gets you smiling anyway. You look up to find Seokmin looking at you. He has a strange look on his face, frowning, but not angrily. He looks a little bit like when Soonyoung can’t decide between the right answer and the second best option. He doesn’t look away when you catch him staring.

“What?”

He pauses a long moment before answering, as if pondering how to answer. Finally, he says, “I like you.”

You stare at him. Soonyoung had been diligently working on practice problems but his head jerks up at the words.

“I mean, you’re a cool person,” Seokmin quickly says. “Good tutor for Soonyoung.” After hearing his name, Soonyoung grins and turns back to underlining in the workbook.

“Tutor?” You say. “I really don’t think I’m doing all that much.”

Seokmin shrugs. ”I don’t know many people that would spend this much time with someone if they aren't helping. Besides, either way, I’ve never seen Soonyoung this dedicated before.”

“That’s because you don’t dare to bet against me,” Soonyoung says without looking up.

“He might have a point there,” you say. Soonyoung takes a moment to smile at your support.

“What I’m trying to say is that you’re cool,” Seokmin says.

“Thank you?” You wait for him to say something else but he sits back and rests his hands behind him, stretching out in the sun a little more. Sighing, he tilts his head toward the sun.

“Seems like the weather will turn cold soon,” he says. “This might be the last warm day of the year.” He glances at Soonyoung. “And you’re spending it here instead of pre-gaming the Tau party.”

Soonyoung’s pencil freezes. He peeks up at Seokmin, then at you, then shrugs. “I take my bets seriously.”

“Whatever,” Seokmin says. He lays back fully, half of his body sticking off the blanket into the grass. “What are the Ke$ha lyrics? ‘The party don’t start ‘til Soonyoung walks in?’” He doesn’t wait for a correction. “I think I’ll wait until you're finished and we’ll tear it up together.”

Soonyoung glances at you, then unsuccessfully tries to hide his laughter at your expression. You don’t mean to be rude, but Seokmin really just invited himself all on his own and crashed your picnic. Study date. Outdoor study session. The name doesn’t matter, what does matter is it’s only supposed to be you and Soonyoung.

“He’ll fall asleep in about five seconds,” Soonyoung whispers. “He doesn’t actually care about the party, he just likes my nap blankets.” On that point you can’t really blame Seokmin.

“As long as it doesn’t disrupt your studying,” you say.

“Right,” Soonyoung says, more to himself than you. “That’s what’s important.”

You aren’t so oblivious that you miss his bitterness, but you are enough of a coward to decide not to ask about it. How do you even ask about something like that? You can barely answer his questions about the LSAT, so feelings? No chance.

You flip open your own workbook and set a pencil case down to keep the book open and ignore the soft snores from Seokmin. Soonyoung hums, the soft breeze carrying the gentle tune to you and easing you into a false sense of comfort, planting the idea that it’s always been like this and it always will be. But Soonyoung will take the LSAT in November and you will graduate in the spring and there won’t be any more excuses for seeing him, let alone laying out in the sun with him. Letting yourself enjoy this moment has dangerous consequences for your heart.

And yet you enjoy the warm sun on your skin and hum along with Soonyoung anyway. Seokmin is right: this kind of day won’t last long.

You jump awake at the sound. It takes you a moment to register where you are, to blink the sleep out of your eyes and recognize the stiff library chairs, the yellow tinted lighting of the study rooms on the third floor. Built like a prison cell with no windows and stained linoleum floors, you aren’t entirely sure how you fell asleep. The last thing you remember is working on your essay on Sense and Sensibility, which was rather difficult since you haven’t had the time to finish rereading it. Your book rests on the table next to your open laptop, screen dark.

A second knock reminds you why you woke up in the first place and you turn to the door. Through the glass door you see a student with a backpack hanging off their shoulder, half smiling. They turn the knob, opening the door just enough to stick their head in.

“Hey, sorry, I think I have the room scheduled,” they say.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I lost track of time,” you say, slamming your laptop shut and shoving everything into your backpack. To their credit, the other student doesn’t rush you, even apologizing and telling you to take your time. But if you’ve lost the room, that means the two hours you had booked the study room for–the two hours you designated for writing the essay and doing problem sets–were spent asleep, which means the LSAT cram schedule has been completely thrown off with only three days before the test.

You groan as you step into the elevator, pressing the button for the fifth floor. The farther up, the more intense the quiet levels get. Hopefully it won’t be so quiet that you fall asleep, but since you got a nap, you should be able to power through an all-nighter. It wouldn’t be the first time. You brace yourself to check your phone for the time, though being kicked out of the room means you already know your fate. 9:08 means that you have a little less than three hours until the library closes. You’ve done more with less time.

The first couple desks are occupied by students but you don’t stray, heading for a familiar corner, ignoring the empty desks that line the stacks. Your corner, that you found freshman year during finals season when you couldn’t find an empty desk, is perfect: hidden behind the encyclopedia shelves with a light directly above it, only three dicks carved into it–all on the underside (discovered on a particularly bad day where you found it most comfortable to lay underneath and rethink your entire life). You smile at the small comfort, striding through the stacks with Sense and Sensibility still in your arms.

You nearly drop the book when you see the backpack, abruptly turning despite the fact that it must have been obvious to whoever stole your corner that you were headed there. You feel rage boiling up and threatening to spill. You close your eyes, reminding yourself that the corner isn’t actually yours. Still, as you settle into a desk facing a giant window that reveals the dark campus, you can’t help but feel bitter. Your thoughts stray to the desk that should be yours, even as you pull out your computer.

BATTERY LOW

The words light up your screen, mocking you before the screen falls dark again. You dig in your backpack for your charger that you always slip into the main pocket. You feel your underused pencil pouch, the single journal since you keep most of your notes on your laptop, LSAT prep book, your three folders, and no charger. Even when you look inside and lay the entire contents of your backpack on the desk in front of you, the only charger you find is for your phone. Which means the longer laptop cord is probably sitting on your desk, all the way back at your apartment.

A twenty minute walk back, twenty minutes less for writing your essay. You can start it on your phone, maybe, though the thought of switching between reading the Sparknotes and typing already exhausts you. It’s moot anyways, since all you can do is sit and stare at the desk, covered in the contents of your soul. This is what your life has become: a stack of paper that weighs less than the digital universe on your laptop that’s all contingent on a $15 charger that abandons you when you need it most.

In the end it isn’t the rage that gets to you. It’s the hilarity of it all, how silly it is that your life is dictated by something so stupid.

The fifth floor decrees silence, so you make sure that your sobs don’t make a noise. You can’t control the tears but you can hold your breath. When your head starts to feel light and your lungs are desperate for air, you can breathe through your mouth and inhale as slow as you can to keep the shakiness to a minimum. You can do everything you can to hold it together, even when you’re falling apart.

Someone taps you on the shoulder. You lift your head, ready to face a tired librarian kicking you out but instead you see bleach blonde hair and a forced smile over a furrowed brow.

“What are you doing here?” You whisper, glad for the quiet because you don’t trust your voice to support you.

He holds up a thick, leatherbound book. LSAT for Dummies. “Extra reading couldn’t hurt, right?”

You blink at him. The only times you’ve seen Soonyoung in the library on his own has been with a thick blanket and closed eyes (it’s how you know he sleeps with his mouth open, just a little). You can’t quite believe he’s in front of you and yet he takes a step closer and doesn’t vanish.

“What are you doing here?” He asks.

“Shhh,” you say, holding your finger to your lips to get him to quiet down, even though there’s no one in sight. “Quiet floor.”

He nods, looking around as if he’s waiting for someone to kick him out. He turns to look at your desk, the contents of your backpack still strewn about. He tilts his head but doesn’t dare raise his voice to ask. You know he hasn’t missed the tears, still wet on your cheeks.

You done? He mouths.

Not even close, you think, but you nod anyways because it’s the easier answer. Soonyoung doesn’t hesitate, gently closing your laptop and sweeping everything into your backpack. You watch as he dumps it all into the biggest pocket, zipping it up and slinging it onto his back. He tucks the law book under his arm and holds out his other hand for you to take.

“Come on,” he whispers. And you take it, let him pull you out of your chair. The walk to the elevator; out of the library; toward the edge of campus; nothing feels far when Soonyoung doesn’t let go of your hand. You follow him in a daze, clinging to his hand in the off-chance that all your luck rides on him–like if you let go, you’ll lose your tether to this planet.

Soonyoung rarely walks in silence and today is not an exception. He rambles about the only member of the frat capable of cooking that apparently can’t do anything without creating a giant mess. Even as he complains about the guy, Soonyoung can’t help defending him, explaining in mouth-watering detail how good his food is.

“One time he crowd sourced some steaks and did a grill for the new pledges and they all thought it was a prank or something and nearly cried when he actually let them eat them. I think they burnt their mouths from eating it too fast, afraid someone was going to take it away from them.” Soonyoung stops at the edge of campus. He glances at you, a question in his eyes. Where are we going?

“Soonyoung,” you say. Squeezing his hand feels natural. “I don’t really want to go back right now.”

He nods, squeezing your hand back. “You want to go for a ride?”

“You have a car?”

“Nope.” Soonyoung fishes his phone out of his pocket and makes a call. You can only hear Soonyoung, who says, “I need a ride,” and “Pick me up by the duck statue,” and then he hangs up.

The edge of campus that Soonyoung drags you to is right next to the athletic fields, which explains why there is a giant statue of the mascot that towers over you. It has three of its own personal spotlights and shiny claws from fans rubbing them for good luck, despite there being no official tradition. You only went to one game, mostly to confirm you would rather be anywhere else (except maybe the bathroom of the stadium). Either way, the only thing you do know about the statue and mascot for your school is that it is not a duck.

“That’s a raven.” You point at the statue.

Soonyoung frowns between you and the hunk of metal. “Oh, Larry?”

“It has a name?”

“Well, there’s the official name, which is like, Midnight Rain or something, and the frat name.”

“And the frat name is Larry?”

Soonyoung shrugs. “I didn’t choose it.”

“And you call it a duck, too?”

“It looks like a duck.”

You study the statue. You aren’t an ornithologist, but you’re pretty sure ducks have webbed feet instead of talons, and different beaks. Plus you’ve never seen a pure black duck. But you’ve spent enough time with Soonyoung to know it doesn’t have to make sense when the frat is involved (in fact, you’ve found sense is rarely involved in their decisions).

“We just call it the duck. Or Larry, when we want to be formal.” Soonyoung jumps at the honk of a horn. You turn around with him to find an obnoxiously red convertible parked against the curb. The driver’s smooth black hair is styled to look effortless, hair falling just above his eyes, and he wears sunglasses despite the fact that the sun went down three hours ago. He might be attractive, if he wasn’t trying so hard. You never thought you had a type, but someone like Soonyoung, who wears clothes that he likes and sticks his hair straight up because he thinks it looks funny–that’s more your style.

“Here’s our ride,” Soonyoung says. He starts walking, pulling you with him, still holding your hand. You aren’t sure if he even realizes, but you’re in no hurry to remind him.

“Hey Josh,” he says.

Driver (Josh, apparently), finally pulls off his sunglasses. “Soonyoung, you have a friend.”

“I’m YN,” you say, wishing your voice didn’t sound so scratchy from crying.

“Oh, I know,” he says, a twinkle in his eye that flirts between danger and fun. “I’m Joshua.” You try not to feel unsettled by it. He raises an eyebrow as Soonyoung slides into the backseat and you sit beside him. “Am I just an Uber to you?”

“Seungcheol is out and I knew there was no way you would let me drive your car,” Soonyoung says.

“So, yes?”

Soonyoung shrugs and laughs at Joshua’s expression.

“Where are we headed?” He asks with a resigned sigh as if he’s used to Soonyoung’s antics. Has he done this before? You frown. Why does it matter to you if he’s done this with someone else? You’re so busy with the internal war, you miss Soonyoung’s answer.

“Seriously?” Joshua asks. “It’s a weeknight.”

“Like that’s ever been a problem for you.”

Joshua glances at you. “You’re okay with this?”

You pause. You don’t actually know where Soonyoung said to go. But it’s Soonyoung, your heart says. You're inclined to agree with it tonight. “Yeah.”

He shakes his head and mutters something you don’t catch and kicks the car into gear. Before long, you are flying down a two lane road you didn’t even know existed. The wind starts to pick up with the top of the car down, blasting your face. Though your nose is still stuffed from crying, the air fills your lungs, tasting like dead leaves and unnatural warmth courtesy of climate change. For the first time tonight, you can breathe.

The clock reads just shy of 1 am by the time the car stops. As soon as the rumbling engine cuts out, another noise takes over, drowning everything else out. Crashes too rhythmic to be thunder, the blows softened by tall dunes illuminated by the car’s headlights that Joshua didn’t turn off.

Soonyoung turns to you with a grin. “Ready to have some fun?” He doesn’t wait for an answer, jumping out of the car instead of opening the door, ignoring Joshua’s shout. He sprints toward the crashing waves.

Joshua shakes his head, opening his door and ushering you out from the back. He even closes the door behind you, folding his arms over his chest and walking slowly to the beach with you. The headlights cut out but the moon and stars shine enough to see where the boardwalk ends and the sand begins. Soonyoung’s movement gives him away more than any light, running alongside the water and dancing with the tide.

You clear your throat. The ride cleared your head enough for you to feel properly embarrassed about meeting someone right after sobbing. You shudder to imagine how terrible you looked when he first picked you up, clinging to Soonyoung like he was the only thing keeping you alive. A blush forms just at the thought of it.

“So, you do this often?” You ask.

“Do something truly insane because of Soonyoung? All the time.” Joshua laughs. “We don’t usually end up this far away though, and usually someone’s life is in imminent danger.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” you say, watching Soonyoung strip his socks and shoes off and toss them behind him. One sock gets caught in the wind and blows back toward you and Joshua.

Joshua stops before the two of you can catch up to him. You turn to look at him. It’s difficult to read his expression in the moonlight but he frowns like he’s not sure he should say something. Eventually he says, “I’m going for a walk down the boardwalk.” He glances at Soonyoung, then back at you and smiles. “Have fun with him.”

You watch him turn around and trudge back up the sand, wondering if all of Soonyoung’s friends are this strange. Maybe it’s just being in a frat. You grab Soonyoung’s sock and set it with his shoes, smiling when he turns around and waves like a maniac.

“It’s the ocean!” He shouts over the crashes.

“You’re soaked!” You shout back. He glances down and apparently finally realizes his shirt is wet, clinging to his shoulders already. He strides back toward you, grabbing your arm and pulling you closer.

“My shoes are not coming off!” You warn him.

“Just come closer!” He says. “It’s amazing!” You stand with him at the edge of the water, watching it rise in the darkness and draw closer and closer. It crashes on the sand first, a violent move, kicking up wet sand and mixing it with white water. The frothy white water creeps forward, until you have to dance backward. Soonyoung stays in the water, letting it wash around his feet.

“It feels better like this,” he says.

“My feet are covered in enough sand,” you say, though he does look like he’s having fun. The water must be freezing this time of the year–it would feel so nice running over your skin. But you’d end up with wet socks and even more sand in your shoes to clean out.

Soonyoung holds out his hand. “You’d like this.”

You chew on your lip. Normally you’d laugh in his face and say ‘not a chance.’ But normalcy has never been running three hours away to the beach in the middle of the night when you have class at 9 in the morning. You pull off the sneakers without untying them and pull your socks off, setting them next to Soonyoung’s and joining him at the edge of the water. His hand isn’t out by the time you return but he slips it into yours when you join his side.

Another wave crashes and you watch the water creep forward, faster than you expect it to be–and you’re right, it’s freezing, but Soonyoung’s right too, it sends an icy shock throughout your body that sends a tingly rush up from your toes to every nerve in your body, setting them on fire. You squeeze his hand and laugh.

“Good?” He asks.

“I love it.”

You don’t know how long you stand there, holding onto Soonyoung’s hand and letting the water wash over you. After a few waves, it doesn’t feel cold anymore. You stand until your feet are buried in wet sand, each wave sending you lower and lower.

“My feet are freezing,” Soonyoung eventually says.

“Mine, too.” You lift your feet reluctantly, already missing the coarse sand and cold water. You have to let go of Soonyoung’s hand to put on your socks and shoes, shuddering at all the sand in your socks. The cotton became damp from sitting too close to the water, your shoes faring the same. Yet you don’t regret a second of it.

You stand up and stretch, feeling your spine pop. When you turn back around, you almost scream. You manage to contain it to a gasp, a wheezing Soonyoung’s name. He blinks at you innocently, like he isn’t standing in front of you with his shirt in his hand.

“What are you doing?” You choke out.

“We’re at the beach,” he says. “I have to take pictures.”

“And you need to take off your shirt for that?”

“Why? Does it bother you?” He smirks.

Muscles have never been a selling point for you. The “people” you’ve crushed on have all been smart or kind, crushes of intellect rather than bodies. His toned abs, sculpted shoulders, the way his body curves gently as he allows you to stare at him–normally it wouldn’t get to you at all (other than the embarrassment of being this close to a shirtless man for the first time in a long time). But it’s not just the muscles. It’s Soonyoung, your Soonyoung who calls you at four in the morning to tell you about the movie he just finished and is too endearing for you to truly be annoyed at. It’s the Soonyoung that gets lost in the Engineering building even as a senior. It’s the Soonyoung that drags you to the beach in the middle of the night just to make you smile. Yes, it bothers you. No one should be this incredible and hot.

“No,” you mumble, failing to convince yourself of the lie.

Soonyoung seems to be done teasing you, dropping his shirt into your hands. He walks a little closer to the waves, apparently not bothered by the chilly ocean breeze. He starts to pose, then raises his eyebrows. “Aren’t you going to take pictures?”

“Where’s your phone?”

“The camera’s broken,” he says. “Just use yours and you can send them to me.” He continues to pose, flexing his arms as subtly as he can which isn’t particularly subtle (though the muscles are even more impressive in person). You are tempted to reach out and feel the tension, before you realize you are staring again.

You numb to Soonyoung in this half-dressed state as you take the pictures. The frat must have a professional photographer or something, because Soonyoung knows how to pose. Despite some of the angles and positions seeming awkward, each picture comes out as if from a photoshoot. He only gives you a few instructions on taking pictures, and compliments you way beyond your talents.

“Just like that!” Soonyoung says, breaking his model face to grin at you. “You’re really good at this.”

“You can’t even see the pictures,” you say. You bite your lips so you don’t smile. Apparently that doesn’t matter, because he keeps posing. It’s a good thing you just upgraded your phone storage because you estimate at least a thousand pictures are taken for each pose.

“Are you guys done?” You jump at the voice next to you. Apparently Joshua returned from his walk, sneaking up using the crashing waves as cover. “We should head back soon if you want to make your morning classes.”

“Definitely want to,” you say. You haven’t gotten any work done, but that’s no excuse to skip class. Soonyoung pouts but doesn’t argue.

“Perfect!” Joshua claps his hands together. He shoves you toward Soonyoung and grabs your phone. “One more picture together and we’ll go.”

Being at a distance worked perfectly fine but those muscles have you frozen in place again. Soonyoung throws an arm over your shoulders and grins like you do this all the time. His biceps press through your jacket, the flex of the muscle exactly as you imagined it, not that it stops your heart from thundering.

You can’t help but steal a glance at Soonyoung. Despite feeling like you’ll malfunction at any second, there’s nowhere else you’d rather be. Soonyoung’s features look soft this close, even the sharp cut of his jawline. You want to study every line of his face, each curve, memorize it until the way his lips slowly curl into a smile is carved into your heart. Spending the rest of your life here doesn’t seem too bad.

“Let’s go,” Joshua says, breaking whatever magic froze time for you. You are left with cold toes and sand in your sneakers as you march up the dune and back to Joshua’s car.

“I just cleaned it,” he groans, looking at all the sand you and Soonyoung tracked in.

You mumble an apology but when you try to offer to clean it for him, he shakes his head. “Nobody touches my baby.”

You glance at Soonyoung, who followed you into the backseat again. He rolls his eyes at Joshua, smiling in a way that you know means he isn’t serious. You smile back at him and click your seatbelt into place.

“Address?” Joshua asks, handing you his phone. You punch it in and hand the phone back. 3 hours and sixteen minutes.

Joshua whistles, seeing the arrival time of 4:53. “Remind me never to do this again.”

“The beach was your idea,” Soonyoung says. His words slur a little.

“Just go to sleep already,” Joshua says. The engine rumbles on and he pulls away from the empty boardwalk.

“‘m not even tired,” Soonyoung says, fighting a yawn. He slouches and leans against the headrest, rolling his head to look at you. “You have class in the morning?”

“Not until nine.”

“That’s good.” He doesn’t succeed in fighting the yawn this time. His blinks become longer and longer, eyes closing more than opening. It’s like watching the energizer bunny shut down.

“Soonyoung?”

He opens his eyes and you think maybe he’d wait for the rest of his life for you to say something.

“Thank you.”

“Always.” He smiles lazily. “I swore I’d do anything.”

His sworn loyalty. It should be fun, having a boy like him dedicated to fulfilling your wishes. But what would it be like if he wasn’t sworn to you? If he did these kinds of things just because he wants to?

You didn’t think you were tired but the next thing you know, Soonyoung gently shakes you awake.

“We’re here,” he says in a quiet, very un-Soonyoung voice.

You blink at him, trying to figure out why your neck hurts so much, frowning at the unfamiliar surroundings. From the rear view mirror, Joshua watches you. Right, instead of writing your essay, doing the problem sets, or any of the readings, you went to the beach. You wait for the guilt to set in but it doesn’t come. None of the anxieties from earlier in the evening (the technical part of your brain reminds you it was the night before) overwhelm you.

“Right,” you say, clearing your throat. Your mouth tastes nasty but before you can say anything, Soonyoung hands you a water bottle. You take a sip before saying thank you.

Soonyoung unbuckles his seatbelt. “I’ll walk you up.”

You nod, grateful you don’t have to ask him. The night has been a full adventure on its own yet you aren’t quite ready for it to be over. At least you aren’t ready to say goodbye to Soonyoung.

There’s still something you want to tell him. You want to tell him that you like his blonde hair, even though everyone else thinks it’s ridiculous. You want to tell him that you lied earlier, you nearly lost your mind seeing him shirtless. You want to tell him that you feel proud when he gets the right answer on the first try, that you think his concentration frown is cute, that you’ve never enjoyed studying like you do when he’s by your side. You want to tell him that on your worst days, days like today, just being Soonyoung makes it better.

But you learned a long time ago tired ramblings and drunk confessions are siblings. They both end in heartbreak and twelve packs of ramen.

So you ride the elevator with him and watch the lights flicker. You never cared when Jihoon brought his friends (well, Jun) over, but the carpets that look dirty no matter how many times they’re cleaned and beige walls are even worse tonight. You can stand to live in a boring apartment, but not a dirty one.

“This is me,” you say, gesturing to 808. You turn your back on the door, facing Soonyoung instead. He looks radiant under the fluorescent hallway lights, which really isn’t fair. They make his bleach blonde hair look natural, highlight the blemishes on his skin, easy to see when he’s this close.

You should go inside and he should go back down but neither of you move. For the second time tonight, you are frozen in time with Soonyoung.

The floor creaks and you jump, turning around at the same time, accidentally knocking into Soonyoung’s chest as you turn to face the noise behind you. Jihoon, gym bag over his shoulder, frowns at you across the hallway.

“Are you seriously just getting back now?”

Shit. You never texted him. “Um, Jihoon, this is Soonyoung,” you say. He waves behind you. “Soonyoung, Jihoon.”

Jihoon folds his arms. “I’ve heard about you.” You glare at him, which he ignores. “You’re taking the LSAT on a dare?”

“You’re the one that wants to be a music producer?”

Jihoon raises his eyebrows and looks at you. “You’ve mentioned me?”

“Only the worst,” you say, smiling at him.

“I thought you were at the library all night?” Jihoon says.

“We went on an adventure,” you say. You show him your sandy shoes. He raises his eyebrows but doesn’t say anything. It’s clear he knows he interrupted something, but the stubborn asshole doesn’t move.

You turn back to Soonyoung. “Goodnight,” you say, resisting the urge to hug him.

“It’s morning,” Jihoon says.

“Goodnight,” Soonyoung says, glancing at Jihoon. He pauses and fidgets with the hem of his shirt but finally gives you a half hug that feels more like a bro hug than anything else. He disappears into the elevator then pops his head out a final time “Send me the photos!”

You turn to Jihoon. “I forgot to text you.”

“I figured I’d wait until the morning to call,” he said. “Even if you were kidnapped there’s still a 90% chance you’d figure out a way to show up for class on time.” He turns the key in the lock and strides into the apartment. You’re too tired to argue back, especially when he’s right, so you just follow him into the apartment.

“I like him,” Jihoon says before you vanish into your room.

“Should I find you a wedding dress?” You say. “Soonyoung is single.”

Jihoon rolls his eyes and grabs a protein shake from the fridge. “Why do I even bother?”

You don’t wait for him to leave first, peeling your shoes off in the entryway where you can sweep up the sand and practically fall into your room. It’s race to change into an old t-shirt before you collapse onto your bed.

You set an alarm for 8:30 and check fifty times to make sure it’s actually set. Then you open your camera roll, shaking your head at the countless pictures. You choose twenty non-blurry ones before your eyes start to droop. You scroll to the bottom and click on the pictures Joshua took. Soonyoung grins for the camera, his easy smile as captivating on your phone as it is in person. You are staring at him, a soft smile on your lips and hearts practically bugging out of your eyes. It’s so ridiculously obvious how you feel. You send him his thirst traps and keep that picture for yourself.

It takes a week for you to realize Soonyoung never posted the pictures.

The weight of the world has the decency to wait until you’re home to fall on your shoulders. You hold your keys up and can’t push it into the lock. If you didn’t do well today, it means the past two months have been a complete waste–all the studying, the assignments you got low grades on because you were studying, the nights you spent at your desk–wasted and doomed to repeat.

All but the time you spent with Soonyoung. Even if you fail (again), he should at least score decently, and you can’t consider that a complete waste.

You raise your key to insert it into the lock but the door flies open. Jihoon glares at you, arms folded over his chest. “What the hell is taking you so long, your boyfriend is here.”

You peer past him and find Soonyoung lounging on the couch, feet resting on the coffee table. He sits up when he sees you, grinning and waving. You wonder if he’s been there since you told him you were finished. You make a mental note to get Jihoon his favorite protein shakes.

“How did you know I was here?”

“Me and your boyfriend heard you shaking your keys in front of the door for like twenty minutes,” Jihoon says.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” you mutter, praying Soonyoung didn’t hear either of you. You push past Jihoon, letting him lock the door behind you. Soonyoung jumps off the couch as soon as you drop your bag, almost tackling you in a hug. You pretend not to hear Jihoon’s scoff as he locks himself in his room again.

“How’d it go?” He asks, squeezing you one more time before letting go. You try not to feel disappointed about it. “I mean, I know you did amazing, but how do you feel? Was the room super hot or super cold? Did the proctor give you the evil eye when you turned in your paper because they were secretly trying to sabotage you?”

“No?” You frown. “And the room was fine, I felt pretty good about it, but I felt good last time, so I don’t really know, I just really don’t want to take it again.” You sigh. “I know you want to know as many details as possible for your test, but I really, really don’t want to think about it right now.”

Soonyoung grins and pulls out a package of White Claws and a bottle of vodka from a plastic bag that you just noticed sitting on your coffee table. “That’s perfect because I brought a gift from the whole frat.”

“That seems pretty on brand,” you say.

“And a gift from me.” He digs again and pulls out a DVD. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

“You’re kidding.” You say. “I think I have to be drunk to watch that.”

“You don’t have faith in my taste in movies?” Soonyoung asks but he pops open the first drink and slips something shaped concerningly like a knife out of his pocket and stabs the can, chugging it before it can really spill on your carpet. Before you can register what he did, he tosses the empty can on the coffee table, immediately scrambling to straighten it. “Sorry, force of habit.”

“Soonyoung, I don’t think I can keep up with you,” you say, sitting slowly onto the couch.

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m a lightweight,” he says. “I definitely should not have chugged that.”

“I guess I better catch up,” you say, unscrewing the vodka and pouring a shot in the little paper cups that Soonyoung brought. The acrid scent curls your lip but you knock it back as fast as you can, forcing it down when you miss the back of your throat and it burns your tongue. Soonyoung hands you a can, the lime flavored seltzer pushing the nasty flavor out of your mouth.

“Yeah, I’m terrible at that,” you say.

Soonyoung shrugs. “I’m not one to judge. You should have seen me as a pledge.”

You grin at the mental image of Soonyoung wearing a fake toga made of bedsheets. “I bet you were adorable.” You take another sip of the drink (which tastes significantly worse when you aren’t comparing it to straight vodka) and miss Soonyoung scrambling for words.

“I can’t drink this,” you declare, setting the can down. You cross the room to the fridge, opening it and studying the contents. Soonyoung follows you, resting his chin on the door and glancing inside.

“Jihoon does most of the cooking,” you say, feeling self-conscious. Not much populates your fridge, a package of chicken breast and a carton of eggs. A couple containers of take out that are either two days or two weeks old sit in front, and the drawer of fruit that is filled with apples from Jihoon’s mother definitely smells funny.

“I live in a frat house, this is heaven.”

You flash him a smile and grab the orange juice, shaking it as you grab a glass from the cabinet (thank god Jihoon did the dishes last night). Soonyoung follows you back to the couch and waits for you to pour a glass and add two shots of vodka. You raise the glass and he takes your rejected White Claw and clinks it.

“Cheers,” he says, sipping this one instead of chugging it. He sets it down and leans against the armrest so that he can face you. “How did you meet Jihoon, by the way? He seems like a pretty reserved dude.”

“Yeah, sorry if he was short with you, he isn’t half as mean as he pretends to be,” you say.

“We actually talked a lot.” He pauses, tilting his head as he thinks about it. “Well, a lot about working out. I think I could turn him into my gym buddy with enough pressure.”

“I would pay to see that,” you say. Jihoon tried to bring you to the gym exactly once, and you have regretted it ever since. The soreness haunts you, but you think Soonyoung might be one of the few people on the planet that could keep up with him with those arms.

“I didn’t know you were into that,” Soonyoung says with a giggle. You roll your eyes.

“You know for a fact that’s not what I meant,” you say, “and to answer your question, we lived in the same dorm freshman year. He was next door, and both our roommates were psychotic, so we ended up trading. We’ve been living together ever since because I’m the only one that can put up with his annoying ass. Also he cooks and keeps me alive during finals.”

“I can’t believe I was a dorm assignment away from living with you.” Soonyoung shakes his head and pretends to sigh. “Fate isn’t on my side.”

“Don’t you live in a frat house?”

“Semantics,” Soonyoung says. He pauses. “Semen-tics.” He starts to laugh and though the joke is far from funny, you find yourself giggling too.

“You’re drunk,” you say.

Soonyoung points at you. “I’m pretty sure you’re drunk too.”

You tilt your head from side to side, trying to think at first but the motion feels nice, toeing the line between dizzying and comfortable. Right, you were checking if you were drunk. You have your answer, but you don’t want to stop spinning just yet.

“Do you really want to be a lawyer?” Soonyoung asks. You freeze with your head on your right shoulder, frowning at him. “I mean, like, how do you know?”

“It makes good money,” you say. “Well, corporate law does. Everything going according to plan, I’ll be out of debt before I’m thirty, retiring at 65.”

“But how do you know that’s what you want?” Soonyoung asks. You wonder if he’s asking you or himself. You think about the first day you met him.

It was the first day of your sophomore year, 8 in the morning in the worst classroom in the Armhayer Building at the end of a dead end hallway with no windows. The business program had a required career building course and some cruel administrator decided to make the other available class clash with the other required business class for the year, so half the class was people you were stuck with for the full year. Despite its reputation, the business school at the university seemed to only accept idiots.

You settled for a long semester of biting back your eye rolls and yawning through class, choosing a seat in the front so that at least you won’t have to look at anyone else. And for fifteen minutes, you struggled to keep your eyes open.

Then Soonyoung walked in.

He was out of breath, telling the professor that he got lost several times and someone gave him the wrong directions. You didn’t really pay attention to him until he dropped into the seat next to you. Fully prepared to give him a side eye and judge him for the rest of the semester, Soonyoung flashed a smile at you and apologized for disrupting you. He was so obviously not your type, yet when his head dropped on your shoulder, you didn’t wake him up. Two classes later when the professor told the class that you would be in a semester-long partner project, you didn’t hesitate to say yes when Soonyoung asked you.

Soonyoung hadn’t ever taken the class seriously, going through the motions and doing the bare minimum for most of the assignments. You never paid any attention to it, but you realize that he never actually told you what he planned to do with his life, always asking you what you planned to do with your copious amounts of money. Now you wonder if it was because he really doesn’t know.

“I want stability,” you finally say. “This plan is stable. Safe, as long as everything goes according to plan. I guess it’s not as cool as dreaming about being an astronaut or whatever, but it’s what I want.”

“I think it’s cool. Knowing what you want to do.” Soonyoung says with little enthusiasm.

“You don’t have any idea?”

He shrugs. “I have to be smart to do the things I want to do.”

“You are smart.”

“You don’t have to pander to me, I’m not looking for your pity.”

“Soonyoung.” You wait for him to look you in the eyes. “You are smart. This isn’t pity. Sure it takes you a little longer to read things, and you have to work a little harder to answer some questions, but that doesn’t mean you’re not smart. You’re just as capable as me, more capable when it comes to emotional intelligence. Have you ever noticed that wherever you go, someone is always waving to you? I don’t think there’s a single person in this world that doesn’t like you. Don’t downplay how important that is.”

He chews on his lip and you know he doesn’t believe you. How many people have told him he’s dumb? You want to drag every single one of them here and make them apologize, make them realize how special the boy in front of you is. Eventually he shrugs. “I’ll just end up being an intern, and then I’ll be so charming they’ll promote me without realizing I don’t know what I’m doing and I’ll become a CEO that pays people to do the job for me.”

You smile and shake your head. “We can vacation together in the Bahamas.”

“Please, that’s where the semi-rich people go,” Soonyoung says, lifting his head from the back of the couch. “We’ll have our own islands and sail past each other.” This time when he smiles, the sparkle glints, just a little. His bleach blonde hair sticks in strange angles from rubbing against the couch, looking a little like a fuzzball. You reach a hand out and pat it down, except the hair is fried from being bleached so many times and almost breaks under your hand.

When you pull your hand down, Soonyoung is staring at you. Except staring isn’t the right word. He looks at you like no one else ever has, a thousand unsaid words behind his eyes, a language like no other that maybe only you can understand. Those dark eyes, so soft and warm, begging you to drown in them. He’s a siren, luring you in with a song of desire that only you can hear.

You don’t realize you’ve leaning closer until you fall forward, catching yourself on his chest. Soonyoung’s hand flies to your waist, moving so fast it must have been reflex.

“Sorry,” you mutter but you don’t get off him. Resisting his eyes from this close is impossible. Soonyoung blinks at you, frozen. It occurs to you that you’re almost kissing him. All you have to do is lean forward, press your lips against his. Would his lips be chapped? Would he kiss you back? Would he make fun of you for being a terrible kisser? You hold your breath, wondering if you are about to find out.

You jump at the bang of a door slamming shut. You push off Soonyoung’s chest, back to your side of the couch until your back slams against the armrest. The pain is almost enough to sober you up and you realize exactly what you were about to do. You can’t bear to look at Soonyoung staring at you so you look at Jihoon instead, who doesn’t seem to realize that he interrupted anything by walking into the kitchen, headphones blasting music so loud that you can hear it. He grabs one of the takeout containers from the fridge and finally notices you and Soonyoung staring at him.

“What?” He shouts over his headphones. You shake your head and he stares at you all the way back to his room, slamming the door shut behind him with enough force to make you jump again.

“We should probably start the movie,” you say, turning to face forward, anywhere but Soonyoung. “I’ll get my laptop.” He doesn’t say anything but you can feel Soonyoung’s eyes on you as you jump up. Ignoring the spinning in your head, you walk to your room. You lean against the door as soon as it shuts behind you, closing your eyes and taking a deep breath.

You wish you could blame the idiocy on the alcohol, but you aren’t drunk enough for that. Besides, regardless of the reason, it was a mistake, it would be a mistake, to kiss Soonyoung. No matter how badly you want to do it.

Your computer sits on your desk. The longer it takes for you to get back, the stranger it will be, so you grab it and return to the couch. Dizziness gives you an excuse to peer at the floor, perfectly valid reason to avoid Soonyoung’s eyes.

“Are you ready to have your mind blown?” He asks when you insert the DVD into your laptop.

You raise your eyebrows but still don’t have the courage to face him. “It’s that good?”

Soonyoung laughs easily, as if nothing happened. “You have no idea what you’re in for.”

You peek at him from the corner of your eye. He faces the computer, sitting back against the couch. Other than his red tinted cheeks, you can’t tell he’s drunk at all. You have no idea what you’re in for, he said. He has no idea how right he is.

You hold Soonyoung by the shoulders, staring him down. Your eyes begin to water but you hold them open, determined not to lose. Soonyoung squints, tears forming in the corner of his eyes. You just have to hold out a little longer, but your eyes begin to ache and the air pierces into them.

“Damn!” Soonyoung cries, throwing himself back onto the couch and squeezing his eyes shut. You let go of his shoulders and resist the urge to rub your eyes, settling for blinking as fast as humanly possible. Your eyes burn but you smile anyways, wiping tears away with the back of your hand.

“How are you so good at that?” Soonyoung asks. He gives into the impulse, hands pressed against his eyes.

“I’m really not, I think you’re just bad at staring contests,” you say. “Now hurry up, you lost so you have to answer.”

He sighs as if he didn’t beg you to help him study. With only a day before his test, you’re not sure how much this is really helping, but at least he isn’t partying with the rest of his frat (who do a pre-finals bar crawl, apparently). Instead, Soonyoung is on your couch, again. You try not to think about the last time he was here. Not productive thoughts, especially not when Soonyoung is one day away from taking the most important test of his life.

“Is it B?”

“Are you asking or telling?”

“I hate when you say that.” He peers at the paper, eyes moving slowly as he rereads the line. “No, it’s C! Wait, no, B. No, A!”

“Pick an answer.”

He chews on his lip. You have to force yourself to keep your focus on his eyes. “B,” he finally says.

You’re tempted to drag it out and make him wait but he puts on the Soonyoung Sparkle so you go ahead and nod.

“I knew it! Trust your gut!”

“You’re quoting me now.” You pretend to wipe tears from the corner of your eyes. “You’ve grown up so quickly.”

If it were Jihoon, he’d roll his eyes but Soonyoung perks up, as if you’ve given him a real compliment. He pauses before asking his next question, eyes flickering to the papers separating you from him.

“You really think I’ll do well?” He asks softly.

You study him, the way his unnaturally blonde hair has been strategically gelled to stick up in all the right places, the way his plain white t-shirt hangs loose on his shoulders. You wonder what he sees when he looks in the mirror because the way he sits now, waiting for an answer as if you’d actually say no, breaks your heart a little. He really has no idea how brilliant he is, in every sense of the word. You don’t know how to make him see it so you just take his hand and wait for him to look you in the eyes.

The second the glittering dark irises meet yours, you see the desperation. He tries to smile, to hide the fear but Soonyoung has always been easy to read. You fight the urge to brush your fingers against his cheek.

“Soonyoung.” You squeeze his hand. What you feel isn’t a passing crush, you’ve known that for a while now. Admitting it doesn’t give you the bravery to do anything except pull the shield of cowardice around your heart a little tighter. “I’d be an idiot if I said I didn’t.”

He holds your gaze a little longer, until it almost looks like he believes you. Then his eyes light up. “I have a surprise for you!”

He digs into his backpack, pulling out a blanket (not the one he used when it was still warm enough to sit outside in the grass), a plastic water bottle half-full of bright green liquid, three crumpled flyers for events on campus, and finally, a small rectangular item, carefully wrapped in paper towels.

“I was a little worried it would get damaged in my backpack,” he says. “I really, really tried to walk gently and didn’t bring it near any coffee.”

You choose not to point out the unnatural liquid in the plastic water bottle, instead appreciating his efforts to protect whatever your surprise is. Besides, it’s not like he didn’t try. He carefully pulls the paper towels off, revealing a navy blue leather bound book with gilded lettering. Not just any book.

“You got it back?” You cry. Soonyoung pulls the rest of the paper towels off to reveal the intricate design on the cover, the golden pages, with Pride and Prejudice inscribed on the spine. “My baby!”

You hover over the book, not wanting to ruin it with the dirt and oils from your hands but so desperately wanting to caress the beautiful book. It’s just as you remember it, down to the tiny dent on the front cover where you accidentally knocked it against a railing. You can’t wait to put it back on your bookshelf where there has been an empty space ever since Jun managed to snag it. You remember Soonyoung is there when you hear his laughter.

“You like it that much?”

“Of course,” you say. “It’s my baby.”

“It’s a book.” But he smiles and you know he’s just teasing. So you figure, why not?

You throw your arms around his neck, pulling him into a hug. His frat-bro instincts must take charge because he doesn’t hesitate to hug you back, pulling you against his chest and squeezing you like he’s the one getting a gift.

“Thank you,” you say. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

“This is my thank you,” he says. You can feel his voice rumbling in his chest, a strange sensation that sends butterflies tumbling around between your stomach and your heart. “It’s the least I could do for you.

The awkward position isn’t exactly comfortable, twisting your body to face him with your shoulder overtop of his forcing your face into his neck but you don’t want to let go. You give yourself five more thundering heartbeats before you let go, turning to study your book again so you have an excuse to avoid his eyes.

“How did you get it back?”

“Same way you lost it,” Soonyoung says. “I made a bet.”

“On what?”

Soonyoung shrugs, turning to look at the book that still sits in his lip. He gently places it into yours, using the paper towels to prevent smudging with his fingers.

You frown. “How? Jun is in another hemisphere.”

“Don’t underestimate the power of video calls and express shipping,” Soonyoung says. “By the way, I’m wearing your friends down. Pretty soon they’ll like me more than they like you.

“Oh really?” You raise your eyebrow. You ignore the vole gnawing at your gut whispering that he might just be right.

“I got Jihoon to go to the gym with me and I got him to admit I was friends with you before he was,” he says, holding a finger out. “Jun says that he wants to meet me the second he returns to the country.” A second finger goes up. “Who else can I add to the list?”

He’s only joking. He doesn’t mean it the way it sounds, but your skin wants to crawl inside out. The truth is, they are pretty much your only friends. Jihoon, Jun, and Soonyoung, the latter two having wormed their way into your life. My only friends.

“You’ve got to start going on the offensive,” Soonyoung says. He avoids your eyes and you know he didn’t miss your discomfort. Great, now he pities you. “I’m serious, Seokmin and Joshua have been asking about you, and Seungcheol keeps complaining that he hasn’t met you yet.”

You snort. “They’re frat bros, they just want more people to party with.”

“I’m a frat bro,” he says.

“Yeah, but…” But what? He’s Soonyoung? Once again, you wonder why he is so different to you–why the epitome of frat boy chaos doesn’t repulse you like he should. But he isn’t some one-dimensional steroid-infused party boy, not the type to bully the freshman trying to join just because he can. He gets drunk after two shots and makes his pledges follow him for 24 hours a day as “hazing,” only to take them for a dinner he can’t afford and skips his own classes so they don’t miss theirs.

He’s not a typical frat boy. But Soonyoung loves his frat, and you can’t find a way to tell him this without making it sound like you are looking down on the rest of the members.

So you just say, “Isn’t this supposed to be a study session?”

Soonyoung sighs, pulling the book in front of him and staring at the words. Even though you can see that he isn’t reading, he doesn’t say anything else.

“Your test is tomorrow,” you say.

“Yeah, I know.” He doesn’t pick up the pencil.

You’ve never struggled to read Soonyoung. He can’t hide when he’s upset, shoulders slumping, a little pout forming over his lips. He doesn’t fully frown but his eyebrows comes together, just a bit. And it’s usually easy to figure out what’s wrong–he’s tired, or wants to be at a party instead of studying. But now? He was fine just a moment ago, even while he was cramming earlier.

“Is something wrong?” You don’t know why you’re so scared of the answer.

“I just thought that… nNever mind.” He sighs again. “You’re right, this is a study session. I should be studying.” He doesn’t look at you and you can’t help but feel like you messed up. But Soonyoung eventually picks up his pencil and asks you to check his answers and the feeling slowly fades.

Will the rest of your feelings fade when you aren’t with him like this anymore? When he takes his test and has no reason to see you every day? Will your heart still beat at the mention of his name? Will you spend the rest of your life thinking about all the almosts with him? Or will it fade until Soonyoung is just a boy that you helped because of a silly bet?

Even as you consider it, you know the answer. He isn’t just a boy, and he never will be. Maybe that’s what really scares you.

You glare at Soonyoung. “Do you know what time it is?”

Jihoon glances at his watch. “7:43.”

Soonyoung grins beside him, arm over his shoulder. Both boys stand in your bedroom doorway looking far too composed for this ungodly hour.

“It’s a Saturday.” Just two minutes ago you were in blissful sleep. Okay, maybe not blissful, since you stayed up until three in the morning because you couldn’t fall asleep, and you were having a weird dream where you were looking for something and ended up by the stadium staring at a giant duck statue instead of the raven. But the point is you were asleep until two fists banged on your door so loud you thought it was going to fall apart.

You can’t even be that mad at Soonyoung, not when he smiles like that. So you glare at Jihoon.

“Honestly, I figured you would be up,” he says. “You were the one that said you didn’t think you were going to get any sleep.”

“I’m sorry,” Soonyoung says. “I really just wanted to help distract you for the last hour.” Right. The last hour until your entire future would be determined by a triple digit number. No biggie.

“Let me get dressed,” you say. They step back before you have the chance to slam the door in their face. You’d like to be able to dress up nicely, but you’re already shivering, so you grab your comfiest sweatpants and the sweatshirt Soonyoung lent you (that still smells like his cologne). You dart into the bathroom and meet the two boys in the doorway of the apartment, pulling on your sneakers.

You pull the hood over your messy hair and tighten the strings. Soonyoung grins at you and taps your nose.

“Ready to go?”

“How did you get out of bed this early?”

“Oh, I never got in,” he says. “Long story, but we gotta go, they won’t wait much longer.”

“They?” You ask but Soonyoung doesn’t hear you. He turns to Jihoon, waving.

“See you tomorrow!” He says, throwing an arm over your shoulders to pull you out the door. “I’ll let you know how it goes!”

Jihoon rolls his eyes. “Whatever.” But he looks at you and smiles. “It’ll be fine.” Before you can thank him, he shuts the door.

Soonyoung doesn’t let go of your side, pulling you to the elevators and squeezing you against him. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I should be asleep.”

Soonyoung smiles, as if your grumpiness is funny. You decide it’s moot since there’s no way you could fall asleep now that you are an hour and seven minutes away from finding out the results of your future.

“I figured I’d save you from wallowing in worry,” Soonyoung says. “We can do fun things while we wait. I planned out the whole morning, we have options! There’s going to the gym, or for a job around campus, breaking into the science lab and petting the rabbits, going to Barb’s for breakfast–”

“Breakfast,” you say. You aren’t a huge fan of getting in trouble with the college when you have just over a semester before graduation and though you aren’t sure if your stomach will accept food, working out is a guarantee for throwing up. Besides, a hot cup of coffee could clear a little of the fog in your brain.

“Barb’s it is,” Soonyoung says, practically bouncing on his toes. He really seems to only have two settings, and today he’s at 120%.

He lets go of your side when the elevator opens and you step to the ground floor of your apartment. You rub your arms and pretend like the chill is from the weather even though the lobby is still warm. He holds the door for you pretending to be a doorman, bowing and gesturing with his arm for you to pass. You turn so that he doesn’t see that the silly gesture made you smile.

Parked outside is a white jeep that looks larger than normal, and is apparently the asshole that’s been blasting their music for the past ten minutes. You aren’t surprised in the slightest when Soonyoung strides up to the car.

“I don’t have a car,” he says, belatedly apologetic. The two men in the front seat don’t seem to mind, though you suspect they have been up all night along with Soonyoung as soon as the door opens and you hear their voices singing off-tune over the blasting music.

“Boy, you got my heartbeat runnin' away,” The driver cries, using a water bottle as a mic. You recognize Seungcheol from Soonyoung’s descriptions, half from his voice and half from the back of his head. The person riding shotgun is also familiar, a mess of dark hair that must be Joshua. He doesn’t look much different in daylight, sunglasses resting on his forehead. Thankfully they turn the music down a little and stop singing when you get it.

Seungcheol grins at you through the mirror. “So I finally get to meet the infamous YN. You know, you still haven’t shown up to any parties.”

“I’ve been busy,” you say, glancing at Soonyoung who focuses a little too much on his seatbelt.

“Hi, YN,” the passenger up front says, waving at you through the rearview mirror.

“Joshua,” you say. “Get into life and death scenarios with Soonyoung recently?”

“Well, Soonyoung jumped out of a car window.” He pauses. “It wasn’t moving,” he adds when Seungcheol jerks his head towards him. “Though I wouldn’t put it past him.”

“I have done it before,” Soonyoung says solemnly. It takes him a moment to realize everyone is staring at him. “It was a dare.”

“Why am I not surprised,” Seungcheol grumbles, turning back around and putting the car into drive. Though you were thinking something along the same lines, the way Soonyoung deflates a little makes you wish Seungcheol hadn’t said anything.

The rest of the drive is quiet–at least in terms of conversation. Seungcheol cranks his stereo up to the loudest setting and blasts the Spice Girls until Joshua starts singing along. Apparently car karaoke for “Wannabe” is sacrilegious to the frat leader.

You can hear yourself think again when the car pulls into the parking lot and he finally cuts the engine. A few cars line the parking lot of the 24 hour diner that sits on the outskirts of campus. The giant neon red Barb’s that hangs over the entrance flickers in the cloudy morning light teeters the line between quaint and electrical fire waiting to happen.

The workers, a host and three waitresses, wave at the boys, and do a double take at you. You swear you hear the host whisper “Is that really them?” to Joshua as he leads the group to a table in the corner but Soonyoung distracts you with the menu.

“I had this thing memorized since freshman year, I can’t believe you’ve never been here. The pancakes are my favorite for hangover cures, not that I’m hungover by the way, I’m actually running on my third energy drink.” He taps the picture, a golden stack of perfectly fluffy pancakes that can only be photoshop.

“Aren’t energy drinks bad for your heart?”

Soonyoung shrugs. “Joshua invented this to get through finals, you mix Red Bull, Bang, and Coke and it keeps you up for three days straight. Great for when you’re nervous because you physically have to do something about it.”

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” you say. “Wait, why are you nervous?”

“Your test results come out today,” he says too quickly.

You consider debating with him but a waitress approaches, wearing a fifties frock and a high ponytail with a ribbon that probably looked like a bow at the start of her shift but has drooped down and now just looks sad. Her face is a mask of emotions, not a smile, not a frown, just emptiness, a contrast to the button clipped to her collar making her “Happy.”

“The usual?” She asks, pausing at you. She tilts her head and you can see the mask twisting at the edges, a frown almost forming on her brow. She glances at Soonyoung. “Is this who I think it is?”

“Who do you think it is?” Soonyoung asks at the same time that Joshua and Seungcheol say, “Yes.”

The corner of Happy’s lips turn into a tiny smile that seems to be her equivalent of a grin. “I’ve heard so much about you.”

“Okay, haha, very funny,” Soonyoung says. “Stop harassing my friend. We’ll order when we have a chance to look at the menu.”

Happy raises her eyebrow just slightly at the word “friend,” but closes her notepad. She returns to a pastel pink bar where you can clearly see her whispering and gesturing to you.

“Why do so many people know me?” You mutter, shrinking into the corner of the booth.

“The thing about Drunk Soonyoung is that he doesn’t really shut up,” Seungcheol says.

“That’s being gentle,” Joshua says. “One time he spent four hours describing Finding Nemo. That’s longer than the actual movie.”

“It’s a good movie,” Soonyoung says.

“The point is,” Seungcheol says, glaring at Joshua, “he tends to talk when he’s drunk. Usually about good things, things that he… Well, things that he likes.”

You turn your head to look at Soonyoung, who is once again pretending to study the menu. “You like studying for the LSAT that much?”

Joshua unsuccessfully tries to hide his laugh with a snort while Seungcheol gains slightly more success with a fake cough. Soonyoung doesn’t react at all, staring at the painted flowers on the menu. Eventually, he shrugs. “I’m dedicated to the bet.” He points at a stack of pancakes covered in bananas and chocolate. “That’s what I usually get.”

“Isn’t against all rules of gym core and muscle building to eat decadent things?”

“Did you just call working out ‘gym core?’” Seungcheol asks.

“Am I wrong?”

“Nope!” Soonyoung says brightly. “And cheat days are a thing, so do you want to split it or not?”

“You know I can’t say no to bananas and chocolate.”

“And pancakes!” He waves down the waitress and points to the stack.

“Ah, the new Soonyoung,” she says. “You guys getting your actual usual?”

Joshua and Seungcheol nod and she doesn’t bother to write any of it down. Then again she already knows their orders. Except she called Soonyoung’s “new.” Before you can ask what she meant, a shout makes you jump. You turn around to see a stream of boys entering, enough of whom you recognize that you realize at least half the frat has rolled into the diner. The waitresses roll their eyes and groan but somehow they don’t look all that upset.

“Mr. President!” The tallest boy, Johnny according to Soonyoung’s Instagram tags, holds a fist over his heart and pounds it a couple times. Seungcheol nods and greets each of the boys, most of whom seem to still be in various stages of inebriation. Almost all of them glance at you and whisper to each other, and you get the feeling they know exactly who you are.

Just what has Soonyoung said about you?

“How are we doing on time?” One of them calls out.

“46 minutes,” Joshua says. You frown. 46 minutes… until 9? Do they all know about today?

You tap Soonyoung on the arm. “What’s going on?”

“You see, the thing is,” he says, “apparently I was nervous?” He tries to fake a laugh but it sounds strained. “I don’t really know but the guys made me tell them about today and then I didn’t really know what was happening but I guess they followed us here? Thought you might like moral support, or something.”

You peek out at the booths crowded with frat bros and cringe back into your seat when they grin at you. “They’re all looking at me.”

“Well, I guess I do talk about you a lot,” he says, only loud enough for you to hear. He won’t meet your eyes.

Ask him why. You want to be brave. You want to be right about the answer you think he’ll give you. You chew the inside of your cheek.

“Because of the bet?”

Soonyoung doesn’t answer for a moment. “I guess.”

Coward.

“Why are we whispering?” Joshua asks, leaning across Soonyoung towards you. “Are we gossiping?”

Soonyoung pushes him off. “Butt out.”

“Just telling Soonyoung that I’ve never had an army of drunk guys rooting for me before,” you say.

“Could have had it sooner if you came to a party,” Seungcheol says.

“You really want me at a party that bad? We just met.”

Seungcheol glances at Soonyoung, who shakes his head. He sighs. “If only I could tell you why you need to come.”

You frown between the three men. “I don’t like when people talk in circles over me.”

“Just promise you’ll come to the Christmas party. It’ll all make sense then,” Seungcheol says. You’ve heard a lot about Seungcheol from Soonyoung, and the more you listen to him, the more you believe it. He’s a strange man.

“I’ll think about making an appearance.”

“Really?” Soonyoung whips around to face you and you know that you have to come now. You haven’t seen him this excited since you let him skip studying to party. No, he’s even more excited now. “You’ll come?”

You can’t stand his gaze so you study the placemats. “Maybe.”

He grabs your hand until you meet his eyes. “Please?”

The Soonyoung Sparkle. You never win against it. “Fine.”

“Get a room,” Joshua says behind a very fake cough. You pull your hand back into your lap and pretend like you aren’t embarrassed.

“How long now?” You shout out.

“40 minutes,” someone answers. You groan and lean back into the sofa. Studying was hard enough but waiting makes you want to pull out each individual hair on your head. You stare at the ceiling, trying to decide if the stain looks more like a horse or a flower.

“Look at this.” Soonyoung passes his phone in front of you, forcing you to look down. His Instagram is open to a picture of a kitten looking drunk, face covered in milk. Such and obvious attempt to distract you but you smile anyway.

“Sweet,” you say and even you aren’t sure if you mean the cat or Soonyoung. He shows you cat pictures until the food finally arrives (33 minutes to go). You have to wait another five minutes because Soonyoung insists on having a photoshoot, despite your protests that you look like you just woke up (he raises his eyebrows at that). You stop fighting when Joshua makes him cut a piece of the pancake and feed it to you. Chocolate nearly drops in your lap but Soonyoung shoots his hand out at the last second and catches it.

“Okay, can we please just eat,” you say. Joshua and Seungcheol shrug and pretend like they weren’t instigating the pictures and telling you and Soonyoung how to pose.

Soonyoung was right about the bananas and chocolate. Rich and decadent, they’re delicious. When he cuts you a slice and pushes it toward you, you can even forget the countdown to the end of the world. Or, more accurately, the end of the world doesn’t mean anything to you when Soonyoung smiles at you like that.

You eat slowly enough to bring you to the ten minute mark. Fear mixes with the dessert for breakfast in your stomach, twisting it until it threatens to jump out of your throat. Soonyoung takes your hand under the table and holds it. You don’t run away this time.

He holds you to the planet again, keeps you from floating away and disappearing before you can reach the stars. It’s Soonyoung that keeps your heart beating. Always Soonyoung.

Seungcheol and Joshua chat, Soonyoung piping in a few times, but their words don’t reach you. Stuck somewhere between crushed beneath the weight of the world and floating away, you focus on the clock, watching the seconds tick closer and closer.

“Last minute!” Someone behind you finally shouts. Soonyoung squeezes your hand. You pull up the website on your phone and put in your login information and hover over the SUBMIT. At thirty seconds, they start shouting it out.

“Ten!”

“Nine!”

“Eight!”

“Seven!”

“Six!”

“Five!”

“Four!”

“Three!”

“Two!”

“One!”

Half the guys start cheering already, probably forgetting the count down doesn’t mean as much as the results themselves. You hit SUBMIT and watch the little wheel spin around and around and around until it finally refreshes. The number stares back at you, impossible to read right in front of you.

169.

“Congratulations!” Soonyoung shouts, throwing his arms around you and squeezing while you try to comprehend what that means. 169. The number should be all you can think about but Soonyoung holds you, shouting how proud he is, how he always believed in you.

“169!” Seungcheol shouts, miles away from your bubble. You can hear the guys break out into cheers, hear them chanting the number (which turns into 69) but it’s just you and Soonyoung. The world didn’t end and Soonyoung is still by your side.

The rest of the morning is a blur. Every member of the frat insists on congratulating you, which mostly means a lot of hugs, though one of the more drunk guys tried to spin you around on his shoulder. You laugh when you’d usually frown and find your way back to Soonyoung’s side like a magnet.

Maybe it’s the euphoria that gives you courage.

“Hey Soonyoung?”

“Hm?”

You say it before you can think too much. “Maybe just the two of us next time?”

He grins before you can finish speaking. “I’d love that.”

You have the courtesy to let Soonyoung sleep in as much as he wants. You wait for him at Barb’s, trying to figure out how to call this a date.

You’ve seen him a couple times since you got your score back, but you needed to study for finals and he had to make up for missing a lot of frat activities. You’ve only seen him in passing, nothing to fill the Soonyoung shaped hole in your heart. But today that will change. You will celebrate together and you will tell him how you feel. And then… you have no idea.

It’s just Soonyoung there’s nothing to be nervous about. Too bad your body doesn’t agree with you. Every nerve stands at attention, jumping at the bell that rings when the door opens. You don’t worry when Soonyoung doesn’t get to Barb’s by 8:30 like he said he would. Even at 8:45, you aren’t worried.

It’s only at 8:55 that you really start to wonder where he is. Maybe you should have picked him up. Knowing him, there’s a 50% chance he’s lying in a ditch after a failed attempt to recreate an impossible stunt from Fast and Furious. At 9, you call him. Between each silence in the ring, you wait for his voice but it never comes. He uses the automated voicemail, so you don’t even get his voice telling you to leave a message.

The anxiety turns to fear while you wait. The door rings and you see a fluff of bleach blonde hair and jump up. But though you recognize the face, it isn’t Soonyoung.

Chan, one of the younger members of the frat, with Mingyu and a guy whose name you forgot. They all have the same look in their eyes when they see you, far too much like pity.

“You’re YN, right?” Mingyu asks. “You’re supposed to meet Soonyoung?” The two guys with him, easily identifiable as frat members between their unkempt hair and sweatshirts plastered with Greek letters, stop mid conversation and glance at each other.

“Is he okay?” You ask, still standing in the awkward position in the booth.

“He’s got his score back,” Mingyu says.

“We were supposed to–”

“Yeah, I know,” Mingyu says. “It was a 167. You should really talk to him yourself.” He pauses, glancing at his frat brothers but they shrug. “He’s at the house. See if you can talk some sense into him.”

You’re too afraid to ask any other questions so you just watch Mingyu and the other two walk past, and pretend that they aren’t whispering and stealing glances at you.

Going to a frat house was never on your bucket list but your feet travel without guidance. You find yourself in front of a rather nondescript house. No bodies hang out from windows, no one is passed out in the yard. Then again it’s a weekday.

You pause at the door, wondering if you should knock. You tap your hand on the door and it slides open, the latch bolt pushed completely in. You step inside tentatively, peeking around but it’s quiet. You turn the corner to find an open room and Soonyoung sitting on a couch, glass with a bright liquid in his hand. He doesn’t even look at you.

“Are you seriously drunk right now?”

Soonyoung just shrugs, taking another sip from the glass. Even from here you can smell that it’s more tequila than fruit punch.

You shake your head, crossing the room sitting beside him even though he didn’t invite you to sit down. He was considerably cuter the last time you saw him drunk. You’ve gotten used to the power of Soonyoung’s facial expressions, his smiles, his frowns, the way his eyes glaze over when he’s bored, the way they gleam when he daydreams; they’re as precious to you as Soonyoung himself. But his face is a clean slate now, not a smile, not a frown, just a blank stare.

“You know a 167 is still insanely good, right?”

He shakes his head.

“Soonyoung.” He doesn’t look at you, so you grab his drink. Any other day and you would have failed miserably but his alcohol-impaired senses make him slow enough for you to get a hand on the half-empty glass. He glares at you but you don’t yield, tightening your grip and pulling the bottle even harder.

“Let go,” you growl. “Talk to me like a normal human.”

He shakes his head, pulling on the glass so you yank back, except you overestimate how weak he is like this, and the glass flies out of his hand, the contents spilling all over you. The red liquid sinks into your blue sweater, soaking you through all three layers.

“What the hell?” Soonyoung says.

“That gets your fucking attention? Spilling your drink?” You say. “You know, I really thought you were different.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re acting like a child. So you didn’t win the bet. Who fucking cares? Do you know how hard it is to get higher than a 160? Soonyoung, you are smart, and you worked so hard for this. You could go to law school with that score. You could graduate above a 2.3 if you stopped acting like a stereotypical fuck bro and actually studied.

“You know, you could actually be something if you wanted. You don’t have to get a degree and work at a corporate job that sucks your soul away until the Soonyoung that actually matters is gone. I know it’s easier this way, but if you actually tried to dream, you could do something. I don’t get it, honestly. Because everyone thinks you’re an idiot you act like one? Is that what it is?”

“You don’t have to pretend like you don’t think the same thing.”

You snort. “I don’t, but clearly you won’t believe me. You think that if you have to work for something then it’s not worth it when you could be so much more.”

“Why do you even care?” Soonyoung asks, looking you in the eyes for the first time. For a moment, you think you might actually be wrong, because all you see in his eyes is pain. A physical force that constricts your heart and makes you weak in the knees, Soonyoung looks at you like he’s been fighting a war you never knew about, like he’s been suffering in silence for a lifetime. He looks at you like you’ve broken his heart.

Why do I care? You could scoff. Because I’ve been in love with you ever since you fell asleep on my shoulder. I’ve been fighting this stupid crush for so long that I don’t know who I am without it. I don’t know who I am without you. I care because every day the world proves that we aren’t worthy of this planet, that love can’t solve all problems yet you make me question it all. You don’t just bring light into my life, you make it glitter. And I can’t tell you any of this.

“I don’t know.” The lie tastes bitter but it’s still sweeter than rejection.

“Then why are you here?” Soonyoung looks away. Without his eyes pinning you down, you can breathe again, but every inhale still drags against your heart. You stand up. Afterall, you don’t have an answer for him.

“I take it back. You are an idiot,” you mutter over his head as you walk past him. You make it to the corner of the street before the tears finally spill over your cheeks, and all the way back to your room before you can’t breathe.

Without the distraction of finals, you are left with your own thoughts, your words and Soonyoung’s floating around your head. You have always been something of a hermit but you’ve become J.D. Salinger himself, only leaving your room to sneak into the kitchen and scrounge for scraps of junk food that Jihoon hasn’t thrown away yet. You watch so much reality TV that you start to dream about it.

Every episode the people, a family living on a homestead that just happens to dress in brand name clothes and drive a Benz, fight and cry and make up. You yell at the mother when she forces her daughter to change because she didn’t think polka dots are appropriate and cry along with the daughter when she starts to sniffle in her confessional, wondering if her mother would ever approve of her choices, whether it was clothes or the people she wants to date.

You bet your confessional would be a hit if it was ever filmed. Tears run down your cheeks as you practice it in the mirror, choking out an apology for calling him an idiot and telling the whole world what you aren’t brave enough to tell him.

Jun calls but you can’t answer. He leaves three voicemails: an apology, a goofy one telling you he’ll be back soon, and a final one, yelling at you to pick up or at least let him know you’re alive. You text him an apology you don’t know if you mean. He says thank you anyway and doesn’t call again.

You have no plans to change your schedule (wake up, steal food, cry, sleep) but on the third day you run out of goldfish and can’t find anything in the kitchen that doesn’t make you nauseous. To make matters worse, despite the fact that it’s seven in the morning (the earliest you’ve woken up since the Fight), Jihoon catches you.

You’ve successfully avoided him and his inevitable lecture, slamming your door shut and ignoring his knocks but he catches you off guard today. He sneaks in from his morning workout wearing a black t-shirt and slides that he somehow manages to walk stealthily in, scaring you when you close the fridge and find him standing where the door was.

“Are you done hiding?”

“I’m not hiding,” you mutter.

He folds his arms.

“Fine,” you say. “I’m not done hiding.”

“Well too fucking bad,” Jihoon says. You try to step past him but he holds his arm out. You’ll never beat him in a physical fight so you step back, shaking your head.

“Have it your way. Go ahead.” You wave your hand. “Get it all out. Yell at me or lecture me or whatever, I don’t care. You’re going to tell me that I’m an idiot? That I shouldn’t be so afraid of rejection, that I’m blind to how he feels?

“Or are you going to tell me that I shouldn’t trust someone like him? That I shouldn’t be crying over a goddamn frat boy, I’m better than this, I’m better than him.” You choke back a sob, not sure what words are coming out anymore. You wipe at the tears in your eyes and are so focused on trying not to cry that you don’t notice Jihoon walking away. You do see him come back, blurry shape coming into focus as you blink away the tears. He holds something in his hand, a navy blue square. A throw pillow from the couch?

He shifts it in his hand until he holds the corner with the zipper, swinging it a couple times back and forth. Then he yanks his arm back and arcs the pillow in a wide loop, landing directly on your head.

“Ow!” You cry but Jihoon just swings again, hitting your arm this time. He hits you so hard it knocks you off balance, sending you to the floor. Jihoon doesn’t hesitate, swinging the pillow into you again and again, every inch of you.

“You. Are. An. Idiot.” He grunts out each word with a blow. “You really think you’re better than him?”

He finally pauses, not even breathing heavily. You shake your head to answer him. “Of course not.”

“Good,” he says. Then he hits you again and again and again.

“Ow, Jihoon, what the hell?” You bury your head in your knees and hold your arms over you, trying in vain to protect yourself.

“I’m not your babysitter,” he says. “I’m not your father, or your brother, or any of that shit. I’m your best friend and you’re being an idiot and I’m not going to stop hitting you until you get some sense knocked into you.” He freezes, as if realizing exactly what he said. “Wait, no–that’s not what I mean, shit, sorry, but–”

You peek out from your arms and find Jihoon opening and closing his mouth, trying to figure out what to say. He looks like a fish out of water, and it occurs to you he is a fish out of water. He’s never had to comfort you before, probably never had to comfort anyone. No wonder he’s so bad at it.

You wouldn’t laugh at him and borderline abuse, but your emotions are beyond fried, and he just looks so funny standing over you with a pillow raised, still sputtering half apologies. You try to stop the laugh before it comes out but it turns into a snort and then you can’t stop laughing, tears that you tried to push back falling freely. You lay back on the floor and laugh until your sides hurt, only vaguely aware of Jihoon laughing above you. Eventually he joins you on the floor.

“You know what I meant,” he says. The pillow rests on the floor between his legs, all the fluff on the far end from the one-sided pillow fight.

“I knew what you meant without the pillow.”

“Too bad,” Jihoon says. “I’m tired of listening to the theme song of that god awful show. You could at least watch something like–”

“I swear if you bring up an anime, you’ll feel exactly how hard that pillow can hit.”

Jihoon laughs, patting it a couple times. “I saw him the other day. He looked tired.” He pauses but you don’t dare speak. “We didn’t speak. I don’t even think he saw me. But it doesn’t matter because I’m not the one he needs to talk to.”

“I know,” you say.

“Then why are you still on the floor?”

Because you’re scared. Because it would be easier to just give up now, for once to ignore putting in the hard work and just let it pass. But just because it’s the easy option doesn’t mean it’s the right option. At the very least you need to apologize to him.

“What if he hates me?”

Jihoon snorts. “Then he’ll get some pillow violence too.” He pauses. “He doesn’t, though.”

“It doesn’t mean that it will turn out okay.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Jihoon says. “But no matter what happens, you’ll deal with it. And even if it absolutely sucks in the moment, eventually it will be over, and it sure as hell will be better than that stupid fucking show.”

You nod, setting your chin on your knees. Your stomach turns in anticipation for what you will have to do, but he’s right. It’s time to stop running. Tonight is the Christmas party, and you were never formally uninvited. Somehow you doubt Seungcheol will throw you out. It’s time to get off the floor and get ready.

“Have you ever thought of being a life coach?”

“Hell no.”

What am I doing here? You fake a smile at Seungcheol and swallow the shot as fast as you can, grimacing as the vodka burns everything from the inside of your mouth to the depths of your stomach. You should have just stuck to your mixed drink only policy but Soonyoung always has you breaking your rules. Even when he isn’t with you.

Seungcheol disappears as soon as you take the drink, and you don't see anyone else you are comfortable enough to chat with, though that list is quite short. You do a turn of the house, which looks marginally better than the last time you saw it ,the benefit of bad lighting. It’s already crowded with more people than you’ve ever seen on campus. You make your way through each room on the lower floor, finding more than a couple bleach blondes. None are who you’re looking for. You stop in the living room, where you saw him last.

“He isn’t here.” You turn at the voice. An unfamiliar boy stands next to you, holding a half-empty Smirnoff Ice. “He went to visit family or something.” He pauses, looking you up and down. “At least that’s what he said.”

You nod. You find it doesn’t surprise you that he seems to know who you are. You suppose you’ve grown used to it, just one of the side-effects of being close with Soonyoung. Though it’s still strange, it doesn’t make you uncomfortable anymore. Or it wouldn’t, if you didn’t think this stranger is implying that it’s your fault Soonyoung isn’t at the ‘Party of the Year.’

You can’t stand his gaze so you make your way back towards the drinks, grabbing the first bottle you could find and chugging half of the lukewarm drink. It tastes like a fruit you can’t recognize and carbonation and the more you drink the harder it is to swallow but you force it down.

You came to apologize. He isn’t here, so why do you stay? Because you promised him? Do you really miss him that much? That you would come here and suffer through all this chaos, just for the memory of him? It doesn’t make any sense but you think that might be a side effect of the alcohol. You get another drink just in case you’re still sober.

Your head pounds, the aching feeling of the stage between drunk and sober. Normally you’d like to be sound asleep by now, or at least in the comfort of your home, but you can’t bring yourself to leave. It’s hot and sweaty, the music is way too loud, and you can’t find water anywhere, but you stay anyway, because you’re an idiot that fell in love.

You curl up on the couch, opposite of a couple making out as if the room isn’t full of people, waiting for just a glimpse of him that will never appear. Even drunk, you think it’s pitiful, but you can’t stop.

You didn’t think you could fall asleep in all the noise but you open your eyes when you feel the world tilt sideways. You’re vaguely aware of the arms underneath your legs and back, cradling you against someone’s chest. No, not just someone.

Because you aren’t enough of an idiot, you can tell it’s him, his sweet scent, maybe even just his arms. Soonyoung carries you out of the living room and up the stairs, the blaring music fading only slightly.

“I thought you weren’t here,” you mumble.

Soonyoung frowns down at you. “You okay?”

You shake your head, suddenly realizing there are tears in your eyes. No, I’m not okay, I love you, you want to say. He squeezes you a little tighter, trying to hug you while still carrying you.

With your head resting against his chest, you can fully appreciate his beauty. His hair is black, which suits him even though he looks nothing like your Soonyoung anymore. You reach up and trace the lines of his face that are unchanging, the sharp straight line of his jaw, the gentle curve of his nose, his soft eyebrows. You drop your hand when you realize he’s staring at you, belatedly realizing you never got to his lips. You can only imagine how soft they’d be, soft like Soonyoung himself.

“You’re crying,” Soonyoung says softly. You can’t tell if he’s talking to you or not. He pauses in front of a door, struggling to open it without dropping you. Finally the door swings open and he sets you down on a bed, taking a deep breath and sitting beside you.

He brushes the tears from your eyes, as Soonyoung as ever. Sweet as ever. Sweet and Soonyoung. They should be the same word. You make a mental note to email Merriam-Webster’s dictionary and make the suggestion.

Soonyoung doesn’t say anything, just watching you with those perfect eyes. His hand rests on your face even though the tears are long gone, thumb tracing shapes on your cheek.

“You swore you’d do anything for me,” you say.

“Anything,” Soonyoung repeats.

You turn to the walls, knocking his hand off your cheek, not daring to look him in the eyes. Even drunk, you are a coward. He’s put up pictures on his wall, a couple Polaroids but mostly printed pictures, with the frat, some childhood pictures, and one that you recognize. The picture of the two of you at the beach that you thought you didn’t send, where you are looking at him with all the love in your heart. You trace his smile, blinding even in paper form.

“Could you maybe try loving me back then?” You mumble. Your eyes feel heavy between the alcohol and the tears and you’ve said what you needed to say, so you let them take over, closing your eyes and letting the blasting music from downstairs drown out any thoughts. And because it’s so loud and you’ve already drifted off to sleep, there’s no way you could hear his answer.

“I already do.”

The first thing you do when you wake up is throw up. You make it out of the bed but not to the bathroom, mostly because you don’t actually know where it is. You grab the nearest bucket-shaped item, which happens to be a mostly empty trash can. You lean away as soon as you’re done, breathing through your mouth and looking away from the mess. Belatedly, you realize someone is patting your back, brushing hair out of your face.

“Better?” Soonyoung asks. His knees rests against your lower back, one hand resting on your back, the other caressing your face. Thank god you already threw up because looking at him makes your stomach twist again and if there was anything in you, it would come up again. If you could throw up your heart, you would. As it is, the organ is trying to climb its way up your throat, whether it’s guilt or heartbreak you don’t know.

You nod in answer to his question, letting him help you up. Your head pounds and though you know you won’t throw up again, your stomach flips. Right, your policy of mixed drinks is definitely reinstated after this.

“Sorry I threw up in your trash can,” you say.

“Believe me, that is not the worst that trash can has seen,” Soonyoung says. “Wait, that sounds bad, I didn’t mean it in a weird way, I just mean–” He stops himself, shaking his head. “It’s a frat house.”

“It’s your room,” you say softly. With sober (albeit heavily hungover) eyes, you take in the room again. It’s tiny, one bed pushed against a wall with a desk set right next to it. Unsurprisingly, it’s stacked with protein powder and a pile of frat flyers, laptop balancing off the edge, not a paper in sight. Except for the one next to his bed, the walls are bare, an ugly shade of beige except for a circle filled with white plaster that looks suspiciously like the reformed crime scene of a fist going through drywall. It must be from whoever owned the room before Soonyoung.

The wall next to his bed is covered in pictures. You remember being amazed by them last night. Your eyes zero in on the picture of the two of you, right next to the pillow that’s still dented from your head.

“Did I steal your bed?” You frown except the movement hurts your head.

“I slept in Johnny’s room since he’s decided to disappear off the face of the planet instead of accepting the fact that he graduates next semester,” Soonyoung says. “I actually just came in here for some clothes, which reminds me.” He rummages through a drawer, pulling out a wrinkled t-shirt and handing it to you. “If you want a change.”

You glance down and feel like throwing up all over again. Your favorite shirt is covered in stains, alcohol, vomit, and something you definitely don’t want to name. If you weren’t feeling so terrible already, you’d cry that Soonyoung is seeing you like this.

“I’ll get you a toothbrush, too,” he mutters, disappearing and leaving you to scramble to switch shirts. The white dri-fit is meant to be a workout shirt, though it’s clear that it would be oversize on Soonyoung. Either way, the soft fabric is gentle on your skin, much better than the jeans you slept in. Too bad you’re stuck in them until you get back to your apartment.

You could run away right now. Soonyoung probably wouldn’t be surprised. But he’s being nice to you, so much nicer than you deserve. Sweet and Soonyoung. But you came here to apologize, and though last night got derailed, you can’t keep running from it. Besides, it’s not like the morning can get much worse.

So when Soonyoung comes back proudly brandishing an unopened toothbrush that he may or may not have stolen from Seungcheol’s bathroom, you accept it gratefully. You stare yourself down in the bathroom, fighting nausea and an impending migraine because you have a mission to achieve, a real mission unlike last night. It’s still a haze, but you don’t think you’ll ever forget how gently Soonyoung cradled you against his chest, the brush of his fingers on your cheek. If he didn’t show up this morning, you’d think it was a dream.

Soonyoung’s door is open when you finish but he isn’t in his room. You grab your bag from the floor and venture down the stairs, leaning heavily on the railing. There’s a couple people passed out in the living room, and one person snoring softly in the kitchen, head folded in his arms in a position that must be incredibly painful for his neck. But it’s where you find Soonyoung, digging through the fridge and finally pulling out a water bottle. He hands it to you, along with a bottle of pills.

“Thank you,” you sigh, not even bothering to check the label for the brand. You take a couple and chug half the bottle, gaslighting yourself into believing that it will instantly revive you (it doesn’t work and your head still pounds).

“Are you hungry?” Soonyoung asks. He opens the fridge again, this time wide enough to show the shelves that are filled with beer, vodka, and White Claws. There’s a pizza box and some eggs, but not much else.

“How are any of you alive?” You ask softly, glancing at the snoring person on the counter.

“Yuta can sleep through an apocalypse, don’t worry about him,” Soonyoung says, waving his hand. He closes the fridge, leaning against it. “And most of us keep our actual food in mini-fridges. I just cleared mine out for break, so I don’t have anything in it.” He doesn’t say anything else about vanishing.

“I’m pretty sure that pizza has been in there since the start of the semester and I’ve never seen eggs in here before though, so I don’t think you should risk any of this,” Soonyoung says. “McDonald’s fries are a far superior hangover cure, they’ve never failed me.”

“There’s a McDonald’s nearby?”

Soonyoung grins, pulling keys out of his pocket and spinning them around his fingers a couple times, except they fly off and clatter on the floor. The man asleep on the counter, Yuta apparently, stirs but doesn’t move. You can’t help but smile as Soonyoung scrambles to retrieve them from the floor. If you didn’t know any better, you’d think he was flustered.

“There isn’t one,” Soonyoung explains, leading the way to the door. “But I have the keys to Seungcheol’s car.”

“I’m not really comfortable with grand theft auto,” you say, though you don’t stop following him to Seungcheol’s giant white Jeep.

“He gave me the keys last night when I walked in,” Soonyoung says. “Something about owing me. He was pretty drunk.” He darts around to the passenger side before you can, opening the door for you. He waves his hand when you frown at him, as if you’re the one acting strange. Thinking with this headache is too hard so you just get into the car and strap the seatbelt on.

“I can’t believe you thought I’d steal a car,” Soonyoung says. He turns the engine on and scans the front of the car before finally settling his right hand on the gear shift.

“You have driven this car before, right?”

“Of course,” Soonyoung says a little too fast. You grab onto the door handle and hope that your stomach really is empty.

Soonyoung’s driving isn’t the worst you’ve ever experienced; that title goes to Jihoon, who was banned from touching car keys after his Mario Kart driving. That said, you think he’s a good second place. He slams on the gas and the brakes too hard and drives altogether too fast. He blasts the radio and sings along purposefully off key. You should be terrified but it’s the most fun you’ve ever had riding in the passenger seat.

“I’m never riding with you again,” you say, breathless from laughing. He pulls to a stop at the red light, the Golden arches of your destination still one light away. “You know yellow lights mean slow down right?”

“I stopped at this one!” Soonyoung says. “I’ll have you know I haven’t been in an accident.” He pauses. “Since I was nineteen.”

You nod, pursing your lips to stop yourself from smiling fully. “That’s what I figured.” You peek at Soonyoung and he’s smiling too.

So different from the last time you saw him. You don’t deserve this. You shouldn’t be able to laugh and joke around with him so easily, not when you still haven’t apologized. And Soonyoung shouldn’t be looking at you like that, genuine fondness in his eyes.

“The light’s green,” you say. His smile fades a little when he turns his head and drives ahead, stepping lightly for once. You’re so close now, but a car going straight in the right lane prevents him from turning.

The pain medicine must have kicked in because your headache is slowly fading, replaced by heartache that no medication can cure.

“Why are you being so nice to me?” You blurt out.

The blinker beeps a steady rhythm in the empty silence. “Isn’t it obvious?”

“Nothing’s ever obvious with you, Soonyoung,” you say softly.

“Oh.” The light turns green and he guides the car slowly into the parking lot, stopping in a spot instead of pulling up to the drive through. As soon as the car is in park, he turns to face you. There’s a crease in his forehead that you recognize from the rare occasions that he would actually talk to you seriously. “YN, I genuinely thought I was being clear about this from the beginning, but if you still really don’t get it, then I’ll say it straight up: I like you. I’ve liked you since the day we met and then I fell in love with you.

“Did you know you’re the first person that’s ever genuinely believed in me? I mean, I know I have friends, and my family means well, but they always get this look in their eye whenever I talk about trying for things, like it was cute that I was trying, but they never actually believed in me. And I started to believe them too. I started to believe that I couldn’t believe in myself.” He frowns. “That makes no sense. The point is, you are the reason I started to believe in myself again.

“No one’s ever looked at me like you do. No one’s ever told me to get my shit together–well, they have, but you’re the only one that told me it was because I could be better.

“You say it wasn’t obvious, but I’ve tried to tell you a thousand times. I flirted, I tried to ask you on a date so many times, and I finally accepted that you’d never see me like that, so I was a dick. I told you off, even though you were right. I’m so sorry for that, and I’m sorry I ran away, and I’m sorry it took me so long to apologize.”

“Stop,” you say. Soonyoung’s eyes widen, tears welling up, and you realize he thinks you’re rejecting him. “Stop apologizing!” His brow creases in confusion, an adorable frown. Summoning all your courage, you reach out, resting your hand on his. “I’m the one that’s sorry. I didn’t have any right to judge you and the choices you were making, and I shouldn’t have yelled at you when I knew how much the bet meant to you.”

You squeeze his hand, closing your eyes. “And I think I was a little oblivious on purpose. I’m not the kind of person that has crushes, let alone crushes that like me back, so I freaked a little and missed all the signs.” You open your eyes and grin at him. It’s easy to feel brave when he smiles back at you. “But I like you, Soonyoung. I like you so much, I don’t have enough words to express it. My whole life has been about my future, my career, and it’s exhausting, but being with you makes it all exciting again. Like, no matter what happens, if you’re with me, it won’t just be okay, it’ll be fun.”

Soonyoung beams. “Really?”

You squeeze his hand. “I like you.” Like the first time you took the LSAT, you can’t think of a single word, except instead of damning your future this feels like the start of it. Soonyoung sits across from you and you don’t need words.

You don’t know how long you sit there, but reality sets in when your stomach growls. You glance outside the window and remember where you are. “Did you just confess to me in a McDonald’s parking lot?”

“Better than drunk in my own bed.”

“I didn’t!” You let go of his hand to hide your face.

Soonyoung grins. “You were cute!”

“I don’t remember it, it doesn't count!”

“Whatever you say,” Soonyoung says, leaning over the center console. He gently pulls your hands away from your face, hand circling your wrist gently. You instinctively hold your breath, though you don’t lean away. Soonyoung leans a little closer, forehead resting against yours.

“This okay?” He whispers, breath kissing your lips, and you remember that less than an hour ago, you were throwing up. Your head still aches and your stomach is still queasy and your whole body feels disgusting.

“We are not having our first kiss in a McDonald’s parking lot,” you say, leaning back. Soonyoung sighs, but he sits back in his chair, settling for grabbing your hand and interlacing his fingers with yours.

“Fine,” Soonyoung says. He rubs his thumb back and forth, and when you meet his eyes, you see a familiar glint of trouble. “You know I’m still sworn to you. Whatever you want.”

The words go straight to your heart. You could live a thousand lives and never meet someone as genuine as Soonyoung. You know that he means it, heart and soul, that he’d do anything for you. And it should be terrifying that he’s willing to bear his heart for you, that you are willing to do the same. But it’s Soonyoung. It’s easy to trust him with it, because even though he breaks half the computers he touches and can’t hold onto a pencil for his life, he won’t ever drop your heart.

I love you. One day you’ll be able to say it, one day you’ll scream it like you so desperately want to. But until then, you settle for his certified brilliant smile and the gentle brush of his lips on the back of your hand, only letting go to turn the engine back on.

“Let’s get you some fries,” he says. “Then kisses?”

You shake your head and laugh, slipping your hand back into his.

Before he can put the car into gear, his phone rings. He stares at the screen for a moment, frowning like he can’t decide whether he should answer it or not. Finally he slides the green across, turning on speaker.

“Hey Seungcheol, I’m with—”

“Where the hell are you? And where is my car?” Seungcheol’s voice is somewhere between angry and concerned. “You think it’s okay to vanish and then show up only to steal my car?”

“First of all, you gave me the keys,” Soonyoung says. He glances at you. “And I’m at McDonald’s because YN desperately needed a hangover cure.”

“Hey,” you say so Seungcheol knows you’re there.

The line is quiet for so long you think Soonyoung’s phone has finally given up on him but eventually he says, “You’re with YN?”

“We talked,” he says. “And we’re good.”

You snort. “That’s how you’re going to describe it?”

“Are we not good?”

You glance at your hand still intertwined with his, the Soonyoung Sparkle glittering back at you when you look him in the eyes. Good? There’s not a word to describe how you feel right now.

“We are beyond good.”

“Are you crying?” You whisper. Soonyoung shakes his head, chin brushing against your head but when he inhales again, he sniffles. You reach up to pat his cheek and are entirely unsurprised when it’s wet. On screen Elle Woods continues her speech, for once not wearing pink.

“She’s just so cool,” Soonyoung says. You lift your head off his chest so you can look him in the eyes. The temptation to tease him is hard to resist but he pouts his lips and you see another tear slip out. You kiss his cheek, out of habit more than anything. Strange how much can change in two weeks, how something you’ve never imagined doing has become natural. But being with Soonyoung is just like that. New and old at the same time, the kind of comfort that has you planning how to make this last a lifetime.

Soonyoung wraps his arms around you tighter, so you nestle back into his chest, turning away from the end of the movie to close your eyes and breathe in his cologne.

“I can’t believe you’ve never seen this,” you whisper, lips brushing against his neck. “The whole bet was based on a movie you haven’t seen.”

“You’re missing the end,” he says. His voice rumbles in your ear, drowning out his heartbeat.

“I’ve seen it before.” Your bed really isn’t built for two people to lay down together. You are laying more on Soonyoung than the mattress but it’s not the first time. From the way he holds you, you doubt it’ll be the last.

The credits roll too quickly, but Soonyoung still doesn’t let go. He pulls you up so that your head is next to his, nose centimeters away from yours.

“So am I officially qualified to go to law school?” He asks.

“You are Elle Woods certified,” you say. “But you’re sure that’s what you want?”

“I mean I have to get in. But I figure if I’m going to waste away at a desk, I might as well do it for something I believe in.” He pauses. “With someone that believes in me.” He presses a kiss to the side of your neck, breath tickling the sensitive skin. You can’t help but sigh.

“That doesn’t mean it’s what you want,” you say, after several heartbeats of struggling to think.

“I want…” His words “To be with you. However you’ll have me.” His arms loosen, hands sliding down to your waist.

“Still not answering the question,” you breathe out but you can’t even remember what the question is, not when he’s shifting to lay on top of you, lips inching their way up your neck. He kisses your jaw, your cheek, the corner of your lips, then stops, pulling away and meeting your eyes again.

The Soonyoung Sparkle. The grinch has nothing on you–your heart swells so large it feels like it’s going to explode out of your chest–Alien style. Does he know what he does to you? How he’s made everything in your life shine? How happy you are when he’s with you?

“I love you,” you whisper.

Soonyoung blinks at you. “You…”

“I love you,” you say again, this time with more confidence. “I really, really love you.”

Soonyoung grins, leaning down and pressing his lips to yours, moving like the world outside has stopped. He makes a bubble around you again, or maybe it’s your own heart; either way the only thing that exists is the way his hands inch up your shirt, the way his lips begin to press harder against yours. You give up on coherent thoughts, settling for wrapping your arms around his neck and pulling him closer.

“I love you, too,” Soonyoung whispers between kisses. “If that wasn’t obvious.”

Soonyoung who always treated you like you were enough already. Soonyoung who does everything with 100% of his heart. Soonyoung who has always been sincere with you, from the first day you met him. Soonyoung, who you are so lucky to be loved by.

You don’t know how to say any of this in a way that makes sense so you let his fire melt you until you are putty in his arms. He pulls away, and the Soonyoung Sparkle burns, your personal stars flickering back at you.

“You want to–” Soonyoung starts to say, but the door slams open. Then Soonyoung falls on you, pillow rolling off his head.

“I’m taking this back!” Someone shouts while you hear Jihoon cursing.

“Read the room, idiot!” Soonyoung pushes off of you, sitting up and pulling your shirt down as smoothly as he can. You sit up, trying to decide if you should be embarrassed or angry. Facing Jun, frozen midstep with his jaw hanging open a little and Jihoon in the doorway with his arms folded, shaking his head slightly, you opt for the latter.

“Does no one knock in Colombia?” You frown at him. “And when did you get back? Why didn’t you call?”

“It was supposed to be a surprise,” he mumbles, staring at his feet. “And you were supposed to be alone, according to my sources.” He glares at Jihoon.

“YN didn’t say he was coming over,” he says with a shrug.

You turn your frown to him. “You walked in halfway through the movie, I literally shouted ‘Soonyoung’s over.’”

“I had my headphones on,” he says, though he’s avoiding your eyes too. Typical of your friends, never claiming responsibility for their actions.

“So this is Soonyoung,” Jun says, turning to face him. Soonyoung moved to the edge of the bed, too far away for your taste but probably an appropriate distance for your friends, especially compared to what they walked in on. Jun tilts his head. “You dyed your hair.”

“Yeah,” Soonyoung scratches the back of his head. “Spur of the moment thing.” You miss the blonde, surprisingly fitting considering it isn’t his natural color. But the black suits him too, and probably will help him with law school interviews. Then again, knowing Soonyoung, this color won’t last long either. Good thing there isn’t a color you don’t think suits him.

“We should do this properly,” Soonyoung says. “Go out for dinner or something.”

“Hey, I didn’t get dinner,” Jihoon says.

“You want to get dinner with me?” Soonyoung perks up.

“No, I’m protesting unfair treatment.”

“It’s not unfair, I’m just clearly his favorite,” Jun says.

“Can you guys stop fighting over my boyfriend?” You say.

Jihoon and Jun stare at you. When Soonyoung turns to face you, he grins, eyes sparkling.

“What?”

“You just called him your boyfriend,” Jun says.

“Well… he is.” You feel your cheeks flush. “Why are you guys making it weird?”

“It’s not weird,” Soonyoung says. He scoots closer to you, wrapping an arm around your shoulders. “It’s cute,” he whispers in your ear. “Adorable.” This only makes you flush even more.

“Well, I don’t want to interrupt, so I’ll just grab this and you two can get back to… whatever.” Jun takes a step towards your bookcase. You grab the pillow that he threw at Soonyoung and nail him in the chest, earning a laugh from Jihoon.

“Don’t even think about it.”

“The book is mine, Soonyoung never fulfilled the bet!” Jun says. You stand up, blocking him from your Pride and Prejudice.

“Hey, I followed through!” Soonyoung says. “We’re dating!”

“I remember the bet stating that you had to ask YN out after you took the LSAT.” Jun turns to him.

“And I did,” Soonyoung says. “You never said it had to be right after.”

Jun eyes him. “That’s cheating.”

“That’s being a lawyer,” you say. “And I think he’s going to be really good at it.”

Jun glances between you and Soonyoung and shakes his head. “Whatever, I’ll get my book back another day.”

You step closer to Soonyoung and he links his pinky with yours. You glance at your friends. “Are you going to stand there forever or are we getting dinner?”

“You two don’t want to get back to what you were doing?” Jihoon asks.

You slip your hand into Soonyoung’s. He meets your eyes and he’s only been your boyfriend for two weeks but looking at him is like looking home. There’s no need to rush.

“Sounds like someone doesn’t want to pick where we go.”

“We should make them pay, too,” Soonyoung says.

You grin at him. “You are the smartest person I know.”