#trauma survivors navigating spice

[ashintheairlikesnow]

The Same Bed: Lost (And Found)

CW: Trauma recovery, healing internal and external injuries, references to noncon and choking, brief suicide mentions at the beginning, references to past pet whump, consensual spice between survivors, brief masochism funtimes

The Same Bed: Part One: Jake | Part Two: Krista | Part Three: Chris | Part Four: Vincent | Part Five: Antoni | Interlude | Part Six: Nat | Part Seven: Owen | Part Eight: Tonight | Part Nine: Reunion | Part Ten: Too Late | Epilogue: Lost (And Found)

(using the “Lost” prompt for @whumpmasinjuly day 2 for this! Loosely interpreted, but still...)

-

“Hey.” Jake drops the stack of folders, stuffed with paperwork, onto the table. “I brought these by for you to look over. I think I have it all taken care of, though.”

“Cool.” Jenna doesn’t look at him, sitting with her chin in her hand, watching a TV in the corner. Jake follows her gaze to see the chyron running along the bottom of the screen, a news anchor talking animatedly. The volume is so low he can’t hear it, but the subtitles are on. 

NOTED FORMER CHILD STAR OWEN GRANT FOUND DEAD IN APPARENT SUICIDE…

Jake takes a seat across the table. “Suicide? That’s what they went with?”

“That’s what I paid the coroner to go with, yeah,” Jenna says, leaning forwards a little. She’s cut her hair short, to her chin. It suits her. “Figured it’d be better to have open-and-close suicide case then a bunch of cops looking for a murderer they’re not gonna find. Cops hate that shit, but they love getting to wash their hands of something and say it’s not their problem. And that Grant asshole doesn’t have any living relatives to push for it to be a crime, right?”

“Right. He just had his mom, some distant cousins that hated him as much as everyone else did.”

“Good. Yeah, the coroner’s going to find that Owen went a little off the rails after losing his mom. It’s believable.”

“Yeah. He definitely went off the rails, anyway.” Jake hesitates, and then offers, reluctantly, “Thanks, Jenna. For your help. I know how you feel about Kauri-”

“You know how I felt about Kauri,” She answers breezily. She sits up, then, pulling one of the folders in front of her, opening it up and looking over what she sees inside. “It’s been years, Jake. He’s not who he was then, and neither am I. Plus, I don’t like the idea of people fucking with us after we’ve started to really get better. It wasn’t that big of an ask.”

“Jenna.” Jake barks out a laugh. “I asked you to drive around with a dead body in the trunk to help Antoni get rid of it, that's not a small ask!”

“It is,” Jenna says, almost primly, “When I don’t mind doing it. I didn’t mind following him to make sure he went to that house like we thought he would, and I didn’t mind helping Antoni out with the body. Besides, I used Vincent Shield’s money to bribe a coroner to say Owen Grant is dead by his own hand, you can’t tell me that’s not some poetic fucking shit right there.” She sighs, looking over at him. “You can always ask me for help, Jake.”

“Can I? Since goddamn when? You’ve been calling Kauri a whore for a decade-”

“Nah, I haven’t done that in a while. Since I decided to stop like five years ago. Since, you know, I realized… I was just taking out on him what I wanted to say to the other pet in the house I ran from.” Jenna sets the file down again. A frightened young woman’s face looks back up from a printed out copy of stolen WRU records. Someone new to hunt for, someone listed as ‘assisted walk-in’, an abduction in flowery language. Someone they can save and if they make it public, WRU can’t try to take them back without running afoul of the law again.

“Jenna, I don’t-... I don’t understand-”

“People change. I changed. Just… let me have changed, Jake. I was scared, and pissed off, and just… lost… for years. I was angry at her for nearly getting me killed, and Kauri reminded me of her, so I took it out on him. But, years back, that little one, uh, your brother-”

“Chris.”

“Right. Years back, Kauri called me for help with him. And I helped, because I’m not a complete asshole, just like seventy percent of one, and after that… I don’t know. Kauri really stepped up for that kid, and I could see how scared he was. Kauri and I are never going to like each other, but that doesn’t mean he’s not one of us.”

“Well… yeah, okay. Thanks. I won’t push you on it anymore.”

“Welcome. And thanks. Congratulations on the marriage, by the way.” She waved at the ring on Jake’s finger. “Good fucking luck with that. Marrying two people sounds way worse than marrying just one.”

“Nah.” Jake shrugs, and opens a file himself. He circles what he sees - ‘referred by foster mother, assisted walk-in’. “It’s way, way better. They’re pretty cool to be married to.”

“If you say so. No marriage for me, thanks. Too much like being kept all over again.”

“That’s fair. Live the life you want to live, right?”

“Right.” She smiles, then, looking around the little kitchen in the small brick ranch she lives in. “Damn straight. Live the life you want to live, all yours, on your own damn terms. Okay, so I say we start with this one, she’s part of a bonded pair. We can get them both.”

“Where are they located?”

“That’s the best part. They’re handler’s pets. They’re local.” Jenna grins at him, sparkling and full of mischief. “Ready to break into a handler’s house and fuck some shit up?”

Jake can’t stop himself from laughing. “Clearly not as ready as you are.”

“... so yes or no?”

“Yeah, Jenna. Let’s do it. Let’s plan a raid.”

“Cool. So how do you feel about setting his house on fire?”

“... I might know someone who can help us with that.”

-

“She’s said sorry like seven fucking times.” Jameson lays on his side on his bed, his back pressed to the wall. “If she says it again, I might lose my goddamn mind, Allyn.”

“She just feels bad.” Allyn smiles at him, laying a hand against the side of his face, their thumb rubbing over his cheekbone, over a small scar. He shudders, closing his eyes as sparks seem to light and dance down his skin, buzzing just under the surface. When they move their hand away, he can still feel the weight of it, the ghost of pleasure. 

“I know, but I already told her, I don’t mind hurting for her. I didn’t mind. It wasn’t even that bad, I’ve been hurt worse than that!”

Between them on the bed Trash Cat lays curled in a contented little ball, eyes closed. Her ear flicks whenever Jameson speaks, as if listening to him, keeping track of the emotion in his voice. Reading it for potential trouble. 

“But she never wants to hurt you. She never wants to hurt anybody. I get it.” Allyn’s hair falls in loose red waves over shoulder and neck and lays against their face. He tucks a little of it behind their ear, watching their freckles shift as they smile at him, flashing white teeth against pink lips, sparkling gray-blue eyes. 

He listens to their voice, tastes the rainshower that comes with it. 

“I don’t mind hurting,” He repeats, but softer this time. “If it’s the right person hurting me.” There’s an unmistakable flirtation in his voice, then, although it’s tentative. He’s never sure how to start this, now that he isn’t having to guess at a master or owner’s mood, read the tension in the air and break it down by handing his body over to the whip and the cane until they are both bonelessly satisfied. 

No, this is… something else.

Something honest.

Something equal. 

If Allyn hurts him, he knows, it will be because he asked to be hurt. Not because it’s his place. The idea feels like wandering in a new landscape. Touching unfamiliar trees that at least still have bark and leaves, but wondering at colors and shapes he’s never seen. Lost, even with map in hand, because the place he is in is so like but not at all the same as the world he knows.

Jameson shifts forwards, as best he can, back curving a little so he can kiss them. Their lips are warm and soft and his own are a little rough and chapped. For a second they go still, and then they’re kissing him back. It’s perfect, at first, too perfect, and then both of them drop the instinctive training and the kiss goes clumsy and they both laugh as they bump teeth.

Trash Cat chirps, lifting her head to look back at them, and then slowly stands up. She stretches in a perfect arch before stalking down to the end of the bed.

“She’s giving us our space,” Allyn whispers against Jameson’s lips, and giggles. The sound of their laughter sends warmth down his spine, and he moves closer, until they’re touching from collarbone to knees, even their feet twining together. His bandaged hand moves slowly up their side, feeling the slight curve, nearly an angle, from narrow waist to larger ribcage. His thumb is so, so close to their chest, and they inhale in a soft hitch. 

“She just doesn’t want me to push her off the fucking bed in a minute,” Jameson answers, a little breathy, and he hates his hoarse voice - can remember he had a normal voice, with Nanda, before Brute and Robert made him scream until it was gone over and over until it stopped coming all the way back. 

“Can I-... can I try something?” Allyn asks in a whisper, and when Jameson nods, they give a little smile and reach up, taking his hand from their face and holding it in their own. Their soft sotto voice is like subtle droplets on Jameson’s tongue, a burst of the way the air taste just before it really starts to rain. He watches them, meeting their eyes with his own, as their thumb settles just over the center of his palm. Beneath that, a healing cut, where Nat had jammed a GPS tracker as deep as she could get.

And Jameson hadn’t screamed.

He knew how to hurt.

“Can I push down?” Allyn’s eyes search his. “While I kiss you, can I… push down on the cut a little bit?”

His mouth goes dry. Jameson’s body is a lightning rod, and he stares at the storm and wants to beg for the roll of thunder that follows the strike. He nods, a little jerk of his chin. “Yes,” He breathes.

Their lips are on his own, again, opening to slide their tongue against his, and he hums into the kiss, pressing his body to theirs. Warmth stirs deep in his stomach, his body waking up, answering the firmness of their kiss.

Then they press down, pain racing down Jameson’s arm and into his body, and he moans, unmistakable and louder than he means to be. He’s rolled onto his back with Allyn pressing into his hips before he can think, and Allyn’s mouth is on his neck, teeth bearing down on soft skin as they roll their own hips against his, and he moans again.

The front door closes, muffled downstairs.

Allyn pulls back, startled. Then they burst out laughing, leaning over until their forehead touches Jameson’s. “Oh, no, I forgot she was home.”

Jameson breathes in soft gasps, and laughs, too. He tips his head back, baring his neck. The place they were biting is cold where air and the remnants of drying saliva meet. “She’s not home anymore,” He offers.

Allyn leans down to bite again, and presses their thumb into his hand at the same time. 

“I love this,” Jameson groans, eyes fluttering closed. His hips move to meet theirs right through their clothes. It doesn’t occur to either of them to take them off… not yet. “I love, love this-”

“I love it, too,” Allyn murmurs, nipping at his earlobe.

Neither of them says what they really mean. Both of them have loved men who could never fully love them in return. Both of them know the words have always been hollow. But both of them think it, if not consciously, then with every inch of skin where they touch.

I love you.

-

“Antoni.” Kauri’s voice, still hoarse as he heals from the hands that had tried to choke the life from him, is laced with a kind of affectionate irritation. “I don’t need it.”

“You do.” Antoni sets the mug down on the side table next to the bed. The tea within is faintly pink, see through, not marked with milk. Kauri can look down into it and see, a little muddied, the image of a cat face painted on the bottom. He sighs and looks up at Antoni, whose eyebrows raise. “You do,” He repeats. “Tea is good for sore throat.”

“Yeah, for like… when you have strep or the flu or some shit,” Kauri groans, but he pushes himself slowly up to seated, back cushioned by approximately eleven million pillows Jake and Antoni have both insisted on keeping near him at all times. Not that it isn’t really, really nice to have one to sit on when he leaves the bed and ends up in a chair like a dumbass. “I was choked, Ant, it’s not the same. Not even the first time I’ve been choked. Not even just Owen! There was this one guy I went home with once…” He smiles, but the laugh dies in his throat before it comes out as he meets Antoni’s dark eyes.

“I remember,” Antoni says. “I remember that night.”

“Of course you do.” Kauri sighs, and pats the bed beside him. Antoni sits, just at the edge, as if he might flee at any second. Like he wants to run from the pain still marking Kauri’s skin. 

Kauri leans over, and places a hand over his. Long fingers that have been slightly cool for so long are warm from too much tea and time under the covers. His ring glimmers in the light, back on his finger where he plans to never ever take it off again. It overlays Antoni’s own. 

“Ant,” He says, softly. “For the thousandth time. It isn’t your fault. I knew what might happen when I went into that room. I was… I was ready for it.”

I was ready to die.

“I should have been inside faster,” Antoni says, and he leans slowly over until his head rests on Kauri’s shoulder. The soft, messy nearly-black hair tickles Kauri’s cheek and he smiles, pulling Antoni’s hand to his mouth to kiss his knuckles, gently, one by one. Bruised knuckles, torn and bloodied the night of the rescue, now healed but still scarred. “The fight with the other one was not supposed to take so long. We had a plan, and we nearly-... you could have been dead-”

“I’m right here,” Kauri says, voice low. He turns and breathes deep. Antoni’s hair smells like tea-tree and mint shampoo, and there’s always something of a kitchen around him. Smells like flour and baking things and sweetness. “I’m right here, Ant. I am alive, I’m right here, look, I feel like a flip flop left out in the mud but I’m here.”

“If not for Vince-”

“Then you would have saved him.” Kauri smiles, and he keeps that smile in his voice. “And that’d be something, wouldn’t it? Secret runaway pet saves multi-millionaire movie star…”

“It would not matter. It would be nothing, if Jasha and I lost you.” 

“You would still have had each other-”

“It would be nothing. You are the… the piece of puzzle that holds two others together. You are color, we have none without you.”

“Bullshit.” Kauri’s smile widens, though, and he flushes a little at the praise, at being told he is needed. Not just needed but wanted. That, at least, he’s never quite lost, and he wonders if that was inherent in Liam Harker, the man who once walked around in his skin. What parts of him have survived within Kauri? 

Maybe just a need to be loved, and wanted, and needed. 

Maybe Liam had that, too.

“Kasha, I love you,” Antoni whispers. It’s hard for him to say the words. Kauri kisses his forehead. Then the tip of his nose.

He pulls back. “I love you, too, Ant. You and Jake and I… we’re forever.” They sit in silence for a few minutes. In the background, a soap opera plays, which both of them are entirely ignoring. Then Kauri says, softly, “Antoni… will you go get my phone? I forgot it in the bathroom and I don’t think I have the energy to go get it on my own just yet.”

Antoni stands, retrieving the phone where it lays on the bathroom counter. When he comes back, he climbs right into the bed, lying on his side under the blankets, near to Kauri without quite touching him. Kauri doesn’t push, this time. 

Antoni offers touch, when he wants it.

“I’ve been thinking,” Kauri says, taking it and tapping idly on the screen, listening to his fingernail click against the shining black. “About a lot. Since I, uh, didn’t die. Lots of time to think when your partners won’t let you leave the fucking bed.”

“Mmhmm.” Antoni doesn’t take the bait, but he smiles a little, pleased with himself. “What do you think about?”

“I think I should call my mom.” Kauri says it all in a rush. He barely gets the words out, even so. The old drumbeat begging him to run from what’s behind him is still so strong, it nearly drowns him out inside his own mind. But he clings to this thought, because he needs Antoni to either encourage him or talk him out of it. “Well, Liam’s mom. I was thinking, if I had died… she’d been trying to get ahold of me, but what if I died and like, she found out Liam was alive and then I got his body killed anyway? Before she could see him?”

“You are Liam, Kasha,” Antoni says. He watches Kauri with inscrutable eyes, looking up at him from where he lays propped up on one elbow. 

“Yeah, but… what if I’m too different, and she hates me for stealing him? What if she thinks Liam is lost, and Kauri is what came back from the dead?”

“You cannot do this,” Antoni says, shaking his head. “Steal him. WRU stole, and he is not lost. You are him. I think it is a good idea to call your mother.”

“But… what if she hates me?”

“Then you never speak to her again, and she can go fuck herself.” Kauri’s eyebrows nearly raise to his hairline, and Antoni laughs, low and soft and deep. ‘What? You think I can’t swear?” He takes Kauri’s hand, and presses warm lips to the back, right in the middle of blood vessels and nerve-endings, making Kauri shiver pleasantly. “Call her. Kauri Grant is brave, and strong-” He kissed again. “Smart, and good. I think that Liam Harker would like this Kauri Grant. So I think Liam Harker’s mother will like Kauri Grant as well.”

Kauri swallows. “Are you-... are you sure about that? I’ve done some pretty seriously fucked-up shit to this body, Ant. Remember when I spent like a month straight on ecstasy?”

“I do, yes.”

“Plus, there have been, like, seven orgies…”

“Sssshhh. Kasha. Listen to me. She will love you. She loves you already, she is Liam’s mama and that means yours. And also… it will probably help if you do not talk to her about the orgies.”

“Right, right, keep a lid on the orgy talk. Got it.”

“Oh, one more thing.”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t talk to me about the orgies, either.”

Laughing hurts, but Kauri discovers that once he starts, he can’t quite make himself stop. 

-

“And… and, and then they… laugh at me.” Chris sits with his knees pulled to his chest, the heels of his feet just barely balanced on the edge of the chair, arms wrapped tightly around his calves. He won’t look at everyone else, keeping his chin tipped down so the shimmering light purple of his hair hides his green eyes. “And, and, and say, um, you-you wanted me to, and when I, um, when I say I, I, I-I didn’t, they, they, they… get angry.”

He has a silicone feather pendant on a small cord stuck in the corner of his mouth, slightly muffling his speech. 

“They say then, um, then why did you you you sign up? Like… like they, they don’t already know that, um, that I didn’t, and… and then they, they say, let’s go again, and I start… I, I, I start crying, because, because they sound just, um, just like… like my-... like him. And they, um, they put me on my, my my my my, my, my… on… on m-my… stomach…”

There are tears in Chris’s eyes, running down his cheeks, but no one moves. No one speaks. Not yet. 

“And, and, and then… I wake up.”

There’s a breath of silence, and then a man to the left of Chris leans towards him, putting a hand to his back. “I have dreams like that, too.”

Chris looks over at him, resting his head on his knees. His eyes are red-rimmed, wreathed in shadows. “You, you do?”

“Yeah. I’ve been married for, like, what, three years now?” The man gives Chris an encouraging, soft smile, rubbing at his back a little. “And free for ten. And I still, sometimes, I wake up just gasping for air because I remember how it felt. And sometimes I dream that my wife is the one hurting me like he did. Probably-... probably all of us have nightmares, right?”

He looks to the rest of the group of twelve, seated in a circle of folding chairs in a small side room in a community building they rent for these meetings. The others, men and women from their early twenties through their late forties, all nod. 

“It just… it goes with getting better, is that-” The man’s eyes flicker to the therapist ostensibly in charge of this meeting. Dr. Francis just nods, gesturing with one hand for the man to continue. He has a cup of bad, bitter decaf coffee in his hands, slowly warming the styrofoam cup, with powdered creamer stirred in and bits still floating a little on the top, refusing to fully dissolve. “That your brain doesn’t always know that you’re safe. And nightmares are just… how your mind tries to, to put together the two parts of your life.”

“It’d… it’d be, be, be be-be nice if it could, um, could do that some other way,” Chris mutters, and there’s a scattering of soft laughter, kind and well-meaning, from everyone else. 

“It would be,” The man says, and gives Chris a final pat on the back before sitting back. “But that’s not really how brains work.”

Dr. Francis clears his throat. “Isaac is correct,” He says, and moves to take his own seat, sipping his coffee and steadfastly making no expression at the awful taste. “It is, indeed, more common than not to have nightmares, and for many those nightmares can last for years. But they are just that - nightmares. They are your minds working inside of you to put together a life of subjugation with one of freedom, and struggling to reconcile the details. But that doesn’t mean you aren’t doing that. It’s only that our brains must adapt in order to survive at a lightning speed. But… it takes so much longer, doesn’t it, for our brains to realize those adaptations are no longer necessary.”

More nods from everyone around the circle. 

“It… it, it does help,” Chris offers, without uncurling himself. “To know everyone else, um, does, does those dreams, too, that it it it doesn’t… they wouldn’t ever, um, hurt me… they wouldn’t.”

Dr. Francis nods. “But someone did. And our bodies and minds catalog those hurts, and hold on, because they are trying to prepare you for that pain to start again. Your body is trying, as hard as it can, to keep you safe. Let’s take a moment to close our eyes, and just-... you can do this silently, everyone - just say thank you to your body for keeping you alive, and safe, to get this far. Just a quick thank-you. All that fear and pain, that was adapting to survive. Let’s thank our bodies for those adaptations.”

There’s another silence, heads bowed and eyes closed. It looks like a prayer. Some of their lips even move, but no one here is thanking God, not really. Instead, they’re whispering a prayer of thanks to nerves and bone and blood that bruised and broke and sent screaming pain signals to brain cells that rearranged, rerouted, made new pathways of survival where none had previously existed. They are giving their gratitude to lungs that fought to expand even with hands around their throat, to a heart that refused to stop beating even as it broke again and again, to hands that slapped and punched, feet that kicked out, lips and tongue that held desperately to the memory of words they weren’t supposed to say.

Words like fuck you and I don’t want this and stop touching me.

Words like we did not sign up for this.

Words like no.

Dr. Francis ends the moment of silence by clearing his throat again. Some of the men and women in the circle have glimmering eyes when they look back up, rubbing just under them in ways they think are subtle, but which everyone recognizes and no one remarks on. 

“Now,” Dr. Francis says, “We have someone new here tonight, and he would like to tell his story. Would it be all right if I call him in? Remember that there is no wrong answer here. And he won’t be listening to any of your stories, just telling his own.”

Some of the group meet eyes, and then they look back to the doctor and nod. Some carefully, others more enthusiastically. A few even smile, kind and soft, agreeable. 

The doctor stands and steps out of the room.

“It’s the guy who came with you, right?” A woman asks Chris, and he nods without uncurling, chewing on the silicone feather. He starts to sway, just a little. “I wondered why he didn’t come into the room right away. He’s one of us, right?”

Before Chris can answer, the door opens again. Dr. Francis steps in first.

Vincent Shield steps in after him.

He moves with a slow, slightly shuffling step, showing the aches that haven’t quite faded in a body still working hard to heal itself. His movie-star megawatt smile is subdued, simply lips pressed together. The shadow of a bruise still wreathes his eye on one side, another clings to a cheekbone. Finger-shaped bruises are finally fading enough from his throat to not be immediately visible for what they are. 

“Hey, Chris,” Vince says, voice low and slightly rough. Chris hums a greeting. There’s a whisper from a few of the circle participants, people who have seen his movies. Their eyes are wide, surprised, but no one comes at him. No one even stands.

They respect the circle, and the people within it.

“Okay, Vince,” Dr. Francis says amicably. “The circle agreed to hear your story tonight, and welcome you to our meetings from here on out. Gang, let’s make some room for Vince to sit down.”

“Uh, Dr. Francis-”

The doctor looks over at a woman in her thirties, while others are shifting their chairs with soft scrapes along hard floors so Vince can unfold a new one and put his own into the empty spot, slowly sitting down, looking around and smiling with a nervous shyness utterly at odds with the empty friendliness he has on the red carpet. 

“Yes, Trin?”

“He’s… he’s not a Romantic, though,” Trin says, glancing to the side. “Sorry, Vince, no offense.”

There’s a bit of low laughter, not unkind, from the participants. “It’s not exactly something anyone should apologize for not being,” Isaac says, good-naturedly. Trin blushes a little and looks down and away, shrugging, smiling a little uneasily. “But she has a point, Dr. Francis, this is group for Romantics only, isn’t it?”

“Normally, yes. But Vince’s story is a little different. He’s been seeing me for a couple of weeks now, and I think it’s worth all of you hearing it. So many of you struggle with feeling separate from the world, and that’s because of the laws and societal isolation, of course, but… I want you to hear this. Your stories, your experiences, they are connected with the experiences and stories of people outside of WRU, outside the system. I think it could help to see that you are not set apart in that way. Vince, if you wouldn’t mind?”

Vincent Shield sits back. He doesn’t look like a movie star - his hair is shaggy and unwashed, he’s wearing an old Nirvana t-shirt he borrowed from Nat and sweatpants, a pair of sandals that don’t even match. You’d never know who he was, if you saw him on the street.

You might wonder if Kauri Grant was having a bad day, but looking at Vince, you’d never see the movie star beneath the real man. 

“Hi, um. Hi everyone.” Vince smiles. “Dr. Francis asked me to talk to you all tonight. He thought it might help, and I’ll… I’ll talk about my, um. What happened to me, and then you can… I’ll step out and you can vote if you want me here. If you don’t, no harm no foul, I totally get it. I’m not sure I even want me here.” He laughs, but there’s no humor in it. “I’m… I’m really lost, if I’m honest. I’m totally lost at what to do with… everything now. I have this entire life and it’s just… hollow. I’m just doing what everyone told me I wanted to do, but-...”

“But it’s not what you want,” Trin suggests. 

“It isn’t. I’m not sure it ever was, or if I just… was told so many times…”

“They tell you that you want it, the way they treat you.” That’s another young woman. “They tell you you’re a flirt, but they make you flirt to get everything, to get food, to get a place to sleep. They make you… they make you pretend, over and over, and tell you that you’re not pretending.”

“They call, they, they call you a slut,” Chris whispers. “And, and, and if you say you’re not, they, they, they say you’re so good at acting that, that, that you must really be…”

“Right.” Vince clears his throat. “Shit. I didn’t know that I would feel… I told myself for forever that what everyone told me was true. But I can’t… I can’t lie to myself any longer. I just can’t. It’s been eating me alive for so long, and I don’t know what it’s like not to feel that way, and… I guess we’re going to find out. But Nat suggested… therapy, and… maybe not lying to my therapist so much this time.”

“You lied to Dr. Francis?” A third person, a man Chris’s age, asks in a scandalized hush.

Vince smiles - it’s a real and sincere smile. He shakes his head. “No, my old therapist. I’m not seeing her any longer. I wanted to start over. I’m… I’m starting over. So. Uh, where… Dr. Francis, where should I start-”

“Anywhere you like,” Dr. Francis says, voice low and gentle. 

“Uh, okay. I’ll, uh, I’ll start kind of like I start when I go to AA, if you all don’t mind?”

“I go to AA,” Isaac offers, a kind of hand outstretched, in words if not in gesture. “Every week. I’ve been sober for two years.”

“Congrats,” Vince says, sincerely. “I’m, uh, it’s been… a few weeks, but after I got to Nat’s I kind of, I fell off the wagon. I wasn’t sleeping, every time I closed my eyes I saw him... what happened. At the end. Drank until I blacked out and woke up on the floor with Nat’s, uh, that Jameson guy pouring water on my face. Then I got so sick I could barely move, turns out when you stop drinking and then start again, your liver gets really angry… it doesn’t matter. I’m starting over. So here’s to… three days sober, I guess?”

“Here’s to three days,” Isaac says, and smiles. “Three days is a start.”

Vince looks up, then, letting his eyes drift over the ceiling. He shifts and his chair creaks beneath him, as if castigating him for pausing for so long, for letting the silence draw out. Then he takes in a deep, deep breath. He fills his lungs with the oxygen until it burns, lets it slowly, slowly push out again.

“My name is Vincent Shield, and I’m an alcoholic. Sorry, just. That bit’s habit. Anyway… When I was twenty-one,” He starts, still not looking at anyone. His voice shakes a little. It’s thin and strained, pushed out past twenty years of keeping secrets and bruised from Owen’s hands. His throat wants to close around the truth, the way it has always wanted to close. The way he allowed it to close over and over for so, so long. His hands find the sides of the chair and grip, white knuckled. “When… when I was twenty-one, my best friend - my only friend, really, kind of my only real family, my parents had already stopped talking to me by then - told me he loved me.”

The room is silent, except for the soft hissing crackle of the coffeemaker and the hum of air conditioning blowing cold air through vents. 

“I told him I didn’t… feel that way about him. He said okay. For a little bit, things were okay. I thought it was fine… and then he-... he acted normal for a while, but… but then he drugged my drink. And when I woke up, I was tied to a bed.”

Vince swallows.

“Naked.”

Perfect silence, nodding heads. They’ve been tied to beds, they’ve woken up naked, they’ve faced down what had felt like such a unique horror to Vince. A terrible thing that it felt like didn’t happen to other people, and here is an entire room of people for whom it was so commonplace they were told their entire lives revolved around it.

Here they all are, with new lives, hobbies, friends. Things they do that aren’t pretending to be someone else, or being… or…

“I was raped.”

It comes out all at once, a single breath of air, a slur of syllables. Iwasraped.

The next words, somehow, harder to say. He forces himself to speak more slowly. He makes his mind dwell on each and every single word. On what it means, on what it’s always meant, on what damage it’s done. He fights not to cry.

Vincent Shield confesses someone else’s sin.

And grants himself absolution.

“Owen Grant raped me… and it wasn’t my fault.”

-

@burtlederp @finder-of-rings @endless-whump @astrobly @thefancydoughnut @newandfiguringitout @doveotions @pretty-face-breaker @gonna-feel-that-tomorrow @boxboysandotherwhump @oops-its-whump @cubeswhump @whump-tr0pes @downriver914 @whumptywhumpdump @whumpiary @orchidscript @nonsensical-whump @outofangband @eatyourdamnpears @hackles-up @grizzlie70 @mylifeisonthebookshelf @keeper-of-all-the-random-things

#whump #wij day 3 #prompt: lost #wij lost #whumpmasinjuly #trauma recovery #recovery whump #therapy whump #consensual spice #survivor navigating consent #healing injuries #injured whumpee #referenced noncon #referenced past beating #ptsd tw #traumatized whumpee #referenced nightmares #rape mention #suicide mention #jameson bb #allyn bb #jake the shelter guy #erase to control #antoni sings lullabies #come get y'all qpr #chris the strawberry blond romantic #bbu #box boy universe #box boy #the same bed arc

[reading-giraffe]

REVIEW: Does It Hurt? H.D. Carlton

MMC: Enzo Vittale

FMC: Sawyer Bennet

Full disclosure: I listened to it as a dual-narrated audiobook on Audible. Apologies for spelling errors. Narrated by Troy Durhan and Michelle Sparks -- both insanely talented and completed this audiobook experience for me.

🌶️🌶️🌶️

Sawyer is a fugitive from the United States who finds herself stranded on a lighthouse island with Italian shark researcher Enzo Vittale, with a creepy lighthouse keeper. While stranded on the island, Sawyer has no choice but to share her truths with Enzo since she can't run away, nor can she hide. The two of them have a complex relationship with their own trauma and each other, which they navigate while waiting for rescue.

----

Unlike many FMC's I've read, Sawyer is very edgy -- I love her. Granted, her edginess and dark sense of humor comes from a life of trauma and fear. I see a lot of myself in her. Neither of us are long-term friendship-types, value our privacy, don't dole out our life stories to just anyone, and are always on the move. She is elusive, clever, and keeps her walls up HIGH.

Correct me if I'm wrong. But I think H.D. Carlton has a knack for writing up some of the most f***ed up MMC's. Enzo is no exception. He's confusing to me. Domineering, controlling, threatening, Enzo is also protective and chivalrous to Sawyer? He goes from trying to drown her as a threat, to trying to drown her to heighten her org*sm, to putting his life at risk to save her? Don't get me wrong. I love a broody, mysterious, complex man. By the end of the book, Enzo seemed like a trustworthy protector. But he kept making off-hand comments about how only he is allowed to kill and/or torture her? Part of me is wondering if he's only saying that because he knows it hits some survivor part of Sawyer's brain that likely sexualizes her trauma.

Plot: I thought this was a creative plotline. Having seen The Lighthouse movie with Robert Pattinson recently, I can put a face to Sylvester and feel immersed in the lighthouse thriller theme. Carlton quite gracefully married the romance, eroticism, and thriller themes together.

Spice: Enzo and Sawyer 🥵 wow. I love a rough dom. His methods go beyond my zone of comfort for "rough" sex but I still love the psychological manipulation methods Enzo uses during the scenes. And that mouth of his? Filthy. Terrifying. Comforting. Troy Duran is my hot Italian daddy thanks to that voice of his. All things I love. Not the spiciest I've read. Nonetheless, I finished the audiobook wondering if I need to see a psychiatrist.

#hd carlton #does it hurt? #enzo vittale #sawyer bennet #booktok #books and reading #smut #contemporary romance #romance #romance books #book review #book recommendation #book recs

[northwest-cryptid]

(sending it as an ask because I'm not sure if it was okay to reply to the post about kink directly since it was tagged personal, so you can choose to ignore it)

There's a lot of… equating discomfort with danger when it comes to this taboo. "It makes me upset, therefore it's bad" I'm not a kinky person, and there's a wide number of kinks that make me uncomfortable, but at the end of the day, those engaging in them are responsible for their own safety and don't hurt anyone else. I can just choose not to get in their business and go about my day. And it's also true that not being informed about kink and how to navigate them can lead to accidents (or, in some cases, bad actors taking advantage of more naive individuals). It's in this weird state where, after coming to terms with having a kink and living with it, you have to find people and a space where you can learn about safety, but it's not socially acceptable so that search is on your own. From what i've seen, there's a ton of emphasis on safety and consent, and the weird toxic dynamics have been from people who want the spice of kink but "ew not like them" so they never learn to do it safely. They never engage with a community. Though, well, I assume with the internet it should be easier to find that information...? hard to say.

Anyways yeah society is weird about physiological stuff sometimes, specially about sex.

You are absolutely fine to comment on my stuff, friendo!

And yea I absolutely agree with this! I think a big thing with all this as well is honestly just a matter of also like, "there's a time and place for everything but it doesn't have to be all the time and anywhere" it's something I often tell people when kink topics do come up. As far as I see it, discussion of such things being a huge social taboo does lead to a general lack of sexual knowledge and that can lead to potential harm. However, I also feel like the comfort of everyone (not just those who we may deem victims but yes, literally everyone) needs to be taken into account. As you said you're generally uncomfortable with such topics I wouldn't wish to openly or publicly speak on such matters in a group where someone such as yourself may be made genuinely uncomfortable with such discussion. Especially considering that we don't know the reasons for such feelings and could easily end up accidentally triggering a trauma response. I remember an old friend specifically going off about his enjoyment of rather extreme bdsm and as an abuse survivor who was literally stabbed for "misbehaving" you can likely understand that discussion of knives and bloodplay are REALLY not the sort of things I feel comfortable discussing. Unfortunately given the general acceptance of "hoho it is so hot if a girl could kick my ass" as a sort of kink, those sorts of things are often discussed openly around me and any potential protest from me is often ignored outright.

I was once told there was a fine line between understanding someone's boundaries and respecting them, and just being shut down for discussion of "taboo topics" which to be honest I disagree with, I think that line is pretty fucking thick, like thicc with two Cs and a Q. Because someone actually feeling uncomfortable due to personal history, emotional connections with things, or trauma and some pearl clutching Karen are two EXTREMELY different things and I do personally believe that if we are to move forward and accept sex topics as something not entirely disgusting and taboo we need to understand and respect the boundaries that others may set for themselves that come with that.

I do really appreciate the additional commentary on this, it's always nice to hear other's perspectives on this topic since I otherwise cannot learn where I may be wrong. Plus you're cool so like, you know it's always nice to hear from you

#hope you dont mind me answering this publicly #if you do just let me know and i shall delete! #anyways thank you for this i always love good conversation

[relax-and-read-on]

Sexualizing Konrad Curze you say?

*Crack knuckles*

Anon you are in for a world of trouble.

(I promess there will be horny ramble further down just skip the essay to the bullet point list if you want the Fun Time Stuff)

I love Konrad. So much. He's my blorbo. He's my fav to such a degree, I don't even want to fuck him myself, I want to get him the Perfect Partner. He's interesting and unique and provide amazing narrative.

The Problem that I have with sexualizing him is that... Either it turn extremely unhealthy (wich, fair enough, that's hot), or I need to write an entire essay and FIX HIM first before I can hope to get anywhere with him.

Im fascinated by complex character. I am also extremely sex positive, and LOVE a good healing/redemption story. If you mix all that together, you get to my fav type of story ever, wich go as follow: "Character is beaten and broken down, in horrible ways beyond imaginations. They are jagged and a mess. But slowly, they claw their way out of their hole of despair and trauma, bitter inch by bitter inch, and reclaim their agency, body autonomy, and the fact that they CAN love themself."

And like. Isn't Konrad the perfect candidate for that?!?

"That's all well and good Math, but how tf does that relate to sexy stuff??" I hear you say at your screen.

Well! I actually HC Konrad as having survived through CSA. I went into it a bit more deeply early on in this blog, and I might one day make a full analysis of the why I think that, and how it's still affecting him. Let's just say that, the signs are pretty clear.

CSA survivor can, if they want, have a healthy sex life. It just present itself with it's own challenge, unique to that person. Konrad, having incredibly complex and layered trauma, is something else all together. It's straight up fascinating to me to observe his sexuality, and how he can navigate all that. Both in a healthy "trying to get better" way and in a "If you Don't Question Yourself Than Nothing Will Hurt You" way.

That said- here is finally some! Complex nsfw hc of Konrad!!!

Sex with Konrad is. A challenge. He is unpredictable, as he has MANY triggers, and doesn't even know or realise half of them himself.

The neck is 100% off limit. No strangling, and its dangerous to even just kiss it. The hair should NEVER be pulled, but he might melt if you gently scratch it.

If triggered, he won't want to stop, no... He will just get very violent, but will want to continue. Can, and has, bitten chunk out of his partners body.

Only allow oral sex on himself if he REALLY trust the person. Will never perform oral sex on someone else, unless you are really into some serious mutilation.

Do actually like being the bottom. The feeling of being cared for is foreign but nice. Loosing control, however, make him feel weird af. On one hand, it's nice to finally let go. On the other, trauma.

Absolutely accept and is into a partner hurting him during sex. For him it's added spice, of course his partner wants to hurt him!!!

Does not want to cuddle or fall asleep after, unless he has build a GIANT amount of trust with his partner.

Is it pleasure, pain, or just the sensations that he associate with the only times people would willingly touch him? Better not think about that and ask to be slapped harder!!!

Will talk during sex. Not necessarily dirty talk, but similar-ish.

Age play is.... Very, VERY risky. On one hand, if properly done, it might actually help him process some shit, and he would be into that. On the other.... Further trauma~~

Restrain are. Well. He's an eel, and will have fun showing you that they are useless and may have a good time. But if you get him Actually Contained... There's a solid chance you will get the Night Haunter.

You don't fuck with the Night Haunter. He will be the one to tell you to stop and get tf out, and you listen if you value your organs. (Yes, Konrad can only refuse sex if his protective alter ego come out. I know.)

Does not masturbate himself, but would be lowkey curious to watch his partner pleasure themself.

3 way or group sex are dangerous. He might become violent if he's the focus too much, or if there is too many hands.

Once properly introduced to it, would LOVE structured BDSM, with proper scenario and aftercare.

A switch in general in dynamic. He does really need to learn how to not violently hurt his partner, he has huge problems understanding limits.

#warhammer 40k #warhammer #wh40k #primarch #konrad curze #primarch headcanon

[albino-whumpee]

On those quiet moments

As part of the editing, I decided to put 3 chapters into this one, collecting Sann´s experience at Zarai´s and how his relationship with Albus gets more intimate. Hope you enjoy it! (the first one requested by @liliability the second is inspired by this post by @whump-galaxy and the third one was requested by anon)

Taglist:  @castielamigos-whump-side-blog @giggly-evil-puppy @cowboysrappin @haro-whumps @burtlederp @neuro-whump @comfortforthepain @whumps-the-word @whole-and-apart-and-between @broken-horn @ashintheairlikesnow @rosesareviolentlyread@starnight-whump @just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi @as-a-matter-of-whump  @whumpasaurus101 @grizzlie70 @twistedcaretaker

Ok, god, this has been so so long in my drafts I´m so sorry.

I wanted to make something cute for this, I really tried, but Sann is opening up to me with a lot of dark stuff, so I will kind of share some of it? Hope you like it~

CW// Dehumanization, pet whump, creepy whumper, trauma recovery, collars, mental games, past noncon and dubcon touching, conditioning muzzles, conditioning, emotional whump, slight spice, mentioned past torture, scars, identity issues and trauma survivor navigating consent and relationships. Ask to tag! 

“Sann” the boy whispered to himself inside the crate he had arrived to the Glass mansion “Sann. My name´s Sann” he said to himself over and over as he tried to keep his mind away from the cold, from the pain of the bruises and beatings and the smell of other people. “Sann…”

His name was the first thing his Master gave him. Then the collar around his neck. A soft black leather band with golden buckles.

It meant Sann was his, and he had the right to do whatever he wanted to him.

Sann had expected to have his name called sweetly, gently pulled to his chest and be rewarded for his services. But his wishes were nobody´s concerns. Neither his comfort nor his happiness.

He was Robert Glass´s Romantic and he would obey his every whim.

He would stay put when he ordered him to. Watch how he took out his knife, or the belts, or the cane and the handcuffs and he would extend his wrists out and let him mark his body as he wished.

He would scream and shiver when he put the shock collar and slipped on the hood before leaving him tied in the basement for hours or even days, when he got sick of seeing his face.

He would go when he was called and smile when he ordered him to. He would take the beatings, the whipping and the tight ropes holding him in place for hours until his Master came to untie him and laugh when he plummeted to the ground made a shivering, crying mess behind the hood.

Despite all of it, he still held his hand, despite every second of screaming and begging, and rubbed raw wrists and ankles, he still called him Sirius sometimes.

Sometimes, when he wasn´t Sann, he would be kind. Sometimes, when they were alone on their way to another place, in the dark above the clouds, he would free him from his tight bindings. He would gently unbuckle the muzzle on his face and pull him up his lap to sooth his wedges and cuts and all the burns in his body.

“Quiet” the man would say as his stroke his cheek and slipped his hand down his thin shirt. Down his pants.

Sann would never admit now, sitting comfortably next to Al, head resting on his chest or chin on his shoulders, getting drunk in the fragrance of safety the albino induced, how Robert´s lips against his skin gave him goosebumps. How the man´s gentle shushing and hands felt like, when he played the game his father bought Sann for.

In the morning, he would be tied and muzzled all over again. However, when he got one second of solitude, Sann would pass his fingers over his lips. Wondering, if they could reach a point where the brusqueness of Sann´s kisses could be put aside for the gentleness of Sirius´s.

How much he had desired Robert to call him by the name of the person he longed for again, kissed the corner of his mouth and the tattooed lunars on his neck with affection Sann was forbidden from, and how earnestly, he had tried to keep him playing, to taste a little bit of the real love the man had to give, was his deepest secret.

It had been such a fierce desire, yet the dream cracked and crumbled when he took his voice.

By the time his Master took him to Zarai´s Christmas party and he met Albus, he had completely given up on getting kissed with love again.

It was slow, it took a while to stare at Albus with his shyness and odd ways of putting a smile on his face or tend invisible wounds he soothed with his presence alone, so the desire could ignite on his chest. Not the artificial warmth of letting his mind slip into the safety of his programming, but allow Sann, himself, to touch that flame and not burn on it.

Until one day, after Albus and Ma´am came from work, vibrating from accomplishment and pride, his happiness bled into him and Sann kissed him. He had seen how his face turned completely red but ended melting in his lips.

He wasn´t always sure if he was allowed to feel it as Sann, but with Albus, he didn´t have to whisper someone else´s name to hope there would be no pain later.

Being Sann was enough to be loved.

--

“I told you I´m not an artist” Sann said as Albus giggled at his fake, badly drawn mustache on the mirror.

They were once again alone at home, their owners going out for the weekend meant they had the house all to themselves and keys to go outside if they wished to. Sann had spent the whole weekend trying to teach Albus how to swim and laughing at his childish splashing. After so much time under the sun, a massive amount of freckles and small rashes had sprouted on their burnt skin, hence why they had rested the last day before their owners came back and applied sunscreen and cream on each other´s back before laying down in the couch. 

In Albus´ teasing about the new freckles in the other´s back, Sann had picked up the pen they had been using for an hour now to paint on each other´s skin.

“What do you say? Should I let one grow?” The other said looking at himself side by side. Sann stared at him for a long moment. In all the time since he had become Zarai´s property, he had never seen him use a razor.

“Can you?” he asked finally after a moment.

“Possibly not” he giggled taking the pen they had been using to doodle over their faces “But you would look handsome with a beard, should we try see?”

Sann shook his head as he swooshed away the other boy´s hands, unable to stop the smile on his face. Would he? His Master never let it grow, after all.

“Ok, ok. Give me your hand” Albus said extending his arm with a pen on the other. The taller boy looked at his hand and then at him, arching an eyebrow. “C´mon, it´s nothing bad, I swear” he flashed a little smile at him.

Sann put his hand on his, puzzled at the way the other watched and traced the burns and cuts extending all the way from the back of his hand to his forearm, more underneath the flamingo shirt he was wearing then. Webs of them hid from the view below his clothes when it was a “don´t wanna show” day.

His fingers ghosted the diagonal lines on his wrists and moved to the circular, old scars of cigarette burns, before doing that flip with his pen to settle it over his skin.

“Would you like something in particular?” Albus asked looking up at him through his lashes. White like the rest of him, hiding that beautiful gleam of red. Sann made a vague gesture as if saying go ahead and surprise him.

Albus was careful to not put too much pressure and the pen´s ink was cold, but after a while, he could find it almost soothing. Even better for Sann as he couldn´t get bored of seeing the other stick his tongue out just like every time he got completely focused.

“There, look” The other told him suddenly, just as his eyes went down to find the burns with blue lines that made them look like meteors, a few of the cuts made to look like an alien ship flying by, his own freckles made to look like stars, connected to other freckles with a pointed line. Right on the back of his hand, there was a telescope.

Sann passed his fingers over them with widened eyes and then his expression softened. Never thinking he would like to see the scars over his skin. He was not afraid of showing them, he didn´t care anymore, but he never thought they could be pretty to look at.

“Can you do the other?” Sann asked him with a warm feeling extending over his chest.

“If you let me paint a beard”

“Forget it”

“Oh, c´mon!” Albus laughed.

--

Being Zarai´s came with perks he would have called luxuries with his Master. A soft bed to sleep in where he wouldn´t be woken up to be dragged up the mattress and then tightly tied face down with his ass up in the middle of the night. That wouldn´t happen. He could sleep tangled up with Albus and he could be sure he wouldn’t wake up with an unusual pain in the back of his throat, but instead he would be woke up when the albino tried to leave the bed as silently as possible, but when he failed and Sann clung to his shirt, the albino would greet him with a kiss in his forehead and a whispered “good morning”.

Sann spent most of his time alone at the house. Carrying the three legged cat all around the house as he searched for things to do. He could swim at the pool and step out of the house whenever he wanted. He even had access to the TV, laptop and all the books at the studio. He had so much freedom suddenly, at the beginning he had knelt in the middle of the house and waited. Expecting it to be a game where Zarai would appear out of nowhere to punish him for his incredulity. He had rather play it safe. But a few months later, the scared boy was curled up in the sofa watching videos about how to build a hinge for a prosthetic leg for the cat purring in his lap. He still had the habit to look around every few minutes just to make sure nobody would come to hit him.

It had been a reflex to scrunch his eyes when Zarai pulled her hand up behind him one night. The woman and the albino were working in another project together and had stayed working until deep into the night. Sann had taken that time to make them company in the living room working on the latex prosthetic and was so focused on it, he hadn´t noticed it was already past three when Zarai tried to touch him.

He knew she wasn´t the type to hit her pets, he knew it and yet his breathing still got cut short when she called for him and the only thing he saw was her hand growing closer. He hadn´t even noticed he had put his arms around his head defensively until she called for him again.

“Sann?” she asked, gently pulling his arms away to see his terrified face. “I´m sorry, I didn´t mean to scare you” she said as the boy pulled his arms down slowly to sign sorry while shaking his head. “It´s kind of late already and my assistant is taking a break” she said nodding at the boy peacefully sleeping with his arms over the dining table with a blanket draped over his shoulders. “I´ll be working a bit longer, but I´ll need some help. Could you give me a hand, Sann?”

The pet´s eyes widened at her before giving a hesitating nod. After a while, Sann was sitting in the ground working on the spreadsheets scattered in the coffee table while Zarai revised her part of the work when Sann felt something fuzzy covering his shoulders. When he turned to see her, clinging to the blanket, the woman looked at him for a moment before slowly pulling her hand up to his hair. The boy flinched away slightly, but as her fingers ran through his hair smoothly, the boy let his defenses down one stroke at a time. Each stroke a little closer, making him a little less stiff, until finally, he leaned into her hand with closed eyes when she cupped his face in her hand.

For a second he doubted if he needed to go further, if it was necessary for him to show eagerness but after a second she simply went back to her work, her hand going back to her lap not looking for anything else to happen. In fact, the next time she touched him, it was only to put the slipping blanket back over his shoulders.

It was a warmth he had never had so freely given at Robert Glass´ mansion.

At his Master’s house, he would sit idly by the bed and wait for the guest to come inside the room, just as ordered. His knees were callous with how much he knelt, but his body still resisted to get used to the cold when wearing just the black leather harness and collar while waiting.

The first time he had serviced another person that wasn’t his Master by his orders, his heart thrummed on his ears like a war band. It had been with many people watching, many of who he had pleased right after the other. He had pleaded in vain, made them laugh when he begged to be forgiven and reserved to only his Master. His heart had raced and lost strength over and over, so many times now, that in the silence of the guest room on those nights he waited for the guest to come inside, it was calm.

A firm rhythm that stuttered whenever he heard steps outside. That smothered when they went away and beat with renewed strength, when the door opened to a face he hadn’t seen before, yet looked amused and pleased when they stared down at him.

His mind wondered sometimes, if the albino would ever look at him that way, but the thought quickly vanished.

There was one night he fled to the studio when nightmares came for him -Of past games his Master played with him and he had no chance of winning, nor of escaping the punishment for losing- when he knelt next to the couch and woke him up with ragged sobs and face filled with tears. The albino had rushed to straighten up and sat on the ground with him, allowing him to bury his face on his chest and cry.

After he had dried himself of tears to shed, when his cheeks were red and his eyes hurt from the strain on his head, he realized the thundering thrum of his heartbeat would be quiet.

Being held was a privilege back then, but with him, it was not earned by winning a game. Nor was expected to make his heart race all over again when sleeping together.

It was strange…a placebo, maybe, to have a pillow that prevented him from slipping his hand below the other boy´s waistband when training took over his judgement. It was a rule to have it between them if Albus was going to start sleeping with him and he was definitely trying his best to keep it that way, getting used to it was quick.

But after so many nights of being woken up to collect Sann on his arms, Albus was exhausted. He had forgotten to put the pillow between them and Sann had to shake him awake a few times so he could change and slip inside the bed. Still, he had an arm over his waist.

Sann´s heart picked up when Albus pressed himself against him. Feeling his face nuzzling against his back just making it drum harder. He could feel him so well, yet, he didn´t dare to move at all. He couldn´t even hear him over the loud ba-thump, ba-thump reverberating on his head.

The shock on those red eyes, cowering on the edge of the bed was something he never wanted to see again.

So when he jolted at the other´s half asleep groan, afraid he had moved, only to notice he was trying to retrieve the arm he was crushing underneath him, he giggled wryly.

He could hear his heart get quieter as the albino retrieved his arm, most probably numbed out, with half opened eyes, he brushed his cheek with his other hand and mumbled a thanks under his breath before going back to sleep.

Sann then tried to follow, taking his hand on his own and curling around it like a cat. Effectively stopping the wild drumming on his ears that become, ever so slowly, a soft murmur that melted with the sound of soft breathing.

#writing #whump #bbu #box boy #pet whump #you came back a stranger #tw slavery #tw dehumanization #robert #fluff #sann #albus #trauma survivors navigating relationships #deconditioning #emotional whump #multiple whumpees #mute whumpee #creepy whumper #tw past noncon #tw dubcon #tw dubcon touching #trauma response #tw conditioning #collars #muzzles #slight spice #mentioned past torture #scars #trauma survivors navigating spice #trauma recovery whump

[ashintheairlikesnow]

Intrinsic: Jameson in Therapy

Prompt from Anon:  If you're still taking prompts... "Have you tried NOT doing that?"

CW: Noncon survivor discussing future consensual spice, Jameson’s masochism, frank references to noncon and pet whump, brief internal victim-blaming, world-building detail about WRU

Dr. Berger tucks a bit of graying hair behind one ear, smiling slightly at Jameson from her place in the soft armchair she uses during appointments. “Well,” She says, thoughtful, “have you tried not doing that?”

He looks up at her from where he sits curled up on the long sofa, knees to his chest, picking absently at loose threads across the knee of his baggy blue jeans. As always, she is careful not to let her eyes move to the places where hair is slowly growing back in over bald spots where the straps of a leather muzzle had rubbed, careful not to look at the scars he wears on every inch of exposed skin - she’d made the mistake of being caught looking, however briefly, and had discovered that the newest of her clients was deeply insecure about the visible evidence of his captivity.

She’d apologized, but it had taken time to develop enough trust to come back from her initial mistake. She would not jeopardize that now, after they’ve made so much progress and she’s begun to see a shift in how he talks about and relates to his new life, his world.

He even told her the name he chose for himself, and that he’s been telling the others in the house, one by one. Accepting that it won’t be taken from him like his original name was - that it belongs to him, and is his to share or not. 

She would never, ever admit it, but... Jameson is one of her favorite clients to work with. He’s working so hard, every week that they meet he trusts more and more that the path he’s on is one that will move him forward. 

“What?” 

His voice is slightly rough - someone who has screamed enough to have permanent vocal chord damage, she thinks. She makes a note to speak to Jake Stanton about having a physician check on the potential for nodes or other issues that might pop up later. She’s not a medical doctor, but… well. She’s had a lot of clients with vocal chord damage in the sixteen years she’s been working in the pet lib movement, and you start to pick up on the little signs and symptoms they don’t necessarily declare out loud.

“My question is really just me being a little facetious, I won’t lie, but I do want to talk through the spirit of the question. When you mention feeling guilty that you are having a physical response to your housemate, that you are attracted to them and have been struggling with... well. I’d like to really dig in to where that guilt comes from. Now, I am aware that adjustment houses tend to discourage relationships between household members during their time in residence to cut down on the chance for conflict, but that’s not where your guilt lies, is it?”

He goes back to picking at the hole slowly wearing through his jeans. Dr. Berger waits, giving him the silence and time he needs to think his way through the question and the possible answers. After a long time, he says softly, “No. It’s not. I don’t give a fuck if Stanton wants me to hold somebody’s stupid hand or not.”

She has to force her smile not to widen, wondering if Jameson is aware of just how like Jakob Stanton he really is. No wonder they don’t always get along. “Okay. So can you talk to me about just what you sense of guilt, this worry you feel, is rooted in?” 

She watches with some small surprise as the angry, defiant recovering Box Boy who has spoken frankly and openly to her about being maimed, injured, treated as an object, referred to as an animal... blushes.

“I want-... It’s not the, um, the response. That I hate.” He won’t look at her now, and he’s one who loves to stare her down whenever he thinks she’ll be shocked or disgusted by what he has to tell her. But this… this, he’s ashamed or embarrassed to say. “They’re fucking gorgeous, that’s... anybody would like them. It’s… it’s what I want from them that... scares me.”

“You are accustomed to a certain level of unwanted physical attention, it’s not at all uncommon in Romantic rescues to continue to feel sexual attraction and desire after freedom-”

“No. It’s. It’s not that I-... I know that’s normal. It’s… I want…” He shifts, uneasily. “I want… I want Allyn to hurt me.”

The last sentence is whispered. It’s not sharing a thought, it’s confessing what he feels is some kind of sin he is committing or intending to commit. Dr. Berger sometimes feels like a priest in a confessional booth, although she’s never been one to suggest atonement - no, fear of oneself is where the core of most of her clients’ pain lies, in her experience. Instead, she works on reconstructing the impulse or fear from its foundations, breaking apart the horror of its weight and reconfiguring it so it’s easier to understand. 

To take control of, to direct.

She helps them to own themselves, not to fear the prospect but to see in it freedom they have always deserved. 

Fear is the absolute last thing any of her clients should ever have to feel again. They have been taught to devalue and debase themselves, to fear what their bodies can be made to do. If she does nothing else, Dr. Berger hopes she is able to help them be just a little less afraid of the bodies they live in.

“You want your housemate to hurt you?” She asks, gently. “Do you mean in the sense of a serious injury, or…”

“No. Um. No, I fucking… I think about them, um. Hurting-... like… like they used to do. Biting me, or... or scratching... I th-think sometimes about Allyn h-holding a... never mind. Just. Hurting me. I’m-... made to be hurt.”

“You are made only to be yourself,” Dr. Berger reminds him, her voice low and without any hint of judgement. “We’ve talked about your captors before and how you were held. You believe that you were made into a masochist as part of your training, and so you’re frightened that your mind is thinking about your housemate in ways similar to how you were once forced to think about your captors.”

His nose wrinkles - he’s more dismissive than most of the language she uses, and early on delighted in insisting on using words like owner, handler, master. Things he thought might shock her. But Dr. Berger has heard nearly everything she thinks there might be to hear, by now. She only smiles slightly at his expression, jotting quickly down on her notepad a few notations. 

Finally, he offers hesitantly, “I-I guess. Allyn is… good. They’re soft, and nice, and they’d never-... but I want them to. And it’s-... it would make-... them be like Robert, or… wouldn’t it? It’d be… treating them like… I don’t ever want to be what I was again, so why the fuck can’t I stop thinking about it?” 

He is so rarely vulnerable. Dr. Berger doesn’t take for granted the gift he gives her by letting her see past the wall of anger and derision he has built to keep himself safe. In many ways, he reminds her of when she saw Jake Stanton after his own brush with WRU’s handlers and their methods. Bristling, defensive, and with wounds that cannot be bandaged. They instead need to be exposed to the light.

“Intrusive thoughts that contain elements of your captivity are absolutely normal. You are still in the early stages of making progress, and progress is never linear, Jameson. There is no starting line, no ribbon at the end of the race. There is only moving forward, bit by bit, even if sometimes we move back.”

“You mean I move back,” He says, sullen now. “You don’t do shit. You’re already fine.”

“Mmmn, that’s not… quite accurate. I actually see someone myself, you know.” Dr. Berger smiles at his obvious, visible surprise. “My mentor once told me he never trusted a provider of therapy who did not themselves seek it out. I have my own progress to work towards, just as you have yours.”

“Problems are probably real fucking different, though.”

“Well, that’s true.” She allows herself a warm laugh - and is rewarded when he doesn’t bristle or assume mockery like he used to, but relaxes and even gives her a very small smile in return. “But I would advise you not to compare yourself to others. Your situation, while not unique in some ways, is still unique to you. You’ve been through a kind of horror that no one else has - even if others have experienced some similarities, the traumatic events they experienced will never be entirely like yours.”

He nods.

“But-” She holds up one finger “That doesn’t mean we can’t use what we know as a framework, a foundation you can build your own way on. Think of an ancient Roman road paved into a highway in modern Italy, for instance. The foundation was there, a path laid by people who came through before. But you can take what you need and use it to find your own way. I know that you’re scared of your thoughts, I know that you are frightened of wanting to find gratification or satisfaction in pain because you think it means a return to how you were treated before, or that you are inherently changed in damaging ways by your captivity, but…”

When she trails off, he leans slightly forward “But?”

She chooses her words carefully. “Jameson, would you be willing to consider something that may make you a little uncomfortable?”

He looks at her, depths of feelings in his brown eyes, and slowly nods. “Why not? I’m already fucking uncomfortable. All the time.”

His thin shoulders under the oversized band shirt he wears make angles under the fabric as he shrugs, although in the time she’s been seeing them those sharp edges have already begun to round out, the lines of his jaw and cheekbones are softening.

She’s seen it over and over again, the physical changes reflecting the rebuilding of an entire life. It never ceases to amaze her, how hard each and every one of them works. 

“Okay. This may be hard to hear at first but I think it will help you.”

Eventually he nods. “Yeah,” He half-rasps. “Yeah, okay. Just say it. Everything… everything else you’ve said has helped. Go ahead.”

“Okay. So, what I would like you to consider… perhaps what you see as an enforced flaw, a crack that was put into you, a danger you present to your housemate due to your conditioning and mistreatment… it might be in fact an intrinsic part of your sexual expression, and simply an aspect of your attraction to them, and the wish you stated to me to perhaps escalate your current relationship.”

He swallows. The color drains from his face, except for two spots of bright red high along his cheekbones. “What?” His lips barely move. 

“Jameson…” Her tone dips, reassuring and soothing. “I know what you were told. I know you were likely given a series of half-truths and whole lies designed to engender dependence and teach you to loathe yourself and therefore disconnect from your body. But… that body? It’s very real, and it’s entirely yours. I think that we need to look into the possibility that you already had certain tendencies that were exploited and twisted. Those tendencies are not inherently unhealthy or damaging if you learn to pursue them in a safe environment.”

He blinks, once, twice, his eyes glittering. 

She’s made a misstep and she knows it immediately, clear as the tears Jameson never allows to fall. She didn’t time it quite right. They should have spent more time working up to it…

“Are you saying I’m just-... like this?”

“Not the way you are suggesting,” Dr. Berger says softly. “I’m sorry, I didn’t express myself clearly enough. Please let me elaborate a little.”

“I fucking hope you d-didn’t mean that I’m-... that I’m just fucked up,” He says, looking away from her, down at the floor. She pretends she doesn’t see one hand go up to curve around the side of his neck, recreating some of the weight of the collar they are so often taught to rely on for a sense of safety.

“I absolutely did not mean that. One thing WRU excels at - one of the reasons they have been so successful - is that they utilize very effective techniques that encourage a sense of complicity and responsibility in the people they abuse and violate. I’m going to hazard a guess that you were told that you chose what happened to you.”

“I signed up for this,” Jameson whispers automatically, rote and robotic, without hesitation. At least, Dr. Berger thinks, she’s been doing this job long enough that hearing that no longer gets to her like it used to. “I wanted to be some rich asshole’s-”

“Yes. That. One way I think they are able to convince so many individuals so thoroughly isn’t only because of the standard methods of sleep and nutritional deprivation, the repetition, memorizing, the mistreatment… no, I think one thing WRU does is find in each of its victims a core truth they can exploit and cause you to fear in yourself, making you more vulnerable to the idea that this company is somehow saving or helping you by ‘making use’ of it. They find your weak point and use it to shatter you, but what WRU never realizes is that the very weakness they exploit is also often the same piece of you we can recover, that we can reclaim. In your case… Jameson, have you ever heard of consensual masochism?”

He’s hooked, she thinks, on this line of logic. On the lifeline she’s thrown him, something to grab onto. A way to begin to believe, in some small way, that he isn’t ruined. They all think they’ve been ruined, by the time she meets them.

None of them is.

“No, I-I haven’t. Does this mean… there are people like me who aren’t, you know, fucktoys-”

“Recovering Romantics,” She corrects, gently. “And yes. Masochism is a not-uncommon mode of expression that many people engage in consensually in the context of healthy sexual expression.”

He swallows, hard. She watches his throat move. Sees the look in his eyes, the minute changes in his expression. The hand pushing against the side of his neck slowly drops. She can see the gears turning within him, a shifting point of view maybe. She can see what he doesn’t want to speak out loud.

There’s another silence. This one is more comfortable, and as always she gives him all the time he needs. 

“How-” His voice cracks, and he clears his throat, blinking rapidly again. His knees slowly uncurl and his feet, clad in old hand-me-down sneakers, find their way to flat on the floor. Without his ever-present scowl, he looks years younger. Terrified.

Hopeful.

“How can I-... how do I-...” He takes a deep breath. “If it’s just… part of me… how do I make it safe?”

-

@astrobly @burtlederp @finder-of-rings @whump-tr0pes @raigash @moose-teeth @orchidscript @doveotions @pretty-face-breaker @eatyourdamnpears @boxboysandotherwhump @vickytokio @whumpfigure @outofangband @downriver914 @justabitofwhump @thehopelessopus @butwhatifyouwrite @yet-another-heathen @nonsensical-whump

#whump #recovery whump #referenced pet whump #recovering whumpee #wru #bbu #box boy #box boy universe #masochism tw #condtioning #deconditioning #jameson bb #dr. berger #trauma recovery #noncon survivor navigating consensual spice #referenced consensual spice #referenced noncon #internalized victim-blaming #whumpees in therapy

[ashintheairlikesnow]

Can we see Jameson and allyn sharing a soft moment please? 🥺👉👈 - theo-

Happy blog anniversary, @boxboysandotherwhump - I give you softness and angst with a hint of spice, my specialty

CW: Survivors of noncon/dubcon navigating early steps of consensual spice, panic attack, memory of sadistic whumper, referenced death

Timeline- Several months after their arrival at Jake's safehouse

The first time it happens, they're in the literal closet.

Jameson doesn't miss the irony, exactly, but he can't really think about it, with his back pressed against the spaces where he's carved in their names - his own must be somewhere near his lower spine, maybe - and Allyn leaning in, close enough that their breath is warm against his face.

Part of him files the moment away for later, first kiss in an actual fucking closet like seven seconds in heaven, a game he remembers in a foggy way but could never define if anyone asked him.

Besides, it's not actually his first kiss, just the first one that hasn't felt like forcing his head underwater until his lungs burn.

How they went from curling up together in the dark, in the way they have now or working through nightmares here where the cold white light cannot find them, to Allyn pressing themself, soft and only slightly pinked, to Jameson's chapped lips, is beyond him.

He hopes the roughness doesn't bother them. They don't seem to mind, hands on either side of his head against the wall to brace themself, their hair falling forward to make everything smell like them, all the air he breathes is theirs.

"You broke a rule," Jameson whispers when they pull back, and his voice is more hoarse than usual, roughened with the emotions he never lets out. "Big guy's gonna blow a gasket."

Allyn breathes hard, sitting back on their knees, weight resting on Jameson's thighs. He can barely see their gray eyes sparkle in the dark. "Only if somebody tells him," They whisper back, sunshower rain barely misting, tasting like green leaves and ozone. "Are you gonna tell him?"

Jameson doesn't answer. He just carefully puts his hands on their waist, just above their hips, fingers closing in the loose sweater they sleep in, and pulls them back to him.

This time, their hands move to hold his face, and their thumbs rub light as a feather over the short hair growing back in over his bald spots, running wrong-way to feel it, making him shiver.

He makes a sound.

They make one, too.

It feels natural and he's not afraid, and yet... His heart jumps with each unwelcome image, a burst of dread, not quite fear.

He tries to remember what the therapist said, that it might be normal, not bad, to have a flicker of thought that he wishes Allyn would scratch their fingernails, manicured and painted, down his back, that they would close their teeth on his lip, suck a bruise into his neck and make it something he can't possibly hide.

It might have been there all along.

Their hands shift, fingers just slightly grazing the angles of his shoulders, dropping to his sides, sliding down to find the hem of his T-shirt and slide up underneath it, cool palms against the scars layered over his stomach, heated and shifting under their touch and he can feel the blade of the knife-

"Wait." He breaks the kiss, but there's nowhere to go. His heart moves from beating a rhythm against his breastbone to his throat and then to his knees, a lurch that nearly makes him sick with sudden panic. "W-wait, Allyn, wait-"

Their hands freeze, then move away, his shirt dropping back into place. Still he can't breathe, he can still feel it, not Nanda or Brute or the ones whose names he never knew but Robert.

He feels like one of the ones dragged into the basement who never came back out, the smell in the house, the bones they probably found if they looked after he called from the only payphone he's ever found to report it, he feels-

"Wait."

"I'm waiting." It's not impatient. It's soft, and they move back, giving him more space. The air cools when it doesn't come secondhand from their lungs and he gulps it down, hands shaking as he slowly raises them to cover his face. "Jameson? Are you-... Did I-"

"N-no, you're fine, it's f-fine, I'm... I'm fine, I'm okay. It's okay." He's not and it isn't. He's bones waiting to rot and being a fucking masochist is the only reason Robert left him alive. He should be in the basement, too.

Where he left Robert, lying right on top of all his fucking trophies, the IDs scattered everywhere like seeds that might grow back into the lives Robert stole, before Jameson stole his.

Scars on his stomach, layers of them, the newest ones from Robert's knife as he fought not to die, time's up, turn the tables, let Robert scrabble and claw while the pet stares down, unblinking, uncaring-

Jameson hears a whimpering sound and realizes only when Allyn pulls fully away that the sound is coming out of his own mouth. He curls up, as tightly as he can, stomach burning, lit with flame like salt in the wound.

"I can't," He says. "I, I'm sorry, I fucking c-can't-"

"That's all right," Allyn says, voice still gentle, falsely calm. But he can hear how it trembles. "Should I leave?"

"No!" Jameson shudders, seeing eyes in the dark, shakes his head as fast as he can. "N-no, pl-please, please d-don't leave-"

"Okay. I'm right here. I'll stay right here." Allyn swallows with an audible click in the silent darkness. They sit together for a while, how long Jameson doesn't know. Until he stops shaking, anyway. Their hand finds his and he holds on tight.

Then, hesitantly, rainbow spotted through rain, they say, "I guess there's a reason for the rules, huh."

Jameson's laugh is shaky and too high-pitched, but it's real. "Y-yeah, I fucking guess there is."

-

@astrobly @finder-of-rings @whump-tr0pes @raigash @moose-teeth @orchidscript @doveotions @pretty-face-breaker @eatyourdamnpears @boxboysandotherwhump @vickytokio @whumpfigure @outofangband @downriver914 @justabitofwhump @thehopelessopus @butwhatifyouwrite @yet-another-heathen @nonsensical-whump

#whump #box boy #box boy universe #trauma response tw #trauma recovery tw #allyn bb #jameson bb #noncon survivor navigating consensual spice #referenced past noncon tw #referenced torture #masochism tw #tw: panic attack #sadistic whumper #referenced past murder #past pet whump reference

[ashintheairlikesnow]

Welcome Home, Kauri

@gottalovethemwriters (won’t let me tag you!) requested:  I know Kauri said he’d be there when Jake wakes up but could we have a drabble or snippet -or whatever you want, honestly- where Kauri wakes up and has to convince himself it’s okay to stay? please?

CW: Domestic abuse survivor navigating trust and relationships, some trauma response, PTSD references, referenced consensual spice

Jake is still asleep when Kauri slides out of bed.

After years of finding his way into apartments and bedrooms and basements next to a series of men he can barely remember, whose names slip off his tongue like oil or stick like ash or just don’t stay at all, Kauri is an expert at getting out of bed without waking the other people in it up.

He inches along the cool sheets and he doesn’t allow himself to look back until he’s out, pulling on his pants from the night before, tossed haphazardly with laughter. There’s an ache in him, sweet and slight, the stretched muscles of a night spent moving, laughing, arching his back and wrapping his legs around Jake’s waist, hands on either side of the other man’s face. His fingers twitch at the memory of Jake’s stubble scratchy against his palms, his cheek, his lips.

He can still hear it, still feel Jake’s hands sliding along the outsides of his thighs, shifting up to his hips, murmuring things in his ear in that low, deep voice that the really tall guys get sometimes.

He looks back, once his pants are on. 

He gives himself a moment to love the ache, and mourn walking away from the promise he knows neither of them can keep.

Jake sleeps on his side, sprawled in the bed - king size, the one thing he told Kauri he couldn’t say no to when it was his own house, because he was six-foot-three and slept with his feet hanging off the edge of a bed his whole life since he was thirteen and he didn’t have to do that anymore, so he wasn’t about to - and the stress around his eyes and mouth drops away when he sleeps. Mussed-up blond hair and the line of his jaw catch Kauri’s breath in his throat.

The sight makes him forget, briefly, why he’s out of the bed at all.

I won’t be gone when you wake up.

He remembers.

“Sorry,” He whispers, too low-pitched to ever wake Jake up. He told Jake not to trust him - he’s told him a hundred times. Kauri can’t be trusted, he’s running from something inside of himself, and you can’t outrun your own emptiness. It follows you through every bus stop, every bad night spent sleeping on a bathroom floor or a park bench. It finds him through all the drinks and all the times he’s let himself be pushed up against the wall and taken, rough, and left limping to find the next direction to run.

He can’t run far enough to get away from this.

And Jake should have known better than to believe Kauri would be here, like he said. Everyone should know better than to believe Kauri’s promises.

He doesn’t believe them himself.

It’s with a burst of anxiety that he slides on his shirt, scratching lightly at the inside of his left wrist, digging into scars he wants to cover up with ink someday, maybe, but just… just can’t bring himself to do it. He’s had to hold still for too many needles, in his life. 

Jake breathes, heavy and solid, and there’s a gravitational pull to that breathing, to the promise that if he gets back in bed, Jake will shift, and lay his arm over Kauri’s waist, pull him close, and that deep breath would shift the hair on the back of Kauri’s neck and send shivers down his spine. Kauri feels like he could circle Jake’s light.

It would be safe, wouldn’t it?

He could be safe, here.

But he’ll just hurt everyone, in the end, when the ugly inside of him finds its way out. If he doesn’t stay, that means he’s never here long enough to let his guard down, and they’ll never see him long enough to see what happens if he does.

If he doesn’t stay, Jake won’t see the emptiness inside him, the white light and cold walls and 162 tiles and roses and champagne and you’re so fucking lucky anyone ever loved you that chase him, and chase him, and never stop.

Anxiety turns to fear, bald-faced and laid hideously bare in the early morning pinkish-light cutting through the blinds, as Kauri turns the doorknob slowly, silently, and slips out of the room. He’s a coward for not trying to stay.

He’s exhausted by running.

He can’t stop.

He pads barefoot down the hallway, shoulders hunched. Antoni sleeps in this room, he thinks, letting his fingers graze over the roughened texture of the old wood, to the smooth frame around the door. If he knocked on the door, Antoni would wake up and let him in, and help him remember how to stay.

He doesn’t knock. He keeps moving.

The floor would creak, but Kauri knows how to avoid all the noisy spots. He’s done this a hundred times, two hundred, a thousand. Stay with someone, get up while they’re sleeping, sneak out the front door, and be gone before they wake up.

No one has to miss him.

No one ever does.

Right?

His backpack waits, next to his shoes, and he slides it on over his shoulders, humming in a half-whisper to Keira’s murmured greeting from inside. She’s all he really needs. She’s not dangerous, she won’t lock the doors, she won’t depend on him in ways he can’t possibly reciprocate. 

He can’t be trusted, and Keira knows that. She’s been with him through every step, since Owen brought her home the first time in her big awkward box, since he named her, since the night Owen nearly killed him and broke her in ways that let her thoughts expand in ways they never could before. 

Breakfast locations near me? Keira asks in her faintly metallic, feminine voice, muffled from inside the backpack. 

“No,” Kauri whispers. “No breakfast. Let’s just go.”

Sensors indicate Kauri negative emotion feeling. Kauri reassurance require?

He moves out the door, sets the lock so it will click into place behind him, and closes the door. For a moment, he just stares straight ahead, at the nice little street, the sweet little neighborhood, the world that Jake lives in that is so far removed from what Kauri’s life has been. Run-down houses with cared-for yards, tricycles left out on sidewalks and in driveways, chalk drawings littering the world around him.

He hops down the stairs and starts walking. 

“No,” Kauri repeats.

Kauri reassurance require. Keira’s voice is firm. Keira reassurance provide. Kauri good.

“Kauri’s not good.”

Kauri good.

“I told him I’d stay and I’m leaving. He should have known better than to believe me.” The sky is blue only around the edges, and mostly dark still overhead. He can see the last stars as the light of the sun begins to slowly overcome the colder, smaller light they send. He remembers, vaguely, that stars are photographs of already-dead things, sometimes.

He’s a photograph of a dead man, too.

“It is common for survivors of long-term domestic abuse to be afraid to enter into new relationships”-

“Don’t fucking quote Triumph at me again,” Kauri snaps, and then feels guilt, nauseous and heavy. “I’m sorry, Keira. I just-”

Want to go back.

He ignores her, now, and walks faster away from the house, from Jake, from the promise of safety he has never been able to trust. There isn’t anything safe about staying in one place, giving yourself up to be hurt again. There isn’t anything safe about staying.

“I told him. I told him not to trust me. I told him. I said you can’t, you can’t trust me to stay, you can never trust me to stay I won’t stay. I’ll run, I always run, because I can’t-... I can’t do anything else. He knows that, I told him I can’t stay.”

But he’d promised to try, the night before, weeks ago, he keeps promising to try and letting people down. That’s what he’s good at, after all. Letting people down.

Running when they want him to stay.

Disappearing when they need someone to rely on.

Sleeping on park benches just to prove a point, to himself if no one else, or to Owen, who he hasn’t seen in years and won’t ever have to see again, right? But still he wants to show Owen that he doesn’t have to stay in one place, that he can keep running and running and if he just keeps running, Owen won’t ever hunt him down, not even inside his own mind.

One block becomes two, and then three. A few hundred feet becomes a quarter-mile, and then half. He stops at a bus stop, standing a few feet away from the little covered shelter area, where a tired-looking older woman is already sitting with a thermos of coffee and a small service dog in a vest lying calmly at her feet. If she looks at Kauri, he doesn’t look back at her.

Just another young man running from whatever he’d done the night before, wearing the clothes he was wearing then, with his hair mussed and sticking out or pushed down. Just another dumbass who partied too hard and lived to regret it, right?

I want to stay, Kauri remembers himself saying, and closes his eyes against the hot rush of tears that hits, unbidden, unwanted. He’d said that. He’d told Jake he wanted to stay, and it was true, but if he stays they’ll see how little there is inside of him. How carved-out he is, how empty.

Bus arrival approximately nine minutes from now, Keira says from inside the backpack. The woman sitting in the bus shelter looks over at him and raises her eyebrow.

“Fitbit,” Kauri says automatically, and she makes a noise that could mean bullshit or could mean she believes him, and goes back to drinking her coffee.

He thinks again of Jake sleeping, sprawled out, long limbs and muscled shoulders. The way his face has changed, as Kauri has known him, losing the last vestiges of roundness from being young and gone more angular. The line of his jaw has sharpened with time, just like Kauri’s.

He doesn’t realize he’s lifted his own hand to his face, feeling the spot where jaw and neck meet, the flutter of his pulse underneath it.

Last night he had felt Jake’s heart beating fast, pressed a palm over it, pressed his ear there just to listen.

Kauri heartrate accelerate, Keira provides helpfully.

“Shut up,” He mutters.

The woman doesn’t look over this time. Probably safer to ignore the guy talking to his Fitbit first thing in the morning, right?

Kauri stands there, minutes ticking by, and just as he sees the bus turning the corner at the end of the block, he shifts just enough of his weight from one foot to another to feel the ache inside him, as much emotional as physical. The ache of a night spent with someone who would rather die than hurt him, a night spent wrapped in arms that would - could - keep him safe.

The ache of a loneliness Kauri is tired of carrying, the rock he wants to put down more than anything on earth.

He turns and starts to walk away, listening to the rumbling engine as the bus pulls up to the stop, but he doesn’t go back and climb on. It would be old habit, to curl up in one of the seats ignoring mysterious stains and close his eyes, try to catch a little more sleep, before he gets out a few stops from now.

It’s easy to keep living the way he’s been living.

It’s harder to make the choice to stop.

Kauri heartrate accelerate.

“I know,” He whispers. His steps go faster, and faster, and then walking turns to running, his backpack smacking into his lower back. He ignores the flare of the ache inside him - or rather he holds onto it as tightly as he can, to the memory of laughing and lips on his neck and someone who wanted to look him right in the eyes the whole time because someone needs to show you you’re gorgeous, you never believe me when I tell you, I have to show you I never want to look away.

The slap of his shoes on the pavement is familiar but it’s not, too, it’s entirely new.

Kauri has been running from the tiny white room inside his mind, from hands around his neck, from a love that wasn’t, for too many years. He knows how to run from things, it’s a pattern he carries deep inside him.

What’s new isn’t the running - it’s that he’s not running away this time.

What’s new isn’t the movement of muscles, the soft sound of his jeans, the wind in his hair drying the tears in his eyes. What’s new isn’t a half-mile becoming a quarter-mile becoming a few blocks becoming one more turn around a corner and then a couple more blocks-

What’s new is the man he can see waiting for him, on the lawn, when he turns. Small as a finger, from the distance, but that doesn’t matter. Small in the distance, large in his mind, under his hands, in his heart.

Kauri stumbles to a stop, catching his breath, staring. 

At the end of two blocks, Jake is sitting out on a lawn chair in front of his house, and there’s another chair next to him, and it hits Kauri like a brick to the back that the extra chair is for him.

“I want to stay,” Kauri whispers, lips barely moving to form the words.

Kauri good, Keira says. Kauri good. Kauri good. 

“Go home,” Kauri tells himself. For a moment, a horrible awful dizzy second, his feet don’t move. “Go home, Kauri. Go home.”

Kauri go home, Keira supplies.

He starts running again. 

Jake looks up when Kauri comes to a breathless stop in front of him. He’s still wrecked from sleep, his hair looks ridiculous, and his blue eyes are sparkling as he gestures to the chair. He’s wearing a loose pair of sweatpants and a red t-shirt, and he’s never looked better, in Kauri’s eyes, than he does sleep-shadowed and touched by early morning sun. 

“H-hey.” Kauri’s voice is breathless.

“Hey,” Jake answers, sipping his coffee from a deep blue mug he bought a few weeks ago, at a farmer’s market. Kauri was with him. Kauri picked out the mug.

There’s another one, pale with milk and sugar how Kauri likes it, settled on the sidewalk in front of the second chair.

“Door’s open,” Jake says, voice low, deep and soft. He doesn’t ask Kauri why he tried to run, or why he stopped, what brought him back. “I made coffee for you.”

“You… you were awake when I left.”

“Yeah.” Jake gives him a slight smile. “I told you - I’ll never stop you when you have to go.”

“But?” Say it again. Say what you said last night. Please, please, please say it again.

“But,” Jake says, and holds out his free hand, “The door will always be unlocked, for you, Kauri. I’ll always be waiting to let you back in.”

Kauri takes Jake’s hand in his, his long, thin fingers interlacing with Jake’s. He slides the backpack off his shoulder, lets it fall, gently to protect Keira inside, to the ground. Kauri good, Keira says, voice a little hushed. If she were human, it might be a whisper. Jakob Stanton reassurance provide. Kauri good.

“Kauri good,” Jake agrees, and Kauri moves to him like falling into orbit around a sun. “She’s right. You’re good, Kaur. You’ve always been good.”

“How did you know I’d come back?” 

“I didn’t.” Jake grins, flashes slightly crooked teeth, evidence of a childhood where money for braces was never an option. His nose is a little crooked, too, evidence of having it broken more than once. It’s all a part of him, and it’s all perfect. “I hoped, but… mostly, I just didn’t mind risking looking like a fucking idiot out here in two lawn chairs by myself, for you.”

Kauri laughs, and the tears in his eyes are part of the laughter now, as Jake sets down his mug to pull him close, arms around his waist, resting his head against Kauri, cheek pressed to his stomach. 

Kauri heartrate accelerate. Kauri go home.

“Kauri go home,” Kauri repeats, placing his hand on top of Jake’s head, running fingers through the mussed-up blond, sliding his palm down to cup the back of his head, fingers just brushing the nape of Jake’s neck. “That’s what I did.”

“Welcome home,” Jake says, eyes closed. “Welcome home, Kauri.”

“Welcome home, me,” Kauri whispers. Fear shivers over his skin, the hint of a memory of hands around his neck, locked doors, and pain. He lets it happen, doesn’t run from the memory this time, doesn’t try to chase it off. Just... lets it be there, and then feels the fear fade under the determination he’s made to stop running. “Welcome... welcome home.”

“Right. Now drink your coffee before it gets cold and ruins my big romantic gesture.”

Kauri laughs loud enough to start a dog barking halfway down the block.

---

Tagging Kauri’s crew:  @maybeawhumpblog, @pepperonyscience, @haro-whumps, @18-toe-beans, @burtlederp, @finder-of-rings, @giggly-evil-puppy, @whimpers-and-whumpers, @moose-teeth, @whump-it, @lumpofwhump, @pumpkinthefangirl, @slaintetowhump, @astrobly

#erase to control #fluff #hurt/comfort #all comfort no hurt #ptsd references #abuse survivor tw #survivor navigating trust #relationships after abuse #future kauri #jake the shelter guy #referenced consensual spice #original fiction

[ashintheairlikesnow]

Shake: Chris and Laken

(Why do so many of Chris’s pieces end up having a title of just a single word? Huh. This is just a very smol drabble I’ve been meaning to write and is basically a present for @slaintetowhump, as is most of my Laken content let’s be honest here)

Timeline: College!Chris, early in his burgeoning relationship with Laken. I’d say first semester in college. 

Tagging: @burtlederp, @finder-of-rings, @endless-whump, @whumpfigure, @stxckfxck, @slaintetowhump, @astrobly, @newandfiguringitout, @doveotions, @pretty-face-breaker

CW: Some brief references to past trauma/noncon, fucky survivor thoughts on navigating consent and relationships post-recovery, memories of conditioned thoughts around spice

“I can’t believe you’ve never tried this before,” Laken says, leaning over, so close their knees are nearly brushing his, and Chris’s eyes are caught in theirs. Dark, so dark, and ringed in black eyeliner that makes them seem even wider and darker, pools he could dip into and not ever come back from. 

“I... I, I might, um, might h-have,” Chris says, his voice strained and a little rough around the edges. All the hairs on his arms and his neck have stood up, goosebumps rolling over his skin as Laken’s hand moves. “I don’t remember.”

Laken pauses, giving him that sort of thinking-look they have sometimes when he says he doesn’t remember things, or doesn’t know a movie or show or some big national thing everyone else does. Then they seem to shrug that moment off, but Chris caught the pause.

He should have pretended to know about this. 

He’s just so tired sometimes of lying.

They pick up a single french fry from the plate they and Chris and are sharing, skinny as a matchstick, one of the fries not already drenched in the neon-yellow-orange cheese sauce they’d ordered. Laken smiles, top teeth just resting on their full bottom lip, and dips the fry into the chocolate milkshake with whipped cream and a cherry on top they have right in front of them.

“See? Dip, hold for one second-” Laken holds up a single finger on their other hand for emphasis, and Chris can’t help the way his own mouth stretches in a smile. “-and eat!” 

They pop the french fry into their mouth, closing their eyes, and Chris loves the perfect even line of their eyeliner, the way it swoops just a little further than the corner of their eyes. 

“Now you try.” Laken points back at the plate, and Chris’s eyes drop quickly down to it, his face reddened and warm at the idea that Laken caught him staring at their face. A bit of their hair has fallen into their eyes and he wants to bury his hands in the thick, curly black hair that runs over the top and back, rub his fingers into the soft, short shaved hair at the sides, wants to-

Just wants, in formless ways that go no further than the idea of what he might feel if they held him, kissed him, were near him, legs intertwined, a subtle weight against his side.

The wants are good, but under them lingers the fear of what comes after the holding. When the weight is no longer subtle but heavy, when kissing isn’t enough for them, when they want him to perform. 

They wouldn’t call it that. That’s not what it’s called, out here. That he’ll lose himself again, and the next time maybe he won’t remember how to run from it first. He can’t be rescued every single time he gets in over his head, can he? He’s supposed to be able to do these things himself, now. 

It was less than a year of his life, lost, they think. Nat and Jake think so, anyway. 

How can less than a year of his life still hurt so much later?

“Chris?” Laken snaps their fingers in front of him and he blinks, sitting up in a sudden flinch backwards-

Pay attention, darlin’, you should always have eyes on your owner

-and catches himself just as fast, giving them a smile. “S-sorry, I, I was in my, my my-my head I guess. What, what did you say?”

-won’t repeat myself, you should have focused on me-

Laken pulls their hand back.

-what else is there for you to look at, hm?

Laken’s hand hesitates, as though they might want to reach forward instead of pulling back. He wants them to touch his face so badly and he doesn’t want to be touched at all. He wants both things. 

He wants to grab at them and hold on and say please tell me I can do this and he wants to say just walk away before you find out and the sentences are so jumbled together in his brain he can’t say either at all. 

The lights are making a sound, a sort of hum that he thinks Laken can’t hear but he can hear it and it drills into his ears, under the memory of Sir’s voice, slick and smooth, the sense-memory of a hand lying on the back of his neck, pressing soft leather into his spine.

Pay attention. I said-

“I said,” Laken says, softer this time, “that it’s your turn.” They hold out a fry, skinny twig potato, with only a hint of cheese sauce at one end. “Dip it in the shake, take a bite. I promise it’s amazing.”

Amazing. You really were worth every penny I paid, weren’t you?

 Chris is sure he sees uncertainty in their expression, but he’s not always good at knowing what the people around him are thinking. The subtler shifts of expression that don’t contain the threat of violence he was trained to prepare for sometimes mean nothing at all to him, and between the weight of their face at the front of him and the pressure of the fluorescent lights in the diner above and behind him, that buzzing noise that no one seems to hear but him, Chris wants to run.

Get up and run, like Kauri used to run, and that feels safer than what he’s trying to do here.

The train tracks of his thoughts are scattered, unsure. He wants to get up and walk out, go somewhere dark, and remind himself that people like him weren’t ever supposed to have moments like this.

You are a pet and you’ll never be anything but-

Chris sets his jaw and tries to remember that memories can’t grab you out of the light, the buzzing is just a sound - the lights are just cheaper than any other kind - and Laken’s hand is safer than the hand in his mind.

You’ll never be anything but-

This. He can be this, instead.

He takes the fry from Laken’s fingers, lets his brush theirs just a little for the rush of electricity along his nerves, the feeling of touching lightning, and dips his fry in the shake.

Then he pops it into his mouth, and his eyes widen at the sense of cold and hot, chocolate ice cream and fried potato, salt and sweet. He picks another fry up and tries it again.

Laken laughs, sitting back and clapping their hands, ducking their head slightly. “See! You like it! Didn’t I tell you?”

“You, you, you-you you did, you told me,” Chris smiles at them around the french fry still sticking out of his mouth, prompting another peal of laughter, catching the eyes of people in the other booths in the diner. Chris would sink into himself, except he realizes after a second that the older couple looking at them is smiling, watching Laken laugh.

So he starts to smile again, too.

“Great.” Laken picks up a long-handled spoon, dipping it into the whipped cream and picking the bright-red, fire-engine-colored cherry off the table. “You want my cherry?” They start to giggle, blushing themself, and Chris just blinks, not understanding this joke, either.

There are so many jokes he doesn’t understand but he smiles along with anyway.

“I’m kidding, I’m just-... sorry, being out with you makes me kind of nervous, and I’m just covering it by being ridiculous,” Laken says, sighing, eating the bite of whipped cream and the cherry themself. “I really am sorry, Chris.”

“You, um... you, you, you-you... you’re nervous?” Chris asks, voice low. That... he can’t have heard that right.

“Uh, yeah, of course I am. You’re fucking gorgeous and you dating me... it’s a lot. You know? You make me really nervous.” Laken hesitates, swirls their spoon around in their milkshake without looking up. “Like I’m going to fuck this up for sure.”

 “Me, um, me-me... me me me, me-... wait, my words, um-” Chris groans, reaching for the black bracelet he always wears on one wrist, pushing the little metal circles wound into the heavy nylon rope to focus on the press of an edge against his finger, the way they spin against his skin. “I’m... I’m nervous, too.”

“Are you?” Laken cocks their head, and there’s that hair again, falling over one eye. “Well, I guess we’re both nervous, so that cancels us out, right?”

Chris takes a breath, reaches out, and brushes the bit of hair from over their eye, watching Laken’s smile grow and change, become softer and warmer all at once, as they look up at him.

This look, he knows. The I want you look. He’s given himself, practiced and performed, with a smile that never reached his eyes. 

Laken’s eyes, though, are warm. He’ll fall in.

“I, I, I think I’m too weird for, um, for you,” Chris says, finally, hesitantly. 

Laken grabs his hand in theirs, twining fingers warm around his chillier ones, and kisses the back of his hand. “Not possible.”

“No, really-”

Laken shakes their head, pulling his hand to rest his knuckles against their cheek and his voice is caught in his throat, then. It’s lost somewhere in the look on Laken’s face. He can’t quite remember how words work, but he’s pretty sure he doesn’t have to. 

“No.” Laken says the word soft as can be. Chris thinks of the way it felt to pet the kitten when Ruth’s stray cat had a litter. “Really. You’re not too weird for me, Chris. I want this to be our first date, not... not the last one. Yeah?”

Chris breathes in and out. His hand is on fire with sparks from Laken’s touch.

He wants, all those things that feel safe. The holding, the kissing, the things that go no further. He has no idea how to ask.

“... right,” He says, finally. “First date, not, not, not-not last date.”

“Perfect.” Laken kisses the back of his hand and then gives it back to him, but he kind of hopes they’ll just keep his hand forever, it can be all theirs, whatever, just keep smiling like this and he’ll give them anything they want. “So. Next fry?”

They pick one up.

Chris picks a fry up, too.

They dip their fries into the milkshake in unison, and Chris can’t think of anything but how gorgeous Laken looks in the awful fluorescent light.

#whump #sort of #trauma recovery #referenced past noncon #past noncon tw #survivor navigating consent #conditioned whumpee #pet whump #in a sense #he is recovering from it #creepy whumper #thoughts #bbu #box boy #box boy multiverse #box boy universe #chris the strawberry blond romantic #laken mamani: frankly I want to date them #recovering whumpee #trauma recovery whump #recovery whump #they cute though

[ashintheairlikesnow]

8, 9, 20 and 21 please

CW: DISCUSSION OF SURVIVORS NAVIGATING CONSENT FURTHER DOWN

Is what you like to write the same as what you like to read?

This is an interesting question because broadly speaking, sort of? Like, I do tend to read whumpy books and I really love when a book actually gives time and space to the trauma someone would undergo/feel after the events of the book. The whump I am drawn to online tends to be a BIT different than my own and focus on different things, but I also do read a lot of whump that is similar in structure to mine, too!

I go through cycles and right now I’m knee-deep in reading basically only whump and nonfiction, so right now I’d say no as far as published books go. but normally I would say mostly yes! 

Are you more of a drabble or a longfic kind of writer? Pantser or plotter? Do you wish you were the other?

Last year I finished one longfic, wrote about a third of a second and nearly all of a third, and then ran out of steam and lost inspiration and I feel awful about both those things. So right now I’m focusing on drabbles and trying not to lose myself in plotting. I’m definitely a pantser. I write as I write and what happens, happens. I wish I were better at plotting and then still having the focus and inspiration to actually write the thing I plotted!

Tell us the meta about your writing that you really want to ramble to people about (symbolism you’ve included, character or relationship development that you love, hidden references, callbacks or clues for future scenes?)

I actually talk pretty openly about the symbolism as I post/publish, so I don’t think I have a ton to share that would be new about that! Like I’ve already talked about Chris’s relationship to the red cardinal and what that symbolizes/means in my own life/a common understanding of cardinals as symbols of the dead coming back to see it and how that references his mother, in my mind. 

I will say that my OCs having a strong positive or negative connection to their mothers/motherhood is definitely something that winds through everything I write, for several reasons. 

I would sayyyyy one thing I love and love to talk about is how Danny, Kauri, and Chris all lost total autonomy over their bodies and had them used for someone else’s pleasures and purpose... and all three of them relate to their physicality after escape/rescue in very different ways.

Danny: Touch-averse with everyone but Nate, but very touchy-feely with Nate and eventually comfortable with the Fucked Up Support Group, and then Mina. But he struggles with allowing people to touch him casually, and he has a lot of struggles with sex even though he badly wants to have a healthy sex life again.

Kauri: Pleasure-seeker post-escape, goes home with different men all the time, doesn’t care if he knows their names or if he even stays for breakfast. Seeks out signs that he still matters by testing to see who wants him. Very unhealthy way of using sex to cope with trauma. Fears emotional intimacy but replaces it with physical intimacy in ways that actually divorce the act from anything really that intimate. It takes him a long time to have emotionally intimate spice again.

Chris: Was asexual prior to what happened to him, although he doesn’t remember that. He finds himself as asexual again but not without some serious agonizing over whether or not he can even date since he assumes everyone will sooner or later want “that”, which he doesn’t and will actually have serious trauma responses to. Repeatedly gives Lake the option to break up with him because he doesn’t want to do that, but enjoys giving to them with his hands and mouth. He is emotionally intimate easily and biromantic and adores physical intimacy as long as it never crosses a certain line. Like I don’t think he could ever have full on PIV or, uh, PI-anything that didn’t end up with him having an absolute full meltdown as a result.

I just really enjoy the comparison of the three of them reacting to going through somewhat similar traumas, in this case, and having their recoveries look so different.

What other medium do you think your story would work well as? (film, webcomic, animated series?)

Danny might work all right as a webcomic and with a TON of editing could be published, I think. Chris doesn’t really have that linear a structure and would need a lot of reworking. Ummmmm I don’t know! I can’t really see any of them as anything but essentially non-linear posting in an online format?

#writer asks #discussion of rape survivor tw