#and lots of different wedding ones; those are always so cute

[relaxxattack]

tbfh i love when people will headcanon characters as being of their culture and then draw little comics of them participating in traditions that the artist is clearly intimately familiar with. like YESSS share your personal cultural experiences with me through the blorbos!!! i love to see it!!!!!!!

#once saw this comic of rezi eating like... this little doll thing that got hidden in food i think? i think it was a spanish thing maybe? #it was years and years ago so i dont remember but i did think it was cool #and lots of different wedding ones; those are always so cute #or literally just ones of the blorbos speaking other languages #its all so good! please share your beautiful or silly or dumb traditions with me! i love learning how other people live

[bluessmutifyplaylist]

Separate Yandere Malleus (Hubby), Rook (Hubby), Leona (Lazy), Jamil (Babygirl), Azul (Babygirl), Jade (Menace), Floyd (Menace) and Sebek x Female!Tanjiro Reader SFW and NSFW please?

She’s kind, helpful and supportive, always willing to help others and she doesn’t expect anything in return? How cute (Naive), and after getting a taste of her kindness and care, he’s not going to let her go (And is now very territorial/protective of his soon-to-be wife/wifey)

Why can I see Floyd saying ‘Wifey’? (Rook would just make poems upon poems about how much he loves calling her his ‘Darling’ or ‘Wife’ and would violently tremble in joy if she just looks at him Top Tier Romantic/Stalker)

Sorry if that’s a lot, I’m a little knew to asking about Smut Requests (But I love my Twst Men so much, especially Malleus, Idia, Rook, Jamil and Azul, they just need hugs)

This is SMUT, and consensual, despite being Yandere.

Warnings: Yandere, Stockholm Syndrome(?), naive reader, creampie, breeding(?), unprotected sex, all characters are adults, sex with the intention of having children, slight dumbification, Malleus has 1 dick (sorry monsterfuckers), somnophilia in Malleus’s

Leona Kingscholar

You supported him even in his darkest moments, no matter if he was rude to you back. You were there, and the way you would take Cheka when he wasn’t feeling super great really had him appreciating you in a way that he never thought he could before. So, once you had graduated, he asked you if you would marry him.

Of course, this comes from a much darker place in him. He was never going to let you go, even if you refused him. Luckily for him, though, you were in tears as you accepted his proposal, happy to be marrying the love of your life. You were wed rather quickly, with it being a small ceremony, and it was the first time you had seen Leona cry because you just looked so beautiful walking down the aisle. That moment was one you would cherish forever. 

Now, your wedding night was a different story. With how hard he was thrusting up into you, making you see stars. You could feel his cock pounding your insides, and you were thanking every god in existence that you married this man. You were two orgasms in already, and you were approaching a third, while he still had his first to go.

“Look at you, my naive herbivore being fucked dumb.” Just hearing those words made you falter and stutter your movements, but it didn’t stop Leona. He was making you ride him through your orgasm, and you were so sensitive. He let out a groan as he came inside you, saying, “I’m not stopping until you are filled with my cubs, baby, so you better keep going.”

Azul Ashengrotto

He knew you were the one when he showed you his cecaelia form for the first time. Instead of being disgusted or even afraid, you used a gentle hand as you played with the tentacles that were pulling you closer and closer. Eventually, you found yourself face-to-face with the Housewarden, and you threw your arms around his neck as you pulled him into a kiss. He immediately reciprocated, and he laid claim to you that night.

Years later, you both were married, and he was a successful business owner. You were in the upper-middle class of the ocean, and you both were talking about starting a family. You were already his housewife, keeping the house clean because you both agreed on it (and because he didn’t want you going anywhere that he didn’t have control over). 

You weren’t about to complain, though, because he had you in the missionary position. It’s a bit basic, but fuck did it feel good. He was desperate; desperate to fill you up, desperate for you to feel pleasure, desperate to push himself to another climax despite the overstimulation. Your legs locked around him as he started releasing ropes of cum inside you, and you had the orgasm of your life.

“I love you, honey~” Your voice was strained after about two hours of moaning. He laid down next to you, and you laid your head on his chest. He started drawing patterns on your back, and he said I love you in return. You leaned up and gave him a kiss on the lips, and then trailed it down his chest… lower and lower, until round 2 was started.

Jade Leech

You were his the day you burst into Azul’s office and demanded that your friends be let go of their contracts. Hardly anybody would have that amount of confidence, and he found himself obsessed. He’s stalking you, he’s making sure his brother knows that you are his territory and his alone. You could always smell that he was there, as he didn’t know about your keen sense of smell. But, you didn’t mind it.

Years later, you both were married, and it was an interesting marriage. Your in-laws absolutely adored you, Floyd tolerated you, and Jade was still as obsessed with you as he was back in your NRC days. In fact, he wanted to give you a reason to stay forever, so he brought up the idea of having kids. You had many siblings back in your home world, which you never found a way back to, so it was understandable that you would want a big family yourself.

So, that’s how you got here, you being folded in half, your legs being pressed to your shoulders as he pounded you into oblivion. For the past 4 hours, you have been in every conceivable position you can think of, and this was going to be your final one. If you wanted a big family, that is exactly what you were going to get.

“Darling, how many kids do you want? Do you have an exact number? Or am I going to fuck you and keep you full of children until you say that you don’t want anymore?” Just the thought of having so many kids made you orgasm. You realized that you wanted to be with this man for the rest of your life, and you wanted to be surrounded by a family that the both of you created, and you were definitely going to enjoy the process to achieve your newfound dream.

Floyd Leech

He claimed you as his also the day you walked into Azul’s office, as no one ever had the courage, bravery, or stupidity to do it. When he went to squeeze you, you wound back enough to headbutt him, making him drop you. From that point on, you had become his new obsession. You were the only one who could beat him in a fight, so it was kind of obvious that this would happen.

As much as you Floyd simps would probably want to be married to him, he’s just not that big on marriage. He’s not that big on commitment in general. However, he knows that he’s committed to you because he wants you to be committed to him. Plus, any thoughts against marriage flew out the window when he saw you stretching and yawning.

Hours later, your neck was covered in bite marks, some a bit bloody, but he just licked it all away as his cock was buried inside your cunt. He had cum inside you about 2 times by now, and your muscles were sore from being contorted into a multitude of different positions. He had a newfound need to make you his little wifey who was stuffed with his kids 24/7.

It wasn’t until there was a bit of a bulge in your stomach from all the cum he had released when he pulled out of you. You were on the verge of unconsciousness, but you felt his arms wrap around you and pull you close. His body was warm, the final lull to sleep that you needed. It was a rare but sentimental Floyd, where he watched you, in such a vulnerable state… marriage is the best option to make sure you are his.

Jamil Viper

You were the first thing he could actually call ‘his’. He did not have to give you to Kalim, and he was never going to let that happen. In fact, during his overblot, he made his feelings known to you by keeping you at his side. However, you wanted your Jamil, not the one controlled and bound by the ink. After, in the infirmary, he asked if what you said still rang true, and that was where you had your first kiss.

Skip to years later, and you both were married. He still works for the Al-Asim family, but you couldn’t ask for a better husband. He has told you about his hesitancy towards having children of his own, as they would most likely serve the Al-Asim family as well. You understood, but you still wanted to have children with him. He told you that you could have one child for now, and see where it went from there.

Round 1 started right then and there, in your kitchen. He bent you over the counter, railing you from behind. Before, whenever you both would have sex, he would use protection. This time, though, he went in raw, and it was the first time ever that you both truly felt each other, and damn did it feel euphoric. You couldn’t even think anymore.

Of course, this was not exactly a fitting place if you were going to conceive your first child. So, he picked you up into his arms and carried you to your shared bedroom once you had your first orgasm of the night. There were many more to come (get it?) and you were barely getting started. You will not be able to walk for two days, and you will be walking out with hickies… mostly in between your thighs.

Rook Hunt

When he first discovered you, he immediately started stalking you. However, he wrote you sonnets, limericks, and poetry of other sorts for your eyes and ears. He sang your praises, and to lastly win over your heart, he serenaded you properly, under your window. You told him to wait there, and you ran downstairs and glomped him, making out with him on the ground. If it weren’t for his desire to make your first time special, you would have probably conceived a child right then and there.

However, he did wait until marriage… which was less than a year after you graduated. He had a steady income, and he already had a cottage in the forest in the Shaftlands. He always had a fantasy of a big family in a cottage, being a hunter and having his beloved wife by his side as an equal in the home. He cherished you, making sure that he provided for you in every way you needed. You became a housewife, as you would like to be there to take care of your children.

Speaking of, not a single night has passed since your wedding night where you haven’t fucked like rabbits. Sure, you both were still young, but you had been talking about this since you both were in NRC. You felt like you were ready to take on the challenge of rabbits. So, every night, you were filled with his cum. You were claimed as his, with all the hickies all over your body, with the sinful stretch his cock always seemed to give you… it was heaven in Twisted Wonderland.

It did not come as a surprise that you fell pregnant merely a few weeks after your wedding. The news made your beloved hunter so excited. Now, you could never leave him for your world. You had children that tied you to him. During your pregnancy, he is a devoted lover. He makes sure all your needs are met, and that includes the needs that are in the bedroom.

Malleus Draconia

You were his first friend outside of his retainers. You showed him kindness, and you were not scared of him at all. That alone made his draconic instincts want to kidnap you and keep you all to himself. However, he was able to hold off just a little, and you came to him on your own. The rose you had presented him with remains preserved, even years later, as it is a token of your love for him. He was a bit delulu, but aren’t we all?

It was a big request to ask you to marry him, as you would become the queen of a great nation of mostly fae folk. However, you were up to the challenge, and the people loved you. However, there was great pressure for an heir. Again, you were up to the challenge, but you discussed it with your husband first. You both concluded on a large family, so that the children wouldn’t grow up isolated (and totally not because Malleus wanted to see you round over and over again).

That night, all the staff had been advised to vacate the corridor in which your shared chambers resided, as you were not able to quiet yourself. You went a total of 8 rounds, one of which you were passed out for, but gave him the ‘okay’ to fuck you through that brief nap. Any chance of walking was out of the question. You could barely lift your head, and you had to be tended to by maidservants for a week. Unfortunately, Malleus couldn’t tend to you himself, as being the King meant that he was busy.

The entire realm rejoiced at the news of your pregnancy, and you had the world’s best doctors at your disposal. Everyone was concerned about making sure that the heir survived to take the throne, but they were also a tad worried about them being half-fae and half-human, as it meant that their lifespan would be shorter than a typical fae’s. Neither you nor your husband cared, however, as you were just happy to start a new chapter of your lives together.

Sebek Zigvolt

His pride denied him the pleasure of accepting his feelings for you in the first place, and he instead wrote anonymous poems for you that he would leave at your desk. You had no idea who it could be, so when someone claimed it was them, Sebek shouted that it was he who wrote the poems and not the plagiarist. He looked like he was about to fight the poor unfortunate soul, but you placed a kiss on his cheek, telling him that you accepted his feelings and not the other person’s.

About the topic of marriage… he would prioritize being a knight first. However, when he sees a time in his career, he will definitely get married to you. He enjoyed that he was in Briar Valley often and he just needed to train new recruits, and he would return home to you cooking dinner. As for children, the topic would blurt out of his mouth as you voiced your sadness about being lonely. You loved the idea, and as irresponsible as it was, the way you looked at him with newfound dreams in your eyes, he carried you to the bedroom and started right away.

You had discovered that Sebek had a hidden breeding kink, and he loved seeing your face as he came inside you over and over. The husband you thought you knew was giving into the primal instincts deep within him, and you were loving it. His fangs had made their mark all over your neck and shoulders, claiming you despite the ring on your finger showing you were taken.

The Zigvolt family, as well as Lilia, Silver, and King Malleus, were all excited when you announced your pregnancy. However, only the two of you would know what sinful things took place for this to happen. Know that this is not your only child, even if you don’t actually have another one. He wants at least two, and he is willing to adopt.

#twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland smut #twisted wonderland x reader #twst #twst smut #twst x reader #disney twisted wonderland #disney twst #twst wonderland #leona #leona x reader #leona kingsholar x reader #twst leona kingscholar #twst leona x reader #twst leona #leona kingscholar #twst leona kingscholar x reader #azul #azul x reader #azul ashengrotto #azul ashengrotto x reader #twst azul #twst azul x reader #twst azul ashengrotto x reader #twst azul ashengrotto #jade #jade x reader #jade leech #jade leech x reader #twst jade

[boiohboii]

The Spaniard's Wife (Carlos Sainz x wife!reader)

Inspired by @charles-eclair16 's fic

Carlos Sainz had a secret for the past 9 years, but when he forgot to take off the one thing that can reveal everything, everyone has questions

or

in which Carlos let's everyone know that the rumors, in fact, are true

masterlist

N.B: didn't turn out how I wanted but I've been rewriting it multiple times and I think this is the best option, hope you like it...WARNINGS: swear words a lot, not proof read, spelling mistakes and really bad photoshop tbh, if I missed anything please let me know!

Faceclaim: Emeraude Toubia

Liked by Charles_leclerc, danielricciardo, landonorris and 910,583 others

Carlossainz55: my wife and I have been friends for 20 years, we have been lovers for 13 of those years, engaged for 2 and married for 9. I have never been sure of much, but I am sure that I love her with my entire heart, I will always love her. I have known yn since before I could even dream of being an f1 driver, what happened in that one interview was disrespectful and just disgusting. No one has any right to speak any ill word of my wife, you don't know her and you never will, as long as she doesn't want you to. I will do everything for her, for her happiness, her comfort and for her ease of mind.

landonorris: tell yn I miss her!

Carlossainz55: leave her alone

landonorris: I'll tell her that you're rude to me

Carlossainz55: she's my wife!

landonorris: yeah yeah, you never let us forget it

username: yn been here since day 0 apparently, can't fight her now

username: YES!! CHILDHOOD FRIENDS TO LOVERS!

username: I want dts to make a reincarnation of their love story

username: we need a spinoff

username: yes! It'd be so cute

username: I can't imagine 16 year old carlos realising he is in love with his friend

username: she is every man's wet dream

-this comment has been removed-

username: she looks so pretty wtf

username: she's looks like a doll

username: wish i looked like that at 20 years old

username: her dress is phenomenal

username: this screams money

username: 2 different cars for a wedding

username: the third slide, holy shit

username: I wouldn't be surprised if the last 2 pictures are carlos' or her house, like holy fuck

username: both scream rich

username: mum used to say rich people look it and I never gave it much thought until I saw carlos sainz and now his wife

username: did y'all see the picture that one twitter user took? Their outfits looked so fucking good

username: YES! I SAW IT! I could never afford a thread on either outfit!

username: did you guys see her hair! It looks so thick and healthy

username: fr!

username: I want a wedding like that!

username: I want a husband like that!

username: I want a wife like that!

username: I love how he is not in one single picture 💀😂

Liked by danielricciardo, landonorris, Pierregasly and 1,209,316 others

Carlossainz55: 10 years since i was able to call you wife, and I will never get tired of letting everyone know that. I am in love with you, forever and always.

Charles_leclerc: simp

Carlossainz55: I don't know what that means

landonorris: ikr, it's laughable man @.Charles_leclerc

Charles_leclerc: don't pretend like you're not the same with your girl @.landonorris

username: damn charles really coming for everyone's neck today

username: bet charles is the biggest simp of them

username: he really making us feel lonely as hell huh

username: 10 fucking years, Holy shit!

username: no cause if I had yn by my side I too would be in fucking love

username: don't embarrass yourself, everyone knows you're in love without her by your side

username: I didn't ask to be attacked like that wtf

#f1 imagine #f1 x reader #f1 social media au #f1 instagram au #f1 smau #f1 #carlos sainz social media au #carlos sainz smau #carlos sainz instagram edit #carlos sainz x reader #carlos sainz twitter au #carlos sainz x yn #carlos sainz x you #carlos sainz x female reader #carlos sainz x y/n #carlos sainz #carlos sainz wife #carlos sainz x wife! reader #carlos sainz jr

[crystallilytarot]

Your life after marriage. Choose a crystal /rock.

Pile 1 - marble

You will have everything financially. It depends where you want to live, of course, but I see a big, cozy house. Maybe a garden too or just some flowers/ plants and sunshine. A few luxury item too. You will probably move somewhere else with your spouse and it will be hard, at least in the beginning. Or one of you will travel a lot because of work, I think it's more likely your spouse. And it's gonna be hard because you can't spend so much time together. I feel both of you are mature, not neccesseraly like you are older, but you are both emotionally available, understanding and open. So if anything is bothering you, you can talk about that with your spouse always. I feel you both need to pay attention to this, because there are emotions and both of you want to know and understand each other. But sometimes you can get distracted because of work or just because of life, and your responsibilities. So take time to talk to each other always, and this can be a very harmonious relationship. I think you will travel together too, even if you only have time for a little trip sometimes. If you want children, I see a child, but can be that later you have more. I think there will be age difference between the children, if you want more. One of you feel like a little bit of an overthinker or just worry a little too much, but the other person is going to help with that. They feel like a lion or a bear. I mean like they are powerful, succesful, wise but calm too. I see you cuddling after a long day in the couch or in the bed. You can overcome anything together, your spouse is always there for you. It doesn't matter what happened, any bad thing, gossip, they are with you no matter what. And you can give strength and hope to each other. It is a very strong bond between you two.

Pile 2 - rose quartz

I feel either both of you are young or you just don't have so much experience in terms of relationships. Or at least one of you are more innocent in this way. But it can be that you didn't have this kind of relationship before. Because it will be different. Even if both of you were in relationships before, it will be so much more than that past connections. Special in a way. But because of this, you both need to work on this, but you both want to work on your relationship too. You won't take the other for granted. I see that you will always be able to compromise, in any question. Like a win-win situation, but it's not a good example, because neither of you will loose never. Even if you do something for the other person, they will do something for you too. I hope you understand what I'm trying to say. You both find each other beautiful. And it's not even lust, you don't just think that the other person is sexy, but really beautiful, almost like an art. Chemistry is very good too, don't worry. It's a pretty balanced connection. I can see that you will go to dates even after being together 10, 20 years too. I see a picture of those cute older couples. You both can be strong when there is something hard in your life. You can overcome it together, but I see that neither of you want the other to worry, so sometimes you will rather suffer silently than asking for help. This can cause a little conflict from time to time, because it's not like you are bothering the other, they really want to help. I feel like you both are dreamers, but you can work hard too. I can see you both are romantic, it's like from a movie, roses, champagne, jewelry, little gifts, little love notes, everything. You are both so sweet. I think even your wedding will be very romantic, even if you don't want a big wedding, it will be just beautiful. Cooking something together, just really everything sweet. Little conflicts can be happening of course. I think it's just because of a hard time at work, money or for some of you, there will be people in the family or some friends who won't want you two together. Or I think they are just jealous. You don't want to pay attention to them, but they can be toxic, so if you can, it's better to not talk to them at all. It can be that both of you will have some new beginning in the first years of your marriage. Changing jobs, finishing your studies, something like that. So even if you want kids, I think it will happen a little later. Even pets too, I guess, because I think you will need time to get used to your new place together first.

Pile 3 - tiger eye

There are families, who always doing something together. A trip, going to the zoo, decorating for the holidays, kite flying in a windy day. Sometimes it's not even that you talked about it, it's just random. Like the kids say one morning they never seen a lion, okay, so let's go to the zoo. It feels like you always know each other, like your life will be completely different than before, but in a good way. Even in rainy days, the sun is shining for you. Sexual chemistry is very strong here. You can be soulmates. I think you will more likely live in a house with a garden, in the suburbs, or there is a park nearby. Don't get me wrong, I can see that you have everything for a comfortable life, but you can find joy in simple things. Watching the birds with the children. Enjoying a hot drink on a cold day. I think you will have a few gatherings too, birthdays or just enjoying a nice meal with friends. I can see 2 children, and I would say at least 2, can be twins. It's a very nurturing connection, it's like your home is your safe place, for both of you, and for the children too. Both of you are givers, I think the children will be like this too, no selfishness in your family. A very happy, lively home. For outsiders it looks like too good to be true, so you need to be careful who you let enter to your house, I don't think they really want to start a drama, more like some people can be energy vampires. Don't let them bring their toxicity to your well deserved happiness. If you do something creative, you will have more inspiration than before. Or just the inspiration to get up even in a hard day, because you will be happy finally, you will feel like you belong and like your life is complete. I see a lot of gifts, not always expensive ones, but like a little flower from the children. Or someone go out of their way to do something to make the other happy.

#free tarot #pick a card #tarot #pick a pile

[sirfrogsworth]

Photo Restoration Project - Part 1

A long time ago, Katrina sent me some old photos of her family I could restore. Her parents have been helping me from afar for years and I really wanted to do something nice for them. Unfortunately my dad got much worse and I pretty much forgot about this project for quite some time.

But then I decided to visit Katrina in Orlando and we discussed having dinner with her parents and I remembered these photos. So I thought I would fix them up so I could present them as a gift in person.

The first and most important photo was from her parents wedding.

Old photo prints can fade over time due to UV light exposure. From what I understand, different colors fade at different rates and red/orange tones tend to be the least susceptible to this fading. Thankfully all of the color information is still there, it's just that the darks are not as dark and the lights are not as light. The dynamic range got squeezed like an accordion. However, if you do a levels adjustment on the red, blue, and green channels individually, you can unsqueeze the accordion and balance everything back to the way it was.

But you can't always save everything and there may be other damage that needs fixing. If something becomes pure white, there is no way to restore that detail. Thankfully I was able to use the new generative fill feature to bring back detail in the dress, the flowers, and the tuxedo shirt.

And because I hate front facing flash and how it makes colors look ugly and sterile, I may have also added a marble floor and pillars.

Next up was a photo of Anastasia, Katrina's mom, protesting Henry Kissinger on behalf of her home country of Greece. This suffered from the same color fading issues.

What made this one a little more tricky was an uneven fading. The left side had to be adjusted independently and the top was even more faded. I had to isolate the trees to bring back their color. And the protest signs were difficult to read, so I enhanced those as well.

Next we have this lovely photo of Anastasia tending to some house plants.

This photo was actually in decent shape. It lost a little contrast, had a little bit of fading, and her top retained almost no detail I could recover. Recovering accurate skin tones is probably one of the most important skills I learned when restoring these photos. I wanted to keep that filmic look of the era while avoiding making people look jaundiced or pale. Lightroom's new masking feature that let's you isolate every aspect of the people it detects in a photo. This made fixing skin tones much easier. I could isolate just her face or her lips or her hair or her eyes and make precise individual adjustments. This process could have taken a great deal longer without this feature. But, I brought back proper contrast and color, added a little bit of detail to her top with gen fill, and hopefully got fairly accurate skin tones as well.

Next up, forward facing flash strikes again in a photo of Mike and Anastasia during Christmas.

Film did not do well in low light. If it was indoors and nighttime, you pretty much had no choice but to use flash. But a flash is a very small, bright light source and this causes a very unflattering result on humans. Today we have much more powerful flashes with rotating heads. We can bounce the light into the ceiling or off a wall and increase the size of the light source to get a more flattering result.

In this photo I wasn't able to do much, so I just balanced the skin tones and brought out some hidden detail and called it a day. It's still a lovely memory and thankfully film has such character that it negates a lot of the unflattering aspects of direct flash.

Next up is some cuteness...

A big priority when editing photos is to make sure the subjects are the star of the photo. And in this one their faces were a bit obscured in shadow. There was also a lot of haze in the background hiding the beautiful vista. Not to mention when I cleared that haze, there was this super faint hint of something in the sky. I can't tell if it was a rainbow, but I decided to believe it was a rainbow. The only thing that I am still struggling with, and this seems to be common with a lot of old photos, is green. Getting a good, saturated, natural green to look right has been very difficult. Everything I try ends up looking toxic or fake. The only thing that ends up looking right with the rest of the photo is more of a yellow-y brown. It's something I'll have to work on as I learn, but as long as the overall photo looks balanced and natural, I'm okay with not perfectly nailing the greens.

Up next we have a lovely scene on a Greek dock...

As far as editing goes, this was pretty basic. I just undid the fading, adjusted the skin tones, replaced the blown-out sky, and made the colors pop. But I think this is actually one of my favorite before and after shots. I just love how such a simple fix brought this scene to life.

A new car is a big deal and Anastasia looks so proud here...

This image has another common issue in addition to the typical fading of colors. It has a yellowish orange color cast. This could have been an issue with the film used or the development process or a chemical reaction on the print. A color cast is a lot like looking through colored glasses. It's like a translucent color material was put on top of the image. This can be a little trickier to deal with, but if you know your color theory, you might already know the solution. Blue is the opposite of yellow/orange on the color wheel, so if you introduce blue to the image it should balance out. Also, add a sky if it was missing.

Next up we have a landscaping project...

This one wasn't too tricky, but there was one interesting issue I had to address. All light has a color temperature. Daylight has a temperature of around 5500K. But the inside of the garage was being lit by reflected light and so that light took on the color temperature of the things it was bouncing off of. So I had to mask out the people and the car and address the color temperature inside the garage to make everything look balanced. Also, the green fought me hard on this one. And with the theme of this picture being plants, I felt I really needed to find a tone that worked. I think I finally got there, but I spent way too much time in the color picker doing trial and error of green tones. Also, new sky.

With this next one I actually did a pretty thorough explanation of how I edited it. But this was probably my favorite puzzle to solve from this collection of photos.

I'll do the abridged explanation...

The physical photograph was printed on a paper with a very heavy texture. And when it was scanned, the light from the scanner bounced off that texture and created a pattern of unwanted highlights.

I was worried this was impossible to fix and I almost gave up on this photo. But after one final Google search I discovered something called "Fast Fourier Transform." It's a mathematical formula that can be used to detect patterns. And the image editing software Affinity Photo, just so happens to have a filter called FFT denoise that helps you remove unwanted patterns from scanned photos.

And thanks to that filter, I was able to remove a substantial amount of that pattern...

Then I did my standard clean up techniques...

Oh, and I decided to try learning how to colorize.

Photoshop has a new set of experimental filters and a colorization tool is one of them. It is not great yet, but it is a great starting place. Instead of having to hand paint every single thing in the photo, Photoshop gave me a base to work with and I could take it from there with traditional techniques.

That's all I have the energy for today, but there are a bunch of cool restorations to talk about. Hopefully you all find this interesting. It was such a great gift to give to Katrina's parents. And spending that time with them and making them happy felt like I was with my own parents again. So we all got a gift in that wonderful evening.

Part 2 coming as soon as I have the energy!

#photography #photo restoration

[star-anise]

This is what the fight is like

Sooo, apparently the extremely tenuous and recent nature of the LGBTQ+ community's legal right to exist was not actually super widely known to a lot of people on Tumblr?

Which clarifies some stuff in retrospect. I have so often wanted to grab people by their lapels and shout, "Stop picking on someone for not meeting your entry requirements! We need everyone we can get, you asshole! DON'T YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THEY HATE US OUT THERE?"

Aaaapparently... no, they did not know. Or they knew and were a conservative psyop preparing the ground for our loss of legal rights. Fun times!

So: Look, it is bad. Shit is scary. They really do hate us out there. You're not wrong.

But: This is what we've always fought. This boat we're in with its antique fittings and strange markings on the floor is a battleship. Work has always been going on in the basements, and when shit gets tough, we clear away clutter and roll out the cannons.

I found this chart a couple weeks ago and hung onto it because it felt like the map to my first 25 years on this earth:

[Image description: A graph titled "Same Sex Marriage: Public Polls since 1988." It is from FiveThirtyEight's NYT column. It records the percentage of US Americans polled who would say yes or no to legalizing same-sex marriage, from 1988 to 2011.

The two lines begin with roughly 10% saying yes in 1988, and 70% saying no; the two lines gradually draw closer over the years, until by 2011, the percent saying finally dips under 50%, and the group saying yes makes a tentative reach for the majority. End of image description.]

After some great social change has happened, when everyone has admitted that gay marriage is very cute and Pride is a colourful parade, hooray, people like to pretend that it was just natural and inevitable and happened on its own. People just became less prejudiced! Courts just decided on a case! Governments just passed a law!

In reality, it was a vicious fucking fight, every fucking time. Every fucking where. There are a lot of people who deeply, sincerely believe that a hundred years ago, society had good rules about sex and gender and intercourse and marriage, and that changing those rules has made the world worse. They don't always agree on the specifics, but they can work together far enough to fight anyone with new ideas.

This is why we are a community. Even when we don't have the same experiences of attraction or identity, even when we don't do the same things, even when we have wildly different ideas of a good time. Because when these groups take aim, we're all under fire, and none of us is responsible for why they hate us.

In some ways I think it's a miracle that there seems to be a generation that did not grow up, as I grew up, constantly glued to news reports about What Percentage of Society Hates Us this month. I can't imagine who I'd be if my brain and heart and soul hadn't been tied up, that whole time, in the political question of whether I'd get to dream of a decent future.

I think that it will give us strength to have people who can imagine a world where no one hates us. Who believe in it so strongly they can taste it. That's my prediction: If you didn't know this was coming, you'll be a boon to us, because we have always needed joy so fiercely, in this fight, to keep us going on. We have needed drag queens and punk bands and "her wife" and safe space stickers. Parade floats and wedding days and little dogs with rainbow collars, badges and banners and meetups, because more than anything else we need to fight our own despair, and our fear that the world will never get any better than this.

It will. We know it will. We can taste it.

Look up to the history, organizations, and people who've got us this far for information on what forms of activism will actually advance our political goals. Look to the side to make sure the comrades within reach are keeping their heads above water, and that you're keeping enough joy going to stay alive. Look back to see who's more vulnerable than you are that you might have forgotten or been tempted to leave behind. Look after each other. Look after yourself.

We can do this.

To your battle stations.

#lgbt discourse #staranise original

[gisellecnz]

Cherished moments.

(≧∇≦)/ Sypnosis. This is after your wedding with satoru. Your honeymoon together.

•Contents. Pure fluff, just fluff, reader is fem, gojo crying cuz your too pretty, cuddles

•note. I'm kinda new to writing + I'm new to tumbler, and english isn't my first language. So I'm sorry if my writing is kinda off, p.s if someone made a similar fic, please don't misunderstand. That might be just a coincidence, the moment I saw that picture of gojo (the one I used above this post) that inspired me to write a fic about it. Also, credits to the owner of the drawing! I just saw it on Pinterest and I don't know who the artist is.

It is now 11:48pm, it has been a long day and is probably one of your best days of your life. You are now married with the man of your dreams, the one and only Satoru Gojo.

6 hours ago was your wedding, the moment you started walking down the aisle, Satoru was in tears. You were also in tears, but Satoru was more emotional. You found it cute how his eyes were red and puffy after, you wiped his tears as you brushed your thumb over his wet lashes. You've done this before but now it felt so much more different- you've felt alot of butterflies in your stomach as satoru opens those eyes of his which you've adored a lot since you were in highschool. They were so pretty, they were as blue as the ocean.

You also couldn't believe you now have Satoru's surname. You are now called as Mrs. Gojo.

In Satoru's pov, he couldn't hold back his tears from seeing you. You were so beautiful, he thinks you were the most prettiest woman that has ever stepped into earth. His heart raced with anticipation, the way your pretty smile was illuminating the room, and how your veil was delicately flowing over your face like a cascade of dreams. The way your gown trailed behind you, your eyes sparkled with so much love and joy as you looked at him. He swore that if he was stuck in a time loop in this situation, he wouldnt get tired from it.

After you and Satoru exchanged your vows and said your "I dos", your friends: Shoko, geto, yuuji, Megumi, Tsumiki, nobara gathered for a group photo. Along side with that there's a seperate photo of you and Satoru kissing from the wedding. They are now framed, sitting on the lamp table beside you.

Right now, you are lying down on a hotel bed. Satoru made sure to book in a very luxurious hotel for your honeymoon. (It's also canon that he's rich rich)

You were very tired. Today was so much fun, you exchanged your clothes to a more comfortable one, which is why you are wearing satoru's shirt right now. It also has his scent in it which is why you always preffered to sleep in his clothes.

And there, your love of your life came out from the bathroom. He just took a shower, his fluffy white snowy hair is now wet. AND DAMN his towel was wrapped around his waist, his abs were showing. You've seen it a lot of times already but you just couldn't get used to it. Your face was now pink.

Satoru laughed at your actions, you were so cute. He dried his hair and changed into his clothes, he got into the bed and snuggled beside you.

"Tired, hm?"

Satoru layed down his head to your chest, he loves lying down there, he loves hearing your heart beats and the way your breasts were squishing his cheeks.

"Mmn, yeah."

You chuckled as you gave a kiss to his forehead, your fingers combing through his fluffy hair.

He looks at you with pleading eyes, looking like he wants something from you.

"More kisses- please?"

You gave a kiss to his cheek and his lips. "Gosh, so clingy as ever."

You said as you chuckled and smiled at Satoru. But suddenly you gasped as he rolls you over, making you the one on top of him now, laying down on his chest.

He gives you that cheeky smile, "I love you so much y/n, I literally couldn't hold in my tears back from seeing you in that wedding dress. "

You were about to say something but he cuts you off by kissing you in the lips. And starts saying one of the most sweetest things to you.

"The most-" a kiss on your forehead. "Gorgeous-" a kiss on your nose. "Prettiest-" a kiss on your lips again. "Sweetest-" a kiss on your left cheek. "Girl I've ever met. " a kiss in your right cheek.

His actions made you tear up, hes so sweet. But he wasn't expecting you to react like that.

"Hey, why're y' cryin? Don't cry." He frowns as he pulls you closer to him and gives you one last kiss to your forehead. You chuckle and tell him that's it's okay.

You both finally fell asleep, embracing each other. You will cherish this day forever.

note: I'm sorry if this is short and it's rushed plus again I'm sleepy and it's like 3:14 am, I'm gonna sleep now cuz I'm finally finished 🥰

#gojo fluff #gojo satoru #gojo x reader #satoru x reader #gojou satoru x reader #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jjk fluff #jujutsu kaisen #jjk #fluff #pure fluff

[bitterie-sweetie]

This is how we fall

Pairing: Mingyu x reader Genre: fluff, light angst, fake dating au WC: 18.5k Warnings: swearing, mentions of blood, alcohol A/N: happy belated mingyu day!! this is an updated ver of my fave fic i posted for another fandom, but i think it fits mingyu the most <3

You should know better than to make a deal with a stranger, but the need for a date to Minghao’s party has you desperate. It can’t be too bad though; all you have to do is show Mingyu what you saw in your reading, and he would be your date for one night. Simple enough, right?

The fates were playing with you.

That much you can be sure of—there is absolutely no way you should be seeing yourself in one of your clients' readings, in the same way that you aren't able to see what lies in your own future. And yet, here you are, getting a glimpse at the same hairstyle, the same smooth skin and face shape that you see in the mirror every day. It isn't entirely clear when your client doesn't look at his lover's face directly, but surely those features are enough to conclude that it's you, right?

"I see myself in your future."

"Is that a terrible pickup line or are you serious?"

You vaguely notice that Mingyu is laughing. It makes you realize that neither option was a good one really; a pickup line would imply you're interested in him, while seeing yourself in his future certainly implies a lot more than that. Perhaps you silently pray to the fates that those words didn't make their way to your boss in the other room.

But as the scene progresses, there are some other details that you notice. The kitchen in the background doesn't look familiar at all, nor do you recognize the light fragrance of oranges surrounding you—not a bad scent, though it isn't one you have lying around at home. What his lover is wearing is different from anything you own too, which could only indicate that you were wrong: they have to be someone else.

"Nah," you shrug, quickly trying to brush off your mistake, "I was just kidding."

That earns you a bemused smile as Mingyu raises an eyebrow, entirely unconvinced. "You sure about that?"

With a nod, you quickly pull your hands back to break out of the visions and internally curse yourself for being stupid enough to think that the lover in the visions was you. Just how delusional are you now? Sure, you've always been a head in the clouds type of person, falling in love with the possibility that everywhere you go, the next person you meet might just be the love of your life. Eye contact with the cute dog walker at the park turns into getting lost in their eyes while walking under the stars, and a brush of hands with the hot barista at the local coffee shop turns into holding hands while reciting wedding vows.

And admittedly, Mingyu is good-looking. But this isn't the same—he's a client, and you're working. It was silly to have thought of the possibility of being in his future in the first place, but even more ridiculous to have said it out loud.

You immediately shake off the thoughts when you catch him staring.

"So?" He leans forward, looking at you like he has some big secret to share. "What did you see?"

"Um, your love life will be just fine."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." You avoid his gaze, choosing to stare at the small piece of lint on your sleeve instead. "Things will run smoothly with your partner. I could sense your love for them and how committed to them you are. And similarly, how in love with you they are." 

This is the part you've always hated the most about the job. Jeonghan may have thought that hiring a "real psychic" was a good idea, but you think otherwise—surely anyone who knows anything about palm reading would immediately be able to tell that you're a fake. A fraud. You're not here to look over the love lines and life lines on your clients' palms when the visions come to you as naturally as breathing: they let you see a few scenes from the client's future, usually scenes involving a lover from what you've gathered over the years. And while it's no surprise that Jeonghan put you on love readings because of this ability, it's not like you can tell clients about the exact scenes you see.

Hence why you resort to vague summaries of the readings that make you feel like an imposter.

"Really?" Mingyu cocks his head, still watching you carefully. "Anything else?"

There were three scenes that you witnessed: holding hands across the table at what looked like a dimly lit restaurant, with tiny scars on his lover's hands. "There might be some dark times in your life or your partner's, but the two of you will be able to support each other." A kiss in what seemed like an open-air market, with the sweet taste of apples on your lips and the warmth of sunshine against your skin. "They'll bring you warmth." Then there was the final scene where you thought you'd seen yourself—slow dancing in the kitchen at midnight with faint music playing in the background and Mingyu's soft whispers reaching his lover's ears. "And your partner will make you believe in love again."

A fairly normal set of scenes compared to some of the things you've seen from other people, although it's a bit strange that they happen to be scenes where he's not looking directly at his lover.

"Hmm, okay." Mingyu nods slowly and then purses his lips, seemingly deep in thought. Maybe it's the dimness in the room, but it's like you can see the gradual change in his demeanour as his smile falters. "That sounds great and all, but I'm single as hell right now."

It takes all your efforts to not let your shock show. "Well, it can be your future partner."

"Sure, I guess." He shrugs, but the gloomy expression never leaves his face.

You open your mouth to give a retort, to defend yourself or to convince him somehow, but nothing comes out. Plenty of skeptical people have sat in that very seat before, but you've never dealt with someone who reacted like this. It almost seems like a prank or a test that Jeonghan is giving you to gauge how well you can react in these types of situations.

"Things didn't really end well with my ex, so I don't know if I'd want to go through all of that again." He grimaces. "But I'm kind of curious as to know how you came up with that."

"Well, what did you expect?"

"I'm not sure. Maybe something more realistic? Like telling me why my past relationship failed and if I'm destined to have bad luck with them."

Destined to have bad luck with them? Now that's a first. Many clients have argued with you before that any bad readings would never come true, but you're surprised to hear that it's the other way around with Mingyu. Just what has he gone through to make him doubt a good reading? You almost want to convince him, to have this reading be what helps him out of this turmoil that he's going through.

"I can show you, if you want." The words are out of your mouth before you can process them, and it isn't until you see the stupefied expression on his face that you realize just what you said.

"What?"

"I can show you what I saw in the reading," you repeat, figuring it's too late now to back out. Show him? Are you out of your mind? At least the worst that can happen is it'd make you look stupid; there is no way he'd accept—

"Oh. Um, yeah." Mingyu's shock gradually disappears and turns into something else that you can't quite pinpoint, but you might say that it almost looks like hope. "Okay, sure. How would that work?"

"I can show you the locations that I saw and, um, the—" You pause because how are you supposed to word this? "The events that happen in them."

This should be when he says you're joking, that he's not going to fall for some scam. But against all odds, he nods, and a smile gradually appears. "Is this a part of what's included in the reading, or do I have to pay extra?"

You're about to open your mouth and tell him that it's included—to essentially own up to your own mistake of offering in the first place—but something else comes to mind.

There is the party coming up. You've been complaining to Jeonghan all day about your lack of a date for Minghao's party, since receiving the invite and figuring out just who would be there. And while normally you wouldn't care about whether you had a date or not, this would be the first time that you're reconnecting with your old college crowd since graduating and leaving certain people behind.

"It's not included, but you don't have to pay; I'd gladly accept a favour instead. There's this party that I'm going to, and I need a date—not even like a real date. You could just be my fake date and—" You force yourself to stop when he doesn't react and simply blinks at you. "Never mind, forget I ever said anything. I'll just ask Jeonghan to be my date—"

"Y/N, you know I can't go to that thing," Jeonghan voice comes floating in from the other room. "I have a business to run."

Mingyu's face brightens, eyes twinkling in amusement, and you have to resist the urge to sink into the ground. "Okay, so a party? Sure, I can go to this party with you if that's what you want."

You want to stop this thing in its tracks. Your joke of an offer coupled with the mention of the party to a complete strange surely would be a recipe for disaster, and besides, why would he would even care to know what you saw in the reading? Why would he believe you if you do show him the scenes? But you can't bring yourself to say any of that. At the prospect of being handed a solution to your dateless party problem, you decide to bite your tongue and go ahead with it. Showing him a few locations that you saw in your reading would be nothing compared to being alone with certain people from your past.

"Okay, deal. Let's do it."

A few minutes later, he's leaving the shop with a little wave, and a new contact has been saved into your phone.

"You good?" Jeonghan raises an eyebrow, stepping out of the back room as he gives you a look that says he heard everything. His glasses are halfway down his face and hair ruffled like he tugged on the strands in frustration way too many times, which isn't surprising when the shop is on the verge of needing to be shut down. "Were you serious about asking me to be your date?"

"No, you must've heard wrong." You quickly shake your head, plastering on a smile. "And I'm great. Wonderful. Amazing." You're definitely not. "Everything is fine." It definitely isn't.

The only reaction you get is a teasing grin. "Well," Jeonghan pats you on the shoulder, "let me know how it goes. Maybe you really did see yourself in his future."

Great.

It was at this moment you knew you fucked up.

"You look like you just lost your job," Soonyoung says right when you step into the apartment that night.

You shoot him a glare. "Unprovoked?"

He's slouched in yet another strange position on the couch, eyeing you with the concern that should probably be going towards fixing his posture, and his phone screen in hand is flashing with probably some show he's been bingeing despite the TV being only a few feet away.

A typical night at your residence, really.

"Should I leave?" he asks, sitting up straighter.

You kick your shoes off, too worn out to think of a smart retort tonight. Then you slump onto the couch beside him. "Is it that obvious?"

"Uh huh. You want to talk about it?"

With a sigh, you start from the beginning. Mingyu had been friendly when he walked in that evening, all charming smiles and lingering stares. There wasn't anything particularly interesting about him, though you may have thought he was good-looking and may have been a tiny bit glad that he made a last-minute decision to switch from the career reading to the love reading.

You tell Soonyoung about the readings, dragging on the details until he's waving you on impatiently. And then comes the end—the deal you made where you'd show Mingyu what you saw in the reading in exchange for having him be your date to Minghao's party.

"Why the hell would you do that?" Soonyoung narrows his eyes, stare seeming to bore into your skull. "He was hot, wasn't he?"

"Um, well..."

"I knew it." Then he put his hands on your shoulders and shakes you a little. "Y/N," he looks you dead in the eye, "you need to stop being so nice to people you find hot. Well, except for me; I'm an exception."

You scoff. "It's not that. I need a date for this party, okay? You know he's going to be there so there's no way I'm showing up alone."

"Forget the party," he gives a dismissing wave, "how are you going to show him everything? The guy seems like someone who doesn't believe in this kind of stuff."

"Yeah," you mutter, "maybe he knows I'm a fraud and is secretly filming all this for his YouTube channel. Can you imagine the title? Delusional psychic makes up romantic scenes."

If Mingyu really did think you were a fraud, he wouldn't be wrong. After all, you only learned about the different palm lines as a cover for the real abilities you used for these readings. Maybe it isn't such a bad idea to switch over to regular readings now though; if only you'd been blessed with Jeonghan's bullshitting skills instead of this ability that's starting to feel more like a curse.

"No, Y/N. Who does he think he is?" Soonyoung abruptly gets up from the couch, hands balled into fists instead of laughing at your joke like you thought he would. "No one forced him to go to you. And we all know that fortune telling is a big sham; surely he should know to take everything with a grain of salt."

You nod, but then you think back to the reading. "Well, I did think that I could be wrong. The reading was... well, it was weird. I couldn't see his lover's face, like, it either went by really fast or he wasn't looking at them at all."

"Those scenes don't necessarily have to be with the ex he mentioned, right? You have no control over what point of someone's life you see."

Soonyoung is right. You can't control the time frame of someone's life you witness, so it's plausible that the love interest is someone else entirely. Perhaps from a future relationship, or maybe Mingyu and his ex if they get back together one day.

Or maybe the visions are wrong. Just because they haven't been wrong before doesn't mean it can't happen.

"Or," Soonyoung flops back onto the couch excitedly, "do you think it's because he has bad eyesight?" He leans in until his face is mere centimeters away from yours, pretending to examine you through squinted eyes. "Maybe he never sees his lover's face that clearly anyway."

"There's a big difference between having bad eyesight and simply not looking at something, you know."

"Then do you want to use me as practice?" He holds out his hand, placing it on your knee with his palm up. "You can check if futures can change or if eyesight really does affect the readings."

You give him one last skeptical glance before going along with it. Then you press two thumbs at the edges of his palm with your eyes closed and wait for the visions to arrive.

It's been years since you've glanced into his future, but still you immediately recognize the images. There's Soonyoung laughing while on a picnic with Wonwoo in the same sunny field, Wonwoo playing the guitar in your current apartment, and a final close up of the ring on Soonyoung's slender finger. You wonder if he still remembers this last one; you're at the age where all of your friends are getting engaged left and right, and you're half expecting a wedding invitation any day now.

But just before you can pull your hands back and ask him if the first two events have already happened, the vision changes. A new scene takes shape this time and it confuses you at first because the view starts off with an unfamiliar ceiling. Then as Soonyoung glances down, Wonwoo's face comes into view and—

"What the hell?" You immediately jerk back, scrambling to break out of the vision. "Please don't get me to do your reading ever again."

Soonyoung gives you a confused glance. "Why, what did you see? Did it change?"

"Let me just say that I really don't need to see the things that you and Wonwoo do."

"You—you saw what?"

"I heard it too." You bury your face in your hands, trying to wipe the memory away. "The visions really just had to give me first person seats to a show I never wanted to see."

Soonyoung chokes on his spit.

If Mingyu forgot about this agreement entirely once he left the shop, it wouldn't surprise you. You'd just take it as one of those situations where friends tell each other to hang out but never end up making plans, so why would this be any different?

What surprises you is that he does text you a few days later.

So through your text conversation, you tell him all about the first scene you saw—the restaurant with the hand holding across the table. A dinner date, essentially. It's a good thing that this is the easiest scene to reenact; maybe after this he'd decide that he's had enough of this fake fortune telling stunt while still upholding his end of the agreement.

But despite how simple the scene is, the thought of doing this makes you all kinds of nervous. Your stomach twists at the thought of spending a whole night on the receiving end of Mingyu's intense stare, especially when this would be so different from your interactions with him while working that day. At least at work you knew what you were doing. This on the other hand, is completely out of your range of knowledge. Like, what do people talk about during these kinds of events? What if whatever you're eating gets really messy? What if—

"Wait, where are you going today? Soonyoung didn't tell me about this." Wonwoo glances over at his boyfriend in confusion before turning back to you. "And what did you agree to do?"

"Um," you say slowly, glancing between the two perched on the couch. "I made a deal to show a client what I saw in his reading."

"But why?" Wonwoo puts his hand on your knee, leaning over with concern written on his face. "You haven't done anything like this before for your other customers, have you?"

"No way. I probably wouldn't be doing this if he hadn't agreed to be my date for Minghao's party."

Maybe it was weird to have agreed to this—the look on Wonwoo's face said as much. After all, Mingyu is a stranger, and you don't know anything about him other than the flashes of his life you witnessed through the reading. But won't it simply feel like an awkward first date? All you have to do is take him to a restaurant that resembles the one you saw and hold hands across the table. It can't be too challenging when there is no need to do much talking nor get to know each other.

"Oh. Because of..." Wonwoo trails off, giving you a feeble smile. "Right."

"Well, don't mention him," Soonyoung elbows him in the ribs.

Wonwoo waves his boyfriend off. "I'm not sure how you're going to make this client believe you, but your time with him today doesn't have to be a bad thing."

"But babe, you didn't see how upset Y/N was that night after agreeing to this." The dramatic pout on Soonyoung's face has you rolling your eyes. Then he turns to you. "He might be hot, but he could still be an asshole. This guy seems like bad news. What if you get kidnapped? What if you go missing? Who's going to help pay the rent then? And—"

"Don't act like you're not waiting for me to move out so that Wonwoo can move in," you reach over to flick him on the forehead. "Thanks for your concern but I think I'll be just fine."

"At least share your location with us, okay? If you need an emergency phone call to get you out of there, I have my scream perfected."

"Unfortunately, I am very aware of that." You definitely don't want to think about the last time Soonyoung called to pull you out of a group meeting back in college and nearly damaged the hearing of your entire group. "Okay, I'm really going to go now."

"Oh and," a hand wraps around your wrist just as you stand, "don't fall for him."

"Shut up, it's literally one meeting."

One meeting won't be a big deal. It'd be a nice dinner date with some innocent hand holding, and then you probably wouldn't have to see Mingyu again until the party. Nothing can't go wrong when you'd be in public the whole time anyway.

Soonyoung shouts something that sounds like, "At least wear something nicer!" but you're already out the door.

"Oh, you actually came." Mingyu comments, face instantly lighting up when he spots you. "I almost thought you decided to back out."

"Me? Never." You try for a smile, but you know he's referring to your tardiness.

It'd be easy to blame your annoying roommate for holding you up today, but embarrassingly enough, it wasn't because of him. Your shortcut through the park's uneven grounds was the culprit, causing your massive tumble which ultimately led to being much too late for this date. It's times like this when you wish your ability would let you see more useful things than random points in other people's futures.

Upon arriving at the restaurant though, you realize that something else you wish you'd seen is how your choice of restaurant is nothing like what you expected. You picked the place after scavenging through the depths of Google Maps, digging up pictures left and right from various reviews, and the single review of this place was the only one that seemed to match the one in your visions. In the photo, the restaurant was just as dim, and looked like a casual place. But now, in front of you, is a restaurant that looks nothing like the one in the photo.

In front of you is something much fancier—small chandeliers hang above every table and elegant decorations line the walls. There is no doubt that it must've gone through a major upgrade since the local reviewer posted those pictures from five years ago. Now not only was your attempt at finding the restaurant in your visions futile, but this place also makes you wish you chose a different occupation entirely. Preferably one that pays more than the meager amount your readings are worth.

"Well, this is an interesting choice," Mingyu comments, eyeing the walls. "Seems like a nice place."

You debate pulling him right out of there. "Um, actually, it's not—"

"Hi, do you have a reservation?" the hostess asks, looking between the two of you. And before you can even answer, there are two menus in her hands and she's leading you to your table. Great. Perhaps you'd just have to take off one of your rings and fake a proposal for the sake of a free meal if it turns out to be too expensive. You heard that it worked for a friend of a friend once upon a time.

Once seated, you nearly do a double take. There is no dim lighting obscuring Mingyu's handsome face this time, and under the glow of the chandelier, you can finally see his smooth skin, plush lips, and large eyes that seem to twinkle when he glances at you for whatever reason. If you thought he was good looking before, you have to admit that he looks even better today. 

You turn to the menu instead, studying it intensely despite having immediately picked out the cheapest option. Five minutes go by. The waitress comes by to take your orders. Another five minutes. Are first dates always this awkward? It's been years since you've gone out with anyone, but if this were the reality of the dating scene, maybe third-wheeling your friends for the rest of your life wouldn't be such a bad idea.

Mingyu clears his throat. "Should we start with the basics?"

"What?"

"A story to tell people at the party if they ask about us." He swirls his drink around, eyes flickering to yours occasionally. "We need to be on the same page with our answers to make it convincing."

Right, he's going to be your fake boyfriend for the party. You haven't thought that far yet when you've had the scenes to worry about, but he's not wrong. "Oh. Um, okay. So how did we meet? It wouldn't be through mutual friends because most of them would be there. Maybe a dating app?"

"Hmm," he hums, looking over everything on the table as he thinks. "We met at your shop when I got a reading done. Then you showed me how everything happens."

"We're just going with the truth?" You're slightly doubtful of whether this story would be believable, yet the same time you're relieved you wouldn't have to be lying. Soonyoung has always said you were a terrible liar. "I guess that works. So then how did we fall for each other?"

Mingyu presses his lips together and thinks for a while. "Through reenactments of the things you saw in the reading." As if for emphasis, he moves his drink out of the way before putting his hand on the table between the two of you, and then beckons for you to do the same.

"Oh. This is what you mean by reenact it."

Of course you knew this might be what he wanted, and you came here fully prepared to reenact this with him. But because of your fall at the park earlier, now the fresh scrapes on your palms are telling you to stop in your tracks. You shouldn't be touching anything and sure as hell don't want him to see the state of your battered hands.

You opt for a shrug, feigning nonchalance. "Um, yeah it was just hand holding. You know, we don't have to actually—"

"Come on, Y/N." He puts on a pout and the longer he stares at you, the more his eyes somehow start to have the effect of puppy eyes. "Just humour me?"

So you give in, reluctantly. You reach out a hand and rest it on his with your palm up to show him exactly why you don't want to do this.

Mingyu's eyes widen at you before he's holding your hand up to examine it closely. "Oh shit. What happened? Did you fall on your way here? Is that why you were late?"

You nod a little.

"Hey, you should've said something. I'll go ask for some bandages, okay?"

"No, it's fine—" you start, but he only shoots you a smile before leaving his seat.

Looking down, you can see that your palms already appear to be much better than earlier—the red splotches are mainly dry now, and the dirt has been wiped off. Thankfully, Mingyu didn't see the worst of it, but that does little to stop the embarrassment in its tracks. You only hope that the heat at your cheeks fades when he comes back a few minutes later waving a handful of bandages around.

You think that it would end there, but it doesn't. Mingyu insists on putting these bandages on your wounds. His fingers are light where they graze your skin as he carefully places them on your scrapes, and it's such a nice gesture that you're suddenly taken aback. This is supposed to be a quick dinner, and he's supposed to hate you for the bad reading. But now you question if any of that is true when he continues to act so kind and friendly.

"This is not how it's supposed to go." You frown, trying not to stare at his face as he works on the bandages in total concentration. "Not at all."

Because your hands may be in his across the table as you wait for your food to come, but he's only holding them to bandage your wounds. And while this restaurant does seem romantic, it's nowhere near the look of the one in your visions.

Mingyu's eyes fill with amusement when he looks up. "Holding hands across the table as we wait for our food, right? Isn't this close enough?"

"You're bandaging me. This isn't remotely romantic."

"Love isn't always supposed to be romantic, Y/N," he says dramatically, rolling his eyes. "Haven't your readings shown you the small things that people do for each other?"

You wonder just what kind of readings he thinks you do. "Um. I guess."

He does have a point. Maybe this moment, no matter how embarrassing or ridiculous it seems, is better than having to sit through faking or pretending everything. It may force you to be vulnerable, but each gentle brush of Mingyu's fingers and each press of a bandage against your palms hint at a vulnerable side of him too.

You study him, wanting to figure out just what kind of person he is. Why is he being so kind when the two of you are practically strangers? When this meetup should be a quick meal at a casual food place, involving no more physical contact than two seconds of hand holding? Well, perhaps five seconds. But now, it seems like the two of you have gone beyond your original plans of fake pleasantries.

"All done." He lightly presses the last bandage onto your palm, and you're grateful for the arrival of your food as an excuse to pull your hand back.

"So, um," you rack your brain for literally anything to say, "why did you come in for a reading that day?"

"There was a career decision that I was stuck on," Mingyu picks at his food then looks up with a twinkle in his eyes. "I don't believe in this whole fortune telling thing, but I needed some advice on what to do. Figured that maybe while you were telling me to look deep inside myself and to follow my heart or whatever, I'd suddenly get an epiphany about what to do."

"And did you?"

"Yeah."

"Even without the reading? The boss would've done a good job on it." That part is true; you may be the real psychic of the two of you, but you can't deny how good Jeonghan's readings are. Heck, you'd rather choose to believe his words over what you see in your own visions.

A nod. "Just going there gave me what I needed. I decided it would be good to start fresh, to try something new." He pauses to take a sip of water, but then his eyes snap to yours. "Wait, hold on. Did you say he's your boss? You were going to ask your boss to be your date? For the party?"

"Oh, Jeonghan?" You want to laugh at the incredulous expression on his face. "Nah, he's not exactly my boss. We met in college as classmates."

Your previous thoughts about not needing to talk completely disappear as you tell him about how this little psychic shop started. It had been Jeonghan's idea, a backup plan for a backup plan essentially. He'd always joked about starting a business if nothing else worked out after graduation, and the opportunity came around sooner than expected.

"Damn, I wish my boss was chill like that. Mine really makes everyone stay back to finish the projects that he deems urgent when they aren't."

"You mean you're not in school?" You have to wipe the shock from your face. "I would've thought that you were some frat boy in college."

Mingyu stares at you blankly, blinking a couple of times. "You know, I'm not sure if that was a compliment or insult." He frowns. "Well, I guess it's good that my job hasn't aged me too much yet. But frat boy? Really?"

"Hey, maybe that should be our cover instead," you tease. "Frat boy Mingyu who I met at a party in college years ago but only recently reconnected with."

He rolls his eyes at you, suddenly starting to chew so aggressively that you have to laugh at his expression.

The rest of the night goes by similarly, allowing you to forget all your worries about awkward first dates. Mingyu is a good conversationalist and surprisingly funny to, and when he drops his fork and later bumps his head on the chandelier is so endearing that you find yourself smiling every time you look at him.

As the two of you walk back to the shop afterwards, your time together leaves you thinking about how he's not the person you thought he would be. Maybe you should know that already based on the glimpse into his future because the warmth that you'd seen from those scenes alone could've been an indicator.

"There are two more things you saw, right?" Mingyu turns to you, sparkles in his eyes from the reflection of streetlights right outside the shop. "Are you free next weekend too?"

"Wait." You're almost sure you heard wrong. "You—you want to see the rest of them? The scenes I saw?"

"Yeah, of course," he says like it's obvious, seemingly unable to understand the surprise that must be on your face.

This is a possibility that you never considered at all. You don't get why he would want to see you or spend time with you again, or how showing him what you saw in the visions would possibly convince him that they're real. "Oh, um. I didn't think you would be interested."

"Why not? We still need to figure out more of our cover story for this party too." He gives a shrug and then raises a hand up in a wave. "See you next week?"

"Yeah, okay," you manage to say. "Next week."

The rest of the way home is filled with Mingyu's words echoing through your mind.

When you open the door to your apartment, Soonyoung drops his phone mid-scroll, giving you a onceover that makes his eyes as big as saucers. Then he's running over to you.

Right, you completely forgot about your state of being until this reminder.

"What the fuck happened to you? Did the Mingyu guy do all of this?" He stops you in the middle of the hallway, hands on your shoulders to spin you around as he glances over every inch of the mess of blood and dirt on your clothing. You understand what it would look like from the outside—the result of your fall must be fueling his thoughts about Mingyu being a bad guy. Maybe it looks like you bravely jumped out of a moving car and managed to crawl back home.

"No—"

"See? I told you he was bad news," he huffs and then guides you into the kitchen where he sits you down on a chair. "What happened? Did he pull something weird? Should we be calling the police?"

You feel a laugh on the verge of escaping your throat, but you bite it back. Soonyoung's questions are so absurd that you almost want to keep quiet and make him frustrated by his overwhelming curiosity. That'd certainly be one way of annoying him the way he always annoys you.

"No, nothing like that," you say instead, shaking your head. "I tripped and fell while walking through the park." Then you hold up your palms to show him the small bandages where they're peeling at the corners. "He helped bandage me at the restaurant."

Soonyoung nods slowly, but judging by his narrowed eyes, he's entirely unconviced. "Okay, but you look like you got into a fight with him or something. And why would you go through the park?"

"You're the one who made me late, okay? I had to take the shortcut." You go to push him then instantly regret it when the contact makes your palms throb. "Anyway, Mingyu was really nice. Though the, um, reenactment didn't really go as planned."

Then you begin to update him on everything that happened during your date, starting from the restaurant and how it didn't match the visions, to your fall and the bandages. But as you go over all of the moments, you realize there are a few things you intentionally leave out, like the tiny crinkles that appeared at the corners of Mingyu's eyes whenever he smiled. His soft hands that bandaged you so tenderly. Maybe he was right that love is all about the small gestures—even though you initially thought the moment paled in comparison to the one in the reading, the more you replay the day over in your mind, the more you realize that it was indeed romantic in its own way.

"And? Is that it?" Soonyoung gestures wildly. "You won't have to see him until the party, right?"

You can feel the smile on your face fade. "Um, actually. He wants to meet again for the next scene that I saw."

"Don't tell me that's the kiss scene?"

"Yeah... the kiss."

"Well, good luck with that one." Soonyoung's smirk only grows at your reaction. He gives you a pat on the back, but it feels just as insincere as his words. "Try not to fall for him."

As your roommate leaves the room, you can only sigh. This is exactly why you left out those details about this date—Soonyoung would be making fun of you forever. Yes, that has to be the reason. It definitely wasn't because you considered those moments special.

All week, you try to come up with a plan to avoid showing Mingyu the next scene from the visions. You think about making up a more PG-rated scenario since there is no way he would know if what you're showing is real or not, but how can you lie about it when he'll experience the real thing in his future? Besides, Soonyoung tells you the scenarios you come up with are lame.  

So your choices for this scene are really limited—either you would have to share a kiss with him in public or watch as his face contorts with disgust at the thought of having to kiss you. Or perhaps you would be dealing with the awkwardness of dead silence between you once he turns down the kiss. Either way, today is not looking good for you.

On top of that, the location for this scene gives you even more trouble than the first one did. You hadn't exactly gathered much information from it; without being able to use your sense of sight, you only know there was kissing, the smell of the outdoors, and light chatter in the background. A park might seem too public, too open of a space to be doing this, and a forest trail might be too isolated and not sunny enough compared to the sun you'd felt on your skin.

In the end, you decide on the market. A cute date at the market seemed like it could be the perfect balance, and today it bustles with the afternoon crowd of couples on their date and the elderly running their errands. When you look at Mingyu, your hypothesis is confirmed—beside you, he watches the rows of vendor carts and tents with amazement in his eyes.

"You've never been here before?"

Mingyu shakes his head. "Nah. I've been meaning to, but just haven't had the chance to yet." Then he turns to you with a teasing smile. "You chose the perfect spot. It's like you actually read my mind." 

"I can assure you I'm not psychic like that," you mutter, stunned for a second. "Let's take our time exploring and see everything today."

So the two of you slowly walk through each aisle and you watch him marvel at different items from each of the stalls you stop at. It's merely an excuse, though. You're stalling. You still haven't told him about what is supposed to happen in the second scene, and you've been carefully dancing around the topic each time he asked. How are you supposed to blatantly say that the two of you are supposed to kiss? All you can do is hope that the wonders of the market would distract him enough so that he forgets why you're here at all.

"So how long have we known each other?" Mingyu turns to ask as the two of you walk to the next stall. "And what kind of party is it? Don't tell me I unknowingly signed up to go to a wedding with you."

"It's not that much better actually—it's an engagement party."

He stops dead in his tracks. You laugh.

"A year minimum," you continue like he's not giving you a deadpan stare. "Maybe two? We should be pretty serious about... each other."

"Do you think I could watch over the shop for you while you take your boss to be your date?" He pauses, looking at you with hopeful eyes that immediately dim when you shake your head. "What have I gotten myself into?" Then he's walking to the next stall with dramatically loud steps, though you manage to catch the smile he tries to hide.

The rest of your cover story slowly comes together over the course of the date—he asked you out, some of the places you frequent are last week's restaurant and today's market, and you sometimes spend the weekend at his place which is why Soonyoung and Wonwoo haven't met him yet.

After exploring the majority of the stalls a while later, Mingyu finally turns to you.

"Hey, let's head over there." He nods at the field behind the market, shooting you a grin when he takes your hand in his.

You hope he doesn't hear the startled sound that escapes from the back of your throat.

Tucked away behind the row of vendors at the very edge of the market is a field with a few empty picnic tables. And while you aren't sure if this is how the kiss happens in the vision, you get the feeling that maybe he knows. The bit of privacy behind the stalls and the way the noises of the market gradually fade into the background as you approach the table tell you as much—if you were looking for an opportunity to reenact the scene today, it would be here and now.

You climb onto the table, letting your legs dangle off the bench while Mingyu follows suit beside you.

"You haven't said anything about why we're here today." He eyes you up and down with amusement playing on his lips. "Why? Is it something bad?" The teasing tilt in his voice paired with a slight eyebrow raise is enough to have your cheeks quickly burning up.

Then the embarrassment kicks in. You know that there is no avoiding it when the two of you are already at the location of the second scene in your vision, and now it's just a matter of telling him. But no matter how you try to phrase it in his head, what could possibly be a good way of telling your client that you're supposed to kiss him? That's what Mingyu is, right? A client that wanted to see and experience the things in your reading of his future.

"Um. It's... a hug," you say hesitantly, testing the way it sounds in your mouth. Picturing the way his face would fall at the word 'kiss' is enough to scare you into changing your mind at the last second. "A hug is supposed to happen here."

As if he knows you're not telling the truth, Mingyu cocks his head. "Oh yeah? Here of all places?" Maybe it really was a bad idea to lie; you should've believed Soonyoung when he said you can't tell a lie to save your life.

"Yeah." You try to swallow the lump in your throat. "I'm not sure why it's here either."

If he does detect your lie though, he doesn't say anything about it. Instead, his expression morphs into something softer. "Love can be found everywhere, Y/N. Even in a hug at the market if you want it to." Then he gets up and holds his arms open, eyes twinkling with the question of whether you want this.

And do you want this? It might be too soon to be doing this when you barely know each other, but it's also too soon for your heart to be speeding up the way it does, for you to feel a small burst of butterflies in your stomach every time he so much as stares at you for a moment too long, and for this cover story and the reenactments to feel more tangible than the abstract concepts they are meant to be.

But despite all that, you find yourself getting up from the table and carefully stepping into Mingyu's arms. You slowly relax in the warmth of his embrace and let the faint scent of his cologne envelop you, and though it's a tender, loose hug, you can feel the steady beating of his heart and the rises and falls of his every breath.

"Is this how it happens?" he whispers, the rumble of his voice vibrating through his chest.

You can't respond. You don't know how to, nor do you know why he's even the slightest bit willing to act out a scene from a stupid reading that he probably deems a scam anyway. So the obvious answer would be to say yes and call it a day.

The answer is at the tip of your tongue. But as you open your mouth to respond, something stops you from continuing the lie. "No, not quite."

It's the same feeling that tells you to cup his cheek and bring him closer to you, and it makes you lean forward, just until you can see his smooth sun-kissed skin and the small mole at the tip of his nose. And then you're slowly squeezing your eyes shut and bringing your lips to his—kissing him, like how it happens in the reading.

Mingyu's surprise is evident in the way he freezes momentarily, and the rational part of your mind would think that this is it. This is your big mistake and now he's going to back away and—

He kisses you back.

He pulls you even closer and you expect it to feel like the delicate kiss in the reading, but it's completely different in that he kisses you like he wants this. Like he wants you. Those supple lips glide across yours, consuming you, making you feel like you're sinking into the depths of his touch and his body. And all you can do is hang on, grasping weakly at his collar as every essence of your being is filled with want for a person you shouldn't want.

Mingyu breaks the kiss just as you start to think this might be too intense to be done in public.

He catches his breath and then gives you a shy smile, not quite meeting your eyes. "Oh, so that's how it happens?"

Your head is still spinning, but when you look at Mingyu, it's like he's glowing. The way the sun glistens on his skin and lights up his face makes him so beautiful that you almost forget to breathe. If the kiss hadn't felt so real, you might've been thinking that this moment, and Mingyu himself, are straight out of a dream.

You can answer him easily now. "Yeah, it is."

When he takes your hand a moment later, all the thoughts about cover stories and readings and Minghao's party disappear from your mind, leaving only the warmth of him beside you and the memory of his lips on yours.

However, reality hits you very soon. There, by one of the nearby stalls, is someone who looks like Mingyu's lover in the visions. They have the same hairstyle as you, the same smooth skin, and even the same face shape. Without directly glancing at their face, you can assume that you are looking at yourself.

But even though they don't turn your way as the two of you walk by, simply seeing them has your heart sinking. It sinks at the thought that the kiss might be nothing more than a figment of your imagination or of a world where you're both pretending that you really are the lover from the visions. That Mingyu's eagerness to kiss you, to want you, wasn't actually meant for you at all, but rather for someone he hasn't met yet.

And you don't get it. You don't understand why you're disappointed by this when it isn't even real. It shouldn't ever be real. Regardless of whether it was a good kiss, of whether it felt wonderful and realistic and enticing, you should know that it wouldn't mean anything.

Because you're not the lover from the reading.

Perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise to you at this point, but Mingyu agrees to reenact the third and final scene of the vision. You were sure that he would say no, that he definitely wouldn't appreciate having a stranger barge into his home for this one. So to have him actually agree to it has you thinking that maybe if you tell him you're going skydiving he'd agree to that too.

This time it's not as difficult to tell him what happens in the scene—it's just slow dancing, which should be easy to reenact at least compared to the kiss at the market. All you have to do is rest your hands on his shoulders and then step side to side to the beat of the music. How hard can it be?

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Soonyoung peers at you from the doorway of the bathroom. "You barely managed to escape from this guy during your first meeting, and now you're walking right into his home." He comes closer to where you're checking your outfit in front of the mirror, and says in a loud whisper, "where you'll be alone with him."

Right, that is the part you're trying not to think about.

"You sure you can handle it? After," he gestures in the air, "what happened at the market and all."

Internally, you grumble. Externally, you ignore him.

"I know you're picturing that steamy kiss." He rolls his eyes, which you can all too clearly through the mirror. "But anyway, if you're sure about going to his place tonight, just remember to be safe, yeah? Share your location just in case. Hold your head if you're about to jump out of another moving car."

"Don't you have a boyfriend you should be bothering instead?"

That earns you an enthusiastic nod. "He should be coming soon. So take your time on your date tonight."

You finally get some peace and quiet when you step out, once again leaving your roommate mid-sentence about how you picked another terrible outfit.

You're the first to arrive at the restaurant, though it isn't long before you spot Mingyu coming from a block away—he's late for your date and clearly running to make up for it by the way he dodges other people on the street, nearly knocking them over. He gives a big wave when he sees you.

"Sorry for being so late," he pants as he bends over to catch his breath. "Thank you for waiting."

"Guess that makes us even. Although I hope you didn't trip on your way here."

That puts an instant grin on his face. "Nah, I just had to clean up the apartment a little. Well, actually," he pauses, the grin fading, "a lot. Can't have it be a mess for when you come over tonight."

"Oh, right." You still don't know why he would agree to all this, especially if it takes that much work.

The dinner goes well. It's one of the few moments of peace, considering your first meal together was ruined by the remnants of your nasty fall, and the market date was interrupted by an abrupt awakening. Despite the mishaps, you don't exactly see these events as losses when your memories are brimming with Mingyu's gentle touch when he bandaged your hands, and the warmth of his lips fitting so perfectly with your own.

And tonight? You know that there will be another moment for you to commit to memory forever.

When you arrive at your destination, you finally understand why he was late for your dinner. The place is spotless; unlit candles fill the room, a bottle of wine with empty glasses are on the counter. There are flowers in a beautiful vase on the table. It's like he spent all day running around just to set up for this moment.

"It's presentable, right?" Mingyu cracks a smile, slipping off his shoes and sliding his jacket onto the rack, followed by taking your coat as well. "Not sure how it's supposed to happen, but I figured I should at least try to make it—well, as romantic as possible."

"Wow, you didn't have to do all this," you manage to get out. You're still standing right in your spot as he goes over to light the candles, in shock and confusion over why he would possibly do such a thing.

He turns back to give you a small shrug. "I wanted you to have a good time."

When he finishes lighting the candles, he puts on some music by selecting it on his phone, seemingly having put together a whole playlist for the occasion. And if you didn't know any better, it would be so easy to believe that he simply put together a romantic date night at his place for the two of you. That he did all this because you're someone special to him. That this means something.

Well, if he can pretend for a night then maybe you can too.

You shake the thoughts from your mind and replace them with a smile as a song you don't recognize starts softly in the background. Mingyu heads to the table, beckoning you to follow, and then pours two glasses of wine.

"You know, I'm really glad I went to you that day." He takes a sip of his wine and then swirls it when he puts it down. "For the reading. I'm glad I met you. And um, I should thank you for showing me all of this."

"Shut up," you scoff, rolling your eyes. "Don't lie. You still don't believe in any of this fortune telling stuff, right?"

Mingyu bursts into laughter. "Okay, you're right. I don't. I just wanted to see some acts of love after going through a breakup, to kind of feel like there could still be hope for me. Honestly though, when you offered to show me what happens, I thought you would make up random scenarios just to date me or something." He waves dismissively at the frown on your face. "But it doesn't matter to me. Real or not, I like spending time with you, and... well, maybe you've convinced me."

"I convinced you that the reading was real?"

You're met with a shrug as he takes another sip of his wine, and in that brief silence you ponder about what he's referring to. There is no way he believes in fortune telling, so what else is there to convince him of?

But then something else pops into your mind.

"Can I ask you something?" You take a deep breath, letting out a sharp exhale when Mingyu nods. "What happened with your ex?"

It's clear that he hesitates with the way he swirls his glass, pressing his lips together and avoiding your gaze.

"Never mind. We don't have to—"

"It's okay. It was a long time ago and I'm over it." His eyes meet yours before flickering away. "Actually, I think I knew it was over long before it was really over. But I kept hoping that things could be fixed. I was stupid and kept trying."

"Hey, no, that's not stupid." You reach over and take his hand. "You were willing to put in the effort to save your relationship, and that shows you care."

But he merely shrugs. "Seems like a waste when they were busy cheating on me."

"That's not your fault, and it's not a waste. The love that you show the world is never a waste." There's a flood of emotions running through you, you belatedly realize—you're clutching the glass so tightly in your free hand that you begin to fear it might crack. It's directed at Mingyu's ex, at the thought that someone would hurt him like that when he's done nothing but fight for their relationship.

"It's kind of ironic now that I think about it," he continues. "Right before I found out they were cheating, I went to a psychic and got a reading done on the relationship. Apparently the reading said everything would be fine, and I just stupidly believed it."

"Mingyu... is that why you don't believe in this stuff anymore?"

He nods.

"I wish I didn't either." You swallow the lump in your throat, letting go of the glass. It's not only the mention of his ex that's making you feel this way, but also the lover from the visions. You want to hate them, to curse at them and at your fate for ripping away what could be a beautiful relationship before it's even within your reach.

But it all makes you want to try harder to prove it to Mingyu. That he's worth more than what his ex had made it seem, and that he doesn't need to be closed off to the idea of love because someone in the future is going to walk into his life and show him exactly that.

"Why?" He squeezes your hand lightly. "What makes you say that?"

"It's also because of an ex."

It was Junhui. Or rather, what you saw in his future. Two years after the start of your relationship and four after the start of your friendship, you'd trusted him enough to tell him about this little fortune telling party trick, and he'd trusted you to take a look at his future. Maybe that's where things went wrong.

Looking back, you aren't surprised that you saw someone else in his future. They appeared so happy together, he made her laugh, and she seemed to fit in all the ways you didn't. But there was no point in waiting for fate to inevitably bring them together while pulling the two of you apart, so you ran—you didn't want to stick around to find out what would happen.

"Wow." Mingyu blinks at you, seemingly unable to speak after your story. "Do you know if they ever met or got together? Your ex and the person you saw in his future."

You shake your head. "Haven't heard anything about him since we broke up."

"And he's the one who's going to be at this party?"

"Yeah. He's one of Minghao's close friends."

"I'm sorry that happened to you," Mingyu drops his gaze as he gently traces circles into your palm with his thumb. "I see why you don't want to believe in that stuff now. Actually, it's kind of funny how it was this fortune telling thing that screwed both of us over."

"Right? I should get Jeonghan to close the shop and we could open a boba store instead or something." You roll your eyes, chuckling at the thought. "Probably makes better money than this ever will."

"That's not a bad idea." Then he sets his glass down and stands, coming to your side to pull you into a hug. "But Y/N, don't beat yourself up for what happened, okay? You didn't know what you would see, and you have no control over it."

"I guess."

"Besides, I'll be such a good date that you won't even notice him the entire night." Mingyu releases you and steps back, smile turning shy as he holds out a hand. "Shall we?"

"I have to warn you that I'm not great at dancing," you mutter, taking his hand anyway and letting him guide you towards the space in the living room. "Don't hold me accountable for any injuries you might sustain."

When you put your hands on his shoulders, you can feel yourself tense up—your body is awkward, and your arms are too stiff as if not wanting to rest your weight on him. But when you hear a bubble of laughter and see the way Mingyu looks at you so fondly, you feel the same pull as you'd felt at the market. The pull that makes you want to relax and sink into the warmth of his body.

His touch is gentle when he places his hands on your waist, all too carefully and delicately. It makes you wonder if it's even possible that those are the same hands that his ex had willingly let go of, and if those light steps that he takes when swaying to the music are the same footsteps that will walk into the life of the lover in the visions. You wonder if this Mingyu, glancing back at you so tenderly, is the same as the one that will forget about you as soon as this moment is over.

But most of all, you wonder if the you that had originally agreed to do this is the same as the you whose heart beats faster and faster when he meets your gaze now. If the you who only wanted a date, any date for the party, could possibly be the same as the you who now finds yourself wanting to lean into his touch, wanting him to want you.

"You okay?" he murmurs, pulling you out of your thoughts.

"Yeah. Perfect."

Mingyu breaks into a soft smile. "You know, I've always wondered what you keep thinking about. When you get lost in that world in your head, what do you see? What do you dream about?" 

"It's different every time." You try to ignore the way your palms feel all too hot against his shoulders. "But these days... it's you."

You don't tell him that it's also getting to know him, falling for him, and imagining how you should be the one doing all those things with him like in the reading. It's picturing a love that flourishes ever so slowly, one that silently rests between the two of you, growing steadily until a day when it becomes the only thing you notice.

And though you leave all that out, your answer seems to be enough for him.

"Me?"

"Yeah," you say softly. "Whatever happened in the past—I really hope it doesn't keep you from experiencing the kind of relationship you deserve. You're not hard to love, Mingyu." Just a brief moment of hesitation before you admit, "Not at all."

Your words feed the twinkle of hope in his eyes as well as the one that seems to have been blossoming in your own heart for a while now. Maybe you can finally admit it; this would be the last time you see him, so maybe it wouldn't matter what happens tonight.

The thoughts swarming your mind are soon forgotten though. Mingyu pulls back slightly to gaze at you with a bright grin that sends your heart back into the frenzy it never recovered from. And a moment later, when his lips are on yours, the dancing, the music, and the entire scene are long forgotten in the background.

This time you let yourself believe that it's real.

You fall deeper into the world where you're the lover from the visions, a world that contains just the two of you. And this time you aren't afraid to kiss him back like you want him because you do. You pull him close until your bodies are inseparable, and you allow yourself to be overwhelmed by the heat of his mouth and the burns of his touch. You let yourself want, as your back hits the wall and you're trapped between it and the weight of Mingyu's body pressing against you, and you let yourself take, let your hands trace over the defined lines of his muscles, the smoothness of his skin, and the softness of his hair.

You kiss until you're breathless, until your knees are weak and you're sinking once again. Until his little breaths come out in fuller moans, and hands are wandering into dangerous territory.

"Is this how it happens?" Mingyu whispers, gaze dropping as he leans in to press his forehead against yours. "Is this how we fall for each other?"

No, you immediately think, not at all. The apartment is dim with only the small lamps at the sides of the room and the candles lining the table as the only source of light. The music, despite being slow and romantic, feels much too loud for some reason. It feels forced. And the way you manage to step on his toes on all the wrong beats surely can't be the right path to falling in love.

But maybe you're not afraid to admit it anymore.

"Yeah," you say instead, "it is."

Mingyu eyes snap to yours, and what you find in them makes you want to repeat your answer again and again. You're not sure why he would be hoping for this answer or why he would be satisfied if his own creation were to match perfectly with the one that you'd seen. Even more uncertain is why he would choose that particular set of words to say. But none of it matters when his lips are back on yours, writing an answer of their own.

And for one night, you let yourself be Mingyu's lover from the visions.

One thing becomes painfully clear after that—you cannot be seeing Mingyu ever again. Not even for one last party date.

On the surface, you know that your job is done. You showed him all of the moments that are supposed to happen in his future, and you upheld your end of the deal. But the truth is that every time you were with him, it became difficult to remember that you're not the lover from the reading, and every time you talked to him, you found yourself wanting more and more to be that person.

Your plan to avoid him doesn't go as expected though, for he keeps texting you. He sounds normal, continuing to send memes and share posts like he's been doing for the past while. And when he asks you for a movie date the following weekend, he acts as if the past three meetups were exactly that—dates. It's like it never occurred to him that you were there only to show him how everything happens, and not to actually date him. Though now, you're no longer sure if that's true.

So you say you're busy, you limit your texts to once per day, and you don't pick up when he calls. You follow the textbook formula for ghosting for days to the point where Soonyoung hides your buzzing phone under the couch cushion while spewing threats about throwing it out the window, and even Jeonghan's sighing at you tiredly, telling you to call Mingyu back.

You give in eventually. You call him back and schedule a meetup, and now you find yourself sitting at a cafe with him across from you.

"Hey, thanks for agreeing to meet with me. This won't take long." There is no smile on his face this time, and you realize that it might really be the first time seeing him like this—eyes devoid of emotion, face a neutral mask. It reminds you of the first time you met him at the shop, when he was spiraling into a hopeless void, but perhaps even worse.

You nod slightly in acknowledgement, trying to hide the way your heart sinks at his words. They are something you should be relieved to hear, but you know you're still clinging onto the inkling of hope that you can go back to pretending the two of you mean something to each other.

"Have you been doing okay?"

"Just busy," you repeat the same kind of boring answers from your texts. "You?"

"Yeah," Mingyu says slowly, dragging out the word. Then he takes a deep breath. "Are you avoiding me?"

Yes. "I didn't really see any reason we should stay in touch." A partial lie. It barely makes it out of your mouth.

"Are you for real? Y/N, where is this coming from?"

"I did what I said I'd do." The mask on your face was threatening to crack, especially after seeing the flash of pain in his eyes. "I showed you all of the scenes I saw in the reading. What more is there?"

"I—well, yeah." He frowns. "That might be what we initially agreed, but you can't deny that we had something special. There is no way you didn't feel anything when we were together."

You merely shrug and try your best to harden your eyes instead of giving in to the tears that threaten to spill. Because how can you tell him the truth? How can you give him hope just to crush it with the reality of your doomed fate?

"So—so what, all of it was just pretend? The things you said—you lied, didn't you? When you said I'm not hard to love..." He looks away, biting his lip. "I should've known."

"Hey, no. Everything I said was true, but this has nothing to do with that."

"Did you want to do this at all or were you doing it out of pity? Did you hate every moment of it?"

"Mingyu, stop. Okay, you're right. Let's say I did feel something and that I do like you. But does any of it matter? You're forgetting that I'm not the one in your future. You might not believe in this stuff, but my readings have never been wrong before." You can't do it anymore; it's too hard hiding it. Everything comes tumbling out all at once when he looks so broken. "You're going to meet them someday, and you're going to love them. Whoever they are. It just won't be me."

His jaw goes slack, mouth opening but nothing coming out. It's as if he finally realizes the truth that both of you had forgotten along the way.

"Oh and also," you say, clenching your fists at this final difficult lie you have to tell. "You don't have to hold your end of the agreement. I'm not going to the party anymore."

You know that what you said today would definitely change things since people tend to be averse to anything that goes against what they believe to be their fate. So when you get up from the table and leave, you know that Mingyu won't be chasing after you.  

You're right.

Mingyu stops texting you.

It should be a good thing; now you would both return to your normal lives and pretend like this entire thing never happened. But even though you know all this, there is still something weighing you down. It weighs down each step you take, becoming a salient presence that you can't seem to wrap your mind around.

And despite knowing that your relationship with him was only temporary, that you would be no more than a filler until the person in his future arrives, you still look over at your phone in the hopes that maybe the notification would be from Mingyu. You can't help but want him to still want you.

"You're in your head again, you know," Soonyoung jabs you in the arm, dragging you away from the thoughts and back to where you're seated in your living room. "Can't you think more quietly?"

"Can't you shut up for once?"

"See? I told you he was an asshole!" He flicks a piece of popcorn over at you, hitting you perfectly on the head. "I told you that he was all kinds of bad news. Didn't I say you were too nice for your own good? I knew something like this would happen."

"You said," you roll your eyes at him, throwing the piece of popcorn back, "that he might try to kidnap me. And to stop being so nice to hot people—no, I'm not making an exception for you."

"He really said that last part?" Wonwoo asks incredulously.

You nod. Soonyoung shakes his head.

Wonwoo clicks his tongue at his boyfriend and sighs with disbelief. "So about this fate thing. I know you believe you're not the one in Mingyu's future, but do you think a relationship with him is something worth pursuing regardless?"

"Why would it be worth pursuing if I know it'll just end?"

"Well, how do you know that for sure?" Wonwoo puts a hand on your shoulder and pats you comfortingly. He shakes his head a little. "Y/N, maybe you weren't meant to see his partner's face. Look at the rest of us—we don't have your abilities and we all go through it blindly. I started dating Soonyoung because I liked him, and not because I knew that he was the one who would be appearing in my future."

"But—" you start, and then stop. It takes a few replays of his words to let their meaning sink into your head.

"Hey," he continues, "if you think this is something worth going for—and by the way you've been moping around, it sure seems that way—then you should talk to him. See what he thinks."

Maybe Wonwoo is right, and part of you really wants to believe him, but you can't help but think that you should be using the information you have to your advantage. Surely, your ability has to be a blessing at some point, right? Isn't it a good thing to have put an end to your relationship with Mingyu now so that it wouldn't hurt even more later?

"You never know what could happen in the future." It's as if Wonwoo can hear your thoughts. "Maybe the future can change, or maybe the person in the reading really is you. There may be other people who can fit what you saw but that doesn't discount the possibility that it might be you."

"Yeah, yeah. All this talk is nice but that doesn't mean that Mingyu isn't just an asshole who's playing with you," Soonyoung stuffs a handful of popcorn in his boyfriend's mouth and turns to you with a serious look. "You need to think this through, okay? Do you really like him or do you just like the attention he gives you?"

"Y/N can't possibly fall for someone that easily, right?" comes out muffled from where Wonwoo is still trying to chew through the popcorn. He raises a brow at you.

"You'd be surprised." Soonyoung rolls his eyes then turns back to you. "Do you really like him or do you just like kissing him?"

You feel the full force of their scrutiny when Wonwoo also peers closely at you, searching your face for answers. Maybe the heat on your cheeks is enough to provide one.

"Do you really like him, or do you just enjoy fixing broken people?"

"Um—"

"Do you really like him or is he just hot?"

Wonwoo snorts. "By that standard, I'm quite surprised that Y/N never had a crush on you."

"They did—" Soonyoung quickly stops himself, but it's too late. Wonwoo's judging eyes are already on you, making you slowly sink into the couch and hoping you can disappear.

Not going to the party was a lie that you told Mingyu—an excuse so that you would have no reason to ever see him again. However, the problem is that scrapping the agreement hasn't only left you with a broken heart, but it also brought you back to square one: you still do not have a plus one for Minghao's party.

Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad though, or at least that's what you tell yourself.

From the outside, Minghao's house looks massive. He has fancy lights installed at every corner, lighting up the exterior walls every couple of feet, and giant windows through which you can already see people mingling about. Wonwoo pulls into the driveway slowly and turns back to give you a worried glance just before the three of you step out.

The interior of the house is just as impressive. A chandelier hangs in the front foyer, and symmetric spiral staircases spread off to either side. Minghao stands near the front, a drink in hand, and his shy smile is plastered all over his face as he greets everyone that walks in. He greets you with a hug.

"Congrats on your engagement," you say, taking in his new look while trying not to glance around the room. His hair is a bit longer than what he had back in college, and you don't recall ever seeing him wear anything remotely formal back then.

"Y/N, how long has it been?"

"Considering the last time I saw you was when you were single?" you laugh. "Yeah, it's been a while."

"It's good to see you again," Minghao grins and then goes to peer behind you. "Oh, is your boyfriend here too?"

"Um, he wasn't feeling very well so..." A lame excuse but it's the best you could come up with at the moment. "He couldn't make it."

"That's okay," Minghao's face falls for the briefest second before it lights up again. "Oh, you even brought the Soonyoung? What a rare sight." And then he goes off to wrap Soonyoung and Wonwoo in a big hug before dragging them off into the living room. At least he wouldn't be the one questioning you about your non-existent fake boyfriend tonight, though Minghao isn't who you should be worrying about.

You follow along, sticking to the walls in the hopes you'd be just as invisible as wallpaper. Even without seeing Junhui here, this is what you fear the most—being amongst your college crowd would bring back feelings you haven't touched in years. Feelings that you're not sure you want to ever unpack. But soon it gets a little easier when Minghao pulls you with him to greet everyone around the room, and so you catch up with Vernon and Seungkwan, and then later, you say hi to Chan and Jihoon.

It isn't until you reach the kitchen when you finally spot him. Junhui has his back turned to you, helping with preparations, and beside him, Seokmin greets you silently with a nod as your eyes meet. You smile at him, thankful that he's not alerting everyone of your presence especially when you know just how loud he can be.

Just before you turn to leave and make your escape, you see her. From far away, she's another face in the crowd, though you can feel a spark of familiarity as if you've seen her somewhere before. Perhaps in one of the readings that you've done over the years for clients? You've read somewhere that the brain never forgets faces, after all.

She greets you and then heads over to the kitchen.

"Hey, Junhui, right? It's so nice to finally meet you," she says, holding out a hand. Her voice seems just as familiar as her face, and now you're sure you've seen her before. "I'm Minghao's cousin."

When Junhui takes her hand, she smiles. It's a full smile that reveals her teeth, and her eyes disappear, and—

The drink you're holding falls to the floor.

It all rushes back to you. The reason why she's so familiar is because you've seen her in the scenes of the fateful reading you did years ago. You've seen her on an amusement park ride, with one hand in the air and the other in Junhui's. On a dancefloor at a wedding—that you now assume to be Minghao's—with arms wrapped around him and later, lips against his. And then there was this very moment where their handshake was interrupted by a glass of wine hitting the floor.

This is the moment they would meet. The one that you've been running from all those years ago, the one that would start everything between them.

This is how it happens.

"Are you okay?" She comes rushing to your side without missing a beat, paper towels in her hands. "Be careful of the glass."

You're frozen on the spot, unable to feel bad about dropping the glass and unable to help clean it up. Unable to feel anything except for the one thought that flashes through your mind: you have to get out of there as fast as you can.

Everything is a blur after that. Somehow your feet get moving, slowly at first and then quickly after that, and you hear your name being called a few times as you head to the door, but you don't stop until you're outside and halfway down the steps.

Outside it's quieter and the air is cooler, and it's enough to slow down the thoughts running through your head. You end up sitting on the steps and leaning against the cold metal of the railing in the hopes that it might numb your feelings.

"Y/N? You okay?" a voice mumbles above your ear. It's familiar for a different reason this time, and you look up to see the person you least expected but wanted the most. Mingyu steps out of the house and closes the door behind him, glancing at you with an unreadable expression. You hadn't seen him inside, but he must've arrived sometime after you—too late to be your date, and too early to miss your embarrassing moment.

"Mingyu? Why are you here? I told you I wasn't going to the party."

"I hate to break it to you, but it wasn't exactly a believable lie." He gives a weak smile then sits down beside you on the steps. "I wanted to make sure you'd be okay."

"I really should've stayed home. I knew this would be a bad idea but—" You quickly turn away to get rid of the tear that slips out.

"Hey, Y/N. Talk to me. What's wrong?" Mingyu takes off his jacket and wraps it around you, and then gently moves you until you're leaning against him, buried in the crook of his shoulder. "Was she who you saw in his future?"

"Yeah, but it's—it's not just that. This was the moment that I saw in his reading. This is how they meet."

He tenses slightly. "This was in your reading? That's tough. Y/N, I don't even know what to say. I'm sorry, I should've gotten here earlier to be here with you from the start like we planned."

"It's okay, it's not your fault. But Mingyu, what have I done? I broke up with him thinking that he would leave me for her one day, so I didn't want to find out if and when they would meet." You have to swallow the sob in your throat. "I've always held onto the hope that it would be wrong. But now, I got to witness it anyway, right in front of me."

"Do you regret your decision?"

"No." You shake your head. "Well, I don't know. I'm over him but I just—I hate it so much. I hate feeling like I'm helpless and unable to do anything about fate."

A silence stretches out between the two of you with only the music from the house and the distant rumble of cars filling the night. It hasn't been long since he sat down beside you, but the warmth of his arms around you and the rising and falling of his chest are enough to slowly wipe away the worries from earlier.

"Look, I thought about what you said," Mingyu breaks the silence, pulling away to meet your eyes instead, "and I don't think it changes anything."

You immediately know what he's referring to. "How does it not?"

He takes a deep breath. "You want to know why I don't believe in fortune telling? This is exactly why. I don't like the idea that we are locked into our fates, or that certain things will or won't happen no matter what choices we make."

"What about when you really meet them one day? And inevitably fall for them?"

"I get why you would be afraid of that, Y/N, I really do. But none of that matters. When I say I want to be with you, this is my choice. It doesn't matter who it is that you saw in your reading; I want to choose you and love you on purpose. Not by accident, and not by fate."

You know he's right and Wonwoo was too. This entire time, you've been trying to run away from a fate that you can't escape, and what you saw today only proves that.

But maybe now, it's time to stop running.

"Do you really think that we can change things?"

"We can do anything we want to do." Mingyu nods firmly. Then he takes your hand, squeezing you gently. "But first, let's get out of here?"

"Yeah." You smile for the first time that night and let him lead the way.

A small diner at the corner of the street near your place is what the two of you decide on. When you enter, the first thing you notice is how much it reminds you of the "before" images of that nice restaurant. Half of the diner is dark with the overhead lights flickering once in a while in an attempt to turn on, while the other half is cast in an unpleasant fluorescent light. There are pieces of garbage on the floor that an employee sweeps up as she greets you. In short, the state of it almost makes you want to walk right out.

But instead, you order your food. You sit down at a table towards the darker half of the room as you wait.

Mingyu clears his throat. "You know," he starts, a shy smile on his face, "I can read your palm too."

"What?" That isn't remotely close to anything you might expect him to say. You give him a questioning look as you put your hand on the table, palm up. "Um, sure. Go for it."

He takes your hand and then gently runs his fingers over the lines on your palm, tracing them as he closes his eyes and pretends to envision something the way you do. Soon, your confusion fades into amusement at the effort that he's putting into this. Each of his feather-like touches causes your heart to speed up a little, and you have to try to will your palms not to start sweating because that would not be attractive at all.

"So? What do you see?"

"Shh," he whispers with his eyes firmly shut. "The spirit is still talking."

You use the chance to really glance at him. Not much has changed since the last time you'd seen him, but somehow he looks even better now—perhaps healthier or more radiant, like he's completely healed from the remnants of a broken heart plaguing him before. Maybe even happier. You wonder if what Soonyoung said about you healing broken people is true.

"I saw a lot of things," Mingyu finally says as he opens his eyes, and his lips automatically curl into a smirk when he catches you staring. "First, I saw myself in your future."

"Yeah? What were we doing?"

"We went on a picnic and ended up getting chased by bees," he chuckles. "Then we went to a bookstore but ended up making out between the shelves, but we got kicked out by a tired employee who looked like it wasn't his first time kicking people out for doing that."

You stifle a laugh. "Why does it seem like our dates are always being interrupted?"

"Hmm, there was one where we had some peace, actually. It was when we were skating, and I fell right on my butt. Then you asked if it hurt when I fell for you—well, you tried to say it as a pickup line, but you messed it up." Mingyu pauses for a second, biting his lip like he's almost hesitant. "Instead, you ended up asking me if I've fallen for you."

"And? What did you say?" Your heart speeds up tenfold.

"I said yes, Y/N. I've fallen for you. I think you already knew it by the time I said it, but you just smiled. Then you suddenly fell too, and we laughed about it."

The way he says it with all the confidence in the world tells you that maybe it's okay for you to admit it too, that there's no need to be afraid to confront your feelings like you'd always done before. Now the insecurities that had been plaguing you suddenly fade away, leaving only one thing clear in your head: there would be no more running.

You break into a smile. "Then I said I fell for you too, right?"

"Yeah, you did." It takes a moment for the initial shock on his face to disappear, and when it does, he's smiling so widely that small crinkles appear near his eyes. "And if you want, I can show you how each of these scenes are supposed to happen."

"Okay, sure. Show me."

Mingyu lets out a loud exhale. "That's a relief. For a second I thought you were going to complain about everything the way I did with your reading."

"Hey—see? I'm nicer than you are." You shoot him a glare. "Who even does that?"

"Yeah, I'll admit that wasn't the greatest impression. Maybe we can start over?"

"Well," you pretend to think about it but can't help the smile creeping onto your face. "This is kind of a shitty place for a first date."

"Maybe our first date will be that picnic I saw in my reading then. But without the bees, yeah?"

You nod.

"Oh yeah, have your wounds healed? They didn't leave any scars, did they?" He lifts your hand to examine it carefully before taking your other hand as well, turning both of them over to look for the evidence of your wounds from the fall. Then he simply holds them.

And suddenly, it clicks into place. The small scars you'd seen on the hands in the vision, the dimness of the diner, and the blurred face of the lover. Everything seems to line up so perfectly that it has your head spinning for a moment with deja vu. Had it really been you in the vision?Was the lover not someone with your hairstyle, nor Mingyu's ex, but actually you yourself? And wasn't this moment at the diner—with your hands and the tiny, healing scars on them enveloped by Mingyu's—the first scene in the vision? Maybe this is how it happens. You really hope that this is how it happens.

You don't know whether you should tell him or not, but when you look up and see the small smile dancing on his lips and the sparkle in his eyes, you get the feeling that Mingyu already knows. And whether he's purposely trying to recreate the scene or whether he merely lets it occur, the gesture ignites a sort of warmth in your heart. It fuels the seed of hope that maybe, just maybe, you won't have to say goodbye one day.

It takes a couple of weeks for life to settle down after that. Between working your regular hours at the shop and then coming home to Soonyoung and Wonwoo's invasive questions, you also have to deal with the aftermath of Minghao's party. Which, surprisingly enough, is not as scary as you once might've thought.

Junhui is actually the one who reaches out to you first. He sends a text asking if you're okay after what happened, and you nearly jump at seeing the name flashing across your screen; admittedly, you never did end up deleting his contact info. And with a bit of encouragement from Mingyu, you end up not only texting back but also meeting him for a chat about everything that's happened since college.

He's grown up since you'd last seen him, but otherwise, he's still the same Junhui: quiet, smiley, and laughs easily at the things you say. Most of all, he doesn't resent you for what you did and rather understands. You're not sure if he says this because he's finally met who he's meant to be with, or whether he remembers the scenes at all, but you don't bring it up. You want to save him from going into this new relationship with any expectations, whether that be the failure or the success of it—something you only learned recently. Regardless of what happens, you hope he can be as happy with her as he was in all the scenes of his reading.

The weekend after that, the picnic date that Mingyu jokingly mentioned in his reading finally happens. Well, it's not exactly a picnic date since he switches it up at the last minute and the two of you end up going apple picking instead.

It's a beautiful day—the sun is shining brightly with no clouds to be seen—and it gives you a sense of relief when the past while has been so hectic. Mingyu picks you up at your apartment, and you rush out while ignoring your roommate's terrible advice and continuous questions about what you'd be doing and where you'd be going. Although even after you go downstairs, you're almost sure you can see Soonyoung peering from your seventh-floor balcony; knowing him, he's probably got binoculars out too to watch your every move.

"So what happened to the picnic date that you saw?"

Mingyu shrugs without missing a beat. "The reading changed, and I just went with what I saw."

"Oh, did it?" You give him a questioning look, but he only smiles back at you and doesn't give away any more information.

The drive to the orchard is slow with the busy traffic of the city around you, and you enjoy your time relaxing in your seat and listening to Mingyu talk about his week. He tells you about his new job and moving to new place and says that Seungcheol is a much better manager than his previous. And when he asks about meeting Soonyoung, you're ready to spill all the details about all of your roommate's silly antics—from avoiding baking because he didn't know to use oven mitts when taking things out of the oven, to setting an eight-hour timer every night in place of an alarm. There was also a time when Wonwoo had unknowingly poured salt into Soonyoung's coffee instead of sugar, and being the considerate boyfriend he is, Soonyoung drank it without so much as a grimace.

They are stories that have gotten old to you, yet Mingyu laughs like they're the funniest thing. The way he turns to you at each red light to simply look at you with a smile is enough to have your heart speeding up and your palms sweating. He takes you in like he's committing each moment to memory. Well, at least until the cars behind you start to honk impatiently when the light turns green.

It turns out that Mingyu does that a lot. During your time at the orchard, you could be saying something as you reach up to grab the apples, and he would just be staring at you as he listens intently.

"What?"

A nonchalant shrug. "Just appreciating the view."

"So tell me," you say, glancing at him up and down, "what's supposed to happen here? What did you see?"

"Hmm, we picked two bushels of apples."

"That's it?"

"Yeah," he confirms enthusiastically. "And they got quite heavy to carry."

"Oh."

"Were you expecting something more? Hmm?" A small smirk rests on his lips when he leans in a little closer. He's so close that you have your lips parted and eyes nearly shut, anticipating the feel of his soft lips on yours. But instead, he pulls back with an apple in his hand. "Found a good one right behind your head over there."

You roll your eyes, turning to leave so he doesn't see the embarrassment on your cheeks.

"Hey, I'm kidding. But if you want me to kiss me, you should just say so." He stops you from leaving, and this time he traps you in place with hands on the branches on either side of you. "I'm all yours, Y/N."

Then he finally closes the distance. You expect it to be like the last time, for hands to wander and for lips to consume you, but this time his lips are barely there. It's almost achingly slow the way he kisses you so tenderly, lighter than you thought possible, like a gentle breath against yours with the taste of apples lingering between you. His hands reach up to caress your jaw as if any more pressure would break this fragile moment, and then your senses are overwhelmed by sweetness. The sweetness of apples, the sweetness of Mingyu's lips and the warmth of his mouth, and the sweetness of the sun against your skin and breeze in your hair and voices floating over from a world away.

When you pull apart and open your eyes again, something about this suddenly triggers a memory. You thought the second scene of Mingyu's reading would take place at the market because the faint taste of apples in it reminded you of the cider at the market. But maybe the answer isn't the market at all, and rather an orchard. And maybe it is this particular moment.

Your heart races a little faster at the thought that it really could be it. You really could be Mingyu's lover from the visions.

"Oh, watch out." He steps aside, pulling you with him to avoid a bee flying by.

"Hey—I thought you said no bees?"

That gets you a laugh as Mingyu takes your hand and tugs you along. "Maybe it's good that it interrupted us."

And you simply smile, brushing off your thoughts and letting yourself enjoy the moment.

"I know you said he's hot, but I didn't expect him to actually," Soonyoung gestures, "be hot."

You turn away from the rink to shoot him a glare. "I am offended."

Initially, you thought Mingyu's idea for turning your skating date into a double date would go terribly. How were you supposed to let him meet the two friends who thought he was a creep? Especially Soonyoung—you were sure he'd make some crude comments that might entirely sabotage your budding relationship. But to your surprise, a charming smile and an offer to help lace up their skates is all it took for Mingyu to have them wrapped around his finger.

Pretty privilege, that's exactly what it is.

"Hey! I wasn't sure if you were serious or if you only found him hot because he gave you attention—" The rest of Soonyoung's words get cut off as he goes to dodge your punch. "Anyway, you're treating him well, right? Are you nicer to him than you are to me? Don't hurt him, okay? Don't break his heart."

"I can't believe you," you snort. "Whose side are you on?"

"I'm saying all of this for your sake, Y/N. We can't have you moping around like you did for the past few weeks."

You turn back to the ice and pretend you didn't hear him at all. Should you be laughing or crying in this situation? While you're glad your friends are getting along with Mingyu, it's all too ironic how a pretty face is all it takes for Soonyoung to go back on his words about not being so nice to hot people.

After Mingyu and Wonwoo finish up their laps around the rink, Mingyu comes back to drag you with him this time. You go, albeit reluctantly. The feeling of falling at the park was still too fresh in your mind, and so you skate with one hand in his while the other is grasping at anything to avoid a hard collision with the ice.

"You're not going to fall." Mingyu raises an eyebrow at you, eyes brimming with amusement. "I was only joking about that."

You glance at him warily. "You said that you would."

"Maybe, but only for you."

He smiles, and despite the anxiety that courses through your veins, you find yourself smiling too. Every step you take with Mingyu squeezing your hand reassuringly, you're able to relax like you're basking in the warmth that radiates off of his happiness, and slowly but steadily, the two of you make it safely around the rink without falling.

By the time you stop to take a break, Soonyoung and Wonwoo are nowhere to be seen. You scan the rink, trying to find the familiar faces amongst the larger afternoon crowd now, but your search is unsuccessful. What you find instead, strangely enough, is that people are suddenly gathering around on the opposite side. The rink seems to quiet down with a silence now lingering in the air as if everyone is waiting with bated breath, and in your curiosity, you pull Mingyu over with you to join the crowd.

And that's when you see it: Wonwoo on one knee, Soonyoung covering his mouth in shock, and a ring resting in the box in Wonwoo's hands. The same thin, silver ring that you've familiarized yourself with from seeing it in Soonyoung's future. This must be the exactmoment you saw.  

Soonyoung smiles brightly when he gives his answer that you're a little too far to hear, though you don't doubt it's a good one judging by the looks on their faces. The crowd erupts into applause and then Wonwoo is tackled to the ice by Soonyoung enveloping him, and two of them are lost in their own world, too busy to notice anything or anyone else.

"And this is how they fall for each other," Mingyu murmurs into your ear. "Guess my reading was wrong—it wasn't us. It's them."

Once the crowd dissipates, the two of you wait for the newly engaged couple by the bench. Soonyoung flashes the ring on his finger before heading to the snack bar, and while later, Wonwoo joins you with an endearing grin on his face.

"Wow, congrats!" You pull him into a hug as soon as he steps off the ice. "But why didn't you tell us? We could've helped you prepare for it, or we could've taken pictures or something."

"That was..." He lets out a loud exhale. "It wasn't supposed to happen like this. I was going to do it over dinner—I had one of those private rooms booked out at the restaurant and all. But the ring fell out of my pocket when I fell on the ice, and well. It landed right in front of him. So," he gives a wry smile, "I didn't really have a choice."

Mingyu pats him on the back reassuringly. "Hey, it's about the simple things. Love doesn't always have to be romantic."

You remember him saying these exact words from your first date at the restaurant but hearing them again now makes you wonder if you had it wrong this entire time. Maybe you've been focusing so much on making your reenactments romantic to match the scenes in the visions that you never realized the scenes are meant to happen anywhere. They're meant to happen in between the normalness of everyday life. They're simple acts of love, just as Mingyu always says.

Later when the four of you are sufficiently warmed up with hot drinks and laughter is in the air, you think you have it figured out. Each of these moments can easily be something that you witness in a reading, but maybe the point isn't to go out searching for them or to run away from them. Maybe it's to make choices that will create a future that you want—on purpose, and not by fate.

"What do you think, Y/N?" Mingyu pulls you out of your thoughts, gently wrapping an arm around your waist.

"What?"

"You can come over tonight," he suggests. "Since Soonyoung will be out all night anyway."

"Wait, are you sure? I don't want to intrude or—"

"Yeah, it's fine. Besides, you haven't seen my new place yet."

Your heart gives a loud thud at the thought of being alone with him again, all too reminded of what happened the last time. But you swallow the nerves away, put on a smile, and agree.

The two of you leave the couple to go to their fancy dinner as fiancés, and afterwards, you find your hand in Mingyu's as you head back to his place.

Right when you step into his apartment, you get the strangest thought that you're relievedto see nothing is set up. There are no fancy candles lining the room this time, no vase of beautiful flowers on the table, and no strings of sparkling lights hanging from above. Mingyu's place looks entirely normal, albeit slightly messier than before since it's clear he hasn't fully unpacked yet.

"Don't judge," he says, quickly going to collect the few pieces of clothing left in the living room while avoiding your gaze. "I just moved in recently."

It's a smaller space than his previous apartment, but much nicer—newer looking and without any cracks at the seams like there were in his previous. As if this were a fresh start for a fully healed heart, one that was ready to love again.

Mingyu cooks a nice dinner and as you try to help out in the kitchen, you start to think that you could really get used to this. Watching him add all the different ingredients and seeing the gears turn in his head, and then when you're seated at the table, feeling the smile lingering on your mouth until the last bite of the first proper meal you've had in a while. You think that maybe this is it.

And a while later, you're settled on the couch to watch a movie though it quickly fades into the background when the warmth of his body is pressed against yours. His lips are soft, mouth sweet from the wine, and all around you is the faint smell of oranges from his bodywash and a hint of citrusy detergent from his clothes clinging to your skin.

It has to be past midnight when the movie comes to an end, with the credits slowly fading out. Mingyu gets up to refill your glass of water and you follow him into the kitchen grab a snack when suddenly a blast of music comes from the other side of the wall. It's noticeably loud at first but is soon turned down into a quiet melody in the background.

Mingyu frowns, pausing to listen to the song. "These walls sure are thin, huh. It's generally been pretty quiet around here until now."

"You could probably Shazam their entire playlist like this," you joke. Or, well, maybe it's not so much of a joke when you feel like looking it up yourself because there is something familiar about the song. You can't quite place it, but it's so familiar that it almost bothers you like an itch you can't scratch.

The corner of his lip twitches. "It's okay, maybe they also have something to celebrate."

You're still thinking about why the song sounds so familiar when Mingyu gently takes your hands and guides them to the back of his neck, and then wraps his arms around your waist to pull you in. And when you look up, everything clicks. The familiar walls and familiar music, the snacks on the counter, the light scent of oranges from the bodywash, and even the clothes that you're wearing—Mingyu's clothes. This is the final scene you saw in your vision. This is how dancing in the kitchen at midnight is supposed to turn out.

"You're not going to step on my toes again, are you?" Mingyu's eyes twinkle with amusement as he slowly starts to move with the music, dragging you with him.

The two of you step and you sway, and it's not quite to the beat of the song. You do end up stepping on him, your knees bump a few times and your foreheads nearly do too. It's every bit as awkward as the first time you did this, and even more so without the blanket of darkness or the pretense of romance.

And yet, you hear the endless bubbles of laughter coming out of your mouth. You see the sparkles in Mingyu's eyes, the bright smiles like he can't contain his happiness. You feel it in the way you dance together at a rhythm that belongs to no one else but the two of you.

You know it when he leans in, breath but a whisper at your ear as he says, "Thank you for making me believe in love again."

Now you don't have to look into his future to know that all the scenes you'd seen were about you. Now you can picture it—Mingyu looking up from your laced hands on the table and seeing your smile, face no longer out of focus. Pulling away from your kiss in the orchard has you seeing your own gaze, surprised but content. And then there is this very moment when you see yourself in Mingyu's eyes and you just know.

This is how you fall in love.

#mingyu fic #mingyu fluff #mingyu scenarios #mingyu imagines #seventeen fic #svt fic #mingyu x reader #seventeen fluff #mingyu x you #svt fluff #svt scenarios #my fic #anyway hbd to kim mingyu i guess #this wasn't supposed to be his bday fic LMAOO #i planned on finishing the jogging fic that i started on his bday last year #aka my first ever svt fic!!! but alas... it isn't done #i do think this fits him the most out of my 3 versions tho #his positivity and strong beliefs about chasing what makes you happy #and choosing a path that you want #and seeking out new experiences to get him out of his sadness #gahh i'm rambling about kim mingyu once again 🫠

[daysofyellowroses]

yellow rose

david von erich x afab!reader | 6.2k | 18+ minors dni | tw: language, smoking, mild smut | a reflection on your journey to the altar

so this is a complete and utter work of fiction, based on the very brilliant movie the iron claw. i knew as soon as i watched it i would have stories but i was a little surprised david came to me first. obviously harris dickinson is beautiful but i am down so bad for jaw. i got some kerry ideas too, and i always have a hundred different bear ideas on the go too so more to come | also just to note that because this is totally fictitious, i am choosing to ignore real life events for the most part and live in fanfic delusion. enjoy 🌼

-

It all seemed to happen in a flash.

In theory, you should have been used to it. Ready for it.

One minute you were heading to a local sports center on a work assignment, then in what felt like the blink of an eye, you were walking up the aisle to marry the subject of one of those photos.

But, to get to how exactly you ended up walking down that aisle, you need to go back to how it all started.

Which, like with most things when it came to you,started with a picture.

📷

From an early age, you loved photography. Capturing a moment in time, being able to look at it any time and relive the moment was always a thrill. Your childhood home was full of framed photos and photo albums, a collection of memories surrounding you.

When you turned 13, your parents gave you your own camera. It wasn't anything too technical or fancy, but it was immediately your most treasured possession. You took photos of everything, family occasions, your friends hanging out, nature, snapshots of Dallas.

As you grew older you threw yourself into studying everything about photography, worked an extremely tedious part time job to save up for a real camera, dedicated yourself to honing your skills. It wasn't difficult, your friends and family kept you busy with birthday parties, weddings, christenings, anything worth celebrating and you were there to capture the moments.

When you were in your senior year of high school, you discovered a fondness for a particular subject of your photos. You had been sitting in the bleachers after school one day with your friends, all you of chatting and laughing about something when you'd looked onto the football field and spotted two of the players talking about something animatedly, one of them slapping the other on the back as they laughed. 

You had grabbed your camera, snapping a photo and rolled your eyes playfully as your friends teased you. Sure, the players were cute, but that wasn't why you took their photo. When the shots had developed, you were thrilled that your instinct had been correct. The red of the players jerseys popped, the gold star on their helmets gleaming in the sun. They looked graceful, despite their large frames, natural and charming. 

From that photo, you began to base more of your photos on sport. It wasn't an area you had expected to become interested in, but it inspired your photography. Cheerleaders in perfectly formed pyramids, track stars crossing the line, football players clutching the ball to their chest as they threw themselves across the post.

After graduation, you applied for a journalism course, figuring it didn't hurt to have a backup plan and maybe it would get you a gig as a photographer for a newspaper or magazine. 

Leaving home was tough, especially when a big going away party was thrown for you, your friends and family coming together to celebrate your accomplishments. When the time came to leave you were sure you'd never cried so much, trying to hype yourself up for the adventure ahead.

It was a lot of fun, being at college, as it turned out. Making new friends, learning new things, having new experiences. By the time it was over it felt like you could back and do it all again in a heartbeat.

You decided to move back to Dallas after you graduated. A job opportunity at a big paper came up, and your friend Pam had found an apartment that came with a spare room so it seemed like the right move.

It was about two weeks later you were tasked with going down to the Sportatorium on a Saturday night to document the latest wrestling match. Every time you went to a sporting event for work, you were accompanied by the senior sports writer, Duke. He was older than your father, far too old for his cheap toupee to be even the slightest bit believable. He wore cheap polyester suits, too much cologne and had a fondness for calling you ‘missy’ and placing his hand a little too low on your back.

You had psyched yourself up to ask Pam to come along, preparing a whole speech in your head. If she was with you then you could avoid Duke like the plague, couldn't possibly leave your guest alone. 

Turned out Pam didn't take much convincing at all, in fact she practically jumped at the chance to come along. You tucked her excitement away in your mind, curious to see if the source would reveal itself at the match.

When the day came, you were excited to get some shots of a new sport. From what you'd seen on TV, the Sportatorium was bright and colorful, the wrestlers just as much so. You packed up your camera before getting changed into some jeans and a t-shirt. 

Pam had taken one look at you and marched you back into your room, your protests of “But I'm working!” falling on deaf ears.

A compromise was reached. Your t-shirt stayed but a denim mini skirt replaced your jeans and brown cowboy boots replaced your beat up sneakers. You felt a little ridiculous, your job had you in all kinds of angles and positions to get the best shots, the last thing you wanted was to be unable to get a good picture because you'd end up flashing tomorrow's laundry to thousands of strangers.

When you arrived at the Sportatorium, the sun was dipping below the horizon and what seemed like hundreds of cars and trucks were pulling up. People were grabbing beers out of coolers, blasting music from boomboxes, grilling up hotdogs on portable barbecues. You got a couple of shots before Pam was hustling you inside to get your seats. Well, her seat. You told her you'd meet her outside after the match, not that she seemed to be paying attention, her eyes focused on the empty ring. 

You made your way down to the ring, keeping an eye out for Duke and ready to sprint back to Pam if needed. To your relief, Duke wasn't in attendance. The junior sports reporter, Brian, had been sent in his place. The two of you weren't exactly close friends but he was much more professional. You got some shots of the crowd, feeling excited to see a match live. The atmosphere in the stadium was electric, like something incredible was about to happen. 

When the announcement came for the first tag team, you got some shots of them walking through the tunnel and into the ring, holding their arms in the air and greeting the crowd. Brian walked around the ring slowly, scribbling into a notepad, cigarette perched behind his ear.

Then they announced the next tag team, and you moved to the opposite tunnel to get shots of them. You took a breath as you snapped a shot of the taller one, his wavy blonde hair peeking out from under his back cowboy hat. He was wearing a leather jacket that he promptly tore off before he got into the ring, his back muscles rippling. 

You cleared your throat, taking more photos and trying to concentrate on what you were there for. 

The bell rang, and once the match started you had no shortage of great photo opportunities. The men in the ring moved with perfect proficiency and style, playing up to the crowd and putting on a spectacular show. You found yourself more and more drawn to the tall blonde, David Von Erich, you discovered. 

He was so graceful yet could have these huge men slammed onto their backs, his arms bulging and a cocky grin on his face. Once or twice you could have sworn he caught your eye and winked at you but you were sure it was your imagination. 

The Von Erichs won the match, you snapped a photo of the referee holding up the brother's hands as the crowd roared. Brian checked back in with you, telling you he was going to grab some quotes before heading off. You bid him farewell before going to find Pam, heading outside with the rest of the crowd.

“Hey, over here!”

You quickly spotted Pam, smiling as you waved back at her, weaving your way through the crowd to join her.

“Hey,” You smiled, laughing softly as Pam grabbed your arm, a wide grin on her face. “Are you al-”

“Come on,” Pam immediately started tugging you in the opposite direction. “let me show you something,”

You just about managed to maintain your balance and hold onto your camera as you dodged through the dispersing crowd, wondering what exactly Pam was doing.

Before long you had an answer, as you and Pam joined a large group of women hanging around the back door of the Sportatorium. Her keenness to come to the match made much more sense when Kevin Von Erich walked out the door, towel around his shoulders and bag slung over his shoulder. You had never known Pam to look at any man the way she was looking at Kevin.

“What are you waiting for?” You asked, giving Pam a gentle nudge. “Get on over there, girl.”

“I can't, there's too many girls round him,” Pam sighed. “I am not desperate. I'll wait for my time.”

“Saving the best for last huh?” You grinned, watching Pam roll her eyes playfully. “I don't think he's gonna be able to take his eyes off you.”

“You think?” Pam asked, glancing over to you. She looked genuinely concerned and you gave her a reassuring smile. 

“I know.”

A little while later, when the crowd had dispersed and Kevin was signing the last couple of autographs, you gave Pam a gentle nudge, smiling as she quickly fixed her hair.

“Good luck,” You grinned, gently squeezing her arm. “Not that you need it.”

You gave her some space, walking over to a trash can before fishing a pack of cigarettes from your purse. You lit one up, glancing over to Pam and smiling as you spotted Kevin heading in her direction. Closing your eyes as you looked away, you took a long drag on your cigarette and felt yourself relax.

“You know it's a bad habit to smoke those things.”

You opened your eyes, finding a familiar face standing close to you. He looked better in person than he did in the ring, if that was possible. 

“Well I'm sure you know that it is very rude to keep your hat on in the presence of a lady,” You raised a brow, flicking your ash into the trash can. “I could be deeply insulted.”

“I apologize,” David grinned, taking off his hat and giving you a slight bow as he did. He introduced himself properly, as did you, his hand moving over his heart as he tilted his head. “You know I was just joking, there's worse habits to have than smoking.”

You nodded, smiling a little. “Like creeping up on strangers?”

He laughed and you felt a flutter in your stomach. You willed it away, not wanting to be another simpering fan.

“You want one?” You asked, holding out the box of cigarettes. David looked like he was considering saying yes before he shook his head. 

“No, thank you. I shouldn't.”

“Fair enough,” You nodded, putting the box back in your purse. “It really is a bad habit. I'm trying to quit but I got some time to kill so..”

“Oh yeah?” David raised a brow, glancing around the quiet car park before looking back at you. “What you waiting for?”

“My friend,” You gestured in the direction of Pam, who was deep in conversation with Kevin. “she's a big fan.”

“So I see,” David grinned, looking over to his brother and Pam before focusing his attention back on you. “and uh..what about you? Are you a big fan?”

You thought about it/made him wait for a moment as you took a drag on your cigarette and raised a brow.

“I'm just here for work.”

“Really?” David looked a little surprised, lightly rubbing his jaw. “What kinda work do you do?”

You held up your camera with a smile before flicking your cigarette in the trash can. “I’m a photographer,” You explained. “for a newspaper.”

“Oh right,” David smiled, folding his arms. “I'll have to buy that, see if you got any good ones of me. Which paper is it?”

“It's the uh..huh,” You grinned as you glanced over to Pam, watching her laugh as Kevin said something to her. “Excuse me for one second.” 

You turned slightly, holding your camera up and focusing it on Pam and Kevin. You felt very aware of David's presence behind you, trying to hold your hands steady as you snapped a picture. 

“I have a feeling I may need that one day,” You smiled, settling your camera strap back over your shoulder and turning to David. “They're cute together, don't you think?”

“Yeah, I guess so,” David nodded, his gaze staying on you. “She ain't the cutest one here though.”

You rolled your eyes but couldn't fight the smile on your face and multiple flutters in your stomach. 

“Oh shut up, that's such a line.”

“I'm deadly serious,” David grinned, holding his hat over his heart. “I promise.”

You were about to say something when Pam appeared, linking her arm with yours and giggling as she went to drag you away. 

“Hang on one second,” David called, making you look over your shoulder with a smile.

“You never told me the name of your paper!”

“It's in Dallas,” You called back, walking forward with Pam, the two of you giggling. “If you find it, call me!”

📷

A couple of days later you were in the newspaper office, going over some photos for an upcoming article when one of the secretaries knocked on the door and asked for you.

“Call for you,” She explained, gesturing to the phone as you went to her desk. “They didn't give a name, just asked for you.”

“Okay, thanks Margaret,” You smiled, feeling a slight knot in your stomach. It was extremely rare someone called you at work, and you tried not to think the worst. 

Going to the phone, you picked it up and took a deep breath before holding it to your ear. 

“Hello?”

“Hello yourself.”

You let out a soft sigh of relief as you realized who was on the other end of the line, a small smile on your face.

“How many papers did you have to call before you found me?”

“That's not important.”

You rolled your eyes with a grin.

“More than two?”

“..five.”

“Oh wow,” You grinned, turning more towards the wall. “That's perseverance right there. I'm flattered.”

“Well so am I,” David replied. “I saw those pictures you took. They were great, I wanted to thank you for catching me at such a flattering angle.”

“You're welcome,” You smiled, glancing over your shoulder before looking back and lowering your voice slightly. “That the only reason you called six newspapers? Angles?”

“Not quite,” You could hear a cheeky tone in his voice, your fingers holding the phone cord. “I was hoping you'd come see me again. You don't have to take pictures this time, if you don't want.”

“As it happens I am coming,” You raised a brow with a smile. “Your brother beat you to the invite. He invited Pam, who invited me. So I'll be there.”

“Well damn,” David laughed softly. “I guess I'll just have to come right out with it then..ask you on a real date.”

“Oh?” You grinned, feeling like a teenager as your cheeks grew warm. “How about we make it interesting?”

“I'm all ears.”

You took a breath, trying to calm your heartbeat. You were aware of Margaret behind you, knowing she'd be listening to every word. 

“Alright, if you win..I accept. If you don't, no deal.”

“Hm, sounds fair,” David replied. “I guess I'll have to try a little harder this week. I'll let you get back to work, alright?”

“Alright,” You nodded, trying not too smile too widely. “I'll see you Saturday. Bye.”

You hung up the phone, turning around to Margaret with a polite smile.

“Thank you, I'll be in the office.”

Once you closed the door and found yourself alone, you let out a laugh, shaking your head and wondering what you'd let yourself in for.

📷

Saturday came around quickly, and most of the day was given over to preparing. At first you were just helping Pam, heading into store after store to find the perfect outfit. Then you started looking for yourself, realizing that you wanted to put in just a little more effort since you were going to watch, not work. 

As the evening drew closer, the radio was on full blast in the apartment as you and Pam cracked open a bottle of wine and started the beauty process. You couldn't shake the slight nerves that were settled in your stomach, but they were joined by an excitement. 

“Oh,” Pam turned from the bathroom mirror to look at you. You were sitting on the edge of the bathtub, carefully painting your toenails. “Did he ever get in touch? David? I completely forgot to ask.”

“Yeah, he found me,” You grinned, laughing as Pam gasped. “Asked me to come along tonight. I told him I was already coming.”

“And?” Pam asked, waving her hand at you. “What else? Did he ask you out?”

“I told him he can take me out if he wins,” You smiled, holding the bottle of nail polish up in the air with a laugh as Pam rushed over to hug you.

“This is so exciting! We're gonna be like sisters!”

📷

When you arrived at the Sportatorium, it seemed to be even busier than it had been the previous week. You stepped out of your truck, smoothing out your outfit. It was only a black off the shoulder top and some denim jeans but you hoped it still looked good. 

You linked your arm with Pam's as the two of you headed inside the bustling arena, your heart beating faster as you took your seats. As it turned out, watching the match was totally different to photographing it. You couldn't move about, couldn't pick one thing to focus on. It was all happening, bright and loud and thrilling. You found yourself cheering and whistling with the crowd, you and Pam both jumping up and screaming when the Von Erichs emerged victorious.

When it was all over and you were enjoying the fresh air, you couldn't help but find it adorable when Kevin couldn't keep his eyes off Pam while he signed autographs. Once he was free you gave him and Pam some space, almost immediately bumping into David.

“Hey winner,” You smiled, resting your hands in your back pockets. “Nice angles in there.”

“I hope someone was there to capture them,” David grinned, taking his hat off. “Did you have a good time?”

“Yeah,” You nodded, watching David for a moment, smiling as you realized he almost seemed a little nervous. “I really enjoyed it..though I'm a little curious about something.”

“What might that be?” David asked, moving his hat from one hand to the other. 

“Well,” You smiled, stepping closer and looking up at him. “Are you going to honor our agreement?”

📷

It was only when you were putting on your coat to leave the apartment when it dawned on that you hadn't actually been on a first date for..a while. There were some relationships in high school, a couple in college along with some dates and flings but the last had been before you graduated. 

You tried not to think about it too much, you were just going for dinner and seeing a movie. Worst case scenario, you and David didn't end up hitting it off and the world would go on as it always did. But part of you was hopeful that something would come from the date, that it would develop into something really great.

Grabbing your purse, you left the apartment and went downstairs to hail a cab, excitement starting to outweigh the nerves.

📷

“No way,” You laughed, your eyes going wide as you placed your hand over your chest. “You did not do that.”

“Yes I did,” David nodded, a serious look on his face before he laughed. “I was so sick afterwards. Never got found out though. Mom just went and got Kerry and Mike a new egg each. I couldn't eat chocolate for like three months.”

“I'm not surprised,” You laughed, picking up your drink. “You can't say you didn't deserve it.”

David laughed, nodding as he picked up his own drink. 

“I certainly did deserve it. Moment of weakness I guess.” 

You took a sip of your drink before setting the glass down and glancing around the restaurant. It was a steakhouse, but it felt like a nice one. Elegant lighting, candles on the tables, classy music playing. No sawdust or butcher paper to be found. 

“So do you think your brothers ever found out?” You asked, sitting up a little and resting your hands in your lap. “Or did you tell them?”

“No to both I'm afraid,” David sighed softly, lightly tapping his glass as he set it down. “Though I think Kev knew it was me..” He smiled to himself as he looked down. “Never said anything if he did know, though.”

“Seems like you two are close,” You smiled, your heart picking up a beat as David looked back at you with a warm smile. 

“We are,” He nodded. “We all are. I can't imagine life without them, they're amazing.” 

You felt your heart swell, trying not to get too swept up in your emotions. 

“That's so wonderful,” You smiled. “It's amazing that you're all so close.”

“Yeah,” David grinned, sitting up a little. “I just feel so lucky every day, like..” He stopped himself, lightly rubbing his neck.

“You know what, I feel like all I've done is talk about myself, my brothers, I don't want you to think I'm self absorbed or nothing, I promise I ain't like that.”

You shook your head, reaching your hand across the table and grinning when David held it with his own.

“I know you're not,” You insisted. “You're wonderful. Now tell me more about your family, I want the good stories.”

You ended up missing the movie, but neither of you cared. You talked until the restaurant was closing, David's jacket around your shoulders as you walked out into the night air. He gave you a ride home and kissed your cheek by your door  like a gentleman. 

“I had a great time,” You smiled, carefully taking off David's jacket and giving it back to him. You could tell he wanted to tell you to keep it, and you knew why he couldn't. 

“Maybe you should win another match, take me out again.”

“It's a deal.”

📷

Going to matches became a weekly event. You and Pam would cheer and cling to each other, laughing at how silly you were being. You took pictures for yourself, wanting to remember every moment. Afterwards you would meet David and Kevin, go for burgers and debrief on the match. 

It wasn't always easy for David to visit you, so you called each other when you could, spending an hour or two talking about anything and everything. You drove down to Denton a couple of times, meeting him for something to eat or just for a drive. 

He was always a perfect gentleman, opening doors for you and holding your hand, never pressing for anything more even though you suspected he was just as keen as you were to take things further.

You decided to nudge things in the right direction one night when you had gone down to visit him. Pam had come with you, and David and Kevin had taken you to the lake with their brother Mike, who you instantly adored. 

The afternoon was perfect, gorgeous hot weather and ice cold beers, floating along in the water and feeling like nothing else could possibly matter but being in that moment. 

You were sitting on the edge of the dock while the others drifted along on the huge rubber float, snapping a couple of shots of them before setting the camera aside. David appeared next to you, sitting down and resting his hand on your back. You leaned into the touch, his arm moving around your shoulders. 

“I love this,” You smiled softly, closing your eyes and letting out a breath. “If every day was like this..what a world.”

“It's perfect,” David murmured softly. “I can't think of anything better.”

“Hm, I reckon I can,” You smiled, opening your eyes and looking up at him. His eyes were already on you and you grinned as he took a breath and leaned in, his lips feeling like heaven against yours. 

You could hear the cheers and whistles, smiling into the kiss and feeling satisfied beyond belief. 

📷

“You ready for this?”

“Absolutely not. You?”

“Absolutely not.”

You flicked on the indicator and headed up the long drive to the Von Erich home, glancing over to Pam in the passenger seat.

“At least we're in this together.”

It was incredibly daunting, the thought of meeting David's parents and his brother Kerry, who had recently come home. He had told you countless times that they would love you, but it didn't ease your nerves. 

You were relieved to have Pam with you, that she was in the same boat. Mike met you both at the door, giving you both a hug and chatting away as he led you outside. 

It was a flurry of introductions, handshakes and hugs and the most perfect kiss from David that had you instantly relaxing.

By the time everyone sat down for dinner, it felt as though you had known the Von Erichs forever. The food was delicious, the weather was beautiful, the company was amazing. You felt David reach for your hand under the table when his parents talked about how they met, your heart swelling. 

When Doris forbade Mike from going to a gig that night, you glanced across the table to Pam smiling as she gave you a slight nod.

📷

“Alright, drive, drive!”.

You put your foot down, laughing as you glanced in the mirror and watched your boyfriend and his brothers gradually haul themselves into your truck. You turned the radio up when you left the driveway, rolling down the windows and cheering as you hit the road.

It didn't matter whose house the party was in, it was big and roomy and most importantly, fun. You had a beer in your hand before you knew it, hitting the makeshift dance floor. The brothers spun you and Pam around, laughter filling the air as you moved to the music, not a care in the world.

When Mike took to the stage with his band, you stood with David behind you, his arms wrapped around you. You all cheered as the song started up, swaying along as you held your hands over David's. 

Later in the evening you gently took David's hand and pulled him into a quiet corner, whispering in his ear and enjoying the slightly tipsy smile that crossed his face, a flash of worry passing his eyes.

You led him upstairs, finding an empty bedroom and closing the door.

“We..we don't have to,” David insisted as you slipped off your shoes. “I don't want you to feel pressured.”

“I don't,” You smiled, walking to the end of the bed and unzipping your dress before turning back to David. “But I will think you don't want to if you don't get over here in the next thirty seconds.”

He didn't need to be asked twice.

You laughed as you were picked up bridal style and carried to the top of the bed, letting out a soft moan as David laid you down and gave you a tender kiss.

Despite your suspicions that David was possibly a virgin, you didn't ask when he didn't bring it up. He was a little apprehensive, but once you took the lead he seemed to tap into his ring persona and the confidence in his movements had you struggling not to scream as your nails dug into his back, the sheets, your body crying out for more. 

“Oh god,” You moaned, touching David's cheek and looking up to meet his eyes as your legs hooked around his waist. “Baby..’m so close, please..”

You closed your eyes as he pushed deeper into you, his forehead resting against yours.

“Me too,” He murmured, his hand reaching for yours. “Fuck..fuck..I love you.”

Your eyes went wide at the confession, a deep moan spilling from your lips as you felt a wave crash over you, feeling David fill you moments later. You moved your hands to his neck, meeting his eyes and taking a deep breath. 

“I'm sorry,” He sighed, looking down. “I shouldn't have-this isn't the time..”

“No,” You insisted, a smile spreading on your face. “It's the perfect time. I love you, too.”

📷

“Mind if I get one of those?”

You turned around, letting out a sigh of relief as you spotted Kerry walking towards you. 

“Of course,” You smiled, taking the box of cigarettes from your purse and handing it over. “Thought you were David for a second.”

Kerry laughed as he accepted the box, shaking his head.

“Nah, your secret is safe with me. Just needed one huh?”

“Yeah,” You nodded, flicking away the ash. “I'm so nervous. I don't know why, it's not like I have to walk down the aisle in front of hundreds of people wearing this,” You raised a brow, gesturing to your dress.

As much as you adored Pam, and as thrilled as you were that she was getting married and had asked you to be her maid of honor, you did not exactly love the dress she had chosen. For a start, it was a mix of dusky pink and peach, the skirt was so big you wondered if you fit down the aisle, and the sleeves were almost the size of your head.

“I feel you,” Kerry nodded, looking down at himself as he lit his cigarette. “I think we all feel a little ridiculous. But you know the worst part?”

“Go on,” You smiled, lifting up the puffball that had slipped down your shoulder. “shock me.”

“I gotta do this three more times,” Kerry sighed, lightly prodding the flower attached to his suit. “At least you get to choose your wedding dress. I'm stuck in velvet hell.”

You laughed, shaking your head and taking a drag on your cigarette. 

“Oh come on, it ain't so bad. I think I heard Mike say he would never have velvet.”

“Really?” Kerry raised a brow, looking over to you. 

“Promise,” You grinned, holding your hand over your heart. “He said he'd have velour.”

“Oh fuck off,” Kerry laughed, shaking his head and holding his hand out. “Gimme a mint and get out of here, I'll velour you.”

“I'd like to see you try,” You laughed, getting a mint from your purse and flicking your cigarette away before walking over to Kerry. “See you inside. Don't destroy that flower.”

📷

“Isn't she beautiful?” You smiled, watching Pam and Kevin sway on the dancefloor, smiles etched on their faces as they moved to the music. 

You felt the urge to take a photo, but a professional had been hired for the day. Pam had insisted she wanted you to be in the pictures, not the one behind the camera. You had been a little disappointed, but you gave her the photo you'd taken from when she and Kevin had first met, and her reaction made it all worth it.

“She really is,” Doris nodded, looking over to you and taking your hand with a smile. “And you will be too.”

“Thank you,” You smiled, giving her a kiss on the cheek. “Let me go get us another drink.”

You stood up, making your way over to the bar with a smile. While you and David weren't officially engaged, it was kind of an unspoken truth that when Pam and Kevin had gotten married, David would propose to you next. Kerry wasn’t seeing anyone, and while Mike was dating a girl, they had only been together a few weeks.

So, you knew you were next up.

As you waited for your drinks, you smiled as you felt a familiar presence by your side.

“Have I told you how beautiful you look today?”

“Yes,” You grin, turning to face David and giving him a kiss. “But I don't mind hearing it again.”

As the song ended and a new one started up, more guests took to the floor.

“Should we go for a twirl?” David asked, gently stroking your cheek. “or maybe not quite a twirl, that dress will take out anyone who comes close,” He teased.

“Oh shut up,” You laughed, lightly swatting him. “I'm getting your mom a drink, if I don't take you out first.”

“I'll take it to her,” David smiled, leaning down to give you a soft kiss. “Then you owe me a dance.”

📷

So, here it is. 

The big day. 

You thought at times it would never come, but it's here. 

A lot has happened, of course. Weddings need buildup, after all. The guests can only talk about how beautiful you look and wonder who did the food for so long. You gotta give them something. 

So what's new? It's been a minute, a luxuriously long engagement. 

The Von Erichs have gone from strength to strength, reaching the top of the wrestling game. You still go see matches, when you can. They're global now, you always feel a rush of pride when you watch them on TV at some crazy hour.

Pam is a world class veterinarian, an incredible mother to the most gorgeous baby, and still the best friend in the world. 

Kevin won the WHC belt, is the most devoted husband, father, brother, brother-in-law and son. He and Pam keep saying they're going to buy a ranch in Hawaii for everyone to live in, and you like to think maybe it could be true.

Kerry insists he's your favorite brother-in-law, and you insist that you couldn't possibly choose a favorite but deep down you think he's most likely right. He makes you laugh the most, teases you and makes stupid jokes to cheer you up when you need it. The two of you have sneaky cigarettes and know what the other is thinking when you look at each other. 

Mike has just signed a recording contract with his band, and you tell him all the time he better come to you first with concert tickets. He's going to be the next one engaged, he's so loved up and it's adorable. 

Then there's David. 

The yellow rose who called up six different newspapers just to ask you out, who let you into his life, who loves you unconditionally and makes you so unbelievably happy that you wonder what you ever did without him. You would never have pursued your dreams without him and his family, that's something you know. And let's not forget his proposal, which was the most beautiful moment of your life.

David had taken you on a surprise trip one night, insisting that you were just going for a drive after you'd been out for dinner, but you knew it wasn't true. You found yourself at the lake, David's hand in yours as you walked down to the dock, which..was decorated with candles in jars, rose petals, a bottle of champagne sitting in ice. 

Knowing that you were marrying your soulmate, joining a family you loved deeply, it made you feel so safe, so secure. You quit your job, deciding to pursue your real passion. You bought a gallery in Dallas, and displayed your own work along with other local artists, including your soon to be mother in law. It took time, but it's become a success, and you don't care what any of them say, you couldn't have done it without your family.

Plenty for the guests to talk about, right?

You take a deep breath as you step out of the car, Pam fixes your dress and you take a deep breath. Her dress is beautiful, and most importantly, simple. 

Before you know it you're walking down the aisle, your heart beating faster as hundreds of faces smile at you, but there's only one you need to see, and when you do it makes everything okay. 

You reach the top of the aisle, feeling overwhelmed with love, beaming as you turn to look at your soon to be husband.

“You know it's a bad habit to leave the bride with a veil over her face,” You grinned, watching David gently touch the hem of the silky veil and carefully move it back, a wide smile on his face.

“I do apologize,” He grinned. “Still gonna marry me?”

“Of course,” You smiled. “You look perfect from this angle.”

#the iron claw #the iron claw fic #the iron claw fanfiction #david von erich x reader #david von erich x you #harris dickinson #harris dickinson fanfic #harris dickinson x reader #harris dickinson x you

[psychelis-new]

pick a pile: "Your first impression about your person and viceversa"

take a breath and choose the photo or number that calls you the most to read what was/may be the first impression you'll have about your person when you met/will meet them and viceversa. for a couple of piles MAY not be necessary but I suggest you to take the pac 2 times, one asking about your person's first impression of you and the other asking about your first impression of them (or vice versa): you may get two different piles and it's totally fine. This person may be your current/next romantic partner, your destined romantic person/soulmate, fs/fp, exes and 'friend-crush'(= crushes you have/had interactions with).

don’t take the reading too seriously. only take what resonates with you and leave the rest. if you're not called by any pile, let this reading slid as it may not hold messages for you. if you're called by more than one pile, there may be messages in each of those piles. remember that is a general reading and some things may not resonate with you. energies can change and readings are based on present ones (as you read); you're always in charge of your life.

(photos found on unsplash)

- ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ -

1 2 3 4 - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ -

pile 1

--your first impression of them--

This person seems having either a double aspect to them, a double nature or may immediately look pretty balanced. They may also seem a mystery to solve, kinda like... they hide something or are very private. At the same time, they may be speaking or do something which will make you think they have it all together (but probably don't say it all) and are wise and also resourceful. It feels like a meeting in a job setting, where they aren't being their full self. Like you know, maybe they have to be a bit collected and all for clients or boss looking or anything. They may be under the spotlight for some reason, may be again a presentation or something where there are many people around (it could be even eg. a wedding where they talk about either of the newly weds) and they wanna do good, but you'll think they seem very fascinating and mysterious. For some of you, they may look jealous or sulky, or maybe you will feel like this (either for their abilities or because they're not alone).

song: jealous | labrinth

--their first impression of you--

They'll think you look a bit introverted/shy at first but maybe you'll interact with someone and they'll realize it's just an impression. Or, you'll probably be in a moment of your life where you're letting people in again after a while so it'll feel a bit weird but cute to look at you standing in a corner and trying to interact with others. They'll find it endearing. I think the setting will be the same as above (job or a palce with many people involved as a wedding or anything else): I'm getting again jealousy involved, so either of you may be talking with someone else and it will hurt the other's feelings somehow (like you're each other first-sight crush?). They'll find you special anyway, beautiful, despite (or even cause of) this shy side of yours. They'll see how strong, grounded (maybe you'll be giving very good informations and be very detailed when it comes to work or your presentation or something), and funny you can be, and will adore your bright smile. I think they'll try to talk with you first. And they may even like a lot how you look. Like, a lot. I am hearing "peeling" so they may even imagine removing your clothes or want to get to know you better.

song: watch me burn | michele morrone

- ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ -

pile 2

--your first impression of them--

You'll like their vibe. They look comfortable, easy, calm... I'd say like an ocean, but we all know oceans aren't that calm. Maybe you'll like that storm that you can imagine going on behind their eyes. I think you'll notice how passionate they are about something and this will make you more curious about them, somehow even proud? Or you'll find them inspiring for what/how they do something or think. You may start as friends first. They are a very abundant person, rich not just necessarily on the outside but in particular inside. They have a very various/wide world in their guts. They're also very nurturing... I'd say healing to you. That type of comfort. It can come as a storm but it's still good. They will probably help you chill somehow, even with just a look. Or a few words said all of a sudden. Maybe they are/will be that type of friends coming to see you at 3 am if you need or pick you up somewhere. You'll instinctively trust them.

song: I'm gonna be (500 miles) | the proclaimers

--their first impression of you--

They like you. Like a lot. Like with a passion. They are attracted by you. They may be even trying to manifest you or attracting you in their life. It's like you starstrucked them in a way, and they cannot get over you. Maybe they also felt like a little closed off from others (and from you too at first, pretty delusional soul when it comes to love), not trusting many people, but the moment you came in and found your way inside of them, they changed their mind. I think that despite finding you hot, they also really like you for something else. Either they feel a connection with you or appreciate your vibe/happy side, or... you're just surprising them cause again they may have tried to manifest you or talk with you. But indeed, the first thought is something about you being very physically (or your vibe) attractive and they needing to contact/talk with you asap in any way. They'll find you very fascinating then, cause you incarnate exactly what they were looking for in a person but could never find anywhere (that's probably the reason behind being closed off or a bit off in general at first).

song: 34+35 | ariana grande

- ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ -

pile 3

--your first impression of them--

They seem someone open and very connected with their inner child, very kind. Not naive ofc, just very comfortable with being spontaneous. They seem gentle and cute too. May be a friend first (this is the first impression of them as a lover, so kinda a realization) or someone that you met in the past or even in a past life, or they remind you of something that happened in your childhood, make you nostalgic (maybe you were like them but somehow you changed: probably you had to heal something and grew a bit more serious). They are very welcoming and loving, very hearty-nature. They are a lover by all means. They are also determined and chill in a way that make sthem hopeful and positive about anything they're trying; any new endeavour or experience they can do, they'll happily try it out. Very cheerful and positive person, may also be pretty happy about where they are in their career or mentally (may have healed/be healing something but be in a balanced situation). You really like having them around, they make your life better/cheer you up by simply being themselves or around you.

song: if i ain't got you | alicia keys

--their first impression of you--

You're a little shy/closed off and it may take a while to get inside of you. I think the setting can be the same as above: you two may have met in your childhood or in a past life. There's a connection between you two. They will think you're very strong-minded and (for some) even a bit stubborn. Still, they'll like that of you. They think it's cute when you pout. They'll think you're very much the person of their dreams, you make them feel good, you relax them somehow. Maybe they often felt on guard for some reason, but you feel comfortable for them. You help them chill. They'll think you changed a lot or it will be clear that you have been through some important stuff (maybe from the way you act). Probably cause you don't let people in that easily, you kinda have a wall to protect your most inner side, but they're not scared to work on it cause they really find you endearing and fascinating. they're not very preoccupied by your walls anyway they're "more stubborn", lol.

song: the arc | godevil godevil

- ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ - ’ -

pile 4

--your first impression of them--

Two options: they seem bright, and they bring you some kind of inner peace. Or... you don't like them that much. They seem a bit too much to bear with, a bit too "uptight" or something like that. Probably there's something blinding you, like an idea you had or a belief and this person is challenging it a lot. A LOT. Not sure if it's just with their appearance or how they act (eg. maybe you like more silent people and they're all chatty and kinda annoying) or in the way they talk or about what they talk or anything... still, it's kinda upsetting in a way. This challenging feeling though will change with time (we're ofc talking about your person). They'll find a way to get to you. You probably need to find a balance and let go of your old beliefs a little more. Find a new compromise. I think you'll end up liking them much more than you ever thought. This challenge will make you upset/get on your nerves, but in a hot way too at a certain point in your connection.

song: i wanna be yours | sofia krlberg

--their first impression of you--

They'll find you very interesting, appealing, they'll find you like a dream come true for certain aspects. They will love how determined you are and how you don't let people disrespect you. They will like that meeting you will feel like fated, for any reason. You're again whoever they dreamed to be with in and you're there in front of them. Just like out of nowhere. It feels a very sudden meeting or realization tbh, like they were going out for some reason and bam, there you are. You're beautiful, welcoming (I think if you're a female you may have a very nice curvy body or if you're a male you can be pretty toned -I'm getting big chest vibes-, but any other gender applies: this person just has a fascination about your body too and how comfy it looks to them specifically or it could be how kind, welcoming, gentle you look to them -so it can change according on this person's likes). Dunno what else to add tbh, they're just there with their mouth open. Starstruck. (For some, you may know them already or they may have seen you already)

song: a little bit yours | jp saxe

#pac #pick a pile #pick a card #pick a card tarot #pick a pile reading #pick a picture #pick a photo #divination #fs #intuitive readings #clairs readings #psychic readings #free tarot reading #tarot readings

[aestheticaltcow]

Fatherhood: Billy Hargrove

Billy met you when he moved back to California after graduating high school and turning 18. He got a job working at an autobody shop. He watched you pull up in a baby blue 1969 Bronco; he was the first one to come up to ask you what kind of help you needed. You thought he was cute and hoped to run into him again.

While driving home after work, he noticed that same Bronco in the parking lot of the local grocery store. He didn’t want to seem like a stalker, but seeing you twice in one day felt like a sign.

He was right to ‘run into you’ at the grocery store- you asked him if he wanted to hang out that weekend, and the rest was history. 

Your relationship moved ‘quickly,’ saying ‘I love you’ after a couple of months, moving in together at six months, and engaged within a year of knowing one another. Your friends thought you were insane, and so did your parents- until they saw just how happy Billy made you.

After a small wedding on the beach, the two of you enjoyed a few years of married bliss before deciding to start your family. You wanted ‘like a million’ kids. Billy wanted to make you happy but couldn’t suppress his fears of being like his father. ‘Billy, you’re nothing like him- you’re different, love.’ as much as you tried to reassure him, it could only do so much.

You wanted to tell Billy you were pregnant in some cute way, but he beat you to it when he was emptying the bathroom trash, ‘Holy shit.’ he muttered under his breath before going back inside the house to ask you if it was true. When you nodded, he hugged you tightly and promised to be the man you saw him as.

Watching your body change throughout your pregnancy made Billy feral. Knowing you were having his baby- it just did something to him. He’d rub your feet and hands at the end of the day to help alleviate swelling pains. He’d help you rub cocoa butter on your bump to help with stretch marks. He went to every appointment and listened as you summarized parenting books to him. 

When the two of you found out you were having a boy- Billy tried not to think about the pain Neil had put him through; he would be the father he’d wished for as a kid.

Joseph Anothy Hargrove, 8lbs 14 oz, 19 inches, was born August 15, 1991. Billy was in love the second he laid his eyes on the infant; he had your eyes- how could he not fall in love with those eyes all over again?

In the early months of Joseph’s life, Billy felt useless. He tried his best to help and became inactive as Joseph got older and slightly less dependent on you. His favorite time of day was the early mornings he’d spend with Joseph; you’d be asleep in your shared bedroom. Billy would sit in the rocking chair in the corner and hold Joseph against his bare chest, ‘I got you, baby. Daddy’s always gonna be there.’ 

Billy kept that promise. Whenever his son needed him, he was there. He coached Little League basketball and even took a turn being the leader of his Boy Scout group. 

Both of you taught him how cars worked- although you’d sneak away after a few minutes to give the boys their bonding time, you loved how Billy relaxed when he was with Joseph.

Billy had broken the cycle.

#billy hargrove #billy hargrove fan fiction #billy hargrove fan fic #billy hargrove imagine #billy hargrove one shot #billy hargrove x reader #billy hargrove headcanon #stranger things #stranger things fan fiction #stranger things fan fic #stanger things imagine #stranger things one shot #stranger things headcanons

[ja3yun]

The Sun That Always Burns | S.JY pt.4

sim jaeyun x afab!reader

warnings: suggestive, heartache (lots of it), flirty heeseung bc i can't resist, angst, confrontations, pet names, ynjake are so obvious it hurts.

wc: 9.7k+

synopsis: you and jake's high school relationship blossomed into a romance filled with hope and promise. however, as time went on, jake's long-term expectations began to weigh heavily on you, who struggled to meet them. your paths eventually lead you in separate directions, each experiencing different aspects of life and ultimately moving on from your past love. unexpectedly, fate intervened and you both reunite after years apart. the reunion allows you to rediscover your feelings for each other but also forces you to navigate the complexities of your past and present.

part 3 | part 5

a/n: so i was gonna stop this chapter earlier than it is here but I think having the last scene in this chapter makes sense! also I know nowt about physics so when they start talking about it just pretend it makes sense pls <3

In the guest room, Eunseo is deciding what to wear, it’s between her usual jeans and a crop top or playsuit she bought 2 years ago that she swears makes her look ‘snatched’. In your eyes, she always looks beautiful. “Why are you stressing? It’s just dinner.” 

“Um,” She looks at you like you have 12 heads, “YOU should be stressing, Heeseung and you are sat next to each other.” 

“Wait, what? We have designated seats?” You question.

Rolling her eyes she fixes her hair in the mirror, “Obviously, I mean, there are like 14 of us.” You knew that but no one came up with a breakfast seating plan so why now?

“I’m fine in this,” You look down at your midi dress and white cropped cardigan, “It’s simple and cute, and I am NOT trying to impress Hee.” You cross your arms to protest but Eunseo turns sharply and quips up, “You just called him Hee! That’s a nickname, see, destined to be.” If only she knew. In your defense, it was never that Heeseung was unattractive but Jaeyun was the only person you ever thought of, you didn’t have to think about anyone else. 

You point to the playsuit for her to choose. As she goes to get changed there is a knock at the door, “Come on in.” you say just lower than a shout and Mrs Sim walks into the room. Urgently, you stand up and brush yourself down, ironing out the creases as best you can, “Hi Mrs. Sim. What can I do you for?” 

“I’m just here to let you girls know that everyone is downstairs waiting for you.” She nods and eyes you up and down. “Tell Eunseo to hurry up please.” She smiles and goes to leave but you hold her arm to stop her.

“Why didn’t you use the money you saved up for this wedding?” You question, too impatient to wait and ask Heeseung later on. With a sigh she turns to you, cursing Heeseung’s name under her breath.

“She’s rich, I’m not, the family didn’t need my money.” Her face is screwed up, wanting to tell you more, wanting to tell you the truth, "Honestly, Y/N? We aren't thrilled with the wedding but at the end of the day it is happening. Nothing I can do."

“Mrs. Sim?” You call out to her as she is leaving, “I missed you.” 

Her shoulders slump but a smile adorns her face, “I missed you too, Y/N. More than anything.” As she finishes her sentence you rush to hug her tightly, making up for the lost years. “Shh.” Her hand strokes your back as you hold in your sobs, “You had your reasons,” Mrs. Sim pulls away and looks you deep in the eyes, “If those reasons don’t matter anymore, you should do what you think is best.” As you look at Jaeyun’s mother leave you take in her words and how she looked at you, like she was telling you a secret you didn’t know, and you’re still clueless. 

Eunseo emerges from the bathroom, dressed and ready for the night, “Ta-da!” 

You give her a thumbs up and a weak smile, “You look amazing.” She jumps happily and clasps her hands. “Then if we are both ready,” She reaches her hands to yours, “Let's go.”

Making your entrance to the dining room was weirdly calm, knowing you had Heeseung by your side set your mind at ease. Eunseo addresses everyone with a hello and bow and you follow, the whole family smiles and greets you. A single place next to Heeseung and…

Jaeyun.

“Shit” you mumble under your breath as you walk towards your seat, smiling at everyone as you pass. Heeseung’s hand strokes your hip, guiding you to your seat, “I was wondering when you were going to come down.” His smile dazzles up at you as you tuck your dress under and sit on the white satin seats. The set up for this dinner is a little fancy but this must just be how rich people did things.

“Eunseo takes forever to get dressed.” Playfully rolling your eyes you get comfy, ignoring the tempting presence to your right, but it’s harder than expected. Jaeyun is wearing beige trousers with a mint green jumper accented by a white collar, and he looks beautiful, like the sun on a cold winter day, “Hi, Jake.” 

His face frowns, not used to you calling him Jake, “Hello, Y/N.” His head tilts forward in your direction before facing forward pretending to listen to the conversation happening between his and Yeoreum’s parents. You want to reach out for his hand, tell him you missed him, tell him what a stupid mess you are, but as you stretch your hand out, Heeseung’s fingers interlock with yours. “Don’t” He whispers, pulling your body with his other hand to face him, “Focus on me, Y/N.” You nod and shift to Heeseung as he smiles, “You’re too close to the attentive members of the family, pretend I’m the one you want even for a few hours.” 

It takes all your will power but heading his advice, you focus on him. “Thank you, Hee.” 

Jaeyun hears it all, how Heeseung’s voice holds adoration, he sees how your fingers are intertwined. He is furious, his jaw clenched, and as much as he tries to remind himself he shouldn’t be possessive over you, it comes so naturally that he can’t help it. In every atom of his being, you are still his and he is still yours.

Heeseung’s thumb brushes over the back of your hand to settle your nerves. As Mr. and Mrs. Son bring out dinner, they place a vegetarian meal in front of you, and you glance at everyone else who has steak on their plate. You aren’t a vegetarian by any means but you are thankful since you hate red meat in general. But how did they know? You never told them about your distaste for red, especially bloody and rare, meat, and that's when a voice interjects your thoughts, “I told the cook you were veggie since you can’t eat any red meat that isn’t burnt to the heavens.” A chuckle follows the sentence and you turn to your side to face Jaeyun.

“Dig in!” Mrs. Son exclaims and gestures to the expansive amount of food in front of you all. You don’t know where to begin but Heeseung helps you as he picks up the bowl of marrowfat peas and scoops some onto your glistening white plate. You hold it up as he continues to pile the plate with food for you, not asking what you like because through what seemed like 20 million conversations about you with Jake, he learned enough about you. Heeseung sets the tongs and spoon down in their respective places and glances at you.

“Thank you.” your voice comes out no louder than a whisper. Just like the pepper incident earlier, Jaeyun knew you well enough to cater to your needs and it made your stomach flip. He nods courteously and faces his fiance once again, leaving you grateful but your heart is tired of pretending that his actions aren’t making you fall more in love with him. All the effort you made to try and bury your feelings deeply is unraveling with every passing moment. 

“That okay?” It was more than okay, he picked all your favourites, but you simply nodded and smiled at him in gratitude and he smiled at you briefly before eating the food in front of him.

This was abnormal for you. Your parents were loving and affectionate of course, but you never really had dinner like this, a feast upon your eyes and having the option to choose. Usually, your mum or dad would come home from work, come in, find something in the freezer, and shove it into the oven. Nothing fancy, nothing extraordinary, but enough. You were always grateful. 

“Baby, can you pass the salt?” Jaeyun says lowly and without thinking you reach out and pass him it, which he accepts gladly. You don’t notice the air shift until Heeseung’s eyes fall on you, wide and uncomfortable, and unfortunately, he isn’t the only one with that look on his face. As you scan around, half of the table, including Mr. and Mrs. Sim are looking at you incredulously, and then it dawns on you what you did. You aren’t his baby anymore. 

Jaeyun is none the wiser, pouring the problematic salt on his food before setting it down and digging into his food. Yeoreum side-eyes you both, and only you seem to notice, making you extra uncomfortable because at least if Jaeyun acknowledged it, you could both cover your asses together, but you guess this is up to you now.

“Oh um, the salt was just there, thought I would save Yeoreum the hassle.” You say not daring to look at anyone. Your voice sparks Jaeyun’s attention and all eyes shift to him, who simply looks at you with confusion, but when your eyes plead with him to say something he understands the gravitas of the situation, “Thanks, Y/N. I guess the salt was closer to you.” 

It’s innocent, the scenario that just happened, but after the whispers, the apple juice, and now this, someone could easily suspect something. You nod and go to eating your food, however, you still feel eyes on you. Yeoreum. Her gaze is too intense for you not to feel but you don’t chance a look at her.

“Come here.” Heeseung’s raspy voice flutters through your ears and you look at him, his face inches from your own and then, his lips on your forehead. They felt different, foreign compared to your ex-lovers, but pleasant. Heeseung and you had observing your surroundings as a common trait so when he saw Yeoreum eyeing you, he had to throw her for a curve.

Yeoreum’s eyes widen and fall back to normal in record time causing Jaeyun to follow her stare.

Red. He sees red as he witnesses another man’s lips on you, regardless of who it is, it should only be his. He grips his cutlery tightly and rips his gaze away before he does something crazy like grab his best friend and beat him to the last inches of his life. 

“Hee, it’s okay.” You smile and place a hand over his, “Let's eat, yeah?” Jaeyun scoffs and flicks his food across the plate, suddenly losing his appetite. Jaeyun has always been jealous, this isn’t new information to you, but it makes your brain wonder how he still gets riled up like this even though he isn’t yours anymore. 

Your hand instinctively wants to reach to Jaeyun again to reassure him, but you stop yourself, aware of how that would make the situation a million times worse but also, he wasn’t yours to comfort. 

The meal goes on and no one bats an eye at you anymore, well, the two boys beside you steal glances as you all eat, but the majority have disregarded salt-gate and you’re thankful. 

“Jake, how is the new job?” This is the first time you’ve heard about his new life outside Yeoreum as Mrs. Son asks him the dull question and it makes you remember that the Jaeyun you knew wasn’t the Jaeyun sitting next to you right now.

“It’s good. I’m still learning the ropes but the team is super nice.” He smiles and bows his head lowly when addressing his seniors, something he always did with your parents. Maybe he hasn’t changed that much at all. The answer seems to be acceptable enough as Mrs Son smiles and doesn’t press further. 

Jaeyun smiles at you and his demeanor changes to one of glee, “You remember the Jo twins that started that enterprise with aerodynamic cars?” He asks quietly and you nod, eyes getting bigger as you piece the puzzle together before he can even finish the sentence, “Well for my dissertation I did a study on aerodynamic cars and their resiliency in weather adverse conditions, focusing on autonomous vehicles, and they loved it,” His eyes sparkled just like they did all those years ago when he spoke about science stuff, “Offered me a starting position with them in assisting the theory I proposed.” 

“What’s the job?” You whisper to him but don’t look up, playing with your food just as he did earlier in the evening. 

It was in that moment of Jaeyun speaking that you realised as unorthodox as your leaving was, it was 100 percent the right decision. He had stars in his eyes that would never shine as bright if he hadn’t gone to Apollo and got this opportunity, and for the first time this week, you’re content. Seeing him achieve a dream, or at least on the way to achieving it, made you feel elated. 

“I’m so proud of you, Jaeyun.” It was a sincere statement and Jaeyun smiled widely at your words, like they were the words he had been waiting to hear his whole life. His heart is beating rapidly and you think you can hear it thumping against his ribcage, but you don’t mention it. He thanks you and that’s when Yeoreum pulls you both back to reality.

“My Jakey is so smart, aren’t you.” She caught onto your conversation halfway through his excited outburst, “I have no clue what it means but-”

“So you would propose a framework that tested all the elements to understand just how reliable self-driving cars truly are when faced with weather stress and how to adapt them to overcome the stressors?” You don’t mean to butt in but you always loved to speak about these things with Jaeyun, even if it was basic-level knowledge you had.

His focus was on you, his puppy energy radiating through and if he had a tail, it would be wagging right now, “Exactly! Fuck, the main focus these developers had on the vehicles was sensors that focused on detecting other cars and members of the public but say there is a massive hurricane coming, the sensors would trip out, I proposed a study to test the sensors in adverse weather conditions; fog, rain, wind, heat, all of them.” 

Jaeyun rambles on about his theories and you fall right back into how it used to be. You listen intently and learn about something you didn’t care about until he starts speaking about it, and he teaches you something new. It was just like old times. Almost.

“Babe, Y/N doesn’t want to hear all that.” Yeoreum laughs and strokes his arm, “Sorry, Y/N, he gets into all this complicated sciencey stuff that no one has a clue about and forgets to stop.” You notice his face turn red in embarrassment as if he’s just been caught doing something indecent. There is a silence that follows Yeoreum’s words until you speak up.

“I think it’s interesting, I would love to hear more about it.” 

He’s so in love with you and he really feels it at its purest form in this moment. It’s a simple thing to listen to his interest and he’s grateful you want to engage more in it. You’ve always been like this, supportive of his ways, never judgmental or dismissive. He’s thankful for you.

“You might be the only one.” Yeoreum and her parents laugh, but as you scan the top half of the table, you see Mr and Mrs Sim smile at you, appreciative. You give Jaeyun a look as if to tell him to continue he shakes his head. “It’s okay, it’s boring anyway.” 

Your heart breaks a little seeing the fire in his eyes extinguish as he goes back to eating his food. There isn’t any part of you that hates Yeoreum, but right now you are not her biggest fan, but you let it go. His mood changed but he tried to hide it from everyone, smiling and laughing with them. Recklessly, you place a hand on his thigh and squeeze it to reassure him just like you always used to. Usually, it was to comfort him during his friend's teasing, but now seemed as good a time as ever. His eyes drop to where your hand is situated and he smiles, his left hand weighs itself on yours and he’s calmer. “Tell me later. I want to know all about it.” You whisper to him.

“Thank you, Princess.” The nicknames he used to call you fall so easily out his mouth that he never has time to stop them, but you don’t mind. “And by the way,” He says, his voice lower than ever, “I was asking you for the salt earlier.” 

______

The next day, Mrs. Son enters you and Eunseo’s temporary room as you straighten your hair. She is dressed up casually for the first time since you arrived, even her pyjamas seem classy and elegant, so as your eyes take in her loose mom jeans, a grey old university jumper that reads ‘Boston University’ across the chest, and her hair covered with a navy baseball cap. 

You remember all the walks you and the Sim family went on, your hand glued to Jaeyun’s as you took in the sights of the city, sometimes even taking hikes of your own early in the morning to watch the sunrise. It wouldn’t be like that this time.

“Girls, we’re going for a walk, Jake’s father's idea,” she rolls her eyes at Eunseo who chuckles, continuing to apply her strawberry chapstick, “Wear something comfortable.” Her sigh indicates that she is in fact not thrilled with the choice, never mind the clothing situation. Not to stereotype but it doesn’t seem that the Son family is common enough for a simple walk. 

“Um, I think I’ll stay here, this seems like a family thing.” Your voice is a whisper as you try to get out of seeing Yeoreum take your place beside Jaeyun. This was also a good time to get out of this house and go back home before the wedding. Eunseo shakes her head and stands up. 

“Be ready in 5 minutes.” Mrs. Son says and leaves the room. It doesn’t take 5 minutes because with Eunseo it takes 23 minutes and 13 seconds according to her dad who timed her. 

“Absolutely not! You’re coming with me. I need my girl to motivate me.” Her eyes are pleading and a pout forming on her lips and you find yourself saying yes, just like you did in that cafe earlier in the week. That was the poorest decision of your life so, this couldn’t be much worse. 

We walk downstairs to see everyone waiting and Mr Son is impatient, either from Eunseo’s lack of urgency or because he wants this over and done with just like his wife. “You guys are so impatient, I had to find these cute leggings!” Eunseo scoffs and turns around and models the navy blue leggings that do wonders for her ass.

Jaeyun’s eyes roam over your body as you bend down to put on a pair of old trainers Eunseo dug out from her cupboard so you could match “It’s important to colour match, Y/N! I have a pair of shoes in here just give me a minute” she told you. His teeth find their way to his lip as he bites down, the habit he picked up throughout your relationship because he could never hold in his want for you. Jaeyun wants nothing more than to grab your hips and hold you against him because truthfully he missed your body on his. 

“Eunseo, sweetie, you’re going for a walk, not to Seoul Fashion Week.” Mr. Son laughs and starts to tie his shoes. She looks disgusted at her father's insinuation that she would ever wear this outfit to a fashion week and grunts as she sits down, putting on her trainers. Unfortunately for you, you didn’t pack any appropriate attire for this so you’re clad in Eunseo’s tight leggings and crop top. It’s exposing and not something you usually wear but it was either that or a sundress and wedges. 

Scared of getting caught ogling you, he turns to his fiance and looks down as she clings to his arm, engrossed by a conversation she is having with his mum. He grabs her face towards his and kisses the side of her mouth, aching for a distraction from you but all his mind is occupied with is you. Even as he kisses Yeoreum, he’s thinking about how your lips used to taste, how they felt, he’s starting to forget how they feel and it sinks his heart into his stomach. All these years without you causing his memory to lapse, only remembering how you used to wear cherry lip balm, or was it oil? He needed to kiss you one more time just so he never forgets. 

He feels shitty using Yeoreum as a distraction, kissing her not because he inherently wants to but because at least it keeps his mind and eyes off you.

Yeoreum’s hands glide down his arm as she kisses him back, her lips soft but not yours. He knows it’s wrong, to be thinking about someone else while his fiance is draped over him, her hands in his and giggling as she smooches his face.

You finish tying your shoes and turn round to see Jaeyun’s hand on her waist and mouth all over hers and a wave of sickness comes over you, you can’t do this, not now and not ever. Every time you think you’re okay and can control your emotions he does something that sends you spiraling. 

A broad chest blocks your vision of him and you feel two big hands land on your shoulders. Heeseung. You glance up and softly smile at him in gratitude for tearing your eyes away from the horror scene of your love’s tongue down someone else’s throat. Heeseung’s hands squeeze your shoulders and his lips on your temple. You don’t recall Heeseung being affectionate like this before but it has been 4 years since you’ve seen him, he’s probably changed a lot, just like Jaeyun.

“Just stick beside me, yeah?” His voice is gentle and sweet, and you agree to stay with him. He has become your unofficial saviour this week and nothing you do will ever be enough to thank him. 

Mr. Sim clears his throat to disrupt the couple’s PDA and starts to speak, “We have two cars to get us to the trail since it’s only,” Mr Sim starts to count heads since some of the family are staying behind,“5,6…9 of us, we should be able to fit 5 and 4. I have a bigger car so I’ll take the 5, Jaeyun can take the 4. Who wants in what car?” 

Everyone looks around like it's the first day of school and you’re being asked to partner up. Yeoreum is the first to speak, raising her hand excitedly, “I’m in the car with Jakey obviously.” Jaeyun’s bottom lip protrudes as he nods his head. Of course, it made sense, but knowing you would have to witness her in the passenger seat, his hand probably laid on her thigh, you wanted in the other car more than anything else right now.

“I’ll go with Mr. Sim,” Jaeyun’s eyes dart to yours confused but you shrug it off. Eunseo, who is the opposite of Heeseung, seems to be your worst enemy this trip pipes in, “How about all the adults go in one car and we go in the other? I’m sure Y/N wouldn’t mind sitting on Heeseung’s lap, yeah?” Oh, you are going to kill her. Mr. and Mrs. Sim look between each other and share a personal laugh. You’re glad someone is finding it funny.

“Great! It’s settled then. Let us go.” Mrs. Son barges past everyone to get to her seat, mumbling annoyance along the way. 

“It’s fine, I hope you got some meat on those thighs.” You say trying to lighten the mood, and it works for a second. Heeseung laughs and wraps his arm around you and guides you to the car before whispering, “My thighs can hold you just fine, Y/N.” 

“You okay with that?” Heeseung’s voice is low but filled with concern, he knew what Eunseo was doing and he wasn’t uncomfortable with the idea, but considering you would rather ride with 4 parents, 2 of whom you don’t know and the other 2 aren’t exactly pitching for your team, he guessed you didn’t want to be in Jaeyun’s car.

Heeseung’s laugh runs through your ears and you feel instantly calm. 

Jaeyun and Yeoreum get in the front and the three of you sleek into the back. It’s in this moment that confusion clouds your face. “There are enough seats in here? Why would I have to sit on Heeseung’s lap?” Your question is pointed to Eunseo but Jaeyun answers,

“Oh, we have to pick someone up on the way.” His smile was bright and wide, “She’s a diva and likes her own seat.” Tilting your head at him, Jaeyun looks down and laughs lowly as if you should know.

“You can avoid Heeseung’s lap for now until we pick her up.” Eunseo states as she slides into her side. “But after that…” She winks at you as you scoot into the middle seat. Your best friend really was something else.

You decide to focus on the interior of Jaeyun’s old but new to you car. It’s a lot less shabby than the one you knew, with black leather seats that don’t have cracks in them from years of wear and tear, and his old cassette player has been upgraded to a built-in CD system. 

“Let’s put on some music!” Yeoreum says as she trifles through a CD case but Jaeyun quickly takes it from her and laughs nervously.

“Why don’t you take the aux like always? I've said before these CD's aren't your thing.” Jaeyun puts the CDs in his glove box and continues to drive forward. It piqued your curiosity about what was in the case. Probably a surprise wedding mixtape he spent forever on with all Yeoreum’s favourite songs, just like he used to do with you. That sickness from earlier starts to bubble, but you swallow it down. 

“Fine. Y/N, what do you like to listen to? I know everyone else’s taste but yours!” Yeoreum is so sweet, and it’s killing you a little. If only she was a bitch. 

“Um, I think everything,” You say as you watch her add songs into a queue, clearly picking an eclectic mix to keep everyone happy. 

The car jerks forward as Jaeyun almost emergency brakes when Heeseung calls you angel. You’re body lunges forward a little at the jerk but Heeseung shields your body, acting as another seatbelt. “Mate, watch what you’re doing.” Heeseung scorns his best friend as he rubs your arms, “You good?” Nodding in response you get comfy again.

“Put some Monsta X on,” Heeseung’s face turns to you as he speaks. “She loves them, don’t you, angel?” 

The rest of the car is filled with Yeoreum’s hand-selected playlist and tension between the driver seat and the one behind.

Jaeyun turns into a quaint little area with a few shops and buildings about 20 minutes into the drive. “Are we here already?” you ask Heeseung but he shakes his head. “Did you forget we have a passenger princess to pick up?” You let out a silent ‘oh’ and nod. 

As the car stops in the parking lot you shift a little uncomfortable. “I’m going to stretch my legs.” Heeseung steps out of the car to let you out but you stumble out of the car, luckily, Jaeyun is there to catch you, his hands placed on your shoulders to stop you from face-planting. He doesn’t say a word but his expression is laced with concern to which you shake your head and whisper a thank you.

You brush yourself down and straighten up. “I’ll be back in a minute.” He says to you and lets his hand linger down your arm. All you can do is nod and watch him leave.

“You know her well.” Oh no. Not another ghost from 4 years past. You can’t face another stern face cursing you to oblivion for your previous actions. 

“Who are we picking up?” You stretch your right leg and look at Heeseung who laughs. 

Yeoreum squeals and gets out of the car, “There she is!” Your sights set on Yeoreum and follow to where she is staring and your heart leaps out of your mouth. As you cross round the car you see the familiar blonde charging her way to you.

“Layla!” You shout, a shit-eating grin plastered on your face as the dog bounds towards you, happiness evident on her face. 

In a blur, you kneel down and she jumps up to give your face sloppy licks. Layla was Jaeyun’s family dog, a precious piece of their family, and admittedly your favourite, even before Jaeyun. “Whose my good girl?” You hug her tight as she barks, her tail wagging excitedly, the feeling of missing each other is mutual. Ruffling her coat she jumps around you and barks loudly. Jaeyun smiles down at you both, and you smile back at him, however, you’re the only two smiling as Yeoreum and Eunseo have a look of bewilderment.

“I thought you said she was reserved around new people?” Eunseo asks Yeoreum who hums to confirm. 

You miss out on this as you give Layla long-awaited kisses and cuddles, whispering ‘I missed you’ and ‘good girl’ into her fur. 

“Um, Jakey? Isn’t Layla shy around people she doesn’t know? She was like that with me when I first met her.” The question from his fiance brings him back to earth and his smile wipes from his face, clearing his throat to buy him some time to think of an excuse.

“Eh, maybe she just trusts Y/N because she’s with all of us.” A pathetic reasoning but you weren’t exactly any help, too busy playing with the excited animal.

Shit.

Heeseung crouches beside you and gives Layla a pet, nudging you in the process, “Remember where you are, Y/N.” 

You look around and everyone’s eyes are on you. “She must just sense I’m a dog person. Are you a dog or cat person, Yeoreum?” If there was one thing you perfected over the years it’s how to deflect situations onto another person and that's through the art of asking them questions about themself.

“I like dogs!” She smiles, “But I do like cats.” Her pondering face is matched with her hand on her cheek, “Jakey, do you think she didn’t take to me because I like cats?”

“Yes!” Jaeyun claps and points to her excitedly, happy to have a reason for this scenario in front of him. “Must be that, Reumie.” His shoulders relax and his eyes fix on Layla. She’s clueless, just happy that you’re back.

Getting back into the car you sit on Heeseung’s lap and Layla looks at you, like if she focuses on anyone else you’ll disappear again. You pet her to reassure her and it doesn’t take long for her to lay her head on your thigh, just happy for your presence. Jaeyun’s heart flips at the scene as he watches it through the rearview mirror. 

As you’re getting comfy on Heeseung’s thighs, you hover a little to not put all the pressure of you on him, but Heeseung is Heeseung and he notices. His hands grip your waist and plonk you down until your whole weight is on him. “You won’t break me.” He chuckles and rubs circles into your hips. A slight nod of your head is all you offer him and you get comfy.

Jaeyun starts the car, reversing out the car park, one arm resting on the seat as he looks behind him, for a split second he looks your way but quickly goes back to focusing on not crashing the car, his tongue pointed out the side of his mouth in concentration. You shift in Heeseung’s lap as heat bubbles in your stomach. There is something about Jaeyun driving that always made you think out of church hour thoughts, the way the veins run up his arm, how his tongue pokes out and wets his lips, his one hand on the wheel reversing, it was all so hot. There were times on occasion you couldn’t handle it and got him to take you in the backseat, those were not the thoughts you need right now while you’re on his best friend’s lap. 

“Hey,” Heeseung rips your gaze from Jaeyun’s hand with his voice as you turn your head to him, his voice low enough only you can hear, “If you leave a wet patch on my sweatpants I will have you pay for my dry cleaning.” He huffs out a laugh as your face falls and goes bright red.

“I-I, shut up, Hee!”  You whisper and slap his chest. 

__

One hour later you arrive and see the couple’s parents waving Jaeyun over. As he parks the car you all clamber out and greet the others, Layla ping-ponging herself between you and Jaeyun. 

A tap on your shoulder has you turning to face a serious Eunseo, “How did you know her name was Layla?” The question catches you for a new one but you just spout the same excuse you have this whole trip. 

“Jake told me.” 

“You know.” She crosses her arms and taps her foot a few times before continuing, “You seem to have spoken to Jake a lot and yet, I haven’t seen you talk to him once.” The tone of her sentence is accusatory but you keep calm.

She hums, “He knew about your distaste for black pepper, you knew he was captain of his high school football team, and I heard him request a vegetarian dish for you to our cook so I presume he knows you hate red meat. All that was way before dinner.” Her stance is strong as she leans back and waits for you to explain, but you can’t.

“W-what do you mean? We spoke last night, about his job and stuff,” your hand points to her, palm faced forward, “you saw.”

“Oh Eunseo, Jaeyun is actually the love of my life, we dated for about 4 years and then I left without a word. Now he’s going to marry your sister and I want to die at the thought.” 

That is what you probably shouldn’t say, so you settle with, “Just small talk I guess.” A nervous laugh leaves you but she doesn’t let up. “Y/N-”

At the same time Eunseo is saying your name, Heeseung comes over and hugs you from behind, “You coming, ladies? Or do you want to stay here with all the screaming children?” Heeseung points over Eunseo’s shoulder to the crying toddler and their sleep-deprived parents.

“You two need to be more careful. If Eunseo finds out, she tells Yeoreum, and I don’t think you want to be the topic of that conversation right before the wedding, yeah?” 

“Coming!” You say and rush off, grabbing Heeseung’s hand and getting you both out of Eunseo’s earshot. “Thank you.”

He’s right. He always is and it exudes a heavy sigh from your lips. “I know, it’s just so easy to forget.” You admit and his silent nod is all you need before the group of you head for your walk.

It’s peaceful, every so often you throw a stick for Layla, and chatter amongst the parents is all you hear as you make it your mission to not look Jaeyun’s way. Eunseo walks alongside the happy couple and you do as Heeseung suggested and stay by his side. The scenery takes your breath away, the golden sun burning your skin, not a cloud in sight. You take some time to reflect on the past 4 years and realise the sun doesn’t come out so much in Pyeongchang. 

“Y/N?” You turn to see Yeoreum looking at you, “Can I ask you something?” Oh no. Eunseo told her, fuck, maybe Mrs. Sim did. Is she going to throw you over the cliff, is all this one big ploy to get rid of you? 

“Oh, sure.” You look away and prepare for the worst-case scenario.

“Tell us more about your ex. I can’t stop thinking about it.” Your eyes widen and look straight at Jaeyun who, despite his golden skin, is suddenly pale white. “I don’t know why you broke up with him if you were so perfect for each other.” 

Jaeyun and Heeseung look at each other in confusion. They weren’t there for the conversation when the football game was going on, so they had no idea what Yeoreum was talking about.

“Yeah!” It’s Eunseo’s turn to chime in, “Y/N is such a closed book, I still know hardly anything about her. Tell us. You said you had challenges.”

“I-”

“It’s not really our business though, it is? We don’t have to know.” Heeseung speaks up in your defense but Yeoreum just scoffs. “I know about everyone’s exes, I love hearing about them. I know all about yours,” She points to Heeseung, “I of course know all about Jake’s.” She rolls her eyes as she spits the last sentence out, clearly, Jaeyun had said some bitter things about you, but you don’t mind. You deserved it. “So tell us about yours, Y/N. Jake, you should have seen the way she spoke about him! It was true love, I know it, maybe we can give you advice and get back together?”

Jaeyun coughs and looks up to the sky, wishing a bright light would come from between the clouds and either obliterate him like in that War of the Worlds movie.

“It was just,” You stop, uncomfortable at the idea that the subject of conversation is only a meter from you. Maybe this was your chance to really explain yourself in a controlled environment where emotions had to be under control, not like that night in the kitchen. 

“I just was scared I think. I didn’t really handle the situation well. I was scared of long distance so I didn’t tell him I was going to college in Pyeongchang and just up and left.” 

“I thought it was the right call. He had dreams, and honestly? He would have given all of it up for me. His dream school, his future, just to follow me and I didn’t want to live with the guilt of it.” Your head hangs low, and Heeseung’s hand grazes yours in an attempt to comfort you. “In the moment, I thought it was the right choice.”

“Damn,” Eunseo slows down her pace and looks at you, “You mean you just, left him behind?” 

Eunseo stops completely, “Your parents…”

“Left them behind too. I didn’t want to risk him finding out where I was going. I didn’t tell anyone. Literally.” It was all clicking in Eunseo’s head and her jaw hung open.

“That’s cold, Y/N. I can’t imagine how he feels. Does he know where you are now?” Yeoreum asks the wrong questions every single time and you almost laugh at the irony.

You shrug, “I-” 

“What do you think about it now?” The Australian accent jolts you to attention and interrupts what would have been a lie. Turning your head to him you wish he wasn’t looking at you with his eyes wide, like they’re desperate for something only you can give him.

Swallowing you nod slowly, “I think- I think I made the wrong choice.” You should have stopped the sentence there but you continue, “He’s everything to me still, I would do anything to go back and change it.”

In another world, Jaeyun is tearing himself away from Yeoreum, picking you up, and kissing you because you are the only one that matters. But this isn’t a romance movie, and you’re both deep in this tangled mess.

“I think you should reach out. Then you can have what me and Jake have.” A scoff is heard behind you. Turning, you view Heeseung with disgust on his face, his jaw is clenched and his eyes don’t even give Yeoreum the time of day. “What? You don’t think she could have that?” 

“I think Y/N can have anything she wants,” He’s biting his tongue. Jaeyun’s gaze is looking pleadingly at his best man to shut the fuck up. He doesn’t, “It’s just Y/N is describing a love that sounds like once in a lifetime.”

It’s Yeoreum’s time to stop in her tracks. “And you think Jake and I don’t have that?”

“Yes.” If gagged had a visual representation next to its definition in the dictionary, it would be a still-frame picture of your face right now. “It’s not that you don’t love each other obviously,” damage control Heeseung was coming to fruition as he saw the shocked faces staring at him, “It’s just love like that isn’t easy to find.” He mumbles, cursing under his breath that he even opened his mouth. 

“Well, for your information, Heeseung I brought Jake back to life after his high school relationship. He was nothing but a hollow body until he met me. If it wasn’t a ‘once in a lifetime love’” She air quotes the phrase, “then he would still be moping around over a shitty, second string ex that never deserved him.”

“Enough.” Jaeyun’s voice is stern, not like you’ve ever heard before, “Both of you just shut up. I love Yeoreum,” He faces Heeseung almost trying to convince him, “I wouldn’t be marrying her otherwise, “and you don’t get to shit on my ex.” His attention now on his fiance, “You don’t know her, she had her reasons, and yeah she hurt me, but she deserved all the love I gave her. So keep her out of your mouth. Got it?” 

Maybe Yeoreum’s face right now should be next to gagged in the dictionary. Scratch that, just have this whole scenario play out on a projector. Jaeyun strides ahead, annoyed that anyone in their right mind would ever say anything like that about you. The silence is loud as you all continue your walk, Layla still none the wiser.

As you reach the top of the trail, Jaeyun’s emotions have settled but he doesn’t look at you or Yeoreum once, focused on the sun. Even though it’s shining bright, it’s a lot colder with the breeze from the height where he stood.

Layla is pulling at you to follow her and with her leash in hand you do. She paws at Jaeyun who looks down with a smile and pets her head. “I’m sorry.” He whispers and you take a moment to register he’s talking to you. “She shouldn’t have said that.”

Your heart beats loudly because even after all this time he’s still looking out for you, still caring about your feelings even though he would have every right to hate you and curse you just like Yeoreum had.

“Jaeyun, It’s okay. She’s not wrong. It was shitty.” You suck your teeth and then you laugh, “You’re gonna be a terrifying dad,” He doesn’t say anything but his eyebrows scrunch together, “The way you put them both in their place, I’ve never seen you get angry.”

“Ah, that’s not true.” Now it was your turn to adorn a face of confusion, “Your birthday party, with Sunghoon?” Oh. Yeah. That. You shift from one foot to another, wrapping Layla’s lead around one of your hands. “I think that was the only time though.”

“I’m sorry about that.” He laughs loudly and shakes his head. “Baby, that was like 7 years ago. I forgive you. I forgave you that night.”

“Then go forgive Yeoreum.” The statement causes Jaeyun to lean back. “You should forgive her. It wasn’t nice but she didn’t mean it like that, she was protecting you because she loves you. If you can forgive me that easy then you can do the same for her.”

He sighs and sticks his hands in his pockets. “It’s easy to forgive you.” 

“Do you?” Your voice is a whisper, your heart rapidly hitting against your chest, “Forgive me.”

Jaeyun nods his head slowly and turns to face you properly, “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

Taking his hand out of his pocket he grabs yours and squeezes it. He loves you and that is never going to change. It’s just that he loves Yeoreum now. You can try to find contentment in that.

_______

For the car ride back, Yeoreum storms into the backseat without giving any warning, clearly mad at her future husband. Heeseung guides Layla into the middle seat before situating himself on the seat beside her and waiting for you to crawl onto his lap. That however does not happen. Eunseo decides to sit on Heeseung’s lap instead and he is less than impressed. “Um, Eunseo?” She turns to Heeseung as if sitting on his lap is the most obvious decision in the world. “What? I’m not sitting next to him after he shouted at my sister.” Jaeyun opens the driver seat and throws himself down onto the leather, muttering a barely heard ‘I didn’t shout’. You look at Heeseung to help you out but he shrugs and mouths a sorrowful ‘Sorry.’ which is no comfort at all. “Y/N can sit in the front.” Yeoreum huffs and you follow her instruction mindlessly. You get into the passenger side and buckle your seatbelt for the awkward 2 hours that await. 

“Let me put on some music, yeah?” Your voice is calm and quiet like you’re trying not to disrupt the tension. Heeseung is the only one to agree but you still grab the aux and plug your phone in. Unlike Yeoreum, you don’t ask what songs people want and settle for one of your playlists but just as you go to hit play, your phone says it’s at 5% and you mentally curse yourself for taking so many pictures. You have a choice; you can either play the songs right now and have your phone die in 2 minutes, or sit in silence. You sit for a while and the silence causes Jaeyun to turn to you.

“You okay?” he asks and you hum explaining about your phone, “Here.” Opening the glove box he hands you the CDs he hid from Yeoreum and she notices, crossing her arms and holding back from making a sarky comment.

Flicking through the CDs you see the mixtapes he made over the years until one stops you dead. ‘Y/N #1’. Your fingers flip through and all of them are named something similar all the way to ‘Y/N #38’. The last one has drawings of rings and keys all around it and you lightly trace your fingers over it, scared that if you touch it you’ll break it. 

To confirm your theories, you pick it out and enter it into the CD player and your heart skips at least 5 beats as the first notes play from Love is All Around by Wetter. You choke on nothing as the memories of that night come flooding back to that night. He had taken all those cassette tapes and made them into CDs. Even after you abandoned him he still took the time to transfer every single mixtape. Your chest feels heavy and you feel like you’re going to pass out until Jaeyun places a hand on your thigh to calm you down. His touch is so familiar and comforting that instantly you feel relief wash over you, your hand intertwining with his. Just like how you used to be, you’re seeking his comfort. 

Yeoreum is in too much of a sour mood to notice how his thumb rubs your skin, and how his whole body suddenly feels like it’s found the missing limb that’s been detached from him. But Heeseung doesn’t. He sees it all and he wants to cuss you both out for being so obvious. Still, instead, he’s engaging Eunseo in meaningless conversation, distracting her of any chance to see how Jaeyun has his fingers tracing hearts into your thigh.

As the song’s final chorus blares through the speakers he brings your hand to his lips and kisses it gently. It’s a foolish move and Heeseung panics, looking between the sisters to see if any of them notice and somehow they don’t. He is going to have some words for you both when they all get back. 

Alan Watt’s monologue at the end of the song doesn’t help the way you’re feeling, like for the first time in years you are exactly where you should be, with the love of your life. But his hand leaves yours as the journey goes on due to worrying that Yeoreum could turn her head and see it, and you’re pulled back to reality. He isn’t yours, and he’s getting married in two days.

____

Stepping out of the car you watch as everyone walks into the house, some sullen, and some oblivious about what happened. You wish you were the latter. Jaeyun walks with his hands in his pockets, head down as he follows a pouty Yeoreum up the stairs and into their bedroom. The house’s once light atmosphere is now heavy and by this point, everyone can feel it. Mr. Sim pulls Heeseung to the side and they share a whisper. Mrs & Mr. Son kidnap Mrs. Sim and Eunseo to the kitchen to help them prepare dinner.

You don’t follow your best friend, instead, you tread up the grand staircase, ready to shower and wash off the antics of today, craving the battering of hot water against your skin. Your foot is not but a second on the first floor when you hear shouting. It’s muffled and honestly, you shouldn’t be listening but you’re nosey and you one hundred percent know who it is.

“I just don’t understand why you shouted at me like that. And in front of our friends!” Yeoreum cries out. Don’t eavesdrop your mind is telling you, but your feet are gingerly walking to their door, it lays slightly ajar.

You don’t see lots but you can see Yeoreum’s back and sometimes when she moves, you can see Jaeyun. He looks lost, guilty, and bored all at once.

“Reumie, I did not shout at you. I told you to not speak about my ex. What is your fascination with her? You bring her up whenever you get the chance.” 

Yeoreum scoffs and folds her arms, one foot pointed out to the right and her hip jutted out. “Me?! Fascination?! You have some nerve to ask me that.” Jaeyun looks at her confused, “Jake, you are so sensitive whenever I bring her up.”

“Because she’s my fucking ex, Yeoreum. It’s a sensitive fucking topic for a lot of people believe it or not. I told you talking about her makes me uncomfortable” He’s mad and he’s scared she’ll say something that will have him saying something regretful. Jaeyun’s hands are in front of him and his fingers are joined as he tries to calm down. “Look, let’s just forget it-”

“Get over it, Jake. She probably has. I am the one who got you out of your rut, I am the one who held you on those nights you’d cry over her wishing she would come back even though I, your girlfriend, was right there, and I sure as hell am the one you asked to marry you.”

Jaeyun stills at the memories of him laying on his dorm bed, willing you to come home to him, Yeoreum hugging him from behind, lulling him to calm down. He couldn’t even pretend to care about her presence when thoughts of you struck into his mind. She didn’t deserve the way he was back then and he’s surprised she stayed around.

Jaeyun opens his mouth but she cuts him off before he can even respond, her eyes are on him with a deadly stare, “Do you still love her?” It’s his turn to scoff but she doesn’t let up, “Tell me you don’t love her, and I’ll put it all behind me. I will forget this ever happened and drop it.” She knows the answer, but she wants him to lie to her.

“I- Yeoreum everyone still has feelings for their first love.”

“If she walked through that door right now, would you leave me for her?” 

A gentle hand enveloped the top of your arm, causing you to gasp and turn around panicked. Mr. Sim’s gaze meets yours. He gently leads you from the door and into your room, “I think you’ve heard enough.” Although the statement can come across as rude from anyone else, his tone is comforting. He was taking you away from the possibility of the answer you knew he was going to say. Of course not. He wouldn’t leave her if his ex walked into his life again because you did walk back in and he is still very much engaged.

Jaeyun’s dad shuts the door behind him and sighs, “Y/N, Heeseung told me what happened.” You nod.

“It wasn’t a big argument, they’ll get over it in a minute.” Looking up you see him shaking his head and waltzing towards you, guiding you both to sit on the edge of the bed.

“He told me everything.” Oh. You nod again, this time heavy and with dread, as you think about the prospect of how this conversation will go. 

The next words to leave his mouth are not in a million years what you would have guessed,  “Thank you.” Shifting your body to face him completely you stretch your neck forward to make sure you heard him correctly, eyelids invisible as your eyebrows dart up.

Mr. Sim laughs and gently shakes your leg affectionately. “I know I didn’t give you the best welcome back reaction but you have to understand.” You daren’t say a word, trying to listen carefully, “When you left, you left behind my son but you took him with you. His livelihood, his character, his heart, he lost himself and I think it’s because you accidentally packed him up with your bags.”

“I’ll be candid, we lost all respect for you,” His face is sour and all you can do is nod because he had every right to feel this way, “But after these past few days, and Heeseung telling me why you left, I realise I have to thank you.”

The guilt your heart feels is astronomical, you knew it would hurt him, but something about the way his dad is putting it is like having someone poke multiple pins in your heart and dragging them down slowly, and painfully, torturing you as you awaited death.

“Why? You should hate me, you said yourself, I destroyed him.”

“Emotionally at the time, yes. But every step you took was always with his interest at the forefront. You knew he would reject Apollo if you told him you weren’t going with him.” A chuckle leaves his lips and his hand pats your leg again, “One thing about my boy? He is stupid when it comes to mind over heart. And you are so smart, baby girl.” Mr. Sim’s eyes are just as they used to be, full of adoration for you.

“If Jaeyun had left with you, he might have started to resent you and the relationship, wondering if he made the right choice, it would cause arguments, you’d drift and it would all have been for nothing. You saw that didn’t you?”

Yes. That is exactly how you saw it. When you made the decision to not tell him, long distance was your main reason, but as you stewed with it for years you truly know the guilt of keeping him from his dream school and ultimately sabotaging his future was the main reason. You wouldn’t be able to look him in the eye. “Something like that.” Is all you mutter to him, “I knew how hard he worked for all of it, Busan, Apollo, his career, I didn’t want him to jeopardise it for some girl. And he always said long-distance scared him.” Tears are ricocheting down your face and you taste the salt as the liquid slips past your lips. For the first time, your feelings and actions are being validated.

“He also got Yeoreum.” You say smiling sadly. He grabs your chin and turns your face to his delicately.

“My son was always your number one priority, even when you didn’t realise it. Now do I wish there was a better way you could have gone about this? Categorically so.” He laughs and for the first time in the whole conversation so do you, nodding your head and your eyes looking up. “But you deserve a thank you because look what he has; honours in one of the most prestigious colleges in the country, a job he loves and is so dearly passionate about, I mean really, I cannot get him to shut up about it,”

“Do you love him?” You agree without hesitation and try to focus on anything but his eyes, too painful and far too similar to his son’s. “Then let me give you some advice,” Shouting can be heard, Jaeyun and Yeoreum’s voices getting louder but you’re too busy hanging on to every word Mr. Sim is speaking to tune in, “Do what you think is best, for you and him, either together or separate. You’ll make the right choice, Y/N. I know that now.”

#aj writes #jake x reader #jake sim #enhypen smut #enhypen x reader #jake smut #enha smut #lots of hidden things in this part that sets up nicely for the last 2 parts :)

[luci-in-trenchcoats]

The Princess & The Playboy (Part 4)

Summary: The reader and Dean come up with a not so subtle way of addressing their relationship status. However, the more she thinks about it, the more serious her relationship with Dean seems to be and with that comes a newfound trust. Meanwhile, the pair have a busy Sunday when they have to deal with not only their bodyguards but meeting parents for the first time too...

Masterlist

Pairing: NFL Quarterback!Dean x Pop Star!reader

Word Count: 9,800ish

Warnings: language, family trauma/angst, kidnapping, smut

A/N: Hoo boy this part is a lot. I love all of these guys so much. Please enjoy!

_________

Reader POV

“You know you don’t have to tell anyone shit,” said Emma, your new head of PR. You worked on your mascara, Emma leaned against the makeup counter. “You and Dean are entitled to your privacy.”

“I know,” you said, blinking your eyes a few times, checking your teeth for lipstick. “It’s why I always wanted you to be my PR manager. You won’t fuck me over.”

“Bold statement from someone who knows better than to trust anyone in this business.” You straightened up, Emma looking you over. 

“I trust Eric and he trusts you,” you said, stepping closer in your heeled booties. “I don’t think his little sister’s going to stab me in the back after all.”

“He told you,” she said, her chin tilt slightly annoyed. You shook your head with a smile. “How’d you know then? I’ve never used my maiden name professionally.”

“Same nose and eyes. The fact your twins are Eliot and Emmet and he has twin nephews by those names. Y’all really love the ‘E’ names in your family, don’t you?” She looked impressed, nodding her head.

“Eric said you’re smart. Tough too.” She stepped aside when you motioned for you to walk. “It’s a pretty good idea to present you’re dating on your terms but again, you don’t have to do it. You can just…be.”

“Yeah but if we address it head on, at least we can stop whatever fake rumors get put out there. The world doesn’t get to know every little thing about us but Dean and I both feel like this is the best way forward. I mean, we want to stay private but we’re okay with this. We don’t want to be forced to hide.”

“Alright,” she said, stopping with you by a rack of clothes. “Can I ask a personal question?”

“Shoot,” you said, running your finger through the different options, one catching your eye.

“You love him?” Your eyes darted to hers, Emma watching carefully. “The way you two looked at each other this morning when we came up with this plan…those kinds of looks are dangerous.”

“...We’re dating is all. It’s only been three weeks,” you said, picking up a hangar, ignoring her stare.

“You’ve never publicly dated and never gone on more than a few private blind dates in all the time my brother’s worked for you. And the supposed playboy of the NFL comes along and you two commitmentphobes are head over heels?”

“Your point?” you asked with a sigh. “What, you want to plan the wedding already?”

“Some celebrities get married for money. Some for careers and some for image. And the public knows it. If you go out there tonight wearing that, the public will fucking fawn over you and Dean because you’re the real deal. Just be prepared for the long term because doing this might be a decision that will follow you the rest of your life.”

“He’s not a playboy,” you said absently, Emma smiling softly. “He was just…in pain.”

“Then keep loving him and we’ll figure out the craziness together,” she said, nodding at the piece of clothing in your hands. “That’s cute. It’ll drive him nuts.”

“I never said I loved him,” you said as her phone started to ring.

“Oh, sweetie. Your face said it all,” she said with a smirk. “I’ll let you get ready.”

You swallowed when she left the dressing room. Three weeks ago, Dean Winchester was a playboy asking for your number in a McDonald’s at midnight. And now…

You ran a hand over your stomach, butterflies filling it. 

“Hey,” said Eric, knocking once on the door and poking his head inside. “You’re supposed to be on stage to start the encore in thirty seconds.”

You shook your head and threw the shirt on, Eric biting back a smirk. “Oh shut up.”

“I said nothing,” he grinned, helping you fix your hair where it got stuck. “I told Emma you knew what you were doing with this.”

“Well your sister had to come and drop a bomb that I apparently love Dean on me,” you said, fixing your ponytail, Eric adjusting the clip in the back like he had a million times on tour. “Eric! Say something about how ridiculous that is.”

“You are kind of in love with him. Good news, I think the kid’s in love with you too,” he winked. You stared up at him, Eric chuckling. “Oh, a handsome sweet man loves you. What an awful life you live, kiddo.”

“He does not love me and I’d appreciate if you don’t bring up that word around him.” You smoothed out your outfit, Eric still laughing. “I don’t…that word him at the current moment.”

“Yeah you do. Otherwise you would ignore the media and press until you did know.” You rolled your eyes at him, Eric patting you on the butt. “Go sing to your heart’s content little miss not in love.”

“Asshole,” you said, walking ahead of him towards the end of the makeshift hallway. You breathed heavy at the end, Eric rubbing your shoulders. “I do like him.”

“He brings you to life,” he whispered in your ear. 

“Just…don’t say anything. Not until we have that conversation ourselves,” you said.

“Of course,” he said. “Three more songs and then you’ve got some chicken nuggies waiting for you.”

You took a few deep breaths before you opened the door and jogged up some crew stairs, appearing in the wings of the stage where VIP’s got to view the show.

And tonight that meant Dean and his friends. You saw some of their eyes go wide before you grabbed your cloak off the rack and threw up the hood, concealing you away.

“Is she wearing…” you heard Benny say as you stopped in front of Dean, giving him a quick kiss. 

“Break a leg, sweetheart,” he whispered as you were handed a mic. “Have fun.”

“I’ll see you in twenty,” you said before walking out on stage, a ravenous applause deafening you for a moment. You took your mark in center stage, the music for Fairytale starting up. It was one of those songs that started slow and ramped up. Every night on tour you got to have fun with it. The outfits were insane. Normally they were all fairytale themed and the crowd was always excited to see what theme you went for when your dancers would yank the cloak off you in the second chorus.

You swore you’d never heard a stadium so loud as when the cloak fell away and they saw you were wearing Dean’s NFL jersey. Well, almost his jersey. This one had been modified to add some lace and a few sparkles but it was subtle. You caught Dean smiling out of the corner of your eye and winked at him. He’d been all for the plan of your indirect way of addressing the photos from last night.

It told people enough but also meant you and Dean didn’t have to specially come out and say you were dating. The second you did that, they’d never stop wanting more and more from your private lives. And while you didn’t like to admit it, Eric and Emma had a point.

Dean calmed a part of you that hadn’t known peace in a very long time. It just felt…easy.

Two and a half songs later you took a bow and jogged off stage, Dean waiting with open arms. 

“You’re amazing,” he said, picking you straight up in a hug. “You make that look like a walk in the park.”

“Years of practice,” you said, Dean setting you down. “I can’t wait to come to your guys game tomorrow.”

“Pretty sure the whole country can’t wait either,” joked Michael. “Speaking of which we better get out of here, getting pretty late.”

“Later guys,” said Dean, joining you as you went downstairs again to your dressing room, Eric and Sloane on your tail along with some other security.

Exactly forty two minutes later you were home with Dean, his strong arms throwing you over his shoulder. “Dean I just ate!”

“Well now I want my dessert,” he laughed, rushing upstairs with you, gently dropping you on your bed. You both were giggling, Dean leaning over you as he pushed hair out of your face. “Seeing you in my jersey was hot in way you don’t even know.”

“I can imagine. Let me wash up quick,” you said, rolling out from under him. He hummed and laid back on the bed while you ducked into the bathroom and made a straight shot for the closet. Less than two minutes later you exited, Dean relaxing with his eyes closed.

You cleared your throat, Dean lifting his head as he leaned against his elbows. He froze half-way up though, eyes wide.

“You said you liked me in your jersey.” You tugged on the bottom hem of the jersey to bring it down, just barely covering yourself. “What if I was wearing only your jersey?”

“Are you-”

“Uh huh,” you said, stepping forward, letting the material rise up and show him your completely bare bottom half. You crawled up on the bed, straddling his thighs as Dean swallowed roughly. “I was always afraid of what would happen once the world knew I was dating someone. That’d it’d be too much or the person would betray me.”

“I have a sneaking suspicion you no longer feel that way?” asked Dean. You nodded, taking his hand in yours, lacing your fingers together.

“We’re not going to screw each other. I like the fact we can go do things out together now,” you said, bringing his hand up to your lips. Your eyes closed softly, Dean’s thumb wiping over your bottom lip. “You don’t want anything from me. That feels so damn good, Dean, you don’t even know.”

“I wouldn’t say that exactly,” he said, your eyes peeling open as he moved his hand with yours to your cheek. “I do want something.”

Your heart started to race as he sat up, his free hand wrapping around your back, holding you flush to him. He smirked when he felt your chest thumping away, his hand squeezing yours.

“Oh, isn’t it obvious what I want, princess?” he murmured, practically crushing your body against his. “I told you from the start. I want you.”

You would have melted into a puddle on the floor if not for his arm around you. He kissed you sweetly, slowly, taking all the time in the world to enjoy this.

“Someday,” he mumbled, giving you a chance to cup his cheeks, Dean absently turning into the touch.

“Someday what?” you whispered, Dean smiling again.

“Someday you’ll fall in love with me too,” he breathed out, kissing you gently. He pressed a finger to your lips, shushing you. “I’ve been a sucker for you for over a decade. I get to say it. Just don’t freak on me, Y/N. I can wait-”

“Someday,” you said, Dean nodding. “Someday soon.”

“Someday soon,” he repeated, dipping his lips to the hollow of your neck. You didn’t like the tone though and grasped his chin, bring his head up. Sad green eyes met yours, a pain behind them you hadn’t seen before. “It’s been three weeks. I know you can’t-”

“If it wasn’t you, I wouldn’t have let you in this bed.” You murmured. “If you can know, I can know too and I know that you are the first person I’ve let myself love in a very long time. God Dean, you don’t know how bad it was. How fucking alone I was. Surrounded by people all the time but so goddamn lonely.”

He shushed you, hugging you tight. “We don’t have to be lonely anymore, sweetheart. We can…we can just be together.”

You nodded, arms wrapped around his broad body, head buried in the crook of his neck. 

“Here you thought this was going to be a sexy conversation,” he chuckled. You laughed softly, Dean’s lips pressing against the top of your head.

“I like all of our conversations,” you murmured, inhaling his musky cologne. You enjoyed the scent, his warm body soft as it held you. 

“You got to be tired,” he whispered, running a hand down your back. “We should get you to sleep.”

“Dean.” You tilted your head up, Dean’s eyebrows raising so slightly you almost missed it. You nodded, taking his hand and putting it against your chest. “I don’t want to go to sleep.”

He pressed a hungry kiss to your mouth, tongue playfully devouring you, a hungry beast finally uncaged within him. You gripped his t-shirt in your fists, pulling hard on the material. He got the message, breaking free to yank it off one handed, giving you space to undo his belt.

“Do you have a condom?” he breathed, his cock already straining to get out of the confines of his pants.

“In the nightstand if you want. I have an IUD,” you said, tugging on his jeans, Dean toppling back on the covers. You put your hands on his hips, Dean giving you a reassuring smile. You’d been playing the past few weeks, teasing each other with hands and mouths. Dean always guided you though, focused on your pleasure, was so slow and gentle the first time you went down on him.

You had no doubt that tonight though he’d let you run things.

“Do you want a condom?” you asked, taking his boxer briefs off, momentarily crawling off the bed.

“I’ve never not used one.” You stood up, reaching for the drawer when he was suddenly sat up, long fingers wrapped around your wrist. You stared at each other, Dean pulling you close, sliding his hands upwards and pulling the jersey off.

“Are you sure?” you asked. 

“I’m clean. A little fun fact about myself? I haven’t gotten laid since last winter.” You blinked at him, lips parting. “I know. All the dates, the girlfriends. Hooking up lost it’s appeal a while ago.”

He settled his hands on your hips, licking his lips as he eyed you up and down properly for the first time. 

“Think my brain caught up to the fact I always belonged to someone else.” You closed your eyes, straddling his lap. Large hands splayed against your bare back, Dean shaking your hair loose from your bun. He buried his nose in the strands, inhaling deeply. “I really convinced you to give the playboy all the pieces of you so quickly. Gotta say I’m a little surprised.”

“You’ve earned it,” you whispered, hands sliding from his shoulders, down his chest, down his stomach, tracing every inch of his muscled body.

“Because I annoyed you into hanging out with me?” he chuckled. You shook your head, finding his chin, grasping it lightly until your eyes locked.

“Because you’re my best friend. Because I know you would never pressure me for anything, never ask for anything from me but my friendship in return.” You touched your forehead to his, Dean closing his eyes. “Because you’re mine, Winchester. I picked you first after all.”

“You so did not,” he chuckled. “I saw you with those obnoxious sneakers first.”

You laughed, Dean’s eyes peeling open, a devilish smirk on them. “Oh, Winchester. You really never paid attention to who would sing the National Anthem before all those little football games, did you?”

He blinked, cocking his head, eyes widening. “You! That wasn’t-”

“I was horribly shy and there were fifty thousand people in the stands each week. I went Hannah Montana and wore a wig and those crazy sunglasses.”

“You’re Penny Princess!” he exclaimed, shaking his head with a smile. “She flirted with me all the fucking time before games!”

“I was emotionally repressed in college, not dead. A girl has needs,” you laughed, running your fingers through his hair. “You were so fucking cute back then. So many times I wanted to be brave and go talk to you at a party but all I saw was pain. But I did think you were cute.”

“I thought you barely remembered me from college,” he said quietly. 

“I repressed a lot from back then. I’ve been…thinking about you a lot lately and remembered some stuff,” you said, your cheeks feeling flush. 

“Alright. You picked me first,” he murmured, thumbing over your hot face. His hand drifted downwards, lightly grazing over your chest, knuckles brushing your pebbled right nipple. Teasing. The barest of touches that sent sparks down your back.

Then you were both were moving fast. His thumb on your clit. Your hand pumping him. Mouths smashing together like you hadn’t spent the past three weeks making out every night.

“Whoa, girl. Get a little wet-” said Dean as you grabbed his shoulders and slammed down on his cock. The groan he let out was absolutely sinful. “Jesus. You’re wetter than the fucking ocean.”

“Emotional reassurance turns me on,” you said, Dean laughing so hard you felt it run like a wire through your body.

“I’m going to tell the press you should be the one with the naughty nickname if you can take dick like that on your first go.” You lifted your hips a few inches, dropping slowly, raising up slow again.

“You really ought to take a look in that nightstand sometime, handsome,” you winked, Dean’s chuckle turning into a soft little moan.

“How are you going so slow? You’re not gonna last,” he breathed out, squeezing your body tight.

“Feel my thighs,” you said, Dean’s hands sliding down, fingertips pressing into the flesh.

“Shit, girl. Gotta give me your leg workout.”

“Squats. A lot of fucking squats,” you said, slowly falling down on his cock again, his thumb rubbing lightly, easing you back from your build up. “I might not know what the fuck I’m doing but I can stay along for the ride at least.”

“You uh,” he groaned when you ground your hips down and rolled them, his cock twitching inside you. “Shit, you know what you’re doing, sweetheart. Trust me. Actually better cool it with that move unless you want me to go early.”

“Not yet, want this to last a bit longer.”

A bit longer turned into nearly an hour, both of you fucking drenched in sweat, Dean bouncing you up and down on his cock as you moaned into his neck. His whole body tensed up when he finally came a moment after you, your legs shaky but body sated.

“Did I do okay?” you panted, lifting your heavy head. Dean wore a goofy smile as he started to giggle, arms wrapped you, hugging you in a warm embrace.

“You did fucking incredible,” he laughed, kissing your cheek. “I can’t wait to go again.”

“Me too,” you said, eyes catching the clock on the nightstand. “Oh shit. It’s already after one. What time do you have to get up?”

“Six,” he said with a grin. “Don’t worry about it. Tomorrow, well today, should be an easy game.”

“We still got to get you to bed.” You tugged him up and into the bathroom, trying to get him to take a shower and into bed quickly. But he insisted on helping you clean up, washing your hair for you and even wrapping it up in a big towel while he dried off.

“You’re so fucking cute,” he said when you shook your damp hair out, his eyes sleepy but a smile in them.

“You say that a lot.” You ran the towel over it one last time before ditching the towels on the floor, walking him back to the bedroom. 

“It’s true,” he said, booping your nose. You barely had the covers peeled back when he tugged you to his chest, throwing the blankets over top of you. A heavy arm slid over your waist, your head resting on his shoulder while you hugged his torso. “See? You already know how to do a post-sex cuddle too.”

“Dork.”

“Yeah but I got the girl so…” he teased, kissing you when you looked up. 

“Yeah I guess you did.” You kissed his pec, a pleasant warmth filling you when he tucked your head under his chin protectively. “Goodnight, Dean.”

“Goodnight, sweetheart.”

You woke up to yelling. Dean was sat upright in bed, his body between you and the door, an arm in front of you as you both tried to shake the haze of sleep.

“Shut the fuck up, Eric!” screamed Sloane. You both relaxed, a glance at the clock showing it was five thirty. Eric shouted back as you ran your hands over your face.

“We need to have a talk with those two,” he sighed. “Here I thought you meeting my parents would be the most awkward part of my day.”

“Parents?” you asked, Dean humming as he pecked a kiss on your cheek and swung his legs over the side of the bed.

“They always go to my home games. You’ll have to watch with them in the private booth I share with Benny. There’ll be other people. His family and friends. I’m sorry, I should have warned you it’d be different than the booth you had with your friends in New York. I can try to get you one on your own-”

“No,” you said, shaking your head, cupping his cheek when the worried eyes remained. “I’d love to watch with them, meet them. And I like Benny so I’m sure I’ll like his family too.”

“Okay. I promise they’ll be cool. Well probably not but I can plead and beg with them at least.” 

“I said shut up!” shouted Sloane again. You shared a look and got up, going into your closet to find a bra and underwear. You tossed a flannel shirt Dean had worn over last week on and wearily walked out, Dean dressed in last night’s clothes.

“I’m sure I’ll love your parents. Probably more than my own,” you mumbled, Dean catching your hand before you could open the door to go face whatever the hell was happening.

“Do you talk to them at all?” he asked. You shrugged.

“Holidays. They come to my award shows and normally at least a few concerts a year, normally the ones in Kansas City back home. They…visit during Max’s birthday week,” you said, glancing down. “His birthday is today. He’s twenty eight. They’ll show up tomorrow.”

“Why not today?” 

“I get the feeling they don’t want me around today,” you whispered. “Another day that’s supposed to be his and I’d somehow make it about me.”

“We’ll celebrate tonight.” Your eyes darted up, Dean nodding. “We’ll have a cake and you can tell me all about him.”

You swallowed thickly, blinking back the sudden wetness in your eyes. “Y-You don’t have to do that.”

Dean stepped forward, tucking your loose hair behind your ear, humming to himself. “You’re right. I don’t.” 

He held out a hand, smiling softly when you bottom lip wobbled. “Why do you care?”

“Why wouldn’t I care?” he responded. You nodded quickly, Dean shushing you when you sniffled. “I still make Sammy a birthday cake every year. Let’s do the same for Max, okay?”

“Okay,” you whispered, grateful as he intertwined his fingers with your own. Another round of shouts came and you readied yourself, Dean wiping away the rouge tear that had fallen. “What do we say to them?”

“Either they work it out, they work different areas or one of them has to go,” sighed Dean. “I really don’t want to lose Sloane, especially now with probably needing actual security for myself.”

“And I can’t lose Eric. I just can’t. He’s the one person I can trust without a doubt on my team. Plus he’s my only real friend beside you. Everyone else is superficial.”

“My boys can’t wait to hang out with you properly. They’re pretty ride or die,” he said, closing his eyes. “We tell them they work it out or they just don’t speak to each other about anything not strictly work related. They’re both professional enough to not jeopardize the two of us.”

“Agreed,” you said, the shouting getting louder. Dean opened the door, letting you take the lead when you got to the top of the stairs, looking over the balcony to see them shouting in the kitchen. “Eric! Sloane! It’s not even six in the damn morning!”

They both snapped their jaws shut, going into rigid upright positions as if they were soldiers in trouble. 

“Guys, this can’t keep happening,” said Dean when you got downstairs, taking your hand in his again. Eric stared at his shoes while Sloane shot angry daggers in Eric’s direction. “We know the history between you two. But Y/N and I need the both of you, more than ever. You have to learn to get along or we have to insist you don’t talk to each other beyond what is necessary for work. Can you both do that?”

“Yes,” said Eric. 

“Yes,” Sloane grit out, still glaring at Eric.

“Sloane,” snapped Dean, her eyes shooting to him instead, chin falling. “Yes or no. It’d kill me to lose you but if you can’t live with the options we presented, I will ask you to resign for the sake of Y/N’s safety.”

“I would never put her in danger,” said Sloane quickly, glancing at you. “I can work with Eric as Dean’s primary. We just…will be professional. There’ll be no more fighting.”

“Agreed,” said Eric, nodding quickly. “We apologize for disturbing you.”

“You’re lucky Dean had to get up soon anyway.” You went to the coffee maker, grateful one of them had already made a batch. You poured some in the periwinkle mug for Dean before making a cup for yourself. “Dean, would you be okay with Eric sticking with you today?”

“What?” asked Eric, Dean taking the mug and ignoring him.

“Love to,” he said. “Sloane will get you to the stadium and keep an eye on you.”

Sloane looked equally annoyed as Eric, the both of them keeping their mouths shut. 

“I left you a care package in your office,” said Dean with a smile. “If you don’t want to wear my jersey that is.”

“I think I might be inclined. Wouldn’t want people thinking we’re together or anything.”

“Pft. God no,” he teased, Eric rolling his eyes. Dean kissed you quickly before going to Eric, throwing his arm over his shoulders. “Come on, buddy. You can help me pick out my outfit to walk into the stadium. Now I’m thinking a Princess of Pop tour t-shirt…”

Eric sighed as they headed out, the door closing softly behind them. 

“You can go back to your morning coffee,” you said, Sloane picking up a black mug on the island. You held yours with both hands, sipping slowly.

“Why did you want me to stay here?” she asked, a little cold for your liking.

“Because I want to talk to you alone,” you said, going to the backdoor, opening the slider. You motioned and she followed with her mug, the two of you sitting in the early dusk light on the patio. 

“You will never convince me to forgive Eric so don’t even try.”

“I wasn’t going to.” You felt her stare but resisted the urge to look at her. “I could tell you how he has regrets and guilt and he believes you’re so much better at the job than him but you already know that. I know you don’t care. All I wanted to say was…I understand loving someone so completely and then they hurt you in a way that, even though you still love them, it’ll never be the same. There will always be pain there. And you want to stop loving them or you want to find a way to forgive, one or the other but you fucking can’t and it just…sucks.”

You sat in silence for a minute, only the sound of a few coffee slurps in the cool morning air before Sloane finally drew a deep breath.

“I know you’ll understand this because you’re a strong woman. Not the way I know how to deal with weapons or threats but you’re strong. You built a goddamn empire by yourself and you get rid of the shitheads without a second glance. I know you’re like Dean in a way too and yet you keep on going.” You turned your head, the tip of her nose pink in the soft light, a glimmer of wetness in her eyes. “Sometimes you don’t want to be strong. You just want your person to be there and hold you and make you feel safe and like you can fall apart. I know you understand that because I see your face when you’re with Dean and I see how no one will ever be able to protect you the way Dean will.”

You nodded, reaching over to her chair and holding her cold hand.

“I was so hurt and I just needed Eric to sit there and hold me. It’s all I needed and he couldn’t do it. He was so caught up in his own guilt, which it wasn’t his fault we had bad intel in the first place which he fucking knows, but he was so wrapped up in his head he couldn’t be there for me. He couldn’t see past his pain and see that I needed him more in that moment. Could you imagine the worst day of your life and Dean is right there, ten feet away, and he won’t come to you? All you want is him and he leaves you on your own?”

“Men are idiots,” you said quietly, Sloane laughing dryly.

“Fucking preach,” she sniffled, closing her eyes. “And then he got me fired. I understand why, I fucking do because in his fucking little moronic man brain that was how he stopped me from getting hurt ever again. But all he did was made me lose the two things I was fucking good at, fucking loved, in the span of a week. He made decisions about my life for me and that is not okay.”

“Eric’s been known to be a fucking idiot on occassion,” you said, offering a smile. She nodded, breathing deeply to look out over the yard. “Why do you two keep screaming at each other?”

“He tries to apologize and I don’t want to hear it. It will never be good enough. He stole a part of my soul and it’s never coming back,” she whispered. “The worst part is I look at him and I still love him. But I know what he’s capable of and I won’t do that to myself again.”

You rubbed the back of her hand, Sloane smiling over at you. “Dean and I are getting serious. There’s a chance…real serious. Someday our security might not be so separate anymore. I want you to promise me something.”

“What?”

“Eric’s soul is fucked up too and I’d love nothing more than to see you two somehow work it out. But if you never did and if it hurts too much, I want you to tell me and we will find a way where you two will never interact. You will not lose your job because I am dating your protectee and you have the shitty luck of your sort of ex being my guard. I promise.” Sloane watched you, nodding her head.

“I see why Dean’s in love with you,” she said. “You are tenacious under that sweet little pop princess guise.”

“Wolf in sheep’s clothing,” you said. “Kinda like you. I bet you know how to fuck people up big time.”

“Oh yeah,” she laughed, taking a sip from her drink. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me for being decent.” You closed your eyes, yawning loudly instead. “There’s some spare rooms at the far end of the house. You can pick one for if you stay over again, keep some personal things there.”

She nodded, neither of you saying a word for a good ten minutes as you watched the sun slowly try to poke it’s head out over the trees.

“Would you be able to forgive Dean if he did what Eric had?” Her voice was small, unsure. You finished off your coffee, resting the ceramic against your bare thigh. 

“Sloane.” You waited until she was looking at you, a slight crinkle in her forehead. “Eric was a fucking asshole for what he did. But I know how protective of me he is. Seeing you hurt and him thinking it was his fault? It broke him. He probably wanted you to hold him in that moment as much as you wanted it except he hated himself so much he ran. It was the wrong move but he can’t change it. Let him go or find a way to forgive him.”

You stood up, stretching up on your tip toes.

“Come on, no more silly men talk,” you said, taking her hand and yanking her up. “Let’s go pick out our outfits for the game.”

“Uh, what?” she asked, letting you tug her along after you.

“You’re sitting with me in the box. You think I’m going to meet my boyfriend's family for the first time by myself? No way. You’re protecting my ass today and that includes awkward situations.”

“I don’t get paid enough for this,” she sighed.

You showed up to the stadium after an early lunch with Sloane. It’d taken a bit of work to get her to talk about anything besides security protocols but she’d warmed up to you by the time the morning was through. 

Offering her chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast hadn’t hurt either.

And you absolutely loved your surprise from Dean. It was an old school letter man jacket for the Wolves. Original. You didn’t even want to know how much he’d paid for it.

Eric had texted multiple times that Dean was annoying the shit out of him but you had a feeling they were starting to become friends when Dean texted that he was leaving you for his new bestie Eric.

Y/N: Cool with me. You take Eric. I got dibs on Sloane. She’s actually hot when you get her out of that awful pantsuit.

Dean: YOU GOT HER TO CHANGE??? I’ve been trying for years! Also, no. I get both of them. Throuple all the way

Y/N: You want to be in a throuple with those two? We should check you for a concussion babe.

Dean: Good call. I’ll settle for you. 

Y/N: Settle? And I wore my new jacket and everything for you!

Dean: Well you didn’t say that lol. Btw I told Eric he doesn’t have to hang out with me all day. I’m in the locker room, nice and safe. Shockingly, he didn’t listen to me.

Y/N: That’s cause he gets paid to listen to me, not you. 

Dean: Why does that not surprise me? I have to run to a team meeting and then prep. Have fun and I’ll see you after the game to make our cake for Max! 

Y/N: Be safe!

Dean: I’ll do my best!

“Are you ready?” asked Sloane as you crowded into a service elevator. You hummed, shoving your phone in your shorts pocket, taking a deep breath. “His parents are kind people. I wouldn’t be nervous.”

“Force of habit,” you said, Sloane raising an eyebrow but she didn’t say anything else. Honestly there was no way it was going to be more awkward than when your parents showed up for a few days tomorrow. They always visited for Max’s birthday week but they didn’t talk about him and instead spent most of the time going out to eat, shopping or hanging out in your pool.

Ironically, it was great for your creativity when you were forced to hide away in the studio for days on end to escape the tension. Last year you’d written three songs in the span of four days. One of them was still in the top forty nearly six months after it’s release.

“The Winchesters live in LA. Perhaps if things go smoothly, the parents can meet when yours get in,” said Sloane. You raised an eyebrow.

“That’s a little fast to introduce them to each other, don’t you think?”

“Just a thought,” she hummed, clasping her hands behind her back as the door opened. The hallway was sparse, a thick lump in your throat when you walked past some people in the corridor and got stares. “I’m not the only security on this floor.”

“I wasn’t worried about that.”

“I know. Stating a fact simply,” she said, stopping outside a gray door with a number 15 on it. You readied yourself and slipped inside, finding around a dozen or so people inside already. 

“Hey!” said a young woman, probably college age if you had to guess. “I’m making margaritas. You guys want one?”

“On duty, Casey,” said Sloane, the woman’s bright blue eyes turning to you. 

“Uh sure,” you said, Casey shooting you a thumbs up and grabbing another red cup from where she worked at the back counter. 

“Benny’s youngest sister,” said Sloane in your ear as you gave a few nods and smiles to people who caught your eye but returned their attention to their own conversations quickly enough. All the while Sloane was giving you the play by play of who they were. 

Apparently Benny had a pretty big family. It wasn’t until you even made it past the food and drinks to the seats that you made it through all of them. Which meant the lone couple already in seats in the front row must have been Dean’s parents.

“You must be Y/N!” said an older blonde, shooting up from her seat and climbing the steps. She wrapped you up in a big hug, surprising you so much you just stood there. “Sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m Dean’s mom. We’ve heard so much about you.”

“Don’t run her off yet, Mary. Dean’ll kill us,” teased an older handsome man. It was quiet obvious where Dean’s good looks came from. He picked you up in a bone crushing hug, squeezing you tight. “Hey, kiddo. I’m John.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” you said as he set you down on your feet. “Dean gets his hugs from you guys it seems.”

“We’re big huggers,” said Mary, Sloane saying a quick hello to them both before taking a seat in the second row beside one of Benny’s uncles. “I am so sorry I scared you. You must get that a lot.”

“No, you’re fine. I just wasn’t expecting it,” you said, rubbing your left arm, glancing at the field. “Watching the game from up here is cool, huh?”

“Sure,” said John, his tone making you look back at him. His dark eyes were relaxed, sympathetic almost. “The cameras will be on our box probably more than once to catch a glimpse of you. Try to relax and have fun.”

“What John is trying to say is,” said Mary, taking both your hands in hers, “We are really happy to meet you. Dean’s always carried a guilt inside of him and we’ve seen that ease over the past month. We know it’s because of you that he’s finally allowing himself to be happy again. So thank you.”

“He makes me happy too,” you said quietly, offering her a small smile. John threw his arm over your shoulders, your head turning up. 

“Good. So stop being nervous and let’s have some of those margaritas to get to know each other over, okay?”

It was the end of the fourth quarter, the two minute warning ongoing and the Wolves were up by two touchdowns. And as much fun as you had watching Dean play, you’d spent the better part of the game talking with his parents. You already liked John when he asked what you did for a living and asked if you were hoping to make a career out of music. While he was silly, Mary was a complete mother hen over you, always making sure you had enough to eat and drink. It was refreshing to hear them talk about Sam openly. Max was such a touchy subject in your family but they were practically giddy telling you about how Sam had mercilessly teased Dean about the girl in the orange sneakers. 

“That boy is looking down laughing his fucking ass off at his brother that he was right about it taking a decade to land a girl like you,” laughed John. 

“C-Can I ask you guys a personal question?” They both turned in their seats, giving you their full attention. “Why did…when you don’t have a concrete answer…how’d you decide to say he was…”

“We understand,” said Mary, taking your hand. “Honestly? We took a look at the facts and the evidence we had about what happened to Sam. We understood most likely which ring took him and after a certain age, we know what they do to those boys. So we won’t ever know for sure but we know all we’ll ever be able to and those facts told us Sam’s not here anymore.”

“It wasn’t an easy decision but it’s one we decided as a family. Dean doesn’t agree with us but we respect his choice too. It wasn’t so much about having a funeral for us but more symbolic, an attempt for us to stop living in a grieving limbo and turn Sam’s life into a celebration for the time he was with us,” said John. You nodded, swallowing thickly as you glanced down. John rubbed your back, his heavy hand comforting. “Whatever choice your parents made, it was not an easy one.”

“They won’t talk about him anymore,” you whispered. “S’like Max didn’t exist.”

“The pain is excruciating,” he said. “Don’t blame them for trying to ease it. For a very long time Dean only talked about Sam to a few people. But even if they won’t, it doesn’t mean you can’t. We’d like to know about Max if you ever wanted to share.”

You smiled and nodded, getting a side hug from Mary as the last of the game clock ticked away. 

“We weren’t so bad, were we?” asked Mary, John chuckling deeply beside you.

“I think Y/N’s put up with tougher shit than the two of us,” he laughed. “But it was very nice to meet orange sneaker girl finally.”

“You guys were great. I’d like to have you over for dinner sometime when we figure out a day that works,” you said, Sloane tapping your shoulder. 

“We need to go downstairs before there’s too many people out there. Now,” she said. You stood up, surprised to find John right behind you. “John-”

“I’m an ex-soldier just like you. If you have a problem with me going with you, you can respectfully kiss my ass, Sloane.” You turned to Mary, an apologetic smile on her face.

“I can’t say I disagree with him going,” she said, Sloane rolling her eyes. 

“Fine. Cover her behind,” said Sloane, quickly jogging up the steps. You said quick goodbyes to Benny’s family and were out in the now crowded hall, Sloane barking orders at five different security guards that were by the door.

“I’m sorry. I should have brought my team,” you said even though no one responded. Except for John that was.

“We can blame the fucking broadcast network for alerting everyone to exactly where you were,” he said, putting his hands on your shoulders, walking behind you. Thankfully you got through the hoard of people quickly and to the service elevator, John slipping inside with you and Sloane.

“So this is one of the perks of being a celebrity,” said John as he took in the grimy elevator. 

“You don’t really get used to it,” you said, John crossing his arms. 

“Yeah, you’re too sweet a kid to actually like that shit,” he said, the door dinging and opening slowly. You followed Sloane out, John still on your heels much to her annoyance. “What?”

“What the fuck is happening?” snapped Eric as you rounded a corner, quickly getting in Sloane’s face. “You took her out of a secure room with fucking rent a cops?”

“Don’t you fucking start,” she shot back, John looking to you.

“It’s not you she’s pissed at,” you whispered, stepping between the two of them in a service hallway. “Fight later. I want to see Dean and I would like it if one of you could go back upstairs and escort Mary out of the box please.”

“You should have waited for me, Sloane,” growled Eric, grabbing your arm roughly, yanking you to his side. “Do as she asked and we need to have a serious discussion regarding Y/N’s safety if-”

“First off, stop fucking hurting me,” you said, ripping your arm away, Eric spotting the growning bruise and frowning. “Second, our security protocol says as long as we have two trained agents, we can use readily available security to move me. John is an ex-marine, like you, so Sloane was perfectly fine to move me. I was not in any danger. Now one of you please go get Mary.”

“I’ll go. She doesn’t know him,” said Sloane, bumping him on her way back to the elevator. Eric closed his eyes and sighed.

“Sorry,” he said quietly. “I just-”

“I know. It wasn’t normal. We’ll bring the team from now on,” you said, waving a hand forward. “Let’s go.”

John leaned down to your ear, the two of you following after Eric. “Are these the two that are in love?”

You hummed, John chuckling.

“Five bucks they end up fucking by the end of November.”

“October,” you said, John extending his hand and shaking yours. 

“You’re on pop princess,” he teased, Eric gritting his teeth as he opened a door to reveal more people. It looked like some family members were hanging out in the hall and about twenty minutes later a door popped open, a few players walking out, Dean one of them. 

“Hey!” he said, rushing over and picking you up in a spinning hug. “Did you have a good time? Were my parents okay?”

“Oh they were awful,” you said as you turned towards John.

“She’s terrible, truly terrible,” said John, not even able to hide his laugh. “Of course we like her you idiot. You think we were going to waterboard her or something?”

“No, just…shut up,” said Dean, pecking a kiss on your lips, the smell of pine in the air from his very recent shower. “I’m glad you guys got along.”

“I invited your parents to dinner sometime,” you said, Dean happy to hear that. 

He had to run off to a post-game interview which gave Sloane enough time to bring Mary down. You chatted with them more while you waited, Eric and Sloane choosing to spend the time by watching opposite ends of the hall. It was another twenty minutes before Dean returned and he gave both his parents big hugs, catching up with them for a few minutes. 

Finally after what seemed like another half hour, you were alone with Dean in his SUV, the two of you headed for home.

“So how’d it really go with my parents?” he asked, talking hold of your hand across the center console. You smiled out the window, his large thumb running over the back of your hand.

“They’re good people.” You tilted your head against the glass, closing your eyes. “I’m jealous.”

“We can share,” he said quietly.

“I’d like that.”

One Hour Later

The kitchen was an absolute mess. Cake mix covered nearly every surface, including you and Dean. Someone, Dean, hadn’t locked the head on the mixer. That someone had also turned it on full blast and absolutely whipped every single ingredient in the bowl out in a ten foot radius.

And you were laughing so hard looking at his chocolate covered face you were hit with the realization you hadn’t laughed on Max’s birthday in over a decade.

Dean was giggling as you stopped, concern filling his eyes when you stepped forward. “Hey, what’s-”

You grabbed his wet cheeks and planted a harsh kiss on him, Dean backing up against the fridge, letting you move you lips roughly against his. It wasn’t gentle. It was needy, Dean’s hands wrapping around your waist, holding your body to his.

You breathed hard when you felt light headed, Dean panting when he stared down. 

“You’re mine,” you said, grasping his chin. He nodded, his warm breath pooling over your face. “Come wash up with me.”

“After you, sweetheart.”

It took another two hours but you finally had clean bodies, a clean kitchen, and a frosted chocolate cake sat on the island. Dean worked on slicing you each up a piece as you finished with a simple pasta dish for dinner, all the while your heart hammered in your chest. Something felt different. A good different. Like you weren’t so afraid of moving so fast anymore.

You carried the pasta and dessert into your dining room, settling in at your usual spot, Dean sitting beside you at the head of the table.

“Happy birthday, Max, wherever you are,” said Dean, rising his glass of wine, clinking it to yours when you smiled. 

“I’m going to keep you, you know,” you said to him, Dean smirking. “Sweet boy.”

“Lucky me,” he said, leaning over, kissing you sweetly for the briefest of moments. 

“Me too, Dean.”

??? POV

“The Wolves keep this up and they’ll be a shoo in for the playoffs,” said Sebastian as he spoke on the phone to his brother, watching sports center late that night. I set his beer down on a coaster on the end table, taking away the empty. “One sec.”

He covered the phone with his hand, glancing up at me.

“Is Cecilia’s lunch prepared for tomorrow?”

“Yes sir. Soccer uniform is also washed and ready in her sports bag,” I said, Sebastian nodding in approval.

“Good. Take care of that and you’re excused for the rest of the night.” 

“Yes sir,” I said, nodding before leaving him in his man cave and heading for the kitchen. I had just finished rinsing out the bottle when I heard soft footsteps enter, the fridge door opening.

“Is dad still on the phone?” asked the young voice, shutting the door with a sigh.

“Yes, Miss Cecilia,” I said, drying off the bottle and placing it in the recycling bin under the sink. “Would you like me to prepare you anything?”

“No. I just want some chocolate,” she said, opening the pantry and grabbing a fistful of dove chocolate squares. “Want one?”

“No thank you,” I said. 

“Well if you had a period, you’d want one too,” she said, tearing off the wrapper and popping a whole one in her mouth. “I can’t believe I have to deal with fucking cramps for the next thirty years. Minimum.”

“Language,” said Sebastian, walking in, finally off the phone. “And don’t discuss your menstruation with other people. It’s not classy.”

“Don’t even start,” she said to him, taking a permission slip out of her pocket. “Can you sign the stupid thing already?”

I attempted to leave but Sebastian held up a hand, my feet planting firmly in place. “I think you’re too young to be going on a week long trip.”

“I’m fourteen, dad. My body is literally, as we speak, expelling shit from me because there isn’t a baby in there. So I’m old enough to make human life but not go on a fucking school trip?” she asked. Sebatian looked at me and I wished I could run away. I knew how this would fucking end.

“Wouldn’t you agree fourteen is too young to go?” he asked. I didn’t even hesitate.

“Yes sir. Miss Cecilia will have plenty of other opportunities to travel when she is older,” I said. Sebastian crossed his arms at his daughter. Cecilia responded by twitching her eye in rage.

That was one of the reasons I liked that kid. She didn’t give two fucks how rich and powerful her father was. 

“You did this same exact thing when you said I could go to the Y/N Y/L/N concert in the summer and then you turned around and said I couldn’t! Stop talking out of both sides of your mouth.”

“Excuse me?” said Sebastian, raising his voice. “You went to that fucking concert with all your little friends. VIP tickets I paid for if I recall.”

“You said I could go by myself and then my fucking dad shows up-”

“I was not letting a group of six barely teenagers go to a concert by themselves.”

“Your security was with us! It’s not like we were alone!” She shot back.

“You are still too young-”

“Asshole!” she shouted, grabbing the paper and throwing one of the chocolates at his face. “I’ll get mom to sign it when I’m at her house then.” She stormed off and upstairs, slamming doors as she went. 

“Be glad you don’t have a fucking hormonal teenage daughter,” sighed Sebastian, picking up the chocolate and tossing it to me. “Retire to your quarters for the night.”

“Yes sir,” I said, going to the pantry and putting the chocolate away. 

“Go on,” he said, my head whipping over my shoulder. “You can have one for putting up with her bullshit.”

“Thank you sir,” I said, grasping two in the bag, hiding them in my fist as I pulled it out. I left him in the kitchen before heading through the butler’s pantry and to a plain door. I entered the room with two double beds, nightstands, a desk and bookshelf. I bypassed the door to the bathroom and headed for the closet, stepping inside and shutting the one after myself.

I sighed and went to the door on the far side, opening it and stepping into the open room. I shut this door too and ripped off the fucking tie around my neck. “I hate that motherfucking asshole.”

“Not going to disagree.” I sat down on the twin mattress beside my sole friend in this god awful place. His head was buried in a book, one he must have read fifteen times by now. “I made stew. Ready to eat whenever you are.”

“Let me wash up quick.” I shoved the chocolates under my pillow and grabbed a pile of semi-clean clothes, going to the corner of the room and pulling the curtain shut of our makeshift bathroom. My shower was fast like it always was and in five minutes I was changed into sweats and a t-shirt, walking barefoot against the cool concrete over to the table where a camping stove housed our stew in a pot.

“So how was your day dear?” he joked as my stomach grumbled at the smell. 

“Oh just lovely,” I said, dishing us each up half into a bowl, carrying them over along with a pair of spoons. “Here.”

“Thanks,” he said, putting his book aside before taking the bowl, setting it on the floor in front of him.

“Hey,” I said before he could start eating. I reached under my pillow and grabbed the chocolates, holding them out to him, his eyes wide. “Don’t worry. I had permission. Well for one but I figured I could get away with it.”

“I haven’t had chocolate in fucking forever,” he said as I dropped them in his hand, his free one instantly grabbing my wrist and shoving one back in mine. “We share. You haven’t had it in forever either.”

I nodded, each of us quickly eating our dinner before unwrapping our dessert, clinking them together with a quiet laugh. “It’s not much but-”

“Thanks, Sam. It’s great,” he said, taking a small nibble, savoring it. “Really fucking great.”

“Happy birthday, Max,” I said, biting into my own, enjoying the first rush of sugar in ages. We ate in silence, finished much too soon. I took care of the dishes and joined Max again, a strange little smile on his face. “What’s that look for?”

“Did you see any of the Wolves game today?” he asked. 

“Just a little at the end. Why, Dean get a touchdown again or something?” I asked, Max smirking. “What?”

“My sister was at the game. Apparently she and Dean are fucking dating.” My eyes went wide, Max nodding. “They’re together. Isn’t that some kind of twist of fate or some shit?”

A spark of an idea shot through me. It was barely there but shit it was the first good idea I’d had in years on how to get out of this fucking shithole.

“What are you scheming?” asked Max quietly, even if this was the one room in this whole house where there were no cameras, the one room where security wasn’t constantly watching us. 

We’d learned too many fucking times over the past decade that any of our escape attempts were dead on arrival. We knew we needed outside help and while we’d contemplated enlisting Ceclia knowing she’d be revolted enough by learning the truth about her father to help, it was too dangerous.

The last time we attempted an escape was seven years ago and we both still had the scars on our backs to remind us.

But if we could somehow reach out to our siblings…they were now rich and powerful enough to not be completely endangered themselves. 

“Cecilia’s pissed at fuckface,” I said.

“What else is new?” asked Max as I shook my head.

“She’s extra pissed and still salty about the concert thing. Now we know fuckface is a huge fan of the Wolves and Cecilia is a big fan of your sister…we gotta find a way to get my brother and your sister here, like a party or some shit.”

“My sister doesn’t go to shit unless it’s for charity,” said Max. “According to Ceclia at least.”

“We gotta try Maxie. If we can get Dean and Y/N here at this house…we can find them and get the fuck out of dodge. But I know if we fuck this up-”

“We’re getting buried in the woods out back,” said Max, nodding once, knowing we had one last chance at this. He smiled though. We were both sick of living this way enough to take that risk. “Let’s fucking do it. Let’s get a game plan and get the fuck out of here.”

“Hell fucking yeah we are.”

___________

A/N: Read Part 5 here!

#supernatural #spn #dean winchester #dean winchester x reader #dean winchester fanfic #spn fanfic #supernatural fanfic #dean winchester x you #dean x #dean x reader #football au

[sailor-aviator]

Meet Me at the Sea: Chapter One

Meet Me at the Sea: Chapter One

Pairing: Jake "Hangman" Seresin x Reader

Summary: Your best friend, Bob Floyd, had insisted you join him for the summer at his family's home along the Carolina coasts. You had been hesitant at first, but ultimately agreed to his request. Now, here you were in a new town with strange locals who spoke in hushed whispers and cryptic retellings about glistening scales, glowing eyes, and haunting songs that echoed from the sea. You didn't believe them at first, but when you wake up on the beach one morning after having fallen overboard the night before, you can't help but think that maybe you hadn't imagine the strong arms and deep, green eyes of the man that had saved you.

Trigger warnings: Alcohol consumption, Sassy Bob, Flirty Bradley, Supernatural elements, Siren calls. I think that's it?

Word Count: 3.1k

A/N: Here is chapter one!! I hope you enjoy this story as much as I am enjoying writing it lol I'm so excited to continue this one. Just a quick reminder to you all that I will be out of town Wednesday-Saturday, so I'm not sure how much I'll be able to update as I will be attending a wedding! As always, reblogs, comments, and likes are greatly appreciated! 18+ ONLY!! You can also follow me on AO3 under sailor_aviator where I will be posting updates as well!

Series Masterlist || Jake "Hangman" Seresin Tag List

You crossed the bridge to North Island a few hours later, the sun hanging low in the sky, but not quite to the point of setting. You marveled at the expanse of water that stretched on beneath you as you drove.

“Not sure why the founders wanted to settle way the hell out here,” Bob grumbled beside you. “We’re too small to even have a damn Walmart.”

“Walmart is overrated,” you told him, turning the radio down. “Besides, small towns are so cute!”

“Not when you’re forced to live there every day,” Bob retorted with a roll of his eyes. You rolled your eyes back at him, repositioning Rusty who still sat on your lap.

“You’re too close to it to see all the charm it has to offer.”

“I give it two weeks before you eat those words,” he smirked. You reached over to smack his shoulder lightly, and he looked over at you in mock shock. “Don’t hit the driver!”

“Well, maybe the driver shouldn’t be such a cynic,” you teased, leaning back. Bob chuckled as the car reached the other side of the bay, passing the crowded beaches. “Does North Island get a lot of tourists?”

“Only during the summertime, really,” he replied. “It’s a calm, quiet little town with white beaches and pretty views all over the island. The founders have really played into the local legends over the years, so we have a lot of souvenir shops dedicated to those.”

“What local legends?” you asked him, quirking a brow. Bob flushed, the tips of his ears turning a bright red.

“It’s dumb,” he grumbled, but you were listening intently now.

The two of you drove through the downtown area, people milling about and enjoying the end of the summer day. The dinner crowd was beginning to pick up and you could hear the music blaring from several different buildings.

“No, come on,” you grinned. “You can’t drop that little tidbit and then not tell me.”

“Alright, fine,” he sighed, glancing at you. “For as long as the town has been around, there have been stories of…things in the water.”

“What do you mean? Like a really big fish or something?”

He shifted in his seat, turning down a side road that led away from town.

“I mean,” he hummed, “things like mermaids.”

You laughed at that, and Bob grimaced. “I told you it was dumb,” he muttered.

“No, no,” you giggled. “It’s cute, really. I love mermaids!”

He rolled his eyes. “You wouldn’t if you grew up surrounded by them.”

“There you go being all cynical again,” you scowled. “I would have killed to live somewhere like this with such fun local legends.”

Bob pulled down a gravel driveway and past a grouping of trees. You saw a grand, white house perched at the edge of the hill overlooking the water. A porch wrapped around both the first and second floor, and you saw a path lead down the hill towards the beach.

“I’m glad one of us is excited to be here,” he chuckled, coming to a stop on the blacktop as you stared at the large house in front of you.

“You live here?” You asked, looking over at him in shock.

Bob had the decency to look sheepish as he turned off the car. “Yeah, this is home.”

At that moment, a small, blonde woman opened the door with a wide grin. She rushed out onto the porch as a burly, spectacled man stepped out behind her. Bob opened his door, and you followed suit. Susan Floyd rushed down the steps and up towards you, wrapping you in a warm hug before turning to give her son a matching one. Richard Floyd gave you a warm smile as he clapped his son on the back.

“You two must be exhausted after that drive,” Susan cooed, ushering you into the house as the two men moved to get your luggage out of the car. You smiled warmly at her and allowed her to lead you into the house.

“I’m not too tired,” you told her as she sat you down in a stool by the island in the kitchen. It was a spacious room, opening up into the dining room. A set of glass doors led out onto the back porch, the ocean sitting front and center in the beautiful view of the beach below.

“That’s good,” she hummed, stirring the pot on the stove. “Are you hungry, sweetie? I made some of my special spaghetti. It’s Bobby’s favorite, you know.”

Bob groaned as he stepped into the kitchen with his father. “Mom, I’ve told you. It’s not Bobby, it’s Bob.”

Susan smiled at the younger man affectionately. “Yes, of course dear. Were you hungry?”

“Starved, actually,” he smiled, plopping down in the seat next to you. Susan began piling noodles and sauce onto two different plates before setting them down in front of the two of you. Bob uttered a thanks before shoveling a healthy fork full into his mouth. You giggled, watching as he ate like he hadn’t eaten in months. You took a much smaller bite than he had, humming at how good the sauce tasted. It had a hint of red wine that pulled out the flavors of the garlic and herbs.

“How’s it taste?” she smiled at you, leaning against the counter.

“Ifs delisus,” Bob said through a mouthful of noodles. She scowled at him before throwing a napkin at him.

“Don’t talk with your mouthful,” she scolded before turning to look at you expectantly. You chuckled before nodding your agreement.

“It’s delicious, Mrs. Floyd.”

“No, none of that,” she scowled. “Call me Susan.”

“Yes, Susan,” you smiled. She smiled at you before turning to clean up the rest of the kitchen. Bob inhaled his first plate of spaghetti, and Susan was quick to load his plate up with more.

“Has Bob told you any of the town’s history yet, y/n?” Richard asked you from his spot at the dining room table. Bob groaned, hiding his face in his hands as you smiled.

“He told me about the mermaid legends,” you grinned. You saw Susan pause out of the corner of your eye as Richard gave you a wry smile.

“I don’t know if I would call them mermaids,” he mused, giving a pointed look at his son who refused to meet his gaze. “But our town has a long, storied history, yes.”

“Oh?” You asked, eyebrows shooting up in surprise.

Richard hummed, leaning back in his chair. “No, mermaid is an insulting term for what these creatures are. They’re fierce hunters, preying these waters with deadly accuracy. Sometimes they even hunt on land.”

“What do you mean?” You frowned. Susan gave him a warning look, but he continued.

“They say these creatures come out of the depths to prey on humans on the land, dragging them into the depths never to be seen again.”

“Alright, that’s enough,” Susan snapped at him, Richard giving her an apologetic look. “I don’t want to hear any more of that nonsense tonight. Why don’t you make yourself useful and go take out the trash?”

Richard heaved a sigh, standing to obey her. He passed you with a wink, dropping a hand to your shoulder.

“I’m sure you have nothing to worry about, y/n,” he smiled, turning to head out the door. Susan sighed, turning to look at you once she heard the door close behind him.

“I’m sorry about him,” she grumbled, shooting a glare at where her husband had just disappeared. “He loves those crazy stories. Don’t even pay him any mind, okay?”

“I don’t mind!” You assured her. “I think it’s all very interesting. The most anyone talks about where I’m from is Bigfoot.”

“As much as I would love to hear you go on your bigfoot theories tirade again,” Bob spoke up, rolling his eyes. “I thought you might want to go out tonight.”

“Bobby, I’m sure she’s tired,” his mother started, but you shook your head, turning excitedly to look at your best friend.

“No, it’s fine!” You chirped. “I think it would be fun to go out and get to see the sites. Where did you have in mind?”

“I was thinkin’ I could take you down to the Hard Deck,” he mused.

Susan rolled her eyes at him. “You want to take her to a bar of all things?”

“Why not? The gang is going to be there tonight, I already texted them to make sure. They’re anxious to meet her.”

Susan seemed to brighten at that. “Oh, you’ll love’em, y/n! They’re such a good group of kids, and I just know they’ll love you too.”

“So we have your blessing then?” Bob joked, earning another scowl.

“Yes, you kids go out and have a good time, but don’t be out too late! I think your father said something about wanting to take the boat out tomorrow morning.”

“Yes, ma’am!” He mock saluted, earning a smack to the top of his head this time. You chuckled at the two of them as Bob rubbed the back of his head. He turned to look at you with a scowl at your obvious amusement. “C’mon, I’ll show you your room.”

The night was warm despite the cool breeze blowing in through the window from the ocean, and you chalked it up to the densely populated bar you now found yourself sitting in. You had followed Bob inside, having to grab his hand in order to keep from getting separated amongst the crowd.

“Bob!”

You turned to see a group of five seated at a large table on the far wall next to the patio. The only woman in the group raised her hand to grab his attention, and Bob eagerly dragged you over to them.

“Hey, college boy,” grinned a tanned man with long, curly hair that was slicked back. “How’s it hangin’?”

“More importantly,” said the dark-skinned man across from him, looking at you, “who’s your friend?”

“Guys, this is y/n, my best friend from Duke,” he gestured to you with a grin. “Y/n, this is Mickey, Reuben, Natasha, Javy, and Bradley.”

Each of them waved to you at the mention of their name, and you waved back with a small smile. The mustached one, Bradley, grinned up at you before shuffling over on the bench.

“Ain’t no need to be shy, sunshine,” he winked at you, gesturing to the now open seat next to him. “We’re all friends here.”

You sat down slowly next to him, Bob scooting onto the bench across from you and next to Natasha.

“So, y/n,” she smiled, leaning forward with intrigue clear in her eyes, “where you from?”

“Oh, I’m from Missouri,” you smiled at her.

“Missouri?” Mickey snorted, earning a ribbing from Javy. You chuckled, feeling your cheeks heat up.

“Yeah, it’s not glamorous or anything, but it’s home,” you explained.

Reuben leaned around Bradley to look at you. “So you were in the same major as Bob, right? How did you even get into that?”

“Oh, I’ve always had a fascination with the sea, I guess. Felt like I might have been a mermaid in another life,” you joked, and the group chuckled, earning a look from Bob as you looked around uncertainly. “Did I say something funny?”

“Nah, sunshine,” Bradley grinned. “It’s just cute is all. Imagine you being a little mermaid.”

“In fairness, I was five,” you blushed, and he reached down to pinch your cheek gently.

“Don’t go gettin’ shy on us again,” he drawled. Javy rolled his eyes, taking a sip from the glass of beer in front of him.

“You’re almost putting Jake to shame right now,” he chuckled, causing Mickey and Reuben to both snort. Bob looked around the bar, brow furrowing.

“Speaking of, where is he?” He asked the rest of the group. Bradley let out a low chuckle, resting his arm behind you as Natasha rolled her eyes at the name.

“Mandy has been especially clingy, as of late,” Reuben frowned, peering towards the bar with a pointed look. Bob turned, frowning at what he saw. “Been dropping hints left and right for weeks. She barely leaves his side.”

“Well, yeah,” Bradley scoffed, taking a swig from his bottle. “I’m not surprised since it’s almost time for-”

Natasha cleared her throat, giving a pointed glance to you.

“Almost time for what?” you asked, looking around at the table. No one said a thing, giving small glares at Bradley who shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He cleared his throat and looked down at you, an easy smile spreading across his face.

“I just noticed that you don’t have a drink, sunshine,” he said. “Why don’t you come with me to the bar, and I’ll get you something?”

You gave one last look around the table before nodding slowly. “Yeah, okay. I could use a drink.”

You stood, Bradley close behind you, and you looked over at Bob. “You’re usual?”

“Please,” he said, giving you a tight lipped smile. You returned it softly, following Bradley up to the bar.

“Bradley,” hummed the older woman behind the bar, green eyes narrowing in on him as she saw you next to him.

“Penny,” he smirked, leaning against the counter. She walked over to the two of you, placing a hand on her hip as she frowned at him.

“What can I get you?” She asked him.

“Two beers and?” He turned to you, eyebrow raised.

“A jack and coke, please,” you smiled at her. She returned the gesture warmly, moving to make your drink.

“You best be careful around this one, honey,” she drawled, eyeing the man next to you. “He has a habit of goin’ around breaking hearts.”

“Penny, you wound me,” Bradley cried in mock hurt, gaping mouth quickly turning into another grin. He shot you a wink. “I would never do that to sunshine here.”

Penny snorted, handing him two beers and you your glass. “Right. You’re no better than Seresin over here.”

She jerked her head to the other side of the bar. You followed her gaze, seeing a blond man turn at the sound of his name. He glanced over to where Penny was looking at you and Bradley leaning up against the bar. He had an easy smirk on his face that rivaled Bradley’s, and when he turned his green eyes to you, you swear your heart stopped beating for a moment. His eyes were like sea glass, a frosty, almost moss colored green. It was like the world faded to black around you as you looked at him. You felt something that you could only describe as a tether snapping into place as his eyes bore into yours. If you didn’t know any better, you could have sworn his eyes started glowing as he continued to stare into the very depths of your soul.

“Y/n?”

Your eyes snapped to the side where Bradley was watching you worriedly. You shook the silly thoughts from your head. “I’m sorry, what?”

Bradley chuckled down at you, a hint of worry still tugging at his lips.

“I was just asking if you were ready to head back to the others?”

“Oh,” you trailed off, glancing back at the stranger across the bar. He was still staring at you, face unreadable. The brunette standing next to him looked very put out as he continued to ignore her.

“Jake!” She hissed at him, gripping his jaw and turning his face to look at her. “Are you listening to me?”

Jake looked down at her, a puzzled expression on his face. “Huh?”

“You are so dense sometimes,” she snapped, dropping her hand back to her side. The stranger, Jake, glanced back over at you, and the brunette followed his line of sight, scowling when she saw you. Bradley let out a low whistle before nudging you with his elbow playfully.

“Would sure hate to be him right about now,” he joked, an exaggerated grimace making you giggle. “Mandy is no joke when she’s pissed.”

“Jake!” Mandy shrieked. You chanced another look across the bar. Mandy looked like she was about to blow a fuse as she stared daggers between you and the man at her side. Said man was now frowning, eyes darting between you and Bradley. “I’m talking to you!”

“C’mon, sunshine,” Bradley said with a roll of his eyes at the couple across the bar. “If we stay any longer, I might lose my hearing.”

You followed him back to the table silently, still feeling the heavy weight of two green eyes on your back.

You slept with the window open that night, eager to feel the sea air on your skin as you slept. Your curtains billowed lightly as the moonlight poured into your room. You tossed and turned, trying to find a comfortable position to fall back asleep in. Your bed wasn’t uncomfortable, quite the opposite in fact, so you weren’t sure what had woken you up. You glanced at your phone, the numbers on the screen showing that it was far too early in the morning to still be awake. You huffed out a sigh, listening to the waves as they crashed against the shore below. That was when you heard it.

You weren’t sure what it was at first, it was so unlike anything you had ever experienced. It was a low hum that slowly turned into a lamentful cry amongst the breaking waves. You tossed your blankets back, quickly getting up and padding over to the window. The cry turned into what you could only describe as a song, not too dissimilar to one a whale would make, but this sounded almost…human? You peered out the window, heart racing as you continued to listen to the strange song. You felt a yearning unlike any other crescendo inside of you, calling to you from a distance almost like it wasn’t even your own. Your mind began to feel heavy, hazy with what, you weren’t sure. The song continued, calling to you, begging you to follow. Your eyes grew lidded, skin warm as you felt the call seep into your skin, drowning everything out but the inherent need to obey. You turned, taking a step towards your door.

A dog began to bark, causing you to jump and the song to stop. Shaking the cloudiness from your mind, you looked out the window once again. You caught sight of what you could only describe as a fish’s tail, silver scales gleaming in the moonlight, rising up before disappearing back beneath the waves.

#jake seresin x reader #jake hangman seresin #jake seresin #jake hangman seresin x reader #jake hangman seresin x you #top gun hangman #jake seresin x you #jake seresin fic #jake seresin fanfiction #hangman top gun #hangman x reader #hangman seresin #hangman imagine #jake hangman seresin imagine #siren au #mermaid au #mermaid!siren!jake #meet me at the sea #mmats

[bejeweledblondie]

Phillip Graves Headcannons

A/N: These are supposed to be somewhat realistic, I lived in Texas for three years on an Army Base & Jesus Christ they’re flooded with plenty of Phillip Graves

Phillip Graves x F! Reader

• You met Phillip while he was on a four-day weekend at a UT vs. Baylor football game

• You were one of the cheerleaders on the sidelines & you caught his eye immediately

• I mean c’mon those shorts & chaps mixed with Pom Poms (The UT Cheer uniform is so stinkin’ cute)

• Your friend pointed him out to you at first

• “Girl that man has been staring at you”

• He was nearly focused on you the entire game, you kept smiling & giggling at him the more he looked

• He found you as you were walking out of the stadium, he asked you out & ofc you said yes

• There’s 100% an age gap (this man’s ego is equally as large as big as Texas)

• If you’re in a sorority he attends the formals with you

• he drives the most lifted extra pick up truck you can imagine

• “Babe can you even see over the damn steering wheel?”

• As you graduate college he proposed to you (with a two carat diamond) & you had a elaborate wedding on his family’s ranch in Texas

• You had multiple wedding dresses designed by Berta bridal

• Surprise Pom dance for him with your cheer teammates

• After the wedding you honeymooned in Italy

• Ofc y’all decided on off post housing so you be able to have every commodity on the planet

• hear me out indoor swimming pool

• Even though you went to college, Graves is a very traditional man he doesn’t want you to work

• You have different hobbies, go to cycle class, shop ofc, get Botox done etc.

• Since he’s a very traditional man I do feel like he’d hold some old fashion views that were engrained in him from childhood

• He’s a religious man to some extent (he’s from Texas there’s no way around that)

• He 100% loves to show you off on & off post

• His Shadows at first were in pure disbelief that he married you, hell some of his Shadows are closer in age to you

• Buys you lululemon work out clothing for the “quality” he loves the way your body looks like those damn align leggings

• You guys do go line dancing & the both of y’all are pretty good at it

• He loves to go to the range to shoot in his free time, & he’s a hunter (I apologize to my fellow animals lovers) but not a trophy hunter

•He conceal carries a handgun at all times

• He makes delicious Deer jerky

• This man collects old Allied WW2 firearms

• He loves History Channel documentaries on WW2

• full on dad stance in front of the tv while watching

• “Honey come look at this!”

• He’s not that old but due to his time in the Marines & current job he does have bad knees, a bad back etc. the cracking his body does is insane

• He does take pills for that & you have to remind him to take them

• Whenever you ask him to read something he whips out his old man glasses

• He is always losing them too, so at work he will wear contacts (no one knows about this at his work)

• “Turn the radio I can’t see”

• He adopted a golden retriever puppy & a German Shepard puppy for you

• They’re your guard dogs when he’s away

• You got pregnant a little bit later in your marriage solely because Phillip was focusing on work a lot in the beginning of your marriage

• He was over the moon excited that you were pregnant

• Your gender reveal was powder inside of a target & be shot at it

• It was blue, you were having a little boy

• He made sure the nursery was set up prior to him leaving

• When you went into labor Phillip was about to go on a mission & it was the most excruciating experience knowing something horrible could’ve happened

• He watched your baby be born on FaceTime. It hurt him to see you upon so much pain & just surrounded by medical staff

• Due to a miscommunication & an ambush he unfortunately got held up

• He didn’t meet your son until a month after you delivered

• He looked at the photo he had of you in his plate carrier in the safe house he was held up in wondering how you & his newborn son were doing

• His Shadows & their significant others gifted you the most beautiful baby gifts once they returned from the missions

• Graves would fall asleep with your baby on his chest in the living room after feeding him in his recliner

• Your son’s little face would be smushed up against Graves’s chest drooling on his t-shirt

• He too would bring your son to work, but once he started crawling (I swear if there’s one thing that will break any hardened military man is a baby)

• Once your little boy is old enough he would play football & baseball

• Graves also helps coach when he can, he too played those sports as a little boy

• He’d also probably take him hunting too & teach him how to live off of the land

• The saying Once a Marine Always a Marine rings true in the Graves’s household

• Just like his old man your little boy joined the Marines

• Graves is a true traditional family man at heart & does everything he can to shield you guys from his line of work

✨NSFW✨

• huge daddy kink, his ego is already big & he loves the idea of you having to rely on him

• Loud office sex whenever you’d visit

• Cockwarming him while he does paperwork

• You’d wiggle around & he’d hold you down

• You went topless in Italy when you went to the beach on your honeymoon, & he constantly was grabbing at your tits

• You adopted the habit of tanning like that in the privacy of your backyard

• Major breeding kink too

• He loves finishing inside of you

• He’ll also use you to take his frustrations out when he’s had a rough day at work

• Lingerie especially red lingerie is his favorite

• He’s 100% a boob man & he’d be happy to pay for fake tits if that’s what you wanted

• You’d 100% wear his cowboy hat while riding him

• He spanks you as a punishment

• You do have sex in the back of his pick up truck under the infamous Texas starry nights

• You two have made so many sex tapes together from all different angles

• He also has so many nudes of you

• One or a couple may have accidentally gotten leaked to his team (this just fed his ego more)

• You’d also probably wear his old marine dress blues for the Marine Corps birthday as you rode him

#cod imagines #call of duty #cod masterlist #ghost call of duty #phillip graves imagine #graves x reader #phillip graves #phillip graves smut #cod graves #graves mw2 #graves smut #ghost x y/n #cod modern warfare #phillip graves x you #phillip graves x female reader

[canirove]

My neighbour Rúben | Chapter 21

Author's note: And we've made it to the end 😔 Hope you guys have enjoyed this story even if it isn't the very best out there and the plot isn't groundbreaking 😅 But sometimes you just need to read something cute and simple, and that was my aim with this. As always, thank you very much for reading and all your support. It means a lot 💜

Previous chapter

Masterlist

It had been a month since my fall at the Etihad. Since I had made it to the news because someone had reported that the woman rolling down the stairs was Rúben Dias girlfriend and that that was the reason why he had run to her aid half way through the team’s warm-up. Turns out that I wasn’t dreaming when I thought I had heard his voice.

And, of course, after being on tv now everyone knew about us, my parents included. After a few calls from my mum asking me how I was, she had finally convinced my dad to come visit me in Manchester, see with her own eyes that I was actually ok and that I wasn't lying every time she had called me, and also meet Rúben.

“Can you please stop? You are making me nervous” he said.

“I can’t. This is huge, Rúben. Like… huge” I said, dramatically lifting my arms in the air. “It’s not just that my parents are coming back to Manchester after ages and the possibility of us fixing things, but also ruining them forever. They are coming to meet you too. My boyfriend. The first I’m introducing them to.”

“Hopefully the last one too” he replied with his usual smirk.

“God, I hate you” I said, back to pacing around the living room. 

We were meeting at Lucy’s apartment since she and Julia were out with Rodri getting to know each other a bit more. Though Julia was already as in love with him as she was with Rúben.

“I love you too” he chuckled, those three words being something I still hadn’t been able to say despite being what I felt. 

“Urgh, that’s them” I said when I heard the door’s bell. 

“Relax, it’s gonna be ok” Rúben said, putting his hands on my shoulders. “I’ll charm them the same way I’ve done with your whole family.”

“Yeah, sure” I said, with a nervous laugh.

“I will. This is gonna work, ok?”

“Ok” I said, taking a deep breath.

“I love you” Rúben said.

“I love you too” I replied, not realising what I had said until I saw the smile on his face. I loved his smirk, but this one… This one had just become my new favourite smile.

“C´mon, let’s go meet my in-laws. We don’t want to keep them waiting” he said, taking my hand and walking towards the door.

━━━━━━❃━━━━━━

And all that, takes us to the present day. 

"Do you know what day it is today?" Rúben asks me as we walk towards our apartment. Because his apartment, is ours now.

Lucy and Julia have moved to Rodri's house, where she is loving having a huge garden to play football with him. Though what she is loving the most, is the idea of becoming a big sister in just a few months.

"It wasn't planned, it just happened" Lucy shrugged after sharing the news. "But I know he is the one, and not because every single person that knows me has said it. It is because I can feel it. It is different to what I've felt with all the other guys I've been with before, my ex included. He is the one."

After they left, Rúben asked me to move in with him, and I obviously said yes. Now I still take care of Julia from time to time when both Lucy and Rodri are busy, but I am not her nanny anymore.

"I'm 6 now! I don't need a nanny, that's for babies" she said one day. 

What I keep doing tho, is being her piano teacher. Hers, and a bunch of kids from her school. We’ve kept the piano at Lucy’s apartment, only going there for my lessons so we don’t bother Rúben. But besides teaching, I’m also playing at events and weddings all over the country. It doesn’t matter if they are posh or tacky, if they have a low budget or lots of money. If I like the people I’m playing for, I say yes. 

My dad didn't like the idea at first and said that, of course, I should focus on teaching. But when he saw how much I was earning by playing on those events, he changed his mind. And I want to think that the fact that he was seeing me enjoying playing the piano for the first time in my life, also had something to do with it. 

And things have also kept getting better and better between us. He has joined grandad and I at some Arsenal games, and Rúben got to charm him just as he said he would. Though I must confess I still am getting used to how well they get along. Seeing them laughing together feels so weird… 

"Do you remember or not?" Rúben asks me again when we make it to the front door, the new doorman opening it for us. Roger retired and he is now living in the countryside with his wife.

"Wednesday?"

"That's now what I asked. The number."

"Eh… 10th?"

"Urgh" he says, rolling his eyes. "Today, three years ago, we met for the first time. And it happened here, in front of this lift."

It had been three years already. Three years since I met Julia at the shopping centre. Since Lucy asked me to work for her. Since Rúben and I crossed paths on this same spot and I just froze in place. He was the most handsome man I had ever seen, and he still is. 

"I remember the way you looked at me" he chuckles. "You couldn't stop staring."

"I probably looked like an idiot. Or a creep."

"You looked very cute" he says, calling for the lift. "I couldn't stop thinking about you, about who you could be."

"Really?" I ask. He had never told me about it, about what he had felt when we first met. In my case, I didn't have to tell him. As usual, my face had said it all.

"Really. I don't know what it was, but there was something special about you. It felt... Different."

"Lucy would call that the one feeling" I chuckle.

"The what?" 

"The feeling you get when you meet the right person. The one" I say, walking into the lift.

"Interesting… But you know," Rúben says, walking behind me and pressing our floor's number. "This lift isn't just important because we met here for the first time. It also is important because it brought us together again."

"Oh, please. Don't remind me of that day."

"It wasn’t that bad" Rúben says with that smirk of his.

"The beginning was really bad. The end, not so much" I say, mimicking his smile.

"That's what I thought. And here is the thing" he says, stopping the lift.

"Rúben, what are you doing?"

"Listen to me" he says, taking my hands on his. "You just said it yourself, that what I felt when I first met you was because you were the one. And it's the truth. You are my one. The one I want to spend the rest of my life with. I had a list of things I wanted to tell you, but I’m too nervous and I've forgotten most of them, so I'll keep it simple" he says, letting go of my hands and getting on one knee. "Will you marry me?" 

"Rúben, I..." I mumble, watching him get a small box from his pocket and opening it, the most gorgeous ring I had ever seen inside it. "Are you sure?"

"I've never been more sure or serious about anything in my life. So I'll ask again, here, on this lift that brought us together. Twice. Will you marry me?"

"Yes" I say, my voice shaking. "Yes, Rúben, I will marry you."

I barely give him any time to get up, throwing myself at him and kissing him. A kiss, that three years later, keeps feeling and being movie worth it.

"I love you" he whispers, his lips still on mine.

"I love you too" I reply.

"But before we keep making out, can I put this on your finger?" he says, showing me box.

"Yes, of course."

"I hope it fits" he chuckles. "Lucy said it was the right size."

"She knows?"

"She knows" he smiles. "And she was right. Perfect."

"Wow" I say, inspecting it closer. "It's beautiful, Rúben."

"Do you like it?"

"I love it. Though not as much as I love you" I say, kissing him again.

"We should probably go home, don't you think?" he says. "Continue with the celebrations there."

"I like how that sounds. Very very much."

But the moment the lift's doors open on our floor...

"Congratulations!" our friends and families scream.

"What the..." I mutter, my heart on my throat. "What is this?"

"A surprise party to celebrate our engagement" Rúben says, hugging me from behind.

"So… they all knew?"

"Yep" he replies, kissing my neck.

"What if I had said no?"

"Oh, c'mon, that was impossible" Lucy says, coming to give a hug. "He is your one, remember?"

"He is, yes" I say, looking at him while Rodri and Ivan congratulate Rúben, a big smile on my face. "He is the one."

━━━━❃━━━━ FIN ━━━━❃━━━━

#ruben dias #ruben dias fanfic #ruben dias imagine #football fanfic #football imagine