#as the name suggests its Dance! edited in front of Laugh! Be Happy!

[mother32006mp3download]

just found a very strange discrepancy between my midi and mp3 versions of the ost; the mp3 version includes a track called Dance! Laugh! Be Happy! as track number 113 that is not present in the midi rip, but it also doesn't have Thanks, Drago! so it still comes out to the same number of tracks

#as the name suggests its Dance! edited in front of Laugh! Be Happy! #very poorly I might add #i think this ost is from back when i used yt for the majority of my dls so what do you expect

[miss-celestial-being]

Say You Won't Let Go

✥﹤┈┈┈┈┈﹥✥

request | masterlist

✥﹤┈┈┈┈┈﹥✥

𝑝𝑎𝑖𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔: eddie munson x fem!reader

𝑠𝑦𝑛𝑜𝑝𝑠𝑖𝑠: lyric fic to the song "Say You Won't Let Go" by james arthur

𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑤𝑎𝑟𝑛𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠: mainly tooth-rotting fluff, minor angst bc it felt too tooth-rotting, mentions of cheating but not like detailed (lmk if i missed any)

𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑑 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑡: 4.4k

𝑎𝑢𝑡ℎ𝑜𝑟’𝑠 𝑛𝑜𝑡𝑒𝑠: the ending's kinda rushed and im too lazy and in pain to edit anything so you get what you get 🤷‍♀️

tbh i dont suggest listening to the song while reading bc you'll have to keep pausing which is really annoying so if you've never heard it before, listen to it before reading so you know what the tune is and if you have heard it, you're good to go

✥﹤┈┈┈┈┈﹥✥

Eddie sat Y/n down on the edge of their shared bed, moving a chair to sit in front of her, guitar in hand. He looked into her eyes lovingly, smiling at the sight he knew he'd never get tired of. "Happy anniversary, my love." He said as he picked up his guitar pick, strumming away at the acoustic guitar in his hands.

I met you in the dark, you lit me up

You made me feel as though I was enough

Eddie looked around the room, feeling overwhelmed by the amount of people bow in the small pub he'd grown so fond of, celebrating the graduation of the class of '86. He walked to the bar, ordering a drink over the noise.

Y/n walked to the bar, already tired of the people around her. She walked up next to a boy with long curly hair and rings littering his hand. She smiled at his appearance. "Hey, I like your hair." She yelled over the music as she admired his curls. "Really? I was thinking of cutting it." Y/n's eyebrows furrowed. "Why would you do that? It looks awesome." Eddie looked down bashfully. "I used to get bullied for it, called a freak–well technically it wasn't just for that." He rambled, his mouth moving on its own as his mind focused on the girl before him. "Well now I have to know." Y/n rested her chin on the palm of her hand, batting her eyelashes at the man. He laughed.

"I'm in a band-" "Oh, that's not too bad." Eddie looked down at his drink, not wanting to finish and drive the girl away. "And I play DnD." Y/n shrugged after a moment. "Still don't get why they called you a freak. I mean I get that the newspapers call it devil worship and shit but they make shit up all the time, anything to get more readers." Eddie chuckled, lifting his glass to take a sip of his drink. "I wish everyone was as open minded as you." Y/n smiled. "But then what would you need me for?" She nudged him, Eddie looking down at her with fondness in his eyes. "Hey, what do you want to drink? It's on me." He winked, smiling growing wider at the sound of the girl's angelic laugh.

We danced the night away, we drank too much

Y/n stood up after her third drink, grabbing Eddie's wrist as she walked to the middle of the room. "What are you doing?" Eddie laughed out, confused. "I'm tipsy, I dance when I'm tipsy." Her words came out slightly slurred as she stumbled through the room. "C'mon, dance with me. I thought you were fun." She pouted as Eddie stood still, watching the girl in amusement. Y/n walked forward, moving Eddie's hands to her hips as her own trailed down his chest, back up to his shoulders.

"I don't even know your name and you're trying to feel me up." Y/n laughed, leaning up to his ear. "Y/n." Eddie blushed slightly. "I'm Eddie." Y/n ran her fingers through his hair, a lazy smile resting upon her face. "You have pretty eyes, Eddie." Eddie leaned forward, pressing a soft kiss to her nose. Y/n pulled back, dancing a little as she tried to encourage Eddie. "Now c'mon, you know my name so dance with me." She whined. Eddie rolled his eyes, taking her hand and spinning her, swaying to the rythme of the slow music. The two stared into each other's eyes, minds clouded with the thoughts of the other.

I held your hair back when

You were throwing up

Y/n groaned, sitting up in the unfamiliar bed, holding her aching head. She looked around the room, finding herself alone, surrounded by metal posters and random knickknacks and clothes. A sizzling sound came from just outside the room, the smell of bacon carrying throughout the trailer. Y/n stood slowly, her legs feeling like jelly.

Eddie turned and smiled at the messy-haired girl walking out of his room. "How'd you sleep?" Y/n looked confused. "Where am I? You didn't kidnap me did you?" She chuckled, sitting down on a random chair. "No I didn't kidnap you." Eddie rolled his eyes. "You at my trailer, you want me to take you home?" Y/n whined, shaking her head, stopping abruptly.

Her head was spinning, her eyes going unfocused. Eddie turned to her fully, looking at her worriedly. "You ok-" He was cut off when Y/n stood up, walking quickly into the bathroom. She lifted the lit to the toilet, letting out whatever it is she ate the night before. Eddie winced at the sound, turning off the stove before walking in slowly. He knelt down next to Y/n, rubbing her back comfortingly. "Shh." He whispered in her ear, holding her hair in a makeshift ponytail. He kissed her shoulder lightly, whispering sweet nothings in her ear repeatedly.

She sat up, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, looking up st Eddie with teary eyes. "Sorry." She mumbled. "Why are you sorry?" She shrugged, looking down as Eddie ran his fingers through her hair. "Go lay down, I'll bring you some food and water." He said softly, pressing a kiss to her temple, helping her up and into his bed once more.

Then you smiled over your shoulder

For a minute, I was stone-cold sober

I pulled you closer to my chest

Eddie yawned as he woke up, hugging Y/n tighter to his chest. He placed a tiny kiss to her hair, trailing down her neck to her shoulder. "Good morning beautiful." He whispered groggily in her ear. She groaned, squeezing her eyes to stop light from slipping through the cracks.

Eddie kissed her cheeks, then her forehead, then her nose. Y/n turned her head into the pillow, making Eddie chuckle. "C'mon, love, we gotta get up." Eddie spoke quietly with his lips pressed to her bare shoulder. "Why?" Y/n whined. "Because," Eddie kneaded her thighs gently under the covers, "I have a date planned for us, remember?"

Y/n turned her head to look at him, her face puffy with sleep. She smiled softly, looking up into his eyes, letting Eddie place a chaste kiss to her lips. Eddie pulled back to admire her, completely smitten. He stared at her in awe, his mouth slightly agape. "You're gorgeous."

And you asked me to stay over

I said, I already told ya

I think that you should get some rest

Y/n stumbled into her room, Eddie behind her, keeping her steady. "Alright, c'mon." He mumbled, helping her onto her bed. She sat at the edge, whining as Eddie picked up her leg, taking of her shoe before moving to the other. He moved to the dresser, opening a drawer to find pajamas. "Ok what do you wanna wear?" Y/n looked up at him, thinking for a moment. "The grey ones." Eddie nodded, picking out a grey shirt and pants.

"Alright, can I take this off?" Eddie asked, his hands holding her waistband. "You can to more than that." Her face morphed into a sloppy smirk, leaning back on the bed. Eddie rolled his eyes, taking them off slowly, replacing them with the pants he grabbed.

He slid off her shirt, stopping to admire her, leaning forward to kiss her lips. Eddie unclasped her bra, looking away slightly as he put the shirt over her head.

He laid her down completely on the bed, placing the covers over her as he pressed a kiss to her forehead. Y/n snaked her hands around his neck, pulling his closer. "Stay." She whispered, her eyes fluttering closed. Eddie shook his head, pulling back. "Get some rest, my love."

He turned off the light, closing the door most of the way before walking back down the stairs and out if the house.

I knew I loved you then

But you'd never know

Eddie kissed all over Y/n's face, relishing the angelic sounds of her giggles. She grabbed his head gently, kissing him softly. Eddie deepened the kiss, Y/n's hands falling to her sides.

Eddie pulled back to look into her eyes, his face falling into a soft smile.

"What?" Y/n laughed out, furrowing her eyebrows. Eddie shook his head, lifting his hand to hold her face. "I love you."

Y/n's laughter slowed as she placed her hand over his. Her smile grew as her face grew hot. A smile took over her face as she looked into Eddie's eyes lovingly. "I love you too." Eddie smiled, tickling her sides as she leaned up to kiss her nose, biting it lightly.

'Cause I played it cool when I was scared of letting go

Eddie frowned, hugging Y/n tighter as the speakers announced last call for her flight. "I'll be back in a few months to visit, I promise. We can call every day." Y/n tried, pulling back to look into his sad eyes. Eddie nodded, stepping back with a sniffle. "I love you." Y/n smiled softly, kissing his nose, then cheeks, then lips. "I love you too."

She picked up her bag from the floor, wheeling her suitcase to the gate, leaving Eddie standing by himself.

Eddie sat in his car, sobbing as he rested his head on the steering wheel. He watched as what he assumed to be her flight took off, taking his love away from him. Eddie took a moment to compose himself, driving home to stare at the phone until it rang.

I know I needed you

But I never showed

Eddie held his pillow to his chest, crying into it. His room felt empty without Y/n, making his heart ache ten times worse.

The door squeaked quietly as it opened. A figure tiptoed in, setting down their bag as they sat on the edge of the bed, hearing Eddie's soft sniffles. The figure moved his hair out of his face, eyebrows furrowed in concern. Eddie looked into the familiar eyes, perking up immediately. He brought her i to a tight hug, relishing in the feeling of her warmth. "I love you." He mumbled into her neck, drowsiness taking over.

"I know, baby, I love you too." She spoke softly into his hair, pulling back gently. "Let me get changed and I'll be right back, ok?" Eddie whined but nodded, loosening his hold on Y/n as he watched her move around the room.

She got back into the bed, pulling the covers over the two of them as Eddie rested his head on her chest, holding her close. His eyes fluttered shut, content at the feeling of her hands running through his hair."

But I wanna stay with you until we're grey and old

Eddie took Y/n's hand, guiding her to their destination. The blindfold on Y/n's head was pulled off, revealing a picnic set up at the edge of lovers lake. She turned to him and smiled, her face morphing into that of surprise at the sight before her.

Eddie kneeled, one knee on the ground, a small box in his hand. The tux he was wearing too big for him–likely borrowed from Wayne–making him all the cuter. Tears filled Y/n's eyes as Eddie opened the box, revealing a small ring with one circular diamond in the middle.

Y/n knelt down in front of him, taking his face in her hands, bringing him into a long kiss, nodding into it, running her fingers through his curls. She pulled back, smiling at him brightly, kissing his nose before picking up the ring from the box, slipping it onto her finger.

Just say you won't let go

Just say you won't let go

Y/n screamed out, squeezing Eddie's hand tighter and tighter as the nurse told her to push. She stopped, shaking her head as tears flowed down her cheeks. "I can't, I can't." She repeated, sobbing as Eddie kissed her temple comfortingly.

"It's almost over, my love. Just a little more, baby." Y/n looked into his eyes, nodding, pushing once more before finally hearing cries that weren't her own. She relaxed, closing her eyes as she laid her head back. Her eyes wide, shooting down to look at the doctor as she told her there was another.

After another few minutes of hell, Y/n took her two beautiful babies into her arms, both blessed with the big brown eyes of their father. She looked up at Eddie with a soft smile, pressing a kiss to both the little one's noses.

I'll wake you up with some breakfast in bed

I'll bring you coffee with a kiss on your head

Eddie shushed the two anxious kids as he opened the door softly, revealing a sleeping Y/n. The kids immediately ran, jumping on the bed to wake up their mother. Y/n groaned at the feeling of tiny feet trampling her, turning to shove her head in the pillow. "Wake up! Wake up!" They shouted, stopping their movements to sit next to Y/n under the covers.

Eddie walked in with an apologetic smile, leaning forward to kiss Y/n's head. "Sorry, love, told them to stay quiet but they didn't seem to listen." He rubbed the back of his neck, placing a tray full of Y/n's favorite breakfasts. Y/n sat up, looking at the meal with tired, happy eyes. "What's all this?" She yawned, tickling toddlers' stomachs. The two kids giggled, leaning up to peck her cheek simultaneously. "Happy mother's day, mama." She smiled at them, pulling them into a tight hug. "Thank you babies, I love you." She said softly as she kissed the top of each of their heads.

Eddie came back into the room, a mug of coffee and a card in hand. "Happy mother's day, beautiful." He mumbled against her lips, making the little one's screech out in disgust. "Eww!" The couple laughed against each other's lips, making a scene of kissing each other deeply.

And I'll take the kids to school

Wave them goodbye

Eddie let a tear fall down his cheek as he watched his little one's walk into the big middle school for the first time, smiling sadly at how fast they're growing up. He waved them off, his cheek missing the goodbye kisses they used to give as they went on their way.

He pulled out of the school parking lot, crying softly on the way home. He sat at the dining room table until Y/n got home from the night shift, crying in her arms. They stood like that for a while until Eddie's alarm went off to pick up the kids from school. He sniffed, pulling back to look into the eyes of his wife, smiling at her beauty. "I love you." She whispered, beating him to it. Eddie chuckled softly. "I love you more." Y/n shook her head, running her fingers through his hair. "Not possible."

And I'll thank my lucky stars for that night

Y/n sat at her home desk, typing up some emails, pausing as she rubbed her temple, struggling to keep her eyes open. She leaned back in her chair, her eyes moving to her and Eddie's wedding picture. She smiled at the memory, playing with the ring on her finger. Eddie walked in quietly, wrapping his arms around her tired frame. "Come to bed." He whispered in her ear, his voice raspy from sleep. "I'll be there in a minute, get some rest." Y/n mumbled, her eyes still on the picture.

Eddie followed her gaze, smiling at the picture on her desk. He kissed her neck lightly, turning her face to look at him. "I love you." Y/n's eyes fluttered closed as Eddie's kisses trailed down her chest. "Now come to bed." Y/n let him guid her to their shared room, falling asleep the moment her head hit the pillows. Eddie smiled down at her, kissing her forehead and getting into bed next to her, rolling over to turn off the light.

When you looked over your shoulder

For a minute, I forget that I'm older

Her fingers were pruned from how long she had been washing the dishes, scrubbing away at the mess of the dinners they ate that week. Eddie sat at the dining room table, strumming away at his guitar, writing down on his notepad every time he found something he liked. Y/n smiled at his soft humming, listening to the lyrics he added every so often.

"For a minute I forget that I'm older." He sang quietly, stopping to write it down. Y/n hummed a small tune, continuing washing the dishes as Eddie played the very same tune moments later. "Thanks, darling." Y/n looked back at him over her shoulder, the smile lines by her eyes prominent as she admired him. Eddie looked up at the feeling of her eyes, making funny faces at her to hear her laugh.

Y/n stepped away from the sink, turning it off before stopping in front of Eddie. She looked down at him, playing with his partially graying hair, staring lovingly into his eyes. "I love you." She sighed out, kissing the tip of his nose. Eddie smiled brighter, kissing her stomach, eyes looking up into Y/n's.

I wanna dance with you right now

Eddie hummed softly, taking Y/n's hand from her desk. Y/n looked up at him, slightly confused as he started dancing as she had done when they first met. Y/n laughed, standing with him, wrapping her arms around his neck. "I wanna dance with you right now." He sang quietly before humming once again.

Y/n smiled against his shoulder, rocking gently. "I love you." She whispered. Eddie smiled. "I love you more." Y/n pulled back, biting his nose softly. "Not possible.

Oh, and you look as beautiful as ever

And I swear that everyday you'll get better

You make me feel this way somehow

Y/n turned around, clasping her necklace before patting down her dress. "How does this look?" She asked Eddie as he sat with his back against the headboard, tapping his pen against his notepad. "You look as beautiful as ever." He said as he stared at her in awe, writing down the words after a moment. Y/n kissed him on the cheek, laughing as he hid the paper from her view.

"Wish me luck." Eddie shook his head. "You won't need it, you're already the luckiest person in the world." He rolled his eyes, playfully gesturing to himself. Y/n chuckled, putting on her shoes before heading out.

I'm so in love with you

And I hope you know

Eddie read the words back over and over, smiling at the accuracy. He hummed the tune, strumming away at his guitar. With Y/n out he could finally practice the song he'd been working on for months, just past halfway done by now.

He looked at the clock on the wall after what felt like a few minutes, only to find that it'd been at least three hours. Seconds later the door opened and Y/n walked through. Her feet were sore from dancing and the lazy smile on her face suggested she had a few drinks. Eddie chuckled, standing up to take her hands in his, guiding her to their bed to rest.

Darling, your love is more than worth its weight in gold

Eddie smiled as Y/n unwrapped her gift, their matching Christmas sweaters sparkling under the Christmas lights. Their kids came home for Christmas, sitting around the coffee table as well as their partners. Y/n gasped at the small ring inside, the diamond much larger than the one on her ring finger. She looked up at Eddie with wide eyes, tears forming in them when he got down on one knee, taking the ring in his hand.

"Last time I tried this, I never got to say the speech I had planned so I thought I'd do that now." He cleared his throat, taking his wife's hand in his free one.

"Y/n, you're smile brightens my day, twinkles like the stars. Your laugh makes my day, your cries break my heart. I love you more than the sun loves the moon, so will you please do me the honor of being my wife." Eddie looked up into her eyes with all the love in the universe, he paused for a moment. "Again."

The room echoed with laughter of the people inside as Y/n nodded through the tears, holding his face to bring him into a kiss. "That was the cheesiest shit ever." Y/n laughed as she wiped her tears, stopping Eddie as he tried to take off the old ring, instead putting the new ring on her right hand.

We've come so far, my dear

Look how we've grown

And I wanna stay with you until we're grey and old

Eddie kissed Y/n's shoulder, listening to the soft snores she emitted as she slept. The room felt peaceful, Eddie felt calmed. He hummed the song from where he left off, picking up the notepad from the bedside table to write down the notes.

"I wanna stay with you until we're grey and old." He whispered as he wrote it, stopping once he heard movement from beside him, quickly closing the book to kiss his wife good morning.

Just say you won't let go

Just say you won't let go

Y/n threw her shoes at Eddie as he walked into the room, his heart laced with guilt. He cried silent tears as he watched the love of his life sob in their shared bed. "I'm sorry." He whispered, kneeling next to ber on the bed. "I'm so sorry, my love." His voice cracked as he held her head in his hands, he kissed her forehead, hugging her tight. "I-" He started, stopping as he realized he had no excuse.

He instead sat beside his wife, crying as she curled up i to him. She sobbed softly into his neck, shaking her head. "Why?" He shook his head, running his fingers through her hair. "I don't know." He whispered.

"Do you love me?" Y/n's voice was small, her eyes looking everywhere but him. He held her face, looking into her eyes. "Of course I love you. You are the only person I will ever love, I swear. I am so sorry I ever did that to you. And I will spend the rest of my life hating myself for it. For hurting you."

Y/n looked down. She turned around, facing away from Eddie. "I don't hate you," She started, tears falling again, "I just need time to think." Eddie nodded, moving to stand. "Lay with me?" Eddie smiled sadly, laying back down, wrapping his arms around her. "Of course, my love." He kissed the shell of her ear, whispering softly. "I love you so, so much."

I wanna live with you

Even when we're ghosts

Eddie drove to the supermarket, buying a bouquet of Y/n's favorite flower, walking down the street with them in hand. He walked past an old couple, holding hands and sitting in the park, smiling at them as he realized that's what he wanted with Y/n.

He walked faster, running into the house, picking Y/n up and taking her to the couch to pepper kisses all over her face. She laughed as she pushed at his chest, smiling up at him. Eddie lifted the bouquet in between them, hiding his smile behind them. "What's this?" She took it in her hand, getting her arm pushed back against the cushion as he kissed her neck. "For you."

He kissed her lips, soft and slow, smiling against her lips. "I love you."

'Cause you were always there for me when I needed you most

Eddie whined, coughing into his elbow. The ice pack on his head was no longer cold. The thermometer on the table reading 105°. Y/n sighed, switching the ice pack as she sat next to him, a bowl of soup in hand. "Alright, c'mon. It'll make you feel better." Eddie pushed it away, careful not to spill any. Y/n rolled her eyes. "I already had to deal with two kids, I'm done with that. If you don't want to get better, that's your choice.

Eddie grumbled, taking the bowl, lifting the spool to blow on it before taking a sip. He hummed in delight, eating the rest in minutes. He turned to Y/n, pulling the best puppy-dog eyes he could manage, Y/n rolling her eyes and laying his head on her chest. "I'm gonna get sick you know." Eddie hummed contently, hugging her tighter. Y/n kissed his hair, laying back against the couch.

I'm gonna love you 'til

My lungs give out

Eddie huffed, bending over with his hands on his knees as he tries to regain his breath. The family went to the local park and the little ones wanted to play tag–which for some reason included Eddie. He shook his head, standing up once again. "No more, I'm out." The kids whined and groaned as Eddie walked away, sitting next to Y/n at the picnic tables.

"You're getting too old for that." Y/n smirked as she took a sip from her glass. Eddie placed a hand over his chest, feigning hurt. "I feel betrayed." He turned away from her, crossing his arms like a toddler. "Oh c'mon, you big baby." Y/n rolled her eyes, nudging Eddie with her shoulder. "It means we can spend more time together." She interlocked their fingers, resting her head on his shoulder, looking out at the family she and the man next to her built.

I promise 'til death we part like in our vows

So I wrote this song for you, now everybody knows

That it's just you and me 'til we're grey and old

Eddie and Y/n sat on the couch, cuddled up together as a movie played. He looked down at the woman he loved with everything in him, a soft smile on his face. He kissed her cheek, holding her tighter to him.

Just say you won't let go

Just say you won't let go

Just say you won't let go

Oh, just say you won't let go

Eddie finished, setting his guitar down, a small blush covering his cheeks. He looked down at the floor, too nervous to loom up into her eyes. Y/n smiled like she smiled when they first got engaged, like their wedding day, like when their children took their first steps, like when those same children graduated high school. She looked at him with complete and utter love in her eyes, and behind it all, pride. Pride for the man she had loved for all those years, and the many years to come.

#boredbeeswrite #eddie munson fic #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson x oc #eddie munson x bee #eddie munson #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson x you

[purpletaecup]

6 ☾ these echoes of laughter fade into a distant memory

note: fully written chapter again this time, with social media half chapters coming later this week! this chapter is mainly Yoongi and we see a little bit of his side and how he felt in the past and how he feels in the present. not edited, wanted to post this before the concert so we can all cry together!

rlly important note: i suggest you guys listen to nineteen by hayley williams because i basically base this whole story off that song (and some chinese webnovels i read lmfao). It’s one of my favorite songs ever and it hurts a whole lot. I wish i could experience how I felt when I listened to it for the first time again. As always, feel free to vent/rant and tell me your theories about how the story is going to go! let’s cry together :’)

final note: IM SORRYYY FOR THISSSS don’t hate me pleaseee 

word count: 2,523

That night, Yoongi slept in your hospital room. The emotional weight of everything that had happened had kept him nailed to the chair beside your bed. The smell of the air after the rain permeated into the room and reminded him of the day that his lawyer delivered the divorce papers to you, who was alone at home and probably waiting for him. Looking back at it, maybe it was an impulse decision that he made due to the frustration and exhaustion that your marriage caused him. He grew weary and waking up in the morning felt like a chore. You were distant, he was distant and both of you were living lives going in different directions. But you loved each other, and for a while, he thought that could be enough. Evidently, it wasn’t. He doesn’t regret the divorce because in the end, he thought he was doing what was best for the both of you. He knew how tired you were and how you felt being around the people in his life. He felt the same way with the people in yours. Everything about your lives clashed and he thought that divorce was the best solution for both of you to become happy again. He wasn’t getting any younger, but you were still very young and you could still find someone who could love and cherish you better than he could.

He didn’t regret it.

He didn’t.

Or at least that’s what he keeps telling himself. He didn’t regret it. He couldn’t regret it. But remembering how you looked when he came home that night breaks his heart to pieces. Your pale and shivering figure crying by the front door and the way your trembling hands shook him off when he tried to help you up. It was a sight that would remain ingrained in his mind and his heart forever. When you two finally made it inside your house to sit on the couch, he fully expected you to shout and scream and throw a tantrum about the divorce papers. He did not expect the quiet sobs that wracked your figure, or the broken “why are you doing this?” and finally the resignation in your voice when you told him you’d sign it. He remembered, at that moment, that he began crying too. He walked over and sat next to you and took you in his arms like you were his whole world even though he knew he had just ruined yours. With his head buried in your damp hair and neck, he whispered a million apologies. Sorry for breaking your heart. Sorry for wasting your time. Sorry for not knowing how to love you properly. Sorry for not trying.

These apologies meant nothing to you. They were nothing compared to the pain you had endured to be with him, to love him. He didn’t know that. For the last months of your relationship, he didn’t know who you were and that’s what pushed him to get the divorce. You were a shell of the woman you were when you two first met. Your smile didn’t make butterflies appear in his stomach anymore and your laugh didn’t make his heart flutter like it used to. It wasn’t the same anymore. You were both different people, changed people.

In the midst of this change, he was introduced to Yura by Jungkook. A model he worked with a couple times and a really nice woman. Beautiful, even. Almost as beautiful as you, he had thought when he first met her. Jungkook pushed and pushed for him to hang out with them and the rest of the guys and the more he saw Yura, the more he talked to her, the more he began to like her. She reminded him of you when he first met you.

You were 19 and he was 23 and you were modeling at the same set he was supposed to shoot at an hour later. He came early to help the staff prepare for his music video shoot and hopefully talk to the director but he had ended up watching your shoot for most of the time until it was his turn for the set. The people around you liked to say that Yoongi fell in love with you at first sight. He often refuted that it wasn’t at first sight because he wasn’t the type of person to fall in love because of how someone looks. In private, he told you that he fell in love with you at first smile, first laugh. The sight of you laughing genuinely in the middle of hydrangeas and baby’s-breath enchanted him so much that he remained rooted to the floor for the remainder of your shoot.

The laughs and the smiles were Yoongi’s favorite. You were the most beautiful person he’d ever met. You are still the most beautiful he’d ever met, but perhaps it was the exhaustion of life that wore the both of you down. What had started as a beautiful, youthful romance filled with picnics in meadows had ended with divorce papers on a rainy day in September.

These are the thoughts that followed Yoongi to sleep that night.

☾

[nov. 10, 2020]

The same thoughts haunted him day in and day out ever since he left that next morning at the insistence of Jungkook and Taehyung. He spent 4 days on his own, working and living his life but only on the surface. Conservations with people, including his friends, remained minimal. He couldn’t stop thinking about your broken and bruised body laying in the hospital bed, and he was anxious for the news of you waking up but none had come. He received no calls from the hospital since he left, and Taehyung said that visiting was meaningless unless the doctor told him new information.

Yura told him, verbatim, “I understand that you’re worried about her safety, but the doctors said she would be fine. She’s your ex-wife, I get it, but she’s not your responsibility anymore.”

In a way, she was right. But he couldn’t help but feel sick at the thought of leaving you all alone there. He knew it was hard for Jin to come out because he was incredibly busy with work, and when he wasn’t traveling for his job, he lived too far from both of you to ever accompany you in the way that you needed. In addition to that, he had no idea what happened to you and your mom. The last he heard, which was when you were still married, you were on speaking terms with her and there wasn’t a problem between the two of you. At least not that he knew of. Namjoon was on a book tour and Jimin was constantly booked due to his dance career. In any case, you had no one here. Yoongi was all you had and that was evident in your unchanged emergency contact list.

After Yura had said that, he felt uneasy being around her so he told her that he truthfully couldn’t stand to just move on with his life while you were practically lifeless in the hospital, and if that was a problem with her then maybe they should just take a break from each other. He kept telling himself that he really liked Yura and he wanted what she could give him, but he couldn’t ignore the four years that you two spent building a life together. Especially not now that you were pregnant, a fact that he had kept hidden from Yura.

When he thought about the pregnancy, everything else seemed to melt away. Despite the circumstances, the news of your pregnancy made him happy. Extremely so, albeit a little scared as well. He wondered how long you had known, and if you were happy or scared.Or what if you didn’t know at all? As far as he could tell, you weren’t showing. There was no sign of a bump on your little belly, but the doctor’s words were irrefutable. There was a baby growing in there. A baby that was half you and half him and that thought of that made him smile like he hadn’t in a long, long time.

That night, he dreamt about a little girl with your eyes and your smile and a nose that resembled his. A laughter that reminded him of yours echoed in those dreams.

☾

[nov. 11, 2020]

Pleasant dreams faded into a pleasant morning as Yoongi woke up much earlier than he was used to and felt better than he had in ages. He spent some time by himself before his phone was bombarded by phone calls and text messages from the group chat with the boys asking him when he was coming for work.

As he saw the sun take its place in the blue skies and white clouds, he decided that the day was too beautiful to waste on a day in the company. 5 days passed since your accident and he thought it was time to go back to the hospital and see how you were doing. Of course he wasn’t expecting any changes to your condition considering he hasn’t gotten any phone calls from the hospital yet, but he thought it might make him feel more at ease to sit next to you.

On his way to the hospital, he stopped by the flower shop you often went to, the one next to the park with the yellow flowers that you liked so much. The woman at the front, whose name was Yerin by the looks of her nametag, recognizes you immediately.

“Mr. Min Yoongi? How can we help you today?” She asks, immediately standing up straight at your intimidating presence.

“Just here to get some flowers.” He replies nonchalantly.

Yerin runs around the counter to stand in front of him.

“Is there anything specific you’re looking for?”

“No, not really—wait a second, that flower right there. Give me a bouquet of those.” He says, pointing to the bunches of purple flowers hiding behind Yerin.

She turns to see what he was pointing to. “Ah, purple lilacs. Okay, I’ll put it together for you really quick!”

He saw her go around the many shelves of flowers to what he assumed was the back inventory of the shop and didn’t see her come out until a couple of minutes later. In her hands was a beautiful bouquet of the purple lilacs with white baby's-breath. His eyes softened at the sight of the white flowers. The sight was familiar to him.

“That would be 25,830 won.” Yerin handed the bouquet to him and smiled.

He handed her 35,000 won, murmured his thanks and left. Once out of the shop, he was hit by the bright sunlight and couldn’t help looking over to the park. Kids were running around while their parents watched them on picnic blankets.

Warm and sunny days like this reminded him of you. Spending your days in the sun, laying on a picnic blanket and eating fruits, was your very existence.

He spends only a few moments admiring the scenery of people enjoying the weather before he makes his way back to his car and to the hospital. When he arrives at your room, nothing has changed except for the fact that your skin has regained a bit of its color and the bruises began the healing process.

Yoongi sets the flowers down on the table beside your bed. He moves the chair from the wall to the side of the bed so he could sit right next to you. His heart almost stops when he sees your face. It seems like the nurses changed the bandage on your head as the bandaging was noticeably lighter, but he could still see a bit of blood seeping through. The bruises on your arms and everywhere alarm him but he knows that you’re okay and you’re healing and that’s enough for him. It’s enough to know that you were alive and going to be fine.

His eyes trail down to your stomach and he lets it linger on them for a long time because he takes your hand in his and takes a deep breath. Two months ago he could have never imagined that this is where he would be right now. Two months ago, both of you had walked away from your marriage and Yoongi honestly thought that you two may never have crossed paths again despite his thoughts going to you more often than it should be. Now, two months later, you were divorced and pregnant with his child. His eyes continue to stare at your stomach, still flat and showing no signs of carrying a second life, and he resists the urge to caress it. You weren’t conscious and even if you were, would you allow your ex-husband to feel your stomach like that? No, probably not.

And that’s when he felt a twitch in his hand, not coming from his own. He looks down to see your fingers moving just barely. His first reaction was shock, then anxiety. He didn’t know what to do and the shock of your movement paralyzed him. It was only when he felt another movement, stronger this time, that he felt the need to press the call button to alarm the doctors and nurses. You were moving, which meant that you might be waking up.

The moments pass quickly and slowly at the same time. The doctors barely made it in time to see you flutter your eyes open and groan with a broken voice. Yoongi looked down at you, still holding your hand. You blinked your eyes multiple times. The light was too bright to take in all at once. He squeezed your hand at the relief he felt in seeing you wake up.

“Yn, how are you feeling baby?” He couldn’t help the pet name that came out of his mouth. You looked so vulnerable and fragile that it came out on instinct.

Yoongi waited for a reply for a little bit but heard none. The doctor came around to stand next to you.

“Miss Yn? Can you see us? Hear us?” he asked.

You nodded slowly, wincing at the pain in and on your head.

“Where m’I?” You attempt to speak out, but it comes out broken and croaky.

Yoongi is glad to hear your voice, to hear you talk for the first time in so long.

“You’re in the hospital right now, you were in a car accident but you’re okay now baby. How are you feeling?” He couldn’t help but ask.

You craned your head towards him, blinking furiously with your eyebrows furrowed. Confusion marred your features. Yoongi was scared that you finally realized he was here, with you, and would kick him out at any chance. He was scared that you were going to kick him out of you life before he could ever see the baby that you had made together, but this fear of his could have never prepared him for the next words to come out of your mouth.

“Who are you?”

☾

← masterlist → 

taglist batch 1: @victoriedulce @yoongistruth @rebeccawoodrow @moon-asia @koochiekoo @sonderkook @fangirling-gallifreyan @teresaisla @veronawrites @haeilove @rjsmochii @mama-m0chi @agustd-2020 @imluckybitches @dreamer95 @coldfreakeggsexpert @rjsmochii @loveyoongles @selfproducingfanfictionauthor @mr-robot-x​

#yoongi x reader #bts x reader #bts fanfic #yoongi fanfic #bts social media au #bts fic #bts au #bts smut #bts angst #yoongi fic #yoongi fics #yoongi au #yoongi smut #yoongi angst #min yoogi social media au #min yoongi #min yoongi x reader #min yoongi imagine #min yoongi social media au #bts fake texts #jungkook x reader #jungkook au #jungkook fanfic #purpletaecup: i feel you in my heart

[allaboutthebooz]

Still Learning Pt. Three

Summary: After having everything stolen from her, the reader meets Bucky and they form a relationship, that works for the both of them. She needs money and he needs the company. There are rules that need to be followed. What will happen when the rules are broken?

Pairing: Bucky x Reader

Warnings: Cursing, drinking

A/N: Sorry this has taken so long. Just when I find a groove, it gets knocked off course. But it's finally here and I hope you all enjoy.

After getting your drinks, Bucky decides to get a little invasive. “So, how come you are here by yourself?”

Y/N lets out a small laugh. “I’m not. My friends decided they would rather dance than sit with me while I wallow.” She juts a thumb behind her, point to the small dance floor. Bucky looks past her to see a few people dancing. Most were couples dancing a little too inappropriately, but there were two women dancing together, and he assumes they’re Y/N’s friends.

Turning his gaze back to his company, he gives her a quick look over. Her jean jacket covering her upper body, but he notices her dress. The soft silk material, covered in a combination of blue, red, and orange, clinging to what curves her can see. Her hair down, but half was pulled back into a braid of some sort.

He looks at her face. Not noticing the look behind her eyes, until now. He should have been able to tell that she wasn’t happy. He’d seen the same look on his face, often when he’d look in the mirror. The mask she wore, similar to his.

“Wallow?” He asks.

She nods. “Yeah, I haven’t had the best luck lately.”

“Want to tell me about it? Maybe talking to a stranger will help.”

She shakes her head and huffs. “I doubt it. I’m in deep shit and have no clue what will happen.”

“Maybe I can help?”

She looks at Bucky, silent. He can see her debating what to say.

You’re not sure how long you spent staring at the man next to you. The man who wanted to know what kind of trouble you were in, after only knowing his name for thirty minutes. Looking down at the glass in your hand, you bring it to your lips and take a long sip from it.

“Fuck it. Why not tell it to you. Not like you’ll be able to find me again.” Looking back at Bucky, you see his jaw clench just slightly.

“You never know.” Is all he says. His voice gruff.

You open your mouth to start your story, when you feel two bodies press close to you. Looking to your right, you see Lexie and Deanna standing there. Both focused on Bucky.

“You okay?” Dee asks, her mama bear side starting to show.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“You sure?” You feel Lexie grab a strand of your hair at its end. “Sorry we’ve been ignoring you.”

“No, it’s alright. I was actually thinking of heading home. I’m pretty tired.”

Both girls groan. “You’re supposed to be having fun.” Dee pushes.

You look over at Bucky, giving him a quick smile before turning back to your friends. “You know that’s impossible right now. I can’t focus on having fun when I’m about to lose my apartment. I’m gonna get home so I can get some sleep. I have to edit some photos and have them turned in tomorrow.”

Deanna opens her mouth to respond, but Lex puts a hand on her shoulder. “If that’s what you want to do, that’s fine. We know you have a lot going on right now. We just thought getting you out of the house would help.”

“And I appreciate it, but once everything if normal again, then I can start having fun.”

“Well, we can go. Let’s settle our tab.” Lexie says.

“No, you two stay. You’re actually enjoying yourselves. Don’t let me ruin your fun.”

“Are you sure?” Deanna asks. “We don’t mind.”

“Yeah, stay. I’ll get a cab.” You start to stand. Hugging the girls, they head back to the dance floor. You turn back to Bucky. “It was nice to meet you.”

You notice the panic slightly raise in his face. “Wait. I’ll go with you.”

You raise your eyebrows. “Back to my place? I don’t think that’s such a great idea.”

“No, not there. Why don’t we just walk around for a bit. Maybe see if there are any diners open or something.” He suggests.

You find yourself staring at him again. Your eyes rake over him. His dark hair, his blue eyes. His leather jacket and Henley shirt clinging to his chest. His thick thighs clad in dark blue jeans. Were you going to let this man keep you company? Were you going to open up to him? You probably won’t see him again after tonight and he seems like a nice guy. There was something familiar about him and you weren’t sure that you were ready to say goodbye.

“Okay. But just for a little while I really should get home and edit those photos.”

Bucky smiles wide and follows you out of the bar.

“I know a place that’s open all night. They have great food.” You suggest.

“Lead the way.”

You move down the sidewalk, Bucky beside you with his hands shoved in his jean pockets.

“So, you’re a photographer?” He asks.

“I am. Mostly fashion right now.”

“That’s cool. Anything I might have seen?”

You laugh. “Not unless you read Vogue.”

“No, I can’t say that I have. I really haven’t had time to do a ton of reading. My work keeps me busy.”

“Oh yeah? What do you do?” You ask, looking him over.

He stares at you like you should know who he is and what he does. “Uh I guess you could say that I work with the military.”

“Doing what?”

“Linguistics.”

You make an impressed face. “Sounds interesting.

It’s Bucky’s turn to laugh. “Yeah, I guess it can be.”

You both walk in silence for a while. You can feel Bucky’s urge to finish your conversation that was interrupted.

“You’re still wondering why I wasn’t wanting to stay and have fun, aren’t you? I can feel your curiosity growing.” You smirk at him.

He gives you a shy smile. “Yeah, I am. We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to. I don’t want you to think I’m overstepping.”

You look up at the night sky. The stars barely visible beyond the city lights. Sighing you say, “A month ago, my ex-boyfriend stole every single penny I had to my name. He destroyed my credit. He opened a couple of credit cards in my name and a loan from a bank in my name and never paid them. He disappeared and I haven’t heard from him. The cops haven’t bothered to find him. So I have no money, except what little cash I managed to withdraw before it all happened.”

Bucky stops walking, making you stop too. “Are you shitting me?”

You laugh. “I wish I was.”

“Son of a bitch.” He says, before continuing his stride.”

“Yeah.” You both walk a bit further before you stop in front of a wall full of windows. “This is it.”

He opens the door, allowing you to step inside first as he follows.

After settling into a booth by the windows, you both spend the rest of the night talking. He asked a few more questions and you explained to him that you were pretty much out of a job and would soon lose your home if you didn’t make enough money to pay your rent.

Eventually, you convinced him to move onto a different subject. Before you knew it, the sun was starting to peak from behind the other buildings. When a ray of light blinds you, you squint and look out the window.

“Oh shit. We literally talked all night.”

“I guess we did. I’m sorry. I know you needed to get home.” Bucky apologizes.

“You know what? I’m not even upset. This was way more fun than sitting at my desk in an empty apartment that won’t be mine for long.”

You start to gather your things as Bucky lays a few bills on the table. You both step outside, pulling jackets on. You look at Bucky and wonder what to do next.

“Well, I guess this is goodbye.” You say.

“It doesn’t have to be. I’d like to see you again.”

You bite your bottom lip. “I don’t know. I’d like to see you again, but my life is such a mess right now.”

“It doesn’t have to be. I’d like to help you.”

“How can you do that? You got a ton of money laying around or something?”

“Or something. Why don’t we do this again tonight? I can explain everything then.”

“I don’t know, Bucky.”

“How about this? I’m going to come back here to have more of those delicious pancakes. You can join me and let me help you. I’ll let you decide. I’ll be here at 7. If you show, we’ll talk. If you don’t, I’ll leave you alone.”

He gently leans in and kisses your cheek.

“I hope I see you later.” He hails a cab and opens the door for you, closing it once you’re settled in the backseat and walking the opposite way down the sidewalk.

‘What the hell was that?’ You think.

The taxi dropped you off in front of your building. You hand the driver some cash, telling him to keep the change. The whole drive home, you kept thinking about what he meant by wanting to help you. Did he have a job for you? Did he want you to take some headshots for him? You didn’t know much about him, except that he worked with the military, and he didn’t seem like he was the model or actor type, so headshots were out of the question.

You walked up the stairs to your apartment still pondering why Bucky wanted to help you and how he planned to do it. You get to your floor and move down the hallway, your apartment at the very end with your door facing towards you. You’re almost in front of it when you notice an envelope taped to your door. You peel it off, curious, and stick your key in the door to unlock it.

Stepping through the entrance, you lay your purse on the counter in the kitchen, peel your jean jacket off, and then your shoes. Once you’re somewhat settled, you peel open the letter and pull the piece of paper out of its snug exterior.

‘Y/N,

I hoped you would be home when I came by. I didn't want to do this how it's been done, but I don't have a choice.

I know how tough things have been for you the last month and I've done everything to try and help. You've been a perfect resident. Always paid your rent on time. You've always been nice to everyone here. However, unless you pay your rent by the end of the week, I'm afraid that you will be forced to move out.

I've tried talking to Tom to get him to understand your situation and though he is sympathetic, he can't pay the mortgage for the building without your portion of the rent.

I'm sorry there's nothing more that I can do for you.

I would hate to see you go, but I do not have a choice.

Let me know as soon as you can, if you are able to pay your rent and we can work something out.

Again, I'm sorry.

David’

Sign you crumble the paper into a ball and let it drop onto the counter.

‘Perfect.’ You think. After having a great night, you should have known the bliss wouldn't last for long.

You wanted to cry, but suddenly felt too exhausted. You decide to get a few hours of sleep, before trying to work or do anything else.

Peeling your silky dress from your body as you move towards your bed, you unhook your bra, tossing it aside, and finally collapse onto your mattress. You barely pull the covers over your mostly naked torso before you fall asleep. Dreaming of the blue-eyed man you had just spend your evening with.

TAGS:

Still Learning- @chipilerendi @vicmc624

Marvel- @shreddedparchment

Forevers- @jamielea81 @dnnwnchstr22 @also-fangirlinsweden

*If you would like to added to the tag list, please send me an ask. I am able to keep up with them better that way!

#bucky barnes #bucky x reader #bucky reader insert #sebastian stan #sebastian stan x reader #marvel #marvel series #marvel reader insert

[sxfterhearts]

37. [10:14 pm]

➳ pairing: yugyeom x reader

➳ genre/warnings: fluff with a sprinkle of suggestiveness ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°), established relationship!au

➳ word count: 1,280 words

➳ summary: 37. “Can I kiss you?”

➳ author's note: for the lovely 🌻!! i sincerely hope that this will give you some ~feels~ and that it can act as a little mood booster for the upcoming week! i listened to a lot of ‘got7 but you’re in a car and its raining’ yt edits, which i’ve linked down below. thank you for always supporting me honey! ❤️

➳ music rec: ♪

You scrolled through the playlist labelled “2am drives” on your boyfriend’s Spotify, lips pursed together in deep concentration. You were spoilt for choice, seeing as both of you shared such a similar taste in music. The sound of rain and thunder beyond the comfort of his beat-up Honda was a suitable accompaniment to the cosy ballad you chose, the tunes uniting in a charming harmony that pleased and soothed your ears. As you busied yourself with filling up the queue, Yugyeom sneakily threw his arm around your shoulders, coaxing you to come closer, to lay closer on his warm body.

Your boyfriend was good at a lot of things. Dancing was a prime example, and making mixtapes was another. He seemed to be gifted in just about anything, especially everything to do with making you laugh. Being sneaky, however, was something he was not gifted at, at all.

His other hand messed around with his laptop, setting up the movie he downloaded earlier for the two of you to watch. You had initially suggested Princess Diaries to him in the hopes that you would be watching it on your couch over Netflix Party after a long, tiring week at university, surrounded by fluffy pillows and a generous serving of ice cream. You were fully prepared for the virtual date night – you cooked yourself a proper dinner – the first one this week, pampered yourself with a moisturising mask pack and even put on your favourite polka dot pyjamas. What you weren’t prepared for, however, was for your boyfriend to turn up at your front door, all giddy smiles and goofy gestures, urging you to join him on a late-night drive, destination nowhere.

In the months you had spent as Yugyeom’s girlfriend, you slowly began to accept your new life motto of “Expect the Unexpected”. Things never really go as planned when your Gentle Giant was around, and especially if his Thai best friend was also involved.

Which is exactly why you did not make a big fuss when your boyfriend tugged you out of your apartment and drove you into the rainy Seoul night. In fact, you gladly welcomed it. The past few days had been heavy, after all, and your heart’s battery needed to recharge by being around Yugyeom. As cheesy as it sounds, any time spent with your boyfriend was time well spent, regardless of whether the dates were planned weeks in advanced or sprung up on you via text as he left his dorm.

Once you were satisfied with your song choices, you shifted a little in his arms to face him and was pleasantly greeted by your favourite side profile in the world. His tongue poked out of his glistening lips while his nose, high and sharp, scrunched up cutely as he played with the settings. Your fingers yearned to trace along his arched browbone, down to the apples of his cheeks, pinching the tip of his nose before finally settling on the strong edge of his jaw. Perhaps you’d even steal a kiss from his lips.

Yugyeom emitted a victorious “Yes!”, barely audible above the pitter patter of the rain. “All set! We are ready to discover the wonders of Genovia with Her Royal Highness, Princess Tia.”

“Her name is Mia, not Tia.” You couldn’t help but to giggle at his mix-up.

His entire body shook as he laughed, eyes squeezing together in mirth. You scooted even closer to the boy, longing to be close enough to feel his skin against yours with absolutely no gaps in between; longing to feel his every movement and every breath. “Ah, I’m never good with English names!”

Yugyeom’s finger moved the cursor towards the play button, but you quickly halted his actions by placing your hand on top of his. “Wait, not yet.” You paused him. “Can we just sit here for a while?” Your voice was reduced to nothing but a whisper.

Yugyeom hummed in agreement, his chest vibrating against your back. The sensation was oddly comforting.

For a few moments, you simply closed your eyes, soaking in the affectionate warmth provided by Yugyeom’s embrace, listening to the music playing softly from the radio, remixed with the ambient rain falling onto car’s windows and the rhythmic beating of two connected hearts. He moved the laptop out of the way as gently as possible so that he could bring his other arm around your smaller, precious figure, completing the hug he couldn’t but would’ve gave you if he was beside you this past week.

Nothing else could compare to Yugyeom’s hugs, you concluded. The moment you felt the gentle pressure of his kiss against your hair, you were certain all the pent-up fatigue and frustration left your body and evaporated into thin air. A trembling breath left your lips. You were so secure, so filled with love that it was threatening to spill over.

“Better?” He mumbled with his chin resting upon your head.

The thumb that was rubbing slow circles against your forearm was distracting, hypnotising. Your words failed you. Instead, you opted to turn towards him with your chin angled upwards, a silent, telepathic Can I kiss you?

Yugyeom craned his head downwards, his lips meeting yours halfway. The kiss was soft and gentle at first, just two lovers greeting each other after days apart. Then came the playful nips at your bottom lip and teasing licks of your front teeth. It was hard to resist a giggle or two, which Yugyeom definitely used to his advantage by swiftly and expertly swooping into well-explored territory.

Every single fibre of your being rejoiced as your tongues danced a familiar tango. Better, you conveyed through heated kisses and insistent tugs of his hair, so much better.

You squealed in surprise when you felt his cold fingers travel under your pyjama bottoms, caressing your love handles. You could tell where this was going, and you were more than happy–

Until Yugyeom’s cursed ringtone pierced through the air. Your movements faltered, the rational part of your brain registering that there was only a small handful of people who would call your boyfriend at this hour. Yet, Yugyeom persisted, trailing down your jawline towards your neck, leaving a trail of wet kisses and kitten licks in its wake.

“Yug–”

“Shh.” He shushed you immediately, his teeth grazing against delicate skin.

“Wait, it could be–” You were promptly cut off when Yugyeom nibbled and sucked, hard. The high-pitched whine that left your mouth was completely involuntary. “Could be important, baby. Maybe it’s Jaebeom oppa.”

Yugyeom groaned at the shrilly ringtone. Reluctantly, he peeled himself away from your neck and fished his phone out of his pocket. With a huff, he swiped across the screen to pick up the damned call.

“Yugyeom, finally! Listen, I worked out the final part of the song. We’ll use the same melody from the previous chorus but change the last two words of the sentence.”

“Great, hyung, hooray.” Yugyeom deadpanned. You smiled while poking his side, reprimanding him for being sarcastic and borderline rude to his senior.

“What’s with that tone, Kim Yugyeom? That’s not how you-”

“Hyung…” He whined into the phone. “I’m sorry, I’m really sorry. Thank you for figuring out the song, I’m just, you know, busy at the moment.”

“Oh, did I interrupt something? Is Y/N there? Wait, you know what, don’t answer that. I don’t want to know what you two lovebirds are up to. I’ll hang up, bye.”

“Bye, hyung.” Yugyeom said even after the line went dead. He tossed his phone onto the front seat before turning to you, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “Now, where were we?”

#kwritersworldnet #yugyeom fluff #got7 fluff #yugyeom fanfic #got7 fanfic #yugyeom drabbles #got7 drabbles #yugyeom scenarios #got7 scenarios #yugyeom timestamps #got7 timestamps #yugyeom imagines #got7 imagines #yugyeom x reader #got7 x reader #got7 writers #yugyeom #kim yugyeom #kim yugyeom fluff #got7 #yugyeom soft #got7 soft

[latetaektalk]

in love with you | bbh

“you have been in love with byun baekhyun ever since you were children, but to him you were only his best friend. you were fine with that, fine with being nothing more than friends with baekhyun, but when he starts his search for true love and doesn’t look at you to find it, you weren’t sure anymore if you were truly fine with just being friends.”

“or the four times you try to dye baekhyun’s hair.”

genre: best friends with to lovers! AU, semi college! AU, angst, fluff

pairing: baekhyun x reader

word count: 19.021 (i dont know how i did this in six days)

warnings: cursing, bad singing and dancing

playlist: ifly - bazzi, break my heart again - finneas, love story - taylor swift, claudia - finneas

a/n: okay, i wanted to finish this before baekhyun’s bday, but i only realised it was his bday like six days ago. so i basically wrote this all in six-ish days and i haven’t even edited it. but im posting it because its his birthday! this was meant to be pure fluff, but somehow turned out much more angsty than i wanted it to? anyway, happy bday to baekhyun! 

masterlist

You two were sitting on your couch, watching ‘Community’ for the hundredth time when Baekhyun turned his head to you and looked at you.

“I want to dye my hair.”

Your eyes tore away from the TV screen and instead travelled to Baekhyun. You furrowed your brows at him. Baekhyun knew the moment he had said the words that he really wanted to dye his hair and that he didn’t just say it because he was bored.

“What?” you said, confused. Your attention was now completely on Baekhyun and your TV faded into the background, serving as background noise than anything else.

“I want to dye my hair,” Baekhyun repeated before smiling at you. He watched the knit between your brows deepen and he knew you weren’t completely convinced of the idea.

“Okay,” you said, voice wavering a little with worry as you eyed his healthy and luscious and beautiful and full hair, “You mean like dye it brown?”

“No,” Baekhyun said without missing a beat even though he hadn’t actually thought much about it. Instead he decided in the moment. “I want red hair.”

“Red?” you blurted out and sat up straighter, eyes growing bigger at Baekhyun’s words. His lips split into a grin and he gave you a nod, a nod that had you shaking your head.

“Bright red.”

“You sure?” you asked before you reached over to run your fingers through his hair, “Your hair won’t be the same after dyeing it.”

Baekhyun shrugged and gave you a grin that had your heart beating a little too fast. It was sad how easy it was for you to ignore it, for you to push it away because you had gotten so used to Baekhyun having such a big effect on you.

It didn’t take you long to realise that you were in love with Baekhyun. In fact, you knew it the first time he had smiled at you when you two were measly 6 years old. You felt stupid, stupid for being still in love with him after so many years, but his name was just written on your heart. It belonged to him and you had accepted that you couldn’t change anything about it, couldn’t change anything even if you tried your hardest.

Instead of attempting to erase Baekhyun’s name with another over and over again, instead of attempting to burn away Baekhyun’s name, you locked your heart into a cage. You threw away the key to it, scared that if you didn’t, certain words were going to slip off your tongue one day and ruin the friendship Baekhyun and you had built.

“Who cares?” Baekhyun continued and you scrunched up your face, “It’s just hair and you only live once, right?”

You hummed, still very much unconvinced. You kept threading your fingers through Baekhyun’s hair and he let you. For a moment, you thought he was leaning into your touch, but you quickly dismissed that thought. There was no way, no way because to Baekhyun you were nothing more than just a friend.

“You really sure?” you asked and Baekhyun laughed at how you contourted your face, the worry and uncertainty written all across your face. 

“Yes, I really want bright red hair,” Baekhyun said and you tilted your head to the side, pursing your lips into a thin line.

“You sure you thought about this or are you just saying you wanna do it without even thinking about it?” you said and Baekhyun reached for your hand, fingers wrapping around your wrist to pull your hand from his hair. He put his other hand on yours and gave your hand a squeeze.

It wasn’t fair how easy your hand melted into his, wasn’t fair because it was like the universe was laughing at you, mocking you because your hands just fit perfectly, but it was the only way you two fit together. You would never hold his hand, never hold his hand because you were more than friends because, again, you weren’t, not to Baekhyun at least.

“I’m sure,” Baekhyun smiled and nodded to confirm his words. You sighed and you knew there was no convincing Baekhyung otherwise.

“I guess you’re old enough, right?” you just said and Baekhyun grin grew a little bigger at your words, causing your heart to skip a beat, rattling its cage a little. You paid it no more mind anymore. Your heart always just did that whenever Baekhyun grinned at you like that. It was normal, expected now.

“Okay, great,” Baekhyun cheered before squeezing your hand again, “Will you dye my hair for me?”

You pulled your hand out of Baekhyun’s grasp and shook your head, horror settling in your chest because deep down you knew Baekhyun was going to force you to do it and you just didn’t want to. You would never be able to sleep if Baekhyun blamed you for ruining his hair. Too much responsibility.

“Please,” Baekhyun started and both of you knew you were going to give in eventually. You could never actually say no to him, not to Baekhyun, not to your Baekhyun.

“No, Baek, I don’t know how to dye-”

“There are so many YouTube videos and tutorials,” Baekhyun started and inched closer. You kept shaking your head and shuffled away, being too close was dangerous. “It’s easy. I’m sure.”

“Then do it yourself,” you said, but Baekhyun frowned at your suggestion.

“How? Do I have eyes at the back of my head-”

“Use a mirror,” you cut in and Baekhyun frowned even more, knit deepening between his brows. 

“Can’t you just help me?” Baekhyun whined and took a hold of your hands, wrapping both of them into his now, “Be a good friend?”

He looked at you with his big brown eyes and it was then that you knew you couldn’t resist any longer, knew you couldn’t keep saying no anymore. The pout Baekhyun added, did nothing but make it more difficult for you and you hated yourself for being so weak, for being so weak for Baekhyun.

The fact that your heart tightened painfully at Baekhyun calling you a friend barely registered in your mind anymore. You had gotten so used to the pain, had gotten so used to being nothing more than a friend to Baekhyun that it barely affected you anymore. At least that was what you told yourself.

“Fine.”

“Okay, so, looks like I gotta bleach my hair a bunch of times before we can actually dye it,” Baekhyun informed you and put down his phone. You looked up from your laptop and raised your brows, still very much unconvinced.

Baekhyun hadn’t mentioned something about dyeing his hair for a whole week and a part of you had hoped that he had forgotten about it, but, of course, he hadn’t. You tucked a strand behind your ear and your back cracked when you straightened up. 

You had been studying for way too long now and it was taking a toll on you. The uncomfortable chairs in the library certainly didn’t make it any easier for you to stay focused.

“Maybe we shouldn’t do it,” you said, not really feeling like bleaching Baekhyun’s hair over and over again, “I mean bleaching your hair a bunch of times. Won’t it fall out, then?”

Baekhyun scrunched up his face at your words, obviously sad that you were trying to convince him again not to dye his hair. He leaned forward and rested his arms against the table, hands folding together.

“But I wanna dye my hair,” Baekhyun whined and you cringed a little, asking yourself how he could be older than you and how he could be a functioning adult if he cried like a baby every time things didn’t quite go his way.

“I’m just saying, Baek,” you shrugged and Baekhyun pushed out his lower lip as he batted his eyelashes at you. 

“But I want red hair,” Baekhyun repeated and you sighed, folding your arms in front of your chest.

“Maybe just go to a professional-”

“You think I’ve got the money?” Baekhyun said and you pressed your lips together, knowing exactly that he didn’t have enough money, remembering the amount of ramen he consumed in a month just simply because it was cheaper and he had to cut corners everywhere he could.

“I don’t want you to blame me if it turns out shitty or if you lose all of your hair or something,” you explained and tightened your arms around your chest. Baekhyun rolled his eyes at you and you were about to kick him in the shin for it when he spoke up.

“It won’t. It’ll be fine, I’m sure,” Baekhyun said and you were about to voice your complaints and worries when he continued on, “And if anything I won’t blame you. It’d be my fault because I’m essentially forcing you to dye my hair.”

“How can you be so sure?” you asked, unable to understand how Baekhyun could talk with such confidence when neither of you had any experience in dyeing hair before.

“I trust you.”

Your heart rattled its cage and for a moment, you thought it was going to knock it over and free itself and you were going to scream out the three words that had been dancing on your tongue since Baekhyun and you were children, but it wasn’t enough. The rattle wasn’t enough and a part of you thanked the universe it wasn’t and another wished it had been enough because then maybe Baekhyun and you could be something.

You hated yourself, hated yourself for being so fucking pathetic, for getting your hopes worked up every time Baekhyun was being somewhat affectionate with you and you wished you could get over it, stop obsessing over his every word, but your heart didn’t allow you to stop.

When it clicked in your mind that you had been silent for maybe a little too long, you snapped out of your thoughts and focused on the present right now.

“How about Chaeyoung? She has experience in dyeing hair. She did it on herself a bunch of times,” you said, voice wavering just the slightest. A part of you was still shaken up about the possibility of the three words spilling out.

 Baekhyun scrunched up his face when you said ‘Chaeyoung’. The second her name fell from your lips, he disliked the idea, no, in fact, he hated it.

“What’s wrong with Chaeyoung?” you asked, puzzled because Chaeyoung was nothing but nice and cute and sweet. Baekhyun shrugged before his head landed in his hands, his low grunt muffled by the table. Your eyes scanned the people around you and you let out a relieved breath when nobody was looking at you.

“Hello? I asked you a question, Baek. What’s wrong with Chaeyoung?” you said and took one of your pens to throw it against Baekhyun’s head when he wouldn’t respond. It bounced against his hair before falling to the side. 

“Ow.”

Baekhyun looked up and rubbed his head as he sat up straight. His eyes locked with yours and for once, the pout was gone from his lips. 

“What’s wrong with Chaeyoung?” you repeated your question and Baekhyun scowled at you, obviously unhappy about the fact that you had just thrown a pen at him.

“That hurt, you know?” Baekhyun said before he dropped his hand and took your pen into his hand, twirling it around as he leaned into his chair. You rolled your eyes at him and you had to bite away the smile that tugged on the corners of your lips.

“What’s wrong with Chaeyoung?” you asked for a third time and Baekhyun sighed, scowl melting away as he stared at you in complete seriousness. Your heart started to pound in your chest, but you were quick to tell it to shut up, to stop being like that, to stop because Baekhyun and you were only friends, nothing more. You were about to put another lock on it, another lock to the hundred locks you had already put on it in a vain attempt to get it under control when Baekhyun answered.

“She isn’t you.”

Fuck.

“Fine,” you said after a beat, your mind made up. Baekhuyn beamed at you and you could only smile back at him too, seeing him so happy made you happy as well.

“Love you,” Baekhyun grinned and your smile almost faltered. Words almost slipped off your tongue, words that you could never let out. You wanted to tell Baekhyun that he didn’t, that he didn’t love, that he didn’t love you the way you did, that he didn’t love you the way you wanted him to.

“Love you too, Baek.”

You hated that those three words, that sentence ‘She isn’t you’, was all it took for Baekhyun to break the hundred locks you had put on the cage. And almost, almost, your heart had spilled out, but somehow you held the cage shut, somehow held it shut long enough to put a new, better, stronger lock on it. And you followed that lock with thousand more, determined to keep your heart silent and locked away forever.

Those three words were also all it took for you to completely give in, to quench your worries and doubts about dyeing Baekhyun’s hair. From that day on, you were completely convinced, looking up various articles to ensure the health of Baekhyun’s hair and scalp.

At first, Baekhyun was excited that you were so committed to dyeing his hair now, but after the tenth text about the measures he and you had to take before dyeing his hair, he wasn’t sure if he wanted you to be this on board anymore. 

“It’s gonna be fine.”

He had to say those words over and over again until they lost all their meaning to him. Baekhyun started to repeat them like a robot, saying them before you could get a word out.

“Why don’t you tell her she’s lowkey annoying you?” Sehun asked and shoved his hands into his pockets as he and Baekhyun made their way down the street to the coffee shop to grab a coffee before class. Baekhyun frowned at Sehun’s suggestion and immediately shook his head at him.

“She isn’t annoying me,” Baekhyun said with a slight edge swinging in his voice and Sehun immediately put up his hands, obviously noticing the way Baekhyun had said the words.

“Hey, I’m just saying,” Sehun said and Baekhyun’s frown slipped away, realising himself that he had maybe reacted a little too harsh, “I mean you’re complaining to me about her, aren’t you?”

Baekhyun stopped and thought to himself. Sehun was right, he had turned to him to talk about how he and you had just texted for ten minutes to figure out when to dye his hair because you didn’t want to bleach his hair more than once during a day, but you weren’t annoying. You couldn’t be.

You were just worried and Baekhyun was just sometimes a little impatient. If anything, it was his fault for being so impatient. You were just being a great friend.

“She doesn’t annoy me,” Baekhyun said and Sehun looked at him, “She could never.”

Sehun eyed Baekhyun for a moment before snorting and shaking his head at him. Baekhyun raised his brows, not quite catching up with Sehun. They turned the corner and Sehun opened the door to the coffee shop, the bell above the door ringing to announce their entrance.

Immediately the scent of coffee and pastries made their way to Baekhyun and it was considerably warmer inside the shop than outside. It wasn’t that it was very cold outside, spring starting to replace the winter, but the air outside was still somewhat fresh and biting.

“Are you in love with her, dude?” Sehun chortled and a grin pulled on his lips, both of them stopping in front of the line. Baekhyun pressed his lips into a thin line before he let a few scoffs slip, head shaking from left to right almost in an instant, almost like he had trained himself to.

“No,” Baekhyun said and he cringed because he had said it a little too loud. Maybe Sehun was being a good friend because it was obvious that Baekhyun didn’t really want to talk about it or maybe it was because Sehun didn’t notice, but he didn’t mention it, mention the slight raise in Baekhyun’s voice.

Even as Sehun started to talk about what he should order, Baekhyun wasn’t quite there, wasn’t quite listening anymore. Instead his mind was still repeating Sehun’s question over and over again. 

There was no way, right?

Before Baekhyun could shake the thought out of his head and decide to ignore it, a familiar voice cut in.

“Byun Baekhyun?”

It was truly remarkable, remarkable how Baekhyun and you could just decide to ignore things, ignore the questions repeating in your minds over and over again. Maybe that was why Baekhyun and you were best friends, maybe that was why he and you got along so well.

Because the next time Baekhyun and you saw each other, he had the most excited smile plastered on his lips, ready to do this.

“Let’s go,” Baekhyun grinned and held up the plastic bag, containing everything you had told him to buy to make sure Baekhyun’s hair wouldn’t fall out the second the bleach touched his hair.

You pointed at the chair next to your biggest window, papers laying on your floor around it in a circle already to make sure that none of the bleach or dye would fall onto your floor and cost you your deposit. In front of the chair you had put up a small mirror to give Baekhyun the chance to look at himself whenever he wanted.

Baekhyun skipped to your chair and you just shook your head at him. Unlike him you weren’t excited or giddy or happy. Instead you were still worried, worried that you were going to fuck this up even though you have read every online article out there on how to dye hair and even though you have watched every hairdresser reacts to and hair dyeing video on YouTube. In fact, you had done more research on how to dye hair and how to do it well and whatnot that on any other topic.

“We really have to spread this process out into weeks?” Baekhyun asked, shrugging off his hoodie to reveal a simple white tee. 

“Look, you said you didn’t want to lose your hair and that you didn’t mind being blonde for a while. We’ve gotta bleach your hair at least twice to get the red you want at the end. So, unless you want to lose all of your hair, we can do it all in one day,” you said and shut Baekhyun up.

You made your way over to him, picking up the plastic bag Baekhyun had put next to him to sift through the things he had bought. You pulled out the bleach and the mixing bowl with the brush. 

“Can you take out the scale?” you asked and nodded to the plastic bag. Baekhyun picked it up and searched for the scale he had brought from home before following you to your couch and placing it on your coffee table.

“What are you doing?” Baekhyun asked and you turned on the scale, putting the mixing bowl and brush on top of it.

“Making the bleach,” you said and poured the baby blue bleach powder into the bowl before pulling the top off the developer, making sure that you were keeping the mixture in a two to one ratio.

Baekhyun eyed you carefully as he watched you mix together the powder with the development, amazement sparkling in his eyes.

“You’re so good at this,” Baekhyun mumbled and you just rolled your eyes at him, but you couldn’t quite hide away the grin that pulled on his lips.

“Yeah, can you put on some music and get a towel from the bathroom?” you asked and Baekhyun nodded, sitting and watching you for another second before doing as he was told. Your eyes followed Baekhyun as he stood up and walked away and you sighed to yourself.

As Bazzi filled up your flat, you finished up mixing the bleach together. The powder and developer had turned into a baby blue paste and Baekhyun was standing with a towel wrapped around his shoulders, smiling at you.

This my baby This my Look

“Sit,” you said to Baekhyun and gestured to the chair. He wrapped the towel tighter around his shoulders and he couldn’t hide the grin adorning his lips. 

“Hold.” You handed Baekhyun the mixing bowl to put on gloves, not really up to bleaching your skin before ruffling through the plastic bag again. You split Baekhyun’s hair into four same sized sections, clipping the pieces of hair together with hair barrettes.

Touchin' you slowly, love how you hold me I was a player, that was the old me I sent a prayer for something holy Got naked and show me

“Okay, you’re really ready?” you said after you had taken back the mixing bowl from Baekhyun and stood behind him. Your eyes looked with Baekhyun’s in the mirror in front of you.

“Yeah,” Baekhyun breathed out, lips splitting apart into an even bigger grin.

Girl, summer's been lonely, yeah At first, I was hesitant (Spooky) Like a skeleton You 20, but intelligent

You waited for another moment, giving him the last chance to change his mind, but when Baekhyun just nodded again, you shrugged and put on the first bit of bleach. Almost immediately Baekhyun let out a tiny gasp.

“Okay, no turning back,” Baekhyun laughed as you distributed the bleach in his hair, still unsure what you were doing because even after watching every hair dyeing tutorial out there, you didn’t feel very comfortable or skilled in doing this.

Now all them other bitches so irrelevant, ah-ah, yeah Tan lines and some memories (Woo) Guess summer got the best of me (Woo)

You started out with the length of Baekhyun’s hair, not wanting for the roots to bleach quicker than the rest of his hands. You scrunched up your nose when you got the first whiff of the bleach, the smell of it really not sitting that well with you.

Chef B with the recipe, yeah With you, it's a better me

“Who would have thought that one day I’d be dyeing my hair?” Baekhyun said and smiled at you through the mirror. You just shook your head at him and kept your eyes trained on his hair, making sure that you evenly distributed the bleach.

“I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin' is, I-I fuckin' love you,” Baekhyun started singing and took the words out of Bazzi’s mouth. Your eyes flickered to Baekhyun’s face and you smiled, smiled as you looked at every centimetre of his face.

His eyes were fluttered shut, words slipping off his tongue with such easy and grace that it was truly admirable. His voice was angelic and you wanted to hear more, wanted for him to never stop singing. 

For a moment, you just focused on Baekhyun, on how beautiful he was, on how much your heart wanted him to say those words to you. Your heart rattled in its cage, fought against the metal bars, banged on them in a vain attempt to get out, but you didn’t allow it, didn’t allow it to win.

You started bleaching Baekhyun’s hair when you realised just how quick it was lifting. Baekhyun kept singing, kept taking the words out of Bazzi’s mouth and you silently hummed along to the melody. The song soon started to play on repeat.

The barrettes landed on the floor with a little bleach on them as you worked your way through Baekhyun’s hair, starting to get the hang of it. And you were completely focused on that, on dyeing Baekhyun’s hair, but when he poked you into your waist, your eyes shot to him.

“Sing with me,” Baekhyun said and you raised your brows at him. Baekhyun kept going, kept singing, but he never looked away from you. You knew he was waiting for you to join in, for you to start singing as well, but you weren’t quite sure.

“Please.”

And it was all it took for you to join Baekhyun, for you to sing along and the grin that spread across Baekhyun’s lips had your heart beating a little too fast for your own liking.

I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin' I guess what I'm sayin' is, I I fuckin' love you (I do)

Your eyes locked with Baekhyun’s as he and you sung the words and you wished they hadn’t, wished that he had been looking somewhere else, wished he had his eyes closed or something because in an instant you could feel this seed of hope plant itself into your chest, watered by every word and look Baekhyun gave you. Your heart reacted immediately and you made sure to put on extra locks. 

This wasn’t your first jam out session with Baekhyun, wasn’t your first time singing with Baekhyun, wasn’t your first time belting out love songs at the top of your lungs with Baekhyun - ‘Love Story’ by Taylor Swift was the song that started it. 

You knew by now that it was stupid, that it meant nothing, that you were nothing more to Baekhyun than a friend, but you could never not get your hopes up. You could never tell your heart not to, not even as it hurt so bad when your hopes and expectations were quenched later on.

“I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin' is, I-I fuckin' love-” 

“Skip,” you said, almost commanding Baekhyun to and cut in before he could finish the lyric. The words died on Baekhyun’s tongue and he furrowed his brows at you. “Skip the song.”

“Why?”

You couldn’t quite take the way Baekhyun was looking at you and instead started working on the back of Baekhyun’s head, forcing him out of your view.

“We’ve listened to it long enough,” you lied and swallowed the truth, not wanting to admit that you couldn’t take it, couldn’t take Baekhyun saying that he ‘fucking loved you’ whilst he looked at you and actually didn’t.

Baekhyun hummed before shrugging and pulling out his phone to skip the song. But to your dismay, the next song was even worse.

Hey, you I'm just now leaving Can I come around later on this evening? Or do you need time? Yes, of course, that's fine

Finneas’ voice filled up the air around you and you wanted to tell Baekhyun to skip the song again, but when he started humming along to the melody - his brows pinched together and his eyes fluttered shut - you couldn’t bring yourself to. Not when he looked like that, not when he looked so incredibly beautiful.

Soon enough Baekhyun started singing along, started to make the song his own and soon enough your heart jumped to your ears and pounded so loud in them that it was deafening, so loud in them that it hurt.

So go ahead and break my heart again Leave me wonderin' why the hell I ever let you in Are you the definition of insanity? Or am I? Oh, it must be nice To love someone who lets you break them twice

Baekhyun continued on singing with the song accompanying his beautiful vocals and you slowed down your movements, too busy listening to Baekhyun’s voice to focus on bleaching his hair. Your heart fluttered every time in your chest whenever Baekhyun sang the chorus and you wanted to record him, record him so you could have him sing to you every time you needed him to, so you could imagine a world in which Baekhyun would sing for you because you were more than just friends.

You thought the song was going to repeat again like Bazzi’s ‘IFLY’ did, but instead Baekhyun peeled his eyes open and unlocked his phone, swiping across the screen and typing something into it. And a second later, Taylor Swift’s ‘Love Story’ started playing.

Nostalgia hit you an instant and your eyes locked with Baekhyun’s in the mirror as the guitar filled the air around you.

“Oh my God,” you whispered quietly, remembering the many times you had forced Baekhyun to put on the second when it had first been released. 

“Baek,” you said as the intro started to come to an end. Baekhyun had the biggest grin on his lips and it was so contagious that you could only grin yourself. Memories flooded you and before you could control yourself the first words slipped off your tongue, your voice filling up your tiny living room.

“We were both young when I first saw you, I close my eyes, and the flashback starts, I'm standing there,” you started and pointed at Baekhyun at the latter part of the first lyric, eliciting a laugh from Baekhyun.

You were pretty sure that this song would make you just as sad as Bazzi’s ‘IFLY’ and Finneas ‘Break My Heart Again’ if Taylor Swift’s ‘Love Story’ had such a different meaning to Baekhyun and you. The lyrics didn’t mean anything to you anymore, instead they were just there to be screamed at the top of your lungs, gained their new purpose ever since he and you were young.

Baekhyun started joining you, singing dramatically the lyrics like he was truly feeling all of the emotions, telling his own story.

On a balcony in summer air See the lights, see the party, the ball gowns See you make your way through the crowd And say, "hello" Little did I know

Baekhyun and you kept looking at each other, never breaking eye contact once as the words rolled off your tongues. You forgot about bleaching Baekhyun’s hair and instead started giving your all to sing out the song that was connected with so many memories.

When the song got closer to the chorus, Baekhyun turned to you and just took the mixing bowl out of your hand and put it on the coffee table behind you. You let him and when you realised what Baekhyun was doing, it was already too late.

Baekhyun grabbed you by your hands and started to dance, leading you through your living room as both of you belted out the lyrics. Pure bliss and joy filled up both of you and it was like there was only Baekhyun and you in the world and no one else.

You were jumping around and just singing, enjoying yourselves when the bridge started and Baekhyun let go off your hands to caress your face with the back of his hand.

I got tired of waiting Wondering if you were ever coming around My faith in you was fading When I met you on the outskirts of town, and I said

You had to try your hardest not to laugh, Baekhyun struggling just as much as the song calmed down and the guitar almost slipped away completely. Both of you looked at each other, grins adorning your lips as you acted sad.

When the melody started to pick up again, ramp up to the last chorus, Baekhyun and you prepared for the finale, both of you stopping for a moment as you waited for your cue.

And said: "Marry me Juliet You'll never have to be alone I love you and that's all I really know I talked to your dad, go pick out a white dress It's a love story baby just say 'yes'"

Baekhyun and you were practically screaming at this point and it took the end of the song for both of you to calm down, for you to snap into reality again.

“Your hair, Baek!” you yelled out and grabbed Baekhyun by his hand to practically throw him onto the chair. The bleach was starting to drop down the side of his hair and you quickly picked up the mixing bowl to make sure Baekhyun’s hair wouldn’t turn out completely patchy and ugly.

“It’s just hair, Y/N,” Baekhyun laughed, a grin still very much on his lips.

“You won’t be saying that when it turns out ugly,” you said and Baekhyun laughed again. A new song came on, but you didn’t recognise it. 

“That was fun,” Baekhyun said and your eyes wandered to the mirror for a moment. Baekhyun was already looking at you and he was giving you this look, expecting you to agree with him and you couldn’t help yourself but to just do so. A smile split onto your lips and you could see the pride glinting in Baekhyun’s eyes.

“We haven’t listened to that song in such a long time,” you realised, starting to work on the sides of Baekhyun’s hair. The top was done and now it was really just bleaching the sides of his head.

“I know,” Baekhyun grinned, “Why did you think I put it on? Remember how often we used to listen to that song?”

You could only nod at that memory. Of course, you remembered, remembered so clearly because that song encapsulated all you wanted. Your heart yearned for that kind of love, yeared for Baekhyun to love you like that, but you knew just how unrealistic that was now.

“We’re so old now,” you sighed and tilted Baekhyun’s head to the side, “Can you fold your ear really quickly?”

Baekhyun looked somewhat confused before he did as you told him and you applied the bleach on his hair around his hair.

“Yeah, we’re really fucking old now, huh?” Baekhyun said and you could only nod, “But I’m not only talking about our age. In general I just feel so much older now.”

“General I just feel so much older now.”

“General I just feel so much older now.”

Baekhyun and you saluted and spoke at the same time, eyes locking with each other before bursting out into laughter. It was an inside joke between him and you to mock salute whenever someone somehow mentioned a military rank.

“Oh, we haven’t done that in a long time,” Baekhyun chuckled and you nodded.

“Why not?” you mused and Baekhyun just shrugged with a grin plastered on his lips.

“I don’t know, we should do it more often,” Baekhyun said and you could only agree, nodding your head before going back to applying the bleach. “But as I was saying, I do feel like we’ve aged a lot more the past years than even before.”

“We’re definitely different now.”

“Better,” Baekhyun corrected you and you raised your brows at him, not sure if you would agree “Well, I’d definitely say that I’m a better person than I used to be.”

You frowned because you couldn’t remember a time where you thought that Baekhyun wasn’t a good person. ”How so?”

Baekhyun grinned at you and pulled the towel tighter around him before answering. “Remember how I used to date all of these girls in middle and high school? I could never say no to them even though I didn’t like any of them.”

You remembered, of course, you remembered, you remembered very clearly and you remembered even more clearly the pain pulling in your chest. Every other month Baekhyun would have a new ‘girlfriend’ or something and it hurt, it hurt because it was never you.

You knew then that he only dated those girls because they asked him out and Baekhyun was just too nice to say no to them, but that didn’t make it any less painful for you to witness it all. It hurt even more to see him share kisses with them in front of you and that it was according to him the only benefit of having a ‘girlfriend’ he actually didn’t like, the fact he got to kiss them.

“Yeah, you’re right,” you said and tapped on Baekhyun’s hand to signal to him that he didn’t need to keep folding his ear over. You moved to the back.

“No, that was truly awful of me,” Baekhyun said and you only hummed, “Why didn’t you tell me? I mean I kissed those girls and really strung them along. God, I was a dick.”

You just shrugged and tucked a strand behind your ear. “Not saying that it was their fault, but it wasn’t really a secret at one point that you would date pretty much any girl because you couldn’t say no. So, I feel like most of them knew what they were getting themselves into.”

Baekhyun scrunched up his face at your words before crossing his arms in front of his chest, obviously not very proud of his younger self.

“Yeah, but I was still the dick,” Baekhyun said and you smiled at his words, eyes meeting Baekhyun’s in the mirror.

“You still are,” you grinned, earning you a gasp from Baekhyun, “I’m not saying I disagree, but I do believe that some of the girls thought that they could change you or something when they asked you out.”

Baekhyun hummed and thought about your words for a second, music switching to another song you, again, didn’t know. 

“Yeah, but I do feel like I hurt a lot of people. Unnecessarily,” Baekhyun sighed and you stopped applying the beach on him to look at him.

“No, yeah, you did,” you said and tucked a strand behind your ear, “But I don’t feel like it’s fair that you blame yourself. It’s been, what, six years now? It was literally middle and high school. We all did stupid shit.”

“Okay, true,” Baekhyun sighed and you knew that he still wanted to say something, “But I still remember the way Minji cried when I broke up with her.”

You paused and stayed silent for a few seconds. Of all the girls’ hearts Baekhyun would inevitably break, Minji stood out from all of the girls. Because, for some reason, Baekhyun decided to deliver the bad news right before class and, well, Minji didn’t take it very well. Long story short, Minji started yelling and crying in the middle of the hallway and their breakup was a much discussed topic for the rest of the year. In fact, it was named the ‘Minji Baekhyun Gate’ and everybody knew about it.

“Well, on the flip side no more girls asked you out after her,” you said and Baekhyun frowned a little at your words. 

“I guess,” Baekhyun sighed and you continued applying bleach onto his hair before you paused again and looked up to him.

“I wonder what she’s doing now,” you hummed before you worked through Baekhyun’s hair again. If you had looked at him a second longer, you would have seen the blush spread across his cheeks, would have seen the way his eyes grew in size, but you didn’t.

“Actually,” Baekhyun cleared his throat and you raised your brows at him, brush still mid air as your gaze wandered to him, “I actually, uh, ran into her a few days ago.”

“Shut the fuck up,” you blurted out and you couldn’t stop the grin from spreading across your lips, “Did she slap you? Yell at you? Cry?”

“What? No!” Baekhyun shook his head and you shrugged. After all she had done two of the three things you had listed when Baekhyun and she broke up in high school. “She did none of that.”

“Where’d you run into her?” you asked and finished applying the bleach on the back of Baekhyun’s head. 

“Coffee shop. I was with Sehun grabbing a cup when she came in, too,” Baekhyun recalled and you nodded.

“What does she do now?” you kept asking, genuinely curious about Minji’s life right now. Sure, it hurt to see Baekhyun with all those girls, but you never blamed them for it. If anything, you admired them for being so brave and confessing their feelings. Something you could never do.

“Oh, she’s a graphic design student or something like that,” Baekhyun said and you nodded, finding it not surprising at all that Minji became a graphic design student. It fit her well.

“That’s cool,” you said and pointed at Baekhyun’s ear with the end of the brush, “Fold.”

Baekhyun folded over his ear and you started applying the bleach. The music was still very much playing, but for the first time, it was quiet, silent between Baekhyun and you.

And it was then that you knew that he was going to say something, that he was thinking about how to word it, that he was struggling to find the right way to say it.

“Spit it out,” you said and Baekhyun looked like a deer caught in headlights when his gaze met yours in the mirror. His cheeks reddened and right away, you knew you weren’t going to like it.

“I may or may not be going on a date with Minji in a couple days.”

Your chest tightened painfully and your throat constricted into a tight knot at Baekhyun’s words. Your heart, for once, didn’t attempt to break out of its cage and instead stepped away from the locks and the door. It fell to the floor and hugged itself as the tears threatened to spill.

You pressed your lips together and swallowed the actual words that wanted to roll off your tongues. Instead you said what you knew was the right thing to say right now, the right thing to say right now as Baekhyun’s friend.

“Tell me you’re not going on a date with Minji because you can’t say no to her. We really don’t need a ‘Minji Baekhyun Gate’ in college, too,” you said and as bad and awful and heartless and selfish as it was, you wanted Baekhyun to tell you just that, tell you that he was going on a date with Minji because he couldn’t say no to her and not because he actually liked her or something.

You prayed to the universe that Baekhyun was only going on a date with Minji because he couldn’t say no because you weren’t sure what you were going to do if he was going on a date because he actually liked her. Baekhyun had never voiced any interest in actual relationships or love or whatever in his life before and it made it easier, easier for you to be fine with just being friends with Baekhyun, but you weren’t sure if this was going to be the case if he started to date, seriously date.

“Actually I asked her out.”

Your heart shattered in your chest and the knot in your throat tightened so much that it was suffocating you and for a moment, you thought you weren’t going to survive the pain tearing through you, but you never fell to the ground. Instead you kept looking at Baekhyun as he eyed you carefully.

“And before you say something about me asking her out too early because I feel guilty, I didn’t. I’ve actually been texting with her for the past week and I think I’m really starting to like Minij.”

The seed of hope that had planted itself into your chest went up in flames and you almost laughed, laughed because, of course, it did. There was no way it could ever grow, grow bigger, grow into an actual flower.

With your best effort you put on a smile, a smile that hid away all the pain and tears and frustration and sadness inside of you right now.

“I’m so happy to hear that, Baek.”

The plan Baekyhun and you had agreed upon to achieve the red he wanted was that you would bleach his hair for a second time a week after and dye it red then the week following. But Baekhyun cancelled a few days after the first time you had bleached his hair. 

“Minji wants to watch this film that comes out on that day and I don’t wanna say no.”

You didn’t ask how Baekhyun’s date went, you didn’t hate yourself enough to ask. You couldn’t do that to yourself and you weren’t going to, but when you ran into Baekhyun in between classes, you could see how happy he was. His eyes were sparkling, lit up like a city and you knew why, knew it was because of Minji. It broke you, broke you to see him like that. Because not once had you elicited the same light in his eyes before and the ashes of the seed of hope crumbled further into dust.

[Baekhyun - 14:06] :

does tmr work for you? i cant walk around with a baseball cap for another day

You wanted to text Baekhyun that today would work, that you would do his hair at two in the morning, but you didn’t tell him, didn’t because it was just a little too much.

[You - 14:06] :

yeah, after class?

Baekhyun didn’t answer until the next morning.

“God, you look fucking stupid,” you said when Baekhyun took off the baseball cap. His hair was a disgusting and brassy blonde colour and you pointed at the chair.

“I know. I thought for a while that it was fine, but I just couldn’t keep lying to myself,” Baekhyun laughed and shrugged off his jacket, hanging it up before he let himself fall into your chair.

Baekhyun had left his plastic bag with everything inside at yours the last time and you had already mixed the bleach and put out a towel for Baekhyun.

“Thanks,” Baekhyun said and wrapped said towel around his shoulder. You just smiled at him and put on the gloves before stirring the bleach again as it had thickened a little over the past minutes, but it was still perfectly fine to use.

“You know the only good thing about my hair is that I at least know that Minji isn’t with me for my looks only,” Baekhyun joked and you forced yourself to smile a little bigger. 

“Hold,” you said and shoved the mixing bowl into Baekhyun’s hands. The brush fell out of the bowl, but luckily you had put out the papers again and Baekhyun bent down to pick it up again.

“Smart,” Baekhyun said and gestured at the papers and you just silently took the compliment before you started to thread your fingers through Baekhyun’s hair.

“I didn’t really get to look at your finished hair,” you said, recalling how late it had been when Baekhyun and you were finally done with the first round of bleaching, “You literally bolted out before your hair had dried.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry,” Baekhyun grinned and you looked at the small parts that were still black. As handsome and pretty as Baekhyun was, even he looked ridiculous with the black patches in between the brassy blonde.

“Can we get started?” Baekhyun said and your eyes locked with his, not really understanding the hurry, “I promised to go over to Minji’s later. She really wants to see my hair.”

“Oh.”

You nodded and held in the sigh that wanted to escape. Instead, you just grabbed the barrettes you had laid out on the coffee table behind you and started to divide Baekhyun’s hair into four parts.

“Don’t forget the roots at the front,” Baekhyun reminded you and you internally cringed at the black streaks at the front between the blonde strands, “Don’t want you forgetting those again.”

“Yeah, I won’t,” you said and clipped the last barrette into Baekhyun’s hair before turning to the mirror to look. A smile spread across your lips at the sight of it because Baekhyun truly looked adorable with those barrettes in his hair.

“Stop,” Baekhyun simply said and rolled his eyes at you. You just grinned and shrugged before taking the mixing bowl out of his hand and starting to work on his hair. Soon enough Baekhyun put on music and both of you started jamming out again, time flying past in a blink.

“Front, front, front,” Baekhyun said and poked your leg after you had just said you were done. You rolled your eyes and walked around him, scraping the last bits of bleach out of the bowl to apply it to the roots at the front of Baekhyun’s hair again.

“Yeah, I get it,” you exhaled and bent over to carefully apply the bleach.

“Sorry,” Baekhyun smiled and you watched his lips split into a grin, eyes fluttering shut to not get any bleach into his eyes, “I just want it to turn out good.”

“Again, Chaeyoung is probably willing-”

“And again, I only really trust you,” Baekhyun cut in and you pressed your lips into a thin line to hide the smiling pulling on the corners of your mouth. It was stupid, considering that Baekhyun had his eyes closed.

You hummed quietly to the music, applying the leftover bleach onto Baekhyun’s hair. The thought of pressing your lips against Baekhyun’s crossed your mind and you hated yourself for it, hated that you would even go there. But you couldn’t quite help yourself.

Your face was literally centimetres away from Baekhyun’s and you could feel every single one of his breaths fan against your skin, tickle it. Your eyes travelled across Baekhyun’s face and you remembered every mole, every freckle, every scar you would see, making a note to yourself mentally. You wanted nothing more than to press your lips against them, place soft kisses on the curve of his cheek, breathe feathery kisses against each of his eyelids, trail down with your lips to his, connect them with his like you had always dreamt of doing.

But those wishes, thoughts, wants were quickly dismissed, dismissed because Baekhyun and you were just friends and that was fine, that was enough. 

And for a moment, you thought everything was peaceful.

“Do you not like Minji?”

Your hand stopped midair as your gaze travelled to Baekhyun and he peeled his eyes open. He looked into your pupils, searching in them desperately for the answer to his question, but he turned up with nothing. Instead, Baekhyun watched you slowly furrow your brows and tilt your head to the side.

A lump grew in your throat and the music faded away, silence growing between Baekhyun and you as he kept staring at you, waiting for an answer to his question. Your back started to ache and you straightened up, not wanting to be so close to Baekhyun anymore. The proximity grew dangerous again.

“Why would you ask that?”

Baekhyun sighed and almost ran his hand through his hair but you quickly stopped him, hand wrapping around his wrist to pull his hand away. He sighed again - to himself though this time - and you just kept looking at him, noting the way Baekhyun’s face etched into ambivalence as your hand slipped from his.

“I- I don’t know,” Baekhyun mused and his eyes landed on the floor, flickering back and forth as the wheels turned in his brain. There were a few seconds of silence until Baekhyun continued again and in those your heart stopped beating. 

“You didn’t ask how my date with Minji was.”

You probably would have groaned, rolled your eyes and told Baekhyun he was being incredibly dramatic and stupid right now if there wasn’t some truth to Baekhyun’s words.

“And, I don’t- You just don’t seem very thrilled?” Baekhyun continued, hands tightening into fists, “And like, you don’t have to be much because I’m just dating.”

You wanted to cut in and say that Baekhyun wasn’t ‘just dating’, that it was so much more because if he was truly ‘just dating’, it wouldn’t hurt so much. You wouldn’t be spending your nights crying, wouldn’t be spending your days thinking when Baekhyun would inevitably leave you for Minji.

“But- I just thought you were gonna be more excited and interested because, I don’t know- you usually are for like things about, well, I guess, me. I mean you text me every morning before an exam and after it to ask how it went. I don’t know- you’re just always so invested and it was kinda odd when you didn’t text me when I went on my date with Minji.”

It was sad, sad and laughable and pathetic that Baekhyun was never going to connect the dots, never going to understand why you were so invested in his exams, never going to realise why you didn’t text him on the day of his date with Minji.

“And, of course, you don’t have to do any of these things, but I just asked myself if maybe you didn’t like Minji,” Baekhyun finished and glanced up to you, his eyes big and doe like. 

“Baek,” you sighed and shook your head, unsure for a second what to say, “I like Minji.”

“You do?” Baekhyun asked and looked up to you. Your chest tightened and you swallowed the knot in your throat before putting more locks on your heart, scared that you would accidentally tell him how you truly felt about him.

“Yeah, of course,” you continued and let your gaze wander, swallowing before continuing, “How could I not? Minji is incredibly nice,” you busied yourself with the mixing bowl because while you weren’t lying, it hurt to admit all of this, “And talented and pretty and kind. She’s great.”

“Okay,” Baekhyun exhaled and in an instant a grin flashed across his lips, relief washing across his face. When you saw it, you wanted to tell him not to do that, not to grin at you like that because it did things to your heart, things you didn’t want for your heart to do.

“Because,” Baekhyun started and gnawed on his lip, rubbing his hands together as he struggled to finish the sentence. His cheeks reddened and you knew right away his words were only going to hurt more, rip you apart, tear you to shreds.

“Because I really, really like Minji. Like, genuinely. I like her in a way I’ve never liked somebody before.”

Baekhyun glanced up to you and you had to force yourself to keep the eye contact, force yourself not to tear away your gaze. You let a smile spread across your lips, but it didn’t reach your eyes, but Baekhyun didn’t notice, didn’t notice because he was too busy talking about Minji.

You felt like somebody was pushing a knife through your heart, every syllable, every word driving it deeper into it, carving a hole into Baekhyun’s name. It was stupid that it hurt so much, pained you so much because you already knew that, knew that Baekhyun had never liked somebody so much, knew that Baekhyun had never and will never like you so much.

“And I just want you to like her too, because she’s really great and amazing and so incredibly funny and smart at the same time too,” Baekhyun continued and you couldn’t help but note that it only took one date for Baekhyun to be head over heels for Minji. Baekhyun would never talk about you like that, not even after 16 years of friendship.

“Because I really think she and I could be something, you know? And I know it sounds stupid and ridiculous because we’ve only been on one real date. I mean the ones we had when we were teenagers definitely don’t count,” Baekhyun laughed and you could see the city light up in his eyes in a way you wanted them to when he talked about you, when he looked at you, but you knew that was ridiculous, everybody did.

“And I don’t know. I’ve never been interested in relationships and whatnot before, but I do kind of want one now. God, this is cheesy, but I really think that Minji could be it. I mean she’s known me ever since we were young and she has kind of seen me grow up, you know? And she was there for me during high school and I was just a dick then. And she doesn’t care about my looks either because, well, look at my hair right now. I looked fucking stupid on our first date, but she didn’t care. She’s literally the best girl- no person I’ve ever met.”

A part of you wanted to scream at Baekhyun, cry, yell because, fuck, you had done all of that. You had known Baekhyun ever since he was young, had seen him grow up, had been there for him during high school, hell, you had done so much more than Minji had ever done. You had pretended to like his cooking when he first started out, had carried him up ten flights of stairs after he had gotten a little too drunk, had given up your bed for him when he had been too drunk even though your back complained to you for the next week about it, had made him chicken soup when he was sick. And yet, Baekhyun didn’t feel the same way about you, didn’t like you nearly as much as he liked Minji.

It wasn’t fair.

You were the best person Baekhyun had ever met, but he would never realise that, would never because he was too busy calling you his friend.

And your heart felt taunted, laughed at, ridiculed, mocked. It cowered in its cage, begging for it to be let out, but not to tell Baekhyun just how you felt, but to escape the taunt, the laughter, the ridicule, the mockery. 

“I really feel like she’s all I’ve been looking and waiting for.”

You turned your back to Baekhyun, unable to blink away the tears any longer that had been threatening to spill any second. They ran down your cheeks, leaving hot scorching trails behind them, marking where they had touched, burned your skin.

Baekhyun usually would have taken notice of your silence, taken notice of body language, but this time he didn’t. A part of you was thankful because you knew you would break, knew you would spill everything that had been weighing on your chest if he asked you what was wrong, but another wanted to scream at Baekhyun. Was this how it was going to be? Was his life just going to be consumed by Minji and no one else? Were you going to be cut out of it?

You pressed your lips together and put down the mixing bowl, ripping the gloves off your hands as you wiped across your cheeks. Baekhyun continued on, continued on talking about Minji and how great she was and you continued listening, but his words stopped registering in your mind. You just needed to protect yourself like that.

You sat down on your couch, elbowls digging into your knees as you kept nodding your head to every single one of Baekhyun’s words. He had turned around, eyes focused behind you as he rambled on, kept on telling you just how fucking amazing Minji was, how she had been the one he had been looking for, that she really showed him how great relationships could be, that she was the one that had him excited for a relationship for the first time. And whilst you listened to every word, listened to Baekhyun’s rambling about Minji, you realised one very important thing.

You could never be Minji.

You could never elicit the same feelings, same thoughts, same urges in Baekhyun Minji could after just one single date. You could never and you will never. If after 16 years of friendship, close friendship, Baekhyun couldn’t see you more than as a friend, then he wasn’t going to start soon. 

[You - 01:42] :

i know we said we were gonna do your hair tomorrow, but i really just dont feel well. maybe ask chaeyoung to do it? i know your hair somehow turned out worse and youre bothered by it and i do wanna do your hair but i just dont feel fit for it. im sorry :(

You were watching ‘Community’ once again, sprawled on your couch as you looked for a specific episode. You were in need of a laugh and you knew just what episode to watch, but you were quickly interrupted by your front door unlocking.

For a second, you were just frozen, confused and a second later you sat up and turned your head around. You were about to ask who it was when they announced their entrance themselves.

“Hey, Y/N, it’s me Baek, your best friend,” Baekhyun said and you cursed yourself for giving him a key when you had first moved in. At first, it had seemed smart for him to have a spare key in case you got locked out or something, but now you wanted to turn back time and slap it out of his hands. 

“Baek?” you called out and soon enough he turned the corner and you were met with a grinning Baekhyun, baseball cap hiding his truly awful hair. He held up a plastic container and you scrunched up your face, about to ask him what he was doing here when someone else stepped into your view.

“Minij?”

She smiled at you and gave you a wave, the excitement plastered on her face. You barely matched her smile, still too confused about this whole situation. Your eyes kept wandering between Minji and Baekhyun and you wanted to say something, but you couldn’t quite.

“Hey, Y/N,” Minji said and it was odd how little she had changed over the years. 

“What’s happening right now?” you ended up just blurting out, still too confused to really wrap your mind around whatever was going on.

“We came over because you said you weren’t feeling well,” Baekhyun explained and walked over to you, placing the plastic container right in front of you on your coffee table, “I made you chicken soup. It’s still warm.”

“Oh,” you said and slowly started to understand the purpose of this visit. You looked at the chicken soup and you could see it still steam inside the plastic container. 

“I didn’t expect that,” you cleared your throat, cheeks reddening because, god, you had to look awful, but Baekhyun and Minji thankfully didn’t comment on it. Your eyes slowly travelled back to them and you rubbed your hands together, trying to find something to say. “Uh, you guys want something to drink? I’ve got tea.”

Minji looked over to Baekhyun, obviously also a little flustered about this whole situation. He locked eyes with her, giving her the kind of smile you wished you could receive before turning to you and nodding.

Your heart was literally burying itself into the ground of its cage, attempting so desperately to just escape this, to not have to see this and you wished it was this easy. You wanted for it to be this easy, for you to unsee Minji and Baekhyun together.

“Yeah, tea sounds great,” Baekhyun said, “I’ll help you with the soup.”

It was obvious to all of you that you didn’t need help with the soup, obvious to all of you that you could very much just eat it out of the plastic container, obvious to all of you that Baekhyun only said that to get a chance to talk to you in private and all of you played along.

“Okay, I’ll just be here,” Minji smiled before turning to look at you, asking you for permission and you nodded.

“Yeah, just make yourself feel at home,” you said and put the remote on the coffee table for her, grabbing the plastic container and handing it over to Baekhyun when he walked over as you straightened up, “The bathroom is just down the hall, second door on the left. In case you need it or something.”

You pointed into the hallway, incredibly glad that even if Minji was to go to the bathroom, it would be in the opposite direction of your kitchen. Minji nodded and thanked you before Baekhyun and you headed for your kitchen, acting like you were going to do something in there except talk.

“Are you mad?” Baekhyun asked when he closed the door behind him and you poured water into your water kettle. You turned it on and waited a few seconds, listening to the water start to boil before turning around to face Baekhyun, hands folding over your stomach.

“No,” you said and you honestly weren’t sure if you were lying or not. You were still too confused to figure out. “I wouldn’t say I’m mad, but- I’m definitely not thrilled.”

Baekhyun put down the plastic container on your countertop and rubbed his hands together.

“I thought you liked Minji,” Baekhyun whispered into the silence and you groaned, shaking your head at him.

“Baek, this has nothing to do with whether or not I like Minji or not. For the record, I do,” you started, growing annoyed because, fuck, how could Baekhyun be this inconsiderate at times? “This is about the fact that you just showed up with her without asking me beforehand.”

“But I do that like, all the time. Isn’t that why you gave me a key?” Baekhyun asked and recalled the many times he had paid you a surprise visit. Your arms tightened around your stomach, the water behind you starting to boil, whistle. 

“No,” you sighed and licked your lips, “I gave you a key for emergencies and just because you’ve been showing up out of nowhere doesn’t mean I’m fine with it or fine with you just bringing someone along.”

“Okay, but you never said anything before that about that,” Baekhyun argued and you threw your head back, eyes screwing shut as you felt yourself start to get too worked up about this, “And Minji isn’t just ‘someone’. You know her. Don’t act like I picked up a stranger-”

“Baek,” you cut in and turned your head to him, eyes locking with his, “how about you own up to the fact that it’s not okay to just show up at other people’s flat with other people? And, again, this isn’t about Minji. I’d be equally mad if you showed up with Sehun or Chanyeol.”

Baekhyun pressed his lips into a thin line and you could see the frustration build up in his eyes, build up inside him. A part of your heart just wanted to close the distance, pull him into your arms and tell him it was fine, but you shut off that part. This wasn’t okay and you weren’t going to act like it was.

Silence settled and you only turned around when you heard the water kettle switch off behind you. You pulled out three mugs, grabbing a bag of green tea and two bags of chamomile tea. You put both of them respectively into the mugs, pouring the hot water into them until it reached the brim of the mugs.

You could hear Baekhyun shuffle behind you and soon enough he was standing next to you, leaned against the countertop as he watched you stare at the tea bags. You knew he was waiting for you to look at him, face him, but you didn’t feel like it.

Baekhyun sighed softly next to you before reaching over to tuck a strand behind your ear, fingers lingering behind your ear and you wanted to swat away his hand. It was laughable, pathetic how that simple gesture had your heart looking up, skipping and jumping around in its cage when it should stay beaten down, on the floor, there where it belonged.

“I’m sorry,” Baekhyun started and his voice was a quiet whisper, barely loud enough to reach your ears, “You’re right, of course, you’re right.”

You just let out a small breath, letting Baekhyun continue without interruption.

“I didn’t plan this or something. I just let it slip that I was gonna drop by at yours and Minji had seemed so excited to see you again,” Baekhyun continued, fingers skimming the top of your ear, “And she also told me in secret that she always admired you, thought you were cool or something. So I suggested that she come with me.”

Your gaze travelled to him and any frustration had dissipated the second Baekhyun had apologised. You weren’t surprised, you could never be mad at him for long.

You turned to him, hand wrapping around his wrist to remove his hand from your ear, scared that your heart might just combust if you let his fingertips linger a little longer, scared that Minji might walk in and get the wrong impression.

“It’s fine, I get it,” you hummed softly, shuffling a little away from Baekhyun, needing distance to breathe, “Just don’t bring someone over like that again. Check with me first.”

Baekhyun nodded and a smile started pulling on the corners of his lips, eliciting a smile from you. Both of you just did that for a while, smiled at each other and it was all fine for a moment before you remembered something, remembered Minji sitting in your living room.

“You also shouldn’t touch me like that anymore,” you started, voice wavering a little and gestured around when Baekhyun knitted his brows together, “You know tuck my hair away or something like that. You wouldn’t want Minji to get the wrong impression, right?”

Baekhyun pressed his lips together before he nodded, seeming to understand what you were trying to say. You could see in his eyes that he wanted to protest, probably argue that you two were just friends and that Minji understood and whatnot and you were incredibly thankful he didn’t. You couldn’t stand listening to Baekhyun just call you a friend and nothing more any longer.

“So, you said you weren’t feeling well?” Baekhyun started and you just rolled your eyes, completely forgetting before that you had to act sick or something.

“Yeah,” you lied through your teeth and Baekhyun laughed at your simple answer before shaking his head at you.

“Lying is bad,” Baekhyun said and you just tsked him, turning your head away from him to stare at your wall like you had never seen it before.

“I didn’t feel great this morning,” you said and cringed a little because even you barely sounded convinced, but it wasn’t like you were trying very hard if at all.

“But now that I’m here, you’re all better, huh? I’m all the medicine you need, right?” Baekhyun grinned and stepped into your view. His hand brushed against your arm instinctively and goosebumps travelled down your skin. 

Baekhyun had this smirk on his face and you knew he wanted to tease, challenge you a little and you wanted to play along so badly, but you couldn’t. Unlike Baekhyun you were very much aware now that he was dating and that such behaviour between a girl and a guy never sat well with the other person. You weren’t going to risk Minji and Baekhyun breaking up just because he was a little too dumb to get it. 

“Anyway, I’m gonna take these with me and you can-” you stopped to grab the plastic container and shove it into Baekhyun’s hands, “do something with this.”

Baekhyun was about to get another word out, but you quickly grabbed the mug of green tea and the mug of chamomile tea. You made your way out of your kitchen and into your living room, leaving the other mug of chamomile tea for Baekhyun.

“Hey,” Minji greeted you when you turned the corner and put away her phone. For the first time, you could mirror the smile on her lips and you handed her her green tea.

“Hi, is green tea fine or do you prefer chamomile or something else?” you asked, remembering just then that you had just thrown in tea bags without asking what Minji wanted.

“Oh, green tea is just fine. Thank you,” Minji smiled and you sat down next to her, your mug landing on your coffee table. Your eyes wandered up and down her form for the first time properly.

Her hair was now cut in a stylish bob and it was insane how well it suited her. There was still something very youthful about her and you were glad to see that she didn’t lose that spark, that fire burning in her pupils. Her lips were glossy with chapstick and a perfect winged eyeliner adorned her eyes.

Minji hadn’t changed much, hadn’t changed much appearance wise, hadn’t changed much voice wise, hadn’t changed much personality wise and you were happy, happy because you had always liked her. You hadn’t been lying to Baekhyun when you had said all those nice things about her. 

Minji was truly an angel, considerate, kind, nice, perfect.

“Uh, can I hug you?” Minji asked and put down her mug of green tea, next to yours, turning fully to you. Her cheeks turned rosy and you were a little taken aback by her question. Minji and you became friends when she dated Baekhyun, but the second they broke up, you two were back to being classmates.

“It’s just been such a long time, but if you don’t want to it’s completely fine and I mean you’re also sick. Not like I mind, but if you-”

Your arms wrapped around Minji’s shoulder and she immediately reciprocated your hug, hands settling on your shoulder blades like yours had. 

“It’s so nice to see you again, Minji,” you said when you two pulled away. You were seated a lot closer to her now and both of you smiled at the other, obviously genuinely happy to see the other. “I’m sorry if I was a little cold just-”

“No, please don’t apologise,” Minji quickly cut in and shook her head at you, “If anything I should apologise. Baekhyun had just said that it would be fine and I mean I did want to see you again.”

Minji’s cheeks reddened even more at her confession and you could just chuckle, feeling this urge in your chest to wrap your arms around her and never let her go. She had always been so cute and sweet.

“Well, I’m very happy you’re here,” you said and Minji’s whole face turned red at your words, eliciting only a chuckle from you. It was now that you realised, realised why Baekhyun liked Minji so much. She was truly deserving of everything and you didn’t blame him for starting to like Minji. 

It still hurt, there was no denying in it and there was definitely still a part of you that was bitter and angry and frustrated about the fact that Baekhyun liked Minji and not you, but it had gotten a little smaller and was securely hidden away now.

“Can I just say how amazing and great I think it is that Baek and you are still friends?” Minji said and you reached for your mug, gaze turning to her before you blew over the surface of your tea. 

“I guess thanks?” you laughed, a little unsure how to respond. You had to be honest, you didn’t think it was an amazing feat, after all Baekhyun and you had been friends with each other for the past 16 years.

“No, I mean most people grow apart, but you guys have always stayed strong,” Minji explained, eyes glazing over as she started to recall high school, “I always admired you guys. I’ve always wanted such a strong bond and friendship. It was- sorry, is truly amazing.”

“I guess it’s childhood friends for a reason, right?” you mused, taking a sip from your tea. 

“Yeah, but I remember girls being so freaking jealous of you,” Minji continued and your eyes grew a little bigger at her words. That was news to you.

“Were you?” you asked carefully and raised a brow at Minji. You weren’t sure what answer you were hoping for and what you were expecting, but you were curious.

Minji’s eyes jumped to yours and she smiled at you before shaking her head and you knew she meant it.

“No, at least not in the way the others were,” Minji said and you nodded, a little sad that you couldn’t elicit the same jealousy in her like she could in you.

“I was definitely jealous of your friendship, but never the way the others were.” Minji shrugged and you took another sip from your tea and this time the liquid burned on its way down, but you didn’t flinch.

“I just hate the cliche of the girlfriend hating and being jealous of their boyfriend’s female friend. It’s just so stupid,” Minji continued and you hummed, agreeing that the cliche should die in TV and films, “Jealousy is just so spiteful.”

You thought about Minji’s words for a few seconds before letting out an unsure noise. Minji leaned forward, genuinely curious about your thoughts.

“You don’t think?”

You shook your head and put down your tea, scared you would spill some of it on you if you had it in your hand any longer.

“I don’t feel like jealousy is inherently spiteful. Sure, there is definitely this ugly kind of jealousy. You know the kind we see on TV and whatnot, but I also feel like there’s a different kind. The kind that, I don’t know, shows you care. The kind you don’t really want to feel because jealousy isn’t the nicest feeling, but you can’t help yourself but to feel just that, feel just jealous.”

You sounded unsure, uncertain, confused and you were about to dismiss all of your words, tell Minji how they didn’t make any sense whatsoever when she cut in.

“I really didn’t think about it this way,” Minji started, humming lowly as she brood over your words for another second, “But I think you’re right.”

“Wow, philosophical much?” 

You turned your head around to see Baekhyun standing in the doorway with a bowl of chicken soup in his one hand and mug in his other. He smiled at both of you before walking over to you, putting the bowl right in front of you. You looked into it and you were about to thank him when you watched Baekhyun walk around your coffee table to sit down next to Minji, but not without pressing a kiss against her temple.

You ignored your heart, refusing to acknowledge it in its cage and instead started to take a sip from the chicken soup Baekhyun had made for you.

“Thanks,” you smiled and Baekhyun nodded, grinning at Minji and you.

“We weren’t being philosophical,” Minji laughed and softly ran her fingers across Baekhyun’s jaw, “We were just talking a little bit.”

You hummed in agreement, but you had this feeling the noise got lost and didn't meet Baekhyun’s ears. He put down his mug and wrapped an arm around Minji’s waist. She leaned into him and you felt your heart tighten and ache, but you shut it up, refusing to pay it any attention.

“Sure, but like deep talking, right?” Baekhyun said and looked at you for confirmation, but his gaze didn’t linger long enough on you. Instead, it wandered to Minji and stayed there and you could feel your chest tighten painfully.

“We weren’t talking about anything major or worth nothing.”

Your hand twitched next to you and almost instinctively you wanted to do your mock salute, repeat Minji’s words after ‘major’, but you halted. Your gaze shot to Baekhyun, but it was either because he didn’t notice it or because he was staring too deeply into Minji’s eyes because he didn’t even react. His hand didn’t flinch and the words didn’t even start to slip out.

“I’m sure it was interesting,” Baekhyun hummed and pressed another kiss against Minji’s temple. Your grip around your spoon tightened and your jaw locked up at the sight of it all. You kept your head low, gaze downcasted as you swallowed the chicken soup, every sip edging you closer to throw up.

“It really wasn’t,” Minji giggled and placed her hand on Baekhyun’s knee. You wanted nothing more than to yell, jump up and lock yourself into your bathroom, but you feared neither would notice and you didn’t want to have your fear confirmed.

Baekhyun grinned at Minji, arms tightening around her waist and you just shuffled away, inching closer to the edge of your couch.

“Well, I still think it was. You are so smart you can only talk about deep stuff,” Baekhyun said and you wished you could shut off your brain, wished you couldn’t see their every movement even though your head was literally inside the bowl already. 

“You’re literally so smart, babe.”

You thought your heart was going to pierce through your chest and throw itself out of your window when you heard the pet name. Your skin started crawling and your grip around your spoon tightened so much that your knuckles turned white, turned white so much they almost teared through your skin. A lump lodged itself into your throat and you thought you were going to choke on the chicken soup.

“Oh, Baek.”

Minji giggled in a way you could never, in a way that it sounded pleasant, soothing. Her giggle was heartfluttering and you didn’t fault Baekhyun for liking her so fucking much because there was truly nothing about her that you could ever dislike, not even if you tried your hardest to find something.

And that fact made it just so much more difficult, so much more difficult for you to smile, laugh, nod, agree, talk, act fine, act fine when you were dying inside, when your heart was digging its one grave to rest, sleep in.

It was then that you realised it, realised that you needed distance, realised that you needed distance to heal, realised that you needed distance to move on, realised that you needed distance from Baekhyun.

[Baekhyun - 20:42] :

for clarification, can i still pay you surprise visits?

You didn’t respond and Baekhyun didn’t notice.

“I can’t do your hair this weekend. I’ve gotta study.”

“I’m sorry, I promised Sooyoung I’d go shopping with her.”

“Sorry, I just saw your message. Let’s take a rain check on your hair, yeah?”

“I’ve been very busy this week and I wanted to take the weekend just for myself to relax a little.”

You thought it was going to get easier, easier to type out the messages, easier to lie to Baekhyun, easier to avoid Baekhyun, but you could feel your heart die a little inside you with every message, could feel your chest tighten painfully with every lie, could feel yourself missing Baekhyun more and more with every day you spent without hanging out with him, talking, texting or simply seeing him.

Every time you saw him on campus, you made sure to run into the opposite direction and for once, you were thankful that your campus was as big as it was. Avoiding Baekhyun was also a lot easier because you knew his routine, knew his schedule, knew his way to class. 

In the 16 years of friendship he and you had never spent more than three days without contact with each other. He and you had been attached to the hip ever since you had met Baekhyun and both of you had fallen into a routine of being with each other every day ever since. He and you even talked when Baekhyun had been on the other side of the globe when his family went on holiday. The time difference didn’t stop either of you from talking, from calling the other, from texting.

So every morning you woke up wanting to grab your phone and call him up, wanting to jump out of your bed and bang on his front door, wanting to wrap your arms around him and tell him you were sorry for avoiding him, but every morning you stopped yourself, controlled yourself, but you could feel yourself slip more and more with each day without Baekhyun.

You went to sleep earlier in an attempt to forget for a little and today was no exception. Surprisingly, it was easy for you to fall asleep, easy for you to sleep through the night, but this time you couldn’t.

“What the fuck?”

You jerked up and you hit your head on the back of your bed, hands gripping around your blanket when you had felt a hand on your shoulder, ripping you out of your sleep. It took your eyes a few seconds to adjust to the darkness, to realise just who had touched you.

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” Baekhyun whispered even though you weren’t sleeping anymore. He held up his hands and had taken a step back, scared you were going to punch him or something when you had suddenly woken up.

“What the fuck, Baekhyun?” you yelled and took one of your pillows to hurl it at him. He caught it and held it in front of him, for protection.

“I’m so so sorry, Y/N-”

“What the fuck are you doing in my bedroom?” you said and turned to your clock to check the time, “It’s fucking one in the morning. What are you doing here?”

You hadn’t thought that was how your first time seeing Baekhyun in a month was going to go and for a moment, you had completely forgotten that things were awkward between him and you.

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” Baekhyun apologised for the third time now and slowly inched forward. You let out long breaths, your heart still pounding in your chest and for the first time, it wasn’t because Baekhyun had smiled at you.

“What are you doing here?” you hissed, but nevertheless moved away to give Baekhyun some space to sit down, “I thought I told you it wasn’t cool to just show up unannounced.”

“No, yeah, I know,” Baekhyun started and sat down on the edge of your bed, your mattress dipping underneath his weight, your pillow landing in Baekhyun’s lap, “And I’ve been trying not to come, but-”

Baekhyun stopped and you could hear the quiver in his voice. He let his head drop and it clicked in your mind that something was wrong, clicked in your mind that something had happened. And you softened, softened immediately.

You could see Baekhyun swallow heavily in the darkness and you placed your hand on his, scowl melting away to allow for worry to etch into your features.

“What happened?” you asked softly and it was like your question had turned a switch in Baekhyun’s head because the tears spilled, the sobs teared through his throat. Baekhyun broke down in front of you and you were quick to wrap your arms around him, pull him close to you.

“It’s fine,” you whispered into Baekhyun’s ear as the tears continued to spill from his eyes, as the sobs continued to rip through his chest, leaving him empty and heaving for air, “I’m here. It’s fine. Just let it out, it’s okay.”

Baekhyun’s hands grabbed your T-shirt, gripping it so tightly that you knew the knit was never going to straighten out of it, but you let him, let him hold onto you like his life depended on it. You didn’t care that his tears stained your shirt, didn’t care that you spent the hour just holding Baekhyun close to you. 

Baekhyun and you had moved further into your bed at one point and he was now laying in your lap, arms wrapped around your pillow, knees drawn to his chest as you continued to whisper assuring words into his ear, continued to wipe away the tears whenever they dared to spill from his eyes, continued to comb your fingers through his hair.

The silence between you two was never interrupted during the hour safe for your words and Baekhyun’s sobs and hiccups, but he never spoke a single word. You wanted to know what had happened and you knew it was Minji, but you didn’t ask, didn’t push Baekhyun to speak and tell you because you knew he wasn’t ready. And if he never was going to be, you were fine with that too.

So you were surprised when Baekhyun decided to speak up after an hour of crying.

“It’s not easy.”

The words came out broken through Baekhyun’s lips and you stopped for just a moment to comb through his hair before continuing again. You watched Baekhyun swallow heavily, struggling to find the words to capture the emotions and sadness ripping through his entire body.

“It’s not easy with Minji,” Baekhyun said and you wiped away the tears, “I talk to her and we can talk, but we don’t- we don’t really talk. We just say stuff to each other, but it never- It just doesn’t feel quite-”

Baekhyun shook his head and you just let out a low hum, wanting to show him you were listening, but not wanting to interrupt him in any way. It took Baekhyun minutes to speak up again and you didn’t mind.

“It just doesn’t feel quite right, natural,” Baekhyun sobbed and you knew these thoughts had been on his mind for a long time now, laying and weighing down on his chest, “easy.”

“You talked to her about it?”

When Baekhyun peered at you, strands sticking to his forehead and eyes red from all of the crying, you knew the answer, knew he hadn’t. It was Baekhyun after all.

“You should,” you whispered, heart breaking to see Baekhyun like that. You wanted to give him everything, wanted to fix it for him, wanted to heal him, but you knew there was nothing you could do. Baekhyun had to do it himself and he knew that.

A part of you blamed yourself for all of this, blamed yourself for Baekhyun’s state right now. You cursed yourself for not being there for him during this month, cursed yourself for not being there when things started to crumble, cursed yourself for not being there to pick up the pieces and you would turn back time if you could. You would stay by Baekhyun’s side even if that meant listening to him gush about Minji on and on, even if that meant seeing him press kisses against her lips, her temple, her nose, her forehead, even if that meant hearing him call her ‘babe’ as long as it meant that you would catch Baekhyun before the fall.

“I don’t know how,” Baekhyun cried and his face contorted into pain and sadness. You could feel your own tears brim your eyes and you squeezed your lips shut, head turning away to silently drag your hand underneath your eyes.

“Why isn’t it easy, Y/N?” Baekhyun asked you and you wanted to have the answer, but you didn’t know.

“I thought Minji was it, thought Minji and I could be something,” Baekhyun continued and you could feel new tears forming again. You could barely swipe away Baekhyun’s before new ones spilled, not to mention wipe away your own. So you let yours spill, let yours tears just fall, run down your cheek, burn your skin.

“I just want to love someone, Y/N.”

Your teeth sank into your bottom lip and you wanted to tell Baekhyun to love you, to choose you, but you swallowed the words and locked them away like you had done with your own feelings, your own heart.

“Why can’t I find someone to love, Y/N?”

Your vision continued to blur and you hugged Baekhyun tighter to you, wanting so desperately for him to feel all the love you were giving him.

“Why can’t I find someone to love me, Y/N?”

You shook your head, begging silently for Baekhyun to stop asking you because you did, you fucking did. You loved Baekhyun as much as the stars loved the moon, as much as Romeo loved Julia, as much as the Earth loved the Sun.

But it wasn’t enough.

It wasn’t enough for Baekhyun to notice and you wanted to give him more, bleed him more, but you were at your wits’ end. You didn’t have anything more inside you, anything more to offer and you wished you did.

“I’m sorry, Baek.”

“Thank you.”

Your eyes travelled to the mirror and locked with Baekhyun’s in it. You stopped applying the bleach and tilted your head to the side.

“For what?”

You stopped avoiding Baekhyun after that night and just two days later he and you were sitting in your flat again. You were bleaching his hair for a third time because the second time had somehow turned out more patchy and since it would only translate patchy if you slapped the red on, Baekhyun and you decided to bleach his hair for a third time. Hopefully the last time.

Baekhyun smiled at you and you started brushing the bleach alongside the back of Baekhyun’s head again.

“For everything.”

You just looked at Baekhyun and gave him a simple nod, both of you communicating by just looking at each other. It was enough for you both, all you needed.

Baekhyun had ended up staying the night the other day and you hadn’t minded at all. In the morning, it had been admittedly awkward and weird, but luckily both of you had classes to attend. During the day you had arranged lunch with him and it had been quietly established during it that you two would just ignore and not talk about what had happened. 

“Anyway, Sooyoung just noped out of there and went home,” you finished telling your story and Baekhyun laughed along, grins adorning your lips, “But, again, don’t ask her about it. She’s gonna fucking kill me.”

“Yeah, I got it.” Baekhyun rolled his eyes at your hundredth reminder not to talk to Sooyoung about her recent date and you just shrugged. Baekhyun folded his ear over when you got to it and you carefully applied the bleach around it.

You were so busy focusing on applying the bleach that you couldn’t bring yourself to tell another story. And for the first minute, you didn’t even notice the silence lingering between you two, the music playing quietly serving as enough background noise for you.

You moved to Baekhyun’s front, leaning down to make sure you had evenly applied the bleach to his root. And it was then that he decided to speak up, when there was no escaping him because he was directly staring into your eyes and you were directly staring into his eyes.

“Why did you avoid me?”

You froze and your eyes travelled to Baekhyun’s, locking with them in an instant. Your heart started hiding in its cage and you wished you could too.

Baekhyun’s gaze was unwavering and you swallowed, not sure what to say. Your throat felt dry, scratchy and the lump lodged inside of it certainly didn’t make it easier for you.

“And please don’t say you weren’t because we both know it’s a lie,” Baekhyun said quietly and you wanted to give in, let out the truth, but you knew you couldn’t, “Please, don’t lie to me.”

You really wanted not to lie to him because it hurt you just as much as it hurt him when you lied to him. No, in fact, it hurt you even more than it hurt him when you lied to him. Every time you had to, had to think of some bullshit excuse and present it to him, you felt like dying, felt like your heart was withering, rotting away in its cage.

“It was just,” you started, shrugging and right away Baekhyun and you knew you were lying, “It was just not a good month.”

You thought Baekhyun was going to call you out on it, demand for the truth because he had just asked for it, but instead he looked at you and nodded. His lips were pressed into a thin line like he was holding back so many words and you hoped, prayed they would stay sealed shut.

“Okay.”

And that was it. You finished applying the rest of the bleach and Baekhyun thanked you with a smile, a smile that almost reached his eyes and you assured him there was no need to thank you with a smile too, a smile that also almost reached your eyes.

“Tea?” you turned to Baekhyun after he had just finished setting the timer for his hair to process. He looked up from his phone and nodded.

You moved into your kitchen, pouring the water into your water kettle and turning it on before opening the cabinet to your mugs. You almost missed Baekhyun’s steps, the water starting to boil and whistle so loud that the noise was almost drowned out.

I think you're gonna change my plans With those emerald eyes But you don't even understand How much they're on my mind

‘Claudia’ by Finneas started playing throughout your flat and you turned around. Baekhyun approached you with a smile on his lips and this time it was genuine. His hands reached for yours and before you knew it, he was twirling you in your own kitchen.

Baekhyun started singing almost in an instant and you could only smile, could only enjoy his singing. He and you started dancing, but he led, holding your hands and encouraging you to do various spins.

You spun into Baekhyun’s chest and almost lost your balance, but Baekhyun was there to hold you, steady you at your waist, fingers digging into your skin as he sung the chorus.

Oh, I'm in trouble now Come kiss me black and blue Might last another round But I'm bound to fall for you

Your eyes locked with Baekhyun’s and your lungs were left aching for air, oxygen because staring into Baekhyun’s eyes stole your breath away. The words slipped off Baekhyun’s lips with such ease and grace that your heart almost believed them, that your heart started rattling its cage, but you quickly realised it was a song and this meant nothing to Baekhyun.

You turned on your heel, spinning out of Baekhyun’s arms. For a moment, you thought Baekhyun looked sad, but then he continued singing and you joined him. Your heart, however, wasn’t in it as much as it was before, the possibility that Baekhyun maybe meant his words haunting you and taking up too much space in your mind.

We're undercover now I don't know what you do Just know I love it now I'm bound to fall for you

You were making yourself dinner when you heard your front door unlock, but unlike before you didn’t whip your head around and ask who it was. You knew who it was because it could only be him.

Baekhyun had started to come over to your place more often than not, started to abuse the power of the key you had given to him and you stopped minding, stopped minding after he had come to you that night and cried into your chest.

“What’s up?” you asked and turned around when Baekhyun entered your kitchen, turning off your stove because you had just finished your chicken. Baekhyun raised a take out plastic bag into your view and you let out a sigh.

“You already made dinner, huh?” Baekhyun hummed and you could only nod, “Fuck, I wanted to surprise you with Chinese.”

“But you know I always make dinner at 7,” you said and Baekhyun placed the bag on your counter, unpacking all of the food he had bought. You helped him.

“Yeah, I know,” Baekhyun sighed and ran a hand through his beautiful blond hair. It had reached a point where it was truly beautiful, the brassy tone was now completely gone and every strand matched with each other. You had to say, you were proud of what you had done.

 “I just thought that maybe today was gonna be different,” Baekhyun sighed, shrugging before bunching up the plastic bag and throwing it to the side, “What now?”

You hummed and looked at your dinner before turning back to the take out food. “I guess I’ve already made my dinner for tomorrow.”

Baekhyun grinned at you and you just mirrored it, heart fluttering in your chest because of how happy he looked. Your chicken and rice and broccoli was quickly wrapped up in tupperware and soon enough Baekhyun and you were sitting in front of your TV, enjoying Chinese together as you watched ‘Community’.

Both of you were just eating and focusing on the TV when Baekhyun turned his head to you, similarly how he had when he told you that he wanted to dye his hair.

“I’m going to Minji’s later.”

Your eyes travelled to Baekhyun and your spring roll landed back on your plate. You stared at Baekhyun, trying to see how he was feeling, but you couldn’t quite read him. His eyes were almost void of emotion and you really didn’t know what he wanted you to say.

Baekhyun and you continued to date and if you weren’t completely wrong, they had been for a little over two months now. Two weeks had passed since Baekhyun had come over to you, crying his eyes out because things weren’t working the way he wanted them to between Minji and him. 

And you knew for a fact that he hadn’t talked to her about his worries, knew for a fact that he hadn’t because Baekhyun could never. Baekhyun also stopped mentioning her in front of you, probably in fear that you would urge him to talk to her. You wouldn’t, but you were fine with him not talking to you about her.

“Okay,” you said and waited a moment, still unsure what to say, “You can do it.”

“Yeah, no, I know I can,” Baekhyun said and put down his plate, hands rubbing over the top of his legs. You paused the TV and waited quietly for Baekhyun to continue.

“I mean I’ve still been seeing her,” Baekhyun said and his gaze landed on his hands. His voice was shaky, breathy and it was like he just didn’t know what to say, like he just didn’t know what he wanted to say.

“But?” you quickly asked when Baekhyun stayed silent a little too long.

Baekhyun shuffled and folded his hands together. For a moment, it looked like he was going to say something, but then he shook his head and closed his mouth again.

“No, nothing,” Baekhyun breathed out, picking up his chopsticks again, “Just eat. It’s fine.”

You knew for a fact it wasn’t, wasn’t just fine, but you didn’t push it, knowing all too well that if Baekhyun didn’t want to talk about it ,he wasn’t going to.

You shrugged and turned on the TV again, picking up your plate like Baekhyun had.

“Okay.”

You were, once again, sleeping when you felt a hand on your shoulder.

“What?”

You jerked up again and it took your eyes to get used to the darkness. Everything felt very similar and you knew it was because Baekhyun had done this just two weeks ago, woken you up in the middle of the night.

Your heart was beating out of your chest and you ran a hand through your hair, still too sleepy to properly process what was happening.

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” Baekhyun said and you looked at him, blinking a few times.

“Are you okay, Baek? Is everything fine?” you asked and were up on your knees in an instant. Your hands landed on Baekhyun’s shoulders, ready to pull him close to your chest if he broke down again, but this time there was a small smile spread across his lips.

“Yeah, everything’s fine,” Baekhyun assured you and slowly your hands slipped down his arms. You sat down again and your fingers lightly laced with Baekhyun’s.

“What’s up then?” you asked and the sleep was evident in your voice. Baekhyun’s smile grew into a grin, a grin you didn’t quite like because it was different. You squinted your eyes and Baekhyun settled on the edge of your bed, hands intertwining with yours as he squeezed your hands lightly.

“Will you dye my hair black?”

There was a beat of silence, a beat of silence because it took you that long to realise what Baekhyun had just asked you to do. 

“What?” you spat out, annoyance and frustration growing in your voice. Baekhyun held onto you a little tighter like he was scared you would push him out of your bed and tell him to fuck off. His grin grew bigger and you hated it.

“I’m sorry, but can you please?” Baekhyun pleaded and you wanted to shove him out of your bed, but he held onto your hands a little too tight.

“Now?” you asked, turning to look at your clock, “It’s fucking two in the morning, Baek. You are kidding me, aren’t you?”

Baekhyun continued grinning at you and you groaned, throwing your head in your neck.

“I thought you were trying to not come to my flat unannounced,” you said, recalling how the last time Baekhyun had said he had been trying to not pay you surprise visits anymore.

“Oh, please, you love it when I come over,” Baekhyun laughed quietly, “If I don’t, you’d miss me too much.”

Baekhyun was right. You did kind of start to love it whenever he would come around and you would definitely miss him a little too much if he didn’t come over, but you wouldn’t admit that.

“I thought you were going to Minji’s or something. What’re you doing here?” you whined, craving the sweet sleep you had just been in.

Baekhyun let go off your hand and tipped your head back, fingers brushing a strand behind your ear and lingering on your ear again.

“I was at Minji’s.”

You furrowed your brows and rubbed your eyes, not quite understanding what ghost had possessed Baekhyun and prompted him to come over and ask you to dye his hair fucking black. Your brain was still half asleep and you were definitely not ready to have this conversation.

“We broke up.”

Now, you were wide awake. Your gaze shot to Baekhyun’s and you stared at him in the darkness, waiting for him to break out in tears or tell you he was joking or something, but he just continued to look at you with this smile on your face, this peaceful smile.

“Before you ask, I’m fine,” Baekhyun whispered quietly and his fingers wandered down the length of your hair, wrapping said strand around his finger as he continued to speak, “I broke it off and Minji was really understanding.”

You just stared at him, still too shocked to say something.

“And now, I really want black hair.”

You pressed your lips together and you weren’t sure if you believed him, believed Baekhyun that he was fine. It was then that it clicked in your mind that this was what Baekhyun had wanted to talk to you about when you were eating, that he had been trying to tell you he was going to break up with Minji.

“You’ve got dye?”

Baekhyun grinned at you and, of course, he nodded at you. He pulled you out of bed and when you walked into your living room, you were surprised to see that he had already set everything up. Baekhyun had somehow managed to lay out the papers, open all of the windows and prepare the dye in the mixing bowl without you hearing a single sound.

“What would you have done if I had said no?” you asked, putting on the gloves that were next to the mixing bowl. Baekhyun wrapped the towel around his shoulder and smirked at you.

“You wouldn’t have.”

And you really wouldn't have.

“How could you be so sure?” you laughed and Baekhyun’s smirk grew a little bigger when you handed him the mixing bowl to divide his hair.

“Because you love me.”

Your heart froze in its cage and panic almost flushed through your whole system, but you were quick to get it together. Your eyes wandered to Baekhyun and you knew right away that he didn’t mean it the way you first thought he did.

“Whatever,” you exhaled, voice slightly pitchy as you clipped in the barrettes. Baekhyun just chuckled, shrugging to himself before putting on music.

And both of you did that for a while. You dyed Baekhyun’s hair at two in the morning and Baekhyun just sang along to the music every now and then.

“Why black so suddenly?” you said and took up some of the black dye on your brush. Baekhyun hummed and scratched his arm. “I thought you really wanted red.”

“Yeah, I thought so too,” Baekhyun hummed, “But I just realised that sometimes that you truly don’t want something, you just think you do.”

You paused for just a second before you just ignored Baekhyun’s words and continued. But this time, Baekhyun didn’t feel like ignoring things, he felt like talking, opening up, being brave.

“She was really understanding, Y/N,” Baekhyun said and you knew who he was talking about. You moved in front of Baekhyun and just let him continue as you dyed his roots at the front. “I told her how I’ve been feeling and she understood, said she could feel that something wasn’t quite right.” 

“Well, I’m happy that it wasn’t another ‘Minji Baekhyun Gate’ this time,” you grinned, recalling the memory of their breakup in high school. Baekhyun, however, didn’t laugh at your words and just fixed you with a stare, a very intense gaze.

You could feel the tension thicken between you two and you stopped applying the dye, brush landing in your mixing bowl.

“You know I thought about Minji and me a lot the past weeks and I asked myself over and over again what was wrong, why we just didn’t feel quite right,” Baekhyun said and you held in your breath, eyes glued to Baekhyun’s.

“I really wanted for Minji and me to work, but it didn’t and I was really upset and sad about it,” Baehyun continued and you didn’t know what he was trying to tell you, “But then I realised that there was no reason to. Sometimes things just don’t work out.”

“And Minji agreed with me, told me that she had learned after our first breakup that it’s stupid and useless to force a connection, a bond when there wasn’t one. In fact, she joked that maybe that was why she and I got together again. So, I could learn what she had learned after our initial breakup.”

Baekhyun stopped for a few seconds like he was thinking about how to word the next things and you could only continue to stare at him and let him talk

“And, you know what? Minji is right. I’ve been looking for someone to love and when I stumbled across her again, I just thought that was the universe’s way of telling me that Minji is the one I’ve been looking for, but, well, she isn’t.”

Baekhyun stopped again, taking a longer pause this time. He drew in a very long breath, eyes glancing up into yours and you could feel your heart stop when he did.

“You are, Y/N.”

You thought your brain was playing tricks on you, that you had misheard, but Baekhyun continued and quenched all of your doubts.

“I’ve been blind this whole time, Y/N, and I’m sorry that I’ve been,” Baekhyun whispered and his hand laced with yours, “I wanted to find someone to love and someone to love me and I feel so stupid because you’ve been there all this time. You’ve been by my side, seen my worst and you are still with me, tolerate me even though-”

You pressed your lips against Baekhyun’s and it took Baekhyun a second to realise what had happened, but quickly his hands found your waist and he pressed you flush against his chest. Baekhyun straightened up, pulling you closer to him as he continued moving his lips against yours.

The mixing bowl fell out of your hand without you thinking about it as you cupped Baekhyun’s face, but when it landed at your feet and the dye splashed up your legs, you had to pull away.

“Fuck,” you laughed, bliss still filling up your chest as you looked down. The dye had landed all over your floor, but luckily it wasn’t much. However, you were still scared that the black was going to stick.

“Yeah, fuck, big time,” Baekhyun said and you looked at him. You almost bursted out into laughter again when you saw him. Black dye stained his cheeks and it was then that you remembered that you had cupped Baekhyun’s face with your gloves on.

“I’m so sorry, Baek,” you said and quickly took off your gloves, letting them fall to the floor as you started to attempt to rub away the dye. Baekhyun just laughed and took a hold of your hands, shaking his head.

“It’s fine,” Baekhyun said and you shook your head at him this time.

“No, we gotta wash it out,” you said and Baekhyun just grinned at you. You turned on your heel, wanting to lead Baekhyun into your bathroom, but he stopped you. He turned you around to him again and you stared at him, cheeks flushing red the longer the silence lingered on.

“I’m major in love with you.”

All of the locks on your heart broke away and your heart pushed the door to its cage open, spilling out of it to reveal itself. 

“Major in love with you.”

“Major in love with you.”

Baekhyun and you both saluted and spoke at the same time, eyes wrinkling when you bursted out into laughter. You cut the laughter short though when you pressed another kiss against Baekhyun’s lips.

“But I am, Baek,” you breathed against his lips and he grinned at you, “I’m major in love with you.”

“I’m major in love with you, too, Y/N.”

Baekhyun and you saluted again.

masterlist

#baekhyun #exo #baekhyun angst #baehyun fluff #exo angst #exo fluff #baekhyun x reader #exo x reader #baekhyun au #exo au #best friends to lovers #bff2l #baekhyun fanfiction #baekhyun fanfic #exo fanfiction #exo fanfic #baekhyun scenario #baekhyun imagine #exo imagine #exo scenario #baekhyun one shot #exo one shot #in love with you #linh.fic

[bellemareyouserious]

Panic Room

warnings: tom wilson x f reader, mention of alcohol, mention of toxic relationship, swearing, SMUT

word count: 3,682

authors note: WOW y’all its been a hot minute since i wrote anything!!! i was inspired to write for @hockeynetwork​‘s fic exchange, this story is for you @ihaveamillionfandoms​ !! i really hope you enjoy it! (special shoutouts to @tkuhnhackl​ for helping me edit and to @coffee77cat​ for sending me so much hot Tom for inspo)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Panic. 

You're 3 shots and a couple of drinks deep when you spot your ex boyfriend through the crowd. You could've sworn it was a drunken hallucination but the second glance tells you it's a nightmare come to life. The fear sets in quickly when you shoot a side eye to your best friend at the exact same time she spots him. She's in the middle of the dance floor with some random guy attached to her back so she can't do much to help you besides motioning for you to get some air. 

The drink in your hands is funneled down your throat before you're speed walking to the bathroom on the verge of a panic attack, praying your ex didn't see you. The breakup was nasty and only happened a couple of weeks ago, though it felt like years since you've seen him. The relationship should've ended months before. You kept making excuses for him and blaming it on yourself. Looking back on it, the toxicity was all him and you finally figured out you deserve better than that. So you left. 

He didn't take it so well. Called you every name in the book, tried to turn your friends against you, even tried to convince your parents to talk to you for him. You knew you made the right decision when he trashed your car before your 12 hour shift. Even though it was finally over, the emotional trauma left behind wasn't so easily forgotten, which is why even seeing him sent you into fight or flight mode. 

The path to the bathroom is crowded and dark. You definitely have a slight buzz that isn't helping either. You finally spot the small sign and practically run around the corner to get there when you run face first into a broad chest and nearly fall backwards, but two strong hands catch you before you hit the ground. 

"Oh my god I'm so sorry are you okay? I didn't even see you comi- hey is that you y/n?"

Before you get a chance to be embarrassed about the situation you quickly recognize the large man in front of you as Tom Wilson from the Washington Capitals. Or just Tom to you. 

"H-hey Tom, it's okay I ran into you. Thanks for uh, catching me," you stutter out, still in panic mode from seeing your ex. You see the confusion on his face as soon as you feel your hands shaking on top of his arms. You've known Tom for a couple of years now through your job. You started as a nursing student intern at Medstar and eventually worked your way up to becoming a full time pediatric nurse. The Capitals often visited the kids staying there and you happened to meet Tom one day on their Christmas visit, immediately blushing and thinking of how hot this guy was. Your coworkers were quick to spot how he was making you feel and kept teasing you about it until he walked in and heard the whole conversation. Your face when you saw him in the room had to have been priceless; he cracked up when you turned around and realized. It was one of the most embarrassing moments of your life but when you went to lunch that day there was a note waiting for you on the fridge. "You're cute when you're embarrassed. Text me sometime. Xo Tom" with his number attached to it. You couldn't believe he had an interest in you but you needed to play it cool and wait a few days to text him. 

You talked to him constantly the first couple of weeks, and you really thought there could be something between you two. However, with both of your jobs being so damn hectic, there was little to no time to see him and things fizzled out pretty quickly. You were bummed but the two of you still occasionally talked over the last few years and hung out as friends a couple of times.

Now he's standing there holding you, on the brink of a breakdown, in the middle of a loud and crowded club. Perfect circumstances, you think sarcastically. 

He lifts your chin up with one finger and looks in your eyes before he speaks this time. "Hey look at me. Are you okay? What's wrong?"

"I uh, saw my ex on the dance floor and I'm kinda freaking out," you manage to get out while looking over your shoulder for any sign of your ex. 

Tom's demeanor instantly shifts from soft and serious to protective. "Has he hurt you? Do I need to beat his ass?" Now he looks around despite not knowing what he looks like. You chuckle to yourself but put a hand on his chest. 

"No you don't need to beat his ass but I appreciate the offer. He's never touched me but he can get scary when he's drunk. It didn't end well," you undersell how badly it ended so Tom wouldn't actually kill him tonight. "Just the sight of him put me into a panic but I feel a bit better now."

His eyes fixate back on you to find worry still written on your face. "Well now that I know that I'm not letting you be alone in here. Nobody should ever feel that way," he all but barks out. You flinch away from the sound slightly, his thumb rubbing your arm instinctively when he notices. "Do you still want to go to the bathroom for a minute? I'll wait here for you."

His strong presence alone calms you enough to feel okay again, though you want to make sure you don't look a mess before returning to your best friend. "Yeah, that would be great actually. Thanks, Tom," you smile at him as you slipped into the bathroom. Your hands brace the sink as you take a look at your flustered state in the mirror, not too bad for someone who basically saw a ghost. Your face is beet red but other than that, not even a hair out of place. Impressive. You’re glad for at least that, Tom seeing you like that and looking like a hot mess would've been even more embarrassing. You smooth your outfit swiftly before returning to Tom. 

"You okay?" he asks at your return and you give him a small nod. "Okay good, let's go get you some water," he holds his hand out for you to take and intertwines your fingers easily, making your heart skip a beat. Your eyes flick down to your hand and back up to Tom's face just in time to see the hint of a smile pulling at his lips while you weave through the crowd. The flush on your face is more prominent now, you’re sure of it. 

The heavy beat thumps against your chest, distracting you from your irregular heartbeat and dizzy thoughts. You run into someone and realize it's y/b/f/n. 

"Oh my god, y/n. Are you okay?! Sorry I couldn't get away from that guy in time to be with you. I think your ex left but I can't be 100% sure-" their rambling stops when they realize you have a giant man attached to your arm. "Oh wow, Tom right? How lucky is y/n that you're here tonight?!" They grab Tom for a hug, he looks surprised that they remember him and returns the hug, never letting go of your hand. "I'm so happy you're here!" you hear them yell in Tom's ear over the music. They look between the two of you and gesture back to the dance floor, "Shall we?" They reach for your free hand and drag both of you onto the crowded dance floor. Your eyes meet Tom's again as you raise your eyebrows at him, earning a laugh. 

You are starting to feel better and more comfortable just by having Tom's hand in yours. A poppy song starts playing so you start bopping along when Tom suddenly twirls you around and draws you back into his arms, face inches from yours when you start to feel the butterflies. It feels like you could stay this way for hours and be content with it. 

You sense Tom is thinking the same when he gives you a shy smile but he immediately surprises you by turning you back around and attaching himself to you, hands gripping your waist. You’re glad to be facing away from him just so he couldn't see the growing flush on your face. His mouth dips down to your ear and you shiver as he whispers, "Is this okay?" in a low voice. Your enthusiastic nod makes him giggle; meanwhile his hands grip your hips even tighter. Y/b/f/n catches a glimpse of you and wiggles their eyebrows up and down with a smirk. If you were closer to them, you would've smacked them in the arm. 

Y/b/f/n picks up their phone and is on a brief call before striding back over to you and Tom. "Hey, my friend is gonna pick me up and I'm staying at their place. Tom, you okay to take y/n home?" they ask suggestively while looking between the two of you; you both just laugh and Tom speaks up first. 

"Yeah I think I can handle that, as long as it's alright with y/n," he looks down at you expectantly and your heart speeds up once again. The effect that one sentence had on your body was almost embarrassing. 

"Y-yeah, yeah. Go with your friend, be safe," you completely stutter out. 

Y/b/f/n pulls you in for a hug and murmurs, "You owe me one, kid. Be safe and have fun," they wink at you and wave goodbye as they disappear into the crowd. 

….

The traumatic events of the night are just a memory now, Tom's frame against yours the only thing on your mind. The way his hands travel your body, how perfectly his body moves in sync with yours, the tension between you is electric and you both know it. 

In the spur of the moment, you turn to face him and interlock your hands behind his neck while pushing your hips towards him. His eyes sweep down, taking in your form while his lip is drawn between his teeth. The rhythm of your bodies never stops, just gets closer and more desperate for each other. The world seems to freeze when he looks into your eyes, down at your lips, and back up to your eyes again, silently asking permission for what he's wanted to do all night. You stop breathing for just a second before moving your hand to his cheek and going in for the kiss. 

It's slow at first, wanting. The way his lips envelope yours sends your mind wandering, hoping this night ends with you in his arms (and his bed). His tongue slowly slides into yours, making you melt into him even more. The rhythm of your tongues mimics your bodies and you're craving his touch everywhere. His hands come up to rest on your ass and you immediately remember you're in a public place. You break the kiss just to catch your breath while looking up at him through your lashes, seeing the blush on his face makes you want to jump on him right then and there. 

"Do you maybe… wanna get out of here?" you ask shyly, as if you weren't just dry humping on a crowded dance floor. His low laugh sends shivers down your spine as he nods.

"My place or yours?" he asks in your ear. Before moving away he places a soft kiss right below your earlobe and you can feel your heart rate speed up instantly. 

"Yours? If that's okay?" His hand finds yours and the walk outside feels unbearable. The crowd of people only slightly part to let you by, every moment you're not attached to him feels like eternity. It's a bit chilly outside and with how hot you already are, it makes your whole body shiver.

You're finally at his car and he opens the door for you, a hint of amusement in your smile. "Wow, what a gentleman, thank you," you tease, but before you can get in he lays a firm smack on your ass. The feeling goes right to your clit and turns you on more than you'd care to admit. His smirk shows he knows exactly what you're thinking.

"What was that about being a gentleman?" he breathes out while closing your door. The second he gets in the car, you are buzzing with electricity. Everything he does gets you hotter. The car revs and you're speeding off to his place, his hand on your thigh moving upwards until you think he's finally going to touch you but then he pulls away.

By the time you get to his house, your underwear is soaked with anticipation. He practically throws the car in park and runs around to your side of the car to open the door for you. Even for a hookup he's a gentleman, although a small part of your mind wants it to be more than a hookup. You never stopped thinking about him even while dating your ex. 

Tom's hand reaches for yours as he helps you out of the car, both of you eager to get inside. He fumbles with his keys before the door is finally unlocked. As soon as you walk in, he slams the door shut and backs you up into it. Your breath catches in your throat while you take in the sight of him; the way his shirt strains against his biceps, how his pants hug his waist just right. His eyes are doing the same to you while one hand hits the door next to your face and the other cups your cheek. He can't stop staring at your lips when he whispers, "You have no idea how long I've wanted this." It makes your knees go weak, but his body pressed against yours keeps you upright. His kiss is urgent but tender, one hand roaming your body. The kiss deepens and you're left breathless, fingers tugging on his hair and clawing at his chest, silently asking for more. He gets the hint easily and suddenly his hands grip under your thighs as he picks you up. The kiss is never broken while he walks backwards towards his room, his knees abruptly hit the side of his bed and you both fall on it, giggling the whole time. He puts his hands on your legs and picks you up once again, turning you around so he's on top of you. His kisses trail from your neck down to the hem of your top and his hands find the bottom of it. He looks up at you asking for permission, so you lift yourself up so he can take it off easily. 

His eyes go wide as soon as he sees your bare chest. "So fucking beautiful," he groans while moving his mouth towards your already hard nipples. His mouth is around one licking and sucking and you can't help the small moans escaping your mouth. Your hand finds his shoulder and you motion for him to take his shirt off. He's straddling you now and easily removes his shirt, the sight one you could never get tired of. His wide frame is chiseled and you can't help but reach out and touch it. Your hands trace his muscles before finding his button and undoing it. He bites his lip and sighs at the almost contact but you continue to move slowly just to tease him. Once his pants are finally off, he moves down the bed to take yours off. A whine catches in his throat when he sees you in nothing but your panties. He comes back up to kiss you, tongue darting in your mouth with impatience. His finger moves down your body leaving goosebumps in its place. He hooks your underwear around it and pulls them down around your ankles. His finger finds your clit easily, making you moan into his mouth. His thumb starts circling your clit while his strong fingers move to your soaked pussy. He grunts when he feels just how wet you are. 

"Fuck baby," he pants out, "so fucking wet for me huh?" You just nod in response, unable to form words. "Is this okay?" he asks while mouthing sloppy kisses down your stomach. 

"Yes, yes babe," you whine. The pulse in your clit is making it hard to not push his whole face down so he can give it the attention it needs. "Please, Tom."

His tongue finally finds your throbbing clit, slow and timid motions at first while he gets a feel for what you like. He licks a stripe down and back up through your slit, nose brushing your clit on the way back up. Tom’s tongue is moving in circles making your legs shake. He sucks your clit into his mouth and you can't control the noises that come out of your throat. His mouth comes off of you with a pop and he's smirking up at you between your legs before he suddenly puts one finger into you making you gasp. He pumps it into you a couple times before adding a second one and curling them in just the right way. Your chest is heaving and you can feel your orgasm building slowly when he pulls out of you. He stands up next to the bed and pulls his boxers down, hard cock finally springing free. You look up at him through your lashes and reach out to touch it. His eyes flutter shut the moment your hand is around him, slowly pumping him before you're kneeling in front of him to put it in your mouth. 

He looks so fucking pretty like this- lips red and swollen, dick eager to be in your mouth. His hand grips your hair, pulling your head back slightly before you lean in to kitten lick the tip. You swirl him around in your mouth briefly before taking half his length in your waiting mouth. His hips buck at the contact, fist tightening in your hair. You can feel him watching you, so you look up at him innocently before moving so his cock hits the back of your throat. The moan that leaves his mouth is so fucking hot so you keep going, moving his other hand to your head so he can better direct your movements. He goes gently at first but feels your moans around him so he increases his speed and starts to fuck your face. There's spit running out of your mouth and tears threatening to come out of your eyes but the look on his face makes your pussy quiver. 

He slows his motions and lets go of your face before helping you up. He signals for you to get on the bed while he gets a condom from his bedside table then rips it open with his teeth. Once it's on, he climbs over you and looks over your body before finding your eyes and brushing your hair back. You can't help but smile and blush at how the whole night has played out. 

His thumb comes up to rub at your cheek before asking quietly, "You ready?" You nod and return the favor of pushing his hair back while locking your legs behind him. He runs his cock through your folds and pushes into you gently. You both gasp at the feeling while he bottoms out. He gives you a second to adjust when he pulls almost all the way out and thrusts back in, making you whimper. Your walls are already fluttering around him, nails gripping his back. 

"Fuck y/n, I'm not gonna last when you feel this fucking good," he groans in your ear. He picks up the pace and starts thrusting even quicker, pelvic bone hitting your clit in the best way. You can feel yourself getting close when he slightly changes angles and makes you feel like you're floating. You move your body along with him, nails dragging down his back causing him to bite your shoulder. His cock is hitting in just the right place and you start to unravel underneath him, walls clenching as your orgasm hits. 

"Fuck Tom, I'm cumming," you whine while bucking your hips to meet his. The moan that escapes your lips when you finish just inches him closer. You're still out of breath, but you clamp your walls down on him making him curse softly. His thrusts become erratic and you know he's close. 

"Cum for me, babe," you whisper in his ear and pull on his hair, eliciting a loud gasp. He pumps into you a few more times and then stills while a string of curses falls from his lips. He kisses you sweetly before collapsing next to you on the bed. 

You both look at each other at the same time and you move to put your head on his panting chest. His arm comes firmly around you and gives you a small squeeze, fingers running through your damp hair. 

"Wow," he breathed out. "You're incredible, you know that?"

You can't help but giggle. Only 1 night spent with him and you already feel like a princess. 

"You're pretty incredible yourself."

"Remind me why we've never done that before?" he teases with a smirk. "Can I ask you something?" You just nod lightly in response. "Can I take you on a proper date?"

Your head whips up to look at him, the cheesy grin on your face hard to hide. His eyes light up as soon as he sees your expression. 

"I would love that, Tom," you answer cheerfully and he returns the smile. He leans down to kiss you and you both let out a content sigh. 

Hopefully this was the beginning of something special. 

#tom wilson #washinton capitals #tom wilson x reader #ihaveamillionfandoms #the summer fic exchange #tom wilson smut #nhl imagine #nhl smut #hockeynetwork #my writing #i hope you like it!!!

[writethehousedown]

The start of all things that are left to do (Jankie) - Mar

A/N: Jackie had been surprised when Janice approached her at the end of their creative writing class, all smiles and boundless energy. Janice was a pretty girl, and Jackie, at twenty-two, had yet to learn how to talk to pretty girls without stumbling over her words.

Jackie was already nervous to begin with, so perhaps arriving thirty-six minutes early and drinking two large cappuccinos before Janice even met her at the café hadn’t been the smartest choice. Now she was nervous, trembling a little, and had thirty six minutes left to think about everything that could go wrong once Janice sat in front of her to work on their project. Jackie could choke on her words the second she saw her, or draw a blank on any story plots and be useless as a partner. Then Janice would think that she was a fraud, and maybe she was a fraud and her parents were right and she should have gone to law school like they wanted, oh God… That was, if Janice even got to the cafe. Maybe she’d decided she didn’t want Jackie as her partner, after all.

Jackie had been surprised when Janice approached her at the end of their creative writing class, all smiles and boundless energy. They hadn’t had a real conversation before that; just some small talk here and there, whenever Jackie felt brave enough to hold eye contact with the girl instead of avoiding all interaction by sitting as far away from her as possible. Janice was a pretty girl, and Jackie, at twenty-two, had yet to learn how to talk to pretty girls without stumbling over her words. And she so wanted to talk to this one. So, when Janice asked her if she wanted to work on the assigned short story together, Jackie forced herself to say yes, to Janice’s obvious delight. And now there she sat, trying to rein in a caffeine rush and starting and scratching out sentence after sentence.

“The air in the windowless room was cold and stale-” No. Pointless.

“A girl walked alone at night-” That’s the name of a movie.

“The rain came down on the-” No, no, no.

Jackie dropped her pen on the table and buried her face in her hands. She looked at the wall clock. Twenty five minutes left. She puffed her cheeks and huffed while looking toward the counter. Screw it, she thought. Might as well make it three coffees.

    At four minutes past three p.m., Janice bounced into the café, in lilac dance shorts and a matching sports bra that showed through the open side of her white tank top. She waved at Jackie and went up to the counter. Jackie used that time to clear the table and straighten her clothes and her posture and her thoughts.

Janice came back holding a reusable cup with a straw in one hand and a paper bag of scones in the other. She sat next to Jackie and left the bag open on the table. An offering. Jackie took a scone and smiled at her.

“Thanks, Janice.”

“Oh, please, Janice was my father. I’m Jan.”

Jackie laughed a little at the dumb joke and Jan looked very pleased with that.

“Alright. Jan. What did you get yourself?” asked Jackie, trying to make some conversation before they got to work.

Jan shook her cup a little. “Watermelon frappuccino.”

Jackie’s disgust must have shown on her face, because Jan smiled until her eyes crinkled and said “Don’t judge me, it’s good,” then bit her metal straw.

Jackie’s eyes flickered down to the girl’s mouth, but she blinked and quickly looked up. The mischief in Jan’s face told Jackie she hadn’t been quick enough.

“Do you wanna get started?” asked Jackie, scooting closer to the table and putting her hair up in a bun, just to give her hands something to do.

Jan nodded and rummaged through the backpack she’d left on the floor, taking out a lavender, leather bound journal and a handful of glitter pens tied together with a rubber band. Jackie looked at the colorful stationary and thought it matched the image of Jan that was slowly forming in her mind.

They both opened their journals side by side and dived in.

“So. Do you have a plot in mind?” asked Jan, while she wrote “Short story (w/ Jackie)” in bold letters at the top of the page.

“No, unfortunately,” said Jackie, and quickly added “I’ve been trying, though. I think I’m off my game today, sorry.”

Jan smiled at her and lightly bumped her hand. “Don’t worry, gorg, we’ll figure it out together. We have eight days.”

“No, for sure. I know.” Jan seemed satisfied with her response and turned back to her notes.

Jackie knew she could have left it at that. But the monologue that had been rattling around her head all day wanted to make its way out through her mouth, and before she could stop it, she was dropping all her inner turmoil on a girl that barely knew her name.

“It’s just, in those eight days I have to fit this six thousand word story and two big projects I haven’t even started. Plus I promised I would help my cousins with their college applications because my mother said I’d be neglecting my family if I didn’t. And I need our story to go well because it’s the first project of the year and if our professor doesn’t like me now, he won’t have me as his TA next year and I need some teaching experience just in case playwriting doesn’t pan out and I have to find a new source of income.”

The rant cut there, leaving Jackie out of breath and incredibly embarrassed. She chanced a side look at her partner to gauge her reaction and found the girl frowning, taken aback.

“Jacks…” Jan started, pity evident in her voice.

Oh, here we go. Jackie knew better than to lose her composure in front of girls like this, who never understood. She was always ready to smile and nod at the tips on how to control her anxiety from people who didn’t have a clue. Jan opened her mouth and Jackie braced herself for whatever tired suggestion would come out. Probably yoga, if her outfit was any indication.

“Let’s make a work plan.”

What?

If Jan noticed her shock, she didn’t acknowledge it. Instead, she barreled through like a woman on a mission, writing everything down as she went.

“Six thousand words in eight days, minus two days for editing and as a buffer, just in case. That’s less than eight hundred words daily. We can’t meet up everyday, but we can work on the same Google doc and try to align our schedules to have virtual meetings. We’ll take the next half hour to sketch out the whole plot and we can discuss character types as we go. What do you think?“ she finished, finally looking up at Jackie.

Jackie stared back, unable to answer.

“Jacks?”

“Uh, yeah, yeah, that sounds reasonable. Perfect, really.”

Jan preened under the compliment and added more comments on the margins of her journal.

"You really have it together,” said Jackie, still in a trance.

Jan looked sideways at her, clearly pleased with herself.

“My college grades average out to a nine so far. I don’t plan on changing that. Do you?”

“No, of course not. Let’s start.” Jackie grabbed her own journal and searched the table for the pen she’d been using, coming up empty. She noticed Jan staring at her and turned to face her.

“What?”

Jan smiled a little and leaned in. “You, um…” she trailed off and reached her hand towards Jackie’s face, pushing stray hair away from her cheek as she reached behind her head. Jackie couldn’t move, couldn’t look away from Jan’s eyes. She felt a tug in her hair and Jan pulled her hand back, holding Jackie’s missing pen.

“You were looking for this?” she whispered.

Jackie moved to grab her pen and grazed Jan’s hand in the process.

“Thank you,” she whispered back. It felt important to keep her voice low. “You’re so pretty up close.” Or maybe she should’ve not talked.

Jan’s eyes widened, but her smile didn’t falter. “Am I?”

“And from afar. You’re just pretty.” Jackie straightened up in her chair and shrugged, feigning nonchalance.

Jan sat up and picked up her drink, swirling the straw in the almost empty cup.

“I think you’re gorgeous,” she shot back, glancing sideways at Jackie. “I’ve wanted to talk to you all month, but you always run out of class as soon as it’s over.”

“Oh, that,” said Jackie, chuckling a little. “Yeah, I’m always late to something. And, if I’m being honest, I was avoiding you.”

Jan dropped her smile for the first time that afternoon. Jackie noticed and rushed to correct herself.

“No, not like that! I just get nervous around you and I always say the wrong thing when I’m nervous. Just now is a good example.”

That seemed to appease Jan, but not enough for her to drop the subject. Instead, her eyes showed that same gleam from before, and Jackie realized she wouldn’t leave this conversation unscathed.

“Why do I make you nervous, Jackie?” asked Jan, the image of innocence as she leaned back on her chair and sucked on the straw.

Jackie didn’t buy it for a second.

“You know why, Janice.”

Jan did a happy little wiggle on her seat and left the cup on the table. “I know, I just wanted to hear you say it.” Jackie just laughed. Her nerves had turned into giddiness and it wasn’t just the caffeine anymore. She felt light, she felt brave enough.

“Alright, I’ll say it: I like you. You’re cute and bright and I get stupidly happy when I see you in class.” But Jan knew that already.

“You’re adorable. Maybe once we turn in this story, and you finish your two projects and send your cousins to college, you can sweet talk me some more over dinner.”

“Well, who could say no to that?”

They both stared at each other, beaming, until Jan turned to the table with purpose and asked: “So, story now?”

“Story now.”

#rpdr fanfiction #jankie #jan sport #jackie cox #the start of all things that are left to do #mar #lesbian au #concrit welcome #back to school 2020 #day 3: pens #submission

[not-another-fangirl74]

“Not to freak you out but I’m a cuddler” Taron Egerton x reader

“Not to freak you out but I’m a cuddler” Taron Egerton x reader

A/N: this came to me on a dream after a long time of me not being able to write anything decent, I still have some requests to do, and if you want to request anything you can, also maybe I’ll do a part 2 of this I’m not sure yet. I hope you like this I really spend time editing this. 

Pd: it’s slow burn I think

Warning: some cursing, mention of sex

W/C: long enough

“You’re going, end discussion” your friend says as you two walk down the busy streets of the city, it was a chilly day and you were on your way to eat lunch “why do I have to? haven’t seen any of the guys in a long time” you try to make her understand your point of view but you know deep down that is useless, she was going to convince you anyway, It’s not like you don’t want to see your old friends but you feel like it’s been so long. “first of all Harry is going to be there and I need emotional support in case I do something dumb, like getting back together... and second T is going to be there, you know, your friend the one you have a huge crush on that you’ve been ignoring for the past 6 months or more,... and guess what the guy is single again so you don’t need to avoid him” you look at her as you took a seat on the table “I wasn’t avoiding him” you say looking at the menu, memories flood your mind about the things you used to do all together, movie nights, karaoke, going out to dance but as you grow older, most of your friends found jobs and were working so finding time to spend together was getting harder but you kept in touch. The only ones you saw almost every week was y/f/n, Harry and Taron, so it was normal for you to text every day with Taron, friends do that, right?, you never read much into that, texting all day and talk about your days or a movie you watched, him calling you when got a new role for a movie or you being there for him when he didn’t get the part, in the end, all of your talks end up in you going to bed smiling and your heart beating faster, but that wasn't the only thing you did, sometimes you went out to catch up over a coffee or your favorites, when you had your Netflix marathons. You used to do a lot of things together till one day he came to your house and told you that he had a girlfriend at first it took you by surprise but every second that passed of him talking about her your heart broke a little more. It was hard to keep a smile that evening and pretend that it didn’t affect you, but what else could you do?. 

That night you went to bed crying, you weren't aware of your feelings towards him till that day, as weeks passed it was getting harder to spend time with him, and knowing that by the end of the day he was going to be with someone else, so instead of telling him how you felt and make things awkward you focus on your job and work your ass off.

 You sigh “okay, I’ll go” after the waitress took your order you add “and I don’t have a crush on him” “yeah right” your friend says rolling her eyes.

By Friday noon you were already halfway to your weekend getaway you tried to keep your mind on the road, your friend was asleep next to you and you still have 3 hours to get to the cabin, let's face it you were bored so you decided to pull a little prank on y/f/n. 

“y/f/n Oh god we are gonna die!!!!! watch out ahhhhh!!!!!” you scream turning the steering wheel to the sides, your friend wakes up screaming and you burst out laughing “I can’t believe you!!!!” she screams mad at you “you are the worst, you know that?” she adds slapping your arm “ouch” you said keeping your eyes on the road “you know, you are the worst, you are supposed to keep me awake” you tell her “you could have woke me up calling my name, not by giving me a fucking heart attack”, “but I was bored” you turn to her pouting “fuck you y/l/n” then she turns on the radio and Lizzo starts to sound you both look at each other smiling and start singing and dancing to the song. 

Why men great 'til they gotta be great? Woo!

I just took a DNA test, turns out I'm 100% that bitch

Even when I'm crying crazy

Yeah, I got boy problems, that's the human in me

Bling bling, then I solve 'em, that's the goddess in me

You coulda had a bad bitch, non-committal

Help you with your career just a little

You're 'posed to hold me down, but you're holding me back

And that's the sound of me not calling you back

After that, the trip went fast and now you were parking your car outside the cabin, your friend rushed out to knock on the door because she had to pee but you stay a little longer taking a deep breath to calm down, then you got out the car, someone finally opens the door and your friend almost kicks the guy down “sorry got to pee” you hear her screaming, you stopped in your tracks when you notice who is at the door “Hi” Taron says smiling at you “Hi” you answered “I thought you weren’t going to come” he said scratching the back of his neck as you entered the house “someone has to take care of y/f/n” you say quickly and with that you run inside not looking at him, yup, up to a good start, not awkward at all.

You greet your friends they were happy to see you after a long time, there was a new couple between them "I can't believe you are finally together" you say excited "well, it took us a little but I couldn't resist that cute little face" she says squeezing the guy’s cheek "aww, I'm so happy for you guys" you add hugging them, turning around you see y/f/n talking with Taron and another guy that looks very familiar, she sees you and motions for you to get close, you walk to them "y/n do you remember the bodyguard" you friend says looking at you "which one?" You knew which one she was referring to but you just like to mess with her "the one on Netflix" she answered "I'm sure there is more than one" you said "the one with the really hot guy, with the accent and nice butt" she said quickly and you hear Taron and the guy laugh, then she notices what she just said to the guy beside her and you see her face getting 20 different shades of red, you smile at her, fuck she is going to kill me you think "oh, the serie, yes, I remember" you say "well this is the guy" your friend whispers clearly embarrassed "I'm Richard" he says with his Scottish accent and extends his hand to you smiling "y/n" you shake his hand "what she said is true though, you have a really nice ass" you add smiling teasingly, all of you start laughing and you feel Taron eyes on you, you look at him and he had a smile but honestly he looks a bit mad, you continue your talk with Richard he is a really nice guy (and really handsome) but you know your friend likes him so you started to turn the conversation to her and help her with him, they start talking and you are left to the side with Taron, you get nervous again, you were about to walk out of there but y/f/n stops you "wait, T is going to show us our room" she tells you "okay" you sigh and keep your eyes anywhere but him. 

After Taron shows you the room you will be sharing with y/f/n, you left your bags in the room and all of you go to the Woods to explore the surrounding areas, it was breathtaking. You let the smell of grass fill your nostrils and let yourself relax at the nice feeling, it was a much need it change of air. No one was running late to work or the loud sounds of the busy city. Just the sound of the birds chirping and little creatures that live in the woods. 

Walking down the path there was a river close to the house, walking a bit farther there was a tree house that had a view of the mountains. You stopped at a meadow to run around and play, suddenly, starts to rain and everyone runs back to the cabin to seek refuge from the water but you take your time, you always loved the rain, find it so relaxing when pours down, the sound that makes when hits the ground so you zip up your jacket and slowly made your way back. "I knew you were going to take your time" Taron startled you from behind "god, you scared me" you almost fall and he laughs at your reaction and helps you to steady yourself "it's not funny" you said fighting the smile making its way on your face, you walk silently together, you are so close that your shoulders bump into each other "I'm happy that you came" Taron says breaking the silence "I am too, I really miss all (mostly you) but I was busy with work and stuff" you said. Neither of you said anything else, close to the house Taron stops walking making you turn to look back at him "something wrong?" You asked, he kept silence for a while debating if he should ask "are you avoiding me?" He asks dead serious "what!! No...not at all, wha… why!? You stutter and he steps close to you "that's how it feels, we used to talk all the time but then we stopped, did I do something wrong?" He inquiries "No...we just...I don't know" you say fidgeting with your fingers not looking at him in the eyes. “We just fell apart” you finally say lifting your gaze, you couldn’t tell what he was thinking, the rain started to pour down heavily “We should get inside before we catch a cold” he says breaking the silence and you walk back to the house.

It was late at night and all of you were on the living room around the coffee table playing games as the fire of the chimney kept you warm or it was the amount of alcohol you were drinking? at this point, it didn’t matter, after a round of drinko and truth or dare, Sophie suggested playing fuck, marry and kiss with an empty bottle of beer, y/f/n was in front of you and it was her turn to spin the bottle, she turned the bottle and stopped pointing right at you, you sip your drink “y/n, fuck, marry and kill” she slurred “wait no fuck, marry and kiss mhm Hugh Jackman, Taron or Richard” she finished looking at you smiling “it’s not fair two of my options are here” you tell her “it’s your turn babe answer or drink 3 shots of tequila” she says, you were a little tipsy but didn’t want to get drunk “fuck Richard, marry Ta..no wait marry Hugh and kiss Taron” you answer, she looks at you satisfied with your answer “good answer, I would marry Hugh too” Richard whispers on your ear and you laugh, you ask the same to the next person that the bottle landed on and the game kept going again you feel Taron observing you but you didn’t let that affect you, now you were playing never have I ever, quickly turning into a nsfw game, you drink at the most boring ones but you didn’t mind as all of your friends were definitely drunk, your friend somehow got closer to Richard and ended sitting on his lap the game came to and end as most of the players passed out, you help some of them to their rooms others lay on the couch and y/f/n disappeared with Richard a while ago. 

“that was fun” Taron says sitting next to you on the floor “yup” you say remarking the p “why marry Hugh and not me?” he asks taking the bottle of beer from your hand and sip from it, you looked at him in disbelieve “are you really asking me that? c’mon you know the man, he can do it all and he is funny and handsome” you say counting the things with your fingers “true” he agrees and you took the bottle back to drink “how’s been life treating you?” you nervously ask “can’t complain...just finished press tour of Rocketman now I’m back at home to spend time with my family and friends some of them I haven’t seen in a long time” he smiles down at you “looking forward to catch up with them and finally rest” he adds without noticing you start playing with his hand that was close to you drawing circles on his palm “I think you deserve it, It was a really good movie” you whisper “did you watch it?” he ask not believing you “Of course I did, I didn’t know you could sing” you stop playing with his hand and put yours in your knee and look at him “I do apparently, I used to sing but nothing serious, like in the shower type of thing” you laugh “fuck, you even got to know Elton, I hate you” you two talk for a while till you couldn’t keep your eyes open and after you yawn for the fifth time “I think you should go to sleep, love” you feel your chest flutter at the nickname, it felt so natural, and you die a little on the inside “good night” you say as you got up from the floor.

 You made your way to your room but you hear the moans coming from it on the hallway “fuck” you mutter out loud, now what? you think, maybe you can squeeze yourself on the sofa?, walking back to the living you bump into Taron “is everything alright?” he asks “my roommate is kinda busy fucking Richard so I’m going to sleep here” you say looking at the already crowded couch “I don’t think that’s a good idea, there is no space here... maybe….since your roommate is fucking my roommate...we can share my bed?” Taron asks nervously “oh...I don’t want to bother you, I’ll manage something” you say quickly “nonsense you are certainly not bothering, and there is no space here, c’mon let’s go” he practically orders making you walk with him, you were lucky that it was far from the room were your friend was so you couldn’t hear a thing, getting inside the room and looking at the bed all your fears are left behind and crawl into the bed right away feeling exhausted “you are not sleeping with that right?” he asks “well all my things are in my room and I’m not going there anytime soon” you turn yourself onto your back and gaze at the ceiling crossing your arms over your chest, you hear Taron shuffling in his bag and throws a t-shirt at you “you can use that” “thanks” you mutter and went to the bathroom and change, taking off your jeans and shirt, you put his t-shirt and you smile like a teenage girl at the smell that came from it, you were short so it fits like a dress but it did lift up a little on your ass, perks of having a big booty, trying to get the t-shirt as down as possible, it didn’t, well it’s not getting any down than this you finally say, you let your hair fall freely from your ponytail, back to the room Taron was looking for something and he was shirtless, fuck that man is so hot, not wanting to get caught staring you walk to the bed and get inside humming contently with your eyes closed feeling the soft bed sheets hugging you, opening your eyes you see Taron smiling at you and got into the bed too, keeping a prudent space between you “g night” you say turning over and he turns off the light “night” you hear him “wait” he said, "before you fall asleep" you turn around and he says  “... not to freak you out but I’m a cuddler” you see his cheeks getting red even when the light was off and you laugh at his confession “good” you said turning around again, not knowing from where this kick of confidence came, you pressed your back to his chest and grab his hand to pull it around your waist and put your hand over his arm you feel his hot breath against the back of your neck as he nuzzled his head in the crock of your neck, you tangled your legs together “good night Taron” you finally say and fell sleep right away. Being held by him it was far better from anything that you ever imagined.

#taron egerton #taron x reader #taron imagine #taron egerton x you #Richard Madden #richard madden x reader #richard madden imagine #Rocketman #rocketmanmovie #Elton John #elton john movie #eggsy unwin #Eddie the eagle #eggsy x reader #robin hood

[wetookanoath]

Supernatural Season 6 | The Haunting of Loey Lane.

Shane and his Shaggy cosplay are everything I need to know to be asured this episode will be iconic. And look a thim go. I love him.

I am way too distracted by Ryan’s buttons being open, I’m sorry, I cannot fuction now.

“Oh, no voice this time?” Okay, but Shane’s smile is... fjnfiwsmdikr. Why is this man like this? Anyway... Ryan’s laugh and the way he just, turns on Host Mood again, holy shit.

The way Ryan is narrating this episode is even more precious when you look at the credits and see that he himself wrote this episode. “From guru to booru”, I fucking hate you, Shane. Ryan’s face, tho. That look between done and fond, same.

“I was very respectful”, honey you were high in medicine, shut up.

Weekend At Ghoul HQ, starring Ryan Bergara and real size doll Shane. “I believe you believe” it’s the creepiest shit, stop that.

Growing up in a haunted farmhouse? Same. Oh gosh, jokes aside, I’m gonna say this right now... I’m not going to discuss in public whatever I believe in what may happen in this episode or not. I’ve been realizing slowly that I don’t feel comfortable talking about these things online because believing has a lot to do with faith to me, and faith is part of my life in a way that is too important to me. That said, watch me make fun of my own faith all the time and discuss whatever else you guys wanna talk about with me regarding the show, the boys, etc.

Loey saying she has never been scared of ghosts it’s exactly how I feel about the paranormal and the supernatural in general. I mean, I don’t claim having any kinds of powers or touch, or what have you. But god, I would be so happy and enchanted by seeing a supernatural being right in front of me. And whatever may scare me sometime, it’s always human doing, it’s always natural, tangible, there. And even then, I do like being scared. So there’s that, I guess.

“Are we Bruce Willis in this situation?” how the hell did that came from what they were talking about, lmao. Another Willis mention this season, Mr. Die Hard will end up becoming part of the inside jokes in this fandom at some point.

“I love a little stirring” Shane looks so excited about doing Some Bullshit in this episode, and I saw how chaotic he was in his solo, I can’t wait to see it by myself. LMAO, this bit is both funny and kind of adorable. Also, witches AU.

“Why would you come to us uf you want us to fix it?” An excellent question I don’t understand either, to be honest. The show is not about actually hunting enthities or debunking shit, so this is... come on. I think we know what it is, lmao. But it’s fine, I like this House Call shit.

No ofense, but using a 100 hundred years old Ouija board as a decoration is like a horror movie plot where white people are white people about it. I love it.

*Rubs eyes and sighs deeply*

... What is Shane doing with his tongue? I, I, I don’t like that... Not a fan... Put that tongue back in your mouth, Shane. I don’t like this bit.

Shane calling Ryan a, like, passionate paranormal investigator and the bitch immediatelly saying he is insane is my aesthetic and also yet again, a great summary of the show.

“This is the part where you learn how truly boring it is to be a ghost hunter”, lmao. Talking about these parts, I love the colors we get from the cameras each time, I can’t wait to make the edit for this episode.

Oh man, it must be something to see these two grown ass men saying and doing stupid shit to get ghosts to listen to them and do something But also, Shane slowly walking towards Ryan to film a super close-up of his eyes, OKAY. They are so stupid.

That... that is a werid thing, Shane is right. Oh man, this is giving me flashbacks to that serial killer dude in The X Files that was obssessed with women’s hair/cleaning them up for burials. 

Okay, that thing Shane just did with his mouth knocked me out for a bit. Imma head out. “That sounds demonic”, this better not be the season’s demon investigation. And oh look, what’s a supernatural season without Shane giving hints of him being a demon? It makes it funnier how he never really talks about it anywhere. Like he obviously knows aboutt he fandom’s joke, and I’m sure he keeps doing shit like this to feed it, but it all becomes even better when he just... never says shit about it. It’s always Ryan the one who answers when asked about it.

Cats do tend to get spook at everything and look up for no reason at all, every time my cats do that and one of nieces or nephew is around and asks about it, I always go “oh, he is just seeing the ghost that lives here” and then their mothers want to kill me.

Yeah, you don’t... do that. Horror movie 101. Don’t ever give permission to shit to enter. “Hey, can I come in?” “No, bitch, go away” is always the answer lol.

Guuurrrrllll...

This bitch ass thingy in her home really is there because of her. If there’s something in there, it’s not the place, it’s her. Also bitch ass demons as always listening to Shane is everything.

I.. like how Shane looks in that blue lighting. “Oh, you know what? Not bad, not bad”, why is he like this. 

Ryan’s metaphores are excellent, imagine him giving talks to his future children by using weird ass metaphore and the kids just... staring at him. 

“I’ll take you home with me, I don’t care” LMAO, imagine this idiot walking into his apartment, “Hey Sara? I got a demon, can we keep him?” “No” “Too late, I told him he is staying!”

“Assert my dominance” the smile? Awwww. The awkward moves of his hand, fjnvidnfir, Ryan is so fucking cute, makes me cry.

... What is Shane doing? I love how they just leave Shane’s whatever there while Ryan talks to Loey, fkjdniednfirnfgirt. Do that more often. Love that hair, also. Long hair is the best hair.

Shane literally saying he will use all the power he has gotten by defeating demons it’s such a powerful prompt. He is giving us the power to create shit, use it well, demon Shane writers and fanartists. “Alakazam! Big bang boom, hope you like hell, you loser.”, I fucking love this dork.

“What does that mean? You guys have inside jokes?” “Yeah, we bonded” JFNIERDNFIRF SHANE.

Loey is me and Shane is my brother, this is how we usually talk when one of us is saying some bullshit kfdndiofmkirg

“What’s your name? Come on, what’s your name? I know that gives away your power”, Ryan out there getting advice on demon hunting by The Conjuring 2 is the biggest mood. No, but for real-- there’s actually plenty of myths and cultures that believe the way to defeat some sort of evil is by knowing its name. It’s really interesting, the kind of power we really do give to names.

Not really a fan of this. Man, I really hope this is not the season’s demon investigation.

Ryan Steven Bergara Stop Saying You Are Annoying Or Ugly Or Whatever Negative Shit You Are Always Saying About Yourself Challenge.

This is such a “So... you come here often?” type of situation, djnfisndief, I love this. And we are back at the ‘I hate Shane’ bit again, I really stan a twelve years old. The fond voice with which Shane says “I mean, you are having fun”, awwwwwww. Cuties.

Shane looks hella cute doing his fornite dance, I hate him.

Did that shit just laugh after scaring this poor woman? JFNFIENFIERNIGF

Christ almighty, Ryan looks so fucking small at Shane’s side, what the hell? Also, this is so... damn adorable. Shane trying to teach Ryan how to do the dance, it’s hella cute. Oooohhmmmygoodddddd, I’mmmmm meltinnngggggggggg... Ryan’s little dance, djnfienf he is such a bad dancer, I love him so much.

This poor woman is having a breakdown in there and these two bitches are just being... whatever the hell they are doing, lmao. “You are suggesting a ghost farted in my face?” “Yeah” AHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Ryan suggesting the demon is asking her out for a drink and looking at Shane while doing so, jfniednfir what the fuck is that. This demon suitor just doesn’t know how to ask her out on a date, lmao.

“Our job here is done!” and Loey’s reaction, dkjnfeinfir same.

Get haunted for the aesthetic, why not? Interesting episode.

#buzzfeed unsolved #ryan bergara #shane madej #loey lane #bfu #supernatural #ss6 #loey lane ep #text #your local nerd talking.txt #mine #text* #ss6* #ss6text* #long post // #commentary #commentary*

[introvertguide]

Singin’ in the Rain (1952); AFI #5

The next movie on the AFI list is perhaps the most popular musical in American Film, Singin in the Rain (1952). This film is far and away the highest ranked musical on the AFI list. It is a comedy set in early Hollywood when movies switched from silent to having sound. A lot of actors were suddenly exposed as talentless with a pretty face and the old vaudeville performers suddenly regained popularity. A film that didn’t hold any punches as to the difficulty Hollywood had with understanding this new aspect of movie media, this is definitely worth checking out. I want to go over story details before addressing the behind-the-scenes aspects, so...

SPOILER WARNING! THIS DESCRIPTION COMPLETELY SPOILS THE STORY SO WATCH THE MOVIE FIRST!

At the premiere of his latest film, The Royal Rascal, Don Lockwood (Gene Kelly) tells a gathered crowd an exaggerated version of his life story, including his motto: "Dignity, always dignity." His words are humorously contradicted by flashbacks showing him alongside his best friend Cosmo Brown (Donald O'Connor) working all the undignified jobs involved with acting. He is with his shallow leading lady Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen), who turns out be very screachy and stupid. The new movie is a hit and Don leaves with Cosmo to the producer after party when the car breaks down and Don is recognized. To escape from his fans, Don jumps into a passing car driven by Kathy Selden (Debbie Reynolds). She drops him off, but not before claiming to be a stage actress and sneering at his "undignified" accomplishments as a movie star.

At a party, the head of the studio, R.F. Simpson (Millard Mitchell), shows a short demonstration of a talking picture, but his guests are unimpressed. To Don's amusement, Kathy pops out of a mock cake right in front of him, revealing herself to be a chorus girl. Furious at Don's teasing, she throws a real cake at him, only to accidentally hit Lina in the face. She runs away. Don is smitten with Kathy and searches for her for weeks. While filming a love scene, Lina tells him that she had Kathy fired. Don finally finds Kathy working in another Monumental Pictures production. She confesses to having been a fan of his all along.

After a rival studio has an enormous hit with its first talking picture, the 1927 film The Jazz Singer, R.F. decides he has no choice but to convert the next Lockwood and Lamont film, The Dueling Cavalier, into a talkie. The production is beset with difficulties, including Lina's grating voice and strong New York accent. An exasperated diction coach tries to teach her how to speak properly, but to no avail. Don is also given diction lessons which turns in a great tap number with Cosmo to Moses Supposes. The Dueling Cavalier's preview screening is a disaster; the actors are barely audible thanks to the awkward placing of the microphones, Don repeats the line "I love you" to Lina over and over, to the audience's derisive laughter, and in the middle of the film, the sound goes out of synchronization, with hilarious results as Lina shakes her head while the villain's deep voice says, "Yes! Yes! Yes!" and the villain nods his head while Lina's squeaky soprano says, "No! No! No!"

Don, Kathy, and Cosmo come up with the idea to turn The Dueling Cavalier into a musical called The Dancing Cavalier, complete with a modern musical number called "Broadway Melody". The three are disheartened when they realize Lina's terrible voice remains a problem, but Cosmo, inspired by a scene in The Dueling Cavalier where Lina's voice was out of sync, suggests that they dub Lina's voice with Kathy's. R.F. approves the idea but tells them not to inform Lina about the dubbing. When Lina finds out, she is infuriated. She becomes even angrier when she discovers that R.F. intends to give Kathy a screen credit and a big publicity buildup afterward. Lina threatens to sue R.F. unless he orders Kathy to continue working uncredited as Lina's voice. R.F. reluctantly agrees to her demands, as a clause in her contract states that the studio is responsible for media coverage of her and she can sue if she is not happy with it.

The premiere of The Dancing Cavalier is a tremendous success. When the audience clamors for Lina to sing live, Don, Cosmo, and R.F. tell her to lip sync into the microphone while Kathy, concealed behind the curtain, sings into a second one. While Lina is "singing", Don, Cosmo, and R.F. gleefully raise the curtain, revealing the fakery. Lina flees. A distressed Kathy tries to run away as well, but Don proudly announces to the audience that she's "the real star" of the film. Later, Kathy and Don kiss in front of a billboard for their new film, Singin' in the Rain.

I really enjoy the movie, but I have to admit a couple things that I have noticed over the years on different viewings. One thing is that the acting is not very good. It is all very hokey and I like to believe that this was done on purpose, but I have seen other productions from these actors and the acting from all three is  pretty similar. Another thing is that the pitch for the “modern number” that turns out to be the Broadway Melody was just shoved in for timing reasons and it comes out of nowhere and goes nowhere. I noticed that Rita Morena is in this film and she is a complete triple threat, but a 19-year-old Debbie Reynolds got the lead.

There are some very well known behind the scenes trivia notes that are pretty general knowledge to American movie fans, but I will go over a couple things. The Singin’ in the Rain number was set up but Gene Kelly was very sick with a fever so he did a practice take and went home. They continued filming the next couple of days but most of what is in the movie came from that initial sick take with fill shots from the other takes. 

Debbie Reynolds was not a dancer or a singer, but a gymnast. She had to be taught how to dance and you can see in her face how hard she is trying. Strangely, the speaking that she put in for Lina Lamont was actually the actress Jean Hagen (who played Lamont and was nominated for best supporting actress) who did not have that high pitch voice but a deep smoky voice. The singing that was dubbed over was not Reynolds either, but a professional singer named Betty Noyes. 

The film had a lot of difficulties as takes had to be redone because the crew did not really know what they were doing. There were episodes where the mic was poorly placed on the actor’s body (Debbie Reynolds) and there was difficulty getting clean takes, including an episode when the mic picked up her heartbeat. Donald O’Connor had to do the Make Em’ Laugh number twice because the cinematographer left the lens aperture open and the film fogged over. A lot of numbers actually had to be redone because of a fire. 

None of the other actors in this film ever reported working with Gene Kelly as a positive experience. Kelly had a very high standard and a very specific style which could be difficult as Reynolds was not a dancer. Kelly also had just come off of filming the previous year’s best picture, An American in Paris, and really wanted the movie to do just as well. He was mean to Reynolds and made her cry. He also had her do the Good Morning number over and over until vessels broke in her feet and she started to bleed all over the stage. O’Connor did not like the way the Kelly pushed around the other actors and referred to Kelly as an aggressive control freak. Gene Kelly admitted later to being far too hard on his fellow actors during this filming and both O’Connor and Reynolds forgave him suggesting it was a learning experience. It still sounds like pretty awful working conditions to me (edited)

Only two of the songs in the film were original for the movie, Moses Supposes and Make Em Laugh, although the former was based on a children’s rhyme and the latter was very similar to Be A Clown by Irving Berlin. This was actually the seventh movie that had Singin’ in the Rain as a feature song. It seemed like an homage to the popularity of the Follies in the 1920′s, using all of the popular notes of the year to commemorate the past. 

So should this film be on the AFI List? Absolutely, although I don’t know if I would have put it in the top 5. It is a lot of fun, it is very well known, it is still mentioned frequently in current popular media, and the actors really put a lot into the production. However, I wouldn’t put it above movies like Gone with the Wind and The Wizard of Oz. That is a little much. And would I recommend it? Of course! This movie is a lot of fun and one of those movies that the pace pulls you through without ever needing to check the time. The dancing is fabulous and the show of the misunderstanding of sound in movies by the characters is truly hilarious. It is 100% certified fresh an Rotten Tomatoes and I completely agree. 

#singin in the rain #Gene Kelly #debbie reynolds #donald o'connor #musical #afi movies #make em laugh #film review #rotten tomatoes #comedy #silent film #50s #hollywood golden age #introvert #introverts

[dvp95]

quiet on widow’s peak (1)

pairing: dan howell/phil lester, pj liguori/sophie newton/chris kendall rating: teen & up  tags: paranormal investigator, youtuber phil lester, dan howell is not a youtuber, online friendship, slow burn, strangers to lovers, nonbinary character, background poly, phil does some buzzfeed unsolved shit and dan is a fan word count: 3.2k (this chapter & total) summary: Phil's got a list of paranormal experiences a mile long that he likes to share with the world. Abandoned buildings, cemeteries, and ghost stories have always called his name, and a particular fan of his has a really, really good ghost story. Bingo squares: met on tumblr

new wip? NEW WIP.

read this chapter on ao3 or here!

The wind is loud in this one. That's frustrating, and it makes Phil's job a lot harder, but he can't control the weather. Be cool if he could. He does his best to level out his voice and the background noise of Mother Nature before he settles in with his good headphones and really cranks the volume.

It's even more annoying to listen to the alternating crackle and whistle right in his ears. Phil has dealt with worse during this whole process, though, so he finds the strength to power through it. He listens to the full thing three times, scribbling a few timestamps down on a Post-It pad as he does. He takes a break after that, does some stretches around his tiny bedroom and tiptoes out to get a snack without waking the whole damn house, and then he's right back in his apparently ergonomic office chair to subject his ears to more of this nonsense.

Wind, wind, and more wind. And sometimes just Phil's own voice. Nothing of note.

Phil is about to give this video up as a loss altogether when he hits one of the final timestamps and... can't figure out what that noise is.

For the first time since he opened this file, Phil grins. He exports the clip and plays around with it in Audacity. Some videos are always more fun than others, and Phil had felt like he was slogging through this one until now.

"Do you hear that, Theodore?" Phil murmurs. The tiny cactus on his desk, thankfully, does not respond.

It sounds like a person. It sounds like a person, whispering, and it definitely isn't the wind, and it isn't Phil's own voice, because he's in the middle of a question in this clip.

Phil might just be going crazy from sleep deprivation or wishful thinking, though. He pulls out his phone and texts the only group chat that doesn't cause him anxiety, which is comprised of the housemates that he actually gets along with. Anyone up? he asks, adding a single eye emoji for good measure.

Even though it's gone two in the morning, he gets immediate responses from all of them. A string of vaguely dirty emojis from Chris, a simple yeah from Sophie, and a cheerfully morbid did you know that insomnia leads to an early death? from PJ.

Wanna listen to a noise for me?

Within three minutes, Phil's bedroom is full of people in various states of sleepiness. All of them are in ridiculous pyjamas - including Phil - and PJ's hair in particular has taken on a mind of its own. Phil's room isn't really big enough for all of them, so there's some awkward shuffling before PJ claims the office chair. Phil sits at the foot of his bed with Sophie and Chris on either side of him, pressed close against each other's shoulders. It's a good thing he likes these people.

"I mean, it isn't the wind," is PJ's confident opinion. "Did you have anyone with you?"

"No, it's just me and my camera against the world," says Phil.

"No need to be a twat," Chris informs him. He taps at PJ's upper arm, impatient. "Let me have a go, then, if there's something there."

Chris is famously bad at hearing things in white noise, but PJ acquiesces the seat easily enough. Phil laughs, watching them do a weird step dance around each other in the small space between Phil's bed and desk.

"I can't hear any specific words," PJ says as he flops down across Phil's pillows, making himself comfortable. Phil just nods, because neither can he.

"How d'you know it's a person, then?" Sophie asks. Her voice is probably the only one soft enough for the hour. Their other housemates hate them for their frequent all-nighters, but Sophie is kind and quiet enough that she slips under the radar.

"You'll see for yourself."

When Sophie goes to respond, Chris interrupts in a hilariously loud voice, as if he's forgotten that having headphones on doesn't mean they can't hear him. "It's some kind of ghoulie or ghostie! I can barely fucking hear it, Philly, why didn't you mic it?"

"Why didn't I mic the ghost?" Phil asks, bewildered. Naturally, Chris doesn't hear him.

Sophie taps Chris on the shoulder and stands, leaning over his shoulder as she takes her turn listening to the sound clip over and over. Chris spins in the chair a few times and gives Phil an unhinged sort of grin.

"You got something this time," says Chris. He sounds like he's having just as much fun as Phil is, now that there's actually a thing to listen to besides his own voice and the loud, loud wind.

"I think so," says Phil. "Why didn't I mic the ghost?"

"I'm saying it would make your job a lot easier if you mic the ghost, yes."

"If I could mic a ghost, I'd be a millionaire."

"Then you better get on it, eh?" Chris laughs, spinning a bit faster. Phil has never seen the man sleep. It's a little bit worrying.

"Sure," Phil says, giving up on trying to teach any logic to someone who's clearly long lost their hold on it. "Next time I spend all night in a graveyard, I'll mic any spirits that might be hanging out."

"Shut up," Sophie tells them, mild.

Chris mimes zipping his lips, wrapping an easy arm around her waist, and PJ laughs.

For the first few months they all lived together, Phil had struggled to keep up with whatever dynamics were going on between the three of them, but he's long since given it up as something he's not going to understand.

After a moment of quiet, Sophie nods. "I hear it," she tells them. Even with the headphones on, she's quiet. "It's not words, I wouldn't put any subtitles over it."

"Yeah," PJ agrees. "Just let your audience duke it out in the comments like they always do."

"Thanks, guys," Phil says, feeling a sort of warmth sink into his shoulders. He notices that Chris is pulling up another application and half-heartedly protests. "Chris, you don't need to edit this one for me. I still haven't paid you for the last video." Or the one before that. Or the three or four previous. Phil has it written down somewhere.

"Don't be stupid," Chris hums, already clicking around erratically. It makes the editor in Phil want to scream, but he has to admit that Chris manages to find more weird visual stuff to isolate than he could on his own.

"I feel bad," says Phil, chewing his lip.

"I've told you," says Chris, "you can pay me back in chores and sexual favours."

PJ's slippered foot knocks against Phil's hip, and he grins brightly when Phil turns to him. "You know, I do have a bit of a laundry backlog."

"Funny thing, that," says Sophie.

Biting back a laugh, Phil shakes his head. "Alright, alright. Everybody leave their laundry in front of my door tomorrow."

"That's a no on the beej, then?" Chris asks, raising a single eyebrow and pointing dramatically at Phil. It has been near two years of this, and Phil is still too afraid to ask if it's a joke.

It's not as if Phil's answer would change if it wasn't a joke, because he's not interested in Chris, and he's especially not interested in becoming entangled in whatever nonsense his housemates have gotten themselves into. But, still, he might be kinder about letting Chris down if he were being genuine.

"That is a no," Phil confirms. "But I will wash your pants."

"Kinky," says Chris. He turns back to the screen and makes an incomprehensible hand gesture. "This is pretty shit. You know that, right?"

Yeah. Phil does know that. It's getting harder and harder to have the same optimism in every video that he'd had when he first started recording his wanderings around the supposedly-haunted places of Rossendale. He'd brought the camera with him when he left, but might have left that optimism behind. Phil only kind of believes in supernatural things - the way he only kind of believes in giraffes or true love - but it's been more fun than anything else to pick up a camera and try to find some evidence.

He's been doing this since he was nineteen, though, and he's getting a little bored by the formula of it all. Go into a haunted place, try to communicate with the spirits, pick up some garbled words or creepy noises, highlight visual oddities like orbs, and let the internet tear it all to shreds. Honestly, he'd have more fun making proper horror at this point in his life.

Phil shrugs and pulls his knees up to his chest. He wants to hide away from the sympathy in Sophie's eyes, from Chris' blunt words. "Yeah. I'm getting kind of... I don't know. Restless."

"Maybe you should ask people to submit things again," PJ suggests. "That went well last time."

It had, actually. Phil had needed to sort through a lot more ridiculous stories and obvious hoaxes than usual, but he'd found some nuggets of gold in all that hay. Or however that saying goes.

"People did like having their stories read out," Phil says slowly. "I'd just need to be extra sure that nobody's, like..."

"Ripping off r/NoSleep," says PJ.

"Yeah, exactly."

"We can help," Sophie says, and Phil could cry at how easily PJ and Chris agree with her.

He really doesn't deserve to have such great people around him. They've got work and lives of their own, but they're always happy to spend time crowded around Phil's computer listening to weird noises together. Phil sometimes wonders what they get out of it. Do they just like helping him, the way he has fun holding the boom for PJ's films or testing Sophie's concoctions? Or are they just as fascinated as Phil by the weirdness of it all? Do they want to see the cool instances of paranormal activity, too? At this point it feels nearly impossible to ask.

"That's going to be a lot of washing pants for me," Phil sighs. He doesn't know how to thank them, not when they always just wave it off.

"Sure is," says PJ. "But you should... ask the audience!"

"Your Chris Tarrant is pretty good," says Phil, only a little surprised by it. PJ's voice is as much of a tool to him as the rest of his body, and it's one he's always been skilled with. The impressions still tend to catch Phil off guard sometimes.

PJ tips an invisible hat. "Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week."

At his friends' not so gentle encouragement, Phil makes a few posts on his socials to ask his followers for new creepy things to explore. It might be the middle of the night in Brighton, but he has a feeling that Chris isn't leaving his desk until he's found every instance of an orb or strange shadow in the fifty minutes of currently uncut footage.

It seems like Sophie is on the same page, because she excuses herself to make tea for everyone. PJ leans over Chris' shoulder and watches the clips without sound, his lips moving as if he's murmuring to himself.

Sometimes this feels more like a group effort than Phil is comfortable with. He's never been very good at asking for help. As grateful as he is, he still itches with the need to take back control of the situation. He uses the slow trickle of fan submissions to distract him from that feeling, because all three of them do make his videos better when he stops being so possessive over his footage. Phil flops onto his back and scrolls through the incoming emails, tweets, and Tumblr messages to see if there's anything promising.

For the most part, the answer is a resounding no. Some things are blatant lies - there are countless ripoffs of films or novels that Phil happens to be familiar with, a few things swiped from creepypasta or subreddits, and his usual amount of conspiracy theorist fans insisting that some high profile person or other is a lizard - but most of it, to Phil's dismay, just doesn't grab his attention the way he wants it to.

Sophie comes back with tea and snacks. She leans her head against Phil's shoulder and watches him cycle through his apps, fact-checking idly and sighing every time something easily proves to be a hoax. Her hair smells like coconut and she makes a soft humming noise every time she lifts the mug to her lips. Her presence alone, small and warm and supportive, is enough to keep Phil from throwing his phone across the room and having a right sulk about how his career is in a tailspin because nobody makes ghosts like they used to. At some point in the night, Sophie's breathing evens out to the point that Phil thinks she's asleep, but then she reaches out to tap a tiny finger to his screen.

"What's this, then?" she murmurs.

Phil has been zoned out entirely for at least fifteen, and he blinks back into reality. There's a new message in his Tumblr inbox, one that seems like it must be over the character limit for asks. He must have submissions turned on or something, that's the only possible explanation for an actual essay being sent to him. It's barely broken into paragraphs with very little punctuation and no capitalization, and Phil has been staring at screens for far too long to try and parse this on his own.

"Can you please make sure this isn't, like, the entire Bee Movie," Phil asks, handing Sophie his phone with only a slight twinge of anxiety. He trusts her not to go snooping, but. Still. "I need to pee."

"Mhm," Sophie hums, already apparently lost in whatever stream-of-consciousness has been dropped into Phil's inbox.

The floorboards in this old Brighton house creak, and Phil has always envied some of his housemates for being able to sidestep the noises. It doesn't seem to matter how long he lives here, how much he tries to avoid making any noise, it's like the floorboards are determined to creak under Phil's weight. He winces as he passes two bedrooms whose occupants surely don't appreciate creaking outside their doors at such an ungodly hour.

At least he doesn't run into any walls this time. The nightlight in the bathroom at the end of the hall is the only thing lighting Phil's way, and he tends to stub his toes on absolutely nothing in this kind of semi-darkness.

When he makes his - very, very creaky - way back to his own room, he's bewildered by the scene that greets him. PJ and Chris have joined Sophie on his bed, and all three of them are poring over Phil's phone as though they're looking at a map to the Holy Grail.

"Hello," Phil says slowly, closing the door behind him. It creaks, too. "You aren't going through my pictures, are you?"

"No," Sophie and PJ chorus without looking up.

"You got nudes on here or something?" Chris asks with a mild sort of interest, clearly also too engaged in Phil's phone to put his all into the flirting.

"I don't," says Phil. It doesn't sound convincing, even though it's true, and he waits for Chris to tease him about it some more. When he doesn't, Phil has to admit that he's curious. "So I guess it isn't a meme or something?"

That makes them look up, in almost comedic synchronicity. Sophie blinks a few times, as if she's coming back to herself. She holds out Phil's phone and shakes her head.

"It's not a meme," she says. "And near as we can tell, it's genuine."

Phil joins them and takes his phone back, adjusting his glasses. His bed really wasn't made for four people, but his housemates have never had any personal space amongst themselves, and Phil isn't one to say no to human contact when he isn't getting it anywhere else.

The message is just as hard to read as it was at first glance, but Phil puts his brain to work. If his friends are reacting like this, it usually means he's in for something good.

hi ok so the thing is that this is completely ridiculous and i dont think its what youre looking for at all but theres a building near my uni thats got a ton of stories around it and it only started happening like this year like it isnt an old obviously haunted type of place but theres a lot of weird shit that goes down there so i found all the references to it online that i could and ive summarized them here (w/ sources ofc im not a dick) and its all just this side of strange so it seems like the sort of thing you might be interested in ok here we go SO

And it goes on like that. Phil feels his eyebrows raising as he clicks the provided links in the following walls of text, which are exactly what they're advertised as. Not a single rickroll in there. Just a handful of posts on Reddit and Facebook and independent blogs about various experiences people have had with a particular abandoned building in -

"I know this place," Phil says, surprised. He looks up at PJ's grin, Sophie's wide eyes, Chris' palms rubbing together in exaggerated interest. "I've been to parties here. Well, okay," he corrects himself before his friends can do it for him, "I've gone with Martyn to parties here and left early."

"Yeah, it isn't far out of Manchester," PJ hums. He bounces in place a bit, like he's suddenly energized enough to go jump on the soonest train up north.

"It didn't seem that weird," says Phil. "It's been a few years, I guess, but it wasn't even that scary."

"Sounds like it's only just started, though," Chris pipes up.

Phil isn't sure how much he likes that. The idea of a place he's been a few times, half an hour from his childhood home, being so suddenly full of haunted activity feels... weird. Still, it's catching his interest in a way that nothing else has in months, so.

"I'll look into it some more tomorrow," he decides, glancing at the time. His brother is probably still awake, to be honest, but Phil doesn't want to be that guy asking 'hey, do you remember the Wilkins place?' before dawn has even broken. Again. He has definitely done that sort of thing in the past. "I'll have plenty of time while I do, what, seventeen loads of laundry?"

"Something like that," PJ laughs. "Want us to clear out?"

As nice as the company and help has been, Phil still feels a rush of relief at the concept of being left alone again. He nods, still scrolling idly through the Wilkins place submission.

It hits him, very literally, too close to home to ignore. He wonders if his fan knows that, if this is somehow an elaborate prank that will end up just wasting Phil's time, but he's too curious to leave it alone. He'll just have to ask around, see if anyone else has heard these murmurings.

Til then, maybe he ought to try and get some sleep. Phil's computer, still open on the editing software, tempts him.

Well. What's another couple hours at this point?

#phanfic #phanfiction #dnp fic #words words words #qowp..... mayhaps i made a mistake w this title...... #quiet on widow's peak #YES it's another marianas title what are you the marianas title police? #bingo

[this-is-freeridge]

The Air Between Us

Chapter Thirteen: Mari worries Oscar and Trey makes a phone call.

Warning: this fic deals with dark themes, including but not limited to teen pregnancy, rape, drug abuse, murder, abortion, underage drinking and underage sex. Read at your own risk.

Find all the other chapters here.

Find the more frequently updated and better-edited version here!

It was safe to say that Trey had saved their date. After what happened with Oscar, they did what Trey suggested - they got in his car and they drove until they were out of Freeridge, away from everything that threatened to bring them down. It was getting dark by the time they found somewhere to stop.

On the side of a road on a hill overlooking the beach, they sat in the back of Trey’s truck under the warm light of the sunset as the ate. Once the sun had set, they wasted time counting stars and talking. They didn’t talk about the deep things, the real things, and it was a nice reprieve from the heaviness that is ever-present with Oscar.

She felt light and she felt happy and she agreed to a second date, and then a third and a fourth until Trey didn’t even have to ask. He had taken to picking her up every morning, too. It meant he had to get up earlier to make it to school on time, but he was worried about her.

Mari spent almost every waking hour at that store, not to mention the heat was only increasing. She was leaving herself no time to rest. If he could force her to stay home even an extra couple of hours, he would consider that a win.

“Hey,” Trey greeted with a smile as she jumped in the car. He reached over and pressed a kiss to her lips. She didn’t kiss back. It felt strange, wrong somehow, to kiss someone else. He didn’t make her heart race like Oscar did, didn’t taste like cigars and Corona.

“Hi,” she said, wiping her forehead with the back of her hand. She was too hot and she was sticky and, if she was being honest, maybe a little lightheaded but she put that down to skipping breakfast that morning.

“So, I was thinking,” the boy started as he turned on the car.

Mari threw him a look, eyebrow cocked, and said, “I’m still not going to the homecoming dance with you tonight if that’s what you’re thinking. The last thing I wanna do is hang out at a high school dance with my little brother and his friends,”

Trey chuckled. “No, no. I’ve learned my lesson from your multiple rejections,”

By ‘multiple rejections’ he meant exactly three. He had asked once, the first time, in passing as they worked. She had said no, equally as casual. The second time was at the end of a date; after he had walked her to the door and right before he kissed her goodnight. Still no.

So he tried once more, in an attempt that involved the back of his truck filled with tea light candles, and a soft love song playing from the car stereo. It was extravagant and dramatic and Mari was so embarrassed. He had thought she wanted something bigger and better and it wasn’t until she had said no, yet again, that he realised she just had no desire to go.

So he didn’t quite understand her yet, she realised, but surely he would in time.

“I was actually thinking about Halloween,” he said. “It’s coming up soon and my parents will be out of town for work. I was wondering if you wanted to come around? We can marathon the Halloween movies or something,”

Mari offered a weak smile and a nod, resting her head against the car window. It wasn’t that she wasn’t interested because she was (she wouldn’t be with him otherwise, right?) but she was having a hard time focusing. There was ringing somewhere in the back of her mind and things were getting a little blurry like the world wasn’t quite in focus.

“Mari, are you alright?” She heard Trey ask, but he sounded far away and she didn’t quite have the energy to respond. “Mari?”

Her eyelids were heavy, weighed down by some invisible force. Unable to keep her eyes open, she gave up the struggle to stay conscious and let the world around her fade away as it all went black.

. : ♱ : .

Mari woke to a mechanical, high-pitched beeping. Her eyes were heavy and her lips were dry. Dark curls had fallen in her eyes but she couldn’t brush it away because she couldn’t seem to move her arm. Cold panic filled her veins. Her breaths grew shorter and shorter until she was almost gasping for air.

Somewhere in the background, behind the loud beeping and even louder blood pumping in her ears, she could hear someone calling her name. Closing her eyes, she focused on that voice. Trying to pinpoint its owner, she used that as an anchor to pull her out of the terror that was threatening to swallow her whole.

“Mari, it’s okay,” the voice said. A smooth hand brushed her hair aside. “It’s okay, you’re okay,”

“T-Trey?” She rasped. Her voice was thin as paper, fragile as glass, yet it hurt to speak as though her throat was filled with gravel. The bed dipped beside her.

“Yeah, it’s me,” his hand closed around hers, “I’m here,”

Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

Glancing around the room, she took in her surroundings. To her left was a chair, covered in worn blue fabric, in front of a large window. The beeping was coming from a machine behind her and there was a large needle buried in the crook of her arm, attached to an IV bag full of clear liquid.

Hospital. She hadn’t been in hospital since her mother and her boyfriend were still figuring out how long they could lock her in a room without food.

“Wha-” her voice died in her throat. After a weak attempt to clear her throat, she tried again. “What hap-”

“Don’t try to speak, it’s alright,” he reached over for the glass of water that was sitting on the bedside table, a blue plastic straw sticking out the top. It took all of the strength she could muster, which wasn’t a lot at the moment, to take one sip. “You passed out, Mari. Honestly, you scared the shit out of me. I’m just relieved I was there, that anyone was there to take you to the hospital. I wish I could tell you more but I don’t know anything, the doctors will only speak to your family so I called your mom-”

The colour drained from Mari’s face and the world fell away until all that was left was a low buzz in the back of her mind. He called her mother.

He called her mother.

The anxiety she had been feeling before flooded back in, washing over her until she felt as though she were drowning.

“My mom?” She repeated weakly, almost thankful for her broken voice so as not to convey her fear and accusation.

“Oh, yeah, I’m sorry I went through your phone. I didn’t know who to call and your phone was unlocked so-”

A painful lump made its way to her throat. Swallowing it down, she forced out the words: “call Ruben. You need to call Ruben,”

Maybe it was the hard look on her face, or maybe he could see the glint of fear in her brown eyes, but he didn’t ask any more questions.

“Yeah, of course,” he nodded, grabbing her phone from the bedside table and excusing herself to make the call.

When he came back, they sat in silence. Trying to speak only hurt, and Trey didn’t seem to have anything to say, something Mari was secretly happy about. After what he did, she was having trouble even thinking of anything to say to him other than “how could you?”

She had to mentally remind herself that he didn’t know any better. She hadn’t told him anything about her mother or their relationship; that information had been reserved for Oscar and, since he had thrown it back in her face, she’d decided she wouldn’t be opening up that again.

Mari had to remind herself that he was just trying to get her help. She shouldn’t feel this angry or betrayed, but she couldn’t seem to stop it.

She didn’t know how much time had passed by the time Ruben rushed into the room, breathing a sigh of relief to see her awake and, for the most part, okay.

“Mija!” He called as he ran to her and pressed a kiss to her forehead. Warmth ran through her. She felt instantly better, having Ruben here. He made her feel safe like she was finally home.

Mari took in his appearance; his hair was dishevelled, his cheeks were flushed, his suit was ruffled and his tie hastily loosened. A pang of guilt shot through her as she realised that he must’ve left work to be here, something she hadn’t considered when she asked Trey to call him.

“I’m sorry, you were at work-” she started, but he cut her off with a shake of his head.

“I only wished you called me sooner,” he said.

Mari mustered a smile that she hoped would convince him she was alright as she told him “I only just woke up. Trey called you as soon as he could,”

“Yes, Trey,” Ruben said with a bemused but tight smile, “I don’t believe we’ve met,”

Jumping to his feet, Trey reached across Mari’s hospital bed to shake her father’s hand.

“Uh, hello, sir,” he stammered over his words, clearly nervous. “I’m Trey, um, I’m your daughter’s boyfriend. I hope that’s okay,”

Mari snickered beneath her breath, only biting her lip to stop herself at the look of terror on the blond’s face. He really was desperate for Ruben’s approval, and though Mari knew she would date him regardless of what her dad thought, it was sweet.

Ruben let out a quick laugh and said, “Mari’s smart, she can make her own decisions; no need for my permission. If she’s happy, I’m happy,”

Shoulders slumping as the tension left his body, Trey nodded with a relieved smile. “Okay, sir,”

Ruben scrunched up his nose and added, “you can stop calling me sir,”

“Yes si- uh, yes,”

Trey was red-faced and, judging by the look on his face, he was mentally kicking himself. First impressions were never his strong point and watching that felt a lot like watching a car crash play out in slow motion.

“Oh, you’re awake!” A new voice came into the room. It was bright and bubbly and just hearing it made Mari want to smile too. Not to mention she was more than grateful for a distraction from the train-wreck happening before her.

Throwing a glance behind Ruben, Mari found the source of the voice. A dark-skinned woman in teal hospital scrubs had entered the room. Unruly curls were wrangled into a ponytail at the base of her neck and she wore a bright smile as she headed over.

“How you feeling?” The woman asked, pressing a hand to Mari’s forehead and then checking the IV drip beside the bed.

“I’m okay,” Mari said, watching the woman work. Every move she made was lightning quick and perfectly practised, though she moved elegantly, as though she were gliding around the room. “A little thirsty, maybe. Are you my nurse?”

“Sure am, sweetie,” the lady said, smiling down at Mari, flashing her pearly white teeth and dimples. “Name’s Latisha. Mari, right?” Mari nodded. Latisha turned to the boys, adding, “you must be the father and boyfriend?”

“Yes!” Trey confirmed, a little over-eager. Mari blushed a little at his enthusiasm, but Latisha only laughed a little to herself. That boy had it bad.

“So,” Mari spoke again, taking the spotlight off of her relationship and shining it on the matter at hand. “Do you know what’s wrong with me,”

Latisha must’ve picked up on the way that Mari’s voice trembled, as she stopped pressing buttons on the monitor and turned all attention to Mari.

“Right now, the running theory is mild dehydration brought on by overworking yourself this heat. We’re still gonna do some blood tests, just to be sure, but we’ll do that after you get some more fluids in you. It’ll make the blood easier to draw and a lot less painful.

“No food for the next four hours or so, until the blood test is all done. We’ll probably keep you overnight as well, just for observation. We don’t want you heading home and passing out again!”

The last thing Mari wanted was to spend the night in a hospital room, but who was she to argue. She hadn’t even noticed how fatigued her body was, she didn’t trust herself when it came to her health right now.

The nurse reached up and pulled down a bulky plastic remote, with only a few buttons, attached to the bed by a thick cord.

“I have to go,” Latisha said, handing Mari the remote, “but if you need anything at all, you just press this green button here, you got it? I’m here all night,”

Mari thanked her and offered an appreciative smile. Silver lining: at least she got a nice nurse. She waited until Latisha had left the room before she let out a deep sigh. Overnight? Mari hated hospitals and would take a hundred nights on the couch over this any day. It wasn’t negotiable though, she knew that, and she had to look after herself if not for her own sake, then for Ruben’s.

“I suppose you’ll be needing a change of clothes for the night then,” Ruben said. “I’ll head home and grab you some things. Trey, why don’t you come with me?”

Trey blanched, glancing between Ruben and his daughter. He wanted to stay with Mari, but who was he to say no to her father?

“Yeah, sure,” he agreed and made his way to Ruben, stopping only to press a small kiss to the back of Mari’s hand. “We’ll be back soon, babe. Make sure you get the nurse if you need anything,”

“I will,” she nodded in promise and waved to them as they left the room.

Sighing, she let her head fall back onto the stiff pillow. For someone who had done nothing but sleep all day, she sure was exhausted. Mari let her eyes fall shut, eager to get back to that peaceful nothingness, but a knock at the door interrupted her.

Reluctantly, her eyelids fluttered open. Mari almost couldn’t believe her eyes. Was this some sort of hallucination? What was he doing here?

“Oscar?”

He was leaning against the doorframe, shoulders hunched, hands tucked deep in his pockets and seemingly unable to meet her gaze. She had never seen him look so small.

“Hey mami,” he said finally, “mind if I come in?”

Was that even a question?

“Of course you can,” she told him, watching carefully as he crossed the room in three long strides. He made his way to the chair Trey had previously occupied, dragged it closer to her and took a seat.

Mari shifted into a sitting position, careful not to disturb the cannula in her arm. Spooky stayed quiet, head hung low and eyes closed. He was so close Mari could count each one of his long eyelashes, but he was distant too, as though his mind were somewhere else. Mari had never seen him like this; big, strong Spooky looked...weak.

“Spooky,” she said softly, “please say something, you’re scaring me,”

Oscar let out a short, sharp laugh.

“I scared you?” His eyes finally, finally searched out hers and he shook his head incredulously. “Shit Mari, do you know how fucking scared I was? If something happened to you and the last thing I...”

He looked away again as his words trailed off, unable to finish the thought, let alone the sentence.

The last thing he did was what? Yell at her? Break her heart? Make her feel like she couldn’t trust even him with her biggest fears and darkest secrets?

It was easy to see how guilty he felt. It was a sight to behold: Freeridge’s scariest cholo sitting in a hospital room, head in his hands and at a loss for words. If Mari was the kind of person she wished sometimes she could be, she would tell him exactly how he made her feel; lonely and cold and uneasy. She almost wanted to rub salt in the wound, to make him feel worse and worse until somehow, on one cosmic plane or another, they were even.

But she couldn’t.

He had built her up and broken her down so many times until she was a lego house that only he had the instructions for - she wouldn’t do the same to him. Oscar had never been this honest with her, this vulnerable. She wanted to reach out and take his hand. She wanted to kiss him.

“Nothing happened, Oscar. I’m okay, really,” she assured him, hoping to bring him even a little comfort.

After a few seconds of silence, he confessed: “I miss having you around,”

She couldn’t help but smile.

“I miss being around. Even with the other Santos,” she told him, and it was true. She’d give a hundred days surrounded by cholos even if it meant only one more night with Spooky. But she was digging herself into a rabbit hole. Mari couldn’t keep thinking about him like that, so she changed the subject. “How did you find out I was here, anyway?”

“Ruben told me,” he ran a hand down his face as though that’d calm him down. “He thought I’d wanna know. Thought there was something goin’ on between us,”

Trying to lighten the mood, she flashed him a small grin; teasing and flirty and only for him. “Wasn’t there?”

He laughed, dimples and all.

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I guess there was,”

There was a brief pause when their eyes met, the kind where the world stops spinning and it’s only them, and then he wrapped her small hand in his own.

“Look, Mari, I know you’re with High School now, and I’m happy for you, but I hope you know how I feel about you,”

Mari’s heart skipped a beat and her breath caught in her throat. He continued before she had a chance to speak.

“I didn’t choose this life. Being with you makes me wish there was a way out. But there ain’t. You were the one good thing I had going, Mariana, and I acted like a dick. I pushed you away because it’s easier if you hate me. When you’re around I just want shit I’m never gonna get,”

“Spooky,” she murmured, unable to muster much more than a breath, “just say the word and I’m yours. Trey, he...he’s nice but he’s not you. He’s not who I want to be with and you know that,”

The hand around hers tightened.

“I wanna be with you, the same way you do, but I’m a cholo and I don’t want you dragged into this the way I was. I may not like him but at least the kid’s normal, safe. He won’t hurt you,”

“I know the risks, Oscar. You talk about your life like I don’t know any better but I do. I’ve known the risks from the moment we met and I don’t care!”

She was expecting him to yell back, to scream and get angry like he always does. But he didn’t. He was calm as he looked her in the eye and told her: “I do. I care about you, Mari. What happens when I get my third strike, huh? Or when I get popped off? What happens to you in the aftermath? I can’t do that to you,”

Mari hated that he had a point, but he was talking in absolutes. Nothing was written in stone; there was no guarantee that he’d get a third strike, no way to know if he’d-

Well, she didn’t like to think about that last one.

“Am I interrupting something?” Trey asked, standing in the threshold of the hospital room. Oscar looked at him for only a minute before looking away as though his eyes burned. Mari couldn’t look at him at all.

“Nah,” Oscar said as he stood, “I was just leaving,”

The warmth of his hand left Mari’s as he reached up to cup her face. His thumb brushed over her cheekbone as he leaned in to press a soft kiss to her forehead.

“Look after yourself, mami,” he whispered, so low only she could hear. Then he left, not even sparing Trey another glance as he shoved past him and out the door.

Taglist: @robinsdolan @lostgirl219@kseniainneverland @ravengreystone@weediskindabad @moistdollerbills @javoqetal@kenzie44469 @goddessate@blackdepressoexpresso @classyputa @babygirl-htx @wonderlandlovelove @cacapoodlepoo @agent-femmefatale @elliesshitofablog@daydreamer0307@harduy @elizabeth-santana-98 @lonelyyblues

#on my block #on my block fanfiction #Oscar diaz #Oscar diaz imagine #Oscar spooky diaz #spooky #spooky diaz

[irarelypostanything]

Unforgettable Scenes - The last scene in “La La Land”

I have a coworker who’s relatively new to piano, and I recommended that he learn City of Stars.  Seriously, it’s one of my favorite songs and it’s really not that hard.  One thing I’ve found most interesting about it, though I’ve never backed this up or even looked it up, is that it’s really easy to take that song and swing the notes.

What do I mean by that?  I mean I think it works really well as a jazz song.  You can change up the rhythm, even omit some notes.  I don’t know if this was intentional, but if it was then i think it’s pretty great.  The actual song, as it’s played in the movie, seems more classical.  It does end some notes on a staccato, but it certainly doesn’t swing.

I also like how they make the song a duet later in the film, and you can see how it becomes a duet.  A rush.  A glance.  A touch.  A dance.  It becomes call and response.

La La Land is a musical movie that draws influence from Grease, West Side Story, and a ton of movies that span decades back.  It features stunning choreography, good acting, and a series of now famous scenes that were often miraculously done as one-takes.

*Spoilers*

We’ve seen these two characters grow and develop.  They’ve had a relationship and they’ve lost it.  They have actual names, but I always refer to them as Ryan and Emma.

We’re transported back near the beginning of the film, and Ryan is just fired because, for the first of two times in the film, he’s in a job that he actually hates.  Emma compliments him, he starts to walk on by, and then instead of just ignoring her he kisses her.

This, some critics cite, is a pretty unrealistic thing but a very common trope in Hollywood.  Taking it from there, we start to get this giant series of wish fulfillment.  If the scene stood on its own, it would be your run-of-the-mill classic romcom Hollywood sequence.  It’s not.  We know everything that actually happens, so it’s poignant and original.

JK Simmons, in this movie, plays my third favorite asshole.  In this imagined scene, he’s kind.  Emma, who performs her one-person act in front of almost no one, performs to an enormous crowd with Ryan right there to support her.  They’re together.  They go from one famous film-inspired scene to the next, always happy and always together.

And then in my favorite part of the whole thing, they play City of Stars again.  We see fictionalized camera footage of Ryan and Emma getting a house, having children, driving to a scene side by side that we know they don’t enter into together.  It all works.  It’s all perfect.

And then the scene ends, and then it’s reality, and then it’s credits.

What does this scene suggest about love, about the nature of film, about the nature of musicals?  Is it all just a dream?  Are we all constantly chasing the idea of love, instead of love itself?  The things in this imagined what-could-have-been sequence seem childishly unrealistic.  Why would he kiss her?  He’s just been fired.  Why would he pass up a good job opportunity?  It would have to be if the opportunity never presented itself, surely.

I think that if you want to know La La Land, all you have to do is listen to City of Stars.  It says it all.  Two voices, so naturally done that Emma laughs in the real recording at “crowded restaurant.”  Love is all anybody wants.  Is it true?

Maybe they were never meant to be, but they could have been.

This movie stands as a landmark, a reanalysis not just of great musicals but also of film and Hollywood.  More so than that, it also stands as an analysis of love and human interaction itself.  It’s a masterpiece.  It’s music shouldn’t just be enjoyed, it should be replicated by our own hands for the full experience.

And that’s why I’m so, so glad that this movie became the well-deserved recipient of the oscar for best picture.

EDIT: Wait, what?

#la la land #15-minute freewrite

[theladymeera]

Arya’s Visit/A Heart-to-Heart

Can’t come up with a better title at the moment, sorry. A short Arya one-shot for @aegon. Sorry it took so long. I ended up doing a little prequel to the bran/meera modern au I’m going to start publishing soonish since I love the Stark girls in it more than anything. You can read it below the cut or on AO3 when I post it there.

Edit: Here’s the AO3 link [x]

Arya popped her bubblegum loudly, a habit that had always made her mother angry but her mother couldn’t complain when she wasn’t there to watch so Arya kept blowing bubbles. It was quiet at the train station that afternoon, a benefit of leaving early. Arya kept her hands deep in her fleece-lined pockets to keep her hands warm as she’d forgotten her gloves.

The ride from Riverrun to Winterfell was long but Arya enjoyed it, she needed the quiet for a few minutes. A 24-hour shift in the chidlren’s hospital had left her feeling like a damp rag that had been rung out too much. So many children. Some of them were only there for minor surgeries, a couple stitches, a broken ankle. But there were others that had the bald heads, sallow skin, or empty eyes of someone who had been too sick for far too long. It wrenched at Arya’s heart.

Her thoughts were broken when a text came in, another one in the continuous conversation on the Stark’s group chat; currently named “Howlies” at Rickon’s suggestion. Arya had a feeling the name would not last just as the last eight names hadn’t. The addition was Sansa’s “Can’t wait to see everyone tonight!”

Arya’s phone kept buzzing with her brothers’ and Jon’s responses, with the exception of Bran who Arya figured was probably sleeping, possibly high although he swore up and down that he was clean and had been for nearly six months. While Arya was thinking of a response she received a private text from Jon “You are coming aren’t you?”

“On the 🚂 now”

“Okay I’ll pick you up when you get here.”

Arya grinned, she had missed Jon more than anyone. She spent the rest of the train ride listening to music, looking out the window, and ignoring the continuous texts of the group chat and the occasional text from a friend. Hot Pie was filling her inbox with his lengthy musings on his bread recipe. She didn’t need to comment on it and she’d benefit from it when she returned to Riverrun.

Jon was waiting for Arya as she stepped off the train at the Winterstown station. He wrapped her in a bear hug when she found him. “How was the trip little sister?”

“Fine,” she told him. Arya picked her bag up from where she’d dropped it and followed Jon to the car. “So how is everyone else?”

He waved his hand “Well enough – some better than others. You’ll find out when you get home.”

While Winterfell as a city had been officially absorbed into Winterstown centuries before it had remained the most upscale and wealthy area of the entire North, and as a result of its being much more well known that Winterstown the whole region was known in the South as Winterfell. Some things had changed Arya saw from the window of the passenger’s seat in the waning light. There was new construction near the airport and some of the shops had changed in even the older parts of town. She and Jon enjoyed having only the radio quietly playing the latest hits from Volantis and Lannisport, though Jon would have honestly preferred classical music and Arya leaned towards Braavosi styles but neither of those were available at that hour and it was easy to tune out.

Arya drew in her breath when Jon turned onto the street into her parents’ neighborhood. The fencing was imposing and the houses were particularly large and often lavish. There was a change in the front garden of her parents’ home. “Jon what happened to the tree?” she asked, a tinge of panic in her voice. The ancient ironwood that had stood sentinel over her parents’ front lawn since before her father was born was gone, an enormous black stump and some missing grass was all that was left in the area it had once been.

“It was diseased and it had to be taken down a week ago. I thought your mother would have mentioned.”

“She didn’t.”

“Well maybe this is why if you’re going to cry over it,” he said good-naturedly.

The annual flowers were different, her mother had chosen a mix of what looked like purple and white flowers from what Arya could see in the dim light of the street lights and the garden lamps. Arya noted this without the shock she’d felt at losing her favorite climbing tree. Her mother usually chose a different mix of annuals annually. It kept things fresh without cutting into the foundations of what made their home, well, their home. “Do you need a minute with the stump?” Jon asked, grabbing Arya’s bag from the trunk.

“No, I’ll have a funeral for it tomorrow.” That got her cousin to laugh and he threw an arm over her shoulders to guide her inside.

It was just the family that evening. Normally Arya would have expected to see some of her mother’s Tully relatives like her great uncle Brynden and his husband, her uncle Edmure and his wife or some family friends such as the Reeds or Baratheons but instead it was just her parents, siblings, and Jon. Which would obviously lead to some sort of girls’ activity with her mother and Sansa, the two people she was looking forward to spending time with the least. Arya bore the tight embraces, Rickon’s fist bump, and a somewhat awkward hug with Jeyne due to her swollen belly. Arya felt as if there were butterflies in her own belly.

The dinner went smoothly, the only blips being when Robb spilled wine on his dress shirt and when Rickon failed to smother a belch which earned himself and Robb sharp looks. Rickon for belching, Robb for laughing. Arya hid her own snort by pretending to choke on a sip of wine. Her mother noticed but chose to ignore it.

“It’s wonderful to have all of us together again for once,” Catelyn began when the table was being cleared.

“Here we go,” Arya thought dismally.

“– and while I adore all of my boys I think we need to have some time together as ladies. Sansa, Arya?” Catelyn’s stare seemed to bore into Arya’s head. Arya didn’t dare ignore the direction and followed her mother, sister, and sister-in-law to the theater room. Jeyne and Sansa settled down to work on giving Jeyne a pedicure, she couldn’t reach her feet after all, and Catelyn pulled her youngest aside.

“Did you get a new tattoo or a tongue piercing or whatnot?” Catelyn snapped once they were out of earshot of their companions.

“What? No.” Arya crossed her arms in front of her chest and glared up at her mother.

“Then can you explain why you’ve spent the whole evening acting guilty?”

“I have not been acting guilty.”

“Then what would you call your behavior? It is not normal for you. I appreciate your not fighting with your sister, though I will admit you haven’t done that in some time, but if something wasn’t off you would have at least spent more time talking to your brothers or Jon.”

Arya took a deep breath, “I didn’t want to have this conversation.”

“What conversation,” Catelyn put a cool hand on Arya’s shoulder.

“I –” Arya glanced at where her sister and Jeyne were seated, “can I speak to you in private?”

Catelyn’s eyebrows rose, “alright.”

They walked back to the kitchen which was deserted now that the cook had gone home. Arya ran her hand along the marble counter and listened to the dishwasher humming. Her mother set two glasses of water between them and stared her daughter down. “What is this all about? Out with it.”

Arya kept her eyes on the lines in the stone, “I quit med school.”

“You what?” Catelyn hissed.

“I couldn’t do it anymore. I – I hate the studying and I don’t like any of the doctors I know. It’s too cerebral or, or whatever. I just felt so tense all the time, I was under so much pressure to finish school and become this like, great doctor like I’d planned on and it wasn’t working and when I sent the school my withdrawal letter it felt so good and I didn’t want to tell any of you because I’ve been working towards being a doctor for so long and I felt so ashamed that I jumped ship so late when I was supposed to be smart and dependable and I always said I’d never change my mind about what I wanted to be but it just wasn’t right. I’m sorry.” Arya wiped furiously at a tear that had escaped.

Catelyn stayed quiet for a few minutes while Arya regained control. “I was afraid you were going to tell me you were pregnant,” she said at last.

Arya laughed, “Me? No. No. Never.”

Catleyn leaned back in her chair, “Never say never Arya. You just told me you quit medical school, giving up a dream you’ve had since you were nine years old.”

“I mean I don’t expect to ever come crawling home in tears as an unwed mother who doesn’t even know who the father is.” Arya took a drink of her water, “Aren’t you angry with me?”

“For dropping out of school? It is disappointing, an adjustment to be made, but it’s not the worst thing you could have done. As long as you’re happy. Speaking of which, what have you been doing since you quit?”

Arya’s shoulder’s dropped as the last bits of eternal stress fled her system. If her mother wasn’t angry that she’d quit school then there was no chance her father would be. “I’m still an RN you know so I got a job at the children’s hospital in Riverrun, since I didn’t want to go back to Braavos at all, and I’ve been taking some courses at the community college there in like languages and math. And I’ve been dancing a lot. Just, trying to figure out what I really want now that I know doctoring isn’t it.”

“So you’re not living on the streets in Essos?”

Arya shook her head, “No, of course not.”

“And you’re happy?”

Arya thought for a moment, “Yeah, it’s the happiest I’ve been since before dad went to work in King’s Landing.”

“Good,” her mother said before she stood and came around the counter to bury Arya in an embrace. “That’s all I want for you my little wolf girl,” Catelyn muttered into Arya’s hair.

#aegon #end of year celebration #asoiaf fanfiction #fanfiction #my fics #arya stark #jon snow #catelyn stark

[werelywrites]

Glimmer Karamatsu x Reader

Sorry not sorry how cheesy this idea is but I wanted a fated string au fic with Karamatsu so i frickin delivered!

Gender neutral reader. enjoy!

You always see strings attached to people. Some, you’d notice would be attached to someone nearby or, more often than not, would go somewhere where you couldn’t see who was on the other end.

Some, including yourself, wouldn’t have any string attached at all.

In highschool, you had noticed that one friend’s string was attached to their crush. A crush that had no clue who your friend was. So you took initiative and, long story short, got them together as a couple and to this day they were happy together.

You figured that maybe these strings were like a sign of soulmates. You weren’t sure. Talking about it to anyone wasn’t an option, not after being told that maybe you should see a therapist by the school counselor. So you kept it to yourself, other than giving a few hints here and there to people who were looking for love.

It had always worried you that some people didn’t have strings. You actually laid in bed restless because of it. Did that mean you and these other people didn't have a soulmate? It was a lonely thought.

But as you got older you noticed that some people who didn’t have strings would have one pop up suddenly.

The first time you noticed it happened, you actually followed it. Curious as to why now all of a sudden did this person have a string? You didn’t have far to go, it ended up being attached to someone who, from the looks of things, had just got off a plane. Catching a bit of their conversation with one for they’re companions, you confirmed that they weren’t from around this area.

Ah, so it’s a distance thing, you figured. You had to be close to whoever was your stringmate for a string to appear. It calmed your nerves some and your hope of maybe finding your stringmate glimmered.

Years pass and you still didn’t have a string. You had no idea how close you needed to be for it to appear but unfortunately the option of traveling everywhere wasn't really affordable. It had stopped being your focus, although, it wasn't’ really your main focus in life to begin with. Instead you focused on your studies, work and your favourite pastime.

Just sitting at your favourite bench and people watch.

You’d watch stringmates and make little assumptions about them from the little acts they did. You also made a note of their string and how it was attached. Who knew, maybe these little details where a clue as to who they were?

*Couple with mini poodle with a rainbow bandana: Red string, attached to wrist from one then ring finger on other.  String looks like wool, scratchy appearance but no doubt soft.

*Double daters having picnic: each person has three string all attached to pointer fingers all connecting to one another. Talk about a criss-cross. All have a different coloured ribbon looking string.

*Old couple fishing (but don’t seem to be in a romantic relationship together, rather separate): seem to be connected by old tattered cloth. Bandage? It’s around one forearm and then the others thigh.

Fate seemed to weave people together in all shapes and forms.

How does the old saying go? When you aren’t looking for love, you find it? It pretty much sums up what had happened to you.

You had a vacation and you had saved up enough money to travel to a new area. A friend had suggested it, you figured why not? It was the end of summer, fall creeping in just a little. It was beautiful this time of year. You were walking around enjoying the scenery and of course seeing the surrounding peoples’ strings. You were too busy looking around at other strings that you had failed to notice the glittery one appearing on your wrist.

But eventually you caught it shimmering in the sunlight. Dumbfounded, you just stared at it for a good minute.  Then everything else slowed down around you but your heart was beating fast. Exhilaration took hold as you grasped at your blue glitter leather strip and tugged. You felt something heavy on the other end. Your knowledge of the fact that strings never got loose, as you got closer to whomever you were attached, went out the window. You continued to grasp at it randomly as anyone else would following actual string, picking it up on occasion, gathering it under your arm, holding onto it for dear life. Your heart beating against your chest with each step. Who was it leading it to?

Turning the corner you nearly bumped into another person who looked just as out of breath as you. You gave the man a quick apology at the same time he did. Both of you inadvertently getting in each other’s way again as you each had tried to move out of each other's way. You couldn’t help but to laugh at the awkward dance the two fo you had done.

He touched the edge of his sunglasses and started to chuckle himself until he saw something that made him choke on his laughter and a huge blush take over his face. He couldn’t help but to point.

Following his pointer finger you looked down to your wrist and noted that it was the wrist that had your leather string attached. Confused, since you knew of no one else that could see them you glanced up, absentmindedly grasping the string and gave it a reassuring tug. You felt the weight at the end and immediately heard a grunt from the leather jacketed man in front of you.

“Please, don’t tug on that, my Karamatsu angel. My heart is pounding enough by your presences alone. You don’t have to tug on its string, heh.”

You blinked a bit at him in confusion, then it registered. With a gasp you glanced to his arm and, sure enough, the glitter leather strip that was attached to your wrist was also attached to this man’s wrist. Your mouth hung open in shock before you felt a finger go under your chin and pushed your head back up to meet his gaze. His sunglasses now further down his nose to get a good look into his eyes.

Of all the things you’d thought you would say to your stringmate you had never thought you would ask what you did, “you can see it?”

“Hmm? You mean our ribbon of destiny? Of course my dove.”

You had so many questions swirling in your head, you felt dizzy just trying to focus on what to do next.

You settled on giving him your name first.

“Ah, my love, a beautiful name indeed. I am your knight, Karamatsu.” he posed for your splendor.

Happy tears spilled form your eyes; however, he interpreted them as otherwise and started to panic. He became a nervous wreck, pleading to make it right whatever it was that ailed you.

Touching his string wrist and letting out a watery chuckle, he stilled. “Nothing’s wrong. I’m just so happy to meet you finally.”

You figured he’d go back to his cool persona but he actually blushed and nervously looked away for a moment. He coughed in nervousness and finally said in a shy manner. “It’s nice to meet you too, finally.” His whiskey eyes returning to yours with an intensity that made your heart flutter. He took your string wristed hand in his and let out a sigh of relief as he added,“you have no idea how long I’ve waited for you, [y/n].”

The leather strip shimmered against the sunlight as it folded itself into a bow around your joined hands. The edges gently going with the breeze as if fate was breathing their own sigh of relief.

Though he was a stranger, and you couldn’t wait to get to know him, you felt right at home. You finally shared your own breath of relief.

How finely woven all things are.

A/N: so I wrote this with a very sleepy brain last night and unfortunatly i have a migrain today so edited it isn’t really possible so I apologize if it’s not readable. I’ll come back and edit it when i feel better. 

#karamatsu x reader #Karamatsu #karamatsu matsuno #string of fate au #glimmer #werelywrites #ososan #osomatsu san #Osomatsu San drabble #x reader #reader insert #gender neutral reader #osomatsu san oneshot