#he's being so loved by his team i can continue sleeping my nights well

[seresinhangmanjake]

Simon "Ghost" Riley x Soap's Sister!reader

Summary: Because Johnny found him sleeping with his sister, Simon had to live the last three months without you, but he's about to get his girl back.

warnings/notes: a little smut 18+, cursing, drinking. That's probably it. Oh, typos, im sure, as well.

words: 1830

Part 1

He drinks at the same bar. The one his team practically lived in when they were all together for an evening, but that doesn’t happen anymore, not with the entire group. Johnny stays home if he knows Simon will be attending the night out, and Simon, if informed Johnny wants to be with the team, elects to remove himself from the situation for everyone’s comfort. He figures it’s the least he can do. He’d slept with his best mate’s sister, he’d fallen in love with his best mate’s sister, and so he has taken on the consequences, no matter how infuriating and unreasonable and unfair. 

“You want another, Honey?” the bartender asks. She grins. Her eyes shine with desire, as they have all night, and it might be a pleasant sight if Simon had never met you. He might’ve taken her home, fucked her like a toy until he was spent and she was happily ruined by his cock before he kicked her out. But she isn’t you. No woman is you.

“Keep ‘em comin’,” Simon replies, downing the amber liquid in his glass. 

Suddenly, the stool beside him slides across the hardwood floor, now occupied by a newcomer he wouldn’t hesitate to shove to their ass if he could do so without causing a scene. What kind of rude bastard risks sitting next to someone when ten other seats are open?

“Actually lass, do me a favor and cut ‘im off. I need ‘im in his right mind.”

Simon almost chokes at Johnny's voice but he doesn’t turn his head as he slowly sets the glass back down on the counter, his fingers tightening around it. Anger, confusion, pain, anxiety. It all crashes over him in a hefty wave, because rolled into this one man is both the friend Simon has missed for months and the asshole who has forced him to be apart from the love of his life. And it’s almost too much to handle at once.

“I’ll take his drink,” Johnny tells the bartender, who has lost all hope now that the man she’s been attempting to charm is no longer lonely enough to be convinced to take her home. When she places the glass in front of him, he takes a sip. “You look like shit, Ghost.”

“What do you want?”

“We got a problem,” Johnny says, getting right to it. “A bit of a disaster, really, and I gave it my best shot, but I can’t fix it.” Simon blinks. His brows pinch. Johnny drains the remainder of the alcohol and wipes his mouth with the back of his forearm. “She’s miserable. And considerin’ the timeline, I’d wager it’s because she’s without you.”

Simon’s heart—though had fallen from his chest months ago—sinks lower into his gut. 

“Look, I didn' believe it was that deep,” Johnny continues. “Figured you were jus’ messin’ around. Being stupid and disrespectful with my baby sister. But I cannot have her miserable, Ghost. It won’t do.” He looks at Simon and releases a long sigh. “She loves you. I don’ like it but she does, and you need to make it better.”

“What exactly are you askin’ of me?”

Johnny’s eyes land back on the empty glass. He plants his elbows on the counter and rubs his fingers across his forehead, kneading the wrinkles. “Just…go to her, alright?”

That snaps Simon out of his grumbly attitude. “You serious?”

“Unfortunately,” Johnny says. 

Simon practically leaps out of his seat, nearly knocking the stool to the floor as he shrugs on his jacket. He’s almost at the door, but then he stops. Taking a breath, he turns back to his old friend. “Will you be able to handle this?” Simon asks. “Me and her? Because you can't ask me to let her go, Johnny. Not twice.”

Johnny takes a second, then he gives a brief nod. “I’ll adjust. Somehow. With time; lots of time.”

It isn't much reassurance, but it's enough for Simon to be on his way. He rushes out the door, jumps into his truck, and races down the road. He forgets the seatbelt. Ignores the speed limit signs. You don’t live far, and you’re worth the risk if it means getting to you faster. 

He knows the elevator in your building is much too slow because he’s been in it a hundred times. He has made out with you in it; fucked you in it, slamming the emergency button so no one could interrupt on the nights you couldn’t wait to get to your bedroom. So he takes the stairs. Two at a time, up eight flights, and down the hall. With a heaving chest, he bangs on your door. 

“Love, open up!” He knocks harder. Loud enough to make your neighbor pop her head into the hall to understand the ruckus. 

“Oh, wonderful. You've returned,” the old woman huffs. “And just when I was starting to believe I’d never again have to endure listening to that moaning and groaning at all hours.”

“We talked ‘bout this back in June, Mrs. Brimsby. Get yourself some earplugs,” Simon retorts before calling for you again. “Baby, please, it‘s me!”

“I’ll report the two of you for the noise.”

“You probably should. You’re in for a long night.” He hears a scoff but doesn’t bother to glance in the direction it comes from. 

“Still so disrespectful,” she spits before slamming the door to her apartment. 

Simon has held a low level of hatred for the old bat since the morning after the first time you’d slept together. It was an early Sunday full of soft touches and kisses and tea to nurse the mild hangovers you’d both had because of a couple of drinks the night before—the drinks that allowed the two of you to finally surrender to the sexual tension. After kissing you goodbye, he’d stepped out of your apartment with a smile he hadn't donned in quite some time, only to have it wiped away from the unexpected grandma in a collared nightgown tapping her foot as she stroked the fur of the cat in her arms. 

“You kept us up all night,” she had scolded. “We need our sleep.” The cat then hissed for emphasis. 

Now, Simon has never been so happy to have that woman blathering in his ear. She reminds him of home, because home is with you and this is where you are. Getting yelled at shoots him into the memories of the time you spent together all those months ago. The stupidly high levels of bliss that, based on the trajectory of his life at the time, he’d assumed was more of a myth than anything. But you had made it real. You had soothed the pain. You were the patch on his wounds; the brightest spot in his life which dimmed the trauma and horrors. 

He’s so lost in those thoughts that he doesn’t immediately notice when his banging fist plummets through the air.

“Si?”

At your voice, Simon’s mind instantly clears. His eyes meet yours.

“Fucking finally,” he mutters, not letting a beat go by before he’s bending at the knees, wrapping his arms around your waist, and lifting you up. Instinctually, your arms snake around his neck, your legs circle his hips, and he feels his cock begin to swell from the reminder of how natural that action is for you. How right it is that you fit together like lock and key. 

Many questions are brewing in your eyes, but you don’t ask them. You kiss him instead, hard and thoroughly as he carries you into your apartment and kicks the door closed behind him. When he sits you atop your kitchen counter and settles himself between your spread legs, his hands go everywhere; under your sleep shirt, up the curves of your body to squeeze your breasts then back down to your hips. His palms slide around to your ass and jerk you closer so the center of those thin little shorts is pressed against the mound protruding from his jeans. 

Buttons scatter across the tile from his impatience, unwilling to delicately undo each tiny closure of your shirt. Your fingers trickle lower on his body to the belt buckle you quickly undo and the zipper you harshly yank down. He’s about to tell you to lift your hips, but you do so without his command, shimmying out of your shorts, and Simon takes the chance to do the same, pushing his pants just below his ass. He springs free, the heavy column of flesh landing at your navel. 

Leaning back, you guide his cock through the slickness of puffy lips into your tight, clenching walls. It sucks the air from his lungs. His head falls to your shoulder as you both try to breathe at a steady pace. His hands brace on the counter on either side of your body, nails digging into the granite. Home.

“Simon…baby, you have to move,” you pant. “I c-can’t take it.”

“I’ve got you,” he whispers in your ear before lifting his head and placing a quick peck on your mouth. Shifting his hips, he pulls out and then slowly eases himself back inside of you. His groan drowns out the sweet song of your moan. “I’ve got you, love.”

—

“Your neighbor still hates us, jus’ so you know,” Simon says as he slides under the sheets. Were he not so exhausted, he’d chuckle at the idea of being beside you in your bed and not immediately trying to fuck you, but after the kitchen counter, then the couch, then the living room floor, you’re both worn out and in need of a good night's sleep. “Probably more now than she did before.”

Normally, you would have found his words amusing, but you remain silent on your back, staring straight up at the ceiling. Simon raises a brow and flips onto his side. Then he sees the tear slip from the corner of your eye down to your ear. 

“What're you thinkin' about, love?” he asks as he places his hand on your cheek and turns your face toward his. 

“I'm scared,” you tell him. “I've missed you so much, but the second you leave, everything will go back to how it was without you. That broke me the first time, Si. How do I go through it all over again?”

His eyes pinch tight and he sighs in shame. He should have told you. It should have been the first thing out of his mouth, but then he saw you and he needed you and that was all that mattered in the moment. “Baby,” he begins, brushing the hair back from your face. “I'm not leaving you, and we are not goin’ back to that, ok?”

“But Johnny—”

“We don't need to worry about Johnny.”

Your eyes widen. “What? Why not?”

“Because, love,” Simon says, his hand finding the middle of your back and snuggling you into his chest, “Johnny sent me.”

@universitypenguin @ghostslittlegf

#simon ghost riley #simon riley smut #simon riley x reader #simon riley #simon ghost riley x reader #simon riley x you #simon riley fic #cod ghost #cod fic #mw2

[thesmutsideblog]

Never Ever? - Spencer Reid x Reader

Summary: After a you and your long term ex breakup, some truths about your sex life come to light at the BAU and the idea that you've never had an orgasm, does not fly with Spencer Reid.

Reader is AFAB, and the story is using she/her pronouns, mostly because this one is really self indulgent and loosely based on me being pissed off about my ex.

Content warnings: dumbification of Spencer Reid, simp Spencer, shitty ex boyfriend, self indulgent writing, no beta or proof reading, cursing, smut, sexual worship, porn with plot I guess.

I have never written in second person before so I can only apologise for the shit quality of this, I havent written smut since 2018 and it's unedited, there is going to be spelling issues it's the dyslexia I'm sorry xx

GIF by comeandjointhebigboys

Spencer is doing everything in his power to look like he is minding his business, mostly because he really is trying to not eavesdrop. He came over to make a cup of coffee because he got barely any sleep last night and he wants to keep focused. But with no case directly at hand, there was something else the team were paying attention to and it was impossible for Spencer to completely ignore it.

"So he just, broke up with you?" Emily asks, dumbfounded.

"Over the phone," you say tilting your mug towards yourself, choosing to stare down at the small remainder of your coffee rather than to make eye contact with your team members.

"What an asshole," JJ says, lacing her arms together, until she looks like a disapproving mother. "Did he say why?"

"He said, we were going different places, and it would be a disservice to the time we spent together to pretend to be happy and keep lying to eachother," you say, sighing and putting the mug down, choosing to accept this caring interrogation about your breakup as your fate for the next twenty minutes.

"He used those words?" Emily asks, still trying to grapple the concept that your boyfriend, who she had met on a few occasions and had some thoughts she kept to herself about, had broken up with you.

"He used those words but what he really meant was 'I want to start sleeping with my twenty year old coworker and you spend too much time at work, so I'm ending things,' but he won't have the decency to admit that, despite the fact he was sleeping with her before the week was out," you roll your eyes as Emily and JJ continue to voice their disgust, loudly across the bullpen. You catch Spencer's eye for a moment and give him a small sad smile across the room, he nods and then looks away.

The guilt is eating Spencer alive. It's not like he actually had anything to do with the end of your relationship, he actively kept himself far away from it and even discussing it with you as possible. But the facts still remained the same, he likes you. He has liked you since your first day at the BAU and his feelings have never faltered. But you have always been in that relationship since long before he met you, and he knew that he didn't stand a chance, and he wouldn't want to mess around with that anyway. But he was unable to disagree with Prentiss, his own feelings for you aside, the simple fact of the matter was you have always been well out of your exes league. You are beautiful, and intelligent and charismatic, and your ex thought he was those things but more often than not fell short.

It's not like he even wished that your relationship would end and could blame it on the unlikely event of magical intervention. But the sheer fact that he was undeniably happier that you were no longer dating a man you were once very much in love with, that was enough to have him feeling guilty. Which is one of the many reasons he is really trying to not get involved in this conversation. One of the many reasons he is trying to keep a distance.

"How long were you two together again, like three years?" JJ asks. You shake your head.

"High school sweethearts," you correct her, "it's been a lot longer than three years."

"And he broke up with you over the phone, for a co-worker?" Emily emphasis each word in the sentence as she slowly sounds them out.

"He denies the last part but, yes," you nod.

"What are you beautiful ladies being so loud about?" Derek asks, approaching the three of you with some files in hand.

"The fact that men never fail to both disappoint and astound me," Emily states looking up at Derek from her seat, "no offence."

"None taken, but a little context wouldn't go a miss," he says looking at each of you in turn.

"My ex is a pig," you explain as nonchalantly as you can manage. You're trying really hard to be very collected about this. You've had a few days to process the breakup and you knew it was coming, even if you won't admit that to yourself. But being broken up with hurts, whether you see it coming or not. He was the only person you ever really dated, and having spent so much of your life with him this was a big adjustment. But deep down you weren't exactly mad about the situation, as much as it made you feel a lot better to complain about it. Things had not been right between the two of you for quite some time, and you find yourself almost relieved that it's over. But that still gave him no right to be as much of an asshole about it all as he has been.

"So he is the only guy you've ever really dated then, huh?" Emily asks. You give her a look as the thought crosses through her mind. "Wait, does that mean?"

"We started dating when we were barely more than kids Emily," you defend.

"So it's just been that guy, that guy?" Emily is struggling to be even the smallest part composed. "What is wrong with men?"

"You need some strange," Derek says casually.

"Morgan," JJ scolds him but Emily is slowly nodding her head. "Emily..."

"Best way to get over someone," Emily points out.

"Wow, I am not getting under anyone," you state, holding up your hands.

"Look, I understand the appeal of someone you've been with for a long time, they know you, they know what you like," Derek leans back on the table, "so new is risky, and some people really don't have a clue what they're doing I'll admit," he chuckles, "but trust me the longer you leave it-" Derek knows he isn't crossing a boundary, you and him have had plenty of conversations, but as soon as you give him the look to stop talking, he stops.

"I appreciate your concern but sex, is really not at the top of my priority list," you say.

"Please don't let a guy like that ruin it for you," Emily is staring up at the ceiling all types of distressed at the idea of your ex and his general existence.

"I don't think you need to worry about him ruining anything for me, more like just wasting my time," you say before realising that may be revealing too much. All three of them look at you instantly. "Do not read into that."

"Disinterest," Emily states looking you up and down. "And no immediate desire to release that usually comes with a breakup."

"We're not really doing this, are we?" JJ asks looking between the two profilers concerned.

"She's been distant the last few months, talking less and less about him, so the breakup wasn't unexpected, which means the sexlife probably wasn't up to scratch at the time," Derek adds.

"Oh you guys are doing this," JJ gives you an apologetic look as they start rattling off assumptions.

You try your best to ignore them until Derek says something which does tiptoe over the line- by a mile. "Pretty boy, what are the statistics on post breakup sex?" He is half joking but it pulls Spencer directly into a conversation he had been trying to avoid.

Spencer knows the answer, and that's obvious, but answering will only encourage them to get him involved in the conversation. But not answering is suspicious and could cause worse problems. He pushes his thumb into the centre of his palm as he speaks. "27% of adults report having sex with an ex within a two-year period," Spencer states knowing that's not what Derek meant but hoping he could get away with it.

"No, I mean rebound sex," Derek corrects.

"Studies show that thirty-five percent of those who are broken up with have sex to get over their ex, and twenty-five percent as a form of revenge," Spencer says giving in and stepping closer to the group.

"Look sixty five percent of rebound relationships fail within six months," you say. That's a safe thing to say you believe, as you know the team would likely assign that research as an attempt to make an educated guess how long the fling with the coworker would last. But Spencer knows better. He cannot help but wonder if that's what has been making you act differently the last few months. If you saw the end in sight and wondered what that means for you when it's over.

"You're not looking for a relationship though, you're just looking for some fun," JJ points out.

"You do remember how to have fun, don't you beautiful," Derek asks giving you a wink.

"Yeah," you say brushing him off.

"Do you?" Derek asks, unconvinced.

"I told you, I'm not interested in going out and getting laid, it's not worth the energy," you say.

"When was the last time you had an orgasm?" Emily asks. Spencer chokes on his coffee.

"Emily!" JJ chastises her.

"Someone had to ask," Emily says.

"No one had to," you tell her.

"Come on, six months?" Emily asks. "A year?"

"Emily," JJ warns.

"Shit..." Derek whispers and you feel his gaze on you intensifying. He has you all figured out.

"What?" Spencer asks, not meaning to.

Derek is keeping his eyes on you and you cannot meet his eye. "Tell me I'm wrong pretty girl," Derek says, wanting himself to be wrong.

"I... I don't know... You're a profiler, how am I supposed to lie to you?" You huff.

"Are you kidding me?" Derek asks.

"Derek you're not helping," you state.

"Sorry," he says, "I just don't understand how that can be the case."

"You said it yourself, some people really don't have a clue what they're doing," you say.

"So you've never?" Emily asks cottoning on.

"Can we please stop talking about this," you say.

Spencer's brain is ticking over trying to read between the lines and when it clicks he is struck with a similar dumbfounding as Morgan. How? How?

He cannot help but have one clear thought scrambling around his brain at a million miles per hour. If he had ever had the chance, he wouldn't have wanted anything more than to make sure you felt good. To know he had made you feel good.

How inconsiderate could your ex be? How little attention must he have been playing to not even notice that you were not getting what he was out of it? How had he never cared to make that better?

And why did you not feel cheated by that fact?

"I'm not eavesdropping," Garcia defends bringing Spencer out of his head and back into the room.

"Okay why don't we just fax everyone the stats on my sex life," you groan, resting your head in your hands.

"I'm just saying," Garcia tries.

"I appreciate all of the unnecessary concern," you say, "but my sex life isn't a BAU case." Emily smiles as she goes to speak but you catch her thought right before she opens her mouth. "And it's no ones problem to solve either."

"It's a little tragic," JJ confesses.

"JJ," you're surprised, JJ is normally the one you can count on to get the others back on track but she just shrugs.

"Let's leave it be, Garcia do we have a case," Spencer is talking with his hands even more than normal and you cannot help but notice. He is trying to come to your rescue and you appreciate that. You appreciate everything Spencer does.

"Maybe," Garcia explains, waving her tablet at the group. "Hotch wants us in the conference room, five minutes ago."

You're quick to get out of your seat and away from the grilling you are receiving from the team and everyone else is quick behind you. Hotch and Rossi are at the desk when you all enter.

Hotch frowns. "You took a while," he notes.

"Discussing the breakup?" Rossi asks, looking you up and down.

"I dont even want to know what has given that away," you admit taking a seat. Hotch nods a half apology which you silently shrug off in return.

You were trying your best to pay attention, giving Hotch the respect he deserves, but the case he was talking about didnt feel like it required the BAU's involvement and Emily is quick to voice that opinion. You managed to register a few words about consulting and favours, but nothing is really sinking in, not when you can feel Spencer's gaze on you as hot as a fever.

You raise your eyes to meet his and they dart away. You think back, and it occurs to you that maybe conversations about your sex life or anyone of the teams sex lives for that matter wasnt exactly what Spencer signed up for. You feel a little guilty, knowing you kind of indulged the others and let him get pulled into the conversation even if that wasnt your intention.

You catch him looking at you again but he doesnt see you looking back, it's like he is trapped in a thought, and in this moment you've never seen Spencer look so without a clue.

"Reid?" Hotch asks, repeating the question.

Spencer looks to Hotch, and he buffers. You know he knows the answer to the question, you know he always knows, but his brain seems to have frozen up on him. "I... sorry what?"

"This is statistics kid," Derek says, "are you sick or something?"

Emily gently pokes Spencers shoulder. "Maybe he is getting a software update," she jokes.

You lean forward and give Hotch the answer he is looking for, remembering from a conversation you and Spencer had a few weeks back about Ohio. Hotch gives a side eye to Rossi before continuing.

You look back at Spencer and he is watching you again, you offer him a small smile and he returns it. You've always been better at reading Spencer than most members of the team but you don't recognize this behaviour at all.

"Are you okay?" You ask him as you both make your way down the steps of the BAU.

"Of course, why do you ask?"

"You blanked back there, Spence, pretty hard," you say as gently as you can, "I havent seen you like that since..."

"Since when?" Spencer looks curious, and softer somehow.

"Since we worked that case in Illinois, with the models, you took one look at that girl Annie Grant was it, and your IQ dropped like a hundred points," you laugh gently.

"She was pretty," Spencer confesses.

"I think Morgan got her number," you recall.

"He did," Spencer agrees.

"So, what is it? Because it's not a pretty girl in lounge wear," you say.

"You dont know that for sure," you can tell he is trying to joke around the subject, and normally youd find that cute. Cute in the kind of way you havent been able to admit to yourself before. Because having a crush on a coworker is not convenient at the best of times.

"Okay, Dr Reid, keep your secrets," you give him gentle shove and his smile is disarming, soft and so happy to just be involved. "Got any fun evening plans?"

"There's this new study into cognitive dissonance in specific trauma patterns I have been meaning to read," he offers. You bite back a chuckle.

"You've got a date with science," you nod to yourself, "of course you do."

He looks around, thinking for a moment. "Are you going to walk?" He asks.

"I usually do," you admit, "it's only a few blocks after all."

"Can I," he pauses, "can I walk you?"

"You want to walk me home?" You ask, a little suprised at the offer.

"If that's okay, the study can wait," he says. There is a look in his eyes you can't quite pinpoint, somewhere between pleading and hopeful. You nod.

"I'd love that Spence."

The distance to your apartment door had never felt so short, and you hadn't realised until now quite how much you enjoyed the moments when you were with Spencer, and no one else was watching. Maybe because he paid less attention to making sure no one noticed him watching you, and he just keeps watching.

Spencer looks at his feet as you fumble with your keys, he has no idea what he is doing. He didn't think any of this through, he just kept thinking about you, and what you deserved and what you should've always been given and now he is stood at the doorstep of your place with no plan, no idea of what compelled him to think any of this was a good idea and no idea of what to do next.

You smile at him, and bite your lower lip just a small bit, the look is so demure that Spencer wonders if he imagined the entire conversation in the bullpen, wondering if maybe he was really so wrapped up in these months of conflicted feelings for you that he managed to lapse from reality so badly that he got himself here.

"Do you want to come in for coffee?" You offer and his heart damn near stops in his chest.

"Coffee is never coffee kid," Derek's voice rings in his head. "It's an invitation."

"Got decaf?" Spencer asks, and you laugh.

"Like anyone who works at the BAU knows what decaf is," you open the door wide and walk through. "You coming?"

He doesn't answer but follows you, closing the door behind him. Your apartment isn't a mess but it's clear things have been moved around since your breakup, there is clear empty spaces where things once collected dust, like so many things once filled a place and vanished. You weren't dwelling on the relationship, because there wasn't a point. You had loved and you had lost, and you knew it went like that sometimes.

"You better not be profiling me Dr Reid," you quip as you catch him looking around.

"I wouldn't dare," he says.

"So, are you going to explain why you're being so sheepish?" You ask, reaching for a mug, to actually make coffee.

"I'm being sheepish?" he asks. He had hoped he was hiding it better.

"Nervous at the very least," you say putting the kettle on. He says nothing and you sigh. "Did we make you uncomfortable earlier?"

"What?" Spencer asks, caught off guard by the question.

"Talking about my ex," you offer up. "I know that sort of gossip isn't exactly for everyone-,"

"No," he is quick to defend, "that's not what's bothering me."

You smirk and he sees the trap you laid for him that he walked right into. "So something is bothering you pretty boy," Morgan's nickname for him falls from your lips and it sounds so different. It burns every nerve ending, each fibre of his being and he forgets how to speak for a moment too long. "Spence?"

"I," he brings himself back.

"I don't mean to pry, you don't have to tell me anything," you explain quickly.

"How was your ex such an idiot?" he asks outright. You laugh, it's short and shallow because you're not expecting anything close to that from Spencer.

"What?" It's your turn to feel dumb now as you spiral trying to process what Spencer is suggesting. That the conversation had gotten to him, but not in the way you'd thought. His problem hadn't been with the topic but the content, the confession. The kettle brings itself to a boil but you're interest is elsewhere now.

"I don't mean to speak out of place here, but if I were him there are so many things I would've done differently," he fidgets with his tie but doesn't stop. This confession is coming out now or not at all and he wants it finished. He needs it finished. He does not want blurred lines. Not between the two of you. "Not even touching the subject of how your relationship ended. I wouldn't have left you in the rain last October, I wouldn't have held all the things I knew about you when we met as reasons to run years after I agreed to love you regardless. I wouldn't have let you go to work angry all those times. I wouldn't have lied about plans. I wouldn't have let you go to sleep sad or angry, and be gone in the morning. I wouldn't have left you wanting, for anything. Because if I was him I would understand what a beautiful rarity it is to find someone who does what you do, with your compassion and determination and dedication and is still kind, still hopeful, even when things are dark. There are not a lot of things I don't know much about, and maybe relationships, and romance and sex are in that limited list, and maybe he would argue that hypotheticals hold no ground when your experience is as limited as mine, but I frankly don't care what his opinion would be. Because he didn't see you for what you are and that means his thoughts are of no value to me. I don't tell you this because I am expecting you to say anything, it's just burning me up that you weren't treated, hell worshiped, in the way you deserved and I had to tell you that I can't think of anything more wrong." He steps back and you're still catching your breath. "I, I am sorry I shouldn't have... I will see you at work."

He turns and strides to the door, and your breath heaves in and out of your chest and you wonder if you can find your voice before his hand finds purchase on your doors lock. "Spencer," you breathe out. He pauses, hand hovering over the door handle.

"Yes?" his voice is so quiet, and he doesn't turn to look at you.

"Please don't leave," the request falls from your lips and Spencer has never felt more of a need to do something than to do anything you ask of him in this moment. But his doubt still hangs gently in the space between the two of you.

"What?" he asks again, searching in the word to find something to hold onto, looking for some guidance or instructions he missed. He didn't have a plan, and he doesn't know what to do with this.

"Please," you say again, voice sturdier now as you start to close the distance between the two of you, "Spence," his breath hitches as you place a hand gently on his shoulder, encouraging him to turn back to you, and he does, "don't leave."

His eyes stare into yours and you swear you feel all the months of unsaid things, of quiet wanting, of stolen thoughts in weak moments, bursting at the seams. You had told yourself in another world, another life time, had you met Spencer Reid and the timing had been different, if you had been different, he would've been everything. You told yourself from that first day that those brown eyes may plead into you with every moment you meet them but it was never going to be the right time.

His eyes stare into yours and he feels the weight of all the things he long tired to bury, crawling their way up from the depths and pushing against his skin, desperate to get out. Desperate to be known. Desperate to correct the wrongs and do right by you. Desperate.

His hand hovers touch's length away, scared to close the distance, scared to make the move, to change everything. You both know in this moment, that all it takes is one touch and you're going over the cliff.

This is a road you do not turn back from.

You whisper one last time, like a prayer, "Spence," and in a blink gravity turns back on, and everything blooms in bright technicolour.

It unfolds in a rush, his hand to your waist, pulling you that much closer, both of your hands gripping to the fabric of his shirt as he pulls you up to him, other hand moving gently under your chin to guide the tilt of your head. His lips crash onto yours and there's a hunger you've never seen in him, and a hunger you've never known inside yourself.

There's a gentleness, a caution in his desperation, in his need, one that you don't have in your own. He keeps kissing you and you back up, footing not very careful as you tighten your grip on his shirt. Your back finds support against the edge of your counter and you find yourself letting on of the hands slip from the fabric of his button down to tug at his tie, to keep him closer at first, and then in an attempt to remove it entirely.

He pulls back for a moment, not to catch breath as either of you would be happy to drown in this moment, but his eyes are scanning you, like he is looking for something else, something missing.

You pause, slowly tugging the tie from his collar and letting it fall to your floor. "Spencer?" you ask.

He looks lost as he breathes in. "I don't know what I am doing," he says.

"You're doing great is what you're doing," you say, not looking away.

"Is this okay?" he finally asks. Your heart starts running away from you as you try to remember to breathe.

"This is more than okay," you assure him, "please Spencer, don't stop kissing me."

That's all he needs to hear and his lips are back on yours and the kisses are feverish and starved and he presses his hands into your hips and the gentle moan that leaves your lips sends Spencer's mind spinning.

He pulls his lips from yours and starts kissing a trail down to your neck, you lean more into the support of the counter top and let a hand find it's way into a tangle of his brown hair.

His tongue against your skin, the gentle brush of teeth on that spot that makes the sound from before seem like a draft of a masterpiece. Spencer knows that now he has heard you, voice like honey, moan trembling from your lips, nails dug into his scalp gently tugging on his hair, barely able to keep your eyes open yet again your breathing steady, no sound will ever compare.

In the the times he had let himself think about you, imagine all the things, let his fantasies and dreams run away with him, he had never come close to this moment. How your fingers shake as you start to unbutton his shirt, needing to do something, needing something.

Needing him.

And you can feel his need in return, in the way he holds onto you, on the way he is listening to your body, hearing every response, feeling every movement, determined to do this right.

He feels the way you press your tights together, tight against the counter, the need for something more radiating off of you, and you don't give time for the doubt to creep in. "We should," you breathe out as you feel the blood rushing through you, knowing that there will be marks from where he is kissing you that you won't be able to hide tomorrow, not that you want to, "move this to the bedroom."

"Is now a bad time to point out that I have mostly just a conceptual understanding of what we are about to do?" Spencer asks between kisses.

"I think you're worrying too much, because if you're basing this on theory," you take his hand leading him towards your room, "so far you're giving nothing but hard evidence."

You let your own innuendo slide as you both fall back onto your bed, he looks down as he leans over you, and there's a softness, a patience in this moment, as he needs to soak it all in.

You reach up and continue to undo the buttons on his shirt until they are completely undone, and he watches you as you do, you give the fabric a gentle tug and he catches on, slipping the rest of the shirt and the jacket off and letting it fall back somewhere out of mind. You trace a hand gently up his arm and he leans down to kiss you again, your lips, your jaw, your neck.

He runs a thumb over the deep red mark he has left and you feel the fever rising again. You need out of these clothes, you need more.

You start to undo your own shirt buttons and as each button comes undone Spencer follows the trail of exposed skin and leaves hot kisses on each new place.

You can feel the hard outline of his cock against your thigh as you reach to unzip the side of your skirt. The nervousness is still fluttering in Spencer's face as he helps you slip out of it. His fingertips brushing over exposed skin, his hand creeping up the inside of your thigh and you buck up gently at the touch.

His lips trace kisses up your torso to your chest and like this, each kiss so intoxicating, each touch so electrifying, his hand inching further and further up your thigh, as his lips dance over the skin around the fabric of your bra there is nothing he could ask of you that you would not do.

Sex may never have been perfect before, but you'd always thought it was at least decent, passing, respectable. But this build up with Spencer, his hands on your skin, his lips leaving evidence on your body that he has been here, this was more than you'd ever felt. And he hadn't even really touched you yet.

You reach to undo his trousers, eager to get him in less clothing but he pulls back, out of your reach. "Not yet," he whispers against your skin, "you start doing that and this will be over way too soon." He brings his lips to yours again, stealing a deep kiss as he unclasps your bra. "And this is about you, all about you," he is mumbling again, almost incoherent against you. He is determined, his mind is focused on you and your pleasure and what you deserve.

You don't think you've ever wanted anything as much as you want this.

His thumb brushes against the your clothed skin, and sparks shoot through your body, nails digging into his shoulder as you gasp at the contact.

He nudges closer, his forehead pressed to yours, and you look at him. Spencer, your colleague, your friend. Spencer who never forgets your coffee order. Spencer who stayed all night to help with paperwork because you lost a bet. Spencer who has accompanied you to every movie you've ever asked him to. Spencer who bought an extra ticket to every convention just in case you would want to come.

"Please," you plead, like you need to, as if it was possible that he wouldn't do anything for you in this moment. As if you even needed to ask.

He kisses you, pulling you up and towards him, breathing you in as his hand finds its way between the elastic of your underwear and your skin.

Your nerves are as quick to respond to his touch as fire to a accelerant. Every movement makes you wonder if Spencer was given some map of your body that you didn't know existed, a guide to movement and pressure and timing that couldn't be more perfect.

You are nodding at his movements, keening at every increase of pace, every finger curl, every swipe of his thumb. Your body shuddering in anticipation and a pleasure you never knew courses through you.

Spencer is leaving compliments with every kiss across your body, so eager to please, so desperate to worship. When he hits the spot, your body gives you away at alarming speed, you buck, moving your arms to prop yourself up on elbows, leaning into him, into the movements, rutting against him. "Fuck," you manage in the haze.

Spencer responds to this approval with dedication and vigour and then you feel it, that hot white coil of pleasure pulling at you, like a tight chord. "Shit," you start breathing heavier, faster, "shit, shit."

"You're so incredibly beautiful," you hear Spencer whisper. You can't keep your eyes open as your knees begin to shake.

"Spencer," you whimper, not for any reason but to say his name. The need to say his name over and over, and over as the chord pulls tight and finally snaps.

The pleasure explodes through you, every nerve tingling, like fireworks cascading through you. You shake, riding the high through and fall back onto the bed, slumped with a laboured breath.

Spencer moves back up to be level with you, gently brushes some stray hairs from your face and he smiles down at you. "That is what it's supposed to feel like?" You ask.

If this was all he could have for the rest of his life, Spencer would be a happy man. He plants a kiss on your forehead, and that look of devotion has not left his eyes.

But he has been filled with a new sense of purpose, like he was made for this. For you.

He doesn't have time to debate internally if your ex was purely just that poor at what he did or if it feeling so easy, coming so naturally to him was something else entirely. He didn't really care which it was, maybe both. Right now all he cared about was making up for lost time, lost opportunities, all your disappointment.

He kisses you again and the force of it is more knowing, more sure, it's hot and messy and every moment it feels like you need to be closer, deeper, more entwined. The whole time he keeps his hand in your underwear, thumb running in soft, intensely accurate circles as his fingers do most of the work.

It crosses your mind that maybe it should be almost embarrassing that he is making it so easy. It should be embarrassing that Spencer barely needed any time to bring that second orgasm to precipice. It should be embarrassing that you're convinced this man could make you come by the way he kisses you alone, but you're not embarrassed. Not because you've never felt the pleasure like this before, not because you think pleasure it never something to be embarrassed about and not because after everything you deserve this. But because it's Spencer Reid, and everything with him has always felt like it is exactly as it should be, and him making you feel this way, is no exception.

He holds you in the kiss as your second orgasm pulses through you, just as intense as the first one, he feels you shake as it floods you. A moan escaping into the kiss, from your mouth to his and he groans against your lips.

He is so focused on you that he isn't paying any attention to how this is effecting him, how hard he is against you. How desperate he is for you. His need for your pleasure overtaking any need of his own.

You know if left to his own devices Spencer would stay as the two of you are, skin pressed to skin, lips on yours, trying to write years worth of wrongs in one night. But you do not want to give into exhaustion before you have let him ruin your expectations in all the ways you know.

He moves from your lips to your neck and before you can process much of his plans you feel the kisses trailing your hipbone, and with the third orgasm approaching you can see where his mind has wondered to. You lean forward, gasping in pleasure, but determined to get his attention, you place a hand on the side of his face, tilting up his chin to meet your eyes. "Wait," is all you manage to moan out before the pleasure tears into you, your head falls back and you grab a fistful of sheet, trying to keep yourself up through the pleasure.

Spencer does as you ask and waits until you manage to gather your words, eyes on you. "Please," you try. He runs his eyes over your body trying to understand your request.

You reach down, pulling once again at the edge of his trousers, fumbling to undo them, to get him out of them. You've never known Spencer to be so slow to catch on, but he is practically drunk on you.

"Oh," he manages. "Oh."

Before he can start to explain all the reasons he doesn't think that's important right now you look up at him with those eyes so pleading. "Please," you whisper again.

And he is putty in your hand, happy to do anything you ask of him, he nods and you finish undoing his trousers and push them down, he finishes discarding them.

Now it's your fingertips against his skin and he holds his breath as you move for his boxers. "Is this okay?" you ask quietly.

"You're everything I have ever wanted," the honey leaves his lips and you kiss him, his lips focused on you as you help him out of his boxers and pull him down and close.

"I need you," you whisper. "Right now, I need you."

"I am yours," he responds.

You keep your fingers threaded in his hair, and you tug a little harder as you become overwhelmed with him. "Fuck," Spencer's voice shudders in pleasure and you understand his desperation to please you instantly, because you want nothing more than to give him everything.

Everything becomes a mixture of moans and names, lips pressed to skin, and fabric scrunched with every thrust. You kiss Spencer's neck, finding his sweet spot with a similar precision to which he found yours. Leaving a collection of marks on his neck before her buries his face into yours, repeating your name over and over, becoming more and more wanting. His neediness matching your own and as he digs his fingers into your hips that now familiar feeling starts to rush you.

"Spencer, I am going to cum again," you whisper. Spencer cannot form words, he just keeps kissing, sucking, digging at your skin, even now he isn't close enough to you. "Fuck!" You scream out and the pleasure of your orgasm is almost too much for Spencer.

"Fuck, I," Spencer's brain is doing flips trying to figure out what to do, what he is supposed to do. "I am going to."

"Please," you beg in his ear.

"I should, I haven't," he is trying to piece the words together but they're not coming. You know what is trying to say, what is cannot find the words to ask.

"Please stay with me," you say, nudging his nose with your own, "please."

Your gentle request is his breaking point and he crashes his lips back onto yours as his own orgasm comes to fruition.

He collapses down next to you, both catching your breath. "Fuck," you repeat, for what might be the millionth time, as you long lost count.

You cannot help it, you let out a little laugh and Spencer glances at you, a smile breaking out on his face. "For the record, I hadn't planned that," he says.

"For the record, I really planned on drinking my coffee."

"I can make you a coffee," Spencer offers, turning to his side.

"We should, get cleaned up first," you smile.

"Then coffee?"

"Then coffee."

#spencer reid #criminal minds #criminal minds smut #spencer reid fanfiction #criminal minds x reader #criminal minds fanfic #spencer reid smut #smut #smut fanfic #no beta we die like jason gideon #reader x spencer reid #bau fanfic #bau smut #matthew gray gubler #fanfic #x reader #bau #criminal minds fic

[angelic-sturniolos111]

The Right Words 🧸

Chris begins to question his opinions on commitment and relationships after being close friends with you for months. Chris’s feelings for you have grown stronger, but he can’t quite articulate his affection for you. Instead of using his words he makes a romantic gesture to show you how he feels.

chris sturniolo x fem! reader

warnings: none, just chris being super shy and fluffy

author’s note: kinda inspired by stuff he’s said ab relationships and how “too much love” kinda scares/intimidates him

not proofread lmao

Chris’s POV:

Matt had invited Y/N to come hang at our house while we record our podcast episode for the week. It wasn’t unusual for Y/N to always be around, she was our friend, but I hadn’t opened up to my brothers about how I truly feel about her.

She moved to LA a few months back and we all met her at some influencer party, and she hit it off with us immediately. First, it started with the four of us going out to record content, going bowling, thrifting, things like that. Eventually, we all grew closer with her and she started hanging out at our house a lot more, and often sleeping over. The first time she had slept over was after Nick and Matt had already gone to bed, and since she didn’t want to wake them she slept in my room with me. After that night I guess my room became the unofficial-Y/N-sleepover room because she has always spelt in my room every time since.

I immediately found Y/N attractive when we met— she’s a very pretty girl. I’ve always had closer girl friends in my circle, and even if I think any of them are pretty, my feelings never go beyond that— it’s always platonic. I know part of that is because they just weren’t the right girl for me, but another part of me knows it’s because I don’t let myself sit in those feelings. I’m scared of commitment, relationships, things of that sort. Sure I’ve hooked up with a few girls in my day, but I’ve never had any serious romantic feelings for anyone.

Until Y/N.

That first night she slept in my room we stayed up for hours talking about everything from our favorite hockey teams to deeper emotional stuff. That became our routine when she would sleepover… always the last ones awake, and always having long in-depth conversations with one another. What started off as friendly, platonic feelings for her quickly changed after many nights spent late night talking.

As much as I loved our late night talks I honestly wanted more. I wanted early morning talks, afternoon talks, and to just be with her every second of every day. I wanted to hold her, spoil her, kiss her, and call her mine. I thought I would never feel this way about anyone before, but she makes me feel things I’ve never felt— she’s everything to me.

I recently came to the conclusion that keeping these feelings buried was starting to drive me insane, and I had to open up to someone about it.

Matt and I were currently getting in his car on the way to pick up Y/N. Before Matt put the car in drive, I spoke up;

“Hey, can I talk to you about something that’s been on my mind a lot lately? I just really need someone to talk to about it.” I say sheepishly. Matt’s eyes leave his phone to meet mine, and he instantly put his phone down giving me his full attention.

“Yeah bro of course. You can tell me anything. What’s up?” He says concerned because usually this is the other way around. Matt opening up to me about his issues. It was rare that I ever had anything on my end to discuss.

“Well it’s just,” I pause, hesitating if I should even continue. Matt puts a hand on my shoulder comforting me enough to move on.

“I have serious, and I mean serious feelings for Y/N.”

I’m not sure what I was expecting in response, but it wasn’t this…

He started laughing. LAUGHING. In my fucking face.

“Okay why are you laughing? Is something funny about any of this?” I say now a little pissed off that he wasn’t taking this seriously.

“Oh man, no no I’m sorry I’m not trying to be rude. It’s just… SO obvious.” He says and continues to laugh.

“WHAT?! IS IT REALLY?” I yell. Oh god, I hope Y/N doesn’t know and I’m not making a complete ass out of myself.

“Yes! Nick and I talk about it all the time. You may not realize it but you NEVER stop talking about her. “Y/N said this funny thing last night,” “Y/N really likes this movie,” “You know one time Y/N” Y/N Y/N Y/N. I swear every god damn sentence you utter her name leaves your mouth.” Matt mocks, but before I can interject he continues;

“Jesus not to mention the way you stare her down whenever she’s in the room. Nick and I are always laughing about it— like when he’s editing our videos and we can see that you looking at her constantly whenever she steps behind the camera? Or when we went to the beach that one time!? You saw Y/N in a bikini for the first time, and we saw you grab the towel to cover your lap because—”

“Okay OKAY! Alright, I get it! I’m not as good as hiding my feelings for her as I thought…” I cut him off before he can continue to blabber about it any more. Matt comes down from his laughing fit.

“Hey, I’m sorry. I’m not trying to be mean. My point is is that we’ve never seen you like this with anyone before, and it’s really sweet.” Matt rests his hand on my arm reassuringly. “Well, we told her we were on our way to pick her up. If you want to I can text Nick and we can come up with some sort of excuse to leave so you guys can have some alone time together and maybe you’ll be able to talk with her about it?” He suggests.

“Yeah… it’s the talking that I’m scared of.” I look down and play with my hands in my lap. “That’s the problem. Like you said, I’ve never been like this with anyone before, and I don’t know how to put my feelings into words. If you haven’t noticed I’m not necessarily the most romantic person ever.” I say with a sigh.

Matt looks around the car seeing if anything might give him an idea. He sees the gummy worms in the center console from the last time we filmed a car video and picks them up to show me.

“Okay, candy? What about candy?” He says as if he just made some sort of scientific breakthrough.

“Kid, what the fuck are you talking about? Candy?” I laugh, completely confused.

“Yeah! We can swing by the store and you can get her her favorite candies and snacks, and you guys can watch a cute movie together or something? If you can’t tell her how you feel maybe you can show her through your actions.”

I thought about it for a second, and it honestly wasn’t a bad idea. I knew her favorite candy, snacks, movies, all that stuff. I know she loves comfy blankets for movie time. She also complains about not having a stuffed animal for her to cuddle when she sleeps over, and she usually steals one of Matt’s. All these thoughts came flooding into my head at once, and suddenly I had the best idea.

“Okay, I got it!. We’re going to need to stop at the store before we get her. You and Nick distract her when we get back to our place, and then find some excuse to leave. I have the perfect plan.” I say excitedly.

An enormous smile grows on Matt’s face. He clicks his seatbelt, and before he can back the car out of the driveway we see Nick striding out the door to the car. Matt rolls his window down.

“What the fuck are you two still doing in the driveway? I thought you were getting Y/N?” Nick says.

“Bro get in the car you’re coming with us we’ve gotta update you on Chris’s love affair!” Matt says jokingly making me laugh. Nick just rolls his eyes, and climbs in the backseat.

***

Y/N’s POV:

Chris had given me a call earlier to tell me that their manager, Laura, needed Nick and Matt for something at her house tonight so it would just be the two of us. She had apparently given them a call on their way out to pick me up so they were running late. Honestly, I was a little nervous that Chris and I would have the house to ourselves. I was always comfortable being alone with him in his room, and I’ve always hoping he’d take one of these nights to make a move. In my head I tried to convince myself he hasn’t made a move yet because his brothers were always home— worried they’d barge in and interrupt or something. I’ve had a HUGE crush on Chris, and I wasn’t super hopeful that he felt the same way because he’s never been a relationship type of guy. Plus, he always has girl friends, and I’m worried I probably just fall under the friend category in his eyes.

Finally, I see headlights shine through my front window and look to see Matt’s car in the driveway. I grab my purse and head out the door and open the car door to climb in the backseat. I was surprised to be met with Chris in the backseat, and Nick in the front with Matt.

“Fancy seeing you in the back. You’re never back here.” I say getting in my seat and clicking the seatbelt.

“Umm yeah, I— um.” Chris starts before Nick cuts him off.

“He was taking too long in the store so I hopped in the front.” I see Chris raise his eyebrows slightly at Nick, giving him a weird look.

“I didn’t know you guys went out. What were you getting?” I ask.

“Um just toiletries and stuff. Needed some, uh, shampoo.” Chris says shrugging his shoulders and breaking out eye contact. He seemed tense, but I brushed it off.

***

We pull into the driveway and I get out of the car making my way over to the trunk. The three boys get out and stand awkwardly behind the car with me.

“Did you want help bringing the stuff in?” I say and there was silence as the boys just awkwardly stared at each other, and then at me. “…From the store?” I continue.

“Oh no Chris’s got it. Matt and I wanna show you the updates we made to the podcast studio, come on!” Nick says grabbing my arm and leading me up the driveway to their front door leaving Chris behind to get stuff out of the trunk.

Matt, Nick, and I go inside and they immediately go upstairs to their studio, and I stop to hesitate at the bottom of the stairs.

“Should we wait for Chris?” I say. Matt turns around to look at me, and then shoots a glance to Nick.

“No he’s slow as fuck. Come on!” Nick yells. I laugh and make my way upstairs.

Matt and Nick start showing me decor and stuff around the studio. It honestly wasn’t anything that I haven’t already seen before, but I kept my mouth shut because it seemed very important for them to show me again. As they blabber on I see Chris run swiftly past the door, carrying a bunch of shopping bags, and going into his bedroom slamming the door. I became even more suspicious to his weird behavior.

Matt and Nick went on to me about the podcast episodes they were planning to film, but I was barely even listening since my thoughts were elsewhere. I’m snapped out of my daydreaming when Chris comes in and stands in the doorway.

“Okaaaay! You guys have to go to Laura’s, yeah?” Chris asks his brothers.

“Yes! Yes we do. Matt let’s get going!” Nick says to Matt and they eagerly start walking out of the room. Matt turns back and gives me a smile, “Have fun!” He says. Matt then gives Chris a pat on the shoulder before him and Nick make their way downstairs and out the door.

Why the hell were they all acting so weird?

I take a step towards Chris as he remains blocking the doorway.

“So, what do you wanna do?” I question, and a smirk creeps up on his face.

“I actually have a special movie night planned for us.” He says with that sweet smile of his I love so much.

“What makes it special?” I ask. He grabs my hand, making my breath hitch in my throat slightly at our touch. He leads me to his bedroom. Was this it? Was he making his move? I didn’t necessarily think he’d be so bold as to bed me right away, but I also wasn’t complaining. I thought to myself before he proves me wrong. He opens his bedroom door and leads me inside, and I smile big once I see what he’s done.

His bed is full of pillows from both his room and the spare bedroom, and they’re covered in a huge blanket. There’s another sherpa blanket on the bed with a cute teddy bear on my side where I usually sleep. On his nightstand is a bowl of popcorn, and bags of my favorite candies. He had turned his ceiling lights off and had fairy lights draped over his headboard illuminating the room. Also lighting the room was his TV which had one of my favorite Disney movies cued up ready to watch.

Chris steps back as I walk around the room taking it all on.

“Chris! This is so sweet!” I gawk as I jump into his bed and wrap myself in the softest blanket and he follows suit. We lay in his bed together in silence for a moment before he grabs the teddy bear and handing it to me with a smile. I take the bear from his hands and wrap it tight in my arms.

Chris’s POV:

“Chris, what’s all this for?” Y/N asks looking at me with her beautiful eyes.

I knew that she’d ask why I went all out. I had ran a couple scenarios of her possible questions in my head, and embarrassingly enough I may or may not have practiced what I was going to say with Nick in the car earlier…

“Well, it’s for you.” Duh? Chris I think that’s kinda obvious you dumb fuck. I don’t think any amount of practicing could’ve prepared me to face the prettiest, sweetest girl I’ve ever met in my life. I could feel my heart beating faster with each passing moment. She smiles, her eyes softening, and she scootches closer to me.

“You did all this for me? Why?” She asks sweetly. I knew she’d love the surprise, but also knew she’d be confused.

I really tried my best to prepare for this talk, but I was still so nervous. I didn’t know what to say.

I take a deep inhale before starting the conversation.

“I— I did this for you because I wanted to. Well I mean obviously I wanted to or else I wouldn’t have done this. What I mean is I want to show you what I think of you. Or, I mean, how I feel… and I— ugh.” I sigh and burry my face in my hands now completely embarrassed from my nervous rambling. “I don’t know how to use my words.” I mumble into my hands.

I feel a soft, gentle hand on mine pulling it slowly from my face, and I’m met with Y/N as her eyes lock on mine. When my hands are back down in my lap she reaches her hand up to gently cup my cheek, not breaking eye contact. Her eyes flicker from mine down to my lips, and back up to mine before speaking;

“Then don’t use your words…”

I bring my hand up to lay on top of hers cupping my cheek, and I lean in to her touch. I bring my other hand gently to the nape of her neck and pull her closer. Her face is mere inches away from mine. Our eyes breaking contact and moving to our lips. She slowly closes her eyes, and I pull her in fully and plant my lips on hers.

Her lips were soft. Sweet, even. They molded perfectly with mine as we kiss. The kiss is gentle and eager at the same time. I’ve only ever dreamed of this moment, and I can’t believe it’s finally happening.

We pull away from our kiss, our foreheads still touching. I open my eyes first to look at her, and when she opens hers a sweet smile creeps on her lips making me laugh softly.

“Hi.” I say in a whisper.

“Hi Chris.”

“I really like you, Y/N.”

“I really like you too.”

She pulls me in, this time with more force, and plants a passionate kiss on my lips.

We continue to kiss for a moment before I pull back.

“Will you be my girl?” I ask.

She smiles, nodding her head feverishly before bringing her lips back to mine and throwing her hands around my neck.

I’m in heaven.

**********

I honestly didn’t know how to end this and I’m kinda cringing but oh well.

Happy Thanksgiving y’all! 🦃

— Kay 🖤

#chris sturniolo #sturniolo triplets #matt sturniolo #nick sturniolo #let’s trip tour #versus tour #sturniolo x reader #chris sturniolo x reader #matt sturniolo x reader

[ghcstao3]

prompt from @juggalomary :

“A teenaged ghost who often shows up to places with bruises and cuts. Who is a regular visitor of the homeless shelter by the soccer pitch popular with the local grammar school boys. Soap who is a troubled student from the grammar school who plays keeper in soccer matches with his friends.

One day ghost missed the final call before they locked the shelter after a late night argument with his dad. He slept on bench for the home team at the pitch. Soap being soap was up at that ungodly hour playing soccer when he accidentally hit ghost with his water bottle.

Next thing they knew ghost will either throw rocks at soaps windows or just walk through the front door when he can’t sleep at home.”

-

Plink.

Johnny frowns, tearing his gaze away from his homework for a moment to wonder if he’d really just heard something. But when nothing happens for at least another minute or so following, Johnny resumes his work and chalks it up to his imagination.

Plink.

There, again. Johnny turns to the window where he’s sure the sound had come from, if it isn’t just in his head, and watches. Mindlessly twirls his pencil between his fingers and waits… for nothing. Another drawn out silence.

Plink.

Just as Johnny is making for his second dismissal, there’s a flash of grey bouncing off the glass that catches his eye. He slowly sets his pencil down and stands from his creaky desk chair before creeping toward the window.

There, on his lawn, with a bruised jaw and a toothy grin, is none other than Simon Riley.

Johnny hastily pulls his window open, leaning over the sill to whisper-shout, “Were you throwing rocks?”

“Maybe I was,” Simon whisper-shouts back. He less-than-discretely empties his hoodie pocket of an arsenal of pebbles now that he’s gotten Johnny’s attention. “You have room for one tonight?”

“Your dad kick you out?”

Simon shrugs a shoulder, grimacing. “Somethin’ like that.”

“Right, well—“ Johnny casts a quick glance back to his room, winces at the state of it, then decides Simon probably wouldn’t care, “—I’m sure my Ma won’t mind. Just wait there a sec.”

His Ma wouldn’t mind, sure, she loves Simon—but Johnny doesn’t imagine she’d be all too pleased to be disturbed at this hour, either, so he’s silent leaving his room to quietly greet Simon at the front door to let him in.

It’s the first time he’s ever come this late.

Johnny immediately shushes Simon once he’s ushered inside, though Simon has yet to say anything. He lets himself be led toward Johnny’s room without a word, dutifully following Johnny’s silent instruction to sit on the bed and wait while he retrieves the First Aid kit from the bathroom.

The bruise is worse, up close, though it’s old. Nothing Johnny can fix.

What he can fix, however, is the cut on Simon’s temple and the one through his bottom lip—all it requires is some gentle blotting of a cloth soaked with cold water to clean, and butterfly stitches on Simon’s head because it’s either that or Johnny’s wee sister’s princess bandaids to keep the wound covered.

Which, Simon jokes, would make him look too tough. But they both know the real reason he can’t use one.

When Johnny realizes he’s still leaning too far into Simon’s space, even now having finished tending to his cuts, he reels back before Simon can notice the blush that begins to bloom across his face.

Johnny hangs his head, picking at a loose thread on his pyjamas, doing his best to ignore the warmth burning from ear to ear.

“D’you wanna talk about it?” He mumbles.

He can feel Simon staring at him, something he always seems to be doing whether or not Johnny notices. Johnny continues picking at the string.

“Not really,” Simon says. “Can we sleep?”

Johnny nods, standing to push his desk chair back in place. He can hear Simon moving back on the bed, crawling underneath the covers like he’s now done so many times. Johnny clicks off his desk lamp and blindly wanders to the unoccupied side and gets into bed along with Simon.

They sleep back-to-back, always. And also like always, Johnny fights his exhaustion until he can be sure that Simon’s breathing has evened out; that he’s actually getting a proper rest.

Johnny knows he’ll have to deal with his Ma in the morning, but he doesn’t care. He just wishes it were easier for Simon to be safer like this every night, and not just the few he ends up staying here.

Johnny is still happy to provide any bit of help he can, though. God knows Simon needs the support.

Satisfied when he hears quiet snores escape Simon, Johnny, too, falls asleep.

#ask #simon ghost riley #john soap mactavish #soapghost #ghostsoap #ghost x soap #ghoap #alternate universe #writing

[httpiastri]

lucky charm? – al12

arthur needs your support after the feature race in austria.

genre: fluff, comfort

pairing: gender neutral!reader x arthur leclerc (i think i used the female form of a french word, but that should be the only female mention)

warning: hmmmm none!

requested: yes!

author's note: hello hello! i had bigger expectations on myself for this but i haven't been able to write a lot these last few days soooo... anyways! please forgive me if i use the wrong terms when i wrote about the dams garage and drivers room and so on, i don't really know how it all works and where people are allowed to be haha! hope u enjoy<3

f2/f3 masterlist

you feel yourself being unwillingly pulled out of your sweet sleep way too early for your liking. you could just as well just turn over and fall asleep again; the combination of the soft mattress and the fluffy hotel covers could lull anyone into a deep slumber. but just as you’re about to relax again, you hear the shuffle of socks against the carpet, followed by a thud and a quiet swear word.

you open your eyes slowly, letting them adjust to the morning light seeping in through the messily closed blinds, before they find arthur standing by the edge of the bed.

his eyes fix on you too, a guilty look spreading across his face. “did i wake you?” he asks. “i’m sorry, i dropped my phone…”

he reaches down to pick it up from the floor as you shake your head. “it’s fine,” you hum. “good morning, love.”

“good morning, ma chéri.” he flashes you a smile as he scoots over to you, pressing a kiss against your forehead.

you shut your eyes again. “why are you up so early?” you ask. “didn’t we say breakfast at seven?”

“it is seven,” arthur chuckles, but just as you’re about to sit up and scold him for not waking you up in time, he speaks again. “don’t get up, i’ve already had breakfast. you can continue sleeping.”

you frown with your eyes still closed. “what’s that supposed to mean? why-”

“i’ve been called in for an extra team meeting. they want me to meet them there in 30 minutes.”

your eyes open again, looking at your lover now sitting right by you on the bed. he’s got a hint of sadness in his eyes, and he feels another sting of guilt pass through his body.

he still looks as handsome as ever, though, and you can’t help but to let your hand cup his cheek. “when did you get up? you must be so tired.”

he shakes his head, a slight smile adorning his features; half due to the concern in your voice, half due to the love he can feel even in your touch. “we went to bed so early, i’ll be fine. you can still get another hour or so in, though.”

you pout. “i can’t sleep without you.”

arthur’s pretty laugh meets your ears. “you had no problem falling asleep while i was brushing my teeth last night, amour.” he takes your hand from his face, intertwining his fingers with yours. “but if you really don’t want to sleep any more, you could get some breakfast and then watch me get ready in the garage.”

you consider the options for a moment. “maybe i will,” you say, squeezing his hand once.

he takes your hand up to his mouth, placing a few sweet kisses to your knuckles. "my lucky charm." even more kisses. "i do unfortunately really need to go now. but i'll see you on the track?"

you nod, looking up into his eyes. "good luck, darling."

your boyfriend leans down towards you to meet your lips with his. both of you are still sleepy and it's evident in the kiss because it's lazy and slow. yet, it's filled with so so much love. when you feel him starting to pull away, you place a hand by the back of his neck to keep him close. he laughs against your skin before he manages to leave your lips – his neck muscles are apparently stronger than your hands.

"i'll see you soon again, okay?"

"mkay."

and after one last kiss, he's gone through the door, leaving you all alone in the big bed.

arthur was, as usual, quite busy right before the race.

that meant that he didn't have a lot of time to spend with you, but by now you'd learned to enjoy spending time in the dams garage, despite how different it felt to the prema garages you visited last year. you followed arthur on the tv as much as you could during the race, while also having time to chat a little with the crew every now and then.

you found it funny how it seemed like arthur and his friend ollie bearman found each other even on the track, the two of them following their former teammate through the laps and even into the pit stops.

arthur came out on the track just before ollie, which made many of the dams workers cheer. but just a short while after they left the pits, it happened. one of the few things that was not allowed to happen.

in one of the turns, not even one minute later, one of his tires flew off the car.

arthur couldn't have done anything to stop it or make the situation better. it was in no way his fault, and yet, it had all of the worst consequences for him.

thankfully, there was no crash and the tire didn't hit another driver, so it wasn't really a dangerous incident. but when arthur gets up out of the car and you can tell he's uninjured, you still let out a thankful breath you didn't know you were holding. you know this is awful, as it is any time he's forced to retire out of a race, but at least he isn't physically hurt, which was the most important to you.

a couple of minutes later, arthur arrives back in the garage, where he receives a bunch of pats on the backs and compassionate looks from team members. you are still sat on a chair a bit further into the garage, wanting to give him some space instead of approaching him, but you watch his every move carefully. his dark eyes stay aimed on the floor and he doesn't give out much more than small nods to the people trying to talk to him. he's holding his helmet in one hand, his balaclava still on and helping cover what you assumed was a regretful look.

you were so sure he wouldn't notice you, but his eyes land on you just as his hand reaches for the door to his driver's room. you kind of expect him to give you some kind of reaction. a smile, a nod, anything. but just like to everyone else, he looks away.

as he's gone through the door, you feel some kind of disappointment in the pit of your stomach. you know it's not personal, but it still pains a little to think about him treating you just like everyone else.

you wait until the race is over and the staff is busy celebrating the other dams driver's podium before making your way towards the door. after knocking on it a few times, you can hear his voice from the inside, muttering something about leaving him alone.

"arthur, can i come in?" you ask, ignoring his request.

when he hears that it's your voice seeping through the cracks of the door, he's instantly on his feet, making his way to you.

when he opens the door, you're met by an exhausted face. the balaclava is off now, lines on his face still showing where the seams had been pressing for the long race. he steps aside to let you into the room and then closes the door behind you. he sits down on the couch and you take a seat right next to him, eyes never leaving his sad ones. he's looking everywhere but at you, though, feeling way too sensitive to take in the way that you were looking at him. with so much comfort, support, love.

"i'm really sorry," you say, voice low. "that sucked."

he nods, eyes moving to look down at his feet as he leans his elbows onto his knees. "shit happens."

you stop for a moment but then you decide to be brave, putting a hand on his shoulder. when he doesn't shrug it off, you begin stroking over his white fireproof shirt with your thumb, hoping to comfort him even the slightest.

"i just... felt like the pace was good, you know?" you nod, even though he isn't looking. "i was ahead of ollie, and he ended up in p5..." your hand moves to the back of his neck, softly rubbing up and down his skin. "i don't know, i just feel like i could've scored some points too."

"yeah, definitely," you hum at him. "you did really well, love."

one of his hands comes up to wipe over his face, before he finally turns to look at you. "thank you." a slight smile takes over your lips. "and thank you for being here."

"of course. anything for you, mon amour."

arthur leans towards you, molding his lips against yours. the kiss is a lot different than how he kissed you earlier this morning; it's soothing, tender, gentle. yet, it's filled with just as much love.

"sorry i wasn't your lucky charm like you said i am," you tell him once you pull away, faces still close enough to feel his breath on your lips.

his mouth curls into a smile before he kisses you again. "don't worry," he moves to give you a couple of pecks along your jawline. "i'll buy a new charm since having you around doesn't work."

you gasp, slapping his chest as a big, teasing grin lightens up his face. "hey!"

and when his wholehearted laughter fills the room, you smile, despite his insult just moments earlier. you smile because you know it's all going to be fine; you smile because after his next race, he will be smiling too.

#f1 #arthur leclerc #fluff #comfort #x reader #x yn #x y/n #x female reader #x gender neutral reader #fic #fanfic #blurb #drabble #imagine #al12 #x you #headcanons #boyfriend #romance #f2

[taexual]

sleepwalking ● 11 | jjk

pairing: jungkook x fem!reader

summary: due to unfortunate circumstances, you ended up managing your ex-boyfriend’s band. you thought you’ve both made peace with it, but suddenly he’s very eager to prove to you that first love never dies.

genre: rockstar!jungkook / exes to lovers

warnings: explicit language, ANGST, PENT-UP FEELINGS, SLOW BURN

words: 7.8k

read from the beginning ○ masterlist

chapter 11 ► i can hear your heartbeat i’ve tried so hard to forget, i’m being buried under the memory of all of my regrets

On the flight to Amsterdam in the morning, you ended up sitting next to Luna. That wasn’t particularly unusual as your entire team—apart from the roadies who drove the bus with the equipment over from Oslo, bless them—tended to change seats as they pleased.

Normally, though, Luna sat next to her boyfriend. So, the fact that she was sitting next to you this time was unusual.

“Funny thing,” she said to you once the plane was in the air and everyone around you began to slowly move around. “I didn’t sleep well last night.”

You looked at her. “How is that funny?”

“It’s funny because when I woke up to get a bottle of water from the mini fridge,” she said, “the curtains on your bunk were drawn.”

You swallowed, suspecting what she was getting at, but refusing to give in. “That doesn’t sound very funny, either.”

“No, I agree,” she said, grinning as she got to the best part, “but as I went back, I noticed that Jungkook wasn’t in his bunk.”

You looked down at your tablet, the e-book you had opened already forgotten as the lines on the screen blurred together. “Huh.”

“Yeah,” Luna said. The more you evaded her, the happier she seemed. She had come to her own conclusions that, honestly, weren’t very far from the truth, but you couldn’t admit that, not even to her. “Any clue what’s that about?”

“None,” you lied with a nonchalant expression. “But I’m sure the explanation would be funny.”

She continued to grin at you. “I’m sure it would be. I’d love to hear it.”

You swallowed and pretended to be busy reading, even though the words on the screen might as well have been gibberish, given how little sense they made.

“I’m sure you would,” you mumbled.

Luna groaned. She wanted to know, and it was hard not to push when you were right there, and the truth of what had happened was on the tip of your tongue.

“Come on!” she pleaded, nudging her shoulder against yours. “Don’t make me wake Maggie.”

You knew Maggie was settled in the seat behind you, sleep mask, earpods and neck pillow in tow. She wasn’t the interrogator out of the two of them, but if she and Luna teamed up, they would either get you to admit everything, or they’d come to their own—probably exaggerated—version of what happened which you’d have to deny, thus confirming their initial suspicions anyway.

“What do you want me to say?” you asked, stalling.

“Just confirm what I already suspect,” Luna said, knowing better than to ask for the whole story.

You looked away instead of answering, but there was a warmth in your eyes that wasn’t there before; Luna’s questions had evidently brought back the memories of last night.

“Alright!” your friend cheered at the sight of it, relentless. “That’s confirmation enough.”

You shook your head, trying to suppress the smile that was tugging at your lips, but Luna still saw the corners of your mouth lift.

“How about you tell me why you weren’t sleeping tonight instead,” you said—only partially because you wanted to change the subject. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah. That just happens sometimes, maybe too much adrenaline.” She shrugged, letting you drift off topic for the moment. “Should’ve jumped less at the concert last night. But hey, that was the reason I got to witness that very funny thing last night.” She snickered then, and, in response to your glare, said, “but I’m really fine.”

You knew the band would have three days off in Amsterdam before the next show, so Luna could reasonably get enough sleep in that time, but you still asked, “you sure?”

“Yes,” she repeated, then ran her fingers over her eyes, “and no third degree, please. I’m sitting with you because my boyfriend,” she emphasised the word as she sat up straight to look over the several rows of seats behind her where Taehyung sat, “as much as I love him, he won’t stop asking me if I’m fine every two seconds.”

“And here I thought you were sitting with me because you loved me,” you teased.

“I do love you,” she said. “But I also feel bad for him. I told him to sit with Yoongi, because Yoongi always naps on flights, and I knew that was the only way Tae would get any sleep.”

“Wait, so he didn’t sleep tonight, either?” you asked.

“He did at first,” Luna said, “but then he saw that I was awake, and he ended up staying awake, too.”

You smiled despite yourself. “You guys sicken me.”

Suddenly, someone grabbed the back of your seat—you felt fingers brush gently past your tied-back hair—and you heard Maggie moan behind you.

“You guys,” she muttered, sliding the mask from her eyes and leaning into the gap between your seat and Luna’s, “sicken me, too.”

“I thought you were asleep,” Luna said.

“How can I sleep? My earpods died a minute ago,” Maggie explained her own logic before directing her attention to you. “So, anyway. What happened between you and Jungkook?”

The continued ambush made you stutter, “wh-why do you keep asking that? Nothing happ—”

“Luna,” Maggie turned to your friend. “What happened? You and Taehyung were awake. I trust your words.”

You raised your eyebrows while Luna chuckled.

“Don’t worry,” she said to you. “I was the one who drew these conclusions. Taehyung didn’t see anything, he only heard Jungkook climb into his bunk.”

At first, you hadn’t even realised that Taehyung staying awake when Luna couldn’t sleep meant that he was not only a great boyfriend to her, but also that half the bus was awake when Jungkook snuck into your bunk.

“Jolly,” you said dryly as your eyes immediately left your friend’s face.

She smiled automatically, and, urged by your flustered state, turned to Maggie to tell her the facts: her lack of sleep and the search for a water bottle that led to the discovery of your drawn curtains and Jungkook’s empty bunk.

“And if you must know,” Luna said to you then, “my original plan was to make sure you were alone on the plane, so someone could take the seat next to you. But I ruined it by exiling my boyfriend to the back and finding you myself.”

“Clever plan,” you commented. “Thanks for sabotaging it.”

She snickered, not losing her optimism despite your sarcasm.

“More flights in the future,” Maggie remarked, prompting Luna to nod in eager agreement. “Maybe it’ll work out then.”

“Mmhmm. Fingers crossed,” you deadpanned.

“So, um, not to ruin the happy conversation,” Maggie said before she ruined the happy conversation, “but have you made a decision about Reconnaissance?”

“Oh.” You slumped in your chair. “No. My decision is to think about it as little as possible, so I can call Nick next month and tell him I’m not doing it. Because I’m afraid that if I do start thinking about it, I’ll end up… you know, wavering.”

Maggie regarded you from the gap between the seats. “And that’s bad?”

“That’s bad,” you confirmed. “I know I want to stay here.”

“Have you told the guys?” Luna asked.

“No. I haven’t had the chance yet.” You looked down, twisting the decorative silver-coloured ring on your index finger. “I kind of want this to come up naturally. I mean, as naturally as possible. So that it doesn’t seem like such a big deal.”

Luna nodded sympathetically, while Maggie’s grin widened behind you.

“Yeah,” she said. “And, obviously, you and Jungkook are busy with other things for this to come up naturally.”

You saw Luna start to laugh as your eyes widened and your lips formed the first excuse that came to mind. “Okay, that’s not even true, we were just—”

The two girls were snickering too hard to hear you, but it was Maggie’s considerate tap on your shoulder—as if to tell you to stop talking because they knew better—that made you close your mouth and roll your eyes at the two of them.

“So.” Luna shifted in her seat, looking for a more comfortable position. Even though she had the window seat, she didn’t look out once, focusing on you instead. “Now that we’re back on the subject—”

“There was no subj—”

“—you and Jungkook,” she persisted, undeterred by your attempt to return your attention to the tablet on your lap. “What does this mean?”

You sighed, realising you needed to say something. Luna and Maggie weren’t questioning you to be mean, they just wanted to know. And it was fair, considering you shared almost everything with each other, especially now that Luna joined Rated Riot for some of their tour dates.

And yet this particular topic was difficult. Just the mention of Jungkook’s name blocked something in your throat, as if there were only certain things you could say about him, and what had happened on the bus last night was not one of them.

“Nothing,” you said sincerely, because those five minutes with him were truly not supposed to hold any significance. “It wasn’t—it’s nothing.”

“Okay,” Luna said, lowering her eyebrows and her voice. “And if we’re serious, then what does it mean?”

You closed your eyes. “It—”

“Hey.” Unexpectedly, Jungkook’s voice rang from the aisle next to you. “Am I interrupting?”

This forced your eyes to shoot open in surprise.

“Oh, speak of the devil,” Maggie muttered with a half-smirk as she pulled back, retreating deeper into her seat. Her eyes were still shining from this seemingly top-secret information that she had to squeeze out of you.

“Huh?” Jungkook looked at the girl behind you. Then, beaming as he realised what she was getting at, he asked, “oh, were you talking about me?”

“Not at all,” you said, locking your tablet and putting it in the back pocket of the seat in front of you. Jungkook wasn’t sure which of his questions you were answering. You asked, “what’s up?”

“It’s Hoseok,” he said. “He’s had a headache since before we boarded. He says he’s fine, but the veins on his temples are very prominent, so I think he could use some medicine.”

You grew visibly alarmed as he spoke, your mind racing through scenarios of what to do. There weren’t a lot of options, considering you were thousands of feet in the air right now.

“He hasn’t taken any?” you asked slowly.

“No,” Jungkook replied. He reminded you, “he says he’s fine.”

You nodded – this was Hoseok in a nutshell. Unless he collapsed abruptly, he was in perfect health.

“Of course,” you said. “Give me a moment, I have Advil in my bag.”

Jungkook patiently waited while you stood up from your aisle seat and grabbed your backpack from the overhead compartment. He was completely unaware of the big grins on Luna and Maggie’s faces as the girls watched him watch you.

They didn’t know why they bothered asking you anything. You were both painfully obvious.

“Here,” you said, handing him the package of medicine. “Maybe I should go over there—”

“I got it. Thanks,” he said with a good-natured smile. After a beat of silence, during which the two of you just watched each other and Luna had to bite her lip to stay quiet, Jungkook added, “get some rest. We have big plans in Amsterdam.”

You raised your eyebrows. “We? As in, you and me?”

You could see Luna through your peripherals, pretending to scratch something near her eye to hide her ridiculous beaming.

“Yes. I made a promise, remember?” Jungkook said.

You didn’t, not right away. Then the taxi ride in Paris returned to your memory.

“Oh, the bikes?” you asked, feeling almost ridiculous now. You had mentioned Amsterdam as a dream destination back then, but you didn’t think he’d consider it important enough to remember. “We don’t have to—”

“We’ll do it,” he cut you off. “I’ll come pick you up from your room when we get to the hotel.”

He made sure to leave you no option to disagree, so, you swallowed and nodded your head. ���Okay. Sure.”

He gave Luna a quick smile, nodded at Maggie, then winked at you, and walked past, intentionally bringing his hand over your waist as you stood in the aisle.

You sat down, your skin on fire, but you naively hoped it did not show on your face. Really, it didn’t have to. Luna was, on a certain level, a psychic. Or, at least, hyper-aware of her surroundings. Maggie, on the other hand, just reacted to social cues, albeit not always quickly unless they were obvious. And, this time, they were obvious.

“Romantic,” Luna commented.

“Why bikes?” was Maggie’s addition to the conversation. “I say rent out a carriage. With white horses.”

Luna jumped in, “and white doves!”

“Alright, shut up,” you shot back, shaking your head to fight off another smile as the two girls nodded at each other conspiratorially.

This was ridiculous. But as Luna and Maggie chuckled next to you, you found yourself relaxing as well. They hadn’t scolded you for being unreasonable or evading a decision about Reconnaissance, or behaving stupidly altogether—even though you thought you deserved that. Instead, the girls just seemed excited for you.

Because of their good mood, you couldn’t bring yourself to worry about the meaningfulness of going bike riding after all that had happened on the bus last night.

And, in all truth, you felt excited as well.

As Jungkook unzipped his suitcase in the hotel room he shared with Yoongi—who had already finished unpacking his equipment and had successfully occupied the only desk in the room—he realised two things.

The first was that he hadn’t packed enough black shirts and would have to wear white today, like a—he didn’t even know what. He always wore black.

And the second was that he felt a newfound motivation. Last night, as he returned to his bunk, stumbling over his own feet and thoughts of you, he had felt, simply, deflated. But today was different. He decided that if he were to take anything from last night, it would be this: you didn’t push him away.

And now he couldn’t give up on you.

So, groaning, he changed into a white shirt and glanced at the mirror by the door before leaving. He saw no difference in his appearance as he brought a hand through his hair, letting it fall in shaggy curls over his face. But then as he reached for the bottle of cologne in his toiletry bag, he saw that his hands were shaking. He was nervous.

He could remember an almost identical moment seven years ago when he took you out on your first date, not knowing back then that it would lead to a three-year relationship with a very bitter end.

To be clear, it was the bitter end that he hadn’t foreseen. Because even seven years ago, as he frantically double-checked your dinner reservations with a carefulness that was very unlike him, he knew he wouldn’t go on another first date after that night.

It was funny how he managed to be wrong and right at the same time.

This felt like a first date again. But it was still with you.

Seven years ago, you two had ended up missing your dinner reservations after all, because you’d gone to see a movie first—some romantic drama with a tragic end that you both pretended not to have cried at—and by the time it was over, it had started to rain.

You had tried to run, but you never made it past the park across from the restaurant. You had ended up in a gazebo in a clearing surrounded by willow trees and spent that night listening to the rain and falling in love.

“You okay over there?” Yoongi called out, bringing Jungkook back down from his memories.

“Hmm?” he turned to look at the older member. “Yeah. Why?”

“Been staring at your reflection for the past five minutes,” Yoongi said, taking off his headphones and resting them around his neck. “Is this an existential crisis or something I shouldn’t even bother asking about?”

Jungkook smiled softly. “Probably a little bit of both.”

“Alright.” Yoongi felt himself smile in response. “Stay safe.”

The younger boy nodded, took a deep breath, and glanced at his reflection one last time. Unconsciously, he brought his lip ring between his teeth and held it there for a second, before finally exiting the room.

He walked two doors down and knocked on yours. You opened it almost right away, but his heart still managed to do twelve and a half somersaults while he waited.

And then, as soon as you smiled and opened the door wider, inviting him inside, he could tell he was so fucked that he wasn’t sure if he could even fully grasp the extent of it.

You were wearing a loose pale blue shirt with a dark blue sports bra peeking through, paired with black biker shorts. The outfit seemed fitting for the occasion, but it made him lean against the door frame to avoid losing his balance. His mind was overflowing with thoughts and memories of you, to the point where he was sure they would start leaking if he opened his mouth.

Thankfully, you spoke up first as you went over to grab your backpack—smaller than the one you carried your belongings in during flights—from your bed. He found himself wondering how many bags you’d brought to Europe in a desperate attempt to distract himself from his pestilent memories.

“How’s Hoseok?” you asked.

Somewhere deep in his mind, Jungkook recalled walking the older member to his room when they got to the hotel, because as soon as Hoseok’s headache subsided, he really struggled to stay awake. But now, as he watched you move around the room—literally not doing anything other than gathering your phone and the hotel keycard—Jungkook found himself unable to form a single coherent sentence.

You paused and looked at him questionably.

He figured he’d better speak up instead of standing here like a complete idiot.

“He, uh—he’s—you know, he’s, uh, taking a nap,” he managed to say, mentally kicking himself. He sounded more composed when he wasn’t speaking. He cleared his throat and crossed his arms over his chest to get it together. “He said he’s fine. I think he meant it this time. Some colour returned to his face.”

“That’s good,” you said with a thoughtful nod. “He’s probably tired now. I’ll text him to let me know when he’s awake.”

“Yeah,” Jungkook agreed, listening to you but only half-hearing everything as you walked around your room, looking for something.

You weren’t sharing this room with anyone, but not by choice. Your room happened to be used to store everything that was too dangerous to keep on the bus for several nights during the stop in Amsterdam. 75% of the space here was filled with boxes of instruments and stage clothes.

Now you stood in the very centre of the room and somehow managed to look so effortlessly captivating that Jungkook wouldn’t have noticed if a robber jumped in and carried all the furniture out in comic slow-motion. He brought his hands over his face while you weren’t looking, but it did little to slow his heartbeat down.

“So, anyway,” he said with a strained voice, “are you ready?”

You bit your lip—why, why, why, had he not died enough times since he came here?—as you hesitated. “Yeah, but, as I’ve said before—”

“Then let’s go, please,” he cut you off shakily before you could assure him that he didn’t have to do this.

He thought he did. Although not to win the bet.

He had to do this because he knew you wanted this, and he’d rather throw himself into one of the canals than miss the chance to make at least one of your dreams come true.

He also had to get out of your hotel room, because being in control of himself was starting to seem like a theoretical idea more than an actual mechanism that he could use.

While you locked your room behind you, Jungkook turned to see Sid and Jude exit the elevator at the end of the hallway. Sid noticed him and stopped, punching Jude on the chest to get his attention. Already in the process of swinging back at him, Jude lifted his eyes and caught sight of Jungkook, too. Even from across the hall, Jungkook could see the impressed smiles on their faces when they noticed you next to him.

He looked away immediately, but still felt a sobering sensation in his chest. Once again, he repeated to himself that he wasn’t doing this for the bet.

However, he couldn’t help but doubt if that made any difference. What he was doing now still counted towards winning the bet.

But he knew he didn’t have the strength to avoid you or to justify the bet to himself in any other way. He’d given in last night. And he was barely holding himself together right now.

This was it. He’d made a choice.

It was a choice he should have made four years ago, instead of watching you walk away. Instead of thinking he could drown out the bitterness of you leaving with drinks that Sid, Jude, and Minjun served him.

It was you. It should have always been you.

Fortunately, his friends had already gone to their hotel room when you looked up, so you didn’t have to see them.

And, when the two of you found yourselves alone in the elevator, Sid and Jude were the last thing on Jungkook’s mind.

He felt you glance at him, but avoided meeting your eyes. He kept biting his lip, acutely aware of how long the ride down from the tenth floor should take and all the things that you could do during it.

“White looks good on you,” you commented, looking away from him.

Reflexively, he looked down at his shirt. “You think so?”

“Yeah,” you said. Then, glancing at him again, you added, “somehow brings out your eyes.”

This made his smile ridiculously big, the reaction amplified by the casual tone of your voice. You sounded like you’d just pointed out to someone that their shoes were untied – a helpful observation, nothing more.

“Ah,” he said, unable to resist. “Brings out my eyes, does it?”

You shot him a glare from the corner of your eye.

“I take it back,” you said. “White looks awful on you, never wear it again.”

He laughed, but did not lose his footing as he teased, “well, if it bothers you that much, I can take it off.”

You started to smile—an automatic reaction when you heard him laugh—but then widened your eyes instead.

“Please don’t do that in such a public place,” you said.

The alarm in your voice amused him endlessly. In your defence, you knew him well enough to know that he would actually do it if you challenged him.

“Oh?” he inquired, leaning closer with a playful grin. “Where would you like me to undress for you, then?”

You glanced at him and then very ceremoniously looked away. “That’s n-not what I meant.”

He laughed again and you were relieved when the elevator doors opened in the lobby a moment later, because you were certain that the warmth in your chest was starting to radiate off of you.

Jungkook wanted to rent bicycles for the whole day, but you convinced him that you’d both already be tired after a few hours. He knew you had a point, but he wanted to spend as much time with you as possible and he was fine if bikes were, really, the reason for it.

In the end, you agreed on three hours, which was already too much as both of you began to complain about your thighs hurting after the first hour and a half.

But Amsterdam was beautiful, and it made the ache worth it.

Subtle tinges of decay and dampness, along with the stunning trees, still in miraculous full bloom despite it being mid-September, all tickled your senses as you and Jungkook rode your bikes through the streets of Amsterdam. The canals sparkled on your left while beautiful buildings lined the street on your right, tourists coursing back and forth down the pavement.

The wheel of the bike felt rough against your palms, and you wished you had brought gloves, but the sights, the smells, and even the noise of the crowds made it easier to endure the slight discomfort.

When you caught up to Jungkook, the two of you exchanged a glance. Both of your eyes were glittering, smiles widening, your hair blowing in the wind.

You realised that the sights here looked remarkably like the postcards your uncle had brought you. But being here felt completely different from what you’d expected when you looked at the cards.

Wordlessly, Jungkook smirked and challenged you to a race. Laughing as you sped up to catch up to him again, you took a deep breath and closed your eyes for just a second, savouring it all.

The feeling in your chest right now was something you could never capture in a postcard to bring home.

Another hour later, the two of you returned your bicycles and Jungkook persuaded you to get some ice cream. You had to agree. At that point, you were tired and a little dizzy, and the sun was too bright to do anything but attempt to cool yourselves down.

You sat down on a bench by the canal and Jungkook noticed the almost constant smile on your face. He felt a surge of ideas of all that he could do in hopes of making you smile like this again.

“Did you ever think we’d be here?” he asked after a minute, looking back at the canal. “You and me.”

You looked at him. “What do you mean? In Amsterdam?”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “Back in university. When you used to look at those postcards above your desk, did you ever imagine us being here?”

You blinked, surprised once again by how much of your conversation in Paris and how much of your life from four years ago he remembered.

“You remember the postcards,” you said softly.

“Of course,” he said, suddenly turning solemn. “I’m sorry I never asked what they meant to you.”

“No, it’s—” you stopped in the middle of shaking your head. Then chose to just answer his previous question instead, “I don’t know. Back then, I think I imagined us everywhere.”

He smiled as he adjusted to the irregular beating of his heart. It was a new constant when he was with you. And it was a health hazard, he knew. And still, he’d missed it.

“Was I in a band in your imagination?” he asked.

“Absolutely not,” you said, pausing while he laughed so hard that he nearly doubled over. You didn’t think your response deserved this reaction, but it drew a smile from you regardless. “And I wasn’t your manager. We were normal people, doing normal things.”

He stopped laughing and looked at you, a slight furrow in his brow. “Wait. Are we not?”

You gave him a look. “Are we?”

“Why not?” he asked with a shrug as he took a bite of his waffle cone before the ice cream could fully melt. “Who’s to say what’s normal?”

You continued to watch him, several classes of statistics and standard deviation under your belt. “Do you want an honest answer?”

“No,” Jungkook said without hesitation. He looked ahead as he spoke, “I like to think that ‘being normal’ is just a construct.”

“Well, it is, but—”

“Don’t do it,” he interrupted. “If you mention statistics, I will—respectfully—toss you right into that canal.” He was the one who paused here as your smile widened at his threat. After a moment, he continued, “let me romanticise this. In my head, we are normal people.”

You agreed with a noncommittal shake of your head. “Okay, sure.”

“To be honest,” he said then, “I never imagined us here.”

“No?”

“In my mind, we were always in our little world. The campus, our dorms, our family homes,” he explained, gesturing with his hand as he listed the places that the two of you had spent years in. “That’s as far as I imagined us.”

You swallowed an unexpected lump in your throat and felt it go down heavily, catching on your trachea, stumbling around your lungs, and forcing you to clear your throat as you still tasted something bitter on your tongue.

It was a nice day. You didn’t want to rip open old wounds and pour salt on them just to see what would happen.

“Well, you’re not far off,” you said, brushing invisible dust off your shorts and focusing on your ice cream for a moment before you added, “that’s as far as we went.”

Jungkook sensed the discomfort in your words, but did not understand the cause.

“What do you mean?” he asked. “We’re here, aren’t we? The furthest I imagined us was, maybe, 100 kilometres south of your mum’s house. By the sea. And now we’re in fucking Amsterdam.”

He was right, you’d made it so far. But even though you felt your shoulders relax a little, you still insisted, “it’s different now.”

“How is it different?” he questioned further.

“Well, for one, we’re not in university anymore,” you said obviously enough. “No campus to come back to.”

“Bless that. I wouldn’t want to go back now.”

“And we’re not together anymore.”

Cringing at the unnecessary addition, Jungkook managed to say, “but we are.”

You looked down as you finished your ice cream and kicked some pebbles with the soles of your sneakers. “You know what I mean.”

“I know,” he replied, not giving up as he looked at you for a moment before stumbling a bit quietly, a bit awkwardly, “but, um. We are together. Still.”

You lifted your eyes to meet his, but looked away after barely a minute, frightened by how much of your shared history you could see there.

You couldn’t do this. Five minutes in the dark bus, with no one but the two of you in your bunk, was one thing. You could pretend it didn’t mean anything, even though his taste still lingered in your mouth.

But this conversation was not something that you could pretend to forget in five minutes. This was four years of silence. Of locked doors, deleted pictures, and wet pillowcases.  

Four years of forced solitude, tall, thick walls, and strict boundaries.

Some of them you’d crossed.

But now you were here. And you couldn’t cross this one. You couldn’t reminisce with him while ignoring the weight of your break-up.

Exhaling, you pursed your lips. “You know what? You’re right. We’re as together now as we were back then.”

Jungkook felt his muscles stiffen. The last bites of his ice cream were completely tasteless.

“What—what is that supposed to mean?” he asked, not blinking as he watched you.

He was cold all of a sudden, he realised. Sitting right under the warm sun of September, and shivering. He suspected that ice cream had very little to do with this.

“You know what it means,” you replied, unaware of how much your vague response affected him because you did not look at him.

It felt like he was speeding down the streets of Amsterdam on his bicycle, and suddenly, someone poked a stick into the wheel, forcing him to fly off the bike and land on something very sharp. Something very confusing. Very painful.

“No,” he said slowly. “I don’t think I do.”

You looked up finally, more out of confusion than anything else. You weren’t sure if he was pretending, playing another stupid game, or if he genuinely did not understand.

He was watching you with a frown, clenching his jaw harder with each passing second that you did not respond. He genuinely did not understand.

“It means,” you said, “that this was what our dates used to be like. Like two co-workers trying to have a meaningful conversation.”

Jungkook didn’t know which word to react to first: ‘co-workers’ or ‘trying’, so he just went quiet.

“And, at what point in our relationship,” he asked after a minute, “did you figure that was how you felt?”

You heard the bitterness in his voice and felt your irritation grow. He had some audacity to question you like this after the way your relationship ended.

“It wasn’t how I felt,” you said, nearly spitting the word out. “It’s how it was.”

He scoffed. “Don’t try to make this objective. It’s clearly just your own perception.”

Your eyebrows rose involuntarily, your heart reacting to his words before your mind could.

“How could it be?” you argued, clearly in disbelief that he had a different point of view. “We barely talked. The longest conversation we had, at that point, was when you had to describe the fucking police station that you were in after you got arrested.”

“At what point?” he asked again, frustration even more evident in his voice.

“I don’t know,” you shot back, exasperated. “A few months before we broke up, maybe? We weren’t spending any time together anymore. And if we were, then your asshole friends were there with us. Everyone who knew us could tell we were going to break up eventually.”

Looking away, Jungkook squeezed his lips together, running his tongue over the inside of his teeth. His entire body seemed to go numb and then suddenly tense up again.

He didn’t know how you got here, how you reached this conversation, but he had a vague feeling that you were meant to talk about this sooner or later.

It wasn’t easy, though. He had to force himself to keep looking at you, force himself to speak, to say the things he’d only managed to put into song lyrics until this point.

“I couldn’t,” he finally said.

You frowned. “What?”

“I couldn’t tell,” he said, a self-deprecating expression on his face. He continued speaking while intentionally gazing into the distance, “you may find that shocking to believe, but until the day you said we shouldn’t be together anymore, I thought we were in love.”

“You literally just said that you could barely imagine us outside of my mum’s house,” you retorted.

“That’s because I never wanted us to be anywhere else!” he snapped, looking at you with a level of anger that you’d never seen in all the years you’d known him. “I liked what we had.”

“We had nothing!” you argued, your hands in the air. Out of the corner of your eye, you noticed some tourists doing double-takes as they walked by. You were far too engrossed in the conversation to control your volume. “You went out every night and caused a scene every time you brought your friends over. You went along with them when they tried to kill themselves drag racing, despite my protests. You didn’t even—”

“I named my car after you!” Jungkook interjected, even though the car wasn’t, technically, his. It had been a gift from Sid, so all of his friends could race together, but he thought his point still stood. He used the car, and he wanted it to have your name.

“Right,” you acknowledged his—largely pointless—interruption, “and I’m sure that would have been very meaningful if you hadn’t crashed it on your first fucking drive. Like I told you that you would.”

“Yeah, well.” He moved his jaw, poking his cheek with his tongue. “At least I loved you until the very end.”

That was a lie, the past tense he’d used. But he looked at you and the fire in your eyes intimidated him. He knew you wouldn’t believe him if he told you he’d never stopped being in love with you.

“For your information, I didn’t break up with you because I stopped loving you,” you said with an angry huff. Your following explanation seemed to rip the bandages you’d carefully glued on the gaping wounds in your chest. “I broke up with you because I felt like you stopped loving me.”

He felt a sudden chill, and—immediately—frostbite. As though he’d gone out dancing in a blizzard the night before, and the blood in his veins had frozen, a bewildering cold gripping his chest.

You thought he had stopped loving you.

Jungkook swallowed hard as he listened and couldn’t open his mouth to reply. Couldn’t lift his eyes off the ground.

He didn’t know how long he stayed completely still, alternating between seemingly looking at himself from the outside, and listening to the deafening screeching inside of his mind.

He was paralysed when he felt you stand up from the bench. When he saw your shadow move away and, eventually, disappear.

You hadn’t said another word and he remembered how familiar this feeling was.

He remembered standing in his dorm room, speechless and angry with himself, after you stormed out because he had told you he already had plans; he was going out with Sid, Jude, and Minjun again—racing. Or drinking. Or one after the other, not necessarily in the same order.

Maybe you were right.

He had stopped acting like your boyfriend long before he actually stopped being one.

Because the two of you had wordlessly agreed to never discuss your relationship or your break-up again, four years have passed without any closure whatsoever—and only now he realised that he wasn’t the one who was hurt.

He realised how much he’d hurt you.

All this time, he was insecure about the end of your relationship because you were the one who broke up with him. You were the one who left.

He never looked for reasons within himself. He stupidly, blindly, thought he hadn’t done anything that warranted this. He thought you just didn’t want him anymore. He thought these things happened sometimes.

He never thought he was the one who made that happen.

He didn’t know what he was doing now.

How could he even attempt to get back together with you without making up for his mistakes? Making up for his unforgivable ignorance?

He’d apologise—he’d have to, he could feel his entire skin itching the longer he sat there, not looking for you—but would it mean anything, if you didn’t believe that he changed?

Had he changed?

He was sitting here, alone, after all. Because of a bet that he’d made with the same people who broke you up the first time.

Suddenly, Jungkook looked up. He knew how to answer all of his questions.

He had to act, first of all, instead of passively regretting everything he’d done and hadn’t done.

“The bet is over,” Jungkook declared as soon as he threw open the door of Sid’s hotel room, not bothering to knock.

He wanted to get back together with you, without any underlying conditions, secrets, or bets.

Just you and him.

All three of his friends were here and they were, understandably, surprised. Although Minjun’s shock quickly turned into pride—and Jungkook felt his heart flutter. He needed this.

“What?” Jude asked, poking his head out of Sid’s bathroom and sniffling before he brought his hand over his nose. “You’re back together?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Jungkook replied firmly. “I’m not doing this anymore.”

Sid walked out of the bathroom next—Jungkook had no interest in what they were doing in there—with some sort of a mix of a smirk and a scowl on his face.

“Well, you can’t just decide that,” he said, wiping his hands on a towel even though they seemed dry, “can you?”

“Uh, yes, I can,” Jungkook argued, feeling foolish to be having this conversation. It seemed as silly now as it had before, when he had returned from Paris and Sid forcefully prolonged the bet. “I made the bet—”

“We made it, too,” Sid cut him off, his voice stern. He treated this like a legitimate deal, a legally binding contract almost. “And we don’t think it can be over just because you’re afraid of losing.”

“I’m not afraid of losing,” he said and for a moment, he was surprised to realise that he truly meant it. His bike seemed so trivial when compared to all that he could lose if he won it back. “I’m just not fucking doing this with you anymore.”

“Well, then you lose by default,” Sid shrugged. “I keep the bike.”

“Actually, we keep the—” Jude was interjecting, but Jungkook took a large step towards Sid, stopping just inches from his face. It caused Jude to stop talking immediately.

“You don’t keep anything,” Jungkook snarled, emphasising every syllable, despite seeing how little it meant to Sid. “If the bet is over, there’s no winners or losers.”

“But the bet isn’t over,” Sid countered with a self-assured grin. “Not unless all involved parties agree to it. Right, Minjun?”

Jungkook glanced at the only remaining person in this room.

Minjun sounded uncomfortable as he began, “well, to be honest—”

“Careful now,” Sid cut in sharply. “You’re supposed to enforce the rules of the bet.”

Of course, what he really meant was, you’re supposed to obey me.

Jungkook saw Minjun hesitate.

“Look, man, it’s a bet,” he said. Jungkook felt himself exhale in immeasurable relief. He had someone on his side. He had a friend. Minjun continued, “it’s literally just a game. If he doesn’t want to do it anymore, then—”

“Then tough shit, isn’t it?” Sid’s tone was menacing. “Considering he’s going to have to do it anyway.”

“It was stupid—”

Sid was so indecently unfazed that he was practically inviting a punch in the face as he replied, “he shouldn’t have agreed to it if it was stupid.”

His sneer made Jungkook perk up.

“I didn’t agree to shit. It was you—” he started to say, then cut himself off. He did agree to it. But he couldn’t help but still feel manipulated. Tricked.

Likely for the first time in his life, Jungkook could see—with bitter clarity—that these people were bad for him. But he’d called them friends for so long, he’d done so much with them, never really facing any long-term consequences, that he never even questioned it.

Until now.

Until he realised that there was a long-term consequence to his friendship with Sid: your break-up.

“I’m not doing this,” Jungkook finally finished.

“Not doing what?” Sid asked with a laugh that seemed louder than usual, strengthened by whatever he’d done in the bathroom before he got interrupted. “If you back out, you lose. The bike goes to me—”

“And me,” Jude interjected. Jungkook was this close to knocking them both out, but he knew it’d bring him exactly zero extra points with his band or with you.

“—what’s not clear to you about this?” Sid finished, ignoring Jude and the glare on Jungkook’s face.

“I won the first bet,” Jungkook hissed, “so the bike is, technically, mine, but that’s—”

“Technically, you didn’t,” Sid interrupted, pouting to convey fake-pity. “And you won’t win this one, either. That’s clearly why you’re trying so hard to get out of this. It’s what you do. You never fight if you see that you won’t immediately succeed.”

It stung – because he knew that Sid was right. But it also felt unfair, because Sid was the one who made it impossible for Jungkook to succeed at anything unless he excelled at it on the first try. Sid simply couldn’t voluntarily surround himself with people who were better than him, so he put in great effort to make sure they weren’t.

“I’m not—I’m just realising how fucking immature you are,” Jungkook retorted, trying to control the volume of his voice as he knew his frustration only benefitted Sid.

Sid laughed and leaned in even closer—his nose nearly brushed against Jungkook. Once again, he felt irritated that despite barely being shorter than Sid, he was still treated like the last living hobbit.

“Oh, the little baby thinks I’m immature because he realises that we’re not here to cater to his wishes,” Sid taunted. If the edges of Jungkook’s vision weren’t so red, he might have pointed out the irony to him; Sid was the one who made a living by forcing people to favour him. “Maybe you should have considered that before making the bet. You’ve never won against me. And you never will.”

“Sid,” Minjun cut in again. “Let it go. You can have your fun at someone else’s expense.”

He pulled something out of his pocket, and Jungkook’s breath caught in his throat when he recognised the keys to his Katana. Sid had a similar reaction, except his surprise quickly turned to disdain.

Who does he think he is, Sid’s scorn seemed to be asking, to defy me?

“You might want to think twice about it, Minjun,” Sid said out loud, his voice dangerously calm. He pulled away from Jungkook to give Minjun a warning look. “You think this is a funny little game, but I bet it won’t be so funny when it has very real consequences.”

Jungkook turned his head in time to witness Minjun’s face drain of colour, but he couldn’t comprehend this reaction—not in a way that made sense, at least. His only assumption was outrageous.

Would Sid really take this so far? Would he really exaggerate the significance of this bet so much?

“What—what is he talking about?” Jungkook asked Minjun. “Your parents?”

Minjun simply hung his head, his knuckles turning white from the force of his grip on the keys in his hand. He didn’t say anything, and Jungkook knew it was true.

Sid was threatening Minjun’s family—the jobs of his parents, both of whom depended on Sid’s mother. Without her, they would still have enough money to survive, even keep and maintain all of their real estate, but Sid’s mother had the power to blacklist them from the industry. And she would, Jungkook knew. She’d do anything for her only child.

Sid was using Minjun’s parents as leverage for something as stupid as a fucking bet that Minjun did not even make. A bet that was never supposed to even get this far.

That was the point he was proving.

Jungkook narrowed his eyes. He recognised what this was really about, these tireless attempts to establish superiority.

Sid was the great-grandson of one of the top conglomerates in the country. The only downside to his life was that his inheritance came from his mother’s side of the family. As a result, he was taken less seriously among his family—because the Old Money world that he lived in functioned only within their favourite -isms: sexism and racism.

Sid was no one in the eyes of his relatives. So, he was going to do everything to make sure he was someone here.

“That’s what I thought,” Sid barked at Minjun’s submissive silence. He turned to Jungkook. “So, what’s it going to be? You admit your defeat now, or do you want to delay it? I’m generous enough to wait. I know I’ll win in the end. I always do.”

He always had a point to prove to an audience that listened. And his audience was here, in this room.

But Jungkook was done listening.

“You know what?” he said. He glanced at Minjun—who stood there helplessly and miserably—before looking back at Sid and spitting, “I’m not going to fucking entertain you anymore. Fuck you.”

Without waiting for either of them to respond, Jungkook stormed out of Sid’s room, slamming the door behind him. He didn’t even consider the possible complaints from other hotel guests who probably heard him throw the door open fifteen minutes ago, and then leave again in an equally furious manner.

Blind to everything around him, he marched over to your room and knocked on your door before he lost the angry courage.

He needed you. He’d always had.

You appeared surprised when you opened the door and saw him in the hall.

“Hey,” he said, looking somehow very small, despite his frame filling the entire doorway. “Can I come in? We should talk.”

You watched him for a minute.

The two of you had just had your first fight about your relationship since you started working together and decided to leave everything that had happened between you in the past.

Neither of you knew if this argument was a good thing (closure?) or a bad thing (a final fight in your long list of fights).

But maybe today had to be the day you found out.

“Yeah,” you decided, stepping aside to let him in. “We should.”

chapter title credits: bad omens, “the letdown”

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[writingsfromhome]

Dos and Don’ts IV

A/N: hello my loves this final part to this fic completes the birth of one of my favourite fics I’ve written. Thank you for reading and enjoying it just as much—every like, comment, and dm meant the world <3

Parts: 1 / 2 / 3 / 4

—————————————————

We have an extra day in Barcelona and the team is buzzing to enjoy their nightlife since we could sleep all day tomorrow. I’d visited here while I was a uni student so I give some suggestions.

Harry’s a little on edge the whole time. Earlier today some headline from a musician Harry worked with was taken out of context and thus took the internet by storm. Now he was being flooded with people wanting to know his thoughts and feelings. It was a hot topic.

With a joint effort of me, Jeff, and Graham, we tried to keep the spotlight on his Barcelona show. Well my role was mostly to screen Harry from seeing any further discourse online.

The show itself was one of the loudest I’d been to—I was glad I had my own ear protection. The tense Harry falls away and he’s electric on stage. Even coming backstage he’s on a high; he hugs the crew and thanks everyone like he usually did at the end of shows and disappears into his dressing room with Jeff. They look like they’re talking intensely.

“So,” Sarah slides in beside me. “We noticed you’re a bit different coming back. What’s happened?”

I try to play dumb but the girls keep pushing.

“Me and my fiancé ended things,” I confess. They gasp, Claire’s eyes actually fill with tears.

“Shh!” I shush them. “Keep it on the down low please I don’t want anyone to know.”

“But y/n why are you even here!? Is it because of tour! I’m sure Harry could have rearranged things-“

“No no,” I appreciated their support but I didn’t want to hash things out. “It’s just…I think it was a long time coming. God, I don’t wanna cry. I’m good. For now. And I want to be on tour I need the distraction.”

“I get it,” they sympathize. “We’re gonna make you forget so hard tonight.”

“Okay but don’t,” I look around us to make sure there was nobody else around. “Please don’t tell Harry. Seriously please. I don’t want him to know especially. I don’t want him to treat me differently or something.”

“Lips are sealed.” Sarah zips her mouth. “But we can all tell you’re off. It’s hard not to practically living together these last couple months. If he asks we’ll say…”

“Just say she’s on a break?” Charlie suggests.

“Yeah,” I shrug. “Things are complicated, I’m on a break, whatever that’s fine.”

The girls lean towards me and envelop me in a hug. It reminds me of my friends I’d said goodbye to.

“Thanks,” I say through tears.

And the girls hold me to their promise.

After we get dressed for the night—I chose a corset-style top and trousers—we head out. The sun dips below the horizon and the old city is cast in a warm orange glow that could inspire anyone who set eyes on it. String lights come on and music plays from various doors; the city is alive.

We tease each other about looking so glam as we wander the narrow cobblestone streets. Aside from the shows we all wore sweats and tees.

Every place we pass sets my senses alight. We grab tapas from a place that smells irresistible and chat over each other about tonight’s wicked show. I continue avoiding Harry by sitting as far away from him as I can get.

As we wander off in search of the club I can’t help but feel a twinge at how incredibly romantic the moonlit streets felt.

The club is loud and alive, the noise levels even feel normal after the roar of the last few of Harry’s shows. My mood starts shooting up steadily as I drink in the energy around me.

We join the crowd and I give away my worries and my annoyances to enjoy the music. I feel it in my chest and for a blissful moment I’m grateful for my whole damn life despite everything.

“Cute guy!” Someone shouts in my ear.

Charlie nudges me to one of the guys dancing nearby. “Get distracted!”

I shake my head no.

“Do it!” She cheers. It barely travels to me. She grabs Claire’s hand and tugs her, letting her in on the plan and they goad me into going for it.

I motion a drink. I’d need another shot for the courage.

We trail back to the bar and do a round of shots, and they grin with thumbs up as I hesitantly enter the crowd again.

The dude they pointed out is tall and beautiful. Like beautiful not even handsome. I get stuck looking up at him in awe, he wasn’t really my type. A tad too pretty boy but when he notices me looking he smiles and I’m won over. I couldn’t deny a good smile.

“Hey!” He turns his body to me. At least I think he say hey.

“Hey!” I shout back.

“Que pasa?”

“What?!” I couldn’t hear a single thing. What did I expect.

He smiles and takes my hand that had been anxiously playing with the edge of my top. The other has a hand splint that I’d received in Madrid. Apparently I sprained my fingers.

The stranger wriggles both my hands to loosen them, raising his brow at the splint. I laugh.

He asks in my ear but I don’t understand. It sounds like a question, something bylar. When I scrunch my brows he laughs, “Dance! We dance!?”

“Dance!” I laugh. He was cute! “Yes! I want to dance with you!”

“Vamos,” he pulls me in. I understood that at least.

I used to do this in uni, I think. I should be able to do it again.

He teases me a little because I’m so tense. His hands knead down my back to my waist to get me to relax. It feels nice, being touched by a man that looks like he was carved from marble but filled with music.

I begin to find my rhythm and sway with him, eventually letting go completely. He compliments me as I start to move with him and pretty soon I’ve channeled my 20-year-old self. It feels pretty spectacular.

When his lips ghost my cheek I don’t protest. Right now, I felt good. Everything was on the back burner’s back burner and I felt grounded in this nighclub with this random stranger who was paying attention to me, just me. And it’s just us. And it’s just temporary. And I feel good.

When I turn around, my back to his chest, he moves my hair to the side and kisses down my neck. It felt good.

I run my hand up into his hair and he moves lower murmuring foreign words on my skin, our bodies still dancing in the same language, his hands still gripping my waist and my hips. I feel blissed out.

It ends in a split second.

“What are you doing?” Harry’s suddenly tugging me towards him. His mouth makes the words I just fill them in with his annoyingly bossy voice.

“Hey man,” the guy I’m dancing with tries to get in between us.

“What are you doing!?” I snatch my hand away from Harry.

Harry puts his hand on my partner’s chest and says something to him, maybe in Spanish. He looks at me with puppy dog eyes and I look at Harry. What had he said.

“What did you say?” I ask. I try to call back my dancing partner but he just salutes me with a smile and fades into the crowd. No wait, I’m being dragged away.

“Y/n what are you doing out there?”

“What am I doing?” I shout. “What are you?! I was having a nice time with that guy what did you say to him?”

He walks away, further back into the edges of the club. There’s a few people milling about with a number of them involved in heavy makeout sessions.

Harry turns to face me finally. “You’re engaged y/n, Claire and Sarah said things are complicated at home is that why you’re doing this?”

“What!” I throw my hands up, tears prick my eyes. What the fuck was his problem! Since when did he care? “Why do you care?! Yes, things are complicated and I was getting my mind off of said things—what is your issue? You want to drag me back here and remind me of how shitty things have been?”

“This isn’t the way,” Harry insists. “You don’t even know that guy!”

“Whatever I’m over this convo.”

I turn to leave but Harry grabs my hand, the one in the splint, and pulls me back.

“Sorry,” he lets go of the splint. Then picks it up again. “Look. I’m worried about you. This isn’t you, you’re not the girl that goes home with another guy when your fiancé is back at home! I just don’t want you making any regrets.”

“Oh is that it,” I step towards him so my hand isn’t so outstretched. He stands still but on my second step he inches back. “Since when did you get a high horse huh? Don’t tell me who I am and who I’m not. You barely know me! If I want to make decisions I regret I can do that. They’re mine to make.”

“No. Y/n, as mad as you are don’t go home with a stranger.”

“As if you don’t!” I scoff. “What’s your real agenda here? What’s going on?”

“Nothing!” He insists.

“Why do you suddenly care so much about my chastity?”

“It’s for your own good!”

He’s lying. I know he’s lying and I don’t know why he pulled me away from my beautiful Spanish dance partner but I was actually relaxing and now he’s put me right back into this crazed and tense headspace I kept finding myself in.

Fine, I decide. I could make him regret it.

“Really? You care about my morality that much?” I ask.

With my hand flat on his chest I’ve pushed him further into the wall behind him. He watches me with a guarded look.

But I want him unguarded, vulnerable. The same way he’s made me feel. I lean in, “Are you really worried about the technicalities of me cheating on my fiancé?”

I hover a half foot from his lips. Finally his eyes flicker down to my lips and I know I’ve got him.

I slide my hand up his chest and when my hand inches up the skin of his throat his eyes grow unguarded and heady with lust. He doesn’t push me away. He doesn’t say no.

Hypocrite.

I drop my hand.

“That’s what I thought Mr. Styles.”

I watch for a wonderful moment as the lust clears from his eyes and he realizes what happened. Shame, embarrassment, resignation, and then anger.

I spin on my heel and head away from him. He could deal with the consequences of his actions all on his own.

I’m half-afraid he’ll come after me but luckily I make it out of the club alone.

“He’s such a dick,” I say more to myself. Just to get it out because I’m pissed. “Who the fuck does he think he is!?”

My night is over. I just want to take this all off and forget about it. Maybe I can lock myself in my room and raid the mini-fridge, get drunk and cry myself to sleep. Those seemed like the best options right now.

I take an uber to the hotel. As I walk up to it I notice a weird crowd outside. For nearly 2am I wasn’t expecting this and my instincts kick in that this wasn’t normal. Especially when I notice all the camera straps.

“Excuse me,” I ask the front desk. “Why are there a bunch of paparazzi outside?”

“Is there?” The man behind the counter asks. “Sorry we will tell them to leave. Are you staying with us?”

“That’s a privacy concern out there, and a concern with your staff because they’re here. How do they know who’s staying here?!”

It seems to dawn on him I wasn’t just asking out of curiosity. He promises me he’ll get management. In the meantime I call Jeff and explain the situation. He starts to panic the way I hated, looking for something to blame. He calls Graham who sounds like he’s driving in nascar. It’s a very noisy and over-stimulating conversation.

“Call Harry!” Jeff orders. “Tell him he cannot go back to the hotel no matter what! Fucking vultures man!”

“Y/N,” Graham says in a calmer voice. “You need to go back to where Harry is with some sort of disguise. A hat or sunglasses. That sort of thing-“

“It’s night.”

“Yes night. No glasses. Book the closest hotel you can find. Tell his band they can come back, but to go through the back. They might get spotted but they’re trained on dodging questions. That will keep the vultures there waiting for Harry and we can pick you two up back to the airport tomorrow morning. Where’s after this?”

“Glasgow,” I bite my nail as I think. I had to call Harry asap. What if he was on his way back. “I gotta go now to call him though. Talk later.”

I hang up and call Harry. He picks up the second time.

I explain the situation and he reacts the same way as Jeff, swearing and cursing the papps. I tell him what I was going to do and tell him to go right back into the club. To pass on the word to the team even though I was going to send them a text.

I head up to my room and grab what fits in my bag. I didn’t have Harry’s room key so I decide he’d have to wear my hat and head back out. The vultures stay waiting, now just a few feet further away from the entrance.

I speak briefly to management—I figured Jeff could talk to them and give his classic earful.

On the drive I find a nearby hotel to the club and collect Harry to get him there. We’re too tense to talk when we meet up. Once inside again, I tell him to sit in the lounge while I go up to the desk.

Act above it all, I channel a rich bitch. We needed privacy and we needed nobody to know Harry was here.

“Hi I need a room.” I say.

“Of course, how many night will you be staying with us.”

I glance back to see where Harry sits. He’s in a wingback chair that’s mostly turned away and with his hair stuffed in the baseball cap you can hardly tell it’s him.

“Just a night. I need your best room please.”

“Absolutely,” the woman smiles and I feel bad for only giving a tight-lipped smile back. I wait as she clicks away, finally looking back to me with a slight frown. “So miss unfortunately we are very booked tonight. There are a couple events going on in the city making things very popular.”

“The best room will do. Preferably large.”

“Well,” she hesitates. “A lot of our larger rooms are taken um. I can offer you a bed with one king, it is a bit smaller because it’s by the elevators. I also have one with a queen that is tucked away in the corner with a better view.”

I wanted to be as far away from Harry as possible but by an elevator was asking for trouble.

“Well, I’d rather stay far away from noise so we’ll take the queen.”

“Is that just you or…” she glances at Harry.

“Yes. Two. We’ve had a rough day of travel he’s just resting.”

I hand over ID and my card, trying not to balk at the total. At least I’ll get reimbursed.

“Do you have any bags?” The concierge swoops in as I get the key card.

“No! No. Like I said, bad travel day. We just need somewhere to sleep and we’ll reunite with the bags once they arrive tomorrow.”

They leave us alone after that. I hoped it was because I’d been standoffish enough and not plain weird.

The elevator ride up to the 8th floor is stony and I spend the spare second to text Jeff and Graham the hotel’s address.

The room itself is pretty sub-par and the adrenaline of getting Harry here safely wears off.

I drop my bag by the door and pull out my toiletry bag.

“I don’t have clothes for you to change into, I didn’t have your room key.”

“Yeah. S’fine. I’ll just sleep shirtless unless that bothers you.”

We stare at each other for a tense moment.

“I’m fine with that, you’re the one with the high horse.”

After doing all this for him I wasn’t going to be easy to deal with if he wasn’t going to be easy to deal with.

He chooses to ignore me.

“How the fuck did they know I was staying there? We were under a-“

His phone rings and he answers. Sounds like Jeff.

I use the time to go to the bathroom and finally take off the makeup. I realize I should have grabbed my pjs from my bag too. I take my hair down and massage my scalp with my fingers, letting myself calm down despite the aggressive voices outside.

“Yeah whatever. Keep me updated.” I hear. Great. That was done with.

I leave the bathroom and Harry’s still pacing the floor.

“You’re gonna wear the carpet down if you keep doing that.”

He stops and looks at me, his eyes trail down my body.

“You didn’t bring yourself a change of clothes either?”

“You wish,” I head for my bag again and grab the tee and shorts. “I just forgot them out here.”

“Do you always have to be so snarky?”

Oh, so he wanted to fight. Good news for him, so did I.

“Depends. With you? When you’re being a dick? Yeah. I do.”

“It’s really quite unbecoming.”

“Is it?” I mock his accent. “It’s not proper for a lady to be snarky?”

“I don’t sound like that. You just never let anything go.” He continues.

“I never let anything go?” I repeat.

“Yeah! Ever!”

“What do you want me to let go?” I ask.

“Everything. You’re bothered by everything just let it all fucking go.”

“No like specifically what should I let go?” I turn on him and with each question I stalk towards him. “Being treated like trash by you? Being told I’m replaceable and unnecessary? Getting bossed around about who I can and can’t dance with because you suddenly decide to be the morality police!?”

“Jesus take it down a notch y/n.” We’re fuming as we square off. “I’m not your bloody fiancé.”

“And thank fuck you’re not!” I throw the clothes in my hand on the bed. “You’re my employer Mr. Styles and I’ve been nothing but a good fucking employee for the last year! I try to keep my patience and do everything I can to do my best! You’re the one always trying to blur lines! You’re the one always getting in my damn business when I don’t pay you to!”

With every accusation I poke my finger into his chest and it’s like literally pushing buttons. His face gets stonier and stonier until I’m sure he’s going to crack.

“You wanna know what your fucking issue is?” He swipes my hand away.

“Oh sure tell me, wise Harry Styles who definitely has no issues at all. Tell me.”

“This. This is your fucking issue,” he spits. “You’ve always got such a temper on you! I’m not blurring any bloody lines I check up on you and you get all offended over nothing!”

“Over nothing?” I ask. I laugh sarcastically and walk away from him. I was seeing red. “Over nothing?”

“Yes! I don’t do shite and suddenly you’re trying to bite my dick off.”

“You fucking wish,” I turn on him. “It’s crazy you don’t realize what an absolute jackass you are! We should be refunding all those fans who’ve come out to see you because the man they’re paying for is a fake! You’ve treated me like nothing and embarrassed me countless time-“

“Embarrassed you,” he scoffs.

“Yes!” I go on. “What do you call what you said on our way to Paris huh? You can be so cruel! So if I have a temper it’s justified because you’re one of the worst people I’ve met!”

“What did I say?”

“Are you kidding? You’re going to make me repeat it?” He was crazy. He was depraved and absolutely insane. Or he just hated me.

“I’m not playing a game just tell me!”

“You said I could have skipped the whole tour and nobody would notice.” I say the words that had looped through my head. And of course, he has the audacity to look surprised. “Thanks. A lot! It makes it even worse that you were so casual with your cruelt-“

“You need to stop being so sensitive,” he has the nerve to say. “Then maybe you can manage your temper.”

“I can manage my temper any time but you’re moody like a pre-pubescent teen and that looks to be a lifetime fucking problem!”

“What’s your fucking problem Y/n! What is your problem with me!? Why do you still work for me if you are this angry all the time!”

“I’m not this angry all the time, you just makes me this angry! And I hate you for it!”

“Then quit!”

“Maybe I will!” I had to. After tonight and this blowout I had to. How could I work for Harry like this.

“Great! Then you can take your problems with you.”

“Don’t gaslight me,” how dare he. “You’re not innocent in this! You create my problems and blame me for being this way.”

“Whatever y/n.”

“No.” I wasn’t letting him off the hook. I get in his face again. “Why did you stop me tonight? Why did you keep me from doing what I wanted tonight?”

“What? I told you I was looking out-“

“Bullshit!” I cut him off. “That’s a bullshit excuse, I want to know why!?”

I feel like I’m made of flames and in desperate need of a lobotomy. How could one guy make me this crazy. How could it all revolve around him.

“I was doing it for your own good! But clearly I understand why it’s so fucking complicated with your partner-“

“Don’t you dare talk about him,” I seethe. I was mad. Fuming. I want to get physical, I wish I could throttle him or at the very least access one of the pillows from across the room and smash it to the floor. I want him to see how angry I am because my words are twisted with every angle Harry could find. I wanted him to admit to something he’s been skirting for a long time. “Tell me.”

Harry stares at me with hate in his eyes and I know I have the same look. I wasn’t going to let him get away.

“You don’t even have the balls to admit it,” I poke. “Is this why you’re so hard-headed to anything I say? Because you can’t even admit something like this to yourself?”

“Just shut the fuck up y/n and stop being so mental.”

“I refuse to shut up. I want you to talk.”

His breathing gets faster and I watch him flex his hand. He was as angry as I was. Good.

“You’re a fraud. And I hate you.” I step into his space. Our bodies are a hair’s breadth away from each other’s. I want to show him how mad he makes me. I want to do something. I want him to admit this thing he’s been dancing around. It makes me so mad!

When he starts to shake his head at me I lose it. Instinct takes over where I want to physically show him how angry he was making me. I grab his face in my hands and push my mouth against his. I meet teeth.

But it doesn’t take long for him to respond. To correct the unadulterated anger with purpose.

He pushes back, kissing me harder whilst pushing me against the wall. I feel sandwiched, my chest crushed against his and I bite down on his lip trying to get back some control.

My hands are all over him, grabbing his shirt, running through his hair, pushing under his shirt to touch skin. Harry does the same, pulling at my hair and lifting me onto him.

Our tongues clash together, his hand grabs my ass, squeezing and moving up. His hands feel hot on my skin, his metal rings an icy contrast. Neither of us want to give up control. We keep fighting, just now with our bodies.

“Why can’t you ever just let it go,” he traces his teeth over my collarbone. It all feels too much.

In response I push him back, he stares at me for a heated second before we crash into each other again. We don't care where we are. All that mattered was here and showing the other who was in control. Who hated who the most.

Harry pulls away, his mouth a deep pink from our fight. His eyes are half lidded, his pupils dilated. I can tell he wants this but a part of him hesitates.

"We're doing this," I commit, not taking my eyes off his lips.

"I’m doing this," he growls and lifts me up, any hesitancy washed away. I wrap my legs around him, not thinking about anything but what I was going to do.

He whirls me around and deposits me onto the bed, and his body covers mine while his mouth attack my neck.

He wasn't gentle or slow, but then again, I didn't want him to be. I pull off his shirt, not wanting anything between us, not caring that my nails would leave marks down his back. Leaving something permanent on him sounded exactly what I needed.

I tug on his hair as his teeth come down on my chest. I feel heated as he swears, “Teasing me with this top all night was a fucking sin y/n.”

“Fuck off,” I gasp as he figures out the row of clasps at the front and the icy rings of his fingers presses against my sternum. I grit my teeth, “I didn’t wear this for you.”

His abs contract as he pushes himself back up, his eyes dark as his hands find the clasp on my trousers, undoing them with ease and tugging them off. His other hand comes back up to tilt my chin up.

“D’you really hate me?” He asks.

“Yes,” I respond with zero hesitation.

He moves his body, covering mine with his own again. My breath catches in my throat as he presses his lips to my neck, slowly moving down. He drives me crazy with anticipation and I wriggle up to keep up the pace but he holds me in place. I let out a moan as he kisses my inner thighs, his fingers gripping the tops of them. I'm squirming under his hold, the heat pooling inside of me.

“Do you hate me?” He asks again.

“Yes,” I cry, not wanting to relent to him.

“Good,” he says and that’s the last thing I remember.

The rest is a tangle of limbs, an out-of-body sensation, and seismic wave after wave coursing through my body. It’s unlike anything I’ve experienced before; the fury we felt with each other fuzes to the passion of the moment and it blitzes every damn thought out of my head.

Hours later, or maybe the whole night later—I don’t know but all I do know was that my body was spent and I was barely hanging on.

“I can’t,” I plant my hands on his shoulders and nearly pitch forward just from pausing. His hand splays on my back, keeping me in place as he turns us around.

“Okay?” He asks low.

I nod, grateful that he was taking over.

And after riding out what I know would be my last wave he rolls off of me, and we lay there just trying to catch our breaths.

After a few minutes, I sense him tilting towards me, his eyes on my face. When he stares for so long it becomes obvious, I look back at him.

His eyes are not the same ones that started this mess, they’re breezy meadows of green compared to the icy sea glass from before. But it’s not surprising. With each round and each minute we spent with other tonight, things had grown softer. Not gentle, but softer.

And as we look at each other with the awareness that the anger had bled into the threads of these tangled sheets a long time ago, we’re left with something neither of us want to distinguish. At least I don’t.

His gaze holds something too real for a place like this and I quickly look away and back at the ceiling. I feel his eyes on me a moment longer before he himself turns away to stare at the same ceiling.

“Y/N,” someone suddenly calls my name, tapping my cheeks with a gentle pat. I have to pull myself from the depths of wherever the fuck I just went to open my eyes and look up, at Harry. He looks concerned and asks me a question that I don’t register—I was truly out of it. I must have dozed off.

I push his hand away and grab the closest piece of clothing to wrap around myself in which ends up being a sheet. I take myself to the bathroom to clean up.

I hardly recognize the girl in the mirror. My eyes are blown out and my neck looks like it was rammed by a bull. I can hardly look at the rest of me. I would need to buy something high necked before we got picked up tomorrow morning and use all the concealer I had. I know I marked every inch of him I could find too.

I had never felt that level of passion with anyone. It was unnerving.

My knees collapse under me as I sit on the toilet and try to count the tiles on the opposite wall, just to come back to earth. To my body.

I sense a shadow under the door after I’m in there for a while, I watch it move from one side to the other and then move away. I wait longer, nearly falling asleep there before going back out.

The bed looks a right mess and most of the duvet is twisted to the side. I don’t bother with it, I use the sheet I’m wrapped in and crawl right into bed. Harry seems to have fallen asleep too but as I near sleep I feel the bed dip and the heavy weight of the duvet drapes over me.

I don’t have enough clarity or energy tonight to think about what any of this meant but I know I was right about leaving.

***

We return to London on a Wednesday morning and nearly kiss the ground. Harry was still playing two shows here but getting to go back home instead of a hotel room was enough to make us weep.

I didn’t really have a home to go back to. I’d been thinking about that a lot as the tour took us closer and closer to London. I had texted Gray yesterday and we agreed I could crash there until this weekend to get my stuff together.

London had a metaphorical grey fog over it in my mind. Nothing felt appealing about it and the only thing on my mind these days was home—my childhood home.

I already knew I was going to give in my resignation letter to Harry after tour but I had a 3 week period under contract. I don’t think I could afford a hotel for three weeks and staying with any of my friends is out of the question.

These thoughts kept me preoccupied.

It helped me not to think about that night though. I avoided Harry unless it was for work, returning to the solitude of my first few months working for him. He does the same: curt and avoidant. I know others notice but nobody dares to ask.

It was the most intense thing I’d done in my whole life and that was saying something. There was a way that Harry got under my skin that nobody else could. And it was hard to find a balance after the scales had shifted so far in that direction.

I felt like I had to block it out until I could have space to process it. And yet memories still seeped through when I was quiet for a moment too long or when he’d walk past me with the same cologne as that night and I’d catch a whiff. I was doubly sure this chapter had to close.

When I get back to the flat on Wednesday Gray has vanished as he promised. He told me he’d drop by that evening to talk. Surprisingly, I felt calm about it. I don’t know if it was getting all of that ferocious energy out that had been churning for months, but I feel level-headed and I appreciate the space to myself.

Gray texts me before he arrives. Like this wasn’t the flat he was now paying for alone.

I know what he wanted to talk about—we were all supposed to go to Harry’s last show at the o2 since I had tickets for everyone. Josie was stoked and based on the way she’s been texting me leading up to the day I don’t think she knew. Gray confirms it.

“So,” he rubs the back of his neck. He looked nice in a beanie and corduroy jacket. I wonder if any of the effort was for me, then vanish the thought.

“So,” I echo.

We stand awkwardly across from each other—him propping himself up behind the couch and me leaning against the dining table. Like we needed to get as much furniture between us. Like we hadn’t shared a bed a few weeks ago.

“We should sit?”

“Yeah,” he attempts a laugh and sits on the sofa. I choose the closest chair and turn it to face him. “Yeah. Um, I don’t know how you feel about Saturday. But I haven’t told Josie yet. I haven’t really told anyone.”

I nod, “Me too. Not really. People at work think we’re on a break.”

“Right. Good.” He says. “I’m not tryna lie to people but I don’t really want to get into it…”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “So Josie?”

“I’ll let her know once…once you move out?”

Move out. Of this flat. It’s been home for nearly 3 years.

Gray had surprised me with it when he found it—I had been broke and only been able to pitch in for utilities and groceries but he’d been gracious. He’d been supportive once. But I guess his support had boundaries too. I didn’t entirely blame him for that.

“Sounds good. Or later, maybe when she’s done her exams.”

He leans back on the couch, arms spread over the back and sighs as he studies me. “Yeah of course. I should’ve thought of that. You’re always good at that stuff. She’s gonna be gutted.”

I nod. Not sure what to say to that.

“So you’ll be out on Saturday yeah?” He asks after a while. It seemed both of us had a lot on our minds. But his question stings a little.

“Yep. I’m off for most of the week so I’ll just pack things up. Uhm, with Josie and whatnot I guess we’re still acting like a couple? Will that be weird?”

“Yeah. It will be but we’ve got no other option.”

“Right.” I respond. His voice grows an edge I’m not a fan of. “Well. Thanks for letting me stay here. If you need anything else I guess you can grab it now.”

I want to ask how he’s doing, who he’s staying with, and just hold his face one last time to really remember. But his cold apathy grows like frostbite over the room and creeps into my heart. I always thought where there was love there would always be love but I’m not as sure tonight.

I stay busy and when I can’t sleep at night; I map out a dream, an exit plan home. I write up my resignation letter, I look at flights and rentals and talk things out with my family, I cancel wedding and couple shit, and grieve a fair bit.

On Friday afternoon, my only formal shift this week, I head to Harry’s with an anxious weight in my chest and a buzz in my head from the hope. Hope that this chapter of my life could end soon, and I can head home and recuperate and plan out what my life was going to look like.

Harry’s on a call when I get in. He spares me a glance but I head to the office with my stack of mail. Today was mostly for some housekeeping/admin but I hope to avoid Harry for the most part like I’ve done since that night. My letter sits like a bar of gold in my bag.

I hear him move about the flat. I restock some pantry items, and we speak as little as possible. Going with him to his meeting was my final task for today so I decide it’s a good time to hand in my letter.

I find him sitting in the studio, tapping a pen against the table.

“Mr. Styles?”

“Hm?” He drags his eyes away from his screen to look at me.

“So we’re heading to your meeting in 10. Before then I just wanted to hand this in.”

The envelope stays outstretched in my hand and he eyes it, not taking it.

“What is that?”

“Can you just take it?” I shake it a little, like a bag of treats for a puppy.

His muscles move one inch every ten seconds, that’s how slow he is to sit up in his seat and finally take the letter from my hands. I almost let out a big sigh of relief. The process was finally in place.

“What is it?” He asks again, tearing the corner and down the side like he usually did.

I wait for him to unfold the thirds before answering, “my resignation letter.”

His eyes scan the sheet left to right right to left and when he looks up at me it’s hard to say what he’s thinking.

“Is this a joke?”

“No? Obviously not? I’m handing in my 3 weeks. I’ll also email a copy to Jeff and you.”

“Why are you doing this?” He stands, his tall frame rigid.

“Why? Because I’m…I’m quitting? I think I’ve learned everything I could here a-and it’s time to move on.”

By here I don’t mean working for Harry Styles and co but just here as in London. I’ve learned a fuck ton of life lessons here, and it was time to process them elsewhere.

“Is this to get back at me somehow? I don’t understand,” the papers crinkle in his fist as he grips it tighter. “Do you want a raise? Can we talk about this?”

“No.” I say and even though there’s so much more I could say I think that sums up my answer.

He looks puzzled, then annoyed. Just then my phone buzzes. The car was downstairs.

I grab my laptop and we head down. I was coming along to take minutes and then head home. In the car I reassure Harry,

“I plan on wrapping things up in the next three weeks and making sure everything is set up for an easy transition. I’ll leave continuity notes and reach out to people I regularly communicate with to break the news. The next couple months are pretty easy anyway coming out of tour and going on holiday so there should be plenty of time for the new PA, whoever your hire, to catch up.”

He doesn’t say a word. It reminds me of our first drive to the studio together. How naïve I was. How things changed.

He continues staring out the window, resting his face on his fist. I remember my teeth dragging over that jaw. I blink the image away; this was why I had to go.

When we get to Graham’s office Harry tells Jeff, “we don’t need minutes.”

Jeff looks over at me for answers and I shrug. I guess I came here for no reason but at least I had my laptop to work.

“Uh y/n please come i-“

“She’s fine working out there,” Harry cuts Graham off. Graham looks offended, his gaze drawing between Harry and I. Again, I shrug. I wasn’t leaving today I don’t know why he was acting like it.

For the next hour or so I sit at a spare cubicle and do just as I said in the car. I type out lists for upcoming interviews and studio days. I send emails for information to note for whoever the poor person was to replace me.

I had been keeping the Dos and Don’ts updated over the last year and it feels like a baby the way it came together with so much thought. I was almost sad to part with it.

Nobody tells me the meeting is over. The door simply opens and Harry breezes past.

“I’ll be in the car.” He mutters. Any faster and I would have to hold down the papers around me.

When he’s gone beyond sight, I turn back to the open door.

“What’s the matter with him?” I hear Graham asking inside.

“You keep pushing him,” Jeff responds with irritation. “That’s not his brand Graham.”

“Well that’s a different tune. Prior to this you were singing my praises with these new ideas.”

“I don’t know. Something’s been up with him for…a while-“

“Since that article isn’t it?” Graham references the Harry Styles slander when we were in Spain. Little did they know other things had also happened.

“We dealt with that article.”

Shit, I think. Has he been any different? I think I was keeping too much distance from him to notice.

“Y/n,” my name snaps me out of my thoughts.

“Mhm?” I’m beckoned to the meeting room. “Yes?”

“Find out what’s wrong with him. Or better yet just convince him to be a bit more alive at his last show tomorrow with his usual charm? He hasn’t been his full capacity the last few shows has he?”

Shit. “Um. Burnout?”

The two men look at each other. They make a face like that couldn’t possibly be why. I tell the men what they want to hear, that I’d try to find out and get him back to his charming self (yuck) before joining Harry in the car.

“Jeff and Graham aren’t all that happy with you,” I say when we start driving. Harry was giving me a lift home. “They’re insisting you do it right at your final tomorrow. Be your charming self.”

He grunts in response, head facing the window again. Was he allergic to look forward in the car or something?

“Are you coming?” He asks after a good ten minutes of silence.

“Tomorrow?”

“Mhm.”

“Yeah. I gave my extra tickets to…my fiance,” my brain fumbles my words as it remembers what he was and now is. And the lie I had to keep up. “And his sister and her friend.”

He just nods in acknowledgement, somehow stonier.

When the car pulls up to my familiar building I thank his driver and begin my shimmy out but Harry puts a hand to my knee to stop me. His touch sears right through my stockings and he must feel it too because he slides his hand back.

“Answer this,” he looks at me for the first time tonight. Wow, this really did feel like my first week on the job.

“Sure,” I reply.

“Is it because of that night?”

It’s the first time it’s been mentioned, and his gaze burns brighter than a forest fire. It’s mesmerizing and I can’t look away.

Wait, he wanted an answer.

“It’s because of a lot of things,” I answer truthfully.

He clenches his jaw. Leans back in his seat. The seatbelt reverses to hold him in place again and he’s no longer looking at me. I take that as my cue to go.

***

Josie bursts into the flat dressed to the nines in a groovy floral jumpsuit and boas in her hand. “Don’t worry. I have one for each of us.”

Her friend trails behind her in an equally 70s inspired look.

“That’s what you’re wearing?” Josie judges her brother’s hoodie and jeans. “You’re lowering the vibe Gray do better. Y/n? Why didn’t you brief him?”

“I did!” I eye Gray. “Don’t blame me.”

This was way more awkward than I thought. Or I really was not as good of an actress as I wished.

“What am I supposed to wear?” Gray asks. “I’m not wearing a jumpsuit.”

Josie rolls her eyes. “Y/n please drag him back and find a decent tee or something?”

“Yes ma’am,” I take Gray by the arm and take him back.

“This is kinda weird hey?” I whisper when we close the door.

“I don’t really like it either,” Gray scratches his head. “But it’s for the best.”

I nod and then louder announce, “Well it’s Jo’s night so find something a tad more retro?”

We end up with a red tee and find a belt to tie the look. Josie hugs her brother with thanks when she sees it.

I had on a pair of black bellbottoms paired with a blank tank. My hair was in spacebuns and Josie plucks a few boa feathers to accessorize my hair. It’s cute.

We head off and I have to make a conscious effort to remember my mannerisms with Gray before all this. I feel woozy while I slide my hand into his on the ride there, as Josie snaps our pics on her disposable, as she tells us to get one of us where Gray’s kissing my cheek and she’ll save it to show our kids. It makes me sick.

He keeps an arm on my waist as we walk. I want this night to be over so bad but every time I look Josie’s way I perk back up a little. I wanted her to enjoy this.

And she does. I’m sure she’s lost her voice by the end of the concert. At one point we drift away a little and breathe easier to drop the act but when she’s back Gray wraps his arms around me from behind and we act like a happy couple. Again, I felt sick.

Being in Gray’s arms held none of the spark it used to. I just feel awkward and sad.

At one point Harry looks my way, I don’t know how he spotted me in such a big crowd. It’s between songs and he looks at the group I’m with. I give a pathetic wave and he nods ever so slightly, his gaze sliding off soon after. Gray’s arm tightens around my shoulder and my heart gives a squeeze in response. I’m reminded: this era was ending.

The band told me to meet them backstage at the end, to join in on the final-show celebration. Josie and Gray would wait at a local pub and with the way Josie’s Instagram stories were glowing I could imagine her sitting there uploading it all.

“I couldn’t have done it without any of you,” I catch Harry saying as I slip behind stage with my pass. “I know I’ve not been the easiest to be with but you all sit in my heart. This is our Euro tour, concluded.”

Somebody pops bubbly and I congratulate the whole team as they drink. They insist on going out for proper drinks and I’m denied not going. They tell me to invite my guests to party with them and I know, based on where we were going, Josie was going to flip.

Juniper, a club that gets us all in on Harry’s face card, is opulent and lively on the inside. Josie is buzzing about with her friend—Gray had opted to go home, claiming he had early morning sessions. Josie didn’t think twice about him, but we pretended to go back and forth with a final warning from Gray to Josie to behave.

“He’s a broody one,” Charlie comments on Gray as we chatter while we get drinks. “Sister?”

“Yeah. Doesn’t know yet though so,” I put my finger to my lip.

“So no Barcelona dancing tonight?” Sarah teases. I laugh and tell them to keep me tamed. “We gotta do some shots with the team though where is everyone?”

We gaze around the room and manage to get everyone together. After one round of shots and another that Harry forced on all of us I feel the tension I’ve been carrying with me most days slide away.

We end up sticking together as a group and dance together, laughing and cheering each other on. Even Harry’s in a cheery mood—I suspect the alcohol. I catch him watching me at one point and when I raise my brow he takes my hand and spins me in a friendly twirl. I trip on my wide-legged pants and he catches me from behind. With my back to his chest I have the urge to turn around and kiss him and feel the peculiar comfort I had received from him before. That thought drives me away from him again. Despite the tight knit group there’s too much between us to even attempt being close.

I call it quits when Josie finds me and announces she was going home. I hug the newfound family I had made over the last few months one final goodbye, knowing I might never see them together like this again.

***

Jeff’s reaction to my news surprises me the most. He’s visibly upset and tries to sell me anything to stay. I tell him there was nothing to keep me at my job but I would rely on him for a good reference. I think it’s the first time he’s ever reassured me.

Between Harry and I it remains curt. Sometimes even edgy. I post my own job replacement and Jeff keeps me updated on potential candidates. By the time my last week rolls around I’m host to a roil of emotions.

The first week homeless, Charlie had let me crash on her couch and promised not to say a word to anyone. I didn’t want to overstay my welcome and so I had checked into a hotel and called it home for now.

I’m on my way back home to the hotel after being at Gray’s. We’d invited Josie over for dinner now that her exams were over and she’d been suspicious from the start.

We had told her the truth and she refused to believe it, hurt and betrayal in her eyes as she looked at me and realized she had been kept in the dark for the last week. I felt worse then, than I did when Gray and I called it quits.

I promised her a lunch together this week to talk more. Just because I was out of Gray’s life didn’t mean I had to be out of hers. I thought I could also tell her then that I was leaving to go back home.

On my second last day at work, Harry sends me on an errand near the end of the day. When I get back there’s a small group of friendly and familiar faces waiting to surprise me. I’m touched by the gesture, and I try to corner Harry to say thank you but it feels he avoids me at every chance, always in a larger crowd.

I finally catch him while I’m heading out of the bathroom and he’s heading down the hall.

“Oh hey,” I step in his way. He looks cornered. “I just wanted to say thanks for throwing this.”

“Yeah,” he gestures it was nothing. “It was Jeff’s idea.”

Ouch. I hide the sting. “Well. Thanks regardless.”

He nods, staying mute, but his eyes speak a thousand words—just none that I can read. They stay trained on me, communicating whatever.

Slowly the furrow between his brows eases and the sharp edges of his face give way to a softened expression. I’m scared to move in case I break the trance and don’t get to hear whatever his racing thoughts spit out. Just when it looks like he’s about to say something, a guest turns the corner up the hall.

“Anyone in the toilet?” It was Mitch. Damnit.

“Nope,” I step out of the way, inadvertently brushing Harry. A shiver runs up my spine and I try to act casual but he stiffens beside me. Was it that awful being around me, jeez.

I give up. If he wanted to continue staying moody, so be it. I leave to go back to the party and don’t look back.

My final days in London are hard. The same way I arrived, I go: alone and unsure of what’s ahead.

I always thought here was where I would stay forever. And maybe one day I would return but there was a little too much friction between me and the Capital.

I finish work on an unremarkable note after going through processes with the new hire, and dotting all of my i’s. Harry is nowhere to be seen and I’m gone before he gets back. I’m frustrated that he’s behaving this way but there’s also too much between us for the simple goodbye I yearn for.

I visit all of my old favourites, have one last drink at my old local pub somewhere in between Gray’s flat and Harry’s. I shed a lot of tears on my pilgrimage through the city’s veins. I promise the paved and cobblestone roads I would be back one day.

The walls of my lungs ease open on the flight home. Still, tears cascade down my face silently as the plane sleeps. Eventually I do too. When I wake the sky is filled with bright blinding sunrise, and American soil peeks out below me: I was finally home.

••••••••••••••••••••

Present (2 years on):

My heart flutters seeing Harry here, I chalk it up to anxiety. But it annoys me that despite all the distance and the growth, he still had an effect on me.

Harry’s head turns and before I can be smart about it our eyes lock. His eyebrows raise ever so slightly before his face falls into a nonchalant facade again. I don’t even want to know what my face looked like.

Then he gets the nerve to smirk, hang his head, and then grab his drink and walk towards me.

“If I had a cross I would be holding it up right now.” I have to shout a little so he hears me before he gets to me. He was an emotional vampire feeding on all of mine.

“Now why’s that?” He continues towards me. My emotions swirl through me. “I thought time heals all wounds. Why the unfriendly welcome Mrs. Duran?”

I grit my teeth at the name, he was still filled with poison. “Right, the timeless wisdom of clichés.”

“I like to think I’m pretty timeless.” He smiles.

“I’ve found that time may heal wounds, but scars make sure you never forget.”

“Well, scars aside, you look good,” he moves on and I feel like an idiot the way I was used to feeling around him.

“Of course I do.”

“What are you doing in London? Last I checked I was getting a reference check from America.”

I debate not answering him but I was trying to straddle the line between indifference and confidence. It was like walking a tightrope.

“I’m in London for a little while,” I give vaguely.

“Ah,” he smiles and damnit I forgot how handsome he could be. How handsome could then turn into seductive so quickly. I had to remember: Still a devil. “Are you looking for a new employer? Because I could be hiri-“

“No.” I cut him off. “I finally have a job I love so I’m good.”

Something flickers in his eyes but surprisingly he stays quiet.

“What are you doing here?” I ask. I sort of wish I still had a drink in my hand, they feel awkward and clunky and I want to avoid playing with my hair. Gah. “Global star drinks alone at his local bar?”

He laughs but I can tell I hit a minor nerve. “Here I’m just a local. Always have been—it’s nice to be anonymous for a little bit.”

I roll my eyes. I didn’t believe that for a second. He loved his fame and everything that came with it.

Plus I used to come here all the time, I would’ve known if my employer was a local too. He was lying for some reason.

“Mr. Styles if there’s one thing I remember about you, you’d choose death over anonymity.”

“Firstly,” he leans in and I get a whiff of his usual cologne with a hint of malt. “A person can change a lot. So maybe you don’t know me as much as you think you do-“

“Oh I don’t think anyone can change that drastically in only a year-“

“You seemed to have.”

His words take mine out of my mouth. I hadn’t changed, not really. I’d always been this y/n but the further I got away from him the more reassured I had gotten being that y/n.

“And secondly,” he continues before I could think of a response. “You no longer work for me. Harry is fine.”

The smile he throws me is almost sweet if I didn’t know the cruelty that could hide underneath. I don’t return the smile, I only raise my brow and look back down at my phone. My cell service hasn’t gotten any better and I’d missed the wifi password.

I could connect to Harry’s wifi, ask him so that I could order an uber.

I’d rather van gogh my ear.

I weigh all my options and consider the last one again. I look up to see what Harry was doing in the silence and find him looking at me. A shiver runs up my spine as our eyes clash. So much history and words unspoken fall in between. A very specific night flashes through my mind. I wonder if it does him because he looks down first. Damn.

“So I’ve gotta get going,” I say.

“Let me buy you a drink.” He says at the same time.

He laughs awkwardly and repeats, “One drink?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“We’re not drinking buddies.” I pull my purse to my chest, wanting to hop off this stool and run home if I need to. Put as much distance between myself and this man that was put on this earth to confuse me.

“Then what are we y/n?” He asks, his voice silky smooth as he leans in. The voice that whispered sweet nothings into my ear in my worst nightmares, nightmares of cotton sheets and heated limbs, of passion and shame.

“Ex-employer,” I point to him. I point to myself, “Ex-employee.”

“Exes have drinks together,” he grins full well knowing the double meaning.

“Never ends well,” I eye the door.

“Just as stubborn as I remember.”

“And you were saying people change?” I raise my brow.

He drops the smile and sighs, “I’m not gonna be able to convince ya am I?”

I shake my head. He should know that by now.

“Can I walk you out at least?”

I shrug, couldn’t hurt.

“What is this?” I ask as he opens the door for me.

“What?”

“This? Why are you trying to be so friendly?”

“I thought we could be friendly exes.”

And when did he get so cheeky.

“Something weird is going on,” I watch him stay in step with me as I walk up. With no service I was going to take the tube. “And I don’t like it.”

“Nothing weird is going on don’t get all paranoid on me.”

“Don’t call me paranoid! You never call a woman paranoid.”

“I thought that was conspiracy theorists?”

“Nooo. You’re being weird.”

"Alright, no need to get all Freudian on me. Just trying to be a decent human here."

I shake my head, somehow in our exchange my face had decided it was okay to smile. To forget what he put me through and remember instead that when things were good between us we actually got along.

Damnit. The devil knew how to play tricks. I wipe the smile off my face while he continues walking with me.

“So…what have you been up to?” He asks.

“Working, you know me.” I say after trying to figure out what his angle was but unable to find one.

“Oretta Smith I hear, how did you manage that?”

“I’m just that good Harry,” I say. His name is weird in my mouth. Sure I called him that in my head but I usually used Mr. Styles. I can tell he feels the same with his quick glance my way.

“How do you like that?”

“Yeah, she’s a great employer like I said. Very professional. Lots of flexibility.” Each praise is a knock to his ego. But it was all true, plus with Winnie joining the team I had a friend my age that felt great.

But there was also a darker side called burnout that I barely admitted to myself. Ever since we landed in London and I had time to orient my new self in a city that molded my old self, I felt the familiar singe of purposeless. But I keep it to myself of course.

“Great.” Harry responds curtly. “What about yourself? How’s your life, are you finally married?”

My instinct is to raise my defences and chew him out, he must know Gray and I were done what with me living in the States.

And yet, when I peer past the defences and take a long hard look at him I realize he is asking earnestly and without another angle.

We’re nearing the tube now. I hesitate in lying or telling the truth.

“We broke up,” I choose to confess. I peek at him and he looks surprised, even sorry.

“I didn’t know. Sorry.”

“I’d hope not,” I reply. “Otherwise you’d be an asshole calling me Mrs. Duran.”

He huffs an awkward laugh.

“Anyway this is me—

“I can give you a ride home—wherever that is right now?” He asks.

We’re stood in front of the glass doors. There’s not a lot of people this time of night. And as tempting as his offer was, the way he looks at me right now sends poisonous butterflies to my stomach and I think it’s best I get home for the big day tomorrow and not make any regrets.

“I’m not too far,” I lie. I point a thumb to the doors behind me. “I’m just gonna…”

“Yeah. Yeah right.” He’s awkward, which is a first. He clears his throat and stuffs his hand into his pocket. I watch him with a removed sort of curiosity. Eventually he coughs out his question. “How long are you in London for?”

“A few weeks,” I reply.

He finally meets my eyes again—and there goes my stomach. He was supposed to have zero effect on me, I was supposed to stay mad at him. Why was my body betraying me? Why did it continue to loop memories from that night and remind me of the things he whispered in the dark?

“A few weeks,” he murmurs back.

His gaze travels over my face openly, no longer holding back the barely-hidden expressions from before. Because I told him Gray and I weren’t a thing? Because I was entertaining whatever bullshit this was?

“Yep,” I nod. Awkward. Nervous. Cautious.

“My number’s the same,” his eyes snap back to mine. “If you want to go for that drink later.”

“Harry,” I try to break it to him another way. I wish I could just say I never want that drink. “I don’t think-“

“Don’t think,” he cuts me off. He laughs when I furrow my brows. “I mean, I’m right here for most of the next few weeks. When you feel like you want to have that drink just give me a call. Or text.”

Why, I want to ask him. Why, after all this time, after everything that happened? And it’s like he reads my mind in the silence.

“I know you left on a pretty poor note.” He shuffles his feet. “I know a lot of that was my fault. I apologize for that. Um, but I did enjoy having you around. You were excellent at your job and…you are missed. Even Jeff remembers you fondly. Which is saying something.”

This was some sort of prank. Or Harry had gotten so famous he now had a doppelgänger roaming the streets as him. It couldn’t be that Harry, my Harry, would say something so sentimental and so…genuine.

“So uh yeah, I would love to see you again while you’re in town.” He says when I don’t respond.

“Right.” I choke out.

He shrugs when I can’t bring myself to say anything more. “We do change, whether you believe it or not y/n.”

I swallow, hoping to lubricate my vocal cords and find my voice. “I-I really do have to go.”

Crestfallen, he nods. His hand comes up to touch my elbow. “Yeah ‘course. Just…think about it?”

I look down at his hand and he lets go, we stay in another bubble of silence. His eyes flicker down to my lips and I feel a wave of warmth as I try not to do the same.

“Goodnight,” I blurt and get to the other side of the glass doors. He watches me go.

On the escalator down I risk a glance back and he’s still there, watching until I’m out of sight. That ended incredibly awkward.

Leave it up to Harry to confuse me in coming back into my life. Damn him, he could never be consistent.

***

Waking up super early to catch the train out to Cambridge is so worth it because I get to watch Josie walk the stage and graduate with distinction wearing her famous smile that beams over the vast room.

Despite what happened with Gray and I, Josie and I have kept in touch steadily over the last year. It started as weekly facetimes which reduced down to monthly calls and have now become a steady stream of texts and memes swapped back and forth.

When she found out I’d be in London around her graduation dates she gave me no choice but to show up, sending me a ticket without asking.

I knew I’d see Gray, and a part of me was nervous and curious how that was going to go. But mostly I was grateful to still be in Josie’s life and spend time with her in person. She was the part of this life I missed most.

I’m sat somewhere in the middle of the room and Josie was smart enough not to seat me with the rest of her guests. But I know I would see everyone during photos and the dinner we were having later on. I try keep my focus on the ceremony however.

“Y/N!” Josie rushes towards me when she sees me after the ceremony. The group she departs from I recognize is a mix of her girl friends, her family, and a few others.

“Josie!” I return the same energy and she leaps into my arms. I squeeze her tight to me. “I’m soo proud of you my girl.”

We sway side to side, until we get enough hug.

“Look at you!” She exclaims when she leans back. “Your hair looks amazing and you are glowing. Please tell me you have a boy in your life.”

“No,” I laugh.

“A girl?” She asks hesitantly.

“No! I’m just…happy where I am right now! How about you look at you! You look phenomenal as per.”

“Oh thanks,” she takes the compliment and giggles. “I asked my dad to grad gift me a salon and spa visit so I am rejuvenated and blown out.”

“Aren’t you ever,” I touch a lock of her hair. “Congratulations.”

“Eek!” She squeals. “Finally finished this hellscape! I can’t wait to never write an exam again—ooh wait I want you to meet my boy…”

“So that’s why we’re actually glowing,” I tease as she tugs me towards the group. That definitely has Gray. My stomach drops the closer we get, he doesn’t seem to notice. He looks busy talking to one of Josie’s friends.

“Anyway,” she deposits me in front of a 6 foot something guy made of angles. “This is Jax. My boyfriend. We met during a Friendsgiving Myles threw last year.”

“Nice to meet you,” Jax smiles. “Y/N right?”

“Yes!”

“I was supposed to get around to that,” Josie huffs.

“Sorry she talked about you a lot when she found out you were coming. She was really excited.”

“Ugh,” she turns to me like she was embarrassed but her face is glowing. Josie was in looove.

“You two are so cute,” I tease which just makes Josie blush a little harder. “So are we getting any pictures?”

“Oh yeah,” Jax swivels his head. “Liliya has the good camera if you want to get-“

“Oh we can use our phones,” Josie cuts him off.

“No get the high res one—Liliya, camera?” Jax motions a shuttering action to the friend Gray was talking to. He’s so tall above the crowd that both look up at him and comply.

“Y/N,” Josie drags my arms back and takes me on the outskirt of the crowd. “I’m so sorry I never mentioned because I thought you wouldn’t come if I did tell you but you-“

“Y/N?”

Josie’s rushed whispers are cut short when Gray notices me and calls my name. He looks stupefied. I spare a glance to Josie and she’s paled.

She didn’t tell him.

“Hey,” I force a friendly tone. I was going to kill that girl.

“Did you all want a photo?” Josie’s friend Liliya shoulders her way back into the circle with the camera on a strap. She turns to Gray, “Babe?”

It’s an odd sensation, like all oxygen has left my lungs and they’re being squeezed as if tightened in a vice. Gray’s eyes drag away from me to his…girlfriend? Definitely not Josie’s friend.

It shakes me in the moment how much I realize I still cared, still carried a shred of hope for…something. And not consciously knowing this makes this moment feel a little like a slap in the face.

What did I think? I was going to leave this country for a year and people were going to pause where I last left them? Of course Gray’s moved on. Aside from the end he was a great partner and anybody would want that.

These thoughts race through my head in the few seconds Gray responds to his girlfriend and I look at Josie. She looks guilty as charged.

“I tried to tell you just now?” She whispers.

Deep breaths, I remind myself. You’re not the hot-headed y/n these people knew last. This day is not about you. It’s about Josie.

“It’s cool. Let’s get some photos,” I smile. “Don’t want to miss having them with you.”

She sighs but keeps her eyes on my face as we walk farther out.

“I am really sorry,” she whispers.

“Hey it’s alright,” I lie. This was the worst of it—Gray had moved on, had a great girlfriend, and I was living the life I wanted. No harm and no foul. “Honestly Jo I get it, you wanted me here reallllly bad.”

“I did!” She says. “But I’m also gonna kill Jax.”

I laugh and we straighten up when we realize the camera was already pointed at us. Josie flashes her degree and a few of her friends join the pictures too. We hustle back to Gray to see them and flipping back on the first few makes my breath catch in my throat. There’s one in particular where Josie is turned to me talking and my mouth is in a big grin because I’m laughing.

I catch eyes with Gray in an uncomfortably intimate second.

“Send me that one for sure wow Gray that’s a really good shot.”

“Oh wow,” his girlfriend peers over. “That’s a great candid.”

“Yeah,” I agree. I’d love a copy too. And of course that’s when Gray’s girlfriend notices me and introduces herself.

“I don’t think we’ve met—is that an American accent I detect?”

“It is,” I smile. “I’m Y/N.”

“Oh!” Two spots of pink appear on her face. It seems she’s heard of me. “Well it’s nice to meet you—nice that Josie invited you! I’m Liliya but Lily works too.”

“C’mon!” Josie interrupts the awkward by grabbing her brother’s arm and pushes him in the direction of where her friends are posing for photos. He takes some shots but Josie hates the look of them and gives the camera to Lily instead.

With just Gray and I left behind it grows very awkward.

“I thought Josie told everyone I would be-“ I say just as he says, “I didn’t realize you would be-“

We stop and chuckle awkwardly.

“Sorry,” I shake my head.

“No,” he shrugs. “It’s cool. It’s cool you’re here actually.”

“Okay,” is all I can say. Until the awkward silence stretches. “So…Liliya?”

“Yeah. Yeah, Liliya. You?”

I want to lie, but I shake my head. “No. Sorta needed the year to breathe a little.”

“Fair. How’s America?”

“Oh y’know, still super-sized and politically a guessing game.”

“Have you turned on our news while you’ve been down at all?” He raises a brow. I laugh because he was right. It was all a shitshow everywhere.

He asks me about my family as Josie jogs up to us.

“Okay, tell me the truth is my hair going flat?”

“No,” I look behind her where her friends are hovering over Lily and the camera going over their photos.

“Good. Where’s mum and dad?” Josie asks Gray. “Dad was just here 10 minutes ago he said he’d come by for—oh there’s mum! Look!”

We turn to where she points. Michelle—what I’ve always called Gray’s mom, spots her daughter at the same time and waves. She starts to walk towards us.

It’s nice to see her but I also feel a bit nervous; going cold turkey on relationships you only had because of an ex are always weird to come back to. Especially ones you were fond of.

“Mum! You’re missing all the pictures!” Josie says. “Where’ve you been!?”

“I just saw somebody I knew back from my first job as a librarian can you believe that?” Michelle says as she joins the group.

“Crazy. Well mum look who got to show up today! Isn’t that crazy too?”

Michelle looks at me and the bright smile that was intended for her daughter dies like a flower in overnight frost. The look wipes the anticipation off my face.

“Who?”

That one word shades the sun from the sky and brings forth a gust of western winds through the group.

“Mum,” Josie look between me, her mum, and Gray. She’s confused. “Y/N?”

“Hey Michelle,” I croak. Maybe my hair was too different for her to recognize me, or maybe she had early onset alzheimers. Surely this woman who I’ve had a better relationship with than her own son has wouldn’t be treating me like your worst frenemy at your high school reunion.

But Michelle looks right through me. I can’t explain how it feels, not in the moment. I’m gutted, and feel an unexplainable wave of sadness.

“Mum…” Josie sounds hurt and Gray finally decides to swoop in.

“Mum let’s check out the photos we took already. We gotta get some of the three of us.”

They walk away and I feel seven inches tall but I turn to Josie with a brave face and face her teary one.

“That was kind of awkward,” I downplay.

“Y/N I’m honestly so sorry I-,” Josie blinks rapidly.

“No it’s ok!”

“I don’t know why she acted like that-“

“Hey It’s natural for her to feel that way I’m alright don’t get upset-“

“It’s not alright though! That was such a…she never acts like that.”

It was true. Michelle was a free-spirit as she called herself. That’s why Gray had such a hard relationship with her; in his words, she was too emotional and ungrounded for him.

Yet apparently, she was able to find enough ground to stand on when it came to treating me like a nobody. I wonder if it’s because she heard Gray’s biased side of the story or she was hurt herself—still, the way she’s always talked about herself never struck me as someone who would believe a one-sided story. Or be a bitch to someone they previously called their daughter. It hurt like a mofo.

I didn’t want Josie to find out this way, here of all places, that her mom was just human after all. She idolized that woman.

So even though it hurt, I comfort her instead.

“She probably just feels betrayed by me leaving and stuff since we were close too. Imagine if Jax broke up with you and she gave him the cold shoulder—wouldn’t you feel justified?”

Josie scrunches her brows to think about the simplified story I’ve just fed her to feel better. I can tell it still doesn’t sit well with her but she nods in acceptance, “I guess.”

“Yeah, just forget it Josie. Plus you’ve got pictures to take so dry those eyes.”

“Shit I know,” she blinks some more. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to invite you here and twist the knife at every bloody turn.”

“Jo I’m honoured to get to be here and see all your hard work pay off. Don’t worry about anything else.”

“It’s unfair,” she says before she drifts to her group of friends. “I feel like nobody understands how…how understanding you are. But I’m really glad we’re still in touch. And you came for me.”

Her words bring tears to my eyes and I nod, afraid that talking would bring them forward. I watch her crash her group and start instructing photo coordination. I help hold things for people while they take photos and feel like a stranger outside the crowd. If it weren’t for Josie, I think I would have regretted coming here. I feel homesick and unwanted. A tough combo.

I was supposed to crash on someone’s couch tonight and do brunch with Josie tomorrow before going back to London but from the last half hour alone I know I’m going back to the city no matter how late it gets tonight. I think of the hotel room that was home right now, of how lonely that was going to feel to go back to too.

Home right now was in America, in the same time zone as my family, and comfortable in my shared apartment with one of my high school best friends who I reconnected with after going back home. I miss it so bad. And I feel like I’ve bitten into an unripe fruit coming back to the UK before I was ready apparently. My experience feels soured.

I shake off the doom and gloom when the party breaks. We were all going to meet at the restaurant at 6–my plan was to explore the university city and find a place to kill some time in. Maybe go outside to a park with lunch. Josie tries to convince me to join her and her friends for their mid-day celebration but I lie and tell her I had some work to do.

I call Winnie on my stroll through the city. I insist she update me on last night first, and she has more to tell—the guy had a yacht and he was inviting her to a party tonight. She tells me to join if I came back early and we cross our fingers that Oretta wouldn’t need her before then.

I originally called her to rant about Michelle and Gray but I don’t, I didn’t want to kill her vibe. So I scroll through my other contacts but don’t want to worry my mom and it was too early back home to reach anyone else.

My eyes catch on Harry’s name, he was at the top of my texts currently because he sent me a link this afternoon asking me for thoughts on it. I hadn’t opened it yet, I wasn’t sure what to think about this new persona he was wearing or that he thought yesterday’s run-in went okay enough to casually message me for my thoughts.

I remember the weird electricity of yesterday and shove my phone back into my pocket.

He genuinely wanted to have a drink? And talk??

I did enjoy having you around. You were excellent at your job and you are missed.

Was he trying to make up for his cruel words? But he also seemed a lot more mellow than before. Maybe that was just because I didn’t work for him. What did he want? And was I twisted for believing the new schtick?

Most curious of all was him at the pub in the first place. He was not a local there—that was a big lie.

I try to conjure up my previous hatred, calling him the Devil in my head. But it’s harder to do. Seeing him yesterday, he was just a man standing in front of a woman with a head full of cautionary tales and bad experiences.

Without warning images from that night come back and I feel my heart flutter. I shut them down just as quick. Not all bad, my body tries to remind me. I tell it to shut up.

I’ve barely stepped foot in this country again and already my mind was running circles around my heart. How exhausting.

***

I’m early to the restaurant, before anyone else apparently. As the hostess finds my name on her floor plan Josie comes in behind me with Jax.

“Oh! Y/n you’re early!” She seems flustered.

“Yeah I didn’t think I would be,” it was only a few minutes to 6.

We make small talk while we’re led to the table, Josie’s eyes keep darting to where our table might be.

“Sorry I was hoping to do this before you came,” she says when we get there. There are name cards along the 7 seats and she picks the one in front of me. “I’m just gonna move mum to my other side so it doesn’t get weird. Which means she’ll be closer to dad but…I think he’s bailing since his girlfriend doesn’t want to do this.”

Josie shrugs, I know how she feels about her dad’s girlfriend. She begins explaining the plans she has to do dinner with her dad later this week and the more she talks the more I can tell that she feels awkward. And I hate that it’s because of me. At one point Jax and I catch eyes and pass an awkward smile.

“Josie,” I walk up to her fiddling with the name tags. She stops talking immediately. I grip her shoulders. “Thanks.”

“Sorry,” she whispers. I wrap my arms around her and she melts into me.

“Stop apologizing.”

“Sorry. I can’t help it. It’s a disease.”

We let go with a laugh and she seems more stable. “This is going to be fine.”

Famous last words.

It’s definitely not fine and very awkward. Jax ends up sitting in front of me, and even though Liliya’s name tag was beside mine it’s suddenly swapped as they slide in and Gray sits beside me. I guess it might be too awkward for her but not awkward enough to fit someone we both dated between us.

I can sense Michelle’s pinched face as she notices us sitting beside each other and I feel badly for Josie the most as she tries to play the gracious host. At one point I sense Jax laying a hand on her arm and taking over, asking Michelle questions about her yoga and getting her talking.

“Did you need more?” Gray turns to me with the wine bottle, it’s the second thing he’s said to me tonight. Otherwise he mostly just watches me talk and leans back enough when others are talking so I can be involved.

“I’m okay,” I whisper. I didn’t want to draw any attention while Michelle was talking. She hadn’t said a peep to me, even when Josie tried to involve us both in a shared memory. She continued acting like I was Casper the ghost.

I can feel Lily’s eyes on us as Gray offers wine, of course they would be. No wonder Gray barely spoke to me all night. Fuck me, what was I doing here.

Jax is a sweetheart, asking me about my job and encouraging conversation between the both of us. I’m so happy for Josie that she found a partner like him.

By the time dinner is over I mostly want to cry. I feel spent. But I also feel like I crashed an intimate dinner and everyone’s polite enough not to mention it. Despite Josie, I do actually regret coming.

As we pay the bill and shuffle out, Josie grabs my arm.

“So I have two friends where you can crash at their place or Jax can sleep over at mine and you can sleep at his or-“

“I think I’m gonna head back to the city.”

Her face falls. But it’s like she knew I was going to say that.

“Sorry Jo. I think you should come to the city next week—maybe visit your brother? And while you’re down we’ll do brunch then. I’m mostly free while I’m here. I’m just pretty tired and have to help Winnie with something tomorrow.”

“Really?” She says in the smallest voice I’ve heard out of her. Salt to my wounds.

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I know we were looking forward to getting time together.”

She juts out her lip and I’m reminded of the girl I met when I first started dating Gray. How she’d taken to me so quickly. How the whole family had. How things could end up like this.

And suddenly I see the future laid out in front of me. After tonight it would be hard to keep this relationship going—Josie and I. She’s just seen her mom be an unreasonable bitch for the first time, I can tell she’s been trying to compensate all night but the cracks won’t go away. It’ll always be a sitting duck between us.

We might try to stay in touch, maybe I’d reach out if I was ever in London or if she ever visited the west coast. But this would fizzle out.

She was still young and naive enough that her mom hung the moon and stars; mom’s beliefs were gospel, her opinions were rulings, and she’d just delivered my ultimate sentence: I was a black sheep to the family. How could sweet Josie walk through a mess like that?

“I’m so proud of you,” I tell her as I fight tears. “Congratulations again and thank you for inviting me.”

“Thanks. And you don’t have to be so nice. I know it was kind of a shitty invite.”

“No,” I insist. “I loved being here. I don’t regret showing up for you. I can’t wait to hear what you get up to.”

“I’m going to make sure to make it to the city next week,” she squeezes my arm. “We’ll see each other soon.”

“Exactly,” I look over at the rest of the group, where her boyfriend waits for her. Her family. “And I really like Jax, so good on you for that.”

“He…” she twists her lips, swallowing what she was going to say before vomiting it out. “I always aspired to have a relationship like yours and Gray’s. I never wanted to settle for anything less so that’s…that’s why Jax.”

“Hm I think you made us the bar and you leapt over it babe,” I wrap my arms around her again. I ache with the loss of what we used to be.

“See you soon,” she says before she drags herself back to the group.

I stand off to the side, awkwardly ordering an Uber. The group begins to walk the opposite way waving bye to me. I breathe easier without the weight of them around.

As I tap my foot in anticipation of the ride to the station arriving, I feel a hand tap my shoulder.

“Y/n,” it’s Gray. “Hey I…I just wanted to say something before you left.”

“Oh. Hey yeah. Shoot.”

What was it with everyone wanting to say something to me.

“Uh…ok give me a minute,” he laughs in the way I know to mean he was feeling nervous. “I just sort of jogged back impulsively.”

“Yeah well you have,” I glance at my phone. “4 or so minutes.”

“Damn,” he ruffles his hair. “Alright. I think I just wanna say sorry.”

“Oh.” That was it. Everyone had something to say to me and the something was apparently sorry.

“Yeah I’m sorry. I…when we broke up I was so upset and caught up in my own head. I blamed you for everything. I think it only hit me when you just up and moved out of the country how things actually went down.”

I hadn’t told anyone but Josie that I was leaving.

“Yeah you were just like gone.” He continues. “I guess a part of me thought we’d get some space, maybe circle back later…”

“You really betrayed me,” I remind him.

But even I know what he means. He hurt me bad and it might be crazy stupid but on some level we were both aware we were in an ugly place and maybe with some space we might come back to the place that was good for us again. Maybe bump into each other one day, strike up a conversation, find there might still be a small amount of love left. Enough to water and grow again.

“I know,” he sighs. “I know. I hate that I hurt you like that. I regret…I actually don’t really hang out with that group of friends as much anymore. I sorta have myself to blame but I didn’t like who I was with them.”

I listen, letting him speak. It hurt too, knowing this was the Grayson I had fallen in love with. Kind and supportive, and now apparently he’s learned to communicate. Maybe that was a Lily thing.

“I guess,” he blows the air out of his cheeks. “I want to say I’m really truly sorry. I missed you a lot after you left. Nothing was the same and life was fucking hard. I wish things didn’t end the way they did and I stayed mature but I was just jealous and angry.”

I nod to acknowledge what he’s saying and watch him take a breath to continue.

“And I always appreciated how you never let us shake your relationship with my sister because she bloody loves you—I don’t think how mum treated you was right today but I never really understood her in the first place. I’m sorry about that.”

“Yeah,” is all I can manage without making it obvious how emotional this was all making me. How one year could make me feel like a completely different person. How this man I loved, and still love in some way, could stand in front of me talking about us as something in the past. Because we were. Long past.

My phone dings with a notification that my ride would be here. We glance down and out into the street.

“Anyway,” he swallows. “I just wanna apologize. And say I genuinely hope you find love y/n. Love that’s as fierce and loyal as you are. I hope you can forgive me one day. And I hope you’re successful as hell in whatever you pour yourself into.”

“Thank you Gray,” I want to say I was sorry too. For what it was worth. But my car pulls to the curb.

I wave at the driver to let them know I’d ordered it and we walk the few feet to the back door.

I face Gray and open my mouth to say it. Say something more: how I appreciated his words, how I was sorry for how things ended too, how I hope he is happy. But nothing comes out of my mouth. I just stare at him, my eyes welling with tears instead.

Gray holds out his hand and I look down at it. I knew those hands well and it’s like walking into a place you used to frequent in the past and have memories rush towards you as you remember: those hands held me and wrapped around my own and comforted me, they made me food and stroked my hair, and carried my bags when they got too heavy. They once wore an engagement band I gifted, they once held a small box with a life-changing question I had said yes to.

Now it was just a hand.

I clasp it and he squeezes.

“I know,” he says, his eyes trained on my watery ones. He squeezes again and lets go.

I rush into the car, those two words nearly cracking me in half. I wave goodbye through the tinted window and feel a wave of despair that pulls me down into the depths of darkness.

Too much was happening at once.

My emotions spiral out of me and I feel alone in this foreign country; I needed comfort where none could be found.

I don’t mean to. Or maybe I do. But on the train back to London I text Harry: is it too early to cash in on the drink?

His response is immediate: no, I was waiting for this text last night

I smile, despite myself.

Can I come over? I text with shaking hands.

H: For drinks?

Y: For drinks

H: Ofc.

***

The taxi drops me in front of the familiar building. I feel an echo of anxiety pierce through me as I go through the familiar doors. I nod at the concierge, the night replacement was new and I’m grateful nobody can recognize me making this potentially stupid decision.

For a brief second I wonder if Harry had other plans tonight but decide not to overthink it. He’d invited me openly. And maybe I was making a decision based on sadness and loneliness and grief and needing to be wanted but I make it. And I would make it like a grown woman—ready to accept the consequences.

I didn’t want to go back to my lonely hotel room. I didn’t want to call anyone and talk about what just happened. I didn’t have words. My body was taking the beating, feeling everything under the sun and now bruised and battered for it. I just wanted my body to forget that. And there was only one person in this godforsaken city that could help.

I’m let up to the penthouse and I forgot it had a distinct smell, wood-like and something indescribable. Weird that it felt comforting.

“You made it,” Harry comes into view in a simple pair of shorts and a long-sleeved white tee pushed up to his elbows. It’s the sleeves that really do it.

“I did.”

I leave my bags beside the elevator next to the umbrella stand, keeping my eyes on him. He doesn’t take his off mine either. I’m glad he doesn’t. Now I know he knows we both said drinks but meant something more.

He reaches out for me before I even get to him, and I know I would think about that later. A lot. But right then in the middle of his entryway I wrap my arms around his neck and lean up on my toes to reach him too.

His lips are soft against mine and he tucks me into him, his hand splayed out on my lower back. It feels like a return to a lover, someone who knows you, like I would’ve thought seeing Gray again would feel. But it’s just Harry, and the thought of baseless familiarity freaks me out a little.

The next time I feel his lips they’re on my jaw and neck and down to the base of my throat. He murmurs my name as he makes his way down and my body reacts immediately. He takes me by the waist and backs me up against the nearest wall, and I have a feeling I might fall.

I had made the conscious decision to walk into the devil’s lair because it was the only place I could get what I needed.

My fingers dig into his shoulders. My body wants this. Every part of me wants to pull him close and hold him and never let go. I wanted all of it tonight.

But I am so tired.

I put a hand on his chest and press gently. I can feel the warmth of his skin, the firmness of his muscles and the beat of his heart as he pauses.

“Sorry, I should have started with a hello. That was too fast was it?” He whispers, looking me straight in the eyes.

I have a million answers, but nothing comes. He puts his hand over mine and I feel it as a shiver runs up my spine.

"Is this too fast?" he asks again, and I hear the worry in his voice.

I shake my head.

He gives a breathy laugh, "Then tell me."

"I think I-“

“Don’t,” he covers my mouth with a laugh. “Please please. Don’t think.”

I smile under his palm and he drops his hand, I can tell he’s proud of lightening the moment by the sheen in his eyes. The moment is tender in a way that takes me back.

He brushes back my hair and kisses my forehead. I close my eyes, breathing in his cologne.

“That’s not where I want to be kissed,” I tell him.

“Then where?” He plays along.

“Anywhere but there.”

He kisses my nose. “There?”

“Not there,” I open my eyes to look up at him. “I’ll have you know that was very snotty just an hour ago.”

He groans, “you really have a way of taking the desire out of a situation.”

But his brows furrow and he watches me even closer.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I respond to his unasked question.

With that statement he takes a painful step back and I nearly slide down the wall without his support.

“What?” I ask.

“We should take that drink first.”

I feel the loss of his body pressed against mine, I realize miserably.

“What do you mean? I thought the drinks were just an excuse?” I ask.

He laughs a little, “Maybe tonight, but I really did want to have a drink with you. And talk.”

“Harry,” I groan. “I’m all out of talking tonight. Truly.”

“As much as I want to say forget talking and take you to bed I need to do this…just follow me,” he leads me and my flushed body through to the main living area which I was well familiar with but it’d gotten a facelift. I make commentary on the changes and he tells me more about it as he pulls a wine he wants out for us.

“I changed things around a little after you left,” he says as he hands me the wine glass. “I needed it. The change.”

“Oh.” Is all I can muster. I follow him to the sofa, tonight he doesn’t leave as much space between us but it still feels like a weird parallel to the night I landed in the hospital; a confrontation with Gray leading me to wine with Harry. “Look Harry I don’t know if I can do this.”

“Why not?”

“I…I’m at minimal capacity right now I just-“

“Just let me talk then.”

“Why does everyone want to talk!”

“I need to tell you what I should have said a long time ago and I want to apologize-“

“You already did-“

“Properly.”

I cross my arms and sigh.

“Y/n bloody hell I forgot how quickly you can get under my skin.”

“So this isn’t a great thing then.”

“Y/N,” he says my name like a warning and I want to comply. I roll my eyes and knock back my glass of wine, the buzz from the glass at dinner has long since worn away.

“Part of me wants to top you up but another part remembers what happened last time.” Harry eyes me.

“No I’m okay with just one glass. Drinking when I’m upset doesn’t end well.”

“Yeah…I don’t want you concussed on my watch again.”

“No we don’t want that,” we smile at each other, a soft and sentimental smile that gets the anxious stuttering of my heart to calm down a little. He just wanted to talk, so what?

But the anxious voice runs through the scenarios he might want to—his recent text, or something I did as his PA he wants to take up now. Gah.

“I really have missed having you around,” he says softly.

“Didn’t feel like you would with how you treated me.” I raise my brow.

“I know.” He pauses then mumbles something before talking to me directly. “You must have heard about the PA before you? Maybe from Riley?”

“Kind of.”

“Kind of?”

“Hmmm this feels like a trick question.” I say but he tells me he just wants to know what I knew. So I rip the bandaid off. “You had a fling with her.”

He hangs his head back over the seat of the sofa and sighs. “I knew that piece of…Riley makes me really mad when I think about him sometimes.”

“Does he?” I raise my brow. “I can think of someone else who makes me madder.”

“I know that’s supposed to be me. And I don’t know what to do about that except come clean right now.”

“And why is that?” I ask. “Coming clean? I came here just to get distracted in bed with you. I never thought I’d live to see the day where a guy like you wants to talk instead.”

“Y/N,” he says with such an intense look my way my stomach flips. “Trust me. I want to have you in my bed more than you do. But I told myself if that day ever somehow happened it would be after this.”

I shrug, let him continue. In reality his words make me weak and I can’t speak. Which kind of annoys me—why did he have such a strong pull over me? How did he so easily admit he’s thought about me, about having me in his bed!?

My heart flutters amongst other things.

I remember a brief conversation I had with my mom last year when she asked me why I wasn’t putting myself out there and dating again and I told her I just didn’t have the heart for it. She had said it seems I left my heart in London—my passion and my heart. Sitting here with Harry stirs something inside of me, scares me, and I want to distract that with more wine. But I manage to control myself.

“I was fairly new to the industry when I hired Riley and it was his second proper job or something so we were both a bit young and we ended up being friendlier than we should have.” Harry starts. “But he was great at his job and never gave me any issues. I stayed naïve that people in this industry would look out for my best interest-“

“That’s really naïve,” I can’t help but comment but he throws me a look and I zip my lips. “Sorry.”

“I was lucky that the first few relationships I built as I got my foot in the door were genuine but I realized too late that it wasn’t a norm. Everyone wanted a piece of me and they all wanted me to be someone else. Some angle. Shit hit the fan pretty quickly. So when I needed more help I decided to create a new role for Riley and hire a PA. She was seasoned and came highly recommended.”

I nod along to his story.

“Long story short, she started out good but she kept trying to get me alone and get me talking. And back then after being friends with my old PA I didn’t have the wisdom of setting boundaries—don’t give me that look.”

“What!” I raise my hands. “I’m just listening.”

“You’re judging me.”

“Just continue,” I encourage. I was judging a little.

“Anyway, where I thought we were just friendly she thought I—I dunno I was falling for her or something. And one night she was working late so she had dinner here. She kept refilling my drink I didn’t realize she wasn’t drinking as much. It’s not much of an excuse but by the time she came onto me I was pissed and it didn’t take much.”

He continues the story like it was nothing but his voice catches a little and he doesn’t look me in the eye. My insides grow colder. I want to reach inside of him and hold the old Harry, the naive one who didn’t know better.

“Please don’t feel bad for me,” he cuts my sympathy short. “I didn’t turn into a great person after that. Especially with how I treated you.”

“That’s right.” I pretend to be unaffected by his story like he wanted me to be. But it’s near impossible.

“So that’s how I decided it was best for me to play the asshole. I couldn’t fire her after that—it would look awful and she could report me and screw me over. But I could make working for me a nightmare and so I did. A few months later she quit.”

He sighs and takes a swig of his wine, “Then you came along and I thought ‘I should play the asshole from the get go.’ I had gotten good by then at compartmentalizing my personality in the industry.”

“Hmph,” I raise a brow. He has the decency to look embarrassed but he continues.

“But the more time we spent together the worse I felt. You were nothing like the previous PA. You were genuine and down-to-earth. Pretty fiery but I wouldn’t find that out until later,” he grins. I roll my eyes. “I tried to ease up a little but things kept happening to push me back into the asshole box.”

“But you were so snappy, and a dick.”

“I know. I didn’t know how to tell you you worked too hard without dropping the asshole act and making you feel even shittier.”

“What do you mean?”

“I had to be the villain in your story-“

“What?” What was he talking about?

“Yeah like, you were working all the time even though there were some times I told you to wrap it up for the day.”

I remembered that, thinking he was kicking me out.

“But you took the job so seriously. I appreciated everything you did but you were dogged at making sure you did the best at any cost.”

“What do you mean? At any cost?” I ask, a cold sensation running down my back.

“For example take that one time a few months in when I asked you to call me because you forgot to order wine. You bloody came all the way back to hand deliver it-“

“Yeah because you said to call you and you were gonna be pissed if I-“

“No, y/n,” he lays a hand between us. “I just wanted you to call to know where you usually ordered from so I could order that for myself. You weren’t in any trouble! But I could only blame myself for playing the hard asshole too well.”

I think about that night, Josie’s birthday party. How I left early and upset Gray. How I didn’t need to but I had been following the Dos and Dont’s list.

Shit, the lists. They were added onto by the last PA who, now I know, was having her life made into hell just so she would quit. Some of those lists were on an extreme I didn’t even have to follow. Fuck. That was on me.

My face must be a painting of regret because Harry apologizes again.

“I’m sorry but I didn’t want you to…I just felt like I had to play the villain so you could do what you had to do. So you could continue hating me and we could establish the clear boundary.”

“Right.” I have a bitter taste in my mouth.

“But I genuinely liked you, I thought you were funny and sensitive-“

“You don’t like my sensitivity.”

“I do. I just hated how angry you were-“

“Because of you.”

“I know. I created a monster, I’m Frankenstein.”

“Damn straight.” I agree and we pause a beat before laughing.

“Anyway,” he continues. “You were funny and sensitive and resilient, passionate and smart, and you cared so deeply. It was rare meeting people like you in this field. I wanted to wrap you in bubble wrap but I think I shattered you instead. I’m sorry for the way I just let my past colour your time here. I feel like you left because of me-“

“It was really a lot of reasons.”

“I know but I was part of that and I felt no good. After you left I was a miserable son of a bitch for a while. I couldn’t even enjoy my holiday because I kept thinking of you. I was miserable so I barely even said goodbye—I didn’t realize you were going to run away so far. But I also didn’t want to say goodbye because I was scared I would convince you to stay by spilling my truth.”

His words sit on my chest and they slowly sink down to my stomach. I don’t know what it meant, what he wanted me to do with this confession. It’s too much.

“Mostly,” he continues, shifting closer to me on the sofa. He lowers his voice, “Mostly I’m sorry about Barcelona.”

I flush at the mention of it. At the heat and passion from that night. His eyes roam my face.

“I’m not that guy. I should have treated you nicer, should have been the one to keep my patience.”

“I didn’t make it easy,” I admit.

“No,” he chuckles. “You really fucking did not.”

We smile.

“But you’re so much more than anger y/n. I could barely sleep that night, I kept regretting giving into the anger and not being slow and soft with you the way you deserve. I regret it all the time.”

His confession pulls the veil off my eyes and I see a sharper image of my past. Of everything. It all comes at once and I can’t sort through it in the moment but I know what I want to do.

I shuffle over until I’m up against Harry, I hold his face in mine and he cups my face in his hand.

“You drove me crazy,” I tell him. “Made my life hell.”

“I know. But you drove me crazy too. Nobody got under my skin like you did.”

“Same.”

His hand snakes down to my thigh and he nudges it over his lap so that I’m straddling his body. I feel vulnerable and scared—not the first time these emotions have coursed through me in this very room. But today I don’t feel powerless.

His lips are soft against my cheek, my jaw, down my neck. Unlike the first time he’s slow and deliberate like someone who’s waited so long to unwrap a cherished gift and can’t stand ripping even the gift wrap. He pushes my hair out of the way and trails his fingertips down the back of my neck.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he whispers in my ear. The more he talked the more nervous he was making me. I turn my head to capture his lips, run my fingers through his hair which is too short to really grasp. I missed his old hair.

We break apart for a breath and I can feel the tension. The desire to have him near clashing with the need to go slow. To savour this. Somehow we both feel it.

“We don’t have to do anything tonight,” Harry promises me, his finger trailing down my arm. “Just having you here is enough.”

Oh god. How did he know just the things to say. This man was way too suave. He really was the devil.

But I needed him. It’s scary to admit but I did. I wanted to be here, I really did. I needed to be in this moment with him. Fulfill some shut-out desire that had grown dusty in the corner of my heart.

“I want to do this.”

With a gentle kiss he gets us up and takes my hand. I feel myself being pulled through the living room and towards the bedroom. The sheets are cool, but not cold and when he crawls in beside me I forget that I had ever been anywhere else.

He’s attentive and deliberate and I’m buzzing with anticipation. I decide to pick up the pace, propping myself up to take off my blouse. I watch his throat bob up and down like he’s never seen me like this before even though he has. It’s endearing.

The way his hands fit in the curve of my waist makes it harder to breathe. He moves his hands up my torso and to the straps of my bra. He pauses, as if asking permission, and when I nod, he kisses me. He unhooks it and slowly slides it off my shoulders, eyes fixed on mine.

The intensity of his gaze is overwhelming.

I pull him close to kiss him again, and he pulls me under him so I can feel the full weight of him against me. This is what I needed. To be physically present and not stuck in the after tremors of the earthquakes of my past. Not that he wasn’t part of my past but this is different. A non-verbal agreement to just be present. I knew his ways with women, it could be a one-night thing and that’s what I needed.

But that’s why the moments of tenderness and adoration nearly take my breath away. I don’t know where to put these things.

He kisses down my shoulder while his hand trails down to my trousers. He hooks his finger into the belt loop and tugs gently, looking up at me for consent.

I nod.

He slowly takes them off, and when his fingers brush against my bare legs, my breath hitches.

It happens again when he presses his lips against my hip bone.

He stops for a moment, and I can almost see the cogs in his brain whirring.

He moves up to press his forehead against mine.

"I don't know how to do this right," he says quietly, and his eyes search mine.

“What do you mean?”

“This is always how I should have treated you,” he whispers. “I want you to know-“

“Harry,” I smooth out the lines on his forehead.

"No," he grabs my hand and kisses it. "I don't want you to feel like I don't care because I do. I don’t want to hurt you. I'm not good at saying these things. But I want you to know how much I value you. That I like you as a person. I respect you. I want you to be okay.”

“I-“ who was this Harry, seriously!? “I get it. I’m okay. I am.”

He smiles at me tentatively and my heart does a somersault.

I grab the back of his neck and pull him down, pressing my lips against his. I could taste the sweetness of the words he had said.

I tug at his shirt and it flies into the darkness of his bedroom. His skin is heated against mine.

It feels like an eternity before he finally reaches the band of my panties, and my heart thumps wildly.

"May I?" he looks up.

"Please," I whisper.

For the first time since I’ve met him he doesn’t make it about himself or what he needs. It’s almost intimidating how intense he is as he looks after me and it’s hard to reconcile this man with the man in my head. We’re of one mind and it’s like he knows everything I’ve been through in the last 24 hours; he just attends to my every need reminding me that I was here, right here, in his arms and in this body.

And it doesn’t go unnoticed.

“Are you staying the night?” He asks later with a final kiss to my shoulder.

“If that’s alright?” I ask. I didn’t want to be alone in a cold hotel room.

“I’d love nothing more.” He says earnestly.

Love. I brush the word away.

He warns me that he was a slug if I stayed and he’s not exaggerating, with his arm draped over me and tucked up against him he’s like a child with a plush. He falls asleep just as quickly.

I should too but can’t. I feel so intensely about this body laying beside me, I want to crawl inside of him, understand him, understand us and how this worked.

Or maybe I wanted to just understand me, and why I felt a piece of myself sliding back into place tonight. I had to be the most fucked up person in this city.

Instead of sleeping I lay awake thinking about everything and I can’t help it. I go over this morning—god it felt like weeks ago. Josie’s graduation. Josie. Gray. Even Michelle.

I feel slightly paralyzed by everything that transpired today—it truly felt like peering through a glass window into a life I used to have. I try to break open the glass, sort it all out.

On one side is me and everything I’ve done this whole year to move on from the crumbs of my life here in London. I don’t know why but I really did think that coming back I would be 100% untouchable by my past. I was an idiot for thinking that because I was bothered that Gray seemed to have a steady girlfriend. Why did I think anything would rekindle between us?

I dig deeper, did I even want that to happen? Or did I just want to prove to myself that I was the one Gray let get away because I was too scared to face the possibility that I was the one who let Gray get away.

But clearly something didn’t work with us, I think bitterly. A few months with his new girl and he found the balls to open up with me and communicate his grievances and his apologies.

Love that’s as fierce and loyal as you are, he had said. Was I too much for Gray? Is that why we were made to burn out? It hurt too that he had damaged all my relationships I made in my life here in London only to cut those same people out of his life immediately after I left. The more I think about it the angrier I feel.

And his mom, I still feel bruised by her acting like she didn’t even know me. It stokes the anger higher. Her own son has called her crazy on multiple occasions, I was always nothing but kind to her. Gray was the one who put the final nail in our coffin yet the woman who called me her daughter and claimed to love me had been cruel. Even in the face of getting along for Josie’s sake she had put her petty feelings in the forefront.

These people made me so angry.

How did I ever think I could rekindle anything with Gray? As much as I was to blame, I realize, Gray couldn’t even be kind in the end. Just because the year apart was good to him didn’t mean he would still be good for me.

I think about the man laying beside me, in a hypothetical situation if things got ugly I instinctively want to say he would be cruel too. But I have to push past the persona he claimed to have put up and think about the glimpses of the man I saw underneath. Something tells me he would be just as fiery in letting me know how he was feeling. But with his recent apologies I’m not as convinced he would go out of his way to hurt me again.

Even in the bar last night, I just assumed he called me Mrs. Duran to be cruel but he hadn’t known. Or when I had assumed at Josie’s birthday party I would be fired for forgetting wine because he was an asshole when really he just acted like one so I wouldn’t feel worse.

How many times had I judged people because of how skewed my own lens was? It’s a sobering reminder.

Josie’s face flashes through my mind and I tear up at knowing we were going to cut each other out. No matter how much we loved each other staying in touch at this rate was no longer sustainable. For her best interest.

I think of my younger brother back home, my older sister, our family of 5. When I went back home there was so much to catch up on and eventually, apologize for. I had missed out on so much of my family’s life because I believed I needed to leave to grow. Well, life sure handed me a lot of lessons but I needed to go back home to plant them and let me grow.

Harry stirs beside me, nuzzling my neck in his sleep. I feel myself go teary eyed for no reason.

I wondered if this was just a one-night thing. If we would see each other again while I was in London. Did I want to see him? My heart sings yes immediately.

Damn.

What was it about him that pushed my emotions to the highest highs and lowest lows. How did he know every button to push and every bruise to kiss. This had to be toxic, we couldn’t just take our great big baggage of a past and see each other casually while I was in London. It couldn’t be that easy.

What if it was, hope whispers. I squirm. Could I forgive Harry for everything he’d done?

“Y’sleeping?” Harry mumbles to my left. Shit.

“Yeah,” I say which invokes a throaty chuckle from him. I check the time, it was nearly 4. Double shit.

“Liar,” he tugs on my hips and I turn to face him. “Talk to me.”

I couldn’t. Half of my thought were about him. And how could I tell him I was thinking about my ex after spending the night with him. So I just shake my head.

“Please?” He brushes my cheek with his thumb. “You need to sleep.”

“I-“ I try to say I can’t but the words get stuck in my throat. The emotions of everything I’d been thinking in the last couple hours threaten to dislodge the words from my throat so I close my mouth. But it doesn’t work.

A sob bursts out of me and before I can reel it all in the floodgates swing open and it carries all the pent-up sorrow and confusion, grief and anguish I had bottled up.

Harry freezes for a moment, probably very confused to wake up and have me reacting this way. But he recovers and pulls me into his warm chest.

“What is going on in that head of yours love,” Harry murmurs. Love. I sob even harder.

He murmurs reassuring words whilst stroking my back and I cry an embarrassing amount in the same bed where just hours ago I was blissed beyond comprehension. Life moves fast.

Finally when I gain enough composure I lean away, covering my face because crying into him was one thing but seeing my ugly cry face was another.

“Here,” I feel his body move and then tissues pressed into my hand. I’m grateful for them but I wasn’t going to blow my nose here. I sit up and try to dry my nose. His hand reaches out and the tips of his fingers rest on my spine like he was tethering my lost body to him. Somehow even that is reassuring.

“Don’t go trying to kiss my nose this early on again,” I try to joke through a stuffy voice.

“I wouldn’t dare,” he tugs my arm a little and I fall back beside him. He holds me in both his arms and I watch in horror and affection as he kisses the tip of my nose.

“Stop being so nice,” I laugh and cry a little too.

“You’re actually complaining about me being nice?”

“No I just—I’m not used to it,” I press the tissue to my eyes again.

“Well get used to it,” he peels the hair off of my face and pushes it back. “I don’t want to be the one hurting you. I swear to never ever be the reason you cry like this to anyone.”

“Don’t say those sorts of things if you don’t mean it.”

“I do,” he caresses my face. “You’re breaking my heart y/n, I don’t know who hurt you but I never want to see you like this. Especially not because of me alright? I’m sorry if I ever-“

“Stop,” I put my hand to his mouth. Which is kind of gross since I just blew my nose but I’m pretty sure him kissing my snotty nose means he didn’t care.

“But-“ he says behind my hand.

“I’m embarrassed right now,” I admit.

“You have seen me in every compromising situation,” Harry says. “And we have been through too much together to be embarrassed right now.”

“Fine,” I sigh. “It is tiring.”

“Maybe you can finally sleep now that it’s…almost 5?”

“Sorry,” I sigh. “I hope you don’t have something early?”

“Nope,” he kisses the top of my head. “And even if I did it wouldn’t matter.”

So we both try to go back to bed and I manage to fall asleep, all of those tiring racing thoughts washed away by a good cry. I feel warm and cared for and vulnerable and protected. A stark change from how Harry has made me feel before. Maybe this was temporary or maybe this was the start of something new. I’m just taking it minute by minute while all I can think is Do I or Don’t I?

***

It’s my final week in London and if you’d asked me a couple weeks ago if I was looking forward to going back home I would have said without hesitation yes.

But that night at Harry’s and putting my past to rest brushes away an old and tired film I had been viewing the city with since I landed.

We had seen each other a couple times a week since—I’ve been cautious despite my body saying otherwise. There were many days I had been free but I had made up some excuse not to see him, I was scared of getting too attached and having to leave.

But I can’t deny how nice it was to be with Harry without any labels. Most of the time I went over to his, it was tricky going out somewhere too public and risking getting papped. Together we just talk about life and work, my life back in America and my relationship with my family, his life growing up and his relationship with stardom. We watch movies and listen to music and make jokes and I open up a little about what had been weighing on my mind that night.

Winnie teases me that I was lighter than she’s ever seen me, that London looked good on me. I tell her she’s crazy. But even Oretta admits it when Winnie brings it up to her.

Harry makes the effort to make up for how he acted until it’s not just words. I believe what he was saying. And I admit to my faults too.

We still get under each other’s skin.

The thing we argue about the most is an opportunity Harry tries to get me to sign off on. The link he texted me when I was in Cambridge was an upcoming single one of his friends was releasing and he wanted to get me to bid on executing a music video for it. I tell him he was nuts and that I had no experience, plus I had a job. But he persists. He thinks I should explore putting my creative skills to use and not just my organizational skills. The arguing continues.

I have a date with him tonight, at the same bar we bumped into each other that first night. I have a question I’d been meaning to ask him.

“You aren’t actually a regular here are you?” I ask when we’ve settled.

“Of course I am,” he says but I know he’s lying. I raise my brow and he looks everywhere but at me. “Fine. I’m not.”

“So how the hell did you end up here that night?”

“Coincidence.”

“Liar.”

“I’m an honest man.”

“Truth please?”

“You’re embarrassing me here let’s move on.”

“Nuh-uh,” I’m enjoying his bright cheeks and darting eyes. “Did you stalk me or something?”

“I…I knew this was a local spot for you. Or was.”

“Really? How?”

“You mentioned it a few times? And I dropped you off here once after work.”

He might’ve. I’d met many friends and especially Gray here. I motion for him to continue.

“I might’ve known you were in town, might’ve found out you were here and…”

“So you did stalk me,” I gasp. “Oh my god ladies and gents he is obsessed.”

“That’s a strong word.” He argues.

“You. Stalked. Me.”

“Oh fine, I’ll confess: I’m used to the stalkers and I thought it was high time I did some stalking and see what the fun was all about,” he joins in on making fun of himself.

“Someone get me a restraining order,” I say just as someone approaches our table with drinks. As soon as they leave we burst out laughing.

“So have you given the music video any more thought?” Harry asks as the evening continues.

“Can we not talk about this right now?” I ask.

“I just think you should give it serious thought. I know you want to go into PR, be somebody’s Graham, but you have a really good eye for this thing. Before you pursue what you think you want, try this out.”

“You’re one dude,” I say again. “Who believes I can do this. You want me to throw away the career I’ve worked on for years to dabble in this and potentially waste time instead of getting to where I want?”

“Firstly, if you love doing something it’s not time wasted. And secondly you only ever need just one person to believe in you, angel.”

His fingers brush mine on the table, the familiar electricity courses through me just through the small touch. And of course, his use of pet names always turned me to putty. I hated how malleable he made me.

“Consider it. Just write a proposal y/n, it’s not betraying Oretta or anything. I can talk to her if you want if they choose your idea.”

It was scary putting myself out there for something I didn’t believe in myself for. But my echoes of burnout grow towards the idea of doing something less demanding than being an assistant just like a sunflower to the sun. It basks in letting my creativity flow.

“I’ll think about it.”

“Not for too long,” he taps my fingers again. We were cautious about being too touchy in public, even in a place like this where people genuinely didn’t care who he was. “Proposal’s due at the end of next week.”

When I would be back home in America. Away from here. Him.

We hadn’t talked about it, if we would try to keep in touch. I can’t really imagine a long-distance thing with Harry. Not at this stage. Mostly we enjoyed being in each other’s company and I was scared forcing labels just because we would be apart would ruin this fragile thing.

“Fine.” He’d worn me down and I submit. “Fine I’ll get something in for you.”

He pulls back with a shocked expression. “Did I just convince the stubborn y/n y/l/n to do something she didn’t want to do?”

I scowl. “Don’t get used to it.”

“I won’t,” he laughs, waving his hands around him like he was fanning in an aroma. “I’m soaking this in though.”

“Whatever,” I say with a smile.

“You make me work hard,” he smiles back. “For everything y/n. That’s one of the things I l-I-that I really like about you.”

We ignore the near slip of something far too serious for what we had going. We move past it but it sets my heart racing.

“So this friend of yours,” I change the subject. “With the music video. Didn’t you guys have like, beef when you were on tour? All that article stuff?”

“You of all people should know not to believe what you see online. It was all manipulated and put out of context.”

“I know but you were all moody for all your shows afterwards. I remember Jeff and Graham complaining. I assumed the articles had worn you down a bit.”

He raises a brow like he’s waiting on me to figure something out.

“What?”

“Really? You think it was the artcles?”

“Well what else happened that-“

Oh god. Was I that stupid?

Of course it wasn’t the articles, it was me! Us.

A smile stretches over the contours of his face as realization dawns on mine, “Twice in a row I’ve got you today, I should buy a lottery ticket.”

“I’m off my game today is all, don’t get used to it.”

I can’t believe it. Not that I didn’t believe Harry after the last few weeks but I—that night—really meant that much to him that his feelings over it had affected the rest of his tour? I had affected his tour?

“Why didn’t you say anything if it was weighing on you so much? If I recall I tried to talk to you a couple times.” I ask.

“What could I say,” he snorts. “You were engaged and my loss of control was why you cheated. Then you were quitting and I knew if I said anything you might have stayed. I didn’t want to keep you where you didn’t want to be.”

His words tug at my heart. He really had thought up a storm.

“Harry,” I lean back. “Gray and I broke up before I joined you guys on tour again. We weren’t cheating.”

His forehead creases, “What?! But you were together at my London show. I thought you two broke up after you moved back home?”

“No,” I guess in the last few weeks I’d just mentioned we broke up a long time ago. He didn’t know any specifics. “We were fake-together because he hadn’t broken the news to his sister then. But that’s why I was all…y’know in Barcelona-“

“Fuck me,” he groans. “No wonder you thought I was an ass for pulling you away-“

“Well you were-“

“Yeah alright-“

“Why did you really pull me away though?”

“I…I was feeling a bit possessive.”

“What?”

I wasn’t expecting that to come out of his mouth. He smiles sheepishly, “I thought we already came to terms with that.”

My stomach does a few somersaults. Until tonight I don’t think I’ve really focused on the magnitude of how Harry felt back then. Parts of my mind were still remembering him as a prick just because it was easier to remember my side of things. But this spins things in a brighter light.

“I was just your assistant though.”

“Y/N,” he tilts his head to the side. “Did I not already tell you what I thought about you that night in my flat?”

“Yeah but-“

“I’d never met anyone like you, I really liked you. I couldn’t have you though and I had to push you away constantly. And that drove me a bit crazy sometimes.”

I let out a noisy breath, wondering if how he felt about me was just as intense now as it was then. A part of me knows it must be. Feelings like that didn’t fade. But here I was, barely knowing what it was I felt for him. All I knew was that it was nice when we were together.

Why me, I want to ask. But I hold back. It wasn’t a question I could ask my ex-employer current-lover part-time-asshole.

“Sorry,” he apologizes. “Was that a bit strong?”

“No,” I sigh again and he laughs. “Fine. A little. But it’s fine, I’m okay.”

“Okay,” he believes me. “So you broke off your engagement and didn’t tell anyone?”

“Kinda, we weren’t in a place we could come back from. We decided that mutually after things blew up. He didn’t even know I was leaving the country actually.”

Harry whistles. “You ran out on all of us.”

I scratch the side of my head, “Maybe?”

“Well I’ve enjoyed having you again, here.” He says with sincerity. “I’m really relieved to be able to get to say everything I wanted to your face.”

I agree. Neither of us mention I was leaving later in the week.

Even by the night before I’m leaving London we still hadn’t discussed a thing. But there’s a heaviness to us as we have dinner at his, as we pretend to watch a movie only to cuddle on the couch. We lay there facing each other and I trace his eyes, his nose, his wonderful mouth. It’s so odd to me that this was the same Harry Styles performing in sold out venues and on the walls of teenage bedrooms. That I got to have him in these quiet moments and be present.

I feel so grateful for this. That I didn’t have to carry around these draining stories within me anymore, that it felt like it happened to someone else. In a way even if nothing came from all this, I got closure. I was able to move on now.

I imagine my heart and it feels like when you take a stroll mid-March and realize nature was healing from winter’s blues. Warm and blooming the earth was growing again—my heart was growing stronger. Now the idea of a date or a partner didn’t seem so daunting and exhausting. I would never have guessed that it would take the man who almost broke me to come into my life again for me to see how to fit those pieces back in place again.

“I don’t know what I’m gonna do not having you in town anymore,” his lashes flutter as I run my hand through his hair. It was still shorter than I was used to but it had grown in the last three weeks.

“Oh you’ll be fine,” I say. “I’ve worked on your schedule before: meetings and studio sessions and photoshoots and interviews.”

“A busy life isn’t always a full one,” he whispers. And it’s the closest thing to a confession we were going to get to. I cover his mouth with mine and we indulge in each other one final time.

There is a symphony of unexpected but undeniable intimacy woven between the beats of our entwined hearts. I know I would probably never feel this way with anyone and I don’t think I’d want to. Being with Harry was passion. It was losing myself and finding myself at the same time. It was being vulnerable and guarded and cherished and known.

My flight out tomorrow is around noon but I can’t stay the night as I’d have to help Oretta in the morning to make sure everything gets to the airport in time. Harry walks me down to his lobby and we stand there for a few, just holding each other tight. He doesn’t ask me to stay and I don’t ask him to come.

“This isn’t goodbye y/n,” Harry says when we part. His hand rests on his heart. I know the feeling, mine aches so hard I want to press my hand to it just to tell it everything would be fine.

“No,” I shake my head. My eyes had been teary ever since he squeezed me to him. “We’ll talk soon.”

“You’ll be directing music videos soon.”

I roll my eyes, “I’m still working on the proposal.”

“I have a good feeling about it.”

“That makes one of us. But…thanks for believing in me.”

“Thanks for believing in me,” he whispers. “Even when you didn’t have to.”

I’m glad I did. The only time in my life not paying attention to the warning bells had paid off.

“I’ve been working with this new producer and he wants me to come out to a studio in Cotati?” Harry mentions. “How far is that from where you are? Are you still in m Burbank?”

“Burbank’s where my parents are,” I shake my head. I look up what he’s talking about and feel a thrill when it’s less than a couple hours. Still, I try to maintain neutrality. “A little over an hour?”

“Well,” he brushes my hair over my shoulder and keeps his eyes looking just over it. “Depending on what you’re doing—maybe if you’re free…we can see each other again?”

I would love that. My heart is bursting just thinking of getting to have him in the place I called home. Of this meaning something. Of him wanting to see me again.

“Of course if you have a boyfriend by then and he doesn’t want you to see me that’s…I mean, live your life and if it works out we-“

“Yes,” I cut him off. “Yeah. Let’s see but that sounds good.”

He meets my gaze and I laugh a little, he was nervous and that was rare.

“Good,” he smiles with. “Until next time.”

“Until next time,” I step into his arms and it’s a quick affair before he steps away. I turn to head out the door, shielding my eyes from him. Not wanting him to see that this was stupidly hard to say goodbye.

He waves me off and I head back to my hotel with a heavy heart. But I think about him asking to see me again. Who knows when that would be. And I know this wasn’t the end of our story.

***

I’m happy to land in SFO the following evening, happy to busy myself with Oretta’s business, happy to have Winnie chattering away. I spent parts of the flight I wasn’t sleeping working on my MV proposal and it awakens a familiar passion inside of me I’d been afraid I’d lost.

I send out a silent thanks to Harry for knowing what was good for me.

I think of Harry often, Gray even less until I don’t think of him at all. I dream of London weekly; I missed it this time around. And as life resumes again I anticipate the change I sense on the horizon.

So when life gives me lemons I stop asking Do I or Don’t I. If one thing the last year has taught me was I had to listen to my gut and look at the signs. I had to start asking what I wanted and go after it. Even though Harry and I barely talk, I remember the lessons he’s taught me.

I stop looking to others to make decisions. There’s no guidebook or lists to help me make my decisions either. I take deep breaths and I believe in myself.

I build a new life on the remains of my old. I don’t let it dictate what I did anymore, I simply leave it as the foundation to elevate me even higher. I reach for the sky with my feet planted firmly on the ground. And I grow with reckless abandon.

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#writingsfromhome #harry styles x reader #harry styles fic #harry styles #harry styles fanfic #harry styles imagine #harry styles angst #harry styles fluff #musician!harry #harry styles series #harry stylesxreader #enemies to lovers #dos and don’ts #this is DONE #I HAD THE MOST FUN WRITING THIS I REALLY POURED MY HEART INTO IT #IM SO HAPPY ITS DONE #AHHH #I LOVED WRITING THESE CHARACTERS #EVEN THE FRUSTRATING ONES #fic #<3 #i considered an epilogue but firstly not enough space and secondly idk if this open-ish ending suited the series? #if you didn’t like the ending I’m sorry just consider the alternate ending to be right after the grad dinner #but listen distance and experience provides perspective so nobody stay mad #okk byee #love ya

[helloaugustmoon]

this is so classic wattpad plot but I literally do not care

Michael Jackson x she/her!reader

·˚ ◌༘͙[Keep The Faith] ! ˊ

Fishing has been one of Michael’s favorite hobbies for some time. Not in the traditional sense - he cannot sit still for long enough to actually go fishing - but rather by his own definition. Whether it be peering at the faces in the crowd at a concert, seeing faces pressed against the windows of cars and buildings he’s in, fishing is a term that Michael dedicates to peacefully viewing pretty creatures that appear just to see him when he’s passing through. In no way is it dehumanizing; he views it as comparing people to other beautiful things in nature, and in a comical sense too, of course. By now, his team is well aware of his traditions when it comes to fishing, only laughing along and agreeing with his comments pertaining to ‘nice fish’, all in jest and never something he’d consider seriously pursuing; he’d feel he had too much power over a fan that it wouldn’t be fair or just, it would be taking advantage, and that’s not something that sits well with him.

That is, until your face catches his eye.

Fan after fan came and went, greeting Michael and taking pictures while he signed their copies of ‘Bad’ and gifted him their most sincere praises. It was certainly lovely, never something he takes for granted, but to an extent, the social scale of the event can become quite tiring. He’s grateful the line is nearing its end, hoping that soon enough, he’ll be able to rest. But when Michael lifts his gaze from the table in front of him and his eyes meet yours, when he sees your smile- he swears to every holy thing he’s ever known, his heart stops. You aren’t screaming or hyperventilating, but you are trembling in a way that stirs the gentleman in him, wishing the circumstances would allow for him to perhaps offer his jacket to you. The smile on your face as you look at Michael is reflected right back at you, and his previous idea of having any power over a fan is single handedly erased by the existence of you. In that moment, had you wished it, he’d have dropped to one knee and ripped his own heart out to offer it to you. One word from you, and he’d do anything for you. All you had to do, was-

“Hi, Michael.”

And he’s yours.

Your voice is the sweetest melody he’s ever heard, and he already knows it’ll inspire more songs than anything ever has before. You are the siren to lull him to sleep, to guide him to the pearly gates of heaven someday, and he is nothing if not a devout worshiper at the altar that is you.

“I don’t want to take up too much of your time, you’ve already been here so long- but, I just wanted to thank you for the music you make and the message of love that-“

Is now and has only ever been meant for you, he realizes.

Words continue to fall from your lips like a steady stream, a peaceful and thought-out poem that touches every part of Michael’s very soul. And he sits there, smiling up at you as you stand before him, in absolute awe of you. The stars of the night couldn’t hope to hold a candle to the ones in your eyes.

“You don’t need to thank me, it’s my pleasure. It brings me joy to know that my music brings you joy, too.” He answers, his own voice softer than he’s ever heard it.

Your smile turns shy, then, and Michael wishes he had the kind of magic to seal this moment in a bottle, or lock it away in a drawer, so that on the lonely nights he foresees in his future he might gaze upon this moment again. You.

“What’s your name?” He asks you, the question feeling more like a desperate plea than a general curiosity, and when you do tell him your name, it’s immediately stitched into the very fabric of his being.

He wants to compliment your name for how pretty it sounds, how well it suits you, how he’ll close his eyes and whisper it to the sky before he falls asleep and wishes for you without being capable of waiting for a shooting star to do so. He wants to, more than anything. But for risk of seeming too forward, Michael only allows his smile to widen, tells you it was wonderful meeting you, that he hopes you’ll have a pleasant rest of your day, and then passes you back your copy of his album - signed with his name and a kiss that he simply couldn’t resist leaving for you.

Michael’s team exchange glances when his eyes linger on you, watching you leave until you are completely out of sight. At which time, he releases a sigh that is impossible to mistake as anything other than a swoon. With his longing being so obvious, a member of Michael’s team steps forward.

“Would you like us to ensure tickets for tomorrow night’s show, Sir?” The security guard offers, and is surprised when Michael only shakes his head, not offering a verbal answer as he turns his attention to the next person in line.

That night, Michael is ringing up an impressive phone bill from his hotel room, rambling to Janet about every shade in your eyes, every intricacy of you, every cadence you spoke in. After an hour, he finally leaves enough time for his sister to actually respond.

“So you made certain she’ll be at the show tomorrow, right?” It almost sounds rhetorical, not to mention sarcastic, coming from Janet - not that either would surprise Michael.

“No, no,” He shakes his head, leaning against the wall as he holds the phone to his ear, careful not to step too far from the cord. “I don’t want to enforce or engineer anything- that’s not love, that’s a script. If I’m meant to see her again, I will.”

Janet sighs at this, knowing Michael’s mind is set and that means he’ll be too stubborn to consider any alternative; his views on love and fairytales are so absolute, he’d rather spend a lifetime waiting for you and loving you anyway, than use the powers at his disposal to set up a meeting that could lead to a love story.

That said, Janet also knows that for you to have captured Michael’s attention so, you must be some girl. Women have thrown themselves at him from the moment he entered the spotlight - for him to not only notice one amongst the rest, but yearn for you so obviously and without any trace of hesitance, you must be something special. For that, Janet can only pray alongside Michael that somehow, some way, you will find your way back to him.

During rehearsals the following day, Michael finds himself envisioning you in front of the stage, using the idea of dancing to impress you, to woo you as his motivation for giving the performance tonight everything he’s got. No matter how bright the overhead lights of the stadium are, he can picture your smile widening when he dances around onstage, pointing at you as a means of dedicating the song to you, and you alone. He intends to do so regardless of the fact you won’t actually be there. Perhaps he’ll point at the stars, lest you see the footage and misunderstand that he’d ever point at another girl again.

The screams of the crowd do little to quiet the thoughts of you that continue to whirl around the mind of a lyrical genius, even when he runs out onstage to greet them. Breaking into the first song of the night, Michael puts his all into his performance as he always does, but can't help feeling that tonight he has a heavenly blessing in the form of your smile lingering in his thoughts, pushing him that little bit harder. It isn’t until the end of the first song that Michael stops moving for long enough to scan the faces he can actually see from where he stands, the distance from the stage to the front row being further than he’d like. Pausing only momentarily for a brief interval of fishing, Michael’s eyes trace over the front row. And then, he does a double take.

His heart must have been playing a trick on his eyes, surely.

He looks back again, feeling an irregularity in his own pulse when he struggles to find you in the sea of faces again, until whoever had been cruel enough to temporarily block the view of you happens to move just enough for Michael to see you again. Front row, clinging to the barricade like your life depends on it. And you’re smiling at him just the same.

His eyes lock with yours, the band behind him exchanging confused glances. By now, Michael should have given the cue for the second song to start, but the perfectionist has been entirely distracted by the very definition of perfect that he’s been waiting his whole life for. It takes several seconds for him to accept the reality that you really are right there, but as soon as he does, the smile on his face is so big he’s concerned it’ll split his face in half. Giving the cue for the second song to start, Michael points right at you.

“You knock me off of my feet now baby, HOO!”

Throughout ‘The Way You Make Me Feel’, Michael’s gaze connects with yours, and he doesn’t shy away from devoting the song to you in every way he can. If it weren’t for the rehearsed role of the woman onstage that he’s barely even noticing, he’d have pulled you up here with him. Instead, Michael settles for pointing at you, winking at you, and holding your gaze while singing lyrics and dancing in ways that leave no room for misinterpretation.

He continues this for the remainder of the setlist, a plan forming in his head over the course of the next few songs. Because now that divine intervention has resulted in you being right here with him again, who is he to stand and do nothing in the face of that? Of you?

With the instrumental for Liberian Girl beginning behind him, Michael sets his plan into action. Against the better judgment of his security, he jumps from the edge of the stage, making a beeline for where you stand in the front row, every face except yours blurring into his peripheral vision, the increasing volume of the screams of the crowd fading into nothing with the way your smile brightens, the closer he gets to you. Realizing how disastrous this could be, Michael’s security lunge forward to lift you over to the barrier, holding back the other fans that try to climb over with you. And then, Michael’s hand is taking yours, holding it so gently, his free hand bringing his mic back to his lips.

“Liberian girl, you came and you changed my world, a love so brand new…” He sings, eyes holding yours with reverie as he guides you by the hand until you’re standing onstage with him.

The very second there’s enough time in between lyrics, Michael lifts your hand to kiss your knuckles, and that shy smile he’s already dreamt of appears on your face again. With the gentlest movement, he pulls you closer to him, inviting you to erase the distance that he’s desperate to be without, and you’re hardly going to hesitate. You let go of his hand to instead wrap both of your arms around his neck, and Michael has never cursed not having a headset more than on the occasion that he can now only hold your waist with one arm because he’s required to use the other to hold up his microphone. Sometimes, the world is too cruel to comprehend, he thinks. Still, a man can't complain about getting to hold you in any capacity.

“More precious than any pearl…” Michael sings, his voice soft in your ear, intimate despite the scale of the concert itself that surrounds you.

Unable to resist the urge a moment longer, he starts to sway with you in time with the music, melting into the most perfect slow dance on a stage with an audience of thousands, but feeling like the only two souls in the universe.

When the song draws to a close with notes that have you ascending to an astral plane, the crowd screams with enthusiasm like never before, and Michael lowers his microphone. Wrapping both arms around your waist at long last, he leans to your ear to ensure that you can hear him.

“I prayed I’d see you again.” He tells you, his voice so sincere.

“You must be on pretty good terms with God, then.” It’s all you can do to prevent yourself from collapsing in his arms at words like the ones he just spoke.

“I think I must be.” Michael chuckles. “Now, I owe him more than ever.” His arms tighten around your waist, and your heart splutters in your chest.

Knowing that this moment is one that needs to be put on hold for now, Michael sighs, moving one hand to hold the back of your head.

“Would you mind waiting for me, backstage?” He wonders, and when you shake your head into the crook of his neck, his entire body relaxes with relief.

“See you after. Break a leg.” You wish Michael luck, surprising him with a kiss on his cheek and then stepping away from him.

His hand trails down your arm, to your wrist, and holds your hand for every microsecond he can until you slip from his grasp, but his smile is unwavering. Michael watches you leave, waiting until you’re safely situated backstage with his best security guard at your side, and then he blows you a kiss that you catch in an instant. With an effortless, expert kick in the air, Michael breaks into his next song. And he cant help looking over at you longingly every so often, just to check the perfect vision of you is still there, still waiting for him. Still smiling at him.

#michael jackson x reader #michael jackson imagine #fanfic #fanfiction #imagine #imagines #x reader #headcannon #headcannons

[whorekneecentral]

max baby fever is real actually… enemies to lovers hatefucking but you guys eventually become fwb and then BOOM suddenly youre married but the sexual tension never leaves and then you have a tiny baby lion

- 🐣

it’s the baby lion for me 🥺

working for red bull was no easy task. especially the weekend after weekend of scrutiny. surely, people had their reasons but its still a pain in the ass. 

you were a press officer for the team, you covered the general press handlings; approving press releases, statements, team appearances etc. but recently, you were stuck working with max as his old press officer was on maternity leave. 

max was the biggest pain in your side, you don’t think you’ve ever worked with a driver that was so irritating. 

over the course of the season, things got better. max sort of mellowed out and only became a little tense during the last race. it was down to the wire between here and lewis as to who was going to win the championship.

the was exactly what the team had been looking for and the celebration was beyond anything you could imagine. the drinks were following and one by one, the cans stacked up. 

you and max some how ended up in the same elevator after everything, the two of you had too many drinks and ended up all over each other. stumbling back to the room, hands all over each other and clothes all over the floor and you two spent the rest of the night in bed together. 

from that night, it spiralled into more. you and max ended up going back and forth over the break, sneaking around together for a bit before the season started. 

you two continued through the racing season; longing looks, hidden kisses and touches, the extra long hugs when he wins. 

at some point after the summer break, his press officer returns from maternity leave, and you go back to your regular duties, which means now you can announce that you're dating without there being a conflict of interest.

the dates were like no other, how many women can say they get to travel the world with the person they love and go on dates around the world every other weekend? 

you and max were in brazil this weekend, the season to last race when he rolled over in bed. “hey,” he whispers and you look over at him. 

you were doing some work in bed, max was settling in for the night. he rested a little velvet box on your laptop and you looked at him, confused. “what's this?” 

“open it.” he tells you, so you do. inside is a ring, a fat emerald cut diamond set on a slightly thick gold band. 

“max,” you look over at him and he smiles. “I know you didn’t want a big proposal but I can still get on my knees if you want.”

you shook your head but he pulls the ring out, reaching for your hand. “will you marry me?” 

“yeah,” you giggled, you can feel the tears when you lean over to kiss him, the cold band pressed to his cheek once it was on your finger. 

your laptop and max going to sleep was long forgotten. a tangle of limbs, clothes all over the floor, the blankets were kicked to the end of the bed. 

“I cannot wait to marry you,” he whispers to you, your legs wrapped around his waist. “might be the wrong time but just letting you know I'm keeping my last name.” 

your wedding was nothing if not picture perfect, as was your honeymoon. 

you two had a week to yourselves, a little villa on the amalfi coast. max was determined that you two would be starting your family sooner than later and that’s exactly was he was up too. 

“gonna put a baby in you, pretty girl.” 

“that’s my girl, take it so well. made just for me.” 

“look so pretty full of me.” 

and surely enough, about 3 months post honeymoon and you found out you were having a baby. you were both beyond ecstatic. 

max was more into the baby planning, nursery thing that you were so you let him take charge. 

turns out the little boy was getting a jungle themed nursery and in the centre of the mural painted on the wall was a lion, the king of the jungle. 

the months roll by and now you’ve got your own little lion, most weekends it killed max to be away from you two but the little one was too little to travel so many miles, though you two did go to the monaco gp to surprise him. 

most nights when he came in, he changed off and went straight to check on the little man, you got booted to second place. 

more often than not, you find max sleeping in the rocking chair with your baby boy in his arms. 

#this isn't really smutty but yeah #daddy max is so special to me #max verstappen #max verstappen smut #max verstappen x reader #🐣 anon

[corrodedcoffins-blog]

The Agreement

quinn hughes x nhl player!reader

note: this take place on Jan. 27/28 of 2023

warning: food mentioned, badly written/rushed (even though it took the longest to write) smut, lowkey Quinn is a simp

word count: 2.3k

This wasn’t ever supposed to happen, sure Y/n had always found Quinn attractive, but that was where the line was drawn and she told herself never to cross it. Y/n had been on men’s teams since she was 13 and started liking boys, but she never even kissed any of them, let alone slept with them. 

-last night-

It all started when the team went out to celebrate their win against Columbus, and with them not having another game for a couple days, they probably got a couple rounds too many.

“Another!” “No! We’re done, yeah just the check please.” “Bo, you are no fun.” The only woman at the table says, pointing her finger at him while she does, before grabbing her purse and searching through the mobile junk drawer to hand him a couple bills. Before she gets the chance Quinn taps her hand, a signal for her to stop as he paid both their shares. Before Y/n could open her mouth to argue, Quinn interrupted with, “You get the uber?” “Okay.” She says, smiling, Y/n gets very smiley when she’s drunk, and flirty, which did not go unnoticed by Quinn; he watched her flirt with the waiter all night.

After saying their goodbyes to their teammates when their uber arrived, the two walked out of the pub and into the cold Vancouver air. “I really love Vancouver, I’m glad I got drafted by a Canadian team. It has a piece of home. Rains a bit too much though, I could do without that. And you lived in Toronto right? I never went there before playing the leafs.” She also rambles when she’s drunk, “That’s us I think.” The tall woman walks over to the black car, confirming it was theirs, before opening the door for Quinn. 

“Shouldn’t I be getting the door for you?” “If you know me at all Huggy, you know that’s not true.” “True.” Y/n had always been independent, and with playing in the NHL she never wants the guys to treat her differently just because she’s a woman. And maybe it was a bit of internalised misogyny, and she was working on it, trying to be seen as strong while not giving up her feminine side, it was hard.

The drive was quiet, Y/n gazing out the window, Quinn gazing at her. And between his looks towards the woman he couldn’t help but notice the uber driver also taking his fair share of glances at the beautiful woman. Just like back at the pub with the waiter Quinn had this overwhelming urge to pull the guy’s eye out of their sockets so he could never look at his girl like that. Well not his girl- she wasn’t his girl and at the rate they were going Quinn doubted he would ever get the confidence to change that. His thoughts were interrupted by the uber driver himself, 

“We’re here.” “Thank you, bye Quinny see you-” Her words being cut off by Quinn closing his door. “Oh… OH! Jeez!” Y/n’s door opened in time with her scream, “Quinny, god you scared me.” “You should come inside.” “Why?” Quinn sent a quick glance to the man behind the wheel, before turning attention back to wear he often found it, Y/n, “This guy gives me bad vibes I don’t want to leave you alone with him.” “Quinn, it will be fine.” “No, come on, I’m serious.” His words slightly strained as he reaches over to undo the woman’s seatbelt, and grabs her wrist to bring her out of the creep’s car, slamming the door and continuing to his building. 

“You didn’t have to do that, I can handle myself and-” “You know that I am the last person to think you can’t handle yourself, it’s not a matter of that-” “-then what-” “-My mom raised me right, and I got bad vibes from that guy, and I didn’t feel comfortable leaving you with him. If you don’t want to stay here tonight I can drive you home myself.” “...Thank you. I’m fine to stay here tonight, I’ll just sleep on your couch” “Nonsense” The man mumbles, reaching over to press the floor his apartment was on, then continuing, “I’ll sleep on the couch, you sleep in my bed.” “No.” “Yes.” “No- '' Before Y/n could reply with her argument, Quinn walked out of the elevator on his way to his door. “Hey!-” Quinn opened the door for them, moving his arm to signal Y/n to enter, “-Thanks-'' He then closes the door, and makes his way to the kitchen to get water for the two, while Y/n continues her case, “I’m not taking your bed, it’s yours.”

“Fine, whatever you say, you want to watch something?” Quinn asks, knowing he will get his way, turning on the TV and skimming through the different streaming services he has. Y/n comes over, sitting next to Quinn, “Left, Up.. Right, right.. Hmm down-” “I’ll just give it to you.” She takes the remote from him and eventually selects friends, knowing it was a safe option.

“God, I hate Ross. I think it’s because he reminds me of every guy I've dated.” With a quick glance Quinn determines it safe to ask, “How so?” “How so? Well let’s see, he’s controlling, and overly possessive and jealous, he’s never happy for Rachel’s accomplishments, and he has this egotistical air of superiority about him.” “Not that you're bitter or anything.” “I don’t know why I attract these terrible guys. Or I’m not going for the right one’s, like you. You’re good, I don’t know why I can’t get a guy like you.” At that, Quinn leans over to grab his water, suddenly really needing it.

“Sorry, that made things weird, maybe I’m still a little drunk.” Y/n mumbles, turning to face the man that is already looking at her. Against her own control, her eyes fell down to his lips, they’re a perfect shade, and looked so kissable. Not that she was thinking- oh hell, yes she was. After noticing how long she had been staring, she quickly brought her eyes back to his, only to find that the man’s own eyes were on her lips. So with the positive signals and the little bit of vodka and diet coke still in her system, the woman brings her hand to Quinn’s jaw, the action causing his eyes to finaling meet hers again. And while not saying anythingl, their eye contact said it all, and their lips crashed together.

They fit together flawlessly, moving in sync with each other. Y/n tongue coming to Quinn’s bottom lip, begging for access, which he qladly gave up with no fight. Her hands moving to around the man’s neck, and swinging her left leg over his to straddle him, his hands now moving down to her hips. Y/n could tell he wasn’t sure if he was allowed to touch her ass, so she did it herself, grabbing ahold of his wrists and moving his hand to comfortably grasp the flesh there. Subtly Y/n began to rock her hips against his, eliciting a groan from Quinn. 

This must have been Quinn’s last straw because he quickly stands, his hands holding Y/n up as she wraps her legs around his waist. He carries her to his room, never wincing from holding Y/n’s body weight, probably because her weight was his warm up weight, that fact only making him so much hotter to Y/n. He closes the door with his foot, continuing the walk to the bed, throwing the woman in his arms on his soft comforter, and crawling over top of her. 

Hastily kissing his way up her body and he does, deciding to set up camp at her neck, kissing and sucking on her pulse point. Tired of the slow pace, Y/n starts pulling at Quinn’s shirt wanting it off, getting the idea, Quinn leans back to take it off, Y/n did the same leaving her just in a sports bra. They have both seen eachother in this state many times before, but in the new setting, it was far more sensual. After taking off her shirt, Y/n moves her hands to her dress pants, Quinn mirroring her movements, “Are you sure about this?” “Yes.” bringing her knees to her chest, Y/n throws her pants on the floor for future her to find, while Quinn stands to take his own off.

Now both in just their underwear, Y/n drags Quinn with her hands on his shoulders, to sit against the soft headboard straddling him again, it was now her turn to suck hickies on his neck. Grasping the hair at the nape of Quinn’s neck and grinding against his hard-on with fewer layers, evokes moans from both. Quinn moves his hands from her back to wear Y/n is grinding herself on him to move the constricting fabric of their underwear, pulling his boxers down just enough for his cock to slap against the man’s abs, “Jesus.” “What?” Quinn asked, he never got complaints about his size but hearing Y/n’s reaction made him more self-conscious about his dick than he ever has been. “You’re just.. Big” Y/n laughs at her choice of words, not having known what to say. And after realising what she said, Quinn laughed too. It was nice to know they were still comfortable around each other; hopefully that won’t go away in the morning. 

“Um, thanks” “Anytime.” Y/n respond quickly, bringing her hands back to around Quinn’s neck pulling him into another kiss, just as fast as she started it, Y/n breaks the kiss reaching for the hem of her sports bra to rip it off, and somehow seeing the woman’s boobs made this all feel real, and Quinn must have been staring longer than he thought as Y/n reaches forward to raise his chin so his eyes are looking back at hers, “My eyes are up here, Huggy”

Without waiting for his response, Y/n brings Quinn in for another heated kiss, and after a moment brings her hands to move her panties to the side, feeling the wet spot on them. She grasps Quinns cock in her hand, giving it a few good pumps, before rising to her knees, and lining her wet hole with his hard cock. “Last chance, you sure Quinny?” “God, ye-.” 

Before he could finish, Y/n sinks herself fully on his cock, giving herself a moment to adjust to Quinn’s size before moving up and down, with the help of Quinn with his hands on her ass once again. “Oh, Quinn.. So full.” Y/n really having to carry the conversation as Quinn is too pussy drunk to respond, only moaning and groaning when Y/n does something he likes. “Fuck Y/n! You’re so tight, pussy feels amazing” Saying this, Quinn brings his thumb to Y/n's bottom lip, in her lustful state, she opens her mouth allowing his thumb to enter without much thought. Swirling her tongue around his digit, then releasing it, when Quinn makes moves to bring his thumb towards the woman's swollen clit. Rubbing small circle there, which cause Y/n to moan loudly at the feeling.

Neither of the two last that long, “Oh fuck- Y/n I’m gonna- fuck.” “Me too. Fuck! Oh fuck!” With one last sink down Y/n is cuming harder than she has in a long time, not completely stopping her movements but slowing them, trying to help Quinn find his orgasm and for her to ride out her own. Feeling Y/n come around him, Quinn is about to give in, “Where- want it.” “Inside! Please!” And at that Quinn is gone, bucking his hips up into Y/n more riding out his orgasm. “Ah~ Quinn ‘s sensitive.” "I know, baby"

Both panting, Quinn still inside and slides down for his head to be on his pillows, and Y/n leaning her body on his chest. “Let me get you a washcloth.” Quinn said, making moves to leave, before Y/n put her hands on his pecs and stopping him, “Give me a sec.” Y/n pants out and about a minute later says, “Okay.” And she starts rising on her knees, only for them to give out, “Do you want-” “Nah, I’m good.” Giving her legs their redemption, which they do well at, and lays on her back next to Quinn. “I’ll get you a washcloth.” Quinn reaches for his boxers, getting up, putting them on, then starting for the bathroom “No wait. I have to pee."

-the morning-

The late morning sun dipped into the bedroom, hitting Y/n in the eyes, causing her to wake up, not only to the feeling of the winter sunshine on her face but to the feeling of an arm around her, a man’s arm, Quinn’s arm. “Fuck.”

Softly, Y/n slips out of Quinn’s bed and tries to find her clothes to get dressed, all while trying and failing to not wake Quinn. “Morning” He says, in a husky morning voice. “Good Morning. I’m gonna be on my way, don’t want to intrude on your off day.” “Nah, it’s fine. I’ll make breakfast.” 

Y/n now dressed in Quinn’s clothes and Quinn making the two of them eggs on toast, the girl had to put her mind to rest and ask Quinn. 

“So.. Last night..” “Yeah.” With neither knowing exactly what to say, silence engulfed the room. 

“It was good- great! It was great.” “Yeah” “...Would that ever happen again?” That shocked Quinn he was preparing himself to get rejected, “Do you want it to happen again?” “I mean..Yeah.” “Okay.” With their nonchalant-ness you wouldn’t think they just agreed to sleep with each other again. Though their nervousness and tension in the room could be cut with a knife. “But, if we’re doing this we should have like a couple ground rules.” “Oh, yeah. That's a good idea.” 

The two sat at Quinn’s island turning their bodies to face each other, “Okay.. obviously not telling anyone.” “Of course.” “And no kissing, unless we’re leading it somewhere.” “Okay.” “And no dates or anything like it.” “Right.” “Okay, that’s the agreement?” “Yep.” “Shake on it.”

Y/n said, sticking out her hand, Quinn taking it and shaking her hand in agreement.

These rules will kill him.

~taglist~

@books-hlmc

#quinn hughes #quinn hughes x nhl player!reader #quinn hughes x player!reader #quinn hughes x fem!reader #quinn hughes x reader #quinn hughes x y/n #quinn hughes x fem reader #quinn hughes fic #hockey player!reader

[harry-on-broadway]

My Rock Star

Word Count: 3.6K || Rating: M 

A/N: I knew I wanted to write a Grammys fic and had drafted one a couple of weeks ago. But after last night, it underwent a major overhaul to capture the magic of the evening. I really enjoyed writing this one and hope you enjoy reading it. Would love to hear your thoughts! 

***

It was too soon.

And besides, he almost never brought anyone special to any of these events.

“You get that, right?” he whispered against your hair, fingers scratching lightly at the exposed skin of shoulder as he held you close in bed.

For anyone else, the two-year mark almost guaranteed attendance at your partner’s work events, but Harry’s situation meant you all played by a different set of rules.

“I get it,” you said, even though deep down a part of you felt hurt by his continued refusal to bring you into all facets of his life. You knew it came from a place of well-meaning, but that didn’t make it sting any less. You counted the freckles on his chest to distract yourself from the frustration brewing inside.

“I’m not happy about it,” Harry said somewhat forcefully. “If I could have you there I would.”

“And you can. You’re just choosing not to.” His hand stopped mid-scratch and you could feel him suck in a breath. “That was a low blow. I’m sorry.”

“You’re just being honest,” he said. It was clear he was trying not to snap back at you.

“No, I’m being petty and unfair.” You twisted and propped yourself up on your elbow to look him in the eye. “I know why you’re like this. It all comes from a place of love but sometimes I just want to celebrate my boyfriend. I want to support you.”

“And you do, love. Just because our situation isn’t traditional doesn’t mean it’s wrong or bad.”

You looked down at him. His eyes were clear, if a little tired, and you could see a faint puffiness under his eyes. He’d been working so hard recently, squeezing rehearsals, wardrobe fittings, and writing sessions in between shows. It was cruel to take out your anger on him when he hadn’t done anything wrong. You knew what you were in store for when you started dating and understood that this would always be part of your relationship. You ran your hands through his hair, gently scratching at his scalp. “You’re right,” you said. “What we have is pretty damn great.” You planted a kiss on his lips. “Now how about we go to bed. I’m a little tired and I think you are too.”

Harry sighed. “I am. And I have to be up in…” He squinted, looking at the clock on your nightstand. “...five hours. Fuck.”

“Don’t think about it. Just go to sleep.” You rolled over and turned off the light, hoping to force him into getting at least a couple of hours of rest. “Goodnight, H.”

Within minutes you were listening to the sound of his quiet snores as your mind continued to swirl with thoughts of what it would be like to share just one celebratory moment with him.

***

Sunday afternoon and you were still in your sweats while the man of the hour was being helped into a sparkly patchwork jumpsuit.

You’d offered to step out and grab lunch with a girlfriend to give him some space, but he’d been insistent that you stay near. Which meant you’d been orbiting him and his team all day, sitting far enough away that you wouldn’t be in the way as Jeff came in and out of the room with updates and Lambert helped with last-minute fittings, but remaining close enough that you could see Harry when he went looking for reassurance.

You bounced between your book and phone, reading a few pages before responding to messages from Anne and Gemma, giving them the play-by-play and glimpses behind the scenes they so desperately wanted, until you felt someone tap your shoulder. Looking up, you saw Harry.

The room had cleared out, leaving the two of you with a moment of privacy for the first time all day. Harry pulled you into his chest, holding you tight.

“Nervous?” you asked, lips pressed to his chest. You felt him shrug. “It’s OK if you are. If you can tell anyone you can tell me.”

“I–I know I tell everyone shit like this doesn’t matter, and it doesn’t, but I really want to win. Prove to everyone that I matter.”

“You do matter, Harry,” you said, cupping his face in your hands. “And if it wouldn’t make you late, I’d make you sit down and listen while I listed off everything you’ve accomplished in the past couple of years.”

“I mean I wouldn’t be upset if you did that.”

You pinched his cheek, earning a giggle from him. “What I do want to talk about is this outfit.” He was decked out in a tight, low-cut jumpsuit in a sparkly geometric pattern that somewhat resembled an afghan that had rested on that back of your grandmother’s couch for a number of years. “Maybe it’s a good thing I’m not going,” you teased. “I wouldn’t have been able to match you, fashionista.”

“I would have liked to see you try.”

“I’m sure you would.” You stepped back to fully take in Harry’s outfit. “You look really good, baby.”

“Yeah?”

You nodded. “Promise me something?”

“Anything.”

“I’m the one that gets to take this off of you tonight.”

Harry licked his lips and you could have sworn you felt something stiffen below his waist. “Uh, I think I can make that happen.”

“Good. Because you owe me.” You pressed up onto the balls of your feet, wrapped your arms around his neck, and pulled him close, and slotted your lips over his. The kiss was gentle at first, but as soon as you got a taste, something came over you. You nibbled at his lips, and when he returned the gesture with even more fervor, you slipped your tongue inside, deepening the kiss and pulling a low groan from Harry. You dug your fingers into his shoulders and started to stroke his growing bulge when you heard a slight cough from the doorway.

You parted, only to find Jeff standing there, artfully avoiding eye contact. “Car’s here, H,” he said as you all caught your breath. “Need to head out now.” He nodded your direction before walking purposefully out the door.

“Going to need a sec, Jeffrey,” Harry called after him.

“Fuck, that was awkward,” you said, feeling your face grow hot with embarrassment.

“He’s seen worse,” Harry offered in an attempt to help.

“Not with me, so I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that.”

“Oh stop, you know you’re my one and only.” Harry inhaled. “It’s going to be good, right?”

“Of course,” you said in one last attempt to reassure him and calm his nerves. “Just go out there and make me proud.”

“Don’t know if I’ll be able to do that.”

“Yes, you will. Just by being you.” You pinched his cheek again. “Bringing home the big one will just be a bonus.”

“H! Car is leaving now!” Jeff called from the hall. “Adjust yourself on the way there.”

Harry leaned down to steal one final kiss. “See you at the party?”

You nodded, acknowledging your plan to meet him at a private afterparty some of his friends had organized. “I’m counting down the minutes.”

“Alright…”

“Harry, you need to go.”

“I know.” He picked up his phone and sunglasses from the table. “See you later.”

“Mhmm. And don’t forget your promise.”

“I won’t.” A cheeky grin had returned to his face. “You’re the only one undressing me tonight.” He turned towards the hall. “OK, Jeffrey,” he shouted, smacking his palm against the top of the door frame as he walked through. “Let’s go. We’re already late because of you!”

You rolled your eyes, pretty certain that Jeff would not appreciate Harry’s jokes when they were 15 minutes behind schedule and already fighting a losing battle against Los Angeles traffic.

Alone in the room, you turned your attention to your own outfit, a simple party dress you’d worn to bachelorette parties and nights out. In fact, you’d been wearing it when you’d first met Harry. It had to have some sort of luck, right? You slipped it on as you said a silent prayer for the night.

***

You’d already downed a drink before the ceremony started and were almost done with your second. Which meant you weren’t sure if Harry’s category was first or second or later in the show, so you played it safe and settled onto a small velvet couch, attention solely on one of the many televisions scattered around the room. You chewed on the straw as the telecast ran through the nominees, bracing yourself to hear a name that wasn’t Harry’s, only to be completely shocked when his name was read off the card.

The room erupted in screams as people shouted with joy, jumping up to hug one another, you stayed still on the chair, too surprised to move. It wasn’t that you didn’t believe he could do it. Hell, he’d done it once before. But you’d spent so much time preparing for the worst, thinking about how you’d soothe the sting of losing that you hadn’t spent much time thinking about how you’d be celebrating.

By the time you’d calmed down and returned to normalcy, Harry was already walking off stage. You smiled, thinking of how his short and direct speech was so…him. Seeing him holding that trophy had you breathing easier. One thing checked off the list.

Things slowed down after the win, you could tell he was nervy the second he stepped on the stage to perform, and after that, several losses in a row had dimmed the energy of your group. With just one category left, everyone was preparing to hype up the man of the hour when he arrived. You had started to tune out the broadcast as album of the year was announced, and you were convinced you were hallucinating when Harry’s fan read his name off the card. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion as you watched Tom and Tyler and everyone around him pull him into a warm embrace before he made his way on stage. You tried not to think about how you wished you were the one holding him up there.

Waiting for him to finish up his interviews and photo calls after the show was the most agonizing thing you’d ever experienced, and no matter how many people you talked to, no matter how many appetizers you ate, you couldn’t stop thinking about Harry. Countless minutes later, you were alerted to his arrival when you heard screams and cheers coming from the entrance. You walked over to the bar to get him a drink, pausing when you felt someone behind you.

“Have you ever slept with a Grammy winner?” a voice purred in your ear.

You turned around to find Harry, curls flopping over his forehead, body clad in a nearly all black ensemble, save for the low cut white tank he had on underneath.

“Actually I have,” you said with a laugh.

“Shit, I messed that up. I was supposed to say three-time Grammy winner,” Harry slurred.

“Started the party early?” you teased.

“There may have been some libations passed around the backseat on the way over here, but I could never start celebrating without my best girl.”

“Who me?”

“Yes you!” Harry leaned his forehead against yours. “I-I really wanted you there,” he said softly. “Was thinking about you the whole time. How you should have been there beside me. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize,” you murmured, stroking his cheek. “I get you all night.” You kissed him. “And tomorrow.” Another kiss. “And the day after that.”

“You have me forever, love,” Harry said, eyes clearer than they had been all night.

You were about to respond when Tom and Ben bounded over, jumping on Harry’s back. “Fuck yeah! Album of the year!” Tom shouted, pulling Harry back to the center of the room. You laughed, picking up your drink and Harry’s, finding a quiet corner to chat with the band while Harry made his rounds.

***

It had been close to midnight the last time you looked at a clock. Any other night, you’d be fading about now, ready to head to bed, cuddling with Harry if he was in town, but tonight, you felt energized. A lull had fallen over the party as revelers searched for a third – or fourth – drink or chased down one of the trays of appetizers that had been moving around the room. You were trying to decide what your next cocktail would be, when someone grabbed your hand, jerking you out of your stupor.

“Harry?”

“This way,” he said, pulling you over to a door that led to somewhere unknown.

“What are you doing?”

“You’ll see.” You all wound up in an empty room that might have been used to store tables and other furniture when they weren't in use. “So,” Harry began. “I know I promised you something today, but I’ve clearly not held up my end of the bargain.”

You were confused. “Uh, what are you talking about?”

“I promised that you would be the one to undress me. And while you didn’t specify which outfit, I have a feeling you were partial to the jumpsuit. I’m hoping this,” he gestured to his jeans and tank. “Will suffice.”

You took a shaky breath. “I think I can work with this.”

“Well, go ahead.” Harry lifted his arms as you blinked incredulously.

“Wha-here? Now?”

“Why not?” He shrugged. “It’s not like anyone will hear.” You stared at him. “Love, you’re loud, but not that loud.”

“Harry!”

“Everyone has been drinking since noon, they’re not going to notice we’re gone.” You chewed on your lip, unconvinced by his reasoning. “You know what, we can wait,” Harry said after a moment. “We’ll head home soon and then –”

“No! I don’t want that.” Harry’s brows jumped up his forehead. “I want you. Here. Now,” you continued.

“OK, love,” Harry said softly, as if he didn’t want to break whatever trance had come over you.

You approached him, kissing him fiercely as you pulled the jacket from his shoulders. He kissed you back, his dexterity not impacted by the large amount of alcohol he’d consumed that evening. When the jacket hit the floor, you untucked his shirt, grazing your fingertips along his skin as you pulled the garment over his head, depositing it on top of the pile. His pants were next, and you took your time undoing his belt, unbuttoning the trousers, and slowly peeling them down the muscle of his thighs and calves. You could hear him inhale, then let out a slow breath when your hands grazed over his hips, face just inches away from the bulge in his pants that was growing by the second. He kicked off his pants and was left standing nearly naked.

“Now this feels unfair,” he said, teasing evident in his voice.

“This was my consolation prize,” you said with a smirk.

“Well what do I get for winning?”

“This.” You brought his hand up your thigh and under your dress, pushing your panties to the side.

“Fuuuuccckk,” he moaned, feeling the dampness between your legs.

“You can’t expect me to watch you parading around on the carpet like that, walking up on stage, winning a fucking Grammy and not get wet for you.”

“Fucking hell,” he breathed. His fingers swiped at your center, barely there, the teasing touch only winding you up more.

“May I?” he asked.

“Of course.” You swallowed. “I got mine and now you’ll get yours.”

You could have sworn he growled as he thrust his fingers inside of you, thumb readily finding your clit. You were so slick that his fingers slipped out of rhythm several times before he was able to steady himself. The constant stopping and starting only built your desire, and you found yourself biting down on Harry’s shoulder to keep from crying out. He continued to circle your clit and you started to feel that sensation behind your belly button, like you were climbing up a hill and when Harry finally touched you just like that, you found yourself falling over the edge and into his arms.

“I’ve got you,” Harry said, his arms steadying you as you rode out your orgasm. “I’ve got you.”

You looked up at him, still dazed, and were only able to utter a single word. “More.”

Harry was quick to respond, stepping closer to you until you were backed up against the wall. “Up,” he said against the column of your throat where he was sucking kisses against every inch of exposed skin he could find. You jumped, or at least did the best impression of jump you could manage in your state, Harry’s arms catching you, and holding you close against him.

He could feel him, hot and hard against your core and in that moment you knew you needed him. All of him. Here and now in whatever room of this downton hotel you all had commandeered. You pawed at the waistband of his briefs, trying to pull them down. When they were pooled around his knees, Harry lined himself up with you, catching your eye and waiting for you to nod your consent before he pushed inside of you.

You all both cried out as you clenched around his cock. You always felt filled to the brim when he was inside of you, but tonight, it was like it had never been before. A perfect fit. Like you all were made for each other.

“Is this good?” Harry asked as you adjusted to him.

“Yes, so good,” you whined.

He rocked his hips, thrusting deeper, inching closer to the spot that drove you wild. He repeated the action again and again, moving farther each time until you were crying out with pleasure.

“H-, don’t stop, please,” you moaned.

You felt his fingers dig into your hips as he pulled you even closer to him as he increased his pace. His hips rammed into you, more aggressive than he usually was, until you could feel them falter. He was close and you needed to feel him spill over the edge.

“Come on, H, please baby, you’re close I know it.” You wrapped your fingers in the tangled curls at the base of his neck and tugged, pulling his face from your neck so you could look him in the eye. “Cum for me baby. My rock star.”

Harry groaned and when you felt his body shudder and that telltale warm wetness inside of you, you knew he’d finished. He was still for a moment, but when he adjusted, ready to pull out, he moved in a way that triggered your own orgasm, even better than the first. Numb and tingly in the best way possible, you gave him a hazy grin and leaned in to kiss him.

“Not the worst way to celebrate,” Harry said, breathless. “I should win awards more often.”

“There’s always Saturday,” you shot back.

“I like that way of thinking,” he said, patting your ass as you bent to straighten and adjust your panties. You’d need to clean up before you made your way back to the party. “That’s what I keep you around for.”

“My brain?” You smiled and tossed Harry his pants.

“Something like that.”

He’d just pulled his pants up when there was a knock at the door.

“H? You in there?” It sounded like Jeff and some others.

“Fuck!” Harry shot you an apologetic look.

“Go,” you urged, handing him his shirt and jacket. “They want to celebrate you.”

He pouted. “But maybe I don’t want to.”

“You were fine with celebrating a minute ago.”

“Yeah, because I was naked with you.”

“Go,” you repeated. “I’ll see you later.”

“Oh? You coming home with me?” He grinned and you swore you swooned. Dimpled grin and disheveled curls, he was a sexier version of a matinee idol.

“You know I am. I always come home to you.”

“Yes, you do.” He kissed your cheek, a surprisingly chaste gesture when he’d been knuckle deep inside of you just minutes earlier. “I really do wish you had been there with me tonight.” He cleared his throat. “Tom and Tyler might have helped make the album, but it never would have existed if it hadn’t been for you.” His eyes were watering and he swiped at them with the back of his hand.

“Well that’s bullshit.”

“It’s not,” he said, firmly. “I feel like I never treat you as well as I should and that you could do so much better.” He gave your shoulder a squeeze. “I have my reasons. Doesn’t make it better, but I do it because I care. One day, I hope I can give you everything you deserve.”

You were at a loss for words and settled for hugging him as tight as you could, until the crowd outside began to pound on the door. “I think your admirers are waiting,” you said. You pushed him forward. “Go, have fun.”

Looking over his shoulder, Harry walked across the room and opened the door. His friends embraced him and you had to fight the urge to intervene when a drunken Tommy and Tyler tried to hoist him onto their shoulders. Harry was laughing hard, and even from your distant vantage point, you could tell just how much love surrounded him.

There were a lot of challenges in your relationship, the chief one being having to share him with the rest of the world. But as you caught his eye and shared a smile, you were sure of one thing.

He’d always be your rock star.

#harry styles fanfic #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles writing #harry styles blurb #harry styles fic #harry styles fan fiction #harry styles one shot #harry styles ff #harry fic #harry styles fluff #harry styles smut #harry styles fan fic #harry writing

[subbmissivesuccubus]

H-L ( Part 2)

Content : Rengoku X Fem Reader X Uzui. NSFW one shots.

A-Z prompts, part 1~

H = Hair (how well groomed are they? does the carpet match the drapes? etc.)

Rengoku grooms himself well, a neat patch of hair on his abdomen that matches the red and yellow pattern of the hair on his head. It made him a bit flustered the first time you saw it, your eyes widening as you didn't realize you were just staring at this man's dick. Uzui is completely clean shaven, not a hair on his body as he finds it more comfortable and gets to show off his physique more flamboyantly.

I = Intimacy (how are they during the moment? the romantic aspect)

The intimate moments while you're getting you back blown out by two amazing men always made your head spin more so than their thick cocks splitting you open. Rengoku is very romantic and it came as no surprise to you. Even when he's rough with you, pulling the leash of your collar and lightly choking you as his hips continue to piston into your pussy from behind, he manages to keep the romance going. "Oh, angel~ You're my perfect wife~ How did I get so lucky, hmm?" Definitely more of a kisser, his lips on you as much as possible. He loves kissing your lips of course, his favorite thing to do as you fuck, swallowing down the moans and whines he gets out of you. But as he kisses you, Uzui is also working hard to distract you away from Rengoku, pulling your chin away from the flame Hashira so he can take them instead. The romantic aspect of your time with Uzui depends on his mood. One moment he's peppering your face with kisses as he makes love to you and the next second he's pistoning his cock into you like a mad man, growling degrading filth. Uzui is either at a zero or a hundred and there's no in between. It sometimes gives you whiplash on how last night he was so sweet and intimate with you that it almost made you cry but tonight, he's got you in a mating press, a blindfold over your eyes and a gag in your mouth as he pounds your pussy, growling as he fucks you into next week.

J = Jack off (masturbation headcanon)

With his numerous partners, Uzui sometimes forgets how enjoyable it is to jerk off. He'd always prefer to sleep with you or his wives but in cases where he's alone, out on missions, or sometimes even when there's free time while lounging around in an inn, he'll whip his cock out and start pumping. To help him along, he has four pictures, one for each of his partners in very sexy positions- yours in particular was of you on the bed, looking into the camera lens as it captured Uzui's cum dripping out of your pussy, hickies and bite marks littering your beautiful skin. He'd hold the photo with one hand while he jerked himself off with the other, working his fat cock as he pumped up and down, his mind wandering and thinking of all the filthy, nasty things he was going to do to you once whatever mission he was on was completed. He's definitely a man who buys erotica, a man of culture who appreciates the work that goes into writing a steamy piece of fiction and he has absolutely jerked his cock while he reads, picturing himself and you undertaking the sexual acts described within the pages. Depending on how pent up he is and what materials he uses to help him along, he'll either cum in minutes or it takes an hour- but either way- he's having a good time.

Rengoku didn't understand the point of masturbating. If he had a lover and they had an active sexlife- why waste his seed on his hand when he can instead pump it deep inside of them? But his viewpoint changed when he met you. All three of you being high profiled demon slayers meant many missions and nights without each other which made the man finally understand the desperation to feel pleasure.

Rengoku, at one point, got so desperate for release that he didn't even make it to the inn. He saw a glimpse of you and your team rushing to another destination to slay demons, passing through the area that he just finished cleaning up. The two of you made eye contact, the first time seeing each other in two weeks and immediately, he felt his cock throb with need. It didn't help that you had subtly separated from your team secretly to quickly run upto him to give him a kiss before running back to your team, a peck that barely lasted a second and that made his desire for you to grow tenfold. It took everything within him to not simply grab you and take you to bed- his responsibility as a demon slayer stopping him from keeping you be his side. Once you were gone- and he is ashamed of this- he found a dark corner in an alleyway and jerked himself off, biting the collar of his uniform to keep his grunts and moans of your name from escaping his lips. Just something about seeing your beautiful face and perfect body and feeling your soft lips pressed against his made his cock instantly harden. Fisting his cock, he keeps his senses sharp to make sure no one would walk in on him furiously jerking off, Rengoku trying his best to imitate your movements as he closed his eyes, picturing you jerking his cock instead. Post nut clarity hit him hard when he was cleaning his cum off the walls, a deep blush on his face as he got embarrassed, but he just couldn't help himself.

K = Kink (one or more of their kinks)

Rengoku has a breeding kink because of course he does. He strives to one day have a wonderful family with a beautiful wife and an army of healthy, happy children. He can't wait for the day he becomes a father and of course, raise his children along with their stunning mother. He tries to push down this side of him as you two aren't married (yet) but one time he accidentally came inside you and the image of his cum dripping out of your pussy pushed him over the edge. Now, he doesn't care. He just can't have sex with you without dumping load after load into your pussy. He'll sometimes overstimulate himself, refusing to stop until his cock is weeping for a break, balls drained of every drop as he floods your womb with his seed. His favorite position is the mating press and fucking you from behind. Anything that can get his cock deep inside you to fill you up will always be his go to position. Legs pressed against you ear as he fucks into you vigorously, balls slapping against your pussy or with you face down, ass up, Rengoku having a bruising grip on your hips as he pounds you from behind, your ass jiggling with every thrust- nothing can beat it. He'll whisper the most wholesome things into your ear while having filthy, filthy sex, the contrast of the two giving you whiplash. "I can't wait to start a family with you!" he'll say as he pushes your face against the mattress, muffling your moans as he pounds you from behind. "I want a baby girl that looks like you~" he'd grown into your ear as he takes you against the wall, his cum dripping out of your pussy and onto the floor. "I want to make you a Mommy- make me a Daddy- just marry me already!" he'd say as he pistons his cock into you, hands pushing the back of your knees harder, folding you in half as he aimed to dump another load inside you. You get the idea.

Uzui loves making you cry. Tears of frustration prickling your face turns him on to no end. His favorite way to break you down is by overstimulating you or edging you. Over stimulation tends to occur fairly often thanks to his and Rengoku's high sex drive- they end up leaving you a fucked out mess, body trembling and pussy twitching from how many orgasms you experienced. But he edges you on the days you're particularly naughty and bratty. He punishes you by taking you right to the edge before pulling you away, ruining orgasm after orgasm until you're begging him, apologizing for being naughty with tears in your eyes, pussy a bright red from how many time's he's spanked it to ruin your climax. If he feels like you've learned your lesson, he'll lie you down and eat your pussy out, his hot and talented tongue finally making you orgasm. If he isn't feeling very nice, he isn't above leaving you without any release for the whole night, the sight of you sobbing and pathetic stored in his brain forever, to be used as fuel for future jack off sessions.

He also has a size kink because of course he does. A tall, muscular hunk of a man- he loves how tiny you are compared to him. He could cum in his pants with just the image of manhandling you into whatever position he wants with one hand, always towering over you, his body keeping you at his mercy. He also has a breeding kink (although not as intense as Rengoku's) and he loves it when he cums too much and his seed seeps between the gaps of his cock plugging your pussy, dripping down your body.

L = Location (favorite places to do the do)

For Rengoku, even though it's quite boring, it is the bedroom. Nothing beats being with his lover in the privacy of his own room, surrounded by four walls with nothing to distract them as he takes you. It's simple, but effective and gives him all the freedom to go all night long without any interruptions.

Uzui is an equal opportunity slut and so, his favorite place to have sex is anywhere at anytime. In a bedroom? The perfect place to take your time and make sweet, passionate love. In the forest? What better place to breed you like an animal than to be surrounded by mother nature. Hot springs? It washes away the juices while your having sex- very efficient he'd say. In an alleyway minutes before you need to leave for a mission? Makes it all the more exciting!

You get the idea~

#subby writes #kimetsu no yaiba smut #demon slayer smut #kny uzui #rengoku smut #rengoku #rengoku x reader #kny rengoku #rengoku kyojuro #rengoku x reader x uzui #demon slayer uzui #uzui x reader #tengen uzui #uzui tengen #uzui smut

[daisygirlwrites]

early hours of the morning

summary: spending time with König before he leaves

note: No use of (Y/N). This is a part of my Crash series but this can be read as a standalone. Plus, there's no mention of the reader's gender, so this can be read as GN. warnings: Angst and Fluff

pairings: König x Reader

a/n: hey, sorry for being mia these past couple weeks. it's just been overwhelming for me. i actually wrote this based on what i experienced last week. um, hope y'all like it and thank you for reading. hopefully should get another work posted sometime this weekend.

taglist:

@bobfloydsgf , @warenai , @devilsfoodcake22 , @imalovernotahater , @cutiecusp , @allen-444

gif credit: @leonkennedy-s

In another life, you would get to experience this every day. To have him in your arms, sleeping peacefully against your chest as you run your fingers through his red hair. In another life, you would have all the time in the world to count all of the freckles that’s scattered across his skin. You would have kissed them all too. In another life, your relationship wouldn’t be a secret. There wouldn’t be any sneaking around the hallways or hearts breaking as the other person leaves. You would have held his hand, no questions asked by others. Both of you could have a normal relationship and maybe, just maybe, would have married each other in the future. But instead, the man you fell in love with will be leaving by daybreak. All of the rescue missions were completed with success, so König and his team are no longer needed.

There was a going away party at the same bar everyone went to on the night of their first mission. The same one where both of you admitted that you liked each other. It seemed so far away but it really was just a few months. How quickly you fall for one other. And yet, you didn’t feel like celebrating. The pain in knowing that the person you love is leaving was too much to ignore for a night. König felt the same way, he didn’t have the energy in him to pretend that everything was okay.

After making some bullshit excuse to your captains, both of you watched the group drive away from the base. And it was just the two of you. In any other situation, you would have jumped for joy for having a night to yourselves but all you could do was walk into his arms and hug him tight, not wanting to let go.

His hold on you was firm but gentle, as always. Both of you stood in the kitchen, enjoying the embrace. König places a kiss on top of your head and lifts your face up. Your cheeks were hot and tear stained, you wouldn’t meet his eyes, because you knew it would break his heart. And it did. He couldn’t help but feel his own tears forming as well.

Walking hand in hand, both of you make way to his dorm. Once the door is closed, you begin to unbutton your pants as he takes off his, a familiar dance you do every time you spend the night with him. Keeping your shirts on, you climb into bed, König’s hands automatically flying to your thighs . You wrap your arms around his upper body, pulling yourself to his chest, taking in his scent.

Neither of you know how much time has passed in the dimly lit room and neither of you wanted to look at the alarm clock on his desk. The red numbers glare at them, a reminder of their dwindling time. But after a while, you lift your head up to gaze at him. His eyes were slightly red as he smiled at you. You watched as a single tear ran down his cheek. Sliding your hand onto the side of his face, you quickly wiped it away with your thumb

König mirrors your actions, wiping away your tears before pulling you to a kiss. It was heavenly. His lips are soft and plush, something that surprised you during the first time and all the times after, it still does. You melt into him, bringing him closer. But as you break away, your tears never stopped.

“I love you,” you whispered to him.

“I love you more,” he smiles back.

Neither of you slept that night but you continued your quiet confessions and kisses, not letting the other one lose from their grip, until the early hours of the morning.

#daisygirlwrites #könig x reader #könig modern warfare #könig imagine #König #konig x reader #konig call of duty #konig imagine #konig #call of duty x reader #cod x reader

[darkherolovercroissant]

It Ends Here

Simon Ghost Riley x Fem Reader

Warnings:Mentions of smut. (I’m only here to make toxic fanboys uncomfortable) mature themes & Language. Minors please go away.

Library 📚

————————

“It ends here” he huffs after he comes down from the high.

I smirk and trace the tattoos on his forearm while resting my head on his shoulder.

“You always say that, yet you’re the one that jumps into my bed whenever you need a release. Seems as though you have a hard time following your own word.” I snicker

“I mean it this time, no more after tonight. It’s getting to Soap.” He growled

“That muppet couldn’t find his way out of a wet paper bag.” I huff and get up to retrieve my clothes.

“I thought you liked him?” He teased

“I did until he started being a dick.” I reply

“Get used to it. That’s soap in a nutshell.”

—————

“Where’s Ghost?” You ask as the team stands overlooking the explosion.

“Hopefully in the explosion” soap hissed

“Aww is little soap mad?” Roach teases

“Want me to knock your ass out?” He replied

You just laugh and shake your head. You could see Price was like an exhausted father with his many troubling children. Now he lost one somewhere and the rest were about to go at it like there was no tomorrow.

“Bring your kid to work days suck” the familiar deep voice sighs as they approach from behind.

“And where the fuck were you!?” Soap yells as Simon joins your side.

“Off smelling the roses.” He shrugs before following Price

“You are the biggest disappointment I’ve ever seen” Soap continues his bickering as he followed behind Simon.

“Y/n would have to disagree.” Gaz smirks

“Wait what?” Soap stops abruptly causing me to smack right into him.

“Oh yeah. Last night, I heard them going at it like rabbits.” He laughs

As we head to our evacuation point, Soap continues to ask questions, but Simon and I just ignore him while Gaz is the one that answers them.

“Can’t believe you’d sleep with that muppet” Soap mutters as he glared at Simon who just flips him off.

“Jealous?” I tease

“Pfft you wish lass. I just don’t want any little ghosts running around. Bad enough I have to deal with him, we don’t need any more.”

I just laugh as we return home from this mission.

————

It was 9:37pm when a firm knock came on my door. Pulling it open to see Riley standing there, I smirk as he rolls his eyes before pushing in the door and then carrying me to my bed.

“It ends here” I mock in a horrible English accent.

“Shut up.” He replies before removing any article of clothing.

————

Happily eating my lunch, Gaz comes to join me at the table along with Soap.

“Oh god Riley! Right there!” Gaz mocks what I guess I sounded like last night causing Soap to curse before leaving followed by loud laughter from both Gaz and I.

“He must be good if he can keep you going that long. I was wondering if you guys were ever going to stop.” He laughs

“I’m so sorry Gaz” I blush

“Don’t worry about it. It’s worth seeing Soap all pissy”

————

As I was about to head to bed, Soap yells from down the hall.

“I swear if I hear you two tonight, I’m gonna cut his dick off!”

“At least buy me dinner before you touch me you prick.” Riley huffs as he enters the room before me.

“You’re in a very calm mood for just being threatened.” I tease.

“I’d love to see that muppet take me. I’d break his neck before he could blink.” He replied

“So let me guess. It ends here?” I smirk as my hand reaches out for his bicep. They were very well built from years of training and the way his body had been sculpted from over the years makes your mouth water.

“It ends here” he says before pulling me closer.

“So I’ll expect you tomorrow in my bed as well.” I tease

“And the day after that and then the day after that.” He hums before lifting his mask up to kiss me.

“Can’t wait.” I moan as his lips latch onto my neck as I hear him undoing his belt before picking me up and carrying me to my bed.

#short stories #simon ghost riley #oneshot #reader is female #x fem reader #call of duty fanfic #I’m here to make toxic fanboys uncomfortable #Simon ghost Riley x fem reader #please enjoy #fanfic #darkherolovercroissant #fluff #mentions of smut #enjoy this before someone somehow finds this problematic

[harry-styles-obsessed]

Wouldn’t miss it for the world

Just a cute lil something! Daddy! Harry again. Enjoy my loves!!

©️ please do not copy or translate my work.

“Is daddy not coming?” Your eyes moved down to look at Alex your son, Timmy stood beside Alex both looking at you expectantly “he’s on your sweethearts… he would be here if he could… you know that.” You spoke softly squeezing Alex’s cheek lovingly. Both boys 8 and 7 had a football match and this was the first match Harry couldn’t attend… he was of course massively disappointed but it was hitting the boys hard. They wanted to see Harry being proud of them and whistling and just supporting them. “I’ll record it so he can watch it okay?” The boys nodded and you smiled “there’s my boys.. now go out there and smash it!” You smiled giving their cheeks a kiss watching as they ran towards where their coach was stood, their T-shirts grubby with grass and mud ‘STYLES’ written on the backs of their shirts which honestly just melted your heart.

The football match started, and immediately it was successful, your boys doing you proud- scoring two goals instantly. What they didn’t know was that you and Harry had planned a surprise for them. Harry had lied by saying he had a tour date that evening, when he didn’t… it was one of the days he was actually free and he wouldn’t miss his boys football match for the world. You smiled watching Timmy score again making you jump up and down as you clapped your hands, Timmy instead of running with his teammates instead ran straight towards you, jumping into your arms a soft laugh coming from you as you gripped onto him tightly “well done buddy. You’re doing amazing,” you kissed the top of his head “thanks mum! I love you!!” He then ran straight back onto the field immediately beginning to play again, both boys doing you proud as usual and as the boys continued playing you soon felt two hands cup around your hips, arms wrapping around your stomach “boo” Harry spoke into your ear making you smile and you looked at him “hi honey” you turned around in his arms kissing his lips gently before wrapping your arms around him fingers gently rubbing against the nape of his neck,

“The boys missed you dearly… they’re gonna be so happy when they see you.” You spoke with a soft laugh, Harry stroking his thumbs against your hips gently “well I missed them. And missed you.” He then slowly pulled away, keeping his arm around you his eyes remaining on the boys who were the main team players. They were both amazing. You both stood wrapped in each others arms, watching as your boys did you proud.

An hour and a half passed, lots of goals and lots of emotions and as the boys scored again the coach blew his whistle pointing in the direction of your sons’ goal- they had won the match. You grinned clapping your hands, Harry joining you before he placed two fingers either side of his lips as he whistled loudly that whistle travelling far both boys hearing it Timmy and Alex snapping their heads in the direction of the whistle before their eyes lit up, tears glossing over their eyes “daddy!!” Alex was first to move sprinting over to Harry before colliding into the man’s embrace, Timmy walking over hand covering his mouth as tears streamed down his cheeks. He was a daddy’s boy, certainly, he missed Harry so much that it was often incredibly difficult for him to sleep at night without being tucked in by harry. Alex gripped onto Harry, arms locked around his neck before Harry focused on Timmy holding one arm out for the boy but the poor boy was starstruck

“I thought you weren’t coming” he cried out softly Harry’s heart breaking, Harry slowly letting go of Alex pressing a kiss to his head before standing up and walking to Timmy “heyy..” he soothed crouching down before he pulled him close, wrapping his arms around him tightly “I wouldn’t miss it for the world, mate..” Harry muttered softly Timmy gripping onto the man nuzzling his face into the crook of his neck “I missed you…” “I missed you too,” Alex soon stood in front of Harry, Harry smiling softly extending one arm out towards him, him happily rushing into his arms as Harry held his boys…. His beautiful little family. You snapped a quick picture a happy smile on your face. Your boys had done you proud… but also done you proud for always being their honest self. Not afraid to show their emotion. Harry then slowly stood up with both boys in his arms, squishing them together as they burst into fits of laughter their cheeks wet with tears which you were quick to wipe away pressing a kiss to each of their cheeks before kissing Harry’s his eyes falling onto you as he smiled lovingly

“You really think I would let my beautiful family down hm? No way.” He spoke before placing them down onto the floor again the boys practically remaining latched to harry as if making sure he wouldn’t disappear again. “How about we go have a movie day at home yeah? Have a takeaway tonight?” He asked the boys immediately cheering as they ran off towards the car, Harry chuckling before wrapping an arm around you his lips locking around yours gently before he pulled away looking into your eyes “I’m so glad I’m back home… for good now..” he spoke making you furrow your brows “for good? What about tour?” “It finished last night.” He spoke your eyes lighting up a happy laugh leaving your lips… you now had indefinite quality time with your husband and your boys… your beautiful little family.

#x reader #harry edward styles #harry styles #harry styles x y/n #yn #imagines #comfort #stories #harry styles comfort #harry fluff #daddy harry #dad harry styles #daddy harry styles #one direction #harry styles fanfiction #fanfic #fan fiction #comforting #comfort stories #harry x fem reader #harry x y/n #harry styles x reader #harry styles x you #harry styles x yn #fanfiction #one direction fanfiction #one direction fandom #love on tour #harry styles sweet. #harry styles x oc

[jjsmaybank20]

Hello, I was wondering if you could write a fem reader x natasha romanoff where reader is a world famous sports person (any sport u would like: cricket, soccer, or anything) and nat had met her when she was given the mission to protect her from some ppl when she had received death threats before a game. Now they are a couple and nat comes to cheer her on at a big final game and she is so adorable cheering for reader and then someone fouls the reader, reader gets injured but continues to play (nat is pissed off) and then the reader leads the team to victory and aftermath “i am soo proud of you! But where is that person who hit you? That was on purpose. Gimme a minute with them.” Sorry for the long ask I just cant get this out of my head 😭

Death Threats and Soccer

Natasha Romanoff x Fem!Athlete!Reader

Summary: Natasha was assigned to protect you, and in the process, she fell for you. Now she is your biggest supporter and your cutest defender.

Warnings: Just fluff, really shitty descriptions of soccer, talk of death threats, slightly suggestive at the end if you squint

Word Count: 1.4k

A/N: Hope you like this! I really am not a soccer person, but I thought this fit better than other sports, so what can you do.

navigation  marvel masterlist

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Being a famous athlete came with its ups and downs. You got to play the game you loved and hopefully help millions of other people fall in love with it as well, but that also meant that you were constantly in the spotlight. This meant that a whole lot of people know who you are, and a fair amount of them absolutely hate you. 

This was how you met the Black Widow herself, Natasha Romanoff. You had begun to receive death threats from some people, so your manager thought that it would be a good idea to hire some extra protection for you. You agreed, not knowing who he would choose, but when you were called into his office one day and standing next to your manager was your favorite Avenger, it took everything in you not to pass out right there. 

It took a while for Natasha to warm up to you, but when she did, you two became inseparable. You soon asked her out on a date, and she accepted. When more death threats came in, you found out just how protective Natasha could be over you. You came home from practice one day to find her pacing in the kitchen, on the phone yelling at someone. 

When she sees you, her pacing stops and she quickly hangs up the phone. You come up to her and wrap your arms around her waist, mumbling into her neck, “Who were you talking to?” The redhead turns around in your arms before wrapping hers around your neck. “Tony. We need to find out who’s been sending these threats.” You nod seriously before leaning down to press a quick peck to your girlfriend’s lips.

“And I know you will, babe. You’re the best of the best. Now in the meantime, what would you like for dinner?” Natasha happily sat herself on top of the counter, telling you her order. As you cooked for her, her worries about you slowly faded. All she could think about was how much she loved you and how happy she was in your relationship.

Later that night, while the two of you are cuddled up in bed, you decide to bring up an upcoming game. You glance down at the gorgeous redhead laying on top of you, brushing some hair out of her face and quietly saying, “Hey, baby? Would you maybe want to come to my next match? It’s a home game, and it might be a little chilly, but it could be fun.” 

Natasha grins at you, nodding and placing a gentle kiss on your lips. “Of course I want to come. I would love to watch you play!” You smile back at her before settling in and whispering up at the ceiling, “Goodnight, baby. I love you.” You hear her mumble it back before you close your eyes and drift off to sleep.

---

Your teammates were not the most subtle people you know, so when you walk into the locker room and they begin to whisper, you know something is up. You let them talk quietly for a second before whipping around, catching them off-guard. You make eye contact with your teammate Ella first. She tries to act casual, glancing away from you, but you’re locked in on her.

“What the fuck is going on?” She giggles nervously before your other teammate, Grace, teasingly exclaims, “You have a guest in the stands. She’s very enthusiastic. You can practically feel her team pride.” You give her a confused look before realizing… is she talking about… no, she can’t be. Natasha would never dress up in your team colors in front of thousands of people, let alone be decked out in it. 

The team goalie, Mia, shrugs, nodding in agreement with Grace. You let out a laugh before turning back to your locker. You would believe it when you see it with your own two eyes. You quickly got changed and began stretching with the team captain, Vivian, leading. 

As your team lines up to go out onto the field, you decide to try and spot Natasha in the crowd. The team jogs out to meet your opponents at the midfield line, and as you stand there, you look into the stands. You quickly catch sight of your girlfriend, completely covered in your team's memorabilia. You let out an astonished laugh, putting your hand up to wave at her. She enthusiastically waves back, jumping up and down and waving a flag with your team logo on it. 

You shake your head in amusement before focusing on the game. You get into position on the midfield line, and as soon as the whistle blows, you are in your professional headspace. You are the center forward on your team, and you and the second striker, Hazel, follow the ball towards the opposing team’s goal.

You quickly take control of it, passing it around to keep it away from the opponent defenders. Hazel takes the ball and draws the defenders away from you, leaving you open and able to take a clean shot at the goal. You both jump at the opportunity, with her quickly passing it to you and you swiftly kicking in the first goal of the game. 

You can practically hear Natasha screaming from the stands, making you smile as your teammates pat you on the back. You get back into position before play resumes.

---

As the match goes on, the score becomes tighter until it is 3-2, the opposing team. You grunt in frustration when you glance at the scoreboard, knowing that you would have to bring your best if you wanted to get back the lead you had before. 

You call Vivian over, telling her you have a new strategy to help. She tells you to proceed and you fill her in. Instead of just Hazel drawing the defenders away, two of your midfielders, Grace and Ella would assist so that it would be more thorough. Vivian agrees and tells the team the new plan, and you all get into position. 

As soon as play starts, you and your teammates spring into action. You run forward quickly, making sure to stay spread apart from Hazel, Grace, and Ella. They lead the defenders away and the ball is passed to you. You get ready to take the shot, but then suddenly you feel cleats make contact with your leg and you are on the ground.

You notice an opposing player standing up near you, and the referee walks over to you. You decide to play it up a little, holding your leg to your chest and rolling around a bit. You glance up at the referee who then blows his whistle and holds up a yellow card. Hazel jogs over to you and helps you up.

As you stand up, you limp, slightly in pain, but you decide to just push through it. Vivian jogs over and asks, “Are you good to keep playing?” and you nod and grin at her. You shake your leg out and glance up at the stands, catching sight of Natasha fuming. You would have to remember to calm her down and reassure her that you’re okay after the match. 

In the meantime, you resume your strategy from before, with the two midfielders assisting Hazel. Soon, you gain back your lead, with you making three more goals and leading your team to a 3-5 victory. 

You run around the field before you stop suddenly because of a pain shooting up your leg. You quickly forget about your injury though when the rest of your team jumps on top of you, cheering about the win. You make your way towards the stands, making fans cheer louder. 

Natasha meets you at the edge and you pull yourself up so that you can pull her into a passionate kiss. She sighs into your mouth before chasing your lips when you pull back. You laugh breathlessly before looking her over. “You look good, babe. Our colors suit you.” 

She grins at you before replying, “That was so amazing. I’m so proud of you!” A dark look quickly passes over her face, making you stumble back slightly from the mood change. “Who was that person who kicked you? That was clearly on purpose. And they were allowed to stay in the game? Let me talk to them, then they’ll know not to mess with you.” 

You laugh at her determination to defend you before you kiss her again, but more softly. “It’s okay, baby. Really, it is. It’s just a part of the job. I’m just glad you’re here.” She smiles up at you before grabbing your hand and dragging you towards the exit. 

You look at her, confused, before asking, “Where are we going?” She just gives you a suggestive smile before supplying, “We’re going home. Don’t you want to celebrate your victory?” Now, how could you ever say no to that?

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