#i wanted to go to an emergency protest against what's going on you know where

[gatheringkeepsakes]

.

#need a new job so bad #this one makes me violent #spend all my time either waiting for shit to do #or doing the most asinine and pointless things that just don't matter #and i'm not learning anything new and there's no room for growth and it's so fucking boring #and the communication and project organizing is so unbelievably bad #i wanted to go to an emergency protest against what's going on you know where #i was all wrapped up and ready to head out early for the day #and then 20 mins before I have to leave I'm given another hour+ worth of work that could have been done earlier #but they weren't clear enough with the instruction #saw some article floating around here the other day about how your boss has more of an impact on your health than your doctor #and yeah #i could be drawing or doing work that actually matters to me #but instead i'm changing 0.001 of a decimal point in engineer manuals and not allowed to go march for smth a million times more important #GRUMBLE GRUMBLE MAD

[eggonthemoon]

Alien Stage Round 6 Character Analysis and Lyrics Breakdown

Okay so obviously spoilers, don't click Keep Reading if you haven't watched Round 6.

God fuck it's so fucking beautiful, where do I start?

I don't even know what is going on with those rapid shots of what I assume is some form of experiment that Till was involved in. I have no clue what the goal was or if it succeeded but somehow (for no real reason other than that one image of Luka standing behind Till ominously) I feel that Luka is involved with it.

Was this an attempt by Heperu's (Luka's guardian) rival to make a human capable of going up against Luka? Till being the youngest and Luka being the oldest also means that Till's guardian could have caught on to what Heperu was planning to do with Luka and then start experimenting on humans shortly after and it would still somewhat line up with the timeline.

But I'm getting into conspiracy territory, back to suffering!!

Allow me, to the tips of your fingers

Allow me, to the ends of your feet

Dissolve me in your gaze

I don't want to let you go

Oh this hurts. Seeing him look so defeated and exhausted, you can tell that even though to the public it's not certain whether Mizi died or not it doesn't matter to him. Because she's still gone away from his world, where he is unable to reach her. He wants to dissolve and die but he also doesn't want to let her go if there is even a sliver of hope that she lives.

Please, leave me scars

Please, hurt me so that

Not a single drop of me remains

Let me drown in you

The footage that plays to these lyrics really show how defeated he is. He refuses to sing, his passion for the art completely dead and buried. And (his guardian I assume) when someone shoves the fact that Mizi is gone in his face he lashes out and punches one of the aliens near him.

Until these falling stars

Are buried in the blur of time

However his heart isn't entirely in it and is quickly apprehended.

He is beyond exhausted and doesn't even protest or put up a fight while (the same alien he punched btw) another alien runs their fingers through his hair.

On your icy lips

Read my soul

Yes, my soul

He hopes that even if Mizi is dead that her spirit watches over him, seeing his soul and by extension, Him, for all that he is. Every thought and breath until he falls asleep is for Mizi.

But didn't we already know this is how he'd be like? Time for something juicier~

Even if your cold words

Carve scars beneath my eyes

May they linger on your tongue

You can break me apart

God this is heart shattering. Even if Till doesn't care for him, even if Till throws hurtful words his way, Ivan will still lie awake at night, cherishing what sliver of attention he is given. It doesn't matter if Till hates him, because as long as he is on Till's mind Ivan is happy. He is entirely in Till's hands, capable of being build up or torn down depending on how much (or how little) he is perceived by him.

Notice my pain

And mend me right now

To quiet my fears

I'll drown in you

He wants so deeply to be seen by Till, noticed. Till who doesn't let anything hold him down and always picks himself back up became a pillar of hope and strength to Ivan. It didn't matter how or in what context he gets to be seen, so he went out of his way to provoke him just to get Till to look at him even for a moment.

This was mentioned a while back on VIVINOS Patreon but the entire incident where Mizi and Till got attacked by that hound monster was orchestrated by him. I feel like there is two possible reasons for this depending on when in the timeline this takes place.

Either he wanted to test Till's resolve in hopes of being proven wrong about his courage (after all your hopes can't be dashed on the rocks, if you never had hopes to begin with) only for his obsession to end up growing even stronger than before.

Or he tried to let Till get roughed up enough that he'd be transferred (solitary confinement? emergency room?) somewhere else away from the others at Anakt, so they could escape together.

But we all know how that turned out.

Either way what Ivan wants isn't freedom, he's long since given up on that. There's no point in his freedom if the person that inspired him to yearn for it isn't by his side. He needs Till there, his very presence to reassure him that no matter what Till won't falter. But he failed to take account of the one thing that weakens Till's resolve.

Mizi.

Mizi is to Till what Till is to Ivan. And so without Mizi in his world Till crumbles. Since Till will only go where Mizi is and Mizi already gave away her heart to someone else, it's impossible for Ivan to be free while keeping Till in his world.

And so he follows him, resigning himself to a life without freedom.

Sick of these nights to come

To be engulfed in silence

But the distance between them is killing him, and each and every day they come closer to their inevitable doom.

It doesn't matter if they believe the lie the aliens told them, that if they die singing they will be blessed. Because what is the point in that? How can going somewhere far away from the people they love be a blessing?

In your gaze where I am seen

Consume me

Yes, me

His desires mirror Till's. He wants his soul to be seen by him, recognized for his undying love for him. He wants Till to see that he can give him all that Till yearns for in Mizi and more.

To this everlasting melody

Face to face we dance

And yet Till still refuses to look Ivan in the eyes.

Things get a little unclear but since they aren't shown singing here and there's no flashback to accompany the lyrics, we can assume that at this moment Till most likely gave up on singing.

With our story

Lost in forever's embrace

I'm not sure if Ivan intended this from the start or if it's a decision he made then and there but one thing is certain. If Till stops singing then that would mean he forfeits, he'll lose. Till has never once given up. Even when he went back for Mizi that night, he never intended to leave her in the first place. But now without her he crumbles.

And Ivan can't let that happen, not like this.

Moral grey area aside, this scene is so deeply moving to me

And I don't say that in a romantic context, absolutely not. This is something much deeper than just love. This is the culmination of everything they've been through, all those moments lead up to this.

Because this isn't a kiss.

This is Ivan throwing his life away for Till.

Till was going to loose, the only thing that could overturn that is if his opponent attacks him. The kiss was to distract Till and keep him from catching up to what Ivan was planning.

Just look at the contrast between their first and second kiss. As soon as the score board shows Till is in the lead, he gives him a gentle peck on the lips. The contrast is stark and full of meaning. This was the genuine kiss, hidden behind a smokescreen of aggressive bravado created from the previous one.

And it worked. Till was completely convinced that Ivan's intentions was to kill him, and he was fully intent on letting him.

I know a lot of people doubted his intentions. Because he didn't let go of Till's neck the minute he saw their scores, a lot of people assume that this was Ivan trying to drag Till down with him.

But the minute he coughed up blood what does he do?

He smiles.

and let's Till go.

He's only human. He might know logically that Till has won the match. But emotionally he refuses to let go until he is certain.

Until he knows for a fact that he is the one bleeding and dying he'll keep up his charade.

And then.

And only then.

Till truly sees Ivan.

As he dissolves in his gaze.

#THEY RUINED MY LIFE /POS #I FUCKING HATE THEM /AFFECTIONATE #ivantill #alnst till #alnst ivan #alnst mizi #alnst #alien stage #에이스테 #ramble rumble #I don't know what happened #I had a thought and a neuron activated #I think I might have ascended #alnst spoilers #alnst round 6

[steddiealltheway]

(Set right before season 4)

Steve rushes over to the Henderson house after an ominous call from Dustin saying, "Come over as soon as you can, it's an emergency," before hanging up dramatically.

He can hear his nail bat rolling around in his trunk every turn he takes as he gets there in record time. He grabs the bat out of the trunk and rushes to the door, not bothering to knock before he barges in.

He's met with the sight of Eddie Munson staring at him with wide eyes as Dustin yells, "No! No! Don't swing! Not a code red!"

Steve sets down the bat and lets out a deep breath. "What the hell, Henderson?! I could've seriously taken you out with this thing!" He hears Dustin give him a half-assed apology as he tries to get his heartbeat to slow down. "Next time, don't leave such a cryptic message, okay?"

"Okay," Dustin says, holding his hands up.

"What the fuck is that?" Munson asks, staring at the bat.

Steve points at him and says, "Language," before turning to Dustin and asking, "What's he doing here?"

Dustin sighs and gestures them toward his couch. Steve shoots Eddie a look before taking a seat right against the arm of the couch. It's not that he hates him, hell, he's pretty sure he's gotten weed from him before. It's just that he doesn't like sharing this older brother role with another guy - especially one who likes to make dramatic speeches on top of lunch tables.

Based on the way Eddie is similarly leaning away from him and uncomfortably fidgeting with his rings, he can tell there's a mutual tension between them. Dustin doesn't pick up on it as he sits across from them, acting like he's about to deliver the worst news ever.

Steve leans forward a little trying to get Dustin to finally spill and tries not to lean back immediately when he sees that Eddie is doing the same thing.

"Okay, Suzie and I were talking, and her family is considering visiting Hawkins."

Steve smiles. "That's great, but why-"

"Why are you acting like that's bad news?" Eddie asks, finishing Steve's sentence. The two glance at each other, and Steve tries not to size him up.

Dustin groans, "Because I need to take her on a proper date! We weren't able to go on dates during science camp, so I want this to be special. Of course, this is all contingent on whether she can convince her dad to give us alone time..."

"I could be your chaperone, but I'd ditch you once you got to the movie theater," Steve offers.

Eddie scoffs, "Yeah, a date with Suzie will not be at a movie theater."

Steve crosses his legs and turns toward Eddie. "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't know you knew something about dating. Wait a minute." He directs his attention back to Dustin, utterly horrified. "You asked me and Munson for girl help?"

"Don't sound so shocked," Eddie says, but Steve ignores him.

"Yes," Dustin states simply. He sighs and gestures between the two of them. "Steve, you're a lady's man and you know exactly what to say and where the best date spots are, but you pick up the worst girls. Except Robin who you refuse to date." Steve doesn't have time to argue before Dustin points at Eddie, "And Eddie understands all the cool nerd stuff that Suzie and I like, and he's super charismatic. So, I thought we could combine your abilities to create the most epic date in the history of dates."

"No," Steve and Eddie both say at once.

"Guys-"

Steve turns to Eddie and raises an eyebrow. "Why are you protesting my help?"

"Because try as he might, Dustin can't convince me that you aren't an asshole that has never actually wooed a girl. You get by with your pretty looks and think that's enough."

Steve's mind lingers a bit on the "pretty looks" for some reason, but he pushes past it to say, "Please, you're telling me you know a single thing about wooing a girl?"

Eddie leans in with a bright smile. "You heard it from Henderson, I'm charming."

"Charismatic," Steve corrects him, "But I haven't seen a shred of that yet."

Eddie tosses an arm over the back of the couch and scoots in until Steve is trapped against the arm of the couch. Steve tries not to show Eddie how much the sudden closeness is affecting him.

"I could easily charm your pants off, big boy," Eddie says with a wink.

Steve's eyes betray him and flicker down to Eddie's lips. "Please, I'd easily beat you to it."

Eddie tilts his head and looks at him through his lashes. "Are you saying you want to charm my pants off, Harrington? I'm flattered, but I'm not that kind of girl."

Steve raises his eyebrows. "Is that a bet?"

"Do you want it to be? Because it kind of sounds like it."

Steve blames his series of bad dates, the meaningless sex with girls with no substance, and the weird tension between them for his response. "It's a date, Munson."

"So, I'm going to assume that was the weirdest way of you two agreeing to help me," Dustin says, startling Steve away from Eddie who he was definitely not just about to kiss.

"Jesus H. Christ," Eddie mumbles under his breath as he moves away, seeming to have also forgotten where they were.

"Sure, we'll create a date for you two and trial-run it for issues," Steve says.

Dustin smiles wide and giggles, "See, I knew you two would help if you just put your dumb differences aside!"

"Something like that," Eddie mutters. "But hey, what does your gut say? Where do you want to take her?"

Dustin shrugs. "I like the idea of the movies."

Steve slowly looks over at Eddie and gives him a cocky smile. Eddie's mouth twitches momentarily into a frown, but he ignores him. "I'll think of something special to do after, but Harrington can fill you in on a movie date."

"I thought you were the expert on wooing," Steve snarkily replies.

Eddie huffs, "Movie dates just aren't my thing."

If they're actually trial-running this, Steve will make it a point to make movie dates Eddie's thing.

"That sounds great. Thank you both!" Dustin says, still ignoring the obvious tension.

"Well, I've got to head out, but it was good seeing you," Eddie says with a genuine smile that Steve thinks he would like to see more often.

"I do, too. Hey, I'm glad I could help. Next time maybe don't make it sound like a nail-bat emergency though," Steve says lowering his voice before grabbing the bat.

He follows Eddie toward the front, but they both stop and turn to mess up Dustin's hair simultaneously. Steve pulls his hand back when Eddie's hand runs on top of his. He looks at him with his eyebrows furrowed.

"I told you you guys are similar."

Steve thinks that Dustin's right, but maybe they're only similar in the way they both obviously care for him.

They finish their goodbyes and head out into the cold January weather. Steve clutches his jacket tighter around himself - he had forgotten to grab a heavier coat in his rush over. He turns to Eddie and says, "Hey."

Eddie turns to him and raises his eyebrows.

"Want to trial-run that date tonight?"

Eddie frowns at him. "I thought you were joking."

With that, Steve should take the clear out given to him and agree. Yes, it was just a joke. Instead, he says, "It doesn't have to be."

It's a long few seconds of Eddie staring at him before he gets a quiet response of, "Yeah, sure. Uh, let's go to my place though. I don't want your reputation to be tainted if you're seen in public with me."

"I wouldn't mind," Steve says sincerely. He's not sure why he's so adamant about this date, but maybe he just wants to see where that moment on the couch could truly lead. "But hey, your reputation would also be tainted if you're associating with me."

"And we wouldn't want that," Eddie says with a small smile. "The freak and the king. What would people say?"

This surprises a laugh out of Steve before he says, "I think your place would probably be a little more intimate than a movie theater."

He can't tell if Eddie's cheeks suddenly flush a little pinker from the cold or a blush. "I told you, I'm not that kind of guy."

"More intimate doesn't always mean sex. You know this."

Eddie laughs and shakes his head. "Why don't we continue this conversation at my place so you don't freeze to death?"

"I like the sound of that," Steve says, making his way to his car and trying to hide the huge smile that's trying to split across his face all because of Eddie Munson.

He rushes to shove his bat into the trunk, hoping that he won't have to further explain that to Eddie. But based on the way his eyes linger on it, he's thinking he won't get away from questioning too easily.

Luckily, he has prepared his Harrington charm for this moment. And boy, he's going to be using it as often as he can to prove Eddie wrong.

Part Two (aka the final part)

#steddie #eddie munson #steve harrington #stranger things #steddie ficlet

[lev1hei1chou]

Run Away

Dad!Gojo x reader Genre: Fluff Words: 653 Synopsis: Your daughter wants to run away from home Masterlist

In the Gojo household, chaos was just another member of the family. Amidst the battles and the trials, there was a slice of normalcy: your child.

Little Yuki was the light of your life. She looked like the carbon copy of Gojo, but somehow inherited your calmer personality. Like any child of her age, she had her moments of defiance. And today was one of those days.

"Mommy, Daddy!" Yuki's voice pierced through the silence of the household like a tiny arrow. You and Gojo exchanged a glance, accustomed to such interruptions.

"What's up, kiddo?" Gojo asked, a grin already spreading across his face.

"I want ice cream for dinner!" Yuki declared, crossing her arms over her chest, her pout matching her father's all too well.

You exchanged a look with your husband, silently communicating that it was a battle neither of you were going to win. "Sorry, sweetheart," you began, "but ice cream isn't really a dinner food."

Yuki's face fell, her disappointment evident. But instead of the expected protest, she surprised you both with a declaration. "Well, if I can't have ice cream for dinner, then I'm running away!"

Gojo's laughter echoed through the room, and you couldn't help but chuckle at your daughter's dramatics. "Running away, huh? Where to?" he teased, kneeling down to her eye level.

Yuki's tiny brows furrowed in concentration as she pondered her escape plan. "To the park! I'll live on the swings and under the huge elephant slide!"

You exchanged another glance with Gojo, both of you struggling to contain your laughter. "Well, we'll miss you, little adventurer," you said, trying to keep a straight face. "But don't forget to pack your teddy bear!"

Yuki's resolve wavered for a moment as she considered the logistics of bringing her favorite plush companion on her great journey. "Okay!" she exclaimed, dashing off to her room to fetch her teddy.

As she disappeared down the hallway, Gojo turned to you with a amusement in his eyes. "Should we let her go through with it?"

You shook your head, a smile tugging at your lips. "Of course not. But let's play along for a bit. It'll be good for a laugh."

Agreeing to the plan, you and Gojo followed Yuki to her room, where she was diligently stuffing her teddy bear into a tiny backpack. "All packed and ready to go?" Gojo asked, leaning against the doorframe.

Yuki nodded solemnly, her expression a mix of determination and excitement. "Yep! I'm gonna live at the park forever and ever! And I'll have a lot of fun!"

As she made her way towards the front door, backpack bouncing with each step, you exchanged a knowing look with Gojo. This was going to be one for the family scrapbook.

With exaggerated solemnity, you and Gojo followed Yuki out the door, watching as she marched purposefully down the sidewalk, her tiny frame filled with determination.

But as she reached the end of the block, her resolve began to waver. The park seemed much farther away than she had anticipated, and the weight of her decision started to sink in.

You and Gojo watched from a distance, hidden behind a tree, as Yuki paused at the corner, her bottom lip trembling ever so slightly.

"I don't think I want to run away anymore," she finally admitted, her voice barely audible from your vantage point.

With a silent nod, you and Gojo emerged from your hiding spot, unable to contain your laughter any longer. Yuki's face lit up at the sight of you both, her momentary distress forgotten.

"I'm sorry for trying to run away," she said, her eyes brimming with tears.

Gojo scooped her up into his arms, planting a kiss on her forehead. "It's okay, sweetheart. We know you were just upset. But next time you want something, just ask nicely, okay?"

Yuki nodded, her tears replaced with a wide smile. "Okay, Daddy."

#jujutsu kaisen #jjk #gojo satoru #gojo #satoru gojo #jjk fanfic #jjk x reader #jjk gojo #jjk gojo x reader #jjk satoru #gojo fluff #satoru gojo x reader #satoru gojo fluff #gojo smut #gojo satoru smut #gojo satoru fanfic #gojo satoru x reader #gojo satoru fluff #gojo satoru x you #gojo x reader

[livwritesstuff]

you know that feeling where you’re having a god-awful day and all you really want is a hug but you’re at work so, like, that’s not gonna happen, and you basically just have to stew in all those shitty feelings and wait out the clock? yeah, me too, that’s kind of where this came from.

Eddie had a tough day.

It had started early that morning when the girls missed their school bus – not a huge deal, honestly, he was already gonna be leaving early to go get his car looked at.

But then he got shitty news from the mechanic, and then a meeting with his agent didn’t go the way he’d wanted at all, and then Hazel ended up being a total pain in the ass after he picked her up from kindergarten, and during her relentless haranguing, she knocked one of Eddie’s favorite mugs off the counter. It shattered, obviously, and she cried about it so he’d had to deal with both of those things at once, and it was just a day.

None of it was anything he couldn’t handle – the problem was the compounding nature of it and the way he basically just had to stew in it all until the next obstacle came along and made shit even worse.

All Eddie really wanted was Steve, and how Steve being around made dealing with this stuff so much easier, even if every other circumstance was the same.

He has to share Steve, though, and today he’s sharing him with Steve’s work until four o’clock.

It’s fine.

He can wait until four.

The older two girls got off their bus at half-past three, and, seriously, someone must have put something in the water this morning because they are in rare goddamn form today. If Hazel alone was bad, all three of them together were…well, thrice that. It’s like the universe said I see your bad day and I raise you three elementary schoolers hitting their peak annoyance thresholds simultaneously.

And it’s not like Eddie can even fucking fold, either.

It’s cold and kind of windy outside, which is Eddie’s least favorite weather and he’d thought maybe the girls would want to go right inside, but no. Of course they want to dig out the chalk that got stashed away in the garage last fall, and while Eddie is stuck shivering outside breaking up dumb arguments about who’s allowed to use which colors (he figured the answer was an obvious everyone, but apparently that’s incorrect), Steve leaves a message saying he tacked on an emergency session onto the end of his day and now he’s not out until five.

Eddie doesn’t hear it until he’s back inside, obviously, but when he does it’s like someone ran a whole fucking dagger through his chest.

He’s halfway through making dinner when Steve gets home (he’d actually be done making dinner if the pot of water hadn’t boiled off while he’d dealt with yet another stupid argument), and he drops everything to meet him at the door.

It’s like Steve can tell in an instant the kind of day Eddie had.

“What happened?” he asks as he toes off his shoes.

Eddie shakes his head, “Everything…nothing…I don’t even know. Just…one of those days.”

Steve nods his understanding, and as soon as he’s got his coat hung up he’s pulling Eddie into a hug.

It ends up being kind of a bone-crushing one — that’s on Eddie, though. He’d just fucking needed it. He knows he’d needed it when Steve’s arms tighten around his shoulders and he feels that much better.

“You okay?” Steve asks without letting him go, the breath of his words hitting warm against Eddie’s neck.

“Just tired,” he answers.

Steve pulls away.

“You can take a break, Ed,” he says, and there’s something in his eyes – not concern, exactly, but more like awareness, “I’ll be up in a bit.”

Eddie just nods and heads for the stairs. As he goes, he faintly hears Steve asking, “What the hell did you guys do to Dad today?”, followed by the girls’ defensive protests.

In their room, Eddie makes it through one full rerun of Star Trek and then the first few minutes of a second before Steve joins him.

He notices that it’s quiet downstairs for the first time that evening, and he tries not to take it too personally. He’s always been comfortable in the knowledge that Steve might be better at the whole parenting thing than him (psych degrees and all that), but, shit, if he’s that much better…

“What’d you do, strangle them?” Eddie asks as Steve swaps his jeans out for a pair of faded plaid pajama pants.

“No, I told them that if I hear a single peep in the next hour I’m beheading all their stuffed animals.”

Eddie blinks.

Okay, maybe better isn’t exactly the right word.

“So they’re on verbal lockdown, basically,” Steve finishes.

“Jesus Christ, Steve,” Eddie shakes his head, “You’re kind of crazy.”

“Yeah, well, you were always gonna rub off on me one of these days — don’t.”

And Eddie couldn’t help the way he threw his head back and laughed.

#idk steve is just eddie's person #he gets him -- all the way down to his ear for a dirty joke #steddie #liv’s steddie dads verse #steddie dads #steve harrington #eddie munson

[dukeofankh]

Trying to find progressive masculine community is so exhausting.

I've flipped through local men's groups, trying to find places to explore masculinity in a chill, progressive setting. First of all, they mostly seem to be modelled after AA, and like, my gender isn't a debilitating addiction, it's part of my identity actually, but also, the invite and description of the event have maybe a short paragraph tops actually waving vaguely in the direction of what the purpose of the group is, and then ten to twenty paragraphs breaking down the rules. One spent longer talking about the hand signals he would use to direct conversation than he did describing what the conversation would be about. Another had a full paragraph explaining that if the group thought you were evading what they thought your "real" problem was, they'd probably "call you to take accountability". Like...I don't even know who these people are yet and they're already letting me know that they view it as their right, no, their duty, to bully me into seeing things their way. Like, this is in the invite.

...and this warning is there instead of any sort of breakdown of like, I dunno. Whether you should be a feminist to show up. Whether it was a safe space for queer men. What the hell they wanted to talk about. Joining a men's space is on some level inherently submitting yourself to the authority of the leaders of that group, and you don't usually get a particularly clear breakdown of what the values and goals of those leaders are, because on some level the answer is always going to be "whatever I want"

And like, unfortunately you do need to filter men to build a men's space. You do need to remove or chastise men who act in ways that are toxic or disruptive or misogynistic. If you don't things turn into an MRA chapter pretty quick. But the sort of emergency powers that leadership takes on as a result of that...just kind of naturally end up reproducing masculine heirarchies.

MensLib, the only online community of progressive dudes talking about masculinity that I'm aware of, is...on Reddit. So there is a moderator system. In theory, a moderator is there to...moderate. This is a space where people are going to be talking, and mods are there to make sure things don't get too toxic or off topic.

The issue is that, on some level, that is technically a leadership position. In a sub trying to rehabilitate masculinity. So you've got a bunch of folks who view themselves as the leaders of this bastion of goodness standing against the depredations of the misogynistic internet, guiding the hapless smooth-brain neophytes towards The True Way.

In practice, this looks like 95 percent of the posts submitted for the subreddit being rejected. That isn't hyperbole. On average, the sub has about one new post per day. Almost all posts directly relating a personal experience are deleted immediately, in favour of articles written about masculinity in traditional media publications, which are considered more trustworthy than the sus lived experiences of the guys in the sub. The post I wrote here about the effect of purity culture on male sexual shame that's sitting at about 15K notes was based on a 10K word post I wrote for Reddit that was deleted because "I didn't cite any sources to prove that there is a link between purity culture and male sexual shame, or that my experience was anything more than anecdotal". I get comments deleted on a regular basis, and after paragraphs of protesting in modmail that my comments are both fully in line with feminism and not against the rules, the mods have just finally told me that the rules don't actually drive their actions as a team. They delete anything they feel leads the conversation in a direction they personally feel is unproductive. The rule cited at the time of deletion is really just the broad category of why they decided to hit the button that says nobody is allowed to read what I wrote.

The issue is kind of twofold. First of all, progressive men do not trust other men. A good dude knows that he, individually, is a good person, but literally any other man external to him is on thin ice. Do you really want to tie your wagon to that guy? Do you trust him, really? How do you tell the difference between a guy criticizing an article because it's factually incorrect and criticising it because a woman wrote it? Probably best to play it safe and delete it. Weight of the odds, he's probably a misogynist, right? This is the internet.

And thats the other half of it. If you view yourself as part of the leadership of The Good Guys, and you're getting hatemail from incels and facists all day, you get to the point where most of the time people challenge your authority it's because they're a terrible person. It is very, very easy to get to the point where someone challenging you is seen as evidence that they are a bad person. And now someone is challenging you (and therefore bad), in an environment where you are in charge, and you have a "make your opponent disappear" button.

I know. A Reddit mod was rude to me and now I'm butthurt. It's petty and stupid. I'm just feeling like there's nowhere else to really go, and I'm pretty despondent that literally every space I've seen that even looks like it might be for progressive men has the same deeply hierarchical structure and constant status-oriented squabbling as patriarchal spaces.

#me writing stuff #positive masculinity #menslib

[patrollingboston]

Hiya! Could you write a fic where we have to share a bed with Price?

Much love ❤️

An awkward conversation // Price x reader fluff

guilty pleasure one bed trope, this is not meant to be realistic!

After completing gruelling week on a mission, You, Gaz, Soap and Price were headed back to the pickup location to take you all back to base. The conversations being shared were short and snappy due to everyone’s exhaustion. Gaz was fast asleep snoring like bear and it was driving you insane. Soap had earphones in as Captain Price drove along the long stretch of road ahead whilst you were directing him from the passenger seat.

A loud crackle buzzed through everyone’s radio; Gaz snapped awake as everyone focussed on the voice on the other end of the radio.

“Bravo 0-6?”

“Price, you there?”

“What is it Laswell?”

Price held down the button on his radio whilst his eyes remained focused on the road ahead. He drove with one hand on the steering wheel occasionally looking over at you. Everyone’s curiosity was peaked as the mission was over, why would Laswell need to contact them now?

“Nikolai has a problem with exfil, his helicopter has needed some uh, um emergency maintenance. We can’t fly you back to base until tomorrow morning, can you all find a motel nearby just to rest up for a night?”

“Oh, fucking hell- “

Gaz groaned, Soap joining him. You flopped your head back against the headrest in protest. Everyone just wanted to go home, sleep in their own beds, eat normal warm food and be alone.

“Is there no other option? I think we all just want to be back ASAP Laswell.”

“Fraid’ not, earliest we can get to you is 8am tomorrow.”

“Alright, we will sort something out.”

Price said taking his hand off the steering wheel for a second to rub his temples, you glanced over noticing how tired his eyes looked. Everyone’s did.

With that statement the radio cut off. Everyone’s eyes were on Price as he was magically going be able to solve the issue.

“Well, what’s the plan?”

Soap chimed in, peeking his head round from the back of the car.

“There’s a cheap motel not too far, look we aren’t going to be there long. It’s already late, it’s just to clean up and get some rest. I know it’s not ideal.”

“I’m sure we can survive one more night, at least it will be warm?”

You spoke, trying to lift the mood of your fellow soldiers only to be met by awkward silence.

Price tapped on his phone to get directions to the motel. He was right about needing to clean up. Everyone was in their gear, dirt and mud were splashed over everyone’s clothes and face.

“I miss real food.”

Gaz said, Soap nodded in agreement as he began bumbling on about a restaurant near his house.

10 minutes later the car pulled up into the carpark for the motel. There wasn’t much to say about it, it didn’t look too bad from the outside but in your current state of tiredness you would sleep in a bed made of cardboard.

“Gaz, Soap go get us rooms, we will unload the car.”

Price ordered, Gaz and Soap split off entering the reception as you and him began lugging in everyone’s duffel bags. It was quite sparse, a few potted plants and a strikingly red carpet that frankly was hurting your weary eyes.

“Cap? They only have 2 rooms.”

You placed the bag down you were carrying and peered over to soap who was stood speaking to the receptionist.

Price sighed so loudly you could hear it from across the room.

“Well, we can go two and two, or we can take a chance on the other motel, think it was about 20 minutes away.”

You stepped over the pile of bags to join the conversation.

“I don’t mind sharing, please I just want to shower and lie down.”

You said rubbing your eyes, smearing the warpaint from earlier.

“Who goes with who?”

You suddenly felt everyone’s gaze on you.

“You pick F/N you’re the only woman here.”

“Why do you say that like it’s a bad thing?”

You teased as you watched Gaz’s face drop.

“No that’s not what I meant, c’mon.”

You weighed the pros and cons of each person in your head, quickly ruling out soap for how often he liked to flirt with people, that could never end well. Gaz was an option? But you recently discovered he snores and you needed sleep. That only left Price, your captain. You didn’t mind him, in fact over time you had grown quite fond of him despite his grumpy attitude and hat collection.

“I’ll go with Price.”

Price’s eyes widened ever so subtly; it seemed like he was taken back you chose him. His face quickly returned back to normal but you still managed to see the change in it.

A few moments later you stood outside in the hallway shoulder to shoulder with price as he wrestled with the dodgy room key.

“Sonofa- got it.”

He said before cracking a little smile and barging the door open.

You stepped inside looking at the (one again bright red) carpet laden with cigarette burns, you shrugged the bags onto the floor before going into the rest of the room and standing beside price who looked to be in deep in thought. You followed his gaze to find it.

One bed.

One bed that looks like it was made of concrete, with white ruffled sheets and 2 sad pillows.

Your stomach sunk, you had read about this in books and seen it in films and now it was happening to you.

You gulped loudly, praying Price didn’t sense your hesitation.

“I’ll sleep on the floor- “

He said sharply, it caught you off guard. What do you do now? Do you object? Do you share the bed? Do you let him stay on the floor?

“No, I know you’re just as tired as me, I don’t care, please.”

You said gesturing to the bed. He turned around and gave you a kind smile before he sat on the end and started removing his boots.

“I’m going to hop in the shower.”

He nodded as you stepped into the backroom locking the door behind you. That shower might have been the most heavenly experience of your life. Washing away weeks build-up of dirt on yourself. The warm water flowed down your back; you could have stayed in there forever. You stepped out wrapping the white towel around yourself as you reached for your bag. You searched through it trying to find something you could comfortably sleep in. Most stuff in there needed a wash as it was covered in dirt or sweat. You cursed under your breathe as you unlocked the bathroom door and peeked your head out.

“Hey Price?”

He was sat on the bed with his arms folded across his chest, intently watching the little crappy tv.

“Mhm?”

He said his gaze finding you, you could have sworn his eyes faltered and fell up and down you. Pushing back down the blush creeping up your cheeks you responded.

“Do you have anything I could sleep in? My stuff is all uh in need of a wash.”

“Oh, um let me look.”

He hopped off the bed and bent over to rummage around in his backpack before throwing you a khaki green shirt.

“That work?”

“Cheers.”

You closed the bathroom door again before changing into the shirt. It hung below your knees like a nightgown. It was so comfy compared to the mountains of gear you had been wearing for the previous week. It smelt like him too, it was comforting.

You walked into the room; Price had changed now. He was wearing a tight-fitting grey shirt and some baggy shorts. You had never seen him this casual, it was weird but you also liked it however you couldn’t deny how good he looked in his gear too but you would never let anyone know you thought this.

You peered over at the clock.

1:23

Price was just beginning to pull back the duvet on the left side of the bed. Would it be awkward if you did the same? God, it felt like watching an awkwardly married couple get into bed. You both climbed into the bed, the space between you was almost amusing, it was clear you were both trying to avoid one another.

“Night F/N.”

He grumbled, shuffling around to get comfy.

“Night!”

You chirped back, your voice slightly breaking in doing so.

The both of you were so tired you fell straight asleep.

 You woke up to some movement beside you in the early hours of the morning. Your eyes fluttered trying to gather your surroundings only to find yourself wrapped in someone’s arms. Realizing whose arms, it was you were torn on what to do. You decided to stay still, letting yourself take in the warmth. You lay there comfortably, his breathe tickling the top of your head as you fell asleep trying not to think about the awkward conversation this would lead to next morning.

#call of duty #call of duty fanfic #john soap mactavish #soap x reader #call of duty fluff #call of duty x reader #captain john price #captain price #captain price x reader #cod fanfiction #john soap mctavish x reader #soap mactavish x reader #soap call of duty #soap cod #gaz cod #gaz garrick #ghost x reader #captain price fanfic #john mactavish x reader #john price #call of duty fanfiction #ghost call of duty #call of duty modern warfare #simon riley #modern warefare 2 x reader #cod modern warfare #modern warfare 3 #fluff #cod oneshot #one bed trope

[sourcherryandsprinkles]

Conrad and reader are seeing each other in secret but everyone knows because they’re shit at hiding it

Requests: for conrad x reader, they're in a secret relationship (maybe reader stays in the summer house with everyone) and they get caught?

Could you do a sex with conrad fisher fic?

Warnings: smut, p + v,

my taglists are here + you can send requests here at any time

—

You and Conrad were not as slick sneaking around as you thought you were. Three weeks into summer and everyone already knew you were hooking up. The smell of your perfume lingered in Conrad's jeep in the morning and Jeremiah swore he saw a bra in his brother's bedroom when Susannah asked to get his laundry basket for the cleaning lady. 

What confirmed that Conrad was seeing someone was that Steven’s bedroom was right next to Conrad’s and he could hear the headboard hit the wall on some nights. He even heard some girl moans, which he quickly downed by putting his headphones on. Conrad was his friend, but he didn’t want to hear him pleasure a girl. That was just too much.

You were fisting the bedsheets with your hands, biting down your bottom lip to try to stifle your moans at every snap of Conrad’s hips. It was past 11pm and everyone was asleep so you had to be quiet. Susannah was cool, but she wouldn't like her son sneaking a girl in at night to have sex. Even if he was eighteen. 

Your back arched up off the bed for him, buried so deep inside you. Sweat was sticking to his chest and his hands had found purchase on your thighs, keeping them open while he pounded into you. 

‘’Ahh, don’t stop, Connie. I’m close,’’ you whispered in the dim-lit room, feeling your orgasm hurtling toward you. It was so hard to keep quiet and control yourself when all you wanted to do was scream Conrad’s name. 

He nodded, one hand leaving your thigh and crawling where your bodies met to start rubbing against your clit while looking at you like you’re the only important thing in the world. Conrad might be portrayed as cold hearted, but with you, he was always warm and sweet — unless you didn’t want him to. 

When it all became too much, you clenched around him one last time, your toes curling and legs shaking as you came all over his cock, a series of quietest moans slipping from your mouth. Conrad climaxed shortly after you, spilling into the condom with a swallowed groan. He ran a hand through his messy hair, then pulled out and threw the used condom in the trash before coming back at your side. 

He seemed lost in his world for a few seconds, his face resting over your breasts as you scratched his back, waiting for him to come down from his high and catch your breaths. Conrad's post-sex affectionate nature was truly endearing; it was unexpected, yet incredibly sweet and vulnerable. 

As much as you cherished the moment, the reality of the outside world nudged you back to your senses, forcing you to detach yourself from Conrad. ‘’Sorry, but I really need to pee.’’ 

He groaned in protest, disappointedly letting you go. 

You put your panties back on and Conrad lifted his head from the bed, looking at you with a mix of longing and tiredness. ‘’You’re coming back, right?’’ he asked, seeking reassurance.

You nodded, offering a reassuring smile, as you slipped one of his shirts on before quietly leaving the room. 

As you emerged from the bathroom, you hadn't expected anyone else to be awake at this hour, but to your surprise, you almost walked right into a sleepy-faced Jeremiah in plaid pajama pants. 

‘’Jeremiah. Hi,’’ you greeted him, trying not to look flustered. 

A smirk drew on his mouth, confirming his assumption. ‘’Hi,’’ he responded, seemingly amused by the situation. His smirk widened as he leaned against the hallway wall, his eyes playfully glancing over your disheveled appearance. ‘’So, I guess Conrad's having a good time?’’ Jeremiah teased, raising an eyebrow mischievously.

You tried to maintain your composure, but the embarrassment was evident on your cheeks. ‘’Eh…I should probably get back to…’’ you trailed, glancing towards Conrad's room.

Jeremiah nodded again, his smile softening. ‘’Mmh. Good night, Y/N.’’

‘’Good night, Jere.’’ 

When you returned to Conrad’s room, he was still on his bed, except he had moved under his comforter and blanket, nestled like a child. The sight made you want to crawl under and fall asleep beside him. 

You shut the door and Conrad looked up when seeing you.  You shifted on your feet, a little nervous, about to tell him something you didn’t know how he would react to. ‘’I just saw your brother. He knows.’’

—

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#conrad fisher #conrad fisher x reader #conrad fisher imagine #conrad fisher fanfic #the summer i turned pretty #the summer i turned pretty imagine

[special-agent-sass]

Elevator Passions

Warnings

Smut

Y/N sauntered into the bullpen, leather jacket squeaking as she walked. She headed straight for her desk, not making eye contact with anyone. The rest of the team watched her warily. Ever since her blow up with Gibbs last week, she'd been quiet and closed off.

Tony sidled up next to her desk. "So, Y/N/N, you coming out with us tonight?" He gave her his most charming smile.

She didn't even glance at him. "Not really in the mood, DiNozzo."

McGee piped up from his desk. "Come on, Y/N. It'll be fun!"

"Yeah, we haven't seen you outside of work in weeks," Tony wheedled.

Y/N finally looked up, pinning them both with an icy stare. "I said no. Now drop it."

Tony and McGee exchanged a look but didn't press the issue. Ever since Y/N had joined the team a little over a year ago, she'd been like a little sister to them. Former Marine, tough as nails, and beautiful to boot. But lately, something had changed.

Gibbs strolled in then, coffee in hand. "Gear up. Dead petty officer in Anacostia."

The team scrambled to collect their things. As they headed to the elevator, Gibbs grabbed Y/N's arm.

"You good for this?" His steely blue eyes searched hers.

Y/N yanked her arm away. "I'm fine."

Gibbs studied her a moment longer before giving a curt nod. They joined the others in the elevator, tension thick between them.

At the crime scene, Y/N immediately got to work photographing evidence while McGee bagged and tagged. Tony interviewed witnesses while Gibbs examined the body.

"Single gunshot wound to the back," Ducky pronounced. "No exit wound, so the bullet likely fragmented inside the body. I'll know more once I get him home."

Gibbs grunted in acknowledgment. He glanced over at Y/N, crouched low as she took photos. The sight of her ripped jeans stretched tight over her curves made his mouth go dry. Shaking himself, he turned back to Ducky. "Time of death?"

"Based on liver temp, I'd say between midnight and 2am."

Gibbs nodded, then went to check on his agents' progress. McGee had finished collecting evidence, Tony was wrapping up his interviews, and Y/N was scribbling notes about the scene.

Back at the navy yard, the team dug into the victim's background. Petty Officer James Rourke, 25, was a communications technician stationed out of Norfolk. No wife or kids, parents both deceased.

"Looks like Rourke had a bit of a gambling problem," McGee announced. "Some large cash withdrawals over the past few months that far exceed his salary."

"Owed money to the wrong people, maybe?" Tony speculated.

Gibbs turned to Y/N. "Bring up his financials, see if you can trace where the money was going."

Y/N's eyes flashed with anger. "You don't need to tell me how to do my job."

"When you're acting like a probationary agent, then yeah, I do," Gibbs shot back.

Y/N shot to her feet. "Just because I won't kiss your ass like Tony doesn't mean I don't know what I'm doing."

"Hey!" Tony protested.

"You make one more outburst like that, you'll be riding a desk till you retire," Gibbs threatened. "You got that?"

Y/N stepped close until they were nearly nose to nose. Gibbs could feel her breath on his face, see the fire in her eyes.

"I could ride you instead" she taunted. "Clearly that's what you'd prefer."

Tony's jaw dropped. McGee's eyes bugged out. The bullpen went deadly silent.

Gibbs clenched his jaw, hands fisting at his sides. "With me. Now." He stormed off towards the elevator.

Y/N followed, chin held high. The doors slid shut behind them. Gibbs flipped the emergency stop switch, halting the car between floors.

He turned to Y/N, eyes blazing. "You ever speak to me like that again—"

"You'll what?" Y/N cut him off. "Spank me?" She stepped closer, breasts brushing his chest. "We both know you've wanted to bend me over your desk since I got here."

Gibbs swallowed hard. "It's against protocol." But even as he said it, his hands grasped her hips, pulling her against him.

"Screw protocol," Y/N hissed before crushing her lips to his.

Gibbs groaned into the kiss, backing her against the elevator wall. Their mouths clashed hungrily as his hands slid under her shirt, finding smooth, warm skin. Y/N nipped his bottom lip as she frantically unbuckled his belt.

Breaking the kiss, Gibbs rasped into her ear, "We shouldn't..." But his protest died as she wrapped her fingers around him. He shuddered, head falling back.

"I need this, Jethro," Y/N pleaded breathlessly. "Make me forget everything else."

Surrendering, Gibbs hoisted her up, her legs wrapping around his waist. Their clothes disappeared in a frenzy of tearing fabric and grasping hands. Then he was inside her, swallowing her cries with his mouth as he took her hard against the elevator wall.

After, collapsed in a sweaty, panting heap on the floor, Gibbs pressed a kiss to her hair. "I've wanted this...wanted you...for a long time," he admitted gruffly.

Y/N nuzzled his cheek. "Me too. Rules be damned."

Gibbs smiled and pulled her close. Protocol could wait. Right now, he had everything he needed.

#gibbs x reader #ncis gibbs #gibbs x y/n #jethro gibbs imagine #leroy jethro gibbs #jethro gibbs #gibbs smut #smut #ncis #jethro gibbs x reader #gibbs

[yelena-bellova]

Twenty Years Later: Joel Miller x F!Reader - Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten: September 26th, 2003

Plot: There are very few tragedies in life that come with warning.

Word Count: 12.8k (longest chapter yet)

Warnings: tlou ep.1 spoilers, language, canon-typical violence, gore, blood, guns, death, loss of a child, injuries, implied smut (16+)

A/N: Well, we’ve arrived at that fateful chapter…this took so long to even be emotionally able to write. There are so many small details that I hope people catch, and plenty of things to remember for future chapters.

As always, this series is 16+ and I will not be adding anyone to the taglist unless your age/range is specified in your bio. Gotta look out for younger eyes 👀

I hope y’all enjoy this one, and thank you so much for all the kind words, theories and general love I receive throughout the week 💞

————————

September 26th, 2003. Austin, Texas.

There are very few tragedies in life that come with warning.

Families of the terminally ill are given a vague timeline of when they’ll lose their loved one.

Soldiers are told before marching into battle that they may lose their life.

But a car crash does not announce itself before causing the collision.

A heart attack doesn’t prepare its victim before it steals their breath.

Nor did Cordyceps feel it owed the world any notice before it arrived.

On the morning of September 26th, Y/n was awoken by strips of sunlight coming through the blinds of Joel’s bedroom window. She was the early riser out of the two and she never minded, it gave her more time to admire the handsome lump weighing her down.

Y/n brushed a strand of hair off her boyfriend’s forehead and pressed a feather light kiss to it. Joel didn’t wake easily, but she liked to say she at least tried the sweet way before having to go nuclear. She gently rubbed his back, running her palm up and down the warm skin, but it only made him settle deeper into her chest. Y/n smiled and shook her head, knowing that in mere seconds….

BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.

It truly was miraculous how deep Joel could go into his rest. Y/n rolled her eyes and tried to reach across the pillows to switch off the clock, her fingers wiggling in the air as she strained. With his arms firmly wrapped around Y/n’s body, Joel didn’t even budge.

Finally, salvation came in the form of Sarah banging on the bedroom door, jolting Joel awake.

“Alarm,” the girl called, raising her voice the second time, “Alarm!”

“Thank you,” Y/n called back.

Joel rolled over, barely aware of his surroundings, and switched off the clock. He pushed up on one arm and turned back to his girlfriend, watching him with a smirk.

“What?”

Y/n shook her head, “You must be great in emergencies.”

Joel rubbed at his eyes, “Maybe I’m a little tired because someone wore me out last night.”

“Oh, don’t blame me for this,” Y/n laughed, “A year and a half and I’ve never seen you wake up when your alarm goes off. Not once.”

Joel looked down at her, squinting from the sunlight, a small smile playing on his lips, “Maybe I hear it, but there’s a more compellin’ reason to ignore it.”

He slipped back down into the sheets, resting his head once again on Y/n’s chest.

“Oh, no, no, no,” Y/n began to shimmy out of his arms, “We gotta get up.”

Joel tightened his hold around her torso, “My birthday, I make the rules.”

“No, it’s your birthday and Sarah and I make the rules,” Y/n corrected. Joel had never been one for celebrating the day, meaning it was up to Sarah and Y/n to make the day special, “What you want actually ranks very low on the list.”

Joel was paying very little attention to his girlfriend’s words, trailing a line of kisses up the chest of his t-shirt she was wearing and across her neck. “Five minutes,” he mumbled against her skin.

“No,” Y/n denied, her pulse speeding up the further his lips travelled.

“Yes,” Joel ignored her protests, making his way up to where her jawline met her ear.

“No,” Y/n laughed, her words not lining up with her reaction as she ran a hand over Joel’s hair.

“Say it again, honey,” Joel whispered against her ear, “And mean it.”

Y/n was teetering on the edge of letting him take what he wanted, but her loyalty to Joel’s daughter won out. “Sarah’s cooking you breakfast,” she said, slipping her hand between their chests, “And I’m not gonna be the one to tell her that her dad missed out on her efforts because he was horny.”

Joel snorted, dropping his head and laughing against Y/n’s chest.

Y/n pulled his face up to hers and laid a kiss on his lips, “Happy Birthday.”

“Just another reminder I’m gettin’ old,” Joel grumbled.

“True,” Y/n smiled, taking his scratchy cheeks into her palms, “But you’re my old man.”

Joel chortled, running his hands over Y/n’s body one last time before reluctantly rolling off of her. Their day had to begin, whether he wanted it to or not…

The two got dressed for work, while Y/n hadn’t officially moved in with the Millers, it was her second home. She kept practically one of everything in Joel’s room because of how often she slept over.

Y/n was the first of them down the stairs, landing in the kitchen where Sarah was already laying strips of bacon in a pan, “Can you take this so I can get the eggs?”

“You got it,” Y/n responded, switching places with the girl.

Sarah opened the fridge doors, getting a whiff of the inside, “When was the last time we cleaned this out?”

“Uh, two weeks ago, I think,” Y/n replied.

“Well, something died in it recently,” Sarah stated, grabbing a bowl to whisk the eggs in.

Sarah and Y/n’s relationship had stayed as steady as her and Joel’s. She’d expected some sort of pushback eventually, Sarah had just hit the teenage years, but it had yet to come. Y/n theorized it was because the young girl was just happy to have a woman in her life, but she felt like that was giving herself too much credit.

With the protein cooking on the stove, Sarah started searching through the cabinets. Joel had just come downstairs, still buckling his belt.

“Where’s the pancake mix?” Sarah asked her dad.

Still groggy, Joel scrunched his brows. “Oh, I was-” he’d forgotten the trip to the store he was supposed to take the night before, “Yeah, I was. Sorry.”

“I was gonna make you birthday pancakes,” his daughter complained, marching to the fridge and muttering to herself, “I swear…”

Joel ignored the smell of the food cooking and headed straight for the coffee pot, “You know, I don’t really like pancakes.”

“I know you don’t,” Sarah replied, pouring a glass of orange juice, “It was for my and Y/n’s benefit.”

“We’ll survive,” Y/n said, working on the eggs while Sarah was away, “Though pancakes are a weird thing to not like.”

Joel bristled at his girlfriend’s remark, turning around and facing Sarah with the glass of juice extended towards him.

“Vitamin C,” she explained.

For as much as Joel took care of his daughter, the roles were beginning to shift the older they both got. Sarah could spot his bad habits and tried to fix them wherever she could, the biggest one being his lack of actual nutrition. The man existed on coffee.

Joel took the glass from her, setting his mug down and humoring Sarah with a sip.

Y/n chuckled as she watched his expression turn sour, “Look more enthusiastic. I dare you.”

Joel grimaced, proceeding to pick up the coffee as soon as Sarah was back at the stove.

“You get your, uh, homework done?” Joel asked Sarah, waiting for her smile when she turned around, “Fractions?”

Sarah laughed, it was fact not only that she was ahead of her classmates, but Y/n was her tutor when it came to math. Joel wanted nothing to do with the subject.

Y/n and Sarah plated the feast and the three of them sat down at the table, as they did most mornings. Between Y/n and Joel’s work schedules and Sarah’s extracurriculars, it was the only guaranteed time they had each day to spend together.

“How old are you again?” Sarah asked her dad.

“Thirty-six,” Joel answered with a mouthful of egg.

“Gonna have to start wearing diapers soon,” Sarah joked, her tone remaining remarkably even.

”Who says I don’t already?” Joel replied, it wasn’t hard to track where Sarah’d gotten her humor from. He proceeded to pick something out of his teeth, looking to his daughter, “Shell.”

“Calcium,” she said, grinning wide with a mouthful of eggs on display.

“Lovely,” Joel muttered, looking over at Y/n as she laughed, “You’re encouragin’ bad table manners.”

Y/n shrugged and held her coffee mug to her lips, ”I see it as supporting a potential future as a comedian.”

The truck engine in the driveway signaled that Tommy was there to pick his brother and Y/n up for the day.

“Is there enough for Uncle Tommy?” Joel asked Sarah.

“There would’ve been,” Sarah grumbled into her plate, still bitter about the lack of pancakes.

“I can whip him up something, if we’ve got time,” Y/n offered.

Joel shook his head, “Nah, we gotta get going.”

Tommy entered through the garage door, the most carefree of them all. “Ay,” he clasped Joel’s shoulder, “You’re still alive, you old fucker.”

“Language,” Y/n chastised, she’d been trying for months to curb Tommy’s soldier’s mouth around Sarah. It wasn’t working.

“Aw,” Sarah cooed to Joel, “He loves you.”

“He’s dependent on me,” Joel watched his brother begin to raid his kitchen, “Not the same.”

Sarah shrugged, “I think it’s the same.”

“It’s definitely the same,” Tommy said, examining the countertops for food, “I thought we was havin’ pancakes.”

“The age started to take his memory last night,” Y/n’s tone turned serious as she pressed a hand to Joel’s bicep, “We’re meeting him where he is.”

Joel’s smirk contradicted the glare he shot his girlfriend, letting her hand stay on his arm through the teasing. “We’ll pick you up somethin’ on the road,” he addressed Tommy, “Concrete guys gonna be there?”

“Yeah, they said maybe,” Tommy replied as he opened up the fridge.

“‘Maybe?’” Joel echoed, “We can’t frame until we pour. We’re not gettin’ paid until we frame.”

Tommy started sniffing through various leftovers, “Well, we could bring someone else on, get the job done faster.”

“No, no,” Joel shook his head and cut up another bite of eggs, “I’m not splittin’ this job, I barely wanna split it with you. We could work a double.”

Sarah and Y/n both turned to him.

“Literally?” Sarah asked, “Today?”

“Joel, come on,” Y/n agreed, “Not today.”

“I know,” Joel was quick to remedy the moment, “I’d be done by nine,” he called to Tommy, “By nine, right?”

Sarah gazed across the table to Y/n, the two of them sharing a disbelieving look.

“I’ll bring back a cake,” Joel looked between the girls, “I promise.”

Y/n sighed, holding her coffee cup to her chest. Joel had been pulling double shifts more and more recently. She’d been meaning to talk to him about it, how she and Sarah had been missing him, but she was in no position to stop him from working. Money was tight and contract work was never a sure thing.

A news broadcast broke up the top 40 station Sarah had turned the radio on to while cooking. “Continued disturbances in Jakarta…” the voice announced, the clinking of silverware against plates breaking it up, “But are advising U.S. citizens-“

“Jakarta?” Joel repeated, “Where is that? Middle East?”

“Doesn’t ring a bell,” Tommy shook his head, holding a coffee cup, “It’s definitely a country. Or maybe a part of Asia?”

Y/n smiled and tilted her head at Sarah, who was already prepared to answer.

“Jakarta isn’t a country,” she interjected, “Being a part of Asia isn’t mutually exclusive with being a country and in fact, it’s the capital of Indonesia.”

“That’s my girl,” Y/n said proudly.

“Shit,” Tommy grinned, “Hope for us yet.”

Joel took a final sip of his coffee before slapping his hand against his bare wrist, still expecting his broken watch to be there. He, instead, dug into his pocket checked the time on his cell phone.

“All right,” he announced to his daughter, collecting his and Y/n’s plates, “Finish up quick. We’ll drop you off.”

“I’m still eating my eggshells,” Sarah said.

“You got seven minutes,” Joel replied, dumping the dishes in the sink for later.

“Your t-shirt’s inside out.”

Joel looked down, deflated at the trip he now had to make back upstairs, “Shit.”

Sarah waited till he was out of the room and cocked a suspicious eyebrow at Y/n.

“Pop that thing down, missy,” Y/n pointed downwards, “Your dad just pays shockingly little attention for someone who works with power tools.”

Tommy smiled over the wings he’d taken for himself, “He’s losin’ it.”

Y/n laughed and nudged Sarah’s leg, “C’mon, finish up.”

Sarah scooped the last bite of egg into her mouth and handed her plate to Y/n, who brushed past Tommy on her way to the sink. She reversed a few steps to get a whiff of the chicken.

“Found the smell,” she called out to Sarah, patting Tommy’s shoulder, “I’m sure you’ll be fine.”

“Stomach of steel,” he replied, setting his plate on the edge of the sink and planting a kiss on Y/n’s cheek. The two of them had become as good as siblings.

Y/n climbed up the stairs and down the hall to Joel’s room. He emerged just as she approached, brushing his hand across her hip as they passed one another. As much as they both loved pouring out the fullness of their affection, the casual intimacies were their favorites.

Grabbing her keys and wallet off Joel’s dresser, Y/n peeked out the window and waited till she saw Joel outside with Tommy. “Sarah,” she called down the hall.

Sarah tiptoed her way in, just to be safe, “Good?”

“Yep,” Y/n nodded.

Sarah found the assigned drawer, digging through Joel’s possessions to pull out his broken watch. She’d developed the plan to fix it as a birthday present last month and had gotten Y/n in on it.

“You’ve got the money?” Sarah checked.

Y/n flipped through the bills in her wallet, “Should be enough.”

Sarah thumbed through Joel’s cash and pulled out a few extra, smiling mischievously, “Now we can be sure.”

“Sarah! Y/n!” Joel called from the truck, Tommy was honking the horn.

Slipping the watch into her backpack, Sarah and Y/n quickly left the bedroom and headed down the stairs. Y/n hung back to make sure the coffee pot and stove were off before exiting out the front door. From the porch, she could see Sarah was in conversation with Mr. Adler next door. Or rather, dodging conversation.

“Make ‘em happy,” Joel encouraged, passing Y/n to grab another load of tools.

“I could come by after school, but just for like, a little bit,” Sarah offered.

“She’ll take what you got,” Mr. Adler replied as he fed his elderly mother-in-law, “Y’all can bake or whatever. Speakin’ of,” the man held up a plate, “We got a lotta extra here, y’all want some biscuits?”

“Dad,” Sarah masterfully tossed the ball to Joel, “You love biscuits.”

“I do,” Joel replied cheerily, “But Y/n’s got me on Atkins.”

Y/n snorted, watching the exchange go down from the bed of the truck.

“On what now?” Mr. Adler asked.

“It’s uh-“ Joel stopped himself, “You know, we gotta run but Sarah’ll be by later. She’ll stay as long as you want,” he smiled genuinely to his neighbors and smugly to his daughter, “Tell you all about Atkins.”

“Great, I’ll let Connie know,” Mr. Adler called back as Joel took Y/n’s hand and led her around the truck, “Hey, Y/n, you’re invited too.”

She peeked over the truck’s flatbed, “I’ll be working, but I’ll come grab Sarah on my way home.”

“Thank you,” Sarah smiled at her dad’s girlfriend, glaring at her father himself, “Solid.”

Joel held the door open for them, smirking at Y/n. “Thirty minutes, then you can rescue her,” he instructed.

“I never suggested Atkins,” she replied, sliding into the backseat beside Sarah.

“Can’t tell you how exciting it was listenin’ to that fuckin’ conversation,” Tommy commented, his speech molding around the cigarette between his lips.

“Put that out,” Joel said, a second before Y/n could form the same words.

Tommy flicked the smoke out onto the driveway, “Happy birthday to you.”

The truck pulled out into the cul-de-sac, carrying each of them off to their separate days.

Once Sarah had been dropped off at school and Y/n at the hardware store, Joel and Tommy headed across town to their construction site.

“Y’all got plans for tonight?” Tommy asked as they rode.

“If I don’t bring a cake home, they’re gonna string me up,” Joel answered, “Other than that, nothin’.”

His brother chuckled, “Least they gang up on you together. I got a buddy who just brought his girl home, his kid can’t stand her.”

Joel wasn’t an idiot, he knew how lucky he was that his girlfriend and daughter got along. No, they did better than just get along. They were practically inseparable. He’d take as much shit as they could give him, so long as they did it together.

“When’re you gonna marry that girl?”

It wasn’t the first time Tommy had asked that question. It had been increasing in frequency over the last few months. After they’d passed their one year anniversary, it became a thought consuming more and more space in Joel’s mind. It had taken enough time to sort out his thoughts and fears on the subject of going into marriage again, but it had been something that week that had settled him on the matter.

Monday night, Y/n had dropped by after her shift to help Sarah with homework. Joel had been at work, but when he got home, he expected to see them waiting for him at the kitchen table. Finding only silence, he climbed the stairs and peeked into Sarah’s room. Y/n was sitting against the headboard of Sarah’s bed, the young girl tucked into her shoulder, the math homework spread across their laps.

In the seemingly meaningless display of affection, Joel saw so much more. He saw the rest of his life. He could finally give Sarah a crucial piece of happiness that she’d been deprived of. He could have the love he’d craved and denied himself for so many years. The three of them, a family.

He was going to ask Y/n to marry him that weekend.

“I was gonna head to that place in the mall tomorrow morning,” Joel replied, his fingers rubbing together in anticipation. The last few weeks of working double shifts would pay off if he could find the perfect ring.

“Oh, shit,” Tommy grinned, “You’re actually doin’ it.”

“No reason to wait,” he said, staring ahead as if he could see his bright future.

“Think she’ll say yes?” Tommy asked, practically bleeding from the daggers Joel shot at him. He heartily laughed, “You get Sarah’s blessin’?”

A small smile stretched across Joel’s lips, “I know I already got it. But yeah, I’m gonna show her the ring, ask her officially.”

“Girl’s not gonna say no,” Tommy replied, making a turn onto the street the construction site was on, “She’s as crazy about her as you are.”

Joel couldn’t see any reason why Sarah would reject Y/n, she liked her better than she did Joel half the time. But he’d still never make such a big decision without consulting his daughter.

“You fucker,” Tommy chuckled, smacking Joel’s chest, “Won the damn lottery.”

Joel smiled out the window, he knew it too.

——————

Y/n’s day went by as slow as possible. She kept moving around the hardware store, helping employee and customer alike with anything they needed. All she needed was to stay busy until 3PM when she’d clock out an hour early, pick Sarah up at the house and they’d head downtown to the watch repair shop.

She absentmindedly spinning down one of the aisles, passing Melinda, one of her co-workers.

“Head outta the clouds, kid,” she chuckled.

“I’m on the ground,” Y/n replied, doing another twirl, “I just need this fucking day to end.”

Melinda went back to hanging inventory, “You and Joel got big plans tonight?”

“I was gonna grill us up some steaks,” she shrugged, “Cake. He’ll get squirmy if Sarah and I spoil him too much.”

“I got a question,” Melinda rested her arm on a shelf, “And if it’s too personal, you tell me. I won’t care, but you can tell me.”

Y/n giggled, “Okay.”

“Are you two ever gonna get married?”

Y/n’s movements came to a stop in the middle of the aisle. She’d been thinking more and more about what it might look like to marry Joel. It wasn’t like she was daydreaming about meaningless details like what dress she’d wear or what color roses would serve as centerpieces. She thought about waking up in Joel’s arms every morning, cooking breakfast for Sarah, being there for every moment, big or small. That was what she cared about.

Joel had eventually opened up to her about his ex-wife and what her abandonment had done to both him and Sarah. Y/n knew it was a scar that was as healed as it could be. She would never rush Joel into making a decision about their future, but she’d have been lying if she’d said she didn’t want to eventually wear his ring on her finger.

“I’m not sure,” she answered honestly.

“Well, he needs to lock you down,” Melinda pointed towards Y/n with a hammer, “My cousin, came in last week, got one look at you, he’s been asking me for your number all week.”

Y/n laughed, “Ring or no ring, I’m locked down. This is it for me.”

The women turned their attention down the aisle to a man, taking sloppy steps down the aisle. It was barely two in the afternoon, a little early to already be drunk, but Texas took the rules of happy hour very loosely.

Melinda groaned, “Ugh, you want me to take him?”

“No, I got it,” Y/n put on her cheery voice and walked up to the customer, “Can I help you find any-“

The man spun to face her, snarling, and took a swing at Y/n. She jumped back just in time.

“What the f-“

Growling, he charged towards her again, this time using her shock against her and tackling her to the floor. Y/n screamed, shoving her hands against his chest in an effort to push him off of her.

“Fuck!” Melinda yelled, pulling at the guy’s legs, “Help! We need help!”

Y/n stared into the man’s eyes, they were glazed over entirely, filled with pure, animalistic rage. He snarled and bit at the air before wrapping his hand around her neck. She used all her strength to push him away, her breath stuck in her throat. He lunged to burrow his face where his hand lay, Y/n couldn’t get him off her, but she kept him from getting any closer.

The manager, Don, sprinted down the aisle with a few other guys and pulled the attacker off of Y/n. The man fought back, growling and clawing relentlessly at her. One of the employees dropped him on the ground and sat on him, ensuring he didn’t go anywhere.

Y/n scrambled to her feet, Don came to embrace her.

“You okay?”

She was fighting to catch her breath, “Yeah, I’m okay.”

“I’m callin’ the police,” Melinda announced, rushing off to the phone at the front desk.

“What happened?” Don asked, moving to hold Y/n’s arms.

“I-I don’t know,” she ran a hand through her hair, “He came down the aisle and just lunged at me. I-I just offered to help him.”

With the man still fighting to break out of his hold, making sounds that made him seem possessed, Don pulled Y/n out of the aisle.

“I’m sorry, Don,” Y/n apologized, her voice still trembling.

“You got nothin’ to be sorry for, sweetheart,” he quickly shook his head, “Men gotta learn they can’t go gettin’ rough on a woman just cause they’ve had a bad day.”

The police arrived within ten minutes, running down the aisle and cuffing the monstrous man. Y/n stayed far away from her attacker as he was dragged out of the store, residing between Melinda and Don. She’d been asked if she wanted to press charges, but she declined. She just wanted the whole thing to be over.

“Take off now,” Don offered after the officers left.

“No, I-I’m okay,” Y/n smoothed her apron down with shaking hands.

“Don’t even try,” Don shook his head, “Get on out of here.”

Y/n took the first breath she could actually feel, wasting no time in dashing back to the break room and grabbing her purse out of her locker. She wanted to be as far away from anything about the afternoon as she could. Plus, it would mean she could pick Sarah up straight from school instead of the Adlers.

“I’ll see you guys tomorrow,” Y/n bid her co-workers farewell on the way out.

Don rasied a hand alongside Melinda, “See ya tomorrow. Wish Joel a happy birthday from us!”

The mention of his name got a smile out of Y/n, “I will.”

With Joel and Tommy having dropped her off, she had to call a cab to take her back to her apartment. She held in her tears until the front door was locked and she knew she was safe.

Why hadn’t she fought back? Fought harder? She was great with her words, but she’d never been able to physically defend herself. In the world they lived in, it was becoming more and more necessary for a woman to be able to throw a punch. Y/n felt weak for not fighting for her safety with the ferocity that Joel or Tommy would have. It just wasn’t in her nature to be violent, even if her own life was on the line.

She managed to collect herself, drying her tears and heading back down to her car. She was determined to put the incident behind her and not let it ruin her day.

Y/n parked directly outside the front of the school so Sarah couldn’t miss her. She waited against the car door, tapping her heel against the asphalt until a barrage of kids came pouring out of the building. Sarah clocked her just before she headed for the bus.

“I thought you were picking me up at home,” she called across the street.

“My shift ended early,” Y/n explained, excluding the reason why.

Sarah opened the passenger side door and jumped in, “Can we grab ice cream or something after?”

“Nice try,” Y/n started up her car, “I’m dropping you off at the Adler’s after this.”

Sarah let her head fall against her seat, with a small groan.

“Half an hour and then there’ll be some big birthday emergency,” Y/n offered, turning onto the next street over, “Seatbelt.”

It was these small domestic moments that showed just how good of a parent Y/n would make. She still didn’t believe she was doing anything exceptional, but the smallest acts of care meant the most. Making sure Sarah walked on the inside of the street, making sure she’d eaten enough, helping her with homework…all of that equated to Sarah knowing she had someone else looking out for her.

They made it downtown to the jewelry-clock repair shop within minutes. Their part of Austin was small enough that everything was five minutes away.

The owner at the front counter examined Joel’s watch, “Twenty.”

“That’s it?” Sarah asked, surprised.

“Okay,” the man smiled, “Thirty.”

“My little negotiator,” Y/n looked down at Sarah, smirking, “Let’s stick with twenty.”

“It’s a spring,” he explained as Sarah pulled out the twenty she’d taken from Joel, “I’ll do it right now.”

Y/n put an arm around Sarah’s shoulders and tugged her into her side, the two of them absentmindedly hugging as they glanced around the store. Behind them, a line of police cars followed by a fire truck sped down the street. It pulled Y/n back to an hour before.

“All day, I swear,” a woman emerged from the shop’s back room, switching between speaking in English and Arabic, “We’re closing.”

“It’s 3:15,” the owner responded, “We close at 7.”

The woman anxiously stood at the window, staring down the street. She lapsed back into Arabic as she addressed her partner, before putting her hands on Y/n and Sarah’s arms, “I’m very sorry, he cannot finish.”

“I already finished,” the man replied, holding out the boxed watch to his wife.

She pressed the box into Y/n’s hands, “You should go home.”

“W-wait,” Y/n stuttered as the woman rushed them out of the shop, “Wh-“

“Go home,” the woman urged, staring into Y/n’s eyes with a desperation a child could never understand.

She shut the door on Y/n and Sarah, flipping the ‘open’ sign to ‘closed’ after and pulling the blinds.

“That was weird,” Sarah muttered.

“Yeah,” Y/n watched as the woman continued shutting the blinds in the windows.

Successful in their quest, Y/n and Sarah loaded themselves back in the car and headed home. On the way, they passed four more police cars and one more fire engine. Austin had its fair share of crime, especially downtown, but this was out of the ordinary.

“What do you think’s going on?” Sarah asked at one point.

“No idea,” Y/n answered, pulling them into the driveway of Joel’s home and unbuckling, “I’ll check the news. Go be a good person.”

“I’m timing you,” Sarah said firmly.

Y/n smiled, “Go.”

Sarah dragged herself and her backpack out of the car and trudged across the Adler’s lawn. Y/n watched her lovingly, she had the biggest heart of anyone she knew, it was just butting heads with teenage hormones.

Y/n let herself into the Miller’s house, her body relaxing as soon as the door shut. She kicked off her sneakers and headed for the living room, switching on the television. She changed the channel to the local news station, expecting to see a fire or mass shooting. All the anchors said was that there had been reports of heightened violence throughout the day and that citizens should avoid going downtown. That lined up with what Y/n had experienced at the store, apparently the city of Austin was acting like a collective asshole.

Satisfied, Y/n busied herself with laundry and taking care of the dishes from breakfast until she scanned the clock, seeing it was ten past the time she said she’d pick Sarah up at.

She went outside, crossed the shared lawn and knocked on the Adler’s front door. Connie was the one to open it.

“Well, there she is,” the woman exclaimed, “Come in!”

They entered into the hallway, which smelled like cookies and mothballs, and Y/n spotted Sarah sitting in the kitchen, bag packed and a barely concealed frown on her face.

“I’m sendin’ you two home with some cookies,” Connie said, bustling around the kitchen for a Ziploc, “They’re raisin.”

“Oh, yay,” Y/n feigned excitement, following her in and stroking a hand across Sarah’s hair, “Those’re Joel’s favorite.”

Sarah fought the laugh caught in her throat, Joel would’ve rather died than touch anything with raisins in it.

Connie handed Y/n the bag and took her other hand, “You tell him happy birthday from us.”

“We will,” Y/n smiled before they headed down the hall and to the door.

“Wait,” Sarah mumbled just as they were walking out. She stopped to see Mercy, the Adler’s dog, whining at Nana Adler, seated in her chair as usual.

“Dogs are super tuned into their owners,” Y/n explained, “Some studies suggest that they can sense if their person’s in pain.”

Sarah hummed and accepted the answer, exiting out the front door with Y/n. “You were late,” she stated.

“I was doing your laundry,” Y/n replied, dipping her hand along Sarah’s through a lawn sprinkler, “So I’d say we’re even.”

The sun was just setting, a warm pink taking over the sky as night’s opening act. Kids, home from school, were playfully screaming a few houses down. Everything felt perfectly in place.

An overhead thundering encroached on the peaceful scene, drawing Sarah and Y/n’s attention skyward. Three fighter jets in formation blew over their heads, flying in the general direction of downtown.

“Air Force base isn’t too far from here,” Y/n commented, it was the only explanation that made sense.

Sarah didn’t seem too concerned, cutting ahead across the lawn and up to the front porch.

Inside, Y/n busied herself with cooking dinner while Sarah sat at the table finishing up homework. The steaks she’d bought a few days prior had gone bad, and she was searching the fridge for anything she could turn into something special.

Pressing her forehead to the appliance’s cool steel, she admitted defeat.

“You know Dad’s not picky,” Sarah tried to comfort her.

“Yeah, well, I wanted to do something nice for him,” Y/n replied, kicking her foot lightly against the fridge, “But I suppose ordering Chinese is just as special.”

“We could always run by the store,” Sarah suggested.

“Mm-mm,” Y/n shook her head, digging through the takeout menu drawer, “No one’s going anywhere while there’s all those cops on the road.”

They ended up ordering enough for themselves, Joel and Tommy, if he decided to stay for dinner. As the night went on, the food grew cold, and by eight o’clock, Y/n and Sarah grew too hungry to wait and sat on the couch with their cartons.

“If he’s home by nine,” Sarah thought the next part of her sentence over carefully, “I’ll give you a whole week off of helping me with my homework.”

“Doesn’t feel like much of a win,” Y/n shrugged, picking at another piece of orange chicken. They were coming up with bets for when they thought Joel would actually return home, “I don’t mind being on homework duty.”

“Okay, fine, um…” Sarah continued drafting, snapping her chopsticks together, “I’ll do the dishes for a week. Every load.”

Y/n waved a chopstick at the girl, “Done. But if he’s home past nine, I will…get him to learn one of the Halican Drops’ songs,” she tilted her head, “That’s a win for you and will definitely cost me.”

Sarah laughed, “Deal.”

They spent the evening talking and watching tv, the later hours eventually tiring them. Sarah leaned up against Y/n, lost in a magazine while Y/n read a book she’d left on the coffee table. The television played lightly in the background, though they’d stopped paying attention long ago.

Eventually, five after ten, a pair of keys jingled in the front door lock, signaling Sarah had won the bet.

“You locked the door this time,” Joel said, addressing his daughter, “Good job.”

“Yeah,” Sarah switched off the tv and sat up, “Y/n reminded me.”

Y/n scooted over to give Joel a spot on the couch, he flopped down on the cushions, digging his palms into his eyes.

“It’s 10,” Sarah said what they were all thinking.

“I know,” Joel groaned, pulling back up to take off his boots, “They…gave us the wrong size for the headers,” he looked over his girlfriend to Sarah, “That doesn’t mean anything to you, barely means anything to Y/n. I’m sorry.”

Y/n’s fingers walked across Joel’s leg, “And dessert would be…?”

Joel slumped forward, “Shit.”

“Come on, man,” Sarah bemoaned.

“I’ll get us one tomorrow,” Joel promised for the second time that day.

“Swear,” Sarah replied, “Or you don’t get your present.”

Joel turned, brightening up adorably fast. “You got me a present?”

“Swear,” Sarah continued.

Y/n smiled, eyeing her boyfriend with the same loving frustration as Sarah.

“On my life,” Joel swore.

Deeming it an acceptable answer, Sarah rotated and dug behind a pillow. Joel slid his hand over Y/n’s, flattening it down against his knee.

Sarah presented the box, holding it out to her dad.

“Wow,” Joel said, making a theatrical face before opening it. He hadn’t expected what was inside.

“Fixed it for you,” Sarah beamed with reserved pride.

Joel ran a thumb over the watch and held it to his ear, furrowing his brows, “Did you?”

“What?” Sarah reached for his hand.

“I don’t hear anything,” Joel continued.

“It was working four hours ago,” Y/n exclaimed, adjusting herself to sit up and examine it for herself.

The two girls barely had to raise it to their ears before they could hear the strong ticking. Sarah groaned and lightly shoved Joel, who was heartily laughing.

Y/n rolled her eyes, “Screw you, man.”

“That was lame,” Sarah smiled, “You’re lame.”

“Yeah, I know,” Joel chuckled, taking another second to admire his gift, “Where’d you get the money for this?”

“Drugs,” Sarah answered, “I sell hardcore drugs.”

“It’s better than what I do,” Joel slipped the watch onto his wrist.

“It was only $20, which I stole from you.”

“Which I had,” Y/n interjected, “If you’d have given me two seconds...”

“I could have stolen $60, but I put the change back,” Sarah defended herself against Joel’s parental stare, “Because I’m an honest thief. Besides, it’s the thought that counts. And you were never gonna do it for yourself, so…”

Joel, never one to be selfish, looked on lovingly at his daughter and co-conspirator, before turning his head downward. “Thank you.”

Sarah smiled, looking to Y/n victoriously. “Oh, there’s one more,” she dug behind the pillow once again and retrieved a DVD case, “Borrowed it from the Adlers.”

Joel wasted no time in taking it from her, it was Curtis and Viper, the guiltiest of all guilty pleasure movies. “Oh, this is the one with the deleted scenes.”

“Yeah, imagine how bad those have to be,” Sarah commented, “Come on, pop it in, while it’s still your birthday.”

Y/n got up alongside Joel, “I’ll go heat up dinner and brace myself for the cinematic masterpiece I’m about to experience.”

“I showed it to you a while back,” Joel called out to her, “Remember?”

“I remember,” Y/n swung into the kitchen, “And yet I’m still with you.”

Joel smirked to himself, setting the disc in the tray and jogging off to join Y/n. “Chinese?”

“There was going to be something home cooked,” Y/n scooped some food onto a plate for Joel, “But the grocery gods were conspiring against me.”

“Kidding? This is great,” Joel replied, coming to hold Y/n’s hips and move around the kitchen with her. He settled his chin against her head, “Thank you. For all of it.”

Y/n leaned back into Joel’s chest, “I don’t see how crappy Chinese food and aiding your daughter in thievery deserves thanks but,” she twisted her neck to plant a kiss on his cheek, “I’ll take it.”

Joel absentmindedly ran his hands up Y/n’s arms, gazing down at her skin. His eyes drifted to her exposed neck, the glow of the microwave illuminating a purple splotch across her throat.

“What’s this?”

Y/n was watching the timer, “Hm?”

Joel pulled back the rest of her hair and lightly ran a finger over the skin, “Where’d you get this?”

Y/n pulled away, confusedly grabbing a spatchula out of a drawer and relfecting it back on her. Sure enough, there was a large purple bruise developing where the psycho in the hardware store had choked her.

“Hm,” Y/n thought, she hadn’t intended to ruin the levity of the night, “Uh, are we sure you didn’t put that there?”

Joel bristled at the idea, even at his most passionate, he wasn’t rough like that, “I’d never do this to you.”

Y/n sighed, pressing the ‘stop’ button on the microwave before it could beep. She pulled Joel’s food out, set it down and leaned up against the counter.

“A guy attacked me today at work,” she said softly, not wanting Sarah to hear.

Joel’s eyebrows raised two inches, his voice got low, “What?”

“He came down the aisle and just,” Y/n gestured suddenly to herself, “Tackled me to the ground. It took three of the guys, plus Don just to get him off of me.”

Joel surged forward, hovering his hand over Y/n’s neck and examining her, “How bad is it?”

“I’m okay,” Y/n gently took Joel’s hand, bringing it down to his side, “Headache from smacking my head on the floor, little sore, but fine.”

“Please tell me you called the police and pressed charges” Joel asked, fully in protector mode.

Y/n shook her head, “I didn’t wanna drag it out, I just wanted the whole thing to be over. The cops took him, they can deal with it.”

Joel braced himself against the counter to Y/n’s side, halfway-caging her in. “And you weren’t gonna tell me about it?”

“It’s your birthday,” Y/n smiled softly up at her boyfriend, “I just wanted to come home and have a normal evening with you guys. Forget it ever happened.”

Anger swelled in Joel’s stomach for whatever freak had gone after her, but his gaze stayed soft. Her pain was his pain.

“Wanna know what the worst part was?” Y/n asked, looping a finger through Joel’s and smiling sadly, “I could have fought back…but I just laid there. I tried to push him off but…”

There was no need for her to finish the sentence. Joel’s mind flashed back to the night they’d met, when that creep had laid his hand on her and she hadn’t fought back. It was one of his deepest worries, that one day someone would come at her and he wouldn’t be there to protect her.

“Can you please,” he begged, “Enroll in a self-defense class?”

“Yes,” Y/n agreed, saying whatever she could to get the night to return to normal, “I think there’s one down at the community center.”

Joel’s shoulders rose and fell with his sigh, cupping the back of her neck and drawing her into his body. She wrapped her arms around his middle, digging her face into his pec.

“I hate the world sometimes,” Joel said over her shoulder.

Y/n scoffed, “You and me both, bucko.”

They stood in each other’s arms a moment, letting the stress of the day melt away.

“Your daughter’s waiting,” Y/n smiled into Joel’s chest, “And she’s been waiting all night.”

Joel broke from her, stroking a thumb over her cheek. He was looking forward to revealing the reason for his late night hours.

With dinner in hand, Joel and Y/n headed back into the living room, where Sarah was waiting with the remote. Joel settled down in the middle of the couch, giving him room to be surrounded by his two favorite people.

“Don’t fall asleep,” he warned, as Sarah snuggled into his shoulder.

“‘Course I won’t,” she said, “It’s too riveting.”

“I make no such promises,” Y/n replied, hanging one of her legs on Joel’s knee.

Both of them were out cold within an hour.

Joel couldn’t complain even if he tried. With Sarah passed out on his leg Y/n tucked under his arm, it was the happiest he’d been the whole day.

While watching the movie, Joel’s mind kept spinning around proposal ideas. If he got the ring in the morning, he could do it that night. Or did he need to spend more time, crafting some elaborate idea involving doves and roses and all the movie shit? Y/n wasn’t fancy, she probably wouldn’t care if that was missing. All he cared about was that she said ‘yes’ and that the ring was something she could cherish the rest of their lives.

Joel gazed down at his daughter and soon-to-be fiancé, fast asleep on him. A lifetime of that was a thought he could get used to…

The vibration of his cell phone broke Joel out of his daydream. He reached forward, trying not to wake either girl, bur Y/n stirred enough to come to.

“Sorry,” he whispered, picking up the call, “Hello?”

“Joel, it’s me,” Tommy’s voice cut through, Y/n’s head was close enough to hear the call, “Uh, I’m okay.”

“Yeah?” Joel asked.

“But I’m in jail.”

Y/n sat up groggily as Joel arched back into the couch, rubbing his eyes in stress.

“Wasn’t my fault this time,” Tommy was quick to defend himself, “I was at the bar, some guy goes crazy, starts swingin’ at waitresses, I stepped in, knocked him out, cops showed up-”

Joel and Y/n shared an exhausted look, both from true tiredness and Tommy.

“Look, it doesn’t matter,” Tommy hurried, “You gotta bail me out.”

“Now?” Joel hissed.

“It’s Friday,” Tommy said, “You don’t get me out, I’m in here all weekend. It’s a fuckin’ madhouse, Joel. I gotta get out.”

Y/n rubbed the sleep out of her eye, and lowered her voice, “I’ll go get him.”

Joel’s hand shot out across Y/n’s legs, “No,” he switched conversations, “Well, which jail. Travis County?”

“Yeah, on 10th,” his little brother answered.

“Damn it, Tommy,” Joel shook his head.

Tommy took a breath, “I’m sorry…please.”

Joel waited before answering, “Okay,” he hung up his cell, “Fuckin’ idiot.”

“Joel, just let me go,” Y/n offered, gesturing to Sarah using his leg as a pillow, “You got him last time.”

“I don’t want you out this late,” Joel shot down the idea a second time, “Especially in that part of town. I’ll be back, hour tops.”

Carefully, Joel eased Sarah off of him and lifted her into his arms. He carried her upstairs to bed while Y/n stayed on the couch, trying to get her bearings.

Joel came back downstairs, grumbling to himself as he collected his wallet and keys.

“We do all this,” Y/n gestured to the empty dinner plate and gift box, “And Tommy’s still gotta one up us.”

“Yeah, well,” Joel muttered, throwing his cell phone in his pocket, “I shoulda just left him in there.”

Y/n looked up amusedly at her boyfriend, “Yeah, like you’d ever do that.”

Joel’s instinct was to protect, he couldn’t have left his brother to rot for the weekend if he tried.

Y/n got to her feet and slid a hand up Joel’s chest, bringing his restlessness to a halt. She wrapped her other hand around the base of his neck, rubbing at the permanently tense muscles.

“Happy Birthday to you,” she sleepily smiled.

Joel leaned forward to connect his lips to Y/n’s. In an ideal world, he’d carry her upstairs and they’d fall asleep in each other’s arms. But after rescuing Tommy, they’d have the whole weekend for that. Still, he poured as much love as he could into his kiss.

Neither of them knew it would be the last one they shared.

“Be safe,” Y/n told him once they broke apart.

“I will,” Joel replied, heading for the front door, “Go to bed. Be back soon.”

Y/n nodded, her eyes following him till he was out of the house. In her stupor, she wasn’t thinking of how packed the streets had been earlier in the day with cop cars. Or how the news had said there’d been increased violence in the city. Or how the story Tommy had recounted sounded eerily similar to hers. She was just tired enough that all that made sense to her was climbing into Joel’s bed and going back to sleep.

Slowly climbing the staircase, Y/n made her way down the hall. She paused outside of Sarah’s room, poking her head in to make sure she was settled. Joel had thrown a blanket over her and she was rolling over. Satisfied, Y/n pushed off of the door frame to leave.

“Mom?”

She froze in her tracks, she’d barely moved out of sight before Sarah had called for…someone. Not her. It couldn’t be her. But who else? She had no memory of her birth mo-

“Mom?”

Y/n’s chest fluttered, it could only be her. She hesitated to answer, “Yeah?”

“Where’s Dad?” Sarah asked, her eyes were still scrunched but she was looking to Y/n’s silhouette.

“He had to run by Uncle Tommy’s,” Y/n answered, saving the full answer for the morning, “He’ll be back soon.”

Sarah seemed to accept the response, nodding a little and settling back into her pillow.

“Goodnight,” Y/n wished, her hands awkwardly fidgeting against her chest.

“Night,” Sarah mumbled.

Slipping against the nearest wall, Y/n’s breath trembled with joy, shock…she couldn’t tell. Sarah had made up her mind as to what Y/n was to her…and what she was was a mother.

Feeling like she was floating, Y/n made her way down the hall to the bed that was as good as her own and slid underneath the sheets. Her smile stretched so wide, she thought her cheeks might split. She couldn’t wait to tell Joel when he got home….

—————————

First came the sirens.

Then came the choppers.

Then the car alarms.

And the flares.

Y/n was the first to wake, the sound of helicopter blades and the sensation of the house rattling waking her. She reached over in the dark for Joel and grasped air. The clock read 2:15AM, he’d left at 11.

That was enough to wake Y/n the rest of the way up.

She rolled out of bed and went to the window, peeking through the blinds to see flares being shot into the sky. Though her vision was blurred from sleep, she could see the smoke cloud in the distance. It was coming from downtown.

“Dad?” Sarah called down the hall, “Y/n?”

“In here,” Y/n said, still watching the sky as another round of helicopters flew over their neighborhood.

Sarah came through the door, “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” Y/n answered, her stomach twisting in confusion, “Go check if your dad’s downstairs.”

Sarah left, calling for Joel as she descended the staircase. “He’s not here,” she yelled up.

Y/n’s chest sank, anxiety beginning to creep its way up her throat. Was this some kind of invasion? It had barely been two years since 9/11, was something of that scale happening in their backyard?

“Y/n!”

The urgency in Sarah’s voice got Y/n moving out the bedroom and down the stairs as quick as she could. “What is it?”

Sarah had switched on the tv, the emergency broadcast signal was on every channel, delivering an ominous message to stay indoors and wait for law enforcement.

A thud against the window had Y/n pulling Sarah to her chest, the girl wrapping her hands around Y/n’s wrists. Mercy, the Adler’s dog, had his paws against the window and was trying to get inside.

“Stay here,” Y/n told Sarah, heading to unlock the front door. She crouched down on the porch and the dog leaned against her legs, whining. “Shh, Mercy, shh…”

“Is he okay?” Sarah asked, right behind Y/n.

“I think,” Y/n answered, clueless as Mercy panted furiously under her touch. She looked across the street, finding nothing out of the ordinary visually. Audibly, there were car alarms coming from all directions and the chopper was making another circle around the subdivision. Something felt very, very wrong.

“Stay here,” Y/n told Sarah, “I’m gonna take a look around.”

“No, I’m coming with-“

“No,” Y/n’s tone firmed up, “Take Mercy inside and stay-“

Mercy started barking as if he knew he was being discussed. Y/n knew nothing she said would get Sarah to listen, she was out of options.

“Let’s get him back home,” she said.

Sarah led Mercy by the collar across the lawn and onto the Adler’s driveway. Once he realized he was back at his house, Mercy began to whine and pull away from Sarah.

“C’mon, Mercy, please,” Sarah begged.

Mercy pulled one final time, the collar unclipping and letting him loose. He took off into the night.

“Mercy!” Sarah called, he was too far gone to hear her.

“It’s okay,” Y/n quickly tried to smooth Sarah’s heartbreak over, “We’ll find him. But first, we’re going home and-“

Clanking from inside the Adler’s home drew their attention.

“Mrs. Adler?” Sarah called, receiving no answer, she looked to Y/n to decide their next move.

Y/n was torn between following the noise and running back home to call Joel.

“Stay behind me,” she decided, placing herself in front of Sarah as a barricade.

They crept up the Adler’s porch, letting themselves in through the ajar door. The carpet runner was scrunched up, something the meticulous Connie would have never allowed.

“Connie?” Y/n announced their presence.

“Mrs. Adler?” Sarah repeated, the two of them frozen in the hallway.

Another loud sound from the kitchen, followed by a distant gunshot and chased by a car alarm.

Y/n tried to inhale steadily, but the trembling came anyway. The long stretches of silence broken up by what sounded like war were creating a steady pit of fear in her chest.

She reached backwards, pulling Sarah closer to her body. The girl was already holding onto Y/n’s hips. They took soft steps through the hall and to the kitchen.

“Con-“ Y/n held on to the room divider as she stumbled, looking down to see the slippery substance across the floor.

Blood.

Sarah and Y/n’s breaths caught in their chests as their eyes followed the trail of crimson through the kitchen…to Mr. Adler, laid against the cabinets.

“Help me,” he whispered, a particularly gory wound to his neck oozing blood down his body.

Y/n moved to help him but was yanked back by Sarah, who already had eyes on the next terror.

Nana Adler was hung over her daughter, her face burrowed into her neck.

Y/n eased Sarah back, making no sudden movements, as the elderly woman slowly looked up to them. There were strands of something springing from her mouth, it was something out of a horror movie.

Nana rose to her feet, her movements choppy and careless, and Sarah wrapped her arms around Y/n’s torso.

The woman, animalistic, shrieked and ran towards them.

Y/n shoved Sarah back towards the door, racing out of the house and onto the lawn. She was pulling the girl toward their house when the roar of a pickup truck came barreling down the street.

Tommy’s truck.

Tommy pulled the truck up onto the curb, Joel jumped out before it had even stopped.

“GET IN THE TRUCK,” he yelled at Y/n and Sarah, “RIGHT NOW!”

With Sarah in her hands, Joel grabbed Y/n and pulled them to the vehicle, “Move!”

Nana Adler came screaming out of the house, Y/n and the Millers watching the bones in her body violently crack under her skin before she fell to the ground. They waited in anticipation until she startled back to life with a gasp, stumbling to her feet and charging towards the family.

“What are we doin’, Joel?” Tommy yelled, his rifle pointed at the grandmother.

Y/n wrapped Sarah in her arms, shielding her body from any harm, but not her eyes.

Joel wasted no time in making the decision, it was either her, or the women he loved. He slashed the wrench he was clutching into Nana’s head, the life leaving her as she dropped.

After, he turned to Y/n and Sarah, their tearful eyes widened in horror. He rushed to them, bending to cup Sarah’s cheek.

“You killed her,” the girl said, unable to form a deeper thought.

Joel pulled his daughter and partner into his arms, “Baby, I’m sorry.”

“Joel, we gotta go,” Tommy warned.

“Joel,” Y/n shook, “What’s going on?”

“Listen to me,” he looked to both his girls, “It’s not just the Adlers,” he took Sarah’s cheeks into his hands, “But we’re gonna be brave, and we’re gonna get out of this.”

A flash of green to their left and Joel was covering them with his arms. The transformer at the end of the block had exploded.

“Hey,” Tommy rounded the truck, “Let’s go. C’mon!”

Joel and Y/n hurried Sarah in front of them, “Get in.”

Y/n stopped before joining her, gripping Joel’s arm, “Joel…”

“I don’t know,” he shook his head, posessing no more answers than she did, “I don’t know.”

Y/n dove into the truck, pulling Sarah into her arms the minute she was seated.

Joel slammed the door shut, his neighbor calling his name out in concern.

“Denise, you get back inside the house,” he yelled, “You lock your doors! Now!”

“C’mon, c’mon, get in,” Tommy urged.

The second Joel’s door shut, Tommy was already pulling them around the cul-de-sac. As he rounded the turn, Mr. and Mrs. Adler came across their lawn and into the street, in the same possessed state as Nana had been.

“Get your seatbelt on,” Joel told Tommy.

“Hold on,” his brother said, accelerating the engine and ramming into the Adlers head on.

Y/n tried to pull Sarah’s head into her shoulder, but the girl was too quick, already looking out the back to see Mrs. Adler on her feet.

“You take 70-“ Joel began to give directions.

“71,” Tommy finished, “I know.”

A line of police cars blew down the opposite lane, speeding towards more chaos they didn’t even understand.

Sarah’s breath had steadied enough where she could speak clearly, “Daddy-“

“We don’t know,” Joel cut her off.

“They’re saying it’s a virus,” Tommy explained, “Some kinda parasite.”

“What parasite does that?” Y/n asked, knowing none of them had an answer.

“Is it from terrorists?” Sarah asked, her voice getting watery.

“We don’t know,” Joel repeated himself, watching his brother as he drove.

“A-are we sick?” Sarah’s panic was growing.

“No, we’re not sick,” Y/n answered immediately.

Joel fiddled with the radio, getting static back in return.

“Why did things blow up?” Sarah asked.

“No cellphone, no radio,” Tommy mused, “Minute ago, newsman wouldn’t shut up.”

“They were broadcasting emergency signals on the tv,” Y/n recalled, as if it made any difference now.

“How do you know?” Sarah kept up her questioning.

“What?” Joel acknowledged her.

Sarah couldn’t hide her tears any more, “How do you know we’re not sick?”

Y/n stroked her hair, offering what little comfort she could while also sharing Sarah’s terror.

“They’re sayin’ it’s mostly people in the city,” Tommy explained, “That’s why they got the highway blocked off.”

Joel craned his head to meet Y/n’s eyes, “This what happened at the store today?”

“Yeah,” Y/n answered, flashing back to 12 hours before. Her attacker hadn’t had the strange strands hanging from his mouth, but he’d had the same animal-like rage.

The car fell silent again as they passed a house, the whole structure consumed by flames.

“It’s Jimmy’s place,” Tommy said as they drove by.

“The Adlers would take Nana into the city,” Sarah continued to try and solve the puzzle, “To the hospital for stuff.”

“That’s right,” Joel agreed, “They would. That’s probably why.”

“But…” Sarah’s brain worked double time, “You’d have to go a lot…right?”

Tommy shook his head slightly, “We’re fine, trust me.”

Through the dashboard mirror, Y/n’s worried eyes met Tommy’s. He was saying a prayer rather than stating a promise.

On the side of the road, a car was pulled over, a family standing outside it waving their hands wildly. “Here! Right here!”

Tommy began to slow down, drawing Joel’s confusion. “What’re you doin’?”

“They got a kid, Joel,” Tommy gestured to the family.

“So do we,” Joel said firmly, “Keep drivin’.”

The father panicked as Tommy followed orders, screaming for them to stop.

“We could put them in the back,” Sarah offered just as they passed them by.

Y/n’s heart sank as the father’s cries echoed in her ears, her eyes drifting to the back of Joel’s head.

“Somebody else’ll come along,” he said to the car, but mostly to himself.

Sarah, trying so hard to remain calm, let her tears fall silently. Whatever shred of reality they could make of the chaos around them was starting to sink in on Y/n too. She pulled Sarah deeper into her arms, feeling the girl’s sadness land on her skin.

Tommy sped down the lane, trying to get on the freeway, and meeting the sea of likeminded cars.

“Fuck,” he exclaimed, “Everyone had the same fuckin’ idea.

Panicked drivers were speeding towards them, the little white lines on the asphalt ceasing to matter.

“I can’t get through this,” Tommy said, dodging the cars.

“All right, all right,” Joel tried to remain calm, “Let’s think it through, we’ll think it through.”

“Tommy!” Y/n cried as another reckless driver nearly clipped them.

“All right, take the field,” Joel directed, “We’ll cut across and pick up on the-the west side.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,” Tommy’s breath shook, “West, west, all right. All right, hang on.”

Sarah held onto Y/n a little tighter, bracing herself as Tommy went off road into the tall grass. The truck dipped and bounced with the land, until they met smooth dirt…giving them a view of the freeway. The military had already set up shop.

“Shit,” Tommy exclaimed, “Fuckin’ army!”

“Isn’t that good?” Sarah asked

“It’s good for them” Tommy said, “But that’s the highway we’re tryin’ to get to.”

Joel’s brain was spinning with roads, “All right, keep movin’. Head north.”

“Could be a lot of people,” Tommy pointed out.

“Well, we can’t go south, we can’t go east, we can’t go west,” Joel replied, “Hell else we supposed to go?”

Tommy hesitated, his hands nervously gripping the wheel.

“Tommy, come on,” Joel yelled, his own anxiety beginning to show itself.

Listening, Tommy turned the truck north, leading them towards the distant light of a small town.

“Yeah. Yeah, I know that place,” Joel said, “This can work.”

“Joel,” Y/n spoke up, “What then? Where are we going?”

He didn’t know, he barely could remember the numbers of the highways. All he knew was he needed to get his family to some sort of safety. “I don’t know, Mexico,” he blurted out, “Just far, far as we can,” he looked to his brother, “How much gas?”

“Three quarter tank,” Tommy answered, it was enough to make it to the border.

“Go through town,” Joel began to list off directions, “Golf course by the river, straight across, we pick up the highway on the other side of the blockade…” he exhaled, “Then we’re out.”

“Maybe it’s everywhere,” Sarah theorized, trying so desperately to make sense of what was happening, “Maybe there’s nowhere to go.”

Joel and Yn’s worried eyes met in the dashboard mirror, they were both wondering the same thing. Illnesses didn’t stay quarantined to just one city in one state, they spread like vines, reaching for any life they could. What if this parasite worked the same way?

A loud roar began to encroach on the truck from above.

“What the fuck?” Tommy exclaimed.

Sarah and Y/n shielded their ears from the noise, looking up through the roof’s glass top to catch a low-flying plane directly above them. There were a line of three more trailing the sky behind them.

“Shit,” Y/n whispered, her facade for Sarah was fading.

Down the road, the red white and blue lights of a police car became a stumbling block. “Son of a bitch,” Tommy complained, “Gotta go around. Grab somethin’!”

Joel reached an arm back, both to brace himself against Tommy’s seat and give Y/n something to hold onto. Sarah held fast to Y/n as Tommy made a hard right down the next street. The town they’d turned into had descended fully into chaos, its residents running wildly through the streets, either screaming for help or attacking one other.

“All right,” Joel talked his brother through the roads, “Keep goin’, keep goin’,” he looked to his left to see a truck barreling towards them, “Shit, Tommy!”

The tire screech had Y/n flipping Sarah’s body over hers, making herself a human shield. Thankfully, the crash never came.

The next street Tommy turned them down was even worse. People were beating each other senselessly in the street, the screams of the wounded piercing their ears.

“Tommy, you can’t stop here,” Joel said as his brother slowed the car.

He gestured to the crowds, “I can’t drive through ‘em.”

“Are you serious?” Joel yelled, “Just keep goin’!”

Up ahead, an explosion shattered the windows of a building, eliciting every person inside to run for their lives, all headed towards the truck.

“Go, go, go,” Joel urged, smacking the dashboard a little harder with each utterance, “Back, back, back, back, back, back, back!”

“I’m tryin’!” Tommy yelled back.

Y/n caught the faces of people as they ran past, the terror, the confusion in their eyes. One woman had blood streaming down her chest, the deep red turning her white blouse deathly crimson.

“Tommy, go faster,” Joel berated, “We gotta go!”

“I’m tryin’, there’s nowhere to fuckin’ go,” Tommy said, maneuvering them backwards.

“Tommy,” Y/n couldn’t stay quiet, “Fuck, anywhere!”

“Find an alley!” Joel added.

“What alley?! There’s people everywhere!”

“Roll the fuck over them,” Joel ordered, “We gotta get off this street.”

Sarah had shifted out of Y/n’s arms and was staring out the back, watching as the humanity was sucked out of her city. In the sky, she could spot bright, blinking lights headed straight for them.

She blindly reached for Y/n’s hand, “Dad?!”

Y/n and Joel both turned, their eyes falling on the same sight. One of the planes was headed straight towards them.

“Fuck,” Y/n uttered breathlessly.

“Move…” Joel managed to say, “Move!”

The plane completed its nosedive into the road behind them, exploding in a fiery inferno. Joel reached back to grab hold of Sarah, Y/n shoved her down into her lap.

None of them saw the piece of debris heading for the truck.

—————————

Joel was the first one to wake up. He struggled out of his seatbelt, dropping to the roof of the flipped truck and looking into the back.

Y/n and Sarah were out cold.

Sarah’s leg was elevated, her foot caught in some part of the truck. Y/n lay in a terrifyingly still ball.

“Sarah…Sarah…” Joel weakly called, tugging on her free leg and startling her awake, “Stay right there. Don’t move,” he looked to Y/n, “Y/n, wake up.”

No response.

“Rosebud,” Joel urged, his voice betraying him and turning to a whine, “Honey, get up.”

“Y/n,” Sarah disobeyed her father, fear-stricken, and stretched her arm out to shake Y/n.

Y/n gasped, waking up the same way she’d passed out; panicked.

“Joel,” she cried out, “Sarah?”

“We’re here,” Joel reassured her, a hand to her arm, “We’re here. Tommy? You okay?”

Tommy grunted, trying to free himself, “Yeah, I’m okay.”

With a pounding headache, and the feeling of air hitting small cuts across her face, Y/n struggled to her knees. Nothing felt broken inside her, just weak.

Sarah’s breathing began to pick up, turning her body to stare out the busted window. Twenty feet away, someone was heaving over a body, draining it of blood the same way Nana Adler had.

“Sarah,” Joel moved to the back of the truck, “Don’t look. You look at me or Y/n, okay?”

Y/n was at Joel’s side instantly, gently holding Sarah’s calf so he could free her leg. The girl winced as Joel worked.

“I’m sorry, baby, I know, I know,” he apologized profusely, letting her leg drop into Y/n’s hands.

“Come here,” he urged his daughter, “Put your arms around me. Come here, come here,” he pulled Sarah into his embrace, “I got you.”

Y/n was crawling past, into the driver’s half of the truck, “Tommy?”

Tommy was already out, kneeling down at the window, “Come on, take my hand!”

Straining to reach him, Y/n slapped her palms against his and he dragged her out. She could feel the glass scrape against her skin, trying to hold her cries in for Sarah’s sake.

Tommy and Y/n pulled each other to their feet, Tommy reaching for his rifle after. Joel and Sarah had made it out on the other side. Y/n rushed around the wreckage of the truck to reach them, grabbing them both, “What’s wrong?”

“My ankle,” Sarah strained.

“We gotta get off the street,” Tommy urged, a fast approaching siren sending him diving for the asphalt, “Shit!”

A police van slammed into their truck, creating a fire between the two vehicles. Joel and Y/n shielded Sarah from the flames, “Tommy?”

Y/n wrapped her arms around Sarah, trying to take some of the weight off her ankle and freeing Joel.

“Tommy!” Joel screamed again.

Separated by the two totaled bodies, the brothers found each other.

“Head to the river,” Tommy shouted, “I’ll find a way!”

Joel hesitated to leave his brother behind, regardless of his competency.

“Get ‘em out of here,” Tommy insisted, “Go, Joel!”

It was the mention of Y/n and Sarah that snapped him back, he immediately turned and bent down to Sarah’s eye level.

“We can’t leave him,” she argued.

“Joel-“ Y/n began.

“He’ll be fine,” Joel said, “Can you both run?”

“No,” Sarah said as Y/n nodded.

Joel bent over and swung his daughter into his arms.

“You keep your eyes on us,” Joel half demanded, half begged Sarah, “Okay?”

“Okay,” she breathed.

“And don’t look anywhere else,” he finished, his panicked gaze moving to Y/n, “Don’t let go.”

Y/n locked one arm around Joel’s shoulders, the other under Sarah’s legs, needing one hand on them both.

The three of them rushed through the street, lost as to how to get to the river. Joel stopped in fear when they found a grouping of bodies, groaning, writhing, devouring one another on the ground. He guided Sarah’s head back into his body, but she’d already seen too much.

One of the monsters popped up, eerily fast.

Y/n and Joel’s hearts collectively stopped, anxiety kick starting them to run for the back door of a building. They dove inside, Y/n running ahead to bang on the locked door.

“Move,” Joel cried, kicking down the wood and pulling them through it, “Get ahead!”

Y/n jumped in front of them, racing down the length of the diner. She could hear the frantic footsteps and growls of the monster chasing them.

Slamming her body into the second door, Y/n cleared the path for Joel, the two of them sprinting away from the encroaching death nipping at their heels. The monster snarled as it came after them, too quick for Y/n or Joel even at their fastest-

BANG!

A shotgun fire silenced the animalistic sounds, Joel spun around to see the creature laid out in the grass, blood spilling from its head.

“It’s okay, baby,” he assured Sarah, “You’re safe.”

Y/n’s hands dropped to Joel’s arm, resting her head against his shoulder in an effort to catch her breath.

“C’mon,” Joel urged, turning around for the way of the river.

A searchlight hit them.

“Don’t move,” a stern voice commanded, through the light, Y/n and Joel could make out it was a soldier.

“My daughter’s hurt,” Joel explained, “Her ankle.”

“Stop right there,” the soldier ordered, they’d barely moved in his direction.

Y/n and Sarah both trembled, in shock at the sight of the rifle pointed at them.

“Okay,” Joel backed down, taking them the slightest step back, “Easy now. We’re not sick!”

The soldier reached for his radio, reporting into it, “I got three civilians by the river, one of ‘em injured,” he waited for a response, “Ankle.”

“What about Uncle Tommy?” Sarah looked up to Joel.

“We’re gonna get you somewhere safe first,” Joel panted, “Then we’ll go back for him, okay?”

“Okay,” Sarah accepted.

Y/n rubbed a hand over Sarah’s uninjured leg. The horror still had yet to be named, but they were so close to asylum from it.

An impatient Joel took a step forward, earning another up and close look at the rifle’s barrel.

“Hey,” the soldier shouted, “No one told you to move.”

Y/n trembled against Joel’s arm as they waited, why was it taking so long?

“Yes sir,” the soldier said into his radio, his voice having shifted and making Y/n and Joel’s stomachs tighten.

The gun came back up.

“We’re not sick,” Joel echoed, knowing what was about to happen.

“W-w-wait,” Y/n’s lips began to shake, she held out a hand to the soldier, “We’re not sick.”

“Sir,” Joel urged again, his voice rising with every second of silence, “We are not sic-“

Bullets rained down on the three of them, the force of the lead sending them rolling down the hill.

Joel pushed himself off his stomach, a harsh light on him drawing him onto his back. The soldier was mere inches from him, his rifle trained on Joel’s chest.

“I’m sorry,” the man said, he almost sounded genuine.

“Please don’t,” Joel begged, raising his hands.

Y/n had rolled farther than Joel, already weak from the crash and now with a pain radiating in her side. One of the bullets had definitely grazed her. She was able to push up onto her arms, dragging her gaze across the dirt and spotting the position her boyfriend was in.

“JOEL!”

The soldier was thrown forward, a bullet from behind lodging in his chest. Joel looked up to see Tommy, marching forward with his rifle still trained on the dead soldier.

Joel hurried to sit up, running a hand his side, a bullet had scraped across the skin.

Y/n let out a breath as she watched Joel move, her eyes scanning around her for Sarah.

“Oh, God,” Tommy breathed.

Frantic breaths could be heard, closest to Y/n and furthest from Joel.

Y/n froze at the sight.

Then she was rising, racing to the spot.

Joel was right behind her. “No…” he mumbled, “Oh, no.”

Y/n made it to Sarah first, her breath catching in her throat as her eyes ran over her body. Her attempts at breath were wracking through her violently.

“No, no, no,” Joel shushed his daughter, pressing a hand to her neck, “Okay, you’re okay. You’re okay, move your hand, baby.”

“Sarah, move your hand,” Y/n rubbed the girl’s cheek, “We gotta take a look, babe.”

Sarah let her hand drop to her side, revealing the blood that covered her entire lower abdomen.

Joel felt his heart drop into his stomach.

Y/n felt her entire body lock up.

Joel was the first to move, slipping an arm under Sarah’s shoulders. She let out the most heartbreaking cry, pain flooding her body as she reached to push her father away.

“I know, baby, I know,” Joel agreed, “I know, I know, I know. I know it hurts.”

Sarah’s breaths came quicker, groans accompanying them as she strained to take in air.

“Eyes on me,” Y/n urged, taking her face into both palms and rubbing her thumbs across the skin, “Don’t look down. Look at me.”

Sarah struggled to move her lips, barely pressing them together and humming. She was trying to say something.

“Shh, shh,” Y/n tried to keep her calm, “It’s okay.”

“Come on, baby,” Joel soothed as he examined her wound, “You’re okay, you’re okay.”

Another wave of unbearable pain hit Sarah as Joel pressed down on her wound, trying to slow the bleeding.

“I know, I know, I know,” the panic finally reached Joel’s voice, “I know, baby. I know, I know. I know this hurts. You’re gonna be okay.”

Sarah’s breaths grew ragged.

“You’re okay,” Y/n fought back the relentless tears, keeping her hands on Sarah’s cheeks, “You’re okay. I promise. You’re okay.”

“All right, baby, baby, baby,” Joel tried to talk over and in between Sarah’s noises, “Listen to me, I gotta get you up, okay?”

Sarah shook her head, her eyes widened with terror she couldn’t physically put into words.

“Babe, we have to get you up, okay?” Y/n continued, “It’s gonna hurt like hell for a second, but it’ll be alright.”

“All right,” Joel couldn’t wait any longer, “You come on.”

Y/n moved around to help lift Sarah’s back, her and Joel working as a team to raise her. Sarah groaned and wept as they shifted her body.

“I know, baby,” Joel was on the verge of tears as Sarah strained to help herself up, gripping his neck. “I know, I know, I know,” his voice rose in fear, “I know, I know, I know.”

Joel turned to where he’d left his brother, “Tommy, help me!”

Tommy didn’t move, “Joel…”

Sarah’s body stopped shaking under Y/n’s hands, her chest went still.

“Sarah,” Y/n begged, “C’mon, babe.”

“C’mon, baby girl,” Joel whimpered, moving frantically to loop an arm around her, “I gotta get you up. Come on. Come on, we’ll get up.”

Rising on her knees, Y/n hung her head over Sarah’s. The girl’s eyes were blank, her lips were parted.

“Come on,” Joel sobbed, his pleas dropping off as reality began to invade his blind hope, “Come…please…”

It was too late.

Joel took Sarah fully into his arms, wrapping around her so tight, he thought he might be able to physically put her back together.

Any air Y/n still had in her chest left her body, her hands resting in midair as if she was still holding the child.

She crawled to Joel, covered in blood, rocking Sarah’s body and sobbing breathlessly over her shoulder.

It was real.

“Sa-“ Y/n whispered, tears starting to flood down her cheeks. Her voice dropped to a whimper, “Sarah.”

If the universe could grieve a human being, it was Sarah Miller’s passing that brought it to tears. No part of the Earth would be spared from the chaos that had claimed her. No corner of the planet would ever bloom and flourish as it had when she was alive. When she ascended, she took humanity and all of its beauty with her.

And the souls of the two people cradling her corpse, screaming into the night, went with her.

——————

TYL Taglist: @bachiracore @stolenxkissess @kayleezra @the-wistful-reader @allthesesonsofbitches @goth-detectives365 @trippovert @rh1nestonecowg1rl @emiliaserpe @khaleesihavilliard @frietiemeloen @gracie7209 @dorck26 @thegirlnextdoorssister @alanis-altair @mariwinns16 @whosscruffylooking @endofthexline @alexiaricciardo @eonnyx @pedrosmexicangf @scarlettequinn @ao-sleepy @toinfinityandbeyonce2 @deanlovescassie @turmoil-ash @sorrowjunky @kpopslur @xxlilyxx90 @midgetpottermills @presidential-facts @scoopsnini @tubble-wubble @jamesdeerest @burninggracesandbridges @star-wars-lover @lucyhotchner @cococola-cocaine @witheringhqarts @fall-writes @alwaysdjarin @xxmoonn @emilia-the-artist @wand-erer5 @boneyarrd @lizard-zombie @itwasallinmyhead1 @cassidylea123 @paleepeaches @mxltifxnd0m @kettlekatie @ultimate-cinephile @gloryekaterina @caramelkatsukis-bitch @whovianayesha @memeorydotcom @deadunicorn159 @get0ut0fmyr00m @siriuslymooned @emmyeed @superbreadsoul @hellu-people1 @ourautumn86 @inas-thing @noraapple05 @givemylovetoall @luvwanda (tags continued in comments)

#joel miller x reader #joel miller x female reader #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller imagine #joel miller fanfic #joel miller fic #joel miller fanfiction #the last of us fanfiction #the last of us imagine #the last of us fanfic #the last of us fic #twenty years later

[mrsstarkey1]

slow dancing w rafe 👀👀

SUMMARY: attending midsummers with rafe

WORD COUNT: 0.7k

WARNINGS: none

A/N: check out my most recent rafe fic

You loved midsummers. You looked forward to it every year. You even picked out your dress in March - well, February if you were being honest.

Every year it was the same magical evening, where you didn’t have to worry about any of your day-to-day problems. It was just a time to be with your friends and drink expensive champagne and eat fancy hors d’oeuvres.

There was one other reason you looked forward to Midsummers; your designated date. You and Rafe Cameron made a pact your freshman year of high-school to always attend Midsummers together. This pact emerged after your eighth grade Midsummers, when everyone you knew had a date and you couldn’t find one. You sat in the corner alone nearly the entire night, until a little brunette boy approached you and asked if you wanted to dance.

Now, 6 years later, you walked into the party alongside Rafe with your arm interlocked with his. You and Rafe separated from the rest of the Cameron family, going to get a drink.

No more than 20 minutes into your favorite party of the year, chaos had broken out. A pogue you'd vaguely recognized was yelling at everyone as he was escorted out. The scene played out over the span of a couple minutes, resulting in the pogues leaving the party in a dramatic fashion, all eyes on them. Everyone whispered to each other, trying to make sense of what had just happened. Within seconds, the mood in the room had completely shifted.

You glanced at Rafe, seeing his jaw clenched tightly as he watched the four figures disappear into the night. You squeezed his hand tightly, and his eyes flickered to yours. “You okay?” he asked you, eyes scanning your face.

“Yeah, that was insane,” you shook your head. You glanced around the room, seeing everyone standing still, the dance floor completely empty. You frowned unwillingly, “no one’s dancing anymore.”

Rafe glanced to the dance floor, then back to your face with a smirk. “Doesn’t mean we can’t,” he said, holding out his hand.

You hovered your hand above his, hesitating for a moment. “We’d be be only ones out there, everyone’s gonna be watching,” you whispered, a red flush on your face at the thought.

“Let them watch,” Rafe said with a shrug, grabbing your hand. “I’m not going to let the pogues ruin your favorite night of the year, y/n,” he spoke matter-of-factly. He led you to the middle of the floor before you could protest anymore.

The two of you fell in step, letting the rhythm control your movements. Your left arm wrapped over his shoulder, right hand placed tightly in his own against his chest. Rafe’s free arm snaked around your waist tightly.

Your worries about people watching suddenly became irrelevant as the scenery and people around you dissolved into nothing. It was you and Rafe, alone.

Your eyes glistened, and Rafe’s heartbeat quickened as he looked at the smile that spread across your face.

Uncontrollable feelings surged through your body and your fingers tingled against Rafe’s. Arm tightening around you, Rafe pulled you closer to his chest and you rested your cheek on his shoulder.

“The night isn’t ruined, is it?” Rafe whispered and you felt his breath on your ear, sending a shiver down your spine.

You shook your head without hesitation, “not even close.”

You heard Rafe take in a deep breath before speaking again, “you know how we only spend time together at Midsummers every year?”

“Mhm, it’s tradition,” you replied simply, wondering where he was going with this.

“I was thinking, um-” he cleared his throat, squeezing your hand slightly tighter. “What if we changed that?”

You pulled away at his words, eyebrows furrowed in clear confusion. “You don’t want to come with me anymore?” you had to ask, disappointment evident in your voice.

Rafe’s eyes widened and he shook his head in a panic, “no, no,” he laughed a little, “I mean, what if we spent time together.. some other days of the year?”

Your eyes lit up with realization, and you hung your head down slightly with a chuckle. “You scared me for a second,” you admitted. You lifted your head back up to meet his eyes, “I’d love to hang out with you some other days of the year,” you said with a smile.

Rafe let himself grin, a relieved breath escaping him, “thank god.”

You rested your head back on his shoulder, “best Midsummers ever,” you muttered into his suit.

taglist: @rafes-bae @willowpains @maybankslover

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#rafe x you #outerbanks rafe #rafe cameron fic #rafe x y/n #rafe outer banks #outer banks fluff #outer banks season 3 #obx #outer banks #rafe cameron #rafe cameron imagines #drew starkey imagines #fluff #obx imagines #drew starkey #rafe cameron x reader #rafe cameron fanfiction #rafe cameron x you #rafe cameron angst #rafe cameron fluff #john b obx #obx characters x reader #obx fanfiction #obx imagine #jj obx #rafe obx #jiara obx #obx season 3 #obx x reader #obx jj

[zbis]

☆.｡.:*summary : your boyfriend comes home bruised and bloody yet again

☆.｡.:*pairing : boxer!gunwook x reader

☆.｡.:*warnings & other : blood, mentions of fighting, a bit of angst if you squint(?), fluff, not revised

☆.｡.:*w/c : ~1k

“stupid fucking-” gunwook groans out loud. “such a lucky hit, i swear...” he taps his finger on the marble surface of the kitchen island contemplatively. “i was just distracted,” he tells himself.

he places his head on the counter, mulling over the loss of the night. god, if only he did a left hook instead of the right. 

“ow..” he lifts head up and looks down, noticing his forehead wound has opened back up and has left a blood stain on the counter. “shit,” he mumbles. just as he’s about to go grab a towel to clean it up, you emerge from your room. 

“you’re back?” you yawn, your hair looking just a dishealved as his.

he clears his throat, diverting his gaze awkwardly from your exposed torso when you stretch. “yeah..” he mumbles. you laugh at how red his ears get until you notice the forehead wound among many others. you see his blood stained cheeks and eye that's just asking to get swollen if untreated. “gunwook what the fuck?” you scold him. “i-” you cut him off when you notice the stain he left on the counter. “and you’re leaving your blood everywhere!”

he scoffs, “ i was just about to clean that up..” he sighs, “im not really in the mood for this right now..” just then do you notice the way his eyes are downturned and his usual bubbly self is nowhere to be found. 

“did you-”

you dont finish your sentence because the way hes carrying himself tells you everything already. “oh wook..” you walk up to him and cup his face gently, although he still winces at the touch. “it’s just one loss you know?” he sighs, “i was gonna use the money to take you out or something, we haven't done anything fun in months.”

 “i dont care about that, you’ve done alot for me already plus i dont want you to die while making me happy.”

you dont even need to ask questions to know. gunwook typically never fought past his range. he would only go against people whom he knew he had a good chance against. however, every saturday there was an event where the fighters of the area could go against one of the strongest fighters in the city. the cash prize was good but what was even better was the reputation that came with it and your boyfriend wanted nothing more than to have it.

you were supportive but for the past 4 months, every Saturday without fail, gunwook would come home beat to a pulp. you tried to get him to give up but he was determined to win one day, he just had to get stronger.

you sigh, looking over his face. his lips were more swollen than normal and some strands of his dark hair were crisp with blood. “can you just-” “of course.” you cut him off. you place a chaste kiss on his lips, which he hisses in pain at and you laugh.

you silently lead him to the bathrooom where you keep a first aid kit on deck. you grunt as you pick up the heavy box, refusing to let gunwook help you. “just sit your ass down.” when he does you give him a once over.

he looks like a stray puppy who’d just been abandoned at the side of the road. you let out an exasperated sigh at his appearance, “you know, im not a licensed nurse. you need to go to the hospital one of these days.” he plays with his fingers while you get the kit ready for use. 

“why would i do that when i have my own personal fixer upper right here?” he jabs at your side playfully. “ow, it hurts when you do it.” you glare at him with an annoyed but light smile. 

“too strong.” 

“not strong enough apparently,” he mumbles, once again reminded of yet another saturday loss. “well,” you take place on his lap with a cotton pad wet with alcohol in hand. instinctively he moves his hand to your waist to keep you steady. “you’re strong enough to keep me safe,” you whisper.

before he can protest or say anything demeaning about himself you place the cotton on the cut closest to his eye. he hisses in pain and glares at you. “be gentler,” he mumbles. you hum, moving the piece of cotton across whatever cut or gash you came across, making sure to change it whenever it got too saturated with blood.

 “seriously though...you need to be more careful wook,” you place a kiss on the cut you just cleaned and place a bandaid over that. “my biggest fear is getting a call about a wound I won’t be able to fix.”

he nods solemnly, placing his patched up face on your shoulder. you sigh, choosing to play with his hair to soothe his stress and sadness.

after a couple beats of silence, he suddenly pips up.

"but next saturday i've definitely got it in the bag!"

#zb1 x reader #zb1 imagines #zb1 scenarios #zb1 reactions #drabble #gunwook imagines #zb1 headcanons #gunwook headcanons #gunwook fluff #mtl zb1 #zb1 fluff #gunwook x reader #send asks im new im excited to write for zb1!

[paperbackribs]

for the 'Eddie freaks out over How to Survive a Werewolf Attack' post and those who missed the upload on Ao3, this is the second part of the chapter from Steve's POV, with a little protective stobin to delight

🦇🐺🦇🐺🦇

Steve leaves the pulse of the woods behind him as he emerges from the trees that abut his backyard. He’d smelled Robin long before shifting back into his human form, the sharp mint of her shampoo mixing alongside the sweet earthiness that he now attributes to family. Never having had one, he nevertheless knows that the combination will always mean sister.

Circling the pool, its night lights cast an uncanny, rippling blue across the surface, he heads to where she sits under the warm yellow lights, propped on her elbows against the wrought-iron patio table. In her cupped hands rests a book with an overflowing tree protectively sheltering a dog and her pups, Woman and Nature carefully inscribed above them.

She stirs as he approaches, inserting a receipt between the pages to save her place and resting it beside her. Looking into her concerned eyes, Steve grimaces. “Well, that went well,” he says lightly, feeling the need to inject some humour into the memory or he may be tempted to dwell on the ache that wants to rise instead.

Robin’s face softens and he knows that she can feel his hurt even without him saying it. They’re so connected sometimes that he wonders if his wolf forged something with her when they’d sat there, bound and interrogated by Russians, only able to depend on each other. “He was a little freaked out from the unexpected is all and he just needs to get used to the idea before…”

She trails off and Steve finishes her sentence, “Before he can be in the same room as me? Robs, the guy practically had a panic attack on my mother’s Giorgetti rug. I could smell his fear: he was terrified that I was going to eat him or something.”

Robin’s lips firm as she drums her fingers over the book cover, “Yeah, well, that’s his problem. After you left, we gave him the rundown; that you’re just a normal wolf—”

Steve snorts: there’s nothing normal about his transformations at all, but Robin ignores him to continue, “—and hopefully if he’s affected by the bites then it’ll turn him into a normal bat too.”

“And how’d he take that?” Steve asks curiously.

“Oh, another meltdown,” Robin says blithely, “He’s now convinced that he’s going to turn into Bela Lugosi and will be prowling the night for his victims before we know it.” Steve laughs despite himself, already able to imagine Eddie making exaggerated gestures in the middle of the group.

“Did he hiss like a vampire?”

“Nah, but he did do that thing, you know with the cape?” She shields half her face with her forearm as if hiding menacingly behind it. Fond amusement fills Steve, as if often does when faced with Eddie’s dramatics only for it to quickly drain away at the reminder of how drastically he had taken Steve’s shift.

Robin notes his change of mood and scowls at an absent Eddie. “Scaredy-cat,” she mutters darkly, “Should have called him a scaredy-bat to his face.”

Steve chuckles and leans forward to gently tug on a lock of her blonde hair, “And then give him my nail bat…”

“So, he’d be a scaredy-bat with a nail bat that lost his bat-le shield.”

Steve waggles his hand in a so-so motion, “Could use some work.”

“Oh, screw you, buddy, I did all the work,” Robin’s eyes dance with humour even as she pokes him with a sharp finger at his ribs. Steve squirms away, “I gave you the nail bat!” He mock protests before the image of Eddie’s wide and terrified eyes crosses his mind again. He sighs, “Do you think I should avoid him for a while? Let him get used to the idea before springing myself on him again?”

Robin leans back with a too wide smile, its awkwardness immediately transparent. “What?” Steve asks suspiciously.

Her brow furrows in an apology that gives lie to the smile, “We’re meeting back here tomorrow. El thinks that she might be able to lead him through a change if he’s got it in him, and we all thought it better to get the potential of it all out of the way before Eddie devolves into one big puddle of fear.”

Rubbing the bridge of his forehead, Steve sighs, “So, not only is he freaked out by the sight of me but I’m going to see him in the next twenty-four hours.”

Robin looks at her bulky men’s watch with a grimace, “More like twelve. We figured that we should get it over sooner or later, and this way he can work out whether he wants to freak out over being a bat or a vampire.”

“Or neither,” Steve points out.

She shrugs, “It seems unlikely, right? Correlation doesn’t equal causation, and you may be the outlier, the one cool weirdo out there.”

“Thank you,” he says dryly even though he does appreciate her positive spin on his furry little situation.

It had been months after the events over Halloween, when he’d been bitten by a demo-dog, that he’d started to notice the first few small changes. At first, he’d been convinced that it was the world that had transformed: smells becoming deeper, sights becoming sharper, but after one night where he had been panicked to find that his feet were no longer so far away, and suspiciously clawed, that he’d come to the realisation that it was his senses that had evolved, not the sun or the trees or the perfume of his history teacher.

The kids, while excited, had been very little help, but their encouragement had made him feel less alone. He took Dustin’s attempt to turn him into a science experiment in stride and as an extension of the little butthead’s support. But it was when Robin had been brought into the Upside Down fold that he’d felt truly embraced.

Surprisingly, rather than turning to books and research, she’d listened to him instead. Asked Steve what he wanted to be called when he was turned and let him talk about the oddities and freedoms he’d found in this new version of himself.

Steve had already known that the wolf would be a part of him forever, but Robin’s role in his life had cemented that feeling into a bone-deep acceptance, an understanding that he wasn’t weird or wrong for his new transformation, but that it was simply another part of Steve. Or Furry Steve as Robin would gently tease him.

“Are you staying over?” He asks now, watching her smother a yawn and nod in agreement.

He stands, waiting until she walks through the door before flipping the light switch off, the flurry of moths above flutter in confusion at the sudden darkness. “We can practise some more on the way home tomorrow if you like.”

Robin had gained her license a month ago, but with no car to drive Steve was building her confidence by having her drive his. She often teased that their love was a true one since she’s the only one allowed to touch the bimmer.

Wrapping an arm around his waist, they walk through the kitchen and head to his bedroom in unspoken agreement. “That’d be great. Do you want to wolf-out or be on your side of the bed,” she counters sleepily, leaving her book on the counter as they pass.

He hums, thinking. Months ago, after they’d worked out that the Upside Down nightmares were better handled when they knew the other one was in the room, Robin had struggled with having Steve in her bed.

It’s not that he wasn’t welcome, she’d reassured him, or wanted, she’d said with a haunted expression, clearly thinking of having woken up silently screaming not moments before. But having his skin touch hers made her irritable in a way that she had no explanation for. Fur, however, was fine.

Since then, if Steve needed cuddles he was allowed to wolf-out, as they decided to call it. Once transformed, Robin had no problem with Steve’s fur covering her skin; rather, she quite liked the partial weight of his body.

He thinks that tonight he’d like the reassurance that there is one person who is not only unafraid of him but likes the differences that make him not-quite-human.

“Wolf-out,” he responds, letting go and allowing the wolf to unfold. The sweet musk of the kids sharpens, even with them having departed hours ago, as does the appealingly darker scent of Eddie, although it is bitterer than it normally is as if his fear had saturated the small space.

His tail drops sadly at the reminder, but Robin distracts him with scritches behind the ear before leading their way up the stairs to his bedroom. Steve pads behind, happy to have a friend in Robin and determinedly putting Eddie out of his mind for the rest of the night.

If you enjoyed any of this drop me a comment over at Ao3, it'd make my day! (fic now titled Swift Wings and a Brave Heart)

#platonic stobin #steddie #steve harrington #robin buckley #stranger things #paperbackribs writing

[sunkendreams]

I haven’t seen any billy loomis content on your blog ,,, would love to see some smut of him! nothing specific, I know you’ll write something good!

devil in disguise.

➾ pairing ; billy loomis x fem!reader.

in which billy decides to visit you once your father leaves for his shift — but there’s an additional element.

FORMAT: one-shot — requested.

WORD COUNT: 6.7K.

WARNINGS: SMUT (mdni), loss of virginity, rough sex, unprotected sex, p in v sex, multiple positions, multiple orgasms, sex during a storm, dirty talk, fingering (f!receiving), cunnilingus, oral sex (f!receiving), heavy knifeplay, billy is a little deranged in this, begging, creampie, cumplay, bloodplay, tiddy sucking, mild body worship, biting, hickeys/marking, choking, hair-pulling, finger sucking

AUTHOR’S NOTE: not gonna lie, I was suffering from billy brainrot and this emerged from my brain. I love him so much !!! I do want to write some more mickey & ethan landry content too, but I do need to tell y’all about my new influx of blorbos lately LOL! love you all so much and thanks for your continued support! Means the world to me!

Whenever it rained in California, you considered it to be a once-in-a-lifetime occasion — wisps of black clouds fluttered overhead, accompanied by the haze of an overcast sky. Even for the evening, the skies were unnaturally dark, making it seem like nighttime altogether. The scent of encroaching dewdrops drifted through your bedroom.

“Honey?” Your father gently tapped his knuckles against the white pane of your door, dressed in his police uniform. “Mind if we talk?” He asked, clearing his throat. The badge of the Woodsboro Sheriff’s Department glistened on his ironed shirt.

With the recent killings of Casey Becker and Steven Orth plaguing your school, your father had reason to be concerned. He was the Chief, after all — he was cleaning up mess after mess, investigating these murders without any leads. Stress shimmered upon his features, showing up as heavy bags underneath his eyes.

You swiveled around within your seat, busying yourself with homework for the evening. Books were strewn across your desk, accompanied by a computer that barely ran nowadays anyway.

“Sure,” You cleared your throat, awkwardly shuffling away from your chair to the edge of your bed. “What’s up?” The relationship with your father was somewhat tenuous — being the daughter of a police chief came with unwanted attention and his constant overprotective nature.

“You know about the murders,” He began, looming in the doorway of your bedroom. His countenance glistened with a thinly-veiled anxiousness, but also a bit of fear. You rarely saw your father show anything remotely close to terror, but here he was. “About your classmates.”

“Yeah,” Your brows furrowed together — where was he going with this? “You don’t want me to leave the house anymore, do you?” An exasperated sigh escaped you, but he immediately shook his head.

“No, no. I just think …” He clicked his tongue. “No visitors for a while, not until we clear everyone at the school as a suspect.” A sinking feeling pooled within the pit of your stomach, accompanied by disappointment. It meant that your boyfriend couldn’t come over — indefinitely.

Billy Loomis was a mysterious boy, cunning and charming with a silver tongue — he constantly wrapped you up in it, time and time again. He’d broken up with Sidney Prescott last year, not long after her mother had passed away. He was more than good to you, but your father wasn’t convinced.

His suspicion of Billy wasn’t subtle whatsoever, and it irked you at times. You’d gotten into several arguments about the morality and character of your paramour, and your father had inevitably relented, letting you date him — but there was always protest involved.

“I think you want to say Billy, Dad.” You uttered, lips curling into a sour frown as you stomped back to your chair with an indignant huff. “You’ve always disliked him. This isn’t about anyone else I hang out with — it’s about him.” Your tone became clipped and volatile, prompting you to return to studying.

Chief Burke let out a deep sigh, knowing he’d upset you with this news. “We’ll talk about that later,” He murmured, checking his watch with a thin-lipped expression. “I have to get going to the station.” Your father stepped forward, attempting to press a kiss against the top of your head — but you’d flinched away.

Gritting your teeth together, you attempted to maintain a shred of kindness towards your father. You wanted to explode, but it wasn’t a good time. He was under a lot of stress. “Love you.” You sighed, grabbing your pencil as you returned to writing something down in your notebook.

“I’ll see you in the morning.”

From behind the curve of your shoulder, you watched as your father retreated from your bedroom, shutting the door behind him in the process. A twinge of guilt flickered through you, and you couldn’t help but feel like the villain. Your mother was out on work-related business, and your father was drowning away in work.

Oftentimes, you were left to your own devices, absorbed in school, hanging out with your friends, or spending time with Billy — but that was all on an eternal hiatus, it seemed. You pressed your tongue against the inside of your cheek, stepping toward your door. The house was eerily silent, just you and the encroaching thunderstorm.

A clap of thunder rattled the skies, causing you to nearly jump out of your own skin. Goosebumps formed along the column of your spine as you crept down the stairs, traipsing towards your kitchen. Being home alone had a plethora of perks — the alcohol being one of them. If your father knew about all of the underage drinking, he’d likely have a heart attack.

There were so many things that he didn’t know about.

A brief flash of lightning illuminated your surroundings, casting the kitchen in a quick burst of white. You opened up the refrigerator, carefully removing one of your dad’s Abita’s from the side door. After rattling around in the cupboards, you found the bottle opener, popping open the amber lager as a stream of vapor emerged from the top.

You were swift to retreat back upstairs, latching your bedroom door in the process. You placed the beverage along the edge of your desk, listening to the atmospheric deluge of rain pattering outside, falling against the rooftops. You left your window open, lulled into a sense of comfort from the stormy evening.

A sharp thump reverberated against the side paneling of your house, prompting you to rock forward. Normally, you wouldn’t have given it much thought, but considering that someone was killing your classmates, it filled you with a pang of dread.

Hesitant, you crept toward the window, and through the haze of rain and darkness, you noticed a figure moving against the tall wall of lattice that climbed around the back of your home. You squinted, head canting to one side as you realized who was sneaking around.

Billy’s soaked frame appeared before you within an instant, still scaring you as a strangled gasp escaped your lips. “Billy!” You squeaked, lips parted as you noticed his hair, slick and plastered to his skull. The blue-and-white flannel he wore atop a white t-shirt remained stuck to him like a second skin.

“Hey,” He greeted cooly, flashing you one of those little smiles that made butterflies erupt within your stomach. Those warm, earthen-colored hues shamelessly flickered across your attire, finding some sort of attraction in the long-sleeved nightgown you wore. “Cold?”

“Not really,” You mused, nibbling along your lower lip as he ogled the still-icy beer sitting atop your desk. A bemused chuckle left him as he sauntered forward, head cocked to one side. “You’re soaked. Did you walk all the way here?”

“Thought I’d walk, but I wasn’t expecting the rain,” Billy murmured, taking a hold of your drink. “A little brazen, don’t you think? Aren’t you worried that your father might arrest you for underage drinking?” He teased, mouth curling into a playful grin as he took a swig of lager.

“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” You chimed, nose wrinkling in amusement as he passed the bottle to you. With a brief exhale, you took a drink of lager, feeling the bitter twang of alcohol swarm your mouth as you swallowed. “Do you need me to throw anything in the dryer?” For someone soaked to the bone, Billy remained unphased.

He shook his head in dismissal, clicking his tongue soon afterwards. “No,” Billy’s brows furrowed together for a moment, and then he peered toward the door. “Your old man not around tonight?” Normally, he was always quiet for your sake — and you were often a ball of nerves, but you seemed so carefree tonight.

“He’s gone until the morning.” It was a declaration and a not-so-subtle hint — you could stay. Your relationship with Billy was still somewhat new and flourishing, but you were hoping that it would only continue to intensify. You hadn’t really done much of anything outside of making out and touching. He was patient with you, too.

Billy hummed, gaze surveying your bedroom with a sheen of curiosity. He often searched for new details or anything he found intriguing. His fingertips grazed across your quilted bedspread, and then toward the open window. “Do you like thunderstorms?” He asked. “Or do you keep the window open for me?”

“Would it make you feel better if I said both?” A bubbly burst of laughter escaped you as you tidied up your desk, putting your studying aside for the time being. You enjoyed the lightheartedness of it all despite the dour weather and less-than-savory conversation you’d had with your father twenty minutes prior.

His footsteps were light across the carpeted floor until he approached you, palm cupping your jaw with a certain level of care. At the very beginning, he asked you for everything — for a touch, for a kiss. You didn’t want him to ask nowadays, careening into the warmth of his hand as he brought you in for a kiss.

This bout of shyness always rippled through you whenever he was near — his presence was so enigmatic and overwhelming in the best of ways. He smelled like a smoky cologne, accompanied by the scent of dewdrops. You shivered when his arm crept to your hips, lightly massaging at your waist over the cotton of your nightgown.

Billy was an incredible kisser — always walking a fine line of soft and voracious. You wondered what it would be like for him to really give in. It was a fantasy that had crossed your mind more than you could count. His head tilted slightly, thumb tracing over your chin before he withdrew, stare bleeding with a thinly-veiled desire.

“You’re beautiful,” He uttered reverently, idly dragging the pad of his thumb across your lower lip. “Prettiest thing I’ve ever seen.” Billy’s voice was husky, an alluring drawl that was barely above a whisper. It sent a shudder of delight cascading down your spine, anticipation pooling within the pit of your stomach.

A brief sigh left you, trapped within your throat as you tilted inward, hands pressed against his chest. The material was damp underneath your palms, not that you cared. He had snuck through your bedroom window countless times — but it felt so much heavier this time around, given your father’s stark statement of not wanting you to see him.

You ducked your head, heat crawling across your body as you chewed at your lower lip. Billy knew that you were smitten, and he devoured every scrap that he could, but something felt off, as if you had something to tell him, dancing upon the tip of your tongue. “Hey,” He murmured, titling your chin up to meet his gaze. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, just …” You couldn’t lie to him. Billy had this radar for bullshit, able to see right through you, pierce your armor with ease. “It’s my dad, that’s all.” Admittedly, you were hesitant to reveal the truth, considering that Billy sometimes had a strong reaction to things.

Billy had a feeling that your father had it out for him — an intelligent man, to be certain. Of course, such suspicions were true, but he wasn’t about to make that known. A huff of laughter escaped him, followed by another debonair grin. “What, does he want to arrest me?” He mused, pressing a string of soft kisses along your jaw.

“Something like that,” You mumbled, burying your face into the crook of his neck. He smelled incredible, like a dusky night, drawing you in with his magnetizing pull. “He doesn’t want me to see you right now because of all of the killings and stuff.” The confession felt like a weight within your chest, but oddly enough, Billy didn’t seem too angered by this.

“Does he think I’m a suspect?” Billy questioned, point-blank. His tone became rather blunt, but still held that little shred of amusement. In the grand scheme of things, he was on the right track — unbeknownst to you, of course. It would stay that way.

“I don’t think so. He’s just skeptical, I guess. It’s his job.” You hesitated, drawing away just enough to get a look at your boyfriend’s handsome visage. “I just don’t want you to feel threatened or feel like you can’t come around. I don’t care what he says — I want to be with you.” You murmured, brows furrowing together.

His jaw tensed, gaze incendiary and oozing with a lasciviousness as he pressed a lingering kiss to your mouth, fingers idly stroking aside some of your hair. Billy had grown very fond of you, but with that, there was always some twisted desire to corrupt — the obsession that blossomed with it all.

“You have me,” Billy exhaled, body pressed against yours, hands pinning you close. “This all feels a little defiant, doesn’t it?” His tone had dropped an octave, akin to a delicate purr as he brushed his mouth against yours. You leaned in this time, pressing your lips against his as you chased after that sensation with a fervor.

“Yeah,” You whispered, feeling a newfound thrill churn within your stomach, coupled with exhilaration. “Can you stay tonight?” You asked, fingers gently weaving themselves into his mousy tresses, tugging at the hair around the nape of his neck.

His head cocked to one side as he arched an eyebrow. “I thought I couldn’t,” Staying implied one thing — sex. You had never propositioned it until now, let alone entertained the thought. “Unless you’ve changed your mind.” He didn’t want to rush anything or pressure you into something that you weren’t prepared for.

The constant feeling of doom hung over you — religion and saving yourself had always been a point of contention in your family. You were worried that Billy would leave you if he had you, but you knew that wouldn’t be the case. You were ready to have your first time and have it be with him.

Your head began to bob in a little nod, heat creeping across your body as it blossomed within your cheeks with a burning sensation. “I want you,” You whispered, breath hitching within your throat. “I — I need you, really. I don’t want you to go, Billy.” You mumbled, nearly gasping when his hand began to caress along the curve of your thigh.

“Are you sure?” Billy asked, brows knitting together in a moment of concern. “We don’t have to do anything intense,” He reassured, pressing another kiss against your jaw, and then to your neck. “I don’t want you to feel rushed.” Admittedly, he wanted nothing more than to touch you, to take your virginity, make you feel good, but it needed to be on your terms.

It felt good — the spark of retaliation and rebellion against your father, seeing Billy again in such a secretive fashion. You knew that if anyone found out, namely your parents, you’d be in a world of trouble. Fortunately, it was just the two of you and an empty house.

“You’ve been really patient with me,” You murmured, a soft sigh drifting from your lips as you sank forward into his embrace. “I want this.” Billy’s constant chase for consent and ensuring your comfort was beyond attractive, and you were thankful for it, but this was long overdue.

A soft laugh burst forth from his chest as Billy stroked at your cheek, calloused fingertips traveling across the delicate plane of your visage. “I would wait for as long as you wanted me to.” He uttered, gaze shifting from affectionate to incendiary, simmering with an unmistakable sensuality.

He was so good to you — your ex-boyfriend paled in comparison to Billy Loomis in more ways than one. “I know,” You sighed, lips twitching into a smitten smile as your digits plucked at the damp fabric of his shirt. You pressed another chaste kiss against his mouth. “Should I shut the window?”

Billy clicked his tongue, mouth twitching into a faint smirk. “No,” He swept strands of hair behind your ear, cradling your cheek within his warm palm. “You’ll have to be quiet. You think you can handle that?” The little evocation of a challenge was prevalent — your insides turned to metaphorical mush as you shivered.

“I can’t promise anything.” Your voice was wrought with excitement, barely above a whisper. The blood was rushing to your head and heart, hot and fervent as Billy gently guided you toward your bed. His smirk morphed into a wolfish grin, unable to tear his eyes away from you.

As he placed you down against the mattress, atop your quilted bedspread, he crawled in between your legs, lips hungrily returning to kiss you. He tasted like a lick of amber lager, intertwined with breath mints and the hint of cigarettes. Your heart began to beat faster as Billy’s hand rubbed along your thigh, digits flicking at the hem of your panties.

The ambiance of the thunderstorm outside provided a rather atmospheric setting, on top of the dim lighting throughout your bedroom. Rain noisily pounded against rooftops and the surrounding neighborhood, as if masking the salaciousness of your actions. Your hands pushed at his flannel, and he took it off, along with his white t-shirt.

“May I?” You whispered, eyes wide and mesmerized as Billy let out a brief chuckle. He was so painfully handsome, especially when he smiled — it only served to make you squirm, goosebumps erupting underneath his wandering touch.

“You’re sweet,” Billy murmured, voice deliciously husky as he pressed a kiss against your mouth, teeth playfully snagging your lower lip. The sheepish, stupefied reaction you had was well worth it, prompting him to grab one of your wrists, steering your hand to wherever you wanted it to go. “I want to see you.”

His composure was beginning to crumble, foundation being chipped away at. You were so infectious, like a fever, and Billy only wanted more. He had to restrain himself from being rough, watching with lustful eyes as you sat up a little bit.

You shivered when his hands slipped underneath your nightgown, curling into the hem as he helped you take off the lengthy, frilled garment. Billy licked at his lower lip, hooded stare eating you alive once you were stripped of that coverage. The pastel brassiere and panties you wore were just in the way.

“Lay down.” Billy husked, presence exuding a domineering edge without even trying. You silently obeyed, breath hitching within your throat as he covered your body with his, all sinewy muscle and tan skin. His mouth clashed with yours, voracious and all-consuming as he kept himself propped up with one arm.

Curious, needy digits found their way to your chest, groping and kneading at your chest over the material of your bra. “Billy.” You sighed, moaning into his mouth when he bit at your lip again. It was sharp and somewhat painful, but admittedly, you found that minuscule prick of discomfort to be exciting.

With a brusque tug, Billy’s palm circled around your bare breast, massaging at the sensitive flesh as he tugged at your nipple. Your hands flew to the nape of his neck, dragging through his hair as his mouth tore away from yours, only to find their purchase against the slender column of your throat.

Your flesh was velveteen underneath him, warm to the touch as he began to suckle against the sensitive flesh of your jugular. Teeth and lips created a series of marks — some were more obvious than others. A clap of thunder caused you to jump, a soft gasp escaping you as your body clashed with Billy’s.

His grin was tangible, like an imprint seared into your collarbone as he peered at you with those shimmering brown hues. “Scared?” He murmured, flashing those pearlescent teeth in a brief grin. Billy felt your skin erupt with goosebumps, creeping like a wildfire across your body.

“No,” You protested, tongue absentmindedly swiping across your lower lip. You gently tugged on his hair, hands wandering about until you were cupping his narrow face within your palms. “You’re so perfect.” A soft, enthralled sigh escaped you as he stared down at you.

That calculating, searing gaze would have burned right through you if it were possible — you could feel the desire that oozed from eyes alone. Billy turned his head, planting a kiss against your palm as he grabbed your wrist, fingers tangling with yours.

“You’re beautiful,” His voice dipped into a low, lascivious purr, a delicious octave that made you shudder. “You’re mine.” Billy uttered, and for a moment, there was something dark and innately possessive within his voice, something that you hadn’t heard before. While some might’ve found it strange and obsessive, you were hooked.

You swallowed the growing lump within your throat, feeling his lips press against yours again with a vigor and urgency. Silence drifted between the two of you, but the intensity and desire only seemed to amplify. His kisses were ravenous and passionate, accompanied by teeth and tongue.

“Take this off,” Billy murmured in between kisses, tugging on your brassiere for emphasis. His digits deftly felt along your body, ending up between your legs as he began to touch you. You were barely able to unclasp your bra without squirming and wriggling, hips jolting forward. “Hold still for me, baby.”

Inclined to obey, you ceased your movements, breath hitching within the back of your throat as his hand dipped beneath the waistband of your panties. You felt absolutely pathetic, already wet from just the tension and kissing alone. With this discovery, Billy grinned, letting out a soft laugh as his digits ghosted along your cunt.

“You’re wet for me and I haven’t even touched you yet,” Billy crooned, pressing a heated, sloppy kiss against your collarbone. His other hand torturously tugged and caressed at your breast. “So sweet.” He uttered, nipping at the soft flesh of your chest.

You moaned, body set ablaze as he dragged two digits along your cunt, allowing them to sink inward as he briefly touched your clit with his thumb. “Billy,” You whimpered, legs parting for him as he settled between them, reveling in your pleasured expression. “Please, please don’t stop.” You wanted to cry.

A low hum emerged from his chest, mouth pressing gentle, lasting kisses around your breast. “You’re so pretty.” He mumbled, taking your hardened peak into his maw as he sucked at your nipple. Those experienced, quick fingers developed a rhythm as he stroked along your slit, thumb lazily circling your clit.

Billy could only imagine what you’d be like if he were rough with you — if he had a knife in his hand, licking the blood from your swollen mouth. The thought alone made his cock throb within his jeans, but he would save it for another time.

As he bent you to his will, making you submit with his fingers alone, your body viscerally reacted to his ministrations, back beginning to arch. “B—Billy,” You sighed with passion, goosebumps beginning to coalesce along your spine. “God, feels so good.”

Innocent — that’s what you were. Vulnerable and pious, something to covet. Billy wanted to possess you, breathe you in, control you.

Akin to a canary trapped within the talons of a predator, you squirmed with delight, desperate for his embrace. His digits dipped toward your warm entrance, teasing you with gentle prod. “I’ll try to be gentle,” He crooned. “You make it so hard for me. Just relax.” Billy mumbled, teeth grazing your nipple as he licked at your sternum.

You nodded, stomach churning with molten heat as you felt some pressure. Your fingers dug into the nape of his neck, leaving behind crimson crescents as he kissed along your stomach. His digits sunk into you with some resistance, pushing into your tight cunt. A wanton moan escaped you, mouth agape.

It was a foreign sensation, but you savored every second, cunt clenching pathetically around his fingers as he began to find a sluggish rhythm. Billy kissed his way toward the heat between your thighs, tongue raking liquid heat over your aching core.

A spasm ran through you as a choked whine escaped your mouth, countenance rippling with surprise. “O—Oh,” You croaked, awash with delight as his mouth carefully roamed over your slick cunt. He began to lick and lap at your core — slower, at first — more exploratory. “Billy!” You squeaked.

The myriad of sensations you were experiencing were excruciatingly pleasant. It was pure bliss, feeling his lips caress your slit, digits steadily pumping their way in and out of you as he toyed with your clit. Every mewl and moan only spurred him on.

Something dark and alluring danced within his eyes, and when you lazily rolled your head to look down, his stare could’ve burned right through you. A flash of lightning only contributed to his sinister countenance, lips twitching into a smirk as he lapped at your cunt.

Billy ate you out like a man starved, touching you in places that you’d only dreamed of. His tongue was hot, raking hot embers over your slit as he showered you in endless attention. A strangled gasp escaped you as his fingers stilled, nose bumping against your clit.

His palm splayed out along the meat of your thigh, nails digging in, fingers pressing down hard enough to leave behind bruises. You clawed at his hair, hips lurching forward, but he pinned you down without hesitation, shivering at the sound of your sweet, innocuous moans.

Part of you wanted him to be rough, to really show you how much he desired you. Every fiber of your being ached for him in a way that made you itch, heat crawling across your supple flesh. “You can be rough,” You whispered, feeling the subtle hitch in his throat, tongue stilling atop your clit. “Billy.”

Billy’s jaw tensed, gaze dancing with a subtle malevolence, intermingled with obsession. His darker side often festered under the skin, but when you asked him to be rough, he knew he needed to be careful. He didn’t want to hurt you or scare you away with his potential antics.

“You want me to be rough?” His tone emerged as a low purr, murmured into the pliant meat of your inner thigh. Billy’s teeth suddenly nicked flesh before he licked at your cunt again, grazing your clit in an effort to tease you. “You don’t know what you’re asking for.” It was more of a warning than anything else.

Maybe he was right — you hadn’t the slightest clue of where this could lead.

Whatever darkness you saw, part of you viewed it as an act, as a facade for the sake of intimacy. Nonetheless, you still wanted him to be a little more forceful with you. As much as you savored his gentle streak, you wanted the intensity and the heat of the moment.

He wanted to let you stew on it for a little while, lips greedily pursing around your clit as he began to suck a the sensitive clutch of nerves. Billy’s fingers pushed themselves inside of you again, evoking a barrage of pleasured whines and moans from you. It very nearly derailed your train of thought.

With quivering digits, you reached for his hair again, raking through his tresses with a fervor. Billy felt you tug and pull, which only served to spur him on as he finger-fucked you into a blissful oblivion. It was intermingled with delicate licks to your clit, causing you to writhe in-place.

“I’m close,” You whined, hoping that he would keep going or be rough. Part of you wondered why he was so hesitant, but you didn’t want to push the matter. “Billy, please don’t stop!” With a shrill cry, his ministrations only intensified, fingers pistoning in and out of your cunt.

Billy gazed at you with eyes that almost appeared black, simmering with an unrestrained desire. “Yeah?” He purred, lips dutifully returning to suck and lap at your clit. The sensations were mind-numbing, nearly overwhelming as your stomach surged with a churning heat.

He curled his digits inside of you, letting you simmer on that sensation alone before he stopped. Billy finger-fucked you, accompanied by the tantalizing movements of his mouth. He couldn’t get enough of you, delighted to lap at your sweet cunt.

You nodded several times over, bucking toward his mouth as he continued to kiss and suck at your clit. Billy led you into the white-hot abyss of your orgasm, digits drenched in your slick as he withdrew, licking at his lower lip.

The pleasure was almost blinding, body hot and borderline feverish as you attempted to regain your composure. Your chest rose and fell with quick pants, mouth dry as Billy crawled up, covering your body with his as he placed two fingers against your lower lip.

“Open,” It wasn’t a question — it was a demand. Billy’s countenance had become shadowed, jaw tense as he watched you sheepishly open your mouth. You felt filthy for doing something like this, visibly flustered as his digits landed upon your tongue. “Only right if you have a taste.”

You shivered, a noise stirring within your throat as you began to suck, able to taste yourself in the process. He seemed delighted, lips twitching into a subtle smirk as he made you continue to his satisfaction.

“You sure you want this?”

His question was sharp and succinct, annunciated with something penetrating. Billy knew that if he went to his roots, to become something close to who he really was, he ran the risk of scaring you away. Brown eyes bored into you, hawkish and calculating as you withdrew his fingers from your mouth.

“Yes,” You replied, wondering what exactly he had in-mind in terms of being rough. “I trust you.”

A big mistake — your naïveté was laid bare, stretched out along your sleeve. Billy was untrustworthy, a sinister force with the means for destruction, but you were none the wiser. He liked your innocuous nature, the sweetness that oozed from every pore.

“Stay here.” Billy murmured, slipping off of your bed as he made for your bedroom door. You very nearly questioned him, wanting to know where he was going, but a rancorous clap of thunder effectively silenced you as you sank down into your mattress.

You counted — Billy was only gone for three minutes.

When he emerged through your bedroom door, it almost didn’t feel like the same person — not your charming, debonair brown-eyed boyfriend. He seemed possessed, as if something else had grabbed ahold of him. The glint of silver sparkled within his right hand, and that’s when you saw the large kitchen knife.

Something heavy swirled within the pit of your stomach — exhilaration intermingled with fear and uncertainty. You knew that he wouldn’t hurt you, but being rough was a different matter entirely. You gulped, throat thick as Billy moved toward the edge of your bed, available hand grabbing your thigh.

He dragged you close, looming over you with a shimmer in his eyes that told you he was still mostly himself. Even then, that pang of terror gripped you as he prodded the tip of the knife into your thigh.

“Billy,” You exhaled, goosebumps forming underneath the knife’s sharp blade. He continued to trace it across your supple flesh, moving it along your hip bone until he let it ghost above your stomach. “Want you t—to fuck me.” You stammered.

“You want me to fuck you?” Billy murmured, leaning inward, knife in-hand. You felt the blade jut into the swell of your breast, causing you to shudder from the icy chill of the steel. “Maybe I’ll gut you with this, instead.” He stated, though his voice held some modicum of playfulness to it, just enough to ease your nerves.

The doe-eyed look you wore made him frenzied — he wanted nothing more than to see you like this all the time. Billy hastily reached down, unbuckling his jeans with a sudden haste as he crawled on top of you, sticking the tip of the knife into your ribcage.

You gasped, and when you attempted to lean away from the knife, he simply pinned you there. The tip of his cock was oozing with precum, erection desperately grinding along your slit. “Billy!” You whimpered, afraid that he would accidentally dig the knife a little too far.

“Gotta stay still, pretty girl. You don’t want my hand to slip.” He warned, pressing a hot, incendiary kiss to your lips. You reciprocated, cunt throbbing from the added thrill of the blade as he began to ease himself inside of you.

The sudden intrusion made you cry out — you hadn’t done this before or gone this far, and Billy knew that. A myriad of breathy moans escaped you as you attempted to adjust, feeling his leg nudge you apart, spreading you open for him.

He pressed a series of kisses against your face in an effort to soothe you, teeth nicking the soft flesh of your jawline. Billy hesitated, waiting for you to have some time to adjust, heart pounding erratically, akin to the beating of a drum. You reached for his neck, hands tangling together at the nape.

“Still want it rough?” Billy murmured into your ear, hot breath fanning out across the side of your cheek. The blade of the knife prodded into your abdomen, as if it were issuing a stark warning — to turn back, or to proceed. You wanted him more than anything else — rough or not.

You couldn’t deny the excitement and sick thrill you gained from this, as if it had suddenly unlocked unfamiliar territory for you. Billy’s gaze danced with a lustful fire, tongue swiping across his lower lip.

After enough deliberation, you nodded, nearly shying away underneath his shadowed stare. “Yeah, I do.” You whispered, throat becoming thick as he thrust his hips forward, cock burying itself deep into your tight cunt. The feeling was intense, but his eyes were worse.

Billy grinned, throat erupting with a sardonic chuckle as he clicked his tongue. “That’s my girl.” He kept the knife against your stomach, threatening to dig into skin as he began to fuck you. The friction was delicious, breathing heavy, chest to chest, silvery blade prodding at your belly.

“Billy,” You moaned, back arching into the brutality of his thrusts, legs rattling like leaves. His hand grabbed at your leg, hitching it around his waist for better leverage, hips rutting forward in a series of sharp thrusts. “A—Ah! Please don’t stop!”

His teeth brazenly snagged across your lower lip, biting down hard enough to draw blood. He kissed you then — vitriolic copper intermingling between mouths, breath hot and labored as he fucked you in some frenzied state. Your poor cunt clenched around him, drawing him right in.

With a brief adjustment, he moved onto his knees, cock still pounding away at you as he used the grip on your leg as a crutch. Billy dragged the knife along your body, digging the tip into your sternum, letting it ghost above your breasts. He wanted to lick the fear in your eyes — drink it right from the source.

“Look so pretty like this,” He purred, using the cold flat of the knife to press into your chest. It caused you to moan, eyes rolling into the back of your skull as he continued to fuck you at a rather brutal pace. “You like this, don’t you?” Billy huffed, noticing the way your flesh prickled with a barrage of goosebumps.

You nodded, somewhat reluctant to admit to enjoying the roughness of it all. You felt the tip of the knife press just underneath your jaw, causing you to shudder, hips pushing forward as he met you halfway.

Every fiber of your being felt feverishly hot, like a live wire, coursing with raw electricity. The fire that burned bright within your belly demanded to be extinguished, cunt clenching around his cock as Billy continued to fuck you. He very nearly pulled out before ramming himself right back into your tight heat.

Billy momentarily abandoned the knife, grabbing at your hips as he turned you over, manhandling you onto your stomach. You gasped, letting out a series of moans and whimpers as his fingers roamed through your hair, tugging fistfuls of it as he rutted into you.

It was hot and quick, as if he didn’t have any time left at all. “Billy!” You cried out, feeling somewhat abashed as his cock slapped into your cunt, body pressed to yours. Once he’d gotten himself going, you felt the intrusive chill of the knife again, scraping back and forth along your spine.

“I—I’m close,” You panted, hands clawing at the quilt beneath you, nails threatening to pluck the strings and fabric away. Billy didn’t stop for anything, fucking you at a very erratic, feral speed, yanking on your hair. The knife added an element of danger, liquid heat coalescing between your thighs. “Don’t stop.”

“Yeah?” He purred, gritting his teeth together as his cock throbbed with an urgency. Billy groaned — a deep, unrestrained noise, and you yelped when the blade had cut too deep. He didn’t intend to cut you — it was a shallow, superficial wound, but it only drove him crazy. “Fuck, you’re perfect.”

The cut on your back oozed with rivulets of blood, not nearly enough to warrant any concern. You moaned, huffing and writhing atop the quilt as Billy pushed into you once more, cumming inside of you without a second thought.

He pulled out midway through, leaving behind a sticky mess of his seed along your cunt and inner thighs, intermingled with your arousal. Your body twitched and spasmed, awash with a sense of relief.

“Shit,” Billy murmured, clamoring away to find you a towel. He pressed it against your back, hoping to wash away some of the blood, even if it wasn’t very much at all. “I’m sorry, baby. I got carried away — I didn’t even think.” He sighed, watching as you attempted to clean yourself up.

“It’s fine, Billy. I know you didn’t mean to,” A soft exhale escaped you as you attempted to regain your composure, hoping to seize another towel as you sheepishly wiped his cum off of your body. You were sensitive and hot to the touch in the aftermath of it all. “I did enjoy it.”

Billy appeared perplexed, neglecting to comment for now. He wanted to take care of you as any dutiful boyfriend would do, retrieving your panties and nightgown as he helped you get dressed again. Outside, the thunderstorm continued to rage on.

“You did?” You shouldn’t have said anything — Billy’s thoughts went somewhere dark and salacious. Now, he wanted to fuck you with the knife all the time. If he were lucky, you’d bear more than one scar. It was a possessive mark, a reminder that you belonged to him.

“Yeah,” You confessed, laying down on your bed. Billy hastily zipped his jeans up, declining to put his shirt back on, given that it was still soaking-wet from the rain. “That was amazing. I’m glad I got to do it with you.”

As he laid down beside you, his gaze became dark and shadowed once again. His finger idly traced across the newly-formed cut on your back, lips pressing themselves all over your neck. “Maybe we could try something different next time.” He proposed.

“Like what?” You asked, admittedly curious as you snuggled against him. His digits idly roamed throughout your hair, mouth briefly pressing against yours before he withdrew altogether.

There was a sly, indiscernible look within his eyes — you didn’t know if you should’ve been worried or not.

“Maybe a costume next time.” Billy murmured, and despite the bemused grin on your face and his subtle smirk, you were entirely oblivious to the multifaceted meaning of his words.

Fortunately for you, you were safe — for now.

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[bruisedboys]

-🍓 James potter and “I like everything about you.”

Also, congrats on 2k! Love you and your blog 🥰

summary: james comforts a shy!you when you’re worried about meeting his friends

shy!fem!reader 0.9k words

James likes you. Loves you, even. You’re perfect, even though you’re shy and quiet and have so much self doubt it makes his chest ache. He loves you for your heart. Your quietly huge heart.

You’re squeezing the life out of James’s hand. He really can’t find it in himself to ask you to loosen your grip a little.

“Y/N,” he says gently. At his voice your head snaps around from where you’d been gazing at the drink bar. You stare at him like a deer in headlights. “Are you alright?”

You gulp. You don’t look alright. You look scared shitless.

“I’m fine,” you say, sounding far from it.

James gives you a look that says we both know that’s not true. He slides his free hand over the table and offers it to you, palm up on the scratched wood surface. You take it, shy and timid, but the moment your hands are locked in you’re squeezing the hell out of that one, too.

James grimaces. “Sweetheart,” he says, his tone drenched in pity. “You look petrified. What’s the matter?”

He knows exactly what’s the matter but he wants you to say it. You do, though you’re very shy about it.

“I’m just a bit nervous,” you say. ‘A bit’ doesn’t cut it. You’re so nervous you actually look queasy. “About— about meeting your friends.”

Without meaning to, James makes a pitying sound from the back of his throat. You’ve hidden your face, ducking your head down so you don’t have to look at him. You’re embarrassed about your confession. Contrarily, James is proud. Proud that you’re able to tell him what’s wrong so easily. You’ve come a long way from when you first met.

You surprise James when you speak again. He was sure he’d have to coax more of an explanation out of you.

“It’s scary,” you admit in a small voice, staring at your lap. “I don’t know if they’ll— um, well … I just don’t want them to not like me.”

You cringe at yourself and pull your hands away from James’s, wringing them in your lap instead. James sighs, heavy and sad and loving all at once. When you don’t show any signs of opening up further, James takes matters into his own hands.

He stands from his spot in the booth, rounds the table and slides in next to you, so quick you don’t have time to protest. His thigh presses into yours. His closeness flusters you and you duck your head, staring at his knees.

“Baby.” James hooks a finger under your chin and pushes gently until you’re looking at him, his thumb against your jaw to keep you in place. “You have nothing to worry about, I swear.”

“But—“

“But what?” James asks quietly, as kind as he can when his chest hurts so much. “Is it that you’re quiet?”

You nod. You’re staring at James like he’s your saving grace. He’s trying his best.

“That doesn’t matter, honey,” he says earnestly. “Really, it doesn’t. I like you, don’t I?” You open your mouth to answer but James doesn’t let you. “I do like you. A lot. A lot a lot. I like that you’re quiet.” That you only ever open up with him, that he gets to see both sides of you, shy you and you you. “I like everything about you, angel.”

You hide your face in your hands like he’s said something awfully cheesy, which he supposes he has.

“I’m serious!” He keeps going, because he can sense you’re smiling into your hands and he wants you to keep smiling. “If you want me to list everything I like about you, I’ll—“

“No!” You gasp, emerging from your hiding place to slap your hand to James’s mouth. “Don’t, James.”

James grins against your palm and then kisses it for good measure. You flush and seem to realise how close you’ve become, releasing his mouth and returning your hands to your lap. James takes one in both of his, because he can.

“They’re quite nice, actually. Sirius and Remus,” he says quietly. Heaven forbid anyone ever hear him say that. Anyone but you, of course.

You look up at him with too much hope in your eyes. “Yeah?”

James squeezes your hands. “Yeah. Loud and mildly annoying, but … nice. They won’t care that you’re quiet.”

Really, they won’t. Sirius is loud enough for the four of you and Remus is, well, Remus. He’s only loud when he wants to be. James knows he’ll tone it down for your sake.

“Don’t tell them I said that about them,” James adds, faux serious. He knows you wouldn’t ever but wants to make you laugh.

It works. You giggle and the smile you’re giving James is enough to knock the breath out of his chest. He grins like a madman as he releases your hands to slide an arm around your shoulders, pulling you into his hold.

“And I’ll be here the entire time,” he reassures, giving you a gentle shake. “You’ll be okay. Okay?”

James feels your entire being melt into his side, your thigh pushing into his, your shoulder crushing into his armpit, your head lolling against his shoulder. In what James thinks is a stroke of bravery, you slide your hand over his thigh, slow and sweet and enough to make James lightheaded. He doesn’t think he could ever love anything more than you, his perfect shy girl.

James can hear the soft smile in your voice when you answer.

“Okay.”

-

“Okay.”

#★ mal writes! #𖤐 2k celebration! #ღ james #james potter #james potter fluff #james potter x shy!reader #james potter imagine #james potter x y/n #james potter x reader #james potter x reader fluff #james potter x fem!reader #james potter x you #james potter fic #james potter blurb #james potter blurbs #james potter drabble #✉️

[not-the-droid]

What If’s

Pairing: Supreme Leader!Kylo Ren x Force Sensitive!Reader

Synopsis: Kylo’s empress has to go on a diplomatic meeting without him, causing Kylo to worry over what could happen without him there.

Word Count: 1.4k

Warnings: angst, Kylo being a worry wart, mind reading via the force, sexual intercourse, vaginal fingering, semi-rough sex, orgasm denial, a teeny bit of biting, 18+ only minors do not interact

Request: Hi! Could you do a Kylo Ren x Reader imagine/fic with “What if something happens while your gone? What if you get hurt and I’m not there to protect you?”, prompt?. Where the reader/his empress has to go on a mission alone without him for once, and he’s worried for her. Can be fluff or smut - like the night before she leaves-.

A/N: it’s a teeny bit different from the request so i hope that’s ok :)

Kylo Ren’s mind raced as he listened to the faint pitter-patter of water hitting the shower floor as his empress prepared for bed.

He knew this would be the last night she’d be with him before they landed in the early hours of the morning, removing herself from his watchful eye and protective embrace.

His new role as Supreme Leader came with many, many new responsibilities. Squashing enemy rebellions, keeping the galaxy in check, attending political meetings with ally planets. The latter of which he wasn’t particularly adept at.

The Supreme Leader could squash as many rebels as needed but couldn’t find out what to say in a diplomatic discussion to save his life.

But his empress could. Kylo kept her close by his side in those meetings, his chest swelling with pride as she spoke so eloquently on behalf of the First Order.

Tomorrow would be different, however. He had other First Order issues that needed attending to, making him unable to join her on for the week-long meeting with the First Orders allies.

That terrified him. Anxious fantasies filled his mind as he paced around the bedroom. What if their allies turned on him? What if they used his beloved empress as a pawn against him? He knows how these politicians acted. He knows their tactics.

He feels a small tingling sensation spread across his forehead, sighing softly as he watches his empress emerge from the refresher.

“I thought we discussed prying in each other's minds.” Kylo states, his eyes flickering for a moment to the exposed skin of her breasts beneath the dip of her robe.

“I could feel you fretting about something. I wanted to know what it was.” She replied softly, sitting on the bed before gesturing for him to join her.

Kylo sighed as she rested her forehead against his, still a bit damp and warm from the shower. “What if something happens while you're gone? What if you get hurt and I’m not there to protect you?”

His empress pressed her lips to his in a chaste kiss. “That won’t happen.”

“What if-“ He began, screwing his eyes shut at the images that flooded his mind.

“I will be surrounded by troopers who are there to make sure that doesn’t happen. And Hux will be there and-“ She began, a scoff from Kylo at Hux’s name cutting her off mid sentence.

“Hux is incompetent.” Kylo snapped.

“Am I incompetent?” She asked. Kylo didn’t respond. “I would know what they were planning long before they wouldn’t even set in motion to act.”

“But what if-“ Kylo began again, swiftly being silenced by his empress' lips firmly being pressed against his, causing him to forget his protest.

When she pulls away, Kylo’s lips subconsciously follow hers for a lingering moment. His empress ran her fingertips gently over his jaw, pulling a low sigh from his throat at the feeling.

“I will be fine. Relax, my love.” She whispered, pulling him to lie beneath the covers beside her.

Pulling her against his bare chest, Kylo willed himself to focus on the scent of her hair as he tried to push his paranoid thoughts away unsuccessfully.

His empress must have been able to sense his unsuccessful attempt at calming himself. She repositioned herself on top of him, her knees on opposite sides of his hips as she bent to kiss his forehead.

The lines in his forehead softened at the feel of her lips pressed against them, his heart swelling at the intimate feeling of her fingers carding through his curls. He removed her hands from his hair, pressing her knuckles to his lips.

If any enemies could see him now, Kylo thought, they’d have ammunition against him for the rest of his life.

“Well then it’s a good thing it’s just you and me then huh?” His empress said aloud.

Kylo scoffed slightly, his hands running over the exposed skin of her thighs. “I wish you would stop that.”

She shrugged. “When you allow yourself to tell me when something is troubling you, then I’ll stop.”

Kylo chuckled. “Deal.”

Their lips collided once more, this time with more force than before. All of his anxious fantasies seemed to slip from his mind as he ran his tongue over his empress's bottom lip before pushing past it.

New types of fantasies replaced them. He liked these fantasies much better.

“Take what you want, my love.” His empress broke their kiss to whisper into his ear.

“I thought we just settled this mind reading nonsense.” Kylo responded, pressing his lips to the pressure point in her neck.

She gasped, gripping at his hair as he continued his assault on her neck, trailing his lips up and down, stopping every few inches to nip and suck at her soft skin.

“I don’t need to read your mind to know when you want me.” She replied breathlessly, moving her dampening core over the growing bulge in his sleep pants.

Kylo hissed, flipping her over to lay on the soft sheets of his bed. He tugged at the closure of her robe, removing the garment and tossing it over his shoulder.

He marveled at her bare body, her chest rising and falling rapidly as her nipples peaked in the cold air of the bedroom.

“I would destroy anyone who would ever try to hurt you.” Kylo grunted before taking one nipple into his mouth and pinching harshly at the other, causing his empress to cry out in delight.

He rutted his throbbing cock against her exposed core, coating the front of his sleep pants in her wetness. Her cries of pleasure as he attacked her breasts, switching from one nipple to the other, causing his cock twitch.

Kylo removed his lips from her breast, placing a hungry kiss to her lips before shedding his pants and boxers. His tip was angry and red, precum already leaking as he averted his gaze to her dripping pussy.

He ran a finger between her folds, a whimper escaping her as he pushed it inside her, quickly followed by another. “My sweet empress….so desperate for me….gonna come for me?”

A string of pleas was all that she could muster as he pumped his fingers in and out, his thumb moving to run her clit in time with his motions.

Her orgasm was quickly approaching, her hips moving in time with each pump of his fingers to chase her high. Kylo stopped his motions abruptly as he left her begin to flutter around his fingers, causing her to whine loudly.

He pressed his lips over hers to silence her. “Want to feel my empress come on her Supreme Leader’s cock. Stars, so beautiful. Don’t deserve you.”

Lining himself up with her entrance, a loud, guttural moan escaped him as he pushed himself inside her warmth. The tightness caused him to bite down gently on her shoulder for a quick moment, before returning his lips to hers as he began to rock in and out.

His pace quickened the very moment they had both adjusted, his empress gripping his shoulders and crying out as he hit the perfect spot inside of her.

Kylo didn’t last very long after her, hot spurts of his cum coating her core as she tightened around him in her own orgasm.

Letting them both come down from their highs, he pulled out, admiring his cum dripping from her before going for a warm cloth to clean her up with.

He laid down beside her, all anxieties forgotten for the next few moments as she fit herself against his arm. Kylo’s heart tightened at the intimacy.

“I don’t know what I’ll do without you for the next week.” Kylo mumbled into her hair. His empress’s laugh caused his heart to skip a beat.

“You’ll manage and so will I.” She replied, kissing him on the cheek. “Just don’t find yourself a new lover while I’m gone.”

Kylo cringed at the mere thought. “Never. There will only ever be you.”

His empress sighed happily, closing her eyes to get some much needed rest before her departure in the morning. Kylo pressed his lips to the crown of her head.

Kylo assured himself that she would be fine without him. Deciding to focus on what would happen when they were finally reunited after a week of being away from each other.

He really liked that fantasy.

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