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7spaceace7 · 3 years

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Secrets (A Donatello x Reader)

This is incredibly self-indulgent and was really just a fic for me to obsess over tesla coils, but my girlfriend convinced me to post it- so here it is! It got kind of long too, but I hope you enjoy!

Word Count: 3236

Reader is given feminine terms in this one

Mild cursing (thank you Raph)

Absolute fluff attack, the sweetness will rot your teeth

Singing was your greatest passion. From a young age, you had been roped into music, the emotions it could represent with just a few notes and some relatable lyrics. It was happiness, it was sadness, it was anger and excitement, and it was everything you couldn’t express well enough with just words. Being a writer, sometimes that would get frustrating, but music helped you overcome the most challenging spots in a new piece or story. This is why you would constantly have earbuds in as you sang along to every song you’d memorized on your Spotify shuffle.

And Donnie noticed this. Every time you would enter the turtles’ lair, he would see you unplug and pack-up your headphones. Hell, he was even able to detect your singing from the sounds of the sewer tunnels echoing with every step you took closer. He’d hear you talk about the music or soundtracks of your favorite games and movies, analyzing what every slight twinge or reprise would allude to. And he loved every part of it. He loved getting to see those moments where music was all you could focus on. Your heart rate rose exponentially in anticipation and excitement. Your eyes would screw shut while you broke into a grin. Your hands would mimic motions to the beat as you played on invisible drums, or strummed a nonexistent guitar.

It was adorable to him, to say the least. But he never told you so. He never said a word, in case this might scare you off for coming across as “creepy” or weird. He knew most people probably didn’t pay this close attention to little things like that, but then again, he also knew that most people weren’t madly in love with you.

Which Donatello was.

He couldn’t tell you, because once he started rambling about you, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to stop. And if he didn’t stop, then he’d run the 89.07% chance risk of telling you how he’d been in love with you since the day they met you. That was way too high for him to be comfortable. No, he couldn’t tell you, no matter how badly he wanted you to know.

“Okay, so what if you just show ‘er you’re interested instead?” Raph asked, half paying attention to his brother’s predicament, half pounding the punching bag before him into the ground. Leo was in the dojo meditating, and Mikey was playing video games in the living room, which left the two middle brothers to their own devices. For Donnie, this was literally. His three-fingered hands fiddled with his latest electrical circuit. It was bound for sending the right amount of voltage into his inventions without needing four power strips and a generator all on their own. Unfortunately, he was too distracted to actually delve into its components, and settled for breaking and piecing it back together again.

“Show her? How would I do that?” Donnie’s voice trembled at the thought.

“I dunno, you’re the genius here,” Raph huffed, “There’s gotta be somethin’ in this place that you think she’d find cool. She loves music, right?”

“Yeah, like a lot, she even-”

“Rhetorical question, Don, heard the rant plenty,” His brother cut him off. Pausing his violent onslaught of the dummy, he turned to face him. “You’re nervous ‘cause you ain’t ever done somethin’ for a pretty girl before, I get it. So do somethin’ you know you’re good at. That’ll take the nerves off, your plan works, and then I won’ have to listen to you babbling about whatever new fuckin’ thing she did today. Win win.”

The younger turtle paused. “That was...actually pretty sound advice, thank you, Raph.”

“Anytime,” Raph nodded, a smug smile tugging at his lips from being able to help. Problem was, now he was invested. He’d listened to his brother’s rants and rambles and failed plans of possibly confessing for weeks now, what was gonna happen once he finally did it? Raph plopped onto one of Donnie’s bean bag chairs. He didn’t bother to pick up the training dummy. “So what ya gonna do, smart guy?”

Donnie blinked a few times, glasses twitching on his nose as he pushed them up. He didn’t know it, but you coined this his “brainstorming face”. He fiddled with the circuits once again.

“Uh...I’m not sure,” His tongue went dry. A million ideas fly through his brain each minute, and this decides to be the time that he can’t think of a single one good enough. Figures. “I could build her something? Maybe a new stereo, or upgrade the one she has.”

Raph made a noise of disapproval. “You can do better, any old fix-it guy could do that.”

“Fair. Maybe I could- ow!”

A short buzz of the air cut him off as his fiddling paid off. To the world’s great irony, a light bulb several inches away lit up.

“You good?”

“Yeah, I’m good, I…” Donnie trailed off. The purple-clad turtle’s eyes widened as he registered what happened. “I’m better than good, I just had an epiphany!”

“Epipha-what?”

“An epiphany, sudden realization, an idea!” Donnie flicked his goggles back down, enhancing his vision with the magnifier on it. Wires were tugged in and out, and a transmitter was displaced. With a snort of triumph, he raised it to the air for his brother to see. “This is the answer!”

“A tiny board thing. Just what she’s always wanted,” Raph rolled his eyes, but Donnie was prepared for this.

“Not just a tiny board, a tiny board with this!-” With great haste, Donnie was next to Raph, holding the board out properly. “My side-side project, this little thing, look at the coil here, this is it! This is a tesla coil, capable of transmitting thousands and thousands of volts of energy surging through the air, powering anything within its radius, which is perfect and exactly why I needed to reconfigure it to power my lab and this one new machine I’m working on, but that’s not why this is the perfect idea!”

“Wow, please continue, professor, I’m dyin’ to know.”

“Glad you asked! Watch this!” One aux cord, T-Phone connection, and light-dimming later, the lab went dark in anticipation. And suddenly, with the press of a play button on Donnie’s shuffle, music started to fill the air. But it wasn’t coming from his phone. It was coming from the coils, surging and creating not only electric energy that was visible to the human eye as it sparked, but music. Sound. The beats and notes of the song playing sprouted out in the form of electricity.

Raph’s green eyes became transfixed on the sparks flying out. “Holy shit.”

“Holy shit is right!” Came the squeals of utter nerding out, “This is only a tabletop version of an SGTC circuit, my own type of it anyway based on Tesla’s original designs, but if I reworked it, made it bigger, made it lifelike and maybe four or five of them, I could create the most advanced musical performance this city has ever seen!”

“I’m gonna pretend I know everything you just said because clearly this is your nerd thing,” Raph started, utterly confused. Even still, a reassuring smile framed his features. “But this looks pretty damn cool. This right here? Exactly what ‘m sayin’, Don. This is you.”

“Do you think she’ll like it...?” Donnie asked in a hopeful voice. He wasn’t just asking about the invention.

“Course she will.”

~x~

A couple weeks had passed since that fateful conversation with Raph. He’d been in and out of the lab since then, but between patrols and the mandatory bathroom breaks, there was hardly a time he wasn’t working on his great new project. You weren’t even allowed to go into the lab, per his request, for all his time there.

However, he always made sure to make at least one movie whenever you’d come hang out at the lair from work.

Finally, one Friday night, the set up was complete. Pride swelled in Donnie’s chest as he looked at his creation: six symmetrically placed tesla coils sprung up from the ground and walls all around his lab space. The coilings wrapped around metal frames, spiraling into a beautiful arrangement of engineering, if he did say so himself. Mikey said it looked like the lasers out of a DC comic, which was also not a bad thing to be. He just hoped that you would like it. All of it was for you, of course, but over the weeks that he’d been preparing it, he found more beauty in the music of tesla coils than he ever had appreciated before.

Donnie thought he might thank you for that, if he could get his nerves around it.

God, he was so nervous. Anxiety rushed through his body like the electric pulses he was perfecting. They were already done, but it was all he could do to distract himself while waiting for you to arrive. Maybe the frequencies weren’t in the right key. What if they sounded better this way? Or maybe the firing power wasn’t enough? Trajectory looked alright, maybe it just-

“Donnie?”

“Gh! Y/N, hey!” Stammered the surprised terrapin after knocking his head against the top of a coil. His goggles were on the setting of night-vision, but that didn’t account for night-spatial-awareness, it seemed.

“I got your text to come,” You tried to smile at him, but the dark laboratory proved to make that difficult. “How come it’s so dark in here?”

“Uh, well, that’s p-part of the surprise! Eheh. Gimme just a second-”

You waited patiently outside of his lab, vision still applicable, but grew concerned the more strange noises and clangs you heard coming from inside. This was definitely a whole new level of “Donnie Surprises” just by how nervous he seemed about it.

You yelped when his hand grabbed your arm and dragged you back inside the darkness.

“Okay, uh,” He started, before clapping his hands together for the lights to switch back on, “This is what I wanted to show you.”

Your gaze spun all around the lab. After adjusting to the light, you could clearly see giant mechanism after mechanism placed strategically around in a dome-like setup. Coils that protruded like round-edged spikes circled you both, and in the center was a metal cage.

“Oh my god…” You almost whispered. A large grin broke out onto your face as you stared in quiet marvel at the scene. His plan was working, and Donnie lit up with an outstretched arm in presentation.

“These bad boys are called tesla coils-”

“Tesla coils!” You squealed in imperfect unison to what you assumed was the start of an explanation. “You made tesla coils, Donnie, holy shit!”

“You’ve heard of them?!” Donnie exclaimed, eyes widening behind his glasses.

“YES!” Your hands began to wave around excitedly, “Oh my god I used to be OBSESSED with these things! I heard about when I was a kid from that old movie, oh what was it, it was like the apprentice’s-”

“Sorcerer’s Apprentice!”

“THAT! Yes!”

“I haven’t seen that movie in years!”

“Me neither! All I remember is that Hiccup’s voice actor totally nerded out and programmed his giant tesla coils to play music for the girl he wanted to impress, and it was the coolest thing because these giant machines were playing music, music out of nothing but sparks of electricity at different frequencies, which to be honest probably would have caused more of an energy problem than the movie suggested because goddamn do they take up a lot of power, but I was like six and didn’t care!” You laughed in an energetic burst of word association, practically bouncing on the balls of your feet.

Donnie could have kissed you then and there for that alone.

A grin crept onto his lips as he watched you ramble on about the movie, leaving all anxious thoughts to fall from his mind. For once, someone actually understood one of his passions. Better than that, she was explaining the process to him of all people! Sure, she was intuitive enough to know he didn’t need it, he literally had just built them after all. This was just out of pure excitement. Someone in his life was talking about science and technology like they were the most fascinating things on the planet, just as the purple-masked turtle believed it was. Well, second only to the ecstatic girl in front of him.

“-And so, I randomly remembered it again not that long ago, so I looked it up and found so many videos on YouTube about it. I kid you not, I listened to tesla coils and tesla coils alone for a solid week.”

You breathed heavily, a little winded after such an intense info-dump. God, he always loved when you got excited about something.

“This is kind of surreal,” Donnie chuckled a bit, pushing up his glasses when they tumbled down his nose, “I had no idea you’d get what these were, much less have known so much about them.” Donnie’s eyes widened at his own panicked-fueled blabbering. “N-Not that I think you’re stupid! I just-- I mean it’s not-- common? It’s more of-”

“A niche interest, yeah. No worries,” You finished for him, signaling his stuttered words hadn’t fallen on offended ears. Donnie quietly sighed in relief. Time ticked by in seconds, but even that was much too fast for this martial artist to grasp. If he could have constructed a device to pause the fabrics of time, he would have long ago, simply to relish the moments with you that meant everything to him. It wasn’t your fault your eyes captivated him more than any element he’s worked with.

“So,” You began eagerly, startling him out of his thoughts, “Are we gonna listen to some zappy poles go brrr or what?”

Donnie snorted at your juvenile word choice. “Yeah, totally. Now, ah,” He walked over toward the large cage in the center, stepped inside, then poked his head out with a dorky grin. A large, green hand stood outstretched towards you. “I think you’d better step inside my cage.”

“If you keep quoting the damn movie like this, I am going to explode from excitement, and it will be your fault!” It was a wonder how you hadn’t caught onto his plan yet, honestly. You made no sense of hesitation before grabbing his offered hand (even though your hands were small enough that they hardly matched his palm’s size), and clambered into the cage in front of him. This was a great excuse for you to be close to him without it being weird. And now, with your back brushing up against his plastron, the butterflies in his chest told him it was totally a good call.

Donatello would take this secret to his grave, however.

“Put your hands on the rail here, yep just like that,” Donnie nodded after your hands found the safeguard rail. A couple buttons tapped into a laptop later, he settled his own hands next to yours. “Let the magic begin.”

Magic would have been the understatement of the year. A coil in front of you quickly shot out its first spark. Familiar music breached the sound barrier to your ears. The one behind you both caught it instantly. Spark after spark sent back and forth between the coils, soaring through the lab like the most incredible game of electric catch.

“Whoa!” You laughed when the sparks would bounce off the cage itself, pressing closer to the turtle behind you (much to his surprise every time). Your shining e/c eyes never left the electric bolts shooting out. “This is insane!”

“Heh, glad you like it!” Donnie watched you closely that entire time, more entranced by your excitement and wonderstruck self than anything he’d created. He could power up the tesla coils anytime of day, but this was a special moment he’d never be able to recreate in a controlled environment. This was no experiment, this was real and it was happening right now.

The only thing left to do was tell you how he felt.

“Y/N, I have to tell you something,” He began, stepping away to give you a bit of space. His heart rate was increasing by the second. The way you turned to look at him wasn’t helping, either.

“What is it?” You spoke softly, somehow able to be heard over the music. Donnie could hardly meet your eyes, so he took your hands in his instead.

“I...I don’t know how to say this exactly,” He started, “I’ve been trying to do it for months, going over every possible conjuncture of words, something that would be heartfelt and honest, poetic even? But the truth is, words aren’t my thing, th-they never have been. I’m a science guy, I take things apart and put them back together again, I figure out what makes them work, I see life as a million tiny parts to analyze.”

He paused his quickened speech to take a breath. Your hands squeezed his larger ones as an offer to continue.

“And so, I’m...bad at feelings. I see it all as chemicals and components used by the brain to create action and reaction. But now I’m not so sure if that’s all they are, and really the only thing I am sure about is that it’s because of you that I’m questioning everything I ever thought I knew. Maybe, maybe life is more than atoms and chemicals, and instead it’s about..moments. Moments like this. Moments that...that I..that I really want to keep forever and play over and over again.”

“Donnie…” You spoke. This time he squeezed your hands.

“I know I’m rambling and I should really get to the point, so what I’m trying to say is,” He took another breath, steady this time. His gaze met yours again. “I want to live these moments with you every day. You’re special to me. You’re part of our family, but this is more than that, this feeling is-”

“Love.” You finished for him. Both of your eyes widened as you realized the other felt how you each did.

Donatello nodded slowly, hesitant to be so certain, but knowing it was true. There were no more words to be exchanged after that, only actions, only movements so soft and gentle that the large terrapin was certain he’d break if they could fit in his hands. Your hands left his and instead reached up to grab the long ends of his mask, and tugged gently for him to reach you. He leaned down without a thought. A three-fingered hand found your waist this time.

You kissed. Soft, human lips connected to his slightly chapped reptilian ones. The turtle had waited for this moment since he realized the attraction he felt towards you was not just powerful chemical reactions, but true feelings. It wasn’t biology, it was chance and fate and one-in-a-million all at once. As the sparks continued to (literally) fly, Donnie let his eyes close. This was the present. He was here, he was holding a great new adventure in his hands, and there was a brilliant future just around the corner.

The song may have finished, but this is what would last forever.

#tmnt #tmnt donatello #donatello x reader #tmnt x reader #tmnt 2014 #tesla coils #tmnt raphael #donnie and raph are good bros #tmnt donnie x reader #tmnt 2016 #donatello #raphael #donnie #raph #donnie x reader #fanfics

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taliaromanovaswife · 3 years

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Exothermic

Summary: Meet the original character, plagued by amnesia after an accident. But what if a certain deadly assassin is the cure for that?

Warnings: softly NSFW... like, it could be worse? Little swearing

The sound of her own, slow footsteps was her only companion on this evening's stroll through the sterile, clean corridors. Though barely audible, the noise was almost deafening to her and yet it did not manage to stop her mind from reeling. Nothing around her seemed familiar, starting with her room and ending with the smell of the hallways. There was absolutely nothing that managed to jog her memory so far, and it irked her. Apparently, she was a member of the greatest team of heroes that walked the Earth, but every time she looked into their faces, her brain could not connect the dots. And worst of all, every Avenger had told her that they were not allowed to help her; that her amnesia had to fade on its own terms and that telling her the truth could make it worse in the end. So, here she was. Eight weeks after an accident where she had been thrown through a window on the first floor, discharged from the hospital because her wounds were healing nicely, yet she still did not remember anything from her past. Nothing, except for her name, age and powers, but even that information was given to her.

Alexandra, twenty-five, defender and healer – whatever that was supposed to mean.

Pressing her palms against her temple, she scoffed and rolled her eyes at herself. Nothing happened, just like nothing had happened since the day she regained consciousness. She had no clue how her powers actually worked, but if she was a healer, then why was she unable to heal her own brain? “You're so stupid”, she cried out, banging the balls of her hands against her already aching head. “Why can't you work? I just want to know who the fuck I am?!”

She rounded another corner, walking past half a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows when she stopped dead in her tracks. Something in the corner of her eye had caught her attention, something she was unsure had been there before. Nevertheless, it was something that spoke to her and for the first time in weeks, she felt a sense of familiarity warming up her insides.

Taking a chance, the tall blonde tried the door handle, happy to find it unlocked. After light brown eyes had scanned the area to make sure that she was alone, tentative feet slipped through a small gap, still wondering if her mind was playing tricks on her now. She had been walking these halls since she was brought home, but had never noticed a piano up here, or anywhere for that matter. Not even downstairs in the bar. ‘Too expensive’, the man who introduced himself as Tony Stark had said when she had asked. ‘The last one got destroyed by Ultron’, a muscular, tall, blond guy had added before receiving death glares from the rest of the group. Alexandra had no idea who Ultron was. How could she, if she was still unable to put the pieces of her own past back together? And what about her present? Did she even go by her full first name or did she prefer it was shortened to Alex? Or even Lexi? Did she like being an Avenger? How strong was her power, how strong was she? She did not know and they did not tell her. But she felt drawn to the piano, as if it was calling out for her and that feeling eased some of her frustration.

Carefully lifting the fall board and locking it in an upright position, shaky fingers pressed down a combination of keys that her brain did not remember, but her muscles certainly did. Muscle memory, she sighed. How could she remember this but not even the bare minimum of her life? Her most important muscle was not working the way it should. Slender hands pulled the matching black piano bench out from under the instrument and she sat down, her fingers gliding over the keys like second nature as her feet hit the pedals.

Suddenly, her mind flashed to a different time. A different piano was in front of her and perfectly manicured short, red-painted fingernails produced a tune she could not hear. But if Alexandra had to guess, she was reliving a tiny bit of her memory. Maybe, hopefully, this was the pivotal ingredient that she had been missing.

Closing her eyes, she allowed her fingers to work the way they knew how to, her vision not providing much help anyway. And as the melody filled the air and cautious fingertips became more confident of their skill, so did her feet. Alexandra was no expert in how muscle memory actually worked, but she could not explain what was happening right now any other way. Her mind drew blank on the names of the songs that she brought to life, and yet, somehow her brain knew what belonged together and when she transitioned to a new melody. So she kept playing, kept her eyes shut tight and let her emotions rage freely like a wildfire.

Alexandra was so lost in her creations, she did not register the other person entering the room, nor did she feel their presence. Her upper body leaned into the music, swayed with every crescendo and diminuendo. The music consumed her entire system, every nerve ending was accommodating to her trance as the cells in her brain sprang into action. Still, her fingers danced over black and white keys in the most beautiful pattern she had ever heard.

Natasha Romanoff was utterly captivated by the sight before her eyes, as mesmerizing and enthralling as ever. From the moment she had stepped into the room, she stood still and quiet, simply listening to the melody with a sad smile on her face. There was something magical about the way that Alexandra commanded the keys under the pads of her fingers and she was glad she had suggested buying a piano for the younger woman. It was minutes later that she slipped her ballet shoes on and tied the ribbons around her ankles, green eyes never leaving the figure behind the piano. Even as she pulled her red hair into a neat bun – years of practice making the need for a mirror unnecessary – her gaze was fixed on the musician, waiting. The assassin had noticed the slight change in the other hero's posture, the deeper breaths and the parted lips. She knew what was coming, long before Alexandra herself had figured it out.

Words formed in her head. If one were to ask her, Alexandra would say she did not know where they came from, her brain not remembering the song. But her heart did, even if it did not understand the meaning just yet. “Dancing around in the rain again.”, she sang, finding the lyrics to the accords she played. Her voice was soft and quiet, trembling with insecurity at first. 'Cause you said that I was my only friend. Playing with the flowers that I picked myself. Because I know they won't come from anybody else. Wrap myself up to warm my hands. From the biting ice that you made them stand.”

As her favorite voice filled the room, velvety and clear, Natasha began to stretch her tired muscles. Last week's mission had been tough on all of them, and the ache from multiple hits and countless falls still lingered in her bones. It could have been worse, but it also could have gone a lot smoother and with less injuries. Still, there was no pain that could stop her from being here, from dancing to Alexandra’s song. Not her bruised ribs and most definitely not her bandaged wrist – just a sprain, she told everybody.

Tears began to form behind her closed eyes. How could she remember songs but not her life? What kind of sick and twisted condition was this retrograde amnesia and why would it not let go of her? And while her fingers moved across the keys without any mistakes, and her feet operated the pedals below them, the first tears spilled down her cheeks. She just wanted to remember. “I'm still moving cities and I'm still causing storms. I don't know if you know this. But when I shoot I score. Took this pain inside of me, turned it into gold. I made this exothermic. Now watch my heart explode.”

Natasha's heart broke for the person, as it did every day since the accident. She had thought that the first few days had been the hardest, when no doctor was giving a clear statement whether or not she would wake from the coma. Then, when Alexandra did wake up but did not know who she was, did not recognize her, the agent's entire world fell apart. Adjustments had been made before the young Avenger had been released from the hospital, hushed conversations that would make everybody feel left out had become the norm around the blonde hero. But every look into Alexandra's sad eyes chipped away at the – usually put-together – assassin. Natasha shook those thoughts from her head as she carefully pushed herself onto her tip toes and raised her arms above her head, extending her index finger and pinkie into perfect position. Out of everything she had been trained in on her way to become one of the deadliest assassins in Russian history, ballet had always been her favorite and to this day, she still used dancing as a stress reliever.

Brown, teary eyes fluttered open and the music abruptly stopped. Her fingers halted over the keys, her mouth remained agape as she stared at the woman who was introduced to her as Natasha Romanoff. She thought she was alone, but there stood the beautiful Russian, dressed in tight black leggings, a matching form-fitting black bodice and a white silken skirt. “I’m-“ She pulled her fingers in, forming fists that slowly clenched and unclenched with every passing second, her heart rate speeding up to the same rhythm. Nervously chewing on her own bottom lip, she stared at her own hands and then back at the other woman. “Was I not supposed to be in here?”, she asked anxiously, Natasha’s intense green eyes seemingly staring right into her soul.

“Please don’t be scared”, the assassin replied. “This is your home, you can be in every room you want to be in, use everything you want or need.” Graciously lowering herself back onto her entire feet and resting her hands on her hips, the redhead tried reassuring her. “You should feel at home here.”

The words were mumbled, but Alexandra still caught it and scoffed. “And yet, everybody stops talking when I walk into a room”, the woman shot back, smoothing her palms over the long, honey-blonde braid and sighed. “I’m sorry. It’s not easy being me right now, whoever I am. But you did not deserve this.” Everybody around here had been nothing but amazing towards her, despite her condition. Sure, their conversations stopped or changed, but that did not mean that she was not included in whatever topic followed after. “I can go, if you want to-“

“Please don’t”, Nat said in a haste, stopping herself before she could say the name that lingered on the tip of her tongue. She took deep breaths, reminding herself that Alexandra’s memory was yet to come back. “Would you play for me?”, she asked quietly, her lips curling into a smile. “Your song was very beautiful and I would like to dance to it.”

The blonde eyed the assassin apprehensively. Was this a regular occasion? Did she used to sing for other people? “Damn it, you stupid brain”, she cursed under her breath, eliciting a light chuckle from Natasha. Thinking about the request for a moment, she finally agreed. “Only if I am allowed to watch you dance.”

“Always”, the redhead smiled, her body protesting slightly as she pushed herself into the releve pose. She steadied herself before finding Alexandra's eyes. “Ready when you are.”

As if nothing had stopped her in the first place, expert finger tips roamed over the keys, picking up where they had left off. Once again, the melody resonated in the air, but this time, Alexandra only had eyes for the gorgeous woman dancing for her. Every part of Natasha’s body appeared to be in sync with her music and somehow the blonde knew that this was not the first time she had twirled to this particular song. “Dancing around in the dark again. But I'm happier now than I ever was then. Feel my heart as it is ablaze. Making room for another in these better days. Days, days.” Forcefully pressing the keys into the instrument as the music became louder and more spirited, brown eyes followed Natasha’s every motion doing the same. She did not notice the two figures standing on the other side of the glass, staring and smiling at her.

Wanda sighed in content, listening to the sound of Alexandra's beautiful voice. She and Natasha always begged the young hero to sing for them, or at least play one of her favorite compositions for them. It helped with the stress after a long day of work. It eased their minds and both women knew that the same applied to Alexandra. “Do you think this will help her?”, the witch asked aloud, her Sokovian accent less prominent now that she was spending most of her time around Americans. Cocking her head to the left but never averting her eyes, she added, “Natasha could use a sliver of good news.”

Arms crossed over his chest, Steve observed as one of his oldest friends danced. He let out a long breath. “I really hope so. I don't know how long Nat can keep going like this. It's ripping her apart.” The super soldier truly admired the redhead for still walking tall. He was not sure he could do the same. “If this doesn't work, then I don't know what could, besides telling Alex the truth. And the doctor's strictly recommended not to do that. But-”

“But at this rate, our most deadliest and finest assassin is no use on missions”, Wanda finished his sentence with a soft nod while watching the Black Widow dance with an elegance unmatched by anything she had ever seen.

“I'm still moving cities and I'm still causing storms. I don't know if you know this. But when I shoot I score. Took this pain inside of me, turned it into gold. I made this exothermic. Now watch my heart explode.” Alexandra's vocal cords vibrated deep within her throat as her voice reverberated with every word she sang. Louder and louder. The keys molded to her every tap and she had to focus on keeping her eyes open. She never let Natasha out of sight, but as the song went on, it was harder and harder not to give in to the music and let her feelings take over. “Oh, watch me exo, o, o, o. Watch me exo burn this. I deserve it, ohh. I deserved this. I deserve it, oh! I deserve this, woah!”

The Russian's feet hit the parquet floor in a faster pattern now, her body spiraling with every pirouette. The position of her hands was immaculate, the satin skirt wafted with every turn and yet, every time she spun around, her eyes locked on Alexandra's. Watching the other woman play with such intensity, like nothing had changed in the past weeks, made her want to cry. But Natasha swallowed her emotions and danced until the blonde stopped playing. She came to a stop, her breathing ragged and the pain from her bruised ribs jabbing into her sides. Still, Nat regretted nothing.

Neither of them said a word or dared to move. The last notes had long since faded away, but they still felt connected through the music. An invisible bond both held onto, fearing that breaking the silence would involuntarily end this moment of peace.

It was Alexandra who moved first, carefully closing the fall board and rising to her feet. “This was nice, we should do this again.” The comment came with a smile. She had not felt this free in weeks and even though her memories did not return – she had hoped they would – the blonde felt a lot better. “Thank you for the dance, Natalia”, she said out of a habit she did not understand. Hearing the sentence, but specifically that name, falling from her own lips caused a chain reaction. She froze on the spot and went stiff as her brain was flooded with millions of memories from her past. Missions and fighting. Loki, Ultron. Iron Man, Thor, Captain America. The Hulk. Clint and Wanda, her brother Pietro. Vision. Her healing a gash on Natasha's temple. Natasha. Everything came back to her, and all at once. And as her brain completed the puzzle, everything began to make sense again. The last image she saw showed Natasha – her Natalia – in a simple white dress and with white flowers in her red, wavy hair as she was waiting for her on the grass behind the Avenger's compound. And then finally, she remembered her full name. Alexandra Romanoff.

Natasha gasped, her hand covering her mouth in shock. She had waited so long to hear her wife say her name again. No one ever called her Natalia, no one but Alexandra. “Sasha”, she whispered her lover's nickname, eyes filling with tears. With hesitant steps, she closed the gap between them. Soft hands cradled the blonde's face the second she was close enough. “I've missed you so much.” Her lips brushed against a tear-stained cheek, tasting the salt on the tip of her tongue. “Thank you, for coming back to me.”

Gently taking a bandaged hand in her left, Alexandra carefully lowered their limbs. Her wife appeared tough on the outside and would never admit to anyone how much pain she truly was in. But brown eyes saw right through the facade. It had been those very same eyes that had torn down Natasha's walls, stone for stone, when they had started dating all those years ago. A mellow light radiated from her, encasing both women in the warmest, white gleam. Her powers searched for every single one of Nat’s injuries, healing them one after the other. “I will always come back to you, моя любовь. Always”, she promised.

Just as she leaned in for a kiss, Natasha saw the two people outside of the room move slightly – of course her trained senses had picked up on their presence earlier, but she had chosen to ignore them. “FRIDAY? Please close the blinds”, she asked the Artificial Intelligence in her sweetest voice. A swoosh sounded through the room as the shades dropped from the ceiling almost all the way down to the floor, effectively blocking every curious onlooker. “Now we are alone.” Her voice was husky now, even lower than the usual rasp that was just so distinctively hers. “You didn't notice?”

Alexandra shook her head. “I was watching you.” Pale cheeks blushed a dark shade of red when their lips were mere millimeters apart, their foreheads touching. She chuckled. “Even when my brain was all chaotic and weird, I could not stop looking at you.” Nudging her partner's nose with her own, she inhaled Natasha's perfume. “I'm sorry it took me so long.”

The motion was barely visible as the red-haired woman shook her head. “It doesn't matter”, she whispered softly, stroking a few loose curls out of Alexandra's face and behind her ear. “What matters is that you remember now.” Finally pressing her lips against her wife's, she was immediately engulfed by the familiar warmth and love she had for the other woman. God, how much she had missed her.

Pale hands rested on either side of a slender hip, thumbs stroking the bone over the soft material of the dancer's outfit. The cutest little moans escaped her throat. This was what coming home felt like. Natasha was home. One of her hands slid lower, fingers fanning out over a firm bottom cheek as she smiled into the kiss. Tears of happiness ran down her cheeks.

“Don't cry, Милый”, Natasha whispered, wiping her lover's tears away with a gentle brush of her knuckles. “Please, don't cry.”

Swallowing the lump that had formed in her throat, the blonde reconnected their lips. A dire need to be as close as possible to her wife was all she experienced in this moment. “Happy tears”, Alexandra assured between kisses, pulling the assassin even closer into her body. She relished in these moments, remembering how the redhead never let her guard down around anybody but her. It made every moment of intimacy even more special. “I love you.”

Her wife's breathless confession caused her heart to pound even faster in her chest. “I love you, too.” Strong hands moved to her lover's behind, cupping a cheek in each of them to hoist her up. She felt legs wrap around her waist as a squeal left Alexandra's mouth, followed by the most precious giggles. Natasha had to crane her neck now, due to the change in height, but it had always been one of her favorite things to do. “I love you so much.” A couple of quick steps later, a slim back collided with the wall behind the piano.

The kiss grew more heated, tongues danced to an unsung melody. Their hearts beat in sync, wanton lust overtaking both women. It took all of her willpower, but when she felt full lips suck on her neck, Alexandra let out a frustrated groan. She knew she had to put a stop to this for now. “I think we have a more suitable... room for this, Natalia”, she moaned, her voice dripping with desire. “Our room.”

Natasha hated to admit it, but her wife had a point. Their reconnecting deserved more than a quickie in the newly appointed music room. She pressed their lips together in one last heated kiss before carefully lowering the blonde back onto her feet. Both inhaled deeply to regain some composure and smoothed over their clothes. “Ready?”, she asked, reaching out her hand for Alexandra to take, her other one holding her sneakers and sweater that she had picked off the floor.

Fingers intertwined, they exited the room with mischievous grins tugging on their lips as they walked past Wanda and Steve who were engaged in a conversation in the middle of the hallway. But the couple did not pay any attention to them anyway, too absorbed in each other's presence. Throughout the entire way to their room, neither spoke a word. Yet, the silence was not uncomfortable.

“Everything is still as I remember it”, Alexandra spoke when she entered their suite and took a look around. “Even my slippers are still where I kicked them off before we had to rush into the mission.” Her leather jacket – a birthday gift from a time when they were engaged – was still draped over one of the chairs. She smiled lovingly at Natasha when she noticed another detail. “I see you've been sleeping in my shirts.” She was not mad about this; she could never be mad about this. Because if the roles had been reversed, the blonde would have done the exact same thing.

Natasha blushed lightly, shutting the door behind them and locking it with a twist. “They kept me sane”, she explained. “Some of them still smelled like you.” And if they did not, she always imagined her wife's unique scent on them. Coming up behind the blonde, the dancer looped her arms around a slim waist. “You are what keeps me grounded, but you were not with me. So this was the next best thing.” The truth was, nothing could ever compare to the real thing. She tightened her embrace. Delicate fingers moved a honey-blonde braid out of the way before soft lips began to caress the back of a creamy neck.

Turning in her wife's arms and instantly missing the touch against her skin, Alexandra nuzzled her nose against her lover's cheek. Her fingers found their way to the hair tie, pulling lightly so red curls could fall onto almost bare shoulders. “I missed the feeling of your hair between my fingers”, she breathed, burying her hands in silken tresses as she claimed crimson lips in a fierce kiss.

The air was full of sexual tension as both women tugged and tore at each other's close until either of them was left in only their underwear. Natasha unhooked her own bra first, knowing how much her partner enjoyed the view. When the garment landed on the floor, nimble fingers fiddled with the clasp of the necklace that held her wife's wedding ring until she finally slid it back onto its rightful place. She smiled brightly. “Much better.” Wasting no more time, the red-haired woman unceremoniously undid Alexandra's bra before moving on to the matching pair of panties. “I missed all of you”, she husked seductively in her wife's ear before nibbling on the shell of it. “Every. Single. Inch.” And as her hands were busy getting reacquainted with the blonde's naked skin, she maneuvered them towards their bed.

Alex could not stop the moans as they spilled past her lips between kisses. She tried dipping her hand into her wife's underwear but remained unsuccessful before she was pushed onto the mattress. As brown eyes opened, the irises shone with a passionate hunger. “Come here”, she beckoned, ogling her lover while Natasha stripped herself of the last article of clothing. For a moment, she forgot how to breathe. “Natalia”, she groaned, growing impatient.

Knowing that teasing was not an option right now, and that it would ultimately cause both of them to suffer, the assassin climbed into the bed. Dainty hands wandered upwards, over pale ankles and satiny legs. Skipping her wife's sex on purpose and provoking a growl when Alexandra noticed what she was doing, the redhead did neither budge nor stop until she was once again face to face with the love of her life. “Hi”, she breathed against kiss-swollen lips as the pads of her fingers playfully fondled her wife's round breasts. Skillfully tweaking rosy buds into pebbled peaks, Natasha licked the blonde's full bottom lip, asking to be granted access.

Her mouth parted on its own accord, as did her legs to welcome the warm body on top of her between them. She let her hands rove over the smooth skin of Nat's back while the assassin played her body like an instrument. When wet lips encased one of her nipples, Alexandra arched even further into the touch, her own caresses never stopping.

Natasha hissed as she kissed a path from one boob to the other, certain that her lover's fingernails left crescent shaped marks on her right shoulder blade and neck. Her wife's nickname followed the next gasp, “Sasha.” Grinding her body into the one beneath her own, her slick center was mere inches away from Alexandra's. “Promise to never leave me again”, she pleaded, her voice barely audible against full lips.

“Not willingly”, the blonde assured her and wrapped her arms around her wife, holding her close. She could not even begin to imagine how hard the last weeks must have been on the other woman. “Never willingly, my love.” With a gentle nudge – in a moment of Natasha's inattentiveness – she flipped them so that she was now on top. “My promise to you will always stand, my beautiful Natalia. I will always love you and I will always come back to you”, she said, reciting parts of her wedding vow as she kissed along a creamy neck and toyed with hardened pearls. “If you're lost, I will find you.” Natasha's body bowed below her when she let her fingers dance over her ribs. “I will forever be yours.” When she looked up, she found Natasha's watchful gaze staring right back at her. “And you will forever be mine.”

Sneaking her left hand between them as Alexandra's traveled past her stomach, both women moaned vociferously when delicate fingers flicked each other's clits the way only they knew how. The Black Widow relished in the fact that the blonde had ruined her for anybody else and that she had returned the favor with pleasure. “Let go for me, Sasha”, she whined just as two of her lover's fingers slowly entered her. Mimicking Alexandra's action, the redhead eagerly swallowed her wife's whimpers.

The blonde's orgasm was approaching quickly and she could feel the walls around her digits tightening as well. Rubbing her thumb over her wife's engorged, needy bundle of nerves, she quaked when the assassin did the same. “I'm close”, she warned, her voice merely above a whisper as she pressed her forehead against Natasha's.

“Me too.” She loved their slow dance of passion and lust. There was no moment that she got to spend with her wife that she did not cherish. But tonight weighed a lot more as both women felt like they were coming home after being gone for weeks. “Come with me”, Natasha groaned, capturing full lips with her own seconds before she tumbled over the edge and Alexandra followed suit right after.

As both came down from their climax, the blonde felt the light strokes of fingertips as they pushed loose strands of honey-blonde hair out of her face. A satisfied smile spread across her lips. Her body revelled in the afterglow, tingled all over with bliss and adoration for the other woman. Lifting her head, she got momentarily lost in her lover's green eyes. “I am so in love with you, Natalia.”

“You will never know how much I love you, Sasha.”

#first marvel fanfic #natasha romanoff #natalia romanova #OC #soft smuft #exposing myself to the world #one shot #piano #dancing #amnesia #natasha romanoff fanfic #natasha romanoff is a softie #ballet #marvel fanfiction #black widow #black widow fanfic #more tags?#exothermic

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toxicjayhoe · 3 years

Text

Maximum Decibels

Shinsou Hitoshi/Reader (Some description of OC)

Alternate Universe - No Quirks (My Hero Academia)

Concerts

Song fic

Explicit Sexual Content

Some Plot ish?

Alcohol

One night stand

Word count : 3000

Songs in this fic : You'll be fine by Palaye Royale I don't feel quite right by Palaye Royale

If he hadn’t been wearing earplugs, he was sure the noise blaring from the low-quality speakers to his right would have blown out his ear drums. Thankfully, Shinso wasn’t an amateur. He lived for his Friday and Saturday nights out.

Music was a big part of his life, just like most people, he assumed. He wasn’t much of the type of person to go out to big venues and rather preferred to go to see and support local bands that played in small, overcrowded bars.

He had never liked crowds, but they seemed easier to manage emotionally in seedy local venues. Physically, not so much.

Another black clothed mosh pitter was dramatically thrown from the pit and headed his way. It was common courtesy to just push them back in.

As with any show, it was impossible to escape the movements of others, shoulders and elbows bumping him as they swayed to the music or a hand on the back as they made their way to the front of the stage, hoping for a better view.

Shinso didn’t care about the view. He just wanted to stand there, lean against the wall behind him, and let the music wash over him, let it drown out all of his worries and anxieties.

The opener for the night said their thanks as they finished the last song of their set. The crowd hollered and screamed their appreciation before the horde scurried off like cockroaches towards either the bar, the bathroom or outside for a smoke.

A sigh left his lips as his shoulders relaxed before stretching his arms over his head, walking over to sit on the edge on the stage as the next band began setting up their gear.

Purple eyes scanned the darkly lit room, pausing on the small groups that remained on the lower floor, analyzing but not judging.

Everyone looked similar. Dark clothes, bright hair. He wasn’t much different. He stared at his old, dirty black boots. His favorite pair. Despite their age, the steel toes were still in perfect shape. He didn’t trust anything more than these boots.

His black jeans were ripped at the knees and, if they hadn’t been tucked into his boots, you could see the tears at the cuffs. His brow furrowed at the thought. He should probably get a new decent pair to replace them. He probably wouldn’t.

There were a few familiar faces, of course. He was here every weekend, and he wasn’t the only one. He didn’t talk to any of them, really. They had a silent understanding, nodding their greetings and nothing more.

Just the way he liked it.

The lights dimmed, announcing the start of the next band. He pushed himself up and walked back over to his wall as everyone started to pour back in.

He closed his eyes, intently listening to the melodies and beats. He wasn’t one to dance, but he lost himself to the music that day, allowing his head to bob to the rhythm.

Fridays were reserved for new bands to make their debut, while Saturdays were a mix of newcomers and the local classics.

He enjoyed getting acquainted with new sounds, but there was just something about recognizing a song with just the first few notes that made life worth living.

Tonight happened to be one of those nights. The bands started earlier and finished later. It was the one night of the week that he would come home exhausted and actually be able to get a full night's worth of sleep.

Saturdays were also the one night he would grab a few drinks of whiskey to accompany the thrum of vibrations coursing through his entire body. The alcohol just seemed to elevate the sensations while also allowing him to relax and enjoy his night more thoroughly.

Earplugs in and glass in hand, he leaned against his usual wall. Everyone was dressed much the same as usual and he was no exception. The only difference? He’d opted on a simple white t-shirt.

He found himself pushing his hair back as he scanned the faces in the crowd, his eyes lidded and his own expression passive. As usual.

A loud laugh caught his attention and his gaze darted to the offender. A flash of red hair, glasses and a crooked grin as the woman continued to laugh at whatever her friends were talking about.

It wasn’t a face he recognized, but it was one that he would remember. He tore his eyes away when he felt the familiar static in the air as the band began their sound check.

The second band had just finished their set and Shinso headed to the bar with the rest of the crowd for another glass of whiskey. He put it on his tab. He’d pay at the end of the night.

He took in his surroundings, much like he always did as he leaned on the bar while he waited for his drink. The place was much busier than usual, which made sense considering the line up. Some of his favorite locals were playing and he felt considerably lucky to experience them all play the same night.

In fact, the last band of the night had become fairly well known over the last few years and they were on tour in their hometown. He smiled at the thought. He remembered their first show.

His cup was placed by his arm and he nodded at the bartender in thanks. People had already begun to pile back in and he quickened his pace to stand in his usual spot. It was the perfect spot. Close enough to the stage that he wasn’t blinded by the mob jumping and far enough that he wasn’t completely trapped between sweaty bodies.

The familiar buzz of the mics being tested filled the room. Sipping the amber liquid, a small smile painted Shinso’s lips.

He was in for a wild night, he could tell with how rowdy the crowd was, shouting as soon the drummer began beating against the kick drum. Shinso tapped his foot to the rhythm.

As soon as he finished his third whiskey, his eyes caught a flash of yellow in the pit. Shinso dragged his gaze higher, from the hem of the patterned skirt and over a band shirt, red hair bouncing with the force of the woman’s movements.

Shinso stared as she sang with the band, her nose scrunched up and eyes closed, body swaying to the chaotic rhythm. Her every expression was exactly how he felt while listening to music, only he kept it in his heart instead of showing on his sleeve.

The brightness in her eyes when she opened them rivaled that of the sun’s.

He tore his gaze away and pressed his back into the wall.

And if he stole quick glances her way for the remainder of the song, he convinced himself it was just part of his routine; constantly scanning his surroundings. Analyzing and never judging.

Shinso never understood how bars had so few bathrooms. While the line for the boy’s bathroom was nowhere near as long as the girl’s, it still annoyed him.

Honestly, it should be illegal to have people waiting so long for a basic need.

Just as he’d made it to the front of the line, he caught sight of the pretty little redhead exiting the bathroom with her small group of friends. She was covering her mouth in an attempt to stifle her laugh, her arm linked with her multicolor-haired friend in the leather jacket.

He hadn’t noticed it was his turn for the bathroom until the guy behind him cleared his throat.

For some reason, Shinso had drinken far more than what he was used to. He was feeling rather good and very relaxed, a gentle smile plastered on his face, his eyes even more lidded than his norm.

His fingers tapped to the beat against his leg, eyes concentrated on whatever band they were on now. He couldn’t remember. He’d even left the comfort of his wall to get a better look at the stage. He only regretted it a little as more people bumped into him, a few almost knocking him over.

Shinso couldn’t remember the last time he felt this at ease in a crowd. Most likely never, if his memory served him right.

A more rough and up beat song was currently playing and the crowd was going absolutely wild, more and more people joining the center of the floor to jump and dance and push against the pit.

He changed his stance to have a bit more stability. He was glad he did, his arms instinctively reaching out as a small body collided with his, making him stagger.

Gazing down at the person in his arms, his breath caught in his throat as he hauled her up quickly.

She was even prettier up close.

The grin he received in thanks made his heart flutter, her hand squeezing his arm before she darted off into the pit again, disappearing from sight.

Shinso felt his legs moving of their own accord, towards the pit in an attempt to follow her.

I see it in those eyes

His eyes searched frantically in the horde, sweaty bodies pressing into him, moving him into one direction to the next. Shinso felt like he was in the ocean, the waves dragging him back and forth with a strength he couldn’t begin to comprehend.

You're so damn hypnotized

The lights from above the stage danced across them, illuminating the crowd long enough for him to catch a glimpse of red hair.

You wanted to pretend the voice you hear is not in your head

She was facing one of her friends, the tallest one of the three, the two of them grinning as they screamed the lyrics at each other, jumping in time with the crowd.

You wanted to escape, but you're not that innocent

Shinso couldn’t help but appreciate the fact that she seemed to know all the lyrics by heart, knew exactly when the pauses were and when the band would pick it up again.

Just stay for the show, don't turn around

His heart hammered in his chest.

I'm looking for you out there

He was unmoving, barely registering the bodies colliding with his, eyes still trained onto the group of friends as they bobbed their heads to the beat.

I’m looking for truth inside your stare

She had her back turned to him, but her friend with the dark hair did not. Their eyes locked for a moment before she looked away, quickly connecting the dots.

I’m looking for you outside

He could see her moving her lips, no longer singing the song before she motioned towards him. Ginger hair bounced as the redhead snapped her head his way.

'Cause I mean it, no, I mean it, you'll be fine!

The lights passed over the crowd again, allowing them to both see each other clearly. Recognition crossed her features.

I'm looking for you this way

She whispered something to her friends, and they both gave her exasperated looks, hands up in the air in a confused manner. Like they were arguing.

But you don't hear a word I say

Her eyes met his and he didn’t shy away from the intense gaze. It only pulled him forward.

I'm looking for you this time

Shinso saw as the two friends looked at each other, nodding before shoving the redhead towards him. He caught her in his arms again.

'Cause I mean it, yeah, I mean it, you'll be fine!

She was smiling up at him, heat rising on her cheeks at an alarming rate. He could no longer hear the music, just a faint buzz as everything else faded out.

Shinso had grabbed her by the wrist and gently dragged her to his spot at the wall. He could still hear the music but didn’t pay it much mind. He could still feel the vibrations coursing under his skin.

But nothing compared to the way his heart hammered in his chest, his purple eyes peering into hers. They were like sunbursts surrounded by chocolate brown.

His gaze traced down her face, connecting her freckles with his eyes, pausing when he reached an opal adorned nostril piercing, to the matching septum before he reached her cute pink lips.

His tongue darted out, wetting his own lips. Her eyes followed the movement.

Shinso shifted closer, practically towering over her as she watched him through her lashes. He wasn’t sure when he’d gotten so bold. Perhaps it was still the alcohol running through his veins.

Maybe it was whatever connection they seemed to have urging him on.

A new song came on, her eyes lighting up but never leaving his. He watched as she mouthed the words, sending electricity up his spine, heat coiling inside him.

I don't feel quite right

The curl of her lips.

There's something in the air tonight

The suggestion in the way she stared up at him.

Must be the way she's looking at me

Shinso mouthed them along with her.

Is there something wrong

She took a step forward.

Is there something wrong with me

Her hands on the center of his chest, his own arms circling around her waist.

I don't feel quite right

Their lips collided.

Nothing like this had ever happened to Shinso. He never believed he could go through with anything like this.

In fact, the thought had never really crossed his mind.

He fumbled with his keys when they reached his door, the concert completely forgotten.

It was a blur of deep kisses and hands roaming the other’s body with soft but insistent touches.

Pushing her red hair from her shoulder, Shinso dipped his head to her neck, all lips and tongue against salty skin.

Delicate fingers threaded through his hair, gripping tightly when his fingers slipped under her plaid skirt and up the back of her soft thighs, tracing the edges of her panties.

His hands tightened before he heaved her up, her teeth on his bottom lip and she wrapped her legs around his waist.

A soft gasp escaped her when he dropped her onto his bed.

Shinso didn’t move, just stared down at her with lidded eyes. She looked perfect, hair messy, lips swollen, legs spread apart for him like an invitation.

He gladly accepted, crawling between thick thighs, hands on her knees. He spread her wider.

Agile fingers unbuttoned his pants, pushing them lower on his hips before he took over, discarding them somewhere on the floor.

When his cock collided with her heat, they both moaned, hips grinding into each other.

Any doubt he’d had about his current situation flew out the window as he pressed his fingers to her clothed clit.

Her panties were soaked through.

Slowly, he rubbed her little bundle of nerves with two fingers, a third sneaking under the material to feel just how wet she was.

Shinso released a breath he didn’t know he was even holding, hand sliding completely under the fabric and pressing two fingers into her heat.

A different kind of music filled the room. Breathy moans, small whimpers and the wet sound of his fingers inside her. Shinso’s thumb danced rhythmically at her clit, keeping the pressure gentle yet persistent.

His free hand pushed up her shirt roughly just above her bra, exposing her to his hungry eyes.

Cupping one of her breasts firmly, he squeezed into the soft flesh over and over, loving how she filled his large hand perfectly.

Shinso squeezed her nipple through the material of her bra and was very glad he did as her pussy clenched around his fingers still working inside of her, and juices rushed out of her and all over his forearm.

He’d never experienced anything so hot in his life.

When he removed himself from inside her, he chuckled at the desperate whimper she made.

Shinso wasted no time discarding his boxers, pumping himself slowly and groaning as he stared down at her.

He didn’t even bother removing her panties, just pushed them to the side with his cock before sliding in to the hilt.

A new beat could be heard throughout his appartement as he pounded into her rhythmically, her moans urging him on. Deeper, harder, faster before slowing down again, building up the pressure in the pit of his stomach.

His hands gripped her hips as he lost himself in every sensation. The way she tightened around him, the look of her throwing her head back, the glimpse of lust and pleasure in her eyes sent heat from his chest to his dick.

He felt himself twitch inside her.

Shinso could feel she was approaching her crescendo. His hips rolled over and over, pressing onto her clit with every thrust, tempo increasing until her cunt spasmed around his cock, her back arching off the bed.

Shinso fell forward with his hands on either side of her head, eyes locked as he buried himself into her again and again. The look she gave sent Shinso over the edge as he pulled out, spilling himself all over her pretty little skirt.

The image of her would be locked into his core memories for years to come.

He rolled over and laid on his back as they both tried catching their breaths.

The room became quiet as she drifted off. Only then did he allow himself to glance over at her.

Well, I can see the way she sleeps

He was sure he would wake up to her gone.

Tonight, I find a better peace of mind

It didn’t bother him as much as he thought it would.

In her eyes, oh her eyes, oh her eyes, yeah

Shinso stared at her a little longer, a smile plastered on his face.

In her eyes, lord, her eyes, oh her eyes, yeah!

He never learned her name.

Art by me.

I wrote this fic as a birthday gift to myself but I hope you enjoyed!

#mha #bnha #shinsou x you #hitoshi shinso #shinsou x reader #hitoshi shinsou x reader #hitoshi shinso fanart #boku no hero fanfic #boku no hero academia #bnha shinsou #shinsou smut #shinsou simp #song fic

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karasimpno · 3 years

Text

{Day 18} First Date/Last Night | Atsumu x Reader

Pairing: Atsumu x Fem!Reader

Genre: angsty fluff, jerkface Atsumu, hurt comfort???

WC: 1.5k

Warnings: language, a “dogfight” (Atsumu asks reader out as a joke so he can win an ugliest date contest)

⍋⋆*❅｡. 25 days of fic-mas mlist .｡❅*⋆⍋

Don’t know why I decided to come. Meet me halfway - a touch-and-go of don’t what to say. Do we talk? Don’t expect too much, just walk. — First Date/Last Night; Dogfight (music and lyrics by Pasek & Paul)

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

Atsumu sits uselessly at the kitchen table while his brother aggressively chops shallots.

“No, really,” Osamu asks. “Like, I don’t know what kind of degenerate crowd you’ve started hangin around with, but why the hell would you think askin someone out as a joke would be an okay thing to do?”

Atsumu was committing one of his major flaws: not listening while someone else was talking. How could he even begin to explain that what had started out as a joke became something so different? ‘Samu always thought the worst of him so why would he believe that he had actually tried to fix the shitty thing he had done last night?

“She’s my best fuckin friend, I can’t believe you. Do you have any idea how much ya hurt her last night?” Atsumu flinches. He used to be Osamu’s best friend but deep down he knew that hadn’t been true for a while. “Ya have to fix this,” Osamu says, in that same way their mother used to.

“If ya care about her so much, why don’t you go be her shoulder to cry on, huh?” Atsumu lashes out, grumpily. “What, do ya have a thing for her or somethin?” he sneers.

“I was,” Osamu’s voice cuts. “After she found out that you’d only brought her to a dance to see if you could win an ugliest-date contest, who do you think she texted? I can’t believe you,” he says in exasperation, ignoring Atsumu’s taunt.

“Fix this.” Osamu’s eyes are empty on Atsumu’s. Atsumu swallows roughly. Osamu’s fiery eyes and pounding fists he could take, but when that disappointed look crosses his brother’s face, he knows he’s fucked up.

He reaches for his phone.

You stare at the text on your screen longer than you felt you should have. You want to throw your phone across the room. Or cry. Or both. You can’t believe after the disaster of last night that Miya Atsumu really had the nerve to reach out to you. You consciously remind yourself to unclench your jaw, the frustration bubbling through you making it difficult to relax.

Well. It wasn’t allllll bad....

And that was exactly what had made it so bad! You couldn’t believe that you had fallen for his flashing smile and charming laugh. All a cruel, cruel joke.

You opt to ignore the text for the afternoon, going about your usual studies and not mentioning the text to your best friend—the asshole’s brother—knowing that it would only make him more upset. But you can’t get the text out of your head. What did he want to talk to you about? Every time you find your mind wandering off, you’re jolted back to reality when you catch yourself thinking about the earnest conversation you’d had last night before things turned south.

A dangerous curiosity begins budding inside you.

Atsumu had been so...intimate with you last night—there wasn’t any other word for it. When he’d first brought you to the party, you didn’t think very much of his friends. But when he shot one of them down for making a crude comment about someone else’s date, pulling you off to a separate corner for some space from them, you had actually had a wonderful conversation with him. You had felt liquid warmth swimming around in your chest when the two of you began dancing together and...you almost wanted to believe him when he said he had changed his mind about why he had brought you there, when he chased you down and tried to apologize or at least explain after everything went to shit.

But at the end of the day, he was still the kind of douchebag who would do something as low as asking a girl out as a joke—to win a vile competition for the ugliest date. You were annoyed that there was any hint of positive feelings towards him still lingering in your heart.

Still...

You pick up your phone.

You’re the ugly one, not me.

Your text plays over and over again across Atsumu’s eyes. God, he feels like an idiot.

If he were you, Atsumu would not have texted himself back. So he doesn’t know why you do.

How could he tell you how sorry he was over text? Would his pride allow it? Would it make a difference? He knows he’s done damage but he also thought you had a connection last night, even if just for a moment....

Maybe....

Just tell me to fuck off and I’ll fuck off.

Osamu would probably think you’re an idiot. So you don’t tell him that you don’t tell his still-pretty-scummy brother to fuck off.

But here you are, walking alongside the sharp-eyed man with the smile that never fails. Dinner, you had agreed, so he could make it up to you. Even if his apology wasn’t perfect. You tell yourself you’re just going for the free food.

Walking along the shoreline, your steps are illuminated by dim street lamps. Clouds are rolling in over the ocean and a sea breeze whips across your face. It is quiet between you.

He’s trying not to look at your face.

He’s so ashamed that he hurt you last night when at one point, all he had wanted just to spend the night on your couch, talking about your favorite music and movies and food. He feels like an idiot for not having gotten you out of there sooner and doing exactly that. But now he doesn’t even know what to say to you. What happened to all that chemistry you had last night? He wants to kick himself for having let that slip away.

You glance over at him periodically. You can’t read him. Hands shoved in his pockets, he just stares straight forward. He doesn’t look as closed-off as you expected him to be—his eyes are surprisingly soft. He has the posture of a proud man, but not the huff of an arrogant one. You catch yourself wondering what he’s thinking and swallow, your throat a little uncomfortably dry as the temperature drops. You cross your arms across your chest. Despite the breeze, the air feels a little thick around you, the uncomfortable weight of last night oppressive on your shoulders. As you’re wondering whether to engage in some light small talk, you hear him make a small noise, the sharp contrast from the silence drawing your surprised attention.

“What?” you ask, unsure if you just hadn’t heard him.

“Huh?” he answers, his eyes wide as it registers too late that what you had heard was only him clearing his throat. You mentally berate yourself for being so jumpy but the conversation returns to a stagnant crawl.

Great. So he wouldn’t be meeting you halfway then.

A part of him wonders what he’s even doing here at this point. A guy like him could have anyone he wants at the drop of a hat. But not you. Why does he care that he made you cry? You’re not the first girl to be wronged by Miya Atsumu. Not by a long shot. But he makes the mistake of glancing over at you—in between your furtive glances towards him—and his heart leaps a little. He swallows, feeling a dryness in his throat, making him clear it awkwardly again and in the exact moment, you do the same. Your joined half-coughs resonate differently in unusual unison and Atsumu whips his gaze to yours. Lips relaxed, eyes seeking, you hold each other’s gaze for a moment too long. Could this be a connection? There is a moment of awkwardness, and you look away again. But his eyes don’t leave your face. You look cold, he realizes.

Before he even knows it, he’s unzipping his jacket and placing it around your shoulders.

“Oh, sorry...” Atsumu trails off, surprising you a little as he brushes his hand against you, reaching into the jacket he had just settled around your shoulders, pulling his phone out and slipping it into his back pocket. You don’t acknowledge the apology but don’t thank him for the gesture either. Your pride keeps you from opening your mouth at this point, though a small part of you finds it very sweet

But the more you walk, the more you realize his scent faintly lingers on the material, reminding you of the warm glow of the liquid gold you had felt swimming between you two as you danced last night. Your gaze trails off out over the sea and you miss the way his eyes watch you, realizing how good you look in his jacket. It could be worse, you think—what else would you be doing on a Saturday night besides going to bed early anyway? Besides, people can surprise you....

With a twinge of nervousness, you decide to give him a shot.

A/n: Aaaaaaaaah we’re getting to the fics that I’m the most passionate about! I now understand what people mean when they say they have beautiful ideas in their heads but struggle to write them! PLEASE please please go listen to this song - it is just EVERYTHING and Atsumu is TOTALLY this character it’s just...perfect in so many ways. If you’re not familiar with Dogfight or musicals in general, Pasek and Paul, the composers, also wrote the music for The Greatest Showman and Dear Evan Hansen. Lindsay Mendez, the OG Y/N is absolutely incredible, please give it a listen. I hope you enjoyed! xoxoxo - Elle

taglist: @izagraceee @musicgetsmeoutofbed @azo-musxas @tsumurai @ghostlydiamond135 @animeboysimppp @starshaped-raindrops @harokat

#miya atsumu #atsumu #atsumu x reader #miya atsumu x reader #haikyuu #elle writes #25 days of ficmas

74 notes · View notes

bubmyg · 4 years

Text

footnote: better together - ksj

pairing: seokjin x reader

genre/warnings: neighbor!au, strangers to enemies to lovers, fluff, sugar glider fun, seokjin has a collection of stationary and alpaca statues, cheesy holiday goodness

word count: 10,935

summary: the tale of semi friendly notes exchanged passive aggressively between a pair of neighbors until they’re no longer threatening to blackmail one with voice memos of the other singing justin bieber in the shower or the one where you’re alone in your apartment complex and holiday activities are done better together

a/n: happy holidays and happy late birthday to mistre seokjinnie!!!!

Kim Seokjin had a way with delivering words. You’d, quite literally, discovered that hour one of indirect interaction with him.

Three weeks and the newness of your apartment had started to fade, your decorations hung at slightly crooked angles from your pattered meanderings around the vicinity of your space, laundry dangling out of the hamper rather than meticulous stuffed inside, snacks now scrawled on a list pasted to the front of your fridge where their once full wrappers were hidden in the depths of your trash can. Muscle memory started to carry your legs up the back staircases and through narrow hallways for your apartment, passing by familiar decorations hung on the outside of doors and the occasional familiar face whose schedule happened to coincide somehow with yours.

It was in a similar fashion that you assumed you had no neighbor directly next to you. The walls were paper thin as the individual across from you took great privilege in letting their door crash shut every time they opened it at four in the morning and from your limited knowledge of building layouts and the way yours slotted nicely to the neighboring apartment, you assumed that if you did have a neighbor, you would have heard them in their bathroom at least once at this point.

You hadn’t. Not one noise.

Three weeks into newness fading from your apartment meant built up grime in varying degrees was starting to plague your apartment, thus, time for the first weekend day dedicated entirely to scrubbing into crevices of tile and wood. The earbuds snug in your ears played some tune, something you vaguely recognized from the radio as you hummed absently to it in meandering into your bathroom to grab another wipe from the yellow cylinder perched on the counter.

The pop of the lid opening and closing registered louder over the sound of your earbuds but it was the melody of something that didn’t at all match the music contained only to your ears that caused you to pause, disinfectant wipe dangling from the pinch of your thumb and index finger as you glanced around the small space. With your free hand, you clicked at the tiny white control dangling off your earbuds to silence your music, squinting as if the narrowing of your sight would help your ears pick up the source of the noise.

Seeping between the drywall was the voice of Justin Bieber, or rather, the lyrics over a Justin Bieber track but the voice pitched higher, dramatic clearly for the fact that this water was in the shower but with a hint of training, melodious and mesmerizing to an extent.

If only that voice weren’t loud as fuck.

You tried to ignore it by tapping your volume up a notch and clicking to a playlist of songs that were just a fraction louder than before. And for the most part, you did forget about the actions of your apparent new neighbor while you scrubbed down the cheap countertops in your kitchen and piled trash bags near the door to take down to the dumpster when it wasn’t dark and less than ten degrees outside.

The volume in your ears sank as the sag of your couch cushions swallowed your stature, allowing your muscles to relax as you paused your music and let your eyes close for a moment of peace. Except there was the patter of water that wasn’t rain or snow or any type of precipitation coating the window beyond your cheap curtains but instead your neighbor still showering. With a groan, your thumb tapped at your phone screen a few times.

Taehyung answered half a ring in, “Can’t talk right now, just let the water for my ramen boil over—”

“Wait, did you actually?”

“No,” You heard a vague, high pitched laugh, “For what do I owe the pleasure of your correspondence?”

“I have a new neighbor.”

“Awe, did your landlord spoil the surprise? It’s me!”

You rolled your eyes, “Were you belting Justin Bieber in the shower earlier?”

“How’d you know?”

“Tae—”

“No, I wasn’t. I’m offended you’d even think that of me.”

“Someone must have moved into the empty apartment next to me while I was at work last night. And they are a better singer than Justin Bieber.”

“Not hard to accomplish that, dove—”

“What do I do? It was funny for like two seconds but I can’t deal with that all the time every night.”

Taehyung scoffed noisily with his lips, “I don’t know. Tell the front desk?”

“Hoseok will be of absolutely no assistance,” You blinked at the far wall from your couch as one of the decorative picture frames you had hung from a command strip began to shake a bit. Popping out an earbud, you found muffled shower sounds replaced with the slam of bathroom cabinets and the uninhibited sound of music, something you vaguely recognized from your previous, radio friendly playlist. “I guess I’ll just hope that it’s the new environment thing running its course. Hopefully I won’t have to experience a terrible concert every time my neighbor wants to shower…”

“I hope that for you as well…” Your best friend trailed off on the other end, “I was partially kidding about the water thing so I kind of have to go...but definitely call me if you have anymore juicy updates on the new neighbor. Maybe I’ll come over sometime and experience it for myself.”

“Go tend to your ramen mess and don’t make Yoongi clean it all up,” Taehyung made another noise of indignation before you signed off with a soft bye, tapping the end button on your phone with another slipping sigh.

You stared at the wall until the popular radio tunes had faded, just a noise but nothing distinguishable as the new tenant had evidently moved out of the bathroom. You had half the mind to connect a bluetooth speaker to your laptop and blast something off of one of your albeit embarrassing playlists but you didn’t feel petty enough for your neighbor’s first night so you gathered your clothes and fiddled at the creaky dial on your shower in silent peace.

The damp towel hung loosely from your neck as you wandered back into the hallway, humming something in place of music but pausing the noise and your steps when something white fluttered underneath your front door. Squinting, you tugged the towel a bit tighter and gripped onto the baggy center of your hoodie as you crouched to swipe up the piece of paper.

It was patterned stationery, a step below cardstock maybe with purposeful, cloudy puffs of grey sprinkled throughout the slightly offwhite paper. Elegant paper, if paper could be elegant, ruined by the messy scrawl of a bleeding black pen, lettings pinched and scrunched to the top half of the paper when they easily could have stretched throughout. In fact, the only thing on the bottom half of the paper was a signature line, spread out and blocky.

Hey, your new neighbor here...if you haven’t noticed, the walls are a bit thing. If you could keep it down when you’re on the phone, that’d be really helpful. Wouldn’t want to have to tell the front desk, you know? Have a nice (quiet) night! - Kim Seokjin (or...your new neighbor).

Your handwriting turned out equal in horrendous quality as your shaking hand etched across a piece of notebook paper you yanked out of a drawer in the kitchen. Seokjin’s note fluttered sadly to the floor as you passed where you’d slammed it down on the edge of your kitchen counter, nearly crumpling the return letter in hand as you retched open your apartment door.

Hey, your neighbor here. I’ll keep that in mind but I’d say you should probably heed your own advice. Wouldn’t want to broadcast a voice memo of you singing 2013 Justin Bieber to the entire building, now would we? Have a nice (quiet!) existence - your neighbor (I don’t think you’ve earned my name quite yet).

In your angered haste, you knocked on the door before you slid the paper underneath, not wanting to give them the satisfaction of stumbling upon it some time throughout the evening like you had. You, and your hazed subconscious, wanted them to know of your threat now.

...until everything screeched back into reality when a few locks fluttered and the door was yanked open to reveal your neighbor, Kim Seokjin.

Wet black hair was swept backward by a searching hand, black joggers snug underneath a massive pink sweater that hung off the knuckles of each hand, the one in his hair and the one clutching your crumpled piece of notebook paper. His facial features were gentle but critical, dark eyebrows pulled inward, plump lips pursed until they gradually pulled outward into a smile as soft brown irises flicked haphazardly across the contents of the note.

“So, what you’re saying is…” Seokjin looked at you, one eyebrow cocking, “You don’t like my music?”

“I don’t like how loud your music is.”

He leaned into his open door, laughing, “Touche’.”

“Just…” You clenched your fists by your side and you half assumed frustrated steam was billowing quietly out of your ears, “Just try to keep it down, please? And if you have a grievance with me just...come knock on my door or something.”

“Only if you don’t threaten to broadcast my bad shower singing—” He paused in place of your name, one you provided with a sigh. He repeated it with a giddy grin, sticking his hand out that you unwillingly shook, “Nice to meet you.”

Except Seokjin all but refused to knock on your door for anything, instead leaving you messily passive aggressive pieces of various colored stationary underneath the sizable crack in your apartment door.

Forest green with darker specks in between had the request for your Wifi password after he’d given some sob story via barely comprehensible handwriting about how his provider couldn’t make it for another week and he needed to submit something for his work now or he’d get fired. You’d refused, obviously, with a silent protest of not returning his request, something he countered with ridiculously obnoxious music for hours straight until you caved and thrust a ripped shard of yellow notebook paper underneath his door.

Only when he’d navigated onto his laptop did he notice that you’d changed your Wifi network name to don’t use this to stream Justin Bieber. A week later, when your connection finally turned to normal did a new network shuffle among the list of others scattered throughout your building.

Using this to stream Justin Bieber.

A pastel blue sheet with purple and navy specks through it came to your door to asking about a printer, Seokjin claiming he’d heard the unmistakable sound through the paper thin walls and that he desperately needed to use it as his suddenly wouldn’t connect to his laptop. If he hadn’t heard a printer, the asterisk at the bottom informed you to disregard completely.

The largest part of you knew it would be a disaster if you were to give him the ability to connect to your bluetooth printer but the smallest part of you knew you couldn’t hide that secret and he’d just torture you with a Disney movie soundtrack until you caved so you scrawled out connection instructions and taped part of the user manual to the note you slid underneath.

It took him a week to start taking advantage of the printer, beginning to use it in place of his notes instead of trekking down the hallway to push cardstock beneath the crack. The first couple were serious, a request for a spare iPhone charger, a half attempt at getting you to invite him over for dinner with a compliment to how good your dinner smelled. The next couple were ridiculous, a meme outdated by about three years, a Wikipedia page on the history of twist bottle caps that he insisted was just an accident with the next print.

Then there was one you thought was ridiculous until the same message printed again on fake cardstock, a color he’d applied to the paper that printed in your apartment (soft pink with maroon splotches) and added text that said THIS IS NOT A JOKE, HELP ME.

You vaguely understood the logistics of sugar gliders but you grabbed a hand towel on your way out of your apartment anyway, picking careful feet on the patterned carpet as to not accidentally step on the creature. It found you first, however, scurrying underneath your pant leg and you had to muffle your scream in the towel as you crouched, managing to fish the sugar glider out with little trouble and throw yourself into Seokjin’s apartment when he opened the door for the tap of your foot against the bottom of it.

“He was outside?” Seokjin took the towel from you to inspect the tittering creature with wide eyes, “How did you get outside?”

“You’re welcome—”

“Please don’t turn me in,” There was a separate panic in Seokjin now that he’d retrieved his pet, referencing the no animal aside from non aggressive fish rule in the apartment building. Another second of you being silent and he continued to ramble, “I don’t have anywhere else to take him and he’s good most of the time I just—”

“Seokjin,” You held up a palm, “I’m not going to turn you in.”

He bounced the towel in his arms like it was a human baby, eyeing you with innocent irises, “On any conditions or you just won’t period?”

You considered his proposition for a moment and felt a tiny bit bad for making conditions on him keeping his pet. But only a tiny bit.

“Stop playing your music so loud,” You proposed. “And I’ll stop using your printer!” Seokjin’s words ran together and his eyes bugged wider, “I’ll give you my number so we can stop wasting paper. Anything…”

He thrust out the hand that wasn’t cradling his pet, “...deal?”

You sighed, watching as his sugar glider’s nose began to twitch and he burrowed into the tiny nest made by your towel. “Deal…”

Except that deal lasted less than a week and he was back to playing music at a ridiculous volume, clattering his cabinets loudly, printing so much it ran out your black ink and you had to ask for money to go buy a new cartridge when you took his heaving stack of documents over to his door.

You tried banging on the wall as a warning, something you’d never thought of before, an action that caused the lowering of volume for no more than ten minutes before it was up again and you were back to digging the heel of your palm in the shared wall separating your bathrooms (and apartments).

This was the first time he’d texted you, something you stared at for a hard few seconds upon forgetting to save his name to the contact information, just a puke emoji. It was the contents of the message that jogged your memory.

Were those knocks Morse code for a song request?

You sighed, angrily tapping into your phone.

No, they meant shut the fuck up.

Months of living in your building meant you had a general idea to the schedules of those who lived around you and how they coincided to yours. That meant you generally parked in the same parking place, took the same route up the stairs, pressed a halfhearted smile into your cheeks at the same people in the lobby and the elevator and the halls. That entire routine was thrown off when you worked over one day, sweat tattered into your hairline and the buttons on your clothes itching to become baggy sweatpants before you departed for an exam that evening and all you could think about was the newly empty parking spot that was entirely closer to the door than where you normally parked.

In the time it took to shed your polo and jeans smelling of the restaurant you waitressed at part time and grab your backpack, there was someone parked directly behind you, effectively boxing you into the space that had a concrete wall in the front and two other cars on either side. At first, you assumed it was an accident until you got closer and the soft wind fluttered at a piece of pastel purple stationary with blue tick marks splattered throughout it.

I see you are enjoying the convenience of my parking spot. The code word is “penis”. Scream it loudly down the hallway and I’ll come out and move my car currently blocking you in. If I don’t “hear” from you in an hour, I’m calling a tow truck. Yours truly, Jin :)

You were shaking by the time your trembling legs brought you in front of his door, your voice miserable in rising to say plenty loud enough, “Penis.”

There was a gentle cackling from the other side of the door and his voice answered back, “Not loud enough.”

Anger, one like the initial day he’d moved in next to you, began to lace into the exhaustion and anxiety crippling the swirling pit of your stomach. It caused your voice to rise a second, unashamed octave, “Penis!”

Seokjin’s fingers tapped on the inside of the door and he hummed, “Still can’t quite hear you, darling.”

Your fists curled so tight it crumpled the note in your hand and you set your shoulders, letting your vocal chords waver as you, pointedly screaming, “Penis! Penis, penis, penis—”

The door swung open to reveal Seokjin’s concerned features, his hands lifting in penance but you continued to repeat the word, pausing only to chastise, isn’t this what you wanted? until a lock could be heard down the hall and Seokjin panicked enough to grab your wrist and tug you into the depth of his apartment.

When he dropped your wrist, you silenced, staring hard at the scrunch of his features and it was the ripping sob that made you immune to the way he’d asked if you were okay approximately three times before the first of the tears began to appear across your cheeks.

“You have my number!” You wailed, hysterical, “Why couldn’t you have just called me like a normal fucking person and asked me to move my car?”

Seokjin stuttered, “A-are you going somewhere?” His eyes flicked to the strap of the backpack that you gripped for dear life.

“I have an exam tonight asshole. Not like you care but I’m probably going to miss that too.”

“No, no, you won’t just—” He darted somewhere and returned with a wad of tissues and his car keys, “—dry your face and let’s go. I’ll drive you.”

“I don’t want you to drive me,” You dabbed at your face with the wad of tissues rather than separating them individually, “I want you to move your car.”

“But—”

“Seokjin,” Your voice rose again, only to dip into a tremble as more tears leaked miserably from the corners of your eyes, “Just move your car. Please.”

The next note came two days after you’d been fifteen minutes late for your exam, paired with the warm scent of freshly baked cookies. The plain piece of white paper advertised that too, that there was a plate of cookies waiting for you just outside your door and you probably needed to get them quickly before other tenants started to think you were running a one person bake sale from inside your apartment. You munched a sizable dent into the tiny pile of chocolate chip lain treats while thumbing softly over the tiny heart curled into the corner of Seokjin’s signature, considering it as some sort of unspoken apology.

He didn’t stop there in his quest to earn back your trust, to amend the absolutely heartbroken expression plastered to your features as a buildup of stress but that he took as his fault for taking the friendly enemy step one footprint too far.

For example, you didn’t question how he’d discovered it was your laundry tumbling in the dryer down in the common area of your floor. Maybe he’d correctly guessed, but regardless, he’d piled your laundry in neat, sorted piles in the white wire basket you’d left perched on top of the machine. You tried to ignore that he’d touched, multiple, pairs of your underwear and instead took the clothes against your side in the trek back to your apartment.

And aside from targeted attacks of penance, he overall tried to be a quiet neighbor, giving off the impression that no one lived there aside from the occasional slip of a shutting cabinet and the flick and click of his door knob and lock. The top forty playlists had ceased along with any other form of music and once you caught him exiting his apartment with earbuds attached to his phone, something a few months ago that you weren’t entirely sure he owned.

It went on this way until the fall month melted into deep winter, ice covering the sidewalks in a thin layer on the first day that it seemed plausible that there would be a white Christmas and you loathed it like the various warnings of canceled (in your email, on the airline website, through the tight lipped voice of the attendant who you’d spoken on the phone with, to the many news warnings flashing across the television screen every time you turned it on to something that was vaguely a news channel) attached to your flight tickets lain forgotten underneath some loose change on your kitchen counter.

You took in the supportive text messages from your family and friends back home with misty eyes kin to the thin glaze of ice covering the window in your apartment that promised not to melt for at least a week, if not the exact opposite and enhance by a few quarter inches with the cold front coming in directly before Christmas. Your fleece blanket served as a tiny, furry cave, sheltering you from the crippling sense of loneliness that came with being alone on the holidays, a sense that plagued your very being of living alone yet heightened when you had the expectation of it ending for a few days while being at home surrounded by other people.

The Snapchat notification from Taehyung went unopened when you saw his story said he’d just touched down in his hometown, just hours before cancellations began to flood in to that particular airport. You swiped away the missed call notifications from your parents that served only to cheer you up but assumed would just make the tired butterflies in your stomach sink. You moved the stack of neatly wrapped presents in your corridor to the hall closet that only contained a vacuum and a dustpan (no broom), even the present that you’d scrawled Seokjin’s name over but had considered keeping for the sake of your own dignity several times over.

You even managed to loathe the wall you shared with Seokjin a bit extra, as it was eerily silent, no annoying albeit comforting ambience filtering from it but instead dead silence, reminding you that you were virtually the only person left in your entire building, if not the entire vicinity of the your suburban side of the college town.

Until that wall began to chatter, first with a barely there scuffle of things against the floor and second with the unmistakable sound of music, his trademark no less, except in holiday fashion this time, melodious bells and jingles marking the underneath of lyrics you couldn’t hear but beats you could vaguely recognize.

Half of your exhausted conscious thought it was a mirage, that you were simply imagining that your neighbor was still here with you as the second and only two individuals left in the entire building, so it aided in your carelessness of wrapping your fleece blanket tighter to your shoulders and venturing out into the hallway. The music of your mirage only seemed to grow louder the closer you shuffled to his door, and you timed your knocks with the tune of jingle bells until you were met with the panicked expression of Seokjin, one you’d seen only once before when you’d been cradling his nearly lost pet in a clump of grey towel.

“Shit,” He cursed, “I figured you’d went home, I’m sorry. I’ll turn the music down again, that’s entirely my bad I was just…” Seokjin trailed off, gesturing quietly over his shoulder and when he stepped aside, you could see the mass of a fallen, plastic tree along with nearly a dozen half opened packages of ornaments. Green metal hooks decorated all the spaces in between, ones curled like his lips into the dimples in his cheeks when he shrugged, “...was trying to put up my tree, is all.”

“Oh,” You nudged your nose into the material around your shoulders, “It’s alright, I just...didn’t think you were here either—” You tried to smile underneath the puffy, sewn hem, “—making sure it was you, you know. Being a watchful neighbor.”

The tiniest of grins manifested to his lips, gradual in growing into the slight wheeze of his laughter but the speech he articulated didn’t quite match, just a soft, “Yeah…”

A few more heartbeats of awkward and you broke the trance with a nod towards the floor, taking a step back, “Well, if you need me then...you know where to find me.”

Seokjin returned your nod. “Yeah. I mean yeah, yeah same.”

You were two sad shuffles down the hall when something was tugging on the end of your blanket. It was Seokjin with the grey fleece held hostage, tugging softly again before dropping it all together, the round of his mouth suggesting the mortification he felt at the situation as the tips of his ears slowly grew red but none of that stopped his invitation.

“Do you want to help me put up my tree?”

When you just stared at him from underneath your makeshift cape, he held up a single finger, a sharp wait! before a distinct crashing could be heard as he stumbled back into his apartment. Moments later he returned with a strip of that familiar stationery, ripped a bit more on the perforated edge in his haste but the message read semi clear as he pressed the paper to the wall and began to mark on it with a thickly tipped black marker.

With all the giddiness in the world, he thrust the note toward you.

Come help me decorate my tree?1 (pretend that one is a footnote) and at the bottom, smooth edge of the paper footnote: this activity is done better together. promise.

In all your short lived instances of appearing in Seokjin’s doorway to explain notes or hand him documents (or sugar gliders), you’d never taken the time to really look at his apartment or at least, those parts of it you could see. Perched on his couch while he stretched on his tiptoes to plant a plastic star with red glitter woven through the middle was an entirely different perspective, especially when the itchy wool inscribing an ostrich with a Santa hat on the front rode up a bit on his hip bones and you had to force yourself to examine the apartment rather than the occupant of said apartment.

It was a similar layout to your own, an open concept living room into a kitchen with fully functioning appliances (his fridge, for example, freckled white and covered in so many magnets you would almost venture to describe the color as magnetic). There was a hallway beyond the wall in which the couch you perched on was pressed to, to the right, his bedroom and to the left, the connection of your bathrooms. In theory, your walls touched in more places than just the initial hotspot that was the shower concert, but seeing the layout for yourself in comparison to how you knew yours was laid out did nothing to change the perception already ingrained in your conscious.

Seokjin seemed to go for modern and minimalistic decorations, monochromes the theme for the big (the black leather couch and matching armchair, the white drawers shoved into the black outlined entertainment center), and wildly neon for the accents (a sharp red shag rug pressed underneath your socked feet, tiny alpaca figurines shoved onto decorative shelves and coffee table corners, a round pink bunny pillow with a questioning eyebrow taking the place of a decorative pillow on his couch).

One alpaca in particular caught your attention, standing upright with a tiny red bow around its neck as it seemed to wave in your direction from it’s place on the edge of the entertainment center. Seokjin’s voice dragged you away from being endeared by it, however, and you again felt your face heating as your eyes tore to the dip in his exposed spine.

“Hello,” He crooned again and you tried to ignore the slight slant in his lips when you finally met his gaze, “Is the star straight?”

You blinked up to where the red spined topper was very clearly lopsided. “Not even close.”

“Okay,” You were quickly growing endowed to the wheeze in his laughter, “Which direction does it need to go?”

There was a vague flick of your wrist toward the front door. He complied and you shook your head, “No...back this way.”

Too far again the wrong direction. Too far back. Nearly tumbling backward off the tree. Pressed forward so the tip was pointing toward you.

Finally, you shrugged, “...that’s good enough.”

Seokjin groaned, letting the pins and needles in his arms relax as he turned to you with slumped shoulders and accusing eyes. “You’re not very good at this thus far,” He told you, placing the bend in his thumb and pointer finger to the high rise of his waist.

“I don’t have much practice this year,” Your voice was light but the implication of the words wasn’t and Seokjin sensed it.

“Not much of a decorator?”

You answered the unasked question, “No. I was waiting to do it with my family.”

“Oh.” He shuffled away from the tree to bend over a cardboard box, traping a tangled mass of green wired lights from within. His attention focused on straightening them out while he inquired gently, “...so you are you staying here over the holidays?”

“Yes. My flight was canceled and a proper one won’t be available until after the holidays.”

“Oh,” Seokjin emphasized the word, nodding mostly to himself as he let the unlit lights drape down his front to sway against his legs, “Good, good. Me, uh...me too. I mean I’m staying here too. And my flight got canceled. The me too was to that part, too—”

“Good,” You happily dismissed the rambled ends of the conversation there, unfurling your legs from underneath you to stand, “Want some help with those?”

You aided each other in wrapping the thin, artificial tree in four strands of twinkling white lights, passing each other the looped wad in front and behind the plastic limbs, careful not to dislodge the prior work of the balanced star while also assuring the bulbs sat nestled in the branches. It looked a bit overwhelmed, wrapped in unlit green wires until Seokjin crawled to the floor to jam one end in the nearby outlet, only to have the tree look a bit underwhelming when only two of the strands lit up, those two being the ones that hugged the middle half of the tree.

The next twenty minutes were spent silently checking each individual bulb, Seokjin stretching back for the top of the tree while you crouched below. You’d barely made it halfway when he was waddling determinedly off into the apartment, only to return with a creaky wooden chair that he ordered you to sit on while you did the work.

“What if we rotate the tree as well,” He proposed, fingers reaching for the light he left off on, “That way we don’t have to, oh—” His fingers twisted into one of the bulbs and suddenly, his entire strand came on with yours following close after. A puzzled smile stretched into his cheeks as he regarded you where you sat on the edge of the chair he’d brought you, “—well, never mind.”

“You know…” You’d watched him meticulously separate green hooks from each other in silence for far too long, “You can turn your music back on.”

A pile of hooks snagged haphazardly against each other fell to the floor when he looked at you. The silence was affecting his ability to function as well, clearly, particularly when he said, “The music? What music?”

“The....the music that you were—?”

As if to cover himself after the handful of heartbeats that were nothing but silence in response to your statement, Seokjin began to laugh, a high pitched wheezing sound that paired to the hand he cupped across his stomach and the other that he slapped against his thigh.

“Oh, right,” Seokjin nodded, stumbling on the fibers of the festive socks on his feet to wherever the source may be, “That music.”

You took it upon yourself to untangle the hooks.

The exchange of silence stayed for the first few songs on the holiday playlist, an unspoken teamwork of you weaving hooks on shiny plastic bulbs while Seokjin placed them evenly around the tree. It took a package of red and silver ornaments and half a package of unconventional, squished lamp shaped ornaments of a green hue before he began to hum.

They were hums that grew louder as your fingers brushed in the transfer of hooked ornaments until he was essentially serenading you with the seam of his lips pressed tightly together, prolonging the shared contact on the ornaments as he leaned a fraction closer with his head wiggling to the beat and a smile tugging upward on his sealed lips.

Then he was singing, something akin to the tone of voice you’d heard him use the very first day he’d moved in. A bit pitchy but on purpose, careless and carefree, soft at first but growing louder the more comfortable he got with you being in the presence of a one man audience for a one man concert.

And then his voice switched, something more formal, a bit whispery and genuinely beautiful. It had you pausing in your actions, hook in one hand and ornament in another while the corner of your jaw began to unhinge. He was lost in it, unaware that you’d failed to hand him another ornament until he turned with eyes screwed shut and bumped into your outstretched fists.

Seokjin’s eyes popped open, immune to the expression on your features as he took the ornament from you, placing the unhooked plastic and the hook on separate places on the tree before sliding his hands into yours. His voice wavered between silly and trained, happily wavering your intertwined hands in between your bodies as he danced your figures in messy circles around the myriad of excess decorations.

“You can step on my feet, you know,” Seokjin assured, letting go of one of your hands to coax you into a stumbling circle. When you made the revolution, he held you at arms length as the streaming service through the speaker buffered between songs.

“I’m not close enough to step on your feet.”

He regarded you for the half second it took a single eyebrow to cock before he jerked on your arm, tugging you nearly on top of his toes. Seokjin hushed, “Is this better?”

There was a distinct waft of cinnamon and vanilla that filtered off the smiling ostrich stretched across his broad stature paired with a comforting warmth that soothed through the stabilizing hand you’d pressed to his chest. Your gaze trailed upward from the stitched tufts of hair woven into the top of the ostrich’s head to meet Seokjin’s gentle eyes, irises brewed in something that radiated the same coffee warmth of the rest of his aura.

Bluntly, you answered, “Yeah, I’m standing on your feet now.”

He took that as his cue to rock you back and forth, still perched on the tops of his feet, matching the beat of the more melancholy instrumental that filled the apartment. The sun had begun to set outside, lessening the natural light into a glossy orange hue that enhanced the twinkle of lights now forgotten on the tree as two shadows curled around the small space and melded into each other.

“You have a nice singing voice,” You said to his collarbone, afraid to meet his gaze again.

“Thank you,” Seokjin squeezed one of your hands, “You’re a terrible dancer.”

It was reflex to smack his shoulder, daring your gaze up at him just to glare and in turn sending the two of you into a fit of unabashed laughter. It was laughter that brought the curl of your bodies closer together, gripping each others hands tighter, until the giggles died into soft smiles directed solely to each other.

Seokjin cocked his head after a moment, “Would you like to stay and watch a movie?”

“I don’t have much in my cabinet other than this—” A warm bowl of ramen was placed gently on the fold out TV tray in front of you, “—and this…” Next was a paper bowl filled to the top with buttery popcorn. Seokjin held a sheepish smile when you glanced up at him to thank him, “Movie night essentials, you know.”

You hummed, sliding the wrapper from the chopsticks he’d provided to absently dig them through the noodles, “Thank you. We could have ordered something, you know…”

“Yeah? What could we have ordered?” The smile on his lips was teasing as he gestured for the ice stained window in the corner where flakes of new falling snow could vaguely be seen. “I don��t think much is open anyway...we’re pretty close to campus and nearly everyone has gone home.”

You moaned into the first bite you pushed past your lips, “That should have been us. Don’t remind me.”

“What?” Seokjin plopped next to you on the couch, dragging his own TV stand closer to ruffle around at the utensils and bowls, “You mean you’d rather have a home cooked meal and a tree with fully functioning lights?” His eyebrows lifted in the direction of the tree you’d aided in decorating where the bottom strand of lights flickered each time you stepped on his floor with a little too much force.

“Thank you, though. Seriously,” You let your next bite of ramen pool back into the bowl, eyeing it as you confessed, “It’d be worse to be alone so...I’m thankful you’re stuck here too.”

A surprised noise left Seokjin’s lips as he mumbled around the chipmunk shape of his cheeks as a result his own steaming bowl, “Well I’m glad you’re here too—” He swallowed thickly, leaning over to nudge you with his elbow, “—you’re not a half bad tree decorator. The lights are my fault somehow, I’m sure.”

The television was on but without anything playing, just the home screen of various applications and the name of the building cable provider in the corner. You ate through the silence of a dozen mouthfuls of food until Seokjin began to hum to himself again, shoving his bowl aside to dig busy fingers in the popcorn while his free hand went fishing in the couch cushions. You watched as he returned, triumphant, with a remote, clicking at the buttons with the brush of his thumb.

“What do you want to watch?” He continued to munch happily on his popcorn as he opened a streaming service and navigated to the holiday section. “Any traditions you’re being deprived of this year?”

You watched as he skimmed past the green, yellow, and blue cover of—

“Elf is pretty good,” You murmured, stirring the ends of your chopsticks through the leftover broth in your bowl.

Seokjin navigated back to it quickly, pressing play before he asked, “Oh, yeah? I don’t know that I’ve ever watched it all the way through.”

“You’ve never watched Elf?” You passed the utensils in your fingers aside to reach for your untouched bowl of popcorn, pulling it against your chest as you leaned back into the couch cushions. You stuck the first of the pieces in as the beginning tune of the opening credits filled the apartment, “Well, you’re in for a treat.”

He was still giggling by the time Christmas was saved by the less than magical voice of James Caan singing Santa Claus is Coming to Town in the middle of Central Park but not enough that he was distracted from you nudging him off your shoulder to gently take his dirty dishes and empty trash to usher it all into the kitchen.

“You don’t have to do that,” Seokjin rushed, galloping after you only before nearly tumbling headfirst over the TV tray still folded open in front of him. He caught up to you as you began to run water through the dirtied bowls, “I invited you to stay, wouldn’t I be a bad guest making you do my dishes?”

“Don’t let me do them, then. Help me,” You handed him the rinsed bowl and gestured to what appeared to be a frayed sponge and a half full bottle of soap. You made a point of grabbing the soap and pressing a dollop of it onto the otherwise dry sponge Seokjin lifted to scrub through the curved inside of the bowl. “Then you can let me meet your sugar glider. Properly.”

“Gukmul,” Seokjin nodded, letting the half clean bowl splatter to the suds below, “I”m sure he’ll be thrilled to properly meet his savior.”

You started to say his name as he disappeared down the hall of the apartment, effectively leaving you with the dishes all over again. He was quick though, you halfway through rinsing the bowl he’d abandoned when he returned with a towel shaped ball, your towel, curled against his chest.

“Here,” He gently held the bundle out toward you, especially when the white furred creature with grey ears poked its head out from between the sanction of his owner’s palms. “You hold him and I’ll do that.”

You dried your hands on the front of your pants, brushing fingers with Seokjin as you assured him you had the bundled up creature, quickly bringing him against your chest. Gukmul didn’t stay in the cocoon for long, regarding you with black beaded eyes until he made his move. Tiny, jumping movements let him glide up the front of your sweater until he was perched against your neck, content with his tiny heartbeat rapidly brushing against your skin.

“He likes you,” Seokjin nodded, placing one bowl aside to reach for the other.

“Is he going to jump off?” You countered, too preoccupied with how soft the little animal was for proper flashbacks of the last incident to flash in your conscious.

“Probably not,” He grinned when you looked horrified, “What? I can’t guarantee he won’t.”

“...although he might want to stay a little longer if you bribe him with a treat—” Seokjin jerked a suddy thumb over his shoulder, “There’s cut apples in the refrigerator if you want to feed him one.”

Elongated, picking footsteps carried you toward the refrigerator, ones in which Gukmul barely moved an inch other than to stabilize himself against your shoulder. The same amount of care was taken to get back across the room once you’d retrieved the apple cube, successful in not losing the tiny sugar glider until he resided in your palm with his treat happily munched between his cheeks.

“Will you help me pick up all the decoration stuff too?”

You glanced up at Seokjin from where you’d previously been watching his pet with utter fascination. “If job can be to hold Gukmul so he doesn’t get in the way, then yes.”

“He has a cage for that,” He placed the second, clean bowl aside before reaching for the pan he’d cooked the noodles in. He exchanged an amused glance between you and the sugar glider, “I was kidding, anyway. You don’t have to help me.”

“I was still just joking, you know,” He told you a few minutes later when you stood shoulder to shoulder in front of the dozen plastic bins that looked as though they’d puked holiday cheer onto the tile floor of Seokjin’s apartment. “You don’t have to help me.”

“I’m going to help you.”

You moved to crouch on the floor to collect stray hooks and an assortment of miniature, icicle shaped ornaments that had scattered outside of their plastic box when he was cupping your elbow to halt you.

“Wait—” Seokjin held up a finger with a mischievous glint in his irises that tucked into the corner of his eyes to regard you, “—I have an idea of what to do with these.”

“Are we going to get in trouble for this?”

Seokjin huffed dramatically from below, hands shifting off the small of your back so that he nearly got two handfuls of your ass. “Probably not, now attach the garland before I drop you.”

The connection of the twist tie around the wire of the green branches was messy but it secured enough along the top part of the cabinets in the common area of your floor, perfect timing for the way your foot slipped off the small part of counter top and proceeded to throw most of your body weight into Seokjin’s palms.

“I’ll never forgive you if you let me fall,” You threatened.

“That implies that you’ve forgiven me for everything else,” Seokjin grunted, bracing his weight and pushing until you were stabilized again, “So that to me is a win.”

You glanced at him over your shoulder, finding the tiniest bead of sweat matting down black fringe on one side of his face but he was wholly serious as he huffed and got a tighter grip on your back. You teased gently so he would look at you, “Who said I forgive you for anything?”

This time, his palms did cup your ass in route to land on the backs of your thighs, exasperated as he began to rant, “I am still sorry for being the shittiest neighbor ever. I had no idea you had an exam that day but it didn’t really matter I shouldn’t have done that anyway and—”

“Jin,” You trusted your balance enough to flick a socked foot backward at his face, “Hand me the lights.”

Seokjin whined into handing you the rolled up wires, “You didn’t let me finish.”

You sighed, tossing the outlet end of the lights down the side of the cabinets before beginning the meticulous weave through each of the rungs on the cabinet.

“Proceed.”

“I was going to say I still owe you some more fresh baked cookies,” He grunted when you shifted and squeezed your thighs, “but I’m really not sure that I’m sorry anymore.”

He regarded the work you’d done around the small common area with a critical eyebrow, standing shoulder to shoulder with you as he took in your surroundings. The lights had proved easier to weave than the garland, now on and twinkling between the tiny bits of artificial green. You’d hung a few leftover bulbs for good measure, tucking them back into the greenery. A tiny tree, one you’d fished out of forgotten presents in your hall closet, sat idle on the corner of the cabinet, directly next to the microwave that didn’t work and the sink that no one obeyed the don’t do your dishes here rule of. You’d looped the last of the multi colored lights to that short, fake vegetation, clicking settings on the little dial until the lights were programmed to a periodic flashing motion. The glitter all over the floor was simply a hazard of all the other decorations but it added to the ambiance, especially when the time curled dangerously close to the midnight hour, reflecting the blues of the snow outside through the glass windows lining each part of the common room before they disappeared into the individual hallways.

“Not bad,” Seokjin mused. You held your hand out, palm up for a high five.

“So…” You began once his hand touched yours, curling your fingers around his to hold him there, “...about those apology cookies you still owe me?”

“And I was under the impression you were a master chef.”

Seokjin’s eyes brewed a similar shade to the chocolate chips buried within the perfect block of dough he was breaking apart, regarding you under shaggy bangs that hung over his eyes.

“Generally, I am,” A high pitched squeak left his lips when a particularly difficult square cookie finally gave way to his prying hands, followed by a few more other noises as he spread that piece to the greased cookie sheet, “but on account of the time and the worst ice storm in the history of the city, I can’t exactly go get fresh ingredients.”

You leaned against his counter top, watching as he spread the rest of the premade cookies across the sheet. The festive oven mitt was shrugged on until it rested across his wrist, doing a dramatic twirl across his kitchen to place the pan in the oven.

“A master chef would have bulk supplies for potential winter storms,” Your palm cradled your chin, “No?”

Seokjin tossed the oven mitt so that it slid across the counter, smacking into your elbows and in turn making you flinch. There was a grin plastered to his features when he tottered over to retrieve it, murmuring, “Sorry, darling. Thought I could make to—” He flicked open the part in the cabinet below you before slamming down the fabric and slamming it shut, “—the drawer.”

“Ramen, popcorn, and premade cookies,” You tapped your fingers in succession against your bottom lip, “Quite the array of food to have until it clears up outside.”

“I have other stuff,” Seokjin defended, motioning toward the top half of his refrigerator on the far adjacent edge of the kitchen, “Some French toast sticks, a frozen pizza or two. I think there’s a box of instant mashed potatoes somewhere around here…”

“Master chef,” You nodded.

“Precisely,” He shoved himself up off the counter, hands braced on the edge and elbows locked as his head lulled to the side, “Going to have a holiday feast tomorrow night.”

“Enjoy it.”

“You aren’t coming?” You blinked at him until he added, “I mean, you can come over if you want. We can pretend to exchange presents or something. I’m sure I can spare an alpaca figurine. You might be worth it.”

Part of your body went numb with the realization that you’d now have an excuse to give him his present, the one that had tumbled to the middle of your hallway when you’d carelessly yanked your tiny tree from your hall closet. You ignored it to joke stiffly, “Frozen pizza and a present that may or may not be a tiny alpaca? How can I resist that?”

A fond smile curled into a tiny half circle on the plump seam of Seokjin’s lips, pressing into the cute indentions of his cheeks as he looked away from you. His eyes instead went to the screen of his phone that he dug out of his back pocket.

“It’s late,” He said after a moment, still not quite looking at you, “If you want to go home, I’ll save the cookies for tomorrow.”

“You won’t eat one without me?”

“Not even a crumb,” Seokjin vowed, looking at you now with a hand dramatically slapped over his heart.

“I’ll be able to hear if you do,” You half threatened, slowly moving to where your keys were.

His nose wrinkled when you bumped into the side of the couch, eyes glinting.

“Won’t taste as good without you, anyway.”

You contemplated the gift package in your hand for far longer than you considered the red and white striped fuzzy socks tucked nearly up to your knee caps. Whether that was a good or bad thing on your part, it cost you another half a roll of wrapping paper as you tore open the gift, considered not taking it, thought to take it again, hid it underneath the scarf you’d gotten one of your cousins, and finally swallowed your pride to tuck it under your arm and go the short distance to Seokjin’s place.

“He was joking about the alpaca thing,” You conversed with yourself in the first two footsteps out your front door, “You’re going to look silly bringing him a gift that you bought months in advance. Who has this just laying around, anyway—”

That was the first thing Seokjin said when he opened the door too. “Oh. You brought a gift—” He nudged the door a bit wider to coax you inside, “—not anything that could be considered payback for all my neighbor crimes, is it?”

You bypassed the insinuation of his hanging guilt to instead hyper-fixate on how his hair was stuck up in a few different directions, his holiday sweater bunched around his waist, and the way his teasing smile didn’t quite meet his eyes. He looked nearly as disheveled as he had when you’d swept his pet up in a navy blue towel after he was sure he’d lost it forever. You paused halfway in the threshold, nearly pressed against his chest.

“Are you okay?”

Whatever remaining resolve that Seokjin had been putting forth crumpled in that moment, stature slumping off the door so that it swung to a hard close behind both your figures. His hand was in his hair again, tresses poking in more awkward angles between his digits.

“I think Gukmul is sick,” His hand shifted to his nape, “He hasn’t ate since you left yesterday. And he’s being lethargic.”

“You think it was the apple I gave him?”

“Some of the other pieces were browning but,” Seokjin’s hand fell limp to his side and he shrugged, “I don’t know. It’s probably nothing I just…”

“Okay, so we take him to the vet,” You placed your gift aside to reach for your phone, tapping away at the screen, “I’m sure there’s a twenty-four hour clinic somewhere that’s open on Christmas Eve.”

“Darling,” He touched your hand, thumb stroking between your knuckles, “It snowed a couple extra inches last night. How are we going to get there?”

“Drive? If we take it slow—”

“In whose car?”

“...mine?”

Seokjin paused, “Are you in my spot again?”

You slumped under where his hand touched yours, “We don’t have time to play the penis game again—”

“I’m just kidding,” His fingers laced around your wrist, squeezing, “I could easily drive us too, then…”

“I’ll drive. And, I have something to help us—” You dislodged his grip on you to reach for your present, tearing easily into the newly wrapped sides to reveal the box inside. Seokjin protested the whole time but you ignored him, slicing the tape with your thumb to digging inside.

It was a fanny pack essentially, bright pink with stark black zippers and a black strap with a plastic buckle. The front pouch was sheer netting, enough so that you couldn’t see inside but enough that the creature inside would be able to breathe. You thrust it toward his chest, “Here.”

“It’s supposed to be a carrier for Gukmul,” You explained lamely, “You know, so you can take him out of the apartment and not lose him. Or get busted by Hoseok.”

“Oh,” He took it into his grasp, gently turning it in his hands, running his fingers across the zippers, “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I got it a long time ago,” You winced at your own admission, “and in pink too. You seem to like that color.”

“I do,” Seokjin blinked from the pack to you, “Thank you.”

“Of course. Now go get Gukmul, I’ll go warm up the car.”

“Oh. Oh,” He stumbled over himself in an effort to shrug the strap over one shoulder, “Right. Okay, right, I’ll meet you out there. Be careful on the ice!—”

Thirty minutes to what was normally a ten minute trip later and the vet was descending behind an ominous looking door with that navy blue bundle curled against her chest. There were a few fishtails and a handful of instances where you didn’t think your vehicle could make it up inclined streets in between stop signs but Seokjin’s knuckles hadn’t been nearly as white then as they were with your hand pressed between both his palms..

He leaned against you, turning your palm over in his lap to trace gentle fingers across the lines in your palm. You let him, leaning too until your heads touched. His leg bounced in time with sighs he took to attempt to calm his breathing.

“You know, I’m really glad our flights got canceled,” Seokjin said, lacing his fingers through the spaces in yours to pat your intertwined appendages against his thigh, “That sounds horrible. I mean I just....am glad you’re the one who lives next to me, is all.”

“Up until a few months ago, I couldn’t really say the same about you, you know,” You flexed your fingers in his grip.

“I was a dick at first on accident. Then I thought it was entertaining. You never seem that bothered by me. If you were, I assumed you would have told Hoseok and I would have had complaints on my file or something. But you never did so I just...figured you went along with my stupidity because you enjoyed it too. Until that day you cried…”

“It’s okay, you know,” You shifted on his shoulder to peer at the side of his face, “You don’t have to keep apologizing for that. I wasn’t going to get an A in that class, anyway.”

“The exam wasn’t the point. The point was that I teased you like I knew you. Like we were friends or something. And it turned out I didn’t know you at all. I didn’t even know you went to university.”

“...I didn’t know you but I wanted to know you,” Seokjin swallowed, squinting up at the paw print shaped clock on the far wall from where you sat, “Your presence was just...strangely comforting. Knowing that you could hear me being dumb almost felt like I had a roommate. Like I wasn’t alone with myself.”

“That’s why Gukmul means so much to me, aside from the fact that he’s a part of my family. He reminds me that I’m something larger than myself. That I’m not constantly alone.”

“I guess what I’m trying to say is thank you,” Seokjin’s chin pressed to his neck to smile down at you, “For being here with me. For putting up with me. Indirectly and otherwise…”

“And I’m sorry I was such a shit neighbor for so long. It was like I reverted back to middle school—” He gestured with the hand that was still twisted around yours, “—you know, tease the person you like and that’ll make them understand that you like them.”

“You weren’t and aren’t a shit neighbor,” You assured, nudging your nose against the underside of his collarbone, “You bring the same kind of comfort for me, you know.”

“You know how many times my friend Taehyung told me I should turn you in? So many times,” You shrugged, “You’re kind of annoying but nothing unbearable. It’s part of what makes you charming.”

“Thanks,” Seokjin laughed dryly and you smiled when a part of his natural wheeze came out in the giggle.

“I just got used to you. It felt weird if I couldn’t hear something going on over there...if my printer wasn’t whirring to life at the most inopportune times…”

“Why do you think I said up until a few months ago? I realized that I—” You nuzzled your cheek against his jacket so he couldn’t see your face, “—kind of liked you too. I mean, hello I bought you a gift in advance. I don’t even buy my family presents in advance.”

“Sounds like we should talk more outside of bluetooth printing, vague wall knocks, and horrible Spotify playlists,” Seokjin playfully jostled you on his shoulder.

You curled your free arm around his elbow, snuggling in closer to his side, “We definitely should.”

You sat in the silence that came with observing the basket of haphazard animal magazines and the children’s play maze that consisted of tiny wooden beads on twirled metal tracks, the whisker hands of the cat shaped clock stuck to the front of the reception desk ticking by unbearably slow. The paw print clock showed the same drag of time, the ticking of the second counter in time with the bounce of your own leg.

Time means it’s something bad. Or it’s nothing. Or it’s something and it’s small. Of course, bringing him here was going to take time but—

“Looks like your little buddy here just had a tummy ache,” The vet reappeared holding your towel, the only difference being that there was a small white head now peeking up from between the rolled center. What was once lethargic was now energetic, head darting back and forth at he new surroundings with his tiny nose twitching to the overwhelming smells. “He puked a bit of something up but took to the carrots I fed him like he’d never ate before…”

There was a bit more exchange between the owner and the vet as she passed Gukmul into Seokjin’s care, just a reminder to keep an eye on him for at least another twenty-four hours and the instructions to give her a call on her personal cell phone if anything got worse. The exchange of credit card information, a few shards of carrot for the road, and Gukmul was bundled back up into his new pouch laid across Seokjin’s chest. He chattered happily on the careful trek to the care, noise happily placed between munches on the carrot the vet had given him.

You scratched underneath Gukmul’s chin before Seokjin closed the wire gate to his cage, standing so that he could drape an arm across your shoulders.

“I think he’s a faker,” Seokjin said finally, watching as the sugar glider hopped away into one of his hanging toys.

“Be nice!”

“What?” He grinned when you turned to him to swat his shoulder, “Had us risk our lives in the middle of an Antarctic winter storm just to get a couple shards of carrot. I would have bought him carrots after everything melted—”

You tugged on the lapel of Seokjin’s jacket, cutting him off long enough to roll onto your toes to plant your lips softly to his cheek. “It’s okay,” You soothed, brushing your thumb over where a blush spread outward from where your lips had touched his skin, “We made it, didn’t we?”

“Wait! That reminds me!”

You startled with the intensity that he blurted the statement, stepping back when he stepped away from you, too. You stood rooted in the spot as he stumbled around his bedroom, coming back with a piece of stationary in hand, one of red and green speckles this time. Black ink was written neatly to the paper this time, looping letters complete with the normal heart next to his signature at the bottom.

“It was a scavenger hunt but I don’t have the patience to wait while you do the other steps so—” Seokjin gestured vaguely to the paper in your hand, “—that’s the last clue.”

“Go to the kitchen,” You read, lifting your eyebrows first before your gaze, “Quite the clue.”

“Hush, do you want your gift or not?”

“I—”

You faltered when he began to direct you with hands firmly set on each of your arms, steering you out of his room, down the hallway, and around the bend of the kitchen. It was a push and pull, forward a few steps on the tile, backward toward the plate of cookies he’d arranged on a plate shaped like a snowflake, forward one step and finally his grip left you.

“Okay, turn around. And look up.”

You saw his red tipped ears first, a color that spread over the entire surface of his skin in each area the longer he tried to smile at you. When you didn’t budge, his eyes flicked upward a few times, then his head jerked, then he blatantly pointed until you laughed.

“My present is a kiss?” You giggled, stepping closer to him.

“Yes, of course,” Seokjin’s pink features told a different story than the way he confidently reached for your waist, drawing you against him, “Only the best for you.”

“I didn’t think Gukmul was going to get sick and we were going to have this weird confession session in the lobby of the vet’s office. This was me, what do they say...shooting my shot?” One hand came up to cup your cheek, “I was going to lure you in here naturally with my impeccable charm but...this is cute and romantic too? Right?”

You touched your lips to Seokjin’s to dispel the last of uncertainty that still saturated heavy in his tone.

#bts reactions #bts scenarios #bts imagine #bts x reader #bts fluff #seokjin imagine #seokjin x reader #jin imagine #jin x reader #seokjin fluff #jin fluff #fic: footnote better together #i hope u enjoy!!! as always lmk what u think :-)

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ghostparents · 4 years

Text

school of rock nd headcanons bc i do what i like and also i love this show sm!!!

DEWEY!!!!!!

adhd & autism & dyslexia!!!! never got diagnosed with any of them as a kid and was just always labelled a ‘problem kid’ and ‘lazy’. it isn’t until he gets his kids and he’s like ‘don’t do that around adults they don’t like it!!!’ and they’re like ‘no mr s it’s cool i’m just stimming’ that he even knows why he does any of this!!! ros helps him get diagnosed :’)

his special interest is rock (obviously) and he will talk about it for hours upon end!! he doesn’t consider himself very smart but his knowledge of music theory is like? masters level?? he just doesn’t realise that most people don’t know these things

quotes music lyrics when he can’t think of things to say. is really bad at being put on the spot and using his own words. he can write songs really fast though!!

there’s always music playing in his head. he likes to rock along with it :’)

he has like really low uh?? like emotion reading skills?? he’s got super high empathy but he can’t pick up on people’s feelings. once they tell him what’s wrong he Feels A Lot With Them but they gotta tell him first!!! people tend to think he’s being rude but honestly he cannot tell when he’s being annoying or if someone wants him to go away unless they say something

literally no social skills at all. he just speaks to everyone the same and doesn’t super get that like? there’s different kinds of conversations??

most of his stims are physical!!!! jumpy stompy wiggly boy!!!! raptor hands and he smacks them together. he also sings his words a lot!!!

also stims by playing his guitar. sometimes if he doesn’t have it on him he’ll play air guitar instead. always needs some form of music playing or else he just Feels Bad

personal space??? never heard of it

if he’s super frustrated or overstimulated he goes nonverbal and just Makes Noises and jumps around until he’s got the energy out and is calm enough to speak about what’s bugging him

he has like a bunch of instruments and they are all his babies but also his main guitar is his comfort object and he doesn’t like people touching it

has a pretty high pain threshold and just Doesn’t Feel A Lot. hates light touches bc he literally doesn’t register them. loves pressure!!!! carries his guitar with him a lot because he loves how the weight feels around his neck, pretty much always wearing multiple layers of clothing. has a weighted blanket in every room and two in his van

major executive dysfunction. he finds it hard to stick with things and carry out tasks if not given small steps. is kind of still overwhelmed by the fact that it’s a Thing and that it’s not just him being lazy and bad

has shutdowns and will just curl up in a little ball and shut out the world. best helped by someone coaxing him out and reminding him he’s not alone and giving him a very tight hug

ROS!!!!

autistic!!!!! was very much a child prodigy and never caught up to like the expected level of socialising. got diagnosed pretty young but never super learned how to deal with herself healthily (thought that the best way to deal with her autism was to just Look Normal which,,,,,,,yikes) but she’s getting there!!!

oh she sure is repressing a lot always huh

stims by singing!!!! also is a ridiculously good singer bc duh but she doesn’t like singing in front of people a lot. she spent a long time trying to hide it because she thinks it’s kinda childish but she sings when she’s happy and excited!!! also likes to sway a lot

goes nonverbal when she’s feeling A Lot. her and dewey have worked out a system to communicate when that happens

at first her and dewey had some tension bc he just doesn’t care if people see him stim (even before he knew that stimming was a THING) whereas she hates people looking at her for any reason. they’ve worked it out now though

speaks in a very very formal way and isn’t great with metaphor

is pretty good at reading people actually but has very low empathy and just. she WANTS to help she just doesn’t know how. not great at picking up sarcasm though

doesn’t always get a lot of jokes, tends to just absorb them and say them back to people without knowing why (or if) they’re funny. she’s very naturally funny though when she uses her own words!!!

not super tactile but likes very short very tight hugs. holds hands with dewey when he’s super overstimulated to calm him down they’re just ;-;

loves schedules and routines. gets anxiety attacks if her schedule gets disrupted. best way to calm her down is to let her tire herself out first and then calmly talk through why things went awry and how this can be fixed for next time

dewey is obviously super loud and picks fights easily but he won’t stand up for himself if someone’s being ableist to him bc a part of him still thinks they’re right. ros, on the other hand, will verbally rip them to shreds for him (she hasn’t had to yet but if they didn’t stop even after being yelled at she Would punch them)

#school of rock #dewey finn #rosalie mullins #headcanons #dewey: jumps around and twitches #me sobbing: look at that funky nd boy go

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madfatty · 4 years

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the finn nelson agenda - an mmfd fic #27

Long time, no see. I come bearing gift. Consider this my woefully inadequate attempt to distract you for a few moments from the shit-show that is now.

The plan is for this to be one of eight or nine stories about Finn falling for Rae, as told by the people who watched it happened. The collection is tentatively titled, ‘Why Are You So Blind?” and this one is from Finn’s POV.

What I’ve learned is that I can’t write it in the order that it ought to be read, so they’ll go up as they’re finished (if they’re finished). This is probably third or fourth from the end, so for the time being, we’ll pretend it’s a stand alone.

My thanks to the most lovely and much missed @bitchy-broken for planting the seed and my dearest @slitherouter for listening to me read it in many of it’s various forms and for the words that inspired both me and the title

.. my secret agenda is actually just to sit in your room and show you my favorite songs while you explain different things you have on your wall or your desk to me

Things Finn Nelson says

(a thing that Shiri said. I mean, *GAH* right. I love her SO much.)

Ta very much to @late-to-the-sexy-party for her thoughts and enthusiasm. Big love and thanks to the wondrous @endemictoearth for giving it a twice-over and the benefit of her talent and experience. She made it infinitely better. Thank you, my gorgeous.

And finally, thank you dear reader, for giving this a go.

the finn nelson agenda

It’s one of those lazy, late summer days he’d spent all term daydreaming about, slouched in the back corner of some classroom, tapping out bass lines on his desk or scribbling band names and song lyrics all over his binder. Staring out the window while elaborate fantasies built of music, football and girls, all vividly drawn, played out against the white noise of his reality. He feels the waste of it; counting down the seconds to the end of the hour, the end of the day, the end of school.

None of that matters now. There are still weeks left of the holidays and each day is filled with even more promise now that Rae’s around. Days like today. While there are thousands of elsewheres he imagines himself being between nine and three during term, today Rutlands will do just fine.

All his mates are here, there’s tunes and booze and a sense of time being stretched out and suspended in the liquid amber of the golden afternoon. It’s almost perfect. The only thing missing is the girl. And fingers crossed, she’ll be here soon too, because Finn’s beginning to realise things are just better when she’s there.

Where was she though? He’s been a twitching mess the whole time they’ve been here, checking his watch every few seconds, never registering the time, but still feeling the drag of it. Not toward the end of something now, but the start.

Ever since the party, he’s tried to find time every day to get her on own, but it isn’t easy. She’s quickly become the centre around which they all revolve, so competition for her attention is huge. This means he spends a lot of his time waiting to share hers. He prowls an invisible periphery, ever watchful for his chance. They don’t come up nearly as often as he’d like so he’s had to get creative.

Now, depending on how late he gets in from a long day of almost being together, there’s a new nightly ritual he follows; home, a quick shower and something to eat, then he makes a mug of tea and a cosy nest and dials her number with shaking hands. The last of his preparations is pressing ‘play’ on the carefully curated backing tracking for their conversation while he listens nervously for her to pick up.

Even then, he has to share her with her family. The sniping and the bickering between her and her mum, the deep warm tones of a hesitant male voice, a rumble in the background.

He can hear the life she complains about going on behind her, crowded and noisy and messy; the chaos and the lack of privacy, he can’t help feel how much he wants to be in the middle of it.

What he’d really like is to show up at her door with a bag full of music and a couple of sneaky cans of lager. He’d happily listen to her mum bitch about the ladies she works with at the hospital and watch football with Karim or help out with the birds if it means that eventually, they can escape upstairs to her room, because even though Finn’s only really been to her house the once, (if you didn’t count the apology), he likes it there. Finn’s got a secret wish; to sit in her room, sharing his favourite songs while she talks about her books, and her posters and all those weird little toy things that cover her desk. He wants to find out about all of it. To know everything about her.

However, despite his best -obvious, desperate - efforts, she hasn’t taken any of the heavy hints he’s dropped to ask him over again, so he’s going to invite her ‘round to his. He’s going to ask her today because he wants so badly for her to come and fill his house with her smile and her smell and her stories and yeah, to make some stories of their own.

He’d tried again, last night at the pub. Just as they were all getting ready to leave, with his heart in his mouth - ‘cause that’s always where it is when Rae’s around, when it’s not in his eyes or on his sleeve, - he’d stuttered out an offer to collect her this morning. His plan was to get there super early so they could just hang out on their own. He’d been prepared for her ‘no’ but it didn’t stop the curl of disappointment when she gave it.

Sometimes he worries that that night at hers didn’t mean as much to Rae as it did (hell, still DOES) to him, that it was just a random kindness, not the revelation that he’d felt, and to her he was just a guy having a bad night that she’d taken pity on. Other times, he believes she can feel this thread between them too. A delicate thing but he thinks it’s getting stronger, can feel it getting tighter somewhere around his ribs. No longer nothing, but not quite the something he’s hoping for.

Finn doesn’t want to test that thread, in case he tugs too hard and it snaps. He can’t help feeling that he needs to do something though, because it doesn’t matter what Archie says about it, there’s this niggle inside him that says all it would take would be for Archie to finally decide that he really did want her, and with the crook of his finger, Rae would come running.

He’s separated himself slightly from the others, coiled up tight in the shade of a nearby tree, his back to the bark, the pinch and bite of it through his t-shirt not enough to distract him from his vigil.

Cigarette butts lie in an untidy circle around his feet. His ears are straining past the drone of the radio and the fat buzzing noise of insects, tuning out the prattle of the others for the first sign of her. Her name caught up in the pulse behind his eyes. Everything is so loud inside his head.

He’s about to risk asking Izzy for a third time if she’s sure Rae knew exactly where they’d be when Rae appears. The anxiety of her absence is replaced with the relief of her proximity. The physical response is exactly the same. The next breath he takes is easier than the one before.

He doesn’t care what it looks like. It’s not enough to be near her anymore; he can’t bear any distance between them. It makes him brave. Or crazy.

Without consultation, his body moves with deliberate intent. He turns the music up, up, and reaches for another can, trying to fill his belly with something other than butterflies, hoping that his counterfeit swagger hides the jelly of his knees. Finn lets himself fall – continue to fall, he’s been falling for a week, pushed from a plane without a parachute – to land beside to her.

He must have lost his mind. It’s the only way to explain his behaviour. He’s got her pinned to the ground from shoulder to ankle like some sort of lunatic but that’s not the insane part. No, the insane part is his brain trying to convince him that if he doesn’t grab hold of her hand like he so desperately wants to, she won’t notice that he has her pinned to the ground from shoulder to ankle like some sort of lunatic. For fuck’s sake, it’s screaming, don’t hold her hand because then she’ll know. Like that’s where all his subtlety would disappear. He holds fast to his wrist, pinning the would-be offending hand to his chest; a single idiotic attempt at self-restraint.

It’s all he can do to lie here, outwardly calm while inside he’s vibrating so hard his teeth are rattling, his heart bouncing so fiercely off his ribs any minute now he’ll come loose from the ground. His tongue lies thick and useless in his mouth, dry despite the beer.

He hopes his deafening silence reads like casual confidence to her.

The weight of the sun and the heat from the ground beneath him, simultaneously seeps in and rises up to meet in the middle of him. Yet neither burns him like the length of her body under the press of his arm and the cage of his legs. A sheen of sweat covers his body, caught between his skin and his clothes. It tickles along his hairline, behind his ears and slides down the sides of his neck.

Everything inside the moment is sharp and highly defined. He can feel each breath that fills her lungs. Everything outside of a three foot radius blurs in his field of vision. It’s coming in waves, all at once and he doesn’t know which bits to savour, which bits to focus on and what to put away for later. He has to keep sneaking looks at her just to make sure this is really happening. Rae on the other hand, has her face turned skyward, barely acknowledging his presence, unmoved by the miracle that’s changing his life.

He’s filling up with her. His head, his heart, his bones. Every nerve is exposed. It’s all stinging nettles and ants itching under his skin.

He couldn’t have stood if you paid him. Dizzy from the blood roaring in his ears before it raced south.

She hasn’t pushed him away.

What would she do, if he just stopped thinking and did what his body was screaming out to do; if he rolled over and covered her body with his own. What would she say? If he gave in to the impulse and kissed those maddening pink lips, lush and full, and coaxed her sharp acid tongue into his own mouth, to taste the sweetness he’s seen her gift to others?

What she must feel like under the long cotton sleeves of her shirt, and what might that do to him; finally touching her skin. He’s never fantasised about forearms before, or calves or even feet. Her pale wrist under his thick fingers, or the crook of her elbow beneath his lips. The curve of her shoulder, the tip of her ear, the back of her knee. To see and touch and memorize. To know if his hands have guessed the way of her correctly.

Lying here, so close to everything he longs for, his thoughts slide inevitably to those most recently taken up residence in his brain, a divine carnal loop he indulges in almost hourly, the heavy press of her breasts against him, the torment of that smug mouth around his cock, the taste of her cunt, should he ever be blessed enough to be invited.

He has to stop that line of thought before his body gives him away. Before he can’t help himself anymore and he takes hold of her hand and places it on his hardening cock – do you see now? This is what being near you does to me. This is me, all the time, thinking about the back of your neck and the length of your leg and what sort of knickers you’re wearing or if you’re wearing any knickers at all. Look at me Rae, I’m trying to tell you that I … that I’m a mess about you. My head and my sheets and my record collection. The smell of green apple makes me hard, costs my dad a fortune at the green grocers. I can’t sleep, can’t leave myself alone, imagining your hand down my pants, your tongue in my mouth, the sounds that you’d make with my fingers inside you. I… I… Even in his own head he can’t say the word. Even he knows it’s too soon, but… Like is not enough, although he does like her. Desire is a stupid overused word, a song lyric that rhymes with ‘fire’. Want. He definitely wants her.

Can you see, Rae?

He can’t tell which one of them is trembling.

She still hasn’t pushed him away.

She’s quiet. He doesn’t like it as much when she’s quiet; it makes him nervous. Everything about her makes him nervous but at least when she’s talking, he has some idea of what she’s thinking and right now he needs to know what’s going on in her head. So he asks.

Her answer makes him laugh. It’s not exactly what he was hoping for until she laughs too. It’s treacle over his jangled nerves. They take the same breath and he feels her relax beneath him, which is when his brain detonates.

With the shittest timing in the world, Chop’s hissing Kendo’s name.

Kendo’s a mate of Chop’s older brother Robbie and a wannabe hard man. He’s also a prize dickhead but that doesn’t stop Chop trying too hard to look cool in front of him, although Finn can see he’s shitting himself in case Kendo makes him look like a twat. Right now, Finn thinks Chop’s doing okay on his own on that score.

Rae stiffens. She sits up and Finn can’t help but follow, caught up as he is in her gravitational pull. All the ease from a few seconds before is gone. Everything that’s said in the next two minutes sounds like it’s being spoken underwater because Finn can’t focus on anything but the distance she’s trying to put between them without physically moving.

The damage is done by the time Kendo finally slithers off, dragging the corpse of the mood he’s killed behind him.

Finn’s still up in his head about how he’s going to get Rae to lay back down with him or if that moment’s gone for good, so he’s not really listening when Chloe asks her question. He says ‘yeah, course’ two seconds before his brain catches up with his mouth and just as he’s trying to scramble back from his offer, Rae’s telling them she can’t go. The ground drops out from under him and his heart is flailing, doing a Wile E. Coyote over his gut.

Wait, wait, a minute ago we were on our way to perfect. Fucking Chop. Fucking Kendo. Fucking fuck.

He’s reeling but before he can find a way to get them back to where they were, a shadow falls over them and Chloe’s voice, brittle and insistent.

“Rae, can I speak with you? Privately.”

Fucking Chloe.

For a moment hope soars because he can feel Rae’s reluctance to move but it’s only for a moment; she’s pulling away now and she’s taking all the warm and the hope with her. He sits there among the shattered bits of the beautiful bubble they’d been floating in, with his unasked question filling up his throat and his eyes closed because he can’t stand to watch her walk away.

#madfatty spouts off #mmfd fanfic #the finn nelson agenda #a part of the 'why are you so blind?' collection #if and when it eventuates #i made this #27 #i'll fix any fuckups tomorrow #now i gotta sleep

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msiconoclast · 4 years

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Again - Chapter 1

Pairing: Jaebeom x Reader

Genre: romance, angst

Word Count: 2.3k

Summary: Lim Jaebeom was the single most significant part of your college experience. A chance encounter brings you together again many years later when you’ve both settled into your careers (Jaebeom is a music producer and Y/N is a journalist). As you take a walk down memory lane, you reflect on your understanding of love and its many trials. Some loves are meant to make you grow, and some are meant to help you heal. And some are destined to be both.

A/N: Whew, this took longer than I expected. Enjoy! Read the prologue first if you haven’t yet: Again - Prologue

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Lim Jaebeom first showed up in your life the summer after sophomore year. You were nineteen at the time and life was still full of glorious possibilities.

Before you learned his name, he had been "hoodie guy from film class".

Hoodie guy almost always showed up to class late, often with dark circles under his eyes that looked like they'd been there for days. His usual attire of oversized hoodie, shorts, and sandals suggested that he'd probably just rolled out of bed and come straight to class. He would inevitably fall asleep in the back row and start snoring at some point during lecture. You had to physically move to the front just to block out the noise and catch what the prof was saying.

Yet somehow, he managed to be the professor's favorite student.

The thing is, when he wasn't nodding off, hoodie guy was apparently Ebert incarnate. He was usually quiet but whenever the class discussion came to a halt, he would always make a comment that somehow managed to cut straight to the heart of the film. The class would give collective pause over his flash of brilliance and then resume in excited debate in a new enlightened direction. On the few occasions when the professor decided to read out excerpts from written assignments, you knew.....you just knew that they were always from hoodie guy's papers by the smirk on his face.

In other words....the guy was annoying as hell.

Look, you loved movies and film class was sacred. It was one of the few classes you actually enjoyed outside of your major. How dare this guy just waltz into class in his pajamas and proceed to wax philosophical on “French New Wave” while the rest of you barely understood what the films were trying to convey? Was he some kind of silver screen idiot savant? More importantly, why was he trying to ruin the curve for everyone?!

Needless to say, by the time the semester ended, you were more than done with hoodie guy’s antics. If you were to never see him again, that would be absolutely perfect.

Life, unfortunately, had other plans for you.

As spring eased into summer, you decided to take a job at Joe's on Third to supplement your non-paid internship at the local paper. Joe's was your home away from home as a student. Cozy and airy, it had the perfect ambiance and was never too packed. As a bonus, they served a mean grilled cheese among a small menu of comfort food classics and you would get fed every day you worked there. It was going to be tough balancing the two jobs but all things considered, it wasn’t a bad deal at all.

When you showed up at seven for your first day at Joe's, the place was still empty. The only sound came from behind the counter where someone was grinding coffee beans. A tall figure with an enviable head of hair was rustling around getting the goods ready before the morning rush. As you got closer, you noticed that he had more than a few piercings, one in particular under his right eye. You never really found facial piercings to be attractive on men but there was something oddly intriguing about the look on him. It gave him an air of nonchalance. A rebel without a cause.

He was so concentrated on his tasks that he didn't notice you until you tapped on the counter in front of him.

"Shit....oh...." It took him a moment to collect his thoughts until a look of recognition registered in his face. "You’re Y/N? I'm Jaebeom. Call me JB. Joe said I'm supposed to set you up on your first day."

Hoodie Guy?

The second he opened his mouth, it dawned on you that this was no stranger. Though you never cared to study his face, you had memorized hoodie guy's voice by heart. And while this clean shaven, well dressed man in front of you looked nothing like the guy who always buried his face in his hoodies, the voice was unmistakable.

"Intro to World Cinema. Were you the one who got the only A in class??"

Confused, he raised his eyebrows and tried again. "Uh, I'm supposed to get you trained on your first day and make sure you can..."

"I'm asking if you were in Intro to World Cinema last semester? Didn't you always wear a hoodie to class and nap in the back row? Were you the jerk who ruined the curve for everyone and got the only A on the final paper?

He stared at you as if you were nuts. But you didn't really expect him to protest innocence.

"I was in that class too and would've gotten an A if it weren't for you! Instead I got a B+. First B+ in two years of school!!" The words flew out of your mouth before you could catch yourself. Oh, you knew it was petty but your indignation had been brewing for weeks.

He squinted his eyes and continued to stare at you.

Ding!

Somewhere in the back, a toaster went off. This seemed to snap him out of his trance and you watched as confusion dissolved into amusement on his face.

He cleared his throat: "Well...Miss B+....we got twenty minutes until open. If you want to keep this job, I suggest you get going and put all the baked goods out."

Not waiting for you to respond, he turned towards the kitchen.

Just before disappearing into the back, he suddenly swung around and grinned`: "Yeah, I got the A. And you were the girl with the pencil hair bun who always sat in the front."

So he did recognize you.

Asshole.

The first week of your new job breezed by without much of a hitch. You'd worked restaurant jobs before and a cafe was a piece of cake by comparison. What surprised you was how efficient JB was at the job. You just couldn't stitch together the image of him snoring in class with how professional he appeared at the cafe. Not only was he efficient, he also seemed to be preternaturally friendly towards everyone who walked in. Loud teenagers, moms with screaming babies, post-breakup girls drowning in their brownie-a-la-mode, he handled each and every one of them with calm and kindness. Yet, you wouldn't exactly call him a "people person" since he never voluntarily took up small talk with anyone nor did he socialize much with the other staff. It seemed that JB simply existed comfortably in the backdrop of the cafe’s inviting atmosphere and treated everyone with the same distant warmth.

After the awkward initial encounter with JB, you maintained a precarious distance towards each other. You were still reeling from the embarrassment of your outburst, and he must have decided to steer clear of stirring up the "crazy" in you again. In fact, he treated you just like any other member of the staff, as if the incident never happened. If anything, you two developed a satisfying partnership of sorts. When the cafe was busy, you teamed up to keep the orders moving and the kitchen hot. When there was a lull, you gave each other plenty of space. You would work on your articles for the paper while he pranced around behind the counter scribbling down notes on little pieces of paper.

Mid-afternoons were usually the slowest at the cafe. You savored these moments when time seemed to pass by as slowly as dust particles that swayed in the summer sun. It gave you a strange sense of privacy even if you were sitting in a cafe full of people. Sometimes, when you were feeling really wild, you'd stealthily switch the cafe jazz that droned on in the background to your favorite soundtracks. None of the cafe patrons seemed to mind as long as it was something mellow. The one person who did take note though was JB.

"Is that 'Before Sunrise'?" Um hum.

"That sounds like 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'?" Yup.

"Oh, 'Midnight in Paris'. The gypsy jazz is cool." Totally...

Either this guy had seen every movie under the sun or you two just happened to have very similar tastes. What was most curious was the fact that these were all movies that any other guy would scoff as “chick flicks”. Not the type of entertainment that you’d expect a “rebel without a cause“ to seek out.

"So did you actually watch all of these movies?" You had to ask him one afternoon.

"Hmm......yeah." He waved one of the little pieces of paper he was scribbling on: "They help me with my songwriting. I......heh, need inspiration and I like movies that provide different perspectives on the concept of love. "

So that's what he had been working on. Song lyrics. You weren’t entirely surprised since half of the population in LA were trying to make it in Entertainment in one way or another.

"Why do people write so many love songs anyways? Loneliness is totally underrated."

"Because almost any emotion that music can express can be related to love. It's universal." he said

"Yeah? And what have you learned about love in all your movie-watching and song-writing experience?”

"The heart's not like a box that gets filled up. It expands in size the more you love."

“Her”. Nice..... another sentimental fool.

The best thing about working at Joe's was the weekly closing party. Every Friday night, the staff would string up lights around the back patio and put on a little dance party while closing the cafe down. It was an unspoken rule that whatever bottles of wine were open by the end of the week was a free for all for the party and the beer taps were open until dry. Quite a nice little perk for the employees.

You had always enjoyed yourself at these parties. Most of the part time staff were kids who went to the same school, people you had seen around campus. It was where the staff really got to know each other and sometimes, got their hands on each other. And it didn't take long for everyone to get comfortable and really let loose. It was also funny to see how people changed when they were drunk. The shy introverted ones would surprisingly become super hyper while the normally outgoing ones often ended up bawling their eyes out in the corner by the end of the night. Nothing short of human theater.

The first couple of times you'd joined, you were still careful not to drink too much. You wanted to make a good impression and actually get to know everyone. But by the fourth closing party, you were well on your way to earning the title of dancing queen. See, alcohol also had an intriguing effect on you. It helped you break out of your usually calm shell but it also had a tendency to make you more than a little flirty. And on this particular night, you were definitely feeling the love.

The theme for the night was 90s jams and you had been showing off your moves on top of one of the patio tables for the last 45 minutes. But it was nearing midnight now and most people were either too drunk or too tired to be dancing and you were starting to feel the early signs of a crash yourself. It was then the bass thumping hip hop switched over to a slow and smooth R&B song that you had never heard before. There was something seductive about the way the singer cooed out the words.

"Girl it's only you

Have it your way

And if you want you can decide

And if you'll have me

I can provide everything that you desire

Said if you get a feeling

Feeling that I am feeling

Won't you come closer to me baby,

You've already got me right where you want me baby

I just want to be your man

How does it feel

Said I want to know how does it feel

How does it feel

How does it feel"

As you spun around on the table, you noticed a pair of gaze that fixed steadily on you as you swayed your hips slowly to the beat. You couldn't make out the expression on his face but there was an intensity in his gaze that made your body heat up. The thought that you had a captured audience turned you on and prompted you to run your hands across your body. As you felt your body heat up more and more, you reached for the glass nearby and took out an ice cube. You desperately needed to cool down. Holding the ice cube in your mouth for a second, you then started to run it against your skin. Trails of ice water trickled down your neck, your collarbone and pooled where your cleavage had shown through your shirt. The song was pushing towards a crescendo and the singer's falsetto was ringing in your head. It grew louder and louder until the lights started to spin.

Dizziness took over. Suddenly, you felt yourself lose your balance and stumble towards the ground.

Black.

And the next time you opened your eyes, a familiar face was just inches above you. The owner of the gaze had his arms propped up beneath you while they supported your weight.

You could feel his breath on your face and for what seemed like an eternity, you simply stared at each other.

Finally, you ended the silence by flashing him the brightest smile you could muster and pointing at his nose: "I forgive you!!!...Hoodie guy!"

The corners of his mouth curved up.

"You're pretty cute, B+." He chuckled.

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#got7 #got7 jaebum #jaebeom #jaebum #got7 fanfic #kpop writing #got7 fiction #got7 fic #got7 imagines #got7 jaebeom #got7 jb

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lorei-writes · 4 years

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Masamune x Polish!MC

Thanks a lot to @datenoriko for suggesting this and for @nad-zeta for writing hers (VERY INSPIRING, SERIOUSLY, GO CHECK THOSE OUT) headcanons :D Here’s my version. I wrote for Polish MC in particular, because I didn’t want to be disrespectful and there’s a lot of historical nuance that I could butcher otherwise.

[Note from future Lorei: This is honestly very stupid and I cannot believe I didn’t write it when I was 15, geez.]

Content Warnings: profanities, kidnapping, pain, injuries

Background information & notes:

Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth was partitioned by Habsburg Austria, Kingdom of Prussia and Russian Empire. As the result of annexations, the country disappeared from the world maps for 123 years. I will not go into detail about how the situation of Polish people was different in each of the parts, since that’s besides the point, but well - keep in mind that it did differ greatly. One can argue that the marks of it are still visible today, both in infrastructure, architecture and language.

I was born in the South-Eastern region of Poland and as such, that’s where I’d like my MC to be brought up.

MC is in no way representative of how each and every woman from Poland is. I tried to write her based on the women of my family, my friends, classmates, basically - the people I’ve seen and spent my time with.

I will not include anything religion-related, although it is a thing that’s present in lives of everybody (even atheists) here (to be more precise, Catholicism). Why? Because it is a very controversial topic, one of huge complexity.

... There will be profanities, because I love my Polish swearwords - and CURSE YOU ENGLISH. WHEN I YELL THE CURSE I WANT TO SOUND LIKE A FREAKING FERAL ANIMAL

Broken English in italics = broken Japanese.

There will be a dictionary at the end, so don’t worry.

Masamune

Upon meeting her, he did not understand anything she said - well, none of them did. However, she did rescue lord Nobunaga - a funnily dressed foreigner that seemingly didn’t speak Japanese couldn’t be that bad, could she?

Yet she still was thrown into the dungeon. In his mind, that was the perfect opportunity to investigate on his own.

Taking advantage of the opportunity, Masamune sneaked into her cell. Soon, his blade was on her throat. “ Who are...?” he started, but was instantly cut off by her yelling: “ Czy was tu wszystkich kurwa do reszty pojebało?!” He stood there, staring at her. Seeing his confusion, she pointed at him and then tapped on her temple a couple of times, an unimpressed look on her face.

Was she suggesting that he was insane? Hah, that certainly was some lass. He laughed loudly and gestured for her to follow him.

Well, it certainly took some explaining, but in the end, she got a job as one of the maids. After all, you hardly need to understand language to sweep the floors and do the cleaning.

However, she... Didn’t exactly fit in. Not just because of her weird mother tongue - she was taller than most women and not exactly petite. Appearance wise, she resembled the Portuguese missionaries, but that wasn’t exactly this either.

Masamune came around to “bother” her at times. To his surprise, she started to picking up the basic words by herself. Sometimes, she’d point an object, say something (presumably the name of it in her language) and wait for him to do so as well.

One day, she did just that while cleaning the floor of a veranda. “ Chrząszcz.” It took a second to register. Was that really a word? “ Chrząszcz,” she repeated, staring at him. Right, he had to reply, otherwise she’d never stop. “ A beetle.”

Later that day, he tried to pronounce the word. He couldn’t do it. Actually, he started thinking that she was making it all up.

That, however, changed once he heard her sing. Unaware of his presence, she continued working, the song filling the air: “Gdy swe oczy otworzyłem Wielki żal ogarnął mnie Po policzkach łzy spłynęły Zrozumiałem wtedy, że Czarny chleb i czarna kawa Opętani samotnością Myślą swą szukają szczęścia Które zwie się wolnością”

To his delight, she started speaking broken Japanese within a couple of months of her stay at Azuchi. Finally, he could satiate his curiosity - or at least he planned to.

She went out to do the shopping in the afternoon, but didn’t return after the dusk. Thinking something bad must have happened to her, Nobunaga issued a search. Masamune volunteered to lead it.

She woke up with a start, her head throbbing. She looked around - where was she? It seemed to be a tiny hut of sorts. She got up, trying to catch a glimpse of whatever was happening outside through the crack in the door. A man was guarding it. Did she hear a river? Whinny of horses? She had to escape - she search for cracks in the walls, until she found one. She recognized that armour. They were looking for her! She had to make some noise!

She yanked at the door, but it didn’t want to give out. She banged at it with her fists, yelling: “ Tutaj! Ratunku!”

The kidnapper didn’t understand the weird language, so he didn’t react at first. However, once the heard the approaching horses, he decided he had to silence her. He got inside the hut and gripped her by the wrists, telling her to shut up.

To his surprise, she struggled against him, breaking free of his hold on her.

He pinned her arms to the wall of the hut, threatening to hurt her if she even squeaked. “ A weźże ty mnie kurwa w nos pocałuj!” she yelled, before headbutting him.

Surprised, the man didn’t react instantly. Taking advantage of the opportunity, she kicked him hard.

It didn’t exactly work, though. Infuriated, the man wanted to punch her - yet, he didn’t notice the rescue that had just arrived. Masamune stopped his fist in the air.

Masamune didn’t see her in the couple of the following days, as they all worked to find out who was the person behind her kidnapping - and why was she even considered a target in the first place.

When he finally met her, he was stunned. Her entire forearms were covered in bruises in the shade of deep purple, almost black. He lifted her hands up, saying: “ I’ll check you up for wounds. Wounds. Check. You.” To his surprise, she shook her head and smiled brightly. “ Boli, znaczy że żyje. Hurt mean alive.”

It dawned on him then - he never really saw her smile before. They were complete strangers, but he wanted to know more.

With the language barier in place, it wasn’t exactly an easy task. Granted, she could understand simple sentences - yet, it wasn’t enough. Masamune was up to the challenge and so, he asked her to teach him her language.

Given the grammatical cases that influenced form of both nouns, adjectives and numerals, he soon started regretting his choice. The nouns had gender? Two future tenses? And what was up with all those ch-h, rz-ż, u-ó pairs that sounded exactly the same, but somehow weren’t interchangeable? Not to mention how some words seemed to consists exclusively of consonants. Rybołówstwo? -wstwo?

“ Okay. Your turn. Na wyścigach wyścigowych wyścigówek wyścigowych wyścigówka wyścigowa wyścignęła wyścigówkę wyścigową numer sześć.” Masamune blinked fast. “ It was the same word over and over again, right?” “ Nope. Maybe w Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w trzcinie?”

It seemed she tried to torture him. Though, having her laugh, even if at him, made him feel warm.

One day, he was taking a stroll and heard her voice. This time, however, he understood the words she hummed to herself. “ Raz i dwa, raz i dwa, Dziewczynka Wojenka na imię ma. Trzy i cztery, trzy i cztery, Dziwne ona ma maniery. Pięć i sześć, pięć i sześć, Wcale lodów nie chce jeść. Siedem, osiem, siedem, osiem, Wciąż o kości tylko prosi. “

“Where do you come from, if you sign about war like that?” he asked. “ Can’t tell you. You’ll think I’m mad.” “ Try it either way.” “ You see, future. But I can’t say wars aren’t a thing anymore. Sadly.”

After that, they spoke for a while. Apparently, her grandparents were both in partisan army. She grew up hearing their stories - or much rather, what little was said about the horrors of the war. What surprised him, though, was her request.

“ Will you teach me how to use a sword?” “ A sword? Why?” “ I can’t be helpless. I have to adapt.” “ That’s the spirit,” he laughed.

She certainly was a curious creature, one with a will to survive. She was amusing... Although sometimes she did find a way to get on his nerves.

“ I am NOT cute.” “ You are. You have lisp and can’t say “r” like little child that can’t speak good yet.”

Dictionary & Notes:

“ Czy was tu wszystkich kurwa do reszty pojebało?!” - “Are you all fucked in the damn head here?”, although not exactly. The Polish version doesn’t entail anything that could indicate any connection to psychological disorder or madness. Both “kurwa” and “pojebało”(pojebać) are swear words that would be translated to “fuck”. Recently those words lost a bit of their shocking effect, but if you ask me - you still don’t want your mother to hear you saying those. Under any circumstances. Direct translation would be “Are you all fucking fucked up here?”

“Chrząszcz” - a beetle. However, can we appreciate the nasal “ą” sound and the fact that it’s the only vowel in the entire word? Apparently, it’s hard to pronounce for foreigners :D

“Gdy swe oczy otworzyłem /Wielki żal ogarnął mnie /Po policzkach łzy spłynęły /Zrozumiałem wtedy, że //Czarny chleb i czarna kawa /Opętani samotnością / Myślą swą szukają szczęścia /Które zwie się wolnością” - lyrics from song, you can listen to it here. “ When I opened my eyes/ a grief overwhelmed me /Tears run down my cheeks/ Then I understood that // Black bread and black coffee / Possessed by loneliness / Keep searching with their thoughts for happiness/ name of which is freedom” (excuse the translation, I wrote it myself). I don’t listen much to Polish music, but this was somewhere around ever since I remember - I think many people would recognize it? Plus, the theme of freedom seems to be rather common one.

“ Tutaj! Ratunku!” - “Here! Rescue me!”

“ A weźże ty mnie kurwa w nos pocałuj!” - “ Fuck, kiss my nose.”; There’s another version of with, “pocałuj mnie w dupę” (kiss my ass). This one is more polite? Less crude? Either way, it means “I’m fed up with your bullshit.” Note: weźże is an verb derived from “weź” (to take) by adding a particle “że” at the end. Said particle indicated irritation and frustration. Construction weź + do something (weź idź na spacer - go on a walk!) is basically an order/ a request said with some level of irritation.

“ Boli, znaczy że żyje. “ - “If it hurts, it’s alive.”/ “If you’re hurting, you’re alive.” ; that one isn’t exactly universal, but it was a huge one for me. I always heard it from my grandparents and aunts.

Rybołówstwo - ... Fishing. When pronounced, it’s “rybołóstwo” - we still have a cluster of consonants here, but it’s easier to deal with.

“ Na wyścigach wyścigowych wyścigówek wyścigowych wyścigówka wyścigowa wyścignęła wyścigówkę wyścigową numer sześć. “ - “During the racing event the racing car got ahead of the racing car number six.”; tongue-twister If you were wondering,the adjectives are in bold. The crossed out word is the predicate of the sentence (the verb).

w Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w trzcinie - in Szczebrzeszyn a beetle can be heard from the reed; tongue-twister.

“ Raz i dwa, raz i dwa, /Dziewczynka Wojenka na imię ma. /Trzy i cztery, trzy i cztery, /Dziwne ona ma maniery. /Pięć i sześć, pięć i sześć, /Wcale lodów nie chce jeść. /Siedem, osiem, siedem, osiem, /Wciąż o kości tylko prosi. “ - song lyrics you can listen to here. Lao Che is a band that I think plenty of younger people interested in rock music will know. “One and two, one and two / The girls is named little war / Three and four, three and four / Strange are her manners / Five and six, five and six / She doesn’t want to eat ice-cream at all / Seven, eight, seven, eight/ She just keeps begging for bones.” ; All the songs from this particular album (Dzieciom - For Children; yes, it’s for adults that used to be children) are stylized to resemble a rhyme for children - at least in the lyrics and at first glance.

A note: Japanese and Polish “r” are extremely different. Japanese “r” resembles Polish “l” sound a lot - and many children can’t pronounce “r” at first, exchanging it for the “l” sound. In other words, Masamune speaking Polish would have a really hard time due to his slight lisp... And he’d sound like a little child that tries, but fails. :) IT WOULD BE SO CUTE!

When MC says her grandparents were in partisan army, she means they were part of AK - Armia Krajowa, during WWII. Whether that’s a good or a bad thing, I’ll let you decide for yourself. I don’t want to make this post any longer.

“ Seeing his confusion, she pointed at him and then tapped on her temple a couple of times, an unimpressed look on her face. “ - That’s basically how I’d show somebody another Polish saying “A puknij się w głowę” (Tap yourself on the head), which means “are you nuts”.

O, yeah. I don’t know if you can find the translation of the entire lyrics online, but if you were curious... You know, hit me up. I can translate them.

... I got too excited. Would you be mad if I wrote another one of those? I kinda want to...

Tag list: @datenoriko , @nad-zeta , @tsubaki3192 , @choi-jiyu If you want to be tagged under my future works, let me know (any way works)!^^ Also, if you have some preferences (for example: you’d rather not be tagged under some series, etc.), please, tell me.

#masamune date #ikesen masamune #ikemen sengoku masamune #ikesen #ikemen sengoku #ikemen series #my hc #im soo nervous all of the sudden #please dont hate those #and listen to those songs #they're good i swear

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frankpanioncube · 4 years

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Karaoke Night - I did this whole thing on one of my Discord Servers

So basically - it was the 7 main guys and what they’d do on Karaoke night.

I said I’d put it on my Tumblr...but it was going to be when I could do some linking to stuff: So I have put music vids, links to songs wherever they are and if nothing else - enjoy this

Lucifer: Can sing like a...well (fallen) angel. Is a lyrical baritone but can get up to some Tenor stuff.

Karaoke night is a hard thing to get him involved in because (and he recognizes it) he will be asked to do STUPID stuff.

They make him do Weird Al covers, Eminem...the lewdest crap they can imagine because...well..also - he can pull off a lot of stuff it's like 70 percent to irritate him and 30 because ....well...they all want to have him sing "Friend of the Devil" by Adam Jensen.

MC/Lucifer - they're doing Andrea Bocelli and Sarah Brightman. "Time to Say Goodbye" and mC can't keep up with him...it's his show.

Lucifer/Mammon Duet: Mammon willl make Lucifer sing X Gonna Give it To ya (specifically the Deadpool version) and Mammon does most of the work here but but he is so invested int getting Lucifer to rap it's actually quite amazing.

Lucifer/Leviathan Duet: Carameldansen - Levi will pull off all the dance moves in the background and will back up Lucifer. Who will be stock still otherwise.

Lucifer/Satan Duet: It's Shia LaBouef. Satan is no singer but pulls off those spoken word bits - and Lucifer is ...okay until he realizes what he's singing about. It's an odd vibe - it's awesome and also very strange to watch.

Lucifer/Asmo Duet: It's "Mad World" but the live version from the Adam Lambert concert. Asmo is the vocalist and Lucifer does back up and by GOD it works.

Lucifer/Beel Duet: I'd Do Anything for Love - and it doesn't go how you'd expect - Vocally it's Beel's show - Lucifer turns off the kareoke player and plays the piano. It makes everyone watching very hot. it's a dangerous combo.

Lucifer/Belphie: I Hate Everything About You by Three Days Grace. And BY GOD. It lands.

Karaoke Mammon:

Is the guy who figured out you can make dying whale noises in rockband to pass levels. And does it unappologetically. As a singer - not bad when he's trying. He could pull off something if he practiced. He has a good range but it's not refined. He can hit some contralto notes occasionally and some baritone stuff but very much lacks the practice.

Mammon on his own: Picks villain songs from musicals. He can do "Gaston" or "All you Wanna Do" from Six (much to Asmo's disgust).

Mammon and MC Duet: It's Tough to be a God from The Road to ElDorado. He'd love to do that and he makes a great Tulio to MC's Miguel.

Mammon and Lucifer: They do a duet of "Not a Common Man" - Mammon does a lot of musical stuff and he HATES Lucifer takes this one over. Cause the lyrics are him. Lucifer likes that he does the legwork on this.

Mammon and Leviathan: Butterfly by Crazy Town - to be fair - Levi thought it was Butterfly from the DDR game. However - between Mammon's voice and Levi's aptitudte for rhythm they manage this shockingly well.

Mammon and Satan: This duo isn't nearly as vicious to Lucifer as Belphie and Satan but - oh it's gonna get messy. Rage Unrestrained by Excessum and they're all going to the ER. Including Mammon. It's worth it.

Mammon and Asmo: THey do a duet of David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust. It gets chaotic. Both can't wait to be the centre of attention.

Mammon and Beel: Sex Bomb - Because even if it makes everyone feel sorta...weirdly sexual (and probably because he wants to stick it to Asmo) - Getting Beel to do some Tom Jones is a great idea.

Mammon and Belphie: The Real Slim Shady - Eminem - and they they can do it. And Belphie can pull that nasal stuff.

Karaoke Leviathan:

On his own: Does lots of anime and idol stuff of course. He's mediocre as a singer but pulls off all the dance moves well.

Levi on his own: Does exclusively stuff from his fave idol groups - not that he nails the vocals but he's not intolerable. He does nail the chorography.

Leviathan and MC - gets as many people invovled as he can and they do TRI-ANGLE feat BOA and the TRAX - They know if they flatter Mammon enough he'll do the break down.

Leviathan and Lucifer - Real Emotion - The idol song from FFX-2 - but Lucifer doesn't find the song that offensive and Levi can do the background dance stuff.

Leviathan and Mammon: X Japan's Rusty Nail. And if you haven't seen the music video to that - it's the epitome of 80ies/mid 90ies anime music vids. (plus I am in love with Hide and cried my eyes out over his suicide.) - they'd manage this one. Not without Mammon remembering the music video and SOBBING.

Leviathan and Asmo: Hey, they do this one song: Sinful Indulgence. It's from a popular Otome game. It's Asmo's show but Levi can keep up.

Leviathan and Satan: THey do the Local Butterfly Guy rap from Devilman Crybaby. It's best not to have Satan sing but he can get away with spoken word and raps quite well.

Leviathan and Beel: Has him doing Evil Food Eater Conchita from mothy. It's hard outside of his range but actually Levi pulls off the background vocals really well. He does some higher vocals well. Beel feels bad for the subject of the song...but sympathizes.

Leviathan and Belphie: Lizzy Hale and Lindsey Sterling's Shatter Me - Belphie can be convinced to do the ballet here and it's BEAUTIFUL. Neither Belphie nor Levi are the best of singers but they manage it together.And Belphie doing ballet is something to behold.

Karaoke Satan

He's just NOT a singer - It doesn't matter that much - He know it drives Lucifer nuts because Lucifer is lovely to listen to. But he's in two minds. He's either sober and refuses to embarrass himself or is three sheets to the wind and WILL embarrass not himself but Lucifer rather.

Satan on his Own: Will do William Shatner's spoken word version of Rocket Man. Can be convinced to rap but doesn't get into it too much.

Satan and MC: David Bowie's 'Space Oddity’. He's off key the whole time but no one cares - they manage to do the acting for it.

Satan and Lucifer : Here Comes the Snake by the Cherry Poppin' Daddies - It's rough but but Lucifer does the hard notes and Satan isn't pretty by any means but he does it a tad more spoken word. Lucifer does this like champ however. It winds up being way more attractive than it should be.

Satan and Mammon: Mammon does 'Every Last Motherfu*cker should Go Down' from Jerry Springer the Opera...and lets Satan choose if he wants to actually play Satan. He usually plays Jerry as a matter of fact. Up to the second half. After that Satan chokes it out. Because he'd love to stick it to Lucifer like that

Satan and Leviathan: An odd one - "Hell" By the Squirrel Nut Zippers. Levi would groove to it but everyone would enjoy joining in.

Satan and Asmo: (And everyone) Somebody to Love - Queen - and everyone shrieks it along. Cause Asmo would simply get in every one all in and that'd be that. Asmo's gonna hit that high note but Satan doing the song on his own isn't fabulous but he's backed by the whole group in the end.

Satan and Beel: Royal Oil by the Mighty Mighty Bosstones - Ska stuff works with Satan and Beel's rumble works with this song - it...didn't hurt that Satan explained what the song was about sometime LATER.

Satan and Belphie: Dark Personality by The Planet Smashers. Mammon gets to join in on this one - this is dedicated by that trio PERSONALLY to Lucifer. It's VICIOUS. Mammon is DEFINITELY in on skanking. He dances like a true rudeboy. Oh and so does Satan.

Karaoke Asmo

Is quite possibly the best Kareoke singer out there. It STINGS with him that he loses out to some of his brothers - Asmo's got charisma and sex appeal and a great voice...and well, that's actually where he loses. He's got this record quality voice and it tend to miss out on some of the kareoke appeal. Like that's the one place you're not supposed to be PERFECT singing and he IS. No fair!

Asmo on his own: Quite apart from this little ditty you may or may not of heard of "Sinful Indulgence" Asmo would do Marina Diamandos' alter Ego Electra Heart's "How to Be a Heartbreaker"

Asmo with MC: The Devil's Son by The Creepshow. It'd be verrry sexual. Asmo would however take over the song and be the singer - because it'd be right up his street.

Asmo and Lucifer: Nobody's Side - from CHESS. Lucifer does the intro to it just to get to get out of it - He plays the American (and does a fair job of it - he is after all quite vocally gifted) with Asmo as Florence.. Asmo is content to do the rest of the song. He's got the whole dramatic prodouction going on with it

Asmo and Mammon: If Mammon goes for Bowie, Asmo goes for Lady Gaga. They are going to do Applause and it's just as messy. They step all over eachother. Asmo's got the vocals to do it, Mammon's just simply not going to sit down for it and really won't outdo him on stage. It's a miracle they can throw it together.

Asmo and Leviathan: They're doing Pinball Wizard by the Who. They are actually a great team up for this song. Levi's got the moves and also digs the subject matter but Asmo gets to shine doing the lead singing on it

Asmo and Satan: Shut Me Up by Mindless Self Indulgence - Asmo is well aware that Satan can't carry a tune in a basket but is shockingly good at tempering him - Asmo is a great singer and can work with a lot. Satan's shrieking is actually quite awesome when paired with Asmo doing a sort of screechy emo/goth/metal thing himself. Asmo's the one you WANT paired with Satan should you not want to visit the emergency room later.

Asmo and Beel: They are doing Cab Calloway's Minnie the Moocher and Oh GOD is it fun. Beel's still a little stiff as a performer but Asmo gets everyone into it - he covers (and gets everyone to do) the scatting...but absolutely lets Beel do the low notes at the end. Even he makes happy noises when he can get into those low registers and it turns out to be fun for all involved.

Asmo and Belphie: Funnily enough - it's Belphie who pulls this one off. And of all songs? It's Wonderboy by Tenacious D. (Seriously just imagine "How about the power of flight, that do anything for you? and Belphie just doing a straight up "That's levitation, Holmes." It's not Asmo's style but he's got the chops to back Belphie up on this one so it turns out fun.

Karaoke Beelzebub

Beel on his own: Can't be bothered much but bribe him with food and he's got this incredible baritone, and can get down to a bass. He sings what other people want him to so there's a bit of a dichotomy about the fact that people want him to do the Beast Song from "Over the Garden Wall" - it’s not Beel’s style to sing that but god he could do it if you asked. and also Barry White's "Can't Get Enough of your Love"

Beel and MC: Dearly Departed by the Creep Show. It's MC's show and Beel does the backups but there's a lot of onstage chemistry. Everyone feels a ...way afterwards.

Beel and Lucifer: Where the Wild Roses Grow by Nick Cave and Kylie - and yeah - Lucifer does the female part. It was sort of a joke that went in a really wildly sexual direction, but also it is capable of shutting down the whole night. Thankfully it was done at the end of the night.

Beel and Mammon: Mammon's got a bit of a penchant for musicals so he kinda is into doing a lil' bit of Little Shop of Horror's "Feed Me/Git It" Especially because he knows he could explain the concept and well yeah. Beel gets a LITTLE into it. "just pretend I ate your custard" And it's a done deal. Mammon also does a great Seymor. Beel and Leviathan: They're doing Zu Ende from Dracula Musical (Incidentally: if you want to know what my own voice is like - Wao Yoka is very close to me - if Wao was wite chick) - but Levi is doing Wao/Drac's part and Van Helsing's part is Beel's.

Beel and Satan: Poe - Control - Satan lets Beel do this - but it's not melodic enough that he can pull some weight here. Beel backs down if Satan's managing it. But he more or less just lets Satan do the second verse.

Beel and Asmo: Sweet Tooth by Scott Helman - It's Asmo's song really but Beel doesn't over take Asmo and they really pull this off. Beel joins real hard at the end and it gets very good.

Beel and Belphie: Slumber by Bad Religion. This really is a duet. They both sing this together. Beel does the bridge however. Belphie does air guitar occasionally. It’s rather potent - they are twins and they use this distinctly to their advantage.

Karaoke Belphegor

Belphegor isn't much for this whole kareoke thing but can be convinced into it. Hey - his twin's great, why does he have to put in the effort? However - when the situation calls for it - hes got a variety of tricks up his sleeve.

Belphegor on his own: Picks the classics. Just whatever the place has in the book mostly. But paired up then this guy is a little shit. As a singer he's not the strongest but he's not bad either. When he's trying he's quite interesting when he's bored he's just...meh, knows it and does not care. I want Candy? These Boots were Made for Walkin? Yeah those are Belphie's stuff

Belphie and MC: Belphegor's still trying too hard with MC and so they're doing Strange Disease by Prozzak. He thinks it'll help. He's not bad at doing the recieved pronounciation accent either though at that.

Belphie and Lucifer: Belphie ain't letting Lucifer get away with SHIT. Belphie is making him full on do Aqua's Barbie Girl and that's that. It's...ridiculously funny as a matter of fact. Belphie's plan may have backfired a little given that everyone really likes singing along. On the other hand, he DID make Lucifer say "Come on Barbie, let's go party."

Belphie and Mammon: Corey Hart's Sunglasses at Night - with Mammon indeed wearing his sunglasses at night for maximum effect. Mammon's way more into it than Belphie but it's an entertaining performance nonetheless.

Belphie and Leviathan: The ODDEST combo but - Dionysos (F. Olivia Ruiz)' 'Tais Toi Mon Couer' - Levi likes the animation in the video and Belphie can pull off the french and the vibe. it's actually much more effective than Belphie's attempts to do anything with MC (and if you haven't seen the vid and don't speak French there's some vids with subtitles - see above!) Belphie and Satan: (with Mammon) When You're Evil by Voltaire - Dedicated FULLLY to Lucifer. And they all get into it. Mammon's particularly good at this - but while Satan isn't much of a singer he's just willing to keep up. Mammon carries this but it's this lot very much singing directly to Lucifer. It's honestly terrifying but man the Anti-Lucifer Club pulls this one off like champs.

Belphie and Asmo: They do Four Chord Song by Asis of Awesome - it Belphie's brain of 'easy' with Asmo's need to show off. They can do this very well. Asmo does wonderful masterful work but Belphie does the stuff that Asmo can't reach. They just do a medley.

Belphie and Beel: Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeplin - and oh - Belphie will turn off the kareoke machine and bust out his accoustic and put in the effort - So it's Rodrigo Y Gabriela's cover. Beel is all in for it. But it's really Belphie's talent with the guitar. In almost any other story Beel's voice is the thing but here? No it's him.

#obey me #obey me head canons #what else #if tagged everything we'd be in for one wild ride #I have linked to official music and performances

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harryseyebrows · 4 years

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Fine Line - Track-by-track rating

I’m in the mood to start shit. So here it is. My comprehensive album rating list. Rating subcategories should be self-explanatory, but I’m judging based on lyrics, how listen-able the song is overall, how interesting it is in terms of JUST sound, and crafting/production/my perceived idea of how well done the entire song is in terms of all the elements combined. Think about the effort that Liam put into his album vs. the effort Harry put into SOTT. What was written and created with intent and what was created maybe more for the sake of creating. Then, I did ACTUAL MATH and came up with an overall score out of ten. Read with caution and yell at me if you feel the need.

Golden:

Lyrics - 7/10

“I know that you’re scared because I’m so open” is fantastic and it’s great to see him literally being more open with his songwriting, but he loses some points for the general repetitive nature and more common turns of phrase.

General listen-ability - 10/10

It’s an easy song to listen to, whether you’re putting it on for background noise, listening while driving, or listening specifically with the intent of paying attention and enjoying.

Sonic intrigue - 8/10

The slower beginning and then the slam into the guitars and drums is great. It flows nicely and has a good pace/rhythm.

Crafting - 9/10

Overall: 34/40 = 8.5/10

Watermelon Sugar:

Lyrics - 6/10

Nothing particularly thrilling. It’s a generally fun song with some lyrics that are suggestive but not overtly so. Good to know that he’s enthusiastic about oral, but again, it’s not his finest lyrical work.

General listen-ability - 8/10

Another more easy listening track. Good for any time. A fun, sexy little bop.

Sonic intrigue - 7/10

The horns and bass line save this song from otherwise being a bit lackluster in terms of production, and make it interesting in a subtle, understated way that’s very enjoyable.

Crafting - 8/10

Overall: 29/40 = 7.3/10

Adore You:

Lyrics - 7/10

Kinda cliche and corny; “I get so lost inside your eyes”. Otherwise, very fun and leans heavily into a more pop lens. Makes up for it with “You don’t have to say you love me / You don’t have to say nothing / You don’t have to say you’re mine” and the “Oh honey”s.

General listen-ability - 10/10

I want to listen to this song all day every day. There has to be something in the soundwaves that’s brainwashing me. Can’t stop won’t stop.

Sonic intrigue - 9/10

At first glance (listen) it’s a very basic sort of pop song. But the more you listen, you realize that it’s rooted in a more funk-style guitar lick and utilizes synths in a way that doesn’t come off as too manufactured or ‘fake’. It’s layered; you find more and more complexity with each spin.

Crafting - 9/10

Overall: 35/40 = 8.8/10

Lights Up:

Lyrics - 8/10

The lyrical structure, if you look at it on paper, could easily be read as some type of poetry. The song opens with a question: ‘What do you mean?’ and then proceeds to offer fragments of sentences that aren’t necessarily connected, but somehow offer a cohesive picture — a message that’s still a little unclear but offers multiple interpretations in meaning.

General listen-ability - 9/10

It’s fun and boppy but also surprisingly mellow. For me personally, the tempo and bass mean that it can be hit or miss in terms of how/when I want to listen to it, but for the most part, I don’t skip it. This might also have to do with it being the first song we heard from him since HS1, and I might have overkilled it a bit.

Sonic intrigue - 8/10

It’s hard to not compare this song to his work on HS1, for the reasons above. HS1 was definitely more rock-oriented; more bare bones production and an ode to the more classic methods of music making ie singer, guitar, bass, and drums. Whereas with this song, it was essentially a complete 180 in style and production, with a little flair of R&B style music while maintaining his classic air of whimsy in both the lyrics and his less-frequently-used breathy head voice. Sometimes I still find it hard to believe that it’s a Harry Styles song.

Crafting - 8/10

Overall: 33/40 = 8.3/10

Cherry:

Lyrics - 8/10

One of Harry’s many talents is his ability to project tone with the combination of how he sings/emotes with his voice with the lyrics he’s singing. This song is no exception. It’s a sadder, more melancholic song, where he’s expressing some less-than-pleasant feelings, and you’re not only getting that from the words he’s singing, but HOW he’s singing it. It allows the listening to feel and empathize. It’s something he’s very masterful at. (See: the opposite would be something like Adore You, which under the guise of a more upbeat song, the lyrics are actually kind of sad and grovel-y)

General listen-ability - 7/10

I respect his artistic vision and the choice to include the voice note but as part of a general playlist, it can come off a little odd and out of place. Otherwise it’s very palatable. It just makes me sad, so I don’t often intentionally put it on to listen.

Sonic intrigue - 7/10

I liken this to a FTDT style song. Very raw. More singer-songwriter than pop. Some very lovely guitar playing and it’s nice hearing him sing in a register that’s been essentially neglected up until this album. But for the most part, I don’t think it’s his most interesting work. Very typical singer-songwriter guitar type song.

Crafting - 8/10

Overall: 30/40 = 7.5/10

Falling:

Lyrics - 7/10

I enjoy and appreciate his honesty, and perhaps there’s something to be said about the lack of flowery turns of phrase, but I just don’t feel like this is his most clever work. Again, great to see him being so honest, but it sounds like the extended version of If I Could Fly.

General listen-ability - 6/10

I can’t allow this to randomly come on shuffle without putting myself at risk of a depressive spiral. That’s where he loses points.

Sonic intrigue - 7/10

Every album has one, and this is it. The Basic Song. So widely palatable that it’s...boring. Shoot me, I know.

Crafting - 8/10

Overall: 28/40 = 7/10

To Be So Lonely:

Lyrics - 9/10

Currently, with just HS1 and Fine Line under his belt, THIS song is his lyrical Magnum Opus. It’s honest. It showcases an intriguing narrative. It’s clever. It’s fun. It’s a little sad. This is Harry and his amalgamation of musical influences mixed up in a bowl, poured into a pan, and baked into a perfect cake with frosting flowers.

General listen-ability - 8/10

This is another one of those songs that you can have on in the background and it fits into whatever you’re doing, or you put it on specifically to scream ‘arrogant son of a bitch’ back at him. It’s versatile.

Sonic intrigue - 10/10

The production on this song is clean but also a little rough around the edges, and I think it was done intentionally. You can hear the buzz of guitar and bass strings. There are peaks and troughs of volume. It has a sneaky little swinging beat that makes it impossible to not bop your head along with it. Again, it’s INTERESTING.

Crafting - 10/10

Overall: 37/40 = 9.3/10

She:

Lyrics - 8/10

I’m afraid to say anything negative about this song because I don’t want to be executed, but here goes. I think it offers a fun, interesting narrative on the first few listens. It’s a story; a little fantastical and sultry. But for me, it feels a bit like Woman 2.0

General listen-ability - 7/10

I have to be in the right mood to put it on specifically, so otherwise, it’s one that I won’t necessarily skip, but I prefer to have it on when I want to listen to slower music. Also kudos to Mitchell but the guitar wank at the end is just a little on the long side.

Sonic intrigue - 8/10

This is definitely a stylistic callback to the overall sound of HS1, and for that reason, I think it offers a nice bit of continuity.

Crafting - 8/10

Overall: 31/40 = 7.8/10

Sunflower Vol. 6:

Lyrics - 9/10

The story! The atmosphere! The pure, unbridled joy it offers! KISS IN THE KITCHEN LIKE IT’S A DANCEFLOOR!!!! I’m offended at how cute this song is. More men need to write songs like this.

General listen-ability - 9/10

This song instantly puts me in a happier mood. I don’t feel like a car ride is complete without listening to it at least once. It’s textural. I love it.

Sonic intrigue - 9/10

The backwards audio in the beginning. The weird bass. The vocal layering. The nonsense ad libs at the end!!!! FUN!!!!

Crafting - 10/10

Overall: 37/40 = 9.3/10

Canyon Moon:

Lyrics - 8/10

This song is deceptive — underneath the cheery, more jovial sound, it actually has some more echo-y melancholy notes — the ‘So hard to leave it / that’s what I always do’ and ‘I’m going home’s. It’s about reminiscing but still moving forward. Reflecting!!

General listen-ability - 9/10

Could easily fit in on a romcom soundtrack, and I mean that in the best way.

Sonic intrigue - 7/10

If I didn’t know that he specifically sought out Joni Mitchell’s dulcimers for this, it would feel just like any other upbeat guitar song, but I DO know his process behind it, so his score gets bumped a bit.

Crafting - 9/10

Overall: 33/40 = 8.3/10

Treat People With Kindness:

Lyrics - 7/10

Ohhh Harry Styles. He just wants people to be nice to each other! And maybe be a utopian society cult leader. It’s okay. We love him anyway. This song is full of idealisms; perhaps it’s a toe-dip into social commentary. Perhaps it’s a reflection of his own life, on dealing with friendships and loss and the overall nature of being a person. Who knows! It’s a batshit extravaganza in the best way.

General listen-ability - 8/10

If you can listen to this song without wanting to dance...you have a problem.

Sonic intrigue - 9/10

This song is all over the place but in a very thoughtful, cohesive way. It would not be the same if he sang the chorus; half of what makes it so charming is that he doesn’t, and instead, he sounds like some sort of unhinged ring-leader at the end, demanding ‘one more time’ and screaming. UNHINGED BUT MAKE IT JOYFUL.

Crafting - 9/10

Overall: 33/40 = 8.3/10

Fine Line:

Lyrics - 9/10

This song doesn’t have many lines, but the ones that do exist, are all purposeful and pack an incredible punch. It would be a disservice to him to try and pick a ‘best’ one, but ‘Put a price on emotion / I’m looking for something to buy’ and ‘my hand’s at risk / I’ll fold’ are up there as two of my favorite things he’s ever written. The repetitiveness of ‘we’ll be a fine line’ can be a little grating, but I find that to be entirely dependent on my mood, and not any fault of his own.

General listen-ability - 8/10

I put this on when I want to disassociate. Not ideal for when I’m driving down the highway, but what can you do.

Sonic intrigue - 10/10

One of the most, if not THE most, beautiful pieces of music he’s ever put out. Nothing more or less can be said.

Crafting - 10/10

Overall: 37/40 = 9.3/10

#this took me a long time to finish so you better appreciate it

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you-turn-it-into-light · 4 years

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Wakana - magic moment (2020) Album Review

My girl releases another album less than a year after her first. What a hardworking woman! First, let’s do some overall thoughts:

I really love the title of this album, it’s a happy title for a mostly happy sounding album

I also love the cover, maybe even more than the ‘Wakana’ Album

Are those shoes the same ones from the Aki no Sakura EP?

I really love the diversity of sound in this album. One of my complaints of the first album was the lack of variety. I love me some ballads (70% of my playlist of all the music I listen to are sad songs) but it felt a bit stale after a while.

My complaints with Wakana’s singing is always going to be the same thing since her vocal delivery has not really changed technically that much. Her vibrato is actually quite nice as opposed to what some people would say as ‘Goat Wakana’ (great criticism I must say), especially at the end of 442, her lower register is gorgeous but has no support (as expected of a soprano) and her higher notes in her chest voice are quite nasally. Her falsetto however is quite grating on the ears (I’ll elaborate later)

Why is Orange on the album? To fill up space, that’s why (I get it, making an album is hard, but why not just leave it out? There’d still be 10 songs) And Wakana wrote the lyrics, I guess?

I’m really interested to see how some songs will be performed live with some overlapping vocals (in 442) and strings being in many of the songs (without a violinist for the upcoming live)

I listened to the album first when I was in a bit of a bad mood so everything seemed super average. I’m feeling a bit better about most of the songs. Also after reading the self-liner notes for the album and listening to the lyrics, I was able to appreciate some of the songs more.

Okay, now for the individual songs:

breathing

(Lyrics: Wakana | Arrangement/Composition: Yumemi Kujira)

The orchestra sound is so gorgeous. At first it was weird hearing the japanese lyrics though lol. I like how they added different instruments for variety’s sake. The choir in the background was more hit or miss for me. During the first chorus is was really distracting but it was great for the rest of the song. My main problem is not the song itself but Wakana’s delivery of the falsetto; it’s very disconnected and screechy. It’s very hard to listen to and since the same chorus is repeated 4 times? It makes it a bit of a hard song to listen to overall. Wakana needs to develop better placement, breathing techniques and support when hitting notes in her head voice.

揺れる春 (Yureru Haru)

Lyrics: Wakana | Arrangement/Composition: Miki Sakurai

I don’t really like this song? The lyrics are quite nice, but it just feels like a plain upbeat song about being happy and reaching for goals and all that fun generic stuff. But what Wakana said in the self liner notes made me feel a bit better about the song:

“The hook’s 駆け出した (run off) and 君の叫び (your scream) are connected, right?”

“The urge to run off and shout. It’s exhilarating, and the canvas that you have now is white so you can draw freely and go with the urge. And the second verse’s 睫毛に触れたのは昨日の自分の欠片 (What touched my eyelashes was the pieces of yesterday’s me) are about tears. The tears hit my eyelashes and one part stops there. The fragments that came out of itself include those that you pick up yourself (I had a hard time translating that sentence so I used google translate hehe).

where

Lyrics/Composition: AlbatoLuce | Arrangement: Akihito Takashi

I LOVE Wakana’s low register in this song and the verses. I also really like the acoustic guitar, it provides a really contrast to the more dance-centric feeling of the song. The first chorus still lacks the appropriate punch, but the key change for the second half of the song makes up for it. Also those ‘wooah’s’ are really awesome. Wakana’s voice during the 3rd verse (after the key change) is just gorgeous.

442

Lyrics: Wakana, Airi Okamoto | Arrangement/Composition: Koichi Ikekubo

I really wanted to know the meaning of the title, and apparently it’s the hertz sound of a baby crying for the first time!

“The lyrics are co-authored. First we talked about the subject (of the lyrics), we said “When we plan the song, let’s make the theme the reason why you started singing”. So when looking at the lyrics given to me, words came out from inside of me. In particular, the phrase 愛の声が聴こえた (I heard the voice of love) that Okamoto-san produced for us for the hook. [...] I thought that I was born to listen to the “voice of love”. And so, that singing voice is echoing throughout my whole body. It’s strange to cry with the same sound of when we were born. I wonder why? I thought about it, I was born to do something and I thought that your first cry was a singing voice that expressed it.”

I love the melody and instrumentation of this song, especially the chorus. The chorus holds an incredible amount of weight. Apart from her nasality, Wakana’s singing is quite solid throughout this song. I love Wakana’s ‘ai no’ at the last chorus. So much power! I also really like the violin and am disappointed that there won’t be any in the live... Also I love the last line 響き渡る歌声 (resounding singing voice) and the music stops when Wakana sings ‘singing voice’. I don’t have anything objective to say about it, I just adore that part.

ひらりひらり (Hirari Hirari)

Lyrics/Composition: Silence! | Arrangement: Mamoru Kuge

Bland... It might take me a few listens but I don’t know if I’ll like this song. Wakana’s singing during the verses is gorgeous, very clear and the melody of the verses and pre-choruses are lovely, but the chorus is really bland and forgettable. I like what Wakana said about the song though.

“It's a song for people who want to meet but can't meet, whether it’s because you can't meet because you're away or because you don't have the courage.”

I’m in a long-distance relationship, so this song hits home a little bit. The lyrics are actually quite sad. If the whole song was like the verses I’d like it a lot more but the chorus is so uplifting...

アキノサクラ (Aki no Sakura) (Acoustic ver.)

Lyrics: Kei Saito, Yoshitaka Taira | Composition: Kei Saito | Arrangement: Toshio Uchida

I love the combo of bongos and accordion! There isn’t much to say about this song apart from the new instrumentation and the tempo. I really like the former but not really the latter. I don’t think I like it more than the original, but it’s a very nice song. The vocalisations during the bridge is also a pretty touch, especially when Wakana sings along with the music. and that ‘naite’ at the end was so emotional

myself

Lyrics/Composition: AlbatoLuce | Arrangement: Yoshifumi Ise

When I first heard this song, I thought it was BORING. On the second listen, I really liked it. Wakana’s voice is so gorgeous on this song. I love the melody of the line 壊れぬように抱きしめてた (I embraced it so it wouldn’t break). Her vibrato is a bit shaky with the delivery and her low register is not as clear as other tracks (but maybe that’s because of the mixing). Some of the strings sound synth, especially during the bridge but I’m not very sure. The parts with just the one violin instead of the quartet are my favourite bits of the instrumentation; it sounds really lonely. There’s nothing much else to say about it, a very solid song.

君だけのステージ

Lyrics: Wakana | Composition/Arrangement: Satoshi Takebe

I was disappointed. I really like this song and in my review of the live version I mentioned that her high register suits a song like this. But the way Wakana’s singing in the recorded version sounds different to me. The vowels are shaped in a way that sounds like a sadder song. Maybe this me being picky, but it took away from the happier experience. The nasality in her voice is the worst in this song, it literally sounds like she needs to sneeze and drink some water. Also the added noises (synth bells?) during the pre-chorus is very distracting. My review sounds very negative, but I really like this song and the lyrics are gorgeous.

Happy Hello Day

Lyrics: Wakana | Composer: Akihiro Kasuga | Arrangement: Shu Kanematsu

At this point, the strings are really nice, even if they’re getting a bit old. But the piano during the verses is very cool... I really like the strings in the chorus and the melody of it too. The message of the song is quite sweet and easily applicable to anyone in every day life. These lyrics in particular:

手を叩き軽やかに Clap your hands lightly, 口笛吹いて whistling. ありふれた幸せで僕らはできてる We are made of ordinary happiness.

君が空を仰いで涙流し You look up at the sky, shedding tears. 息を詰まらせて動けなくなったら If you get short of breath and can't move, 此処に僕が居る I'm here.

These lyrics (for like the first 2 lines) are about a performer and the audience. Creating the atmosphere of a happy and chill live (clapping lightly, still listening to the music) and everyone being the same, even the performer. The second section reflects the way some people view performers and music to be an escape from their life. But it can also be interpreted as just an everyday person being happy to have met someone they like. I love how it’s so interchangeable and up for interpretation.

magic moment

Lyrics: Wakana | Composer: SIRA | Arrangement: Shu Kanematsu

The strings are gorgeous (why no strings for the live????!!!!) and so are the verses. I particularly love the pre-chorus. The chorus however is quite bland and boring and the changing rhythm is a bit hard to grasp. The lyrics are lovely as well. I mean, I’m biased because Wakana wrote them. But I love these ones:

いつから夢も見ない大人になったの？ Since when did I become an adult that never dreamed? 最後の場所は決めたよ　さあ行こう I've decided on the last place. So, let's go!

The song is actually quite growing on me. I’m sure I’ll keep liking it but the chorus is still weighing it down.

OVERALL:

I really like this album. An unimpressive first impression followed by a very nice second and third one. I’m impressed with the amount of variety in the songs and her singing is mostly solid. I just wish she would improve on different places and I’ll probably keep complaining about them. I think Wakana is liking the independence when it comes to helping the creation of these songs and I’m very happy for me.

#wakana #magic moment #album #review #2020 #kalafina

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taliaromanovaswife · 3 years

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Exothermic - SFW version

Summary: Meet the original character, plagued by amnesia after an accident. But what if a certain deadly assassin is the cure for that?

Alexandra, twenty-five, defender and healer – whatever that was supposed to mean.

“Always”, the redhead smiled, her body protesting slightly as she pushed herself into the releve pose. She steadied herself before finding Alexandra's eyes. “Ready when you are.”

“Don't cry, Милый”, Natasha whispered, wiping her lover's tears away with a gentle brush of her knuckles. “Please, don't cry.”

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happymetalgirl · 4 years

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March 2020

Wow, March seems like such a bygone era, time doesn’t mean anything anymore with so much turned upside down (especially in the music industry) in the throes of the pandemic going on right now. One of those things was me losing my punctuality with this blog. While I haven’t been on top of my writing, I have certainly been listening as much as ever, with plenty to talk about this month, so better late than never I suppose. Here are the albums I listened to during March.

Code Orange - Underneath

I just wrote about the Pittsburgh metalcore juggernauts’ highly anticipated fourth full-length, but I’ll summarize again what led me say that Underneath is a good album, but not as good as the breakthrough album whose high bar this album was always going to have a hard time clearing. The band go all in on the industrial elements that accented Forever on Underneath, as well as push their luck on the more melodic, alternative metal-oriented hardcore tracks, which came with some growing pains, the latter more than the former. And I really think that they probably are just growing pains with the band getting more comfortable with this expansion of their sound, which (contrary to what the many zealous 10/10 reviews are saying) I think the band will get significantly better with if they keep this trajectory going into their next album.

8/10

Body Count - Carnivore

I really have tried to focus on the positive aspects of Body Count’s music, the fearless, topical, confrontational lyricism and the capacity the band has to generate a good hardcore breakdown, but the band really do seem to be unable to get out of this one-dimensional rut they’re stuck in, with Carnivore simply a few shovels deeper in. The band’s appeal tires very quickly with Ice-T’s recycling of lyrical themes and his band’s repetitions of generic hardcore tropes. They come through with a few moments of intensity, a sick breakdown or two, but the positive, hopeful moments are too few and far between. I would think that with not a whole lot of competition and a hip hop icon behind the microphone that Body Count would have the capacity to do more for rap metalcore, but they seem stuck in a cycle I do respect the stances Body Count takes against injustice, and I want them to be a more prominent, important voice in metal, but they have some climbing to do to get there.

4/10

My Dying Bride - The Ghost of Orion

The grand masters of gothic death-doom don’t ever really steer too far off course, rather they sometimes just take their foot off the gas, as they do on The Ghost of Orion. It has all the elements of any beautifully melancholic My Dying Bride album; the slow and burgeoning guitars, the downtrodden vocal melodies juxtaposed with bursts of growled anguish, and the melodrama of vibrato-laden strings; but it’s all arranged and conjured without much tangible passion or pain. That’s by the standard of the band’s pretty solid discography though, so with that considered, it’s by no means a terrible death-doom album, it just won’t be converting anybody or getting anyone more excited about My Dying Bride and death-doom.

6/10

Warp Chamber - Implements of Excruciation

Brutal death metal can often seem pretty one-dimensional, and it often is, but in the hands of a band who really has the ambition to make more of it than just some guttural rumblings from all the instruments involved, the genre can really take on a wholy new monstrous form, its horrific, deathly instrumentation heightened by the melody and the compositional nuance that a competent band can bring to it, and that is exactly what Warp Chamber do on their debut album here. Full of cavernous growls and ceaseless low-register battery, it can seem, at face value like just a regular brutal death metal album, but when the band starts breaking out the winding tangents and manic solos that, again, just heighten the chaos and compliment the brutality. It’s more than just regular-ass death metal, and I’m glad to have heard this debut. I hope Warp Chamber has more in store.

8/10

Loathe - I Let It in and It Took Everything

Do you love Deftones? Maybe you do. I do. But I don’t think either of us love Deftones as much as Loathe loves Deftones. I’m goofing right now, but Loathe really do channel their Deftones fandom real hard when they’re not in full hardcore mode or getting eccentric with the segues on this album. And it does offer a great combination of styles, with angular, low-tuned modern metalcore noise riffage juxtaposed pretty strongly against the gauzy shoegaze that immediately hearkens to that facet of Deftones’ music. The band struggle to get the flow just right on certain songs and across the album in general, with some pretty inconsistent songwriting, but it’s definitely outweighed by its still somehow immersive quality and the strength of the individual pieces going into it.

7/10

Earth Rot - Black Tides of Obscurity

The Australian band brings forth some more of the tried and true modern death metal a la Bloodbath, Carnation, and modern Cannibal Corpse, but with enough eerie, blackened oddity throughout the songs to keep the journey from being too homogenous. It’s these moments that both give extra life to the bludgeoning, but at-times basic, modern death metal the band is conjuring and kind of disrupt the flow of that muscly death metal. At times I do wish the band would chose to focus one or the other more exclusively, but if this pushes Earth Rot further into this kind of stylistically ambitious death metal, I appreciate the stepping stone this album acts as.

7/10

Myrkur - Folksange

After riding a pretty strong wave of critical adoration for her contribution to the growing wave of atmospheric black metal that culminated in the respectably sonically unique Mareridt in 2017, Myrkur’s Amelie Bruun has taken a step back to refocus or recalibrate artistically. As the title suggests, Folksange finds its creator rewarding herself for her contributions to black metal with a return to her love of Scandinavian folk music, and you can tell she loves it on this entirely folk-music-based project devoid of any black metal elements. I may not have been as head-over-heels as a lot of critics were about her black metal albums, but I certainly appreciated her folk-inspired ambient take on the genre, especially the unique sonic pallet of Mareridt. I liked those albums quite a bit, yet it is clear that the sound on Folksange is her forte, which makes sense if Scandinavian folk has been a longer-standing passion than black metal for Bruun. The instrumentation is absolutely beautiful and Bruun’s angelic voice fits so perfectly with it, but Folksange is more than just superficially aesthetically gorgeous. The songs (old and original) are written and arranged with such a natural knack for the style that makes it such a serenely enveloping experience that stands as Myrkur’s best work yet. I highly recommend it.

8/10

Old Man Gloom - Seminar IX: Darkness of Being

The famed supergroup’s first of two releases planned for this year after the loss of Caleb Scofield sees them dabbling around in an experimental array of genres that all the members have some sort of significant experience and specialty with. From post-metal of the sludgy, Isis-esque variety to the more noisily esoteric, Sumac-esque variety, to distinctly post-hardcore-influenced stylistic diversions, the band’s wide-reaching sound takes all sorts of twists and turns along their most recent experiment with the members’ varying pedigrees and influences guiding the music on quite the unusual nomadic trek. From the repetitive chord progression of the opening track to the album’s noisy finishing tracks (one of which features what sounds like rocks tumbling down a shaft of some sort for an extensive period of time), the band let their adventurers’ instincts guide them as they wander through their own experiment through the interplay of their members’ various styles. It’s weird, and not super polished, but it’s certainly fixating.

7/10

Candlemass - The Pendulum

After further cementing their relatively unchallenged status as the kings of epic doom metal with The Door to Doom about a year ago, Candlemass have offered up a quick little demo-focused EP with one new fleshed-out song, the title track, which takes them to the faster, more Dio-era-inspires side of their sound with the grand, soaring operatic vocals on the chorus and the relatively fast (by doom standards) guitar rhythms on the verses (think “Paranoid” or “Children of the Grave’). I love the very Dio-esque delivery of the word “fools” at the end too, very fitting. The demo track “Snakes of Goliath” slows it back down to Ozzy-era Sabbath worship in typical Candlemass fashion, the riffs and arrangement pretty respectable for a supposed demo track. The other full-length demo, “Porcelain Skull”, by contrast, does feel much less compositionally fleshed out and more like an actual demo piece. The other three demo tracks are just little instrumental studio doodles that don’t really add anything to the EP. If this EP could be interpreted as any kind of power move, it’s that Candlemass at demo level have just such a sharp compositional intuition for grand Sabbath doom metal and can pretty much nail it in their sleep.

demo-level 7/10

Igorrr - Spirituality and Distortion

I was definitely looking forward to this album big-time after the gloriously unashamed weirdness of 2017’s Savage Sinusoid filled a massive void I felt was needed in my metal bank. By contrast, Spirituality and Distortion is such a reserved project it feels either shy or cowardly from the usually hyper-eccentric band. The greater absence of the vocals of Laurent Lunoir on the album highlight also just how much character he brought to Savage Sinusoid through his zany performances. Without his vocal wildness across the album, the attention on Spirituality and Distortion is then directed to the significantly timid production and electronic finagling that doesn’t measure up to that of Savage Sinusoid.

6/10

In This Moment - Mother

*Sigh* In This Moment is one of those bands who I think really do show a lot of potential but just can’s seem to reach it. They get a lot of unnecessary shit for Maria Brink’s sexy stage presence and generally theatrical aesthetic and live show, but they do have the capacity to produce emotive alt metal ballads like “Whore” and bangers like “Big Bad Wolf” that give some insight into what heights they could potentially reach if they were much more consistent. I was hoping that Mother would be a solid rejuvenation/comeback after the benign disappointment of 2017′s Ritual, and while it’s certainly different, it’s not better. Mother really tries to take on this big, enveloping sound, and biblical, post-apocalyptic feel, and it can sort of carry it for a little bit and be temporarily immersive until the band needs to go full force. When it’s just some fancy eerie atmosphere and Maria Brink’s sultry vocal delivery, it holds up okay, but when the horribly synthetically produced arena-booming instrumentation really comes in and breaks that immersion, you remember that it really is all just trite alt rock whose lofty flair is all a facade.

4/10

Mamaleek - Come and See

Undoubtedly the most wildly experimental album to grace my ears so far this year, I was not expecting such a forceful avant-garde project from Mamaleek so relatively soon after Out of Time, but damn I’m glad I got it! The anonymous brotherly duo have always taken black metal on quite the far-off journey whenever they bring it along on one, ever making it their mission to create something one-of-a-kind with their work, and Come and See has to be their most enthralling album yet. Ramming together the transfixing manic anguish of their blackened experimental noise with the angular dynamism of jazz and even some blues rock in a musical particle collider, Mamaleek have made a truly one-of-a-kind album, and that’s even by their standards. I’ve mentioned before that I tend to like my jazz pretty rowdy and aggressive (like my metal), and the chaos that Mamaleek already generates with their brand of black metal is perfect to trim with and infuse with the angular dissonance of traditional jazz at its more energetically extreme. While the array of chaotic sounds may make Come and See their most intangibly black metal album, the ethos of that root genre pierces through by way of the harshly shrieked vocals just as much as the new jazz elements do. I really might just have to do a full-length review on this one because there is so much going on here that is worth admiring and I can’t stop loving it.

9/10

Phalanx - Golden Horde

This album came out a few months ago and has been making some pretty significant waves on Bandcamp, and for good reason. The relatively young band on their second release ever do showcase a pretty good knack for groove and death metal brutality, balancing slow, thick, tasty groove and blasting death metal without falling into metalcore breakdown clichés or death metal clichés. The three-pronged vocal attack the band touts isn’t quite as dazzling as they might think it is (with the abundance of talented vocalists capable of shapeshifting through a variety of metal vocal techniques), but I do think it would be cool to hear them use that approach with all three vocalists acting more simultaneously to more effectively convey the chaos of the war-related lyrical themes they focus on. Nevertheless, this quarter-hour taster is a great starter for them and definitely worth checking out. Hopefully it’s a foreshadowing of the blossoming of a bright new act for death metal.

7/10

Regarde Les Hommes Tomber - Ascension

I’ve been seeing a lot of praise being thrown this album’s way, and I honestly can’t disagree too much with that it is a pretty damn good album. It is very reminiscent of the Numenorean album Adore that I praised so highly last year. Like Adore, Ascension is an atmospheric black metal album that could easily hook your typical dude who hates Deafheaven and blackgaze and makes a really big deal about it. The band’does well on Ascension to avoid the reliance on generic post-rock guitar reverb ambiance that turns so many people off from blackgaze, working together a lot of unique sonic twists that don’t usually find their way into ambient black metal and channeling direct, cutting, yet humanly vibrant instrumentation that’s backed by raw cries of agony very similar to what Numenorean was doing last year. Perhaps this is the new way forward for atmospheric black metal and blackgaze. If so, Regarde Les Hommes Tomber are doing well to lead the way.

8/10

Deadspace - A Portrait of Sacrificial Scars

I already offered my praises to this album at length with my long-form post dedicated to it, but I’ll give it another shout for its brilliant, bittersweet sending off of the seemingly tireless Australian band. Deadspace give their oppressive/depressive sound the added magnitude and glory offered by choir and orchestral elements with more tact than most bands that use those elements regularly. I really am surprised that the band have decided to split up at such a high point in their artistry and I wish there could be more from them, but I have to respect their decision to end it here, and A Portrait of Sacrificial Scars is a great note to end on.

9/10

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