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#to being someone who's just allowed to exist and make his own decisions about his body

whenthewallfell · 1 year

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~The Many Legs of Peeta Mellark, or A Weirdly In-Depth Look at Panem Prosthetics~

Concept art for Peeta’s leg because I can (details below the cut)

Catching Fire: though the leg itself is removable, the cover is non-optional and the access panels can only be used by Capitol technicians. Due to how ornate it is it can get a bit heavy after long periods of wear, and there’s limited movement in the ankle which impedes walking. It’s designed to mimic the shape of the original leg so it fills out clothes nicely, but flashy enough to be worthy of a Victor should anyone see it. A very pretty prosthetic, but only slightly better than a peg leg. Mockingjay: this is what the prosthetic looks like without the fancy cover. It’s very no-nonsense with an advanced ankle component that has better range of motion without the casing, and features a rubber tread on the bottom of the foot blade to allow for better traction when chasing down and murdering his one true love. Although a vast improvement mobility-wise, it’s been permanently bolted to his leg and the control panels are all welded shut. Everything about this is short-term - they don’t care what happens to him once he’s killed Katniss.

Post War: when he’s caught in the explosion/fire from the bombs that got Prim his leg melts and fuses to his stump, so the doctors end up having to amputate even more. He’s given the choice to try out an experimental implant, which he accepts. This is vastly different from the other ones because he’s got so much autonomy - he can change the settings himself, remove the foot shell, opt in for a leg casing if he wants (he doesn’t). All in all it’s a very low maintenance leg, which suits him just fine, and because it’s an implant it finally feels like a part of him again.

#it's about character arcs as told through injuries #going from having no control over his life and being seen as the disposable 'other victor' who's alive only because of katniss #to being someone who's just allowed to exist and make his own decisions about his body #really pleased with the design for the capitol leg #think it's a nice mix of real anatomy and something vaguely art nouveau #are people tired of me talking about prosthetics yet?#is this what i'm gonna be known for?#the hunger games #peeta mellark #peeta's leg #<-- i guess this is a tag now lmao #fanart #mcbaart

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tuwlips · 25 days

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Yours Truly 🪷

contents: Arrange marriage trope | 3 year age gap | Slow burn | Angst | One sided love?

Being married to Nanami Kento through arranged marriage has been nothing but beautiful all this time.

Never having been in a relationship before, you were nervous. You never dated or had a boyfriend and now straight to marriage? What if this ends really badly.

You didn't get married right away. Two months into getting to know each better, if it feels right and all.

Amidst these two months, you and Kento became good friends. A bit comfortable now with each other's presence. Not to mention how he has been nothing but a gentleman. He was your type. Older than you by 3 years, had a stable job, respectful, kind, handsome. Most importantly, he listened to you, understood you. You slowly fell in love with him. Your husband to be.

From Kento's side, you were adorable. A bright bubble. Which balances his nonchalant persona really well. He could listen to you all day. You make him laugh, make him happy. Before he even realized it, he started to long for your presence.

Kento was not inexperienced, no. In fact, he dated someone before he met you. But alas, things didn't work out and they both had to part ways. First love always hurts and it hurt Kento bad.

He actually wasn't interested in getting married anymore. After the heartbreak he thought he would end up alone.

But then miracle happened and now in a few weeks he was going to marry you. The one who made his mundane life bright with her existence.

After marriage however, things were happy but you felt a hint of loneliness.

Kento became a bit distant. Yes he was still nurturing and caring towards you. But you felt a wall in between. While you poured your heart out to him, he didn't do the same. To you it seemed like he.. didn't care?

You took it as a one sided love. How pathetic, unrequited love in your own marriage. How much more miserable could you be? You had no one to love before and now when you finally have someone in your life, it's one sided. Love was cruel.

It hurt all the more knowing he had a first love and you can never be that. Was he still hung up on her? He did mention before getting married how much his first relationship meant to him and how much it affected him.

Silent tears were wept when he wasn't home. Sleeping on the same bed but seperately. Is that even possible?

Kento was never open to you in a physical sense. You never held hands or hugged. You didn't even kiss despite being married. Not even a soft kiss on the cheek.

While you were completely inexperienced, not having your first kiss or being even on a date let alone holding hands, Kento wasn't.

He did it all. Holding hands, went on his first date. He had his first kiss, his... first time and it was all in that one relationship which was before his marriage with you. It was all with his first love. All the more reason to hurt because you knew about that, you knew how special first times were, you knew all about his first relationship.

One of the things you love about Kento is his complete honesty. When you asked about his first relationship or if he has ever been in a relationship out of curiosity, he told you everything. He didn't want to keep anything from you and for you to later find it out after marriage. He told you everything so that you can make your decision about him.

Of course he was allowed to have a relationship. Why wouldn't he be. Plus this all happened years before he met you. Four years to be exact. Is he still hung up on his first love? Did he not like you even a little bit?

Slowly you started to distant yourself from him. Morning conversations turned into notes left on tables and fridge. Lunch time phone calls turned into unseen messages.

Nanami isn't naive, nor is he ignorant. He picked up your distant behavior. How you don't tell him all about your day anymore just a "it was okay" when asked about your time at work. How you didn't ask him back about his day.

Warm welcoming mornings turned into cold greetings when Kento woke up and saw you already left without telling him. He used to drop you off to work but suddenly one day you told him your work schedule changed and you had to be early at work. Yes you lied, but it's fine. It's fine....

You didn't sound as cheerful and bubbly anymore. Rather conversations became awkward and silent. The person who once used to tell him a lot of things now didn't utter a single word unless necessary.

You and Nanami were total opposites. While Nanami was mature and composed. You were a bit childlike and found joy in the littlest of things. Not that he minded your childlike personality. In fact, he admired how simple you were. A breathe of fresh air. It was so easy to just, be with you. You gave such simple solutions to his complex problems.

His previous relationship, both him and his partner were a bit alike. Hardworking, mature and adult. That's his type, at least it's what he always thought until you came along.

Afternoons turned lazy with you into taking naps. Showing him a new game and how to play it, the little things you collect and asking him his favorite things. He enjoyed these little moments with you so much. He missed them.

He missed you.

He hated how you were slowly fading away from him. Hated how your smile wasn't as bright as before. Hated how he couldn't figure out what the reason was. When did communication between you get so hard?

#nanami x reader #nanami kento x reader #kento x reader #jjk nanami #nanami kento angst #jujutsu kaisen nanami #nanami kento #comfort character #deeply in love with Nanami #nanami x reader angst #nanamin

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jave1y · 1 month

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Since yall loved my other post and I might as well lore dump and introduce my ocs

elmur is a 19 year old who was born with a curse that gives him the ability to see beings that normal naked eye can’t see. These other beings include monsters and ghosts. He grew up with azazel and yuria and they became like his own parental figures, since he didn’t have the best guardian when he was growing up. though it’s hard for him to make decisions between the two since polar opposites opposite. Yuria being more laid back and azazel being more stern and serious. But he always has his uncle Dean to be the (well the only good human figure in his life ) elmur is super chill, and he’s also kinda dumb but I love him idk, (also no one can see these creatures other than him)

Yuria is a . Well was a semi famous solo singer that was murdered in the 1980 by a fan on her wedding day. But instead of doing the usual “haunting and being sad all the time”. She takes the opportunity to have fun with her predicament, especially when death (grim reaper or death in general) is waiting for her to move on. She’s semi friends azazel but often gets into shenanigans with him due to their polar personalities. She is very chaotic, but she’s also kind of sassy. I love her. I love my wife. I’m so glad that other people love my wife. Oh and she’s also pen pals with Dean.

Azazel is a being that is known as the outsider which is a monster that is exist in the outside plane, which is where most of the monsters that Elmer can see. It’s a combination of what we see. Basically monsters that just appeared but can’t be seen. They tend to copy humans mannerisms but not all of them are friendly . Azazel is one of those friendly monsters that had basically adopted elmur. He originally knew elmurs grandmother who had unfortunately passed. So taking care of Elmer is like a justice to her. he’s a stickler for the rules and sometimes he doesn’t realize that he’s being too serious with elmur. He’s not really used to it. He’s /srs most of the time, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t pissy (think of the narrator from Stanley parable)

Dean is Elmer’s uncle and he already has a lot of personal issues and like Elmur he didn’t have the best life either. He drinks a lot but he also doesn’t want his past to define who he is now. Hes a Divorced police officer and he lives his nephew elmur and his son Travis (and some extra company) Dean is aware of Elmer’s “friends” but he’s supportive of it and doesn’t like to judge or shame elmur. Despite being divorced he’s on friendly terms with his ex wife and they still talk. But Dean is mainly alone when it comes to a social life, which is why he’s been getting random letters in mail from a secretive pen pal. Let’s say on the side of yuria chaotic energy and azazels serious and /srs manner, he’s in between I didn’t be careful someone who is confused about what they want can become confused about what you’re worth

Yeah so those are my bbs

If you have any questions feel free to ask or if you wanna draw my ocs ur absolutely allowed

I love ya

#my art #glass eyez

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myhyperfixatedmess · 10 months

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Intrusion.

Tom Riddle × Fem!Reader

You always had a hard time understanding why Tom kept you so hidden away. One night something happens that makes you realize why.

Word count: 1.7k

Content warning: Hints of a panic attack, violence, depictions of torture.

Soft!Tom makes an appearance!

You were very aware that Tom kept you at a distance from his...business.

Even during your time at school, he only allowed you to attend the Room of Requirement meetings a couple of times after much pleading. Graduating didn't change the situation much, despite your marriage; you didn't mind not knowing every detail of his plans, but the extent of your seclusion felt odd. You just wanted to understand why he kept you hidden away so intensely.

Most days, you tried to convince yourself that being the wife of the Dark Lord was enough, even if you had no say in his world-altering decisions. It was hard to ignore that some of his followers were unaware of your existence, while others knew you only as "The Dark Lord's mistress," a term you doubted Tom was aware of or would tolerate.

Though a few Death Eaters knew you from your Hogwarts days, most remained tight-lipped around you, offering mere nods or quiet acknowledgments. It was clear they feared Tom greatly; making eye contact with you seemed like a perilous act. You weren't sure if it was due to his direct orders or their assumptions about his expectations. Either way, though you couldn't really fault them for hiding from you. While you weren't scared of Tom, you could understand why others would be.

Quiet apprehension gnawed at you as you contemplated discussing your concerns with Tom. But you reasoned that avoiding potential arguments and trusting him were better choices. After all, you were an adult now, not a teenage worrier. You had married him despite his questionable morals, so who were you to judge?

The muffled conversations behind closed doors and fleeting glimpses of secretive meetings became your new norm. Sometimes you managed to catch glimpses through cracks, only to have the door swiftly shut when you were noticed. While you occasionally wondered about his trust in you, you pushed those doubts away to avoid unnecessary distress. You remained silent, occupying yourself with your own pursuits, whether it was reading, writing, or wandering the halls of the inherited family estate.

On this particular evening, you found yourself in the library, Tom being out for the night, which didn't bother you. As you perused the shelves, a loud bang from downstairs jolted you. Frozen in place, you strained to listen for more sounds, until harsh, unfamiliar voices reached your ears. Loud and aggressive, they echoed from the ground floor.

Panic surged as you realized you were in danger. These voices weren't part of Tom's inner circle, and you backed away from the library door, realizing that someone had broken into your home. The thought of a robbery crossed your mind, but then a chilling realization struck—you hadn't considered the possibility that Tom's ambitious plans might have made enemies.

Your initial instinct was to leave the house, apparate, and contact Tom for help. But as your hand reached for your wand, you remembered it was in your room. Unlike Tom, you couldn't perform wandless magic. Trapped and helpless, the sound of angry shouting grew louder, approaching from downstairs.

With each thud of footsteps ascending the stairs, you strained to catch their words. The first voice, a man's, sent a shiver down your spine as he called out, "Where is that bitch?" It was clear they were after you, and this wasn't just a random intrusion; they intended to harm you.

Anxiety clenched at your heart. You had never felt targeted before, never imagined this vulnerability. You cursed yourself for not being better prepared, for letting yourself be defenseless and alone. As their voices drew nearer, panic coursed through you; you were trapped, with no means of escape.

With painstaking effort, you inched backward against the library wall, the cold surface offering a stark contrast to your racing heart. The air felt thin and suffocating, your breaths shallow and uneven, while beads of sweat dotted your forehead.

They were right outside the door now.

You pressed your hands against the wall, your pulse pounding in your ears, as you prayed for them not to notice you. They pounded on the door, and you clamped your eyes shut, fear tightening its grip on you with each thud.

A shiver of dread ran down your spine as the door gave way, crashing open under their assault. Two men stormed in, wands at the ready. Your body locked up, terror stifling your voice, and you blinked back tears that threatened to betray your composure. This couldn't be real, it couldn't be happening.

The realization hit that running was futile—your exit was blocked. Your heart raced as their eyes settled on you, and you weighed your chances against them without a wand. Your legs trembled as the fear that gripped you teetered on the edge of overwhelming.

"There she is," one of the men sneered, his gaze locking onto you. Panic gripped you tighter, the world narrowing down to their menacing forms.

"We've been looking for you. I'll take her. Come along." His companion's nod was a chilling confirmation, and your pulse quickened as he aimed his wand at you. Their grip tightened, hauling you forward, and you struggled against their grasp. Your voice wavered as you spoke, desperation evident, "Don't do anything foolish. Let me go!"

Their faces twisted with anger at your words, their cruelty evident.

"Voldemort's whore has a temper," the other man taunted, the use of Voldemort's name sending a shock through you. These were Tom's followers, but why target you? They had to know the repercussions of angering him.

"What do you want with me? What are you doing?" you pleaded, flinching when the grip on your arm intensified.

"Enough talking," he snapped, his wand slicing through the air to silence you. Before you could react, the curse fell from his lips.

"Crucio."

Agony erupted, a scream tearing from your throat. Pain seared across your skin, your body convulsing as the torture curse wracked you. Darkness encroached on your vision, and you were thrown backward, a collision with a bookshelf shattering your senses.

As your awareness wavered, a silver dagger gleamed in one captor's hand, your body too weak to move. The other man grabbed your hair, his wand trained on you, while the dagger-wielding one advanced with malicious intent.

"Please, no! Tom will b—"

"Shut it!" the man spat, the blade plunging into your leg. Agony shot through you, your body wracked with pain as your screams filled the room.

"That bastard doesn't even know we're here, but he's gonna regret making a fool out of us," the man hissed, drawing closer. Nausea swelled within you, tears clouding your vision.

"Unhand her." The voice cut through the chaos, familiar and commanding.

"Tom…" you croaked weakly, blinking teary eyes to see him standing behind your assailants. His eyes blazed with fury, and you clung to his presence, your savior in this nightmare.

The attackers froze, their surprise palpable.

"M- My lord," one stammered, and Tom's lip curled with disdain.

"Ah, so it is 'my lord' now?" he seethed, closing in. The men scrambled, leaving you slumped against the bookshelf.

"We meant no disrespect, sir," one attempted, while the other looked on anxiously. "We simply were…"

"Were what?" Tom's anger laced his voice. "Please do explain your assault on my wife."

"My lord," the shorter man bowed, "We didn't know—We just thought she was some intruder!"

The taller man nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, we came for you and saw her! We thought she was breaking in, my lord, I swear!"

The lies were transparent.

"Not only did you invade my home and attack my wife, but you dare lie about it," Tom growled, his gaze steely.

"No, we're—"

"Silence!" Tom's command silenced them both.

"Both of you will go downstairs; I will address this later." The men hurried away, assuming they were off the hook. Tom turned to you, worry etched his features as he reached for your trembling hands.

"My love, can you hear me?" he murmured, his voice a soothing balm. His arms enfolded you, lifting you gently. Pain rippled through you, your vision swimming.

"Everything will be all right now, I am here," he assured softly, but your pain remained relentless. Tom's gaze shifted to your bleeding leg, his brows furrowing in concern.

"You will be fine," he said gently as he cradled you. The pain was overpowering, your vision blurring as you teetered on the brink of unconsciousness.

His voice reached you, your consciousness slipping away, but you knew he was there.

And then the darkness enveloped you.

When consciousness returned, you found yourself in your bed, the dull ache in your head the only lingering reminder of the ordeal. Your gaze shifted to your bandaged leg, confirming that the events weren't some nightmarish illusion. Sighing, you realized it had all been real.

You pushed yourself up, cautiously testing your body's limits. Muscles protested the movement, and a groan escaped your lips as pain surged through you. Memories of the harrowing experience played on a loop in your mind, each scene etched with vivid intensity.

Tom's voice interrupted your thoughts. "You need to rest." His presence filled the room, and you met his gaze as he spoke.

"How long was I asleep?" you questioned, trying to make sense of the passage of time.

"13 hours," he replied calmly, offering you a glass of water. He settled beside you on the bed.

"Thirteen hours!?" Shock colored your voice as you nearly dropped the glass. "I was unconscious for thirteen hours?"

Tom's reassurance came with a touch. "It is okay, you're safe now," he said, his arms encircling you. The glass of water quickly emptied as you downed it, your body yearning for hydration after the ordeal.

"So, what happened to the intruders?" you ventured, your apprehension clear in your voice.

"They have been dealt with," Tom's response was clipped, his demeanor stern. You understood the implication behind his words and chose not to press further.

"I'm sorry, Tom," you murmured, resting your head against his chest. Fatigue washed over you, threatening to pull you back into sleep.

"For what?" he inquired gently.

"Being reckless," you admitted, your eyelids growing heavy.

"I was careless too," he confessed, pressing a kiss to your forehead. "They are gone now. I will never let any harm come to you again."

"Promise?" you whispered, your eyes fluttering closed.

"I promise," his reply was tender, and with a content smile, you surrendered to sleep once more.

#tom riddle x you #x reader #tom riddle x reader #tom riddle fanfiction #tom marvolo riddle #tom riddle #female reader

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yourleftpinkytoe-blog · 4 months

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Andreil soulmate au:

Background

Not everyone has a soulmate

To have one you need to fall into a very specific category of people

To put it simply “in order to have a soulmate you and your partner have to choose each other in every universe in existence”

This is a very rare occurrence

Like one in of every million people have a soulmate

You know you have one when you are born with a picture of something that holds meaning to you and you soulmate in every universe

There is only one way to make the marks disappear (when they do you are no longer soulmates in any universe)

“If romantic feelings are expressed and unreciprocated”

As long as there is a possibility for a relationship there is a bond

So all it takes is a no that is genuine for the bond to break

(So if affection is felt by one but never expressed then your still soulmates until the other party rejects you)

(If both parties hold romantic feelings for the other but are unable to be in a relationship then the bond is still there)

It’s basically a “yes, until it’s a no”

***

Nathaniel Wasinski was born with a soulmate to the delight of absolutely nobody. His father hated it for the soul reason of it being a potential joy for his son. He will go on to attempt to rid his son of the mark via a hot iron.

His mother hated it for being a distraction. Years after she would hate it for the fact that frankly, it’s too recognizable. Too distinct.

Abram likes it. In his eyes it’s something to latch onto. “In another universe maybe I’m not constantly in fear of the mob coming to kill me.” It’s hope but hope is not something he has room for so he doesn’t dwell on it.

Alex, Stephan, Chris nor any of his other identities have a soulmate. Abram’s soulmate is his and his alone. He only allows himself to acknowledge his mark in the dead of night locked in motel bathrooms. He traces the lines of the key, watching himself do so in the mirror. He doesn’t acknowledge the multitude of scars surrounding it. In those moments he lets his mind wander to all the possibilities. Who is his soulmate? Are they happy? Do they have a mom that rips their hair out too? Will they ever meet? If they do, could he even feel the types of feelings necessary for them to stay soulmates? Would his soulmate like him? He hopes so. It’s the only thing he lets himself hope for.

***

Andrew Doe was born with a soulmate, his twin brother was not. That distinction played a major part in Tildas decision. She knows the attention people like that bring. If she’s already going to have to deal with a snotty crying shit maker, she wants to do it in peace.

You’d think a child with a soulmate would be easily adopted. It is already rare for a child to be born with a soulmate let alone one that’s being put up for adoption. But Tilda’s track record for abandoning then subsequently coming back for said child put a bad taste in potential adopters mouths. So Andrew gets passed around from one hellhole to another, each with a new and exciting type of trauma for him to experience.

Andrew when he was young liked that he had a soulmate. He’d been abandoned so much but the idea of someone actually choosing him not just once but in every universe gave him hope.

All hope he had died when he was seven.

By the time Andrew Minyard is his legal name he no longer looks at his mark with any emotion at all. It was apart of him but he felt nothing for it. Or at least that’s what he tells himself.

He definitely doesn’t get an intense feeling of longing when he catches a glimpse of the key on his forearm. He definitely doesn’t ever think about his soulmate. who he is, what he’s doing, if they’ve met, how they could meet, what he look like. Is his life just as shitty as his own? No he definitely doesn’t think about that.

Except Andrew is only a liar when it matters and this doesn’t matter. So yes he thinks about his soulmate far more than he’d ever admit out loud ,But it’s not like it matters to him. His soulmate is a pipe dream, something to thinks about but never something he can have.

He’s too broken for his soulmate to choose him anyway.

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i-cant-sing · 1 year

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Whispers in your ear like a devil on your shoulder: you should make the Miguel O'Hara scenarios. Think of the hot dad energy he would emanate :))))))

Jokes aside, it is truly up to you what to write and I would always read it, but I am begging on my hands and knees for you to tell us the platonic yandere Miguel O'Hara scenarios you have thought of.

Nooo stooopppp girll- *puts on Miguel's theme music in the background* ahh shit here we go.

Platonic Yandere Miguel O'Hara as a dad:

Okay, so im just gonna word vomit here and yall make sense of it, but like the first thing that comes to mind when I think about yandere dad Miguel is that him kidnapping daughter reader from a universe where he doesn't exist, so he's technically not breaking canon or whatever and really, it doesnt even matter if you're his bio kid or not, like u could be a literal random civilian but if he is drawn to u, then he is. And while some of yall say "oh come on, Miguel cant be like that. He doesn't make careless/thoughtless decisions like that" I'm sorry, but is this not the same person who had the nerve to step in as his dead self from an AU and sleep with his parallel universe's wife and father someone else's kid??? Granted, they did end up dying but really, the only difference between that decision and this decision to kidnap u is to make sure that u don't end up dyingggg.

Moving on, he kidnaps u, makes up some bs about your life being in danger and blah blah blah, you HAVE to stay by his side, okay??? And at first, reader is like "umm okay?" because who tf wouldnt agree with SPIDERMAN??? (especially one who looks like Miguel? he is already giving dad vibes)

And the thing with Miguel is that he super protective (because PTSD) and he's possessive too, so the only person you're allowed to hang out with is Mayday (she is the cutest, i would die to have a kid like her ngl) because he doesnt see her as a threat (someone who could take u away from him). ABSOLUTELY NO CONTACT with Miles (because he hates that kid, pain in his ass/bane of his existence) and pretty much all other spiderpersons as well because all of them are sarcastic and he does not need them rubbing off on u. The only other person he would trust u with is Peter B, probably when Miguel needs a babysitter (because u learned to mess with his tech-typy-locks and traps, so u need an actual person to keep eyes on u. curse the universe for u being smart like ur papa), and the biggest reason he does trust peter with u is because since peter is a father himself, he would definitely know that while miguel's methods are wrong, in his own way, he is protecting u, and peter b knows that he would do absolutely anything to keep his daughter safe too. Also- since peter has mayday, if he were to actually take u away from Miguel, then Miguel would 10000% kidnap mayday and use her against peter too until he inevitably has to return u to him.

Now Miguel is emotionally crippled due to his trauma, so he's not great at expressing his feelings, at least not when you're awake. When you're asleep, maybe his eyes turn a little softer, maybe he cups your cheek, some guilt and sadness swirling in his eyes when he sees your tear stained cheek (because u missed ur family. or maybe u got told off by Miguel in front of everyone), presses a soft kiss to your forehead and mumbles something in spanish ("you will understand in due time, mi hija.") Definitely has cameras in your room, so he looks at you through the screen and sighs when u flop on the bed and stuff your head in the pillow and start crying, heart slightly heavy with guilt.

Except from interacting with others and leaving the spider society/his apartment (idk where he lives), every need of yours is pretty much taken care of IF you follow his rules. If you behave, u get everything. If u yell at him, try to break out of his place etc, privileges are revoked and BAM, you are now confined to your room with no access to entertainment or any of your hobbies he allowed u to have. Those novels u liked to read? Too bad, they get thrown in the fireplace. Gaming console? Broken in his hands. Liked to cook/bake? No access to kitchen because u are now locked in your room.

Miguel has one important rule- you MUST obey him, under all circumstances, no questions asked. If he tells you to go to your room, honey go before his eyes turn sharp and he has to manhandle you. If he tells you to eat dinner with him, you need to eat food even if you are full. And if he's forbidden you from going to the locked room in his place that's full of info on you and your old fam, then its best for everyone for u to obey.

Now, while Miguel does have trouble expressing emotions (i mean, the most affection he's shown is head pats and if u are really really sad, then yes, smooches on the forehead.) but he has no trouble expressing anger and rage. If u mess up real bad, in the sense where u disobey him and end up hurting yourself (no matter to what degree), GIRL HE IS SCREAMING HIS HEAD OFF AT YOU (like the scene from the movie where he's yelling at miles). I mean, he's so mad, he legit picks you up and hauls you to your room, where he's yelling at u even more, using the terms "child" "kid" and patronising tone because you may think you're a grown up (u might even be) but he will ALWAYS view u as a kid- THE KID he lost, the child he promised to protect and somehow get redemption, or at the very least, fill the empty hole in his heart.

And since nobody thought to inform me that my man Miguel is a literal VAMPIRE and that his fangs are not just for show to attract all kinds of viewrs, we gonna talk about that as well. Does he use them on reader when she finds out that Miguel actually fucking murdered her real fam (maybe not directly kill them, because he is a hero after all. Maybe in the sense that he knew they were gonna die, you would too unless he took u away, he just didnt bother calculating the repercussions if he did indeed save your family.) and reader is now hyperventilating and trying to claw her way out of his arms but muscled arms only pull u tighter against his chest and he just bites ur neck to let the venom paralyse you long enough for him to not only offer an explanation for his actions, but also put a tracker in you and chain u to your bed.

Does Miguel's heart absolutely shatter at your body wracking sobs and distressed state as you realise you have lost your family? Yes. Does he apologise? Never. Does he like seeing you in pain? NO. Will he cause you even more pain? ...yes, if circumstances change.

Hurting you is the last the thing he's do, but its still something he would do. He wont enjoy it, but if u messed up real bad (escaped and endangered yourself) then Miguel, with a very heavy heart will snap your ankles and limit your ability to walk for months (if not for life). This is one of his harshest punishments, and punishments are immeadiately followed with comfort, so Miguel does put your fractured bones in a cast and wipes the tears from his eyes, shushing you gently as he softly explains why he did what he did, how you dont need to worry about anything because since you took your punishment so well, Miguel will help you (he will carry you around everywhere), and maybe if you're in too much pain, he may give you some drugs(or even his venom) to put you to sleep right away.

He has lost too much, too many times. His wounds are deep and still fresh, he is not taking any chances... especially not with you.

okay thats all i have for now(its a lie, i just need to pee) but feel free to send in ur asks/thoughts/scenarios.

#yandere miguel o'hara #yandere miguel x reader #platonic miguel #platonic yandere #yandere spiderverse

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nikito0x · 1 month

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RadioApple AU - Forget me not

I am too lazy to write a whole fic of it, but I can't get this plot bunny out of my head so here we go:

This is so AU it will never be canon (obviously) but it's ridiculous enough to be believable.

To start off: We all know the age old story of Lucifer's fall and the way he and Lilith got together. Right? Well forget all about it. In this AU it's all a lie. Let me explain.

The first humans to have ever been created were Alastor and Lilith. They were acquaintances and simply live peacefully in the Garden of Eden for a while. There is nothing romantic between them.

Lucifer gets assigned to watch over them and at some point witnesses Alastor interacting with some of his creations. So he decides to ask him about his opinion of them.

They start a conversation about Lucifer's other, weirder, creations. Some of which were rejected by the elder angels.

Alastor, as someone who gets easily bored, finds Lucifer's ideas amusing and intriguing. So they become friends, partially thanks to Alastor's pure fascination with Lucifer's mind, and partially thanks to Lucifer having finally found someone who would listen to his ideas and even like them. Not to mention add some of their own to his to create something even greater.

So they become friends. Lucifer starts visiting Alastor more and more often as time passes.

Alastor witnesses how Lucifer isn't exactly treated great by his siblings a lot of the time and tries to soothe the angel or distract him with a new invention that may never be allowed to be created, but would be fun to think about anyway.

Lucifer gets isolated from his siblings because of his "shortcomings" and at some point ends up in a situation where he has to ask for Alastor's help with preening his wings as no one else would.

Alastor notices Lucifer being uncomfortable and asks about it. Lucifer tries to deflect and ignore the problem but Alastor convinces him to trust him with whatever issue he has. And so - wing grooming happens.

Insert typical Wing Fic tropes here.

This becomes a regular occurrence.

Meanwhile Lilith is just chilling and exploring the garden. Nothing much to see here 👀

Michael is going to be sort of a villain in here.

Michael sees the bond forming between his brother and this inferior creature his father has created and disapproves of it. So he decides he will have to seperate them for the good of everybody.

Michael goes to Lilith and convinces her to help him with that task. Lilith would try talking to Alastor and Michael would talk to Lucifer.

Lilith is confused and uncertain about that. She tries asking questions but he rebuffs her and simply reassures her that it's all for the greater good.

In the end Lilith just asks something like: "What if I can't? What if I don't succeed?" And Michael implies that her existence is at stake if this doesn't work.

Remember: Alastor and Lilith are the first ever humans. They haven't eaten the fruit and know very little of the world, only what they've been told and found out for themselves. And since they have committed no sin yet, they are basically immortal as long as they don't injure themselves to a point of no return. And so they don't know pain like a regular human does.

Lilith becomes fearful of Michael's warning and tries explaining to Alastor the importance of not associating with Lucifer anymore. Alastor is confused and doesn't understand her worry, so he doesn't listen. Lucifer is too much fun for him to just abandon him like that. Besides, he's started to care some for the angel. He won't just do something without a good reason for it.

Alastor, in this sense, knows more than Lilith since he's been in contact with Lucifer (who's been explaining things to him) for a while now. Alastor would know more of the world than Lilith and wouldn't just make a rash decision to follow any order he is given like she does.

Michael also fails in convincing Lucifer that Alastor isn't worth his time. The conversation does rather the opposite of what he wanted, as Lucifer is reminded of all the things Michael and the other angels didn't do for him, that Alastor did in their stead.

Alastor and Lucifer talk about it and simply decide to ignore them and continue as they have.

At some point Michael gets frustrated and gives Lilith an ultimatum. Get this done by the end of the week or God will be informed.

"Remember, your existence might be at stake." And so Lilith panics.

Nearing the end of the week, Michael becomes impatient and introduces Lilith to something no human at that point has ever experienced. Pain.

He cuts her hand with an angelic weapon to prove to her what she could feel (if not a 100 times worse) if she doesn't comply. The cut is shallow, barely there and Michael heals it afterwards, but Lilith has never experienced such a horrible thing before. This was pain? And it can be a lot worse?? No, she has to separate Lucifer and Alastor at any cost.

Michael stays in the shadows and observes, satisfied.

Lilith, out of desperation, reaches the conclusion that it would be better for Alastor to get hurt than her, since he is the one who doesn't wish to listen to God's will. And so, in a frantic state of panic, Lilith attacks him.

She doesn't really know what would happen if she hits him hard enough with a rock or sth, since neither of them have ever truly witnessed death at that point; so she tries hurting him to show him the consequences of his actions if he doesn't listen to her.

Alastor ends up accidentally killing her in self defense. Alastor pushes Lilith away but as she rolls away from him she hits her head on a rock and dies that way.

Alastor explains everything to Lucifer and Lucifer goes to find Michael because this situation stinks of his interference.

God finds out about the situation and sends both Lilith and Alastor's souls to Hell.

Lilith starts hating Alastor and Lucifer from then on. So when she and Alastor meet in Hell, she screams at him that if he'd just listened to her, they wouldn't be in this situation. He tries reasoning with her, even as much as he's angry with her, but she just storms off away from him.

The first residents of Hell have been added.

Alastor still gets his deer like characteristics as he spent a lot of time in their presence at the Garden of Eden.

Meanwhile, Lucifer finds out where Alastor has ended up and tries to convince God to change his mind. He doesn't.

So he makes a plan. The new humans have been created. They're supposed to be better than the last ones. Lucifer tries to prove God wrong by getting Adam and Eve in trouble. He tries to prove that just sending every human who has made a mistake in Hell without a chance to redeem themselves gets you nowhere. But his plan doesn't work the way he wished, as Adam and Eve are turned mortal and Lucifer gets sent to Hell as well.

Michael is the last person Lucifer sees as he falls, wings cut off, betrayed and in pain.

Alastor finds him and helps him heal mentally and physically. They end up actually getting together there and they are the most disgustingly adorable couple ever.

They build Hell up and create Pentagram City. They're happy and the people of Hell respect them and appreciate their presence.

Lilith's POV meanwhile: she starts asking questions like: Okay but what if nothing bad would have happened if Lucifer and Alastor stayed together? What if Michael lied to me? Well, he could still have hurt me (for his own agenda) when I was alone, since Alastor spent all of his time with Lucifer. And I don't have anyone else. Well, if I have to be miserable and alone, then I'll make sure they are as well. And I'll take Hell for my own in the meantime.

So now she hates all three of them. Yes, she's a victim but she chooses to deal with the anger and grief she has in a toxic way.

Charlie will still exist in this universe, but for now, she'll be a creation of Lucifer's who somehow combines his and Alastor's energies, and uses whatever powers of creation he has as an angel, to create her.

Even with the depressing circumstances of only being able to see the worst of humanity, Lucifer doesn't fall into depression like in canon, not to that extent at the very least; Alastor an Charlie would be there for him after all.

He ends up ruling hell well, having Alastor's help doing so as he is the more politically savvy between the two of them.

( Spark of Redemption: After being cast down, Lucifer could create Charlie as a symbol of hope. Her creation could combine his angelic power with Alastor's understanding of humanity, creating a being with the potential for good even in Hell. Balancing Darkness: Charlie could be born as a counterpoint to the growing darkness in Hell. Her presence, filled with Lucifer and Alastor's love, could offer a glimmer of light for lost souls.)

( Showcasing the respect Hell's residents have for Lucifer and Alastor can be done through small details: demons seeking their counsel, celebrations held in their honor, or acts of loyalty in times of trouble.)

The Morningstar family is as wholesome as it can get in a place like Hell.

Shared Responsibilities: Charlie, with her inherent compassion, focuses on rehabilitation efforts in Hell, while Alastor manages the day-to-day operations and Lucifer acts as the final authority figure. They respect each other's strengths and work together for the good of Hell.

After a few decades in hell, Lilith disappears. No one knows where she went. She's gone for a long while until she pops up again, more powerful than ever.

In reality, Lilith made a deal with Roo. It is in Roo's interest that Lilith uses her concerts to spread sin and rebellion in order to turn Hell into a domain of evilness to fuel her power. Roo in return gifts Lilith power, she becomes strong enough to affect most with her voice and words, even someone as powerful as Lucifer himself.

No one but the two of them are aware of this deal being made. The deal was made some time after hell establishes a proper society with its own system.

Lilith decides to build her power, by making deals with other demons for their souls, her deal with Roo enhances those deals and gives her a larger boost than it would have given her otherwise.

Lilith decides it's time to enact her revenge.

She targets Alastor, knowing that without him, Lucifer will crumble under the pressure like what happened in canon with his depression. This would cause Hell to go in chaos once their powerful leader seems to have lost any care for the souls in his domain. This would spread sin and rebellion in Hell even further.

Lilith holds Charlie hostage as she makes a deal with Alastor for both Lucifer and Charlie's safety. She uses her voice/songs to brainwash them into forgetting Alastor's very existence. She does the same to the whole of hell.

Instead, she replaces Alastor with herself in those memories and convinces everyone that she's been the one by Lucifer's side all along. For the safety of his loved ones, Alastor signs away his soul to her. Lilith forbids him from approaching Lucifer, and from telling him anything about the truth of what actually happened between the three of them (Lilith, Lucifer and Alastor).

In the meantime Alastor's powers are severely restricted and he is not allowed to make deals for other demons' souls in an attempt to increase his strength.

Lilith goes to Heaven, making sure that Roo's plans for the yearly exterminations are going well and that her hidden seeds of sin in Heaven continue to grow. Lilith is strong but not strong enough to defeat Lucifer in battle. Replacing his memories of someone with another wasn't easy, but was simple enough to trick the mind to do.

She knows she can't convince him to give her his crown, not now anyway. She is convinced she would rule Hell eventually. As Roo's powers from the spread sin and chaos grow, so would hers - a nice gift from Roo to her, as she's doing such a fine job on their deal. Lilith disappears for seven years.

After all that Alastor tries his best to regain any power he can. He looks for loopholes in his deal with Lilith and realizes that Lilith didn't forbid him from approaching Charlie, so once he feels he can be of help to her in any way, he would approach her.

Lilith didn't forbid him all interaction with Lucifer. Lucifer can still approach him himself and they can talk about other things that don't include the contents of Alastor's deal.

Alastor also figures out that Lilith had made a deal with someone powerful, he doesn't know who, but he knows she can't have gained abilities strong enough to manipulate an angel from just deals for others' souls.

Alastor is convinced, however, that given time and some reminders Lucifer will be able to break through Lilith's deception, as he is still more powerful than she is. (he is right).

For now Alastor has a new goal: Get stronger and get noticed by the king of Hell somehow. That's how he becomes an overlord.

Once radio was brought in hell, he makes it a part of his brand (as it is in canon);

That's how he meets Vox. Here is why they don't get along in this AU. For one, Vox is a clout chaser while Alastor does radio mainly for himself and his own enjoyment; and other such character differences that get in the way of them being truly close.

Alastor one day approaches Vox with an idea: bring others' memories to the screens of their TVs. Vox loves the idea, he imagines he could make a whole lot of profit by exploiting sinners' longing for home by bringing their memories of Earth to their screens.

The project is going well and Alastor finally decides to share his reasons for coming up with such an idea. He tells Vox that someone he loves was attacked by another with the ability to erase his loved one's memory of him. And he wants that person to remember him again.

Vox becomes angry with Alastor, since he has a crush on the Radio Demon and doesn't want to help him reunite with his love. Vox puts an end to that project. Vox and Alastor fight and Alastor manages to win even with the restriction placed over his powers.

Alastor was really powerful before it. Even now, restricted, he will be above average in regards to power even compared to the other overlords.

After that Alastor disappears for 7 years - like in canon. Maybe he's looking for alternative ways to get more powerful. Maybe he finds out that cannibals have just that little bit more power to them than regular demons and joins them as he has nothing left to lose. Maybe he's looking for other demons with the power to affect the mind. Maybe he tries making deals for favors instead of souls. Maybe he gathers allies to fight alongside him against Lilith for the future. Idk.

Alastor uses his weakened powers to subtly manipulate events around the developing hotel, guiding Charlie's path with anonymous warnings or nudges to ensure her safety.

After he comes back, the events in canon from season 1 proceed to happen as they originally did. The only difference being that Alastor cares about the residents of the hotel more than in canon.

He sort of becomes "the dad" of the group, before Lucifer shows up.

Lucifer and Alastor still have their fight in "Hell's greatest dad" with their song. The difference is that Alastor has different motivations for being angry with Lucifer. He intentionally calls Lucifer a dud in their song, because he is angry with how neglectful he had become to Charlie in the 7 years he was gone.

Canon events happen as they originally did until the end of season 1. Alastor still makes a deal with Charlie for a favor. The difference is that this time he plans to use it in a situation like this- example: Charlie's loyalty to her friends might threaten her safety and Alastor plans to use his favor to make her run if needed.

Alastor uses his fight with Adam to test his strength and see if he has managed to get any stronger despite the restrictions he is under. He still loses that fight. Even if some of his strength was returned it isn't anything significant. Alastor learns to use whatever little powers he has as efficiently as possible. Low effort maximum efficiency.

After that first season Alastor and Lucifer start getting along better. Lucifer realizes Alastor was angry with him for his absence in Charlie's life even when he doesn't know where that anger stems from and resolves himself to be better for her in the future. He tells Alastor so and they forgive each other for whatever wrongs were inflicted. They still tease each other often, but that's just a part of their dynamic.

Eventually Lucifer will start getting dreams of things that look like memories but can't be because he doesn't remember ever having done those things with Alastor. He ignores the dreams, dismissing them as wishful thinking as he had started to view Alastor as a close friend after they forgave each other.

Lucifer slowly falls in love with Alastor, and those dreams continue to haunt him.

Alastor never fell out of love with Lucifer to begin with.

There will be a whole lotta angst in regards to Alastor. He will have to realize that during the time him and Lucifer were separated they have become different people entirely and he will have to let go of the past and maybe get used to Lucifer and him being friends because he doesn't know if they'll ever be anything more.

And with how much he's changed - becoming an overlord and a cannibal to boot, he doesn't know if Lucifer could ever accept him. Especially since at the time he just sees him as just another terrible sinner.

Alastor falls in love with that new version of his husband and Lucifer does the same.

Eventually Lucifer breaks through Lilith's enchantment and him and Alastor have a proper reunion. Lucifer will break the enchantment on Charlie soon after.

Alastor writes down what happened and explains why he made the deal with Lilith (he can't tell anyone anything, but he can write it down)

Lucifer will be able to get him out of it with some time.

Eventually they will fight and win against Heaven.

Maybe they'll cause a rebellion in Heaven by it's residents by using both Lucifer's angelic power and Alastor's radio show to broadcast the truth of their pure leaders. The ones that take pleasure in killing and hunting those who are already down.

Whew! Done! Finally! Whoop!

It turned out far longer than I thought it would but here you go ig.

#hazbin hotel #hazbin fic idea #hazbin alastor #hazbin lucifer #hazbin charlie #my fic #fanfiction #hazbin au #radioapple #appleradio #strawberry shortcake #duckiedeer

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lurkingshan · 4 months

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After reading this post from @waitmyturtles about her read on Fire and Dynamite, I was thinking a bit more about the way the show has handled their story and what I love about it. And I think it comes down to a crucial point: Cooking Crush, unlike most Thai bl, is NOT in the bubble, and the presence of homophobia, both internal and external, cannot be separated from their story. This is a queer narrative to the core.

Both Fire and Dynamite are shaped by their sexuality and their experiences or fear of rejection because of it. Dynamite is out and proud and unapologetic about what he wants, and as we learn when his backstory is revealed to us, this is a direct response to the familial rejection he experienced when he came out. Dy is defiant and in your face with his desires because he has already experienced the worst kind of rejection and is always bracing for more. So he dares people to do it right out of the gate. He likes to know where he stands with people, so he’d rather be his brashest self and suffer the loss early before getting attached. He deals with fear by daring people to prove him right.

Fire takes his fear in the opposite direction, denying who he is and rejecting anything that makes him think too hard about the aspects of himself he does not want to deal with. Even without Dynamite in the picture, it was clear that he was trying to talk himself into liking Jane in a way he simply did not. Once we got to know his mother, the source of his fear became crystal clear, and it was easy to see why he worked so hard to suppress himself. Fire was unhappy living that way, and Dynamite was a constant reminder of what he was trying to keep down, so it’s no wonder he reacted so viscerally to him.

But that’s exactly why their story works. Fire needed someone who he couldn’t ignore to draw out his true self, and because Dynamite is so unwilling to put up with mixed messages and half-hearted declarations, Fire had to work himself all the way out before Dy would accept him. One of the genius things this show did in their arc was have Dy pull away as soon as Fire began sending mixed signals. Dynamite was fine in the face of Fire’s firm rejection—it as what he always expected to get from him along with everyone else. But he wouldn’t allow Fire to run hot and cold on him and play with his emotions, because that was where he knew he could get really hurt. And this boundary that Dy set forced Fire to figure out what he actually wanted and communicate it clearly.

Which is why we saw Fire change so much as soon as they were together, because in the process of deciding what he wanted from Dynamite, Fire had to make some decisions about who he wanted to be and how he wanted to live. And he chose to embrace his queerness and live a more authentic life. He is a new man in this relationship because he is being himself for the first time ever, and he’s finally breaking free from the weight of his own internalized homophobia. It’s a positive change and one that is clearly making him happy, and part of him must feel grateful to Dy for pushing him into figuring out what he wanted.

But crucially, that is where Dy’s pushing ends. He is utterly unwilling to make any further demands of Fire regarding coming out, to the point that Dy puts his own friendships at risk to hide their relationship and protect Fire until he’s ready. He understands the fear of rejection Fire is still dealing with because he lived it. And he has already proven that he’s up to the task of handling Fire’s mother whenever Fire is ready to face her. These two are still early in their relationship but they have already fallen into a very natural and easy pattern of providing each other emotional support and stability, and we can see them shoring each other up. They make a great pair and theirs is a story that can only exist between queer characters.

I just love that in this show that feels so light on the surface they have made room for such depth in the storytelling. Watching Cooking Crush feels like a warm hug because even though it’s gentle and funny and often silly, there are real emotional struggles to ground us, and the story takes them seriously. We’ve seen this consistently in the main storyline with Ten and Prem, and Fire and Dynamite are no exception.

#cooking crush #thai bl #shan shouts into the void

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witchspeka · 11 months

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I dont think Mob is naive as much as he's socially unaware, like the reason why he trusts Reigen so blindly is a bit more complex than just him being naive

Cause Mob reached out to Reigen because he was desperate to find someone like him, someone who understood his psychic specific issues, someone that could truly know what he's feeling and going through and give him guidance and support

Post incident Mob's thinking process was something along the lines of my powers hurt people -> my powers are bad -> my powers (my emotions, my instincts, myself) cannot be trusted

So he lost all confidence and trust in his own actions, resigning to being as passive as possible to avoid any further damage to anyone else, thus he started doubting his own perception of reality too

He's a kid already struggling with being ostracised for being socially inept, who just got traumatised and all of his insecurity increased by the tenfold, he doesn't know how to process what he's going through. He needs help.

And here comes Reigen, seemingly reliable, a responsible adult in a child's eyes, someone who claims he can understand him

Even tho Reigen doesnt. But it doesn't matter, because Mob finds comfort in his words and takes them to heart

Even if Reigen doesn't fully get it, even if he doesn't see the bigger picture, even if his advice isn't always the best

Eventually, Mob grows up, realises Reigen isn't as honest as he seemed through his 11 year old perspective, but like most things, he refuses to acknowledge it on a deeper level

Mob knows, but never tells Reigen, never thinks about what all those lies mean to him (ofc until he forces himself to face those doubts regarding Reigen, to properly acknowledge both of their flaws and accept them as they are, I should scream into the void about Confession Arc more God)

Due to his lack of trust in himself, Mob has relied on Reigen for years now to shape his moral compass, his thoughts, his decisions

Because well, Reigen lies, sure, but he isnt a bad person. When he hurts Mob, it isn't intentional or with ill intent, he still wants the best for him, what's the issue?

Except that it stunts Mob's growth. He doesn't develop as a person, doesn't have goals or wishes or ambitions, can't make choices on his own, he doesn't even let himself acknowledge his own emotions, he refuses to let himself exist

But Mob realises in time that he wants more than that, he wants to become better and be independent and feel again

Still, he puts the acknowledgement of the lies on hold for as long as he can, unwilling to question the way things are

This can make him feel a little naive, he constantly relies on Reigen and trusts his decisions and raises questions rarely until separation arc when he finally puts his foot down

And I do think that moment is the most resounding proof we have that Mob knows and allows himself to be used by Reigen, not wanting to shake the status quo, until he gets fed up

I mentioned the social ineptitude at the beggining but idk if I should even elaborate on that, you've watched the show, you know what I mean

He's blunt and can't read social cues or tonality that well and can't speak in front of crowds and is overall pretty awkward and I do think some people conflate that with naivety

Mob is still a child, he doesnt fully understand how the world works at the ripe age of 14 years old, but some folks take that as him being inherently naive/innocent/whatever which I don't find true

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theerurishipper · 9 months

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Personally I think there isn’t enough meta about Adricat being a girl coded character and you should make one too

Okay, so when I say "female coded," I mean that Adrien's character fulfils the role that female characters usually have done in media. He's the love interest, he's the emotional support. He's sensitive and he's emotional. He's the heart of the team. Marinette on the other hand is a "male coded" character. She's a leader, she comes up with strategies and plans, and she is the brains of the operation. I used to think that was really cool, the way they subverted gender roles and allowed the characters to shine as characters instead of putting them in a box. Marinette was a strong and determined person, but she also had moments of weakness and vulnerability. Adrien seemed like the usual trope of the damsel in distress, but he was also literally Chat Noir, who often escaped his own situation and whose arc was about him breaking of his father himself.

But then they leaned too far into it, and it just became a gender swapped version of the same tired tropes that we've all seen. Marinette became The Leader™ who can do no wrong and doesn't need to do that emotional support shit for her partner when he needs it. Adrien lost any and all agency in his own story, and effectively just became the damsel in distress who had to sit there and look pretty as he waited for Marinette the knight to come and save him. I mean, you can't get more on the nose than this.

(And yeah, this is supposed to be the class' fanfiction and not representative of what the show was building up to, but this is literally what ended up happening.)

His choices became more and more irrelevant, and his feelings became more and more unimportant, until the entire Ladynoir dynamic became Marinette being The Leader™ who doesn't need to tell Chat Noir anything and doesn't owe him anything, and Chat Noir became the emotional support who is always attentive and considerate of Ladybug's needs to the point of invalidating his own. His feelings of sadness at being left out of the loop and being pushed away by Ladybug ultimately did not matter.

And then Season 5 spent its time setting up a rivalry between Marinette and Gabriel over what's best for Adrien. The fight wasn't Ladybug and Chat Noir against Monarch, but Marinette vs. Gabriel, and whoever won got to take Adrien home as a prize. Adrien's agency was diminished throughout Season 5 and annihilated entirely in the Season 5 finale, where he spends the confrontation with his father locked away in a white room while Marinette has to take the fight to Gabriel and confront him on Adrien's behalf. And he is sound asleep far away from the conflict while Marinette and Gabriel fight over what's best for Adrien instead of him, you know, deciding that himself.

I mean, the finale could not have been clearer about it.

At least he's there in the dream lmao

And the end of Recreation reveals that Marinette is lying to Adrien about his father so as to protect him. Because apparently Adrien won't be able to control his emotions and needs someone else to make his decisions for him. Because clearly, he would be too emotional and wouldn't be able to make his own informed choices. And it's quite common for women to be told that they are too emotional and so the big strong man should make the decisions for them. So the female coded character is treated like his emotions are a weakness and a burden and like he requires other people to make his choices for him.

And so, Marinette the knight defeats the evil Gabriel, saves the helpless Adrien from his evil father, and they kiss in the sunset, and all is well. Except Adrien isn't being allowed to make informed choices about his own life and everyone around him is denying his autonomy, but he only exists to be the trophy for whoever won in the Marinette-Gabriel rivalry (which Marinette only won because Gabriel forfeited anyway), so he doesn't get to make choices and have any of those inconvenient emotions like anger or sadness, and all really is well.

Thomas Astruc even mentioned on Twitter that Chat Blanc was the reason why Adrien could not participate in the finale. And the implication is that he couldn't be there because he would be too emotional and would destroy the world. So Marinette had to do it for him, and Adrien had to be removed from his own story and put away in London with nightmares so that he wouldn't get in the way with his emotions. So yeah. The female coded character was reduced into being a damsel in distress and was told his emotions rendered him incapable of making his own choices because he wouldn't be able to control them.

Anyway, that's my take on it. Here are some other posts that discuss this.

Thank you for your ask!

#MLB #ML Salt #ML Writing Salt #ML Writers Salt #Meta #My meta #Asks #Marinette Salt #Not really but just in case #Sexism in ML

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eoieopda · 11 months

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menace (pjm) — pt. vi

Pairing: Park Jimin x Kim!Reader Type: 6/6 (Mini Series) ⇢ Previous Chapter | Masterlist Genre: Smut + Fluff Rating: M (18+) Word Count: 6k+ Summary: This Valentine’s Day looks a lot different than the last one. AUs: Older brother’s best friend, fuck buddies that hate(d) each other CW: Reader is AFAB & queer, Jimin is so soft omg, ✨vulnerability✨, so much kissing wtf who am i?, nipple play, fingering (v), unprotected sex (p in v), DID I SAY SOFTNESS? A/N: Thank youuuuuu to everyone that stuck with me and these two idiots until the very end 💕 If you get lonely now that this is over, check out the rest of my masterlist. ⚠️ 18+ only ⚠️ minors and ageless blogs will be blocked. my content is not for you. i do not want to interact with you. please respect my boundaries.

It was odd, starting over with someone you’d known longer than nearly everyone else in your life. Jimin wasn’t a stranger by any means; he’d always been present, life running parallel to yours, but you’d never truly seen him up close.

Not accurately, anyway.

When you were younger, the pedestal you put him on kept the sun in your eyes. You’d have to squint to see his shortcomings, but you never did. Maybe that was one of yours, willful blindness. As far as you knew then — or, rather, as far as you bothered to look — Jimin had none. All he had was a bright, white light.

After that pedestal crumbled and Icarus took a swan-dive to the sub-basement of your expectations, the shadows down there warped the flaws you finally recognized. A trick of the light, they exaggerated every shitty thing you thought you saw and made them all worse. Scarier, even. Worth hating.

Once you finally allowed him to exist on equal footing, you realized that Jimin wasn’t made to be viewed in such high contrast. He wasn’t the monochromatic figure you’d mythologized, not two-dimensional. In reality, he was a prism refracting a thousand different, complicated colors that you hadn’t been giving him due credit for.

The first shade you discovered was the one that broke your brain the most. Jimin — the only person you knew that never responded to anyone’s calls or texts — wasn’t actually as solitary as he seemed. Really, the only thing he hated more than being by himself was having to admit that fact to anyone, especially you.

So, instead of calling to invite you along on his errand runs, he started showing up at your door to ask, “You’re not busy right now, are you?”

And just like that, without meaning to, you learned his routine. Another shade.

Every other Sunday, you’d wake up a little earlier than usual. No matter how tired or hungover you were, you would crawl out of your bed, into your well-functioning shower, and make yourself presentable. Then, when you no longer looked like a hobgoblin, you’d sit on your couch with your tea.

None of it was a conscious decision — waiting in the nearest seat to your front door, angling yourself so you could keep an eye on the driveway — at least, not at first. In fact, you didn’t even notice what you were doing until your newly-acquired therapist pointed it out.

“It sounds like you’re making space in your life for him, brick by brick.”

You laughed it off when she said it, but as weeks flew by, you finally had to concede that she was right. She was right about something else, too: you hadn’t been viewing yourself fairly, either.

“Cellophane can be iridescent, too, if you hold it right.”

Whatever shades of your own that you uncovered, you gradually learned to let Jimin see, too. He picked up on all of your intricacies much faster than you did — because of course he did — and unlike you, he didn’t stumble upon revelations by surprise. He didn’t muddle through your less-pretty shades by trial and error, like you did. To the contrary, he had an unexpected knack for anticipating your reactions, and he planned accordingly.

Everything he did was purposeful, from his choice of words to his actions. Like exhuming his phone from his pocket — “only because it’s you” — to let you know if he was running late to plans you’d made. It was rare that he didn’t show up on time, but whenever he couldn’t, he’d call to promise that he really was on his way. And he always was, no matter how shitty the weather was, or how much he might’ve wanted an extra hour of sleep.

Jimin and all his shades showed up for you.

On Christmas, when Seokjin’s part-time girlfriend threw a dinner party without knowing what the fuck she’d signed up for. You were three-quarters through a bottle of wine before you were pulled in to take over meal preparations with Seokjin; and although Jimin was mostly useless in front of a stove, he was good at fetching whatever you’d need next without you having to point to it. He was even better at keeping your respective glasses full, which felt even more important. Washing dishes after the fact wasn’t all that bad with him there, also drunk off his face, drying them.

On New Years’ Eve, when Jimin was too sick to join the bar crawl but still set an alarm to wake up and call you — right at midnight. You stepped out onto a snow-slicked sidewalk in order to hear him, disappointing the hell out of the girl whose lips wanted to kiss you into the new year. You ignored her pout, ignored the chill in the air, and focused on the way Jimin’s raspy voice had dropped an octave. He was asleep when you swung by shortly after with a box of tissues and a bottle of decongestants, but that didn’t matter; his spare key wasn’t well hidden, either.

And again — now — on Valentine’s Day, when you both decided to blow off Seokjin’s deranged, annual Parent Trap scenario.

Sprawled out on his couch like you owned the place, you scrolled idly through Netflix’s home page with your face scrunched. The hand not holding the remote dipped down into the bag of kkokalcorn chips resting on your chest.

“You’ve got an identity crisis in your watch history, Jimin,” you yelled out to him, hoping he’d hear your teasing clearly from where he stood in his kitchen. “I’m having trouble believing that you’re not actually a middle-aged white woman.”

At this, he stopped rummaging through his refrigerator and stood straight up to glare at you. His eyes and mouth all flattened into matching, straight lines.

You rattled off your findings, nudging him further. “The Notebook, Sleepless in Seattle —”

With every title you dropped, so did one of Jimin’s heavy footfalls. He was halfway to you, scowl growing, in the blink of an eye.

“10 Things I Hate About You?” You snorted. “Little too on the nose, don’t you think?”

Standing at the other side of his coffee table, he parked his hands on his hips and scoffed. “My choices are being criticized by an entire adult with corn-chip witch fingers? Are you kidding?”

Sheepishly, you pulled your hand from the kkokalcorn bag. He was correct; you had stuck your fingertips in the openings of the funnel-shaped chips. You wiggled them at him with a coy smile that made him roll his eyes. Satisfied, your mouth claimed the chip perched on the tip of your index finger.

If you didn’t know better, you’d say that the flash in his eyes just then was fondness.

You held the bag out to him, careful not to disrupt the rest of your manicure, and smiled to yourself when he accepted your offer. He tilted the bag and dumped a few of the chips into his open palm. With a small smile, he mused, “Haven’t had these since we were kids.”

That wave of nostalgia must have caught him in a riptide because he went quiet in a way that made you pause. You were about to speak up — to say what, you weren’t sure — but you promptly shut your mouth. Index and middle fingers now extended, he held out his hand to make a peace sign. Each fingertip had a small cone sitting crooked on top.

Jimin laughed unexpectedly, which almost made his already-crinkled eyes disappear completely. “Kinda look like little wizards.”

If you didn’t know better, you’d say that the thumping in your chest just then was fondness.

After shaking your head to clear those thoughts, you realized that the little wizards weren’t holding the glass of hard cider he’d gone to his kitchen to refill. You pushed yourself to your feet with one hand and a playfully exaggerated groan, popping the remaining chips from your fingers into your mouth at once.

“Leaving already?”

He should’ve known better than to ask you a question while your mouth was full, but he didn’t. The explanation he received was therefore unintelligible. Head cocked curiously to the side, lips slightly parted, he tried to connect the dots. Just as soon as he started, he gave up and trailed after you.

Jimin didn’t stop until you did, right in front of his refrigerator. He was so close, in fact, that you accidentally hit him with the door as you pulled it open.

“Oh, shit!” You muttered, shutting the door again quickly.

Wincing, your gaze flitted over to assess the damage you’d done to the outside of his bicep with the metal corner of the door. On instinct, you reached out to run the pads of your fingers over the faint red mark blooming there. Goosebumps spread in the wake of your touch, but you didn’t feel that same phantom chill. Just something electric that sparked against your fingertips.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.” He said gently. “I don’t bruise like you do.”

In the moment of silence that followed, you felt compelled to lift your eyes but not your hand. Unless you were imagining things, he leaned into your touch, just slightly. Not enough to see, but enough to feel.

It’d crossed your mind a thousand times since you walked through his front door. With that throwaway statement, Jimin confirmed he’d been thinking about it, too — about who you both were on this date last year. About the way you’d only ever let him treat you roughly because anything sweeter threatened the distance you were trying to keep. About the bruises given with no chance to kiss them better.

You weren’t that person anymore, and neither was he.

“Jimin,” you started.

It was the farthest along in your sentence that your voice would let you go.

After the million baby steps you’d taken in his direction and the healing you’d allow yourself to do, you were still scared to show your cards. Now, you’d seen him in technicolor. Now, if you fucked things up, you’d never be able to go back to black and white.

What if you fuck things up again?

Jimin sensed your hesitation, but he didn’t accept it. Instead, he closed the distance so slowly that your hand wasn’t disrupted from where it rested on his bicep. His hands found you just as easily. One made its home at the small of your back while the other cupped the side of your face.

With a whisper lighter than air, he asked, “If I kiss you, will you let me?”

His eyes flitted from yours, to your lips, then back again.

“Or will you kamikaze dive into my kitchen table?”

Your reply was even softer than the question posed. “Only one way to find out.”

If the uptick at the corner of his lips told you anything, it was that he intended to.

Cautiously, as if sudden moves would startle you, he pulled your body flush against his. His other hand tilted your face upwards, thumb gently tucked under your chin while the rest of his fingers rested in the space just below your ear. His touch kept your body present even when the sensation of his kiss threatened to sweep your feet out from underneath you.

Plush pink and delicate, his lips molded to yours like they were specially designed to do just that. Like cracks giving way to let the light in, you opened yourself up for him. Licked into his mouth, eager to learn the parts of him you’d missed in all the time you’d shut him out.

And if you listened — really listened, over the moan he swallowed from you — you could’ve sworn you heard all the silly pages of your childhood diary flipping furiously. Scribbled to hell and back with a glitter gel pen, each one noting that this is what you wanted, this is what you wanted, this is everything you wanted.

The eternity in that kiss wasn’t long enough. Eventually, he broke the contact, pulling a disagreeing gasp from you when he pulled away. Your lips buzzed from the sudden loss of pressure — that, or they trembled without the warmth of his mouth. Either way, he was gone too soon.

The hand you had resting against his bicep slipped down to the center of his chest to tug at the fabric of his t-shirt. Unable to nip that growing neediness in the bud, you frowned.

“Jimin,” you sighed. You had nothing to follow-up with. His name was the totality of that thought.

Several moments of silence came next. His brow furrowed, like he was trying and failing to find something less vulnerable to say. He couldn’t. When it slipped out, his eyes searched your face for a reaction.

“I want to be soft with you.”

Any time you’d been together before, it was carnal, dripping with unarticulated hurt. He didn’t want that, not this time. You didn’t have to guess why.

Though the level of desperation you both felt now was familiar, the underscore had changed. Jimin wanted to touch you carefully because he felt fragile — so did you. If either of you moved too quickly, too roughly, you ran the risk of upending the balance you’d found. Like you, Jimin seemed to know that this was delicate.

You lifted your hand from his shirt and placed it on top of his where it sat above your jaw. Gently, your fingers wrapped around his and lowered them so you could intertwine them properly. Then, without a word and without letting go, you led him out of the kitchen into the small hallway.

This was the first time you’d crossed his house without sprinting and violently shedding your clothes as you went. It felt like you were seeing it all for the first time because, in a way, you were.

You’d never noticed the framed photos lining the walls of the hallway, or the subtle notes of grey in the white paint behind them. In all the time you’d spent there before, it’d never clicked that this house was a home. Everywhere, there were hints of him — his interests, his achievements, the friends you’d never met — sitting so blatantly in places you’d previously ignored.

Jimin apologized when you stepped over the threshold into his bedroom. “My plan was to clean it tomorrow.”

He smiled sheepishly as his free hand carded through the hair at the base of his neck.

“Doesn’t do you any good today, though.”

“I don’t mind,” you hummed in reply, shutting the door slowly behind him. “My plan was to do laundry today, and — well, you’ll see how that worked out for me.”

You kept your fingers interlocked with his while you surveyed his room. Like the rest of the house, you’d been in there countless times before without truly seeing any of it. Apart from the bare minimum clutter he’d needlessly apologized for, every surface was thoughtfully decorated. Even the absence of some keepsake or trinket on his shelf was purposeful.

He keeps space.

Propped on a stand near his dresser was his guitar, which you didn’t even know he still played. Of course he does, you thought, he’d have been an idiot to throw that talent away.

You were smiling long before you noticed you were doing it, even more so when you clocked where it sat. Just like it did in his childhood home, the guitar was positioned directly across the room from his doorway — the first and last thing he’d see when he came and left.

Carefully, you reached out and trailed one finger over the tuning pegs. It all felt forbidden, but stupidly, you felt compelled. You spent a lifetime aching to touch him. For reasons you couldn’t explain, his guitar was no different.

Watching you caress his guitar made his pulse race harder; you could feel it where your wrist aligned with his. If nothing else had changed, you suspected that he still didn’t let anyone lay a finger on it. Jimin always insisted that he did all the maintenance himself because he didn’t trust the technician at the local music shop to be careful enough.

To your surprise, it didn’t appear to be anxiety spinning circles in his stomach as he watched you. He spun you around, and it was clear from the look in his eye — the unshakeable desire he felt to touch you that same way.

You wondered what he was thinking while he studied your face in silence — if the months he’d spent trying to teach himself to hate it had blurred your features; and if he saw them clearly now.

The smattering of freckles across the bridge of your nose which swept over the tops of your cheekbones — even though it was winter, and you hadn’t seen much of the sun for weeks.

The small scar interrupting your eyebrow, which you’d gotten when both of your families went camping together a million years ago. He’d sprinted across tide pools to help you back to your feet, reaching you long before Seokjin could catch up.

You didn’t know if it was a conscious decision now, but he leaned down and placed a kiss there the way you wished he had back then.

“This isn’t still illegal, is it?” He murmured against your skin.

Unable to breathe, let alone speak, you shook your head so subtly that it couldn’t reasonably be counted as movement. Your next move was bolder, though: You unzipped your sweatshirt, shrugged your way out of it, and let it fall at your feet.

With a quick glance down, you remembered what you were wearing and cringed with your whole body.

Neither of your socks matched; your sweatpants had a hole near the crotch; and your sweatshirt’s sole task had been to hide the ratty, old MapleStory t-shirt that you stole from Seokjin when he went off to college.

A certifiable mess in a self-imposed dry spell.

Jesus Christ.

“Laundry day,” you blurted out in explanation, though he hadn’t asked. He wasn’t laughing, either — not reacting in any way to roast you the way you expected him to. Still, the tips of your nose and ears burned with embarrassment. “I didn’t plan for… this.”

His index finger dipped under the hem of your t-shirt and his thumb mirrored the way it traced the stitching.

“I kind of forgot that you own shit like this.” He replied softly, looking more pensive than usual. “Never see you in sweats.”

It was a fair point.

Jimin had slept next to you on three occasions — when the rules permitted — and you always woke up the same way you’d fallen asleep: completely naked. Somehow, it felt even more intimate for him to see what you wore when you went to bed without him. The silly, branded t-shirt probably said more about you than your bare chest did.

You realized that you’d never seen him in his current state before, either, with black joggers hanging low on his hips. His fluffy, air-dried hair didn’t sit smoothly the way it normally did. You wanted so badly to run your fingers through it, but there was a stronger compulsion to reckon with:

His shirt was ripped at the hem, not quite covering the lower inches of his torso.

Unthinkingly, your hand reached out so your fingers could rest against the skin there, midway down faint the trail of hair that dipped under the waistband of his pants. So much warmer than you, he shivered at your touch. You paused, self-conscious, then glanced up at him with eyebrows raised.

Is this okay?

You didn’t have to ask out loud to get an answer. It came as a whisper — “cold hands” — and it was accompanied by a smile that made your knees weak.

He nodded towards the other side of his room and said, “C’mere.”

The hand that previously held yours found it again. Fingers slipping easily into the spaces between yours, he led and you followed.

The crisply folded sheets contrasted completely with the effortless coziness of the rest of the space, but they didn’t stay that way for long. With his free hand, Jimin gripped the comforter and tugged it loose. It fluttered and fell freely back down over the bed.

Sighing reflexively, you slipped into the opening he’d created within the blankets. Every fiber smelled like him — clementine flower, orange blossom, water lily and orris — and now, so would you.

Jimin waited for you to scoot over before filling the space next to you, tilting his body inward to keep his eyes on you. His bent knee pressed against your outer thigh. It was chaste, especially when you considered the thousand other ways he’d touched you, but it had you vibrating in place, nonetheless. He probably felt it when he leaned in and kissed you for the third time, fingers sliding into your hair.

Tangled in him, your intrusive thought won out. Loose, it flew like a ping-pong ball around the inside of your skull: He can probably feel all that dry-shampoo, too.

Like he was begging you to focus, the tip of his tongue flicked across your bottom lip and stole a whimper. Your lips parted eagerly against his to accommodate him; both of you starving for every bit of tenderness you’d refused to let him give before.

As he poured more of himself into that kiss, the hand in your hair ran slowly down the length of your neck, over the slope of your shoulder, and down the curve of your torso. It stopped on the top of your thigh, warming you through to your bones. For the first time, his fingers didn’t dig harshly into the doughy flesh he found there. Now, his feather-light touch left you buzzing instead of bruised.

With every second that passed, your tingling spine struggled more and more to hold you upright. Noting the slight shift in your posture, Jimin guided you — still lip-locked — to rest your head on his pillows. It wasn’t until you tilted your head slightly to the side that his lips left yours; dipped down below your jaw to pepper the exposed skin there with unbearably soft kisses.

Each one made your pulse race harder than the last, pulled needy little breaths out of your mouth.

“Sound so pretty when you sigh like that,” he hummed against your throat. “Might have to kiss you like this forever if this is what it gets me.”

You’d been underneath him more times than you could presently recall, but never like this. Until now, you never understood how a person could say they loved you without any words at all, but you heard it. More than anything, you felt it in every brush of his lips — in the static crackling around you, charged with every little, languid line his tongue left behind.

The only thing distracting from your swelling heart was the wetness pooling in the bikini bottoms you’d hastily thrown on in the absence of clean underwear.

Fucking laundry day.

The sole consolation was the fact that the blend of polyester and elastane was better suited for a flood than any lace you would’ve consciously selected.

The breath behind his words tickled and surprised you, derailing your train of thought.

“Is it against the rules to tell you how beautiful I think you are?”

The circles he drew against the fabric of your sweatpants had you hypnotized, but you still managed to reply, “No more rules. Except — Oh, fuck.”

You mewled at the sensation of him suckling at the spot where your neck joined your shoulder.

“Except that you can’t ever stop.”

His lips curled into a smile against the love bite he’d so carefully crafted.

“I won’t,” he murmured before placing a kiss in the same spot he’d marked. “But I may need an intermission to get these incredibly chic clothes off your body. Kind of feels sacrilegious, though, I’ve gotta say.”

Your eyes flickered over to him, eyebrows raised. He pursed his lips to keep from smiling, forced the straightest face he could muster, then traced his fingertip over the rip in the crotch of your sweatpants. Sounding downright reverent, he explained, “They’re holey.”

“Oh, Jesus Christ.” You dropped your head back against the pillows with a groan that didn’t outgun your laughter. “Straight to jail for that. Seriously, that’s a federal crime.”

When your eyes stopped rolling and settled on him, Jimin was already looking down at you with amusement sparkling in the deep brown of his irises. He said nothing, opting instead to kiss you — for the fourth time — as a farewell before pulling away entirely.

The spot next to you went cold as soon as he sat up, but — bravely — you didn’t complain. You watched with your bottom lip pinched between your teeth. He grabbed the end of his haphazardly, perfectly cropped t-shirt and pulled it off over his head.

Your only instinct was to reach up to his bare chest and trace every plane of it. To your dismay, Jimin intervened. Fingers at the hem of your top now, he stared expectantly at you until you stretched your arms above your head. That stupid, stolen shirt was guided up and off before it was discarded somewhere unseen.

Jimin’s pupils dilated immediately, gaze sweeping over your bare chest like he was beyond grateful that all your bras were at home, drowning in your washing machine. Uninhibited, he leaned forward. The delicate, cuban-link chain of necklace tickled the skin of your stomach while he placed an open-mouthed kiss in the space between your breasts. Cool to the touch, you shivered for more reasons than one.

When his tongue flicked out over one erect nipple, all you could offer was a breathy sigh, brain scrambled to hell and back. He seemed to draw inspiration from this — him and his goddamn mouth promptly switched tactics. Mimicking you, he looked up at you from under his lashes and blew a warm stream of air over your other nipple.

You were full-out whimpering underneath him. “Shit.”

“Yeah?” He smirked before taking the pebbled bud into his mouth and sucking softly, eyes still locked on yours.

Can I cum from this?

Oh god, I really might cum from this.

His mouth’s ministrations continued while his hands swept gently down the curves of your waist. That is, until they reached the elastic waistband of your sweatpants. Abruptly, Jimin stopped and sat back onto his calves.

You didn’t have to ask. Jimin’s eyes widened in tandem with the grin on his face; and you knew what he’d discovered. Smiling now with all his teeth, he tugged playfully at the knotted tie sitting above your right hip, keeping your bikini bottoms in place.

He snorted incredulously, “Be fucking for real.”

“Stop.” The word was elongated as you whined. It was useless, but you swatted at his arm. “I told you — ”

“I know, I know. It’s laundry day.” Fuck, his affection for you was written all over his face. “Incredible — truly, I have no notes.”

You buried your face in your hands to hide from him, but he didn’t let you. Just like he did that time on your couch, Jimin pulled your hands away from your face and held them in his own. This time, when he kissed you, you didn’t tear yourself away from him. Instead, you did the opposite. You grabbed the sides of his face in your hands and leaned into him.

With his hands now free, he was able to push your sweatpants down the rest of the way without extricating his lips from yours. Those fucking bikini bottoms went with them when he slipped the fabric over your ankles and tossed them blindly over his shoulder.

Mouth moving hungrily against yours, his hand hovered over your cunt, radiating warmth. You fought to keep your last shred of patience but lost, shifting underneath him to beg wordlessly for his touch. He obliged. His middle finger dipped between your sopping folds until it found the swollen bead of your clit and spiraled over it.

“Fuck,” you moaned into his mouth. He swallowed it, kissed you so deep your mind went blank.

The slow pace he’d chosen normally would have driven you mad, but instead of coming across as a taunt — or a punishment — you got the impression that he was basking in your arousal. That he was taking his time, savoring you and the million ways your body craved his.

When you pulled back, your lips were kiss-bitten and palpably swollen. He must have felt your quickened breath against his own lips. They autonomously curved into the tiniest sliver of a smile.

Watching him watch you, it was clear that Jimin loved you like this — wide-eyed, unguarded, inviting. He loved you generally. You knew that much for certain as he gazed down at you, and you were so fucking thankful that neither of you had to keep pretending otherwise.

Whatever trance he’d fallen into ended when you whispered, “Please.”

Though your plea wasn’t much more than an exhale, he didn’t need to be told twice. Momentarily, he stood; and as he did, your own hand dipped down between your legs. He stepped out of his joggers with his focus trained on you, staring spellbound while you touched yourself in his absence. Wet enough to drip.

If you had to wager on it, you’d bet that he could’ve stood there all night observing, listening to the way you moaned as you slicked your own fingers, but the darkened tip of his cock was weeping like he wanted you badly enough to ache. Completely incapable of spending any more time as a bystander, he fell to his knees between your legs. There, he guided them further apart with his hands.

Desperately, you grabbed one of his hands from where it sat on your knee and pulled him so that he was leaning over you once again. You wanted to feel the way his breath caught as he entered you, bare chest pressing into yours while he filled you. Needed him — just him — all the time.

Forearms now pressed to the mattress and fingers in your hair, he caged you in. His forehead came to rest against yours when you reached into the space between your bodies and dragged his tip through the mess he’d made of you. That faint squelch was obscene enough in the quiet of his room. It couldn’t hold a candle to the groan that escaped his chest when he finally entered you.

“Holy shit.” He exhaled sharply through gritted teeth. Your walls enveloped him, squeezing tight enough that no question remained about where he belonged. “Fucking missed you.”

That initial, perfect ache threatened to blind you, but it wouldn’t have mattered with the way your eyes screwed shut — too overcome with want to do much more than breathe. Slowly, inch by inch, his cock stretched you until he bottomed out. It was the closest thing you’d ever had to an out-of-body experience.

“Missed you,” you mumbled.

Well beyond fuck drunk, you bordered on incoherent. A kiss on your forehead lassoed you, brought you crashing back down. It was redundant, but he murmured, “Come back to me.”

You blinked up at him in a haze.

“Want you to look at me.”

He sounded shy, more vulnerable than you’d ever heard him, and you didn’t need any further explanation.

Eye contact had never been on the table before, deemed early on to be far too fucking intimate. If this is what he wanted, you decided, you’d never take your eyes off him again. Especially not when he looked at you the way he did then, like you hung the fucking stars in the sky.

You countered, “Kiss me.”

And he did, like he might never get the chance again.

No amount of closeness could’ve been enough, but you settled for wrapping your legs around him. With his range of motion now limited, he grinded against you; the curve of his cock rubbed against that secret spot behind your pubic bone.

Bones? Do you still have any of those?

Every tantalizing, slow thrust made it harder for you to remember why you’d ever required harshness when his gentleness now was infinitely more intense. It was so much better — being loved by him rather than hated.

Desperate fingers left half-moon imprints on his back, which was beginning to slick with sweat. The spaces between your whimpers lessened while the pressure in your abdomen began to build. Jimin had you teetering at the edge of the world, and you told him so with your lips at his ear, “Please — I’m so close.”

His forehead creased, and you watched in real time as determination etched itself into his features. He was perfect — beautiful — and he was close, too. You clenched; he cursed, “Fuck.”

You looked up at him through fluttering lashes, silently begging him not to stop. Not now, not ever. Stay.

“You’re all I’ve ever wanted,” Jimin murmured, burying himself deeper with every thrust. “You know that, right? How much you mean to me?”

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.

He watched your face as you came — when your eyes rolled back, and your head tilted against his pillows. Your legs loosened their binds around him as they shook, gasping moans tumbling out of your open mouth. His pace didn’t falter; his presence deep inside of you only elongated your orgasm.

Bliss.

You were still fluttering around his length when your eyes finally drifted open again. Not even through your first aftershocks, his panting breaths alone could’ve pushed you headfirst into a second orgasm.

His gaze had dropped at some point to see the way your cunt clung to him with every backstroke. He must’ve felt you staring, though; he looked back up at you, pupils blown wide. That was all it took to dot stars along the edges of your vision.

Back arching up off the mattress, you gushed around him once again. Mindless babbling — consisting only of his name and expletives — fell clumsily off your tongue. It caught both of you off-guard when your shaky voice managed to plead, “Wanna feel you cum — please. Want you to let go for me.”

Only after you begged him did his thrusts become desperate, reckless. There was the unmistakable sound of your wetness and skin colliding with skin, and then there was the low moan that built in the seat of his chest and broke free. Face buried in the crook of your neck as he came, the heat of his breath on your skin was rivaled only by the dizzying warmth of his release spilling into you.

He struggled to hold himself up while his spent cock still twitched inside of you. If you were being honest, you adored the way his weight pinned you against his mattress. Maybe, you thought, you could stay there forever.

Eventually, an exhausted voice came from the curve of your shoulder, almost too muffled to hear.

“How is it —” Jimin panted. “— That in the hundred times we’ve had sex, it never felt like that?”

You chewed on the inside of your cheek. Tingling fingertips ran lightly and lazily across his shoulder blades. The hint of hesitation bubbling in the pit of your stomach cautioned you not to speak your thoughts out loud, so you stared at the ceiling above you and willed yourself to be brave.

Your voice threatened to give up on its way out.

“Nobody’s ever fucked me like they love me before.”

He mustered all the energy he still had to turn his head and look at you. At first, you couldn’t tear your eyes off the ceiling to look back. Make space, you begged yourself; and so, you did.

With his chest resting heavily on yours, you wondered if he could feel the way your heart skipped a beat at that eye contact alone. The glimmer in his eye informed you that, yes, he could.

“Better get used to it, then.” He punctuated his thought by pressing his lips to your temple. “‘Cause that’s what you signed up for.”

You smirked, “Oh? Was there a contract?”

You might’ve kept teasing him if he didn’t tilt your head to kiss you properly — and fuck, you were melting all over again.

“Sealed with a kiss, no less.” He leaned down to nip affectionately at your earlobe. Mouth at the shell of your ear, he purred. “Like any deal with the devil should be.”

“Goddamn.” You whistled. “Promoted from menace to devil already. Congratulations.”

With a roll of his eyes, he pulled out of you and forced himself upright to his feet. Before you could even ask him to, Jimin leaned down to kiss the lips you’d poked out into a pout. Your voice was uncharacteristically needy as your question slipped out.

“You are coming back, right?”

“Nope,” he hummed against your lips. You leaned away from him with your jaw dropped incredulously. “I’m taking a shower and I’m taking you with me.”

That was the only warning you got before one of Jimin’s arms slipped under the hinge of your knees, and the other disappeared behind your back. You screamed. Instead of flailing — a one-way ticket to the floor, you imagined — you threaded your arms around his neck and clung to him as if your life depended on it.

“Pardon me,” you sputtered. “But what the fuck is happening right now?”

“Shhh — pipe down. I’m keeping a promise.”

You stared at him expectantly. For a moment, he ignored you and continued quietly on his way towards the bathroom. It wasn’t until he reached the threshold that he paused with a sigh.

The look he shot you then was far more earnest than you could’ve expected under the circumstances. One that said he saw you, not through you, and he wasn’t going to look away.

Jimin said it breezily, like it cost him even less than the air it took to vocalize it: “I am not letting you down again.”

A pinprick of tears stung the corners of your eyes. You fought like hell to keep them where they belonged. It was such a stupid joke — made so lightly — and it still held more weight than anything you’d ever heard.

Eyes swimming despite your resistance, you sniffled and laughed. “Not, like, literally, though — right?”

“Aw, baby.” He kissed your temple again, cooing. Part of you hated it, but the rest of you swooned. “Don’t test me.”

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wongyuuu · 11 months

Text

Elevator | 02

pairing: jihoon x fem!reader genre: angst, soulmate word count: 17k sumary: in a world where soulmates exists, jihoon is faced with difficult decisions

part one | part two (final)

He doesn't know what woke him up first, the wetness on his face or how tight his chest felt - like it was about to explode. Maybe it was a weird mix of both.

Pushing the covers off his body, Jihoon tried to sit up. There was no reason for him to be feeling that way, he knew that. He didn't dream of anything, or at least he didn't remember it. In an attempt to calm himself, Jihoon got out of bed, went to the bathroom, and washed his face.

But the tears were still there when he tried them off, the tightness in his chest and throat getting stronger by the second. He hadn't felt that way in so long and even back then it wasn't that bad…

Jihoon ran to the door before his body could fully process what he was doing. His mind moved much faster than his recently awoken body allowed him to. There was only one reason why tears would spill from his eyes without his permission, one that he was never able to control.

"y/n!"

Jihoon hit the wooden door with all his strength, both of his hands taking turns on an unstoppable plea for you to open the door. He knew that you were the only one who could bring out that sort of reaction in him. He should have realized it earlier. It took him too long to wake up and understand what was happening.

"y/n! Please, open the door"

He didn't stop even when a neighbor came out to see what all the commotion was about. At that point, he didn't know if the tears in his eyes were only yours or if his own had gotten mixed up together. And being honest he didn't care.

Your name was on the tip of his tongue, ready to be called out again when the door was door was pulled open. Jihoon didn't even have a chance to look at your face before your arms circled his neck and pulled him close.

Not knowing what to do, he just held your trembling body close. Running his hand over the length of your hair, in a silly attempt to calm you down. It was obvious that it wasn't going to help all that much, but little was still better than nothing at all. Some sort of momentary comfort was all he could give you.

When he was a kid, Jihoon's mom would do the same to him. Not when he was simply throwing a tantrum, though his parents always caved during those times, they knew the difference between real and fake tears.

The notch in his throat got thicker as your arms got tighter around him.

"It's Chan," you said finally, your words muffled by his shoulder "Accident"

You said more but all of your words got lost in his shirt. Though he didn't understand the rest, what he did understand was more than enough. When both of you were stuck at the elevator, you explained it to him or, rather, gave him little information that told him everything he needed to know.

He pulled your hands away from him and took a step back. Your hair was sticking to your face, your pajamas wrinkled, and the tears left an obvious path on your cheeks.

Jihoon wanted to protect you from the world, from himself. However, there was only one thing he could offer you.

"Put your shoes on, I'll take you to him"

Somewhere along the road, you stopped crying. The only sound coming from you was the leftover sobs that still lightly shook your body. Your eyes had been so focused on the road ahead of you, on how it seemed endless, that you didn't even notice that Jihoon held your hand, that he looked at you now and then - concern covering all of his features.

The only thing on your mind was Chan. If he was okay, what exactly had happened to him? The emptiness that filled you when you were told that your parents were gone threatened to make its appearance once again and you hated it.

Another car crash.

Was it possible that life, universe, destiny, god, or whatever it was called, was cruel enough to take someone else from you like that? You wanted to believe that lightning doesn't strike the same place twice but it was hard to do so. No one wanted to give out any information on your brother over the phone, even when Jihoon tried calling them and playing the doctor card.

It was completely silent. The world around you got smaller, and darker until it was hard to breathe. And there was nothing that you could do about it.

Jihoon was doing his best, driving over the speed limit, but having to be careful so both of you didn't get in an accident too. A car drive that usually took three hours became two but still felt like an eternity.

Please be okay.

You bolted out of the car the second it stopped, forgetting to check if Jihoon was behind you. Everyone looked at you with wide eyes as you rushed inside, taking notice of your pajamas, worn-out shoes, and messy hair.

"Someone called me about my brother, and said that he was brought in after an accident"

The lady behind the computer looked at you over her glasses and sighed. It was something she was used to, desperate people looking for family members.

"Name?"

"Lee Chan"

It felt like forever had gone by while she typed your brother's name and waited for the computer to load all the information.

"ER 3" she finally said.

A huge hospital, with more hallways than what you thought was possible, separated you from Chan. Thankfully Jihoon seemed to know exactly where that was. His hand landed lightly on your lower back, guiding you.

You walked inside the room frantically, going from bed to bed, until you heard Chan's voice, his laugh going around the wide room.

Pulling the curtains away you were faced with a very happy Chan, looking at his coach like nothing was wrong in the world. A sling covered his arm and an orthopedic boot was around his left leg.

"What are you doing here?"

All of the concern and fear you felt seconds before were replaced by anger. The purest kind of anger that exists, borderline wrath. Your body now shook for an entirely different reason.

"You were drunk and driving?"

It was so easy to pick up the smell of cheap beer and booze on his clothes. It was so strong that you were sure that he had bathed in it.

"I wasn't the one driving," he said.

He was out of it, almost completely. His words were a slurred mess, the smell of vomit coming out of his clothes and mouth almost made you want to throw up. The scene right in front of you made you wonder just what kind of life Chan was living now that he was at college, away from you.

"Do you have any idea how worried I was? I thought you were gone too" the words were barely a whisper. You wanted to hit him, shake him until he was finally back to his senses until that goddamn alcohol left his body.

Instead, you cried. You were angry with him for being so careless but you were also thankful. You spend three hours thinking that he was dead, that because no one wanted to tell you how he was, the worst must have happened. The fear of being in a world without Chan, of being left alone, far greater than anything you've ever felt. It didn't even compare to the day you lost your parents, because then you had Chan. Without him, you weren't too sure of what would be left of you.

"So what now?" you turned to his coach, pushing the tears away.

You remember talking to him briefly before at one or two tournaments you had attended since Chan was a freshman. He wasn't exactly what one would expect of a taekwondo coach, short, bald, and fat, but your brother loved him. Whenever you talked with Chan he only had good words to say about the older man.

"Well, he's suspended for starters" when Chan complained his coach turned to him, his voice suddenly louder than when he was speaking to you "You were training for a competition, you weren't even supposed to be out of your damn dorm"

You were grateful that your brother had someone like that in his life, someone who was willing to ground him and call him on his shit, though all of it could be for show. Maybe he was just playing tough in front of you and at the end, he was like all other coaches ever, the kind that thinks that athletes should be above everything else.

"He'll also need time to heal his arm and leg. So maybe three months overall?"

That was going to be hell for Chan, you knew that. For as long as you could remember, everything he ever did was somehow related to the sport. There was no way Chan and Taekwondo existed in separate realms.

He couldn't be older than four when you first heard him talk about Taekwondo. The two of you were watching TV and someone in the movie was doing it. The second he saw it, he fell in love with it. He said Sis, I want to do that. And, oh how he wanted it.

For weeks he walked behind your dad begging to go to classes. I'll be the bestest boy, I promise! Until your parents finally caved. You had never seen Chan quite that happy. It was like someone that young had already found what they were supposed to with their life.

Your parents were sure that Chan would eventually give it up, that he was just going through a phase. Every kid wants to be thousands of different things while growing up and your parents were sure that Chan would be just like all of those kids. It didn't turn out that way though.

As time went by Chan was falling deeper into Taekwondo. There were days that he didn't talk much when he got home, he was frustrated, slamming doors and barely eating. But when you walked past his room you would see him training with a frown on his face and trying again and again. Some days he managed to get it right and others he failed. But never once he gave up, not even for a second.

"I'll take him home, to make sure that he doesn't do anything stupid"

You assured the coach, who seemed relieved by your words.

"As if" Chan scoffed.

You could barely see him, his coach covering most of his body, so you pushed the older man to the side.

"Oh, this is not up for debate. You're coming home with me and that's final"

He looked at you then, his eyes turning vicious, knowing that whatever he said next was going to hurt you but still choosing to go forward with it.

"You're not my mom, you can't make me"

He was being petulant, acting in a way he hadn't since he was fourteen, or maybe fifteen. But instead of backing down, let him have the last word, you crossed your arms over your chest and held your head higher than ever before.

"I'm not Mom, but I'm the only one you've got so suck it up and do as I say"

Jihoon didn't dare to stay inside with you after he saw that Chan was fine, or as fine as he could be considering the situation. He figured it was more of a family situation and whatever he wanted, which was to stay close to you, didn't matter all that much. He reached for his phone and dialed his mom's number before he could stop himself - or even realize what he was doing.

He didn't think that his mom would actually pick up the phone. It was late, the middle of the night, but that was never a problem with Jihoon's mom. Since he was a kid she told him that she worked better during the night and that was one of the reasons why he never really cared about the time he called her.

"Hey son"

Of all the people he met in his life, patients, friends, and coworkers, his mother was by far the easiest-going person he ever came across. He knew that if he called her and asked about soulmates and how the bond worked she wouldn't make a big deal out of it. She would be curious about it, like crazy, but she wouldn't press Jihoon to talk about it - at least for a few weeks.

"Hi Mom, how are you?"

"Who do I have to thank for this phone call?"

He could hear her smile. Was that a weird thing to say? He just knew when she was smiling.

"I have this friend, right?" his mom hummed at the other end, probably knowing that he was full of shit "And he met his soulmate, for a while now, and things are going sort of… bumpy. He is sort of an idiot, but she is great. Anyway… you've always said that once the bond is made and the mark is gone, the trait that connects souls vanishes. But what if it doesn't?"

"You mean it happened again?"

It was his turn to hum and his mom went silent on the other end. He heard as she moved around, the sound of books being opened and closed, pages being turned, was all he received.

Jihoon knew that he shouldn't have called his mom but she was the only one he could ask. Talking to his dad was just too hard, he would ask too many questions and Jihoon didn't have answers that his dad would like to hear. He wasn't too fond of lying to his dad either.

"It's not impossible" his mother dragged the words out "It doesn't happen very often though. Did it happen to you?"

He choked on his saliva. He tried for a good minute to recompose himself. It was bad enough that a nurse came to check on him.

"I haven't met her yet, you know that"

Jihoon played it off. He didn't call his dad because he had no intention of lying but he was just doing it to his mom.

"You may not talk to me a whole lot but your girlfriend does and she tells me things"

Right then was the moment Jihoon regretted telling Mina about it. Then again, he didn't want to keep anything from her. The entire situation was bad already, he didn't want another thing to make it even worse than it had to be. Mina not knowing about you was going to hell on earth.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you" was all he said.

Was there anything else he could say? At the end of the day, it was his life and ultimately his decision. But Jihoon had always been the kind of person who talked to their parents, even when it was hard to get the words out. Like in that moment.

He knew what his parents thought, knew that they would want him to stay with his soulmate. That's what the universe planned for you, son. There were too many things fighting him on it. It was like the universe was fighting against him, instead of with him.

"It's your choice, you don't have to apologize," his mother said softly, a hint of sadness in her voice "So this girl, y/n, cried again and you did too?"

He nodded, even though his mother couldn't see him. He felt like a child that did something wrong, who broke something expensive, and lied to his parents because he was scared to get caught. So he told his mother everything, from the day he met you to the moment he almost tore you down.

In complete silence, his mother heard everything that he had to say. Not even once did she stop him to ask anything, something that wasn't like her at all.

Talking about it with someone was better than he expected. Though he told Mina about you, Jihoon didn't dare to say everything - not when she wasn't the one for him. How unfair of him would it be to talk with his girlfriend about his soulmate? He also couldn't talk to Soonyoung about it either. His friend was against everything Jihoon was doing.

"Fear of death," his mother said after some time "What she was feeling was probably too overwhelming, maybe even bigger than the soul connection. The two of you are yet to fully form the bond, both of you are still holding back right now so it's not that strong yet. She was likely scared that her brother was dead and was scared because she was going to be left alone"

Jihoon's car was quite large but it felt way too small for the three of you. The tension in the air was palpable, you could almost see it. You felt the need to apologize to him but also maybe hit Chan in the head with a hammer. He had been sulking the entire time since you left the hospital and that wasn't making the three-hour drive any easier, the smell of vomit and beer wasn’t helping either.

"Will you stop that? It's not the end of the world, okay?"

"That depends. How angry will you be if I fail this semester?" his voice was dripping with sarcasm.

You just knew that Chan was lying about it. From what he told you, and what his coach said, if Chan failed or got bad grades he was out of the Taekwondo team in a blink of an eye.

"Will you quit sport then? You can if you want but I call bullshit"

Instead of a smart comeback at your words, Chan laughed so loudly that even Jihoon seemed startled, his eyes looking at your brother through the rearview mirror. A small smile tones his lips. He was relieved that you and Chan were, apparently, on better terms than when you left the hospital. If his laugh was any indication of it, he wasn't as angry anymore.

"Are you the one teaching her how to curse? Big Sis never did that. Should have learned some of those back in college, would have been very helpful"

You just wanted Chan to shut up. That was ages ago, long enough that you barely remembered it - or you'd like to think you didn't. But it seemed that it was still very much alive in your brother's memory.

"That barely counts as cursing," you said

"What happened in college?" Jihoon asked at the same time.

It was the first time Jihoon said anything at all since you went inside the ER to find a somewhat drunk Chan. When you came out of the room, fuming, ready to just burst, Jihoon remained calm. The only thing he did was hold your hand, to let you know that he was there. As much as you didn't want to admit his presence had helped, it made you feel less likely to go insane at any given moment.

But right in that second, after Chan opened his big mouth, you wished that you were on your own, that your little breakdown didn't at all reflect on Jihoon and he had remained oblivious to it. Something, you had no idea what happened and he was suddenly at your door, screaming your name at the top of his lungs and banging on the door like a madman. His voice somehow helped you to get away from the fog that clouded your mind.

Jihoon's presence had made you feel somehow a little closer to your normal self.

You were sure all of it had to do with the soulbond and you hated it all. Hated the idea that you leaned on him, the fact that even after you promised yourself that you wouldn't let him close to you, he did. And with your permission, on top of that.

Now he was getting an insight into your life when he shouldn't. It felt like you were living your life, since the day you met Jihoon, like a broken record that is stuck in the same song. You told yourself that he wouldn't get close to you again, he promised you that he wouldn't, but at the first chance you got you found yourselves near each other again. Whatever excuse you could come up with was valid enough.

"y/n had a boyfriend in college. Real nice guy until he dumped her the second some other girl showed up"

Let the road swallow me whole, you prayed to whoever listened to you. You didn't want to go there, didn't want to ever talk about that again. Jun had hurt you, yes - quite a lot actually - but many people go through that in life and you certainly weren't going to be the last one.

You were young at the time, thought you had life completely figured out, and believed what Jun told you. It all seemed so simple. Kids born out of bondless couples don't have soulmates; if you stay with someone for long enough the feeling is just the same as the soul bond All of it was just a huge lie, the biggest one someone ever told you. That someone was yourself.

You were with Jun for five years, from the second year of high school to the third one of college. And you believed it. His parents weren't soulmates either and you two hit it off since the first second. Other kids at school looked at the two of you in a funny way but neither of you seemed to mind.

It was true, you didn't in the least. You were happy when you were with him and he was too, or at least you liked to think so. You wish you could say that something happened, that towards the end things were bad, but it would be a lie. Everything was fine, great actually. You had been talking about moving in together and life after college. One word that could describe what you felt, was happiness. You felt as if the world was conspiring with you, helping you move forward in life.

One day Jun called you and asked to meet you for coffee. You went, of course. Put on nice clothes, did your makeup, thinking you were meeting your boyfriend for a date in the middle of the afternoon. An escape, as he liked to call it. You noticed that something was wrong the second you went inside the cafe. One look at Jun was more than enough to tell that something was wrong and whatever it was, it was enough to break everything that was carefully built for a little over five years.

"I've met her, my soulmate"

All plans and dreams vanished the very second those words were said out loud. You swallowed everything, the lump in your throat, the sudden pain in your chest, and smiled. I should be happy for him. Just because it wasn't certain that you would find your soulmate didn't mean that Jun had to stick beside you.

Soo Ji was nice. Not someone you would ever picture as Jun's soulmate but the universe worked at its own pace. It wasn't your place to butt in. At first, you two, and even Soo Ji in some ways, tried to stay close. For years you stuck to each other so it was weird not to be close or in some sort of contact. But soon you understood that it didn't work quite like that.

A relationship of three doesn't work.

"It was his soulmate, what did you expect him to do?" you asked quietly.

You had that same argument many times with Chan over the years and it always ended the same way. He didn't quite understand and you always played it like it was nothing at all.

"Stay with you. Lots of people do the same. I bet he is miserable right now, thinking that he should have stayed with you"

Chan couldn't be more wrong. Out of coincidence, you met Jun the other day. He came into the bakery with Soo Ji, a baby in her arms. You had never, not even once, seen Jun smile that brightly when he introduced you to his son. Both of them seemed happy together. It was like the things left unsaid weren't there, that there were no lingering feelings. And perhaps there weren't any on their end, maybe that was only you. You who tried to grab onto something that was doomed from the start.

Soo Ji had been the one to see that your mark was gone. You could see in her eyes that she didn't ask with malice, she seemed genuinely happy for you. For the first time, you felt the need to lie, to pretend that you were living a life that didn't belong to you.

So you did.

You told them about your soulmate, about how amazing he was, how happy you were with each other. You just blurted out lies about your life, about moments that never happened, of a future that wouldn't exist at all.

"Does it make sense that you're here, sad, all on your own because he left?"

You shook your head, a sigh escaping your parted lips. Chan always had the same argument and he never really understood.

"My soulmate is out there, I'll find him"

Jihoon stiffed by your side, or maybe he had been like that since the whole conversation started and you simply didn't notice. Your words weren't meant to hurt him, they were only supposed to shut Chan up. It was what you always said and, like many times before, it worked wonders.

More than anyone in your life, Chan knew what your limit was and when it was time to just stop. And that was the right moment to stop, when he saw your hand going unconsciously to your left shoulder and massaged it lightly. The spot your mark was on.

"I've met mine, you know," he said quietly, more of a secret to himself than words that were supposed to be said out loud.

You did your best not to make a fuss over it. Like you, Chan had been certain that he would never meet his other half. Your mother's words floated around in your mind, both of you are special. You thought of it only as parent talk. Every parent says that in hopes to lighten up their kids. It just seemed that your parents were onto something when they said that you.

"What happens now?" was all you asked.

If you learned one thing about Chan over the twenty years you've known him was that his life was his and his feelings were only for himself to know about. You had to always be careful of what you said to him, how you asked things. He never lashed out at you, or your parents. The only time he got worked up over something was talking about Jun.

Chan was always the kind of person that retreats into himself whenever things get too much and you knew that his feelings were too much.

"Nothing. We don't get along at all, that's it"

Your eyes drifted to Jihoon for a second, to find him looking back at you.

Was it possible that both, you and your brother, were doomed when it came to your soulmates?

My soulmate is out there, I'll find him.

Your words hunted Jihoon in his sleep - or better said the lack of them. After he dropped you and Chan home, Jihoon went straight to the hospital.

His mind was thankful for the distraction that was work. Never before had he been that pleased to work twelve hours without a break. His day had been so busy that he didn't even find a few minutes to talk to Soonyoung - which was probably a blessing in disguise.

Jihoon was certain that if his friend found out about what you said he would have been thrilled, ready to rub it in his face that he had indeed messed up. He didn't know what he was supposed to do. Jihoon couldn't do to Mina what your college boyfriend did to you. How was he supposed to walk away from Mina like nothing at all ever happened? He couldn't just leave you behind you either.

His mind went around like it was in a maze, only to end up in the same place he started. He had no idea what he was supposed to do. He was certain of one thing though: hearing you talk like he wasn't there, as if you hadn't met him at all, hurt a lot more than he expected.

My soulmate is out there, I'll find him.

He felt that he was made of thin air, that someone could just pretend that he didn't exist. Not once in his life he felt that way. Jihoon never felt so little that he believed he could truly disappear.

So he did the only thing he could do, he waited until morning and knocked on your door. Chan was the one who opened the door for him.

"Is your sister still at home?"

He looked at Jihoon with narrowed eyes, head slightly tilted to the said. The doctor was ready to have the door closed on his face but Chan just shook his shoulders and pointed to a closed door at the other side of the room.

Jihoon was surprised to see that even though your apartment had the same design as his, everything was completely different. Where his place was mostly white and grey, yours was colorful. When he looked at the walls he felt that life jumped out of them, straight to his face pointing out everything that was wrong with his place - or maybe even him.

You had an entire wall dedicated to your family. Pictures of a younger version of you, of Chan when he couldn't be older than ten holding medals and trophies, of your parents and the family together. Jihoon didn't have a single picture of his parents and friends in his apartment, not even on his phone.

"Don't look around too much, the walls may fall down," Chan said from behind him.

All Jihoon did was give him a nod and knock on the bedroom door quickly before going in. You were sitting in your bed, putting your shoes on, when Jihoon burst through the door.

It wasn't at all what you expected to see in the first few hours of the day but you were certain that it would eventually happen. You hoped for it to be much later than it was but there was nothing that you could do to fight it off.

You knew Jihoon was going to ask why you said what you said. He seemed uncomfortable when he heard you but being honest you wished that he could just let it go. Those words were more to soothe Chan than anything else. You knew who your soulmate was and had already found him, you just didn't know what to do with yourself.

You wished your life could be as simple and easy as the movie made it seem, as Jun had made it look like that all those years before. All you wanted to do was take Jihoon by the hand and run towards the sunset like everyone else. Why is it that everything seemed to be just a little harder for you? While all the people around you, not that there were many but enough, seemed to have their entire lives figured out you were still struggling to take a step forward.

You had been so naïve when Jihoon suddenly showed up in your life. Though you convinced yourself that he would reject you, you still hoped that he wouldn’t. Wanted with the strength of your body that just once things would go your way. The easy way. How easy it would have been if you could just simply follow your heart.

Buried deep down in your heart was the truth you never allowed yourself to say out loud, to even feel. Jihoon carved a place for himself in you, even if your words said the other way. He was the first person you thought about every morning and the desire to hear his voice was the last thing you felt before falling asleep. But none of it belonged to you. Though those feelings existed and were yours, they belonged in a box deep inside the closet where no one could ever have access to it.

If you couldn’t acknowledge your feelings it was better to pretend that they didn’t exist. It was best to pretend that Jihoon didn’t exist.

“Why are you here?”

You looked at him quickly before going back to tying your shoes.

“We have to talk. I wanted to tell you something…”

“I don’t want to hear it” you got up and walked past him, pulling out a coat and putting it on “I appreciate what you did, how you helped me with Chan and stayed by my side. Honestly, thank you for that. But I wish you’d keep your word and stop coming around”

He took a step back as if your words had physically hurt him. Jihoon’s face wasn’t as composed anymore. His soft features contorted into something that you couldn’t quite put your finger on.

“I know I said that but it’s not easy”

“And you think this is easy for me?” you pushed the wardrobe door closed with a loud sound. You were sure that it was loud enough that Chan was able to hear it from outside “You keep playing this game of push and pull. It hurts, Jihoon. It hurts so much because you don’t want me, but you also don’t want to let me go. I’m stuck here and have no idea what I'm supposed to do! Should I follow my heart and let this go on, even though I know I'm going to have it broken in the end? Or do I do the reasonable thing and tell you to fuck off?"

You hadn't realized that you were crying until Jihoon was in front of you, his hands on your face as his own eyes welled with tears. You hated how good it felt to have him touch you. Your skin seemed that it was on fire, your entire body reacted to his proximity.

“Don’t cry, not because of me”

You almost laughed at him. He should have said something before you spent the entire night tucked in bed doing your best so Chan wouldn’t hear a sound from the couch. He noticed that something was wrong when you walked inside the apartment. Chan became certain when you moved around like you were on autopilot, when you didn’t say anything about the accident, or even when you didn’t get close to the kitchen at all.

Before whenever Jihoon said that he would stay away you’d secretly wish that he wouldn’t. You used to think that just a little of him was better than nothing at all but as time went by you learned that it wasn’t at all like that. For your sanity, it would have been better if you hadn’t met him at all.

"Can you look at me and say we will be together? That you're going to leave Mina and be with me, as it's supposed to happen between soulmates?"

You could see it, his pain. It was evident in the way his face contorted as if showing the way his brain was working. You know that he wouldn't leave Mina and in a way, you were proud of him. Loyal to a fault. Maybe if Jun had shown you the same loyalty things would be much different.

“Let’s end this, whatever it is, right now. I can’t do this anymore”

Jihoon shook his head in protest as you pushed him away from you, trying desperately to cling onto you – in whatever way he could, for however long he could. But you were adamant about your decision. Nothing he said or did would make you change your mind.

“I’ve been rejected before and it didn’t hurt half as this. I loved Jun very much but I was always ready for the moment he would leave, he wasn’t my soulmate. I knew that it could happen but with you... It never crossed my mind, not even for a second, that something like this could happen. That I would have you this close to me and yet you were so far away. Unreachable. Please, let me go. This never really started but let’s end it anyway”

What could Jihoon say to make it okay again? He knew that there weren’t a lot of words that could do so, and none of them came to mind. Probably because he knew that nothing he said would make you change your mind. He didn’t know you all that well but one look at you was enough to tell him that nothing would.

He just stood in place, his fingers holding loosely to your sleeve. One last silent attempt. You looked at his hand for a second before wrapping your fingers around his wrist and pushing it away. You walked past him, being careful this time not to touch him in any way. Pulling the door open you crossed your arms over your chest, for protection more than anything else.

“Get out, please”

It felt weird to look at the place you had called home for two years empty. When you first moved in you thought of it as a place you would stay for years to come, until the day you managed to get your own house.

The decision to move was you being purely selfish, it was you running away. It was bittersweet, to be honest. You were trying to pretend that nothing ever happened and at the same time doing your best to give yourself a fresh start.

It took you a little over two months to finally find a place that was of your liking and that had two bedrooms, not one like the apartment you lived in before. Though Chan no longer needed to stay with you, since he was fully recovered and had gone through his suspension, you still wanted to have a room for him. He was all grown up and could take care of himself but to you, he was still a little scrawny kid running around pretending that he was the best taekwondo athlete the world had ever seen.

“I never thought that I would have to do this again, you know. Help you move and stuff” Chan complained.

You just rolled your eyes at him. Though your brother recovered and his arm and leg didn’t bother him anymore, you didn’t let him touch a single box. The last thing you needed was to have him complaining that because of you he was feeling sore and couldn’t practice as he should.

“You’re such a baby, we did all the heavy lifting,” Soonyoung said picking up the last box.

It was surprising to still have him around after you cut off any sort of contact with Jihoon. The two of them made no secret that they had been close throughout their entire lives. You thought that by ending your relationship with Jihoon, if you could even call it that, Soonyoung would become a lost friend. It didn’t happen that way though.

Soonyoung kept on showing up like he always did, this time he was just more careful not to say anything at all about Jihoon.

Content perhaps was the best way to describe how you were feeling at the time. It certainly wasn’t how you expected to feel after such a short time, especially compared to how you felt just a couple of weeks before. But it was better than not feeling anything at all. Your mom used to say that you should try to find happiness in the little moments, those matter a lot more than the big ones we make a fuss about.

That day, right there, with the four of you looking at the empty apartment was one of the little moments your mother talked about.

“That’s because my sister loves me very much”

“Don’t go counting on that. I just don’t want your coach screaming at me because you’re not recovered yet”

Chan dropped an arm around your shoulder and pulled you against his side, squeezing you a little too much. Yumi and Soonyoung weren't related by blood to you but whenever you looked at the two of them it made you feel that they were your family.

A small family, made of people who chose to be with each other, sounded pretty amazing.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Yumi asked for the billionth time.

It was almost funny to have her talk that way to you. Not that long ago she was the one encouraging you to go on a date. Pushing you, was a better way to put it. And now she was the one who seemed to have reservations about it. Or maybe she was just being cautious because she wasn't the one who introduced you to him, to Seungcheol.

To be honest it wasn't the first time you met him, not really. Attending your request, Soonyoung had taken him to the bakery. You knew that it wasn't the best place to meet someone for the first time but it was all you were willing to do.

That's probably why your friends seemed cautious and confused about your decision because they thought that you were mostly setting yourself up for failure.

Partially, you could understand it.

Yumi knew you for years, since the day you entered college with a bunny plushie that dated from when you were just a baby. She saw how you always held yourself back when meeting someone. The stories were no secrets and your future love life wasn't going to be as bright as hers or half of the world's. Instead of making you more outgoing and willing to try new things, it made you more cautious. There was also the whole situation with Jun, your parents' accident happened just a few months after that. Everything just sort of went to shit within a year.

"You seem more nervous than me" you laughed at her.

Yumi huffed and turned her back to you, carefully choosing the shade of blush she wanted to apply to your cheeks. You looked between lovely rose and glow, and finally chose the one on the right side. Why the hell not? you thought. You were the one starting this so it made sense that you were the one to put the most effort into it. Also, you knew that Yumi was going to put on glow on your face whether you wanted it or not.

"I am but then again when wasn't I? I set up all of your past dates but this feels different. I always felt more excited than you. For this though… I never saw it coming after... you know"

Does anyone ever think that they'll meet their soulmate and then simply move on, and date other people? It didn't sound plausible. But you weren't naive, you knew that it happened. You just didn't think that it would happen to you.

"No one ever does but life happens. Now help me, I want to look pretty”

Yumi smiled at you, not a full one like you were used to but a tiny one. It was still better than nothing at all.

“You want this”

She sounded surprised and it almost hurt you, but not to the point you got angry.

“He seems nice, doesn’t he? And handsome too, right?”

Just once in your life, you wanted to act young, probably younger than your age saw fitting, and gush about a handsome guy with your friend. And Yumi caught onto that quickly because a second later she was sitting by your side telling you all the dos and don’ts of a date.

“What is it with you? Where do you even find these guys? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you talk to an ugly guy, that was all me”

Seungcheol was, to put it in a few words, not at all what you expected. And that wasn’t a bad thing at all.

When you first met him, knowing only the simple description Soonyoung had given you, you thought of him as someone quiet and shy. It was true that he liked to have his own time, be by himself thinking about his life and those around him. But that wasn’t all there was to him, of course.

That first date, or at least the first time you considered a date, made you feel seen in a way that you never felt before. Seungcheol gave you his full attention the entire night, never looking bored. He seemed genuinely interested in what you were saying, from the bakery that took most of your time, to Chan, who was competing at the time so you were worried about him getting injured again.

He walked you home after dinner, his fingers brushing yours from time to time until he finally held your hand. You felt your cheeks get warm as a small smile played on your lips.

After that first date, the two of you were inseparable. When he got off work he went to the bakery and on the days he couldn’t make it, you found yourself texting him in between one recipe and another. For the first time, you felt clingy towards someone, it was like nothing before.

During the five years you dated Jun, it didn’t happen like that. You loved him with your whole heart, planned your life with him for years ahead of time, but also knew how to be without him. You lived your own life and he did the same, only seeing each other when there was time, especially during college when both of you lived almost completely on your own. Only meeting occasionally once a week, when there was even time to do so.

With Seungcheol even when there was no time you wanted to meet him, talk to him, hear his voice, or read his words. Whatever little pieces of him you could get at a time.

The relationship moved forward quickly, faster than what you or anyone could have predicted. And yet you were the happiest you had ever been. Complete.

“Do you have to leave for work this early?”

You smiled, turning around while pulling your hair one last time through the hair tie. Seeing Seungcheol in the early mornings was like seeing a little piece of paradise every day. From the nest of hair, the small eyes, the throaty voice. Everything about him was very dreamlike, a fairytale of your own.

"Is not my fault you live so far away from downtown"

You sat down by his side, Seungcheol's hand immediately going to your waist. His fingers slightly pushed your shirt up so they could touch your skin. Your fingers reached for the exposed skin of his chest, tracing his tattoo. One that you had grown too fond of since the first few days, the wrong spelling of the word becoming something both of you laughed at.

"If you wait a little, I can take you. It's still dark outside"

Shaking your head you leaned forward, your lips brushing his for a second before pulling back. Your other hand moved to his hair, pushing it away from his face.

"I drove here last night, remember? Don't forget though, Chan is coming for the weekend"

"I've met Chan before, you don't have to be nervous"

Seungcheol smile at you, entertained by your sudden nervousness. He hadn't met Chan yet, not really. Yes, he went with you to one of Chan's competitions but your brother wanted to celebrate with his friends and coach so you didn't bother to stay back. As soon as it was over you and Seungcheol left. So all your boyfriend saw was you screaming at anyone who dared to hit your baby brother and Chan fighting someone.

"I know, it's just… everyone is going to be there and we've never really done this"

By this Seungcheol knew that you meant the fact that even though you had been together for almost a year, neither of you had ever made things official, in a way. Your friends knew about your relationship but no one had really seen you two together often. That dinner and Chan were just an excuse to gather all of them and finally make it official.

"Hey, don't worry. We've got this"

Dinner with Chan was just ordering some takeout from different restaurants and eating at the store after hours. It was as simple as that. All of you gathered around a table, eating to your heart's content and talking to one another.

What was truly surprising about the night wasn't your first night with Seungcheol and all of your friends at the same time. Not at all. The most unexpected thing was that Chan showed up with a girl, holding her hand nervously. It was funny to look at them, your brother had never been that nervous around you - or anyone else for that matter.

Like a good older sister, and partially responsible for Chan, you wanted to know everything about that girl. How they met, when they met, if they went to the same school, if she too did Taekwondo. But you didn't ask any of that, your brother would have killed you if you did. Instead, you just welcomed her, offered her a drink, and answered questions she had about the bakery.

"You can do that older sister thing, you know? I don't mind" she said from behind you.

You hadn't realized that she followed you inside the kitchen. She was beautiful. Looking at her you would never think that she and Chan would fit together but seeing them side by side made you think that they were meant to be.

Meant to be.

"Are you his soulmate?" she went quiet for a few seconds, her eyes darting all over the kitchen before settling on you again "I'm not judging you, please don't think that. My boyfriend isn't my soulmate and the one before him wasn't either. I don't know why I asked that. I'm sorry"

She smiled at you then, her eyes turning into small crescents on her face. The unsettledness that covered her face just a second before completely vanished.

"In our case, I think it's more of a curse than a blessing" she moved away from the door, helping you with boxes of food and plates "My brother hates him and so does my dad"

Your mind suddenly went back to that day, almost two years before, when Chan and you were in the car with Jihoon. The Taekwondo athlete had been the one to mention his soulmate and had also been the one to brush it off, saying that they didn't get along at all. And then he just showed up with her, no warnings or anything.

"But I'm here now, so it probably means something"

You smiled at her then, passing her a tray while you held the other one.

"It does. It means everything"

You smiled again, happy that whatever happened between the two of them was seemingly in the past, but still somewhat worried over the idea of her family not liking him.

She walked out of the kitchen and Chan went in, right after her. He looked behind his shoulder for a second before closing the door and leaning against it, his arm crossed over his chest.

"What?" you left at him.

Ever since you moved from the old apartment, Chan had gotten way more protective of you. One would think that he was actually the older brother, from the way he talked to you, always asking if you were doing good, if you were dating.

You knew that he somehow found out about Jihoon and the soulmate thing, probably through Yumi. He never asked and you never said anything.

"I missed seeing you like this," he said quietly and you furrowed your brows at him, still smiling "Happy. You look happy. It's been too long"

You put the tray down and walked to him. You put your hands on his shoulder, forcing him to stand straight.

"Chan, I'm happy" you assured him "And even if my love life was a little all over the place for a few years, I was still happy because I had you"

He mimicked your stance, his hands moving to your shoulder too. The position was awkward, making you laugh and drop your hands by your side.

"I know but I'm not talking about those years and those idiots" he rolled his eyes and pulled you in for a hug "You seem free again, like when you were a teenager. I never told you this, but I always thought you were pretty cool. Even now, that you have this lovey-dovey look on your face, you're still pretty cool"

You pinched his side, causing a laugh to erupt from him, and took a step back, a smile still on your face.

It was so easy to forget sometimes that Chan had grown up over the years and if anything being an athlete helped with that. He was more responsible than most twenty-two-year-olds, he no longer needed your help and you were sure that he only asked for advice to entertain you.

"And for what is worth, I like him" he nodded at the door "I don't think I've ever not seen you smile while talking about him, so you deserve it. Don't ever let go of your happiness, please"

"Then I guess you're stuck with me forever"

It came as no surprise to Jihoon having people in and out of your apartment, the place you once called home, thinking if they should rent it or not.

Everything happened so fast after the day you told him to get lost, that you wanted to end something that hadn't even truly started. One day you were there and the next you weren't, like you had disappeared into thin air.

He tried asking Soonyoung about you. Jihoon knew that the two of you were still in touch so asking about you to his childhood friend seemed like a good idea. But Soonyoung wasn't willing to say anything though, it didn't matter how much he begged and whatever he could promise. The doctor was true to his word and didn't say anything at all.

And Jihoon did his best at staying away like he promised you many times but failed every single chance.

That was why he kept coming around when he knew that it was probably best to stay away from you. When he knew that he should stay away from you. Whenever he was away though, he felt like he was missing a part of himself so he kept coming back. Jihoon made himself believe that it was better to have you close, even if it was in complete silence than to not have you at all.

What he didn’t know was that his actions were as bad for you as they were for him, if not worse. You made a good job of making him believe that you weren’t interested at all in him, that whether he was there or not didn’t make a single difference for you. You were right in front of him and yet he felt as if you were farther apart than when the bond wasn’t made.

When Jihoon told Mina about it, about you, he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to expect. Maybe have her throw him out like it was the case with many others, have her scream at him, or have her tell him that it was okay if he walked away. He could never see it coming, the “so what? It doesn’t have to mean anything”.

That night Jihoon watched as she just turned on her side to sleep, only to wake up the next morning pretending that nothing at all ever happened. Never again Mina mentioned you. It seemed so easy for her to pretend that you didn’t exist at all. Her actions always made him wonder just when had she changed so much. If the roles were reversed and she had been the one to find her soulmate, Jihoon would have been more than happy for her.

As kids, the two of them always talked about what it would be like to find their soulmates. Jihoon coming from the way he was raised, with parents that were soul doctors and conversations that only revolved around soulmate bonds, and Mina having the natural curiosity every kid has.

It was so easy to remember her reaction when she first met Chanwoo.

It happened during her first day of high school, she was a senior just like Jihoon and Soonyoung. When the three of them met during lunch Mina had a pink tint to her cheeks, the tray of food in her hands shook slightly as she walked towards their seat, looking behind her every couple of seconds to ensure someone was still there. From his seat Jihoon saw Chanwoo, a tall guy standing behind Mina, looking at her with the same kind of dreamy eyes she had on.

“Another crush?” Soonyoung teased when she sat down.

During their high school years, it was like Mina had completely forgotten about her soulmate, her interest being entirely focused on the guys at school and her latest crush. One would be surprised how fast she fell in and out of love but all of that could be blamed on raging teenage hormones.

Mina leaned forward, pulling the collar of her shirt to the side showing the now empty skin just below her collarbone, where her mark used to be. Unlike the one Jihoon carried on his wrist, Mina’s mark was just a simple pink glittery strip. She had always been proud of it, saying that she got lucky that hers wasn’t as horrendous as his snowflake or Soonyoung’s smiley face. But her mark was gone.

“If he is the one, what are you even doing here?” Jihoon asked.

He looked over her shoulder to see Chanwoo still standing there, staring at Mina’s back as if he had found his entire reason to live right in that second.

“Can I really do that?”

It was funny how sometimes Mina acted like a kid, who was used to asking permission for everything.

“I mean, we’ve eaten lunch together in the past, what? thirteen years? I don’t mind not having to talk about the latest fashion trend for a day”

One day turned into many and soon enough Mina was someone Jihoon only saw when passing through the hallways or when he was going home. And being honest he didn’t mind it that much. It’s not like he could simply overlook the years of friendship that the three of them shared but he was genuinely happy for Mina. When someone grows up the way they did, with soulmates being the center of their reality, it was only natural that she felt the need to stay with Chanwoo whenever it was possible.

Things only started to get back to normal during college. By then, Mina was far more used to having a soulmate and the idea of being away from him wasn’t as painful as it was at first. The honeymoon phase, as Jihoon and Soonyoung called it, was finally over. The trio then became a quartet and Chanwoo was a nice addition to their small group. Of course that sometimes it was troublesome, especially when Chanwoo and Mina got all touchy with each other. Other than that, everything felt normal again.

Or at least it did for a few years.

“You remember we have dinner with your parents tonight, right? It’s your mom’s birthday” Mina asked.

Jihoon looked up from his phone. He had been staring at the thing for 15 minutes without actually seeing the screen. It was open on the news but he wasn’t reading anything at all. She was in front of her dresser, looking at him through the mirror.

“Yeah. My dad wants to meet after work, though. You don’t have to run there after you finish it off at the office”

Mina smiled at him but it didn’t feel as before. When he was young seeing Mina smile made him somewhat feel happy too. Seeing his friends happy made him feel good, knowing that he had helped get that smile. But Mina's smile wasn't like that anymore, it didn't fully reach her eyes and was only there for show.

"Yeah, I'll see you then"

Working at the hospital, with kids, was the only thing that brought Jihoon some sort of solace, that made him feel more like himself. Though at times he hardly knew where the line was, between who he was and what people saw him as. Jihoon felt that in the hospital he was who he wanted to be.

Growing up, it was clear to Jihoon that he was going to be a doctor. Whenever someone asked what he wanted to be, his answer was a straightforward doctor. Most people thought that he was simply following his parents' footsteps but that wasn't really what he wanted.

His parents barely had contact with other people. The starting point for their research was people, yes, but to his parents, people were nothing more than data. Whatever they wanted to know could have been found through books and questionnaires, created by them but asked by others.

Jihoon wanted the human contact a hospital doctor had. Maybe it was the way that grew up on his own, without his parents around all that much, or perhaps it was just something that he was born with. And being a pediatrician happened naturally. When thinking about which specialty he should take, the first thing that came to his mind was pediatrics. At first, Jihoon was stiff around kids, not knowing if he should talk to the kids or their parents, or how much strength he should use. Slowly, but surely, he got there.

"Your dad is in the waiting room," the nurse told him.

He was ready to leave, his clothes had been changed and his hair was wet from the shower he took. Jihoon knew that he was supposed to meet with his dad right after work but he didn't think, not once, that he would come into the hospital. His dad was a doctor, yes, but only at the title. The older man hated hospitals to the point he had to be dragged to one when he was sick.

Whatever reason brought Jihoon's dad to the hospital couldn't be a good one.

"Hi Dad," Jihoon said, awkwardly adjusting the bag on his shoulder.

His dad wasn't a man of many words. Even when the man was furiously out of his mind, his words remained calm and very few. That's why Jihoon always thought, as a teenager, that he could get away with anything at all. All he would get from his father was a disapproving look and even more silence. As a grown man, Jihoon understood his actions as a way to get his father's attention, though it was futile because it never worked the way he planned.

"So your mother said no to drinks before dinner but we are in charge of cake pick up, that should give us enough time"

It was so much like his dad, not even saying hi and going straight to the point. For Jihoon, it came as a surprise that his dad wanted to meet and talk. This time the initiative didn't start on his end. For once, his father was the one who started it, a text saying when and where to meet. Curiosity had been eating him alive, his mind bouncing all over the place wondering what was so important and secretive that couldn't be said during dinner in front of his mother and Mina.

The two of them walked to the parking lot in complete silence. To be honest, it was something Jihoon was used to and a moment he found peace in. The soul doctor was a man of books and theory, Jihoon was sure he read every single book on maternity he could get his hands on before he was born and even some after. Words were never his strong suit but he always managed to show his support by being there when the moment mattered. Yes, it was true that his parents missed the day-to-day life, probably didn't see when his second and third tooth fell, and weren't home to help with school projects. That had been his nanny but his first words, first steps, teaching him how to ride a bike, graduations, any speech Jihoon had given, they were there. His mother was the more vocal one, his dad putting a hand on his shoulder and giving him a light squeeze as if saying you did good son.

And those words, even in silent form, meant more than anything else.

"Your mother ordered a cake from the bakery down the block"

Jihoon swallowed his saliva and nodded. His dad didn't have to give more information or directions to the place, he already knew it by heart. Not once had he been there after you told him to leave you alone. If you can't be with me fully then I don't want you at all. Your words hadn't been those but he understood what you meant. What you said had been carefully chosen. Even under those circumstances, you didn't want to hurt him.

After he left your apartment, Jihoon was numb - to say it nicely. During the following week of that morning, he didn't go anywhere except work. Soonyoung didn't say anything about it. When they had a chance to meet, their conversation had been minimal e nothing like the lively chat both of them often engaged in.

It felt weird to be with Soonyoung in silence. His friend had always been talkative, filling the silence with jokes and stories - at times saying the same thing more than once. Soonyoung was disappointed in him, Jihoon was certain of it.

Jihoon didn't complain and just drove there. When he parked in front of the bakery, he didn't get out of the car. The truth was that he couldn't.

"I'll wait here"

His dad didn't fight him, he just got out of the car and went inside. As much as Jihoon tried to stop himself, he couldn't. He knew that he shouldn't but you were right there, and he hadn't seen you in two years. All we wanted to do was look at you, for a brief moment.

And you looked gorgeous.

Your hair was longer than before, your skin had a light tan on your skin - a sign that you had taken part in the street fair a week before -, and your smile was the brightest Jihoon had ever seen on your face. He watched, in pure amazement, as you talked to his father, laughing loudly at something he said.

Suddenly you extended a hand to your left and a second later a man took your fingers in his hold. A weird lump formed in Jihoon's throat, his chest tightened and he felt as if he was short of air. The man snaked an arm around your waist and pulled you closer to his side and you looked up at him like he had rang all of the stars in the sky. As if he was the sole reason why you were on this earth. As if he was your soulmate.

Jihoon didn't expect to be taken over by jealousy, much less like that. He felt like he was ready to combust within his own body. He wanted to get out of there and pull you away from that man.

You had someone and that person wasn't him. He knew that it wasn't his place, he had no right. He was with Mina, he refused to end things with her to be with you so he couldn't expect you to stay on your own.

He couldn't say that it didn't hurt, because it did. A whole lot. And the guy by your side had the same look on his face. If he didn't know any better, Jihoon would have thought that the man was your soulmate, not him.

You said goodbye to his dad, a smile on your face as you handed him a second box.

"Wish her a happy birthday for me!" you shouted from inside.

In the same way that Jihoon hadn't seen you, he also hadn't heard your voice. Back then you didn't talk a whole lot to him but he always heard your voice. When you talked with customers, with Soonyoung and Yumi, when you were on the phone with your brother. Your voice was a sound Jihoon didn't know he needed to hear during his entire life.

The passenger door opened and his father went inside, moving a little awkwardly as he tried to get inside without dropping both boxes on the floor.

"She's such a sweet girl, y/n. Why your dumb ass let her go is beyond me" his father sighed.

The older man's words should have made Jihoon surprised, but they didn't. Of course that if his mother knew, his dad would also know about you. He would have been childish and naive for thinking like that. How they found out who you were, was something yet to be discovered but when his parents wanted to know something they dug deep.

"Dad…"

The soul doctor held a hand up to stop his son from talking. His fingers drummed on the side of the boxes he carried. He wasn't a man of many words, he mostly let his wife do all the talking. Both of them agreed that she was better at it than he was. But he felt the need to talk for once. This time around he wanted his son to hear every word he had to say.

"You're holding onto Mina out of friendship, loyalty, guilt, and love to some extent. When you started your relationship, although we didn't show it the proper way, your mother and I were happy for you. Mina is, somewhat, of a nice girl and you've always been good friends" he sighed, thinking of what he should say carefully "Because of our research, you, as well as many others, were led to believe that it is harder, borderline impossible, to find your soulmate after you turn twenty-five but we were wrong. And you and that girl are the living and breathing proof of it. That girl inside the store, smiling at her boyfriend, is the one for you. She is the one who will complete you in a way that you never even knew you needed.

"We don't know how soulmate bonds are created and why they happened in the first place, but they exist. Something, someone, God, whatever it is, put the two of you together. Jihoon, you deserve that happiness. I'm not saying this because you are my son, because I feel the need to protect you. I'm saying this because you are a good person, someone who devotes his life to helping others."

His father sighed again, looking tired probably for the first time in years. Throughout his childhood and adolescence, Jihoon learned that his father was the kind of person to bury himself in his work until it was finally done - something Jihoon had learned to do, as well. Days would go by without his father going home and when he finally did he didn't look half as tired as this.

"I was never Mina's biggest fan, ever since she was a kid. You know that. I never hid it. She knows that if you don't leave her for your soulmate, you'll always stay by her side. Think about it this way, if the roles were reserved do you think that she would stay by your side? Do you believe that if Mina met Chanwoo now, while she is in a relationship with you, she would let him go to be with you?"

"No" Mina simply said, getting out of the car and slamming the door behind her.

For days, Jihoon thought about his father's words. Hours on end were spent, every single moment that he was by Mina's side. He analyzed every little aspect of their lives, from their childhood until now, when both were grown-ups that lived their own lives despite being a couple.

Jihoon had never given it much thought, how weird their relationship was. Even people that were just friends, that stayed by each other's side out of loyalty - much like Jihoon stayed by Mina's - seemed to have more interaction with one another. They hardly saw each other, once every two or three weeks. Texts and phone calls were barely there, and he was always the one to initiate their "meetings". All of it got even more sparse after you were gone from his life.

For a moment, as soon as Jihoon told Mina about you, she made sure that her presence was known. She wanted to come over to his place almost every day, his phone was flooded with her texts and missed calls. It was hard dodging her. It has gotten to the point where Soonyoung would also receive calls at work and the nurses always approached Jihoon saying that his girlfriend had called. She seemed to be desperate, you should call her back, they kept telling him.

But all of it was just gone the moment Jihoon said that you wanted him out of your life. Thinking back now, truly analyzing it, especially after the conversation he had with his dad - who seemed to know a whole lot more about you than he did - the timing was just perfect. As if Mina was adapting her behavior to your presence in his life.

"Mina, we're talking about this" he tried to reason with her, following her out of the car.

It was stupid, he knew that. Mina was never the kind of person who liked to hear what others said. Her opinion was the only one that mattered. She would, sometimes, hear what Jihoon and Soonyoung had to say but only to entertain them. The final decision was hers and nothing they could do would change that.

"There's nothing to talk about. You want to break up, I said no. That's the end of the conversation"

Was it weird that Jihoon didn't know what Mina did for a living? She probably made a lot of money out of it, considering the place she lived and the kind of car she drove. He couldn't even remember what she graduated in. All he did know was that she was indecisive until the very last second.

He didn't know a lot about her, about who she was as an adult. Sure, he remembered this and that from their teenage years but he was certain that a lot had changed since then. Jihoon didn't have to go very far to see that. The reaction Mina was giving him right that second proved all of that.

"I bet she showed up again. Didn't she? That y/n" she said your name with disdain, as if by saying your name she got nauseous "She showed up again, saying this and that. Trying to get you away from me, I'm sure of it"

Jihoon just shook his head. You had nothing to do with his decision. Breaking up with Mina didn't guarantee anything. You had a boyfriend now. And by the brief moment Jihoon saw you and him together was enough for him to know that the two of you had created a strong bond, maybe even stronger than the one he created with you.

He wouldn't blame you if you chose to stay with him. Jihoon had hurt you, more than he could have possibly imagined. His dad told him things about you - your parents, Jun your high school and college boyfriend. Knowing all of that made him feel even worse about how he left things. He didn't know how his dad had found out all of those things about you, his best guess was Soonyoung, but he trusted every single word that left his dad's mouth

"You say that but I don't believe you for a second. Do you suddenly want to break up? If nothing happened, there's no reason for this"

"Nothing has to happen. I'm just tired of this. This isn't even a friendship. We're strangers to each other. So what's the point of this? We saw each other more often when Chanwoo was alive"

Jihoon saw the change in Mina's eyes the second he said Chanwoo's name. Ever since he passed away it was prohibited to say his name, to bring up anything at all that was related to him in some way or another. He lost count of how many times Soonyoung got yelled at for it.

"You don't get to have a happy ending when you took mine from me," she said between her teeth.

Her eyes shone with tears and anger, her cheeks suddenly turning a bright shade of red that started at the base of her neck.

Ultimately that was where it started and ended.

Jihoon remembered it clearly as if it was happening right in front of his eyes. Chanwoo and him went out like they did every once in a while. Mina had to work late, for whatever reason that night. They went to a bar and talked for a bit. The intention was to meet Soonyoung but he couldn't make it because his mom had called him.

Neither of them drank that night. Chanwoo said that since he still had to meet Mina, he didn't want to. She isn't the biggest fan of tipsy me and I’m driving. Chanwoo did everything in his power to make Mina happy, even things that he considered unnecessary or even wrong in some way or another. They were from very different backgrounds but those differences just vanished the second the bond was made.

The second Mina called Chanwoo, they left. Chanwoo insisted on dropping Jihoon off at home. It wasn't far from the bar they were at and he would have to go through his block to get to Mina anyway. Jihoon sat in the passenger seat and put on his seat belt, Chanwoo didn't. While going through an intersection a car came full speed from the right. By the time Chanwoo noticed it was too late to stop the car but he tried to hit the brakes anyway, which was also a mistake. The car hit the passenger side with full force while another one hit them from the back.

Jihoon then woke up at the hospital, his parents and Soonyoung by his side. For days Mina was nowhere to be seen. No matter how many times he asked about Chanwoo, no one told him anything. His mother kept telling him, focus on your recovery, we'll talk about Chanwoo later.

The silence was what he needed to know that the worst had happened.

The first news he got about Chanwoo was delivered by Mina, who went inside his hospital room screaming at the top of her lungs.

"It should have been you! Why do you get to live when Chanwoo is gone? Why is your life worth more than his?"

Soonyoung was quick to pull her out of the room, but not fast enough that Jihoon wouldn't hear it. His parents looked at each other before his mother took a step forward. Jihoon just shook his head. He understood why they hid it from him but that didn't mean that he had to like or be okay with it.

A week later Jihoon was discharged and the first thing he did was look for Mina. He wanted to apologize, though he knew that he had nothing to be sorry about. He wasn't the one driving any of the cars involved in the accident and yet, he felt the need to.

Unlike the last time, Mina seemed to have calmed down. When Jihoon entered the apartment she and Chanwoo were supposed to share, she didn't scream at him. The second she laid eyes on him, she started to cry. The ugly kind of cry, the one that comes from deep inside and takes over one's entire body.

A year later, Mina started to ask Jihoon to go places with her. Lunch, dinner, the mall, a walk in the park, and then suddenly they were dating.

"That's not true. We both know that"

Their relationship, as it was - or how it was supposed to be - started that like that. With both of them searching for solace in each other. It happened naturally. Neither of them had a soulmate, for entirely different reasons, but they found each other standing at the same spot.

Jihoon shouldn't have been so naive, though. He knew that Mina wasn't one to change her mind once she was set on something. He thought that what she said, all those years back in his hospital room, had been anger-driven and not close to the truth.

"Look at you! You're right here, living your life to the fullest, following your dreams, and becoming who you wanted to be all along. And where is he now?" she pushed away her tears, enraged that she cried in front of Jihoon "So yeah, the way I see it the fact that you even exist is your happy ending"

She walked closer to him then, a vicious smile on her lips. Mina's hand reached for Jihoon's face, a sloppy and careless touch.

"How pathetic you are. Thinking all along that I was ever in love with you. No, honey. I was disgusted every time you touched me, being around you made me sick. I was just making sure that at least one tiny bit of your life was miserable. Y/N doesn't want to have anything to do with you. Did you know that she has a boyfriend? And your parents and best friend are disappointed in you. If you leave me, you'll be completely on your own"

Her words were supposed to hurt him but Jihoon didn't feel anything at all. If anything at all, they freed him.

"Poor companies are worse than loneliness"

You dropped your purse on the couch and went straight to the bathroom. Your hands moved without any sort of thought, just reaching for the soap and throwing it inside the bathtub. The hot water would calm you, there was no mistake in that. It worked before, there was no reason as to why it wouldn't work again.

Just a few minutes to yourself, to allow yourself to think about what happened less than an hour before.

It was all set, you were ready to go home.

You were locking everything down, turning the lights off, making sure that the gas was off. The usual routine. Seungcheol had gone to the car, taking with him the day’s leftovers.

For once, you were looking forward to the weekend. You and Seungcheol made plans, a weekend out of the city somewhere only your boyfriend knew about. It was going to be the first time you stayed away from the bakery for more than a few hours at a time.

Though you were worried, you wouldn't lose a night of sleep over it or call every other hour. Yumi knew what she doing, you hired someone to help her while you were gone and you were sure that Soonyoung would show up when he had a chance. Your store was in good hands.

A weekend away with Seungcheol sounded too good to be true. You had been together for almost a year and not once you had done something like that. To be honest, you hadn't had two days off since college. Someone who owns a business, as small as it was, and who did all the baking couldn't afford to spend a weekend away. Though most of your customers were students and office workers, there was still a fair amount of people there at the weekend.

Your life, you felt, was finally falling into place. Everything was going forward exactly as you had planned years before. Chan was doing fine - he and his soulmate seemed to be working things out - the bakery was steadily growing and you could see yourself expanding sooner rather than later. You had someone you loved with all of your heart by your side. Your friends were happy, sort of.

When you first met Soonyoung you were certain that Yumi could be his soulmate. They were so much alike, though at first glance one wouldn't think so. Soonyoung seemed serious, unreachable even. His doctor persona came out before anything else. But the second you got to know him he became someone else, loud and cheerful. Always ready to make those around him laugh. Yumi was much like that, though she was a bit more aggressive in the way she showed love.

There was no mistake, at least to you, that they were a perfect fit. But suddenly Soonyoung showed up, holding someone's hand tightly saying "This is Dan Oh, my soulmate". What you didn't know was that he had known her for a while, a long one, before introducing you to her. Seungcheol knew too but claimed that it wasn't his place to say anything. You were a little hurt, of course. You felt that he was your friend, part of your family even, but he kept a big secret from you.

It didn't matter how hurt you were, or what you felt. For Yumi, it was so much worse, her hurt was far greater than yours. She was sure that if neither she nor Soonyoung met their soulmate, they would get together. She had feelings for him. When he entered the store with Dan Oh you saw your friend wilt. Yumi looked sad, simply putting it. You started to go to her place almost every day, nursing her through her broken heart.

Having the two of them around each other was somewhat weird. Soonyoung, who was completely unaware of Yumi's feelings for him, now seemed to sense that there was something weird going on. Yumi, on the other hand, did her best to pretend that nothing happened, and tried to make Dan Oh feel welcome in your circle of friends. It's not her fault that she is his soulmate, it's mine for thinking that we could be something more.

You didn't try to fight her, just silently stayed by her side and supported her every decision.

This weekend was supposed to be about you. Forty-eight hours worrying about no one except Seungcheol and yourself. For two days you didn't have to worry about Chan or the bakery. Your life was finally yours to enjoy to the fullest. It seemed too good to be true. And then it became just that.

You were turning the last switch off when the bell about the door rang. Turning around you expected to see Seungcheol. When it was time to close he always rushed you, saying that you didn't need to check the locks three times. This time though, it wasn't Seungcheol. You thought that you would see your boyfriend's tall figure but instead, you saw Jihoon's small one.

No matter how badly you tried, your body just refused to obey your wishes. You should have pushed him out, screamed at him, tell him to never show his face in front of you again. But then there was a line between what you should have done and what you did. You just stood there, eyes on his face, and waited – for what exactly you were unsure of at the time.

You were seeing him for the first time in over two years and your heart was stuck. When you looked at him right at that moment it felt as if you were transported back to the very first time you spoke to him, in his apartment. You couldn’t consider the elevator meeting to be something more than it was. Back then you didn’t know so you couldn’t pretend.

When you talked to Jihoon in his apartment, though you were certain of his inevitable rejection, you thought of it as some sort of beginning. As he stood in front of you, in complete distress, you couldn’t help but think that him being there was some sort of ending.

“Mina and I broke up” was all he said.

The heart beating inside your rib cage stopped and you suddenly didn’t know how to pull air inside your lungs again. The words he said in that instant were the ones you longed to hear during the eight months you were around Jihoon. But hearing them now seemed odd, and not at all what you wanted

“I need to know that because?”

He took a step forward, and at the same time, you took one back. You shouldn’t get anywhere near Jihoon, the further apart you stayed from him the best.

“This is coming too late, I know.”

“You’re right, it is too late” you pushed the off switch and walked past him, forcing him out of the store “What makes you think that you can do this? I was ready to do everything with you. If you said the right word I was going to be by your side no matter what. But you played me the entire time, acted as if my feelings didn’t matter in the least. You made me, and everyone else, believe that you were the center of the universe and I mistreat my feelings and myself. What right did you have to do that?”

It would be a lie to say that you never thought about what you would say if you were to ever see Jihoon again. But thoughts of him were very few and far between. They never followed a constant path and that was why you usually stopped as soon as it started. Days when you thought of him were usually bad ones, in which your mind took you to dark places that weren’t cozy at all to be in. It was when you thought of yourself as someone who wasn’t worthy.

“That was never my intention, you know that”

He looked at you in such a way that it almost seemed as if he was lost. Before, whenever you saw him, you felt that Jihoon had his whole life figured out already. For the first time in three years, it felt as if you were on the right track, certain of yourself, while Jihoon looked like he didn’t know what to do next.

“It might as well have been because that was what happened, that was how I felt whenever you did that shit. But want to know what I finally figured out? That stupid mark that was on your wrist and my back doesn't mean anything, it doesn’t have to. I am my own person and I am happy, in a way I have never been. And you’re not part of that happiness, I don’t want you to be”

If you were allowed to say so, you weren't sure why you were acting like that, why you were feeling that certain way. It honestly didn’t make a lot of sense, not even to you, the person who was having those sorts of feelings.

You were inside the bathroom for hours, your body immersed underwater. There were so many thoughts going around in your mind that you couldn't focus on just one but there was one thing that was a constant amidst the craziness: Seungcheol.

He didn’t turn the lights on like he normally would, even though it was uncomfortable for him to be in the dark like that. He was never one to enjoy the darkness, not through his teenage rebellious years and certainly not as a grown man. But on that specific day, it felt like the most appropriate thing to do.

When he said yes to meeting you, he knew that he was setting himself up for a broken heart, probably the worst one he’s ever had. You weren’t Seungcheol’s first relationship, a topic that came up during your conversations more often than not, making him cringe at all the things he had said – it mostly made him regret the fact that he told you about them at all.

Going through those relationships, Seungcheol was always careful not to grow too attached to any of them. With all of his past relationships, the girls had their marks, and every single one of them was fascinated by his markless body. At his young age, Seungcheol liked it. He thought that it made him more interesting and in a way it did. But it also made him aware of where he stood and where he would always be stuck at.

From the day he was born to the day he died, Seungcheol would remain as the kid who didn’t have a mark.

He used to say that he was lucky, that he didn’t mind it at all, and that to some extent it made him happy that he was born without it. Those words were said out loud so many times that Seungcheol himself started to believe them. And then he met you. Someone who didn’t care in the least, who didn’t ask and made it seem as if it were the most important subject. And he liked that.

Being with you, even if it meant doing simple things such as going for ice cream or staying inside and watching a movie together, made him completely forget soulmates and marks. Neither of you ever made it seem like it was more than it was. Or maybe both of you made it seem like it was less than it truly was.

The life both of you led together was so simple, so ordinary, that was it so easy to lose himself in it. So easy to forget that you weren’t meant for each other, that whoever set up the souls didn’t think that the two of you were the perfect fit.

Living in a society that revolved around soulmates made it impossible for him to ignore it, impossible to wonder why he was the one who didn’t have a mark. It was like someone asking why they worked so hard and still got paid so little. So Seungcheol went ahead and got marks of his own, told people that the blue and red moon on his forearm was his mark. Suddenly he was like everyone else. But he knew, even if no one else did, that it was all a lie.

You never cared about it. When Seungcheol told you about his tattoo you looked at him as if you could understand him, as he wasn’t at all weird for doing that. Whenever you could, whenever you had the chance, when you didn’t even notice what you were doing, you would run the tip of your fingers over his tattoo. You looked at it like it held the answers to all the questions you could ask.

But in one night, a second at a time, the world both of you carefully built, the life you dreamed to have together, came crashing down. It reminded him that together you built a glasshouse, a sandcastle that could be taken down by a wave at any given moment.

He didn’t have to ask to know who was that the man that walked inside the bakery at such a late hour. It was so obvious in the way both of you stood still in the dark store, the tension in the air powerful.

Jihoon.

The wave that could destroy your castle had finally arrived.

Seungcheol was many things in his life, but dumb wasn’t one of them. He didn’t have to ask, a single guess was enough. And when you didn’t say anything it only made matters worse. You were on edge the entire car ride back to your apartment, and didn’t say a single word – the opposite of your normal chatty self. The bags were tossed aside and you hurried towards the bathroom.

At first, he waited for you. Both of you were grownups and serious about each other so whatever it was, you had to talk about it - like you always did. After an hour he threw away that resolution and left. Seungcheol knew just how much of a hard time you had when you had to give someone bad news, how long it took you to build up the courage to do so.

So he left quietly, made sure to lock the door on his way out as silently as he could. Seungcheol wished he had somewhere else to go besides home, someone he could talk to. He knew that he could call Soonyoung or Yumi, a random person at a bar would do the trick too. Instead, he went home, the solitude of his bedroom was the only place he truly wanted to be.

He couldn’t sleep though, not for a few short minutes or the hours following it. It’s over, all of it. Was the only thing he thought about. No other words or memories came to mind, just those five.

“I’m sorry” Seungcheol opened his eyes but didn’t dare to move. A delusion of his mind, he was certain that it was all it was. If he moved the smallest inch then it would vanish into thin air. You would vanish “I know you’re not sleeping. You can’t when we fight. It’s not like we fought really but let’s say it’s the same thing for now”

A smile betrayed his lip. It always happened when you became witty with your words, and called him out on his shit. Instead of getting angrier, he found it amusing, enough to make him forget about what he was angry about just a second before.

“You had to think and you like to do that on your own, so I left”

You left your position by the door and walked across the room, easily taking a seat by his side on the bed. It was so easy, you figured, to be with him. Whenever you were around him, close to Seungcheol, you felt like you were at home. Everything one was supposed to feel when they meet their soulmate, you felt with him. The sweaty hands, the butterflies, the heartbeat increase, the happiness, the giddiness. The feeling of finally being home. All of it.

“I was on my own in the bathroom. Why did you leave?”

Reaching forward you ran your hand through the strands of his hair, something that you had taken a liking ever since you met him. The first time you did it was only to push his hair away from his face and then it just became a habit. You knew that sometimes, especially when you first started your relationship, Seungcheol was surprised when you reached for him, but all of it would suddenly become the other way around when he pulled your hand close to his head.

“You know why”

“No, I don’t. Please, do enlighten me”

You knew exactly what Seungcheol was talking about, he didn't have to say the words out loud. But this time around, even if it was something you had talked about many times before, those words had to be said. Just once, it couldn't be something that was in the air.

Actions matter more than words but sometimes words are necessary.

"Jihoon is back. That means you're going to leave"

The hand that was in his hair ran down to his face, your other hand came up to his face as well. Your thumbs going back and forth over his cheekbones. You intended to make him look at you, even if it was too dark to do so. It was an attempt to make him listen to you.

"I'm not"

Seungcheol nodded in your hands, his own hands going to your waist like they always did when you were by his side. For him, it was a way to keep the memory of you for as long as he could.

"You won't be able to stop yourself. That's okay, honestly. It's the sort of life we live"

"Why are you giving up on me so easily? If you think that I was going to stay with you until the day Jihoon showed up saying that he was finally ready, you're wrong. I didn't know you would think so little of me"

He pulled away from you and sat up, leaning to the side slightly to turn the light on. Seungcheol was still wearing the same clothes he had on when he left your house, down to his jeans. His hair was a mess, caused by your hands just as much as his.

"You know that's not it. It's not like you couldn't make it work with him. There's probably a reason the two of you are soulmates. Who am I to stand between you?"

"The one I chose, that's who you are. You're right, we could have probably made it work. Maybe because it was easy, maybe because we thought that we had to. I wish people would stop telling me what I should do, who I should be with. It has been this way my entire life, since the day I was born, because of that stupid mark. I didn't ask to be born with it and I certainly won't let it rule my life. At least, not anymore"

Maybe in a world where soulmates didn't exist, a time when a deity didn't choose who people should be with, a place where people did truly have their free will, you would be angry at him for not trusting you from the start. As he said, in the world you lived in, you could understand where he was coming from.

You took his hand and placed it over your chest, right above your heart.

"This isn't yours because of a stupid mark, because someone said so. It's yours because I want it to be, because little by little you overtook it and made it home. I love you. Not because someone told me to, but because I want to. Don't ever doubt my feelings again, not even for a second. If they change I'll be the first one to tell you. I'll be honest like I have been from day one with you"

You could see it I'm his eyes, the desperation to believe you but he had been left behind way too many times so it was hard.

"I don't know if I ever loved Jihoon, truly," you said honestly "Meeting him, knowing that he was my soulmate brought me to this place where I felt as if I should. So I made myself picture him in my life. There wasn't a switch, I didn't meet him and was suddenly in love. It was more of an obligation, in a way. But being with him hurt me so much because all I got from him was rejection. He rejected me from the start and I always felt so little next to him"

Seungcheol squeezed your waist, his eyes searching for yours with care and adoration. So much love. You smiled, reaching for his neck, while your thumb traced his jawline, his plump lips.

"And with you… I never questioned my actions, never felt as if I was any less. I always felt like I could truly be myself with you, from that first day at the bakery. My heart skipped a beat when you said hi, when you shook my hand, and smiled at me. You might not believe me, but you had me from that moment"

You moved your hand, back to his hair. You needed him to believe you, needed that frown to leave his beautiful face. There was no version of the world in which you didn't want Seungcheol, where you'd leave him for anyone else.

"Since meeting you, Jihoon has been nothing more than an afterthought. My reaction today was a reflection of who I was while around him and I hate that, I hate that I made you feel like this” you scooted closer to him “You're not my soulmate and I'm not yours either. But I am yours. You're the only one I want to spend the rest of my life with, that I want to have a family with. I have this dream where you're sitting in the bakery, a baby in your arms. Our baby. I am never going to leave you. By your side is the life I envisioned for myself, the life I want. And if our souls truly do live many different lives then I will find you in the next one and I will love you again, choose you again"

Seungcheol's lips were on yours barely half a second after you were done talking. His arms went around your waist, pulling you as close as you could be. Your legs on each side of his thighs. His lips were anxious against yours as if still looking for answers. The warmth of his body was everything you need to feel assured. The way he held onto you, so desperately, was how you felt on the inside.

"Don't give up on me, even if I seem like a lame soap opera character"

You smiled against his neck, your arms circling it as you moved back slightly.

"You're not lame, just a little weird for watching it so fervently"

"A weirdo you like"

You brushed the tip of your finger over his nose and his lips.

"A weirdo I love"

hi! thank you so much for reading, i hope you enjoyed it.

#seventeen imagine #seventeen x reader #seventeen x you #svt x reader #svt imagine #svt x you #jihoon x reader #lee jihoon x reader #woozi x reader #jihoon x you #woozi x you #woozi #seventeen angst #woozi imagines

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setsugekka · 11 months

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『atarashī 』 ; 05

❝ breaking point ❞ | mlist ｡

student!hongjoong x fem!reader, husband!yeosang x fem!reader — drama, dark romance, mystery, heavy sexual content [8k wc] ch cws: smut, a lot of it!!, more marital problems (yes, the baby thing again), very destructive, heat of the moment decision making out of anger that certainly can't be undone...heh

"I think I'm falling in love with someone."

Sitting on the couch beside you, sharing the same warm blanket and with a glass of wine not unlike your own in hand, Yeosang turns to look at you with an expression that vividly says is that so?

It's evenings like this especially that you're thankful for your wealthy background—an apartment to yourself in the middle of the city during college—not something many others get to have for themselves. As a result, you and your boyfriend enjoy so many nights together such as this one, cuddled up in the living room with a movie on the television that neither of you have much intention of paying attention to.

"Oh really?" Yeosang says, playing along. "Anyone I know?"

You smile, pleased by his willingness. "Not sure, just some finance guy with bleached blonde hair and a pretty birthmark by his eye."

Grinning, Yeosang pulls closer to your body. "None of those things sound especially...special. Surely there's something else about him that you like that has you falling for him?"

Face nuzzling into your neck, you feel his lips press into the skin there while a hand beneath the blanket slips over your thigh and slowly between your legs.

"Yeah, I guess so," you reply, feigning being lost in thought on the matter. "He's got a big dick."

Yeosang laughs out loud and into your flesh—not anticipating the comment—and as a result you feel the wetness of his saliva sprinkled from his reaction. You reel with a shriek, pulling quickly away from him and lamenting the outcome of this through laughs that the both of you share.

"Seriously! You spit on me! Gross!"

"Sorry," he says quickly, still grasping towards you in an effort to pull you back against him. "I wasn't expecting the comment about my dick, can you really blame me?"

"For spitting on me!? Yes!" you retort, though playfully and with little resistance to his desire to have you close to him again.

"I didn't mean to do that part," Yeosang says, lips finding yours and hand slipping between your legs once you're close enough again. "I have something you can spit on though, if that would help."

An enticing offer, hard to refuse. You begin to allow yourself to melt into his touch, another evening of enjoying all of the ways that the two of you seem to fit together with such ease. In so many ways, you can't even begin to fathom a world in which you don't. Maybe this is it. Maybe this guy will be the one.

A concept you've never found yourself particularly fussed with before, but who knows. Maybe with him.

"Hey."

The word brings you back out of your thoughts, Yeosang's eyes fitted firmly onto your own now. A small smile paints his lips, as if wildly pleased just by the mere existence of you. Probably true, too. The beginning always feels like this.

"It's about time you caught up, was starting to think I was going to be waiting forever here, by myself, like a loser."

"What do you mean?" you question, eyebrows furrowed.

Yeosang kisses you lightly then, no nefarious intent behind it. A mere showing of kind affection towards you that feels so strongly like the warmth of adoration from one person to another. Innocent, well-meaning. Perfect.

"I love you."

Over the sound of sizzling onions in the pan just in front of you, the loud pop of a champagne cork echos through the dining area of your apartment and turning to look to your left, you watch your husband pour two glasses of the beverage. One for each of you.

Yeosang slides closer to you, slips an arm across the small of your back and around your body to pull you closer against him and places a kiss atop the peak of your shoulder. His lips curl into it, which has a similar effect on your own.

So, you turn your attention fully to him, and the two of you share a kiss over the savory scent of dinner preparation, and in times like this you're actually able to forget all of the other stuff that lies dormant beneath the happiness that exists within this partnership.

If only he was home more often so that it was more of the norm, and less of a reminder.

"It smells delicious," Yeosang says, lips still pressed into your shoulder as he stands beside you. "I wonder what dessert is going to be."

Hardly hidden in intent enough to even be considered an innuendo, Yeosang tips his glass lightly towards your own before whisking himself away and out of the kitchen entirely before you have a chance to chastise him for his filthy mind.

"Be good, or there won't be any dessert."

"I hardly believe that."

Unfortunately, Yeosang knows better. The long, messy hair that delicately cradles the sharp lines of his face as well as the pretty birthmark he has now long since given up trying to hide—your husband stands at the end of the kitchen island in just a plain, white button down shirt and black slacks, but it's plenty to have the mind wandering about what dessert might have to offer indeed.

You remain strong in your resolve, flash him a look that tells him to behave, and at the very least he appears to acquiesce to the suggestion, taking a sip of his drink and then carrying himself further away and towards the dining room table.

"How is it?"

You ask over the gentle clinking sounds of silverware against porcelain plating. It's not often that the two of you get to share evenings together such as this—dinner often reduced to quick and cheap take out, less candlelit filet and the fancy champagne glasses that you received as wedding gifts.

Yeosang leans back in his seat though, mouth full of food and chewing while grinning like a pleased child who couldn't possible receive anything else, anything better from the world. "Delicious. Amazing. You've really outdone yourself this time."

A loving grin takes your face, bashful in the praise even if it comes from your husband, and he's not even finished yet. Yeosang leans forward again with elbows into the glass table, eyes pressed onto you.

"I'm so lucky. The luckiest man on earth, if I had to guess."

You play along. "It is hard to imagine anyone else to be living more lavishly than you are right now, isn't it?"

"Unfathomable, really," he chuckles under his breath, taking a sip of champagne and tossing his napkin onto the table to signal his defeat by the meal in question. "I'd like to see someone try."

Sliding his hand across the table, you meet him halfway and place yours on top of it.

"I have a couple of work emails to catch up on that I've been ignoring all day," Yeosang says with a disgruntled sigh. "But after that...maybe we can revisit that conversation about dessert."

It's not the most ideal, but duty calls. Suppose the table could use some clearing and pans beginning their soaking process in the meantime—thus, you agree with little pushback on the matter.

"I'm holding you to that," you say, coy.

Yeosang takes his hand back, stands from the table and leans over to kiss you on the mouth, lips lingering just atop yours as he grants you a whispered reply. "Good, I hope you do."

Hands wet with warm water and dish soap, you idly drag a sponge across the front of a plate with little thought expended towards the act.

And then your phone vibrates atop the counter just beside.

You still—confused—it's so late in the evening by now that you wonder who it is that could possibly be attempting to contact you. Seonghwa knows you're sharing an evening with your husband and wouldn't bother with an attempt to shoot the shit right now, so when you quickly dry your hands and illuminate the screen, the email that pops up is far from one that you would expect to be finding.

Hey, Sorry for the late night contact, I was going through the other lists of contacts and couldn't find anyone who might be able to set me up with some industry viewings or interviews. Would you happen to know anyone I could speak to about this? My professor is, to put it kindly, useless. Thanks, Hongjoong.

You reread the email two, three times in total. Glance around yourself to ensure that you're alone despite knowing that Yeosang is still holed up in his office with work. Not that you're doing anything wrong—this is work of your own to deal with, after all.

Something in you enjoys this, however. Enjoys the attention, enjoys the way that Hongjoong comes to you for the things that he may need. There's a guilty part of you that knows that the correct choice in this matter is to tell him that he should only contact you during normal, business hours, but another, louder and perhaps sinister part that enjoys the attention; basks in the way that Hongjoong seemingly wants your attention just as much as the other way around, and has no qualms with doing what it takes to acquire it.

Your last meeting with him was a mistake, one that you have no intention of ever revisiting. Boundaries need to be put in place. You can reel this back enough that it sits firmly in the harmless flirting category rather than whatever that was that happened in the theater hall before.

Hey, Unfortunately, I don't have anything on hand, this conversation would be better suited for office hours back at the theaters. I have a personal listing of contacts that would probably suit you well in an effort to advance your career. The professors at the Akademiya have no such lists. We can meet sometime this week and look it over.

See? Perfectly professional. You set your phone down to get back to the dishes that await, but his reply chimes through quicker than anticipated, and worse than that, the excitement of that fact vibrates electric hot under your skin.

Then what kind of conversation would be better suited for the late evening hours? Do you have anything in mind? Instead of waiting for the week to meet, we should meet tomorrow night.

Well, you certainly can't chalk this one up to you. Wholly started by Hongjoong now, you try to fight back the way the corners of your lips curl upwards at how seemingly desperate he is for your attention—for you to talk to him, see him—and while you know you shouldn't be indulging in it, they're just emails. Just text. He can't touch you here, can't undress you here. Nothing on the table like the last time.

But now the dishes go all but forgotten entirely; you turn away from them, phone in hand and glancing up every now and then to keep an eye on the door to the office room. Still closed.

You wonder how wrong this really is. Where the line of affair truly begins and ends.

I don't think it's a good idea for either of us to be going out to do God knows what on a Saturday night, but I appreciate the offer. I can meet you early Monday morning to go over the potential prospects that would likely suit you.

Hongjoong replies quickly to that. Something that you find you are enjoying.

Perhaps not a good idea for you. There's a club I want to go to, you're not allowed to go out and dance when you're married? You didn't answer my question about what we should be talking about at night, by the way. Also, I'm a little regretful I didn't think to take photos of the garment on you, they would have helped a lot with the future planning phase. Instead when I'm working late at night I just have to go off of memory...

The last paragraph is so poignant that you almost immediately forget about the rest of the words laid out in the text. Your heart rate accelerates—hard and fast against your chest as you read the words over and over again—is he...? Is this...?

A thinly veiled admission to touching himself to the memory of touching you?

That thought does something hateful to the way your skin feels across your body. Heat felt all across you as you think of the possibility of it; Hongjoong laid out along his bed, the fabric of his shirt pushed up just slightly across his abdomen and pants pushed down, hand tightly wrapped around his cock as he thinks of you, imagines that it's you, pretends that it's you as he comes across his fist.

You shake the thought from your head as quickly as you can, but the lasting effect of it sitting pooled between your own legs isn't as easily pushed away.

There's a conscious effort to read back the email and simply ignore that bit now, so that you can at the very least reply to everything else.

Surely you have friends from the Akademiya to go with, no need for a married housewife to tag along.

Trying to make yourself sound as boring, uninteresting as possible. You continue on.

Sorry about the garment. As for nightly discussion topics, I'm not sure if there's anything that would be deemed rather appropriate.

Great. You've done your part. You sigh, quickly put your phone on the counter—face down—and make an effort to get back to the dishes, but unfortunately Hongjoong seems to have no intention of allowing you to do any such thing and his reply comes through just as fast as the others.

You nearly drop your phone upon reading it, however.

I don't want to go with friends from the Akademiya, and I have no intention of remaining professionally appropriate, either. I think you liked the way I touched you back at the theater. Do you want to know what other ways I can touch you?

No. No, no, no. In your mind, at the forefront of everything, you repeatedly tell yourself that you cannot engage with this any further. That a conversation needs to be had with the Akademiya board about this, that you cannot keep indulging in this banter with him, because it's going to impede not only your ability to be professional, but also his ability to be a student. You're going to have to take this to administration Monday morning. This can't keep going on.

Beyond that thought, your thoughts wander to exactly what it is that he's implying. Recalling the gentle, tender ghost of his fingertips across your skin, his attentive gaze upon your form with every movement, every single thing that he had done in regard to you. Hongjoong has only ever given you his full, undivided attention—you can't help but wonder what that might be like when there is no barrier to the way his hands, or mouth, could be on you.

You must not reply quick enough for his liking, and that makes sense because a part of you has long since abandoned the want to continue partaking in the conversation at all. It's no good for you, and only going to get worse the more you respond. There's guilt there, because what if he feels terribly for having sent you such things—creepy, uncomfortable in the aftermath of never being met with a response—but the stronger part of you, the part that slowly has your own hand sinking down into the front of your jeans to alleviate some of the pressure that this has resulted in, can't be bothered to care. Regardless, another email from him comes across your inbox.

Are you thinking about it now? I'm thinking about it too.

The thought has you putting pressure into your fingertips, bottom lip caught up between your teeth as you close your eyes and picture it; his hands on himself, his hands on you.

You have no business indulging in this fantasy, but at the end of the day, it is just that. It's not real, and nothing has happened. You imagine your husband has probably shared similar moments of weakness—coming over his fist to the thought of having a colleague in a particularly fitted pencil skirt, no doubt. It's a human want, desiring the new, and even in some cases, desiring precisely the thing that we should not ever have.

Hongjoong doesn't email again, and in ways it leaves you high and dry—wanting but never reaching any particular point within the interaction. You wash your hands then stand idly in front of the sink, staring blankly into the tiled, back wall of the countertop and contemplating what, exactly, you're going to say to the administration board come Monday morning.

Less than the breaking through of light through the crack of the blinds, it's the feeling of your husband nesting his chin against your shoulder that wakes you back to consciousness in the morning.

Yeosang brings an arm up from behind you, tosses it lazily over your side to pull you tighter against his form. Lips drop chaste kisses to the exposed skin below them, and the reminder of his early morning attraction to you is felt firm and thick against you from behind.

And so, you lightly push back into him, reveling in the low groan that rumbles in his throat as a result of the motion. His kisses upon your shoulder turn slightly harder and paired with small nips of his teeth—the hand once against your stomach then traveling down beneath the sheets and settling between your legs.

"Good morning, baby," he says, just above a whisper and the morning gravel to his tone adding just that much more to the desire you carry for him. "Sorry for the late night, maybe I can make it up to you now?"

Practiced fingers rubbing into you, Yeosang continues pressing himself against you, hard and thick, slotting between your pressed together legs and shallowly driving into you as to simulate the turn that this morning can take. You moan lightly, melting into the touch. Desire creeping up through your veins at a rapid pace and pushing back timed just right to meet his motions halfway.

"You do kind of owe me," you answer back playfully, alluding to being left to fall asleep alone so many hours ago. "How do you intend to do that?"

Yeosang hums, thoughtful. "In theory, shouldn't I be at the mercy of your whims? Made to do whatever it is that you wish of me?" His hand slips away from between your legs then, instead moves between your bodies, positioning himself better for what's soon to come. "Or maybe I'll just take matters into my own hands. Flip you over, fuck you into the mattress where you belong."

Your groan is louder but still airy and sleep-carried at not only the words, but Yeosang's initial, slow drive inside of you. A strong hand moving to grip at your thigh—pry your leg apart just slightly to make space for him to fill you—it only takes a few, shallow strokes before he sits firmly planted deep within the warmth of you, though he doesn't sit still for much time before he withdraws equally long and slow, pushing in again and biting into the skin of your shoulder as you gasp out at the feeling of him having you.

"How's this for owing you?" he asks, though there's little genuine question in it and you know that. "How about I make you come around my dick, then we'll see who owes who."

Yeosang delivers a hard thrust then, punching the air and another whimpered moan out from your throat as you lean forward to clutch at the sheets beneath your bodies. His motions don't relent, settling into that pace for the foreseeable future—fingers gripping hard into the flesh of your thigh as he nearly pulls your body down and onto his cock with every drive forward.

"Fuck, Yeosang—"

"Yeah? Feels that good already?" he answers low, taunting. "Always know you're dying for it when I've got you moaning my name."

Repeated hard and long strokes of himself into your body that quickly send you teetering on the edge of release, Yeosang continues teasing you through it with his words—the sound of your bodies meeting quickly and in succession resounding through the otherwise silent room—and just when you feel your body pulling taut around him, whining and whimpering into the sheets below in desperation for him not to stop, to keep going, begging for more, harder, faster; Yeosang gifts you with just that.

"That's it baby," he says now, voice more pointed, domineering. "Come real good for me so I can fill you up just like you want—" teeth nipping into your skin again, teeth clenched when he stops to speak and fucks you even harder still, almost angrily in delivery both words and body. "Fuck my cum deep into you, get myself that baby I want after all."

It rattles you, but you're too far gone and within the throes of dirty talk, the filthiness of it still has you coming apart around him just like he wants from you. When your orgasm crashes over you, it has every nerve ending in your body firing off, skin on fire and burning at the spots in which he touches you as he continues to fuck you through it, and shortly after, empties himself inside of you with a deep, hearty groan too.

But the post-orgasmic bliss of it all wears off much quicker than under normal circumstances.

Your breathing steadies, body returning to normal fast and as a result, you're pulling away from him and creating space between your forms. When his softening length drops from inside of you and the subsequent leaking of what he's left spills out, you grimace at the feeling of it.

You don't say anything right away, but he must notice—knows you. The two of you have been here before, after all.

"What?" he asks, but his tone makes it evident that he already is well enough aware, and annoyed by your reaction too.

Part of you considers not bothering with answering him, little point to starting this fight, but he is your husband, and suppose he deserves at least that much.

"Seriously? Again with that?"

Yeosang doesn't say anything right away, which spurs your glancing back and over your shoulder at him.

He's smiling. Pleased.

"You didn't seem to hate the idea when you were coming."

"Yeah, because you were talking dirty to me and I enjoy having sex with you! It feels good! I love you! That doesn't mean it's free range for you to drag in all of our points of contention."

He rolls his eyes, turns to lie on his back. "All of our points of contention, as if there are any besides this one thing."

You have to fight back the laugh that wants to tear through you, it's like he's never heard anything you've been saying at all: in regards to a baby, in regards to his being gone all the time, in regards to your inability to nourish your desire for the arts. Nothing at all.

Instead, you pull yourself up from the bed entirely and make haste in getting dressed. You've got to get out of here, and more than that, you have to get away from him.

Yeosang's eyes remain on you as you throw items on your body. "I have to go to work," you say, and when you hear your husband huff out a laugh, you regret giving him even that much.

"Work," he repeats, plain. "I'm sure you have so much work to do."

That infuriates you more. The incessant unwillingness to take you or anything you do seriously so long as it doesn't involve him and his wants from you. You pull a light jacket from the closet, shrug it on fast, then walk back to the nightstand to grab your phone and hurry your way out of the room.

"Lemmie ask you something," Yeosang then says, voice still simple and unbothered in a way that infuriates you just that much more. Because of course he doesn't care, you'll come around for his desires just as you always do, he just has to wait it out a bit longer.

You stop in the doorway, turn to look at him, and don't bother masking the contempt etched into your face.

"Do you want to have a baby?"

Counting the seconds between the words leaving his mouth, and your response to him is simple enough. It's seven. Seven seconds is all it takes to come to your final conclusion.

"No."

And then you're gone.

So many reasons to go home, you instead ignore all of them in favor of staying late at the theater office.

You make up work that needs to be done. Door knobs that need to be polished and rooms that need to be vacuumed out despite just having done it not long ago before. Emails that probably need to be tended to though it's the weekend, and you've already answered the ones that had come in through the week.

A few hours into the dark quiet of the night, you consider that maybe you do need to finally go home. Confront your husband, have this conversation finally. You're not really ready to do that. You wonder if you ever will be ready to do that.

You wonder if this is what standing in the face of a divorce looks like—having told him the truth of how you're feeling now. Maybe Yeosang already has the papers drafted up. Maybe it takes longer than a few hours to get the papers drafted up. You don't know, it's your first potential divorce, after all.

But the idea of it, of dissolving your marriage to him and going your separate ways saddens you in such a distinct and visceral way that perhaps you'd lost sight of over the last few contentious weeks. A reminder that you love him, that you want to remain in this marriage to him—but you don't want to have a baby, not like this.

Memories of the horrible comments he has made to you in relation to it all then flood through your mind and you're filled with rage over them all over again. You try to remember a time back in college when he was so terrible to you like this, a red flag that you had missed, or maybe just ignored. You fail to locate one, but the anger that sits at your finger tips as a result of it itches in such a distinct and particular way that you have a difficult time setting it aside and being the bigger person about it.

A desire to cause harm, a craving to do to him as he has done to thoughtlessly to you.

Your phone vibrates then, pulls you from the thoughts about it all. Far from hoping to be greeted by a message from the man in question, you're instead shocked to find what it is that is awaiting you, having all but forgotten not only him, but what this evening is.

Last chance to come out tonight.

It's the only thing Hongjoong says. No flirtation, no additional commentary about what may or may not lie beneath the suggestion. A simple enough message, and because of that, suppose you find it easy to lull yourself into what may be a false sense of comfort in regards to the situation.

If only your husband knew. He would hate finding out about where you were going, and who with.

All the more reason to go.

You reply, tell Hongjoong to send you the address of where to meet and he does so quickly. Still, nothing extra added to the messages, so flat, in fact, that you consider the possibility of being entirely delusional about the exchange of messages the night prior. Maybe that never happened, maybe you had had a little too much to drink.

It's not hard to locate the email thread and scroll through the messages as they had been left to you, and no, you did not, in fact, have too much to drink last night.

You grab your bag, sling it over your shoulder, and head out down the red Aurelian halls towards the door.

Upon your arrival, you realize that you had not put thought into proper dress attire for this sort of endeavor—not that it had been planned anyway.

It's early enough in the evening that the crowd outside isn't that jam packed. People stand around in small pockets of peer groups, dressed somewhat similarly as if having presented a theme and wholeheartedly wanting to stick to it. The sight of it sort of endears you, makes you wish that that was something that you could partake in too.

Instead, here you are; oversized hoodie and a boring, black skirt that comes down about mid-thigh. Hardly sexy, hardly anything really.

You glance down at yourself, frown a little at what you have to offer. A few years back you probably would have really killed the scene at something like this, but now, this is all you've managed to bring to the table.

There's a run climbing its way up the side of your calf in your tights, and you can't help but think of it as an incredibly apt manifestation of everything.

"Hey."

Turning to face the voice, Hongjoong approaches you as he takes a final drag of a burnt down cigarette. Not a fan, but far from your place and you suppose it's not especially shocking, either. He's never smelled of smoke down at the theater, but more than this knowledge is the fact that he's more or less dressed just the same as you usually see him too. Tight, slightly ripped jeans, a simple shirt, and a jacket over top—only this one has more zippers, more buttons, more adornments that make it appear more him.

"I didn't know you smoke."

"I don't really, only socially, when I'm drinking," he replies, flicking it to the ground and crushing it under the heel of his boot. "Why? Don't like that?"

You shrug. "Not really up to me what you do, I'm not your keeper."

Hongjoong smirks, leans in a little bit closer to your face with those words. "Mmm, wouldn't you like to be though."

He leans back again just as quickly, as if never having said or done anything out of the ordinary at all. Looks you up and down for a second—judging, you consider—but any negative commentary never comes, and instead he nods towards the entrance to go inside.

"You ever been here?" he asks as the two of you wait behind only a handful of people at the door.

"No," you can't help but laugh. An asinine question. "I'm thirty."

"So? You can't have fun anymore when you're thirty? What's the age cut off? Or is it just that your husband doesn't want you getting out of the house too much anymore."

Hearing Hongjoong speak so clearly about Yeosang sends a spike of rage down your spine that you sort of don't expect. You want to bite back at the comment, though the truth in it and a reminder of what it is that he has said to you grants Hongjoong unknown reprieve from being on the receiving end of such.

"I just don't get out much anymore, not like this," you choose to reply. Somewhat true, in ways. You watch Hongjoong nod to the door guy as the both of you enter together and become swallowed up but the pitch black dark and loud, booming bass of the floor inside, forcing you to yell the remainder of your sentence to your company for the evening.

"No one to go with."

Hongjoong turns his head, looks you dead in the eye at that. Mischievous perk to the corner of his lips as he leans in so slowly, so pointedly, that a part of you thinks that he's going to kiss you.

"Guess I'm going to have to fix you then."

It's not lost on you at all, the verbiage of choice. Not a matter of fixing that, your outlook, your circumstances. No.

He's going to fix you.

An hour or so into the night and two drinks down, there's a loosening in your body that feels much needed after the prior events that still hang heavily over your head. The music is loud—so loud that you can feel it rattling through your bones—jarring in a way that feels new to you despite this not being your first time at a place such as this. Hongjoong seems content with allowing you to take the lead for the evening, and the two of you hang back in a corner of the open floor plan just next to the steps that lead upwards. He asks if you want to get another drink but you decline the offer, swaying to the electronic music as stand.

A few more moments pass, he leans in towards your ear once again. "Dance with me."

It's less of a request, more of a demand you realize, when you feel him slot himself behind you and a hand sets lightly against your waist. A part of you wants to protest the action, remembering the last time you allowed the man to be so close in proximity to you and what resulted from that. Tonight isn't supposed to go like that. Tonight is only meant to take the edge off of the looming problems that await you back home.

The alcohol certainly helps, fuzzy through your veins and electrifying his touch on you. Not long after, Hongjoong spins you so that you're facing him, hand coming up to hold you by the back of the neck and pulling you so closely to him that your foreheads meet and eyes settle harshly upon one another. In a brief moment of weakness, you remember the emails sent the night before; the implications, the understanding without explicitly being stated that they hold. A rush of excitement courses through you—you shouldn't be here, you shouldn't be here with him.

Then you think of Yeosang, wonder what he's doing right now while you're out here, like this. Wonder if he's choosing baby names, wonder if he's going as far as to sabotage your birth control. You don't really know how far he's willing to go to get what he wants from you—his wife, his incubator.

At a place like this, with a man like Hongjoong, none of that matters. He wants nothing of the sort from you. Zero expectations of a role you're meant to be fulfilling for him.

You love your husband, but you also hate him for everything that he is putting you through.

Hongjoong's face slips past yours, mouth settling atop your ear instead. So close that you can feel the warmth of his breath ghosting over you, sending a shiver across your flesh.

"Stop thinking," he says against you. His other hand sits at your hip, though you can feel the burn of his fingers curling into you—the fabric of your skirt riding up your leg to expose more of it. "You can be whatever or whoever you want here. None of that other shit matters."

His lips slip down just a bit then, lightly trailing over the skin of your neck—almost nonexistent in the way that he touches you but still so sure of it that you allow your head to fall back, loll to the side with eyes closed to take it in. Hongjoong's teeth graze you, and it manifests in a vivid throb of arousal between your legs that you want more than anything to find the strength to ignore.

But you don't, not anymore.

You bring your head back up, look him in the eyes for just a moment before your lips crash against his, and he meets you eagerly, hungrily. Not missing a beat despite the neediness. No one is here to find you, no one is here to see this, and for all intents and purposes; it might as well not even exist. Not the kiss, not you, and not him. The hand cradling the back of your neck tightens in grip, pulls you harder against his mouth as teeth nip at your bottom lip like he's been waiting for this forever. Desperate for it, unwilling to allow you to escape it. You don't want to anyway.

Over the sound of your back meeting the firm mattress below, you barely have a chance to find your bearings—hear the sound of the front door closing and clicking locked—before Hongjoong is crawling over your form and pressing his mouth to every bit of exposed skin that he can manage to find. There isn't much, and this obviously frustrates him with the quickness in which he pulls you sitting, hurriedly peels off the sweatshirt that hides your torso from him, and tosses it somewhere on the floor of his quiet apartment.

He kisses you again, just as much neediness as before, and you meet him with just the same amount of vigor. Quick fingers unfastening the garment still hiding your chest from him, his mouth traveling downward then to press his mouth and tongue into the soft flesh that awaits him there.

You gasp out, back arching up and into him. Heat rushing to your head with every expertly placed swirl of his tongue, though it's lost quickly when he sits back onto his heels, grabs at you by the thighs and pulls your hips to the edge of the bed to settle himself between. It's dizzying intoxicating, everything happening so quickly that you can barely find it within yourself to keep up. When you're grounded enough, Hongjoong's fingers are already dug into the hem of your skirt, pulling it down your legs, and when your eyes meet his, he makes it a point to dig nails into the soft fabric of your already previously marred tights. Ripping them more as they cascade down to pool at the floor.

There's a protest that begins within you but dies out in almost an instant—the feeling of Hongjoong's tongue pressed into your folds destroying any chance the words had at escaping out into the air.

"Oh my God—" is what you do get out, and Hongjoong hums into your cunt in response to the lazy attempt.

Urgency courses through every movement, and it thrills you and sets your body alight. You understand it well, every thought put out of your mind except for him, the way that he's touching you, the way that he seems to crave your body in a way that you haven't quite experienced in so, so long. To be desired for exactly what you are, not what you could be—not for what you can give him in the future, even.

Hongjoong's fingers come up to meet his mouth, presses two inside of you slowly enough but the need is still sitting just behind the motion. You moan out loud at the feeling of him—any part of him—filling your body. Back arching again, hands coming down to curl into strands of hair that do not belong to the man who put a ring on your finger.

He sets a rhythm, brings you even closer to being drunk with visceral want for him. All you can think about is what's next, needing more, needing to feel more of him.

And it's as if he can read your mind, understand your body as it lies beneath his grasp as he pulls away; stands just long enough to strip himself of his jacket, his shirt. Can't be parted from you long enough to remove his jeans all the way and only gets far enough that the front is unbuttoned before he's pushing you up the length of the bed and slotting himself between your legs once more. Lips crashing down onto yours just like before, the weight of his body held to one arm while he works himself out of his jeans and you don't get any further warning than that before he sinks into you—slowing just enough in an effort to ease the sting of the stretch, but carving space inside of your body for him all the same.

You gasp out, his name somewhere in the sounds. His teeth find your neck as a hand finds one of your thighs you pull you open for him. Hongjoong's hips snap into you three, four times, and each time the air is punched out of your lungs, electricity raging through your body with every hard, thick drag of his cock inside of you.

He feels and looks like heaven when he pulls back enough to focus on the task at hand—a steady, rough rhythm as he fucks you hard, reveling in every whimper and moan and gasp that he drags out of you as he does so. Bottom lip tucked up between his teeth as he stares down at the way that you come undone beneath him. You want him. You desire him. You crave everything about him—most of all, the way that he craves you.

There's so much behind it, overwhelming in all ways. Another pained, desperate whimper falling from your lips as you reach out towards his face to bring him closer to you. He does, drapes himself over your body as he continues full, pointed drives that have him burying every inch of himself between your legs. You attempt words though it's much of a failure, but Hongjoong seems wildly attuned to the needs of you, your body—brings the hand not clutching at the flesh of your thigh up and into your hair as if to hold you there in place, his lips sitting at the shell of your ear once more to drive you just that much more wild.

"Anything you want," he whispers against you, a call back to an earlier conversation before things ever got this far. Not even all that long ago, either.

Your muscles tighten, contracting with the impending crash of your orgasm. You know what you want: to feel him like this for as long as you can manage to do so. His lips on your skin, his hands all across your body, the perfect, velvet drag of his cock against your walls—a desire to taste him, watch him come against your tongue—and perhaps even the filthy desire to be had by him, taken by him, in all of the other ways that people who engage in debauchery do. Even currently fucked by him, your mind wanders briefly to the thought of a hand tightly wrapped around your throat, and his cock embedded tightly in your ass.

Anything you want. What do you want? This?

"'m coming—" you gasp, the words barely even coherent enough to be understood, but Hongjoong is attuned to it, to your body in such an unfathomable way. Delivers into you harder, longer, more fulfilling strokes until you're whining and begging and nearly crying out as your release crashes down upon your body. Eyes rolling, crown of your head pushed back and into the mattress as your body arches up and against his own—orgasm ravaging you, claiming you for his.

Hongjoong hisses at the tail end of yours, two, three drives tip to hilt inside of you and then he buries himself deep to the point that it nearly pains you to have him so hard and heavy and be so full of him, but he holds you there—down and against him and in place as he empties inside of your cunt with a few pulsing, firm throbs.

The weight of reality crashes down much faster than you suppose you might have anticipated—if you were to have considered this to ever be an option that you would go through with.

Your stomach turns, chest clenches tight, and throat runs dry. Hongjoong kisses you on the mouth and that distracts you long enough—still melting into his touch—what you've done not enough to put you off of the man that has been your ultimate moral failing.

How did you get here? How did you allow this to happen?

It's in that moment that you hear the vibration of your phone from inside of your purse, left somewhere along the floor in the flurry of sexual deviancy. Hongjoong lies himself on top of you fully, holding you to the mattress as his lips find your neck and trail hot, wet kisses into the skin there, as if still in need of your body. As if just having had you moments ago not even close to enough to take the edge of his want for you off.

And it's just as intoxicating to you as before. Eyes closing, palms running up his back and nails digging into his skin as you feel him gently begin drives of himself inside of you once more. Softening, spent length still nestled against your walls, marred and marked with his cum even still as he shallowing fucks into you again.

"Ignore it," he whispers into your skin, teeth finding the flesh in a way that has you keening.

"I have to—" you start, finding all of the will inside of yourself to pull away just enough to locate the bag. Hongjoong once more pushes your back down against the mattress, continues his handwork on your body as you do whatever task it is that you need to do, unbothered by the fact. "It might be my—"

Hongjoong's head pops up from the crook of your neck just enough, the two of you making eye contact at your unwillingness to state the obvious. As if he's testing you, waiting to see if you're willing to say the word.

3 Missed Calls.

Terrors strikes through your bones at the sight, already knowing who from. The feeling of a hand slipping down between sweat-dampened bodies not enough to distract you—that is, until his fingers find and begin their work stroking circles against your clit.

"Hongjoong, I have to—"

His hips push forward, firmer once again. His cock hardened and fuller in the meantime and offering deliriously delicious friction that, when paired with the perfect press of his fingers just above the place where he remains buried inside of you, leaves you wildly unable to escape his hold.

"I'm not done with you yet."

You type up a text, send it off just as quickly and toss your phone back to the floor. Hongjoong swiftly changes your positions; lies himself back against the bed and pushes you up to be seated atop him. Body weight pushing him fuller into you, grinding yourself down harder in all of the ways that make your body feel like it's on fire as his hands once more travel your skin—nails digging into your hip, soft pads of his fingers ghosting over the supple flesh of your chest in just the way that has you arching and whimpering for more.

Over the breathy, quiet groan of Hongjoong from below you, you hear the quiet vibration of your phone receiving a message. Most likely from Seonghwa, because that is the person that your only message this evening has gone out to.

If Yeosang asks, tell him I'm with you. I'll explain tomorrow. Love you.

Only a few more perfect rolls of your hips, and Hongjoong has you unraveling for him all over again.

a/n: oh dear.

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bird-inacage · 10 months

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Only Friends: Ray x Sand Character & Relationship Theories

So a fun game I like to play before a series airs, is to speculate on the characters and the possible direction or conflicts that may arise (based only on what we've seen so far). An initial delve into Ray and Sand as individuals and as a couple.

RAY

"Ray is quite spoiled. He wants to be pampered by everyone." Being spoilt often means getting your way, and hence unable to compromise or settle for less. Ray loves attention, which can lead to an inflated sense of self-importance or narcissism. The issue with this is your identity becomes so easily informed by those around you. Without attention to thrive on, Ray may feel invisible or inadequate. And when feeling insecure, they may feel driven to do things to purposely draw attention to themselves (exhibitionist-like behaviour or throwing tantrums/sulking). Attention only supplies a fleeting sense of validation. It's nowhere close to true fulfilment.

A spoilt nature can also manifest as clinginess or possessiveness. ‘This is mine', 'this belongs to me and only me.' As Khaotung puts it, Ray likes being 'pampered' aka doted on by those around him. So when Mew is swiped away by Top from under his nose, Ray is clearly annoyed. This is partly due to Top being his love rival, but I believe it's more simple than that. Mew is his friend. Once Top comes into the picture, Mew naturally spends much less time with him. Possessiveness is the close relative of (petty) jealousy. You don't want 'your people' spending time with anyone else. You ideally want them revolving their time around you, because they validate your existence.

"Be patient with his hot temper, because Ray is easily frustrated." Confrontational, brash, and a loose cannon when angry. Ray seems to react on emotion rather than rationale. If things aren't to his liking, his immediate knee jerk reaction is to act out. Essentially, he's a bit of a brat. "He's going to be straightforward. His words might not be appropriate. Ray might just say what he wants honestly." Ray isn't deterred by formalities or niceties. You’ll get the truth whether you like it or not.

"Deep down, I think he's someone who needs love." "So if you're his friend, he might fall for you too." These points Khaotung shared are the most intriguing in my opinion. It implies that it's not Mew exclusively that Ray could have developed a crush on. It could have easily been another close friend in an alternative version of events. Ray may latch onto others far too easily (especially towards those who give him positive attention and reinforcement, possibly).

SAND

First emphasises that Sand's financial situation has a huge bearing on his character. "He works to earn his living, thus he must be patient when doing things to ensure his survival... he has to work many jobs to earn money". Sand appears to be a musician who side hustles as a sex worker (which is at least two jobs). He has to be resourceful and pragmatic, especially in how to set his priorities in order.

"Sand doesn't have time. He's someone you must approach first." If they say my treat, they suddenly become more interesting to him." It requires more effort for someone to get to know Sand. I speculate that Ray might begin by 'hiring' Sand under the pretence of work. If Sand doesn't have much free time to spare, this would allow Ray to see him if he offers to 'pay for it'. Even though it's in Sand's best interests to pursue connections that will benefit him, he makes exceptions for those he considers his friends. This tells me that Sand has a strong righteous and moral compass. No matter how tough his own circumstances may be, he'll prioritise those he cares about.

"You will see his patience." Patience nurtures a willingness to listen and a willingness to compromise. Patience suggests registered and thoughtful decision-making rather than haste. Unfortunately it can cause others to push your boundaries, under the assumption you'll be more forgiving. In the trailer, he's frequently on the receiving end of Ray's wrath. Everyone has a limit, and it's likely that Ray will test Sand's patience to the point he snaps.

"People around him might sense tension and pressure from him sometimes." It's no surprise that when you live on the edge, you can be highly strung. His circumstances would understandably make him less tolerant to 'first world problems' or unnecessary shenanigans. Sand seems like the type to have a no nonsense policy for mind games. He could be a voice of reason in the series, as we see him trying to talk sense into Nick regarding Boston’s treatment of him. I have a hunch Sand will act out of genuine concern for Ray in a lot of instances, which gets rebuffed or misunderstood as being overly nosy or preachy.

RAY x SAND: Potential Conflicts

Sand's Financial Status

Mew, Ray, Boston and Top all seem to move in the same circles - appearing fairly wealthy. Often seen in homes with huge pools, driving nice cars and dress fairly dapper too. Ray has a ridiculously lavish bedroom (I mean fur pillows??) Whereas I think Sand and Nick may live together, and are on the other end of the spectrum. Sand works multiple jobs and Nick works in a phone shop.

When there is a wealth imbalance, it's common for those lesser off to have a complex around this (being in a position of disadvantage and seen as inferior). "Do I need to pamper you and call you Sugar Daddy? I don't know how to do that." By definition, 'Sugar Daddy' is usually someone older/richer who lavishes gifts on their 'partner' in exchange for sexual favours. Sand's cynic quip is a little dig at their dynamic, alluding to the fact that he doesn't know how to play to those in richer circles.

"It's clear that you just can't take care of what you have." Top mocks Sand in a way that could support this theory. That he can't take care of Ray and support his lifestyle. Ray also says, "You think my life will be better with you?" Which could be interpreted as: 'What value do you bring to my life (when I already have everything)?' It also has an air of 'Who are you to comment on my life when we come from different worlds entirely?'

Ray is High Maintenance or 'Troubled'

"I'll never take someone like you as my boyfriend." Which is Sand declaring: 'You/Your type are way too much trouble for me'. (Famous last words). He also says, "You should save your money for a shrink." Ray likely comes with baggage, bad habits or more serious issues. Whatever this may be, it's very clear to Sand that Ray would be too challenging a prospect as a boyfriend. Though there is undoubtedly attraction between them, Sand's wariness about these issues are strong enough for him to be hesitant about going further.

Another curious detail is in one scene Ray's arm is in a sling, and another he appears to have a bruised lip and cheek. Ray clearly has a volatile temper, which is a probable cause for trouble. But something tells me that Ray may have a far more underlying problem that would warrant Sand suggesting he see a shrink. Anger management issues feels too on the nose.

More Than Just Bed Friends

At the start of the series, Ray is pining over Mew. Somewhere along the line he starts to pursue Sand more seriously instead, though Sand doesn't consider Ray as boyfriend material. "Can you make an exception for me?"

"Can you stop thinking about something else for just one second? Focus on me for once, will you?" Sand seems frustrated that Ray blows hot and cold, which means he doesn't really know where he stands. Ray has either given very mixed signals from the get go or majorly yo-yos after Mew is definitely taken. "Stop poking your nose into my business. What are we to each other?" "Now that you already stepped into my life, I won't let you walk away." One minute he's telling Sand to piss off, and the next he's vowing not to let Sand out of his sights.

The ultimate conflict being 'so, what are we'?

Ray and Sand are referred to as 'Bed Friends' but Boston and Nick are referred to as 'Friends with Benefits'. (I thought this meant the same thing, but is there a distinction? Someone enlighten me if so). In the context of this series, it seems 'Bed Friends' refers to sex that leads to friendship. Whereas 'Friends with Benefits' are two friends that have sex regularly but don't share a romantic relationship.

-----

There will be plenty to analyse as soon as the first episode airs this week. Super interested to hear what others have been speculating is in store for us. We will not be prepared.

#only friends #only friends the series #ofts #only friends theories #ray x sand #sand x ray #khaofirst #firstkhao #first x khaotung #khaotung x first #khaotung thanawat #first kanaphan

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your-mom-friend · 3 months

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hey rem, I’m just curious, no judging—what’s the reason you left your religion? I found that you’ve been struggling more since you started to lose your faith, so I just wondered what made you take that decision?

Well, since you asked so kindly

I left my religion slowly, over a long time, for a lot of reasons.

The easiest one that most people accept is that I do t like Islam’s treatment of queer people, since being queer is a huge part of my identity and people are usually ready to accept that answer.

But it is not so cut and dry

The reason is that I do not believe in the concept of an all-powerful, all-knowing, and completely passionate and caring deity that presides over the universe.

If Allah exists, then he allowed a five year old child to be groomed and abused, by a man that styles himself as an Islamic Scholar, for almost nine years. He allowed that trauma to happen and allowed that man to die before he could face any justice for his crimes.

And for what? Because it’s part of his plan? If an omniscient and omnipotent being needs an innocent child to suffer like that for his plan to come to fruition, he is either not as compassionate as he claims or not as powerful as he claims.

People will tell me that he will burn in Jahannam for eternity for his crimes, but why was the crime allowed to happen at all?

Do you know why Muslims pray five times a day? The Quran tells the story, saying that on the night of Al Isra wal Miraj, the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) ascended to Jannat (heaven) and was able to speak to Allah, who told him that every Muslim was to pray to him 50 times a day. He accepted, and as he descended through the layers of heaven, the prophet Musa (Moses, peace be upon him) told him to go back up and negotiate it lower. 50 to 45 to 40 and so on until it went to 5. That’s why there are five daily prayers.

What sort of God is so egotistical that he needs every single believer to pray to him 50 times a day to prove they love him? If he is all knowing, why start with 50 and not just command it be 5? Why do you need 5 at all? Why do you need people to constantly tell you that they love you?

I have my own religious trauma, from things taught in classes to the fucking pedophile calling himself a priest who came to my home 90 minutes a day 6 days a week for 8 and a half years, who was too religious to celebrate a birthday or let anyone else do so but apparently not enough to avoid abusing children

There are many arguments to be made about why I dislike Islam, most of them can be boiled down to something someone or the other will argue to be “misinterpretations of the text” or “a cultural thing” or “personal choice”

But in the end, at my core, I do not believe in the concept of a perfect, unerring God. The “Perfect” god of Islamic and Christian faith, insofar as I have seen, has allowed untold carnage, depraved abuse, and unspeakable violence to occur with the promise that one day, if you’re good, if you follow the rules, and pray every day, things will eventually, some day, somehow, turn out fine.

I respect Muslims. I respect Christians. I respect every single religion and every person of faith because I believe they all want to be good and do good because I think that is the nature of humanity. Who they choose to attribute that good to is none of my concern. I believe that everyone is human before they are their religion. Neither goodness nor badness can be attributed to a religion. They all have supremacists and extremists and people that will give their lives away trying to do good and make the world a better place. But if a god comes and declares that they are responsible for all of that, including the bad, and are just letting it happen for “divine purpose”? I reserve the right to question that.

And for the record, sweetheart, I am not suffering more since I’ve left my religion. I’ve been suffering the same for a very long time, and it’s only now that I’m in college, away from home, that I’m getting the space to process all of it. And sometimes things have to get worse before they get better. Right now it’s just worse than usual because the holiest month of the Islamic year is about to start, and it is always tough on me.

#rem rambles #ask and ye shall recieve #anon asks #ex religious #religious trauma #ex muslim

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lanafofana · 21 days

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The chronic pain do be chronic-ing today so have some edible induced ranting :)

I hate when you’re on the dock and Gale’s like I’m gonna do it, I’m gonna give the crown to Mystra. And tav/durge is like and then you’ll be Mystra’s chosen again!

What? What? What?!

I understand that his character growth is about trusting in the goddess to understand how the crown should be handled and following through with his oath in a bid for redemption.

I get that, in surrendering the crown, he is finally accepting that who he is is enough, not only for his lover but also, for himself.

But, larian, I have spent an entire [redacted] talking my companions down from the precipice and severing their blind devotion to their deities so why the FUCK am I suddenly like yaaas embrace the chosen status! Fuck agency!

(Remember how Gale accepted/understood that Elminster had no choice but to charge him with self detonation because he was bound by the duty of being Mystra’s chosen??)

Especially as someone who romanced him and saw him up close and personal at his absolute lowest when he was damn near willing to jump out any window he came across because he thought fatal penance was the only redeeming path open to him.

And to be clear I’m not in the Mystra hate camp, I get why you would be but I think she acted in typical ‘nothing matters more than The Balance’ god fashion. If anything, I kinda headcanon that Gale had an intrinsic touch of fate/destiny about him that probably drew her attention. She may not have known or understood exactly what the nature of that fate/destiny was and, eventually realizing the danger the Absolute posed to gods as well as mortals, simply misinterpreted it. She, as well as everyone, was making decisions based on the information available as well as the wisdom of past experience (cough Karsus).

Something I don’t see talked about much, and maybe it’s because I’m usually too deeply entrenched in my Halsin brainrot to look for, is how power hungry Gale is. When he’s convincing you that he should be allowed to pursue godhood he tries to convince you that, morally, he’s going to be so much better than the other gods. There’s an option to say something like Morality? Who cares about morality? Think of the power! And Gale’s response? Could not be more chuffed. He’s like OMG YOU GET ME.

And…like, his pursuit of power is not just based in thinking he’s not good enough. Before he was knocked down several pegs by the orb sucking away the majority of his powers, he very much considered himself good enough. He desired power, lusted after it so much, he was willing to ignore the wisdom of the goddess of magic herself. True he was pursing it out of a misplaced devotion to the diety he loved but he was still pig headed enough to pursue it. The man had confidence coming out of his ears. I 100% believe if he had understood the nature of the Karsite weave and had knowledge of the Crown’s existence he could have been the Big Bad of Baldur’s Gate 3 instead of the Dead Three.

Anyways, what was I saying? Uhhhh yeah! So his path to redemption is very much about relinquishing that lust for power. Power for its own sake, as well as power as a balm for his crippling self doubt. Self doubt he only acquired because he was one of the most powerful and gifted wizards of his time and had the majority of his powers stripped from him for reasons he didn’t fully understand.

And telling him how great that he can finally return to being Mystra’s chosen feels like erasing that agency he’s finally found for himself.

Anyway, I hate it. Fuck being chosen.

I need a nap.

#bg3 spoilers #bg3 gale #gale dekarios #gale of waterdeep #mystra

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