#unfortunately charlie is not streaming this week BUT

[yonpote]

yall gotta start watching charlie on twitch pleeeeease you dont have to chat you can just lurk (altho it would be fun to see more peeps in chat) but her vibes are immaculate like we just hang out and talk a bit, we get to look at gideon her fluffy old man cat, other than Epic Stardew Gaming she also does lego builds and some indie games, and everyone in the community is just so sweet and welcoming and funny and aaaaaa just watch charlie w meee :')

#unfortunately charlie is not streaming this week BUT #its cuz shes working on a new youtube vid so thats exciting!!!! #also if yall do come along and watch charlies streams pls... be chill #i think i explained how i felt when SOME phannies are in pj's chat and dont engage w pj and just talk abt their own thing #i havent reeeally seen that in charlie's chat which is nice! but if u chat pls! engage with us and with her! #obv its ok to be like Hey i found this from dnp's video!!! she'll love to hear that fer sure #and im sure she wouldnt mind talking abt that when she starts streaming again #but like twitch chat isnt a youtube comments section ykwim #just like be cool ok <33 #mytext

[speedycoffeedelight]

An Animalistic Disaster

Summery: You come across something you never expected.

(A.n: Buckle up everyone, cause this and the next chapter are going to be a little dark. I swear crack and fluff are on their way!)

Tw: Murder, details of murder,animal death and blood

CH-5 : Could this day get any worse?

You slowly walked up to the spider, examining it. The spider was also looking at you with its..mismatched eyes? Are spiders supposed to have mismatched eyes? The spider was almost as big as your plam. It had a pink heart shaped fur on its back.'Huh, that's cute..' you thought. You still weren't a big fan of spiders. Though nor did you like to kill them. "I'll...just leave you be for now I guess?" You said while awkwardly scratching your neck. You didn't want to risk getting it outside for it to jump on you. Having the cockroach jump on you was enough for one day. As long as it didn't do any funny stuff, you should be fine right?

You walked back to your chair, Keeping a cautious eye on the spider. Part of you believed looking at it intimidatingly will make it fear you and not come close. As you sat on the chair, you could almost swear the spider rolled it's eyes at your antics but you were probably just imagining it.

"Alrighty then..time to get to work!" You said to yourself. You decided to put some songs as your background music while you worked. Picking up your phone, you started the first song that came up, which was 'Inside of every demon is a rainbow' from hazbin hotel.

You found out about Hazbin Hotel about a few months ago and it has been living rent free in your head since then. Luckily enough, it's first season will air in a couple weeks and you absolutely couldn't wait to watch it. You adored the whole crew, especially alastor. You were kind of a simp for him to be completely honest. You also listened to hunicast's past hazbin hotel live streams too. They absolutely made you lose your shit from laughing sometimes and sometimes made you melt like a puddle with their flirting. You sorta could understand Ashley's pain. You were sad that you didn't find the live streams sooner.

You started to work while humming with the song. This time you had to edit some drafts about a murderer on loose that's terrorising everyone recently. His name was apparently Elias Adler. He was in 26-29 year old range. He had long blonde hair, and bags under his blue eyes. He also had a piercing on his ear. Police hasn't been able to catch him yet. But they did manage to catch one of his accomplices. They learnt about his name from there.

Unfortunately they couldn't get any other information out of him since Elias wouldn't share any personal information with them. Police suspected the guy was just a another tool for him to get what he wanted. He has committed 16 confirmed murders till now. They were able to identify the murders being done by him due to how violent the scenes were. Bloods and guts everywhere, head half separated from the torso, multiple stab wounds and more.

Police were close to catching him one time. But he slipped them, though it cost him a bullet in his left arm. He was last seen about a couple of kilometres away in a town from where you are currently. Police are searching everywhere currently to catch this man. Police promised large amounts of money if anyone could give them any clue about this man. You sighed, people could be so rotten sometimes in this world....you prayed from the bottom of your heart for this man to be caught as soon as possible.

Somewhere,a man inside a van sneezed as he was patching up his wounds. "For fucks sake, I don't need to catch cold right now" he cursed.

As you started to edit the next topic of your work. You failed to notice all the animals inside the room freaking out about the song you blasted .'How..how is this possible..' Charlie whispered as she heard her song from her recent interview come up. Never in her whole life she expected her song to be played on earth.

Others were freaking out too. Vaggie quickly flew in front of your phone to check what was going on. 'Is this us...? Why do we look so.. cartoony? This is from 'Hazbin Hotel?? How do they know what we are working with??' Vaggie screamed. 'Does that mean people are spying on us??' Niffty asked. 'But hey this could be good guys! What if we convinced them that we are actually these demons. Then she could help us figure something out right?' Charlie said with hope.

'And ya think this girl will take kindly to know that she has four demons under her roof? Hah, that's the fastest way for us to get kicked out toots' Angel snickered from the back. 'Although I hate to admit it, Angel is right about it hon.' Vaggie said flying back to Charlie. 'She would just get freaked out more. We need more time to decide what to do. Especially since somehow we are... cartoon characters on earth. She might not believe us'

Charlie looked at you humming and singing her song with delight, then back at Vaggie. 'I..suppose you're right.. let's wait to see where this goes!' Charlie said with enthusiasm. Though a part of Charlie's heart felt a bit warm seeing you liking her song so much, especially since how she was treated for the song after the interview.

You worked about 2 hours before you decided it was time to take a break. Taking a big stretch, you closed your laptop and stood up to make a cup of coffee. You let out a yelp to find out that all the animals are standing right beside your chair together, except the puppy. You didn't even notice when the spider came down and sat beside your chair. You carefully tip toed around the spider, not wanting to set it off and went to the kitchen.

After taking your coffee and spending your time doing random stuff, it was already afternoon. You decided it would be nice to go out for a walk. Also the sheep could use some fresh grass to eat from outside.

You packed some snacks in a bag and also your drawing pad in case you felt like drawing outside. Then your eyes came into contact with your pocket knife and a pepper spray in the drawer. You used to keep them just to be safe while walking around alone in town at night. You wondered if you should take them. After thinking for a bit, you shrugged, why not, better safe than sorry, even kinda in the middle of nowhere.

Wearing your bag, you picked up the puppy and called out to your ewe as you opened the door. The ewe came running after you. The moth came too and again sat on your head. You locked your door and looked at the ewe only to find the spider was sitting on its fur. You walked around for a bit and then sat on a side of a field and watched while the sheep and the puppy were running and playing with each other. A small smile came to your lips as you picked up your tab to draw a quick sketch of the adorable sight in front of you.

Suddenly a cat approached the puppy and the sheep, mewing loudly. They both stopped playing and started to listen to it. Within seconds they rushed to you. The puppy started to bite and drag your pants leg.

"Ow,hey,hey, what's going on?" You said standing up. The puppy barked at you and ran a bit ahead and stopped to look at you. You took it as a sign that it wanted you to follow something. You began to follow the puppy who was now running alongside an old looking cat. You were weirded out of your mind but decided to push it away, what if the puppy found its owner and wanted to show you. After walking through the woods for some time, both the cat and the puppy stopped in front of a large bush. The puppy started growling and the cat started hissing. The sheep which was following you stopped behind you too. It was like they all sensed some kinda danger in front of them.

Giving them a worried glance you walked in front, pushing the bush out of your way, you came across a sight you never expected to see in a million years.

There was the big deer from before. Now its body was painted with red and had a lot of wounds. In its antlers were some pink gooey looking things covered in blood that you guessed were the guts of some of the wolves that were lying in the ground right now. It looked tired and almost ready to give out at any moment. The ground around them was splattered with blood as well. There were only two wolves left standing. One of the wolves was closing in on the deer, while the other locked eyes with you and started coming your way.

You could feel your heart beat out of your chest as you clutched your bag tightly. How the hell did you fall into this situation??

(A.N: In any case you guys don't know hunicast, I highly recommend checking it out!! Especially to alastor simps, check out hunicast's alastorcast, I promise you won't regret it~)

Master list

#hazbin hotel #alastor #alastor x reader #hazbin hotel alastor #hazbin hotel x reader #alastor hazbin hotel #hazbin alastor #alastor the radio demon #alastor x you #charlie x reader #vaggie x reader #angel dust x reader #husk x reader #human angel dust #hazbin hotel husk #hazbinhotel #angel dust hazbin hotel #husk hazbin hotel #charlie #Vaggie #angel dust #husker #niffty hazbin hotel #niffty

[wrestler-smash-or-pass]

Weekly Wrapup 3/3/24 (late!)

This Week's Rankings:

Hangman Adam Page (Mustache) - 70.7% smash

Drilla Moloney - 70.7%

Kagetsu - 66.7%

Randy Orton - 62.3%

Alex Coughlin - 61.3%

Amir Jordan - 60.2%

Shane Haste - 59.0%

Rocky Romero - 58.4%

Tetsuya Naito - 54.1%

Tony Nese - 51.4%

Al Snow - 47.3%

Eve Torres - 47.1%

Julius Creed - 27.9%

Kevin Sullivan - 13.1%

Average smash rating this week: 53.6%

More stats under the cut, along with my observations, commentary, and some of my favorite tags...

Most total votes this week (most enthusiasm)

Hangman Adam Page - 529 votes

Alex Coughlin - 279

Drilla Moloney - 246

Rocky Romero - 245

Randy Orton - 236

And least total votes this week (least enthusiasm)

Kevin Sullivan - 153 votes

Amir Jordan - 166

Eve Torres - 174

Julius Creed - 201

Tony Nese - 218

The closest poll was Tony Nese, who won 112-106

Top Ten Overall

Kris Statlander - 91% smash

Athena - 90.2% smash

Hikaru Shida - 89.7% smash

Minoru Suzuki (Young Variant) - 88.7% smash

Swerve Strickland - 88.3% smash

Toni Storm - 88.1% smash

Hiroshi Tanahashi - 87.7% smash

Hangman Adam Page - 86.4% smash

Bianca Belair - 86.4% smash

Hikuleo - 86.0% smash

Bottom Ten Overall

Vince McMahon - 3.9% smash

Ric Flair - 4.6% smash

Kane (Corporate variant) - 10.1% smash

Miracle Violence Connection - 11.8% smash

Gene Munny - 12.4% smash

Spike Trivet - 12.% smash

Kevin Sullivan - 13.1% smash

Triple H (Terra Ryzing variant) - 18.6% smash

Eric Bischoff (NWO) - 20.0% smash

Charlie Dempsey - 22.1% smash

Top Women Overall

Kris Statlander - 91% smash

Athena - 90.2% smash

Hikaru Shida - 89.7% smash

Toni Storm - 88.1% smash

Bianca Belair - 86.4% smash

Bottom Women Overall

Eve Torres - 47.1% smash

Carmella - 47.8% smash

Nikkita Lyons - 48.2% smash

Julia Hart (Cheerleader Variant) - 49.8% smash

Kelly Kelly - 50.3% smash

Top Men Overall

Minoru Suzuki (Young Variant) - 88.7% smash

Swerve Strickland - 88.3% smash

Hiroshi Tanahashi - 87.7% smash

Hangman Adam Page - 86.4% smash

Hikuleo - 86.0% smash

Top Tag Teams

The Golden Lovers - 80.4% smash

Best Friends - 66.7% smash

Motor City Machine Guns - 65.5% smash

Roppongi Vice - 62.7% smash

Young Bucks - 43.8% smash

Mustachioed Hangman took the No. 2 spot for most total votes, with 529 votes cast. However, there was a 13.6 point drop in his smashability when the mustache is taken into account. He scored 86.4% smash for his previous poll, with 386 smash votes. With the mustache, he scored 70.7% smash, with 374 smash votes. I thought he'd do better, given how popular mustaches seem to be overall, but maybe the mustache fans are just a small, vocal minority.

Eve Torres had the misfortune of being the least smashable woman overall. She was the fourth woman to score less than 50%.

We can now add Rocky Romero to the rankings for Best Friends and Friends:

Kris Statlander - 91.0% smash

Orange Cassidy - 77.1% smash

Danhausen - 68.8% smash

Chuck Taylor - 66.2% smash

Trent Beretta - 61.3% smash

Rocky Romero - 58.4% smash

And for their tag teams, we have

Best Friends (Chuck and Trent): 66.7% smash

Roppongi Vice (Trent and Rocky): 62.7% smash

In other news, I'm starting to add Cagematch rankings to the results spreadsheet (reminder, that exists here: Google Docs). I plan to eventually make some silly charts involving those ratings, like smashability vs. Cagematch rating.

And now for some of my favorite tags and comment

@tetsuya-taito on Julius Creed: #he looks like he rubs the inner thigh and asks if you like that

@mancewarner on Julius Creed: #he does unfortunately look like hed call me a slur though so id hit it and ghost

@mancewarner on Shane Haste: #just watched an insiderz stream where he was chugging coke and burping extremely loudly into the microphone. that being said yes id smash

@sanguinaryrot on Kagetsu: #uhhhhh yeah I stand for the troops (transgender professional wrestlers)

@dykecassidy on Hangman with a Mustache: #everyone stop clicking smash i wanna be the only one please let me be alone with this hangman

@theunprettier on Drilla Moloney: #i wanna get tangled up in his body hair and die like a fish caught in ocean debris

Honorable mention to the MANY people who tagged the Hangman poll with some variation on "save a horse ride a cowboy"

#weekly wrap up

[mrbensonmum]

TV Show - HALO

Since Voyager continues without me for now, and I don't feel like watching movies too much, I looked for some new material. Yesterday, I stumbled upon HALO!

I had started watching the first season some time ago since the second season was on its way. Now it's here and streaming on Paramount+ in Germany.

I've never played a HALO videogame, even though I find the world-building and lore incredibly interesting. Maybe it's because of this that I was so impressed with the first season, even though there were a few points I didn't like so much. But I really enjoyed the lore and world-building, although I have to admit that during the rewatch, I understood a lot more than during the first watch.

So, I was ready for the second season, started it, and was initially very annoyed. A desk jockey leading the Spartans was such a typical "That's lazy writing!" (Deadpool 2) move that really irritated me. Why can't Hollywood come up with something new? Unfortunately, that feeling only slowly faded away, and the weird dude, whose name I've already forgotten, got less and less screen time and even ended up fleeing, coward!

I think the new dynamic between the Spartans is great; they've stepped it up a notch. And in the last episode from this week, I believe, I particularly liked the admiral's speech. It showed me that they're on the right track, and right after that, there was plenty of action plus a surprise, which I don't want to spoil here. I really enjoyed it, and I'm looking forward to the next episode!

I think it's good that I don't know much about HALO because then I have more freedom to enjoy what's being shown, I don't set the bar too high, and I don't have too big expectations! And luckily, the second season isn't released all at once but only one episode per week. I liked that with Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, too, and it makes me feel a little nostalgic because there's something to look forward to, just like in the old days. The glorious time before streaming services, that was nice!

I particularly like, regarding both seasons, Pablo Schreiber (The dude really stepped up physically in the second season, it's quite intense!), Kate Kennedy, and Charlie Murphy. Although Kate Kennedy would be a perfect fit for Samus Aran, somehow I feel like I'm hitting a brick wall. But I don't really care; right now, with what's shown in the second season, I'm even more convinced. A big point, aside from the desk jockey, in season two that I don't like, is Cortana's design. Yes, she still has a relatively small role in the second season so far, but I really liked her design in the first season, and I also miss the dialogues with John, which were sometimes very humorous!

Since I like to fill the time between episodes, I've chosen another series that has been available on Prime for a few weeks now. But more on that in another post!

#tvshow #HALO #streaming #paramount+ #star trek #master chief #john 117 #halo tv show #halo series

[soratsuart]

Hey so-

I might have been a bit too busy these past few days and haven't been able to catch up with streams to make lore summaries for a while

I am trying to keep track of everything as much as I can though, so here's a brief recollection of most important stuff:

-The eggs have matured and they only need to be taken care of three days a week now.

-Richarlyson lost a life to a bull, they're now in hardcore mode.

-Cellbit has officially joined the theorist club and is investigating like crazy.

-I believe people have found out Roier was the one to vandalize Wilbur's house with Quackity and Charlie.

-Cucurucho told Maxo the reason they can't leave the island is "QUACK".

-Quackity is being suspected even more as people are noticing when he's around none of the weird stuff happens.

-Quackity is also 1% Richarlyson's father and is building Christ the Redeemer as a gift for the Brazilians (spoiler alert, everyone but him is building that thing).

-Forever still wants to imprison Philza and make him love him.

-The binary code entity are being more active and attacking everyone, but especially the eggs with two lives.

-As a result, Bobby unfortunately lost a life while fighting against it. He's now in hardcore mode.

#qsmp #qsmp lore summary #kind of #this is the most relevant stuff iirc #I'll try to make more summaries #soratsu speaks

[hallmark-movie-fanatics]

See first photos of 42 new Hallmark Christmas movies (Entertainment Weekly/TV Insider) - Hallmark Movies Now

As part of this year’s celebration, Hallmark Movies Now, will feature special offerings. Subscribers will be able to check out two new original films a week before they air on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries as well as two streaming exclusive premieres. Plus, the streaming service will have extended cuts of two 2022 hits.

A World Record Christmas Streaming Date: Thursday, November 9 Stars: Nikki DeLoach, Lucas Bryant, Aias Dalman Early access before the November 16 premiere on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries Charlie (Dalman) is an autistic boy determined to set a Guinness World Record by stacking 1400 Jenga blocks. His mother Marissa (DeLoach) and stepfather Eric (Bryant) encourage him to reach for his dream and they all celebrate when he gets the good news that he’ll have get his chance on Christmas Eve. In the spirit of the holiday, they organize a fundraiser giving the townspeople an opportunity to donate and decorate a Jenga block, with the proceeds going to benefit kids with autism. Charlie’s journey to setting the Jenga world record gives them all the chance to learn more not just about themselves, but about what family really means.

Time for Her to Come Home for Christmas Streaming date: Thursday, November 16 Stars: Shenae Grimes-Beech, Chris Carmack, Grace Leer Early access before the November 30 premiere on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries Facing her first Christmas without her mother and looking to avoid loneliness, Carly (Grimes- Beech) heads to a quaint town to lead the church choir at Christmas. Once there, Carly meets Matthew (Carmack), a man back in town after serving in the army. As she gets to know Matthew, the choir and townspeople, she stumbles across clues that suggest she may have been brought here for a life changing reason. As the mystery unravels one thing is clear, this journey will teach Carly about true love, learning to trust, and that forgiveness is needed to finally heal.

Three Wise Men and a Baby – EXTENDED CUT Streaming date: Monday, November 27 Stars: Paul Campbell, Tyler Hynes, Andrew Walker, Margaret Colin A never-before-seen extended cut exclusive to Hallmark Movies Now Three brothers (Campbell, Hynes, Walker) get the surprise of their lives when they are forced to work together to care for a baby over the holidays. As they slowly get the hang of things, they find themselves on unexpected journeys of self-discovery and begin to rebuild their relationships as brothers, as well as the damaged romantic and professional relationships in their respective lives…all while rediscovering their love of Christmas.

Rescuing Christmas (working title) Premieres: Dec. 7, Hallmark Movies Now Cast: Rachael Leigh Cook, Sam Page, Patrick Thomas O'Brien, Bailey Stender, T. Mychael Rambo Contains: Three magic wishes, a woman who isn't feeling festive, saving the holidays before it's too late Official description: "In a world where Santa (Rambo) is real and wants to drum up some holiday spirit, two of Santa's elves, Chuck (O'Brien) and Debbie (Stender), devise a plan to grant one human on Earth three wishes to kickstart the holidays.  Unfortunately, that human is Erin (Cook), who has lost all affection for the season.  Even a blind date set up by her sister, with the affable and charming Sam (Page), won't change her mind about Christmas. But when she makes the mistake of wishing Christmas would 'just disappear,' Erin wakes up to a world where the holiday never existed! Horrified, she realizes that she's taken away everyone's joy, so she enlists Sam to help her reinvent the festivities from scratch.  In the process, Erin learns just how much this holiday and its traditions have meant to everyone around her — and how much Sam has come to mean to her."

An Ice Palace Romance Premieres: Dec. 14, Hallmark Movies Now Cast: Celeste Desjardins, Marcus Rosner Contains: Home for the holidays, overcoming personal fears, an ice rink owner and his young daughter Official description: "A journalist (Desjardins) faces old fears when she returns to her hometown ice rink to cover a story.  With the help of the owner (Rosner) and his young daughter, she begins to reevaluate her life's purpose."

A Holiday Spectacular – EXTENDED CUT Streaming date: Thursday, December 21 Stars: Ginna Claire Mason, Derek Klena, Eve Plumb, Ann-Margret, Featuring the Radio City Rockettes Hallmark Movies Now Exclusive In 1958, Maggie (Mason) is an heiress from Philadelphia who puts her high-society wedding plans on hold in order to sneak up to New York City and make her secret dream come true: dancing live on stage in the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall.

Click these links for more, ew.com, today.com, tvinsider.com

#news #hallmark movies #hallmark movies now #link #first look #photo preview

[lumeliasimblr]

At the Eglamour boys' place, Arnold has been enjoying the new hot tub immensely, inviting several of his love interests over to 'enjoy the spectacular view over the bay', and other equally enjoyable activities.

Eluned and Charlie have been dating on and off since they were teenagers, but have never been ready to commit to eachother. Eluned enjoys her independence, and her lovely little house, and Charlie is busy with his two businesses, barely having time to see her at all. Yet they always seem to come back to eachother in the end.

Speaking of the businesses, Charlie and Arnold have worked hard, and the music Store is now rank 5, and Lumelia now has enough economic power to build trade relationships with another region, unlocking our second city connection.

Back at Eluned's, in the weeks following her and Charlie's most recent date, she's been feeling more and more under the weather. Growing more concerned, Eluned turns to her niece Louisa, asking her to help allay her fears that she too could be pregnant.

Louisa, unfortunately, could do anything but, noting Eluned's lack of appetite and nausea as the exact symptoms she's felt during the early weeks of her pregnancy.

Eluned knew there was nothing for it, and headed straight to Charlie's the next day to discuss their situation.

To Eluned's surprise, Charlie took the news well, and if anything seemed very excited to find out he was going to be a father.

There was, of course, the issue of figuring our what was going to happen with their living situation. Eluned loves her home, but there is not enough space for a family. Meanwhile Charlie has the space, and the funds to develop the property, but Arnold was still living in his spare room.

Knowing it was only fair to include Arnold in their discussions, they asked him to join them. After explaining the circumstances, Eluned and Charlie raised the suggestion to Arnold that he move into Eluned's home as a tenant, giving him space to finally live independently after living with his brother all this time. Excited at the prospect of having more privacy for his many sleepovers, Arnold happily accepted the proposition, and, facing the reality that all their lives were about to change, plans were set in place.

Soon enough the day came for Eluned to hand over the keys to Arnold and finish moving her belongings over to Charlie's. After a final fish in the lovely stream on her property, Eluned waved goodbye to her home.

Charlie spent the next few days helping Eluned and her pets settle in. Squirt, having only just gotten used to Eluned's house, took some time to warm up to Charlie, but grows more confident everyday. The fish on the other hand couldn't care less.

Eluned couldn't help but be uncertain. Children had never been in her plan, and being so close to her elder years, she wondered if she and Charlie were making the right decision moving forward and changing their relationship in this way.

But, as the weeks passed and her pregnancy developed, the couple realised that maybe this is all they had ever truly wanted, and it had just taken most of their lives to realise it.

Eglamour II - Second Summer - Year Five

#eglamour #thorne #bacc #lumelia #sims #ts2 #sims2 #sims 2 #sims 2 screenshots #sims 2 pictures #sims 2 gameplay #ts2 simblr #ts2 gameplay #ts2 screenshots

[wroteonedad]

Dogtooth Isn't A Good Film

Yesterday I logged the original Charlie's Angels onto my Letterboxd. A couple of beers in and watching the original major camp girlboss film. When I was younger, I never had the attention span to be able to sit down and watch an entire film so now I'm a grown adult it means I've been spending the whole time playing catchup with forms of media that I've missed out on. Lots of feelgood films and laughs filled in with binge watching TV shows and exploring the art house genre of film. Watching everything so fast means that I've finally been able to grasp what is good cinema and what is not. Unfortunately, I'm here to tell you all that Dogtooth does not make the cut of good cinema in my eyes.

Dogtooth is one of those films that I've been eyeing up for a little while. I've seen it Mark Kermode's top picks on BFI and I read the synopsis and said to myself, yeah I'm going to watch this. That was 6 months ago. This evening I opened up MUBI to try and find a movie that was different from what I've been watching lately and up comes Dogtooth, a yellow banner across the top reminding me that it leaves the streaming service in less than two weeks. Tonight I was going to make it my mission to finally watch the film.

I don't really know what I was expecting with this film. At first glance into what the plot was about, it seemed to be one of those movies where the kids all live under one roof, they have controlling parents and that it was going to be rather comedic. Maybe when I think of comedy I think of something that is in your face, silly, a loud = funny type of comedy. This film was actually, and pardon my French, seriously fucked up. Almost to the point that my stomach felt like it was turning for a good while after the abrupt ending credits and silence appeared on my screen. If you were a filmmaker and you were mentally ill, had about 50p in your bank account and a cool film camera that you inherited from one of your dead relatives then this is the type of film I expect to see.

The plot follows three children / teenagers / young adults, it's never really disclosed how old these people are. They are placed into what is a lovely spacious home, they live with their parents, their mother being pretty much a stay at home and their father being the real breadwinner of the house. They are completely isolated from the outside world, unable to leave. So as lovely as this home is, it quickly becomes a beautiful prison cell. The entertainment they are allowed to see in the home is subjected and controlled by the family, i.e only homemade family videos, performances are done by the children, they are not allowed to learn words that are deemed 'unsafe' from their safe space. In fact, the cats are deemed the most cruel creatures of them all.

Despite not liking the film, I think the way in which Yorgos Lanthimos tackles controlling parents is powerful. The way in which the plot for Eldest Daughter is experimented is enticing, it's one of those where no matter how awful the film is you can't turn away. The way in which she grows to rebel against her parents, to become meta in realising that she is being controlled by them. I believe that one of the major domino effects as to why she ended up rebelling the way she did was due to her parents forcibly allowing her to sleep with her own brother. Prior to this, the trio of siblings would spend all their days listening to homemade tapes trying to teach them their own vocabulary. Almost like this movie is supposed to be an extreme way of discussing the concept of home schooling and the major impact that it can have on young people's lives upon entry into the real world.

Despite the film having one of the all time lowest budgets I have ever seen, the filmography at times was also quite beautiful. Green and yellow hues in the garden and throughout the home indicating the middle of the summer, a time when most young people are out socialising with one another. But it also stays disturbing in nature, the correlation of the film camera creating the idea of perhaps we as the audience are also there. We are in the corner of the living room as the father puts the VHS into the TV and suddenly it's this film that's rolling, and you're there. It creates the idea of if they're living this forced homemade lifestyle then are we also living that same life by consuming this movie?

The mystery of the characters is also really interesting to me. There is only one character who is revealed to have an official name, that person being Christina who is later on denied entry into the families lives after exposing the eldest daughter into the world of cinema. The only time the eldest daughter is ever given any form of name is when she tells the younger daughter that she wanted to be called Bruce. This creating another underlying layer of the exploration of sexuality between the three children as well. Though I don't want to go into much detail about this because of the nature of how it is described.

Truthfully, I think the main reason why I don't like this film is down to its ethical value. Its narrative is doomed and morbid, it ends on an open chapter so you can decide for yourself what happens to the eldest daughter in the exploration of the world. There are many factors in this film that are just left for interpretation, but it doesn't stop me from feeling disturbed and disgusted. I am angry at the parents for raising them in the way that they had, it seems like a living hell and I can sympathise with the eldest daughter for wanting to escape. I am also angry with how all of the characters were written, though I think it was done on purpose. I don't believe any of these characters were written to be liked, rather most of them were written to be plot devices for the eldest daughter. Ethically, gross. Visually, pretty. I give this film 2 stars out of 5.

Dogtooth (2009) is currently available to stream on both MUBI and BFI.

#writing #review #dogtooth #dogtooth review #movie review

[pretzel-the-frogtopus]

condi: unfortunately guys the dark pictures stream will overlap with the jrwi stream i think :((

bizly, who does that every single week anyway without hesitation:

Hshdhdhdhdhdhddh to be fair I’m more mad at condi and charlie because they could’ve done this literally any other time 😭 also because I’ve been looking forward to this stream for ages

#friendly visitors

[flowerboycaleb]

wanted to post more over here and had the idea to do lil reviews for albums from years past. i'm gonna try to post a review for this series, as the name suggests, every thursday!! this week we're looking at a masterpiece and career defining record from one of the greatest jazz artists of all time: Let My Children Hear Music by Charles Mingus!!! also feel free to follow me on rate your music and twitter <3

Let My Children Hear Music - Charles Mingus

◇ release year: 1972 ◇ genres: third stream, experimental big band

By the mid-1960s, following two masterful albums for the Impulse! label and some other releases here and there, Charles Mingus’s output had slowed tremendously. He was largely out of the spotlight during the spiritual jazz revolution as well as the advent of jazz fusion towards the end of the decade. However, had he been active during this time, I doubt that he would’ve played into a lot of those sounds. In the early 60’s, On albums like The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady and Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus, the “angry man of jazz” had begun to play around with big band music and had incorporated a lot of classical music influence into his compositions. It was an interesting change of pace for someone whose music had always felt so raw. Those two albums are now regarded as some of his best and I have to agree. This shift provided extra layers to his music and gave him a whole new world to explore. A world he would continue to explore nearly a decade later in his unfortunately often overlooked masterpiece Let My Children Hear Music. 

Charles Mingus, 1972

The album opens with one of my favorite Mingus compositions. “The Shoes of the Fisherman's Wife Are Some Jive Ass Slippers” is a dynamic and impressive piece. There’s so much happening here musically, but it all feels carefully orchestrated. Opening with some ascending brass instruments with a tuba providing this ominous bass to it all before giving way to an incredible saxophone part. It sounds very theatrical. From there we get to the meat of the song with what sounds like a classic Mingus piece except way more fleshed out. Every piece of this orchestra plays a crucial role. I get chills every time around the 3-minute-10-second mark when that piano comes in and has to fight for your attention briefly before becoming the main focus for a few moments. It’s such an incredible moment and shows off how talented Mingus is as a composer. This song manages to fit in so many twists and turns and each one feels more exciting than the last. 

The classical music influence is very much present on the second track, “Adagio Ma Non Troppo,” but it still has that Mingus edge to it. I love the cello playing on this track and it juxtaposes the horns on here which often have a sort of urgency to them. This song also utilizes a lot more woodwind instruments than the previous which mixes in nicely with the grand, weighty brass throughout the piece. “Don’t Be Afraid, the Clown’s Afraid Too” is probably the most experimental track here as it features, what I believe are, recordings of various zoo animals undercut by a drumroll and a very shrill, almost electric trumpet. Very offputting stuff, but it sounds so cool. This song features some callbacks to other jazz tunes. At one point, the piano playing is a reference to Duke Ellington’s “Take The ‘A’ Train” with its distinct twinkling piano part at the beginning. Towards the latter half of the song, the band shifts into this almost circus-like sound. I don’t know a better way to describe it, but it fits the theme of the track very well and shows the album’s range. It is also during this part that the band pays tribute to several Charlie Parker compositions so I think this song might act as some kind of tribute to some of the jazz greats of the 1950s that Mingus admired. It’s important to note that Mingus played with both Parker and Ellington over the years. The latter of which Mingus was very open about being inspired by and you can draw plenty of comparisons between their composition styles. Another note, perhaps the title of this song is in reference to his 1957 record The Clown. Maybe Mingus is harkening back to these jazz legends of years gone by and saying “I’m afraid of where the genre is going.” Maybe Mingus predicted the catastrophic arrival of Kenny G! Conversely, maybe he’s using it as a torch-passing moment, “don’t be afraid” in the face of the wild experimentation that had been happening in the genre at the time. I could be reading far too much into this, but it’s cool that so many conclusions like this can even be drawn in a song with no words. Reissues of the album following the 1992 CD release include “Taurus In the Arena of Life” as the next track and it’s good! It’s the shortest song here by a lot at a bit over 4-minutes, but it has plenty of great moments. Like the matador-like sound at certain moments, which again fits the theme of the title. He’s so clever. It also calls back to some of his flamenco jazz endeavors on records like Tijuana Moods and songs like “Group Dancers (Soul Fusion) (Freewoman and Oh, This Freedom's Slave Cries)” from The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady. Ultimately, I’m glad it’s here, but it isn’t my favorite. I just consider it a little bonus.

The second side of the record kicks off with “Hobo Ho” and it’s another one of my favorite Mingus pieces. That thumping bass at the beginning gets me every time. It’s another example of how cinematic Mingus could get. This sounds like the soundtrack to the coolest movie never made. The directions this song takes you in are just so exhilarating. Towards the halfway point, the orchestra gets this sort of woozy sound to them. It’s almost waltz, yet way more hard-hitting. That bass I loved so much returns to lead into the finale of the song and it’s amazing. This leads into the darkest song here, “The Chill of Death (Recitation).” In this chilling piece, Mingus recites a poem he’d written decades prior. The music sort of reflects that older, almost sinister nostalgia as well. Again, I feel a bit like a broken record, but it’s cinematic. It sounds like the backdrop to an old radio drama. His gruff voice puts so much power behind these words. In the poem, he makes a woman the personification of death that “charms” him to his demise. It’s a great moment that shows Mingus’s trademark humor even when handling subjects like death. 

“The I of Hurricane Sue” closes the record and, like “Don’t Be Afraid…” earlier, it features some sound effects. This time it’s wind and rain instead of zoo animals. The music plays on over it and the sounds can faintly be heard beneath them before returning in full-force at the end. Similarly to the opener, the middle part of the song is very reminiscent of classic Mingus yet more layered. He sounds so confident as both a bandleader and composer here. It feels almost like a victory lap after an amazing album.

Charles Mingus, 1972

According to some, Mingus described Let My Children Hear Music as “the best album he ever made” in the original liner notes to the album, but I can’t find a confirmation of that. If true, it would be difficult to disagree with him. I believe this album is one of his two masterpieces, the other being The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady. This was a triumphant return for one of the greatest jazz musicians of all time. It is easily his most ambitious album and that ambition pays off wonderfully. This record gets a lot of acclaim in jazz circles, but I’m hoping one day this record can break through those barriers and get the reputation it deserves as one of the greatest albums of all time. 

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ thanks for reading <3

#throwback thursday #music #rateyourmusic #music review #charles mingus #jazz #70s music

[docrotten]

LADY IN WHITE (1988) – Episode 217 – Decades Of Horror 1980s

“I really liked your story, Frankie. I wish I was as weird as you.” You are. Trust us. Join your faithful Grue-Crew – Chad Hunt, Bill Mulligan, Crystal Cleveland, and Jeff Mohr  – as they travel to upstate New York on Halloween for this quirky independent ghost story, Lady in White (1988).

Decades of Horror 1980s Episode 217 – Lady in White (1988)

Join the Crew on the Gruesome Magazine YouTube channel! Subscribe today! And click the alert to get notified of new content! https://youtube.com/gruesomemagazine

An author tells the story of how, as a young boy growing up in a 1960s small town, he was haunted after witnessing the murder of a little girl.

Writer/Director: Frank LaLoggia

Cinematographer: Russell Carpenter (director of photography)

Visual effects supervisor/Second unit director: Ernest Farino

Selected Cast:

Lukas Haas as Franklin J. “Frankie” Scarlatti

Len Cariou as Michael Phillip “Phil” Terragrossa

Alex Rocco as Angelo Rodolfo Scarlatti

Katherine Helmond as Amanda Harper

Jason Presson as Geno Scarlatti

Rose Weaver as Matty Williams

Henry Harris as Harold “Willy” Williams

Rita Zohar as Mrs. Agnes Cilak

Renata Vanni as Mama Assunta

Angelo Bertolini as Papa Charlie

Joelle Jacobi as Melissa Anne Montgomery

Jared Rushton as Donald

Gregory Levinson as Louie

Karen Powell as Anne Montgomery (Melissa’s mother/”Lady in White”)

Bruce Kirby as Cabbie

Lady in White is Jeff’s pick and he loves the family dynamics depicted in the film coupled with a ghost story that includes racism and a serial killer. Crystal sees traces of A Christmas Story (1983) in the use of a narrator and a young boy who sends away for a prized possession, this time a typewriter instead of a decoder ring. She also lauds future Oscar winner Russell Carpenter’s cinematography and the cast’s acting, singling out Lukas Haas for his cuteness factor. Finally, for her, the combination of child murders and racism coats Lady in White with a patina of sadness. 

Bill describes Lady in White as being good in a lot of ways but just missing the mark of being a great movie. Each element is fine by itself but the humor makes a weird mix in a film featuring a child-molesting serial killer. He also singles out Ernest Farino as a frequent provider of quality visual effects in independent films. It comes through, for Bill, that Lady in White is made by someone who loves the material and loves movies.

As of this writing, Lady in White is available to stream from Shudder. Unfortunately, the Scream Factory Blu-ray is currently out-of-print. 

Every two weeks, Gruesome Magazine’s Decades of Horror 1980s podcast will cover another horror film from the 1980s. The next episode’s film, chosen by Bill, will be Stephen King’s Cat’s Eye (1985), an anthology film starring James Woods and Drew Barrymore, just in time for Halloween.

Please let them know how they’re doing! They want to hear from you – the coolest, grooviest fans – so leave them a message or leave a comment on the gruesome Magazine Youtube channel, on the website, or email the Decades of Horror 1980s podcast hosts at [email protected].

Check out this episode!

[lasnevadaslaborunion]

Not replying to any specific thing because I do not want anyone to get harassed, but there's something distasteful about equating c!Quackity’s treatment of c!Tommy and c!Tubbo with c!Dream’s treatment of those two (or c!Q’s treatment of c!Purpled, for that matter). They’re three very different situations with very different contexts.

c!Quackity was generally honest and open with c!Tommy and c!Tubbo during their interactions in Las Nevadas. He has always considered both characters to be his friends, hence why he tried to talk to them, was never violent toward them even when directly threatened (with c!Tubbo’s nukes), and ultimately respected their decisions if they turned him down (in c!Tommy’s case). He offered jobs he thought they would be happy with and did his best to shield them from harm (telling the other members of LN to “go easy” on c!Tommy even after he kidnapped c!Charlie, being terrified for c!Tubbo’s safety after he was caught in c!Wilbur’s trap for his horse). This pattern is nothing like c!Dream abusing one of them nearly to the point of suicide (and later actually killing him) and publicly humiliating/threatening the other with death, either in his intentions or in actual effect.

What c!Quackity did to c!Purpled is somewhat more comparable to c!Dream’s behavior, as both of them destroyed the respective kids’ homes to make some kind of grand point or pressure them into reliance on them, after having been deceitful to get something they wanted. I would still argue that this one severe wrongdoing - the destruction of his teenage business associate’s house to make the world’s shittiest sales pitch - with relatively impersonal motivations (and which c!Q did apologize for) is not the same as a weeks-long series of subtler manipulations designed to terrify someone into complete submission and later resulting in outright murder (which c!Dream has never expressed any remorse for) - and the destruction of that person’s home multiple times on top of it all. Cruelty is cruelty, and overall the third Las Nevadas stream definitely shows c!Q at his most callous, but these specific instances are not identical in either motivation or scale.

There is still no excuse. c!Purpled still deserved to kick c!Q’s ass for it (and I assure you that the union would have supported him had he sought another form of compensation; we unfortunately cannot abide the tragic death of a fellow worker). But the mistreatment c!Purpled faced is bad enough by itself without drawing faulty parallels.

#dsmp #c!tommy #c!tubbo #c!purpled #c!dream critical #c!quackity critical #for the subject at hand #hey. i've gotta call out my faves when they screw up too #tw abuse #oh. and btw. #there's a reason i'm not replying directly to the post that irked me. #if you know who it's from then for the love of god leave them alone #fandom critical #discourse

[marvelvsmarvel]

Here’s the obligatory reminder that the Netflix Defenders actors and actresses are able to return to the MCU if Kevin Feige & Co. are willing! The Disney+ series have been killing it and it may have made it easier to not miss our beloved street level heroes as greatly as we once did. But man do I miss that change of scene, the grit and violence from Hells Kitchen to Harlem. I miss the ability to binge watch the series in a weekend and the dissect it the following weeks even more. Gotta admit I miss the ragtag bunch that made up this unlikely heroic cast. So here’s to that continued hope with some small updates!

Charlie Cox’s biggest recent act has come with the rumor that he may be the first to reprise his role in the MCU in the upcoming Spider-Man: No Way Home film. Outside of this he’s been mostly hushed possibly to keep from spoiling anything at all.

Krysten Ritter is back in action after a maternity leave and is set to direct an adaption the horror stories Girls in the Woods for the Peacock streaming service. She’s been enjoying motherhood with her first born son over the past year.

Mike Colter has received a second life with the horror show Evil which itself has found a second life after being picked up for the Paramount+ steaming service after being cancelled by CBS. Incredibly incidentally he just literally did an interview discussing a lack of closure with the Luke Cage series and yet he seems to have moved on.

Finn Jones is set to debut on the Apple+ series Dickinson alongside the titular character and future MCUer Hailee Steinfeld. Earlier this year the fellow Hero for Hire had a interview where he pretty much shared the what would have been plot details of Iron Fist Season 3 and Lord only knows what that might mean for his stock.

Jon Bernthal remains a Hollywood stud and it is only the losers not casting him for lead roles who are missing out! His latest and perhaps greatest ventures are on the horizon as he is set to feature in the highly anticipated film The Many Saints of Newark a prequel to the iconic HBO series The Sopranos plus he is making a return to television in a revival of the iconic series American Gigolo for Showtime.

Rosario Dawson has traded up from the burrows of NY to a galaxy far far away as the Jedi Osaka Tano. After absolutely killing it in the mega hit Disney+ series The Mandalorian her future series of the character’s namesake is arguably the most anticipated upcoming Star Wars property.

Simone Missick has enjoyed two seasons starring in the CBS show All Rise. Unfortunately the series has come to abrupt end but rumors followed that she may be set for her own maternity leave but it has not been confirmed yet.

Jessica Henwick is coming off some good screen time with the film Love and Monsters that released last year in the middle of the pandemic. That was still enough to get this Daughter of the Dragon some much bigger gigs having joined the cast for mega franchise sequels in the Matrix 4 and Knives Out 2 as well as the Blade Runner animated series.

With the release of Black Widow the MCU is back on schedule and while the next few years of Phase 4 already seem jam packed changes have been made before. Again even if they do not get to suit up as their hero selves they each still did such an incredible job. Those series have great rewatch ability and it would be really great to see them again even if by way of small Easter egg head nod cameos. Whether Cox is in Spider-Man 3 or not will set the tone but honestly not only do we the fans lose but Feige & Co. join that list of losers if they don’t put Jon Bernthal back in that skull vest!

#i miss them so much #marvel #mcu #marvel cinematic universe #marvel studios #marvel netflix #marvel defenders #daredevil #matt murdock #charlie cox #jessica jones #krysten ritter #luke cage #mike colter #iron fist #danny rand #finn jones #heroes for hire #misty knight #simone missick #colleen wing #jessica henwick #jon bernthal #the punisher #frank castle #rosario dawson #claire temple #mcu rumors #marvel tv #netflix

[jjkpls]

set your world alight (m)

genre : fluff, smut, tiny lil bit of angst

pairing : jeon jungkook x reader (f)

word count : 24k (eye-)

warnings/content : mentions of bruises, mature language, long haired jaykay, awkwardness & cutesy overload, clumsy frustrating idiot(s), bratty reader, explicit sexual content (fingering, handjob, protected penetrative sex), HARRYPOTTER!AU (i cant believe i forgot to precise that in the teasers), jeon as charlie weasley, pretty much.

Jeon Jungkook is a mystery. Master of dragons. Long dark locks hiding a face most have never seen. Skin covered in scars. A brave, unpenetrable, curious being that you don’t know much about for, the very few times you’ve seen him in your life, you didn’t dare talk to him. Of course, you’d have the fatest crush on him.

“If we add roses instead of eucalyptus, wouldn't it turn into a love potion?”

You could have predicted it. If you were to have spent your evening scribbling the course that this morning, with the introducing of a new potion to your year 6 class, would take, solely based on intuition and experience, you would have gotten it right. Down to who's asking the question. 

“No, it won’t.”

“Are you sure?”

Are you? After having spent your whole schooling career in Hogwarts, having studied the art of potion-making for five years filled with internships in the four corners of this Earth, in the greatest House of Potions there are, are you sure?

You could say all that. You could even tell to this annoying Gryffindor to shut the hell up because everyone, and you first, can’t stand to hear her voice anymore, interrupting constantly every lesson either with pointless questions or with obnoxious jabber.

But you don’t. Obviously, you don’t. 

“For now, let’s just focus on learning what the actual recipe is. We’ll worry about interchanging ingredients later.”

Which is almost a lie. You won’t ever do that with them. You have your tight program, with a limited amount of recipes, that you’re supposed to go through with them. And creating new potions, or adapting already existing one to discover new effects are not on the plan. Not with Mrs Umbridge watching closely over every Hogwarts teachers' shoulders. 

If they ever still find themselves obsessed with their dating life and enlarged pores once they'll be done with school, they will worry, on their very own, about creating the magic juices and ointments they need -given their lack of attention, investment and overall talent, you do sincerely hope they drop it because the results might lead to catastrophes but that's beside the point. 

Miss Gryffindor sighs loudly. Turning slightly on her chair to roll her eyes to her friends, who snicker along, they’re whispering Merlin knows what about you and you’re just left there, trying to find your way back to the lesson without losing too much of your composure. 

It doesn’t take you so much effort because unfortunately you are used to this. This class of Gryffindor is terrible. In your couple of years of teaching, you’ve never fallen upon a class filled with so many disinterested, awfully rude teenagers. Naively, when you just walked out of Hogwarts yourself almost ten years ago, when you were wondering with a certain dreadful desperation, what path to head for, you had finally chosen the teaching one, believing that by the time you’ll become a teacher, you’ll be old enough and teenagers would stop being scary by then, you might even grow a little fond of them, embodiment of a something long time gone, of nostalgia. 

You were wrong. At twenty-six, you still feel like a barely done with teenagehood human, hardly an adult yet. The weapons you thought you’d gather along the way didn’t appear in your robe’s pockets as you thought they would. 

Instead, you only have one, effective on an immediate use, but pretty useless on the long run: a monk’s patience. 

You can ignore them. When they’re being so aggravating, you consider sometimes taking a hundred points away from their house -but you don’t because you’ll have to justify to the very biased Head of Gryffindor and fucking Umbridge-, you can ignore them. It’s the most effective way to react as it doesn’t feed them much, they just get annoyed with your unresponsiveness and decide to contain their disruption between themselves. The thing is, the steam has to blow some way, somehow. It’s fine when you can wake up early and spend an hour or so meditating, to gather all of your monk's potential, or if you ever have a Draught of Peace laying around, that can help too. 

These days, it’s just harder to meditate, to try and keep your mind light, unbothered and calmly content.

So much harder that by the end of the class, only fifteen minutes left, you snap and end up taking off ten points from Gryffindors. 

There’s a lot of whining, of strident eruptions of indignation, however, you’re smart enough to do it the moment you’re dismissing your class and they have to leave, sulking and hating you with a passion, for their next lesson. 

“What have you done?” It’s Taehyung asking. He has a little alarmed look shading his abnormally handsome face, but a tiny little tremble of the corner of his mouth gives him away. 

“Ten points.” You state with a bored raised of your eyebrows. What a bunch of babies. 

“You suck. They’re going to hate me too, now.”

Which is not true. Immature profiles like them would tend to hate a teacher simply by association -it is to say that Taehyung is well known to be always stuck to your shoes, you grew up together anyway- but they would never Taehyung. He’s too handsome, has a voice way too sultry, too much charisma for anyone to hate him, especially his students. They can't stand his lessons though. He’s the worst option for a History of Magic teacher. He is passionate about his studies, really really passionate. Therefore his classes, in summarise, turn into him ranting non-stop, jumping from the main point to tiny insignificant streams made of pointless anecdotes that leave his students lost and confused, holes in their parchments, hands burning from their poor attempt at trying to take notes. His classes are Hell, made of boredom and confounding. The only upside being that he’s very nice to look at. He’s like an ancient mage stuck inside an elf body. 

“Do you know how many times this year I’ve had to tell them that ‘no, this potion that has nothing to do with a love potion can’t be turned into one’? Why do I have to deal with their hormones all the time, seriously?”

“You mean, on top of yours?” It freezes you on the spot You could have heard that coming, with the big old ton-heavy boots. You don’t bother looking up from your papers you are reorganising. It’s pointless because you already know what you’d see. The smart ass’s shit-eating grin, singularly square at the edges, with the mischievous squinted eyes and subjective dance of the eyebrows. 

“Shut up.”

“I can’t. I know you love talking about him since you don’t talk to him.”

The shame is burning the back of your neck. It’s climbing up your cheeks, taking over your ears in the process. If there’s one person who does wonders at not-making-you-feel-like-an-adult, it’s Kim Taehyung. Because of course he saw you grow up, and of course, he’s noticed that the timid, coward of a little Ravenclaw you used to be, hasn’t changed one bit.

“You’re so mean.”

“Am not too.” He giggles as he leaps from the front table he had been sitting on to your desk, where he takes a seat, not caring about your quill holder that he knocks down. “You’re never going to try?” 

“I don’t know, Tae.”

“He doesn’t look mean. A bit gruff but I guess that’s what living like a wild creature surrounded by the wildest creatures makes you look like.” 

You hum non-committally. You have come to the same conclusion already. But you hate the idea that you could be right because it gives you one less reason to not dare approach him. “He must be nice.”

“He must?” You cackle a bit. He doesn’t even sound so sure of this statement. Taehyung smiles along, shrugging with a tilt of his head. 

“Well, I don’t know. But you have to talk to him. Soon he’ll be portkeying back to his Transylvania-“

“Romania.”

“-you won’t see him ever again. And also, seriously, it’s been like, what, three months since he’s back?”

“Actually, it’s been barely a month.” The idiot is pretending, with a grandiloquent theatrical performance, that he doesn’t believe you, that somehow you’re trying to deceive him. And it’s ridiculous because no matter how dramatic he always aims to be, no matter how long indeed this whole pinning over the pretty guy without having the courage to act on your feelings has been lasting, it still has not been three months. It’s been three weeks and four days, not that you're counting. 

He arrived on a rainy Friday morning, you remember it well because the wet weather agitated the frogs an awful lot and you ended up spending your ten minutes of break between two classes, on all fours, crawling along the hallways of Hogwarts to try and retrieve three escapees. 

A real joy. 

Especially when he appeared at the end of the hallway. Soaked to the bones but not seemingly caring, as opposed to Mr Filch who seemed even angrier than he usually does. You barely recognised him, from so far, looking up from the ground, with the hood of his heavy coat low above his eyes, nothing peculiar in his appearance that would give him away, not a word uttered that could have helped. Until he turned the corner of the hallway, and the emblem of this foreign school of wizardry appeared. With the purple embroidery contouring the white seagull, it just clicked. You remembered the rumours spreading wildly, excitedly around the castle, that despite the very vindicative Mrs Umbridge's opinion, dragons would be introduced this year to the course of Care for the Magical Creatures and real dragons, seen by their master, would be flying to you and inhabit the grounds of Hogwarts for this semester.

And of course, it would be him. With his impressive resume, or that unauthorised biography written about him by that one stingy journalist singing his lauds that you could read anywhere -there was even a version, presented as fiction, that’s been published in the muggle world- and also, his first and last visit to Hogwarts, two years ago, for the Triwizard Tournament when he proved his talent and bravery in front of all by forcefully regaining control over a Horntail that was just about to chew a few students’ heads off after having eluded his chains -and conveniently, it's also the same time when you fell head over heels for the stranger. 

It was ridiculous because you never talked to the guy. But two years later, just his silhouette and the bouncing of his heavy head of curls you have to come to the shameful acknowledgement that your heart hasn’t gotten over the crush. 

It’s ridiculous. 

It precisely why you shouldn’t have talked about it to anyone. It’s just too hard to keep anything from Kim Taehyung though. Even if your life would have been so much easier if you’d only have to listen to your own nagging about this and not his. 

“You’re going to end up as a crazy old spinster if you keep acting like that.”

“And you’re going to be late for your class if you keep on bothering me.”

“I don’t have a class.” Taehyung stares, dubiously. Now that you don’t have to face head-on your shame, attention slightly steered away from your useless self, you can stare back, glare even, as you challenge him with a raised eyebrow. 

“You do.”

You relish in the sickly white suddenly brushing all over his face. He curses under his breath, grabbing his briefcase with one of his gigantic hands, before he’s flying out of your classroom. 

Quite frankly, you’re not sure if he does have a class at the moment. You do know for a fact that he doesn’t know either because strangely enough, for a teacher whose whole subject depends on memory and a good one at that, he’s never been able to memorise his planning. 

An easy escape you’ve come up with. 

Everyone needs those. 

Especially whoever’s having their ears talked off by the crazy old howl, Umbridge, down the corridor. You can hear her from your room, even with the door almost shut close. Her whole monologue is hard to decipher. You do hear that it has something to do with “her disapproval” and someone else's “irresponsibility” and “pure lunacy”.

By curiosity, you lean your head through the thin entrance your door is offering, picking discreetly to see who the victim is. 

It's the guy. Jeon Jungkook. Standing with his feet pointing away from Umbridge, hands tucked deep in the pockets of a thick winter vest, you can’t see half of his face because of his hair, as always sitting low down his forehead, but you can tell from the thin line of his mouth, his tensed shoulders and something else, maybe his aura, so loudly screeching annoyance, that he's not having a good time. 

It’s him. And for some reason, for the first time ever, you recall words Taehyung has said to you, loud and clear and pressing and inspiring. You don’t want to become a “crazy old spinster”. Therefore you decide to become a crazy something else you don’t bother to identify right this second.

“Oh, Mrs Umbridge!”

“Miss ___, as you can see, I am already-“

“Oh!” The loud gasp, hand clasping on your gaping mouth, wide eyes completing the look. You can’t find the courage to turn to him to reinforce -in case it wasn’t clear enough- that you just, now that she mentioned it, realise the man was here.

Mrs Umbridge has this quality to her. You find her so awfully ridiculous that you turn yourself in a clown, subtly mocking her -though you don’t think she fathoms it since you’ve always acted this way around her- each time you share any kind of conversation.

It can work and you can go along with your usual antics only if you forget the obnoxiously troubling presence of the dragon master.

“I am so deeply embarrassed, I didn’t realise. I’m not wearing my glasses, I’m an incorrigible mole without them.”

“Is that so?” From above the frame of her pink glasses, her beady eyes scrutinize. “You should wear them on your nose then, Miss ___. Now, if you will-“

“I’m sorry, I needed- It’s very important.” You cut her off with such speed and enthusiasm, you know she can't shut you off. “After discussing with my students about the program, I thought about something. Maybe I could introduce a new-“ “Miss ___!” She screeches, the triggering words -”introduce” and “new”- having hit perfectly right. “The program, as you owe to know, has been carefully crafted by the great Minister for Magic and doesn’t need for an airheaded little teacher like you to add any changes to it.”

“Oh yes, of course, how could I forget?”

“It is bad enough as it is that this foolish Hagrid has been able to convince my confreres of bringing a useless study on the most dangerous creatures there is-“ She pointedly glare from the corner of her eyes to the man who remains silent and immobile. His hands haven’t moved from the depth of his pockets, you can’t see his eyes even up close, because the curtain of dark curls hiding them is even thicker than it looked like from the other end of the hallway. He doesn’t seem particularly bothered. You wonder if he’s even listening. Barely swinging on his long legs, waiting for his presence to be dismissed it seems.

“Dragons are quite interesting creatures. I suppose that’s why they were added to the program. The Ministry for Magic must have thought so too since they voted...”

She gnarls at that. She tries to be discreet, conceals a bit of her spite but there’s no doubt in your mind that her mouth's just filled up with a distasteful repellent aftertaste.

Since the main goal was to distract her from him and free him from her claws, you start again with the suggestions for a revised scholar program. Her cheeks grow pinker than her jacket, her eyes start reflecting a fire alike the ones from Hell, her usually perfectly well-combed hair releases a few angry frizzes. She’s beyond herself and without letting you finish your little act, she’s going over all the things that are so wrong about you, about Hogwarts teachers in general, about young people and their disrespectful tendency to want to add their little spice to every tea.

You take the nagging like a champ. Because you’re used to it and to be perfectly fair, you’ve mastered a certain state of meditation whenever she’s coming your way with some complaining.

None of her words successfully reach you to stick around.

She holds strong for a good, fat fifteen minutes. At some point, you even worry that this time, her pit of nonsensical arguments won’t ever show a bottom. Until it does.

She looks all dishevelled from her heated argument. The hair worsened, with now drops of perspiration shining on her forehead. The mean beady eyes are dull, exhausted from the fight as she contemplates the void between you and the man. With a last dismissive wave of her hand, she leaves, stumbling on top of her lacquered Fuschia heels.

How can someone work themselves up so badly with so little provocation -and no further response too?

It leaves you alone with the dragon master and only now, even though you had plenty of time to take in this present, you realise how inconvenient for your coward self the predicament is. You are meant to talk to him now, aren’t you? Maybe the same question raises in his mind however he certainly doesn’t reach the same conclusion. Deeming it unnecessary, he turns his back to you and heads down the hall without much of a look spared to you. Maybe he did check, through or maybe under the impenetrable curtain of hair, for the identity of the idiot that thought he needed help to escape the annoying old owl but you wouldn’t know.

Watching in pure despair, your heart prickling uncomfortably in your bosom, you wonder if you somehow upset him. He did look irked from what you could tell. Anyone else, anyone less grumpy, anyone feeling anything but discomfort or discontent would have said something, wouldn’t they?

That’s what you explain to Kim Taehyung. Emphasising on the fact that you did try to approach the guy. You did. You created the situation, you faced him fully, you did miss the moment when you were probably supposed to say something to him but he left, too soon, and clearly is not interested in getting to know you, and whatever, you’re fine with that you just want your friend to note and remember for later reference that you did try this time.

Taehyung who’s never keen on trusting your words, no matter the fact that you’ve never lied to him -or maybe just a few times so he would leave you alone, but nothing major really- decides that you are wrong. That somehow you misinterpreted the whole thing and surely you need to hop back on the horse and try, again, maybe this time more vindictively.

It takes quite a couple of days for him to convince you. You’re not sure how. It might be from exhaustion, it might come from those three too many butterbeers you drank even though you didn’t remember ordering, back when you were gloomily celebrating your never-ending celibacy in Jjang Jjang -the magical bar held by your friend, Min Yoongi, in the far end of Hogsmead.

You promise that if an opportunity appears to be showing the very tip of its nose, if the universe is kind -and delusional- enough to gift you another chance, then you would try.

It’s funny how the laws of attraction work. Or rather, probably more accurately, it’s funny how Taehyung can be so shameless and volunteer when he has his mind set on something. He has no problem manipulating people and situations as if the universe is his and he decides whatever happens to the little pawns inhabiting it.

A week later, when he, the dragon master, is the curious apparition manifesting itself in front of you when you open the door to let your class free, it doesn’t fall into place right away.

It’s a strange coincidence. Maybe he messed up and meant to find another classroom, any other classroom but yours. He doesn’t budge when he sees you, doesn’t seem startled by your presence. He only takes a step to the side once he realises that a wave of hurried teenagers is about to swarm him in their way out.

“Miss, are we still going to study this potion next time or will we move to something more interesting?” It’s that same Gryffindor. The same as usual. She’s just made of attitudes, eye rolls, hand on the hip and all.

“Once you’ll be able to make it without cooking a hole in your cauldron, we’ll be starting with a new one.”

You’re snarkier than usual, there’s no denying that. It’s your fifth class of the day, everyone seems to have signed an agreement on messing with your patience and he’s here, hearing and seeing an umpteenth attempt to humiliate you from this kid and you’re not having it right now, not today. She grows red on the cheeks, eyebrows frowning dangerously low, they might fall from her face when she barks, “I told you the hole was already there!”

“I understand. Next time, I’ll lend you my old cauldron so there won’t be any issue, alright?”

The angry wands she owns for eyes shoot you a good dozen of curses and she departs, with her friends, as angry as ever.

There’s a heavy silence, setting around you both, engulfing you. The wood of the walls, dark and cold, make it old the more uncomfortable until you can not take it anymore. You’re about to mumble something, maybe point out the end of the hall and suggest he tries there, to find whatever or whoever he is looking for. He beats you to it. Having reached the very limit of handling this silence at the same time as you do.

“Good morning.” He starts, clearing his throat. A husky, quiet yet somehow soft voice that he doesn’t seem to have used quite often. “Here’s the stuff for your potions.”

He holds out a strong hand to you, all veiny and sparkled with tiny bruises, a dark bag made of linen held in his fist. If he can see you, he can undoubtedly take in your confusion. You have no idea what “the stuff” is. If it’s a badly expressed thought. If he meant to say, “some stuff” for your potions. Because you’ve never asked for anything from anyone for your potions -even though, the thought crossed your mind that he, with his magical pets, must have some fantastic ingredients for your searches. You don’t know if it just comes from him. If he thought you may need it and generously prepared this for you -you doubt that one highly. The other reason, way more evident, quite obnoxiously obvious actually, that doesn’t reach your brain which is only working at a quarter of its habitual capacity given his standing here, and his smelling like woods and smoky and something subtler, you can’t pinpoint but feel addicted to as soon as it reaches your nostrils, is that someone -Taehyung- must have put him up for it. He must have gone behind your back, mumble some basic potion ingredients knowledge he owns to him and asked him to bring it to you.

“I put my Norvegian Ridgeback's scales in a separate bag because they’re very sharp -and poisonous too- so be careful when you open it.” He’s done talking, he clears his throat again, this time you’re pretty sure it’s out of discomfort as your gaping silently like a dumb fish must not be the easiest response to receive. A little inviting shake of his fist brings you to your senses, and you reach forward to grab the present. Your arm drops down from the surprising weight of the thing, fortunately, as if he expected it, he catches you before you topple over, a hand on your shoulder and the other encasing yours holding the bag, squeezing around your own as he lifts some of the weight up.

“Sorry, I didn’t expect it to be this heavy.” because you carried it like it was filled with dragons feathers instead -you mean to add.

“It’s fine.” He simply mumbles. You add your free hand to cup the underside of the thing, pressing the whole to your bosom and he lets go there, letting you step inside your room to find a place on a shelf to put it away. You probably take a second to long, your back facing him, as you stand staring at your new possession. It’s the heat remaining on the back of your hand that troubles you. As if not only have his pets decorated the top of his skin with scratches and bruises, they’ve sighed enough fire in his palms for them to forever feel this warm. And he touched you so naturally so. Pressing his large hand around yours that seemed so tiny in comparison. Probably without even acknowledging it while you are shook to your core.

This added to your confusion born from his surprise apparition, are the reasons why, as I said, your brain doesn’t reach its full capacity. Still, the idea that Taehyung is behind it all, that it can’t solely come from this man here, just won’t do in your idiotic head.

You’re enamoured, even more than before, just by a touch and by the gentleness his words hold under the tougher surface. And you decide, that if you turn around and he’s still standing there you’ll ask him out.

You do so, spiralling in slow motion, filled with apprehension. He’s here. His hands back inside the pockets of his jacket, the shadow of a sparkle coming from his eyes, under the heavy protection he’s wearing in front of them.

“Jeon Jungkook?”

He’s startled at the call of his name, the top of his mop of hair bouncing slightly and you just find it adorable. Maybe he didn’t expect you to know his name, he must not even know yours. Of course, he could not have expected that you had spent way too long, two years ago, back when he came to Hogwarts for the first time and you had heard his name amid a conversation, trying it out for yourself. Not to wear it out but repeating his name to yourself, appreciating the way the syllabus formed, how they felt so well chosen for each other’s, for him, and the feeling, light heading, that it gave you to pronounce it.

“Would you like to have a drink with me? On Fridays, I like to go to my friend's bar in Hogsmead and I was wondering, maybe you’d like to come?”

More clearing of the throat. It’s stalling the delivery of his answer, you hate it and almost jump to your cooking station to sort out a quick remedy for it. Your heart is beating so furiously, you might pass out and he’s just taking his sweet time to answer. You feel the awkwardness. You don’t see it. You can’t see anything, the bottom of his face not telling any secrets on his feelings. You must look terrifying, red anywhere it’s possible for you to blush, sweating and fidgety like you’re on a Girding Potion bad trip. And he doesn’t show anything. You’d rip the hair out of his eyes if only you could. 

There’s only one telling sign that manifests in the form of his hand, slipping out of his pocket to reach for the back of his neck where it scratches for a bit. 

It’s no. It must be a “no, I’m absolutely not interested and this moment is very awkward”. 

“I have my dragons to exercise. Sorry.” 

“Oh. It’s ok.” It is not. 

You hope, with all your might, that he doesn’t notice how upset you are. Through your prickling eyes, through the trembling pout you try to hide behind a casual smile.

It is terribly not ok but fortunately, he doesn’t stick around. That’s probably the thing you’re the most thankful for at this moment, his laconic tendencies. Anyone else may have tried to say something else to make you feel better, to make you feel like the rejection isn't worth throwing you off one of Hogwarts high tour. Instead, he just quits, swiftly. Leaving you alone to compose yourself back enough to handle your very last class of the day. You manage to feel fine, sort of numbed out for long enough until you don’t have to pretend anymore and you can let all the emotions out. 

Bent over on the wooden tabletop of Yoongi’s bar, you’re crying out your whole soul, face laid in a pool of your own tears, a gentle hand petting awkwardly the top of your head. 

“I hate you Taehyung!” It hardly comes out, half mumbled, half coughed out. The hand on your hair still in the air for a second so he must have got the jest of it until it resumes to its previous activity. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t think he’d reject you.” He sighs deeply. “I didn’t even think you’d ask him out!” 

“Yeah, what’s up with that?” You rise from the depth of your despair, hidden in the centre of your crossed arms. Yoongi looks extremely distraught. Your face looks awful, you know. But seeing him this shaken upsets you even more. You feel mad and vengeful and you’d like to flood his shitty bar with your tears to teach him a lesson -you’re not sure which, maybe: don’t look so disgusted when your friends look indeed disgusting, that’s mean- but the realisation downs on you that you cried so much you don’t have any tears left. Just the rashness around your eyes and nose, no snot left because Yoongi had maternally cleaned it for you, tiny pathetic sniffling around nothing but heartbreak now. 

“He sent him to me!” You bark, punching Taehyung in the shoulder, not caring the least that half of his drink gets spilt everywhere. 

“You didn’t have to just ask him out! You could have just, I don’t know (he pretends to think deeply, the tip of his fingers tapping lightly his chin), talk to him! Like a normal person that’s never spoken to him would have done.”

You gasp, eyes burning with fire. “Yoongi, he called me a freak!”

“When have I ever-“

“Normal people, my ass!” You continue, sort of having a lone conversation parallel to theirs. “What do you know about normal people, you fucking Grindylow.” You swallow down your fourth butterbeer, one furious finger indicating Yoongi that you need another one. Taehyung is just rolling his eyes, not taking offence of the nonsensical insult. “I hate you so much, Merlin, how am I supposed to face him again?”

“You do like everyone else’s does. Just start hating him until you don’t care anymore.”

“People do that?” Yoongi asks curiously. He’s slid you a new pint, filled to the brim. 

“I know I do.” You slap the back of his arm there, without giving him any explanation, just because you’re sure he’s bullshitting you -the guy surely never has been rejected. 

“Doesn’t matter. How could I ever hate him anyway?” A lone survivor tear falls from your lashes into the calm, quiet amber lake topping your glass. It doesn’t hit you there that there’s no foam. Yoongi watches you carefully, one of his hand is patting your forearm. 

“Is he really that great?” Taehyung just shrugs. He’s such a dimwit. You nod, heart growing big with sadness before it breathes it out, turning into a tiny, squeezed on itself pained creature. You leave the conversation then. Simply trying to rest with your hurting bosom. It needs nurturing and a benevolent yet firm healing hand to tell it to rest for a bit, and stop overreacting. 

[“What's he like?” Yoongi asks directly to Taehyung as he can see, clearly, that you’re not here anymore, for now.

“He’s... uh...” Taehyung starts with very flimsy conviction. “He’s into dragons.” More shrugging.]

Honestly, you might be exaggerating. You do not know much about him. Most of what you believe to know, assumed by what little you do know about him. You believe he is nice and sensible, from the way he treats his animals and the way they treat him. 

[“Oh. Holy Dumbledore!”

“Stop saying that! I told you it’s fucking disrespectful.”]

You’ve seen how much respect and trust lay between them. It’s blatant. And to create this kind of relationship with some of the fiercest creatures in the magical world, he must be something else, something exceptional. 

[“It’s him. It’s fucking him!”]

And you read about him, a lot, the two books he wrote solely about his creatures. They don’t directly tell much about him but indirectly, they hint his humility and humbleness. It’s not like that stupid Gilderoy Lockhart and his autobiographies on magical creatures. And there are the numerous articles that were written about him and his exploits and alleged character.

[“You’re lying.”

“I’m not!”

Sharp short nails are jabbing annoyingly in the skin of your forearm. It’s Taehyung, of course, he never stops bugging you. It’s his second passion after the soporific subject he’s decided to teach. You close your eyes, frowning a bit because he won’t stop, trying to annihilate him from your existence, to annihilate yourself from it too.]

Simple, humble, smart and strong. Passionate, sensible and a beautiful set of thick dark locks you want to slip your fingers through as the cherry on top. 

“It’s apple juice!” You screech in disgust, pushing your fake butterbeer far away from you. The hocus-pocus, if it irritates you, at least brings you back to earth, and back to the noisy bar. Min Yoongi mouths something about you having drunk enough but his attention is elsewhere, along with Taehyung's. 

“Oh, Merlin's beard.”

Of course, he would be there. He’s been back to Hogwarts for over a month now, you’ve never seen him around here, but of course, the day he rejects you, he has to come to your retreat, and witness the mess he's made of you. What kind of sick joke from the stars is that?

“Holy shit. Isn’t he a bit much for you?”

You know exactly what the barman means. It makes you blush slightly under the tipsy flushing already adorning your cheeks. 

If Jeon Jungkook may or may not be made of all the qualities you’ve named for him -with or without reasons-, he has some very visible, very obnoxious other qualities to him. Qualities that you’re not proud of pining over because it makes you feel shallow and superficial. The expression on Yoongi's face makes it feel better though. Justified. As if, well, here they are, you can’t deny it. And since you like his imaginary personality, you might as well like the body imaginarily hosting it. 

Jeon Jungkook is tall as a tree and as strong as one. It’s hard to tell, from here, with the layers of clothes he’s wearing on his back to protect himself from the cold, to what extent he fills them but it’s obvious he’s broad, wide. He walks with strong determined steps, with his fists tight to his sides, as tight as his jaw, square, sharp. 

He’s big. Both in appearance and aura and you can understand how Yoongi wonders if he’s not “a bit much” for you. 

“Don’t call him over!” You whisper-yell, digging your nails in the tender skin of Taehyung’s forearm. He whines, curses and tries to let himself free while telling you that of course, he’s not that dumb, he won’t. He doesn’t need to, anyway, because the guy, after seemingly exploring with his gaze the bar, sets his aim on your table, slowly starting to make his way towards you. 

“He’s coming.” Taehyung mumbles, bewildered. 

You are too. Could it be you misunderstood earlier when he said he couldn’t come because he’d be “exercising his dragons”? It can’t possibly be true. You don’t even know what the heck is up with this excuse. Because it can’t have been anything more than an excuse. Since when do dragons need to be exercised and by a wizard at that?

And now he is here. 

Literally, he’s standing right in front of your table, a hand reaching for the back of the empty chair, next to yours, but stops mid-track and backs away to his side. 

“Hi. Do you mind if I sit here ?”

You can feel, physically, the two heavy heads of your friends, turning slowly on their necks towards you, like an idiotic audience, not wanting to miss one beat of the drama playing for them. 

There’s a little snappy answer that rises to the back of your throat. Something inspired by what Taehyung said earlier, about hating him. You almost tell him aloud that he can do whatever he wants, that you don’t own this fucking chair.

Jeon Jungkook is still raspy but soft voice. With his bruised hand with the fingers red from the cold, not assertive and confident enough to dare grab the chair yet and you can’t do much but nod your head, swiftly sliding your own chair to the side to draw a little distance between you. 

It takes forever for the initial tension to drop a little bit. You can’t say anything, Taehyung the chatterbox can’t either, Jungkook probably feels too awkward by your behaviours to find a casual way to start the conversation. It’s Yoongi who realises the successful start. By doing what he does best, serving your new guest the best butterbeer there is in Hogsmead (Yoongi would say that it’s the best in the world, both magical and muggle, but given he hasn’t stepped two feet outside of this village for the past two decades, you wouldn’t give him that).

“My name’s Jungkook, by the way.” He starts quietly, in the direction of Yoongi. The latter nods and smiles a bit too eagerly. He tries to be natural, you can tell. And fail miserably, you must add. 

“I’m Min Yoongi. Welcome to Jjang Jjang!” Taehyung cringes visibly. Yoongi leans further, towards yours and Jungkooks side of the table, wanting to ignore at best the unhelpful clown beside him. “You must already know...” With a vague hand gesture, he points Taehyung and you. It makes you want to die, the idea that he knows your name, he knows you. You’re unsure what’s going on. Why he’s here, where this will lead. But it would all feel infinitely better if you knew that somehow, he didn’t know anything about you. It’s hard to remember people without their name. It’s the first thing you learn about someone, really, like a tag they’re wearing on their foreheads and when recalling about them, ever, consciously or not, the name comes always. He knows yours so he won't forget you.

It takes all of you a short eternity to warm up to each other. The bar is still noisy, with its occasional rough burst of laughter from the tough-looking wizards, maybe missionaries, the high giggles of a group of Hogwarts 7th year students hidden in a corner. You’re all nurturing your drinks, even you with your stupid apple juice and the unease is even louder, the silence deafening in the middle of the concert of voices and shatters of glasses. 

Until Taehyung says something weird, “So you like dragons, uh?” You don't understand why he persists on making it sound weird, like he's romantically interested in them. 

You hit him under the table, a good kick to the kneecap but it’s clear to everyone that his yelp comes from you. That makes Jungkook laughs. 

He pretty much giggles, sounding like a boy, head tilted down forward with his locks sadly hiding his smile. 

“Yeah, you could say that.” He finally answers, clearing his throat, words coming out sweet and sheepish-like, as if he’s embarrassed from having been caught laughing.

“Oh, that explains this.” Yoongi says, pointing at his skin and the numerous bruises orning it. You’ve never hit Min Yoongi because 1) he’s older than you, 2) he’s a tiny little thing that you’re scared to hurt but you are this close, the width of a hair away, from throwing your foot up again and hit him in the junk. For a second, Jungkook seems awkward. Staring himself at his hands, one sliding over the other, the tip of his thumb grazing with insistence on a deep scar. Until he raises his head again, you assume to let his eyes go over your faces, studying them silently and something he sees there, maybe innocent benevolence -even if Yoongi's comment was lowkey inappropriate, he didn’t mean any ill- and something else, childish excitement probably suffice to relax him. Letting his hands be, one wrap around his pint, the other flat on the tabletop, tip of his fingers drumming quietly every now and then, out in the open for anyone who'd like to to see. 

“They tend to be a bit playful.” He says this with a sly smile raising the corner of his mouth. Something ridiculously sexy that makes you choke on your fake beer and back away from him even more. You shouldn’t raise an arm to plant your elbow into the table, as a sort of shield between you two, because it’s rude and lame, but you do it anyway. Because it’s all a lot. 

He's a lot.

Yoongi, probably, knows you better than you could ever imagine. Seeing right through you, added to the statement he raised earlier -and maybe he was right, maybe he's a whole lot, and a whole lot too much for you-, he reconsiders forbidding you from consuming any more alcohol. Kindly, he manifests a glass of sparkling juice, right in front of you. It's a light peach colour, from the first sniff of the aroma, you can tell it won't knock you unconscious any time soon. It's more sugar than alcohol but at least, it succeeds to soothe the harsh edges of your nerves. Because your nerves are on the verge of a fucking spontaneous combustion.

"Hey! Why does she get another one?" Since earlier, Taehyung, too, has been switched to a strictly non-alcoholic beverages diet. He's not happy about it but you understand easily Yoongi's train of thought. You need to relax so you deserve a little something -especially given the fact that Jeon Jungkook's appearance had you almost entirely sobered up-, while Taehyung's stupid mouth is way too loose and needs to be fed something soft and safe.

"Because he likes me and he hates you." You mutter, not daring to look up from your glass by fear of coming across your neighbour's attention. Your comment is well received though. You allow yourself to joke like that because everyone, Taehyung included, knows that Kim Taehyung is everyone's favourite. No matter the competition. No one can hate him, even when he's boring as hell, even when he's too loud, too nosy, dumb or annoying. He knows it as well as you do and each time you throw one of these snarky taunts, a glint of amusement sparkles his almond eyes and he loves to act all hurt and offended. 

He turns all gasps and bombastic hand movements, claiming unfairness, misery. You start nagging back at him, adding more about how dumb he sounds and stupid he looks, while he counteracts with more dramatic appalled cries, as Yoongi just shrinks onto himself, shaking his head in disconcertment -even though, he's too used to your antics to be any surprised nor confused. 

You're so caught up in your childish bickerings that slowly, only you two, and the amusement you're trying to contain in your stomach, matter and exist. Jeon Jungkook disappearing entirely. It has your voice turn louder, mimicking Taehyung's, your insults getting bolder, your face raises as you squint your eyes menacingly at your friend.

It's once Taehyung grabs the wand from his pocket and aims it at you, threatening to turn you into a pile of ghoul's shit if you won't shut up, that he's reminded to you.

The giggles, like earlier. Boyish and rusty, uncommon, that can only be his, ring and bless your right ear. It has you shut up instantly. Startled, you stare at him, only for a soft smile to grow on your lips, fond as you are to see him laugh like that, because of you. 

You must look stupid as your eyes jump to Taehyung, silently begging him to acknowledge the wonder taking place just next to you, too giddy, too excited, too blushy to be part of it. He just grins back at you, nods his head even though you're not exactly sure at what, one of his elbows poking Yoongi's side.

"How long have you two been friends ?" He asks once he's managed to calm down his fit with a bite on his lower lip. Your heart is running a marathon and you're not sure for how long it'll keep holding up, you might need to focus all of your energy on the course, on not breaking a leg or pass out in the middle of the run, but you refuse, because he's talked to you again, because your best friends are accessorily here to help out, ease a bit of the burden of having to face the terrifying idea of being rejected (again), of failing at being good enough, somehow, to a guy you don't know much but like a lot.

Therefore you answer, aiming a joking dark glare at Taehyung because it helps to look at him, "Too long." Jungkook sniggers at the answer as Taehyung slips his ugly tongue out to you.

Somehow the tension diffuses itself. As if now that all of you had placed a word in the conversation, played somehow a role in it, it feels better, the ice has been melted and you can all, finally, relax.

Without even realising, your elbow slips from the tabletop, you're still wary, still very much aware of him sitting so close to you but you're fine with it.

As the drinks, more or less loaded, flow, Jungkook's cheeks fill up with mountains upon mountains of the fried wonders Jjang Jjang's beloved house-elf, Seokjin, has to offer, the discussion runs smoothly, tongues untied and excited.

It starts with Taehyung telling a very inaccurate version of your first meeting and blooming of this decades-old friendship (you add now and then, when the exaggerations and blatant lies get too much, little modifications to the tale that have Jungkook snigger and nod his head discreetly to you in secret confidence). It continues with Jungkook, pressured by a very adamant audience (which you are not part of, even if you are probably the most interested in the topic, in any topic that would have him speak a bit more, you don't want to bother him with your curiosity which Taehyung and Yoongi do not seem the least disturbed about) telling about the couple of last years he'd spent all around the world, in the most secluded corners of Earth, where only dangerous creatures like his beloved pets live and where only the foolhardiest or most suicidal wizards dare to adventure. As you expected, he's quite humble about it. He doesn't insist on details that make your heads spin in bewilderment, shrugging his shoulders lightly when you're the one whisper-yelling that "but you could've died?!". After a lot of cooing, from all angles of the table, tiny whispers repeating some of his words like a strange echo as you all try to handle the admiration -and intoxication-, he starts feeling himself, a tiny, discreet but visible smile, slyly redrawing the corner of his mouth. He shrugs a little less, nods his head firmly a little more, voice louder and more confident, shaping in the full form it's able to take.

He sounds lovely when he doesn't care anymore. When he feels unrestrained, comfortable and easy-going. He laughs a lot, you notice. It colours almost every single one of yours and your friends' comments, and maybe the fact that you're all a bit dumbed by shock and interest and starstruck and tipsiness makes it so that they're pretty ridiculous, hence him laughing so much. It's not so much that you're all hilarious, rather than you all being pretty stupid but it doesn't matter. You note how easy his laughter, that you couldn't even picture before hearing it for yourself, can come out. How open he is to meddle with you.

He fits so well in your bubble. This personal place only Taehyung and Yoongi have ever been authorized to inhabit. He matches perfectly. It fills your heart and mind with so much content, you feel your cheeks hurt from smiling constantly without meaning too. It's what he does, you suppose, making you smile. And when you notice the pink tint colouring his cheeks, rounded out lovingly so by a grin, you assume he's feeling the same, enjoying his time with all of you, your heart dips in the warmest bath. 

"Dude!" For the umpteenth time, he's trying to wave himself some air with a hand. Taehyung has had enough and just slammed his fist to the table, making everything on it knock against each other, Yoongi's eyes this close to falling out of their sockets. Jungkook just giggles some more, he might be a bit tipsy. "Just tie your hair up, you're making me sweat just looking at your mop!"

"I don't even have-" Taehyung's already up from his chair, he bumps his leg in the process but pay it no attention, marching over his future victim with a little hair-tie that seemed to appear from thin air -probably did too. Jungkook is so lenient with your best friend, too lenient you'd say, you wouldn't even have it in you. When he excitedly reaches forward, his long fingers parting the dark locks in two, he's trying to tie one end into a little side ponytail. Before he's even done with the first one, you roll your eyes, knowing what he's aiming for. Of course, he wouldn't just give him a regular manbun or something.

For the first time, you meet one of Jungkook's eyes, the one uncovered thanks to Taehyung's shenanigan. It's round, dark but warm like rich chocolate, sparkling with exhilaration but concerned.

"What's he doing?" He asks you, unbeknownst to the fact that meeting half of his face for the first time, the endearing pretty thing, stole every single little last word from you. With two fists hold to the side of your head, you attempt to show him the cute girly hairstyle Taehyung has in mind. He winces at that, nose scrunching into itself so high, the round thing turns into something adorable, shaking his head to try to free himself from your friend's prying hands, a grin still on his lips.

"Stop being such a baby!" Taehyung growls, trying for a little while to keep ongoing, his hand desperately holding onto the second bunch of hair. He's soon forced to stop as the victim turns to be too unwilling. "Ok fine! You do it then!" 

It's you he is barking to. If the hair tie thrown straight in your eye is any teller. It renders you blind for a second. Until you can blink the stingy discomfort away and you’re greeted by Jungkook and his endearing face with the oh so adorable tiny tail hanging from the side of his head, observing you with great attention, single eye blinking worrisome. He looks cute, half dolled up like a girl, fearful and curious to discover how you’ll treat him. For a second, you are tempted to follow your friend's design. Because how cute would this man look with two ponytails hanging on top of his head, with maybe even tiny hair clips to perfect it all.

He’d be pissed though and wouldn’t keep it probably so what’s the point.

The real point is that you have a hair tie in your hand, fingers itching on instinct to play with the shiny raven locks and the owner of said pretty locks, silently permitting you to do just that.

Maybe Taehyung is not as dumb and as useless as you thought him to be. Your prior reflex would be to assume he didn’t even mean to create this opportunity for you. He’s just invading as a person, touchy-feely and very comfortable with anyone entering his vicinity. You do owe him more credits and you willingly give them to him for this time. Because if he didn’t intend to put your foot on the stirrup, he surely did anyway, with a natural and a smoothness you couldn’t imagine coming from him. 

Standing behind Jungkook's chair, hands hovering centimetres away, you feel so blessed, you’d jump over to Taehyung's side to snug him to your fervent heart if you didn’t have better at hand -and if the idea of actually having him this close to you did not fill you with an immense cringe.

Taehyung is watching, over the rim of his glass, with an obnoxious, kid like excited sparks burning you uncomfortably. You curse him out, soundlessly but with such great articulation, he can’t possibly miss the words.

Yoongi who watches all of it notices and understands it all as he always does even when he pretends he doesn’t, starts talking then. Something about Brazil where Jungkook had spent nine months, living alone in the wild forest of Amazonia, and about the curious plants and fruits he heard that could be found there. It’s a nice distraction. Soon Jungkook is on it again, Taehyung partakes a role in it too, leaving you alone to handle the grandiose yet terrifying fantasy that is touching and messing with Jungkook's hair.

The first ponytail comes undone easily, the hair tie simply slipping off with just the tip of your fingers to guide it.

When you timidly start, reaching with two hands to grab all of the hair from him, you feel a rush of blood to your cheeks, heart skipping beats and perspiration bubbling at your temple. Your fingers just have to graze slightly the skin of his neck, all warm and soft, you have to do it a few times even because his pretty locks are rebellious and your fingers too willing to let them run in between them, silky as they are. 

There’s a strand refusing your gentle taming, slipping from your grasp and falling in front of his eye. You go to catch it back, meeting hot fingers on his temples. Yours surrender immediately. Jungkook from the corner of his eye, over his shoulder, throw you a glance and a smile. A small one, small but fond. 

"Doesn't it get lonely?" Yoongi asks as Jungkook tucks the strand behind his ear.

"Not really. I'm used to it." He shrugs. You take your sweet, sweet time to finish the half-bun, half-tail hairdo you're working on. Somehow something lovely has settled. Something comfortable, domestic. He's not wary of your touch, letting you mess with his hair, not even flinching when, tentatively, just taking a chance, just once, the pad of your thumb stroke the hot skin of his neck. "Dragons can be very affectionate-" That makes Taehyung cackles as Yoongi gasps in disbelief. You have a hard time picturing those creatures as affectionate. Jungkook is different anyway. You need to be different to go after the path he's chosen for himself. "I swear!" Taehyung rolls his eyes, shaking his head.

"Have you considered all this time spent away from civilization turned you mad?"

The bun is done, sadly. You made it last for as long as you could but eventually, as every perfect moment, it has to come to an end. You don't even bother to hide your dread as you let your ass drop to your chair, puffing.

"Leave him alone, moron." A few peanuts to his stupid head and Taehyung stops messing with Jungkook, stops acting like he's insane and starts telling about something no one cares about -so much so, Yoongi leaves to go chat up an old goblin who's just entered the bar.

Jungkook turns to you, leaning a bit. Smiling quietly, gently. As if he doesn't realise the face he owns once his hair isn't hiding the majority of it anymore. 

It must be a joke. He must know. He must have noticed how his straight, dark eyebrows, with the cut splitting the right one in half, gives an irresistible, dark, mature shape to the roundest, sparkliest set of eyes the world has ever seen. He must know his face is a wonderful work of art, with the tiny little details, here and there, adding charms and depth and uniqueness, that only the greatest, only a special artist would know to use -like this faint scar linking a mole under his lip to the corner of his mouth, or the one craving in the top of his cheek. His colours are splendid too. While you'd always seen him with black everything, black hair, black clothes, quiet sombre aura and a tiny bit of red, you'd catch sometimes, where he'd hurt his hands. Never would have you thought, he's more harlequin than monochromatic. Golden scopes, tipsy patches of red matching the tiny pout he owns for a mouth, eyes not dark but the richest shade of chocolate.

"You," Jungkook starts in a whisper, now so close you have a whiff of his smell, torturous scent of pinewood, of soot, and something else, more natural, sweat most definitely but turns out to be the better element of the mixture, suave, awfully addictive. "you believe me, don't you?" You need a full minute to get your brain's vessels to connect. A full minute during which you have no idea what the hell he's talking about, what words are and how to use them, and all you can focus on is not dying from a heart attack -and also, not show that you are having one.

You shake your head up and down, still unsure to what you're agreeing to. It does not matter that much because he's smiling the way he does. The adorable smile another wonderful novelty, shaped like a bunny one, eating up his upper lip into the thinnest cupid bow. The sparks in his eyes, on his cheeks, from excitement, mirth. He's really here with you, warmer than you've ever thought him able to be, and somehow, different than what you had expected, but thousand times more endearing. Having developed a crush on him previously makes more and more sense by the second.

"Thank you for the invitation." He says quietly. You don't miss a single word, nor the least flinch in his intonation (soothing, genuine), even in the loudness of the bar, because, for some reason, he's never leaned back. He remains there, hardly a dozen of centimetres away from you.

"No problem." You lie, effortlessly after a few gulps of liquid courage. If you're enchanted by the evening, the unexpected turns of events, he still made you go through a short misery for this. He must see your awkwardness, he must notice how you're sweating bullets and swallowing with difficulty. How your eyes keep battling between wanting to bath in his and avoid them at all cost. Jungkook doesn't budge though and it almost gets annoying, almost upset you how he doesn't care -or maybe simply doesn't realise- the effect he's having on you. "I thought you couldn't-" You start, meaning to sting him a bit because he deserves it.

"I finished early, and um-"

"Was it even real?" You ask, genuinely curious to have him clear this out for you. It's not like you're mad anymore. On your face, you only feel a tingle at the apple of your cheeks from how many smiles and waves of laughter you've shared, the desperate tears from earlier long dried and gone. "The excuse, I mean."

"It wasn't an excuse..." Jungkook turns his face away from you then. Biting hard on his bottom lip, a traitorous grin hardly contained. The tip of his ears are flushed, you wonder from what, until you see his hand raising to the top of his head where it flats down hair that doesn't need it. "I- I just-" Maybe it's seeing him this abashed that pushes you forward, literally, scraping your chair to the wooden floor, thigh meeting his in the process. "I was startled when you- asked. When you said my name even, I wasn't- like- expecting it and I'm not used to-" He cuts himself off, a hand vaguely motioning the room.

"To what?" You insist, mimicking his murmuring tone, terrified as you are to pop out the little bubble now only he and you dwell. 

"Going out with people or just- hang out, I don't know." He looks inherently embarrassed now. Possibly even a bit saddened, you note. Still, his face remains open, kind, the ever-boyish smile teasing at least the corner of his lips. You don't mean to be so sappy but you wish, consciously, right this second, for this very moment to last an eternity or at least, for your memory to take a picture realistic enough, as in-depth and detailed as possible so that you'll be able to recall and relive it for years to come. 

"Oh. Dragons don't like to go clubbing?" He bumps your thigh with his knee, chortling at your words but shaking his head nonetheless. As you stare at his thigh, covered by a cheap black cloth stretched to the very limit, stuck to yours, almost supported by yours, sending a continuous channel of heat from there to the pit of your stomach, it seems like you've reached a determining point. A definite phase where you can handle him (more or less). Enough not to liquefy on the spot at his every glance, while remaining way too aware of him, his smell, his warmth, every sound coming out of his mouth, his lovely, lovely charms. 

You really like him.

"My head hurts." Taehyung's half-dead on the table. You're not too worried because as his head lies flat, his hair marinating in a pool of spilt beer, he can mumble with a lot of coherence about how heavy his head feels, and how it will probably weigh this much until Monday. Jungkook grabs a bunch of tissues to try to slip under Taehyung's head as an absorbing pillow, it's no use though, because Taehyung, strangely enough, feels too comfortable in this position to let himself be disturbed. Jungkook seems concerned, a bit bothered even -way more than you are because you are very much used to this depiction of lame- until Yoongi passes by, observing with deep disapproval written all over his face. He kicks on purpose one of Taehyung's chair legs, making him groan, and leaves.

Greediness turns you bold. Knocking Jungkook's leg the same way he did earlier, you call back his attention on you. For some reason, he stares at your legs, touching. You wonder for a second if you shouldn't have. It's not that much, he did it earlier, but maybe you shouldn't have. He's too pensive. Doesn't budge a muscle. In deep reflection. You hit him again, a tiny little push, and a few others to follow, like an annoying bratty kid trying to steal someone's attention. His hand finds its way to your knee then, enclasps it entirely, thumb pressing and you have no idea if any of this means anything, but it does send a rush of jolt straight between your legs. Surely he doesn't mean this use of firmness to turn you on, does he? How could he even guess it having this effect? You didn't even know it yourself.

It does work though. You stop acting like a feisty little brat, patiently waiting for him to be ready to listen to you. He pretends, mean as he is, that the hand won't stay, letting it slide slightly away from your knee. It doesn't go far though. Somehow it's comfortable a bit higher on your thigh. Not very high. It's awfully PG, awfully casual and platonic, but it serves to drive you a little breathless.

With the wide glassy eyes, the small smile that keeps finding its seat on his lips each time he turns to face you, he's all ears, all eyes, just for you. It's infuriating. Galvanizing. You lavish in it.

"You said it doesn't get lonely?" You blurp out, putting all efforts on focusing on the question you are sincerely curious about. If you didn't have it blinking loud and bright in your brain for the past ten minutes, you would have had it long lost and forgotten. He's messing with your head. But you owe to ask. The curious sadness, that you may have imagined for all you know, you saw briefly earlier needs to be addressed.

If it ever were there, it's gone anyway. As he stares into your eyes, seemingly pondering his next words around in his head, there's a gleam shining to you personally there.

"It doesn't when you don't know what you're missing."

"I don't feel too good, puffskein." Taehyung burps out. Thanks to some miracle, he doesn't end up vomiting all over the table but it's obvious he's this close to it and needs to be taken home. It takes all the goodness of your soul, all of it, to control your urge to grab your wand and throw a forbidden curse on his stupid ass.

The asshole makes you out to be an ungrateful friend, appreciation long gone, aggravation deeply grounded. It was going so well.

"Sorry about Taehyung." You start, wincing a bit. Your back leaned against the door of your room, it's late, quiet and badly lit up in Hogwarts' hallways. Taehyung is sound asleep in his bed, fully clothed and wrenching of a burp who turned down to be vomit. You've managed to use your wand on him, something to make sure he'll have a long and safe night and a rather gentler awakening tomorrow.

Jungkook pretty much carried him on his back, all the way to his bed, without much of a complaint, only a growl or two when Taehyung showed himself difficult in the capricious stairs hall -because it's the best and safest place to try and stumble, blindly, drunk out of your mind. 

"It's fine. I had a great time."

"Dragging Tae's drunk ass all the way here was fun to you?" You tease, squinting at him. You know what he means. You know that he knows what you mean. You're only trying to earn time. Just a little bit more time. It's late, he's about to leave you for his room, you assume, and you're not just ready for it yet.

"Maybe not this part."

You don't know what to say to make him stay. It's not like you could possibly invite him inside, is it?

Yoongi would say it's way too soon. Another version of you, maybe a twenty-four-hour younger version of you, the one that didn't know him from this close yet, that didn't get to talk and undergo the full experience that is Jeon Jungkook, to feel his hand on your thigh, his pretty eyes -Merlin, there is a time when you didn't even suspect he hid those wonders right here- would agree. It's not your kind, to have hook-ups. You wouldn't even know how to.

That being said, it's not like you often meet Jeon Jungkooks.

You're not that greedy. You're sure of it. When he's leaning himself against the wall, shoulder pressed against it to support himself, head slightly tilted, watching you soundly, the corner of his lips always curled upward. His eyes say it all. Completely black in the shadow, hooded, tempting. Sending heat to your core, shudders along your spine, tingles to the tip of your fingers.

If he says something, if he suggests anything, you'll say yes. He just has to say it. You've been courageous enough already. Asking him out, talking to him, and everything else. You just can't. You can't imagine admitting out loud what you wish to happen now, exposing yourself to him again by asking him if he'd like to stay the night.

And it's too soon, isn't it?

But Hell, you still have the lucid memory of his hair, running in between your fingers and it's become undeniable how bad you'd like to have it again except this time, you could be less delicate.

"I should probably go."

The disappointment is the language you speak because you're too tired to filter the vexation in your voice, "What, your dragons need to be tucked in?"

"Uh?" He chortles. All teeth out, eyes a bit wide, he regards your face, evidently amused. "Is there anything on your mind you'd like to share, maybe?"

"Absolutely not." You're bratty. It's the tiredness and maybe the butterbeer too. Undoubtedly the frustration. Arms crossed, looking away, pouting because somehow you are unable to relax your mouth and need to be so obvious about it all.

"Are you mad at my dragons?" Jungkook asks lightly. If you don't dare look at his face right now, you can guess it. He must have that smirk you've seen a glimpse of a few times tonight. From your peripheral vision, you can tell he's mocking you. Standing away from the wall, a step closer to you, chest puffed out and arms crossed on it.

"Why would I be?" You mumble, ever so vexed. 

"Exactly." He's holding back a laugh, you can hear it louder than if he were to let it out.

Continuing, same tone, same pout, squinting harder at the void that is the end of the hall, "They sound awesome, I have no reason-"

"They are. You should meet them."

Startled, you look up to him, eyes wide with both fear and interest. "Should I?"

"Yeah." His tongue swipes swiftly over his bottom lip before he bites on it for a second, pondering. "Go to bed now so that you're in good shape tomorrow and I'll introduce you then."

Of course, he'd be so casual about it but the idea kind of blows your mind. "Really?" You've seen dragons from afar a very few times, during competitions or this one time, with Taehyung at that circus in Wales. But never have you approached one. Like most wizards, at least all wizards holding the basic amount of worth necessary to their life, it's not something you want to do: approach a dragon. You know that for the Care of Magical Creatures class, Jungkook only brings one dragon at a time. The class with their professor standing on one end of a wasteland, and Jungkook, at least a hundred feet away, presents them the animal. 

"Yeah," Jungkook says again, bobbing his head along. You're dazzled by the light the grin adorning his face brought. He really wants to show you his dragons. "But early. Like super early. They're tired in the morning so they won't be too... agitated."

"Is this supposed to reassure me?" He shrugs with the same cheerful beaming. 

"Did you hurt yourself with Taehyung?" For the third time tonight, you've seen him reach a hand over his shoulder, messily massaging the muscle with a tiny grimace on his face. He hasn't mentioned it so you did not bring it up but the thought that maybe it's your dumbass of a best friend who's responsible awakes your guilt.

"No, it's not Taehyung." He scoffs. Almost offended that you could imply he hurt himself that way. "I had a bad fall."

"On your back? How do you fall on your back?" There are, actually, a lot of ways for someone to fall on their back but somehow, you can only imagine Quidditch players to have the occasion to do so. You haven't fallen to the ground since you were twelve and finally mastered the skill of flying on a cheap broomstick. But Jungkook is different, right?

"Tina. You'll meet her tomorrow."

Tina. One of his dragons. Of course. He sounds so excited to introduce you to a mythical creature who manifestly attacked him, you start to wonder if that's not the thing that is wrong about him. Because everything is too sweet and lovely and perfect about him, something must be wrong -or else, it's not fair. And maybe his thing is that he is batshit crazy.

"Anyway," A clearing of the throat -you almost missed those, "go to bed. Sleep tight. Tomorrow, I want you-" Your heart stops in your bosom. There's the tongue winking at you again, through his pink lips, it's indecent, makes you forget it all about his alleged insanity, "alive and kicking."

You roll your eyes, raising your eyebrows, bewildered by his choice of words. He laughs, again. The boyish one but quieter, as if he's scared to wake the castle or just a grumpy painting possibly hanging somewhere in the dark. It's lovely. "Thanks for walking me to my room. And for Tae." You say, sincerely, turning to your door to open it.

"You're very welcome." Before you disappear in your suite, you glance his way. It's sappy-you again, needing to take a mental picture of his face, with the hair still pushed back, the rebellious strand from earlier curling against his cheek, his handsome everything, his soft expression and charming smile. He doesn't seem to mind. If anything he's doing the same, not hinting to a departure until you take it upon yourself that maybe, it's enough staring at each other wordlessly for tonight and you wave him goodnight, closing the door behind you.

By Merlin's beard, what the hell happened today?

And what the fuck is going on, now?

Your ass down on the hard ground, head dizzy, with a little warm tingling sensation in the crook of your neck. 

Jungkook is standing, looking like he’s a thousand feet tall with his long legs, chest puffed out and leaning upward. He’s facing Tina, the infamous Tina, about his height if you put aside the long tail laying flat to the ground in between her legs. She's a bright degraded of a deep purple and a fire red, covered in scales, sharp and standing upwards every few seconds as if they're breathing along with her lungs.

He has a forearm blocking her jaws open, glaring with the most severe set of eyes you could never have imagined on him boring holes in her flamboyant ones. He’s growling things in a language you think you recognise as Romanian, barking in her face as he forces his arm deeper, gagging her, not caring about the sharp teeth digging in his skin. 

After a while of the strangest and scariest staring contest you’ve ever witnessed, the tail lying between her legs flap once and she whines a heartbreaking mewl.

His face softens at that, slightly, he frees her from his arm, taking a step back while keeping an attentive eye on her. 

Tina snivels more, as soon as her master’s attention hints at leaving her, rubbing the tip of her gigantic snot against his shoulder blade. 

“Not now.” He says, sending her away with a pat to the side of her neck. 

This is the weirdest thing you’ve ever experienced. 

You simply remain there, staring, gaping, trying to process it all. 

You’ve been jumped by a dragon and Jeon Jungkook is-

“Are you okay? I’m so sorry.” He still has his hair pushed back in a messier bun than the one you made for him yesterday as if he knows that you like him a lot like that. Therefore nothing is hiding the most pitiful look you've ever seen on anyone's face when he looks down to you. Eyebrows dropping low above shiny wide pearls, his two hands reaching for you, munching nervously on his lip. 

-Terrible. You just had the biggest fright of your entire life -and probably, hopefully, the last one of the kind- and all you can think about, is how wet you got from Jungkook growling like an animal, and somehow intimidating the fiercest animal there is to submission. 

“She doesn’t- I didn’t think she’d be that excited, I’m sorry, ___.” He mumbles, guilt laced in every syllabus he pronounces. You accept one of his hand, sliding yours against his palm, hot and calloused, sending warm all over your body as he squeezes around your fingers. “It’s my fault. She’s used to playing rough with me and she doesn’t control her strength very well yet-“ 

He bends over, catching your second hand in his and lifts you, a bit too strongly given how you are entirely made of mush right now. You hit his chest in the process, he has to steady you once you’re up on your wobbly legs. He holds you with a hand to your upper arm, still hot, still firm, it has the blood to your face boil even more. What kind of experience would it be to bathe entirely in this warmth, to have not the least stupid barrier in between yours and his skin, to feel his firm hold grabbing you, his whole body covering you and pressing you down?

You need to focus on the pets. 

Tina seems upset, a few meters away, her tail slapping the ground impatiently but her head held low. There are three others, different sizes and spices, quietly laying above the trees forming the forest glade. They’re watching inquisitively, quiet, as cats would, you had no idea they could behave like that but then again, they were raised by this fucking guy. 

The guy still holding you close, breathing hard over your forehead, who’s most definitely searching for your eyes you are deliberately not allowing him to meet. You’re not mad. A bit shook still maybe. You’re just soaked, head filled with inappropriate thoughts you're terrified he might hear from how loud they are. And the oblivious idiot keeps apologising and asking if you’re fine because you should not be, you should probably be more traumatised, certainly not aroused as you are, especially when he’s feeling this guilty. You catch a wobble in one of his words and wonder if he could even cry from a guilty conscious. 

Therefore you grant him a glance. 

“I’m fine, Jungkook. Really.”

He must see something there, hear the subtle tilt your voice, too soft, has taken because he nods, visibly relaxing. His hand departs slowly, fingers grazing your skin. 

“Jungkook, I have something for you.” You say it like you know where it’ll lead. Frankly, you have no idea. You can hope, wish very loud and clear in your mind, but you can’t bet on it. “For your back.” You fish out of your shoulder bag a tiny flask. With its shimmery blue content, the tag on it with his name and a short note consisting of wishes of healing you’re somehow embarrassed to show him. “I made it before coming. It should fix your back in no time.”

“That’s very kind of you, ___. Thank you.” He grabs your hand along with the bottle as if he couldn’t take it on its own, and now you’re sure he knows what he’s doing to you. He can’t be innocently stealing all of these touches from you without knowing how intensely pleasing it feels all over.

“Don’t thank me yet, you might not like the... process.” He raises an eyebrow, head slanting to the side. “It’s a bit uncomfortable for like... 30 seconds and then it gets better.” 

“How uncomfortable?” 

“Well... Nothing too bad. I’m sure you handled way worse.” He can see you’re not completely honest with him. For your defence, looking at all the scars scattered on the very few skin your eyes have access too, he must be used to some kind of pain. It’s not painful per se. It is uncomfortable. Like dipping a firstly warmed up skin in a cryogenic liquid for half a minute kind of uncomfortable. He senses it. Watching the strange liquid carefully, suspiciously, he’s not certain he’ll use it. 

“Is it dangerous?”

You scoff, hands raising to your sides, “No, I mean- Not if you apply it correctly, it’s fine.”

“If I-“ He worries at his lip, frowning, mentally debating the subject as if it’s that much of a big deal. Honestly, the risk, is, not that tragic. An over-application can cause a curious discolouration that will, later on, turn into a marble-like blue patch -it might be definite but you’re not sure-, you can potentially burn your skin too but usually, it only happens -and it’s the case with any magical ointment really- if it’s mixed with another ingredient it shouldn’t come in contact with or on a body that’s already under certain charms -which is not his case, you assume-, and of course, an ointment made for local application should in no circumstances be ingested. It’s not that complicated. He doesn’t need to look so scared and suspicious. 

“For Merlin’s sake, Jungkook! Don’t use it if-“ You aim to snap it out of his hand but he’s quicker, holding up where you can’t reach, the corner of his eyes crinkling cutely. 

“No I want to but- can you do it for me? You worried me.”

“You really are a big baby, aren’t you?” He shrugs, doesn’t deny it. He looks cute like that. Dancing on his two feet, munching on his lip, hands deep in the pockets of his pants. “Fine.” You say without meaning it. You wouldn’t say that you’re fine or that you’ll be fine. 

When he walks you to his cabin, twenty meters away from the dragons' playground, your heart starts beating hard and fast, more furiously at every step. It might not mean much more than a nurse job. At the same time, would it make any sense for you to not take the opportunity to take a step and make it more than that? Kim Taehyung would turn you into some kind of pile of whatever gross creature's shit if he were to hear that.

The cabin is super tiny, rustic and barely equipped. Wooden floor, wooden walls, wooden furniture -if you can call them that. Mentally, you curse at Mrs Umbridge. If she didn’t plan this on purpose just because she despises the guy and his pets. You can tell he sleeps in it because of the shitty mattress sitting on a pile of wooden boxes, with the sheets unmade. Discarded used clothes in a corner, a little tower made of books that all seem to be about travelling, magical creatures and travellers’ autobiographies. It’s dark, smells like soot with a tint of something sweet, as if the remnants of a pastry made of cinnamon is hiding somewhere.

Jungkook excuses himself for the mess, even if it’s not much compared to the poor condition he must have received the cabin as, jumping to the only window to tear open the dusty curtain.

It brings a bit of light inside, a subdued but warm yellow-ray coming straight from the barely awakening Sun.

It feels a bit stuffy in here. With him taking over the whole space, and your lungs struggling to pump normally. It feels too intimate, to be standing a few steps away from the place he sleeps in at night. Too intimate because you're not used to it, and two days ago, or even fucking yesterday morning, you would have never thought you'd ever be standing here.

"It's cosy."

You comment, humming to yourself, at the same time as he asks, "Should I take off my shirt?"

You almost choke, tilting your head, watching him with misplaced shock. He's already holding the hem of his black shirt higher on his stomach, exposing smooth golden skin, tight on a thin, sculpted waist, a trail of teasing black hair under his belly button, yet looking at you with his wide round eyes, unsure, quite innocent somehow.

"I don't think you need to- the whole thing." Coward-you hurries to answer, trying to divert your attention to anything but him.

Jungkook turns around, giving you his back and raising his hands to the back neck of his shirt, wincing silently, as he lifts the cloth. The back is almost worst than the front. The thin waist you had a glimpse of, the smooth skin with the golden highlights, the cute dimples at the bottom of his back, the developed, beautifully drawn muscles. A dizzying hot flush takes over your head.

This guy is a mystery. Under his thick, oversized clothes, you knew he was well built, but never would you have expected that. It's not like you care about it usually but with him standing in front of you, smelling so wonderful, with this thing, intense and unique, linking and running in between you two, you can't ignore it all. You can't ignore nor deny how attracted you are and giddy and greedy at the idea of seeing it, of touching it all -when most people don't even get close enough to him to suppose what he's hiding.

It's easy to get back to Earth and the present moment with the large, blue hematoma marking his right scapula. It looks painful as hell, so much so you wonder how he's been handling it so far, how he hasn't visited the infirmary yet, how often it happens and if he always simply tighten his jaws and take the pain until it just leaves.

He turns you cheesy again. You'd like to lean forward and press a kiss to make it better. You wouldn't dare though, and you know, for a fact, that the ointment you prepared for him would be an infinite amount of times more effective to heal him.

He shudders at some point. Probably because you're taking a short eternity to do anything, or just say anything, silently contemplating instead.

Gulping hard, you start, "Bear with me, ok? It'll be better in no time." He grumbles something to himself, way too quiet for you to hear over the loud popping of your potion's bottle and the even louder rummaging of your heart in your bosom.

The first drops seem to be fine. He's not squirming under the gentle touch of your fingertips, handling the strange sensation that the potion causes at first, instantly warming up at the contact with skin. He even relaxes, letting you spread evenly all over the bruise, calm and still as the perfect patient. Until he squeals.

"Fuck, what- ah!"

On reflex, he tries to bend and twist, attempting desperately to avoid the inhumanly freezing discomfort burning his skin. You try to hold him still, hands clasped to his shoulders but he wouldn't stop wriggling, whining like a hurt puppy.

For a tough guy, he can't handle much, you decide. It's amusing but concerning as you see him move around so much, you can imagine how he's stimulating the pain coming directly from his injury rather than the ointment.

"Jungkook, stop!" He manages to knock the pile of his books down with a blind kick. "It'll last just a few seconds, calm down!" Your hands fully pressed against his bruise, the heat coming from your overly agitated heart helping, it releases some of the cold. Somehow your tiny hands on his broad back are enough and he sighs in contentment, just a tiny whimper uttered as a remnant of his short but intense torment.

"Are you ok?" You ask after a few minutes. His breathing has quieted down too. His shoulders hanging low, his head relaxed, ease and comfort have taken over his body and mind.

"Yeah. But-" Tentatively, he tests out his right shoulder, rolling it up and down a few times, a tiny impressed 'wow' escapes him and you grin to yourself, enchanted to see him acknowledge your talent. "When you said discomfort-"

"Sorry about that. I thought you wouldn't want to try but it's worth it, isn't it?"

"It is." He has a sudden burst of laughter when he turns around, flashing you a relieved smile. You can read in his eyes that he's a bit surprised, a bit confused himself about what's so funny, probably settling on the little fright the experience gave him. You won't mention that the potion, if it's so effective and this, so quickly, is because it has very highly active ingredients that mess with the organism as soon as it penetrates the skin and his insides might be a tiny bit all over the place for a few moments.

Suddenly, a big whooshing sound comes from outside, seemingly knocking against the front wall of the cabin and making it shake on its hinges. It just makes him chuckle some more, not worried the least and beyond amused by your reflex to step towards him, hands raised, this close to grabbing a hold of his shirt.

"It's just Tina getting impatient, don't worry."

"Don't worry?" You scoff. The mention of her name brings back the memory from earlier. For some reasons, Jungkook's presence now and inside that memory, make it all seem rather mundane but you're sure, you're positive that you should feel traumatized by what happened. A dragon fucking attacked you. Jungkook shoots you a crooked smile you can't say you recognise. With a little bite on the corner of his bottom lip, dark eyes squinted yet shinning mischief.

"You're safe with me." He says, voice low, teasing, as one of his hand reaches for his index and thumb to pinch lightly at your waist.

"Because they're scared of you somehow?" He laughs again, hand now encompassing your side, staring down at you. He looks so inhumanly attractive. You're confused where this intensity comes from. If it's simple lust, coming from a genuine natural place, the same as yours. Or if the potion is not still messing with him, and his hormones, possibly. It shouldn't. It's been a good ten minutes and his build wouldn't entail this long of a repercussion.

"They're not scared. They just know who's the alpha." He explains with the cockiest shit-eating grin you've ever seen. Even greasy Gilderoy Lockhart doesn't have those. You'd find him gross if he was a hundred per cent committing to the act. There's a lurch though, in the way chocolate marbles shine in childish amusement, the tendentious beam turning into a boyish one, biting back something you know would sound like a giggle if he let it escape. You chuckle yourself, hitting him on the chest -because now that he's healed, he can take it. He doesn't budge an inch, doesn't back the slightest away from you. If anything, the hand holding you slide a bit further behind your back, keeping you close. "I'm just kidding." He whispers, voice as soothing as his attentive gaze as turned. So attentive you feel your face burn with shame. As a poor attempt to deflect your focus on this, your hand raises to his chest again, fingers scrapping at a tiny default in his shirt.

"You're not." He snickers. "I still don't understand how you're not scared of them..." The question somehow was never brought up. The whole night, the day before, your friends and you spend your time praising him and asking so many questions about his life and dragons in general, the things he's seen, the things he's done, the reasons that push him to take this orientation -something about adventure and wanting to see where the world ends was the answer however you could tell it wasn't entirely the real one- but you never actually asked how come he's not terrified of these deadly creatures.

"Honestly, your students are way scarier to me than they are." Your eyes grow big with surprise as you simper. You naturally lean a bit back as you laugh, and he follows you, for some reasons, eyes fixed on you, a tiny smile shaping his mouth. "That one girl the other day, the way she looked at you."

"Yeah, they can be real brats sometimes."

"My dragons, on the other hand, are super playful and soft." He sounds like a little boy, trying to brag about his alleged better pet. Of course, he'd be lethally sexy a second and undeniably adorable the next.

"You're a bit weird, Jeon." Jungkook shrugs, not sure what to say to that because he knows you're right. He can also hear in your voice that you don't mind and he's not sure how to say that he's glad you don't. Because he doesn't say anything you force yourself to look up, study his handsome face to read him. His expression is precisely what you expect yours to look like. Content yet expecting for something more, enamoured.

It's just hard to take the first step. Impossible to overcome.

Only now, from so close he can probably feel your breath hitting his neck, you notice he has a thin beard decorating his jaw. There's a patch missing on the left. You press the tip of your index to the tender skin, noting he's probably got burnt.

"That's what happens when a baby with a cold refuses to leave your shoulder." "It sneezed on you?" He nods, grinning. "I could make something for that. And for your eyebrow too." You stare, your finger caressing the soft skin, cheating a bit and slipping to the side of his jaw where there's nothing except a barely unshaven skin. Jungkook sucks in a breath.

"Would you?"

"If you want me too. You'd be losing charm points for sure but-"

"Oh, I have those?"

For some reasons, it’s this moment your memory chooses to recycle your friend’s words. The ones about him being that great. With the pretty gold glimmer coming from his peculiar round eyes, you do not doubt that he is. “As if.” You roll your eyes, jaded by his certain lie.

And the ones about him possibly being a lot, being too much to handle follow quickly behind. He is a whole lot, from head to toes, to the very essence of his character. The thing is he’s dipped in a thick pool of sweet honey, rounding his edges into something so much more accessible, too easy to swallow, how could you not try. “Let’s not fix it then,” He starts, one of his hand roughly rubbing at his short beard. “you already have too many ahead of me.” You give him a doubtful “oh really?” look he greets with an amused grin. He’s pretty smooth for a guy that hardly ever interacts with women and humans in general. You almost ask if his pets give him dating advice but you decide to keep it for later. The cat and mouse game is getting hard to endure. You’re not bored of it but you know you’re both ready for it to turn a little less playful and a little more decisive -also you don’t know exactly what time it is, however, you do know you have a class in the morning. It (whatever it is) won’t happen with you bullying him restlessly. Maybe one of you will get tired of watching so closely the other's face, you both know the details by heart by now, are probably even able to draw them with your eyes closed, and act. There’s a subtle frown messing up his handsome face. A tiny dip of the starting lines of his eyebrows and a pout reshaping his lips. “I’m really sorry about that.” He mutters, shame dripping from his words. The pad of his thumb raises to your neck, grazing ever so lightly the skin surrounding the tiny cut Tina gave you earlier. It’s not that bad. Doesn’t even hurt anymore. When your heart is beating so fast, when your cheeks are burning so high, when your core is quivering so much, you barely remember about the cut on your neck ever hurting. He seems so sorry though. And then he’s leaning towards you, dubious eyes not leaving yours until he’s hidden in the crook of your neck and can’t see you anymore, and softly, presses his lips to the bruise. It feels like a seizure in your heart. It shouldn’t be much but it is, the softest touch, most delicate, also a beautiful promise for more to come.

You relax under him, his arm naturally sliding further behind you, pulling you flush against him. You tend your neck, expecting more, demanding more. He instead breathes in, nose buried in your hair, humming to himself as if the scent pleases him before he’s kissing your neck again, this time a more resolute kiss, with a tough pressure, a louder smack.

You can’t help but giggle, he sniffed you like an animal would, like a dragon would. The giggle turns into an embarrassing fit of laughter, the tension wearing you out probably helping a lot.

“What’s so funny?” Jungkook asks, cheeks flushed, eyes bright with curiosity and a smile translating his bemusement. He backs away for a second, just to see your face.

“Sorry-“ More giggles, he pinches your side, you barely manage to bite your laughter back in your throat. “Sorry but you’re really- I just didn’t realise to what extent you’ve been raised by dragons.”

He’s confused you can tell, frowning in deep thought yet not looking the least vexed. It makes you smile. Seeing him looking so adorable, a little lost, a little embarrassed. You kiss the palm of his hand, the one that’s sitting where it fits perfectly, tucked in the crook of your neck, his eyes grow big for a split second. “Cause I smelled you? Was it weird? I’m sorry, I’m just used to- like- smells are imp-“

He made it so easy for you to press your lips to his. Everything about him, from his smell to his warmth, to his smiles both from his pretty flushed lips and from the wonders he owns for eyes, his voice soothing, welcoming, words always gentle, always soft. He’s both the unknown and at the same time, the most comfortable aura you’ve ever wanted to dip in.

It’s hesitant at first, or more precisely sheepish, like testing the waters. Figuring out where you’re stepping in, noticing you’re barely keeping your nose up and afloat. It’s scary, new and exciting. Requires a little bit of practice, some intended nibbles, some timid lingering.

You’re both unsure, trying until you’re not anymore. Like a button blooming into a rose, suddenly turned bright bloody red, intense and passionate, with fierce thorns digging and scratching at the skin.

You sigh into him, he’s humming as in agreement. There’s a little agitation coming from outside. As if they know what you two are doing, how you’re feeling. As if impatient Tina can tell you’re stealing her human right under her snoot.

He is so willing to get stolen though. Chasing after your mouth when you worry for a second about the ruckus going on just behind the wall, arm tightening around you, hugging you as close as he can, his body melting with yours whenever your fingers dig in his skin.

You’re the first one to slip your fingers underclothes to just have a little sample of naked skin. It’s just past the hem of his sweatshirt, the soft and burning skin of his waist. It spurs him on. As if he was just waiting for you to give him permission, his hands find a home under your shirt. Flat on your skin, so large, so hearty, raw skin from someone who’s worked with those hands a lot, feeling so nice on you, feel like he’s holding you captive in between the palms.

The hand against your back slides up, stopping an instant where your bra is sealed, toying with it as if he’s wondering if he can. Deeming that he can’t, for some unknown reason, he goes further to grip the back of your neck. You’re too busy with his tongue teasing yours, with the growing stiffness digging in your stomach to notice. Have your brain been less occupied, you would probably have the fingers playing with the ends of his hair, pulling a little harsher than they already are. He’s loving it, it seems. Moaning each time you do, groaning each time your nails slip through the hair to scrap at his skin.

Everything is too good. Everything feels made to be, bodies made to meet and make up. It feels like this could be enough. Highly satisfying, more delicious than any make-out session has ever felt because none of those boys before were Jeon Jungkook and never have you liked someone as much as you like him.

But Jeon Jungkook can’t be perfect. You don’t know if he means to be to tease or if it’s just him holding onto some doubts, some insecurities, not wanting to go too far without you explicitly telling him that it’s what you want -because, clearly, it’s not evident enough, the way you’re hanging off of his mouth, limp in his arms, subjectively grinding against his cock can’t be telling enough.

His second hand, the one closest to all the places you want him to invade, won’t give in. Set on your stomach, his thumb retracing the underline of your bra, this hand is the very incarnation of a tormentor. You don’t last long, grousing in your mind, losing your shit and your patience, giving him chances after chances to finally get to it but of course he never does.

Your frustration reaches its limits when you back away from him, hitting his chest with your fist, breathless and frowning.

He’s too dazed, hooded eyes barely seeing anything but your swollen mouth, to comprehend. Until you bark his name, punching him again.

Jungkook takes in your mad eyes, scrunched eyebrows and impatient tapping of your foot on the cabin's floor.

“Touch me.” You whine more than you demand. His light chuckles fill the suffocating air, diffusing a little bit of the tension and maybe it’s not for the worst.

“Is that all?” He asks, leaning in to place a soft kiss on your pouty mouth. “You scared me.”

“I don’t care.” He is so gentle on your lips. The sweetest touch you’ve ever received there. Your heart is growing exponentially, threatens to burst in your chest and you’re loving every single second of it.

“You’re a bit mean when you’re frustrated, you know that?” He can hardly contain his amused grin long enough to kiss you. Explicitly telling you, he doesn’t care much for your moody outbursts. “And,” Another kiss right in the centre of your awaiting lips. “I was touching you.”

“Not enough.”

“What’s enough, lil’ brat?” He mumbles against the skin of your neck, biting a little at it, definitely grinning to himself there. You almost cum there.

“Touch me here.”

You can sense his cockiness drops to the ground when you grab his hands and press them to your clothed breasts. He just gapes, too shocked to act, as if it’s the first pair he’s coming in contact with. You have to do everything on his behalf and really, thankfully for him, you like him that much you don’t hold it against him. Tearing the cups of your bra down and under your breasts, guiding his long fingers to your tender mounds, he takes in a shaky breath, his curious eyes borne into yours.

Tentatively, he wraps his hands around them, weighing them, the pad of his thumb caressing the skin, enjoying taking extra time on the nipple.  You can tell he wants it, he’s too willing to touch you, yet his mouth, the stupid thing, starts to stutter, “B-but, I don’t think righ-“

“Please.” And if this isn’t enough, you’re giving up. You’ve tried so hard. Asking, moving his hands for him, pleading with your boobs out and your shirt bunched up over them. If this isn’t enough, you’re giving up and probably kicking him in the dick in your way out.

His puppy eyes fall from your eyes down to your breast, almost reluctantly. He leaves out a tiny whimper of pain. As if he’s the one hurting. As if it’s not you, the one suffering, the one tortured, because he’s been messing with you, shaking your insides upside down, baiting and lightening up sparkles but refusing to feed you accordingly the way you need to. As if he’s not the only one inflicting himself the torment, refusing to give in for reasons you don’t understand.

Until something clicks in his brain, finally, common sense meeting desires, his mouth fall from your neck and straight to your nipple, kissing hungrily. Licking and sucking and nibbling, moaning almost as much as you do. Once both your nipples are swollen and a pretty flush, he senses your sensitivity, deciding to drop from the buds, meaning to cover the whole supple surface of your tits with lovely kisses and infuriating grazing of the teeth.

The position is awkward. Him bent in half, you on your tiptoes, trying to ease the access for him while simultaneously ordering your wobbly legs to keep on supporting you. The task is not easy, so poorly executed he gets tired of it in seconds, big hands seizing you to pick you up, holding you close, your legs wrap around his waist, so comfortable, so natural, somehow more convenient for him, he doesn’t seem to be in the least amount of effort as he feasts gladly on your chest. His hands stay on your ass, fingers digging, occasionally dragging you up and down his front where you can feel him hot and hard against your centre, a few times squeezing and tearing your cheeks apart. If this is not what paradise tastes like, then you don’t know what is.

It’s perfect pleasure, pure satisfaction.

But of course, you’re human.

Soon, it’s not enough, anymore. And more and more you want and you need. You can feel your cunt clench around nothing, drops of honey dripping from the side hems of your panties crotch. He’s so good to you, lavishing and ravishing your breast like it’s the only job he’s ever wanted but you want more. Maybe you’ll let him worship you another day. Place the kisses and paint the marks he wants on every inch of your body.

Right now you need release. Any kind. He’s pent you up to a point, you can’t handle the idea of not letting any steam out.

You’re about to get bitchy again. Getting saltier and saltier at every empty-handed clench of your cunt. If you don’t take a step now, make him take the step, you’ll turn into a sex-deprived gremlin again, this time worse than earlier, and it’s not a good look you wish for him to see -again.

“Jungkook?” You can sense him perk up at the call of your name, even though he doesn’t stop his ministrations. He hums against your nipple, held tight in between his wet lips. “Fuck, Guk- just- uh- your bed.” No reaction. You suspect he didn’t even listen. “Take me to your bed, Jungkook!” It’s the harsh pull on his hair that’s made him look up and pay attention to your words. Like an obedient puppy with unmatching dark eyes, he nods, swirling around to head for his bed, carrying you effortlessly like you're not a full-grown adult hanging from his neck.

You’re about to meet his sheets. You’re about to get ravished and treated so, so right. You can tell from all the promises his hooded gaze has no shame sharing. Anticipation is killing you. The tenderness and affection along with the evident intense lust you read in him are killing you. Your back is just about to meet his sheets when it just doesn’t. He’s holding you centimètres away from it, eyebrows frowned, preoccupation taking over his face and covering everything sexy that fitted it so prettily.

“I can’t have you on this bed.”

“Wha- why?!” Maybe you yelled a bit. He winces. You don’t know what you look like right now, lust turned into pure fury, you just hope if you feel and talk like a gremlin, you still don’t look like one.

“Have you seen it? It’s not even a bed, it’s just a pile of dirty rags probably a thousand years old-“ It’s sweet and annoying, infuriating beyond belief. He’s blushing too. One foot hitting with spite the pile of rags he was given to use as a bed.

You want to cry.

“Why are you so fucking difficult, Jungkook?” You spit his name with venom, forehead hitting his shoulder, defeated as you feel. He’s hugging you closer, hands less sexual and just warm tenderness as they slide along your spine, pressing you closer if it’s even possible. Feels nice. But your panties, the soaked ruined cloth that is uncomfortably sticking to your cunt are reminding you you’re hating this moment.

“I don’t mean to. I- you deserve better than-“

“But you sleep on it!”

“I can sleep anywhere, it doesn’t matter but you’re too pretty to be laying on this.” You huff at that. Too frustrated to just take the compliment and let it shake your belly with the butterflies in it like a kid would a Christmas snow globe. “I’m sorry.”

“Should apologise to yourself, why you’re sleeping in it if it’s shit? Don’t you deserve better?”

He can tell how you feel. You’re kind enough to let everything clear as day, written in a language he mastered in so little time, an intimate one he’s only allowed to see. He sees the disappointment. Also the ease you’re feeling. The lust that’s not left. The despair and frustration tinted by dark shades of anger. You look cute as hell. All pouty and mushy in his arms. Whining and complaining and so angry yet fingers gently caressing the nape of his neck. He can tell you’re bitchy, feel like arguing but probably want something else even more.

“Wouldn’t it be better to use your bed instead? I saw it yesterday, looks nice.” He suggests, kissing your jaw to relax you.

“It is, it’s a troll size.” You lean your head back, giving more space for his mouth, mumbled words hardly falling from your pout.

“I saw that.” He says, amusement teasing the corner of his eyes.

“Professor Jeon!” The amusement completely annihilates from his eyes, his pretty rosy lips falling in a shocked o, along with all colours leaving his face. You gasp silently, wide eyes matching his.

There’s a terrifying succession of thuds shaking the little cabin, the call of his name again. Slowly, he releases you from his arms, making sure you meet the ground without emitting the least noise.

“I told you I had a class-“ he mimes with his mouth rather than speak.

“You never told me that?”

“I mean- I tried to but you wouldn’t- you wouldn’t list-“

“Professor Jeon?” More knocking on the door. You both hear the man outside mumbling to himself, a little commotion and you can tell, he’s trying to find a way to reach the window to have a look through it. Jungkook jumps on it, tearing the curtain in front of the blurry glass.

“Yes- uhm-“

“Are you okay? The class is ready for today’s demonstration! We’re all excited about that Opaleye you’ve talked ab-“

“Hagrid, I- I need to- finish get ready so- if you and the class could wait- f-five seconds?”

You are fuming. Glaring at him with the meanest eyes you own. Smoke probably coming out of every orifice, desperately trying to leave out some steam or else you’ll be spitting fire better than his fucking pets do. Tucking your boobs back in your bra, tearing your teeshirt back down, probably looking as miserable as you feel.

He’s apologetic though. One hand holding yours between gentle fingers, massaging kindly the palm of your hand. Looking guilty as hell, pouty with the watery eyes, a sweetheart.

And you like him. The realisation hits you once again, full force, you like him a whole lot. Frustration fading into compliance, leaving you helpless, about to forgive him wholeheartedly and suggest to come back later when his schedule sees it more fitting.

“Alrighty! I’ll show them that cute baby dragon I see over there-“

Jungkook winces visibly. Even you can tell it’s not a good idea to leave Hagrid alone with kids and dragons unsupervised, his reputation precedes him, unfortunately. He doesn’t hint a gesture towards the door though. Observing you with attentive eyes, the same from earlier, as if he’s trying to memorise your traits with utter accuracy, knowing he won’t be seeing it for at least the whole day ahead. You should suggest he takes a picture, it’ll last longer. But you’re overwhelmed with a vague wave of sadness, suddenly, so close to the parting from him and so unready for it.

You don’t know if he sees it, senses it, if when he kisses you hard on the mouth it’s to make himself feel better or if it’s just for you. It works in any case. Your heart filled up as it’d been, with lust and affection and something that can’t be but is so akin to love.

“I wish you didn’t have a class-“

“Do you want me?” He asks in a breathless whisper. The question is ridiculous, the answer being so fucking evident, you’d hit him to the side of the head if you didn’t like so much how intimate, how sexy he sounds murmuring against your lips.

You nod. Realising as you try and fail that he’s stolen all air from you -and probably a few other things like your heart and sanity along the way.

“Can you be quiet?” His hands have already dropped from your face, attached to the hem of your pants, hurried fingers proceeding to open them up. The situation in its entirety with the environment, with the people outside at most a dozens of meters away, the awkwardness, the everything can’t hit you, can’t take a sensible shape. No information able to be treated because of him, his everything, the whole lot that he is, infuriating, dizzying, shattering, moving. All you know is that you can be quiet, you can be whatever he wants you to be right this instant.

“I’m sorry for being so terrible at all that-“ He starts, sincere but light, amused, comfortable with you -and that’s the nicest look you’ve seen on him. “I’ll make it up to you until later when I- can really make it up to you.”

It’s funny to see the two facades of his personality clash like that. He’s apologising, red in the cheeks, but also a mouth, reshaped by a confident fatal crooked smirk, stating promises as facts.

How does he know he’ll make it up to you? How does he know he’ll make you feel good enough you’ll forgive his clumsiness?

“I’ll need more than five seconds, Jeon.” That makes him chuckle silently, shaking his head and squinting in defiance.

“You’ll need hardly more than that.” He says, dragging your pants and your panties at once, down a few centimetres.

Heat burns your face as air hits your centre. It feels shockingly exposing even if he can't see much from up there, with your shirt down, with little to no light coming from the curtained window and his large hand, that doesn’t wait for a second, slipping in between your thighs, covering your mound instantly as his mouth covers yours.

He’s right. This fucker.

You don’t time but you know he makes you come incredibly fast.

First starting by sliding a lone finger in your heat to quickly realise that you are soaking wet, sloppy to be exact, perfectly able to fit at least two and probably a third one easily. And he obliges so, filling the torturous void, fucking you with them slowly, dragging the pad of his rough fingers along your walls, teasing your sensitive entrance with lovely, lovely strokes. The sound -and he has to slow down to keep it quiet enough- is obscene. You don’t remember the last time you’ve been so fucking turned on. Dripping down your legs and unto his hand.

He spends only a few minutes on that, on fucking you nice and open when you both know he won’t even be able to fill you as you both wish he would until, well, some undefined time. It should be revolting, that thought, sort of a quick, immediate satisfaction for a long term painful wait.

But then his fingers leave your hole to migrate to your clit, as engorged as ever, as it’s not been for a long, long time, all of this for this stupid crush, from this stupid man, from his kisses and his scent, and his purposefully neglecting to give it attention. A few strokes only, fast and hard, messy and desperate with a sweet pet name he’s never used but fits so nice from his lips press to your ear and you’re coming, hole kissing emptiness, it sucks but you're invaded with so much content, legs shaking, heart beating fast, remnants of the orgasm reshaping the whole stance of your body, feels like you've just moved in an entirely new one, and head dizzy, feeling in love.

“Told you.” He’s chuckling to himself. Full of himself as he wipes you clean with a teeshirt he just picked up from an open travelling bag.

“Shut up, Jungkook.” You groan. One hand holding onto his bicep while his owns diligently tie back your pants, fixing you like nothing happened. The orgasm has been so good, it devoided you of all strength and energy you may have had.

You need to leave. Or more precisely, he needs to leave and meet the class, take them away probably in the forest so that you can escape and flee back to the castle. It’s inevitable.

You close your eyes for a second. Trying to empty your head, focus on breathing properly again, hiding how upset you feel. It’s not that dramatic. Surely, you’ll catch him again, today probably, later, tonight, but you feel so upset. Like a little girl. You don’t want to leave him yet.

Jungkook calls your name softly. You open your eyes, biting on your lip to contain all the emotions wanting to spill out right under his nose.

“Do you like me?” This time you have to throw a punch to his side -it hurts your knuckles more than it does him- because how dare he ask and look so unsure of the answer. “Well, I don’t know- I don’t- you never know with women and- and like- I- you never said-“

“I’ve liked you for two years, Jeon Jungkook.”

“Two...?”

You see the gears rolling, slowly, unsettled by big knots of confusion. You’re sweet, you’re generous and you just came in his hand, literally, so you have no issue admitting -with only a slight blush on the apple of your cheeks, “When you first came for the Triwizard Tournament.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t-“ Again with the apologies. With the looking so pitiful, with the guilt, with the him being so lovely of a man, especially when he’s so big and covered in all those warlike scars.

“Well you had this in your eyes anyway, would have been hard to notice me.” You joke, stealing one of the locks hiding behind his ear and tickling his eyelids with it. He scoffs, smiling before he slips it back where it was.

“Thanks to Taehyung, I have a hair tie now. So that I can see you better.” He’s beaming, staring at you fondly, it’s insufferable and you look away, embarrassed as ever because those big eyes being just yours, admiring you -for what too?- are hard to handle. You need practice.

“Is it your dragons teaching you all this cheesy garbage-“ He cackles at that, not even letting you finish and you’re loving the idea that it’s you causing that. “You need better wingpets.” He laughs even harder, you’re grinning even harder until a screech, ear-splitting, resonates through the whole surrounding forest. For a second you wonder if it’s not just Tina throwing a fit because she heard how her master is having so much fun with someone else than her but there’s a commotion following and what sounds like a seventeen-year-old Slytherin boy losing his shit, yelling and crying, and alarm takes over Jungkook's face.

“Can I see you tonight?” He asks in a hurry and you nod. “I’ll meet you in your room after I trained-“ A big smooch to your lips. “Actually maybe before, I don’t know, I-“

“Just go, Jungkook.” His eyes say something his mouth can’t, you can read the trepidation, as he sprints to the door, gaze not leaving you.

You can’t be sure a hundred per cent but you’re almost certain he just told you that he really likes you too and suddenly, you don’t feel as upset as you did, knowing you will find him back later.

« Thanks for earlier. »

For a second, you don’t know what he’s referring to. Until he points a finger towards his crotch, a little flush showing on his cheeks, where his hair doesn’t reach. 

That makes you laugh. You shrug your shoulders, waving his thank away because of course, you wouldn’t let him run in the middle of a class full of teenagers with a rock hard cock showing through his pants. 

Too focused on the possible catastrophe happening in his front yard, he didn’t seem to realise, if any discomfort or pain ever existed he couldn’t acknowledge it but you surely did. 

After having it pressed to your crotch, having felt its hardness and its heat, there’s no way you’d be able to just stop thinking about it. Then in the cabin, with your tingling cunt and sticky panties, and the whole day ahead, no matter how far away from him you were, physically and supposedly mentally, it’s just all you could think about. 

Blushing incessantly at the least stimulating moments. Gagging back giggles whenever a word, a touch, a smile of his recalled itself to you, and this in front of confused and suspicious eyes.

The whole day was a pain. It simply wouldn’t roll fast enough. 

Now here you are, standing in front of him, not recognising him fully. He’s hiding behind his hair again. He’s quiet and awkward like he too forgot how to talk to you. 

Maybe that’s what you get for meddling with him so quickly. Suppose you get separated for a short dozen of hours, he becomes a stranger again. 

It’s an awful feeling. Seems like maybe you made it all up. The comfort, the noncommittal love and adoration, the ease, the lust, the warmth. Maybe all of it was just a hazy dream. Made up yesterday evening by alcohol and this early morning by fatigue. 

Here you are sober and empty of any other commitment and you can’t picture how you could have gotten to that special place and how to find it back if it ever existed.

“You’ve let your hair down.” You simply say. Maybe it’s your way to point out aloud how you feel like you’ve been thrown a thousand steps back. He’s hiding behind his hair, being unreachable again. 

“Yeah, I just- they were all staring so I felt awkward-“ You mean to interrupt, let him know because you’re sure that he doesn’t (the boy from the bar yesterday didn’t know) that if they were staring it’s because he is that beautiful and certainly no one has expected that. “I wanted to tie it back for now but I lost the little thingy.” You take a step forward, closing some of the distance between him standing against the wall and you in the middle of your room. The more you hear his soft voice, the more you recognise him. “I hope Taehyung won’t be mad, I can buy a new one for him.” You could probably point out that Jungkook probably did not lose anything. That probably Taehyung used a charm and like any of those, the object you didn’t pay for, that materialised itself from thin air, simply disappeared after some time. Maybe you’ll tell him later. Right now you’re close to him again, so close you can catch a glimpse of an eye under the pretty locks. Your ears recognise him, your nose too, and you’re impatient to see if your fingers would too. 

You reach up, catching his fringe in between your fingertips and dragging them behind his ears, opening the silky curtain and smiling to yourself, eyes almost blurry with emotion, when you see his handsome face now on display. With the pretty brown eyes, the rosy lips, the cut eyebrow and that scar on his cheek, just above his timid dimple that shows up only when it wants. 

“Hi.” 

“Hello.” He squeaks out, flushing. “I must look ridiculous-“ He gestures you his hair your holding hostage behind his ears, taking advantage to caress his soft skin with the pad of your thumbs. 

“You look cute.” He does. He looks a bit awkward, like a boy who just finds himself with too much hair and tries to do something about it. “Very cute.” You add, beaming when you see his embarrassment grow. 

“Liar.”

He catches one of your wrists in his hand, bringing it to his lips to kiss the thin skin of the inner part. Lips soft, eyes soft, voice tender. “I thought about you a lot today...” Somehow he found you back too. He feels comfortable saying this while you’re sure he’s not used to it. Therefore even if you hate it, you can’t help but admit it. That you too, obviously, could only think about him the whole day. “I’m not here to stay forever, ___.” 

Your airy smile flatters until it disappears completely. 

Way to ruin the mood. 

He senses it. Press the hand leaving his face back against his cheek, pressing the second one to his mouth again as if he could bring you back to him and forget all about what he just implied. 

Obviously. 

Obviously, his life is not here, in Hogwarts. He’s not a professor, he doesn’t want to become one, he’s here for a project that has a defined limited time - Mrs Umbridge made sure of it. He’s an adventurer anyway. He only knows forest and lands and mountains and mythical creatures, extreme weathers and dangerous places. 

Obviously, you two only properly met a few days ago, only started to get to know each other less than 24 hours ago, it’s too soon to be in love, too soon to be so attached that a separation would feel that devastating. But even if you’re not, you feel in love. You feel wonderful in his arms, under his gaze, with his pretty smiles lighting on you and his sweet voice rocking your heart. 

It’s so upsetting to think about. You don’t want to. Just him hardly bringing it up makes you so upset you could cry. 

“But I- I know that you know that already. Maybe it’s clear for you that- we can’t-“ The more he talks the less sense he makes. Every syllabus seems dragged out of his mouth. He struggles so bad, your hand distractingly playing with the neck of his shirt, only because his hand wouldn’t let it go, you can feel his beating heart through the thick vein of his neck. “What I mean to say is- I don’t know what this- could mean to you. If it means anything or it’s just- like- fun,” Your eyebrow ticks at that. How dare he? “either way I don’t mind-“ He’s quick to add. “Really! Whatever you want is fine. I just mean to say that we can’t- I mean- at some point, I’ll be very very far away so-“

“Does it matter now, Jungkook?” 

The whole dilemma is not that hard to solve, on your part anyway. There’s nothing you can do about his future departing, is it? All that’s under your control is either you decide to indulge in him, have him the way you crave to, feed in this lovely thing that’s started blooming yesterday evening between you two and later on, deal with the heartbreak you’ll surely have once he leaves. Or will you deny yourself this, still get the heartbreak but way earlier on and have to nurture it for probably less long but in this peculiar case, through a thick coat of regrets. 

You hate to think about it all. You hate to think about a time when he’s not going to be around, not even only appearing at the end of a hallway, not even noticing you, not doing anything special except existing and breathing the same air as yours. 

It’s clear for you. He’s right here, right now, literally right under your hands, there’s no doubt in your mind that you’re going to consume as much as him as you possibly can, if only he’ll let you. 

He looks worried, concerned. Not on the same page as you maybe. Guilty too. While it’s not his fault. It’s your own stupid, unpractical dumbass’s fault for falling for the only guy that lives like a fucking wild animal and is probably inept to leave his wild savage life for more than a couple of months at a time. 

An attempt nibble to his bottom lip. Your eyes shut close slowly as to not squeeze a droplet menacing to fall from your eye. He sighs deeply, leaning into your mouth for a moment. 

“I guess it doesn’t have to matter now.” He decides, pressing a new kiss to the relieved smile growing on you. 

"Cause you had a few things to show me, I believe..." It's subtle. Sort of. The words may be but the eyes you give him are not, demanding, minxy. Your intentions are no secret to him and you can tell in the way he smirks, kissing you again, this time his warm palms holding your cheeks still. He's made up his mind too.

It's all you needed to wash it all behind. Everything that could be too heavy for your shoulders or your heart to carry right now. Anything that could affect this moment, tarnish it, make it lesser than it could be.

It just has to be good. Only good and nothing else. His hands everywhere, on your ass, squeezing, on your breast, fondling. He seems to have remembered what you like. He's not withholding, he's not overly gentle. He's still awfully tender, awfully sweet because it's just the essence of his person, you feel it in every breath you steal from him. The way he carries you so softly, sitting you down on his lap as careful as ever as to not have you tip over and fall off of the bed.

When you're so greedy and almost rude in comparison, lavishing in the position he just offered you, groaning when you feel his thick thighs stretching yours wide, grinding already, sliding forward to feel his hardness anew against you. You touch him everywhere because his body feels surreal. Hard and taut and skin boiling even through his clothes. Your hands disorganized, impatient, start by unbuckling his belt to then jump to the hem of his shirt, dragging the cloth up and off of him.

You hardly catch a glimpse of fair honey skin before the light is shut off suddenly. There's the very recognizable thud of a wand hitting the wooden floor that hints at you that he's the one who did turn it off and you want to whine and complain and maybe even argue a little, and maybe more, enough for him to turn it back on but his wet mouth is sucking at your collarbone, the indignant scold dies into an insignificant, trembling whimper.

He lets you undress him. Even if you're missing the visual, you decide you'll enjoy the touch. His skin is so soft, too soft in a few spots where you guess he's been hurt, uneven, little bumpy traits, here and there, like the trace of a road on a map, scattered all over his chest, his shoulders, his arms. He feels wonderful under your fingers. Hot and soft. He smells heavenly, encaging you as he does, you're bathing in his scent, earthy, smoky, masculine.

You have the push him away, a hand on his jaw, another on his chest to have him quit mouthing at your skin and lay his back down on the mattress. In the very dim light, you catch his shiny eyes, wide and intense as they observe you in the dark. You lean over, pressing kisses you hope as loving as his on his skin, starting from his cheek, you feel moving under your lips from him smiling, descending to his hard belly without missing a spot.

Your mouth turns extra delicate when your lips meet uneven skin, as if you could hurt him, as if he hasn't been long healed and your lips aren't the last thing that could ever hurt him, it makes him gasps and sighs though, each time, you feel his abs tighten under you, his thighs stiffen.

"Am I hurting you?" You ask quietly, even if you doubt it.

"Yeah-" He sighs and you freeze. "I mean no! No, no, don't worry."

"Are you sure?" You insist and he groans in defeat. You might be palming his cock through his pants, which you should be patient enough to wait until he answers properly if you'd honestly like an answer. But the rock hard member has been poking your thigh for too long and you can't help it. He's so responsive too, concealing poorly his groans and his moans, his whole body and cock twitchy under you.

You're close to giving him more. To give him fully what he came for. Nails grazing with intent the line where the hem of his underwears lay but not moving down further, hinting at something more but not giving in yet.

It's exhilarating to have him so docile under you, waiting, hardly patiently, for you to give him what he wants and you can tell, from how hard he is, that he really does want it. He sucks his breath in one more time, loudly, and you snickers above him, excited as you are.

Until he decides it's enough. Raising one thigh fast and hard, pushing at your ass, making you tip over with a squeal. He catches you with the cheeky chuckle you've grown to adore, rolling you unto your back so he can hover over you. You feel so tiny under him, with his strong thick arms encasing you, the line of his wide shoulders barely decipherable in the dark. Your hand follows the line, appreciating him to be so willing to be touched, always leaning onto your fingers. When it stops at his chest, your fingers mean to play a little but you're stopped in your track by the thudding hitting your palm. It takes you a hot second to realise it's his heart, being so loud and agitated, so expressive from where it's hidden. Of course, someone as reserved as him would have a heart that vocal.

"Your heart's beating so hard." You comment quietly. You don't mean to embarrass him. You don't even mean to reverse the power button hanging between the both of you. Yours in your own chest has to be causing a similar ruckus. But it's his that matters right now. You can't get over the fact that it's for you.

"Stop teasing me." He grumbles. He's not even vexed. He's embarrassed, but you hear the slim smile in his voice, a sheepish one.

"I'm not. You should feel mine." He hums against your mouth, then backs away laughing a bit.

"Smooth."

"It wasn't-" You sigh in defeat. It was not a subtle attempt to have him take care of your tits. Seriously. He's too glad to comply though, you're not one to complain.

You only have a vague notion of time passing, of things progressing. Somehow a second he's suckling on your nipples through the thin material of your top and the next, both of you are naked, panting in each other's face. Your nipples erect and still wet, occasionally rubbing against his chest, two of his thick fingers pumping in between your folds, a third one occasionally teasing the entrance, hinting at a stretch you're so greedy to feel even though you're not sure you can take; your hands wrapped around his shaft, pumping furiously, squeezing hard to have him hiss and curse against your lips, with your thumb teasing the slit of the tender slick head.

His free hand is at your neck, resting there, fingertips pressing in your skin, his thumb toying with your swollen bottom lip whenever he's biting too hard on his own to kiss you properly.

"I'm close..." You whimper, nibbling on the flesh of his thumb. He smiles vaguely at you, hooded eyes unfocused, eyebrows scrunched from pleasure. "I want you, Jungkook."

"Like now?" Fuck. You really have to like the guy a lot. He dares stop fucking you too, all attention now driven to your face. You don't say anything, your eyes telling enough. He nods to himself. "Okay, now. But uh-"

"Jungkook, sometimes you're half-useless." You try not to be mean but you can't help some snarkiness to escape. You have patience. You have a lot of it. But he just makes everything so difficult. How can you be sin and temptation embodied and at the same time, be so fucking clueless? He's like the cure but also the disease.

You roll over on your bed, grabbing a condom from your bedside table that a certain friend I don't need to name provided you with, to then face him again, brandishing the foil packet in his face.

"I'm sorry, I don't mean to-" He seems confused for a second, struggling to get the thing open and you wonder if it's been as long as it's been for you since the last time he's been with someone like that, or if it's been even longer. "but-" Growing even more impatient, you jump on your knees, kneeling next to him, taking the thing from him and tearing it open for him. "You're, like, a lot."

You stay silent for probably too long, frozen, hit by his words probably too intensely.

"In a good way! In a- in a, you're- I like you a lot and it makes me all-" He's talking too much you decide. Stuttering the sweetest things you have a hard time hearing while you're both naked in your bed, so near to get even closer, even more intimate to each other in a way you're too excited about to handle any extra pandering -especially given, you know exactly what he meant. Who would have thought? Jeon Jungkook talking so much you'd have to kiss him quiet.

"How do you like it?" He asks in a whisper, kissing your jaw in a way that makes you shudder. He's making you lightheaded, so dizzy, with the stupid jumps between his sexy lust-filled self and the adorable clueless dude he can also be.

"Just- however you'll have me." You answer, ignoring blatantly that it doesn't mean much.

So he decides. Laying you down on your back, hovering you. The thought that maybe you are made for each other hits you full face then, because that's exactly how you'd like him to have you. Just like earlier, so close, so intimate, sort of intimidating, dominating too. All yours and you, even more, his, with his soft locks caressing your forehead, lips so close you hardly have to make any effort to reach, not that he lets you have your mouth for your own for too long anyway, every few seconds, claiming it with lingering kisses tasting of greed. You know you're in trouble as soon as the very tip of his cock squeezes in. It's somehow a tight fit, even with his earlier ministrations, even with the ones from this morning that made you feel loose all fucking day. Jungkook only fucks you with the head of his shaft for a while, feeling you so tight around him, savouring the sensation but also worried he'd hurt you if he were to go further.

You're on edge. On edge of a devastating orgasm, already too fucking close, and even if you could blame it on the foreplay, on your hormones or whatever else, he'd know. He'd know it's because of him, because of how much you like him, of how good he makes you feel, how much he turns you on.

You don't really care. He's already panting in your ear, groaning and moaning with tight jaws about how good you feel and how pretty you are, when he's only half of the way inside and that's more than enough. It's kind of too much. Kind of impossible to handle.

It's a mewl to the shell of his ear and the digging of your nails in his firm ass that push him further and balls deep inside you. It feels like discovering new places within yourself, places you haven't reach before alone or with someone else, brings a rush of excitement to your whole body that translates in a vice tight clench around him.

He fucks you so good, it feels so nice, his cock was made for you. His rhythm steady, rather slow but powerful, sending you a tiny bit higher on the bed at each thrust, with one arm slid behind your back, his hand wrapped around the back of your neck to hold you still enough. It's little to no effect but it drives you crazy, having him own you like that. From all those places, his dick, his thigh pressing yours higher, his hands, his mouth, his words. Bewitching, he is. Everything feels and sounds and touches him, the air you breath tastes like him.

You wish it'd last forever but it can't. Like everything that tastes that wondrous.

"Jungkook, I think- uh- gonna come." You lie because you don't think, you know you're about to come even if it's been a couple of minutes since he's started. Conveniently, the moon chooses this very moment to come out of wherever she was hiding, shining right through the only window of your suite and hitting him right in the face to bring clear light to him and to his grin, the smug grin you've only caught glimpses of. Your nails dig deeper in his flesh, he gasps lightly and bites on his lip but the smirk doesn't leave, even though it looks ridiculous with his heavy droopy gaze, his red cheeks and his heaving. He's as affected as you are. And that's that precise revelation that throws you over the edge. You mewl aloud, turned euphoric with how incredible it feels to have him keep fucking you through your orgasm, with his cock dragging along your tight, sensitive entrance with his movements.

Soon he follows. You don't exactly catch the moment, too lost in your own euphoria to decipher when his begins, but you feel the change in his thrusts, sloppy and harsher, skin slapping louder in the quiet room and once you've both bathed fully in the pleasure, came back to the now calmer, quieter Earth, you realise your ear rings with the ghost of a raw, low scream that certainly was his.

Fuck, you need to hear this again but this time with your full, undivided attention.

But another time.

Right now, you're half dead. Your hearts have just started coming down from their high. With him laying almost entirely on you. The most of his weight he safely pressed to your side but he's clinging to you, the round tip of his nose buried in your neck, hands holding you tight against him and legs intertwined with yours. Your hand has found its way to his hair, the ungodly mess, fingers gently massaging his scalp, rolling the curls in between.

"So warm..." He hums against your skin, almost purrs. You smile lazily. "Never wanna leave."

"You don't have to." It's the exhaustion that renders your filter ineffective. You know you shouldn't have said that. You know even more so when he doesn't say anything back. "For now, I mean." You don't even know how much of this is a lie. If you really were only thinking about this moment, this night or if the future you both know too well, ugly but very real just waiting its moment to play out, was also on your mind. You're too tired and concretely, fucked out, to even think properly.

"I still have four months." It's a poor consolation. You don't mean to spoil it all. After having spent such a precious, wondrous time with him, you don't want to fuck it all up but you can't help your heart from squeezing painfully in your chest, your throat from struggling to swallow down the heavy ball that's lodged up there. Jungkook senses it. You know he does by the way he holds you tighter, pressing one of those kisses, the most tender ones, at the corner of your lips. "We'll figure something out." He says with an assertion you didn't expect and don't know the origins of. Yet, you trust him and the lump in your throat decides to leave for now.

Somehow, persuaded that you and your heart are safe with him.

A/N: i can’t believe i finished this fucking monster. i need sleep. i’m sorry if it’s not super well edited, i did the 33 pages in one go and yeah. also it’s been so long since i wrote actual explicit smut, i have no idea how it turned out. 😳 let me know :)

to anyone who’s made it this far, thank you so, so, so much. you have my infinite gratefulness and i sincerely hope you enjoyed it.

i’m off to sleep, i hope you are having a wonderful day. stay safe, lots of lots of love 💜

#ksmutclub #networkbangtan #btswriterscollective #ggukienet #bts fluff #bts smut #jungkook fluff #jungkook smut #jungkook scenario #jungkook fanfic #bts scenario #bts fanfic #my writing #when posting will stop being so scary lmao

[bookishofalder]

Night Changes [Five]

Series Masterlist

Summary: Poe and the reader eagerly focus on their friendship. Unfortunately for them, life isn’t that easy.

Warnings: Language, mentions of smut, violence, injuries. WC: 11.1K

A/N: Please enjoy this failed attempt at fluff. Also, thank you to @hoeforthefictional for inspiring a scene in this chapter (see: Charlie’s shirts)

Your hand smacked against the cool steel of the dining table as you snorted, “That is not true!” You exclaimed, watching Poe run his hand over his mouth to try and hide his smile, though you could still see him shaking with laughter. “Poe that was Charlie, it was NOT me!”

“Sure Sweetheart,” He drawled through his chuckles, quirking a brow at you, “Charlie convinced your dad that we could all be trusted on our own for the weekend. ‘Cause, he was the one with the big sad eyes your dad fell for every time.”

You groaned, knowing Poe was right, your giggles confirming it to him even though you didn’t outright admit it. “Well you were the one who suggested we try to nab some booze at Eddard’s,” You pointed at him accusingly as memories of you, Charlie and Poe as preteens trying to break into a closed cantina to steal spotchka replayed in your mind. “I was the only one the old man didn’t hit.”

“My ass smarted for a week after that,” Poe frowned at the memory and you giggled again. He grinned over at you, and you felt a flush of delight at the early morning banter, each of you sipping your caf as the golden sun streamed in through the high windows and the room steadily grew busier around you.

It had been a few weeks since your return from the classified mission, the data collected on the outpost proving to be immeasurably useful, earning you both a very pleased smile from the General. A larger secondary team was already there; though they were outfitted with greater protective equipment and a lot more manpower to clear back some of the overgrown jungle from the base and work to bring it back up and running.

While it was a severe break in protocol, neither you nor Poe included the exposure to the red flower pollen in your mission reports. You described the sighting of the plant, cautioned approached and advised the settlement team to wear protective gear, but that was all. Though a mild amount of guilt settled in your stomach for the breach, the idea of writing down what had happened, of being hauled for questioning and medically assessed, was more than enough to make you feel it was the right decision.

It had taken three days to return to base from the mission. Even after your long conversation with Poe assuring him you were alright and that you didn’t blame him for what happened, he still walked around you like he was afraid any moment you would crack and reveal your anger or mistrust. He’d pointedly refused to touch you or come too close after the initial embrace you shared, and although you disagreed with his reasoning, you couldn’t help the relief that you felt because something about being close to him, touching him, stirred feelings inside you that you didn’t want to address.

It made it easier to focus on repairing your friendship if you maintained a slight distance from the man you’d known your entire life. Better to set aside any feelings or thoughts and work to find your way back to the version of yourself you missed. The one who had been happy. You wanted to be her again because the lonely woman you’d become was less than ideal. And you had missed Poe more than you’d admit.

You just wished you could stop the dreams.

“You know,” You spoke slowly, your eyes losing focus as you thought back to those younger years, “I’m pretty sure that was the weekend I became obsessed with learning about Mandalore. I saw that picture of the really famous one up in the cantina and wanted to know everything about it all.” You shook your head at your youthful silliness, the crush you’d developed for the faceless bounty hunter simply from hearing the tales of his heroics. You’d even had a-

“Remember the picture you had?” Poe cut into your thoughts and you refocused on him, “You had that up for years, on the back of your door, a street artist's painting of the rogue Mandolorian, Charlie teased you all the time for having it.” He was smiling at the memory, his eyes crinkling slightly.

You stared at Poe in surprise as warmth swept through you. “You remember that?” He shrugged, his eyes flicking away to glance at the table as if he was suddenly self-conscious, surprised at himself.

“Yeah, I...” You watched as he appeared to steal himself, his cheeks dusted with colour. “I remember everything. It was always us three, wasn’t it? I’d never forget Charlie or y-you.”

When he looked up again his eyes were burning with bright intensity. You couldn’t bring yourself to look away, even as your heartbeat tripled and emotion swelled inside you. Everything else-the noise of the caf, the sounds of others laughter and conversations-it all faded into the background as Poe and you regarded one another across the table.

A hand coming down onto your shoulder jolted you from your thoughts. You glanced up to find Temmin grinning at you both as he moved to take a seat next to you. “Morning, morning,” He glanced over mischievously at Poe, then back to you, “Sorry to interrupt your eye-fuck session, just wondering if you saw our surveillance got moved up?”

Poe was quicker to recover, pulling Temmin’s attention from you as heat flooded your face and you gaped wordlessly. “Uh, to now, I’m assuming?” Poe spared you a glance, his eyes unreadable as you swallowed, embarrassed at your reaction.

You’d anticipated those close to you or Poe to tease you both about the renewed friendship, entirely unsurprised that Temmin was the leading comedian about the entire thing. He’d happily jumped on any excuse to tease, but even though you were never one to flinch away from adult banter, the occasional sexually suggestive comments brought you straight back to the memories from your mission and rendered you speechless each time.

Pursing your lips, you took the last sip of your caf and stood up, your hands automatically sweeping down the front of your flight suit to straighten any wrinkles. You tried to give a half-hearted smile, hoping Temmin didn’t start to think you had a shitty sense of humour.

“I’m going to get started on pre-flight, in that case.”

You glanced at Poe and found he was already watching you, his lips quirking up in a way that made your insides bubble confusingly. Before you could turn away, however, Temmin was gently grabbing your forearm.

“Don’t uh, go that way, use the longer route. For your sanity.” He suggested, grimacing as you groaned in frustration.

“Kriff. Thanks, Snap.” You spun and stalked in the opposite direction, your eyes still scanning to ensure that you didn’t accidentally run into Rush despite Temmin’s warning.

The Healer had not taken kindly to your outright disinterest, apparently taking Poe’s interference at the cantina before your mission as a challenge. You felt you had enough on your plate now to justify not telling him point-blank to fuck off. You’d instead found yourself actively avoiding him, going so far as to duck into storage closets to hide, or in the case of two days ago, hide behind the broader frame of your Captain when you’d spotted the Rush walk into the hangar and look around for you.

Temmin had started to goad you after Rush had departed, stopping when he saw the look on your face and you’d resigned yourself to explain the situation. When you’d finished, he’d offered to talk to the Healer for you, suggested the Poe could and would step in as well, but you had been very clear that you didn’t want either of them to deal with your issues and told Temmin in no uncertain terms to keep the situation from Poe. He had been going out of his way in previous weeks to be kind to you. His continued (and entirely unnecessary) attempts to make up for everything that had happened, both on the mission and before. Having him do another favour for you when you had yet to figure out how to give back to Poe, didn’t sit right with you.

So you snuck out of the back of the dining hall and hoped you’d bought yourself more time to figure your shit out.

Earlier that morning

His curls were softer than you’d remembered, you loved sinking your hands into them and gripping. Your head felt so heavy that you felt yourself drop it into his neck, your heart swelling at how right it felt to nuzzle into Poe as he held you.

Fuck, it felt so good to straddle him this way, not just for how close your bodies were, how easily you could kiss him, but because his thick, long cock hit the best spots inside you at this angle. It was bliss, delicious, something you should have been doing for years. You rolled your hips as you came, crying out when he slammed you onto him and held you there as he came undone as well, feeling close to passing out when he cried out for you.

“Sweetheart, oh fuck, (y/n)!”

“FUCK!”

You gasped as you woke from your dream, trying to sit up even as your body continued to convulse from your orgasm and small moans tore from you. You gripped the sheets, panting as you floated down from your high, again. Another dream, the same memory replayed over and over every night until you eventually woke up like this, shaking and sweating and cumming.

You sobbed, sitting forward and drawing your knees up to your chest, wrapping your arms around yourself as you dropped your head. This needed to stop and you didn’t understand why it wouldn’t. It had started up the first night you were back on D’Qar, always the same; the memory of those finals moments wrapped around Poe, the last orgasms you each had as the pollen had worn off, and then you’d wake up as you came. You’d tried masturbating before bed just to try and curb the need, but that hadn’t helped in the least. You were desperate now, confused and exhausted from waking up day after day filled with an intense need for something you shouldn’t want.

A good part of you thought your sleeping brain was just cruel, taunting you for what had occurred. But the logical side of your brain noted that it could very well be an aftereffect of the exposure to the pollen, perhaps the last dregs of it working its way from your system when you were most vulnerable. But since you hadn’t reported the exposure, there was no way to find out. It wasn’t like you were going to ask Poe if he was experiencing anything similar-either response he could give was equally as mortifying just to imagine.

Kicking your sheets away, you glanced at your clock and noted the early hour before stalking angrily into your fresher to take a shower. A cold one, because despite the daily orgasms you were waking up from, you were constantly on edge, hornier than you’d been in a long time.

It didn’t help that you were a touch-starved, lonely and unattached woman. Aside from what had happened with Poe on the mission, you hadn’t had sex in a long time and even the last few times you did, it wasn’t anything spectacular. Which was why you’d been almost ready to let Rush take you to bed before, just to feel something pleasurable.

And now...now you wanted to run away from all pleasure.

+

Poe watched as you hurried out of the room, your shoulders stiff and he frowned when you glanced hastily toward the other doorway before slipping out of view. He looked at Temmin, who was giving him a knowing, guilty kind of smile from across the table. “What the hell was that about?”

Temmin considered his words for a long moment, rapping his knuckles on the table. Finally, he said, “Major hasn’t told you?” As if hoping Poe might suddenly realize what was going on with you and let him off the hook. At the same time, his friend appeared unsurprised of the direction the conversation had gone since your odd departure.

Raising a brow at his friend, Poe leaned forward. “No,” He replied slowly, shaking his head, “Told me what?”

“Let me preface this by telling you she asked me not to make you aware of the situation. Healer Derrin has been cornering her around base every day since you’ve been back, trying to convince her to give him another chance,” Temmin paused as Poe shifted from curious to downright outraged, “Don’t look at me like that, I just found out myself like two days ago.”

“But-I-” Poe stammered, half rising from his seat, “What the fuck has he been doing?”

Temmin waved a hand in a calming manner, “Popping up all over, trying to catch her for a conversation. Only reason I found out was that he came into the hangar the other day and she practically climbed on my back hiding behind me from him.”

Beside himself with fury, Poe took several deep breaths to relax. “Fuck,” He growled, running his hands over his face.

A distant part of his mind wondered why he was so physically worked up, ready to seek out the Healer and lay into him. When he glanced up, Temmin was casting an obvious glance to the time and Poe relented, releasing his anger to focus on the task at hand. “Sorry, thank you for telling me. Let’s go.”

With a curt nod, Temmin jumped to his feet and fell into step with Poe as they made their way to the hangar. It didn’t go unnoticed by Poe that his friend cast a wary eye around, no doubt concerned they would run into Rush and he would be required to break up a fight.

Quietly sighing to himself, Poe rationalized that he could focus on patrol, then return to base and seek out Rush for a civil conversation, nothing more. Flying would calm him, help him to clear his head, and despite your request to keep Poe out of it, he wasn’t about to let you down by allowing some dick head to harass you.

-

Patrolling the Resistance base was a duty that fell upon every squadron, regardless of status. Poe knew he could probably convince Leia to let Black team off the hook, considering the number of high-status, incredibly dangerous missions she entrusted them with, however he felt it was good for his team to pull their weight when it came to the less exciting tasks.

It was also a good opportunity for some team building, as you all kept your comms open to have idle chit-chat throughout the shift. “Listen, Poe, Tommy was a lot taller than you. You know it, I know it, hell Temmin knows it! He knew Tommy!” You were giggling now, which was the only reason why Poe had continued to argue that Tommy wasn’t all that much taller than him.

“She’s right, Commander.” Temmin supplied with a chuckle.

Kare’s voice joined in, “I’ve never met this Tommy but he sure sounds a lot taller. Did you date him, Major?”

At the question, Poe felt himself stiffen slightly, suddenly extremely curious to hear your response. You didn’t hesitate, “Oh, maker, no. Never.”

“Wow,” Poe chirped with a laugh, “I’m kind offended for Tommy with how passionately you just said that!”

You laughed, “Tommy wasn’t my type, Kare. We were just friends.”

“But he did ask you out,” Temmin suddenly supplied, unknowingly causing Poe to frown. Tommy had asked you out...when? It can’t have been during Gold team days, because then he’d know about it, if not from you then certainly from Charlie, who was close with Tommy. Which meant that you had seen Tommy at some point after you left and spent enough time with him for the handsome pilot to ask you out. Jealously silenced Poe and he opted to listen only.

“Oh,” You sounded surprised that Temmin knew about it, “Yes, well we were stationed together for a while at an outpost a few years ago.” Though your voice had tightened somewhat, Temmin had apparently not picked up on it and continued speaking, teasing you.

“Huh well, Major, from what I heard via our mutual friend Rico, you two had a 'friends with benefits' thing going on during that assignment.”

You laughed in embarrassment, “Fuck off, Temmin.”

Realizing that his silence was both telling and uncalled for, Poe decided to join back in. “What, sweetheart, embarrassed to admit you liked his man-bun?” He joked, happily drawing further laughs from you and the rest of Black team. Inwardly, however, Poe was spinning and he tuned out of the remainder of the conversation as he fell into deep thought.

It was incredibly wonderful having you back. Despite everything that happened during the mission, the resulting change between Poe and you had exponentially increased his overall happiness. It felt, in some ways, like old times. The void that was Charlie was there, ever-present but not always overwhelming, sometimes it was just a hum of grief in the background as you walked next to Poe, your shoulder occasionally brushing his arm, or when you laughed fully and your eyes crinkled the same way Charlie’s had.

And stars, you were funny-Poe had always thought you had a great sense of humour, but the past few years had given you a slightly harsher perspective, something that most Resistance fighters developed in time. It meant your wit was a little drier, your sarcasm in great abundance. He’d laughed more these past few weeks than he had in years, something that didn’t escape Temmin’s notice, his friend often shooting him a knowing wink when you weren’t looking.

Professionally, not a whole lot had changed, though conversation and directives were less chopped, he was proud to know that despite the tension and anger that had been between you before the mission, you had both worked immensely well together.

He had been terrified that you would leave again, despite your assurances on the contrary. He wouldn’t even have blamed you if you had; he remembered everything that happened, the way he’d touched you, the dark bruises and marks he’d littered across your soft skin, and the things he said. The harsh, cruel words still twisted in the back of his mind, surging to the forefront at random to taunt him, force him to relive the way he’d demeaned you. But you hadn’t left, in fact, Poe was pretty certain that the first few days back you had barely left his side just to prove to him that you wouldn’t, and he was grateful for that more than he could tell you.

He was grateful to have you back, to banter and tease, to see your smile brighten the room every day, usually because of something he had said. His old feelings were stirring, never really having faded altogether, but he was eager to push them down again and focus on the friendship. He needed to reign in his jealousy over something that had happened years ago between you and Tommy.

There was no reason good enough to admit how he had felt before Charlie died, and certainly, nothing in the galaxy could convince him to confess to you how he was starting to feel now.

It was better, he thought, to just be friends. Safer.

Earlier that morning

Your skin was soft, delightfully silky and smooth under his rough fingers, and he enjoyed gripping you harder, pulling your hips to his as he filled you, over and over. Your warm body pressed against his as you straddled his lap, your moans weak and head lolling from the pleasure.

The feel of your head falling to his neck, your body curling into him as your orgasm hit.

“Oh Poe, don’t stop!” The way you said his name. How you clenched around him, pulling him to his own peak. The feeling that was coming inside of you, bliss and rightness of the action intensely overwhelming as you shivered in his arms.

With a start, Poe woke up, his dream-induced orgasm ripping from him. He was unable to do more than groan in pleasure, his hips rutting against the mattress as his cum spurted, hands gripping his pillow. Biting his lip, the shame washed over him before he’d fully finished cumming, his groan morphing into a pitiful sound of desperation.

Every fucking day he woke up much the same, his dream-memories of those final moments under the grip of the pollen replaying over and over until he woke up mid-orgasm. He hadn’t had wet dreams since he hit puberty, for Maker’s sake. He thought it must be an aftereffect of the pollen, further proof the intensity and potency of the red flower was beyond anything he’d ever heard of.

Grunting in frustration, Poe climbed out of bed and retrieved a towel to clean up his mess. Turning on the shower, he glanced at the time, happy that he had enough time to rinse off before meeting you for what was becoming a routine morning caf.

He kept the water cold, punishing himself for his dreams and wishing like hell he could erase the images of you, so beautiful and soft around him, from his mind.

+

It was ideal that the man essentially stalking you was a Healer because it meant that he was relatively easy to track down on base. Healers had long shifts in the med-bay and usually didn’t stray far from base in case something major happened that required additional medical support. Poe was walking to the med bay now, leaving you with Temmin and your funny friend Ana back in the dining hall, to confront Rush.

He’d come up with a simple excuse to step away, stating he required a few essentials from the commissary and wanting to get there before they closed. You were eating slowly tonight and he had taken advantage of that and Ana’s rare presence-something that would keep you in the dining hall much longer, conversation flowing, so that he could slip off to the med-bay.

He’d felt your eyes watching him as he excused himself, burning into the back of his neck as he tried to walk as casually as possible out of the room. As soon as he was clear, he sped up in case you decided to follow him, but a glance over his shoulder before he turned the corner a few minutes later proved he was right that you would linger with Ana instead.

As he walked along the halls, nodding and smiling at anyone he passed, Poe attempted to steady and control his emotions. He would ask Rush to leave you be; be nice but incredibly firm. Advise the healer that it was in his own best interest to keep things professional unless you did indicate you were interested. As he argued with himself on the best way to word the request, Charlie’s image floated around in his head, reminding him that if he was still alive and some dick head was bothering you, he would be the one to calmly protect you. Poe was the less than calm protector, but he needed to channel your brother here because he hoped to prevent you from finding out he’d cornered Rush.

As he approached the final stretch of the hallway that led into the med-bay, a nurse just coming off duty came walking along in the opposite direction. Poe recognized the older woman, brightening when she glanced up and saw him. “Evening, Rosie, how are you?” He flashed her his best grin.

With an affectionate roll of her eyes, Rosie calm to a halt in front of Poe, “Good evening Commander, what brings you to our neck of the woods? You don’t look injured unless your big head is giving you a headache.”

This was why Poe liked her, she was the type to catch on to bullshit and funny as hell. He couldn’t help his bark of a laugh, “No, I’ve gotten pretty good at lugging it around,” He replied, “Listen, can I ask you a quick question before you head off for a night of dancing with a lucky guy?”

“Lucky lady,” She corrected with a wink, and Poe smiled apologetically with a nod, “And go ahead, what’s up?”

“Right, my mistake, although now that I think of it I don’t think any of us men could survive your charms,” He joked, pulling a laugh from the deadpan nurse, “I’m looking for Healer Derrin, do you happen to know where I could find him?”

Something close to a knowing look flashed in her eyes then, but Rosie didn’t comment. “His shift just ended, actually. He left for the hangar roughly, oh, ten minutes ago.” She glanced at her wrist comm for the time, nodding to herself at her estimation.

Poe frowned, realizing that it was routine for you to have left dinner already to go to the hangar to input your mission report for the day and perform your check of his and your own ships. Because you were dining with Ana, however, you hadn’t left yet. “Thank you, Rosie.” He gently clasped her shoulder as she smiled at him with that look still in her eyes, but she merely bid him farewell before he spun around a hurried away, taking the quickest route to the hangar.

When he arrived, the hangar was fairly quiet, only a few lingering mechanics wandering about, several service droids cleaning the large space and performing nighttime checks. Still wearing his medical clothing, Rush was easy to spot as he stood near your ship across the room, eyes staring off at nothing as he waited to see if you’d turn up.

When he heard Poe’s footsteps approaching, he turned with a hopeful look before spotting him and shifting to a placating smile. “Evening, Commander!”

Poe stopped a few feet short Rush and tried his best to return the smile, “Healer,” His voice was clipped, and he took a careful breath in an attempt to keep calm and channel Charlie. Friendly, to the point, no need to get worked up. “What brings you here so late?”

Rush shrugged, “Hoping to catch the little bird that keeps flying off,” He admitted, gesturing at your ship, “Can’t seem to get any face-to-face time with her, but I’m hoping to clear things up and start fresh. Think I moved too quickly before.”

Poe plastered his face with a neutral expression as his insides burned upon hearing Rush refer to you as ‘little bird’. “Listen, man, I’ve known (y/n) my whole life and I don’t think she’s interested, I mean, it’s been weeks since your date and she’s been avoiding you since.” Poe kept his voice as steady as possible, not wanting his tone to convey anything other than mild interest.

Rush bristled immediately, however, “That your objective opinion, Dameron?”

His voice was pointedly not steady and his tone was anything but mild. Still, Poe held up his hands in a placating gesture, “It is, and it’s kind of...uh, obvious, I guess.”

Poe watched as Rush took a measured step closer to him, though this didn’t serve to intimidate as the Healer stood an easy couple of inches shorter than him. “You’re full of shit. You’re telling me this because you want to fuck her,” He glared up at Poe, who was frowning as he fought his internal battle to remain calm. “Actually, noticed you two are buddy-buddy all of a sudden; so that’s it, isn’t it? You went off together for nearly two weeks and she spread her pretty legs for you-“

Well, no one could say Poe didn’t try. His fist was connecting with Rush’s smug face before the Healer could continue his vulgar accusation, falling back a few steps before regaining his balance and shooting a glare that did nothing to intimidate Poe.

Forcing himself not to move in for another punch, Poe pointed his finger at Rush, “Shut the fuck up, asshole. I never want to hear you talk about her that way again, got it?”

Rush scoffed, his hand rubbing along his reddening jaw, “You’re only proving me right, reacting like that. Either you want her so you’re trying to prevent me from having a chance, or you already had her,” The Healer was seething mad, clearly not thinking straight. He didn’t seem to see the tension rolling over Poe’s body, anger coiling within and ready to burst forth in more than just a single punch. Or maybe a handsome guy like Rush Derrin couldn’t stand the idea of having a competitor, as he seemed to view Poe, and it clouded his usual ‘nice guy’ personality entirely, made him mean, made him say things that he really, really shouldn’t. “Tell me, what is she like when you’re balls deep-does she moan as loud as I-“

This time, Poe didn’t hold his anger back into a single punch, he opted instead to launch himself at Rush, whose eyes flashed in fear just before he was taken to the ground. Fistfights weren’t something that Poe usually got himself into anymore, though he’d had more than his share growing up. He held himself to higher standards now, especially considering his high rank within the Resistance, the respect he had from his fellow fighters.

All of that was out the window though as he wrestled on the hangar floor with Rush, who gave a yell of anger as he tried to out fist Poe. He was strong, a decent enough match physically despite being shorter than Poe, who twisted his hips to roll Rush in a flurry of movement, eager not to end up bested by being pinned under the man. He did feel the punches he gained in return, particularly a stinging blow to his cheek that seemed to hit directly on the apple, skin splitting on contact. Rush was wasting energy on cursing and yelling insults, most of which didn’t register with Poe as blood rushed loudly in his ears, rage only intensifying.

It was only a few moments of fighting at this point, not long enough for anyone who had been on the other side of the hangar to have made it over already to break them up. This was why Poe stiffened in complete surprise when he saw a figure approaching quickly in his peripheral vision, which distracted him just enough for Rush to take advantage and roll heavily, slamming Poe into the floor. He felt his head hit the concrete, though it wasn’t too hard of a blow it was disorienting. Before he could even begin to attempt to get Rush off of him, however, the figure that had first distracted him now came directly into view over Poe.

It was you.

But you weren’t yelling for them to stop like he would have imagined you would do. Instead, from his vantage on the ground, Poe witnessed your fury first hand, so much more intense than he’d seen in years. But the night of Charlie’s funeral that fury had been lined with grief and heartbreak. Now, you looked shockingly terrifying as you swiftly launched yourself at Rush, tackling him off of Poe in one motion before rolling with ease and jumping back to your feet.

When you pointed your blaster down at the Healer, who lay flat on his back in complete shock, even Poe flinched at the look on your face.

“Don’t you fucking touch him,” You hissed, your voice cold and low. There were a few people nearby, all who’d frozen upon seeing the Major asserting her authority over the lower level Healer. Though he partially flushed with pride and equal parts surprise, Poe was quick to scramble to his feet and hurry to your side. “I forbid you to enter this hangar again unless it’s for medical purposes, got it?”

Poe could see that your finger wasn’t on the trigger of your blaster, the safety clicked on still. All the same, your reaction was completely out of character and he wanted to stop that cold, harsh look on your face in its tracks, even if it wasn’t directed at him.

“Sweetheart,” He murmured, quiet enough that only Rush could discern his words, “Let’s take a walk, let Healer Derrin go and lick his wounds.”

The moment you dropped the blaster, Rush was on his feet and hurrying out of the hangar, blissfully silent, entirely amusing. Poe glanced around to the others nearby and gave a friendly nod of release, and they broke away to finish their work. Placing a hand carefully on your lower back, he put a slight pressure and started to walk, relieved when you complied and holstered your blaster.

Though he’d suggested the walk, you seemed to take control of the direction and somehow Poe found himself stepping through the door of your room minutes later. He barely had a moment to glance around at the minimally decorated space, his eyes again finding your pinned copy of his favourite photo on the corkboard, before you rounded on him.

You weren’t as furious as you had been before, but he still took a measured step away from under the heat of your gaze, flinching as he waited for you to begin yelling at him for interfering in your life, for embarrassing you, bracing himself for your wrath.

Instead, your angry gaze met his own and you faltered, your eyes flicking over his face and Poe watched the anger melt away, your expression softening into concern. “Oh, Poe,” You sighed, closing the distance between you both to reach up and carefully grab his jaw with one hand, turning his head to peer up at the cheek he’d taken the worst punch to, “Are you alright?”

You dropped your hand, not completely as he would have expected but to rest on his chest, just over his heart. Poe felt himself stiffen again, the casual way you touched him driving him almost into a frenzy of confusion and hope and fear.

“I’m fine, I can take a punch,” He grinned, cringing when his cheek stung from the movement. “Might need to pop a bacta-patch over this, though.” He reached up and carefully prodded the split skin, hissing at the pain.

You stepped away, tugging Poe by the arm, “Sit,” You ordered, pushing him toward your bed. He perched himself on the edge and watched as you went to the med-kit you kept in your fresher to pull out bacta-patches. “I knew you weren’t going to the commissary.” You added when you walked back toward Poe, grabbing your desk chair and setting it in front of him before taking a seat.

“In my defence, I was being nice at first,” Poe said as you wiped away the blood on his face before gently placing the patch, your eyes focused on your work. “He uh, turned out to be a bit more hot-headed than I’d have thought.”

You snorted, “I came in too late to know who hit who first, but you don’t need to defend yourself,” Picking up another wipe, you cleaned around the patch and some spots along the rest of his face that must have had blood splatter. “I made Temmin tell me if he told you about Rush. I know you were fighting with him because of me. And that’s...that’s why I hadn't mentioned it, actually.”

Poe stared at you for a beat, “What do you mean?”

“I just,” You sighed, your eyes searching his face before you tossed the wipe in the trash and you sat back in your seat. He already missed the feel of your hands on his skin. “I knew you would want to talk to him, and that could lead to a fistfight or whatever on my behalf, and I didn’t want you to put yourself in that position just for me.”

“Just for you?” Poe repeated in surprise, leaning forward, his arms resting on his knees, to look at you closely, “Sweetheart, come on, you know I’d do anything for you.”

You nodded, but Poe wondered if you understood how serious he was, how he wouldn’t hesitate, wouldn’t question. Or maybe you did understand and that was why you looked slightly afraid, your face flushed as Poe gazed at you intently.

“Poe, you’ve been going out of your way for me since we’ve been back. You know it’s all...we’re good, I trust you,” You leaned forward, your face mere inches from Poe’s, and took his hands into yours, “So you don’t need to keep proving yourself, I promise.”

Poe felt himself nodding as he looked at you, gazed into your bright eyes and saw the sincerity in them, the emotion. He was still, afraid to move now that there was nothing between either of you, fully aware that you were alone together in a locked room and nothing could interrupt you. He felt himself blush, heat crawling up his neck, and Poe wanted to lean away and clear his throat and push back everything he was feeling but you were making it too difficult, sitting there with wide eyes and plump lips and a look so earnest, so trusting that he was transported straight back to the first time he’d wanted to kiss you.

But the thing was, he was a skinny teenager back then, and it had been easy to talk himself back and resist the urge because of Charlie. Because he didn’t want to offend you. Because your mom was just down the hall and could walk in at any moment.

But here, Poe wasn’t a teenager anymore, and for that matter neither were you. No, you were both fully grown adults, a fact he was keenly aware of as his eyes moved from yours, slowly, and he saw the way your lips were parted, the flush up your neck, the way your chest was heaving slightly.

He’d never wanted to be braver in his entire life.

Just as he thought of closing the gap, though, an image surfaced. The memory of you, trembling on the table after the pollen had worn off, just before he could give you the bacta shot, your body littered with marks he’d put there, the marks that were in the nightmares he kept having. Bile rose in his throat and he was sure you sensed the shift then because you were pulling away even before Poe broke the connection of your gazes and eased his hands from your grasp.

It was quiet for a minute, each of you looking determinedly away from the other. You stood, and Poe glanced up, fearing you were going to ask him to leave. You had a thoughtful look on your face, however, and moved over to your dresser instead. He watched as you opened the lowest drawer, flipping through the contents.

“I realized the other day that you didn’t have any of Charlie’s clothing because of course, I’d taken it all,” You straightened, turning around with a small stack of shirts clutched in your hands, “But I shouldn’t have done that, so here, take these.” And you held the stack out to him, biting your lip as you did.

Poe’s heart stuttered in his chest and he had to blink a few times to clear the sting of tears threatening the corners of his eyes. “These were...Charlies’?” You nodded, your eyes swimming with similar emotion. He took them from you and looked down at the familiar, worn fabric in a variety of colours, each shirt soft and well cared for. “Sweetheart, I don’t know what to say.”

He stood up, gripping the clothes in one hand before carefully reaching out and wrapping his arm around your head, pulling you close and kissing your hair. You were stiff in his arms, but he felt you patting his mid-back. “You don’t have to say anything, flyboy.”

—

It was very rare that you found yourself in your current position, crouched outside of Poe Dameron’s window late at night, grateful that his father slept on the lower floor of their home because he found it cooler. And even though you knew Mr. Dameron wouldn’t be mad if he found you sneaking into his son’s room, because you and Poe were together most of the time anyway since forever, you didn’t want him to interrupt your attempt to apologize to your friend.

You carefully slid the window open, your eyes attempting to adjust to the darkened room within but there was no light this evening, even the stars were hidden by clouds that threatened rain you knew wouldn’t come for another day at least. You were gazing in the direction of where you knew his bed was, so when hands shot out to grab you from almost right in front of you, you couldn’t help the squeak you let out, still desperate to be quiet, before promptly falling backwards. You wondered if you were about to break your arm again, and it had only just healed the month before. Kriff.

Thankfully Poe had already grabbed your waist, his hands gripping tighter when you lost your balance before he pulled you through his window with a grunt, both of you tumbling down due to the force he’d used to ensure you didn’t fall. Landing clumsily on top of him with a thud, you both froze in the dark, listening for any sounds from downstairs.

You waited a few minutes, heart pounding in your ears, wishing you could at least see Poe’s face but it was too dark, you could only make out the faint outline of him. You could tell he was looking up at you, but that was about it. Feeling confident Mr. Dameron was still fast asleep, you shuffled off of Poe, only his hands were still gripping your waist, so you ended up kneeling right next to him.

“Poe?” You whispered, moving a hand down to pat the back of one of his, “I think we’re good-sorry, I wanted to-“

Poe’s angry sigh halted your words in their tracks, and you felt his fingers flex before he released you and moved away. After a pause, light from a small lamp bathed the room in a low, golden glow and your best friend came into view, standing a few feet away with his arms crossed over his chest.

“I heard your apology the first time, (y/n),” He hissed, and you hated the way he said your name, that he even said it at all when you were used to him only referring to you as ‘sweetheart’. “Breaking in to say it again doesn’t really-“

You had climbed to your feet, dusting off your knees before glaring up at Poe, “Fine, I won’t apologize again. But I’m not leaving until you talk to me, tell me how I can fix this.”

Poe ran a hand wearily over his face, not meeting your eyes. Guilt and shame and sadness were all that you felt these past several days as Poe actively avoided you, refused to even look at you, because of what you’d said. And you hadn’t meant it, you really didn’t, it just slipped out in a moment of heated disagreement and you wished you could eat the words back up before you’d fully finished speaking. The look he’d given you...

“I don’t know, I just need some time,” He grumbled, still not looking at you. You took a half step closer, hoping to draw his gaze. Disappointed when he only frowned harder and kept his eyes on the wall. “I know you’re sorry, but you still fucking said it.”

“And I have no excuse for it, Poe, I was out of line. I was angry and I wanted to just...”

“You wanted to hurt me.” He finished, and you were shaking your head violently because that wasn’t it, it really wasn’t.

“No, no that’s not why,” You breathed, tears threatening but you swallowed them back, blinking, “You’ve just been so weird lately, and you wouldn’t tell me why so I lost myself and wanted a...a reaction, something, from you.”

Poe’s eyes locked on yours then and you felt yourself shrink inward at the coldness within them, “You said my mother would be ashamed of me. Out loud, to my face. Because I wasn’t explaining why I’ve been moody-which by the way, if you thought about it you’d fucking realize why-so that was your solution?”

His voice had raised only a fraction, a whisper yell in the dim room, yet he might as well have been screaming at you. You deserved for him to rage and yell because you had said that. In a stupid, selfish moment, after weeks of odd behaviour from Poe and another fruitless attempt to ask him what was going on, you’d said his mother would be ashamed of him for shutting you out. You hated yourself for saying it.

You grappled with yourself, struggling to find words and Poe jumped on your silence to continue speaking. “I forget sometimes that you’re just a kid, a silly, spoiled little girl who gets her way all the time,” His words cut through the air like little knives, driving straight into your chest, “But in the real world, when you say mean shit like that you can’t always just bat your pretty lashes and say you’re sorry. Words have consequences, you fucking brat.”

You bristled, despite having known when you decided to come here tonight and beg for forgiveness that he might lash out, you weren’t prepared for Poe to talk down to you like this. Little girl. Spoiled. Brat. Was that really how he saw you?

Was he really going to leave to join the Resistance and you’d never see him again?

“Fuck you,” You gasped, pain lancing your heart as you glared up at your best friend, “You don’t talk to me like that, Poe Dameron. I said a shitty, horrible thing to you and I didn’t mean it and I’ve been trying to apologize, that doesn’t give you the right to speak to me like this. You’re calling me the kid when you-you’re acting like an angry little boy?”

Poe dropped his crossed arms, his mouth opening in fury as he stepped toward you, and you were ready for the fight, for the words to start flowing between you both as whatever the fuck was going on lately seemed to bubble up and over. But the dim lighting of the room left a lot of shadows and darkness, and his sudden movement toward you startled you. You couldn’t help it, you flinched, visibly and almost bone jarringly. You flinched away from Poe, one hand half raising in front of yourself defensively.

And the fight in Poe, that fire and passion, it was out in an instant. Like you had flipped a switch and all the power was sucked from the room. For a moment, he stood frozen in mid-motion, gaping at you as you straightened from your defensive stance, and you shook your head to organize your thoughts, wanting to just apologize again and leave. But he was looking at you so intensely now that you felt like you couldn’t move; like he’d pinned you with his horrified expression.

“Are you-?” His voice almost broke, and he didn’t try to clear it, merely lowered the pitch, “Are you scared of me?”

You wanted to shake your head, but your brain was still processing the shocked look he was giving you, the colour rising to his cheeks as emotion seemed to overwhelm him. Poe looked utterly wrecked at that moment, and even though you knew he needed to hear you speak, to assure him that of course, you weren’t scared of him, the sudden movement and looming shadow on the wall had simply caught you off guard, you couldn’t bring yourself to fucking speak.

“Sweetheart, fuck, I’m so sorry, please don’t be afraid,” He gasped out, holding up both hands slowly, palms facing you, “I would never-shit, sweet, beautiful girl, please don’t be afraid of me, please I’m sorry, I’m so so-“

You cut him off as he started to nearly sob, convinced you were scared of him, that you thought he might hurt you. “Poe, no, I’m not scared!” Regaining the use of your brain, you stumbled forward and threw yourself against Poe’s chest, gripping the soft tee he’d worn to bed, your face pressed over his heart. “I was just startled, I’m not scared of you, I could never be scared of you.”

You could hear his heart hammering away in his chest, feel how tense he was, his hands hovering in the air behind you. His voice was so quiet when he spoke that if you hadn’t had your head so close against him, you wouldn’t have heard.

“I would never hurt you, fuck, I wouldn’t try to intimidate you. I’m sorry I was going to stand closer so I-I could yell without waking dad up, so stupid...” The sob that had been threatening him tore out, crushing your heart a little.

He was ridiculous because you’d know him your whole life and you knew he wasn’t the type of man to physically harm or scare anyone. Sure, he’d been in his share of fistfights, but even you knew he was usually throwing a punch in response, and these last few months he’d been relatively cool-headed, a sign of his maturity.

You pressed your body closer to his before lifting your head to look up at him. Poe was still not touching you, and he was looking across the room unseeingly as he blinked back tears, his expression tense and upset. With slow movements, you reached up to stroke along his jaw, your hand pausing when you first touched him, your heart rate picking up a little when his eyes closed at your touch. You stroked more than the usual three times, repeating the action until his body relaxed against yours, continuing until his hands tentatively moved, one settling on your waist and the other raising to cup your face.

You stood like that for a long moment, your fingers still trailing the familiar path of his stubble, drinking in the way his expression, eyes still closed, softened for you.

“I know you wouldn’t ever hurt me, Poe,” You whispered, “That’s why I’m fucking wrecked that I hurt you. If you don’t want to see me anymore...I understand, I crossed the line like an idiot. Our friendship has always been the most important thing to me and I overstepped and I’m sorry, you’re right that I’m just a stupid little-“

“Stop,” Though it was low, whispered into the room, the command behind the word was enough to silence you and you gazed at Poe in surprise. He looked at you then, and you delighted at the expression he had, so filled with love and care. “I forgive you, I know you didn’t mean it. I saw your face right as you said it...we just, we both got too worked up. We keep doing that, I think because we know Charlie and I leave in less than a year.”

You nodded in agreement, the small movement making you suddenly very aware of how tightly pressed against Poe you were. He was still holding your face gently, but the hand on your waist was gripping you in a way the suggested he felt the proximity as well. You took a shuddering breath, “I love you, Poe. I’m sorry.”

He dropped his head to rest his forehead against yours, his eyes fluttering half shut, and the weirdest thought suddenly cropped up in your head. The most absurd notion that you could easily tilt your head and press your lips to his. You remained still, but couldn’t help but stare at his soft lips as he spoke.

“I love you too, sweetheart,” The hand on your waist clutched you closer, which you hadn't thought was possible, “And I promise I would never hurt you, never lay a finger on you or say something awful that I meant, never. Nothing could ever, ever make me hurt you, sweet, lovely girl.”

You closed your eyes, unable to trust yourself to resist kissing him when he spoke to you like that, his words coated in the deep, suddenly husky tone of voice. And you couldn’t rid those thoughts as he led you over to his bed and you cuddled against him, ready to sleep but your heart thrumming away as you imagined what it would be like to kiss him, your Poe.

What would it be like to be with him, to touch him, to-and you really blushed now, grateful he’d shut the light back off and his light snores were filling the room-feel him hard for you...you’d never been with a guy before, not like that. You’d had some steamy make-out sessions, groped and fondled with cute guys...but the idea of your Poe coming undone for you...

Well, that was suddenly an idea that you were completely unaware would have such an intense impact on you. You let the images play out in your mind for a moment before taking a deep breath and pushing them back and down, convincing yourself it was just a reaction to the adrenaline, the high emotions. Poe’s grip on you tightened in his sleep, and you snuggled closer to lay your head over his heart and listen to the steady beat.

—

Word travelled quickly around base that Rush Derrin had been beaten up by a pilot; the surprising thing was, at least to you, that the pilot in question was you and not Poe. Apparently, Poe scrapping on the floor with Rush wasn’t nearly as interesting or exciting as the story of how you’d tackled Rush, moved to your feet and drawn your blaster on him in one swift motion.

You had grown used to the quiet greetings over the months you’d been on D’Qar, and enjoyed the last few weeks of friendlier hello’s that cropped up in response to your rekindled friendship with Poe, but the tale of your no-nonsense, ego stripping attack on the rude Healer seemed to blast you into the same orbit Poe had been in as the ever-popular poster boy for the Resistance.

Everyone said hello, no matter where you went or the time of day. Ana sought you out the afternoon after to tell you that all the mechanics were raving about how they thought you were snobbish, and now realized you were, in fact, a silent badass. As embarrassing as it all was, it was nothing compared to Poe’s response to your new status.

He was insatiable, eagerly and proudly telling anyone who would listen-and it seemed everyone did want to listen-his first-hand account of watching you tackle Rush. Of how you’d coldly told him off as you followed your professional directive-protect your Commander, no matter the threat. Your shoulders were starting to ache from the number of times he’d clapped his hands over them, rooting you to the spot so that you couldn’t escape the latest admirers, gripping you because he really was proud, really meant everything he said.

“Okay, seriously,” You breathed when you finally broke free from a group of younger pilots, Poe laughing at your side in amusement at your reaction. “Commander, I may have protected you but I can just as easily go ahead and kick you in the-"

“Ah, come on now sweetheart, you wouldn’t do that,” He laughed, a playful arm dropping around your shoulder. Your insides had started reacting to every single touch, lingering or not, that Poe gave you. Which had been happening a lot lately. And it didn’t help matter that he’d look at you the night of his fight with Rush like you had told him you’d hung the moon just for him. You couldn’t shake the memory of the way he’d gazed at you as you sat frozen, inches away.

“Don’t be so sure,” You grumbled, allowing him to lead you to the hangar, “I now have to hope that if either of us gets seriously injured Rush isn’t the Healer on call, because I doubt he’d be much help now.” You noticed then that even though you were still passing people, and those people were smiling at you, no one had stopped you or spoken to either you or Poe.

Confused, you frowned up at Poe, intending to ask him, but the words died on your tongue.

No one was stopping you because they didn’t want to interrupt Commander Dameron and Major Horn, happily wrapped around each other, looking exactly like a love-struck couple. You were sure that a previous version of yourself, the one who existed years and years ago, would have quickly sprung out of Poe’s reach and laughed awkwardly, made an excuse to run to the fresher. Instead, a feeling grew inside of you that felt a lot like...

Possession. But that wasn’t right, was it?

Poe wasn’t yours, not like that. It was almost like there were two parts of you reacting to the increasing touches; the part that enjoyed the familiarity of his affection, and a part that starved for more and grew hungrier every time it was fed. It made it hard, impossible even, to sort through your real feelings for Poe. Because you did love him, you did feel yourself flush at the idea that others were viewing you as a couple, and yet...the path of your thoughts seemed to reroute itself constantly, focusing on the physical and craving more of it.

Maybe this was your problem before, you couldn’t admit to yourself how you felt toward Poe and it ended up being twisted up until Charlie died. You’d admitted to yourself that the biggest reason you’d fled was that you had realized, all those years ago, that you were in love with Poe. Was that what this was now? Old feelings slamming back home with startling intensity?

Then why could you only focus on his hands on you, if that was the case?

He’d noticed you’d gone quiet and came to a sudden halt in the empty hall, glancing down at you curiously, his eyes darker than normal. You felt his arm hold you a little tighter, the hand on your shoulder gripping almost too hard.

It felt really good.

Fuck, what the fuck.

“Sweetheart?” He searched your face, brows pinching in confusion.

Feeling a little dazed, you shook your head to clear your mind, keenly aware that there was no space between your bodies, that you could press up against him easily. And you were warm, actually. Really, really warm.

“Sorry,” You murmured, forcing yourself to give him a placating little grin, “Just...a little overwhelmed, I think.” You admitted, conceding a partial truth that you knew would suffice.

Instantly, his expression softened and he was backing up, pulling you with him until he was leaning against the wall. He spread his feet apart and pulled you to stand between them, his hands moving to cup your face gently as he looked down at you with kind eyes. You think you stopped breathing. You think he did too. He seemed surprised at his actions.

“I’m sorry, I’ve been teasing you for days,” He sighed after a pause, one thumb absentmindedly stroking your cheek. You were going to combust or pass out, or maybe just evaporate on the spot. “Good news is, I’m pretty sure the General has another mission that’ll take us out of this parsec for a day or two. Should give everyone enough time to move on.” His other hand moved from your face to brush back a few stray hairs, his eyes following the movement hungrily. They were darker still.

There was a familiarity in that darkness.

“That-that’s uh, good,” You stammered, your eyes moving everywhere except to meet his. You were afraid of what he’d see if he looked directly at you. Of what you’d see...but you didn’t understand why you were afraid.

You just got Poe back, you weren’t fucking this up. Get it together, get it together, breathe...

“I know I don’t need to ask,” His voice was low, the timbre shooting straight to your core, “But are you okay to fly, because you seem a little out of it.” His voice sounded wrecked, like it was painful to be speaking.

You nodded hastily, pressing your hands into his abdomen for some unknown reason. You could feel the muscle under his shirt, hell you could remember what it felt like to touch those muscles, to drag your tongue along the surprisingly soft skin, before...before...

Oh fuck.

You think you realized what was happening a moment before it was too late to react, your brain opting to shut down as pleasure ripped through your body with a ferocity that knocked you clean over. With a shuddering moan, you collapsed into Poe as your orgasm rocked through you, unable to speak now as wave after wave turned you into a whimpering mess. He caught you, his face confused even as he unknowingly rutted his hips against you and started trembling.

“What-?” He got a good look at your face then and realization dawned, his expression twisting in horror. “Oh shit, shit,” He groaned, clutching you harder against him and you heard him breathe out your name, equal parts fear and desire colouring his tone before he sunk to his knees, bringing you down with him, and his body stilled.

His orgasm tore through him just as violently, the only thing he could think to do was nuzzle his head into your neck and hide his face as he came. You were limp, your body jerking and convulsing as the high never ended, it seemed to hold at its peak and just drag you along for the ride, unwillingly. In the very back of your mind, you recognized that what was happening was, undoubtedly, an aftereffect to the pollen you’d been exposed to weeks prior. The nightly dreams, subsequent orgasms, the way fire licked up your spine at every touch from Poe...it made sense, and if you weren’t currently trying to keep yourself and Poe quiet as you each came, you’d probably be feeling like a first-class idiot for not reporting the exposure.

“Fuck,” You whimpered pitifully, clinging to Poe for life. You felt another hand on your shoulder suddenly and registered a voice saying your name. It took a few moments to find enough clarity to look up, blinking through the haze to find Temmin standing over you both, his expression frantic with concern.

“Major, (y/n), tell me what’s happening, talk to me here!”

“T-Temmin...we, we were exposed on our, shit,” You had to pause as your orgasm seemed to notch up another level, dropping your head to hide your face against Poe’s. “Mission. Red fertility plant, help, oh maker please help!” You cried out, the burning and heat threatening to undo you completely, no longer overwhelmed with lust but now a high that seemed too far for humans, your heart hammering in your chest like it wanted to break out, run away from you and abandon your trembling body as you burned.

You slumped over, distantly aware of Temmin roaring for medics, but determined to bring your focus to Poe, who was now holding you too tightly. You realized he was speaking into your neck, and you had to tilt your head awkwardly to hear. Your vision was narrowing now, but you could hear him perfectly.

“I can’t hurt you again, don’t let me hurt her, please make it stop.” He repeated this plea over and over, and it was the only thing you could hear as your eyes began to close, as other hands were on you, pulling him away and you fought to keep him close until the heat became too much and a sudden stinging cool hit your arm and you were falling, down and into an unknown abyss, your last thoughts swirling in your head louder than any voice around you.

‘Don’t let me hurt him again, please don’t let me hurt Poe again...’

—

Temmin paced the med-bay waiting area frantically, waiting for an update from the Healers on both the Commander and Major’s statuses. He’d been leaving the hangar when he found them in the hallway, clinging to one another as they seemed to convulse with pain, and it had fucking terrified him. It had made some sense when you’d be able to gasp out an explanation that you’d each been exposed to a fertility plant during your mission. But he didn’t have any room to be embarrassed that you were both essentially having orgasms in front of him because you looked so scared and confused and Poe’s words were stuck in his brain now.

“Please don’t let me hurt her again, make it stop, I can’t hurt her, she’s everything to me, please make it stop...”

While he knew he was a less emotional sort of man, Temmin wasn’t an idiot. He knew that Poe and you were soulmates who’d been through some seriously dark shit. That you just needed to work through it all to find your way back to one another. And apparently, you had started the process-finally-during your classified mission. He had been overjoyed at the change in your interactions with one another, that you seemed to be friends again, at least.

But he’d also noticed the weird reactions you both had to some of his more inappropriate teasing, seen how you would both flush and change the subject and he thought at first that maybe you had started dating again, only something seemed off. You had become increasingly more wound up over the weeks, and Poe had appeared to turn inward more and more, as though his thoughts were so intense he was trying to conceal them with every fibre of his being from everyone.

You had only mentioned a suspicious plant in your reports from your mission. It had been with dawning horror, as he screamed for Healers, that Temmin understood you’d mentioned the flowers because you’d been exposed. That whatever had happened upon exposure had been so bad that neither you nor Poe wanted to include it in your reports.

“Captain?” A Healer came out from the back, a soothing expression on her face that told him you at least weren’t dead.

He hurried forward nonetheless, “Maker, Healer Brooks, please tell me they’re going to be alright!”

Did you enjoy this chapter? Consider leaving a comment or reblogging to ease my inner turmoil as a writer. Thank you 🤍

@mermaidxatxheart @foxilayde @eleinemk @paintballkid711 @mylifeisactuallyamess @20th-centu-fairy-girl @deitysnips @cannedsoupsucks @ubri812 @poedameronloverx @hoeforthefictional @astrological-bitch @itsnottilly @its-djarin @alex-sulli

#reader insert #poe dameron x reader #night changes series #fanfic #angst #fluff #poe dameron #multichapter #friends to lovers #star wars #poe x reader #oscar isaac #poe dameron fanfic #poe dameron x female reader #poe smut

[raindownforme]

Writing Event

Hi! I was tagged by @jschllatt for a writing event, and this is for her!

———

5. Charlie slimecicle x reader [they/them used] (reader had freckles for context)

y/n stirred in their sleep, doing their best to shift with the almost unfamiliar weight. Almost, as if they didn’t know what it felt like to have someone else laying on top of them.

“Charlie?”

“No no no, go back to sleep.”

y/n peeked one eye open, looking at their boyfriend. Charlie was lazily propped up on one arm, the rest of his weight draped over y/n’s once sleeping self.

“Good morning I guess.” y/n tried to move, but found themself still stuck under Charlie. He had a leg wrapped between theirs and a hand holding the side of their face. “Can I get up yet?”

“No wait I’m counting.” Charlie’s voice was hushed, just above a whisper. y/n watched him squint as he focused on various points of their face.

“Maybe you’d be quicker if you put your glasses on.”

Charlie gasped, letting go of y/n’s face to reach over to the bedside table. He returned with his glasses resting on his nose, starting to fall off from the angle. “Okay. Now I have to start over.”

“Do we have to do this right now?” y/n yawned.

“Aw, you’re adorable. And yes I do.”

“Babe, I want to get up. Can you do this later? Some other time I’m asleep?”

“Fine I’ll stop counting.”

“Thank you.”

“Now it’s time to play connect-the-dots!” Charlie pulled y/n closer with his legs. He began to very gently drag his finger across the surface of y/n’s skin, following made-up patterns and lines.

y/n hummed lowly, feigning annoyance with their boyfriend. “Can you stop playing connect-the-dots with my freckles?”

Charlie drew back his touch. “Fine.” He rolled over, releasing y/n from his weight, and rolled over.

y/n propped themselves upright, frowning. “Don’t tell me you’re upset?”

Charlie mumbled a response and y/n leaned closer to try and hear him. He leaned closer a bit as well, repeating himself. “I wanted to see.”

“They aren’t even patterns, it’s just dots.”

“No, these ones-“ Charlie turned back and very gently put his thumb over the side of their face, right over where the cheek bones began and to the side of the outer corner of their eye. “It’s almost a triangle shape. Or a couple triangles. There a couple patterns, you just don’t see them.”

y/n paused, almost freezing under Charlie’s touch, then leaned into the contact. “Fine.”

“Fine?”

“Get back here and keep counting loser.”

y/n opened their arms, allowing Charlie to get back to his previous position in the shared bed and continue happily connecting the dots.

———

8. Charlie Slimecicle x reader [they/them]

y/n shivered. It was that kind of early morning cold. The being on a leather car seat while the wind whipped outside. The early morning chill of January.

y/n and Charlie knew this was coming. They’d known for two months know. Earlier, in the beginning of November when they planned the trip, neither one of them felt the sadness they feel now. They’d both been happy; y/n had the ability to come stay the whole month with Charlie. Usually, the couple could only see each other a few weeks out of the year. Usually it was Charlie with the looser schedule, and usually that made Charlie the one to drive or fly the distance between them.

y/n stared out the window lazily. There weren’t very many people out on the roads at this hour. They watched the grey industrial buildings pass as Charlie turned into the airport, going up to the third floor of the parking garage and finding an empty spot.

y/n quietly and slowly unbuckled themself from the car. They left the car, turning to see Charlie already holding their large suitcase. y/n smiled at him, small tears coming to their eyes. They reached out politely, trying to take it from him.

“No I want it.”

“It’s okay, it’s not even yours.”

“Let me. Please?”

y/n gave in with a smile, taking Charlie’s free hand in theirs as they let Charlie lead them into the airport. They made their way across the patterned carpet to the check-desk.

“Hi there.” There was a lone employee working the front desk. She extended a hand outwards. “Boarding pass and ID please?” y/n fished though their carry-on bag, bringing forth the paper and plastic card. The employee scanned it and looked over at their computer. “Alright, just you y/n?”

“Yes.” y/n knew it wasn’t meant to be cruel, but the words still dug at their skin and itched at their bones. Just them. No Charlie. They’d be alone. Again.

“Alright. That’ll be gate 36B. Unfortunately, sir, you can’t come to the gate.”

“What the farthest I can come?” Charlie glanced over to y/n.

“Just to TSA.”

“Is there any way?”

“I’m sorry I can only bend that rule if you’re accompanying a minor.”

Charlie nodded and the couple walked away. They walked towards the large LED bord that displayed the flight information. y/n watched Charlie scan it with squinted eyes.

“401 right? Flight 401? We’ve got— shit.” Charlie frowned. “40 minutes. We move gotta get you through security.”

“We?”

Charlie looked back to y/n. They had tears brimming their eyes and were fiddling with a loose string on the sleeve of their sweater. They were still wearing Charlie’s sweater.

“I guess I can’t take you any further.”

“I know that.”

“You don’t have to get mad at me.” Charlie frowned at y/n. He set their bag to the side and gently took the carry-on from their shoulders, placing it near the bag. Charlie pulled them closer, wrapping his body around them and leaning his head against the top of theirs. “I’ll see you again.”

“But when?” y/n did their best to not cry, but it seemed impossible in this moment. They were tired. They were cold. And they had to leave the person they cared for more than anything within the next ten minutes.

“I don’t know. Valentine’s Day? I can try and drive over in maybe April?”

“But that’s such a long drive. God why can’t this be fucking easier?” y/n groaned against Charlie’s shoulder, grasping onto his shirt tighter with their fists. “It took me so long to save for this and I don’t know— I don’t know anything.”

“Then move in with me.”

“What?” y/n looked at Charlie with a strange smile. It wasn’t the first time Charlie had suggested the idea, but they’d only been dating for a few months the last time it was mentioned. Now they were a year and 6 months deep and it was the first it had been mentioned in a while.

“Or I’ll move in with you. We wouldn’t have to be separated, and I could work virtually anywhere.”

“We don’t have— I don’t have room at my place for a streaming set up.”

“We can get an all new place. Just us. We can go look around when I’m down there.”

y/n thought for a moment. “Alright. You better hurry then.”

“Of course.”

The two stood in silence for a minute, still hugging. y/n glanced over at the clock that hung near the LED display. “I gotta go. I still gotta get through security.”

“No. Wait, don’t pull away… not yet.” Charlie pressed y/n even closer, leaving light kisses on the top of their head and the side of their face. “I love you. Please text me when you land. Like seriously.”

“I will I will. I love you too.”

“Okay.” Charlie let y/n go. He handed them all their stuff and stepped back, taking them in before not seeing them for the next few weeks. “How many other sweater did you steal?”

“Only two more, but I think I deserve them.”

“Alright.” Charlie laughed a bit. “Go get on your flight.”

“I love you.”

“I love you.”

Charlie watched silently as y/n made their way through security. It took them almost five minutes, but once on the other side, they sent a sad wave to Charlie and walked off to the gates. Charlie waited a moment, hesitating, then made the walk to his car alone. He crossed the airport street alone. He walked in the parking garage alone. And he got in his car and drove home. Alone.

———

12. Canon! Charlie slimecicle x reader [they/them used]

Las Nevadas was on fire. The water feature had died out hours ago. The casino was crumbling to stone. The tower had been cut in half. The strip club had been shattered. The restaurant had been torn apart. The roads were destroyed. The toll bridge had collapsed.

But they won, right?

Quackity stood alone. He watched his allies from a short distance. Foolish supported Purpled’s weight as he leaned against the god with a broken leg. Fundy rested against a wall, panting and covered in blood that didn’t belong to himself. Sam was no where to be seen, but they knew he was still alive.

But Slime? He was running. He was running in a large circle, searching through rubble and ash as he shouted.

“y/n?” Y/N?” He leaned on his hands and knees in the sand. His suit had been ruined for a long time now. The seams of his button up shirt had begun to rip in battle, the bottom of his pant legs had been singed and torn and blackened by the battle, and he wore only one suspender now, the other one much too weak and quite easily forgotten. He did not wear his tie, however he knew who was wearing it. “y/n?”

“Quackity,” Fundy looked upwards to his ally. “We can’t let him.”

Quackity ran a shaky, blood-stained hand down the front of his own suit in a nervous manner. “He has to find out somehow. Do you want to tell him?”

Fundy didn’t say anything, instead watching his friend run around. “Y/N!”

“This is cruel.” Foolish whispered to Purpled. The young boy could only nod in agreement, just a little too weak to do much else. Foolish, realizing this, helped the teen move over to sit next to Fundy, resting him against the crumbling wall of the fountain. Foolish turned around with the intent to aid Slime in his search, but was stopped by a simple hand placed upon his shoulder.

Quackity stood to the left of Foolish. He could see Quackity do his best to hold in the tears that had already left small tracks through the dust that had settled over Quackity’s face. “Just— let him. I can’t tell him. I can’t.”

The group watched Slime dig by hand. The rouble almost phased through his skin, but he kept digging. When he got too frustrated by one building, he ran to the next one, repeating the process. They watched on in pain for only a minute longer. Fundy looked to Foolish and Quackity. “Do we know where-?”

“Y/N.” Slime screamed in utter joy, pulling out y/n from the rubble. He proudly carried them back over to where Quackity and the rest of the group sat, gently setting them down on the ruined pavement. He kneeled with them, resting their head in his lap. Slime very gently carded his fingers through their hair, seeming to think to himself. He reached deep into the pocket of his pants, pulling out a neon pink healing potion.

Foolish shrugged off Quackity’s grasp and walked over to where Slime sat. He kneeled down next to the green guy, placing a hand on his shoulder to try and pull him away. “Slime, buddy—“

“Let me go.” Slime’s voice was gentle and somehow mature. He spoke sadly, but also as though he understood what was happening still. “I can still save them. I know I can.”

Foolish glanced back to the group to watch Quackity shake his head solemnly. “Buddy, I know it’s hard-“

“No, I promised.” Slime’s voice began to shake. He desperately poured the potion over the parts of y/n’s body where damage was obvious; bruises from the crushing rubble, burns from the fires and explosions, and the gaping cauterized sword wound to their abdomen. Slime smiled as he gazed at their peaceful face. It almost looked like they were sleeping. “I promised them.”

“Promised what buddy?”

“I told them everyone turns to dust and goes away, but I promised them I wouldn’t let it happen. I’ve seen it happen. I watched it. And I wouldn’t let them turn to dust.” Slime leaned down, pressing a light kiss to y/n’s forehead. He stayed close, whispering to the corpse in his lap. “Im so sorry.”

Foolish placed a hand on Slime’s shoulder again, trying to pull him away. “Buddy-“

“No!” He pushed Foolish away, leaning closer to y/n and holding them in a protective embrace. Slime gently laid a hand on y/n wrist, feeling the material of his neck tie in a knot around it. “I can still help them, please just let me— let me save them. Please.”

The group sat in silence. Slime’s shoulders shook as he sobbed over y/n’s body. Fundy and Quackity wiped away a few tears as well, listening to their friend wail into the night.

———

14. Charlie slimecicle x reader [they/them]

“Listen, man, hurry up. We were supposed to leave twenty minutes ago.” Schlatt leaned back into the plush leather seat, resting a hand over his eyes.

Charlie sighed, looking over the stuff he’d piled on the couch. He huffed, looking around. “Okay. I’ve got my phone, charger, wallet, jacket, I’m dressed, teeth brushed, what the fuck am I forgetting?”

“Uh, buddy.” Ted cleared his throat and tapped at the side of his face. Charlie paused for a moment, squinting before realizing what he missed.

“My glasses! My goddamn glasses. Alright gimme a minute.”

The two boys watched Charlie walk back down the hall of Ted’s apartment. Schlatt groaned and lazily stood up from his seat. He walked over to the small pile of Charlie’s stuff and began sorting through.

“What are you doing?”

“If I can find these faster, maybe we can actually get out of here.” Schlatt stuck his hands into the pockets of Charlie’s jacket. “Hate this fucking smog— oh.”

“Oh?” Ted sat up slightly, watching Schlatt pull a small black velvet box out. “Oh. Oh! Holy fuck.”

“Did he talk to you about this?” Schlatt dropped the volume of his voice, trying to not alert Charlie.

“No not at all. Is it for y/n?”

“I guess.” Ted and Schlatt had never met y/n in person before, only talking when they would be nearby if Charlie was in a discord call. But the two knew that Charlie loved them dearly, he talked about them whenever he got the chance. He boasted about anything y/n did, anywhere they went, any thing he could say.

“Do we— do we give him advice? Do we say anything?”

“Do you have advice to give someone who’s about to propose?”

Schlatt bit the inside of his lip. Instead of responding to Ted, he opened the box and his eyes went wide. “Holy shit dude.”

“What?” Ted got up and walked over to Schlatt’s side. The ring Charlie had gotten was beautiful; a silver band with ornate vines that held very small diamonds, all encasing a round amber gem. Ted very gently took the box from Schlatt, rotating it back and forth to see how the light glimmered on the gemstones.

“Ted this is… where’d he even get that?”

“I don’t know.” Ted stared into the ring. “We shouldn’t be hanging this. We should put it back.”

“Why do I want to wear it?”

“Why do you?”

Schlatt took the box from Ted, staring at it for a moment, then put it back in the coat pocket. He shuffled the jacket around, trying to make the setting look natural. “Now wha—“

“Okay I found it.” Charlie ran out of the room, rubbing at the glass with his shirt material. “What are we standing about?”

“Nothing.” Ted turned to Charlie quickly, awkwardly smiling. “Ready?”

The three boys made their way from Ted’s home to his car, then out onto the streets of Hollywood, headed towards Santa Monica. It was only a half-hour drive, and no one had too much to say.

“So. Charles.” Ted glanced at his friend in the backseat through the rear view mirror. “How are you and y/n doing?”

Schlatt made a pointed look at Ted as Charlie began talking. “We’re great! They got this really big job and we’re going to celebrate when I get back. There’s this restaurant downtown that’s so pretty— it’s their favorite! I mean, it was going to be a surprise, but hopefully it all goes well.”

Schlatt, thought for a moment, catching on to what Ted was thinking. “Is there something that needs to go well? It’s just dinner isn’t it?”

“Actually, can I tell you both about something?”

“Yes.” They both answered in unison, turning to look at Charlie as they stopped at the red light.

“Well, I wanted to, at dinner, I mean we weren’t doing dinner until I get back home, but I have this.” Both boys held their breath as Charlie went fishing in his jacket pockets. It took him a few minutes to procure the small black box, but eventually his found it and held it forwards, showing it off to his friends.

“Wow. Proposing?” Schlatt laid surprise thick into his voice, and thankfully Charlie didn’t notice.

“Yeah! I picked it out myself. Here look.” Charlie opened up the box, showing off the gems that sparkled in the sunlight. Schlatt glanced up at Ted who stared forwards at the 10 freeway.

“That’s really cool, thanks for telling us.”

Charlie frowned. “Is it not as good idea? You don’t sound that excited.”

“No it’s a great idea! I mean obviously we don’t know y/n as well.” Schlatt gestured to himself and Ted. “But it’s obvious you love them. I mean look at you, buying a ring and everything. Making dinner plans, Charlie this is amazing.”

“Also Schlatt found the ring earlier.”

Schlatt smacked Ted on the arm, sending him a glare. “So you guys knew?” Charlie smacked the box shut.

“Not on purpose. I was trying to find your glasses and I just happened across it. You didn’t hide it very well.”

“I—“

Ted laid on the horn, repeatedly honking at the Tesla that had cut him off. “Son of a mother fucker.”

“Starting to hate LA?”

Ted peered over at Schallt with a glare, then went back to driving. “We are happy for you Charlie, we were just kind of waiting for you to mention it to us.”

“Yeah, and we want to meet y/n! It’s been two years now?”

“Of course you can.” Charlie scratched at the back of his neck. “I’m just scared? I don’t know. I mean, I’ve never felt so strongly about anyone before. I’m terrified.”

“Hey, you’ll be okay. It’s y/n. You fly home tomorrow right?” Charlie nodded. “Let us know how it goes man. I’m invested now.”

Charlie laughed. “Alright. Tomorrow.”

Tomorrow, Charlie took the 7 hour flight home. In that same day, Ted and Schlatt each received a picture of y/n wearing the engagement ring around their finger, both them and Charlie smiling wide.

———

Congrats Nat on getting 1k!

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