#(actually I guess the voice note was kind of sort of touching on that bc shona says she's proud of them and what they stand for...) | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

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#(actually I guess the voice note was kind of sort of touching on that bc shona says she's proud of them and what they stand for...)

crybabyddl · 1 year

Text

Looking Sharp

Part 2

Keith Kogane x Fem!Reader

Warning: smut, knife play, degradation, praise, dirty talk, swearing. Please do not interact with this content if you are not 18+

Author’s Note: happy keithtober, happy kinktober let’s fucking gooooo

^^^LMAO it’s been WAYYYY too long. Like, over a year. I’m so sorry to everyone who has been waiting for this bc I’ve racked up quite a taglist for this story alone haha. But seriously, thank you for all the support on part 1 and I hope you enjoy part 2!!!🥰

—

“You, Y/N, are a tease,” Keith’s look turns cold in replacement of the heat from his lustful gaze. “And I’m tired of it. Let’s see just how clean cut you are…”

His voice trails off, as well as his stare. His pupils are redirected to the thin, beautifully crafted knife, and I have no choice but to let my eyes follow.

He drags the weapon agonizingly slowly up my leg. The pressure is feather light. The ghost of Keith’s disconnected touch has my body temperature doing cartwheels.

“When I have you begging me to let you cum as I press this cold, sharp blade on the inside of those precious thighs of yours, shall we?”

Just when I thought my jaw was locked shut in disbelief and awe, his sensual musings easily loosened that tension.

“Y-yes. Oh my god, yes.” I breathe, reaching out for the paladin’s chest to bring him closer.

Keith evades my grasp and moves to spin me around, holding me flush against him. I can feel the dagger’s chill on my neck while his erection meets my backside.

“Not like you had much of a choice.”

—

It was almost too good to be true—somehow Keith knew my body as well as I did. The way he tightened his hold on me whenever I’d try to squirm out of his grasp; the icy stares he’d give me whenever a gasp escaped my lips.

Part of me felt guilty for enjoying this so much. It made no sense, but that didn’t stop me from worrying. My anxiety must’ve been evident on my face, because Keith seemed to notice something was amiss.

“What’s wrong?” He asks, his voice was softer, trading in his raspy, demanding tone for considerate and gentle inflections. The swordsman even lowered his knife, genuinely concerned for my wellbeing.

“Sorry,” I sighed, separating myself from him completely. “It’s just a lot all at once, you know? Plus, I never really thought this would happen. I mean, you’re… you, and I’m just me. It doesn’t make much sense.”

“What are you talking about? That’s ridiculous, Y/N.” Keith’s eyebrows arch as he searches my eyes for an indication of some sort.

“I– well, I just got overwhelmed is all.” I shrugged as my mouth formed a grimace.

“No, not that part. I totally understand that, and I feel it too! I’m talking about the whole ‘you’re you and I’m just me’ thing. Why would you think that?” Keith actually looks pained when he repeats my own words back to me.

“Think about it, Keith. You and I are so different and if something like this never happened, we probably never would’ve known how we felt about each other. And if you take into account our personalities in general, anything between us is bound to end in disaster. Like I said, we don’t make much sense.” I look down at the floor, unable to meet his—without a doubt—awkward sympathetic gaze.

“We don’t have to make sense! We just have to like being around each other! I’ve never felt this way with anyone before; do you know how hard it is for me to admit something like that? There’s no way to know what happens or what’ll become of any of this, but it’s not important right now. I never thought I’d be the one to say that, but it’s the truth.”

“I guess I just thought that you were too good for me. I mean, you’re a paladin of Voltron for fuck’s sake!”

Keith stays silent for a moment, smiling softly to himself as he looks down at the ground.

“Keith?” I try to recapture his attention, waving a hand in front of his face. He laughs again.

“Are you kidding? You’re practically perfect! Smart, kind, funny, a badass fighter, and god, you are so pretty.”

“I’m far from perfect, silly. Besides, that’s how I feel about you!” I feel my cheeks burning, but try my best to ignore it.

Keith closes the distance between us and gently grabs my face with both hands. Before I can think better of it, my hands find their way on top of his, keeping his touch there.

“Will you ever learn to take people for their word?” He chuckles.

I lean into his touch, and I could’ve sworn my heart was beating out of my chest in that moment.

“Probably not.” I shrugged, looking up at the paladin and giving him a sly smirk.

He rips his hands out of my grasp, my cheeks becoming cold from the sudden loss of his touch.

“Well then,” Keith is quick to sweep his leg under me, sure to catch me before I trip, laying me down gently on the floor. My breathing becomes ragged as he positions himself over me. I feel trapped, but I don’t mind it now. “I guess I’ll have to take care of that, won’t I?”

“Good luck with that.” I say nonchalantly, or at least as nonchalantly as possible. I was doting on his every breath, impatiently anticipating what his next words, movements, or touches would be.

“Thanks. Not that I needed the encouragement, but I will say it does help.”

The silence that would’ve formed between us is swiftly overthrown by my sudden gasp as Keith brings his knife back into the equation. He has it against my cheekbone, the blade is horizontal as its steely edge rests upon my skin.

“Does it turn you on that your life is in my hands?”

“I trust you.” I tell him. He would never hurt me, at least not without my consent. Despite his confidence on the battlefield, he was typically quite awkward in conversation.

“Oh, that’s sweet, you think this is about trust. I could do whatever I wanted to with you right now. You’re just my plaything and you won’t be forgetting that by the time I’m done with you.” His smirk is subtle, but it brandishes its image in my brain with hot iron.

He’s still on top of me, but he’s apprehensive, meaning I can still take control of the situation. I use the opportunity to grab him by his collar, yanking him down so his face is mere inches from mine. His dark blue, almost indigo eyes are locked into mine. He seems more vulnerable, but Keith always shields himself from others to some degree.

“Well tough shit, paladin. I don’t answer to anyone but myself.”

“Is that so?” he looks skeptical. “Well if that’s the case, then I guess I’ll be on my way out–”

“Wait!” I place my hand around the back of his neck, releasing my other hand from its grip on the collar of his shirt.

Keith eyes me, offering a quizzical hum.

“Please stay. I was just trying to be sexy and defiant! I don’t actually want you to go.”

While his expression gave no insight as to what he might be feeling, I could tell Keith was affected by my confession. I just wasn’t sure how. He was sitting up straight now, a distance created between us.

The moment was only a few seconds away from being awkward when I heard him scoff. Not only that, but that same smirk from before had returned.

“You were trying to be ‘sexy and defiant’?”

“Uh,” I swallowed hard, but not audibly. “Yeah. Those were the words I chose to say out loud.”

“I’m sure you’re wishing you’d chosen something better to say, aren’t you?” He laughed into the last word he spoke.

I nodded.

“That’s the thing about honesty,” he pauses, leaning back over me, looking directly into my eyes. “It leads to weakness.”

His words sent fire down my sternum. Feeling the cool metal of his blade return to my neck shot that heat downward, pooling in my stomach and searing against my clit.

—

Looking Sharp Taglist: @tompetersebbuckyhazleo @iris-iiridescent @deadgirlvamp666 @thevalkyriee @growingupnrealizing @fookinslut4harry @fictional-addiction

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pinkteapotwriting · 3 years

Note

yasss you’re taking requests <333

can you write a smut with Marauders where it’s readers’ first time and the boys are already experienced so she is kind of nervous(also little insecure about her body bc stretch marks?🤗)

I loooove your writing, have a good day and please take care of yourself!

Marauders x Fem!reader

Warning : Smut, fingering, female receiving, pet names also did not proof read

Word count : 1721

---

I made this more light hearted, thanks for your patience love.

James’ hands were getting lost in your hair, much like your inhibitions. Today was going to be your first time and they knew you were anxious. So they were trying their best to keep things light but still intentional. You were mirroring Sirius on top of Remus, both of you straddling a brunette below you. Sirius however kept pulling away from Remus to pull you away from James. Apparently he couldn’t decide who he wanted to be kissing more. Which was all fine and good, for you. James however was getting frustrated with Sirius’s blatant thievery. Sirius wasn’t in reach though. So you were unsuspecting when his hands drifted down to your waist. Just when you thought you were safe you were being tossed onto your back and James was tickling your sides and you were trying your best not to kick him.

“Jamie, JAMIE stoooop. That tickles!”

“That’s kind of the point. Last I checked you were kissing me. Sirius can wait his turn hmmm?”

“AH stop! Stop it!”

You were playfully slapping his hands.

“Beg then”

Sirius and Remus were now enjoying the show. But then your shirt started to ride up and you pushed your palm against his chest as hard as you could; which surprised the boys. You were quick to pull your shirt down once you sat up and crossed your arms over your chest. Successfully creating a physical barrier to help mask your insecurity. Sirius was now turned around completely. Why were you hiding yourself from them? James felt especially bad.

“M’sorry for tickling you. I thought it was funny, but now I see it just made you feel bad. Are you okay?”

“Yeah I just” you took a deep breath “I didn’t want you to see yet. I thought I was ready and brave enough but I didn’t want you to see my- my”

James reached for your hand as soon as he heard your voice falter.

“Your what, love?”

“I have some stretch marks, and I know it’s ridiculous to hold myself to society's standards about my body size and how I look but it’s hard sometimes.”

Remus was the first to reassure you. He pushed Sirius forward so he could stand beside the bed and pull off his shirt.

“I know what it’s like to feel insecure about my body Y/N. Some people learn to accept and love themselves on their own, but we’re both lucky that we have people that are here to remind us that they find us attractive.”

He chuckled then because you were kind of listening, but really your main focus was running your hand across his chest and tracing his scars delicately. He hadn’t even noticed you edge closer to him until he felt your warm touch.

“I do find you attractive.”

“Really Bunny? We didn’t notice.” Sirius snickered at first, but then he became more sincere. He lifted the bottom of James’ shirt.

“See look, James has some stretch marks too, and we think he’s beautiful.”

Sirius’s head was much closer to James' lower stomach now. Close enough to delicately kiss along each mark. Remus had turned you around now and was resting his chin against your shoulder. Both of you very much enjoyed the beautiful sight of Sirius worshiping James with his lips. Remus starts to do the same for you but on the sweet spot on your neck before whispering in your ear.

“Want Siri to do the same for you, love?”

Your nervous disposition started to dissolve and you found yourself nodding now. Sirius was smiling, not his cocky grin, but one full of the same love and adoration you felt for him. He lifted the hem of your shirt and his palm felt warm against the softness of your stomach.

“Breath honey, you gotta breath.”

You let out the air you didn’t know you were holding at Remus’s reassurance, but squeezed your eyes shut. You didn’t want to see, but the boys wanted you to. Remus slid his hand to grasp your chin and pull your gaze down to Sirius.

“Open your eyes darling, that’s it. See? There’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

Remus had one of his hands in Sirius’s hair now and while it was nice, you couldn’t help but notice James in the same spot at the edge of the bed. He didn’t look lonely, he actually looked pretty pleased with the view. The bulge in his pants made that perfectly clear. You’re not sure how you got away from Sirius and Remus, maybe they noticed the focused look in your eye, but you were able to make your way to James again. This time you were the one to get that pesky shirt out of the way and kiss his stomach and lower abdomen.

“Like this James?”

James adored how timid you were, how soft you traced your fingers across his chest. It was maddening.

“Yes dove, but this is supposed to be about you, no?”

“I guess so.”

“Okay love, we’ve gotta prep you okay? Can we take your clothes off now?”

“Only if the rest of yours come off too.”

Sirius stood up instantly and threw his shirt to the side and yanked his pants off. Once his clothes were off he spread his arms out.

“I’m ready, your turn.”

All eyes were on Sirius now. James hucked a pillow in your honor that hit Sirius straight in the face.

“Shut it you git. Let her take her time.”

Remus furrowed his eyebrows, because instead of the usual angry outburst from Sirius there was a focused look in his eyes. Then he turned around to find you completely naked with your arms outstretched giggling.

“I’m ready, your turn.”

Sirius quite literally dove across the bed. James and Remus didn’t have time to process what was happening. They barely were able to scramble out of the way as Sirius clambered on past him. But he halted as soon as he was in front of you, smiling like a little kid.

And you wouldn’t be separated.

Your fingers locked into his hair, while his hands hooked under your thighs to pull you onto his lap. He fell onto his back and pulled you in chest to chest.

“Sirius, come on. We wanna see her too.” James was getting less and less patient, but Remus was smarter than James and knew how to coax you out.

“My angel you’ve got to remember to breathe.”

As soon as he reminded you you were able to pull away and to your surprise you were panting. Once your breath was level Remus took your face in his hands gently and kissed you. You don’t know how you made the switch but you were now being pulled onto Remus’s lap. There was no control over your body with any of these boys. It was like you were magnetic, it flowed through you naturally to follow their lead now. The embarrassment dissipated all along the way. You needed them.

“Remus please”

“Alright love, who do you want to prep you?”

“Let’s flip a coin.” James suggested.

“There’s three of us, you idiot.” Sirius retorted.

“Yeah, but I figured you don’t even count so.”

“Sirius counts, don’t be mean James.”

Sirius was very pleased you stood up for him. “Thanks bunny, does that mean you pick me?”

“Well… seeing as Remus is the only one not acting like a five year old.”

Remus tried not to look too happy with himself as he led you to lie back against the pillows. James scooted up to the right of you to hold your hand as Remus rubbed the inside of your thighs when they fell open. Sirius looked like he was plotting something, but instead opted to sit beside Remus and flash you a cheeky grin.

“You ready love”

“Yes.”

His fingers lightly trailed your inner thighs. He relished in how sensitive they were. His thumb found your clit and he began to massage gentle circles against it.

“You’re so wet already love, and we’ve barely touched you.”

Sirius grumbled; Remus humored him.

“What was that Padfoot?”

“I said you’re welcome”

Remus slipped a finger inside you now, which had you bucking your hips up which had him pushing his hand against your lower stomach.

“I don’t think I need your help getting her off Sirius.”

“I personally wouldn’t mind his help.”

Remus rolled his eyes at you while adding in another finger.

“You sure about that?”

“Stop being mean to our bunny, I bet she looks so pretty when she cums and your banter is preventing that.”

While James stole Remus’s attention Sirius took the opportunity to tend to your neglected clit with his tongue. The unrestrained moan you let out gathered everyone’s attention. Your thighs began to shake while Remus quickened his pace.

“Si-Siri I can't, it's too much.”

Sirius didn’t stop though. James was still holding your hand, completely mesmerized by your face as you were building to your release.

“Doing so good for us love. Come on, it’s okay to let go.”

You whimpered, James grinned.

“You look so beautiful like this bunny.”

This time Remus let you arch your back. A high pitched whine was ripped from your throat and Remus had to pull Sirius away to keep him from lapping at your cunt. He was able to get over the loss of contact when he saw that your legs were still trembling. He was going to make some sort of snarky comment but the blissed out look on your face had him crumbling.

“Oh Puppy, you look so pretty. Are you ready for more?”

You nodded your head.

“By the way Siri, I think you’re pretty too.”

“See Remus, Y/N knows how to feed my ego. Take notes.”

“You think I want to encourage your behaviour.”

“Yes yes i d- OI James you can’t snog her under our noses like that.”

So silly to think they’d dislike you for the way you looked. It was a battle for who would get to sit next to you in the great hall for dinner. What else would you expect for something like this? You would be sure to make it known you’ll fight for them the same way that they fight for you.

And they would always fight for you.

---

@sunny-bunnny @quindolyn @midnightgremlin @weasleyposts @bluemoonyblurbs @emmaev @agalandhermarvelobsession

#Sirius Black #sirius black x reader #sirius black smut #Remus Lupin #remus lupin x reader #remus lupin smut #James Potter #james potter x reader #james potter smut #Marauders #marauder smut #marauders x reader #harry potter fanfiction #Harry Potter Smut #fanfiction #smut

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roscgcld · 3 years

Text

GOJO SATORU || pain in the ass

request: gojo and reader are special grades and their parents want them to get married so they could make a strong generation for their family (she doesnt like this and she thinks it's stupid). in the first meeting, they went together to exorcise some curses in mountain (their family asked them to do it together so they can get along), she ignored him bc she thinks he is kind of asshole but gojo keeps teasing her (he thinks her reaction is cute and she looks hot and actually he likes her and thinks getting married with her doesnt sound so bad).

could you make it jsjjdks i keep imagining this in my head and i think it's cute if the reader started to catch feelings too...... btw your writings are amazing i really love them and thank you!!

note: AHAHAHA I LOVE THIS! I am so happy most of us agree that Gojo, as hot as he is, can be an asshole. But this one is v fluffy, and very cute! I tried to cut down on not making it too long cause not going to lie, I always love reading tropes like this! the “annoying-ass-to-kinda-cute’” sort of trope, and I love it cx but here you go babes! I definitely enjoyed writing something like this.

pronouns: she/her

“Y/N, guess what?”

Y/N’s chopsticks came to a stop as she closes her eyes, taking a deep breath to brace herself before slowly bringing her eyes away from the meal before them; meeting her mother’s eyes head on. “What is it, Mother?” She asks the older woman hesitantly, unsure of how to respond when she saw the familiar glint in her eyes - immediately telling her that she was not going to like where the conversation was heading. “Remember how we talked about being in the main family? How, as the oldest child, you need to set an example for your siblings?”

“..yes?” Y/N’s voice was uncertain, which made her mother frown but she didn’t comment any further on it. “Well, your father and I met up with a family recently, who has a son around your age.” The older woman said just as an annoyed sigh was heard, the woman narrowing her eyes at her daughter who sets her chopsticks down quite loudly. “Mother, how many times have I told you that I don’t like this whole arranged marriage scheme you and Father have come up with.”

Before her mother can give her a response, her husband reaches over to grab her hand in his, giving her a soft look before he clears his throat loudly. “Everyone, would you give us a moment?” He asked as he glances over at the rest of his kids, who all gave their oldest sister a concerned glance before they started to make their way out of the room; their mother closing the door after them. Not without giving her husband another look, one that Y/N caught and had her blood boil a little in annoyance.

Once the shoji doors of the dining room were slid shut the older man lets out a soft sigh before he made his way towards his oldest, taking up the zabuton that his son had left empty by her side. Quietly he reaches out to take her hand in his, his rougher hands incasing her own ones that were roughen up by years of combat training; but there was still a certain softness and feminine touch to them. “Princess - you know your mother and I just want to look out for you.” He started off with a tired sigh, to which the younger woman just gave her father a look. “I know you don’t see marriage as a viable route. But you have to remember, not only are you a Special Grade sorcerer, you also come from a strong clan like ours.”

“Yes, yes, I know - but what does my marriage status have to do with this?” Y/N stresses with a frown as she looks over at her father once more. “You and I both know that the elders can be very old schooled. I mean - who still insist on marrying every of age person of as soon as possible?” She ranted with pure annoyance lacing her voice, the older man just listening to her complains with a soft smile. He can’t get upset at her - he himself went on a rant when he was first told of his own engagement during his teen years. “I know it’s sudden and against your wish, but can you entertain your old man once? One meeting, that is all I ask of you.”

At first his words was met with silence, but he just waited for her to slowly but surely give in. Which she did after a few more moments. “...just once.” She said with a tired sigh, causing the older man to chuckle before he leans over to kiss her on the head softly. “But if I don’t like him, I am never going to let you forget about this.” She stated simply as she looks over at her elderly father, who just smiles softly in return. “I am sure you’re going to enjoy his presence. He’s of your age, and a Special Grade sorcerer too. I am sure you two are going to get along just fine.”

“I am going to murder his dumbass.”

To say Y/N was upset would be an understatement - there were clear waves of annoyance just radiating off the sorcerer. Today was the day she was supposed to meet with her ‘fiancé’ for the first time, and he was not giving her the best first impression. Not only is he half an hour late, he didn’t send anyone to give her a heads up either. So now she was just standing there, tapping her foot impatiently as she glanced at her watch once more.

They were supposed to meet at the gates of a mountain temple to exorcise some curses that had started to appear around the temple. Hence why she stood by a traditional torii gate, her mood souring with each passing second. She glanced over at the monks who care for the temple and bow at them apologetically, to which they just gave her reassuring smiles and bow back softly as well. “I do apologies for my companion. Seems he still lacks the ability to read a clock.”

“How rude. And here I thought that you’d be excited to meet your future fiancé.” A teasing voice came from behind her, causing her to turn her narrowed eyes back to finally get a look at her fiancé - only to have her eyes widen when she realised just how tall the man was. She gave him a once over, noting his handsome features and white haired style upwards; and how his eyes were covered by a blindfold. He sported a soft grin which he thought might have tell her how apologetic he was, but it just causes her to get more irritated. “I do apologise for making you wait. I had a run in with some pesky curses along the way.”

For some reason Y/N did not believe his words, but she just rolled her eyes before she turned and made her way towards the torii gate, walking on the side like she was taught to do. Quietly she started to climb the stone steps up to the temple, not even caring if the man was following behind her. But she can tell from the footsteps that followed behind her, and soon he opened his mouth once more. “What? No introduction?”

“L/N Y/N.” She stated simply, her hand resting on the beautifully carved katana that rest on her hip as she started to glance about the wooded area; trying to see if she can sense any Curses near by. “Nice to meet you, Y/N-chan. My name is Goto Satoru.” The white haired shaman greeted back with a grin, to which the woman just lets out a soft hum, not necessarily paying attention to what he had just said. But Goto wasn’t deterred, walking a few steps behind her as he watches her walk before him. “You’re the oldest heir of the L/N clan?”

“Unfortunately.” The woman replied back in annoyance, to which the taller male raises an eyebrow at her response. He can tell that in that sense, they can definitely relate - they were both heirs to clans who are so backwards thinking that they think that they need to find ‘the best matches’ for all of their available heirs.

If he was being honest, Gojo had no intention of coming to arrange meeting. He wanted to blow it off with some lame excuse, or just flip off his elders when they ask. But something told him that he should just come for the sake of seeing which miserable soul was forced into the same position he was in. And if he was being honest, he doesn’t regret coming to the meeting that much anymore. “By the way, do you consider this to be our first date?”

“If it is, I can definitely say my low standards for the day just reached the floor.” She grumbled before she paused just underneath another torii gate, looking up at the Curse that was wrapped around one of the sides like a giant snake; hissing at them loudly. “How rude.” Gojo replied back with a pout, standing back and watching the woman unsheathes her katana, how she imbed her own Cursed Energy onto the blade; raising a curious brow at just how strong her Cursed Energy was.

Weirdly enough, he finds her not only interesting, but extremely hot. Who wouldn’t find a strong woman hot?

He watches her in silence as she sliced the air before her, the Curse letting out a loud cry of main as it was sliced up into pieces by invisible blades. But the woman didn’t cast the withering Curse another glance as she pushes forward. “Come on, let’s get this over with.” She sighs as she rest her katana over her shoulder, looking back at the man with an unamused look. Gojo instead grins before he follows behind the woman now getting more interested than he was before. “You know, I think you and I are going to get along well.”

“What a pain in the ass.” Was her only answer, causing his grin to widen as he hums to himself whilst following behind the clearly fuming woman. Yeah, he definitely doesn’t regret his decision to come now.

It wasn’t the first time the both of them were forced to cross paths with one another.

With all that said and done, both Gojo and Y/N were definitely quite the duo. Both of them are Special Grades, and both of them work together almost flawlessly. Even though Gojo is considered ‘the strongest’, Y/N is the more polished and definitely more refined sorcerer; since she had taken her early training. Because of this they balance each other out quite nicely, making them quite the formidable duo. Due to this, they are scent to many missions together, forcing them to spend a lot of time with each other.

Y/N’s first impression on Gojo is that he doesn’t necessarily care about anyone or anything. Yet Y/N can tell that he cares for all of his students with his entire being, and is always willing to go the extra mile to make sure that they get to experience their youth to the fullest extent. Besides that, he’s also someone who can try and make light no matter the situation. Even Y/N can admit that his snarky comments and sarcastic responses has made her let out a laugh or two.

It wasn’t just that - it was also how, even though they were forced into a union together unwillingly, he tries to make the most out of it. Not only does he show her around Tokyo, since she’s from a town in Kyoto Province - he also made it his own mission to show her all the fun restaurants and dessert cafes all over the city that he himself visits. He also goes out of his way to make sure that her elders are not bothering her too much about when the wedding is going to be. Gojo can tell that Y/N’s elders are pushing for this more than his are, so he did visit her clan’s home a few times to make sure that they weren’t pressuring her about marriage.

Along the way he has met her parents and her siblings, somehow managing to fit into her family unit in a short about of time. Whether it’s playing video games with her younger sister, or rough housing with her younger brother, even bonding with your parents over tea - there was no denying that he somehow manages to get along with everyone. It did make her heart flutter a little, since finding a man who is not only an ease to be around, but also makes the effort to get to know your parents is a rare gem to find.

On days when they are both free, he would appear and drag her out of her home, begging for her to bring him around her hometown and to the Kyoto School for a visit. For the most part though, he just goes to the Kyoto branch so he can annoy Utahime, who will turn to you with the most annoyed scowl on her face. “Out of all the men on this planet, you had to choose the white haired menace?” The woman would ask her junior with an unamused scowl, to which Y/N would just apologise wordlessly with a soft one of her own.

If she was being honest, she had no idea that the man she once found annoying become attractive; and was definitely not even sure when she started to fall for him. But she remembers the day when she realised that there was definitely something more she felt for him - it was family game night. Gojo, who had visited Kyoto to handle something, had dropped by with some takeout to share with your family. After a nice dinner, which was filled with laughter, Y/N sat down on the engawa of her family home; smiling softly at the sight of Gojo playing with her younger siblings.

Just the sight of the three of them bonding together, laughing and running around the courtyard that cause a warm feeling to travel through her entire person; a wider and much more sincere smile tugging against her lips. It was when a pair of crystalline blue eyes that seemed to almost glow in the night turn to face her, half hidden behind darkly tinted sunglasses as the owner grinned over at her with such child like happiness that it hit her like a truck.

“Holy shit, I’ve fallen for him.” She whispered quietly to herself as she continues to watch the oblivious trio before her, her cheeks warming the longer she watches him laugh and play with her siblings. If her past her sees her now, she might not be too proud at how they had decided to go against her number one rule - and that was not to fall for the man.

Now she is never going to hear the end of this any time soon.

#jujutsu kaisen #jujutsu kaisen imagiens #jujutsu kaisen imagine #jujutsu kaisen fluff #jjk #jjk x reader #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jjk gojo #gojo satoru #gojo satoru x reader #gojo x reader #gojo satoru fluff #jjk gojo x reader #jjk imagines #jjk imagine #gojo sensei

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atlabeth · 3 years

Text

fever - sokka x reader

this has been sitting in my drafts half finished for 3 weeks so i thot it was prime time i actually finished it

this is kinda based off the song w dua lipa and angele so you can listen to that if you want

summary: sokka's convinced there's a mystery illness keeping you from focusing, but somehow he's completely oblivious that the only 'sick' you are is lovesick, and he's the reason you can't focus.

a/n: i have never written a sickfic. but this is like. a fake sick fic. its an idiots in love fic. i mean this is coming from mr "is he taller than me? is he better looking?" himself so. it makes sense. as usual, this is not proofread bc im a lazy mf

also im sorry for being vague with the calc but i was NOT about to do math during summer who do you think i am? ??

wc: 1.7k

warning(s): mentions of being sick and 🤢calculus 🤮 but otherwise tooth rotting fluff

How could the smartest man you knew be so, so incredibly stupid?

You thought that you were being obvious, so obviously that you were sure he knew. It was embarrassing how obvious you were.

You had met Sokka in your calculus class at the start of the new semester after you ended up sitting next to each other, and it wasn’t a stretch to say that you were immediately smitten. With eyes like the ocean and a face that had to have been crafted by the gods, you were almost too distracted to respond when he asked you for a pencil. But when he winked at you after giving his thanks, it only solidified what you had already suspected: you had known this man for all of five minutes, and you already had a crush on him.

Little did you know, it was going to turn into the most infuriating crush you had ever experienced.

You and Sokka became fast friends even though calculus was the only class you had together. Unfortunately, it was also something that you completely sucked at. Bad news, it was required for your major. Good news, Sokka was some sort of genius and offered to tutor you — Wednesdays in the library turned into a weekly occasion, and served as an opening for your calculus skills, your feelings for Sokka, and your exasperation to all grow stronger.

You normally weren’t someone to beat around the bush. If you started to like someone, you told them and dealt with whatever happened after, but something about Sokka just kept you from spilling your feelings outright. You knew that if he didn’t feel the same way, your relationship likely wouldn’t change, but there was still that tiny voice that said it’s better to stay like this in case things do go wrong — and this was the first time you listened to that voice. You simply valued your friendship too much.

But that didn’t mean you were going to be completely quiet about it — you hoped that if you did enough, he would be able to realize you liked him and do the whole process for you. A bit of a dim hope, but crushes make people do stupid things.

Things like bringing an extra coffee to every session, laughing at all his jokes (even the bad ones), sitting a little closer to him than usual, not dropping out of this wretched class so you could spend time together (it might’ve been required, but you still counted it). He didn’t make a point to object to anything, so you knew you weren’t making him uncomfortable — but you had concluded after nearly a whole semester of working and studying together that he was the most oblivious person in all of Ba Sing Se. He could teach you all kinds of formulas, but had no idea that you liked him. Grand.

Today was arguably the most important session out of any of them, seeing as your next class was the final, so it was only fitting that Sokka unknowingly made himself more interesting than any material you could’ve been working with. His arms were going to be the death of both you and your calc grade. You swore that the heat rushing to your cheeks was actually emanating off of you.

“Hey, Y/N!” Sokka grinned as he saw you and raised a hand in greeting, a sentiment you would’ve returned had it not been for the coffee cups in your hands. You settled for mirroring his grin and settled down in the seat across from him. You slid his coffee cup over, set your own down, then shrugged your bag off all before taking a seat.

“You ready to study ‘till your eyes bleed?” he asked, prompting a nervous laugh from you.

“You jest, but my eyes might actually start bleeding depending on how long we go,” you sighed. “There’s a reason I got an extra shot of espresso today.”

“Come on — by now you should know that you have nothing to worry about! I am the best teacher there is, and you got me all to yourself.”

Your eyes widened momentarily and you coughed, purposefully averting your gaze to give yourself some time to recover. Okay, he was going to make it really hard to focus today. “Let’s just get into it.”

He nodded and flipped open his notebook, beginning to talk as he rifled through his bag for a few extra things. “Okay, we’re just gonna start with going over the basics, then we’ll work our way up. There’s a couple practice problems on that page, so you can go ahead and answer those as a warmup.

You slid the notebook over in front of you and after approximately five seconds of looking at the first problem, found yourself studying Sokka rather than the material. Who could blame you? In the battle of cute tutor boy versus calculus, he was going to win every time.

He turned around and you immediately averted your eyes once again, trying to appear extremely involved, but you found that your mind was empty on anything to do with math. “Hey, uh— how do you do this first one? I’m totally blanking here.”

“We use limits in everything — this is actually something you’re really good at!” He studied you intensely and frowned. “Are you okay? Like, you’re not sick or anything, are you? You seem kinda out of it.”

You choked out a laugh and shook your head. “No, no — I’m fine. I guess I’m just a little tired.” As if to demonstrate your lie, you took a sip from your coffee and cringed internally. Love had turned you into an idiot.

He seemed to buy it as he nodded and picked up the pencil, scribbling a couple of notes as he explained the first problem to you. “Does that make sense?” You nodded and he handed the pencil back to you. “Okay — the other ones follow the same kind of process. It should be easy enough.”

You managed to get a little further in the second problem, but your lovestruck mind would not stop focusing back on Sokka every time you tried to do, well, anything. Curse him and his perfect arms, and eyes, and hairstyle, and everything.

You shook your head and set the pencil down once more, letting loose a frustrated sigh. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me.” Yes, you did. “I just can’t focus at all.” Because of you. You picked up your cup once more and took a sip, hoping it would do something to get you back into the math state of mind.

Sokka frowned once more as he put the back of his hand against your forehead. “God, you’re hot.” You nearly choked on your coffee as your eyes practically bulged out of their sockets — he had to know what he was doing by now — how could he not? “Like, you’re completely burning up. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine, I swear— I just…” you set your cup down on the table and heaved a sigh that was a touch more exasperated than necessary. “Are you telling me you seriously haven’t noticed? Like, not a single thing this whole year?”

“I’ve noticed a lot of things this year,” he chuckled. “It’s kind of our whole job, so you’re gonna have to be a lot more specific.”

You finally couldn’t hold it in anymore. “Sokka, I’m not— I’m not sick! Haven’t you noticed that I’m only ever flustered, or running into things, or forgetting info, or— or just a complete idiot when I’m around you? I like you, like, a lot, and I have for an embarrassingly long time! The reason I can’t focus is because I am hopelessly attracted to you in every single way.”

His brows creased for a moment and you clamped your mouth shut, worried that you had just ruined everything. It was only after a pause that felt like a century that he finally responded, the hint of a smirk on his lips.

“Well, why didn’t you just say something?”

You stared at him, eyes wide and lips slightly parted in pure surprise before the annoyance set in. You set your jaw as your brows furrowed and you hit him lightly on the side of his arm with the back of your palm. “You can’t be serious! You— you’ve gotta be messing with me by now. I really can’t believe that you can be that smart but this oblivious!”

He finally let the grin play across his lips in full force and he shrugged nonchalantly. “I mean, I don’t know how you don’t expect me to mess with you when you scrunch up your face all cute like that every time you get mad. Besides, I started liking you after that fifth class; I offered to help you out so I could spend more time with you! I didn’t realize you felt the same way. I kinda just enjoyed the free coffee and getting to look at you all the time.”

“I can’t believe you!” you cried as you hit his other arm. “You’re telling me that I had to deal with this- this mental turmoil about whether you liked me back, while you were just enjoying the free eye candy and coffee the whole time?”

“You have nothing to worry about! I enjoyed the company far more than the coffee,” he joked, a certain twinkle in his eye. “But, you are probably out a couple twenties after all of that. So, what do you say about this Saturday, the cafe by the shoe store? My treat.”

“Damn right it’s your treat,” you shot back, though you couldn’t stop the smile forming on your face. “You owe me a lot — you have to make up for those coffees and all the emotional distress you caused.”

“Oh, I think I’ll have plenty of time to make up for lost time. After all, we do have a lot of coffee dates to get through.” And when he winked at you just like that first day, you remembered just how impossible it was to be angry at Sokka. “But first, we kinda have to get through this study date. The final’s still happening tomorrow.”

You responded with a raised brow. “This is a study date?”

Sokka shrugged and grinned. “They’ve all been study dates. You just didn’t know it.”

idiots in love idiots in love idiots In LOVe

perm tag list: @dv0412 @siriuslyslyslytherin @maruchan77

atla: @marianne1806

#sokka x reader #sokka x you #sokka x y/n #sokka fic #atla #avatar #avatar the last airbender #avatar the last airbender fic #avatar x reader #reader insert #sadie writes

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wtf-yoongi · 4 years

Text

Curly. / JJK

pairing | jungkook x reader

summary | it’s another lazy morning one + you help jungkook fix his curly hair after a shower 🥺

genre/warnings | fluuuuuuff

words | 911 *laughs* yes jk is the reason i’m callin sir

note | had this idea bc jk permed his hair and it’s so messy i love it big fan i wanna scrunch his curls man (also he complains about not being able to handle it so)

It’s just like any other day. Well, at least any other day you sleep over at Jungkook’s.

You can see the sunlight peak through the edges of his dark curtains – the brightness telling you it’s way past reasonable waking up hours. You know you’ve slept through many alarms, but weekends just ask for more time in bed and leaving his side seems like the most illogical decision ever.

And it usually is. It’s just starting to get chilly again, with late nights and early mornings bringing some sort of unfriendly cold air to the apartment that clouds your judgement further. He’s just so warm all the time, like a cozy comforter you don’t want to let go. Ever.

So it really bothers you to feel his body stir, limbs stretching under yours to increase the blood flow and feel alive again. You cling onto him like a koala, holding tighter in hopes he will just stop moving and moaning lowly as if you’re saying don’t you dare.

“I have to,” he answers your unspoken question, turning his body towards yours to hug you with the same intensity. He sighs loudly. “I actually have a dance practice today.”

Your voice comes out as raspy as his, but, to you, it definitely doesn’t sound nearly as good. “But it’s Saturday.”

“I know. I’m sorry.” Jungkook now moves his hands to detach yours from his waist, delicately kissing them in the process. “You can sleep more if you want to, but I need to take a shower.”

You stay in bed just for a few more minutes, not long after you hear the water running inside the bathroom and Jungkook humming to a song you can’t recognize. That’s when you think staying in bed doesn’t make much sense anymore since Jungkook is not lightly – and sometimes not as lightly – snoring next to you. You blink a few times in an attempt to wake up more and finally leave the bed as well.

In the kitchen, things look much more lively. You’ve always loved the way the sun hits the marble counters perfectly – almost as if it’s constantly telling Jungkook to have a nice day, every day. You get started with some coffee, hands lazily dragging themselves to check JK’s fancy coffee grinder first.

You’ve lost count of how many times late mornings have gone just like this. And you don’t think you’ll ever get tired of it.

After breakfast is kind of worked out – kind of because there’s so much stuff inside the refrigerator you can never guess what Jungkook wants –, you move back to knock on the bathroom’s door and let him know breakfast is kind of ready. Before you can do that, though, he opens it all of a sudden.

“Oh, hey,” he greets with a smile, realizing your hand was just about to knock. “I’m almost done, then you can have the bathroom.”

“What are you doing?”

Maybe your question comes out a bit too out of context, but not without good reason. Jungkook has a comb in his hands and was about to touch his hair with it. Really, what does he think he is doing?

“What? Am I doing something wrong?”

Your next question comes in pieces, as if saying it at once would hurt your soul. “Are you… Just… Going to… Comb it?”

“Yeah… And blow-dry it…” He explains, but, this time, slowly and with a little less confidence as the look on your face becomes recognizable to him. This isn’t good. “Shouldn’t I?”

“You realize you permed your hair, right?” You ask with a raised eyebrow. “You have to treat it differently. Didn’t anyone teach you how to do it?”

“Uh, no.”

“Wow, I’m going to have a very serious conversation with your hair stylist,” you say jokingly, pushing him further inside the bathroom and taking the comb out of his hands. “First, forget this exists.”

“I shouldn’t comb my hair?” He asks, his final words becoming a third higher and you don’t even have to look to know his eyes are as wide as they can be. “I didn’t know that.”

“I mean, you can,” you admit. “But not in the way you usually do. And definitely don’t blow-dry it the way you usually do too.”

You make Jungkook crouch a little so you can reach his hair better. Occasionally, he giggles like a little kid, enjoying the feeling of your hands expertly moving around his hair strands, scrunching them together with a bit of his leave-in product. Then, you look at both of you in the mirror to admire your work.

“You should do this so you help the shape of the curls, you know?”

“Well, this is a lot of work if I’m being honest.”

“You have perfectly straight hair and want it curly, what can I do?” You ask rhetorically with a smile on your face that mirrors his. Soon, you reach for a towel to help you get rid of the excess water. “If you don’t have a diffuser, I wouldn’t recommend trying to blow-dry it.”

“I don’t think I have one, no. Do I ask for one of those? I can get one from the staff, I think.”

“If they already have one that you can use…” You shrug, fixing a final strand in his forehead. “There you go. Now you’ll have to walk around with this perfect face and perfectly curly hair. What a life, huh?”

Read more ›› masterlist

#jeon jungkook #jungkook x reader #jungkook x you #jungkook imagine #jungkook oneshot #jungkook fluff #jungkook scenarios #jeon jungkook fluff #bts imagines #bts fluff #bts fanfic #jungkook fanfic #i'm soft

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scaredyships · 3 years

Text

Renegades (Din Djarin x gn!Reader) | pt. III

summary: Mando picks out the planet Sorgan for the three of you to lie low on. Things get complicated, Reader gets a glimpse of how hectic Mando's life can be as a bounty for hire, and everybody is confused about feelings.

word count: 14.5k (...help)

author’s notes: Good LORD I was stuck on this for way too long. Between my creative focus being elsewhere and just being completely stuck as to how I wanted some scenes to play out, it took a lot for me to do more than a sentence or two at a time and then forget about it for days or weeks at a time.

This was also hard to write bc I am very uhhh put off by Omera and her original role as the possible love interest and I was trying very hard to remain believable/respectful about her. Cara Dune was also hard to write because of certain actions by her actor, so she's got a little bit of a lesser role.

I'm saying this now, with future chapters I am not going to be going episode-by-episode like I originally intended. I might jump around and have some "filler" things, I may completely skip over some episode happenings, I may diverge from canon here and there, but generally the outcomes will be the same as the show. I cut out the actual battle of Sorgan too bc this is already too long and I am terrible at writing action scenes. :v

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 (you are here) // ao3 link

---

It had been a couple days since you’d set yourself up a space in the hold. At least, it felt like a couple days. You weren’t accustomed to space travel and dealing with the lack of solar cycles to indicate the passage of time, so it was difficult to tell exactly. It didn’t really matter, in the end, but it was still a little annoying.

In that time, you spent most of your time getting to know your way around the Razor Crest’s small layout, what panels and buttons did what, and making sure the child on board was cared for and didn’t get into anything he shouldn’t. Easier said than done, as that kid was surprisingly sneaky and far too curious. He seemed well-behaved, right up until you weren’t looking, and the next thing you knew he was doing something like rooting around in a pile of netting and getting hopelessly tangled, or trying to put things in his mouth to teethe on.

Right now, the kid was up in the cockpit with Mando. Even though you were on board to help out, Mando still seemed to feel better when he was in the same room as the kid versus you being the one supervising, and to be honest it was nice to have a break from babysitting. You had never wanted kids of your own to begin with, and though this kid wasn’t exactly your standard child, it reinforced that at the end of the day, the factor of being able to give the child back to their actual caregiver played a large role in just how tolerant you were of them.

The entire ship suddenly jerked to the side and sent you crashing into the hull wall, your shins narrowly avoiding smashing against the edge of one of the crates lying around. To say you were shaken was a bit of an understatement, despite not a moment later, the normal smooth flight pattern returning and the ship righting itself. Did Mando hit something? Was some part of the ship on the verge of breaking down completely? You did a quick sweep to make sure none of the weapons lockers were damaged and that nothing was in danger of going ogg. You swore, this man had far too much firepower on board and one day it was going to come back and bite him.

Fortunately, everything was where it should be and the only things really out of place was your now-askew space, and your frazzled self. Huffing, you sped over to the ladder and clambered up to the cockpit to see if you could find out what was going on. On your way up, you could hear the low, modulated voice of Mando speaking, very likely to the child with the tone you could pick up.

“Ready to lay low and stretch your legs for a couple months, you little womp rat? Nobody’s gonna find us there.”

“Nobody’s gonna find us where?” Your head and shoulders were poking out of the ladder hatch, arms folding over the edge as you gave the pair a pointed look. You weren’t about to let Mando decide where you were going to camp out for months without you giving some input.

The Mandalorian turning to face you with the child in his lap was almost comical, like they’d been caught doing something they weren’t expecting to be called out on. You didn’t see any sign of concern over whatever had shaken you down below, so you figured you could bring that up later.

You could see a holomap beyond Mando, though it was too far for you to make out any of the text on it. You dragged yourself the rest of the way into the cockpit, righting yourself and coming to a halt just far enough that you could read the screen.

“An outer rim planet.” He leaned aside and let you read the screen’s details. Sorgan, huh. You vaguely remember that name from when you were compiling planets for Mando back when this whole mess started. The details past that escaped you, though. You squinted as you read on. No populations outside of small settlements to speak of, no starports or anything industrial… and it was one of those planets made up of a single biome - swamp.

To be honest, you weren’t thrilled at the idea of actually camping out for so long in such a place. You were so accustomed to being in places that had somewhat larger settlements, and absolutely more tech than this planet likely had, not just for business but simple things like staying entertained. But you were even less thrilled at the fact that this was a swamp planet. You knew not all swamp planets were the same, but the simple holomap readout didn’t indicate any further details about what kind of swamps it was made up of.

You hope above all things it’s not a bog planet like Nal Hutta. Gaseous atmosphere, skies choked by sickly green clouds, brown water, hardly any land to speak of.

You turned and gave Mando a look. “No information about the biome past ‘swamp’?”

He shook his head in that slow, deliberate way of his. You exhaled through your nose.

“Not a fan of swamps?”

“You could say that.” You turned back to the screen, like staring at it might make it give up more information. Maker , you missed your database.

“How far away are we?”

“Not very, maybe an hour or two.”

You stepped back and fell unceremoniously into one of the passenger seats further back in the cockpit. The child, who had been watching you through this whole exchange, seemed to lose his interest once you sat down and went back to looking curiously around at the controls laid out in front of Mando. You could almost see the cogs turning in his head, and you started to suspect he had something to do with the ship going sideways earlier. Probably got a hold of the controls somehow.

“I guess I’ll have a better idea of where we’re going once we get a look at the planet.”

The Mandalorian nodded, and turned back to the controls to pilot you all there.

You had been closer than you anticipated, though it was still not a very short journey. Instead of going back down to the hull, you opted to stay in the passenger seat and simply wait. Jumping to hyperspace was something you had yet to get used to, but after so long of the smooth traveling with the smears of light streaking past the windscreens, you found you could relax a little and rest your eyes.

A jolt in the ship as you exited hyperspace shook you awake. Blinking and sitting up in your chair, you peered out the window at the planet taking up the view.

Deep green. Streaks of blue. White cloud cover. You breathed a sigh of relief and slumped back against the chair back.

“Acceptable?” There was a hint of amusement in Mando’s voice. You smirked at him.

“Yeah, I’m fine with it.” You actually were looking forward a little to seeing just what kind of plant life was on this planet. You could see a fair amount of tree coverage, which meant forests. It had been far too long since you’d seen proper forests, let alone been out in one. You had tried to replicate it with your plant corner back home, but it was never the same. Some time amongst real trees would do you good.

The descent had you watching out the window the whole time, surveying the landscape as its features came into view. It had its marshes and rivers, but equal amounts of coniferous forests and solid land. This place could almost pass for an arboreal biome planet in places. You spotted very few settlements on the way in, too, and what you did see looked to be the most basic of small villages.

Mando landed the Razor Crest some ways away from a small market, hidden amongst ample tree coverage. He locked down the controls and lifted the kid with one arm, removing a small silver ball from his clutches to attach to one of the levers in the array.

“I’m going to go out and find us some lodging. Wait here with the kid. Don’t let him touch anything. I’ll be back.”

He passed the child off to you, with such surety that you’d take him that he nearly dropped the little one on you before you could respond. You grabbed him with both hands in a slight panic, thinking he was about to fall, and in doing so your fingers gripped into the gloved ones already supporting his weight. Even with the barrier between skin-to-skin contact, it was awkward and had your face heating with embarrassment that you’d accidentally touched the bounty hunter. He, however, made no indication of any such reaction, damn that helmet making him unreadable. His hands withdrew once it was certain the child was in your grasp safely.

You and the child stared at each other as you held him out before you, like you weren’t sure what to do with him now. He looked back at you with a similar expression, and you swore there was a hint of some sort of mischief underneath it. Oh, he had definitely been the one to make the ship go off-kilter, no doubt now. And knowing your luck, he was going to do more of the same once Mando left. You’d already experienced him trying to eat trash despite you actively watching him, you knew he was capable of more.

Mando descended the ladder into the hold, and the sound of the ramp opening up reached the cockpit. You looked out the windscreen, watching as the Mandalorian appeared in your field of view just as the sound of the ramp closing itself back up sounded.

And that was all it took.

The child turned into a complete nightmare the instant it was clear Mando was gone. It didn’t matter what you did - first he fussed and squirmed to be let down, so you did, and the second you turned your head he had somehow managed to get into the pilot’s seat and was attempting to mess with the controls. Every time you picked him up, he fussed again, wriggling and whining loudly, and whenever you set him back down he went straight for whatever he knew he could get in trouble for. You tried to keep this up as long as you could, which proved to be a pathetic five minutes or so. It was like having an extra-smart, extra-naughty loth cat with thumbs on board.

“Okay, kid. We’re going down to the hold. You can’t accidentally start the ship up down there.” You snatched the kid up under his armpits, and though he continued fussing, it was much less, like perhaps he wanted to be in the hold. You knew that the hold had just as much, if not more, for him to get into trouble with, what with the armory down there, but it was better than possibly starting up the engines and taking off.

You awkwardly climbed down the ladder with one arm latched around the child, and once you reached the floor you set him down, hoping he’d behave a little more. How wrong you were. It was like the kid instinctively knew where the controls for the ramp were, because he made a beeline for that panel - knocking whatever he could out of the way just to accentuate his point - and reached his-far-too-short arms into the air like he could possibly reach it if he just tried hard enough. No amount of you trying to redirect his attention or picking him up to set him down elsewhere worked, he would cry and go straight back to the panel and give you repeated looks with big, desperate eyes, like you were a monster for not understanding he wanted to open the door.

“Mando told us to stay here. So we’re going to stay here until he gets back.”

It was when the loud crying started that you knew you had lost the battle.

That alone was one of your top reasons for not desiring children - you couldn’t handle the noise that came with an upset child. Not for any good parental reason like not wanting to see them sad. You genuinely couldn’t stand the screaming, it set you on edge and made you want to scream in turn. And here one was, cries bouncing off the hull walls and drilling into your eardrums with far more force than you could have imagined possible for something so small.

You rushed as fast as you could towards the control panel and slammed the button to open the ramp.

“OKAY! Okay, okay, you win, we’ll go find him.” You glared down at the kid, whose clear face and perked ears indicated the crying had all been an act. You sighed heavily. He’d only known you for maybe a few days and he already knew how to get you to do what he wanted.

“He’s not going to be happy, you know that, right.” The child just tilted his head at you, smug little face seeming to say “no, he can’t get mad at me”.

You wandered back to your area not too far off to get some of your outerwear on - your belt, your ear piece, your blaster, whatever you might need in the immediate future. The neck gaiter you loosely wore got pulled up to securely cover the lower half of your face - it made you feel more secure, somehow, when you were venturing out into strange places. You picked the kid up and awkwardly shifted him to one arm, making your way down the ramp, and hoping you wouldn’t get into too much trouble with the bounty hunter. The kid, meanwhile, happily burbled in your grasp.

With a deep sigh and a roll of your eyes, you marched out onto the planet’s surface in the direction you had seen Mando go.

You were right. Mando wasn’t happy at all.

He had been trudging along, lost in his thoughts about what kind of lodging he should be looking for now that there wasn’t just him, but you and a child to account for, but still attentive enough to his surroundings that when he heard what sounded like distant footsteps crunching through the undergrowth he paused.

It was when he heard the sounds of the child babbling and you calling out to him to wait that his wariness turned to mild panic, and he rushed towards where he could hear your voices, hand staying within reaching range of his blaster. What had happened? He told you to stay back at the Crest and yet here you were, with the child. Had you been discovered, and just barely escaped? Was the Razor Crest captured?

He came to a halt just a few feet from you, surveying you and the child for any signs of distress or damage, stance wary and ready for a fight.

“What happened?” His tone was terse, apprehensive.

You looked wryly down at the bright-eyed child in your grasp, and back up at the bounty hunter. Or rather, somewhere in the general vicinity of him, as you found you couldn’t look directly at him.

“He, uh. Was very upset at you leaving without him.”

Mando’s defensive posture deflated and he tilted his head in a way that you knew he was giving you a disbelieving look.

“I told you to stay put, and the kid throwing a fit is all it took for you to leave?” He didn’t miss the way your mouth tightened into a thin line and your brow furrowed.

“He wouldn’t stop trying to be destructive, and when I tried to move him he’d just scream and go for the ramp! Look, I told you I wasn’t the best out there with kids.” You snapped, glaring into the blank visor.

Honestly, he could tell you were disappointed in yourself for caving so easily, and he probably wouldn’t have fared much better with his own lack of experience with children. But you could have been followed, and now the ship was unattended. The child, however, looked content as ever, his plan having worked. He sighed. It was what it was at this point. At least he was still in range that could lock the ship up remotely with his vambrace controls, which he set to doing immediately.

“Come on, then.” He motioned with a hand as he turned back to the direction he had come from, cape swirling around his form dramatically. You exchanged a tired glance with the smug kid, having half a mind to set him down and make him walk the rest of the way to wherever you were going.

“You’re lucky you’re at least a little cute.”

By the time you get to civilization, you’d let the kid down to walk - just beside Mando, and you just behind the child. Two unlikely bodyguards for an equally unlikely “dignitary”. The towering trees thinned out on the edge of the small market center, man-made structures beginning to appear. The buildings were small, mostly made of wicker and wood, with very little in the way of tech. The people were equally simple, their dress and presentation reflecting their rural occupations.

With the interest of the child in mind, Mando led the three of you into a common house, the busy sounds of kitchen work and the smell of grilling food easily reaching you before you even got to the entrance. It would have been more welcoming, if it wasn’t also accompanied by nearly everyone turning their eyes to your odd trio and whispering amongst themselves. On one hand, you couldn’t completely blame them, as the three of you were like the lead-up to a bad joke come to life. But it still made you very uncomfortable, knowing without a doubt that you were being watched and discussed. You hated the feeling. You self-consciously adjusted the fabric masking your face and furrowed your brow to try and give off the most “do not approach” energy you could, glancing around at the tenants. Not many of them returned your gaze, save a few, including one woman who didn’t at all look like she was from there. Strong, wearing armor and weapons - not to the extent of the Mandalorian, of course. But you could still feel that she wasn’t to be messed with. You averted your gaze quickly.

The child, meanwhile, was bright as ever with this new place he was in. He looked around the establishment, taking in the new scenery and the light filtering in through the gaps of the woodwork with his big eyes. You in turn watched him, as Mando located a table for the three of you. You followed suit and sat at the table, and as you turned to see what the kid was up to, you noticed the little one had locked eyes with a tooka cat beneath the chair of a nearby tenant. The child was curious, but you knew enough about tooka cats to know that the way it was looking back meant it was interpreting the child’s staring as threatening to its peace. Very few animals took maintaining eye contact as anything but a challenge, and this was no different.

“Leave it alone, kid.” You murmured just loud enough that you hoped he’d hear. Your words were too late, as the cat’s lips pulled back and revealed its enormous maw of teeth in a menacing hiss. The child flinched back with a frightened noise, and next thing you knew you were snatching him up by the ruff of his oversized coat and plopping him in the seat beside you.

There was barely any time for any of you to exchange glances when a proprietor approached the table, face weathered but welcoming.

“Welcome, travelers. Can I interest you in anything?”

“Bone broth, for the little one.” Mando motioned with his hand towards the child. You suppressed giving the armored man a skeptical look for ordering the most basic of things for the kid, when it was obvious they had more substantial food in this establishment. It was fine, you told yourself, he had the final say and this wasn’t the place to call him out on his decisions.

“Oh, well, you’re in luck. I just took down a grinjer, so there’s plenty. Can I interest you in a porringer of broth as well?” Mando shook his head. The proprietor turned her gaze to you expectantly.

“No, thank you.” You put your palm out in a placating gesture. Even though the aroma of food filtered through your face covering and had a tempting quality to it, somewhere as public as this was absolutely not somewhere you’d be comfortable trying to eat at. If you could take it to go, maybe. But you had no idea where you’d even be staying at this point, or how much longer you’d be looking for such a place. No, you could wait.

The proprietor nearly began to speak again when Mando cut her off. “That one over there, when did she arrive?”

So, you hadn’t been the only one to notice the intimidating woman across the room. Well, it wasn’t that difficult, with how much she stuck out amongst the residents of the planet. You three were equally as noticeable, and you didn’t miss how the woman was still watching you, though she was trying to be discreet about it. There was wariness coming off of her, you could feel that much.

The proprietor glanced towards where Mando had indicated the strange woman to be, seemingly confused. “Uh, I’ve seen her here for the last week or so.”

Mando continued pressing her for answers she didn’t have. “What’s her business here?”

“Business?” The proprietor looked as confused as ever. “Well, there’s not much business on Sorgan, so I can’t say…” The sound of credits clinking onto the countertop reached in your ears as Mando casually tossed some onto the tabletop. You were too busy watching the woman out of your peripheral vision to pay too much attention to what he was up to. The proprietor mentioned the woman not being a log runner, and offered complimentary spotchka before she left to retrieve the order.

The moment the woman stood and moved to leave the common house, you discreetly rapped your knuckle against Mando’s vambrace. The black T of his visor turned towards you, and you vaguely twitched your fingers in the direction the woman had been moments before. “She’s leaving.” You murmured as lowly as you could so Mando could hear but others couldn’t. You didn’t get any impression of real danger or malice from her, but knowing that the three of you had prices on your heads, you had a feeling the bounty hunter would try to follow her and make sure she wasn’t about to report on your whereabouts to anyone.

Mando stood from his seat, gaze trained on the doorway to the establishment. “Stay here with the kid. I’ll be back.”

And there it was. You exhaled through your nose and looked down at the kid, comically small in his chair and watching as the beskar-clad man made his way to the exit and out of sight.

You wondered how often he went out of his way to pick possible fights like this.

The proprietor returned to the table and placed a small bowl in front of the child, breaking you from your thoughts. The complimentary bottle of spotchka made an appearance, too, but you didn’t pay much mind to it. Alcohol was never something you liked, between it being an acquired taste and dulling your thoughts. You still nodded appreciatively at her before she left to tend to the next table.

Before the kid could finish picking up his bowl, the faintest of sounds reached your ears. While you normally wouldn’t pay much mind to such things in a public place, there was some notion in your mind that it was the buckethead getting into a fight with the woman from earlier. You looked over at your tiny companion, who looked up at you over the brim of his bowl and towards the doorway Mando had left through moments earlier.

“He doesn’t need our help, we’ll just get in the way.”

The kid seemed to take that as a challenge, and hopped down from his seat and began to toddle off.

“Hey, no, we are not going out there-” You jumped up and tried to herd him back towards the table, and you almost succeeded, but the little green thing was surprisingly determined and avoided your awkward movements, both of you caught up in a ridiculous dance. The tenants were watching you and your face heated with embarrassment. You finally scooped up the rapscallion with one arm, narrowly avoiding some of the broth sloshing from his bowl and onto the floor.

“Fine, we’ll go see what’s going on. Just stop trying to run off on me.” You pointed meaningfully at the kid with your index finger, peering into those big dark eyes and hoping he actually listened. He looked back at you with those big bright eyes and perked ears in a way that somehow told you he understood.

You carefully set him back on the ground. “Stay close.”

Exiting the establishment and turning the corner was as far as you needed to go to see just what you suspected - Mando and the woman scrabbling to get the upper hand against the other. It was almost comical, in a way, even though blasters were involved and the situation could very well turn dangerous.

And it nearly did just that when the two fell on the ground with blasters pointed at each other’s heads - causing you to pull your own blaster from its holster - except everything was interrupted by a very loud slurp from the child as he watched from beside you, bowl of broth clutched tightly. The slow turns of their heads and prolonged look from both of them was enough of an announcement of a stalemate as any. You snorted and shook your head slightly at the scene.

“I take it you don’t actually want to kill each other, then.” You slightly lowered your blaster from where it was aimed at the woman. You didn’t miss the way Mando paused in a way that you imagined he was rolling his eyes under his helmet. He turned his attention back to the woman he was still vaguely pointing his blaster at.

“Would you like some soup?”

You all returned to the table you’d had back in the common house. The woman - named Cara Dune, you learned - told you her story. She was a former shock trooper for the former Rebel Alliance working on Endor, with no additional support, and as soon as the ex-Imperials were gone the politics got out of hand and she found herself working to “keep the peace”. Beating rioters and favoring delegates wasn’t what she’d signed up for, so she left, and now had a price of her own for desertion. She recognized Mando as being part of the Guild and suspected he’d come looking for her. She kept glancing curiously at you throughout her explanation, like she wasn’t sure what to make of you tagging around with a Mandalorian bounty hunter and why he was even letting it happen. Sure, the child was an equally puzzling factor, but she seemed to sense he was a touchy subject.

She eventually turned to you after her explanation was finished. “So what’s your story?”

You shrugged, idly adjusting one of your wrist pieces. “He got my house blown up and put me on a wanted list, so this is his way of dealing with the guilt.”

Cara visibly bites back a laugh and tries to hide behind her own cup of broth. You glance over at your companion, whose stiff posture tells you he’s not sure how to react, but he’s definitely embarrassed to some degree.

The ex-trooper downs the last of her broth, and stands from the table. “Well, this has been a real treat. But unless you wanna go another round, one of us is gonna have to move on, and I was here first.” She gives you all a curt nod, and walks away.

Mando leans back in his own chair and looks between you and the kid, who’s working on his second helping of broth. “Well, looks like this planet’s taken.”

The walk back to the Razor Crest was a somber one for you. Now that you had spent some time on the surface, you’d actually taken a bit of a liking to the place. But Mando was right - as remote as this planet was, it could likely only handle one fugitive at a time. Looked like it was back to the ship directory to root through whatever systems it could access. You tried not to let your mind wander off to mourn your lost database again. This was exactly why you compiled lists of multiple options, in case something like this happened and one of those choices fell through.

A tug on your pant leg dragged you from your mulling. You looked down and were met with the concerned face of the child looking back up at you.

“I’m okay, don’t worry about me.” The kid burbled quietly at you in response. That seemed to catch Mando’s attention, as he was now looking questioningly back at you.

“Something wrong?”

You exhaled through your nose, trying to come up with a brief answer that wasn’t too revealing. You weren’t big on talking about your feelings, and you got the impression that neither was Mando, so between the two of you it would be better if it was kept to a minimum.

“Feeling a little useless on the front of hunting for a planet, that’s all.” It was the first time you’d felt this useless in a very long time, to be honest, but you weren’t about to let that part out.

Mando turned back to continue the trek back to the Razor Crest. “We’ll figure something out.” His tone was superficially dull, but you could tell he was trying in his own way to sound reassuring. That counted for something.

Once you made it back to the Crest, which was safe and sound amongst the trees, the two of you got to work - the Mandalorian using the dying daylight to look over the ship for maintenance, while you took up the task of sifting through the planetary database for your next options. Originally Mando wanted you to take the child up with you so he’d be better contained, but after a pitiful look from those big, dark eyes, it was over and decided that he’d watch him. The “watching” very quickly turned into “put the kid to bed”, thank the maker.

It felt like you’d had barely any time to really start your search when you saw what looked like lights on the ground from your view in the cockpit. You slowly stood, watching the lights as they drew nearer. That couldn’t be anything good.

You clambered your way down the ladder and into the hold just as whoever it was pulled up. It was a small cargo sled, one that barely seemed to be holding itself together, with two men of seemingly modest origins on it. Mando wasn’t the least bit concerned about it, as he continued his repairs and ignore them as they tried to get his attention.

“Excuse me, sir?”

Mando didn’t stop working. “There something I can help you with?”

You slowly made your way towards the ramp, taking care to accentuate the sound of your boots hitting the floor and make your presence known, Mando could take care of himself, but if they knew you were here they were less likely to try anything than if he were alone. You shot them a warning glare when they glanced at you, but watching their already-anxious expressions deepen almost made you regret doing so.

“Uh… yeah… raiders.” “We have money.”

You raised an eyebrow at them.

“You think I’m some kind of mercenary?” Mando still made no indication he was going to stop his work for them.

That was enough to get them stammering. First about how they’d read about Mandalorians, and how they thought he was one based on his armor, and if half of what they read was true then they could recruit him for help. One emphasized again, that they had money.

“How much?” Mando had paused his working, turning more attention to these strangers.

“Everything we have, sir. Our whole harvest was stolen.”

“Krill… We’re… krill farmers.” “We brew spotchka. Our whole village chipped in.”

You don’t know what else you were expecting from locals of the planet, but the coin purse one of the men held up as proof of payment was sad to say the least. Krill farming and spotchka brewing didn’t strike you as a very lucrative business anyways, but if that was all they could muster…?

“It’s not enough.” And there was Mando, confirming your suspicions about what his rates were. You didn’t recall him being picky about his bounty, but thinking back, he did go for higher bounties more often than not. It looked like he still held onto that standard despite no longer being part of the Guild. Hell, if you were going by your own rates, what they appeared to have on hand wouldn’t even cover half of your cheapest services.

Mando finished what he’d been doing and made his way up the ramp towards you. The men following him up the ramp was unexpected, but not frightening. They were desperate, and you were getting a better sense of just how much.

“Are you sure? You don’t even know what the job is.” One of them tried to look to you for support. You stared back apprehensively.

“I know it’s not enough. Good luck.” Mando brushed past you, using your form as a barrier between him and the strangers as he retreated further into the hold.

“This is everything we have! We’ll give you more after the next harvest!” You stayed where you were, crossing your arms and staring the men down. You knew you should feel bad for them and try to convince Mando to do something, but with the last time you extended help ending with your entire life up to that point being destroyed, you were too wary to do so.

The two men looked between each other and your standoffish presence. Defeated, they slowly turned to return to their sled, talking to each other as they did.

“Took us the whole day to get here. Now we have to ride back with no protection to the middle of nowhere.”

Mando had only made it a few feet past you by then, so he was definitely within earshot of their conversation. He stopped and turned on his heel, coming up behind you and stopping just behind your shoulder. It took everything in your power to appear unbothered by just how close he stood.

“Where do you live?”

The men paused, turning back to look at the man that had just dismissed them.

“A farm, weren’t you listening? We’re farmers.” The hurt was apparent in the man’s voice.

“In the middle of nowhere.”

“…yes?” The confusion was palpable. You knew where this was going and you weren’t sure you liked it.

“You have lodging?”

The men started to realize where this was going, too, and jumped to provide answers he wanted to hear.

“Yes, absolutely.” Mando briefly glanced at you, as if he was about to ask what you thought. Unfortunately for you, that never happened and he made the decision on his own.

“Good.” Mando motioned to them. “Come up and help.” He motioned to you as well, and began pulling out cargo crates to have them start loading.

You approached the man, once the other men had carried one of the crates far enough that they’re out of hearing range.

“Mando, I don’t know about this. Middle of nowhere or not, Dune’s right, this planet can’t handle more than one fugitive at a time.”

Mando continued moving crates to the ramp. “If it took them all day to get here, they’ll be isolated enough.”

“That kind of distance from civilization, however small, hasn’t stopped bounty hunters before. You of all people know that.” You glared into the T-shape of his visor. You also knew that all it took was enough time for word to get out about sighting a certain beskar-clad Mandalorian traveling with a green child to reach interested ears. For all you knew, it could be happening right now.

Mando stopped his actions to turn and face you fully.

“We can always move on after the job if it doesn’t seem right.”

You sighed heavily through your nose. That seemed to be him trying to tell you he wasn’t about to change his mind. He had been doing this longer than you, you supposed. You glanced towards the closed door of his bunk, where the child was sleeping.

“…fine. But I’ll hold you to that.”

You briskly moved to where your makeshift corner was and started gathering up your own things for whatever sort of stay you were in for. Behind you, you heard Mando exchange a few more words with the men as they loaded the last of the cargo he’d pushed on them onto the sled.

His heavy footsteps approached you. “I’m going back into town for a while.” You turned, and noticed the pouch of credits that one of the men had shown you earlier clutched in his hand. “Stay here to keep an eye on them and the kid. I’ll be back.”

You stared at him for a moment, then nodded slightly. “At least he’s not awake to make me come chasing after you this time.”

You swore you heard a slight snort from beneath that helmet.

He’d returned some time later with Cara Dune in tow, and after rousing the kid the four of you joined the two men on their journey back to their village. The cargo sled, thank the maker, was the only part of the ride, no connections made with another transport like a boat like you were fearing. You didn’t like boats much, the swaying made you anxious. Five people made it a little crowded and awkward, and try as you might to sit as far as you could on some strapped-down cargo, to try and preserve some sense of personal space, you found yourself nearly falling off one too many times.

“That’s a good way to fall off and get left behind.”

You narrowed your eyes as you stared at the beskar-clad man that had basically just talked to you like a parent.

“It’s fine. I don’t want to get in anyone’s way.”

The way he tilted his head was enough for you to practically see the skeptical look he was no doubt wearing on his hidden face. The kid, sitting beside him, watched you intently.

“Nobody’s doing anything but waiting out the ride.” He pointed to a spot on the cargo just in front of him, where there was definitely enough room for you to fit, though it meant if you tried to stretch your legs out they’d be right alongside his. Clearly, he didn’t care about that if he was doing this.

You stared at the spot like it was a trap. Almost as if to prove a point, the sled went over a particularly pronounced piece of terrain and jostled you. You very nearly fell just like Mando had said you would. The only thing that kept you from going completely overboard was your grip on the cargo’s ties, but you still flopped embarrassingly around. You saw the man’s head tilt to the side as if to say “see?”

Defeated and embarrassed, you clambered down into the open area. Thank the maker Cara Dune had decided to try and get some sleep earlier, and the two farmers transporting you were busy navigating. You didn’t think you could handle having them involved in this, admittedly silly, exchange. You kept your gaze down, not daring to even look up at the Mandalorian. The kid, however, earned himself something between a glare and a smirk when you heard a small giggle come from his direction.

You drew your legs up into your new space, both to keep from invading even more of Mando’s space, and to keep out of the child’s space as well. Mando could handle an accidental kick if you absent-mindedly shuffled; the little green one probably wouldn’t fare so well.

Once you’d settled, you leaned back onto the cargo packed behind you and tried to get as comfortable as you could manage. Which wasn’t much. Mando, however, seemed capable of doing it, as he slowly fell backwards and folded his arms behind his head. You didn’t realize how broad he was until now, seeing up close how much space he took up just by doing that. And all over again, you felt like you were in his space, and needed to get out of it out of respect. But there was nowhere to go.

You had to snort to yourself when the child mimicked the bounty hunter and tipped backwards onto his much-softer surroundings, peering up at the dark sky with equally dark eyes. At least he was content to do that.

The sled ride stretched on for the duration of the night and into the morning, the farmers switching shifts partway through. You’d never really fallen asleep all the way, just dozed in the same position you took when you initially settled in. Your eyes had closed, and you became somewhat less aware of your surroundings, but the slightest of unusual sounds or movements still drew enough attention that you’d crack an eye open to see what was happening. All through the hours of darkness and through the light breaking over the land. So when the sled began to approach the village, you could hear it. The sounds of people working, distant voices. Opening your eyes and pushing yourself upright, you turned to look up ahead. In the distance you could see the beginnings of some sort of settlement.

You shifted your attention to the others on the sled. Cara Dune was still sleeping, though you didn’t know how. Mando and the child seemed to be out, as well. It was harder to tell with the bounty hunter because of his helmet, but the way he laid there was convincing.

Reaching over, you lightly grabbed one of the child’s clawed feet and shook it to get his attention.

“Get up, kiddo.”

He blinked awake, eyes squinting in the morning light and mouth working to remedy having gone dry while he slept with it open the night before. His big eyes shifted around to look for his Mandalorian guardian, body relaxing once he located him.

You weren’t going to try and use touch to see if he was awake, though. That could get you stabbed or shot, what with the combination of his reflexes and waking up in a strange place.

“Mando.” You raised your voice, hoping volume alone would do the trick. Fortunately for you, it did. The man shifted and groaned like he had just come alive, his helmet shifted ever so slightly and you could tell he was looking at you.

“We’re there.”

The armored man slowly drew himself upright into a sitting position. As much as he’d tried to get comfortable, he knew he’d be fighting with a back ache for a while after sleeping like he had. It wasn’t anything he hadn’t already dealt with before, with his longer bounty hunts taking him far from his ship and civilization and requiring him to put comfort to the wayside. You, however, had probably not had to relegate yourself to such circumstances. You looked like you hadn’t actually slept, bags present beneath your eyes and a subtle, narrow-eyed scowl he hadn’t seen before on your face. You probably didn’t even know it was there.

The approach to the village was quickly noticed by the villagers, and before you knew it there was a crowd forming to welcome you.

And a lot of them were children.

You could see and hear them immediately. You squeezed your eyes shut and exhaled through your nose for a moment to steel yourself, both for the crowd and the large percentage of it being so young. You hadn’t even had a chance to really get used to the green child you were tasked with helping out with. And these kids could talk .

The sled came to a stop, the slight jarring motion shaking Cara Dune awake. She looked around, mind working to remember the circumstances that landed her in a strange vehicle with equally strange company.

The first thing the children of the crowd did, was fixate on the child companion of yours in the sled. They were all murmuring and giggling amongst themselves, and the kid looked back at them with equally curious intent. None of you had any idea when he was last around anyone of his mentation.

“Looks like they’re happy to see us.” You heard Mando’s voice crackle through his voice modulator. Cara Dune smiled, but all you could do was blink tiredly. You weren’t ready for this.

One of the children, a girl, broke away from the crowd and got closer to the smaller, green child, greeting him personally. You watched the interaction carefully. She seemed to notice, as she quickly made eye contact and ducked away back into the safety of the other village children.

With that, everyone disembarked the sled and began unloading cargo. You slowly rose from your spot, knees protesting from staying folded for so long and making you grit your teeth. You grabbed the pack you’d brought with you, slinging it over your shoulder and hobbling off of the sled to join the others, who were carrying their respective luggage. The child had been surrounded by the village kids, the curiosity on both sides still strong and outweighing the apprehension of the strangers with him.

It was time to be shown where you’d be staying, though. Without any words exchanged, Mando shuffled over to gather up the child, kids scattering, and you, Cara Dune, and he were led to your accommodations.

The village was modest, but cozy. The huts all had a distinct charm to them, with the same woven look as the common house, and reminding you of fishing baskets. Smoke rose from some, and in the distance you could make out man-made ponds where they likely farmed their krill.

You were all led to what appeared to be a building other than a hut. There’s a woman there, apparently putting the last touches on preparing it for guests. When she sees you approaching, she stops fussing with the blinds and turns to face you. You don’t miss how she’s focused in on the Mandalorian, with some sense of hesitation, like she wasn’t anticipating how meeting a Mandalorian in person would be. You couldn’t blame her, honestly.

“Please, come in.” You let Mando lead, watching him walk in and put his cargo down onto the floor. The woman turned and seemed mildly surprised when you entered as well, like she hadn’t really seen you before when you made your approach. Again, you couldn’t blame her - if you’d never met a Mandalorian before, it would be hard to notice anything else. That, and it made sense that should word get out in the village about a Mandalorian arriving, the last thing anyone would talk about would be his companions.

“I apologize… I didn’t realize how many guests there would be.” She glances briefly at you and the child individually. You began to feel guilty about being there at all. Of the adults that were there, you were by far the least useful for the job involving the raiders, and of the resources available for guests you felt like it would be better to distribute them amongst the others before you. The child, too, you felt deserved things before you did. You didn’t miss him looking up at you with his big dark eyes, as if he could sense your discomfort.

“Is, uh, there anywhere else available—“

“This will be fine.”

You give the beskar-clad man a perplexed look when he cuts you off. You were attempting to give the man his space back, surely he would like that better than having you hole up in the same small building?

“It’s not any different from the ship. We’ll make do.” He was looking back at you through that dark visor as if he had heard your thoughts. You blinked.

“Are you sure?”

The curt nod he gave you told you the conversation was over. Well… as long as he was okay with it.

The woman took that as her cue that she could speak again. “I’ve stacked some blankets over there, I can get more should you need them.” She indicated the area she meant. You nodded appreciatively at her.

There’s a very slight sound from the doorway, and both you and Mando turn to see the girl from before that had been talking to the child. She attempted to hide behind the doorframe, bashful about being noticed, but the woman goes to gently pull her back into sight and gently hold her to her side.

“This is my daughter Winta. We don’t get a lot of visitors around here, she’s not used to strangers.” That explains the extra feeling of being watched you’d felt on top of the village at large watching you, this girl must’ve followed along. The woman turned to face her daughter. “This nice man and his friends are going to help protect us from the bad ones.”

Winta looked shyly at you and Mando, and politely whispered a thank you. The woman took her daughter by the hand, leading her outside. “Come on, Winta, let’s give our guests some space.”

Just like that, you were left alone with your usual companions.

You glanced around, seeing that it was essentially just one open room. That wouldn’t do. Whatever Mando told you, you knew he would appreciate having a space to himself. You, also, would appreciate some semblance of privacy.

Speaking of Mando, he hadn’t moved to unpack at all, he continued to stand in place as he tried to process what he’d gotten himself into. He’d done plenty of jobs, with plenty of clients, but he wasn’t at all used to being treated like a “nice man”, as the woman had put it. He didn’t know how he was supposed to fee about it.

His buffering was briefly interrupted when you pushed past him into the barn, and began to root through the blankets that had been left and other supplies that had been pushed off to the side to make space.

“I’m going to build some sort of divide for the room. To at least make it feel like there are two rooms instead of one.” You began draping things over your shoulders and arms as you found them, and looking up at the ceiling and the walls to see what you had to work with. Part of him wanted to tell you to just sit down for now, since he could tell you weren't rested at all from the night before. But he also felt like he wouldn’t be able to stop you from your current activity until you’d finished it. He resigned himself to getting his cargo unpacked.

What he doesn’t know, is you were also trying to distract yourself from your own thoughts. You had noticed how the woman had briefly paused in the doorway as she left to look back - at Mando, and only Mando. You didn’t know why, but something about it bothered you. Was it a look of apprehension and were you offended on his behalf? No, that wasn’t it. It was some other expression that was subtle and layered and happened too fast for you to read. But it still bothered you. You tried to brush it aside and get to working on your new project instead.

Before long you had constructed a simple set of walls from various things you’d found around - you’d taken some sheets from the pile of blankets, and used them in conjunction with some netting and poles to fix them to the walls and ceilings similar to what you had done with your space back on the Razor Crest. A crib had been provided for the child, and you moved that onto the “half” that you’d designated Mando’s space - the larger section, and the one with the window. Your “half” was more like your “third” of the bar’s interior. Really, you didn’t mind. Mando had been busy unpacking and reconvening with Cara Dune to offer any input until it was done, anyways.

Later in the day, you’d more or less finished unpacking what little you’d brought, and Mando was tending to his rifle. You sat on a crate, idly fussing with the settings on your blaster, musing to yourself if you could possibly bother the bounty hunter in the future for something more substantial.

“Knock, knock.”

The woman from earlier stood at the door with a tray of a few plates of food in hand, her daughter in tow. You could see them, but their attention was turned to Mando and the child, who was standing in his crib. “Come in.” Mando’s voice sounded from beyond the divide in the room.

The woman entered, setting the tray down on a nearby surface and picking up a plate from it. Winta stepped forwards shyly, asking if she could feed the child. Mando wasn’t quite sure what to make of that, but he didn’t see a problem with it. “Sure.”

You watched from just around the edge of the divide, as the girl first knelt to feed the child, and then asked if she could play with him. Mando seemed just as fond of dealing with kids as you, hearing his sigh and flat “sure” in response. You smirked at that.

Once Mando had set the child on the ground, Winta immediately darted out the doorway with the child in tow. Mando started to protest, but the woman held him back. You didn’t know why, it was such a simple thing and she was coming from a place of experience where he had none, but for some reason… it made you bristle slightly. You felt like she was overstepping her bounds somehow. You shook your head briefly. She didn’t know any better, it was fine.

The woman then reached for one of the plates of food, to set on a surface closer to where Mando had been maintaining his rifle. “I brought you some food, I noticed you didn’t eat out there. I’ll leave it here for when I go.” Mando awkwardly thanked her, and moved to turn away.

You were hoping she would leave, then, but she didn’t. Instead, she asked if she could ask Mando a question. With his approval, she continued.

“How long has it been since you’ve taken that off?”

Oh, the helmet question. That was bound to happen sooner or later, honestly. You hoped she didn’t say anything too intrusive or insensitive.

“Yesterday.”

“I mean in front of someone else.”

The air felt heavy. You couldn’t quite see from your position where he was looking, but you saw him motion through the window towards what might have been the child and Winta, and other children based on the sounds of play you could hear.

“I wasn’t much older than they are.”

The woman sounded almost horrified that he hadn’t shown his face to anyone since then. The bounty hunter protested, saying that after his parents had been killed, the Mandalorians had taken him in and cared for him as their own.

It’s not like you knew what his past was, or what you expected it to be, but hearing it like this was like a punch to the gut. It was a horrible thing for him to have gone through at all, let alone as a child. You arguably had only just been getting to know him, but the fact that this woman he had never met before was able to get this fact out of him at all, let alone such a personal fact, stung. He had told you earlier that he’d trusted you. That should’ve been enough, and should’ve stopped you from having your thoughts run loose like they were.

“...I’m sorry.” The woman sounded genuinely sad.

“This is the way.”

“Let us know if there’s anything you need.”

Finally, she left. It did not escape you, though, that she hadn’t stopped to see if you had been there to let you know that she had brought you some food, as well, as you also had not left to go get food since arriving. That hurt a little bit, but with the way the prior exchange had gone it probably just slipped her mind. It wasn’t her fault. She was being a good host, she still brought it, didn’t she? You could swear, though, that she seemed to feel some sort of draw towards the bounty hunter and was acting on it in small ways. And you could not figure out why it bothered you.

Once she had left completely, you quietly crept out from behind the divide to retrieve your own plate. Mando was still standing before the window, watching the kids playing with the child. The woman now approached the crowd, no doubt to supervise and make sure they weren’t being too rough. You felt his eyes turn to you slightly.

“I uh… I’m sorry. About what happened in your past. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I couldn’t not hear that part.”

Mando inclined his head for a moment, and then looked back up at you. “It wasn’t anything I wouldn’t have told you if it had come up.”

That lifted your mood a bit. Plate in hand, you wandered over to stand before the window, not too close but beside where Mando stood, to watch the kids.

“Looks like he’s having fun.” Mando hummed in agreement, arms folded.

You don’t notice, but the Mandalorian had turned his head ever so slightly to look at you without giving away that that’s what he was doing. He’s usually not the best at reading people, but he could tell that something about the interaction he had just had with the woman had upset you somehow - he also had not missed how she had left after speaking with him and hadn’t tried to see if you were around to speak to you, as well. This was a different kind of upset than what he had seen when you were first on his ship, after your home had been destroyed. He didn’t like it then, and he didn’t like this now. He realized didn’t like seeing you upset, or to be linked to the reason you were upset.

The two of you stood there for a few more moments, watching the villagers and the child play. You cleared your throat.

“Well, I still don’t like eating around others. I’m going to my ‘room’.” Mando felt a small smile flicker on his face at that, as you left and went back to your area.

Once you were there, you had been about to pick up a piece of the food when you heard the tell-tale sound of Mando’s helmet being removed. You didn’t know if it was the closer proximity or the conversation that had just happened, but you retreated even further into your area until you were as far away as possible, like somehow even being too close while his helmet was off was just as bad as seeing his face.

The job turned out to be much more complicated than any of you had thought. Surveying the woods showed that the raiders were in possession of an Imperial AT-ST, a formidable weapon to have even against trained troops, let alone a defenseless krill farm. Cara Dune was especially off-put by it, having seen the mech in action and barely escaping to tell the tale. Mando, blunt as ever, tried to tell the village’s occupants to just leave and find another place on the planet to farm, but that went over horribly - everyone was angry, saying that he’d agreed to the job and that he should keep to it, that they had lived there for generations and it took so long to even get the farm established, and so on. They insisted they could be taught to fight and help take on the raiders, stubborn in not wanting to leave their homes. Somehow, their desperation won over the bounty hunter and ex-shock trooper, and it was decided that the entire village of twenty-odd people would follow Cara Dune’s instructions to modify the village grounds into a battleground to take down the machine, and the raiders in turn.

The biggest hurdle was teaching the villagers how to fight to begin with. Nobody knew how to deal with hand-to-hand combat. None of them - except the woman, whose name was Omera - knew how to fire a blaster.

That also meant that Mando’s entire arsenal he’d brought along with him would be put to use arming everyone.

While Cara Dune was working with melee training her half of the adults, Mando was overseeing the target practice. You were more familiar with firing a blaster than you were with physical fighting, so you were attempting to help in that department, as well. You had certainly fired off your fair share of one-in-a-million hits in the times you’d even had to use your blaster, but you had no idea how you were able to do it. It was just… an instinct, somehow, that kicked in right at the moment it was needed, and would vanish just as quickly before you could even try to comprehend it. Still, though, you could try.

They were terrible.

Shots were flying and only a small fraction were landing anywhere, and of those, even less were hitting their intended targets. Except for Omera. Every shot she fired landed square in the middle of her target, one after the other. You could see Mando watching her closely, nodding when she turned to look expectantly at him with a slight smile.

It makes you grit your teeth and you don’t know why. He’s allowed to be impressed by someone from a backwater planet being good with a blaster. He was allowed to be impressed by her tenacity to defend her village. He was allowed… and whatever this strange feeling was that you had, wasn’t allowed to get in the way. That was up to him.

You had been walking between the villagers, giving them pointers on how to better aim, but once you’d noticed what you had with the widow and Mando, something shifted in you. And unbeknownst to you, Mando was watching you, probably more than he had been watching Omera. Your eerie accuracy with your own blaster when you fired off and hit the targets, the way you went from person to person to curtly correct their poise, the way your eyes flashed as you stood back and looked from trainee to trainee with a calculating, concentrated look to determine who needed fixing where. This was a new side of you he hadn’t seen. It was intimidating… but in a good way. He caught himself being confused by his own thoughts, and reminded himself sternly that he needed to concentrate on training everyone and getting things ready.

That night, the plan would be executed. Luring the raiders out, having the villagers go hand-to-hand with the raiders while Mando and Cara Dune took care of downing the AT-ST. You hoped it would work.

In the weeks following the successful defeat of the raiders and destruction of their AT-ST, you stayed put in the village. You and Mando and the kid didn't have anywhere better to be, and Mando still stood by it being a good place for waiting out the hunt going on for the kid. Unlike Mando, though, you didn't feel completely safe. You still felt like it was only a matter of time before someone came looking. The raiders didn't all get killed, and though they probably hadn't laid eyes on the child, let alone the village's children in general, it would have been difficult for them to miss the beskar-clad man that they went up against. Word was going to get out.

Mando wasn't convinced. There was nothing besides your sense of unease to indicate that sort of thing would happen, and he needed more substance than that to act. And so, you were stuck there for the time being.

So you tried to make do with living during that time.

Mando spent his time being the quiet watchman of the village, keeping his weapons he'd brought along in top condition just in case. It couldn't hurt to stay vigilant. And it helped you be more at ease to know he hadn't completely shrugged off the possibility of danger.

And when he wasn't cleaning his weapons for the millionth time, or making sure the child wasn't getting into too much trouble with the village children, he was watching you.

He noticed the way you'd go sit out at the far edge of the village clearing, by the edge of the water beneath the shade of the trees, scribbling things in the odd flimsiplast book you'd brought along with you. He got curious one day and wandered over to where you were, making the excuse that he was patrolling the perimeter and just happened to be passing by you on his way. He got to see what it was you were doing - you were sketching the huts and ponds, as well as the trees and animals, making notes beside them. You didn't limit your note-taking to sitting out on the edge of the village, either, sometimes you stayed amongst the buildings and watched the locals and made notes about them.

There were more than a few times that the child would break away from the village kids and watch you, too, and there were times you'd tear a page out and let him scribble on it alongside you. It was endearing to watch, though he'd never admit it, how intensely focused the little one would be on mimicking you during those times. He saw you do your best to be social when the rest of the kids would inevitably crowd around the two of you and watch what you were doing, and begin asking questions. They did that to him, too, with his weapons, and he would try to tell them stories he remembered hearing as a child himself. You didn't seem to tell them stories, so much as just facts about how this or that worked, or how things are different on other planets in this or that way. They still seemed to take it in just as well.

When you weren't note-taking, or trying to avoid being swarmed by curious children, you'd be in the village kitchens, taking advantage of having proper cooking facilities outside of the makeshift space on the Razor Crest and trying out local ingredients and recipes. The child was frequently your taste-tester, and he loved every bit of it. There were times that he'd take a bite of something you'd made, and instead of downing the rest of it, he'd look around for Mando, and upon spotting him he'd hurry over with the food in hand, waving it up at him as if to say "try it". He would, of course, wait until he was in the privacy of his own space, but he'd always try it. He had to admit, though he knew the locals had been working with the ingredients for generations and were by no means bad cooks, there was something about your cooking that he liked better. He knew you'd brought along some of your own spices and that you put your own spin on things, but it was deeper than that and he didn't know why.

He notices that though you try to converse with the locals when appropriate, you frequently retreat to be in his presence and just sit quietly. It starts as you just going back to the barn and him happening to also be there, but over time it evolved into you actively seeking him out in moments where he was apart from the others, wherever that may have been. It was… nice.

It was also nice that, on some nights where neither of you could sleep, you would wind up quietly talking about this or that through the makeshift wall in the barn that divided your sleeping areas. The conversations were about mundane things, never lasted long, and were always quiet because of the sleeping child nearby. But it was a new thing for him that he found he liked. For so long he had traveled alone and in complete silence, and while there was still a degree of silence and separation between the two of you, it was different.

The villagers seemed to act like you would just stay there forever. Names were learned, bits and pieces of life stories were swapped, some degree of familiarity was established.

There was absolutely no way anyone could miss how attentive Omera had become to ensuring you all were still tended to, but especially in regards to Mando. He was civil in return, and you swear he had started to open up to her and go beyond just being polite. You, also, did your best to be civil towards her, but it was difficult for some reason. It was not your place to decide who was allowed to be friends with who, or how they responded to such actions. Not your place to feel put off by another person getting close to arguably the only person you knew beyond vague acquaintance-ship.

And this didn’t just feel like someone building a friendship, either. You did not know why it bothered you as much as it did. But here you were.

One day, you, Mando, and Cara Dune were all on the porch of the barn, lounging for lack of a better word. Cara Dune sat reclined in a chair, you on the edge of the porch, and Mando casually leaned back against the wall of the barn. He looked very relaxed and it took you a little more effort than normal not to just stare at the rare sight.

And then Omera appeared.

She had been in the barn doing some tidying up, as hosts do. As she exited, she handed a cup of spotchka to Cara Dune, who thanked her, and then she turned to Mando.

“Can I set you something in the house?” She briefly turned her vision towards you, to indicate the offer was extended to you as well, but it went right back to the bounty hunter before you could answer.

“Uh… thank you. Maybe later.” He mumbled his answer, awkward as ever. The woman looked back at you, and you shook your head to her offer, not daring to try and open your mouth. She seemed satisfied with that, and turned to watch the village children playing with the child. He’d captured a frog, and wasted no time in stuffing it into his mouth and trying to swallow it like a vine snake. The children laughed and groaned in amused disgust. The frog turned out to be too big for the little one and he spat it out, and everyone cackled as the frog hopped away, no doubt startled by nearly being eaten.

“He’s very happy here.” Omera’s voice broke the silence on the porch.

“He is.” The bounty hunter’s voice responded.

“Fits right in.” And with that, the widow walked away. You watched her leave with narrowly-disguised distaste on your face. The kid was still a target for all you knew, and that little comment implying he should continue to stay just made you realize how little they understood about the consequences that could come their way should the hunters find him. Being able to actually be a child was good, yes, but not at the expense of having another event similar to the raiders, one they wouldn’t have time to plan for.

Apparently, Cara Dune had some thoughts of her own.

“So what happens if you take that thing off?” She nodded at Mando, indicating his helmet. “They come after you and kill you?”

Your distaste turned to her next.

“No, you just can’t ever put it back on again.” Cara scoffed at his answer. She looked at you to see if you thought it was as ridiculous as she did, a smirk on her face. You narrowed your eyes at her, and her smirk faded a bit. You’d known, and you respected his cultural beliefs not to badger him like she was trying to do.

“I was gonna say, if that’s it, it wouldn’t be any trouble at all for you to just slip it off and take up living here, raising the kid and sipping spotchka.” She motioned in the direction Omera had left with her glass.

“The beautiful young widow would be more than happy to help with that.” She looked back at you. “Am I right?”

Your skin felt like it would scramble right off your body.

Somehow, hearing Cara Dune confirm that she, too, had seen Omera’s interest in Mando made it all too real in your mind. And she wouldn’t be making such comments if she didn’t think Mando had similar feelings, either.

Why did it bother you so much?

You heard your name, realizing she was actually waiting for an answer from you.

“Yeah, sure.” Your voice was quiet and clipped, a poor attempt to keep your feelings veiled. Cara Dune finally noticed your tense posture, the discomfort very apparent in the line of conversation she’d started up.

She immediately regretted her teasing about the widow. Unlike you and Mando, she was actually able to read people. Mando may have been oblivious to it, but she could see now that you were more fond of the bounty hunter than she initially thought. She’d sensed some sort of dislike towards Omera from you, with how brief you kept your interactions with her, but this made it make sense. Kriff, you were probably oblivious to it, too.

Mando’s modulated voice brought her back to the present. “You know, we raised some hell here a few weeks ago. It’s too much action for a backwater town like this. Word travels fast. You might wanna cycle the charts and move on.”

You leaned your head back, rolling your eyes. “Finally.” You’d only been trying to convince him to do that the moment you’d chased the raiders off. “I thought it was going to take bounty hunters actually showing up to get you to make that decision.”

You swiveled where you sat to look at the man pointedly. He shook his head lightly. You could almost hear the good-natured smirk under his helmet. You couldn’t help but quirk the corner of your mouth yourself.

As forward as Omera was with hinting her interest towards Mando, Cara Dune thought, you weren’t too bad of a companion choice for him, either. You might not be the worse of the two, either, as far as the dynamic between you. As long as the buckethead wasn’t alone.

She looked back to where the kids were all playing. “I wouldn’t want to be the one who’s gotta tell him that it’s time to leave.”

“I’m leaving him here.”

You and Cara Dune stared at him.

“Traveling with me… that’s no life for a kid. I did my job, he’s safe. Better chance at a life here.”

No. You weren’t going to let him decide that easily.

“Mando. Do I need to remind you that the kid is being hunted as much as you are?” He started to protest, but you continued, standing up from your seat to face him fully, crossing your arms. “And, like you said, the fight with the raiders will have drawn attention. We sure didn’t kill them all, some got away. ‘Word travels fast’.”

Mando stared back, at a loss for words, and looked to Cara Dune for backup. She only shrugged, indicating you had a point.

“...if anyone was going to come, they would have done so by now.”

You dropped your arms to your sides, an incredulous expression on your face. Really? Really?

“Mando-”

He held up his hand to stop you. Such a simple motion shocked you enough to derail your thoughts. He really wasn’t changing his mind, was he…? Was he that ready to leave the kid behind?

Was he that ready to be rid of you …?

Leaving the child here meant your current “job” would no longer exist. It meant having to figure out where to go next, how to start next.

You weren’t ready for that.

You looked down at the wood flooring of the porch. You couldn’t figure out how to argue back in a way that didn’t sound selfish. Defeated, you turned away from the beskar-clad man and faced away, looking at the children playing again.

Mando truly felt like this was the best option for the child at this point. He wasn’t anywhere near an acceptable parental figure, and per your own admission you didn’t do well with kids, either. The kid needed other kids to be around, adults that were willing and happy to raise him. You needed to be able to actually settle down somewhere you could rebuild. This tiny village, with its lack of technology, wasn’t it, and it wasn’t on his cramped ship with his stubborn self, either. You deserved better. He didn’t want to say goodbye to the kid, or to you, but it wasn’t about what he wanted.

The three of you solemnly watched the child play with the other village children.

“It’s gonna break his little heart.” Cara Dune muttered.

“He’ll get over it. We all do.”

You didn’t want to agree with him, on that last line. But he was right.

Everyone had finished packing, all that was needed was for it to be loaded onto the cargo sled. The air felt weighted, and it wasn’t from the humidity of the surrounding swamp.

For you, the air got even more oppressive when you saw Mando approach Omera and lead her slightly away from the others to speak to her. You knew he was just asking her to watch after the child. But you could see the way she was looking at him. You could see Mando fidgeting, almost shyly. You could feel your face get tingly. Why was this so hard for you? It wasn’t about you.

You couldn’t hear the exchange, but you could tell Omera was saying something back at him, and the way her expression changed, you almost felt like she was asking him to stay, too.

But then, pulling you from your wallowing in self-pity, you felt the same thing you’d felt back at your old home, just before the bounty hunters broke through and your life as you knew it ended. The intense, physical feeling of wrong, of something in your head thrashing about telling you to run. Telling you to grab the kid and run.

They were here.

You sprinted towards where the village kids were, focusing in on the child, drawing your blaster.

"Mando!”

Whatever had been happening between Mando and Omera was forgotten, the widow spinning around to see what the shouting was, and Mando falling into a defensive stance, hand going to his blaster handle.

Your timing couldn't have been better. As you skidded to your knees to grab the frightened child, the village children scattering in confusion and fear, blaster fire rang out and a scorched blast marked the earth right where he had been sitting. You ran in a crouch to hide behind the nearest barrier you could get to, in this case some of the cargo that had yet to be loaded. The child whimpered and clutched at your clothing, and you clutched him closer, blaster raised in your other hand in case you needed to peek around and return fire.

You heard chatter from the other adults, and peering around the corner of the cargo, you see Cara Dune and Mando rush off int the trees. Omera is quickly herding the children to safety. You stay where you are, slumping against the back of the cargo, knowing Mando won't let whoever's out there get away. You look down at the kid in your grasp, who is looking back up at you with those dark eyes you'd gotten used to.

"I told him it wasn't safe here."

Just as you had warned him, the shots had come from someone carrying a tracking fob for the child. Cara Dune had seen to the demise of the hunter, and the tracking fob was destroyed. If it had been a different situation, you would have been more smug about being right.

But as it currently stood, you needed to get out of there as soon as you could.

The cargo sled was fully loaded, with additional supplies beyond what you’d brought with you, and the child was seated up where he could see out. You sat close by, not wanting to chance having to make a dive for him again. You hadn’t anticipated being so protective, but here you were. The village gathered around to see you off. Cara Dune offered to escort you back, but the decision was made to completely bypass going through town and just go straight to the Razor Crest. For once, you agreed with this decision.

“Well then, until our paths cross.” the two exchanged a firm handshake. She looked back and nodded at you, and you returned it with a raised hand. It was good to know you had an ally out there now.

You’d anticipated leaving by then, but when Winta rushed forward you had to suppress a groan. You were so ready to leave behind the other kids and yet here they were again, prolonging the goodbye process. With little regard for any sense of personal space, she wrapped her arms around the child in a hug. You leaned away a little to give them room. You didn’t expect her to release the child and give you a hug, too.

“I’ll miss you so much.”

You were frozen, your mind having drawn a blank and your body unsure of what to do. It took you a few moments to regain your senses, and you awkwardly put your hands on her shoulders.

“Uh… us too.” She pulled back and gave you both a shy smile, and scampered away back to stand by her mother.

Omera smiled and nodded at you in farewell. You tried to do the same, but you couldn’t guarantee your smile looked anything other than awkward and forced. You were terrible at this.

“Thank you.”

Mando nodded at her as well, and finally, he boarded the sled, and you left the small village.

It was strange, you’d only been on the Razor Crest for a few days before the stay on Sorgan happened and took up the following few weeks of your life, but somehow the ship felt more like home than the village had.

The three of you all sat in the cockpit area of the ship, Mando at the controls, you sitting in one of the chairs with the child in your lap, you idly letting him mess with your hands.

Now that it was just you three, your curiosity was getting the better of you.

“So, Mando… what was Omera saying to you before the bounty hunter attacked?”

Mando flipped a few more switches and dials on the controls and sat back in his chair. “She was suggesting we stay, too.” You mean she was suggesting you stay, you thought to yourself.

“...if the hunter didn’t show, would you have?”

He turned to look at you. “Would you?”

You huffed. “I liked being in the trees, but… too remote for my taste. Too closely packed. Too many kids trying to see what I was doing.” Too much of Omera trying to be friendly with the Mandalorian. You didn’t say that part, though.

He turned back to face the windscreen. “If I had wanted to settle down somewhere, I would have done it years ago.” He folded his hands over his stomach. “I’m not interested in living the sedentary family life.”

Somehow hearing him say that took a huge weight off your mind. But that still didn’t answer the selfish, nagging question you still had.

“Did you like her?” You still didn’t know why you cared so much. But while your courage was up and you were on this train, you had to get it out. Mando’s head tilted in your direction slightly.

“She was… nice. But I don’t think I liked her at all the way she liked me.” He turned back to look at the expanse of space before the ship. He didn’t want to say it out loud, but he was glad that you all got out of there before he had to tell her that. He wasn’t as oblivious as some thought, he could definitely tell that the widow was harboring some kind of affection towards him. He just didn’t feel the same way back, though. He never did. Besides, even if he did, his idea of how to live was so different from hers that it just wouldn’t work. Living on a farm, having and raising kids, staying in one place? Absolutely not.

You looked down at the child in your lap, tugging on his claws that clutched your fingers, trying to hide the little smile of relief on your face. He perked his ears at you and babbled, seeming to sense you weren’t as weighed down as before.

“You could’ve been free to go start your infochanting back up somewhere, though.” You looked up, a little surprised at the slightly quieter tone to Mando’s voice.

He had come to appreciate your company, but he wasn’t about to directly admit it.

You shook your head and huffed. “Honestly? I don’t mind.”

You looked back down at the kid, gently grabbing the ends of his long ears and fussing with them, making him squeal.

“I’m kind of glad to be back on this bucket of bolts with you.”

You hadn’t made any indication of it, but Mando liked to think you were talking to him just then, and not just the child. Hearing those words stirred something in his chest, and though he couldn’t pin down what it was, he wouldn’t mind feeling it again.

#the mandalorian #din djarin x reader #mando x reader #gender neutral reader #din djarin #mando #reader insert

23 notes · View notes

angelic-blxssom · 4 years

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———— ꧁꧂ ☘︎︎ bnha boys as babies/children with a babysitter!reader

characters ➪ midoryia, todoroki, bakugou, kaminari, kirishima, amajiki, chisaki, and shigaraki

genre ➪ platonic!relationships, fluff

authors note ♡︎ i got this idea from @domhoni on a groupchat so thank u !!

It’s also long but I got too lazy to put the continue reading :(

.☯︎︎.

Izuku Midoryia ☞︎☜︎

- we already kind of know what he was like as a child from the show

- as a child, Izuku was obsessed with all might so expect the boy to go on and on about the hero when you babysit him

- a lot of times you have to comfort the boy as he gets upset about not having a quirk

- if you have a quirk; you like, not show off, but show and explain your quirk in front of him, Izuku is probably amazed and wants to see it more often because if he can’t have a quirk then might as well watch yours

- if you don’t have a quirk; you can relate with the broccoli child. the two of you will talk about how being quirkless and you’ll probably say it’s okay to not have a quirk because you’re still here and happy :)

- he’s a thankful child so bring him gifts, cook him food, or play action figures with him and he’ll be thanking you for the rest of the day

- altogether, 8/10, would babysit

Shouto Todoroki ☀︎︎

- a silent child and most likely very distant

- it’s rare that you actually babysit him cause he’s got a father and siblings and all that Jazz

- he won’t tell you about his eye scar unless he really knows you and trusts you

- speaking of trusting you; once he does, he will y’all about how he hates his father and the grudges he holds against his family

- May mention Dabi, once or twice but that’s it because he prefers not to mention the brother that betrayed the family (in a way)

- like Izuku, he’s thankful. growing up in a richer family than normal, he gets designer shit and stuff but any gift from his babysitter, you, and guess what

- he’s actually quite thankful. Because you’re the only one who understands him. Of course, he’ll accept your gifts, no matter what they are :)

- 6/10, babysit only if you can stand daddy issues

Katsuki Bakugo ♕

- angry bakugo baby; angry bakugo baby 🥺

- a demon inside of a child is what you’re babysitting right here. he communicates with yelling so prepare your ears for his voice

- honestly, this boy would try to use his quirk to start a fire somewhere

- scoldings happen very often when you’re babysitting him, bc angry bakugo baby is a whole package to deal with

- once he warms up, he still yells 24/7 so I guess you really can’t escape

- though, he may cling to you before you leave and he’ll at you for trying to leave him alone with his mother

- 3/10 problematic child but kinda cute 👁

Denki Kaminari ♫

- ecstatic to see you as his babysitter

- he’s a cute child, very happy all the time and very outgoing

- you’ll never get bored with this baby; literally can see sparks fly (platonically) and it’s very cute

- vv touchy, like hugs you and clings to you almost all the time. you’ll be hanging out in his room watching his quirk and all of a sudden his small body will be hugging you

- make him food and he’ll help the best he can, likes to help you with chores and household duties while you babysit

- the two of you become friends, give him platonic love pls

- 9/10, would babysit again

Eijiro Kirishima 𖨆

- he’s nice to you because you’re taking the time out of your day to take care of him

- he would 100% protect you, even as a child he’s a smart boy and would not hesitate with protecting you

- kirishima is also very strong (comes with his quirk) so if you need help lifting something, just ask this little babie

- May grow a liTtLe crush on you if you babysit him often because you’re so gorgeous to the small bean

- would make you food instead of the other way around because he wants to impress you

- 8/10, self explanatory

Tamaki Amajiki ᴥ︎

- very blushie baby

- please give him lots of love because he cannot interact in anyway shape or form

- he most likely is very anti-social and distant for the first few weeks of knowing you but once he sort of warms up then he’ll be less distant

- like he still doesn’t like being touched or interacting too often but atleast you can actually talk to him

- very soft and will love you for eternity (secretly) if you make him tokoyaki

- wants to pursue being a hero just because of you and your praises that you give to him 24/7

- 10/10 please babysit him again

Kai Chisaki ✌︎︎

- like todoroki, he is very distant and quiet at first

- growing up in the yakuza made him very untrustworthy of new people, especially a babysitter

- definitely thinks he doesn’t need one because he can take care of himself but on the inside he’s probably somewhat glad

- if you’ve seen those flashbacks with him getting into a fight because they insulted the Shie Hassaikai, then you can bet that you’re taking care of his ouchies when he gets into fights

- day one bad thing about the Yakuza and he’ll most likely fight you, maybe even take a limb off 😳

- just respect him and take care of this child and you’ll be okay

- 5/10 a respectable yet somewhat problematic one

Tomura Shigaraki ☦︎︎

- plays video games 24/7 and you have to deal with it

- you’ll often hear yelling as he plays games and if you’re lucky enough, you may get to join in; yay?

- besides that, he’s confused on why he needs a babysitter but still won’t try anything bad unless you trigger him to

- he’s kinda nice?? like will threaten you with death threats but also is like “you’re cool,” so not so sure about him

- hates any sort of physical interaction with you but I mean; atleast he still talks to you

- 5/10 only babysit when you’re low on money

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meetmeatthecoda · 3 years

Note

I absolutely ♥️ADORE♥️ Scripted and would love to read your director’s commentary for it!

Oh, anon!! 😍 I'm SO THRILLED that you loved Scripted so much, that makes me so happy!! 🥰 Especially that you loved it enough to want to read my "director's commentary" (that phrase makes me laugh, you'd think I created a feature length film all by myself 🤣), so I think I'll skim through the fic - it's been a while since I re-read it - & make a bullet-point list of any special BTS info I can think of 😊 Anddd I'll also put it under a read more cause you know me, I never use one word when one hundred will do 😂

So, the fic itself was inspired by the ending of 5.08 where Liz wakes from her coma to Red reading to her in an armchair as he had been for the past 10 months, it's fine, I'm fine but she still has a ventilator in so she can't talk & instead has to write "how long?" on a piece of paper & her handwriting is super shake-y bc her muscles are so weak (I think Red even helps her hold the pen? It's clearly been a while since I re-watched the ep whoops but ugh, be still my heart.) For some reason, I just latched onto the idea of a mute Liz, really suffering with the implications of everything she went through (since her recovery was so glossed over in the show boo) & Red 1000% being there for her. Mostly, I just wanted to dive into the dynamic of Liz letting Red care for her the way he's always wanted to (without Tom & Agnes btw) to the point where their relationship is unhealthy in its reliance, but neither can see it bc Liz is blocking things out (& unknowingly falling in love with him) & Red is just so thrilled to be able to love & care for her (while already deeply in love with her obvi). So yeah, that was the kind of dynamic & closeness I wanted to explore between them & it was... really fun 😊

The idea of the coma providing the perspective Liz needed to see that Red has always had her best interests at heart & clearly loves her (in addition to the fact that he never left her side or gave up during those 10 months lol peak romance tbh) seemed very organic & logical to me.

I liked the idea of Red & Liz playing board games as a way to pass the time & get to know each other better. It's the kind of casual interaction we were never gifted with in the show & I think they're both competitive in the right circumstances, even if its playfully so.

I liked the idea of Liz being urged to learn ASL, as I'm deaf in one ear & would dearly love to learn it at some point.

The detail of Red sleeping on a cot close enough to Liz's hospital bed that they can hold hands in their sleep was a total guilty pleasure addition & I'm not sorry.

I loved the scene in the beginning where Red is talking to Dembe on the phone in the hallway & Liz is practicing her letters. She's purely doing it so Red doesn't worry & I loved the idea of her being apathetic to everything except Red's concerns, plus I added in the parenthetical of (Red sometimes squints at her k's.) bc I thought it represented that well, but also bc it was just cute af. I also added the little detail of him waving at her through the window at the last minute bc I thought the scene needed something else & once I pictured that, it was too adorable to leave out.

Red handling all the details of Liz's care & transportation without asking (bc he instinctively knew that's what Liz wanted) only to turn around & panic about excluding her seemed like a very RED thing to do & I like how it emphasizes his well-meaning intentions, respect for her preferences, & desire to see her happy, even if she did actually want to leave him lol as if.

I liked the visual of Liz stumbling into Red's arms as she stands from her hospital bed to leave with him (sets a precedent for later) & I also loved the visual of a pen in her ponytail & of course Red using it to flirt a little bc come on.

I remember struggling to write the car ride transition to the lake house. I usually get ideas & visions for specific scenes, moments, or bits of dialogue, so those kind of transition moments are hard for me sometimes. But I liked that I settled on Red helping to ground Liz through touch (again, sets a precedent for later).

Red & Liz playing hangman in the car with Red using the word "fedora" & drawing a suited hangman made me giggle.

I can see the lake house very clearly in my mind, complete with the willow tree, bench, & tiny house (included bc I desperately want a tiny house in real life) & I really enjoyed describing the interior & imagining the joy Red would get out of decorating it with Liz in mind.

Their first night in the house where Liz has her nightmare & Red comforts her - that was a scene I had in mind very early on & I love how it turned out, especially with Liz mouthing "stay with me" into Red's neck, that part gave me All The Feels™.

The "morning after" scene where Liz realizes on some level that she's too dependent on Red is an important moment in the fic & the off-hand detail that at least "she's not going around murdering people & calling it therapy" was a bit of shade to Ruin (which I don't think I ever saw bc I was kind of appalled with the idea lol) I think I posted Scripted after Ruin aired... if not, I guess I'm psychic?? LOL

The breakfast scene - & the fact that Red is preparing every breakfast food known to man bc he's nervous too - is near & dear to my heart. I think that's a pretty pivotal scene since they kind of reach an unspoken agreement & peace &... "things settle after that first breakfast."

I liked the teeny little parenthetical section that comes next as well, which acts as a sort of middle point for the fic.

The next large chunk of the fic was pure indulgence for me. I LOVED writing about all the different things they would do together when it was just the two of them, it was basically a collection of Lizzington headcanons & that's how I sketched them out LOL Here's some notes on them:

I came up with the jigsaw puzzle headcanon (that Liz is bored by them bc they're easy for her bc she's a trained psychologist & easily sees patterns in things) late in the editing process but loved it so much that I included it.

Liz's sandwich preference is actually mine LOL

The Monopoly banter was fun af to write bc I love that game.

The love notes Liz leaves around the house for Red is still an all-time favorite headcanon of mine.

I loved the idea of Red reading to Liz in a foreign language, holding the book only for looks, but not actually reading from it at all & instead professing his love for her. I think I've even used that headcanon in another fic LOL

Their movie nights were also something I was dying to include, especially since they include snacks & cuddles.

Their co-sleeping habits were also something I wanted to include & Liz's newly tactile nature is both a symptom of her dependence on Red & also a guilty pleasure thing for me bc we all wanted more of Red & Liz touching on screen, plus I felt obligated to explain through Red that it wasn't sexual in nature (though if I ever get around to writing part 2, that will change 😉)

Dembe being the one to observe & interfere in their situation was an early scene I imagined as well, that was always going to be the climax of the fic (or at least part 1). I so enjoyed writing about Red & Liz's relationship through his eyes bc he just loves them both & only wants to help them.

Another pivotal scene I imagined early on was Liz having a panic attack with Dembe when she discovers Red has left & that was super engaging to write, as well as the reunion between them which... I pretty much wrote the whole fic with the goal of getting to that lovely angst LOL

Red's resolve to finally urge Liz to speak was heart-breaking to write (so naturally I loved it lol what's wrong with me) & in particular the detail of them eating fruit for lunch before he broaches the topic with her & the parenthetical about it being "a sign from the cosmos that they are meant to be together just because they don't eat each other's favorite fruit" made my heart happy even tho it's stupid LOL & when Red asks her if she would ever try to speak again & she responds with a simple written "Why?" that was a huge moment that I loved the angst of, of course. As well as the absolutely gutting: "Lizzie, I miss your voice."

I liked that Liz needs some time to think & accept everything Red forces her to realize at the end, that was super important to me in the resolution of the fic/part 1 & I tried really hard to include both their mentalities there at the end.

The fact that Red hasn't had a drink since he started caring for Liz also made my shipping heart happy.

And - lastly - the fact that the only thing Liz actually says in the whole fic is Red's name? Yeah 🥲🥲🥲

Welp, there you go, anon, I'm not sure if that was interesting to you at all, but I certainly hope so!! I know that was a lot but... it's a long fic, my longest ever, so I figure it's warranted, right?? 😂 Anyway, thank you so much, both for the compliment of loving Scripted AND for wanting to read more about it, anon, you are so sweet!! 🥰 I hope you enjoyed this & much, much love to you, my friend!! ❤️

Fanfic Writers: Director's Cut

#The Blacklist #Lizzington #fanfic #Scripted #ask game #fanfic writers: director's cut #mine #ask #anon #thank you so much for this my friend!!#:D #i hope you enjoyed this #:)#much much love to you!!#<3

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random-mha-thoughts · 4 years

Text

Bully Part 2 (Bakugou x Reader)

Pairing: Bakugou x Reader

Genre: Crack, fluff, slight angst, Baku-having-feelings-and-being-soft (bc that's totally a genre)

Sequel to Bully (part 1)

Word count: 2,319

Tags: @yuki-osaki @liviitehe @iamsoftsodonttoucheume-blog

a/n: This ended up being longer and slightly more emotional than I expected. Seems like I’m following the trend of getting the BNHA boys to say what’s really on their minds (I’ve already done this for Todoroki in case you were wondering), so Baku will be ooc and soft here.

This came out later than I intended because...let’s just say I was having a mental breakdown over a really long and really naughty Todo fic here and I ended up calling my little cousin and crying and laugh-crying and shaking and losing my collective mind because none of my friends would know what I was going through. And I was in no headspace to write fluff afterwards, she had to force fluff headcanons into me to go back to normal. Yall should thank her. Enjoy~

None of us had any idea how or why Bakugou suddenly started acting this way. Apparently, he was completely normal until I walked in. All I did was open the door to the classroom, my gaze just so happened to land on Bakugou, and suddenly I heard loud stomps towards me.

I held out a defensive hand, ready to shoot out branches at him if he got too close. "Bakugou-" I threatened. And he did the unthinkable. He gripped me in a choke hold around my shoulders and neck.

Actually, no. He...hugged me?

My clenched fists and the hush that fell over the rest of the students told me this is the first time all day he's done something out of character, something I definitely wasn't expecting. We hadn't talked since I almost jumped out of a window last week. This entire week, he was ignoring me. I was preparing for the day he would finally confront me, and I pictured it would be an aggressive encounter.

This is far from anything I'd imagined.

I never ever thought this porcupine-head could even show affection, that he even has a single gene of softness in him. Yet he was embracing me tightly, nuzzling his face in my neck. The shock of it all made me freeze up and cast a sideways glance at Midoriya, who was just as freaked and confused.

"Get off, Bakugou, what are you-"

The boy lifted his head up, his scarlet eyes softened into fondness and a gentle smile on his lips made the rest of my words catch in my throat. This entire expression was foreign to all of us. His face can look like that?

"I missed you over the weekend."

My jaw dropped. HIS VOICE CAN SOUND LIKE THAT?? The smooth and sweet honey tone was way out of character for him.

But like hell I trusted any of this.

I wiggled my arms up to push his weight off me. "I don't know how you managed to become such a great actor," I succeeded in separating from his vice grip, "But if you think disorienting me like this can be some sort of revenge, you're sorely mistaken."

Bakugou tilted his head, resembling a sad puppy. "What do you mean?"

I straightened my uniform. "Nice try, I know you're just acting so you can, like, throw me off the building or something."

That seemed to hurt him, his jaw gaping open before holding my face in his calloused hands. "I'd never do that to you."

I quickly swatted his hands away, wary that he was about to blow my face off. "Don't. Touch. Me."

The boy froze in place, then rubbed the back of his neck. Regret seeped through his eyes as he stared at the ground. "I'm sorry, about everything."

A strange warmth rushed through me. Something about how genuinely vulnerable he looked shook my entire being.

"I just...really wanted you to give me a chance all this time, but I went about it the wrong way." He encased me into another bone-crushing hug. "But I want to make up for it."

I felt a thud in my chest, probably from fear that he might hurt me.

At that moment, the teacher walked in. "Alright everyone, take your seats." He noticed Bakugou's position, gawked for a second, and cleared his throat. "Uh, Bakugou, let go of (L/n) and take your seat."

"I dare any of you extras to yank me off, I'll blast you into next week!"

He's back, kind of?

Nobody made a move to do anything, they were all frozen by the sight of Bakugou clamped onto me like a koala.

"I'll survive...somehow," I assured them, unsure myself how exactly I would do that.

For the entire rest of class, the boy clung onto me. He had taken over the seat of the person who normally sat on my left and scooted the chair over so he can stay attached to me. Though I reasoned for him to hold onto just my arm (since he wouldn't let go no matter how many times I asked), he hugged my waist with both of his arms, face buried in my neck. I was just glad he left one arm for me to write notes with.

If this was just an act, he did a splendid job of keeping it up. I thought he would've given up after an hour or two, but he stayed like that even after lunch until the end of the day. Anytime anyone would even walk past us, he would glare at them until they scurried off.

It was super weird at first, but I got used to the arrangement somehow. I hate to admit it, but I even felt comfort by his warmth. His breath tickled my neck as his solid arms held me in a vice grip. I found myself hoping this wasn't acting, and thanking whatever miracle made this happen. This was never going to happen again, I might as well enjoy it for now.

"Back off, you damn Deku!" He bares his teeth at the cowering Midoriya, still attached to me at the hip.

I sigh, finally fed up with this whole ordeal. "Midoriya, I'll handle this, I'll call later."

The poor broccoli boy nods and scampers away from us. Bakugou insists on not letting go until I'm home safe, even when I repeated that I live in the opposite direction as him. He won't even let Midoriya near me.

I lead us both over to a bench outside of school. I'm still not convinced that this isn't an act, but I might as well try to talk to him after the incident last week. "Get off," I order, scooting over to one side of the bench. When he doesn't obey, I add, "I wanna talk, so I need to see your face."

After a brief moment of hesitation, he eases off my body, rolling up to sit facing me with a leg propped up on the seat. A dumb smile is on his face.

God, that still freaks me out. I stare at him calculatingly. He hasn't said a word to me the whole day, only barking at other students as he holds onto me. I want answers. "You're sure this isn't some stupid revenge plot to get back at me?"

He shakes his head, propping his arm up on the seat and resting his head there. His wordless, lovestruck stare probing me.

I sputter, "Why are you acting this way then?"

"I like you."

I almost choke at his quick response, my chest throbbing again. "S-Stop looking at me that way, I can't take you seriously! I admit, it's freaking me out!"

"My feelings freak you out?" he says sweetly, brushing the side of my face softly.

I slap his hand away, "You don't have feelings for me, just drop the act already!"

His smile disappears. "It's not an act, I'm being serious." Hurt laces his voice.

I cross my arms over my chest. "Yeah, well, it's very hard to take you seriously when you've been a heartless, pompous, mean jerk for all of middle school."

Bakugou's eyes downcast and his arm falls into his lap. "I...I don't know how else to show how I feel." Raw emotion drips from his eyes as he bites his lip, almost like he's gathering his thoughts. "I act like a jerk because... I just feel so pressured. Everyone expects so much of me just because my quirk is so strong." A dark chuckle emits from him, "Even my mom has ingrained it in me that I need to be strong so I don't burden anyone with being weak. So I've been projecting my frustrations onto everyone else. Deku is just the easiest person to pick on because he's the weakest person, he has no quirk! And I'm just self-centered because I have to tell myself that I'm strong or else...I might slip. Call it an inferiority complex, I guess."

I won't lie, I didn't go into this expecting a therapy session. Part of me does sympathize with him, but the rational side of me is still skeptical of this entire monologue being an act. I wouldn't put it past him for thinking up such an elaborate plan in a week. And none of it excuses him for telling Midoriya to kill himself. "Not that I don't believe you, but so what?" I blurt out.

He grabs my hand in both of his, eyes fully emotional and staring into mine. "I like you, (Y/n). I see how kind you are to everyone else, how you've stayed by Deku and supported him this entire time. I admire you. You're the kind of person who I know would become a great hero because you always know just what to say to people to make them feel better, not to mention you're so badass too. And...in a way, there's something in me that wants you to care about an idiot like me, too."

Tightness tugs in my chest. Damn it, he needs to stop being so emotional, I can't handle it. "I want to help you, Katsuki, but what you said to Midoriya crossed a line. I can't overlook that."

His head drops onto our joined hands and his body starts shaking. "Damnit!" he grits out, "I can't believe I've done so much wrong that the person I like can't even forgive me."

I shut my eyes, not wanting to see him cry. "Katsuki-"

Bakugou's head snaps up and takes my head between his hands. "Do you even have the smallest feeling for me?" His red orbs swim in tears.

A soft spot in my heart persuades me to gently rub the wet trails off his cheeks. "I'm...not sure." I won't lead him on, I really don't know how I feel anymore. It's that I hate him, I don't like the things he says or does.

"Help me, (Y/n)," he practically begs, "I'll become a better person, I promise, but I need you to guide me, please."

This sudden magnitude of emotion other than anger disorients me. Is this something he's kept locked away somewhere in the recesses of his mind? I absently nod in agreement against some of my better judgement.

His shaking form steadies as he stares me down quietly. "Can I...kiss you?" he whispers out of the blue.

My lips slightly part and my eyes widen as he leans into me, softly pressing his mouth against mine. Our kiss is innocent, as if time just stood still and washed a warm glow on us. My stomach flips weightlessly, and I gently grip one of his wrists to ground me. He pulls away just for a moment, letting us linger in the moment and sensation of one another.

His eyes flutter open, facing me with the same loveliness he's showed me all day, before confusion suddenly dawns on him, and then his cheeks color red and he pulls away, almost retreating to the other edge of the bench.

I blink, not sure what just happened, but the tumbling in my abdomen still present. "Uh...Bakugou...?"

The boy doesn't even want to face me. "Did I really just do that?" he mutters to himself, the raspy growl that's more characteristic of him returning.

My heart sinks. "Do you-?"

"Hey, don't look so upset," he glares at me before flushing again. "I...somehow...know everything I did... It was me...but it wasn't...really me."

"But everything you said-"

He growls and crosses his arms over his chest, looking away from me. "Everything I said was true! I just... I'm surprised I did it, and I was such a pansy about it."

I roll my eyes. He's back, for real this time. "Well, if that's the case, I won't hold you accountable-"

"Wait," Bakugou sighs, running a hand through his hair. "I stand by everything I said, even the whole...thing...about you helping me." It almost hurts him to say it.

I fold my arms over my chest and stand up. "You don't have to force yourself to be good if you don't want to. Things can go back to the way they were."

"I don't want it to!" he yells. "I'll work at being less of an idiot if it means...that you'll...go out with me."

I examine him, all red-faced and uncomfortable, unable to look me in the eyes. "I'm not gonna go easy on you."

He stands up and finally garners the courage to look at me again. "I'm willing. I'll try hard, I promise."

After thinking it over a moment, I relax my figure and place a kiss on his cheek. "That's your reward for consciously admitting that you have a problem."

Bakugou's eyes bulge out of his head and I have to suppress my chuckles. "Will there be more rewards?" he mumbles.

"Only if you really try." I lean forward, catching him off guard and finally letting out a small fit of laughter. "You know for most of the day, you were hanging onto me like I was you handbag, now you're shying away from me."

He scratches his burning neck. "Hey, that wasn't me."

"It was a you that probably showed your deepest darkest wants," I tease, a smirk playing on my lips.

"Sh-Shut up, don't be so smug about it!" He lightly shoves me away, digging his hands into his uniform pants pocket. "You're the one asking for it because you liked it, stupid."

"Ah-ah," I hold up a finger like a teacher reprimanding a kindergardener. "First thing is for you to stop calling people names."

He groans. "Fine. (Y-Y/n)." His cheeks color all over again.

I slip my hand in his and his blush intensifies. "Was that so hard to do?"

"Shut up," he mumbles softer this time.

He's a fixer-upper, he's still got a lot to learn, but hopefully, he'll get there eventually.

#Bakugou x reader #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #bakugou fluff #bakugou katsuki #angst #crack #bakugou imagine #bakugou scenario #gender neutral reader #mha x reader #bnha x reader #mha fanfiction #bnha fanfiction

1K notes · View notes

angeltrapz · 3 years

Note

oosdkk dude im sorry ur mood dropped too.. i hope u feel better soon <3 but like i wld love 2 hear more abt ur thoughts on Art in general bc Boy Is He Interesting, and also a lil more abt Daniel coming out as nonbinary to his dad (whether he knows Eric is trans or not at that moment skjdfhdskf)! + if ur feelin it just more abt Mallick in general ESP cuz we agree that Brit doesn't make it thru V

djhfjdks thank u sm <3

okay Art first. I genuinely wonder abt him so much, something in specific I think abt is that aside frm Amanda (+ Eric, obviously, but talkin abt disciples) Art is one of the only trap victims EVER 2 be tested twice and it’s like... what’s that abt? Why? as u’ve said b4 it rly depends on how you personally view his character: whether he’s a disciple or not. fr me, both options are equally plausible, n honestly I don’t rly confine myself to either; it sorta depends on what I’m feeling/writing. if we’re talking abt art being a disciple, then the Spinecutter not going off (one of my BIGGEST questions) makes total sense, as Hoffman’s side of the trap was never set up to work either, + Jigsaw disciples have a history (aside from Lawrence) of appearing as victims in other tests/traps. if he were not just another pawn and was in fact a disciple himself, then the Spinecutter was never meant to go off - it was there just to make Eric think it COULD go off/make it look convincing to outsiders. which brings me to ANOTHER question: what does Art know abt Eric? does he know anything? what does he think of Eric?

(lil side note: if Art is a disciple, then I kinda wonder if it’s a lil bit of a Hoffman + Lawrence situation where Hoffman didn’t know abt Art either? just bc he looks so shocked when he sees Art’s face fully fr the first time... that could’ve just been acting on Hoffman’s part but IDK. food fr thought)

personally, I feel like Art probably does know a lil bit abt Eric - at the very least, he’d know tht Eric had been previously tested + failed by John’s rules, but then I feel that he wld also know Eric didn’t rly have a chance in his second test. that is why Art trying so fucking hard to keep Eric alive is interesting 2 me: what is his motivation 2 do that? like he’s been told Eric’s basically just there to get Rigg to participate, he doesn’t have any personal obligation or anything like that. sure, the aim is to keep Eric alive + see if Rigg can pass his “test,” but nobody said anything about grabbing a man you barely know around his ankles to keep him frm hanging himself w a noose made of chains. nobody said anything abt speaking to him so softly, not even raising your voice beyond saying “hey,” and asking him do you understand? when you tell him to keep still and prevent him frm killing his counterpart (which, if Art is a disciple, he knows it won’t, but he still speaks to Eric so softly, so compassionately, doesn’t he?)

nobody said anything abt grabbing him around the waist and steadying him again after being punched by said man. but Art does that. he stabilizes Eric’s feet on the ice as best he can and he keeps his hips straight and he basically says “look, we’re all stuck here, you need to keep it together ‘til that clock counts down if you want us to live, but I’m giving you a choice,” and he presses the gun w the single bullet into Eric’s hands and tells him it’s up to him. nobody said Art had to care but he does, I think, and it’s just like. he really didn’t have to keep Eric alive over the course of Rigg’s test. he didn’t. but he did and I just,, where does it come from? why does he care? this is even going beyond the fact that we’ve talked abt them being together after their test in a scenario where they both survive - I just think that Art at his core is a very stubborn but very compassionate person, whether he wants 2 be or not. like he HAS to know that kind of involvement cld prove to be extremely detrimental but he cares. I feel like that says a lot abt him (even if he does call Eric an asshole a couple times while doing it,,).

plus I also just. I think his reason for being tested (as it seems to be in most cases) is extremely flimsy. he was doing his job. he’s a LAWYER. often times it has nothing 2 do w personal feelings; they’re there to do their job and sometimes, unfortunately, that is defending possibly reprehensible people (in cases like Rex’s & Ivan’s). + John was already upset w him regarding their argument abt the urban renewal group so like it just feels So Very Petty, y’know?? even in the scenario where he IS a disciple, testing him twice seems entirely like John having a personal vendetta against him. Amanda is the only other person to be tested twice aside from Eric, so like. what. is that abt Mr. Kramer.

like I’ve said b4 in dms one could argue that Art is grey morally, bc we never rly see anything of him outside of flashbacks + acting as a test controller in IV, esp given that he... rly doesn’t seem too bothered abt it all? which is fair. but I also feel like the concern he shows towards Eric is smth to be considered as well.

+ YESS NONBINARY DANIEL I know I’ve mentioned it b4 but for reference, I read Daniel as masc nonbinary (he/they)! so I feel like Daniel wld b pretty comfortable w his identity, he’s never rly had a reason not to be (it’s rly anyone’s guess here tho bc we never see Eric + Daniel + Kate... as a family unit, for obvious reasons), so I feel like he’s vry chill abt it? and in the scenario where Eric survives n is dating Adam, I feel like Daniel wld talk 2 him abt it first (Adam is an adult they quickly come to trust + he’s vocal abt being trans himself so there’s that added layer of understanding - other than his mom maybe Adam might b the first person they come out 2). they’re just kinda like “so I wanna tell my dad I’m nonbinary but like I’ve literally never thought abt coming out what do I do” and Adam’s just like. Aha. bc he knows Eric is Also Trans so like, he doesn’t tell Daniel that bc it’s not his info to share, but he’s definitely like “oh it’ll totally be fine. trust me you have no reason to worry” so Daniel’s just like Okay. I Got This

+ I know I mentioned this in dms but Daniel wld absolutely wear those floral ripped hem skirts over jeans, so I feel like on one of his visits to his dad’s, he just. wears that combined w a completely random niche graphic tee he bought when shopping w Adam (I adore this hc n I am Holding Onto It) n is just like. not super open abt it bc he doesn’t know what to expect? he just kinda waits fr Eric to comment on it but when he doesn’t, Daniel gets nervous n is like “do I look okay?” and Eric’s rly chill abt it, like “yeah! it looks vry cool, vry alternative.” n like Daniel is relieved, of course, but also he’s just like God Pls Say Something so he just comes out w it like “okay this is not working. I’m nonbinary.”

and he’s COMPLETELY SHOCKED when Eric is just like “oh why didn’t u say so? do u have a different name u wanna go by? is Daniel still okay?” bc he wasn’t sure how much Eric knew, so he’s just like “uh no Daniel is still good, he/they pronouns though” and Eric’s just like alright cool but internally Daniel’s just like ??????

n THAT is when Eric asks him 2 come sit out on th front steps w him n is just like. “I don’t think I ever told u this but I’m trans. I transitioned during training in my early 20s” n Daniel is nodding while internally he’s like Adam I’m gonna throttle u. he worked himself up fr NOTHING. he just kinda laughs abt it and Eric is like “are u good?” ‘cause he’s a lil worried but then Daniel just smiles and is like “yeah I’m fine! just realizing I had nothing 2 be worried abt” and it’s a rly good moment fr them. they sit out there together talking abt their experiences for quite a while n at some point Adam steps outside 2 find them deep in conversation + he just smiles n goes back inside bc he cares abt them both so much and seeing them talk like that makes him so 💞💞 (Eric is SO PROUD u can see it on his face)

ohhh gosh Mallick,,, I spend a lot of time thinking abt him actually. he’s just one of those characters I feel vry connected to (me 🤝 Mallick: Ambiguous Disorder 💕) n one I got surprisingly attached to? hello (he IS one of my f/os)

I feel like Mallick is a very lonely person at his core. the way he sort of clings to Brit (w out the whole like. adrenaline of being in very very real danger w ppl trying to kill u SEVERAL TIMES) somewhat confirms this fr me. this is someone who has no reason to look out fr him, no reason to keep protecting him when their fellow captives hit him over th head w a club or attempt to push him into a bathtub to ELECTROCUTE him, but she keeps doing it and he’s just. in awe of it a little bit? ‘cause she could just let Charles knock him tf out or let Luba push him in but she fights for him, some1 she has no obligation to n met fr the first time literally when they woke up.

the moment they share b4 they stick their arms into the saws to activate the 10 Pints of Sacrifice is so very vulnerable and maybe even a little tender. yes he calls her a monster, yes she calls him one back, neither of them deny it. it’s an admission and an acceptance. they’re monsters, sure, fine, okay. but they are monsters and they are in this together. Brit tells Mallick it’s okay when he says he can’t do this alone. she says okay, okay, it’s okay, we’ll go together. and they help each other secure their tourniquets and they stick their hands in together bc it’s the two of them, literally hand in hand, fighting for their lives n for each other n they’re in so so much pain but they are doing it TOGETHER. I lose it thinking abt it!!! they even have a head bonk moment!!! I very much feel like it has some cinematic parallels to Adam & Lawrence’s moment in SAW 2004!!!!

+ as u mentioned, we both share the thought that Brit likely died since she wasn’t present at Bobby’s meetings, and. I want to touch on how fucking despondent and lost Mallick looks when we see him again in 3D. lights on but no one’s home. I feel like for Mallick, losing Brit was losing the first chance at a real connection he’s had in god knows how long - and for him, that’s just very shattering. he’s been thru hell, he’s watched three people die right in front of him, he sawed his ARM IN HALF, n the person he went through all of that with didn’t make it. but he did. and I feel like for Mallick that’s just like... he doesn’t understand it. but he feels even lonelier than he ever has b4 because the One Person who was there w him thru it all, the one person who could ever possibly understand what happened that night, is gone.

the Mallick we see in V would NEVER sit down n willingly listen to Bobby Dagen’s bullshit abt loving yr scars n taking pride in the fact u survived. he wld hate that man with a passion n I am very much sure of this. the fact that he’s sitting in that chair looking numb and glassy-eyed and silent? Mallick is trying to find some1 to connect to, find a place where maybe he belongs. trying to fill that hole that losing Brit made. why else wld he be sitting there, listening to someone he would ordinarily tell to shove his self-love bullshit up his ass? he’s lost. he’s just trying to keep his head above water and find a way to shore even though everything in him is fighting not to. he’s adrift without her.

+ ALTERNATIVELY, bc the reality of that is just. crushing n maybe not where I needed 2 go, in the scenario where Brit survived + just doesn’t want to put up w Bobby’s bullshit, I imagine them to actually move in together after a lil bit of time getting 2 know each other better w out the pressure of “oh god we’re gonna die.” she kinda helps him build up a sense of self-worth bc GOD it’s practically non-existent n thinking abt possible reasons why makes me sad. she’s definitely just like “no, you do deserve to be cared for and you deserve help when you need it, you deserve good things n to be happy.” she just kinds shuts it down while still making sure to talk 2 him abt WHY he feels that way (she’s not dismissing, but she’s trying to nip it in th bud) n Mallick is just like. huh. bc no one’s really done that fr him before. but it rly does end up helping in the long run, even if it is a very slow pace toward actually getting 2 a place where he recognizes his own worth + realizes he deserves all the things he wants Brit 2 have too. they’re there for each other thru thick n thin and if they made it thru their game, they can make it thru anything.

#saw #art #daniel #eric #adam #mallick #brit #thank u so much I rly appreciated this #n it helped me get my mind off things a little #I'm rly glad my ask helped u too!!! mutual support hours #long post #thoughts separated by dashes bc I had Way More than I thought I did oops #asks

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eyrieofsynapses · 3 years

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so today I just watched the first episode of Almost Paradise! And I’ve gotta say, I am impressed. I already had it on my watchlist but I was planning to wait to watch it for a while until I could let Eliot fade a bit from memory, just so I wouldn’t automatically think of him while watching Kane. But I ran into an article this weekend about how it was filmed in the Philippines and the details of that, and my curiosity was piqued considerably more, so I figured... why not?

(I also started White Collar this weekend and that was very enjoyable, but that’s a post for another day.)

Anyway, my brain’s buzzing now, so have some first impressions and reactions, plus initial meta-analysis because I am intrigued. In hindsight I probably should have recorded first impressions while I was watching, but I’ll do my best to remember the bits that stuck out. Warning for... exceedingly long post.

ooo, okay, so he’s got a medical condition. I faaaaintly remember reading about this in the summary but I didn’t pay much attention to that, oops.

telling a guy played by Chris Kane not to get his heartrate up! that’s definitely gonna happen. definitely. one hundred percent. not like this guy loves fighting or anything

(also tbh the joke about, ah, sexual dysfunction admittedly left a sour taste in my mouth, because I do not go for that kind of thing, but... this is Devlin and Kane, so I’m trusting, based off Leverage experience, that they aren’t gonna be too inappropriate. [In hindsight there are actually interesting meta reasons for this so the sour taste has dissipated somewhat.])

this poor doctor. she’s so done with him.

...he’s definitely not gonna pay attention to the monitor is he

that journal’s gonna get zero use oop

(I was duly impressed when he actually did use it later)

huh, liking how we immediately dive into the effect tourism has had on the Philippines. so we’re getting some commentary here too? I can deal with that

...wow. bad shop. eek

I’m sorry but I am loving the touch with the floorboards and such breaking beneath Alex. the look on his face is just perfect

and the monitor goes off! for tbh the last reason I expected it to first go off for, excellent

MOTORCYLE? did they give him a motorcycle?!

awww no it’s the baddies who have the motorcycle :(

hmm this should be interesting. loving the look of this leader guy tho

--aaaand good asthetic guy is dead! with an ice pick! creepy and creative!

bar. no way this could go wrong

internal battle! understandable that Alex wants out, buuuuuuut if he’s anything like I suspect he is--

--yup, picking a fight, with a damn pool cue--

--not picking a fight?

...picking a fight. by being friendly. *sigh*

yuuuuuuuup. that’s definitely good for your heart

badass fighting scene! with a pool cue, that’s a new one! love seeing Kane take ordinary objects and turn them into fighting tools

(ngl this had Eliot vibes. that said I am thrilled to see how damn good these fight scenes are and this is making me even more excited for Redemption)

aaaaaaaaaand oh fuck this was a police setup. which. I actually did not see coming, huh

ahahah they’re pissed! because he messed up their bust? or because he just saved their asses?

...probably technically the former but I suspect the latter is also true

refusing to get Involved being foreshadowed by his indecision earlier! of course he’s going to get Involved anyway, only question is how

“hitter” I SEE YOU. I SEE YOU AND YOUR REFERENCES. I SEE YOU DEVLIN AND KANE

pfffffffffffFFFFFT the meditation, oh gods

that voice. oh Alex.

I genuinely cannot tell if this is him actually trying or if this is him begrudgingly making an attempt because he has to

lacquering(?) the doors, which, hey, actually look pretty nice--this place is gonna look good when it’s done isn’t iii--

oh fuck Alex is being attacked

(this is definitely something to be concerned about. yes. totally. not like we haven’t already seen him take down a bunch of guys.)

with a garrot! this is definitely totally not how he’s gonna get Involved

oh my gods the detail with the paint. nothing says Competent like getting irritated at how the baddie interrupted your house restoration

hehehehe Involved

oooh, hmm, he thinks they sent the guy after him? what kind of corruption has Alex faced? I mean it’s not an unreasonable fear, but jeez, it sounds like this has happened to him before. doesn’t say much good about the DEA...

huh, this is a level of disturbed I haven’t seen from Kane before. which, granted, I have only seen him in Leverage, but I’ve never seen him pull this out before. the voice crack is an excellent touch

also, worth noting, Alex is definitely a notable level of... hmm, paranoid? this is just a tad bit frantic, though that’s understandable from a guy who almost got killed while in the middle of an attempted meditation

oh god being cocky in the middle of a briefing. poor Kai

--being cocky and competence porn! of course he takes the watch and turns it into a lesson

...he must be a hell of a teacher

(also, bonus points for actually using the journal. maybe he’s taking this health thing more seriously than I thought he would?)

may I repeat: COMPETENCE PORN

uh-huh, you’re so not involved, definitely, Alex, not like you’re gonna get pulled straight into this or anything

Ernesto is just watching to see how things play out, Kai is... trying to do things the right way, and Alex...

...Alex gives precisely zero fucks. buddy you are so not subtle

right, walking straight into the lion’s den! radiating confidence! terrifying

this is a disturbing level of truth he’s sharing for this lie. I mean, best lies are crafted from truth, but... jeez

hm. so is Alex also a “I don’t like guns” type guy?

(probably not for the same reasons as Eliot doesn’t [his is definitely more in the “they make it too easy to kill” department whereas I would guess Alex has either more tactical or PTSD reasons], but, hmm. this is something to watch for)

(did they know they were bringing back Leverage when they set up Almost Paradise? I’m genuinely wondering if they didn’t write some Eliot traits into Alex specifically bc they knew Kane missed playing him)

this is a fantastically confident level of grifting--what exactly did he do in the DEA, precisely?

...ah. cool asthetic guy. stuffed in the freezer. gotta admit, I definitely didn’t see that one coming. creepy!

(and it looks like you actually managed to shake Alex a little, hah)

aaaaaand in the meantime we have Kai following his advice! in an... interesting way. hm.

(surprisingly this does not annoy me that much in hindsight. not sure why)

and understandably, this does not go over well! except, oh, fuck, DEA guy. this ain’t gonna be good

...worse. worse than I thought. what happened to you, Alex? former partner? whaaat

“attacks”?

this gonna be the typical “traumatized white dude has Anger Attacks” type thing?

honestly I immediately went “probably not” given how it was handled in Leverage. wasn’t sure though. but that does leave the question of what sort of attacks? it doesn’t seem like it’d be meltdowns, so what does that leave?

hmmm. DEA guy is an Ass. we Do Not Like him. I’ve known Alex for less than half an hour but you do not do that to him. you do not use trauma against your guy, Jerkface.

cutting a deal? this should be interesting

...well shit. I. am sincerely hoping Kai isn’t about to walk in on anything too bad

this definitely isn’t gonna be a fight though, that I called right off the bat

--bottles. dammit

oh, Christ. attempted OD or just drunk?

just drunk! good! well, very Not Good, but better than the other thing

pffffft dunking him in the water and then him going straight back to the water when he sees her, that is both absolutely hilarious and deeply concerning

aaand I’m agreeing with Kai but also, poor guy just got confronted with a hell of a lot of things that would raise his trau--

...mm. yeah. that’d be it.

...I. was. not expecting that much backstory info straight off. holy cow, Alex. that is. messed up. someone get this man a hug

“one of the guys that cared too much”

(...like you?)

(or is that why you won’t let yourself care now?)

fuck, there was a lot more to that boat scene than I thought. ow

partner who betrayed him like that? I’m just. gods.

Trust Issues is definitely gonna be a Thing isn’t it

can we just take a second to appreciate how Christian Kane is playing the absolute hell out of this character

aaaand Kai brings him back to the city for a Heartwarming Reminder of why he was in the game! this is very tropey but it is, as John Rogers has pointed out, an instance of the “well-worn writing tool” rather than feeling cheesy!

holy crap Kai has lost. a lot of people. oh man

ahahahaha classic “why did you bring me here?” line! you know why, Alex. you know why

oh, and Ernesto gets a chance to help him out! I’m already enjoying this so much

awww and Kai shows up to help encourage him! with coffee! supportive friend and very obvious but honestly okay love interest! good!!!

(what the heck is with Devlin and his crew and sticking Kane with two besties? based on Ernesto’s dynamic with him I’m guessing this isn’t gonna be an OT3 but. I am loving the trend)

“I’m gonna regret this in the morning” pfft

huh, working with the DEA agents. not like he’s gonna go off script or anything. that’s totally not gonna happen is it

hehe irritated look while they’re putting on the mic. he is so very unimpressed

--”little episodes”--episodes?

moment of appreciation for the un-forced-feeling diversity in these police squads

“how’s the anxiety?” I’m sorry what

hold up, when we say “episodes”--are we talking panic attacks? does Alex have actual goddamn anxiety?

...actually with PTSD? that would make complete sense. I am... intrigued. I am really hoping that that’s the case, actually, because having seen how well they handled Parker and her PTSD in Leverage (as well as Nate’s and Eliot’s) I have a lot of faith that they could pull that off really well, actually. That would be good.

ppFFFT TAKING OFF THE WIRES RIGHT OFF THE BAT

wait what. you’re telling them everything? what’s your game here?

“get that frikkin gun outta my face!” yup, not a fan of guns! no disarming though? huh

(also can we just. appreciate how Kane manages to make “frikkin” sound just as much like the cuss it’s replacing?)

(LET ALEX SAY FUCK)

oh. OH

hi Ernesto! hi Kai! I see what y’all doing

ohhhhhhhhhh Alex you goddamn genius. Getting rid of all of the drugs so there’s no way the precise thing he was claiming to be doing can happen. I like this

THE MEDITATION COMING ON ON THE RECORDING I CAN’T--OH MY GODS

Alex please tell me you know how to disarm a gun. please. guns are not effective at that distance

OH. OH I DID NOT SEE KAI COMING.

got ‘em! murder confession, how did I not see that coming? good stuff

Kai can fight!

KAI CAN FUCKING FIGHT WOW

I am very much appreciating Kai right now

also is that a FLYING KICK from Ernesto?

they better give these people more fight scenes

aaaaand straight into the water, oh god. I’m assuming this was a choice made because Alex is familiar with this territory? ...I do not think I want to know where Alex learned to fight underwater.

(I really really really want to know.)

how the fuck has your monitor not gone off by now Alex

choking him out underwater, okay, wow

what size are your lungs? this is long

extra kudos for excellent underwater filming and wow I am hoping the actors actually came up for air

(this is also unreasonably beautiful for a scene where you’re choking out a drug lord. the water is so pretty)

Evil DEA guy (no I am not going to learn his name, he doesn’t deserve it) is gonna be Alex’s Agent Sterling, isn’t he? this should be interesting

heh, police chief is taking his side! good stuff, good stuff

(it is very nice to see Alex getting some people in his corner after knowing what hell the DEA put him through)

Alex has fallen so damn hard for Kai. this is very very adorable actually

awww he’s really getting into fixing up the shop, isn’t he? I’m sincerely looking forward to seeing how he gets this up and going, it really looks like he’s enjoying himself

somehow I am starting to wonder if the cocky “oh yeah I’m opening up a gift shop how exciting huh” thing at the start wasn’t... actually genuine. he... is enjoying this, isn’t he? good. very good

I am unreasonably invested in this man’s wellbeing for one episode in

!!!!!!!!! HE GETS HIS PARADE

AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW

AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW

giving him his reason to keep going! yes! yessss

oh Alex you are attached now. you are very attached. good luck my dude and don’t let the trust issues get in the way

this is a good show. this is a heckin awesome show.

also, side note, it is SO PRETTY

I am just loving loving loving all of the scenery. competence porn AND landscape and city porn. beautiful. perfection. excellent

...that was. much longer than I anticipated oops

anyway, conclusion: hot damn this is a fun show! I am very excited to keep watching this. Alex officially has my heart, even if he’s a bit of a cocky bastard sometimes. Kane is fucking hilarious. (More reasons to be excited for Redemption!) Kai and Ernesto also have my heart, and I am extremely interested to see their character development.

Honestly, the beauty is surprising. I didn’t expect to just enjoy how pretty it is. The blues of the ocean, the intense tropical colors, even the run-down gift shop--there’s such a gorgeous aesthetic to it all. If I wasn’t already invested in the characters and plot, I’d be invested for that alone.

So... I have some thoughts on Alex and the show structure.

He’s obviously very disillusioned. There’s a lot of nods to the idea of war--he’s commonly referring to himself as a soldier, as a veteran, maybe as a casualty. I’m gonna take a totally wild guess here and say this show is going to be focused on the drug issues in the Philippines. (Wow, Synapse, how the heck’d you guess that?) I do find describing the war on drugs as a war, and going into the terminology that comes with it, very appropriate, and I like how this show is actively calling this to attention rather than using it as a convenient plot. They’re actually addressing the issue and discussing its impact. And given how overlooked certain aspects of the impact of the drug war on the Philippines is, this is a good choice, especially in order to alert American viewers to the issue. I’m curious to see how they handle that.

Again, interesting drawing parallels to war, too, and comparing it against the likes of WWI and Vietnam. It really gives that sense of weight to the issue and defines a vital aspect of it: the impact of the war on drugs on the people involved. It emphasizes that the people who are fighting it suffer consequences and PTSD just as a soldier in the field does, and it also emphasizes, with Kai, that it isn’t just the people actively fighting who bear the consequences. It’s also the people on the sidelines--it’s the families, the people on the streets by the gunfights, the economical impact, etcetera.

But there’s also an element to Alex’s character that automatically makes him relatable to a lot of people... and it has nothing to do with the PTSD, nothing to do with the war on drugs, nothing really to do with the main issues. It is, simply, the intense hopelessness and depression that comes with trying to make a difference. In his case it’s making a difference on a severe worldwide issue. But the vast majority, if not all, of Almost Paradise’s audience should be able to relate to a feeling of never doing enough. And there’s certainly a large section of that group who can relate to being part of a fight that never seems to end. Doesn’t matter what you’re doing--if it’s driven at helping, it rarely ever feels like you ever do enough. But the advice given is excellent. One of the best things to do, when you’re feeling hopeless over this, is to focus on and take deep joy in the impact you do make.

Alex is an expression of a frustration that a lot of people deal with. This, I think, is one of the reasons why he instantly drew me--and presumably the rest of the audience--in (outside of a fantastic actor and great humor). He’s relatable. He’s something that most people can see a part of themselves in.

Anyway, symbolism and real-world talk aside, this is just... fun. It’s genuine fun. We’re covering rough issues, but there’s a lot of well-written tropes in here too that are written in that way that makes them enjoyable to relive rather than painful. The humor is delightful and plentiful. There’s a lot of beautiful feel-good moments. I’m suspecting this’ll be a comfort show, and I am perfectly all right with that.

Onto the next episode!

#Almost Paradise #Almost Paradise spoilers #Almost Paradise 1x01 #reaction post #christian kane #(please please please let these be the right tags)#synapse reacts #this is a new thing!#hopefully y'all like the new thing!#even though I am exceedingly long-winded #I mean this is basically the equivalent of me yelling into the void #but I need SOME void to yell into #so this might as well be it #and perhaps someone'll get a kick out of it #so why not?

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just-my-sickly-pride · 5 years

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Debut || Roger Taylor x fem!Reader

summary || you’re twenty years old, a full-time uni student, and you’re living out of home. money is tight. so, naturally, you decide to sell your virginity to the highest bidder. when you get an offer from some guy in his mid-thirties, you put on your nicest dress and head on over. but there’s a problem: he has no idea who you are, or why you’ve turned up at his house at nine o’clock at night. maybe things aren’t going to be as simple as you’d hoped. modern day au.

rating || explicit, with fluff dotted throughout. 18+ only. do not read if you are under eighteen. the age gap between reader and roger is sixteen years.

word count || about 17.7k.

author’s notes || welcome one and all to my very first fic on this blog! i pictured roger circa ‘85 (specifically live aid) for this fic. this fic is also dedicated to my friend and fellow mid-thirties-Roger enthusiast Jennifer @mrfahrenhcit (i couldn’t find a way to work in everything you asked, but i’ve saved some of them for the next roger fic that’s in the works). fun fact: this is the first reader fic where i’ve used ‘Y/N’. some people have said they’d had issues with this post being extremely slow to load, or the app has crashed - i think it’s just bc it’s so long, and i apologise for the inconvenience. [i am a proud member of the anti-cross-tagging club.]

masterlist

You don’t think you’ve ever felt more nervous before in your entire life. You’ve wiped your sweaty palms on your dress ten times in the past two minutes, and your heart hasn’t stopped racing from the moment you woke up this morning.

What are you doing? Seriously, what the fuck are you doing?

Well, that’s the thing. You know exactly what the fuck you’re doing.

You aren’t doing it out of embarrassment, or anything to do with pride. You don’t feel pressured, not by anyone, not even by society, fuck society, but you saw some dumb article about it – it was hardly even an article, just gossip – and it gave you the idea, and then you were doing some research about it, just for the money, it’s just for the money, you’ve been living out of home for two years now and life’s still kicking you in the ass, so why wouldn’t you do it for money, if you could? And you can. So you went onto some website and snooped around to check for at least some sign of legitimacy, and then, well, you were making an account, and you made an account, and uploaded some photos that you never thought you’d upload to the Internet, and, a couple weeks later, you found out that someone had chosen you. Chosen you.

And now here you are.

On your way to a strange man’s house.

To lose your virginity to him.

Because he’s paid for it.

Well, he’s paid half. The other half comes… after.

And you’re not nervous about the actual sex part, you suppose, but more about the fact that you’re going to a stranger’s house for sex. Does that make you a sex worker? Could you call someone who played guitar in one gig and got paid for it, but never got paid for it again, a musician?

Probably. But maybe that isn’t the best comparison.

You don’t know much about this guy. Just his address, his name, his age – thirty-six, could be worse, to be fair – and that he’s obviously got plenty of cash to spare. And he’s definitely not the sort of guy you want to have around. Seeing as, y’know, he’s paid a twenty-year-old virgin to have sex with him.

The Uber pulls up to a stop in front of a house. It’s dark outside, almost nine in the evening, so the house is hard to make out, but it’s quite a nice place, very white-picket-fence. Something out of a magazine catalogue about the suburbs. You thank your Uber driver and grab your oversized handbag, climbing out of the car.

You close the door behind you.

The Uber drives off.

And you’re alone on the sidewalk.

You hoist the handbag onto your shoulder. It’s got a couple of things you think you’ll need – condoms, lube, two change of clothes depending on what this guy is after. You think you look more than nice enough in your heels and tight, black dress, but just in case.

You glance at your phone, double-checking the address. You send a quick message to your best friend Justine: at the house. will keep u updated.

She’s the only one who knows; and she only knows because you figured that at least someone should know, if something goes wrong.

Good God, you’re hoping nothing goes wrong. Not in that way. Not in any way, really.

And again, you’re back to asking yourself what the fuck you’re doing.

You take a deep breath, and start heading up the front path.

Your hands are shaking by the time you reach the front step, but you force yourself to raise a fist and rap your knuckles on the door. The automatic porch light is yellow, and you can’t help but feel irked by how unflattering it is.

You can hear movement inside the house. A part of you is searching for the sound of kids, although God forbid there’s any to be heard. But a guy like this… Well, your first conclusion is that he’s looking for an affair.

You really don’t want to be some kind of mistress. But, you suppose, this is really just a business transaction, so you’re free of at least most of the guilt, right? All of it, if you actually have no idea if he’s married.

Please don’t mention your wife, you pray. Don’t implicate me or whatever.

Finally, the door opens, and you feel like you’re about to throw up your heart onto your feet. But you push it down, and drink in the man in front of you.

If you weren’t sure before if he was a dad, now it’s unmistakable. He’s slim, and reasonably tall – not remarkably so, but still tall – and he’s dressed in loose jeans and a blue flannel that he has rolled up to his elbows. His hair is blond, sort of shaggy, sort of spiky, like he spends his time running his hands through it. You idly wonder what it’d feel like in your hands. Guess you’ll find out soon enough.

But the thing that really knocks your socks off is the big blue eyes that blink at you, framed by eyelashes that you’d kill to have yourself. Those eyes flash down to your outfit, and then back up at your face.

Okay. Maybe this whole thing won’t be that bad at all.

You give him your most winning smile. “Hi,” you say in a way that you hope is both alluring and professional.

He blinks at you again. “Hi,” he says, his eyes wide. His gaze flits up and down your body, like he’s trying to compute what he’s seeing in front of him. “Um, hello. What, uh– Can I help you?”

His voice is soft, softer than you were expecting. Gentle, almost.

You lick your lips and shift your feet. “I’m, ah, Mandy. Are you Roger? Taylor?” Your name is fake, of course. You’re not sure about his. Not that it matters.

“Yes, that’s me,” Roger says. He scratches the back of his head. “Uh, I’m sorry, you’re, um, lovely, but I don’t think I know you.”

Huh. Odd. Is this a foreplay thing? “We have an appointment. You booked me two weeks ago, and you gave me this date and this time,” you prompt unsurely.

Roger’s brow crumples. “An… appointment?”

You feel your face starting to heat up. You almost ask if you have the right address, but no, you already know that he’s Roger Taylor, he’s the one who booked, so you must have it right. “Yeah,” you say. “You, um…” You lower your voice a touch. “You already paid in advance. This is pretty much a done deal, but I’m just here to fulfil my end of the bargain. And then, of course, you’ll have to pay me the other half.”

Roger’s starting to look a little pale now, and you’re not quite sure what to do with that. His eyes dart down to your outfit and back up to your face. “Pay you?” he says. “I’ve– what? I’ve paid you? What did I pay you? When?”

Now you’re both embarrassed, and confused, and well, this isn’t something you’d pictured going wrong.

You suddenly feel very exposed in your tight dress and heels.

“Uh.” You scratch behind your ear. “Like, I don’t know what to tell you. You’ve booked me, and I’m here. And it wasn’t a small sum of money, so I doubt you’d want to…”

Roger’s mouth opens, and then closes, and opens again. “Oh, shit, hang on,” he says, his voice flat, “did I… Was this all booked and arranged two weeks ago on the Friday night?”

“Yes,” you say. “Why?”

Roger sighs heavily, and rubs his eyes. “Oh, shit,” he moans. “For God’s…” He raises his head, and sighs again. “Look, um, Mandy, there’s been a big misunderstanding. I, um, went through a divorce, er, relatively recently, a few months ago, and I’ve been doing a bit of wallowing, I guess you could say, and my friends tried to cheer me up a fortnight ago on Friday by bringing round a few bottles of very nice whiskey and gin. I don’t remember a lot of that night, but, now that you mention it, I have some vague memory of my friends trying to get me to, you know, ‘move on’, and, um, I think they might have looked up… people online.”

Your ears are really burning now. “Oh,” you say.

“That’s what this is, isn’t it?” Roger adds. “You’re a…”

“Not really,” you blurt. “Kind of. It– oh, man.” You bite your bottom lip, hesitating, not quite sure how much to reveal about the situation. “Okay, I’ll be honest. Yes, I’m… from a website. But I’m not – this isn’t a living, or a side gig, or whatever. Not that it would matter if I was, because there’s nothing wrong with…” You shake your head. Stay on track. “It’s just a one-off. You paid me to… to take my virginity.”

You swear you can see Roger’s soul leaving his body in that moment. “You– I what?”

You shrug helplessly.

Roger takes a step back, pressing a hand to his forehead. “Jesus Christ,” he mutters. “Jesus Christ.”

“I’m sorry for the confusion,” you say, and your stomach sinks further when a realisation comes to you. “I…” You swallow. Your mouth is dry. “I’m really sorry, but I can’t – The money you gave me. I’ve done this to help pay bills and rent and everything, and it’s already been used. A chunk of it, anyway. I can’t refund you. I’m really sorry.”

“No, God, don’t apologise,” Roger says. “You weren’t to know.” He shakes his head. “Fucking dickheads, the lot of them.” He looks to you, and warily inspects your face. “How old did you say you were?” His voice is small, like he’s scared of the answer.

“Twenty,” you reply, and his shoulders sag in relief.

“Thank God,” he says. “I mean, still, you’re so young, but at least you’re…”

“An adult?”

He nods, grimacing sheepishly. “I really am being honest when I say I don’t remember much of that night. My mates aren’t those sorts of people, but, well, who knows what they’d try to pull when they’re pissed.”

“No, it’s fine,” you say. “I look young for my age. But I am twenty.”

“No, I believe you,” Roger says quickly. “I’m not… No.”

You wipe your palms on your dress again. What now? Do you just go home? That wasn’t the cheapest Uber ride you’ve ever had. You were kind of relying on that extra money.

Roger seems equally at loss. “You– Did you have to travel far?”

“Not that far,” you say. “Forty minutes-ish.”

“Fuck,” Roger says. He puts his hands on his hips, and then drops them again. “What time is it? It’s nearly nine, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, about nine.”

“It’s late. You should be getting home.”

Your heart sinks. Wow. Okay. This is really just over like that. “Um, yeah, I guess,” you say. You take half a step back. “I’m really sorry about the– the, um, whole mix-up thing. And sorry about your divorce.”

Great. Real smooth.

“Thanks,” Roger says. He hesitates, and you’re about to turn and head back down the driveway, when he says, “How are you getting home? Did you drive?”

“Uh, no,” you say. “Uber.”

“Uber? God, no, sod that,” Roger says. “Let me…” He fumbles for something in his back pocket, but comes up empty. “Let me pay for it. I don’t– Can I pay you for it?”

“It’s all right,” you reassure him. “You’ve already given me– it’s okay.”

“No, please, I insist,” he says. “Should I– cash? I can give you cash. Or… transfer…” He rolls his eyes at himself, those pretty blue eyes that shouldn’t belong to a man his age, but somehow suit him perfectly. “God,” he mutters. “I usually have things more together than this, I promise. I’ve just been caught beyond off-guard.”

“Sorry,” you say again.

“It’s not your fault, really, I don’t– How could I blame you? You had no idea. I am going to murder my friends.” He sighs, rubbing his temple. “Um. Okay. I’ve paid you before, haven’t I, if you got the deposit? How did I do it? I can just do it that way again.”

“You transferred it to me,” you say. You shift in your heels. Your feet are starting to ache.

“Let’s do it that way again, then,” Roger says. “I’ll just get my phone, sorry.”

“It’s okay, really,” you say yet again, stopping him. “Don’t bother. I’ll– It’ll take me two minutes and then I can be on my way home.”

Roger hovers, and then says, “Can I– Did you want to wait inside? Or out on the steps? Could I get you some water, at least?”

You hesitate. “Um–”

“I’m not trying to do anything,” Roger blurts, and then he shakes his head. “Now it sounds like I am trying to do something. I’m not. Really. If you want, you can just wait here and I’ll go inside and leave you alone.”

You glance at your phone. You haven’t ordered the Uber yet, but you are pretty thirsty. You look back up to Roger. “Well, I already had it in my head that I was coming here to sleep with you, so I’m not really concerned about you trying anything,” you say. “Some water sounds nice, actually.”

Roger laughs. Like his voice, it’s unexpectedly soft, and it makes you smile.

“Um. Yes,” he says, glancing at his feet. “Well. Um, come on in, then.”

You head back up the path, and Roger steps aside to let you in.

You slip past him. He smells good.

His house, on the inside, is just as white-picket-fence as it is on the outside. Not the tidiest, but you suppose he wasn’t expecting company.

He seems to notice the slight mess the same moment you do, and he hurriedly darts forward to tidy up.

“Sorry,” he says.

“No, don’t worry about it,” you say.

He bends down to grab an empty beer bottle from where it sits on the floor next to the couch. Nice ass.

Not that it matters. You aren’t sleeping with him anymore. But, to be fair, you are only human. Just because you’re no longer ordering doesn’t mean you can’t admire the menu.

“I, uh, wasn’t expecting any guests, obviously,” Roger adds, half-jokingly.

You chuckle, and adjust your dress. Roger’s eyes flash down to your hands, then to your chest where you’ve pulled the dress down a little further in your adjustment, and then he quickly looks away, running his hand along his jaw.

“Uh, um,” he says. “Water? Um– take a seat, by the way. Feel free to sit…” He gestures vaguely around him. “Sit anywhere. Anywhere you like.”

“Um, okay,” you say, and hesitate, before awkwardly perching on his couch.

“Sorry, did you say you wanted water?” Roger says.

“If you wouldn’t mind,” you say.

“Yeah, of course,” Roger says, and then disappears into the kitchen.

You breathe in a lungful of air and slowly let it out. Wow. Talk about an unexpected evening.

You take out your phone and message Justine. boy do I have a story to tell u.

She’s online, and she replies immediately. fuck what’s happened?? everything alright??

You bite your lip, considering how to reply. yeah I’m fine. the guy is super easy on the eyes, but there’s been a mix up and basically I am remaining firmly in the virgin zone for the foreseeable future lol.

You backspace and try again. yeah I’m fine. long story short I’m coming home. tell u about it when I get there.

is he ugly?? Justine replies, and you can’t help but smile in amusement.

oh no, that’s not the issue even a little bit, you reply.

“I’m assuming tap water is fine?” Roger says, reappearing with a glass of water, making you jump slightly and flip your phone face-down on your leg, as if he could somehow see the screen from across the room. “Sorry, I should’ve asked. I don’t really have anything else.”

“No, no, tap water is fine, thank you,” you say, and he hands the glass to you.

You take a sip.

Roger glances away, seemingly looking for something to do or something to say, as if the answer is written in the walls. He chews on his thumbnail.

Your mind scrambles to find something to say, but it feels like trying to eat soup with a fork.

“Is everything all right?” Roger asks suddenly, looking to you. “I know this is probably completely inappropriate, but… Well, paying for someone to…”

Your stomach sinks with embarrassment. “Oh,” you say. “Um. Yeah. Yeah, everything’s fine. Just – could do with the money.”

“Of course, yeah,” Roger says hurriedly, nodding. “You’re at uni?”

“Yeah. And living out of home, so.”

“Right. Yeah, of course, I should’ve guessed. Sorry, that was…”

“No, it’s fine,” you say with a reassuring smile. You chuckle. “I’m sorry for disrupting your evening like this.”

“No, no, it…” Roger smiles, and you feel every trace of oxygen leave your lungs, because wow, he’s attractive. “It’s a welcomed interruption, actually.”

“It is?”

“Well, all I had planned was to watch something shit on Netflix and drink beer,” Roger says, screwing up his nose. “Not exactly exciting.”

“Oh, don’t let me stop you,” you say. “Sounds like they were big plans.”

Roger laughs, and your heart thuds against your ribcage. “The sort of plans that sound much nicer when you have company, I think.” He pauses. “Not that– not that I’m expecting you to–” He sighs, running a hand through his hair, making it stick up. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Really, I’m not usually this… awkward.”

“You don’t have to apologise,” you say, shaking your head.

“I used to be a real ladies’ man, you know,” Roger says. “Back in the day. Before my wi– my ex-wife. And the kids.”

“Sure,” you say, drawling sarcastically.

Roger laughs again, a little surprised, but amused. “I was!” he insists. “I was picking up women left and right.”

“I believe you,” you say lightly.

Roger grins, and you have to take a steadying breath. “You’ve got a tongue on you, haven’t you?” he says delightedly.

“So it’s been said.”

It comes out more suggestive than you’d intended. Roger takes a moment to drink you in, and then he bites his bottom lip, looking away, one hand sliding into the back pocket of his jeans, the other one slipping under his shirt, massaging his shoulder.

Your stomach flips and jumps. You take a sip of water.

“You sure you’ve never been with anyone before?” Roger says.

You snort. “That’s a pretty rude question, don’t you think?”

Roger smiles sheepishly. “You’re right. Sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”

You take another sip of water, and then say, “I haven’t slept with anyone, no. I think I’d know if I had.”

“Right,” Roger says mildly, nodding.

You narrow your eyes at him. “What?”

“Nothing, I didn’t say anything.”

“You’re thinking very loudly. Is there something wrong with me not having slept with anyone?”

“No,” Roger says, his eyes widening. “No, shit, that’s not what I was trying to say. It– you just seem… I’m just surprised. That someone like you…”

You adjust your dress again. Roger’s eyes drop to your breasts again, and back up to your face. “What do you mean by that?” you ask, trying not to preen.

Roger ponders over his answer for a while. “You just seem to… know what you want.”

“Oh, you think so?”

“Yeah,” Roger says noncommittally.

His eyes find yours, and they stay there. Your heart is racing in your chest now, making your blood feel warm. You’ve been attracted to plenty of people before, but this is really something else.

Roger clears his throat, breaking away, and you surreptitiously squeeze your thighs together.

Your phone buzzes on your thigh. It’s Justine. so he’s hot?

“Is that your Uber?” Roger asks. If you aren’t mistaken, he sounds almost disappointed.

Your cheeks grow hot. “Oh, um, I haven’t actually… I forgot to call it.”

“Oh,” Roger says. A tinge of relief? “Well, no rush.”

“It’s just my friend checking up on me,” you add.

“That’s good of them.”

“Yeah. Well, actually, she was checking up on me before. Now she’s just–” You open and close your mouth a few times, but decide to be honest. “Uh, she’s just, um, asking about you.”

Roger quirks an eyebrow, and it’s so hot that you have to look away. “About me?”

Your phone buzzes again. are you on ur way home now?

“Uh,” you say, and quickly type out, not yet.

“What have you told her?” Roger asks, playfully curious.

You put your phone down, and take a breath, smoothing your hands down your legs, thinking carefully of how to answer. “Just that you seem nice.”

“Nice?” Roger says.

“And you’re… Well.” You smirk. “I’m sure you’ve seen yourself in the mirror. No point in boosting your ego too much.”

Roger steps forward, drawn to you by an invisible string. “I don’t think I understand,” he says faux-innocently.

“I’m sorry, weren’t you just saying a minute ago that you were pulling girls left and right?” you say, cocking your head.

“Oh, yeah, when I was twenty,” Roger says. “Not talking about now.”

“Have you tried?”

Roger pauses, slightly taken aback by this, and his eyes roll to the ceiling as he thinks, blowing hair out of his cheeks. “You may have a point there.”

“And I suppose that’s why these friends of yours contacted me?”

“You… may have a point there,” Roger says again.

You nod to yourself. “I don’t see why they couldn’t have just taken you to a pub and set you up with someone there. It’d have been a lot cheaper.”

“They’ve, um…” Roger cards his hand through his hair. “They’ve tried that, actually.” He hesitates, and then walks over to you, sitting down on the armchair near you. “They’ve taken me out a couple of times.”

“And you’ve struck out?” you ask.

Roger chuckles. “No. I – well, like you said, I suppose I haven’t really tried. I didn’t want to.”

“Too soon?”

“No, it’s not that. It’s…” Roger pulls a face. “I don’t know. Haven’t felt like it, really. Maybe it was too soon. Or maybe the thought of having to try to chat someone up just seemed like so much effort.”

“Surely it wouldn’t be much effort for you.”

Roger meets your eyes again, and he smiles slowly, running his tongue along his teeth. “Oh yeah?”

Your phone vibrates. The way Roger’s looking at you makes you wish it was something else vibrating that you could put to good use alone in your room.

Roger’s eyes flick down to the phone, and back up to your face. “That your friend again?”

You hesitate, and then flip the phone over. hellooooo????? wtf is going on????

“Yeah,” you say, and put the phone down beside you.

“You going to answer it?”

“In a minute.”

You smooth your hands down your thighs. Roger watches like a hawk.

Your hands slide back up your thighs.

He swallows.

You smile.

“You, um, you ever…” Roger tears his eyes away from your thighs to look at your face. “Have– have you ever had a boyfriend? Or girlfriend?”

“Yeah,” you say casually. “Not for a long while, though. And nothing too serious. Nothing as full-on as marriage.”

Roger laughs, but it comes out sounding a bit strangled. “Yeah. That’s all right, though. That doesn’t matter.”

Your phone buzzes.

You ignore it.

“I never got around to… all of that,” you explain. “Y’know. Fucking.”

Roger’s face goes slack. “Uh–”

“I wasn’t waiting for anyone special,” you continue. Your blood feels electrified under his gaze. “Just never quite got there.”

“Never quite–?”

You hum. “That’s misleading. I’ve made out with plenty of people, but that’s all. Some over-the-clothes action. Basically nothing, really.”

Roger looks like he’s struggling to breathe. “Uh-huh.”

“You probably find that hard to imagine,” you say with a wry smile. “Having kids and all. How old were you your first time?”

Roger blinks, and takes a moment to reply. “Uh, I was sixteen.”

You laugh. “God, I can’t even picture…” You frown, and shake your head. “It’s hard to picture what it’d be like, you know? The reality of it? You can watch as much porn as you like – and I’ve watched plenty, mind you – but, like, I know that it’s not real. Not realistic, anyway. I’ve spent what feels like ages just trying to picture what is actually is like, but it’s impossible for me to know.”

“It’s good,” Roger says, and it comes out in a rush, and he looks surprised at himself.

You feel a thrill go through you. “Good?”

“Yeah,” Roger says. “Everyone says your first time isn’t good, but that’s only if your partner doesn’t know what they’re doing. And it’s nice when you have an idea of what you’re doing, too, but that comes with time. And if you have a good teacher.” He rakes his hand through his hair again. “But when the chemistry is right, and the mood is right, it’s… good.”

“That’s descriptive,” you murmur sarcastically.

Roger huffs a laugh. “What do you want, a detailed explanation? Graphs and illustrations?”

“A demonstration would be nice.”

Shit. Oh, shit. Shit shit shit. Why the fuck did you say that?

Your eyes are wide, and you open and close your mouth a few times. “Uh.” Roger looks as surprised as you feel. “Oh,” he says. “Um. Wow. Is– is this part of the…”

You blink. “Part of the…?”

“The whole…” He gestures vaguely. “…thing. You being paid to…”

“Did I just make a complete idiot of myself as part of my attempt to woo you as a kind-of sex worker?” you ask. You can’t help but laugh, shaking your head. “Nope. No. That was all me. Just being a dumbass.” You groan, covering your face. “I’m sorry,” you say from behind your hands. “This is so embarrassing.” This whole night has been nothing but a huge embarrassment. You can’t wait to go home and forget about it, thanks to an unhealthy dose of alcohol.

“I’m sorry,” Roger says.

You lower your hands. “For what?”

“For – I don’t know. I just felt I needed to apologise.”

You snort. “You don’t have to apologise for me very clumsily and awkwardly and horribly trying to flirt with you, Roger.” You roll your eyes at yourself. “You’re probably used to seeing that all the time.”

“Again, not for a very long time,” Roger says. “But I know what horrible and awkward flirting looks like, and… that wasn’t it.”

“But clumsy, though, right?” you say, screwing up your nose.

Roger chuckles. “Maybe. But that’s all right.” He shifts in his seat. “I was just as clumsy.”

You wave a hand, and reach for your phone. It’s high time you called your Uber. And reply to Justine. “You weren’t flirting with me.”

You re-read the messages from Justine you’re yet to reply to.

so hes hot?

are you on ur way home now?

hellooooo????? wtf is going on????

Then the new one, from a few minutes ago: for the love of god can u please reply to me. something. anything. I’ll take a solid thumbs-up.

So you send a thumbs-up.

When you look up, Roger is staring at you, and you realise he hasn’t spoken since you did.

You’ve well and truly crossed a line somewhere. You can’t blame him for wanting you out. “I’m sorry,” you say. “I’m just – my friend. I’ll get the Uber now. Sorry it’s taken me so long.”

“Don’t,” Roger says.

You pause. “Don’t what?”

“Don’t order the Uber.”

Your stomach bubbles. “Wh– No?”

“Not yet, at least,” Roger says. He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “You think I wasn’t flirting with you?”

“Why would you be?” you respond automatically.

“Why would…” Roger shakes his head. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because I’m a random twenty-year-old woman who’s just shown up at your door on a Tuesday night dressed like this talking about how you paid to take my virginity,” you say bluntly. “Which is more than a little off-putting.”

“Well, all right, I’ll give you that,” Roger says. “But here I am, still trying to clumsily flirt with you nonetheless.”

You break out into a smile, a bashful one, and duck your head. “Oh.”

“Oh,” Roger repeats, a touch playfully.

You glance up at him. He’s smiling at you, pleased with your reaction, and the thought of kissing him flashes through your mind, and you’ve suddenly never wanted anything more. You purse your lips, looking at your hands again, fiddling with your phone, flipping it around and around in your grip.

“Mandy,” he says gently, and you’re puzzled for a moment before you remember –

“That’s, um, not my real name,” you tell him with an awkward chuckle. But you really like how he said it all the same.

Roger looks so embarrassed that you can’t help but laugh. “Here I was, trying to be all suave, and now I look like an idiot,” he says.

You shake your head. “You don’t. You didn’t know.”

“I should’ve guessed you weren’t using your real name.”

“No, it’s fine,” you giggle.

“Well, am I allowed to know your real name? So I can try again?”

You hesitate.

“Unless you don’t want to,” Roger says quickly. “That’s fine. Security, and all. Stranger danger.”

You laugh again. “Stranger danger? I’m in your house.”

“I could be a stalker. You don’t know that.”

Fuck, you’re attracted to him. “Dork,” you say with a roll of your eyes.

Roger chuckles, his eyes sparkling.

“It’s [Y/N],” you add.

“[Y/N],” he repeats, and your breath catches ever so slightly. He pauses, and then comes to sit beside you on the couch, and holds out his hand. “Nice to meet you, [Y/N],” he says. “I’m Roger.”

You giggle, and take his hand, shaking it. “Nice to meet you, Roger.”

He’s so close now. He smells amazing, and his hand is warm, and his eyes are so blue, and his lips–

You realise you’ve been staring at his mouth, your hand still in his, and you glance back up at his eyes before quickly taking your hand back, looking away.

You tuck your hair behind your ear, clearing your throat. You’re barely aware of your own body – only his, and how close it is to yours. Like there’s a force between the two of you, connecting you. When he swallows and moves his hand back to his own lap, you can feel it as if it’s your own.

“Do you, um…” Roger takes a breath in, and you feel your chest, your lungs, buzz. “Tell me about yourself a bit.”

“Me?” you say, looking to him. Oh, wow, he really is close. Fucking hell, you want him.

“Yeah,” he says, smiling. “What do you do for fun? Stuff like that?”

You lick your lips, and his eyes dart to the movement. “Um, well, I…” You absentmindedly adjust your dress, and it catches his eye again. “I’m at uni, in my second year. It’s all right. Pretty stressful, obviously, but I like it well enough. I live with two of my friends. I, um… I like… dogs.”

Roger laughs.

This is so stupid, you realise. You both clearly want each other.

You shake your head. “Stupid,” you mutter.

Roger frowns. “What’s stupid?”

“This,” you say. You gesture between the two of you for emphasis. “This.”

“Oh,” Roger says. He shifts away from you. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

You huff. “You’re not.”

“Then what–”

“Kiss me,” you cut in.

Roger stops. “Kiss you?”

“Yes,” you say, keeping your gaze steady on his. “You’re too damn difficult to resist. So kiss me.”

Roger hesitates.

You raise your eyebrows. “Unless you don’t want to?”

“No, I – I do,” he says. “I just…”

“What?”

“I feel like the circumstances… I don’t want you to think I’m just doing this because I’ve paid you to…”

“I don’t think that,” you say. “And I don’t want your money; this is way beyond that now. I’m not trying to trick you into sleeping with me so I can force you to pay me. I just know chemistry when I see it.”

Roger chuckles. “I was right,” he says. “You know exactly what you want.”

You steel your nerves. “Yeah,” you say with a shrug of your shoulders. “And I want you.”

Roger swallows. “But you don’t even know me.”

“Nope.”

“And you’re in my house.”

“Yep.”

“And I’m so much older than you.”

“That’s right.”

“And you’re…”

“I’m a virgin,” you finish, nodding. “I know. But for the love of God, Roger, if you don’t kiss me right now, I’m going to scream.”

Roger exhales, shakes his head minutely, and then says, “God fucking damn it,” and leans in to kiss you.

You immediately shift to press closer towards him, one hand coming to rest against his chest. He kisses you earnestly, but gently, like he’s nervous. Nervous about making you feel pressured, you can safely assume.

But that’s not what you’re about. You pull back, and, before he can say anything, you climb on top of him, straddling his waist, and kiss him again, more deeply than before. He breaks away just far enough to whisper, “Holy shit,” and then ducks his head to kiss down your throat. You tilt your head to give him more room, one hand against his chest and the other raking through his hair. His hands, rough and warm, smooth up your thighs, and your breath catches. They stop just under the hem of the dress, and a soft whine slips from your throat.

Roger moans in response. “Jesus Christ.”

You reach down and grab at his wrists, urging his hands to go further up the dress. “Touch me,” you pant.

He draws back, and you look down at him, at his slightly flushed cheeks and his ruffled hair, and you want him naked, right now. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to do anything you don’t want to,” he says. “We can just make out, that’s absolutely fine. Just because of… the whole… arrangement…”

“Roger,” you say slowly, “I’m only going to say this once, because I don’t want to have to repeat myself.”

He nods, swallowing.

You cup his face in your hands, boring your eyes into his. “I want you to fuck me. Tonight. Right now.”

Roger takes a shaky breath. “Are you–”

“What did I just say?” you cut in. “Not repeating it.”

Roger smiles, laughing breathlessly. “Bloody hell.”

You smirk. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Oh, it most certainly is one, believe me.”

You lean in to kiss him, and his hands, thank the Lord, slide further up your thighs. You start unbuttoning his shirt, blindly, fumbling a little, and your kisses grow more eager.

You’ve kissed a number of people in your time. Not a whole lot, but a few. And Roger really takes the damn cake.

When his shirt is fully unbuttoned, untucked from his jeans, you move your lips down his neck, and he moans, letting his head roll back, his hands shifting to grab your ass, pulling you against him. You can feel the tent in his jeans, and, beyond thrilled, you grind against it, loving how a bolt of arousal shoots through you. Roger’s grip on you tightens, and when you nip at his skin, he spits out, “Fuck.”

You rock your hips against him again, and he laughs again. “God, it’s been too long.”

You hum, nipping his throat again and soothing it with your tongue. “How long is too long?”

“Months. Lost count. Ah, fuck.”

You pull back, giving him a look, and he lifts his head to meet your eyes. “Try twenty years,” you say dryly.

Roger shakes his head. “Can’t even imagine.” He kisses you, just once, and then murmurs against your lips, “I promise I’ll make this good for you.”

You shiver. “I’m sure you will.”

“I mean it.” He kisses you again, and then sits back, his hands sliding back to your thighs and squeezing them gently. “I want this to be good for you. If I’m going to be your first, I want you to enjoy it. So you have to tell me if I’m doing something you don’t like, yeah?”

You nod. “Yeah.”

“I don’t care what it is we’re doing – you can tell me to stop at literally any point, and I will, no questions asked.”

You nod. “I know, I know.”

Roger chuckles. “You just really want to get things going, don’t you?”

“Yes.” You press your lips to his, and, now that you both know where things lie between you, you’re both eager to get to the next step. The kisses quickly become more feverish, hotter, deeper. Roger’s hands go to the back of your dress, working the zipper down your spine, and you shudder at the feeling of it. When he’s done, you sit back to yank it over your head, dropping it the floor behind you.

Roger’s eyes drink you in, his mouth hanging open. “Whoa.”

You flush under his gaze. You know you look good – you’d worn your push-up bra and matching lace underwear for a reason – but it’s still a rush to get a reaction like that.

“Bedroom?” Roger says, his voice a touch weak, and you nod, leaning in to steal one last kiss before climbing off him, taking his hand and pulling him to his feet. He groans slightly as he does so, and you giggle.

“I know, I know, I’m old,” he says.

“No, I like it,” you say, tugging him closer to you and hooking a finger of your other hand through a belt loop on his jeans. “Dad noises.”

Roger shakes his head, his hands coming to rest on your waist, and you lean into the touch. “Don’t say that,” he grumbles. “Makes me feel even older.”

“You’re not old,” you say, rolling your eyes. “You’re not even forty.”

Roger laughs. “Ah, yes, a real spring chicken.”

“Can you stop whining and fuck me already? I’m gonna be forty by the time we get to it.”

Roger snorts. “Cheeky.” He leans in to kiss you, and you curl your arms around his neck, pressing into him.

When you break apart, you take Roger’s hand again, and he leads you to his bedroom, both of you stumbling slightly in the dark house. You’re only in your underwear, but you’re still wearing your heels, and you feel like you’re in some kind of Victoria Secret ad.

Roger keeps glancing back at you, his eyes sweeping your body, and he’s so distracted he almost runs into a wall at one point, and you have to tug on his arm to pull him out of the way, laughing as you do so. He retaliates by pushing you up against the wall and kissing you senseless, his thigh slotted between yours. You’re lightheaded and unbelievably turned on by the time he breaks away again, and it feels like a lifetime before you reach his bedroom.

Roger switches on the light.

The double bed is unmade, but the room itself is fairly tidy, just a pair of shoes and a shirt on the floor. The whole room screams tax-paying adult, and you’re reminded again that the man you’re about to sleep with is, in fact, a proper adult. Not like you, an adult by the loosest terms imaginable, but a fully-grown man with children and a mortgage and a career, probably. A completely different world to yours.

But none of that will matter when you’re both naked.

He closes the door behind him, and then you’re pouncing on him, pushing his shirt off his shoulders and all but tearing his belt off. His hands are tight on your hips, and when you undo his belt and the button and fly on his jeans, he pants, “Bed, bed, go sit on the bed.”

You do as you’re told, sitting on the edge of the bed and crossing one knee over the other, taking the opportunity to quickly tie your hair back out of your face while and Roger fumbles with the rest of his clothes, kicking off his shoes and pulling off his socks and jeans. You can tell that he would’ve been thin as a twig back in the day, and you’d easily call him slender even now, but his body is soft, the sign of a father who’s spent more time taking care of the kids and having a beer in the evenings to wind down than going to the gym. It suits him, looks good on him. You’re certainly a big fan.

Soon, he’s down to nothing but his boxer-briefs. His boxer-briefs, which are neon green.

You break out into a grin, and Roger looks down at them, sighing. “Of all the fucking pairs I could’ve put on today,” he mutters.

“They’re pretty great,” you say, and you make sure you have Roger’s full attention before you uncross your legs, spreading your knees wide, leaning back on your hands, “but I’m more interested in what’s underneath them.”

From the look on Roger’s face, you’d guess his legs are about to give out from under him. “You’re gonna fucking kill me,” he huffs, and he hurries over.

Grinning, you scramble backwards on the bed, lying down, and he crawls after you, over you, and his kiss is bruising.

Your hands are shaking now – with excitement and with nerves, a lot of nerves – but you ignore that, and worm your fingers inside his underwear, wrapping your hand around him and giving him a tug.

He jerks, and you have a moment of panic where you think you’ve done the wrong thing, but then he kisses you with more fervour, so you do it again. This time, his hand finds yours, gently guiding you away.

“Did I do something wrong?” you ask.

Roger looks confused for a moment, and then says, “God, no. I just don’t want to get too worked up before we get to, y’know, the main event.”

“Oh,” you say, smiling in relief.

“You really have no experience at all, do you?” Roger says, sounding almost disbelieving.

“That’s what I’ve been saying,” you say. “It hasn’t all been some elaborate ruse to get into your pants. Literally all I have is some vague, theoretical ideas on how this works. And I know the mechanics. But that’s it. So you’re gonna have to be patient with me.”

“That’s fine by me,” Roger says. He chuckles. “It’ll make everything I do seem much more magical than it really is.”

“Sure,” you say mock-condescendingly.

Roger laughs, and he looks so wonderful when he’s laughing that you can’t help but smile, your hand reaching up to comb through his hair.

He notices the look in your eye, your smile, and he smiles back in a way that makes your stomach squirm and your fingers and toes tingle.

He kisses you, and the squirming in your stomach grows into full-blown butterflies, big Amazonian ones, and you begin to have an inkling that, oh no, this could be bad. This could be very bad indeed.

It’s probably nothing. He’s just hot, and nice, and funny, so you’re excited to have sex with him. That’s it. You’re a duckling that’s imprinted on its mother. Except you’re a human, and Roger’s the first person you’re having sex with, not your mother.

Not the best analogy you’ve come up with. You can’t blame yourself, though – the way Roger’s kissing you is turning your brain into mush.

He presses a kiss to just under your ear, and then kisses all the way down your throat, and you tilt your head back. “Feels so good,” you murmur.

You can feel Roger smile against your skin.

He keeps going, kissing the hollow at the base of your throat, further down still, and you bite your bottom lip. He presses a kiss to the top of your right breast, and then looks up at you. “Can I take your bra off?”

You nod eagerly, and he moves back so you can sit up. “Oh, I’ve still got my shoes on,” you said.

“I’ve noticed,” Roger says, and you chuckle.

“As super sexy as they are, I do wanna take them off,” you say.

Roger ducks forward to drop a kiss to your neck, and the butterflies are back, and you can feel your cheeks going pink. You want to hide your face, but Roger’s right there, and you can’t look away from his eyes. “How about you take your bra off,” he says, “and I’ll get your shoes.”

“You don’t have to take my shoes off for me,” you say.

“Well, I want to,” he says simply, and shuffles down, climbing off the bed. He gestures for you to shift forward, and you do, until your feet are hanging off the bed, your knees hooked over the edge. Roger gets onto his knees – he makes a dad noise as he does so, and you giggle again – and fiddles with the buckle on one of your shoes.

You take a moment to watch him, biting your lip, smiling, and then reach behind you and unhook your bra, slipping it from your shoulders.

He doesn’t look up right away, and you’re thankful for a moment to get your head around the fact that you’ve never been completely topless in front of anyone before. You’re self-conscious about the grooves the bra has dug into your skin, about the way your breasts look without the aid of the push-up, and you almost go to cross your arms over yourself, but then Roger glances up, and his hands go still. “Bloody hell,” he breathes. “You’re gorgeous.”

You tuck your hair behind your ear. “Thanks,” you say in a small voice, unsure how else to respond.

Roger shakes his head, and focuses back on the shoe, making quick work of it and easing it off your foot, setting it down beside him. He moves onto the other shoe. “Talk about winning the fuckin’ lottery,” he says.

“I could say the same,” you say.

Roger stops again, looking to you, and then smiles, looking back to the shoe. His ears have gone red.

He takes the second shoe off and places it beside the first, then presses light kisses to the inside of your knee. He moves further up your leg, up your thigh, and you realise you’re holding your breath. His arms are curled around underneath your legs.

Roger looks up at you, his thick eyelashes making him look almost angelic. “Is this all right?” he says. “If I…?”

He’s asking if he can eat you out. Oh, God, he’s asking if he can eat you out. He wants to put his mouth and tongue there, and maybe his fingers, too, and no one’s ever done that before.

You nod eagerly. Maybe a little too eagerly, as Roger laughs.

You feel your stomach cave in on itself in embarrassment. “Actually, no thanks,” you say, trying to pull your legs back. “Changed my mind.”

“No, no, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to laugh,” Roger says, still chuckling. He coaxes your legs back to where they were, and kisses your thigh. “It was just the look on your face.”

“You’re doing a terrible job of wooing me,” you say, aiming for resolute and chastising, but it comes out sounding more weedy and humiliated.

“I’m sorry,” Roger says again, and his hands stroke your legs soothingly. “I am. I didn’t mean to make you feel embarrassed.” He smiles, a glint in his eye, and you’re momentarily left breathless. “Can I… make it up to you?”

You can’t help but smile back, rolling your eyes. “Wow. Cheesy.”

“Thank you,” Roger says. “I’m going to be honest, as fun as this banter is, my knees aren’t going to last forever.”

You splutter a laugh. “Yes, yes, okay, yes please.”

Roger surges up off the floor to press a firm kiss to your lips, and you take a moment to wonder just how dodgy his knees really are if he can do something like that, or whether he was just looking for a convenient segue into getting your underwear off. You’re not fussed either way.

Roger kisses your collarbone, and then pulls back, hooking his fingers into your underwear. “Lift your hips up for me, love?”

The pet name makes heat pool between your legs. Oh, Jesus.

“Mm-hm,” you say, hoping it sounds more nonchalant to him than it does to your own ears, and lie back to lift your hips, and he slides your underwear down your legs and drops them near your shoes.

You expect him to go back to his knees straight away, but he holds himself above you, kissing you, deep and slow, making you whimper into his mouth. One hand holds himself up, and the other one massages your hip, his thumb kneading your skin. Relaxing you, you realise. You let yourself get lost in the kiss, and you’re only partially aware when Roger’s hand moves from your hip to your thigh, brushing over your skin.

You’re extremely aware, however, when his fingers stroke through your folds for the first time.

Despite yourself, you jump, and Roger murmurs, “Sorry,” but you shake your head to dismiss his concerns, and pull him in again.

For a few moments it’s strange, feeling someone’s else hand there, and you’re very conscious of how wet you are, and you wonder if it’s something you should be embarrassed about, but then Roger circles your clit, and suddenly all your worries seem very far away.

It feels… good. Really fucking good. Roger’s fingers are rougher than yours, but they’re clearly experienced in how they move.

You push your hips up against Roger’s hand, wanting more, and Roger complies, his fingers moving just a touch more roughly, and he ducks his head to nuzzle at your throat, kissing it, nipping lightly.

“Oh, God,” you moan to the ceiling, overwhelmed already, and you almost laugh at how surprised you sound. Your hand grips Roger’s hair, and you hope it’s not too hard, but you couldn’t let go if you tried.

Then Roger’s hand is gone, and you let out a choked sound at the sudden stop. You try to gather your thoughts to ask why, but then Roger is kissing down your body. Oh, man, you think, unable to conjure up anything else, and Roger chuckles, and you realise you said it out loud, but you don’t have time to be embarrassed, as Roger takes one of your nipples into his mouth, his tongue swirling around it, his teeth tugging at it, and you gasp.

“I’ve never… That’s new,” you say weakly, hissing when Roger runs the flat of his tongue over your nipple.

Roger pulls off to ask, “Do you like it?”

“Yeah,” you say. “Yeah, uh-huh.”

“Good.” He goes back to his task, and you arch off the bed slightly.

“So good,” you breathe. Roger switches to the other nipple, and you moan appreciatively.

Eventually, both to your dismay and your excitement, he draws away, and presses a single kiss to the space between your breasts. “You’re fucking stunning,” he says, and then he moves back to climb off the bed, setting himself between your thighs.

You struggle to wrap your head around it. How he could be making you feel this good, and then still compliment you, as if you’ve done anything to deserve it?

Roger doesn’t waste time talking now. He kisses the inside of your thigh, and then he dives straight in, his tongue nudging your clit as it pushes through your folds. You suck in a sharp gasp, your hand gripping his hair tightly. Your other hand flails, grappling at the sheets as he starts to find a rhythm. You wind up pressing the back of it to your mouth, trying to muffle the sounds you’re making, trying to gather some sort of control, because right now you feel like you’re falling head-first off a cliff, and Roger has complete power over how you land.

He does something with his mouth – you couldn’t tell for the life of you what it is – and your hips buck against your will. “Sorry,” you blurt out, and it comes out broken and breathless.

Roger just adjusts one of his arms, bracing it across your hips, holding you down, and you moan. His other hand joins his mouth, sliding a finger into you. “Oh, fuck,” you whisper, and then your hand returns to its position, keeping you somewhat quieter.

It doesn’t take long before Roger’s working in a second finger, pumping them in and out of you, and the sound of it is so obscene that it makes your face go bright red. You’re climbing towards an orgasm, frighteningly quickly, and when a third finger squeezes in beside the first two, you very nearly come, but the sting of the stretch is enough to keep it at bay.

But then your body relaxes around the three fingers, and Roger crooks them just so and sucks on your clit, and you move your hand away from your mouth to say in a rush, “I’m– I’m so close, I’m gonna come, fuck, ah, shit,” and then–

Then Roger is gone, his fingers and mouth are gone, and you’re left teetering on the brink of an orgasm, feeling like the air has been punched out of you.

“Wh– Roger?” you say, your head a mess. You prop yourself up on your elbows to see Roger still between your legs, but instead he’s massaging your thighs with his thumbs, dropping light kisses to your soft skin.

He smiles up at you, his nose and chin glistening. “Thought we could try something.”

You shake your head to try to clear it. “But I was just about to…”

You can still feel the urge. Another minute, and you’ll be there. But the longer you wait, the more the feeling fades. It makes you want to punch a wall.

Roger hums. “I know. That’s the point.”

You frown, trying to wrap your head around it. “You… don’t want me to?”

“Not yet.”

It finally clicks. “You’re gonna do that to me a couple more times before you make me come, aren’t you?”

Roger’s smile widens into a grin. “That’s the plan. If you’re on board.”

“I’m on board,” you say. “As long as when I do come, it blows my fucking mind.”

“That’s really the point of it, love.” Roger keeps eye contact with you as he leans forward to press a kiss to your core, and you shudder. “And move your hand away from your mouth. You don’t have to be quiet. The more sounds you make, the better.”

“When am I gonna get my hands on you?” you ask. “I’ve barely even touched your dick yet.”

Roger huffs a laugh, and you can feel his breath against you. “We’re getting there,” he says easily. “Good things come to those who wait.”

“Ugh, that’s such a dad thing to say,” you bemoan, lying back down.

Roger laughs again, and then his mouth and hands return to where you so desperately need them. You suck in air through your teeth. “Fuck, Roger.”

Roger moans, and you jerk at the sensation.

He brings you to the edge once more, and, even though you don’t tell him when you’re about to come, he knows, and leaves you hanging once again. So close, so close, but not close enough.

You feel like crying. Or kicking him in the face.

You moan helplessly, slinging an arm over your eyes, your legs trembling as Roger smiles against your thigh – you can feel it. A smug smile that makes your blood boil and your core throb even more than it already is.

Then his fingers push into you for a third time, and his tongue licks through you, but this time it’s slow, painfully slow, not enough to make you come but enough to keep your head lost in the clouds, enough to make your stomach clench and twist, desperately searching for something. It’s enough to make you grind your teeth together. “God, fuck, I need to come,” you sob against the palm of your hand, your thighs trying to clench around Roger’s ears, but his arm is in the way, keeping your hips still.

His tongue drags against your clit, steady and unhurried, and the gasping whine that rips itself from your throat is piercing to your ears. Not even your hand could muffle it.

“There we go,” Roger says, and does it again.

You squirm. “Roger, fuck, please, I wanna come so bad.”

Roger’s fingers still move in and out of you at a leisurely pace, but he uses his mouth to say, “You wanna come?”

“Yes,” you say miserably. “Please, I need to.”

His thumb presses against your clit, and you bite your bottom lip, your body twisting.

“Christ,” Roger breathes. “That’s a fucking sight.”

“Fuck me,” you beg. “Anything, just please.”

Roger takes his hand away, standing and wiping his face on the back of his hand, and you swear. He kicks off his boxer-briefs. His cock is hard and red, swollen, leaking. You sit up and zero in on it like it’s a four-course meal and you haven’t eaten in days. You scramble off the bed, dropping to your knees in front of him.

“Fucking hell,” he says, clearly not expecting you to do that.

“Can I suck you off?” you ask desperately, resisting the urge to just shove your mouth around his dick without further preamble. “I’ll do a good job, I promise. Just tell me what to do. I’m a fast learner.” You curl your fist around him, sucking the head into your mouth.

Roger makes a strangled sound, his hips bucking slightly. “Wait, wait, wait,” he says quickly, guiding your head away with a hand on your head.

You pull back, but keep your hand where it is. “Just fuck my mouth,” you say, gazing up at him. “I dunno how that works, but I can keep it open.” You do so, sticking your tongue out, silently begging with your eyes.

Roger chuckles softly to himself, running a hand through his hair. “You’re gonna make me come just from running your mouth like that.”

You open your mouth wider.

“Or from just doing that,” Roger says. He pries your hand away from his dick, using it to pull you to your feet.

He kisses you, a hungry kiss, a you’re doing so well kiss, and it makes you preen. “But I want to fuck you,” he says. “I’ve had my dick sucked before; you’ve never been fucked.”

“I’ve never sucked a dick before, either, though,” you reason.

“Well, hit me up next time you’re in the neighbourhood,” Roger jokes. Before you can reply, he kisses you again, and you drink him in greedily, palming at his cock until his kisses grow sloppy, messy, more teeth and tongue, and he has to snatch your wrist. “Let me get inside you first,” he growls. “Good God.”

“I like it when you’re bossy,” you say, teasingly.

Roger hums, his eyes dark. “You need that attitude fucked right out of you.”

“Do it,” you say fervently, grinning in delight when he grabs your other wrist as well to stop you from touching him. “Do it, do it, do it. Fuck it right out me. I need it. Never had anyone try to fuck anything out of me before.”

Roger shudders. “Jesus.”

You half-heartedly try to tug your wrists back, but he holds them tightly. “Fuck me till I can’t walk,” you say. “Come on.”

Roger takes a breath, and then lets your wrists go. “Bed. Now.”

You scramble to obey, clenching your thighs together at the sight of Roger. He looks wrecked already, his hair a mess, his skin flushed, his eyes glassy, his lips red. He goes to his bedside table and digs out a bottle of lube and some condoms. “Maybe should check the date on these,” he mutters to himself, and squints at the packets in his hands. After a few moments of peering at them, he sighs in frustration, and reaches for the pair of glasses on the table that you hadn’t noticed before. He slips them on, and then nods at the packets. “They’re fine.”

He goes to take the glasses off, but you say, “Wait, show me.”

He turns to you. “Show you what?”

Fuck, he looks gorgeous in those glasses. They’re large, round ones, with delicate silver frames, and you make a soft sound. “Oh, wow.”

“I know, they’re horrendous,” Roger says, taking off the glasses and setting them down. “My eyesight’s always been shite, but I can’t stand wearing the bloody things.”

“No, you look great,” you say. “So great, in fact, that I need you to get the condom on so you can fuck me literally right now.”

Roger raises his eyebrows. “You what?”

“I’m dying here, Roger,” you say loudly, smacking the bed beside you. “You look hot as fuck in those glasses, and I’m so insanely horny that I’m about to explode. I need your dick in me right now.”

Roger grins, and rips open the condom packet. “All right. Jeez.”

“Let me do it,” you say, crawling over to him and taking the condom from him.

“You’ve ever done it before?” he asks.

“Not since we had to at school when I was, like, fifteen.” You do it carefully, to the best of your memory. Your mouth waters being so close to his cock. “Is this right?”

“Yeah, perfect,” Roger says. “You look incredible, by the way.”

You look up at Roger, and the butterflies return. You’re left momentarily speechless, but it doesn’t matter, because Roger leans down and kisses you. His hand rests against your collarbones, and you get another idea in your head. You rise up into a kneel, keeping his lips on yours, and then you take his hand, pressing it against your throat: a silent invitation.

Roger moans into your mouth, and applies some pressure, just a bit, testing the waters.

It makes your core ache, and you kiss him harder, so he presses harder in return. His palm is warm against your throat, and you keep one hand loosely around his wrist, the other hand in his hair, as it is wont to do.

You end up lying back on the bed, Roger pressing his hand against your throat as you gasp and squirm.

“You like this, don’t you?” Roger says, fingers on his other hand dipping into your folds. “Fuck, feel how wet you are.”

You nod desperately. Your mouth is hanging open, and your head is starting to swim.

“Is that all for me, love?”

You whimper, nodding again. You can hear your heartbeat in your ears.

Roger lets go of your throat, and you gasp, your eyes wide. “More,” you say immediately. “More. Fuck me like that.”

Roger smiles, keeping his palm against your throat, but brushes his thumb across your skin. His other hand curls around your knee. “Your enthusiasm is… mind-blowing,” he says with a chuckle, “but just take a moment, yeah? You’re all over the shop. Slow down a bit.”

“I don’t wanna slow down,” you protest, grabbing onto his forearm.

“We’ve got time, love. It doesn’t have to be over so quickly.”

“You can’t tease me like that, almost make me come, like, three times, and then tell me to slow down,” you say. “I need you, Roger. Christ, I need you. Show me what it’s like, show me how good my first time can be.”

Roger’s pupils are blown wide, and he lets out a shaky breath. He swallows. “Spread your legs.”

You grin, and do so. Roger lets go of your throat and leans over you on all fours to kiss you briefly. “I’m not choking you while I fuck you,” he says. “I want you to feel all of it, not have your head somewhere else.”

You nod vigorously.

Roger reaches for the lube. You hold out your hand, and he raises an eyebrow at you, but pours some into your hand. You reach forward and slide your fist up and down his cock, spreading the lube. He groans and shudders, and then he says, “That’s enough, that’s enough, I want to fuck you.”

You take your hand away, wiping the lube on the sheets, Roger surges forward to capture your lips with his, and you feel the head of his cock nudging at your entrance. A shot of adrenaline explodes within you.

“Tell me if it hurts, okay?” Roger says, and you nod.

Then, slowly, he pushes into you, just an inch or two. You gasp at the stretch, gripping onto his arms, your mouth wide.

Roger stills, and nuzzles at your throat. “You okay?”

“Mm-hm,” you say, biting your lip. “Keep… Keep going.”

He does, rocking in shallowly, just going a little further each time. He’s panting against your neck, and you can feel your sweat pricking your skin. You can’t help but admire Roger’s back, the way the muscles move.

It feels good. Once you get over the initial shock to the system of having something that size inside you, you realise why you were so excited to get to this in the first place.

“I’m good,” you say, nails absentmindedly scratching the back of his neck. “It– It doesn’t hurt or anything.”

“You sure?” Roger asks, kissing your neck softly.

You can’t help but laugh. “Roger, for the love of all things holy, fuck me.”

He doesn’t need another invitation. He slams into you, and your eyes go wide, a tiny sound of surprise leaping out of you.

“Sorry,” Roger says, raising his head to kiss you in apology.

“Don’t fucking apologise, it feels good,” you say back. “Come on, come on.”

Roger laughs, and kisses you. You can feel his laughter against your lips, feel the way his smile changes the shape of his mouth, and that dangerously warm feeling in the pit of your stomach returns.

You could get used to this. Get used to Roger laughing against your lips as he’s buried inside you. Get used to teasing him, to turning him on, to rolling around in his bed.

As soon as the thoughts creep into your mind, you banish them. That’s not happening, you tell yourself harshly. This is a one-and-done deal. You can’t develop feelings for a man you’ve only met once. A man who is, by the way, in case you’ve forgotten, sixteen years older than you.

Then Roger pulls out halfway and drives back into you, and all you can think about is his dick.

Your hand goes back to your mouth, just like before, keeping yourself quiet as you moan and whimper. Your ankles hook over the small of Roger’s back.

But then Roger pauses, sitting up, and he unwraps your legs from around him and pushes one of your knees flat on the bed, keeping you spread out wide. “Hands away from your mouth, love,” he says. “Let me hear you. It’s okay, you can let go.”

Your face burns, and you cover it with both of your hands. It’s too big of an ask. You’ve never felt more vulnerable. “Roger…”

“[Y/N].”

You lower your hands. He’s watching you, his blue eyes burning with desire, but they’re soft, too. Understanding.

“Keep your eyes on me,” he says. “Hold onto the sheets, yeah? Can you do that for me?”

You nod, and, with no small amount of effort, let your arms go by your sides, your fists wrapping in the sheets.

Roger smiles. “You’re amazing.”

You turn your head away, overwhelmed.

“Eyes on me. Hey.”

You look back at him. Exposed. You’re exposed, in every sense of the word.

Roger braces himself on the bed beside your ribs, and, keeping one hand on your knee, holding it down, he starts fucking into you again, hard and deep.

The sound you make could best be described as a mewl, and it’s a sound you’ve never heard yourself make before. Your hands tighten in the sheets, fighting the urge to cover your face again. Roger’s eyes are still on yours, and it’s too much, you want to look away, but you can’t.

“So good for me,” Roger pants. “Fuck. God, you’re incredible.”

You whine. “Roger.”

“That’s it, love. Say my name.”

He thrusts into you at just the right angle, making your back arch. “Roger.”

Roger groans, and he lets go of your knee to circle his fingers around your clit. You gasp, your eyes finally breaking away from his to look to the ceiling, feeling yourself climbing rapidly for the fourth time that night.

“Let me come, let me come, please,” you beg, your arms straining as your fists pull on the sheets.

Roger leans forward again to kiss you, a mess of heavy breathing and tongues and lips brushing. You let go of the sheets to clutch onto him, pawing at his shoulders and back and hips, unable to settle on where you want to hold him.

One hand inevitably slides into his hair, and you grip onto it, tugging it hard. Roger’s rhythm stutters, and he groans out your name.

His fingers feel so fucking good, and, doubled with the way he’s stretched you out, tripled with how he edged you before, you just know how hard you’re going to come. You can feel it building deeper within you than you’ve ever felt before, like an impending tsunami.

Roger readjusts, sitting back again, his brow furrowed as he searches for just the right spot to hit you.

When he does, you cry out. “Right there, right there, fuck.”

Your hands scrabble for purchase, and one finds your own hair, burying itself, and you don’t pull, but you keep a firm grip on it, the slight pain being the only thing keeping you from losing yourself entirely. Your other hand finds the same spot as before in the sheets, and you sob, screwing your eyes shut.

“You close?” Roger asks, and you nod.

“Say it out loud, love.”

“Yes, I’m so close, I’m so close,” you gasp. You’re almost there, you can feel it, only inches away, moments away.

“Open your eyes, come on.”

You do, and meet his gaze. “Roger,” you whimper.

“You gonna come for me?”

“Y-yeah.”

“I wanna hear it, yeah? Wanna see you. See you come undone on my cock.”

And that’s the final nail in the coffin. You orgasm pulses through you, so hard that you convulse, and you wail, blurting out Roger’s name, clenching down on him. Your blood roars in your ears, and you’ve never come so hard in your life.

Roger moans out, “Fuck,” and then pumps once, twice more, and then comes, groaning your name, a shudder ripping through him.

When he comes back to himself, blinking his big blue eyes at you, you can’t help but think he looks otherworldly. His face, pink, shines with sweat, as does his whole body. Locks of hair stick to his forehead, his temples. His mouth hangs open, and his chest heaves, and maybe it’s the ten-out-of-ten orgasm you just had, but in that moment, you kinda want to marry him.

He takes the hand you’ve tangled in the sheets, and presses a kiss to your wrist. Your heart just about explodes. “You all right?”

You splutter. “All right? The fuck’s that meant to mean?”

Roger smiles, massaging the palm of your hand with his thumb. “I mean, are you hurting anywhere?”

My heart hurts from you being all hot and perfect and stupidly romantic, you think. “No,” you say. “I’m just fine.”

He pulls out of you, carefully, and it does nothing but reignite a spark of arousal within you. Then he collapses onto the bed beside you with an unmistakable dad noise, and takes off the spent condom, tying it off and tossing it into the rubbish bin beside his bed. When that’s done, he wastes no time in rolling onto his side and pulling you in for a kiss. You hum happily, shifting closer to him, not even caring about the sweat and how wet you are all over your inner thighs.

When he breaks away, he says, “So. How do you feel?”

“Like I just had the biggest orgasm of my life,” you say.

Roger chuckles. “I meant now that you’re, y’know…”

It clicks. “Now I’ve lost my virginity?” you say playfully. “Had my sexual debut? I’ve become a woman?”

“Not that any of it matters, of course,” Roger adds. “But it’s still… It can be a big thing.”

You give him a soft kiss. “Yeah, it doesn’t matter,” you say. “Virginity is nothing but a social construct and all of that.”

“Of course,” Roger reiterates.

“But I feel… happy.” You hope your grin isn’t as cheesy as it feels. “It’s nice to not have to… worry about it anymore, I suppose? I don’t know if I was really worrying about it before, but it… I don’t know.” You shrug. “I just had a really good time. That’s all that matters.”

“Good.” Roger’s hand goes to your hip, squeezing it. “I’m glad.”

“Did…” You lick your lips. “Did you have a good time?”

“Did I have a good time?” Roger repeats, almost aghast. “Are you joking?”

“Even though I had no idea what I was doing?”

“You’re a natural.”

You laugh. Your stomach squirms – both because of those ridiculous maybe-almost-could-be feelings, and because, even though you know in your mind that the whole sex part of the evening is over, your body certainly isn’t ready to throw in the towel just yet.

Your thighs clench together, but you do your best to hide how it feels. You don’t want to be greedy.

Roger feels your thighs move under his hand, though, and he looks to you questioningly. “Are you still–”

“No, no, I’m fine,” you say lightly, shaking your head. “I was just moving around.”

Roger pauses, and then says, “All right.” He kisses you, and then takes a moment to gather his energy before he sits up. “I’ll get us some water.” He turns to you, pointing a finger at you, as if something just occurred to him. “You should go pee.”

Your eyes widen, and you nod. “Oh, yes, good thinking.”

“Bathroom’s just there,” he says, gesturing across the room at the closed door.

“You have an en suite?”

“Well, yeah. Much easier when there’s kids around.” His face falls a little. “Not that I’ve had the kids here very often recently, but uh…”

“I’m sorry,” you say.

He shakes his head. “Sorry. It’s fine. Great way to bring down the mood, eh?” He leans down again to kiss you, and then stands up, stretching. “Be back in a mo’.”

You watch him, your gaze hawk-like, as he pulls on his neon-green underwear and disappears out the door, raking his hand through his hair as he goes.

Your thighs clench together again, and you whimper.

You try to push it aside, and slide off the bed to go the bathroom, pulling on your underwear as you go. You don’t exactly feel like putting your push-up bra back on, but you don’t want to just lounge around completely naked. Would it be too presumptuous to put on Roger’s shirt?

You bite your lip, considering, and then decide to just bite the bullet, slipping it on and buttoning it up. It’s comfy, and smells like him; you understand why women in movies do it now. You do have to call bullshit on wearing a man’s shirt like a short, cute dress though – it’s more just like a long shirt, and you’re glad you’ve chosen to put on underwear.

It feels odd to pee in a stranger’s house – even odder that it’s an en suite – but you’re thankful that you get a moment to properly gather yourself in private, instead of while being surrounded by the smell of sex.

It’s when you’re washing your hands that you finally get a look at yourself in the mirror. Your mouth drops open in horror.

You look like a fucking mess. Your foundation is patchy where you get oily and where you’ve sweated it off, and there’s a slight ring of smudged mascara under your eyes – honestly, you’re thankful that it’s not worse, and that your setting spray did at least something. Your hair, though, is the worst of it all. You look like you’ve been dragged through a bush backwards.

“Oh, shit,” you whisper to yourself. What can you do? You don’t have any make-up with you to try to fix the problems, but you can’t exactly take it off, either. You have no way to fix your hair. You untie it from the ponytail it was in and try to smooth it out, but it doesn’t really do much, so you tie it back up again, but it’s a shitty ponytail, so you untie it and try again. Then you try a third time, and give up, settling on the disaster that it is, and grab a tissue, blotting at your make-up.

You sigh, staring at your reflection. Well, fuck. What the fuck are you meant to do? How the hell can you go back into the bedroom, knowing you look like this?

“[Y/N]?” Roger calls. “You all right in there, love?”

You shiver. God, the way he says the word ‘love’. The way he says your name.

You clear your throat. “Um, yeah, I’m– I’m fine. Just…” You can’t say you’re still peeing. Oh, fuck, what if he thinks you’re taking a shit or something? “I’m just fixing up my make-up.”

“I think there might still be some make-up wipes in a drawer somewhere, if you want to have a look,” Roger says. “Maybe they’re no good anymore, I’m not sure.”

You have a dig around, and find a packet. It’s already been opened, quite a while ago by the looks of it. Must be Roger’s ex-wife’s.

The thought of that sits weirdly with you, but you’re not quite sure why. Almost like you feel like you’re intruding, maybe. You certainly don’t feel like you belong here, in this bougie, nice house.

You sigh again, and pull out a handful of make-up wipes, seeing if there’s any that still hold any moisture. One in the middle has a little bit, so you carefully run it under your eyes, and lightly tap it over your forehead and down your neck to soothe your skin, fixing up any problem areas as best you can without it being too obvious that you’ve just wiped off the make-up.

The end result is fine. Not good, and certainly not great, but… yeah. Fine.

You throw the make-up wipes into the bin, take a deep breath, and exit the bathroom.

Roger’s on his phone, and he looks up when he hears the door open. His face goes slack when he sees you. “You’re wearing my shirt?”

“Isn’t that what girls are meant to do after sex?” you joke.

“I just haven’t seen, um, anyone do that in… in a long time,” he says, somewhat stilted, and he glances down at his hands. He quickly turns his eyes back to you. “It looks good. Really good.”

“Thank you,” you say, and pad over to the bedside table near him, where he has two glasses of water waiting. “Which one’s mine?”

“On the left.” Roger sets his phone down and watches you as you take a sip of water.

He’s close to you, and, like before you kissed for the first time, you’re hyperaware of every movement. But he barely moves, just waits for you.

When you put the water down, you hesitate. You want to climb on top of him, kiss him, feeling his arms around you again, but is that too much? Does he want you to go? Are you overstaying your welcome?

“You all right?” he asks gently.

You nod. “Um, yeah,” you say, and take a step back. “You probably, um, have work or something tomorrow, so I should go.”

You don’t miss the way Roger’s face falls a bit. “Oh, you want to go?”

No. “Well, it– I don’t want to impose…”

“If you want to go, then I’ll order an Uber for you,” Roger says. “But don’t feel like you have to go if you don’t want to.”

The Amazonian butterflies are back yet again. “I…”

“Because – and correct me if I’m wrong,” Roger says, reaching out and tugging on his shirt, pulling you closer, and you go without any resistance, “but I think you were telling a bit of a fib before, when you said you were… what did you say? Just moving around?”

You press your lips together as Roger guides you between his legs, and he tilts his head back to gaze up at you. He smiles at the look on your face. “Am I right?”

You can feel your face heating up again. “No,” you mumble unconvincingly, hiding your smile behind your hand.

“No hands over mouths,” Roger murmurs, reaching up and taking yours. “You don’t have to hide.”

Fuck. Oh, fuck. His voice sounds like a warm fireplace feels, and you barely even know him, but you’ve never felt safer, more comfortable, around a man. You can’t pretend now – you’re really starting to like him.

Roger raises his eyebrows at you, just a touch, searching your face. “So? Am I right?”

“It’s fine,” you say, shaking your head. “I’m fine, really. You’ve done plenty, I… I can’t ask for more.”

Roger hums, and presses a kiss to your palm before letting your hand go. “All right, okay,” he says. “I was wrong, I see. Can I at least tell you what I’d do to you if I had been right?”

You breathe in shakily, and nod once.

The corner of Roger’s mouth quirks up. “Well,” he says slowly, “first I’d kiss you, of course. And, as hot as you look wearing nothing but my shirt and your knickers, I’d undress you again. Get you lying down on your back, all spread out for me. I’d kiss you some more. Then I think I’d choke you, because you seem to like that a lot, yeah?”

You nod, hypnotised.

Roger nods as well. “Right. And then, while I was holding you down by your throat–”

You gulp.

“–I’d get my other hand, and I’d–”

“Okay, yes, you were right,” you blurt out, and grab his face, ducking down to kiss him desperately. He kisses you with just as much hunger, and nudges you a few steps back, giving him enough room so he can stand up and start unbuttoning the shirt. As soon as he’s done, your shrug it from your shoulders, and Roger pulls you closer by your ass. One hand moves to cup your jaw, his tongue pressing against yours. It doesn’t take long before the hand shifts to your throat, and you whimper softly, urging him to tighten his grip.

He does, and the feeling of it goes straight to your core. Your hands clutch at him frantically.

He lets go of your throat, and you suck in a gasp, then latch onto his neck, kissing and nipping and sucking at his skin, licking off the salty traces of sweat.

“Careful, love, careful,” he says shakily. “I can’t turn up to work looking like I’ve been attacked by a vacuum.”

You huff, but soften your kisses. He moans under his breath, and you don’t think you’ve ever heard anything hotter.

Soon, you break away, and crawl back onto the bed, and he follows you, positioning himself on all fours above you to kiss you deeply, his knee slotting into between your thighs. He presses it against your core, and you instinctively grind against it, shuddering when it fires an electric shock of arousal through your system. Roger shifts, readjusting his balance so he can bring his hand back to your throat, and you welcome it. You grind against his leg again.

It’s when you have to stop kissing him, your brain going into overdrive trying to force you to focus on breathing, you have to breathe, that Roger sits back, moving his leg out of the way and replacing it with his other hand.

“Fuck, Roger,” you gasp, twitching under his grip, your hands vice-like on his forearm. Your eyes slide closed, revelling in the way your head swims, the way your body fights to suck as much oxygen as it can into your lungs. You’re still so wet from before, still so stretched out, that Roger slides two fingers into you at the same time with ease, and you let out a stuttering moan, bucking your hips into his hand. His fingers swirl around your clit, hitting it in just the right way, and within minutes you’re almost there.

“Most people think the best part about getting choked is the actual ‘getting choked’ part,” Roger says out of the blue, and you frown, trying to follow, opening your eyes.

“Hear me out,” Roger says casually, pushing his fingers back into you and flicking your clit with his thumb, and you whine. “Are you close, love?”

You nod.

Roger hums. “You look so good like this. Does it feel good?”

You nod again. “Mm-hm.”

“Yeah, looks like it does. Looks like you enjoy it.”

“Ah, Roger, please.”

“It’s all right, love, I’ve got you.” Roger’s fingers quicken their pace, and you make a sound, squirming.

“As I was saying,” Roger continues, “people think the best part of getting choked is actually getting choked. But it’s not. The best part of it is actually being let go. Do you want to see?”

You nod, barely even listening to what he’s saying. You’re too close to coming to pay attention.

And then Roger lets go of your throat at the same time he brushes your clit, and a rush of oxygen flows into your lungs, a rush of blood flows back to your head, and your orgasm slams into you, and the world seems so much brighter in that moment. “Oh, fuck, fuck,” you gasp, your back arching, your eyes wide.

It feels like it goes on for a lifetime, although perhaps that’s just your mind trying to sort itself out. When you do finally start to come down from your high, you realise you’re shaking, and Roger is grinning at you. You blink at him owlishly.

“Wh– Huh?” you breathe, your heart racing, and Roger laughs.

“So you’re alive, then,” he teases, and leans down to kiss you.

You grab onto him, kissing him soundly, and roll the both of you over, so you’re straddling him. You just stay like that, just making out, letting the frenzied kisses lull themselves into something slower, something calmer. Just kissing for the sake of it. Roger’s hands stroke up and down your back, and you could almost fall asleep like this.

Speaking of falling asleep – you have to break away, hiding your yawn by tucking your face into his chest. Roger hums, and you can feel it vibrating against your body. You smile. “Sorry,” you mumble.

“Can hardly blame you,” Roger says, his voice low. “It’s late.”

You let yourself slump against him, a moment of pure self-indulgence, and then roll to the side, dumping yourself onto the bed. You groan, unable to stop yourself from instinctively shifting into a more comfortable position for sleeping, your arm beneath your head like a pillow, your eyes closing.

“I’m sorry,” you say again, muffled by your arm. “I’ll leave in a minute.”

Roger says nothing, and you feel your stomach coil in guilt. God, he wanted you to leave fifteen minutes ago, didn’t he? He was just too polite to say anything. And then you pressured him into making you come again, because you were too selfish to know when enough was enough. Great, fucking great, you’ve fucked it all up, and you’re a huge piece of shit, and you–

“Did you want to stay the night?” Roger asks tentatively.

Your eyes fly open, and you shift up onto your elbow. “What?” you say. “Stay?”

Roger glances away from you. “It– It was just a suggestion,” he says. “Just an idea, I don’t know. I, um – it’s just late, and I don’t want you travelling all that way on your own. You can, obviously, if you want to, that’s up to you, I just…”

You’re hardly even listening. You’re still struggling to drink in the first thing he said. “You want me to stay?” you ask.

Roger looks to you, and bites his bottom lip. “If– Well, if you want to, then, um, yes, I’d like you to. But only if you want to.”

You beam, and your heart triples in size. “Um, yes. I’d like to.”

Roger smiles back. “Good. Great. That’s–” He clears his throat. “Did you want to have a shower?”

“I think so,” you say with a laugh. “I’m…” You went to say I’m so disgusting right now, but you don’t want to fuck up your now-sleepover before it’s even properly begun. “Yes please.”

“Well, you know where the bathroom is,” Roger says, nodding towards the en suite. “There’s a spare toothbrush in the drawer, if I remember correctly. I’ll get you a towel.”

“You’re not coming into the shower with me?” you ask coyly.

Roger blinks, and you laugh.

“Oh,” he says. “You were joking.”

“I wasn’t,” you say. “You just made me laugh.”

Roger swoops down to steal a kiss, and you don’t let him leave, pushing up into him, stealing a few kisses back.

“Let me get you a towel,” he says, and then climbs off the bed and pads out of the room.

You bite on your finger to stop yourself from making some stupid giggle, or maybe a dumb squealing sound like a little girl. He asked you to stay the night. He wants you to stay the night.

Oh, shit, you realise, your finger dropping from your mouth. Justine. You never told her what was happening.

Where’s your phone? In the living room. Spitting out a curse, you pull on your underwear and Roger’s shirt again, and hurry out. You run into Roger, arms full of sheets, in the hallway. “Hey, is everything all right?” he says. “What did you forget?”

“I never told my roommate I wasn’t coming home,” you say. “Last she heard, I was about to book an Uber.”

Roger’s eyes go a little wider. “Shit, whoops. Yeah, go tell her.”

You shoot him a smile, and scurry off to the living room. Your phone is on the couch, and you snatch it up. Wow, shit, it is late. You’re glad you only have an afternoon lecture tomorrow.

Thankfully, just one message from Justine, from about half an hour ago. hey, haven’t heard from u in a while. just send me a message when u get this ok? xx

You respond. fuck sorry, left my phone in the other room. I have SO MUCH to tell u omg, but in a nutshell uhh we ended up sleeping together, it was fucking amazing, and now he’s asked me to stay over, so ill see u at uni tomorrow maybe? if not then at home xx

You keep your phone in hand, and head back to Roger’s room. He’s started cleaning up in the minute you were gone, stripping the bed. Fresh sheets sit on the floor. “What’s this?” you ask.

“I’m making the bed,” Roger says simply, tugging a pillow from its case. “I’m too old to be sleeping on sheets I’ve just had sex on. Let me tell you, it makes a difference. And the sheets were due for a change, anyway.”

You step forward. “Well, let me help.”

“Don’t be silly, jump in the shower.”

“Don’t tell me what to do.” You set your phone down beside his on the bedside table, and together the two of you help remake his bed.

Roger chases you into the shower then, and says he’s going to tidy up the room a little more before he joins you. “I’m on a roll now,” he says, picking up your shoes from where you kicked them aside during the bed-making. “Can’t stop, won’t stop.”

You take the make-up wipes. The door is about halfway open, and you can hear Roger moving around, hear when he trips over something and hisses out a curse, making you smile.

The make-up wipe freezes in the air near your eye. You can’t very well have a shower and go to bed without taking your make-up off – it does not make even a vague semblance of a pretty picture – but this is… way more intimate than you were expecting. Why didn’t you think of this when you agreed to stay over? Roger’s going to see you without your make-up on, with your hair tied up in a bun. He’s going to see you in the morning, all bleary-eyed and disgusting. Fuck, morning breath. You have the spare clothes you brought that you can change into tomorrow, but no extra underwear. Nothing to wear tonight. It’s a miracle that Roger even has a spare toothbrush. What time does he get up for work? Will he expect you to leave before he wakes up?

Are you a one-night-stand? Is that what this is? Are you asked to stay the night if you’re nothing but a one-night-stand, or does the fact that he asked you mean something else?

“Is your roommate all right?” Roger asks, coming to the door, leaning against the doorjamb. “No freak-outs?”

You lower the make-up wipe. “Um, no. It’s all fine, I think.”

“Have you found the toothbrush?”

“No, I haven’t checked yet.”

Roger moves around you, pulling open the drawer and rummaging through. “Ah, here it is. Still in the packet! How good am I?”

You smile as he presents it to you like it’s a medal of honour. “Thanks.”

“Sorry about the make-up wipes,” Roger says. “They’re not great.” He huffs, and then leans against the edge of the sink, rubbing his hands down his face. “I’m sorry,” he says again. “I’m… I’m actually really nervous.”

Your eyebrows shoot up. “Nervous?” you repeat. “About what?”

“About… you staying over,” he confesses. “It’s been, I don’t know, ten years since I’ve had anyone new sleep over. My brain is suddenly filled with every annoying thing I do when I sleep. And I look awful in the mornings, let me tell you. If you think I look bad now, just you wait.”

“Who says I think you look bad now?” you say. “I thought I made it perfectly clear that I think you’re a hot piece of ass, Roger.”

Roger splutters, flustered, and you grin.

“I move around a lot,” he says. “When I sleep. So be prepared to cop an elbow to the face.”

“Don’t you worry, I’m a heavy sleeper,” you say. “And I move around, too.”

“I run hot,” Roger adds. “I’m like a space heater. And sometimes I talk in my sleep, but only when I’m really stressed about something, like work. I can be really very clingy.”

“I run cold,” you say with a shrug. “So clingy suits me fine.”

Roger pauses, staring at you, like he wasn’t expecting an answer like that. Then he snaps out of it, glancing away. “Sorry,” he says for a third time.

“Don’t apologise,” you say, shaking your head. “You don’t have to. I’m nervous, too. Like, really fucking nervous. I’m– I’m too nervous to even take my make-up off.”

Roger’s eyes search your face. “I won’t care what you look like,” he says gently. “I’m sorry that you feel nervous about taking it off. But it won’t matter, I promise.”

“Just wait and see,” you joke in a sing-song voice.

Roger is silent for a few moments, and then he says, “Well, I hope you’re ready. I’m going to kiss the bloody daylight out of you when you take it off.”

You don’t know how to respond. “You don’t have to do that.”

“I’m going to. I’m going to do whatever it takes to make sure you don’t feel uncomfortable without make-up on. And if that means I have to keep kissing you all night as a reminder that it doesn’t matter what you look like without make-up, then that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.”

You duck your head, making a disgruntled sound. Why does he have to say cute shit like that? Why must he make you suffer?

Roger pushes the packet of make-up wipes a little closer to you, waggles his eyebrows at you, making you giggle, and then reaches across you for his toothbrush.

You start wiping off your make-up.

Roger waits until you’ve finished taking it off, until you’ve brushed your teeth, until you’re well and truly left without anything to do, and then he cups your face in his hands and does exactly what he promised he’d do.

One steamy make-out session and one far-too-long shower later, you’re sitting on the newly-made bed, wrapping in a towel, the strands of hair that slipped loose from your bun sticking to your neck and temples. You’re watching Roger pull on a pair of underwear and rifle through his chest of drawers. He pulls out a huge shirt, clearly worn and well-loved, and turns to you, holding it out. “I went on a day trip once to Brighton,” he says. “We were out to a pub and I spilled red wine all over my shirt. Had to buy a new one. Sent one of my mates to get it for me and he came back with this. Hence why I have a shirt about five sizes too big for me.”

“You didn’t have to explain,” you say with a chuckle, taking it from him.

“I feel like I did,” Roger says. “I, um, usually use it as a sleep shirt when I travel.”

You slip it on, and then stand up, letting your towel drop to the floor. The shirt is long enough to cover everything, but you’re not about to bend down any time soon.

You glance over at your underwear, where they’re in a pile near the door. Should you put them back on?

“Please don’t,” Roger blurts.

You look to him. “Huh?”

His face goes red. “Um. I just– I– You– I saw you look over there, and–” He rubs his hand along his jaw. “I, um…” He looks to the ceiling, and says it in a rush. “I’m sorry this sounds awful but I saw you looking over at your knickers and I don’t want you to put them on because you look really hot wearing my shirt and the thought of you wearing nothing underneath makes my brain explode.”

“You’re one to talk,” you say, “standing in front of me in nothing but a pair of boxers like that doesn’t make my brain explode.”

Roger’s eyes flick towards yours, and he breaks out into a smile, and then laughs. “I guess we’re even, then.”

“We’ll be truly even when I see you wearing my clothes,” you say teasingly.

Roger steps in close, his hands coming to your waist. “I don’t think your dress would fit properly, love.”

“I’ll have to come better prepared next time,” you say, and Roger hums, leaning in to give you a kiss.

Next time. Next time. You said ‘next time’. Talk about presumptuous. Christ! What is wrong with you?

You break away. “Not that I think there’ll be a next time,” you say quickly. No. Bad phrasing. “I don’t want to assume there’ll be a next time.” Still bad. “I don’t want you to think that I think there has to be a next time.” Even worse. “I don’t want you to feel obliged to have a next time if you don’t want there to be.” Better. Not great, but passable.

“I want a next time,” Roger says. “If you want one.”

“I do,” you say, God, far too eager. “I’d really like there to be a next time.”

“Me too,” Roger says.

You press into him for another kiss, and then, finally, the two of you make it to bed.

Once you’re under the covers, you almost fall asleep immediately. You didn’t realise how exhausted you are. Roger reaches over and switches off the light, and then wraps an arm around your stomach, his front against your spine. You allow yourself to smile freely in the dark, even as your eyes close and you drift off to sleep.

~~~

“I’m… I’m going to send you the rest of the payment,” Roger says. He’s dressed for work, just in a white dress shirt and black slacks, and you’d been admiring him and enjoying the coffee he’d made you after you’d gotten out of the shower. It’s early – too early, for both of you.

But now your stomach drops, and you lower your mug of coffee from your lips. “You are?”

“Yes,” Roger says.

“You don’t have to,” you say. “I said it last night, I don’t care about the money.”

“I know,” Roger says. “But it’s still right. You started this whole thing to help pay the bills, and it’s not your fault that there was that whole mix-up. You don’t deserve to miss out on getting the money you’ve rightfully earned.”

“You don’t deserve to fork out that much money because of that whole mix-up,” you say. “You’ve already paid half of it. And it’s– it’s quite a fair bit, Roger.”

“I can afford to pay it,” Roger says. “I’m living more than comfortably. Giving you the money you’ve earned would just mean that I can’t, I don’t know, travel overseas this year.” He raises his eyebrows a touch. “Well, now that I might not have to be paying for three kids as well, maybe I’ll still be able to afford to go.” He shakes his head. “That’s beside the… My point is, I can afford it. And you deserve it.”

You don’t know what to say. “Roger…”

“Just let me,” he says earnestly. “Please. I want to.”

You open and close your mouth a few times. God, you’d be mad to turn down the money. But it doesn’t feel right. Does it? You don’t even know what to think.

You glance down at your mug. “All right,” you say quietly, so much so that you’re not even sure if he can hear you. But you can’t bring yourself to speak any louder. “Thank you, Roger.”

“Hey.”

You look up at him, and he smiles. “You can pay me back by letting me take you out to dinner.”

Your face immediately grows hot. “Suave motherfucker,” you say, and he laughs.

“I still have a few tricks up my sleeve,” he says playfully.

Your stomach squeezes. “Sure,” you say. “But I’m paying.”

Roger snorts. “Not bloody likely.”

“I’ll fight you for the cheque, don’t think I won’t.”

“Maybe I’ll just sneakily pay for it before you’ve even realised.”

You narrow your eyes at him. “Can we settle on going Dutch?”

Roger sips his coffee. “All right,” he says eventually.

“Good.”

He takes out his phone, holding it out to you. “Text me some time during this week,” he says. “About where you want to go. Or just text me if you want to say hi. Or call me. Y’know, whatever.”

You tilt your head to the side as you take his phone. “That wasn’t quite as suave, I have admit.”

Roger sighs. “Damn.”

You laugh, and send a quick text to yourself, then slide the phone back to him.

He seems extremely pleased, but he takes a casual drink from his coffee like he’s trying to hide it, and you can’t help but think it’s horribly cute.

He shoots a glance at you, and sees you grinning at him, and his cheeks turn pink, and he clears his throat, turning away to the sink to rinse his mug out.

~~~

You’re at uni, half-asleep, shuffling back to the bus stop after your never-ending lecture, when Justine barrels into you, grabbing your elbow so tightly that you yelp. “What the fuck happened last night?” she exclaims.

You don’t know why it hadn’t been awkward this morning. Apart from the money conversation. There had still been some nervousness, on your part anyway, but Roger had been too focused on getting ready for work to let any uncomfortable silences hang. You have to admit that it had been nice to wake up with someone’s arm around you, and you had been quietly delighted to see Roger fussing over the faint bruises on his neck, pulling up his shirt collar and adjusting his tie to try to cover them. After you’d both gotten ready for the day, he’d dropped you at the nearest bus stop. “And I will text you,” he’d said seriously. “Don’t think I won’t.”

“Good,” you’d said. “I’ll be waiting for it. Three days is the general rule, right?”

Roger had groaned. “Don’t make me wait three days.”

You had chuckled. “I’m not making you do anything.” You’d hesitated, and then said, “Is it weird if I kiss you before I go?”

Roger had taken a breath. “I… wouldn’t say so, no.”

So you’d leant in and kissed him, and he’d kissed you back, and you’d wanted to keep kissing him, but a car had pulled up behind you and honked, so you’d drawn back, whispered, “Bye,” and gotten out of the car.

Once you’d figured out how to get home, you’d crashed, sleeping until your alarm had woken you up again for your lecture.

“Stuff,” you say to Justine.

“Stuff?” Justine squawks. “Don’t give me that shit. You have to tell me literally everything, or I’m going to kill you. Come on.” She loops her arm through yours, and starts towing you towards the bus stop.

Your phone buzzes, and you pull it out of your pocket.

I know it hasn’t been three days, but it’s been more than three hours. Is that enough time, do you think?

You smile, reply, I think so, yeah, then quickly pocket the phone before Justine can sneak a glance as Amazonian butterflies flutter around in your stomach.

#queen fanfiction #roger taylor x reader #roger taylor imagine #rpf #mine #smut

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nancywheelxr · 5 years

Note

If I haven't missed a request window?: Something where Elrond is an A+ dad (with Estel, &/or the twins, or Arwen? your call there) + also somewhere included there's an adorably disgruntled bird (like maybe a pigeon or a duck, idk? — I seriously just tried to look up what kinds of birds might actually live around Rivendell but I got nothing bc I suck)?

Hey! I wasn’t sure which bird to use, either, but I hope you like how this turned out!

There is a commotion in the hallway outside.

To be completely fair, they sound as if they are trying not to make a disturbance, but experience shows his children have never been very successful at that. True, it’s been far too many centuries since these halls have held a child’s laughter, but Elrond remembers. Most elves do, he’s sure, considering the fair amount of antics the twins have gotten up to over the centuries. Somehow, adulthood has yet to change that.

Another crash sounds just east of his door.

He should probably make sure nothing dangerous is going on.

The door swings open carefully and he steps out to find a suspiciously empty hallway– which is not to say there isn’t plenty to be worried about here since the only thing lacking are the culprits of the mess left behind. At his feet, one of his once priceless vases is in pieces, ceramic dull in the sunlight, and more concerningly, mud stains the carpets, the walls, the– ceiling?

“How on–” Elrond murmurs, frowning as it drips lazily on the carpet.

Well. That settles it. “Elrohir,” he calls, following the trail of dirt along the halls, “Elladan!”

Silence is all that answers him, as it was expected, and Elrond sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. Briefly, he considers leaving it be, but it would only be a matter of time until someone came to him about this, undoubtedly aggrieved.

Outside the sun is shining warmly over the grass, a truly lovely day if he says so himself, and the creek in the woods is babbling gently, softer in this spring, and he wonders if he should expand his search to the nearby clearings.

As it turns out, there’s no need for that.

While Elrond is looking for his sons, the culprit for the mud trail skids around the corner and dashes right into his robe with a graceless flail of skinny limbs.

“Estel,” he half asks, more startled than anything, and helps the child up, taking the opportunity to check him for injuries. Not that he would be able to tell at first glance, considering he is covered in mud from head to toe as if he’d spent his afternoon rolling in a puddle. Still, first things first, he supposes, “are you alright?”

Realization dawns on him and his eyes grow large, likely guessing he’s in a fair amount of trouble. “Oh, Ada?” Estel fidgets, blinking up in an effort of making himself look as innocent as possible, “I can explain.”

“I’m sure you can,” Elrond says, allowing a touch of his amusement to show, “but I would rather be certain you are not injured in any way before listening to what I’m guessing is a quite long story?”

“Erm,” he shuffles, wiping watery mud from his eyes, “no, not hurt, no. I mean, yes, it is a long story but I don’t think– I’ll explain, I swear! I just need to do something first, so, uh.”

Elrond frowns as Estel’s eyes dart around quickly, but before he could inquire further on what could be oh-so-urgent, two sets of footsteps round the same corner Estel had sprinted from.

“We found her!” Elrohir is announcing loudly only to stumble to a stop once he catches sight of Elrond, his face falling into guilt. “Oh, Ada, you are… here,” he finishes weakly.

Never too far from his twin, Elladan appears soon after and– is that a duck?

“Well,” Estel says, shrugging, “I guess I don’t have anything to do anymore.”

The duck still in Elladan’s arms squawks indignantly, ruffling its feathers, and Elrond finally takes in his sons’ appearances. They both have mud up to their chests and splattered over their faces, he’s guessing courtesy of the equally dirty duck, and Elrohir has a scrape on his cheekbone.

Apparently, all three of the boys seemed to have thought today was, indeed, quite a lovely day outside.

“We can explain,” Elrohir tries, squirming under Elrond’s raised eyebrow, “I mean, Elladan certainly can.”

His brother coughs, startled, where he had been in the middle of passing the aggravated creature to Estel. Surprisingly, the duck takes to him without a fuss, shuffling in his arms. “I–” he glares at Elrohir, dusting feathers off himself, before turning sheepishly to Elrond, “see, Ada, the first thing you must know is that this is in no way our fault.”

“Nope,” Estel nods, his young face schooled in an overly serious expression that is almost entirely obscured by his duck, “not at all.”

Elrond crosses his arms. “Is that so? And which one of you would like to explain why you have a duck?”

“She’s mine!” Estel pipes up, grinning toothly and holding up the bird like a particularly treasured gift, “her name is Bain ‘cause she is pretty! I found her in the pond and she followed me home!”

Oh, dear. He decides to tackle an easier route for the time. “And how do you two add into this?”

“Hm,” Elladan stalls, kicking his twin unsubtly in the ankles, “we were in the kitchen?”

“When Estel came in,” Elrohir supplies, “with the duck under his arm.”

“And already covered in mud,” Elladan hurries to add, “but then the duck escaped–”

“Her name is Bain!”

“And of course we offered to help–”

“ – and we went after her–”

“She is faster than expected–”

“ – and we found her in the pond again–”

“ – but she went loose in the house–”

“ – it was an accident, Ada–”

They all talk over each other, finishing and overlapping sentences, and Elrond has to admit it’s been a very long time since Elladan and Elrohir have looked quite this excited about something. After Celebrían– it hurts to simply think about it, truly, and it’s no secret the whole ordeal has been rather harder on the twins, having found her in that state and never quite getting their mother back wholly despite it, not until she was standing in the docks, backlit by the sunset and the promise of a better place waiting for all of them should they choose it.

In any case, things have never been the same ever since.

And while he can’t say it has now, it is unquestionably better. Since taking Estel in, the hunting trips have been further and further apart, shorter, few and far between. The human boy has his brothers wrapped around his little fingers, really, and Elrond cannot deny even shenanigans like this are welcomed after centuries of somber silence.

If he’s being honest, he’d say he almost missed this sort of thing.

“That’s quite enough,” he cuts in before they worked themselves into an argument, “the lot of you will help to clean the mess the duck has wrecked, yes?”

They nod in surprising synchrony. Elrond spares a moment to thank Eru that Legolas is not visiting at the moment. He doesn’t think the house would stay standing for very long with a fourth menace up and about.

“And Estel,” he crouches in front of the child. Not even ten years have passed and he’s grown so much– much too fast, in his opinion. Elrond fears he’s too used to the slow drag of time for elves. Humans, he knows, don’t have centuries to grow into adulthood; too soon, Estel will be leaving him for his own adventures and a fate he doesn’t dare think about. Now, though, Elrond softens. “I’m afraid you will have to let her back into the pond.”

Predictably, that upsets him greatly. “But, Ada– can’t she stay? Please?”

“She is a wild animal,” Elrond explains gently, “and she needs her freedom. Birds are meant to fly free, not live caged within walls.”

“But, but,” he hiccups, eyes growing watery bright, and Elrond notices the twins shuffling restlessly, “she’s a stray, like me, see? Why can’t you take her in, too?”

“You are no stray, Estel,” Elrond rests a hand on his shoulder, smiling as kindly as he can, “you are a part of this family and this is your home. Would you not miss us, were you to be away?”

He nods miserably.

“I’m sure Bain has a family she would miss as well,” he wipes a bit of the mud from his cheeks, his nose, his chin. “She wouldn’t be as happy here as she is in her home.”

Estel looks at the duck, then at Elrond, then at his brothers, before sagging in defeat. “Alright.”

“You can still visit her, though,” Elrohir suggests, taking the duck from him, “I’m sure she would like that.”

That seems to cheer him up quite a bit, even if he still looks a tick away from bursting into tears. “Bye, Bain,” he whispers to the duck and the bird quacks at him in response. Remarkably intelligent animal, that one is.

“Make sure to ask for bread in the kitchen before you go,” Elrond tells them and Elladan shouts his agreement as they hurry away like that would get them out of cleaning up the mess. He snorts quietly, straightening up and holding out a hand for Estel, “now come along, we should get you in a shower before Erestor catches sight of all this mud.”

He makes a face. The concept of showering is still not to his liking, or at least until he’s actually in the water. “Ada, ‘Ro said Legolas is visiting soon. Can I show him Bain?”

Elrond counts to ten. This is news to him. “If he agrees, I don’t see why not,” he answers calmly, carefully keeping his resignation out of his voice, “did Elrohir have a specific date?”

“No,” then, “oh. He did say not to mention that to you. Erm, oops.”

Well. This can’t be good. He’ll have to have a talk with his sons. And possibly King Thranduil, although he’s not looking forward to that particular headache. “Don’t worry,” he ruffles his hair, ushering him into the bathroom, “do you want your boat?”

Estel nods and reaches for his little toy boat, happily forgetting about their conversation, and Elrond makes a mental note to have a guest bedroom opened before the end of the week. With a sigh, he settles to wrestle the child out of his dirty clothes and prepare himself for what is undoubtedly going to be a very long week.

#lord of the rings #elves #elrond #lotr #elrohir #elladan #estel #aragorn #lotr fanfic #look an ask #lotr tag #imladris tag

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steve0discusses · 5 years

Text

Yugioh S4 E3: So Many Dragons in This One

Y’all so I’m like getting over a pretty nasty cold that’s pretty much wiped me clean like a hard reset and this episode coinciding with it is something else because this episode is essentially a fever dream start to finish.

First off:

If your mind didn’t immediately start playing ska-like alt rock and go through every lyric from “Escape From the City” then I can’t help you. Because that’s where my mind directly went and stayed for the entirety of this episode.

Back in the museum, Yugi learns about some more crypto-history.

Because Y’all, Yugioh just LOVES to screw with history. I mean we’ve already seen what they did to Seto Kaiba’s timeline, but get a load of what they’re about to do with world history.

(Arthur now has the USA gradient because I was at a loss of how else to describe Arthur. If Bandit Keith comes back then I’ll be mixing fonts, yet again.)

This was done mostly to recap the last 3 seasons, but also to drop in some brand new lore that came out of freakin nowhere.

Atlantis.

Yes, he said Atlantis.

(read more under the cut)

In the actual dialogue of the show, Tea mentions she read a single book about Atlantis once in her life, and then Joey and Tristan go “Tea, you nerd!” and it’s like wow the standards are low in this group. One single book, boys? That’s all it takes to be a nerd? When you have any of the KAIBAS right over there? One single book is the requirement?

Starting to think no one in this universe knows what a nerd is.

So the underwater cave dwelling from a few episodes back is none other than the Atlantis ruins. I feel like this should be a way bigger deal in terms of like all of history, since in this universe, Atlantis is time wise at the dawn of (checks wikipedia)...proto-writing...and yet they seem to really have their math and large construction science down.

The arch wasn’t really utilized (I hesitate to say “discovered” as it is an arch) until about 2000 BC or so. Good on the Atlanteans, I guess?

Don’t know why we’re getting so sidetracked by cards when a civilization 10000 years ago could make immense underwater 60 ft castles that don’t immediately collapse under the pressure, but this is the Yugioh universe and everyone’s card addiction runs strong and true.

It just seems funny to me that Hawkins, who devoted I want to say like 60 years of his life toward becoming a walking encyclopedia about Egypt, got super sidetracked and ended up 10000 leagues under the sea in Atlantis. He just threw all that Egypt work completely to the wind and basically changed his career at age I dunno 70 or so. Or maybe this guy is only 50 but he just seems super way old to me.

(And raising his granddaughter for some reason? Hell knows what happened to Rebecca’s parents, but knowing Yugioh, it will probably be really, really tragic.)

So then, although Atlantis is in our world and under the sea, Hawkins decides to throw another fast one on us.

(I just chose a random number, but Buzzfeed decided Washington was 34th. Which is wild.)

Bro took this moment to explain to me in great and excruciating detail that the Atlanteans in Aquaman did in fact invent tanks. Aquaman is his favorite. Ya, I know.

So I thought “ah, this is the Shadow Realm” (since we have seen Bakura just make a monster a real boy before) but then it became kind of unclear if the Shadow Realm is a different realm than this other realm which is just where the nice monsters live. So um...I’m still not sure about that one, I’ll get back to you when it’s made clear (I may never get back to you on that one)

Then Rebecca decides to drop this lore about the ghost that lives in Yugi Muto’s head that we’ve been *pretty Sure* up to this point was strictly Egyptian dealing with strictly Egyptian things.

I am not entirely sure how we’re going to take a guy who lived 5000 years ago and explain why he’s living now in AD 2002 Yugi Muto’s head because of some guy 10000 years ago. But they’re going to try.

Like I’ve heard this referred to as a filler season, because it uh did not happen in the Manga. So, legally, they can’t really touch the manga at all (and I assume they were probably waiting for the manga to finish at this point), and so we’re just gonna...pull Atlantis out of nowhere because the nice thing about Atlantis is that it is so freakin old that it is well outside of copyright. Completely fair use. But it’s still kinda wild.

Also, Yugi made sure to off-handedly tell us that most of the monsters who’ve invaded their world have been very, very, nice, and that’s why everyone has been so chill.

I mean. OK?

You still have literal dragons flying around but apparently only some of the dragons are mean and attack, the rest just chill and float around like a fish or something. Personally, I wouldn’t be thrilled by this.

Hawkins notices Yugi’s enchanted dead guy necklace, and without asking “so...does this belong to a dead guy? Did you get this from the dead guy’s corpse? Yugi? Yugi, look at me. Yugi, young man, is this another dead guy necklace you’ve been carrying around in your pocket because I feel like I see a problem here, buster.”

Hawkins suggests, instead:

Oh OK...that’s a lot to take in.

Didn’t expect giant possessed lady statues but it’s a nice spooky touch. Can’t have enough giant possessed lady statues in your anime, honestly.

Also, I’m really glad they gave this skinny lady statue a double chin.

And after all that, Hawkins decides he’s done with his one single afternoon in Japan, and he’s going to go and travel 16 hours back to the US stuck in a plane within hearing distance of Rebecca. Worth that 32 hour round trip for that one afternoon in Japan (or actually one way is 4 hours longer than the other way or something? I forget the details.)

And like the show had him blush and then Tea got mad, but like Yugi also blushed when Mai gave him a note once that said “thanks for the help!” so I feel like Yugi just shuts down completely whenever he has to deal with girls.

Maybe this is just the face Yugi makes when he quickly enters the pyramid zone and is like “Pharaoh, it’s getting mad weird out there!” And Pharaoh’s just sitting on his throne eating cheese whiz straight out of a can in star pj’s with matching bootspants and he’s like “My Gods, Yugi! If I’m here, and you’re here, who’s driving the plane!?” and then they just start shrugging at eachother about who has to go on the date this time until Yugi snaps out of it.

ah, a disembodied voice.

Literally thought it was my own voice.

It keeps Yugi up for a while, but when has Yugi ever fallen asleep right away on this show?

After Yugi calms down enough to go the hell to bed, we zoom back to our Xtreme sports boys who have finally decided to stop Tony Hawking all over this island long enough to deliver the sober news that Gurimo is freakin dead.

Which they barely brought up at all because who freakin cares about Gurimo? This guy sure didn’t.

Cool. Good plan.

Hard to rebuild civilization without people. Just throwing that out there.

But ya. Lets go end mankind on Episode 3. Thought it would take a little bit longer for him to get enough soul juice but apparently he’s good on the soul juice from these three juicy cards that have no souls (I thought).

3 God Cards + 1 Gurimo - 1 Rex - 1 Weevil = Destroy Humanity

First, a dream sequence.

This is one bizarre ass dream sequence and like...I don’t even know if I have much to say because it’s like...so out of left field and both out of the lore of this show and just barely inside the lore enough for it to work.

Still feels hella out of nowhere though.

That may be just the Dayquil talking.

Either way, we get to have Yugi run around in pjs again, but unfortunately they have no stars so I just don’t freakin care when see it. I get that stars are hard to animate and he’s a year older and maybe grew out of the star pj’s but c’mon. We had a good thing going, show.

But they hear a voice within the pyramid, and I’m using Tea’s font color here but it’s not Tea, it’s another girl who is...a lot like Tea honestly.

So up to this point we’ve accepted that the puzzle is all of Pharaoh’s mysteries and also mixed with the memories of Yugi as well. We have a room of short term memory (that pharaoh never uses) full of little clones of Yugi’s friends. We have a room full of all the lego pieces that Yugi lost over his young life (and 2 very cursed tamagachis.) We have a room that has a gigantic guardian Dark Magician who almost killed Shadi once. We also have several rooms that are just traps that can basically kill you, or if you are Shadi, just totally set you on fire, because screw Shadi.

Also it has this room:

But we find a new room that is like an entire fantasy realm and it’s like...so what memory is this?

Somewhat confusing if you’re me and you’ve assumed up to this point that everything in the puzzle has something to do with Pharaoh’s past. Apparently there’s just a door to another world in here they just never knew was here.

Just this entire time Yugi and Pharaoh were completely unaware that they had a DOOR TO ANOTHER WORLD in their necklace. Which, as I mentioned before, is where all the duel monsters live, but looks nothing like the Shadow Realm, which we’ve seen before.

And like honestly I kinda just figured at first that the giant eye was supposed to be there eating dragons, as if this was some sort of cycle of life for the duel monsters, to be a dragon, grow old, and then get devoured by the eyeball in the sky to start over again as nutrients to feed the baby dragons.

But in fact the eye is Not Normal and we should be alarmed by it.

Very hard to know what should and should not be normal when I’ve never seen this place before, also it has three crystal dragons that I guess the other monsters MUST be worshiping or something because check out the purple tile palace they made just for these crystal dragons.

Like this made me ask a LOT of questions about the civilization of duel monsters. Like who made this? Did a bunch of Kuriboh make this? Hell does this civilization works and is it a monarchy and are there castes?

Do they do taxes?

And then we meet her, the voice asking for our help, it’s this girl. Dark Magician girl. Nice to finally meet you. Wish it had a little more build up and made more sense.

We’ve talked to this chick before. She was digital at the time, but she kind of pretends that she already knows Pharaoh and Yugi and they kinda just...take this as it comes. I mean there wasn’t much time to deliver this dialogue so they were like, if the lady in the cornucopia hat says so, I guess we have to do the thing.

It is nice that we do finally get an explanation for why Pegasus could make all these cards but could not resurrect his dead wife--being that she is...not from this world.

But like now the puzzle not only dives into Pharaoh’s past but is also just a straight up a dimension portal. You can just...visit these people whenever? I guess?

I was getting used to the puzzle being a very large metaphor, and I wasn’t actually prepared for it to have a utilitarian use like a Stargate. This asks a lot of questions, but put those questions aside because we have to adopt this dragon by pulling a huge ass sword out of it’s right eyeball.

This show is SO mean to eyeballs.

She explains that there was some lore that lead to this sword being plunged into this buddy’s eye over here but I forgot it already. It was like half a sentence and then it was gone and I’m on Dayquil and I’m sure it’ll come back. At some point they’ll bring it all full circle, I’m sure.

Like if this happened in a dream then does this place even exist on a mortal plane at all? Can it only be accessed through dreams and being dead? It’s kind of a fascinating concept since these duel monsters have to be summoned through paper, which has all sorts of relevant meaning in a lot of Eastern mythologies.

Stuff I’ll never know because say goodbye to the Duel Monster Land that Apparently-Exists-Now-And-Absolutely-Always-Existed,-Stop-Thinking-About-Who-Invented-Tanks,-It-Was-Obviously-The-Atlanteans-10000-Years-Ago, we’re gonna go and take this huge ass dragon we have no business inheriting but are anyway because the dumbass ghost in our brain has this grand reputation that he banished some sort of evil 5000 years ago but has absolutely no memory of how the hell he did that or what even occurred, and because of his completely wiped bean, this makes him a complete idiot at best and a complete psychopath at his absolute worst.

But yeah, lets take this dragon and see what happens.

You gotta bring furniture, but the dragon is free. 2 bedrooms, no rugs, it’s free.

I just realized we got a dragon and not the sword. Only in this anime.

And then he wakes up to the last thing I expected.

It was nice of Yugi to take the time it took for him to get entirely dressed and ready, but I guess if the world has to end you gotta go out in style. Which for him means his school uniform because, although Yugi absolutely hates this school for some reason, he has a lot of pride for it. Just a crazy amount of school pride for how rarely he attends school and for the lengths he went to get out of soccer practice that one time. But will Yugi be caught dead in anything but his school colors? No.

HOW IS THIS CITY STILL STANDING.

Also Kaiba must be having a wild time on the top of Kaiba Tower but maybe he took a helicopter a while back to go on a world dragon tour because we didn’t hear a peep out of him this entire very Very VERY dragon-centric episode.

Really weird how many dragons there are with so few Kaibas. It’s like the moment they turned around, every dragon on Earth came out of hiding to throw a huge ass dragon party.

PS get a load of this dragon.

Why would you ever give a dragon an ass?

I don’t even know how this is possible because it doesn’t have a butt crack, but it’s got serious ass going on. It’s the Lizzo of dragons, when you set it to defense mode, it probs just twerks to intimidate the other side.

(Yugi’s friends are so freakin patient OMG)

Also how the hell can Yugi play this card on his duel disk if neither Kaiba or Pegasus have any idea this card exists? Magic, I guess? The duel disk is part magic?

Not like it matters much, we know from Bakura that you don’t need a duel disk to make real boy cards if you have a millennium item anyway.

So at this point I’m like...I think I watched the last episode of the season, I think it’s...out of order and bro was like “nope...it’s Episode 3. We’re still on Episode 3.”

And so after that it closed the...dimension joining portal, which was a Golden Compass style aurora borealis, then Dark Magician Girl returned to her home planet.

...Which is also dangling around Yugi’s neck.

This was a lot.

I have a lot of questions.

Everyone in domino SHOULD have a lot of questions but I think they all went back to bed.

A tornado with a GLOWING EYE tried to destroy their city, and they just rolled over and went back to bed.

This season sure takes off really quickly holy crap.

Now fair warning, because I’ve been hella sick the next recap is uhh...a huge mess so it will probably be a week or so before I post it/even get to it. At some point I started numbering them completely wrong and I either saved 10 caps to a different folder or I never made them in the first place and I honestly am not entirely sure. Last week is kind of a blur and it’s a mess on my desktop right now, so my pacing is gonna reflect that because I am...behind...on everything.

Oh dude and actually now that I look at what date it freakin is, I have to go to one of my best friends weddings real soon so can we just say...it might be a few weeks before I can steadily update again? I have to learn a whole dance routine for this giant wedding and y’all, I am not a dancer. And, while my friends have had dance classes since they were like 5, I’m like...low key extremely certain I will fall completely on my ass. Anyway, there is no way out of this situation I thought would never actually happen, and thought was just a funny idea they invented when they got drunk at the bachelorette, but nah, they remembered, and this is really happening but the bride will think it’s funny so here we go.

PS this dance is to the only existing mashup of Bollywood and N*syncs Bye Bye Bye (which, yes, it is a breakup song) I hope you feel the second hand embarrassment through your computer, I am dancing for 300+ people. Directly following the groom’s parent’s dance, which is 10 minutes long, and for which they hired a professional choreographer. We are the only dance out of four epically spectacular dances that is from the bride’s side, and our dance is...2 minutes and the equivalent of a high school lipsync.

TBH I'm low key excited to do it because potentially it could be a really great story depending on the reaction of what happens.

Anyway, so if I disappear for a while only to post fanart I’ve drawn out of stress, that is what I’ve been doing in the background. I’ve just been trying to remember how to do the Bye Bye Bye dance correctly for 2 straight weeks while feverishly trying to catch up with all my other work.

Also, because I mentioned George Washington, I had to go and find the horny grandma clip from Gilmore Girls and I’m so glad that two people on the internet managed to clip it, and I can’t believe the only two people who’ve clipped this did it with their phones. In fact, kudos to this youtuber for videoing a Tablet with his phone, because there’s no better way to watch a show from the 00′s than to make you feel really illegal about it.

youtube

#Yugioh #ygo #photo recap #episode recap #Yugi Muto #dragons #Joey Wheeler #Tea Gardner #Tristan Taylor #Arthur Hawkins #Rebecca Hawkins #Grandpa Muto #The Eye of Sauran or something #Again this episode is kind of a blur and I'm amazed I managed to cap anything this week #Oh yeah #The lost city of atlantis #s4 ep3

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sevenseasofrog · 5 years

Text

Lads ‘n Lasses

pairing: highschool!ben x fem!reader

summary: single sex schools are never boring

word count: 2982

a/n: wagwan gs, this might not be to everyone’s taste but i’ll see how it goes, this is the first time i’ve imagined myself as the reader while writing ?? not as someone else reading it ?? it’s also set in a manchesterish sort of place bc i had a major mind block trying to write about anywhere else other than where i actually live ,, that probably sounds weird idk aha, it’s defo an au where ben basically is still in education and all sorts of chaos takes place as the year moves forward ,, anyway ,, enjoy !! if you have any questions or likewise feel free to send an ask bc i see how it could be semi confusing ,, love u all a lotta :) ❤️

here’s also some stuff that could make it less confusing (especially if you’re not familiar with lingo from north west england, i’ll maybe add to this with each new chapter that comes out :)

St. Mary’s/ Mary’s- the all girls school the reader attends, quite middle class and full of students who like to make drama for their own entertainment, strong focus on languages and arts

St. Peter’s/ St. Pete’s - the all boys ‘brother’ school to St. Mary’s, very laddish with a focus on sports and science

Niamh & Maria - the reader’s two closest and longest friends

Tram/Met - British version of an overground subway?

Shout - another word for a houseparty

Snide - unfair

Swear down - saying you are telling the truth

also, the reader and ben are between the ages of like 17 and 18ish, the whole thing isn’t very accurate to the uk school system but it works a little better like that so yall are gonna have to go with it aha

ps, this chapter is spilt in two bc i got very carried away when writing it and tumblr has a word limit, hmph. however, that does technically mean that i can say i’ve written two chapters not just one ?? go me !!

Chapter 1: September

4th of September, the night before a new term, new academic year and a nearly fresh start. Your last year at St Mary’s had not been something you were dreading so to speak, and now it was finally here. Thanks to upcoming exams, you only had a little over five months to get through before freedom, and eventually, a completely clean slate at a new, far less intimidating school environment. Anticipation building, you called it a night

6:15am. You woke up to the painful sound of your alarm clock, early morning sun peeking through the split between the curtains. Eager to silence the blaring noise you crawled out of the comfort of the duvet and hastily clicked the stop button in the centre of your phone screen. You made your way into the bathroom, careful not to wake your parents, brushed your teeth and quickly got undressed before stepping into the shower, letting the cool water run down your back without getting your hair wet, since you had it cut and washed yesterday afternoon. Slipping on your school uniform you caught eye of yourself in the mirror and decided that you had nothing to lose by putting on a little makeup, you had time after all. It was about 7am when you made your way downstairs, the house still quiet with only you awake. These mornings were the ones you liked best, just you and your own thoughts, with no one to bother you other than the dogs. It was still relatively warm during the September days so you chose to leave your jumper hung over a chair in the kitchen, putting just your blazer over your crisp, white blouse. Throwing an apple and cereal bar into your bag for later in the day, you figured that you might as well also pack some paracetamol and chewing gum for good measure, knowing it would come in handy eventually. You headed into the hallway to sit on the bottom step of the stairs to put your shoes on, tying the laces as tight as you possibly could, slung the black tote over your shoulder and grabbed your set of keys, which were usually on a hook which your dad had attached to the wall earlier in the year.

The walk to the tram stop was pleasant enough. There was no real breeze and you walked with your hands in you pockets to the beat of the music. Skipping down the steps to the platform to buy a ticket for the week, the change rattled in your pocket, and you had to cover it to stop anything flying out. Once you had finally managed to get the machine to produce a ticket after it spat out the coins you tried to use a few times, you spun round and walked towards the sheltered seats down the further end of the stop. It was only 7:45 by this stage and there were still very few people around. Missing the school rush was certainly worth it for you, and it also meant there was time to grab a coffee on the way to school with Niamh and Maria, who both got on at later stops anyway. You pulled your phone out of your pocket, deciding to text your parents, as you did every morning to let them know you were okay. You skipped a few songs before slipping your phone back into your pocket and looking up to examine your surroundings, following a good few weeks of not coming to the somewhat grimy metro stop, nothing had changed. The ground was still caked in chewing gum, graffiti littered the ticket machines, and the bin was, as ever, overflowing.

There was one thing different though, slightly odd too. A blonde haired boy who you had never seen before was stood on the opposite platform. Weird. It was then that you noticed he was in the uniform for St. Peter’s, with a backpack hung on one shoulder and a gym bag on the floor- grim move from the newbie. It suddenly hit you however. He was on the wrong platform, and could end up getting on a tram further into the city centre rather than away from it. God, this was awkward. You could leave him? it would be kind of funny? but also a bit snide.

No.

Don’t do that you told yourself. Deciding to ‘start the new term right’ you cleared your throat before shouting across

“You going to St. Pete’s mate?”

He looked up from the ground, obviously somewhat confused, checking to see whoever the person who had shouted was talking too. Luckily, this was quite easy, given that he then noticed that he was in fact the only person on the platform. You gave a wave and as friendly a smile as you could muster given it wasn’t even 8 o’clock yet, in a desperate attempt to get his attention, which just so happened to work.

“Um, yeah. Why?”

“Because given that you’re on the wrong platform, you’re gonna have a very hard time getting there”. His jaw dropped a little

“You are joking, right?”

“Nope!”, you popped the ‘p’, just for emphasis, “So... are you just gonna stand there like a lemon or change platforms then?”. He quickly picked his bag off the ground and jogged up the steps to the bridge. As he crossed you rolled the waistband of your skirt up, realising that you previously looked a little to nun-ish for your liking. By the time you had finished fixing up your appearance the mysterious blonde was plodding down the steps, towards you. Shit. Now what?

You had just about composed yourself by the time he reached you.

“Ben. Ben Jones” he spoke, before offering his hand to shake.

“You’re very proper aren’t you!?”, you thought out loud “guessing you're not from up here then hm? Name’s y/n l/n by the way, I go to St. Mary’s”, you said, trying to remain friendly.

“Yeah, moved up from Bournemouth at the start of summer. My parents wanted to come up here so I had a chance of getting some sort of sports scholarship or something for rugby, y’know, for uni and that”. He spoke with quite a low, quiet voice, but definitely had a southern accent that you couldn’t imagine going any time soon. Now he was stood nearer, you had managed to get a clearer picture of Ben; he was very well built and had the physique of a genuine sportsman, He wasn’t too tall- but still taller than you by a considerable amount. His facial features were mostly soft, although his nose looked like it could have been broken in past games and he had the most striking green eyes.

“Well, you’d have had a pretty difficult time getting anywhere if you were stuck in the centre of town.” you both let out a laugh.

“Honestly, I’m such a melt, only I could do that on one of the few days that being on time actually matters”. You broke eye contact momentarily to see that a tram was approaching.

“Right then” you said, stepping towards the edge of the platform. “We’re a bit early but I normally get a coffee anyway, you can come if you want? I mean, you don’t have to get this one if you don’t want but if you do then the offer’s there..” You trailed off, noticing that you had waffled on a bit.

“Aha, no it’s fine! I’d be happy to get this one, you’re literally the first person I’ve spoken to who’s like, my age so it’s not like I have anyone to wait for. Plus, I’ll probably get lost if you abandon me now.” He looked up with puppy dog eyes after picking his gym bag off the floor again.

Stepping on the tram, you decided to offer him your first piece of valuable advice; “Right… Well. If we’re gonna be mates I better give you the rules of the road up here”.

“Go on then, local expert”, he said with a smirk.

“First things first. Don’t put your bag on the floor. It’s crusty and makes you look like a gimp”.

“Noted”, he spoke as the pair of you sat on the grey seats.

“Second. Most of the boys are maniacs and the girls are awful bitches, I’d say that I’d help you figure out who’s who but you’ll probably be able to decide for yourself”.

“Hm, you’re really selling it to me. The brutal honesty is a nice touch”. You gave a playful punch to the side of his arm, with a grin smeared across your face.

“Swear down mate, you’ll thank me later for this though.”

The journey passed in a flash, the pair of you talking like friends reunited. You learnt that he had a beagle named Frankie, lived not too far from you, he played rugby for teams but also enjoyed drama and music.

“You’re quite the character aren’t you! can’t say I took you for a performing arts kinda guy”

“Well… What kind of person did you take me as then, all knowing-y/n”

“Well Ben from Bournemouth.. that would be telling wouldn’t it, I can tell you however that this is our stop though”. You both stood up, grabbing your bags and heading for the doors of the carriage. You had a text from Niamh and Maria earlier on in the journey saying they’d be late and there was no point waiting for them, so you carried on the walk alone with Ben.

“If I left you here right now, would you have any clue where to go?” you questioned, genuinely intrigued.

“Erm.. no… I would have to stand around for a bit and hope someone takes pity on me”

“What about google maps though??”

“Hmm.. Let’s just say that there’s a reason I don’t take geography”

The coffee shop was about the same distance from the tram stop as is was from school, and it was about 20 past 8 when you pushed open the door with a small chime. It was a cosy little café, situated on the corner of the market street with wicker chairs outside and brown leather sofas inside. You never stayed in however, much preferring to enjoy whatever you brought during the rest of the walk to school. Today was a latte day, no questions asked. You liked to rotate throughout a few different drinks, depending on your mood. Ben stood close by as you explained how you’d most definitely be on black coffee by this time next week, but you might have the odd pumpkin spiced latte as September moved into October, just for novelty really. He gave out a small chuckle,

“You really are in a league of your own aren’t you? I’ve known you like an hour and I’m convinced you hold the secrets of the universe or some shit”. You liked Ben. He was good company and you had a fair bit in common;

“and what if I did hold the secrets of the universe huh?”

“I’d use the black market to sell you to a looney philosopher somewhere or other and make myself some fat stacks.” You both doubled over in complete hysterics. Would it be weird to say that you’d never bonded so quickly with someone? yeah, probably you thought, brushing the idea away quickly. Your giggle fit was quickly broken up however when the barista announced that your drink was ready, you fished the loose change out of your pocket and handed it over moments later,

“keep the change mate” you said politely, turning on your heel towards the door once again.

“You really are quite the angel aren’t you?” the boy walking next to you said “ooooo, keep the change mate, I’m y/n and I am the source of all life and joy” he mocked.

“You know it blondie”, you retorted with a smirk.

You had walked a fair deal further, now following the main road and considerably nearer to school when Ben reached into his inside pocket .pulling out a cigarette and lighter. You silently watched out of the corner of your eye as he held the stick in his mouth and lit one end, he inhaled deeply before taking it from between his lips to exhale. Before his could bring his hand back up however, you plucked it from his fingers and drew a breath from it yourself before throwing it down and stamping on it. Ben simply stood with his mouth hung open looking dumbfounded. “Whoa steady on...What the fuck was that about then? Oh… and for the record, you owe me a cig now!”, he spoke with a tone of shock mixed with annoyance

“Boo-Hoo”, you spoke back, “But neither of us can have a first day back if we get excluded before we even get to school you dimwit. There’s teachers stood by the traffic lights down there”, you pointed further down the pavement. “See for yourself if you want…” you trailed off. Ben looked a little guilty, realising that he could have got you both in a good deal of trouble,

“Ah, Right, Okay… Sorry about that..”

“Don’t worry about it. Honestly. It’s fine, you’re new! You’ve got a lot to learn still”, you gave him a reassuring smile, but you could tell that he still felt a twinge of regret.

The pair of you carried on the walk in a comfortable silence, and as you approached St. Peter’s a thought struck you. “Right. After school, wait for me here, I don’t really want you being lost in a new town stuck on my conscience all night”

“How noble of you, Miss y/l/n! How will I ever repay you for this selfless act of charity!” He exaggerated, running his hands through his hair as he spoke.

“We’ll have to see about that one won’t we, I guess”, You hitched your bag back onto your shoulder properly. Before he turned into the courtyard of his new school he grabbed your arm,

“Wait a minute... you give off way too much chaotic energy for things to run smoothly. What’s your snap or your number or something incase something goes horribly wrong” He spoke again, with a slight twinkle in his eyes.

“Hm, go on then, I’ll give you my number then you can just add me on snapchat with it too if you really want. Two birds with one stone ‘n all that”, you reached into your bag and pulled out a pen. “Gimmie something to write on, chop chop matey!” you spoke hurridley, realising that you only had 10 minutes before you needed to be sat down in your first registration of the academic year. In a panic, he stuck out his hand, and you began to scribble down the first few digits.

“Fucking hell! I thought you were writing it down not tattooing it!”, he took in a sharp breath.

“Hm.. What.. Wait! Shit, sorry.. I’m a bit heavy handed”. You finished writing the numbers down with a conscious attempt not to press quite so hard and then threw the pen back into your bag.

“Aight then, I’ll see you later yeah?” He looked up at you,

“See ya later lemon boy”. You shot another smile before continuing on a few meters further down the path and approached the gates of St. Mary’s.

Hello old friend, you thought before taking a deep breath and turning into the school, with no way out for the next few hours at least. You stepped hurriedly through the labyrinth of corridors before reaching the room where you’d be registered. Throwing your bag onto your usual desk you could feel two sets of eyes on you.

“y/n l/n, You have some explaining to do! go on then, who’s the boy?” Niamh began, a devilish grin on her face.

“Gimme a second to sort my life out yeah? I just need to get my bearings then you can interrogate me”, you spoke, followed by a heavy sigh. After you put your bag in your new locker you returned to the desk where you were greeted by your long time friends once again. “Wait a minute, how do you even know? started hiring government spies or some shit?”

“Erm, no. But that’s quite a good idea actually. If you’re that desperate to know, Lewis sent me a message asking if you’d got a boyfriend over summer..” You let out a scoff before Maria could continue. “He still really likes you ya know?”

“Yes mum, I do know, you remind me most days” You all let out a laugh, attracting some attention from the neighboring tables.

“We’re off topic, you still need to explain yourself and we have like, 3 minutes until the bell goes” Niamh interrupted, she had always been the most conscious member of the group, as much as both you and Maria hated to admit.

“Right, I’ll keep it simple. I was at the met stop and he was stood on the wrong side so I told him to switch otherwise he’d never make it to school then he told me that his name’s Ben and he’s new and he’s in our year and then we got on the tram and then we went to get coffee then he decided he wanted a smoke and then I told him off and then we got to school and then I told him I’d meet him after school then I walked into school and now I’m here with you two” You barely paused for breath and gasped before either of your friends could continue, both of them looking shocked and rather confused.

“Right. You can explain that all again later in a bit only at least 76 times slower. ok? thanks? nice” is all Maria managed to respond before the door swung open and your teacher walked in...

Hope you enjoy !!❤️

Let me know if you want adding to the taglist !! :)

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