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sweeter-innocence-fics · 1 year

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My Sweetest Downfall - Chapter Four

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Reader

Work Summary:

Eddie’s back from the Upside Down, but things aren’t exactly how he left them. Hawkins is in pieces, his friends are scattered and the love of his life is… pregnant?

Eddie Munson x Harrington!Reader

Chapters: Prologue 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Epilogue

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 2842

Read on AO3.

Masterlists.

Taglist: @mrs-kai-anderson @ang3l1te @missryerye @eddiesgirlforever @harrys-tittie

Taglist info

Previous Chapter

Notes:

warnings for abusive parents, pregnancy, jealousy (reader doesn't know that Robin is a lesbian)

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~ TWO MONTHS EARLIER ~

Day by day, things got a little easier. You still thought about Eddie all the time, but you didn’t shut those feelings down anymore, allowing yourself to feel them instead. You weren’t so numb anymore.

It had been awful at first, spending days crying until your eyes burned and head ached, but you were here now, stronger for it.

The curve of your stomach had swelled and hardened, seemingly overnight. It wasn’t too obvious to anyone that didn’t know you, but to you, it was a very clear bump.

Steve’s eyes had gotten very wide when you showed it to him. He was doing a pretty good job of hiding it, but you know, at heart, he was struggling almost as much as you were.

You weren’t letting yourself fall into a malaise again. If you hurt, then you hurt. Pain was good. It reminded you that you were alive.

Today, you found yourself craving chocolate chip cookies, so you’d decided to bake some. You were just in the process of laying them out on a baking tray when Steve skidded into the kitchen, an oversized hoody in his hands.

“Mom and dad just pulled up in the driveway,” he said, and you almost dropped the bowl of cookie dough.

“Did you know they were coming?”

“Of course not. Put this on.” He handed you the hoody. You didn’t have time to wash your hands, so you got some dough on the sleeves as you pulled it on. To your relief, it comfortably hid your baby bump.

You were in the process of washing your hands when the front door slammed. Your hands were trembling.

There was some shuffling around in the next room and then your mother appeared in the kitchen doorway.

“There you two are. You didn’t even come and greet us.” She sniffed.

“We didn’t know you were here,” you said, before Steve could say anything. “We were just making cookies for the homeless shelter.” You hoped that that wasn’t too obvious a lie.

“Is that right?” asked your father, stepping into the kitchen. You swallowed, and then nodded.

The silence stretched out between you, until Steve cleared his throat. “We didn’t know you’d be coming back,” he said.

“Well…” Your father fixed you with a cold-eyed stare. “We’d heard some concerning things about you. We wanted to verify if they were true.”

Your blood ran cold. You clenched your hands into fists, your fingernails biting into your palms. “Concerning things? Like what?”

“Marcie told me that the last time she saw you, you looked pregnant,” said your mother. Your lips pressed into a hard line. Marcie was your next-door neighbour, and you’d never liked her much. You supposed that your bump wasn’t as subtle as you thought.

“She must’ve seen me coming home from the all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet,” you said. “I was pretty damn bloated that day.”

Steve shifted closer to you, placing himself between your parents and you. It was to no avail though, as your mother walked straight past him and grabbed the front of your hoody.

“Then what’s this about? You look a mess,” she said, tugging it up just enough to reveal the swell of your stomach. “I knew it.”

“Don’t touch me,” you snapped, pulling yourself out of her grip. Steve blocked her, not letting her follow you as you stormed from the kitchen.

Unfortunately, your dad was hot on your tail.

“Don’t you dare walk away from me and your mother, you little shit!” he yelled. You had almost reached the stairs when he grabbed your arm, pulling you back and forcing you to face him. “Who’s the father?”

“None of your business!” You yanked your arm out of his hold.

“It’s that Munson boy, isn’t it? You always were far too sweet on that freak.”

“Don’t you dare call him that!” you screamed back.

“So it is him? My only daughter has gone and got herself knocked up by that trailer trash punk-”

A loud SMACK resounded through the air, stopping him in his tracks. You were holding your hand out, staring at it like you couldn’t quite believe what you’d just done.

Your father brought one hand up to touch his cheek, which was reddening, from the slap or from anger, you couldn’t tell.

His expression turned murderous. Very quietly, and far too evenly, he said, “You ungrateful little brat. I ought to-”

“STOP!” Your dad had been raising his hand, but Steve shouldered his way in between you, protecting you with his body like he’d done so many times before. “Don’t you dare touch her.”

Your father’s nostrils flared. “She slapped me.”

“She’s grieving and pregnant. Don’t you dare even think about laying a hand on her.”

Slowly, your dad lowered his hand. Your body remained taut as a bowstring, and you felt ready to snap.

Steve let out a deep breath. “Alright. We can talk about this later, when-”

Your father’s fist collided with his face, knocking him off balance. He fell back onto his ass, and your dad loomed over you both.

“Don’t think that you can talk to me like that, boy,” he snarled. “While you’re in my house, you will show me respect.”

Steve stumbled back to his feet, looking dazed. “Yes, sir,” he said, almost automatically.

You cringed. “Steve,” you murmured, grabbing his hand. “Come on.”

At your urging, he followed you up the stairs. Thankfully, your parents didn’t seem interested in stopping you. You dragged him into your room and locked the door behind you.

“Sit down,” you said, ushering him towards the bed. He followed your instructions, still acting on autopilot. Feeling a sinking sense of dread, you went into your bathroom and grabbed the first aid kit you’d bought yourself to deal with Upside-Down-related injuries. Never in a million years did you think you’d be using it for this.

Steve was staring at the floor when you came back in. You grabbed your desk chair and sat down in front of him. His lip was split, and there was a nasty bruise forming on his cheek.

You poured some disinfectant on a cotton pad. “This is gonna sting a little,” you warned, and then you dabbed at the cut. Steve winced, but said nothing. When you were done cleaning it, you applied some lip salve to it.

“I don’t think there’s anything I can do for your bruise,” you said. “But you should ice the lip when you get the chance.”

“Thanks,” said Steve, the first words he’d spoken since you’d dragged him upstairs.

You cleared your throat awkwardly. “Thank you. For defending me.” He smiled a little at that, and gave a little shrug. You both knew that he would always defend you. “Has he ever hit you like that before?”

Steve’s lips drew closed suddenly. He seemed to have to force himself to look into your eyes. Taking a deep breath, he said, “he’s never punched me before, but he’s slapped me a few times.”

“… I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you sorry? It’s not like you made him hit me.”

You didn’t know how to answer that. You were sorry for a lot of things. That your dad had apparently hit him but not you, and that you hadn’t known about it, were just the latest two in the long line of offences.

“I don’t know,” you admitted. “But I do know one thing. If he tries that bullshit again, I’m gonna hit him with a baseball bat. We’ve faced demogorgons. Dad doesn’t scare me.”

Steve smiled, and then winced at the sting in his lip.

~ PRESENT DAY ~

You slept in later than you’d been planning to. When you blinked awake, the clock on your nightstand read 11:05. With a groan, you got to your feet and shuffled into the bathroom.

When you were clean and dressed, you made your way downstairs to find Steve and Eddie sitting at the dining table. Eddie’s face split into a grin when he saw you.

“Hey,” he said, rapping his fist against your arm gently. “How are you feeling?”

“Exhausted.” You slumped down into the seat beside him.

“You take your vitamins yet?” asked Steve. You shook your head, so he got busy rooting through the cabinet drawers to find the correct tablets. He served you the pills with a glance of orange juice and two slices of toast.

As you tucked in, he said, “We’re going over to see Hopper today. Everyone’s gonna be there.”

“Everyone?”

He nodded. “I called Dustin this morning. He wanted to bike right over here, but I managed to convince him to wait.”

You snorted. “How did you do that? You’ve never convinced that boy of anything.”

“Yeah, well.” He waved his hand dismissively. “Point is, we’re all meeting up at Hopper and Joyce’s place. Apparently, there’s news to share. We’ll pick up Robin on the way.”

You didn’t like the sound of ‘news’. Feeling an anxious twist in your stomach, you turned to Eddie.

“Did you call Wayne?”

He nodded. “It was pretty surreal. I don’t think he believed I was me at first. He told me he was gonna drive down here right away, but then he started coughing.” Eddie’s expression was tight. “I asked if he was sick, and he said nothing serious. He said it was just the flu, and I said people die of flu, especially old men like you, so he called me a little prick.” He smiled fondly. “I told him to stay home. I’m gonna go see him as soon as I can. He wasn’t happy about it, but…”

“…I can come with you, if you want,” you suggested. You hoped that it was true that it was just the flu. The possibility of something worse made you feel sick.

“I’d like that, yeah. I don’t know where my van is, though, so I’m not sure how we’ll get there.”

Your eyes fell on Steve. He sighed. “Fine. I’m already a chauffeur for a bunch of kids. Let’s make it a fun road trip,” he said, rolling his eyes.

“You’re the best, big bro,” you said sarcastically.

“Finish up,” he said, nudging your plate. “I don’t wanna be late, and we need to pick up Robin.”

As Steve pulled his car into Robin’s driveway, she burst out of the house, messenger bag bouncing against her leg as she did so. You slid out of the front passenger seat to make room for her, but her eyes were fixed on Eddie as he got out of the back.

“Holy shit, you’re real,” she breathed, and then barrelled into him, almost knocking him off-balance. “Holy shit.”

After a moment, he returned the hug. “I guess I’m gonna be getting a lot of this today, huh?”

“Shut up.”

As they held each other, your stomach twisted uncomfortably. An old feeling, something primal and bitter, was taking root in you. Something stupid, like jealousy.

You doubted that Eddie was Robin’s type – she’d never seemed that interested in him before – but pregnancy hormones were swirling and you were getting antsy.

“We need to get to Hop’s. Robs, you can sit up front,” you said, sliding past her to sit in the back. Finally, to the relief of the tension in your chest, the two of them let go of each other.

Robin sat in the front seat, while Eddie joined you in the back. Wordlessly, you grabbed his hand and held it up to your face. His mouth fell open, like he was about to say something, but you cut him off.

“Your nail polish is chipping,” you said, and then dropped his hand. For the rest of the drive, you stared resolutely out the window. Out of the corner of your eye, you could feel Eddie’s eyes on you, but ignored him.

The Hopper-Byers driveway was littered with bikes. Steve tssk’ed under his breath and parked on the street.

As the four of you walked up the drive, the door of the house slammed open. Dustin was standing in the doorway, eyes wide. Under normal circumstances, you were sure that Steve would’ve made some snarky comment about him and his friends parking their bikes better, but as it was, he stayed silent.

“Eddie?” Dustin’s voice rang out across the space between you, sounding so cautious yet so hopeful.

“Henderson!” Eddie called out. He opened his arms and Dustin practically flew into them. He ruffled the boy’s hair affectionately.

You could tell that Dustin was crying, so you averted your eyes. Steve was hovering, like he didn’t know if he should comfort Dustin as well. You continued up the driveway and into the house, and after a moment, Steve followed you.

Mike and Lucas were standing awkwardly by the door. They greeted you politely enough, but you could tell they were looking over your shoulder for a peek at Eddie.

“Give them space,” Steve said to the boys, “you’ll get your turn.”

“So will you,” you murmured, reaching across to give his hand a squeeze. He said nothing, but huffed out a mirthless laugh.

Erica was sitting with Max. This was the first time you’d seen Max since she’d left the hospital. She was in a wheelchair, but you knew that was only temporary. Her bones would heal. Her eyes never would.

“Hey Max,” you announced yourself as you walked in. “How are you feeling?”

“I’ve had worse.” She smiled a little, and you couldn’t help but grimace.

“Max,” said your brother, sitting down beside her.

“Steve!” Her face broke into a radiant smile.

You left them talking. You always got the impression that she only tolerated you, whereas she genuinely seemed to care a lot about your brother. You tried not to let that bother you.

Nancy and Jonathan appeared from the kitchen, clutching cups of coffee.

“Hey…” She gave you a slightly forced smile. Your relationship with her had been pretty strained ever since she dumped Steve.

You’d liked her well enough when they were dating, and even before that, but you were the only person who had seen how devastated Steve was when she broke his heart. She had been unnecessarily cruel about it, and even if Steve forgave her for that, you were having a harder time doing so.

“Hey, how’s it going?” you asked.

“Oh, you know. Good. How are…” She glanced down at your baby bump. “… you? You must be relieved to have Eddie back.”

You nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I am.” There didn’t seem to be words that would sufficiently describe how you felt. When Eddie was gone, it was like the world was ending, and you were slowly starting to put the pieces of your broken heart back together, but now he was back, you weren’t sure where he fit into your life. You couldn’t sum that up in a way that Nancy would understand.

“Must be good to know that you’re not doing this alone.” Case in point, Nancy didn’t understand you at all.

“I was never alone. Steve was always there for me.”

“Of course. Right.”

“I’m gonna go sit down. My feet are starting to hurt.”

There were two armchairs and a wide sofa. Mike had taken one of the armchairs, while Steve was helping Max into the other. Nancy poked her brother sharply in the back of the head.

“Ow! What?” he snapped at her.

“You can sit on the floor,” she said, “she needs this seat more than you do.”

You watched on, amused. Mike gave you a dirty look, but vacated the seat.

“Thanks, Nancy,” you said, sitting down heavily in the chair.

After a moment, Hopper walked in with Eddie and Dustin in tow. “Alright, everyone, grab a seat. Grab a seat.”

Wordlessly, Eddie sat himself down on the arm of your armchair. Lucas ousted Steve from the seat nearest Max, and everybody else squeezed themselves onto the couch, sat on the floor, or grabbed chairs from the dining room.

Dustin sat down next to Steve. He was trying to hide it, but you could tell your brother was feeling a little bit smug about that.

The chief cleared his throat. “Thank you all for coming here today. As I’m sure you all know by now, Eddie, who we all previously believed to be dead, is back. I wish that was all I had to tell you. Unfortunately, there’s more.”

It was quiet enough to hear a pin drop. Eddie’s posture was rigid beside you. His hand was resting on his thigh, so you put your hand on top of it. He jumped, almost falling from his perch. You were about to pull your hand back when he flipped his over, interlacing his fingers with yours.

Hopper continued, “There have been reports over the past few days that I’ve been working hard to verify, but I can’t deny the truth of the situation. Demodogs have been sighted all over Hawkins. Vecna is back, and he’s planning something.”

Next Chapter

#eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x you #steve harrington x sister!reader #eddie munson x harrington!reader #eddie munson x pregnant!reader

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zoeykallus · 1 year

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Rex – In Love And War 12 - Moving On

_________

The journey in the Marauder is a little tense. Away from Rex and Hunter facing off tense, Tech has some other troubling news to share.

_________

What Happened Before:

In Love And War

Part 2 -Noises In The Dark

Part 3 - Sinful Dreams

Part 4 - Mesh'la

Part 5 - Old Friends

Part 6 - Unspoken Things

Part 7 - Lies And Other Things About Love

Part 8 - Guilt And Forgiveness

Part 9 – Love At First Sight

Part 10 – Mine At Last

Part 11 - Unpleasant Surprises

Part 12 - Moving On

Rex was anything but happy about traveling in the Marauder. At least not under the given circumstances. His brow furrowed critically, he looked again and again at Hunter, who again and again looked critically at you.

The tension was palpable and the silence in the room much too loud. For a while, you concentrated on the low hum of the hyperdrive, blanking out your surroundings. Until Wrecker's loud snoring interrupted the silence.

You thought about what Hunter had said, you were still surprised that he thought you had broken his heart. Things between you had drifted, at one point you had hardly seen each other because of your work, you hadn't been close for months. Hunter hadn't contacted you and hadn't responded to your last two messages, so you felt he had no right to blame you. Finally, Order 66 came, and you hadn't thought about him for a while.

You were with Rex now, you were in love with him, and you weren't going to let him take that away from you. And you weren't willing to let Hunter make you feel guilty.

Echo, sitting across from you, smiled tentatively at you as you looked up. You returned the smile softly and asked, "How are you, Echo?"

"Pretty good. We're still alive, we've got jobs, and I've still got my squad. Order 66 was a shock, but I feel like I got off relatively unscathed."

You nodded with a sigh.

"You were on the cruiser with the 501st, you were transporting Maul, weren't you?" he asked.

You didn't remember it with any pleasure, but you couldn't blame him for being curious.

"That's right"

"Did any others make it?" he wanted to know.

Rex stirred beside you and said, "Not to our knowledge. Other than Y/N, myself, and Maul, no one has escaped the cruiser alive"

Echo raised his eyebrows and asked, "Maul is still alive?"

You nodded and avoided his gaze, you weren't going to tell him you released him because you and Rex needed a distraction to escape from the cruiser.

"He let you live?"

Rex said, "Our brothers tried to kill us, we were all in the same boat."

Echo blinked, then finally said, "I see."

"Where are we even going?" you wanted to know.

Hunter answered you, "Ord Mantell, for now. From there you can move on to wherever you want. The main thing is to get away from Batuu. The Empire has gotten wind that many refugees are retreating or stopping over there. They want to build up an outpost there to put a stop to it".

"You know all this from the radio transmissions Tech intercepted?" asked Rex.

Hunter nodded.

"A happy coincidence."

Tech, who had just come out of the cockpit, cleared his throat and said with his finger raised, "It was no coincidence. I was specifically looking for radio transmissions from the Empire."

Hunter rolled his eyes, finally nodded and said with a small smile, "Okay, it wasn't a coincidence. Tech has been purposefully intercepting these radio transmissions for a while now, without my knowledge."

You looked at Tech and asked, "Picked up any more interesting info?"

Tech nodded and sat down next to Echo, across from you in his bunk.

"One or two things," he said, pleased to share his knowledge, "Some of it I have yet to decipher, but some I already know. For example, that a new prototype T-Fighter is being worked on, the station to be built on Batuu and the planning of a station on the moon Endor. There are also new troopers to be trained, special commandos, they call them Inquisitors, Force-sensitive individuals who are supposed to track down surviving Jedi, among other things."

This was incredibly sinister news that Tech was revealing.

"That doesn't sound good at all," you said worriedly, "Force users working for the Empire are a straight-up nightmare"

Rex beside you gently grasped your hand.

"We'll deal with that, we won't let it get us down that easily".

Crosshair growled, "That's easy to say, but now imagine someone with Skywalker's abilities on the Empire's side"

Rex gulped.

"I'd rather not"

Echo played around with his scomp link, nervous and lost in thought, his gaze crossed Rex's, and he finally said, "The Jedi were a strange bunch sometimes, but I kind of miss them"

Rex sighed softly and nodded, "Me too brother, I miss our Commander"

"Ahsoka?" asked Echo.

"Yes. As far as I know, she's still alive, probably. But I'm not sure. She wasn't with the other Jedi when Order 66 went down. Ahsoka was with the Mandalorians, with Bo Katan to be exact," Rex explained.

Echo said, "That's good, so the chances of her being alive aren't bad at all."

You nodded and smiled encouragingly at Rex, "Ahsoka isn't so easy to get down. She's gone toe-to-toe with Maul, after all, and he's killed seasoned Jedi Masters. Skywalker trained her very well, if anyone can survive, it's her."

Rex smiled and nodded as well, he knew Ahsoka was capable and strong.

Tech stood up and walked back to the cockpit, saying as he walked, "We'll be exiting hyperspace in orbit around Ord Mantell any moment now"

"So this is where you live now?" you asked Hunter.

He looked at you, shook his head and said, "No not really. We live in the Marauder, this is just a stopover"

"And your employer," Cid murmured.

Hunter rolled his eyes but finally said, "Let me introduce you. This is Cid, Cid this is an old...friend"

" Friend, huh? Interesting to see someone in your midst who isn't a clone."

You raise your eyebrows and ask, "Old?"

Hunter shrugs and smirks.

"You're older than me."

Cid grumbles, "Everyone is older than you, clone."

He rolls his eyes and is about to introduce Rex when Cid says, "Never mind, I don't need to know names. Here is the payment for your last mission, the customer was satisfied"

Hunter accepts the small case.

"What kind of work are you doing here?" you want to know.

"Various things," Hunter says evasively.

Echo says bluntly, "You could call it mercenary work."

Hunter adds, "We do what we can and must to survive."

You raise your hands placatingly, "No blame from me, I was just curious"

Tech joined in and said, "I found a shuttle you could use to leave Ord Mantell shortly and move on"

Rex said, " Probably for the best. The more of us in a bunch the more likely we are to stand out and maybe attract unwanted attention"

Hunter and Tech escorted you to the shuttle, Hunter handed Rex and you some contact information and said, "Just in case you guys ever get into trouble"

"Thanks," you and Rex said almost simultaneously.

Hunter sighed and said, "I'm sorry for the way I acted. I had no right."

"It's forgotten," you said with a grin.

Tech stayed quietly in the background and nodded goodbye to you.

Hunter called after you, "Rex! Watch out for her, she has a knack for getting into trouble."

Rex smiled and replied, "I will."

Ko-Fi (If you feel like giving me some coffee)

@ttzamara

@chxpsi

@andyoufollowyourheart

@the-sith-in-the-sky-with-diamond

@brynhildrmimi

@nunanuggets

@clone-whore-99

@misogirl828

@tech-deck @rexandechosandwich

@flyingkangaroo

@stardusthuntress

@ladykatakuri

@graciexmarvel

@arctrooper69

@agenteliix

@puppetswithteeth

@punkpirate82

@greaser-wolf

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miasiegert · 2 months

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Suncoast Broadway CATS update 2/17

There was a great comment by @lie-in-a-bureau-drawer , so I hope it's okay that I post it here since I've got some info and comments! (I still don't get tumblr and I keep forgetting how it works/etiquette but I'm trying!)

I never would want anyone to ever strain to put themselves in a financial situation ever for any project I do, or anything in general, but especially me. This is something very personal as in 2016, I was about to live in my car until two amazing friends took me into their home. What was meant to be two weeks turned into six months, which I can never financially repay but I promised to repay it forward however I can. Since we don't have money to pay it forward, that's where on other social media platforms I signal boost, and also where I'm absolutely happy to share info and help when I can. I totally can understand the disappointment of wanting to go somewhere, and it's incredibly touching and means a ton to me (you have no idea) for that sort of support. So thank you, from the bottom of my (supposed to be) frigid heart.

For anyone thinking of or planning to attend, David and I will be there for the shows on Feb 1st and both shows on the 2nd--our flight home is the 3rd (missing that show and the rest of the run). This is pretty standard for costume designers, sometimes we don't get to go at all (aka Wichita with their full department already!). I'd feel bad if someone only came to try to meet us and we weren't there so I wanted to give those dates but the show will run until, I believe, April 7th. There is accessible seating and accommodation.

I'd call the theatre to double-check (as a courtesy) but already in many production meetings I brought up superfans in costume and said there's a good chance that'll happen. They seemed really excited by the idea. So if you like going to shows in costume, this one should be very friendly to it and there will be more interaction than usual due to dinner theatre. I can't say much more than that but there was a very specific reason why we were hired (well, several... but something really stood out).

Let's be honest, this is the one y'all care about: YES, there WILL be pictures and (hopefully) video! And I'm pretty sure people who come to the show will be able to take pics/vid on their phones and probably with performers but I'm not 100% positive there--I will get confirmation. Once opening happens, I will share at least one special costume design I made. There will be one special performer who will greet every table in a very special costume as the host/ess. Who will it be? Who... will it be..? (Spoiler: It's not Macavity. WHEN WILL PEOPLE LEARN HE JUST WANTS TO DO SOMETHING AND IS SUFFERING THE WORST MIDDLE CHILD SYNDROME EVER?)

Additional fun info: On Tuesday (maybe Wed) we'll be teaching the make up classes. We had to improvise with some different products, still Mehron base but also some snazzaroo for detailing and some powder and eyeshadow. I don't believe I'll be allowed to share video of these classes (there will be video) because make up classes usually are emotional the first two days, then by day three everything's fine. It's a very emotional process and I'd love to share how I teach but I also need to respect the privacy of the cast in case there are tears.

Kind Suggestion: If you do go to the show, please tip kindly. As this is nonequity, the actors are responsible for providing their own shoes (they will need to be replaced during the run), undergarments, make up (first initial batch on the theatre), other things. We did everything we could to help them, but I know with undergarments and shoes, especially shoes, some actors are really struggling, and if they dance but also tap, and it seems like one actor will cover three tracks... it's very hard. Just a very kind thing to do/consider. We had to talk with a few about whether they could do just one dancebelt and basically the, "well, yes, you CAN... but for twodoshays, you probably don't want to. If not an option, these are things you can do to help keep yourself dry, prevent bacterial infection and odor, and prevent chafing." Also added like a 4-page skincare routine that I stressed was optional but what I personally do/like in case anyone wants to take care of their skin--if anyone wants the routine, I can share it here but it's seriously excessive.

I'm irrationally terrified of flying, so here's hoping that Monday is very smooth with no sudden squalls or anything. I'm really going to miss my floofs but my mom and her BF will take excellent care of them! Currently I'm resting although I should be packing because my immune system gave out and I'm taking as much stuff as I can to knock whatever this is out of my system.

#cats musical suncoast broadway theatre #cats musical #cats the musical #cats musical costume

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lindwyrmrelinquished · 1 year

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asks you about your aus. any of them. all of them

OH BRILLIANT I CAN SUM UP MY ZOROAKARI AU. BASICALLY IT'S JUST. YKNOW THE POKEMON LEGENDS ARCEUS FEMALE PROTAGONIST. YEAH I MADE HER A ZOROARK

I have fics about her actually!! They come out on my Ao3 every Wednesday!!

(info under the cut bc LONG)

She's technically meant to be a changeling! She was supposed to replace Dawn by possessing her body(courtesy of Zoroark mother) until Dawn's soul collapsed under the weight of Akari's Zorua soul, but that didn't end up happening because Akari ended up being aware of the nature of her existence way too early(woke up while Zoroark mother was putting her in Dawn's body), started hopping out of Dawn's body and letting her take the reigns again, and then shapeshifting into a copy of her, and they ended up living as twins! Johanna was surprisingly chill about this because I like when characters are nice to each other

So Dawn took the champion title at the age of 12, Akari(named after the Hero of Hisui, which she then ironically became) never was much of a battler so she mostly hung out on the sidelines and cheered her sister on

Then when the two of them were 15, Akari gets eeby deebied to Hisui and Dawn has an entire breakdown in every possible way, does everything she can to try and get her back(and fails) and eventually gives up the Champion title back to Cynthia so she doesn't just completely lose her mind

We all know the story of PLA(i think), Akari still gets amnesia but she's still in her human disguise which becomes her default, so she doesn't remember that she's a Zorua until the Red Sky, when a Hisuian Zoroark confronts her about her still being alive when the rest of them had to die first to even get a chance, and she doesn't know what it's talking about for a while. Then she decides "if i can't become something else, it means i'm human and they were wrong" But then she becomes a Zorua. And can't figure out how to turn back because she hasn't shapeshifted or known she could shapeshift for months

She goes out across the Highlands to look for someone or something to help, mistakenly believing that because she is now baby, wild Pokemon will not try to attack her

She gets beat up three different times and almost swept off the side of a cliff by a Gligar

Eventually Ingo finds her! And that's how he learns she's a Zorua, and subsequently helps her figure out her shapeshifting again! While they were practicing, she takes a form that mimics Ingo, then reverses it to look like "the man in white" which triggers Emmemories!!! Hooray!!! But then they have to go fight Dialga and Palkia at the Temple of Sinnoh so the joy is short-lived

Only a few people personally learn that Akari is a Zorua! Those people are Ingo, Rei, Mai, Lian, and Melli(I'm not counting Volo because it's in the middle of the Giratina fight and it's during his religious insanity so he's not paying that much attention)

The whole of Jubilife sort of vaguely knows Akari is a Fox due to an incident where she forgot to put her human disguise back up after sleeping in her quarters for once and answered the door for someone, complete Zoroark(she evolved sometime during or immediately after the Red Sky), but they've all kind of agreed not to tell Kamado due to the exile incident

Cyllene knows though! She's pretty chill with it as long as Akari doesn't suddenly go feral, which, she doesn't think she will. So it's sort of an open secret in Jubilife

Now from here on out, there are technically four ways the Zoroakari AU can go:

1.) Akari gets sent home by Arceus as normal, eventually reunites with her twin and her old friends, and with Ingo(and subsequently meets Emmet and Elesa in the process)

2.) Akari is not sent home, whether by malice on Arceus's part for her being a Zoroark instead of human, or because she still has a role to fill. Either way, Ingo is sent home at her request, but she has to stay in Hisui. Three ways go from here. The first is that Akari goes back to the life she wasn't expecting to continue living, and exists in Hisui-and-then-Sinnoh for around 50 years. Then she fakes her death and starts region-hopping to hide her supposed immortality(in my hc, Zoroark live ~200 years depending on conditions) and brings her Hisuian team with her(mainly a Typhlosion and an alpha H-Zoroark, since both are ghosts and therefore don't die to age)

3.) Akari is not sent home, ends up wandering the Alabaster Icelands and runs into a pack of wild Zoroark. She ends up becoming their Noble Lady Zoroark(and she is motherfucking H U G E), and that's a whole nother story that I've actually written a fanfic about

4.) Akari is not sent home, doesn't leave Hisui, and doesn't become a Noble. Instead, after a while, she notices Hisuian variants are starting to die out, and becomes a specialized breeder for them. She hides away in a forest near a coast at the very edge of the region, and sets up some pastures of her own to make a sanctuary where Hisuian variants still live to this day

One more thing before I'm done here: I subscribe to the Uncle Ingo headcanon <<<<<3

Okay that's all from me tonight probably

Unless I decide I want to talk about a bunch of scenarios

#pokemon legends arceus #akari #pla #pla akari #pokemon akari #mod note #mod post #ask #anon

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angelrider13 · 1 year

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Are you still working on your SI!Leviathan verse? Asking, cause recently I have wondered - you wrote a seaborne!Regis au but what about a seaborne!Noctis?

Like, my initial idea was that maybe it was during the Marilith Incident when he was 8. I don't recall any canon info about the precise location (besides between Insomnia and Galdin Quay), but there could be a river or maybe it was near a seashore.

Either way, bb Noctis is thrown into the water during the attack, too injured to swim, maybe even doesn't know how to yet. And Thalassa, well, she's not heartless, she's not gonna leave a little kid dead. (And maybe there's a small voice at the back of her head that points out that it could help her derail the prophecy, if the newest Chosen King was her sea-child.) She turns him into one of her seaborne.

Noctis stays with his Tidemother only long enough to get hang on his transformation (so 1-2 weeks, tops) because Thalassa doesn't want to draw attention to this. Not yet. And then she puts on a vaguely human shape, kinda like Shiva's Messanger form, and takes Noctis back to Insomnia, to his father.

(Regis was Panicking and Raging the entire time Noctis was missing, and thinking that Nilfheim grabbed his baby boy. He Refuses to contemplate the other option.)

No idea what would happen next, exactly, but it would involve a major bsod on Regis and Co's part when they realise Leviathan helped a Lucis Caelum and Much Research into both prophecy and the Astrals, and merfolk legends.

Also, Ignis and Gladio Despairing because Noctis no longer hides from his lessons under the bed, oh no. Now he hides at the bottom of a pond in Citadel's gardens.

While this is a fabulous idea, it doesn't work with the lore I've built for the verse.

Don't get me wrong, Thalassa would 100% be ready and willing to adopt Noctis (especially after she decides that Regis is Her Person), Bahamut already laid claim to Noctis the moment he was born and once and Astral has done so, they've pretty much declared them off limits to their siblings. And while Bahamut has already bent and broken quite a few Laws, Leviathan will not cross that line.

BUT! FOR FUNSIES!

It is absolutely in character for Thalassa to fuck with the prophecy at every available opportunity so, of course, when smol, baby, heavily injured Chosen King crashes into her waters, she's going to snatch him up. (Bahamut: YOU DARE - Thalassa: Well I didn't see you stepping in. What was I supposed to do let him die???)

It'd be longer than 2 weeks, more like 6-12 months. Thalassa isn't gonna rush her new baby's induction just because he's a prince. That title doesn't mean anything to her anyway - he's not her prince. He's her newest son.

So please imagine, Regis absolutely losing his mind over his missing boy. Refusing to believe the worst even though there is no evidence Noctis survived. Nilfheim could have taken him, could have spirited him away into some laboratory - no. No. He will not stop looking until he finds his son or he finds a body. And if he finds a body, Nilfheim will be reminded what happens when a Lucis Caelum takes the field.

As it is, Regis takes a far more active role in the actual warfare - in a way he hasn't ever. In way his father hadn't either. He runs missions himself, draws up plans, and starts pushing Nilfheim back in a way Lucis hasn't managed in years.

AND THEN.

Even with the positive turn of the war, months have passed. Regis is a widowed king with a missing heir. His counsel is making noises about him remarrying, about securing the line of succession. Regis won't hear of it. Despite being no closer to finding his son, he refuses to consider the alternative, refuses to even contemplate replacing him.

And it is in the middle of such an argument with the counsel when there is the sudden crystal fracture sound of a warp mixed with the crashing of a wave as a small whirlwind of water condenses in the room.

The woman that emerges from it is ethereal and inhuman and dangerous. Long sea green hair done up in braids with sea glass and shells and driftwood. She's dressed in sheer layers of cloth that shimmer in the light like rippling water. Her golden eyes flicker over his counsel dismissively before landing on Regis, a grin tugging on her lips revealing pointed teeth.

"King of Lucis," she greets with a nod of her head, "I believe you are missing something."

"Dad!"

His eyes jerk down and that's his son. His Noctis, whole and hale and alive, holding this strange woman's hand and he's here -

Regis doesn't even realized he's warped across the room until he and Noctis are crashing into each other, clinging desperately to any part of each other they can reach.

"How-?" he gasps out around his tears.

Noctis pulls back and Regis can't help the way his grips tightens. His son doesn't let go though, just looks up at him with eyes that are the wrong color and says, "Mother rescued me!"

Regis blinks. "...Mother?"

The woman hums, startling him. "And now he has been returned home, safe and sound," she says, smoothing a hand over his son's hair. "Different than before, but no less loved for it, hmm?"

It sounds almost like a threat but Regis isn't given any time to reply to that before Noctis is blinking up at her.

"You're leaving?" he asks.

The woman nods, leaning down to place a tender kiss on his son's forehead. "This place is not for me. But I will visit from time to time should you wish."

"Yes!" Noctis demands instantly.

She chuckles. "Very well, Sweet Prince. Until next time."

And between one blink and the next, she is gone. She is gone and Regis has no answers and no explanation, but his son is in his arms, safe and alive, and that is all he ever wanted.

#ask #elri answers #sweat tears or the sea au #anonymous #anon #could leviathan have warped into the room without the water tornado?#yes #but she's a dramatic bitch so also no #also feel like i need to point out that thalassa does not save everyone from drowning #she doesn't just hang around and snatch people left right and center #they have to /ask/#and even then it isn't necessarily a done deal #but /they have to ask/#and noctis wouldn't have known to ask #so #definitely would not happen in canon verse #but it's a fun idea

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salt-volk · 1 year

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re "tbh pretty sure anji just lied about the whole "monthlies and customs only take 10% of my workload" bit because there is no way that is true with absolute NOTHING to show for that supposed other 90% like....."

idk i actually do genuienly believe her (moslty bc 4-6 custom items taking an entire month or even more than 2 days for a 10yr+ professional mostly full time artist just seems impossible to me esp seeing how quickly she does shit on stream & knowing other artists myself haha. no comment on the monthlies since even if they did hold up site progress they cant just be paused as thats the sole revenue for dv so moot to talk abt as an option but id ALSO guess those dont take an entire month or even over a week, esp w how theres always small boring items included w only a few complicated each batch) but like i think was brought up before, i agree the main problem is that all that stuff is one time scheduled release but other content is nearly ALWAYS larger bundles together.

its easier + quicker to do a few art than an entire event. customs are published once their done. but general site content is made dependent on a bunch of other shit ("X item is complete but will have to sit here for month until the other 15 items are done" "Y item is finished but we have to get ahold of our barley functional coder & wait 2 mo. on writing before it can come out"). so stuff like custom queue stays chugging along doing a lil bit here & there while main site content releases are always MASSIVE drops w a bunch of shit all at once to the point that its overwhelming.

there is plenty to show for the other 90% of time they just dont show it at the right times or in the right way bc they put all the stuff together (OR also could be all their time gose into shit that isnt easily visible like background management work or now that anjis trying to learn code to pick up slack she could be spending more time w that which has no visible site progress). fr we spend all our time waiting around for shit to drop not bc progress isnt actually getting done or bc one thing is takign up all the resources but just bc staff just does not know how to do little teasers or small events or small content resleases.

again this all comes down to management issue & site direction. probaly also a community advisor of sorts. which they lack. but could tell them "you dont have to put these items together or drop them w an update. the users do not care". or "you do not have to waste months coming up w grand vision of new event types multiple times a yr i promise you can just do the same thing & nobody will care" haha

which to be clear this is totally their fault & i dont understand the compulsion to always have to have like 85 new items come out simultaneosly as part of one update instead of just slowly drip feeding to at least help w the illusion & create more of feeling of constant content stream -_- i still dont have all the shit from those last two big updates w the stupid circlets & just gave up bc its to hard to keep track of...

oh worm they releasde new event info while iasw writing this. how much do you wanna bet some of the event content will be stuff that could have been seperated & dropped on its own but was just grouped together? even having the first custom auction w the event... that could have been its own thing tbh. released sooner since is not being held back waiting on a bunch of other shit to complete. have a feeling the mini town could have been out on its own too. lord

#anonymous #mod yoshi #staff #customs #events

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thatrandombatgurl · 23 days

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Venting after the read below

Tw: depression & negative selftalk & suicidal ideation

To lay the background, I live with my mom in a house that has a separate apartment that is connected to the rest of the house & my dad passed away in October.

I’m not currently paying rent on the apartment, but I pay some of the bills, get the groceries for us(started buying them a month ago), pay for the dog poop to get picked up (I have a dog & she has a dog), do the dishes, cook or pay for most of our meals, drive her everywhere, etc. while working a full time job and doing online schooling full time.

Now I’ve always had a weird relationship with my mom bc she is definitely undiagnosed with something. I have anxiety and major depression. & she definitely gave me body image issues as a kid, by making me do weight watchers when i was a preteen. She’s always swapped her emotions on a dime & she always denies saying mean/bad things.

Anyways to the present. For about a month she has been in the anger stage of grief and I am most commonly the victim. For example, I went to a concert a few weeks ago and she kept guilting me about me going starting that morning even though she had encouraged me to go for about a month leading up to it. this ultimately led to me being upset and worried the whole time & having a panic attack, thus ruining this once in a life time thing, which she then talked down to me about how I need to just learn to have fun. I didn’t tell her the full reason for not enjoying it, just that I had a panic attack.

Currently she is out of town for the weekend and I am at the house with the dogs. The issue at where she is at is the wifi isn’t working so she can’t watch tv and I tried to facetime her to help & it didn’t work. Then my brother went over today to fix it and it didn’t work. While my brother was with her, my sister came over for a bit & we ended up cleaning the spice cabinet & pantry bc there was an insane amount of expired stuff. We found stuff that expired in 2010! We have moved 3 times since then. Anyways, we sent her a picture of how nice it looks and she was pretty angry but I figured that she would have gotten over it by now after we explained that it was all expired & it’s been about 6 hours.

Anyways she just texted me about something that I already tried to help with over the phone on Friday, Saturday, & this morning. Then as I’m calling her, she texts saying not to call her. Then when I text saying that I have looked everywhere and cannot find the info that she needs, she resent the thing she needs in all caps. And I know that it was probably just the fact that she is older and her texts almost always come off passive aggressive, but it just hit me really hard & I’ve been crying the past 30 minutes and am just really upset & want to run away or do something bad to myself. Luckily knowing that she won’t be back until late tomorrow so the dogs wouldn’t get taken care of is stopping me from doing bad stuff to myself, but I’m just so done. It just makes me so upset and feel like a failure. Which I already know that I am, I fucking dropped out of college and moved home and barely have any irl friends my age who haven’t moved and I still haven’t gotten my degree and i’m an anxious idiot and I’m messy and I’m overweight and I just can’t do anything right.

She acts like she is the only one allowed to grieve my father. Yes, they were married for 26 years, but I knew him my whole life & we were really close. I miss him so much…it’s his birthday on Friday and we are supposed to go to one of his favorite lakes and spread some ashes and spend a few days there just the 2 of us and I really don’t wanna go now, with her pulling this shit.

Anyways sorry i just needed to get this out there…

#bat rambles #bat ramblings

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queen-haq · 3 years

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Fic: A Woman Scorned - Part 13

Pairing: Billy Russo x Reader

Rating: R for language and smut.

Words: ~3000 words.

Summary: You’ve been sleeping with Billy Russo for a few months now. Knowing his aversion to emotional commitments, you’re satisfied with your clandestine arrangement until you catch him having dinner with Dinah Madani one night. Then it finally dawns on you. It’s not that he doesn’t want to commit, he just doesn’t want to commit to *you*.

Billy may think he knows you, but he has no idea what he’s just lost...

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9

Part 10 Part 11 Part 12

gif credit: @bilyrusso

Part 13

It was 8 in the evening and you were still in the office. You hadn’t accomplished much work today, your mind mostly focused on Billy. You were surprised by how quickly he’d been able to make the funeral arrangements for his mother. Yesterday you had driven over to the nursing home and by the time you reached there, Carla Russo’s body had already been picked up. You’d signed a few papers for Billy and picked up the remainder of Carla’s things before you returned home. Everything of hers was packed into a small suitcase and sitting in your living room. You wanted to call him, ask him how he was and offer your support, but he seemed determined to do everything on his own when you’d talked to him last and you didn’t want to intrude.

You gave yourself a mental shake, reminding yourself to concentrate. This workday had been a wash. When you weren’t distracted by thoughts of Billy, you were putting out fires in your team. At least the personnel conflicts have been temporarily resolved, but now you needed to work on a slide deck that you’d been tasked with presenting to the executive leadership committee later in the week.

An hour later you were halfway done with your presentation when your phone rang. You glanced down at your screen to find Billy’s name on the screen. “Hi.”

“Hey.” He sounded exhausted. “You still at work?”

“Yeah. How did you know?”

There was a pause. “You give off the workaholic vibe.”

You smiled to yourself; at least he was okay enough to crack jokes. “How are you?”

“You mean am I grieving over a goddamn dead woman who preferred meth to her own fucking son?” He sighed. “No big loss. I’m fine.”

Anger and hurt saturated his voice despite his attempts to sound unaffected. Your heart hurt for him, you wished there was something you could do. “Do you need anything?”

“The funeral service is tomorrow.” A beat of silence followed. “Do you want to come?”

“Sure. What time?”

“2pm.”

“I’ll take the day off. Do you need my help with anything? Maybe I can call some of her friends?”

“When I found her she was living on the streets, barely alive but still hooked on meth. I doubt she’s got any friends.”

“What about the people in the nursing home? Maybe they want to come?”

“No, I don’t want anyone else there. Just you.”

Not liking the warmth that spread through you upon hearing his words, you reminded yourself he was probably feeling unusually vulnerable. This wasn’t typical of him.

“Do you want to come over?” he asked.

You exhaled a heavy sigh. “I would but I have so much work to do. I’ll be here for another hour at least.”

“Come over after you’re done.”

“It’ll be really late.”

“That’s fine. I can wait.”

“I can stop by my place to pick up your mom’s-.”

“No, it’s okay.”

You realized he wasn’t quite ready to go through Carla’s belongings yet.

“Bring your stuff with you.”

“Stuff?”

“Overnight bag, clothes for tomorrow, whatever.”

“Oh. You want me to stay over?”

“Yeah, might as well. We can drive over together for the service tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

Despite the conversation coming to a natural end, he wasn’t hanging up. It seemed as if he was reluctant to be alone, probably because that meant dealing with the complicated emotions for his mother. You knew exactly how that felt. “If you want, I can leave now. I can work from your apartment instead of the office.”

“You’re not worried I’ll be tempted to spy on Valiant stuff?” he teased.

You smiled. “As if I’d let you see what I’m working on.”

“Guess no corporate espionage for me tonight.”

“Still going to keep you away from my laptop.”

He chuckled. “Just get here. I promise not to bug you while you work.”

“Okay. I’m leaving now.”

“See you soon.”

After you hung up, you started gathering your things together.

***

An hour later, you were at his place. When he opened the door, you immediately grew concerned at how tired he looked. Traveling back and forth from Vegas plus dealing with the news about Carla’s death within the last few hours meant he was absolutely exhausted.

“Hey,” he greeted you, smiling as he took the overnight bag from your hands.

You removed your heels while he took your bag inside his room and then made your way to his living room. While his penthouse suite was much bigger than yours, you actually didn’t like it very much. Despite the high-end finishes and the beautiful interiors - Billy had obviously hired a designer to make the place look good - it always felt very cool and inhospitable to you. It was too perfect and you always felt out of place inside the suite.

“You hungry?” he asked, coming up behind you. “I ordered dinner for you.” Arms encircling your waist, he dropped a kiss on the back of your head as he maneuvered you to the kitchen. He’d laid out the food for you on the dining table, and from the take-out containers you knew it was from one of your favourite Indian restaurants. The thoughtful gesture surprised you, you weren’t used to that from him. Noting that he’d only set the table for one, you turned around to look at him. “You’re not going to eat with me?”

“I ate already. I was starving. Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” You cradled his face with one hand, your eyes roving over his beautiful face as he placed a kiss on the fleshy part of your palm. “You look exhausted. Did you even sleep?”

“No” He leaned back against the kitchen counter, weary. For a moment he closed his eyes, simply holding still, and you found yourself wrapping your arms around him in a hug. You didn’t understand why you’d even initiated the embrace – hugs were never your thing – but seeing him so beaten-down you were desperate to comfort him. He leaned into you, his body flushed against yours, and you held him tight. Stroking the nape of his neck, you placed a soft kiss on the center of his forehead. “Why don’t you take a nap while I work?”

“You don’t mind?”

You smiled up at him, running your fingers through his hair. “At least I don’t have to worry about you stealing my company secrets while you sleep.”

He smirked. “You’ll be here when I wake up?”

“Yup. Probably still working away.”

Billy grazed your temple softly before dropping a tender kiss on the tip of your nose. “Okay, but eat first.”

You nodded your head, watching after him as he sauntered out of the kitchen and disappeared down the hallway.

Sighing, you went to the sink to wash your hands before eating.

***

It was after midnight and you were still working on your slide deck when you heard Billy puttering around in the bathroom. Soon he slowly made his way towards you, dressed in a t-shirt and black boxers, his hair all messy. He yawned lazily, falling onto the other end of the couch.

“I thought you’d sleep through the night,” you remarked.

“Are you still working?” he asked.

“Almost done.” You saved the file and shut off the laptop before slipping it back inside your bag.

Suddenly he pulled you closer and you found yourself tucked underneath him on the couch as he glanced down at you from above. “You work too hard.”

You smiled up at him. “They don’t pay me the big bucks to sit there and look pretty.”

A slow, incandescent smile curved his lips. “I would. If I ran Valiant, you’d be my personal stress relief. You’d be in my office the entire time and do nothing but look pretty and service me.”

“That’s sexual harassment.”

Billy shrugged his shoulders. “Whatever. I’d make it worth your while.”

You laughed, angling up to kiss him. “Your breath is all minty fresh.”

“I brushed my teeth for you.”

“Wow. Be still my heart.”

A warm grin covered his face as he shifted down your body to nuzzle your neck. His weight was heavy as he rested atop you, but you liked the solid feel of him on you, the way you felt all safe and warm. You stroked his hair while he drew lazy circles on your chest, the silence between you two comforting.

“No one knows about her. Not Frank, not Curtis, no one.”

Those names were familiar to you because Billy had mentioned them in passing a few times. Of course he’d never shared any other info, but you being you, you’d dug around and found out more about them. You knew they’d served with Billy and he considered them his closest friends.

“When I found her three years ago, I put her in that home and forgot all about her.”

“You visited her every week,” you reminded him.

“Because I wanted her to regret abandoning me. I wanted her to see how far I’d come, I wanted to throw her mistakes in her face. But I don’t think she regretted safe-havening me, not even a bit.”

The bitter pain in his voice made your heart hurt for him.

“Maybe I should be happy she’s finally dead, or maybe I’m supposed to be sad or something.”

“How do you actually feel?”

“Nothing. I feel nothing.”

“Billy, I think that’s normal. There’s no right or wrong in this. All of your feelings are valid.”

“Even if her dying made me absolutely ecstatic? You wouldn’t think I was a fucking psychopath?”

“You are a psychopath but not because you have conflicting emotions about your terrible mother dying. You have the right to feel how you feel about her, whatever that might be.”

Eyes blazing with emotion, he hovered about you to meet your gaze. “Then what makes me a psychopath?”

You quirked your eyebrow. “The fact you want to torture my dates.”

“Not just torture, I want to kill them.” Eyes darkened, voice velvety-smooth, he covered your mouth with his and ravaged you with a kiss that left you thrumming and breathless.

“Only you’re allowed to touch me?” you asked through labored breaths.

“Yes.” His voice was a lustful rasp, his mouth leaving a heated trail as he sucked on the oh-so-sensitive corner of where your neck and shoulder intersected. Sparks of electricity ran down your spine. “Only me.”

You took his hand and guided it down your body, parting your thighs for him.

Like always, you were soon completely lost in the erotic pleasure of his mouth on you. Your legs hooked over his shoulders, your hands grabbed the back of the couch for support as he fucked you with his hands and mouth, sucking you, licking you, his tongue flicking over your clit until you were keening under him. Body arching off the couch, you moaned his name louder and louder until he drove you completely over the edge.

Then you felt a light slap on your cunt which immediately brought you back to reality. Opening your eyes, you found Billy perched between your legs, gracing you with the most wicked smile. “That’s one.” He slapped your pussy again, this time his long, lean fingers ever so slightly grazing your clit and your hips bucked, wanting more. “As promised.” His eyebrow quirked up. “Punishment.”

“Not fair,” you protested. “I’ll date who I want.”

He slapped you again, a little harder this time, but then he leaned down to place comforting kisses on the very spots he assaulted and you moaned with pleasure.

“All of you.” His tongue lapped over your clit, eyes locked with yours. “Belongs to me. I own you.”

“You don’t!” You squealed when he flipped you over unexpectedly, grabbing you by the hips so your ass was lifted of the couch. And then he squeezed your butt cheeks, biting them lightly before he started rimming you.

***

After sharing a shower the two of you were laying in his bed, your back pressed against his chest as you both stared up at the ceiling. His one hand was intertwined with yours, the other arm circled around your hips. The two of you didn’t have sex but you didn’t mind. You were both fatigued.

“I smell like you now,” you murmured, realizing the soap in his shower had left its scent on you.

“I know. I like it.” He squeezed your fingers. “I have a present for you.”

“I hope it’s not earrings again.”

He chuckled. “No, not earrings.”

“What is it then?”

“Jewelry.”

You turned back to look at him. “What? Like a necklace?”

“Something like that. Except I’m the only one who’ll see you wearing it.”

“Ah. And where is this gift?”

He kissed the top of your head. “Not here yet.”

You smiled to yourself. “People usually wait until they have the gift in hand before telling others about it.”

“I couldn’t wait. I’m excited to see you wear it.”

He stroked your hair, and your eyes grew heavy. Soon you started falling into deep slumber, feeling calm, comforted by Billy’s arms around you.

“What happened with your family?”

Your eyes flew open. Like always, any mention of your family unfurled anxiety within you. You didn’t like thinking about them letting alone discussing them. “They passed away.”

“They’re dead?”

“Yes.”

“Both of them?”

“Yes.”

He pulled you up so you were facing him now, his intoxicating gaze completely focused on you. “That day when I asked you about the pictures, you said you weren’t close to your family.”

“I meant my extended family. I don’t keep in touch with them,” you replied smoothly.

“What were your parents like?”

Irritation surged through you at his obtrusive questions but you had to remind yourself he just lost his mother. He was feeling out-of-sorts, working through his grief – even if he didn’t think so – and he was reaching out to the only person in his life that knew about his mother. “Normal.”

He simply stared at you for a long time, studying you, saying nothing. “Normal,” he repeated, finally breaking the strained silence.

You shrugged your shoulders, dropping your gaze to the base of his throat so you didn’t have to hold his piercing stare. “Yup.”

“How did they die?”

“Car accident.”

“You miss them?”

“Of course,” you lied.

He reached out to cup your face, his thumb stroking your cheek. “So you grew up with great parents, white picket fence and all that bullshit? Sounds like you had a fairytale childhood.”

“Can we talk about this tomorrow? I’m really tired.”

“Sure. I’ll add this to the list of all the other shit we’ll talk about someday.”

He sounded almost angry with you and you weren’t sure why. Before you could question him, however, he pulled you close so you were snuggled against his chest and the warmth of his body was enough to silence your brain and lull you to sleep.

***

It was a cold, crisp autumn day in New York. The outdoor service, attended by only you and Billy, was short and quick. Throughout it, he’d gripped your hand even though he’d been outwardly calm and collected. Even now as he stood a few feet away from you, impeccably dressed in a black suit, his dark eyes hidden behind a pair of aviator sunglasses as he stared out at the pond, you sensed he was a complete mess inside. You didn’t know what to say to him so you simply sat on the bench, both of you in an isolated corner of the garden. Eventually he came to sit beside you, taking your hand in his.

“I’d have given her the whole world.” His voice was filled with pain and longing as he removed his sunglasses and tucked them in the upper pocket of his suit. “I would have given her anything she ever wanted.” Billy’s eyes met yours. “If she’d just wanted me.”

You scooted closer to wrap your arms around him, breathing him in as he sunk into you. His hands caressed your back, his grip on you so tight you almost couldn’t breathe. After a while he rested his forehead against yours, his eyes holding you prisoner in front of him.

“Swear to me you’ll never leave.”

“Billy-”

“Promise me!”

“I can’t.”

“It wasn’t a fucking request, Y/N.”

You tried to pull away from him but he fisted the back of your hair, holding you in place.

The raw urgency in his voice played havoc with your emotions. If you closed your eyes, just for a moment, you could shut out all the doubts in your head and simply believe him - but you could only live the fantasy for a short moment before reality forced its way back in. “You don’t mean those words, Billy.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because you don’t feel that strongly about me.”

His eyes narrowed, glaring at you with hostility. “You’re gonna tell me how I feel?”

“I’m not what you want.”

“And what do you think I want?”

You gave him a sad smile. “The best of everything. Best car, best clothes, the most beautiful women in your arms. You want all that because you need others to want what you have.”

“Is that so wrong?”

You shook your head. “No, there’s nothing wrong with that – except I don’t fit into any of those categories. You want a woman like Dinah Madani. I’m not her. So eventually this thing between us will end.”

His jaw was set in a grim line, eyes burning bright with rage. “So you have me all figured out, huh?”

“Don’t get mad. You know it’s the truth.”

He yanked you closer, crushing you against him. “It’s been me against the world for as long as I can remember. But when I look at you.” His eyes softened, mouth parting as his dark gaze roamed over your face. “I don’t feel alone anymore.”

Your heart melted. The tenuous handle you had on your self-control disintegrated completely. You closed your mouth over his, kissing him frantically as he picked you up and straddled you across his lap.

He pulled back to look at you. “You’re my home. You’re all I need.”

Part 14

A/N - As always, all of your feedback, comments, asks, likes and reblogs are deeply appreciated. They truly inspire me to keep writing, so thank you from the bottom of my heart.

If you want to be added/removed from the tag list, please let me know.

Tag List:;

@yourfavoritefruitybitch @voyevoda-thejoy @adreamemporium @queenmalhinewahine @gubleryum @galaxyjane @xceafh@maralisa124@tomhollandisabae @daybleedsintonightfa11 @lil-baby-nor@all-art-is-quite-useless @tanyaherondale @nashibirne @dour-trash @thetallassgirl @athenamikaelson @agent-jbarnes @primadonnasdream @aleksanderwh0r3 @elisemockingbird @nihilismworld @archisur@nemesis729 @lysawayne@kaqua @ladyblablabla @lemasonda@advictedtohim @24-martie @tarkanelima-blog @shinebrightlikeafanbase @krystal-clear1 @damalseer@dontjinx-it@darkishx @wanderlusting-about-life @thatguppienamedbae @happypepperdog @bat-revival @sassygirl25 @consulting–heroes @the-celestial-kitsune @mackaywhore @ablxssm @competitive-dust @red-head011 @exo-1204 @sunsetenigma @millieb-3199 @chatnain @licensedcheek @tinkertailor1212 @vertesalope @safetyhtom @acourtofglassandroses @eliwinchester-barnes @finnismyoriginalsin @weallhaveadestiny @beananacake @beauty-and-the-beast97 @smurfelle @fire-treasure-iii @charly-0 @kestrafagnor @pigwidgeonxo @damagelove @allegra-writes @pensandthings @jad3djay @batshitbarnes @kashimayuki @secretsthathauntus @odetostep @awesome-eccia @mackaywhore @stories-you-wont-hear @vvsdiamond28 @supernaturalcat7 @arieltwvdtohamflash @iknownoqueenbutthequeeninme @devs-stufff @ticosas @moodacheeks @myakai13 @carlywhomever @fvckthisbxtchup @its-evita-here @papapapadumb @talesfrommycell @bat-luna-cat @fific7 @elluvians @dailydoseofchoices @everythinghappens-love @papapapadumb @mylife-love-and-other-things @bigcreatorwombatdreamer @ancientbeing10 @natty2245 @stuckysavedmylive @kasslucilfer @simp-for-ben-barners @originaldeputycalzoneegg @bdffkierenwalker @kimoranelson03 @sadbi-hours @haushinka27 @haushinka27 @caylaxwrites @extraneousred @agentmstark @crazywitchkitty @its-an-idea-not-a-blog @partypoison00 @fictional-hooman

#billy russo x reader #billy russo #ben barnes #the punisher #billy russo imagine

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mazuwii · 3 years

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Getting Lost with the AOT characters!

Levi:

-I think it's fairly obvious he's going to stay silent and tell you to shut up everytime you try saying something because he knows you're clueless

-he's just flipping the map upside down, right side up, to the left to the right

-you will get back and it won't be because of the map, you two agree to stalk a bird out of the forest😭😭😭

Eren:

-he gets so frustrated. He has no idea how he got it wrong, he's retracing his steps and can't remember crap

-even though you're panicking yourself you have to remain calm because of how this boy sounds. He sounds like he's on the verge of getting electrocuted

-The whole time he's demanding you follow him because his memory is good and you just threaten to knock him out and carry him.

Bertholdt:

-he's somehow good at it, like he's been in the forest so many times that he knows it like the back of his hand

-since it's getting dark he smiles reassuringly and holds your hand so you don't lose him

-Okay but you two heard russling in the bushes and found two squirrels having seggs 💀that scared you more than the monster you were expecting

-sorry that headcannon was out of NOWHERE

Reiner:

-he's brave and shit until it's dark and gloomy and you two are in the middle of nowhere

-He BAWLS the moment he realises his phone has no signal so calling anyone is not possible

-is clinging onto your hand and denies it when you ask if he's still crying.

-at one point he thought he saw a ghost so he threw you over his shoulder and DARTED aimlessly while you wailed at the top of your lungs

Jean:

-he carries a compass around with him 100%, is jokingly trying to scare you with myths

-I personally think you guys would get lost for the day and since it's night time you can't see anything so at that point he starts a fire and you both continue your journey in the morning

-turns out the exit was right in front of you but you know our baby horse💀 always a dunce

Armin:

-he wouldn't cry or panic he would probably stand still and try to come up with a logical plan

-he most likely would help you climb up a tree to see how far away from the entrance of the forest you guys are

-I mean if it begins to get dark he can get very pale and paranoid, like the man kept walking into trees

-reminds you every 2 seconds that he's got you

Erwin:

-He's been keeping track of everything there's no way you could get lost

-he remembers things the old way, like a child. Something like:a red musbroom, then a tree stump, bridge, etc.

-NOTHING scares him, there could be a tiger inside that shit ass forest and he'd just 👁👁 hello

Zeke:

-he insists on climbing somewhere high to see everything beneath him, like you can't climb so you waited for him on the ground

-monkey man- He just needs his hands to climb, nothing else

-you did trip and hurt your knee so you got a piggyback ride on the monke man.

-you get back home faster than expected

Porco:

-Not good to get lost with him, he gets so frustrated. He's so mad that he crumples the map and you just deadpan because it's the last piece of info that can save you

-Get a load of shit with you if you go hiking with him because there's a 90% chance you'll get lost and he'll either blame it on himself or rage like an animal

-at some point your friends find you because it had been too long and Porco just goes "Fucking finally" with his arms raised completely💀

Hange:

-She doesn't give a fuck LMAO

-"Hey um, honey... we're lost..." you say, staring at the map as if it were an alien language. She stops her staring contest with the wood pecker and turns to you with an amused look. "Are we now?" She hums, returning her gaze back to the animal hidden within the shadow of the towering trees.

-Like I said, she can survive up to 3 months in the wild by herself

-Let's just say sometimes it's quick, other times you get Erwin and Levi to try and find you

Pieck:

-She sounds like a middle school teacher 💀 "Oh deary me... we're lost." She taps her chin and looks around in thought.

-I imagine you'd be the calmer person in the relationship but you'd lose your shit in this scenario

-She's just stroking your head while you have a full on panic attack, chuckling about how much you're overreacting and how the both of you will find your way back

Mikasa:

-She's 100% the best person to get lost with

-Like Hange, strong and intelligent enough to survive in the wild but she'd rather not live like that and find a way out

-Tells you to stay behind her incase anything creeps up

-her words are so reassuring and true. Like if she says 'we'll make it out of here' she ain't playin

-Miss gurl here wouldnt sit her ass still SHES SEARCHIN THE WHOLE DAY

Mike:

-Is rambling on how he's an expert on hikes and how he would never ever get lost.

-Chill we get it just find a way out😩

-He did make notes on what he saw on the way so that slightly helps but Mike seems like the type of person to move away from the exit by accident without even realising💀

-you could be telling him how the both of you are going to a different location and he just tells you to 'trust the process'

Sasha:

-you're terrified, she'd eat anything she deems edible tbh

-because you don't want that happening you both try to find your way back using the map yet you still fail

-However when she takes control of it, she begins to pull out knowledge that you never knew she had

-she's pretty fast at navigating her way back and protects both you and her surprisingly well

Annie:

-curses under her breath and begins to try and remember her steps, will probably tell you to shut up even if you aren't saying anything

-like she's even scaring feral animals away from you guys💀

-eventually it's almost night time and she lets it out by wailing 'DAMN IT' at the top of her lungs with birds flying out of trees💀

-her last resort is to just keep walking even if it's almost nightime and thankfully you somehow make it out together

Kenny:

-He's making weird noises as supposed to groaning, realising you're both stuck in this shit ass forest

-I can tell you, he runs so that he can find the way out before night and worst part is he grabs your hand so you're just dying from the amount of sprinting he does

-He assumes everything is there to attack you both, a cat popping out of a bush? He wrapped his arms around you and squealed.

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destroyhorse · 3 years

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(8/23) hi folks. the past few months have been kind of rough financially, so of course babycat has blood in his urine again like a week before rent is due! if i sound like im being flippant i promise im like trying very hard to keep myself together right now 🤪 his normal clinic is at capacity & referred me out. the referral clinic has an exam fee of $155, and the xray will be anywhere from $240-440. they weren’t able to give me an estimate for a possible urinalysis/urine culture. so i know it’s going to be at least $600.

i already had to spend $360 on friday (8/20) for an exam + medications. i’m taking him to the vet later today (they have a 6-8 hour wait rn & i dont want to keep him in his carrier in the sun for that long since i dont have a car). if you can please help out or boost it would mean a lot. any amount helps.

https://www.paypal.me/finnpg

edit: forgot to mention bc i was flustered but if you would like an IOU sketch commission or something in exchange for donating please DM me with the receipt!

more info/screencaps below cut

on 8/9 i was supposed to get a delivery of babycat’s prescription food for his urinary problems. unfortunately, someone swiped it off my fucking porch while i was home! :-) second time someone stole a chewy box from my porch, so cool. i contacted the delivery company and had to wait a week for them to just shrug at me.

i contacted chewy and they were able to send me a new box free of charge. that didnt get here until 8/19. in the meantime, i fed him exclusively wet food mixed with water & cranberry powder for pets. and still by the time his food got here, he started having urinary issues again. YES, i wish my stupid fucking ass just spent $50 to get a new shipment but i didn’t think it’d take almost 2 weeks to sort out. he’s unfortunately had gaps between his prescription food before, but usually he’s been fine with wet food/cranberry powder.

he was squatting + not peeing much the morning of 8/20, so i took him to the vet. he didnt have any blockage, so the vet is pretty sure he developed bladder stones again. i did not have enough money for an xray/urinalysis/urine culture at the time bc it was $800 up front. so we settled on expressing his bladder, giving him medication + keeping him on the prescription food to dissolve any possible stones. invoice from that visit:

#cat #ugly boy #signal boost

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wonwoonlight · 3 years

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📣: idol!Mingyu // idol!yn // fluff // mingyu is flirty lol // 700~ words

A/N: thank you for the request, anon! admittedly, this went down differently than what i had in mind when i started typing this but i liked this better sooo hahah enjoy!!

find the rest of requested drabble here

You stretch a little after the makeup artist is finally done with your face, shaking you awake after your very short nap while she was working on your make-up.

Preparing for a full album has always been extra exhausting, even if you do enjoy the process of it. You’ve slept for roughly 2 hours last night (morning?), because you had a sudden struck of inspiration and you were on a roll so you pushed yourself until your manager reminded you about today’s stage and special MC gig. Being the MC means you need to arrive earlier than when you’re simply performing and that totally went pass your mind.

You’ve just sat down on the sofa when someone knocks on the door, Mingyu’s head peeking in not long after as he greets your group before waving at you and then signaling you to come with him for ‘MC-ing stuffs’.

Your members give you that annoying knowing glance, and you just roll your eyes as you quickly make your way to Mingyu, hoping the guy doesn’t notice your group’s antics. They’re convinced you and Mingyu have something going on despite your constant denial, because there’s no way someone like him would be interested in you romantically.

“Didn’t get enough sleep?” he asks when you let out a soft yawn.

“Yeah. Too much fun in the studio,” you answer flatly.

Mingyu laughs at your words, and you notice you’re blatantly staring at him before you clear your throat and look to the front once again. “Jihoon does that a lot. Are you preparing for a comeback? Or just piling songs?”

“Hmm, that’s confidential,” you shrug jokingly, which makes him laugh again.

“You think I’m going to leak that info to the world?” he grins in amusement.

Mingyu has always liked talking to you; you were an MC for a whole year with him before, the contract ending just a few months ago. It’s a little pretentious, he admits, but he’s always thought you’re cute and he thinks it’s safe to say you probably have a little something for him, too.

That said, you still talk to him from time to time because you no longer meet every week in the broadcasting station, but Mingyu thinks they’re not enough and he wants to talk to you as much time as possible.

“Who knows?” you grin up at him. “Someone tells me you’ve got a pretty big mouth.”

Mingyu groans, frowning a little. “I shouldn’t have introduced you to Seokmin.”

“Why!” you laugh gleefully. “We click pretty well, you know? Plus, we already made a plan to go karaoke-ing next week.”

At this, Mingyu stops walking and the frown in his face deepens.

“What?”

“You make plans with Seokmin?”

“Uhh, am I not supposed to?”

“And you didn’t think to invite me?”

Mingyu regrets his words almost immediately when he sees the way you’re grinning as you let out an ‘awww’ as if he’s a baby. “Ohhh, is someone jealous?”

It’s now or never, he quickly decides.

“And if I am?”

Unexpectedly, you pout at this, which both startles Mingyu and forces him to hold himself back form squishing your face. “That’s not a fun answer,” you say.

“Is it fun if I’m not jealous?” he asks again, confused, but he notices the way you’re suddenly avoiding his eyes and the tip of your ears getting red from his gaze.

“I don’t know,” you turn around instead, not believing your own self just in case you blurt something stupid out of embarrassment. “Let’s talk about something else. Seokmin says—hey! Why are you pulling my arm!”

“Ohhh, is someone flustered?” he grins as you turn your face to the side, refusing to meet his eyes even when he’s leaned down to meet your face.

You’re about to say something when Mingyu quickly stands straight and lets go of your arm. A staff coming into your view when you turn around, telling you and Mingyu you’re called to do rehearsal and then signals you both to follow her.

You try to walk faster than Mingyu, maybe if you’re close enough with the staff Mingyu wouldn’t dare say anything again; but his legs are clearly made for catching up with people and he never leaves your side no matter how much you try to outwalk him.

“We’re going to talk about it again after we’re done with rehearsal, got it?” he quickly whispers to your ear before standing straight again. “You look cute, by the way.”

You don’t say anything back to him, but the way you’re trying to hide your face with your hair as you bite down your lip is enough for Mingyu. You do have a little something for him, alright.

#mingyu fluff #mingyu scenarios #seventeen x reader #seventeen scenarios #seventeen fluff #seventeen drabble #seventeen fic #svt fic #svt fluff #svt imagines #seventeen imagines #mingyu au #mingyu fic #mingyu scenario #mingyu x reader #wwreq #svt fanfic #seventeen fanfic

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felassan · 4 years

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Dragon Age development insights from David Gaider - PART 1

This information came from DG on a recent SummerfallStudios Twitch stream where he gave developer commentary while Liam Esler played DAO, specifically the mage Origin. I transcribed it in case there’s anyone who can’t watch the stream (for example due to connection/tech limitations, data, time constraints, or personal accessibility reasons). A lot of it is centered on DAO, but there’s also insights into DA2 and DAI. Some of it is info which is known having been out there already, some of it is new, and all of it imo was really interesting! It leaps from topic to topic as it’s a transcript of a conversational format. It’s under a cut due to length.

Note on how future streams in this series are going to work: The streams are going to be every Friday night. Most likely, every week, they’re going to play DAO. Every second week it will be Liam and DG and they’ll be doing more of this developer commentary style/way of doing things, talking about how the game was made as they play through, covering quirks and quibbles etc. Every other week, it will be Liam and a guest playing a different campaign in DAO, and Liam will be talking with them about how DA changed their lives or led them into game development, to get other peoples’ thoughts on the series (as it’s now been like 10 years). Some of these guests we may know, some we won’t. When other DA devs are brought on, it’ll be in the DG sessions. They hope to have PW and Karin Weekes on at some point. Sometime they hope to have an episode where they spend the whole time going through the lore.

(Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6)

[wording and opinions DG’s, occasionally LE’s; paraphrased]

DAO’s development actually finished up around April 2009. They then put it on ice for around six months before release. Human Noble is DG’s favorite Origin. It’s one of the ones he wrote. He also wrote the Dalish Origin as well (Tamlen is his doing ;__;). DAO’s temp name during development was Chronicles. DG has never played any of the DA games after they were released. He played them pre-release loads of times, when they were half-broken or incomplete etc. This stream is his first time seeing everything played after completion.

NWN: Hordes of the Underdark was the first game where DG was a/the lead writer, in charge of other writers, as opposed to a senior writer. It was pretty well-received. In the fall of 2003, BW were just finishing up HotU when James Ohlen came to DG to talk. BW had been having issues during the development of NWN with the IP holder for D&D Wizards of the Coast, so they were interested in starting their own IPs that they would have ownership over (and also for financial reasons). JO said to DG that one of these new IPs would be fantasy and one would be sci-fi. He knew that DG was more fantasy-oriented, and so asked DG if he wanted to take this on. DG was down, and the first thing to figure out was what that fantasy IP was going to be.

JO gave DG an atlas of European history, which he still has, and said that he wanted him to make a fantasy world that is reminiscent of medieval Europe and reminiscent of D&D - “make it like D&D but not, file off the serial numbers really well”. This worked for DG because he was pretty familiar with D&D and there were also lots of things that he didn’t like about it and wanted to change. So DG went off and for the next six months worked on creating a setting, beginning with documentation and the map. This was kinda strange because they had no idea at that time what their story would be. JO was very interested in having a “genetically evil” enemy in the setting (like an equivalent to orcs). DG wasn’t a big fan of this and his initial go at the setting omitted this (i.e. darkspawn were not a thing) and was a lot more realistic. JO insisted on adding them later on.

This period of development wasn’t actually a good process. There were other people who were working on the project who were designing the combat side. Looking back, DG feels that they should have put their heads together a lot sooner. The combat designers had various ideas for various prestige classes and subclasses, and DG would be like “these are nowhere in the setting [lore]”. He tried his best to add a few of them after the fact, which is why we see things like DA’s version of the bard archetype. The combat designers and artists originally had a vision in mind of a game that was much more along the lines of the type of fantasy you’d find in the Conan the Barbarian world - bare-chested barbarians, sorceresses that show a lot of skin, a grimdark world with barbarian hordes. They were just assuming that’s what it was going to be. At this point in time DG had never thought, “Oh, maybe I’m responsible for communicating my ideas to them” - he’d never done this role before and was just told to go create the world. He created world-building documentation and would send out emails saying “I’m making this documentation, please go ahead and take a look”, not learning until later on that nobody outside of the writing team really likes reading such documentation. He learned tricks later on like making the docs more accessible, less dense and wordy, and overall easier to peruse.

There was no real ‘vision holder’ for DA. Mass Effect did a much better job of that. Casey Hudson was the project director and the vision holder for ME, and he had the power to enforce a set vision of what was and was not ME. ME therefore ended up having a bit more of a coherent vision. DG was in essence the vision holder for DA, but he didn’t really have the authority to enforce it on the artists. The DA teams ended up spending a good 3.5 - 4 years of the ~6 years of DAO dev time going in circles, not exactly sure what they were going to make, the various people working on it having different ideas of what ‘kind’ of fantasy they were going to make. The writing team were leaning towards LoTR; the artists were leaning towards Conan; at one point one of the project directors was leaning towards a point-and-click Diablo-style action adventure; and nobody was overriding anybody else.

The fans who hang out on the forums and in similar places have a very different idea about what kind of game they like and want to play versus the telemetry BW get from the public in general. As an example, fans on the forums tend towards playing non-humans and feeling that playing as a human is boring. Forum-polls reflected that, but BW’s general public-telemetry shows that around 75-80% of the playerbase played a human in DAO. Elves were at 15% and dwarves 5%. In contrast, in the core/forum-based fanbase, the human figure dropped down to 30%.

DG originally wanted Zevran to be a gay romance (he has talked about this before). He asked JO if he could do that pretty early on, thinking of Jade Empire which had same-gender romance options which were really popular. BW were surprised about that, and DG had no idea that the JE team were going to do this. For DAO, he had an idea for an assassin character. He had been reading about how the CIA and KGB would often recruit gay men to be their assassins, as they didn’t tend to have family ties. DG thought this was really interesting. JO was cool with the idea on a conceptual level, but thought that the work that would end up going into it would be better served if those characters could be romanced by both male and female PCs. Zevran and Leliana weren’t intended to be bi, they were “bi out of convenience”, but at the time these sorts of things (representation and such) didn’t enter into the equation as much as it does today. DG wrote Zevran in his head as being romanceable by men.

DG would ask the hair artists, “Why all the mullets?”, because he never understood that, and he’d get “a sort of shrug response”, and an indication that “it’s easier to model, I guess?” Having hair which is loose, in the face, in locks, coming over the shoulders etc wasn’t really supported at this point by the tech or the engine. Hence, they ended up with like five different versions of mullets. On the subject of the engine, for the first half of development they were using an upgraded version of the Aurora engine from NWN, and it was not good. Several years in they decided to switch. Trent Oster was in charge at the time of making a new proprietary BW engine. At the time it wasn’t ready yet, but the DA team decided to grab it, use it and hammer it into the DA engine. That engine had “so many little weird quirks”, like lighting on skin not working properly and looking bad, and one of the issues was hair. It was supposed to be BW’s proprietary engine but it really wasn’t optimized for RPGs and didn’t include a dialogue system. They had to custom-build the conversation system. (At the time Trent didn’t think BW should be doing RPGs anymore, which is a whole other story of its own). DG recalls programmers complaining about things in the engine that weren’t ready for ‘prime-time’. Even compared to games released concurrently, DAO’s graphics were a bit dated.

For the worldbuilding, they had an internal wiki and they kept everything on there. They ended up with a lot of legacy documentation on there very quickly. Eventually they solved this by hiring an editor whose sole job it was to wrangle the documentation. DG started work on the setting in the same manner in which he’d embark on starting a homebrew - ‘so like, first, here’s a map, oh, I like this name, vague ideas, a paragraph on each major nation, a rough timeline of the history, expanding, and it just growing from there’. After about six months, they brought on other writers, and by then he had around 50 pages of documentation. This 50 pages was a minute amount compared to the amount they had generated at the time of release. Originally, they weren’t sure where in the world specifically the story would take place, so DG made sure to seed potential and brewing conflicts throughout Thedas. They settled quite quickly on the new Blight starting in Ferelden. Once they established that, the writers went to town on taking Ferelden specifically and blowing it up detail-wise. Jennifer Hepler was in charge of the dwarves and Orzammar. Mary Kirby was on Fereldan customs and traditions.

The first version of the setting was more grounded in realism, almost like a post-fantasy. The dragons and griffons were extinct and a lot of the things that were thought to be fantastical were thought to be over with. During development, they started clawing these things back. They brought back dragons because the game was named Dragon Age (lol). DG was approached like, “Hey, we named the game DA, can you bring back dragons and weave them into the story more powerfully?” Wynne’s writer Sheryl Chee had a bit of an obsession with griffons and was often like ‘omg, griffons :D’, and this is the origin of Wynne’s dialogue with the Warden about griffons.

KotOR was the first time BW had tried to do a game that was fully voiced-over. For KotOR, BW sent the work of casting, direction and so on down to another studio in California called Technicolor. BW had little say in the process then and when they got it back, “it was what it was”. By the time they got to DA and the first ME, BW had a good system down for recording and VO had become an important thing in games at the time. BW are really one of the premieres for this, a lot of actors really like acting on BW games as they get a lot of space to act where they wouldn’t normally be able to do so otherwise. DG has learned a lot from Caroline Livingstone on how to encourage the best performance out of an actor. For DAO, DG worked together with the various lead designers and Caroline to decide on the auditions, casting etc. This was one of DG’s favorite things to do.

Gideon Emery as Fenris, GDL as Solas and Eve Myles as Merrill were times where DG had written the character and then went to Caroline and said “I have an actor in mind for them, can you check it out?” These were specific times where he was able to secure the actor he wanted. This didn’t always work out, for example there are times when actors aren’t interested or have no time due to scheduling conflicts or were too expensive etc. Eve and GDL were DG’s roommate Cori’s idea. Cori was a big fan of Torchwood/the actors from Torchwood, and worked as an editor at BW for a long time. Gideon was DG’s idea after playing FF12. For DAO, DG didn’t have any specific ideas in terms of actors. Casting Morrigan was the longest, most drawn out process.

The Circle went through a whooole process during worldbuilding. Initially, mages in the game weren’t supposed to have any “fighting magic”. The restrictions were originally such that in the lore, they didn’t teach mages that. Mages weren’t taught any magic that could kill people, only ‘indirect’ forms of magic that could support others. However, [during what sounds like] playtesting it was asked “Why can’t I cast a fireball? I just want to cast a fireball”, so the writers had to go back and rework how magic in the lore worked completely.

Flemeth was originally going to be voiced by Shohreh Aghdashloo, and she was totally on-board, but unfortunately because of DAO’s development delays, she was unable to attend the new recording time as she had a conflict in her schedule (she was filming House of Sand and Fog). Shoreh was quite disappointed about this and her family had been so excited that she was going to be in a video game. When the movie was finished, Shoreh came back to BW and let them know that she was still available, and this is how she ended up in ME2. For a while they were trying to find an actress with an accent that authentically mirrored Shoreh’s. Out of the blue around this time, Claudia Black’s agent sent BW an audition tape of her. At the time Claudia hadn’t done any games but wanted to get into it. The tape was of Claudia doing a beat poet rendition of Baby Got Back. DG still has this tape. DG was a big fan of Farscape and on listening to the tape, it clicked right away in his head that Claudia would be perfect for Morrigan.

The Fade ended up being a big irritation for the writers. They wanted the PC to be able to assume different forms and such while in there. A lot of this stuff proved too difficult for the combat designers to work out, and so it ended up getting changed a lot. They had a hard time coming up with gameplay that could work in the Fade. The mage Origin is DG’s least favorite of the Origin stories, as he’s really dubious about the Fade section in it. It didn’t work out like how they had pictured it in their heads. By the time they got to DAI, that’s when the Fade really looks like how the writers first described/envisioned it. By this point the artists were more keen to give it a more specific feel. DAO was made at a time when ‘brown is realistic’ was a prevailing thing in games dev.

The experience of a mage in the world isn’t represented or conveyed very well to the player when the player is a mage. The experience of the player when they’re playing a mage or have a mage in their party doesn’t really match up with how the world lore tells them how dangerous mages can be - for example, how they can lose control and so on, we never really have an example of a PC mage struggling with being taken over by a demon. This was originally supposed to be a subplot in DA2 for mage Hawkes, in one of the last cuts. In Act 2, mage Hawke was originally slowly being tricked by a demon in their head that they thought was real, only to realize at the last minute. Mouse the Pride demon in the mage Origin is the only time in the entire series that they really ever properly demonstrated how demons can fuck with [PC] mages. Also, PC templars were originally supposed to have a permanent lyrium addiction that they needed to ‘feed’, but this was scrapped as the system designers weren’t keen on it and felt that it was essentially handicapping the player.

Mages were originally also not supposed to be able to deal with pure lyrium (it would ‘overload’ them). There is a plot where mage PCs run around touching lyrium nodes to refill their mana bars. On this DG was like “Wtf is this?” The designers said that it works, and DG said “but it flies in the face of the lore”. This instance is an example of how the DA team was working where the various departments (writers, artists, designers etc) all had their own ideas about how the game and its world would work and never overrode each other (see above). DG feels that DAO is a little contradictory in that way. It’s only after the game came out that a lot of the people on the team really “bought into” what they’d put forward. This got easier as they went on, with people involved buying then into the things that make Dragon Age, Dragon Age. At one point, not everyone on the team was even aware of those things.

DG relates that originally, they would ask the artists, “Ok, can we get a village?” and said village once created would be quite generic and non-specific to DA. The writers would try to relate how things are in the DA world and list things that would be found in a village like this specific to the DA world, and the artists either didn’t read it or had their own ideas (DG isn’t sure which), and nobody was around to tell them not to do that and that they should do it differently. Everyone having their own ideas like this is why we ended up getting something that is this sort of “cobbled together half-Conan half-LotR mish-mash”, and after a while this sort of became DA’s “thing”.

Initially, BW had concepts drawn up for a lot more different creatures. After they went in circles for those years and consequently ran out of time to do all the models, they had to cut these concepts down more and more. Demons were among the ones that were the first to go (this is why we have situations like a bereskarn as the Sloth Demon in the mage Origin). The original concepts for things like spirits of Valor and Sloth demons were really good. Early on, JO made a list of D&D creatures that he liked. He picked the ones that they were thinking of doing, sent them to DG and said to make a “DA version of this”. For example, D&D succubi essentially became Desire Demons. Desire Demons were originally patterned off Sandman, neither male nor female yet really alluring, acting more like a genie and trying to ferret out mortals’ inner desires (which are not necessarily sexual in nature), without being overtly sexual. The artists’ version came back and that was basically the model seen in-game. The writers were like “What is this, this is nothing like the description?” and the artists responded that on the list from JO, it was included, in that you had to click on “succubus” to get to the Desire Demon description, so they had just read “succubus” and done their version of a succubus. The artists did loads of great work, but this was one of the instances were DG was like “???” By then, it was too late to change it. The writers were able to encourage them to make Desire Demons a little more fearsome, so that made it in at least.

The mage Origin was one of the more contentious Origin stories. It had like 4 different versions written of it over time. It was often the case that BW would hire someone, and writing an Origin story was their first test. Three different writers came in and wrote a version of the mage Origin and those versions just didn’t work. Finally they passed it to Sheryl Chee and she wrote it. The Origins were the parts of the game in general that were written/rewritten the most often. There were several others that got written that they discarded.

Duncan was slated for death from Day 1. When DG writes a story, the thing he does first is pick out the big emotional beats that he wants, such as deaths. He decides these ahead of time and the stuff in-between comes later and is more often changed. Oghren was also originally supposed to die, but this ended up getting cut. DG related a story of how Oghren came to be: At the time, there was a phase JO went through when he thought everything had a formula that it could be done by. One of these ‘creative forumulas’ was that all such IPs had a two-word name that they’re known by, such as Star Wars, Star Trek, Dragonlance (being Dragon-Lance). This is how ‘DA’ and ‘ME’ came to be. One of the formulas he wanted to implement was how to distill the ‘comedy character’, like Minsc or HK-47. These characters were very popular with the fans and JO was certain that there was a way to figure this out to create one for DA. At the time, DG argued with him a lot about this. JO insisted it could be done. DG was originally supposed to write this character but ended up not doing so. JO came up with a list of comedic archetypes and had DG write a blurb about what kind of character each could be. These were then sent out to the team who voted on which was their favorite. This process eventually resulted in an archetype basically called ‘The Buffoon’ (think Homer Simpson or Peter Griffin, the kind of guy people laugh at because he’s such an oaf).

At this point ‘The Buffoon’ wasn’t named or made a dwarf yet. JO came to DG to write him, but DG said there was a problem which is that he hates this archetype. Homer and Peter are characters that he despises. DG is a professional writer, but this was comedy (outside of his areas of strength), and he felt the best he would be able to do is write a character who makes fun of this archetype and lampshade that. Comedy is something that has to come from within the writer. Oghren was given to someone else, and he ended up getting rewritten again anyway. By the time they were working on Awakening, DAO had not yet come out, and the assumption prior to the game going out was that Oghren was still going to be the most popular character from among the followers. The comedic character that ended up being the most popular along these lines was Alistair, which was interesting as he wasn’t intended as a comedic character, “so shows what we know”. DG was dubious that Oghren was going to be popular, because “he was kind of pathetic, honestly”, but that was the thinking at the time. Thinking he would be well-loved is why he was in Awakening.

On Alistair, any character DG writes is going to be sarcastic. At the time DG had made it a sort of personal challenge to recreate Joss Whedon’s dialogue patterns in his characters. Alistair was a sort of mish-mash of Xander from Buffy and maybe Mal from Firefly. DG wanted to see if he could do it, so Alistair was kind of quippy and self-deprecating. DG never really considered this to be Alistair’s main personality feature, but when other writers wrote him, they often had him doing this, as they liked the trait so much, and so this is how Alistair ended up as he did.

On dwarves, the dwarves being cut off from the Fade is very much baked into who the dwarves are as a race. There’s a specific reason why. This has been hinted at so far and it’s likely to come up in the future. DG had various ideas for some things that he wanted to include with the races or the way the world works etc. Some of them ended up never happening or some are mentioned only as part of the lore (templar lyrium addiction never coming up in gameplay is an example of this). Dwarven history and the nature of the dwarves is one of the things that survived pretty well though. DG calls Jennifer Hepler “mistress of the dwarves” and says that she did a really detailed, amazing breakdown of their history. After Jennifer left it was Mary Kirby, and DG feels that they did a good job of maintaining how dwarves were, in terms of both how they’re often presented in fantasy and yet also quite different in DA. Orzammar is one of DG’s favorite plots all together. You can really tell that Jennifer Hepler really enjoyed the dwarves and brought a lot of love to that plot.

DG draws a distinction between DA fans and the unpleasant people who harassed Jennifer Hepler.

They managed to keep the Tranquil in. There was a while there where they were going to be cut. At the same time, DG regrets that they couldn’t solve the making of the player more aware of how mages are dangerous, thing. Players could make a cogent argument like “they’re not that dangerous, look at me [mage PC]” and the writers were like “well... yeah, that is fair”. It was a case of showing one thing and the player experience of it being another. DG feels that this made the templars come off worse than they are. DG feels that they are being massively unfair and too extreme in their approach to the problem, but the problem itself is a real thing. He feels that there’s some merit/truth in the argument that mages are oppressed, but he looks at it more like an issue like gun control rather than as treatment of oppressed people, saying that we don’t have an example in real life of oppressed people who can explode into demons and cast fireballs and so on.

There are some funny pronunciations that worked their way into DA, and the reason for a lot of them is as follows: the writers had to create a pronunciation guide for VO, because otherwise you end up with a lot of inconsistencies. (Some did still slip through). The guide was online, and if you clicked on a word, an audio file for it would play. Jennifer Hepler was in charge of this and did a great job, but has a really strong NY accent, and in some cases the ‘NY-ness’ of her pronunciation endearingly worked itself into things (the way Arlathan is sometimes said is an example of where this happened sometimes).

Sometimes the writers trying to communicate the “hotness” of a character to the artists didn’t go smoothly. The writers would sometimes say things like, ok, this character is a romance, they need to be hot, and the designs would come back looking “like Burt Reynolds”, and the writers would be like “???” And then a character that wasn’t particularly intended to be hot, as in that wasn’t mentioned at all in the descriptions of them, would come back “accidentally hot”, and the writers would be like “Why couldn’t you have done this when we were asking for a character that was meant to be hot”, and the artists would be like “What?? He’s not hot”. And this became a thing (lmao - this discussion was prompted by DG being asked “Was Duncan meant to be that hot?”, for context). Some of the artists were so paranoid about their [in]ability to judge actually-hot characters that when it was time to pick an appearance, like for Alistair, they gathered up all the women at BioWare, and DG (“resident gay”) into a room to show them an array of faces and bodies like “Is this hot? Is this hot?” DG and co would sit there like, “How can you not tell? Is this a straight man thing?!” Anyways, this is why oftentimes we ended up with characters who are accidentally hot.

Over time, the writers realized that the way they communicated to artists needed to be managed better. The words they would use would have different connotations to them the writers, than what they did to the artists. For example, for Anders’ design in DA2, he was supposed to be “a little haggard”. When DG thinks of haggard, he thinks ‘a little tired, mussed hair, looking like you’ve been through some shit’. But the artists based on that produced concepts with super sunken cheeks, looking like he’d been terribly starved. The writers needed to develop a specific vocabulary for communicating with the artists, as artists think in terms of how something looks, but writers are thinking in terms of what the character “is”. Anders’ description talked about his history a lot, and the one visual-type word that jumped out was “haggard” due to its visual connotations. “A lot it came down to the writers being up their/our own asses.”

When they got to DAI, they had figured out that the way to get best results on this front was /not/ to have the writer go off and develop a long description and pre-conceived notion of what the character looked like in their head. In such scenarios artists don’t feel that they have much to contribute to the process or an ability to put their own stamp on who this character is and make them interesting to them (the best, most interesting characters are when people at all stages of the pipeline properly get to feed into it). They learned that the better solution was to bring the artists in earlier, and to give them little blurbs, and not name the character but give them an ‘archetype’-sort of ‘name’. For example, Dorian was “the rockstar mage”, “cool”, “Freddie Mercury”. The writers wouldn’t be sure that a particular concept would ‘hit’, so at this stage they would offer an array of options and sit the artist down and walk them through the concepts. The artists would then provide a bunch of sketches and it would go back and forth, with both taking part in the character creation process together. For the first two games, the writers were “really hogging” this process to themselves. They got better at not doing this and better at communicating with the artists by DAI.

There were a lot of arguments about how mages in DAO had a lot of specific lore words like “Harrowing”, “phylactery”, “Rite of Tranquility” etc. There was concern that this would be too confusing for players to understand and that it was too complicated. DG says that thankfully he put his foot down and pushed for this stuff to be kept. A lot of fans assume that as lead writer DG had all this influence, way more influence than he could possibly exert on a team. He wasn’t even a lead, he was a sub-lead, under a lead designer. He only had so much say. If the lead designer or lead artist wanted to do something differently, often there was not much he could do. Hence he had to pick his battles carefully, choose the important ones to fight. The mage vocabulary thing was one of these.

Templar Greagoir’s name is pronounced “Gregor” and it comes from a place in Alberta near where DG lived.

Codex entries are usually one of the last things that get done in a project like this, and so all of that kind of textual lore comes in super late and is super punchy as by then the writers have written so much and are exhausted. They had to find a way to make this process cute or interesting or fun for themselves, which is why a lot of entries are quite fun to read. Sometimes a writer would make a joke for banter [irl], and it would end up making it into an entry.

Only Morrigan and Duncan got unique body models in DAO. The companions all have custom-morphed heads but not custom-morphed bodies (Morrigan not included here). This is why every model has a necklace or a collar right at the point where they had to be attached to be a body. These sometimes used assets that couldn’t be used by the PC but were not unique to that character. Duncan probably got a unique model because he was in a lot of marketing/promotional material. Qunari were originally conceived as having horns.

Most people didn’t even finish DAO once (public telemetry again here), only approximately 20-25% actually did. The devs try not to read too much into this kind of thing, but the telemetry does tell them where a lot of people stop playing the game permanently (they call these “drop-off points”). One of these points in DAO is the Fade during Broken Circle. Sometimes when people interpret this data they involve self-serving biases, but it was generally accepted that the Fade there was too long, too complex, not interesting enough, etc. [source]

[Part 2]

[Part 3]

[Part 4]

[Part 5]

[Part 6]

[‘Insights into DA dev from the Gamers For Groceries stream’ transcript]

#dragon age #bioware #morrigan #solas #video games #queen of my heart #mass effect #lgbtq #jade empire #fenris #the Fenaissance #alistair theirin #lul #fav warden

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jeonsjiddies · 3 years

Text

Lying That You Love Me | myg (m)

Summary - Upon first glance, no one would assume Min Yoongi would be the type to put someone back together. If his icy cold stare and stoic expressions weren’t enough to spook most people away, then the body covered in piercings and tattoos usually sent them running. You never could have imagined Min Yoongi would be the one to put your pieces back together, but there is always more than meets the eye.

Word Count - 10.5k

Pairing - Yoongi x reader

Genre - smut, minor angst

Warnings - mentions of broken family, family issues, mentions of homelessness, softdom!yoongi, dirty talk, cream pie, unprotected sex, oral (female)

a/n - Part of the Tatted Bangtan Series! 💕 Sorry it’s soooo late, I sprained my wrist lol. Hope you enjoy now that it’s finally here! Huge thanks to @nervouskiwi , @sunshinekims , and @excusemin for beta reading. 💕

You know those people you just instantly connect with? You hear their laugh one time and suddenly you feel more connected to a stranger than a friend you've known your whole life? Something in their smile that resonates deep within your soul, that somehow, on some level (whether it be friends or lovers or a kind stranger who changed your life in passing only to never meet again) you are just... meant to find each other.

Those people who feel like sunshine on your cloudy days? The ones who wrap you in warmth and make your heart say "Ah, yes, so this is what home is supposed to feel like. This is what it means to belong. This is what it means to be myself, unafraid."

Somehow, amidst all the chaos and the heartbreak and the hurt, you find yourself cocooned in safety, building your own version of home with these strangers who feel like family; and it's good. And sometimes your heart beats so fast and your chest feels so tight and you feel like you just can't breathe, so you reach out a hand into the dark unknown and you're met with arms wrapping around you and holding you together. Holding you until all your broken pieces can be glued back together, one by one.

Min Yoongi was one of those people.

Now, upon first glance, no one would assume Min Yoongi would be the type to put someone back together. He looked more like someone who was one wrong look away from tearing you to shreds. If his icy cold stare and stoic expressions weren’t enough to spook most people away, then the body covered in piercings and tattoos usually sent them running.

But you… you were a little different. You’d taken one look at the man covered in intricate inky designs and your face had lit up with glee. A few hours prior to meeting Yoongi, you’d been sitting in your car, reclined back with your phone, leeching off of McDonald’s free wifi for the 11th night in a row. Your back ached, your stomach growled, and your foot was one more cramp away from being the end of you. The tiny cabin of your car was no place for you to live.

You scrolled through rental listings, looking for the cheapest option that didn’t look like it popped straight out of a horror movie. Your budget was low, being recently thrown out by your father after a fight about you dropping out of college. Your father was convinced you couldn’t survive on your own and you wanted to prove him wrong.

Finally stumbling upon a small 2 bedroom apartment on the west side of town leasing out the second bedroom, you clicked on the listing. There was no way you’d be able to afford your own apartment in a safe area, so you’d ended up expanding your search to find someone looking for a roommate. You zoomed in on the pictures provided, though there were few, it looked pretty nice. You scrolled down and read the description.

Single male, 27, searching for a roommate. You pay half the rent and utilities. Rent is $950 and utilities usually range about $300 a month, give or take. Pets welcome, but there is a deposit with the apartment complex and a monthly fee. My friend (and ex roommate) recently moved in with his long-time girlfriend and I need someone to help with expenses. Serious inquiries only. Contact for more info. 555-555-1382.

You quickly typed the number into your phone and texted the man to set up a time to view the apartment, but if you were being honest with yourself, you were already sold. This was the cleanest looking unit you’d seen, on a safe side of town, and it was more affordable than anything else you were going to get that was half as nice.

The man was quick with responses and very polite, and the two of you agreed to meet that evening at 4pm. You were absolutely giddy, a petty smirk on your face as you imagined telling your father that you indeed weren’t coming home, tail between your legs. You would not allow him to dictate your life anymore.

3:30 rolled around and you made your way over to the area the apartment was listed in, not wanting to be late. The apartment was part of a large building that was clearly a few years old but still in good shape. You looked around, noting that the nearby houses were well-worn but not worn down. It looked like a good area, and based on your Trulia searches, the crime was low here.

You smiled from your parking space and waited until 3:55 to walk up to the buzzer, hitting the button for apartment 5D which had Min Yoongi listed as a resident. Yoongi. You liked that name. You grinned when a deep voice came over the speaker, asking who was there.

“It’s Y/N, we have a 4pm appointment for me to see the apartment?” you answered back cheerily.

“Oh, yes, come on up.” before he was even done speaking, you heard the door click as he unlocked it.

You pulled open the heavy door and began making your way up the staircase, glancing around for the correct apartment. Near the end of the hallway, you finally spotted your destination, nestled in the corner by a large window that looked out to the rest of the apartment complex. There was a playground and a tennis court, without a net, but you didn’t really care.

You gently knocked against the wooden door, the only one without some form of decoration on the outside and waited for the man to appear and let you inside. You weren’t sure what kind of person you expected to see on the other side of the wooden door; you really hadn’t given it much thought. You were entirely unprepared however, to see the sexiest man you’d ever laid eyes on swinging the door open and dusting his hands on his worn jeans before flicking his onyx gaze up to meet yours, pinning you to your spot.

You snapped out of your haze and allowed your eyes to roam over his features, from his button nose to his full lips, to his toned arms, covered with decorative tattoos, beautiful inky designs trailing from his knuckles all the way up his veiny forearms, past his biceps, and disappearing into the sleeve of his t shirt. You sucked in a breath, noticing the eyebrow ring and multiple ear piercings.

“Y/N, nice to meet you. I’m Yoongi.” he smiled, revealing his pearly white teeth, something shiny catching the light when his tongue darted out to wet his lips. A tongue ring.

A shiver ran through your body but you reached out your hand to shake his extended one. His large hand seemed to engulf yours, the veins prominent and a little distracting. Your face lit up in a grin, knowing that if your dad took one look at this man, he’d surely lose his mind.

“It’s nice to meet you as well, Yoongi, thank you for meeting me on such short notice!” you smiled, allowing your hand to slip from his grasp and biting back the whine at the loss of contact.

“Come on in, have a look around. Like I said in the ad, my friend moved in with his girlfriend and left me to fend for myself. He did have the smaller bedroom but if that’s an issue, we can switch, if you’re interested that is.” he chuckled nervously, reaching his arm up to scratch the back of his neck.

“Oh, I am interested.” you giggled, looking around the spacey living room, which had an open concept that led into a small kitchen, but it looked like it had decent counter space.

“Oh! This is the kitchen…” Yoongi began, leading you over to get a better look after seeing where your eyes were wandering.

“It’s very roomy.” you noted with a smile.

“Jin did most of the cooking, but I helped out sometimes and we both fit in here pretty easily without getting in each other’s way.” he explained.

“Ooh, you cook?” you turned your gaze to him and watched as the tips of his ears turned pink.

“A little.” he admitted.

“Nice. Me too.” you grinned.

“Cool.” he grinned, his smile was the cutest thing you’d ever seen, the best way you could describe it was… gummy. Sweet. Warm.

Yoongi led you on a tour of the rest of the house, showing you your future bedroom, which was furnished since his previous roommate hadn’t needed to take his bed with him, his bedroom, the bathroom you’d share, and the small laundry unit in the hallway, hidden behind a closet-like door. Nice. In-unit laundry was a definite plus.

The apartment wasn’t super spacious, the bedrooms were on the smaller side, but the living room and kitchen were nice sizes, and there was in-unit laundry, and Yoongi seemed like a very clean, respectful individual. You were sold before you’d walked in, but now you were over the moon about the small patch of paradise you’d stumbled upon.

“Is there a deposit required? Or just first and last month's rent?” you asked Yoongi, who’d taken a seat across from you at the table.

“Oh, just the first month’s rent is fine. I’m not like a landlord or anything.” he said, shooting you a playful smile.

“Okay. Do you want a check or…?” you questioned. “I mean, if you’re willing to let me lease with you.”

“Of course! Check, cash, money order. I really don’t have a preference. If you want a paper trail with the office, we can do a check or money order.” he smiled.

You grinned back at the sheepish man across from you, his eyes shining with excitement. You were absolutely psyched to sleep in a real bed again, so tired of the worn leather seats in your car. Thank goodness it wasn’t summer so your skin wasn’t sticking to the material, but still. It wasn’t exactly a preferred sleeping space.

You ended up going to the ATM and giving Yoongi cash for the first month after adding your name to the lease just before the rental office closed. You both pitched in on a celebratory pizza and ate in the living room. You were surprised the rental office didn’t have to run a background check or something, you honestly didn’t think you’d be able to sleep in the apartment the same day you’d first laid eyes on it, but you weren’t complaining.

You stayed up with Yoongi until nearly 2am talking, drinking, laughing, and getting to know each other. He loved watching WWE, you loved watching K-dramas, he liked pineapple on his pizza and you thought that was basically blasphemy. Yoongi had braces growing up, had an older brother, preferred staying indoors to going out, and had a nasty habit he couldn’t seem to shake of biting his nails.

Yoongi was funny and warm and inviting. Though he seemed cold on the outside, he was actually very attentive and caring, always offering to refill your drink when he stood up, offering you a spare blanket if you looked cold, and making sure you felt comfortable as possible in your new home. You blamed it on the alcohol, but ended up getting way too personal too fast, telling Yoongi about why you’d moved in to begin with.

“... and he’s so condescending and judgemental, like he would hate your tattoos and immediately label you a delinquent just based on that alone.” you took a breath after rambling on for a few minutes, letting out your frustration for your situation.

“Wow, that’s… a lot,” Yoongi shook his head sympathetically, “it’s your life, you should do what makes you happy. It’s not his place to control everything you do.”

“He always has to be right, it’s exhausting.” you sighed.

“Well hey, bright side, you’re here now, and you’re free to be who you want and do whatever your heart desires. I fully support you.” Yoongi smiled at you and your heart seemed to grow three sizes.

“Thank you, Yoongi. You have no idea how much that means to me.”

“Do you have anything you need washed?” you asked Yoongi, gesturing to the washing machine that wasn’t even half full.

“Don’t you have any more clothes than that?” Yoongi asked.

For weeks, you’d been cycling the same three outfits you’d been able to bring with you in a small backpack when you’d left home.You’d thought about going back home to get the rest of your things, but you really didn’t want to face your father. You weren’t scared of him, not at all. In fact, you’d love to rub it in his face that you hadn’t failed as he’d expected you to do. You just didn’t want to deal with him yet.

Being around Yoongi, having the freedom to be yourself and being so wholly accepted for exactly who you were was intoxicating, and you weren’t ready to go back into that suffocating environment full of judgement and expectations, even for a short time. You were strong and resilient, but you also knew that your family issues were a sore spot for you.

“I do at my parents house. I just haven’t had a chance to go get my stuff.” you shrugged, starting the washer.

“You haven’t had a chance? Between lounging around watching Netflix and binge eating takeout?” Yoongi chuckled, leaning up against the wall and regarding you with a curious look.

“I’ve had time,” you emphasize with a sigh, “I just… I’m not ready to go there alone.”

“What if you weren’t alone?”

You looked up to meet Yoongi’s gaze in surprise, a supportive smile playing on his soft lips.

“What do you mean?” you asked, your chest filling with hope.

“If you want, I can go with you?” he offered.

“Really? You’d do that?” you tried to keep the astonishment out of your voice in an attempt to not look as pathetic and weak as you felt.

“Yeah, we can take my car, it’s bigger than yours anyway.” he shrugged, pushing himself off the wall and walking closer to you.

“Have I told you lately that you’re amazing?” you grinned, reaching up to hug him.

Yoongi was used to your affectionate nature, but sometimes it still caught him off guard, as he wasn’t an affectionate person. He wanted to be, he just wasn’t always comfortable using physical affection. He froze for a moment, but quickly regained his composure and wrapped his arms around your torso to return your hug.

“Yes, but feel free to remind me anytime. My fragile ego needs it.” he joked, poking your side playfully.

You released him from your hold with a light chuckle, stepping back and grinning up at him. He coughed and looked down to hide his shy smile from your view.

“Let’s go.”

“Wait, right now?” you gasped, eyes wide.

“Do you have other plans?” he questioned with a raised brow.

“Well, no… but I-” you began but Yoongi sent you a look that had you slipping on your shoes and following him out the door.

Yoongi smirked to himself at how easily you caved into him with just a stern look, unlocking the car and ushering you in before settling in the driver's seat and starting the engine. You couldn’t stop bouncing your leg from nerves, and Yoongi glanced your way every so often before gently placing his large hand on your knee for comfort. Except it did little to comfort you, having his veiny hands on your body only sent your heart into overdrive and caused your breathing to become that much shallower. You gave him an A for effort though.

“It’s going to be okay, I’m right here,” he soothed, “I’ve got your back.”

“Thank you, Yoongi.” you smiled appreciatively, placing your hand on top of his for a moment before looking out the window, watching the trees fly by as you got closer to your parents house.

You hadn’t alerted your parents that you’d be coming, part of you hoping they wouldn’t be home and you could use the spare key to get your things and get out without having to interact with your father.

When the GPS announced you were one turn away, your hopes were crushed into a fine powder as you finally looked up and shrank back into your seat when you saw both of your parents’ vehicles occupying the driveway. Yoongi pulled in behind your mom’s car and cut the engine, turning to look at you. You met his gaze with your panicked one and he motioned for you to breathe with him, taking a few deep breaths and guiding you to calm yourself.

“You got this. You ready?” he asked.

“As I’ll ever be.” you sighed, stepping out of his car and meeting him before walking to the front door.

You gripped his hand tightly, and Yoongi looked down at your conjoined hands in surprise but didn’t say anything, realizing that you needed the support.He squeezed your hand gently before rapping softly on the door. Your whole body tensed when you heard the lock click and Yoongi gave your hand another encouraging squeeze. The door swung open and your mother’s face was revealed, causing the hole in your chest to clench.

“Y/N!” she gasped, her eyes trailing along your form, down to your hands, then up Yoongi’s arms to his face, her expression one of astonishment.

“Hi, mom.” you coughed awkwardly.

“Y/N’s here?” you heard from behind her, the smug voice of your father grating against your ears. “Our little baby came home to admit we were right?”

His grinning face came into your view, standing just behind your mother, his smirk immediately falling once he laid eyes on Yoongi.

“Who’s this?” he asked.

“This is Yoongi, he’s my-” you began.

“Are you dating this man?” your father interrupted, sounding panicked.

Your eyes flitted from your mom’s face to your dad’s, turning red with frustration. He had always hated people with tattoos, and you’d warned Yoongi about this. You didn’t think he’d get this worked up about it, and suddenly an idea popped in your head, and just as Yoongi was about to argue that you weren’t dating amidst your silence, you spoke up.

“Yes. He’s my boyfriend.” you said quickly, squeezing Yoongi’s hand in an attempt to beg him to go along with it.

Yoongi’s breath caught and he coughed into his elbow uncomfortably, but gave a sheepish grin when he recovered, letting go of your hand and extending his out to your parents.

“It’s nice to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Y/L/N. I’m Min Yoongi.”

Your mother stared at his hand hanging in the air like it was a foreign object before she collected herself, gingerly taking his hand in hers. Your father followed suit, his expression hard.

“It’s nice to meet you, Yoongi.” your mom smiled, warming up to Yoongi’s polite aura.

“I’m very honored to finally meet you. I see where Y/N gets her pretty eyes from.” Yoongi smiled, causing your mom to turn bashful and swat at him playfully.

Your dad hadn’t budged an inch, his hard gaze focused on the man at your side, scrutinizing and unwelcoming. His eyes wandered over Yoongi’s plethora of tattoos, many piercings, and ripped jeans. He made a face of distaste before turning his gaze to you.

“What are you doing here?” he wondered.

“We’re getting some of my stuff to take back home.” you explained.

“Home? You live with this man?!” you dad guffawed.

“Yes, we live together.” Yoongi supplied for you, stepping closer to you and wrapping an arm around you, kissing the top of your head affectionately.

He mostly wanted to be a shield for you against your father, as he could tell you were starting to shrink in on yourself, and he wanted to offer you a little more strength. You smiled up at him, hoping your eyes showed your thankfulness.

“Absolutely not, young lady. I won’t permit it.” your father hissed.

“With all due respect, you don’t tell me what I can and can’t do. I’m an adult, and you kicked me out.” you shrugged, using your best acting skills to appear nonchalant.Yoongi felt your body shivering slightly against his.

“I- You-” your dad fumed.

“Why don’t we grab your clothes and come back for the rest when everyone has calmed down a little?” Yoongi offered quietly in your ear.

You nodded, pulling him along with you to your old bedroom. You felt your dad’s piercing gaze follow you down the hallway, but you ignored it. You grabbed some clothes and a few other things, throwing them in a decorative tote you’d once used to house scrapbooking supplies. Yoongi took the tote from you and led the way back out of the house, your hand clutching the back of his shirt like a safety blanket, the other arm filled with more clothes.

Your mom watched you quietly, with a sullen expression, seeming to try and express her apologies through her eyes while your dad seethed from his recliner, refusing to look at you. You sighed, taking a look around the house you used to call home before announcing your departure and waving goodbye, following Yoongi out the front door.

Once you’d placed the things in the back of the car and sat in the passenger seat, your body deflated. Yoongi began driving, to get you out of the line of sight of your parents in case you broke down, so they wouldn’t see.

“Yoongi, I’m so sorry I dragged you into that. I don’t know what I was thinking, I just- I saw his face and I wanted to-” you sighed, struggling to explain the reason behind your split second decision to lie about the nature of your relationship.

“I understand.”

“You’re not mad?” you looked over at him in surprise.

“No. I can see the power dynamic in that house. Your family clearly has some issues they need to work out. I’m not mad.” he explained.

“I don’t deserve you,” you sighed, leaning your head on his shoulder, “you’re the greatest friend I’ve ever had.”

“Dang, that bar is set pretty low, Y/N.” he joked.

You slapped his arm playfully with a grin lighting up your face, suddenly feeling much lighter than you had moments ago.

“How about I pay for pizza tonight as a thank you?” you offered, gazing up at him.

“As long as there’s pineapple on it.” he smirked.

“Half and half.”

Seasons changed, the air turned colder, the leaves on the trees transitioning from vibrant green to deep golden yellows and reds before fading away altogether as the harsh winter breeze bagan to set in. Each new day, you learned more about Yoongi, and the two of you grew closer. Yoongi was respectful of your space and time. He would notice when you were having a bad day and do little things you almost didn’t notice to help you out and reduce your stress. He’d pick up your favorite tea on his way home from work or invite you to watch a movie you knew he wouldn’t have watched on his own.

You tried to show him the same level of respect, like making sure there was fresh coffee for him in the morning, or packing his lunch when he was running late. The more time you spent with Yoongi, the more you adored him. Possibly a little too much… You’d known from the moment you laid eyes on him that he was gorgeous, but you didn’t think it would be so distracting.

Oftentimes, you’d find yourself staring at the way Yoongi’s lips moved while he talked, or watching the way his muscles flexed while he wrote. Your breath would hitch when your bodies brushed against each other in the hallway or maneuvering around the kitchen together. You’d try to slip past him and his hands would reflexively find your hips to steady you and guide you past him. Sparks would shoot through your veins any time his skin touched yours, a warm tingle left wherever his touch had been.

Your eyes would linger a second too long when he’d come out of the bathroom in a towel, or when he’d stretch during your frequent binge watching sessions, the hem of his shirt lifting to reveal a sliver of gorgeous ivory skin. Your mouth would water on the occasions when his hip tattoo would be revealed if his sweats hung a little too low. Sometimes you swore he was doing it on purpose, when you’d look up to find him watching you with an amused expression and you’d tear your eyes away as your cheeks filled with heat.

Yoongi never called you out for gawking at him, he’d simply raise an eyebrow and his delicious lips would turn up in an amused smirk. You weren’t the only one who got caught staring though. You noticed his eyes on you when you would bend over to grab a water from the fridge, or his gaze trailing down your neck towards your breasts when you’d come home sweaty from a run. You pretended not to notice, but you saw the way his eyes would linger.

You danced around each other like that, somehow simultaneously completely at ease and growing closer with each passing day but incredibly bothered with tension and desire. Or perhaps it was all in your head, wishful thinking on your part. You couldn’t count on all your fingers and toes the amount of times Yoongi’s name would fall from your lips in pathetic whimpers while you attempted to keep quiet whilst touching yourself under the covers in your room.

You tried to act like nothing had changed, which is why when Yoongi invited you to watch a movie with him, you’d snuggled up to him on the couch, just like always, a thick blanket wrapping the two of you in warmth. Your head rested on his shoulder and his hand on your knee, the heat from his skin on yours causing other areas of your anatomy to warm up as well. It was hard paying attention to the screen when you could feel the warmth of his skin seeping through your jeans where his hand met your knee but you did your best.

You watched as the main characters began taking their clothes off and tensed up awkwardly, looking up at Yoongi to ask if he wanted anything to drink… at the same time he’d glanced down to ask if you wanted more popcorn. Your faces were mere centimeters away, you could feel his hot breath ghosting against your lips, your gazes locked. Your heart skipped a beat and time seemed to slow, and you could have sworn he’d begun leaning in, but a loud crash in the movie startled you both out of your moment, and you’d pulled away with an awkward cough.

Yoongi scratched the back of his neck and avoided eye contact, and you’d stood up, using his leg as leverage, but your hand slipped and glided up his thigh, almost making contact with his crotch. You wretched your hand away like you’d been burned and mumbled something about a refill before making a beeline for the kitchen. Hand over your heart, free hand resting on the counter to hold yourself up while you struggled to regulate your heartbeat, you closed your eyes and took deep breaths.

Was Yoongi about to kiss you? Surely not, but the way your eyes had connected, the sparks his intense gaze had sent down your spine… you shivered. You refilled your water and grabbed a new drink for Yoongi before making your way back to the living room, sitting a few inches from him and extending out your offering to him, which he took with a quiet “thanks.”

The air was thick and uncomfortable, the lingering tension from the almost-kiss nearly suffocating the both of you. You nearly jumped out of your skin when your phone started ringing, a FaceTime call from your mom. You sat up and sent a panicked look towards Yoongi, who glanced at the screen before scooting closer to you, and pressing the answer button.

“Hi mom!”

“Hello, love. Oh. I see Yoongi is with you. Hello, Yoongi.” she smiled politely.

“Hello, ma’am.”

“Y/N, I packed up some more of your stuff, I felt awful for how the other day went and I wanted to apologize. I talked to your father as well, and… you know how he is. I want to support you and if Yoongi makes you happy, I want to get to know him. I miss you.” she rambled, clearly nervous.

“Oh mom… thank you. I really appreciate that.”

“I do have to admit though, I was very surprised that you two were together, it just seemed so… unexpected. You usually go for a more clean cut kind of guy…”

“Well, you know what they say, opposites attract.” Yoongi supplied with a charming smile after sensing your body stiffen.

“That they do!” your mom agreed with a giggle, “it just didn’t seem real at first, I suppose.”

You shot Yoongi a panicked glance out of the frame of the camera, silently begging him to turn up the PDA. His lip was tucked between his teeth in nervousness, but he let it slide free and steeled himself before leaning in and brushing a gentle kiss to your cheek. Which would’ve been a great plan, had that not been the exact moment you’d decided to turn your head to look at him.

His lips met yours for the briefest moment, the most tender ghost of a touch, but it lit your insides aflame. Your heart pounded erratically, your chest tightening, and the air seeming to have been stolen from your lungs. Your arm holding your phone grew slack, and you dropped it onto the couch cushion, your hand instinctively placing itself upon Yoongi’s firm chest. The kiss lasted mere seconds, but with the way time stilled around you, it might as well have been hours. His soft lips pressed so delicately to yours suspended gravity itself, and you were floating on cloud nine.

“Y/N? Hello?”

The two of you broke apart in shock, springing away from each other like magnets with the same charge, eyes wide and breathing heavy as you stared at one another. Moments passed with your heartbeat pounding in your ear like a drum before you came to your senses and picked your phone up.

“Sorry mom. Can I call you back?”

“Oh sure, love you.”

“Love you too, mom.”

Yoongi had taken your momentary distraction as an excuse to escape to his bedroom, leaving you alone in the living room with wide eyes and fingertips pressed to your lips in shock. Your lips had barely touched and it felt like your worlds had collided, two missing pieces finally coming together. And it was terrifying, so you decided not to dwell on it, you’d deal with it when the time came.

That didn’t stop you from replaying the moment in your head for the rest of the night, however. Laying in your bed with Yoongi just one wall away, you wondered if he was thinking about the kiss, if he was thinking about you too. Shoving the hopeful thoughts from your mind, you let yourself drift to sleep.

You weren’t sure why you’d agreed to spend the holiday with your family, but your mother’s persistent guilt trip over the past few weeks had worn your resistance thin. Yoongi’s family was back in Korea so he didn’t have any other plans, usually opting to spend Christmas alone with a bottle of bourbon and leftover takeout. He’d agreed to be your buffer between yourself and your father and accompany you to the hellscape that was your old home.

Snow had already begun to softly drift from the skies, so Yoongi had reminded you about ten times to dress warm so you didn’t catch a cold. Upon the 8th reminder, you’d snarkily shot back “yes daddy.” and rolled your eyes, stomping off to pull on your gloves. Yoongi had frozen in place, jaw slack as his eyes bored into the back of your head. You paid him no mind, wrapping a scarf around your neck and tucking it into your coat before pulling on your hat.

“Are you coming?” you asked, your eyes warily running along Yoongi’s rigid body as he stood there with his eyes closed taking deep breaths.

“Yeah. I’ll meet you down there.” he tossed you the keys so you could unlock the car he’d started a few minutes beforehand, making sure it was warmed up.

You trudged down to the car, dragging your purse and the pie you were meant to bring to the occasion, sliding into Yoongi’s passenger seat and placing your hands against the vents for the warm air. A few minutes later, Yoongi joined you, much more relaxed than before. You sent him a hopeful smile and rested your hand on his knee.

“Thanks for coming with me.”

“Of course. I’ve got your back.” he shrugged, backing out of the space carefully.

You watched the scenery as Yoongi drove, noting how the snow had dusted the trees with a beautiful blanket, making everything brighter, almost as if it sparkled. You loved the snow as a kid and you loved it still, a fond nostalgia settling in your chest until you noticed you were getting closer to your parents house. Your grip returned on Yoongi’s knee and he tensed a bit before placing his free hand on top of yours.

“It’s going to be okay. I’m right here,” he soothed, then wiggled his eyebrows playfully “plus your mom approves of your boyfriend now.”

“She loves you more than me now.” you pouted.

“Well, I am pretty irresistible.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night.” you threw back.

“Don’t think I don’t notice you checking me out, babe.” he smirked, emphasizing the last word as you both walked up to the front door, Yoongi’s hand reaching out to knock gently.

“Shut up.” you crossed your arms defiantly.

Yoongi poked at your side, almost making you drop your pie, but he saved it at the last minute by reaching out and grabbing it from you. This caused his face to be just inches from yours and your eyes locked for a moment and you swear time stopped. Your heart was pounding in your chest as his gaze flickered from your eyes to your lips momentarily, and you sucked in a breath in anticipation. It might have been your imagination, but Yoongi seemed to get a little closer to your parted, waiting lips before your mom opened the door. The two of you sprung apart like you’d been caught at a crime scene.

“Well don’t stop on my account.” your mom giggled, sending you a playful wink before beckoning you inside.

You avoided eye contact with Yoongi and tried to take steady breaths to calm your racing heart, your mind going a mile a minute. Was he about to kiss you? Surely not. You were play dating, and no one was watching. Did he want to kiss you? Your cheeks were on fire and you were honestly a little riled up, pressing your thighs together discreetly. You handed your mom the pie, which she sliced and set on the table.

“Merry Christmas, mom. Where’s dad?”

“Oh he’s taking a nap. Yoongi, come over here! I want to get a picture of you two together!” your mom grinned.

“What are you, best friends now? You guys video chat at least once a week.” you whined.

Your mom waved you off and held her camera up while Yoongi stood beside you, giving you plenty of room.

“Scoot closer. You’re boyfriend and girlfriend, not awkward preteens.” your mom huffed.

Yoongi stepped closer and put an arm around your shoulder, leaning in and smiling for the camera. You heard the shutter go off a few times, attempting to pull away.

“Wait. Let’s get one of you kissing his cheek, Y/N!” your mom gushed.

“Moooooom.”

“Do it.” she chided.

You sighed and glanced up at Yoongi in silent apology, but he only lent over and offered you his cheek. You gently pressed your lips to it, feeling the skin tingle where it met his. The tips of Yoongi’s ears were suspiciously pink, but you paid it no mind. He was probably uncomfortable. Your mom snapped a few pictures and smiled to herself.

“You two act like you’ve never touched each other.” she commented offhandedly while turning around to place her phone on the charger.

“Yoongi’s not a fan of PDA.” you covered smoothly.

“When I was your age my man couldn’t keep his hands off of me.” she shrugged.

“MOM!”

“What? It’s true. Young men always have a one track mind.”

You covered your face with your hands, and your mom laughed. Yoongi wrapped his arms around you from behind, shielding you with his body.

“Don’t be shy babe. I just wanted to be respectful around your mom but she doesn’t seem to care.” he spoke, allowing his lips to graze along the shell of your ear, causing a shiver to run through your body.

Yoongi smirked and kissed your cheek before letting you go, standing up straighter. You glanced where he was staring and your dad was making his way down the hall to join everyone.

“Merry Christmas, dad.” you said politely.

“Merry Christmas.” he responded, his tone a little stiff and uncomfortable.

He wasn’t showing clear distaste for you or Yoongi, so you took it as a win. Your mom must have had a talk with him. You silently thanked her and took your seat beside Yoongi at the table. Dinner was pretty uneventful, light small talk that your father barely participated in and Yoongi relentlessly complimenting your mom on her cooking skills, telling her how delicious the food was and how he needed the recipes.

After dinner, you all sat around the tree and opened gifts, your father having gifted your mother a lovely pearl necklace, your mother giving your father a new watch. You’d gifted your mom a foot massager that looked like slippers you’d seen at the mall, and your father a new set of tools, knowing his were beginning to wear. You’d gifted Yoongi a gift card to his favorite store at the mall, and he’d given you a beautiful bracelet he saw you eyeing a few weeks back.

The last gift to be opened had been a pair of matching couple’s pajamas for you and Yoongi, a red and white plaid design that was actually kind of cute. Your mom made you hold them up and take a picture together, ignoring your protests that she had taken plenty of pictures beforehand. Packing everything up and getting ready to go, you looked up between your parents and sighed contentedly.

“This was nice, getting along,” you smiled at your mom, standing up and dusting off your skirt, “we’ll be sure to visit soon.”

Your mom leaned in for a hug from both of you while your dad stood silently off to the side, hands at his sides, fingers twitching slightly like he was unsure if he should lean in as well or not. Swallowing your pride because it was Christmas, you walked over to him and wrapped your arms around him. He gently patted your back a few times before stepping back.

“See you around, dad. Merry Christmas.” you spoke softly.

“Merry Christmas.” he repeated, looking away uncomfortably.

You sighed and took Yoongi’s hand in your own, gazing up at him in a silent question. He smiled and pulled you towards the door. The second he opened the entrance, snow blew into the living room from the force of the wind, and Yoongi quickly shut the door, having to put in more strength than usual with how hard the wind was blowing.

“Wow, it’s really coming down hard out there.” your mom commented, eyebrows raising in surprise.

“Does your vehicle have four wheel drive?” your dad asked.

“Um… no.” Yoongi scratched the back of his neck uncomfortably.

“Oh there is no way I’m letting you drive in this!” your mother gasped.

“Mom, we have to go home. I’m sure we can drive slow.” you reasoned, though your nerves about the weather were grating at you.

“Absolutely not. You’ll stay here.” she commanded.

“YN… your mom is probably right. It looks pretty bad out there. I don’t think it would be safe…” Yoongi said quietly.

You sighed, resigning to your fate and nodded, setting your purse back on the coat rack and removing your jacket. Yoongi followed suit, shedding his coat and hanging it up, smiling apologetically in your direction. Your father had already retreated back to his bedroom to clean up for the night.

“Are the spare blankets still in the hall closet?” you asked your mom.

“Yes, why?” she wondered.

“I was going to grab one, Yoongi or I will probably be sleeping on the couch.”

“That couch is not comfortable enough to sleep on. It’s not like I don’t know you sleep together at home.” she scoffed.

Your cheeks lit up brighter than the Christmas tree in the corner of the living room and you didn’t dare look at Yoongi. Your mom laughed at your reaction, rolling her eyes and walking down the hall.

“Goodnight, see you in the morning.” she called over her shoulder.

The two of you stood there silently for a moment before you coughed and gestured for him to follow you to your old bedroom. Most of your stuff had been taken to your apartment by that point, so it was mostly just your old bed and an empty dresser with a lamp on it. You glanced down at the full sized bed, which had enough room for the two of you, but barely enough to ensure that you wouldn’t end up touching.

“Do you care which side?” you wondered, finally looking up to meet Yoongi’s gaze.

“No, it doesn’t matter to me.” he shrugged.

“Okay. You can go change first.” you offered.

Yoongi nodded and disappeared down the hallway to change into the pajamas your mother had gifted the both of you previously in the night. You decided to go ahead and rush through changing while Yoongi was gone, slipping on the matching pair and crawling into bed. The two of you laid straight on your backs, staring at the ceiling for a while.

“I’m sorry about this.” you mumbled quietly.

“It’s okay, really.”

You didn’t remember falling asleep so soon, but you woke up to a pitch black room with something warm and firm pressed up against your back. You snuggled closer to the warmth in the freezing room and were met with a low groan and something a solid pressing against your backside.

“Nnnngh.” Yoongi whined, half-asleep, wrapping his arm around you and pulling you flush against him.

You froze, trying not to rub against Yoongi’s erection that was pressing into your ass, but that didn’t stop the shiver from traveling through your body. With great effort, you managed to turn yourself around in Yoongi’s arms so you were facing him, watching his serene facial expressions in his slumber.

Yoongi really was a beautiful man. You watched him take slow, steady breaths, his face illuminated by the moonlight trickling in between the blinds. You wanted to reach out and touch him, feel his smooth skin beneath your fingertips, but you didn’t dare in case you woke him.

His body shuffled closer to yours once more, his arms tightening around you until your noses were nearly touching and you had to hold in a gasp. There was no way this would be happening if Yoongi had been conscious, and you weren’t sure if you should let him sleep or alert him to what he was doing. You couldn’t help being slightly elated at the situation though, being this close to Yoongi and being able to study his features without fear of looking weird, and the way his groin felt pressed against your lower stomach wasn’t something you’d complain about either.

You decided you should probably stop taking advantage of his unconscious state and attempted to climb over him to get out of bed without disturbing him. Just as you’d swung your leg over his body, he turned in his sleep, flipping onto his back, effectively knocking you off balance until you landed atop his chest, your legs straddling his hips.

You glanced up at his face and your eyes met, faces mirroring expressions of shock. You were both frozen in place for a moment, staring into each other’s eyes. You snapped out of it and tried to climb off of Yoongi’s hips, just as Yoongi tried to sit up, so all the two of you accomplished was grinding your core against Yoongi’s erection. Yoongi let out a strangled moan, reaching out to grab your hips to hold you still.

His fingers gripped the skin of your hips where your shirt had ridden up, and his touch burned in the best way. You fought back a whimper at the delicious feeling, your hips stilling in his iron grasp. The air in the room changed, getting thicker. You swore you could cut the sexual tension with a knife. Your racing heart skipped a beat as Yoongi’s eyes traveled down your body until they rested where your core met his length. He shivered. You gulped. Once again, you attempted to flee your current position.

“Please- don’t move,” Yoongi whined, almost desperately, “you’re making it worse.”

“I know I’m irresistible.” you chuckled awkwardly, trying to lighten the mood.

“You really are.”

Your brows rose in surprise at the earnest tone he spoke in, his voice bordering desperate. Your mouth slightly agape, you searched his eyes for confirmation he wasn’t joking. He smirked and sat up, holding you against him as his lips ghosted along your neck, barely brushing against your skin. His hot breath fanning against your skin sent a shiver down your spine. His fingers dug into your sides almost demandingly, and he let out a low, animalistic growl.

“You don’t even realize what you do to me… how much you tempt me. I see the way you look at me, the way your eyes linger. You’re anything but subtle. I’ve tried so hard to hold back… If we weren’t at your parents house, I’d fuck you so hard you’d forget your name…” Yoongi’s voice was low and quiet, and you let out an involuntary whimper at his words, causing his eyes to darken and a smirk to play on his pretty lips, “but maybe you’d like that, maybe you want them to hear, you want them to know what a dirty slut you can be, wanna show them who you belong to. You’d like that, wouldn’t you, baby girl?” he purred, rocking his hips up into yours, letting his rock-hard member drag deliciously against your covered folds.

“Oh fuck… yes.” you whimpered, all sense of dignity flying out the window at his dirty words.

“Fuck, I’ve dreamed about this for so long.” he groaned, using his hands to guide your hips along his length.

“Me too.” you whimpered, falling forward and placing your hands on the defined planes of his chest, feeling it rise and fall as quickly as yours.

You allowed your hands to wander underneath his sleep shirt, feeling his warm skin against your own, slowly dragging your digits along his torso and teasingly letting your nails scrape gently against his nipples. Yoongi watched with rapt attention as you explored his body, relishing in the way you attempted to memorize every inch your eyes could devour.

His fingers dug into your hips when you flicked your thumb over his nipple, and you smiled innocently before dragging your hands down to the waistband of his pajama pants, gently lifting the elastic and letting it snap back against his skin, causing him to buck his hips up into yours. His hands traveled up your hips to grip the hem of your shirt, pausing and meeting your gaze to make sure you were alright, and you nodded, placing your hands on his and guiding them to remove the fabric, revealing your bare breasts underneath. Yoongi sucked in a breath, a low whine escaping as he released it.

His hands immediately found purchase on your breasts, his thumb and index finger rolling your hardened nipple. You let your head fall back as electricity shot straight to your core at his actions. You felt him move below you, sitting up in order to take one of your pert nipples into his waiting mouth. His warm tongue worked against the sensitive bud, alternating between licking and sucking while he worked the neglected nipple between his fingers. Your breathing grew shallower, your whines needier, and you felt Yoongi smirking against your skin, releasing your abused flesh with an audible pop.

“You fall apart so easily for me… who could’ve guessed you’d be such a responsive, cock hungry little thing.” he mused while allowing his hands to travel down your stomach, so close to where you needed stimulation.

“Yoongi please…”

“Fuck, say it again. My name sounds so much better coming from your pretty lips.”

“Yoongi.” you moaned, nearly breathless. “Please.”

In an instant, Yoongi had you flipped over, resting on your back as he hovered over you, his hungry gaze trailing over your chest and traveling down. He tugged on the waistband of your pajamas, pulling them down past the swell of your ass, then helping you kick them off and aside, leaving you in nothing but your panties.

“Wanna see you, Yoongi.” you pleaded, tugging on the hem of his shirt.

He quickly obliged, whipping it off and tossing it aside, revealing his expanse of glorious ivory skin to you. Your gaze traveled down the expanse of his torso, tracing over the intricate designs that decorated his skin in awe. You’d seen glimpses, when he’d been in just a towel, or stripping off his shirt at the washing machine, but you’d never gotten a good look up close.

You tentatively lifted your fingers, your index gently tracing the inky black lines as tenderly as you could, barely a ghost of a touch as you admired the beautiful artwork that so perfectly suited such a beautiful man. Yoongi shivered at your touch, watching you study his ink with such wonder in your eyes pulled at his heart strings, reminding him exactly why he’d fallen for you in the first place.

“When we have more time, I want to hear all about these,” you mused quietly, “what they mean, when you got them, I want to know everything.”

“I’ll tell you anything you want to know baby,” he pressed a gentle kiss to your lips, “but for now…” he trailed off, slowly moving his body down, kissing a path from your lips down your front until he reached the elastic band of your panties.

He teasingly ran his finger under the elastic, grinning up at your from his spot between your thighs before pulling the garment from your body and tossing it aside, revealing your soaking pussy to him. You tried to close your legs from embarrassment, but Yoongi gently slid his hands up your thighs, gently kneading the flesh there.

“So beautiful, please don’t hide from me.” he cooed, kissing a line from your thigh to your folds, causing you to let out a pleased sigh and spread your legs further for him, “mmm… good girl.”

He rewarded you by licking a long stripe up your slit, gathering your slick on his tongue and making a pleased noise in the back of his throat before diving in, working his warm muscle against your clit in different motions, alternating between sucking it between plump lips, licking broad stripes against it, and drawing figures with the tip of his tongue.

Using your pleasure as a distraction, he slowly eased a finger inside of your entrance, your slick aiding him with the welcome intrusion. He curled his finger and made come hither motions, repeatedly rubbing the pad of his finger against your weakest spot, and it took everything inside of you not to cry out at the intense fire burning in your core as he worked you closer to your first release. He slowly added a second finger, then a third, scissoring you open and prepping you for his cock.

Just the thought of the thick member you’d felt pressing against your lower back earlier nestled deep inside you had you drooling, and Yoongi’s skills with his mouth and fingers were certainly not hurting. Quiet whimpers escaped your lips as you fought the urge to buck your hips up into his mouth as your climax came closer and closer. Yoongi noticed your needy behavior and sped up his actions, working you towards your release.

You bit down on your fingers to stifle the loud moans that threatened to spill from your lips, even in your lust clouded mind, the last thing you needed was to be interrupted before you could get Yoongi inside of you. As your orgasm crashed over you from Yoongi’s ministrations, your back arched off the bed and you nearly drew blood from how hard you had to bite down to keep quiet, your body shaking as you came down from euphoria.

Yoongi kissed his way back up your body, finally becoming eye-level with you, smirking at your fucked out state and heavy breathing. You laughed and hid your face in the crook of his neck, drawing his body closer to yours in an attempt to hide. Yoongi’s low chuckles reverberated, shaking the bed slightly. Your hands traveled from being wrapped around his neck, slowly trailing down his back and pulling on the elastic of his pajama bottoms, desperate to lay eyes on his thick cock, which was pressed into your hip.

“Yoongi… need you. Need you so bad.” you begged.

Yoongi’s cock twitched in his pj’s, and he assisted you with ridding him of them and his boxers in one go, allowing his cock to spring free and slap against his stomach in all its glory. You were absolutely salivating as you looked at the reddened tip, leaking precum, the long shaft, and you couldn’t wait to feel him filling you up.

“Ready, princess?” he wondered, lining his member up with your entrance after gathering your slick to coat the head.

“So ready. Please fuck me, Yoongi.”

Yoongi slowly pushed himself inside your entrance, stretching your walls in the most delicious way. He took his time, periodically checking your expression for discomfort as he impaled you with his length. Your breathing was erratic, you were clutching onto his back for dear life as he split you open, eventually bottoming out. Yoongi stretched you out in all the best ways, filling you up better than any man had ever dreamed of before, and you were living for it.

You rocked your hips up into his, begging him to move, and Yoongi slowly pulled out until just the tip was sheathed inside your warmth before pushing back in, gaining more speed as he went. You couldn’t help the pathetic whines and moans that fell from your lips as Yoongi worked his hips, thrusting into you at a punishing pace. Every rock of his hips had the tip of his cock meeting your cervix, the powerful thrusts sending you closer and closer to oblivion.

“Fuck, babygirl, you look so sexy like this, taking my cock so well… like you were made for me. So fucking perfect.” Yoongi whispered hotly in your ear, licking a bold stripe along the shell, sending shivers coursing through your body.

“Yoongi, fuck.”

“That’s it baby, who’s making you feel this good?” he accentuated the last word with a harder thrust that sent your body a little farther up the bed.

“You, Yoongi! Oh oh o-oh..” your whines grow louder and Yoongi quickly covered your mouth with his own in an attempt to drown out the noise, lest your parents really do hear him defiling their daughter in her childhood bedroom.

You clawed desperately at his back, trying to warn him of your impending orgasm, and Yoongi deepened the kiss in understanding, pistoning his hips with as much strength as he could muster and reaching down to roll your clit between his fingers, sending you sailing off the edge, Yoongi’s kiss stifled your scream before he soon followed you off the edge, painting your walls white with his hot release.

Yoongi pecked your lips tenderly before rolling off of you and landing on his back beside you, both of you panting and grinning like idiots. Yoongi’s cum seeped out of your battered hole, and he licked his lips at the sight, causing you to cover your face and giggle. He stood, walking into the bathroom and dampening a washcloth to clean you up as gently as he could before tossing it into the hamper and resuming his position on his side of the bed.

The sun was just beginning to rise and shine through the blinds as you lay beside Yoongi, still catching your breath. You glanced over at Yoongi to find he was already looking at you. He gave you a shy, tentative smile.

“So…” he trailed off.

“So…?”

Yoongi sighed and sat up, urging you to follow suit so you could both talk. You followed his instructions, wincing slightly. He gently reached out and took both of your hands in his larger ones, looking up to meet your gaze before he spoke quietly.

“Listen… I know this started off as a lie to piss your dad off, but… I would be lying now if i said it was still fake for me. I really like you, Y/N.. I have for a while. I don’t know when it happened but somewhere along the way, I just- I don’t know. But if you’re willing to give me a chance, a real chance, I think I could make you happy.” he spoke quietly, his eyes filled with light and hope.

“Oh Yoongi…” you sighed, cupping his cheek with your hand tenderly and smiling as he leaned subconsciously into your touch, “you already do. None of this is fake for me either, not anymore. I really, really like you.”

A soft knock on your door tore you two from your moment, your heads snapping towards the door as you pulled the blanket up to cover your breasts.

“Morning, guys, breakfast will be ready in ten.” your mom called through the wood.

“I don’t know if I’m going to be able to look your mom in the eye now.” Yoongi chuckled.

“She already thought we were fucking before this.” you reasoned with a smirk.

Yoongi groaned and hid his face in the crook of your neck and you laughed, carding your fingers through his messy post-sex hair lovingly.

“I can’t believe you’re really mine, for real this time.” he whispered into the safety of your neck.

“And I can’t believe you’re mine… for real this time,” you grin, carding your fingers through his hair comfortingly, “let’s eat so we can go home.”

The two of you got dressed and headed out for breakfast, engaging in small talk with your mom and semi-comfortable silence with your dad. You still had a ways to go to fix that relationship, but you were pleased with the progress. You didn’t think you’d ever have a perfect relationship with your father, but you didn’t have to. You didn’t have to fix everything, or be who he wanted in order to receive love, you were slowly learning.

The roads had been salted and deemed safe to drive on, so you and Yoongi bid your parents a farewell, thanking them for letting you stay and for the gifts. Your mom pulled you into a hug, then Yoongi into one as well.

“I just love how happy you are around him, Y/N. It’s like you’re glowing. You two come visit soon, okay? I miss seeing you.” your mom spoke, holding your hand in hers.

“We will. I love you, mom.”

Yoongi reached out and you placed your hand in his, letting him lead you home.

Months later, on another lazy Sunday afternoon, you were cuddled up with your boyfriend on the couch of your shared apartment, snuggling into his chest while the two of you half paid attention to another movie on Netflix. Wrapped up in blankets and Yoongi’s arms, you’d never felt safer, more content, or so unbelievably happy.

Yoongi had your hand wrapped in his, lazily placing kisses along your wrist, palm, the tips of your fingers, anywhere his lips would reach. He wanted to shower you in kisses. You watched him with curious eyes, noting the way his own were shining as he met your gaze.

“What?” you wondered, chucking quietly.

“Say it again.”

“Yoongi,” you whined, looking up at him with a smile nonetheless, “I’ve said it like fifty times today.”

“Just one more time.”

You rolled your eyes before quietly letting the words roll off your lips like dripping honey as you pressed a kiss to his skin. “I love you, Min Yoongi.”

Yoongi hummed happily, almost like a purring cat, “Mmm.. I love you too.”

You snuggled into his embrace before he spoke up once more.

“Okay, just one more time.”

You laughed and rolled over so you were straddling him, reaching down and squishing his cheeks together before pressing your lips to his.

“I love you.” you giggled, pecking his lips once more, then repeating the words and actions over and over and over again.

“I love you I love you I love you I love you.” you peppered kisses all over his face, any part of it you could reach until your boyfriend was a mess beneath you, laughing and blushing with the biggest gummy smile on his face.

Every once in a while, you meet someone you instantly connect with. Every so often you cross paths with someone you’re just meant to meet. But, once in a lifetime, you meet someone who makes your soul feel whole again. You see a face in the crowd and instantly feel at home. You hear their laugh one time and suddenly the world has color again. Once in a lifetime, you meet someone who doesn’t save you, but holds you steady while you gather the strength you need to save yourself.

Min Yoongi is that person for you.

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