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myrandom-fandomlife · 4 years

Note

Jatp

Alive!Luke x Alive!reader

Reader and Luke are dating but reader’s parents disapprove of him being in a band. So one night reader sneaks him into her bedroom and things get steamy/smutty

Ladies and gentlemen are you ready for a cabinet meeting the first (sorta) smut fic of this fandom huh

K here it is under the cut because it’s kinda a lot, lmk if you like!

Warnings: cursing, kind smut, needy Luke, horny Luke, fluffy Luke, friends to lovers, angst, bed sharing, morning wood, accidental spooning, lowkey cringe, all the goods

Word count: 1,536

You sighed, realizing you forgot your phone in Julie’s garage when you were already halfway to your house. Turning around, you retrace your steps and head back to the rehearsal area. You were there for your best friend, Luke, and his band’s rehearsal that day. You ended up sitting in on a lot of them because you loved watching the band play, they were amazing. Luke, most of all. He has a fire when he sings, and it’s probably the most attractive thing you have ever seen.

You finally arrive back at the rehearsal spot, walking through the door and breathing in the familiar scent of Julie’s Bath and Body candles and a mix of the boys’ colognes.

When you walked through the door, you weren’t expecting to see Luke softly strumming his acoustic on the couch. There’s a notebook in front of him, and he’s frantically writing what you assume are lyrics. He looks up when he hears you walk in, “Oh, h- hey.” He says quietly, and you immediately know that something is wrong.

“Are you okay?” You ask, knowing you’re not going to get an answer at first. You find your phone on the coffee table, pocket it, and sit down next to him.

“Yeah. Fine.” You see him write down another note in his song book in front of him, a song titled ‘Unsaid Emily’ and you know it’s about his mom.

“Luke,” you look at him with knowing eyes, hoping he will just let you in.

“I-” his voice cracks, “I got into a fight with my mom about the band again, and I don’t know if they want me there anymore.”

His eyes fill with tears, and you pull him into you. His face is buried in your shoulder, tears falling freely now. You sit there in silence for a while, letting him cry and holding him.

When the tears have slowed to a stop he sits up off you with a watery smile, “Thank you, and I’m sorry for ruining your shirt,” he laughs a little.

“There’s your smile,” you grin because he’s just so pretty. “We’ll sort things out with your parents, I promise, okay? In the meantime, you can stay with me.”

His face goes red, “L-like in your room?”

“Well yeah, my bed is pretty big and I can’t have you sleeping on this old couch” You laugh, feeling heat crawl up your neck because did you really just tell Luke Patterson to sleep in your bed?

“You want me to sleep with you?” His face gets even redder- which you didn’t think was possible- and he immediately retracts that, “N-not that I don’t want to sleep with you, I do, but not like that, not that I wouldn’t sleep with you-”

“Luke,” you cut him off feeling more heat rise to your cheeks at his words, “if you’re that concerned, I will sleep on the floor.”

“No!” You jump at his small outburst, “I mean, I’m not making you sleep on the floor in your own house.”

“Great, then it’s settled. We sleep in my bed. But, you can’t be seen by my parents.”

“I’ve gotten great at sneaking around parents, how do you think I change clothes?”

You snort and grab his hand, pulling him off the couch. “C’mon dork, it’s almost 11, and I need to be home by 11:30.”

On the walk home you discuss how he can sneak home and grab a bag of clothes to keep at your house.

~~~~

The first week of him staying goes well, just a lot of blushing and awkward comments. Nothing that can’t be survived.

It’s on Thursday of the next week that you wake up to notice two things. You are completely wrapped in Luke’s arms, which is definitely NOT how you fell asleep. And, there‘s a poke at your back that you don’t think is one of Alex’s drum sticks. A shiver goes down your spine and you feel your body heat up a little at the thought. Your alarm goes off about two minutes later, waking Luke.

He groggily opens his eyes, “Oh, hey there princess,” he smirks at your scowl in response to the nickname he started calling you when he learned that you needed at least 6 pillows to sleep.

He doesn’t seem to register your position or his situation for another minute. You can pinpoint the exact moment it hits him because his eyes go wide and he jumps so hard he falls off of your bed.

You start to laugh at his antics, when your mom knocks on your door, “Everything okay in there sweetie?” You hear her call.

“Yeah, yeah. I just tripped,” you huff out a laugh and she seems to buy it because you hear her retreating footsteps.

“So, uhm,” Luke clears his throat.

“I’m gonna go get ready,” you cut him off, grabbing some clothes quickly and heading for the bathroom across the hall.

It’s not until you reach the bathroom and you’re halfway through getting dressed that you realized you grabbed Luke’s Sunset Curve shirt by mistake. You decide to make the most of it, tying it up so it’s not so big on you and leaves a small patch of skin showing between the top of your ripped jeans and the bottom of the t-shirt.

You walk back into your room, and Luke is sitting on your bed, waiting. Your mom and dad have left for work by now, so he wasn’t worried about being caught.

When you enter, he looks up and his mouth drops open. His eyes trail up your body, stopping at the exposed skin on your stomach, then up to your eyes. His face is red as a cherry, yours most likely matching. He clears his throat, “Is tha- is that my shirt?”

You meet his eyes, darker than usual, “Yeah, I hope that’s okay. I accidentally grabbed it and didn’t have time to come back and find another.”

“No, no. It’s completely fine.” He can’t take his eyes off you all day, and his face keeps looking like his brain short circuited whenever he sees you. According to Julie, at least.

~~~~

That night, you decide to just untie his shirt and wear it with shorts as pajamas, hair in a messy bun. Luke crawls through your window while you’re doing homework and when he sees you his jaw literally drops again, “Holy shit.”

“What now, Luke?” You sigh, trying to get some of your calculus done. You haven’t been able to focus lately, head full of fantasies with a certain messy-headed, puppy-eyed, brunette.

Something in him snaps because grabs your books and sets them on the ground with a surprising amount of care. He gets on your bed, arms on either side of you.

“You really don’t know what you’re doing to me? God, Y/N, you’re driving me crazy. First you invite me to stay in your bed with you, which is so sweet of you. But then you go and prance around in tiny shorts and a tank top every night. Then this morning you walk in here wearing my shirt and think I’m not going to get turned on? Especially when I’ve been in love with you, basically since middle school. Then this? You might not know it, but you’ve been teasing me since the second you got here. So please, please let me kiss you because I don’t think I can go another second when you look like that.”

You blink, trying to take in his speech, “Wait, like what?” You question, still feeling insecure.

“Like an absolute angel, with my shirt on and tiny shorts, and your hair pulled up like that. Oh my god, you’re so gorgeous.”

Your breath hitches for a second, realizing everything he just said. Then you grab him by the neck of his shirt and kiss him hard.

He enthusiastically kisses back. You lay back on the bed and he follows, arms on either side of your head.

He starts kissing down your neck, and you moan, grateful for your parents being out tonight.

“Luke, no marks please.”

He leans back and smiles at you, “Too late for that one, princess.” Then goes to make another, before you pull him up a little so you can at least give him a hickey too.

His breath speeds up and you smile wickedly, “Now we‘re even.”

He pulls you back to his lips and starts pretty much attacking your mouth, biting your bottom lip occasionally. You pull back again, only to kiss under his ear, hand sliding under his shirt to splay across his toned stomach. His hips buck into yours in reaction, gasping at the feeling.

You mirror his movement, making him groan, “You’re gonna be the death of me.”

Both of your hips are rolling against each other, and you pull his face back down to yours, kissing his swollen lips again.

Your hands move to the top of his jeans and he pulls away from your mouth again, “Are you sure you want to do this?”

“Absolutely,” you smile at the boy in front of you, “Oh, and, I’m in love with you too.”

tags (everyone who responded to my post about this request or I think would want to be tagged): @lukessimp @thatfandomgirl14 @lukes-orange-beanie @spiidergirlsworld @charminggirl-cs @peresphoncs @lovesanimals @hoodpankow @midnightmagicmusings

#luke patterson x reader #jatp luke x reader #luke patterson smut #luke patterson imagine #luke patterson fluff #luke patterson fanfiction

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aka-ashi-keiji · 3 years

Text

“i can’t hear you”

Bakugou Katsuki x best friend reader

soft angst

tw: screaming, emotional meltdown.

short fic about bakugou and you’re his childhood best friend, and you help him through dealing with his hearing loss. enjoy lovies.

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You woke up to the sound of your mother knocking on your door and yelling, “y/n wake up, you have training today with katsuki. i love that boy but i am not in the mood to deal with his explosive attitude over you being late .” You lived right next door to katsuki all your life and since your moms were best friends, you guys were best friends since you learned how to walk. Every saturday you guys would train from 8 AM to noon in his garage since it was basically a mini gym, and then after you both would head over to your house. You checked the time on your phone on the bedside table and it read 7:50. “SHIT MOM WHY DIDN’T YOU WAKE ME UP SOONER” you yelled as you jumped out of bed and quickly found a black tank top and grey sweatpants to train in. You could hear your mom chuckling as she walked away from your door. You grabbed your headphones, phone, water bottle, and Nike’s before yelling a goodbye and dashing over to Katsuki’s front yard.

You knocked on his door four times so that his family knew it was you. You were halfway through slipping your shoes on when Mitsuki answered. She yawned and pulled you into a side hug. “Good morning y/n, you hungry?” She asked as she closed the door behind you guys and started towards the kitchen. “No thanks Mitsuki, I don’t like to train on a full stomach. My mom is making a huge lunch though, you guys are welcome to join us.” You said cheerfully, but kept your voice low since it was very early and you could tell Katsuki’s mom was still half asleep. She nodded and then whipped her head to face you wearing a look on her face as if she had just remembered something very important. “Kat has been very on edge lately and not very responsive this week.” She paused before starting again and turned her gaze to the floor, almost as if she didn’t want to talk. “I think it might have to do with his hearing. He won’t admit it, but I think his quirk is finally starting to affect him. Good thing we put him in those sign language classes as a precaution.” she laughed dryly and then turned back to look at you. “Just, take it easy him with the teasing today okay? and maybe try speaking a little louder. I’ll go see if he’s ready” and with that she gathered herself up the stairs and disappeared.

You thought silently as you waited, and all of a sudden it made sense. Lately at school bakugou has been yelling more than usual, and telling everyone to speak louder. Maybe he was yelling more to be able to hear himself? You didn’t know. Bakugou has been learning sign language since he was 7 years old as a precaution for this and has been regularly signing while he talks since he was 10. So, bakugou using his sign language all the time wasn’t uncommon, but maybe Mitsuki was right. You made a mental note not to say anything until you actually noticed a big change in your guys’ training. You waited patiently for about another 10 minutes before Katsuki finally came downstairs.

“Hey idiot, nice outfit.” Katsuki greeted you in his groggy morning voice, his hands signing his words lazily. You looked down at the tank top and sweatpants you were wearing and looked back to him, you both were wearing the same exact thing. “Morning pom pom” you greeted back as you gathered your things and started to head towards the garage. You turned around to see bakugou staring into nothing, so you called out. “Hey kat, you coming?” No response. You repeated yourself, but this time loud enough you were sure you woke his dad. He whipped his head towards you and nodded before following along. As you were walking down the hall, you turned to him and asked, “You okay?” while signing your words. Katsuki looked down at your hands and his cheeks started to dust with the lightest shade of pink. He huffed and his red eyes sparked as he just growled out a ‘yeah’ and walked ahead of you into the garage, starting to set up for your session. You yourself had picked up sign language at a young age because your dad was deaf because his quirk was being able to shoot sonic booms from his hands. you pressed the button to open the garage door and let some light in. You then walked over to the speakers and plugged your phone in as you hit play on your playlist specifically for training days. Bakugou stopped setting up the bench press station and yelled, “Can you turn it up? “ as he signed quickly, but then went back to putting the weights together. You turned back to the speaker only to be surprised since the volume was already almost at max capacity. You shook your head and turned the volume all the way up. This session should be interesting.

It was around 9:30 AM at this point and you and Kat had finished weights and went on a 2 mile run. You were currently sitting on the floor stretching your quads as the loud techno music boomed around you. You glanced over at katsuki who was stretching on the other side of the garage and he seemed to be in a whole other universe. You called out to him, but he didn’t do so much as flinch. You picked yourself up off the floor and slowly walked towards him. You called a few more times and still got nothing from him, so you decided to turn off the music. As soon as you did Katsuki’s head shot up and his eyes darted towards you. “What the hell was that for dipshit? We’re gonna start sparring soon, we need it.” He said/yelled at you while you sauntered over to him and took a seat about a foot away from his now steaming body. You wiped the sweat from your forehead with the back of your arm before talking to katsuki, well you didn’t exactly talk with your voice, you were mostly signing. “Katsuki are you sure you’re okay? You’re not responding when I call out for you.” You waited for his response as his eyes stayed on your hands that were once moving. This time he answered, but for some reason he didn’t sign. “If I tell you, you can’t tell a single soul you hear me dumbass? Not even my parents. “ You nodded your head and gently reach over to squeeze his hand four times, your guys’ way of saying I promise. He then began to talk, and signed very aggressively as he did so, and what he said was enough to shatter you into a million pieces.

“I’ve been struggling in a way lately,” he started, “I tried to cover it up by just yelling all the time hoping people would just think it was my normal behavior. But, really it was so i could he hear myself.” Katsuki let out a long breath and you could see his hands slightly shaking. “It started out last week as just a slight ringing, but it got louder every damn day. But, this week the ringing got quieter, and eventually everything around me started to sound like I was underwater. “ He looked up at you and your breath hitched, tears rolled down katsuki’s face as he held eye contact. He shook out his hands and took another shakey breath before he began, “I- I can barely hear you y/n! And its so frusturating.” the volume of his voice was rising, and you could see the pain he was feeling through his eyes and the tears that were now dripping down to his shirt. “I can’t hear your fucking voice damnit! It’s the only one that doesn’t drive me up fucking walls. it terrifies me!” He was screaming at this point as his hands worked through the air to express his words. The tears came at a much quicker pace once he had stopped to breathe, and those tear turned into sobs as he curled in on himself. He tucked his knees to his chest and ducked his head into his arms as they wrapped around his legs. His shoulders and back shook as he cried, and for a moment you didn’t know what to do. You haven’t seen Katsuki cry since you both were 8 years old and he was playing with his quirk and accidently blasted your arm. He started crying as soon as he heard you wail in pain, and the lecture from his mother didn’t help in the slightest. You subconsciously reached up to rest your hand on the scar as you tried to think of what you could say to him.

Katsuki leveled his head and looked up at you, and slowly reached his hand out, still crying quietly. For a second you didn’t know what he meant, but it soon clicked in your head and you took his hand in yours. you looked at him with teary eyes and signed, “How can i help?” He untucked his legs from his chest and moved closer to you. Then, before you could even register what was happening, Katsuki had his arms around your waist with his head on your shoulder. You froze, it had been quite some time since either of you had needed a hug like this. once your shock had subsided, you brought your hands to rest on his upper back and rubbed soothingly. He began to cry again, which then led to sobs just like they had before. You began to talk, whispering variations of ‘I’m here’ and ‘You don’t have to be scared’, only to remember that he probably can’t hear you. Seeing katsuki as vulnerable as this broke your heart, and single tear fell from your face. Katsuki could feel your jaw muscles moving against the side of his face, so he knew you were talking, but he couldn’t hear you. “I- i- i- I can’t hear! I can’t hear you! Y/n I can’t hear you, fix it please, please I hate this so much!” He screamed into your shoulder which luckily muffled it enough to not draw any attention from the neighbors. He gripped onto your waist tighter as he breathed long and hard breaths. “I’m so scared. I’m terrified of losing you.” He whispered. This had confused you so you gently placed your hands on his shoulders and put a bit of distance between you guys so he could see you signing. “What do you mean you’re gonna lose me? I’m not going anywhere.” You said and waited for his response. He brought his trembling hands up to start signing and began, “I’m scared that if i can’t hear you, I won’t hear you calling me for help when you’re in danger. What kind of hero am I if i can’t even save my best friend?” You took one of his hands in yours and began to sign with your other. “You’re gonna be okay, We’re both gonna get you through this. I know you, and you don’t take shit from no one. And I know damn well you’re not gonna let a little hearing loss get in the way of beating deku.” He laughed slightly at the last statement, and seeing his small smile was like the world coming off of your shoulders. “We’ll take you to the doctor, they’ll help you.” He shook his head at that and his angry glowering returned. “It’s not anything to be embarrassed about. And I’m sure your parents would do anything to help you become the hero you want to be.” You finished your monologue and squeezed his hand four times, promising him you’re not going anywhere. He smiled down at his hand and then brought his other one up to sign, “I love you shithead” and you signed back, “Yeah I know, I love you too Kat”.

He began to stand up and Katsuki pulled you up with him. He immediately pulled you into the tightest bear hug possible. No one knew, but Katsuki was the biggest hugger, and it was your favorite thing about him. You released your arms from his waist and he released his hold around your shoulders. You took the sides on his face in your hands, and pointed to your lips as a signal to read your words. He nodded his head, and in a volume Katsuki couldn’t hear, you said, “I can hear you, I can hear you.”. He nodded and smiled the most genuine smile you’d seen out of him in years. “You ready?” he signed, and you answered “for what?”. He smirked and was quiet for a few seconds before shoving you to the side a little and running off towards your house. “Race you!” he yelled, “First one there, is your mom’s favorite you loser.” Kat called again. You smiled and shook your head as you sprinted off after him, remembering this is the Katsuki that will be the #1 hero someday.

***************************************🌸

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jamestrmtx · 3 years

Text

Fairytale Complex - [Undertale | Sans x Reader]

[Gender Neutral, Frisk's Parent Reader | Slow Burn]

Chapter Thirteen | Waterfall (Part 1 of 4)

[First] | [Previous] | [Next]

Alternate Chapter Title: “Hey, (mami/papi) - Part Two”, or “Sans acts like a Latin American f*ckboy - The Sequel”

• • •

"Where're you going?"

Frisk's voice activates an unregistered fight or flight response in you, and by that it means their voice makes you hide what you're doing like a closeted person would do with their phone when scrolling through gay stuff near their friends and family.

You stop halfway through getting dressed up and assess your situation before giving them an answer. Between the iron left next to your once wrinkled, button-up shirt and a bottle of (perfume/cologne) held up in your hand, finding an explanation as to why you're putting more effort than usual into something for your own, personal benefit is hard to do. "I'm going grocery shopping." Your words come out rushed, not wanting to be caught in a lie. "And then I'm going to meet with a friend."

"Is… Is it a date?"

Their bluntness makes you delay on a response.

"No," you say, words weighted down by guilt. "We'll just be hanging out like normal."

Giving up, Frisk glances at your phone and smiles when a few notifications show up on screen. "Is it Sans?" they ask again, now confident.

You try not to let your gaze widen and ignore the way your heart's already racing. "...How did you know?"

"You admitted it just now!" they exclaim, pointing a finger at you. "You're just like him." An angry look falls on their face and their arms cross with each other. "What are you trying to hide now?" They huff. "You're keeping things secret from me again!"

"I'm not hiding anything, honey." You scrunch your nose and bring a hand to your forehead, tension eating it up.

You sit next to Frisk in bed and grab them by the shoulders right as you continue with, "He just…" You think about why exactly this is a thing, until you're reminded by the 'buy me dinner first' joke you made the day of the blackout. "He only invited me over to his place for dinner. I don't even see him as a friend, so I… I really don't think him as my boyfriend would be any closer, either." You catch your breath and prepare yourself to keep going. "I mean it when I say we'll just be hanging out." When you see Frisk keep quiet, you hold their shoulders tighter and try to get them to face you. "Are you worried about me?" you ask, going further back in your memories to the day Sans had seen you and Frisk dancing. "Sans, he... He told me about what you were feeling guilty over."

They freeze under your touch. A faint, concerned frown displays itself on their mouth, one they try to fight off. "And what did he say?"

Their voice is too quiet for your liking. It feels like you're threading a needle now -- except the needle is a syringe filled with sour truths and that failing to aim at your target would result in serious consequences. You have to take all possible perspectives into account: from your own, to Frisk's, to Jerry's, and every other viewpoints related to the situation. Completely adhering to one would either make you seem too self-absorbed, too lenient, too forgiving, or something else entirely.

You pass a hand through their hair and brush their bangs off their face. From there, you press a quick kiss to their forehead, allowing them to relax for a brief moment. "That you felt guilty about all this stuff going on with Jerry and me, and that it was one of the reasons why you ran away before falling to the Underground." Frisk holds you tighter, shivers, and presses their face against your chest, staying there while you talk. "He... also said you still felt bad over the last time you ran away, and over those calls I was getting from Jerry before he came over to visit Toriel's last week." You let go of Frisk, wanting them to face you. "You shouldn't feel guilty about any of that stuff, dear," you add, placing a hand on their head. "We broke up when you were way younger, and in the end, it was… It was a choice we both agreed on."

"But why did you agree?"

You don't want to answer, though judging by how close they are to tearing up, you check the time to make sure you have some left to talk a little more.

4:30 p.m.

Sans would be arriving in half an hour, and while you're almost done getting dressed up and ready to leave, your current situation makes you wish for him to be here already.

You try not to let the situation get to you; the reminder that you've left the iron on and that you still have some stuff left to do helps with that. "He..." You stall for time, far from ready to be direct with Frisk about anything related to the past. "He said he didn't feel responsible enough to look after you sometime after you were (born/adopted), but..." A headache makes you stop for a second. Tension weighs down on your shoulders, and you can feel your hands grow sweaty, a product of anxiety. "But he still came to visit twice every week until you were four. He just... wasn't ready for this, in the end."

"And now he only visits on Christmas!"

"Lower your voice," you say, words stern. "Didn't you talk with him last time? He's trying to change now."

"Yeah, but he's still being a real butt about it. I... I couldn't get anywhere with him always saying mean stuff about other people!"

You frown and quirk a brow. "I highly doubt that's all of it, even if he is that way sometimes." You sigh and try to find a way around this, only to fail with each thought that comes to mind. "It's fine if you don't trust him yet, but it's not right to-"

Frisk stands up, hands fists and feet stomping against old, creaky floorboards. A glare's present on their face, meant more at who they exclaimed about rather than at you. "He only came over last week to see who my new friends were. He... He doesn't even check up on me anymore, but then… But then he still called you all those times ju- just to say me falling down was all your fault!"

You look at Frisk in the eyes and give it your best not to frown again. "How do you know that?" It's a stupid question taking into consideration how persistent they can be over certain situations, and even more knowing they had a talk with Sans about it before having him reveal this to you himself.

"You got sad every time Jerry called, and I heard him saying it was your fault one time. But… But when I asked Sans about it, he said it wasn't something I had to worry about!"

"And that's because it's true. None of this is your fault, and none of this is stuff you should be worrying about."

"By you're my (mom/dad)!" they shout, voice breaking. "Do you- Do you really expect me not to care? Maybe Jerry visits me sometimes, but you're always here. I can't just ignore you!"

"You're not ignoring me, honey. This is something only I can deal with."

"That's what Sans said!" Frisk sounds a level or two beyond exasperated by now; as a consequence, you make it your mission not to worsen the situation by telling them to calm down while you do the same. You take a tissue and clean the sadness away from their face, though it continues to pour down no matter how many times you do it. "If… If I made it safe and with new friends out of the Underground, how come I can't help you with this kind of stuff?"

You try to find peace of mind, a challenge too big for you to take without having energy drained from your body. "Just like you made your journey through the Underground, this is part of my own journey -- I don't need your help to overcome it. Simply you being here by my side is enough."

Frisk softens up and pulls you into a hug. They murmur something against you, though you can barely hear it with how hushed they are about it. "What?" you ask, not quite catching their words.

"So… So none of this is my fault?"

You hide their face against your neck and hug them back, twice as tight. Then, you shake your head and pull them closer, kissing their cheek in the process. "Of course it's not. The first time you ran away, you were only four, and it was all because your father and I were arguing way too much about something stupid." You stop, eyes stinging with pent-up tears. "If anyone's guilty here, I think it's him and me."

The alarm on your phone rings, signaling for you to make your last arrangements before leaving off to Sans's home.

You let go of Frisk and pat their head; they smile at that, giggling when you poke their waist and tickle their sides. "I have to finish getting ready now." You turn your back to them as you make way to the dresser. Once there, you list and organize what you plan to bring with you as a 'just in case' and fix the few tear marks on your face, wanting to leave things in order as well as look your best. Though it feels silly to be preparing so much for something so simple, it provides enough reassurance for you not to back away from this at the very last minute.

You look at Frisk when you're done and see them smile when they catch you staring.

"I should be back by eight," you say, smiling back at them. "Are you really sure you're okay being left with Undyne?"

Frisk nods. "As long as she's not cooking, the house is safe!"

"Well, lucky for you, food's already waiting at the stove." You chuckle and gather your keys, wallet, gum, and pretty much every other thing you can think of inside your bag.

While you're not sure why you're nervous over meeting the skeleton at his home, being well-prepared for the occasion makes it easier for your mind to rest. Truthfully, the night at Toriel's and the motorcycle ride the day after had helped you ease in more with Sans by your side, though that still didn't mean you weren't wary around him. You check your phone when hearing it ring again, but with a different tone this time -- messages rather than an alarm, a call, or a calendar event.

i'll be there in 15 mins.

i'm already in your neighborhood, but i stopped to go look for somethin'.

you ready, pal?

I think so.

nice.

i wanna show ya somethin' before we get to my place.

Care to elaborate over what is that 'something'?

take it i'm still a stranger to you?

Somewhat.

What do you want to show me?

there's a place that sells sweets nearby.

i'm kinda there right now, just passin' by.

saw the line, and it turns out it's the new pâtisserie thing that opened up last week.

it's makin' muffet's bakery some good competition, so i went to check it out.

what kinda sweets do you like?

Well…

I don't know what's your plan, but...

I guess (f/d)'s pretty good.

then we'll go buy some there together first.

on me.

What's your plan, Sans?

Are you trying to make this a date?

You know what I said was a joke, so there's really no need for you to do this.

not really.

unless you consider it that way, i'm fine with finally gettin' the chance for us to be friends fo' realsies.

and i know you were jokin' around, but i like takin' opportunities when i see 'em.

You put the phone down and back away, needing a moment to take in the weight of the monster's words. While you're not sure if he truly means them or not, you can't avoid taking them into consideration. You want to ask why he wants you to be his friend, yet by the time you pick up the phone again, there's already another message up on screen.

i'm here.

Your eyebrows furrow at that message while your hand scrolls to see just how much time passed since he sent his previous one. It's a ten-minute interval between them both, making you question why you'd taken so long to find an answer. You leave your bedroom and rush off to the living room, already hearing the motorcycle from afar. Behind you, Frisk sits by the couch, eyes following your movements like a cat after laser's light.

"I mean it," you say, facing them. "It's not a date."

Frisk grins, props their elbows over the armrest, and rests their chin on top of their hands. They then let go of that pose, sit up straighter, and reply with, "Then why did you both bother dressing up?"

Their comment makes you look back outside to see the driver, focusing on him rather than on the vehicle he's in. His trademark jacket's gone for today, and a casual polo replaces his usual, plain t-shirt. When he takes off his helmet, you look away, feeling caught. "Friends dress up to go out. It's really nothing big, dear." You take out your phone when you hear it ring again. Another message shows through, this time by a different sender.

Made it, finally!!

It's Undyne.

Before you can reply, a few more messages pop up, her typing speed deemed worthy of a challenge.

And is that Sans outside??

I knew it. ;3c

You laugh at the sight of her last message. The little face at the end is a surprise to see with the serious image you have of her, so you associate her use of it with Alphys. With her being the one most likely to send messages like those, it's not so far-fetched of a possibility for her to be influencing Undyne in her texting style.

So THAT'S why.

If that's the case, take all the time you need, (Y/N).

I'll cover for you until the end of your date, so no worries!

Who says it's a date?

I do.

You're going over to *his* place, eating dinner made by *him*, and it's just the two of you!

What else can it be?

A friendly way of getting to know the person responsible for judging people at the Underground.

Who was also a sentry for Asgore.

And who's still a stranger to me.

That's it.

Well, geez!

You're no fun.

For now, I don't intend to be.

Again, thank you for looking after Frisk, but…

I still can't overlook what happened down there while I wasn't around for them.

Looking after them right now is the only way I can at least apologize to them for what I've done.

What do you mean?

Did something happen??

No.

I just wasn't there for Frisk when they needed me the most.

So now I can only try to redeem myself by being more strict than I've ever been.

And that includes not taking whatever this hangout thing with Sans is as a date.

So, what I'm getting at here is…

You'd *like* it to be a date??

Maybe.

I mean, I haven't dated anyone in around 6 years, so…

...Yeah.

A strong maybe.

>:3c

I see.

Please don't get any ideas, Undyne.

I really mean it when I say dating's not in my plans.

Well...

I can't promise I won't.

But I'll try. ;)

You sigh, lock the phone, and put it back away in your bag. You check yourself out in a mirror before leaving and open the door slowly, cautious of those waiting outside. Undyne's waiting by the front yard already while Sans is parked near the sidewalk, the former who grins wide at the sight of you.

"Ready to go out?" Undyne asks, grin growing. "Have fun, you two!"

Everything's fine up until you see which car she's gotten down from and who the driver is.

Papyrus.

Just as you're done adjusting to the idea of having dinner with Sans, doubts over being left alone with him surface.

Undyne's message about it being 'just the two of you' makes more sense now, and realizing you're far denser than cake with over-mixed batter doesn't help much with that, either.

[First] | [Previous] | [Next]

• • •

So...

I was down with the sickness for one week, then had to move out the week after, and now this week I took two missing vaccines and I'm sick again due to that, which resulted in a sudden and huge delay in my update schedule, but I'm finally back now. (Phew!)

I'm still very, very, very tired, lol. But I found out one of the main reasons for getting sick again was due to lots of stress and little rest, sooo I'll be focusing more on my hobbies (like this one!) in order to avoid anything like that from happening again.

As a result, story updates might be a lil' wonky in their schedule (until I get enough rest) but more frequent from here on out!!

• • •

Tag List (Comment or message me if you want to be added to [or removed from] it!)

@the-simp-express

@nektotersh

@disastrous-l0vebug

@therealchickenjoe

@mintyflakes025

@pandaquick

@timelock97

@candle-creeps

#sans x reader #undertale x reader #lgbt #lgbt themes #gender neutral reader #male reader #female reader #mother reader #father reader #parent reader #chubby reader #long fic #romcom #adventure #mystery #platonic relationships #slow burn

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raichijin · 4 years

Text

⋆͛♡⋆͛ the hangover; mirio edition. ❥ a one-shot.

━━━━━ 𝐑𝐀𝐈𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐉𝐈𝐍 𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓. (tba)

preface; writing this was honestly so painful. a testatment to why i should never 1.) do collabs ever 2.) write long things. i am drained.

word count; 5k words.

starring; mirio, mina, shinsou, denki, unnamed boyfriend.

summary; after your boyfriend forgets about your anniversary, you spend some time with friends to forgive and forget about what happened. then it gets worse.

warnings; reader gets called some nasty names towards the end of the fic. watch out for that.

you were supposed to be spending this weekend with your boyfriend. at a resort, poolside, on vacation, or on a beach, or where ever he’d fancy peeling off the nice (read: expensive) swimsuit he’d gotten you for your five year anniversary.

he was kind, is kind, but not as committed to your relationship as he was to his job. not even a call as the clock struck midnight, almost an hour past your reservation, but a text the morning after with a short apology, and the sudden announcement that he’d be working late. again. you didn’t cry. wouldn’t, because shedding tears would cause a mess and a headache, and self-doubt is what’s tucking you in at night, telling you that maybe for tonight, tomorrow and the day after your feelings don’t matter.

cause his job is the one keeping you afloat. (your interest in the arts is cute, to him; like a hobby. nothing you could stay afloat with. it’s too risky, he insists, so to you, it became nothing. to others? it became offhand remarks at his high-end office parties. a joke to your in-laws. a breathed sigh of relief from your parents.) so more time is what’s best for the both of you.

that has to be it.

your friends figure out something might be wrong when you go ghost for days, bordering on a week.

you mention how it’s easy to lose track of time when you’re by yourself as you are, but they don’t buy it. say you need to loosen up, take a vacation of your own even when you say you don’t need it because you’re not working, give you sharp glares whenever you object. you don’t know why you thought you had a choice in the matter — especially when mina’s sugar mommy gives her enough money to afford 2 full suites at one of the most expensive hotels in the area.

denki also tags along, just cause, and brings his boyfriend; shinsou, with him.

if they know what’s going on, they never mention it.

and it’s a little easier to cope that way.

you dip your toes, ease yourself into the night, before you’re being pulled into the deep end and your mind’s been left at the door, but your body is having a field day.

you should’ve blacked out two margaritas ago.

you think you did.

you’re too drunk to recall all of the rash decisions you made, or whether or not you maxed your credit card, but you’ve must’ve gotten separated from your friends somewhere along the way, because when you wake up, you are distinctly not in your bed, not in a tastefully decorated room, not in a hotel.

and mina, shinsou, denki? unless they’re in the adjacent room, they’re not here with you either. you’re still in your clothes from last night. your shirt is missing a button and you don’t have your shoes on, but beyond that, you’re perfectly fine.

a scraggly bed head lies next to you, who is, notably, more nude than you are.

he has no shirt. no shoes. no pants. his blonde hair is unruly and you’re so shocked you actually start to wake up. your eyes widen and you’re sitting up so fast you’re a bit dizzy from the sudden motion.

the room is spinning and you feel sick, the headache behind your eyes making you want to grind your molars into dust. and just as quickly as you sat up, you lay back down; shaking the bed with the force. the guy next to you isn’t as heavy of a sleeper as you hoped, though. he blinks open tired eyes, showing you the most exquisite navy blue, and the little bit of drool dripping down his chin might’ve been cute if he wasn’t a complete stranger.

though you can’t stave off the creeping anxiety, the silence as he comes to his senses doesn’t feel wrong, and you’re more confused than scared.

he rubs his eyes with the heel of his palm, and gives you a criminally bright smile, and though his voice is wrecked when he says “...g’morning, sunshine.”, you doubt yours sounds much better.

the nickname makes you feel fuzzy, if only for a second.

“i, uh … good morning?” you sound awkward, but the guy manages to find humor in your predicament when he chuckles gently, sitting up without so much as a second thought. you can see more of his body when he does so, and when his hand comes up to ruffle his hair, you can catch the glint of a silver band, resting on his ring finger.

then everything clicks into place.

did you cheat? was he cheating?

all of the things you’d been beating yourself up over settle thick over top like smoke clouds and a raging fire. you feel like you’re suffocating, and don’t realize you’re freaking out until a strong hand is wrapping around yours, which, in your panic, you squeeze.

you spot a matching ring on your hand, that you know for a fact wasn’t there before,

and you think that’s when you pass out.

you wake up (again) to a room with tacky but charming decor, the smell of breakfast, and considerably less of a headache than what you started with. now more lucid, with the strength in your body to walk and think, your first priority is finding your phone. you tap your pockets, check the bedside drawer and tables, under your pillow, in the cracks of the bed, under the bed.

no cigar. you’re digging through miscellaneous memorabilia, trinkets and clothes that aren’t yours for at least a minute before the guy you were laid up in bed with comes back to just to see you picking through the corners of his bedroom, banana in hand.

he stands in the doorway and clears his throat. he has clothes on this time, pants. “you’re awake? are you feeling any better?”

you startle, straighten your back and stand upright, your arms falling to your sides. “um, kind of. i — have you seen my phone?”

he shakes his head, offers you the banana. “you should have this though! it’ll fix that hangover, i think.”

“i … thanks.” standing and eating a banana in someone else’s bedroom is certainly … a time.

“i made some breakfast,” he says when you’re halfway finished, “if you want some.” he ends with a smile, and you feel those 3 shots of serotonin go straight to your brain.

granted, you shouldn’t be that happy.

he takes the lead and turns around, leading you down a narrow hallway into a quaint kitchenette with a lovely beach view and all the good summer vibes condensed into a single, small room. it makes your heart hurt even more when you realize you have someone home, someone expecting you to come back.

to a hollow apartment, a cold bed, a lukewarm welcome.

you have to force your brain to be quiet to even hear a fraction of what blondie is saying.

“alcohol basically just dehydrates you. the potassium stops that, gets you all your minerals and stuff back. i heard it works with beer, so i was thinking it works for other stuff too!” he sounds so chipper that it brings your mood up just to hear his voice.

so bold and sure, warm and kind.

“but if it doesn’t clear up in 30 minutes, i have some advil i can give you! don’t want you having a headache all day now.” he’s sitting you down at his small table and sliding some pancakes in front of you, some orange juice. eating feels like a chore, but you know you have to, or that you should try at least.

while you push around your food, blondie chatters away, and even if you just met, he has you entranced by the way he speaks. smooth like the butter on his toast as his stories flow effortlessly into one another, how easily he can chat you up is amazing; getting you from gentle chuckles to full blown belly laughter before you can get your first bite in.

there’s lulls in the conversation if you count the moments he takes to actually eat, but he keeps you on your toes with his personal anecdotes, and questions about yourself, forcing you out of your shell, little by little.

the thought of your boyfriend pushed back into the depths of your mind.

until you broach the topic of your friends.

you learn quickly that he’s a good listener, completely silent unless prompted, asking questions or making jokes only when you’re finished speaking. when he asks, you tell him about the ones that got you here, shinsou, denki and mina.

his eyes flash momentarily, a look of recognition, or maybe understanding, passing over him. he hums gently, head swaying as he does so.

“they’re a little rough around the edges but they’re like family, you know?”

“i get what you mean. they were very nice when i met them. especially at our wedding!” he sips his coffee.

“i — are you alright? you’re choking!” that you are. the guilt you felt when you first woke up and the rising panic ram into your gut like a freight train, and suddenly, you don’t want to eat anymore.

"what do you mean we're married?" you rub small circles into your forehead as this idyllic morning goes right back to being cruel hell.

"yesterday, at the chapel," he twists his wedding ring with warm familiarity that makes your stomach churn. "i can't really believe it myself, like maybe we were meant to be? i know the universe works in strange ways like that."

you're sorry to burst his bubble, but you save the happily ever afters for fairy tales, not real life.

you pinch your forehead and heave an exasperated sigh.

"i have a boyfriend." you wrap your arms around yourself, trying to seek lost comfort. "and we don't know each other to begin with. can't even remember your name, i was so drunk."

you cradle your face in your palms, feel his stare bore into the top of your head.

"togata." you perk up.

“what?”

“my name. it’s togata. mirio togata.”

“oh.” you rub your cheeks, pull them back with the heels of your palms.

“that’s a nice name.” an uncomfortable silence washes over you both before someone speaks up. mirio.

“so what do you want to do?”

you answer a little bit too fast in response. “i don’t know. i … i should call my friends. i still need to find my phone—” you stand up, ignore the onslaught of nausea, and look around the kitchen.

“help me look? and then … and then we can figure out all the other details later.” mirio carries both your plates to the sink, and busies himself with dishes for a brief moment, allowing you to find the bathroom nook and reorient yourself. you fix yourself up a bit, straighten out your shirt and fix your hair up. no time to take a shower.

you cup a hand in front of your mouth, breathe and sniff. eugh.

“hey, uh, togata; got an extra toothbrush?” his heart might’ve lept when you called him by his given name.

“um! yeah!” rushing water obscures his voice a bit, but if he shouts he’s loud enough to hear. “check under the sink? i should have some there.”

“thanks.”

you rummage around in his cabinets, and in that time he’s managed to clean up the leftover food and put a shirt on.

your phone having gotten lost or being stolen becomes more of a possibility the longer you think about it. you doubt you came back to his house to do anything but sleep. how many places could you have dropped it? you come out of the bathroom to mirio sitting back at the kitchenette table, holding his phone in his hand.

“hey togata … do you think you can call me?”

“i mean, sure, but i don’t know if i have your number...”

your anxiety makes you a bit snippy even when you don’t mean to be rude, but you can apologize when you get your phone back. ”just give it to me then. i’ll do it.”

it rings a few times before someone picks up, which is a step up from going to voicemail, and the situation goes from okay to great when the croaky voice of shinsou answers, worn out and tired, but awake enough to make a greeting.

he says you’re not here to pick up the phone right now, you interrupt and say that this is you, and that you just borrowed togata’s phone to figure out where yours was.

“togata? who?”

“my, my um. husband.” gingerly said, you can see mirio tense up in the corner of your eye.

“oh,” someone’s snickering away from the mic. denki probably. you can’t help but roll your eyes. “mirio?” you’re upset that he can remember his name but you couldn’t. “how is he?” you shoot mirio a look, he gives you a thumbs up.

“good. so, uh, where are you guys?”

two hours away. they’re two hours away by car and mirio’s pickup truck is exactly what you’d expect from him. it’s big, beat up, it’s blue, and it’s his pride and joy, even if it’s slow to start up. if anything, it feels a bit humbling to hear the low hum of the buzzing engine. brings you back down to reality, out of the lap of luxury.

reminds you of the way mirio laughs with his whole chest. that gentle, rumbling purr.

you’re sinking into the crunchy leather seat with a groan, then a laugh from togata; to which you swat at him. you give him the address so he can set it up with his gps, and get going. he messes it up a bit and then it’s your turn to laugh, much to his displeasure. he blushes from the embarrassment, and you pat his shoulder, still chuckling. it feels natural. waking up together. having breakfast together. unofficial road trip to meet back up with your friends because you got blackout drunk and are 100 miles away.

oh, right. you sigh softly and mirio looks over, thinking to comfort you by turning on the radio, greeted by soft pop and slow guitars.

the silence carries.

fifteen minutes into the drive, he thinks to ask about your boyfriend.

“what’s he like?” togata drums his fingers on the wheel with an air of anxiety almost, though you can’t imagine why he would be — unless he thinks you won’t react well to his question. you don’t mind however, and sate his curiosity without as much as a glance.

“oh, he’s nice,” your statement lacks the enthusiasm you’d expect when someone talks about their significant other. it seems sincere, yet exhausted.

“buys me whatever i want, when i want it, loves his job to death, and … we were supposed to be celebrating our anniversary this week.” dejection is visible in the way you slouch your shoulders, interest waning. mirio can’t help but exercise a little concern, filling in the gaps while he’s at it..

“and you couldn’t, because you came here?” you shake your head.

“what? no. i came here because he was too busy, and my friends thought i could still have some fun on my own. his job is important to him.”

“and your relationship isn’t?” your eyes narrow, glaring at him from the passenger's seat.

“the fuck’s that supposed to mean mirio?”

“well, an anniversary is supposed to be more important than some job— don’t you think he should just take a day off? it wouldn’t hurt.” you lean against the car door, shoulder propping your head up as you peer out the window.

“i mean, i guess. but he’s keeping us afloat, so i can’t really complain.” togata’s eyebrows shoot up.

his tone is incredulous. “what, you don’t work?”

seeing you cringe away out of the corner of his eye is what makes him back track almost immediately.

“i’m so sorry! i’m — wow, that was completely out of line,” your embarrassment lessens when he apologizes, and you inhale sharply.

“don’t worry. it’s, it’s fine.” you can’t help the way your fingers dig into the flesh of your arm, gnawing the inside of your cheeks, afraid of getting laughed at. mirio wouldn’t laugh at you, would he?

“i, i used to make music. i was in a band in highschool, actually.” though mirio’s forced to keep his eyes on the road lest you two crash, you can see the way his smile reaches his ears, the silent ‘wow’ of awe making your cheeks heat up. high brow company doesn’t have much use for your talents unless it’s the violin, or something else that fits their lame-ass agenda. your bass chills in the back of your closet, a relic of the past, but a neat decoration.

you shake your head, too caught up in your own train of thought that you didn’t realize togata was speaking.

“i’m sorry, what’d you say?”

“oh! i was just curious, i asked if you sing?” you snort, then full on laugh, though mirio doesn’t seem to get the joke.

“oh, hell no. i don’t have the voice for it, nor the patience to do vocal training. i just played bass! thought it was easier than guitar because it only had 4 strings. i was wrong. maybe i could … show you sometime? i mean, it’s been a while, but i think i remember a few songs: have you heard of seven nation army?”

you talk with mirio about music at length, and learn that he’s a pretty big enthusiast himself and while he’s never played an instrument, he’s been interested in learning guitar. he brings up your band, and the memories of your senior year come flooding back; mina and denki convincing you to audition, your stage fright, recruitment later in spite of it.

mirio can see the stars in your eyes when you speak, speaking so animatedly with clear adoration at the topic at hand, and he starts getting a creeping suspicion that back where you’re from, you don’t get to talk about this as nearly as much as you like. he realizes in the same breath that he doesn’t mind indulging you. he participates enough so you don’t feel like you’re chatting his ear off, but quiet enough to hear you fill in the empty space.

the way your hands move as you tell stories is adorable and so is your enthusiasm, he could hear you ramble for hours and never get bored. and he nearly does, it’s been an hour and you’re still talking — but then you take a breath, and apologize for no good reason.

he squints at you, confused.

“what’re you apologizing for?”

“i’ve been talking waaaaay too much. i’ve barely heard a word out of you for the last thirty minutes!”

“i thought you were having fun! i know i liked listening. besides, it looks like that you don’t get to talk enough about the stuff you enjoy. i’m willing to listen, so talk all you want!” the assumption makes you furrow your brow, and you hate that you feel like he’s right.

your boyfriend either talks about his job, your friends, his parents, or nothing at all. no interest in music. no time for it. your friends enjoy reminiscing on occasion, but you don’t speak enough to them to get all nostalgic.

it’s … nice that he takes your feelings into consideration. you smile to yourself, saying nothing in response.

“we’re getting closer to the hotel — it’s 30 minutes away now.” it gets quiet again, before all the sounds you hear are the other cards and the slow hum of low volume music you’d forgotten about, coming from the radio. you turn towards the window to take in the scenery while mirio catches glimpses of you in his periphery, surprised at how adorable you look, doing even the most mundane of things.

mirio couldn’t remember much from the night before, well, can’t remember anything that wasn’t you. you weren’t completely out of it when you met him, but he could’ve misjudged, considering he wasn’t quite in his right mind either. didn’t know if it was the alcohol that made you so bold, but everything about you was so charming.

from something as simple as your smile to how easily you chatted him up, despite his tendency to be a tad overbearing, you would take him and his attitude in stride. running around town, dipping in and out of nightclubs with your friends close behind, getting kicked out of said clubs, dancing and laughing together in another—

he huffs, pouting to himself. your boyfriend was so damn lucky.

he steps on the gas and starts going a little faster. you don’t seem to mind.

the rest of the trip was silence, and it wasn’t until he parked and stepped out of the car and said something.

“wow.” he whistles, low and long, until you pinch his arm to stop from attract the stares of passerby. “you guys could afford this? gosh. that’s like, three of my paychecks, maybe.” you chortled as he helped you out, quick to clear up any confusion.

“not me,” you walked in the lobby with him, going straight to the elevators after checking in with the front desk. “i could barely afford it! mina’s … uhm, girlfriend, paid for a room for all of us.” he arches a brow at the emphasis on girlfriend, but if he has any objections, he holds his peace.

“mmh. wonder what it’s like to be rich.”

you laugh as you’re carried up a few floors, specifically to the more expensive suites, at least 12 floors up. “me too dude! mina is lucky.”

you’re barely knocking on the room door before denki is throwing it open and screeching, ushering you both in. they remember mirio from last night, which is upsetting, considering they don’t remember anything else: not how you got to mirio’s house, not how they got back home. not how they found your phone in the bathroom either, apparently.

“speaking of bathrooms, i’m gonna take a shower. keep mirio company, i guess."

you have to look through your luggage for a change of clothes, and find your phone on your bed in your room, charging and you don’t think about going through it until after you’re clean.

coming back to nearly forty notifications from your boyfriend wasn’t on the agenda, and quite frankly, might’ve been a sign. some were calls but most were all lower case texts, each more foreboding than the last. holding your towel up with one hand, you scroll through your messages with the other.

what the fuck is wrong with you?

who the hell is this guy?

beneath it, a video of you and togata. your pupils dilate, and a deeply rooted sense of dread clutches your heart. it looks like a screen recording off of denki’s instagram account, of you two dancing. not overtly scandalous, but too close for comfort.

have you been cheating on me?

for how long

how desperate are you? i say i have a business trip and you take it as an excuse to slut it up somewhere else?

you’re fucking pathetic.

heart slowly sinking, threatening to beat out of your chest, you can’t find it in you to scroll through the rest. you barely have pants on before you’re calling him up, frenzied and feeling out of breath. the phone barely rings twice before you’re going to voicemail and hearing the beeping tone.

fuck. fuck fuck fuck.

you hang up, and try again.

this time, he picks up on the first dial tone.

“baby?” you nearly yell into the microphone, while the other end remains silent.

“what is it.” his voice is hollow, not even asking a question; rather making a statement. you choke on your words, are quiet for a few seconds at most before he’s barking at you. “i don’t have all day. i’m busy.”

“t-that video. it wasn’t, it wasn’t anything—” something slams in the background that makes you flinch, and he takes it as a good opportunity to cut you off.

“so the wedding wasn’t shit either? the way he was holding you, looking at you like that, like some lovesick fucking puppy?”

“w-what? what’re you talking about honey? it’s nothing like that—”

“don’t get fucking cute with me. i’ve seen the photos. that girl mina doesn’t know how to not publicize your life.” you feel like dying.

“i knew i should’ve never settled for you.”

“you don’t mean that—”

“shut the fuck up.” there’s more shuffling on his end, a deep sigh. you’re too shaken to speak. “i wasted so much on you. gave you a house, a home, just for you to repay the favor by being a two-bit whore, sit on your ass all day and complain, and waste my time with those stupid fucking hobbies of yours.” what’s more terrifying is that his voice doesn’t wane or waver. he means it.

“... honey, please. please just let me explain!” you hadn’t even noticed the tears until you’re wiping them off your cheeks, your sniffling getting louder until you’re full on sobbing.

“there’s nothing left to explain. get your shit out by tuesday. we’re done.”

the line goes dead after that.

you don’t realize how much time has passed since you went to go shower initially, only that it’s been a while, considering how urgently mina starts knocking on the door.

“baby, are you alright? you’ve been in there for half an hour!” you can’t find it in you to respond. all it results in is choking on your own words, coughing and sobbing and tears and this fucking headache.

you don’t want to be seen.

mina announces that she’s coming in, and conversation behind the door quiets down until you can’t hear it anymore. just your own thoughts. she opens it and finds you in the corner, your knees to your chest while you’re just barely dressed, hair soaking wet. crying feebly until she rushes over and asks what happened.

you show her your phone. the texts.

she wraps her arm around your back and helps you up. hands you a towel so you can finish drying yourself off, and picks out some clothes for you to wear. when she turns around, she’s greeted by the concerned faces of your friends. mirio.

her face morphs from a look of concern to pure rage.

“what the fuck!?” she all but snatches your phone away from you, to which you pull your hands back and cradle you legs again. “who the fuck does this asshole think he is?” she looks down at you just then, and sees the red in your eyes, the tear tracks that stain your cheeks and a few drops dripping off your chin. you need your help more than you need her rage and half hearted insults.

“you yelled.” shinsou states plainly. “is everything alright?” mina approaches them and ushers everyone out, closing the door, presumably to give you some privacy.

you dress slowly, the few minutes feeling like an eternity before you’re reaching for the door handle, clean and feeling like shit, for different reasons other than a hangover.

when you emerge from your room, mirio gives you a hug.

a hug that you melt into. one that you weren’t expecting but squeeze him back just as hard, tears that didn’t quite make it out seeping into the spot where you press into his shirt. his arms are comforting and strong, rubbing and patting your back gently, until the room is silent beyond your heartbeat and your sniffles, your friends milling about in the background.

“he said i have to move out.” your fingers dig into togata’s shirt. “pack up all my stuff and leave but i don’t know where i’m supposed to go—”

there’s a smaller hand patting your back when mina speaks up.

“d-don’t worry.” you can feel her hugging you too, a special warmth blooming in your chest.

“we’ll figure something out.”

while you’re leaving the hotel, mina makes a call to her girlfriend camie to explain the situation, and by the time you’re back in mirio’s pick up, she said that camie offered to rent you an apartment in her name. the earliest she can get it was by monday, so she offered to let you spend the night for a couple days as well. denki says that he and shinsou could help you with things around the house: shopping, redecorating, etc.

togata is the one who offers to help you get your stuff. you arrange the date for monday, actually exchange phone numbers, and meet up at 8.

it makes sense; his car has enough space in the back, you don’t have much of your own stuff, but you nearly regret accepting the offer in the first place. something about moving out with your … husband in tow doesn’t sit well with you. almost seems like it’s too soon.

but mirio’s charming enough to make the whole ordeal seem less like a fever dream. you’re beaming at him by the time you’re all done, laughing and smiling and so infectiously happy. by the time you both wind down you’re out of breath, wheezing in the front seats of the car.

he smiles fondly at you.

you can feel your cheeks heat as you return the sentiment.

then both of you are back on the road. the musics louder this time, and you get to show him how shitty you sing; which he insists isn’t so bad after all. it’s after twenty minutes of this that you’re suddenly struck by the irony of it all.

“i can’t believe our first date with you was me moving out of my exes apartment.” mirio chokes on his spit, cheeks bleeding red as he does a double take, eyes flitting from the road, back to you, back to the road.

“wait.”

“that was our date?”

𝔱 𝔞 𝔤 𝔩 𝔦 𝔰 𝔱 ; @mitsusuri @okayshin @tamasoft

#mirio togata x reader #bnha x reader #togata mirio x reader #mha x reader #bnha #mha #boku no hero academia #my hero academia #togata mirio #mirio togata #bnha pocuties collab #mirio x you #togata x you #mirio x reader #togata x reader

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jaehyunhour · 4 years

Text

la la love | ten

college!jaemin strangers to lovers social media au.

summary: in which you’re upset at jeno for still talking to his ex yeji, so you recruit jaemin to fake date you to make him jealous, but you accidentally fall in love with jaemin during the process.

pairing: jaemin x female reader (special guest appearances from nct’s jisung, chenle, renjun, jeno, and itzy’s ryujin and yeji).

2.2k words. (warning: slightly suggestive! just a heated make out session, but if you are uncomfortable reading 00 line smut just skip over it! i was born in 00, so i am comfortable reading/writing mature content of 00 liners but i know not everyone is!)

previous | next || au masterlist

tag list: @neocrackheadtendencies @dammit-jjk @infatuated-with-you @donghyuckster @hyucktingz @127-jaehyun @j9emin @sunsungie @lowkeyviv @vintagejaehyun @ryujinnz @air-wreckaaa @jisungpwaarkk @bby-jaem

for tag list, send an ask or comment!

y/n lay in her bed as she scrolled through phone trying to entertain herself. ryujin and jisung were away visiting their families for the weekend, renjun was busy studying for exams as they neared finals week, and she didn’t want to text jeno. she stared at jaemin’s contact in her phone, she could call him and ask him to come over, but she was torn about it. every time she reached out to spend time with him, renjun’s words rang through her head. she really didn’t want to hurt him. but before she could process what was happening, her finger had already pressed the facetime button.

“oh, shit,” she said as it rang, and right as she was about to hang up, it connected.

“what’s up, y/n?” jaemin said on the other line. his hair was messy and he was wearing a pair of round glasses.

“i didn’t know you wear glasses,�� y/n responded.

“i don’t,” jaemin took the glasses off and set them on his bedside table. “they’re just to look nice. am i just going to see the top half of your face or will you show me your whole face?”

y/n sat up, fixed her hair a little bit before extending her arm to show her entire face to jaemin. “happy?”

“very. so what’s up? why’d you call?”

“oh! i was just bored! ryujin and jisung are gone for the weekend, renjun is busy studying, and i don’t exactly want to hang out with jeno… i don’t know if you’d want to hang out though, i know late night impromptu hangouts aren’t really in your fake boyfriend job description.”

“hmmm, i have some exams i have to study for but i think i can spare a couple hours.” jaemin got up quickly and went to his mirror. “i’m just gonna come dressed like this, though, okay?” he flipped the camera to reveal his cozy fit: grey sweatpants and a loose fit white v neck.

“wear a sweater! you can’t catch a cold.”

he pushed his closet open, revealing a bunch of shirts, sweaters, and jackets all neatly organized by color. “which one?”

“i like that red hoodie a lot.”

“you got it. alright, see you in 30.”

“make it 15.”

“i can make it 15 but you’ll starve.”

“okay, see you in 30.”

and as promised, 30 minutes later jaemin was knocking on y/n’s door, holding take out. when she opened the door, she smiled at him before quickly reaching for the food and setting it onto the coffee table in the living room. jaemin slipped his shoes off by the door, and slumped onto the couch.

“i don’t even get a proper greeting? i just cured your boredom and fed you.”

“you’re right, you’re right.” y/n stood in front of him and quickly pulled him up off the couch and gave him a hug. he returned the hug and squeezed her tight, and — did y/n’s heart just skip a beat? no way. “can i eat now?” she asked, getting nervous. he pulled away and nodded.

“are you going to eat?” she asked, returning to the food and beginning to feast.

“i ate just before you called.”

“ah, okay. thank you for bringing food! just take out however much it was out of my purse,” she points at her purse on the table next to the couch. he nods and reaches over, but instead picks up the control to the tv to turn it on.

and they sat in comfortable silence for 15 minutes, y/n on the ground eating and jaemin on the couch behind her looking for something to watch on hulu. he couldn’t find anything that he wanted to watch, so he abandoned it until she was done eating so he could get her full undivided attention. once she was done, she cleaned up the trash and sat on the couch next to him.

“is there anything in particular you feel like seeing?” jaemin asked, handing the control to her. she took it from him, and immediately went to the horror section on netflix. “really? a horror movie?”

“why, are you scared?” she raised her eyebrows at him.

“i should be asking you that!” jaemin responded, but deep down he was a little scared. “you always talk about how you can never get all the way through a horror movie because you get too scared.”

“that’s when i’m alone… but you’re here, we could watch one together and maybe i can get through it.”

“i don’t think holding you while you try to watch a horror movie was in my fake boyfriend job description,” jaemin said, with a laugh.

“it isn’t, but it is in your real friend job description.”

“we’re friends?”

“well, yeah. i thought that was obvious.”

there’s a beat of silence.

“fine, ONE horror movie, but i’m picking it,” jaemin said, taking the control from her hand and picking a movie. he settled on the curse of la llorona, it looked the least threatening and y/n seemed excited to watch it when he read the title. halfway through the movie, though, y/n rest her head on jaemin’s shoulder and knocked out. he had to admit, he was scared of the movie but the sound of her quiet snores was enough for him to brave the rest of the movie because he didn’t want to wake her.

but once the movie was over, he still didn’t budge. her snores had stopped, but jaemin knew — or at least, thought — she was still asleep, because he took his phone out and took a few pictures of her sleeping on him. he didn’t know that she was still awake, but was too comfortable to ruin the moment. she thought maybe if she stayed like that for just a little bit longer, he would pick her up and take her to bed like her parents used to do when she fell asleep in the car as a child. but he didn’t, he sat still. and he spoke.

“my, my, y/n what am i going to do with you? i know i wasn’t supposed to, but i think i’ve really fallen for you,” jaemin whispered. “isn’t that crazy? a month ago i couldn’t even remember the fact that we went to high school together, and now i’m sitting here on your couch and all i can think about is how badly i want to kiss you.” he paused for a second. “but that’s not in my fake boyfriend job description, right? this is just to get back at jeno. and i’m sure we’ll succeed. but, man, what i wouldn’t give to just be able to kiss you once, or even hold your hand behind closed doors. when we’re in public, it’s different. it’s all a show… i think i want to be yours for real. but i have to remind myself this is just to get back at jeno.”

her heart broke a little hearing jaemin’s whispered confession, and she didn’t know what to do. should she tell him she’s been awake and heard everything? or does she pretend to just wake up and ignore it? she decided with the latter, and pretended to just wake up. jaemin held in a breath as she lifted her head from his shoulder, rubbed the sleep from her eyes, and put on her best fake groggy voice.

“how long have i been asleep?”

“i think about an hour, i’m not sure. you fell asleep about halfway through the movie.”

“was it scary?”

jaemin let out a laugh. “yeah, it was. we’ll have to rewatch it another day.”

he shifted his body to look over at her. “let’s get you to bed.” he stood up, took her into his arms, and carried her into her bed. once in her bed, she sat up with her back pressed against the headboard as jaemin walked into her bathroom.

“what are you doing? she questioned. jaemin didn’t respond, but he walked back out of the bathroom with toner, cotton pads, her moisturizer, and some lip balm. “jaemin, i’m too tired to do my whole routine right now.”

he sat on her bed, opened the toner and put some on the cotton pad. he slowly cleansed her face and moisturized it for her. after he set the moisturizer down on her bedside table, he brought the lip balm up to her lips and applied it. her heart was beating faster when jaemin’s hands were so close to her lips, and the tension proved to be too much for him too. he leaned in, and she felt his breath ghost her lips. before she could stop him, he closed the gap between the two and pressed his lips forcefully against hers. at first, she was too shocked to react and jaemin was about to pull away, but her hands found their way into his hair and kept him in place. she kissed back for just a moment, and as she was going to pull away, jaemin gently pushed her into her bed and climbed on top of her.

jaemin’s mind ran wild as he realized what he was doing, he couldn’t believe that he was in this position. her body tucked beneath his, as her hands went from being buried in his hair to feeling all over his body. jaemin pulled back for just a second to look at her, and she pulled him right back in and deepened their kiss, letting his tongue into her mouth as one of his hands squeezed her breasts. her hands trailed down his torso, slipped underneath his shirt and hoodie, and her fingernails lightly scratched at his abs.

“y/n—“ he groaned. she shushed him.

“touch me, jaemin.” she whispered.

as much as jaemin wanted to, he knew things had already gone too far. whether she was acting out of feelings for him or just the heat of the moment was a mystery to him, but he knew he couldn’t keep going. he pulled back and sat up, the hand that was previously on her chest running through his hair. jaemin’s eyes were blown out, and y/n stared at him while she caught her breath. she didn’t know what to say.

“i’m sorry,” jaemin started. “i crossed the line, and i shouldn’t have. i’m sorry. this wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“that’s okay,” she said quietly. her eyes met his and she could tell he really felt sorry. it tore her apart inside.

“i’m sorry,” he repeated, unable to find other words to say. “this wasn’t supposed to happen, this was just pretend for you to get jeno, i wasn’t supposed to kiss you or anything...” jaemin gets up, panicked and begins to head for the door. “i should go home.”

y/n watched him walk to the door and her chest hurt as she stared at him. right as his hand reached the doorknob, he hesitated hoping she would ask him to stay.

“please stay,” she responded. “i don’t want to be alone tonight.”

jaemin turned around and nodded. she got into bed and lifted the sheets up, allowing him access, and he crawled into bed next to her but was careful not to pull her into his arms, despite how badly he wanted to. instead, he turned so his back was facing her. guilt filled both of their chests as they lay there next to each other. she scooted closer to him, loosely wrapping an arm around him and spooning him.

“goodnight, jaemin.”

“goodnight.”

jaemin didn't sleep, instead opting for laying in her bed and trying to rationalize everything that happened. the entire situation etched itself in his mind as a blur; he couldn't quite remember what happened but when he closed his eyes he could see the way she looked underneath him, and feel her lips pressed against his. he wanted to do it again, and again, and again, and for the rest of his life. he opened his eyes again, letting out a deep sigh. y/n stirred in her sleep, disturbed by the sigh he let out. "jaemin?" she said, still half asleep.

"i'm still here," he responded.

she didn't respond, and he waited a few minutes before saying anything. "y/n?" he whispered. she didn't respond, and jaemin let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. he memorized the feeling of her arm wrapped around his body, her forehead pressed against his back, and the sound of her breathing as she slept. at one point, he placed his hand atop hers and fit his fingers between hers to see what it felt like to hold her hand behind closed doors. he tried to sleep but couldn't, and lay awake in her bed for hours as she slipped deeper and deeper asleep.

he was careful not to wake her, gently peeling her arm off his body and placing it near her. he slipped out of bed and felt his stomach churn at the thought of leaving her alone, but he knew he couldn't stay any longer.

y/n woke up to the sound of her phone buzzing, text messages coming in rapidly. she didn't know what time she fell asleep, or what time jaemin left, but in the same spot where his body once lay was his red hoodie folded neatly.

#nct #na jaemin #nct smut #nct social media au #nct dream #nct fluff #nct reactions #kpop #kpop social media au #nct angst #nct jaemin #nct jeno #nct haechan #nct jisung #nct renjun #nct chensung #itzy ryujin #itzy yeji #la la love

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discoscoob · 4 years

Note

Can you write Manmeet meet and fall with college student from America who is studying abroad?

Man Meets Woman

Pairing: Manmeet/Reader

Summary: Manmeet meets you, a college student from America, who has come to India to study abroad.

While dragging a large suitcase behind you and with a heavy rucksack weighing you down, you carefully manoeuvred your way through the crowded airport. Even through the thin and loose material of your clothing you could feel your self beginning to overheat from the climate you weren’t yet used to and the body heat of those around you.

Your eyes searched around through the shades of your sunglasses in search of the familiar face of your best friend, Ana, who you had met in elementary school. She and her family were originally from here in India but they lived in America for a few years when her father had to move there for work, halfway through middle school her family moved back to India but you had never lost touch with one another. It was when you were in high school that you decided that you would study your degree in India so you could reunite with your best friend, your parents had supported your decision and finally here you were, making your dream a reality.

A call of your name caught your attention and you whipped your head around to find Ana jumping up and down with a huge smile on her face, waving her arms above her head to make sure she stood out clearly for you to see.

A smile immediately broke out on your face and you let out a sigh of relief as you awkwardly tried to push your way past the other travellers, while trailing your oversized suitcase behind you.

You were too busy trying to keep your eyes on Ana that when you were turning your suitcase around you hadn’t realised it had caught on someone’s foot until you heard them let out a shout of pain and you immediately stopped to apologise to them.

When you turned your head you saw the person was an attractive young man, almost involuntarily your hand moved to perch your sunglasses on the top of your head to get a better look at him.

His hair was neatly styled so it was pushed back and he wore a dark blue striped shirt which was tucked into his light blue jeans held up by a brown leather belt.

The both of you stayed like that for a moment, just taking in each other’s appearances, you had noticed that the man’s mouth was moving as if he was attempting to form a word but nothing was coming out as his deep brown eyes danced over your features, you couldn’t help the blush that rose to your already heated cheeks.

“I’m- It’s okay,” the man finally breathed out in response to your apology, you decided his accent made him even more attractive, he offered you a sweet smile and you internally scolded yourself for crushing on someone already, barely having just stepped foot on the continent less than 30 minutes ago, you subtly shook your head after you returned a polite smile. You reluctantly tore your eyes away from him to check Ana was still where you last saw her, only to find her staring back at you with a knowing smirk, you were sure the drive back to her apartment would be filled with a whole lot of teasing over your interaction with the handsome stranger at the airport.

•

“Todd, I am in love.” Manmeet sighed happily as his eyes stared towards nothing in particular, holding a longing gaze as the memory of you flashed back in his mind.

“Again?” Todd distractedly responded, through the pen which he held between his teeth as he looked through some paperwork with furrowed brows.

“No,” Manmeet’s dreamy smile quickly dropped as his head turned in Todd’s direction. “I’m actually in love this time.”

“Isn’t that what you said the last time?” Todd took a moment to look away from his paper work to give Manmeet an unconvinced glance with squinted eyes, having removed the pen from his mouth.

Manmeet’s eyes awkwardly shifted as he thought about Todd’s words, but this time really was different, he was sure of it, he had barely spoke two words to you and he already felt so drawn towards you, it was like nothing he had ever felt before.

“I hope you marketed some add-ons to her while you were falling in love.” Todd added with a slight shake of his head, still not convinced of Manmeet’s feelings.

“She wasn’t a customer,” he corrected Todd, as he pulled his eyebrows together in slight offence at the fact that Todd believes the only people he can fall in love with are the customers, “I met her here, in Mumbai, at the airport.”

“What were you doing at the airport?” Todd’s curiosity spiked, giving Manmeet a puzzled look as he dropped the paperwork onto the desk which his friend was perched on so he could focus better on the conversation.

“Meeting the love of my life.” Manmeet’s gaze drifted off again as he spoke through a soft smile and Todd sighed returning his attention to the paperwork, “I was saying goodbye to my sister, she’s going to study abroad.” Manmeet truthfully answered after he was pulled out of his reverie.

“Hold on,” Todd shook his head, trying to figure out what happened, “did you even speak to this girl?”

Manmeet’s eyes filled with a loving stare again as he relived your encounter while reciting what happened to his boss with a dreamy narration. When he focused his attention back onto Todd, expecting him to finally understand why this time was different, he was disappointed to find him staring back at him with an unreadable expression, he nervously raised an eyebrow to prompt Todd’s response.

“You barely spoke two words to her and don’t even know her name and you’ve decided you’re in love? Okay Prince Charming.” Todd shook his head with a disbelieving laugh.

Manmeet’s eyes fell to focus on the floor, dejected at his friends lack of understanding, but if anything it only made him more determined to prove to him that he was confident in his feelings, all he had to do was find you again.

But he soon perked up when he realised what Todd had just called him.

“You think I’m charming?” He smiled, believing it was a compliment.

Todd sighed with a shake of his head, picking up his paperwork and coffee mug before returning back to his desk at the front of the office.

•

You had been living in Mumbai with Ana for a week now and you were loving it, college wouldn’t start for another week yet and you were taking your time to settle in and get familiar with the city you would call home for the next few years.

You were walking through the market, your arm linked with Ana’s as you leisurely scrolled past the different stalls, browsing at what they all had to offer. You couldn’t help but giggle as you passed one stall, which sold fresh coconuts, you watched in amusement as a poor man with his phone gripped between his elbow and ear taking a phone called, got his arms filled with a large pile of coconuts he could barely managed to keep balanced.

The man had noticed your staring and had gave you a sarcastic smile and nod as if to say ‘yeah glad you find my struggles amusing’ when a familiar man ran up to him and tapped him on the shoulder, causing him to startle and drop the majority of the coconuts except the one he held in his hand.

You would have snorted into a fit of giggles had your attention not been stolen by the man who was now looking sheepishly between the man on the phone and the broken pile of coconuts on the floor.

“Isn’t that the guy from the airport?” Ana wondered aloud and you simply nodded, with your eyes still trained on him, endeared by the way he innocently smiled to the other man and held his hands up with his palms facing forward, his lips were moving as he was clearly trying to talk his way out of paying for the damaged goods when his eyes caught yours and his face immediately fell still. His jaw hung slightly slack as he gently waved one of the hands he held up in defence at you.

You found yourself raising your free hand to return the gesture when you felt Ana give you a shove, which caused you to lose your balance and stumble forward some, you looked back at her with a ‘what the fuck are you doing?’ expression. She simply gave you an encouraging nod towards the man who was now whispering in the coconut man’s ear with a triumphant smile as he nodded towards you.

You slowly approached the pair, with a fluttering stomach, you apprehensively glanced back at your best friend who was curiously looking right back at you as she pretended to look through a rail of sari’s, which she clearly had no interest in.

“Hello again.” You clutched your hands together in front of you and bounced once on the balls of your feet, while the young man smiled at you almost as if he was in a trance, you hadn’t noticed coconut man was still stood beside you both, his head moving to look at each of you as if he was watching a tennis match, eventually after his friend failed to return your greeting he gently shoved his arm to prompt him to say something.

“H- Hello,” he stuttered through a wide smile and you couldn’t help giggle at how awkwardly sweet he seemed, “I’m Manmeet,” he introduced himself before he turned his head to his friend, “that’s Todd.”

“Hi.” Todd spoke and you realised he was American too, you quickly acknowledged his hello before you returned your attention to Manmeet.

“I’m (y/n),” you nodded over your shoulder in the general direction of your friend who no doubt was still making no effort to be subtle as she observed your interaction, “that’s my friend Ana.”

Manmeet cheekily waved at your friend and you turned your head just in time to catch her gasp and duck to hide behind the rail of sari’s as if she was trying not to be caught staring.

“She’s shy,” you covered for her peculiar behaviour, after that an awkward silence fell upon the three of you, while you nervously played with your hands in front of you, Manmeet’s eyes wandered around as if he was conjuring up something to say before he grabbed Todd by his tie to turn them both around so their backs faced you.

You glanced around to Ana, unsure of what was going on but she just offered you a shrug.

“You’ve got to help me out, man.” Manmeet whispered to Todd.

“First of all, don’t turn your back on her in the middle of a conversation, it might come across as rude.” Todd offered as he straightened his tie.

“I got it!” Manmeet shouted, as he span on his heel back around to you he theatrically brushed his hands together with a forced face of disgust, “nasty mosquito was on Todd’s tie.” He explained.

“My birthday is tomorrow night, I’m throwing a party at my place, why don’t you come along as Manmeet’s plus one?” Todd interjected, causing both you and Manmeet to smile in relief, saving you both from the trouble of finding the courage to invite the other out on a date.

“I’d love to!” You answered Todd, though your eyes didn’t leave Manmeet’s as you watched them light up at your response.

“Here...” Manmeet quickly pulled out his phone, “take my number and I will text you the details.” he opened up his contacts onto his number and handed you his phone for you to copy it into your own, as you were distracted by that task he gave Todd a prideful smile.

Manmeet’s phone pinged as you sent him a simple text saying hi before you handed it back to him, your fingers lightly brushing each other’s as you transferred the device.

Manmeet saved your number to his phone with a heart emoji beside your name, just as you had with his.

“I’ll see you tomorrow night.” You confirmed as you began to slink away back over to Ana. You probably should’ve been looking where you were going, especially in such a crowded market but you couldn’t take your eyes off him.

Suddenly Manmeet let out a gasp and sprinted toward you to grab for your wrist and pull you back towards him as you stumbled into his chest you felt the breeze of a moped whip past you and you realised Manmeet just saved you from being hit by it, causing you to blush in embarrassment at having a blunder right in front of him.

Taking advantage of your close proximity you decided to plant a quick kiss on his cheek as a token of appreciation for the fact he just saved you from being hit by a small motorcycle before you returned to Ana, this time being more vigilant of your surroundings.

Manmeet stood frozen, his mouth set in the shape of an ‘o’ as he watched you skip away, he slowly brought the tip of his fingers up to his cheek to trace over where your lips had touched.

“I saved her...” He spoke when he saw Todd stop beside him in the corner of his eye, still watching you as you made your way further through the market with you friend, once you were out of sight he turned to Todd, beaming up at him with a cheesy grin. “Just like Prince Charming.”

Todd rolled his eyes, but he couldn’t hide the smile on his face, happy for his friend. As he turned to make his way back to the office, the coconut stall keeper stepped in front of him with his arms crossed over his chest, still waiting for his payment with a hard expression. Todd glances behind himself, looking for Manmeet, but he had vanished, leaving him to pay for the coconuts he damaged.

•

Before you stepped foot into the party, you used the reflection of the window to check your appearance, rearranging strands of your hair and straightening out your dress, a white floral print which hung off your shoulders and flowed out to stop just above your knee.

Once you were sure everything was in order you entered the building to find the party was being held in the shared communal unal area, it was already pretty busy, with people dancing and talking amongst themselves, the bustling sound of incoherent chatter could be heard over the loud Indian music. You nervous played with the strap of your bag as your eyes searched around for Manmeet.

First you noticed Todd so you made your way over to his direction to see if he could tell you where your date was, only before you managed to reach him someone tipped toed up behind you and tapped you on your right shoulder, when you turned around no one was there and you were about to do a full 360° turn when from your left you heard Manmeet say your name and you couldn’t control the way you jumped in surprise, your palm came to rest on your chest to calm your racing heart as you gave him a faux unamused glare as he burst into a fit of giggles.

“You look breathtaking.” he gushed once he had calmed his laughter and you smiled at the compliment as you took in his appearance, he was wearing a pair of polished black shoes, with some dark jeans paired with a crisp sky blue shirt which was neatly tucked into his jeans, the last few buttons left unfastened to reveal just the top of his chest which you noticed had some fine hair growing there, as if he had just removed it and was now letting it grow back.

“You look very handsome yourself.” You returned the compliment to which he smiled with a bite of his lip and your heart practically skipped a beat at how adorable he was.

“Would you like a drink?” He politely offered to which you enthusiastically nodded, you could use one to take the edge off, calm your nerves and get you into a more relaxed state.

Manmeet reached out his hand, which you gladly took in your own and you allowed him to guide you through the bodies of the other party goers to a table in the far corner of the room which was littered with such a variety of alcoholic beverages you could hardly see the table cloth, in the very middle there was a punch bowl containing a red liquid containing chopped up pieces of fruit, reaching for an empty plastic cup you used the ladle to pour yourself a glass of the fruity punch and Manmeet followed your direction as you took a few gulps of yours, you weren’t expecting it to be as strong as it was and you had to slap your tongue against the roof of your mouth a couple times to school your expression.

After a few cups of the punch you were feeling more relaxed and you and Manmeet had found a quiet corner where you could both talk without any interruptions, you were sat facing each other on a windowsill, you both absentmindedly swayed your feet together so they occasionally brushed while you looked out the window at the night sky.

“So what brought you to India, are you on vacation?” Manmeet questioned you as he took another sip from his cup, if you had to guess you would say that he looked almost nervous for your answer, as if he was ready to hear you tell him you were leaving in a few days.

“I’m here for college, I decided ever since high school I wanted to study here.” You told him. “What about you, what do you do?”

Manmeet took another gulp of his punch before answering you, in all honesty he was relieved to hear that you would be staying here long term but then you asked him what he does and he began to feel inferior considering he never studied at college and he works in a call centre selling American novelties, he felt as though he had to impress you and that is why, after almost downing his whole cup, he answered, “I’m the manager of a call centre.” It was just a little white lie and after all Rajiv was on his honeymoon so technically the position for manager was open for two weeks, maybe tomorrow he could ask Todd if he would let him step into Rajiv’s role while he was gone.

“What’s your call centre for?” You asked out of curiosity.

“We sell American... American goods.” He nodded to you before he gasped when the song changed and pushed himself off the windowsill, he put down his empty cup in the place where he once was sat and reached out his hand to you, “dance with me?” He suggested and you couldn’t say no his big brown eyes so you placed your hand in his and allowed him to pull you to your feet, once again you stumbled into him like you did at the market, a combination of standing up too quickly and the alcohol mixed together made you a bit unsteady and your noses brushed as you placed your palms on his chest to balance yourself and he caught you around your waist.

Even after you had regained your balance neither of you made an effort to remove yourselves from each other’s personal space, your faces so close the tips of your noses still brushed as you looked into each other’s eyes.

Boldly you decided to lean forward, your jaw just slack enough so your mouth fell slightly open and you brushed your lips with his, not quite kissing but you liked how soft his lips felt and you wanted to allow yourself to completely dive into them but you didn’t have to wait as Manmeet quickly got the messaged as he further secured his arm around your waist to pull you impossibly closer and he caught your lips with his own and you were right, his lips did feel amazing against your own, you couldn’t help but let your tongue chase after the sweet strawberry taste left on them from the punch.

You felt his hand tangle it’s way into your hair as your own hands stroked up from his chest to wrap around the back of his neck and you pulled him closer to deepen the kiss even more.

“We missed your song.” You frowned breathing heavily when the two of you finally pulled away, even though you weren’t the slightest bit sorry.

“That was much better than a dance.” Manmeet assured you and you both smiled before falling into another kiss.

“We should have lunch together tomorrow!” You suggested to Manmeet, you still both had your arms around each other and that was pretty much how you had stayed for the rest of the night after your kiss, now you were both stood outside Todd’s place waiting for a taxi to share home.

“I could stop by your office!” You beamed at the idea.

When he hesitated to respond you looked down to your feet, feeling deflated.

“Unless you don’t want me to.” You quietly offered him the opportunity to decline.

“No,” he quickly shock his head, “I want you to, I can’t wait to have lunch with you tomorrow.” Manmeet smiled even though inside he was panicking, he had to somehow not expose himself as a liar when you showed up to his office tomorrow.

•

“Good morning, Rajiv.” Todd distractedly greeted Manmeet, who was sat at Rajiv’s desk, as he made his way into the office with his head down, carrying a coffee flask, before he paused, remembering Rajiv was on his honeymoon and looked up to see who was sat at his desk.

“Manmeet?” He did a double take, “why are you sat at Rajiv’s desk?” Then he realised he was dressed in a grey suit, with a white shirt and black tie, he had never seen Manmeet show up to work looking so professional before, “And why are you dressed so smart?”

“Todd, could I speak with you for a moment?” Manmeet politely smiled as he stood from the desk and straightened his tie as he walked towards the break room, expecting Todd to follow him.

“What’s up?” The American asked as soon as they were stood by the coffee machine.

Manmeet’s eyes glanced around, making sure no one was in earshot before he leaned over to Todd and spoke in a hushed tone.

“I told y/n I was the manager of the call centre and she is coming here today to meet me for lunch.”

“Manmeet,” Todd started with a sigh, “I can’t just let you pretend to be manager, I need you on the phones you’re one of my best sellers.” Manmeet’s face lit up at the compliment.

“I’ll still work on the phones, just let me do it from Rajiv’s desk?” He pouted at his boss, giving him his best puppy eyes, which were actually really affective considering how big and round they were.

Todd gave into them and nodded, while pinching his eyebrows with his forefinger and thumb, in all honesty he was still suffering from a bit of a hangover.

“Thanks, man!” Manmeet clapped his hand against Todd’s bicep, with a big smile, as he began to move around him to make his way back to Rajiv’s desk, while Todd shook his head, deciding that once the rest of his hangover had worn off he would need to speak to Manmeet about coming clean to y/n before his lie got out of hand.

•

Todd was slouched on his chair, which was turned to face Manmeet, who was currently taking a call, he was doing an amazing job at marketing the add-ons, managing to sell something extra to almost every caller, with the use of his charm and charisma, but Todd’s staring was really starting to put him off and as he took the customers card details he kept taking fleeting glances towards his boss, who took no shame in being caught observing him. Once Manmeet ended the call he pulled his headset from his ears and rested it on his neck as he swivelled his chair to face Todd.

“What?”

“Why did you lie to y/n about being manager?” Todd leaned forward, resting his elbows on top of his knees, he made sure his sincerity was clear, that he wasn’t judging him, he was just concerned as to why he felt he couldn’t tell the truth.

Manmeet shrunk in on himself and shrugged, swivelling his chair back around to pay attention to his computer screen, which was just open on the desktop page at the moment.

“Manmeet.” Todd pressed him.

“She told me she was here for college and I panicked because I never went to college and I sell crappy American novelties for a living.” He shamefully hung his head.

“Hey don’t insult our products,” Todd warned and Manmeet glanced over to the executive manager in regret, looking genuinely apologetic for speaking ill of the companies goods. “But seriously if she really likes you none of that should matter.”

Manmeet scoffed as if he wasn’t convinced, so Todd tried it from a different angle.

“If it were the other way around would you judge her for her job?”

“Of course not!” Manmeet answered as if that should be obvious.

“And you can’t lie to her forever, Rajiv will be back in less than two weeks now.”

Manmeet had to admit that Todd was right, he couldn’t keep lying to y/n it wasn’t right and if she really liked him it shouldn’t matter, she wasn’t picking him out from a set of applications looking for the one with the best career and education, she liked him for who he was as a person, at least he hoped.

“I’ll tell her when we go for lunch.” Manmeet decided.

“Tell me what?”

He startled, flailing in his chair when he heard your voice from behind him, you didn’t sound accusing just curious, Manmeet offered you an innocent smile when he saw you and you returned it.

“How did you get in here?” He avoided your question, as he leaned his elbows on his desk.

“Gupta let me in.” You smiled towards the kind man who was now sat back at his desk and gave you and Manmeet a wiggly finger wave when he saw you were both looking in his direction. While you weren’t looking, Manmeet squinted his eyes at Gupta for almost exposing him before he got the chance to explain the truth to you himself.

“So what is it you wanted to tell me?” You questioned again when your turned back to Manmeet and from the way he looked almost... guilty? You began to feel nervous, but you tried to not let it show, keeping a neutral expression.

Manmeet left his desk to move over to you, greeting you with a kiss to your cheek he slid his hand into yours, the entire time the way his eyebrows were knitted together and never relaxed and you took a deep breath to settle to doubts.

“I’ll tell you over lunch.” He offered and you nodded with a soft smile as you walked hand in hand out the office.

•

Once you were both sat at a table at one of the market stalls that sold meals you could barely contain your nerves anymore and after a deep breath you just decided the best thing to do would be to just rip it off like a bandaid.

“Look I understand,” you started and you missed the way Manmeet’s eyes widened anxiously, wondering what you were starting to say, “if you’re going to tell me you don’t want a relationship, but can we skip over all the pleasantries and just get straight to it because I think I’d find that approach easier.” You nervously babbled and Manmeet’s eyes only grew wider as you made it through your speech.

“No, no, no,” he quickly shook his head, reaching out for your hand across the table to get you to finally lift your head and look up at him, “that’s not what I have to tell you,” he quickly settled your worries and your shoulders sagged in relief as you flushed slightly and took one of your hands out of his and used it to cover your face, feeling silly for your outburst.

“I- I lied to you about my job.” Manmeet quickly confessed.

“Huh?” You lowered your hand, to show him your confusion, “I don’t understand? I just saw you at work.”

“I made Todd let me sit at the managers desk because he is on his honeymoon, I put on this suit and I never wear a suit to work, I just work the phones and sell American novelties.” He kept his eyes trained on your interlocked hands, “I’m sorry I lied, I just didn’t want to disappoint you.” He added quietly and your chest tightened in response to how insecure he looked, almost as if he was expecting you to get up and leave.

You reached over the small table to rest your palm on his cheek to encourage him to lift his head and look at you, he did so reluctantly, you couldn’t bare to look at the frown on his face so you leaned over the table and slid your hand around to the back of his neck to gently pull him forward so you met in the middle and you could kiss his frown away, hoping this reassured him enough that you weren’t disappointed, that his job didn’t matter because you liked him for him, though you did plan to also tell him all that verbally as soon as you pulled away from the kiss.

Once you pulled away you were pleased to see that his face had settled into a one of bliss, his eyes were still closed and his full lips formed an ‘o’, when he fluttered his eyelashes open his mouth began to form a cheeky grin.

“I should lie to you more often if it gets me kisses like that.” He joked, in a dreamy voice.

“Hey,” you pointed at him, giving him a stern look. “That’s not how it works!”

“If you say so.” He smirked, feigning a smug demeanour, which broke as soon as you lightly swatted his arm when neither of you could contain your giggles.

“So... American novelties?” You teased and Manmeet dropped his face into his palm with an exaggerated groan.

#sacha dhawan #outsourced #manmeet #manmeet x reader #reader insert

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angelic-holland · 5 years

Text

Harry Dean // fratboy!th x reader college au

Summary: You’re tutoring Tom and he invites you to watch his band perform. You reluctantly agree. Interested to see where this goes.

warnings: nsfw, smut

You’re halfway through the calculus homework when Tom groans, laying his head down on your kitchen table.

“What?” You sigh, rolling your eyes.

“Don’t wanna do this anymore,” he groans.

“You have like three problems left, come on, I don’t wanna be here either, I have other work I could be doing.”

“Well, damn Y/N if you don’t wanna be here you can go.”

“No I can’t, first off this is my apartment, and I’m getting paid to tutor you and students like you so let’s move this along.”

He lifts his head back up, resting his chin against his hand and looking at you with puppy dog eyes.

“What do you mean students like me? Stupid students?”

“You’re not stupid, you just don’t apply yourself.”

“That’s what smart people say about stupid people.”

“Well if you think you’re stupid there’s no changing that but I think if you just put a little more effort into your school work instead of other things then-,”

He cuts you off, his foot reaching out to tap yours, “what other things sweetheart?”

“You know what other things, partying, your frat, literally anything but schoolwork.”

“Yeah but college is when you’re supposed to have fun, you gotta relax every once in a while.”

You push his foot away from yours and stand up, “you can have fun but college is literally where you’re supposed to get a degree. Your parents send you here to get a degree in beer pong?”

You move to grab a glass from your cabinet and hear him stand up, the chair scraping against the ground.

“No, they sent me here to get a degree in business so I can eventually take over their company, the beer pong degree is just for fun.”

He’s right behind you now and you don’t dare turn, knowing he’ll be right there.

“Well you need to pass calculus and that’s what I’m here to help you with.”

“You know sweetheart, it’s Friday, what are your plans for the night?”

“Was just gonna, finish-,” you falter as his hands rest on either side of you against the counter, boxing you in.

“What was that?”

“Finish my homework, maybe put together my study guide for the calc exam.”

“That’s in two and a half weeks, why the hurry?”

“I, I don’t know,” you can feel his breath on your neck and you shake your head, clearing any dirty thoughts from your mind, moving his hand and side stepping out of his way, opening your fridge.

“My band’s got a gig tonight, you should come,” he says, sauntering over to you. You fill your cup with water, sitting back down at the table.

“I don’t know, that’s not really my thing,” you shrug as he sits back down.

“Come on sweetheart, gotta have some fun, why don’t you think about it? Not until 10 anyways.”

“Fine,” you say, hoping your response will shut him up so you can finish the homework you had planned to do.

****

“So it’s at Radio Bean, just tell ‘em you’re with me and they’ll wave the entrance fee, I’ll put you down as my plus one.”

“Tom, I don’t even know if I’ll go, I said I’d think about it.”

“Come on sweetheart, you’re always so fuckin uptight, let’s cut loose, just this once, just tonight, for me,” he says, his eyes pleading with you.

You didn’t understand what his deal was, he was flirty with you since you started tutoring him, but he never made an actual move until now, if you could call it that.

“Fine but if you’re music sucks I’m leaving.”

“Oh sweetheart, don’t you worry,” he says with a shit-eating grin before leaving you in your kitchen.

You decide to take a shower to cool down, you weren’t going to lie his words did things to you, the way he called you sweetheart today had you practically dripping. He always gave you little nicknames but today you were already on edge, horny and you haven’t had sex in months.

You end up coming on your fingers with a small moan of his name while the water washes over you. You blush at the thought of him seeing you like this and quickly shake the idea from your head, shaving your legs and washing your hair.

You had set out a few different outfits on your bed and you groaned, you wanted to look hot, you didn’t know if anything would actually happen tonight but you wanted to be prepared if it did.

You had one dress, it was a blue floral wrap dress that went down to your ankles and you shook your head, that wouldn’t work. You had a short black leather skater skirt that your sister bought you and you’ve literally never worn, you paired it with a dark red bralette that matched a lipstick shade you had from ages ago. You set about getting your hair dry and doing your makeup before slipping into the outfit and damn if you didn’t look good. You usually wore jeans and a tshirt so this was way out of your comfort zone, you just hoped it paid off.

You finished up your homework and got started on that study guide despite Tom making fun of you for it. It was better to be ahead of the game and besides, your scholarship depended on you getting good grades.

By the time you had finished it was around 9:30 which gave you enough time to walk to Radio Bean, you’ve been there before on dates, it was a coffee shop during the day, bar and music venue at night. You’d never actually heard of Tom’s band before, you looked it up from his Facebook, it was called “H.D.” and they mostly did covers of rock songs, lots of Led Zeppelin which you knew was Tom’s favorite band. He was the guitarist, sometimes sang, sometimes didn’t, but he always had fun on stage.

When you got there there was a small line to get in and you gave the person at the door your name, they checked the list, each person in the band had a certain number of free spots and they let you in. You looked around, wondering if anyone you knew was there. You couldn’t find anyone but it made sense, your friends were in the math club and the education majors, their parties consisted of cards against humanity and mikes hard lemonade in a dorm room. You got a soda, you wanted to be sober for his set.

You were relaxing at a stool near the back of the bar, the stage and the band’s equipment set up and waiting for them. You checked your phone, 9:55, they should be out any minute.

When the room erupted in cheers you looked up and saw Tom and his band mates walk on stage, he was wearing a black leather jacket, similar to the one you wore tonight and a tight white T-shirt, loose fitting black jeans adorning his legs. And honestly, he looked fucking great.

You stood up from your stool, moving with the crowd towards the stage, you didn’t get too close, watching Tom’s eyes scan the crowd.

“How’s everyone doing tonight?” The main singer asked and the crowd cheered. You didn’t notice Tom had found you until the lead singer elbowed him, “Alright mate, I said you ready to go?”

Tom’s eyes were boring into your own, or more accurately staring at your chest, you had taken off your leather jacket and slung it over an arm, your bralette on full display.

He laughed at his friend, taking off his own jacket and picking up his guitar, “let’s do this.”

His eyes never wavered from yours as they started their first song, the familiar tune of “Thank You” by Led Zeppelin starting out on Tom’s guitar. It was a slower, more down to earth song and you swayed to the music. Closing your eyes and letting yourself get lost. They went straight into their next song, a cover of Green Day’s “American Idiot” and the crowd lost it, everyone was jumping up and down and you followed along, watching Tom watch you.

The next song was a bit slower and you moved your hips to the music, letting yourself get lost in the sound of the lead singer’s voice and Tom’s guitar. It wasn’t until you felt someone’s hands on your hips and body pressed against yours that threw you off your rhythm.

You quickly moved forward as much as the tight crowd would allow you, turning towards the source of the hands. A guy, probably a college student, grinning creepily at you, probably drunk, moved to pull you towards him again when you side stepped around him.

“Dude fuck off I don’t wanna dance with you,” you say, rolling your eyes at the sleazeball.

“Fuck you,” he grumbles, pushing through the crowd. You hear the guitar falter and pause before quickly picking back up again. You turn to face the band and see Tom’s trying his best to hide a scowl, it’s the same scowl he gets when you tell him one of his answers is wrong and he needs to work on the question again. You smile up at him, unsure if that interaction was the reason behind his frown but wanted to reassure him you’re fine.

They play some more songs, Tom’s voice surprising you in a few of them where he sang. An hour or so later they thanked Radio Bean for giving them the space and introduced the next band, another college group. You watched as Tom and his bandmates slipped out to a side room and you wandered back over to the bar, settling yourself on a stool.

“Y/N, are you okay? I tried to tell security about that guy in the crowd but they said they couldn’t find him, the description I gave was shit but-,” Tom said as he stood next to you.

“I’m fine, told the guy to fuck off, it’s whatever.”

“You sure?” He asks, his eyes searching yours for any sign of discomfort or anger over the situation.

“It’s nice of you to worry but I can handle myself.”

“I don’t doubt that Y/N.”

“Good,” he says, holding his hand out. You hesitantly take it, letting him move you through the crowd.

“Didn’t know you had all that under those dorky shirts of yours,” he said, pulling you down a dark corridor.

“Oh yeah? Did you often think about what was under my shirts?” You joked but he bit his lip, blatantly staring at your tits and the way they bounced as you moved along the hallway.

“Only every day of my life sweetheart,” he says coming to a stop at a door.

“Where are we?”

“Performers only lounge, wanna join me?”

“Sure,” you say as he pushes the door open. It was a small space with a leather couch, a table, some chairs and a mini fridge.

“You know, when I saw you tonight, I nearly lost my mind, kept getting distracted.”

“I noticed,” you said as he leaned against the table.

“Subtlety isn’t my strong suit,” he shrugs, pulling you by the waist into him.

“Really? Cause that’s the vibe you’ve been giving off for the past few months.”

“I just, well you’re my tutor, and you’re a nerd, no offense, I didn’t wanna come off too strong and scare you off,” he says, his hands running up and down your sides.

“And what about now?”

“What about it?” He asks, his lips dangerously close to yours.

You couldn’t stand it, crashing your lips against his, your arms wrapping around his neck. You let him pull you flush against him, your hips slotted with his own. You felt his cock hard against you beneath his pants, they were so tight they left almost nothing to the imagination. One hand rested on your hip, the other hesitantly moved to your ass over your skirt. You grinded down against him, feeling your pussy soak through your panties.

“Fuck sweetheart,” he moans as you trail kisses down his neck sucking on a few points, causing him to slap your ass, “if I’d known you’d look like this I’d have invited you to a show ages ago.”

“Felt like bein’ a rebel,” you whisper in his ear and he groans.

“Can I touch you?”

“You already are?” You say, pulling off his neck and looking at him. Tom was red in the face, his hands playing with the edge of your skirt.

“Wanna touch all of you sweetheart.”

“Fuck, does this door lock?” You ask and he nods as you move to lock it, he’s behind you again, pushing you against the now locked door.

His hand grips your ass, the other moving between you and the door to play with your tits. You’re practically dripping as you grind your ass back against his hand.

“You want something sweetheart?”

“Touch me, Tom, please,” you whine, feeling blush creep up your cheeks.

You can practically hear his smirk as his hand tugs down your skirt and spins you around. You kick off the skirt and he kisses you as you try to pull off his jeans. He helps before pulling away to tug off his shirt.

“Fuck sweetheart you look so good like this, could just tug your panties to the side and fuck you right here.”

“Why don’t you?”

He groans, his hands pulling down his underwear and tugging at his cock a few times as you pulled the bralette over your head.

He leans down and grabs his wallet pulling out a condom and tossing the wallet back to the side.

“Look at you, all prepared,” you say, your hand reaching out hesitantly for his cock.

“Go ahead sweetheart,” he says opening the condom and handing it to you.

You roll it onto his cock and jerk it a few times. It looked how you imagined it, long, a little thick, perfect.

His hands had wandered to your tits, fingers pinching your nipples, hard from the cold air and how horny you were.

“You gonna fuck me now or?” You ask and he grins, pushing your hand off him, gripping the backs of your thighs.

“Jump,” he whispers in your ear and you do, wrapping your legs around his waist and arms around his neck. The feeling of his cock against your panty covered cunt making you whimper as he pushes you back against the door, one hand supporting you under your thigh, the other tugging your panties to the side.

“Fuck sweetheart, you’re dripping, this all for me?”

You nod as his thumb swipes through some of your juices, “been, fuck been thinking about you all night Tom.”

“What a coincidence, I’ve been thinking about having your pretty thighs wrapped around me all night,” he says, his thumb now in front of your lips. You suck it down like you would his cock, groaning around it as you taste yourself.

“Fuck sweetheart you look so good like that, wonder if that’s how you’d like sucking my cock.”

You moan around his thumb as he pushes into you, letting you get adjusted to his cock for a moment before fucking into you.

He pulls his thumb out of your mouth, his eyes watching your tits as you bounce on his cock, his fingers digging into your thigh.

“Fuck, Tom, feels so good,” you moan, crying out as he hits your sweet spot.

“Shhh, sweetheart, don’t want anyone to hear us, don’t want to get caught and have to stop do you?”

“No, Tom, don’t wanna stop, fuck,” you groan, your head leaning against the door, your hands gripping his shoulders.

“Feel so good around me sweetheart, love how wet you are already.”

“Oh fuck!” You cry out as his thumb rubs your clit.

“Shhh, what did I say about being quiet sweetheart?” He grins, his fingers resting on your lips, “I can keep you quiet don’t worry.”

You took the not so subtle hint and opened your mouth, letting Tom push three fingers into it. You put your focus on sucking them like you would a cock, tongue swirling around what you could as he picked up his pace, pounding into you. His fingers fucked into your mouth at the same pace, spit dripping out of your mouth when he pushed a little too far, causing you to gag around them.

“Fuck you look so hot like this sweetheart, choking on my fingers while your cunt takes my cock so well,” he groans, as one of your hands move to your clit, rubbing circles around it.

“You wanna come? You’re so wet sweetheart, think you’re going to come soon? Come all over my cock?”

You moan around his fingers, making as much noise as you could. You felt yourself get closer as his cock nudged against your sweet spot over and over again, your thumb making quick work on your clit. His lips work down your chest, leaving marks as he moved down, his lips wrapping around your nipples, looking up at you as you gagged around his fingers, pussy clenching around his cock. His teeth grazed your nipple and tugged it, which was all you needed to get pushed over the edge, crying around his fingers as you come.

The feeling of you pulsing around him and the view of your spit dripping down your chin onto your tits was enough to make Tom come with a groan of your name against your neck.

“Fuck,” he mutters, pulling his fingers out of your mouth, you suck and lap at them, trying to clean your spit off before he trails his hand down your chest, rolling your nipple between his fingers.

“That was-,”

“Fucking fantastic,” Tom says as he pulls out of you and your legs drop to the floor, shaking slightly.

“Why didn’t you fuck me sooner?”

“Didn’t know you wanted me to fuck you sooner sweetheart.”

“Then I guess I’m the idiot.”

“Nah that’s still my title sweetheart don’t worry.”

“Tom? You in there?” Someone shouts, jiggling the door handle.

“Fuck,” he says as you two pull apart from each other and scramble to put clothes on.

When you’re both dressed he unlocks the door and his band mate barges in, the lead singer, you think his name was Harrison.

“Oh fuck, sorry was I interrupting something?” He says taking in the state of you two.

“Nah you’re good,” you say, kissing Tom’s cheek, “call me?”

You wink behind Harrison’s back and watch Tom fumble for words, Harrison making fun of the lipstick stains on his neck as you leave.

#tom holland #tom holland smut #tom holland one shot #tom holland imagine #tom holland blurb #first time writing smut #please send me suggestions on how to improve

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all-the-love-harold · 5 years

Text

Chapter 20 - Earth Side

Master post

Come and Talk about Harry and Poppy

November 3rd 2017 – 29 Weeks

Harry walked into his house, chucking his keys on the table beside the door and bounding upstairs to take a shower. It felt nice to finally peel his suit off after having it on all night, through an hour-long flight and in the hospital with Poppy. Once he had it off, and scattered across the bedroom floor, he climbed into the shower, without waiting for the water to heat up, and let it wash it over him dripping down his side as his mind flooded with fears. He knew that for now, Poppy and the baby were okay, but her labour could start again any minute and he couldn’t bring himself to leave her alone for that, but he also knew that thousands of people had bought tickets to his remaining shows and he didn’t want to disappoint them either. He shut the water off, not wanting to leave Poppy alone in that hospital for too long.

“Fuck” he whispered to himself, realising that he’d forgotten to take a towel from the linen cupboard in the hall. He shook his hair dry and walked out of the bathroom. “Oh god” he used his hands to cover himself as he ran into Poppy’s mum in the hallway “Hi Linda”

She grimaced at him “Hello Harry” she answered bluntly looking him up and down “Left your wife alone again I see”

His nostrils flared as he wrapped a towel around his waist “I needed a shower and some fresh clothes” he ran his fingers through his hair, in frustration “she’s fine by the way, and so’s the baby, but you’re obviously more concerned with me than you are with your daughter and your grandson”

Her jaw dropped, not expecting him to retaliate like this “Don’t turn this around on me, I’m not the one that left her for months”

“I was gone for 3 and a half weeks” he snarled “and a few days here and there not months, but at least I didn’t leave her last night when she was terrified about what was going to happen. I was there for that. Where were you?”

“She didn’t need me then, she needed you”

“And I was there”

“But you weren’t there when it started, you weren’t there when she got that email from your lawyer, you’re only there when it’s convenient for you”

“You think getting back here last night was convenient? It’s not easy to get a flight from Glasgow to London that late, I had to cut a show short, leave all my things in Scotland, inconvenience the entire crew and venue staff, it wasn’t a walk in the park, but I got there Linda, because she needed me”

“Maybe if you never left, you wouldn’t have disappointed so many people”

“Christ” he sighed “how was I supposed to know? Touring is my job, Poppy knows that, she knew that before she married me, she’s always known that, she isn’t upset that I wasn’t there when it started, all she cares about is that I’m here now- so why does it bother you so much?”

“Because she deserves someone that doesn’t have to leave her all the time!” Lind yelled “Her family lives halfway across the world, if you’re not here, and I’m not here, who does she have?”

Harry wanted to yell back, but he could tell this outburst from Poppy’s mum wasn’t coming from a place of malice or hatred, but fear for her daughter, so he calmed his tone and spoke back softly “She has a lot of people here Linda, my sister lives only a few blocks away, my mum a few hours but she’d get here as quickly as she could if Poppy needed her” he sighed “everyone at radio 1 would drop everything for her if they needed to, she’s never going to be alone, if she doesn’t have her family then she has her friends”

Linda nodded, too defeated to say anything else on the matter “How is she? Were they able to stop the labour”

“For now” he answered “but she’s on bed rest for the rest of the pregnancy, so they’re keeping her in there, I came home to shower and get her things, I’m going back soon- are you coming?”

“Of course, I am” she smiled “I’m sorry Harry, I shouldn’t have been so rude to you, I just want the best for her”

“So do I” he said, walking into the bedroom and closing the door behind him so that he could get dressed.

***

November 4th 2017, 29 Weeks.

Harry strolled down the street outside the hospital, on the phone to the manager of his PR team, trying to work out the best way to tell his fans that the rest of the tour will be cancelled because he can’t leave Poppy. It had taken him a long time to make the decision, it wasn’t something he took lightly, but neither were Poppy and the baby, and right now, that was his main priority.

“You think a tweet and an Instagram is too insincere?” He asked, walking into the nearest café to get Poppy a peppermint tea because the hospital didn’t have any.

“I don’t think so, they’re going to be upset obviously, but there’s nothing we can do, and you’re still doing Victoria’s secret and the ARIAs, so there will still be some chance for fan interaction at both of those events”

“Ok” he nodded “I’ll write out what I’m going to say and send it through, so you can check it over before I post it”

“Great, send Poppy our best, we’re thinking of you both”

“Thanks” Harry said hanging up the phone and stepping up to the counter to order “Hi, could I get a large peppermint tea and a black coffee please”

“Sure” the boy at the counter said, “Take away?”

“Please” Harry took his wallet out of his back pocket and paid for the drinks, stepping back from the counter so the person behind him could order.

“Harry?” a voice said from behind him and he reluctantly turned, not really in the mood for fans today

“Hi” he muttered softly

“Oh it is you, I wasn’t sure” she blushed “I thought you’d be around this area though, is Poppy ok?”

“Uhh” he sighed, not wanting to seem rude but annoyed by the invasive question “yeah, she’s doing alright”

“I got her some flowers” she handed him a bunch of yellow daffodils

“Ahhh” Harry said, happily surprised by the gesture “Thank you, she’ll love those”

“I hope you don’t think this is creepy” she added “I work in the hospital she’s in and I saw you running in the other night in your suit”

“Not at all love” he lied “I’m used to it”

She smiled “I’m glad Poppy’s doing ok, I’ve been listening to radio one a lot, hoping that someone would say something”

He nodded “We’re not really sure what’s going to happen, so we’re staying quiet for a while”

“The peppermint tea and the black coffee” the barista called, and Harry went over to the counter, taking the two cups and thanking him, the girl following him as he did so.

“Well I hope everything’s ok” she said “Give Poppy my best”

“Will do” he said walking out the door. He pulled his hood up and walked quickly back to the hospital, keeping his head down so he would be seen by fans or paps. It was very sweet of that girl to buy flowers for Poppy, and it certainly wasn’t something that he expected, but it left him feeling a little like his privacy had been invaded, and that was the one thing he hated most about being Harry Styles.

***

November 13th 2017, 30 Weeks.

Harry and Poppy’s lawyer had submitted a petition for Harry to take Poppy’s place at the court date on the grounds that she had been hospitalised, it was granted and now Harry found himself sitting in a courtroom, opposite Danny, waiting on the Judge to decide on the custody arrangements for their baby boy.

In the weeks since Danny had applied for parental responsibility, They’d both been visited by a law guardian, whose role was to speak on behalf of the baby, she inspected Poppy and Harry’s home, to see what they had done to prepare for Oli’s arrival and she’d done the same for Danny, asking them all extensive questions about parenting and caring for a newborn.

The case was unusual, most custody cases weren’t usually opened until the child was born, but in this case, where it was likely that the child would require medical decisions to be made for him from birth, the courts felt it necessary to have any parental responsibility disputes settled before the birth.

“All rise” the bailiff said from the corner of the room as he opened the door for the judge to walk in and take her seat. The knot in Harry’s stomach twisted as he stood, feeling the tension in the room rise he focused his eyes on the front of the room, avoiding eye contact with Danny.

“I understand we’re here today to settle a custody dispute for an unborn child, am I correct counsellors?”

“That is correct your honour, my client here, Mr Daniel Watts, is seeking custody of his son who he has been denied rights to thus far” Danny’s lawyer answered the judge

“Give me a moment to understand the facts of the case” the Judge said, filing through the papers in front of her “As I understand it, Mr watts has submitted to the courts, a Child Arrangements order where he has requested part time custody and parental responsibility for his child”

“Yes your honour” Danny’s lawyer said

“And Mrs Styles wishes to dispute this on the basis that Mr watts, in his current situation, is unfit to care for a newborn baby”

“My client, as the mother of the child, feels that Mr Watts will be unable to care for what may be a very sick little boy”

“And where is Mrs Styles today, Mr Tanner?”

“She has been hospitalised due complications with the pregnancy, her husband is here on her behalf, I’ve already had that cleared”

“Right, yes, I did see that somewhere” she looked at Harry over her glasses “At this stage in the pregnancy, is there any uncertainty as to who the father of the child actually is?”

“No, your honour” John replied “Both parties agree that, biologically, Mr Watts is the child’s father, but we’re not here to discuss biology”

She drew her lips into a sharp line “Clearly.” Her tone was blunt, and Harry could tell she was annoyed by the case “What are Mrs Styles objections to Mr Watts?”

“My client believes that Mr watts is unable to support the child financially, and has concerns about the effects that the instability that comes with unemployment, would have on her child”

“Your honour” Danny’s lawyer interrupted “perhaps if Mrs Styles is really concerned about instability, she would have thought twice about marrying a man that travels for a living”

“The case has nothing to do with Mr Styles, he is merely here on behalf of his wife” John said in retaliation “your honour, if you look at the home studies conducted on both my client and Mr Watts, you’ll see that Mr Watts is in no way prepared to look after a child”

“I have reviewed the home studies Mr Tanner, and in the interest of keeping this short, Mr Watts, I’d like to see you in my chambers please” She stood from her seat and turned towards the door behind her as the bailiff escorted Danny and his lawyer to her chambers.

Harry let out a deep breath as he turned to John “Is this good news?”

John shrugged shuffling through his papers “It’s hard to tell at this stage Harry” he sighed “I would hope that she’s reviewed Daniel’s home visit and wants to talk with him to see what he really wants from this because it’s pretty clear from that study that fatherhood is not for him”

“How long will this take?”

“Could be hours, could be any minute now, but we haven’t been given a recess, so we just have to wait here until they come back”

Harry looked at his watch, worried about leaving Poppy alone in the hospital for so long. He’d already been gone for hours and anything could have happened by now. With the rest of his tour cancelled, Linda had decided to go home, they were getting on each other’s nerves and with Harry home, Poppy didn’t need her there, but that meant today, she was alone again, and Harry couldn’t wait to go back, with good news.

“How’s Poppy doing?” John asked, bringing Harry out of his trance

“She’s ok, I think being stuck in that room is dampening her spirits a bit, but if I can go back with good news today that will help”

He nodded sympathetically “no more signs of labour?”

Harry shook his head, checking the time on his watch again “C-section is set for December…” The door to the judge’s chambers cracked open and a disgruntled Danny and his lawyer shuffled out and took their seats opposite Harry and John. Harry cleared his throat and straightened his suit jacket brushing his hands through his hair and resting his ringed fingers on the desk, feeling the butterflies rise in his stomach once again.

“All rise” the bailiff said, opening the door for the Judge once again.

She took her seat quickly and shuffled her papers, before speaking “After speaking with Mr Watts, I have unfortunately had to come to the conclusion, that, at this time, he is unfit to parent a child.”

Harry breathed a huge sigh of relief

“After much deliberation, it has become evident to me that it is in the best interests of the child to reside with his mother and her husband, in a family environment. So, it is with great regret, that I will not be granting Mr Watts petition today. With that said, as the biological father Mr Watts has asked that Mr Styles, is unable to adopt the child.”

John looked at Harry who shook his head in disbelief “With all due respect, your honour, if Mr Watts hasn’t been granted parental responsibility, then he is not the parent, and has no right to block the adoption”

“You said yourself Mr tanner, biologically, Mr Watts is the father”

“I also said that we weren’t here to discuss biology, it is clear that Mr Watts does not want to be a father, otherwise he would have made the necessary preparations, he wants to make Mr Styles as miserable as possible, and you’re allowing him to do that”

“If you let me finish Mr Tanner, I was going to explain my decision” she looked at him sternly

“Sorry your honour”

“At this moment in time, Mr Watts does not and will not have parental responsibility, or any contact with the child, however, if in two years’ time, Mr Watts is able to demonstrate his ability to parent appropriately, then the case will be reviewed, therefore, Mr Styles, will not be allowed to adopt the child, until that time. If, by the child’s second birthday, no applications for parental responsibility have been submitted to the courts, then the adoption will be allowed to go ahead”

***

December 22nd 2017 – 36 Weeks

Poppy hadn’t slept a wink in the last 24 hours, this date had been set for weeks now, and barring any complications, or emergencies that the doctor had to attend to, she’d be meeting her baby today and she was too excited for sleep. Harry was much the same, he’d spent the night tossing and turning on the hard hospital couch and woke with a sore back, but he chose not to complain too much considering that in a matter of hours, Poppy was going to have her stomach sliced into while she’s awake on the table.

“I hate you” she glared at Harry as he ate his full English breakfast on the table in front of her. She wasn’t allowed to eat because of the surgery but her stomach was growling, and she envied him with every fibre of her being as she watched him eat his baked beans.

“I’m sorry” he said, mouth full of food “but we get to meet Oli today, and once he’s here you can have biggest meal you’ve ever had”

“Make sure I get breakfast for dinner yeah? I want bacon”

He giggled, “You can have all the bacon in the world”

“Good” she sighed, rubbing her belly “we’re having a baby today H”

“You’re having a baby today love” he smiled “I’m just watching them slice into you”

Poppy winced “Don’t say that”

“Slice” he said emphasising the end of the word, cheeky smile spreading across his face as he ate his last mouth full of breakfast

“Stop” she nudged him playfully “I’m nervous enough”

“Sorry” he pouted “but at least you don’t have to go through proper labour”

“True” she nodded “But I think this will be bad enough”

The rest of the morning creeped by slowly, Poppy couldn’t stop checking the clock, and watching the door waiting for the nurse to come in and start getting her ready for surgery. She knew she had to wait for Dr Marshall to finish her morning appointments in her offices, but it was 11:30 and she was starting to get more and more anxious as time passed. She wasn’t hungry anymore, that feeling had passed hours ago and she was left with a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach as she waited. Harry tried his best to keep her distracted, but by the time lunch time rolled around, there was no way she could think about anything else. Which is why, when the nurse walked in at 12:25 both Poppy and Harry breathed a sigh of relief.

“We’re having a baby today!” she exclaimed, it was Leah, who, throughout Poppy’s stay she’d become quite close to. She always knew how to bring her spirits up and when Harry was away for those few days for the ARIAs and The Victoria Secret show, she would spend hours with Poppy in her room, keeping her company, which she was forever grateful for. “Dr Marshall is on her way now, so things will be getting underway pretty soon, I’ve been sent in to put in your IV, to keep your fluids up for the surgery”

Poppy nodded and stuck her right arm out, “Stick me Lea” she giggled as she got all her things organised

She laughed too “Well, I’m glad to see you’re happy today, most mothers that are about to have a C-section are nervous as hell”

“She gets like this when she’s nervous” Harry added, sitting on the bed next to Poppy, so she could look at him instead of at the needle she was about to put into her.

Leah wrapped the tourniquet around her upper arm and used her middle finger to find a viable vein to stick the needle into “You have junkie veins” she noted screwing her face up in concentration

“I’ve had a lot of failed blood tests in my time” Poppy said

“Well I can see why, your veins are awful, but I’ve found one” she turned and grabbed the IV kit from her tray, keeping her finger on the vein “Alright, deep breath, this is the easiest part of today”

Poppy took a breath and buried her face in Harry’s shoulder, so she didn’t have to watch it go in. she felt the sharp pain in her inner elbow and let go of her breath as she finished.

“All done” she smiled, and Poppy lifted her head, and watched her connect the bag of fluid to the tubes that were now hanging from her arm. “Ok, so Dr Marshall will be in soon to give you the rundown of procedure, and shortly after that you’ll be taken down to theatre, where you’ll meet Kevin, who will give your epidural” she pressed a few buttons on the IV Machine to stop it from beeping “Harry, I’ll see if I can find you some scrubs” she walked out of the room and left Poppy and Harry in nervous silence. Poppy kept her head on his shoulder and waited for Leah to come back.

***

“Ok, are we ready to go?” the hospital orderly asked as he unhinged the breaks on the bed. Not waiting for an answer, he began pushing the bed out of the room. Harry walked beside Poppy, until they got down to the operating floor, where he was told he would have to change into his scrubs and wait until after Poppy had the epidural to go into the operating theatre with her.

“I’ll see you soon my love” he said placing a kiss on her forehead and squeezing her hand as a sign of comfort “real soon”

A few stray tears escaped her eyes as she kissed Harry goodbye. The orderly the rolled her bed into the operating room, leaving Harry on the other side of the door. The room was bright and filled with unfamiliar faces there was nothing reassuring about the space, it was harsh and cold, and her heart raced at the thought of what was about to happen.

“Poppy” an unfamiliar doctor said to her as she lay in her bed “I’m Kevin, your anesthetist” he held his hand out for her to shake “Once the table is fully prepped, we’ll get you to move over there and I’ll give you the epi and once that’s all done and everything is set up, your husband can come in and Dr Marshall will get started with the delivery of your baby”

The rest of the time in that room alone was a blur, she had the epidural and the scrub nurses had put the plastic curtain up in front of her as they brushed antiseptic all over her belly. She was basically naked on the table, with only a light blue sheet covering her lower half for modesty. When things were just about ready to get underway, Harry walked in, dressed in salmon pink scrubs and a blue hair net that covered his curls. Poppy could only just move her head enough to see him as he made his way over to her, but she was glad he was there.

“Hi love” he said softly, sitting down on the stool right next to her face “you good?”

Poppy nodded “Yeah” she whispered, burrowing her face into his hand.

“Alright Poppy” Dr Marshall said “are we ready”

A small “yep” escaped her mouth as she felt the slight pressure of the scalpel cutting through her stomach

“Look at me love” she heard Harry say, trying to get her to focus on something else. The midwife, Julie, was standing next to him, telling him to keep her distracted, so that she didn’t watch as her stomach was sliced into. Poppy turned her head and looked straight into Harry’s eyes, as he stroked her head “You’re doing great” he smiled.

Poppy could feel a slight tugging sensation in her lower abdomen, and she could hear the doctors muttering, the words didn’t reach her ears, but the expression on Harry’s face fell, and she guessed something was wrong.

“H?” she whispered, “what’s happening?”

He looked through the clear plastic and back at Poppy “It’s alright love, they fixed it” he kept his eyes fixed on her until Dr Marshall spoke.

“Poppy, you probably want to be watching for this bit” she smiled and her and Harry both turned their heads as they watched the doctor, lift their son from inside Poppy’s belly. He screeched as he hit the cold air of the operating room and the tears were falling down Poppy’s cheeks while she watched the nurses pull down the screen in front of her so that he could rest on her chest.

“Dad” Julie said to Harry “We need you to cut the cord” she handed him a pair of sterilised surgical scissors and he stood from his seat, moving closer to where Dr Marshall held Oli, who was still screaming, so that Poppy could see what was happening.

“Just between the two clamps” Julie encouraged, and he snipped the cord, smile spreading across his face feeling like a dad for the first time. “Poppy, are you still wanting skin to skin?”

She nodded squirming a little as she tried take down her gown, forgetting that her arms were tied down to the operating table. Harry stepped in and gently lowered the front of her gown and Dr Marshall laid Oli down on her chest. His cries settled the moment he touched her skin, her arms were freed and she placed her hands over his back, peppering kisses over the top of his head as the tears streamed down her face.

“Hi baby” she whispered, and he let out a little squeak “I love you so much little man”

Harry sat back down next to Poppy and placed his hand over hers on Oli’s back, the pressure, calming him even more “hey buddy” harry cooed “welcome to the world” he placed a kiss on Poppy’s cheek “congratulations love, I’m so proud of you”

“Merry Christmas H” She smiled feeling the slight tugging of the doctors putting her back together and behind her, she could hear the nurses getting everything ready to have Oli cleaned up and weighed, but she couldn’t stop staring at him. She couldn’t quite believe that this was real, that she’d just had her first baby, who she was now holding in her arms. This was never supposed to happen to her, but here she was, baby on her chest, and best friend by her side, she couldn’t be happier.

***

Harry sat on the couch in their hospital room with Oli in his arms as Poppy slept soundly in her bed.

“Hey little man” he whispered “you don’t know this yet, but that lady in the bed over there, she’s your mum, and she’s the best woman in the world, so us boys, we’ve got to stick together yeah? Make sure she’s ok, because she’s wanted you her entire life, and we can’t let anything get in the way of that” Oli, twisted his face into what looked like a smile, but Harry knew better “You’ve just pooped haven’t you?” he chuckled “You are on fire little dude- that’s three already, you’ve not been here for more than six hours” He stood and walked Oli over to his crib so that he could change him before he started to cry and wake Poppy up. He placed him down gently, but the minute his body touched the mattress and he felt Harry’s hands disappear he let out a loud cry, which jolted Poppy awake.

“What’s going on” she mumbled

“Nothing love” Harry said softly as he pulled a nappy out of its bag “he just needs a change, go back to sleep, we’re all good here”

She blinked a few times adjusting to the harsh hospital light “I want to cuddle him” she pouted

Harry cracked a smile as he unwrapped the baby “Alright love, let me change him and then we can all have a cuddle” he grabbed the nappy and unzipped Oli’s Babygro, changing him without a hitch and attempting to wrap him again as Poppy watched on.

“You gotta pull it tight over him so he feels secure” she instructed from her bed, pain in her belly reminding her that she had a large cut there.

“Swaddling is hard” he said as Oli’s little arm escaped from the blanket

“Bring him here” she reached her arms out and Harry picked him up gently handing him to Poppy.

“Hiya” she smiled taking the baby from Harry “daddy’s not doing a very good job is he?” she cooed “Lay the blanket down H” she motioned towards the space on her bed and Harry did as he was told, putting the blanket next to her. She laid Oli down on it and he let out another cry, which calmed as she pulled the blanket tight across his chest.

“Can you pick him up again” she asked “Stitches”

“Yeah” he nodded, picking him up and gently transferring him into her arms.

“That’s better isn’t it little dude” she said, pulling the blanket away from his chin “Daddy tried, so we’ll forgive him this time”

“Heyy” Harry said, sitting down on the bed and wrapping his arm around her shoulder “How many nappies have you changed so far”

“Zero” she smiled, rubbing his knee with her free hand “Thank you” she rested her head on his chest and she both looked down at her son

“We’re like a real little family now” he said, moving his hand onto Oli’s torso “My little Styles Clan”

“Yeah” Poppy let out a small laugh “It’s a Sign of the Times H” she smiled down at her sweet little Oli, engraving this moment into her memories, as the happiest she’d ever felt.

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sugarcoated-pain · 5 years

Text

Heavy Rotation Part 5

Thanks to everybody who’s been reading, especially those letting me know what you think! Keep an eye out for Part 6 soon because it is gonna be GOOD! ;)

As always, thanks @sublimehood for all the help, guidance, and general reassurance lol.

Best Friends to Lovers- original character + Ashton

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Over the next few weeks, things started to go back to normal. Well, I mean, as “normal” as things could ever be for us. Ashton and I didn’t speak of the kiss again, and we all did what we could to help him get over his break up. I respectfully didn’t bring up the “friends with benefits” comment while he was grieving, though the thought definitely crossed my mind more than once.

Around the end of January, we got a regular visitor around the studio. Ray is a music producer and owner of a brand new recording studio in New York City, as well as an old friend of Luke’s parents. He’s visiting LA on business, and had never seen the studio, so he stopped by whenever he got a chance, just hanging out and picking up ideas for his own studio. On his first day in town, Liz was giving him the grand tour and they caught me messing around in the recording studio. Whoops. Ray was amused by this, and also could immediately tell that I am an “East Coast Girl”. Didn’t realize it was THAT obvious.

It’s almost impossible for me to stay away from the studio now that I am getting the hang of how things work in there. When business is slow, Ashton and I have been working on editing my demo, but it’s taking longer than it should, since we’re actually supposed to be working. Ray walked in one day and overheard part of my track, and was intrigued. Ashton played it for him from the beginning, much to my embarrassment, but Ray said it was “really good” and that I have “a lot of potential”. Holy crap. This is amazing.

On his last day in town, Ray approaches me alone while I’m working in the store.

“I’ve been really impressed by you while I’ve been here. You’ve got the same energy that I’m looking to have in my studio. If you decide you’d like to move back closer to home, there’s a job waiting for you.”

I’m initially stunned. He hands me his business card. “Wow, thanks. That’s incredible and honestly really flattering, “ I start, once my brain is able to process what he is saying. “But I’ve already kinda built a life here, and I love what I’m doing.”

Ray glances down at the pile of records in my hand, and gives me an incredulous look, “Stacking records?”

I chuckle slightly. “Touche.”

“Just keep it in the back of your mind, okay? The company would pay to fly you there and there could be a nice signing bonus involved. Hit me up if you change your mind.”

I stand there stunned for a few moments after he’s left, staring at his business card in my hand.

“Hey, you okay?” It’s Georgia. She’s bringing Calum lunch, and has clearly noticed that I’m in shock.

“Uh.. yeah I think so... That Ray guy just offered me a job in New York.”

“WOAH…seriously?? are you..actually considering it?” She asks, looking impressed and also mildly concerned.

“Nah not really… I mean, my gut says no, I love my life here.. But it sounds like it could be good money, and it would be nice to be closer to home…” I reply with a shrug.

“Well, you know we’d all miss the hell out of you, but I’m excited for you and support whatever decision you make!”

I smile. “Thanks, G.”

I was on closing duty for the store that night, and everybody else had shit going on, so once my shift was finally over, I had the apartment to myself. I cooked myself some pasta without anybody getting in my way, and plopped down on the couch to watch a movie. Ashton was the first one home.

“Are you watching the Wedding Singer AGAIN?” He asks, shaking his head.

“I love this movie, leave me alone!”

He plops down on the couch next to me, and before I even know what is happening, he grabs my fork and steals a bite of my alfredo.

“Hey! Get your own!” I snap, slapping his hand playfully.

He smirks triumphantly, taking another bite.

“How was work?” He asks, settling back on the couch.

“Boring as hell. OH but that Ray guy came back and actually offered me a job in New York!”

“What?? For real??”

“Yeah but I'm probably not gonna take it.. it's just kinda flattering, ya know?”

“Why aren't you going to take it?”

“Well, I mean, I've already got a job that I usually enjoy..and I've built a life here.. and there's all of you guys…”

The look on his face is hard to read but I'd say he seems pleased with my answer. His cell phone buzzes and he checks it, then let's out a frustrated groan.

“What's up?” I ask curiously.

“Nothing… just… Camille keeps texting me lately..”

“WHAT?!? What does that skanky bitch want??”

“She says she wants to 'talk’. Keeps trying to get me to meet up with her. She is apparently sorry and made a 'mistake’.” He sighs.

“....you're not buying that bullshit, right??”

“I don't really wanna talk about it right now. Let's just watch your stupid movie.” He adds, the last part in a playful tone. Without responding to the text, he puts his phone back in his pocket.

We sit in silence for a little while just watching the movie together, even though I've seen it dozens of times. I’m hyper-aware of the fact that we seem to be inching closer together on the couch, until the point that our legs are touching. I can occasionally feel him watching me out of the corner of my eye. My cheeks start to feel flushed and the air feels like it’s made of electricity. The tension starts to become too much to bear. My heart is racing now and it’s taking everything in my power not to climb on top of him right here on the couch. Almost a month has passed since the breakup, and I decide in this moment that this is a reasonable amount of time to address the thing I can’t stop thinking about.

“So.. remember on New Year’s Day when you made that comment about ‘best friends with benefits’?” Before I can finish my sentence, his lips are on mine. Pulling me closer to him, i wrap my arms around his back and run my fingers through his hair as I kiss him back. “But that’s all this is, right? No strings attached?” I say quickly, pulling away, but with our lips just inches apart. He instantly breaks the space between us to continue kissing me. It’s a deep, passionate kiss, the kind I pictured every time I imagined this happening, but I need to make sure we are on the same page, so I try again, “Because you’re still getting over Camille....”,

“And you don’t want a relationship…” he retorts, but his lips are back on mine as soon as he finishes the sentence.

“And we’re best friends who live together and anything more would be weird….and I wouldn’t want everybody else to know..” I say into his ear, as he moves his lips down to my neck.

“Just shut up and kiss me.” He pulls me up onto his lap, and I straddle my legs on either side of his. I move one of my hands from his hair to his back, moving up under his shirt and running my fingernails all the way down. I can feel him getting harder beneath me, and it’s almost too much to take. He runs his hands up under the back of my shirt to undo my bra.

Suddenly, we hear keys in the front door and I jump off of him as fast as I can. We both frantically straighten our clothes and hair, panting. Luckily, Cal and Georgia are lost in conversation and not paying attention when they first walk in. I pull my loose bra through my shirt sleeve discreetly and stuff it under the throw blanket next to me. I notice Ashton is using the other end of the same blanket to hide his erection, which makes me smirk proudly.

“Hey guys, what’re you up to?” Cal asks as they enter the living room

“Just watching a movie .. but it’s almost over and I’m exhausted so I was thinking about going to bed soon.” I reply, with a pointed look at Ashton.

“Yeah, me too.” Ash adds, picking up on the cue. He better know that I expect him to crawl through my bedroom window the second I get in there and fuck me senseless.

“Aw. We actually had a movie we wanted to watch with you guys. The four of us haven’t gotten a chance to hang out in a while.” Georgia replies. Great. Guilt trip. Ashton and I exchange a look.

“I guess I can hang out a little while longer.” I answer. How long can the movie be, right?

I can wait two more hours for the guy I’ve already waited eight months for. But about halfway through, the rush from our little makeout session has worn off and I start to feel drowsy. Last thing I remember is laying my head on Ashton’s shoulder.

I wake up several hours later, wrapped in Ashton’s arms on the couch. Someone appears to have thrown the blanket over us, so that’s kind of awkward. I realize the sun is already up, and reach for my cell phone to check the time. I’m supposed to be downstairs for work in 30 minutes so I gently move Ash’s arms and begin to stand up. He’s still passed out but he instinctively tries to pull me back to him. It’s adorable and everything I’ve ever wanted but this shit can absolutely NOT happen. This was a terrible idea. I should NOT have allowed this to happen.

“Hey, Ash. Wake up. You’ve gotta go to work soon.”

“morning” he says groggily.

I stand up and fold the blanket, and try to give him a second to wake up.“....We need to talk about last night..” My tone a little bit more serious than I intended.

“Why am I getting a deja vu feeling?” he says, as he stretches and begins to sit up.

“I changed my mind. I don’t think it’s a good idea for us to do this whole ‘friends with benefits’ thing…”

“Can I assume you’re not going to give me a reason as to why?”

Because you’re the most perfect man I’ve ever met and I’m secretly falling for you, which makes you the world’s worst distraction for a girl on a mission. “I just don’t want to deal with everybody in the apartment finding out, but I also don’t want to have to sneak around. I think we’re really better off as JUST friends…”

“Well I’m gonna call bullshit because I know you don’t give a damn what anybody else thinks, but fine. If that’s what you really want, then I respect that... Just friends.”

“Thank you. It is.” UGH it’s very much NOT what I really want. Why can’t I just be real with him and myself right now?

I take a super quick shower before work, and all I can think about is how badly I want Ashton in there with me. This is a problem. This HAS to stop. I’m here for my music, and I can’t let some guy hold me back, no matter how perfect he is. It occured to me in this moment that Ashton was the reason why I immediately told Ray no when he offered me the job. This is everything I wanted to avoid. What if this NYC opportunity really was my fast track into the music industry? The fact that I didn’t even consider it for a second all because of Ashton TERRIFIES me.

As soon as I step out of the shower, I reach for the jeans I had fallen asleep in, and pull Ray’s business card out of my pocket. Before I even get dressed, I send him an email asking for more details about the position. As I head downstairs for work, I hear a notification on my phone. It’s Ray, getting back to me much quicker than I anticipated, and the offer almost feels too good to be true. The money is great, I’d get to be helping make music instead of stacking cds and records all day, and I would receive a signing bonus. He even mentioned that there was a flight at the end of the week on the company’s preferred airline that still had seats available on such short notice, so he had used their miles to secure a ticket for me, just in case. That seemed a little presumptuous, but also nice to know that this guy wanted me to work for them that badly.

It was a lot to think about, and I spend most of my shift daydreaming about what it would be like to be back on the east coast, and REALLY working in the music industry. Being closer to my family and old friends would be nice. The reasons to go seemed to be adding up quicker than the reasons to stay. But I realized that my main reason to stay was more important to me than all of the reasons I should go.

Part Six

Part Seven

Part Eight

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist, and I love hearing feedback!

Taglist: @cheyenne-in-wonderland @drummerboy794 @harrysgucciclothes @emmamarshmellow @rbforsmileycal @asht0ns-world @dukesnumber1

#5sos #ashton irwin #5 seconds of summer #5sos fanfiction #5sos fanfic #5 seconds of summer fanfiction #fanfiction #fanfics #calum hood #luke hemmings #michael clifford

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shadowsof-thenight · 5 years

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The long way home: Chapter three

Story summary: An AU about Steve Rogers that takes place in college. When you were kids, Steve was your best friend. Where he was you were and vice versa. So when your father got a new job on the other side of the country your 11 year old heart broken.

Over the years you had stayed in contact, though. And now, seven years later, you were off to college and unknowingly you'd applied to the college he had started at last year. You agree to meet on your second day and suddenly it all seemed a little less scary. Will you pick up where you'd left off? Or will everything have changed as much as Steve's appearance.

Ship: Steve Rogers X Reader

Warnings: None. Words: 1617

If you want to get tagged, please let me know. I'd be happy too. This goes for all my stories .

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Previous Chapter

Waking up after that fun filled night was tough. Your head was hammering and the sliver of sunlight peaking out between the curtains was enough to make you curse the world. A loud grumble left your throat as you turned to escape the offensive light, you really weren't ready to face the day.

“Morning sunshine” Natasha sounded chipper. Too chipper for someone who matched you drink for drink. Besides the groan you emitted as you pulled a pillow over your head, you remained silent. Your mind was too jumbled to create a coherent sentence. Natasha chuckled softly and you felt her sit down on the edge of your bed. Before you knew it, she pulled the pillow away from you, condemning you to the harsh light still peaking through the obviously useless curtains. With an uncharacteristic shriek you dove under your blanket, earning you another chuckle from your room mate.

“Time to wake up sleepy head” she said, tugging at the blanket that now covered your head.

“No,” you said grumpily, not giving an inch in the tug war.

“I've got you some paracetamol and water” Natasha promised. That was enough to still your efforts for a moment. She pulled the blanket off of you and handed you a bottle and some pills. Grumbling a thanks, you quickly downed the pills with a large swallow of water.

A few moments of silence later Natasha handed you your phone, explaining that it had been buzzing for a while now and she was too curious to wait any longer. You chuckled and unlocked it, wondering who needed you so desperately.

Can I get Natasha's number?

Followed by many of question marks and emoticons. It had come from Steve's number.

Since Natasha was seated right next to you, you schooled your expression as you felt a slight pang run through you. Why did you feel that pang? Trying to shrug it off you quickly checked with Natasha who hesitated in answering.

“Steve? Really?” she said a little confused and you chuckled, asking her if he was not up to par for her. With a blush she began to explain that there had been someone amongst the group that caught her eye, however it had not been Steve.

“Ohhh, tell me, who is it?” you asked teasingly. For some reason it was a relief that she was not interested in Steve. Again her cheeks flushed red and she laughed a little nervous. Promising her to keep it between the two of you, she eventually relented.

“Bucky” she said and you gasped. They had been bickering for most of the night. Surely most of it had been in good fun, but her crush still took you by surprise. She wiggled her eyebrows and raised her shoulders in response. Apparently she liked the bickering. You shook your head with a chuckle and pondered what to respond to Steve. Letting him down easy would be best, but how to do it?

A knock on the door gave you a moments reprieve to think it over and you waited as Natasha moved to open it.

“Hi there” Steve's voice spoke from the other side of the door and dread filled your stomach as you scooted a little lower underneath your blanket once more, wanting to hide away.

“Steve, Sam...this is a surprise” Natasha said, as she opened the door a little wider, allowing them entrance.

“Yes sorry, I lost my phone last night so we couldn't call ahead” Steve explained and you and Natasha exchanged a confused glance. One that did not escape Sam's attention.

“What?” he wanted to know and Natasha explained that you had been receiving texts from Steve's number all morning. Quickly grabbing your phone again you asked the person on the other end who it was, anxiously awaiting the reply. You laughed loudly when it came and explained that Steve didn't lose anything.

“Bucky stole it” you said, holding the phone up for Steve to see. His brows furrowed as he read the texts and chuckled when he understood the reason behind the theft. Another silent exchange between you and Natasha went unnoticed by the men as they asked you to meet them for lunch in 30 minutes while they went back to grab their friend.

As soon as they had left you wiggled your eyebrows at Natasha, who sported another blush and a huge smile on her face.

“I guess he liked the banter as well” you said as you got out of the bed and quickly grabbed some clothes and your toiletries. You smiled at your silent room mate as you left the room to find an empty shower. Natasha sat on her own bed, still smiling, completely lost in her thoughts.

She had not left the spot by the time you returned, though she was now wiggling her feet impatiently. She jumped up as soon as you walked in, ready to meet the men for lunch.

With a laugh you let her lead the way to the agreed upon location. The boys weren't there yet and Natasha kept asking how she looked as you waited. Assuring her she looked astonishing, you were quick to order yourself a coffee while you waited. As much as the events of the past hour had oppressed the effects of last nights alcohol, the hang over was still in full swing and you could do with some caffeine.

When the a bell that signalled the entrance of new patrons rang, you glanced over to the door where Sam was now entering. He smiled as he walked over and sat down in the chair next to Natasha. Just outside the café you could see Steve speaking to Bucky, who looked thoroughly uncomfortable.

Nudging Natasha who was straining herself not to look, you nodded your head towards the direction of the door. Finally she turned in her chair to look. Upon seeing Bucky she quickly turned back with eyes as big as saucers. Mouthing go, you urged her to take a chance. She took a few deep breaths, before nodding and getting up. Suddenly much more timid than you had seen her, she walked to the door and interrupted the conversation the two men were having.

Bucky shifted on his feet nervously while he looked at the ground, while Steve smiled before walking inside, allowing the two to have a private conversation. You smiled as Steve walked up to the table and sat down next to you, keeping an eye on his friend outside.

“What do you think?” he asked. Sam turned in his chair and shrugged, he had no idea which way the conversation would go.

“Oh, I wouldn't worry,” you said cryptically, when the men looked at you you just shrugged, “ I think there is a happy ending in there somewhere” you added.

***

And you had not been wrong. By the time Thanksgiving rolled around, they were in a relationship. One with plenty of bickering and even more kissing. They were either sickeningly sweet or annoying as could be and they both seemed to love every moment of it. Bucky was even going home with Natasha for Thanksgiving that week. Bravely meeting her parents so early into their relationship. Something he had been regretting almost as soon as he agreed to it.

He was terrified and Natasha had done nothing to ease his fears. In fact, she and Sam seemed to enjoy making him nervous. She would mention her fathers time spend in the army. And Sam would mention how scary army dad's were, asking Natasha if he still had his gun. Natasha would then list all his weapons, as well as his accomplishments with them. He was a decorated soldier, after all.

You had just laughed at their antics. Natasha had already told you her parents were pretty laid back. She had promised you to inform Bucky of this before he would step into her childhood home.

And halfway through your own thanksgiving dinner you had gotten a text from Natasha that her family loved him. By the time you were in your childhood bed that night, it was already past midnight and you were knackered. However, sleep was not for you, as your phone rang just as you were dozing off. Steve. Trying to ignore the flutter in your heart you answered the phone.

“Hi” his voice softly spoke as soon as you had picked up. He explained that he had no real pressing reason to call, except to tell you that he was thankful that he had you back in his life. You smiled and returned the sentiments.

Who could have known just how safe this friendship would still feel after all those years. How happy it made you that although everything had changed over the years, you still matched. You could still be yourself around him. And he still made you feel safe and powerful.

You had noticed over the past few months that Steve liked calling. Just to say goodnight. Or ask you to meet up. To ask about your plans. Even sometimes just to say hi, as he put it. You talked to him all the time and you didn't mind one bit. Surely Natasha teased you for it, but you didn't care. He was your friend.

You ignored the butterflies in your stomach each time you saw his name on the caller-id. After all, you were friends. Nothing more. Those butterflies were just confused. By his arms. Or his smile. Or those eyes. Yep. Just confused. You weren't developing a crush on your best friend. Not at all.

Tags: @musicfreak180

#The long way home #steve rogers #Steve Rogers x Reader #College AU

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porchwood · 5 years

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Fic Bits 2018: The One That Got Away

Modern AU; Madge POV. Jude/Madge, Gale/Madge.

They say you can never go home again, and yet here I am, packing to do just that.

The second autumn after you graduate from college is when the niggling feeling starts, like you left town without returning your library books or forgot to put the new insurance card in your glove compartment. When the first one comes around, you’re elated that you don’t have to think – let alone worry – about registering for classes, mapping your daily routes across campus, or buying school supplies of any kind, but by the second you’re starting to feel like something’s wrong. It’s easy to understand why so many people fall into teaching. Your body gets set on that routine, so that going back to school in fall is as instinctual to humans as seasonal migrations are to birds.

Ironically, it was the school year that determined this move – or rather, the school year that necessitated it, though the fall semester is already several weeks underway. Beginning in January, Dad will be teaching again for the first time since I was in elementary school – and, doubt it not, loving every minute of it.

At twenty-three my life could and probably should be independent of my parents’, but no matter which way I turned the situation around in my mind, there was no truly good reason not to move back with them. As badly as I don’t want to go back to the small town where I grew up, there’s nothing substantial enough to keep me here if my parents are gone.

We’ve always been thick as thieves and, oddly, moreso since moving to the capital city. The fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue that kept my mother to a quiet routine in our hometown made her a veritable recluse amidst the constant bustle of squealing brakes and blaring horns, and everything was so blindingly expensive, we rarely partook of the concerts and boutiques and exotic restaurants that had sounded so exciting from our living room back home.

Moving here as a family had been the result of two somewhat predictable stars aligning perfectly: after twelve years as mayor, Dad was elected to the state legislature and I was accepted into the music program at a small private college, a short bus ride from the capitol building. My parents rented a spacious loft halfway in-between the two, which enabled me to keep tabs on my mother while enjoying the independence of living off-campus all through school, while our place back home was loaned out to visiting professors and the like – short-term rentals to keep the utilities running and keep an eye out for any maintenance issues that might arise. I’m told I missed out on the “full college experience” by not living in a dorm, but from all accounts, it’s a party I’m glad to have skipped.

For all intents and purposes, home has been 37 Ash Terrace for the past five years. Four-and-a-half hours isn’t the longest drive, but there was always one reason or another to stay here through the holidays – which is not to say we’ve never gone back, of course. Our family revisits can be counted on two hands, but I’ve made a few extra trips on my own for special occasions, the last of which – the baptism of Katniss’s son Janni – was more than two years ago now.

I look up at my bulletin board, now stripped of everything but the central photo, and have just tugged out the tack when my phone rings. It’s a local cell number – local to our hometown, not to here – but doesn’t pull up a contact, and I cross the first two fingers of my free hand, hoping one of my cover letters has snared an interview as I answer, “Hello?”

“Is this Madeline Undersee?” asks a young male voice.

That was one of the best things about moving away, and one that I’m particularly loath to leave behind: finally getting to be Madeline, not Madge. That a young professional back home is addressing me as such, however, gives me hope.

“It is,” I affirm, and there’s a brief, quickly stifled sound from the other end before the caller goes on, “I was wondering if you might be available to play a wedding in November.”

The pieces snap together in my mind. It’s probably a local boy who went to college in the capitol like myself – it’s a common enough path – and found himself a fiancée, though it is a trifle odd for the groom to call ‘round for an accompanist.

“I’m sorry; I’m actually moving out of the area this weekend,” I reply, “but I can refer you to several other musicians who would be excellent choices.”

“I’m afraid it really has to be you,” he says with what sounds far more like mischief than regret. “What about a wedding in your hometown? Would that be a little easier to manage?”

“In –?” I break off, mind whipping through the possibilities. It’s hardly a secret that the Undersees are moving back after five years in the big city, but we’ve kept radio silence on my own return except where potential employers are concerned, so there’s no way some random local groom could even know about me, let alone want to hire me for his wedding. “Who is this?” I demand more than ask, a shy fifteen-year-old bookworm all over again, bristling in anticipation of the prank.

“You really don't know?” the young man responds, sounding genuinely surprised, and for a half-second my heart skips in hope, never mind that his voice bears no resemblance whatsoever to Gale’s rough, smoky timbre. “I’m wounded, mädchen,” he laments, and my heart trips halfway through its skip and somersaults clumsily forward to faceplant onto the concrete below.

“Jude?” I squeak.

“You haven’t forgotten me entirely, then?” he teases.

“Don’t be daft,” I retort, my stunned heart now flailing in shock. “So…you’re getting married?” I almost ask if it’s Columbine but that crush is surely ancient history now, never mind that last I heard, she was headed to some fashion design or modeling program out east.

“Don’t be daft,” he throws back with characteristic self-deprecation, but the affection beneath it wraps about me like a blanket – or one of Jude’s incredible lingering hugs. “But I do need a wedding accompanist,” he goes on, “which as I said, really has to be you, but I want to tell you about it in person. When are you back?”

“Well – tomorrow,” I reply, and the whole thing suddenly feels surreal. “Well, the day after, really,” I clarify. “Tomorrow’s the drive up and the U-Haul unload. Mom and Dad hired movers but you still want to go through everything, you know?”

“Of course,” he assures me. “Want to meet at Primavera for Saturday lunch – say, 11:30? My treat.”

“Primavera?” I puzzle. There’s never been an Italian restaurant in our hometown – it’s too small and rural to sustain any such – but the nearby city has a few shopping malls and a much wider selection of eateries; it makes sense that Jude would want to go to one of them. “What – where is that?” I ask.

He gives a little choke of laughter in reply. “Have you really been away so long, mädchen?” he wonders, but something about my ignorance seems to amuse – even delight – him. “It’s Italian – awesome Italian – right next to Mellarks’.”

“There’s nothing next to Mellarks’,” I counter, because our tiny historic downtown has never been able to keep shops for long, not with countless department stores and discount stores not twenty miles off. “Unless…are we having a sidewalk picnic, Judah?” I venture, almost hopefully, and he laughs.

“If the first date goes well, we can do whatever you want on the second,” he replies, and I miss him so much that I snatch up a pillow with my free hand and hug it to my chest as hard as I can. “But I promise: there is a legit Italian restaurant next to Mellarks’,” he says. “I’m going to buy you lunch there on Saturday, and you’re going to love it so much that you’ll refuse to live out of takeout range ever again.”

“Color me intrigued,” I tease. “As much about your mysterious wedding as this new eatery.”

“They’re both worth the wait,” he promises, and I can hear the grin in his voice.

“I missed you,” I blurt and Jude falls suddenly, uncharacteristically silent. There are any number of well-deserved retorts he could hand me, ranging from You didn’t have to to I didn’t go anywhere, but Jude is the sweetest boy I’ve ever known – on a level with Peeta, really – and even in our most frustrated moments, he never addressed me half as harshly as Gale would on a good day.

I think I hurt him a long time ago, though he’s never said as much.

“I missed you too,” he murmurs, and the corners of my eyes prickle hotly.

I don’t want to go home – you can never go home again, everyone says as much – don’t want to explain why I have a music degree from a respectable college and am looking for any old day job in my hometown and living with my parents. I don’t want to see Gale Hawthorne – never mind how wildly I do want to see him – to face all the inevitable jibes about how I “couldn’t make it in the real world.”

But if Jude – sweet, funny, precious Jude – is coming back into my life, it just might be bearable. He’ll have a job and new friends now – a girlfriend, to be sure – and he may not even live in town any longer. But we can grab lunches together here and there and laugh about stuff that happened in high school. Maybe we’ll find new things to laugh about.

“See you Saturday?” I say.

“I’ll be the one with the red ribbon,” he replies.

As always, I’m the one who hangs up.

Jude always let me end our calls, always hanging on in case of one last thought or lament, one more drawn-out Night-night or See you tomorrow.

Looking down at the phone in my hand, I remember the incredibly idiotic reason Jude isn’t saved as a contact anymore and sit on my stripped mattress, both arms curled around the pillow and my chin resting on its edge. It was stupid and childish – and ultimately pointless, because he didn’t try to get in touch at all after that. Oh, he did the usual friendly Facebook stuff – comments on my posts and the like – because Jude is that kind of sweet, but he’d never do anything to make me uncomfortable.

And also, maybe, he was hurt.

It’s not as if I shut him out – there were no calls or texts or emails to ignore – and you could hardly call my across-the-state move for college “avoidance,” but it certainly aided me to that end, especially five summers ago.

I bite my lips together for a long moment, silently call myself an idiot, and save the number as a new contact: Judah Tolliver. Neat, professional, and objective, like a grown-up. After all, if he’s hiring me for a wedding we’ll be exchanging calls and texts over the next few months; there’s no reason not to add him to my phone.

Returning to my call history, I dial Rue, the high school friend I’ve stayed closest to by virtue of us attending the same college. Our courses of study and career veered apart over the past few years as Rue set aside music to pursue dance full-bore and is currently spending her days with a traveling company that does famous ballets in a pared-down, intimate contemporary style, with dreamlike costumes that I suspect her father has a hand in, but we’ve stubbornly kept in touch all this while, meeting for a meal and a chat whenever her schedule allows.

She’s halfway across the country dancing Swanilda in Coppélia this season, so our farewell supper took place about two weeks ago. I don’t expect her to answer and am beyond surprised when she does.

“Hey chickie-babe!” she cries. “Are you home? I’ve only got a minute but I want to hear all about it. How did your house hold up?”

“We haven’t left yet,” I tell her. “We’re loading the U-Haul tonight and driving back tomorrow.”

“So where’s the fire?” she teases. “Don’t get me wrong, I love you to bits, but why call now? Are you getting sad about leaving – or going back?”

Rue understands my misgivings, even if she doesn’t share them. After I told my parents I’d move back with them, I curled up on Rue’s couch and cried myself into a stupor while she nestled her tiny fairy-form around me in a supportive hug. Going home is not failure, she told me over and over again, her husky voice sounding so like her mother’s as she rubbed my back in soothing circles. You and your parents have always supported each other; it makes sense you’d go back with them, at least for a little – and it’s not forever, not if you don’t want it to be.

Rue’s parents – a costumer and a choreographer – left the capitol when they started having kids and heartily embraced small town life in the heartland, but they both had vibrant careers behind them and were ready for quiet inexpensive living, for Piggly Wiggly and the county fair and a fixer-upper farmhouse, and they quickly found avenues to exercise their talents on a smaller scale.

I’m a year and a half out of college with eleven wedding gigs, five funerals, and a teaching slot at the local conservatory to show for twenty years at the piano and a B.A. with high distinction.

“Jude just called,” I reply by way of explanation. “He wants to hire me for a wedding –”

“His?” she interjects impishly.

“No,” I quell, “but he wouldn’t tell me who it is over the phone either. We’re meeting for lunch on Saturday to discuss it.”

“Meeting for lunch to discuss a mysterious wedding right after you move back to town?” she presses slyly. “Maybe it’s yours!”

Rue knows there’s nothing of that sort between Jude and me and never has been, but she’s equally convinced that there must be, or should’ve been. He adores you, you know, she’s told me time and again. Like, Peeta-and-Katniss level devotion. Couldn’t you just kiss him once and see what happens?

“Be serious,” I snort.

“I am,” she insists. “I never understood why the pair of you never got together, or why you fell out of touch after graduation. Jude was crazy about you –”

“He was like that with everyone,” I counter. “The sweet, funny thing – that’s just his natural demeanor.”

“And did he ask everyone to marry him if their respective crushes married other people?” she wonders.

“He said we should go on a date, not get married,” I remind her, the edge of a snap creeping into my voice. “It was a low moment and a long time ago. We were both feeling angsty.”

I don’t mention the other thing, the thing I’ve never told anyone – not even myself when I can help it.

“Well…maybe it’s time, sweetie,” she posits quietly. “Maybe Columbine finally found a husband and Jude wants to give the pair of you a chance.”

“I really don’t think that’s it,” I tell her, oddly wearied by the subject, but judging by the increasing volume of background noise, Rue’s about to be pulled away anyway.

“Sorry, I have to go,” she admits at the selfsame moment. “I’ll be back in a few weeks myself, but call me ASAP after your lunch with Jude, okay?”

“You got it,” I promise, and we hang up. I set the phone on my mattress, next to the photo of Gale Hawthorne from the state hockey finals seven years ago, and sigh.

I haven’t seen him since the reception after Ashpet’s baptism, and it wasn’t the most auspicious encounter.

I’d never struck a man before – or since – and certainly never in a church basement.

“Magpie?”

My father pokes his head through the open doorway. “Movers just got here,” he says. “Is your room ready to go?”

I tuck the picture of Gale inside my battered paperback of Jane Eyre, just behind the Candygram with the red ribbon threaded across the top and tied in a perfect, pressed, bow. “This is it,” I affirm, and slip the book into my purse before following my father downstairs.

As a tween I was enamored of the 1995 remake of Sabrina and resolved to head off to school with a photo of Gale – obligingly supplied by Jude, who worked on the yearbook – to pin on my bulletin board and systematically cover with playbills, flyers, ticket stubs, and the like. But I could never quite bring myself to obscure him completely, and when I went to London for my semester abroad I brought him there too, to try and forget in a foreign land.

The book is a Gale token too, also obtained for me by Jude.

I finagled to take Senior Lit in spring of my junior year in order to free up an elective senior year and as a result took the class with Jude. The first book on the slate was Jane Eyre – which I loved, somewhat to my surprise – and in true high school fashion, each copy had a log card inside the cover for the present user to write their name on, beneath the names of the book’s previous readers. Of course, neither Jude nor I got Gale’s but we knew someone had it, and at Jude’s graduation party – months after all the books had been checked back in – he stole me away to his room to press the prized copy into my hands.

I think you were looking for this, he said as I opened the cover, frantically scanned the names inscribed therein and threw my arms around him with a shriek.

But Jude, I realized, pulling back with a start, you swiped this; what if they won’t let you graduate-?

I just did, he reminded me gleefully, and the diploma is signed, sealed, and securely secreted in Mom’s wall safe as we speak. Anyway, it wasn’t my copy, so even if they do notice it’s missing, it’s not me they’d come after.

I looked back at the last name on the card – Annie Cresta – and shook my head at him. If she gets in trouble for this, I warned.

She won’t, he promised. They don’t care that much about one of twenty-three beat-up paperbacks, and it means a whole lot more to you than to the school.

I hugged him again, fiercely this time, and he curled his arms around me with a little sigh. I’m so glad you like your present, mädchen, he murmured. I know it’s not you graduating, but I wanted to beat the rush.

I spent most of Senior Lit associating Gale with Mr. Rochester, to Jude’s clear chagrin, which was curious as he didn’t seem to like the character any more than he did my sullen, dark-haired crush. I’ll grant you similarities, he agreed, but can you imagine Gale delivering that beautiful string speech in any universe?

We took our Jane Eyre final on Valentine’s Day, and in the class directly following I received an anonymous Candygram with a strawberry lollipop affixed, a red ribbon painstaking woven through neat holes punched across the top and tied in a small bow, and the handwritten message:

“I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you – especially when you are near me, as now: it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame. And if that boisterous channel, and two hundred miles or so of land some broad between us, I am afraid that cord of communion will be snapt; and then I've a nervous notion I should take to bleeding inwardly.”

I wished so badly for it to be from Gale – never mind he wasn’t even in school anymore, let alone inclined to quote Charlotte Brontë – or maybe that I had some other mysterious tall-dark-and-handsome admirer, but I knew exactly who it was from and let my head fall against his shoulder as we sat next to each other in the choir room, his literary Valentine cupped in my hands.

Jude’s breath caught a little at the gesture, then leveled out in a long slow sigh.

Thanks, Jude, I whispered.

We both knew it wasn’t a real love note but I treasured it as one just the same, pressed between the pages of my student planner until finding a worthier setting inside Gale’s copy of Jane Eyre. The book and Candygram went everywhere with me – every summer camp and weekend trip during my senior year and in college, on every choir tour, every visit back home, all across Europe on my backpacking trip with Rue and then on to my bedside table in England. If I couldn’t lay hands on it at a moment’s notice I’m not sure I’d be able to breathe.

The movers are quiet and efficient and the truck is loaded in a fraction of the time we anticipated, prompting Dad and me to hash out the pros and cons of setting out tonight instead, but there are plenty of last-minute little things to wrap up and we’d all prefer to make the drive on a good night’s sleep – which unfortunately, is not to be had for me. Dad booked us a hotel room in the suburbs for convenience, so we could check out of the loft as soon as the truck was loaded and leave in the morning without having to wait for one last walk-through with the landlord, but while he and Mom drift off quickly in their queen bed, I frown up at the ceiling from the sofa sleeper, contemplating Jude and Jane Eyre.

The capitol is a long way off, mädchen…

My junior year – Jude’s senior year – was like high school is in the movies: a charmed, wonderful dream that feels like it’ll never end. In October Peeta finally plucked up the nerve to ask Katniss out, and their relationship brought both her and I – and to a lesser extent, Rue – firmly into the Mellark circle. Jude and I had been friendly before that, but he’s both cousin and close friend to the Mellark brothers, and as a result he and I were thrown together almost constantly at meals, school events, even youth group outings. We jokingly called these “triple dates” or “quad dates” sometimes, since the rest of our group consisted of fast-and-firm couples – Peeta and Katniss, Luka and Johanna, and often Finnick and Annie as well – but no one ever seemed to take the idea of Jude and me as a couple seriously.

We were madrigal seat partners that December, which necessitated all kinds of marriage banter throughout the dinners, then after Christmas came Senior Lit and Jane Eyre and auditions for school’s production of Fiddler on the Roof. Determined not to miss out on a role when my best friends were undeniable shoo-ins, I dyed my hair a deep chestnut-brown the night before my tryout – solidly shocking everyone in my acquaintance, but it served its purpose when I was cast as Tzeitel. I’d had my hopes set on playing any one of the sisters and forgot until the read-through that I was playing the one whose wedding is a major showpiece of the play – and that I would be marrying Jude, made even more endearing in little round glasses.

I’d never had so much fun, before or since.

I left most of my high school mementos at home when we moved to the capitol but the Fiddler album has stayed with me, and from time to time I page through the photos, the notes that came with flowers from my parents and teachers, the programs that we all signed – and the subsequent ridiculous everyday notes from Jude addressed to “Wifey” and “Mrs. Kamzoil.”

Prom came around in April and our school required everyone to attend in pairs, so it was effectively decided over youth group pizza after a highway trash cleanup that I would be going with Jude. I’d nourished a pipe dream that Gale might magically materialize and ask me to go with him – you could attend with someone who had graduated and it happened now and again, with college freshmen coming back to escort their girlfriends – but when he actually did appear at the dance it was with Leevy, his flavor-of-the-month girlfriend, if the rumors were to be believed.

I still had my brown hair at prom-time, which Jude lamented to no end while alternately telling me that I was “gorgeous just the same” and making me laugh at the silliest things. The dance was a blast for the first two hours, and then Katniss and Peeta quietly revealed to our group that they were engaged, with plans to marry the following spring after graduation.

Their courtship had been rapid and intense – emotionally, not physically – and no one was surprised that marriage was forthcoming, but the timetable was shocking to say the least. None of us believed that Katniss was pregnant or anything of the sort but they were both barely seventeen, and neither had any interest in going on to college. Peeta had a career waiting at the bakery he loved and Katniss was supremely adaptable to almost any kind of work – and neither was closing the door on trade schools or vocational degrees, if a good fit should present itself. They had decided – rather practically – to spend their senior year planning the wedding and finding a home rather than fretting over the ACT and college applications, and they would get married at the end of May, before the weather got too hot and everyone headed off to college.

It was a preposterous and entirely sound plan.

Peeta and Katniss skipped the school-sponsored after-prom party, unsurprisingly, while the rest of us splintered off into contemplative pairs. Finnick and Annie and Luka and Johanna both seemed as good as engaged to me, but the announcement had rattled them as well, and Jude and I wound up watching the smarmy stage hypnotist by ourselves in a subdued sort of silence.

It wasn’t that either of us was unhappy at the news, exactly. While I considered Katniss my best friend, we had never been chatty in typical girlfriend-fashion, and yet her impending marriage struck my stomach like an icy stone. You’ll be going to college anyway, I reminded myself, and you’ll stay in touch, but none of this served to soothe.

Jude absently wrapped his tux jacket around my shoulders and then his arm, resting his cheek on the top of my head. He’d barely spoken since the engagement reveal and I couldn’t begin to guess what his uncharacteristic silence meant.

It sounds really nice, he said suddenly, softly. Staying right here, getting married, coming home to a wife and babies.

I wanted to retort something dry and mildly caustic but couldn’t find the words for any reply at all because it was nice, this future Peeta and Katniss were setting up for themselves. I wanted to continue with music as long as I could; to study abroad, to live in the capitol and maybe other cities in due course,, but that wasn’t the future either Katniss or Peeta wanted, and why should they force themselves through the college mold, going eyes-deep in debt for degrees they had no interest in and possibly jeopardizing their relationship with the distance and other, inevitable, obstacles when the future they both craved was easily within their grasp?

Madeline, Jude continued in that same soft tone – I was always Madeline or, affectionately, mädchen to him – if Columbine and Gale marry other people, will you go on a date with me?

Almost as long as Jude and I have been friends, we’ve been aware of each other’s hopeless longing for an oblivious sweetheart and openly commiserated about it, with no fear – or even thought – of annoying each other or hurting feelings. Butcher’s son Jude was in love with Columbine Wilhearn, all black curls and lovely voice, whose mother was a small-scale – if highly in-demand – clothing designer and I was in love with broody, breathtaking Gale, whose mother managed the local laundromat and who despised my very existence because, as the mayor’s daughter, I had surely been born to privilege – never mind that my father had been a music teacher before his election and that as mayor he served a rural town of some 8000 people and dealt with weighty matters like dog waste ordinances and ribbon cuttings for tiny antique shops.

We’d both made periodic, futile attempts to elicit our respective crush’s attentions, but somehow for the course of that year – the year of madrigal seat partners and Jane Eyre and getting married on-stage in Fiddler – the longing had felt a little less pressing. Jude still ordered flowers for Columbine on opening night – she was playing the female lead, after all – but in other circumstances he would’ve done so for every performance, not just the first, and he brought me flowers too – a vaseful of red tulips from his mother’s garden to brighten my corner of the greenroom. And while I knew he’d asked Columbine to prom their junior year – and been turned down, of course – I don’t think he even tried the next time around, just cheerfully stepped up to escort me when the opportunity arose.

In fact, to the outside observer, Jude and I probably appeared to be dating for the past year.

The realization left me cross, embarrassed and oddly weary. Jude and I were just friends, everybody knew it, but could we have inadvertently sabotaged each other’s crushes by spending so much time together? Would Gale have emerged to ask me out if I hadn’t been so immersed in the Mellark circle this year – and in Jude’s company in particular?

We’re at prom, I reminded him, my tone shorter than he deserved. I’m wearing an evening gown and your tux jacket. How much more of a date do you want?

I want to pick you up at your house, he replied without hesitation, a brush of lips against my lilac-threaded crown braid. Just you and me and maybe your dad on the porch, to shake hands and talk about the weather and remind me to have you back by 10:00, and I’ll tell you how beautiful you look as I slide an orchid on your wrist. We’ll go to a fancy restaurant and trade bites of our entrees and steal a pepper shaker when we leave, just to see if we can get away with it. We’ll hold hands under the table and slow-dance like it means something, not just because we came together and it’s obligatory, and when I drop you at home, you might let me kiss you under the porchlight.

I pulled away to look up at him, at those gentle smoky eyes – gray like Gale’s and yet absolutely, utterly, nothing like Gale’s – and tried to decide whether to throttle him or burst into tears, because I knew he didn’t mean any of this the way it sounded but it was still the sweetest thing I’d ever heard – and remains so to this day. But I didn’t want Jude – I didn’t, I was sure of it – and he didn’t want me, he was just getting broody – in the hen fashion, not the Gale fashion – because of Peeta’s engagement and Columbine had remained stubbornly indifferent to him, even in a tux or stage makeup or a doublet and tights.

Please, can I go home? I whispered. I’ll call my parents so you don’t have to leave.

Don’t be daft, he said lightly, but his eyes were sad. There’s nothing left to stay here for anyway.

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted Columbine at the soda table laughing at something Gale had just said and was inclined to agree.

I didn’t go home, though Jude was more than willing to make the detour: I went to Rooba’s, because she had a spacious house and had invited our whole group to stay over after the after-prom party, to sleep till noon and enjoy a lazy brunch before going home. We were a remarkably well-behaved group of teens so it felt more like a church lock-in than anything else, except for the fact that I changed into my pajamas from an evening gown and slept in Lettie Wilhearn’s bedroom – sans Lettie, of course, Rooba having given her older kids the weekend off work and banished them to the lake cabin.

Jude didn’t say a word on the drive. When we got to his house he asked if I wanted anything to eat or drink, then obligingly disappeared after retrieving my overnight bag and directing me to the nearest bathroom.

I belatedly recalled that I was still wearing his tux jacket and intended to hang it on the back of Lettie’s desk chair when I turned in, but somehow I ended up taking it to bed with me as an additional makeshift cover, my nose burrowed in the comforting scent of his collar.

I dreamt about orchid corsages and hand-kisses and sneaking a pepper shaker into my purse and woke with sore, slightly puffy eyes, as though I’d cried myself to sleep. Lettie’s alarm clock read 11:18am in the blaring midday sun and in the papasan opposite me was Jude, curled up like a child with a pile of throw pillows under his tousled head. His eyes were open and contemplative and very carefully focused on the pillow adjacent to me.

Hey, I greeted him in a sleepy croak.

Hey, he replied softly, eyes flickering to mine. Do…do you hate me, mädchen?

I blinked rapidly, trying to think what he might have done to make me hate him or if he was just referring to the fact that we’d ended up sleeping in the same room, which didn’t bother me two pins. We’d fallen asleep on each other on the bus back from Knowledge Bowl tourneys and music competitions more times than I could count.

Why on earth would I hate you? I puzzled.

Because I…asked you out, he reminded me with a wince while still firmly maintaining eye contact, as though determined to stay strong for his sentencing.

At prom, I confirmed, a smile creeping irrepressibly across my mouth. It’s a bit like being in love with one’s own wife, Sir Percy. Demmed unfashionable.

The Scarlet Pimpernel was second on the Senior Lit slate and Jude had loved it just as much as I loved Jane Eyre.

Consequently, my remark won a grateful, crooked smile and I patted the bed beside me: an invitation Jude accepted without hesitation, stretching out his lanky frame with a groan and a breathless oof! as I flung my arms around his waist and pillowed my head on his chest.

I liked the smell and feel of Jude beneath my cheek. It felt like home – or going back there – and I think in that moment I finally realized those moments were numbered and swiftly counting down.

I’ve never been asked out before, you know, I reminded him. It was sweet; the sweetest thing anyone’s ever said to me. And anyway, you potentially asked me out, under a very specific set of circumstances.

True, he agreed, and that seemed to set everything to rights. Want go find some breakfast? he wondered, tracing my braid with a fingertip.

No, I replied firmly and nuzzled deeper into his t-shirt, hiding my face from the sun.

Me neither, he agreed, and curled his arms around me, hugging me snugly to him.

Jude had clearly passed a rougher night than me because he drifted off almost immediately and was still sleeping hard at 12:30, when the savory smells of Rooba’s thick-cut bacon and handmade sausages roused my belly and brain respectively. (I learned later that Luka and Johanna had commandeered Jude’s bed, not for anything sketchy, but that they were curled together and sound asleep by the time he finally made it there, hence being relegated to Lettie’s papasan – a fine place for reading and cat-naps but miserable for a night’s worth of sleep.) On my way to the bathroom I practically collided with Jenny, Jude’s fourteen-year-old sister, noshing on a bacon sandwich and voracious for gossip.

So are you and Jude together now? she demanded with all the cheerful frankness of their mother. I saw you cuddling in Lettie’s bed.

I had always adored Jenny Tolliver more than I would ever let on. She and Jude were the only full siblings among Rooba’s five children and the similarities were endearingly obvious, despite the fact that Jenny inherited their father’s stunning black hair where Jude was a tow-headed, gray-eyed hybrid.

That was snuggling, I corrected her. Small but crucial difference.

You should think about leveling up, she advised gravely. He adores you, you know, and I hear teenage weddings are coming back en vogue.

Go away, imp, I teased, unbothered by her implication. She’d wanted me and Jude to get together since our first season of Knowledge Bowl and stubbornly refused to acknowledge that we didn’t like each other that way. I need to find some coffee and then we can argue this further.

I’ll be waiting, she said gleefully, stepping aside to let me into the bathroom.

But Jenny and I never reconvened for that argument, because that afternoon was the start of the slow crumble of the perfect high school year. Not because of anything to do with Jude or prom or Katniss’s engagement: because of something I overheard on my way to the kitchen that ended up being far more significant than I could’ve imagined.

Rooba and Marek – the Mellarks’ bachelor uncle – were preparing all the cooked food for the sleepy teenage brunch binge but Peeta’s father had stopped by with an assortment of pastries from the bakery and was on his way out again, talking to Rooba on the back porch, when I passed by en route to the kitchen.

So they’re young, she was saying. They’re hard workers with good heads on their shoulders, and they both went through the wringer at a young age. They know how to provide for a family and will do whatever it takes to put food on the table. They’ll do fine – better than fine, if we help them out a bit.

Janek Mellark’s response to this wasn’t clear – something about waiting – and Rooba replied in a strange, edged tone: Would you wait if Alys was willing?

I moved away before I could hear his reply, if indeed he made one, and enthusiastically engaged burly, cheerful Marek in a debate as to which of his offerings – stuffed French toast, chocolate chip pancakes, or Belgian waffles – would be the best to start off with, but there was a hot thudding in my ears and my eyes couldn’t seem to focus.

Alys, of course, was Katniss’s mother Alyssum – my mother’s best friend and confidante from childhood to the present – and I knew through my mother that Alys and Janek Mellark had been high school sweethearts on the very cusp of getting engaged when she unexpectedly broke up with him to get together with Jack Everdeen. Janek married Raisa Brognar – Rooba’s younger sister – on the rebound and everyone had gone on to produce their respective children and find varying degrees of contentment in their lives, but by all accounts, the Mellarks had rarely if ever been happy together, and of course, Katniss’s father died six years ago, leaving Alys bereft and in a stupor of grief, not unlike my own mother when her twin sister died at sixteen.

According to my mother, Alys Everdeen and Janek Mellark had carefully avoided each other since their breakup in high school, but when Peeta and Katniss began dating, they were thrown together to a certain extent and forced to interact socially. Further, in an unguarded moment that winter, Janek had admitted to Alys that he was still in love with her – feelings, Alys confessed to my mother afterward, that she was troubled to find she returned.

Of course, I discussed this with no one but my mother, though many a time I’d ached to confide in Jude, since we were similarly on the fringes of this relationship – not directly involved but connected through our mothers and their own relationships with the couple in question.

Something about Rooba’s remark that morning after prom implied that things were changing or had done, maybe irrevocably, and when I asked my mother about it that afternoon she gave a long sigh and kissed my forehead as though I were still a little girl. Do you really want to know, petal? she wondered. It might be easier to be ignorant till it all comes out.

Of course, I wouldn’t be me if I hadn’t wanted to know, and that’s how I learned what happened after the newly engaged Peeta and Katniss left for prom. About the argument that ensued when Alys furiously confronted Janek about his son’s proposal – and what happened after the argument.

I suppose it shouldn’t have come as that great a shock, but when you hear about a classmate’s parents getting divorced, you don’t think about his father sleeping with another classmate’s mother – or getting her pregnant. But it was some months before all of that came out, months when I could almost forget the secret burning in the back of my mind as the perfect year wound down to its inevitable, poignant end.

#the one that got away #fic bits #jude/madge #jude tolliver #modern au

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taettyung · 6 years

Text

Music to my ears - Part one

Pairing: Min Yoongi x Reader

Word Count: 1.5k

Genre: Angst, very very light implied smut, a bit of fluff, friends to lovers au

this was originally supposed to be a oneshot but its hard fitting all of this in one post and i got carried away so

The piano tune captivated you, the melody trapping you in a trance. You craned your head towards the song, wanting to hear more, wanting to get lost in the music.

“y/n, are you listening? Hellooo? Earth to y/n?” Nicole, your best friend, shook your shoulder.

You snapped out of your daze, frowning at your friend for interrupting you when you were listening to your new favourite song. As a pianist, you could appreciate the amount of skill needed to be able to play all these notes, the complexity of the piece calling out to you.

You were amazed at how it was played with so much feeling and…. passion, the music was amazing. And you absolutely knew you had to find out the name of this song.

“I’m going to the piano”

This time it was Nicole’s turn to frown at you “Come on, you already played it yesterday, plus there’s someone already playing it now” she huffed. You rolled your eyes at her, dragging her towards the piano to ask for the name of the song.

There was a guy around your age at the piano, his light blue hair sticking to his sweaty forehead, his eyebrows furrowed in concentration and his tongue peeking out as his fingers moved expertly against the black and white keys.

The song was coming to an end, you watched, amazed, as he finished off the song.

You found yourself walking up to him, although every cell in your body was absolutely intimidated by this boy. You felt unworthy to be in his presence.

You cleared your throat, catching his attention. God, you felt so awkward.

“Hi, um, I just heard you playing and, uh I uh, think you’re really talented. Also.. would you mind if I uh, ask the name of the piece you played? I want to try learning it.” you stuttered out, cursing yourself for sounding so timid.

Piano boy gave you a gummy smile and you felt your heart melt a little. Damn, he’s cute.

”Thanks. I actually composed the song myself. It’s still a work in progress.”

You stared at him, wide-eyed “Are you for real? That’s amazing! I wish I was that talented.” You were awed. He was one of a kind.

Piano boy flushed, rubbing the back of his head “Nah, it’s more of hard work than talent. I mean, I could tutor you on how to do it. I’m Yoongi, by the way.” He held his hand out to you.

“y/n.” You smiled, taking it. “And I would love to take up on that offer.”

Yoongi cocked his head to the side. “Well, guess I’ll be seeing you around, then, y/n. Meet me in the music room tomorrow. 6.p.m”

You opened the door to a brightly lit room, musical instruments at every corner. Yoongi sat at the piano, making annotations on some sheet music. He looked up as you shut the door

“Hey yoongs” you greeted as you took a seat next to him.

Yoongi raised an eyebrow up questioningly at the nickname. “Yoongs?”

You shrugged “It has a nice ring to it”

Yoongi smiled, shaking his head as he took out his phone, starting the lesson.

“Right. Now, making music is all about inspiration. If you think of a catchy tune or riff, you should record it, so you don’t forget about it. Look, I have a few saved.”

He started showing you videos of him humming a random melody, or playing a catchy riff on the piano. You could recognise some of them he had put in the song he played the day before

You spent about 30 minutes looking through those videos, taking note of some ways he implemented the tunes in some of his other songs that he had shown you.

Nothing could prepare you for what you swiped to next.

It was a video of his dick in his hand, sweat glistening off his forehead, furiously pumping up and down. Your jaw dropped and your breath hitched in your throat. You stared at his phone screen in shock, not knowing what to do.

Luckily, Yoongi had been looking away at that point in time, and you quickly swiped back, heart palpitating, hoping he wouldn’t notice how red your cheeks had turned.

You were in a daze for the rest of the lesson, knowing you would never see Yoongi in the same light ever again.

You started meeting up with Yoongi every few days for the next few weeks for songwriting tips and lessons, but you could never get that image out of your mind, the one of his hand gripped tightly around his length, beads of precum leaking from the tip.

You knew it was wrong, but a part of you couldn’t shake the image off. Just thinking about it made you squeeze your thighs together in hopes of relieving some of your frustration. You hated how turned on you got by that one stupid video

What kind of person even films themselves doing the do?

You tried your best to forget about it, and after alot of effort, you finally did. You concluded that Yoongi was a human with human desires and needs and that seeing the video was intruding on his private space in the first place. You forced yourself not to think about it.

Life went on, pretty much normal. You realised you and Yoongi had a lot in common, shared interests and dreams. He even persuaded you to join a songwriting competition you’d always wanted to try joining but never had the confidence to.

Soon, you and Yoongi became best friends, hanging out after lessons together, going to his house to eat. His mother even saved a spot for you at dinner, knowing that you usually ate alone in your house as your parents were both overseas in two different countries for work, only coming home to visit you once every few months or so.

Yoongi’s house became like your second home, and his parents treated you like their own daughter. They had even given you a spare key since you came over so often.

Yoongi was your best friend, but still, you couldn’t seem to shake off certain feelings when he would lightly brush his hand against yours, or when he smiled his gummy smile that would make your heart melt.

But he saw you as only a friend and nothing more, so you pushed those feelings into a dark corner where you’d never have to face them again.

[5.31p.m.]Yoongless: y/n come watch a movie at my house

[5.31p.m.]Yoongless: My parents are out for the weekend so I might have impulse bought 5 pints of ice cream and I need someone to help me finish it before they get back or I’m toast

[5.32p.m.]You: YOU DUMB CHILD

[5.32p.m.]Yoongles: IT WAS A BUY 3 GET 2 FREE DEAL

[5.33p.m.]You: why are you like this

[5.33p.m.]You: also, as much as I love free ice cream, I hAVE CHEMISTRY HOMEWORK DUE TOMORROW :”) SORRY

[5.34p.m.]Yoongless: Goddammit

[5.34p.m.]Yoongless: Nevermind

You chuckled at your phone before shoving it to a corner, sighing as you took out your chemistry worksheet. Fuck Redox, honestly. You could’ve been indulging in ice cream with Yoongi instead.

After about an hour and a half of crying over chemistry, you were finally done with whatever assignment you had. You slammed your textbook shut, shoving everything chemistry related on the shelves.

You glanced at the time.

At this point, Yoongi would probably be halfway through his second pint of ice cream, contemplating if he should throw the rest out or just get caught out by his parents.

You chuckled.

Grabbing the spare keys to his house, you pulled on a sweater and your boots, briefly checking your hair in the window reflection before jogging to his house, which was about 10 blocks away.

You decided against knocking the door, unlocking the door yourself and entering unannounced. Heck, Yoongi always did that, so he couldn’t complain when you did.

You burst through the door “GUESS WHO’S DONE WITH CHEMISTRY AND HERE FOR FREE I-”

You stopped abruptly,

Yoongi was sprawled on the couch, with a girl you vaguely remembered seeing around in school tangled in his arms. What was her name again? Diana? Deanna? You didn’t remember ever talking to her.

Her head rested in the crook of his neck as they laughed at the movie, both of them holding a bowl of ice cream each.

Your heart squeezed at the sight. You felt jealously seep into your bones, wishing you were the one Yoongi had in his arms.

The duo turned to face you upon your unceremonious entrance, the air thick with awkwardness

After about a minute of awkward staring, you finally spoke up

“uhhhh.. i was just about to leave, nice meeting you- i’ll just, see myself out” You mumbled, before hurrying out and shutting the door.

The whole way home, you were trying your best not to cry.

It was ridiculous, you knew.

But all those months of suppressed feelings came crashing down on you like a wave, mercilessly tearing you down.

When you reached home, you didn’t want to hold it in any longer

You couldn’t hold it in any longer

You let the tears flow out like rushing rain, hugging yourself tightly, as if you would fall apart any moment.

#min yoongi #yoongi smut #yoongi fluff #yoongi angst #suga smut #suga fluff #suga angst #bts fic

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desperatelyfullforever · 6 years

Text

Time for a Badly Written Out Omo Story!

So, remember how I said that I have tons of stories? Well, here’s one.

So, this story is me in marching band. A bit of info: tall dark-skinned girl, with curly hair that reached my shoulders and was often pulled into a puff ball. Tomboy, always wearing sweats/jeans and flannel. On this typical day however, I was not the person in dire need for a toilet. My friend was.

Let’s call her Angie. Tiny Hispanic girl without a lick of an accent unless speaking Spanish. She had long, curly/wavy hair, brown eyes, glasses, and barely stood past 5’0” at this point in time. Average body, she wasn’t overweight but wasn’t skinny either. Just a bit of pudgy belly that’s honestly adorable.

A bit more information about her: Angie typically, by some ungodly reason can go an entire school day without so much as a glance at a bathroom. I would know, I’ve known her for 7 years and she’s only urgently needed one about 6 or 7 times. So, to see her desperate is a godsend.

So, for this story, we were in high school. I’ll add that we’re both instrumentalists and thus played in our school’s marching band, her playing the clarinet while I played the trumpet. We typically did a football game for our high school varsity team once a week, while almost every week we had a competition. Then there were “double-headers”, where we would have both a football game and a competition in one day.

On this day, reporting time was 9am in the morning. Me being the good friend that I am, I call Angie and asked if she wants a coffee, because I’m on my way getting one. She said yes, got her a large. Got to school and she finishes it within ten minutes. No big deal, it was expected. We all arrive and go through today’s agenda: away football game in 2 hours, leave during halftime, arrive at competition, get home by midnight.

Not really surprised, honestly I expect it. Buses get there at 12:30, so we have a bit of time in between after a couple run-throughs. We get food, with her buying an iced tea and a water to wash the sugar out of her mouth. Both the water and tea are gone within an hour, and by the time we’re scheduled to leave we camp out in front of the school, waiting for the buses to arrive.

Did I mention that it’s incredibly hot on this day? Did I also mention how shitty the band uniforms are? Our uniforms are thick enough to trap heat inside in the summer, yet not thick enough to act as insulation in the winter. The band parents pass out water to all of us, Angie grabbing a couple.

Finally, the buses arrive. The school is roughly about a half hour away, and I sit with Angie. Normal conversation, nothing out of the ordinary. It’s at the tail end of the bus ride that I notice her a bit tenser than usual, wincing when zipping up the band uniform (they don’t stretch at all; sitting down in them is a pain because it typically just cuts into your body). “Are you okay?” I asked.

She blushed a bit. “I’m fine.”

I left it at that. Didn’t pry, didn’t ask. We finished changing and after the bus stopped, got off and heading to the game. For away games, we perform before the game unless a special request is made (such as the away team not having a marching band or some sort of halftime show), so we were asked to fill in for them. We warm up and get on the bleachers, not really allowed to play because we’re using the show as our warmup for the competition later that night.

I sit with Angie, and she’s quiet. A lot more than usual. She’s also a lot tenser than earlier, not saying anything and simply keeping to herself. “Are you sure everything’s okay?” I ask.

Allow me to describe the field. It’s fucking huge and a bit of a ways away from the high school, so there’s concession stands and bathroom (read: port-o-potties) on both sides. Today just so happens to be this high school’s Senior Day, so it’s packed with families and whatnot. She’s sweating bullets so, in concern and curiosity, I ask her, “Do you need something to drink?”

She stiffens immediately and vigorously shakes her head before stammering, “No! I mean, I…I’m good. I had a bit of water earlier when we first sat down.”

No, she didn’t. She hadn’t had anything since the bus ride, and I know the large coffee, iced tea, water bottle, and two smaller bottles of water earlier were starting to go through her. So, I decide to be a bit of a bitch and ask, “I had a lot to drink, I’m gonna head to the bathroom. Do you need to go?”

I can’t even begin to tell you how many emotions went through her eyes when I said that, and that right there told me that her bladder was, if not full, at the very least filling up enough to be of mild concern. Part of her wanted to say yes, while the other wanted to stay put. Guess what side won out?

“I’m fine. I don’t need to go.” Lies, but I left it there and went to the bathroom. Admittedly, if she had gone one of us would’ve been shit out of luck because I left to go pee around the middle of the first quarter, and the marching band leaves during the middle of the second quarter to warm up and prepare to march onto the field. I get back right as we are packing up to head onto the track surrounding the field, and Angie looks worse for wear. Typically, she’s a lot more hyper, but right now she’s quiet as hell and keeping to herself.

As we’re walking onto the field the band parents are handing us cups of water to drink before we go onto the field (right now it’s about 85 degrees, or roughly 29 in Celsius) and they won’t let us go until we finish it, so we do. Angie takes hers like it’s a damn shot and chucks the cup in the trash before putting on a face, marching to her section.

So, from that point we’re simply warming up, playing parts of the show, etc. About two minutes left on the scoreboard we stand on the track, waiting for the players to be done with the first half so we can perform. We march on in a block, with it going by grade: seniors, juniors, etc. Angie’s standing next to me, and she’s fidgeting. It looks more like her being impatient, but to the trained eye it’s clear she’s feeling full. She’s shifting from foot to foot just a tad while fiddling with her clarinet.

Finally, we perform, and let me tell you, our show this year had a TON of kneeling, running, etc. Keep in mind earlier I said how our uniforms don’t stretch, so the material digs into your skin. The show is eight minutes long, and after we perform we march off to load the buses immediately and to use the bathroom when we get to the next high school. We get on the bus, and drive to the next school.

Now, this ride is about 45 minutes long. Angie is clearly fidgety; she’s rocking back and forth and has her hands somewhat in her lap. I ask her again if she’s okay and she insists that she is. Then we hit a hard, hard bump and she gasps out loud before clawing at her uniform, saying she’s hot and wants a bit of fresh air before we march again. Okay, fair, I don’t pry.

Halfway there, re run into traffic. She’s being way too obvious at this point, and I simply watch in silence while increasingly growing turned on. We get there an hour later, having barely enough time to get ready to perform. We’re told that we’ll use the bathrooms after, which is not going to end well; we’re the third to last band, so we can’t wander too far because the second band just gets to the sidelines while the last band performs. We quickly put our instruments away and the vast majority of kids haul ass to the bathrooms or getting food. Angie and I are captains, so we straggle behind to make sure everything’s okay with our respective sections. All five of the kids in her section hands her their clarinet so that they can rush to the bathroom (she’s known for never needing the bathroom, so they just assumed), and she’s squirming like hell. Her legs are crossed and she just can’t seep to get comfortable. By this point in time, it’d be stupid to rush to the bathroom because everybody is already in line, so she’d have no chance in getting in one until after the awards.

Finally, everybody comes back. Her section takes their instruments from her, and the second they do I notice her frantically unzip her uniform (it’s two layers, a jacket over an overall-type pants that zip up in the front) and sighing in relief. It’s still warm out, so the band parents once again hand out cups, and she once again chugs it.

Boring part of it is sitting through awards. She sat near family so I didn’t really get a good look at her, but the awards lasted for about 75 minutes before we closed (about 16 bands performed, and there were a lot of awards and scores such as best drumline, best color guard, etc.), so we ended roughly on schedule (we got to the football game before around 1ish, the game started at 2, we performed at 4:30, left at 5:15, got stuck in traffic until 7:30, performed at 8:10ish, last band performed at 10:15, awards started at 10:45, and ran until midnight).

I finally meet up with Angie who’s looking entirely too anxious to leave. “I’m hungry,” she says to me, grabbing my hand and pulling me from the crowd. “Can we get food?”

I know why she wants to go. The bathrooms are right next to the concessions. Luckily, we need to leave right away because it’s so late, so the band parents had already brought food for us to eat. We grab food and drinks and board the bus again. Of course, people are being asses and using chairs as tables for plates so there are less seats. I let Angie sit in my lap as we sit by the window.

In order for both of us to be comfortable I basically wrap my arms around her so that she stays steady, which means putting pressure on her bladder. The moment I do this she winces and crosses her legs tightly (by this point we’re out of uniform, both of us in shorts and a t-shirt). I say nothing for the most part.

About five minutes in, she gets a phone call with her parents asking me to take her home. Sure, I don’t mind. We’re gonna get home after 1 in the morning, so I didn’t mind in the slightest. But that meant waitng even longer, because I typically help unpack everything, and that takes about twenty minutes.

Anyway, another few minutes pass and she begins to tremble on and off. There’s times she’s still yet tense, other times she’s squirming like fuck. She slips a bit after a bump, and I naturally tense my arms to catch her. I push a decent amount on her bladder, and she gasps loudly while grabbing herself.

“Are you sure you’re fine?” I ask. “It looks like you need to…”

“Don’t say anything,” she cuts me off as she rips her hands away. “I’m…fine…” this is said while she’s tense as fuck and rocking back and forth in my lap.

I shrug, smirking. “Do you mind handing me my water, then?”

Of course, that fucks with her hard. She grabs it out of my bag and moans, “Oh, fuck,” from feeling the condensation, tossing it onto the seat next to us. She grabs herself again and wheezes, “Fuck, I need to pee damn it!”

Finally! With her saying it she finally gives in, whimpering while rocking her hips back and forth. She’s grinding into me pretty hard, rubbing against me every so often to work me up pretty damn good. “How much time left before we get to the school?” she whispers.

“About a half hour left.”

That only seems to make her need to go more, as she clutches herself. I sit there, not knowing what to say until a few moments later she goes, “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”, grabs my hand and places it over her crotch, pressing her hands over mine while grinding into it.

Cue me overwhelmingly horny and turned on beyond belief at this point. I’d never thought I’d see the day where Angie’s dying for a piss, yet here she is, grinding into my hand while sitting in my lap. Unconsciously, I begin massaging her with the palm of my hand while relishing the sight in front of me.

Allow me to tell you how the hell we didn’t get caught. It was dark as hell inside the bus, and we were near the very back. Plus, the majority of kids were already knocked out from exhaustion. We’d only get caught if someone heard or was looking for it.

Here we are, with her grinding into my moving hand when I feel a spurt against my fingers. She moans and curls into a ball, rocking her hips harder. “Help, please,” she pleads.

Well, she asked.

Instantly I pull her against me even more and tilt her head to mine, kissing her. At first she’s understandably shocked to hell and back, but after a desperate grunt she kisses back. I rub my hand faster against her, making sure to get enough friction through her shorts.

I move from her lips and begin kissing her neck, urging her to keep quiet. She grabs at my legs and cocks her head to the side to give me more access, biting her lip. Did I ever mention that she’s bi, and we’ve had a crush on each other for the longest time? At this point we’ve had unresolved sexual tension like you wouldn’t believe, hence this situation happening like it did.

Anyway, after a lot of heavy petting I decide to risk it and slip my hand underneath her shorts into her slick folds, rubbing her clit while putting a bit of pressure on her bladder to see how she responds. She shivers and grinds harder into my hand, whispering words in Spanish. “Si bebe, no te atrevas a parar.” So, I keep going.

I never fully bring her over the edge because I don’t want her to cum and accidentally lose it, plus it’s just too good to be true for me and I don’t want it to end. By the time we get back to the school she’s leaked a couple more times and can’t keep a hand from between her legs, whether it’s mine or hers. I help pack everything away, with her standing to the side squirming and shuffling around.

I rush a bit and finish five minutes early, hurrying her to the car. Angie lives about ten minutes from the school so it’s not horrible, but right then and there it felt way too short. So, I stop for gas. It’s at this point that she’s on the verge of tears and is frantic as fuck in the car; both hands between her legs, legs moving back and forth, constant crossing and re-crossing, whimpers and moans, and so on. By the time I pull off she gasps again, louder than ever. “I can’t hold it, I’m gonna go, I’m gonna pee!” she whines, looking around as if there’s something she can go in.

“You better not piss in my car,” I warn.

She moans again and rips her shorts down, as if to squat down. “Don’t you fucking dare,” I growl. She finally lifts her shorts back up and continue holding it in, but now I hear steady, sharp leaks. By the time I get her to her house she’s so full it’s insane. She steps out of the car, makes it two steps and the damn bursts. She moans loudly it concerns me, until I notice the HUGE mess. A puddle already is forming, and she looks so relieved.

She takes about two minutes to finish, before inviting me inside and us finally sleeping together.

#desperatelyfullforever #female #omorashi #story

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shatteringzimmermann · 6 years

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hello yes hi i got bored here’s part one

Shitty found him leaning heavily on the kitchen sink, the coffee pot beside him gurgling quietly.

"You okay?"

Jack glanced over his shoulder at his roommate. "Had another weird dream," he said. "I was-" he waved his hand in front of his face and he turned to lean against the sink. His eyes were shadowed and bloodshot. "-blind. Stumbled around for what felt like hours, bumping into shit and nearly breaking my ankle falling off what must have been a curb or a rock." He cursed quietly. "There were other people there too, loads by the sound of all the voices. All blind and bitching about it."

Shitty hopped onto the island counter. His ass was a little closer to the corner than he had intended, but Jack's reoccurring-but-not-exactly-the-same dreams had been happening for months.

"And remember how I had that dream where everything was black and white until I met someone and then everything was in color?"

Shitty nodded. That was three months ago, and not even the first dream Jack had told him about.

"It was the same idea, but I guess I bumped into the right person and suddenly I could see." Jack frowned. "There was a lot of trash littered all over the place.” The crease between his eyebrows deepened. "I was wearing mismatched sneakers."

"Brah," Shitty said. "But what did they look like? Did you see them this time?"

The coffee pot chirped and Jack pulled two mugs from the cabinet. "No, but I'm starting to think it's a man," he said.

"Any reason why you might think that?"

Jack handed Shitty his Harvard Law mug and wrapped his fingers around his own Falconers one. "Just a feeling."

"Is this a...good feeling?"

Jack's right eyebrow rose.

"You know what I mean, man."

Jack hummed. "Yes, Shitty. It's cool that this mysterious person who may or may not be real but that I keep dreaming about may be male. I’m well aware I haven’t publically dated someone of any gender in years but I’m still okay with this dream person being a dude."

"Asshole."

It made Jack smile and when he glanced out the window over the sink again he saw a flash of honey blonde hair before it disappeared in the rush of the morning commute sidewalk below.

"Tell you what," Shitty said. "Start writing this shit down and I'll have my girlfriend paint you a book of these bizarre-ass dreams."

"Girlfriend? When did that happen?"

"Get that shit-eating grin off your beautiful face. It's the girl I told you about weeks ago."

Jack hid his smile behind another sip of coffee. "Eh. She needs to pass the bathroom test."

Shitty's mustache dipped into his light coffee, leaving the hairs looking like a paintbrush dipped in dirty water from a too-much-white canvas. "The fuckin what?"

"Bathroom test. Marty told me he started doing it with his girlfriends over the years and his wife was one of the few who passed."

Shitty frowned. "This isn't some sexist shit is it?"

Jack shook his head. "When she comes over for a long weekend, how much of her girly crap takes over your bathroom?"

"Literally none of that matters," Shitty protested. "She can do whatever she wants to feel good about herself. Why even do something this stupid anyway?"

Jack rinsed his empty cup and tucked it into the top shelf of the dishwasher. "You're right, overall it doesn't matter. But you're not the kind of guy who wants a super high maintenance chick making him late all the time cause she’s still getting ready. You're more of a 'sorry we're late, we got stoned and were halfway through a box of donut holes before we realized the time.'"

It made Shitty chuckle, but he shook his head. "While that last part may be true, I don't give two shits if she wants to use fruity body wash or wear makeup."

Jack shrugged. "It's not a pass/fail text, eh? Just something to notice."

Shitty hummed before pouring himself another mug. He’d decided, way back in high school, that relationship tests were stupid. A decade and a degree-and-a-half later, he hadn’t changed his mind. Jack, sweet, stupid Jack, hadn’t sat through entire semesters of Women’s Gender and Sexuality classes. Maybe there was a book Shitty could get Jack, maybe something comparing women’s rights from the American Revolution to modern day. It wouldn’t be as educational as having to sit through many classmates’ personal stories that still clung to his mind and changed the way he treated everyone around him, but maybe it would open the door for more conversation.

It was barely a week later when the next dream happened. Two days after that, another. Then another and another and- Matching birthmarks, coincidentally identical tattoos, first words memorized by longing hearts. Palms that warmed when held by a soulmate.

The dreams didn't bother Jack, per se, but the way he felt after was enough to pull him from bed and turn on the bathroom light. Dark shadows had been lining his eyes for most of his life but these dreams made it harder to pretend they weren’t there. It wasn’t sleeplessness that caused the shadows, either; Jack had always been too close with the ache in his chest. Sometimes he could keep it at an arms-length away. Sometimes it grabbed him by the waist and held him tight no matter how much Jack fought.

Jack sat up, sheets falling to his waist, and buried his face in his hands. Breathing deeply for a few moments, Jack focused on the things he could feel and hear to ground himself in reality. He switched on the light when he finished. A history book titled 1776 sat on his nightstand and Jack pulled it off, opening it to his marked chapter.

The words blurred after a few pages. He sighed, pressing his thumb and forefinger into his eyelids.

He was Jack Zimmermann, the first out bisexual NHL player. He’d never had to go a day without food or shelter and had gone to the most expensive rehabilitation center in Montreal after his accidental overdose. His parents ended each twice-weekly phone call with a we love you and we are so proud of you. And Shitty, who ran into Jack in a bar bathroom after a Falconers win talking himself through the beginnings of a panic attack, had quickly turned into his best friend. He was a good roommate too, prompt with the meager rent Jack charged and ready for a snuggle when Jack’s anxiety climbed to a suffocating level. Jack could hear him snoring from across the condo; the noise had been one of the things he’d used to center himself in the now.

Jack dropped his book back on the nightstand, tossing his bookmark on the cover and turning off the light before turning away. He grabbed the extra pillow from the other side of the bed. He hugged it against his bare chest, squeezing tightly until his lungs reminded him to exhale. The cool fabric sent a ripple of goosebumps down his back and arms. Pulling the covers over his shoulder helped, but that coldness had settled into his chest a long time ago and no amount of distant lovers, platonic snuggles, and proud parents had ever been able to warm it. They stopped it from getting worse, from every ounce of his insides turning into a deadly winter storm like the ones he weathered inside a warm home, but sometimes…sometimes his feet were too numb to walk toward the laughing brunette at the cookout Marty had over the summer and his fingers were frostbitten when he thought about reaching out to the tan-skinned man with the sweet smile at the last Pride Parade.

The morning summer sun found Jack wearing thick sweatpants and a hooded sweatshirt, eyes open and body shivering underneath enough blankets to melt ice.

When he finally emerged from his room, still wrapped in one of the blankets, Shitty poured him a coffee and slid it across the island.

“What was it this time?”

Jack held the too-hot mug between his palms. “No dream,” he said.

Shitty’s eyebrows rose as they drank in silence.

“My last class is over at 12:30 and I could be back by 1:15,” his friend offered.

“I thought you were hanging out with your girlfriend?”

He spread his arms wide. “Brah. You come first.”

“Bros before hoes?”

“Yes, that’s right, brothers should always come before gardening tools.” It was a familiar banter. Jack’s shoulders lowered a few inches.

“Hang out with your girl. I have meetings all day anyway.”

It wasn’t a lie. He just had an hour and a half between his three meetings. Maybe he could manage a nap in the team room after morning skate.

His skin prickled the second he locked the condo door, body unhappy with the lack of thick clothing in the hallway air conditioning. The few minutes he spent getting into his car and then out of it again at the rink was the only time he felt relatively warm.

Jack’s teammates were familiar enough with his not-very-god days that no one bugged him about his sloppiness on the ice. He showered and changed quickly after Coach called the end of practice. His first meeting was with some journalists from Samwell, the college his mother went to. If he’d gone to college, Jack imagined he would have gone there. A couple of their guys had been drafted in recent years so clearly they were of elite caliber. Johnson and Oluransi, if he remembered right.

The journalism students were nice; professional and understandably nervous. Jack made sure to chat with them for a few minutes before the interview started. Idle chit chat to get them used to him, to the way he spoke, to get over the fact that on my god that’s Jack Zimmermann. Their questions were ranged: everything from how he managed to still be drafted six years ago despite missing a full year of competition, to the charity he started in Providence.

“So much of my life has been obsessed with hockey. I wanted to create something that had nothing to do with it. This Colorful Home is about finding safe, long-term foster families for queer youth. No one deserves to become homeless or forced into unhealthy and dangerous living conditions because of their orientation or identity. I was raised by amazing and supportive parents who love me, not despite my mental health issues or my sexuality, but including them. They are the majority of why I'm still alive today. And-and the thought of children not having the same support system because of who they are-” He shook his head. “It's unacceptable.”

The students were all leaning back in their seats, faces paler than earlier. Jack huffed a quiet laugh. After a silence that had Jack reaching seven before anyone spoke again, there were a few more questions until the students were finished. He made sure to take photos and pass out signed t-shirts.

When they left Jack retreated to the team room. There was no one else around to notice when he stopped hiding the way his hands shook. No one saw him go through his grounding routine or press the heels of his palms in his eyes. He'd gotten good at making people believe his anxiety was well-controlled and easy to live with. It's part of why he almost always agreed to interviews; the more normalized he can make bisexuality, the more people will realize he’s not a walking petri dish of STIs. The more normalized he can make anxiety, the less it will involve silent, life-long struggles. Maybe he could keep someone else from overdosing, someone who doesn’t have a teammate to find them before it was too late.

He was back to his media-ready façade for his next interview. It’s with a reporter from the local newspaper, an older woman Jack respected more than most people who got one-on-ones with him. Her questions always required more than the blanket “Well, we need to get the puck in the net” kind of responses. She never looked annoyed when he took too long to respond. Hopefully she wasn’t just pretending to be fine with it but calling him an idiot in her head.

Jack didn’t tremble as much after this interview, but it’s easier to handle a smaller chat than one with a bunch of people he didn’t know. There was still no chance of a nap. He sat on the overstuffed couch again, lights off, and did enough deep breathing that he got lightheaded.

His last interview was to brainstorm ideas for his upcoming You Can Play campaign. A few other guys in the league were out – Oluransi being one of them – and Jack wanted to do something with all of them. For starters, they’d all been using pride tape for every game. The tape company had even started making more color pairings for more sexualities.

That’s where Jack had gotten the idea for the name of his charity. Most non-LGBTQIA people didn’t realize the amount of colorful flags made for specific orientations. Jack had googled them and scrolled through for nearly two hours, reading the descriptions and history of all of them. So many colors, so many people, choosing to celebrate themselves. Jack had bought a bisexual one immediately.

His sticks were always wrapped in the blue, purple, and pink tape made especially for him. Trilman, a forward on the Schooners, used it too. Oluransi used the rainbow as did four other players. The Devils’ goalie used a black, purple, and white tape for asexuality.

By the time Jack dumped himself into his car a lose plan had been formed: This summer, post-Cup, all the out players would go on a US and Canada tour to speak to youth teams. Jack wasn’t sure how much it would help, to speak out against homophobia, transphobia, and racism in sports, but he had a list of colleges and junior teams to call over the next few weeks. It was a start.

Shitty found him less than an hour later, curled up on the couch in the blanket Jack had left there that morning. Jack wasn’t asleep – far from it- and his eyes ached as Shitty wrapped himself around Jack. He smelled faintly of weed and hot wings and cheap beer. When Jack could finally feel enough of himself to speak again his voice was hoarse.

“How as your date?”

“Fun. You’ll like her. She’s cool as hell.”

“Hell is hot.”

Shitty patted his cheek with a condescending touch. “It’s a good thing you’ve got that wonderful hockey ass,” he said, smiling.

Jack hummed, wishing he could rub his eyes but Shitty was latched on too tightly. “I think my baby cup pictures negate any attractiveness.”

After a pause Shitty rearranged himself so he straddled Jack’s lap, weight carefully held off of the knee that had been plaguing Jack for several years. Holding Jack’s face in his hands, Shitty told him, softly but firmly, “Everyone is embarrassed by shit they did as a kid. Your brain likes to remind you about it more than the non-mentally-ill person’s brain, yes, but what you did as a baby- or even something you did last week- doesn’t detract from your attractiveness.”

Jack opened his mouth to protest but Shitty continued. “Brah, you didn’t kill anyone or steal candy from any babies. And while we are definitely going to have a talk about that stupid bathroom test you’re not any less attractive or less worthy of love because of the struggles you’ve gone through.”

He felt the immediate tension in Jack’s jaw. “You’re my best friend, and nothing is going to change that.”

Jack had to pull his face away. Shitty pressed his hands on Jack’s shoulders instead. The pressure was enough for Shitty to feel the way his friend’s heart was pounding in his chest. Jack’s expression wasn’t one he recognized though; years of friendship and all he could tell was that Jack’s heart was breaking, and he didn’t know why.

“Brah,” he said, squeezing his hands gently. “You can talk to me about anything.”

Jack kept his mouth firmly shut but nodded. His gaze was hard, directed over Shitty’s shoulder. The only thing for him to stare at there was a blank section of the wall. Maybe he would put his next photo print there.

Twenty minutes later Shitty was sitting beside Jack, watching Netflix with Shitty’s legs draped over Jack’s lap. The blanket was spread over them, jostling every time Shitty laughed.

Jack was asleep before the end of the third episode.

#when i finish i'll post it on ao3 #omgcp #check please #cp #zimbits #yes i made jack an asshole there on purpose #he didn't go to college and therefore doesn't get the education canon jack gets #he'll learn to be better in this story i promise #i wanted to work on character growth #anna is lame #omg check please #eventual zimbits #soulmate tag #or is it

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easyfoodnetwork · 4 years

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The Best Thing I Can Do for Harlem Right Now Is Feed People

Marcus Samuelsson serving food in front of the Red Rooster | World Central Kitchen

Since the beginning of the pandemic, Marcus Samuelsson’s regulars have changed, and so has his idea of what it means to feed a community

This is Eater Voices, where chefs, restaurateurs, writers, and industry insiders share their perspectives about the food world, tackling a range of topics through the lens of personal experience. First-time writer? Don’t worry, we’ll pair you with an editor to make sure your piece hits the mark. If you want to write an Eater Voices essay, please send us a couple paragraphs explaining what you want to write about and why you are the person to write it to [email protected].

On May 30, I joined hundreds of people from Harlem for a peaceful protest. From the oldest to the youngest, all had come out to listen and to stand with the leaders of the community, and it made me feel proud to be a Harlemite.

As I stood in the crowd, waiting to give the speech the organizers had asked me to prepare, an elder told me, “I was here when Malcolm was killed; I stood here when Martin Luther King was killed.” Normally, I don’t get nervous about speaking in public. But here, now, in the days of Ahmaud Arbery, of Breonna Taylor, of George Floyd, I felt the weight of this moment. I took a deep breath and drew strength from looking out at our community. I spoke about my son, Zion, and the conversations I have to have with him. I described the three things that Zion loves: chasing after birds in the park, running, and police officers.

Every Black parent knows you have to have the Talk with your child. I thought I would have it with Zion when he was around 12 or 13. Now, I realize that it will have to happen much, much sooner. Zion sees police officers at the park every day and thinks they’re the coolest people in the world. How do you make a 4-year-old understand that things can go another way?

These are the kinds of things that I and many of the people here in Harlem carry every day. For the last three months, we have carried them in addition to the weight of the coronavirus pandemic, which is itself loaded with much of the same weight of racism, given that it disproportionately affects Black and Latino communities: Nationally, Black people make up less than 13 percent of the population, but represent 22 percent of all COVID-19 infections — which also kill Black Americans at twice the rate as white Americans. They’re part of the same story.

When I ask myself what I can do as a chef, I always go back to what I know: Feed the people. But what serving the people means now has changed from what it meant a few months ago. Back then, I knew I was doing a good job because of my regulars. At the Red Rooster, the backbone of our success has always been the diners who show up every Monday to eat, drink, and jam with the band, or the folks who come every Sunday for brunch and gospel music. As a number of our customers can attest, many of our friendliest regulars were longtime Harlemites who were happy to strike up a conversation with other locals, downtowners, and out-of-towners alike.

When I ask myself what I can do as a chef, I always go back to what I know: Feed the people.

In the second week of March, the pandemic changed everything. As restaurant dining rooms across the city shuttered and New York went into a state of lockdown, we had to decide what to do next. We could have closed or pivoted to takeout, but it was clear that the only real option was to continue to feed the community, which was immediately in need as jobs and resources vanished overnight. We placed calls to potential donors who could support our efforts; one of the first was to my friend chef José Andrés. We partnered with his World Central Kitchen to become a community kitchen, giving out meals to those in need. Our first customers were the homeless, followed by the newly freed former inmates whom Rikers Island drops off on the corners of 145th and 125th streets. We also started seeing customers from the two methadone centers next to the Whole Foods on 125th Street.

As New York’s lockdown continued, the ranks of my new regulars has only grown: The line outside now comprises school teachers, construction workers, the people who used to run the mom-and-pop shop around the corner, and cooks and hospitality workers from other restaurants. Some hop off the bus and get in line; others pull up in their cars. By the time we begin serving at 10:30 a.m., there’s already a line halfway down the block. The hardest part of my day is when we realize we have only 150 meals left and need to tell people, “That’s it for today.”

My new regulars are like any regulars: They have preferences. “Hey, chef! I liked the chicken better yesterday.” Or, “I don’t need an apple; I don’t have teeth.” They still want to talk, with each other, with me. They’re cordial, and they remain kind to each other. They stand on line and call out encouragement. “What’s up, chef? You did it on the chicken!”

But grimmer conversations also float by. I hear people asking each other if they know someone with the ’rona. An older gentleman who showed up every day at noon is suddenly gone. “Where’s he at?” my regulars ask, looking around for his familiar face. Someone on the line tells us, “’Rona took him away.” We share our grief six feet apart.

Harlem has given me so much: dear friends, teachers, and a sense of place and home. When the pandemic broke out, being from Ethiopia helped give my family perspective: Tuberculosis killed my mom; Ethiopia has been ravaged by drought and numerous pandemics. Even as many New Yorkers contemplated leaving — or did leave — we knew we couldn’t leave Harlem, a place that has music and dignity, and whose people have each other. Now, more than ever, I need to be here, helping people, feeding every hungry mouth I can.

So this has become my new normal: walking to work, phone in hand, juggling calls while making sure we have the kitchen team up and ready to serve, and making family meal when I can. Robert is managing the line and making sure people are social distancing; after they leave, he’s on cleanup, too. Jamie, our server, is talking to people like she would when she worked the line at Ginny’s. “Come on over, honey,” she tells them. She also talks them through the ins and outs of social distancing, and how they have to keep six feet apart while waiting for their meals. We have Courtney expediting, and she’s quick: “Chef! Two top, three top, four top!”

The people who stand on line tell us how many are in their own families — two, four, six — and we give them what they need. On a fast day, 1,000 meals are served in an hour and 45 minutes. And every day, I ask myself: How can we serve more people?

The answer is that we can’t do it alone. We can serve more by enlisting more restaurants to cook alongside us to serve our community. World Central Kitchen has brought on neighborhood restaurants like LoLo’s Seafood Shack, Vinateria, and Melba’s, friends and partners that have long been a part of Harlem EatUp! — our annual festival celebrating the food, culture, and spirit of Harlem. Building a network of restaurants in our community means we can meet the growing demand of those in need: All in all, 3,000 to 4,000 people a day can now be fed in Harlem through World Central Kitchen.

In getting to know my new regulars, I know that who and how we serve will be changed forever.

This is happening as the restaurant industry takes baby steps toward a new normal. Three months into the pandemic, people are tired and scared — of working and of not working. We’ve got gloves and masks on, but the fear is there; my cooks have families to go home to, too. But everybody knows that we have to stand together or we’re all going to fall apart. The pandemic has cast a searing light on how interdependent we are. As we have been forced to be socially distant, we have also been made painfully aware of how much we need one another to survive and thrive.

We’ve been able to rehire employees at all three of my restaurants. At the Rooster, we pay $20 per hour. That’s almost double the state’s minimum wage of $11 per hour, because we know essential workers deserve higher pay while putting their health on the line, and coming as close we can to paying people their worth is part of how we climb back from this crisis — and also begin to address the issues of economic justice and fair pay, which go to the heart of the sweeping systems that the ongoing protests aim to address.

Right now, so much is unknown. I don’t know what is coming, for the Red Rooster or the world, or what the new New York is going to look like. But one thing I know is that I’m still serving customers. And in getting to know these new regulars, I know that who and how we serve will be changed forever. Restaurants were built to restore, which is why we won’t stop serving the neediest when the pandemic ends. Building partnerships like the ones we have with World Central Kitchen, Citymeals on Wheels — which I’ve worked with for years — and local food banks is something that will grow and evolve so that our kitchens can continue to be of service to the most vulnerable in our communities, particularly as the pandemic continues to reveal who is most at risk, from both the disease and our country’s systemic racism.

Service. Community. Unity. That’s what I saw in the sea of people who gathered to peacefully protest that afternoon. That’s what gives me strength at a time when it has felt so hopeless. Our community has taken shape and come together within my industry too, most visibly in the recent creation of the Independent Restaurant Coalition. With my Black chef brothers and sisters, Melba, Mashama, Nina, Kwame, JJ, Nyesha, we call upon each other. We share stories, we compare notes, and we enjoy the gratification of being able to tap into a network beyond our own kitchens.

Now, more than ever, that kind of network is vital for helping to promote practices like more inclusive, local hiring. Our kitchens must reflect our community from the inside out. It’s our responsibility, but also our opportunity, to have a broader and more inclusive vision for both who we serve and how we rebuild our businesses. We each have our job to do, our voice to raise, our strength to give.

Marcus Samuelsson is the James Beard Award-winning chef behind restaurants including Red Rooster Harlem and Marcus B&P in Newark, New Jersey, as well as the author of Yes, Chef and the Red Rooster Cookbook: the Story of Food and Hustle in Harlem.

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Marcus Samuelsson serving food in front of the Red Rooster | World Central Kitchen

Since the beginning of the pandemic, Marcus Samuelsson’s regulars have changed, and so has his idea of what it means to feed a community

When I ask myself what I can do as a chef, I always go back to what I know: Feed the people.

In getting to know my new regulars, I know that who and how we serve will be changed forever.

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