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kiwisbell · 2 days

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helen ; chapter five

be seeing you

Si vis pacem, para bellum. Or, the choice.

series masterlist | my masterlist pairing: joel miller x f!reader tags/warnings: 18+ (MDNI), john wick AU, hitman!joel, husband!joel, established relationship, artist!reader, love as worship, sacrilege in the name of romance, flashbacks, graphic violence, guns, blood + injuries, tess cameo, childhood/religious trauma, criminal underworld, secrecy/lies, betrayal, ANGST, bamf miller bros, smut, fingering, joel is an emotional munch, shower sex, unprotected PIV, handjob, male whimpering, conflicting emotions, orgasms aplenty, Big Angst and Big Sad but also Big Epiphanies, ambiguous ending, i'm getting emotional writing these tags, it feels so final, the typical alcohol/smoking/profanity, dividers by @/saradika word count: ~ 9.3k a/n: hi, friends. i can't believe we're already at the end of the main story, and tbh if i think about it too much i'll probably cry. i want to thank @cavillscurls for beta reading this chapter as always and giving me the guidance and support i need. we'll have an epilogue after this chapter, so there's still more to look forward to, but nonetheless, i hope you enjoy and thank you so so much for reading. xoxo prev | next

Her eyes are so sad, you think, stepping back to take in the full scope of the canvas. It’s doused in paint from corner to corner, still wet to the touch, the woman and her lover intertwined so thoroughly that it’s difficult to tell where they both end. It’s in shades of glum blue and flecks of angry red and brown where his eye watches you. But it’s her eyes that cannot lift to meet yours. It’s her lashes that fan across her cheeks as she casts her gaze toward the bottom edge where the canvas is wrapped taut around the wood.

The sun will soon rise, but you haven’t slept. The contours of the sky are washed in a haze of greys and pale blues and light pink and the air smells warm, heavy—a storm about to roll in. The clouds on the horizon are thick with a blackening rage. You sit in the alcove by the window and put your temple to the cool glass. You yawn. Joel does not come back.

“Do you think it's true,” you asked him one night, your head on his chest, hand on his heart, “that art makes nothing happen?”

Joel, drawing shapes on your back, dozing off in the golden light of the sunrise, frowned. “Someone tell you that?”

“It's something my art teacher used to say,” you told him. “No matter how much it moves people, it doesn't do anything.”

“Your art teacher sounds like a fuckin’ downer.”

You laughed, hiking your thigh up over his hip and playfully biting his jaw. “So it's bullshit?”

“I think,” said Joel, tucking his chin to kiss the top of your head, “that your art makes people feel. It brings ‘em together. It's important because it's yours.”

You propped your head up on his chest and threaded your fingers through his too-long hair, overdue for a trim. A curl draped over his forehead, his beard patchy and soft under the pads of your fingers. “Sometimes I wonder why you chose me,” you said. “I wonder why the universe brought you to me.”

Joel shook his head, guiding his rough, callused fingers up your arm, curling them around your wrist, gently prodding your veins. “Wasn't the universe,” he said quietly. “Wasn’t a choice. I was yours the second I saw you. So, I guess it's your fault.”

You just rolled your eyes and kissed him, mouth to smiling mouth.

Your paintings may be yours, made with life and energy and colour, but when they are finished, they don’t move. They are stagnant as a heavy rock beneath a cliffside, washed over and over again by the cresting waves, its salt stolen for the water, eternal damnation to a fate of non-movement. And sometimes an artist will walk under the cliff, shove their easel into the fleshy ground the way a man erects his country’s flag in the earth he has stolen, and paint the rock. The artist is moved by the breathtaking colours of the shore and the way the wind flutters through the grass. But the rock does not budge. It never will.

Your art will never erupt from the boundaries of the canvas and tell you what it means. The lovers in your painting will not tear open their mouths like the seams holding a wound together. They will not tell you what they want, need, crave. They are you, and that is what you hate—because dimpled flesh and lustful fingers and the press of his mouth to her throat cannot tell you what you’re supposed to do.

You had become complacent in his love for you. You had let him press his worn hands to your body and pull your soul out through his mouth and you had been a wife, while all the time there was a stranger who occupied his heart, a spirit in an abandoned body. All the time, he'd been haunted. And although you had loved him, your love had not been enough to exorcise the guilt and trauma, pecking at him, an eagle at his liver.

Crossing the room and sitting back down in front of the easel, you press your fingers to the corner of the canvas. The paint is cool to the touch, and you leave behind fingerprints where your signature should be. Pulling your hand back, you examine the accumulation of colour, the blues and reds swirling into the deep purple of a bruise, the bodies on a canvas that may only ever mean something to you, and you wonder, Is this all I am? A cautionary tale, a love lost? A fucking footnote at the end of a clause that reads: “See, for example, the one who never loved deeply enough to make it count”?

You bring your hand to your face to wipe away the tears beneath your eyes and blink hard at the sting, realising you’ve smeared paint across your cheekbones.

In the bathroom, you scrub furiously, the cloying scent of it clinging to your throat and your tear ducts, washing away the evidence of their entwined bodies, their love, your pain.

Once, you tried to get Joel to paint. You sat behind him on your bench, your legs bracketing his hips, your paintbrush in his hand.

“I don’t know where to start,” he said.

Your lips brushed the shell of his ear as you spoke. “There’s no rulebook.”

He tried to turn his head and kiss you, but you nipped his ear in reproach. “Remember when you took me out driving at the airstrip because you wanted me to feel the road? Think of this like feeling the canvas. Go on, cowboy. Make nothing happen.”

Joel’s painting still hangs over your shared bed. The intruders never found it, or never cared enough to destroy it. It’s a candle, just a candle, its lines imprecise, the paint unevenly applied in places, the shine of the flame more orange than yellow. But it’s a painting, so the candle always burns. He titled it Love.

The pain still sits low in your chest, pulling down your heart as if tied to it by a string. But Joel is still out there, fighting his way back to you, the way he always has, always will. You look down at your left hand, clutching the edge of the marble vanity, and decide to clean your wedding ring.

“I’m sorry, brother,” says Tommy, turning the gun on Joel.

“What the fuck are you doing?” growls Joel, struggling against his bonds. The clip rattles faintly in his brother’s hand as a tremor courses through him.

“He’s following my orders,” says Cabrera, clapping his hand down on Tommy’s shoulder. “Fascinating what a man will do when he must consider his family’s well-being.”

Joel sucks on his teeth, his eyes not once leaving his brother.

“It's my son,” Tommy says through his teeth. “It's Maria. If I don't do this—”

“Yeah? You gonna kill me, Tommy? Is that why your hand’s shakin’?”

“Shut your goddamn mouth,” his brother snaps. “You think I want to do this? I gotta save my family, Joel. You know what that's like.”

“All I’ve done for you,” says Joel, his hands curling into fists behind his back, “and you put a bullet in my head?”

“Not just your head, Joel,” says Cabrera. “When we're done with you, we’ll take your pretty girl as payment for my son’s life.”

Joel growls like a dog, blood roaring in his ears. “Kill me yourself, you goddamned coward. Kill me yourself and don’t you mention my wife again, or I swear to Christ—”

“You take His name in vain a lot for a nonbeliever,” says Cabrera, pulling his sleeves through his coat and setting his teeth as he looks toward Tommy once more. “Do it.”

“Yeah, brother,” Joel says darkly, “do it.”

Tommy nods once, planting his foot and pivoting. Five distinct sounds of handguns cocking echo throughout the warehouse as Tommy points the barrel between Manuel Cabrera’s eyes.

“Now that I’ve got a gun to your head,” he says evenly, “you can go ahead and pull that contract.”

Joel at last twists his wrists free of the ropes that bind them and shucks down the sleeves of his jacket to rub the raw skin. Not one soul does a goddamn thing to stop him as he rises to his feet. His chest heaves, his open lungs coarse and wet with a brittle rage, his exposed heart throbbing red, transparent as the stained glass windows of the church.

God does not tolerate anger, said the Sisters, again and again, bringing down the whip across his back. Sinew and bone and skin peeling back to lay bare some tender part of him they sought to rot out. Put your energy into His worship.

Slowly, Cabrera lifts his hands, sneering. “Your wife,” he warns, “and your unborn son—”

“Are family,” says Tommy. “Just like my brother. Now tell your guys to put down their guns and I won't kill you where you stand.”

Joel joins Tommy at his side. “Took you long enough,” he says under his breath.

“Got held up,” he says. “Your wife’s a good artist.”

“Yeah, whatever. You bring me a gun?”

“I’m sure you can find one yourself.”

“Jesus, Tommy. I’m too old for this.” Joel turns to Cabrera and glares at the same stubborn arrogance that once gleamed in his son’s eye. “You pull the contract, and I’ll leave for good.”

Cabrera’s laugh weans out in the air like rings of smoke. “You think you can really leave, Joel? You think that there won't be consequences for what you've done to my son?”

“Yeah,” says Joel, “I think I’ll take my chances.”

“And you?” Cabrera’s lip curls up at Tommy, whose gun no longer wavers in his grasp. “I promised your wife and child security. You’re willing to throw that away?”

“My wife and child are safe because I don’t take deals from men like you,” says Tommy. “You trusted a Miller to turn on his own blood, Manuel. That was stupid. Now pull the contract.”

“So this is your great suicide mission.” Cabrera smiles, a man who knows he has lost or a man who still expects not to. “A man who has seen Hell does not willingly descend back into its depths—not unless he likes the taste.”

Joel feels the corner of his mouth twitch, a wound on his cheek reopening. “Maybe I do,” he says plainly. “Maybe it’ll taste even better when I take you down with me.”

The gleam in Cabrera’s eye shifts as his gaze flickers behind Tommy. Night has since descended, and yet the predator’s eye glints in anticipation of the hunt. Joel turns and shoves his brother out of the way—just as the shot rings out.

He hears Tommy’s breath punch out of him as they both hit the concrete hard. Joel tears the handgun from his brother’s grasp and puts a bullet between each of the two men behind them. He rolls behind one of the hulking bodies and holds up his weight as a shield against the incoming bullets. Tommy takes the dead man’s gun and fires at the remaining three assailants. Only one shot misses, but Joel sends his brother a look anyway and finishes the job.

“Rusty,” grunts Tommy, pushing himself to his feet.

Joel grimaces as he accepts his brother’s outstretched hand, his wrists bleeding from the relentless rub of the ropes. “He ran,” he says, grinding his teeth. “Goddamn coward. Just like his son.”

“Yeah, you’re welcome, by the way,” says Tommy, giving Joel the dead man’s gun and snatching back his own. “Saved your ass.”

“And he got away.” Joel kicks his chair, and the clattering echo of metal reverberates like a choir off the cavernous walls. His hands flex, open, closed, open, closed, until they make tight fists and he can see nothing but red and the silver moon mocking him through the broken windows high above.

“Joel…”

For a moment, he hears the young boy his brother once was, whispering across their shared bedroom to him in the middle of the night when they were both meant to be asleep.

Joel… Are we going to be okay?

“I gotta finish it, Tommy,” he says quietly, his hands shaking loose. Parts of him bite and sting, touched by new and old wounds alike, and he wants to come crawling home to you. He wants to curl into your side and wash away the blood in your cleansing pool, daisy and honeysuckle, some faraway field where you are the warden, where he knocks on the door to be let in, to be gathered, covered in white, buried, unearthed.

“Was he right?” asks Tommy. “Do you… enjoy this?”

Joel casts his eyes toward the ground, his trembling hand, the gleaming band on his ring finger, his skin speckled with blood but the metal pristine. “I don’t know,” he says.

This is who you are, Cabrera would tell him. The Sisters: Your place is here, under God, under His word. And God Himself, silent as the air, the ringing in his ears only ever quieted by the soft brush of your knuckle across his cheek, the whisper of My Joel in his ear.

“Think hard on it,” says Tommy, “because you may like it, but you’ve gotta consider if your revenge is worth more than what you’ve already got. And if you choose wrong, Joel, you’re gonna lose no matter what.”

A figure leans stone-still against the wall by the hotel room door, the gleam of a blade in the soft light the only indication that it is not a mere shadow.

“Hey, kid,” says the apparition.

Joel nods in greeting. “Tess. Could get in trouble with that knife out in the open.”

“You expect me to keep your girl safe with just my fists?”

“You make it sound like you couldn’t.” Tess snorts, and Joel places fifteen gold coins in her waiting palm. “I appreciate you doing this.”

Tess peels away from the wall. “You and your brother are paying me good money to babysit a door. I think I can live without the thanks.”

“Still,” he says, “you did us a solid.”

Tess, who itches at the prospect of gratitude as much as any other gun-for-hire, shrugs. “Everyone’s saying you’re coming back. That true?”

“Just visiting,” says Joel. “On my way out soon.”

Tess flips one of the coins and turns it over and over across her knuckles, evidence of a restless energy that’s always made Joel’s eye twitch. “One way or another, huh?” she says.

“One way or another.” He shakes her hand and watches her retreat down the hall, still twirling the godforsaken coin, before he turns toward the door. Joel presses his forehead briefly to the cool wood and turns the key to seek the field that awaits him.

A key rustles in the door and Joel steps through, closing it gently behind him. Judging by the quiet click of the lock, he expects you to be asleep, but you jolt upright from your seat in the alcove and cross the room toward him.

He meets you halfway, his right hand flexing at his side. You inspect him: the gash on his cheek, the bruise on his jaw, the blood splattered on his white shirt. He makes no footfalls as he walks but you can hear every stride like thunder between your ears. You feel his hand at the back of your neck, cool from the night air, rough as the underside of a shark’s belly.

The moment coils taut between you as your hand reaches up to grab the lapel of his jacket, and he smells of iron, cologne, Joel, some paint. Maybe that smell is you, stuck underneath your fingernails, embedded in your blood. Maybe this is a mistake, maybe you could never help but fall, maybe it never mattered anyway, and you’re already snipping the final thread, unwinding the spool, and kissing Joel Miller like it’s the first time.

He let out a small groan, tasting the first drop of water in a drought, steadying you with his arm around your waist, his hand cradling your head. He’s gentle, exploratory, careful not to jostle, to shock you out of it. You feel his heartbeat thud, strong, calm, steady behind his clothing and skin and muscle, and your body caves.

It’s coming home, you realise, your arms snaking around his neck, fingers tousling the messy curls on his head. It's the warm press of his hand to your spine where it begins to curve inward. It's a soft mouth, a plush lower lip, made for slow mornings and black coffee, for the aching release of a thumb pressing deep into a muscle knot, a wound. Old aches soothed in the space where bodies meet, beginning to colour the slate-grey world.

It’s the exchange of gasping breaths when you pull apart, his mouth still vaguely chasing yours, opposite charge.

You hold him tighter, swallowing the lump in your throat, your hands squeezing his shoulders. "Are you…"

Joel inclines his head. "Yeah."

"Did he..."

"Yeah."

Need pulses. Supernova. Bright as the moment of obliteration. "Can you—"

He nods vigorously. "Yeah."

Joel’s kisses are like raindrops: velvet-soft to the touch—his hands bringing the hem of your shirt up over your head, his fingertips scorching, branding, grazing the supple swells of your breasts—before the crescendo roars in your ears and he loses himself to the storm. He always does.

There is nothing reserved about the way he shows his love. Lightning crackles across your skin where he touches you, baring you to him, his lips making a map of you, mouthing at your jaw, your throat. You hear yourself hum at the press of his lips to the spot beneath your ear, detaching from your own body, absconding with the pleasure of being close to him and leaving the fucking world behind.

Joel staggers forward so he can press you to the wall and begins to sink to his knees. Your breath catches as he pulls down your ratty bottoms, your cotton panties, his mouth burning into your hips and your belly and the ring on your finger.

“Joel,” you say brokenly as he clutches your fingers. Tears prickle, pressure building behind your nose, and he shakes his head, unfurling your palm like a bud in bloom and kissing its heel. Wordlessly, you watch him, your eyes shuttering, blood singing.

Don't hurt me again.

He understands even though the words cannot come alive on your tongue. He squeezes your hips, his thumbs dumpling your flesh, his forehead falling to your belly.

“I’m yours,” he says. “I’m whatever you want.”

Your legs haven't forgotten the way they part so easily for him, one thigh on his shoulder, opening the core of you to his waiting mouth. His lips part, his tongue wetting them, glistening, and your stomach tightens at the sight of his eyes so black.

You could easily cower. His hands are stained with blood. His knuckles are split. But your terror has become an arid thing, no kindling to burn, no oil to ignite. Watching him now, as eager to please as he always has been or maybe more so, on his knees like a supplicant, the hairs on your arms do not rise in apprehension. Your body does not squirm in fear. You see a broad horizon, the sun outside spilling its golden blood over the city, and you see all of him in a way you never did before.

He’s Joel, who grew up in darkness, lashed and beaten for not believing in a false god. He’s a man who has lied and killed and yet he is no liar, no killer. He holds you as he always has, your body liquid in his hands, your mouth proclaiming the word he will follow. You're the truth he's always told.

It still unsettles you to see the dark eclipse that warm brown, to watch his desire consume the hypnotic shapes in his irises, and wonder if that cavernous black was the last thing so many men saw before he snuffed out their lives. But there's nothing of the death shudder in the way you guide your fingers through his hair and beg him—

“Please.”

He brings his mouth to your core and parts your folds with his thumbs, slowly gliding his warm, wet tongue through your slit. You die a hundred little deaths in the split-second of that first touch, that first agony.

You sigh, your head thudding against the wall as he licks through you, his hands holding your hips in place, keeping you from writhing. Joel flicks his tongue over the sensitive pearl of your clit, the pleasure searing, and you tug at his curls to push him away even as you cry out, More, please, please. God, I need more.

He obeys you as easily as breathing, though you suspect he can barely hear your pleas, opening his mouth and flattening his hot tongue to your clit. You gasp, your core pulling taut, your eyes locking with his as the muscle undulates over, over, and over again.

“Oh,” you whimper, your hips bucking to meet his face. He groans, his mouth working your clit, closing his lips over it and sucking. You cry out, your leg kicking, the sounds of the world muffled in his stifling closeness. Your thighs begin to ache, tensing and relaxing a hundred times over in the throes of his attention.

And his fingers are gliding across your hip, seeking the warmth between your legs. You gasp his name, your hips flexing, as he collects your wetness on two fingers.

“Let me in, baby,” he says softly, pressing a kiss to your puffy clit. It relaxes you enough to welcome the press of his fingers inside you, sinking to the knuckle, curling up against the spot he would know in his sleep.

You whine, your body keening toward him, tugging his face back toward your pussy. He obliges with a quiet moan, and you think he needs this just as badly.

The obscene squelch of his fingers inside you rings in your ears as he licks and sucks at your clit, his free hand grabbing desperately at your ass to keep you fixed to him. You’re crying, “Yesyesyes, Joel, please—fuck, that's it,” the pleasure stuck in the grooves of your brain. Absentmindedly, you reach for his hand and clasp it tight, your engagement ring digging into his palm. He holds you with the same fervour as he coaxes you higher, his face buried in your pussy. He grunts and groans like it's his own pleasure he seeks, his battered knuckles stinging.

“Joel… Joel, oh, I’m…”

He knows, of course, from the telltale squeeze of your thighs around his head, the relentless crushing of his fingers in your own, your body tightening for him, cavitating, unwinding—

You come with a shout, your throat raw, writhing in his grasp as he keeps sucking, keeps licking, rubbing, pressing. You're dizzy by the time your head lolls to the side, your muscles twitching, eyes glazed, and Joel is there, pulling his fingers out just to place them on his tongue and swallow you down.

Your breath rattles through your lungs. Joel presses his lips to your inner thigh, beard soaked in your arousal, moustache glistening. His mouth soothes your sore muscles and your eyes begin to droop.

“You need a shower,” you say, your tongue like lead in your mouth. You gently pass your thumb over a cut on his cheek and frown. “You're all bloody.”

He nuzzles his face against your thigh, inhaling you. “I know.”

“You were gone so long.” Your voice quivers, pressure prickling behind the bridge of your nose. “I thought…”

Joel rises to his feet, his hands cradling your face. “I’m all right,” he says. “I’m here, and I’m safe, and I’m so goddamn sorry.”

You shake your head, pressing your lips together so the sob will not escape. Tracing his face with your fingers, broken in places, healing in others, you see the echo of a boy who didn't know his place in the world. You see the haunt of days gone by. A ghost still occupies the cage of his ribs.

“I think you should tell the little boy that still lives here,” you say, putting your hand on his chest. “Tell him he’s alive. Tell him that he made it.”

Joel lowers his head, watching the way your fingers splay over his heart. He puts his hand on yours and pushes, and you feel the strong thump-thump-thump of his heartbeat.

“He knows.”

You lean forward and put your mouth to his temple. “Shower, Joel,” comes your whisper in his ear.

He nods, wrapping his arm around your waist and guiding you into the bathroom. The water hits you both true, scalding, the drain circled with red. He’s naked, his back to you as he sets his hair and lets his wounds bleed what they need to.

You lift your hands and trail them down his broad shoulders, your forehead dropping between his shoulder blades where your name is inked into his back. Joel’s muscles idly flex, his palm flat against the shower wall. His body shudders when you press your lips to the name on his back.

Wordlessly, you bring your arms around him, caressing his side, careful of the new bruises. Your other hand drops to his steel-hard cock and you begin to slowly stroke him. The noise that wrenches free from his throat is half pleasure, half agony, his hips bucking into your fist. You bump your nose against his back, your years-old sign to Just relax, and Joel hides his face in his bicep as you work your hand over him.

“G—fuck,” he grunts. “Goddamn… honey, I—”

You squeeze him at the base and twist your hand up and down the length of him, the weight warm and heavy, your thumb coaxing out a bead of precum. Your cheek is warm on his back, your arm struggling to reach around the width of him, your chest humming at the sound of his gruff moans.

“Let me…” He cuts himself off as you speed up your strokes, and you can feel his abdomen tense. “Fuck, let me make you feel good. Shit… let me…”

“Joel,” you say, “for once, stop trying to be my hero.”

His head falls back and you press your lips to his throat, nibbling the sensitive spot behind his ear: the old scar, that tiny circle, that hairless patch. He groans your name, and you’re smiling despite yourself, your mouth curling against his warm, tender skin.

“Inside me,” you whisper, the pace of your fingers over his length slowing to a crawl. “Remind me how it feels.”

He turns his head to look into your eyes, his lashes dewy, blinking hard to flick away the water, brow furrowed. His moustache bristles as his lips part in a question he does not (or maybe cannot) articulate, and you’re fractured into pieces by the intricate curve of his nose, the freckles on his jaw, the silver strands in his beard. A rough hand cups the back of your neck and another takes you by the waist, and you’re flattened to the wall, your hand braced on the glass next to you as he kisses you deeply.

Consuming, heady, warm—you give in, your hands avoiding the delicate skin of his wrists where he’s been bound, helpless. Sighing softly into his mouth, you let his kiss humble the part of you that still needs the walls you’ve built from the marrow of your anger. It circles the drain, lead-filled paint, as you remember under his hands how it feels to live.

You reach between your bodies, your leg wrapping around his waist, and slide the head of his cock through your weeping slit. Joel sucks in air through his teeth, the water lashing his back like a whip, and he surges forward, grasping you by the waist and sinking his cock into your tight hole.

You cry out his name, burying your face in his throat and baring your teeth. Your name leaves his mouth in kind, an apparition, sounds you barely recognise anymore. As you take him inside you, the memory of who you were with him pounds at your ribcage, begging to be let out. And you covet them, selfish as you are now for fucking him this way, needy and impatient, your fingers tugging his wet locks.

You see no point in scooping out the marrow; there is still sweetness stuck to the bones of your old life with him. Instead, you coat your teeth in this, the slow drag of his cock, the depths he reaches so easily, so knowingly. His fingers prod the bruised flesh of your hurt and yet you still guide him inside. You still pull his hair and kiss his throat where his Adam’s apple bobs and you still let him hold you close enough to splinter.

He’s grabbing fistfuls of your ass and sucking on your throat, his thrusts sloppy as he tries to hold back, to make you come first, but you tighten, clenching down on him, making his groans pitch up into whines.

“Joel,” you gasp, your needy fingers prickling his scalp where you pull his hair. His teeth graze your throat and you want him to bite, you want him to sink in deep, you want his jaws to latch onto your skin. You want him never to leave again.

He comes hard. His hips buck, pushing so deep he disappears into your body, and you see the blues, browns, reds of your painting as he empties all he has left inside you.

Panting, he drops his head to your breast, his open mouth still scattering weak, worn kisses over your skin. Your lungs expand under his palms, fingers stuck in the grooves between your ribs, his body an offshoot of yours, not the other way around. In the ringing afterlife of your pleasure, you vaguely feel him mouthing words you cannot hear. You run your fingers through his hair and enjoy the battering of the scorching water as it melts you both into one.

Later, in the sticky, humid silence of the bathroom, steam still swirling around your heads, fogging the glass, you trim Joel’s hair.

"Do you ever get scared?" you ask him, the shhhick of the scissors gliding across a chunk of his hair. "Do you ever go out on a job and think to yourself, What if I slip? What if this is it?"

Joel huffs. "It's not so much about myself as making sure the other guy goes down first."

“I think I’d be scared.” You twirl a lock of hair around your finger and let it fall over his forehead. “I don’t think I’d be able to look into someone’s eyes and take their life.”

He casts his eyes to his lap, flicking off some hair from his thigh. “One time, I thought it was over. I wasn’t quite seventeen yet, runnin’ drugs for some gangster. He sent me to El Sauzal to discreetly transport a couple kilos out of the city; someone had snitched and he didn’t want any rival gangs to find his stash. But the people there, they… They didn’t know any better. There were mothers, kids. Innocent people, y’know? Just strays. I decided I’d come back for ‘em.”

Your stomach twists. “What happened?”

A muscle in his jaw ticks. “I was too late. By the time I got back, the whole goddamn city was on fire. The people were either dead in the streets or close to it. They didn’t do anythin’ wrong. They didn’t ask for any of it. But they were weaker, slower. I couldn’t walk ten feet without seein’ some kid wrapped up his mother’s arms, burned to a fucking crisp. So, I came back with weapons, marched into the gang’s territory, and I killed ‘em all.”

Days ago, you’d be afraid of the man whose back warms your belly where you stand just behind him. You would hesitate to reach out and put your hand on his shoulder the way you do now. But you curl your fingers over the muscled curve of his arm and his head falls back against you, spidering open, his gooey molten centre bared for you.

Joel. Just Joel.

“Did you see the painting?” you ask him quietly.

“I see everything you do,” he says. “It's beautiful, baby.”

You drop your gaze from his face in the mirror and set down the scissors on the vanity. “I can't pretend to understand what you've been through, Joel, and that makes things even harder. All I've ever wanted is to love you, to take your pain, and all this time there's been so much I never even knew about. And I’m sorry.”

Joel’s hand comes to cover yours, clasping your fingers. They’re warm, rough, but you do not sense the phantom blood. “If I’d told you from the beginning,” he says, “maybe I never would've hurt you in the first place. All those years I thought I was protecting you from myself, I was hurting you—the one thing I swore I would never fuckin’ do.”

“Joel…”

“Baby, don't apologise to me,” he says firmly, putting his lips to your knuckles. “Never apologise to me. And don't you let me off easy.”

“Have I ever?” you say with a halfhearted smile.

“Yeah,” he says, “the day you let me marry you.”

You scoff. “Oh, please. Wedding planning was hell on earth for you.”

“Just because I didn't like the photographer—”

“You didn't not like the photographer, Joel. You wanted to draw and quarter the photographer.”

He huffs like an angry dog, frowning at you in the mirror. “He kept puttin’ his goddamn hands on you.”

You laugh, brushing your thumb over the patch in his beard to indicate you're finished. “He was posing us, cowboy.”

Joel rises to his feet and closes the scissors away inside the drawer. “Posin’ you, sure.”

“He was afraid to touch you. Probably thought you’d take off his hand. And the pictures turned out great.”

“Yeah,” he says, a smirk twitching at the corner of his mouth. “Way the sunlight caught in your hair, your eyes… I don't know. Beautiful.”

He was so shy the first time you kissed him. Cheeks flushed, eyes cast toward the ground, the wind ruffling his curls where it blew over the water. He was made in an artist’s image, you thought that night, the details pored over like paperwork, the sparkle in his eyes something the painter covets. But the portrait has never wilted in the years you've known him. It's grown older, sure, but it is not old. He's still shy sometimes; he still looks down when he smiles, and he still turns his cheek when you tell him he's beautiful.

“Do you…” He rubs his palms over his thighs, looking up at you through his lashes. “Do you wish you could go back?”

It's your turn to sit. You drop into his chair, your arms curling over the back of the seat, and watch him on his journey to his knees. “I don't know, Joel,” you tell him. “I think about that day and part of me wants the magic of it back. I want the breeze and the sun and the white canopy and I want you sliding this ring on my finger. But knowing what I know now…”

“You wouldn't have married me,” he says like it's the only answer. His eyes are wet and sad and they sparkle so bright in the day.

“I wish I’d known,” you say plainly, bringing his hand to your cheek and resting it over the cool wedding band. “I wish you would have told me everything. I wish you didn't make me question your love, even for a second. I wish you could have spared me all this anger I have—all this pain.”

He’s stone-still, a figure in a portrait, and you brush your fingers across his cheek. “But killing isn't what you are, Joel. It’s what you do. And I’m so tired of being angry.”

You say it fiercely, your tongue sticking to the roof of your mouth, your throat tightening. You swipe your thumbs under your eyes and meet your husband’s eye. “I love you more than my anger and my hurt have room for. And if I can love you this hard, if I can feel all this pain and still be that same girl who fell for the guy from the restaurant, then I can let myself get hurt all over again.”

Joel shakes his head, cupping your face in his hands as his eyes brim with tears. “Oh, baby…”

“I know it's never been an easy marriage,” you say, your voice breaking, “and I’m always travelling, and I know that I can get snippy and we bicker, but I wouldn't go back to that day, Joel, because I wouldn't change anything. Even if I have to feel all of this again, I wouldn't take it all back.”

His inhale shudders through him and your heart lurches out of your chest. “I don’t deserve that,” he whispers, his thumb stroking your cheek, catching a tear that falls. “I’ve hurt you too much to ever be worthy of what you've given me, sweetheart. I ain't a good man, or even a decent one. But fuck, if I can be good for you, I’ll pray to whatever God they want me to. I’ll scrape my knees and put my hands together and fake it ‘til I’m someone you want. I swear it, baby.”

“Joel.” You gently pry his hands away. “The life you've lived, the things you've been through… I can't change any of it. I can't be what you need all the time, and fuck, I want to be. I do, Joel. But this life is something you have to figure out yourself. Nobody should force you to believe in something that's only ever caused you pain.”

He never told you about the tattoo; you had to find it yourself. Shucking the hem of his shirt up over his head, two weeks separating the last time you’d been able to indulge in his body, you trailed your fingers up his back and paused at the sound of him hissing through his teeth.

“Easy, cowboy,” you cooed. “Are you all right?”

Wordlessly, he turned, taking your hand and lifting it to the reddish skin around the black ink. You gasped, your fingers jolting backward as if struck by a feeler of lightning.

“Joel,” you said tremulously, “please don't tell me you were drunk and this was an impulse decision.”

“Guys in the Marines would get tattoos that meant somethin’ to them. Easier to carry around with you when you're away.” Joel met your gaze again, your tearful eyes, and brought your knuckles to his mouth. “Tell me you want it gone, and it's gone.”

You shook your head, a laugh snaking past the lump in your throat. “Selfishly, I think it’s very sexy.”

He chuckled, kissing the breath from your lungs.

The memory is heavy in your stomach. It's something you'll have to roll around in your mouth a thousand times before the taste begins to dissolve.

“I need time, Joel,” you tell him. “I need to wrap my head around things. I… I can't be the girl you want right now.”

Joel brushes his thumb over your chin. “You have always been the girl I want,” he says. “If you need time, you have it. If you need a warm body, you have it. I’m whoever you want me to be. And if it ain't a husband, then… then that's okay. But I can’t promise you that I won't stop tryin’ to get my wife back. That’s not who I am.”

You sniffle, twirling the ring on his finger. “You’ll get sick of it. The waiting.”

He smiles so softly that you can feel a bud begin to bloom in the core of you, nourished by the way he keeps his hand on your thigh, absently rubbing the sore muscles there. “I waited my whole life for someone like you to come along—someone who could give me the purpose I’d been lookin’ for. I can wait another lifetime. I can wait a thousand.”

“You’ll resent me. You’ll start to hate me.” You don't know why it comes pouring out of you, but the gates are brittle wood and they snapped in the torrent. “I’m an angry drunk. I smell like paint half the time. I travel for work.”

Joel just studies your face, some inexplicable calm etching out the agony. “You take your coffee with milk and sugar and you can't stand it black, but you make it that way for me anyway. You sleep until noon when you're jet lagged and I sit up in bed just to watch you dream. You lie in my arms on the couch at home and ask me about my day even when you're noddin’ off. You dreamed about love when you were a little girl, the way it happens in books. You told me in your wedding vows that you'd found it with me. You think I could resent a girl like that?”

He smiles like it hurts and heals all at once, like it's a foregone conclusion, like you were meant to be loved by him.

“Time doesn't mean a goddamn thing. I know the girl I see in front of me now. Time won't change how much I love her.”

Flipping through the list of potential venues, Joel tucked into your side, you said, “We’ll have an outdoor ceremony. No churches.”

“Baby, I won't burst into flames if I step inside a church.” Joel playfully flicked his tongue over your nipple, obscured by his T-shirt. “Tommy, on the other hand… things he's done…”

You laughed, gently pushing at his head. “No churches,” you said again. “I don't care how much more we’ll have to pay or travel to get around it. You're my husband. You're my comfort, and I want to be what's comfortable for you. Understood?”

He looked up at you, his lips parted as if on the precipice of speech. You beamed, bringing his face to yours and kissing him deeply.

“But if the wind knocks over the gazebo, you're not getting your dick inside me on our wedding night,” you said against his mouth. Joel shook his head, yanking you on top of him and tearing the shirt from your body. Your binder landed with a flutter of loose pages to the floor.

“You didn't kill Cabrera.”

Joel lowers his eyes. “No. He got away.”

“So there's still a contract on your head.”

“For now.”

“So,” you say with a sigh, crossing the room and digging through your bag, “you have to go.”

“I have to go,” he echoes, following you like a shadow. “No matter what… I’m finishing it. Tonight.”

You pull the switchblade from your bag, open Joel’s fist, and place the cool wood hilt in his palm.

“Goddammit, Tommy,” he says under his breath. “He shouldn't have…”

“But he did,” you say. “He said I should be the one to have it. I think it should be yours.”

He curls his fingers over the hilt and flicks open the blade. It's light, but it seems to weigh him down. You rest your hand over his.

“Do what you need to do.”

He drops his forehead to yours and closes his eyes, soaking in this final breath exchanged between your silent bodies, dipping his fingers in the sanctified waters and coming out unscalded.

Bill calls Joel not a moment after he steps onto the street outside the Continental.

“That's a heavy price on your head.”

“Yeah, Bill, I know.” He breathes in the cool air, like cigarette smoke, his nostrils stinging. Trash and a new, fresh breeze carried into the city. Nothing that stays here ever thrives. “Stayed alive so far.”

“So I hear,” grunts the Manager, “and leaving behind a hell of a lot of cleanup.”

“I won't stick you with the check,” says Joel. “It's my business.”

“I don't conduct business inside this hotel,” says Bill, “which is why I won't tell you that a certain helicopter at a certain helipad is refuelling as we speak.”

Joel smirks, flicking out his cuff to check the time. “Any reason why you aren't tellin’ me this?”

“I like you, Joel. Despite myself.”

Silent, he waits for more.

“Besides,” Bill continues, “we live and die by honour. And you've saved my ass more than once.”

Joel snorts. “Which time are you thankin’ me for?”

“Just take my goddamn advice and leave this world. For good this time.”

“I will,” says Joel. “One way or another. Thanks, Bill.”

High above the ground, sitting in the alcove by the window, you watch storm clouds gather over the city, darkening the sky, the sun, and your Joel, so far away, slouching calmly toward whatever end he will choose.

It's raining.

The first time you kissed him, a downpour suddenly swept up the both of you and you'd scrambled underneath a bridge by the water. You both laughed until your ribs were sore, holding hands as you ran, a soaking wet playbill above each of your heads for cover.

“At least the show was good,” you shouted over the roar of the rainfall.

Joel was mesmerised into stillness by the colours of the traffic lights in your eyes, how they shifted over the planes of your face. Starting to think like an artist, you'd tease, and he'd lean into it, a planet circling its sun.

“It was all right,” he said, taking the playbill from your hand. “You could catch a cold. We should get a cab.”

“Always my hero.” You grinned up at him, your eyes scanning his face in that particular way they did, as if ingesting the sight of him to later put the lines to a canvas. “Did you have a good time, Joel? I mean, really. You won't offend me.”

He grimaced. “I, uh… well, see, I’m not the best judge, and… I guess—”

“Joel.”

There was a gleam in your eyes that could have been amusement or could have been hunger. He doesn't remember. He only saw you tilt your chin and lower your eyes to his mouth, to that one place the Sisters always called vulgar, obscene, a place meant only for His word—

“Can I kiss you, Joel Miller, or will you keep being all heroic?”

It was soft, gentle, exploratory. Your mouth opened his like a wound, setting the scorching blade of your lips to the gash, staunching the blood. You healed and burned him, one hand on his back beneath his jacket, the other cupping his face. It reminded him of the statue that lived in the theatre underneath the church where all the boys and girls trained. An angel cast in white marble, cradling the face of Saint Eustace. The statue was chipped where his eye was meant to be.

He remembers the way he shuddered when you touched him like that. He remembers the chill that started in his feet and crept up his spine. Something like coming alive, settling back into his own body—no longer a spirit haunting the shell of a home but a man.

You pulled back, but Joel curled his hand around the back of your neck and kissed you again, deeper, maybe a little too eager, too inexperienced—but you gasped, fingers curling in his hair, your body curving into his. Your noses bumped when you separated, and he remembers laughing.

The rain is nothing like that night. It's the lash of a whip across his face, seeping colour from the world instead of infusing it with light and movement. The water by the docks slaps against the concrete and boats rock and groan against their mooring. The lights of the city are distant now.

Joel steps out of the car.

He marches toward his target, cocking the pistol in his hand, and calls out a name. It gets lost in the roll of thunder across the sky and lodges in his chest.

Cabrera waits on the landing pad, looking wraithlike in a long black coat and a pair of leather gloves. His pilot fuels the helicopter nearby. Neither of them hear Joel’s voice in the air. The rising sun is what gives him away—or maybe the gunshot, as he lifts his arm and pulls the trigger.

It does not pierce flesh. It ricochets off one of the rotor blades. He had aimed slightly to the left.

The pilot scampers off into hiding, but the slash of the bullet through the rainfall is enough to get the attention Joel wants. Cabrera reaches inside the lining of his jacket and fires a single shot. Joel can feel it tear through skin and muscle, but it doesn't hurt.

“Joel,” greets Cabrera.

“Manuel.”

His chest heaves, his jacket soaked through, the cold sinking bone-deep.

“Let's finish this.”

The glimmer in those depthless black eyes is the panther at the hunt, relentless in its hunger, licking its chops at the sight of a challenge. For all the coward’s blood in his veins, it still pulses at the prospect of winning.

“Like men,” says Cabrera, tossing his gun aside at the same time Joel does. “With honour. No more guns.”

And it's laughable: the thought that there is any honour left in a world like this. A world where children are beaten and lashed and trained to hold a weapon too big for their hands. A world that burns villages, butchers families, and still claims that without rules, we live with the animals.

A world as unruly as this cannot be ruled. He never truly considered it until he saw the sad gleam in your eye, felt the empathetic touch of your hand on his face, and began to realise that maybe he should be furious.

But because he already knows he's going to win, Joel lets his opponent land the first blow.

The blood is tangy, near-sweet, as he swipes his forearm over his mouth and smears crimson on his shirtsleeve. It tingles faintly on his lips and crackles, warm as the melt from a late-winter snow. He feels it settle in the grooves of his palms, the hairs of his beard. He’s drowning in it.

Cabrera hits hard, but he’s slow. He’ll take five punches in the time it takes to wind up for one. Joel brings his arm up to block the next and delivers a blow to the sternum with his knee as his opponent’s guard drops. Wide open, Cabrera stumbles a few steps back, choking down the telltale wheeze of being winded. Joel marches forward, relentless in his crusade, grasping him by the scruff of his neck, teeth bared like a mad wild dog, and bears his skull down on the side of the railing. Around them, the wind howls and lashes at his clothes, but he still hears the pained scream as if it were poured into his ears.

Cabrera drops to his knees, and Joel grabs him again, bashing his head repeatedly against the steel bar, the lapel of an Italian leather coat bunching between his fingers, tainted by rainwater and the fist of the man who's come to take his life.

And fuck, Joel wants to make it last.

But there's a knife in his opponent’s hand, conjured from the darkness of his coat pocket, and Joel must release him to avoid the lethal slash of the blade. Blinking blood and lashing rain from his eyes, the man lunges with a snarl, and Joel recovers from his lost victory, stopping him with his fingers curled around his opponent’s wrist. He brings his hand to the crook of Cabrera’s elbow and uses his leverage to snap the bone.

Yowling, Cabrera drops to his haunches, the knife clattering to the ground. Joel, chest heaving, stands over him, flexing his fingers as he readies his fist for the killing blow.

His name leaves Cabrera’s bloodied mouth, accompanied by a mouthful of crimson-tainted saliva spat on the ground at Joel’s feet.

“Joel…” He lifts his head, cradling his broken arm, and sneers. There’s a chilling glow of satisfaction in it. “Did you get your perfect life, Joel? Do you really think you’ve won? It won’t ever stop. Not after you’ve killed me, not after you’ve killed all of them. Is that what you’re going to do? Kill them all?”

He could. He has done far worse. He has spilled blood for gold coins and superficial alliances and someone else's revenge. He has stalked, stolen, lied, killed, and he could finish this now, so easily, with the flick of a blade.

But the song of death does not call to him now.

For so long he had trudged, unmoored, through heavy crimson blood. Like pulling at the seams of velvet, he'd sewn more lives into the sea of red and he never looked behind him to see the souls trying to pull him down at the ankles. He didn't know purpose until he saw the way the candlelight flickered in your eyes, until he tilted his head to the side and realised your smile was a new kind of beautiful from each angle.

The rain sticks to his lashes and he thinks of an old song of prayer the Sisters used to chant. He remembers curling his fingers around one of the rosaries that hung from the large cross in the cathedral and wincing in anticipation. He thought he would burn—that the metal would leave a red stain on his palm. It never did.

Maybe that's why he never believed. Surely, if there was a God, Joel Miller would have burned by now.

He thinks of shopping for furniture and date nights and lazy mornings, tangled in bedsheets. Your mouth, smiling against his, whispering I love you across the breakfast table. Dancing—or swaying, more like—under the kitchen light. Loving easily, never feeling as if he must grab hold of the cross and burn himself upon it just to feel.

Joel turns the switchblade in his hand, lurches forward, and plunges the knife into Cabrera’s chest.

There is no noise but a faint gurgle from his mouth, his hand weakly rising to grasp the hilt. Joel drops to his knees and fishes Cabrera’s cell phone from his pocket.

“The blade is stuck in your aorta,” he says. “If you pull it out, you’ll bleed out and die.” He puts the rain-slick screen in front of Cabrera’s face. “Pull the contract.”

A few feeble taps are all it takes, and Joel Miller is no longer a target. His name glares back at him on the screen, from two million to nothing, not the boogeyman any longer but something akin to a civilian. Joel tosses the phone into the water and turns to leave.

“See you in hell, Joel,” Cabrera chokes, still grasping the shiny wooden hilt of the blade.

He barely hauls himself into the car, which chokes to a rumbling start. There's blood seeping through his shirt where Cabrera shot him, and his fingers shake as they pull away from the wound, the red so bright, so alive. Joel grits his teeth and squeezes his eyes shut.

If there’s a God, he thinks, I hope you fucking hear me now.

Tell me that we don’t get what we deserve. Because there is nothing I deserve in this world if I cannot keep what I’ve found.

His fingers trembling, smearing blood across the screen, he makes a call.

And your voice on the line, soft, sticky with sleep, whispering his name—just his name: Joel?—is what wrenches the first sob from his throat.

Joel, you say, like it means something, like it's precious. A jewel pressed from dusty black coal. Come back to me. Come home.

So he does.

#fic: helen #kiwisbell's fics #pedro pascal #joel miller #joel miller x reader #joel miller smut #joel miller x you #the last of us #the last of us hbo #tlou fic #joel miller angst #joel miller au #joel miller x female reader #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller fic #john wick au

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hoseoksluna · 2 days

Text

WHITE | jjk

pairing: boyfriend!jungkook x wine!oc

genre: smut

word count: 8.1k

summary: craving white wine, your boyfriend would do anything for you—even let you dom him.

pinterest board: wine

warnings: alcohol consumption, wine!oc is dominant and she's enjoying it, plushie used in a sexual intercourse, dd/lg, jk is desperate and so horny, hand job, oral sex (m. + f. receiving), fingering, squirting, raw sex, the importance of sex being imperfect, use of sex toys — yes, plural, dirty talk, spanking, face riding

note: i'm genuinely sorry for this—SDFKJDSLFJDSLFJS. this is the last wine drabble <3 i loved writing about them again, ugh i missed my babies so much. would you, guys, also like me to write two drabbles about the steam series? i feel like it would only be fair like this. vote in the poll below, pwease. <3 hope you like this last installment.

Your boyfriend has an immense, insane amount of energy.

You have partly yourself to blame. It’s Saturday night, summer at full blast and you felt it thrumming so deeply and intensely within your veins that you found yourself craving your most favored mood-lifter in the world.

White wine.

You’ve almost spent every weekend drinking myriads of different alcoholic beverages, but the white nectar is something you’ve quite neglected. Well, not so much as neglected, but forgotten about entirely. The last time you drank it, you and Jungkook were on far, far different terms. Fuck buddies with a degradation kink, skipping a party because you got horny again. You wonder if things would’ve turned out the same way if you hadn’t decided to spice up your getting ready time with that drink. Would it change the course of events that led him to confess his feelings for you? Would you have allowed yourself to fall for him, had he not made you drunk with his allure?

You only had to mention your thirst and Jungkook was quick to get up to his feet, take his keys, phone and wallet and he was out the door before you could say anything else. Your fond giggles vibrated across the room—so much that Bam lifted his head and jumped on your lap and so you spent the remaining time alone cuddling with the canine friend, catching up in your lovey-dovey dog language, kissing him all over until you dolled him up with red lipstick marks.

He looked so good. Was happy about it, too, because when his Daddy came back, he was similarly quick to show him.

And Jungkook, he laughed so hard that he clutched his own stomach, doubled over, his shoulders shaking. Then, he sat next to you on the couch, pulled you in for a hug as if he hadn’t seen you in years and very solemnly told you that it was his turn now.

The words that tumbled out of you were so swift, without any kind of embrace of thought beforehand, that you didn’t have the time to consider the consequences they would come with until they dazzled you. Through and through, ridding you of your sense of sight.

“You’ll get your kisses only if you show me that you bought the wine.”

Jungkook’s eyes grew in size, darkened in nightly fashion. Twinkles flickering, dimly. The atmosphere, the dynamic and energy shifted, folding into something you haven’t yet experienced in such depth, calming your eyes until they blended back into normalcy. And you wouldn’t perceive it for what it truly was, had Jungkook not wordlessly left to fetch his bag from the convenience store, along with a corkscrew and two glasses, and had he not crouched in front of you.

The view left you stunned. The blatantly obvious fact, too.

The fact that, somehow, you were in control.

And it was so different from the last time due to a simple reason. Jungkook wasn’t the one who initiated it. Didn’t tell you to be in charge. Didn’t give you his control in words, in commands. No, it happened arbitrarily, on its own and Jungkook submitted to it. Submitted to you. Put down his control once he lowered his form between your knees, giving it to you this way, silently.

A thing of utter beauty, filling you up with vibrancy, enthusiasm and… passion.

He showed you his haul, unloading it onto your lap. Sparkling white wine in a golden bottle, dog treats, cheese and crackers and… Miffy.

Miffy in a way you haven’t seen her before.

Made into a sleeping position. Black eyes shut, round butt risen in the air, even rounder tail perked, body soft and drowsy. Bigger than the bunny resting alone on his bed in the other room.

You purred, squeezing her hard before you hugged her to your chest, careful not to smear your makeup on her when you pushed her up to your neck. Looked at your quite small boyfriend with a ravening gaze as you said, “You got bunny a sister, how cute. Well done.”

Your praise coaxed a noise out of Jungkook that you never heard before, one that stirred the eternally slumbering beast in you that had not once seen the night enveloping you. A concoction, most delicious and arousing, of a whimper and a hum. It settled within your core, teasing you there, making you want more. You told him, or the beast more like, to open the wine and he obeyed, right away.

You watched him do it. Watched the flexing of his muscles, tense beneath the fabric of his tiger-print shirt. Watched him not spill a drop and then pour you a glass until it almost overflowed. He handed it to you, expecting you to take it from him, but you caught him off guard.

“Taste it for me first.”

His mouth fell agape. Remained parted when he immediately brought the glass to his lips and took a large sip. Your eyes followed the bobble of his throat as he swallowed and you gave him a big smile for it. A praise, too.

“Good. Let me have a sip now, my hands are full.”

In typical fashion, he drew close to you until your knees squeezed him in, legs wrapping around his torso. One hand wrapped around your hip, the other tipped the glass to your mouth and you looked at him and did not stop until you took a big gulp.

“More.”

He tipped it again. “Tastes good?”

You nodded, liking the sweetness and the fizziness, but this time you didn’t swallow the nectar. Jungkook set the glass down, along with his haul, averting his gaze momentarily and you cupped his chin, bringing it back to you. Leaned in and, in a heated kiss, you spewed the wine out into his mouth. He gasped, pulling away, flushed cheeks a tiny bit full, lips pursed, one mouth end wet with a trickle flowing down. It would’ve been an adorable sight, had his eyes not narrowed, darkened further more and pierced you with such intensity that your clit gained a drum.

Your finger felt for the top button of his shirt. “Swallow. Don’t be messy.” He did. Swore. Breathed hard. You undid the button, lifting your digit to wipe his chin clean, smearing it on his bottom lip until he opened for you. You plunged in. Let out a low sound of delight once he wrapped his puffy lips around it.

And now here you are staring at each other, finger in mouth. His newly secured energy pulsating in him, seconds away from bursting, brutally. You can see it, vividly, and you prepare yourself for it—blaming partly yourself and, feignedly, the palatability of the white nectar for being the cause behind it. He’s waiting for the next move, countenance terribly solemn and stiff. His hands must be oh so itching to take over, but he sticks to the unspoken, patient and good.

Taking out your finger gently, you undo the rest of his buttons, aware of the shudders zapping his body the more you reveal his smooth skin. Jungkook straightens for you, palms on your thighs, breathing heavily, a sound that brings out the strangest of oxymorons in you—simultaneous nervousness and confidence. Nervousness that you call the shots; confidence that the paintwork of his arousal is signed with your name.

And it’s the latter that the beast plucks out, like a twig of flower off a tree.

You push Jungkook back and slide into his lap, biting your lip at the contact of his hardness under the flimsy material of your ivory pajama shorts. His hands clasp around your small hips, but you pry them away, deeming that if you are in control, then it’s you who decides when he gets to touch you. His brows rise when you pin them down and at last he beams up at you, eyes lidded and drunk, despite the fact he merely had two sips of alcohol. Bunny’s sister rests askew in your joined laps, her head pointed towards your mound and it forces a certain idea into your muddy brain.

One that Jungkook fleetingly interrupts.

“You’re gonna take control of me?”

Ooft, making it official. You hum your agreement, repositioning the plushie. Place her directly against his imprint and, pushing the soaked center of your shorts to the side, you sit down on her soft face. Begin to rock slowly. Jungkook’s breath hitches in his throat, fists clench on either side of him as well as his jaw, chin upturned. He’s holding himself back with all of his might and it is only now that you feel your wetness dripping onto the fur, now when the vibrancy of the faint pleasure spreads across your every nerve ending, now when you know that he’s struggling to keep his composure. There’s something so incredibly satisfying about it that you rock your hips harder, whimpering, hands gripping his shoulders.

“Can you handle it?” you murmur, already knowing that he won’t be able to the moment you decide to take things further, but you give him a slither of a chance to prove you wrong, rooting for him from within with a sly smile on your face.

Jungkook pokes his tongue in his cheek, sighing, eyes descending to your neck and to your perky, pebbled breasts under your low cut top. “I’ll handle anything you come up with as long as I get your kisses.”

His sweet response gratifies you so much that you arch your back, lowering your hands down to his chest, the thrum on your clit becoming unbearable, the soft friction of the plushie doing very little to alleviate it. You whine, picking up your pace. “Even—even if you don’t get to touch me?”

Jungkook hesitates, biting his lower lip. A certain sadness coasts his now big eyes that makes you coo endearingly and slow down, feel so bad for him. “Anything for you.”

You can’t halt the groan from escaping, the groan that roots from the passion and the love you carry for him, from the principle of his submission. You’ll make it up to him. Play with him just for a little while and you’ll give him his rightful upper hand right back to him, all because he was so quick to be your little toy. Without a thought, nor a word spared. Without a struggle. He deserves it. Has come a long way.

“You’re just my little slut, aren’t you?” You grab a hold of his throat, tip his chin up, feel his vein throbbing. “My pretty little slut. Hard for me, hm? Will do anything for me?”

Widening his eyes, mouth parted, he moans, sucking in a breath, chest lifting rapidly. Hand automatically lifting to palm himself, just in time to realize that he can’t because the plushie and your lap is in the way. “Yes, I’m your little slut and I need you so bad. Need your kisses.”

You hum, terribly, terribly satisfied. Horny. A fire, personified. Fire and energy—a wonderful mixture about to meet. “Where, baby?”

His breath shakes, his being radiated by you, glistening in sweat. “Everywhere, please.”

You drift your hands down his chest. Think he earned them now by asking so nicely. You sit back on his thighs, plushie in hand, ready to chuck her away, but then another idea comes up.

Grabbing her by the back of her neck, you use her to kiss him. On his jaw, on his neck, on his left peck, nipple and the mole underneath, making kissing sounds. Jungkook shudders at the contact upon his most sensitive spots and you can see his disliking for it before he voices it out. You revel in it, his desperation becoming your obsession.

“No, not from her. Please, from you.”

But in spite of that, your craving to give him everything is stronger.

You toss her on the couch, hands instantly clasping around his neck. You kiss him, wetly, on his Adam’s apple and he whimpers, urging you to continue. The sides of his throat, collarbones, shoulders—you mark him everywhere with your red lipstick, making a pathway down his sternum before you go sideways. Create a large shape of a heart on the left side of his peck, coloring it in with bruises, with kisses so hard that his manhood twitches in his pants. You’re so focused on adorning him, on the citrusy taste of his skin, that you don’t even sense your hands as they rid him of his shirt, unbuckle his belt and undo his button, dragging down his zipper.

You rise to your feet, out of breath, puffy mouth, lipstick slightly smeared, head spinning. “Take off your pants and get on the couch.”

The golden buckle of his belt catches your eye as he stands up. You wrap your hand around it and tug it out of his belt hoops harshly. There’s a hint of timidness in the vast sea of his arousal once he looks at you, aware of what you’re planning with the leather band. With a giggle, you merely wink at him and Jungkook blushes, dropping his gaze in tandem with his pants.

“Boxers, too?”

You edge around his side and envelop your arms around his middle, mouth pressing against his spine. A big, red mark of your lips amidst the broadness of his back. Utterly, utterly beautiful. “Smart boy, yes—off with them, now.”

Jungkook laughs, softly, shyly. You wish you could see his blush deepen as the clenching of his abdomen divulges to you how much he liked that praise. You also wish you could feel the fluttering of the butterflies inside, if there are any at all. You’re getting to know him in such a new way that you otherwise would have never had the opportunity to do so. The shudders, the tension under his skin, the lively energy that is yearning to burst and rain upon you—it is all so awfully exhilarating, even more so the fact that you hold it all in your tender grasp.

And he lets you. In the name of love.

He drops his undergarment and he goes to sit down like you told him to, but you squeeze him harder against yourself. No, he’s not going anywhere. The heat, his soft skin, his gentleness and shyness—you want it all close to you, close enough to seep into your pores so it can make bed there and live there perpetually. So snug, so homely—yes, that’s precisely what it is. Home.

You skim your hands down the defined muscles of his stomach, feeling them move under your fingers. Take his wrists behind his back and keep them there, unrestrained yet, his belt curled on the coffee table. You bring your hands back to his stomach, lowering them down—

“Can you reach me?” Jungkook asks, head turned to the side. You’re so used to degradation in your sex life that at first you thought he was mocking you, but on the contrary—he’s asking in all genuinity. With his forearms pressed to his sides, he’s bigger than he usually is and he wondered if your small form can stretch enough to touch him.

How sweet.

“Such a good, thoughtful boy.” You grab his length. Had to do it from the side a little bit, but you don’t mind. At least you get to see him. See the way he twists his features at the contact, see his energy and his muscles straining. “I guess I can, huh?”

You tug at his length rapidly a few times. His body shudders again, almost doubles over before he straightens his spine, whimpers trickling out of his mouth and rooting in your heat, soaking your pajamas. And when his sounds rise in volume, you swiftly let go of him. Fetch the belt and fasten it around his wrists, leading him to take a seat on the couch.

Manspreading, cock hard, red and long, almost kissing his belly button, hands behind his back, muscles big and flexed, face features darkened by his arousal, ravagedly fixed on you—fuck, you could come from the view.

You sink to your knees in front of him. Itch so fucking hard to take him in your mouth and make that energy paint you in white, but watching him like this—you plan something else entirely. Pressing one kiss on his V-line, you glide your lips upon the tip of his length, making him tremble in desperation. It takes all of your strength not to give it to him, but you know he will be overjoyed with the little thought that’s swarming in your brain.

“Where’s your fleshlight, baby?”

Jungkook loosens a hard, flabbergasted breath and his pretty, pretty cock twitches against your mouth.

You knew it.

You bought the toy together yesterday. It’s still unopened in a box somewhere in his bedroom; you don’t know where he hid it. He may have not wanted to spend money on it, but when you witnessed the way his eyes glowed, you convinced him to get it. Begged him. Told him you wouldn’t leave the sex shop until he bought it and he gave in, timidly. Much to your delight.

“In the closet,” Jungkook croaks out, clearing his throat and you kiss his other V-line as a reward, kitten licking his tip for a millisecond as you rise to your feet. He whimpers, again in desperation.

“You can’t get it, can you?” you taunt, lovingly, fingers hooking under your shorts and dragging them down your hips, your top following over your head. His eyes follow your every movement, fixing on your feminine parts, muscles bulging, yearning to touch you. You grow wetter, being looked at, being desired like that. “You’re just a helpless baby.”

He moans your name, signaling to you that there’s only so much he can take and you understand. You’re quick as you hurry to his bedroom, quick to find it, quick to pull the toy out of the box and quick to return to him.

There’s a trickle of his male arousal gliding down his length when you stand between his legs and your own desperation to pleasure him heightens in you—so much that you’re equally quick to unfold your plan.

You grab his chin and tip it up, harshly. Kiss him so nastily that he moans into your mouth and then… then you stare him dead in his eye. “I’m gonna put the fleshlight under bunny’s sister and you’re gonna show her how hard Daddy fucks his girls, yeah?” He’s left speechless, breathing rapidly, coated in sweat. Eyes narrowed, still darkened but now glowing with that familiar light that you saw yesterday, black irises piercing you through and through. “You should give her a name, though. Have something to moan when you fill her up, hm?”

It’s evident, the way his brain malfunctions, but he surprises you.

“Vinny.”

Vinny and Bunny, how adorable.

You coo, pecking him. “Vinny it is. Such a pretty name. I’m gonna make you nice and wet for her. Would you like that?”

“Please.”

You descend to your knees and you don’t hesitate to immediately take him into your mouth as far as you can. You gag around him, but you relax your throat, bobbing your head only slightly, testing yourself, wanting to stretch your throat out for him. Jungkook groans, squeaks little mewls as he doubles over once more, and the sound is so obscenely loud that your clit throbs harder in response and you would touch yourself if your craving to pleasure him wasn’t stronger.

You pull out until you can stack both of your hands on his length and while your tongue plays with his tip, you twist your wrists. Only briefly, just to make him feel a little better before you lick him all over—just to stay true to your words. And when it’s your name that comes out of his mouth once you slobber all over him, you withdraw altogether.

“Please… please,” Jungkook whimpers, trembling and you feel terribly bad for him. So much that you pucker your lips at him and kiss his cheek endearingly as soon as you get on your feet again, purposefully ignorant to the way your cunt likes his helplessness.

“I got something better for you, Daddy, don’t worry,” you reassure him, slipping into the dynamic your familiarity using the title. You grab Vinny and the fleshlight, placing her on top of the toy, on the armrest of the couch—her butt and her pussy facing him.

And when you glance at him to see his reaction to your artwork, you’re stunned by the look he gives you. Mad, mad stare. Awfully dark and menacing. It would disquiet you if didn’t know that he loved you. There’s no way you could take the liberty in toying with him like this, had you not become exclusive—had he not created a realm of safety for you to do that in.

“I’m gonna fuck the shit out of you for this,” Jungkook threatens and the sliver of normalcy in the middle of the role-play that he caught onto makes you giddy and feel so fucking alive. The threat, too. You quiver in anticipation and excitement, grinning from ear to ear. “You’re not walking after this.”

You laugh, softly, thrilled. “I sure hope so,” you say, grabbing a hold of his arm to lift him up. “I’m dripping for you.”

Jungkook hisses. Won’t budge. Remains seated, looking up at you. Doesn’t reciprocate your smile. Scowls, instead. “Can I taste you?”

You shake your head ‘no’, even if it emotionally pains you. “Not right now.”

He sighs and you take his arm again. This time he obeys—lets you lead him into the position that you want. On his knees, still on the couch, perfectly at level with Vinny’s pussy patiently waiting for him. Jungkook looks at her for a long time, studying the silicone shape of her clit and lips. You’re certain that if his hands were free, his thumb would’ve traced her soft vulva.

“Do you like her pussy?” you ask, your grin only widening, eyes blazing, emitting hot sparkles of light. You’re perhaps more excited and enthusiastic about this than he is.

Jungkook looks at her for a split second more before he flicks his intense gaze to yours. “Yours is prettier.” Your breath hitches in your throat and your heart follows its footsteps, skipping a beat, springing up and grazing your vocal cords. You can’t get a word out—you’re stupefied, in love, so impassioned that you resemble him with all that fire in you, taking after his energy buzzing in him. You sense the same movement in you, hotter, more vigorous. Your mouth parts and, cheeks awash with color, you’re on the verge of bursting. “Let me touch your little pussy, please.”

You bite your lip, pause a tiny bit just to regain your composure and you sigh, eventually, gripping his face in your hand, squishing his cheeks. “I said,” you start, emphasizing your warning just to see his flush deepen like you wanted. “Not right now. Can’t you listen?”

For a fleeting moment, there’s a heavy silence filled with his hard breaths.

Then, Jungkook glares at you.

“I’m gonna destroy you.”

You chuckle, girlishly—even though his threat yet again thrums within your skin, even though your body craves to submit to him, throw the playtime away, forget about it, entirely. “Talk all you want. See where it gets you.” With your other hand, you take his length and line it up at Vinny’s entrance. “Fuck her.”

Now—now he finally grins, a puckish smile that unnerves you a little bit, as if an idea crawled up into that smart brain of his.

And he proves you right.

“I’m gonna show her how I’m gonna fuck you,” he mutters, drawing closer to Vinny, to the arm rest. “Where’s the lube? Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten.”

A trickle of cold sweat trickles down your spine and it’s you who’s left speechless now. You were so quick to return to him that you did forget the lube, mind void of rationality, filled with him that you forgot such an essential thing. You swear under your breath, feeling stupid.

“Go get it before I rip this fucking belt apart and use it on you.”

Wordlessly, embarrassed with your head down, you go back to his room and fish for his lube in his bedside drawer, noticing that it’s where he keeps the vibrator for you. You haven’t used it in so long in your playtime and you reminisce, briefly, on the last time he made you come with it. On this very bed, on his lap with bunny on yours as he rearranged your guts with the toy on your clit—teasing you by lifting it and placing it between the plushie’s legs, acting for her and screwing up his features in pleasure.

Your heart thuds at the memory, your thighs sodden with your essence, and a certain expectation creeps within its chambers. The expectation that the toy will make a comeback tonight. That is, if you even deserve it.

You cringe at your wetness while your feet pad back to the living room. Jungkook stares you down, guilt written all over his face for being mean and it mollifies your negative feelings, dispersing them away from you. It’s enough for you—you don’t really want to talk about how you pitifully failed, nor do you want to hear a mention of it, but Jungkook seemingly does.

Up close, his eyes are awfully soft as if he made a mistake with his last words. You don’t think he did—he’s always been the leader in your playtime, so you deem he only did the right thing. Besides, you’ve worked him up to the point of anger, so from your standpoint, he didn’t do anything wrong. You did.

“Come here,” he says, gently, leaning in and angling his head. “Put your arms around me.” You do as he says, needing to, needing to be led for a little while before you can resume. You sink your fingers into his hair as you rest your forearms around his shoulders, even though all you want to do is rid him of his restraint and let him fuck it out of you. He kisses you with such tenderness that you whimper in sensitivity and amorousness, taking it one step further and moving your mouth against his, slipping your tongue inside. It’s a brief kiss, no matter its intensity, for he still has something to say. “You’re doing so well tonight. I never thought I’d ever get this hard from you being the boss of me. I’m sorry for snapping, you hear me?” he whispers against your lips, each movement causing his pillows to touch yours in faint, faint kisses that make your mind spin and your desire for him to lengthen across your whole body, deepening. You nod for him, hearing his words, needing them, too—glad for the honesty, for the check in, for the sliver of normalcy. “I’m just so horny and I need you. I didn’t mean it, okay? Daddy didn’t mean to talk to you like this. He loves you and you made him so needy that he’s frustrated, but it’s okay. He can handle it. Do you love your Daddy back, hm?”

You moan at the continuation of his words, running your fingers through his hair, inching closer to him until your chest softly collides with his. And his reassurement, the warm feeling of his skin, the potency of his love—it all erases your mistake, leaving only your sensual craving for him. You nod, again, like a little girl given a talking-to from her father, absorbing the lesson. “I love you.”

Jungkook hums, pleased, pecking you. “Good. I’m gonna do what you want now, baby. Gonna make you proud, listen to every word like a good Daddy, hm? You can do anything you want to me. You’d like that? You wanna keep going?”

You smile at him, sweetly, and he kisses your expression of contentment. It feels so good like this and you feel woozy, too. Sluggish, ready to be taken, on your way to cloud nine. You nod your head for the last time and squirt the lube all over him and Vinny’s intimate parts, your desire to take over him blending into your fuzzy feelings.

With your help, he slides inside her, both pairs of eyes watching the slick intrusion, then meeting at once—your simultaneous groans of delight merging, fading into one another, creating one beautiful, heavenly sound, unheard by all angels and celestial beings. You hold the fleshlight steady as he bottoms out, his mouth parted, brows furrowed, eyes so heavy-lidded as he devours your gaze, your face, the pleasure he feels so overwhelming that you almost think he can’t take it. The flexing of his abdominal muscles, the roll of his hips that takes all of his strength while his arms remain restrained behind his back, his neck shiny with a layer of sweat—fuck, the sight is to die for and you melt into something boneless, jelly and gooey; becoming just a hole for him.

You can’t wait for him to fuck you. Perhaps it’s you, after all, who can’t take it.

Jungkook begins to pound her, his mound hitting her clit with every hard motion and it strikes your awe. Your breathing quickens, the drum in your own bundle of nerves unwaveringly unbearable and what’s worse, he keeps fucking looking at you, perhaps imagining it’s your pussy that he’s ruining and your legs tremble, threatening to give out—

“Rub your pussy on the other end, please,” he begs, vocal cords so awfully strained, and this time you decide to gratify him.

The first moan that your mouth emits makes him fuck the toy harder—so much that it slips out of your grasp. You prop your knee on the armrest, flattening Vinny’s face on the edge of the toy, so you can gain the friction you so desperately need and it works. Your cunt soaks her sleepy countenance and you flick your eyes to it, watching the fur get darker with each rock of your hips.

“Look at me,” he grunts—and you do. A hint of softness in the dark sea of his eyes, boisterous waves of arousal sloshing to and fro. “Use her like I am. Hard—” He shows you how by a stroke that reverberates through your body, stimulating your clit by bumping into it. “And then fast.” Quick thrusts that waggle with your form, your curls bouncing against your spine.

And so you match his rhythm. It stimulates you far more than the pace you had going for yourself, your orgasm enclosing around you, inching closer and closer with each graze of your clit against the now more firm plush fur. Your brows knit, the coil in your stomach tightening to the point that it’s you who ultimately takes over and Jungkook follows, matching your rhythm, fucking Vinny faster—the silicone squeaking with each deep plunge of his length into her hole that causes your tits to slap against each other. But Jungkook doesn’t look at them. No, his eyes are set on you and you know that he knows that you’re about to come.

Jungkook begins to pant, marked chest flushing, adorning him most finely. The knowledge is getting him there, too. “You close, baby?”

You moan, sucking in a breath. “So close, I’m gonna come.”

He moans with you, approving of it. “Come, then, I wanna watch you. Make her nice and wet for me, hm?” You rock your hips faster—closer and closer, gripping Vinny with all your might. “I wanna touch you so bad, princess. Kiss you everywhere. Lick that little clit. Fuck you until all that you know is my fucking name. Please—”

You come so hard that it takes both you and Jungkook by surprise, your body violently shuddering and colliding into his. He groans, deeply, following in suit, your orgasm triggering his and he sloppily fucks the toy while he watches you ride out your high, bliss enveloping you in angelic glow.

“Yes, princess, just like that, fuck. You’re so pretty. My pretty little girl, coming so hard. Yes, fuck.” He’s losing himself, moaning your name over and over until there’s nothing left to give to Vinny, until he’s so spent that he sits back on his feet, eyes closing and opening, tongue licking his dry lips. He moans your name again, in post-high. “Please, get the belt—”

You don’t hesitate. With blurry vision and sex hormones swirling in your brain, numb by your intense orgasm, you edge around him and rid him of his restraint, flinging it somewhere away from the both of you, hating it, not wanting to see it again.

You and Jungkook exchange a look full of soft smiles and love, with his joy like a cherry on top of that. He twists his wrists, standing up to his feet, the size difference and the sudden change in energy causing him to grow solemn. No smiles, though the love remains. You feel it thumping in the atmosphere you’re surrounded by as he completely overpowers you, naturally. And you welcome it, needing it—needing to be dominated and fucked until you’re brainless.

“I love watching you come,” Jungkook murmurs, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear and cradling the side of your face. “It’s all I want to see for the rest of my life. Every morning when I wake up and every night before I go to sleep. It’s everything to me.”

It moves through you, his words, almost painfully with their vigor and passion, passing down your body until they settle in your core. You drip for him. Still feel so terribly lightheaded and high. “Just that, huh?”

“And your snores.”

You punch his arm. Jungkook laughs and gathers your hair, pulling it away from your face, stroking it down your back. A grin of your own curls your mouth. You don’t snore, at all. And you tell him.

“You do when you’re tired.” You gasp, lifting your hand again but he catches it in time, intertwining your fingers with his. “You did such a good job today. You learn well from me. Sounded just like me. Made me proud.” He strokes your hair again and you lean into his touch, even though you don’t believe him. You could’ve done a lot better and it could’ve ended just like you planned—fucking him with that fleshlight. You guess you can save that for another time.

You shake your head. “I messed up.”

“But you didn’t.” He angles his head, inching closer so the gravity of his words can pierce your mind, but it does no such thing. You still have one of your own. Solid as a rock.

“No, I shouldn’t have forgotten the lube. It ruined everything.”

Jungkook sighs, drawing back, fondling the back of your hand before he lets go of it and clutches the nape of your neck. “Sex isn’t meant to be perfect. You didn’t ruin anything, why do you think that?” He looks at you for a long time, but you can’t take it—you drop your gaze, still feeling terrible. He calls you by your name, firmly. “Who made you think sex is meant to be perfect, huh? Bring them to me.”

You laugh, softly, at the ridiculousness of his question. It’s him who owns your virginity—you’ve never been with anyone else before him. It’s your own expectations that make you think that. “Right here.” You point to your brain.

Jungkook kisses your forehead. Lingers there, giving you a million tiny pecks, as if erasing everything from there that he doesn’t like. It touches you, deeply, and you can’t stop yourself from submitting to it as it melts your brain. Your mouth rounds in a pout, your bottom lip jutting out and when he gazes down upon you and sees it, he coos at you, kissing it. “I made a mistake, too, didn’t I?” You remain silent—still think he didn’t do anything wrong. “But it was still amazing and we came together, didn’t we?”

He’s right; you’ll give him that. “You really liked it?”

He pecks you, vehemently, on the lips and then points to the fleshlight behind him in all its glory, dripping with cum. So much fucking cum that it makes a puddle on the hardwood floor. “Do you think I would’ve cummed this much if I didn’t? Tell me, baby.”

You swear, unable to take your eyes off of the quantity of his male essence. It draws you in, magnetically, and you obey its call, lifting the fleshlight with your hands, turning around so Jungkook sees and darting out your tongue—

“Don’t.”

You swipe the muscle across the silicone hole, collecting his ivory arousal. Most of it trickles down your neck and bare chest and it’s Jungkook now who swears, loudly. Grabs you by your waist and, flinging the toy away, he kisses you. You didn’t even have the time to swallow. He’s tasting himself on your tongue and it causes you to moan into his mouth. He taps the back of your thighs and you jump, wrapping your legs around his torso. You don’t know where he’s taking you, but at this point you give zero fucks.

His tender bedding grazes your back when he lays you down on it with a harsh thud, breaking the kiss and taking your breath away. Bottom lip between his teeth, he studies your soiled body with his cum, kneeling on the bed by your form. He takes his first two fingers and collects his evidence of pleasure, flicking his eyes to yours. You meet him halfway, expecting him to plunge those digits in your mouth and you’re ecstatic, wanting it badly, but Jungkook pushes you down.

In fact, he turns you around—ass up, face down. With just one hand.

You swear, your arousal gaining new intensity. And it’s your needy hole that he plunges his fingers in, briefly stuffing you with his cum, placing his free hand on your lower back so you can arch your spine for him more. Then, he rubs your clit in hard, slow circles, making you cry out, making your legs tremble all over again—

A spank. A brassy, cacophonous spank that drives you forward, forcing you to grip onto the sheets.

“I told you not to do that, didn’t I?” Jungkook rasps. Doesn’t alleviate the burn. “Answer me.”

Fuck. “Yeah, you told me not to do that.”

You brace yourself for another spank, but it doesn’t come. You feel his lips by your ear, his body heat cocooning you as he bends over you, his fists, pitifully, on either side of your back.

“You’re such a filthy little girl. Licking my cum off like that? Making me hard all over again for you?” he tsks, the sound making you even needier. For him, for his cock, even for another spank. You grind your ass against his hip and he maneuvers so his cock slips between your cheeks. Swears, such guttural noise that you mewl in response. “You just do what you want, huh? I guess you don’t love your Daddy anymore.”

He spanks you again, harder than before, and your vowel of disagreement breaks at the concoction of pain and pleasure coursing through your body. “No—no, I love you.”

Another spank. Lips by your ear again, his body clinging to your side. “You love me?” He clamps your mouth shut, preventing you from answering.

You do, anyways, your words muffled. “I love you. I love you so much.”

Jungkook hums in question. “What did you say? I couldn’t hear you.” He digs his fingers harder into your cheek, other hand rounding around your hip and attacking you with bolts of pleasure that make you quiver against him—rubbing your clit rapidly before he sinks his fingers inside you… and merely keeps them there.

You move his hand away and he lets you, holding it, panting. “I love you so much.”

Jungkook groans, sinking his fingers deeper. “Who do you love, hm?”

He wants you to say his rightful title and you do, with all your heart. “You, Daddy. I love you.”

At your words, Jungkook begins to pump his fingers and you cry out, placing your head on his palm, taking it. “Such a good fucking girl, making me crazy—” He growls, pressing a fat kiss on your cheek, curling his fingers slowly into that place that causes your breath to hitch in your throat, your orgasm quick to catch up to you. “Good little girl that loves her Daddy, fuck. I’m gonna give you everything. Gonna eat that little pussy, hm? You want that? Want Daddy to make you come with his tongue?”

You squeak when he gives you one particular, hard stroke against your special place, mind numbing, a dam broken. “Yes, yes, please, Daddy, please—”

He draws away, instantly. Traces your back with his palms as he straightens, smearing your feminine essence all over your skin that he licks up. And then, his mouth—

Jungkook takes you in his mouth. All of you. Licking against your clit, sucking it, rubbing his face in your cunt and groaning against her. His hands squeeze your ass, painting it redder and he flicks your little bundle of nerves with his tongue until he senses your orgasm. Then, he pulls away for a second, stalling it. Thumbs your other, puckered hole.

“My pretty little pussy. All mine.”

Mewling, you shake your ass for him and he growls, cursing, spanking your cheek, taking the flesh in his hand and squeezing it. Again and again, until you feel yourself drip, until you feel him spread your legs wider and nudge himself between them, opening his mouth for it to trickle down upon his tongue.

“Sit up. Ride my face.”

You moan before you even obey, sitting down on his tongue and grinding your pussy on it. He rolls it against you, back and forth, following your rhythm. Slow and romantic, kissing your clit every once in a while, sucking it as you keep up your movement, inching dangerously close to your orgasm. He’s in absolute control of you, though. Of your pleasure and climax, stalling it before beckoning it forth again. You lose yourself in it, in the profound and all consuming delight toying with all your nerve endings, creating something within you that diffuses you with confidence and allure, that inclines you to ride him harder, whimper a little louder and knead your breast until you leave your handprint in your wake.

He lets you do your thing, but as you saw earlier today, there’s only so much that he can take.

Clasping your hips, he angles them until your hole is at level with his nimble tongue, guiding you to lean back and use his chest to hold yourself steady. And like his fingers, he fucks you with the muscle, curling it each time. The filthy noise of your slick and his saliva, his breaths and hums, your obscene moans and then his thumb rubbing your clit rapidly—it’s enough, with his evident permission, for you to come.

And you come so hard that you sprinkle his face with your dew.

He laughs in utter joy, humming—humming deeply and you’re so obsessed with that sound that you come again, shuddering violently and he spanks you, holds you by your waist, digging in his fingerprints, allowing you to ride out your high, to use him until you’re so boneless that you slump against him.

Jungkook drags you down, though, slipping, instantly, his cock inside of you. And it’s wild, wild butterflies that you feel in your gut owing to it, then pain so acute that you whine. Enveloping his arms around you, tightly, with no way of escaping, his wet face is so tender that you coo at him amidst the rush of your colorful feelings. Wipe away your dew, giggling, kissing him loudly as his cock adjusts in you and the bite from overstimulation withers little by little.

“You can take it, I know you can,” Jungkook whispers, beaming up at you, iridescent. “You feel so good around me. So tight. I love being inside of you.”

Slowly, he begins to move, causing your features to scrunch up. In discomfort at first, then in relish as your stiffened nipples rub against the hardness of his chest.

“You’re my good little girl. You take everything I give you so well. So well.” Jungkook picks up his pace, gathering your hair in his fist. Doesn’t pull on it; merely holds it. You whimper, his words loosening the overbearing tightness of your walls. “I’m gonna take care of you. You’re just my little baby. Mine—” A hard thrust. Your eyes roll back. “My baby.”

“Yes, I’m yours,” you croak out and Jungkook takes your face in his hands and pounds into you until all you see is stars. Pretty, pretty twinkling stars.

Slapping skin, his grunts—you don’t even see your orgasm coming, coming over you so violently and yet in such an exhilarating way. Your dew forces him out, forces his chuckles out again and he brings you back to him, kissing you, plunging his cock back with ease.

You’re so lightheaded that you feel like an angel, soaring in the sky. An angel that years for something more. And you tell him. “Jungkook, please, I want the vibrator.”

He merely smiles at you, arm reaching over and pulling out the toy for you from his bedside table. Turning it on, you’re radiated by the light in his eyes and you whimper in impatience. Jungkook shushes you, like a baby, clicking on the intensity until he’s satisfied, placing it on your clit.

And then he gets up.

Pushes you against his closet, back against the wood, legs around his waist, vibrator on your clit and his hand clasped around your mouth, preventing your loud moans from escaping while letting you know how much he loves being in charge. Giving you hard strokes that secure him your soul on a silver platter before he fucks you so fast that you can’t see anything. Your surroundings are a blur while his face remains clear, painted in tortured pleasure for you as if he were holding himself back.

“Come for me, Daddy,” you beg under his palm, your sound muffled, but it seems that Jungkook understands you.

Pulling away, he turns you around and gets into position again. One hand around your mouth, the other holding the toy on your clit, his dick inside. He begins to play with you, not moving his hips at all, only the vibrator. Panting against the crook of your neck, he takes a second to merely breathe with you while you’re on the pathway to another mind blowing orgasm because he turns up the intensity. “How about you come for Daddy first, hm? I know you don’t need me to move when we do this. You can come just like this. So come.”

And you do, embarrassingly, whining all over the place, twisting your hips to chase your pleasure, causing him to emit the same sounds—causing him to pound you so hard against his closet that he, too, comes in mere minutes. His fingers in your mouth, he’s loud and just as whiny as you, fucking you through his orgasm as you play with digits, sucking on them.

He doesn’t pull away for a long time. Presses you against his chest and holds you like that, still connected. The vibrator buzzes on the floor, the air is stuffed, but you’re content, the happiest angel, held and stuffed, too. With cum and dick. Heaven on earth.

Jungkook begins to kiss your neck, marking you there. Fondles your nipples, making you shudder and sigh, making you utter the three words that he deserves.

“I love you, Ggukie.”

Jungkook makes a sound that tears you apart. A whimper; the whiniest you ever heard him be. He pulls out of you, but stuffs you again with his fingers. Makes you squirt in record time, kissing you everywhere he can reach. Neck, shoulder, jaw, cheek and lips.

You must be soaring again in the clouds because you can’t feel your body, especially not when Jungkook says, “I love you, my little squirter.”

Your knees do give out, after all. Jungkook is quick to pick you up and cradle you in his arms. Wash you clean in the shower. Put on a movie for you while making you food, joining you as soon as he can.

It’s love you feel—love most profound. And as you eat the food together and finish the wine with drenched Vinny on the other side of the couch, you fall asleep with that love thrumming in your heart.

You’ll be his for the rest of your life. And he’ll be yours, too.

BACK to masterlist

#jungkook x oc #jungkook x reader #jungkook x you #jungkook smut #bts smut #bts imagine #jungkook imagine #jeon jungkook #bts scenarios #jungkook scenarios #jungkook fluff #btscreatorscorner #kpop smut #jungkook one shot

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jinuaei · 2 days

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I can offer you an idea of yandere alastor.. What would it be like if alastor as a child knew the reader... Like I imagine alastor as a child not knowing how to act properly like a human, and the reader as a good best friend helping him seems more human (and not because the child reader is scared of him) ... Actually, what would happen?

Wrote this instead of working on my finals hope you enjoyed it!

Yandere! Alastor x Childhood friend! Reader

Warning: Animal death, blood, its YANDERE

WC: ~1.5k

Charlie dragged the whole hotel for another ‘trust’ session, this time, she had the great idea for the sinners to share stories from when they were alive. Granted, some of them were eager to share, namely Nifty and Angel Dust, Husk would share some here or there, although it's mostly due to Charlie and Angel pushing him to. Alastor on the other hand kept quiet during the whole ordeal, until the topic of childhood friends came up.

“I had a childhood friend once, such a sweetheart. Wouldn't leave me alone to play with others!,” Alastor let the statement linger in the air, casually sipping on his coffee.

The other members of the Hotel look aat him with mouths agape, shocked and surprised at the fact that THE Alastor, Radio Demon, Dealmaker, HAD FRIENDS? Moreover, a childhood friend?? Someone stayed friends with him since they were children???

“Don't look at me like I am incapable of having proper friendships, and no, you cannot ask them about me as a child because they're simply not a sinner! Oh imagine my disappointment when I didn't find them down here,” his eyes glazed over in slight rage as he thought about how you weren't here.

Very disappointing that I will never be able to hold my beloved again. What I would do to be able to chain them to my side once more…

“Well don't leave us hangin’, whose this sweetheart of you’s?,” the white spider interjected.

He tells them your name, sighing dreamily as he starts to reminisce about the times you were together when you were children.

You were the child of one of his momma's clients, a bubbly little thing, always eager to play with him regardless of how cold he is to you.

His momma was your family's personal tailor, and by God were you a spoiled little thing. Every week you would ask for 2-3 outfits to be created for you, although it looked more like costumes than everyday wear but he doesn't complain, as long as your family treated him and his momma with respect.

Nonetheless, he refuses to be close to you, considering you as a bother, but of course, he would never admit that to you, lest he wants his momma to get in trouble.

He hasn't always looked forward to when his momma brings him to your house, namely due to you clinging to him every time you meet. There's one thing in your mansion that he’s quite fond of though, once he manages to escape from your grasp, he sneaks into the woods behind your house, gazing at all the wildlife roaming around your property.

One time, he found an injured bird crying close to him, it tried to get away from him but he eventually caught it in a tight grip, it chirped and cried but Alastor just gripped tighter and tighter until, pop!

Blood trailed down his hands and onto the forest floor below, unbeknownst to him, he had a huge grin on his face, too pleased with the mutilation of the poor bird. A gasp resonates behind him and he quickly drops the bird, face stilling at the fact that he got caught.

When he turned his body to you, your eyes were full of tears staring at his hands that he didn't bother to hide. He prepared himself to hunt you down to make sure you wouldn't tattle on his momma but your next words made him stop in place.

“Are you okay???” you rushed to his side, pulling out a handkerchief and started to wipe off the blood coating his stained hand.

In response, the child looked at you aghast, stupefied at the concern you were showing, marking yourself vulnerable to the predator towering over your much shorter build. He could kill you if he could, he can lie and tell your parents that a bear found both of you and killed you, that he tried to save you but was unable to. But then again… as you fret over him, a thought passes through his mind.

You are too kind for your own good, just like momma. Don't worry I’ll protect you.

Alastor raises the now somewhat clean hand, and he notes how you didn't even flinch at it, and just looked at him with your wide, innocent eyes. The hand lowers to pat you on the head, ruffling your hair a little bit.

“I am fine, I tried to save a bird but it was too hurt to be saved,” he shows off the bird, face devoid of any emotions.

You frowned at it and suddenly went on your knees and started digging a grave with your hands.

Alastor furrowed his eyebrows and questioned what you were doing, you responded with, “I’m digging a grave for the birdie, I don't want them to die without a proper burial.”

The boy helped you after a few moments of silence. Once you were done, you clasped your hands together, covered in dirt and blood, silently looking at him to do the same. Look at you, as a child of a rich man you shouldn't be on your knees covering yourself in filth, but perhaps he should indulge his angel for a little bit.

As you started praying he couldn't help but let the bitterness consume his mind. God wouldn't care about frivolous things like this, prayers do nothing, if it did, how come he and his momma are still at the mercy of that monster of a man he calls his father?

“Amen.”

You offer your filthy hand to him, gazing at him with a smile that could rival the sun. Perhaps the only good thing that God has done, is sending down an angel for him to play with.

“You should smile more, you look very pretty,” he raises an eyebrow at that, startled by your bluntness. Admittedly, he can feel himself flush at your compliment.

“Do you like it when I smile?” he hums, taking your hand. Both of you started to walk back to your manor.

“I do! Mommy always said ‘you’re never fully dressed without a smile’ and that's why I always smile!”

“Then I'll smile a lot for you,” he tried to smile, but it looked more like a grimace.

“You're doing it wrong! It's like this,” you show off your smile, toothy and wide.

He tries again and ultimately fails, you pout at him cutely when he failed, and he couldn't help but smile, genuinely smile at that. In response you shout out ‘like that!’, and start vibrating in excitement that you managed to make him smile.

It was almost nightfall when you eventually managed to get home safely, albeit covered in dirt and grime. What greeted you both were your father, stressed beyond belief, and his mother, on the verge of tears. They both rushed to you guys and hugged the both of you, fretting and scolding at how worried they are, they asked you and Alastor what happened and you, being the loudmouth you are, told them the story that you know.

Both adults are relieved to hear that you both are safe, they rushed you to clean yourselves up. Ever since then, Alastor has been looking forward to every visit they had to your house. And every single visit has been a learning moment for him, day by day he learns what you like and what you don't like.

You like gentlemen? The next time you meet, he offers you his arm to hold. Do you like poetry? He memorizes your favourite poems to recite whenever you're bored. Do you like food and cooking? He begs his momma to teach him her infamous Jambalaya and other comfort foods to cook for you.

Alastor molded himself to become your ideal man, the most perfect gentleman that ever existed in your life. But then…

“Then what...? But then what??” Angel exclaimed when Alastor trailed off with a cliffhanger. Everyone leaned towards him, captivated by the story he shared. He smiles cryptically, but still doesn't respond.

“Oh well, it seems like it's almost supper time, I should work on it, wouldn't want to be late for dinner hmm?”

Everyone collectively groaned at the cliffhanger, they wanted to know what happened after, but they couldn't complain much lest they want to be part of Alastor's radio broadcast.

Alastor turns away from them, humming to himself as he walks towards where the kitchen is.

But then you had to die as a saint. You had to marry that disgusting excuse of a man you called your husband, and now he killed you. My beloved, was I not enough? Was I not perfect for you? You would have been safe if you were with me… Don't worry, I made sure that ‘husband’ of yours regretted ever hurting you. May this be an offering to my angel.

A haunting scream pierces through hell, amplified by the speakers scattered around the pride ring.

Support me here so I would be more likely to write more fics 🤭

#yandere x reader #yandere hazbin hotel #yandere hazbin hotel x reader #yandere alastor x reader #yandere alastor #hazbin alastor x reader #alastor x you #Hazbin hotel alastor #alastor hazbin hotel

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sailor-aviator · 3 days

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Hey.

Go ahead and get settled because this will be...long, in true Liz fashion.

So, by now I'm sure most of you have heard what's happened. If not, you can search this blog for some answers or others for more.

I joined this fandom offiicially at the end of September after being a long time lurker. I had just lost my job and times were uncertain for me. I felt inspired to write, and as someone whose formative years were shaped by the fandom experience, I wanted to feel that sense of belonging again - to feel like a part of a community. I've talked about it on here before, but I started my fandom days in the original Hunger Games fandom when the first movie had just come out, and then I shifted gears towards the SuperWhoLock fandom. If you know anything about SuperWhoLock, then you know you had to have pretty tough fucking skin to be a part of any of it.

Of course, this was back in the day when fandom was an actual community and not authors having to beg for scraps of engagement and people thinking its a numbers game. I was a fairly large blog within the SuperWhoLock community (Waywardly-Carrying-On was the username), but I left fandom for a few years because life got hectic and I felt like I had outgrown the fandom itself as I was no longer watching any of the shows. As the years went on, I started to yearn for the fandom experience again, which is how I found myself dipping toes into several different ones.

I was so excited to publish my first fanfic. I had convinced myself that I wasn't a good writer (much to the chagrin of my irl friends), and I had put a pause on writing my original story. I wanted to write this idea about a cowboy and a girl using characters that I had grown to love like I did way back in my older days. So, I started posting, and I was so excited for the story, that I kept posting almost daily. MamaMay was one of the first people to embrace not only my story, but me as a person into the fandom. She made me feel welcomed and wanted.

Pretty much right off the bat I was already getting anons telling me that I was being too much and that I needed to calm down with all the posting. I was confused because...this is Tumblr. It's literally a blogging website? Why wouldn't I post? I decided to ignore the mean words (not before giving my opinion, of course) and kept on doing my thing. Well, the anons got continually worse and worse. I had a suspiscion as to who the anons could be, but I never had concrete proof. So, I experimented with blocking suspects until finally it worked. I'm not naming names because that's not my style, so don't even bother asking.

The fact of the matter is, some of you have entered fandom spaces for the first time, and you don't know how to act. You don't care to learn fandom etiquette as you've made abundantly clear by calling fandom olds every name under the sun while utilizing the anonymous feature. Newsflash, you're part of the problem. You're the reason why authors don't want to publish anymore. You are the reason that something that's supposed to be fun is starting to feel like a goddamn chore.

How many times can authors on here say that we aren't machines? We have lives outside of this website: family, friends, jobs, school, etc. Some of you really are just hellbent on making everyone around you miserable, and it's sad. You can't just leave well enough alone and let people enjoy something, no you feel like everyone has to enjoy it the same way as you.

Some of you go after authors on here because of some weird sense of jealousy too. I don't know why my shit blew up, babe, I really don't. But I started out with no followers and no support just like everyone else. I'll tell you what helped me though: following fandom etiquette and reaching out to other creators to build an actual community. None of this "I've reblogged three of your things and now I'm messaging you so that you return the favor." No, I reached out to make actual friendships which is what fandom is SUPPOSED to be. If someone was clearly not interested, it was fine!! I backed off and kept doing my own thing.

Some of you think being mean on the internet makes you big and bad. Guess what! It doesn't! It's loser mentality and I feel genuinely sorry for you. I'm sorry that people in your own life made you feel so small as to feel like you had to lash out at strangers on the internet who are just trying to have fun.

Anyway, this is my really long way of saying that I am taking a break for a little bit. I have no idea how long it will be - could be the weekend, could be a couple of weeks, could be forever. I need time to decide if this is something I want to keep persuing. If I come back, I don't know if I will remain a TGM blog or if I'll shift gears and hop into another fandom with a rebrand. Guess we'll just have to see.

To the people on here who have been a constant source of joy, laughter, and support: thank you. From the bottom of my heart. Your presence has meant everything to me, and I hope that my break sees me wanting to come back and giggle about the silly plane movie with you all again.

Nothing but love,

Liz 💛

#psa #public service announcement #this has been a psa #liz speaks #liz rambles #long post

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foundheavenly · 3 days

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Hello I wanted to ask about a fic with a dying SO in the arms of Geto,Gojo and Nanami?

If that's too much characters then I choose Gojo.

Thank you in advance

Slipping through my fingers

Disclaimer: English is not my mother tongue so please be nice

Words:

Pairing: gojo x reader, geto x reader, nanami x reader

Theme: heavy angst

Masterlist

Thank you for this requet but who hurt you??? I guessed I'm relieved that I like writing angst because I would have been a complete mess right now. <3

Nanami -

You were weak and battered, every breath feeling like a struggle against an invisible force. Kento held you in his arms, his eyes glistening with unshed tears.

"You can't leave me" Kento pleaded, his voice breaking. "I can't do this without you."

His heart was heavy with fear.

Right at that moment, his mind brought him back years ago. He saw himself back when he lost his only friend, the only person who had ever been his solace. He saw himself back when he lost Haibara. And right after this tragedy, he promised himself to protect those around him. He promised himself to protect you, to prevent anything from happening to you.

Yet here he was. His hands shaking and covered in fresh blood.

Your blood.

You reached up, cupping his cheek with a trembling hand. "You're strong, Kento. Stronger than you know. You'll carry on, and you'll make the world a safer place, just like we always dreamed."

Tears welled in Kento's eyes as he pressed his forehead against yours, your breaths mingling in the cold air of the room. "I can't imagine a world without you in it" he admitted, his voice barely audible over the sound of his own heart breaking.

"Remember when we first met?" you whispered, a faint smile tugging at your quiver and cold lips. "You were so determined to save the world from curses, and I was just a stubborn girl with too much curiosity for her own good."

Kento chuckled softly, the memory of your first meeting flooding back to him. "You were always getting yourself into trouble" he recalled fondly. "But you had a heart of gold, and I knew from that moment that I couldn't let you face the dangers of this world alone."

Your tired and dull eyes met his and you took a sharp breath. "Kento.." you whispered, your voice barely a whisper. "I'm sorry."

"Don't talk." He said firmly and choked back tears, his hands trembling a bit as they pressed against the wounds, trying to staunch the flow of blood.

You managed a weak smile, feeling a surge of warmth from his voice.

His thick fingers gently moved to your face and brushed against your cheek, his touch tender yet laden with sorrow. "You're going to be okay. You have to be."

You shook your head faintly and a faint chuckle escaped your lips, knowing the truth even as you clung to the last vestiges of hope. You weren't ready yet. You didn't want to leave him, not right now. Not when you were close to get married.

"You always were the optimist." You said, your voice barely a whisper. "But even you can't deny the truth forever, my love."

Your words got him.

Simply.

Quickly.

Terribly.

Tears spilled over his lashes, trailing down his cheeks in shimmering rivulets. "Nonsense." Kento insisted even though he was in pure panic, his voice cracking with anguish. "We will find a way. We always do."

It was the very first time his stern mask was breaking.

Your eyes fluttered open, the light within them dimming with each passing moment. "I don't want you to blame yourself." You murmured, voice slurred with deep pain. "This was my choice, my burden to bear."

You acted wtihout thinking. Wave of curses was attacking you over and over. Not sparring you nor him. You just shielded him with your body as he was getting exhausted.

"You are not leaving me." He said, desperation lacing his words. "I won't let you."

Your hand suddenly lost its grip on his cheek, the touch growing weaker with each passing second. "Remember me" You whispered, labored breathing. "Remember us."

"Always." Kento promised. "I will never forget you."

Gojo -

In the dimly lit room of an abandoned warehouse, the air was thick with tension and the scent of blood. Satoru, his normally blue vibrant eyes covered by his blindfold were now filled with worry, cradled you, his best friend, whose life was slipping away with each passing moment. The mission against the curses had taken a disastrous turn, leaving both of them battered and broken.

He was repeating himself that he couldn't lose you. No, he couldn't. Not you. Not after losing his best friend a few months ago.

With trembling hands, Satoru pressed down on the wound, trying desperately to stem the flow of blood. "Hang in there," he whispered. His voice choked with emotion. He was trying hard to keep in control. "We will get you to Shoko."

You managed a weak smile, the effort visibly draining you. "I'm not sure I can hold on much longer, Toru" You rasped, each breath a struggle.

"Don't talk like that" The white haired man pleaded, his heart clenching at the sight of your pain. "You're stronger than this. You've survived worse. Way worse."

A faint chuckle escaped the your quiver lips, tinged with bitter irony. "Guess I used up all my luck on those past missions, huh?"

Tears welled up in his eyes as he shook his head. "No, you're not allowed to give up. I won't let you."

In the distance, the sound of approaching footsteps echoed through the empty warehouse. Satoru's grip tightened around you, a mixture of fear and determination etched on his face.

"I wish I could have protected you better. I let my guard down." Satoru murmured, his voice barely a whisper. "I'm sorry."

You reached out, weak fingers brushing against his cheek. "You've always been there for me. That's more than enough."

Your conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Shoko, rushing to your side. Satoru watched helplessly as she worked frantically to stabilize you, her efforts a blur against the backdrop of your fading consciousness.

Shoko looked at Satoru and he understood.

Darkness closed in around him, he leaned closer, his lips brushing against your ear. "I won't leave your side" he vowed, his voice trembling with unspoken emotions. "I promise."

And in that heartbreaking moment, amidst the chaos and uncertainty, Satoru whispered words of love to the one person who had always meant everything to him, even if he had never found the courage to say it aloud before.

Geto -

"I'm sorry, my love" whispered Geto, his voice trembling with sorrow as he pressed his lips to your forehead. "I never should have let you take that risk."

Lying on the cold stone floor, gasping for breath, a weak smile graced your lips as you struggled to speak. "It was our job, Suguru. Our job to protect the world from the darkness that lurks in the shadows."

Tears welled in his eyes as he held you tighter, as if trying to defy the inevitable. "But at what cost, my love? At what cost?"

He couldn't lose you. Oh, he could be selfish and cursed you so you could stay by his side. But he won't do this. Not to you.

Your breaths grew shallow, each one a painful reminder of your condition "Some sacrifices are necessary. For the greater good."

His heart clenched at the words, a mixture of pride and despair flooding his soul. "I cannot bear to lose you," he whispered, his voice cracking with emotion.

"I'm sorry. I don't think I have much time left." You said.

"Don't say that.” He murmured, his hands trembling as he tried to stop the blood. "We will get you out of here."

"It might be too late for that." You whispered, your voice barely above a whisper. "The pain...is too powerful. It's consuming me from the inside."

Geto's heart clenched with despair as he realized the gravity of the situation. They had embarked on this mission together, determined to rid the world of the malevolent curses that threatened to engulf it. But now, faced with the prospect of losing you, his resolve wavered.

He was going to lose his mind.

He won't be able to live without you.

He can't lose you.

"We should never have taken this mission." Suguru murmured, his voice choked with regret. "I should have protected you."

You winced and reached out, grasping his hand with a strength born of sheer willpower. "Don't blame yourself. We knew the risks when we got to this school. And besides, we've met each other and I am happy I got to spend time with the love of my life."

His eyes glistened with unshed tears as he gazed down at you, his heart heavy with sorrow. "I love you. I can't bear to lose you."

"I love you too, my love" You replied with a genuine smile, her voice barely audible now. You were close to the end. "But you have to promise me something."

"Anything," Suguru vowed, his voice breaking with emotion.

"Promise me that you'll keep going." You whispered, your grip on his hand weakening with each passing moment. "Promise me that you'll never give up and lose yourself, no matter what."

Suguru gulped and nodded.

"I promise" He vowed, his voice filled with determination.

You smiled faintly, your strength fading with each heartbeat.

Your eyes fluttered closed, Geto pressed his lips to your forehead, whispering a silent prayer to whatever gods he didn't really believe in might be listening.

#jjk #jujutsu kaisen #jjk x reader #gojo #geto #nanami #gojo x reader #nanami x reader #geto x reader

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yviqq · 3 days

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jason todd || stake outs, they never really... work

i.e. jason peter todd brain rot hit my brain in the middle of the night when i had an assignment to complete (the assignment was never completed) with this song on REPEAT.

warning: this fic was an oc insert, the only thing changed was the name (or lack of... i suppose) !!!

afab!reader, she/her reader, reader has unnamed boyfriend, reader cheats on said unnamed boyfriend, a lot of f bombs, this is unfinished, stops just when they bouta...

“I didn’t know your eyes were so green,” she mumbled, almost incoherently as her nail graced his cheekbone like it never left, “Like… Deep green.”

Jason doesn’t need a mirror to know his ears are already doing the thing where they’re all flushed, he can feel in the way his breaths stop at that point in his throat, feel it in the way his heart starts stuttering against her hand on his chest. Fuck.

He fidgets underneath her, hands flat on the floor of his van as he tries to sit up, “They’re not— Well sometimes they are… Just… Could you get off me? ... Please?”

Her eyes flicker (and God he wished he didn’t notice the way they wander his body to his lips) before her hand leaves his chest, her nail stopping its movements, and she's sat with her knees to her chin. With a groan, she rests her chin on her knees, quickly replacing it with their forehead when she groans even louder.

Jason chuckles, glad to have his space again but somehow missing the flush of his ears. Fuck. His stupid revived brain cannot be doing this right now. Not on a stake out, not on a stake out with his best friend, not on a stake out with his best friend who just so happens to have a boyfriend of a couple months— Yeah… That’s fucked.

A silence wafts through them, and they both wonder if the other can tell there’s something more in the silence than just that, than just silence.

She shivers at the very thought, shuffling away to one of the computers of the van. Jason stills, finding the back of the van suddenly extremely comfortable as he watches her hands type away. He watches her every move, the way only the slightest movement of her hair falling to her face would irk her off and she’d tuck it back into the back of her ear just as quick as it moved, the way her bottom lips insides were bitten as she examined whatever was on that monitor, the way her eyes flicked from the monitor to Jason— Oh.

“What?” She mumbled. Odd, he realised, she never really mumbled around him before— Not when they were kids, teens, after his revival, not after anything. She was always so…. Snarky.

He clears his throat in hopes it’d clear his mind too, “Nothing, nothing—” he curses at his awkward responses, he was never like this around her before either— “Just lost in thought.”

She nodded, understanding as always, quiet as never.

“Jason…” his heart jumped to his throat at the sound of her voice merely uttering the two syllables that made up his name, “Do you wanna pass some time with me?”

His mind started rushing and his blood started squeezing around his veins at obscure speeds, down, down, down. He let out his second and hopefully last awkward chuckle, “Like a game of ‘I Spy?’?”

They used to play that all the time back in detention whenever Prof. Duong started nodding off to dream lands far far away from that dumb school for the troubled. But Jason guessed they weren’t back at detention, guessed they weren’t really kids anymore when she started to inch closer to him than ever.

He tried his best to look everywhere but her, in hopes his hands didn’t jump at the chance to grab her waist and just have her as near as possible— But of course, as always, he failed. And all of a sudden his eyes couldn’t leave the two piercings that sat symmetrically on her bottom lip— and his thoughts couldn’t leave the mere feel of them against his lips alone.

“No, birdie wonder,” she made herself at home between his legs, on her knees as she leaned in closer and closer. She hadn’t changed her perfume since before his death, he realised when she was just a couple of inches away, “Something more… Grown up?”

The only thing keeping him grounded, keeping him from absolutely taking her in with all his soul, was the two necklaces that were clasped onto her neck. His mothers necklace, and a newer one— A silver heart-shaped locket engraved with the lettering ‘K’.

His hand comes up to fiddle with it, “Hm… Do you think ‘K’ would approve of this?”

That stalls her, just for a bit, just for a small stutter of her heart. All until her hands leave his chest— and he starts wishing he never said anything about no stupid ‘K’— and goes behind her neck to unclasp the poor thing.

She slides it to the other side of the van, “Fuck it.”

The very moment she turns around, he knows how those piercings feel against his lips— Right.

His thumb caresses her cheekbone as he leads their kiss down so that she’s on the floor of the van. His knee comes up and slots easily between her legs as he’s met with the surprise that she’s got a piercing in her tongue as well. He shivers down into a small groan against her lips, his other hand sliding up her shirt and tracing the line of her bra.

She whimpers into his lips and he wishes he could let that consume all of him forever, keep that exact moment engraved in his brain as the feeling of her reverberates across his very soul. He wonders if ‘K’’s ever felt that exact same whimper on his lips, and wonders if he even took care of her like Jason could.

His kisses grew hotter yet languid in the way of savouring every moment their lips touched, he starts to kiss down from her lips, down to the expanse of her neck where he held himself back on leaving any mark of some sort, down to her collar bone where he left the smallest of nips that made the smallest of moans leave her shaky lips.

He looks at her through the gaps of his lashes, the way her eyebrows furrowed and her lips trembled at just his teasing knee and a couple nibs and kisses. He grew hot. And bothered. Very bothered.

But before he could do any more than just that he huffs as he spoke out to her, “Are you sure...? Are you so sure this is what you want? ... With me?”

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endeline · 3 days

Text

We'll Be Alright

Paring: Paige Bueckers x Reader Warnings: Angst with no comfort, closeted Paige, breakups, edited and written at 3 a.m. Words: 1,403 A/n: This is my first fic so feel free to critique the hell out of it! (The woman is making me write, send help.) Summary: "I just can’t be seen with you for a while… I can’t be with you for a while," she whispered, her voice heavy with emotion. I watched as her face crumpled under the weight of her confession. She turned away, avoiding my gaze, and in that moment, I felt my world tilt on its axis.

‘I’ve heard her wrong,’ that’s my first reaction, the only rational explanation. ‘I had to have heard her wrong.’ And I almost want to laugh at the ridiculousness of it, because there’s no way this is happening; it’s not possible. Out of everything I’ve learned in this life, only one thing remains steadfast: Paige won’t leave me, not like this. We've been each other's anchors for too long, willingly entwined each other into every facet of our lives—school, family, friends, work; everything leads back to Paige. My life isn’t mine anymore, it’s ours. You can’t just walk away from that; ‘she won’t walk away from that.’

She holds all of me within her grasp. I've given her everything, laid my heart bare at her feet and begged her to take it. I’m not sure I can even remember how to function without her anymore, and I really don’t want to have to re-learn.

At this, I have to take a breath - ‘she isn’t leaving you’—unclenching my fists, the pain of my nails digging into my palms fades into the background and I try to slow my pounding heart.

‘She isn’t doing this,’ ‘you heard her wrong, just ask her to repeat herself, she isn’t doing this’—I repeat like a mantra. I feel myself begin to open my mouth, but in my panic, I seem to have forgotten what to do next, how to speak, what to say.

I don’t have to though; as I watch her bury her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking with silent sobs, I know I've heard her correctly.

Time slows to a stop as I stare at her, the very fabric of our shared existence unraveling before my eyes. She’s trembling, her form completely hunched over, elbows resting heavily on her knees. I strain to hear the faintest sound of her sobs, unsure if it's her or my own heartbeat drowning out the world around me. Everything goes numb, or at least I think I’m going numb; I might be dying. 'I think I’m dying.’

One week earlier:

KK has perched her phone precariously above her stove, and she’s behind me. Her latest brainchild? A cooking show live, which is apparently just me awkwardly fumbling through a recipe in front of thousands of people, while KK assumes the role of my enthusiastic (if somewhat reckless) sous chef. She’s so busy scaring me half to death with her questionable knife skills and insistence upon dancing around the kitchen, requiring me to guard her away from the open flame and from knocking over everything on her chopping board (again), that we both miss Paige getting home.

I’m reaching to taste, and KK is preemptively handing me the salt as a familiar hand snakes it’s way around my waist. Paige leans over me to take my spoon in her mouth. "Tastes good, babe," she murmurs. I’m frozen under her touch, staring at our reflection on the livestream when KK bursts out in fake laughter. "Damn, all you gotta do to get Paige is know how to cook.” I laugh too, now catching on to KK’s cover story, turning to Paige. "For real, Bueckers, if you wanted some all you had to do was ask. Don’t waste your rizz on me," I joke, removing her hands from my waist. Her brow is furrowed, and a confused look passes over her face briefly until she looks up and sees the livestream, which is now blowing up. She steps away from me quickly and forces out a laugh before she slips out of frame and disappears from view. KK wraps the live up soon after this, and I rush after Paige, but the damage is done.

“I’m so sorry,” she sobs, wrenching me back into this harsh reality. “P?” I manage to choke out as I reach my arms out for her. I’m pretty sure I can feel my heart fall out of my chest as she pulls away, her head shaking in silent anguish.

But she doesn’t leave yet. Instead, she’s kneeling by my bedside, where I’ve seen her praying so many nights before. But she’s not talking to her god now; she’s looking up at me, speaking to me, clutching my hands in hers. “I love you, I’m so sorry,” she repeats, and yet even with her declaration of love, all I can do is shake my head in mute denial. “I can’t do it,” she gasps, desperation tingeing her words. “I can’t tell everyone yet. I’m not ready, and I can’t put you through this. It’s not fair to you.” I flinch away from her now, curling up into the corner of my bed.

“I’m so sorry.”

Even as I cower away, her outstretched hand reaches for me, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. Summoning what little strength remained within me, I unfurl myself from the corner of my bed and reach for her again, ‘maybe for the last time.’ I brushed away the tears that stained her cheeks, my heart aching. “What does me not being seen with you mean?" My voice tinged with a desperation I could scarcely contain. Paige finally looks up at me; her gaze met mine, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. "I can’t handle the rumors anymore," she cries, her words a plea for understanding. "I'm so sorry" It’s my turn to look away now, unable to bear the weight of her gaze any longer, staring into my lap. And for the first time in my life, I shake my head and lie to Paige Bueckers, gently shushing her I reach for her hand, “everything's going to be okay, we'll be alright.”

#paige bueckers #paige bueckers x reader #uconn wbb #uconn huskies #kk arnold #womens basketball #angst #paige bueckers fic #paige buckets #wcbb #final four

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street-smarts00 · 1 day

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I have a request for a drabble or headcannon style thing, whatever you prefer. Where spencer and reader are very close (friends or dating you can decide) and he makes a fatal mistake on the job that gets reader killed 😳 if that is something you will do 🥰 thank you

(Long) Drabble: Doubt Comes in

Spencer Reid x Fem!BAU!reader

A/N: Thank you so much for requesting! Normally I don’t like sad endings lol BUT this request gave me the motivation to write something with this idea I’ve had. I almost made it a full one shot but didn't know how. (if you like Orpheus and Eurydice, see if you can catch the hadestown references)

Warnings!: Sad ending/ANGST, Murder, death of a loved one, mentions of kidnapping, anxiety and questioning reality

Its kinda long for a drabble but not long enough where I would call it a one-shot, i got carried away but hope ya'll like it!

The team was working on a case with an unsub that was targeting couples. The team didn’t realize that the unsub had been stalking them since they arrived. He quickly learned of your relationship with spencer.

You were leaving the precinct to follow up with a victim's family member when the unsub had snuck up on you. After you went missing the team went into a frenzy and tracked your location to an abandoned warehouse.

When they arrived on the scene they had the unsub on the phone. He claimed that you were safe and unharmed.

He said you were free to go but only one member of the team could go get you. He demanded they send in her boyfriend.

Hotch was hesitant to send Spencer in. He was in shambles ever since you went missing that afternoon. His mind was scattered, he couldn’t think of anything but you.

They figured while this was exactly what the unsub wanted, it was their best chance to get you out safe.

Spencer was handed the phone and headed towards the warehouse. The building was dimly lit, it was so dark he could barely see 5 feet in front of him. The place was filled with storage and pallet rack shelves turning it into a maze.

As he made his way through the building the unsub would give him directions if he strayed too far from the path. It was like the unsub had eyes everywhere, he must’ve either had cameras or was positioned on a hidden upper level.

While Spencer was walking the unsub would taunt him through the phone. Asking questions about your relationship.

It made him sick. He never said anything to the man on the other end of the line; didn’t want to give the unsub the satisfaction of knowing he was in shambles.

It felt like he had been walking for forever when he finally reached you. You were curled up in a corner of a dead end. When you saw him you jumped up and landed in his arms. He felt you trembling against him and it made his heart crack.

“You said you would let her go if I came to get her,” he spoke into the phone with a shaky voice.

“And I intend to keep my promise. You both are free to go. Except, she must walk behind you. You cannot not turn around under any circumstance until you both are out of the building.”

“What will happen if I do?”

“Let’s just say you’re wearing a kevlar vest and she’s not. If you turn around, speak, or hang up the phone, I shoot.” Spencer's stomach dropped. “And don’t even think about being a hero and giving her your vest.”

“That's all we have to do? And we can go?” You asked, voice horse from not speaking in hours.

The voice on the phone spoke again. “You’d be surprised how many men can not resist the temptation. The worst temptation you’ll ever meet, the one that lines between your ears and behind your eyes.”

It seemed like a simple enough task. To walk out of the building. Spencer trusted you to be there and you trusted him to keep his eyes ahead.

He placed a hand on your cheek. “I promise I-“

“I know. I love you,” You interrupted.

“I love you,” he spoke softly before leaning forward to capture his lips with yours. The kiss was desperate, like he was trying to savor every last bit.

You both separated from the kiss and started your journey through the warehouse. This time the unsub wasn’t giving him directions to find his way back. At first he didn’t need them, with his eidetic memory he could recall the pathway he took.

But as he kept walking the anxiety started to eat away at him. The darkness was messing with his eyes and the silence was deafening. He started to make wrong turns, forgetting which path to take and doubting himself. Either he was getting lost or the building was getting longer.

The only thing that brought him comfort was the sound of your footsteps behind him. Or was that his footsteps? He didn’t know anymore.

It felt like his senses were working against him. He already felt like an idiot with his mind not being able to think straight due to your disappearance. But now your life was in his hands and they’ve been trembling since he walked in.

The logical part of his brain told him there would be no reason for you to not be behind him. But the anxiety running around in his head was questioning if you had ever been there at all. Or why would he let him win? Why would he let her go?

He had thoughts pounding in his mind of “Is this a trap that's been laid for me? Is this a trick that's been played on me?”

After what felt like a lifetime he made it to the front door. His footsteps picked up and he grasped at the handle to feverishly push the door open.

Spencer walked outside as a wave of relief washed over him. They finally made it.

He turned to face you as the corners of his mouth perked up. He met your eyes, shining with glee that you made it out safe.

Then it got loud. He heard gunshots vibrating against his eardrums. Your eyes went wide as saucers. You grasped at your abdomen before you crashed into Spencer.

How could this happen? They made it out. He said he would let them go. And Then Spencer saw it.

You hadn’t made it out yet.

He turned to look at you before you crossed. You both didn’t make it out. You got hurt, and it was his fault.

He held you close to him. The surrounding sounds all blended together. Morgans screams for a medic, the officers breaking into the building. That all fell on deaf ears.

It seemed as though his whole life fell apart when he saw you mouth his name as the light disappeared from your eyes.

Your life was in his hands, and he let you slip away.

“Eurydice, dying now a second time, uttered no complaint against her husband. What was there to complain of, but that she had been loved?” ― Ovid, Metamorphoses

#spencer reid x reader #spencer reid headcanon #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid x you #spencer reid one shot #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfic #spencer reid #criminal minds fanfiction

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mcflymemes · 10 hours

Text

DUNE (2021) PROMPTS * assorted dialogue from the film, adjust as necessary. suggested by lalamoon

it's good you're up early.

why do we have to go through all this, when it's already been decided?

if you want it, make me give it to you.

you look tired. more dreams?

there is no call we do not answer.

you put on muscle!

i would like you to take me with you.

can i trust you with something?

so you dreamed about stuff we all know about.

i dreamt about you.

i saw you lying dead, fallen in battle.

dreams make good stories, but everything important happens while we're awake.

i wish we could bring them all with us.

you don't think we'll ever come back?

i understand your impatience.

great leaders are raised in the mud, not around tables.

don't throw my words back at me.

i told my father i didn't want this either.

a good man doesn't seek to lead. he's called to it, and he answers.

i found my own way to it. you might find yours.

we have to be ready for anything.

don't stand with your back to the door.

i guess i'm not in the mood today.

you fight when the necessity arises, no matter your mood.

i have you.

will it be that bad?

you don't really understand the grave nature of what's happening to us.

the last of our ships have left.

to break a virtuous man, give him a burden too heavy to bear. a lesser man would drop it, but a good man will carry it 'til it crushes him.

get dressed and come with me.

what's in the box?

i must not fear. fear is the mind killer.

an animal caught in a trap will gnaw off its own leg to escape.

i will face my fear.

tell me about these dreams.

do you dream things that happen just as your dreamed them?

i could have died.

how does it feel to walk on another world?

how are you, old friend?

they were pointing at us. what are they shouting?

let's get you out of the sun.

if you mean to harm me, i warn you. whatever you're hiding won't be enough.

treat them well. these are friends.

i have so much to tell you.

that is all i have to say to you.

wait 'til you see. it's beautiful out there.

you're out of your mind! we're not going out there!

i knew you couldn't stay the hell away.

legend is a pretty word for a lie.

i think you're afraid it might be true.

how can i make my way if my destiny was written before i was born?

you have to sleep.

why not just cut their throats?

don't you dare touch my mother!

it's not safe for you here.

you're not coming with us?

one move and you die.

i would not have let you hurt my friends.

you chose the hardest way up.

i will not have them.

this will be an honor for you to die holding it.

this world will kill you.

do you yield?

this is only the beginning.

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ruershrimo · 1 day

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take me back (take me with you) | f. megumi x fem! reader | chapter 6: beginning

ao3 link for additional author’s notes | playlist | prev

chapter synopsis:

'“Why else do you think I am the way I am? I may be shy and scatterbrained, or a horrible woman with a muddled sense of morality or what I think should and should not happen, when in reality it’s just what I want to happen. But this is why I’m so resolute, and so stubborn. This is why I love you so fiercely. All mothers are like that to some degree, even if my own would never let me bear witness to it.”

You haven’t told her you love her too in years.'

'And Itadori seems… like a good person. I think it’s good, that… you were able to find a friend like that.”

“It was. He’s a really, really good guy.”

“You love him a lot,” Megumi says.

---

You and Megumi set out to prevent an emergency involving Yuuji and a cursed object. Unfortunately, that doesn't happen. But at least everyone is fine in the end, even if it means you'll have to walk away from almost everything (or maybe it's the other way around).

You're going to be all on your own. Still, now it seems like this will hurt less now.

word count: ~8k; tws: none for now :)

17-6-2018

The two of you walk down the lane. It’s midnight. There’s a loitering silence in the air, no words exchanged between you and him, and it twists your heart in brief moments of hurt when you’re not trying to keep your mind occupied with other things. Your legs move subconsciously without you caring to think of them, the route to the hospital ingrained in your mind as if intrinsically there.

At some point, you think your hand with its sweat and its grip is going to leave imprints like a marring on his skin, but it’s of your own selfishness that you choose to hold onto his wrist anyway.

There’s a million things you could say to him right now, things you’ll forcefully push to the very back of your throat, things you’ll keep under lock and key in a mangled mix of quiet anticipation and sombre anxieties. Right now you’re holding his wrist and that’s enough for you, to have him walking behind you if not beside, to be two people near each other— not together— in silence since any conversation is not an option; any conversation could lead to the last spark needed to be fanned into the flame for it to erupt bigger and brighter than ever before.

If you asked about Tsumiki right now, or why either of them never bothered to speak to you since 2016, it could break you apart, of that you’re sure. And even without words it threatens to do so to you like a chandelier of melting wax candles hanging above you being suspended precariously from the ceiling or light lightning soon to be thrown down mercilessly from the sky.

“The turning to Sendai Hospital is on the right.”

“I know the routes better,” you let out, and rather disappointingly it sounds brasher and more derogatory aloud instead of the unobtrusive tone you were aiming for— you hope it doesn’t hurt him but then wonder why you still even cared that much about how he felt about what you said or did anyway, “I got myself accustomed to taking the one on the left that leads you through. Quick shortcut and all.”

You’re not looking back, but the light pull of his hand from the hold of your wrist seems to suggest his slight reeling back in a small sense of surprise and an equal amount of shock, as if suddenly remembering the fact you were your own person, that you had your own autonomy as one, because somehow everyone thought you weren’t.

It’s strange to look back at how you were before: meek, timid. Too shy to speak up. Too innocent to be angered by anything. Always dreaming, mind bleary as if on a cloud in blurred skies, hiding behind the backs of others like a petrified forest critter.

And now you’re this— this person who frowns and disagrees and retorts at every little thing, and as much as you have to, as much as it was nearly inevitable the way you turned out, all you can think you share with the person you were when you first met Megumi and Tsumiki was your need to be useful— and even that has been exacerbated by how you’ve grown, how you’ve become this person you grew into. And a part of you— no, just you as a whole— doesn’t like yourself at all.

Your father was right. That little girl was hopeful, obedient, kind, caring— you don’t know why even then you were dissatisfied with the way you were, or why your dissatisfaction would matter because at that time you’d cared so little about everything besides caring for people and having fun with the pair of siblings that you were so rarely bothered by it, that it was still just a slight whisper from the back of your head that could be shushed or tuned out with library visits and nights in front of the TV and the glow of old cartoons. Your father was right and this is proved even more by the fact that the whole situation just infuriates you on the surface, and just makes you feel like an empty, hollow shell left behind when you reach deeper into yourself.

That little girl had potential, potential to be useful but kind, obedient and close to the people who raised her even if it meant abandoning her own ideals. But you’d been so devoted to them, you think, that she was killed and destroyed in the world she grew up in, and now there’s a space for her that’s left vacant due to the way she wasted away. You miss her, the girl you once were, you miss being her, how easy and lighthearted everything was and how all of you felt so content in every sense of the word. But you don’t want her back. Now that’s just what makes you miserable sometimes.

Self-reflection just made you feel revolted by yourself. You keep your eyes on the road.

“It’s here,” you state, pointing at the building in front of you.

Sendai General Hospital is an institution made out of bare concrete. Its walls are yellowed and close in on its wards like a prison, coloured using old paint that hasn’t been repainted over and is as pallid-looking as the skin of the people sitting on the beds it is inhabited by. Just being in it feels like a hit to the body and the brain and the senses, too. There are old-fashioned tiles on its floors, their pale beige hue muted yet the blinding shine on them harshly mopped clean. Inside it reeks of an imminent presence of sickness or death or illnesses and conditions never to be able to be defeated and sterile sanitisers. Looking at the latex-blue curtains in it feels like a blindfold unwantedly, forcefully pulled over both your vision and your ears.

“You and that Itadori seem close.”

“We are,” you say, then you add, not really knowing why, “He’s my best friend.” Maybe you’re trying to make him jealous, rile him up a bit. But even then you wouldn’t want him to be riled up, nor would you be satisfied if he were to keep silent. Maybe you just wanted to hurt him, to hurt him back or something, if only for something small, even if you’d already resolved not to do so.

You’ll make sure not to do that again, though.

Instead he does something else, takes another route instead. “Then it seems you visit his grandfather often.”

“Uh-huh,” you nod as the two of you enter the hospital, and you have to blink a few times as always in order to adjust yourself to the light and how it reflects off the detachedly clean floor. “My mother’s here, too.”

“Oh, I’m sorry— is she alright?”

“She’s okay, I… think. She… she got sick a while back and stays here now,” you explain, “Let’s not talk about that…—I mean, I… don’t really want to.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to keep saying that.” It just makes people feel worse.

He doesn’t push further and you suppose that’s okay. Your chest hurts a bit, like phantom pain on a wound that’s still there. There’s not really a way to explain it but almost everything makes you feel that way these days. Everything makes you feel horrible to some degree. Maybe it’s being a girl, maybe it’s being a teenager, but it’s not quite either, you guess.

“He won’t be here for a while,” you say, “He’s either still in the room where his grandfather is or he’s buying flowers for him.”

“Then I’ll just contact them and let them know the whole situation first.”

Who’s ‘them’?

“Okay.” You turn your back on him, “—wait.”

“What?”

“Do you have any emergency contact or something? Like, a trusted adult who could help you with any of this? In case things go really bad?”

“...why would you need one?” he questions.

You roll your eyes, “Just give it to me, damn it… if there’s anything I have nowadays, it’s probably foresight for stuff like this. For emergencies.”

He gives you the number, albeit a bit begrudgingly. Why’d he have to be so pissy about anything and everything?

“Okay, thanks. I’m going to visit my mother now.”

The air and the colour from it seems distant as always, the ward she was basically imprisoned in smelling of the indistinguishable mix of sanitiser and sickness. There her body chains her to her bed, and there is little she can do besides rely on and weakly cling to the nurses who assist her, a frail shadow of what she once was.

“Hi, Mummy.”

She turns to you, and your chest constricts. Her hair, once much longer, the type that you dreamed to have as it billowed in the wind, the type that invited you caressively to bury yourself in and take in that heady scent of roses that emanated from it— that hair is now replaced with a cloth wrapped around her head. Radiation. Chemotherapy.

The wrinkles on her face make the difference between her now and her years ago all the more stark. Every visit you come back here, you’ve forced yourself to be acclimated to this new reality, one where she isn’t waiting at home no matter how tedious the fights get or how exhausting it was eating with someone who remained silent, someone who chose to continue suffering if it meant she could hurt and turn her daughter to guilt (as if that would change anything). At least she was there.

Cancer is a terminal illness, especially the type your mother is facing— regardless of how much chemotherapy she would struggle through and how much you didn’t want to acknowledge a truth so plain and conspicuously bare, she would be confined to this bed until her final days, her illness like gyves tying her limbs and forcing her earthbound; the bed a cage she could never be liberated from.

Sometimes she made it a point to you that she didn’t want to liberate herself from it anyway, and you’d never been so depressed yet irked by anything else. (You’d regret everything— not spending time with her, not appreciating her nearly enough— except for your decision to be involved in the Jujutsu world, if not as a sorcerer then as a doctor. That was, and is— your ultimatum. Your end all be all of this whole situation.”

“Hello. Where’s that Itadori boy?”

“Not here today, he’s still with his grandfather— maybe later.” You swing your bag over your shoulder, rummaging through it a while before pulling it out. “I’ve something for you, by the way.”

“Oh! These,” she exclaims, and she smiles faintly, bits of colour rushing back to her face like watercolour dots on moistened paper. “I used to make them for you, sometimes. They used to be your favourite when you were really little.”

“I know,” you explain, “That’s why I made them. I don’t like them anymore, but… I can’t remember your favourite food or if I ever asked, and I know you don’t like the food they give you here as much as… I don’t know. Your own cooking, I guess.”

“It’s not my favourite,” she states, matter-of-factly, bluntly, “But thank you for the effort. My favourite will always be my own mother’s cooking.”

Silence.

“Now that I look back at everything, there are so many things I regret. Things I should have done but never did out of fear; things I should not have done and never apologised for out of pride. I’d like it if you could be different. Your grandmother went out the same way. At least, even if you had the same illnesses as we did, which I hope the genes for which have been curbed by your father’s— at least you would not leave the world with regret,” she looks down at her hands, staring down at them solemnly like a shadow, an excluded figure. “But it was a good life.”

“...then maybe you can tell me more. While you— while we still have time. What was your childhood like? What was your mother like?” It feels strange, imposturous, maybe— to be referring to someone basically a stranger as “grandmother”, to name someone so far away from you so intimate, even if the only generation between you, tying the two of you together, was your mother’s. If you had a daughter it would be the same for her, most likely. There’s a part of you that would find honour in becoming your mother once you’d grown, but there’s a part of you that would think being such would accost you horribly, for all time.

She sighs, “I’ll tell you later. There would be so much to say, like compressing all my words into one tiny paper. The stories have weight in them the same way letters and words in handwriting can be firm and large. But if I were to start,” she begins, “I’ll say that I was born as the daughter of two very powerful sorcerers. Now, I know how much this would sound like some nonsense spouted by your mother, but I think you should listen anyway.

“My parents loved each other a lot, but my mother had come from an obscure clan whose name I can’t remember, but who had high hopes in them having a child with a powerful cursed technique as their last resort, since, if I recall correctly, there had been a crisis within the clan for it to keep surviving.

“I still remember when they found out I had no cursed technique and how terrified they were. In me I had a bit more than the relatively normal amount of cursed energy most people have, and so I was expected to have techniques as powerful as they did. They loved me and treated me preciously, like a fragile object, so long as I was quiet and demure— and I guess to some extent I still was and still am today. They wondered what they could do to run from the clan, as if they didn’t have enough power when they were supposed to protect me despite my father’s bullheaded industry and my mother’s patience-formed strength. They lacked grit to grapple against them, and only in this did they lack it, I think; only against my mother’s family did they not have the ability to resolve things whether peacefully or violently. And eventually they just gave up and thought they would just… surrender me over when I entered my adolescent years. I was their daughter. I… suppose they didn’t love me enough. I know it sounds awful— thinking that they should have always protected me, through and through—”

“No, it wasn’t.”

“—when it could have been the clan itself that would have been mostly to blame.”

“But they were still supposed to protect you! They were your parents—”

“Why else do you think I am the way I am? I may be a shy and scatterbrained or a horrible woman with a muddled sense of morality or what I think should and should not happen when in reality it’s just what I want to happen, but this is why I’m so resolute, and so stubborn. This is why I love you so fiercely. All mothers are like that to some degree, even if my own would never let me bear witness to it.” You haven’t told her you love her too in years.

“But then when I was an adult I met your father, who was a bit like a country bumpkin, but a formidable sorcerer and a kind, honest person, and I couldn’t help but fall in love with the person he was both inside and out. And for the next few years we struggled to have a child until I found out I was pregnant with you,” she continues, “Even though by that time I was well into my late thirties, we were overjoyed and decided to keep you.”

Suddenly you wish there had been more time before things were ruined. Time for you to know her better, the beginning of your existence. You would have begged her for old photos, stories, mementos of her and your father.

“And now the clan’s faded into obscurity, finally. The younger members left and the older ones passed away peacefully. Happy story, right?”

“...yeah.” It all ended well, but you don’t know if you can say the same for your mother’s. At least, you hope, when she goes away, it can be swift and peaceful like the way her relatives did.

Then suddenly there’s a buzz in your pocket. An inconvenient one, out of the blue.

“You should go get that first,” she says.

“...okay.”

You lift it up to your face and feel like crushing the damn thing. Old number. Stupid number. Number you haven’t called in months because you’d given up on that bastard— oh. The two of you were working together now.

You turn away from your mother, creeping to the edge of the room. “What’s wrong?”

“I just talked to him, but I think it would be easier if you came back and was there with him too since you know him better than I do. And he… doesn’t seem like the brightest. He may think that it’s not important enough to hand over unless you ask him to or something.”

You muffle your voice with your hand and whisper, “Hey, you shut up, you know nothing about him. He’s way smarter than people give him credit for. But I’m— I’m with my mother right now. Wait for a second. Just ask him to wait for me first; he wouldn’t need any of my help for all of this yet. Make a friend or get a life or something.”

“...fine. But you’ll have to join us later. He’s bound to ask about you.”

“Then just tell him I’m with my mother!” you snap, still whispering.

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Wh— you little— oh, don’t you hang up now—”

Weird thing is, he probably wasn’t even being so infuriating on purpose. And you wouldn’t have burst out at someone for being that way anyway. It was only because it was him, specifically.

You’d sworn to put that past you.

Your immaturity strikes once again.

“If you have to go now,” your mother says, “You should. Just come back again next time. I can tell you the rest. Thank you again for the food, [Name].” She doesn’t call you ‘darling’ anymore, doesn’t she? Just your name.

“Okay. Sorry.”

You swing the bag back over your shoulder, wearing it this time instead of taking it off, easing your way out of the room.

“It’s okay,” she assures you, “Goodbye. I love you.”

“...I love you, too,” you say, but it’ll mingle with all the other sounds in the hospital, and it’ll be drowned out like a ship in the middle of nowhere, your voice soft and thoroughly soused by the cacophony of bleak noises like telephone rings and beeps from electrocardiographs outside of her deafeningly quiet hospital room.

“Hi, Yuuji,” you greet them in the dimly lit waiting area, “...and Megumi. Sorry to keep the two of you guys waiting for so long.”

“Oh, hey; it’s okay!” he goes, although in his voice it seems that there’s been some of his usual energy seeping away from him. “Didn’t know the two of you knew each other until just now or that you were a part of some magic curse society. Are you guys childhood friends who met because of all that cursed stuff or something?”

“Something like that,” Megumi explains.

“It’s a long story,” you say, not exactly denying him nor conceding his words anyway. Once again, there’s a trace of anger despite your promise to be untethered to your puerility like this. “Anyway, are you okay, Yuuji? How’s your grandfather?”

He pauses. “Oh, about that… he just passed away.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry, Yuuji…” you hold the fabric of his jacket (sometimes it still feels wrong to try and hold his hand— it just makes your heart ache again like a scab being clawed at) and pull him into a brief caress, patting his back as gently as you can manage.

“It’s okay, I’ll be fine,” he smiles as you pull yourself away, “Grandpa wouldn’t want me to be crying right now anyway. So don’t worry.”

“Okay, I won’t. But if you’re sad, just know you can always talk to me.”

He laughs, softer than the boisterous manner he usually does so in, “Yeah, I know.”

Megumi clears his throat, pointedly trying to make a sound, “Anyway. Itadori Yuuji—”

“Just call him Itadori. You don’t have to be so uptight.”

“Nah, [Name], I’m fine—”

Megumi sighs. “Anyway, we need you to give the cursed object now.”

“Oh, yeah, that,” you start, “So, Yuuji, do you have the thing that Megumi would have explained to you? The cursed object? We need it for everyone to be safe, and all.”

“Yeah! Hold on, let me get it. I told you I didn’t have it already, but here’s the box,” he says, tossing it over to Megumi.

He retrieves the box. It’s ancient and wooden, the craftsmanship behind it elite and adroit, and the paper on it has the words for a buddhist sutra written on it like an inscription. You’ve heard of it before, the kind of curse it was meant to seal, but it definitely couldn’t be—

He opens the box.

Holy shit.

“Where is it?”

“It’s empty…” Megumi panics, “Wait— hold on!”

Things are bad— as in, they couldn’t get any worse— not only was the school doomed by the loss of its cursed object, the cursed object was Sukuna Ryomen’s finger itself.

You blame your inadequacy, your inability to have stopped everything sooner— if not for that nobody would have gotten hurt. If not for that there wouldn’t even be a risk of anything happening anyway. You should’ve tried harder to sense it, and you should’ve focused more on it to keep the student body safe and sound.

It was your fault. No one else was to blame but your useless self, and even if that were wrong, you’d still have the most to be blamed for.

Megumi has a hand on Yuuji’s shoulder, keeping the other boy from moving, his breathing erratic and his eyes wide in frantic shock.

“...well, they were saying, ‘let’s open it up to see what’s inside it tonight’,” Yuuji clarifies, standing a few centimetres away from the door, “Why? Is that bad?”

Sasaki and Iguchi?

The air in the hospital feels particularly chilly tonight, gooseflesh terrorising your skin all over, and for all the kinds of reasons that would cause anything like such.

“It’s way worse than bad,” Megumi declared, fear and grim so thick in his voice they were tangible enough to be cut through with a knife. “Your friends are going to die.”

“We’ve got to go,” you rush, “Now! Quick!”

It passes by like a blur, as if you’re in that moment and out of it simultaneously. Your mind has been bombarded with and pressed so thoroughly onto the moment, like tissue on a wet surface, that it seems it’s being blanked out, while your legs continue to run despite your mind nearly forgetting, at this point, why you’re running— as if your legs moving so frantically to help them was something intrinsic, something you didn’t need your mind for.

Sasaki and Iguchi are in danger. Sasaki and Iguchi are in danger.

You didn’t know them all too well, really— just through Yuuji, and Yuuji himself wasn’t as close to the two of them, being their junior and all. And although a part of you was doing this just because you could, like the way you did when you first discovered your cursed technique, you knew that another was doing this for Yuuji. If in any way they were hurt or could not survive, he would blame himself to no end. He possessed such a kindness within him, so much that it hit the depths of your soul sometimes; shattered your heart so gently a million times over or heated it in the kindly way mothers heated pans on stoves despite the heat of it being greater than that of blue flame. If anything happened to them, no matter how much or how little he knew of them, he wouldn’t be able to live after that.

The two of them are near the barrier separating the school from the street before you (you struggle with catching up to them— one’s a star athlete and another has been training for much longer than you, you’re sure), the gates tall and enveloped in darkness. You didn’t think much of school except for when it came to your grades and being with Yuuji, thinking of these gates— the ones that you and Yuuji use when you’re running super late— in particular as just a shortcut entrance you paid little attention to, just something treated with indifference as you passed through them whenever you were late. Yet now they echoed denial, refusal, and slim chances— it was unlikely that they’d be alright, especially since this cursed object in particular was the finger of Sukuna Ryomen.

“Is that the building?” Megumi questions, “Where are they?”

“Fourth floor— guh!” Yuuji seems to come to an abrupt halt, nearly slamming into what seems to be an invisible wall. A veil.

“Yuuji!”

“I’ll handle this,” Megumi declares, hopping onto the metal wires, more directed to Yuuji than you. So even he can tell how selfless Yuuji is, even after only having just met him.

“I may not know those two that well, but—” Yuuji starts, “But they’re friends! I have to help!”

“You’re staying here,” Megumi commands, “[Name], if you could— get your father or any sorcerers you know to come here and help.”

He climbs over the gate.

He’s going away from you again. Slipping away from your grasp. And now, all you can do is watch. There’s nothing else— nothing else you can do, at all. If you went inside now, you wouldn’t be able to help except— what?— tend to their injuries? Manipulate your own cells into weapons? The former wasn’t possible with how much you’d strained yourself from running so quickly earlier, and the latter was too dangerous: you hadn’t even started with the basics of that yet, on your father’s obstinate insistence that even if he’d let you play doctor he wouldn’t let you manipulate any of the cells in your body into any kind of usable weapon. Any simple wrong move could make things turn south in the most drastically terrifying of ways. If you went in there, you’d just die, and there’d be more casualties, more trouble, more problems caused by you and you alone.

You can’t even call your father, either. That would always be your last resort— because even if you fought, you still needed him to rest. You didn’t want him overexerting himself by using his cursed technique at all.

(You were selfish. You didn’t want to lose your father. You didn’t want to have to visit not one but two parents lying sick and tired and grey in matching hospital beds.)

“Yuuji?” you start, turning to him. “You’re…deathly quiet. Are you okay?”

His lips quiver slightly, a faint whimpering noise coming out of him. Is he crying?

“Yuuji, look at me. Are you okay?” you ask, as gently and softly as you can right now, despite your ragged, unsteady, unathletic-addled breaths. You place a hand on his shoulder, slowly rubbing up and down from his shoulder and crook of his neck to his back. “It’s okay. …Megumi’s a good and… capable, strong person and jujutsu sorcerer. He’ll be okay, and they’ll be okay too. Just… just put your trust in him, okay?”

“I’m sorry, [Name], but I’ve got to go,” he tells you, “You stay here, and call for help or something. I’m sorry, but I’ve just really got to do it!”

He hugs you, quickly, deftly. And then he crosses the gate, leaving you all alone like Megumi did. You wish he’d hug you longer, that you could take care of him for a little longer— it was your last way to be useful now.

Still, there’s someone you could call, now that you remember him.

The emergency contact.

You snatch your phone out, resolute.

“Hello! Gojo Satoru speaking,” the voice on the other line says.

You’ve heard it plenty before by accident.

When Gojo and Megumi are back, Yuuji’s in the form of a figure slung over Gojo’s shoulders like he’s been reply entrenched into slumber, his body seemingly limp and his torso completely bare. There’s barely an ounce of movement in him, except for slow exhales and inhales you can see on his chest. Sasaki and Iguchi are both nearly the same, the former covered in bruises and in a deep, panicked haze, and the latter as asleep as Yuuji seemed to be while harbouring injuries he may never recover from.

The only non-roughed up one here is Gojo, it seems; Megumi has a stream of blood running from the top of his head in rivulets, staining his sweaty, scraped forehead.

“Wh— you two, what happened? Why are they all asleep? What happened to Yuuji? Are they okay? What—”

“Calm down, kid,” Gojo says, “They’ll be fine. I mean, there’s a 100% chance that your friend can be executed, but…”

“Executed?” you almost scream, “What the hell happened? You said things would be okay!”

“Uh-uh, again, calm down. I mean, we don’t even know when they’re gonna make him kick the bucket! He ate Sukuna’s finger, by the way.” He holds his arms up in faux surrender.

“Gojo you ignorant slut! Don’t you fucking dare tell me to ‘calm down!’ He ate Sukuna’s finger? Why weren’t you able to stop anything? What’s going to happen to him now? You know what— give him to me!”

“You know, it’s not like I’m scared of being hunted down by your father if you use your cursed technique— I mean, I’m leagues stronger than him— but the stuff was too strong. It’s not like you’ll be able to get rid of the finger in your little boyfriend.”

“He’s not her boyfriend!” Megumi interjects.

“Thank you, Megumi!” Your face is going hot like a campfire fanned by the wind.

“Oh?” Gojo adds, a teasing lilt in his voice. “Anyway, we’re going to get him to a place where we can cover everything with talismans to surround him.”

They’re going to execute him at Jujutsu High after.

“I’m coming with you.”

“You sure?” Gojo asks, “Your father isn’t going to like you travelling so far away without telling him.”

Megumi shifts, a little sombre. “[Name], you don’t have to.”

“...I’m doing this for Yuuji, not for you.”

“You okay?” Gojo asks while the three of you are back in the hospital. (You hate this building so much.) Iguchi’s been transferred to a ward, Sasaki having woken up and insisting on staying with him. “I’ve got kikufuku if you want some. You must be really tired since it’s so late, huh?”

The whole situation is so incredulous you’re unsure of whether you want to burst out laughing or dismember someone.

“...nothing. Wait, let me see Yuuji again.”

Everyone is asleep, it seems— all except for you and Gojo. Yuuji’s been knocked out, and Megumi’s stuck in the world of his dreams.

You can’t sleep. There’s just nothing to put your mind at rest.

At least if there’s one thing you can do it’s this.

Gojo picks him up by the sides of his torso (now temporarily clothed with a spare white shirt) like a child with a heavy book. “Woah— he’s pretty heavy for a fifteen year old kid.”

You lay Yuuji face-up on the line of hospital chairs. There are thin scarlet marks right under his eyes— Sukuna’s eyelids, you’ve been told.

You should’ve done more to protect him.

Slowly, reticently, you kneel by the side of the chairs. You press your fingertips onto that pair of thin tiny lines.

Nothing happens. You can’t picture his cells being able to grow back. It’s as if there’s been a slit on his face and its outline has been replaced with brand-new skin. His cells don’t budge.

“Why don’t you help Megumi? I bet he’s got plenty of healable injuries.”

“…I don’t think I’ll be able to help much. I could faint if I try helping him now. It’s better to leave it to Dr Ieiri or something.”

“Pft,” he scoffs, “Shoko? She’s definitely not going to heal all of him. It’ll just be a waste of her time. You can just help him with the tiny scrapes and bruises first. And I’ll even tell her that you did it. She’s really fond of you, you know.”

You give him a shy, modest smile. “Thanks, then.”

It’s time to get to work.

Megumi’s skin is smooth like a baby’s just like the last time you felt it, though the frown on his face, ever-present, is bound to cause wrinkles there in less than a few decades’ time. You place your hands on him, bruised and bloody, watching in your mind and directing his cells as they work.

Once the smaller injuries have been dealt with, you stop. “I can’t really work on the one on his head, since then you’d get another fainted person to carry around, but he should be fine with some bandages and patching-up there, because I’ve already kind of catalysed the start of that area’s healing process a little. Other than that, he should be completely fine. I’ll give it, say… two weeks or so for it to get better completely.”

“Good work!” he smiles, the outline of his cheeks visible on his blindfold.

“By the way, Mr Gojo…”

“You know, I appreciate the respect you’re giving me now, but just Gojo is fine.”

“Okay, Gojo. Do you think Yuuji will be okay?”

“I mean, I’m pretty sure. And I’m going to ask them to suspend his sentence. I’ll just see whether he wants that or not once he wakes up.”

“That’s the thing. I’m not sure if he even will.”

Gojo laughs. “Don’t worry. He was really strong, and able to switch between being possessed by Sukuna and being himself at will. We haven't seen that kind of talent in a millennia! I’m sure they’ll listen to me, anyway.”

“Thank you,” you sigh. Thank goodness. “If you need any type of payment, um… teleport to my house whenever you get inconvenient little cuts like bruises and stuff. I can help.”

“Nah, reverse cursed technique’s got me covered.”

“Oh, wait— I forgot about that— um… I can…”

“Just leave it to me! No payment required,” he exclaims, holding both thumbs up. “And for the record, the one who wanted to save Yuuji was actually Megumi.”

You wouldn’t have imagined that would happen. Megumi— pragmatic, serious, unkind when he needs to be (no matter how kind of a person he actually is— no, was— at heart), different from Tsumiki in so many ways. There was no way he would have been the one vouching for Yuuji, someone he’d only just met, to be spared.

“Really?” you ask, “I… wouldn’t have thought he was the one who would do it. I thought, maybe, you were just… really kind tonight or something…”

“Well, maybe it was because he saw how much you cared about Itadori and did it for you, or maybe he had met Itadori, liked him, and just wanted to save a good person,” Gojo suspects, “But if there’s one thing for sure it’s that your old friend saved your new one.”

“...oh.”

You’ll have to bring it up with him next time— maybe, if he’s still there tomorrow…

“I know you’re mad at him, but a lot has happened,” Gojo states, voice lower, softer like a schoolteacher’s, “Still, I won’t tell you that you have to give him a chance or any of that. If you don’t want to, you don’t have to thank him or anything. I’m sure he did it out of his own volition without expecting anything from you. He knew he probably didn’t deserve to if it were you.”

You pause. “No, it’s just… I’ll talk to him again the next time I see him. Alone, most likely. And I can figure something out. I think that would be the best way to go around things. Thank you, Gojo.”

18-6-2018

The aftershocks are still there, although you’ve come out unscathed.

Last night was a mingled mess, a blur. You’d tried your best to help Iguchi by the time Yuuji was placed in the room of talismans and you could come back to the hospital and visit, but in the end he still needed better help than that. His injuries were too large of scale for how you were at that moment, already tired after healing some of the numbers done on Megumi.

(You were useless. You couldn’t help anyone. You couldn’t prevent Yuuji from being hit with such soul-striking guilt., couldn’t help Sasaki from being traumatised, couldn’t help Iguchi enough for him to be back at school soon—)

Sasaki’s injuries were limited to bruises and scrapes, but though you could help her physically, there was nothing you could do to assist her emotionally.

You stayed with them for a few hours in the ICU and then one of the hospital wards (a floor under your mother’s), your father calling you once the sun had risen.

“Gojo Satoru told me about everything that happened.”

“Yeah. I know you’ll scold me, but… not now. I’m sorry, I’m just really tired.” You hang up.

For all you spoke of wanting to be useful, the night when your powers were needed the most was when you were at your most useless— you couldn’t help them, you couldn’t help attack the cursed spirits, and the only thing you could do was call for an adult’s help like a little, scared and helpless girl.

You needed to train, and train harder than you had been doing for the past few years.

There’s a knock on the door, a dot-dot-dot-dot-dot. dot dot. It’s Yuuji, you know it is. How ever could you not?

Timidly, movements quiet like the room itself, you pull the door knob, seeing him there, relatively unscathed. You sigh in relief, a moment’s respite before you return to the panic you had been living in before since you deserve the respite less than other people do— no, you don’t deserve such a break at all, you’re absolutely sure of that, not after what you pulled, how horribly and utterly useless you were, you’ll remind yourself of that again and again and again— the heart-piercing guilt and the worry and the constant need to care for the people around you, almost like a mother, maybe, but you don’t like that thought as much as you think you should. Maybe if your own mother knew, she’d disagree— maybe she’d tell you that you should be a mother, maybe she’d ignore that you were also a child at certain times— the most convenient ones, probably. When she thinks it good that you, a child, were someone’s caretaker because women should take pride in and appreciate that, she would encourage you to be one; when she thinks it bad that as a caretaker and a so-called ‘adult’ you can have your own autonomy, agency and opinions, then maybe she’d remind you that in her eyes you knew nothing of the world. But maybe, just maybe, there was also a chance that she wouldn’t be like that in any way.

But you wouldn’t put it past her.

“Yuuji, are you okay?” There are questions about to spill out of you, tears about to fall like gushing rivers, but you’re just happy he’s alive at this point.

“Yeah.” His voice is soft. Your chest twinges; it hurts like an awful, intransigent little bruise. “Hi, [Name].” It feels so unignorable, the way it’s filled with such sorrow and worry that it weighs his usually loud and boisterous voice down.

“I thought that—” you start, lips trembling, “I thought there was a chance I couldn’t lose you. The only thing I could do was—” you sniffle, “Hope that they could delay it or something.”

“Yeah. I’ll explain it later,” he says, his voice sincere.

You squeeze the wrist of his sleeve. “Don’t do things like that ever again,” you plead, “Promise me that at least.”

“I promise.”

“And keep your promises.”

“I will.”

“...want to come inside?”

He walks inside, and you step back to make way for him.

“Sorry I came so late,” he says to you and Sasaki, who shakes her head in reassurance. “Hello, Sasaki,” he greets, “Is Iguchi okay?”

They speak for a while— you don’t feel like it’s much of your right to join their conversation, since you did nearly nothing at all when they were most in danger, so you leave them be for a while. It would be better not to bother them right now, anyway. They’ve both been traumatised until it reached beneath their bones within the past twenty-four hours.

When you leave the hospital, Sasaki tells you that she’s going to stay. You tell her to take care, squeezing her hand one final time.

You let her, patting her on the back. You’ll call them later— she’d given you her contact— just to check on the two of them.

“Where’s Megumi?” you ask Yuuji.

“Oh, Fushiguro? I’m not too sure, but that Gojo guy said he’ll be there soon.”

“Where, though?”

Sheepishly, in peak Yuuji fashion, he scratches the back of his neck. “Actually, another reason why I came here was also because… I mean, I know you and him weren’t close, but I’m going to the place where they’ll keep Grandpa’s ashes, and I think… you know, you could come with me. I… I don’t think I’d be able to do it really well alone, even though he had definitely made it clear he seriously didn’t want me moping around after his death and all. Gojo and Megumi will probably be there, but I thought it would be better if you were there because I know you better than those two, and you’re my friend. So… could you come with me? I know that he never really showed it, but I think he had always liked you a lot. Like, he was happy we were friends and stuff.”

“...mhm. I’ll always be happy about that,” you tell him, before pulling him into a hug. The guy must need one right now. You’ve never hugged him before. Your heart hurts.

The air is hot and humid with the breath of summer, bundles of mosquitoes bound to be breeding new ones these next few weeks. Up in the sky is the sun, bold and bright, glaring down harshly at the two of you.

“Before he passed away, Grandpa actually said something. He… kind of cursed me, if I’m being honest,” Yuuji starts. “He said I was a strong kid, so I should help people. And I’m going to do that. So that was why when Gojo asked if I wanted to be executed immediately or just eat all the fingers before dying, I chose the second option. I… I think I want to help people that way.”

‘You’ve already helped people enough. You helped me,’ you almost tell him.

You frown, because that’s the only thing you can do right now. You search for words to say the same way you do looking for dog books in libraries chock-full with those of other genres. “I’m… disappointed, I— I know I should be grateful, grateful that you’re still going to be alive and all, but… you’re still going to be in danger, and you’re still going to be executed one day. I mean, again, I know I should be happy you’re going to have more time alive and that I can still see you, but what if things don’t go as planned? What if you lose control of yourself once you reach, like, the fifth finger or something?”

You’re selfish like that. In a way, you’re just the way your mother is. You should’ve always known— you were her beloved daughter after all, and the people you know would be loved the same way she did you since the day she knew of your existence, and maybe even before that.

“Don’t worry,” he grins, wide as always. Even in an over-enveloping darkness he still manages to be the light. “I’ll be just fine. I’m a strong kid, after all. And we’ll always be friends!”

Gojo asks if he and Yuuji can talk in private for a while. You wonder if this was how your mother felt as she had to give the person she loved most away (but you will have to go away, one day), because you can briefly tell what Gojo is going to ask. You wonder if she felt this twice.

Yuuji can’t stay with you forever. In the same way you can’t remain by your mother and father’s sides for all eternity.

This won’t be the last time you’re here, you think. For a place of death, it’s quite a bit beautiful how there’s such large masses of grass and plants surrounding it.

Megumi nearly walks past you, his eyes on the old photographs of the deceased all around him.

“Megumi.”

He turns around.

“I just wanted to thank you for wanting to save my friend, even if you may not have wanted to do it for me, specifically… um… I didn’t expect that you’d still be here. Are your injuries okay?”

“I’m okay,” he answers you. “And also, I…” he hesitates, the first time he’s talked to you for something actually related to the two of you in a long time— nearly two years if you’re counting correctly, but the thoughts in your head are a bit too jumbled to count at the moment. “I didn’t really do it for you, though. It… it was for Tsumiki.”

“Oh.”

“Wait! I’m sorry, that didn’t… come out right. But I should also apologise for something else. You wouldn’t have been thrown into this world anyway if not for my own demon dogs years ago.”

“No, no, it wasn’t your fault. And I would have wanted to be in it anyway. There’s not many who can heal other people and all, so I just thought… even if I can’t do as much yet, since I don’t have reversed cursed technique and the drawbacks that come from mine are really bad, I can still help people sometimes if they’re dealing with relatively minor injuries. I can, um… make things easier for people. I can be useful like that. I’d keep to it anyway, because I’m stubborn, but… yeah. It wasn’t your fault, really.”

“Okay. That’s good to hear.”

“Yeah. Anyway, I’m happy to know that Tsumiki is okay.”

Silence again for a while. The air turns a little more sombre, and a lot more awkward.

“She is. And Itadori seems… like a good person. I think it’s good, that… you were able to find a friend like that.”

“It was. He’s a really, really good guy.”

“You love him a lot,” Megumi says.

“I do. He’s a really good friend. If there’s something I’ll always know I know that, at least.”

“I can see that. It doesn’t seem like he loves you back in the same way, though.”

“...wow. Way to be blunt, Megumi. And yes, I do know that, too.”

“Let’s just… change the subject.”

“You’re the one who introduced it in the first place.”

“Okay. How… how are you?”

“I’m good. Wait, I think you should… go back to them. Maybe they’ll need you there right about now. He’s probably going to have to go to Jujutsu High, right?”

He pauses. “Yeah. I’m sorry, [Name].”

“No, no. That’s okay. I expected it. It’s just that I’ll miss him a lot,” you tell him, “He took care of me, kind of. You know I’ve always been a bit of an awkward or shy person, but he still approached me since I was new and we ended up hitting off as friends, kind of. We did a lot of stuff together.”

Sounds pretty familiar, huh.

“If you want I can make sure he’s safe for you.”

“...you should be able to do that regardless of whether it’s my wish for you to do so or not…” you state, “But that would help, I guess. And I’m sorry for my attitude towards you for the past few hours or so. Thank you again.”

“...I’m sorry I never spoke to you for so long, by the way,” he says abruptly. ‘By the way’? Classic Megumi…

“I could tell you were. It’s… it’s okay. The two of you kind of have a habit of doing that.”

All your rage, your loneliness, your feelings of abandonment— and this is all you can do. This is all you can say. You can only just let it go, in the end.

“I’ll explain it all one day.”

“You don’t have to if it’s hard.”

He stays. “No, I will. I promise. And I promise I’ll start to talk to you again, as well. I was just… scared of a few things, maybe.”

“That’s okay.”

The two of you aren’t quite friends again yet, but it’ll happen soon. Maybe. And even if it doesn’t, you’re finally able to say, with an open, honest heart, that that doesn’t matter as much anymore.

“I guess this is goodbye again, then.”

“Not really.”

“Oh, right— promise to keep in touch, okay? My patience is running thin with you,” you chuckle at that last part, attempting to joke and make things lighter again.

“Promise.”

“I’m going to go home now, by the way. Please tell Yuuji that I wish him the best and I’ll visit when I have my own money to visit Tokyo and all.”

“I will.”

“And help me say goodbye to him for me,” you add, “Hope that’s not too much for you to do. Sorry for the trouble. It’s just that I’d actually just about cry if I had to do it in real time right in front of him. Be good to him and be good friends, okay? Keep that promise, at the very least. That’s the one thing that I wish for the most.”

“Bye, Megumi.” You turn back in the direction opposite of his.

“Wait—!”

His hand is on your wrist. Now you’re in front of him, like yesterday, and he’s holding your wrist, albeit a bit gentler than the way he used to pull it a whole eight years ago.

His eyes are cast away from you, slightly avoidantly and in a way that’s a bit abashed. “I’ll miss you, [Name].”

“It won’t even feel like I’m not there,” you say. Though his grip is slightly tight, he loosens it as soon as you try to slide it up, as if he’d let you be free of it if you want him to.

You squeeze his hand instead, turning to face him. It feels warm. It feels like there’s blood coursing through you, the sensation more tender and tangible than it’s ever been.

“Goodbye.”

“Goodbye, [Name]. I’ll… I’ll call.”

“Thank you.”

Now you’re the one slipping away from his grasp. You move your hand away and walk back. The door slides open.

2010. Springs, summers, autumns, winters. Hands on wrists, a back faced to your eyes, wide with innocence. Warmth and laughter and happiness and love. Days coloured with vibrant hues and time spent with dog books and in libraries. Frowns were greeted with smiles. Hesitance was non-existent. You didn’t feel a need to compensate for your uselessness. You were a child. You didn’t feel useless at all. You just felt this: a constant leaping in your heart, the corners of your mouth twisting up into a juvenile grin, braiding someone’s beautiful brown hair and tying it with a pretty cherry hair tie.

You want to cry as you walk back home.

You’re pretty sure you do.

taglist:

@bakananya, @sindulgent666, @shartnart1, @lolmais, @mechalily, @pweewee, @notsaelty, @nattisbored

(please send an ask/state in the notes if you'd like to join! if I can't tag your username properly, I've written it in italics. so sorry for any trouble!)

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notsunnyowo · 7 hours

Text

"𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕞𝕒𝕕𝕖 𝕗𝕝𝕠𝕨𝕖𝕣𝕤 𝕘𝕣𝕠𝕨 𝕚𝕟 𝕞𝕪 𝕝𝕦𝕟𝕘𝕤 𝕒𝕟𝕕, 𝕒𝕝𝕥𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕪 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕓𝕖𝕒𝕦𝕥𝕚𝕗𝕦𝕝, 𝕀 𝕔𝕒𝕟𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕓𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕙𝕖." --𝕌𝕟𝕜𝕟𝕠𝕨𝕟

Trigger Warning : Mentions of blood

Hanahaki disease Gojo x Female Reader

Angst, Gojo suffering from Hanahaki, Angst with happy ending, Female Reader (AFAB), Fluff, Gojo is absolutely smitten with reader

Summary: Gojo Satoru is loved by many, except for the sole person he himself loves

It was sudden, the scorching feeling that filled his throat as the milky-haired man began to cough. His throat and lungs felt like they were on fire. It was almost as if thorns were poking and proding at his insides.

As soon as he thought that the violent coughing outburst was nearing its end he felt something traveling up his wind pipe and entering his mouth. Spitting the foreign object out Satoru was surprised to find a rose petal, covered with crimson blood laying on the floor of his apartment.

___

"Are you certain it's not the doing of some curse technique?" Shoko questioned, carefully examining the bloodied petal her friend had brought to her this morning. "Or a cursed spirit perhaps?" The woman continued, eyes focusing on the delicate object at hand.

"Yes. I'm certain of it." Gojo responded. His voice much too serious in comparison to the usual tone it took whenever the man talked. "My six eyes haven't detected any unknown trace of cursed energy on it."

"I see.." Ieiri commented, continuing to inspect the odd object. She'd received a call earlier that morning from Satoru, asking her if he'd be able to come over to discuss some urgent matter. And that's how she'd gotten ahold of that rose petal.

"So you coughed this up yesterday, correct?"

"Yeah."

"Can you tell me what happened again?" She asked, lifting her gaze from the flower petal in order to look at the man.

"I laying in bed last night, when I felt this strong itching sensation in the back of my throat, followed by a burning sensation in my chest." Satoru began. "And that's when I started coughing like crazy. It was so bad that I couldn't even catch my breath. . . Then I felt something in my throat and this came out."

"Alright.." The woman sat down on her chair, letting out a frusterated sigh.

"What do you think?" The white-haired man asked, his cerulean eyes harboring a mix of concern and irritation deep within them. Despite being worried about his health and well-being, given the gravity of the situation, Gojo being Gojo, found this 'weakness' to be quite a pain in the ass.

After a moment of pondering silence, the young doctor looked up at her patient. "It's a stretch but.." The unsureness of her words sent an irritating feeling throughout Satoru's entire body. "My best guess is to say that you're suffering from a phenomenon called the Hanahaki disease."

"Hana-what-now?" Gojo questioned, his brows creasing as he tried to recall any information he might've had about a disease that caused the patient to cough up rose petals, but to no avail.

Seeing the puzzled look on his face, Ieiri sighed. "Hanahaki is a disease that causes flowers to bloom in the lungs of those suffering from it. Those flowers continue to grow until they eventually suffocate the victim due to the blockage of air they impose on the patient."

"And how do I get rid of it?" Satoru asked, his voice stoic and serious.

"That's the thing.." The woman began, crossing her leg over the other. "It's caused by strong, usually unrequited, feelings of love towards someone."

Unrequited love..?

"So who is it?"

Stunned speechless for a moment, Satoru looked back at his friend. Once he'd regained his composure the man spoke, his tone now shifting to his usual, more carefree one. "Myself, obviously."

With an unamused look on her face Shoko raised an intrigued brow. "I'm pretty sure there's no such thing as Auto-Hanahaki. But, if there was, you'd definitely be suffering from it."

Letting out a loud sigh, the woman leaned back in her chair. "Well, whoever it is, you'd better settle your feelings with them before it's too late." She spoke, sincere concern evident in her voice. "However, just in case, I'll look into this disease more. See if there are any alternative ways of curing it."

"Okay."

___

After Shoko's diagnosis, Satoru was feeling worse than ever. He'd done some of his own research on this wired disease, which was now plaguing his existance. And what he found only made him, feel that much worse.

Hanahaki Disease (花吐き病 ) - a fictional disease in which the victim coughs up flower petals when they suffer from one-sided love. It ends when the beloved returns their feelings (romantic love only; strong friendship is not enough), or when the victim dies. It can be cured through surgical removal, but when the infection is removed, the victim's romantic feelings for their love also disappear...

Frowning at his phone, the young man read trough the Wikipedia article, frustration growing inside him at an alarming rate. "How the hell am I even suffering from a fictional disease.." He muttered under his breath, brows furrowing as he annoyedly shoved his phone into his jacket pocket.

Letting an irritated sigh escape his lips, the man looked off into the horizon. "One-sided love, huh..? To think that I of all people would suffer from a diseased manifestation of one-sided love.."

Despite not voicing his feelings aloud, Gojo was well aware of them. He knew what the problem was. He knew what was needed to be done - who he needed to talk to for all of this to be over..

But he couldn't.

He was Satoru Gojo after all. The strongest sorcerer of the modern era. And with the title of strongest came its struggles. He was the pillar of the Gojo-clan - hell, even the whole jujustu society. A responsibility he alone had to carry to his grave.

Maybe it would've been easier to connect with people on a much deeper level if he was 'normal', if he wasn't 'special'.

But that was just wishful thinking on his behalf.

Even entertaining the idea of settling down, or even having someone to call his own sounded more like some well written fanfiction than a possible future he could look forward to.

There was no way he could possibly have something like that, not as long as he was "The Strongest" at least.

Not as long as there were people, curses even, that would stop at nothing if it meant having a chance to end his life.

He couldn't do that. Couldn't let someone he cared for so deeply be in constant danger, simply because they chose to love him. Couldn't let her life be endangered like that.

Even it it meant keeping her at a distance. Loving her from afar.

Satoru was a smart man and he wasn't oblivious to his feelings for you. On the contrary, he was well aware of them from the start.

He was aware of how he'd light up every time he'd see you. Or how he'd feel his heart skip a beat whenever your hands brushed against one another.

He'd known he was in love from the moment he'd seen you courageously risking your life for the safety of your students. He loved that about you. Hell, he loved everything about you. From the way you'd smile so fondly at him, whenever you were excited about something, to the way you spoke when teaching the first years.

And that was exactly why he could never tell you how he felt.

He'd never be able to live with himself if you'd ever gotten hurt because of him. He loved you with all his heart - and those bloodied petals were proof of it - however he'd promised himself to always keep you from harms way.

Even if that also meant keeping you away from him too.

He'd protect you, no matter what-

"Ah, Gojo! There you are! - I've been looking everywhere for you!" Stopping dead in his tracks, Satoru glanced back, ocean blue orbs meeting with your (eye colored) ones. The sight of your gleamful demeanor as you approached him made his heart swell up with joy - something which happened almost naturally at this point whenever you were with him.

"Is that so?" He cracked a grin, looking down at you.

However, there was something else stirring up inside him as well. A feeling he'd never experienced in your presence up until now. The immense aching feeling that quickly formed inside Satoru's chest was overwelming.

So much so, that the man found himself struggling to take a proper breath - and before he knew it - he'd began coughing. Exactly like how he had done yesterday.

"Yeah. I was wondering if you could-" You paused, looking at the tall man with a look of concern on your face. "Are you feeling alright? That cough sounds pretty bad." Your words, although caring and coming from a good heart, only seemed to further ignite the burning sensation in his heart. Effectively worsening his coughing spree.

Worry quickly spiking, you rushed over to your co-worker, and close personal friend. "Gojo-!" You called out to him, your voice filled with panic. You didn't know what it was that was causing the male such violent coughing, but what you did know was that it couldn't mean anything good.

Your worry only seemed to get worse when you first saw it. There on the sidewalk, all bloodied up, lied a single rose petal. You looked at the small petal with utter shock and disbelief. You were sure you wouldn't have believed what was laying in front of you, wasn't a figment of your imagination if you hadn't just seen it with your own eyes.

"Gojo.." Your voice trailed as you carefully inspected the foreign object. "...You just coughed up a flower petal..." You continued, your tone full of a mix of worry and confusion.

"Yeah.." The man, finally able to breathe properly again, replied.

"And you're not as freaked out about this as mush ws I am..?" You inquired, giving the sorcerer a worried look.

"Not really.." He answered, voice far too calm in comparison to yours.

"Okay..? And care to tell me why you coughed up a literal flower just now..??"

Satoru looked back at you, giving you a casual shoulder raise. "Apparently I'm lovesick."

"What?"

___

"I think I understand what's happening to Satoru.." Shoko began, looking at the two of you. After the whole coughing-up-a-flower fiasco, you'd insisted on taking Gojo to go see Shoko again, even if the man had told you that he'd already visited her earlier that morning.

"Cursed energy is derived from negative emotions. Therefore it's not completely unreasonable to assume that the more negative emotions a person feels the more likely they are to produce an excessive amount of cursed energy." She continued, pointing a finger at Gojo. "Satoru's practically already a walking pool of cursed energy so due to his technique, so imagine adding another load onto his already expensive amount."

The two of you listened to the woman speak intently, not wanting to miss a single thing. "Given the nature of the disease, it appears to be manifested whenever strong feelings are accumulated over a long period of time. And given that Gojo's emotionally constipated when it comes to expressing his feelings, the most probable case is that he's been bottling up his emotions for far too long. Causing them to physically manifest into these petals."

"Ouch, didn't have to bruise my ego like that Shoko." The man said, dramatically clutching his chest with faux hurt.

Letting out an amused scoff the woman continued her explanation. "They say that love is the strongest curse after all. And in your case, Satoru. It seems that you've cursed yourself, in a way."

With a worried frown on your face, you glanced over at Gojo, trying your best to study his every move. Despite him having given you a similar explanation as Shoko's, you still couldn't quite bring yourself to actually believe it was true. You'd known Gojo for quite some time now, having worked alongside him since the start of your teaching career here at Tokyo Jujutsu Highschool. And from what you'd witnessed, Satoru was extremely popular with the ladies, so the thought of a woman not returning his feelings sounded like a piece of fiction to you.

"Given the nature of the disease it's only going to get worse from here on out, if not intervened." The woman added after a long pause. "So I'd strongly recommend telling whoever it is you're in love with how you feel. - Even on the off chance that the feelings aren't mutual, it's might help release some of that cursed energy in a form that isn't hemoptysis."

Hearing Ieiri's words made your heart ache.

It was for a selfish reason really..

You felt jealous.. of the person who'd captured Satoru's heart..

Sure, it hurt you seeing the otherwise cheerful man in such a state.. But what hurt you even more was the fact that it was all because of someone who he thought didn't love him back..

You would be lying to yourself if you said that during the five years you had worked alongside the strongest sorcerer of your time, you hadn't developed some feelings for the charismatic man.

Your heart couldn't help but race whenever he was near you, just like you couldn't help the rosy blush that would tint your cheeks red every time he brought you a souvenir from one of his missions, claiming that he'd put much effort and care into finding the "perfect gift for his perfect co-worker".

Now hearing that he was suffering just because he loved someone who didn't reciprocate his feelings made your heart ache.

You had entertained the idea of confessing your feelings towards the blue-eyed man for quite some time now, hoping that there was a chance he might reciprocate them.

But now? All that hope dwindled like a wilting flower.

"I agree with Shoko.." You spoke, gaze glued to somewhere in the distance. "You should voice your feelings.. It'll help you feel better.."

___

It had been approximately five months ever since Satoru had somehow contracted the strange disease. Five months of coughing up petal, after petal covered with his own blood.

What once used to be him coughing up a single petal, two at most on a daily basis, had now escalated to him vomiting five to six petals at a time, at least three times during the day.

Once he'd even spat out a whole flower.

It would've been a far more beautiful sight, had the rose bloom not been covered with his blood, and had his lungs not burned from the act of coughing up the delicate flower.

For five months Satoru had been living his life with the constant ache in his chest. An ache that would not go away no matter what he tried doing.

The idea to use reverse cursed energy on himself had sprung up in his head during the second month. Right around the time when his constant ache was beginning to consume his every waking hour. Rendering the man unable to focus on anything else apart from it.

The first time he'd used cursed energy to heal his wounds, Satoru felt so proud of himself for coming up with such a brilliant idea, that he felt like giving himself a pat on the back as to congratulate himself for such brilliance.

Unfortunately though, his joy was rather shortlived, seeing as it turned out that using cursed energy was not only a temporary solution, but it also brought more problems than it solved. Using RCT on himself only seemed to worsen the effects of that wretched disease. Almost as if it was fanning its flames.

After that, he'd not tried healing himself using reverse cursed technique once more, unless the situation was quite dire.

For five whole months had he watched his body slowly, but surely scum to the disease. He felt like a shell of his former self. Satoru couldn't remember the last time he'd been able to take a proper breath without choking on a blasted flower.

And it only seemed to be getting worse from here out. Exactly like how Shoko had predicted.

He hadn't told you about his feelings, opting to suffer their burden alone, instead of jeopardizing your safety. An act that would eventually end up killing him in the long run.

Tonight was just like any other night. Satoru had returned home after a long day of work, immediately rushing to his bathroom to cough up the petals that were scratching his throat. It felt almost routine at this point. Get home, stain his sink with blood and roses, clean up and then go on about his day.

It was slowly killing him.

Satoru looked at himself in the mirror, eyes sunken and lips covered in blood. He looked more like a vampire than anything else right now. Lifting his hand from the sink, the man picked up one of the coughed up rose blossoms. His movements were soft and gentle, eyes softening slightly as he stared at the delicate flower.

With a pained chuckle he spoke. "I find it hard to believe that such a delicate thing as yourself could manage to wound the greatest sorcerer to ever live." His voice was hoarse from the constant strain his respiratory tracks had to endure.

Satoru didn't know whether he was referring to the flower or you in that moment, and to be completely honest, he didn't really care. This was just a reminder of all the struggles he had to endure in order to keep his title as "The Strongest Sorcerer of The Modern Era".

RING RING

The sound of his phone ringing caught his attention, snapping the young man out of any potential philosophical endeavors for the time being. Resting the rose on his bathroom sink, Satoru exited the bathroom, slowly making his way to the living room where he'd left his phone.

Picking the small object up and looking at the screen, his eyes lit up upon seeing your name pop up. Swiping his finger across the screen, he answered the phone.

"Hey." He said, trying to conceal the obvious hoarseness of his voice. "Need anything?"

"Hi, no uh-" Your voice came from the other line. Despite having seen you earlier today, Satoru found himself missing you even more now that he'd heard your voice. "I just finished doing some baking, but I accidentally ended up making a bit too many sweets. - And since I know you've got quite the sweet tooth I was wondering if you'd mind if I bring you some. Since, I don't want to waste some perfectly good Dorayaki."

Satoru couldn't help but smile at your considerate offer. God, he loved that side of you. So sweet and considerate. He just couldn't get enough. "Sure. I'm in my apartment right now, so you can stop by any time you'd like."

"Really? Great then!" You chimed. He could almost picture the bright smile you had on your face judging by your tone of voice. "I'll be there in twenty- Gotta clean up this mess first." You chuckled and Satoru swore he'd never heard a sound more melodic than this one.

"See you in twenty then." He replied.

"See ya."

___

Approximately twenty minutes after hanging up the call, Satoru heard the doorbell ringing.

That must be her.

Satoru thought. He'd already taken the liberty of cleaning up his little 'mess' in the bathroom. Taking the flower petals and throwing them away in the trash.

He didn't want you to see them. Didn't want to see that worried look upon your face. It would only make his heart ache more if he did.

With long strides, the young man effortlessly made his way to the entrance. Taking a stand at the door, he glanced at himself in the mirror, taking in his paler features with slight annoyance.

Hopefully she won't notice..

Oh but you had noticed. You'd noticed it a long time ago. Noticed his sunken features, the carefully concealed pain in his eyes. It was hard to look at the man you loved slowly suffering like that. All while you're frustratingly unable to do anything to help. All because of some woman..

You were standing there, patiently waiting for Gojo to open the door and let you in. Once you heard some shuffling on the other side you knew it was him and your body stiffened up.

As the door opened you were met with the sight of the milky-haired man, staring back at you with his big blue eyes.

"Hey." He greeted.

"Hi." You replied, suddenly feeling nervous. It wasn't like it was your first time coming over to his place so what was wrong? You'd visited Gojo plenty of times before, and not once had you felt as anxious as you did now. Strange. . .

"Don't just stand there, come in." Satoru said, offering you his signature boyish grin as he stepped aside allowing you to enter inside his luxurious apartment.

With a soft smile on your lips, you stepped inside, immediately opting to take off your shoes before going any further. Holding the bento box filled with Dorayaki in your hands, you followed the man to his living room.

"Make yourself at home." Gojo spoke, taking a step towards you and stretching out his hands in order to take the bento box from your hold.

With a quick nod, you handed him the container, and upon doing so you took a seat on his lavish sofa. Looking around, you took notice of all the little details about his apartment. It came as no surprise to you to find out that Satoru was a well organized man, even outside of work.

His apartment was absolutely spotless every time you'd visited him. You wondered how he'd get all the free time needed to keep everything so neat and tidy, but then again, he was the head of the Gojo-clan after all. And being the head of the top clan in all of Jujutsu Society came with its perks you supposed.

Resting your hands on your thighs, you took in a deep breath, secretly relishing in the room's scent. It smelled like sandalwood mixed in with a hint of that expensive cologne that Gojo would often use.

Or in other words, it smelled exactly like him.

Perfect.

Straightening up at the sound of his approaching footsteps, you instinctively glanced over to the door. Satoru, holding a porcelain plate filled with as many Dorayaki as he could fit, walked over to the table, before setting the plate down on it.

After giving you another grateful compliment for your outstanding work he finally took a seat, right across from you.

Conversation easily flowed after. Satoru was a man who found it easy to hold a conversation with almost anyone. Another attribute many envied him for. He was just so charismatic. And with the way he carried himself you couldn't help but be engaged in whatever he was telling you. Even if it was sometimes the most boring thing you could think of, he made it sound like such a fun topic.

Smiling softly at the man, you studied his features. Has he lost some weight? You thought, taking notice of his more prominent cheekbones. Shifting your gaze, your eyes met with his. Despite still having that same vibrant blue color in them, you couldn't help but notice the dullness behind them. It was like all the life was slowly being drained away from them.

By this point, Satoru had already stopped talking. Sensing your gaze on him his eyes locked with yours. Part of him knew what you were probably thinking. It made him want to look away. Not to let you see what had become of him because of his feelings for you.

And then he felt it.

Just like clockwork, his airways constructed, causing the man to curl down as he began coughing.

As soon as he'd begun coughing, you were up and rushing to his side. "Gojo!" You cried out his name, worry and panic filling your voice as you wracked your brain for anything that you could do to help him.

But nothing came to mind.

And so, you were left just standing there, arms hovering over the man you held so dear in your heart. The feeling of being unable to help the one you loved made you feel sick to the stomach.

A horrible experience, really.

Once the coughing had stopped, you looked at Satoru's bloodied lips, and then at the rose petals scattered across the floor. Staining the carpet red with his blood.

"How are you?" You asked, looking at the man with a worried expression.

"M' fine." He said in a raspy tone, followed by another deep cough. "Don't worry about me."

You frowned at his words. How could you possibly do anything else aside from worry about him when he was in such a state!

"You don't seem so well Gojo.." You spoke up, looking back at the snow-haired man with a gentle look in your eyes. A look that made his heart ache.

"Your condition only seems to have gotten worse as far as I can tell.." Pursing your lips, you paused for a moment before letting out a quiet sigh. "I'm just.. Really worried about you.."

Satoru could physically feel his heart breaking as you spoke those words to him. The last thing he'd wanted to hear was that he was the cause of your worry. The whole reason he hadn't told you that he was in love with you was solely for the reason as to not make you feel unhappy.. And yet..

He failed.

"Have you.." You continued, suddenly averting your gaze from his. "Have you told her your feelings yet?.."

A deep silence willed the room after you'd voiced your question. Neither of you spoke for what felt like hours, until Satoru finally broke the silence by answering your question.

"No.. I haven't."

"Why?"

The question left your lips before you could even stop yourself.

Satoru simply looked at you, before answering.

"I can't."

"You can't..?"

What does he mean by that? You thought, unable to find a reasonable explanation for why he simply couldn't confess his feelings to the woman he desired.

"I don't understand.. What's stopping you from telling her how you feel?"

You pressed the matter. If Gojo didn't do anything about his condition he wouldn't make it. And you for one were not planning on losing him any time soon.

Satoru looked back at you, and for a moment, he didn't really know what to tell you. He had no proper answer to give you that wouldn't inevitably reveal what he was trying to hide from you all this time.

"It's.. complicated."

"What is?" Furrowing your brows you looked back at him. "Gojo.. You do realize that not telling her how you feel is slowly killing you. There's no harm in admitting your feelings to her, you know.."

Despite the hurt that saying those words to him caused you, you had to put up with it. If it meant Satoru got to live, you'd happily grin and bear it.

"(Last Name), you don't understand.. I can't just tell her I love her, all right?" Satoru spoke, his voice a little shaken up. "It's not as simple as you think."

He paused, looking off into the distance before continuing once more. "Telling her I love her is only going to make her a target for everyone that's out to get me. I can't risk putting her in danger like that. I won't."

"And even if I do tell her. - There's no guarantee that she feels the same.."

"So what? You're going to accept death?" You spoke, voice cracking at the end. Glossy tears filled your eyes as your lip quivered. "And then what? What about all the people that need you in their life?"

"There are people that care so much about you Gojo!" You exclaimed, tears threatening to spill from your eyes. "I care about you!"

By this point, you were extremely shaken up. You couldn't believe that he was willing to accept his fate like that! Didn't he know how much he meant to you?

"I love you!"

The words left your mouth before you could even register what was happening. And once you did it was too late.

You could feel the wave of instant regret crashing against your body with such immense force. And Satoru's science wasn't doing you any good either.

I messed up. I messed up real bad.!

The thought went over and over in your head as you stared back at Satoru. He was speechless. That was to be expected after all! Here he was slowly dying and you'd just confessed your love to him!

"G-Gojo I-" You began, unable to find the right words to say to him. "I am so sorry! I-I don't know what came over me, I just-"

"(Last Name)."

"I know that now is hardly the right time to be telling you this but it just slipped!-"

"(Last Name)."

"I mean you've already got so much on your plate and here I am telling you that I-?!"

Your words were cut off by Satoru's lips crashing against yours. A tingling sensation spread across your whole body and your stomach did flips.

Whatever feelings you were experiencing in that moment, Satoru was experiencing tenfold the amount. Hearing that you loved him back was like hearing the loveliest melody known to man. Those simple yet powerful words made his heart race.

You loved him..

You actually loved him.

After a few moments of sharing a kiss with the Gojo Satoru, the man finally pulled away. He looked at you straight in the eye, with his lips slightly parted.

Meanwhile you were just left standing there, completely and utterly speechless.

It took you some time to fully gather your thoughts, but once you did you asked, or more like stated in pure disbelief.

"You.. kissed me?"

"Yeah.." He began, his eyes softening as he focused their gaze on your petite figure." "I did, didn't I..?"

Checks flushed bright red, you looked back at the slender man. "D-Does that mean?-"

Satoru Gojo, had made a promise to himself. A promise that no matter the cost he would be there to protect you. He'd always be there to keep you safe. No matter what.

He knew that what he was about to say would go against his plan. Confessing his feelings would mean putting you in grave danger.

But he'd decided on something else after hearing those three faithful words from your lips.

He'd keep you safe by his side, even if it meant putting his life on the line. That was a risk he was willing to take if it meant getting to kiss your soft lips once more. Or hearing you say you love him too.

He'd do it within the blink of an eye for you.

That he vowed.

"I love you (Name)."

The words were so liberating. The thorns and roses that had been growing inside his lungs vanished into thin air. And finally, after months of pain and anguish, Satoru was finally able to take a breath without the constant reminder that he would forever be alone.

He loved you.

And you loved him back.

What more could a man hope for?

---

Author Note:

Hope you all enjoyed reading :)

The idea sounded much better in my head tbh but I think it turned out okay. TvT

#gojo satoru x reader #romance #jjk #angst with a happy ending #jjk angst #jjk fluff #angst #tw blood #gojo x reader #satoru gojo #satoru x reader

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fluffyfantasticducky · 23 hours

Text

Mistakes and regrets

☆ Pairing: Loki x Reader

☆ Synopsis: Loki is a prisoner that sees his way out through pretending to you, but when he finds true love he doesn't know how to deal with the guilt of making a very similar damage to the one that had been done to him when he was used for what originally were selfish reasons.

☆ Word Count: 10.5k, I think that's my longest fic yet, and written in the shortest time lapse, not sure what that says about my mental stability rn.

☆ Notes: As I proofread I noticed this could be interpreted as generational trauma, sort of... given I made Loki sort of mirror what Odin did to him. But I wasn't trying to be deep, I just felt like shit during the week and used this to cope. The fic might be cringy as a result, I am honestly not sure.

☆ Warnings: Depression and guilt are the focus points of this storyline. Loki starts is kinda toxic his behavior here isn't meant to be romanticized or intended to be extrapolated to real life, I just wanted to explore a narrative surrounding poor decisions and the dealing of its consequences. The reader is kinda a Mary Sue of sweetness but I just wanted to hammer in Loki feeling bad. I don't know if this is a trigger but I touch the vault scene of Loki and Odin and Odin being forgiven is also handled, Idk if that's trigger warning worthy but I know most of the fandom hates him.

“You’re not making it any for me brother.” Thor spoke through the glass.

“I want my freedom, brother.” Loki sighed, sitting down on the uncomfortable bench. “Don’t think of me as ungrateful, but as much as I appreciate not being executed, I can’t exactly call this a life.”

“Director Fury insisted, I’ve tried explaining to him that New York was a complicated situation. But he wants to be sure you are not a threat to Earth– uh, Midgard.”

“You've surely adapted well to living here” Loki rolled his eyes. “Pathetic.”

“Cooperate with me, I brother” Thor begged. “I want to help you, but I need you to help me first.”

“I’m not sure what I am expected to do from here” Loki huffed annoyed.

Thor sighed and gave his little brother a sympathetic look. Loki was frustrated, and he couldn’t blame him. He would be too if he got brainwashed, had all his anger, sense of betrayal and resentment exploited to torture an innocent planet, and still be the one to pay for said crimes… Sure he wouldn’t be all jokes and laughs.

“I’ve been negotiating a way to test your stability and get your freedom” Thor smiled hoping to cheer up his brother. And he made Loki look up. “It’d be a bit uncomfortable at first. But I know you can prove yourself. You’d have to wear cuffs or a while, but you’d be free to walk around with me and the others on trips to the city.”

“Hooray…” Loki rolled his eyes.

“Please brother, I’m trying, I just need you to be patient.” Thor spoke sadly as he made his way out. “I hate this as much as you do.”

“Do you?” Loki said. “As far as I know, you’re not the one in a crystal cell.”

“Alright, almost as much as you do.” Thor joked softly and Loki did chuckle weakly.

He agreed that Thor had been furious. But it all happened so fast.

Thor had managed to land a fatal blow on Thanos’ chest and soon Steve, Natasha, and Bruce had arrived to back him up and retrieve the Infinity gauntlet. They opened a portal to bring back Tony, Doctor Strange, and the Spider Ling… And surprisingly a weird group of space travelers.

When Thor realized they could travel to anywhere in the universe they opened a portal to rescue the Asgardian ship. There were a lot of severe wounds but surprisingly Thanos had failed, he underestimated the strength of Asgard, and most people could be saved.

“Thor!” Valkyrie screamed and rushed to hug the king.

“Valkyrie! You are alright! Thank goodness!” Thor smiled in relief and hugged his friend.

“Thor you have to come quick!” Valkyrie urged him. “It’s Loki!”

Thor’s heart sank, his heart couldn’t stand burying the only family member he had left. Thor had lost his parents… he had seen his whole planet die. But not his baby brother. Not Loki. Not again.

“Please… not now… Let’s treat the wounded ones first…” Thor spoke with a knot on his throat. “I want to focus on saving lives first.”

“Thor, you don’t get it! He’s alive!” Valkyrie scolded him. “But he’s in a critical state! We need to take him to a safe place to treat him.”

A tear streamed down the new king’s face, and he felt as if he had finally put down a enormous boulder he had been holding onto. He didn’t lose Loki.

“Take me to him!” Thor urged them.

Valkyrie took Thor to a damaged room in the ship that had been used as an improvised infirmary. In the corner laid a figure Thor knew too well being treated by healers.

“Brother!” Thor said. “Oh Gods… You’re alive…”

“You can’t get rid of me that easily thunder brain… ugh…!” Loki joked weakly as he groaned in pain. The healers begged him not to move as they tried stabilizing his condition. His neck had been nearly obliterated.

It was a miracle Loki hadn’t died and that the healers had managed to find him on time.

“We couldn’t abandon him” one of the healers spoke politely to her king. “After all, it was because of you and prince Loki that Lady Valkyrie managed to evacuate the survivors. We apologize for not finding you, my king.”

“It’s no problem at all” Thor laughed in an uncharacteristically quiet manner. He was breathless. “Thank you for saving my brother’s life.”

The lady healer let out a sheepish giggle and bowed. Loki rolled his eyes, earning a lecture from the healers that were still treating him. King or not, Thor still had that charm that seemed to make most people swoon.

The reunion was interrupted by a group of soldiers that broke in with a logo on their uniforms that made Thor’s blood boil when they pointed their weapons at Loki. SHEILD.

They picked up the stretcher where Loki was laying in and took him away to lock him up.

Apparently, the news travel fast, but SHIELD travels faster, and hearing Loki was alive was enough to mobilize and capture the injured God and lock him in a crystal prison cell in a SHIELD base. If Loki had a coin for every time that happened… he’d have two.

He couldn’t say Thor didn’t do anything about it. He could hear the thunders and enraged screams from his brother, demanding for an explanation and Loki’s immediate liberation.

“I demand my brother is released immediately!” Thor yelled.

“You should consider yourself grateful we’re allowing your witches to go and heal that world-level threat! He would be better off dead!”

“Don’t you dare speak of my brother like that! Me and all of my people would’ve died if it wasn’t for him!”

Loki wasn’t sure if he was amused or if he felt bad.

It did stroke his ego being called “Asgard’s hero” in the middle of the yelling. It shouldn’t have surprised him that Nick Fury was just as loud as Thor when angry. He couldn’t complain much. It made it much easier to hear what was going on, which was good, he was too weakened to use his magic to spy on them.

The healers tending to his neck sure seemed awkward overhearing the fight. It must have been uncomfortable to be doing your job in a high security cell. So, he tried entertaining the healers as he could. Although all he got was a lecture when his magic drained his energy, and they needed him awake to monitor him.

Soon he got better, he but wasn’t allowed to be out of his cell. It was a bit nostalgic, in some dark and twisted way. It even made him want to fix his old horned helmet, even if Thor would call him a cow for wearing it.

And when things couldn’t get worse… he met you.

“It’s lunch time” a voice said in a weirdly friendly tone before you head popped by the entrance as you balanced a tray of food on your head in an attempt to amuse Loki. He wondered if there were buffoons in Midgard, but you always tried to draw a laugh from him… Tried.

“Tough crowd, eh?”

Loki couldn’t not be baffled by the way you talked to him. Although he couldn’t decide if that was because you surely knew his reputation as Midgard’s terrorist or because you always talked in a friendly and goofy tone in a maximum-security prison in a super-secret spy agency. You also seemed to be awfully young to be here, but you couldn’t be much older than the girl Barton took as his protégée.

“What’s on the menu today?” Loki asked in a more formal tone.

“Why the hurry?” you asked, “don’t tell me you got somewhere else to be.”

“You think you are a lot funnier than you really are” Loki rolled his eyes. “And it’s not very nice to make fun of someone’s disgrace.”

“I hear you think I’m at least a little bit funny” you smiled as you kept balancing the tray of food on your head.

“Please don’t drop my food, I’d like to have at least something to eat” he rolled his eyes.

You tripped on your feet, and he saw the tray falling down, you caught it last second with your shins, and gave him a little sheepish grin.

“Alright, alright, I’m impressed” Loki groaned. “Can I eat now please? Or is having you torment me part of some attempt to break me?”

“Why are you so moody?” you asked. “More than usual, I mean.”

“I’m starving, and you humans eat way too little” Loki finally admitted. “But that is still better than nothing… Please.”

You stopped playing around and you looked at him as you got the tray into his cell.

“Sorry, I didn’t know you were eating so little.” You admitted.

“I barely have energy to cast small illusions, which would serve to entertain myself.” Loki complained as he sat to eat and you sat by the table and looked at him, you didn’t seem afraid, curious at most. You watched him eat and took his dirty plates by the end.

You weirded him out.

You always did something along the same lines; you came to bring him food, teased him a little and then left when you were gone. Although this time you had asked more questions about him. And you seemed more pensive while he ate.

And later that day he got a surprise. Usually, he just saw you to deal with you while he ate. But today you returned with a brown paper bag on your hands and a backpack, you never carried personal objects with you.

“What now?” he groaned.

You said nothing but opened the door to pass him food and slid the bag inside. Loki opened his end and grabbed the bag, it was warm, and it had a strong smell inside, he reached and pulled out a weird soft cushion with a white cover.

“Bur…ger? What this?” he asked as he read the yellow letters.

“It’s food” you smiled. “Cafeteria is closed until dinner, so I thought bringing you something else might boost your mood.”

“This looks like junk” he snarled, making you laugh.

“It’s something like that.”

Loki looked inside the bag and looked at you.

“There’s no fork.”

“You eat it with your hands” you smiled and pretended to grab a burger and bite it. “Like a sandwich.”

“What’s a sandwich?” Loki asked, making you laugh again.

Loki tried to take a bit, imitating your gesture, but you stopped with a squeaky laugh.

“Unwrap it first!” you laughed. “The white thing paper is not edible.”

Usually Loki would’ve argued more. But he had been really hungry, so he agreed.

“The taste is agreeable enough.”

“Try the fries!” you said eagerly.

“These yellow sticks?” he asked pulling out one fry from the bag, and you giggle once again, he was learning you were quite easy to amuse.

“Yes, the yellow sticks, they’re potatoes with salt and soaked in hot oil to cook them” you smiled.

“That sounds unhealthy” he said, but he surely didn’t pass up the extra meal, and while he’d never admit it, but it was tasty.

“It is on the long run” you agreed. “But you don’t eat these every day. It’s more like… something you eat when you particularly crave it. Like a treat.”

“What’s on your bag?” Loki asked, a lot more agreeable now with a full stomach.

“Ah, you said you didn’t have much to do” you said and passed him bag. “It’s a portable DVD player and old movies.”

“I understood the word portable from that whole sentence” Loki said in an obvious tone.

He wasn’t new to technology, but unlike Earth, Asgard only used technology for practical purposes like travel and fighting. Never for entertainment.

“You can watch recorded over produced plays on the screen” you said adapting to what Loki might be familiar with. “Fury said you can’t have access to internet, so I thought since I don’t use this anymore it’d keep you entertained while Thor negotiates your freedom. And if you need something else, I could surely get it for you.”

Loki was trying to process it all while he followed your instructions to set up the devices you brought him. Now he’d finally give some use to the electricity plugins on his cell.

“Why are you so nice to me?” Loki asked.

“I don’t know” you shrugged. “You seem like you could use some kindness.”

“I’m a charity case?” Loki asked, not sure if he was thankful or offended.

“You wish. If I was charitable, I would’ve brought a fancy brand of fast food, and you’re a good junkyard to bring my old stuff” you snarled, making Loki laugh, for real this time.

Your cheeks flushed and were soon surrounded in a clod of silver mist. And when it disappeared you had vanished already.

Now that… Loki didn’t see coming. He had heard of your kind when he took control of some of SHIELD agents, humans with supernatural abilities. You were a mutant, and for the looks of it, one with teleportation powers. Now it made sense why someone seemingly so ordinary was in a place like this, flirting with a prisoner.

Interesting.

The next few days you kept bringing him food as usual, but two things had changed. One, the portions were bigger now, Loki now got to eat to a point where he was satisfied. Two, you joked around a lot less, in fact, you simply brought the food and stayed nearby in silence, and Loki had caught you staring at him with rosy cheeks.

So, you did fancy him… Truly interesting. And quite flattering too, he at least had to agree you were quite appealing to stare at.

“I watched one of your… Dee Bee Dees…” Loki started the conversation while he ate. “The one with the funny doctor…”

“That… doesn’t narrow it down much” you finally spoke. “Sarcastic asshole with a wounded leg?”

“He is sarcastic, but he treats patients with joy and laughter and goes against the rules. Like the pair of legs at the entrance” Loki specified. “It was a sweet story… I did feel bad for him when he lost his… you know.”

“Ah, yeah…” you said sadly.

For a few more days, the routine kept like that, you seemed a lot shyer than before and now Loki was the one pursuing your attention and with an arsenal of movies you had watched he always had a way to start conversation.

When he was sure he had properly understood your interest in him, he made his move.

While Loki wasn’t as flashy as Thor, he never had much trouble swooning anyone of his interest, with years of etiquette lessons and nourishing his mind with the most exquisite novels and books Asgard had to offer he knew how to charm anyone he desired.

And soon enough he was courting you. He recited for you the collection of the most exquisite verses he had memorized and casted his illusions of roses and butterflies for you to enjoy a romantic set up.

Soon Fury had two people demanding for his liberation. And since Loki had been in his best behavior Fury didn’t have an excuse to keep Loki locked up and while he had a tracker on his ankle and Asgardian magic bracelets capable of suppressing his magic.

You were there when they let Loki out and he made sure to hug you first. The more in love he seemed, the sooner he’d be truly free. You melted against his embrace and wrapped your arms around him in a warm hug.

Loki felt a light tug on his chest. He couldn’t remember the last time someone out of his parents and Thor been so eager and happy to hug him.

“I had been dreaming of this…” you spoke softly. “And your hugs are even cozier than I imagined.”

That felt like a dagger to his heart. Why were you so sweet?

“Alright, Bambi, if you try something your little sweetheart will let us know right away, got it?” Tony warned him.

You wrapped your arms around Loki’s bicep pressing yourself against him.

“He’s gonna be perfect” you defended him. “And if I’m wrong you can lock me up as well for helping a criminal out.”

Second dagger. What kind of idiot were you trusting him so blindly? Could you really not see he just wanted his freedom?

Loki finally had a proper room, or something like that. He would be staying in the Avengers Compound when the Helicarrier landed… until then there was a room where he, Thor, and basically everyone stayed.

Your bed the one right above Loki’s. Loki sighed. Just a few more days. Loki laid down and saw you looking down at him, peeking from your bed with big sparkling eyes.

“Yes?” Loki said in his best sweet loving tone.

“S-Sorry…” you mumbled as your cheeks got red. “I’m just really happy you’re here.”

“Aww, young love…” Kate cooed.

“SHUT UP! I’M OLDER THAN YOU!” you screeched and threw a pillow right at her face, making Loki smiled softly.

“You’re both babies…” Yelena grinned.

“Shut up, you hag!” you and Kate argued.

“You’re all babies…” Bucky corrected.

“DON’T STICK YOUR NOSE, YOU FOSSIL!” the three of you argued.

“I’m… not gonna join this argument being 1,500 years old” Thor laughed and soon eased the mood in all laughter again.

Meanwhile Loki wouldn’t stop thinking what you said to him. “I’m happy you’re here.” Third stab… How could you be so happy and attached to him so easily and quickly?

The next few days he had resigned to adapt to train with you. He had been a warrior all his life, but being a soldier was too boring for him. It was a lot of training, gym workouts, more training, and meetings. He saw you nodding off during the latter. Where did you pull the energy to play and joke around with him when you went to bring food to him while he had been locked up?

You yawned and rested against his shoulder as you dozed off during lunch once. You were so warm and trusted him more than he deserved. You seemed awfully comfortable around him.

Every spare moment you had was dedicated to him, you were awfully cuddly and touchy. Loki wasn’t used to this in the slightest. At first playing along seemed impossible. But your kisses were so gentle and tender, more often than not he found his eyes fluttering close and his hands wrapping around your waist in a loving way. Even sharing a room with a lot of people seemed more fun if he got to study your reactions.

“Take that!” you screamed as you and Kate smacked each other with pillows, but when a stray pillow hit Natasha in the back of the head, it was war.

Everyone was throwing and hitting each other with pillows until someone pushed you to Loki’s arms who had stayed out of the war as just a bystander. No one seemed to be paying much attention to him, but now you were.

Your face was beet red, and you were blabbering apologies if you had hurt him, (which, you hadn’t). But Loki simply smiled and grabbed your sides and started squeezing them, causing you to squeal and burst out laughing.

Oh, of course you were ticklish, he should’ve known. Hel, you irradiated this aura that just screamed “tickle me!” And as the God of Mischief, he was drawn to ticklish little things such as yourself, to make sure he could exploit every ticklish little inch of your giggly body. It had always been a pretty harmless way to ease his need to cause mayhem.

Soon the entire room was in fits of laughter since Loki had unintentionally inspired a tickle war.

“H-Hohohohoney! Pleahahahahase!” you begged Loki, “thahahahahat tickles!”

“So? I hope it doesn’t bother you, my dear” Loki purred in your ear as his fingers traveled up and down your ribs, causing you to screech. “I think I’d like to play with my pretty little toy some more…”

“Nohohohoho! Please! Hehehehehe! S-Stop it!” you giggled until you had proofed to reappear at the top bunk bed, right by the time someone else had surrendered and called truce.

Thor. His stomach was sore from laughing and he needed a break. But the big Asgardian was confident enough to not be affected by being the one to surrender in such harmless play fight.

“I’m nostalgic” Thor laughed. “Reminds me of the sleep overs with Fandral, Volstagg, Hogun and Sif.”

“I wouldn’t know, I was never invited.” Loki said.

“WHAT?!” you gasped and threw a pillow at Thor’s head in Loki’s defense. “JERK! TO YOUR OWN BROTHER!”

“What do you mean?” Thor asked. “You rejected us every time.”

“What are you talking about? You never invited me, brother” Loki explained. “By the time I had found out, you were all locked in your chambers.”

“Sif and the guys always said you said no” Thor said. “That’s why I always made smaller sleepovers with just you and me. I thought you hated big groups.”

Loki never thought Thor had been clueless, if anything he thought it had been him who rejected him, it never occurred to him it was the rest that orchestrated Loki’s exclusion. It made sense in retrospect, they were more Thor’s friends, not Loki’s.

“I enjoy time to myself,” Loki agreed. “But I’ve never been against big events. I always thought it was you who didn’t want me near your friends…”

“Of course not, brother…”

“Don’t feel bad, Loki” Yelena said in a tone that eased the mood. “Nat used to have sleepover with friends and ban me from her room the whole night. But we’re sisters, adopted or not.”

“I said I was sorry, and I was 11 you resentful crybaby!” Natasha argued with a laugh.

You noticed that had hit a sensitive spot-on Loki and went to sit behind Loki to give him a hug from behind. And it was unexpectedly comforting, he sighed as you kissed his cheek. Growing more and more used to your doting affection, you were also rather good to read his mood by now.

It just made him feel more guilty, so he tried changing the subject.

“You poof around when tickled, hm?” Loki chuckled. “Noted.”

“Not just when I’m tickled, when I get worked up by almost anything…” you explained. “I can’t always control it.”

“I see… so, I get you all worked up…” Loki flirted, making you jolt and squeak with a red face. “Heh… I’m flattered.”

“What about you?” you asked when you calmed down, resting your chin on his shoulder. “Does something like that happen to you?”

“Mmm… my magic is also very tied to my feelings is mostly surges of magic when I’m pissed off.” Loki shrugged. “In a way, the source of my magic abilities come from my control of how I feel. Which is why Thor could never learn sorcery… he couldn’t ever keep calm and focus enough.”

It felt a bit of a cheap answer, his guilt told him you were always vulnerable with him. There was another thing…

Alright, now that no one was paying attention to you two.

“When I was little, I used to have a lot of nightmares, and my mother stayed with me and taught me this spell… it allows you to invite someone else to your dreams, to put it simply. She taught me that spell to help me with the bad dreams… And sometimes I still cast it involuntarily while I sleep. It’s… what’s the word? Automatic, at this point.”

“You haven’t used it since we met” you pointed out.

“There’s these preventing that” Loki wiggled the magic cuffs on his wrists, and you shrank sheepishly. “Maybe one day I’ll have you sleep visiting… who knows…”

You smiled too eagerly at the idea… it was painful to see the adoration in your eyes.

The next night you were chatting happily, you laid on the floor with your feet hanging on Loki’s bed. Surprisingly he didn’t mind too much, he found himself much more engaged on the conversation. He simply rested his hand on your shin, caressing it with his thumb.

But at some point during the chat his hand brushed by your ankle, something that should’ve caught his attention way sooner. A location tracker like his. He brushed his fingers along the band, and you jolted, quickly making a bad excuse before rushing out. A terrible liar dating the god of lies. How ironic.

“I didn’t know… I thought I was the only one with one of these…” Loki pointed to his tracker.

“All mutants and non-SHIELD affiliated have one” Tony explained with a yawn. “Basically, if you have superpowers, you have two options, be an agent or an avenger.”

“Or locked up” Loki concluded, and the way no one answered, confirming his suspicion.

“You’re gonna be joining us, right, brother?” Thor smiled.

“Do I have a choice?”

Loki chuckled, he had been thinking about this prior to this information, the fear of actually losing his brother when Thor was ready to leave him forever in Sakaar had been too great.

But what about you? You didn’t strike him the superhero style, a were a fragile and sensitive little thing, and he couldn’t picture you in the battlefield, but being a soldier was clearly taking a huge toll on you. You seemed perpetually exhausted living like this.

“Has my darling decided yet?” Loki asked, he didn’t plan on the pet names, but it felt weirdly natural as it rolled off his tongue. It felt right.

“Not before meeting you, we had tried, but I’d say with you two together… things have changed for the better.” Steve assured him. “It’s a relief though, you two would be great assets in the future, and the life at the compound is bit freer and more independent.”

For some reason, Loki smiled at the sound of that.

“It’s gonna be for the best” Bruce smiled. “Fury can be quite severe, and the soldier life isn’t for everyone…”

Loki couldn’t see you long term here, you’d be overworking yourself for a lifestyle too demanding and that you didn’t even like. It would be for the best to be an Avenger… at least that’d give you some more freedom.

By then, the mood had died down and everyone went to bed, turning off the lights way before you arrived. A few more minutes passed… and nothing. Loki considered going to find you when you opened the door, guiding your way with your phone’s flashlight. You had a messy damp ponytail, and baggy pajamas. You arrived and sat by Loki’s bed and immediately collapsed right beside him, invading his bed. He was ready to climb and use yours when you he felt a tug on his shirt.

“Let me stay with you…” you mumbled with your eyes closed, it seemed you still had some consciousness.

Loki nodded and laid down beside you, wrapping his arm over you, and tucking you under the bedsheets. He had to keep appearances. Yeah… Of course.

He studied you for a while. Your hair was soft, and it smelled like wild berries, shampoo he had started using as well because it smelled so nice. Your skin was soft and smooth, it was addictive to trace his fingers along your body. He traced circles along your side.

“Nooo… thahahat tickles…” you giggled and shifted in your half-asleep state, making something stir within Loki. “You can tickle me all you want in the morning, okay baby…?”

“Ohoho! Is that so?” Loki chuckled. “That’s dangerous thing to offer to the God of Mischief don’t you think?”

“’s okay… I trust you…” you yawned snuggling against his chest.

“Y-You do…?”

“You’d never do anything to hurt me…” you assured him, even with your brain fighting with all it’s might to not succumb to exhaustion.

Once his eyes adapted to the darkness, he stared at your face. Your features were gentle, with a pureness that only a heart that hadn’t been corrupted with cruelness and malice would have. It made him feel weak.

“I love you” you mumbled, kissing his lips before finally falling asleep with the most peaceful smile he had ever seen on anyone that was this close to him.

“I… I love you too…” he whispered and kissed the top of your head.

Now Loki genuinely wanted to stab himself through the chest, he deserved nothing less.

The next morning was the last time he’d be in the Helicarrier for a long time if he could help it. Both of you got the trackers removed and he was officially free. The magic cuffs were taken off of Loki and he immediately summoned a huge illusion that had a radius of a few kilometers as he stretched and showed off.

A huge double rainbow, oh how he had missed using his magic like this. He noticed your eyes sparkling in admiration.

Thor helped him unpack and you two were assigned neighbor bedrooms so the lovey dovey couple could stay close. You seemed ecstatic, you set your room and invited him to see it.

It was very much what he expected from you. Cozy and cute, just being inside made him want to lay down on your bed and sleep. And of course you had a pile of stuffed animals. He laid back on your bed, sinking in the mattress and fluffy covers.

Adorable.

“Honey bunny, I’m gonna go to the city alone today… don’t follow me” you warned him and proofed away before reappearing for a second. “And don’t snoop around my stuff! Love ya!”

And you disappeared in a gust of silvery white mist. Loki napped on your bed for a while, but… he couldn’t resist, he was curious by nature. He walked by your desk and saw the mirror of had a bunch of photos of him stuck to the board, he wasn’t smiling in any of them, and most had been taken him by surprise. Loki would’ve thought it weird, but the two of you were dating. And you only did what was normal for someone in a relationship. He smiled softly at how purely infatuated you were.

“Loki!” you called for him, so you had returned. He went to find you.

You had smiled so brightly as you jumped to his arms and showered his face in loving smooches.

“I missed you!” you smiled between kisses.

“You just left an hour or so…” he chuckled.

“It’s still too much time away from you!” you snuggled with him. “I missed this pretty face.”

“Heh…” he chuckled.

“I bought us something.” You smiled and handed him a golden bracelet with a round item on the middle. You kept the silver one. “It’s a distance touch bracelet.”

You touched your bracelet, and he felt his buzzing. Oh. He knew this couldn’t have been cheap. And you still didn’t hesitate to get it for him.

“Now you can feel me close, even if I vanish, or if we can’t be with each other.” You giggled.

His heart fluttered. How could there be someone so overly sweet? To him, of all people.

“Thank you…” he smiled.

Days passed and Loki’s sanity was evaporating in thin air. Guilt was eating him alive.

You were in truly, madly, and hopelessly in love with him. You wanted nothing but the best for him and you always showered him with love, affection and the sweetest kisses he had ever tasted. And worst of it all, he was falling in love with you. He deserved no love from you, but he had it… And it filled his heart with a warmth he didn’t deserve. Oh, you poor lovely thing, if you only knew how cruel his intentions had been to start your relationship.

He did what you wanted now, trying to make up for it. He didn’t want you to feel like you did all the job in a relationship anymore. Soon the photos were more couple y, of kisses and hugs, Loki took photos of you more as well. He invited you to read and nap with him.

He tickled you lots, and making you giggle in his arms as he held you close. He hugged you tight, trying to squeeze in all the love he had develop for the kind soul that had been nothing but sweet to him. In a wordless pray for your forgiveness.

He did everything that occurred to him would make you happy.

“No way! You’re ticklish?!” you gasped with an ear-to-ear grin.

“Terribly so, I can’t stand being ticked in between my ribs” he smiled as he rested his chin on your head, with you sitting on his lap. “My magic acts up on its own if I get overwhelmed, like you.”

“Really?” you giggled and caressed his sides. “Can I try?”

“For a kiss…” he smiled and puckered his lips for a smooch, which you complied with a huge grin. “I adore you… Fine, you got one minute to tickle my ribs.”

“Just one minute?” you whined with that lovely smile of yours.

“Thirty seconds?” he smiled.

“Eh?!” you whined. “One minute!”

“See how convincing I am?” he grinned.

“Oh, you—” you said and turned around to start poking and prodding his ribs, Loki couldn’t help but burst out laughing.

“Ack! Hehehehe!” he whined, you were too good at this, he was laughing his heart out. “S-Stohohohop! Hehehehe! I-It’s been a minute! Hahaha! S-Stop!”

“I’m not done with you, you pretty tease!” you giggled and kept prodding between his ribs.

“Oh yeheheah?!” he laughed and skittered his fingers along your belly.

You were squealing and giggling in the blink of an eye. But you didn’t stop tickling him.

“Hehehehe! Hic! G-Give up!” you giggled and squirmed as you prodded his sides.

“You give up! Hahahahaha!” he giggled squeezed your tummy and skittered his fingers along your armpits.

“Ack! Noohohohoho!” you whine and squeezed above his kneecaps, making him jump and ergo you fell off his lap and onto the couch.

“You’re in trouble…” he grinned and his fingers, poked, drilled, kneaded and scratch over every sensitive spot on your body, and it didn’t matter if you gave up. He didn’t stop until you were breathless.

Only then he stopped and held you in his arms.

“Remind me to not tickle you again, you’re sadistic” you smiled.

“You know it, darling…” he smiled and kissed the top of your head. “Did you have fun?”

“Mhm…” you smiled and leaned against him. “I love you.”

You were beyond ecstatic. You melted under all of his affection and more time he spent with you, the more he couldn’t deny his feelings for you.

He did it everything he could to make you happy. But nothing he did alleviated his guilt. He could only imagine the amount of heartache you would feel if you found out he had only used you to try looking better adjusted and be free, and that he had pretended to fall in love.

He couldn’t eat, he couldn’t sleep. He was going insane. He walked around the compound like a ghost during the night. He did a stop to throw up in the toilet.

“You’re awake,” you surprised him despite your gentle tone. “Is something bothering you?”

“N-No, love. I just wasn’t feeling very tired.” He assured you. “Don’t worry. Go back to sleep.”

You placed your hands on his hips and leaned closer to him the way you did whenever you were going to kiss him. But you took a little sniff—probably smelling his bad breath—you stopped and smiled at him with kindness.

“Mmm… Insomnia, hm?” you smiled and pulled him to the kitchen. “I know just the cure.”

You heated up water and prepared him a tea with honey. The warmth of the drink ran through him as the sweet drink got rid of the bad taste, and he sighed a tear streaming down his face.

“What’s wrong?” you asked, cupping his face.

“I’ve done so many awful things… And…” he spoke softly. “I don’t know how to fix them… I don’t deserve any forgiveness…”

“Oh Loki…” you hugged him. “No one blames you… you didn’t mean it… I’ve seen your pretty heart, and you deserve all the love in the world… Gosh, if I could take all the pain, you’re feeling for myself, I would.”

“Please don’t say that…” he begged. He couldn’t handle anymore guilt, but he didn’t know how to tell you the truth.

You gently guided him to your bedroom and tucked him in your bed, wrapping your arms around him in a protective way.

“Forgive me love... Please forgive me…” he begged between mutters. “I take it all back… please… Please don’t hate me… please…”

“Shh…” you whispered, running your fingers through his hair. “It’s all gonna be okay… I’m always gonna be here for you.”

Between the warm tea, his exhaustion, the previous sleepless nights, your comfortable bed, and your loving touch… his body gave up on him and he fell asleep.

Everything was dark, and cold, covered in ice and a cruel wind. Loki had a good tolerance to cold, but he was freezing.

“Monster…” a voice echoed so loudly it made Loki’s ears ring. It was his own voice and it came from everywhere around him.

“Traitorous rat…”

“Murderer…”

“Beast…”

“Liar…”

“Frost giant…”

“Monster…”

“Manipulator…”

“Liar…”

“We finally had someone’s trust…”

“Of course, you just play around with others!”

Loki was completely surrounded by copies of himself, all at least twice his size, blue skin, Jotun attire, and eyes red like blood. True frost giants.

Loki simply took every blow and insult. He deserved them.

“Loki…?” a different voice called. “Is this what you meant by inviting someone to your dreams?”

No please… you couldn’t be here.

“Darling… wake up… please don’t be here…” Loki begged you. “Please…”

“I’m not leaving you here on your own…” you spoke and kneeled beside him.

Loki felt his body change, every muscle vanished leaving him as practically skin and bones. Small. Weak.

“Loki… what’s going on?! What’s happening to you?!”

Loki tried to shapeshift back to his natural look, but he had no control of his own body. At this point in life, he should be desensitized to nightmares where his magic didn’t obey him… but…

“Please… leave me here…” he spoke as he could, but he could barely hear himself.

“Don’t say that... What’s… what can I do for you?”

There was something about dreams, and especially Loki’s dreams, that always seemed to be extra dramatic. It must have been so confusing to be in one as an outsider.

Loki’s body changed again, he grew twice his usual size, and his body was blue and muscled. Exactly the body of a Jotun.

“STOP BEING SO GOOD TO ME! CAN’T YOU SEE I DON’T LOVE YOU?!”

“What?!”

What?! No! That wasn’t true…

Loki tried to take it back, but he was in autopilot. He was in the passenger seat of his own mind.

“I DON’T LOVE YOU! ARE YOU THAT GULLIBE TO THINK I’D FALL IN LOVE WITH A MORTAL?! I HAVE BEEN USING YOU!”

“No… no, you're not… You wouldn’t…”

“I JUST NEEDED A COVER, TO SEEM WELL ADJUSTED ENOUGH TO NOT BE A PRISONER! AND YOU WERE ANNOYING ENOUGH TO BARGE IN DEFENSE OF ME! I’V BEEN PLAYING WITH YOU FROM DAY ONE! DON’T YOU SEE YOU ARE JUST A TOY?! YOU’RE PATHETIC!”

The look on your face was heartbreaking. You looked crushed.

“I HAVE BEEN THINKING OF A WAY TO GET RID OF YOU! I CAN’T SLEEP AND I WANT TO THROW UP THINKING I HAVE TO PUT UP WITH YOU YET ANOTHER DAY!”

You curled up on the floor and Loki lifted you but your collar’s shirt.

“GET IT INSIDE YOUR HEAD! I COULD NEVER LOVE A MORTAL AS UNNERVING AS YOU!” Loki screamed at you before slamming you against the floor.

“NO!” Loki sat up with a gasp and his body drenched in sweat. He looked around and saw you curled up on the bed, your back facing him. “Love?! Thank goodness… I’m so— Love, w-what’s wrong…?”

You were stiff and you had a hand on the back of your head. Loki shifted and stretched a bit and saw your face. Your eyes were full of tears, yet he had never seen you with such a cold expression in your face.

“My love… and what’s wrong?” Loki placed a hand over your arm, and you slapped it.

“Why did you say that?” you asked him.

“I d-don’t know… I wasn’t… I didn’t…” Loki stuttered. “My dreams are like that…”

“No. I mean, what you said was really specific. Why…?”

“I don’t—I don’t know why I—”

“Tell me the truth, Loki.” You ordered him. “Did you, or did you not pretend to love me for your freedom?”

Loki stayed quiet. He didn’t have the courage to tell you the truth, but he didn’t have the heart to keep lying to you. With that confirmation tears started falling down your cheeks again.

“Y-Yes but I—that was before…”

“Get out…” you spoke.

“What? No, darling, listen… I…”

“I don’t want to hear you.”

“Please love… let me explain…” he tried holding you.

That made you snap. You started hitting him, being a human it was impossible for you to harm him, but not once in his life had he felt more pain.

“DON’T TOUCH ME! DON’T TALK TO ME!”

“Darling please…”

“I DON’T WANNA SEE YOU EVER AGAIN! GET OUT OF MY ROOM AND GET OUT OF MY LIFE!”

He had no strength to fight you, he was defenseless as you kicked him out of your room, slamming the door on his face.

There were a few faces popping out of their door to try seeing what had happened and that quickly retreated back to their rooms. Loki had no choice but to go inside of his own bedroom.

The next morning, he nearly tripped on his way out with a box by is door. It was full of books, quills, a coat, photos of you together. And… the silver bracelet that matched his own. It tore his heart to shreds. He didn’t feel as guilty anymore. But remorse and the memory of how brokenhearted you looked was even more sadistic. He heard you crying often from across the wall.

A few days later the others started giving him dirty looks. Knowing you and considering that this didn’t happen right away he assumed they had found out after heavy interrogation and now everyone knew he had used you. Even Thor seemed upset, not angry, but he had this… disappointment in his eyes.

“I hate dealing with moving companies” Tony sighed as they all sat for dinner. “But Fury wants to have our little Houdini enlisted by the end of the week. It’s a shame… The kiddos enjoyed being around each other.”

“Tell me about it” Clint sighed. “Kate is devastated.”

“Speaking of devastated…” Natasha said as she stood up, and Loki would’ve sworn she was shooting daggers at him with that glare. “See if I can be more convincing about eating something, otherwise Fury will have a corpse enlisting.”

You were moving out? To become a SHIELD agent? But you hated being a soldier. Had he hurt you so bad that you preferred that lifestyle and ruin your life forever… than being around him?

This all felt awfully familiar. Loki excused himself and went to his room and lock himself inside. He closed his eyes, and part of him wished that they’d never open again.

“Am I cursed?” Loki asked, choked up by the last bit of hope.

“No.” Odin responded the worst thing he could've said him. A curse would've been better.

Loki placed the casket down, weakly, it suddenly felt like a very... very heavy thing to carry. And the weight stayed there, right on his chest even after the casket had been placed back at the pedestal.

“Then what am I?” Loki asked softly, afraid of the answer.

“You're my son.” Odin answered, and Loki doubted his own magic since he couldn't detect dishonesty in his father's words.

Clearly that was a lie. So why didn’t his magic detect that? Loki felt rage spiral out of control like a boiling pot.

“What more than that?” Loki growled, still trying to keep his composure as he walked towards his father that was by the stairs at the other side of the corridor. “The Casket wasn't the only thing you took from Jotunheim that day, was it?”

Odin looked him in the eye. Unable to deny it any longer. It had been to many years with that secret. As Loki walked closer, Odin just started at him in silence as Loki reached the stairs.

“No.” Odin finally said. “In the aftermath of the battle, I went into the Temple, and I found a baby. Small for a giant's offspring— abandoned, suffering, left to die. Laufey's son.”

That felt like a dagger piercing the young prince’s heart. Out of all the things he was insecure about, it turned out he WAS an outsider. Out of all the things he could’ve been, he HAD to be a Jotun, a monster. Out of all the Jotun’s in existence, he was the son of the worst of them all. And out of all the reasons he could’ve been adopted for, was because even his own biological family didn’t want him… and his adopted family never told him any of this.

“Laufey's son...?” Loki finally managed to gasp out, he was choking up on his own tears. “Why? You were knee-deep in Jotun blood. Why would you take me?”

“You were an innocent child.” Odin said, sounding more exhausted by the second.

“No!” Loki begged his father, knowing that Odin was a strategic warrior. There was always a meaning behind his actions. “You took me for a purpose, what was it?”

But Odin didn’t answer. The physical toll of delaying his Odin sleep to prepare Thor to rule, preventing a war, the emotional toll of having to banish Thor and now… having his youngest child doubt his love for him because of his foolish decision of not telling him the truth earlier were overwhelming him.

The All-King saw with pain how the little child that once smiled at him with love when he picked him in his arms after the battle now saw him with fear, pain, and resentment.

“TELL ME!” Loki demanded loudly, no longer capable of remaining calm.

“I thought we could unite our kingdoms one day, bring about an alliance, bring about a permanent peace... through you.” Odin confessed.

That was the final blow to Loki’s poor heart.

“What…?”

A tool. All he had been adopted for was as an instrument of peace between Asgard and a race that everyone saw as blood-thirsty monsters.

“But those plans no longer matter.” Odin clarified.

“So, I am no more than another stolen relic, locked up… here, until you might have use of me.” Loki inquired in pain.

“Why do you twist my words?” Odin asked softly.

“You could have told me what I was from the beginning.” Loki urged, desperate to makes sense of what easily was the worst day of his life. “Why didn't you?!”

“You are my son. I wanted only to protect you from the truth.” Odin said softly, in a fruitless attempt to calm his poor child’s heart.

“Wh— B-Because I-I-I am the monster parents tell their children about at night?!” Loki asked, flooded by all the scary stories about the frost giants growing up. All those times he and Thor played heroes as kids fighting those monsters.

“Don't...” Odin begged as his strength slowly abandoned him.

But Loki couldn’t listen anymore. The grief was too great, and the feeling of betrayal didn’t allow him to trust Odin anymore.

“It all makes sense now! Why you favored Thor all these years.” Loki yelled as he started walking up the stairs to yell at Odin as the All-Father slowly lost his strength and started passing out on the stairs. “Because no matter how much you claim to “love” me, you could never have a Frost Giant sitting on the Throne of Asgard!”

Odin kept trying until his last second of consciousness to beg his son for help, forgiveness… anything. But he had been too weakened to dedicate his young boy some kind of love or reassurance as he fell prey to the Odin sleep, he had delaying for so long.

Now Loki encountered a similar dilemma. He had been stupid, dishonest, and selfish to someone who offered him nothing but unconditional love. He betrayed your trust and there was no way now that Loki could prove that despite his original intentions his love wasn’t any less real.

He laid down on his bed, with his arm draped dramatically over his eyes.

“Troubled, my son?” a voice spoke making Loki sit up.

“Father” Loki smiled softly. “I ruined it. I had the most beautiful love in my life… and I was stupid and lost it because of my own selfishness.”

“That sounds familiar” Odin chuckled. “You truly are my son, after all.”

“You had always been will always be my father…” Loki said the words he had denied for several years. “I never understand your reasons. Cruel as they were…”

“Not holding back against your old father, hm?” Odin laughed.

“Sorry…” Loki smiled softly.

“My original reasons were foolish, selfish, and even cruel as you rightfully… but I always hoped to do what would be best for the 9 Realms” he spoke. “But that didn’t mean the love I had for you wasn’t any less real. You are my son, regardless of the kind of blood that coursed through your veins.”

Loki smiled softly; it was weird. He knew Odin would have never say all that. But now, after growing up so much, he understood it wasn’t because he didn’t feel it, he had always been too proud and formal, too much of a king. And while imperfect, it was still his father.

“That’s why you never caught me lying when I called you my son or said that I loved you.” Odin spoke. “In my heart, you’ve always been my son.”

“I know, father” Loki smiled. “I’m sorry it took me so long to understand it.”

“I’m sorry I never told you before… I feared you wouldn’t take it well…”

“Me? I would never” Loki joked softly.

“We always loved you as our own” a female voice added making Loki turned around.

“Mother.” Loki spoke breathless. “I know… I know… I knew, I was just too scared I could’ve been wrong, and you didn’t…”

“You were too much of a charming kid not to love you” Frigga said compassionately. “Your little human surely thinks so too.”

Ah… that… Loki wasn’t so sure.

“I ruined it, I deserve nothing but the hatred and disgust I’ve earned from my darling.” Loki huffed out. “I manipulated, lied, and destroyed the trust of my love.”

“Dear, there’s nothing final in these matters…” Frigga smiled softly. “If that loved blossomed once, you may rescue it and nourish it again. But first… you need to apologize.”

“I don’t think I’m wanted anywhere near hearing range.” Loki explained.

“Do you think the love between your mother, and I always had a perfect relationship?” Odin smiled.

“Your father was too temperamental for that” Frigga intervened with a smile and both parents looked at each other with love. “But when you truly love someone and you make a mistake, you swallow your pride and make up for your wrongdoings.”

Loki smiled softly, he remembered it well. When Odin’s temper got the best of him because of the stress of being a king, Odin made sure to make up for Frigga know how truly sorry he was, and Frigga who already knew her husband’s temper was an expert on not letting her affect her, knowing it was never personal. She had truly been blessed with infinite patience given she dealt with three men with bad tempers and yet her kindness and loving nature knew no end. It was not rare to see Odin gifting Frigga fancy gifts and spend long hours apologizing and dedicating the day to her. It wasn’t the perfect arrangement, but no relationship was.

Loki chuckled softly.

“Thanks…” he smiled and both parents tended a hand to him with a smile. “I know what I have to do.”

Ready to say goodbye, Loki placed his hands on top of Odin and Frigga’s, and with that, the figure of his parents faded under a green light as Loki’s palms stopped glowing. Loki let out a little laugh as he wiped his tears.

His illusions had never been so benevolent towards himself, they were either torturous or for a fake sense of gloating and dissociation. But your compassion had changed him forever. He could use them for closure and to guide him with the stuff he knew but needed to hear. And… you deserved that at least.

He got up and went outside and went to a trip. It took him around an hour to get to the city and a couple more hours to get his several stops get several gifts. A lovely white bouquet of flowers, a box of your favorite chocolates, a necklace with a cute silver heart shaped locket and got it printed with a small photo, a copy of a photo he had carried from one of your first “dates” you got where you were giving him a small kiss in the cheek and cupped the other one, a symbol of your shared love.

On his way back, Loki held the original photo close to his chest and sighed. He prayed this would work as he was on his way to see you. He knocked on your door and hid his gifts behind himself, not even remembering he could’ve concealed them with his magic from how nervous he was.

His chest tightened as you opened the door, your eyes and nose were red, and your cheeks were stained with tears. Oh Norns… He had hurt you really bad.

“Love… Please… let me explain” Loki spoke softly.

“What do you need to explain, Loki?” you asked and sniffled, practically murdering him when you called him Loki instead of one of your lovely cheesy pet names. “That I was just a toy for you to play with and pretend that you loved me, so you’d be a free man? I got that quite clearly.”

You were ready to slam the door on his face, but he reached his leg to stop you. He nearly dropped one of your gifts. You looked at him confused, eying him up and down before sighing in defeat, opening the door he walked inside of your little room. He saw the little night table covered with used tissues and the bed’s decorative cushions were all over the place. It broke his heart.

“What do you want, Loki?” you asked tiredly as you sat on the bed, placing a cushion on your lap and against your chest.

“My darling, I was the biggest, most cruel and inconsiderate imbecile of all 9 Realms” he said, kneeling before you as he handed you the bouquet of flowers. You gently placed the flowers on your lap, still looking at him.

“It is true, that I was looking to just find a relationship to pretend I had adapted to living on earth” he spoke. “It was a selfish, shallow, and dishonest reason to make you mine… But I did it. It was heartless and there’s no excuse or reason for you to forgive that. But I beg of you to stay here… never speak to me again if you need, but don’t settle to a life of misery just to avoid me. I will happily accept being locked up in a dungeon for a hundred years, so you don’t see the likes of me again…”

He handed you the chocolate, and your gaze softened for a second as you saw the chocolate, he remembered which ones you liked the most. You opened your mouth to speak, but a gentle squeeze to your hands let you know Loki still wanted to speak.

He had caused all of this for not telling you the truth, and now he wanted to fully bare his soul to you now.

“You offered me boundless kindness, patience despite my flaws, understanding to my pain and sins of the past, laughter like I hadn’t enjoyed before, you fed with the most delicious and warm foods I had ever eaten, you showed me the concept of dates and you bared me completely vulnerable to your touch and heart and you bared yourself completely to me without fear of me…” Loki continued, as tears streamed down his face, drowning in regret. “And all I did was play with you and betray the trust your selfless heart gave me without asking for anything in return.”

He placed his forehead on your knees and sobbed, completely ashamed of what he had done to you. He didn’t deserve your forgiveness, but he felt like he’d die without you. And he’ deserve it.

“I don’t care” you finally spoke, and he looked up, he saw the tears streaming down your face. “You’re the God of Mischief and Lies, there are countless stories of how you lied and manipulated to get away with anything you wanted… I should’ve expected I’d be just that.”

“No— No, darling!” Loki held your hands and pressed his lips against your knuckles. “No, my sweet, you— I was selfish. I wanted a cover up, yes, but what I found was love, I found the butterflies in my stomach you always speak of. I found the warm of your hands lingering on my skin after our dates. I found myself awake during the night sighing over those lovely eyes I’ve now so cruelly filled with tears…” Loki spoke softly.

You were shaking in your place as you did your best not to cry and interrupt him. He brushed his finger along your cheek as in appreciation of your effort.

“None of what you heard that night was true in my heart…” he assured you “I never felt so disgusted I wanted to vomit; it was guilt that was killing me from the inside… knowing I was hurting such a beautiful flower.”

He handed you the heart locket and you opened it, seeing the photo made you sob as silently as you could.

“I was selfish and a liar. I don’t blame you if you don’t believe me and want nothing to do with me again. But please know that my heart beats for and because of you only.” He spoke. “I fell hopelessly and irredeemably in love with you. I swear that on my life.”

You looked at him and smiled, as you wrapped your arms around his neck and sobbed now freely and unrestrained. Time seemed to stop for Loki as he hugged you back, taking in your scent and caressing you. Tears fell down his face and he held you, afraid you’d disappear if he let go of you.

You forgave him. He didn’t think he’d ever be so lucky to find a kind soul that would forgive even his worst mistake. But he found it, you were kind enough to do so. Your wrapped your arms around him in a warm hug and Loki was able to let all the pain and guilt go… He couldn’t undo his mistakes, but he could be better, and he wanted to be his best self for you.

“Thank you… Norns, I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…” he repeated over and over between whispers and tears as he held you tight.

You sat up straight and cupped his face and laughed softly as you still cried happy tears.

“You’re gonna have to buy me a new box of tissues, you booger” you joked softly with a sniffle, and pressed your forehead to his and grabbed a tissue to blow your nose.

“I’ll give you the entire world if you so desire, my love” he spoke with a gentle smile. “Just say the word.”

“I don’t need the world” you smiled and kissed his cheek. “I have everything I need right here.”

“What did I do to deserve you?” he chuckled softly as he grabbed a tissue to wipe his tears and blow his nose. “I’m a disaster and somehow I still found the most precious little dove all for myself.”

You held him tightly in a hug… in silence for a few minutes before you spoke again.

“Did you think I was annoying when we first met?” you asked with a stern look on your face. “I want the truth.”

“Truthfully… you were a nightmare…” Loki admitted in a soft playful tone.

“HEY!” you whined and dug your fingers into the crevices of his ribs making him burst out laughing. “I said honest, not mean!”

“Ehehehe! Lohohohohove, let me finish!” he giggled, letting you have this, it was the least he could do. “P-Please, s-stohohohop that! Not there!”

You smiled and went to tickle his belly. Oh, you had really not liked that.

“Plehehehehehease, dahahaharling! I surrender!” he laughed and did his best to not squirm.

“Fine… what is it?” you asked, as you sat sideways on his lap, already happily cuddling with him.

Thank whatever superior force that was out there… Oh, you’re a wonderful blessing.

“You’re a nightmare turned into a dream” he clarified and he didn’t even bother fighting the urge to squeeze you tightly.

“You have 3 seconds to explain how that’s a compliment o I’ll tickle you until you puncture a lung.”

“Ihihi— I mean like, when you start having a bad dream… but it turns around as the most wonderful of dreams, those that you still think about after waking up.” Loki said, and as those words he was sure he had fried his brain because he didn’t make any sense.

But that was enough for you.

“You’re lucky you’re cute.” You grumbled.

“C’mon… don’t be mad at me for being foolish and wrong” he smiled as he squeezed you tight. “Surely you thought I was insufferable at first as well, we’re so different after all.”

You smiled and shook your head.

“I love my pretty prince” you smiled and picked a tissue yourself to clean your face. “Flaws, differences, and all.”

“Do you, now?” he grinned cheekily. “I sure am a lucky one to be called yours.”

“A Loki one” you giggled, and Loki made a scowl of disgust. “Sorry! I thought it too late when I said it and— hehehe!”

“Oh, that was awful— C’mere… you!”

“W-What?! NO! NOHOHOHOHO! LOHOHOHOKI, STOP IHIHIHIT!”

As he made you laugh and held you against him, he couldn’t doubt how fortunate he was to be so undoubtedly yours.

| MASTERPOST |

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katerina-marie · 1 day

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Bathtub Confession (Eres Tú)

Sukuna x Reader

Part 3 to this

The one where you learn that certain confessions don't always have to be romantic, but others certainly do.

Word Count: 5.7k

Notes: Part 3 of my Sukuna x Reader celebrity!au. Takes place directly after part two. Song of inspiration: Eres Tú by Carla Morrison

Content: bandmember Sukuna x actor female Reader (referred to as such, but left descriptively vague), no y/n, manager Nanami, bodyguard Toji, actor Gojo, found family vibes, some angst, fluff, crack, humor, out of character Sukuna (he's so fluffy), suggestive, maybe lightly explicit, tho no sex actually occurs just yet (sorry), so please avoid accordingly.

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“Should I change my name?”

A beat of silence. A drop of water.

“No.”

“Should I get a wig?”

Another beat of silence. A clink of glass on tile.

“No.”

“Should I flee the country?”

A minuscule half second of silence.

“Not if you’re going to quit paying me,” Toji grumbled.

His response made the frown on your face dip down further on your lips, and you rolled your head against the back of your porcelain tub to stare at the ceiling.

“Is that all you see me as?” you whined, “A paycheck?”

“You want me to lie?”

“That’s it, I’m going to drown myself.”

That gets a long, heavy sigh from your bodyguard and you can hear him readjust himself on the chaise lounge seated in the middle of your expansive bathroom before he carries on.

“First off,” he grunts, “no you’re not. That would require me to pull your sad self naked from the tub, and we both know we don’t want that. Second…you know you’re not just a paycheck.” Toji goes quiet for a moment. “I’d like to think that we’ve become a sort of family over the last couple years, you, me, and Nanami. Shoot, even Megs too when he’s around.”

His soft confession brings a smile to your face, and you turn your head to the right to look in his direction from behind a large mahogany privacy screen. It stands tall, wrapping just barely around the ends of your tub where your feet and head lay, keeping you securely tucked away from any prying eyes. It found its way there long ago, because this wasn’t the first time that Toji had played therapist from his dedicated chaise while you lounged in a hot bath and the two of you shared a bottle of wine.

“Thank you,” you whispered to him, “I’m grateful you’re my friend…and my family.”

“Don’t worry about it, I know you are. But don’t go on getting too upset or sentimental just because you’ve had a rough day. Things haven’t been that bad,” Toji said, and you groaned at the reminder.

After finally arriving home safely—no thanks to you—Toji immediately went into damage control mode and spent the afternoon fielding phone calls and text messages, though nothing too serious had been blown your way yet.

You had received a none-too-pleased email from the producer of the movie you and Satoru were co-starring in, accusing you of sabotaging the release by not waiting to reveal your relationship with Sukuna until after the movie premiered in a few short months (as if he couldn’t tell that what happened today wasn’t by choice). Luckily, Satoru swooped in with his sweet-talking words and buttered the producer right back into promising extra money for a job well done. Though Satoru’s idea of fixing things was convincing the producer that the only premise that sold better than a classic love story was the angst of a good ol’ fashioned love triangle, and he was more than happy to play the jilted lover dead set on winning you back. You wondered what it must be like to live in such delusions.

What really put the cherry on top of a bad day was the text you received from Sukuna shortly after arriving home. It wasn’t anything particularly worrisome, a straight to the point, “I’ll call you this evening, busy smoothing a couple things out, x,” but it had you in a fit nonetheless. After sending a quick affirmation back, you threw your phone across the couch in your living room and flung yourself onto the nearest surface to bemoan your miserable existence. Toji was not amused when that nearest surface happened to be his chest, and he only offered you five minutes of soaking his shirt with snot and tears before he drug you upstairs to your bedroom, turned on the hot water to your tub, and shoved you into the bathroom with a promise to return with wine if you quieted down for just a second.

So here you were, an hour later, soaking under a mountain of peppermint scented bubbles while you toed at the hot water handle at the end of the tub.

“You think if I begged hard enough Nanami would let me come stay with him for the rest of his vacation? I’m afraid I’m in need of a tropical escape,” you told Toji, already calculating in your head how quickly you could pack your bags and be on the next plane to Malaysia.

Toji chuckled, “No, I don’t think he would, considering he refused to tell us anything more about his trip other than what country he’d be in and when he’d be back. You showing up would take seven years off his life. Add three more if he opens up the door to you sobbing like you’ve been all day. Besides, running away to another country just because you’re afraid to talk to your boyfriend is a cowardly move.”

You ‘tsked’ at him for calling you out on poor behavior and slouched further down into the hot water in shame-filled defeat. Instead of wallowing in it further though, you popped your ankles up on the rim of the tub, tossed your arms back to hang behind your head, and clapped twice to get Toji’s attention.

“Another glass of wine, please,” you mocked in as snobby an accent as you could manage.

“What do you take me as? I’m not your damn butler,” he complained, but you could hear the quick successive cracking of his back as he stood up from the chaise and stretched.

“Just one more and that’ll be it, I promise.” You considered what else could entice him into doing your bidding. “I’ll let you be done for the evening and take the day off tomorrow if you also bring me a plate of cheese and crackers, please.”

Toji was silent before letting out a begrudging “fine” and shuffling out the door without another complaint.

You marveled in the silence, nothing but the occasional lap of water as you adjusted yourself in the tub to break it. After a few minutes, however, you realized the absence of conversation was the perfect environment for your thoughts to run unhindered, and that was not something you cared to partake in at the given time. Trying to concentrate on anything else though was futile, and perhaps trying to wade through your own head for a few minutes would leave you feeling better when you chose to pointedly ignore it once your butler…ahem, Toji, returned with your snacks.

Besides falling on national television—and underneath Gojo Satoru nonetheless—you had a particularly difficult time deducing from yourself what exactly about the accidental revelation of your relationship with Sukuna caused you so much embarrassment. It wasn’t that you didn’t want to be associated with him or that you always intended for the relationship to remain secret until it had reached its course; your desire was quite the opposite, actually. It was a feeling best left to baser animals and bedroom activities, but the idea of staking a claim, proving that he belonged to you in a way, was not unappealing and not something you could talk your way out of thinking, especially with the world the two of you lived in.

If you got down to it, the real problem lay in your unfortunate habit of caring what people thought. You didn’t want Sukuna to see you as childlike, only a few years younger than him in age but miles behind in maturity. You didn’t want him to view today’s incident as a misfortunate foreshadow into the “what if’s” of your relationship. Neither did you want the world looking at the two of you and questioning how exactly something like it came to be. Where Sukuna was all sharp angles and dark colors, suave nonchalance and carrying a presence that demanded to be seen, you felt painfully opposite. You wouldn’t self-deprecate and believe that you were unworthy of standing beside him, but just cognizant of how different you felt. More like something that could be just as appreciated, but more likely to be overlooked and favored over something brighter. A “mismatched pair” is what they would call you, something that struck you so vividly that the pressure in your chest increased ten-fold. You knew he would hear it, see it, be made aware of it, and while he may not agree right away, you wondered how long it would take for the sphere of influence to get to him too. The anticipatory grief (as your actual therapist called it, usually followed by anxiety) of waiting for someone you valued so much to realize that he had better options was enough to make you consider running away from the whole thing entirely.

And that’s how you came back to scheming your departure from the country. If you hurried, you could probably towel off, pack a bag, and slip out the back before Toji realized (you wondered if the big oaf had decided to take a nap instead of bringing you snacks for how long it’d been since you last heard him). Surely Nanami wouldn’t abandon you in your time of need if you were wailing at him over the phone in the airport of a foreign country.

But alas, you heard your bathroom door open, effectively cutting off any means of escape.

“It’s about time, Toji. What took you so long?” He neither spoke, nor took another step. “Eh, no matter. Bring me my snacks, please.”

Footsteps continued again and before you could chastise Toji further, a voice spoke up from right behind your privacy screen.

“Should I be concerned with the normalcy of your bodyguard attending to you while you’re naked in the bath?”

The shock of hearing Sukuna’s voice caused you to jolt, sending your legs into the water with an unmistakable splash and leaving you to scurry back into a sitting position from where you had slipped dangerously close to submerging your whole head underwater. The indecency of it all would kill you if this conversation that was about to happen didn’t.

“I assure you,” you started, hoping you didn’t sound as wrecked as you felt, “it is not nearly as salacious as you made it out to be.”

Sukuna hummed. “Really? Because it sounded as if you were expecting him, and when I ran into him downstairs he told me to tell you that he would be back up to deliver wine and cheese shortly. Sounds like a romantic evening to me if I’ve ever heard one.”

You were relieved to hear a hint of amusement in your boyfriend’s voice, but horrified at what he was saying.

“Please stop implying things that’ll make me gag.”

Sukuna chuckled, but was quiet for a minute until, “You have five seconds to tell me to stop before I move this privacy screen so we can talk face to face.”

You shot upwards, looking around hurriedly as you tried to scrape the remaining bubbles in the tub to strategic places in order to maintain your dignity, though you realized a moment later that it was probably unnecessary. With a second left, you brushed tendrils of your hair away from your face and wiped your thumb across the top of your lip to remove any remnants of a wine stain from your skin. In the next, Sukuna was pushing aside the privacy screen and looking down at you with a blank—but not unkind—expression. You eyed him warily as he walked up to the edge of the tub and dropped a cushion from the chaise Toji was sitting on earlier to the floor. He settled himself down onto it and then placed his elbow on the edge of the tub so he could lean in close to you.

“Hello,” you whispered to him, settling both your arms down next to his and then resting your head against them. A small smile crossed his face.

“Hello to you too.”

You were surprised at the lack of tension in his face, no clenched jaw or heavy brow to be seen, and as you trailed your eyes further down his torso you noticed its absence there too. His shoulders were relaxed, and his chin was cupped in the hand propped up on the tub so he could gaze at you with those unnervingly observant eyes of his. You wished he’d been wearing a t-shirt instead of the thin navy turtleneck he currently had on so you could focus your stare on the black tattoos decorating his body. Aside from being intricate, and distracting, they always gave you something to look at when meeting his eyes felt like too much.

The tenderness of Sukuna’s knuckles meeting your temple forced you to look back up at him, only to see that he was following the path his fingers were making over your skin. They grazed over your cheekbone, feathered down the bridge of your nose, and then were skimming over your mouth, his thumb catching ever so lightly on your bottom lip. His hand didn’t linger there, and it was quick to skate over your jaw before his thumb landed under your ear and the rest of his fingers tangled in your hair while his palm cupped your neck. With a slide of his other hand up your arm and down your back to press between your shoulder blades, Sukuna brought you close enough to him that he was able to reach the rest of the way over the tub and kiss you. His lips remained pressed against yours for a second or two before he broke away, hesitated, and then leaned in to do it once more, twice, and a third time.

You were the one that put space between the two of you, sitting back in the water and drawing your knees to your chest. You desperately needed to inhale without smelling the crispness of his aftershave or the spiced warmth of his cologne, both of which were guilty of making your head spin.

“You’re not mad at me?” you asked, breaking the silence before he had a chance to, before you lost your nerve. You watched as his head tilted slightly to one side, his expression a touch befuddled, but full of disbelief.

“Why would I be mad at you?” He questioned slowly, moving himself to his knees on the cushion so he could go back to resting his arms on the tub.

“I don’t see why you wouldn’t be,” you told him, your voice a bit sharp. “I inadvertently told anyone with access to the internet that we were dating, without even talking to you about it, and then proceeded to flee the scene like a coward instead of getting back out there to present myself as confident enough to own up to my mistakes. Not to mention the fall with Satoru right before. It’s embarrassing. The whole thing made us—me—look like a giant mess!”

Your voice cracked on the last word, and you bit down on the inside of your cheek until you tasted iron. Sukuna looked pained, and he reached a hand out to play with your fingers as they sat at the top of your knees.

“You’re not a mess,” he said, rubbing his thumb in small circles over the middle knuckle of one of your fingers, “and I’m not embarrassed either. I never intended to keep us a secret, and I’m not trying to implicate you when I say this, but I don’t think I ever implied doing so that evening.”

“Well, yeah,” you huffed, the twinkle in his ochre-brown eyes and the mischievous grin on his face as he hinted to the night the two of you cemented your relationship into the category of “official” making your face get warm, “we didn’t do a whole lot of talking after that point.”

You tried to jerk your hands out from under his to cover up your cheeks, but Sukuna was unrelenting in his hold, and you gave up before continuing on, “I know you never implied that you wanted to keep our relationship hidden, but that’s been the theme of whatever we’ve had going on these last ten months. We were sneaking around from the very beginning, we lied about it to Yuji and Choso, and then let’s not forget about the whole incident of being caught by Satoru,” you pointed out to him, feeling the slightest bit smug when he looked chagrined.

“I apologized for that,” he reminded you, his voice tone faintly defensive. You squeezed his hand in comfort.

“You did, and I’m not upset about it.”

You took a deep breath and cast your eyes everywhere except Sukuna, taking in the details of your bathroom as you tried to muster the courage to share your insecurities with him. He never let his attention on you deviate, and between that and the heat of the water you had been in for almost two hours, you were beginning to feel lightheaded, and everything finally came rushing out of your mouth.

“I feel like we’re mismatched! It feels like everytime someone looks at us, they’re going to wonder why, like we don’t fit well together. And I’m not saying I believe that, or that you would believe that, and I know this whole thing sounds ridiculous because it is ridiculous, but it’s hard to get outside of my own head about this when I already love you so mu—,”

The startled look on Sukuna’s face is what clued you in to the fact you had said something you had not intended to. You snapped your mouth shut with an audible click of your teeth and used your feet to push away from him and to the otherside of the tub, wrenching your hands out of his grasp.

If someone asked why you never liked to talk about your feelings, this was why. Why the words that came out were never as eloquent—or as sane—as the thoughts in your head was something you’d pay so much money to figure out. And Kento was about to have no choice in letting you hide out with him for the rest of his vacation because you were no longer asking, and if he was interested in keeping his job he would do so without complaint. Even so, you considered that forcibly releasing Kento from the grip of a career that was so wrought with overtime would be another mercy for the overworked sal—,

“You know what I think,” Sukuna murmured, bringing you out of your own head to focus with rapt attention on the blissfully contented expression he wore. His fingers curled around the tops of your arms as he reached out to slide you back to his side of the tub, and when you were close enough again, he pushed his nose into the plushness of your cheek to nuzzle there affectionately. You were transfixed by a small tan freckle on the edge of his eyebrow that you somehow hadn’t noticed before.

“I think this whole time you’ve been so focused on pleasing everyone around you—which isn’t necessarily unadmirable, I promise—and treading with extreme care to take into consideration my feelings about our relationship that you haven’t noticed what’s been going on…or I haven’t been doing a very satisfactory job of making it apparent.”

He said the last part more under his breath, but didn’t give you a chance to interject with an objection before he carried on, making intently sure your eyes were on his. “From the very beginning, even when all I had of you were fleeting touches and secret meetings in questionable places, I was always bound to fall in love with you.”

You didn’t know what to say, what to think, and trying to wrap your head around the fact that what you considered to be one of the worst days of your life was ending with unintentional confessions of love in your bathtub wasn’t helping. So you did what you could and traced a finger down one of the tattoos under his eyes, hoping he would keep talking.

“We aren’t a mismatched pair,” he insisted, his eyelids fluttering slightly at your gentle touch, “I think we compliment each other quite well, so please, don’t try to hide or run away.” He fixed you with a pointed look that told you Toji had warned him of your current status as a flight risk, and you ducked your head slightly and in a way that you hope conveyed repentance.

“Because you must know, I will always be chasing after you.”

You wasted no time in hurrying to crush your lips against his and throw your arms around his neck, because what else was there to do when words couldn’t suffice, other than to surrender to the melding of bodies?

Sukuna reciprocated in fervor, breaking apart from you only to stand up from his place on his knees, and reached down to cup his hands under your bottom, lifting you out of the tub and securing your thighs around his hips while his mouth found yours again.

He seemed to care not that you were dripping water on the floor and soaking the front of his clothes from where you were pressed tightly against him. He stumbled back a couple steps until the back of his knees made contact with the chaise, and the two of you fell back onto it. Sukuna adjusted you to straddle his lap, his hands clasping at your hips while your hands scrambled down his back to pull up his shirt. You ground your pelvis down against him as he dropped his head to mouth at your neck, and the rough groan that elicited from his throat had you deciding that your bed was too far away to justify taking time to separate, and that the convenience of the chaise was worth going to the trouble of having to buy Toji a new one. You had no more than let the thought flutter through your head when an obnoxiously loud knock resounded through the bathroom.

“You two haven’t drowned yet, have you?”

Speak of the devil and he shall appear.

Sukuna ripped his lips away from where he was sucking a mark into the space where your shoulder blended into your neck, and met your gaze with one that dared you to intervene.

“Don’t even think about it,” he growled, using the grip he still had on your waist to hold you in place while he rolled his hips up into yours, and you prayed that the moan you let out wasn’t as loud as it sounded. Even if it was, you hoped Toji would get the hint and make himself scarce.

“Look, I get it,” your bodyguard remarked, sounding both amused and vaguely uncomfortable, “but it’s kinda, maybe important.”

With both the mood dashed and your anxiety spiked again, you patted Sukuna on the shoulder in a bid to get him to let you slide off his lap. He rolled his eyes, exasperation—and lustful desperation—painted clearly on his face, but he helped you down without giving you any grief and grabbed a black fluffy robe from where it was draped over your privacy screen. He held it out so you could thread your arms through it, and then he proceeded to tie the belt securely around your waist.

“Come in, Toji,” you called, moving to sit on the chaise while Sukuna came to stand at your back.

Your bodyguard waited a moment before opening the door, peeking his head around first and then sauntering in with his normal arrogance to lean against your bathroom counter just a couple feet in front of you.

“Glad to see that nobody’s drowned. There’s only one of you I’d be willing to do mouth-to-mouth on,” Toji joked, clearly proud of what he had come up with. You felt Sukuna’s hands come to rest on the tops of your shoulders, his fingertips digging into the muscles lightly. They relaxed when you bought one of your hands up to twine your fingers with his.

“So, to what do we owe the interruption?” you asked. The amusement on Toji’s face vanished, and in its place came weariness.

“I just got off the phone with Nanami, and—,”

“You called him?!” You yelped, springing up from your seat, “I begged you not to!”

“Whoa, Whoa,” Toji cautioned, raising his hands up in a surrender, “easy with the accusations. He called me. He knew.” And before you could open your mouth to ask how, Toji’s expression darkened and his eyes flicked up over you to glare at Sukuna. “Uraume called him.”

You whirled around to look at Sukuna, who—thankfully—seemed just as surprised by the news as you did.

“I didn’t ask them to do that,” he assured you, then turned to Toji, “did Nanami say what they wanted?”

“Just to talk about the whole situation, more or less. Nanami said they only talked for about ten minutes, but they’re planning to discuss things more when he comes back in five or six days.” Your bodyguard sighed and crossed his legs as he leaned back further against your counter. “He was nearly ready to hop on the first plane home, but I managed to convince him to finish his vacation. Told him it’d damn near break your heart if he came back early.”

You plopped back down on the chaise, bone tired and completely ready for this whole day to be over.

“Thank you, Toji. I’m sorry for jumping down your throat like that.”

“Don’t sweat it, Princess,” he said, pulling a vaguely familiar set of keys out from his pocket and pushing himself off the counter to walk towards the door. “You two going to be okay if I head out? I have some errands to run and then I’ll probably crash at Megumi’s tonight instead of the staff quarters.”

You nodded at him, sending him off with a wave before shifting to look back at Sukuna.

“Stay with me?” you pleaded. He answered with a kiss to your hair, and then offered his arm so you could stand from the chaise. He followed after you into your bedroom, and the faint flutter of clothing made you glance back over your shoulder. Your heart began to race at the sight of his bare chest, tattoos displayed in full glory. You must have made some kind of noise because he looked up at you from where he was draping his shirt over the back of a lounging chair in the corner of your room.

“I hope you don’t mind,” he said sheepishly, “my clothes are wet.”

You shook your head, tugging your bottom lip between your teeth as you watched the muscles in his back flex as he bent down to push his jeans to the floor, leaving him in simple grey underwear. There must have been something written all over your face as he began to walk towards you, for he was reaching out to pull you into him as soon as he got close enough.

“I’m tired, Sukuna,” you warned as he pressed your cheek to his chest, though you wondered if you could muster up the energy to continue where the two of you had left off in the bathroom. Surely he would make it worth your while.

“I know,” he told you, voice light and good-natured, and he tightened his arms around you briefly before stepping back and nodding in the direction of your bed, “why don’t you go get comfortable. Toji left your snacks on your dresser. Want to finish them off before bed?”

With a grateful nod, you turned to leap onto your bed, sitting down in the middle and wiggling with excitement as Sukuna came to join you. He sat the tray of food and wine in between the two of you and crossed his legs underneath himself before picking up a piece of cheese and offering it to you. You smiled in thanks and began to nibble on it while he surveyed his options.

“Mhm,” you started, an errant thought popping into your head, “I’m assuming since Uraume knows that Yuji and Choso know now as well?” Sukuna raised his head slowly from where he had been studying the various snacks, and the hint of guilt on his face wasn’t confidence inspiring.

“They do,” he drew out, observing you carefully, “they were both watching the interview with me.”

You groaned as white-hot embarrassment flooded your body, and you fell back against your pillows, grabbing one to shove over your face to muffle the bitter laughter you couldn’t control. “What do they think?”

“It’s nothing you should be worrying about,” Sukuna said, suddenly sitting by your head and lifting the pillow off your face to set it above your head, “you know they adore you. Choso was his normal, level-headed self. He’s happy for us. Yuji was just as ecstatic once he got his laughter under control, if a bit disappointed that we hadn’t told him.” Your boyfriend paused, his face darkening suddenly, and you watched with interest as a muscle feathered in his jaw.

“What?” you asked, pushing yourself back into a sitting position and poking him in the arm to urge him to explain. He shook his head, clearly annoyed.

“You know what that little shit said immediately after? He thought that you and Gojo had been secretly dating and were waiting till after your movie was over to say anything.”

Obnoxious laughter erupted from you, and you hurried to slap your hands over your mouth to try to conceal it as Sukuna’s face fell.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you rasped out in between giggles, unable to stop it as you watched Sukuna sit back against your pillows with a huff and a crossing of his arms.

“The little idiot is just dense. And delusional. Anyone could see that you and the q-tip don’t have any real chemistry.” He sounded an awful lot like he was trying to convince himself of the truthfulness of his own statement. You wondered, affectionately, at which brother was a touch deluded. You were a fine actor, thank you very much. And you were about to open your mouth and say so when something ‘plinked’ off the window next to your bed.

Strange. Your bedroom was on the second floor.

Sukuna jerked his head up, all traces of humor forgotten, and the two of you listened for the noise again.

Plink.

“What the hell,” he muttered, pushing off the bed so he could go inspect the noise, “stay right there.”

You appreciated the concern in his voice as he began to lift the window pane open, and he had just begun to stick his head out to look around when something small smacked him right between the eyes, sending him butt-first to the floor.

“Sukuna!” you gasped, rushing over to kneel by his side and lift his hand from where he had it pressed to his forehead. You didn’t get a chance to fawn over him any further before he was up on his feet and striding to your bedroom door.

“Be right back,” he growled, throwing the door open and cursing all the way down the stairs.

You heard something land next to you on the floor, utterly perplexed when it turned out to be a rock from your flower beds. You got up and tiptoed over to the window, just barely lifting your head over the pane as to avoid becoming another victim of a flying projectile, then shot to your feet when you caught sight of a familiar white-haired costar outside beneath your window.

“Satoru!” You screeched, dumbfounded by his mere presence and the way he waved up at you, completely unbothered, “How in the world did you get through the gate?!”

“Hey! There you are!” He called, with a lazy grin on his face, “that’s not really important right now.”

“I would disagree!” You yelled back down to him, making a mental note to have Toji go over all the security points around your property after his day off. “What are you doing here?”

Satoru laughed sarcastically before the smile on his face suddenly disappeared, and he propped his hands up on his hips. “Where is my car?”

No. Way.

“You’ve got to be kidding me, Satoru.”

“Nope! Give me back my car. It’s one of a kind!”

You groaned, reaching up to massage the burgeoning headache you could feel at your temples. “Are you sure it’s not out there in the driveway? Toji left just a bit ago, so you shouldn’t be boxed in or—,” you cut off when the memory of your bodyguard twirling an unfamiliar set of his keys around his finger as he left your bathroom flashed across your memory.

Oh god, that absolute bastard.

Satoru must have caught the horrified look on your face, as well as how you suddenly stopped talking after mentioning Toji because his face blanched even paler than usual, and his voice was two octaves higher in distress when he hollered back up at you.

“Does that criminal have my car?!”

You deserved a vacation at this point.

“I’ll call him in the morning, Satoru, I promise. And I’ll make sure he washes it for you or whatever you want, just come back tomorrow.” You hoped placating him with the prospect of torturing Toji would convince him to leave, but no, he still stood rooted to his spot down below.

“As fun as that sounds,” he mocked back up at you, “I can’t.”

“What do you mean you can’t?”

He looked a bit like a toddler caught with his hand somewhere it shouldn’t be. “Suguru dropped me off and then left in a hurry. He said he had something to do.”

You couldn’t believe that the universe thought that pairing those two together in any capacity was worth the absolute chaos they unleashed on the poor, unsuspecting population.

The slamming of your front door caught your attention, and you figured your boyfriend was about to make himself known.

“Look,” you sighed, backing away from the window slightly, “you can borrow one of my cars and swap it tomorrow when Toji brings yours.” You ignored Satoru’s protests and started to close the window. “Just apologize to Sukuna for hitting him between the eyes with a rock and he’ll open the garage for you.”

You caught the confusion on Satoru’s face, and just barely heard his panicked remark as you shut the window.

“Oh, fu—.”

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Whew, that one took it out of me, not gonna lie. Angst and I are not friends.

#jjk #jujutsu kaisen #jujutsu kaisen x reader #ryomen sukuna #ryomen sukuna x reader #ryomen sukuna x you #sukuna x reader #sukuna x you #gojo satoru #toji fushiguro

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