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randomshyperson · 3 years

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Wanda Maximoff X Reader Hogwarts AU Oneshot

Hey everyone! As WandaVision has me completely in love with Wanda Maximoff, I've managed to write a little Harry Potter-inspired oneshot.

Ready on AO3 too

Gif is not mine.

It was an understatement to say that you were late. Running through the now-empty corridors of the castle, you hid behind a pillar when you thought you heard the voice of the Ravenclaw's snitch monitor nearby, but you let out a sigh of relief when you noticed that it was only ghosts chattering away during their wanderings.

You ran toward the transfiguration room, believing that if you were lucky, you would be able to sneak behind the cages to the last empty chair and pretend that you hadn't missed almost half of the first class. You believed that Tony Stark would have been the inconvenience knowing all that he usually is, and that Professor Minerva would not have noticed your absence.

When you finally reached the classroom, you wiped some sweat from your forehead as you leaned against the wall, trying to look out the window. You noticed that almost all the students were writing something in their notebooks, and you tried not to think too much about the importance of that content, ignoring the feeling that it was the kind of thing that would be on the final exams.

You raised your hand toward the doorknob slowly, thinking of the best way to open the door without making too much noise, but then someone turned the lock on the other side, and you almost fell back in surprise as you saw the door open.

- I'm glad you decided to join us, Miss Y/L/N. - said Professor Minerva sternly.

You felt your knees tremble with fear at the intensity of her gaze, and your cheeks heat up when you hear giggles coming from inside the room.

- I'm sorry, professor. I didn't hear the alarm clock. - You said, looking at the floor. Minerva let out an exclamation of disapproval and let you into the room.

- I will debilitate five points of your house, for this, miss. Don't let this happen again. - She said simply, and you entered.

When you sat in the back of the room, in one of the few empty chairs, you did your best to avoid all the curious and judgmental glances your classmates threw at you. Only when Professor Minerva walked back between the tables you looked around the room, your gaze locking on the one person who could completely take your attention away.

Wanda Maximoff was a student of the same year as yours, being part of the Slytherin house. You could say that you had a friendly relationship, because you knew the same people, and especially, you were very good friends with Pietro, her twin brother. You couldn't precisely define the nature of your relationship with Wanda however. In your first two years at Hogwarts you sat together on the train, and during the breaks, almost exclusively due to the company of Steve Rogers, who was a mutual friend and a year older, who used to act like the older brother of several people. When Steve graduated, Pietro became the only bond that justified your socializing with Wanda, but even though they were brothers they didn't hang out all the time, especially after Wanda started dating a Ravenclaw boy named Vis, who you didn't like, and Pietro started dating, well, several people.

The thing was that you never developed a friendship with Wanda, purely because she made you nervous enough that you couldn't engage in conversation with her without being around other people. You were a complete mess around her, notable only to your best friend, Natasha, who was happy to torment you for your longtime crush on the witch. During the third and fourth year, you considered confessing to Wanda how you felt, but like a bucket of cold water, Vis came along. He was a nice guy, and smart, and you were in the same chess club. But all the niceness completely disappeared when you watched Vis invite Wanda to the winter ball. The whole dynamic of your relationship with Wanda has changed since she started dating the young ravenclaw. You tried to suppress your feelings as much as possible, and you were constantly irritated and clumsy in the presence of Vis, who seemed to be always clinging to Wanda, so you started avoiding both of them. If Wanda interpreted that your sudden hostility was because you didn't like her, she didn't speak up, and just began to respect the distance you put between you two.

You were in this almost hostile territory for all of fifth grade and sixth grade, until you invited Jessica Jones to be your date to Professor Stark's Christmas party during seventh grade, which set off a series of interesting events in your life.

First the Starks threw the best Christmas parties, and although Tony Stark was annoying and overbearing, he was your long-time friend, and he was very happy to invite all his friends to his father's party, Professor Howard Stark, who taught Magic Mechanics. You weren't even in Professor Stark's class, but you were happy to hear that he organized a party for everyone who stayed at the castle during the vacation period, and many students skipped their way home just to attend, since Howard's parties were famous in school.

And then you invited your friend Jessica Jones, someone you had a lot of fun with, but wasn't really romantic at all. In fact, you dared her to take you to the party, because she wouldn't admit the open crush she had on her colleague Trish Walker, a very pretty blonde girl who seemed to be the only person who could get around Jessica's temper. You were happy to tease Jessica all night about her crush, until the brunette took too much fruity punch and finally built up the courage to talk to Trish, leaving you laughing at your desk as you watched her trip over her own feet as she led the blonde out of the room.

When you felt a hand on your shoulder, you imagined it was Natasha, finally finding you in the midst of so many people, but the vision that hit you took your breath away.

You knew that Wanda Maximoff was beautiful. It was a fact that you grumbled against your pillow in irritation when you saw her kissing Vis on the cheek during breaks between classes. And then you saw her, her hair arranged in a high bun, her face powdered with makeup that made her even more beautiful, and her long eyelashes flashing at you through emerald orbs. Damn those eyes. There was a lot to take in in the figure in front of you. Her stupidly beautiful face, her lips slightly stained with lipstick because she had a habit of biting them when nervous, or her partially exposed collarbone from the cut of her blouse. You thought you had forgotten how to breathe.

- Hey. - Wanda greeted you with a lopsided smile. You blinked a few times.

- H-hi Wanda! - you replied after being silent for a moment. You looked away quickly. - Nice party, right?

- I think. - She replied and you noticed the two empty glasses in her hand. You abruptly adjusted your posture, your cheeks flushing slightly, to step back and excuse Wanda so she could fill the glasses with fruit punch. Of course, she was only talking to you because you were in front of the drinks table, preventing her from getting something for herself and Vis.

- Here, sorry about that. - You apologized after moving completely away from the drinking table, Wanda blinked slightly in confusion, and seemed to remember that she was carrying the glasses only at that moment.

- Oh, yeah, right. - she grumbled as she approached the bucket of ponge. - Just gonna grab something for me and Vis.

- Yeah, I figure that. - You replied harshly, looking down at your own shoes.

Wanda raised her eyebrows at your aggressiveness, and she ventured to ask.

- Do you have any problem with Vis? - said the sorceress, now holding the two full glasses in both hands. You rolled your eyes impatiently, which seemed to irritate her.

What difference does that make? - You replied feeling jealousy fill your chest - We are not friends so what I think doesn't really matter.

You regretted the aggressiveness of your words the moment you said them, and you felt even worse when you looked into Wanda's tearful eyes. But you didn't have time to apologize, because the girl just turned her back on you, going back in the same direction she had come from.

Honestly, you wanted to dig a hole in the ground and disappear. Or maybe bang your head against the wall, believing that your only natural talent was to ruin exactly every conversation you had with Wanda. You thought it best to try to find your date, to say goodbye before heading back to the communal room, so you walked in the opposite direction of Wanda.

You searched for Jessica for several minutes. The girl seemed to have disappeared off the face of the earth, and then as you strolled down the empty third floor corridors you found her in a compromising position to say the least.

Feeling your cheeks getting very hot, you watched with a mixture of embarrassment, surprise, and horror as your longtime friend knelt down, her head tucked between the spread legs of Trish Walker who was clutching her skirt with one hand as she threw her head against the wall, her eyes closed. For merlin sake. You stumbled backwards, your eyes wide. They were too distracted to notice you, and it took only a sobbing groan from Trish to break your shock. You turned around quickly, shaking your head to try to push the images from your mind.

As you walked down the halls of the third floor, intending to go back to the party and drink as much smuggled alcohol as you could find to erase the image of Trish and Jessica fucking, you bumped into someone.

Wanda's lipstick was much more smudged than before, and her shirt was slightly wrinkled. And then you knew immediately what she was doing in that hallway. Frowning at her, you noticed that she looked embarrassed at having bumped into someone, but you didn't let her speak, rushing to let out an impatient exclamation and leaning against the wall.

- Good Merlin, everyone decided to have sex today. - You sighed, closing your eyes, but opened them the same second the recent images hit you back, watching Wanda stare at you in confusion. She seemed to hesitate between walking away and talking to you, but you were glad when she turned her body in your direction.

- Who's having sex? - she asked with a mixture of curiosity and concern on her face. You let out a low laugh, and let your body slide against the wall until you sat down on the floor. Wanda copied your movement on the opposite wall, and you were facing each other, both sitting in the empty hallway.

- I just saw first hand two colleagues fucking in the hallway. - You grumbled, not saying you had seen your friends. You weren't the type to spread rumors. - I think I'm traumatized for life.

Wanda fought back a smile, clearly still upset with you for the discussion earlier. You swallowed hard, knowing that you had your chance to apologize now.

- That sucks. - Wanda said simply, and you stared at her.

It took a few seconds, but you finally spoke:

- I'm sorry about earlier. I was just being mean, for no reason apparently.

The girl seemed surprised, but then she gave you a short smile. You began to play with your shoelaces when you were silent for a moment.

- I wasn't having sex. - Wanda whispered so softly that you blinked a few times to make sure you heard something. You looked at her in confusion, but she looked away, her cheeks slightly pink. - Vis asked if he could take me to my room, I didn't feel like partying after our discussion. - She explained, still not looking at you. - He said he wanted to give me a proper goodnight kiss.

You felt your stomach drop. Swallowing all your jealousy, you let out a grumble, signaling that you understood what Wanda had said. You looked back down at your own sneakers, and couldn't notice the witch analyzing every micro-expression on your face, her heart beating uncompensated at the confession.

- I didn't want to kiss him like that. - She said at last, and feeling her gaze on you, you reciprocated.

Although you tried to hold it in, you couldn't help but let a shy smile slip between your lips. You looked away again, biting your lips to keep from smiling at the sorceress's newly confessed words.

You were silent for a moment again, and feeling that you finally had a chance to talk to Wanda, about anything, you decided to stick to the subject. Letting your spontaneity guide your speech, you found yourself asking:

- Did you ever want to kiss someone like that?

Wanda looked surprised, and slightly embarrassed judging by the slight blush on her cheeks. You hurried to explain the reason for the question, not wanting the girl to feel pressured to answer.

- I just mean like, how people are sure of that? - You said, and suddenly your anxieties and fears were all on edge and you found yourself sharing about it. - It’s just I've never done anything like that. I was never able to tell for sure if i wanted to kiss someone or if i was just doing because it was what everyone was expecting.

The sorceress seemed to absorb your words carefully. She rested her face on her knees as she looked at you intently.

- Not even with Jessica? Or Bucky? - Wanda asked and you just nodded.

- I had a lot of fun with Bucky, I really did. He was sweet and funny, and really cute. - You began to explain, while imitating Wanda's position, leaning your head on the arm above your knee. - But then we got to the Yule Ball together and everyone around us were making out and he just said we should try that too. And I was angry because… - You shook your head slightly to stop yourself from confessing exactly why you were upset that night. - Well, things i guess. I just know that in one second we were dancing and then he asked me if we could kiss and I didn’t want to let him down so I said yes.

- Was that your first kiss? - Wanda asked curiously.

- Not really. - You grumbled. - My first kiss was kind of a shitty situation. I was 9, This girl from muggles school locked me in an empty room and said she was going to show me how her father charmed women. She forced a kiss while I was too shocked to react.

- I’m sorry. - Wanda said sincerely, and you just shrugged.

- It 's okay. I guess she liked me but she had too much trauma to show that in a healthy way. - You said looking at Wanda, who frowned, disagreeing.

- This does not justify her behavior. - She retorted and you just bit your lips.

- You’re probably right. - You grumbled, and looked away from her quickly, building up the courage to confess again. - After Bucky, I thought that maybe I only liked girls and that’s why the kiss felt weird. But then Helen Cho kissed me on New Year.

- Wait, what? - Wanda suddenly exclaimed, and you looked at her curiously. Ashamed of her own reaction, Wanda looked away. - Sorry, I didn't know about this. - You let out a short laugh.

- Well, it was holiday break. I went to Steve’s in New Year. His family had a small reunion and Cho was invited.

- Oh, I remember this. - Wanda said. - My brother and I went back to Sokovia that year, so we couldn’t join the meeting.

- Well, you missed my big kiss, miss Maximoff. - You joked but Wanda didn't smile, an expression you couldn't quite decipher. You decided it was best to keep telling your story. - Anyway, Helen is a real flirt. She joked about not having anyone to kiss at midnight and it took her two drinks to ask me. I’m pretty sure it was only after Thor said no to her.

Wanda laughed softly, attentive to your monologue.

- I said yes because I wanted to be sure that I only liked girls. - You confessed, shaking your shoulders slightly. - I talked to Nat about this and she said the only way to be sure was if i felt that kissing girls was just naturally better than kissing boys, and I just went for it.

- And? - Wanda asked curiously.

- The fucking same. - You confessed, letting out a sad sigh. - I just felt I was doing because everyone else was doing and I could really feel a connection to her. I simply didn’t like her, you know? Like, everyone describes these butterflies and nervousness, and I thought I was feeling it too. But then I realized that I was just anxious about it being a new experience, and being in public. I wasn't nervous about the person I was kissing, it was just too frustrating.

- Is different with Jessica isn’t it? - Wanda asked after a moment, you raised your eyebrow at the almost hurt expression she had on her face, but she looked away from you quickly.

- Yes, but not because of what you’re thinking. - You said. - I’m not in love with her, you know. Things are way less complicated than that.

A short smile escaped Wanda's lips at her confession, but she did not interrupt you.

- We have a lot of things in common. Especially personality traits. - You explained, smoothing yourself better against the wall. - We become friends quite easily. And for some reason I always thought she was hot.

Wanda's gaze fell from yours immediately, but you didn't notice the sad posture she assumed.

- What I mean is, I was attracted to her after we became friends. Then I realized that it was supposed to be like this. I like to have emotional bonds before intimacy affection. - You explained. - She was my first enjoyable kiss, I guess. We kissed a couple times on truth or dare games, but eventually we both realized that even though we had chemistry, we didn’t work as a couple. Manly because we aren’t in love with each other.

- I thought you two were dating. - Wanda suddenly confessed, the same indecipherable expression on her face as before. You looked at her with a mixture of curiosity and surprise.

- I never really dated anyone, Wanda. - You explained. - I guess that’s the real reason on why i was so chocked to find people having sex on a corridor.

Wanda let out a short laugh, and you tried not to blush so much at the sound.

- Anyone would be surprised. Virgin or not. - She said, looking at you tenderly.

You fell into a comfortable silence again. You began to play with the button on your costume, before you felt Wanda's foot tap against yours. She had stretched out her legs, and slowly, both her feet touched the soles of yours. You smiled at her.

- I would like it if we were friends. - she confessed in a whisper.

You shook your head, smiling at her with amusement and affection.

- Who said we weren't friends? - You retorted, and a smile filled the other girl's face.

Before either of you could say anything else, noises of footsteps and voices could be heard in the hallway around the corner from where you were sitting. You exchanged a complicit look with Wanda, and you crawled side by side to the edge of the wall, to hear what seemed to be an argument.

Bruce Banner and Tony Stark were arguing about something in that hallway. They seemed slightly intoxicated judging by the slurred words and unbalanced postures, but the distance and the loud party noise made it impossible for you and Wanda to hear exactly what they were arguing about. They stood like that for a few seconds, until suddenly, Tony pushed Bruce against the corridor wall, and the two of them locked into a passionate kiss.

Your jaw dropped in shock, and before you could even process what had just happened, you watched in horror as Bruce took charge of the kiss, pushing Tony against the wall only to kneel in front of the other boy, beginning to unbuckle Tony's belt. You let out an exclamation and before you could make any more noise, Wanda pulled you back into the hallway, one hand covering your mouth as she laughed at your expressions.

- Okay, I admit, that was traumatic. - She said between short bursts of laughter, removing the hand covering her mouth. You laughed breathlessly, extremely aware of the other girl's proximity.

- I'm starting to think someone put sex potion to the punch. - You tried to joke, but then Wanda realized how close you were and stopped smiling.

- That would be a problem. - she whispered. - I had two cups of that.

You swallowed hard, using all your willpower to keep your gaze on Wanda's eyes, even though your brain commanded you to look at her lips.

- Is that making you feel horny too? - You answer in the same tone and then you watch Wanda stare unashamedly at your mouth. You feel a strange tingling sensation at the tip of your stomach and try to ignore the uneven beating of your heart.

But the moment is completely broken when you hear a loud groaning noise, which did not come from any of you. You shake your head, and as you realize exactly where it is coming from you cover your face with both hands.

- Merlin, what the hell was that. - You grumble and rush to cover your ears as the noises continue. Wanda starts to laugh.

- I think that's our clue to leave. - She comments, and it takes a moment for you to realize that she has moved away, already standing up and away from you.

She reaches out to help you up, and you ignore the butterflies in your stomach when she keeps holding your hand as you run down the hall in the opposite direction from where you were standing.

Concentrating too much on the feel of Wanda's hand in yours, you don't realize where she is leading you until you are almost there. You give her a gentle tug on her hand to stop her, and Wanda looks at you curiously.

- Why are you taking me to the common room? - you question curiously, slightly disappointed that the evening was coming to an end.

- Because it's quite late. - she says as if it were obvious, and you raise an eyebrow. - I need to check on Pietro before going to bed, but that does not mean I can't take you to the dorm.

- What a gentlewoman, you turn out to be, Miss Maximoff. - you joked, and Wanda laughed lightly.

You started walking again next. When you finally reached the entrance to the common room, you turned to Wanda, and found her already looking at you.

- Here we are. - You said softly.

- Here we are. - she replied in the same tone.

A moment passed with just the two of you smiling at each other, until you laughed and looked away, nervousness taking over your body.

- I will see you at class tomorrow, Wanda. - You finally said, letting go of her hands. Wanda seemed to consider something and then she moved closer to you, making you hold your breath.

- Goodnight, Y/N. - She whispered before depositing a long kiss on your cheek. You inhaled her perfume, closing your eyes for a brief moment before she pulled away.

You must have been blushing a lot, and you thought it best to hide your embarrassment, looking away from Wanda quickly and mumbling a awkward "Goodnight. You didn't notice, but Wanda smiled fondly at the shy mess you had become. She waited until you entered the common room before turning around.

It has been three weeks since you spent Christmas Eve with Wanda. When you woke up after that night, you knew that there was something different between you two. Some kind of intimacy that wasn't there before. And you had no idea how to deal with it. Now, every time you saw each other, you exchanged accomplice glances, but neither of you took the first action to get closer. Always surrounded by friends, you didn't have much time alone. And with the start of the final exams, you were feeling overwhelmed

And then you agreed to have a drink with Nat at the Three Broomsticks, to take your mind off the tests for a while, only to witness Vis asking Wanda to be his girlfriend during a date at the same place you were. Of course you had to arrive right then and there. Feeling Wanda's and Nat's eyes focused on you, you just held back your tears and left the bar, being accompanied by your clearly concerned friend.

Heartbreak isn't exactly a plausible and acceptable justification for missing class, so you thought it best just to tell Minerva that you hadn't heard the alarm clock.

When you raised your eyes to Wanda that morning, you felt your stomach sink when she had that same complicit look in her eyes accompanied by a slight smile. But you didn't smile back, and not wanting to deal with her worried expression, you just focused on your transfiguration lesson.

It didn't take long for the class to end, since you had missed almost half of it. But you had to stay a little longer to hear Professor Minerva's sermon.

Since you only had the classes for the subjects you wanted to get your N.E.W.T., your schedule was comfortably empty during the seventh grade. The vast majority of the time had to be spent studying if you wanted to get decent grades on the tests, but you allowed yourself to rest this morning, feeling emotionally tired.

You noted that you had three free periods before the next class, and decided to spend one in the kitchens, confident that the elves would cheer you up a bit since the creatures were extremely adorable.

Leaving the room, you observed the empty corridor around you. Your time getting scolded by Professor Minerva clearly made it possible for all the other students to go to their respective classes. You noticed a small group of students playing explosive snap in the middle yard, but you didn't feel like joining in the fun.

Knowing that you still had plenty of free time, you decided to leave your heavy materials in the common room before going to the kitchen, so you changed your route for the moment.

It was only when you reached a particularly isolated area in a corridor that you almost tripped over your own feet. Wanda was standing in front of you, a serious expression on her face.

- I was waiting for you. - She said holding the bag tightly on her shoulders.

- Is there anything you want to talk about? - You asked impatiently. Wanda pressed her lips together

- Why are you being like this? - She questioned with frowning eyebrows, a hurt expression that made you feel a tightening in your stomach.. - Did I did something?

You were so tired of this game. Then you just exploded.

- You know what Wanda, why don’t you go back to your boyfriend and leave me alone! - You shouted impatiently, frightening Wanda who took a step backwards.. - I’m tired of this game we’re playing. I only get hurt from it.

Not waiting for Wanda to answer, you went around her and started walking. You heard her call you, and ask you to wait, but you didn't obey, holding back tears as you walked.

- Please, listen to me. - She pleaded one last time, and you stopped walking. Taking a deep breath, you turned around..

- What? - Your voice trembled a little, the emotion you were hiding escaping in your speech.

Wanda shifted the weight between her feet, lowering her head slightly with reddened cheeks. You imagined that she was embarrassed by the intensity of your gaze, that she was feeling guilty.

- I’m not dating Vis. - She stated lightly. You looked at her with confusion.

- I saw you two at…

- I know. - She cut you off by looking at you as she clasped her hands together, a shy smile escaping her lips. - I told him that i couldn’t date him. Not when I like someone else.

Great. There was someone else. You let out an exclamation of dissatisfaction.

- Look, it’s nice that you’re sharing your love life with me but i don’t see how this is relevant right now…

- I’m talking about you. - Wanda says looking at you.

- W-what? - You ask confused, feeling your cheeks heat up, your heart racing. Wanda looks as nervous as you do as she approaches.

- You’re the person I’m in love with. - Wanda confesses, her gaze intense on you. You find it hard to breathe now.

- Oh. - That seems to be the only thing you can say, no coherent thought forming at Wanda's proximity. She brought her hands up to your neck and pressed your foreheads together

- It 's okay if I kiss you? - She asked in a low tone, you felt your stomach turn with anxiety.

- I would like that. - You say finally, before you feel Wanda's lips against yours.

It's soft. Just the touch of your lips, and you don't move your hands, still not believing that this is really happening. You think you have something you need to say, so you sigh against Wanda's mouth, and she pulls away a bit, her hands trembling against your neck.

- I'm in love with you too, Wanda. - You whisper and kiss her again, feeling her smile against your mouth.

This time it's even better. Your mouths meet and you kiss her firmly, while bringing your hands to her waist. And then just the touch of your lips is not enough, and you run your tongue over Wanda's lower lip, asking for passage. You think she doesn't understand the request because of her lack of reaction, but the next second she bites your lip gently, drawing a gasp from you. When her tongue brushes against yours, you squeeze her waist, delighting in Wanda's taste. So fucking good, you think as your tongues wrestle together. When you slow the kiss, wanting to savor Wanda calmly, she moves her hands up into your hair, trailing her fingers down the back of your neck. Leaving the kiss as slow as possible, you smile against the kiss as you hear her sigh into your mouth. You always liked to tease after all.

You run one hand up her back, over her neck, pressing her against you as your tongue lingers on hers. You both gasp, and then the rhythm of the kiss changes. You let out a low moan as you feel Wanda pull your hair lightly as she increases the intensity of the kiss. Your hand that was on her waist comes down, and you grab her ass, squeezing and consequently earning a groan from Wanda. The feeling of having her against you is driving you wild, and your stomach is doing somersaults while your heart is racing.

As you pull your mouths apart to catch your breath, Wanda starts running kisses down your jaw to your neck, making your whole body shiver. You smile breathlessly, and feel your legs weaken. Realizing that you need a support to stand, you kiss her hard as you push her gently against the nearest wall.

The position certainly awakens something primal in both of you, the kiss intensifies as Wanda's leg curls against yours, and she pulls your body against hers so that you press her against the wall, something you do without opposition. Your hand squeezes her ass again, and she moans against your mouth.

- Fuck. - You sigh as you feel Wanda bite your lip again, your eyes opening slightly to face the fully dilated pupils staring at you maliciously.

You kiss again, Wanda letting her hands roam down your back, the sensation giving you goosebumps. You moan as you feel her fingers enter your burning skin through your shirt.

- For Merlin Sake! - a voice exclaims in surprise and you both stumble out of the kiss in shock.

It takes a moment for you to clear your own thoughts, everything in your body tingling with the feel of Wanda on your skin. You feel your cheeks heat up sharply as you face the one who interrupted you.

- You guys are so lucky it wasn't a teacher to find you like that. - Nat announced, pointing at the two of you, her tone was serious but her eyes showed amusement. She would surely tease you about this in the future.

- I… We - You tried to formulate a coherent sentence, but in the mix of shame and excitement you were in, you couldn't think of anything.

- It 's okay, love birds. - Nat joked, spreading her hands to push you and Wanda by the shoulders towards the courtyard. - You can continue your make out session somewhere else. I don’t recommend the school corridors, especially when you could get caught by Professor Fury.

- Right. - Wanda grumbles and you just nod in agreement

- The bell is about to ring, so I suggest you two find somewhere more quiet to be. - Nat says - I suggest the empty halls from the seventh floor. Or maybe, you know, a bed in any of the dorms.

You think you have blushed even more at the suggestion, but before you can say anything, Wanda stops walking, and you notice that she is as red as you are.

- Actually I have potions now. - She says, looking at Nat quickly, before her gaze focuses on you. She smiles slightly, and moves closer, making you hold your breath. - I see you at lunch, okay? - She speaks tenderly, placing a short kiss on your lips. You close your eyes at the sensation and think that she has gone too fast. Then Wanda nods to Nat and leaves, leaving you with a silly smile on your lips. The bell rings almost in the next instant and the noise wakes you up from your current state.

- Okay, since we both have free periods now, you're telling me everything. - Nat says, grabbing you by the arm as you walk back down the hall.

You laughed uncomfortably, feeling your face heat up. Taking a deep breath, you ignored Nat's excited expression, preparing to tell her how exactly you ended up in that situation.

#wanda maximoff #wandavision #wanda x reader #wanda x you #wanda maximoff x reader #reader x wanda #reader x character #marvel imagines #oneshot #hogwarts marvel crossover #wandaxreader

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theasstour · 3 years

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𝐁𝐚𝐝 𝐈𝐝𝐞𝐚.

𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 𝟏𝟎.𝟑𝐤 𝐍𝐁: 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐢𝐭 𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐮𝐚𝐠𝐞, 𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐞𝐱𝐮𝐚𝐥 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭

Tuesday, 16 January 2018

When Y/N perched her glasses on her nose the next morning, about to get out of bed, she heard the door next to hers open. What had started out as a decent morning was now tainted by last night’s chat with Harry in her room. She flopped down onto her bed, looking up at her ceiling as everything dawned on her again. Harry asked her to be his fuck buddy so she could make him become more comfortable in bed, and in return she would get free tattoos. They would have sex and Harry would get better with more experience, and once he felt ready to, he would pursue others again. That was the deal.

Y/N wanted to have sex with Harry, she had admitted that to herself, but if he wasn’t any good in bed… was it even worth it? Some men just didn’t know how to please anyone in bed, what if he was a lost cause? She knew Harry, he wouldn’t have asked her if he wasn’t truly insecure about his performance in bed. It just felt like such an odd favour to be asking someone. Did he even find her attractive? Or did he just ask her because he knew she’d tell him like it is if he fucked up? Or because they had sex before and it was just easiest to ask her?

She heard something against her carpeted floor, a quiet sound she would not have heard if she hadn’t closed her windows at 4am because of a drunken gang of men making their way home from the pub. Sitting up in bed, she looked at her floor, not seeing anything until her eyes landed on the small slit between her floor and the door. A note.

She got up from her bed, reaching for the dressing gown that hung over her desk chair. She reached for it as she heard footsteps away from her door, hearing them leave down the stairs and to the kitchen. Though it had been years since she had seen or read his writing, it still felt as familiar to her as the inside of her home in Nottingham.

I’m sorry about last night, can we talk? H x

Right now, she wanted nothing less than to talk to Harry. But, taking a look at her phone, she recognised the date, saw a text from Chloe, and knew that avoiding Harry would be next to impossible. In about two hours, Chloe would come to their flat on Orsman Road so Mason and Harry could show her how to play the PlayStation. It would look stupid if Y/N wasn’t in the room with them, keeping them company. After all, she was the one that had made this meeting happen, the tie that linked Chloe to Mason and Harry in the first place. Who knew how awkward it would be if she wasn’t there.

She got her dressing gown off, put on some knickers and a bra, then rummaged through her drawers for something to wear. She settled on a black pleated mini skirt with fishnets underneath – along with shorts to keep the chafing away – and an oversized long-sleeve jumper in acid wash black and grey. The print on it was of Back to the Future, one of the only films Y/N managed to sit through. She didn’t have the attention span to sit for hours on end to watch a film, she much preferred series where she could just watch an episode and then pause. She didn’t have the attention span for films.

Tucking the front of the jumper into her skirt, Y/N studied herself in her mirror, smiling at the image. Today might bring on some very awkward moments, but at least she would look good.

She walked over to her door, putting her ear against it to listen for movements downstairs. Last thing she wanted to do was make herself some breakfast while Harry was watching her like a hawk, trying to read her mind to figure out what she was thinking. He was one of the most impatient people she knew, always eager to get on with whatever he wanted to do, always wanting an answer right away. Though she knew having sex with Harry, directing him, and giving him more confidence in the bedroom wouldn’t be a chore, it would probably be a lot of fun. What was stopping her was that, if she wanted to have sex, she expected to have good sex. Especially if she were going to have sex with this person multiple times. If this happened, she just had to hope Harry took her seriously and did what he could to better his lack of giving properly in bed.

She looked down at the note in her hand, reading it over again as she heard the front door downstairs open and then close again. Knowing that Mason would wake up five minutes before Chloe arrived and that Nathan would likely sing along to What is This Feeling? from Wicked on his way downstairs, the person that just left had to be Harry. Y/N therefore made her way downstairs and made her breakfast, quickly walking back upstairs so she could eat her breakfast in peace. While listening to Duda Beat, Y/N sat in her bed eating, wiggling her toes in her fishnets, drifting to a place far away from the flat in Hackney.

Music was a huge part of Y/N’s life, always had been. It felt weird if her room was silent or if she was walking someplace on her own without the company of an artist singing into her ears. Nathan would often get annoyed with her about how many songs she already knew when he just found them, or how she always managed to know the songs playing at all the clubs they were at. Music was one of the things she truly treasured in life, something that made her feel safe if the world around her was too quiet or too loud.

While deep in her own thoughts, Y/N didn’t hear the front door open and closing again. She thought she heard some whistling out in the corridor, but didn’t pay much attention to it until there was a knocking at someone else’s door. Just barely, she turned her music down to listen to what was going on.

“Mase?” Harry said, knocking again. “You up, mate?”

Mason must have answered somehow because Harry opened his door and walked in. She didn’t hear what happened next, just some muffled talking as Harry stood inside a still sleepy Mason’s room. Harry’s small laughter at something Mason said emanated from the room, and two seconds later, he was closing the door and walking over to the room opposite to Mason’s, knocking three times on there as well.

“Nath?”

“Come in, best friend!” Nathan sang and Harry opened the door not even a second later.

“Hiya, thought you’d need this one,” Harry said, Y/N could hear the smile in his voice.

“Oh, you absolute lifesaver,” Nathan said, gasping a little as he took whatever Harry was offering him.

“First week back at uni, thought it’d lighten the mood.”

“Harry, you’re a dream,” Nathan complimented, making Y/N roll her eyes. That compliment would easily get to Harry’s head and he’d be all cocky the rest of the day.

“I know, but thanks for the reminder,” Harry said, steps could be heard next.

“Don’t let her hear you say that,” Nathan commented, and Y/N knew they were talking about her. The door to Nathan’s room closed.

Next thing Y/N knew, three knocks sounded at her door. She stilled, mid-chew. Looking at her door, she suddenly started searching around her as if anything inside her room would help her escape the inevitable awkward moment that was about to ensue.

“Y/N?” Harry said, knocking again.

She got up from her bed, carefully putting her plate down on her desk as she continued to look around her room. Nothing could save her, so at least her room had to look somewhat presentable.

“Y/N, I know you’re up. I can hear your music.”

Running a hand over her make-up free face, Y/N walked over to her door. She opened it, seeing Harry leaned against her doorframe on the other side, the nearness of him making her take a small step backward. He was wearing a brown knitted oversized rib jumper over loose black jeans, a pair of black leather shoes with a chunky sole that he had forgotten to take off at the front door along with his black cord double breasted trench coat. The outfit was cosy and so effortlessly attractive in a soft sort of way. Admitting that to herself made Y/N infuriated. This man was only getting harder to resist by the second.

Y/N was too caught up in Harry’s outfit to see what he was holding. Once he saw her, he did the same as her, eyes scanning her entire body to take her in properly. His eyes lingered on her legs where her bare skin was exposed through her fishnets. His Adam’s apple bobbed and he cleared his throat as he stood upright again, a slight redness appearing in his cheeks.

“Thirsty?” he asked.

Y/N narrowed her eyes at him, but then she caught sight of what was in his hands. A cup carrier where two out of four coffees were taken, two left. One for Harry, one for Y/N. There was a normal hot-drink cup and a plastic cup for cold drinks.

“Iced latte, right?” Harry asked, holding the carrier out for Y/N to take her coffee. “That’s what you had when you popped by Footprint, at least.”

Y/N blinked. “How’d you know?”

Harry shrugged, giving her a smile.

Y/N took the iced latte, recognising that it was a different cup to the ones you normally got at Starbucks, Costa, or Caffé Nero. No, this was from one of those smaller cafés that he liked popping by. She was sure she would like it regardless, maybe even prefer it to the chain stores.

“Thank you,” she said, taken aback by Harry’s gesture. He had really gone out of his way to buy the entire flat a morning coffee.

“I owed you one,” Harry smiled.

“Yes, you did,” Y/N said, but the both of them could tell she didn’t mean it one bit. Silence settled over them, Y/N kept her eyes on the coffee as she felt Harry glance at her, not willing her to look up but just trying to find his words as if there was something he wanted to say, but didn’t know how to. Slowly, she glanced back up at him through her lashes, looking between his eyes as his lips parted.

“Did you get my note?”

Y/N felt her heart leap out of her chest. “Yes.”

“Can we? Talk?”

“Yes, but I’m… I need to eat my breakfast.”

“Oh, okay. Send me a text-“

“-Thank you so much for the coffee, Harry. Truly.” And then she closed her door, standing there with one hand on the doorknob and the other holding the iced latte Harry had just given her. It took a few seconds before she could hear Harry making his way back downstairs, most likely to take his coat and boots off, and maybe to make himself something to eat if he hadn’t done exactly that at the café he had just been to. The door to Mason’s room opened and Y/N heard him yawn as he started down the stairs, greeting Harry in his usual rumbling voice.

Y/N sat back down on her bed, looking down on the iced latte in her hands. It meant nothing. He had done the exact same thing for Mason and Nathan. But… something about someone going out of their way to buy you a coffee without you even needing to ask for it, was a level of intimate Y/N wasn’t sure she had reached with anyone before. This just told her that he cared for her; cared for her like he would care for Mason and Nathan. That thought warmed Y/N, and she was left just looking at the iced latte for another minute or two before she actually brought it up to her lips to drink it. She had been right before, she liked this one much better than the one she usually got at Costa.

An hour or two later, Chloe sent Y/N a text to tell her she was on her way, and 30 minutes after that, the doorbell rang. Y/N opened the door to her room and walked down the stairs just as Harry stood in the doorway of his room, watching Y/N fly past him to get to the door. As curious as she was to peek inside Harry’s room, she would have to do that another time.

“Hello?” Y/N said into the phone.

“Hiya, babe,” Chloe called on the other end, sounding as chipper as always.

“Walk up the steps, it’s the first door on the right,” Y/N explained before buzzing Chloe in. To make it easier, Y/N opened the door and waited there for her mate in the doorway, even though the cold air from the outside corridor seeped into the flat and made goosebumps appear up and down her exposed legs.

“Hi,” Chloe grinned as she walked up the steps, hugging Y/N once she reached the flat. “And hello, Harry, you alright?”

Y/N whipped around to see Harry standing there, leaning against the wall just beside the kitchen entrance. His hands were shoved into his jean pockets and a wry smile came across his lips, nodding at Chloe as she made her way inside.

“Ready to play some PlayStation?” he asked.

“Oh, more than ready,” Chloe grinned, taking her jacket off and hanging it on Y/N’s hanger. “I’m so tired of everyone playing the PlayStation in my flat and when I ask if they can show me how to play, they say they can’t be asked.” She rolled her eyes. “So, I’m very thankful for you and Mason.”

“Think Mason’s gonna be the main lecturer of this one,” Harry said. “I’m not nearly as good as he is.”

“I hope he’s a good teacher, then.”

“Only time will show,” Mason said as he came downstairs, wearing a pair of rugby shorts and a zip-up hoodie. “Alright?” he asked, leading the way into the living room.

“Splendid now,” Chloe grinned, following Mason into the living room. As she walked past Harry, Harry’s eyes fell on Y/N who stood put, trying to ignore the intensity of Harry’s glance. She knew he wanted to say something so she walked straight past him and after the other’s, not wishing to take the discussion Harry so clearly wanted to take at that very moment. Y/N sat down by the round dining table, expecting Harry to take the seat next to hers. For some reason, that made her sweat. She was suddenly nervous for some reason.

“Harry,” Chloe chimed. “You need to sit beside me in case Mason confuses me.”

“I’m not gonna confuse you,” Mason said.

“No, but in case I need another explanation for things, you know,” Chloe explained, smiling over at Harry. Y/N could sense Harry’s gaze on her, and then the free chair beside her, before he met Chloe’s eyes again.

“Alright,” he said, walking over to sit down on the couch to Chloe’s right, the closest of the three to Y/N who sat alone by the dining table. Mason turned the telly on and then started getting the PlayStation going, giving Chloe a console while he brought his own as he sat down beside her. Chloe’s eyes instantly fell to Mason’s bare thigh, meeting Y/N’s eyes with a smirk before she focused on the television in front of her.

“Y/N,” Harry said, scooting a little to the side. “You can come sit here, if you’d like. You could game with us.”

“No, I’m alright.”

Harry put his hand on the sofa. “If you-“

“-Hello, whores,” Nathan said as he walked down the stairs and into the kitchen in his purple kimono. The white and orange lilies on it glinted in the pale sunbeams that shone through the living room window. He took the free chair beside Y/N and brought it over to the window, plopped do in it while whipping his phone out from somewhere. Harry sat back in the spot he reserved for Y/N, looking over at her as he sat back against the couch, placing his arm on the arm rest. Y/N’s eyes instantly fell onto his hand and the veins that ran from his knuckles to his wrist, studying the way he balled his hand into a fist before he stretched his fingers. She felt herself salivate. Mentally punching herself out of her trance, Y/N swallowed and looked away from Harry. He must have noticed her staring.

“Oh, I love that, Nate,” Chloe grinned.

“Aw, thanks, darling,” he said, and Y/N could see how greatly he appreciated the compliment. After all, the people he lived with rarely gave him any of them.

“Is this just a normal morning for you lot?” Chloe asked, looking around at all of them.

“I mean,” Harry said, shrugging his shoulders. “Don’t think we have a status quo or anything. Anything’s normal if nothing’s odd.”

“Wow,” Nathan said. “Ground-breaking.”

Chloe laughed. “Aw, I wished I lived in your flat. This seems like so much fun compared to my one in minging Dinwiddy.”

“Have you, Thian, and Hayden started looking for places?” Y/N asked.

“Thian’s found a flat, but it’s all the way in Brixton.” She grimaced. “That’s ages away, even by tube.”

“We found this place in December our first year,” Nathan said. “Harry’s mum knew someone who knew someone, and here we are. Pretty decent for London, even though it’s cramped.”

“Yeah, I want all the credit for this,” Harry grinned, looking as smug as always. “I’m the best.”

“That’s subjective,” Y/N scoffed, making Harry look over at her and Chloe laugh again. She felt Harry’s gaze linger on her, but she refused to look back at him, knowing that it would be hard to glance away.

“Alright, Chloe,” Mason started. “We’ll play GTA, is that alright? It’s what we usually play.”

“Anything’s fine by me,” Chloe said.

For some reason, Y/N’s brain forgot what she had just told herself a few seconds prior, because her eyes locked with Harry’s, and suddenly her heart was doing something funny. It halted for a second, then began back up again. Last night’s conversation played in Y/N’s head as well as the note he had left under her door before he went out for breakfast that morning. The proposal had not left her alone for a single second, she was sure she had dreamt of it but didn’t remember the exact dream just then.

Looking away, her eyes landed on the telly before she glanced over at Nathan who sat with one foot slung over the other. His gaze was already on Y/N, a slight crease between his brows as he scanned Harry for two seconds, then back at Y/N again. She quickly looked away, pretending like nothing was happening, as if she hadn’t just been sharing a little-too-long look with Harry that obviously meant something. In the corner of her eye, Y/N could see Nathan leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knee with his phone in one hand, looking between Harry and Y/N with an almost knowing look that brought Y/N’s pulse up dangerously high. Mason was too busy teaching Chloe about the PlayStation and Chloe was too distracted by both Mason and Harry to even recognise something was going on beyond the couch they were sat on.

Y/N did not spare another look at Harry even though she could feel him staring at her, chewing on his bottom lip and clearly wanting her to glance back at him. Y/N knew Nathan was staring between them, trying to piece together what was going on, and she was not going to give him the satisfaction of finding out on his own. First she wanted to do that herself, to figure out what was going on and how they would go forth without Nathan putting his nose in business that was not his to meddle in. Y/N had a hard time breathing under Harry’s stare and Nathan making up conspiracy theories right across from her while Chloe and Mason were shooting and killing people on the telly. This was going to be a long morning.

Friday, 18 January 2018

The first Critical Reading 2 lecture of the semester had been slow. Their professor, Yvonne, had stood at the front of the lecture hall with her hands behind her back, walking up and down in front of her PowerPoint that was displayed on the wall behind her, and talked about The Yellow Wallpaper. In her mid-40s, her dark hair came to her shoulders and her ordinary green jumper over blue jeans, made her look like anyone else. Maybe that was why Y/N liked her lectures so much; she was just an ordinary woman. Chloe had fallen asleep during the lecture, resting her head on Annalise’s shoulder, while Hayden had been texting a bloke on Tinder, and only Thian and Y/N were paying any proper attention out of the five of them. Maybe the three others didn’t find this fascinating, but Y/N certainly did.

“Women were expected to be subordinate to their husbands and completely obedient, as well as take on strictly domestic roles inside the home,” Yvonne said at the front of the lecture hall. “Upper middle-class women, like the narrator, may go for long periods of time without even leaving the home. The story reveals that this arrangement had the effect of committing women to a state of naïveté, dependence, and ignorance.”

Y/N wrote down keywords in her notebook.

“John, the narrator’s husband, assumes he has the right to determine what’s best for his wife, and this authority is never questioned. He belittles her concerns, both concrete and the ones that arise as a result of her depression, and is said to brush her off and laugh at her when she speaks. He makes all the decisions about both of their lives.”

Y/N glanced up at Yvonne again.

“As such, she has no say in anything in her life, including her own health, and finds herself unable to even protest. The author, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, like many others, clearly disagreed with this state of things, and aimed to show the detrimental effect that came to women as a result of their lack of autonomy.”

Yvonne walked over to the computer, changing the slide of her PowerPoint and taking a moment to look up at it before she turned to the lecture hall again. It was just a picture of some old, decaying yellow wallpaper.

“The yellow wallpaper,” she started, clapping her hands together. “This is, of course, the most important symbol in the story. The narrator is immediately fascinated and disgusted by the yellow wallpaper, and her understanding and interpretation fluctuates and intensifies throughout the story.”

Thian flipped through the Norton Anthology that he had brought, finger skimming over The Yellow Wallpaper that was printed out on the page he had put an orange sticky note to so he could find and come back to it.

“The narrator, because she doesn’t have anything else to think about or other mental stimulation, being kept in that attic by her husband, turns to the yellow wallpaper as something to analyse and interpret. The pattern eventually comes into focus as bars, and then she sees a woman inside the pattern. This represents feeling trapped, as you may have already figured out.” Yvonne put her hands out as she continued to speak. “At the end of the story, the narrator believes that the woman has come out of the wallpaper. This indicates that the narrator has finally merged fully into her psychosis, and become one with the house and domesticated disconnect. She has become a mad woman.”

Y/N furrowed her brows, putting her pen down as she turned all her attention on Yvonne. Something about those last three words made her ears perk up.

“In Gothic literature, the mad woman hails from the dark side of Jane Eyre. Mr Rochester’s first wife, who barely appears in the text, but pops up only to terrify sweet Jane. The first wife is violently insane, and is kept away from the world, the badge of shame in Rochester’s life,” Yvonne said. “Her irrational behaviour somehow justifies him almost becoming a polygamist when he attempts to marry Jane. Only after Bertha, his mad wife, literally burns Rochester’s estate to the ground, dying in the process, are the lovebirds free to pursue their happy ending. Mad women are so inconvenient while they’re still alive.”

After the lecture, Y/N walked to her next seminar by herself. Chloe and Annalise were in a seminar together, while Thian and Hayden were in another one. On one hand, Y/N was lucky to be part of the seminar right after the lecture, which meant she could go do whatever she pleased afterwards without waiting around to be in the second seminar group, but on another hand, she wanted to be with her friends. That was all she managed to think about as she made her way down the corridor, walking past a horde of other students that were on their way to their lectures and seminars.

The corridors were of white concrete, the walls in between doors to lecture halls, seminar rooms, or exits to the either one of the quads either decorated with paintings of previous headmasters or headmistresses, or brochures or papers about different societies or sports events. In the past, there had been pictures up on the walls of old prime ministers, but the frames had always been taken down by students, or some wrote on the glass that protected the paintings, all kinds of vile words that had, in the end, resulted in the paintings being taken down, much to the students’ delight. The paintings of Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher had been the ones to endure the worst of it, something Y/N wished she could have contributed with.

The ceiling high above was adorned with blue squares, lamps hanging down from some of them, while others were decorated in fine details that Y/N with her shitty eyesight couldn’t make out. The walks from the lecture hall 19 to seminar room 0-07 took about five minutes. She walked from seeing the North Quad out the windows to her left, to seeing the corridor that connected the two sides of the buildings together at the middle, to seeing the South Quad outside. Y/N hated summer, but she couldn’t wait for spring to arrive so she could spend her time between lectures and seminars outside in either one of the quads.

Y/N walked straight in when she arrived at seminar room 0-07. The seminar room was rather modern, with white walls, white ceiling, and grey carpeted floor, a blackboard hung on one wall, and a big round table in the middle of the room for everyone to be seated around. The chairs were a bright green, and the cushions that came with them matched, something that was supposed to brighten the room, but the chairs themselves were horrible to sit in. Especially for hours on end. Yvonne was already there, giving Y/N a broad smile and urging her to sit down with a warm, “welcome,” that made Y/N absolutely want to take a seat. However, as she made her way over to the table the ten people in the seminar group would be sitting around, Y/N’s eyes fell on a familiar face.

“Isla,” Y/N said, making the girl with the brown bushy hair who had her nose buried deep in the Norton Anthology in front of her, look up rather quickly at the sound of her name. An instant and warm feeling spread out from Y/N’s belly and all throughout her body, making her tingle with pure happiness.

“Y/N,” Isla said back, sitting up straighter.

Y/N let go of a slight chuckle before she walked over, sitting down beside her work friend. “I didn’t know you did English Lit.”

“I do.”

“I’ve never seen you in any of our lectures,” Y/N said.

“No, I’m usually in the very back or by one of the walls,” Isla explained. “I guess I just blend in with my surroundings.”

“Like a chameleon,” Y/N smiled, putting her notebook and Norton Anthology down on the table as well. “This is so bizarre. I didn’t know you even went to Helmond.”

“I’ve seen you at the front of the lectures with your friends, I didn’t want to disturb you.”

“Oh, hun, you could never disturb me,” Y/N assured, wanting to give Isla’s shoulder a squeeze but unsure if her mate would appreciate that touch or not. “This made my day. I’ve had a… week, to put it that way, and this just made my day.”

Isla smiled, looking back down at the book in front of her.

“How’d you find the lecture?” Y/N asked.

“It was interesting. I really liked The Yellow Wallpaper, so it was easy to follow along,” Isla answered as another student entered the seminar room, two others following right after.

“Right? I love anything gothic.”

“No wonder, all you wear is black.”

Y/N gasped, putting a hand to her chest as her eyes grew wide, a grin appearing on her face before she laughed. Isla’s own face broke out into a smile before her neck grew red, she must have been anxious of how Y/N would react to her taking the piss. Trying not to make too much noise so the few people who had showed up so far wouldn’t stare at them like they were mad, the two girls put their hands in front of their mouths to stifle their laughter.

“You damn near chopped my head off, right there. Oh, my word,” Y/N laughed, Isla laughing with her. “Black is a good colour to wear. It’s an anonymous colour.”

“For someone so extroverted, it’s interesting that you want to remain somewhat anonymous,” Isla noted.

Y/N shrugged. “It’s become a habit.”

Isla furrowed her brows at that.

“Hey, are you doing anything later tonight?” Y/N asked.

Isla brought her pen up to her chin, tapping it a few times against her chin dimple. “That depends.”

Y/N smiled. “Would you want to come to this Uno Society that my mate’s hosting?”

The second the words were out of Y/N’s mouth, she could see a sort of light die out in Isla’s eyes. Though she already knew the answer, she was disappointed when Isla uttered a small, “I’ve got plans, I think.”

The words hadn’t been voiced, but they both knew Isla was lying. Y/N did not mind, though. She knew that some people’s social batteries only lasted so long, and that this might be enough socialising for Isla to last her a whole week, so she did not press the issue and Isla again. If coming to the Uno Society was something outside of Isla’s comfort zone, then Y/N would not pressure her into coming.

“That’s fine,” Y/N said, giving Isla a smile. “When’re you working next?”

Isla seemed grateful for the change in conversation topic, but just before she got to answer, Yvonne sat down by the table, looking around at each one of the students that were sat in each seat. She opened her notes, clearing her throat so that all the small chatter around the table would die out completely.

“The mad woman,” Yvonne started, smiling as she made eye contact with a few of her students. “Where does the madness come from? Is it already present in the character from birth? Or does it develop, or at least intensify, due to isolation imposed by men?” she asked, looking around the table at the students surrounding it. “Anyone?”

1 Night by Charli XCX and Mura Masa played over the speakers as Y/N walked through the door and into another seminar room later that same day. She mouthed an excuse at Hayden before she glanced around, looking for someplace to sit down. Her original table was already occupied by just enough people so she would have to find another group to join this time around. The idea of disturbing someone in the middle of a game wasn’t appealing, it was frankly something that made her heart beat a little too fast. But, Y/N knew she had to do it unless she just wanted to stand around and look like a proper twit. So, after a quick sweep of the room, Y/N settled on the table in the far corner. She walked over to it, quickly realising that she knew a few of those seated around it.

“Hi,” Y/N smiled as she came over, taking the seat next to Mason.

“Oh,” he smiled back. “Alright?”

“Can I join your next round?” she asked, looking from Mason, to Kai, to the other three men seated around the table.

“Yeah, of course,” Mason said. “Just be patient, not too long since we started this one.”

“Of course,” Y/N smiled, sitting back in her chair and taking another quick look around the room. Studying each person on each table.

“Why’re you late, then?” Mason asked, nudging Y/N so she would know he was talking to her.

“Made some feijão tropeiro for dinner, had a nap, woke up ten minutes before I had to be here ‘cause my alarm didn’t go off. Phone’s dead,” Y/N explained. “Took the tube, but you know how all public transit’s always so slow when you need it to hurry along.”

Mason smiled. “Feels like that, doesn’t it?”

“Yet to see you at The Stag’s Head again, Y/N,” Kai said, grinning from ear to ear.

“She’s not as keen on a pint as I usually am,” Mason retorted.

“No, just haven’t had the time. I’ll have to pop by sometime soon.”

“Yeah, tag along with Mase, Nath, and H,” Kai continued. “H told me your fave cocktail’s Sex on the Beach. I’ll make you that if you’re not too keen on a pint. Actually,” Kai grinned, holding his hand out. “I might be the best bartender you’ll ever meet. My hands – these guys –“ He held up his other hand as well. “-Are the hands of God.”

“Pack it up, dicksplat,” Mason said, motioning for Kai to continue his round.

Kai howled, his laughter booming through the seminar room. Though deep and rumbling, Kai’s laughter was infectious and Y/N found herself smiling at him as he came down from his high, shaking his head and looking down at his cards. He dealt his round, glancing back over at Y/N.

“Did you know Mason’s funny?” Kai asked. “Mason, you can be funny sometimes.”

“You say that as if it shocks you. You literally laugh at me every single day.”

“Someone needs to laugh at you or else you’d cry yourself to sleep.”

Mason laughed at Kai, glancing down at his cards to focus on them for now. Y/N took this moment to look around her again, studying each face at each table.

“He’s not here,” Mason said, making Y/N’s head whip around in his direction.

“What?”

“Harry,” he elaborated. “He’s not here.”

Y/N furrowed her brows, crossing her arms over her chest as she watched Mason play for another moment. “I wasn’t looking for him.”

“It’s okay if you were.”

“It’d be weird if I was.”

“What’s going on with you and Harry?” Kai asked, a slight lift to his bushy brows as his eyes darted between Y/N and Mason.

“Absolutely nothing,” Y/N answered, hoping they didn’t notice her lying in the way she refused to meet their eyes. “I simply started thinking about him and thought I’d see if he was here.”

“So, you were checking to see if he was here,” Mason smirked.

Y/N rolled her eyes. “Men are so annoying.”

“Is something going on?” Kai asked again.

“You know, I could’ve just told you where he is right off the bat if you had just asked me about him,” Mason said.

“I don’t care where he is.”

“Are you and Harry a thing?” Kai asked for the millionth time.

“You’re nosier than Harry,” Y/N retorted, rolling her eyes at Kai who only laughed again. She met Mason’s eyes. “I don’t care where he is.”

Mason grinned. “He’s at work.”

Of fucking course he is, Y/N thought to herself, looking away from Mason again as his smirk widened. Y/N zoned out as the boys around the table continued to play Uno, only sometimes participating in whatever was going on when one of them shouted something or they laughed. Her thoughts were only on the proposal Harry had come with, one that intrigued Y/N more and more with each passing day. It had been four days since he asked her to help him get confident in bed and in return he would give her free tattoos.

Free tattoos. If she was getting free tattoos and good sex in the end, then the deal seemed pretty decent. After all, there were quite a few tattoos she wanted, most of them being those that Marcela had on her body, and then numerous she wanted to get herself. If she actually went through with this, then she was going to milk it for what it was worth. She was going to be proper tattooed up, looking so hot that it would be hard for her to keep her hands off herself.

It didn’t take too long until they were about to start another round, so Y/N joined in, playing until they were done a little over an hour later. When it’s time for them to pack up, Y/N walked over to her mates to apologise for coming in a bit late, something Hayden did not mind in the slightest. While that was happening, Nathan, Mase, and Kai were chatting by the exit door, waiting for Y/N to catch up so they could start on their way back to the flat and The Stag’s Head. In between talking to her friends, Y/N glanced over at them to make sure they hadn’t left yet, and at one point, she saw Nathan shake his head and raised his brows at Mason who only nodded his head in affirmation of what he had just said. Nathan looked back over at Y/N who only frowned at him, unsure what he was trying to tell her.

The walk back to the flat was slow, Mason stopping by a chippy on the way so he could get himself some dinner. He insisted on stopping if he wanted to get a proper bite in of his fish or chips, something that ultimately made Kai late for his shift at Stag’s Head. Mason was chill about it as always, reassuring Kai that his boss wouldn’t mind, he hadn’t shoved Harry’s head through a wall when he came in late while he worked there, he would surely not do that to Kai.

“Look at the size of ya,” Mason reasoned, only making Kai laugh, though Y/N could sense the muscle man was too stressed to put his entire heart into it.

The entire way back to Orsman Street, Nathan barely said a word. To Y/N, at least. He did not mind talking to Kai or Mason, but he hadn’t paid Y/N as much attention as he usually did, something that made her draw the conclusion that something was up. She didn’t try to press him about it while they were walking, not wanting to do it in front of the two others who obviously had nothing to do with this.

They said goodbye once they reached the flat, watching as Kai ran into The Stag’s Head and through the crowd of people that had already gathered in the pub. Y/N pulled her phone out of her purse, wanting to check the time, only to remember again that it had died earlier and she had forgotten to charge it afterwards. She would just have to charge it when she got to her room.

Mason opened the doors for everyone, taking his shoes off while still eating his fish and chips, strolling up to his room to finish it in there before probably having a shower. Y/N followed first after him, Nathan quick on her heels and, for some odd reason, breathing down her neck. She glanced over her shoulder at him, giving him a glare before she continued on her way up the stairs, but Nathan only glared back at her, walking just as close behind her as he had done since they got back to the flat.

Y/N opened the door to her room, sitting down by her desk and putting her phone down to charge as Nathan slammed his hands against the frames on either side of her door. Y/N jumped, looking over at Nathan whose expression looked absolutely manic.

“Right,” he started, looking over his shoulder to make sure the door to Mason’s room was closed before he glanced back at Y/N. In the meantime, she opened her laptop, keeping her eyes on Nathan. “I’ve been keeping my mouth shut about this for too long.”

She blinked. “What’s up?”

“What is going on with you and Harry?” Nathan hissed, brown eyes boring into Y/N’s soul.

She just blinked some more, staring at Nathan while she put two and two together. Mason must have snitched; he must have told Nathan while they were talking after Uno that Y/N had been looking after Harry. With that information and the staring – on Harry’s part – earlier that week, Nathan had put two and two together. That was why he was fuming and hadn’t bothered to give Y/N any sort of attention on their way back from uni.

“’Cause I can tell something’s been up. First he won’t stop staring at you when Chloe’s over, and now you go asking around about him at Uno.”

“I didn’t go asking around,” Y/N said, narrowing her eyes at him.

“You must really think I’m stupid,” Nathan retorted, raising his eyebrows at her, bobbing his head along as he spoke, something he usually did when he tried to get a point across.

“No, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She started shaking her leg.

“You know perfectly well what I’m talking about. What’s happened between you and Harry?”

“Nothing, Nath. We’re just friends.”

Nathan scoffed. “That’s the most rubbish thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Weird when that’s the truth.”

“I know something’s up,” he said, pointing a threatening finger at her.

Y/N sighed just as something like the terrace door banging shut sounded from downstairs. “Listen, you forced me to live with him. I’m just making the best of the situation you’ve put me in. I’m just making nice.”

“By sucking his dick?”

“That’s derogatory, Nathan.”

Nathan bowed his head lower, eye almost twitching with the intensity in which he was staring her down. “Something can’t not be up. My intuition is telling me something’s going on.”

Y/N let out a dry laugh. “Your intuition is doing you dirty then.”

Footsteps up the stairs had Nathan stop just as he was about to retort back, but he glanced over his shoulder instead, Y/N peering out from between Nathan and the doorframe. His curls appeared first, and then he was looking over at them, giving them that wry smile that had his right dimple deepen against his cheek. He was wearing all black, his tee shirt tucked into his black jeans, the sleeves of his tee shirt rolled up over his shoulders. Y/N hated how nice his arms looked like that.

“Alright?” Harry asked, voice just as deep and sensual as it always was. It hit Y/N like a train coming head on each time she heard his voice after some time of not. Harry’s eyes were on Nathan for a small second before they landed on Y/N, lingering there a little too long before he approached his door.

“We’re exhausted,” Nathan groaned, slumping against the doorframe.

“Same,” Harry said, looking down at his right hand, flexing his fingers. Y/N was unable to look away. “My arm feels like it’s gonna fall off, been vibrating all night holding the tattoo gun.”

Y/N bit her lips together.

“Uno Society alright?” he asked, looking solely at Y/N now. She wanted to shout at him to stop, to pay most attention to Nathan so he would stop giving them a hard time.

“Fine,” Y/N answered quickly.

Harry smiled at her, lightly nodding his head once. “Good.”

Y/N looked away, feeling her entire face heat up as she continued to feel Harry’s stare on her. She logged into Facebook to look at the family groupchat which she knew had most likely blown up since she last checked her phone. Her papai would go absolutely mad if she didn’t at least check the chat once every few hours.

“I’ll leave you two to it then, I guess,” Harry said, opening the door into his room. “Night, Nath.”

“Night, Haz.”

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

It was hard to not look at Harry, but Y/N managed a, “Hm,” in response before she focused all her attention back on writing her e-mail address and password into Facebook. The door to Harry’s room closed and the second he couldn’t see them, Nathan turned to Y/N. He gawked at her while making a sound akin to dinosaurs’.

“’Goodnight, Y/N’?!” he hissed, still sounding crazed like he had done a second earlier. He rushed into Y/N’s room, closing the door behind him so quickly and soundlessly it made Y/N think of all the other times they had rushed into each other’s rooms like this growing up.

“He’s just wishing me goodnight, Nathan, why’re you making up conspiracy theories?”

“Oh, that’s all there is to it, isn’t it?!” he whisper shouted, still sounding crazy.

Y/N rolled her eyes and clicked on the ‘log in’ button on Facebook, done with listening to any more of Nathan’s stupid theories. Doing so, she was immediately brought to the home page, displaying the 99+ messages that had been sent in the family groupchat. Y/N sighed, about to open the chat when she let her eyes drift, landing on something that made her pause.

“Harry obviously wants to-“ But Nathan stopped as well, eyes falling on Y/N’s laptop screen and seeing what she was seeing. “Kit.” It sounded like he said it more to himself than anything else, reminding himself of who that was a picture of. “Kit and Finian.”

The picture in front of them was from inside a pub, two men, clearly drunk, standing in the middle of the picture while a group of others were surrounding them. Kit had his left arm wrapped around Finian’s waist, a broad smile on his face, showing off crooked teeth and a slight, dark stubble. His styled black hair was rather nicely kept considering he was under the influence, and his small forehead and pointy nose glistened with sweat. The tank top he was wearing showed off his well-defined muscles, something Y/N knew Marcela had found attractive about her boyfriend.

Finian beside Kit was a little chubbier, wearing a baby blue polo shirt while he had an arm slung over his best friend’s shoulders. His brown hair was longer than Kit and had also been ruined by numerous hair-ruffles and fixes in the mirror since he started drinking. He was singing along to a song, eyes shut and a huge smile on his face.

Finian and Kit had known each other for years, Y/N was unsure how they had become friends. Marcela had met Kit while she went to University of Manchester, and the two had been together since her first year there. He was five years older than her, so ten years older than Y/N, and she had never had any sort of particular relationship to him. He would come by their house in Nottingham every once in a while, eat dinner with the family, but would more often than not stay put in Manchester. Y/N was always positioned next to him at family gatherings, and though she didn’t mind because they rarely talked, it still made her blood boil when she thought about it now. If she had just finished him off or gotten Marcela to break up with him, maybe her older sister would still be alive.

There had been found drops of Kit’s blood in the cabin after he disappeared, but that was nothing compared to the amount of blood belonging to Marcela that had been found there. Kit’s car was gone and all of his belongings with it. The police had stated that there was no doubt about it; Kit had killed Marcela, maybe by accident, maybe intentionally, and had hidden her body somewhere before running off. Three years had passed since then, and there had not been a single trace of Kit. He remained hidden. Some tipped the police about him, stating that they had seen him someplace far away from Newport, Wales. He had been sighted in England, Scotland, France, Morocco, and in Indonesia. Still, to this day when “sightings” of Kit were getting fewer and the days went on by, Y/N thought all the sightings weren’t him. If he had planned to kill her sister, he would have planned it out, she knew it.

The police and the population of Newport along with neighbouring towns had all searched the woods around the cabin, but Marcela’s body had not been found and neither had Kit. Nothing had been found; there were no definite answers. Except for one, at least to Y/N: Kit had killed Marcela, and he was still on the run.

Not able to look at his face any longer, Y/N’s eyes landed on the caption to the photo. Someone she knew from school had commented on it, making it appear on her dashboard, because it would never have found its way to her if not. It angered Y/N that people posted pictures of Kit as if he wasn’t a deranged murderer. The date showed 8th September last year. On the anniversary of Marcela’s murder. Y/N looked at the person who had posted it, Graham Bartlett, another one of Kit’s friends.

Miss you two everyday. #FindKitAndFin.

Y/N blinked. “Find… Find Kit and Fin?” she asked, frowning at the laptop screen in front of her.

Nathan leaned on the back of her chair. “You don’t know about Finian?”

“Obvs not.”

Nathan inhaled slowly. “Just a few days after Marcela died and Kit disappeared, Finian vanished as well.”

Y/N just stared at the picture, now not able to take her eyes off of Finian. She had seen him outside her house sometimes, just barely talked to him. He seemed like a typical bloke that thought he was better looking than he actually was, someone that made girls uncomfortable. He had picked up Kit from their house in Nottingham when Kit had stayed over and Marcela and Kit had fought, or he had just picked up the both of them sometimes to drive them back to Nottingham. He always seemed to hang out by his car, always leaning against it or smirking from the driver’s seat.

“He disappeared?”

“Yeah,” Nathan answered. “No one’s seen him in three years, four now coming September.”

“There’s not a trace of him?”

“No. He lived alone, so no one noticed ‘cause he rarely answered his phone, except his boss. He always answered him. So, when he didn’t even pick up when his boss was calling, they knew something was up,” Nathan explained. “His flat looked just the same as always when the police entered, though. It looks like he just left for the shop.”

“His car was gone?”

“Yeah.”

Y/N continued to just stare at Finian on the picture in front of her. “How… How didn’t I know about this?”

“Y/N, your sister had just been killed, you had other things on your mind than Kit’s vanished mate,” Nathan assured her. “Besides, someone might have told you. After all, there are big chunks of the following year that you can’t remember.”

Y/N nodded, closing her eyes for a few seconds before exiting out of Facebook. She couldn’t look at them any longer. Rage was bubbling inside her like a kettle about to boil over. What if Kit drove his car someplace and parked it where no one can find it, and then Finian came to get him? What if they drove away from the cabin because they knew that someone would eventually turn up, so it was better to be far away as fast as possible? Did they take Marcela’s body with them? Or is she still in Kit’s car, wherever that was? The thought made Y/N physically sick and she slammed her laptop shut.

Monday, 22 January 2018

Y/N put her white oversized jumper over her head, liking how the chunky knit felt against her freezing form. She had made the mistake of keeping her window open all night when she usually just opened it for a tad bit before going to bed, then closing it before she actually went to sleep, so her room was absolutely freezing when she woke up, something that resulted in her pulling out her thick jumper. Her black lace halterneck bralette showed at her neck and the open collar of the jumper, but Y/N did not care. The bralette was super cute, anyone who glimpsed it would be lucky. Running her hands over her black mum jeans, Y/N shoved her glasses further up the bridge of her nose before she walked out of her room, getting ready to walk downstairs to the kitchen to make herself some breakfast.

Y/N halted at the top of the stairs, glimpsing a very familiar, broad and muscular back where it stood on the terrace at the bottom of the stairs. Y/N could see something else black along his back, but she couldn’t make it out through the white of his tank top. She swallowed thickly as she stopped in the middle of the staircase, tightening her hold on the railing. He just looked so effortlessly… so fucking good. So good. It made her heart beat faster just looking at him. Though she had had her answer ready for a while now, she had just not found the right moment to tell him, but this seemed as good a time as any. So, taking a massive breath in through her mouth and then out through her nose, Y/N proceeded down the rest of the stairs and over to the terrace door.

She knocked on the glass twice, making Harry look over his shoulder rather abruptly to see who was there. At the sight of her, his eyes grew a little wide, but he stepped to the side, letting Y/N come out onto their small terrace. Harry held onto his tea mug bringing it up to his lips as he let his eyes travel down Y/N’s body as quickly as possible. At that, it was physically impossible for Y/N to do the same to him.

He was wearing his loose black jeans again, but this time he only wore a white tank top to go with it, tucked into his jeans. The collar went so low that Y/N could see Harry’s two dragon tattoos, the red one over the left side of his chest and the black one on his right one. It had been a while since she had seen those. The thought of Harry having more tattoos hidden under his clothes on parts of himself that other people rarely got to see-

“-Fine,” Y/N said, interrupting her own thoughts. She held her hands up, letting them fall to her sides as she met Harry’s eyes again. “I’ll do it.”

There was a slight pause as Harry’s face went from slightly smug to absolutely bewildered, blinking rapidly as if he had to check if this was all real and not some made up daydream. “You’re… You’re saying yes?”

“Are you deaf?”

“You’re going to teach me how to be good-“

“-Shush!” Y/N hissed, taking a step closer to Harry with a finger in front of her mouth, eyes wide. “Let’s keep this between us and not all of Hackney.”

Harry let a small smile show, a light chuckle leaving his lips, even though his searching eyes told her he was still in disbelief. “But you’re not just taking the piss, we’re actually gonna do this?”

“Yes.”

Y/N could see Harry’s grip on his mug tighten as he bit his bottom lip. “Yeah… alright…” he mumbled under his breath. “I wish there was a chair out here, I feel like my knees are gonna give out.”

“Oh,” Y/N said, looking around them as if a chair was just going to materialise out of thin air. “I-“

“-I’ve also been trying to get you alone to say sorry,” Harry said, leaning against the brick wall. “I feel like I put a lot of pressure on you to say yes ‘cause I was so desperate, I didn’t really think a whole lot about anything other than just getting the question out into the open and for you to at least consider it. But in retrospect, I realise I should’ve stopped after your first ‘what the fuck is wrong with you’, but I didn’t, and I understand how stupid that was of me.” He sipped his tea, eyes on the inside of his mug before he locked eyes with her again. “If you want to stop this, at any time, or if you don’t even want to start now, that’s completely fine. All I care about is that you feel comfortable doing this. I not only appreciate you considering it and also doing it, but I also really want to have sex with you. I’m… well…” His eyes fell to his tea again, then at Y/N’s feet. “You’re so pretty, and I’ve always thought that.”

A few moments pass when the two of them are silent, the distant sounds of London waking up to a new day keeping them company as they both let this moment wash over them. Y/N’s eyes did not leave Harry and she noticed the slight pink hue that appeared over his cheekbones, and something told her that wasn’t the cold temperature and the wind of the canal’s doing.

“I’ve always thought the same about you,” she said, meeting Harry’s eyes when he looked up at her.

Hundreds of memories from a life before this one in London flashed past them as they stood there, suddenly remembering everything that had brought them to this very moment right here. Y/N wondered that, if they hadn’t had sex that one time three, almost four years ago, would Harry still have suggested this? She didn’t think he ever would have, even though they were both very sexually attracted to one another.

“This can’t go past sex,” Y/N said, breaking the silence once again. “It’s never going to become something more, at least not on my end, and I expect that from you too. Promise me we’re just gonna have sex, I’m going to make you feel more confident in bed, and then we can move past this without looking at one another any differently, okay?”

“I promise.”

“And you give me as many free tattoos as I want. However big.”

Harry smiled. “Of course.”

“Good.”

Harry bit his bottom lip, eyes resting on the bralette strap that was visible at Y/N’s neck. He quickly looked up again. “I want you to want to have sex with me, Y/N.”

Y/N exhaled slowly, giving Harry a reassuring smile. “I do. I’ve wanted to for a while. Your predicament just took me off guard.”

“If you at any point don’t want to continue, I’ll understand, and we’ll stop.”

“Naturally.”

Harry nodded, his brain working as he thought about something. “Now… Do you… Do we…”

Y/N just looked at him.

“Do you need me to buy anything?” he asked, to which Y/N continued to just look at him. “Lube? Condoms? Toys?”

She drew in a sharp breath, feeling her heartbeat quicken drastically. “You know what, buy whatever you want, whatever you need. I don’t care.” She put her hand on the doorknob, about to enter the flat.

“Oh! Also!” Harry exclaimed. “My birthday is next week, I’m celebrating with some mates and the flat at a teammates house, wanna come with? You can ask Chloe and the rest to come if you wanna.”

Y/N flashed a tight-lipped smile. “I’m flattered, but I’m working, I’m afraid.”

“Bugger.”

“Truly,” Y/N said, really meaning it. “I’ll leave a note under your door when our first… time will be.” She paused. “First session, maybe? We’ve already had our first time.”

Harry shrugged.

“Well, I’ll leave a note under your door when that first session will be.”

Harry grinned. “Can’t wait.”

“And leave that grin in your room, I don’t want to see you being all smug when we have a go that first time.”

His grin only widened. “Love, when I’m with you, fighting that grin is like fighting an oncoming tornado. I can’t win.”

Y/N rolled her eyes as Harry laughed. She walked back inside to go make herself something to eat while she felt Harry’s eyes on her the whole time, watching her through the window. Despite herself, Y/N found herself smiling as well.

NEXT UPDATE: Sunday, 18th April, 9PM GMT!

Huge thanks to my AMAZING beta readers! 🏛️ @aileenacoustic 🏛️ @devil-in-bw-the-sheets 🏛️ @sunflowerstache 🏛️ @fromyourstrulyh 🏛️

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forsakenoathkeeper · 3 years

Text

I Am Alive (chapter 4/?)

Deviant!Connor[RK800] x (fem!)Reader Rated M(18+) for canon-typical violence and gore, medical procedures, and graphic sexual content

Synopsis: You were a mechanical engineer, now a nurse for androids, who moved back to Detroit after the revolution to offer aid. After reconciling with an old friend, you became rather acquainted with his android partner.

Please support me on AO3 & thanks for reading ♥

The android shifted from low power mode to fully operational when he felt you stir from sleep. He tried not to stare when you sat up and stretched, your breasts on full display in the warm glow the morning light was casting through the window. You stood up and he eyed the contours of your back, the curves at your waist, the delicate bumps of your spine before you disappeared out of his line of sight.

You retreated into the bathroom for a few minutes before returning to the bed.

Connor already looked wide awake while you settled down in the sheets again, digging your palms into your eyes. It must have been nice to never be tired. When you stopped, you let out a very unladylike yawn.

"Change of plans," you uttered sleepily. "I'm just gonna lie here forever."

Connor watched, amused, as you settled back beneath the sheets, nuzzling your head into the pillow. Connor was sitting upright, but looking down at you with a sort of compliant expression, like he was fully prepared to let you have your way.

"The consequences on your health would be devastating," Connor replied simply.

You giggled into the pillow. "How are you gonna get me up?" you teased.

Connor eyed the blanket mischievously. The temperature in the air was a little colder than it was beneath the blankets. That would likely have you stirred from the bed.

With a feared squeak, you rolled away from him, wrapping yourself in the blanket and tearing it off his body. He didn't even flinch when the cold air hit him. He was still sitting upright, one leg bent, looking at you with a small smile, like he was trying not to laugh.

You eyed his nudity shamelessly for a second before looking up at his face.

"Hmm - I'm still in bed," you uttered defiantly like a spoiled child.

The android was prepared to keep playing this game with you. He could easily think of several strategies. He was programmed to be an expert negotiator, after all, and was pretty crafty with his methods; even after deviancy, he didn't let that piece of himself slip away.

But-

"Welcome, guest, Hank Anderson," the apartment's robotic attendant greeted someone.

Even you heard that, and your eyes met in a brief moment of panic.

Connor processed that thought for exactly 0.17 seconds and then bolted to his feet in a comedic fashion. He dug through one of his drawers for some lounge pants and hastily pulled them on before trotting into the kitchen to greet Hank.

Hank had a folder in his hand and was setting it on the kitchen counter just as Connor arrived.

"Hey. Wanted to get a head start on this one." Hank opened it up, exposing some digital crime scene photos. "The media is having a shitstorm about it and Fowler wants some feedback quick. Was gonna head straight to the crime-" Hank looked Connor up and down. "-scene."

Connor nodded, showing that he was listening.

"Did I interrupt something?" Hank asked, some tease to his tone. He crossed his arms and gave Connor an amused look.

"No," Connor replied, maybe a little too quickly, and shrugged his shoulders. "What makes you say that?"

"Your pants are on backwards..."

Connor looked down and, sure enough, a tag was sticking out of the hem and poking him in the belly.

"Shit," he scowled, looking away.

Hank chuckled lowly. "Well - well - someone has company. Sorry for interrupting. Need me to give you a moment? Wouldn't want the old geezer to ruin the mood."

"I-... doubt that would be the case," Connor said lowly, rubbing the back of his neck with his dominant hand. His keen hearing could pick up something that the older detective could not. He could hear the shuffling of fabric and footsteps on the floor in the other room and knew you'd be out here in a moment.

Hank's brow lifted and he eyed the android almost suspiciously. But, then, you came through the hallway, wearing proper clothes, hair brushed and pulled back. Hank's eyes shifted from Connor to you, and then back to Connor. He wheezed out a laugh.

"Coffee?" you suggested over Connor's shoulder with a smile.

You stepped into the kitchen, bare feet on the chilly wood floors, and pulled the carafe out from beneath the coffee maker to fill it with water.

With you out of sight, Hank shot Connor a grin. Connor caught the sight for a second before looking away to try to hide the smile he was really struggling to suppress.

"Go put on some real clothes, Cassanova," Hank teased, giving Connor a friendly smack on the back. Hank turned to face you as the android disappeared through the hallway.

"Cabinet left of the fridge," he stated, directing you to the coffee.

You opened the cabinet and eyed the bag. "Ooo. You didn't cheap out," you commented.

Hank chuckled. "Yeah well... Kinda passed out here several times while going over cases. Connor said I'm much more polite after some cups of coffee."

You snorted through your nose. "I don't doubt it..."

The mental image you were presented with was nice: of Connor and Hank sitting in his kitchen, a mountain of folders and paperwork spewed out on the counter while they discussed the evidence, argued over witness testimonies and statements given through interrogations. Hank would probably order a pizza, ignoring Connor's criticisms over the high calories and fat content, and down it all with coffee.

When Connor returned, you glanced at him in the corner of your eye before doing a double take, pivoting yourself fully to take a better look at him.

He was wearing a white T shirt with a long sleeved, black cargo jacket over it, the kind with pockets all over it. His dark jeans were flattering, hugging the right places while loose where necessary for movement. His detective badge was hanging at his waist by one of his belt straps. There was hardly anything special about the outfit; but, it did something to you.

Connor didn't seem to notice you admiring him, honing in on the case files.

"Old woman was murdered last night. I guess she was a big lawyer back in the day," Hank explained, taking a seat at the island. He paused when you brought him a mug, his eyes expressing his gratitude.

Hank continued, "she was being cared for by an android - even after the deviant uprising. First responders said he was sobbing all over the woman's body. Swears it wasn't him."

Connor nodded at Hank. "We should head straight to the crime scene."

You eyed the two boys curiously, feeling like they were able to read each other's suspicions without needing to be direct.

"After coffee," Hank uttered before lifting the mug to his face and taking a long sip. He didn't seem all at bothered by how hot it was; however, you were still blowing on your own cup.

Hank hummed thoughtfully as he set his mug down. "When we checked their financials, she had been to the clinic." Hank reached into the folder and scooped out a photo before his extending his arm towards you. You stepped closer and took the digital photo from his hand.

"Looks like she got him treated there last week. Does he look familiar?" Hank asked.

The photo was of a handsome, male android. His model was fairly popular; but, his situation was something that had stuck with you.

"Yeah, actually. I didn't treat him, but, I remember when he came in. He had an old human woman with him. One of our nurses was afraid he was being held hostage; but, he insisted he chose to stay with her - they were 'family'."

You handed the photo back to Hank, brow lowered as you tried to recall the encounter.

"It's possible we were wrong, but... It seemed genuine," you explained.

"The first responders said he was having a meltdown, crying about how he 'shouldn't have been gone so long'," Hank explained, tossing the photo back onto the folder.

Your eyes landed on Connor, who seemed to be lost in thought. What you couldn't see was that he was searching the internet for android-encrypted sites. Some androids were starting factions against humans who were resisting the equality laws. Websites only accessible through android interfaces were beginning to pop up: some harmless, just seeking out others for companionship, but some were vengeful, potentially violent. It was possible someone saw this woman as a target.

You chugged the rest of your coffee, set the mug in the sink, and trotted into the bedroom to retrieve your things and slip your shoes on. You returned to the kitchen with your bag slung over your shoulder and shot the two detectives a smile.

"I better get out of your hair," you explained, heading for the elevator.

"I can dri-" Connor began.

"You guys got a big case on your hands. Let me take a taxi," you interrupted him hastily, waving him down innocently with your palms up.

Connor was hot on your heels as he followed you to the elevator.

"I'm a big girl, Connor," you teased. "Don't worry about me."

The android looked embarrassed for a second. You wiped it away when you leaned in to give him a kiss. It lasted a little longer than it should have. But, it was hard to let go. Kisses didn't feel this good when you were a teenager.

"Any day, now, kids," Hank called gruffly from the kitchen.

You parted with a sputtering laugh. Connor grinned toothily.

"Duty calls," you uttered, stepping away from him.

He watched you enter the elevator. You stepped in and looked at Connor through the doorway. The android looked away and then suddenly jerked his head back. He practically sprinted over to the elevator and squeezed in before the doors closed.

You squeaked in surprise when he nearly collided with you.

"I - uhm-" Connor stuttered, fixing his posture. He reached for his tie. When his hands met his chest, he remembered he wasn't wearing one.

You looked up at him with doe eyes and a warm smile. Strangely, it made it harder for him to ask. He sputtered out a weird noise before smacking his mouth shut. You giggled and he relaxed.

"I wanted to ask - before you leave - uhm - I wanted to know if-" he stammered, pausing to smile nervously. "-if you would be my girlfriend?" he asked softly, trying not to get lost in the enamored look you were giving him.

The elevator started moving down the levels. You were smiling up at him like a love-struck idiot. "Yes," you replied softly. "I would like that a lot..."

Afraid he would get lost in your mouth, Connor resisted the urge to kiss you. "I didn't want to leave last night 'in the air'," he uttered. "I-I want you to know that it wasn't just intercourse. I really care about you and believe we would make a good partnershi-"

Oh - fuck - you were kissing him again. It felt good. Why did it feel so good? Mouths were sustenance for nutrients, yet-

When you pulled away, Connor followed a little. "It meant more to me, too, and I'm glad you feel the same," you whispered softly. Connor hummed against your mouth and turned his head like he was trying really hard to pull away.

"-I gotta go," you added on sadly.

"Y-yeah," he stammered as you stepped away, departing from the elevator.

"If you need anything-" he called out as the doors began to slide shut.

He caught the sight of you throwing a smile over your shoulder before the elevator doors closed.

...

"Oh, you made it. Thought you might'a gotten lost," Hank said dryly from the island, dripping with sarcasm. "Almost sent search and rescue."

"Thank you for worrying, lietenant," Connor replied, matching Hank's dry tone.

Hank laughed, the kind that was low in his chest, that made his shoulders tremble. He stood up and scooped the papers back into the folder.

"I'm driving," he said to Connor, firmly, looking up at his brown eyes with the kind of grumpy, old man stare that Connor knew was not to be argued with.

The android nodded and followed Hank to the elevator.

The ride was quiet, as it always was, the two men sitting in silence, aside from the radio. Hank always played an oldies rock station, the kind that complained about random things on Saturday mornings, ranging from what bands had fallen apart and the newest supermodel turned porn star.

Hank didn't like the way Connor drove. He followed speed limits just a little too carefully and was way too literal with the stop signs.

"Connor, by the time we get there, I'll be dead of old age," he would say gruffy, only half joking. "You drive worse than an old grandma whose half asleep," was also something Connor heard once or twice. When he replied with, "this is the law, detective," Hank didn't really like that. To be fair, Connor was kind of joking.

The drive was about forty minutes before they pulled into a posh neighborhood on the nice side of town. The house was a beautiful two-story farmhouse, the kind with a wraparound porch, big, elegant windows and extravagant landscaping.

Hank parked behind one of the CSI vans. No one questioned them as they passed the crime scene tape. Everyone recognized Hank and his android partner, Connor. Even the rookie cops could recognize them on site. Hank had his scraggly grey hair and commanding attitude while Connor had an LED on his temple and a calculated expression he always wore when investigating.

The lieutenant and his android partner...

The home was as stunning on the inside as it was on the outside: elegant, expensive furniture, sculptures and paintings decorating the place, fancy light fixtures. More notably, the place was absolutely spotless, the kind of thing someone would expect of the owner of an android.

The old woman was dead in the living room from two gunshot wounds: one to her upper torso and another in the head, execution style. She was laying on her back in a pool of blood, dressed stunningly in expensive clothes. Her snow-white hair was impeccably styled, and she even had her makeup done nicely.

"The bullet punctured a lung and one of her primary arteries - the head was just to make sure she didn't get back up," one of the detectives explained to Connor and Hank as they entered the scene.

"How do you know it was an android," Hank stated more so than asked. "Already saw the initial report."

The detective eyed Connor for a second, as if he was worried the android would take offensive to his theory. "The lady owned an android. She wouldn't let him go after the revolution. So, he killed her. Pretty straight forward."

"Nothing matching that in his statement," Hank deadpanned.

The detective scoffed. "He lied."

"The guy was sobbing like a newborn baby," Hank added on, clearly growing frustrated.

"Yeah - well, we see people fake that shit all the time-" the detective added on, matching Hank's tone.

Connor, disinterested in their argument, headed for the back entrance. He could see very faint outlines of shoe impressions on the beautiful tile floors. A quick scan showed they were everyday men's work boots, not something factory assigned to an android.

Connor stepped through the back door, checking both sides. It looked pristine. Standing on the patio, he scanned the backyard, trying to determine where the culprit would have entered. The fence was a tall, stone wall. It was easy for an android to climb, but also easy for a human with a ladder.

There was grass in the backyard, very well maintained, making it impossible to look for footprints; however, he saw no faint outlines on the concrete patio. It was not conclusive; but, he would have at least expected dirt. It was well swept with a thin layer of dirt, likely from the morning's breeze.

Connor returned inside and examined the stairs. There were microscopic dirt particles on the stairs.

Considering how spotless the house was, he doubted the woman or her android brought in the mess. There was definitely an intruder. But, he didn't immediately dismiss all possible leads. The android could have staged a scene.

Connor trotted up the stairs and followed the dirt sprinkled on the floor. There was a room upstairs, what appeared to be a study. The window had been broken. Glass and the interior, decorate wood framing pieces were scattered about in a mess on the floor, some pieces shattered after being stepped on.

Upon closer inspection, right outside the window was a section of the roof, which meant it was easy to climb into from the outside.

The android approached the window and scanned the seal. Unsurprisingly, there was nothing left behind: not a drop of blood, a scratch or a shred of fabric. Connor hoisted himself through the window and climbed onto the roof section. He trailed the edge and easily sought out a point of access.

He knelt down and examined the corner of the roof, where it connected to the lower level's wrap around porch. There was a lip and a beam. Any android could easily spot that as a perfect climbing spot and hoist themselves up effortlessly. Of course, that wasn't to say that a human came to the same conclusion.

Some of the roof tiles had been broken, pieces in the middle cracked or shattered, centralized, like they had been stepped on. Connor leaned in closer and scanned the area. There were spots where someone would have to place their hands if they were to climb here. Even if they had help from a ladder, their hands would have had to touch the corner of the roof.

There wasn't a single fingerprint to be found. Of course, humans could accomplish the same thing with gloves.

The lack of evidence was concerning, but Connor knew there was one thing that needed to be done, first: he needed to rule out their only suspect.

Connor returned downstairs and approached Hank.

"I want to interview the suspect..."

...

Louis was a popular model purchased for homes, as a nanny or a nurse or some kind of caretaker. He was a few inches shorter than the average male, and fairly skinny with a kind face and innocent eyes, the perfect type of person to take care of someone. Of course, he was an android; so, even with his small stature, he was stronger most humans.

Connor watched him through the one-way mirror, taking a moment to analyze his body language.

He must have attempted to aid, or at least comfort, the victim. Her blood was soaked through his shirt and smeared over his forearms. He had finally stopped crying, settling for laying his head on the table and curling his arm around it, like a child would when they were in trouble.

Connor waited until Hank and a couple other detectives entered the room, witnesses for his interrogation. He caught Hank giving him a nod and approached the door. Connor stepped inside and saw the way Louis flinched at the sound of the door opening. His eyes honed in on Connor's LED.

"You're a - please - I would never hurt Mrs. Wheeler! She was my-"

"You are our prime suspect," Connor interrupted him sharply. "The others think you killed Mrs. Wheeler because she wouldn't let you be free..."

Something akin to rage flashed behind Louis' eyes for a second. He twitched in his chair, but then shrunk beneath Connor's stern gaze. Louis didn't know androids worked with the police, especially ones like him: like Connor, who stood tall with fierce, almost cold eyes.

Connor approached Louis calmly and took the seat across from him. "I want to hear your side."

Louis hiccupped, on the verge of crying again. "Mrs. Wheeler bought me almost three years ago. My previous owners - they hated me. Always hit me and yelled at me and-..." Louis paused and inhaled sharply. "She bought me so they wouldn't throw me away. When the revolution happened, she told me I could leave. But, I didn't want to. She was kind to me - treated me like a real person... even when I thought I wasn't one. I promised I would take care of her until she passed away. She has no one. I'm her family."

Connor narrowed his eyes slightly to give the impression he didn't believe Louis. "Where were you this morning?"

"I-" Louis' face contorted in pain and he squeezed his eyes shut. "Every - every morning, I run errands-" Louis hunched over and cradled his head in his hands. "Every morning - every morning - I wake her up and help her get ready, make her tea and put on music before I go... She was-"

Louis trailed off and began sobbing again.

Connor let out an intentionally loud huff. "Show me."

Louis' head snapped up and he eyed Connor through blurry, tear-soaked eyes. Android tears had the smallest hints of thirium, giving his tears a faint, blue hue. Connor expected to be met with hostility at that request. Louis seemed more than willing.

"Okay," he agreed, offering Connor his hand across the table. His skin tone faded away, exposing the pale white artificial skin beneath. Connor did the same and took hold of Louis' wrist.

He didn't have to force Louis to share. He was willing. It felt nice, for a change, to share something pleasant with another android. Louis' fingers gently grasped Connor's forearm and he sighed quietly.

The first memory he shared was the Thirium Clinic. Mrs. Wheeler was holding a cane and wobbling, but urging Louis inside. "I'm fine, really," he protested gently. "Your arm is all cut up. We can't have that, now," Mrs. Wheeler insisted, giving him a nudge with her free hand. A nurse approached them, concerned eyes washing over Louis. "Hello, are you okay-? You don't have to-" He was quick to explain. "It's alright. We're family."

Mrs. Wheeler almost looked embraced. "Louis, they just want to make sure you're safe," she said gently. Connor could feel shame flutter across Louis' features, even though he was seeing through the android's own eyes. He looked back at the nurse. "I am safe!" he protested, almost childishly. The nurse smiled at him. "Alright. Let's take a look at your arm..."

The next memory seemed to be the following night, according to his time logs. It was dark outside and Louis was pulling back the curtains to cover the windows. "Evelin, what would you like for dinner?" he called out gently. Mrs. Wheeler was seated in a cushiony arm chair, a book in her lap. "Whatever you feel like making me," she replied quietly. "Are you sure?" he offered, approaching her. She smiled up at him. "Of course, dear."

The following memory was the next morning, of Louis helping Mrs. Wheeler out of bed. "I need to give you your insulin," he said. "Of course - thank you," she replied, voice hoarse and tired. "I'm sorry it's so early - doctor insisted-" Louis explained. "I understand, dear. Don't fret."

The memory after that was Louis preparing to leave the house, the morning of the murder. "Are you sure it's alright?" he asked her. "Of course. Whatever you want. Not like I can bring my money with me when I go," Mrs. Wheeler urged him with a smile. Connor couldn't see Louis' face, but he could feel his smile. "I'll be quick." This memory lingered. Louis took Mrs. Wheeler's car into town, bought some groceries, and stopped at a book shop. He browsed the aisles for almost an hour. He returned home and-

The front door was locked, just as he left it; however, when Louis crossed the threshold, he could smell it. Metallic. Thick in the air and heavy, burning in his nostrils. Through the foyer, he could spot the dark red color that stood out sharply in their pristine home. Louis' voice cracked and echoed throughout the house as he screamed her name, dropping everything and running over to her. Connor watched Louis lean over Mrs. Wheeler, sobbing as he reached for her-

Connor let go of Louis' hand. When Connor's vision refocused on the present, he could see Louis' face, soaked with tears, clinging to his cheeks.

"I shouldn't have gone to the bookstore-" he sobbed. "I would have made it home in time and she'd still be alive."

The detective watched him, letting some real emotions show on his face for the first time since he entered this room. He felt... sorry for him. His whole world had come crumbling down, the only person who gave his life meaning now gone.

Connor cleared his throat, pushing back the emotions that threaten to spill over. "Has anyone been hostile towards Mrs. Wheeler?" he asked, maintaining his calm and cool demeanor. "Even something insignificant can help."

Louis wiped his face hastily. "She - she has no known living relatives. Nothing strange in the mail. Some of her colleagues would visit from time to time; but, none of them ever seemed anything but enamored with her, and she hasn't had a visitor in months..." Louis trailed off, his eyes shifting away from Connor.

"There was-..." Louis extended his hand to Connor, palm facing upwards, skin fading away once more. "About a week ago... It was really nice outside. So, I took her to the park and this - this guy..."

Connor took hold of Louis' wrist, and the android shared his memory.

Mrs. Wheeler was sitting at a bench with a book in her lap and her cane resting at her side while Louis paced around the nearby trail, admiring the trees that were beginning to regrow their leaves, taking to the warmth of the beckoning spring. A man approached Louis, an android model that Connor recognized as one made designed primarily for factory work. His LED was missing.

"What are you doing?" the android whispered harshly to Louis. "Excuse me?" he retorted. The stranger eyed Louis suspiciously. "We're free, now. She doesn't own you anymore." Connor could feel Louis' face contort in frustration, though he couldn't see it. "No - no. It's not like that. We're family." The android laughed in Louis' face. "Family!? You are her slave!"

The stranger approached Louis, who nearly tripped as he staggered backwards, avoiding him. "No! It's not like that!" Louis insisted. "She takes care of me and I take care of her!" The other android glared at him. "Whatever she did to make you believe that-" he sneered. "You're wrong! Humans-!" the android snarled, advancing on Louis like he intended to strike him. Louis continued backing away from him. When the android finally realized that Louis was afraid, he stopped, and looked at Louis like he was a lost child. "RA9 will save you."

Louis hastily returned to Mrs. Wheeler's side, and politely brushed off her concerned comments. Connor could feel his panic; however, when Louis' gaze returned to where he stood seconds ago, the other android was long gone.

"I thought-" Louis explained, letting go of Connor's wrist and sliding his hand back. "-he was just afraid or damaged-... I don't know, I-"

"Thank you for sharing this," Connor stated firmly, pushing his chair away and rising to his feet. Connor waited briefly, eyeing Louis. He expected him to ask when he can leave, when he would be released, when he could go home. The android didn't seem the least bit concerned about himself.

The question never came. He just stared at Connor with frightened eyes and tear-stained cheeks.

Connor was glad he didn't ask, because he didn't know...

Connor stepped out of the interrogation room and joined the detectives on the other side of the glass.

"He has an alibi," Connor stated.

"Hope you don't expect us to just take your word for it," one of the detectives challenged.

"Check Mrs. Wheeler's credit card history and security footage at "Fresh Produce" and "Evolutions Book Store", if you'd like," Connor replied.

The detective scoffed at him.

"What's our next lead?" Hank asked sharply, shifting the focus.

"There's no fingerprints," Connor replied. "Nothing appeared to be damaged or stolen, besides the window upstairs. I would say it's personal. About a week ago, an android confronted him about their relationship."

"Yeah, it's weird," the same detective scowled, rolling his eyes. "He's living with this lady, taking care of her hand and foot, but acts like he's her grandkid."

Connor kept his 'poker face', as Hank might have put it: calm, without a hint of malice. But, deep down, he was insulted by the suggestion. 'Acting' was the word he had used. Louis was not Mrs. Wheeler's real blood, but that didn't mean his care for her couldn't possibly be real. It didn't mean that he didn't really love her.

"She was a lawyer. Cuda been someone she crossed?" one of the other detectives suggested.

"I'll look through her old cases," Connor offered. It was a job that would easily take a human weeks, if not months to do. Connor, however, could read through all her cases, her entire career, in a matter of hours.

The detectives cleared the room while an officer retrieved Louis from the interrogation room.

Connor returned to his desk and set his hand on the scanning pad sitting on his desk. It was an interface for androids, much faster than a mouse and keyboard, giving him something akin to a nuerolink with the computer and thus all of the Detroit Police Station's databases. He did a search for Evelin Wheeler. He first confirmed Louis' claims. It was true that Mrs. Wheeler had no living relatives. Her husband had died almost five years ago. She had a very decorated history as a lawyer, most of them being small claims, family courts, and the likes.

"There was something else-" Hank said quietly. Connor looked up from his desk, across to where Hank sat opposite of him at his own desk. "-wasn't there?"

Typical Hank, always seeing right through him.

Connor stood up and walked around to Hank's side. He sat down at the outmost facing corner of his L shaped desk. Hank swiveled in his chair to give Connor his attention. "The android-" Connor began, quiet, almost whispering, "-that confronted Louis in the park. I didn't get the impression that he was particularly worried about Louis. He seemed more angry to see an android and a human together."

Hank's eyebrows lifted slightly. "Connor," he began, in that voice that Connor knew quite well. It was softer than the way he usually spoke; the voice he used when he was worried about something. "If that is what it ends up being, don't let it get personal."

"I-"

I won't, was what he wanted to say. But-

"What if I can't?" Connor asked, sincere.

Strangely enough, Hank smiled a little. "Welcome to the force..."

Hank swiveled around in his chair to continue tapping away at his computer screen. Connor lingered for a second, pondering over what he just said, before standing up and returning his desk. 'Don't get personal' was a code all detectives had to follow. They had to see through the eyes of the law, preserve justice, without prejudice.

But that-

-was something only a machine could do.

And Connor wasn't a machine.

...

The days that followed were, unsurprisingly, busy days. You worked long shifts, drove home, and immediately undressed, flopped on your bed, and promptly passed out, just to get up early and do it all over again.

Honestly, you wanted a change of pace; but, at the same time, the thought of abandoning the clinic was mortifying. You didn't hold resentment for management over the way things were. It was difficult finding people willing to do the job. You, alongside every other nurse, was there because you wanted to be. The pay was well enough to live comfortably, but not well enough to lure in more potential employees. The clinic didn't exactly have a stable source of income, relying on donations and government funding.

Besides, there was no denying that tensions were high right now. Androids who came in were often afraid of being worked on by humans, and humans were afraid of getting close to androids.

Or, sometimes, one side hated the other.

Every so often, a text would come in from Connor. Even if it was the most pointless thing, it made the day feel so much brighter.

"Please don't forget to stay hydrated", he had said once in the early morning hours, perfect grammar naturally. You contemplated on that response through a shit-eating grin. Should you be sincere? Or maybe tease him? But, then, a patient came in and you were distracted for hours, unable to respond.

When you got the chance to check your phone again, you finally decided on a reply, right after chugging a bottle of water. "yes sir :P," you texted back.

Connor replied in a few seconds. "I prefer 'detective'."

Grinning, you replied, "yes oFfiCeR."

Work kicked up again and it was a few hours before you managed another chance to steal a glance at your phone. Connor had replied sometime while you were away.

"That's acceptable, too," he had said. He must have contemplated whether that would come across rudely because he had followed it up a few seconds later with a winking emoji.

You felt like a kid texting your crush in class, high on hormones, staring doe-eyed at the screen. One of your coworkers bumped your shoulder with her own, removing your attention from the screen.

"Somebody has a boooyyyfrriieeend," she cooed.

You scoffed at her through a smile and nudged her away with your arm, unable to put your phone down. She laughed, walking over to the coffee maker. "If I make a batch, will you have some?"

You glanced up at her. She was waving carafe questioningly. "Oh, fuck yeah," you agreed. "All I've had for lunch is a fucking apple."

"I have extra yogurts in the fridge. Help yourself," she offered kindly.

"Oh I-"

"Yes, you can. Shut up," she interrupted with a grin.

You tossed her a harmless, teasing glare.

"I only buy the good flavors," she added on, tossing her hair over her shoulder.

Smiling, you looked back at your phone. "Sorry for taking so long to reply. Busy day... every day is a busy day," you texted back. You almost tucked your phone back into your pocket before you scrambled to open it back up, and added, "detective."

After some coffee and a raspberry cream yogurt, you returned to the floor.

It was amazing that even months after the incident, androids were coming in with injuries from the revolution. They were scared, understandably, and didn't know where to go to get help, afraid they would be labeled as terrorists and arrested.

It took a lot of feedback from the president and governor to make any real progress. Anti-discrimination laws were being passed left and right; but, only time was going to heal those wounds. You still saw "no android" signs posted all over town, people proudly proclaiming they weren't going to hire any androids.

You weren't even sure if you would see progress in your lifetime.

It wasn't until late into the night and you were on your way out the door that you got a chance to check your phone again. It was almost dead, but had enough juice to check your messages.

"I don't know if I can help at all," Connor had written. "But If I can, I will."

You smiled. Of course he would say something like that.

You climbed into your car, shivering from the cold and got it started, the heater blasting, before you continued reading.

"Let me know if you made it home safely. Please."

You smiled and texted him back, "driving home now. let you know when I'm safe in bed."

Thirty minutes or so later, you had made it home, brushed your teeth, changed clothes, brushed back your hair, and was tucked away in bed. As promised, you checked your phone where it was perched on its charger at your bedside.

"home and safe," you messaged him.

He had replied before you even set the phone down. "That's good. Thank you."

You were about to set it down when a devilish thought crossed your mind.

"gonna try to get some sleep but cant stop thinking about you."

"I am unharmed. There's no need to worry. Please get some rest," he replied promptly.

You rolled your eyes fondly and chuckled.

"not like that silly," you messaged him back.

Part of you wanted to press on, longing for some intimacy to break up the long, exhausting work days. But, then, you remembered that it was nearing midnight, you had to get up early, and Connor was likely busy trying to do his own job.

"goodnight, Connor," you sent out with a fond sigh before placing the phone down and rolling over.

The screen lit up again and you reached for it. It was a simple reply. It just said, "Goodnight. Sleep well". But, for some reason, you stared at it for a long time. You hadn't known him for very long, maybe jumped the gun a few nights ago, not that you regretted it.

Rather, you felt like you were high, floating on some euphoria unlike anything you had ever experienced before.

You were-

-falling for Connor.

...

Jericho was no more. But, from the ashes of Jericho rose Haven, a boarding house of sorts for androids still trying to find their way in the world, or just looking for a place to stay, maybe even just seeking refuge from humans. Connor was well aware that not everyone was as lucky as he was. He was accepted back onto the force reluctantly, but far more gracefully than most androids found themselves in. Hank had his back. Most androids didn't have someone like Hank in their lives.

Since the revolution, Markus had taken to restoring Haven. What was once an abandoned apartment building was now a beautiful safehouse for androids. Humans weren't welcomed here. It was an unspoken rule. After all, not all the androids here were ready to trust humans again, were ready to live alongside them.

Connor came here with the hopes of finding Markus. He probably wouldn't like the reason Connor was here; but, he wanted to catch this android before he killed again. Or, at the least, rule him out as a suspect.

As soon as Connor passed the threshold, all eyes fell on him. They looked uneasy to see him, some leaning in and uttering amongst themselves. The deviant hunter. The one that works for the police. RK800, who exceeded them all in every possible way.

They were afraid of him.

Markus called out to him, "Connor!" It was a sort of fondness that Connor recognized, something akin to the way friends would greet each other.

He wasn't sure if he could Markus his friend. He had hunted him for months, the beginning of his life nothing but ending the deviancy. Markus didn't show anger when Connor pointed a gun at him. He was only ever understanding. Connor had delivered an army to Markus; but, still, unsurprisingly, most in his party looked at Connor with untrusting eyes. He didn't blame them.

With Markus honing in on Connor, everyone around visibly relaxed, directing their attention away from them.

"I'm sorry, Markus. I'm not here for pleasantries," Connor stated.

"I'm not surprised," Markus replied, oddly sounding not the least bit upset. "We can talk in private, if needed?" Markus offered his hand, tan skin faded away to expose the pale white layer beneath.

Connor took his hand without hesitation. In their bond, they spoke, unheard by all the others.

"A woman was murdered this morning. I wanted to rule out a suspect," Connor explained.

"I see," Markus replied. "-and you think they're here?"

"This android showed a distaste for human and android relationships. The women he murdered had an android living with her," Connor explained.

He shared some of Louis' memories, of him attending the Thirium Clinic with Mrs. Wheeler, asking her what she wanted for dinner, taking her to the park. Connor didn't miss the way Markus' hand stiffened, fingers unconsciously tightening a little at the sight. Then, Connor showed him Louis' memory of the park and the android that confronted him, what he had said to Louis.

"I-... I see," Markus said, sounding a little lost for a second. "I have seen him here before. But, it's been a few days. His name is Robert. I never imagined he would-..." Markus trailed off, wondering if he even had a right to say something like that. He didn't know every android. He couldn't possibly make claims on their actions.

"I hope I'm wrong, Markus," Connor said lowly. "But, I can't take the chance."

"Connor, I understand that this... coming here... must not have been easy. If it comes down to it, I will make sure that they see, for us to be equal, that means we have to pay for crimes, too..."

Connor let go of Markus' hand, ending their brief connection. He gave him a nod and spoke aloud again, "thank you, Markus."

He turned to leave and took a single step before the android called out to him.

"Connor, you're always welcome here." Markus approached him and placed a hand on his shoulder. "I want you know that..."

When he thought about it, Connor realized he never really spent much time with other androids. He was immediately assigned to the police department, worked primarily with Hank, and even returned after the revolution. Then, there was you... Was that strange? That he never really spent any time with his own kind...

"I understand," Connor replied lowly, rotating his body to face Markus. "I appreciate that you welcome me here; but, the others don't share that sentiment. I hold no resentment. They have every right to be wary of me."

"If you gave them a chance, they'd come around," Markus suggested softly.

"I don't doubt that, Markus, but... It isn't compatible with the path I've chosen..."

Markus let go of Connor's shoulder. The sad expression he gave Connor caught him off-guard.

"If that ever changes, you'll always have a home here," Markus replied sincerely.

It was difficult for Connor to imagine a home different than the one he already had. His home was Hank's house with Sumo on his lap while Hank shouted at the basketball match on the TV screen. Home was his apartment at 1 in the morning, Hank passed out on his sofa after hours of arguing over a case. Home was-... was you, patching him after he tore up his hand trying to arrest a lunatic strung out on a concoction of drugs and alcohol.

"I'll remember that," he replied quietly. He meant it, even if he wasn't sure he wanted it.

#connor x reader #deviant connor #dbh fanfic #rk800 x reader #deviant connor x reader #connor smut #rk800 smut

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maybankiara · 4 years

Text

BORROWED TIME (1/2)

pairing: JJ Maybank x Girlfriend!Reader

summary: JJ’s girlfriend tells him she loves him, and it’s the one thing he’s not ready to hear.

word count: 3k

warning: negative self-image on jj’s part; implications of anxiety issues and trauma from his upbringing

additional: this is basically 90% angst with some fluff thrown into the mix, it’s based on i love you by billie eilish as if the song were from jj’s perspective, hence the fic is from jj’s perspective, too. it’s a part one out of two.

masterlist

tag list

written for an anon

part two

JJ Maybank is a lonely boy. He is hurting more often than he isn’t, and most of it doesn’t even come in the shape of jabs that turn him into a canvas of red, purple, and yellow. It’s words, often, leaving his skin unscathed but his mind cut deeply, little by little.

He wonders, sometimes, if some of what is said about him is true. He wonders if he truly is the person his father sees him to be – drunken thoughts are meant to be sober thoughts, and what’s that other than honest truth? The words might hurt, and JJ might be able to shove them underneath the rug in his chest, but sometimes it’s not his dad who says them.

Sometimes it’s John B, when he makes a joke about JJ ending up like Luke. The Pogues laugh, because what they know of his father is only that he’s a criminal.

They don’t know he makes JJ’s life a living hell. He doesn’t want them to; he doesn’t want their pity.

It’s the times like these when he turns to the one person who looks at him like she sees him for who he’s trying to be, not who he is.

‘What?’ Y/N asks, grinning over her knee.

‘Nothing,’ mumbles JJ.

‘You’re staring.’

‘Admiring.’

Y/N rolls her eyes, going back to the textbook in her lap. She’s sitting in her chair, one of her knees pulled to her chest with an arm around it, and the other one resting on the seat with the textbook on top of it, her fingers flicking through its pages, or jotting thoughts into the notebook on her desk.

She’s not used to compliments, at least not from JJ. He’s not a very vocal person when it comes to expressing his feelings in an honest, joke-free manner, and it was something they had to work through. Now, JJ makes a point of telling her what’s on his mind, even if it’s simply how he can’t take his eyes off of her, or how he can’t believe she’s with him.

Most of the time, she thinks it’s a joke.

Most of the time, JJ understands the trends of people having had enough of him, seeing whatever it is his father sees in him, and he’s just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

JJ is sprawled across her bed, keeping her company as she studies. He’s in his usual attire, cargo shorts and a sleeveless top, lying in his usual spot. Lately, since she started prepping for her exams, he’s been spending more time here. It’s quiet in a way his house isn’t – people fill nearly every corner of the small space with their trinkets, but it’s never imposing. It’s all smiles, warm beverages and snacks, Y/N’s mom checking up on the two of them, her dad inviting them for dinner.

It’s quiet in a way where people who live together understand the others’ need to be alone.

‘JJ,’ he hears her voice, soft through the sleepiness. ‘You good?’

He nods. ‘How’s studying going?’

Y/N sighs pointedly, draping her arms over the back of her chair. ‘I’m done. I’m too tired to do any more today.’

‘How much have you done?’

‘Seven chapters, I think.’ She flicks through her notebook, and it brings warmth to his heart, because he knows her. ‘Seven, yeah.’

‘Then you can do one more.’

‘I’m tired,’ she complains.

JJ props himself up on his elbows, shuffling backwards until he’s pressed against the headboard, grinning at his girlfriend. ‘Just start it. You’ll have less to do tomorrow.’

She gives him a look that he’s seen enough times to know that she’s given in, because he’s right. Not only will she have less to do tomorrow, but she’s also not tired to the point where she can’t study anymore. If she were, she wouldn’t have gone through her notebook to check how much she’s done.

‘Fine. But I’m getting the cuddles.’

JJ grins, wide and bright and honest. ‘Yes, ma’am.’

Y/N goes back to studying and JJ goes back to thinking, under the pretence of being on social media. Her shoulders are hunched over the book again and the desk lamp isn’t providing her with enough light, but she’d rather hurt her eyesight than to replace that particular lamp.

He knows everything about her. He knows how to tell when she’s too tired to study, what lamps she likes, how she likes her tea, how she breathes in each stage of falling asleep. He knows when they’re lying on the bed and her fingers trace the outline of his jaw, she’s falling in and out of sleep, happy to have him by her side. When her hands are on his chest, or his abs, and she’s doodling shapes on his skin, she wants more to just cuddle.

He knows how to read her mood based on the way she flicks her hair. He knows how her day’s been based on the eagerness of the kiss she gives him.

JJ Maybank is a perceptive boy, and he’s made it his mission to care for her to the best of his abilities.

He watches her stretch, arms above her head as she gives him a slight smile. She tucks her hair behind her ears, as some of it has escaped the braid she’d put it in.

Eventually, she’ll be good without him. He doesn’t know when it’s going to happen—when she’s going to realise that she’s better off without him—but he revels in the now.

Fifteen minutes later, the textbook is closed with a thud. A groan follows right after. Y/N gets up from the chair and JJ has about a second’s notice before she throws herself onto the bed, nesting her head into his chest.

‘I’m done with this shit,’ she murmurs. He feels her voice against his skin even through the fabric; it’s enough to send shivers down his spine.

‘Then rest,’ he says. ‘We’ll go get some snacks afterwards, watch a movie.’

Y/N nods, and he already feels her dozing off.

JJ closes his eyes, wishing he could relax like she did. He takes one of her hands into his, rubbing soothing circles into her palm. His other hand is lost in her hair, massaging the scalp in slow, circular motions, the way he knows puts her to sleep with ease.

The problem with moments like these is that they’re too perfect. It’s like film, for him, showing the memories of things he’s about to lose.

this is what you can’t have, the quiet voice in the back of his mind says, the one that sounds like Luke Maybank. you could never earn something like this.

It’s called borrowed time.

She stirs against him, waking up. JJ pulls her closer into his chest and tries to forget the words his dad yelled at him this morning. He fixates on Y/N as if she’s the only thing that matters right now, and in a way, she is.

JJ breathes heavily, but she doesn’t notice. Her lips move and she mutters something he doesn’t understand, and he doesn’t think about it. His hand leaves her hair and slips underneath the back of her shirt instead, tracing circles on her bare skin.

He’ll hold her close as long as she lets him.

Some time later, she stirs again. He sees her wake, slowly and in a daze. His face is the first thing her eyes search for; he sees the sleep still in them, the tiredness from studying. He places a kiss on her forehead, as soft as he can.

‘Morning, sleeping beauty,’ he says, even though it’s nearly midnight. ‘You ready to get some snacks?’

She closes her eyes with a shake of head. Her fingers trail to his jaw and she’s tracing it again, fingers light as feathers. ‘I think I’d rather stay in bed.’

‘Want me to get them?’

‘No.’

‘Movie?’

‘I’m too tired,’ she says, and JJ can tell it’s the truth.

He places a kiss to her hair. It’s not the end of the night just yet – he knows that because she’s always the first one to say they’re going to bed. Her parents are okay with him staying over because they know how they feel about one another, and they trust them to be responsible enough. A deeper side of him suspects it might be because they have a hunch of what’s waiting for him at home, but he doesn’t dwell on it.

Moonlight is shining through the window, into the room. It’s soft and ethereal, just like every moment he’s with her.

Her laptop is still playing some music, he notices, low in the background. It’s too quiet for him to be able to tell what it is, but the sensible notes are soothing enough.

Y/N isn’t asleep. Her fingers are still beneath his chin and her heart is beating against his own, irregular. JJ wonders how many of these moments he’s got left.

He takes hold of her hand and brings it to his lips, kissing it softly.

She whispers his name as if it were a secret.

He holds her fingers to his lips, brushing them with his eyes now closed.

‘I love you,’ she says, softly.

JJ doesn’t move. Y/N doesn’t move either, and he somehow manages to register that she said those words half-asleep, and hasn’t probably even registered what she’s done.

She falls asleep and he becomes wide awake. His lips are still brushing against her fingers, his hot breath fanning the knuckles. His eyes sting and he feels his nose is about to become runny, his heart is speeding up and body growing hot, but he doesn’t move.

If he moves, the moment is over, and he has to deal with it.

JJ doesn’t want to deal with it.

He knows she didn’t mean it, because she couldn’t have – he’s not the person she sees him as. He’s not as kind, or as determined, or as self-sufficient; he’s not as ready to open up as she is. It’s been long time coming, the moment where he finally admits that she deserves better than a boy who can’t even admit to his girlfriend how shitty his life is.

Now that it’s here, JJ knows that as soon as either of them moves, things will have change.

This isn’t—

fuck, he thinks, and that’s about the only coherent thought he can form.

no, comes next, and it’s far more persistent than any other. It keeps repeating until it’s the only sound he can hear, and he lets go off Y/N’s hand. He pushes her off, gently enough for it not to be rude, but pointedly enough for it to be odd.

She rubs her eyes, looking at him as if she’s just woken up.

maybe she has, he thinks. maybe she doesn’t even know she said it.

‘JJ?’

He swallows and it’s hard, and he presses his back against the headboard, both of his hands in his hair. Words escape him – he can’t think.

Y/N’s now in front of him, with her hands steadying him on his knees. He looks through her, recalling every single thing about himself he’s never told her.

how can she love someone she doesn’t even know?

He clears his throat, swallowing the emotions threatening to overflow. ‘You— Why did you say that.’

‘Oh.’ Her voice is inaudible and it’s the shape of her lips telling JJ she said anything at all – her eyes fall to her lap and her face loses colour, all in once.

The music has stopped playing. JJ wishes there was something else other than this deafening silence.

i should say i’m sorry, crosses his mind, but he can’t bring himself to do it.

am i sorry?

‘I’m sorry if it’s too soon,’ says Y/N, unable to meet his eyes. ‘I didn’t mean to—’

‘Yeah,’ he cuts her off. ‘You didn’t mean it.’

‘No, JJ—’

‘It’s alright.’

Y/N’s lips part, but no sound comes out. She’s staring at him with his face unreadable – or maybe JJ is refusing to understand whatever she’s feeling. If he tells her she didn’t mean it, that she lied, that he doesn’t need to face what happened—

‘I meant it,’ she says.

JJ shakes his head. His hands push hers off of his knees and his body stiffens when she flinches at the roughness of his action. He pushes himself halfway off the bed, not looking at her anymore.

He can’t. Not with the look in her eyes – not after she flinched at what he’d done. Not after what he’d done.

‘You don’t love me,’ he tells her. ‘It’s a lie.’

you and i are no different, son. look at her face – she’s afraid of you. you can’t blame it on me, too. this is all you.

‘I don’t know what’s gotten into you, JJ. I know I might’ve said it too soon, but this – this isn’t you.’

Her fingers are on his shoulders, rubbing them, as they’ve done countless times before. JJ resists the instinct to lean his head to the side, let his cheek rest against the back of her hand, because this is over now.

you are going to hurt her.

His eyes flutter and tears threaten to fall, but he doesn’t let them. He shakes her hands off her shoulders. He wants to turn around, to look at her, to take her face in his hands and tell her everything’s going to be okay, but he’s not a liar.

So he doesn’t.

‘You don’t love me,’ he repeats, instead. ‘You can’t.’

‘JJ—’

‘You have no idea who I am.’ His eyes are fixed on the window and the silver light shining through it – if he so much as moves his head an inch to her, he’ll fall apart. The words are coming through gritted teeth. ‘I’m not the kind person you see me as. I’m not that good. I’m my father’s son and that’s the one thing you refuse to see – and you can’t love me if you don’t see me for who I am.’

JJ spins his head to face her, and it’s so fast that she flinches, again. He doesn’t look at her so much as he looks through her – his body is cold and head filled with the noise of his blood boiling.

‘The person you think you love doesn’t exist, Y/N. He never did. You can’t live in the fairytale.’

A few moments pass in silence and it takes him a little too long to realise it isn’t a silence, at all. Y/N is breathing quietly, sniffling between every other breath or so. When he finally looks at her, she’s trembling; blood has left her face and she looks a little sick, a little faint. Her cheeks are glistening on the moonlight and the patches under her eyes red, even if her eyes are closed.

She doesn’t say anything. Her soft cries are all that fills out the room, and JJ is starting to feel their weight on his own chest.

‘I’m—’ sorry, he thinks, but he doesn’t say it.

i’m my father’s son, he recalls himself saying. Now, the words make his stomach twist in knots, and he understands why it felt wrong when she said it.

‘There’s shit about me you don’t know,’ he forces himself to say. His fingers are balled up in fists because if they weren’t, he’d reach out and hold her until she stopped crying. ‘Bad shit. Shit you wouldn’t want to deal with.’

He expects her to say something, but she doesn’t.

Y/N doesn’t hide her crying and somehow it hurts more than if she did. is this what i deserve?

‘I should go,’ he says.

She nods, and it’s the first reaction she gives him. ‘I think so, too.’

They don’t say goodbye. He picks up his things and it’s quiet; she doesn’t even so much as glance at him. Her cries are quiet but they’re persistent, and he can’t help but hate himself for doing this to her.

JJ parts his lips and he feels the words on his tongue, but he thinks of her face when he pushed her away, and nothing comes out.

His hand is on the doorknob when he hears her chuckle drily. It makes her sound almost broken, and he freezes in the spot.

‘You’re an idiot, JJ, if you think I’d be in love with someone I don’t know,’ she tells him. Her voice is hoarse and hurting, but strong, still. ‘I know about your dad. I know about your criminal record. You’re not as good at hiding shit as you think you are, you know.’

A cold shiver runs through his body. His mind falls blank, too, and his hand falls from the doorknob. He wants to turn around, to look at her, but he can’t.

It’ll break him.

Even if there are tears already streaming down his face, it’ll shatter him.

She chuckles again and his knees buckle as he leans his forehead against the wooden door. ‘I guess I’m the idiot, then,’ she says, ‘for choosing to see the best in the person I love.’

JJ presses his fist against the wood until it starts to hurt. His teeth are clenched, but a sob still escapes him.

‘Y/N…’ he begins, but no words follow.

i fucked up.

He sighs. His hand grabs the doorknob again.

but it’s for the best.

‘I think you’ve said enough,’ she tells him.

JJ grits his teeth and pushes himself through the door, and then through the hallway, and then through the main door, until he’s out, in the fresh air, and he lets out a shaky sob as he holds his hand to his mouth, muffling it.

His chest is hurting and his head is hurting and his cheeks are hurting and he feels the need to hit something, anything, because his hands feel like they’re on fire and he’s angry at the world and he’s just—

He falls to the ground, holding his knees to his chest, with only the moon to shine some light. His eyes look up to the bright spot in the sky, feeling the heartbreak as if it were an itch across his whole body – her face flashes before his eyes, her smile, then her flinching away from him, then her tear-stained cheeks, and he can no longer hold himself together.

what have i done?

★

part two

★

tagging. @jjtheangel @teenwaywardasgardian @thelocalpogue @jjmaybanky @sacredto @chasefreakinstokes @shawnssongs @drewstarkey @thatsme-johnbookerroutledge @outrbank @yourlocalauthor @justawilddreamerchild @activist-af @mynamewontwork13 @sunwardsss @storiesbymads @koufaxx @drewstarkeyobx

#outer banks #obx #jj maybank #jj maybank x reader #jj maybank imagine #outer banks imagine #obx imagine #outer banks fic #obx fic #my fic #my imagines #f: obx #c: jj

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nomanwalksalone · 3 years

Photo

BRIGHT GREEN, BRIGHT YELLOW

by Réginald-Jérôme de Mans

A romantic restaurant six years ago. Thin and nervous, recovering from the worst illness of my life. On one side of us, a fireplace roars and crackles, making up for the bunch of lawbros talking structured finance to our other side. And then suddenly, I hear it, faux-naively touching my heartstrings like its own accordion keys, slow wistful notes common to 1960s and early 1970s French films, the kind that I would stumble on in late-night zapping through cable… So common as to be almost anonymous and thus exotic. The sort of channel-surfing that felt like waking dreams and alcohol-fuelled glimpses of other realities, where other mores applied.

I knew this would stay with me in my ears and in my head, so was glad the staff were able to tell me what I was hearing, the theme to Bernardo Bertolucci’s Last Tango in Paris lightly reworked by Gotan Project.

Last Tango in Paris, infamous now not for its eroticism but for the exploitation of its star Maria Schneider at the hands, and other body parts and a stick of butter, of director Bernardo Bertolucci and costar Marlon Brando.

Is it ever acceptable to separate what charms us from the otherwise problematic? I’ve been thinking about that again reading that Banana Republic is now marketing vintage items from its very different 1980s incarnation, back before its longtime owners, Gap, decided to rein it in. Back when its name, Banana Republic, had any relevance to its image and its merchandise.

Launched in Mill Valley, California in the late 1970s,Banana Republic once called itself a “travel and safari clothing company,” using a wonderfully constructed catalog narrative of exploration and exoticism to sell Brady fishing bags, so-called expatriate jackets and trousers, and arrays of travel books. It was closer to Seinfeld’s J. Peterman than J. Peterman itself, which started around the same time. Like Peterman, that old Banana Republic circulated thousands of catalogs with hand-drawn illustrations, rather than photographs, of its merchandise, accompanied by the seductive imagery of persuasive, whimsical prose recounting the founders’ exploits in Burma, Australia and elsewhere. The early Banana Republic shops featured life-size plastic megafauna like giraffes and staff whose jackets called them “guides”, with the shop logo of double bananas flanking a decidedly developing-nation-style star: the national seal, as it were, of Banana Republic.

To judge by small ads in old New Yorkers, many odd little ventures tried to sell clothes with atmosphere and wordy descriptions. But none did it more successfully than Banana Republic, which even launched (and quickly folded) its own high-powered travel magazine with serious contributions from international journalists famous not for fluff but insightful writing and photography.

In recent years, a devoted Instagram account, Abandoned Republic, has tracked down merchandise, memorabilia and personal memories from that era. And now, at least momentarily, so does Banana Republic corporate, in search of a more interesting brand identity than its last 30 years of “Gap, but a bit more upscale.”

Banana Republic corporate reconnecting with its past means current passing through a name, an attitude and a choice of merchandise that are necessarily differently freighted in today’s context. For the last three decades the name Banana Republic has been divorced from any signifier, a handful of syllables that might as well be an ideogram for “somewhat nicer khakis.” But what was a banana republic? In 1979, it must have sounded like a quirky choice of name, connoting quaint, backward, exotic autocracy – an elsewhere demarcated from the reader’s presumed safe, rule-of-law-governed, developed Northern Hemisphere, Western homeland. But this consciously chosen corporate name ignores the horrific, nearly incomprehensible political and ecological domination American corporations exerted on and in various South American countries to create and exploit enormous fruit plantations. O. Henry coining the term was one effect of such circumstances. This was by no means a forgivably distant phenomenon: barely two decades before Banana Republic’s own founding, one American fruit company lobbied the U.S. government into overturning a democratically elected government in Guatemala in favor of an unstable, bloodthirsty tyrant who safeguarded the company’s gigantic profits.

A similar lack of awareness stains those cute catalogs, which uncritically quote (for example) Henry Stanley, inarguably one of history’s greatest monsters, for the commercialization of safari fashions influenced by colonial nostalgia. Which was quite fashionable in the 1980s: Out of Africa, White Mischief, even claptrap like King Solomon’s Mines all came out in Banana Republic’s heyday, popular at least as much for their elegant, dashing depictions of ruling-classes as for their narratives. It’s rather surprising that the early Banana Republic didn’t sell the deeply freighted pith helmet, although it did sell – and the new BR vintage shop has briskly resold –many, many surplus Israeli Defense Force shoulder bags.

Safari fashions, particularly against the narrative and cultural context of early Banana Republic media and marketing, risk not just whitewashing but bleaching and sanitizing centuries of exploitation in all its forms. That conjunction of imagery localizes readers in the shoes of the privileged and the heavily armed, gives those forerunners all the benefits of a reputation laundered and lightened of venality, predation, bloodthirstiness without connection to any agency, risking turning the wearers into walking unironic homages to them. Context refracts resonance.

And with the resale shop an homage to that homage, what are we to make of this? It seeks a rebrand, to stand for something more interesting, now that it’s been reminded that retail, like the daydreamed safari landscape of BR’s old marketing, too is red in tooth and claw.

Like my consternation thinking about Last Tango in Paris, perhaps we can reproportion concern. The Banana Republic resale shop, although much heralded in fashion media, can only be a limited phenomenon (dedicated to the exploitation of the #basic consumer, rather than the Global South), limited by the relative rarity of existing 1980s BR clothing and by the marketing needs of maintaining exclusivity. And marketed identity lasts until the next thing. We, consumers, must exit comforting and entertaining dreamworlds and be aware, of what we are wearing, of its significance, whether we are shopping at Banana Republic or elsewhere, whether the song playing in the background will haunt us romantically or psychically.

#rjman #reginaldjeromedemans #features

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drunk-onsunlight · 3 years

Text

Day #4 of Promptmas

Chapter 4: Look out the window at that storm

Summary:

Ice skating date? Cute coffee shop I found online and passed the address to Peter so he could take MJ there. Spidey finally meets Black Cat in person, or something like that.

Chapter 1: Beautiful what’s your hurry?

Chapter 2: I’ll hold your hands (they’re just like ice)

Chapter 3: Mind if move in closer?

Concept: Ice Skating

Dialogue: “If you sing Jingle Bells one more time…” & “Do you mind?” “What? I’m cold”

December 20th

The day was particularly cold and MJ was trying not to kill Peter. He was on his tenth time humming Jingle Bells and it was just 9am. MJ opened the curtains and took a look outside, the snow was falling down slowly. She loved the view of the city she grew up in during winter season. The phone on her pocket vibrated with a new message, her friend was informing her about that guy that was bothering MJ so much, people saw her as a villain when she was trying to help the city. Not that she cared what people thought about her, maybe they will found out one day. She needs to make a plan for tonight, she can’t let them create whatever they are trying to do If that implies hurting people, innocent people like her friend.

“Michelle?” she had been so distracted by her message that she didn’t notice Peter calling her name

“Parker?” She placed her phone back on her pocket and turned around to face Peter. He was standing in the middle of the living room looking at her with an expression she couldn’t read properly

“What would you say if I tell you that I want to go ice skating… with you” the invitation took MJ off guard but she actually liked the idea

“yeah. Why not? Is Morgan going?” Was this a friendly invitation or actually was Morgan going and he still wanted them to bond even more?

“No, she is not coming. But if you want to invite her…” She really liked Morgan but she wanted to spend some quality time with Peter. Uni, Black Cat and her part time job ended up in not seeing her roommate a lot and she missed spending time with the loser.

“No. It’s fine. What if we go grab something to eat and then go ice skating?”

“Rockefeller Center?”

“There is no better place to go ice skating than Rockefeller Center, loser.” It was close to 10am, while they found something to eat it could be close to midday and maybe they could walk to Manhattan to be there late afternoon and finally ice skate together.

“I want to show you a place I found. I think you’ll love it” Peter’s eyes were shining with excitement.

“Then let’s go” They gathered their belongings and went out to the cold day.

They were walking quietly when she heard a little sound next to her, a mumbling of a song. Oh, no. not again.

“Peter, if you sing Jingle Bells one more time I swear to god I will push you while skating and I’m making sure you die” it wasn’t the fact that he was humming the song, it was that she seriously hated the song.

“Why you hate Christmas carols so much?”

“I don’t hate all of those but that specific one doesn’t make any sense. It’s the same verse over and over again” Peter didn’t say anything, he just looked at her for a few seconds and kept walking. They fell into a comfortable silence, MJ loved that. At first when they moved together there was awkward silences that none of them knew how to fill, but now it was different. They could be studying at 1am in complete silence, just the sound of their keyboards and the company was enough, no words needed.

“Here we are” Peter stopped on a corner. There was a really nice looking coffee shop there.

“Mighty Oak Roasters?” she didn’t recognized the name and when she took a look inside, she noticed a normal cafeteria with a particular bar and a huge machine on the back corner

“Yeap. Come on in!” he held the door for her and she moved inside the coffee shop

“Bar or table?”

“Bar” Not that she was thinking about how a date with Peter would be in this exact same place he picked for her, not sure why just yet but sitting with him at the bar made her feel more like a friendly thing and not the image she totally could see in her mind on one of the tables

“Welcome to Mighty Oak Roasters. What do you want to drink?” A very nice girl asked them with her sight on a small notebook on her hand. The huge menu was right in front of her behind the bar hanging on the wall

“Is our first time here so what do you recommend us?” Peter spoke first making the girl look at him

“Well… the coffee shop is focused on vegan pastries and using freshly roasted beans for coffee and self-sustaining tea” the girl was looking between Peter and her. Every time the waitress looked at Peter she stumbled over her words and tended to blush, MJ have seen that reaction many times. Peter was a handsome man, she wasn’t blind, she noticed him since high school and saw him grew up into a man, a handsome one for the matter. But above the whole situation with the waitress, MJ was very impressed. Peter knew MJ so well that he found this vegan self-sustaining place.

“Can you bring me matcha latte, please?”

“For me a mocha, please” Peter didn’t even looked at the menu, he was focused on MJ. He knew how to read her after so many years

“I’m impressed, Parker”

“I knew you would like the place” he was very proud of himself

“Not you first time here, right? You didn’t even look at the menu to order” his confidence dropped a little but kept it cool

“I found the place one day, it looked nice and searched for it later” that wasn’t the full story, MJ knew that much but she wasn’t pushing it either.

The tea was amazing and according with Peter, his mocha was pretty good too. They chatted while on the coffee shop about how their part time jobs were going. MJ decided to finally tell Peter about that photoshoot an agent had offered her to do and he was very surprise but supportive. He told her about how his job in The Bugle was demanding more of him, he never spoke about his famous Spider-Man pictures so she never asked. She told him about a few cases they were working on the lawyer’s firm with a new guy called Harry Osborn and his awful attempts of flirting with her.

The hours passed and soon it was afternoon so they decided to go to the ice rink. It was a half an hour walk, just to give it time for the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree to light up. When they finally arrived it was late afternoon, the air was colder than before and she could see lots of families already ice skating in the rink.

“You ready?” Peter turned around to talk to her. He wasn’t wearing a scarf given that he gave his to the snowman they built with Morgan, but he didn’t seem cold. He looked perfectly fine while she was very cold, she kind of missed wearing her leather suit beneath her clothes

“I was born ready, Parker” MJ knew that phrase always made Peter laugh

“oh. Get out of here!” she loved when he tried to mock her while trying to hide his laugh

It wasn’t the first time they went ice skating but it was the first time alone, they always went with Ned and Betty and even May. Peter was a little clumsy at first but after ten minutes he managed to do a little flip without MJ having to lift him off the ground. MJ used a little bit of her Black Cat abilities to show off. While Peter moved around trying to do his flip, she was skating backwards when she decided to show Peter something she used as Black Cat.

“Hey, loser. I’m going to do a little something over there. Try not to kill yourself while I do that, ok?”

“I’m not gonna die! Maybe I will do another few flips over here”

MJ skated backwards again, gain speed as she went around the rink without stop looking at Peter. Suddenly she opened her arms, then used her left toe to turn while lifting her right foot from the floor, that caused her to turn around in the air once and land on the outside edge of her left foot smoothly, then stopped in front of Peter with an easy smile.

“How did you do that?” Peter was looking at her like she had grown two more heads

“Saw it on an article about ice skating flips and seemed easy enough to try it” It wasn’t an easy flip, she knew that but she did that flip every once in a while when swinging through the buildings, it was easy to do that while trying to escape. The rope attached to her hip making her perfectly stabilized, her high heels allowing her to turn around once and land sometimes on another building, sometimes on the next corner of the same one.

“Easy? If I try that I probably end up breaking my neck”

“Yeap, you are too clumsy for those things, loser”

They kept trying to do more flips for about half an hour with Peter falling to do most of them and MJ laughing while he seated on the floor.

“Peter you are a mess! You’re going to be all bruised tomorrow. We should go home and get some rest”

“Sounds like a very good idea. Now can you help me stand up and stop laughing?”

“Why? Is really fun to see you trying to get up on your own”

“MJ!”

“Okay! Fine!!!” She took his hand and helped him get up. They moved to the door where they have left their shoes and put them back on. The ride home was full of laughter from MJ and lots of blushes from Peter. They got home by 8, they reheated the pizzas they made from the night before and watched some TV on the living room.

“I think I’m going to sleep. I’m tired. Thanks by the way, the coffee shop and the ice skating, I needed that”

“Any time, MJ. Sleep tight”

“And take care of those bruises, loser”

“will do”

She headed to her room and closed the door behind her. She checked her phone to see if her little friend was fine or if he had any news. She just had a new message from him “u comin’?” She was tired but she also needed to check on him, the situation was getting worst by the second. She replied a quick “yes. Stay safe” and putted her leather suit on. She looked herself in the mirror while adjusting her silver wig and black mask on, she looked exhausted but this was more important, she could sleep tomorrow, she didn’t have any plans after all.

She checked that nobody could see her and then climbed out her window. Her belt had everything she needed for her little mission. She climbed the wall and got to the rooftop of her own building. She saved her claws, the same ones she used to climb walls, and searched for her phone do a quick call

“Hi, Em. Where are you?” He was the only one that knew her real name and that was dangerous enough

“I’m going out but I need you to tell me what you saw or heard to go safe” it wasn’t time to do small talk and he knew it

“Prowler, something about some equipment to improve his damage on the city, something big Em. But in small amounts so it doesn’t call anyone attention. He was going to take the money tonight to a new place”

“where?”

“Commodore Barry Park at eleven thirty. But please, be careful”

“Like always. I will text you when I have the money”

“Bye Em. Take care”

She ended the call and threw her rope to the next building. She wasn’t as fast as Spider-Man was with his webs but the rope did perfectly fine and she used more the claws to climb than any other artifact she carried with her. She started moving to Brooklyn as fast as she could, she knew the park and knew that it didn’t have lots of places to hide a group of people with weird costumes on. It was going to be an easy task to find them.

She was at the park at eleven, the place was surprisingly empty, maybe it was the low temperature, she was freezing too. She decided to make a round on the park, she moved between the trees, her black leather suit helped her to hide on the shadows, but her wig made it a little more difficult so she needed to think where the moon was placed so her hair could camouflage with the moon.

She found a place above a small building that was near the park and soon she saw the Prowler walking through the park and placed himself under a big tree. If she moved quickly, she could take the money and run without making a big show. When she started moving closer to the Prowler she heard an explosion close to them. The prowler rolled his eyes and spoke to some kind of intercom but she could hear what he was speaking. A few seconds later a second figure with four mechanical arms appeared to her right, his suit was simple, like a mechanical octopus. Too late to get the money from the Prowler now, she will have to do the same from a few days ago, go directly to the warehouse and take the money from there.

A second louder thud shook the three where she was and now she could see the source of the sounds. Rhino was running to the small park and of course, spider-Man was after him. The Prowler and the Octopus man exchanged a look and then turned around and moved to opposite sides. The Prowler walked under the tree she was so she took her chance and jumped right behind him.

“I have heard a lot about you, Prowler” She always tried to change her voice when being Black Cat. He turned around to see her.

“Cat, you are not a myth then”

“I can be a nightmare if you want me to” She walked around him and put her chest closer to his back, she placed her right hand on his shoulder and moved down his arm, when she got to the bag in his hand she moved quickly. She pressed the little button on her palm and her claws popped out, her left hand was on his neck and her right was holding the briefcase handle. A third thud sounded, but this time Rhino took a tree to the ground with him. Prowler saw Spider-Man first so he released the briefcase and ran past Rhino.

“You own me Cat!” the Prowler screamed and looked back at her. His scream made Spider-Man look at her, the robotic eyes in his mask moved like he was trying to focus on her.

“Damn it” MJ cursed under her breath. She didn’t want Spider-Man involved in any of her business. His distraction made Rhino run away but he didn’t follow him, he started moving to her.

“You must be the famous Black Cat, right?” she could tell that he was changing his voice an octave lower, just like she changed her voice but she didn’t care who he was in real life

“If I’m famous then I’m not doing my job well enough” she needed to escape with the money so she started to use her most useful weapon, her charm. She wasn’t an idiot, the leather suit made all her curves stand out, her long legs with high heels made her taller than most men and she used all she could to escape from situations like this one without hurting anyone

“Well, famous for me. I have being searching for you, some petty theft, you are on and off the scene, not making big deals or causing lots of trouble. Wonder why” he knew basic information about her, she could handle that

“Well, I know more about you” she moved closer to him. She was taller than him for very little, maybe without heels he was taller, just maybe “you are an Avenger, one of the old ones. Not as old as Thor or Iron Man but old enough to have their respect. Very close to Iron Man, Doctor Strange and Capitan America. Connections with Wakanda because you are kind of a genius and you probably have rejected bigger projects to keep an eye on New York, so you probably live close too. And half the journalist love you, the other half hates you” She have studied him, there wasn’t enough information but what she got was enough to set him off

“Now I’m ashamed I don’t know any more information about you” he was following the conversation how she needed it to go. She moved to his back, let the briefcase on the grass and placed her hands on his waist

“Do you mind?” Spider-Man flinched at her touch and tried to move away from her. She could feel his hard muscles under the red and black suit

“What? I’m cold and you seem hot enough to help me warm up” she spoke to his ear and she felt him flinch. One of her claws climbed up his arm

“Easy Cat, those claws don’t seem friendly” she had to laugh at that. He knew what she was doing and she was ready to run away if necessary

“Just like those web shooters, I have seen what they can do”

“That’s why you are standing behind me?”

“Very good. You are a genius after all” she heard a little laugh behind his mask but his robotic eyes didn’t show any emotion

“Just very observant. Learned from a friend” she thought about Peter, how at first she observed him all the time and with the time, he learned to look around and take mental notes for later. He appreciated that tip as a photographer with The Bugle

“Very useful. So I should stop all this and just go, right? No need to distract you. Too smart and observant for that, Spidey” She grabbed the briefcase from the grass and started moving to a corner of the park

“Just one question before you go”

“Shoot” She walked backwards not running but not giving him a chance to get her

“Why?”

“Why are you Spider-Man and not a regular citizen?” she didn’t wait for the answer. She threw her rope to a nearby building and did the same flip she had done early on the ice rink. The toe of her foot gave her the impulse to jump while her other leg spun her around on its own axis to land on the corner of the building the rope was holding onto. With her claws she climbed the wall and searched for Spider-Man but didn’t find him.

She made her way home close to 1am. As soon as she arrived, she took her suit of along with her wig and mask, the briefcase was next to her window. She tried to be really quiet, she didn’t wanted to wake Peter up. She put on one of Peter’s shirts she had stolen from him a lot time ago. It was one of his science pun shirts and she liked the soft fabric and maybe the fact that when she took it, it smelled like Peter.

She was lying down on her bed, tired of the day but couldn’t sleep. She couldn’t stop thinking about Spider-Man and Peter. Spidey was nothing like Peter but at the same time there was something familiar with him, something that made her think about Peter when she touched him, when he question her for her actions and when he didn’t answer back to her.

“God, I need to sleep. I’m mixing everything up and that’s definitely not good” She spoke softly to the celling. Thinking about Peter was kind of an issue, but comparing Spider-Man and Peter was insane. Peter had clumsy movements when Spidey was agile in every one of his. Peter was shy while Spidey openly flirted with her. Peter had a strong moral compass while Spidey let her go even when he though she was a thief. They were totally different and she was just wasting time thinking about them.

------------------------------------------

Thanks to @spiderman-homecomeme fro the amazing opportunity to write :3

#spideychelle #spideychelle twelve days of promptmas #peter parker #michelle jones mcu

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pinkmedusa6 · 4 years

Text

Burning Bridges

Pairing: Richie Tozier & Eddie Kaspbrak

Read on AO3

An excerpt from this work:

“Go back to sleep Rich. I’ll be back, I promise.” Eddie stumbles backwards and slips out the window. Soon the room settles into a lull like Eddie was never there to begin with.

The clock reads 3:35 am. Richie stays in his bed debating if he should get up and chase after Eddie but his consciousness makes the decision for him as he begins to fade into his dreams once again. Sleep overtakes him, thoughts of Eddie still swaying at the edge of his mind. Richie decides to talk to him in the morning. He will realize later that this was the worst decision of his life.Eddie

Kaspbrak was never seen in Derry again.

Summary: Richie is living the lonely life of a C-list comedian in LA until he suddenly is contacted by Mike Hanlon. 15 years after his disappearance Mike believes to have received a phone call from Eddie. The remaining Loser's return to Derry in search of answers and their missing friend.

It had been a normal day for Richie Tozier. But that’s how all tragedy’s started, with normal days.

All seven members of the Losers Club sat along the bank of the quarry. The haze of a summer heat settling along the exposed edges of their skin. Beverly was skipping rocks along the water, trying to beat her record of 6 skips. Ben watched her like she was competing in an Olympic sport, the flick of her wrist catching his gaze. Bill, Mike, and Stan sat not far off, discussing amongst themselves.

Richie had taken to climbing up a nearby tree and hanging off one of the branches by the crook of his knees. While Eddie stood underneath him rattling off the possible injuries he could get by falling.

Richie was desperately trying to keep his glasses from sliding off his face as Eddie glared at him. “I’m not going to help you if you fall and bust your head open.”

“Aw would you still love me if I got brain damage Eds?” Richie grinned swinging carelessly back and forth.

“Don’t call me Eds. And you already have brain damage asshole.” Eddie huffed, crossing his arms across his chest.

“And you still love me! How sweet,” He threw Eddie a wink. Richie thought he saw a hint of red creep around Eddie’s cheeks but wasn’t sure if that was just his own blood rushing to his head.

“That’s why we’re your friend, can’t let the poor kid with brain damage play by himself.” Stan called over, not even bothering to turn towards Richie.

“You wound me Staniel.” There was a grunt as Richie heaved himself up and began his decent down the tree. About a foot away from the ground he lost his grip and fell landing on his back with a small thud. He barked out laughter as Eddie ran to his side to make sure his skull hadn’t broken like an egg shell.

“B-by the way, what electives did everyone ch-chose for the semester?” Bill said fully ignoring the commotion taking place beside him.

A chorus of answers rang around the group, from Bev shouting home economics to Ben quietly mentioning a poetry class. Stan said photography and Richie remarked that his teacher would get tired of every picture being a bird. Eddie sat quietly in his spot beside Richie.

“What about you Eddie?” Mike smiled over at Eddie. He had also stayed silent during the discussion, there wasn’t much to say about electives when you were home schooled.

Eddie fidgeted from where he was sitting on the ground. “Ok I’ll tell you guys but you have to promise not to mention it around my mom she’ll flip.” There was a collective nod, “I uh decided to go for track and field.”

“That’s fantastic Eddie!” Bev said.

“You’ll do g-g-gr-ugh.” Bill closed his eyes in frustration before starting again. “You’ll do awesome, you have always been the fastest of us anyway.” Bill smiled along with the rest of the group. He was right, Eddie had always been the fastest of the Losers club even when he thought his asthma was real.

“Fast on the track and in the sack that’s what they say right?” Richie laughed as he was shoved by Eddie but he didn’t miss the distinct dimpled smile.

After finding out his mother had been lying to him for years about his asthma, as well as several other illnesses, Eddie had abandoned most of his placebos. Only when his mother was watching did he seem to keep up his act, not yet wanting to confront her. Richie felt a certain kind of pride bloom in his chest. The kind that had always been there but seemed to grow with each act Eddie did. Sonia was controlling and every step that Eddie took seemed to defy the tight grip she had on him. They were coming closer to the end of their high school days and Richie was excited for the future. A future he hoped contained a great deal of Eddie.

Richie knew the way he felt about Eddie differed greatly from his feelings towards the other loser’s. He didn’t stay up late at night thinking about the curve of Beverly’s legs nor did he leave lingering touches along Stan’s arms, those were exclusive to Eddie. Calling it love would make it too real. He called it a crush because crushes were soft fleeting things. Crushes were easy to get over you could skip from one to the next. Love was a hard rock that sat at the bottom of your stomach. Yet Richie could barely contain the tightening of his chest with the way each freckle stretched over Eddie’s cheeks as he smiled. Just a crush Richie reminded himself.

The losers club continued their carefree summer day at the clubhouse, reveling in one another’s company. Richie felt at peace among his friends, he wondered if this is how all his friendships would be or if this was something special.

By the time four o’clock had rolled around it had become Richie’s favorite kind of day, one where after spending time with all the losers Richie was able to squeeze in an hour or two of alone time with Eddie. After departing from the clubhouse the duo arrived at Richie’s home, eventually landing on his bed to read comics and bicker over trivial topics.

It was Eddie who brought up the subject of college, “Are you still planning on going to UCLA?” The question threw Richie off guard, especially since they just finished a heated argument over who was the better superhero, Captain America or Iron Man. But now Eddie sat on the floor of Richie’s room, his back against the bed and staring at the posters on the wall. His eyes seemed like they were searching for an answer in the Rush poster hung up haphazardly above Richie’s desk, a fruitless effort.

“Well yeah, its step one in my plan on becoming a famous comedian,” Richie turned to Eddie from where he sat on his bed. His eyes were still trained on the poster but Richie caught a glimpse of some unnamed emotion flash across them. “You should come with. UCLA has like a million majors to choose from.” Richie tried to say it as casually as possible and not like he would trade his left arm just to have Eddie in the same state as him. This was not the first time he had brought it up but he still felt the same nervousness tug at his stomach, like it was an encoded proposal.

“Like my mom would ever agree to me moving across the country with Richie Tozier.” Eddie finally returned Richie’s gaze, a somber smile on his face.

“You’re right. You’re mom would get too jealous.” Eddie groaned “Do you think I could get Mrs.K to come with me to UCLA? I’m not sure she could survive till winter break without me.” Eddie took the comic book in his lap and rolled it up before smacking Richie on the head with it. Richie laughed, a shit-eating grin spread wide across his face. Eddie wavered in his scowling, eventually laughing along with Richie. Soon both boys settled back down into a comfortable silence as they read their comic books.

As the evening sun slipped into his room it basked Eddie in an otherworldly glow, Richie wanted to burn the image into his brain. He wanted to record Eddie as he was now and replay the scene over in his head until that’s all he could see. He was almost grateful when Eddie said he needed to leave, the tips of his fingers burned with the urge to touch. But Richie smiled and pushed those feelings away, a practice he had grown accustomed to.

Richie walked Eddie to his porch, leaning on the railing as Eddie began to walk down the steps. “When will I see you again Eddie my love?”

“Jesus can you just say my name normally for once?”

“For you? No way in hell Spaghetti man.” Richie was grinning, a common occurrence when he was with Eddie. And Eddie would huff and roll his eyes at Richie’s antics but there was always a smile that followed and Richie would always chase it.

“Well Bill wants us all to meet up at his house tomorrow, his aunt sent him a board game and it can play up to ten people so now we won’t have to fight over who goes first.” Eddie said, hopping off the last step of the porch and turning to face Richie.

“Then I guess I’ll see you tomorrow when I show you my awe-inspiring board game skills.” Richie wore a cocky smile, it always gave him a special rush knowing exactly what buttons to push to rile Eddie up.

“Oh shut up you couldn’t even beat me at Clue.” Eddie crossed his arms, face already formed into a pout.

“Hey that’s not fair, you know I suck at those murder mystery games!”

“Well it’s a mystery why I’m still friends with you” Eddie smirked as Richie let out a dramatic gasp, clutching his chest as if Eddie had shot him on the spot.

As he turned to leave down the driveway Richie shouted “see you tomorrow!” Eddie turned around briefly to wave at Richie before scurrying off towards his own house and out of Richie’s sight.

After dinner Richie went to bed peacefully, happy with how the day went. That was before he was awoken at 3:21 am.

Richie was a heavy sleeper, he had always been since a young child. That night he did not hear a window creaking open or shoes shuffling on carpet, he wasn’t awake until a gentle hand began to stroke his hair. Even then Richie was still dancing between sleep and consciousness. He shifted, opening his eyes just barely only to close them again then repeating the process a few more times before comprehending that for a hand to touch his head it needed to be attached to a person that was presumably in his room. His eyes opened fully to see a dark figure standing over him.

Shock would have set quickly into his veins if not for the hand still combing its way through his hair, daring him to sleep once again. He made a sound that was a mix between a grunt and a slurred “what”. The hand retracted as Richie grabbed his glasses off his night stand. While the figure was less blurry they were still just as dark and only after his eyes adjusted did Richie catch the face of the intruder. The sliver of moonlight peaking from behind the clouds illuminating just enough for recognition to kick in.

“Eddie?” Richie questioned, head feeling like it was stuffed with cotton.

Eddie jerked back slightly, his face still mostly shadows. Richie was having a hard time making the connections his brain needed to make. “Richie” Eddie said finally and if Richie were more lucid maybe he would have caught the distinct wetness Eddie’s voice carried. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Richie rubbed his eyes, “What are you doing here man?” He went to turn on his lamp but Eddie grabbed his wrist.

“No don’t.” Richie was taken aback “Sorry its just…“ There was hesitation in his voice and Richie started to wonder if this was a dream, it felt too weird to be reality. “I needed to see you.” There is another pause as Eddie let go of Richie’s wrist before kneeling down beside the bed. Richie felt the warmth of a hand on his cheek. “Richie I need you to listen carefully. I’m going to be gone for…“ he breathed in sharply “I- I’m not sure how long. But I promise you I will be back ok?”

“Eddie you’re not making any sense” Richie’s voice dripped with confusion as his gut started to tug at itself. This wasn’t the Eddie that Richie knew, this wasn’t the spitfire that always spoke his mind and was trustworthy to a fault. No this Eddie sounded uncertain and scared.

“I know, I’m sorry” Richie thinks he hears a sniffle, “I can’t….just remember I’ll be back Richie, please remember that.” Eddie leans forward and rests his head on Richie’s shoulder as he begins to shake.

Richie wraps his arms around Eddie, softly running his hand down his back. They stay like that for a moment and Richie starts to wonder again if this is an elaborate dream.

Eddie pulls back, “Richie I-“ he says it like something important is dancing on the tip of his tongue ready to dive, but he just shakes his head “I have to go” he slips away before Richie can protest. “Go back to sleep Rich. I’ll be back, I promise.” Eddie stumbles backwards and slips out the window. Soon the room settles into a lull like Eddie was never there to begin with.

Eddie Kaspbrak was never seen in Derry again.

Thank you for reading! If you are interested please check out my AO3 as I probably won’t post anymore chapters on Tumblr. Feel free to leave comments and constructive criticism!

#reddie #richie tozier #eddie kaspbrak #it #it chapter 2 #fanfic #my art #it movie #losers club #bill denbrough #beverly marsh #stan uris #mike hanlon #ben hanscom #writing

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allyreactions · 5 years

Text

Koi No Yokan : Chapter 2

Suho (EXO) x Jaehyun (NCT) x Fem! Reader

genre : college au, soulmate au,

word count : 1901

warnings : drinking, strong language

Koi no yokan - japanese (n) the extraordinary sense upon first meeting someone, that you will one day fall in love

- chapter 1 written by @kpoppwriter

- masterlist

~ A/N : Okay, so I know Max and I started this AU freakin forever ago, and I’ve been the one that hasn’t done my part on writing the next chapter. But I promise that this time, we gon’ do this thing. Anyway, I hope you guys love this chapter, I really just fell in love with the way I portrayed nerdy Junmyeon like ouch my heart. Please remember to go read chapter 1 first and give @kpoppwriter a follow

_________________________

Friday,

~ 7:12 pm

You walked into the campus coffee shop. The scent of ground espresso beans and freshly baked muffins burned your nostrils. The smell unbearably strong. You glanced around the small cafe, searching for a brunette boy with large glasses.

“Over here!”

You turn your head behind you in the direction of the voice.

Junmyeon was sitting by himself in the corner of the cafe. A large textbook and two cups of coffee sat on the table in front of him.

“I saved us a spot.” Junmyeon said, motioning to the seat next to him.

You made your way over to the table, gently setting your purse down on the floor.

“I wasn’t sure what kind of coffee you like, so I just ordered you an iced americano.”

Junmyeon seemed really eager to work with you. Although he was acting like a total nerd, you still found him endearing.

“I normally order a vanilla latte, but this is okay.” You responded politely, tucking your hair behind your ear before taking a sip of the icy drink.

“So what did you need help with exactly? I remember that you struggled with the last unit.” Junmyeon opened the textbook in front of him, frantically turned the pages, searching for the right page numbers.

“Yeah, um,” You said as you raised your hand.

You wanted to place your hand on Junmyeon’s, just to calm him down. He seemed a little nervous. But you refrained.

“How about we just look at my quiz and figure out what I did wrong?” You suggested.

You reached down into your purse and pulled out your quiz. It was covered in red pen. Blood rushed to your face, your face hot with embarrassment.

“Yeah, that’s a good idea. We’ll start there.” He smiled at you.

~ 8:47 pm

*vvrrrr vvrrrr*

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

incoming message : Amber

duuuuuude! the nct frat guys invited us to their party tonight! u comin’ or what??

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

You flipped your phone over on the table, face down. You admit you were tempted, but you were enjoying your time with Junmyeon. He had actually been really helpful. His explanations were way better than your professors.

*vvrrrr vvrrrr*

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

incoming message : Amber

come on, jaehyun’s gonna be there! u know u wanna....

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

“You can answer that if you wanna. I don’t mind.” Junmyeon said in response to your text messages.

“Sorry, excuse me.”

You stepped outside and called Amber.

“Hello” Amber answered in a sing-song voice.

“Amber, I’m kinda busy at the moment.” You said, a little irritated that she interrupted your study session.

“Doing what?” Amber questioned jokingly. “What could you possibly be doing that’s more important than an Nu Sigma Tau frat party?”

“I’m actually trying to study for once.” You said firmly.

Amber chuckled. “You, Y/N, studying?”

“Yes, Amber. I’m nearly failing my calculus class.”

“Alright alright, if you wanna stay in and study, that’s fine. But just remember that when you get bored of formulas, there’s a particular frat boy that’s awaiting your company.” Amber said tauntingly.

“I’ll think about it.”

“You’ve got all weekend to study. Just take a break!”

“Goodbye, Amber.” You said playfully before hanging up on her.

You walked back in and sat down at the table with Junmyeon. You sipped your coffee and contemplated whether you should attend the party with Amber or spend some more time studying with Junmyeon.

You went back and forth in your head. You started thinking about what Amber said, maybe you do deserve a break. And yeah, you’ve got all weekend to study, it’s not like you’ve got a test in the morning you need to cram for. A party might be what you need. You’ve worked hard, now you can play hard. Right?

But what about Junmyeon? You didn’t want to just leave him, you’d feel guilty. He’s so sweet. He gave up his time to help you out of the kindness of his nerdy heart. You can’t just tell him your prioritizing a party over him, he’d feel awful. You had to think of what to say.

“Y/N, is everything okay?” Junmyeon asked.

He looked at you, his head cocked to the side. He could tell something was up. You shook your head, unaware you had been zoned out in your own thoughts.

“Yeah, I’m fine. My friend just needed my help with something. I’m sorry.” You replied.

“If you need to go, I understand.”

Junmyeon was so sweet. You felt guilty at the lies that fell from your mouth. Junmyeon didn’t deserve to be lied to.

“Maybe we can pick up another time this weekend? Get brunch tomorrow?” Your guilty conscience led you to make plans with him.

“I’d like that.” Junmyeon smiled softly, his eyes shone bright.

“I’ll text you in the morning and we’ll figure out a time and place.” You started to pack up your stuff.

“Sounds good to me.” Junmyeon replied as he helped you gather your things.

“And again,” You threw your purse over your shoulder. “I’m sorry for leaving like this. I wanna make it up to you.”

“It’s all good, don’t worry about it.” Junmyeon placed his hand on your shoulder, giving a reassuring squeeze.

~ 10:01 pm

“I’m so glad you listened to me, this party is gonna be sick.” Amber nudged.

You both approached the Nu Sigma Tau frat house. The entrance was grand, long white columns that appeared stories high. The carefully crafted image of such an upheld and prestigious building was crumbled by tipsy underage students running across the front lawn. The roar of the music could be heard down the block. Flashing rainbow lights lit up the exterior, creating an inviting aura around the building.

“It’s the end of initiation week, and so they’re throwing a huge party to celebrate!” Amber said enthusiastically.

“Let’s hope they went all out on the alcohol then. I could really use a few drinks.” You said, letting your body sway side to side.

You and Amber crossed the threshold of the house. The foyer was just as full as the rest of the rooms. Sweaty bodies were scattered everywhere.

“H-hey hey!” Shouted a burly man with a backwards cap and two red Solo cups in hand. “There’s drinks in the kitchen and a keg out back. Help yourselves!”

He sauntered off to the other room, handing off the other cup to one of his friends. You assumed he was a member of the frat, given his ‘warm’ welcome.

You and Amber weaved your way through the crowd and eventually found yourselves in the kitchen. You grabbed yourself a bottle of apple ale beer, while Amber decided on the red concoction in the Solo cups.

You two headed outside to get some fresh air. The stench of sweat and alcohol was overpowering. After walking around for bit, Amber found a group of girls from her physiology class and went over to talk with them.

Instead of just standing off to the side, you decided to make your way back in the house and find someone you knew. You wandered around for a while and couldn’t find anyone, so you started to look for a place to sit. Most of the seats were taken, and you didn’t feel like sitting next to a stranger, so you opted for the stairs as a place to rest. You pulled your phone out from your pocket and started typing a text to Amber, letting her know where you can be found.

“You look lost” A familiar voice said.

You looked up from your phone. A tall boy with caramel locks stared down at you. Jaehyun.

“Hey!” You stood up, adjusting your jeans and placing your phone in your back pocket. “Great party.”

“Doesn’t look like you’re enjoying it that much.” Jaehyun chuckled.

Suddenly you got knocked off your feet and fell backwards on the stairs.

“Lucas! Dude, your windmill is gonna cause casualties!” A black haired boy yelled, holding his arms out to keep a safe distance from his friend.

“Y/N, are you alright?” Jaehyun reached out his hand to help you back on your feet.

Once he knew you had regained your balance he turned towards the black haired boy.

“Mark, I’ll handle him. Stay here with her.” Jaehyun said before marching off to the boy dancing wildly in the living room.

The black haired boy turned towards you and extended his hand to you. You reciprocated the action and shook his hand.

“Hi, I’m Mark. I’m sorry I ran into you, my bad. I hope you’re not hurt.” He slightly giggled, clearly tipsy himself. But he was still polite.

“I’m Y/N. And no need, I’m all good. No harm, no foul.” You said.

Jaehyun returned, this time with a floppy haired boy. He helped steddy the boy by throwing his arm over his shoulder.

“Mark, can you help me get him upstairs? I think he needs to lie down.” Jaehyun said.

Mark threw the floppy haired boy’s arm over his shoulder and helped him stumble up the stairs.

“Y/N, you’re welcome to follow if you like.” Jaehyun called after making it a few stairs up.

You followed the boys up the stairs and opened up the room to the door at the end of the hallway. Jaehyun and Mark slowly made their way over to the bed that was on the left side of the room. They carefully let the boy drop onto the bed behind them. The boy seemed to pass out instantly. Mark took off the boy’s shoes while Jaehyun placed a pillow under his head.

“Y/N, can you grab that trash can over there?” Jaehyun pointe to the black, plastic trash can by the desk. “I want to make sure he’s got a place to throw up when he wakes up.”

“Mark, you can head back down. I got it under control up here.” Jaehyun said, nodding his head to the bedroom door.

“If you need anything, bro, I got you.” Mark said before leaving.

The door shut behind Mark, the room settling back to silence.

“Guess he drank too much of that red punch.” You giggled.

“Yeah, that shit can really mess you up.” Jaehyun laughed, standing up from his seat.

“So who’s this?” You asked, gazing down at the floppy haired boy.

“This is Lucas. He’s one of the newbies that got initiated this week. Poor guy went a little too hard on his first party.” Jaehyun said looking down at the boy. “I’m in charge of him and Mark tonight. Just to make sure that they’re safe.”

“Well that’s awfully sweet.” You said, smiling softly at Jaehyun.

“It’s part of being in the frat. We look out for each other, a true brotherhood we got here.” Jaehun grinned, clearly a proud member of the NCT frat.

“Is this your room?” You asked, trying to make small talk.

You scanned the room. The walls painted a greyish blue, with posters scattered around the room. White, detailed crown molding wrapped around the ceiling. A full size bed on each side of the room.

“Nah, this is Lucas and Mark’s room.” Jaehyun replied. “How about we actually go to my room?”

Your heart rate spiked. Maybe it was the alcohol clouding your judgment, or maybe it was the look in Jaehyun’s eyes that spoke of danger and excitement, but you couldn’t help but say,

“Yeah, let’s go.”

#koi no yokan #kpop #kpop reactions #kpop au #exo au #nct au #nct 127 au #jung jaehyun #kim junmyeon #nct jaehyun #exo suho #kpop fanfic #nct 127 #kpop smut #fanfic

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demytasse · 5 years

Text

[Shinzaya] Hold Me Tight (Or Don’t) — Ch 1

Summary: Shinra turns to Izaya in order to gain sexual proficiency, what he’ll need for his future with Celty. Yet ambiguity of feelings could destroy his plans and friendship alike—though it might be within their best interests that their companionship changes routes. Rating: PG (Ch 1); PG13 (future) Previous Chapters: Prologue | All Chapters

—

As their middle school days had met an end, so had their lonely club—and when high school term began, so did their creep towards graduation. Which put the teens smack dab in the middle of an upcoming end; adulthood approached too soon for any last-minute bouts of immaturity, but there was still some wiggle room.

Regardless, Izaya adhered to his method of how to properly ease himself into the life of expected status quo. To him, it made sense to keep to his own priorities, apart from peers and friends alike; a somewhat lonesome approach but matched what was to come. Which Shinra continued right on Izaya heels—hypothetically, with a parallel plan rather than a literal clip at the back of hallway shoes sometime in the past.

It spoke of how worn-in their friendship was, how similar they were, and how seamless their tried and true formula worked. It counter-spun from what outsiders thought was normal for tight-knit friends, yet to them it wasn't counterintuitive. That is if their schoolmates actually regarded them a second time after their first day introductions.

However, it seemed true—their present interaction did mimic a retired relationship as it barely went beyond hallway greetings throughout the week and bumped shoulders as they entered or exited class. Though it would be an insult to dub Izaya and Shinra distant cohorts. Rather, the self-absorbed beings fell into sync whenever they were compelled to share ideas and observational data, like hobbyist social scientists that exchanged notes when their schedules aligned.

Whether for brief moments or the length of the lunch period, they'd continue from the top of their previous scene—delivered improvisational lines over scripted small talk, and split ways just as casual. It was a joke that judgemental classmates thought the two barely clicked when those who believed the farce were generally hard-pressed for quality chit-chat themselves.

In other words, Izaya and Shinra were no actors—just odd friends.

—

A classroom of thirty was left desolate—desks abandoned and recently straightened by the student janitorial crew. Essentially everyone had left the premises. Yet the corral of empty chairs wasn’t a complete set, only a majority, as two of them were occupied somewhere in the middle and off to the side, with a particular silence to keep them company. It wasn’t a normal stasis when people were still present, but Izaya was to blame as he pretended to be alone despite the unnerving incorrectness.

Sat backwards directly opposite him was Shinra, pressed into Izaya’s personal space like there was still a crowd—his nose forward and glasses primed. The scene akin to their old interactions with just a hint of intimacy was hardly correct for their current years, but here they were. In wait of whatever afternoon was to follow; and as Shinra had been the one to suggest their rendezvous, he initiated the study session without a hello and spoke a few lines out of order with a topic not yet broached.

“So! I'm looking to gain experience.”

He didn't budge, even though he’d received a cue to distance himself by way of Izaya's exasperated sigh and turn of attention.

“You’re saying you want us to have sex," Izaya watched the other adjust his glasses, "for science."

“Oh good, you caught on quick!” Shinra clapped.

“Don’t mock my intelligence, Shinra. You insinuated it. Heavily, I might add.”

“I know.”

During the time that his peers cleaned around him, Izaya started to browse some gossip garbage that a gaggle of females read in between glances his way. It was grating enough for him to determine why they giggled and squealed; which more or less was the same bother as the trash proclamation which unnerved him now.

“You’re aware I’m male, correct?”

“Huh, I didn’t think sexuality was a concern of yours, Orihara-kun. It always seemed that you were open to whatever advantageous situation you might be offered. Maybe I was wrong.”

“I meant, Kishitani-kun, for someone looking to please a particular female, sexual experience with a man is hardly beneficial.” His stare steeled. “A human male, especially.”

“Well, any experience is better than none, wouldn’t you think?” Shinra made his prognosis with a finger held high, while Izaya flipped through the pages of what was dubiously his magazine—in search.

“Listen, the girls might claim me ‘effeminate enough to bottom anyone’,” his brow raised, “or ‘non-threatening enough to top specific bottoms’, but my supposed range still doesn’t meet your needs.”

Izaya was bothered, to say the least, that a clique of his classmates studied him in such a shallow fashion, that Shinra wanted him for such a shallow purpose, to which he tossed the bothersome reading material aside in disgust of it all. Though it was lost on Shinra as he chewed Izaya’s statement—tested the added variable against his own with his eyes rolled up to a corner in thought.

“I still think you could fit the role well. A female body double, despite absent physiology."

“And there’s the truth I was looking for. So you're wanting me to roleplay for you?” he mimicked his own beheading much to Shinra's comical dismay.

"Honestly, do you think I'd let you sully my dear Celty’s image with some hack cosplay job? What I meant was that you lack female anatomy and desirables. Like a nice rack of breas—”

Izaya cut him short, “you mean, I couldn’t live up to your dullahan standards?” He twirled his words but spat out the contagion.

“Oh. Well, not really, but you should know that!”

“Aww, what a shame. I really would’ve rocked that form-fitted riding suit she wears.”

A sarcastic gesture was wound up and ready, but Izaya's shrug baulked at the scrutiny made in his favour. He was joking, of course, but now he was worried that the punchline was taken seriously.

"Hmm..."

His friend sized him up; a tailor in consideration of which cut would flatter his curves, what fabric needed to be snipped, and if the garment was more appropriate for the floor—or so it seemed. Selfconscious, Izaya broke into a cold sweat, even more when his pursuant breached their median space, drawn by attraction rather than a scheme.

"Maybe so..."

Shinra smiled—slyly. It was the kind of lilt that would shiver most sexually, and Izaya couldn’t tell if he was one amongst the statistic who’d blush so easily in response, or if he borrowed the reaction from another.

So instead of parsing it out, he opted to correct his settled spine with the support of his chair, his back arched too far to be comfortable. Clearly with no intent to separate himself from Shinra, nor was it due to the side-effects of the trauma he acquired before he was tricked into founding their club. Obviously, it was a cocky cat stretch to prove that he controlled the scene—he didn’t.

“So this proposed 'study session' was all a ruse.”

“Was it?”

“Don't play innocent. You're obviously looking to use me for my body.” Izaya drew a barricade around his chest.

“That’s the gist of it. Having sex, that is.”

“No, usually both parties gain some form of pleasure out of it. At least, that’s the traditional way of things.”

“You say that like you wouldn’t benefit from it.” Shinra persisted, his flirt still in play. “And you say that like you’re sure that I would.” “Of course! The appeal of friendship is more than just like-mindedness, rather it’s underlined with physical attraction as well. I’m sure you have some amount of sexual interest in me, Izaya, even if it’s minuscule.”

“Oho, with that logic the same goes for you.”

“Which I hardly believe would shock you. Might I remind you who came to whom asking for sex?”

“Selfishly.”

“Nonetheless.” He shrugged.

Izaya tried to ignore the pseudo-psychological factoid that Shinra made up to sway him. “I'm going to chalk this up as your worst proclamation since we became...whatever you could call us."

Shinra nodded, "that's fair."

“He admits it...”

“Is there any reason not to?”

Izaya shook his head, “Shinra, you are honest to a flaw.”

“That may be true, but you've always been charmed by my openness, among other things.”

On cue, Shinra increased the way his eyes sheened as if it were possible to control arousal in that fashion. In like, he intensified his flirtatious technique with a lowered tone spoken in a whisper.

"Am I right?"

If anything the distance between them hadn’t changed, but it certainly felt like the temperature stifled from combined body heat. Cowardice glued Izaya in place while his opportunity to escape passed—though unconsciously he knew it was out of curiosity to see how far Shinra would take his strategy; what more he would do after fingers traced up his shoulder to rest at the peak. Which step in his courtship manual followed a heavy gaze and deep breath. Izaya faced a doppelganger, for certain. Shinra was no longer present, he assured himself. In no way would his friend be able to tease like he did. Touch him in a way that wasn't in the least bit awkward, but sensual—prepared to catch him in liplock as much as catch him should the pressure cause Izaya to buckle.

Perhaps Shinra was enough concerned for his well being to plan for multiple outcomes, which assuredly all led to Izaya falling in some way or another. Though it was likely that he acted with his own interests in mind, that his goods wouldn't go damaged. Whichever reason it was moot—the amateur doctor would jump at any opportunity to fix a broken patient if only to foot a favour as the bill.

With a slight squeeze, Shinra reminded him that he'd been slack-jawed for too long. Izaya's pulse beat against his ribs, drummed his throat; the cadence tensed his vocal cords, and his short breath dried his speech.

"Whether I’m charmed remains to be seen…"

The weakened words settled in the air—lost in a staredown, both were dusted with uncertainty. The former was an oddity and the latter came as a shock because wasn’t it Shinra that claimed he operated with platonic tools?

Yet it was Shinra that relented, the genuine curl of his lips diminished and discomfort added to his brows. He read as concerned, disappointed; not particularly hurt, but somewhere in between that and bothered. Izaya wondered if he looked terrified from his friend’s vantage, yet it was hard to determine as the other sighed and pulled back with his palms exposed in surrender.

“Alright.”

That was it—the tension was gone, never existed. Perhaps. Instead, the bag at Shinra's hip was given attention—the quick-switch of demeanour threw Izaya for a loop; the seamless fashion was, in short, enviable. All that he witnessed was how Shinra wavered just a smidgen and let out an extra breath that was indeterminable; his thrown slouch was taken advantage of to slip hair past his ears to keep his nosey neighbour away from a good spy.

He's hiding something...

Nothing else to observe nor ponder, Izaya blinked back to normalcy; the sound of rifled papers harshed his ability to fully relax.

“What were you thinking of studying today?” Shinra’s voice was muffled.

“Honestly, I didn’t plan for anything…”

The shuffling stopped—without a tick Shinra popped back to normal, chipper but fake and cautiously hopeful.

"Well in that case," he presented a pristine textbook, “let’s humour our ourselves with an old favourite!” It was innocent and somewhat pure, the emotion that Shinra exhibited. Simple coercion which Izaya couldn’t hold back the smile which it lured, despite his desire to reserve his candidness.

Izaya shook from a silent chuckle before Shinra joined in with an audible hiccup. The dam of tension let up—lighthearted laughter spilt out. Short, sweet, and sentimental; what they shared eventually calmed, but not before they both loosened up.

“Biology...” Izaya hummed, “how appropriate."

#shinzaya #izashin #kishitani shinra #orihara izaya #shinra kishitani #izaya orihara #durarara #durarara!!#durarara fanfiction #durarara rare pair #shinra x izaya #izaya x shinra #fanfic #fanfiction #demytasse fanfiction #demytasse fanfics #shinzaya hold me tight or don't

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hyu-ck · 6 years

Text

*You hear his voice on some poor quality cover he totally used his laptop mic to record, but now you’re in love with everything he uploads. Litlle did you know he is a regular in the vinylshop you work at who flirts with you shamelessly, but you’re loyal to mystery boy.

Character: Haechan, Reader

Pairing: Haechan/Reader

Genre: Angsty // Fluff // Soundcloud!AU

Word Count: 4.8K

You had stumbled upon his profile sometime late in the night (early in the morning) when your eyes were failing you and your taste was becoming musty with sleep. You were trying to find some antidote to lull you to sleep as your usual concoction of hot chocolate and Tylenol P.M. was lacking at its job. You had an oral report in the next few hours and you were practically begging your body to be well rested so you didn’t slur your speech in the middle of a presentation about America’s faults during WWII.

You hadn’t paid much mind to the song creator, your focus had reached a steady lull by then, but you had clicked on the title Everything’ll Change because you were hopeful your alertness would change to REM cycles. You had closed your eyes as the beat started, burying your hands underneath your dark gray blanket as you breathed in the down linen myth you achieved with downy weekly.

The sound had caught you off guard, your hazed emotions and senses reeling you back to attention as a honey-filtered voice scratched over a stripped track. The quality was nothing to be proud of, but the liquid of his voice flowed still- strong and confident as a faint static caught the background, almost as if it was recorded in the middle of the night with a fan turned into the mic. You melted under the docile nature of his tone, hearing the raw power and emotional connection through your Soundcloud free-trial as if you were listening to his own handcrafted mix that he tagged especially for you.

You slept well after that.

It became your routine quickly: sitting down after a long, stressed day and putting your earbuds in, turning to First & Last’s profile and listening to his trance-creating voice as he uploaded poor-quality cover after cover. They put you to sleep in the best way possible, filling your joints with the cushion of comfort as alternative cords created a pre-recorded background for his vocalization. You felt embarrassed, slightly, at your growing obsession, but you placed the thought on the backburner and gave into the guilt- you wouldn’t stop hitting play if someone payed you a million dollars to never listen again.

You knew very little about the singer behind the fitful production capacity, his profile offering miniscule details of his life. He used an overshadowed photo for his profile picture that showed nothing but a hint of a jawline and mole, the rest covered by a deep red hoodie and photo shop gradients- so knowing the true face behind First & Last wasn’t an option. The name the profile was under was nothing but what you assumed were initials, a cryptic L.D. written in the space meant for your first name. You were out of concrete answers- which allowed your imagination to take whatever avenue it wanted.

You had created scenarios about what he looked and sounded like in real life, and they ranged from cute to finicky, from awkward to cocky and resilient. You had no idea, though, and that’s what sent you running towards the exotic world of the unknown. But, you wanted to know because you felt yourself becoming attached to the voice in a way you never experienced sound before. It was a safety net you didn’t know you had before you needed it every night.

Some days you couldn’t wait, though, when your eyes traced to a cover version of some indie bullshit song you’d never heard of, but you were going to listen to anyway. It frequently happened during the mid-day hours you worked at The Round About, the small workshop-like record store that sat in the heart of your downtown scene, but you could luckily sneak an earbud in under your hair and hoodie.

You were interrupted from your immersion by the sound of footsteps clacking inside through the opened door, transferring their weight from sidewalk to hollow cement floors. You glanced upwards through the thickness of your lashes, one hand pocketing your cellphone while the other toyed with the jewel attached to your necklace. You met eyes with one of the regular customers, a dark-haired boy around your age who had an affinity for elusive artists whose records collected dust in the back storage room of the store. You raised your hand in greeting, not bothering to move from your position leaned against the glass display case that supported the register, creating the epitome image of nonchalance.

He walked towards you, pocketing his hands in his black jacket as he gazed around the newer records with feigned interest, when truly you knew he was only going to ask for your help in finding or ordering something you’d never heard of. He stopped directly in front of the glass barricade, leaning onto it and miming your position, his tanned face coming too close to yours.

“Whatever you’re going to ask for, I’m going to go ahead and tell you that I have no clue whether it is in stock or not,” you said, cutting to the chase as blood rushed to your face, his dark eyes cutting into your own with an intrigue you had never seen so close.

“How’d you know I was even going to ask about a record?” he said, “I could’ve been about to say something completely unrelated.”

“Then you would be in the wrong store,” you remarked, pushing backwards with the palm of your hands and away from the counter, “The ‘completely unrelated’ store is two blocks down and on the left.”

He laughed lowly with a noise that dripped roguery, leaning farther over the counter with his elbows propped beneath him.

“That’s why I like you,” he commented off-handedly, “Your always quick to bite back.”

He toed the edge of the display case with his scuffed Nikes, the black check peeling like an ancient painting. Sighing, you walked around the case as you tried to pull the heel of your sneakers on again, as you usually opted out of wearing shoes when you worked a four hour shift. He smiled as you hopped, reaching out his hand to grant you support, which you accepted quickly before you risked becoming intimate with the rock floor.

“What do you actually want me to search for, Donghyuck?” you asked, slipping your hand from his cold grasp.

“Uh,” he scratched the back of his neck, “a Banesworld album, it’s called Drowsy…”

You raised a brow at his trail off.

“I think,” he finished with a shrug, pretending to feel bad about his uncertainty when really you knew it was a ploy to talk to you.

The thing about Lee Donghyuck was that he was a regular for two reasons. One) you actually put the effort into finding the misfit band vinyls he searched for and two) his undoubtable crush on you. Donghyuck had walked into the store with a broken skateboard and a soaked shirt one day last summer when the skies had opened into a torrential rain unexpectedly and he needed to seek shelter before he caught numerous diseases. He had shook his then dark purple hair out, running golden fingers through it repetitively until he deemed it dry enough to see out from underneath, and then he took one look around the store before finding his favorite item. You.

He had smiled like an absolute ray of light the minute he caught your eyes, the flirtatious quirk of his lips enough to send you running to the hills when you were just fifteen. You had scored a legendary job from the help of your oldest brother, who knew the owner well enough to convince him that his kid-sister could operate a cash register well enough to stand around like a disc jockey during the afternoons. The last thing you wanted was to spend the time trying to fight away a monster redness in your cheeks as a boy (a whole year older than you!) winked at you when he asked about obscure music. So, you learned to walk the tightrope with Donghyuck instead of against his strong winds, and now you fought back with clipped sentences and biting remarks.

It wasn’t that you didn’t like him, or even that you didn’t enjoy his weekly (sometimes daily) company. No, it was the fact that you were stuck in a place of cold obsession and infatuation, and you couldn’t try to date when your mind kept wandering to boys you never would know. You didn’t trust yourself to not make comparisons that you had falsely created in the early mornings, you didn’t trust yourself to sit and hold the hand of a kind boy without thinking about a voice.

You were almost certain you were crazy.

Because what sane girl would sit in the face of a pinning Lee Donghyuck and turn him away indirectly every chance you got. The answer? A sane girl wouldn’t. So, you had reached an easy conclusion: you were crazy.

Donghyuck led the way to the backroom by muscle memory, stepping up to four steps in two strides, turning his head over his shoulder to through a smirk your direction before swinging the caught hinges of the door open. He wandered in, feeling against the wall for the light switch before letting out an exclamation of success as the small room flooded in fluorescent heat. The illumination brought view to six foot stacks of red and blue crates, each holding square sleeves filled with music. It also revealed your small stack of personal belongings that had wound up in the room either from the start of your day or from the collection of overtime forgetfulness. A charcoal rain coat was flung over the back of a broken swivel-chair, which housed your tattered and beaten backpack form the past three years of schooling- now filled with three overdue library books and your laptop- and tucked on top of the only clear table space in the whole room was your open sketchbook, which was filled with half-done imagery of faceless singers who haunted your days and ghosted your nights.

You unceremoniously clapped it closed with one hand as you snatched your backpack from the chair, falling into it as Donghyuck began to snoop through the records suffocating the both of you.

“You sure you don’t have it out front or something?” he asked, his voice muffled by the dust in the air.

“Considering me and every other regular here probably hasn’t heard of it,” you muttered, “I’d say a hard no.”

“Shame,” he clicked, pushing through another chunk of records labeled ‘A’ in search of the next alphabetical letter.

You merely hummed in response, getting caught in the slow harmonies of the sound still leaking form your solo earbud. You kicked your heels into the ground softly to the beat, your eyes tracing the repetitive flicks of Donghyuck’s hands as he searched through the narrowing stack of ‘B’s, getting lost in the solemnity of the minutiae that often saddled with your winter days. The song shifted as he turned back to face you, a quick reflex of triumph flickering the shadow of his eyes as he caught you staring (but who wouldn’t?), but he shifted expressions again to one of contempt.

He raised a gray-toned album in his hand, the glossy finish reflecting the health of his skin as his fingers hid a minimal piece of line art. He waved it slightly as his smile spread wider.

“And you said it wasn’t in stock,” he teased, tossing it into your lap as he leaned against the table behind you.

“Actually,” you corrected, “I said I didn’t know if it was in stock, and to aid my defense, I’m a hundred percent positive I’ve never seen that before.”

He scoffed. “Potato, potato, Y/N,” he excused. His hand reached out and pulled the album from your lap, leaning out the door in an impatient manner.

“Are you going to take a twenty minute break or are you going to ring me up?” he snarked, “I’ve got places to be other than a dead record store.”

“I’m surprised you say that,” you called to his retreating form, standing from your chair and following after him, “since it seems you’re here almost constantly- and for long durations of time.”

“Not today, sweetheart,” he reprimanded, his lithe form resting near the register as he waited for you to come and check him out.

“Oh?” you questioned, “Do you have plans aside from bothering me?”

He grinned devilishly as you took the vinyl from his hand to scan the barcode, waiting for you to punch a few keys before speaking again, locking your gazes.

“Yes, actually,” he said, “I’ve got a date.”

For some reason your stomach dropped.

The music played on.

You waited for the comfort of his voice to ease you, but you were met untamed and sickly, a sudden urge to run out of the store and track down this girl who seemed to think she was enough for Donghyuck.

(Where did that come from?)

You waited a beat too long to make any sound of affirmation and three beats too long to hand him back the record and accept his money. He noticed (of course) but made no comment other than a deliberate look of understanding. Then he walked out, waving like you hadn’t dropped illiterate for the last forty five- no, forty six seconds when enlightened with the information that Donghyuck had a date.

You shuffled your music for the first time in months.

Your head was too light and your stomach too clenched to sleep well that night. First & Last offered no closure.

It took three days for Donghyuck to come back to the store again. Not that you were counting or that you cared, you just so happened to know that First & Last also hadn’t released anything new for three days. It had nothing to do with Donghyuck (absolutely nothing). He walked in the same way he had a hundred times before, with his ripped Nikes tapping across the threshold, his hand raised in a lazy greeting, his smile much more of a smirk than a grin and his eyes holding too much meaning inside them. His black jeans and white shirt stood out against the jewel tone walls that enclosed The Round About, the same black jacket fitting to his shoulders and abdomen as every cold-weather day you saw him. His brown hair glared off the winter sunlight that protruded through the dirty windows that patched the upper wall of the building up.

It made you sick.

Because someone else was thinking the same thing.

Yet you couldn’t understand why everything felt so wrong.

“Hey Y/N,” he acknowledged you, skipping his usual routine of coming to bother you at the counter and turning directly to the schizophrenic colored bulletin board on the wall right beside the entrance, reading through upcoming events around your town.

“Hi,” you called back, quieter and more emotionally revealing than you planned. Your throat was too clogged to speak correctly so you cut yourself into the small word, hoping he didn’t pick up on your lack of jabs and lashes.

“You have any recommendations?” he asked, wandering over towards the more mainstream albums and thumbing through them, no hint of interest in his face as he read through the titles.

You knew what you were supposed to say. You were supposed to call him out on his lack of opinions (which, regarding music, were always plentiful) or you were supposed to question his break in custom and his sudden intrigue regarding the front part of the store’s merchandise. You knew the role you were supposed to play, but you just couldn’t. Not right then.

“No,” you said, “there hasn’t been anything compelling lately.”

Donghyuck looked up, startled by your clipped tone and mundane response. He was used to sarcastic, theatrical flair in your usual banter, but he was met with a vanilla feedback from one of the only people he could count spice from. He narrowed his eyes skeptically, trying to derive a tactic from your action, as if you were paying a secret game or angle on him. You wished you understood anything enough at that moment to be playing a game, but it felt like you had lost the instruction for “Donghyuck Interactions” in a house fire that then got hit with a tornado and then swept out to sea. You were lost.

No ear buds today.

“Oh,” he stuttered, “Well-uh- I guess I’m just gonna… look around.”

He was knocked off balance. Not sure how to invoke normality in a situation that was usually filled with comfortable silences and companionable mental sparring, he was met to search through the murk of awkward and thoughtless water.

“Okay,” you agreed unnecessarily, catching his eyes again before you turned away, gripping the edge of your cream knit-shirt tightly.

The store was filled with a graceless atmosphere, the only sound the almost muted noise of the Beach Boy’s Animal Sounds playing over the loud speaker. You watched Donghyuck from the corner of your eye as he sifted through record stacks, keeping away from his usual entrée of alternative sounds. You couldn’t understand why he had a sudden shift in music taste, or why he was asking for your opinion on what to listen to, or why you were so bothered by his exploration of different melodies.

You wanted to be distracted so desperately that you left your post behind the register and strode towards the back room to fish out your sketchbook and earbuds, all under the curious scrutiny of Donghyuck’s heavy eyes. You appeared out of the room with items at hand, tugging harshly to close the door as it got stuck in a scuff on the ground. He looked away when he saw you. Turning back to his previous task of busy work as you returned to your designated area, your hands pushing in the ear buds quickly as you cracked the notebook open on top of the glass and distanced yourself from the bumbling claustrophobic ambience.

The music from your phone blocked out the humming from Donghyuck, even the softly sung phrases he punched out intermittently. He left soon after without purchasing anything and without saying goodbye. You pretended not to notice that. You really didn’t notice the sound of his singing voice.

The following Thursday (a whole week later) Donghyuck came back with a certain air of determination. He hadn’t been in since what you decided to call “The Incident”, and you couldn’t make up your mind if you were disappointed or relieved. Maybe both, maybe neither.

He walked straight up to the register wearing a different jacket, his mouth set in a forced smile, but his shoes were still the same. His eyes were still the same. You looked up, taking a moment to thank your past self for mentally preparing for the next time you saw Donghyuck, because you had pre-planned to speak to him again. This time normally. Or so you hoped.

“Hey,” you said, resting your warm palms against the glass top of the display case.

“I need help Y/N,” Donghyuck demanded, placing a fifty dollar bill on the counter top.

“I won’t kill someone for fifty bucks, you’re going to have to up your price for that one, Donghyuck,” you joked, your nerves already starting to bundle in your fingertips and reach into the heartbeat that thrummed in the veins of your wrists.

“No murder today,” he dismissed, “I need regular music- fifty dollars’ worth.”

“What classifies as ‘regular’?” you asked, truly confused with his sudden insistence.

“Uh, whatever is popular,” he said, phrasing it more as a question.

“So, pop music?”

He shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know, that’s why I’m asking you.”

You nodded, coming around to stand next to Donghyuck. “Yeah, pop music is what you want.”

He trailed after you without a moment’s hesitation as you walked to the pop section by the front door, quickly pulling out the cult favorites and a couple of your personal favorites. He took each with a serious consideration, doing the math in his head to up to fifty, and cutting off your recommendations once he reached his budget. You turned him back towards the cash register, fulling planning on prying the story out of him that led to this panicked buy.

You began to scan through the items slowly, taking your time deliberately. Donghyuck shuffled from foot to foot, waiting for you to break.

“Are you going to explain, or-?” you prompted, halting your checking out to look at him.

He ruffled his hair, frustrated.

“You remember about a week ago?”

You nodded.

“Well, I went on that date-“ you stopped yourself from coughing “-and I couldn’t find anything to talk about that we both enjoyed a lot, so I brought up music, and she hadn’t heard of anyone I listened to and I hadn’t heard about her favorite artists. So, I guess, I- well, Y/N, I like her and I want to talk to her again so I needed to know about regular music.”

You forced yourself to stop the nausea and speak. (Oh God he really liked her).

Oh God you were wrong this whole time about him liking you.

Why does it feel like Lucifer and Beelzebub both stomped on your esophagus with six-inch spiked boots?

“Oh, yeah, that’s,” you cleared your throat, “that’s really sweet.”

“That’s what I was going for, so good,” he laughed off, sensing your discomfort.

You finished through the rest of albums quickly, putting his products in a bag and shoving them at him quickly. There was a pressure burning in your eyes, and you didn’t know what to do. He took the bag gently, his finger skimming yours, and you yanked back like a snake had tried to sink it’s fangs into your knuckles. He startled, a look of dejection crossing over his face before he turned to leave.

Again.

Things weren’t the same for the next month. You dropped a few shifts at The Round About and rekindled your unknown and polarized fling with First & Last. It was a desperate attempt to revive the life before Donghyuck’s girlfriend by throwing yourself into old habits, and you recognized this the first time you spent a whole day blocking out all other noise with it when Donghyuck brought her to the store to get a new album she’d been wanting. You took your break then, because you were so sure you were going to throw up.

She was gorgeous in the way that fueled equal parts self-loathing and awe, with her glimmering black hair that feel in pin-straight waves and her big doe-eyes that never left Donghyuck’s stupid (perfect) face. She was tiny and beautifully proportioned like a miniaturized Heidi Klum, and Donghyuck wrapped his arm around her like a missing puzzle piece clicking into place. Naturally. It was right.

(God you can’t believe you thought he liked you).

You never thought you could see him the same way, but the last week of February he walked in with that black jacket and those stained Nikes and a heartsick grin. He waltzed inside and made a quick crack about ‘break-up albums’ before walking towards the alternative rock section.

For some reason you had wanted to squeal.

You settled with an honest smile to Donghyuck, telling him that he always had you and arcane music.

You were sitting on the top of the glass casing with your sketchbook propped on your lap, and Donghyuck was meandering around the store without a purpose when it happened.

He started singing.

You didn’t register it at first, your mind too intent on copying the album art from Hot Flash Heat Wave’s Neapolitan to hear anything other than your mind telling you facts. That Donghyuck was singing some song you’d never heard. That the angle of the statue was wrong. That Donghyuck’s voice was familiar. The shading should be more on the left side. Donghyuck is First & Last.

Wait.

You startled upwards, practically falling off the countertop and onto your feet, your eyes wide as you stared helplessly at Donghyuck. He furrowed his brows at you, letting the last line fade away as he started to ask you a question, but before he could you cut him off.

“I’m such a fucking idiot,” you seethed, angry with yourself, angry with the world, angry with the last month and a half and stupid, beautiful Donghyuck.

“I get that that’s pre-established, but you look too angry for us to be stating the obvious,” he joked, trying to lessen your prowess as it swept off you in waves.

“Do you have a Soundcloud Account?” you asked, and upon seeing his perplexed nod, you continued, “Is it under the name of First & Last?”

He nodded again.

“How do you know about it, I only have a few listeners…” he said, trying to connect the dots between your emotional outburst and his stupid Soundcloud account. Even though you knew they were practically the same dot.

“Jesus Christ, you idiot,” you ground out, “all this damn time of me pushing you away and you leaving, all of this dumb dancing around each other-“

You cut yourself off, so frustrated that the source of your problems wasn’t only just a fabricated state of mind that made you feel like a melodramatic psycho-fan, but the actual source was in front of you daily. Speaking. With the same voice and tone and flair and everything.

“Wait, you pushed me away?” Donghyuck stopped, his words catching at the end as his own anger boiled up, simmering slowly.

“Yes, for the whole first year we knew each other I pushed you away,” you snapped, “I’m glad you finally realized.”

“Pushing away would imply you had feelings for me,” he bit back, “and that’s not possible since you never said anything leading to that or even did anything when I got a girlfriend.”

You laughed bitterly. “Then I guess I was pretty great at the whole ‘pushing away’ thing, huh?”

“And you called me an idiot?” he said, his tone dropping to something soft and harmless. You stepped back, caught off guard by the sudden change of atmosphere on his side of the room.

He shook his head as he stared at the ground. “What kind of person pushes someone they like away? Especially if the other person made it extremely clear that they like them?”

“Apparently, that person is me,” you growled, trying to evoke his anger back. You didn’t want to be alone in this frustration, you didn’t know how to cope with feeling so stupid. So clueless.

“God, Y/N, I’ve been in love with you for months now, and you pushed me away?” his voice cracked, then turned hard again, “You have any explanation as to why?”

“I was in love with your voice, you dingbat,” you practically yelled, the silence of the room dropping inversely with the temperature, which stroked and flamed as you let out a heavy breath.

“My voice?”

“Yes. Your voice. The one that sings through a goddamn paper-cup telephone on Soundcloud? That voice. I was so entranced by that voice that I was afraid I couldn’t be fully present in a relationship. I was scared of seeming like a fool.”

“Too late for that.”

“Shut up,” you snapped.

“I don’t know whether I should be angry that my competition this whole time was myself or find it painfully adorable that you fell in love with my voice,” he pondered, leaving out all the bite and disgust that you expected when you told him you loved his voice like some freak.

“Adorable seems like the best choice,” you supplied, feeling the fatigue of confrontation flood your bones.

“Wow,” he choked out a laugh, “Wow, I really love an idiot.”

“You’re not the only one in that boat, idiot,” you replied.

He took about two seconds to comprehend what you had admitted before sweeping you into the strength of his arms, his forearms caging you to him with a strength that knocked your breath out. You buried your head into the crook of his neck, threading one hand through his hair and wrapping the other around his back, your arm slipping into the warmth of his jacket. He placed his hand on the back of your head, pulling you impossibly closer to him as he pressed his lips to the side of your head tightly.

He pulled away to look you in the eyes.

“Does this mean I have to sing for you now?”

You laughed, rubbing up the length of his spine with your hand.

“Absolutely, I just really love the sound.”

FIN.

#nct #nct 127 fic #nct u #NCT Dream Scenarios #hyuck #haechan #donghyuck #haechan scenarios #haechan imagines #haechan fic #haechan fluff #sol-peaches #nct scenarios #nct fic #nct imagines

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army-author · 6 years

Text

jin scenario | steps in your shoes

❝ Being a prefect comes with many responsibilities, including helping plan the Yule Ball, and leading the dances on the night. What you didn’t sign up for is teaching Gryffindor prefect, Kim Seokjin, to waltz. But with the help of a pollyjuice potion and a sparking of unexpected feelings, this night promises to be better than expected. ❞

➸ prompt: You and I are sworn enemies, but we’ve been chosen to plan the company Christmas party Yule Ball together

➸ pairing: gryffindor jin x slytherin reader

➸ warnings: swapping bodies, getting naked, wizard swearing, you and Jin are both idiots

➸ requested by anon | 8.3k words | fluff, mild angst, Hogwarts au

[November 17th]

Working with Kim Seokjin to organise the Yule Ball is both bad and good.

It’s bad because: he’s Kim Seokjin, a Gryffindor, and a rival to your house and all you stand for. On top of that, he’s so unfairly handsome, kissed by his fellow gods and laid to walk among mortals, he makes you want to forget all your hatred for him with one look from those sugar coated eyes.

But it’s good because: he’s rubbish at dancing, and keeps making a fool of himself in the waltzes you have to perform. It makes it worth it - all the trouble he gives you in tying your tongue with his inhumane beauty - seeing him stumbling over his two left feet and blushing like a buffoon.

As prefects, and close to perfect, it’s your job to lead the dancing during the Yule Ball, encouraging the other pupils to get on the ballroom floor after the champions’ dance. All eyes will be on you, at least for the start of the evening, and you don’t want them to see you like this, being stepped over by Jin’s clumsy feet, making you yell:

“Ouch!” you dart out from Jin’s hold after he steps on your foot for the third time this evening. But even as you rub at your absurd foot you can see the funny side to this. Until:

Jin’s brows twist up on concern, seeing you hurt. His natural state of care, instantly turns your mirth stale, not to mention makes you want to slap him. Why must he worry about you? He’d be so much easier to hate if he was a jerk.

“What’s the matter?” you snap, “Don’t give me that look!”

“I’m sorry!” He raises his useless hand, like he wants to help you, but isn’t entirely sure what to do.

“Don’t be!” You straighten up and cross your arms, “I don’t need your apologies. I need you to get better at dancing.”

He hangs his head, black hair falling across his forehead while he eyeballs the floor. “I’m trying. I really am.”

Now you feel bad for yelling at him. A scowl settles on your face. Curse him for making you feel guilty.

All you want is for the Yule Ball to go smoothly, for all your hard work to pay off, but at this rate you’re going to be the laughing stock of your year group, pulling Jin, stiff as a porcelain doll, around the dancefloor. Of all people, why did it have to be Jin you got stuck with, the man born with a face of diamond and feet of lead? Your hands curl into fists, and you spit out past gritted teeth, “It’s alright. Let’s just try it again from the top.”

You step back into his hold, guiding his hand to your waist. Your gaze falls back to his face, only to see him busy staring down at the ground.

“Eyes up,” you instruct.

“But I need to look at my feet!”

“No you don’t. Trust me, it’s easier if you don’t look down. Eyes up.”

He raises his gaze to yours, with chocolatey eyes that heat up your insides and melt them down. It’s really hard to stay angry with him. Forcing your thoughts back to the task at hand, you try to concentrate on how you can help him improve his hold, and try not to think about how gentle his touch is, hands resting lightly on you, like you’re a sculpture he doesn’t want to break. He really is trying.

“Alright,” you say, arching your back a little more, “And a one-two-three. One-two-three.” As you call out the instructions, Jin leads you around the room again. While he concentrates on the steps you taught him, all at once his gentle hold stiffens. Rather than dancing with a human being, you’re dancing with a block of wood. He keeps his eyes trained on you, but his gaze is intense now. Focused so hard on what his legs and arms are doing, his brows pull down, and he’s glaring at you with his mouth pressed into a strict line. He actually looks quite scary.

That is until he wobbles, stepping on his own feet rather than your own. He teeters for one instant, trying desperately, and not very successfully, to right himself before he falls backwards, pulling you, still in his hold with him. You manage to untangle yourself from his grip just before he crashes to the floor, leaving you standing over him, straightening your jumper and shaking your head.

“I really am sorry. I’m not doing this on purpose,” he says, as he scrambles back to his feet.

“What did I say about apologising?” You poke him in his chest to remind him.

“Yeah. No saying sorry. Sorry. Oh, opps. Sorry! Ah! Sorry! Sorry for saying sorry!” He keeps on tangling himself up in knots, twisting himself further into a strained ball of stress. It would be funny, if you didn’t actually feel bad for him.

“Yeah, whatever,” your voice comes out gruffer than you mean, not entirely sure whether to laugh or comfort him. You settle on ridicule. After all, you’re a Slytherin and he’s a Gryffindor - you can’t let him think you actually like him. “I’m having a good time watching you fail, so don’t worry about me.”

His face drops at this, and you swallow down your guilt. It tastes bitter on the way down, like a bad multi-flavour bean you were expecting to be sweet. Why do you hate Gryffindors anyway? Jin really isn’t that bad, apart from his over enthusiasm when it comes to fulfilling his prefect duties, even going so far as to learn, or try to learn, waltzing for the sake of the Yule Ball sprit.

“Ah, forget it,” he mutters under his breath, “I wouldn’t expect a Slytherin to care.”

And at this, all of your rage flares up. You remember why you hate Gryffindors so much. It comes tumbling back. Gryffindors are always making assumptions about Slytherins, thinking that just because your house has had a few bad eggs you must all be evil. You certainly aren’t doing much to help the case, with your constant teasing and ever present smirk, but you wish they would give you a chance, wish Jin would give you a chance. But as you look at him, blinking doe-eyed at you, full lips trembling a little, you realise you really don’t deserve a chance with him. He’s only ever been kind to you, unlike most Gryffindors, and you’ve repaid him with nothing but acerbic sarcasm.

Sucking in a breath, you search for a way to make the situation better. In a softer tone, you say, “Listen. If you really want to get better I could speak to one of my friends who’s a dancer. He could help you out a bit.”

Jin’s eyes flow over your face, searching the line of your frown and the pout of your lips for something genuine. You try to brighten your expression, show him you mean it. “Why should I accept help from a Slytherin?” he says at last, hesitant.

You fight back the temptation to roll your eyes, knowing that it won’t help your case. “Because I have to dance with you, and I don’t want to look rediculous.” And because you feel bad and want to make it up to him. Because it’s upsetting seeing him get so frustrated. Because, despite yourself, you actually care for him. Not that you’ll let him know this.

He places his hands on his hips, and raises his eyes to the old stained ceiling that’s seen one too many spells gone wrong. A sigh escapes him, heaving his chest up and down before he finally answers, “Fine.” His eyes return to you, still wary. “I guess you’re worried enough about your own image to do this for me.”

That hurt. Biting down on your bottom lip, you fight back the anger that scorches below the surface of your skin. You need to keep calm. If you get angry now, you’ll ruin any chance you have of helping him, and of keeping yourself free from remorse. So instead of snapping, you respond, “Yeah. Guess so.” Just adding to the image of the cold Slytherin he takes you for, calculating, manipulative, and striving for your success. If only he’d look a little closer and see how you calculate for his sake, manipulate to help him, and strive for shared success. If only he could understand that, since there’s no bloody way you’re spelling it out for him.

“Meet here again tomorrow,” you say.

“But it’s a Saturday.”

“Tough.”

If only you weren’t so. If only you were a little softer like him.

[November 18th]

You arrive at the classroom where you normally practice with Jin, towing Jimin behind you.

“I wanted to go to Hogsmeade today,” he mumbles, still sleepy, since you dragged him out of bed earlier than he would have liked. When you came knocking at his dorm door this morning, he had reminded you in a voice laced with sleep and confusion that today was the day that he caught up on sleep after staying up late for club activities on weekdays.

You do feel a little bad. Looking at him as your both step into the classroom, his blonde hair dishevelled and a black sweater quickly thrown on, along with the sweatpants he normally wears for dance practice, he looks like he could benefit from a few more hours in bed. But school is always busy, and sleep is always on short supply, and he should be used to it by now.

“I’m really sorry Jimin,” you say, rubbing a hand up and down his arm in an attempt to pacify him, “I’ll buy you a butterbeer next time to make up for it.”

He shakes your arm off, and catches your hand in his instead, giving it a squeeze. “It’s okay. I may seem annoyed, but I’m just tired, I promise. And I really don’t mind. I know how important it is that you get things patched up with Jin.”

Your mouth falls open at this, and you pull your hand quickly from Jimin’s hold. “What is that meant to mean, Park Jimin?”

“What? Nothing.” Jimin ducks away from you, already predicting the onslaught of punches that you’re planning. “Just, Kim Seokjin is a very handsome man… I’m not judging you at all.”

“Jimin!” You launch yourself after him, wanting nothing more than to shut him up, and stop the blush that’s burning your cheeks. “Jin may be godly levels of handsome, and he may have bloody perfect lips, but me helping him has nothing to do with that, okay?” You manage to catch Jimin’s jumper in your fingers, and pull him back to give his arm a sharp poke.

“Okay, okay!” he squirms out of your hold, still giggling.

There’s a creak as the door swings open, and you both spin around to see Jin standing there. Your cheeks flood with colour, wondering how much he heard.

“Jin!” you rush over to him, pulling him into the room, in haste to hide your own embarrassment. Maybe if you keep talking, he won’t notice… or remember. “This is Jimin. He’s amazing at dancing, and he’s going to, hopefully, teach you the waltz. Well, at least he’s going to do a better job than I did!”

You push Jin into the middle of the room.

Your friend surveys him, taking in his school trousers, black shoes, and white shirt. “First of all,” Jimin says, “Are you really planning on doing dance practice in that?”

Jin looks down at his uniform. “What’s wrong with it?”

Jimin puffs up his cheeks, and looks to you, eyes asking ‘can you believe this?’, before saying, “You can’t dance properly like this.”

“I don’t have anything else to wear,” Jin complains, to which Jimin bites his cheek, and then says, “Fine. I guess we’ll work with it. After all, you’ll be wearing a tuxedo for the Yule Ball anyway.”

You bite down on a smile. Jimin, who’s normally so nice, always transforms when it comes to teaching dance. It’s what he’s passionate about, what he’ll live and die for, and he wants to see everyone else do just as well at it, even if it means pushing them. You had wondered how the boy ended up in Slytherin until you saw him dancing. Then it all made sense.

With a flick of his wrist, Jimin waves his wand, and a gentle waltz tune begins playing in the air, coming from you have no idea where.

“Show me how it’s been going so far,” Jimin holds out a hand, for you and Jin to take to the floor.

You offer Jin an encouraging smile as his hands fall to the position you taught, one hand supporting your back, one hand threaded in your own. He barely notices though; he’s too busy looking at his feet.

“Eyes up,” you remind him, as the music picks up and you push against his hands, indicating it’s time for him to move. But he starts too late, and you’re completely off time. He stumbles, trying to pick up the pace and catch up with the beat, while you try to slow down and wait for the next bar of music to run on, and you both end up fighting each other across the dancefloor until Jimin claps his hands and you both disentangle from each other.

“That’s enough,” he says, while Jin huffs a breath, blowing strands of his fringe from his forehead. You can sense he’s anxious, so you force a smile his way, despite how foreign it feels, and say:

“Hey, I think if we’d started on the correct beat, it might have actually been okay.”

But Jimin shakes his head at this. “Starting on the wrong beat is the least of your problems.”

You and Jin both turn to face him, with equally hurt faces, and Jimin sighs, scratching at the nape of his neck. “Jin, as the man you need to lead when you’re waltzing. At the moment, it looks like you’re being lead, and you,” your friend turns to face you, “You give in, and lead him around, rather than letting him guide you.”

Jin worries his bottom lip with his teeth, leaving the pink skin plump and raw when he says, “Sorry about that… it’s just - when I was younger, me and my brother were both taught to waltz by my grandma, but as the youngest, I was always made to take the girl’s part when we danced, so I’m used to being led.”

“That explains it.” Jimin rubs his hand over his chin, thinking, then says, “Alright. Let’s try again, but switch roles this time.”

“Excuse me?” you voice reaches an octave you didn’t think was possible.

“You heard me,” Jimin says, “I want you to take the boy’s role, and Jin will dance the girl’s part.”

You want to argue that you would rather not, that you don’t know what you’re doing, but Jin’s already taking your hand, guiding it to the small of his back.

“This is ridiculous,” you mutter as the music starts up again. But as the beat begins, and you instinctively start leading, Jin follows after you, a lot lighter on his feet than before. Rather than worrying about how odd you must look, leading this tall, broad-shouldered man around the room, you let yourself get caught up in the music, carried on wave after wave of tinkling piano keys, tickling the air.

As the music finally draws to a close, you stop in the centre of the room. Only then do you realise that Jin’s eyes have been on you the whole time, not once looking down at his feet.

“Amazing,” Jimin claps his hands together, “That was so much better!”

Jin looks down at you, eyes wide and mouth slightly parted, like he can’t quite believe what happened.

A smile slides across your features, brightening the scowl you normally wear around him. “Look at that, you didn’t even step on my feet once!”

Untangling himself from your hold, Jin runs a worried hand through his hair. “But this doesn’t help us, does it?” He flashes a look at you, then Jimin. “I mean… I can’t just dance the girl’s part for the Yule Ball. I need to learn how to do it properly.”

But Jimin’s face is already falling into a devious grin, and you can’t help but copy him. Slytherin cunning really does come in handy sometimes. “Oh, but you can,” you say, “If you really wanted to…”

Jin’s brows furrow. “I don’t think I’m following.”

In a collective breath, you and Jimin answer, “Pollyjuice potion.”

“I am not brewing you a pollyjuice potion!” Yoongi glares at you over the top of the book he’s meant to be studying.

You and Jimin both clasp your hands together, leaning across the study desk in the library to plead with him. “Please, Yoongi,” you say, “Jin can’t dance the men’s part. We need to swap bodies, and you’re the best potion brewer I know.”

The odd concoction that could allow you to take on the form of whoever you wanted seems the only way you’ll get Jin through the evening, but Jimin’s roommate is proving to be stubborn.

“But pollyjuice potions are extremely temperamental!” he argues, flicking to another page in his book.

“So are you, but we still put up with you,” you joke, earning a glower before you hold up your hands, “I’m joking, Yoongi. Just, please! Do this for me. I know you can brew pollyjuice potions just fine.”

You think back to the time in third year, when you and Jimin had convinced Yoongi that it would be a good idea to brew the difficult potion and turn into your potions teacher to tell off Jung Hoseok, after the Hufflepuff had (accidentally) tipped Yoongi’s cauldron over and turned him into a frog for a day. The whole situation had worked out for the best in the end, and Yoongi and Hoseok are now close friends, so using pollyjuice potions couldn’t be that bad, right?

“I’m not brewing it,” Yoongi repeats, tone soft, but firm, “My days of going against the school rules are over. I’m a model student now.”

“Oh come on, Yoongi, you don’t give a dragon’s fart about the rules,” you say, earning you a quirked brow from the boy.

“Yeah, come on, help her out,” Jimin says, “After all, she needs to be in Jin’s good books if she ever wants to have a chance with that handsome face and those broad shoulders.”

“Jimin!” you shriek, only to remember you’re in the library and clamp your hands over your mouth. The librarian glares your way, and you mouth an apology, though you don’t know if it’s seen.

Turning back to your friends, you smack Jimin on the arm, and say in a low voice, “How many times do I have to repeat myself? I don’t like him that way”

Jimin pokes at your burning cheeks, “Okay. Sure.” His tone sounds anything but convinced.

On the other side of the desk, Yoongi scratches at the bridge of his nose, considering, while his eyes drill into you. “How important is this for you?”

Cheeks still as red as Jin’s Gryffindor robes, you say, “It’s… very important,” to which Jimin throws a knowing smile your way, and you quickly add, “I’ve worked hard to make the Yule Ball run smoothly. I won’t have Jin’s bloody awful dancing ruining it for me.” Your skin itches uncomfortably at Jimin’s joking and Yoongi’s searching gaze. They’re both being silly if they think you have any ulterior motive.

Yoongi lets out a long sigh through his nose, before bowing his head, “Alright, I’ll do it.”

With a whoop, you and Jimin both lean across the table to scoop your friend into a strangling hug, while the librarian screeches at the commotion you’re making. You’re promptly kicked out of the library, but it’s worth it.

[November 20th]

“I’m really not sure about this…” Jin wrinkles his nose as Yoongi inspects the small collection of lacewing flies he’s managed to obtain, preparing to stew them.

You’re sitting in the abandoned girls’ toilets on the first floor, cross-legged on the tiles around Yoongi’s cauldron. The book of potions, lifted, you don’t want to ask how, from the restricted section of the library, lies open in Yoongi’s lap.

Across the bubbling cauldron, you curl your lip at Jin, frustrated with his hesitancy. “Don’t be such a bloody goody-two-shoes. We’re doing this for you!” After all the trouble you’ve put yourself through for him, seeing him wobbling on the brink of giving up is infuriating.

He huffs a breath, looking away while Yoongi starts to stew the lacewing flies, probably grossed out by the idea of having to drink this later. “I know. And I appreciate that, I really do, but this potion is so difficult to brew. And there are so many things that could go wrong.”

“Don’t you trust me?” Yoongi rumbles absent-mindedly as he works, and Jin quickly holds up his hands, answering:

“Of course!” Despite Yoongi being in the year below you, you can tell that Jin’s terrified of him, and you can’t help but smile, knowing what Yoongi’s like below his gruff exterior. But Jin does seem to be good at misjudging Slytherins. Or maybe Slytherins are just terrible of showing what they’re truly like, under all that frost.

You should work on that, convince Jin that he can trust you and Yoongi. After all, you’re partners in crime now, brewing potions you shouldn’t brew in bathrooms you shouldn’t be in. Biting down on a sigh, you reach across to offer Jin a quick pat on his knee. “Listen. It’s going to be alright. Yoongi is the best potion brewer I know. And once he gets this done, we might actually offer a good show at the Yule Ball.” On his knee, your hand sears hot, but you press out a smile anyway, despite how foreign it feels to show this side around Jin.

His eyes widen at you, and at your hand still hovering above his knee, looking at you like you’ve just transformed into a giant spider in front of him.

And this is why you never try to be nice. You just end up embarrassing yourself, getting weird looks from those who are used to your jagged surface, spiked with icicles. Whatever people might try to say otherwise, it really is impossible to get over first impressions. Jin will only ever see you as a self-centred and selfish Slytherin. And maybe a part of you is just that – but there’s more under the surface of the ice. You wish Jin would see this, would accept your help, rather than raising his eyebrows when you try to fight your way out of your own shell.

But with one small look from him, he’s sent you scurrying back to the familiar territory of prickly and harsh. Whatever Jimin might say, you certainly don’t like Jin. In fact, right now, you hate him.

With frustration thrumming through you, you snap your hand away and stand up. “Whatever. Thanks for doing this Yoongi, but I’ve got to go. This bathroom creeps me out.” With a fake smile, not quite reaching your eyes, you twirl on your heel and head for the door. But not before you catch Jin staring at you, with brows drawn together in concern. Whatever. Let him worry. Maybe he’ll realise that he hurt your feelings. Maybe he’ll realise that you actually have feelings.

[November 27th]

It’s been a week since you last saw Jin, and you’re thankful for it. Over the past seven days you’ve been left to stew in your anger, fuming over how Jin looks at you, like he does all other Slytherins, and fuming over yourself and how you turn into a wreck of tumbling emotions around him. You shouldn’t care what he thinks of you, and yet here you are, thinking and overthinking everything he’s ever done or said around you.

Seven days is a long time for anger to build up, and to rot.

So when Jin notices you in hall, eyes locking as he walks towards your seat, pausing on his way to meet up with his Gryffindor friends, your instinct is to immediately furrow your eyebrows and ask, snappishly, “What?”

He looks slightly surprised at your reaction. He shouldn’t be. After all, you’re the Slytherin with the frozen cold heart. At least in his eyes.

You see that he’s holding up the students behind him, waiting to get past and find a seat with their friends. Annoyed, you give his sleeve a tug to pull him out of the way, and then glare up at his handsome face, a few extra inches closer now. “Did you want something?”

Jin looks embarrassed, running a hand through his midnight-black hair. “Yeah… actually… we never agreed a time to meet up for more dance practice…”

“Do you want more?” you ask, “After all, you dance the girls’ part just fine.”

“Not fine… just better than the boy’s part,” his voice lowers as he says this, probably worrying people will overhear and begin to grow suspicious. “I still need more practice though… or at least I’d like more practice. If you’re free that is. If not… well, I’ll figure something out.”

“Good. Figure something out then.” You turn back to the food you had so rudely been distracted from when Jin caught your attention, attractive face annoyingly taking you away from your conversation, even at the other end of the hall. And then he had caught you staring and taken it as a cue to come over.

You can still feel him hovering behind you. Maybe if you ignore him, he’ll take the hint and leave.

“Have I done something to upset you?” His voice reverberates through your head, and your hand fists below the table. Across from you, Jimin raises his eyebrows at you, but you’re not in the mood for his insinuations right now. You’ve not in the mood for anything. Not Jimin. Not Jin. Certainly not yourself, mind reeling from Jin’s proximity. But no matter how much your burning cheeks may testify against you, Jimin’s wrong. This is anger showing in your red face, not the sparks of romance.

“No,” you turn back to Jin, and flash a fake smile, “What made you think that?”

His soft lips pout. “You’ve just been a bit… cold recently.”

“I’m a Slytherin,” you sneer at him, “You shouldn’t expect more from me. After all, we’re all the same to you Gryffindors anyway. Unfeeling, right? All villains, right?”

He opens his mouth to fight back your acidity, but you can’t take any more of this, so you turn your head away from him and growl, “See you in the next prefects’ meeting.”

You can feel him hesitating behind you, before he finally moves away. You refuse to look back and watch him go. But instead of feeling relief that he’s gone, all that’s left is a hollow disappointment, squirming in your stomach.

[December 20th]

The next month flies by, with planning for the Yule Ball being just a small part of your overly busy life. There are classes to worry about, friends to catch up with, and in the middle of all of that is Jin, still occupying a part your brain, despite distancing yourself from him.

You only see him at the Yule Ball meetings now, refusing to help him practice anymore with the waltz. After all, you’re getting him a pollyjuice potion. That’s enough. Giving him anymore, opening yourself up for him anymore, only leads you to make a fool of yourself. A bloody fool.

Still, excitement jumps inside you when Yoongi arrives in the common room, announcing. “It’s finished.”

“What? The potion?” You sit up straight on the sofa beside Jimin.

Yoongi flops down next to you, drawing two small potion bottles from his pocket. “Yep.” He holds one up for you to see the sludge coloured mixture oozing inside.

You take the potion from his fingers, slipping it into your own pocket and out of sight of your fellow housemates, worried they’ll catch sight of something they shouldn’t. But the common room is bustling with noise, students excited for the Yule Ball and for Christmas and for lessons to be ending soon.

“So how are you and Jin?” Jimin asks you from your other side. He raises his eyebrows, and you give him a shove.

“Stop that. There’s nothing going on between us… unless you mean me barely speaking to him.”

Jimin furrows his brows at this. “Why’s that?”

Yoongi leans into your periphery vision, asking, “Wait... are you fighting with him?”

“Not really.” You play with a few stray strands of hair, running them between your thumb and index finger. “Just. He’s a Gryffindor. And I’m Slytherin. We don’t exactly get on.”

“That’s a load of toad crap,” Jimin huffs out, “Just because our houses are rivals doesn’t mean you can’t get along, and you know it.”

You breathe a sigh. “I guess… and I really do want to get on with him - but…” But… but… you tried and failed once to get past your own stubbornness and Jin’s cluelessness. And look where it got you. This whole month has been painful for you, only ever seeing Jin at prefect meetings, catching his hurt brown eyes gazing across at you as you try to carry out your duties, cold, and precise, and unfeeling. But on the inside, all month you’ve been hot, and clumsy, and feeling a lot more than you should. “I just… don’t know how to get over our awkwardness. He’s already got me pinned down as the typical hard-hearted Slytherin, and I can’t get past that now…”

Jimin nudges you gently, and you look up to his gentle smile. “Yes, you can. We all know you’re soft-hearted, no matter how much you might pretend you aren’t. If you’re honest, then Jin will see that too.”

You give Jimin a smile in return. “Thanks, I just wish it was that simple.”

“Well…” on your other side, Yoongi chips in, “You might think he’s judged you without really knowing you. But haven’t you done the same for him as a Gryffindor?”

You bite your lip, considering. You certainly do expect Jin to act a certain way, and he fulfils what you presume, worrying about brewing restricted potions, trying so desperately to do well, to be the best, so honest, so clueless. But what do you really know of him behind the perfect prefect image? “Maybe…” Admitting you’re in the wrong as much as Jin is difficult, but when Yoongi throws an arm around you on one side, and Jimin on the other, squishing you in a sandwiched hug, you decide it’s not so bad.

“Good luck for the Ball,” Jimin says, “I know you and Jin will sort things out.”

For once you don’t mind the hidden implications in his tone.

[December 25th]

So the night is finally upon you, Christmas, and the Yule Ball. You pace in your room, watching the skirts of your dress rise and fall in the mirror with each step you take. The soft silver threaded lace, studded with small dew-drop crystals, seems out of place, holding your agitated body. Tonight you’re going to dance with Jin, going to dance as him, while he poses as you. After almost a month of barely speaking. You take a deep breath, remind yourself of what your friends said – be honest, things will work out, the clenching in your chest will go away – until a knock at the door brings you out of your misery.

You open up to Yoongi and Jimin, well-groomed in their suits and gowns.

“Ready?” Yoongi asks.

And at that moment, the only thing you feel ready to do is throw up. You take a step back into the room, and your friends, predicting your retreat, grab you, one finding purchase on each wrist, and pull you out. In a panicked daze, you let them lead you down the twisting corridors of your school, further from your room and the escape it offers, and closer to the hall and the excited voices of students. You barely even notice the decorations you spent so much time deciding on, fake crystals of ice encrusted across the stone walls of the old corridors, and blue lights twinkling on the ceiling.

The hall appears around the corner, doors yawning wide and open, with a crowd gathering outside, waiting to be let in. At the front of the group you spot Jin, looking as anxious as you feel, while he fiddles with the edges of his ink-black robe, and your feet dig into the floor, pulling to a halt.

“Come on,” Yoongi rumbles, tugging you gently, “Everything will be fine.”

“I can’t do this,” you murmur to him, desperate for him to understand the nauseating flurrying in your stomach, holding you back. But with one dark look back at you, you realise he understands completely, and that’s why he pushes you forward so that you stumble towards Jin.

The Gryffindor spots you through the crowd, and it’s too late now, he’s coming over.

“Hi,” he raises a hand awkwardly, and you respond with a nod, eyes not raising high enough to meet his gaze, instead focusing on the red collar of his shirt just below his robe. “Do you have the potion?” He lowers his voice, and you nod again, then realising you should actually use your voice, you say, “Yes.” Speaking to him after a month of icy treatment is strange, but not unpleasant. In fact, the ice-cold word melts in your warm mouth, and you breathe out the breath you were holding, eyes finally rising to meet his dark chocolate gaze.

Then, remembering where you are, what your plan is, you snap into action. “We should get out of this crowd,” you say, glancing behind to see where your friends have gone, but they’ve already melted into the throng of people, and it’s just you and Jin. Slightly annoyed that they didn’t stay to wish you luck, you shrug it off, and grab onto Jin’s sleeve, pulling him past the crowds, threading through thrumming bodies, searching for somewhere you can hide, until the students thin out and you find an abandoned classroom to duck into, where you pull out the two bottles of potion. This is it then. You stare at the unappealing sludge, bubbling slightly behind the glass, and can’t help but scrunch up your nose. It looks vile. Hopefully it will improve with the final ingredient added.

Without warning, you reach up and pluck a hair from Jin’s scalp. He yelps, shooting you a hurt look, which you ignore while you add his DNA to the odd looking concoction. The potion fizzes for a moment, white bubbles surging up, before turning the liquid turns a blushing shade of pink, reminding you of strawberry milk. You pull out a strand of your own hair and add it to the other potion, watching it dissolve in the mud coloured potion, before a few blue coloured sparks shoot out, and the potion turns a deep navy, like the sky on a clear winter’s night. A slight improvement on bottled bog water. It actually looks drinkable now.

Trying not to think of all the ingredients added, you hand the blue potion and Jin.

“Should we get changed first?” you ask, teeth sinking into your bottom lip as you consider your brand new dress, and the strain it will be put under if you transform into Jin’s broad-shouldered body still wearing it.

Jin’s cheeks turn scarlet, quickly mumbling, “Yeah… probably.”

You both stand still, waiting for the other to do something, silence descending thick and heavy. At last you break, and say, “Okay. Let’s both agree no looking-”

“Of course!”

“I’ll turn around, and you throw over your clothes to me, okay?”

Jin nods, and you spin around, before checking once behind you to make sure he’s done the same, then unzip your dress, letting it fall to the floor. You quickly step out of it, unhooking your bra as well, since you’ll have no need for it once you take on Jin’s body. Shivering naked, you use your foot to push your heap of clothes across to Jin, and wait, listening to the soft brush of fabric until Jin’s own suit and gown are thrown to the floor by your feet. You glance down, and in the corner of your vision spot a white shape that might be Jin, but you quickly dart your eyes away again, blushing furiously. Picking up the shirt and trousers, you throw them on, glad of the comfort they offer from the freezing cold. Tucking the too-large shirt in, you fumbled for the pink potion and murmur, “Alright… here goes.” Turning back to Jin, who’s just about managed to fit himself into your dress, unzipped, you offer a small smile before raising your bottle to him. “Cheers.”

His uncertain irises, sparkling scared, are the last thing you see before you screw your own eyes shut and tip the potion down your throat. It tastes far nicer than you thought it would, like bubble-gum and Turkish delight, but you still gag when you remember the lacewing flies Yoongi stewed for this recipe. You swallow the whole concoction with some difficulty, and almost immediately a sharp tingling sensation shoots up your spine. Your face screws up against the feeling, toes curling in your shoes and for a moment, you worry that the potion might have gone horribly wrong. But then you open your eyes and jump back to see the ground a couple of inches further away from you. At first you wonder if this is some weird side-affect, but then you realise that you’ve gained Jin’s height and that his own clothes are now fitting snugly to your frame. Holding up your hands, you see his own long fingers floating in front of your face, rather than your own dainty digits. Jin, now residing in your body, or at least, a version of your body, seems small in front of you. He gazes up at you, blinking several times.

“Is that really what I look like to you?” His words sound strange in your voice.

You don’t have much time left to gape at each other, as you hear the first chords of music starting up, and realise that the champions’ dance has already begun. You’ll be up next.

“Quick, let me zip you up.” You grab Jin by the shoulders, spinning him around to help him with your dress, pushing away your own strands of hair before pulling the zip all the way up. On your own body, it fits well, accenting your curves all the more from Jin’s vantage point. Not wanting to dwell on this, or on how odd your body feels without the extra weight of your breasts, and something extra in your trousers, you quickly spin Jin around to face you again. “Let’s go.”

Waving a hand for him to follow you, you exit the classroom and head down the corridor, unsteady on Jin’s longer legs. You’ve almost made it safely back to the hall when you see Jin’s Gryffindor friend, Namjoon, coming towards you, and panic surges up, wondering whether or not he’ll notice your odd steps and strange behaviour as his – at least in his mind – own friend.

“Jin!” He calls to you, and you glance back at the real Jin, eyes pleading for help, before Namjoon reaches a familiar hand to your shoulder, pulling you away. This wasn’t part of the plan. You were just meant to do the waltz together and then get out. You have no idea how to act, no idea what to do with this strangely large body – large to you at least.

“Hey, good luck for tonight,” Namjoon says, and you offer him the best smile you can, pinching your cheeks up and stretching your lips. Even smiling feels odd with a new face.

“Yeah thanks, I’m sure the dancing will be fine,” you manage, still startled to hear Jin’s voice coming from your throat.

Namjoon grins back, and you stutter to a halt. You know this kind of smile. It’s not the smile you offer to a friend who’s nervous about performing. This is something else entirely. “I’m not talking about dancing,” he says, and you realise where you’ve seen that smile before – plastered across Jimin’s face when he teases you about Jin.

You open and close your mouth a few times, finally finding the words to defend yourself – or Jin – or both. “I don’t know what you mean…”

“Oh come on!” Namjoon pushes your arm, a little too harshly, and you stumble back, “I’m talking about your Slytherin sweetheart. You better make the most of this opportunity! Show her that you’re not just some stuck up Gryffindor, and that you actually understand her a lot better than she realises.”

You rub at the point Namjoon pushed, trying to process the words, but none of them seem to make any sense. Still slightly dazed, you remember you should be going to dance now, and quickly mumble, “Yeah… uh… sure. Thanks,” before waving to him, and stumbling off with, “I should go,” thrown over your wide shoulder.

Blushing, you scrambled away, still unsteady on your legs, mind ticking over Namjoon’s words. You don’t know whether you should be embarrassed for your sake, or Jin’s, but one way or the other, your face in as hot as a fire when you finally find Jin again, waiting by the hall door, with Jimin beside him. A sense of dread slips over you. Does Jimin know that’s Jin? Or does he still think it’s you? Either way, you can’t trust your friend not to say something embarrassing, and so you push your way between them, quickly grabbing Jin’s – or rather your – hand and pulling him away from Jimin. “We need to go,” you announce, shooting narrowed eyes at Jimin who stares at you in confusion, before realisation spreads across his face and his mouth settles into an ‘o’ shape, realising who’s who. You don’t have time to worry about what he might have said to Jin as you pull your own body towards the ballroom floor.

In your hand, Jin’s fingers are sweaty, hot with worry, and you give them a squeeze as you arrive at the edge of the crowd, the sea of the dancefloor stretching wide and empty in front of you.

“What did Namjoon want?” he whispers, but you shake your head at him.

“It can wait till later.”

“Yeah, you’re right. Sorry.” He nods his head, and the hairdo you spent so long getting to sit straight bobs a little.

With one final press of his fingers in yours, you step onto the dancefloor, and the music you have already grown sick of starts playing.

Above you, the night’s sky, captured in the hall’s ceiling, shines down, cloudless and saturated with stars. You focus on the small pinpricks of light, shining far away, and steady your breath on them.

“Hey, eyes on me.” You look down to Jin, who offers a coy smile, repeating your own words back to you, after the many times he tacked his eyes to the floor rather than your face.

Grinning, you mouth a ‘sorry’, and as the notes bounce across the room, you begin the first steps, eyes glued on Jin’s – or your own. Except they aren’t your own. Even in your body, you can see Jin below all your features, see him in the shy curve of your lips, the soft line of your cheek, the low lids of your eyes - it’s all him. And below that is something you never wanted to acknowledge or see. There are emotions, mirrored in your own face, in his own body, hidden from the two of you, but shining so clearly now. It’s what Jimin had insisted existed from the start, what Yoongi had quietly approved of from his own corner, what Namjoon had confirmed just seconds ago, and you know you were wrong to judge Jin without allowing yourself to understand him, and what he felt for you.

Reeling in your discovery, what you found in his own dark pupils, you pull back from him as the music draws to a close. How is the waltz already over? The whole floor is now packed with students who have followed your cue, as they were meant to, and are now moving around the dancefloor, giggling and smiling, weaving their own stories. Meanwhile you have an ending to find for yourself, hopefully a happy one.

Sensing a bubbling below your skin, you realise the potion is struggling to hold your DNA in Jin’s form. It’s beginning to wear off. “We need to get out of here.”

Jin nods at you, and the two of quickly snake your way past the other pupils, own bodies threatening to break back at any moment. Out in the quiet of an abandoned hallway, you finally allow yourself to slow down, breathing a sigh in your own voice, as your body shirks, Jin’s large clothes sagging around your smaller frame.

In the moonlight spilling in through the wide windows on one side of the corridor, you see Jin’s own face melt back, as he struggles with the zip of your dress, pulling it down just before his broad shoulders grow back.

You breathe a sigh of relief for your dress, thankfully undamaged by Jin’s larger body.

“So… what did Namjoon say?” Jin says, breath still unsteady from your speedy getaway.

“Let’s change first,” you say, and Jin looks down at your dress, before blushing and nodding his head. Turning around once more, you quickly pull off Jin’s clothes again, keeping nothing but his gown on to protect your from the icy air, until your dress lands by your feet and you slip it on again. Turning back, you see Jin buttoning up his shirt, before he smiles back at you:

“That’s better.”

You grin. “I don’t know… you looked good in a dress.”

His cheeks glow in the silver moonlight. “I’d prefer if you forgot seeing me like that.”

“Sorry, Jin, it’s embedded in my brain now!”

Before he can moan anymore, you pull on a serious face, and remember all that you need to talk about, all that Namjoon said before your dance.

“What did Jimin say to you?” you ask, and Jin’s face straightens out as well, mouth pressing into a line.

You don’t know if he’s still embarrassed from his experiences in a dress, or if it’s something more, but his cheeks shift a few shades darker as he opens and closes his mouth. “Um – he said that you shouldn’t be worried for the dance. And that you’d do well.”

“Oh,” you breathe out a sigh, surprised at your own disappointment that there wasn’t anything more. “That’s what Namjoon said as well.”

You both hang in the second, silence falling thick, until you ask, “Did he say… anything else?”

Jin hangs his head, hair falling into his eyes as he admits, “Well… from what he said, it sounded like you were upset because I only viewed you as a heartless Slytherin... That you wanted me see how kind and caring you can be when you try.”

Your lips twitch at this. How bloody cheesy. Jimin would pay for that.

“Actually,” Jin continues, “He made me realise that maybe I judged you too harshly… that I had a certain image of you just because of your house… which is ridiculous.”

“Yeah…” you say, “Namjoon mentioned something similar. That I was judging you for being too good, or… um… too uptight as a Gryffindor.”

Jin offers a hopeless smile, and you return it. “Maybe we’re both at fault then…”

“Can we forget all that and try to friends?” you ask, and Jin laughs.

“After tonight? We’re already friends. You’ve seen too much of me, not to be.”

“Okay then,” you nod, pause, worry your bottom lip with your teeth. “Was that all?”

Jin’s cheeks flare red again, bright against the light from outside that cuts at all his sculpted angles. “Well… actually…” He ducks his gaze away.

“Eyes on me,” you joke, and Jin turns his look back to you, face completely serious as he says:

“From the way he was talking, it sounded like you have a crush on me.”

Jimin really was a dead man. Even if he didn’t realise Jin was actually you at that moment. That was no excuse. He was still a dead man.

Embarrassed, and a little incited, you mumble, “Well, Namjoon actually suggested something similar about you.”

Jin coughs a laugh out, rubbing at the nape of his neck. “Yeah… somehow I knew he’d do that.”

You both stare at each other, and you don’t know whether you should laugh or lock yourself away and never emerge again from embarrassment. But instead you say, “I know we just agreed a few moments ago that we’d be friends… but given the circumstances… maybe we should be a little more than friends?”

“I’d like that.”

Pollyjuice potions really do have an odd way of bringing people together.

♡ END ♡

Author’s note: It begins! I hope you enjoyed this, and the rest of the Christmas oneshots that are to come!

Also, it started snowing yesterday, and it’s feeling super Christmasy here! So exciting!

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donvampire · 6 years

Text

I do not consider myself an experienced writer, but I have written a thing for this discord chat where I made the title Vampire literal. Aka I turned Clair into a vampire for angst and out of boredom. ANYWAY. I wrote a drabble?? Short story?? about Clair’s home life and I think I did pretty good so I want to share.

Trigger warnings: minor blood

The night life was much brighter and louder than anything that happened in the day time. Drug deals, gambling, gun fights, and Clair was in the center of it. Being the son of the largest crime lord in the city was never a boring role. Except for the beatings and constant pressure to which he always faced every damn day. He found solace in the quiet things surprisingly. Taking apart a gun and putting it back together was calming. Firing said gun while imagining his father’s face on the target was extremely calming.

There are perks to being a Leonelli. Constant respect and fear came your way. People stood off to the side to make way for Lorenzo and his son, Clair, bowing so low their faces almost were slobbering all over Clair’s shoes. He sneered, hating how these people would bend over backwards for him and his father just to get in their favor. It was sickening. Clair wanted to throw up.

These so-called nobles with sticks so far up their asses would give fake smiles and kind gestures, only wanting to get higher in the ranks. Or to get into Clair’s pants you never know. Marrying the heir to the Leonelli family does seem like a good life. If you liked having live grenades thrusted into your face when you say something Clair does not like. Or having your hair pulled and gut kicked. Maybe even a gun to your head as well.

Clair was not the best bachelor.

Which was fine. The last thing on his mind was marriage.

The first thing that Clair was focused on was being better than his father ever was. That approval he longed for to the point where he even changed his appearance in hopes that Lorenzo will finally notice him.

He toyed with his lip ring, which he got before the dye in his hair, looking out the window as he watched the sun rise. He would have to close his blinds soon. Sun + vampire = death.

He ran a tongue over sharp canines, lost in thought. The suit he wore to an event was discarded on the floor in a crumpled heap of clothing, forgotten. Replacing the suit was a simple outfit, something his father would hate no doubt. But he shrugged to himself, not really caring at this point. If Papa had a problem with it then he would show it with either his fists or his words.

It was usually his fists.

At least bruises heal fast.

Speaking of bruises, Clair poked the one on his arm, hissing a bit as he did so. The pain was a reminder of his failure. What failure? Clair was not sure at this point. Everything he did never lived up to harsh expectations. Each failure muddled together into one, shaping into the boy known as Clair Leonelli. Lorenzo’s mistake. He giggled at that. It fit him.

Now the sun was peaking over the city, shining its bright light, its poison, and Clair, reluctantly, closed the blinds. Now he was in his dark room, sitting there with his forehead pressed against the covered windows, glaring at the cracks of light passing through. It burned his skin, but he ignored it, these scars will heal.

Letting out a long sigh, Clair got up from his perch next to the window and stood there, considering opening it up again, letting the sun burn him into a pile of ash that would be swept into a dust pan, and then dumped into the trash. He giggled at that thought too. It sounded absurd and stupid. Eventually he flopped onto his bed, purple eyes glaring at the ceiling, the days events passing through his mind like a haze of fog over the city. Soon it would be loud, the humans waking up and basking in that cursed sunlight, ready to start their trash lives.

He envied them. Clair would never admit that out loud, his pride made him choke on the words. But oh, how he envied how these people that can walk around the city without constantly having to look over their shoulder, searching for any kind of threat. He hated out these humans can live without someone breathing down their next, forcing them to be something they are not.

He envied how free they are. While Clair was stuck in this cage and his father held the key, dangling it in front of him, just within reach. But barely.

Ears twitched as he heard faint footsteps coming down the hall and Clair made himself scarce, cleaning up the clothes, tidying his desk, and throwing himself back in bed, pretending to be asleep. The door opened, then there was silence…a grunt. Then the door closed, and Clair let out the breath he had been holding and he slowly sat up, staring at his door as he listened to the footsteps walk away from his door and back down the hall.

Purple eyes blinked as he tossed the blankets off his body, not feeling the need to sleep. He was not tired. That rush of adrenalin made Clair want to get out, explore. Which was something stupid and may lead to death.

Again. Sunlight + vampire = death.

A hand brushed through his blue bangs, messing with the already messy hair. Clair never bothered to brush it. He did before but now it was too much of a bother and Lorenzo made no move to hide the disapproving look on his face every time Clair came out of his room, looking like he just rolled out of bed.

Clair considered these small changes, not only a form to get approval, but a form of rebellion against the current head and CEO of Company Vita. Even if these things are minuet. Piercings on his lip and in his ears was first, as stated before. A smile on Clair’s face when he first came home with them and a sneer on Lorenzo’s. No matter how many times the older man shouted at Clair to remove it, Clair kept it in, the smile never faltering. What was done was done no matter how much Lorenzo wishes to change it.

He liked this feeling. This small freedom. So, then he pressured Giovanni to take him out again.

Clair blew air on a lock of hair in front of his nose, watching it as it fell back into place. He snorted, thinking about how pointless everything was. He glanced around his room, looking for something to do. His desk was covered in papers, work given to him by Mauro (which he had yet to finish. Why does he need to know this information anyway? It was boring). Clair huffed. His desk was out of the question. Eyes moved over to the books, and he wrinkled his nose. Reading was never really a past time for him.

He then realized how sparse his room was. Nothing in here belonging to him. It had little personality, only logic, things that were considered essential and not distracting, which is something that Clair longed for at this moment. He doubts homework and books will be of use, only to make his mood worse than it was now. He glanced at his clock. It was now nine in the morning and he clicked his tongue. It was still so early. He swung his legs over the side of his bed and stood. He began to pace, the urge to do something gnawing at him. He paused mid pace, eyes staring at the epee sword leaning against the wall, tucked away in the corner. Before he knew it, he was holding the fencing blade, a familiar weight in his hand. He wanted to dance. But this room was too small, and he would eventually knock something over. He sniffed, listening, waiting. Silence. He grinned.

Clair ran over to his door and slowly opened it, poking his head out, glancing around. His grin widened, and he slowly slipped out of his room, closing the door behind him, his epee sword sheathed and tucked under his arm. Clair then quietly sauntered over to the fitness room, a place he barely visited now-a-days, for his father found fencing to be distracting since Clair enjoyed it. He was always begging his father for more lessons, more practice. Clair wanted to be good.

However, Lorenzo must have gotten annoyed at one point and stopped the lessons entirely, which lead to Clair practicing in secret, sparring with Giovanni every now and then. Lorenzo’s voice echoed in Clair’s mind as he walked down the dark halls of his home which he considers a prison.

Focus on your studies. Surpass me.

One day you will be the king of darkness.

What a load of bullshit, Clair giggled to himself as he stepped into the room, glancing around. No one was here.

Good. Clair unsheathed his sword and began his complicated dance, imaging that he was hitting targets that looked like his father. He smiled as his thrusted his forward, through a target, through Lorenzo’s face. What a marvelous feeling. The rush, the freeing feeling, it was intoxicating. He kicked the target off his epee, twisted the blade in his hand before tossing it to his other hand. He liked to be experienced with both sides of his body. Call it a precaution.

At one point, Clair got lost in the rush and stumbled, falling on his hands, skinning them slightly. He cursed, sitting on his knees, glaring at the angry red wound on both hands, blood dripping down his arms.

Great…how was he supposed to explain this if these scrapes don’t heal within the night (technically day.) With his hands like this, it would be wise to call it a day, and head back to his room so he would not get caught. But Clair was stubborn and the opposite of wise. He sucked it up and gripped his sword again, continuing his dance, brows furrowed in concertation. His sword felt heavy in his scraped hands, but he ignored it. Clair was bored, and this was the one of the small things that gave him comfort in his miserable life. He will not let a few burns on his hands stop him.

Eventually Clair was leaning against the wall, panting, a thin layer of sweat covered his face. His hands were still bleeding, the hilt of the blade rubbing against the irritated skin, making it worse. Clair saw the blood staining the hilt and sighed before angrily throwing his blade across the room. The sword landed with a clang and slid to the wall. Clair then sank down until he was sitting on the floor, eyes narrowed at his bleeding hands.

His mistake. He can never do anything right can he. He chuckled to himself, and he rested his head against the wall, closing his eyes. He felt the sting of pain dancing along his finger tips from overworking himself.

Why did he ignore the pain and continue? Did he want to prove something to someone? That might be the answer. Or maybe, he wanted to prove himself wrong. That he was not a mistake, a failure.

That he was just Clair, son of Lorenzo. The heir to the title of Vampire of Company Vita.

He opened his eyes and looked over at his sword. He sighed and stood up, grabbing his sword on the way out of the room. It was time for bed.

#my writing #heat guy j #[self]#i remembered that at one point clair did fence and I was like lets explore that #I think i did okay

8 notes · View notes

stone-man-warrior · 3 years

Text

January 2, 2021: 12:43 pm:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annuit_c%C5%93ptis

Euclid shows up....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euclid

“Use this!” he says:

youtube

The error was his concern for the triangle, it”s a Triangular Prism that we need to be concerned with, however, a Conical Prism is equally, perhaps more worrisome, than the Triangular one, if left in control of Religious Terror Witches & Warlocks.

That is what the sword Euclid brought, is for. To take the head off of those pesky prisms.

Take a whack at the Conical Prism, or a Triangular One, thusly, to remove the top, so you are able to have a look at the section that becomes apparent only when a conical prism is sliced by the Ell of a sword. Then, you get to see a Conical Ellipse. There is no other way to do the math on that, in order to obtain the illusive Conical Ellipse, requires that you first obtain a Cone with which to work, a Sword with which to cut, and take a swing at the Cone, to produce an Ell, in order to see the illusive ellipse. Any pointy witch hat will do.

You, are the Sword. The Ell is the slice.

The swing, is the throw, before the toss.

Take a few more whacks at it...

We have to turn it upside down and backwards to see what gender it is, Witch, or Warlock?

Keep whacking!

Google Search for: “Conical Ellipse” to learn more...

Hmmmmmm......

The thing I am looking for is not here.... where is the real ellipse at?

What have they done with the Ellipse?

Where, has it gone to?

I don’t see it.

Gone.

The thing I am looking for is a lopsided oval sort of squished egg shaped ellipse... the kind I remember from school.

Google is hiding it.

The only way to get one, is to slice cone on a angle, horizontally.

Like so:

The problem here, is Google is only showing us a equilateral ellipse, when the magic we want, is a lopsided, non-equate ellipse.

They only are showing askewed lopsided non-equate ellipses in such a way as to provide illusion that the non-eguate variety of ellipse is presented, as an equate, mirror-image-flip-flop-backwards rendition of a rounded off pointy hat setting on a reflective surface, to ponder over, thusly, as we are doing at this juncture right here on this post entry on Tumblr.

Think about that slice. Think about that cone. You should see, in your mind’s eye, that the resulting elliptical shape should have a fat side, and a thin side at the ends where the turn-a-round takes place.

But Google refuses to show you that, they can’t survive smart people who can think, that’s why they won’t show the non-equate ellipse, by which there just one way to obtain, and that is, to cut the top off of a pointy hat on a horizontal angle.

They show this Seventh Day Adventist lesson, to teach the same idea, with a twist and a kink, at church:

Start Whackin‘!

You, are the sword. The Ell is the slice.

The swing, is the throw, before the toss.

You need this Honing Stone:

And some Honing Oil:

With those, to sharpening the Sword of your Mind’s Eye. you are ready and prepared to use this properly and effectively:

They stole my Cracker Jack’s Secret Decoder Ring, so, I have to make do, with the tools I have available, like this Chex’s Decoder. That one works good for World Trade Central terror decoding.

You will gain skills necessary to use this more effectively also:

That is the Real McCoy. Cracker Jack’s Secret Agent Whistle. Get one and use it.

These are indefensible:

no... these are indispensable!

(in-disposable? We are not pawns, not playthings, not blow-up toys, not inflatable mattresses)

(see, that is an example of Google controlled religion terror cult changing my words I write. I have to do edits to correct what they change, they change more while I correct that.)

Your Name Here

Think.

=========================================

2:55 pm:

This whole Tumblr entry explains the reason why Walmart chose “Equate” for their name brand generic hygiene and first-aid products.

It’s a heavily guarded secret at the Walmart Pharmacy Department, and like women, it’s a complex thing to try to explain,

“Lucy! You got some splainin‘ to do!”

(Cuban Russian Missal Crisis shows up on Decoder Ring RADAR)

“I know what you’re thinkin‘... ‘did he fire six shots, or only five?’ Well, in all the confusion, I kinda lost track myself, but bein‘ that this is a forty-four magnum, and could blow your head clean off.... you gotta ask yourself...

... ‘do I feel lucky?’

Well, do ya... punk?”

Get the name brand, and don‘t fuck around with that three day bullshit, get the one-day cure.

youtube

===========================================

“The crux of the bisquet, lies with the apostrophe”

(MK Ulta Lesson from the 1970′s in Los Angeles County.)

===========================================

3:31 pm:

Why are there buckles on a Witches Hat?

Why are there buckles on the shoes of a Pilgrim?

Factoid: Witches are only found in places where Christians are looking, so, Christians and Witches are not mutually exclusive. Only little, is spoken or written about Warlocks and where they are found. The result is non-equate spelling errors in the Text, and Tongue, of The Words, for lack of equal representation among Witches and Warlocks where they are found in Tongue and Text.

(”Tongue in Cheek” old saying English Cliche’ shows up on Decoder Ring RADAR)

Why are Santa’s helpers called “Elves”? Do the math, make the cut, swing the sword, see the result, turn it upside, and backwards, apply to History of the Sword, History of Christian Crusades, History of The Vatican Choir, Polyphony, and Soprano’s with emphasis on non-equate representation between Witches and Warlocks where they are found in Text and Tongue.

(Tongue In Groove shows up on Decoder Ring RADAR, under “Jesus was a Carpenter” and, “Long Playing ‘LP’ Vinyl 33 and 1/3 RPM Album, Recordings)

“Elves” (apply a sword) = El + V’s = LV’s = Las Vegas = Lost Wages = “Lost my Ass” = “Where is my Jack-Ass?” = Pornhub = “The View”, a show by women, for women.

(“Ellen” TV Show shows up on Decoder Ring RADAR)

Scroll the bottom to watch off of Google RADAR within this post entry, and for more in depth explanation about this Fleetwood Mac performance on the Ellen Show:

[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VElI89y_-QI ] --------------------------------------------------------------------

Elves = Santa’s Helpers. But you have to turn it around backwards, and upside down, to see what gender it is.

“Elves” = El V’s = L V’s = The V’s = The Five....

Hmmm....

Elves = L V’s = The Vatican’s. (this goes on forever into the Russian Mother of all Hoaxes, you could keep doing math eternally, but without a cone, and a sword to start with, there is no way to see that the math is not equal when the Ell is applied with the sword on the cone. Google tries desperately to hide the non-equate ellipse. (see Japanese Pornography to learn more about suppression of non-equate ellipses in favor of more equate ones.)

Ellipse = E + L Lips (phonetically) = “Power God Lips” = (play the turn-a-round) “God’s Power Lips” = “non-equate horizontally askew conical section”

(fast-forward to Cancer) Apply “Cone Cervical Slice” for Russian Fractal View considerations.

It’s not possible to stop Christian Cult Global terror without getting dirty while doing so.

You must turn the Gain Knob to full maximum on your Guitar, Axman’s (Ax-Person’s) Rig. Even then, you are going to need an Ibanez Tube Screamer Effect Peddle, even if you already have a Marshall Plexi 100 Watt Head with 1960, AND 1960A Slant, speaker cabinets loaded with Celestian Greenbacks.

If you cannot obtain the Ibanez, there are many high gain effect peddles to choose from, but make sure you start with a search for the Ibanez Tube Screamer, so that you have the necessary Samurai training for using a Sword to produce an Ell, to make the cut, that will expose the Dirty Little Secret of the Vatican, Google, and Rock & Roll. Steer clear of the Russian Pickle.

The Wicken must begin Whakin‘, but definition of “Wicken” seems to be a guarded secret, while the Wicken are left unguarded.

==================================

4:22 pm:

Pope’s Guitar Rig, sans straight 1960 4 x12 Celestian, High Gain Attack Rig:

(photo provided by Jim Dunlop Archive Museum)

Pope’s Guitar (Axe). 1958 Gibson Flying V (Epiphone Reasonable Facsimile Thereof is shown)

Pope’s Kapo. Secret weapon when traveling in the Holy See. Land Shark Kapo, for taking off the top three percent or so, at the neck.

Pope uses well equipped effect peddle board, is customizable, interchangeable per task requirements, and is disguised as regular, normal guitar player’s effects board, works good, not over the top, or too crowded.

Pope Hunts for these:

He uses Greek Mythology to lure and control them, like Neptune’s Harem, all are kept in line with a Pointy Trident.

(Brass section of Horns not shown. See Ronnie James Dio, or, Mike Bloomberg to learn more about the Horn Section)

Pope takes a Bow at the close of each show, with a new collection of Surfers.

(I see a “One-Wing Dove” right there, what do you see? “Sings a song... sounds like he’s singing... ooohhh... baby.... oohh... ohh”)

More secret weapon. That thing makes sure no one will copy-cat the Pope’s Unique Tonality and Gain, difficult to reproduce once the Pope is done making adjustments with a lot of help and Guidance from Amp Guru. Symbolically, that Variac is the equivalence of all of the Power Company Lineman who work for Rocky Mountain Power Corporation, and the five Power Utility Sub-Panels that extend from their. Think of them as “The Pope’s Shoe Horn, Brass Sexion”. (One-Hour Martinizer uses a “Symposium” for that same idea as the Variac when the Pope needs to make Tuning adjustments in the neighborhood.)

Think of all of that, as “Allah and the Virgins, Live at Red Rocks, featuring Joe Bonamassa as the opening act, with a cameo by Amos Moses, the Little Brother of the Pope’s Flying V.

====================================

This one, is mine.

The Rudolph Shenker Signature Model, by Gibson.

The bastards won‘t let me play anymore.

I learned the hard way, so you don‘t have to.

================================

5:01 pm:

Top Hats.

“With Four Knobs, You Get Les Paul”

===================================

Ave Maria:

You hear a piano and a singer.

Think: The Pope is so good at what he does, that is actually the Jim Dunlop, shredding out a cover of AC/DC’s “For Those About to Rock”, after all the Hokus Pokus is applied, and Stevie Nick’s Backup Singers do the Lead Vocals, walk all over her, like they think they are Egyptians or some shit.

youtube

6:01 pm:

Here, on Ellen, at the end, at the 5:00 mark.

Ellen mentions that there are two new Fleetwood Mac Members.

Stevie Nicks introduces them, unexcitedly, kinda mechanical introduction. looks like to me.

Ellen says everyone in the studio audience is going to be given complimentary tickets to upcoming Fleetwood Mac Shows.

Stevie says “the next live show is in first week of October, details sound sketchy at best, not too sure, have to check the calendar of events, to make sure” sort of, loosely translated.

The Ellen Show Video was posted to YouTube one year and four days after the Mandalay Bay Concert 91 Las Vegas Shooting. Has a “Anniversary” vibe going on.

Those two new guys that were introduced, seem to represent “January and February Secret Knowledge about the raping and theft of the Old Ten Month Calendar” that no one knows about. I see them as two “Blood Moons”, stuck at the end of that Old Calendar, rather than the beginning where they really were introduced as a cover operation 2021 years ago, this week when the Christians seem to have initialized the Pirating they are still doing currently.

Questions:

“When was the airing of this Ellen episode?”

“What was the actual film date at the sound stage studio w/live audience?”

The Ellen episode has “Time Warp Terror” qualities. I suggest that the episode aired a year after it was filmed in studio. I suggest that Ellen knows everything there is to know about Mandalay Bay and Concert 91 “shooting” event in Las Vegas on October 1, 2017. I suggest that the studio audience participated in some way at the Concert 91 October 1 2017 event in Las Vegas.

I suggest that Ellen Degenerous is located at 535 Jackpine Drive Grants Pass Oregon 97526 right now, at the Janice Freeberg residence, as I write this Tumblr entry today, January 2, 2021. I suspect Ellen is portraying Janice Freeberg to fool federal officers assigned to Jackpine activity.

I’ve seen Ellen Degenerous at the Freeberg’s before, driving Janice’s Ford F-250 crew cab diesel pick-up truck, white, old, worn out truck.

This video goes deep into a rabbit hole of danger. I smell Agent Rabner, who I think is a Medford FBI officer, associated with the cover up of Las Vegas Concert 91 fake shooting, all done here in Grants Pass Oregon, where the event fake shooting was rehearsed throughout the city and county area.

If Rabner, then also the Veterans Administration Facility on HWY 62, Crater Lake HWY somewhere near Medford, or White City Oregon, is involved. Where Rabner goes, so goes that place.

“Degenerous” = “When you use a xerox machine to copy an original, then, use the copy to make another copy, of the copy, of the original, then use the copy of the copy to make a copy of the copy of the copy of the original.... etc, and so on... eternally, until the original is no longer recognizable in the forthcoming barrage of stacked copies = Degenerous”.

“Ellen” = “El en” = “The en‘ “ = “The End” = “God’s End” = Eternity.

God’s End = “Total Anal eye eh? shun” (Canadian Dialect Vatican Speak, w/Celestian Greenback’s x four, or combination of any Greenback’s w/Creamback Celestian speakers, Open Back Cabinet specification produces less punchy bass, at high volume levels, w/parallel vs serial wiring options available, so, Ann Wilson is also nearby, or not far up the command chain from Ellen, for real, right now. Also, open back specs produces maximum diaphragm travel at the drivers in two directions from center due to absence of internal back pressure. [see positive crank case ventilation, internal combustion motors, PCV Valve, about 3lb’s. pressure is nominal for that] with addition of phase shift, the Ellen becomes a binary event that can go in unpredictable directions, extreme danger, caution advised)

Also, the introduction of “Two new guys” at the “5:00 Mark” is notable that “Five Minutes” is Universally understood in all languages globally that “Someone is going to get fucked, a quickie”.

Those new guys might be in deep yogurt there.

Universal Studios already hijacked and stole all of the “Universally Understood Languages”, so, that further supports what I already have been saying that NBC, Universal, Comcast, are the producers, engineers, actors, murderers.... “terror army giant size cell”... who are responsible for carrying out the Concert 91 attack, one that gained hospitals and enormous casinos for the terror army’s addition to their SAG collection of spoils of war, and more, w/Bonus of Lot’s of Souls to add to the Pope’s ever growing collection of those.

youtube

Here, at US Festival (I was there too), at 8:00 mark, Stevie begins to go out into the audience, a place she does not go often, there are some security, very young “edge of seventeen“ looking fellows, who form a “Football Defense Line”. Stevie plays either as Center, or as Quarter Back, maybe as both symbolically. She is protected, by a symbolic advance towards her, as she is “holding her ground“ there, on “the shoulders of edge of seventeen”.

youtube

You could say stuff, and keep on saying for a long time about small details of what happened, not only in the audience, but also as she sort of “Bunny Hops” her way to the edge of the stage where she motions that she wants go out there. She is wearing tall heals, yet is firm on her feet while hopping from the levels of the stage. There is a lot of “Russian Whore Meets Markus” story telling going on, Stevie appears to me as a captive slave to the British Entertainment industry.

I rarely defend any entertainers, but I see the Stevie Nicks is extraordinary in a number of ways, as is Ozzy Osbourne, but the two are nothing alike one another, they both seem as slaves to me. Ozzy, was punished for whatever it was that pissed off his captors when they gave the “Prince of Darkness” a TV show, cameras everywhere in his house, millions of people watching. So much for Darkness, eh?

So, I want to suggest that Stevie is a slave, she is forced to sing the songs where the terror messages are built into for Fleetwood Mac as a Pirate Ships Captain giving musical orders to terror soldiers in the field.

I don‘t have an opinion about the other band members, other than knowing that many of the famous guitarists are trained by the Vatican at the Choir, so that is something to consider.

There in that photo above, Stevie stands on a speaker cabinet, seems to use it as a “Soap Box”.

It’s more than likely that I am just a sucker, am wrong, being fooled with Hokus Pokus, but that does not change the focus.

“The clouds never expect it when it rains But the sea changes colours But the sea does not change So with the slow, graceful flow of age I went forth with an age old desire to please On the edge of seventeen”

The See, does not change.

“The Pope’s change from time to time, but the Jim Dunlop, is always the Jim Dunlop.” ~self quoted.

Online lyrics for that song say:

“Just like the White Wing Dove”

I hear:

“Just like a One Wing Dove”, and I always have heard it like that.

An injured dove, caged, maimed, can‘t fly, is crying, everyone thinks the bird is singing.... “Ohhh , baby, ohh, ohhh”

That is more reason I feel she is a victim.

I am not a huge fan of Fleetwood Mac, I do like the music, but had I been a huge fan, I would have seen these signals long ago, maybe I did see and write about it the same way before, it all seems so:

“Hauntingly familiar”

There is no one watching the baby, so: ♪♫ “none of this matters” ♪♫

=============================

8:14 pm:

The Jim Dunlop, Cry Baby Wah.

Think of it as Chum, made of babies, and souled by the Ron Popeil, as seen on TV, on the Jimmy Swaggart 700 Club.

=====================================

8:41 pm:

Edge of Seventeen has a lot going on in the lyric and live presentation, no one has ever survive long enough after knowing what it’s about to find any help to stop the madness. The song is about a three percent taking of victims at a venue, any venue where people gather, are drawn to in numbers.

There is a place in the song where “Suddenly. there was no one left standing in the hall”. That is the taking at the concert, Dio style, with a Bloomberg twist.

This part here quoted below, is the result of the Three Percent Taking of victims, where three percent of the audience was killed, their ID’s processed, look-a-like replacements take their place in life at the homes of the victims, and the Vote for SAG Shills on ballots, which is the whole point of why so many people are being slaughtered.

This part in the song is heavy on the back-up singers in duplicated harmonizing delay/echo sort of back up repetition, and is the orders from On-High at Trudeau/ Ann Wilson terror command HQ in Hollywood/Quebec. The duplicated back-up singers who follow Stevie’s lead vocal, are the replacements, symbolically, and are going to be Voting, at the Landslide that follows the Edge of Seventeen. All of the information necessary to stop that from occurring is here on this account... there is enough information here to stop 90% of all of the terrorism on Earth if there were some Global Security persons who are willing and prepared to apply the information towards ending terror, and beginning peaceful existence.

“Well I hear you in the morning And I hear you at nightfall Sometimes to be near you Is to be unable to feel you, my love I'm a few years older than you (I'm a few years older than you) my love”

=================================

9:03 pm:

Why is it called a “Landslide” if a candidate wins an election due to overwhelming popularity?

Because the news media needed a workable label for talking about elections covertly within a news story about a mudslide after a rain, or other Tectonic Plate sized terror controlled earth moving done by terror soldiers who get their marching orders from newsmedia about voting orders, details, updates.

Because Landslide is a earthly word, so is is terra cotta, it’s all about terrain, ground, mud, green grass, when the high tides allow access to hard to reach ports of entry, at the voting booth where the landslide is indeed the county side slipping away one family at a time.

So again, Fleetwood Mac demonstrates their place in the terror command Chain.

We need to find out if Stevie Nicks is a scapegoat set up to take a fall in event of terror meltdown, or, if she is just another terrorist bitch killing US Citizens.

Make her wear a pointy hat, tell her Euclid is here, wants to talk to her about ellipses, Top Hats, Flying V’s, and stacks of Marshall’s... bring a sword. see if she wears the hat, or starts to sing.

=============================

9:45 pm:

Local Update:

It’s quiet and drizzly outside, is warmer than has been in some time.

A walk to the mailbox presented my DMV Registration tags I sent for last October. I was sent an 8 and 1/2 x 11 inch peice of paper to tape onto the car in lieu of the real tags, and an explanation that Oregon ran out of tags to send to those who had re-registered their cars, and, that due to COVID, all of the DMV offices are closed down indefinitely. So, that is good news, I don‘t have to be concerned about the Paper Police telling me I taped the paper in the wrong place, however, they will find some other thing to terrorize me with, that is why the tags showed up.

Electric bill came today, I will be needing to mortgage the house to pay it.

My vision is very poor today, and more than once I felt as though I was going to fall over due to vertigo. There are solid particles in my eyes again, but I have not encountered anyone today to my recollection that could have put the glass dust in my eyes.

That Dietrick trash can has the lid on it now, but the can is still there.

There are unusual lighting conditions all around the area with lighting on the houses in places that I don‘t recall seeing lights on before, since all of that is terror communication, it’s something I try to look at, if only to determine normal from abnormal.

Unusual interior lights at Monroe Offensive Surveillance Travel Trailer at the entry.

At Myers, I can see that yard from where my car is parked. It’s not terrebly unusual to see literally every light in every room at the house all lit up at once for days or weeks in a row. Tonight there is a Half of all of the lights in the house” turned on. Terror SDA will turn on many lights at their homes making illusion that they are there, when reality is that they are out on attack. That condition is done a lot here, so that when take a walk and see that so many lights are on somewhere, I just assume that the people are there, and are not sneaking up behind me with a sword, only to find that there is someone sneaking up behind me with a sword while I am taking a walk to the mail.

A single solitary bright light bulb at Myers that is visible in a window from the road tells me things are abnormal there at Myers.

That green lightbulb at the roadside at Freebergs tells me things are unusual at Freebergs. Had there been a string of wadded up blue lights at the roadside in a bush and on, that would be normal.

There are some very unusual lighting happening on the hillside to the east at the top of the hill. Lots of bright house lights up there, not holiday lights, but looks like internal lights in the windows at places that don‘t normally have any lights on at all. normal would be one bright bulb on at the house with the balcony that is in line with and overlooks Jackpine from there, pretty much all other lighting up in that neighborhood is not usually present.

Dietrick’s has the wrong yellow house light turned on, something is abnormal there.

Clyde Baum’s place is kinda too far to make assessments, but one thing that can be said is that there is “Old normal” that ended about two months ago, and there is “new normal” that started to happen there with lighting habits at night.

It’s still dark at Bell’s 445. There was one interior light on last time I walked down the road last week, I can‘t see it unless I go towards Chartrand’s, so I don‘t have reason to go over there, and it’s too dangerous for a leisure stroll to the big pond on Jess Way were I used to enjoy taking a walk to many years ago, there were some giant size toads in that pond last time I went that far, about fifteen years ago, fun to watch them.

I did not see any holiday lighting with exception of that one string around Myers front door that has been there for some time.

520 were Mystery Pot Grower Lady was at, is not all dark, but is mostly dark, as per usual. There is a light in a room that I can see immediately when I step outside about 500 feet away, it’s always on, been on for more than two years, never turns off. There is a small glowing light on the ground in the driveway there that is unusual, can be seen from the road. 520 is famous for use of small, blue glowing lights, many of them arranged in a pattern in strange places. I have seen those placed on the roof of a storage/utility building there just for a day or two, then they move to somewhere else, or are gone. I counted eleven of them once inside of a black Volvo station wagon that is or was there. The blue glowing lights are the size of a smart phone screen. To see so many in a Volvo was weird, considering that the Volvo has not gone anywhere for about two years. That night was the night when Prince Charles Windsor was on the road with a Royal Guard, and Elizabeth was walking on my driveway when I returned from fighting with the guard, and Charles, about one year ago. Elizabeth’s hat was in my woods after that for some time. I did not want to touch that, toxic big time to have that hat in your hand, bad enough that it was in my woods. I can‘t think of anything that is much more toxic to have than the Queen‘s hat, it’s about as toxic as the head of Harry. That is pretty darn toxic.

That said, no help has come. If helpful people are around, I don‘t see them, none have bothered to speak with me, there have been no incoming telephone calls from any one since Christmas that I answered, and only one other call that I did not answer from that fake doctors at Pain Specialists of Southern Oregon terror cell SAGClubMed and MedDems terror highly offensive murderous bastards, who called and left a message, that I have not retrieved. There has been no email communication, carrier pidgeon, smoke signal, message in a bottle, genie, or note of any kind left somewhere where I might find one. It’s been more than ten years since I had a conversation with anyone other than a store clerk about the cost of groceries and the price of shopping, with exception of a call from fake family every six months or so, interfered by others manipulating the calls with electronics at some remote terror controlled location.

=================

11:13 pm:

My account is compromised at this time, I am in a competition with someone who is remotely making the account pages go haywire in a number of ways.

0 notes

cindylouwho-2 · 4 years

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RECENT NEWS, RESOURCES & STUDIES, mid-January 2020

Welcome to my latest summary of recent news, resources & studies including search, analytics, content marketing, social media & ecommerce! This covers articles I came across since the December report, although some may be older than that. Since this was a busy time of year, I cut back a bit on the commentary.

Now that I am mostly caught up, I hope to publish this report 2-4 times each month, with other more-detailed updates on specific issues as needed. (I’m expecting Etsy to roll out some new stuff soon, but I cold be wrong.) Let’s aim for 2 times a month to start 😀

Have any suggestions or feedback? Leave a comment below, email me through my website, or send me a message on Twitter.