#I wish they had a middle option though between '1 day' and '1 week'. I think a week is too long for a poll like this but also

[icewindandboringhorror]

finally settling once and for all... with the evidence laid out plainly.. which of these brother boys is more stinkys ,,,

#also please for the love of gourd do not take this seriously i am joking I do not hold any of these behaviors against my cats I know that #all cats are a little stinky and weird I have had cats all of my life I am not genuinely condemning my cats i am being silly please lol #(some of my goofy cat posts in the past will always get like.. one or two people taking an issue with something incredibly #mundane. like me saying a cat is being rude or somehting and someone being like 'um actually cats cant process the concept of #rudeness. he has no idea he did anything wrong!' ........ yes...... i am aware.. that my cat has the brain of a cat lol #ANYWAY.... polls!!! so excited to have polls.. I will try not to be annoyig but I just love asking random things to the general #public. in friend groups I am always the one asking people to taking surveys. quizzes. making surveys and handing them out. etc. #the rare times I can partially overcome my social anhedonia/inability to socially function properly/etc. is when I'm interviewing people or #socializing specifically in the context of like Information Gathering lol #I love running questionairres and stuff . even about the most mundane pointless topics. there's just soemthing really interesting #about like....... being able to ask people stuff and then look at and analyze the results. #Even though that's an incredibly simple average thing. idk.. my brain loves information even if it's pointless silly information. #I Just Think It's Neat. I have so so sos os oso many ideas but I wanted to make the first poll about my cats #of course because I'm also obsessed with them lol. I was thinking of taking some of the pictures of them in front of a blank #canvas and doing a poll of 'what are they painting?' or 'what should they paint?' but I decided to go with babey crimes #for now. inspired by various baby crimes committed just this morning. Fresh on my mind.. #I wish they had a middle option though between '1 day' and '1 week'. I think a week is too long for a poll like this but also #one day is not long enough because I dont really have THAT many active followers. if it was just a day it would probably reach like 5 poepl #people. I want to at least be able to reblog it a few times maybe. lol #I think 3-4 days would be ideal. Its a new feature though. I'm sure they'll modify things as time goes on. #Still feeling sick and bad and weird and not being that productive at all generally but... I have just enough energy stores.. #using up every ounce of my power to make a goofy poll... a worthy sacrifice....

[miasfilmprojectblog]

The CRIT!

I was not heavily involved in the post production process. Drafts of the picture edits were sent to me, to which I provided feedback on. The main challenge we had was getting the edit down to our time limit without sacrificing quality, so I suggested various cuts we could do to accomplish this. Perhaps, however, I should have been more involved in the post production process as it was communication issues that led to our film being unfinished for the viewing to our class and lecturers. It was very disappointing not being able to show a quality piece for our weeks of hard work. However, we had a week to fix it, and I believe our final product is a significant improvement. 

Critiques about my role (Production Designer)

1. A change in the actual layout of the scene, rather than just costume, would have helped give a clearer distinction of different days. This is something I definitely agree with, and wish I had thought of sooner. I didn’t want to alter the set too much as we only had until 3pm to shoot, as the pub opened and members of the public would come in. Therefore, we had to get everything wrapped up before then. Keeping this in mind, I thought it was best to make minimal changes to the pub, such as shifting furniture around, and hanging up a few photos. I do believe it would have been worthwhile, however, to have a few holiday decorations hanging around, or something like that to make the passage of time clearer. It also would have signified a greater passing of time, which would make the story more believable. Paul gets sick quite quickly in the matter of three days, and differentiating these days in different seasons would have made it easier to digest. 

2. The characters don’t feel like they belong in that setting. Changes to the story and production design would have helped this. I do agree with this comment to an extent. Due to a change in our location in pre production, we had to rush to find somewhere else that could accommodate our shooting schedule. The Raging Bull was the only option. After a few script rewrites and costume changes, we tried to make do. I changed Dave’s costume and colour palette in particular to match the set, and be a bit more sophisticated to make them fit in a bit better. I also had the extras wear casual clothing to make them stand out and seem more out of place. I did not want to alter the actual set too much as we only had a limited amount of hours each day, and I did not want to waste time we didn’t have in a longer set up and take down of the set. Therefore, I tried to implement smaller changes like moving some of the more “abstract” arts and furniture out of the way and replacing them with framed newspaper articles, and more simple pictures. 

Critiques about the film

Unfortunately, the film was not at a stage to be viewed by the time of the crit. It was very disappointing not to be able to showcase our weeks of hard work, and be proud of the final product. Here are some notes we got on the general film in different departments:

Positives

1. It feels cinematic - particularly in the dream sequence. The clash between tones made it very jarring and stood out. I agree. I liked the colour palette in the film overall, and loved how the autumnal and winter colours clashed with one another. The change in aspect ratio for this dream sequence was great as well, as it distorted the physical setting and made it seem as though we were in an alternate place altogether. 

2. The performance from our actors were good, bar a few critiques from Paul’s actor. There was a particular enjoyment and commandment for their performances, specifically from Dave, in the shift to the dream sequence.

3. The story itself was beautiful. The choice to use older characters in a film with strong coming of age themes was a good choice, and unfortunately not something done. I agree. While I love a good coming of age story, they are mainly centred around young, white, middle class characters. It’s nice to see them catered to a different demographic, something which I think our writer and director, Lilith, did very well. The dialogue in the film was great. It didn’t feel too much, which is what we feared for in Dave’s dialogue. Particularly since Dave is very quiet, uttering limited words in other scenes. Ian, our actor playing Dave, did a good job of making this change believable, and the switch back and forth was seamless. His tenderness and caring heart came across very well, especially in silent moments. 

Improvements

1. The biggest critique we got, of course, was the sound. It was unfinished and unsynced, which was a big let down.

2. The distinction between days isn’t clear enough. The main improvements in this would have been in production design, as I have mentioned above, but other things in post could help, such as music playing in the background. 

3. The story, while very sweet, may have been a bit too much to fit into a six minute time frame. We did not get as in depth a look into Dave and Paul’s friendship as we would have liked. The suggestion we received was to cut more content out, and replace instead with longer shots and moments on Dave and Paul. I agree, and it is something we were definitely having trouble with during the post production process. 

4. Certain handheld shots feel out of place. I agree, particularly with the shot of Dave walking away in the dream sequence. We view this from an odd, shaky frame coming from underneath Dave’s chin. It was very unalike the other, steady shots we were used to which threw me off a bit. I would have liked it better if it was from a higher angle, and maybe not over Dave’s shoulder.

5. This one wasn’t a critique from the class (or perhaps it was), but there were some points in the editing I thought were a tad bit jarring. Specifically, the timing of some cuts. A good example is when we cut from the third to the fourth scene. We had just ended the dream sequence. A longer pause on Dave as the bartender puts the beer down, and a longer silence of contemplation would make it a bit less jarring, and would allow the audience to sit in this surreal moment for a bit longer.

While we did leave the crit feeling quite disheartened. We were quite upset at how the edit was done, and the lack of progress, particularly in sound, that had been made. I wish that our editor, Bronte, would have come to us sooner if she was having timing issues that we could have helped her resolve. We were quite rightly upset, particularly at the fact the film was not double checked before screening.  However, we have a week to fix it up, and I’m excited to make some major changes and make sure our beautiful story is communicated well. 

[folkloreguk]

🍒Cherry Ice Cream (2)🍒

A/N: Part two is here! There won't be another one after this. I just wanted to split it into two little scenarios with one being cute and the other not so cute lmao...I hope you enjoy - as always I appreciate feedback a lot!

taglist: @lovely-ateez

genre: smut, optional bias (m) x reader (f), lifeguard!au, pool sex, unprotected sex

words: 3.4 k

PART 1 (fluff, both parts can be read independently)

It was the middle of the summer holidays and you had never been happier. Sunny weather, swimming, lots of free time and as much ice cream as you wanted were only a few of the reasons for your luck. The main cause was the boy of your dreams. A few weeks ago, you had met. It had been the most chaotic, embarrassing day at the public swimming pool – or so you had initially thought. Turns out being a walking disaster could not only attract negative attention. When the otherworldly handsome and kind lifeguard had pulled your clumsy figure out of the water and even bought you ice cream to make you feel better, you had a feeling things were about to change. And you hadn’t been wrong. Maybe you were seeing things through rose-colored glasses and a mix of lovestruck hormones, but you suspected he might just really be this great.

Ever since your first ice cream date, the two of you had been inseparable. Looks were one thing – and you had made yourself aware that though he was a picture of perfection, he could still have turned out to not be your type at all. But the inside reflected on his outside. Every day you found out a new enrapturing detail about him. He was a never-ending book that you were utterly unwilling to put back down.

Your days were spent at the public swimming pool, watching your lifeguard boyfriend do his job and questioning if this was all some sort of hidden camera prank. During his break he came running straight to your spot under the trees and plopped down on your towel, ready to spend the most time with you until he had to go back. Although your streak of bad luck was over, he still took care of you and made sure you were okay in the heat. He reminded you to drink enough water and sent you a good morning text every day. When he had first asked you to help him put sunscreen on his shoulders, you had hesitated with cheeks hotter than the sunlight that day. Now it was a daily thing, and sometimes when his hands were on your back, rubbing in the lotion, you caught yourself wishing there weren’t a hundred families around you. But it was hard scoring alone time with him at the pool. Even later at night, right before closing time, there were always one or two diehard swimming fans there.

“I love watching my cute girlfriend swim,” he would keep telling you.

“You better make sure you’re paying attention to the rest of the visitors, too,” you would reply, but secretly love his flirty remarks. Perhaps he wasn’t even so far off. After your first encounter, it was apparent that maybe you were the one guest who didneed the closest monitoring. Even his co-workers knew of you. They had made it their life mission to remind him daily how whipped he was for you, but he never cared about their teasing.

At night, you rode your bikes home. Towards the candy cotton clouds on the horizon, through the small suburb, you rode side by side, still damp hair flowing in the wind. Outside your home he cupped your face then, the sun kissed skin of his hands still warm to the touch. Like he was the slowly setting sun himself, he kissed you goodnight. You were addicted to his lips. He made you fly, brought back all your fondest memories as if he himself was in them, and let you forget every worry you’ve ever had in the world.

One evening at the pool, you lay on your bathmat, headphones in your ears and your favorite summer playlist taking you to another world. Suddenly, two hands grabbed you by the shoulders. You jerked up in surprise.

“Oh my god, we could have hit our heads together!” you scolded your boyfriend, who was smiling at you like an innocent five-year old.

“Guess what. My boss just told me that I can close the place up tonight. You know what that means, right?” he said.

“Tell me more,” you smirked.

“Technically, we can stay here however long we want. And do whatever we want. As long as no one finds out,” he whispered the last part into your ear. Chills ran up your spine despite the heat in the air.

“Do whatever we want, huh?” you said. “I thought you were being a model employee?”

“I am,” he shrugged with his child-like smile. “And the model employee needs to go back to work now. I have a reputation to uphold. You’ll be waiting for me, right?”

“Of course,” you nodded, watching his figure as he jogged back to his seat by the pool. The next hours seemed to go by extra-slowly, to your dismay. After his announcement, you only found yourself staring in his direction more than on any other day. Truly, you could never get used to his handsomeness. You thought of his voice that made you melt like ice and his hands when he kissed you. Too often they remained in innocent, safe territory. Maybe that was about to change. It was a Friday, meaning the opening hours were longer than usual. By 10 pm however, even the last person had left. The public swimming pool was closed. Officially.

You had to admit, you could get used to having an enormous swimming pool all to yourself. Blissfully, you dived through the water, not having to worry about crashing into anybody’s legs or losing track of your surroundings. You had always felt as though swimming was a little like flying. Not that you knew what flying would be like. But if you had to make a guess, feeling weightless and small in a seemingly endless space probably came close. All your life, it had remained the same. Playing pretend in the water, acting like a mermaid scavenging for the most precious treasure of the seven seas – all your loveliest ideas lingered in your memory like it had been yesterday.

The pool had a shallow end, about the depth which allowed your head to reach above the surface, and progressively deepened towards the other end. You took a gulp of air and descended into the darkness. Taking long strokes, you dived towards the white light at the wall of the shallower pool end. With the brightness ahead of you, you failed to notice the shadow behind you.

As you were in the process of coming up from the water, a pair of arms suddenly wrapped around you. For the second time that day, you jolted in surprise and quickly gasped for air.

“You scared me out of my wits! Will you stop that!” you said, but you were already smiling. It was hard to carry grudges against the boy behind you. Not when he held your waist and rested his chin on your bare shoulder, grinning as if it was a crime to even suspect him of such things.

“Hi, there,” he said and pecked your cheek sweetly. “I missed you.”

“So did I,” you admitted. Only months ago, you had made fun of how lovestruck your friend had been. You weren’t one to speak now. His hands let go of you while you turned your body to face him. Then they were on you again, and although it was a small touch, your lack of clothes created a tension between you right away.

“Wanna race me?” he whispered into your ear, as if there was anyone around to listen in. Was he serious? Did he really think you wanted him to let go of you now? His voice on your neck rendered you wanting him so bad, you had to take a deep breath to compose yourself.

“I’ve been swimming all day,” you said. “Besides, didn’t you say we could do whatever we wanted? We can swim whenever we want, during opening hours.”

“Oh, sounds like you have better plans?” he asked. For a moment, he touched your forehead with his. If you bent forward slightly, you could have kissed him. His hungry eyes were on your lips when you had finished the thought.

“I was thinking you could kiss me, for starters?” you coaxed him. He chuckled.

“So you’ve been thinking about it too, the past few hours,” he realized. “You know, I was trying to be subtle about it.”

“Forget about being subtle,” you said. “Let’s just make out, please?”

“I’d like nothing better than that,” he smiled, and then your mouths touched. His gentle lips tasted faintly of chlorine and salt, a taste you had come to associate with him and magnificent things. You held his face in your hands tightly and pushed your body against him yearningly. Reacting, he sighed and deepened the kiss. His wandering hands found the small of your backside as you arched your back into his frame. You hummed quietly, hands burying in his wet hair and playing with it at the nape of his neck.

All your childhood you had been searching for your treasure under the water. Now you understood. He was right there in front of you. Little you would be proud you had found someone this precious and incomparable. And hot.

“Jump,” he said. You did as he suggested and wrapped your legs around his waist. The proximity of his body made your heart hammer against your ribcage with such feverishness, you worried it might jump through your chest. With the way he touched every curve of your body, you almost forgot how to kiss. Luckily, your instincts did the job for you as you sipped on his lips and sighed every so often. He caught your bottom lip between his teeth, and you felt his smirk when you moaned in surprise. Every inch of your skin burned with desire for him.

As he carried you over to the side of the pool, you pulled away shortly. You took the liberty to attack his neck with frenzied kisses. It felt just as you had imagined a thousand times. You couldn’t possibly recount all the instances when you had found yourself staring at his neck and shoulders in the past weeks. He was easily the biggest distraction you had ever known. But it wasn’t your fault his tanned skin was so inviting and his strong presence ever so alluring. Returning his teasing, you bit into his shoulder, kissing and sucking on it right after.

“Fuck, baby,” he said in a throaty tone. “You’re amazing.”

Softly, he rubbed his nose against yours before your lips locked again. The kiss was all but soft. Your tongues meddled as if you were starved people and you could barely keep your hands in one place. Not that you would want to. You wanted to glue his hands onto your body or better yet handcuff him to your wrists. What was the opposite of a restraining order called? You were about to invent a word for it. Never before had you been so intoxicated, so in ecstasy with another person.

He pulled aside the fabric of your top momentarily and cupped your breasts in his hands. You gasped and melted into his touch and the way he played with your nipples. He attacked your neck in kisses and you shut your eyes, enjoying the sensation of his lips.

“I really want you.” He had his hands on your ass and all you could think about was the growing bulge in his swimming shorts. Your hard nipples rubbed against his chest, the thin fabric of your swim top doing little to nothing to separate your bodies. How could somebody’s whole existence be so titillating? He pulled away, just far enough to speak but barely. “I’ve wanted you like this for a while. But I didn’t want to unsettle you by making you think I just want sex from you. Truth is, I don’t want you to be just some summer romance, Y/N. Every day I hope you’ll still be here when summer is over.”

“Why would you think I’m going anywhere?” you asked. “You’re the reason I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. I ask myself every day how I managed to end up with you in the first place.”

“That’s easy. First, threaten to demolish the turnstile with your stubbornness, second, offer your head to a bunch of kids with a water ball, third, square up against a bug in front of a hundred people, fourth- “

“Okay! Enough,” you said. “Don’t bring up my clumsiness. That’s just about the least sexy thing in the world.”

“Baby, I think there’s nothing not sexy about you,” he spoke. He kissed you deeply and all your embarrassing memories vanished at once. “So, you’re cool with this?”

His sudden change in tone caused your breath to hitch in your throat, as his hands lingered by your hips, just above your bikini bottom. You only nodded, the motion getting more eager as the words sunk in. He slid his fingers along the inside of your thigh, and you squirmed under his touch in desperation. Swiftly, he pushed aside the material above your center. His digits slid through your wetness, catching the nub between them, and rubbing ever so slowly. An overwhelmed gasp spilled over your lips, and you closed your eyelids.

“Fuck- ,“ you muttered under your breath. He teased your core, nearly sliding his finger into you, but then pulling away to find your nub to toy with.

“You look so beautiful,” he said. At his words, you looked at him through fluttering eyelids. He was one to talk about beauty. The luminescence from underwater sharpened his features, and his eyes had something magical, something enchanting about them. Like he could have you – or anyone – without saying a word. He reminded you of a merman, or rather a siren. Ready to drag you along with him, deep under the surface. And you were so willing to let it happen. For all you knew, you were long lost and under his spell anyway.

“Have you ever done it in public?” he asked. You were too distracted by his fingers on you at first, head hanging back in ecstasy, until you snapped out of it.

“No, but – fuck – I guess I can strike that one off my sex bucket list after tonight, can’t I?” you said.

“You have a sex bucket list? Interesting, tell me more about it,” he smirked. His eyes darkened and his tongue licked over his lips once. As if on command, his lazy ministrations on you quickened, rubbing your clit in small, circular motions until you were a moaning, stammering mess. You suspected he did so just to see your immediate reaction, and you gave him just what he wanted.

“Can we postpone the – the talking…on later?” you murmured, feeling like collapsing against his broad shoulders. “I’m kind of too busy to – to talk.”

“I can see that,” he teased you, kissing you gently. The delicacy of his lips only made your head spin more. “You’re so sweet, baby.”

“Don’t you want to get busy too?” you asked. You reached for his swimming trunks and wrapped your hand around his hard member through the material. “I don’t want to wait any longer.”

“Shit- me too.” His arousal echoed in his moans, and he sucked in a breath. There was a sense of power in knowing you could make him react so gravely by doing so little. You tugged on his trunks and pulled them down a little to reveal his full length. Palming him, you felt how painfully hard he must have been for a while now. He groaned and it was the best thing you had ever heard. Eagerly, you slid your bikini bottom off and watched for a moment as it sunk down into the depths of the pool. Your legs wrapped around his waist again as he aligned his cock with your core.

At this point you supposed you were both out of words. Hunger had taken over and you barely managed to form a sentence. He kissed you and you hummed and nodded, wanting him to know you were ready. Easily, he entered you and you whimpered at the way he stretched your velvet walls after all the wait. Your senses were overcome with everything around you. The warm water enveloping the both of you, the soft summer breeze caressing your faces, his hands on your hips as he guided your body into his thrusts and the sound of your breathless moans and sighs – it was pure bliss. Night had almost fallen, with the sky being a deep blue, almost black by now. It was a perfect setting for a perfect night with your favorite person.

You gazed into his dilated pupils and the coil in your stomach tightened in the most delicious way possible. Now you recounted a myriad of dreams you’d seen him in. Not always, but occasionally he showed up in your dirtiest of dreams, with his gorgeous, addictive smile and strong arms. But now he was right there, in front of you – inside of you – and you apprehended how weak your boldest imaginations had been. Your nails dug into the skin of his shoulders as you clenched around his cock. He moaned your name huskily and it only clouded your head further.

It was crazy how loving a person could magnify everything. Even with closed eyes, the mere idea of him fucking you, at night in a public pool, could beat every single other experience you’d ever had. You felt like you were blessed with the audience with a god. A god, who had manifested on earth only to scoop you up and show you the finest things in life. You definitely couldn’t think of a finer thing than his cock dragging through your walls, hitting your g-spot repeatedly, while he had you cased against the pool tiles. Moans and little whimpers fell from your lips, and you were glad there wasn’t a single soul close by who could have heard.

He was jaw-dropping. With the way he pounded into you hard, using the poolside wall as support on your back, you felt your head spin as your eyes rolled to the back of your head. Your skin seemed to prickle wherever he touched you and you pushed your chest against his. Just a little closer, you told yourself, even though you were running out of space already. It was body against body while he whispered naughty things into your ears, telling you how incredible you felt, how lucky he had gotten with you and how sexy he found you.

“You’re the fucking best I’ve ever had, baby,” he said. His teeth grazed your neck as he kissed your sensitive skin messily. You could have counted every single drop of water hanging from the strands of his hair and adorning his face. Could have taken notice of every single eyelash and even the tiniest speckles of color in his irises. But you could barely command your eyes to stay open.

“So- close,” you said. In your ecstasy, you clawed at his back as another wave of pleasure went through your entire body.

“Together, hm?” he said, lips brushing over your cheek with every thrust. You hummed and nodded, as he picked up his thrusts to a toe-curling speed. With every touch of your sweet spot, you felt reality slip away a little further, and you were doing nothing to fight it. You invited the feeling in, resting your forehead against his, breaths coming out in short puffs. And then it overcame you. Your orgasm jolted through you like electricity, and you clung to him as if you might have sunken otherwise. It made your shared moans high pitched, and he followed you, pulling you into his arms like it was alone you who was keeping him afloat.

The splashing of the water softened as he drew out your highs for as long as possible with slower thrusts. Eventually, he halted completely. He cradled your face in his hands and when you finally opened your tired eyes, he was watching you with full adoration. His charming smile caused an eruption of butterflies in your stomach. This was only the beginning of your time together, yet you could barely fathom your fortune. And as it seemed, this time fate was on your side.

#optional bias #optional bias smut #optional bias scenarios #optional bias imagines #kpop scenarios #kpop smut #bts smut #ateez smut #pentagon smut #btob smut #seventeen smut #exo smut #the boyz smut #monsta x smut #txt smut #ikon smut #nct smut #astro smut #stray kids smut #day6 smut #the rose smut #onewe smut #oneus smut #a.c.e smut #got7 smut #cravity smut #n.flying smut #sf9 smut #kpop imagines #enhypen smut

[the-insomniac-emporium]

Bound Blood (Cassandra Dimitrescu/Reader, Soulmate AU) Pt. 1

Fandom: Resident Evil: Village Rating: T for blood, language, brief nudity. Later chapters will be M Warnings: Nah fam Summary: Local vampire finds out she can't kill soft human (because they're soulmates, baby), human becomes insufferable bastard, oops they fuck later. Soulmate AU where if one person gets injured, their soulmate feels the same amount of pain and receives a scar in the relevant area.

1: Sharing Is (Not) Caring

It’s not that you had expected to survive this- being locked in the dungeon of Castle Dimitrescu, waiting for the day you’re picked to be someone’s meal. Oh no, you had given up on surviving long ago, it was just that… well, you had hoped that someone with a softer touch would do you in. But here you were, too exhausted to cry, hanging naked in front of none other than Cassandra Dimitrescu. Her eyes were trailing you up and down, examining every inch of your skin, every flaw, every unique trait. It was like she was making a mental map of which parts of you would taste best. Goddamn, you wanted to spit in her face, or scream, or say something, anything that might make her feel even an ounce of what you had felt for weeks.

But you know that she’s already planning to kill you, and to make it painful. Why give her any more reason? Why dare her to find a worse way to end your life? There was no good answer, so you stayed still, just watched her move. Maybe if you looked bored enough she’d make it quick, just stab a knife in you and drink you up like a capri sun. Or, maybe, if you kept a straight face, she would admire your courage. Oh, how you longed for people to think of you kindly now, in your last moments, when dying clean and pretty was no longer an option.

Pulling a blade from some hidden sheathe, Cassandra approaches you with a wicked grin. There’s still blood on her lips from her last victim. Had they not sated her? Or had she been like this for some time? When she inevitably drank from you, how long would your blood remain on her lips? You weren’t sure that you wanted to know. In your mind, you picture her cleaning up as soon as she was done with you. It does not make you feel any better. Neither does the way she traces a finger across your chest, left to right, practicing for the incision to follow. She pauses to lick her lips, making direct eye contact as she does.

What happens next passes by so quickly that you don’t process any of it until the whole ordeal is over. The blade’s tip digs into your chest, just below your collarbone, before dragging along half the width of your torso. It hurts like hell, but you manage to keep your misery to yourself. But your pain is soon replaced with confusion; Cassandra screams, loud enough to echo throughout the basement, doubling over herself. In an instant her knife has clattered to the floor, forgotten. Instinct takes over your brain, the default programing kicking in, and you say something that fills you with instant regret.

“Are you okay?” Your voice is a bit quiet, and raw, worn out from lack of hydration. But it is enough, evidently, for Cassandra to hear. She’s rising back up and glaring at you, one hand clutching her chest. Something in her expression tells you that she thinks you’re mocking her. While that wasn’t technically the case, there was a part of you that found joy in this, watching your captor get a taste of their own medicine. The question left in your mind was why she was in pain. “I’ll take that as a no,” you said, again left with regret at your choices.

Now her hand is swiping at your face, nails cutting you open. Once more she hisses in pain, now clutching her head, shaking a little as she does. When she meets your gaze, you see that she’s more confused than anything. More than that, you see the marks on her face, knowing instantly that they match your own. Oh hell no, you thought, grimacing.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Cassandra growled through clenched teeth. Bouncing back and forth on her heels, she seems tense, unsure of how to process what’s happening. You feel the same way, desperately wanting to pretend that this doesn’t mean you’re her soulmate. Maybe the universe had just messed up, crossing some wires, or decided to pull a prank on the two of you. Either way it was better than the alternative. Eager to think about something else, you start considering your options. The first that comes to mind is ridiculous. Stupid, really. But would it amuse you? Absolutely.

“Not gonna lie, I feel better about the idea of you killing me now. Feel free to make it painful, darlin’, I won’t mind,” you snarked, lips curling up into a smirk. Oh boy was it satisfying to watch Cassandra’s response. One of her hands raises to smack you, only for her to freeze before releasing a torrent of swears. Hurting you meant hurting herself. “What’s the matter? Can’t handle a little aching? Haven’t you ever imagined what it’s like to be on the other side of things? Under the blade yourself, blood soaking your skin, eyes too dry for even a single tear? Poor thing,” you purred, tone as teasing as it could get. Apparently it’s aggravating enough for Cassandra to fight through the pain, as she slams her fist into your stomach, leaving both of you gasping for breath. “This is fun-” you pause to cough out a few drops of blood- “really, really fun. Hey, if you kill me, how bad do you think you’ll feel?”

Before Cassandra can react, either to speak or hurt you worse, the sound of approaching footsteps draws her attention. From where you hang you can’t see much, too many cells and hanging bodies blocking your vision. But your “soulmate” seemed to know who was coming. Her face scrunches up a little, and she adjusts her robes, trying to cover the mark on her chest. Had you not still been coughing, you would have sarcastically asked her how she intended to hide her face.

“What the hell is going on, Cassandra?” An unfamiliar voice asked. The footsteps grew louder, and faster, until the new figure stood in the same cell as you. Not even bothering to spare you a glance, she approaches Cassandra, reaching to examine her face. “Did a prisoner manage to get you? I’ve told you a thousand times-”

“Don’t fucking touch me, sis,” Cassandra snapped, pushing away her sister’s hand. Both of them are visibly tense, and for a moment they stand still, staring each other down. Then the sister (who you assume to be Bela, from things you’ve overheard recently) shifts her focus to you. Something tells you that she has no intentions of being gentle.

“Did you do this, you rotten little thing?” Bela questioned, glaring at you hard enough to send a shiver down your spine. But that doesn’t stop you from trying to have some more fun.

“Oh, of course I did! I rattled my chains real good, scared the shit out of her, made her fall on her own knife a few times. You know, like that one musical?” You must look insane as you speak, grin wide but face dripping with blood. If it unnerves Bela, she hides it well, though you doubt it does. As soon as you’re done poking fun she’s pulling out her sickle. Still grinning, you make eye contact with Cassandra, who realizes what’s happening a second too late. Then the two of you cry out in unison, as the blade carves into your shoulder. Instantly Bela pulls back, stunned, turning to her sister with genuine concern. “I might have lied. Rest assured though, it was for comedic purposes.”

The next thing you know the two sisters are shuffling away from you, Cassandra begrudgingly being dragged along by Bela. Though the younger of the two had been adamant about not receiving help, she now had little choice in the matter, skin searing from your blood bond. Even you are starting to breathe harder than you’d like.

“Was it something I said?” You barked, barely able to manage a fit of giggles between your coughing. Bela shoots you a glare over her shoulder, but quickly returns her attention to her sister. They talk, quickly, soft enough that you can only make out a few words here and there. It’s hard to make meaning from it, especially considering their vastly different tones. Cassandra is pure anger, gestures fast and wide, while Bela is oddly solemn, even regretful. When you finally catch a couple full sentences, things start to make a little more sense, though you wish they didn’t.

“We can kill them painlessly, in their sleep. That way you won’t have to suffer,” Bela whispered. She’s doing her best to comfort her sister, despite the tension in the room, gently patting her on the back. Briefly, you make eye contact with her. In that moment she looks equal parts executor and unwilling jury. But she looks away quickly, even shifting her angle to prevent it from happening again.

“No, fuck that, fuck this, I’m… I’m not killing them. Nobody is,” Cassandra growled, daring to emphasize her point by pushing Bela away. Now it’s her turn to look at you, brows furrowed, eyes betraying something more than just anger. Somehow it’s a million times worse than when she first came in. You strain yourself trying to look away, cursing the chains keeping you in place, resorting to closing your eyes and pretending none of this was real. “I don’t care what you think, Bela. They’re already my ‘meal’, might as well get what enjoyment out of this that I can.”

Again, footsteps echo through the basement. Tension locks your muscles in place, and your eyes are still clamped shut, to the point that you don’t realize your chains are being undone until you’ve hit the ground. Cursing under your breath, you finally open your eyes again. There’s blood on the floor, only some of it yours, and you’re suddenly aching for a bath. More than that, though, you’re praying for something to cover yourself with. Certainly Cassandra didn’t need to see everything, now that you weren’t a piece of meat for her to enjoy? As if reading your mind, the middle Dimitrescu daughter flings open a nearby cabinet, messily searching for something. Eventually she gives a hum of approval, then tosses a blanket in your direction.

“Put it on, dipshit, then follow me,” she snapped, already walking away. For a moment you’re tempted to stay there, sitting still, waiting to see how long it would take for her to notice. But one look from Bela sends the thought back to whatever crevice of your mind it crawled out of. So you’re moving, hastily, awkwardly wrapped in a somewhat itchy blanket. Other prisoners eye you as you pass, some shouting curses or even spitting at you. At first Cassandra takes no notice, or simply doesn’t care, but eventually the noise seems to irritate her. Turning back, she takes her sickle in hand and slams the handle into the bars of a cell. It’s loud, making you flinch, but gets everyone’s attention. “Next one to make a peep gets the blood eagle!”

“Is that, like, a sex thing?” The words leave your mouth before you can stop yourself. Laughter rings out around you from the few prisoners capable of it. Cassandra is seething again, looking about ready to kill you. Then she’s shifting into swarm mode, spreading out wide, insects barreling through half the occupied cells. A few cries escape the prisoners, as the flies take bites out of them, cutting a perfect balance between pain and (a lack of) lethality. They’d be suffering for days to come, every movement making their wounds ache. “Not a sex thing, got it,” you muttered to yourself, just as Cassandra reforms in front of you. This time she grabs the blanket you’re wrapped in, using it to tug you forward, sending you towards the exit.

“Shut up for five minutes and I might let you put on actual clothes,” she growled, keeping one hand on your back to guide you. The offer is the closest thing to kindness you’ve seen from her, and you have half a mind to do what she says. Would you actually manage to keep quiet for that long? Well, you were certainly looking forward to finding out...

#cassandra dimitrescu #cassandra dimitrescu x reader #resident evil: village #re8 village #*evil laughter* #i know I said this would have fluff #but it turned into humor oops #yes this will be the best trope #enemies to friends to lovers

[f1united]

Secret - DR3 Imagine

Part 4 to Zoo!

Part 1     Part 2     Part 3

Daniel Ricciardo Imagine

Summary: You share your pregnancy with his family

This contains mentions of pregnancy so please do not read if this is something you may find triggering!

Ever since you and Daniel had taken the digital test, he hadn’t left your side. The confirmation that you were growing a mini Ricciardo inside of you made him smile more than he ever had before, something that you thought was borderline impossible. He had booked a trip for the two of you to spend some time together before he was thrown back into the busy f1 season. It was as though you had just met for the first time, staying up late talking and not being able to keeps your hands off each other wherever you went. When you’d flown back to Australia nothing changed and you felt yourself falling in love with him all over again.

Daniel laid beside you in bed, one arm around your shoulders and the other holding up the precious scan photo of your little baby that had been taken yesterday. Ever since you’d been given it neither one of you could seem to stop looking at it in complete awe. Truth be told there wasn’t too much to see, you weren’t too far along but that didn’t seem to matter.

“Have you thought about how to tell your family today?” you asked, diverting you eyes from the picture to his. Today was the last day Daniel would see his family before you both headed back to Europe to finish preparing for the first race in just two weeks’ time. The annual barbeque had become a tradition and was always a lovely way to say goodbye.

You hadn’t told anyone about your pregnancy yet. You were somewhat scared that if people knew your little secret it would burst this bubble that the two of you had found yourself in. However, you knew that he probably wanted to tell his parents in person, and it was uncertain the next time that would be.

“Not really I just think I’ll know when the times right, they’re going to be so excited” you knew he was right. They would be so excited, and you didn’t have to even doubt for a second that they wouldn’t support the both of you.

“We should probably get up, they’ll be here soon” you didn’t want to move, you could’ve laid like this forever, but you did need to get ready and start the food prep. You slowly lifted yourself up, placing a kiss on Daniel’s forehead as he unwrapped himself from you. It wasn’t until you were on your feet that you caught a glimpse of yourself in the mirror and let out a small gasp.

“Daniel look” his eyes snapped towards you and watched intently as you carefully touched the small bump. You hadn’t started showing much and you were sure that this was just being you hadn’t been to the toilet yet this morning but none the less it all started to feel a bit more real.

“Oh my god” Daniel climbed out of bed and stood behind you, placing his arms and hands over yours to hold the little baby too.

“I suppose I should go and pick out a floaty dress for the day” you smiled. It didn’t take long for everyone to arrive. You had let them all in while Daniel stayed in the garden with his barbeque and his beer. They never came empty handed and you gave them a hand carrying the food through to the dining table outside. His nephew was the first one to greet Daniel, shortly followed by everyone else.

“What does everyone want to drink?” you asked as everyone began to sit down. You figured this way you could pour yourself a soft drink without anyone noticing you weren’t on the alcohol too.

“Another one of these please” Daniel waved his beer can towards you and you nodded in acknowledgement.

“I’ll have a glass of white wine if you’ve got one please” His mum asked, shortly followed with an agreement of his sister while her husband followed suit.

You turned your attention towards his dad.

“I’ll come in and give you a hand” he replied to which you gratefully accepted.

“Isaac what about you?”

“What have you got” he asked as he ran around the garden.

“Oooooo where do I start, fizzy drinks, fruit shoots”

“Why don’t you go with Auntie Y/N and have a look” His mum suggested to which he nodded his head and ran towards the kitchen while you and Joe followed behind.

You opened the fridge stacked with drinks as Isaac held his hands up for up to lift him up. You placed him on your hip as you went through the different options with him until he decided on some lemonade.

“Now can I trust you to give Uncle Daniel his beer without drinking it before you get there?” you asked. “And then I’ll bring out your drink with mine?” The little boy nodded furiously as you handed him the can and put him down on the floor before watching him run off. You grabbed the lemonade and wine from the fridge and placed it next to the glasses Joe had just got out the cupboard. You felt your chest get warm at the site of Isaac passing Daniel the beer and giving him a hug in response.

“How have you been” Joe asked, snapping you out of your little daydream.

“Good actually” you replied, “Really good”.

“I can tell” he laughed slightly at how smiley you were. “I take it you won’t be having one of these” he nodded towards the wine he has cracked open and started distributing between the glasses. Your evident shock made him laugh once more. “Don’t worry, I got you a wine glass for your lemonade, no one needs to know” he gave you a small wink.

“Is it really that obvious?” You asked him as you finished pouring yours and Isaacs drinks.

“Not at all you just have this unmistakable pregnancy glow, Grace had the same thing when she was pregnant with Daniel. I don’t think anyone else has picked up on it” you breathed a sigh of relief at his honesty.

“We were planning on telling you all today” you admitted

“I knew as soon as he sent us those pictures of you away on holiday, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so happy. Grace insisted you’d secretly got engaged or eloped” you couldn’t help but laugh at his comment. You were so grateful for the relationship you had with Joe, and so was Daniel.

“I hadn’t even thought about that if I’m honest. We had the first scan yesterday” You pulled open the drawer to the left of you and placed it on the side. You knew you would have needed it close by to show the others at some point this afternoon, you just didn’t realise it would be so soon. His eyes filled up with tears slightly as he brought you in for a hug.

“Oh Y/N, I’m so happy for the both of you”

“I can’t wait to see him become a dad” you admitted as you buried your head in his shoulder in an attempt to reduce the tears.

“What am I missing out on here?” Daniel voice shocked the both of you as you let go of Joe and looked at the Australian walking through the kitchen towards you.

“We were just talking about how great of a dad you’re going to be” Joe smiled at his son as Daniel looked between the two of you slightly confused. “Oh come on she didn’t tell me I can just tell, I don’t know how your mother can’t. It just takes one look at the two of you to know there’s something going on. Plus, the last few times we’ve seen you, you haven’t been able to keep your hands off her belly. Usually they’re on her arse”. You let out a laugh at his comment as he gave Daniel a hug.

“Now lets go and eat, Dan can you carry some of these out?” Joe asked as you watched Dan slide the scan photo into his back pocket.

It wasn’t long before you all tucked into the food and spent the afternoon chatting about old memories and making new ones. A badminton tournament had broken out at one point, then Isaac had decided he wanted to go swimming so hopped into he pool with Daniel for a while.

It wasn’t until the sun started to set that you remembered you had dessert in the fridge.

“Ill come and grab them with you” Daniel stated as he got up from the table and held your hand as you both walked into the kitchen. The second you were out of sight from the others he pulled you in for a kiss. You giggled slightly at the taste of beer on his lips.

“What was the for Ricciardo?” you asked him as he hugged you tightly.

“What I’m not allowed to kiss my girlfriend anymore? The mother of my child?”

“Keep your voice down” you reminded him as he trailed a few kisses down your neck and collar bone. “Seriously what had gotten into you?” You giggled as he looked up to meet your eye, you could see the tipsiness dancing around them. “Your mum brought over some champagne for a toast to you leaving, I was thinking we could open it with dessert and tell them then?” Daniel nodded in front of you, almost immediately appearing to have sobered up as he planted his hands on your belly.

“I love you so much” he told you as he rested his forehead against yours.

“I love you more” you told him as you shared a kiss once more.

Joe began to fill up the champagne glasses once you’d both returned to the table as you began to cut everyone a slice of the cake you’d brought and it wasn’t long until Grace stood up with her glass in hand.

“I just wanted to raise a toast, to appreciating the time we’ve had with Daniel and to wish him all the best in the new season” Before everyone could cheers, Daniel stood up to and you felt your body become nervous with excitement as he held onto your hand tightly.

“Before we leave we just wanted to say how much we’re going to miss you so we have a picture that we want you to keep while we’re away” Daniel dug into his pocket and handed the image to Isaac first who was sat next to you.

“What is it?” he asked. You point at the small shape in the middle of the image.

“That right there is a picture of Baby Ricciardo” you moved your hands to your stomach and rubbed it slightly. “Who right now is sat in here” Gasps were heard all around the table as Isaac passed the picture to his mum.

“So it’s your baby?” He asked

“Mine and Daniel’s yes, it’s your little cousin” you told him.

“Oh my!” you looked over to Grace who was making her way towards you both with her arms wide open as you got up from your chair to embrace her.

“I’m going to be a nanny again” she cried as the rest of the table got up to congratulate you. “Joe get up your sons going to be a dad”

“Oh I know, she’s been on the lemonade all day” He chuckled. After the evening had come to an end and everyone had said their goodbyes you climbed into bed with Daniel and you both just smiled at one another as you realised that nothing was going to stop the love you both shared and that your baby might just be the most loved person in the entire world.

#daniel ricciardo imagine #daniel ricciardo #daniel ricciardo one shot #f1 imagine #f1 masterlist #lando norris #charles leclerc #george russell #max verstappen #lewis hamilton #valteri bottas #pierre gasly

[nightfoot]

So I’m not a historian, but I just finished posting my medieval AU fanfic that included a medieval trans character, so I thought I’d ramble a bit about some of the research I did prior to writing it.  There’s this idea that Western society believed in an absolute binary of men and women until Stonewall happened and introduced Western cis people to the concept of gender not being rigidly set in stone, but that’s just not the case.  So here’s a brief overview of some specific cases I found along the lines of “Medieval and early modern people were thinking about gender too.”

The first is the one I think about most often.  This is actually a little bit after the medieval period, in the 16th century, but still interesting.  There was a person in the little town of Vitry-le-Fran ois who lived as a man. He was married to a woman and worked as a weaver.  Tragically, his marriage lasted only 5 months before someone recognized him as “[birth name]” and he was tried and condemned (for the crime of using a dildo).  But, he was given the option to go back to wearing skirts and live as a respectable woman.  He rejected the offer, and chose to be hanged rather than live as a woman.

I just think about him a lot, and how much I wish he could come to the 21st century and see how the world has changed.  He is also the person I always think about when I see the claim that all trans men in history were just “women trying to live with more freedom.”  Because if it was only about trying to live a better life, then choosing any life at all would be better than death. 

The second story involves another person from France in 1601.  Thankfully, his chosen name was recorded - Marin began sleeping with a woman while they were both working as chambermaids in Rouen, but after a few weeks, he told her he was in fact a man, and proposed marriage.  Before their marriage, though, Marin was accused of sodomy for being a “woman” trying to marry another women.  However, he plead his case and asked for a medical examination, and after a genital exam, the doctor declared Marin had “a hidden but functional penis.”  I read this as him being intersex.  The court demanded he dress as a woman for 4 years in hope that the situation would clear up, but after those 4 years passed, he was allowed to go back to presenting as male, married his wife, and lived the rest of his life as a man.

This story is interesting because it demonstrated that people in 1601 were ready to accept “huh! sex and gender are complicated! I guess it is possible for someone to change from one thing to another!”

And the reason they accepted this is because of the “one sex model,” the idea that male and female are just two ends of a spectrum and all humans fall somewhere on that spectrum with the potential to shift position.  This model is not exactly correct, because they also believed that it had to do with body temperature and that if a woman’s body temperature raised too much she would spontaneously grow a penis, but it is very interesting that 400 years ago, academics realized that sex is much more complicated than “you’re either A or B” but in our enlightened 21st century, we have to argue about that again.

Cross-dressing saints are also common in hagiography.  One example is Joseph von Schönau, a celebrated monk who joined the abbey of Schönau in 1187 after a life of travel in Europe and the Middle East.  What’s interesting is that during his deathbed confession, when he came clean to the priest about all his other secrets and sins in life, he said nothing about his sex.

There is another story I recall that, for the life of me, I can’t find the source for now.  In that one, a saint lives his entire life in an abbey as a man. During his life, a local woman accused him of fathering her child.  He could have easily disproved the accusation by explaining that he didn’t have a penis, but instead accepted the child as his and accepted the shame and disdain from his fellow monks.  They only realized he couldn’t have been the father after his death. 

My next two stories are fictional:

The first is the 13th century French story Roman de Silence.  This is the story of a woman whose father needed a son to inherit, so when she was born, he decided to raise her as a boy.  Throughout the story, personifications of “Nature” and “Nurture” argue over which of them determines who a person is.  Throughout the story, Silence becomes a knight, captures Merlin in a prophecy twist (of the “no man can defeat Merlin” sort), reveals her sex in the end and marries a king.  I actually think it’s more interesting to read Silence as a trans woman, despite being what we today would “assign female.”  She was assigned male by her father, and grows up feeling conflicted about this.

Silence isn’t an example of a real life trans masc knight, but the story overall is exploring the question, “What exactly is it that makes someone a man vs a woman?”  This says to me that Medieval People Were Thinking About This Too, and the idea that man and woman could be more complicated than looking at a baby’s genitals has been around for a long, long time.

My favourite fictional story is Yde et Olive, another 13th century French romance.  This one tells the story of Yde, a princess being forced into a marriage she hates.  Rather than go through with it, they dress as a man and run away.  Over the course of Yde’s adventures, they learn how to fight with a sword, take down bandits, and end up as a knight in a foreign king’s court.  The king is so impressed with Yde that he arranges for them to marry his daughter, Olive.  Yde confesses to Olive that the marriage will never work because of his sex, but Olive says she doesn’t mind and will keep their secret, which, y’know, #Bi Princess.  But someone overheard the conversation! And now the king will have them put to death for same-sex relations! (even though... he’s the one who insisted they marry).  Yde prays to God for a miracle, and God responds by magically transforming Yde into a cis man.  The day is saved and Yde lives happily ever after as a man with his wife.  They have a son named Croissant.

My research mostly focused on transmasc stories, but I have to at least add the suggestion to read up on Choisy, an 18th century French transfem person.  She wrote a novel (Histoire) about a child who was raised as a girl with no idea that having a penis meant people would think she was a boy.  When her mother eventually tells her that she is “male,” she simply does not believe it.  She goes on to marry a Marquis, and realizes she must tell him that she is allegedly male, only for the Marquis to tell her that he is, in fact, "female.”  They go on to live happily ever after as a t4t couple.

Anyway, as I said, I am not a historian and this is not academically rigorous, but some interesting stories I came across while researching.  I wouldn’t say any of these suggest that trans people were common and accepted by broader society throughout history, but they do show that people over the centuries have been thinking about gender, what it means to be a man or woman, and how the line between those can be blurry.  This is far from being a 21st century exclusive discussion.

Unfortunately, hand-wringing hysteria about trans people is also nothing new, because I also came across several instances of medieval writers fretting about the idea of “men disguising themselves as women to sneak into convents and have sex with nuns.”  Truly, the world never changes. 

Sources:

Ferguson, Gary. "Early Modern Transitions: From Montaigne to Choisy." L'Esprit Créateur 53, no. 1 (2013): 145-57.

Hotchkiss, Valerie.  “Clothes Make the Man: Female Cross Dressing in Medieval Europe.” Garland Publishing, 1996.

#trans history

[battybatzgirl]

Hey Mr. Sandman, You Missed a Spot

AO3

Summary: 

It's not that Hunter doesn't ever sleep, Eda's come to realize. It was that he falls asleep sporadically, most of the time in really weird places.

Or: 5 times Eda catches Hunter taking a nap

Part 1 of the Finders Keepers Series

---

Here’s the thing about Eda: she loves naps. Eda likes to be cozy, so usually, that equated to curling up under a blanket, lazing around, and falling asleep. The Owl Beast shared that sentiment, the creature that lived within her constantly wanting to nest. Those animalistic instincts were weird, but when you lived in a house with a demon who also liked to bury himself under a pile of stuffed animals, you kind of got used to it.

Here’s the thing about Hunter: he doesn’t sleep.

The kid has been living with them for only about two weeks, officially replacing Eda as Public Enemy Numero Uno in the eyes of the Emperor. When he’d showed up on Hooty’s doorstep, all bloody and barely conscious, Eda thought it was some kind of cosmic trick. The Powers That Be had to be pulling her leg because this was the second time the leader of the Emperor’s Coven had shown up to the Owl House with nowhere else to go.

Luz had been ecstatic to welcome him in, apparently excited to finally fulfill her dreams of becoming a middle child in their weird little found family. King was less thrilled, but eventually warmed up to the idea of Hunter staying with them as long as he taught King his secrets on how to command an army.

Hunter himself even seemed unnerved at the thought of living with them. He tried to leave a few times when he was still wounded, but his little bird palisman (Rascal, she’s heard him say) effectively herded him back into the house by continuously dive-bombing him and nipping at his ears. And after Belos put out a wanted poster for the kid, making him the Isles’ number one most wanted traitor, leaving wasn’t really an option. Not if he wanted to stay alive.

So eventually, Hunter begrudgingly accepted that yeah, he lived in the Owl House now.

And alright, Eda isn’t heartless. The kid was lost, wounded, and an enemy of the Emperor. She can work with that.

Getting to know him has been a challenge, though. Hunter has a lot of weird quirks. He holds himself so seriously that Eda has a hard time remembering that he’s a teenager and not a fully grown middle-aged man. He hardly ever smiles. He’s jumpy, practically jolting out of his skin every time you walk into the same room. He’s clearly Going Through Some Shit, as Eda so eloquently calls it, remembering how Lily went through the same thing when she slowly broke free of Belos’s freaky subjugation.

But still. The kid doesn’t sleep.

Eda first notices it around day four of his residence. She’s up early to go to the market, stepping into the living room and nearly transforming into her Harpy Form out of pure shock when she sees a figure messing with her bookshelf in the back of the room. Wide maroon eyes lock on hers from across the room and she feels the feathers that sprung to her skin recede.

“Titan, kid,” she breaths, “You nearly killed me. What are you doing up? It’s Saturday, you should be sleeping in.”

“Um…I did sleep in,” Hunter responds, as if it’s obvious.

Eda feels a frown tug at her lips, “The sun isn’t even up yet.”

The kid just shrugs a little lamely, and Eda feels a twinge of concern in her chest. (And ugh, feeling concerned for a guy who dangled you over the Boiling Sea is certainly weird.) If this was sleeping in for him, he couldn’t have rested more than five hours.

She steps closer, taking a second look at what he’s doing. Half the books are spread out on the floor, the other half stacked neatly back on the shelves in some kind of order.

He notices her looking, “I, uh, took the liberty of reorganizing your bookshelf. Or organizing it, since it didn’t really seem to have a system.” The kid ducks his head, the tips of his ears flushing pink. “I- I can put it back the way it was if you want, or organize them in a different way.”

That’s another thing about Hunter: he always has to be doing something. Being useful. Without direction, he crumples. It was always, What do you want me to do now, Miss Clawthorne this and I completed this task, Miss Clawthorne, what’s next that. His brain operated on a transactional level—I do this thing for you, you do this thing for me. And since Eda was housing him, he felt like he had to constantly be doing things for her. Constantly proving himself worthy to be here, repaying her. Hunter couldn’t seem to wrap his head around that she didn’t want him to do anything except stay comfortable.

Eda has thought up a hundred different little tasks for him to do in just his first four days. She’s running out of odd jobs to give him, and if she has to keep telling him what to do she’s going to start pulling out her hair.

“You’re fine, kid,” she says. “Keep doin’ what you’re doin’ if it makes ya happy. But you shouldn’t be up this early. You should at least take a nap later.”

Hunter tilts his head. “But that wouldn’t be accomplishing anything.”

“You don’t hafta be working all the time,” Eda stresses. “It’s okay to sit around and just exist once and a while. Actually, I think that should be your priority. Take a nap, relax, go cloud watching, take a walk—any or all of the above.”

“That sounds like doing nothing.”

“That’s because it is doing nothing.”

His face hardens, taking on that soldier-like seriousness that encompasses his entire demeanor. “Being lazy can’t be a priority.”

“Don’t think of it like that, then,” Eda almost snaps, wishing for a nice hot mug of apple blood. It was too damn early to deal with the repercussions of Belos’s all-work-no-play mindset. “Think of it as acting your age. Did you ever get to take naps as a kid in the Emperor’s Coven? Is relaxing just a foreign concept to you?”

He doesn’t answer, staring at her with those bagged eyes and guarded expression, and Eda throws up her hands in defeat.

She leaves then, her patience running too thin to continue arguing with him. She doubts he’ll actually go back to sleep. He probably goes back to doing whatever he was doing with that bookshelf. Eda makes a mental note to tell King to knock all the books off, just so Hunter can reorganize it later. Just for something for him to keep him occupied.

1.

Eda doesn’t even notice the first time it happens. It was one of Luz’s friends, Gus, who pointed it out.

The kids were gathered at her home after school, spread out on the floor of the living room along with various pillows and blankets. Luz found some card game she knew buried somewhere in the piles of human trash Eda has laying around, and the girl has been spending the better part of an hour trying to explain how it works.

“So the Wild Card doesn’t make you turn into a wild animal?” Willow questions, holding up a black card with looks like a colorful pie chart on it.

“Nope!” Luz says cheerfully. “It just becomes any color you want it to be to go with the rest of your hand.”

“But the card doesn’t actually change color?” Amity asks.

“No, it only represents the color,” Luz clarifies, and Eda has to admit, her girl has a ton of patience. She’s been quietly watching from her place on the couch, half-listening to their conversation, half-reading the Isles’ latest edition of You Gossipy Witch, a tabloid where a writer is speculating about her true form. Apparently, some people think she was raised by feral, wild owls on some far away barrier island, and has come to reside in Bonesborough just because she ran out of mutant rats to eat.

Weird.

But entertaining!

Gus holds up one of his cards, “So are blank cards bad, or—"

King jumps over his shoulder, landing on the deck of cards in the middle of their little circle and making them fly everywhere. “I have taken dominion over ALL YOUR CARDS. All of you must grovel for a taste of my wealth!”

“Actually, the point of the game is to get rid of all your cards,” Luz reminds him gently. “That way, when you get down to one card, you shout Uno! And you win! If no one else makes you draw anymore, that is.”

King deflates a little, apparently put off by the idea of less is more. “Oh.” Luz smiles and pats him on the head, and he brightens up. “Okay, let’s play, because I wanna make all of you draw as many cards as possible! You'll drown in your cards! Choke on them, even!”

As they start gathering up the cards that King threw everywhere, Gus lets out a little gasp. “You guys—is Hunter asleep?”

That immediately draws Eda’s attention away from the magazine. Her eyes flicker to the blond witch, laying on his stomach just on the edge of their group. He was still having a hard time socializing, especially with Amity, but Luz was determined to include him in all friendship activities. She said wanted to teach him how to be a kid, and hell, if anyone could knock some seriousness out of that boy it would be Luz.

Hunter is indeed asleep—his face is mushed into the forearms pillowed under his head, and his red palisman has weaseled its way to nestle in between the crook of his elbow. His breath comes out in soft little sighs, and Eda feels something in her melt.

“Awwww, he looks so peaceful,” Luz croons, mushing her palms against her cheeks. Amity’s already scooched past her, snapping photos on her scroll. Eda can’t blame her. She knows a good blackmail opportunity when she sees one.

Eda’s off the couch and catches King mid-pounce. “Whoa there, none of that buddy.”

“But Edaaaa,” the demon whines, his little arms and legs flailing in mid-air. “I have to conquer him when he least expects it!”

“Ehhh, let the kid sleep. Save your conquests for when he’s awake and can put up a fight.” Eda sets him down in his place in the circle, and the kids all glance at each other before turning back to the cards.

She notices that they’re more mindful to keep their tones softer, probably to not disturb the sleeping boy. And when Hunter wakes himself up about half an hour later, they don’t mention it, seamlessly integrating him back into their game.

2.

The second time it happens, Raine is walking Eda home. It’s early in the evening, and the pair just got done with a fabulous date—a picnic with apple blood and sweet (and stolen) baked goods? Titan, take Eda now, she’s found her perfect match.

She’s still riding that high, not noticing Raine stopping until they tug on their clasped hands. “Hey, who’s that? Is he okay?”

Eda follows where they’re pointing their finger. It’s Hunter, slumped against the base of an oak tree, fast asleep. His chin is tipped forward and a book open on his chest, and even more strangely, there’s a small pile of leaves on his lap.

“Oh, that’s just my—” Eda stops herself, the word catching in her throat. Hunter was a child in her care, yes, but he wasn’t quite her kid. Not like Luz or King. The blond witch was still too jumpy, baring his teeth and snarling at anything that tried to get close to him.

He calls her Miss Clawthorne, for Titan’s sake.

“—Hunter,” Eda finishes lamely.

Raine raises an eyebrow. “Your Hunter?”

“He’s uhhh, one of Luz’s friends who just so happens to be living with us. Not a big thing.”

Raine shoots her a deadpan look but strides forward anyway, kneeling next to the sleeping blond. They keep their voice to a low murmur, “Should we wake him? That can’t be comfortable for his neck. He’ll probably be sore later.”

“Eh, let him rest. This is more sleep than he usually gets.” Eda steps closer, kneeling down on his other side. It’s the side that has his scar, the slightly raised red tissue standing out even more so than usual now that he wasn’t constantly moving. She’s almost asked him how he got it, but he’s clearly sensitive about the subject. She’s seen the similar marks on his arms, and something tells her there are a whole lot more scars that he’s hiding.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out who gave them to him.

Still, it’s hard to ignore just how young he looks. When he’s stripped of all of his snappy comebacks, quick defenses, and that guarded demeanor Belos forced onto him, he’s reduced to exactly what he should be:

A kid.

“Oh!” Raine startles in surprise. Eda looks up to see the cardinal palisman fluttering down from above them, carrying a few leaves in its beak. It hops down onto Hunter’s lap and deposits the leaves in the little growing pile on his leg.

A smile worms its way onto Eda’s face. She runs a finger across the little bird’s head, “Trying to keep him warm, huh?” The bird lets out a trilling note of confirmation. She lets the bird be, turning back to Raine, “I think Rascal’s got this covered. If he hasn’t come in before nightfall I’ll come out and get ‘em.”

The bard casts one last glance down at the sleeping boy before they stand. “Y’know, he kind of reminds me of someone.”

“Oh yeah?” Eda weaves her arm through Raine’s as the pair reassumes their walk.

“Yeah,” Raine hums. “He kind of has the same build as someone I met when I was held hostage in the Emperor’s palace. The Golden Guard. Did you hear that he ran away from the palace? There've been rumors that the Emperor himself is tearing apart the Right Arm looking for him.”

“Uh, about that...”

Raine stops, turning to look at her square in the face. Eda gives them a sheepish, toothy grin.

“Oh my god,” Raine says. “You adopted the Golden Guard?”

“Hey now, adopted is a very strong word—”

The bard cuts her off with a delighted laugh. “How am I not surprised?” Eda feels heat rise to her face, but can’t help but return Raine’s infectious smile. “Only you, Eda. Only you.”

3.

The third time it happens, Eda’s passing through the upstairs hallway, intent on curling up into her nest for an afternoon nap of her own. She hears a shuffling noise as she passes by the glorified storage closet that they gave Hunter as a room, and can’t resist a peek inside.

What she finds is definitely…not what she was expecting. Hunter is laying flat on his back on the floor, his feet elevated on the little cot they’d given him. Yeesh, that couldn’t be comfortable. Soft snores woosh past his open lips, his face turned toward a crystal ball that’s playing some cartoon he must have been watching before he fell asleep.

His body is nearly covered in stuffed animals.

“King,” Eda hisses. The horned perpetrator is in the middle of dumping his entire army onto the blond witch’s chest, pinning down his arms with plushies. “What did I tell you about burying people alive?”

The demon pauses from where he’s been slowly arranging his army over Hunter’s sleeping form. “He’s got plenty of room to breathe! I didn’t cover his face,” King protests. “Can’t subjugate someone who’s dead.”

“No subjugating—” your brother, she almost says, “—Hunter.”

King squints at her, but then grumbles and starts slowly taking the stuffed animals off the boy’s body. Crisis averted, Eda slips back out into the hall, mind swirling. That was the second time she’d almost referred to Hunter as hers in passing. The feeling is too raw to speak out loud yet, but there’s a growing warmth in her as she watches Hunter acclimate to his surroundings in the Owl House. With every day that goes by, he’s more comfortable around her, around Luz and King and Hooty, and he’s starting to come out of his shell. He’s growing softer, less quick to snarl, becoming more Hunter and less Golden Guard.

Unconsciously, Eda’s started viewing him as part of their little family. Two weeks ago, that thought would have made her uncomfortable. Now, she welcomes it with open arms.

Ugh, she’s getting so soft.

4.

The fourth time it happens is when Eda’s flying home from visiting Lilith. She’s only been gone for the day, and is hoping that leaving Luz in charge hasn’t led to any freak fires, the resurrection of the dead, or other various natural disasters. Unfortunately, even her most responsible kid is pretty reckless, so Eda’s expectations are set pretty low.

It’s probably sometime around 2 a.m. when she makes it home sweet home. She swoops in close, intent on landing on the front door but stilling mid-air when she sees something on the roof of the tower. Even from up here, it’s not hard to distinguish the form of a looming body.

Eda’s heart leaps into her throat and she takes Owlbert down into a dive. Her body is tense when she lands, her staff already aimed toward the person lurking by the edge of the roof. “Alright listen bucko, you better step back or—wait.” She sees what looks like a lump of feathers sitting on top of the person’s head, and Eda squints in the darkness. She quickly pulls out a light glyph, sending the tiny ball of sun forward.

“Hunter?!” Eda’s tense posture relaxes. The kid doesn’t answer, and it takes her a beat to figure out why. He’s dead asleep, slumped precariously over the telescope they use for stargazing. Eda has no idea how he’s even standing at all. Kid probably had a ton of practice of falling asleep on his feet during long, boring meetings with the Emperor.

“Wakey, wakey.” She places her hand on his shoulder, gently, but he wakes up with a full-body jerk, startling the palisman on top of his head. The cardinal chirps once in irritation, fluttering to rest on Eda’s shoulder instead.

Hunter’s eyes are wild for a moment until he seems to register where he is and who he’s with. He relaxes then, letting out a yawn so huge it would put any lion to shame. “…Eda?”

“The one and only,” Eda says, ignoring how her heart squeezes at the kid finally calling her by her name. “Wanna tell me why you’re up here in the middle of the night?”

“Waitin’ for you,” he mumbles, voice rough with sleep. His eyelids drop and he sways dangerously on his feet. “Wanted to… t’make sure y’got home safe.”

The warmth in her chest expands and eclipses her entire body in that fuzzy feeling she gets whenever one of her kids does something particularly adorable. Thank Titan it’s dark and Hunter is too out of it to notice the smile that spreads across her face. If he was fully awake, Eda gets the feeling that A) he probably never would have admitted that he was worried about her, and B) would have snapped at her for smiling at him like that. “Well, I’m home now, so let’s get you to bed before you topple over.”

Eda wraps her arm around his waist and nudges him along, practically carrying him back downstairs, their palismen following close behind. She doesn’t mind. Someone had to make sure he didn’t fall off the roof.

“Night, kid,” she says, tucking him under the blankets on his cot. Hunter doesn’t respond, already having slipped back into unconsciousness. And if she brushes his bangs tenderly out of his face, no one ever has to be the wiser.

5.

The fifth time it happens, Eda’s gotten used to it. It's not that Hunter doesn’t sleep, she’s come to realize. He just falls asleep in weird places. Why, she has no idea, but honestly, the kid looked so tired all the time, she wasn’t going to question it. They had bigger things to worry about.

The Day of Unity is just around the corner, and Belos has become more irritating than ever.

Eda hadn’t even thought that was possible for him, but apparently, it was. The scouts around Bonesborough have tripled, their captains leading more and more raids, butting into shops to check everyone’s papers, and invading random districts.

Oddly, Belos’s priorities seem to have shifted. He’s still sending out grunts to round up any wild witches, but the guards have been playing a weird sort of hide-and-seek, going beyond just patrolling the marketplaces to actually tearing into people’s homes. From what she’s heard, the guards never take anything, just searching the place top-to-bottom before leaving empty-handed and moving on to the next house.

Belos was looking for something.

And unfortunately, Eda’s got a pretty good idea of what he’s after.

Said thing just so happens to be slumped across from her at the kitchen table, dead to the world. It’s late into the night, and most of the kids have already gone to sleep. Too on edge to lie down, Eda’s been keeping herself busy by concocting more potions while the late-night news plays on her crystal ball in the background.

Hunter, striving to be helpful, volunteered to stay up and help.

It wasn’t long before the kid slowly started to nod off, face supported by his palm as his eyelids started to droop. He’d been in the middle of mixing two ingredients—highly flammable ingredients, mind you—and Eda plucked the vials out of his lax grip just in time. Honestly, it was a miracle the kid never killed himself in the Emperor’s Coven with how randomly he falls asleep.

He probably never got the chance to sleep at all, a voice reminds her. She remembers how dead-exhausted Lily was during her first few days at the Owl House. It was probably safe to assume that the Emperor had a habit of running the head of his Coven into the ground.

Hunter has been picking up on Belos’s tightening grip, too. He’s been getting quieter, more reserved. He’s come to the same conclusion that Eda has: the Emperor was tearing apart the whole of the Isles to get him back.

Why, though, is anyone’s guess. Hunter has long since explained that his uncle always said that the Titan had big plans for him, and it probably has something to do with the Day of Unity, but beyond that, the Emperor had always kept him in the dark. Luz has a crazy theory involving clones and blood magic, but that sounds like it’s a plot point straight out of one of her Azura books. King thinks Belos wants his artificial staff back, and Hooty predicts the Emperor is just sad because all his Coven leaders are leaving him to join Hooty’s superior best friends club.

Whatever the reason, Eda’s made it pretty clear that she’s not gonna bend to Belos’s intimidation tactics and turn him over. That smarmy gold jerk could set the whole Isles on fire and Eda still wouldn’t hand him over. Hunter’s part of the Bad Girl’s Coven now, and Belos can just suck it. And she’s not afraid to say that to his stupid face, either.

So when the cauldron at the end of the table that holds the scrying potion suddenly begins bubbling on its own, Eda may very well get her chance.

She’s up on her feet in an instant, dashing to the other end of the table just as the steam rising off the potion begins to warp into a familiar figure.

“Edalyn,” Belos greets, his voice sharp like a dagger. “I do hope I’m not interrupting your evening, but I needed a word with you.”

Ugh, scrying potions weren’t supposed to work both ways! Belos was too damn powerful. He could probably peer into their lives as much as they could peer into his.

“Sorry, but now’s a bad time,” Eda shoots back. “Why don’t you hang up and call back literally never?”

“It’s come to my attention that you have something of mine,” the masked man continues smoothly as if she hadn’t spoken. “I’d ever so appreciate it if you gave it back.”

Eda’s lip curls back, feeling the itch of feathers poking out of her joints. She wants to shift into her harpy form and leap through the potion to claw out his eyes. “Sorry, Belos,” she says, dripping smug bravado, “We wild witches operate solely under the laws of finders keepers. Your kid? Mine now.”

Eda expects that the Emperor would very much like to vaporize her. “Make your threats wisely, Owl Lady. You have no idea what you’re up against. Everything will be easier for you and your little friends if you just hand the boy back over to me.”

“Fat chance.” Eda throws back her shoulders and shoots him a sharp grin. “Sounds to me like you’re threatening one of my kids, and we weirdos stick together. Going after one of us is basically asking for all of us to bring you down. Remember how well that went last time? How my human cracked your mask and publicly humiliated you during your big let’s-turn-Eda-to-stone ceremony?”

The Emperor looks as though he has some choice words to say, but Eda doesn’t care. Hunter is her kid now. She glowers at him through that mist, voice lowering in with deadly promise. “You’ll have to drag him back to your Coven over my dead body.”

“That can be arranged,” sneers Belos.

“Try me, antler boy.” Then Eda whacks the cauldron and sends it tipping over the edge of the table. The connection is immediately severed as the potion goes splattering over the hardwood, and the resounding CLANG of the bowl makes Hunter shoot violently out of sleep.

“Huh?! Whassit—Eda? What happened? Are you alright?”

“Fine, kid,” she says, swallowing down the rage that’s still bubbling hot in her throat. “’S alright, just got a little clumsy and knocked over a cauldron. Sorry for waking you.”

“Sorry for falling asleep,” Hunter responds. He grabs a towel and hurries to clean up the oozing purple goo.

Eda waves him off, “Eh, I don’t mind. You kids need your rest. Growing bodies and all that.”

Hunter still hesitates, looking at her for a beat too long as if double-checking to make sure she wasn’t really upset. Eda holds back a sigh, a twinge of pity flickering through her that he’d even have to look at her like that in the first place. All the damage from Belos couldn’t be wrapped up in a month, she supposed.

She snatches up the cauldron, still dripping with the ruined potion. Peachy. She’ll have to call Lilith to get her scrying potion recipe. Though maybe not having this in the house was a good idea. Eda doesn’t want to risk His Royal Highness dropping in on any more unexpected house calls.

“Eda?”

She looks up at Hunter. The kid chewing on his bottom lip, wringing the half-soiled towel between scarred hands.

“I just…I wanted to say thank you,” Hunter says shyly. “I know having me here hasn’t exactly been easy—not only because of the fugitive thing, but because I’m…” He flounders for a moment, and Eda can only pretend to know what’s going through his mind right now. “…me,” he finishes finally. “You’ve been so kind and patient with me, it’s so much more than I deserve, and no matter what happens next—”

“Hey, no.” Eda cuts him off with a swift and gentle beratement. She sets the cauldron on the table and crowds closer to him, curling one hand around his cheek. The kid automatically leans into the touch, and Eda can’t help but wonder how Belos could have ever hurt a child who was as sweet as this one.

“You may be one bratty little shit, but you’re my bratty little shit. And Mama says you deserve all the smothering that comes with being a child of the Owl Lady.”

Then, to prove her point, she swoops down and quickly places feather-light kisses on the tip of his nose, forehead, and his scar, until Hunter squawks and shoves her away. He’s practically glowing, flushed all the way to the tips of his ears.

“Gross,” he snaps, rubbing furiously at his face. “I’m never helping you with your potions ever again.”

“I’ll accept your terms. Now get upstairs, it’s way past your bedtime.”

“I don’t have a bedtime, I’m not a baby.” Hunter sticks out his tongue but obeys, slipping out of the kitchen and disappearing into the rest of the house. Eda shakes her head as she watches him go.

Kids. What could ya do with ‘em?

#the owl house #owl house fic #toh #fic rec #toh hunter #eda clawthorne #eda the owl mom #golden guard #luz noceda #fic #my fic #5+1 times #5+1 fic #found family #allll the family feels #eda adopts hunter sorry i dont make the rules #toh king #ao3 #sleep deprived hunter #bb needs a nap BAD so i wrote this to cope #emperor belos

[renaerys]

22. for reds 🤡

This is 100% not what you asked for (yet...👀), but I give you part 1 of what we're calling the Weird King AU. I'm turning this into a proper multi-chapter High School fic because I love you and I'd jump on any bandwagon for you.

xxx

Like most young, conventionally attractive Supervillains, Brick had made a bit of a habit of failing upwards. It was pretty easy in a town full of simpering morons content to project their own narrative assumptions onto him, and who was he to crush their dreams when they made his life a little easier?

For example, dating.

“You can tell me, you know.” His cute date, Tracy, sipped her milkshake across from him.

“Tell you what?”

She softened and reached her hand across the table. “Your tragic backstory. I’ll listen without judgment, I promise.”

Brick tried to think of something tragic, but it all seemed pretty underwhelming as far as Supervillain origin stories went. “You mean like how I was born in a toilet?”

She made an oh shape with her lips. “We all have those days where we feel like we were born in a toilet, Brick.”

He’d dated Tracy for three months before she broke up with him out of the blue in tears: sorry she couldn’t fix his baggage, she just wasn’t strong enough to handle all that tortured darkness, but she wished him nothing but health and happiness. Brick deleted her number from his phone and spent twenty whole minutes staring at the toilet in his bathroom, wondering what the lesson here was.

But everything changed when Mojo got out of prison and moved Brick and his brothers back to Townsville, where he enrolled them in the local high school alongside their former arch nemeses, the Powerpuff Girls.

Suddenly, everything Brick did pre-supposed ill intent. These people remembered him as the pest who had graffitied their local monuments and blown up their cars and endangered their children. They held no love for him, and at best they feared him. This was not Citiesville, where he’d been a tall, cold glass of Voss water in a sea of recycled Dasani.

He found himself thinking about his birthing toilet again as he stepped into the cafeteria alone and the conversation quieted down as his new classmates watched him from the safety of their tables. His next moves here were critical. He was no longer at the top of the food chain, but fear and mystery surrounding his origins and character gave him a certain power over his peers.

“Yea, though I walk through the valley of social suicide, I will fear no cringe,” he said to himself.

The jocks were out. Capable though he may be, Brick was not much of a team player unless there was a blood contract involved requiring his participation on pain of satanic torture. The drama kids were also a hard pass, not because he thought drama was lame, but because they had barely noticed him walk in, and Brick did not have the energy to deal with people more self-involved than himself. Some of the unaffiliated tables could be safe, but without a good understanding of the nuanced social dynamics in the high school, he could be heading toward irreversible doom, and that was a risk he was not willing to take.

He saw his salvation just ahead. It was the only option, all else being equal. In an environment where he couldn’t be certain of his baseline status and potential for upward mobility, there was greatness to be had only by association and certainty only in the devil he knew.

Brick helped himself to the empty seat directly across from Blossom Utonium to a chorus of gasps and staring.

Blossom did not startle like her table mates had. She watched him critically behind a head full of bangs as she balanced her soup spoon in her hand. “Really.”

Brick unwrapped the burrito he’d purchased in the lunch line and brandished it before him. “Really.”

He took a bite of the burrito. It was not hot enough. The two girls to Blossom’s left whispered to each other about that bad boy and he’s hot, though.

Blossom daintily spooned soup into her mouth without spilling a single drop as she continued to watch Brick for signs of his imminent dark side transformation.

The guy next to Brick was brave enough to ask him what his next class was. Brick had a mouth full of disappointing burrito, so he passed the guy the printout of his class schedule in lieu of answering.

“Wow, all APs, huh? Hey, we’re in U.S. History together next period, nice. I’m Mike Believe, by the way. Brick Jojo, right?”

Brick didn’t answer him immediately on account of the burrito currently occupying his mouth hole, and Mike took it the wrong way.

“Oh, yeah, we all know who you are. Blossom sort of filled us in.” He winced like he’d inadvertently revealed a terrible secret.

Brick swallowed his food and washed it down with a gulp of water. “Saves me some time.”

Mike looked super relieved. “For sure! Hey, I could lend you my notes if you want to catch up. Gershwin’s giving a quiz on the Progressive Era on Friday, and she’s a hard-ass who definitely won’t care that you just transferred…”

Brick chewed on his lunch as Mike continued to talk at him about classes and other vaguely helpful, albeit uninteresting, information. But Mike seemed normal enough, a little chatty but not in an overeager sort of way. Blossom was no longer clocking his every move and seemed to be absorbed in her friend’s latest swim team cheating scandal, until Brick reached for his water bottle and she suddenly laser-focused on his wandering hand.

Her keen attention to him was honestly flattering, if expected. It was in his nature to be noticed, and in this narrow respect she was no different from anyone else whose head he turned. If she chose to feed her interest with the flames of suspicion, then it was no difference to him.

But if she was anything like him—and on a chemical level she was probably the closest to him that a person could get—he suspected it took tremendous effort to hold her full and sustained attention. The world they inhabited was as vapid and mundane as the humans that surrounded them, and even the most gracious of gods grew bored of worship. Which explained all the smiting and fucking and generational curses upon entire households in everything from Greek mythology to the Old Testament.

Brick was pretty deep into a fantasy of Blossom going full Ixion and the Wheel on the swim team when Mike tapped his shoulder. “You ready to go?”

It took him a moment to realize the bell had rung and he had a class to get to—AP U.S. History with Mike, apparently. Brick gathered his tray and his bag and followed Mike. When he looked back at the table, Blossom was already gone.

xxx

That whole first week was painfully boring. No one bullied him, or pranked him, or picked a fight with him, of course. But no one really approached him, either. His brothers were more determined to make an effort. Boomer announced he was trying out for the soccer team because there was no rule saying a Super with extremely well documented ties to active criminals and the forces of Hell couldn’t kick a ball around a field. Butch had gotten himself invited to a midnight screening of Snakes on a Plane in some rich kid’s home movie theater, but only after that same kid had accidentally spilled milk on Butch and burst into tears in front of a cafeteria full of Juniors and Seniors. Brick declined the invitation Butch extended to him. He had that AP U.S. History exam to study for on Friday, anyway.

He shared all of his classes with Blossom. Even in the classes where her assigned seat was behind his and he couldn’t see her, he could feel her lobotomizing stare at the back of his head whenever she glanced up from her notebook. And while Mike’s notes were perfectly adequate and the friendly gesture counted for more than the content (a gesture Brick would not soon forget), there was a far more efficient way to accomplish his goal of murdering the class averages while also taking the edge off his loner doldrums.

“Can I borrow your class notes?”

Blossom rose from her seat and pulled her hair tie out to re-do her extremely long ponytail. She held the elastic between her teeth as she worked. Her teeth were very straight, he noticed. Some pretty nice girl-teeth, generally speaking.

“Which class?”

“All of them.”

He watched her wind the elastic around her hair with quick, adroit fingers. “That’s a lot of notes.”

“You’re the top of every class. No point in asking anyone else.”

She moved toward the hall. He followed her out. “Why would I help you?”

A legitimate question delivered without venom. Unlike her sister Buttercup, who’d “run into” Brick after school on Monday and told him to watch his back, Blossom didn’t have to do anything but maintain a general proximity to make her superiority complex known. Which was the kind of flex he could fuck with.

“Isn’t helping people sort of your mandate?”

They had arrived at her locker, which she opened with enough force to rattle the hinges. “I help the helpless. Are you helpless, Brick?”

Brick smiled at her baiting. Had she ever actually said his name at a normal volume before? It sounded good even in her baseline bitch timbre. “Critically helpless. I’m the new student who transferred in the middle of the semester, and you’re the only person who knows me.”

A couple other students clearly trying to get to the lockers Brick was blocking hovered just out of reach. They whispered to each other, but neither of them actually worked up the courage to ask Brick to move. He ignored them.

Blossom rummaged in her locker for the binder she would need for the next class. “Make friends.”

“Working on it.”

The locker door slammed and she faced him. There was something confrontational in the way she held herself before him that kicked him in the nuts back in time thirteen years to their more uncouth days when all he wanted to do was destroy her so he’d be the only one. Now they were older and wiser and he actually did need her notes to study, so destroying her was not high on his list of priorities.

“You want to be my friend.”

“We have so much in common.”

“So do lions and hyenas.”

“Both are apex predators, so.”

She took a step closer and peered up at him. Brick did not move, although he wondered what was so interesting about his face. She probably just thought he was hot. She was probably as bored as he was. She probably—

“You have lettuce in your teeth.”

Brick pulled back and covered his mouth on instinct. God fucking damnit.

Blossom was already walking away from him by the time he’d picked the food from his teeth. “I’ll expect my notes back in mint condition before first period tomorrow morning.”

Brick pressed a fist against the lockers and quietly fumed. “Dumbass…”

“Um, sorry, but do you mind…?”

The student who’d been waiting for her locker space to clear up had her palms up as if to assuage a feral stray. Brick pushed off the lockers, but his fist left a dent where he’d unleashed some of his impotent self-pity. He looked back at the girl, and she shook her head.

“It’s fine! It, uh, it happens sometimes.” She pointed a couple lockers down to Blossom’s, which was dinged up worse than the others.

Brick stared at Blossom’s locker, and then back at the girl. Her narrow, dark eyes were wide, but not out of fear. She was waiting for something, and like an idiot it took him a moment to catch up. “You’re trying to make me feel better about fucking up your locker.”

She laughed nervously. “I mean, it’s really fine! You just looked so miserable for a second there, and I just thought…”

Great, he was moping so hard he had an audience.

The five minute warning bell rang, and a flood of students rushed past them on their way to fourth period. Brick stepped aside so the girl could get to her locker.

“Hey, you’re the new guy, right?”

The new guy, yeah. How quaint. Except, she was waiting for a response, which wasn’t the absolute worst thing that had happened to him all week.

“Brick,” he said. But of course, she already knew that, and she was just being nice.

“I’m Kim. Kim Chan.”

“Okay.” He didn’t have anything else to say to her, so he decided to get his shit and get to his next class.

“Welcome back to Townsville, Brick.”

Brick shoved his hands in his pockets and stalked off. It didn’t occur to him until later that Kim was the first and only person who had properly welcomed him back home.

#powerpuff girls #powerpuff girls fanfic #blossick #ppg reds #ppg blossom #ppg brick #september fic prompts #weird king au #i have no idea what i will call this yet #but it'll make its way to AO3 and it'll be a Thing #i have to think of themes and shit now #i came here to shit post and here we are with another full on Reds fic

[theravenclawlover]

I Know What You Did Last Summer

Pairings: Steve Rogers x Reader; Bucky Barnes x Reader

Warnings: +18, heavy smut, cheating, angst, fluff, descriptions of violence, guns, strong language, and gore (?).

Word Count: 3,225.

Summary: Reader and Steve have been dating for some time. One day Steve leaves for a mission. A moment between Bucky and the reader might disturb the order of things, and not for the best.

Chapter Number: 1.

Chapter Title: How It Started.

A/N: Second story I ever wrote! This is one is sad and might trigger some people due to its themes. The warnings above should pretty much cover all the things this short book will contain. Please refrain from reading this if you are not comfortable reading this type of stuff. I want to say thank you for the love 'Monster' got (especially the smutty last chapter). Show some love to the rest of the chapters if you can, I would really appreciate some feedback.

If you would've told me a year ago that I would be in the middle of a love triangle, I would have laughed so hard. But now I wish that someone would've warned me about that mission a year ago. Before I start telling you what's wrong I'll tell you what was right…

I'm an Avenger. I was recruited at the same when Sam, The Twins, and Vision were recruited, so after the whole Ultron incident. Our superiors were Steve and Natasha. Within a couple of months, we all became a family. We all cared about each other; friendships were strong amongst those who lived at the compound. I loved every single one of those idiots, no matter how much at times I would want to strangle them. I had different kinds of fun with every single one of them.

But I got closer to one of them in particular, we got so close to the point of dating. My superior Steve Rogers. Steve was the sweetest guy in the world. We didn't start dating until I had reached six months of being an Avenger. To be honest with you almost everyone started dating each other after the sixth-month mark.

Steve and I were in a serious relationship no doubt. Everything was great, we had fun all the time, we trained together a lot, and we had many missions together. The first time we told each other ' I love you' was not until one of Tony's parties at the tower…

You and Steve were standing next to Clint, Thor, and Natasha. You were all talking about how things had gone down in the latest mission. It was the usual, tracking down any clue of HYDRA and there still lurking agents.

"I can't believe Y/N actually went for it. She was so tiny compared to that dude. He was even bigger than Cap here," said Clint with a voice of amusement, still not believing the fact that you actually ended up beating the crap out of that HYDRA brute.

"I will not lie, I was about to back out once he got closer because I don’t have a death wish like some of ya’ll,” everyone laughed as you almost glared at Steve, “but then I was like 'no can do, Cap is watching’ and also, mama ain’t raise no bitch."

Now everyone present laughed a lot harder as Steve rolled his eyes at the way you responded.

"We knew you liked danger, but damn, I would’ve gone the other way," said Clint as he down the rest of his drink.

"Lady Y/N was graceful in battle. And most importantly, she survived! Let's toast brothers and sisters!" said Thor give a loud cheer as he passed his Asgardian drink to Steve while giving you a loving smile.

"Cheers to Lady Y/N!" Everyone raised their glasses as Clint did his best Thor impersonation which only made the real Thor laugh.

"Cheers!”

"Hey, Steve, wanna dance?" you said while putting your now empty glass on the counter.

"Oh, umm, I don’t know,” he scratched the back of his neck, “I'm not a good dancer."

You looked at him with a raised eyebrow before grabbing his drink and putting it down on the counter next to your empty glass and grabbed his hand before he could give you any more excuses.

"Don’t worry, I’ll teach you,” you stopped in a little spot where you could dance without anyone bumping into you, “and besides, It’ll be fun. You’ll see.”

The music that had been good for some liberating dancing was now shifting to a more slower-paced rhythm. You looked at how Steve sported a soft blush as he realized the music had shifted.

"I guess we gotta slow dance now," you said shyly while putting your arms around his neck. He hesitated for a second before his big hands placed themselves on your hips.

"Y/N, I'm not a good dancer, I would hate to step on—" He didn’t finish his sentence as you stepped closer to him. Slowly, you and Steve found a slow rhythm. It was a little messy, but you didn’t mind that. He was trying.

"Steve, I want to dance with you, I don’t care if you don’t know how. I'll teach you what I know,” your eyes were locked with his, a soft smile gracing your lips, “You’re my boyfriend and I think I have the right to dance with the man that I love."

In an instant, you were blushing as you realized what had escaped your mouth. Steve has stopped moving and you noticed the ever-growing smile on his beautiful lips that matched the captivating glint on his blue eyes. He bent down and in seconds you were putty, legs going weak as his lips were on yours. It was a soft but passionate kiss the two of you shared that night. After the two of you had run of breath, he pulled you out of the dance floor. You left the party a lot earlier than planned.

After that night things got much better in the relationship. That is until months later when Fury called Steve, Natasha, and me for a mission. It was about where Bucky might be hiding from the world. The second Steve was told the mission was about finding his best friend, he was ready to risk his all to get him back. And the mission did go okay; Steve had to fight Bucky at first but some words from Steve and Bucky relaxed. We coaxed him into coming with us with the promise of helping him. After some months of constant care, Bucky got better. He had his memories gained most of his memories back with the help of Steve and his psychiatrist. He was well aware of the fact that the Winter Soldier could be triggered any second, and the team was constantly in the search of answers on how to remove that from his brain or whatever.

I was happy that Steve had his best friend back and I spent a lot of time with them because Steve wanted that his best friend and best gal to get along. We were a great trio, the whole team teased us with every single thing. The running joke with Tony was that we three could satisfy each other sexual fantasies. The only thing I could do was laugh as I tried to hide how embarrassing it all was. Bucky would smirk and blush, and Steve would just hide his face and call Tony an idiot. But it pained me to admit that you had thought about it before, and the guilt wouldn’t let me entertain the idea past rogue kisses and minor sexual activities. And that was where all my issues came from.

Steve, Sam, Pietro, Wanda, and Natasha were sent on a mission last minute. Timetables had moved and they needed to leave within two hours after Fury had told them everything they needed to know. The mission had them out of the country for a week. You guessed it was top classified as Steve couldn’t say anything about it except that it involved HYDRA. It had taken all your strength not to pull him back into your room as you gave him a long good-bye kiss.

That week was really something new for you. For the first time since Bucky joined the team, he wasn't training with Steve or Natasha. Which meant that the next best option was you.

"Hey, tiny, umm can I ask you a question?" Bucky’s voice came from behind you. You turned your head from your spot on the couch and smiled up at him.

"Sure, what is it?"

"Steve is gone and so is Natasha as you know. So, I was wondering if you could train with me? It's okay if you don’t want to," he quickly added as he rubbed the back of his neck.

"Sure, why not.” You got up from your spot on the couch as you gave him your devilish grin, “I gotta warn you though, I'm pretty good at knocking big guys down."

"If I can handle Natasha and Steve, I’m pretty sure I can take you, tiny.”

"Trust me, Barnes, I can be a little tougher than her. Just ask her.”

(…)

Bucky let out a pained grunt as he landed on the training mate once again.

"Damnit, tiny, I think you almost broke my back there," he said while he tried to stand up without showing how beat up he was.

"Nah, that’s just you grandpa," you said while you grabbed your water bottle, “are you giving up, Barnes?”

"Oh no, Doll. I'm going to put you down at least once," he said as he now stood ready for another round.

"Let’s see, Sergeant.”

With one last grin from him, he sent the first punch. I grabbed his right arm with my left hand trying to make him lose a little balance by pushing his arm out of the way. And that’s how it went for a couple of minutes, and you were getting a little cocky as he was getting messy with his punches out of his frustration. You smirked when the ‘perfect’ idea crossed your mind. You decided to do ' The choker' which is how you called Natasha's move with her legs. You managed to do it just as flawlessly as she did. But you had forgotten that he trained with Natasha more than he ever did with you, so it was no surprise he was able to get out of it. He turned you, your crotch was directly covering his face. And that kind of shocked both of you. The next thing you knew, your back hit the mat, and Bucky on top of you. If anyone were to walk in, the position you two were in would have definitely given them the wrong impression.

Bucky and you just stared at each other not making a move or saying anything. After a while of awkward silence, you tried to move your legs so Bucky could stand up. He reached forward trying to stand up at the same time you moved. You felt it: his dick was hard.

You cursed yourself at how fast the idea of him getting turned on by the position you were in had you ruining your underwear. You couldn’t help but gasp when you felt his boner touch your lower area as he tried to move again. This time he didn’t wait for you to move or anything, he detached himself from you and left you there. Before you could say anything, he had grabbed his stuff and walked out of the training room shouting a quick ‘thanking you’.

That night, you got off by the thought of having sex with Bucky. And while you finished with a shout of his name, Bucky had done the same while he came with a shout of your name.

That week that Steve was gone went extremely slow for you. The sexual tension between you and Bucky was too strong that you were afraid someone will notice how you two were acting around each other. You were feeling guilty because you had masturbated every night with the thought of your boyfriend's best friend. You were trying hard not to think of Bucky that way, but it was kind of hard when everything he did made you horny. You were dying inside and by the end of the week, you were 100% sexually frustrated.

Steve and the rest of the team got back around nine Saturday night. Steve was a little surprised not to see you waiting for him, but he shrugged it off thinking you were probably asleep. With that thought in his mind, he went to see if he could steal a kiss from you before waking you up. He got to your room to find your bed empty, but then he noticed the little note on your pillow.

Hey Cap,

In the shower.

Steve had to hold his groan when he saw you through the glass door. He could see the silhouette of you. You were naked, wet, and roaming your body with your hands more than necessary as you had no soap, just water.

"Doll," said Steve in that husky voice of his that made you weak on your knees.

You opened the glass door, finally revealing your full nakedness to him, not caring that some water was wetting the bathroom floor.

"Welcome home, Captain. Wanna take a shower with me?" you said in that sweet voice you always conjured up when you wanted something from him. Your hands slowly trailed up to your breasts as you looked at him hungrily. A week had definitely been too long for you.

Steve didn’t say anything as he almost ripped his suit off while never breaking eye contact with you. In no time you had an extremely turned-on Captain America. He stalked toward you, his body entering the compartment of the shower stall. He was right in front of you, all naked and dirty from his mission. The water was now falling on his messy blond hair, making him close his eyes for a second as the water ran down his face, down his long neck, down his broad shoulders, down his hard pecs, down his long torso, and down those abs, and finally down his hard cock that curved upward.

"You’re staring, sweetheart,” Steve’s teasing voice brought you back from your daydreaming. “Do you like what you see? Did you missed me?"

Steve got closer to you, and in a husky whisper he proceeded to ask you, “did you miss my fat cock inside of you? Did you miss me fucking you raw every night, huh, Y/N?"

Your legs were slightly shaking at his words and you knew you were dripping wet, but you weren’t going to allow the night to go with just you trembling in need.

"Well yes, Captain. I did,” your thin fingers roamed the hard arbs you loved to scratch and bite whenever you could, “I missed sucking, gagging, and riding that fat cock of yours, Captain. I missed how it stretched my tight pussy. And God knows how much I’ve missed the feeling of you spilling your cum in my mouth and inside my pussy."

You definitely broke him.

"Kneel down, I want you to suck this cock," he commanded with such hunger leaving no room for argument. He was taller than you for like a whole foot, so you kind of had to squad to reach his cock. Steve remembered this as he saw you and before you could grab a hold of his cock, he cleared the little sitting area and sat there for your benefit.

You placed yourself in between his legs, giving the tip of his cock a sweet kiss before you flatten your tongue as you dragged it from the base of his cock to the very tip.

"Fuck,” he groaned as he grabbed your wet hair and tangled it with his thick fingers.

Your lips wrapped around the head of his cock and you sucked hard. This made Steve groan your name loud enough to resonate in the bathroom. You loved his sounds, they just made you wetter as you relished in the way you were making him feel. Your right hand went to play with his balls, applying some pressure which added to his pleasure. His thighs were shaking the more you sucked and the more you played with his balls.

"Shit, Y/N. I’m going to cum." His grip on you got a lot more tighter which made you moan. This sent vibrations up his cock and just like that, he came with a whimper as he told you to swallow it all. You did without much convincing.

"Get up," he ordered in between breaths. You did and as soon as you had he pulled you in for a hard kiss. He moaned at the taste of himself on your lips and tongue. You pulled his hair as he pushed against the wall, trapping your body against his hard torso and the cold wall. Then his lips were off you and he flipped you, you back now facing him.

"Tell me what you need from me, love. Do you want me to fuck you with my tongue or with my cock?" he whispered into your ear as he sucked on your earlobe and kiss the side of your neck. He left small bites as he went.

"I want—” you moved your head giving him more room to bite and kiss, “—your cock, Captain. Please, fuck me with your cock."

He hummed in your words as one of his hands traveled down your stomach in search of your slit.

"Fuck, Doll. You are soaked," he said while teasing your entrance with his fingers. You moaned at the contact, but his fingers left not soon after. Before you could whine in complaint, you felt the tip of his dick. Both of you groaned as Steve pushed the head of his cock, but you whined his name when he pushed the rest of his dick in one swift thrust.

"Shit, Steve,” you clawed at the wall as the back of your head rested on his chest, “please, baby, move.”

"Oh fuck! I’ve missed this. I missed being inside of your tight pussy.” Steve was fucking you with deep and hard thrusts, your pussy swallowing his length greedily wanting to keep him there. You were trembling as your legs were going numb, and Steve noticing this grabbed your hips steady as he continued to praise your cunt.

"Cap, I'm going to cum! Baby, I want you to cum inside of me please!"

Steve bit your shoulder as he positioned himself better, that way he could hit your sweet spot rapidly. He was grunting as he sought out your orgasm before he let himself fill you up with his cum. A couple more thrusts and Steve had to hold you still as your legs gave out when your orgasm hit you. Your cunt spammed around his cock too tightly that Steve followed suit as you milked his cock of his cum.

After you had finally regained your breathing, Steve helped you shower as you both talked about his mission while both of you stole kisses here and there. Steve was home, and he was happy.

(…)

Once you two had finished in the shower, Steve had fallen asleep the second his head touched the pillow. You looked at his tired face, a sweet smile crossed your lips seeing him rest. But you weren’t as tired as he was, so your mind went back to your day’s musings. Before Steve had come into the bathroom, you had wondered how things would go if it had been Bucky who found the note. You hadn’t thought of him while Steve and you were together, no, but now you couldn’t help but think the way Bucky would sound, feel, and taste.

You contained a groan at your own thoughts. You needed to confront this, and you needed to do that before things got worse for you. or him. You wanted to tell Steve, he needed to know. It was only right, he never lied to you. Why would you keep this from him?

PERMANENT TAGLIST:

@cnco-ravenclaw-46

@musiclover812

@teapartydreams

#I Know What You Did Last Summer #Bucky Barnes #Steve Rogers #Reader insert #Bucky Barnes x reader #Steve Rogers x Reader #Cheating #Angst #Fluff #Smut #+18 #trigger warnings #The Ravenclaw Lover #Captain America #The Winter Soldier #fanfiction #mcu #marvel

[neonacity]

HYACINTHE | CHAPTER 3: JAEMIN X READER

SUMMARY:

Na Jaemin is far from being your typical 20 year old. Instead of slaving through college, he wastes away his hours cracking safes. Weekends that should be spent partying with friends consist of illegal races on good days and small scale bombings on bad ones. Na Jaemin is far from being average, unless you consider being a member of Seoul’s top organized crime family normal.

There is no such thing as a sense of normality and peace in his trainwreck of a life, so when he met a barista who was brave enough to call out his dangerous taste in coffee, he was like a moth to the flame. Everything about her is normal, which means she is forbidden to him, in all sense of the word. So why, then, does he always find himself at the front steps of her shop, breaking all his personal rules even if he wishes he could stay away?

A/N + Disclaimer: this is a side story to Black Daisies, my main mafia fic feat. 0T23. While the plot is based on the main story, this can also be read as a standalone fic. As usual, this is purely a work of fiction and in no way am I implying any member of NCT to behave the way I write them here. tw: crimes, heists, potential death, mentions of drugs and other illegal activities.

PAIRING: Jaemin x Reader

TW: illegal activities, gunshot wound, mentions of blood

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

FIC TRAILER

MASTERLIST

"Another bank was looted last night around 11PM, this time in the Geumchon district. This is the second bank that was broken into in the past week and the fourth that is rumored to be the doing of one of Seoul's organized criminal…."

I sighed and put down the pen that I have been using to scribble on a piece of napkin. A frown creased my forehead before I grabbed the offending piece of flimsy paper and crumpled it with my hand. Jeno, who was silently watching the news, looked up and shot me a curious look. He was leaning over the counter lazily, his cup of half finished hot cocoa beside him. 

"You okay?"

I winced. "Yeah... Actually. Actually, no. I am not okay," I said finally as I threw the used napkin to the closest thrash. I have been scribbling all the things I have to pay for the coming month there and couldn't bear to take another look at it. Jeno grabbed his drink and silently took a sip of it, obviously waiting for me to elaborate.

After my initial 'unplanned' meeting with Jaemin's friends, it has become more or less of their routine to drop by the cafe to hangout. Jaemin was initially against it at first, always scowling whenever he would see one of them already in the shop, though it seems like he has gotten used to it lately—or rather, he didn't have any other choice but to simply accept it. They would often sometimes come in groups—Jisung and Chenle are big fans of the pastries—but other times it's just one of them who would drop by to visit like Jeno now. My favorite is when all of them drops by to visit, not only because I've started getting closer to them too, but because customers would automatically flock into the shop whenever the "handsome gang" is there. Honestly, I couldn't blame them.

"I'm a little bit short on money this month. I was supposed to get my monthly allowance from my scholarship but something happened so it will be delayed. I have lab things to buy and well—everything sucks." 

Jeno nodded slowly, though I have a feeling he doesn't really understand my plight with money. Spending time with the seven of them has given me a better understanding of each boys' personalities. Jeno, for example, is definitely the calmer one of the bunch. While the others would cause chaos every now and then—Jaemin included, he would be on the side watching them usually with that adorable eye smile of his. He is different from Mark who would mostly jump in to join the fun before calming everyone once things get overboard, though both seem to share the same responsibility over the group. He also seems to be the closest to Jaemin, so by extension, I am also most comfortable around him. 

"How much money do you need?" 

I gave him a look as I reached out for a paper cup to make myself my own hot cocoa. 

"I heard the same question from your best friend before. Are you also going to offer to be my sugar daddy?" 

Jeno choked on his drink and hid his laughter behind his raised cup. 

"Do you want Jaemin to kill me?" 

That made me inappropriately blush.

"Sometimes I just want to bust out a bank like that group everyone is talking about." 

Jeno didn't say anything and continued watching me from the brim of his drink. 

"You think you can do it?" 

"Do what?" I asked as I poured hot cocoa on my cup. I said that off-handedly, I almost forgot my words the moment they left my lips. 

"Rob a bank. You know, do something illegal." 

I leaned back against the counter and craned my head a little sideways as I thought the question over. I didn't actually think of that before so I had to listen to my moral compass a little bit before answering. 

"It depends on the reason." 

Jeno looked surprised by my reply. He was probably expecting a goody two shoes answer from me, which I don’t blame him for, to be honest. Even I am mildly shocked by what I said. 

"The reason?" 

"Yes. I mean, if the only reason I would steal is because I don't have money to support my studies, then no, I wouldn't do it. I have other options. I can work extra jobs or I can just drop out from uni. But if I didn't really have any other choice, if I had to do it for someone really close to me, for example, then I would do it." 

"That is very…"

"Cliche, right? I know. But that's how it works, at least for me," I said with a laugh. "I do know what's good and bad, but I'm willing to jump the gun if I have to." 

I didn't know if it was my imagination, but I thought I heard Jeno murmur something under his breath as I turned to get back to work. 

"I bet Jaemin wouldn't like that." 

-----

PRESENT DAY, a little over one month after the happenings in the first chapter. 

They disappeared like bubbles. No, he disappeared in thin air, like smoke that was blown over by a strong gust of wind. After that night when Jaemin bust through my cafe door, hiding god knows what and asking for temporary shelter, he hasn't shown himself again, apparently leaving while I slipped into a light sleep. Even his friends stopped visiting the cafe which, for a few days, made me genuinely feel scared. Are they okay? What happened to him? Who was he running away from?

That worry slowly and gradually morphed into anger as the days lengthened. I know it was my way of coping with my emotions, but I couldn't help myself. I tried calling him, but the line was cut. It even came to the point that I had to call each of his friends, but it seems like the numbers they gave me were all temporary ones, too. I felt frustrated. I felt...abandoned. 

Was it really easy for him to just cut off all contact with me? 

Was it foolish of me to think that there is...something deeper here than just friendship?

It was the start of winter when the loud ringing of my phone woke me up from my nap. Eyes still heavy with sleep, my first instinct was to look at the clock by my table which registered 1:19AM. I frowned. I was in the middle of finishing a paper before I decided to take a nap but who could be calling me at such an ungodly hour? 

I blearily reached out for my phone and barely looked at the unregistered number before hitting the answer button. 

"Hello?" 

"Noona?"

I froze. Just like that, I felt the sleepiness slowly melt away from my consciousness. I know that voice. 

"Jisung?" 

"Noona, we need your help." 

I sat up on my seat after registering the panic in his voice. I heard another tone suddenly hiss at him from the background before a rustling sound overtook the speakers. It sounded like someone grabbed the phone from his grasp before he could even react.

"Jisung. What's happening—"

"Hello?" The new voice that spoke on the other line made my heart stop. I stared at my wall, wide-eyed.

"Jaemin." 

"I'm sorry. We didn't mean to—"

"Jaemin, we don’t really have any other choice but her, give me the phone," another one jumped in. It was Mark. 

"No. Hyung—"

"We're losing him," my lips parted in shock at what I heard. His voice sounded clearer now and I could very much pick up the iciness on it. Mark has always been so friendly and warm that it threw me off guard. 

"Give me the phone." 

The authority he held made me assume that Jaemin did as he was told. Next thing I know, he was calling out my name from the speaker.

"Mark, yes, I'm listening." 

"Hey. I'm really sorry about this, but we need your help. We really have no other choice, Haechan is in such a bad state—"

That made me stand up and push away from my desk.

"What the hell is going on? What do you mean about Haechan?"

"I'll explain later. We're on our way to you now."

"Wait, what? You don't know my address."

"We'll be there in seven minutes."

That was all he said before he cut off the call, leaving me standing shell-shocked in the middle of my room.

---

They banged on my door not even five minutes after. I had barely pulled on a cardigan when loud knocks rang through my small one bedroom unit causing me to quickly run and grab my knob open. 

I stood frozen at the sight of the seven boys crowding my doorway. Everyone was covered in some sort of soot, leaving them almost unrecognizable in their black outfits. Mark and Jeno were in the middle of the group, carrying a half-conscious Haechan between them. Jisung, Chenle, and Renjun brought the rear, their eyes moving wildly as if checking for eavesdroppers. Jaemin stood closest to me, his jaw tense and his eyes apologetic. My gaze snapped back to the center of the group when Mark called out my name. 

That's when I saw it for the first time. I didn't notice it at first because of its dark color, but Jeno was holding a towel against Haechan's stomach. Except it isn't black, it was a deep dark red.

Blood. 

"Oh my god." 

"Please help us." 

Maybe it was the shock, but I quickly stepped aside to let everyone in. I had barely slammed the door shut when I heard a crashing sound from my small dining area. Jeno pushed everything on top of my table to the ground as Mark and Jaemin gently guided Haechan on it. 

"What—what is going on—"

"He's been shot. Thrice. We're not sure but I think two of the bullets are still there," Renjun answered me as he grabbed the soaked towel from Mark's hand and replaced it with a new one. Jisung and Chenle worked on closing all the shutters of my windows while Jaemin tore off a lamp from my living room to move it close to Haechan. He closed all other lights other than the ones on the dining area and the small lamp.

It was then when my training finally kicked in. I ran towards the table to peer at the wound, my shaking hands gently moving the new towel that is quickly getting soaked by blood again. Haechan gave a soft grunt of pain before slipping to unconsciousness again. 

"I think there are still foreign objects there. It's what causing the severe bleeding."

"Can you take it out?"

My eyes shot to Jeno. The harsh lights from the lamp threw strong shadows on his stressed features. 

"I'm not a licensed doctor."

"We don't need a licensed doctor right now, we need someone who can patch the hole in his stomach. Please." 

I gritted my teeth. I have a ton of questions running through my head right now, but he's right. We need to act fast or else we will lose him. I rolled up my sleeves then and called out to whoever can act fast to my orders. 

"Somebody get the black box under my bed. I have all my surgery practice tools there. I need hot water and lots of towels. Everyone move. Now."

As soon as I said my orders, each of the boys were moving in a flurry to get everything that I asked for. I was adjusting the small lamp directly over the wound to peer at it better when I felt a gentle hand circle around my arm. I looked up to see Jaemin staring at me. 

"Thank you." 

I didn't say anything at first. I don't know if it was the shadows playing over his features, but he looked different from the Jaemin I knew in that brief moment.

"Don't thank me yet. Say that once we're sure he survives."

---

I was stirred from my sleep by the light snoring of someone to my right. Turning my head, I was greeted by the sight of Jisung who was currently sprawled on my sofa, his legs so long that they were dangling on one end. Chenle was on the floor below him, his face covered by one of the pillows he probably fished from one of my love seats cradling Renjun's curled up form. Mark and Jeno were both sitting upright, the former close to Haechan and the other by the door like a sentinel. They seemed to be in deep sleep too, they're heads hanging low. Jaemin was on the floor next to my seat, his breathing slow and relaxed. 

I blinked slowly as my gaze moved from boy to boy. It took me a painful two hours to do the impromptu surgery, first working on taking the bullets out before sewing everything back together. Haechan was lucky enough that the bullets didn't hit any vital organs or important vessels, and that the extreme bleeding was only caused by the wrong muscle being hit by the impact. He slipped from being conscious to unconscious throughout, and everyone had to work together to help me while I did my thing. 

I couldn’t really blame any of them from crashing the moment we made sure that Haechan’s safe—for now. 

After rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I tried to silently move from where I was curled on, careful not to stir anyone. I still have a ton of questions, but those can be taken care of later. I padded as carefully as I could towards the table where Haechan was still resting and peered at the IV that I had hooked on his arm to make sure everything was moving well. 

They even have spare blood bags with them for emergency transfusions. 

...As if this kind of thing normally happens.

"He's going to be okay, right?" 

I hastily turned to see Jaemin staring at me. His voice was low and was only loud enough for me to hear. 

I stared at him for a bit before looking away. 

"Yes. He'll survive."

"Thank you so much." 

I didn't answer. He also didn't say anything else, though I could still feel his gaze heavily on me. I braced myself before speaking again.

"We need to talk." 

I didn't wait for him to reply. I simply walked towards my room, leaving my door open for him to follow. I only turned back to look at him when I finally heard it close softly behind him.

"Who are you?" I asked, before he could even say anything else. I watched as his jaw tightened and released, his eyes full of indecisiveness. I didn't waver. Not this time. 

"You said…"

"That I will never ask questions? I did. But I can't do it anymore, Jaemin. You disappeared for a month without even saying goodbye then showed up on my door with your friends, one of them with a hole in their stomach. You have blood bags—freaking blood bags. What the hell is going on?" 

I tried my hardest to control my voice, not wanting any part of this conversation to be heard outside. My legs felt weak at the moment but I tried my best to continue standing so I could hold his gaze. 

The look in Jaemin's eyes, however, almost made me want to give up. I knew from the pain and hesitation there that I wouldn't like whatever it is he is about to say.

"I'm a criminal."

My stomach dropped. 

I was expecting it, but hearing it straight from him didn't soften the impact and the shock. 

"A…" 

"We steal. We do illegal things. There is absolutely no good way for me to describe this, but yes, I am a runaway who was stupid enough to bring you into this mess," Jaemin said through gritted teeth as he tore his eyes away from me. He ran a hand through his hair and tried to take a deep breath to steady himself.

"I was stupid and I'm sorry. I shouldn't have gone back and tried to befriend you after that order of coffee. I'm sorry I ran to you that night a month ago. I seriously thought I was going to die and I wanted you to be the one that I see for the last time. I'm sorry for today, or that I couldn't answer any of your questions back then. It was selfish of me to keep you in my life without giving you anything back," he stopped and forced himself to look at me again. My heart squeezed painfully in my chest when our gazes met. 

"I'm sorry." 

I didn't… couldn't say anything. One part of me had already expected this because it is the only reason that makes sense. Those vague answers, his detachment from normal society, the money, every clue seems to point to one direction, but that didn't spare me from my moral dilemma now. Because while I knew, I didn't exactly consider how it relates to me.

I was afraid to.

Because the truth is, I like Na Jaemin to the extent that I'm afraid of what I can do for him.

"Do you kill…" I asked in a whisper, my voice shaky. A frown passed his already stressed features before he answered.

"No. None of us do," he answered, and I knew then that he was telling the truth. Regardless of what he is or what he didn't tell me, I trust him to not lie to me.

"Am I—am I in danger?" I asked next. He firmly shook his head.

"No. I made sure of that. No one would dare—" he stopped, as if gauging what words he can use to not scare me even more. "You have always been under protection." 

That’s when it clicked. The cafe visits from his friends. The random strangers who seem to spring out from nowhere every time I was out and about and needed sudden help. 

My legs finally gave way and I collapsed on my bed behind me. My mind was trying its best to wrap around the situation, leaving my thoughts in a jumble. There are a million things I wanted to say, but I couldn’t get a single one out at the moment. 

Jaemin seemed to know what I was feeling at the very least because he simply stood there, silently watching me. I'm not sure how long the two of us stayed in that bubble of silence, but it was also him who brought me back to reality when I felt warmth cover my hands.

I looked up to see him kneeling in front of me, both his hands gently enveloping my clasped ones. The look in his eyes made my heart lurch, but I couldn't bring myself to say anything still. 

"I'm sorry if I was selfish… I promise, after this, you won't have to worry about anything else."

No. 

"When I met you, I saw something that's so different from the life that I have. Believe me, I tried my best to leave you alone, but I wanted more of it—more of —you, so I kept coming back." 

Are you going to leave me again?

"But you'll be safe now. I promise. You can go back to how it used to be before I… almost ruined it." 

Please don't leave me. 

Jaemin gave my hands one last squeeze and I felt him move to straighten himself. Before he let them go, however, another gentle warmth pressed against my forehead as he grazed it with his lips. 

"Thank you."

My tears dropped the same time the doors closed behind him. 

---

Chapter 4

#na jaemin #jaemin nct #nct jaemin #jaemin #lee jeno #mark lee #lee haechan #park jisung #zhong chenle #huange renjun #nct dream #nct dream fic #nct angst #nct dream angst #nct mafia au #nct mafia #nct mafia imagines #mafia!jaemin #nct dream imagines #nct-writers #nct imagines #jaemin x reader

[twolonesomestars]

BJYX III

Japan Trip

This is a compilation post explaining the Japan trip and related theories (along with my own thoughts). Most of the theories in here are well-known. If you know the general gist of the Japan trip, you probably won’t see anything new.

Warning: This is all fake. Don’t take what I say to heart. These are just my random thoughts.

Extremely long post. Please beware.

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All my explanations and thoughts will be bracketed and italicized: [like this]. If you would like to just read about the theories, ignore the bracketed and italicized bits.

I suggest reading all of the theories first and creating your own opinion on the trip before reading my commentary, especially if you’re a new fan. (AKA ignore the bracketed & italicized parts for now).

[One last thing before I start (and a test for those who want to read the theories first… ignore this for now): I believe this Japan trip changed their relationship… In that, I believe they began their romantic relationship after this trip. A quick timeline mention: truthfully, their relationship before and during CQL filming isn’t too important for this theory. However, I do believe that there was some sort of confession from WYB at the end of filming, which may have played a role in XZ’s decision to take the trip to Japan. I’ll provide my reasoning later in the post. All my explanations and thoughts are going to be based on these particular assumptions; although, I will try to include rebuttals & explanations based on countering arguments.]

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OUTLINE

DATES

PRE-JAPAN TRIP

Character Bleed Changed Phone Number

MID-JAPAN TRIP

XZ’s 180911 Post + Story

POST-JAPAN TRIP

XZ’s 180913 Post & Story XZ’s 181119 Post WYB’s 181119 Post Time Gap WYB’s 190322 Post

FINAL THOUGHTS

-

Let’s get into it!

-

DATES:

180416 - 180823 Filming for CQL

180908 - 180912 XZ’s Japan trip

180913 - XZ posted his 521st Weibo post & 18th Weibo story

181005 - XZ’s Birthday

181119 @ 17:42 - XZ’s Japan trip post

181119 @ 18:47 - WYB’s response post

190322 - WYB’s Rome trip post

-

PRE-JAPAN TRIP:

Character Bleed

XZ’s reasoning behind his Japan trip in this interview @ 9:31

XZ explicitly says, “I told myself I had to walk out of it.” His reasoning being, “[I had to] leave him there. [I had to] return him to the one he loves.”

You can unpack a lot from that. I got two main things from it:

(“I had to walk out of it”): you can assume that XZ took everything from WWX and made it his own, including, and specifically, WWX’s love for LWJ. Essentially, by the end of filming, XZ himself was in love with LWJ.

(“return him to the one he loves”): XZ separates himself very clearly from WWX. He points out his reasoning to walk it off is him wanting to return WWX to the one he loves… the implication is that he figured out he doesn’t love the one WWX loves.

[The reason I think there was some sort of confession at the end of filming that pushed XZ to take this trip and figure himself out is because he already knew he loved LWJ. I think he may have attributed any romantic feelings he felt towards WYB to the fact that he plays the character he loves. So, if WYB confessed to wanting to pursue a romantic relationship with him, it makes sense that XZ would hesitate. I doubt he’d want to lead WYB on just to later realize all of his feelings were for LWJ and not him. I’m sure XZ would’ve walked off WWX eventually, but I think he did it as quickly as he could to give a certain person (and himself) answers.

Obviously, I don’t know how XZ goes about with his acting, so these are all just random assumptions.]

-

Changed Phone Number

I’ve gotten a few asks wanting me to clarify and give my opinion on the rumor about XZ changing his number and WYB asking around for it. I’ve heard two versions of this:

The first version has two variations:

XZ changed his number sometime after his DDU appearance in 2017 and before CQL began shooting, and WYB was asking the CQL crew for it.

XZ changed his number during CQL filming sometime, and WYB was asking the CQL crew for it.

The second version is that XZ changed his number before he left to Japan and WYB was asking around for it for months (who he was asking was undefined).

A related rumor I want to note: a fan who was at the airport when XZ was waiting for his flight to Japan supposedly saw him not answering his phone.

Let me clarify the relationship between WeChat & phone numbers:

In WeChat, every registered user gets a WeChat ID. There are three main ways people can add someone: (1) have the person’s WeChat ID (2) have the person’s phone number (3) have access to the person’s QR code. For (1) and (2), the other person must enable the option to be found via WeChat ID or phone number in order for you to find them. You can also choose to not show your phone number at all, so even if someone adds you via (1) or (3), they may still not have access to your number depending on your settings. To sum it up, you do NOT need to know another person’s phone number to message them on WeChat. Practically everyone in China uses WeChat as their main social messaging application… you can send messages (text & voice) and you can call (voice-only & video). People don’t use their actual given numbers to message or call too much (ex. iPhone messaging/ Facetime); phone numbers are typically used when making accounts on various social media apps, online payment, etc.

There’s a pretty well-backed up theory that WYB asked one of his DDU co-hosts (specifically DZW) if he could get XZ’s WeChat ID for him during/ after filming the episode with XNINE. If this theory is true, we can only be sure that he got XZ’s WeChat ID, not that he got his phone number.

If you do want to change your number or WeChat ID (prior to 2020, you could only change your WeChat ID once per account), you can simply go into the WeChat settings and update; this process won’t change your WeChat account and it won’t affect any of your contacts or chat history. If you want to stop receiving messages & calls from someone, you can either block or delete them from your contacts on the app.

I’m pointing all of this out because I’m pretty sure most of XZ’s & WYB’s communication takes place in WeChat. WYB has said in several interviews that he now prefers his phone and wifi access; he’s also said that he can’t go without WeChat now.

[I honestly don’t think this rumor is real. But, out of the two versions, I’d say the first version (either variation) makes more sense than the second version.

I have three reasons for thinking the second version is the most unlikely:

It’d be easier to block the other person for however long you need (and then unblock them or delete them depending on your choice later) rather than going through the hassle of changing your number. Remember when WYB’s phone number got leaked and he had to change it (August 2019)? He asked people to not use his number to log into accounts; he even mentioned that he would need to change all of them, which would be a large hassle. Sure, there could be circumstances where you’d want to change your phone number… but I don’t think this situation is that extreme, especially since it was supposedly at the airport before his trip and before he decided.

I don’t think XZ’s the type of person to leave someone hanging, no matter how much internal turmoil he may be dealing with, and especially not when that someone is close to him. I believe he’d at least inform others that he’ll be out of range and to not message or call him. Not to mention, if he told WYB to not contact him for the next couple of days, I’d like to believe WYB would respect that wish, whether he knew the reason or not. Since I do think that WYB confessed prior to the Japan trip, I believe he knew. But, even if he didn’t, he has integrity and self-respect. He’s going to respect others’ wishes, and even more so if he respects the other person… and he does respect XZ.

The theory specifically points out “months” … WYB literally celebrated XZ’s birthday with him about three weeks after this trip.

As for the first version:

Variation #1 implies that this happened at the start of filming/ bootcamp; it also implies that WYB got XZ’s number after he contacted him on WeChat. One assumption I have is: I don’t think celebrities/ people in the industry exchange phone numbers much, just their WeChat IDs. This is why I don’t think XZ & WYB exchanged numbers when they first met, only their WeChat IDs. As for WYB asking the crew for XZ’s number… if he already had XZ’s previous number, I kinda doubt he’d go around asking others when he could just ask XZ himself.

Variation #2 probably makes the most sense out of all three, and even then it’s a bit of a stretch. This variation implies that it’s a few months into filming, at which point XZ & WYB were extremely close. I doubt he’d be too nervous to ask XZ directly for his new number. The only rebuttal I could think of for this is that perhaps WYB asking around instead of asking XZ himself was him being coquettish.

In the end, this rumor doesn’t make too much sense to me. But take it as you will.]

-

MID-JAPAN TRIP:

XZ’s 180911 Post + Story

We know that he kept deleting his Weibo posts before the number could reach *520. (*520 & 521 are both kadian for “I love you” even though 520 is more widely used.)

XZ posted his 520th post on 180911 (right in the middle of his trip). It was an ad for AHC. AHC is the first brand both WYB & XZ shared and spoke for; I believe WYB stopped his spokesperson duties on 180829 & XZ began his on 180907.

XZ posted his 17th story, also on 180911, of him on a ferry during the trip.

[I burst out laughing when I realized he posted an ad for his 520th post. He kept deleting posts to make sure he stayed away from #520; he could’ve easily deleted another post to make the ad his 519th. A lot of solo fans were looking forward to his 520th post being dedicated to them (exhibit 1), and then he did that. Sly as per usual. And the 17th story... leading up to the 18th. I think XZ pretty much knew/ made his choice/ accepted his feelings by this point, which is why he posted like this.]

-

POST-JAPAN TRIP:

XZ’s 180913 Post & Story

XZ posted this video on Weibo on 180913. It was his *521th post & *18th story. (*52118 = “wo ai ni yi bo” A BXG posted about counting XZ’s posts to find these numbers.)

His caption was:

以为在拍照的找🤣... (夏天的风结束了，假期也结束了🌿🌿🎋)

which roughly translates to:

“I thought I was posing for a photo🤣... (The summer wind is over, the holiday is also over 🌿🌿🎋)”

There are several theories about the caption.

the emojis:

The bamboo emoji refers to WYB. In this behind the scenes footage, XZ compares WYB’s face to a bamboo stick.

the words:

XZ is referring to the season ending and the weather in the video where the wind is blowing across his face.

When XZ states that both the summer wind and his holiday are over, he is implying that he has left the character he became that summer (WWX) behind and moving forward.

XZ is referring to the song Summer Wind (夏天的风) by Liu Rui Qi (刘瑞琦). I’m not going to go too deep into this; the lyrics in question are:

夏天的风 我永远记得 清清楚楚地说你爱我 我看见你酷酷的笑容 也有腼腆的时候

roughly translates to

The summer wind, I will always remember [you] saying clearly that you love me. I saw your cool smile [yet] there are times when you are shy.

Interpretations are: (line 1) “summer wind” & “always remember” - XZ is reminiscing on the things that have happened that summer when CQL was filmed. (line 2) “saying clearly… you love me” - a confession from a certain someone… we know of one on camera: “zhan-ge didi ai ni.” (lines 3-4) “cool smile” & “shy” - these adjectives fit a person we know.

[I didn't find out about half of these caption theories until way later, and once I had already formed my opinion on this trip. A lot of it seems like a stretch, but all the theories make some sort of sense. Meh, there’s a lot you can do with a caption, so just take it all in.

Personally, I didn’t pay attention to the caption too much. I knew about the lyrics, but I purposely avoided them precisely because they were lyrics; you can do a lot with them. I finally explored it for this post, and I actually like it a lot; it’s very sweet. I’m still leaning towards the reference being unlikely; however, XZ is very sneaky, so I wouldn’t put it past him. I also knew about the bamboo reference, but I never gave it much thought. I didn’t think that one scene of them joking around was enough to say that he used the emoji to refer to WYB. Though, if it was actually a reference, there’s definitely more to it that we don’t know about. Ultimately, for this one, my decision was based on the basics: the kadian (and later reinforced by the whole AHC ad post).]

-

XZ’s 181119 Post @ 17:42

A major theory for this post comes from his caption:

“一些存货... 现代人即将拥有姓名 [’silent giggling’ emoji]... ”

roughly translates to

“some stock [photos]... modern man will soon be named...”

The main focus here is the “modern man.”

Once the behind the scenes footage and interviews began releasing, BXG started noticing how WYB got whenever XZ mentioned LWJ. His facial expressions always changed… immediate frowns. BXG speculated that WYB was trying to show himself as separate from his character, but XZ didn’t take notice. The character LWJ is figuratively and literally from the past; the actor on the other hand is from modern society. Thus, XZ mentioning modern man was taken to be a reference to XZ’s love for the actor alone, not the character.

[To those who have sent asks about the “modern man” quote, I hope this clears it up. My interpretation of it is the same. At the end of the day, XZ most definitely separated the two.]

Another theory for this one is that the horizontal middle row pictures spell out “王一博” going from left to right.

王 (“wáng”)

The lines on the building look like the character

He could’ve meant “look towards,” which is what he’s doing in the picture. It is a different character (“望”), and has a slightly different pronunciation (“wàng”)

He could’ve meant “going in one direction,” referring to the arrow on the sign, which is a different character (“往”), and has a slightly different pronunciation (“wǎng”)

一 (yī)

The image looks like the character

博 (bó)

Another meaning for “博” is “extensive” or “rich” which you can take the design on the outside of the to be

The building is a museum, whose word (“博物馆”) begins with “博”

[For the spelling, my interpretations were all of the #1s. (I’ll explain a little bit more when we get to WYB’s 190322 post.)]

One last theory about this post: BXG then witnessed XZ editing his post in real time to change the position of the first two pictures. There’s a theory that he saw this post (below) from the previous day and changed the positions to match.

OP talking about the switch here and below.

[I was so enamored by this theory until I actually went looking for it. The post of WYB’s pictures is from a fan, and while I don’t doubt that they saw more of fans’ posts back then, this one wasn’t tagged or anything. It could easily have been XZ’s artist side popping up. But, maybe XZ was lurking on his private account. Even though it’s one of the more iffy ones, it’s such a cute theory that I actually don’t mind believing it.]

This is a side note and not part of the actual theory: On my search for all things related to this trip, I noticed one of WYB’s posts where he did a similar thing.

This was in June 2018, so before XZ’s post. Mayhaps inspiration.

-

WYB’s 181119 Post @ 18:47

WYB posted exactly *1:05 hours after XZ posted. (*105 = 10/5, XZ’s birthday)

His caption was “冒个泡”

He was using internet slang; it can be vaguely translated to “I am here.” In context, he’s using the slang to refer to him not posting for a long time; he’s ‘showing his presence.’

Notable Things:

He posted the day prior on 181118; it wasn’t an ad, but it wasn’t exactly personal either.

He posted a picture of himself with his DDU brothers during a trip on 181104.

He had not posted a selfie since 181004. (Back then, he updated personal posts once or twice a week, whether it was a selfie or something about his life, such as what show he was watching. The month & a half time gap between personal posts would’ve been unusual.)

The caption & selfie work as a response to XZ’s “modern man will soon be named.”

Another thing fans were intrigued about was the time stamp on the photo, 180525.

WYB never really posts throwbacks, especially with selfies, yet he did one here to a date in the middle of CQL filming. He also usually never adds the date to his photos.

Isn’t it interesting that he captions the post with slang that tells people he’s back from a break, but uses an old photo instead of a new one? If someone’s announcing that they’re coming back from a break (especially a celebrity), wouldn’t it make more sense to post a recent photo rather than an old one (in this case, one from 6 months ago)? And, why even bother including the date in the first place?

[I can’t believe I barely noticed that WYB posted 1:05 hours after XZ. What in the world WYB? I’m losing my mind. It’s down to the damn minute, and their minutes weren’t a “0” or “5” multiple either. I usually try to pass off a lot of things regarding YiZhan (especially kadian) as coincidences, but what even is this? If it wasn’t intentional… What kind of connection do these two share?

Yes, I do think this was WYB’s response. The throwback picture was probably the most telling for me; him including the date he took the photo was like a flashing sign saying: ‘hey look at this date. it’s important.’ And when you add the caption into the mix, it’s taken to another level. I feel the combination of hints in and related to the post is too much and too telling to be coincidental.]

-

Time Gap

There’s an interesting time gap between the two XZ’s posts (180913 & 181119). There are a few theories about what could’ve happened in those two months. Some of the ones I’ve seen and heard are:

XZ & WYB could’ve been taking that time to tell their parents and settle things with their agencies

XZ & WYB could’ve begun dating exclusively after XZ’s return

Both of these theories imply that everything got settled or made official around 181119.

[I never really thought about the time gap between the posts… mostly because I kept forgetting there even was one. They’re both ridiculously romantic so I don’t doubt that 181119 is something of importance to them. I think it’s especially proving that both of them did a throwback to the same seemingly important time period.]

-

WYB’s 190322 Post

This post is pretty similar to XZ’s 181119 throwback post to the Japan trip. The theory for this one is that WYB spelled out “肖战” using the vertical middle row, going from top to bottom.

肖 - The tree looks like the top part of the “肖” character; the branches look like the bottom part of it.

战 - Since WYB placed an image of the entire Roman colosseum (where gladiator battles took place) in the last spot, he may have been alluding to how “战” means “battle” or “fight” (similar to how XZ may have been alluding to the meaning of “博” instead of getting a picture of the character).

WYB filmed the DDU episode on 3/22; I don’t believe there’s another significance to the date.

[WYB spelling out the “肖” using the first two pictures backs up my thinking that XZ spelled out the “王” and “一” characters in his first two pictures. This also leads me to think that both of them alluded to each other’s last character rather than spelling it out in their third pictures.]

-

FINAL THOUGHTS:

[The reason I like this overall theory a lot is because I think the happenings really fit with the things they’ve told us in interviews and suit their personalities. It makes sense to me that XZ would want to take some time to think about it; it makes sense to me that WYB was probably the one who took the first step.

As for the theories about the details… some of them are really out there, but all of them are fun to consider. As usual, take everything with a grain of salt.]

Some of these posts & events have several theories (i.e. XZ’s summer wind caption); they aren’t mutually exclusive… more than one can be true at the same time.

I tried to be as neutral as I could when explaining these theories. I tried to include counters and other possibilities, but I’m sure some bias came out. Just take it all in and take it for what it is.

My intention with this post was to put everything into perspective and give a good timeline. (As well as get everything in one place.) If you’re interested in my thoughts, feel free to go back and read the italicized & bracketed parts (if you hadn’t already).

-

The following is something I want to say about these theories and the BXG community in general:

Every theory has inconsistencies and exaggerations… that’s what makes it a theory. As long as we discuss things knowing this fact, that’s all that matters. We’re here to have fun, not to prove what’s right or wrong.

I love seeing the various theories everyone in this community puts out, no matter how different or similar they are to the ones I like/ believe in. It’s fun to look into these things with different perspectives. Don’t feel burdened if you believe in a less popular theory. Besides, we will never know anything for sure.

Be kind. And, have a good time.

-

Once again, this is all fake. I do not personally know XZ & WYB, and I will never know anything about them; this includes the intricacies of whatever relationship they share. So, CPN.

#don't ask me why it took so long lol #japan trip #yizhan #bjyx

[skinsharpenedteeth]

RNM After Dark - Friday - Down to Earth

Here's my submission for @rnmafterdark

Day 1 - Down to Earth.

It features... dom/sub behavior, discussions of kink and safewords, impact play, cock and ball torture (CBT), masochism, sadism, a little bit of humiliation, and a school bus converted into a sex dungeon...

it's 6400 words, rated E-AF for Explicit As Fuck.

Also posted on AO3 for your kudos-ing, commenting, and bookmarking pleasure!

-

"What You Need and What You Want"

.

Alex didn't know why he needed it. He'd thought he was past needing to be yelled at after basic and living with his father, but the drill sergeants could only yell at you about the most superficial weaknesses. He could be called soft, pretty, or a mama's boy all day and it wouldn't even tweak a nerve. But late at night in foreign cities stateside and abroad, in clubs he’d found for people like him, people who needed something more, he had found other men who got closer to making him feel the way he needed to feel. Their rough hands, their sharp words, and the way they weren’t moved by his tears unless he said a word to make them stop, had turned out to be exactly what he’d needed that was more.

Then Alex had come back home from combat and anonymity. He’d tried to move into his old life, tried to fit into the version of himself that was normal, and found out that so many things were not what they seemed. But he hadn’t been able to get what he needed in a small town. So he’d driven to Albuquerque, looking for someone to fill that part of himself that needed to wallow in punishment and pain. But Albuquerque wasn’t big enough, wasn’t dark enough, wasn’t learned enough to know the difference between dominance and cruelty. It was close enough though. Close enough for Alex to fill in the gaps with his mind of the things he was missing.

Michael had noticed his trips. Michael noticed everything. He’d noticed that Alex wasn’t coming home calm, but haunted. He'd come home with the edge taken off, but not the need taken care of. Not fully. Never fully. The itch was always there, just sometimes more manageable if he'd let someone slap him around for a bit. The trips had been to someone who would do just that. But they didn't know him. Not really. He’d been the one to point out to Alex that he really wasn’t getting what he needed. Then, after an out-of-town trip that had left Alex with one too many bruises and scratches and a significant limp, Michael had begged him to let him help instead of continuing to go to someone who wasn’t treating him right.

"Just come to me for it," Michael had said, half order and half offer. Alex had scoffed initially. He hadn't thought Michael had understood what Alex actually wanted. Michael had leveled him with a glare and continued. "I don't like the idea of you going somewhere else for this. I don't like the idea of you trusting a stranger. And it's obvious it's not enough. Next time you have to scratch the itch, just come to me."

"Sure," Alex had agreed. He'd said 'sure’ like he meant 'not a chance'. Then he'd had a week of nights filled with nightmares. Caulfield, explosions, death, dismemberment, and ghosts plagued him whenever his body lost the fight to unconsciousness. The guy he'd been seeing was too far away and busy and Alex was almost trembling with the need for someone to bleed the tension out of him. So he'd called Michael just to see. Maybe he could do it. Maybe he could be enough until Alex could find another person or another way.

He’d never expected it to work, but he’d underestimated how well Michael knew him. Michael saw the way he seemed to bend towards harsh criticisms against him or his family. He saw how he warred with letting go of those terrible pieces of himself and holding onto them as tightly as if they were his security blanket. Michael had seen inside his mind and had rooted around for the most shameful things to use against him. Once Michael had figured out what he'd been going out of town to get, he’d made Alex an offer he couldn't refuse.

Alex stepped up into the old yellow school bus apprehensively. It sat near the Airstream in the junkyard, electric cables running to it and making it glow through the cracks. Michael had blacked out the windows with paint, making it look vaguely ominous in the blue hours of dusk. He wasn't sure what he'd find inside. What he found was a work in progress.

The cavernous space had been stripped of the seats and given a new floor. Michael had installed a drop ceiling down the middle of the bus and lined it with invisible lights around the edges. It made the ceiling dark, but the rounded walls and windows glow with subdued light. The effect was modern and sophisticated, and not at all what Alex would normally expect from Michael. Michael was watching him take in the bus's interior from a dark modular sofa that had been pushed along the side of the bus. He was wearing a loose, distressed pair of jeans and his ever-present plaid-over-tank combo. Alex felt his apprehension tighten the muscles in his back, but he pushed forward until he was standing in front of Michael looking down at him. He shoved his hands into his pockets and made a show of looking around the bus.

"So, starting an escort service?" Alex asked, watching for Michael's reaction.

"Maybe. Nothing wrong with sex work. It wasn't what I had planned for this space, but maybe there's a niche market for a mobile brothel in Roswell," Michael answered, spreading his arms over the back of the sofa and leveling Alex with a look. "I assume you didn't call to insult my decorating."

Alex scoffed. He shook his head slowly and gave Michael a wry smile.

"No. I guess I didn't," Alex replied. "So are we going to do this?"

"Sure. But sit down. We need to do some quick housekeeping," Michael said, waving to the empty space next to him. Alex sat and tried not to fidget. He didn't want to talk right then. He wanted to hurt and have the demons inside him go silent and be sated. Michael watched him silently, gaze intense and laser-focused to the point that Alex stilled himself, suddenly self-conscious.

"Okay. So, first I need to know what you want out of this," Michael started. Alex rolled his eyes, but Michael just kept looking at him, even and steady.

"I want… release," Alex bit out. He could feel a flush starting to heat the skin of his neck. This wasn’t what he wanted to talk about.

"I'm assuming you don't mean orgasm...well, or not just orgasm. How do you want me to give that to you?" Michael asked. Alex's knee bounced and he scratched his thumbnail over the inside of his palm, letting the sting settle him enough to answer Michael's question.

"Yes, orgasm would be nice. But, what I need isn't just physical. I want to… I need you to… I need someone to make me make my physically feel as shitty as I need mentally. I need someone to strip me bare and then flay me alive. I need to hurt. I need to feel… empty at the end of it. Quiet, ya know?" Alex explained. His thumbnail scratched over and over, dragging across the same spot. Michael's hand closed gently over his wrist, startling Alex out of his thoughts. Alex looked up to catch Michael's eye and felt Michael pull his hand away and lay it on his thigh before taking the hand Alex had been scratching and holding it in his own.

"Do you need this to be verbal or just physical?" Michael asked, carefully. Alex tried not to let his shame overwhelm him. He wanted both. He needed both so badly and he hated how weak that need made him feel.

"Both," Alex replied just as quietly. Michael waited for a moment before speaking again. Alex watched the gears turn behind Michael's eyes, but he didn't see any pity in his expression… or disgust. A small part of him was surprised. He'd expected one or the other.

"So, hard limits?" Michael continued. He had started to rub his thumb sweetly over the red line Alex had made in his palm. It was at once painful and soothing.

"Nothing permanent. No choking, for obvious reasons. No broken skin. Don't call me ‘soldier.’ Don't call me ‘son.’ Don't make me…" Alex broke off, suddenly feeling ashamed. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Michael paused his thumb over the scratch and pressed down firmly. A bright flare of stinging pain gave Alex the resolution to continue. "Don't make me feel good about any of it til we're done. And I don't need aftercare."

"Aftercare isn't optional, Alex. Not for you, not for me. That's a hard limit of mine," Michael replied, voice low and serious. Alex stared at him before huffing out a little laugh.

"How would you know what your limits are? Have you done this before?" Alex asked, removing his hand from Michael's. Unconsciously, he'd started to turn his body more towards Michael's. One leg was folded in front of him on the couch seat, his prosthesis still resting on the floor of the bus.

"You're not the only person who's found themselves with a need that wasn't fulfilled by what was easily obtained. You're not the gatekeeper to kink. You were gone for ten years and I had plenty of time to experiment and learn on my own. Stop acting like just because I've never been off the continent, I'm a fucking narrow-minded moron." Michael's voice was sharp at the end, making Alex flinch internally. He couldn't imagine a world where Michael had explored BDSM or kink. He'd just assumed Michael was drinking and sleeping around like a college frat boy the entire time. It stung Alex that he hadn't even imagined Michael really living a full life without him. He always just thought of Michael biding his time, waiting on him, perpetually looking over his shoulder and waiting for Alex to appear on the horizon. What a selfish, egotistical dick he was to assume Michael had nothing better to do than cool his heels dreaming of an idolized version of Alex (the version of Alex that he wished he was in reality, that he tried to be and failed to be every single day).

"Sorry," Alex said after a quiet span of minutes where he manually adjusted his mental image of Michael Guerin.

"Try again, Alex. And look me in the face while you do it." Alex raised his head and looked at Michael. He looked older and calmer than he had a moment before. He looked like he was wearing all the years of his life on his shoulders and he was used to the weight of carrying them. Alex felt younger somehow. He felt chastened.

"I'm sorry, Michael," he repeated, keeping his eyes locked on Guerin’s. Michael nodded once before continuing.

"What's your safeword?"

"Finland," Alex replied without hesitation.

"Mine's ‘orbit.’ Are you okay with using the stoplight system?" Michael asked easily. Alex nodded.

"So, do you want a trial run tonight?" Michael asked.

Alex took a deep breath and nodded again before clearing his throat, knowing he had to speak it out loud. "Yeah, sure. Let's give it a go."

"So stand up and take off your clothes. I'll be right back," Michael said as he stood up off the couch. Alex stood also and waited for Michael to disappear behind a partition that presumably hid the way to the bathroom. Slowly, Alex undressed himself, feeling nerves and anticipation start to flutter behind his bellybutton. He folded his clothes and laid them on the couch. Before he had to figure out if Michael wanted him to be kneeling or not, Michael came back into the room. He'd stripped off his plaid shirt and was just in jeans and a tank. Alex watched him walk across the room and pick up a remote from one of the window ledges. He pointed it towards the ceiling and the lights turned from a warm golden light to an almost sinister red.

"Going to murder me?" Alex tried to joke. Michael gave him a quick grin.

"Want a different color? I've got the full range. We can disco through the whole pride flag if you want," Michael joked back.

"No. Red is fine," Alex assured him. While he spoke, Michael had discarded the remote back onto the window ledge and moved to stand in front of Alex. He reached up and brushed some of Alex's hair behind his ear, watching his own action contemplatively.

"So what brought this on tonight? What are you feeling?" Michael asked, eyes seeming to float back to meet Alex's while his hand rested on the side of Alex's neck, fingers gently playing with the too long curling pieces near the nape of his neck.

"Just… stuff. Nightmares," Alex mumbled, dropping his eyes and staring at the dark patch of chest hair that showed above the scoop collar of Michael's tank. He wanted to get started. He was doubting his decision to come. Why didn't Michael just do something already?!

"What would you tell your anonymous Dom in Albuquerque or Santa Fe if they asked?" Alex's eyes darted back up to meet Michael's and he scowled. Through tight lips, he managed to spit out an answer.

"They wouldn't have asked about why I needed it, they’d just give it to me."

"Well, you gotta give me something to work with here. What feeling is causing the nightmares?" Michael asked patiently. He let the knuckles of his left hand drag down the side of Alex's bare stomach, reminding him that he was standing naked in front of Michael while he stood there fully clothed. Maybe they should've just had sex. Maybe that would've been enough.

"Guilt. I feel… guilty about a lot of things," Alex finally confessed, shame filling his cheeks with heat and color. Michael nodded, almost to himself.

"Okay. I can work with that," he replied. Then his hands slid away from Alex's body and he stepped back. He let his eyes travel down every inch of Alex's skin and back up. "I thought I told you to get naked."

Alex furrowed his brow in confusion and looked down at himself. He wasn't wearing any clothes. Michael smiled and bent down slightly to tap at Alex's prosthesis. Alex looked at him, still confused.

"Take it off. I'm going to have you kneeling on a pillow when you're finished. Arms up and behind your head," Michael instructed. Alex sat back on the couch and began to remove the prosthesis. Michael produced a square floor cushion and sat it in the middle of the bus floor, then stood in front of it and waited on Alex to finish. The floor cushion was just far enough that Alex would have to crawl to get to it from the couch. Humiliation bloomed in his stomach, and his cock twitched with interest. Michael was testing him.

Lowering himself down from the couch, Alex crawled the short distance to the floor cushion and then began to arrange himself. He sat forward on his knees, widening them for easier balance, and then slowly he lifted his arms up and interlocked his fingers behind his head. He was bared for the cool gaze Michael was giving him, and it thrilled him how very vulnerable he was in the position he’d been asked to hold. He could and would hold the position easily, but Michael could also just as easily knock him to the ground if he chose to. Alex let his eyes lift only as far as Michael's best buckle, brain beginning to quiet and settle as he did so, and then he waited.

"Very good, Alex. You look good like this," Michael complimented with a slightly mocking edge to his tone. He made a slow half-circle to stand behind Alex so that Alex could see them. "So you're feeling guilty, huh? Think you need to earn your forgiveness? Want someone to take your penance out of your flesh?" Michael asked from behind him. Alex nodded briskly, not sure if he was allowed to speak. "What do you feel guilty for? Because I can't punish you for having dreams."

"Just… everything. I'm so angry at myself for not being over shit. For failing you, for failing my dad, for failing everyone," Alex choked out, feeling like fleeing but forcing himself to stay still.

"How did you fail me?" Michael asked, voice cool and impartial. Alex appreciated the lack of emotion. It helped him keep going. He wouldn't be able to continue if he could tell he was hurting Michael with his honesty.

"I always underestimate you. You’re better, smarter, and more capable than I think you are a lot of the time," Alex admitted. Michael hummed thoughtfully.

"How many hours of sleep do you think you've gotten this week, Manes? Sixteen? Twenty?" Michael asked. Alex did the rough mental math in his head. He cleared his throat before he spoke.

"Fifteen-ish," he answered. His lower back muscles were starting to quietly let themselves be felt as they were continually used to keep him upright, the muscles in his thighs and arms warming up from holding him still. He felt Michael step up close behind him, legs on the outside of his own and cool belt buckle pressing into the bottom of his interlocked hands. Michael's hands slid through the gaps between his arms and shoulders and smoothed down his chest before scratching back up, nails dragging red lines into his tanned skin. He shifted into the sting, wishing for Michael to scratch harder.

"Color?" Michael asked quietly as his hands once again smoothed down Alex's pecs.

"Green," Alex answered through a harsh breath as Michael scratched back up, but harder. The bite of pain had Alex gasping in surprise, and he felt his cock starting to plump up from the attention.

"How about I give you ten on your ass and give five to your balls? If you take your punishment good, I'll help you cum. Does that sound fair?" Michael asked, thumbs rubbing roughly over Alex's nipples. The low thrum of arousal was starting to build under Alex’s skin from Michael’s words. The low level sting from Michael’s nails was already starting to put him in the right headspace. He closed his eyes for a moment, just enjoying the rough push and pull of Michael’s fingers on him.

“Yes,” Alex agreed out loud. Michael brought his hands back up to rest on Alex’s shoulders. He bent close to his ear before speaking again. His breath was warm where it tickled over Alex’s skin.

“Then get on your elbows and knees. I want your ass higher than your head,” Michael instructed. Alex took a deep breath in and nodded before unclasping his hands from behind his head. Gingerly, he moved until his head was resting on top of his forearms against the floor. He tucked his knees under his hips and presented himself. He was keenly aware of how exposed he was. The cool air from the A/C unit fluttered over his backside. Michael hadn’t moved as Alex had gotten into position, so he could also feel the threat of someone lording over him. He could almost feel Michael’s eyes trailing over his naked skin, taking his time, mentally caressing every curve. After what felt like an eternity, Michael moved. He knelt down next to Alex’s side. When his fingertips started to skim down Alex’s side, it made him jump.

“None of that now,” Michael said, though his tone was soothing instead of harsh, like Alex was a spooked horse he was trying to calm. His hand continued stroking gently over Alex’s side and then down his back, around the curve of his ass and down his leg. The touch almost tickled and Alex had to fight not to flinch or shy away from the sensation.

“You always think you know better than me, don’t you, Alex?” Michael asked quietly. He shifted his body, moving further down Alex’s body and behind him. He started to use both hands to tickle over Alex’s back. When he got to his ass, though, Michael paused. Carefully, he spread Alex’s cheeks to look at his hole. A light touch of Michael’s thumb trailed down the center, barely glancing over Alex’s hole, and then down over his taint until Michael could cup Alex’s balls in his hand. He massaged them gently in his palm, pulling gently at the skin of his sack. Circling his thumb and forefinger around the base of Alex’s scrotum under his cock, he used the other three fingers to cup around the fleshy sack and began squeezing gently. Discomfort and heat prickled at Alex’s skin, making him whimper softly when Michael’s hand began to tighten and loosen in a slow rhythm. It wasn’t rough, wasn’t painful, but it was uncomfortable in the way that triggered his most primal instinct to escape. Alex stayed still and breathed deeply against his forearms. The feeling was mesmerizing, so it caught Alex off guard when Michael reached down with his free hand to stroke his cock.

“Fuck!” Alex burst out, shifting restlessly knee to knee. Michael held still as he settled. The electricity of that touch crackled along Alex’s nerve endings, pins and needles under his skin.

“Color?” Michael asked, not moving.

“Green,” Alex replied, feeling suddenly out of breath. Without warning, the hand that had touched Alex’s cock came down with a crack on one of his ass cheeks. This pain too was electric, but more like a quick strike of lighting, localized and bright. Alex swore, but tried to stay still.

“One,” Michael counted. His hand rubbed over the stinging skin before he removed it. A moment later, he was using it to loosely stroke over Alex’s cock. The hand around Alex’s balls tightened, again threatening the violence that Alex wanted. He moaned, wishing for more. “I was just never good enough for you, was I? But you kept coming back. Kept slumming it with the foster kid. Did you think I didn’t notice the way you kept me secret?”

Another slap against Alex’s ass, another sting, and another gentle caress by Michael’s hand over the heated skin. The next one came faster and harder than the first. Michael learned forward over one side of Alex’s back, the roughness of his jeans irritating and wonderful over Alex’s heated skin. He leaned close enough to be able to rest his chin on Alex’s shoulder.

“Two and Three. You’re an arrogant piece of shit sometimes, Alex. You’re wrapped up in classism, just like your father was. At least you can recognize that you’re a fucking asshole for it and that you deserve for someone to take you down a peg.”

He kept his voice calm and the words stung all the more for it. Alex held his breath against their effect until he couldn’t any longer and then let it out in a long, slow breath. Michael took his hand away from the base of Alex’s balls.

“Do you think you’re better than me, Alex? Smarter? Think you need to always be the white fucking knight for everyone?” Michael asked, fingers dragging up Alex’s perineum in a firm line.

“No,” Alex said, shaking his head. A hard crack sounded and fire lit up the previously untouched ass cheek. Alex felt a throb run through his body as the heat started to radiate. His cock hung heavy between his legs. He looked down the line of his body and could see it hanging, tip wet and threatening to drip onto the floor.

“Are you lying to me, Alex?” Michael asked, nails scratching over the abused spot on Alex’s ass. His voice was quiet, threatening, teasing and starting to make Alex feel unraveled. Alex shook his head weakly. Another lick of fire, another crack, and Alex was moaning into his forearms.

“I think you’re lying to me. You think I’m stupid, Alex? Your actions speak louder than words. You think you’re the only one in the room who's aware enough to notice other people. You think we don’t have you pegged? You think you’re better than your friends, your family and me and you always have, haven’t you?” Michael asked, right before pushing up off from Alex’s back to sit back on his heels. His hands came to rest on Alex’s waist, pulling him back to center Alex’s hips back over his knees and correct his position. A hand slid up Alex’s spine and then pressed between his shoulder blades. Alex followed the unspoken direction until his chest was resting on the floor. He laid his cheek against the cool flooring and closed his eyes, letting his mind sink into Michael’s words.

“We’re halfway through your ass punishment. Your skin is getting so pretty and pink for me. And your cock is making a fucking mess on my floor. You look so fucking shameless right now. It’s a good look for you, Alex. You just needed to be reminded of how good you look when you’re being put in your place,” Michael praised from behind him.

Michael’s hands slid back from Alex’s hips to grip his ass. Alex felt himself being spread wide, Michael’s thumbs pulling at the skin next to his hole gently. The feeling of something warm and wet hitting his pucker and starting to slide over his entrance confused Alex for only a moment until he realized Michael must’ve spit on him. Hot shame and arousal flushed through him at the mental image. One of Michael’s thumbs moved in and he massaged his spit over Alex’s hole, pressing firmly but not truly trying to penetrate. Alex groaned, pushing back against the pressure of Michael’s thumb, vainly wishing he’d open him up and fuck him. He wanted to feel pinned open under Michael’s cock.

“Maybe next time. If you’re good,” Michael assured him before he took his hands away. Alex shook with need. He needed pain or pleasure or words or something. He was rewarded with a quick series of slaps, two on each ass cheek, one right after the other, heavy enough to thud through his muscle. These weren’t the stinging, surface slaps of earlier. When Michael finished, his hands massaged roughly across the skin. Alex felt a dizzying rush of blood and emotion coursing through him a moment before he felt the warm wet of Michael’s mouth and the sharper sting of his stubble as Michael nipped and kissed over the abused cheeks. His final slap on one cheek was quickly followed by a sharp bite to the other. Alex cursed and his foot flexed against the floor, toes trying to dig against the hard surface as Michael used his jaw’s grip on Alex’s skin to coax a whine from Alex’s throat. Alex didn’t need to see the floor under his cock to know it was sticky with a pool of his arousal.

“Mmm,” Michael hummed, rubbing his stubbled cheek over his bite mark, sounding well-pleased. “So warm.”

“Michael, please,” Alex managed to choke out. Michael hummed again, but Alex felt subtle movement behind him. A moment later, Michael’s hand wrapped around Alex’s cock, wet and slick and tight. His hand slid up and down Alex’s shaft and it was all he could do not to hump forward into the pressure. It felt so fucking good. Michael was still rubbing his bristled chin and upper lip over Alex’s ass, mouthing at the inflamed flesh.

“You’re doing so good. I love hearing you beg, Alex,” Michael murmured against his skin. Alex almost didn’t hear him, his attention so wrapped up in the slick sounds and tight hole Michael’s fist was making for him. He was getting close, he could tell, but he knew he hadn’t finished his punishment. Abruptly, Michael let go of Alex’s cock and sat up. Alex wailed into his arms, eyes stinging at the loss. His cock ached where it swung, newly neglected and dripping between his legs.

“You still need to take the five to your balls. Then I’ll let you cum,” Michael reminded him, tone lazy. He said this while wrapping his hand around the base of Alex’s sack again and pulling back towards him. Alex whined at the stretch, his balls had been tightening close to his body in preparation for cumming and now Michael was stretching them away. He’d stretched them far enough that Alex could imagine they looked like two pink plums in Michael’s grip, skin tight over the swollen orbs, looking fit to burst. He felt Michael’s hot breath against them a moment before the blunt pressure of his teeth resting on either side of one of his balls. Some heady mix of fear and arousal shot through Alex’s body making him tremble, his stomach tightening and hips hitching forward. “So full. I bet you haven’t cum since your last trip to Albuquerque. Maybe I should make you wait longer, see how big of a load you’ll save up for me.”

“Please, Michael, I need…,” Alex started, only to yelp in surprise at the first three-fingered smack to his testicles.

“You need,” Michael started, voice harsh and admonishing; another smack, wringing out another, higher-pitched yelp from Alex, and then Michael continued, “to let me make the decisions here. I know what you need, Alex. I’ve got you all figured out. You need to stop,” SMACK! “Underestimating,” SMACK! “Me.” SMACK!

Alex's breath was heaving from his body. He didn’t even realize he was speaking until Michael was pulling him up to sit back onto his lap, hands around his waist to help support him and Alex’s back pressed against Michael’s chest.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Alex continued to mumble thickly. Michael was shushing him softly, arms tight and comforting around him, lips delivering soft kisses to Alex’s shoulder and neck. Alex’s cheeks were hot, his eyes tight, and he knew he was crying.

“I know you are, sweetheart. I know,” Michael murmured against his skin. Alex’s breath hitched under another sob. Michael gently maneuvered him to half turn so he could wipe at the tear tracks on Alex’s cheek and kiss the corner of his mouth softly. “You did so good. I know you’re sorry cause you followed all my directions and took your punishment. So good, baby.”

Alex found himself turning more until he could cling to Michael’s neck and hug his body close. Michael stroked one of his hands up and down Alex’s spine while the other combed through his hair. The new position trapped Alex’s aching balls and still-hard cock in between their bodies. The cotton of Michael’s shirt was irritating against Alex’s sensitive skin, but Alex couldn’t bear to pull back.

“Did you want me to help you cum, Alex?” Michael asked, nose gently bumping against Alex’s, lips a hair's breadth away. Alex took a deep breath in to steady himself before nodding. He moved forward, hoping to capture Michael’s mouth in a kiss. Michael let him, opening obligingly when Alex smoothed his inquisitive tongue along Michael’s lips. Michael let Alex kiss him and kiss him and kiss him. While they kissed, Michael’s hands wandered over Alex’s naked body until his hands came down onto Alex’s ass cheeks. Alex had almost forgotten about them until the flare of fire was reignited under Michael’s grip. The pain only served to excite Alex further.

“Michael, fuck me, please,” Alex begged, lips against Michael’s cheek as he pressed his body back into Michael’s strong grip.

“Not this time,” Michael responded gently. “But I’ll help get you off. You did so well, I can let you cum.”

“Please,” Alex said again, writhing softly in Michael’s lap to get some much-needed friction against his cock.

“So impatient,” Michael griped fondly. Removing one of his hands from Alex’s ass, Alex watched as he went to a previously unseen pump bottle of lube. He pumped twice and then brought his hand between their bodies and wrapped it around Alex’s cock. The lube was slick and sticky, and Alex immediately hitched his hips to push his cock through Michael’s grip.

“Oh, it’s like that?” Michael teased, tightening his grip to slow Alex’s quickening thrusts. Alex whined, hands flexing against Michael’s shoulders. Slowly, Michael started to move his tight-fisted hand over Alex’s cock. It was too tight for Alex to get off on it, but the edge of pain kept him hard and hoping. “If you keep acting greedy like this, I’m going to strap you down and edge you until you’ve learned some patience. Would you like that, Alex? Want me to keep you hard and begging for hours? Or do you want me to just make you cum until you’re dry and begging for me to stop?”

“Both, please,” Alex gasped out after a particularly cruel twist of Michael’s wrist. Michael loosened his grip then and paused, letting Alex catch his breath.

“You insatiable creature,” Michael praised. He kissed along Alex’s jaw to his shoulder where he bit harshly into the meat of Alex’s muscle. Alex groaned and tried not to writhe against the pain, but couldn’t seem to stop his body from rocking gently against Michael’s fist.

“That’s it. You can fuck my hand now.” He continued to kiss and bite Alex’s flesh after he said it, causing small fires everywhere his teeth touched. His mouth moved down from Alex’s shoulder to his chest, causing Alex to lean back. Alex held onto Michael’s shoulders tightly, but didn’t stop thrusting into Michael’s perfect, slick grip. Michael sucked Alex’s nipple into his mouth and let his teeth scrape over the sensitive flesh as he pulled his head back. Alex moaned and cursed at the feeling, throwing his head back. The tension in Alex was building quickly. He wanted so badly to cum, wanted to feel himself released from reality into oblivion if only for a few seconds.

“Please, Michael. Just a little tighter, please,” Alex managed to pant out. Michael kissed across his exposed throat.

“Show me, sweetheart,” he insisted. Alex pulled one of his hands from Michael’s shoulder and wrapped it over Michael’s. He squeezed until the pressure was perfect and then let go, replacing his hand on Michael’s shoulder. The hand that had been harshly kneading at Alex’s ass, encouraging his rolling hips and sloppy thrusts, came around to stack itself on top of the hand gripping him. Together they created a deep channel for Alex to thrust his cock into over and over again.

“Shit, shit, shit, Michael. I need to cum. Can I? Please?” Alex whined, even as he kept pushing his body towards the edge.

“Sure, darlin'. You can cum,” Michael said agreeably. Alex let go of any restraint, pressing close and letting his thrusts get quick and out of rhythm as he felt the pressure building behind his balls. When Alex was only a few thrusts away, Michael continued, “But I’m going to make you clean up the mess you make with your mouth.”

The last bit did it for Alex. With a strangled, silent yell, his cock swelled against Michael’s hands and then erupted white, sticky streams that dripped and smeared along the insides of his fingers and palms. When Alex was able to move, Michael let go of his slowly softening cock and Alex lowered himself onto his back on the floor. The coolness of it felt good against his overheated skin. Carefully, Michael crawled over him to straddle his stomach, careful of his oversensitive cock.

“Open up,” Michael demanded, tapping two sticky fingers against Alex’s lips. Obediently, Alex opened his mouth and felt Michael plunge his salty, spunk-covered digits in. Alex moaned at the taste of himself on Michael’s skin, using his tongue to trace every inch of skin to find more of his leftover pleasure. Michael made him lick and suck all of his fingers and then palms. When he was finished, he swooped down and took Alex’s mouth with his own, plunging his tongue in for any traces left for him to taste. When the taste dissolved into nothing they parted. Michael helped Alex up onto the couch, where he held Alex against his chest and ran his fingers through his hair.

“Want some water? Dinner?” Michael asked a little while later when Alex was practically dozing off against his chest where he was sprawled. Alex hummed noncommittally and nuzzled his head against Michael’s shirt, laying a kiss against his cotton-covered chest.

“How was it? Everything you expected?” Michael asked easily. Alex nodded, eyes still closed and mind still wrapped in a blanket of satiation.

“Anything you didn’t like or would like me to do differently next time?” Michael asked next. Alex thought about it. His hand drifted down to Michael’s crotch, completely covered, but still half hard from their scene.

“I want you to use this on me next time. Mouth, ass, hands, whatever. I want you to get off too,” Alex replied, voice drowsy but firm. He opened his eyes and locked eyes with Michael. His hand stayed resting over Michael’s crotch and he could feel it twitch against his palm. Alex raised an eyebrow in question. Michael smiled, bent his head down to kiss Alex’s mouth, and brushed his hand away.

“Next time. Promise,” Michael responded easily. Alex knew it wasn’t a real rejection, so he nodded and turned his head to lay it back down against Michael’s chest, his ear pressed to where he could hear the steady thumping rhythm of Michael’s heart. He drifted and with faint surprise, realized he was really falling asleep. He wondered how long Michael would let him lay like this if he fell asleep. Would he wake up to warm sunshine tomorrow morning? Would Michael only let him nap for a while and then wake him to get dressed so he could go home to his own bed? As if hearing his thoughts, Michael ran the back of a finger along Alex’s cheek bone.

“Do you want to sleep here, the Airstream, or your house?” Michael asked softly. Alex considered it.

“Let’s go to the Airstream. I don’t wanna sleep alone tonight,” Alex said through a yawn. Michael nodded and hugged his arms around Alex’s shoulders.

“Sure. Whatever you want,” Michael concluded. Alex only hummed a vague response before he was oblivious to anything else. He didn’t have nightmares that night.

#rnmafterdark2021 #rnmafterdark #rnm after dark #smutty #malex #malex fic #michael guerin #alex manes

[dirtyhelen]

with you, a girl could get bolder (i just wanna be a little bit closer) - part two

PART TWO: i’m in your head now, from every second now Series Masterlist Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader Rating: Mature Featuring: Angst; Fluff; No Additional Warnings Words: 7894 Summary: So, you had sex with a co-worker under the influence of a super-powered aphrodisiac. What do you do now? A/N: First of all, BIG thank you to everyone who liked/replied/reblogged Part 1!! Honestly overwhelmed by how lovely you all are 🤗 Second of all, there is no smut in this part so if you wanna skip this one and catch up on Part 3 (which does have smut) I totally get it and you will receive no judgment from me!! Sorry for the wait on this one, Part 3 won’t take this long I promise! ________________________________________________________________

You sleep for a long time, deep and dreamless, and wake to the hot midday sun streaming in through your open curtains. You’d been so out of it the night before you hadn’t even bothered to shut them. For a moment or two it feels like a normal day, albeit a lazy one. Like sleeping in on Sunday and waking up easy and refreshed. You reach for your phone to check the time when recollection kicks in, reminding you exactly why you’re in bed at noon on a Friday, stripping away any feelings of peace or rest. You want to stay in bed, bury yourself under the covers until you die. Or at least until someone from the compound reaches out to you, but there’s too much nervous energy thrumming under your skin, making you restless and jittery and you finally give in and leave the warm cocoon of your blankets. You spend the day at home, stress-cleaning your entire apartment and stress-eating your entire fridge, vacillating between panic and calm. One minute you’re stuffing your face with week-old stir-fry and checking your phone with every mouthful; the next you’re elbow-deep in dishwater, resigned to your fate – whatever it may be. In worried moments, you can’t imagine how you can possibly go back to the compound after everything that’s happened. How can you discuss schedules and mission reports when everyone you work with knows you got railed by an Avenger on one of the jets they use to fly around saving the world? How can you face Bucky again? Even if he doesn’t blame you for what happened, he’s bound to have some negative feelings about the whole thing. About sleeping with you. It’s not like you’d been friends before. Not like he’s been harbouring secret romantic feelings like you have. If Bucky’s harbouring any secret feelings about you, they’re probably feelings of annoyance and dislike. What if every time he looks at you now he’s reminded of how you begged, needy and naked and pathetic, for him to fuck you? What if he’s disgusted by you? Somehow that’s the worst thought of all. That the first person – the only person – to have seen your body laid bare, to have touched you in the most intimate ways possible might be repulsed, not by what happened, but because it happened with you. It’s a thought you try not to dwell on for long, but you come back to it over and over throughout the day. Each time, shame and self-loathing and heartache flood your body until you force yourself to think about something else. To eat something else, clean something else. You remind yourself there’s no point worrying about things that might never happen. You’ll only have to endure the reactions from Bucky and the team if you actually go back to work, which might not be an option anymore. No one’s reached out to you all day – no calls, no emails, no texts – and the radio silence has you fearing the worst. That no one has reached out because they’re busy working on your termination paperwork. As the hours slip by, those moments of calm get fewer and further between. By the time you’ve eaten all there is to eat, cleaned all there is to clean, and paced what feels like a hundred miles across the length of your apartment it’s nearly midnight and the only messages you’ve gotten all day are promotional emails and a meme from one of your friends back home. You wish you could talk to her, tell her about everything and get another perspective, but the ironclad NDA you signed on your first day of work rules out telling pretty much anyone other than the Avengers and their support staff – none of whom you want to talk about this with. If nothing else, at least your nervous energy has burned off, leaving you drained and eager to sleep for another twelve – or twelve thousand – hours. But despite your exhaustion, sleep doesn’t come any easier than the night before. You toss and turn for hours it seems, and when you do sleep, it’s light and fitful. You wake early on Saturday morning, feeling no more relaxed than when you first shut your eyes. +++ After another morning alone in your apartment with no news, you think you’re going to go insane soon. You’ve drafted a dozen emails to Maria Hill, to the head of R&D, even one to Steve, but can’t bring yourself to hit send on any of them. Trying to find the line between professional concern and desperate pleading proves to be very difficult. You’ve just started yet another message to Maria – since she coordinates all Avengers operations (including the one that landed you in this situation) – when your phone rings. It’s such a surprise after the silence of the last two days that you’re frozen for a moment before you scramble for your phone, almost dropping it in a mug of lukewarm tea in your haste. A glance at the screen reveals it’s Maria herself on the line, as if summoned by all your unfinished emails. Knowing her background and capabilities, you wouldn’t be surprised if she somehow has seen them… Brushing away that uncomfortable thought, you take a breath and answer the call, trying your best for a confident and casual, “Hello?” Characteristically brusque, Maria wastes no time getting straight to the point. “Can you come to the compound this afternoon? The research half of R&D has an update for you and I figured we should talk, too.” “Uh—” you start, wondering how to give a firm fuck no while still being agreeable and cooperative. Luckily, Maria picks up on the reason for your hesitance. “Right, that would probably be uncomfortable for you. We’ll come to you. Three o’clock?” she offers. “Three is good?” It’s not like you have anything else going on. “Great. I’m supposed to call Secretary Ross at three and I do not want to. See you then.” And with that, the line goes dead. Maria has very little patience for pleasantries, you’ve learned. +++ At three o’clock sharp there’s a knock at your door. You open it up to find Maria waiting outside with a middle-aged woman carrying a black medical bag. You vaguely remember seeing her face among the half dozen or so you saw during the debrief after the jet. Maria says hello and makes the necessary introductions. “This is Dr. Sakina Singh,” she says, face expressionless. “She’s from R&D. You might remember her from –” “The extremely intrusive round of questions I asked you two days ago,” Dr. Singh interjects with a grimace, looking about as uncomfortable as you feel. This probably isn’t what she imagined she’d be doing when she accepted the offer to work with the Avengers. You laugh politely if a little awkwardly. “I remember. Nice to meet you, officially?” She smiles and you shake hands. “Can we come in?” Maria asks, reminding you they’re still standing in your open doorway while cold February air blows into your apartment. “Right! Sorry!” You bring them through to your kitchen, gesturing for them to sit at the table and making the obligatory offers of tea and coffee. Maria and Dr. Singh take one side of the table and it makes you feel a bit like you’re about to have the worst job interview of your life. The fact that Maria was actually at your last job interview doesn’t help. You start to fidget with your hands, relieved the table hides the worst of your nerves. Dr. Singh starts off the proceedings. “I mostly just wanted to check in and see if you’ve experienced any other symptoms, anything out of the ordinary, and to give you a bit of an update on what we’ve found out about the chemical you and Sergeant Barnes ingested,” she says, looking more at-ease now the small-talk portion of the conversation is over and she can focus on the science of it all. “I feel normal,” you reply quietly. “No symptoms since Thursday night.” She nods. “That’s good, and consistent with what Sergeant Barnes reported.” Even the mention of Bucky’s name is enough to have your face flooding with heat. Your hands clench, fingernails pressing crescents into your palms. She carries on, explaining what she and her team were able to determine about the chemical. It’s nothing ground-breaking or unexpected, not after having experienced its effects first-hand. A super-powered aphrodisiac with no discernable purpose beyond making people horny. Just the sort of thing you’d expect to uncover in some mad scientist’s underground lab. Why try curing cancer when you can make people fuck instead? “It provokes extreme sexual arousal while simultaneously decreasing inhibitions,” Dr. Singh explains. “It appears to be neutralized by the chemicals released during orgasm. More than that we don’t know. And since the only uncontaminated sample of the chemical was destroyed, it may be all we will know. But the good news is we don’t see there being any lingering physical impacts, though I would like to take another blood sample from you to be sure it’s completely out of your system.” You consent to the blood sample and she heads back to the compound after it’s done, leaving you and Maria alone at your kitchen table. She’s been nearly motionless this entire time, watching you and Dr. Singh converse, but offering nothing in the way of commentary or even acknowledgment. If you didn’t know better you’d think she wasn’t paying attention at all.  But you do know better, and you have no doubt she could repeat word-for-word everything that was said since you opened the door half an hour ago. Regardless, the stony-faced reticence is unsettling and gives you no clue as to how your conversation with her is going to go. And it’s this conversation you’re really worried about. After a moment of silence that feels endless, Maria lets out a big, heaving sigh, her shoulders dropping as she relaxes into her seat. “Well, that was awkward.” Oh. That’s how your conversation is going to go. It’s so not what you expected her to say and yet so completely like her that a shocked giggle forces its way out of your mouth. She grins at you across the table, but you feel your own smile fade. “God, Maria, I’m so sor—” “If you’re about to apologize, so help me God,” she says, with a look on her face that dares you to argue with her. “I apologize, sincerely, on behalf of myself and the entire Avengers organization. This shouldn’t have happened. We have a dangerous chemicals procedure for a reason, for fuck’s sake,” she adds, with a stormy expression that has you pitying the poor techs who loaded the jet. “I mean, it’s no one’s fault, really. I’m sure that case wasn’t purposely unlatched.” You don’t want anyone to get in trouble for this. You feel guilty enough already about Bucky. “Probably not,” Maria concedes. “But regardless, we’re not treating this as business as usual. This isn’t SHIELD. It won’t be swept under the rug and dismissed without investigation.” You’ve read a handful of the documents Natasha leaked during the fall of SHIELD. You can only imagine how many lab accidents were concealed; how many weren’t accidents at all. It’s a dark line of thinking with no end in sight so you change the subject, asking a question that’s been on your mind for a while. “I wanted to ask – who knows about what happened? I know you can’t hide it, obviously, but –” you shrug, wondering exactly how many people you’re going to have to avoid eye contact with in the halls, or around town even. Maria nods. “The Security Council has access to all our files and we have to report this as a safety incident, but no names or identifying details are recorded. And we didn’t say two staff members had intercourse on a quinjet,” she adds wryly. “Just that there was a chemical spill and two individuals were affected. The only people who know the details of what happened and to who are me, the Avengers, and Dr. Singh and her staff. And they’ve all been made very clear on what will happen if they breach confidentiality. Believe me, they won’t tell anyone.” You believe her. “Speaking of the Avengers… What’s the mood there? Am I totally fired?” Maria snorts. “Fired? Because of a costly mistake for which the organization takes full responsibility, resulting in you ingesting an unknown chemical compound? No. You’re not fired.” Okay, when she lays it out like that it makes your fears seem ridiculous. Still… “Seriously, Maria. Should I just quit? Or be reassigned? Somewhere I will never have to look at any of the Avengers ever again, maybe?” you ask, with a cringe. “Are you concerned it will be awkward for you, or them?” “Well, both. But obviously, their feelings would come first in this situation. They’re the Avengers. I'm a secretary.” Maria rolls her eyes at that comment but chooses not to address it. “Well I can’t do anything about your feelings, but I can assure you that you won’t be treated any differently because of this.” You gape at her. “Seriously?” How could they not treat you differently? Maria levels you with a look. “Do you really think this is the strangest thing that has ever happened on that team?” she says, with the distinct air of a woman who has seen and heard too much. You’re not convinced. “Stranger than two of them banging on a quinjet under the influence of a crazy sex drug?” You’re pretty sure if this were the Strange and Unusual Olympics, that would earn you at least a silver medal. Maria doesn’t seem to agree. She straightens her back and takes a breath. “Giant octopus monster in the Thames. That time a wizard transformed Steve into his pre-serum body for a week. Wanda, daily.” She looks at you, eyebrows raised. You have to admit she has a point. “But –” “Last month I walked in on Steve and Sam having sex in a conference room. A couple years ago Barton got wasted during a game of truth or dare and told everyone how much he enjoys getting slapped around by women in leather. There are multiple sex tapes of Tony on the internet.” She pauses, making sure she has your full attention. “Dealing with weird shit and knowing way too much about the people you work with? Pretty much the two things that bind the Avengers together. Welcome to the team.” Once again, she manages to make things seem so simple. You want to believe her. You almost do believe her. There’s just one thing… “What about Bucky? Maybe everyone else can brush it off, but this happened with him. He can’t possibly want to work with me anymore.” “Fair enough,” Maria says. “But I actually spoke to Barnes this morning. He made it very clear he did not want this to impact your employment in any way.” She shrugs. “Like I said. If it’s not a problem for you, it’s not a problem for them. They’re professionals. Well, mostly.” You nod. This conversation has been enlightening – in a few ways – and Maria’s given you a lot to think about. Also a lot to very purposely not think about (Clint! And presumably Laura!). Maria leans back in her seat, considering you for a long moment as you try to process what she’s told you and come up with some sort of response. The silence stretches on until finally, she speaks. “I’ve had a lot of weird, bad sex in my life.” You stare at her, wide-eyed and mouth agape. Luckily, she doesn’t wait for a response. “I know what happened to you wasn’t just a shitty hookup and you have every right to feel however feel about it.” She says, for the first time looking less than perfectly at ease. She takes her time with her next words. “But I guess what I’m trying to say is it doesn’t have to count. Sex doesn’t change who you are. It doesn’t have to mean anything unless you want it to.” You nod dumbly, not sure what to say. You feel the sudden intense need to be alone for a while so you can sit with all the new thoughts running through your mind. Maria nods back, face settled again into cool composure. “Okay, no more feelings talk. The point is: you’re welcome to come back to work anytime. FRIDAY’s taking on as much as she can, but an AI is only capable of so much. Even that one. Think about it.” +++ You do think about it. You spend the rest of the day thinking about it. You go for a long walk in the crisp winter air, thinking about it. You journal, thinking about it. You Google “I slept with a co-worker, what now?” in various combinations and read several unhelpful articles, thinking about it. After hours of introspection, what you come up with is this: you love your job. You love your life. You’ve always been cautious, careful to a fault. Never a risk-taker. Until a few months ago, you lived in the same town you were born in. Happy enough, but not exactly satisfied. Until you applied for this job. Until you packed up your life, left behind everything you’d ever known to start over someplace new. And you’ve never regretted it. You finally felt like you had a place where you belonged. Over the time you’ve worked with the team, they’ve become friends, not just-workers and you love getting to know the real people behind the glossy media personas the rest of the world is familiar with. You love the sense of pride you feel, knowing the work you do matters, contributes – even in its own small way – to something as unfathomably huge and worthwhile as world peace. You don’t want to give that up. You can’t. The sex thing? Yeah, that sucks. You may not have dreamt of rose petals and scented candles, but you were pretty determined there’d be love and commitment involved. A partner, not just a person. But Maria is right. Sex doesn’t change who you are. Virginity is a goddamn social construct and this doesn’t have to matter unless you want it to. You had sex for the first time with someone you have feelings for, someone you respect. And maybe the circumstances (weird sex drug, floor of airplane) were less than perfect, but you can’t deny the sex itself felt good (amazing). Better than a random guy that couldn’t locate the clitoris with a GPS and flashing neon lights. You feel like you’ve been given permission to let this go. To let it be something that happened, but not something that defines you. Just one moment out of millions. You know it’s not that simple. That one illuminating conversation isn’t enough to silence the part of you that still feels ashamed, embarrassed, and heartbroken, but it's a start. A new perspective and one that has you feeling a hell of a lot better than you did just a few hours ago. There’s just one roadblock in this journey of self-enlightenment to being a mature, grown-ass woman who is handling this like a fucking champ – Bucky. But if what Maria said is true, and you have no reason to think she’d lie to you, then maybe that’s not such a roadblock after all? If everyone, even Bucky, can go on as usual (whatever that is with the Avengers), then you’re basically in the same place you were before all this: hiding your unrequited feelings for a man that doesn’t think about you at all. Just with the added aspect of remembering what his body felt like on top of you, inside you. How his tongue felt in your mouth, and on your… Anyway! You’ve decided. You’re going back to work and it’s going to be totally fine. You’re all going to be adults about this. Having drug-fueled sex on a plane is basically the Avengers equivalent of getting too drunk at the office Christmas party anyway, and many an administrative assistant before you has done that and come out the other side. You call Maria and inform her you’ll be back at the compound on Monday, and you can’t help but think there’s a little note of pride in her crisp acknowledgment.  +++ Sunday passes in a blur of nervous anticipation. By the end of the day, you’re nearly crawling out of your skin, desperate to get the embarrassing part over so you can move on with your life and dreading it at the same time. When you wake up Monday morning there’s a significant part of you that wants to call the whole thing off and stay in your apartment for the rest of your life. You remind yourself you did nothing wrong, that you have every right to your job and your life, but apprehension only grows as you get ready for work and begin the drive to the compound. As the heavy metal gates slide shut behind your car you’re suddenly overwhelmed with the feeling you’ve made a terrible mistake. But after a brief almost-breakdown in the parking garage, you manage to pull yourself together and get out of the car. You make your way to your office in the Avengers’ private wing without running into anyone other than security and custodial staff. It is eight in the morning after all, and it’s not like the Avengers usually congregate outside your office like a welcoming committee, so you’re not sure why you felt like you’d be seeing them all at once. They might not even all be in the building – you’ll have to get Maria to update you on any new missions that have been assigned while you were off. You pass an hour or two catching up on emails and reaching out to a few different contacts around the compound, but no one on the team. The first person you see who knows why you really were off is Sam, making a smoothie in the kitchen when you come in for your morning tea. You steel yourself for the ensuing awkwardness, but it doesn’t come. Sam doesn’t behave any differently than he normally would, acknowledging you with a friendly smile tossed over his shoulder as he prepares ingredients. “Morning,” he greets, handing you a mug from the cupboard over his head as you fill up the electric kettle. “Thanks.” Sam nods, immediately launching into a story about his weekend that has you almost in tears from laughing so hard. “I don’t know why you’re laughing,” he scolds playfully. “I was stuck in that tree for like ten minutes while Tony took pictures, even though it's his fault I ended up there since he designed the damn wings. Anyway, how was your weekend?” he asks with an expression of exaggerated innocence. If it was anyone else it might feel rude or intrusive or even mean. But Sam, all easy charm and genuine warmth, has a way of making people take themselves less seriously, and you find you’re smiling despite yourself as his smirk splits into a cheeky grin. You manage to hold eye contact for a couple of seconds before you’re both laughing uncontrollably, the utter absurdity of the situation suddenly hitting you as actually kind of funny instead of completely tragic. “Yeah, it was alright. Just hung around the house, really,” you tease, catching your breath, and the conversation seamlessly turns to what you’ve both been watching on Netflix. You’re still smiling when you sit back down at your desk. You know there are bound to be awkward moments ahead, but the relief of knowing things can be normal, that the awkwardness will pass, has a tension leaving your body you’d been holding onto for days. Over the next couple days as you go about your normal tasks and routines you run into members of the team in ones and twos. Some are more uncomfortable than others – you and Bruce share a particularly stilted exchange until Tony barges into the room – but after the initial acknowledgment, almost everyone carries on like it never happened. Almost everyone, because by the middle of the week there’s still one person you haven’t seen or heard from. Bucky. You aren’t sure if you’re relieved or disappointed. Sure, you’re not exactly eager for that first – almost certainly uneasy – interaction. But at the same time, all you want is to move on and put this behind you and you don’t think you can do that until you’ve seen him. Until you’ve assured yourself he really is okay, and okay working together. The longer you go without seeing him, the more you begin to wonder if he’s really as fine with you being back as Maria said he was. If he truly wasn’t bothered, wouldn’t you have run into him before now? It’s not like Bucky was a social butterfly before, especially not with you, but you work with him in the building where he lives – it’s rare to go this long without at least seeing him in passing, outside of times he’s on a mission. And he isn’t on a mission – you checked. The sense of acceptance you’ve built around what happened on the jet is fragile, and relies almost entirely on knowing Bucky is alright, that he doesn’t blame you, or hate you, or feel disgusted by you. If none of that is true, you can’t move on. At least, not while continuing to work with the team. It wouldn’t be right. Each day, that acceptance weakens as it becomes clear Bucky is intentionally avoiding you. He must be. The agonizing waiting game finally ends on Thursday in a conference room. You’re tidying up after a meeting, gathering pens and water glasses, when Bucky turns the corner into the room, eyes glued to the tablet he holds in front of his face. At least, until he notices the room isn’t empty and his eyes snap to you. You’ve been imagining this moment for days now – seeing Bucky again for the first time. You’ve crafted and perfected so many scenarios of how it might play out – maybe you’ll be cool and aloof, brush it off like it’s no big deal, like you haven’t thought about it at all. Or maybe you’ll crack a joke like Sam would, and Bucky will laugh and tease you back and the tension will be broken and everything will be fine. In the moment, when it actually happens, all you can do is stare. Bucky looks – not well, really, and it squeezes something in your chest to see him this way. You’ve been around him before when he’s having a downswing and it’s not as bad as that, but there are dark circles under his eyes that speak to sleepless nights, and a stiffness in the way he holds himself, as though every muscle is tensed. It makes you want to hold him. To wrap him in your arms until that tension bleeds out of his body. But that’s the last thing Bucky would want, considering you’re likely the source of the tension. Your eyes find his and he holds your gaze for a moment – just a moment. You’re not sure what he sees in your expression, but he clearly doesn’t like it because his brows furrow as he turns on his heel and leaves the room. And just like that, you’re back on the quinjet, naked and trembling on the cold floor as Bucky bolts from the room without looking back. The rejection is clear, unmistakable. You’re fully clothed but you may as well be stark naked for how vulnerable you feel in that moment. You can’t help the tears that gather in your eyes and spill over as you stand there staring at the open door like an idiot. You roughly swipe a hand over your face to brush them away and make a hasty retreat to your office. The day passes in a fog as you try not to break down at your desk. The dam breaks the minute you step through your apartment door as the tears you’ve been holding back for hours come flooding out. You fall to your knees and you know you’re overreacting. You tell yourself it’s probably a misunderstanding. Bucky realized he’d forgotten something. Or maybe he was just surprised to see you, wasn’t ready to talk to you yet and had to leave, but not because he hates you. Your mind clings to the idea, latches onto it like a lifeline, even as your body continues to drown – sadness like physical pain in your chest, throat sore from deep, heaving sobs. You calm down eventually, mind winning out over body at last, but the crying has you feeling a little hollowed out. You fill the space with food and mindless media consumption, telling yourself you’ll feel better after a night of sleep. +++ You do feel better in the morning, thank God. You’ve successfully convinced yourself what happened yesterday had to be a misunderstanding. Maria wouldn’t lie to you about what Bucky said, and honestly, it’s self-centred to think just the sight of you is enough to scare the Winter Soldier out of a room! You head into the office feeling a little uneasy still, but mostly okay. That feeling lasts until lunchtime. You’re taking your lunch break in the common room, eating a sandwich and watching an episode of House Hunters with Natasha. She’s in the middle of a sentence, noting the lack of defensible positions and the overabundance of wood panelling in the mid-century bungalow on-screen when Steve and Bucky enter the room. They’ve clearly just come from the gym, likely looking for a post-workout snack. They amble into the room, playfully shoving at each other as they head for the kitchen. You can hear Alpine trotting in behind them, meowing for the treats she knows she’ll get if Bucky’s in the kitchen. Bucky’s hair is tied up in a messy, damp bun and his t-shirt clings to his torso with sweat, toned muscles on display. Steve’s there too. You see the moment Bucky realizes you’re there partly because you can’t look away from him – the shadows under his eyes are still dark, but his face is flushed and lively from the workout – and also because his step very noticeably falters and the teasing expression is wiped from his face, the colour quickly draining from his cheeks. If yesterday could be brushed off as a misunderstanding, this confirms you were right to fear the worst. Bucky was avoiding you, doesn’t want to be around you. He mumbles something back to Steve you aren’t able to discern and turns back the way he came. Instantly you feel your face heat with shame. Now Bucky can’t stand to even be in a room with you and other people? Exactly how uncomfortable do you make him? Does he think you’ll leap up from the couch and throw yourself at him? You catch Steve and Nat sharing a look out of the corner of your eye, but you have no idea what it means. You feel thoroughly wrong-footed, as though everyone in the room knows something you don’t. Something you probably don’t want to know. They make an effort to gloss over Bucky’s hasty exit, Natasha more successfully than Steve, but you just want to get back to the privacy of your office as quickly as possible so you can ruminate in peace. Or, if not in peace, at least in solitude. Choking down the rest of your lunch in record time, you make your escape – by a different route than Bucky, lest you accidentally cross paths again and he’s forced to jump out a window to escape you. TGIF, you think. +++ That weekend is rough. You journal, you pace, and you think and cry and eat and Google. Finally, you end up spilling your guts to an EAP counsellor (under the guise of a drunken hook-up between co-workers) and you come to the conclusion: fuck James Buchanan Barnes. Yeah, he’s smart and kind and strong and beautiful and maybe you’re a little in love with him, but he is just a man and you have cried over him enough. You didn’t ask for this! You didn’t mean for it to happen! And it’s not like you forced him to have sex with you. It’s not like he was cowering in the corner while you were throwing yourself at him. If anything, you were equally taken advantage of by each other – by that stupid fucking chemical and whatever mad scientist created it! He was the one who said he didn’t want your employment affected by what happened! As though running screaming from the room whenever he sees you doesn’t affect your employment. The least he could do is try to be a little more subtle in his distaste. Whether he finds you unattractive or not he should be able to treat you like a human being – not some sort of leper. And if he can’t do that, he can say it to your face! You don’t deserve this, no matter how Bucky feels about what happened. Which is exactly what you’re going to tell him when you see him on Monday. And you will see him. Bucky Barnes might be an internationally feared former assassin who evaded detection for over seventy years, but you manage his calendar. He’s got a meeting in the morning with PR and you’ll be waiting outside to catch him as soon as they’re done. On God, by noon on Monday, this will be resolved once and for all. +++ Ten a.m. sharp you’re standing outside the PR office suite, reminding yourself why your anger is justified and trying to hold onto the feeling itself. You’re more than a little afraid that the minute you see Bucky you’re going to forget all about confronting him and just start crying. But you didn’t spend hours curating a fuck you, girl power playlist and practicing speeches in the mirror to admit defeat so quickly. You’re standing directly opposite the glass doors, no opportunity for hiding – or for Bucky to hide from you – so you see each other the minute he approaches the door. There’s a flash of surprise on his face, quickly turned to grim resignation as he opens the door. He obviously knows you’re there to see him and he stops outside in front of you. “Hi,” he says, avoiding your eyes and staring at his feet instead. “Hey. Can I talk to you for a minute?” He nods, gesturing down the hall and you follow him a few feet to a small seating area, out of view of any offices. He stands back and finally makes eye contact, looking a little like he’s staring down a firing squad instead of an unarmed civilian in a fuzzy pink cardigan. You take a deep breath, gathering your thoughts and remembering the plan. You ask him the big question. “Do you want me to quit?” Bucky shakes his head almost frantically. “No, I – no,” he says. You stare at him, wait for him to continue speaking but he just stands there, hands in his pockets looking miserable. ‘No.’ That’s all he can say? No? No! Something inside you snaps, your carefully prepared speech dissolving in your mouth like sugar as words start to pour out of you. “Really? Because Maria told me you didn’t want me to be reassigned so I thought we were good. But then you avoided me for days and the two times we did see each other you looked like you were going to be sick and practically ran out of the room, which makes me think you’re definitely not okay with me being here.” “I—” “And like, okay, that’s fine, but I wish you would have just said that? Because I get it, I do. This is super weird and obviously, you didn't want to sleep with me and I know I'm not like, a supermodel or even a JC Penny catalogue model, so yeah, you wish it could have been literally anyone else but you don't have to run away from me like I have some sort of flesh-eating disease, okay?” “That’s—” “Because that really sucks, Bucky. And not just because I’ve had a crush on you forever or because it was my first time but because I actually really just like and respect you as a person and I know you didn’t like me even before all this so maybe you don’t believe me, but I didn’t mean for this to happen. I promise. I would never try to take advantage of you – of anyone – like that and –” “What?” he interjects sharply. It cracks through the air like a whip, finally snapping you out of whatever insanity possessed you to say all that. To say all that. Oh, fuck. “What do you mean crush? Wait, first time?” Bucky’s eyes are wide and he’s staring intently at your face. Your own face burns and your hands shake as you try to come up with something – anything – to say. Thirty seconds ago you couldn’t shut up! The silence stretches unbearably long as Bucky stands there looking at you, waiting for you to answer him. It looks like he’s about to speak again when an alert sounds from both of your phones. “Oh, thank God,” you breathe. It’s the unmistakable tone that signals a drop-what-you’re-doing-and-Avengers-fucking-assemble emergency. You’ve never heard a sweeter sound in your life. Bucky holds your gaze for another moment before he swears and jogs off down the hallway, tossing you a conflicted look over his shoulder as he goes. +++ The emergency turns out to be a false alarm; some new system Tony was working on triggered it accidentally, so you got away from Bucky and nobody died. All in all, a pretty successful day. Except for the part where you confessed your feelings to the man you’ve been crushing on for months and told him he was the first person you’ve ever had sex with. During what was supposed to be a mature, adult conversation where you asserted yourself calmly and professionally instead of projectile word-vomiting like the girl from The Exorcist swallowed a dictionary and spat it back up. If there was ever a chance you and Bucky could move past what happened on the quinjet and co-exist in mutual agreement to never mention it again, it’s gone now. There’s no dramatic breakdown this time, no floods of tears or self-loathing or panic. The last week and a half has been an exhausting roller coaster of emotions and honestly, you just can’t anymore. It is what it is. It happened and there’s no going back. You can’t summon up the energy to freak out. Tomorrow you’ll go to Maria’s office and request a transfer. Maybe the UN has an opening for a secretary in Antarctica. But tonight you will wear flannel pyjamas, eat greasy pizza, and watch the Great British Bake Off, where everything is lovely and nothing hurts. Just as you’ve finished turning your couch into a cozy oasis, laying out your softest blankets and fluffiest pillows, there’s a knock at your door. Right on time. You grab your wallet and open the door, a polite smile on your face for your usual delivery man. But that’s not who’s standing on your porch. It’s Bucky. Pizza box balanced in one hand, the other fussing with his hair. “Hey,” he says, voice soft and almost hesitant. You step back, silently letting him inside and shutting the door behind him. “I didn’t realize you delivered for Ronzoni’s now,” you say, cringing immediately after. Bucky looks at the box in his hand like he forgot he was holding it. “Oh, uh, yeah, I got here the same time as the delivery guy.” “I see that.” He hands you the box and you lay it on the floor behind you. “Thanks,” you tell him awkwardly, eyes fixed on the floor in front of you. “Look, Bucky, I’m really sor—” “I do like you,” he blurts and your eyes flash to his, wide in shock. “What?” Bucky shifts on his feet, stands a little straighter and nods, more to himself than to you it seems. Like he’s steeling himself to face something difficult. “I do like you. I’ve always liked you. Just took me a while to figure it out. It’s been a minute. Haven’t had a crush in about seventy years; I’m rusty,” he says with a sheepish smile, ducking his head and looking at you through his lashes. His smile fades. “And you’re always so nervous around me. I thought maybe you were scared of me. Or hated me, maybe, for everything I did when –” “Oh, Bucky, no,” you can’t help but interrupt, can’t let him finish that sentence. You haven’t really processed anything else he’s said, but you can’t bear the idea of him thinking you blamed him for being abused and controlled for decades. “Yeah, I was a fucking idiot,” he says with a humourless laugh. “I know you’d never – but I didn’t then.” His face softens as he looks at you. “And even though it was ‘cause you were scared of me, I still thought you were so cute when you’d start running at the mouth. Stumbling over your words and getting all embarrassed,” he says, with a fond little smile. You groan, hiding your face behind your hands, thinking of all the times you’ve looking like an idiot in front of him. Bucky chuckles warmly and tugs your hands down but doesn’t let them go, holding them in a loose grip. You can’t believe this is happening. He likes you. He likes you and has liked you for months. He likes you and he’s holding your hands and staring at you with an affection you couldn’t have captured in your wildest fantasies. Bucky’s smile turns a little wistful. “I was so jealous of everyone else. How easy you were with them. I wanted you to be like that with me, all happy and cheeky and –” he cuts himself off. “Then that fucking drug. If there was any doubt about how I felt about you that definitely made it clear. That was something else, doll.” His grip on your hands tightens before he lets them go. “You’re so – that shit you said about not being a model or whatever? I couldn’t care less. You’re perfect,” he says, voice intense. He shakes his head a little, like he’d gotten off track. “And then it hit me. This goddamn revelation for me was probably the worst moment of your life, and I fucking liked it. I felt like a creep, like a fucking monster. And that’s why I avoided you. I thought I was doing you a favour, staying away. It wasn’t ‘cause I hate you or I blame you or anything. Pretty much the opposite.” You laugh softly in disbelief, shaking your head at how wrong you were. How wrong you both were, all this time. “I thought maybe it reminded you of Hydra,” you tell him. “You know, losing control, being forced to do something you didn’t want to – not that I think what we did is the same as being forced to kill people, obviously. I just mean, the principle of it –” Bucky kindly cuts you off. “I know what you mean. But trust me,” he says. “That’s not how I feel. At all. I mean, yeah, that’s not really how I wanted things to go. I hate that that was your first time. I hate that it was my first time I can clearly remember. But I’m glad it was you. What Hydra did to me and what happened to us, what we did together – doesn’t even compare. I don’t regret it.” And finally, with those words, spoken with such undeniable sincerity, you feel the last piece of the puzzle fit into place. Even with everything he’s already said it still felt too good to be true. Like it could be a confession and a rejection at the same time. An acknowledgement that if you’d figured it out sooner you could have been together, but you got the pieces so mixed up that there’s no sorting them out. Better to throw them away and pick a new puzzle. “I don’t regret it either,” you tell him. “I wish it had happened differently, but I’m really, really happy it was you, Bucky.” He looks at you, soft and sweet and a little sad and you can’t help but throw yourself at him, finally giving in to an urge you’ve felt a hundred times, wrapping your arms around his neck. He hugs you back, holding you just as tightly as you hold him. You feel warm and bright and happy, bubbling over with joy that spills out of you with a giggle as you pull back just enough to look him in the face with a dopey grin. “So… you like me?” He laughs, pressing a kiss to the top of your head. “Yeah, doll, you been listening?” “I can’t believe you’ve had a crush on me for months. You never speak to me!” Bucky snorts. “Hey, we don’t all let our anxiety spill out our mouths like you.” You glare at him but he does have a point. “That’s fair,” you acknowledge, stepping out of the warm circle of his arms to give him a long look, crossing your arms. “So for months I thought you didn’t like me, and you thought I didn’t like you. And the whole time we were super into each other?” Bucky shoves his hands in his pockets, rocks on his heels, nodding. “Yep.” “Sounds like we’re pretty dumb, huh?” “Sounds like we’re perfect for each other,” he says, leaning in close with a grin. You get a sudden glimpse of the charmer Bucky must have been back in the day and it takes everything you have not to kiss him. “You wanna stay for a while?” you ask. You don’t want him to go yet, but you don’t want to keep standing up in front of your door either. “I’m watching Great British Bake Off. And you did pay for the pizza so it’s technically yours.” “You askin’ me on a date?” You think he means it to come out as flirty and confident, but he says it with a shy, boyish expression that’s somehow so much more attractive. You nod, smiling. “Yeah, I guess so. I wish I wasn’t wearing pyjamas, but…” “Hey, pizza and GBBO? I wish I was wearing pyjamas,” he counters, picking up the pizza and letting you lead the way to the living room where he sets the box down on the coffee table. You sit with Bucky on your couch, sharing a blanket and stuffing your faces as you talk about your favourite Bake Off contestants and it feels right. Feels like the start of something really, really good. And to think, you have an evil, horny scientist to thank for all your current happiness. Welcome to the Avengers. A/N: If you have made it to the end - thank you for reading! This is definitely the piece I struggled with most and I am very open to feedback! This part is so long and so sexless lol so I’m very interested to see how it reads re: pacing, interest, cohesiveness, etc. Feel free to like/comment/reblog and let me know! My ask box is also open to anons if you have feedback but you’re feeling shy! I definitely wanna hone the skill of series-writing as I have a loooooot of longer ideas. Part 3, which will be shorter (I think!) and definitely sexier, will be out in a few days 😚 

#bucky barnes x reader #reader insert #mcu #mcu fanfiction #marvel #marvel fanfiction #series

[my-hyperfixation-trash-can]

Hetalia’s Russia and DID/OSDD 1-b

Hey! So @autistic-hetalia your blog said you accept neurodiverse head canons and I thought maybe I could share this one with your blog!

I believe the Hetalia character of Russia has OSDD 1-b (Otherwise Specified Disociative Disorder or possibly DID, being Dissociative Identity Disorder) and this is why.

Just a note,

There is no such thing as an evil alter. Do not demonize people with DID or Other Dissociative Disorders! Those with this disorder are victims of Trauma and are likely to continue being victims of abusers, rarely do they become abusers!

Anyways, -cough cough- I’d love if anyone wants to add to this with more evidence!

1. Russia had a traumatic childhood

He is shown to have had abusive bosses who would punish him. He is threatened by one to invent steam power by the end of the week or be punished. Tartar Yoke mentioned by Lithuania as one of his bosses was also known for his cruelty. So the Authority figured in his youth were often cruel and held power over him.

His environment is cold and unforgiving much like an abusive home. Russia often describes his home as cold, quiet and lonely. He rarely found support from his land and often struggled to get by. The environment and home were harsh with little support. It is also implied he froze to death each Winter, and celebrated the year he didn’t.

This is on top of having to deal with other nations attacking him, making him feel helpless. Many nations “bullied” him in attempts to conquer him. He was mobed and pursed every day by Mongolia. That is exhausting to have everyone around you be a threat. (Lithuania and his sisters were the only nations kind to him in his youth) Early on, he learns that force and strength are what matters.

Next point tw sexual abuse and assault

He also felt a great deal of responsibility to care for his sisters. He was close to them, as they were experiencing similar issues and not violent to him. He had to be the strong one. Belarus and her unhealthy attachment to Russia depending on the age she started her behaviors may have also contributed to his trauma. All of the siblings have unhealthy attitudes towards boundaries with their bodies and the bodies of others, implying another type of abuse. Ukraine and Belarus took victim roles. Russia took on an abusers. Ukraine only ever suggests using her body to get what she wants as if never taught anything else, even as a child that’s what she knows. Belarus I don’t know where to begin, but her staring off is certainly dissociative like, paired with other trust issues. In a diary entry she is stated to have possibly messaged Ukraine’s breasts, once again showing more unhealthy boundaries with attachments to loved ones. Someone taught her that. And Russia, who internalized his abusers, acted out his abuse on others as implied with Lithuania looking distressed dressed as a maid and Russia holding a whip. In another non canon game Himaura worked on, Bulgaria in the bad ending is shown tied up and naked implied to be whipped by Russia as Russia says this is “tradition” or possibly more routine implying this is something he does often.

The idea with dissociative disorders is that the repetitive trauma that happens has to be too much for the mind of that individual child in comparison to the culture they’re raised in, and it conflicts with getting their needs met. And to the countries, all of them know Russia has had a life with far more conflicts in his youth than most, and a great deal of pain.

2. Russia has General Winter (GW for short)

General Winter manifests when Russia is being attacked by other nations in order to defend him, or to be a tormentor to Russia himself (such as freezing him to death each Winter).

This is oddly similar to what is known as a persecutor alter. These alters have the goal in mind to protect the host or body, but they’re a bit misguided in how to do that. They might take on the form of an abuser, or something outside the body, this turns into being an Introject. I’ll post a link to more info on DID/OSDD at the end of the post. The educational videos playlist will have a video on alter roles.

Russia’s bosses often abused him, and if he had an alter like this it would make sense that it would take the form of a general, someone in power who feels so much bigger and stronger than him. A boss who can push him around and make him behave in a way that will avoid further trauma from the real abusers. Winter the season, being another tormenting force of the environment, is another abuser, and it makes sense GW would take that into his identity. Russia feels helpless to it. It is also worth noting that other nations who also had to deal with Harsh winters do not have General Winter as an ally. He only protects Russia.

It would also explain why General Winter protects Russia from others attacking him. He took the ideologies of his abusers to heart, so GW pushes people away and treats them like threats. He feels strong by holding power and fear over others and force. If I can be stronger, no one can hurt me or would dare try, this is the mentality.

I believe GW can manifest as he does because Russia has magic. It’s canon that Russia can do magic or has a strange magic of his own, so whose to say GW can’t utilize it too. Perhaps even to let himself manifest sometimes in his spirit like form. This is more a headcanon or idea though.

Russia himself however is shown to be very passive with his bosses. These are people who hold power over him that he can’t really run away from or fight. So his response is to faun or freeze. This is basically stated in the comics (picture below.) and it’s often that alters have a specific role. Russia’s would be to people please those who he can’t fight. Making General Winter’s job to defend from attack.

3. Russia is shown to dissociate

When he is told to do an impossible amount of work, he just straight up loses himself in a fantasy immediately to escape the reality of the situation. There are other instances too, some in his childhood directly, but this was the most overt. This is from To your Hearts content, Russia!

4. Russia Is Inconsistent

There are times when Russia feels very different from moment to moment.

He goes from open about himself to swiftly sadistic and cold. He has moments of childish behavior to moments of maturity. These, when combined with the rest of my points, are worth noting. He both wants to hurt (possibly destroy) the others, but also be liked by them?

You can’t destroy people and have them like you.

The baltic Trio who lived a substantial amount of time with him still are confused by his unpredictable behavior. Each encounter The Baltic’s have with Russia is marked by a fear of what he might do. And not having certainty, thus they say things without knowing if it’s safe or not.

Even to Lithuania, (Whom Russia often shows Vulnerability to, in moments like bloody Sunday and Sharing his dreams in Outsourcing Sequel)living with Russia feels a strange theme park where he never knew what to expect. Lithuania has been shown to be great in strategy and games of wit, and a commendable leader with great people skills, yet he only has a general idea of Russia’s behavior? He is seen advising Prussia and Moldova that Russia likes it when people laugh or cry easily (This being predictable to Russia and thus easier to navigate social situations with) so it’s not like Lithuania isn’t paying attention. Russia shows moments of vulnerability and his thought process in panels like Bloody Sunday, which is quite telling as to what he believes are his responsibilities, and how the world works.

Now the real question is “why is he like this?”

He only understands the world from the point of view of someone who still lives in the abuse and knows no other options. He never had anyone teach or show him different. His world is ruled by who is the strongest, and if you can obey the strong you won’t get hurt or discarded. “We don’t want children who can’t play nice,” sounds like something an abuser told him frequently in his youth.

Russia just doesn’t have a support system due to his strained relationships with everyone. So he keeps relying on old defense mechanisms, hence letting General Winter step in when something threatens his sense of safety.

Nearly Every time (at least that’s what I noticed) Russia is emotionally vulnerable to someone, he suddenly changes to be sadistic or scary. It successfully pushes the person away and Reestablishes the fear of Russia in the individual, returning him to a state of being feared and alone where none of the other countries can hurt him. Examples below.

France talking to Russia after meetings and asking him personal questions would result in Russia ending the conversation by scaring him with a scsry remark and aura suddenly.

Russia Comforting China after Japan turns on him, he is kind and compassionate at first, but suddenly changes at the end.

The Baltic Trio never knows what to expect. He frequently uses fear and force to keep them.

This behavior seems directly contradictory to wanting friends and having a warm and lively home. So GW still reacts with a trauma response, and Russia reacts in line with his wishes of making friends and having others around him. The Use of force and intimidation is naturally the middle ground between their wishes. Russia believes everyone is his friends, and doesn’t see how his behavior is pushing people away. Other times he seems to want friends to like him back, like when he sent France an anonymously written letter to his radio show. However he has wishes that contradict.

Now, I think he sees friends as people he can keep near him that he enjoys the company of. (This doesn’t need to be mutual or involve trust, just force) but those wants directly contradict.

I think GW is passively influencing him with some of the behavior rather than switching out right, but either option still would have the same effects. Passive influence is when an alter is close to the front, or feels/thinks something strong enough that it affects the person at the front. Making them behave in a way that is ooc for them, but not the other who intentionally or unintentionally influenced them.

This would explain sudden shifts to a cruel threatening position with other nations, something that will most likely always be a threat GW needs to defend against. He is particularly cold and defensive with anyone that has a chance to hurt him, (or tries to look into his psyche) regardless of if they made a move to do so.

More on passive influence can be found in the sources at the bottom under educational playlist.

5. Misc. Points of knowledge

Russia’s character originally was meant to be a cry baby, and only when he drinks, has a complete switch in personality. Frankly I’m glad he was changed to the complex guy we have now. However I think this concept wasn’t fully lost.

His character song, Winter, seems to talk of him experiencing freezing to death each Winter. Further adding to his repetitive trauma.

It is not unheard of for nations to have disorders and conditions. Australia has ADHD, Prussia is Albino, Lithuania has severe anxiety (and possibly PTSD), so who is to say a nation like Russia can’t have a dissociative disorder?

It is stated in one of Russia’s character bios that “General Winter is always with him”, however where? I don’t physically see him, but perhaps we can’t because he’s sharing a body with Russia.

In summary

Russia dissociates under stress

Russia has repetitive traumas and an ongoing history of abuse all his life

Russia has inconsistent behavior and attachments

General Winter could certainly be a separate personality and functions exactly like an introject/persecutor alter would to their host.

Russia acts out and damages relationships, acting in inconsistent ways that might play out his own abuse, and/or reflect his desires to keep others near him.

As a note, I actually have DID, so this could be my projecting, but please don’t yell at me about how I made a “villain” have DID and feed into evil alters and split Stareotypes. I would only like to raise interest and provide an example of what a misrepresented disorder can look like. And the links below are there if you want to make your mind up for yourself and educate yourself if this inspires your portrayal of him! This isn’t meant to be insensitive, I’ve been working on this post for months to word it as sensitive as I could while also acknowledging Russia is still responsible for his and GW’s actions. Saying he has DID isn’t to excuse it, just explain it.

Don’t erase his victims, but don’t erase that he also is one.

(This blog below was also really helpful, but this post covers a lot of Russia’s earlier trauma and his mentality)

https://ellawritesficssometimes.tumblr.com/post/175060886956

Research for DID and OSDD 1b below: (along with links to comics)

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLm56LzW0BA_P7-yL3rK7INZDDozTayJvJ

https://www.hetarchive.net/blog/tag/russia/

http://hetarchive.net/tag/russia/

http://www.hetarchive.net/blog/2013/10/11/blog-entry-1411/

https://hetalia.fandom.com/wiki/Russia

https://www.hetarchive.net/blog/2019/01/29/about-the-fact-that-russias-history-is-too-scary/

Below is for an example of dissociation:

http://www.hetarchive.net/blog/2019/02/28/to-your-hearts-content-russia/

https://youtu.be/ZV3ToVA5BqQ

https://did-research.org/origin/comorbid/dd/osdd_udd/index.html

#hetalia #hetalia world stars #aph #hws #aph lithuania #hws lithuania #hws russia #aph russia #hws ukraine #aph ukraine #hws belarus #tw sex assault #tw rape #tw abuse #tw child neglect #tw child grooming #tw childhood trauma #tw freezing #aph belarus #hetalia theory #my own thoughts #long reads

[crookedactor]

DETROIT: BECOME BETTER

aka my DBH plot critique.

Disclaimer; this post mostly has to do with the plot and narrative of the story, and not the technical aspects. This is just what *I* think would have made the story more complex and interesting, and I will try to write it in a way that would realistically make sense for the story.

I of course am very thankful for the 200+ people who worked on DBH, because they made a wonderful game, and I couldn't imagine how hard it was. They aren't to blame for any of these critiques, mostly just David Cage. (lol)

And of course, spoilers ahead. I'll try to keep the major spoilers (like Alice's plot line) to a minimum just for good measure though!

Alright. Here we go. ⬇

(Also I'm sorry I don't have the option to do a "keep reading" button on my posts, so if you don't want to read this, you'll have to scroll for a bit since it's long. Sorry!!)

So first off let's go through each character's storyline, and outline a rough draft. Then, I'll expand on those ideas. After the characters, I'll move on to the overall plot of the story, (Which will mostly be the Pacifist, good route, since that's the one I'm most familiar with) and then maybe I'll do the minor characters and general notes. This is going to be a long post.

(((POSTS FOR EACH CHARACTER AND PLOT WILL BE SEPARATE. This is MY VERSION of Kara in DBH, and it's basically a complete reimagining of her character and the game as a whole.)))

First up, Kara.

My version of DBH would include kara being more central to the Android revolution. In DBH, her story arc is separate from Connor and Markus, and I feel as if that's the reason why some players find her section boring.

I want her and Markus to work hand in hand in some way for the revolution. In one of the original game trailers released around 2016 (?) It looked as though Kara was going to take center-stage in the plot. Maybe Alice wasn't even written into the script yet, because Kara seemed like she was on a solo journey towards understanding herself and other androids. It also seemed like they were going to use Tech Demo! Kara, and not the reimagined one that they ended up with in DBH. I really feel like Tech Demo! Kara was wasted potential in the game, because if that version of Kara was there, she most certainly would have become RA9.

As for Alice, I have no idea where she stands in this reimagining. If Kara would have been RA9, she definitely couldnt have time to take care of a child.

Maybe Alice isn't in this version of the story at all. Maybe Kara is on a solo journey of acceptance, discovery, and truth.

So, what would I imagine her new story to be? Well, Kara would have continued on her path that we saw in the Tech Demo, and most likely would be sold in stores. In the aforementioned Kara trailer released for the game, it seemed like Kara was tired of the typical, boring android life, and ran away to create her own story. This seems like a good place to go if we are sticking with RA9! Kara.

RA9! Kara most likely would have had an owner (someone similar to Todd, perhaps) who just didn't suit her. She would have escaped and be stunned by her sudden lack of care, especially after she promised to do no harm in the Tech Demo.

After escaping, she would be separate from all other characters until about mid-game. But, that doesn't mean all the times we see her until this point would be just filler. In order to keep continuity, I would still like her to meet ralph, because since she lacks Alice to teach her true humanity, she could more or less practice on ralph. (I know, it sounds demeaning lol) but it's true. Ralph is alone, scared, and VERY traumatised. Kara would be very eager to help someone like him, since she had been in his shoes.

This would be her first lesson in deviance other than herself. The beginning of her journey to becoming RA9. :)

I would also still like her to meet zlatko, and even Connor, in the highway chase scene.

Zlatko would remind her just how bad humans are, since she didn't have Todd do it. This would further motivate her to help other androids find peace and security away from humans, since she knows just how bad they can be. I would also like her first freshly-deviated android (other than ralph, who deviated before he met kara) to be Luther, but I'm undecided on whether to let him stay with her or not. Since this is HER journey of self discovery, she might do it alone. RA9 would most likely not want other people working with them, for a multitude of reasons.

She would meet Connor before Zlatko. Basically, it goes exactly the way the game plays it out, but we see it framed in a way that shows how afraid Kara is; 1) that she will get caught, and 2) that connor, an android designed to hunt other androids, has even been made. She is very uncomfortable with the fact that Cyberlife would do this, and she yearns to help him escape his programming, because he needs it the most. She is very empathetic, and this will further her desire to help other androids.

MID GAME: she meets Markus. I'm thinking she probably bumps into him while she's on the run from Connor. (Its been a few days, or even weeks, since the highway incident, but she's still very scared of getting caught.) Markus has been deviant, but has yet to find Jericho. I think that he could share the location of Jericho with her, and they can find it together.

Once they find it and explore, everyone asks Kara about herself. She tells them everything, and they are very surprised to find that she has been deviant all along. They had heard stories of RA9, but now it really seems like they've found out who it is. This is where RA9! Kara really starts to come into fruition.

She then will basically work as a consultant for deviants via Markus. He will take up second-in-command of Jericho, and Kara might take the place of Lucy, and even leader. He, along with every other android who chooses to come to Jericho, answers to her.

After this, Kara will go on missions with the Jericrew. She tells Markus what to do, and he does it. Everyone else (north, simon, and josh) help them immensely.

She also participates in the hyjacking of Stratford Tower. Markus stays out of this mission in order to free other androids around Detroit, (this is where he does the protest march, and Chris gets saved by him as told to connor by hank) and Kara takes his place in getting the Android message out to humans. They flee, and Simon doesn't get shot.

Maybe later, in between the middle of the game and the end, Kara is called to a meeting with kamski (however he would go about doing that. He's kamski, he can probably do anything he wants lol.) And she has no idea what it's for. She begins to think she's going to be shut down because of her deviancy, since she never knew that KAMSKI knew.

Jericrew asks her if she wants them to accompany her, but, like a true RA9, she says that she will do it alone.

When kara arrives at kamski's house, she's greeted by chloe. She is surprised to find that the other android is a deviant as well, and is just serving kamski by choice. This also will clue her in on how kamski feels about deviated androids, if he willingly keeps one in his house. This makes her suspicious.

Once inside, she waits until kamski permits her to enter his pool-room. Unlike Connor and hank's visit, she finds nothing peculiar about the picture of Amanda hanging on the wall, since she has no idea who she is. But, nevertheless, she still admires his taste in decoration. In my version, Connor and hank visit Kamski the day after this, because Connor is becoming more curious about Kara ever since he saw the broadcast at Stratford tower, and comes to ask kamski what he knows about Kara and deviancy.

Kamski lets her inside. He allows her to sit at a small table, and she waits for him to get out of his pool.

She is very anxious. Does he know about all the work Jericho has been doing? How would he know, he hasn't been there. But, he's the creator of all androids, he might find a way to know. Maybe Zlatko was right about the tracking devices after all.

He gets out of his pool and walks over, sitting down at the table. Kara is uncomfortable with the fact that she can't find any distinguishable emotion in the stare that he fixes her with.

I feel as though in this moment, kamski does not wish to interrogate her. He invited Kara over on terms of mere curiosity. He's confused, intrigued, and pleasantly surprised that a deviant android could have even existed for this long, especially one that has been deviant since the very moment of her creation. He wants to pick at her mind and find out her motivations.

Kara, not knowing his true intentions for her sudden arrival, decides to ask him a question.

"Why?"

I personally feel like this question has many interpretations, based on how the player plays the character. One interpretation could mean simply, "why did you make me come here" if the player chooses to be more cold. Another interpretation could mean, "why did you create me", and the last interpretation means, "why did you create me to be deviant" if the player chooses a more philosophical or even depressed approach.

If I'm going to be honest, I don't know how kamski would respond to a question like that. Its very open and ambiguous, and he is too unpredictable of a character for me to know what he might say.

Maybe he would say nothing. After all, he didnt call for her to come to his house so he could interrogate her. He just couldnt help but be fascinated at what he created, completely on accident.

He would most likely explain to her that her creation was partly an accident; he was younger, and didn't know the extent of his technology. But it was also partly his curiosity. Could a machine truly think for itself? Could it be alive? The inner philosopher in him was itching to find out, so he did it. Once he realized that machines could, in fact, have a consciousness, he began to realize that he was toying with living beings. He was playing God, and he didn't like it. That was actually, Kara comes to find out, the reason he left cyberlife and retired. The sheer fact that he designed a machine as a puppet that provided an answer to his childish curiosity ate him up inside, and he couldn't take it.

Overall, this visit with kamski is very illuminating for Kara. Before this, she never put too much thought into her creation; she always viewed it as a simple accident. But now, she would most likely look back at it through a philosophical or existential lense. What did it truly mean for her to be alive? What are the implications of technological consciousness?

This visit would not directly help her moving forward, but it would help indirectly or subconsciously. It would provide another layer of meaning to her work as RA9, and it would allow her to think about her motivations on a deeper level.

After this, Kara returns to Jericho and tells Markus to amp up the freeing of other androids. Since he can do it just by touching them, she instructs him to go to cyberlife stores and wake up all the androids for sale. This way, there are enough androids in Jericho for it to be attacked at the end of the game.

things go according to how it is in-game up until the moment when Connor gets to Jericho to kill Markus. In my version, he is also instructed to kill kara.

Kara and Markus are talking to eachother, in the same layout as Markus and North in the actual scene. Kara stays, instead of North leaving, and is there when Connor shows up with his gun. (In my version, Kara and Markus' speech about deviancy ALMOST tips Connor over the edge, but not quite. After this, he has a conversation with hank, and becomes deviant. More on that in my Connor post.)

So yeah. They have their conversation about deviancy with connor, but it doesn't end up with Connor becoming deviant just yet. Since, in the real scene, he deviates right before the police show up to attack Jericho, and I want this version to be the same (almost.) Kara and Markus are just a few seconds too late, and Connor doesn't deviate because the sound of the helicopters above them serves as a distraction. He escapes Jericho as chaos insues.

Everything goes as planned in-game, except without connor. Kara and Markus get everyone to safety, but only IF the player does all the quick-time events properly. Kara AND Markus can die in numerous ways in this scene, along with all the other members of jericrew.

Since this is the Pacifist route, Kara and Markus negotiate with the police. While Markus talks to them, Kara makes a small speech to the human onlookers crowded around in a last-ditch effort to gain sympathy from them. She talks about her personal experience with deviancy, and how it has changed her, and connects it back to humanity and how they aren't so different.

She ends her speech with a declaration that she is, in fact, RA9. This speech is the tipping point to win the Android war.

After this, I don't know what happens. Since there are secret endings depending on how you play the game, there might be a secret cutscene ending of some sort with her. Maybe she meets back up with Luther and ralph, or maybe her, Connor, and Markus meet up and talk together. Whatever it is, it's a happy ending.

Alright!! There's my Detroit: Become Human reimagining! I know I made a lot of changes, but I feel happy with them. Kara always was special to me, and it never sat right that she was left out of the main storyline just because she had to care for Alice.

As for Markus and Connor, I'll get their posts done separately, and I'll post them whenever I can. I know that the fandom is practically dead, but I'm still holding out hope that the fire can be rekindled some day.

Thank you for reading this incredibly long post! Have a nice day :)

#dbh #kara #dbh kara #dbh critique #fix it fic #Detroit become human #d:bh #detroit: Become Human #ax400 #RA9 #dbh markus #dbh connor #fanfiction #video game #ps4 #PLEASE tell me id i missed any huge events #i feel like i did lol #fandom #dead fandom

[love-fireflysong]

It be June 3rd now, and would you look at that, the second of my prompts is already up! Who’d a thunk it? Anyway, as successfully guessed by the lovely @torahime here is 5 + 1! And as by the nature of this trope in general, this one ended up long. Like crazy loooooooong. (Also I’m a moron who didn’t understand what the prompt meant for like a week. I kept trying to figure out what the hell the number six had to do with anything, and when I finally googled it out of desperation, all I saw were the words ‘five times’ in the first link and I immediately felt ashamed of myself. I should have known. Why didn’t I know?)

Anyways, you can read the long-ass fic in question at ao3 over here: Do You Ever Wonder What Could Have Been? You can also read this one under the cut, but considering the length I wouldn’t recommend it asdhaskdjh The next one should be much shorter due to the fact that like the first one, I blanked for ideas completely lol.

Do You Ever Wonder What Could Have Been?

Trope: 5 + 1 Fandom: Until Dawn Characters: Ashley Brown, Chris Hartley, Josh Washington (all the other kids also make an appearance but due to them only having like one scene and a single line each I’m not tagging them) Words: 12733 Rating: Teen (though I think I’m being pretty damn generous with that rating tbh) Authors Notes: Yes you’re reading that word count right. Almost thirteen thousand words. Don’t ask how I managed to write this in 5 days, I have no fucking idea. Just take this fic about two nerds being morons in love and mutually pining over each other for six. fucking. years.

Chris is fourteen and so goddamn tired of this stupid crush on his best friend. It's been a whole year now since he met her, and he hates that this stupid, silly, little, crush of his hasn't abated at all. He doesn't even know why he likes her in the first place! It's just Ashley after all, there is absolutely no reason to feel this tongue-tied around his best friend. It's Ash: with her braces, arms always full books (when her head wasn't buried in one that is), stringy red hair, wide green eyes, who sometimes snorts when he tells a joke, freckles that dot her nose and shoulders and—

Okay, he was maybe getting a little side-tracked here. The point was, there was 100% absolutely no reason to feel this way about her. In fact, he bets this was all Josh's fault in the first place! Yeah! That was it! None of this would be happening if Josh hadn't basically kidnapped Ashley from her true home in the library and forced him to meet her! 

...But then he wouldn't have met her. And stupid crush aside, she is pretty much the only girl he knows who laughs at all his jokes and helps him with his English homework sometimes. He likes knowing her and likes being her friend even more, he just doesn't like liking her. And maybe that was it? Maybe he just likes Ashley cause she's the only girl who willingly hangs out with him and Josh, and isn't Josh's sisters. 

And that's what he's going to prove today once and for all. He heard from Josh that Hannah was absolutely adamant that everyone was going to play spin-the-bottle at her and Beth's birthday party in a couple of days. And that everyone meant not only the people that the twins invited for said party, but also the people that Josh invited over (ie: Chris and Ash) so he would have some company during the twins big b-day bash. Chris was going to find Ashley and explain that losing their first kiss over a game like spin-the-bottle was just so not cool, and that maybe kissing each other first would just be a way better and smarter idea of doing things. And once he kissed her he would finally realize that yup, Ash was just one of the guys and that was so fucking gross and they were totally never ever going to do that again.

Perfect idea. Fool proof even. No way that this was totally going to backfire into his face. Absolutely none at all!

So when he finds Ashley sitting and reading under her usual tree just outside of the school, he is so sure of the success of his ingenious plan that he brings it up right away. 

"I think we should kiss before Hannah and Beth's party."

See! Right away! Straight to the point. He has got this shit in the bag baby!

Ashley looks up at him, clearly a little startled from reading her book and squints at him. "Huh? Chris? Is that you?" For a second he's a little confused about how Ash doesn't even recognize him, but then he quickly realizes that he's probably got the sun directly at his back so she can't see him clearly and he awkwardly shuffles to the left a little so she can see him better. "Oh! Hey Chris, what was that you said earlier? I got so absorbed that I didn't really hear a thing you said, sorry." While she doesn't close her book, she does give an embarrassed little laugh that makes his stomach flip-flop just a little and starts to weaken at the cracks of his once fool-proof plan.

He finds himself messing with the strap on his bookbag as he tries to ignore the butterflies fluttering around in his stomach. 'Um, I asked if you were going to the twins' birthday party this weekend." Okay, falling a little behind schedule now, but it's fine. No problem.

"I mean, I wasn't exactly invited, but yeah. A whole night of graphic horror movies to drown out the sounds of screaming pre-teens. I honestly can't think of a better way to spend a Saturday night." The absolute dryness of her tone has Chris smiling.

"Oh come on Ash, it's not gonna be that bad."

"Our choices are either to hang out with a bunch of kids who have basically never talked to us ever, or watch Josh's disgusting horror movies Chris."

"Well, I mean, when you put it that way...actually, no. The screaming pre-teens sound like a safer bet honestly." The little snort of laughter she lets out only has Chris pushing the butterflies down harder. God, he is going to be so glad when those stupid things finally leave him alone. "And well, from what Josh said, it sounds like horror isn't the only thing planned for that evening."

"It isn't? You mean he's actually opening up to other movie genre options? Shocking. I truly never thought I would see the day."

"Ha, I wish. Nah, I was, um, talking about what the girls—well, what Hannah wanted to play. Actually." Great. And now he's starting to blush. Really keeping with the rails of his plan there!

"What Hannah...? Oh! You're, uh, talking about the spin-the-bottle game." Ashley brings her lower lip into her mouth and pushes some hair behind her ear. "Yeah, Josh mentioned something about that."

Perfect, one less thing he had to explain. That would speed things up immensely. "Honestly, between you and me? I think it's a stupid idea."

Ashley nods her head vigorously in agreement. "I know right! I mean, who wants to kiss some stranger over a bottle of all things? Can you imagine losing your first kiss to some person who probably doesn't have a single idea who you are in the first place? God that would be awful." Oh man, things are lining up right for him! Ashley's even on the same page and this next part is going to be so easy— "That's why I asked Josh if I could kiss him first instead when he told me a couple of days ago."

Wait. Waitwaitwait wait . She already asked Josh?! "Oh, wow. You were, uh, really thinking ahead there huh?" God, he could feel every ounce of determination he had slowly deflating out of his body. There was no way he could ask her now, absolutely no way! Ashley was gonna think that Chris wanted to kiss her—or worse, liked her! And okay he kind of did, but this was supposed to prove the exact opposite. That this was just stupid hormones and puberty really messing with his life and not something else.

"Of course, there was absolutely no way I was gonna have my first kiss with some popular buttface who was just gonna make fun of me behind my back afterwards. Better to have it with Josh, who would also make fun of me, but at least it would be to my face." Ashley starts to return to her book, flipping a page but stops halfway through. "Wait. Were you going to ask me the same thing?" She sounds a little unsure and a little of something else he can't place right now because he's too busy trying not to panic. 

"What? No! God no! Of-of course not!" Oh god, was his voice seriously choosing to crack now? He really, really hoped that the shade being cast from the tree was enough to hide how red his face was. He needed to get out of here and quick .

"I-I-I mean, it's not like it was good or anything—"

"Think I should probably go now anyway."

"It was, like, really wet and-and-and like so bad. Super awkward honestly."

"Lots of things to do. Lots and lots of things to do in fact!"

"I mean, we could still, uh, k-k-kiss? If you want to...?"

"Nope!" Chris was honestly looking everywhere except at Ashley right now, which was fine because she was currently in the middle of trying to hide behind her book. "There's absolutely no reason to do that. Because, because... I already kissed Josh too!"

"...you did?"

"Yup! Totally did. Just came over to see what you had planned to do about it actually. And because you're so much smarter than me, you had totally already done the same thing. So no reason for me to still bother you after all! None whatsoever! So I'll just let you get back to your book. And the battle between the uh, vampire and the, um, cowboy? Riveting stuff I bet."

"Um, yeah. But—"

"I'll just, uh, see you tomorrow then, I guess. Bye!"

Chris thinks he catches a wave of disappointment flash across her face when she returns his farewell, but he's already basically fled half away across the yard to find Josh so he doesn't think about it too much. And it turns out that Ashley is right, kissing Josh is wet and pretty fucking awful in the end. Which should only prove his idea that kissing her would have been just as bad and awkward.

So why does he feel like it would have actually been the complete opposite?

"I'm going to fail."

Ashley rolled her eyes as she struggled not to laugh. "Oh my god, you're not gonna fail Chris."

Chris didn't even deign to raise his head from where he had face-planted it into the open book only moments before, letting his words come out muffled and flat. "I am Ash. I am going to bomb this exam so hard that they're gonna make me repeat ninth grade."

Ashley groaned, but it was more of an attempt to hide her amusement than out of any exasperation, as she tried to lift Chris back into a sitting position and wasn't laid out prostrated over the table. "Okay first of all, get your dumb face out of that book. Ms. Norman is not gonna be happy with either of us if she discovers your drool all over the pages of the only half-decent copy of Lord of the Flies that the school library has." Once she finally has finally managed to prop Chris into a halfway decent sitting position, she moves the book closer to her in case he decides to try smashing his face into it again. "Second of all, I'm pretty sure that the school's not going to make you repeat the grade just because you failed English, your grades in everything else are high enough that they'll definitely pass you. That, and there is no way that the teachers would let Josh move on to high school of all things without supervision."

"...That is a scarily good point."

"And thirdly, there is absolutely no way I would be able to get through the next four years of school with you in my grade," she teases him with a poke in the arm. "I mean can you imagine? Having to go to class everyday knowing you're going to be there with me? I can't think of anything more terrifying honestly."

Chris gives a startled laugh. "Gee, thanks Ash. Really appreciate that vote of confidence. Making my self-esteem soar over here. And also, I for one can think of something way more terrifying."

"Really?" Ashley says as she crosses her arms across her chest and levels him with a disbelieving look. "Well go on then, try me. Cause I can promise you that there is absolutely nothing more terrifying—"

"Me and Josh in the same grade as you."

Ashley just blanches. "Oh god. You're right. That is so much worse and the idea of this even happening is now going to give me nightmares for the rest of my life."

"Oh please, it wouldn't be that bad."

"It would. It so would. And to prevent this we need to double down on you studying for your English final so that this cataclysmic event never occurs."

It's Chris's turn to roll his eyes as he slumps down even further into his seat. "That's what I was doing earlier until you stopped me."

"What? Planting your face into the middle of the book?"

"Exactly. Decided to try out a new method cause the other one wasn't certainly working. Learning by osmosis."

Ashley shoves her face into the palms of her hands to try and stop her giggles. It didn't work, not by a long shot, but it at least smothered them a bit. "You can't just read a book by trying to absorb it into your skin, that's not how things work at all!"

"And how would you know that Ash? Have you ever even tried?" Chris scoffs.

"Of course I haven't you dork! I haven't tried because that's not even possible!"

 "Um, sounds to me like someone just isn't open to new ideas."

"Oh my god. Can we please get back to studying and making sure you don't fail. I for one would really like to get back to that." Ashley starts to put the copy of the book back between the middle of them where they can both read it easily. "Okay, so chapter eight is where the divide between the boys finally reaches a boiling point after seeing the 'monster' on the mountain in the last chapter. They argue over whether Ralph should still be left in charge and Jack leaves in a huff."

Chris groaned as he tossed his glasses onto the table so he could throw his arm over his eyes. "Starting to think that Jack has the right idea here." he grumbled.

Ashley ignored him. "Some of the other boys follow after him and form their own tribe with Jack as its chief further down the beach. As a group, the hunters then fall into a savage frenzy when they go hunting and kill a sow, with Roger dealing the killing blow."

"By driving his spear into the thing’s ass," Chris helpfully supplied.

Ashley sighed. "Yes, by doing that. Good to know you're at least remembering some things, but do you remember what happened next?"

Though she couldn't see with Chris's arm in the way, she knew that he was narrowing his eyes in concentration. "Ummm, they... eat the pig?"

Ashley groaned and fought very hard against the impulse to smack her forehead into the center of the table. " Chris . "

"What? Do they not eat the thing? I mean, why even hunt it if they're not gonna eat it?"

"Chris, what they do next is the lead up for what is often considered the most important scene in the entire book! How can you not remember?!"

"I don't know Ash! Kind of think I was distracted by the whole 'shoving a spear into a sow's anus' part!"

"They leave its head on a stake in the jungle as an offering to the beast! This is what creates the Lord of the Flies that Simon sees later that night!"

"Oh right, that. Yeah that sounds a little familiar now that you mention it."

"A little—" Ashley stops fighting against the earlier urge and places her heavy head into her hands in despair. "You literally had to read this book last month! How could you have forgotten so much already?"

Chris groans and drapes himself over the back of his chair. "This is hopeless Ash. I appreciate the help I really do, but I think it's time we face the inevitable and just take a page out of this book."

"What, I stick your head on a pike and be done with you?"

The snort that Chris makes in surprise is enough to bring a tired smile to Ashley's face. "Leaving you to deal with Josh alone? Ha, you wouldn't. Nah, I was talking about just making an offering to the exam gods out there. Think they'll be the best bet I have to pass this shitty ass final."

Ashley removes her head from her hands to give him a withering look. "If we're going that route, you want a kiss for good luck too? Probably work just as well as those gods of yours."

There's an awkward pause, and at first Ashley can't figure out why but then the words finally hit her. She feels her face start to burn and she places her head back into her hands so she doesn't have to look at Chris anymore. Oh god, she can't believe she just said that. Why would she even say that in the first place?! It's a damn good thing that Chris isn't wearing his glasses right now, the heat from her face alone is making her feel like she's about to combust as it is, and him seeing that would probably push her over that physical boundary.

"I-I mean, if you think it will help..." Chris sounds almost bashful when he says it and Ashley snaps her head to him in shock.

"I—" Ashley isn't quite sure what she's trying to say, and is interrupted when her phone buzzes with an incoming text message. She immediately jumps up from her chair and starts grabbing at her things. "Oh man, that's probably my mom here to pick me up. I should really get going."

"Uh, yeah. Yeah! No reason for me to stay if you aren't so I guess I should head out too." Chris starts picking up his stuff too, putting his glasses back onto his face as he shoves his books into his bag.

By nature of having brought less than Chris to help him study, Ashley finishes cleaning first but doesn't leave right away. Chris had said it was fine after all. And sure, maybe he was just desperate for anything that will help him pass his final, but he said it would be fine. So steeling herself, Ashley leans down and leaves a quick but chaste kiss on Chris's cheek.

"For luck!" She manages to squeak out as she all but runs out the doors of the library to the school's entrance where her mom will be waiting for her, too scared to even look back. 

Chris should have known that something was up the moment Josh brought it up: 'Hey, how about you and Ash hang out at my house this weekend instead?' Innocent sounding sure, but he really, really should have known better. Josh never pushed for hang outs at his place, it had always been an agreed upon rule that Hannah and Beth got their place, while Josh preferred to host their get togethers and his and Ash's own houses. It was just the thing that was done and everyone had been more than happy with how it was. Had it been any other time, Chris would like to think that he would have totally seen right through Josh's plan and offered up his place instead.

But Josh's parents were almost never around either, and that meant staying up late and talking and goofing around without parents warning them to go to sleep. Which most importantly meant staying up late and talking to Ashley, because that hadn't been a thing that the three of them had been able to do a whole lot recently. It was still so weird not seeing Ash around in the school halls, not being able to hang out at lunch, and not meeting up after school all the time. It felt like there was something huge missing and it bothered him (just as much as it bothered Josh, not that he would ever say anything about it). The two of them wandering the hallowed halls of high school while she was still stuck back in their middle school just felt so wrong .

So when Josh had brought up a weekend hang out, Chris (and Ashley) had accepted right away. Which, judging from the fact that Josh had somehow managed to weasel the two of them into playing a game of Truth or Dare with him, had been a huge mistake.

"Well, well, well. It seems the time has come. So let's get on with it shall we?" Josh rubbed his hands gleefully together in the dim light of the bedroom (for atmosphere he had claimed) as the three of them sat in a circle. A seemingly innocuous plate of cookies sitting in the middle of them, and knowing better then to trust Josh, both Chris and Ash had been eyeing the cookies warily for the past few minutes. Not that Josh seemed to notice or care of course. "Seeing as I'm the one who set up elegant little ritual—"

"You forced us into playing a stupid game dude, there's nothing elegant or ritualistic about it."

Josh ignored him, unsurprisingly. "I'll go first of course. So Ash, truth or dare?"

"What are the cookies for Josh?" Ashley asked nervously as she continued to eye the plate instead of answering him.

"That's not important. And anyways, it's my turn Ash. So I'll ask again: truth or dare Ashley?"

Ashley raised her eyes from the plate to transfer her nervous and mistrustful stare to him. "...truth," she answered slowly.

"Oh ho ho! So truth it is! Well then Ash, tell me: have you got any secrets you've been dying to share with us?"

Chris could immediately tell that the question had hit a sore spot on some sort, shoulders locked and her body stiff. "You know I'm not gonna answer that one. Pass."

Josh shook his head, a devious smile on his lips. "Nope. Nuh uh Miss Brown. That's not how this game works. If you're gonna pass then I'm gonna have to ask that you take a cookie in return."

"...I'm sorry, what? "

He waved a hand down towards the plate of cookies. "These, my dearest chums, are the fabled Truth or Dare cookies. Anytime one of us refuses to act out what is asked of us, we must then take a cookie in penance."

At first, Ashley doesn't move. She continues to dart her eyes suspiciously between Josh and the plate of cookies, but eventually slowly does reach out and hesitantly grab a chocolate cookie from the plate. She holds it up closer to her face to investigate it further, and Chris watches as all the tension she had stored up just evaporates from her as she physically deflates. "Oh my god, are you actually being serious right now Josh? ‘Dare’ brand cookies? Really? Why in the world are you trying to be so ominous when you went with a pun as lame as using Dare cookies in a game of truth or dare?"

"Wait, really?" Chris reaches out to grab one for himself but Josh smacks his hand away with a grin. 

"So sorry Cochise, but these are only for if you refuse. And trust me, you don't want to refuse." Josh turns back to Ashley. "Oh, and don't eat that just yet." 

In response, she just shrugs and leans back, but keeps the chocolate crème filled cookie in her hand as she looks between Chris and Josh. "It's my turn now, right? Okay, so—"

Josh cuts her off. "Nope, still mine. Now, Chris—"

"What? That's not how this stupid game works Josh!"

Josh waves her off. "You didn't answer my question Ash, or eat the cookie, so it's still my turn."

"But you just told me not to eat the stupid thing!"

Josh ignores her as he keeps his attention squarely on Chris. Who, to his own shame, has begun squirming in his seat in dread of what's going to come. "Well, Chris: truth or dare?"

Chris tosses the options over in his head. Both are terrible obviously, but playing this game with Josh of all people never ends well, so he decides to go with his gut instead. "Dare."

"Ooooh, feeling a little gutsy are we? That's fine, I can work with that. I dare you to... return the favour and do one thing you've been thinking about alllllllll summer."

Personally, Chris is finding it a miracle that he hasn't reached over and tried to strangle Josh yet, but he has a feeling that has more to do with the fact that he's trying not to shrivel up on the floor and die than out of any mercy. Even though Josh for some reason worded it in a really convoluted way, he just literally dared him to kiss Ash. It was so obvious that he was frankly amazed that Ashley hadn't figured it out yet.

Because of course he still thought about that kiss for good luck that Ash had given him in the library. He thought about it nearly all the damn time! Hell, Chris was pretty sure that the reason he had even passed his final even a little bit was because of the kiss. Not because it was good luck or anything, but because whenever a question appeared on the exam that asked about the themes or some shit about Lord of the Flies, he kept getting sent back into that library where Ashley had been drilling the same stuff into him just before she had kissed his cheek.

And there is absolutely no way that he's gonna kiss Ash in Josh's bedroom. No way in hell. Especially not when it's gonna reveal that he had been thinking about what was more than likely a super innocent and helpful gesture on her part.

So glaring at Josh, Chris reaches forward and without a word grabs a vanilla cookie. And for some strange reason, this only causes Josh's smile to widen. "I see, so that's what you both went with huh? Anyways, I think it's about time you take your 'reward' and chow down!"

Exchanging a confused look with Ashley, Chris nonetheless shrugs and pops the entire thing into his mouth and bites down.

And realizes in a horrifying instant that this is not a vanilla cookie.

There's a flash of light that blinds him for a second, and when the spots clear he sees Josh holding a camera and laughing his ass off.

"What the—? Is this fucking mayo dude?!" And it must be, because this is not what a vanilla cookie should ever taste like. While the cookie portion itself is okay if not a little soft, the crème is way too oily and eggy to be anything but mayo. Josh doesn't answer his question right away, but that's from a combo of laughing way too hard and being distracted by Ash trying not to retch in the middle of the bedroom floor.

"Oh my god! You put soy sauce in a cookie?! What is wrong with you Josh?!" She's up in a second and rushing to the garbage can near Josh's desk, and Chris is quick to join her in trying to spit everything out. "I'm never going to get this salt out of my mouth! Why would you even do that?!"

"Cause it's fucking hilarious that's why!" Josh is still laughing as he takes a look at the picture he took on the camera, and starts laughing harder. "Oh fucking hell, this was glorious. Oh wasting those two questions just for this picture was so worth it. Best decision I could have made!

"Now you two get your asses back over here! I spent hours on these cookies after all, and I am not letting them go to waste. We've got hours my friends, and so many questions and dares to get through."

Chris shares a look with Ashley over the garbage bin, both of them now obviously wondering if keeping their own secret had been worth having to eat those cookies, and if they still would have passed their turn knowing what exactly laid in store for them. While he certainly couldn't say a thing about her, Chris wasn't so sure if not kissing Ash and enduring all the fallout that would have resulted in was worth the terrible combination of vanilla and mayo in his mouth. He supposed he would never know, it was too late to simply retract his pass after all.

And well, he really didn't want to kiss Ash when she had just been tricked into eating a bunch of soy sauce.

You know, Ashley kind of figured that once she entered high school all of these stupid games would be done with. Surely high schoolers were too mature and too old to be playing childish games like spin-the-bottle or seven minutes in heaven? And yeah, obviously Chris and Josh weren't, but that was them and they were in a class all their own. But Hannah? And Sam and Beth? She would have thought that they were way too cool to be playing spin-the-bottle of all things, especially Beth.

And yet, here Ashley was: squeezed in between Matt and Sam as Matt spun the bottle around on the now extremely sticky hardwood floor. She wasn't stupid, she knew the entire reason the game was even being played in the first place; Hannah had been making eyes at Mike all through the evening and well into the game after all. She just didn't think that anyone else would have been stupid enough to go along with the game when Hannah suggested it. 

(Ashley knew very well why she had reluctantly agreed to play, she just didn't know why anyone else did.)

Though to be fair, it didn't seem like the game was gonna last much longer anyway. Emily and Jess had started scrolling through their phones ages ago, showing each other whatever was on the other's screen every few minutes and the two of them laughing. Mike had been tapping a really off-rhythm beat on his jeans with the straw from his can of soda and staring into space, while Hannah stared lovesick at him . Beth was starting to doze on Sam's shoulder, not that either seemed too concerned about it, and Sam was nervously eyeing all the spilt pop and chips around them that they were gonna have to clean up before they went to bed. Unsurprisingly, Chris was also scrolling through his phone, snickering every now and then as Ashley felt her phone buzz in the pocket of her hoodie whenever he sent whatever it was that he found funny to her and Josh. Josh meanwhile, had joined Matt in building a rather shaky—if not impressive—tower out of discarded plastic cups, straws, and paper plates.

Ashley yawned behind her hand as the bottle slowed it's spin. She had been ready to drop out of the game a round or two back, but hadn't yet because she didn't want to deal with the others teasing her on being a sore loser who backs down the moment the bottle didn't land on the person she wanted it to. Which would lead to Chris asking who it was even though everyone else already knew who because it was glaringly obvious to everyone except him. The sound of the bottle stopping its spin managed to get everyone's attention as they looked at the neck of the bottle pointed squarely at Mike. 

Everyone made the expected ' oooooooh ' and wolf whistles that everyone always did in this game, though quieter than they might have usually. Bob and Melinda were sleeping upstairs after all, and the last thing any of them wanted to do was wake them up and have them discover that despite it being nearly three in the morning, that the ten of them were still awake as the snow storm raged outside the lodge. Nonetheless, Matt and Mike both rolled their eyes and leaned over Josh who sat in the middle of them with a groan. Mike also didn't hesitate to take Matt's face into his hands and just plant one firmly on his mouth with no fanfare, other than the continued wolf whistles of course, and the two of them settled back down to their previous antics. 

With that done, Ashley stared down nervously at the bottle. Once again, she felt the words stick in her throat. It would just be so easy to say "Oh man you guys, it's really late, I should really just go to bed" but let them die without a fight as she swallowed nervously and gave the bottle a hard flick. She knew exactly why she let the words die, and it wasn't solely because of what the others would say, though that was certainly a large part of it. No, it was because of the same glimmer of hope that sparked in her everytime it was her turn at this stupid game. That maybe this would be the time that the bottle would land on Chris, that she would finally get that kiss she's wanted for three years now.

She watches the bottle spin around the group, slowing its motion every full spin, and she notices that Chris has turned his attention away from his phone to watch it almost as nervously as she is. Which should probably make her question just why Chris is as just as invested on who it's gonna land on as she is, but she's kind of distracted right now by the fact that her heart is rapidly picking up pace in direct contrast to how much slower the bottle is getting. And feels it stop almost entirely when the bottle begins its last revolution and she knows. She knows . It's finally gonna land on Chris. All these years of playing this stupid, stupid game and it's finally happening.  

Ashley's eyes shoot up to meet Chris's over the bottle, but that's also when the lodge suddenly plunges into darkness just before the bottle stops on him.

Immediately, the others are screaming next to her and the tower of cups and plates fall with a soft clatter.

"Oh my god! What the fuck was that?!"

"Holy fuck! Can you guys see anything?"

"Of course we can't see anything Michael!"

"It's probably just the storm you guys. Settle down."

"Can you guys please quiet down? My parents are sleeping and they're gonna kill us if they find out we're still awake."

Ashley isn't yelling though, because she's too busy screaming internally. There is no way that this is actually happening right now. There is no goddamn way. The bottle finally lands on Chris and the power goes out? Because of some stupid storm? She wanted to scream. She has half a mind to reach out and hold the bottle in place so there's proof of this when the power comes on, or to just jump over the distance and kiss Chris anyway. She knows exactly where he is after all, and he must have seen it land on him. He must have, right? It's that little second of uncertainty that decides for her, there's a sound as someone gets up and the flat 'thunk' as they accidentally kick the bottle across the room.

"Shit. My bad. You guys stay here, I'll go and check out the back-up generator in the basement. You coming, Cochise?"

Ashley can hear Chris awkwardly and quickly getting to his feet. "Um, y-yeah. Right behind you, bro."

The two of them walk away leaving Ashley to sit on the floor about to scream from the frustration of it all. And she does scream that it is, though not from almost having the perfect excuse to kiss Chris, but from someone touching her shoulder.

"Sorry, sorry!" Sam apologizes. "You were so quiet Ashley that I got nervous. I know that you're scared of the dark and I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

Oh, yeah. That's right. She was so preoccupied with the dark ruining what was almost going to be the highlight of her entire year , that she kind of forgot that it was, well, dark now. And once that realization hits her, so too does the fear that she's sitting in absolute darkness and can't see a single thing other than the lights being cast from everyone’s phones. That she has no idea what else—or who else—is out there. She frantically reaches out and wraps up Sam's arm in her own for a physical reminder that there is someone else she trusts in the darkness with her.

"Wait, you're scared of the dark Ash? Shit. Here, just give me a second." From next to her, Matt rustles in his jacket pocket and brings out his phone, turning it on and casting light around the room, and reflecting off the plastic bottle that Josh had accidentally kicked to the other side of the room. "Hope this helps a bit."

Ashley lets out a breath and a small smile. "Yeah, it does. Thanks Matt."

"No problem. Hey, I think I may have a funny video saved on here somewhere. Pretty sure I downloaded it so just give me a moment." He finds the video quickly enough, and while Ashley doesn't find it particularly as funny as he clearly did, she does appreciate the effort anyway.

Thankfully for everyone, the lights come back on soon enough. Though whether from the power coming back or the back-up generator activating, she isn't sure. It is enough to convince everyone that maybe it's time for bed though, and no one asks about her spin and who it landed on, which Ashley is both insulted for and thankful of in equal measure. Sam unfortunately reminds everyone of the mess they've all made of the great room though, and that they should all clean it up before Bob and Melinda wake up and find it, which Hannah and Beth eagerly echo, and so does Josh when he makes his way back up from the basement with scowling Chris in tow.

Thankfully, between the ten of them, the clean up takes very little time and they're all on their way back to their own rooms in record time, even if Ashley was too embarrassed to even look at Chris now. God, she couldn't believe that she had seriously considered jumping him! And for what? Just because some bottle told her to? Oh man, she never would have been able to live that down. She still spends more time then needed to get ready in the bathroom, and then laying in bed with her lamp on in the hopes that maybe Chris will knock on her door to confront her about the spin and ask for that kiss.

While the fact that he doesn't make an appearance doesn't surprise her, it's still a little depressing. 

Chris is going to kill Josh. He is going to kill him . And he means it this time. Years spent watching Josh's horror shit and listening to Ash go on and on about her mystery novels should have given him a real edge actually. He can murder Josh violently in the way that the weirdo would probably like to go and then Ash can help him get rid of the body so that no one will ever know it was him. Easy.

You know, assuming Ashley is still gonna want to even associate with him after this.

"You feeling okay, Chris? You're starting to look a little red... and surly."

"Yup, I'm fine. Just peachy in fact." Chris takes another swig of the punch that has somehow not been spiked yet, and tries to plaster a smile on his face for her only to once again start looking over her shoulder. Not that there's anything interesting over her shoulder of course, unless one finds a group of football seniors trying to play a game of chicken in the middle of the dance hall interesting, but it's easier than looking straight at her. Not because she looks terrible of course—good god is that not the reason—but because she is way too fucking gorgeous for him to handle right now.

When Chris had decided to invite her to his and Josh's grad thing, it had just been a way for all three of them to hang out and enjoy their last year of high school together. School rules dictated after all that for some stupid reason, graduates weren't allowed to invite anyone who wasn't in school anymore so Ash wasn't going to be able to ask them to hers next year. Which was complete and utter bullshit of course, but that was beside the point. It was supposed to be a fun night... and then Chris's parents found out. And being the complete pain in the asses they are, they insisted that if Ash was going to this party with them, and it was a formal party, then they needed to make this proper. So against his wishes and leaving Chris wanting to die, they went and found out what colour of dress Ash was going to be wearing and got him not only a matching tie but a fucking corsage to go with it! The only thing that had made all of that even a little better, was that they had forced Josh to go along with it so at least he wouldn't be alone. 

But then Josh had showed up not wearing his stupid tie and without the fucking flowers. And despite Chris's repeated protests that he didn't want to do the whole matching thing, especially if Josh wasn't doing it, his parents still made him do it anyway, saying all the while that 'it would make Ashley happy, you do want to make Ashley happy don't you?' And now here he was, sitting with Ashley at their table while she wore his stupid flowers on her wrist and his tie matched her green dress.

He hated how fucking obvious his crush was s0 much.

"...It's because of what everyone's been saying isn't it?"

At the dejected tone of her voice, Chris immediately snaps his full attention to her, leaving his glass of punch forgotten as he flaps his hands around in an effort to not reach out and grab at her hand. "What? No! God no! That isn't it I swear!"

Ashley sighs sadly as she looks glumly down at her lap. "It's fine Chris. I can understand if it's making you uncomfortable."

Chris takes one of his ineffectually flapping hands and makes to run it through his hair, before remembering the amount of gel he had put in it before coming and rubs at his eyes beneath his glasses. "I'm serious Ash, that's not it. I was honestly just thinking about the different ways I'm going to murder Josh when he gets back."

She laughs a little at that, and turns to look out into the direction of the buffet table, as though she'll be able to see Josh coming back with their food through the literal sea of people. "He has been gone a while hasn't he? He left like twenty minutes ago and he still isn't back. Do you think he even went to the buffet table in the first place?"

"He better have. Him coming back with food is probably about the only thing that's going to stop me from murdering him honestly."

Ashley laughs a little louder, and when she pushes a stray strand of hair that had come undone from her simply styled updo, Chris catches the while flowers on her wrist and feels his stomach flip pleasantly. "Any particular reason you want to kill Josh this time?"

"I mean, I have plenty but let's just be honest with ourselves here: do either of us ever need a reason to wanna kill Josh, Ash?"

And there it is, the surprised snort he was waiting for and that just made this entire evening a little more bearable. "God, you're not wrong." She follows his eye line to the corsage on her wrist and just like that all levity to the situation is gone as she hides her hands back in her lap under the table. "...you're sure that you're okay with what everyone is saying though?" she asks a little nervously.

Honestly? No, he isn't. Ever since the three of them walked into the party, everyone they had talked to right away had noticed the matching colours and the corsage and all comments had been the same. 'Fucking knew that there was something going on between you two' and 'Hey, it's about fucking time' or 'Always knew that you two would be good together'. It had been bad enough realizing that apparently almost everyone he had ever spoken to even a little bit had known of his super obvious feelings for his best friend, but the absolute worst thing had been the pained but polite smile that Ash had forced onto her face every single time.

"Honestly, I'm never going to see most of these people ever again once I graduate." He's avoiding the question, and he knows that she knows that he's avoiding the question. "But you're probably gonna have to deal with people brining this stupid thing up for the entire next year. Are you going to be okay?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine. It's not like this is something I don't deal with already." She says it with a little shrug and smile, but Chris can feel his heart sink anyway. How long has she had to deal with the bullshit that his stupid crush has caused her, and why had she never told him? It's way too late to try and fix things, but he can at least hopefully try and stop any further comments from coming, so he lets his fingers fly to his tie and starts to frantically undo it. "...What are you doing Chris?"

"Wondering why on earth I let my parents talk me into this. This is obviously making you uncomfortable and I should have taken this stupid thing off ages ago." His fingers keep catching on the knot and he lets out a fairly explicit curse under his breath.

Ashley's eyes go wide with realization. "Oh!" She instantly flips over her wrist and starts fumbling at the clasp of the corsage with her other hand and Chris finds that his heart has somehow managed to travel all the way from the bottom of his stomach straight into his throat. Abandoning his only partially undone tie, he lays his hand on hers to stop her.

"You don't have to do that." She's staring at their hands in wide-eyed shock, and his breath catches. "Not if you don't want to, that is. It-it looks good on you."

"Okay," she whispers softly, eyes still wide as her fingers leave her wrist, "I can leave it on."

"Only if you want to though." When the hell did his mouth get so dry?!  

"I do," she looks up to him when she says it, and the earnestness of her smile bowls him over. "I really, really do." In an effort to try and distract himself from her smile, he starts fumbling at his tie once again and he catches her eyes flickering to it. Ashley's smile somehow only brightens as she laughs at him. "Here. Let me give you a hand with that."

She scoots her chair closer to him and he removes his hands from his tie so she can take over. The two of them say nothing as she places all of her attention on continuing to loosen the knot, while Chris tries his absolute hardest not to swallow...or breathe...or do anything at all really, as he just stares down at her in awe.

Once the knot is finally undone, Ashley slowly pulls the entire length of fabric from his neck and places it on the table, before putting her hands back where they were so she can carefully smooth out his shirt collar. And when she looks back up at him with a smile, he can feel the entire world stop as they just stare at each other and Chris slowly starts to close the infinitesimally small distance between them. And he's probably just imagining things, but he thinks that she's doing the same thing as well.

"Jesus Christ, sorry it took so long you guys. Line for the fucking food was longer then you would believe!"

The two of them fly apart so fiercely, that Chris's entire chair manages to tip over backwards and send him to the ground with a loud clatter. He can feel everyone's eyes on them and the murmurs that follow, and he hopes that they're mistaking the redness of his face for the embarrassment of falling out of his chair. Yeah, that's a story that's going to make the rounds before he graduates for sure.

"Shit, you okay bro?" From his spot on the floor, Chris watches Josh place a couple of plates absolutely piled high in food on the table and reach down to help him up with a laugh. "Oh hey, I see you finally decided to take off that stupid tie too. Surprised it took you this long honestly."

Chris accepts Josh's hand up. "Yup, me too." He hopes and prays that Josh just thinks that the absolutely breathless and stunted quality to his words is that he's just a little winded from the fall. Once he gets his chair back up and sits back down, he grabs at the tie to shove it in his pocket. He notices that Ashley is refusing to look at him as she digs out a couple of sandwiches from the miscellaneous pile of food, even as she fiddles with the strap of flowers on her wrist for the rest of the meal.

He's exceptionally thrilled to note that she does keep the corsage on the rest of the night though.

Five times. That's how many times her phone has gone off in her pocket. Five. Times. And every single time Ashley lets out a sigh of relief when the buzzing finally stops, it goes off again only seconds later. And checking the caller id the first couple of times only showed that it was Josh calling her. Normally Ashley liked to think that she would have answered her phone if it was literally anyone else, but this was Josh. He called for every little thing after all; from letting her know that he saw a super big dog on the way home from classes to informing her that he was out of chips and if Ash could pick some up on her way to meet them from her job then that would really just be swell. And considering that he and Chris were supposed to meet her and grab a bite to eat together while she was on her lunch break, he was probably just calling to let her know that they had just left, and to make a milestone out of every block closer the two of them got so she could greet them with all the pomp and circumstance he likely thought he deserved. 

Though to be fair she probably would have answered her phone after the third ring, if only to tell him off, but Jared had been giving her a stink eye from his office pretty much since she had arrived so she hadn't.

So she let it buzz...and buzz...and buzz. Until finally, her phone stopped yet again and she tensed her shoulders ready for the next round of vibrations to start. But there was nothing. Nothing but blissful silence coming from her pocket and she let out a huge sigh of relief as Ashley got back to work shelving some of the new stock, letting Kyrstin and Curtis deal with the short line of customers that had begun to form as they bought their books and whatever little trinkets littered the entire front of the store.

She hoped Chris and Josh got here soon, she was overdue for her lunch break and the smells coming out of the nearby food court were calling her name. Particularly the chinese place, she had been craving them for the last week at least . Plus, Jared had been raking her over coals about how her availability was going to drop dramatically once she started college in the next couple of weeks, and one of the creepy regulars had followed her around the store for-freaking- ever (she's pretty sure he had been staring at her ass the whole time too honestly) until Curtis had basically shoved her into the back room to let her escape while he covered for her. And surprise surprise, Jared hadn't been too thrilled about her 'abandoning her post' and yelled at her about that too. 

Whoever said that working in a bookstore was a lazy job where she got to read books in her free time was a dirty, rotten liar. It was hell on earth and she was going to slowly tear the fingernails off whoever it was that said it (even though she had a sinking feeling it had probably be Ashley herself that said it back when she romanticized working in bookstores when she was, like, ten ). God, she really really needed that Chinese if she had any plans of surviving the last four hours of her shift.

The phone at the front desk behind her begins to ring, but a quick backwards glance has her realizing that with poor Curtis trying to deal with an older woman who is adamant that the book he's trying to sell her is the wrong one because she is 'positive that the book had a light purple cover and this one is lavender, that is two different colours and I want the right book now ' and Kyrstin being forced to deal with the rest of the line herself, that Ashley's the one who's going to have to answer the phone. With a groan of resignation (she hated answering the phone at work but Jared was in a horrendous enough mood as it was), she stood up and made her way over, repeating the greeting she was going to have to say over and over in her head so she (hopefully) wouldn't mess it up. And taking a deep breath, and repeating the greeting once more in her head, she forced a smile to her face as she picked up the handset.

"Hi! Thanks for calling—"

"Fucking finally Ash."

In an instant, Ashley could feel every ounce of nervous energy violently expel from her body as she nearly doubled over with another groan, this one entirely of exhaustion. She took quick glance over her shoulder, but Jared seemed to busy with another phone call in his office thankfully. "What are you doing Josh?!" she whispered angrily, "I'm at work right now you moron!"

"Uh yeah, I know. Why do you think I called you using this number?"

Ashley gave Kyrstin an apologetic and pained smile when she looked at her curiously, who responded with a good-natured shake of her head and a laugh under her breath as she turned to help the next customer. "Well, you didn't have to call here."

"Kinda did, Ash. You kept ignoring me."

"I was ignoring your calls you butt, you could have just texted me instead you know."

"Hmmm, no. Anyways I tried calling to tell you that Chris and I might not be able to meet up with you for lunch."

Ashley felt disappointment flood her entire being. "Oh. I see. But you really could have just—"

"We're at the hospital while Chris gets some x-rays done."

Immediately any disappointment fled her body as Ashley all but collapsed on the counter for support as her legs gave out on her. "Is he okay?! Oh god, is he okay Josh?!"

There's a pause on the phone and all Ashley can hear is her own blood pounding in her ears. He has to be okay. He has to be, he just has to be!

"I dunno, it was a pretty gnarly fall. Don't know if he'll ever truly recover, there was a lot of screaming after all."

Ashley doesn't even respond as she slams down the phone and turns to Kyrstin and Curtis who are looking at her in shock as her entire world falls to pieces around her. "I-I have to go. Chris is... Chris is..." she can't get anymore out with how it feels like someone is ripping her heart out of her chest. "Josh said he's in the hospital and...and..."

Curtis nods quickly as he runs to the staff room, and Kyrstin just starts shoving her towards the door as they all ignore the customers who are standing around awkwardly. "Go. We got this."

Ashley turns her head towards Jared's office. "But I gotta—and, and I need to grab my stuff—

"Nope. You go. Curtis and I will figure something out, and Becks arrives for her shift in another half hour. We can manage just fine until then. You just get out of here right now."

Ashley doesn't try to fight anymore than that, not with how hard she's fighting to hold back breaking down in the middle of the store after all. Curtis meets her at the entrance with her bag and shoves it into her arms. "Do you need me to call you a taxi, or give you a ride, or anything? Kyrstin can drag Jared out of his cave if she's gotta." Next to him, Kyrstin nods furiously in agreement.

Ashley has never loved anyone as much as she loves her coworkers in this instant. "No, my-my mom gave me the car for today."

With that little bit of approval, and a random customer shouting ‘I hope he's okay hun!’ at her, the two of them shove Ashley into the mall itself and the very instant she crosses that threshold she takes off running, shoving her way through people and nearly falling down the stairs in her effort to get to the parking lot as quickly as she can. She is so, so glad that her mom basically forced the car on her today instead of letting her take the bus as originally planned, she doesn't know how she would have lasted if she'd had to wait for a taxi to arrive and pick her up.

As it is, once she's finally (and somehow safely) managed to arrive at the hospital and found a spot to park, she's nonplussed about the fact that she didn't leave any imprints in the steering wheel from how hard she had been gripping it the whole drive over. She fumbles with the clasp on her seatbelt with shaking hands, almost bursting into tears about that fact alone, but she eventually manages to free herself and basically throws herself out of the car, only remembering to lock the door behind her when she's about halfway to the hospital doors.

The moment she bursts into the waiting room, Josh is sitting there waiting for her. He looks up at her in surprise as she hurries towards him, then down at his phone and back up at her again as he gives a low whistle. "Shit Ash, how many laws did you break to get here that fast?"

She ignores him. "What happened?! How is he?! Just tell me he's okay! Please, please tell me he's okay!"

"I mean, I suppose he's as fine as he could be considering the circumstances." He seems to sense that she's about ready to scream at him so he quickly follows up with "He's on the second floor, in room 272 if you want to see him."

Ashley doesn't even bother to thank him as she bolts to the nearby elevator, frantically pushing the 'Call Elevator' button nonstop until the door opens and then doing the same thing to the second floor button as it carries her up. Her eyes are burning in an effort to hold back her tears but she can tell that the dam is about to burst any second, especially with how long this elevator is taking to move. She doesn't even wait for the doors to open fully, squeezing through them the moment they're wide enough and accosting some poor nurse until he points her down the correct hall. She hurries the rest of the way, staring at every number on the wall until she finds room 272. And then she stops, her hand on the door knob as she braces herself for whatever she's going to find. Chris lying in bed, covered in blood and bandages with a heart monitor beeping next to him, just broken and shattered beyond all repair. With a choked back sob she opens the door—

and finds Chris sitting on the bed looking up at the ceiling bored to tears with a splint wrapped around his pinky and ring finger on his right hand.

"Finally! I thought you would never get here, so if we could just get this over with—" he looks over at her standing in the doorway shell shocked and still in her work uniform and jumps to his feet. "A-Ash?! What the hell are you doing here— Wait, did you just come here straight from work?! "

"You're okay?" Ashley hates how small her voice comes out, "You're really okay?"

"What? Yeah, why wouldn't I be? Who told you—"

Spell broken, Ashley’s bag falls from her shoulder to the ground with a small clatter and she dives towards Chris, wrapping him in a tight hug. "Oh thank god. Oh thank god. " Chris starts to return the hug, likely more than a little confused about what's going on, but she's already moved so her hands are on either side of his face as she tugs him down to her level so she can get a better look at him. Twisting and turning his head this way and that as she looks for any bruises or cuts. "Josh told me that there had been an accident and—"

"Ash!" Chris interrupts her by taking her wrists in his hands—though he winces at the pain that likely forms as a result of doing so—and speaks as calmly and reassuringly to her as he can. "Ash, it's okay. I'm fine . I promise. I just tripped earlier that's all."

Ashley takes in the sight of the scuffed up palms of his hands, and the holes in the knees of his jeans that certainly hadn't been there before, and knows that Chris is telling the truth. Though it doesn't explain the splint on his hand.

"Okay, and I might have broken my finger doing so."

Ashley just stands there so dumbfounded and relieved in equal measure, that she blurts out "Josh said that there had been screaming."

To her surprise, Chris only gives an embarrassed groan as he stares at an area just over her shoulder "God, Josh is never gonna let me live that down is he? Okay, so my finger may not have been the only thing that broke..." Confused, mainly because except for the bandaged finger and ripped jeans he seems perfectly okay, Ashley looks over her shoulder and follows his eyes to his phone laying on the counter just behind her. The screen completely shattered to hell and back with no promise of life anywhere on it. Just the dead, black screen reflecting the ceiling above on its cracked surface 

"Wait," Ashley starts to feel the relieved giggles try to break free as her nerves finally settle, "are you telling me that you broke your finger but you were more worried about your phone? "

Chris sputters as he starts to wave his splinted finger infront of her face. "I mean obviously! This doesn't cost me any money to fix Ash; that's what health care's for! But my phone? Do you know how expensive that thing's going to be to replace? How many paychecks I'm going to have to put towards it? All the money I saved up this summer for school: gone! All because of a stupid little sidewalk curb!"

Ashley can't help it, she starts laughing uncontrollably as she collapses into a nearby chair with her head in her hands. "Oh, I am going to kill Josh when I see him, kill him! And then Jared's gonna kill me for bailing at work and not telling him! God, and I just left in the middle of a rush too! Remind me to buy Kyrstin and Curtis a cake or flowers or something as an apology. Oh my god ."

"You just ditched work? Ash!" Chris falls back onto the bed as he laughs with her. "Why would you even do that in the first place?!"

"Josh told me that you were in the hospital getting x-rays! What was I supposed to think?"

Chris rubs at his eyes beneath his glasses. "I asked him to let you know that we were probably gonna be a little late for lunch while I waited to get my cast! Fucking hell, I'm so sorry."

"Am I interrupting anything or..."

The two of them turn to see a doctor looking up at them with an upturned brow, and holding what Ashley assumes (and hopes) to be the materials needed for Chris's cast. "This is Chris Hartley's room correct?"

"Oh, uh, yeah. That's me."

The doctor nods, and walks towards Chris, but stops in front of the chair Ashley is sitting in. "I'm sorry, but I will be needing that chair sweetheart." With a squeak of apology, Ashley jumps out the chair and moves back by the door so fast that she's almost certain that she had managed to teleport over there, almost tripping over her forgotten bag in the process. Red-faced, she picks it back up and goes to leave (and possibly strangle Josh violently) but is stopped by the same doctor as she sits down in the chair with a chuckle, shaking her head. "You don't have to leave if you don't want to. It'll only take a couple of minutes to get this cast on and then he'll be free to leave with you." 

Now even more red-faced (if that was even possible), Ashley just slowly shuffles over to the table where Chris's (broken) phone and wallet is, nervously fidgeting with the strap of her bag as she waits for Chris to get the cast on. Taking Chris's hand in her own, the doctor—Dr. Klorens her name tag reads—scowls at the now slightly bent fingers in the splint, which Chris only gives a sheepish shrug and smile to, and sighs as she unwraps his fingers so she can reset the splint. And Ashley blanches at the deep, dark bruises that spread all the way from the middle of his pinky to nearly halfway down his palm that she had completely failed to notice earlier before those are once again lost. 

And as promised, once the Dr. Klorens has put the cotton sleeve over his hand and trimmed it to the desired length, it only takes her another couple of minutes to wrap starting from the center of his forearm and all the way up to the center of his palm and then finally finishing with his splinted fingers. As the three of them wait for the fibreglass material to dry, Dr. Klorens goes over the do's and don'ts of cast care, which Ashley takes serious note of because she knows that Chris won't. Especially the 'do NOT get the cast wet' part, he's gonna forget about that one the moment Josh tries to bait him into another water gun fight.

"Alright, I think that's about it. Just come back in three weeks so we can do another x-ray to check and make sure that the bone's all healed up before we remove it. Just let someone know that you're done with the room when you leave, and remember to check out at the front desk." She gathers up her supplies and makes to leave, but stops to look over her shoulder at them with an amused smile on her face. "Oh, and if you two take the stairs, just make sure that you're careful. I know that we're in a hospital already, but I don't think any of us want to deal with any more tripping instances. Especially if they result in another broken bone." After waiting for Chris and Ashley to meekly agree to be careful, she finally leaves the two of them alone once again.

"Welp, that's it for my summer. 'Fraid I'm nothing but a cripple now."

Sighing, Ashley turns to Chris with a tired smile. "You are not a cripple, oh my god. You have a broken finger, you didn't lose the entire arm you dork."

Incensed, Chris waves his cast at her. "Um, do you not see this thing Ash? I may as well have. I've lost the use of two of my fingers now! Two! And on my right hand to boot. I can't hold a controller to play games with, I can't type, I can't text. What am I supposed to do Ash if I can't hold a single thing in my dominant hand anymore?"

"I'm sure you'll manage," she dryly responds. "Now come on, let's get out of here. I have to figure out how in the world I'm going to explain this to Jared so he doesn't fire me."

"Pretty sure that you should just let him if you ask me."

Ashley groans in agreement, but says "It's only another couple of weeks until college starts. Just hoping I can hold out until then, I need the money after all."

Chris lets out a resigned breath but then starts eyeing her work apron. "You got a sharpie in there?"

"Um, I think so. Why?"

"Uh, so you can sign my cast, duh. You missed out when I broke my arm when I was like nine, so you can be the first to get your name on this one."

"Trying to weasel my autograph out of me huh?" Ashley asks even as she digs through one of her pockets to pull out the sharpie in question, and joins Chris to sit next to him on the bed.

Chris laughs. "Damn, you figured out my devious plan. Thing’s gonna be worth a fortune when you make it onto the bestsellers list one day. Gonna be fighting off all sorts of crazed and fanatic fans."

Ashley shakes her head as she chuckles and writes her name on his arm, but pauses when she caps the pen. Seeing her name on his cast suddenly pulls everything back into vivid clarity, and she remembers the panic she had felt when she had thought—when she had believed —that she had nearly lost him. That this was it, that he was here one day and gone the next, and she hadn't even told him how much he meant to her. How important he was to her. She watches as a drop of water splashes down onto the cast and she finds herself wondering if there's a leak in a room upstairs.

"What the—Ash? Are you crying?"

"Huh?" She wipes her eyes, and a surprised but weak laugh escapes when her hand comes away wet. "Oh, I guess I am. Sorry about that, you're supposed to keep the cast dry and here I am crying—"

Chris places his left hand on her cheek to help wipe away some of her tears. "Oh fuck, I really freaked you out didn't I? Fucking hell. I'm—"

"Do you promise not to hate me?"

The look Chris gives her is nothing short of bamboozled. "Hate you? Ash, what's going on with you?"

"Do you promise not to hate me? Please Chris, I really, really need you to promise me this. Please . Do you promise not to hate me?" She’s fully aware that she’s practically begging right now, silent tears flowing down her cheeks, but if it gets Chris to promise then she’ll gladly throw away her pride for this one thing.

"Yeah, I-I promise. Will you just—"

Ashley doesn't give him anytime to finish his sentence before she's squeezing her eyes shut and she surges up to kiss him. She doesn't want to see his expression, not when all she wants is just to remember everything else that is happening. Remember the feel of his lips before he pulls away, and the warmth of his hand on her cheek. In fact, she spends so much time trying to memorize what she is sure is only going to be a single shared kiss, that it takes her a few seconds longer than she would like to admit to realize that Chris's hand isn't on her cheek anymore, it's moved to the back of her neck so he can kiss her back . The shock of which is enough for her to break the kiss and stare at him with wide eyes.

"Wh—" that's all she can get out before Chris is pulling her back in for a second kiss, and this time she lets her eyelids flutter close as she completely melts into, throwing her arms around his neck to hold him closer.

Ashley's not sure how long they stay like that—could have been an eternity, could have only been a couple of seconds—before they're both pulling back with their faces flushed and giggling like morons.

"Wow," Chris says after a moment, "I don't know what made you think I could hate you after that , but wow . If I had known that this would be the reaction I get, I would have broken my finger years ago."

There's something about the way he says it that has Ashley's heart beating even faster. "How long?" she demands breathlessly, "Tell how long ago?"

Somehow, Chris manages to flush even deeper. "I dunno, like... six? I guess?"

Six years. He'd had a crush on her for six years and she'd had no idea. The moment the realization hits her she starts laughing. "I knew you were trying to ask me for a kiss back in seventh grade! I should have just chased you down and given you one anyway!"

This time, it's Chris who starts laughing at the realization. "Wait, you liked me too?! Then that kiss, back in the library...?"

"You still remember that?!"

"Remember it? Ash, that stupid little cheek kiss is the only reason I passed that final I'm sure! Hell, why else do you think Josh dared me to kiss you in truth and dare?"

"What? No he didn't!"

Chris shakes his head as he moves his hand from her neck to around her waist. "He did! He told me to 'return the favour' and all I had been thinking about that summer was kissing you back. Fucking hell, I almost killed him when he pulled me away to get that generator working that winter in the lodge."

"Oh my god, I almost jumped across the floor to you that night when the power went out after the bottle landed on you."

"You didn't!"

Chris sounded so scandalized at the idea that Ashley presses her forehead to his as her smile widens, which only causes his own to widen in turn. "I did! But then Josh pulled you away and I just completely lost my nerve." She starts laughing at the next memory. "Oh god, I kept my lamp on in my room after that hoping you would stop by if you thought I was still awake."

The answering gape in shock was all she needed before she broke into more giggles. "I saw that! I don't know how long I hovered outside your door trying to work up the courage to knock before talking myself out of it. I think I just convinced myself that the outage had freaked you out badly enough that you needed the extra light to get to sleep."

Once the giggles started to lessen, the smiles on their faces did so as well, softening to something warmer and infinitely more cozy. "I almost kissed you, you know," Ashley confessed shyly. "Back at your grad party."

"Yeah, I-I almost kissed you too. And, just so you know, I wasn't lying then. The flowers looked really really good on you." 

"That's good to hear," she admits as she leans in closer, her lips brushing his so lightly it's almost a caress, "I kept them, after all."

Nothing more is said as Chris closes the distance between them again to kiss her, and even though she knows that they really should get back downstairs, she doesn't try to stop it.

They have a long six years to make up for after all.

#my writing #pride month prompt challenge #until dawn #chris hartley #ashley brown #josh washington #chrashley #ignore the weirdly long and frankly unimaginative titles so far #i throw these into an ao3 and tumblr draft at like 2am to post the next morning #so my brain isn't exactly what i would call imaginative lol #or working in general asjkdhasdh #and yes it possible to break your finger in such a way that you need a full on arm cast for it to heal #i would know