#I'll fix the italics tomorrow

[neoplatinum]

hold me tight - bts | kim dahyun

summary: maybe cupid could save us

pairing: dahyun x fem!reader

themes: angst, fluff, tension, use of flashbacks in italics, marriage counseling, reader insecurity, past physical violence (against original male character, not any member of twice), implied sex, some of twice!

wc: 7.2k

polished silverware, two table napkins, two sets of forks, and knives. a draped tablecloth, and the long wooden table stretching down the dining room. on two ends are two lost souls, once connected with bountiful joy and prosperity. now sat farther apart than the two ends of a colossal ship. barely stitched together by unspoken words and exhaustion.

"what time?" you dig into your steak, back and forth sliding it down the tender meat.

"2pm tomorrow. should i call your assistant?" dahyun digs at her roasted potatoes, a little sweet, just the way she likes it.

"no need, i'll be there." you counter, stabbing the slice of steak, digging into it. pushing the green peas a bit to the left, and sipping the wine. a delicacy truly.

"good." she says quietly, "pass me the pepper?" you look up, the bottle is in the middle.

the dmz line, you lean foward, grabbing a hold of the glass bottle, placing it into her hand.

"here."

"thank you."

the rest of the dinner is followed by the sounds of silverware, and only silverware.

--

dr. yoo jeongyeon, phd, lcpc

you stare at the plaque, gold serif lettering, bold face on top of a black rectangle, sitting directly in the middle of the edge of her desk. your loafers gently tapping the carpeted floor, in time with each tick of a second.

she looks confident, shoulders back and sinking into her leather chair. glasses perched on her nose, a montblanc in hand. eyes a little empty, but inviting, a little too inviting.

"thank you both for joining us today, first time?" dr. yoo starts, eyes taking a slow drift from dahyun to you.

dahyun's legs are tucked together, low heels and a brown suit. she leans forward at dr. yoo's question. "yes, first time."

a simple nod, and a scribble along her notepad. you tilt your head to the right.

"each session with me runs fifty minutes, no longer. if needed, it can be cut short." she says, placing some files away, shuffling paper away, and fixing her glasses. you both nod at the terms. "lovely, could i have you both introduce yourselves?" she continues, eyes back on you and dahyun.

you stare at dahyun.

"i'm dahyun, 26, a fashion designer and a wine enthusiast, lovely to meet you." dahyun stands up, offering a handshake. dr. yoo smiles lightly and shakes it.

"and you?"

"i'm dahyun's wife, 26, ceo and founder of future consultants llc, and a tennis enthusiast."

dr. yoo's eyes stare at you, but her pens moves quickly along the page.

dahyun stares at you, before looking back at her folded hands.

"thank you both, now could you both explain why you are here?" her eyes come back up, those glasses hanging so low is making you mad.

dahyun coughs into her hand.

"we need help." a little unsure, but a desperate plea. your foot stops tapping on the carpeted floor.

dr. yoo scribbles along a new line.

"and you?" the doctor stares at you. you sit up, fixing the buttons on your blazer.

"we're...not the same as we used to be." you say, pulling one leg over the other. dr. yoo nods at that, another line filled.

"alright, now, let me give you some insight on me. i'm dr. yoo jeongyeon, did my phd in human psychology, masters in counseling and bachelor's in neurology. and i'm a lcpc: licensed clinical professional counselor. you can say i'm a people enthusiast." she smiles lightly, dahyun laughs under her breath.

your foot goes back to tapping.

"let's get into it." she sets down the notepad. "could you tell me how you both met?"

--

"what's the maturity date for a treasury bond?"

"20 - 30 years, you seriously have to try harder, sam." you laugh, taking another sip of your beer. sam just grins and flips over a new flashcard.

"okay smarty pants, what are floating-rate notes?" sam taps the index card on the bar table. eyes a little playful, he always did like making you work for your reward.

"they're-"

"stop it ryan." behind you is the voice of a woman, her back hitting yours, nearly spilling your beer. you turn around, a man towering over her, hand on her wrist and his firm grip, stopping her. no matter how hard she tries to pull.

you signal sam.

"take your hand off her." you press down on his wrist, holding his arm in place. the woman stares at you and sam, bewildered eyes and still pulling against ryan's hold.

"fuck off." he spits in your face.

"yeah? let's see how your face looks after this pretty boy." you slam into his chest, him tumbling backwards, foot hitting the barstool and a loud thud hitting the floor. you spot the submariner on his wrist shining under the bar light, fuck.

sam's at the ready, hand on a switchblade, you signal him back, not him.

the woman gasps, hand immediately shooting her sore wrists, shit it looks bad. ryan's still on the group, and then he shoots up. hands at the ready to land a punch, weak form though. you sidestep him, letting him fall forward.

"daddy can't pay to fix your crooked nose?" you smirk at him, taunting him to do anything. his eyes ablaze as he tries again. what a foolish boy.

you let him try and land a left hook, before you start punching his jaw, one good liver punch and he topples over. damn, your jaw hurts too, men like him throw too much of their power into their punches.

"fuck, sam." you groan to your friend, hand trying to pop your jaw back into place. you do, letting out a low shout, before getting your stuff.

stay too long and then he'll call the cops, the last thing you need is another fine print on your academic file. you stumble forward, feeling blood dripping down the side of your head, cheeky bastard, he had rings on.

you barely manage to push the bar door, string of curses falling out of your lip, the cold air immediately frosting your breath. damn it all, and you left your beer half finished.

"excuse me!" the woman's voice carries from the door, and you can see her, urgently trying to get to you. "thank you so much back there."

she's trying to offer you some napkins from her clutch, all you can do it hope that liver punch suckered him to stay on the ground long enough for you to dissapear.

"you have anyone safe?"

"safe?"

you gesture a bit. "like a friend maybe? did you come alone?"

you lean to the side trying to get a glimpse of pretty boy, but he's no where in sight. a good thing. you can see sam though, shoving bills at the bartender, and grabbing jackets.

"no friends, i came with him." her hand goes back to her bruised wrist, yeah that looks awful. you're very glad you stepped in.

"listen, i need to leave now. i would love to do the whole 'thank you, you're welcome' pleasantries, but I don't know how long he'll stay down before he calls the cops."

you explain, seeing sam opening the bar door, urgent eyes calling for you to disappear into the night.

"could you take me home, i really have no other way to get back." you stare into the bar, oh pretty boy's up, shouting at a bartender. you need to exit NOW.

"okay, let's go. i know you're wearing heels, but keep up." you offer a hand, and disappear into the back alleyway. by the time you just turn around the corner at the end, you can hear the distant voice outside the bar.

you're finally in sam's beater car, an old hand-me-down from his grandma, with the girl from the bar in the backseat.

she keeps watching you from the mirror.

"where do you live?" you pull out of the back lot, she's still soothing her bruised wrist.

"eleanor court, upper east side." damn shit, of course she's rich too, loaded with daddy's money just like that dude you suckered punched. how you always manage being at the hands of rich people, you hope to find out soon, because this sucks.

the drive's pretty silent, sam's got his old 80s mixtapes playing from the car radio. and he's humming along as he taps on his passenger door, you're glad that at least one of you has a car.

"woah..." sam brings you out of your thinking. woah is correct, even sam can see it.

colonial style homes the size of manors down the perfectly paved roads. long outdoor lamp lights lining the street. lush bushes and trees lining the sides of the house. not a single police car in sight, you can even see fountains spouting water from a statue.

what a bunch of crap.

"dude, she's asleep." sam taps your shoulder, you quickly put his car in park. looking at her from the rear view, damn she is asleep, jacket covering her torso but her head leaning against the window.

damn, damn, damn.

one wrong HOA member being curious, and you can easily be thrown in jail for the rest of your life. you open your door, rushing to the backseat. opening the door, and placing your hand against her head to keep her body from falling out of the car.

"miss, we're home." she just curls into your hand. "sam, help me hold her up." he nods, using his bodyweight as a rest for the girl's body. you begin searching through her clutch, hopefully she has an id inside.

"kim dahyun.....501 eleanor court." you shove the id back into her clutch. "sam move." you grab a hold of her body, picking her body up. wrapping the jacket and clutch over top of her.

"stay in the car. i'll bring her in." you began walking down the eerily quiet neighborhood, goodness rich people are so pretentious. you struggle to open the gate. then you hear a low mechanic voice.

"hello, who are you?"

"hi, i'm just here to drop off a kim dahyun. she had an issue with some guy at the bar, and she needed someone to take her home." you speak into it, a clicking noise and then the metal box goes silent.

the large metal gates open, you step in, walking up to the front porch, pillars lining the wide entrance.

goodness, you need to get out of this neighborhood. the large wooden door opens and you see two people, a suited man and a maid. of course.

"miss dahyun?" the maid begans fussing over her, hand on her cheek, "oh my!" a loud gasp at the bruised wrist. you drop her into the leather couch.

"what happened?" the butler asks you, offering a towel at your dried blood.

you try your best to keep yourself from dirtying the house, both of them keep staring at you though.

"uh, some guy at the bar, ryan. he kept bruising her wrist, so i had to step in." you point at your head. the butler nods, and the maid begins inspecting the bruise.

"i told miss dahyun to stop seeing him." the butler explains, placing the jacket to cover her.

you nod, so this wasn't even the first time. the maid returns with soothing cream, applying the ointment over her bruised wrists. you stand idly by the couch, a little confused with what to do here.

you stare at dahyun's face, she's rather pretty is what you land on, before the man's voice brings you out of your focus.

"let me offer you a new shirt." you look down, and it does look like you just got into the ring with rocky, blood-dried splotches all over. the butler disappears before you can even say no.

with a folded new shirt, linen and italian, goodness these people have too much money, you shuffle into a bathroom.

changing into it quickly, eyeing all the towels and expensive soaps on the counter. you fix yourself up and exit, seeing the butler and maid still crowding around the girl.

"i, i really should leave. i'm sorry." the butler and maid are still trying to get you to stay, to offer some reward, but really all you want to do is leave this hellscape. unfamiliar faces, with unfamiliar mannerisms, its all too much.

--

"she saved me from a sleazy guy at a bar." dr. yoo jots it down.

"and you?"

"i, i guess i did?"

"you guess?"

"i, yes, i saved her from the sleazy guy." dr. yoo nods.

the ticking sound comes back clearer in your ear. the repetitive ticking feels like tumbling down a hill, imminent and quick swift death.

"let's move on then, how did you two start dating?"

"dahyun was insistent on paying me back for the bar, kept telling me she needed to." you offer.

dr. yoo nods, another scribble along the notepad. then she pulled the file from her desk, and two separate questionnaires werefilled out.

"and it says here, you both attended the same university." ever since dahyun found out you two attended the same university, she began urging you for dinner.

you tried very hard to say no, but in the quad, down the main academic path. she just kept finding you, like a needle in a haystick, she always managed to pick you out from the hundreds of students.

if she wasn't so nice about it, you might have considered it creepy.

"yes, brown." you nod.

"lovely school, my friend's alma mater." dr. yoo comments and lifts her head once more from the notepad.

"how's your sex life?"

you see dahyun's feet uncross and cross again. while you start tapping your foot again.

"we haven't done it," dahyun begins, "in a long while."

dr. yoo nods, and turns to you. "how does that make you feel?"

"i'm not sure."

dr. yoo nods again, dahyun's feet uncross and cross again. the clock's still ticking on the wall.

you are sure it's non-judgmental, it just makes you aggravated, like you're being lectured on how to love.

dahyun can't remember the last time you two have cherished each other. dinner's filled with delicious food, to cover the absence of enticing conversation.

being married to the point of small talk, has drained you both more than you wanted to admit.

"this is still the first session, so let's start with simple exercises. try and vocalize your appreciation for each other. this can be as simple as: i appreciate you doing the dishes today. remember, speaking the unspoken words can change your relationship for the better." dr. yoo stands up, offering you both a handshake and walking you both out her office.

--

"i have to get back to work." you comment, letting dahyun walk in front of you. she nods at that, you both are busy people, even though it's important to try and fix your breaking relationship, you both have jobs to do.

"i'll see you for dinner?" she says as you open her car door, holding a hand over her head as she sits.

"yes, dinner." she nods at you, wanting you to say more. you want to as well, a little unsure.

"thank you, for being here today." she starts, staring up into you, you smile lightly back at her, dahyun's still got that warm eye smile that makes your heart burst.

"you as well dahyun." you lean your head down a bit, "charlie, get her to her office safely." he nods from the rear view. and with that you close her door. watching the car roll away from the sidewalk.

it's weird to have to see a professional for marriage counseling, but in your heart, you do want to fix things with dahyun.

sweet dahyun who is always so concerned with everyone's wellbeing; often neglecting her own. the rest of the afternoon, you try and focus on work, feeling downright awful about how your relationship has disintegrated.

--

"dahyun? i'm home." you enter the brownstone, a little more excited to be home. she's in the kitchen, an adorable brown bear apron over top.

"hey, i'm making pasta tonight." she's smiling.

"need help?"

"no, i should be good. could you set the table?" you leave the kitchen, entering the wine pantry, grabbing one that you know she loves. as well as two glasses, a gift from her parents.

dahyun's walking out with bowls of pasta, surprised to see the bottle in hand.

you begin pouring them into the two glasses, passing one to her, she thanks you quietly, placing down the bowls, and returning to the kitchen. you follow after her, grabbing knives and forks and napkins.

she's busy with another dish, and you hum to yourself, cleaning the silverware while waiting for her.

"damn it. fuck fuck fuck." dahyun's hand jerks back against the pot, her hand instantly going to hold it. you drop the silverware in the sink, quick strides towards her. she burned herself with the pot.

"dahyun, let me see." there are tears in her eyes, and she's shaking her head, she's always been so dismissive of her own pain. you take her hand gently, looking at it. it's definitely bad, red skin over top, hot to the touch. "let's run it under cold water, okay?"

she nods, even though there's tears in her eyes, and all she wants to do is just shrink into herself.

you run the water cold, feeling for it before letting it run over her burned finger. the tears in her eyes are still there, threatening to spill out.

then dahyun cries out. "i'm so stupid, i can't even cook a simple dinner." her tears are falling, much like the water over the hurt finger. like letting the pain rain out from her heart.

"oh dahyun, no you aren't stupid, you never were." you hug her tightly, letting her head fall to your shoulders, quietly crying against your shirt. she cries even harder at that, an anguish cry out for help,

you feel your own tears spring up. how you hate seeing dahyun cry.

"how is it?" you ask, pulling her away, looking at the finger under the water. it's less red, still there but it looks better.

"hurts." she pouts.

"let me go grab some ointment, stay here okay?" you leave, turning down the hallway to the bathroom, rummaging through the medicine cabinet for ointment cream to sooth the pain.

you return quickly, gently dabbing the cream over her finger with a q-tip. letting out a low hiss, and you apologize quickly, letting her relax a bit before continuing to spread it around.

"okay?" you step back, throwing away the q-tip.

"it's good, thank you." then she slips away to finish dinner. you stand by letting out a breath you didn't know you were holding, with every bit of your heart, you hope that dahyun wants to work this out as much as you do.

--

"hello, come on in." dr. yoo's now a familiar face, always a warm if not stoic face. never showing signs of disinterest or much of an opinion, you begin to wonder what it takes to be a professional therapist.

"thank you." you let dahyun ahead of you, her sitting in the left armchair, while you sit on the right. fixing your blazer as you sit with one leg over the other. eyes watching dr. yoo in anticipation.

"how are you both doing?" she starts, that same montblanc in hand, a new shirt, dark blue and glasses hanging on her nose.

dahyun looks to you.

"we're doing okay." you offer, a little smile on your face.

"and you?" dr. yoo turns her head towards dahyun.

"we're doing better." dahyun fiddles with the band-aid over her finger. your eyes linger on it, a reminder of the small act of affection.

"lovely, last time you both mentioned that sexual intimacy had not happened in some time. has that changed since our last session?"

dahyun coughs into her hand, sinking into her armchair. you look away from her.

"no, it hasn't changed." dahyun speaks softly, like she's confessing a sin. you fold your hands over each other.

dr. yoo nods, another line written.

"how is work-life balance for you two?" dr. yoo stares into you, you sit up again.

"it's fine, the normal 9-6pm work day." dr. yoo jots that down. the clock continues to tick in your ears.

"what about you?" dahyun stares at the floor.

"it's okay, usually after work i'll unwind with some wine or television series." dahyun's always been so absorbed with her dramas, often asking you to join her to watch them. you often decline with the pre-tense of overflowing work from the day.

"ah yes, you mentioned you are a wine enthusiast." dahyun nods, wine has always been something she indulged in, you don't share the same love for the drink. finding it all a bit too much for yourself.

"could you tell me how that started?" your eyes go wide a bit, you never bothered to ask dahyun that, just assuming she's always enjoyed it.

"my late father used to own a winery, when i was able to start drinking he started training me as a sommelier." you knew of mr. kim's obsession with wine.

multiple wine cellars across his basement, walls lined with rows of wooden aisles, each row lined with bottles filling the basement. often times you snuck into the basement with dahyun sharing kisses and giggles away from the prying eyes of her parents.

"sorry to hear that mrs. kim, that's lovely to hear that you still has a passion for wine." dr. yoo continues, letting the words fly across the notepad. you uncross and cross the other leg over.

"and you mentioned you were a tennis enthusiast, how did that start?" dr. yoo's eyes are still on the notepad, pen quickly running across the page. you lean forward a bit.

"my friend sam, used to sneak us into the tennis bubble after work, when all the people left the country club. and we would play for hours." dr. yoo nods, more lines filling across the page.

"you never told me it was because of sam, you said it was just a hobby you had." dahyun comments, eyes on you, a little suprised at the conversation.

"i couldn't afford tennis equipment, too expensive." you explain.

dr. yoo continues to write as you and dahyun talk.

"but all those times you came to the country club, you offered to pay for the tab." dahyun leans into you a bit, you let your eyes wander over the name plaque on dr. yoo's desk.

"had to work overtime to pay it off." dahyun sinks back into her chair.

"and dahyun, you seem suprised, how does this make you feel?"

she looks back at her hands.

"i feel awful, i didn't know it costed that much for you." you return your gaze to her, watching the anguish in her eyes.

you wish you didn't feel ashamed about your financial situation, but every second spent with the kims was another jab at your own social status.

"i'm sorry dahyun, i kept it from you because i didn't want you to treat me differently." you shrink a bit, pulling the blazer a bit tighter. eyes falling to the floor naturally.

"and i'm sorry too, for never noticing." dahyun speaks it softly, you barely register the words.

you just nod, letting her hand hold yours. you can't bring yourself to look at her, too ashamed that you feel like you have to hide yourself from the woman you devoted your life to.

you begin to think about the early days of dating dahyun, days filled with anticipation of seeing her. constantly checking your account for how much you could expend on your paycheck, often stretching it for a simple date.

often on the weekends, the kim's visited the country club, the managers all fussing over them, pampering them with free items, as if the rich needed more free item, it used to make you angry.

but never dahyun, a sweet girl built upon integrity and honesty, always offering to pay. treating you with respect that most members of the country would never do, them often throwing towels or other trash at you to pick up. and with gritted teeth, you always do, remembering you needed this job.

"so you both met often at the country club?" dr. yoo cuts into your thinking, pulling you out of your memories. one's that are filled with happiness and anger, all in the same bunch. anger at the rich, but happiness at seeing that beautiful smile in person.

"yes, i worked there, and dahyun's family were well known members there." you explain, squeezing dahyun's hand in yours.

--

"2 o'clock, the kims." your head snaps up from the tennis magazine you're reading. and there you can see your supervisor and your supervisor's supervisor crowding around the kim's.

especially dahyun's mother, she was always more prone to fawning at the attention that the staff would shower them in.

"stand up!" you read from your supervisor's mouth, then he goes back to smiling fakely at the kim's probably hoping to pick at their pockets later when they're far too tipsy from all the champagne they bathe in.

"one day i'm going to strangle him." you side whisper to sam as you both bow at the family.

"not if i get to him first." sam side whispers back, smiling at the kim's. continue to bow at them as they walk across the lobby to the courts. squeaky new tennis shoes on the marble floor.

"hey! you work here!" that familiar voice., you've been trying to avoid her since she found you in the quads hanging out with sam. insistently trying to get you to let her pay you back for the bar.

"hi miss, glad to see you are doing better." sam walks away, citing a need for a bathroom break, but you know better with the way he playfully walks away.

"you still haven't said yes to letting me pay you back."

"because you don't have to pay me back, i just did a nice deed."

"and you should be rewarded." you just sink back into your stool. letting her lean over the desk. "well as kim dahyun, a prized patron here, i order you to follow me to the courts."

"the courts?"

"yes, i want to play." you stand up, heading into the back to get that signature tennis racket that she loves so much, specific engraving of her name etched on the neck of the racket. "grab another one!" she shouts from the desk. you grab a generic one, one that still costed way more than a month's paycheck. placing both racquets under your arm.

"here's what we're going to do, three games, if i win three, i get to pay you back for the bar, dinner on me.

"miss dahyun, that really isn't neccessary."

"it's my wish, and you can't deny a patron's wish here."

so you get beaten, pretty badly, 0 - 3. with you sweating and falling on your back, breathing heavy as dahyun grins from the other side of the court. letting out a loud laugh.

"dinner on me, i'll drag you there myself if i have to!" dahyun's still bouncing a tennis ball with her racket while you recover your breath, all you can do is lift an arm to give her a thumbs up.

--

"well i am afraid our time is up for today, please schedule a session again soon." dr. yoo offers a light smile, and walks you both out of the door. letting the heavy door close behind you. you look at dahyun, she hasn't looked at you since the confession.

you walk her to her car, "dahyun, i really am sorry for hiding it from you. i just didn't want money to affect us."

she stares at your blazer, it's buttoned, the same button she stitched on a couple weeks ago.

"but it does, doesn't it?"

"money?" you stop to think about it, as much as you tried to let it not be a determining factor in your relationship with dahyun.

it really does bleed into your relationship, leaving you paralyzed with fear that she'll leave you.

when you first met the kim's for an official dinner introduced as dahyun's girlfriend, you spent hours with sam trying to find a decent hand-me-down outfit for the dinner.

they were not impressed to say the very least, you had no proper dinner manners. confused your soup spoon with the dessert spoon. nearly knocking wine onto mr. kim.

"i think it did, for a very long time." you open the door for dahyun, letting her in, hand covering her head as she sits inside. you walk over to the driver's side, sitting inside. "i wanted to prove myself to your family, but mostly to you."

"you didn't need to prove anything to me." she says, hands gently grabbing yours. you feel your heart sink a bit.

"it sucked, seeing all your friends get gifted lavish trips and designer bags, while all i could afford to do was cook you homemade dinners." you explain, thinking back your university days, meeting dahyun's friend.

"but that's what they didn't have." she counters. "all the homemade gifts, it was just gifts with enough value to hold each other over."

you really did try your best, with limited budget and often asking for favors. you did your best to offer the best anniversary, valentine's, and birthday gifts.

all of which were intended to express your love for her, spending hours decorating homemade cakes, learning how to cook dinners for two. renting cars to go on road trip, all of which you happily experienced with dahyun.

"i wanted to be someone you could confidently show off to your friends." you think back to dahyun's birthday parties.

open bars, waiters and a massive table filled with gifts for her. all you could do was stare in wonder at the exuberant gifts, all the while you would shrink into yourself, trying to hide your embarrassment watching her open your gifts.

"do you? did you...resent me for it? having money i mean." dahyun drops the question you've been trying so hard to ignore. it's been plaguing your mind lately, how you think about how hard you tried, giving your all into your work for an ounce of validation from the kim's.

validation that you never seem to get.

"no, never. never you, you were the only person i didn't resent." you smile at her, genuinely, and she smiles back. you're glad you met her, even if the circumstances have made your life complicated.

"for the record, i was always confident in showing you off, because i knew who you were in your heart." you give her hand a squeeze as you drive home.

--

"another hour please, i'll pay triple." you say, staring at dr. yoo.

"i'm sorry mrs. kim, but i have another appointment." she stands up, trying to walk you out of the room, and when the door opens, there stands two woman on the other side.

"sorry for the delay, mrs. and mrs. park."

"no worries, dr. yoo, sana and i don't mind." the two woman nod at you, before sitting in the same chairs that you and dahyun were sitting just seconds ago.

"i'm sorry mrs. kim, but really, we don't have more time today, schedule another appointment soon." and dr. yoo closes her heavy wooden door.

you nod solemnly, "dr. yoo, i'm sorry for my behavior." you explain, a bit embarrassed now.

"no need, i understand. go check up on mrs. kim." she just nods and gives your shoulder a pat, closing the door again.

now you stand in the office lobby, with a crying dahyun in a chair.

you sink to your knees, eyes staring up at her. her hair like curtains to her face, concealing the quiet sniffles and sobs that she's letting out.

"dahyun, darling?"

the tears keep falling, staining her dress pants, you hold her shaky hands. as she speaks to you, holding her breath here and there to control her emotions. "you never told me."

"i know, i didn't want to burden you." rubbing at her hands to sooth the pain in her heart.

"but isn't that what we're here for, to shoulder each other's burdens." she cries louder, a couple in the office look over, but you don't care right now. you brush the tears away.

"we are, i just, i didn't know how to tell you."

"but he, he did all that to you, and you didn't tell me. he's my own father."

"i know, i am sorry."

"let's go home please, i want to talk at home." you nod, letting her walk to the car, following her footsteps closely.

--

dr. yoo welcomes you both into her office, getting familiar with the diptyque roses candle burning lowly on the desk.

"mrs. and mrs. kim, please have a seat." dahyun smiles as she sits down, a new pair of glasses hanging on her nose.

"new glasses?" you ask.

dr. yoo smiles at that, pushing up the glasses. "yes, new! just got them yesterday. you smile, dr. yoo has become a familiar and friendly face with you and dahyun. almost like she's a friend, almost.

"shall we get started?" she looks up at you two, that same notepad in hand and the montblanc.

you both nod in sync.

"so, how have you both been?"

"good." dahyun smiles a bit, letting her arm lay along the armchair, eyes brighter than usual. you smile at that.

"and you?"

"we're doing better, i'm happier." dr. yoo write it along a new line, a light smile on her face.

"that's lovely to hear, could you explain why?" dr. yoo picks her head up, watching you explain how life has been. there's been a shift at home, dahyun and you having more time to go on dates instead of tensed dinners filled with the sounds of silverware.

"we spend more time together, having lunch together, and dinner's have become fun to cook together." dr. yoo nods at that, more words written along the notepad, you share a warm gaze at dahyun. her eyes smiling in that way you love so much.

"i haven't asked this before, but how are the in-laws?"

you immediately frown, thinking about the pretentious man that was dahyun's father. a dicator in the family, ruling with an iron fist and often giving you trouble for growing up "different." as he so nicely put it.

you often remember dinner's with the kims filled with biting your tongue and just letting snide comments go by, even dahyun's mother had no say whenever he made uncomfortable jokes.

"i don't think dahyun's parents liked me much, especially her father." you sit back, continuing your thoughts about the demanding man.

"could you expand on that?"

"i didn't grow up rich, which was the biggest thing he disliked, he didn't think i was a good fit for dahyun." you explain, often remembering the side comments that her father would make when dahyun couldn't hear.

"and did you know about this?" dr. yoo turns to dahyun.

"yes. he was adamant about me breaking up with her but i never did." that you didn't know. you always assumed that it was just sly comments towards you, but never did mr. kim outward display his disdain towards you to dahyun.

you button up your jacket. dr. yoo continues to write across her page, leaving you both to sit and think about dahyun's words.

"understood, do you think dahyun's parents affected your relationship with dahyun?" you think about the question, how loaded it all is, you cannot even begin to explain how suffocating being around him was.

family dinners spent trying to escape into the bathroom so he would stop pestering you about your business ventures, or the capital that you had under your belt. you just shudder whenever it becomes holiday seasons.

fearful of the power that mr. kim had over you, one of his last wishes before he passed away was upending his entire gambling debt onto you.

it had become a hold over you, that he would only support the love that you had for dahyun if you were able to help pay off his debt. it became a huge burden on your shoulders, conjuring up a plan to reach financial freedom and success without hindering dahyun's future.

one that you wanted to support from day one, pushing her towards her goal of becoming a fashion designer, every day you suffered at the hands of her father, letting his debt take over your life, all to prove your devotion to dahyun.

and it hurt, to shoulder this weight alone, you always had shouldered the weight of the world on your shoulders to begin with.

"yes, unfortunately. dahyun's father, he. he told me that by taking on his gambling debt before he died, that he would allow me to marry dahyun." you explain, feeling your shoulders release tension.

dr. yoo continues to write fervently, eyes on the page, but a slight nod here and there. you can feel dahyun's gaze on your face, one in disbelief and utter shock. you turn to look at her, meeting her blank eyes.

more than anything, you beg for dahyun to understand, to really understand where you are coming from. a whole life you lived having to make opportunities for yourself, little to no support from others. fighting tooth and nail just to prove that you are worth it. that you are deserving of success and love.

"were you aware she took on your father's debt?" dr. yoo looks to dahyun, not missing a beat or letting any inflection slip in her tone.

"i wasn't. i wasn't even aware he had debt to begin with. what? sorry. um, what? no sorry, how much?" dahyun turns to you, trying to understand all the information that has just been dumped onto her.

"50 million." you sigh, just thinking about the figures. spending late nights calculating interest, and ways to even pay off the large sum of money.

"50? million?" dahyun stands up suddenly, you stand up too. watching her bewildered eyes scan across the room, trying to control her breathing, watching the clock, watching the blue in the reds in the carpet. holding herself as she walks out of the room.

you stare at the open door, the sight of dahyun turning and sinking into a chair.

dr. yoo stands up.

"mrs. kim, perhaps we should end this session here today. dahyun seems to be shutting down."

--

you and dahyun are standing on both ends of the table, her eyes filled with tears as she glares at you.

"you don't think i recognize money-obsessed? you think i can't recognize my father turning you into him? that's all i can see! our marriage is falling apart and you have become my father and i've become my own mother!"

"dahyun, please, all i wanted was to marry you, he forced his hand, i didn't know what else to do." you can feel yourself shaking a bit, your heart racing as you both stand on opposite ends of the room.

"you should have told me." dahyun arms are crossed as she stares you down.

"i didn't want to tarnish the image of your father. i just wanted to love you, and if that was the final condition to marry you, i would do it.." you throw your arms around, frustrated with all this confrontation.

"his gambling debt costed us years of our marriage, can't you see? all this time you wanted to prove yourself to him, he just used you to fix his own problems." dahyun uncrosses her arms, voice reverberating around the large dining room.

"i thought, i thought it would, make him okay with me." your hands drop to your face as you cry into your hands. dahyun stops and walks over to you, wrapping her arms around you, holding you tightly.

"oh darling, i wish you didn't care so much for him opinion." she softly rubs your hair, rubbing circles into the back of your chest as you cry freely. for the first time in a long time, you feel the exhaustion, sadness, yearning all come crashing through your body.

"i wish i didn't too." through long cries in between you finally vocalize it.

"but you love me? isn't that why you did all this?" she questions, a thought thats been plaguing her mind. do you still love her? do you still have the same passion for her you once declared openly to the world? do you still mean each vow you said to her as your hands held hers?

"i do, more than anything else in the world, i love you. my words can only show so much of it." you lift your head up, wiping her tears as she wipes yours.

a small smile on her lips, it's all so stupid.

"show me." she stops crying for a bit, eyes glimmering with hope. she stares at you, in that way you love so much.

"show you?" you try and stop the tears, getting a clearer view of her face.

"show me how much you love me." she says crashing her lips into yours, pulling you forward, your feet nearly stumbling as you wrap your arms around her waist. "show me."

she whispers against your lips, like a spell, you nod and grab a hold of her, rushing you both into your bedroom. you try and show her, that the passion you have for her has always been there, and always will.

--

"mrs and mrs. kim!" dr. yoo invites you in, a warm light shining into the room. you both get seated, while dahyun lets go of your hand.

"i know last time, we had a bit of an outburst, how has that been?" dr. yoo stares at you both, notepad in hand.

"we resolved it." dahyun says confidently.

"resolved it?" she stares at dahyun. dahyun just nods.

"and you? what do you think?"

"we resolved it." you nod back, smiling at dahyun.

"alright, that's lovely to hear. so to follow up, how is sexual intimacy going?" dr. yoo notes the light blush on your faces, unwilling to look at her or even each other.

"it's, it's um, it's good." dahyun starts and coughs a bit, shuffling her feet.

"and you?"

"it's good. very good." you reply, and dahyun slaps your arm, trying to get you to shut up. "oh i see." dr. yoo writes along a new line of her notepad. eyes reviewing her notes so far, comparing previous sessions with this one.

"is there more we should discuss?" dr. yoo comments, eyes lifting off the page again, a light smile upon her face.

"no, i don't think so." dahyun nods at your words, you smile at her. and she shares that same eye smile that you love so much right back.

"right then, well, these sessions are on a as-needed basis. so let me say this in the nicest way possible. i hope we never have to meet in this room again. although my door is always open." dr. yoo gives you both a wink as she ushers you both outside. you wrap your arm around dahyun's shoulder, a little smile on your face.

you hold onto dahyun just a little tighter.

--

a/n: genuinely had so much trouble with this fic, but it has come to fruition so i'm happy regardless! had to do research on marriage counseling and i hope it is obvious but this is fictional and i am not a licensed therapist so there will be inaccuracies. also shoutout to @cry4mina who listened to me word vomit my troubles with this fic <3 please listen to the song as well as look up the meaning of the song!! stay safe and stay healthy everyone!!

to @saiiidahyunee this fic is for you, hope you enjoyed <333

#dahyun x reader #twice dahyun #dahyun twice #kim dahyun #twice x you #twice x reader #twice #kpop imagines #neoplatinum

[undercoverpena]

viii. tomorrow I'll be gone, save tonight

javier peña x f!reader | chapter eight of late night texts

summary: It's the year 2000. Javi is minding his own business on the porch of his pop's ranch when a text from an unknown number vibrates his phone. The only problem is, no one knows he has a phone and no one has his number.

chapter warnings: fluff. flirting. continuous romcom vibes. fluff. falling in love. idiots in love. we're approaching the sadness ✨ wordcount: 3.4k.

text key: bold is you/reader | italics is javi

It takes longer to get going the next day—mainly due to the number of times one of you begins pulling the other close.

A simple kiss here, a nuzzle there.

The morning ticking away as the two of you remain blissfully happy under hotel sheets. All undressed, sated and smiling.

Now, he’s basking in your laugh.

Laughing at him as he tries (poorly) to explain and rationalise his low score on Snakes. The game you had told him about to begin with.

Tears falling from the edges of your eyes as he tries to argue his case repeatedly. Your little wheeze making his heart clench with joy—your head shaking, hand cupping your mouth as each noise slips out.

“You’re clearly just not good with your fingers.”

He pinches you teasingly. “You know that’s not true.”

You're still smiling, your laugh fading as shyness begins to fall over your features. It starts with your eyes dropping to the bedsheets hiding both of your bare skin, and he waits for the feeble ‘stop’ that’s usually accompanied by a swat.

It never comes.

You lift your gaze back up instead, something twinkling, sparkling in your eyes. “Give it to me.”

“What?” 

Gesturing for his phone, you take it, all devious smirk with a wiggle of your shoulders. Throwing his arm behind his head, sighing—all blissful and content—as he leans against the headboard before you begin shifting in the sheets. Watching as you begin moving so your bare skin is on show as you do so. Slowly, and teasingly, you begin positioning yourself between his legs, as he sits up so your back connects with his chest. 

“Watch the master, okay?” 

He smirks, snorting. But he still slides his hands around your waist, feeling you twitch from the first feel of it before you relax. 

“So what’s the—“

“Shh,” you say, his lips sliding to your cheek, smelling the lingering scent of your perfume from dinner last night—and the two of you. 

His eyes fix on the screen. Watching the digital serpent slide around the screen to the sound of your key clicks—each pixel-bit collected as the tail grows longer. Your movements are quick—far quicker than he can text, never mind play this—

“Wait, you can go through walls?” 

“This one… this one you can,” you reply, words dropping off, concentration hanging on each syllable. 

It’s odd to be in awe of someone in how they control a snake across a screen. But he is. The score racked up, far surpassing the one that took him an embarrassing amount of time. 

Then, the screen flashes, your groan so cute—grunting out of you as you shake your head in annoyance. 

“You should take this off me.” 

“Competitive, are we?” 

Smirking, you hand him the phone as he casts it to the side with relative ease. More focused on keeping you here, close, skin to skin. 

“How am I even meant to beat that score, querida?” His lips find the skin behind your ear.  

“You’ll have to try real hard.” 

“You’re devious.”

“I prefer menace.” 

He’s about to agree, your mouth connecting with his—stealing them. Feeling the way you’re trying to punctuate something to him with your lips. Fingers brushing over his cheek, over the edge of the hair above his lip, before you slowly stop, lashes lifting to shower him in something which both shatters him and heals him all at once. 

“I should shower. Alone.” 

His mouth twists as he fights a smirk, all reluctant to let you leave this time. Like he had been the last time, his fingers softly holding your wrist, as you mumble about being quick, that if he was taking you out for the day, you wanted to not stink of sex. 

Something he wouldn’t have complained about, personally. Until he remembers the scent of your body wash. The one which has been burying itself inside of him, a flurry of softness and sweetness that if he ever smells a single ingredient of it, he’ll think of you. 

“I do wanna take you on all the dates, baby. So, go. Shower. Otherwise, I’ll never get the chance.”

You look over your shoulder, bent over your case. “All of them?” 

“Need to cram in all I can until…”

His words fade as he feels himself lurch. The noticeable hole in his chest began to widen—the one first appearing when you fell asleep in his arms last night.

Now, though, he gets to watch your reaction too. A front-row seat to your bottom lip wobbling, eyes averting him—as though you’re splitting apart two.

He doesn’t think. He just moves. Javi's feet kick the sheets free as he walks over to you. “Yeah, let’s… let’s not talk about that.” 

Burying his lips against yours to rid you of any remainders of it, as he positions your body back against him where he can. The wall greeting your back, his palm boxing you in until the two of you forget all about the impending deadline—and only about the now. 

“Javi…”

He groans, pressing his forehead to yours. “I know. You want a shower.”

Your fingers tap his chest lightly, forcing his head to lift, lips pressing a kiss to your hairline before turning. 

Sighing, he runs his hand over his face—hearing the bathroom door close—as the sheets crinkle back beneath him, blending with the falling water coming from the room next to him. 

He was happy. 

Ridiculously so. It runs through him together with looser muscles and more relaxed nerves. It swims inside his chest and balloons his heart. Mainly, it sits in his cheeks—the ones slowly beginning to ache from how often he’s been sporting that grin only you can pull from him. 

should I be worried about how long youre in the store for 

The woman in front of me is returning her entire life and then using coupons to buy a new life. Kill me.

cant. unfortunately I would miss you 

You’d replace with me ease. Have you seen your face?

can’t replace you hermosa but hurry up before I begin taking a bite out of each of the donuts 

You wouldn’t dare.

Id dare because the glazed one looks good 

“We could do nothing.”

It’s not that he hadn’t thought of (or planned) what the two of you could do together, he just hadn’t expected to burn through them all so quickly.

It didn’t help that it had been a while—too long—since he’d dated a person. Rarely ever making it past the first date. Most of them being dinner or coffee, or not even making it to either and finding himself getting what he needed without learning their surname.

Smirking, he runs his tongue across his teeth. “Nothing isn’t a date.”

“Not that way, we do nothing,” you retort, and he shakes his head as he grins. “We’ve done a restaurant, a museum, a picnic. We’ve done a lot.”

“We could go to the cinema?”

“But that means I can’t talk to you for over an hour.”

Javi smiles, hand running across his jaw. “Could make out at the back, though?”

Pulling a face, you sigh. “You drive a hard bargain, you do. But—”

“Fine, no movies. Another time?”

Grinning, you lean back in the booth of the diner, the one you’d requested—determined to make your way through the menu before you left.

Smiling, you sigh contently. “One day, we won’t even need to question it. It’ll be like a weekday date thing we do—once a month, on a Wednesday.”

“You thought about it?”

You hum, glancing back over the menu—brows knitting as you attempt to choose. “What?”

“Us. Dating.”

Your eyes flash up, all wide, full of panic. “Is that… I guess—I mean, like I know this isn’t conventional in the slightest and—and we haven’t, like, talked about it. I… I’m fucking up, aren’t I? Shit—“

“Fuck, hermosa. No. I mean… us going on dates, together. After this week—in one location, a setting a plan.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

Swallowing, you shift in your spot. “Um. Yeah, I have. The location is foggy, naturally.”

“Naturally.”

Your eyes fall to the table, fingers tapping along the plastic as you do. “I—I know… well, because I know you have the ranch and your pop, Javi.”

He swallows, rolling his lips as you try to fake a smile. 

“So, I know what that means. As I’m sure, you do.” 

He doesn’t, not a single clue. His brain racks to find it—what it is that you mean—but you clear your throat, eviscerating any further attempt at a push for that information as you smile, significant—all beautiful and charming. 

“What about bowling?” 

“You’re a cheat.” 

Coming up behind you, he spins you on the spot. Welcomed immediately by your grin, the one he’s been able to admire on your face for the last hour.

“Don’t be like that, Spare. You did well. Only 28 points behind.”

Shoving a finger at his chest, shaking your head, “You blindfolded me for one.”

“So, I could kiss you.” 

Smirking, you slowly wrap your arms around his neck, his arms finding their place on your hips. A place they’ve come to know as home. “You were worried about me winning, weren’t you?” 

“You were showing me up.”

“Bet if we went shooting, you’d beat me—Mr DEA,” you say, the latter all a whisper. 

“You’d go shooting?”

“Oh, fuck no. I can barely be trusted at the fair to shoot those little tin cans off the stand—you should not, I repeat not, put a gun in my hand.”

Beaming, he draws shapes with his thumbs. “Alright, noted.” 

Watching you from the corner of his eye as you grin, fidgeting with your jacket before you look up, and come to a stop. Something flashes across your face, glee—excitement—your head twisting to meet him. 

Then your hand slides inside his, the other hand wrapping around his wrist. He doesn’t fight the way you pull him towards it. The little photobooth you’d eyed up in the bowling alley. 

“Please?”

As if he could ever say no. 

Your legs over his, bodies crammed in the small space as he slides the dollar in. Your face is full of glee, your body bursting with excitement. 

I’ve always wanted to do one of these. 

There’s no decision on poses, you pressing your cheek to his as you slap the button, and the two of you grin on command. FLASH. Then after, it’s a quick reposition of movements that the two of you both seem to understand as you both pull a silly face. FLASH.

The next, he’s sure time slows for. Javi’s head turning, eyes lingering on you as your laugh blossoms across your features. His heart thundering in his chest, hammering so loud and heavy as that familiar, wanted, feeling flares up inside of him.

It isn’t until the next flash does he realise how wide he’s smiling. Feels it in his cheeks, as the light illuminates the flecks in your eyes—the ones he wants to fall into and never leave.

Then, time resumes, you leaning in—hand on his cheek, nose tip to his: the almost kiss.

FLASH.

Neither of you move. The two of you hovering as the photos finishes, the machine whirring—

“Kiss me,” you whisper, lips ghosting over his.

And who is he to deny you? Javi would kiss you forever if he could, so he slants his mouth over yours, feeling that rush of warmth in his chest that he gets when he kisses you. When he gets to, your smile presses against him, his fingers sliding up your neck. 

“You’re so handsome, Javi.” 

He smiles, thumb brushing your cheek as the machine spits out the two copies. Your arm diving, body twisting from him as you do—taking them, handing him one. 

But he doesn’t even stare down at his own copy. Javi just watches as you take in yours. How your eyes flick down each one, alternating smiles as you take them all in—lingering back up to the third. 

Just like he is. 

“We look good.”  

You grin, swallowing. “We do.”

You married yet?

shut up murphy 

Tell her I said hi. 

Javier Peña had wished for a lot of things when he was in Colombia.

A lead. A break. To catch Escobar. To take down the cartel. To keep himself intact—to leave with his head held high.

Then he wished for nothing. No reason to, no hope or want that even allowed the thought of one to appear, never mind to request it.

Now all he was doing was wishing.

As each hour of your last day together ticks on, he longs for more. Prays for a phone call that tells you that you can stay—craves a justifiable reason to throw you in his truck and take you back with him.

There isn’t one.

Just a looming goodbye and a prickling pain that’s biting at the edges of happiness and adoration.

He’d wanted to take you for food, but you’d insisted on drinks. Finding your leg between his as you tell him about your friend moving for her new job, about your childhood and how you had a goldfish once.

In the last few days, the two of you had shared so much, that the missing pieces of who the other is began to fill. He’d told you bits about Colombia, his Mom, Laredo.

You’d told him about work, about the people you meet—the issues you have to sort. The things in your apartment, the things you do with Aish and the life you live.

But, the confession that gets to him, is spoken softer, dropped into conversation nervously—as though you’ve been worrying about speaking it:

I like all the things we’ve been doing, but I have missed doing the crossword with you.

It’s that declaration that makes him talk about why. Allows him share that he likes doing them with you too, having done them for something to do—no pressure after Colombia, just a puzzle that needed solving.

Javi isn’t stupid, he knows there’s a bigger reason as to why he likes doing them, and with you. Why they have fallen to the wayside as soon as he had you in his arms. It pulses in his chest and drums along his bones.

And then you take his hand, as though knowing it too. Clutching it tight, a thousand questions bubbling about Colombia, but are never spoken. Because you don’t ask, don’t push.

I know you’ll tell me when you’re ready.

Your words make his heart soar. Make the beer on the table fall over as he leans across to kiss you, to cup your cheeks and thank you with his tongue behind your teeth.

Now, he’s glancing over at you—watching you with your legs crossed, eyes shimmering from alcohol. You wrap cheese around your finger, licking it from your skin before taking a large bite. 

“This pizza may be the best thing I’ve ever tasted.”

His mouth slides into a smirk, all about to make a comment when your eyes land on him. 

“Second to you, of course.”

“You been around me a week, and look at the tongue you have on you.”

“Yeah, you’re a bad influence.”

Leaning back, he wipes his fingers on a napkin. “You mind?” 

Shifting his weight on the floor, he watches as you chew—the back of your hand covering your mouth as your eyes roll, chewing more furiously. He shifts again, feeling something digging in, moving his hand to his back pocket of jeans, only to pull out a strip of photos.

The ones taken a day ago. 

His fingers unfold them as he hears you clear your throat, reaching for your red cup filled with wine as his eyes land on the third one down. The one where you’re laughing, spotting how he’s looking at you—not sure if he ever remembers seeing that look on his face in any other photo or in the mirror. 

“No, I—”

“Baby.”

He doesn’t mean to interrupt, but it's sitting on his chest again. Rising and falling like waves, and he’s tired of waiting for the storm to pass. Especially when he doesn’t want it to.

Javi wants it. You. Him. So much so, it’s close to erupting from him. The confession which has been sitting there, growing with each minute he spends with you until it thumps independently to his heart and feelings. A thing which has grown, expanded until it's now filling the space in him that he always imagined would be vast and empty. 

“Javi…”

“I want those dates with you. Cinema ones, once a month.”

Watching as your mouth falls open, hand furiously wipes the pizza dust from your fingers onto a napkin as you turn on your hip to face him. 

Clearing your throat, you sigh. “Me too. But, I know you have feelings on long distance, but—“

“Wait. What? What makes you say that?” 

Shrugging, you avert your eyes, lips rolling together nervously. “You said the other day, about how you almost got married. Before the DEA. That you were glad. That the distance wouldn’t have worked, and it meant you could focus.” 

His brow raises, waiting, wondering. 

Thinking there’s more—there has to be. The pieces not fitting, until they slowly slide into view. Your words in the diner, I know what that means. As I’m sure you do.

“Querida, no—”

“Did I… Did I put two and two together?” 

Taking your hand, pizza dust be damned, he sighs. “I… it was complicated. I just… I didn’t wanna marry her, but I didn’t want you to think I was an asshole for that. For leaving her, the way I did—I probably didn’t explain it well. But, it’s different with us. I want to make this work with you.”

His grip tightens on your hand, fingers lifting your chin so your eyes have nowhere else to look other than his. 

“So, we don’t see one another every week. We’ll plan it—talk like we did before, and make sure we have phone dates.” 

Nodding, he watches as your eyes fill with tears. Shimmering, making the flecks in your eyes stand out even more. 

“You don’t think I’m too much?”

His eyes widen, face softening—realising he's doing it again, the puppy face (as you so eloquently called it a day ago).

“No. Not in the slightest. I told you—baby, I never think that. Haven’t once.”

You look surprised, but you swallow it—smiling instead. “It won’t be easy.”

And he wants to laugh. Because he knows that. He knows hard. He’s faced hard, run through and been smacked with hard.

This with you, it could never be described as that. It’s easy, like breathing or existing.

So he cups your cheek, seeing you visibly sobering under the conversation. “I think we can do it.”

It’s more a statement, than a question. Watching you think it over, all unreadable, anxiousness fluttering in his stomach.

“I know we can,” he adds. “Until one day…”

“One day,” you repeat, as though turning the words over on your tongue. “Are you… are you sure?”

Looping his fingers around your neck, he presses his forehead to yours. Intimate, close—romantic. “Of course, baby. I want this—you, us. Do… Do you?” 

A tear falls, skidding down the apple of your cheek as you smile. “Of course. I… I may have cried in the shower this morning… because I didn’t want to say goodbye.” 

He sighs, light—shifting the weight which had been resting on him and closing the hole in his chest. Pressing his lips to your forehead, thumb and fingers stroking your cheek. 

“I can’t let you go, baby,” he whispers, resting his lips against your forehead. 

His ears hear the faint sound of me, either, before your fingers wrap around his wrist, forcing his head to move back before your lips burn the reply against his.

Over, and over, again.

It begins tender, warm—tinged with other words he’s not sure he’s meant to hear—before it moves to something that burns. Your touch is like flames, leaving marks against him he never wants to vanish or be rid of. It grows messy, his tongue licking into your mouth as the pizza lays forgotten as you move into his lap. 

Thighs on either side, fingers in his hair as he grabs your waist tight, pinning you close, until he makes you stand. 

Then the bed is dipping, the sheets crinkling, and he has you close to him. His name falls from your lips as he whispers yours, the two names merging together—blending, just as the two of you are. His fingers spanning your hip, keeping you flush with him, nails in his hair.

Then he hears it, breathy and right up against his ear. 

Mine. 

His head pulls back, eyes staring into yours. “Todo mío.”

if you haven't already, please check out this gorgeous piece that was gifted to me by @ghostaholics 🩵 for this reason, this chapter, the many dates and the way they're falling, is dedicated all to you, G.

#javier peña x reader #javi peña x reader #javi peña x you #javier peña x you #narcos x reader #javier pena x reader #javier pena x you #javi pena x reader #narcos javier x reader #narcos javier #pedro pascal x reader #narcos fanfiction #pedrostories #mm: late night texts #javier peña fanfiction

[gadriezmannsgirl]

Men Are All The Same - Pedri González

Sooo... I got this idea, this morning while listening to this song, waiting for my Class to start at Uni and I don't know why but all I could see was Pedri fitting in this shot. So, I hope you guys like it.

Song Inspo: Los Hombres Son Todos Iguales - Lasso (Such a beautiful song)

*Song name traduces to: Men Are All The Same* *Don't worry, song lyrics will be traduced to English* Italics means song lyrics

I tell her in her ear: "You are the most beautiful woman that I've seen in my life" She laughs and replies: "Seriously, don't you have a better line?" She tells me in my ear that she wasn't born yesterday, That she already learned that lesson. I laugh and reply that she agree to have a drink with me and then decide

"Pero, es que tú eres la mujer más hermosa que he visto en toda mí vida" (But, you are the most beautiful woman that I've seen in my whole life) Pedri says leaning into your ear whispering the words so that only the two of you can hear it

It's been four months since you and Pedri have met at that clothing store where he was trying to run away from some fans and collied with you, dragging you unintentionally, into one of the fitting rooms.

It was weird how much time it passed for his fans to leave the store (Three solid and good hours), so in between that time he made an effort to make a nice conversation trying to fix the fact you also got stuck with him. Resulting in a good friendship.

But, he obviously has been trying to hit on you since two months ago. And you can't say that you're not interesed in him, because he is damn beautiful, but you were broken before and you weren't going to let him break you once more.

Not when you just fixed yourself.

And adding the fact, Pedri is a famous persona. That only make your walls come higher than before.

"¿De verdad, Pedri? Pensé que tendrías una mejor línea que esa. It's very cliché" (Really, Pedri? I thought you had a better line than that one)

"Come on, you know it's true"

"I wasn't born yesterday, González" You replied "I know how that game works, I learned the lesson from it"

"Pero, venga" (But, come on) Pedri insisted "Let me have a drink with you, if you think I'm like the others, I'll back down" You looked into his eyes.

You were trying really hard to fight it. But you knew and he knew, he had that drink with you in his hands.

Like a star, she leaves me at daylight When she leaves, I pray to heaven, the night, just to see her again She is so beautiful, she hates being toyed with She swears that if she falls in love with me, she can only suffer, she already knows: "Men are all the same"

"¿Y?" (And?) Pedri asks after dropping her at her apartment after that date night

"I had a great time with you, González" You replied with a soft smile making Pedri break into a grin

"So? When is our next date?" You rolls your eyes and shake your head lightly

"It's getting late for you to drive"

"You're offering me your place to stay tonight?"

"I'm telling you, you should go to your house and have a good night, you're on training tomorrow" You said opening the door to your apartment

"Why are you so hard on yourself? You know you want to but you aren't accepting" You sigh after hearing Pedri's words

"You're beautiful, González" You began "But, if I fall in love with you all I'm gonna end up with is with a broken heart and I can't handle that again. Not again. Because no one is there to pick up the pieces except for me. Men Are All The Same, Pedri"

"Well, no", I tell her: "I'm not like that" "You charge me when the debt is not mine" "Pardon me", I tell her, "I am going to insist" "You can't live with fear all your life" She tells me: "They all start out like you, with a twinkle in their eyes" "And little by little, the routine drives them crazy and they take off" She tells me: "I hate being in love, being so blind and devoted" "So when something goes wrong, they'll leave with another one much prettier, prettier"

"I'm sorry to correct you, bonita. I'm not like that" Pedri shakes his head laughing lightly "You're charging me when the debt isn't mine. It isn't my fault some idiot didn't know what a wonderful woman he had by his side. I'm truly sorry he broke your heart and that I wasn't there to help you pick it up again"

"But I do know how wonderful you are and I'm trying to have you by my side, I know how much you are worth, you're so precious, it's crazy" Pedri shook his head "So I'm sorry, but I'll insist until you give in, you can't live with fear for the rest of your life"

"He told me the exact same thing you said, Pedri. He had the same look on his face, you're having right now. I fell, I fell and hard" You sighed taking a deep breath not wanting to cry "...And I hated it. I was so blind, so in love, so devoted and when something went wrong, even the smallest thing, he left me, blaming me for everything, for what went right and for what went wrong, for what it happened and for what it didn't. Everything, Pedri. He took the love I saved for myself and I watched him giving it to somebody else, somebody who was prettier than me in every single aspect" You sniffled looking at Pedri in the eye "That broke my everything"

"And I will pick it up" Pedri said decided "I will not be him. Trust me, please. That's all I'm asking. One chance, to prove I'm not like him"

Like a star, she leaves me at daylight When she leaves, I pray to heaven, the night, just to see her again She is so beautiful, she hates being toyed with She swears that if she falls in love with me, she can only suffer, she already knows: "Men are all the same"

You were having the time of your life with Pedri, deciding to give him a chance, giving in into his arms. You were out with his teammates, girlfriends and friends in a little bar, enjoying the meal and the drinks.

"Let's go dance" Sira Martinez said with a smile

"Yes, let's go!" Aurora, Gavi's sister said standing up

"C'mon, Y/N/N" Anna, Robert's wife said

"No. I'm fine" They complained but let it slide, if you didn't wanted, you didn't wanted.

"You really don't wanna dance?" Pedri, your now boyfriend of two months asked in surprise "You love dancing around in the house"

"I'm..." You trailed off, Pedri inmediately knew what was wrong

Your ex-boyfriend didn't let you dance in bars and clubs, even with your girl friends, he always wanted to have you by his side. You still had that part of the chip inside of you, afraid of Pedri not liking that either.

"Go" Pedri said "You can enjoy yourself too, okay? I'm not like that asshole" Pedri whispered in your ear "Go if you really want to" He nodded "I might join you girls later" He added making you laugh "But I still need more of this" He lifted his Corona beer "For that" He pointed to the little dance stage

They are all the same

You kissed his cheek and walked towards the girls, thinking. They are all the same but maybe he isn't.

And like a star, she leaves me at daylight When she leaves, I pray to heaven, the night, just to see her again She is so beautiful, she hates being toyed with I swear that if she falls in love with me She won't be sorry, I'll show her That all men are not the same

"Had a great time, young lady?" Pedri asks after coming to you, recently showered from his recent match against Real Madrid

"Yes, I did. My boyfriend scored and he dedicated me the goal. Also, his team won, couldn't get any better"

"Such a lucky guy he is" Pedri passed his arm around your shoulder as yours went to his waist

"No, I'm the lucky one" Pedri smiled "He's incredibly in love with me, I'm incredibly in love with him and everything's going incredible between us"

"Those are really great news" Your boyfriend of now, two years smiled at you leaning down to kiss your lips

"Can I drive the car?" You ask

"Can you give me back my hoodie?"

"No" You whine

"Ugh" He rolled his eyes dramatically making you laugh "Fine, you can have the damn hoodie, love. It looks better on you" You laughed "I hate the fact I can't say no to you"

"It seems like we're whipped for each other, because I can't say no to you either" He squished your cheeks together pecking your lips repeatedly

"Of course we are"

We are not the same, we are not the same Because all men are not the same

"I still hate the fact I can't say no to you" Pedri said after watching you ate one of his fries as you laughed

"So, if I asked you marriage...?"

"I will obviously say yes. Like, why would I ever say no to that?" You giggled "Like... When's the wedding?" You laughed

"Eres tonto" (You're silly)

"But I'm sorry to tell you. You can't do that"

"Why not?"

"Because I already did it" He pointed at your ring finger where the engagement ring was, making a smile break into both of your faces

You leaned in and kissed him

"You were right" You said after separating from him "Not all men are the same"

°°° °°° °°° °°°

@gaviypedrisbride

#pedri gonzalez #Pedri Gonzalez x Reader #pedri x reader #pedri x you #pedri imagine #pedri fluff #pedri blurb #pedri icons #pedri x y/n #fc barcelona #fc barça #M. is writing #writing #song inspo #Pedri González Lopez #pablo gavi #pedri

[caroldantops]

got bodies on bodies like this a slow dance

ship: venom!carol danvers x reader

summary/request: carol and venom ruin your anniversary, so they try to make it up to you with a special surprise.

word count: 1.1k

warnings: smut (18+), dom!carol and venom, sub!reader, straps, venom dick, oral sex (r giving), unrealistic deepthroating, throat bulges, breathplay, mentions of vaginal and anal sex (r receiving)

a/n: italics is venom talking, bold italics is carol and venom speaking as one. 

masterlist | monsterfucker celebration 2022 masterlist

“We ruined our anniversary, didn’t we?”

“We didn’t do anything! You did!” Carol growls at the gruff voice in her head, slamming the fridge door shut. The appliance is no match for her anger and superpower enhanced strength, and the door falls pathetically off of its hinge. “Stupid fucking parasite.”

“Hey!” Venom pops their head out of Carol’s body to complain, while she’s busy trying to put the door back on the best she can until she can actually fix it. “Not a parasite!”

“Whatever. The point is, you were the one piloting when we punched that waiter,” Carol points at Venom, who immediately turns her own finger back at herself. “You flipped the table!”

“You’re both idiots!” Venom retreats back into Carol at the sound of your still angry voice from the locked bedroom.

“Well, they’re talking to us again. That’s a good sign.”

Carol lets your pouting last for about another hour before she starts getting antsy. She hates sleeping on the couch. She's used to falling asleep with you wrapped up tight in her arms and her memory foam pillow under her. Venom is mumbling complaints about how long it took her to "man up" and knock on the bedroom door, but she ignores them as she taps against the wood.

"Baby? Can I come in?"

"Maybe," your muffled voice answers.

"I don't know how many more times I can say sorry. I promise we can go out tomorrow night, if you still want."

"Just not back to that place!"

"Yeah, just not back to that place."

"Or we can get noodles!"

"Oh, yeah, good call," Carol nods to herself. "Or we can order takeout from that place you like so much. I'll even get extra dumplings. And we can watch whatever horrible rom-com you want us to."

"Scream!" Venom suggests out loud.

"That's not a rom-com." Carol can hear you trying not to laugh through your words.

"Maybe not to you."

The apartment is silent for a moment before they finally hear the click of the door unlocking. Carol goes to open the door, but stumbles as you beat her to it. You give her one last indignant look before tugging her face towards yours.

"You're a piece of work, you know that?" You mumble practically against her lips. She meets you the rest of the way, happy to finally be in your good graces again. "I should still be mad at you two."

"But...?" Carol grins against your mouth.

"But, I'm not," you admit, pulling her backwards until your legs hit the edge of the bed. Carol is immediately pushing you backwards, suddenly reminded of all of the after-dinner ideas she had planned for your anniversary night. Her trail down your face to your neck, and you feel the tell-tale scrape of sharp teeth that mean Venom's getting eager as well. "I'm only forgiving you because that waiter was a creep and deserved it."

"And because we're a good fuck, right?" Both of their voices blend together in that way that makes your toes curl. You can see the glint of Venom's fangs poking through Carol's smug grin.

"Mm, why don't you put your money where your big mouth is?"

Spit drips down your chin as your nose comes close to brushing against Carol's skin. Surprsingly, Carol chose one of her smallest straps tonight, so you have no issues taking her length down your throat.

"Who's putting their money where their mouth is now?"

You move backwards in an attempt to pop the toy out of your mouth to reply, but suddenly you feel the distinct sensation of the symbiote’s tendrils wrapping aorund the back of your head, pushing your face back towards her hips. A gruff laugh that could’ve come from either Carol or Venom erupts from above you, amused by your desperate attempts at pulling away for air.

“Fucking look at you, so fucking pretty,” Carol groans, stroking your drool soaked face and admiring the dazed look in your eyes. “Bet you’d take whatever we gave you, slut.”

The grip the tendrils have on you loosen, and you’re given enough slack to pull away for a moment. You feel them skating over your body, squeezing your tits, trailing down between your thighs. The break that they give you doesn’t last long before Carol’s slapping the tip of her strap against your tongue and thrusting into you again.

Carol and Venom both have a fascination with watching their cock down your throat. It’s almost obsessive the way they could watch you for hours. You’re content with it too, loving the way that they get so absorbed in the sight that they lose control.

Suddenly, you feel a new sensation trailing along your tongue as you suck. You start to pull back, thinking something’s wrong, but those damned tendrils hold you in place, while some are stroking your clit between your soaked thighs. A muffled questioning noise comes from around the strap as you feel the toy going deeper than before. Your eyes water as you gag and adjust to the growing length. Carol and Venom’s moans blend.

“You like that? Good anniversary surprise?” they groan. With their moaning, you finally realize what the new sensation in your mouth is. The inky symbiote flesh has snaked around Carol’s strap, forming Venom’s thick, heavy cock in your mouth. “We thought the Captain should get to feel how good your wet little mouth feels.”

The cock fucking your throat makes it impossible to respond other than whining. Neither Carol nor Venom are ever gentle when fucking you, but tonight they’re especially riled up.

“Such a fragile little human.” You blink away tears so you can look up at them. Carol’s still present, not wanting Venom to take over completely right now, but their bodies are shifting and molding together like waves crashing against the shore, parts of Carol’s body being enveloped by the symbiote as they intermingle consciousnesses. “You can barely take our cock. It’s bulging in your pathetic little throat.”

Their hand comes down to your neck, squeezing the bulge and growling at the sensation. Finally, they pull you off. You gasp desperately for air wiping the spit from your face with the back of your hand.

“Fuck, give me some warning next time,” you feign annoyance. You’ve taken worse from them - you just enjoy how they look at you when you give them a pathetic pouty face.

“Aw, poor little one. How about we make it up to you?” They pull you up to the bed, easily setting you in their lap. You cup their face, admiring the way their eyes shift between Carol’s brown ones and Venom’s pure white. They give you a smug look that only Carol could achieve with such charm, kissing you gently as if she wasn’t destroying your throat seconds ago. “Where do you want us? Want us to fill that tight cunt? Or maybe we’ll stretch your ass so it’s pretty and gaping for us.”

You grin wickedly.

“Surprise me.”

#carol danvers x reader #venom x reader #carol danvers smut #venom smut #silver's 2022 mf celebration #silver writes #c: carol #venom!carol

[smoooothoperator]

What A Shame

04: Human

Driver! Charles Leclerc x Singer! OC (Juliette Morelli)

Exes to Lovers, Forced Proximity, Childhood Sweathearts

Summary: memories and small confessions, what can go wrong?

Words: 2.2k

warnings: Sebastian Stan x OC, charles' dad, still angsty, flashbacks are on italics

Official Playlist

Masterlist

previous part | next part

a/n: hello beautiful people! i know this chapter is short but don't worry, tomorrow you'll have a new one!

🎤

"Juliette, can I ask you something?" he said smiling, playing with my hair.

Sebastian Stan. We flirted for a long time, working together on Marvel and now on our own new movie was something that made us be close. I knew he was older, fifteen years older, but that never stopped me. Age doesn't matter, right?

I knew he had feelings for me, but he never told me. We liked each other, even acted like a couple, but we never were one, we never talked about it. I went to his house to sleep and he came to mine to do the same. We slept together and tried to be careful so no one noticed our relationship.

"I'm not the guy of your songs, right?" he sighed, smiling weakly.

"W-what?" I frown looking at him, sitting on the bed and covering my naked chest with the blanket.

"I noticed that every year you drop a love song the same day" he smiled weakly, holding my hand and squeezing it. "I'm not him, right? Those love songs are not for me"

"Seb…" I mumble, swallowing thickly.

“Something inside of me knew that those songs were for someone else, but I just wanted to believe that you wrote them for me” he mumbled, never erasing the smile of his lips.

I looked at him, feeling my heart beating faster after hearing his confession.

"The last four years I noticed that you always stare at your red clothes" he said, brushing his thumb on my knuckles. "That you write a lot in your notebook and sometimes I hear you cry when you think I'm asleep"

I looked at him, surprised. He noticed all those things?

"Who hurt you, Juliette?" he whispered, pushing my body to his, wrapping his arms around me.

"Charles Marc Hervé Perceval Leclerc" I whisper, saying all his names, feeling how they burned my throat. "The guy of the songs is him"

"Oh…" he nodded and I could hear his heart beating under my ear. "You want to tell me? I'm here for you, you know that"

"You are too good for me, Sebastian" I whisper, feeling tears in my eyes. "You are too good for me and I don't deserve it"

"Why not? Hey, come here" he whispered, rubbing my arm and peppering soft kisses on my forehead.

"Because I won't love you" I whisper. "I won't love you because he still owes my heart and he always will. Because he's just my soulmate and even if he broke my heart I'll never stop loving him"

"That's… That's beautiful, doll" he whispered and I could hear his heart breaking. “I’m sure you two will fix things”

I have to be strong. I need to be strong. Strong heart, even if the other half of it is no longer with me, but with him.

"Leave me alone, Charles" I said, tightening the grip of the microphone in my hand. "You did it once, it is not that hard. Just walk away and don't look back"

"I won't" he said frowning. "What the hell happened to you?"

"What happened to me?" I scoffed, trying to not let the tears show up. "You. That's what happened. And if you don't want me to raise my voice and make Valerie angry because I can't sing after screaming at you, leave me the fuck alone"

"So you can't scream at me but you can scream when Lando fucked you like a whore, hm?" he said and I saw the vein in his forehead showing up. He's pissed.

But that didn't stop me from slapping his cheek. That didn't stop me from making his head turn to the side with the strength of the slap making his cheek get red.

"Don't you dare to call me that way ever again" I said angry, pointing at him with a finger.

He would never call me that. He would never call a woman that way.

I saw the shock in his face, the way his jaw clenched hard and how his chest moved anxious. Even after all these years I know how he feels by only looking at him.

"Leave" I said, trying to sound hard.

Leave before I regret everything I did.

Before he could say something else I turned around, my hand in my chest holding all the pain, and left the microphone on its stand, walking inside the building and going as fast as I could to my room, with memories running around my mind and making the tears go down my cheeks.

Why can't I forget Charles and be happy for once? Why does he hurt so bad?

All those years I played with men, using them and throwing them away like they were toys, just because I wanted to forget someone that hurt me.

Why does he has that control over me? Why do I still love him after what he did to me?

I searched my notebook, grabbing it and going through the pages and reading everything. All the pain written down on it, all the anger and fear. He's my life, I can't live without him.

I saw his eyes. The pain in them mixed with anger and desperation. The way he clenched his jaw meant that he was anxious, scared. I saw it many times.

"I can't believe I lied to him" he mumbled looking at himself in the mirror, dark circles under his eyes while trying to button his shirt.

"Love, it was for the best" I whispered as I walked towards him, the black dress moving as I walked towards his panicking figure. "You know that it made him happy, he left happy"

"He's disappointed" he mumbled, his eyes getting red slowly. "I just… God, how could I do something as stupid as that! Lying to my father while he was dying right in front of my eyes"

His breathing was quick, his nostrils moving with his breathing. The vein on his temple was visible and the naw was tense. All his body language was screaming panic and anxiety.

"Charles, love, listen to me" I whisper cupping his cheeks, wiping away the angry tears. "Your dad was, is and will always be proud of you. You are following your dreams and he's so happy for that. If you don't get the Ferrari seat this year you'll have it next! It will come in the right time"

"But…" he mumbled, slowly leaning on my touch. "I'm losing everything… Jules and now my father"

"You are not losing me" I whisper, pecking his lips. "You'll never lose me"

I stopped on that page. I wrote a song for him after he lost his father. I needed to be calm for him, he needed someone to lean on while he was breaking down. Turns out that I never released it, I never put a melody to it. I only wrote down my feelings to let all that sadness get out of my heart.

But right now, even if that song was for him after his father passed away, that song talks about me.

I hugged the notebook close to my chest, letting the words get close to my heart.

All those love songs, even if they were heartbreaking songs, were only for him.

"Juliette?"

I looked up to the wooden door, three knocks followed my name. He's out there, on the other side of the door.

"Leave" I said out loud, making sure he heard me.

"I just want to talk" he said. "Can you let me in, please?"

"The door is open" I mumbled, noticing the moment he opened the door that I said that.

I saw him walk in, closing the door behind him and standing in front of it. I could read him like an open book, still. I could see that he was nervous, that his mind was trying to find words in whatever language that comes first to his mind. I could see his eyes were asking me for permission to sit next to me on the bed. He's the same after all those years away from me.

"I tried to hate you" I said, looking down at my lap. "I tried so hard, so so hard… But it never worked"

I heard his feet moving on the floor and walking closer to the bed. But still, he didn't sit down.

"I had a lover" I said laughing sadly. "A man that worshiped the floor I walked on. That, no matter what, loved me. But I couldn't love him back"

"Juls…" he sighed, calling me by the nickname he gave me. It just made my heart break because I missed hearing him say it.

"Sebastian was amazing" I whisper, holding the notebook closer to my chest. "But I couldn't love him back. God, not when…"

"I never had a lover all this time" he said, making me feel worse than I already was feeling. "I couldn't find a woman that made me feel how you did… It was impossible to find someone that made me feel as complete as you did"

I looked at him, how he sat at the edge of the bed, close yet away from me.

"I'm sorry I called you a whore" he frowned looking at me. "You are not a whore, I just… I was mad, Juls. You just slept with one of my friends and it really made me sad"

I took a deep breath and nodded. I saw him reaching my notebook to read it. I don't care if he does, after all, everything that is inside is all about him.

"Those songs… I never heard them" he said, reading the lyrics. "This one…"

But I'm only human

And I bleed when I fall down

I'm only human

And I crash and I break down

Your words in my head, knives in my heart

You build me up and then I fall apart

'Cause I'm only human

"Is the one I wrote for you when your dad passed away" I whisper tired. "I witnessed everything from outside, I saw how broken you were and…"

"And I kept going on" he whispered, his fingers caressing the black handwritten words. "I kept fighting for a seat that made my life a hell"

"Charles I didn't want to say that…" I frown looking at him, how he smiled weakly.

"But you were right" he nodded. "You are always right. You always told me that red is the meaning of danger. Yet I never listened to you… If I did none of this would have happened and we could be already married like I promised you"

I looked at him surprised. He remembers. He remembers the promise.

"I was so blind, so selfish" he frowned, focussing his eyes on his hands. "I wanted to win, to fight and be the best out there. I wanted to be the first driver, be someone important for Ferrari. I wanted to be a legend… I wanted to be what they called me, il predestinato…"

"You brought them wins, Charles…" I sighed reaching for my notebook.

"And they brought me misery, insecurities, anxiety…" he said looking back at me. "You know, I had a season where I thought I could be a champion. It was in 2022. I thought I could fight, that I could be a world champion"

"I read it, yeah" I nodded, making him raise his eyebrows surprised.

"That season started amazing, I started winning the first race with Carlos next to me" he smiled weakly, sitting on the end of the bed comfortably, smiling like remembering a dream. "I fought, I had podiums… but then I started to fuck up everything. Ferrari started to destroy every chance I had to be on top of the podium. They fucked up my races, making me doubt myself…"

I look at him and swallow thickly. Maybe if I begged him to stay he would be better. Maybe it really was my fault for not fighting for us. I could have made him a better man, he could have someone next to him to support him.

No. He decided himself that he didn't want me by his side. He pushed me away and made the decision alone.

I took a deep breath and closed the notebook that open on the bed, holding it on my chest.

"But still, you've got what you wanted" I said, my voice coming stronger. "You've got two championships, as I heard"

"Yeah, but…"

"Will you please leave? I have to get ready for lunch" I said, getting up off the bed and opening the door for him to leave.

"Juls" he frowned looking at me.

"Don't call me like that ever again" I said, biting my lip, holding the door handle tighter. "I'm not yours anymore. You lost every right to call me like that"

I saw his eyes getting wet, red. I can read him like a book and I hate that. Because I know how he feels right now and it makes me want to hold him.

He got up and walked out of the room, and I just closed the door before I saw him turning around to look at me. I can't let him win this time, I can't let him have whatever he wants. He was the one that wanted me out of his life.

taglist

@lestappenloverr @racinggirl @roni-midnights @livster @kakorrhaphiphobia @starkeyellow

#f1 #f1 x y/n #f1 x oc #f1 x reader #f1 imagine #f1 drabble #f1 serie #formula 1 fic #formula 1 drabble #formula 1 x reader #formula 1 imagine #formula 1 fanfic #formula 1 #charles leclerc #charles leclerc x you #charles leclerc fanfic #charles leclerc x reader #charles leclerc imagine

[spaghettificationandpretzels]

Be Known in its Aching

Mayans MC Masterlist

Part three of A Gentle Kind of Love.

Contains: Fluff, mutual pining, angst (endless longing, discussion of sibling death, sadness and grief, combat and war and past near-death experience.) flashbacks in italics, slow burn.

5.5k words

Comment if you want to be tagged/removed or follow #a gentle kind of love.

Wasteland, baby, I'm in love, I'm in love with you.

"What are you fuckers gossiping about now?" Bishop wasn't happy, they had returned to Oakland from Santo Padre in the early morning after dropping you off. They were back home now, milling around the Clubhouse, acting like idiots.

"Manny and the good doctor Pres, something happened when we took her home."

Bishop sighed, resigning to the fact that this was happening, "you wanna tell me what?"

Angel smiled, "well, he walked her to her door and she kissed him."

Bishop's eyes went wide, "on the mouth?"

Coco shook his head, "on the cheek but it looked, umm, affectionate."

Bishop huffed, "this is what you're wasting your time about, a kiss on the cheek? Get back to work you shitheads."

You had been a worried mess since Manny dropped you home two days ago and your conversation with Coco the next day hasn't helped. 

You kept going back to your phone, considering calling Manny and explaining yourself when Coco called you. You picked up and didn't even give him a chance to speak, "oh my God, I made such a fool out of myself."

Coco chuckled, "nah, the dude hasn't stopped smiling, it's getting creepy." 

"What the fuck do you mean? Please just put me out of my misery."

He snorted, "no. I was calling to tell you your car's almost fixed, I'll drop it by your office before you head home tomorrow."

You rubbed your face, "thanks Coco. Has Angel been terrible?"

Coco chuckled, "yep, he's right you know."

You shook your head, "no he's not. We're just friends." 

"Sure y/n."

A knock on your office door had you shaking your head, "doing paperwork, can I help you?"

It was your security guy Barry, "ahh, Manny? Is here with your car."

You shot up and opened the door, "tall, neck tattoo?"

He nodded, "that's the fella."

You smiled, "thanks B, all go out there and deal with it."

Barry stopped you, his thick English accent making the whole situation feel even more ridiculous, "you and the lad, is something going on there?"

You sighed, "no, has a man named Angel turned up in your dreams to tell you differently?"

Barry shook his head, "nah, just something about the way he looked when I said I'd send you out."

You walked outside to be greeted by Manny leaning against your car holding your keys up, "your steed."

You smiled, "my steed? How fancy."

He smiled, "the last time we saw each other, you did look like a princess, so I figure it fits."

You shook your head, "thank you Manny. How was the rest of your weekend?"

He smiled, "good, it looks like we won't have to go to Charming."

You breathed a sigh of relief, "that's good, the Club has its own mess to clean up without having to deal with anyone else's."

Manny's shoulders dropped, "yeah I know. It's getting worse, Yuma not even bothering to call to help with the Sons, shit's brewing."

You blinked, "unless all the other charters get on board there's nothing you can do. I know SP and Yuma have been at each other's throats since Marcus chose you guys for the new pipeline but Canche still has the connections."

"It's not just that, what happened in the desert caused some kind of cosmic shift. Shit's gonna hit the fan if nothing is done about it."

You shrugged, "what can you do? It either gets worse and something terrible happens or Canche comes to his senses and begs for people to stop seeing him as an enabler for a monster."

Manny nodded, "yeah, you're right." He tapped the hood of the car, "I gotta head back to the metal yard, you call me if anything goes wrong?"

You nodded, "will do, thank you for dropping it off."

He smiled, "no worries, I can't wait for the cake."

You got around to the cake a few days later, you had wrapped it up nice and taken to the metal yard when you were currently slicing it for Coco and Angel. "This is so good, how do you do it?"

It was muffled, "Angel, don't talk with your mouth full, it's made with strawberries from my garden and local honey." You looked around, "where's Manny?"

Angel shrugged, "he's in the back. He's been a bit sad, maybe you can cheer him up?"

You nodded, "thank you, I'll take him a slice." You put one on a plate and headed to the back office, softly knocking on the door and waiting for Manny to answer. He offered you a soft smile when he opened the door, "I brought cake." You held it out and he took it from you, looking at it like it was some foreign substance,

"It will keep for like five days, you don't need to eat it now. You seem down, is there something you want to talk about?"

The silence was deafening, "nah, it's just been a long week but it's better now that you're here, do you have some time to eat this with me?"

You nodded, "of course, let me get my own slice and a fork, I'll be right back."

You returned as fast as you could, sitting down next to him on the couch, "how's work been?"

He shrugged, "hauling scrap metal isn't all that fun."

You nodded in agreement, "I imagine, shit pay, no appreciation, possible hazards. Is there anything I can help with? I've done a lot of odd jobs through the years."

He smiled, "nah, how's your day been?"

You thought for a moment, "good, one of my favourite patients had their last regular appointment today, they're at a place where they'll only need to stop in if things take a turn."

Manny's head tilted, "are you allowed to have favourite patients?"

You sighed, "in theory? No. In practice? Almost everyone does, I'm still human and in all honesty, the parents play a roll too."

He nodded, "I could not do your job, I'd start killing people."

You huffed, "you don't think I think about it, there are people I would happily shoot."

Manny's eyes went wide, "wow, I thought you were all about kindness and understanding."

You smiled, "most of the time I am but sometimes I just think about it, vivid homicidal fantasies keep me sane in court."

Manny seemed to agree, he also seemed a little brighter, "how's Mr Butterscotch?"

You smiled, "jonesing for a beard to lick, he looks behind me when I come home now."

Manny smiled, "that is so cute."

Something about him made you feel worried, "I mean, you can come over and provide yours, I think he'd be happy with that."

Manny averted his eyes, "I can't just drop by your place to hang out with your cats, I'd never leave."

You snorted, "please, come over and hangout with my cats, I only have so much lap to offer."

He laughed, "alright, how does tomorrow afternoon sound?"

You smiled, "that sounds great."

He was at your door right on four the next day, to your surprise, he opened his arms for a hug as you invited him in. You wrapped your arms around his body and squeezed and he almost collapsed into your embrace. A meow parted you and he bent down to pick up Mr Butts, the fluffy ginger cat going right to his beard.

"I miss the little guy."

You smiled, "judging by how his little paws are holding on to you, I think he feels the same way. You want something to eat? I'm making grilled cheese."

He shook his head, "nah, why are you always trying to feed me?"

You shrugged, "because you're my guest and I'm civilised, it's polite to offer you food."

"You punching Canche wasn't very civilised." There was humour in his voice.

"He was asking for it, maybe the kick to the testicles was uncivilised."

Manny chuckled and shook his head, "nah, that was awesome." He was still holding Mr Butts, burying his face in his fur.

He sniffed and a sadness came over the room, "you work with kids who have lost people, does it ever get easier?"

So that's why he was there, "it's like a open wound, it heals and scars over but it never goes away, you wanna tell me why that's on your mind?"

There was silence and then he spoke, "my little sister died when I was fifteen, her birthday is tomorrow."

You sat next to him and put your hand on his leg, his arms hugging the cat to his chest, "I'm so sorry for your pain, would you like to tell me what happened?"

He sniffed again and you could see his eyes getting red, "cancer, it was fucking horrible."

You nodded, "I can't imagine how terrible it must have been to watch her suffer that and I understand why you're so sad right now, it's clear to me how much she matters to you and you're not going to get to see her grow up. How old was she?"

"Seven, my parents tuned out at the end, I was the one there when it happened."

His voice was cracking now, "that's a lot of put on a young boy, you shouldn't have gone through that."

He nodded, "yeah, well it made me a man."

You nodded, "I can understand that, you had to do a lot of growing up in a very short amount of time."

Mr Butts settled on his lap as the other cats wandered in to see what was going on, Manny looked at Lady Midnight as she jumped on the couch and rubbed her head on his shoulder, "your cats are really sweet."

You nodded, "they know when people need a bit of love. Have you considered talking to someone about how you're feeling? "

He shook his head, "what's the point, it's not going to bring her back."

You nodded, "no, it won't but I never heard you say one thing about your parents and I'm getting the sense that you don't really like them that much."

He huffed, "I fucking hate them."

You could tell by his tone he wasn't lying, "I don't blame you, they left you to care for your dying sister all by yourself, I think would there was something up if you didn't have any ill will towards them."

"Really, I thought therapy was all about love and getting over shit."

You shook your head, "no, a lot of what I do is teaching people it's ok to hate people when they hurt you, it's ok never to want to talk to someone again. You just can't let it take over your life."

He smiled sadly, "I just miss her so much. She wanted to be a teacher, she'd spend all her time reading, when I couldn't find her I knew she be hiding under the stairs with her head in a book."

You smiled and reached up, wiping the tear from his cheek, "I have the whole night free, how about you tell me all about her."

Manny didn't know where to start, he was lost between being overwhelmed with her memory, the pain of losing her and not knowing where to start, "her name was Clara, she loved daisies and her favourite colour was yellow. She hated peas but loved fried rice so I used to pick out the peas for her so she didn't have to."

He was awash with visions, "I walked her to and from school every day and in the afternoon she tell me everything she learned, she was always so happy. When she got sick the worst part of it was that she was missing school so I would go to the library and print out worksheets and take them into the hospital."

He blinked away tears, and you placed your hand on his leg, "when she got really sick, she couldn't even hold up a pen so I would just read to her. She would fall asleep and I would stop then her eyes would..."

He could keep going, overwhelmed with pain and grief, he crumbled into your arms and started to sob, "I miss her so much."

You hugged him to you, trying to soothe the ache in his soul, "I am so sorry."

"You seemed better."

Manny nodded, "yeah."

His lack of elaboration had Coco curious, "you went and saw y/n."

It was a statement, not a question, "she's really great."

Coco smiled, "I know, you love her don't you?"

Manny sighed, "yeah, I do." It's not like everyone was in the dark, it was clear by the way he looked at you that he loved you, it was just that he hadn't said it out loud yet, "please don't tell Angel, he'll never let me forget it."

"Tell me what?"

They jumped, "where the fuck did you come from?"

Angel shrugged, "I was in the yard, what don't you want me to know about?"

Coco smiled, "Manny's in love with the good doctor."

Manny glared at Coco while Angel smiled, "tell me something I don't know, you gonna grow a set of balls and tell her?"

"Nah, I ain't going to ruin our friendship."

Angel huffed while Coco shook his head, "are you blind mano? She's into you."

Manny wasn't listening, "you're seeing shit that isn't there Angel, you need to let it go."

Angel sighed, "alright, but I'm gonna be telling you I told you so."

"GET BACK TO WORK YOU LAZY FUCKS."

Bishops booming voice filled the yard, "sorry Bish."

Coco slapped Manny's chest, "you heard him, we've got to get back to it."

It had been four days since Manny's visit and you were at the metal yard hanging out after a long day at work, "you guys seem busy?"

EZ nodded, "we got a contract from a used car guy, he sends us the ones that he can't sell."

You raised your eyebrows "good for you, I hope you don't find anything gross."

Coco cringed, "it was one time, how were we supposed to know people think you can dispose of bodies in a compactor."

"Have you ever seen a mob movie? It's like the most common way."

EZ shook his head, "I thought that was concrete shoes?"

You waved your arms around, "do you see any water around here?"

Manny came wandering in, a smile on his face, "are you still going on about that body? It was probably just some dealer disposing of his rival." 

There was a loud noise, not unusually for the work going on but the screams that followed had everyone running, you rounded the corner and found the source of the yelling. Riz had a piece of rebar embedded in his shoulder. 

Without thinking, you pulled off your top to wrap the wound, running over to him to hold the hunk of metal steady. "You need to call an ambulance, I don't think it hit anything but the longer it stays in the worse it's going to be."

Manny was standing in front of you, his eyes locked on your body, you could see the wheels in his brain turning as he took in the deep scar on your stomach. "I got shot, now stop fucking gawking and call for help." It didn't take long for the ambulance to arrive and Bishop directed you to the bathroom where you could clean up. 

Knock knock

"Yeah, come in." Manny opened the door his eyes stuck on the back wall as he handed you a spare work shirt, "thanks."

He nodded, seemingly wanting to say something, "ask, everyone does."

He blinked, "I'm sorry I didn't mean to stare."

You shook your head, "it's fine, I looked like I was gored by a bull."

He huffed, "it's honestly pretty badass. What happened, I mean, if you don't mind telling me?" 

"It happened in Afghanistan, I was working at a brick and mortar field hospital and had just finished a group therapy session for a bunch of kids when two Afghani cops went rogue and went looking for people to kill. Their first stop was my office. I was wearing a bulletproof vest but one of them had a sawed off shotgun. The gun I was given jammed and he got the best of me, most of the pellets went through the vest and into me." 

Many blinked, "what happened next?"

You sighed, "I raised my sidearm and fired, it hit the mark and he dropped like a sack of potatoes. I was mostly ok, but some of the pellets ended up in my right lung. After the guy died, I don't remember much, I could hear someone screaming for a medic turns out it was me. Then the next guy came in, I knew that was it because with all the blood I was losing, there was no way I could fire my gun again, then the guy's head exploded."

Manny was deep in thought, "Coco?"

You nodded, "Yep, the man saved my life. All I could think about when I was lying there bleeding out was that I had to get to the ER with a chance or they'd let me die. I spent like four days at death's door. All I have left is this nasty thing and the pellets in a glass case." 

Manny smiled, "that is so hardcore."

You chuckled, "yeah, it is. Not as hardcore as the time a patient's father stabbed me for getting his kid taken from him."

You pointed to the faint scar under your collarbone, "you're right, there's is a lot I don't know about you, I never would have guessed you were so metal." 

You lifted the shirt up, "I'm gonna put the shirt on now, I'm getting kinda cold."

Manny looked at his hands, "yeah, I'm gonna see Riz, wanna come?"

"Yes please, I'd like to see how he's doing."  

Riz was out two days later then it was time for another Friday party, this one was a big one since Marcus and Oakland were there. You were sitting by the fire with Manny and Creep, talking about Creep's strange fascination with mushrooms, "I was really disappointed when I had truffles."

He nodded, "yeah, they taste like dirt."

Manny huffed, "when did you two get so fancy?"

"It wasn't really my choice, I was on a date, he ordered for me."

Manny smiled, "I bet you hated that?"

You nodded, "he tried to order me wine after that, I got the hell out of there and took my dirt pasta with me."

Creep shook his head, "you took it with you?"

You nodded "out of spite, I gave it to Barry, he liked it."

"Wow, I learn more and more about you every day, what else have you done out of spite?"

There was something in Manny's tone that had you ready to laugh, "truth time?"

They both nodded, "I only come here to spite Raul."

Creep made a face, "what do you mean?"

You could tell he was bullshitting, "I know you all know what happened, there's no way something like that doesn't get out."

Manny smiled, "your conversation with Coco was on speaker, we all heard it."

You clapped, "I fucking knew it, you wanna fuck with him a bit more?"

Manny smiled, "fuck yeah."

You nodded, "call him over."

Creep shot up and looked around, landing eyes on the prospect, "HEY SHITHEAD, GET YOUR ASS OVER HERE."

Raul came running, barely looking at you before standing at attention in front of Creep, "did you need something?"

Manny smiled, "yeah, tell us about your night together, what was it that you said about y/n?"

His mouth opened and closed like a fish, "umm, it's not important."

You smiled and tapped the seat next you, "oh come on, don't be like that, I'd love to hear your version of things."

Manny's expression was tinged with something, "what, you were fine talking about what happened when we were together, is there any reason you can't do it with her here?"

He swallowed, "look, I'm really sorry about what I said, I figure you've already been through all of them and I'd look bad if you……" You covered your face and Manny's hand collided with Raul's jaw.

You turned to Creep who was smirking, "should we, umm?"

He shook his head as Manny climbed on top of the man, "nah, the dude needs to learn if he wants to get his patch."

It didn't last long, Manny was stepping back and dragging Raul up by his kutte, "fuck off prospect and go and get me a fucking beer."

You smiled, "maybe don't ask him to get you anything, I don't think you want his spit in anything."

"Good idea y/n, you can go clean the shitter instead."

Raul hurried off and Manny sat down and rubbed his knuckles, "you want me to get you some ice?"

He shook his head, "I'm alright, that felt good though."

You sighed, "you didn't need to hit him you know?"

Manny huffed, "yeah, I did."

Creep chuckled, "you really have shit luck with men, don't you?"

You rolled your eyes, "I mean, I don't have the best track record but you know, I have this thing, it's called a vibrator, and it kinda makes men obsolete."

Creep cringed, "you're a little vulgar, you know that?"

You nodded, "I'm just being honest."

Manny shook his head, mischief on his face, "you talk like their competition and not friends, maybe you just haven't found the right guy yet."

You pressed your lips together to stop yourself from laughing, you face getting hot and the implication of his words settled over you, "what are you, God's gift to women. Does that cocky shit really work for you?"

Manny nodded, "hey, I'm just being honest."

You sighed, "well.. I don't have a response to that other than, good for you."

Marcus watched the fight with curious eyes, "what was that about Primo?"

Bishop sighed, "the prospect told everyone he and y/n went at it, in reality, she climbed out the window to avoid humiliating him."

Marcus chuckled, "and her and Manny?"

Bishop shrugged, "there's something going on there but they're both too blind to say anything. If Angel had any say they'd be married already."

Marcus nodded, "and your read on her?"

Bishop thought for a moment, "she's a good woman, very kind but you saw what happened with Canche, she's no shrinking violet. She's not a big fan of these parties but she comes because people like her company and she's always ready to help. She's been through something because she's got a healed gash the size of my fist on her stomach and she's observant like she's seen the business end of a gun one too many times."

"Does she know about the drugs?"

Bishop nodded, "I think she figured it out pretty quick."

Marcus huffed, "it sounds like she's a good fit. And it looks to me like those two are meant for each other."

Bishop rolled his eyes, "not you too."

Marcus chuckled, "don't worry about it Primo, these things work themselves out."

You sighed and stood up, you had been talking to a revolving door of people all night, "as much as I would love to continue this conversation, I need some air. I'm going for a walk, I'll be back in a bit."

Manny stood up, "let me go with you."

You waved your hand, "it's alright, I just need ten minutes."

He nodded, "alright, but come back in ten minutes or I'm sending a search party." 

You smiled, "ten minutes, I promise." You headed off and wandered up the streets, enjoying the clear night sky, they were mostly empty until you came to a long street a few blocks away from the Clubhouse. There was a black van on the road, and four men were milling around it. As you got closer, you could hear parts of their conversation and you started to worry. 

"We got to do it now," One of the men shook his head, "no, we wait until they're all drunk. Those fucking Mayans won't know what hit em." 

You swallowed, a plan forming in your brain. You took your phone out and looked around like you were lost then walked up the street looking for street signs. After a few moments you approached the men doing your best to look lost, "I'm sorry gentlemen, I'm looking for a fancy French place, La Creme or La Cream or something like that, I'm really lost and I'm late, can someone tell me where it is?" 

You didn't miss how one man was doing his best to hide the iron cross on his neck, "you're going to wrong way, it's back there miss."

You sighed, "you're not serious, I've been walking this was for twenty minutes." As you spoke, you made sure to memorise the men's faces and any tattoos they had, you could hear men in the van, but not their conversation. 

"You know where the biker clubhouse is?"

You shook your head, "I walked by a crazy party with some bikes out the front, is that the place?"

One of them nodded, "yep, it's about ten minute's walk from that, take the long road up, then take a left down the side street and you should get to Mainstreet it's easy to find from there." 

You looked at their faces, the older, harder, looking men wouldn't even acknowledge you were there and judging by the way everyone was acting, you could see that this was some kind of initiation, the ones that were talking to you were the ones looking to jump into the gang. You smiled, "thank you so much, I'd offer to buy you some beers but I'm so late." 

The man with the iron cross on his neck stiffened his posture, "then you better head off, you don't want to run into trouble all by yourself out here, bad things can happen to a nice lady like yourself." You got the message loud and clear and with one last thank you, you started to jog away, breaking out into a run the moment you were out of their sight. 

You bearly had any breath left when you got to the Clubhouse, Angel and Gilly were standing by the door and noticed something was wrong, matching your pace to meet you at the door, "what's wrong?"

You raked in a breath, "the Clubhouse is about to be hit, I heard and a group of men talking a few streets up. They said they were going to wait a little while but I don't know how long you have." 

Gilly had run off, coming back with Marcus and Bishop, "what's going on?"

You took a deep breath, "you need to get everyone inside, I guess you're about half an hour away from a massacre."

They looked at you and Marcus blinked in worry, "what do you mean." Bishop waved to someone and produced you a bottle of water. 

"I was walking around the block when I overheard a bunch of guys talking about hitting the place, no elaboration. I acted like I was lost so I could get a read on them. As far I could tell, it's some kind of jump in, only two guys had any gang markings. One had an iron cross on his neck, which he was doing his best to hide and the other had a strange tattoo on his wrist I had never seen before, the only reason I could tell it was white power was that there were the numbers fourteen and eighty eight." 

Angel's eyebrows wrinkled, "what does that mean?"

You inhaled again, trying to calm yourself, "H is the eighth letter in the alphabet, so eight eight is HH meaning heil Hitler and fourteen is fourteen words, it's a white power slogan." 

"We need to get everyone to safety." Bishop's tone was firm.

You rubbed your face, "permit me to share my idea?"

Marcus nodded, "you don't know who these guys are or what they want, wouldn't it be better to stage an ambush of your own? Have the music loud enough that they can't tell people aren't here, close the big doors and lead them in the small door then grab them and question them." 

Bishop smiled, "I don't see why that won't work, could you ID the tat if you saw it again?"

You nodded, "it's the only reason I spoke to them, I could tell you all about the guys I could see."

By now, most of the Mayans were standing around you. Hank was giving orders, and then he turned back to you, "how many guys?" 

"Four men on the street and I could hear three or four men in the black van, the license plate was 7FYNY89. One guy had San Quentin prison tats they were all under fifty and all white and before you tell me to go home, I'm the only one who saw their faces, you need me here." 

Hank huffed, "we are not putting you in harm's way."

You glared at him, "I knew the risk I was taking when I went up to them, you need me here. Now you all need to get your shit in order before they show up." 

Coco put his hand on your shoulder, "I'll take her to the back and see if I can find that tattoo she was talking about, we should have enough time?"

You nodded, "the guy in charge wanted to catch everyone off guard, you've got a little bit of time left"

The air changed and everyone jumped into action, Bishop stopping you just as you turned to go, "we're going to talk about this young lady." 

You threw your hands up in the air, "I can't fucking wait, last I checked you're not my fucking daddy, you can't tell me what to do and you're not responsible for me." You could tell by the way everyone was acting that there was a lecture on the way but they had more pressing matters right now. 

It only took ten minutes for them to clear the compound, and all the Mayans were preparing themselves to face the threat. It didn't take long for them to arrive, you could see the large metal doors shake and then they tried the small door, falling right into the trap.

It was over quickly, they came in and looked around but they realised too late that it was a trap. Two of them were stupid enough to try and fight and they died where they stood, dropping like stones as the bullets entered their heads. The others fell to their knees the second the command was given and then they were being pulled away.

It was the sound of the van screeching off that had them running but by the time they got to the front, it was too late and at least one of them had gotten away. You were still in the back when Manny came in and he looked worried, "what's going on? I heard shots."

He sighed, "we need to out here, did you manage to ID the tat?" You nodded, "yeah, some group called the hidden order, their whole thing is blending in. Manny, what's going on?"

"One guy got away, we don't know if he knows your face." When you walked out into the compound the only evidence that someone was there was some blood and bullet casings, Bishop and Hank stomped up to you looking unimpressed.

"Someone needs to stay with you until this is done." Hank left no room for you to argue.

"Fuck that, I have a state of the art alarm system and I sleep with an M16 under my bed. I can look after myself."

Bishop shook his head, "no, we're not leaving you alone, Coco can stay with you until we deal with this."

You huffed, "no, Coco needs to stay with Lettie and Hope."

"Manny can stay with her."

You wanted to punch Angel, but Marcus was smiling, "great idea Angel."

You sighed, "fine but that's as far as it goes, you're not parking yourself outside my work."

They weren't listening, "someone will be watching the street."

You looked at them, eyes wide, "this is insane, you don't even know if they're going to come after me."

"It's not up for debate y/n, Manny is going to stay with you until we know you're safe and people will be watching your office. They'll stay in a car, no one will know they're there."

You shook your head, "I thought you'd be the logical one Marcus, I'll be fine."

"Come on Tesoro, we have fun."

You sighed, "fine, I give up."

Hank smiled, "thank you y/n, you saved a lot of lives today."

You huffed, "and you're thanking me by landing me with a babysitter?"

Hank's face was impassive, "I'm thanking you by keeping you safe."

Bishop and Marcus turned to the group, "Temple now."

Part 4

Song inspo for this chapter is Hozier - Wasteland, Baby!

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#mayans mc fanfiction #mayans #mayans fx #manny mayans imagine #manny mayans x you #manny mayans #manny mayans x female reader #manny montana #mayans mc #mayans mc fanfic #fluff #a gentle kind of love #angel reyes #ez reyes #hank loza #neron creeper vargas #gilly lopez #bishop losa #michael riz ariza #johnny coco cruz #hope #leticia cruz

[fff777]

was literally about to go to sleep but then decided i needed to massively overhaul a part of the story lol. basically jh and some magical beings would be able to have side conversations that only they could understand. but it became really hard to format because italics were already reserved for internal thoughts and i couldn't use them again for these side conversations. so then i tried to right-align these side conversations which in theory worked well. but then i realize that this was getting way too complicated and convoluted so i decided to scrap the whole 'side conversations with the magical beings.' they never really had a huge role anyway, mostly for practical reasons to get jh to look a certain direction, and also to reflect on jh's personal state. for which internal dialogue should be more than enough. i only roughly removed it all though. when i do my second edit i'll still have to fix it so that the references to those conversations will be gone

i'm still not done the full draft yet. got stuck on a certain part. but i think i'm close!!!! don't think i'll be able to finish tomorrow. but we march on (y)

#thinking out loud #fic talk

[aokotorigames]

Alpha update 0.2.1

Update 0.2.1 is out and brings with it a few new things.

Bug fixes:

Fixed UI falling apart if no scenes exist. Placed an error catcher that informs if the gameData file is not detected and steps to fix the issue. Appropriate message should appear in all editor windows if this happens.

Editor UI tweaks:

Placed horizontal bars to help with readability of page editor’s sections.

Spaced the page list a little to help with miss-clicks.

Increased the indent level of page elements inside a condition.

Stretched the editor window in the attached layout to accommodate for smaller resolution screens. You will need to once again load the layout from file to overwrite the preset in your editor.

New features:

Implemented accessibility mode.

You can now name individual pages. For space saving purposes the field to rename a page only appears for the currently selected page. Same thing applies to scenes.

You can now jump to the next scene from any page by setting the choice button’s destination page to -1. Depending on future feedback navigation might be expanded further.

Implemented choice picked as a possible condition. You can now type “choice = {number}” to have text appear only if a specific choice was selected on the previous page. Choices are numbered top to bottom starting at 1. Other methods of comparing can be implemented in the future based on demand.

Not exactly as new feature as it's a system built into TextMeshPro, but you can make your text bold, italic etc. by using HTML style inline elements like .

In a few moments the files will be sent to all testers. There's no need to install the editor from scratch you can update it by importing the package into your existing project. Unity will handle replacing and adding necessary files on its own. Later tomorrow I'll update the existing guides to account for new features and also start working on part 3 which will touch on how you can customize your game's interface.

[solivar]

WIP: Ghost Stories On Route 66

In which Zen and Hanzo have an unexpected experience.

“So, you remember when I told you the fabric of reality around here is usually a schmancy high thread count thingamabobber?” Jaime asked, as they clustered around him in the tiny oasis of normality beneath the streetlights. “Well. About two, three o’clock this afternoon, the monitors started pingin’ like mad and, uh, yeah, now the local area immediately inside your house is all dia -- diaphra -- diaphragmous? See-through like?”

“Diaphanous,” Hana replied tersely. “The word you’re looking for is diaphanous.”

“That’s the word! Thanks, chippie -- ow, ow, hey, ow, okay okay okay, I’m sorry!” He held up hands and tablet in self-defense. “Thank you, Hana. Anyway, we gathered up all the extra stabilizer stakes we had charged and called Rein and booked it up here as quick as we could. The stakes and the wards Rein rigged up are keepin’ it isolated for now but, uh, we dunno for how long. We’ve definitely got interference bleedin’ into local communications already.”

“Yeah, we noticed.” Jesse budged over to let Reinhardt join their huddle, taking the opportunity to slide his arm around Hanzo’s shoulders as he did so. “So I’m guessing it’s not going t’be safe for anyone to go in there?”

“We have been working on that,” Reinhardt rumbled. “Mako and I have tested a solution -- a ward that stabilizes the local area around its wearers, preferably two or three to create a large area of usable space.”

“And by ‘tested’ he means ‘they went inside wearin’ a pair and made me monitor the situation from outside so I could start screamin’ if they disappeared,’” Jaime clarified, still obviously aggrieved.

“He,” Roadie rumbled, gesturing a complicated gesture at Hanzo, “shouldn’t. Too close to the cause. Wards might not be strong enough.”

“His bedroom wall was where all this got started,” Genji added thoughtfully. “Hanzo, is there anything up there you absolutely couldn’t live without? Is there some way we could, like, seal it shut extra strongly?”

Hanzo leaned into the comfortingly solid warmth of Jesse’s side, and considered -- the computer and art pad he used for digital and holographic designs were expensive pieces of equipment but replaceable. So were the majority of the physical supplies, inks and watercolors and paper, that he kept on hand at home. Santa Fe contained enough thrift stores to replace his entire wardrobe if necessary. “My bow and quiver are downstairs in the sports equipment closet -- so is my gym bag. Just those. If we can ward my bedroom shut, we should.”

“And by we, we mean absolutely not you.” Genji replied sweetly. “Zen, can you do that thing you did back at the Student Union again?”

“That depends entirely upon the availability of duct tape and Sharpies but, yes, I can.” Zen offered him a faintly apologetic smile. “And I should go in first to perform the binding, just to be safe.”

“D’you honestly think we go anywhere without enough duct tape to fasten our truck’s entire frame and undercarriage back together?” Jaime asked, moderately affronted, and it was clearly a rhetorical question because a moment later a caseful was hitting the sidewalk with an emphatic thud.

Hana wordlessly dug at least six different colors and opacities of markers out of her bag and offered them up as a sacrifice. “What? I hit the bookstore when I was done with class. I had a bad feeling, okay?”

“No judgment.” Genji replied with an easy soothing grin as Zen made his selection, armed himself with three full rolls of tape, and marched toward the condo with Roadie in tow. “Wards? Wearable kind?”

“Yes! Come, we’ll get you fitted up.” Reinhardt, it seemed, approached literally everything with boundless good humor and radiant competence; Hanzo rather suspected if someone told him an asteroid capable of sterilizing the biosphere was about to hit the Earth, he’d respond with a cheerful grin and a plan that just might work.

He led them to one of the three trucks taking up approximately four hundred percent of their allotted curbside parking: a flatbed pickup truck obviously cobbled together from the frames of at least two pre-modern-technology vehicles, sun-faded and rust-speckled, mounted to a hover rig by means that probably wouldn’t stand up to close inspection and might not survive actual aerodynamic hover forces, flanked by not one but two trucks that looked for all the world like home repair/landscaping contractor vehicles, which he supposed was a reasonable enough approach for itinerant craftworkers in disguise. Reinhardt opened the side-panel of the truck he had clearly arrived in, internal lights flickering on as it folded out to reveal a collection of bog standard tools and tool boxes firmly mounted to internal magnetic brackets.

“I actually am a mechanical engineer,” Reinhardt grinned at them, flipped a few more switches, and the side panel continued unfolding in a way that emphatically denied the reality of physical space restrictions, containing rank upon rank of drawers and shelves labeled in neatly precise script, holding components and finished pieces alike, some enormous and obviously meant to be hung on mounts even larger yet, some exquisitely tiny and delicate, an entire worktable, its surface etched in complex diagrams, drafting tools and equipment clipped to the edges, storage caskets racked together beneath the drawers.

The wearable wards were on the smaller end, emerging from one of the caskets, Reinhardt handing each of them one as they clustered around him. “They are more durable than they look but I would not suggest hitting one with a hammer if you could avoid it. They produce a more individual focused variation of Jaime’s reality stabilization matrix and draw some of their strength from their wearers and more from proximity to others of their same kind. Stay close to one another when you go inside.”

Hanzo tapped one of the wards -- a small disk, its surface inscribed with a complex sequence of curves and lines and angles, exterior edge an unbroken line of letters? Runes? Something vaguely literary in a language he absolutely did not recognize. “Is this...fast curing craft clay?”

“It is, my friend! Good eye.” Reinhardt clapped him hard enough on the shoulder to shift the entire group sideways six inches. “Some particularly bloody-minded purists argue against using such materials but, between us, in situations where time is of the essence, the results are just as good as spending six days scribing on disks of bone or metal, especially if the wards need only last so long.”

“I can believe that,” Hanzo agreed, having witnessed first hand what Zen could accomplish on the fly, and clipped the band around his wrist. The throbbing spiky pain in his chest dulled, almost immediately, to a fretful ache, and he drew his first unobstructed breath in a solid ten minutes. “It -- my chest hurts less.”

Reinhardt and Roadie exchanged a glance and Roadie took him gently be the elbow, guided him out of the group and to the cab of Reinhardt’s truck. “Sit. Truck’s warded, too. Don’t look when we open the door.”

Hanzo took a shivery breath. “Okay.” He pulled out his tablet, reflexively checked email and messages, looked anywhere but at the house as his family quietly discussed among themselves who was going first and how long they’d be allowed to stay inside. They had, perhaps unsurprisingly, attracted more than a little attention and he murmured, sotto voce, “Neighbors are filming.”

“Of course they are, because our neighbors are relentless busybodies with nothing better to do with their lives!” Genji raised his voice enough for most audio pickups to catch it, and then dropped back down to normal. “You want me to get your hamper out of the laundry room? I’m pretty sure you’ve got some unwashed clothes in there yet.”

“Please.” He offered his best attempt at a reassuring smile. “Be careful. That sounds so...stupid? Inadequate? Both?”

“Heartfelt. The word you’re looking for is heartfelt.” Genji grinned and closed the cab door, mouthed stay here, and made his way up the sidewalk to the front steps, where the door was beginning to open.

Hanzo forced himself to look away, thumbed open his library and picked a book at random, spent the next interminable period of nerve-wracking eternity reading the same page approximately a hundred and forty thousand times. He didn’t have to look because, despite the wards, a thread of ice dripped down his spine every time someone opened the condo door and he sat, tense with dread, until he heard their voices again, the sounds of suitcases and storage trunks and gear carriers thumping into place in the back of the pickup, Hana arguing for or against something with clearly audible vigor, Lucio’s husky laughter, Genji’s very best lazily unconcerned drawl that in absolutely no way successfully concealed the depths of his unease, Zenyatta calm and even and serene as only he could be, no matter the circumstances.

“Hanzo!” Hana yanked the door cab door open and only twenty years of finely honed reflexes that he hadn’t entirely allowed to go to pot in the last few saved him from hitting the ground with a total absence of grace. “Jeez, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were leaning on it.”

“That’s okay,” Hanzo accepted the hand Jesse, materializing at his side, offered to boost himself back to his feet. “It’s dark. What’s the problem?”

“Tell them I don’t have to put Tokki in the back of that...that...thing.” Hana gesticulated one-handed and just short of frantically at the truck.

“Tokki? Who’s --” It took a moment for the reality of what he was seeing to filter all the way into his mind but, gradually, he realized that Hana’s entire other hand, in fact her whole arm, was wrapped around an enormous pink something, something a solid four inches taller than she was, something that probably out-weighed her, too, something that looked like the unholy offspring of a torrid affair between a fuzzy pink fairground toy and a Gundam dakimakura. “What. What is that. How do you wash it. How.”

“You really need to do that little rising-falling thing with your voice when you’re trying to ask a real question, Hanzo.” Hana replied tartly. “This is Tokki, he’s very old, I brought him from home, and he is absolutely not riding in the truck.”

“There won’t be enough seats for everybody in the van if he doesn’t ride in the truck.” Genji pointed out in tones of sweet reason as he hefted the last of his own luggage into place. “Back me up here, aniki.”

“I’ll ride back in the truck with Jaime and Mako if you like, Hana.” Hanzo replied gravely. “You’re right, something so venerable and well-loved should not be subject to such an indignity.”

“I don’t know if I should punch you for making fun of me or hug you for agreeing with me.” Hana admitted and then settled for doing both. “Best big brother.”

“Yes. Yes, I am.” Hanzo agreed and waved her off. “Go on before I regret my munificence.”

“That was not the backup I expected.” Genji threw his hands in the air and walked away, muttering under his breath, to help Hana get her giant pink monstrosity aboard.

“I’d’ve offered to put him in the van’s storage but, uh, I don’t think he’d fit.” Jesse admitted and smiled down at him. “That was good of you -- she was actually pretty upset about it.”

“Given the expense and effort it must have taken to transport it from Korea, it must be very dear to her.” Hanzo replied quietly. “I trust everything went well?”

“Better than I thought they would, honestly.” For the first time, Hanzo realized he was wearing his weapons, gun-belt slung around his hips clipped with extra ammunition and less immediately identifiable objects of a potentially violent nature. “Wards worked like a charm and Doc Tekhartha’s got your bedroom door bound up like a frat house prank with extra magic just for giggles. And I have your things stashed in the van.”

“Thank you. It would be a genuine pain in the ass to have to replace my bow.” Hanzo smiled crookedly. “I may have some experience when it comes to the expense and effort of keeping beloved things close.”

“Archery, hmm? I admit, I’d wondered.” Jesse grinned, dark eyes glinting. “Strong hands and shoulders, lots of well-kept muscle, and you don’t strike me like the type to spend a lot of hours a week liftin’ weights.”

“And you’d be right because that’s the most boring form of exercise known to man.” Hanzo found a grin lurking at the corners of his own mouth and let it stay. “Great-Uncle Toshiro taught an entirely different regimen and Genji graciously assists me in maintaining it, though I do most of my target shooting at this little sporting goods place just at the city limits. The only place I’ve found with indoor and outdoor ranges for archery as well as firearms.”

“Navarro’s? Oh, yeah. Know ‘em well. They’re my supplier for some of the more normal stuff I keep on hand for survival caches -- not a craftworker among them, but they’re good people.” Oh so casually Jesse reached for his hand. “Maybe we could make a night of, uh, going there sometime.”

“If you two idiots could stop flirting for five whole seconds and help we might be able to get out of here sometime tonight.” Genji suggested, entirely loud enough for everyone up and down the street on both sides as far as the eye could see to overhear.

Hanzo, just barely, managed not to melt into a puddle of liquid humiliation as at least a few of the neighbors sent up a cheer in response to this intelligence. “We should probably help.”

“I’ll help you find a place to bury him where no one will ever find him later, if you want?” Jesse suggested but nonetheless immediately moved to help sort out the increasingly elaborate Jenga puzzle of everyone’s belongings, at least some of which were delicately electronic and quite probably highly experimental.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Hanzo murmured in reply and took up station on the periphery of the increasingly contentious gathering, inserting suggestions as seemed appropriate, and as he stood became aware of a slow icy drip sliding down his spine and a sharp, cold pulse beneath his breastbone.

When had he taken the ward off? He couldn’t remember -- his wrist still felt its comforting embrace but when he looked down it simply wasn’t there, gone as if it had never been.

And when had he started walking towards the house? He had no conscious recollection of that, either, of when he’d begun obeying the relentless cold tension in his chest, like a line drawn taut, pulling at him like a fish well on the hook.

Behind him, he heard Jaime say, rather distinctly, “Uh, gang? You might wanna look at this.” And, beneath his voice, a frantic low-toned beeping.

He wanted to speak -- he wanted to say something, anything, but his tongue was pinned flat to the inside of his mouth and his teeth were welded together and his legs would not stop moving as he took the steps in two strides. Before him, the condo’s security access pad flicked from red to green, the locks slotted back into their mounts, and the door slowly, slowly cracked open, a thin slit of unrelieved darkness.

No. It took all his strength to articulate that thought, as his hand reached for the door handle, to open it further, to step inside.

Behind him, the steady monotone beepbeepbeepbeep of Jaime’s machinery sped up and grew louder BEEPBEEPBEEPBEEP and through it heard a voice, more than one voice, raised in alarm, calling his name. But the metal of the door handle was cold -- burning cold, cold beyond anything nature could claim -- against the palm of his hand, throbbing against his breastbone, forcing the breath out of his lungs in heavy streams of frost.

And, again, he said, “no” only aloud this time, soft, thin, and it took what was left of his strength to yank the door shut, slamming it hard into its frame and his free palm against the lock plate. He felt the tension holding him, the relentless pull, snap like an over-stressed line and he staggered backwards, scrambled on the edge of the steps, caught himself on the railing as several pairs of arms tried to catch him from behind, and mostly succeeded.

“Hanzo --” Genji, that was Genji, arm wrapped tight across his chest, his chest which was no longer filled with an icy throbbing ache.

“Darlin’ --” And that was Jesse, catching hold of his arm, gently cradling the hook-fingered claw of his hand. “Easy, l’il brother, he’s hurt.”

“Get him away from the door.” And that was Zenyatta, and received immediate obedience from all three of them as through their combined efforts they got him turned away and back down to the sidewalk.

He was only mildly surprised to find he needed it -- his legs felt like rubber bands twisted and stretched nearly to breaking and his insides like freshly melted ice water and his head spun with exhaustion, as enervated as if he’d just run a marathon. Between them, Genji and Jesse settled him in the shotgun seat of Reinhardt’s truck, cab lights turned on as Zen examined his hand. “Where is your ward?”

“I’m...not certain?” Hanzo admitted, light-headedly. “I don’t remember taking it off. I --”

“Here,” Hana elbowed her way past his brother and his ranger, holding the band out for Zen’s perusal.

The ward was cracked cleanly across, only the wad of epoxy underneath it holding its pieces together, the magnetic clasp corroded to crumbling bits, the band itself dry and cracked. As Zen took it, it finished falling entirely to pieces, striking the sidewalk in rapidly decomposing bits.

“Too close,” Zen muttered. “We should have sent you back to the hacienda.” He snapped open the first aid case Rein set at his feet, pulled on a pair of nitrile gloves, and began applying something wonderfully soothing to the reddened, blistered skin striping his palm.

“Maybe, Doc, but maybe not.” Jaime interjected. “‘Cause whatever he just did? It caused the anomaly to go pop. Shut down just as it was cyclin’ to its widest aperture.”

“Did you do something?” Genji asked, flicking a glance holding distinctly murderous intent over his shoulder at the house. “Did it do something to you?”

“I felt...called. Pulled.” Hanzo reached up with his free hand and scrubbed his aching, weary eyes. “Not a voice just...an impulse I couldn’t resist, like when I --” He stopped, breathed peace, continued. “Exactly like when I tore Zen’s wards off in the Student Union. I couldn’t stop myself, until I came to the door -- it wanted me to open it, to go inside but I...made myself not do that.”

“I’ll send you the data the sensors picked up.” Jaime flicked open a few screens, started a download. “‘Cause I’d like all your thoughts. But it looks to me like the anomaly was drawin’ power from him and when he cut it off, it couldn’t sustain itself any longer.”

“Too close,” Zen reiterated, as he finished taping bandages in place. “Reinhardt, if you would be so good as to take him back to the hacienda, right now, we will be directly behind you.”

“Of course, Doctor. Seatbelt, my young friend, and sit back. We will be home before you know it.”

***

Hanzo drowsed most of the way back to Cerrillos and woke much the better for it, enough so that he insisted on helping where he could, schlepping lighter items that wouldn’t tear the bandages off his hand before Terrifying Smoke Gabe insisted they stop for dinner. “It’s not going anywhere, the truck can sit overnight in the service garage, you’ve all done enough for one day. Come inside.”

Significantly more than just dinner that greeted them: it was the hacienda’s actual dining room, opened up for the first time since their arrival, a table to sit twenty laid out with exquisitely painted plates and gleaming silver and glasses of something pale yellow and fizzy, two enormous pans of enchiladas montadas, platters of tamales and flautas and chile rellenos, a crock of tortilla soup gently steaming next to a stack of earthenware bowls, a chafing dish of fruit salad sitting on ice, bowls of guacamole and salsa and extra cheese. At the far end, Hot Vampire Jack and Badass Granny Ana leaned against one another, half-dozing, bestirring themselves only when the noise of everyone trooping inside became too much to ignore.

Hot Vampire Jack cracked open one eye and muttered, “Frankly, I blame the lot of you for reactivating all his maternal instincts. On the other hand, I almost have to thank you because his empty nesting was about to result in a murder.”

“I made the prickly pear lemonade spritzer,” Ana added, not even bothering to open her eye. “You’re welcome.”

“We really have been adopted by supernatural entities living in a ghost town in the desert,” Hana observed, struck by what appeared to be fairly legitimate awe.

“Yes,” Hanzo agreed, pulling out a chair for her.

“Are you okay, Mrs. Amari? You look beat.” Lucio touched her shoulder gently. “Can I get you a plate?”

“That unholy fiend worked us like dogs,” Mrs. Amari replied, quavery and exhausted, reaching up to pat Lucio’s hand. “Such a good boy you are. I only wish I had a grandson like you before I go to meet my ancestors.”

“Are you trying to guilt trip my kid with that?” Terrifying Smoke Gabe misted in through the kitchen door carrying an armful of crocks and a condiment caddy. “Also: don’t listen to her, she was in charge of juicing lemons.”

“Juicing lemons is a very strenuous task for a woman of my advanced years,” Mrs. Amari replied loftily and accepted the bowl that Lucio handed to her. “Thank you, young man.”

Multiple sets of searing crimson eyes opened for the sole and express purpose of rolling at her. “Make yourselves comfortable, there’s plenty for everybody and -- what happened to your hand?”

An inky misty tentacle wrapped around Hanzo’s wrist, quite a bit warmer than he’d imagined it would be the first time he saw them, and reeled him over for examination, the bandages a bit roughened from hauling things but bearing no signs of seepage or blood. “Uhm. I’m not entirely sure myself,” Hanzo replied in what he hoped was a soothing tone of mildly alarmed squeak.

“An energy discharge of some sort at the condo -- his palm was burnt.” Zen mercifully interceded on his behalf.

“And by ‘energy discharge’ he means our boy here might have closed the spatial anomaly at the house just by tellin’ it to go away and layin’ hands on it.” Jamie added helpfully. “I’ll dump the readings I took after supper.”

“It wasn’t that exciting,” Hanzo demurred and earned himself a multi-eyed roll of his very own as Terrifying Smoke Gabe waved him off to his seat, where a plate filled by both Jesse and Genji awaited him.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” Jack replied, dryly. “What happened?”

Hanzo heroically stuffed a flauta in his mouth to avoid having to go first but, as it happened, Jaime was more than happy to tell the tale and his body, now reminded by his taste buds that food was good and that he hadn’t actually had any since breakfast, insisted that he address that deficiency immediately and in mass quantities. He was midway through his third fully stuffed plate when he began hearing the words “....and then we all saw Hanzo walkin’ up to the house and the door startin’ to open…” and realized that he was going to have to stop inhaling calories long enough to speak and that quite literally everyone at the table was watching said inhalation with varying levels of knowledgeable amusement and borderline alarm.

“Uhm.” Hanzo said, setting his silverware down and dabbing the corners of his mouth with what had to be someone’s grandmother’s linen napkin, “I...wasn’t entirely operating under my own recognizance at that point -- moving without wanting to move, reaching for the door without wanting to reach for it. Something wanted me to touch it, to open it and I --” He took a breath, closed his eyes, as the memory washed over him, Jesse’s arms sliding comfortingly across his shoulders. “I refused. I said that I would not and closed it and --” He held up his injured hand, “This happened but the compulsion ceased at once.”

“And the anomaly collapsed pretty much immediately, too.” Jaime finished.

“And now he’s eating like he’s got two empty legs,” Jack observed meditatively.

“Interesting development,” Ana agreed, sipping her drink with a twinkle in her eyes.

“What these two tricksters are pucking around about is the use of some gifts can really take it out of the craftworker, physiologically speaking, and after particularly grueling spellwork you can feel like eating a horse. And, depending on your capabilities and needs, you might try.” Gabe shook his head at them. “You spent some power tonight, kid, and your body is demanding that you put it back in.”

“Spoilsport.” Ana literally, actually stuck her tongue out at him. “That’s why we usually have a hearty brunch before we try anything too enthusiastic these days. Reinhardt and I are not getting any younger -- our ability to draw on our physical resources for extra strength is not what it once was. Jack and Gabriel have their own hungers to feed when  they are forced to exceed even their much greater limits. I strongly suspect that you are experiencing that need.”

“If the anomaly was caused by the Serpent-Wolf,” Zen murmured in the tone of one speculating aloud, “it may be using its connection to the magatama we found to circumvent the defenses we built around the condo -- we did bring Hanzo dangerously too close if that is the case.”

Hanzo swallowed the mouthful of soup he’d taken. “That wasn’t your fault. None of you could have known.”

Zen acknowledged the point with a graceful inclination of his head. “And you being strong enough to break its attempt to dominate you was not something it could have known. Now it does, and that increases the risk to you.” A fractional pause. “In Dr. Saddind-Maas’ absence, do you have reason to go back to campus right now? If not, you should probably stay here, where the defenses are more consistent and robust.”

Genji choked, swallowed, croaked, “Wait, wait, what?”

“Dr. Saddind-Maas appears to be missing,” Hanzo admitted reluctantly, around the remains of a fifth tamale. “I was, uh, questioned about the last time I saw her this afternoon --”

“Questioned?” Genji asked, and flicked a look at Zen. “You were, too, weren’t you?”

“I believe I said as much,” Zen replied, displaying such deft rhetorical evasion skills that Hanzo was briefly envious.

“You said that campus security had asked you about the Student Union --” Genji stopped, exchanged glances with Lucio and Hana. “The MiBs? Are they involved here somehow? Trying to make connections? Because we all know the campus rent-a-cops don’t have enough between their ears to fire up a light bulb much less the imagination necessary to put what’s actually going on here together.”

“One of the people who spoke to Hanzo was the head of security for TALON -- gave her name as Amelie Lacroix.” Jesse replied, hesitated fractionally. “The other one was Chase Whitehawk, acting in his capacity as an agent of the TSS.”

Across the table, Jack, Ana, and Reinhardt all went totally still in three completely separate and disturbing ways. Very deliberately, Jack took a sip of his soup, set it down, and said, “I’m still working on digging out more details about TALON -- my usual resources are markedly reluctant to share intel on them, which in and of itself says something. The Lacroix thing, though? That’s...not good.”

“The Lacroix are a family of vessenjaegers,” Reinhardt added, his tone freighted with a concern all the more disturbing coming as it was from him. “Monster hunters, witch hunters, greatly feared for centuries and with good reason. They are killers without peer.”

“The Whitehawks are much the same -- they’re a clan whose purpose has always been to protect the people from the naayéé, and they take that duty seriously.” The corner of Jesse’s mouth quirked back, the expression there and gone again, and Hanzo took his hand beneath the table, squeezed it gently. “Those forces making common cause, at the direction of unknown parties...well. I’m not sure that bodes well for anybody.”

“Not likely, no.” Jack replied flatly. “I’ll lean a bit harder where I can, open some other lines of inquiry. Otherwise, I tend to agree with the good doctor on the issue of Hanzo staying here in town for the time being.”

“I do have other classes, you know,” Hanzo said, aggrieved.

“Yes, but you can’t pass any of them if you die or have your soul eaten or your body stolen,” Terrifying Smoke Gabe pointed out sweetly. “And there are things you can do here to minimize the possibility of that outcome in the meantime.”

“...Point.” Hanzo was forced by native honesty to admit. “I can do most of my Instructor Aesthetics in Art Education work from here, too.”

The initial expression on Genji’s face, as he opened his mouth, suggested he was going to say one thing only to have his train of thought unexpectedly derailed, explosively, and sent plunging over the edge of a potentially bottomless ravine. “...I didn’t know you were taking education track courses.”

“It seemed a reasonable alternative to starving artistry,” Hanzo replied wryly. “Though I’m finishing that approach first -- Dr. Saddind-Maas thought it would be detrimental to studio program to fully commit to a second degree while one was already in progress.”

“You are a fucking masochist.” Genji informed him. “But, for the record, I think you’d make a good teacher -- I mean, you were a thousand orders of magnitude more patient with everybody back home and I’d have been. They’d still be looking for all the body parts if I had to teach Goro’s kids how to do anything.”

“Thank you,” Hanzo replied, absurdly touched.

“You’re welcome.” Genji smiled sweetly. “How long has your flaky thesis advisor been missing?”

“You’re not going to let this go, are you?” And at Genji’s flat look, “I don’t know for certain -- the two that interrogated me didn’t allow that information to slip. She has not, however, responded to the text I sent her this morning and the last communications I have from her were all sent on Saturday. She was...considering going to the condo.”

“So she might be actually, legitimately missing.” Genji said into the thoughtful silence around the table. “Or she could be shacked up somewhere with that Bob Ross clone who’s always telling the CS students they need to go outside and make a pot or something with her phone turned off.”

“Yes, exactly.” Hanzo looked down to discover his plate empty again and his stomach not immediately agitating for more and settled for sipping his lemonade.

“So we’re not going to panic yet.” Genji leaned back in his chair and glanced at Lucio and Hana. “I’ve got my usability testing practical tomorrow afternoon and lectures in the morning. You two?”

“Composition and rhetoric paper presentation in the morning, digital research seminar in the afternoon -- I’m not going to be out of class until close to seven.” Hana pulled out her tablet. “I might be able to ditch the seminar, the paper’s already been submitted, and my presentation on that one isn’t until Thursday at the earliest.”

“Lectures all day for me and for the next several -- my next presentation isn’t until Friday. That’d be the advanced sound design for digital media project I was working on with Cora before she actually disappeared.” Lucio glanced around the table. “D’you...think it might be risky for us to go to school with these MiBs lurking around?”

“Maybe?” Hot Vampire Jack answered. “It’d definitely look suspicious if you all dropped off the face of the Earth simultaneously.”

“True.” Genji sighed. “Look, the best we can do is hang close together, stay in contact with the hacienda, and call for help if we need it. If any of us get cornered alone, we answer their questions to the best of our ability, but we legit don’t know anything.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Lucio agreed and Hana nodded, frowning at her tablet.

Hanzo was excused that evening from after dinner chores by virtue of his wounded hand (“It’s not that badly wounded!”) and instead set to the task of sorting his own admittedly somewhat neglected laundry hamper and putting on a load to wash. It would, he admitted without shame, be nice to wear clothes that weren’t some variation of sweats and a tee-shirt again, even if the variation was only cargo pants, and to have his own pyjamas and underwear for bed. He set the machine, a high efficiency water recycling model, then wandered into the sitting room with the idle thought of restarting his book again, only to be ambushed by Zenyatta, carrying a much larger and more comprehensively supplied first aid kit.

“Sit,” Zen said in a tone close enough to a command that Hanzo, trained from the cradle to obey reasonable authority figures, immediately planted himself on the couch. “Let me see your hand -- the field dressing I used probably won’t stay put through the night.”

“Really, it’s not that bad,” Hanzo insisted, as Terrifying Smoke Gabe materialized to observe the proceedings.

“It was visibly blistering,” Zen countered, exasperated, as he carefully peeled off the last layer of bandaging and reached for a packet of delicately fragrant, likely exceedingly magical wet wipes. “It has to be -- oh. Oh my.”

The messy blistered blotch that had marred his right palm was significantly less of both -- the skin still reddened, as though he’d set his hand against something hot, and raised slightly, but not as if it were blistered. Instead it was a visible pattern: a near-perfect circle on the pad below the right index finger, a curving series of ridges across the palm below that resembled nothing so much as roiling stormclouds, jagged lightning crawling among their swirls.

Hanzo spoke for all of them when he said, “What fresh Hell is this?”

“Doesn’t look that Hellish to me, kid,” Terrifying Smoke Gabe observed from his perch on the back of the couch. “And, trust me, I speak with a certain quantity of direct personal experience on that score. Does it hurt?”

“Not...really?” He flexed his fingers and while the skin on his palm pulled a bit with the motion there wasn’t even much of a sting left. “We’re all seeing this as a pattern, right?”

“Yes,” Zen confirmed as he took gentle possession of Hanzo’s wrist and carefully applied a cool, damp wipe to it, then looked again.

The patterning didn’t wipe away but the red visibly faded and the swelling went down almost at once, clarifying the details so nicely that, when Genji strolled in squabbling good naturedly with Lucio and Hana, she could stop, lean over the arm of the couch, and say, “Hey! I’ve seen that somewhere before.”

His hand immediately became the central point of focus of the entire cluster as his brother and Lucio joined them, Genji giving him a narrow-eyed look containing a massive sibling concern storm and Lucio adding, “I’ve seen it too but I can’t remember where.”

“The genealogy chart.” Genji added, concern doing a little dance with realization on his face. “It was on the genealogy chart -- I remember it, too.”

“Really? I don’t --” And then he did, or thought he did, and dug around in his bag with his free hand, pulling out his tablet and pulling up the relevant files, poking through them until he came up with the mon of unknown origin/function list. “I’ll be damned.”

“Please don’t say that,” Genji replied not at all serenely. “Fifteen instances across both halves of the clan, over a thousand years -- including our missing warrior-woman.” He pulled up the list of holders. “And of course there’s no detailed information about how they came to be awarded it or possess it or why.” He paused, traced his fingers over the list. “Kazutaka had it, too.”

“That’s more often than not the truth of many of the older aspects of the clan’s history -- before we settled permanently in Hanamura, we carried our history on our backs.” Hanzo smiled wryly. “Bits and pieces got lost along the way.”

“Inconvenient that this was one of them.” Genji traced his fingertips over the mark. “There’s, like, a zero percent chance that this isn’t significant in some way, right?”

“It is extremely unlikely.” Zen replied, closing up the case, and taking Hanzo’s hand in both his own. “I thought it looked like ward-burn back at the condo -- that can happen when warding energies ground themselves through a physical conduit. But it may be more than that.”

“The spatial anomaly collapsed when he closed the door -- apparently to the second, from what you were saying, and Jaime’s data pretty much supports the conclusion.” Gabe replied thoughtfully. “You sense any residuals, Dr. Tekhartha?”

Three of Zenyatta’s orbs curled themselves into existence around them, glowing gently and chiming as they were wont to do, as he closed his eyes, a little concentration mark forming between his brows. Hanzo forced himself to relax, to breathe normally, to let his hand rest lightly in Zen’s and he was not entirely sure where the lightning-stroke-bright flash came from, his palm or Zen’s orbs, or the flare of purple, deeper and more vivid than any natural light, but the shockwave definitely forced their hands apart, and then the rest of them, and the next time Hanzo was aware enough to realize what was going on around him he was laying sprawled on his back between Genji and Terrifying Smoke Gabe on the sitting room’s exquisite hardwood floor, staring up at the definitely supernatural plasterwork of the ceiling, itself crackling with lightning-silver-eye wateringly-painful-violet threads of energy, rapidly dispersing. His skull was ringing like a selection of Lucio’s tuning forks, each set to a slightly different pitch, he was pretty sure a portion of his brain was trying to ooze out of his ears, and his hand ached from the tips of his fingers all the way to the elbow.

Next to him, Terrifying Smoke Gabe pushed himself up on his elbows, surveyed the wreckage of the living room and asked, “What the fuck just happened?”

“I...don’t know. Genji?” Hanzo reached over and gave his brother, dazed and blinking rapidly as he came back to his senses, a careful shake. “Are you okay?”

“What -- that was -- I’ve only seen that --” Genji bit down on what he’d been about to say, started scrambling to his feet, couldn’t quite manage it and sat down hard again. “Where’s Zen?”

The heavy couch they’d all been sitting on was laying on its back, throw pillows thrown, cushions askew. The end tables were likewise located far afield from their previous positions, at least one lamp smashed, the other tipped over but still alight, casting bizarre and vaguely threatening shadows across the wall and ceiling, along with the weirdly flickering violet light still emanating from beyond the tipped-over furniture.

“Zen?” Hanzo heaved himself to his feet one-armed, his skull slowly ceasing its suture-threatening vibrations, offering his good hand to Gabe as, in the near distance, dogs began barking and footsteps thumped across the floor and voices raised in alarm became clearly audible.

“Here,” For the first time in ever, or at least as long as Hanzo could remember, Zenyatta did not sound some species of serenely in control of himself, “I am here.”

He was, in fact, planted against the far wall next to the fireplace, folded around himself, his head in his hands. Scintillating filaments of purple flickered under his skin, girdling his fingers and wrists in patterns that pressed themselves into the backs of Hanzo’s eyes, stomach-churning with their intensity, as he made his way around the couch toward him. “Are you okay? What --”

“Wait.” He flug out a hand, palm up, and Hanzo froze where he stood. “Just...just a moment.”

The filaments marking his palm with a pattern not unlike an open, slit-pupiled eye flared and faded from the outside in, peeled away from his fingers and flowed up his arm and away and by the time Hot Vampire Jack burst in with Lucio and Hana and the pack in tow, he was mostly himself again, weary and slightly dazed and unnaturally out of sorts, a little ashy from the fireplace tools he’d slammed into, his eyes a washed-out dull gray. Jesse paused in the doorway and immediately crossed to his side, offering him a steadying hand as Genji helped Zen up, unsteadily, to his feet.

“I take this to mean,” Terrifying Smoke Gabe asked dryly, as he and Lucio and Hana righted the couch and got Zen settled on it, “that there were some remnant energies?”

“Yes,” Zenyatta replied, slightly brittle around the edges, and accepted the cup of tea Jack handed to him. “I am...not entirely certain why they reacted as strongly as they did but…” Zen looked up and caught his eyes, smiled with such ridiculously warm reassurance that Hanzo felt himself responding completely, comfort mingled with relief and gratitude. “Hanzo, I believe that you did close the door attempting to open there, in every possible and literal sense.”

Hanzo clutched Jesse’s hand, forced himself to reply calmly and evenly, “My gifts...do you think they are…?”

“I think,” Zenyatta replied carefully, “that you still possess an abundance of will, and of knowledge, and that you may finally be healing from the injury done you all those years ago. How this is tied to the Serpent-Wolf, or the magatama within you, or your bond with Ranger McCree, are questions we will have to answer sooner rather than later. But, for now, I think we should all rest and approach them with fresh eyes and minds, tomorrow. I, for one, have a wretched headache.”

#WIP Ghost Stories On Route 66 #I'll fix the italics tomorrow

[letapollojusticesayfuck]

“would you come to my funeral?” + narumitsu

"I'm going to write something short," I say, and then come out with nearly 1300 words of Angst. But this really was the perfect line for some good angst, and so I hope you like it! (and please excuse any typos, I very much have not done any editing here)

Thanks, Sparrow! :)

Send me a randomly-generated line of dialogue and some characters, and I'll write a (relatively) short fic!

............

It’s raining. That’s the thing that Phoenix notices, first—the way the water collects on the pane-glass of the window, the office dark and silent otherwise.

How long has he been in the building for the weather to have changed so drastically? How long did it take to extricate himself from the aftermath of the trial, to escape the celebrations and cheer once he’d noticed the conspicuous absence where someone should have been?

Long enough for the cup of tea abandoned on the desk to have gone stone-cold, he realizes, when he presses his fingers gently against the side of the delicate china vessel. Long enough that Miles Edgeworth might be long gone by now, and he’d have to ride his bicycle home in the storm, without even getting a chance to check in with his oldest friend.

Motion, from the corner of his eye, and Phoenix swings around to a previously unexamined corner of the room, in the shadow of the vibrant pink sofa and the framed jacket on the wall. A hiding place, of sorts, and for half a second he feels the chill of adrenaline through his veins as he wonders if he’s about to be attacked in Edgeworth’s office, victim of a trap planted for the prosecutor and not for him.

But he relaxes, as much as is possible, when he recognizes the figure slumped against the wall by his distinctive cravat, his steel-grey hair. Miles Edgeworth, looking distinctly miserable, but Phoenix will take it if it means he’s here.

“Of course you’d manage to find me,” the man grumbles, and Phoenix laughs, awkwardly.

“Well, you know what they say about defense attorneys,” he jokes, hand combing through the hair on the back of his neck. “Always sticking our noses where they don’t belong.”

Miles huffs, as though he can’t be bothered to dignify that with a response. With some trepidation, Phoenix moves closer, kneels next to him, attempts to put himself on a level with the prosecutor. He doesn’t quite reach out, the way he so desperately wants to, because he’s never quite sure where exactly he stands with Edgeworth, these days. He’d hoped, that since they’d cleared up the history behind the DL-6 incident, that they would have properly reconnected, but…

Well. It’s unfortunate that they only ever seem to see each other at opposing ends of the courtroom, or so it seems.

But Edgeworth looks so downtrodden that Phoenix can’t help but want to help him, and so he crosses his legs and leans against the wall, nearly casually, and risks his life to ask his next question:

“What’s the matter? Why aren’t you out with everyone else, celebrating a job well done?”

“Wright. Really?”

“Well, yeah, maybe it didn’t turn out quite as well as it could have, but...we’re still a step closer to fixing the justice system, aren’t we? Sure, the Chief Prosecutor’s….in jail, and the Police Chief is...alsoin jail, but--”

“Wright, I’m going to stop you before you can jam your foot even further in your mouth than it already is.”

“That’s...probably a good idea, yeah.”

They pause, for a moment, listening to the wind and the raindrops against the window. A distant lightning strike illuminates the office, and Phoenix is reminded of quite how high up they are.

“Would you come to my funeral?” Edgeworth asks, apropos of nothing, and Phoenix’s head whips around almost faster than he can process the words.

“Your—Miles, what are you--” He can’t form a full sentence, finding his mind blank even at the prospect. Edgeworth sighs, deeply, and leans his head back against the wall, eyes closed.

“My funeral, Wright, it’s not that difficult of a question. At such a time as I perish, whether through natural or unnatural means, would you attend the event that I assume someone would inevitably arrange for honoring my memory or other such tripe.”

Phoenix is still stuck processing, the very prospect of Edgeworth and death and funerals all sparking associations he’d rather not think too hard about, calling to mind the ceremony they’d had for Mia not even six months ago—and, even earlier, the image of a far younger Miles Edgeworth in a black suit, surrounded by arrangements of lilies and with an unreadable expression.

“I—well, in a purely hypothetical scenario, because you aren’t going to have a funeral anytime soon—in that case, of course I would come to your funeral, Miles, what do you take me for?”

“Truthfully, I don’t know. I’m not—” and Edgeworth pauses, clutching at the fabric of his sleeve as he averts his gaze to the opposite corner of the room. “I’m not exactly a paradigm of innocence, and your reputation for...well…”

“Are you still trying to say that you’re guilty when we’ve proven that time and time again to be untrue? Miles, c’mon, that’s bullshit. And—my reputation?What, do you think I’d even care, if you were—”

“Wright, surely you’re not that much in denial. I’m as much guilty of evidence tampering as Lana Skye. And worse—you know the tactics us prosecutors employ. I did not gain the name Demon Prosecutor for nothing. I’m not—you shouldn’t even associate with me.”

Phoenix frowns, eyebrows furrowing. He’s clenching his hands into fists, he realizes, as he takes a deep breath and focuses on trying to have this discussion rationally, as much as possible.

“Miles Edgeworth, you can’t blame yourself for doing as you were taught. You were only a child, you should have been able to trust your mentor figures—it wasn’t on you to be able to construct a detailed critique of the legal system! And you think that I wouldn’t associate with you because of that? I guess…” he swallows, looking away from the prosecutor. “I guess you don’t know me as well as I thought you did, then.”

The silence is almost tangible, as they let Phoenix’s words sink in, settle around them in the dark office. In his mind, Phoenix begins to count the seconds that it’s taking Edgeworth to answer—one, two, three…

“I suppose I don’t,” he finally supplies, and that’s it, then, the kind of sentence you don’t continue a conversation from. It’s not the only thing he seems to want to say, Phoenix notes, but it’s the only thing he vocalizes, letting the sound of the rain fill in the empty spaces.

Phoenix breathes out, slowly, and stands up. His knees pop as he does, tiny cracking noises competing with the rumble of thunder from outside.

He looks over his shoulder, and Edgeworth’s still on the ground, avoiding eye contact. It’s not like he wants to leave, but…

Maybe Miles just needs some time alone. He seems to have a lot on his mind, and Phoenix probably isn’t helping by bothering him with conversation.

He lets himself out of the office, vowing to himself that he’ll check back in tomorrow morning, when the rainstorm’s let up and the world’s back to normal. He isn’t going to let Edgeworth wallow in his thoughts for too long, at least.

Overnight, the rain fades to nothing, clouds making way for soft sunshine, promising bright blue skies for the day and uncharacteristically warm weather for February. Miles Edgeworth’s office window lets in the sunlight, where it illuminates the grand desk and the items on top of it. In turn, the light falls on a pen, a nameplate, a lamp.

A teacup, still half-full from the night before. And…

A note, with one single line of neat cursive penned in the middle of the crisp, textured paper:

Miles Edgeworth Chooses Death

#ask #asks #ask game #my writing #ace attorney #exitcorners #thank you!! #let's hope i managed to fix all the bits where copy and pasting italics got rid of the space after them #sorry this is Sad #also uhhh rfta spoilers #if that's a necessary thing #angst #major character death #except not Really #that's spoilers though #ANYWAY #it is 2:30 AM which means i'll probably write the others of these tomorrow morning

[weaselbrownie]

we’re okay | d.m

draco malfoy x fem!reader

summary : draco and his girlfriend got in a fight but she stayed patient with him.

warning : swearing, angst, accusations?, fluff towards the end, talk about starting a family

a/n : flashbacks in italic

word count : 1.8k

01.30 am

It was late and you had to wake up early tomorrow for a potions exam but your mind was elsewhere. Tossing around in your bed the events of last night kept replaying in your head. 

"Why can't you see– I love you Draco"

"No Y/N you don't love me– you love the idea of fixing me!" Draco shouted at you through his gritted teeth and locked jaw. 

"You can't possibly think that's true..." You backed away from him as the tears in your eyes started to fall. 

Fighting and fighting was all you've been doing with Draco. You knew what you signed up for when you got into a relationship with Draco, but you never thought it would get this bad. Every day you try to hold onto him, try to lend him your hand because God knows he needs it in times like this. After Draco got the mission from you-know-who, he has not been himself. Always sneaking away, only to come back to his dorm past midnight. You tried for so long to try to talk to him but he wasn't budging, and now, here you were. All you wanted to do was tell him he's not alone and that you love him but of course he would turn that on you, twisting it into something sick. 

"Y/N we both know it's true, you come into my life when I'm at my lowest and you try too hard!" Draco continued to shout at your fragile state. 

"Try too hard? Try too hard my arse Draco– This is what I get for caring about you?" You fought back at him not wanting to lose another fight to him.

"I didn't ask for you to care for me– You came to me all on your own trying to be little miss perfect, fixing the broken boy like last year's project! Well, guess what? You can leave now, there's the door Y/N!" Draco spat out at you when a single tear escaped from the corner of his eye. 

Your body ran cold at his harsh words, you knew Draco didn't mean what he said but it still hurts like hell. You've been in his life since the very beginning, growing to love him through your years in Hogwarts. You knew he was hurting and it was hurting you more that you can't take the pain away from him, you love the boy so much to the point where you would sacrifice yourself in a heartbeat in exchange for his happiness.  

"What happened to you? What happened to the boy who helped me ride my first broomstick, to the boy who stuck up for me when those Gryffindors cornered me, to the boy who took me to the Yule Ball–" You chocked out in between your streaming tears "What happened to the boy who I comforted in his home when it was invaded by death eaters? To the boy I've loved since the first year?" You really couldn't control the tears anymore, you had to get out of here before it gets worse.

You shook your head before gathering your book bag and robe, slowly making your way past Draco and to the door he pointed to behind him. You placed your hand onto the doorknob before turning in your place to see Draco's back. 

"Please come back to me" 

With that you were gone, tears run on Draco's pale face– realizing that he just drove you out of his life. Y/N, the last person to truly cared about him, the love of his life. Draco broke down with a scream throwing anything he could get his hands on. 

On the other side of the door, you stood muffling your own tears as you hear him completely breaking. You wiped your face before forcing yourself to step away from the door and back into yours. 

You took a deep breath as you stare up to the ceiling of your dorm. Your roommate was out for the night so it was even quieter, the thoughts in your head screaming at you. You decided that maybe a cold shower would help you sleep.

Before you could even move a muscle the doorknob started rattling, thinking it was your roommate to go get something you turned your body away from the door and closed your eyes, pretending to be asleep. 

The door slowly creaked open and closed again. Footsteps started to approach your bed you could feel a shadow in front of you. The person in front of you stayed there for a moment before brushing a small strand of hair away from your face. 

When the fingertips touched your face you already knew it was Draco, you didn't need to open your eyes to know Draco was touching you. Playing along you stayed still pretending to be asleep as Draco admired your figure wrapped around a thick blanket. Draco placed his hand on the side of your cheeks, stroking it lightly before softly letting out a few words. 

"I'm so sorry"

"I didn't know why I did it but I didn't mean the things I said, I was just– angry, angry at myself for hurting you but angry at you for staying with me when I know someone else could make you much happier than I ever could" Draco softly said, still caressing your rosy cheek in the process. 

"I have never loved anyone other than my family and I don't know how to process the feelings I have for you. This is for the best sweetheart, someday you'll find a guy who will treat you the way you deserve to be treated– like a princess. I'll be okay, as long as you're happy" 

Draco whispered to you, as you felt a teardrop land on your cheek. Your heart aches, listening to him, listening to how he thinks someone else could make you happier. Little did he know that he was it for you, that he was the person you wanted to spend forever with. 

He kissed your forehead lightly before cupping your face again. Goosebumps start to form on the back of your neck as he leaves little kisses on your face. Your head going dizzy, inhaling his scent that you love to drown yourself in. 

"I love you Y/N" 

Not wasting another second he pulled his hand away from your face and sniffled a little. The warmth from his hand leaving your cheeks, and then you heard his footsteps drifting away from you. 

This was now or never if you don't tell him now you might never will. So with a determined mindset, you slowly sat up from your spot and turned around to see Draco opening the door of your dorm with his head hung low. 

"Draco.." 

He picked up his head and quickly turned on his feet to face you. His tear-stained face and his ruffled hair. He changed into a comfortable jumper along with sweatpants to keep him warm in the cold air. His eyes lit up when he noticed you were wearing his jumper, the very first jumper you stole from him in 4th year. He has told you many times to get rid of it as it was old but you never did, considering that it smells like him the most. 

You eyed his figure in the dark before extending your arms out and made grabby hand gestures at him. He smiled softly before closing the door and walking towards your bed. He touched your hands keeping them in his for a while before closing the space between the two of you with a tight hug. You rested your head on his torso with your legs dangling off the bed on either side of him as he kissed your hair. 

Draco finally let go of the hug just to kneel in front of you. He pouted when he saw your face with tears in the corner of your eyes and squeezed your thighs reassuringly. He took your hands and kissed your wrist before cupping your face to wipe your tears away. 

"I don't want you to go..." You murmured down at him 

His mouth fell into a straight line as he takes in the beautiful sight in front of him. His hands fell from your face to your hips, keeping them there and his head hung low too ashamed to look at his love. 

"Nobody compares to you Draco– N-not even close.." You cooed lifting his head by cupping his face much as he did with yours just seconds ago.

His silver eyes were blown, looking up at you with all the adoration and love the world could possibly offer. He opened his mouth to say something but before the words could leave his mouth you closed your lips on his. He stayed still for a second surprised at your action before closing his eyes and returned the kiss. The kiss wasn't like the many kisses you shared before but rather a needy broken one. His lips were soft and tasted a bit salty from all the tears. Without breaking the kiss you guided him to stand and join you on the bed. You backed up until your head hit the soft cold pillow and Draco hovering above you with his arms on either side of you. The both of you finally pulled away in need of air as you admired the boy above you. 

"Y/N wha-"

"Shush Draco," You said in your sweet voice looking into his eyes. 

He smiled down at you before letting go and crushing you. You smiled at him as he snuggles into your neck, leaving a few open mouth kisses. You wrapped your arms around his shoulder and kissed the top of his head before playing with the ends of his hair. 

"You will not speak such stupid words again Draco– I'm not going anywhere" You whispered to him as he picked his head up from the crook of your neck to look at you. "You do know that I want to spend the rest of my life with you right?" You cooed down to him as his eyes lit up once more. 

"Do you mean that?" Draco asked slowly, wanting every word you're saying to be true. 

"Mhm– After this pass, we can get out of here, get a house in the countryside with a big garden and maybe a pond. Then we can start a family, just the two of us– Unless you're not ready to start a family then we can wait as long as you want. Then we'll watch as the kids grow up and go into Hogwarts to start their own lives and then w–" You said as you imagined your life with Draco. 

He looked up at you with a soft smile before interrupting you with a soft kiss on your lips. He smiled and chuckled into your lips as you do the same, the kiss ended up being a small laughing fit for the both of you. 

"Darling I've never heard anything better" Draco cooed after you both calmed down. 

You smiled at the boy in front of you and returned to your previous position with his head on the crook of your neck and your arms around his neck. 

"I love you, darling" 

"I love you too Draco"

#draco #draco malfoy #draco malfoy imagine #draco imagine #draco x y/n #draco malfoy x y/n #draco malfoy x fem!reader #draco malfoy angst #draco malfoy fluff #harry potter #harry potter imagine

[scvrllet]

CHAPTER ONE — AN EPILOGUE BEFORE WE’RE DONE

They say true love is the strongest weapon of them all, but perhaps it’s just never met something (or someone) as willing to test it OR in which Draco is given news that puts his relationship at stake

contains: lucius’ and narcissa’s blood supremacists beliefs, small allusion of smut, mental dialogues represented in italics. (2,113 words) for general story warnings, check series masterlist

authors note: my first series that i actually have plans of finishing and did! all chapters have been written and scheduled to post on their assigned days so i swear i won’t be abandoning this series.

join my taglist | series masterlist

The bed was empty when he woke up in the morning, his hand meeting the cold mattress rather than his partner who he remembered falling asleep with the night prior. A sigh escaped his lips as he opened his eyes to see the bedroom like it was the night before, save for the neatly folded pile of clothes at the end of the bed that he was certain you folded before leaving for work.

It was nothing new for Draco to wake up alone in the mornings and in all honesty, he didn't mind it. He adored how independent you were, it was one of the many things that made you catch his eye after all.

Growing up with classmates clinging to his side to get even an ounce of influence from him and his friends, it was refreshing to meet someone who knew him as just simply Draco and not the heir of the Malfoy fortune. To you, he was just an ordinary boy and status was something of secondary, even tertiary, priority.

A smile lit up his face as he recalled the day he met you. It wasn't the most pleasant of ways to meet someone but quickly after you both parted ways, Draco was certain he would let you ruin all of his suits as long as it meant he'd get to see you with the promise of a coffee date the following morning. Had it been anyone else he would've probably started a storm in the center of the Ministry building right then and there but when his eyes met your (E/C) ones, he froze.

He was barely registering your apologies and offers of paying for a new one or to get it cleaned despite magic being an easy fix for the temporary issue that was his suit for he swore he was going to say something. It seemed that your coffee wasn’t the only thing that was missing that morning.

"It's, uh, it's fine." He mumbled in response, cutting you off as you were talking. "Nothing magic can't fix."

Draco awkwardly coughed into his elbow as his thoughts only seemed to be able to focus on you, and in that specific moment, of how he didn’t mean to cut you off but was unable to find any words to say. Thankfully, you didn’t mention it and instead grabbed your wand before looking at him, silently asking if it was alright for you to clean up the mess you had made on him. He nodded, watching as you promptly waved your wand and watched as the coffee that once stained his pristine white shirt disappeared right before your eyes. He stared at the shirt as if you had just casted a charm he didn’t know existed before your voice broke him out of his thoughts.

"How about I get you coffee tomorrow? I promise this one won't end up on your clothes." You asked in a teasing tone.

Draco could feel the sudden rush of heat rising to his face as he gave you a smile and small nod in response. He never thought the day would come where he was completely speechless but it seemed his life was just beginning to change and it was all thanks to you.

"Great, I'll send you an owl later tonight." And with one last smile, you left. The ghost of your smile etched deep into his mind for the remainder of the day until the morning after where he got to see you again for coffee that thankfully, did not end up on his shirt. He didn't realize it at the time, but Merlin was he whipped for you. And he barely even knew you yet!

It was a small knock on his door which pulled him from the fond memory back to the present and earned a groan from him. Getting up from his bed, he searched for a shirt to wear only to frown when he couldn't find the one he wanted. Opting for a random black tee he hastily grabbed from the closet and putting it on, he opened the door to reveal one of his House Elves.

"Mistress is requesting the young Master’s presence in the dining room." The House Elf, Zardy, said before stepping to the side to guide Draco out of his room and down to where his mother was waiting for him. Once he reached the main floor however, Draco dismissed the House Elf to its other duties before heading to the dining room himself.

He never understood why his mother seemed to like this room so much when it took up nearly a quarter of the first floor and not to mention the ridiculous length of a dining table that ran down the middle of the room. Perhaps it was the paintings she spent weeks asking his father to buy or the chandelier that almost crushed him when the House Elves were trying to hang it up and he was still only a young boy—Draco briefly remembers his father demanding they wait in his office once the task was done but the memory turned blurry shortly afterwards. Whatever it may be that caused his mother to like that room so much however may never be known to him but as he neared the room, his mind started to focus on something else: Why were his parents here on a Friday? Usually his parents would leave on Thursdays to visit their secondary home in London but it seemed they came back early this week. A little too early.

“Draco, my boy, so glad you arrived.” His father said, announcing his presence to not only his mother but the guests who were sitting in the lush chairs with breakfast served before them. There was a sense of familiarity as he looked at them but he couldn’t seem to pinpoint why.

An empty seat in between his parents silently called for him and not wanting to make an even worse impression for whatever his parents had planned with these guests today, Draco took it. He could already hear the lecture his father would give him afterwards for wearing a t-shirt before guests despite him failing to inform him, or you, of guests in advance. Speaking of which, where were you? If his parents had made plans with guests then surely they would have informed you to attend as well? You were his partner after all, they knew this.

“Draco, these are the Greengrasses, you’ve heard of them right?” His mother asked and Draco mutely nodded, taking a sip of the coffee as he waited for her to continue. So that's why they were so familiar. But why were they here now? He and Daphne graduated nearly five years ago and they lost touch shortly after leaving Hogwarts.

“He went to school with our eldest, Daphne Greengrass. Truly a brilliant witch she was.” Mr. Greengrass spoke as he brought a forkful of sausage into his mouth.

Draco tried to ignore the bothersome noise that was Mr. Greengrass speaking with a mouth full of food as he instead redirected his attention to the coffee he had just tried. It was horrible to put it lightly but he would never be able to tell his mother that. It was one of the finest in Europe (according to her) and who knows how she’d react if she knew he preferred the cheap coffee sold at the cafe two blocks down from the Manor. He just hoped that with time he’d at least get used to the new brew while she was around where she insisted on everyone having some.

“I don’t think any amount of milk or sugar could make this any better.” He muttered as he forced himself to take another sip.

“What was that?” Mrs. Greengrass asked him and Draco almost choked on the drink.

Shit. How much of the conversation did he miss?

“Oh-”

“He was just saying how excited he was for this arrangement.” His father said, giving him a knowing look before turning back to the Greengrasses who had pleased smiles at those words. It put him off greatly.

“Right, but just for clarification sake, may I ask what the arrangement is?” Draco asked though he quickly regretted ever opening his mouth as his father started speaking.

“You’re to be engaged with Astoria, their youngest daughter.”

Draco’s face fell as he whipped his head towards his mother whose face was void of any emotion. She must’ve already known what was going through his mind but the Malfoy’s reputation mattered more than her own son's feelings apparently as she continued to show no signs of sympathy or even pity! Closing his mouth, he returned his gaze to the Greengrasses and flashed them a tight lipped smile before promptly excusing himself from the table, claiming that he forgot he had a meeting with members of the Ministry to attend. Whether they had anything to say after he sat up or not, Draco didn’t care to stay and listen as he headed for the stairs towards his bedroom.

Pacing back and forth through his room, Draco didn’t notice his parents footsteps travelling towards his room until they barged in with no warning. A nasty scowl was on his fathers face whereas his mother held her composure as usual. She was always a difficult woman to read, even if he knew her his whole life.

“What do you think you are doing?” Lucius started angrily. If his face were to get any redder Draco was sure steam would start escaping through his ears and nostrils. “How dare you almost embarrass us in front of the Greengrass’! Do you know just how long it took for your mother and I to even get them to consider this offer? We spent weeks-”

“You planned for me to get married?!” Draco’s voice cut him off abruptly. He could see his father try to keep his composure as he nodded in response. “You know I’m in a relationship (Y/N)! We’ve been together for over two years. How could you do this behind my back-”

“Don't you dare speak of that mudblood in front of me, and in my own home-”

“They are my partner! This manor is their home as much as it is mine, father.”

He felt ill. He wanted to scream. He wanted to go back down the stairs and yell at his parents and the Greengrasses for pulling him into this mess but at the same time he wanted to see you. Needed more like. His parents, despite the anger he presently felt towards them, could wait until he was back in your arms again. His parents, the Greengrasses—the world for that matter, could all wait. All he needed right now was to have you with him.

Lucius looked at Narcissa then back at him before pinching the bridge of his nose, taking a deep breath before speaking in a calm— or as calm as he could be— tone. “The engagement party will be in three months where the news will be made to the public. You have until then to end things with that filthy muggle born and prepare for a more serious commitment with Astoria or I will do it for you myself and much quicker than the time I’m giving you.”

“But-”

“No buts! I will not have my sole heir throw away all I’ve sacrificed for a muggle born of all kinds. You’re lucky we even let you bring them into this house. Now you can either listen or- Look at me when I’m talking to you! Draco!”

Lucius’ voice began fading as Draco turned on his heel and dashed down the stairs, hot tears lining his eyes as he tried his best to fight it. He couldn’t be here any longer, he needed to leave, be anywhere but here. Managing to compose himself to tell a House Elf to later inform you of where he’s gone, he grabbed a handful of floo powder and headed towards the fireplace. Inhaling a shaky breath, he muttered the location of his desired place and just as green flames began to consume him, he saw a glimpse of his fathers face. Disappointment and anger etched into the lines of his skin as the flames rose high above his body and took him to his desired destination of your shared cottage.

It was a place where only the two of you knew how to get there and served especially useful in times like the present. All he had to do now was wait and he’d be all yours again, even if it’d only now be temporary it seems.

permanent taglist: @princekooks @lucy-malfoy07 @tsukilover11 @sweetblueparadisebabyg @gryffindorgirl @annika0-o @rocketxgirl @debesteimanetje @vixxiann @nataliewalker93 @averyisbackinthetrashcan @killzandchillz

all hp taglist: @joyfullymulti @hehehehannahthings @water-vevo @yourmumsdirtysock @dreamyender @denkisclown @thepolywrites @drayshadow @dandyylions

draco taglist: @coldlilheart @willowmores @its-9pm @oh-my-ronron-mphfpc-fanfic-heart @heyyitsreign @yiamalfoy @c-u-tmrw @quivvyintheclouds @kpopgirlbtssvt @alexxavicry @xreaderandshits @comfort-reads

#story of another us #draco malfoy x reader #draco malfoy x you #draco malfoy x y/n #draco malfoy series #draco malfoy oneshot #draco malfoy fic #draco malfoy fanfic #draco malfoy fanfiction #draco malfoy #draco x reader #draco x you #draco x y/n #draco series #draco oneshot #draco fic #draco fanfic #draco fanfiction #draco #hp fanfiction #hp fanfic #hp fic #hp au #hp oneshot #hp x reader #hp x you #hp x y/n #no voldemort au #arranged marriage au #right person wrong time

[neptunetheplanet7]

𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐰𝐨 - 𝐢𝐜𝐞 𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦

DM ME IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO BE PUT ON THE TAGLIST!!

;mikasa ackerman x fem!lesbian!reader

;modern au, band au

word count: 2.1k

warnings: swearing, floch’s bad flirting

bold italics is a text conversation

listen to the music masterlist

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disclaimer again!! i wrote this a long time ago. i know there are things that need to be fixed and things that don’t fit right. i plan to edit this story more in the future but today is not that day :)

You took a shaky breath in as you stopped midway of putting a clean sheet on the bed Mikasa would be sleeping in. The room still had some of her old stuff in it, it's just no one ever came in here after she left. You looked around at all the items she left behind. Smiling fondly at an old picture of you two, you noticed a small figure crossed out in the background. Glancing at the rest of the photos on the shelf, you noticed that every photo had something crossed out.

After looking at each picture, you came to the conclusion the figure was Jean. She must have only taken the photos without him and did this to the rest. You frowned and walked back to the bed. Carefully, you climbed onto it and propped a few pillows up to support you as you leaned back.

For the first time in two years, you got a good look around the room. On the side of the room with the door, there was a large glass window overlooking the balcony above the living room. You always found it strange that she chose a room like that when she usually kept those blinds shut. Her bed was in the middle of the room with a tv mounted on the wall across from it. On the other side of her bed, there were a couple of bean bags below the bay window that looked out on the driveway.

You sighed and took out your phone, pulling up old texts with Mikasa. The last time you texted her was three months ago when you got too drunk at one of Reiner's ragers.

mikasa

mikasas pleasdse

come home

i miss you

i miss you so much

we all miss you so much

come home to me.

She didn't respond to that and you wouldn't know if she even looked at it. She turned her read receipts off for everyone after the first week of trying to contact her. The only time she had ever contacted anyone was two weeks after she left the house.

Don't look for me. Don't contact me.

You got a lot of your friends asking if you got the same message. She sent the same thing to everyone who tried to get in contact with her. You still didn't know where she was or what she was doing. The only thing you knew was that she was coming home the next day. You sighed. Suddenly, you didn't feel like cleaning anything else. You briskly walked out of her room and dialed the number of your best friend.

"Hey, Y/n! What's going on?" Sasha's cheery voice rang through the line.

"Hey hey, Sasha. I'm doing great. At least, I think I am. Do you wanna go somewhere? You can pick me up? Or I can pick you up if you like."

"I'll come to pick you up, honey bunny, don't you worry." You heard her struggling with her keys on the other side of the line and snorted at the noise.

"Need some help, Sash?" You grinned while skipping steps.

"Fine, thanks." She grumbled. "I'll be there in fifteen! You stay put!" She briskly hung up.

Sasha had been your best friend ever since Eren's nineteenth birthday party. She caught you and Eren coming back inside just as she was about to leave, with half the pantry in her arms. She asked for your number to make plans to hang out and chat sometime. You happily obliged, which was probably the happiest thing you had done that night.

You tossed your phone onto your bed as you walked into your room. Your room was on the first floor. You got first pick since you were the one who inherited the house. The house was big and beautiful. It was also on a lake. Perfect for the parties Eren and Jean loved to host. Perfect escape from paparazzi.

Your room had big glass doors that opened to the balcony that wrapped around the back of the house. You had a great view of the lake. The room was painted white. There was a black marble fireplace in one wall with a small wardrobe you used for storing memorable items to the band. You didn't need to use it for clothes since you had a walk-in closet in the big bathroom you partly shared with your bandmates. Jean liked to use the large bathtub.

You collapsed onto the bed and stared into the vanity mirror next to it. It was then when you realized you were still in your pajamas. "Oh shit." Your eyes widened as you hurriedly stumbled over to the closet, falling over once.

You grabbed a pair of baggy sweats and a big t-shirt. With duck socks, of course. The outfit didn't look much different than your pajamas but Sasha would probably be wearing something similar.

You threw your hair into the easiest hairstyle you could muster. You grabbed your boots and hopped up and down while trying to put them on while also leaving the room. "Jesus." You muttered.

Your phone vibrated, signaling that Sasha was here. "I'm heading out with Sasha! You're on your lonesome!" You called out to wherever Armin was in the house.

"Okay! Don't be back too late!" He shouted back.

You laughed aloud as you realized how much he sounded like a dad. You opened the front door and ran to Sasha's car. "Let me in!" You knocked on the passenger window as she reached around to find the button that unlocks the door. Once it was unlocked, you swung open the door and hopped inside.

"Nice outfit," was the first thing she said to you. You glanced at her outfit and scoffed. Your predictions were correct, she was wearing something similar.

"Gee, thanks." You gave a lopsided smile and rolled your eyes.

"Where to, honey bunny?" Sasha said, giving a mock salute while her other hand rested firmly on the steering wheel. You giggled and thought about it. You called her on such a whim that you forgot to even plan anything.

"Uh how about Brain Freezes? I could really use a catch-up with Connie right about now." You suggested.

"That sounds like a great idea! Turns out you do have a brain up there." Sasha snickered.

"Oh good one, because you're the real genius here, clearly."

After a lot of lighthearted banter, you arrived at Connie's workplace. Sasha aggressively grabbed the door handle and slammed it open, causing the bell to fall off its perch and land on your face. "Oops." You grimaced and bent down to pick up the bell. You rang it in front of her face.

"Sasha! Y/n! My two favorite customers!" Connie jumped up and down on the other side of the counter. "How can I assist you ladies today?"

"I'll have the usual." You gave a half-hearted smile, head still impaired from the bell. Sasha had quite the habit of accidentally hurting you.

Sasha snatched the bell from your grasp and started ringing it. She announced her very long order that you could barely keep up with, but Connie was used to this kind of thing, especially with her.

You noticed one of his coworkers scowling at Sasha. You didn't like Floch, to say the least. He was always inviting himself to your parties but he was rude to all of your friends at the same time. He noticed your gaze and smirked.

He strutted over to where you stood, pretending to become very interested in toppings. "How are you, Y/n? It's been a while huh?" He leaned over your shoulder in a way that workers shouldn't with their customers. You made a hasty effort to slip away from his presence.

"It really hasn't. I came here last week. I come here every week and you say that every time." You usually tried to be nice to Floch, but today you didn't feel like being nice.

"Well, even a day without you feels like an eternity." He flirted horridly. You stared blankly at him until he awkwardly cleared his throat and traded spots with Connie at the register.

Connie took off his apron and handed you and Sasha your orders. "Sorry about him. That guy really can't take a hint even if it's right in front of his face." He shot Floch a venomous glare. "Luckily, you guys got here right as my shift ended! Wanna get out of here?" His previous anger seemed to dissipate in an instant.

"Yeah, I do! Where should we go?" Sasha beamed with her spoon still in her mouth.

"Can we just drive around? I've got something I wanna tell you guys." You played with your spoon in the ice cream, averting eye contact.

"Sure thing, Y/n. Let's go." Sasha and Connie said in unison.

Sasha let you drive her car since she was preoccupied with her mountain of ice cream. Connie didn't have a car, he failed his driver's test every time he took it. You'd think he'd learn most of the material by now. "Hey, Y/n?" He asked from the backseat.

"Yeah?" You nodded to him.

"Are you gonna finish that?" He said, referring to your cup of ice cream in the front cupholder. You sighed.

"Go ahead." He thanked you over and over as he leaned over and snatched it.

"So, Y/n? What was it you wanted to tell us?" Sasha wiped her hands on her pants and set the empty container in an extra cupholder.

You gripped the steering wheel harder then relaxed. You took a shaky breath in. "Mikasa is coming home tomorrow."

Connie started choking on your ice cream. "I know, I had the same reaction." You quipped.

"Mikasa..is...WHAT?" Connie managed between coughs.

"After all this time? It's been two years. Tomorrow? That's so sudden! Are you even ready to see her?" Sasha's mouth was gaping open. You leaned over and shut it for her.

"Yes, tomorrow. I still have to get the house ready. I couldn't even make it through her old room without calling you. Jean told us this morning. I don't think we should be worried about me being ready to see her. I think we should be more concerned about her and Jean." You informed. "But, then again, she told Jean about her return first. Plus he's picking her up tomorrow at the airport. So based on that, I think they're on better terms."

"You don't think they'll get back together, do you?" Connie said, his eyebrows furrowing.

You snorted. "Of course not. You know Jean is with Marco now, and he seems pretty happy with him. They've been together for two years now, probably longer if I'm being honest."

"Then what do you have to worry about?" Sasha asked, confused.

"Are you joking? I mean, what if she has found someone? What then? What if she quits the band forever? What if we argue? She dropped off the map two years ago. Completely. She stopped responding to me, to all of us. For two years I thought she lost her interest in everything and went to live a new life, with people better than me. And now she's coming back, out of the blue! It's too much." You stressed.

Connie and Sasha made quick eye contact. "Y/n, I think you're reading too far into it. I doubt anyone could lose interest in you. You're too cool! Let's look on the bright side, she's ready to come home and you finally get to see her again," Sasha said in an attempt to lift your spirits. You smiled graciously. You really were lucky to have a friend like her. "Right, Connie?" She gestured to Connie who looked very deep in thought.

"Didn't you and Mikasa go out in high school?" You almost crashed the car from the shock of the question.

"Briefly, yes. But we weren't 'going out' so to speak. We just, like, made out a couple of times." You could feel your face grow hot at the subject. You thought you were over your crush on Mikasa, but after hearing that she was coming home, the familiar feeling was coming back.

"You're going red, Y/n. I think it was more to you than just a make-out." Connie grinned while Sasha wiggled her eyebrows.

"You're totally in love with Mikasa!" Sasha sang.

"Shut up, you two. I don't wanna get into the details right now." You couldn't even try to hide your heated face since you were the one driving the vehicle.

"Not right now? So maybe somewhere down the line, you will?" Sasha raised her eyebrows and broke out into another infectious grin.

"Whatever, Sash. Enough about Mikasa and me. I really wanna hear about you and Niccolo." You gave her a similar grin while she slowly turned red.

"Nice one, Y/n!" Connie cheered.

"You idiots should just shut it!"

posted: 8/24/21

neptunetheplanet7© 2021

no reposts, edits, or modification to my work by anyone other than me.

#mikasa x reader #mikasa x you #snk fanfiction #aot fanfiction #mikasa ackerman #band au #modern au

[smoooothoperator]

What A Shame

08: Lover

Driver! Charles Leclerc x Singer! OC (Juliette Morelli)

Exes to Lovers, Forced Proximity, Childhood Sweathear

Words: 2.8k

warnings: fluff, angst?? lot of tears, flashbacks are on italics

Official Playlist

Masterlist

previous part | epilogue

a/n: last part!!!! tomorrow i'll post the epilogue!! BIG BIG BIG APPLAUSE TO MY LOVELY @racinggirl BECAUSE IF IF WASN'T FIR HER THE ENDING COULD HAVE BEEN WORSE

Every interaction is very welcomed!!!!

🎤

Time. Time is free, but it’s priceless. You can’t own it, but you can use it. You can’t keep it, but you can spend it. Once you’ve lost it you can never get it back.

When someone in a relationship asks for time they never say how long, because what they need is a moment to stop and think, to heal and see every issue, every small detail that tells them how to fix it.

Time can heal a relationship. But only when you spend those seconds, minutes or hours, even days and weeks, trying to avoid all those issues, you won't get the lost time back.

"Time" he sighed looking at me, letting go of my hands. "Time…"

"Charles" I sighed. "You were away for ten years and never told me why. You just told me everything right now. The least thing you can give me is time to assimilate it"

"I know, I know…" he mumbled looking at me. "I just…"

"You can't expect me to give you a second chance right now" I frown. "You can't expect me to give you an answer right now and ignore all the pain you gave me"

"I love you, Juliette" he said, looking at me anxiously.

"And? What else?" I sighed tired. "If you truly loved me I should be first instead of Ferrari. If… If you truly loved me you would have turned them down and come to me. But you never did"

"Because I was greedy!" He said nervous, trying to hold my hands. "I am greedy, I wanted to win. I wanted to be on top. I felt so good when they treated me as their favorite, when they treated me like a hero, Juliette… But…"

"You thought you were someone else" I sighed. "You thought you were Michael Schumacher"

"But I didn't have my Corinna with me" he mumbled. "I couldn't be Michael because I didn't have my Corinna and the only one to blame here is me. I know"

I nodded and looked at him. I can't pretend like any of this happened, like if he broke up with me because his boss threatened him.

"Did he threaten to ruin your career?" I sighed, closing my eyes.

"Yeah" he mumbled weakly. "I had to do whatever he wanted… They put so much money for me, I had to make something for them to not be a waste of money"

I look at him and sigh.

"Give me time, please" I whisper. "I… Yeah, I still love you. But please? Please give me time to think"

And again, before he could say something, I walked away, leaving him alone and going to the villa. I admitted that I still love him, I admitted it in front of him.

I walked inside the villa, walking around trying to find my table. Thank God it was with Carlos and Isa and other people.

"You okay?" Isa asked me, placing her hand on my back and rubbing it softly.

"Yeah, I just…" I sighed.

"You want to come with me to the bathroom?" she smiled softly. "I have make up in my bag in case you want to retouch it"

I smiled weakly and nodded, getting up quickly and following her. I just let her help me, wiping away the black traces of the masquera under my eyes and fixing my makeup.

"I talked with him" I mumble looking down. "He… It was Mattia…"

"I imagined" she sighed. "That man took things too far with him"

"But why did he let him do that!" I sigh looking at her. "Charles… How could Charles let him do that!"

"Because he believed in Ferrari" she smiled weakly at me. "He believed they could change, that the following year could be better and he kept fighting"

"But… I…" I mumble. "Mattia asked him to break up with me, and what hurts me the most is that Charles did what he said"

"Juliette, you and I know how that people are" she smiled weakly, holding my hand. "You and I know that they can lose their seats if they don't do what they want. Look at Pierre… He lost Red Bull, look at Alex… Ferrari is not less"

I sigh and nod. Right, Pierre lost his seat in RedBull, he lost his chance to fight to be on top, I still remember that day.

"You know… Michael Schumacher's son lost his seat too" she smiled weakly. "He got in Formula 1 in 2021 on Haas, he only had two years with them"

"Really?" I asked surprised. "But he's a Schumacher… I still remember how he was in Formula 2…"

"He wasn't enough" she shrugged her shoulders. "Now he's back, but after Mercedes' wing in Williams"

I sigh and nod, surprised. The moment Charles told me that Mattia made him do those things I didn't think about that possibility.

"Charles fought for his seat. He wanted the seat and fought until he got tired of them" she said. "I'm not defending him. But… Imagine what Mattia could have done if he disobeyed him? Imagine Charles losing his seat, his dream team…"

"He could have been destroyed" I answered, Isa nodding after I talked. "He could have lost everything…"

"Exactly" she smiled weakly. "I know he kept looking for you. I went with him to one of your concerts, you know? Carlos and Vera went too"

"Oh…" I nodded. "Yeah, he told me he was still there…"

"He was so afraid, Juliette" she said. "So lost, so… I don't know. I didn't recognize him at all after he broke up with you. I can tell you that he still regrets that day"

I nod and sigh. He kept the distance to save himself, and save me.

"What should I do?" I whisper. "He asked me for a second chance"

"And you want to give him a second chance?" she asked me, making me look at her. "Do you still love him? Do you want to spend the rest of your life with him?"

🏎️

I sighed, watching her walk away. 

She wants time. Time to think. 

I have to respect her wishes, I just don't want to lose her again. Yeah, I have to give her all the time she needs.

"Mate! You coming?" I heard George calling me.

I sigh and nod, walking towards him and walking in silence next to him. He's a great teammate, but it's better to have him as a teammate and not as a rival.

"You looked kinda off during the whole wedding" he sighed. "You okay?"

"I think so" I smiled weakly. "I feel like I'll get my girl back... Or not. Maybe I'm having high hopes when I don't deserve them"

"Ah... I see" he nodded. "I remember watching you two together around the paddock"

"Yeah" I smile weakly. 

My first race wearing red. I was excited. All these years I can finally make my dream come true.

"Are you excited?" she smiled holding my hand.

"So much" I smile, squeezing her hand softly, kissing her temple.

We always liked to match our outfits, and now with the red shirt of Ferrari she walked next to me wearing a red summer dress through the paddock of Bahrain.

"Some of us were a little surprised when she stopped coming to the races" he sighed. "It was cute, and well... After that you started being a jerk"

"Yeah, I know" I smiled weakly.

When we arrived at the villa I sat on the central table, at the edge of it and next to Pierre's mom.

"You okay, honey?" his mom asked me and I just smiled weakly.

"Come on, everyone noticed that I zoomed out during the wedding?" I laugh softly. 

"Yeah" she laughed. "You okay? It was Juliette, right? Everything is okay?"

I sigh and smile weakly, my eyes searching for her in the crowd. But she wasn't there, neither was Isa.

"I hope so" I nodded, smiling weakly. "I hope everything goes better... I talked with her"

She smiled and nodded. She's like a second mother to me, she knew what happened with Juliette.

"You told her?" she whispered and I just nodded. "I'm so proud of you".

The dinner was nice, just how it had to be. There was a room for the kids where they could play and have fun without disturbing their parents. 

I just couldn't stop looking at Juliette. She looked more calm, talking with Carlos and Isa. I just want to be with her again, I want to show her that I missed her.

She got up and I followed her with my eyes, as she walked towards the small stage where the rest of her small group walked up after the dinner. She was getting ready, turning on the speakers and putting on her earplugs while all the girls got up to catch the flowers.

"You ready, girls?" Valerie smiled looking at the group of girls, holding her bouquet of flowers tightly and turning around. 

"3... 2... 1!" Everyone exclaimed and then I saw Valerie smirking at me, turning around and still holding the flowers while she walked towards Juliette.

"No way" I gasped when I saw Juliette looking at Valerie surprised.

I saw how Juliette grabbed the flowers, making my heart beat fast against my rib cage. I saw her hugging the flowers and looking at me.

"I think you'll have to talk with her again" Pierre's mom smiled at me.

I nod and smile, happy. I have hope. I have faith.

Pierre walked towards Valerie, whispering something in her ear and then they looked at me. They walked to the dance floor, both of them holding each other while the music of the band started.

I sat on the table, watching them dance their first dance, hearing Juliette sing.

Can I go where you go?

Can we always be this close forever and ever?

And ah, take me out, and take me home

You're my, my, my, my

Lover

I heard her sing, and it just reminded me of us. Of Juliette and me. Of things we said and did. 

Again, this is a love song. A love song she wrote to me.

It was our first time. The first time we had sex. We have been dating for a while now, but didn't feel ready to sleep together. 

It was magical, intimate, passionate. I love her so much.

"Can we always be this close?" she whispered, brushing her nails on my chest.

"I would love to" I whisper, kissing her temple. "Forever"

I saw her looking at me, singing to me. Pierre and Valerie were holding each other in their own bubble, but right now I am in my own bubble. 

Is this a dream? Maybe this wedding will be tomorrow and I'm just still in my bed dreaming of something impossible. Yeah, it's that. I drank too much and I'm imagining things.

I should wake up and make things right.

I just stayed frozen there, looking at how she smiled at me while she sang. After she finished her song and everyone clapped at her, she talked with the people of her band to keep playing something soft before she walked out, going to her table.

🎤

I just needed to relax, to think. 

If my manager asked me to break up with Charles, threatening me with ending my career... Would I break up with him?

I'm not perfect, who am I lying to? Even if I loved him the most I would have done what they asked me to do, just to save my career and my future.

But he was part of my future too, and I was a part of his too. I shouldn't be selfish, I should give him a second chance, right? But it's just so wrong, it's so wrong that I still love him even if he broke my heart into a million pieces.

I sighed and rubbed my temple softly, closing my eyes. Some people were on the dance floor, dancing with their partners and friends. Carlos and Isa were dancing together, George and Carmen were hugging each other while moving slowly with the music. 

But what caught my eye was Charles dancing with Vera. He was holding her in his arms while the tired five years old girl rested her head on his shoulder.

"Would you want kids?" I asked when we walked in front of a kid's toy store. 

"Hm? Why the question?" Charles asked, wrapping his arm around my shoulders, pulling me close to him.

"Oh, no... Nothing" I chuckled. "Not that I have the baby fever. Just... I just think you would be a great father"

"Really?" he smiled. "You know I love kids"

I sigh and look at him, how he smiled softly and closed his eyes when the little girl snuggled closer to him.

How unfair. We could have been married. And we could already have a kid. 

I just got up, feeling how my chest started to hurt, and walked out to get some fresh air. I just needed to be away from the music and all the people for some minutes.

Hugging myself with the white silk shawl, I walked towards the garden looking at the vineyard and how the light of the moon was shining up there in the sky.

"Should I forgive him, Hervé?" I sighed looking up at the stars. "He's your son... What should I do?"

I just needed a signal, something that could convince myself that I indeed wanted to give him a second chance. I needed a small push.

And then I felt a soft breeze wrap my body, moving my hair and the material of the dress. 

"Okay" I whispered, smiling with little tears in my eyes wanting to fall.

I just stayed there for some time, heating the crickets and the music, taking deep breaths trying to calm my hysteric heart.

I didn't need to turn around to feel him standing some meters behind me. I just felt a little tickling on my pinky finger, like a string tightening its grip around my skin that warns me of his presence.

"Is it unfair, you know?" I said, not turning around. "If only you told me what Mattia said... If only you didn't lie that night and stayed to explain to me what was happening... We could be happy"

"Juliette" he sighed, the fallen sticks of the trees breaking under his shoes as he walked closer to me. "I was afraid..."

"Afraid of what, Charles?" I sighed. "You had everything. You had the seat, an amazing teammate, people loved you. Why did you need to fight more? Why couldn't you be happy just the way we were?"

I looked back at him, the tears still wanted to slip down my cheeks. I'm afraid of loving him again and being in the same situation.

"We were perfect, Charles... I knew you like the back of my hand, I knew when you felt anxious and how to calm you. I was the person that actually knew how much that red team meant to you, yet you were the one that pushed me away because of them" I mumbled. "I knew how much this sport meant to you, I didn't care about the risks if that meant seeing you smile! I risked my own sanity to see you happy, Charles! I had anxiety every time I saw a red flag because I was so afraid of losing you! I'm still afraid of losing you!"

He looked at me, hearing me talk. He held my hands, trying to calm me while he rubbed his thumbs on my knuckles. He nodded, giving me permission to continue, to let it all out.

"I wanted to be with you on all your victories, Charles" I whisper, feeling my cheeks getting wet. "I was in the worst part of your life, I... It was that? Everytime you thought about me it reminds you of when Jules and your father died. Yeah, it might me that-"

I just couldn't talk anymore. He pressed his lips on mine, cupping both of my cheeks with his hands. I tried to push him away, but who am I lying to? I needed to kiss him, I missed kissing him.

SonI just gave up. I let all my walls down, what was left of them. I let him kiss me and hold me close to him, making sure that I couldn't talk anymore.

"You never meant something bad in my life, Juls" he whispered, making me melt after he said my nickname. "You were my light, what took me out of the worst moments of it. You were the person that held me tight when something went wrong. And Juliette... I still need you, please. I need you to have me and to hold me and guide me"

"Oh Charles..." I mumble resting my forehead on his, closing my eyes and feeling his hands rubbing my cheeks.

He kissed me again, this time softly, gently. Making my mind go back to all those time he kissed me, he loved me. He loves me.

"Please, I'm asking you again" he whispered, cupping my cheeks. "Give me a second chance, Juliette Morelli. I know you asked me for time, but I can't live anymore without you. I can't live if you are not next to me, please..."

taglist

@lestappenloverr @racinggirl @roni-midnights @livster @kakorrhaphiphobia @starkeyellow @ru-kru @chonkybonky @vita-di-moda

#f1 #f1 x y/n #f1 x oc #f1 x reader #f1 imagine #f1 drabble #f1 serie #formula 1 fic #formula 1 drabble #formula 1 x reader #formula 1 imagine #formula 1 fanfic #formula 1 #charles leclerc #charles leclerc x you #charles leclerc fanfic #charles leclerc x reader #charles leclerc imagine

[deadsaigon]

Kindred spirits || Carl Grimes

Summary: In a parallel universe where Carl is still alive, he experiences the events during the 9x15.

Warnings: Death, and yeah, a lot of cuteness and sadness. All at the same time.

Note: The flashbacks are in italics. Gif is not mine.

A/n: I've been working on this for a while, I hope you like it. Honoring my baby Carl, he deserved to live longer in the series. Requests are open. Sorry if it's too long, but I think is worthy to read. Hope you like it.

"I stand before you today at the start of a new tomorrow. A tomorrow made possible by the sacrifice of many over the years. Among them a man whose mission was to build community and strengthen the bonds between us. A man who had to destroy the very thing that connected us in order to save us. It took us far too long to fulfill the promise of what Rick Grimes and his son Carl, who is here with us, envisioned" King Ezekiel stoped his speech, due to the ovation that the people started when they heard the name of 'Carl', Carl was a living legend. He and Amunet were between the crowd. One of his arms was around her waist and her head was over his shoulder. When the people around them began to applaud him, Carl blushed a little and he thanked them with his hand. "The same promise, Paul Rovia, better known the most as Jesus believed in when he brought us all together those many years ago. We've always been bound to each other. We always will be. We fought our way back to each other. We've grown. The crossing over the river may be gone, but we rebuilt a bridge nonetheless. Today is the proof that we can unite, not against a common enemy but for the common good. So eat, drink, trade and be merry, cause we got a lot of lost time to make up for" Ezekiel ended his speech.

Jerry stood in front of all the people. "That the first Annual Inter-community Reunification Fair begins" He said.

"Jerry, we changed that" Ezekiel told him with a little smile. All the people laughed. "Carl, could you make me the honor to say some words and inaugurate this?" The King asked him. "Amunet, you can pass, too". Carl blushed again, but Amunet encouraged him. They hold hands and passed to the front.

"Mmm, hello" He said, he was so nervous but Amunet pressed harder his hand, trying to calm him down. "I would like to thank you all, for not abandoning my dad's dream, the dream he worked so hard for so many years, the dream he gave his life for: the dream of being a big and unite family." Carl reached the cage of the white doves. "That the Fair or the New Beginning begins" He finished by setting free the doves. The people started to applaud again, and yeah, Carl blushed, once more.

Once the people got disperse, Carl and Amunet started walking around the Fair. "You're so cute when you blush" Amunet said.

"Stop it" He answered.

"It's the true, you are adorable" She laughed. Carl take her from her waist, pulled her close to him and kissed her.

"I love you, Amunet"

"I love you too, Carl" Amunet and Carl met each other since the beginning of the chaos. They were friends in the Atlanta camp, in the Hershel's farm, in the prison, and they started dating when they arrived to Alexandria. They had been a couple for 8 years approximately. They had always support each other.

.

"Alexandria is granted to give asylum to Lydia" Carl spoke. The leaders of each community, Tara for The Hilltop, Carol and Ezekiel for The Kingdom, Rachel for OceanSide, and Carl and Michonne for Alexandria, were discussing about the fact of Lydia forming part of the communities now. Henry, Lydia, Judith and Amunet were also there.

"If her mother retaliates it's gonna be against Hilltop, not Alexandria" Tara said, she didn't seem to be happy with Lydia being around.

"Tara, remember when you stood in the prison with the Governor? You were our enemy. But Glenn saved you, and brought you with him. At the start, people didn't trust you, obviously, but we gave you the doubt benefit, and look how it come, now, you become part of the family" Carl told her and Tara seemed to understand what he was trying to say. "That's why we propose a mutual protection pact. If her mother wants to attack Hilltop, it won't be easy, cause she is going to have to fight the four communities. They mess with one, they mess with us all" Carl continued talking. Everyone in the place agreed.

"How do we seal it? A blood pact? Do we cross the pinkies?" Tara said making everyone laugh.

"I just got an idea" King Ezekiel said and searched for something. Finally, he found the agreement that Rick had made so many years ago.

"How do you have it?" Michonne asked.

"Maybe I took some things when I left Alexandria" Tara answered.

The first who signed it were King Ezekiel and Queen Carol, then Tara, it continued Rachel, and then, it was the turn of Alexandria. Michonne took the pen in her hand, but extended it to Carl. "It should be the Rick Grimes son" She said. Carl took the pen and signed the paper with 'Carl Grimes'. It was it, the mutual protection pact was signed.

Amunet and Judith stood next to Carl. "Carl you did it amazing!" The little girl said and give him a hug.

"Thank you Judith" Carl took the body of his little sister in his arms and carried her.

"Thank you, Carl. Thank you so much" Lydia said.

"It's okay Lydia, I couldn't let you alone. You are one of us now. Also, Henry needs you" Lydia and Henry laughed. When Henry went for Lydia, after Alpha took her from The Hilltop, Carl, Daryl and Connie searched for him. Daryl and Connie didn't understand Henry, but Carl did.

.

"So, that's how you make CPR to a person" Enid finished her explication. "Who wants to pass and do it with the doll?" Judith raised her hand. "Okay, Judith, let's see how you do it" The doctor said her. Judith stood near to the doll, and started to do the steps that Enid had explained before. "You did it very well, congratulations! Take a lollipop. That's all, thank you"

The people dispersed, and Carl walked to Enid. "Hey, my favourite cowboy is here" They hugged each other. "How are you doing? Did Amunet came?"

"Cool, I'm pretty cool. Yeah, Amunet is here too. How are you Enid? Or I should say 'doctor Enid'?"

"I always call you 'cowboy', you have the right to call me 'doctor'" Both laughed.

"I'm happy to see you, Enid"

"I'm happy too, Carl. It's been a long since the last time we see each other"

"But we saw us in The Hilltop, when Rosita and Eugene got in trouble"

"I know, but I refer, to see each other like this, like family, not like two strangers. I'm sorry for never had get back to Alexandria, but Maggie needed me here"

"And I'm sorry for never have go to Hilltop to visit you, but you know what happened with Michonne, I needed to stay in Alexandria taking care of Judith and Rick Jr."

"Maybe we can be the same best friends that we were"

"I'd love that"

"It's gonna be a little different, I'm not the same depressive Enid that used to hate everything and used to sneak out the walls"

"That Enid was pretty cool, tho"

"It was cool for the emo Carl you were in that time. The antique Enid doesn't fit with the famous leader Carl you are now. But the doctor Enid, she fits perfect"

"I'm not famous" "Of course you are. You know that the adults tell about 'the Grimes' to their children?"

"I've heard about that, but I didn't think it was true"

"It's true, Carl, everybody knows your story, and I'm so proud of you"

"Heeeeyyyy, you're talking without me? I feel betrayed" Amunet got into the conversation.

"We were about to look for you" Carl said.

"I'm gonna pretend that I believe you. Enid! I've missed you so much" Both women hugged each other.

"I've missed you too. What have you being doing in Alexandria?"

"I'm in charge of the hydraulic system that provides water to the community. Also, I'm in charge of the maintenance of the solar panels, and the power generators. If they don't work, I fix them" Amunet said proudly.

"Woah, did Eugene teach you that?" "Who more could it be? The dude is a freaking genie. I'm glad to say that Siddiq did a good job training you, doctor"

"Can you believe it? Six year ago we were only teenagers trying to survive in the end of the world, and now, look at us" Enid said.

"This shit is crazy"

"Language, Carl!"

"Judith, what are you doing here?"

"I want a caramel apple, can we get one?"

"Okay, come on. Ladies, I'll see you later" Carl kissed Amunet before going with his sister.

.

"You don't have to go. They can patrol the surroundings by themselves" Amunet said to Carl.

"It's okay. I'm gonna be fine. Daryl is going too"

"Yeah girl, I'll take care of him, even if he doesn't need it anymore" Daryl said.

"You should reconsider it" Michonne said.

"Mom, you are worrying to much"

"Mom is right, Carl, it's too dangerous. What if something bad happens to you?" Judith said sadly.

Carl kneeled to be at the same height that his sister and put his hands in her cheeks. "Judy, do you trust me?" The girl nodded. "I'm going out there because I want to help. I can't stay here pretending that everything is fine with those crazy people with skin masks around. I want to guarantee the safety of you three" He said to Amunet, Michonne and Judith. "I have to do it"

Judith jumped into Carl's arms. "Just be careful Carl, please" The girl said.

"Be prudent. And do what Daryl says, Okay?" Michonne told.

"The last time I listen to Daryl I was fifteen, but sure, I will" Michonne, Carl and Judith involved themselves into a warm hugged.

Amunet was the only left to say goodbye. "Promise me you'll get back"

"I do. I always get back to you"

"I can't loose you, don't make me get through that"

"You are not going to loose me. I'll be back" The couple shared a kiss full of love and hope.

"I love you so much" Amunet said.

"I love you more. I'll see you later. Don't forget that you have my heart and that you are the fucking love of my life"

"Carl! Language"

"Sorry, Judith"

"It's time to go" Daryl said.

"Daryl, please, protect him"

"I will. But you have to understand that he's not a kid anymore Michonne" The man said before the group conformed by Magna, Yumiko, Carol, Kal, Marco, Dianne, he and Carl left.

.

"What the hell is that?" Carl asked.

The group had meet with DJ, Alek and Ozzy. They had found a destroyed carriage and dead horses. "We don't know. The bodies that were in here are missing. They must had been going to the Fair" DJ said.

"Do you think they were them?" Carl asked again, making reference to the people with masks.

"I'd like to say no, but you are not dumb"

"We should separate. Daryl, Carol, Yumiko and I will follow the rast of the bodies, and try to find them. Magna, Dianne, Marco and Kal, get to The Hilltop, and make sure everything is okay. DJ, Ozzy, Alek, keep patrolling around here. Let's go" Carl ordered.

When Carl's group moved, Carol and Daryl kept watching at Carl. "What's wrong guys?" He asked them.

"You did it pretty well in there. Being a leader is your thing, kid" Carol said with a little smile.

"Your dad would be so proud" Daryl told.

"Please, stop. People have been saying stuff like that all day"

"You shouldn't be ashamed of that, Carl" Yumiko said.

"Can we just keep going?" Carl ended the conversation.

.

The day turned into night. Carl's group was still searching for the bodies of the people from the carriage. Suddenly, some walkers appeared in their way. "Take care, watch their hands, they could have knives" Carl said.

Walkers grew in number, and then, a body of 2 meters of height appeared in front of them. Carl, Yumiko, Carol and Dary prepared their weapons. "Drop them. I won't ask twice" Beta ordered. The four obeyed him, and the tall guy directed his voice at Carl. "You just had to give me the girl. Now that deal is over. You are coming with us"

Beta took them to the Whisperer camp, and tied them to a tree. Then, Alpha appeared. "You, one-eyed, come" She said and unleashed Carl. Ponting at him with a gun, she took him to a pit, where a big horde of walkers was in. "I hope I'm wrong saying that you can't take care of my daughter" Alpha said.

"You are. We will be the family that Lydia never had. She is better with us" Carl answered her.

"You and your people are alive because I let you live. But I'm done with you all. If you cross into my land, once more, I'll guide the horde to the communities. I've mark the border to the North, you see it as you leave. Now, reunite with the rest of your group and get away from my sight".

.

After Alpha let go Carl, Daryl, Carol and Yumiko, they found Siddiq roofed to a tree, he had some injuries and the eyes bended.

"Siddiq! What are you doing here?" Carl asked him.

Siddiq wasn't able to answer him, so Carl helped him to get up and to keep walking.

During the way back home, they saw it, they saw the final warning that Alpha was talking about: some heads in pikes, marking the border of the Whisperers' lands.

Ten heads. Ten reanimated heads. Ten reanimated heads of people they loved and cared about. Ten people that were gone. Ten people that had died in a horrible way.

Once Yumiko, Daryl, Carol, Siddiq and Carl were close enough to the heads, they could finally saw who they were. And that only disturbed them more.

First head.

Ozzy.

Ozzy was the leader of the Highway men. He was working with his men to get to chance to watch a movie, and he didn't was capable to do that.

Ozzy was working only a few hours, and now, his head was the first of ten.

Second head.

Alek.

Alek was the right hand of Ozzy, and a member of the Highway men.

He was working with Ozzy for a benefit for him and their people only a few hours ago, and now, his head was the second of ten.

Third head.

DJ.

DJ was a reformed Savior that rebuilt his life six years ago when he redeemed himself and took the invitation of living in Alexandria. Since then, he had shown his effort by making sure that the surroundings of the community were safe. And Carl appreciated that.

Carl felt sorry seeing his head, cause he had live and worked with him for a long time. DJ was the proof that a person can actually change for good.

DJ was talking with Carl about his concern about the possibility of the Whisperers were killing people only a few hours ago, and now, his head was the third of ten.

Fourth head.

Frankie.

"Hey, Nabila, have you seen Frankie?" Eugene asked to the woman. He and Frankie's daughter were looking for her, there had been a long time since the last time they had saw her.

But Nabila hadn't seen her, cause Frankie wasn't in the fair anymore.

Frankie used to be one of Negan's wives. After the Saviors' defeat, she was accepted in Alexandria, where she adopted a girl and became in a great mom.

Carl felt sorry too. Judith sometimes used to play with Frankie's daughter and some others kids, and Frankie had always watch them. Frankie had take care of Judith on several occasions and he was thankful for that.

She was hugging her daughter and enjoying the fair only a few hours ago, and now, her head was the fourth of ten.

Fifth head.

Tammy Rose.

"Have you seen Tammy?" Earl asked Connie and Kelly, with his son in his arms.

Kelly repeated the question with sign language, so Connie could understand.

The answer was no. The sisters hadn't seen her, Tammy wasn't near.

Tammy was an old lady that lived in Hilltop with his husband Earl. They had lost his son Ken six years ago. But life had give them happiness again with the arrived of a baby that Connie had rescue from The Whisperers.

Tammy was talking with Earl about how they should name their son only a few hours ago, and now, her head was the fifth of ten.

Sixth head.

Rodney

Rodney was a teenager that lived in Hilltop. He was trying to have a normal teenager life.

He was hanging around with his friends only a few hours ago, and now, his head was the sixth of ten.

Seventh head.

Addy.

Addy was other teenager from Hilltop. She had worries about the walkers, but also, she had some teenager worries, like, trying to make the guy you like to like you.

She was talking with Henry only a few hours ago, and now, her head was the seventh of ten.

Eighth head.

Enid.

"It feels so sweet" Alden and Luke were singing on the stage. They had a large audience, but still, Alden noticed that someone was missing. Someone special. Had she forgotten? of course not. she was eager to see her boyfriend sing and be able to make fun of it. If Enid wasn't there, it was because she wasn't in this world either.

Enid was a resident of Alexandria when Carl met her. She was mysterious and mature, things that made Carl to got interested in her, an also, to liked her. Both had a realistic perspective of the world, and they became best friends cause of that.

Now, Enid was a doctor. She had something worth to work for. She was an important member of her community. She was living the happy life that she always had deserved.

When Carl saw her, something cracked inside of him, his heart for sure. He couldn't deal with the fact of seeing his best friend's head on a pike. So, a tear fell down his cheek.

"No" He mumbled. "Not you".

Carl was being Siddiq's support, but at that moment, the roles got changed. Carl's legs shaked like he was about to fall. " It's okay, Carl, it's okay. Stay with me, please" Siddiq said.

"Hey, my favourite cowboy is here"

"I always call you 'cowboy', you have the right to call me 'doctor'"

"I know, but I refer, to see each other like this, like family, not like two strangers. I'm sorry for never had get back to Alexandria, but Maggie needed me here"

"Maybe we can be the same best friends that we were"

"It's true, Carl, everybody knows your story, and I'm so proud of you"

Memories of her didn't leave his mind. Memories of Enid being happy. Memories of his best friend for all life.

He remembered the first time she saw her, on that abandoned house at the entrance of Alexandria. He remembered the times that he followed in the woods and lost her from his sight. He remembered when they used to sneak out the walls and go into the woods to read comics. He remembered all the times that she gave him advices about his relationship. He remembered when they skated in their way to Hilltop. He remembered a lot of things that they could never do again.

He had lost his best friend and he couldn't get her back.

Enid was teaching people how to do CPR only a few hours ago. Enid was eating caramel apples with his boyfriend only a few hours ago. Enid was getting back the lost time with her best friend only a few hours ago, and now, her head was the eighth of ten.

Ninth head.

Tara.

"If you happen to see her, could you tell her I need to speak with her?" Gabriel asked Eugene.

"I haven't seen her in a while, but she must be around" Eugene said. Sadly, he was wrong. Tara wasn't around, not anymore.

When the prison got under attack, Tara was in the Governor's army, she was with the guy who killed Hershel, she was the enemy. But things changed. Glenn needed her help, and, Tara needed to help Glenn, she needed to help him so the guilt she was feeling could disappear. It was when she was ready to die in that tunnel full of walkers, so Glenn could live and continue searching for his wife, that Tara stop being the enemy, and became family.

She was Hilltop's leader since Jesus' death, she was capable to lead, and she was ready to. She was supposed to be a great leader.

Carol, Daryl and Carl looked at her head with melancholy. They had survived with her during a lot time, and now, that girl with an incredible sense of humor that used to brigthen their days didn't exist anymore. She had been reduced to a sad walker.

"If her mother retaliates it's gonna be against Hilltop, not Alexandria"

That thought arrived at Carl's mind. Tara was protecting her people, but she must have protected herself.

Tara was thinking about what was the the best for her people only a few hours ago. Tara was signing the mutual protection pact only a few hours ago. Tara was being the leader that the Hilltop needed only a few hours ago, and now, her head was the ninth of ten.

Tenth head.

"Where could she be? She's not the kind of people that disappear without telling someone where she is going" Rosita told to Eugene.

"Maybe she wanted to be alone. She wasn't happy about Carl going out there. Maybe she wanted to distract herself"

"Eugene, she wouldn't do that. If she didn't tell anyone what she was going to do, it's because she is going out there and look for him. She care so much about him"

"In that case, I hope she is still in here. She can get hurt if she goes alone"

"Come on, we need to find her. Carl is going to kill us if something happens to her" Rosita commanded.

Even though Rosita and Eugene went to look for her as soon as they realized that she was missing, someone else had already found her.

And then, Carl saw the last pike. With his eye wide open, he unconsciously left Siddiq alone. He dropped the Colt Phyton that he had in his hand. He couldn't take his sight apart from the head. He approached to the pike a little more, he was wishing that his sight was playing tricks on him, because in case it wasn't, and the head was of the person he was thinking it was, he couldn't stand that.

He was about to get close enough when Daryl got between his sight and the pike. "No! No!" Daryl shouted, while he was holding Carl of his shoulders. "Don't look at it. Don't look"

Carl's legs shaked again, but this time, he fell on his knees. Daryl got on his knees too, to comfort him. "Kid, please, don't look at her, don't do that".

Carl's cry was making him look so vulnerable and so broken that even Yumiko felt the need of hug him. But nobody dare to do it, except of Daryl, who was already with him.

Daryl was speaking to him, but he wasn't listening. His heart was so broken and he was so submerge on his memories that everything around him didn't seem to be important.

Inside of Carl, it was like his mind wanted to live again all the moments that he had shared with her, like he needed to remember everything he had done with Amunet.

Cause, yeah, the head that was on that pike was hers.

"Hi, my name is Carl, what's yours?"

"I'm Amunet" The little girl answered. They were in the outsides of Atlanta, in a camp.

"Do you wanna play with me and Sophia? She wants to meet you"

"I would like to"

"Great! Follow me" Carl took her hand and guided her to where the other girl was. They played all morning and all afternoon, that when the sun hid, the three kids could barely stay awake.

The memorie of the first time they talked arrived. Carl felt like he was just being stabbed in the heart, so he let out a heartbreaking scream, toring apart his lungs.

"Carl! You woke up" Amunet had been waiting to him to wake up since Hershel operated him. She was happy that his friend was okay.

"Hello, Amunet. How's Sophia?"

"We hadn't find her" She said, sadly. But at least you are okay, I've missed you"

"We'll find her. I promise. I've missed you too. My dad gave my his hat, cool, no?"

"Yeah, now you are a cowboy"

"You can try it on, it must look great on you" Carl put the hat on Amunet's head. Both kids were laughing, but Carl started to cough.

"Carl, are you okay?" The girl asked worried.

"Yes, I shouldn't laugh too much, it hurts"

"You should get some sleep. Hershel said you're still weak"

"Could you stay here? I don't like to be alone"

"Sure"

The boy made a space in the bed, so Amunet could lay on it. "Sweet dreams, Amunet"

"Sweet dreams, Carl"

The sound of Carl's sobs were mixing with the sound of the moans that Amunet's head was doing. It was a brutal and depressive mix.

When a walker Sophia appeared out of the barn, Carl and Amunet started crying. They hugged each other and stayed like that for a while. After Rick put her down, and the adults began to move the bodies, they were the only ones that were near the barn.

"I thought we would find her" Carl said.

"I did it too. I'm gonna miss her" Amunet started to cry again.

"Hey, don't worry, we are you and me now, okay? You and me, together"

"Forever?"

"Forever"

Carl scratched the dirt under his hands, like the only way he had to express his anger. He could felt the Daryl's arms around him, but he didn't feel comforted.

"My mom's dead, Amunet. I killed her"

"You did what you needed to do. You couldn't just leave her, you know what would've happen"

"I'm a killer. The last moments I had with her I acted like an idiot"

"You were a great son, your mom loved you. And you are going to be a great big brother. Big brother Carl, remember that?"

"Can you give me a hug?"

"You don't have to ask for one"

"We should put them down" Daryl said, and his arms left Carl's body.

"Left Enid and Amunet, please, I'll do it" Carl said, standing up. Daryl moved his head in approval.

Carl got in the wagon that Garet told him. It was dark, but he could see that there were more people in there. A familiar silhouette appeared.

"Carl?" A voice that he knew perfectly asked.

"Amunet!" He said with joy. Both kids got together in a lovely hug, with tears in their cheeks.

"I thought you were dead" Amunet said crying. "When we were running out of the prison and you covered me from the walkers cause I didn't have ammo, I lost you, I looked for you but you weren't there"

"I had to get away from other way. Sorry"

"Don't you ever left me like that again"

"I won't"

Carl finally stood up, with his hands still shaking, he took the knife that Amunet had got for him in one of the running supplies that she did in Alexandria.

Carl opened his eye for the first time since he had get shot by Ron. The first thing he saw after had defeat the death again was Amunet, who was sat next to him. Amunet was submerged in her mind, she didn't notice that he was awake.

"Hi" He said.

Amunet made eye contact with him, and she smiled. She was showing him that beautiful smile and seeing him with those precious grey eyes that had him hypnotized.

She didn't said anything. She just stood up, got near to Carl and kissed him on his lips. "Thanks for wake up. I was losing my mind"

"I just lost mine with that kiss" He joked.

"I should've done that a long time ago"

Carl reached Enid's head.

"Why did you come to get me to The Hilltop?" Enid asked.

"I was worried about you. You didn't take any knife with you"

"I can take care of myself"

"I know, but..."

"But what?"

"You are my best friend. I needed to know you were going to be fine"

Enid hugged Carl and talked to his ear. "And you are my best friend, too. Thank you for made me company"

He raised the knife and buried it in the skull.

"I'm so sorry, Enid. Go to rest, it's time"

The head stopped moaning and Carl felt a little relieved. His best friend was resting now, in a place without suffer, that was what she deserved.

What Carl did next wasn't easy. He was in front of Amunet's head. It was the only left to put down. Everyone was waiting for Cark to do it.

Carl raised his hand, but this was shaking a lot that he dropped the knife.

"Carl, I could do it" Daryl said.

"I have to do this, please" Carl took again the knife. He looked at the walker's eyes. They were grey, but not the beautiful grey that Amunet's eyes used to be. And that was because that walker wasn't Amunet anymore, Amunet wasn't a sad head, Amunet was a shimmering start that guided Carl's life during so many years, and that wasn't going to change. A last memory appeared before Carl had put down the walker.

Amunet and Carl hugged after Carl almost got killed by Lucille. "I love you, Carl, I love you so much"

"I love you too, Amunet. I love you too" That was the first time they said 'I love you' to each other.

"I will always love you, Amunet" Carl said before he buried the knife, making the moans stopped. Amunet was now a free soul. Amunet loved Carl until the ended of her life. Amunet died thinking about Carl. And Amunet would always be with Carl.

Amunet and Carl were kindred spirits.

#carl grimes #carl grimes imagine #carl grimes imagines #carl grimes one shot #carl x reader #twd #twd imagine #carl grimes deserved better #twd oneshot #the calm before #the walking dead #carl grimes smut

[theghostofashton]

tdiu is up!

here’s ur link!!

#the italics got fucked up in the second half #but it is almost 1am and i cannot be bothered to fix it #i'll deal w it tomorrow #tdiu things