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totalswag · 1 month

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unfold — RAFE CAMERON

authors note sorry for not posting as much with fics, life got a little to serious for a moment. huge thank you for 600+ followers you guys are absolutely amazing ugh. this idea came in mind randomly one day and rafe little unfolding with his enemy is...

summary you have been rafe camerons shit list for a long time now. what happens when you attend a party at tannyhill and somehow make Rafe cameron fold

warnings mentions of smoking, drinking, cussing, partying

Rafe Cameron, kook king, as people would say.

He’s one of the most popular people in outer banks. Just hearing his name sends shivers down people's spines. He has girls practically on their knees for him left and right. There’s something about him that captivates them.

But, you don't want to mess with him either. You don’t want to be on his bad side. When he walks into a room, everyone stops and looks at him with fear or wondering what he's gonna do. He loves the fact that he has that effect on others. It helps boost his ego.

Rafe Cameron, on the other hand, has had you on his shitlist for a long time. You enjoy antagonizing and teasing him. You enjoy seeing him furious when you do things that irritate him. People warn you, but you dismiss them since he never does anything about it. He’s never and will never do anything in ways to hurt you physically.

Rafe’s throwing a party at his house tonight. Of course he didn’t invite you. He knows you’ll show up regardless because that's how you are. Word spreads quickly on the island.

"Y/N, I didn't expect to see you here?" stated one of your close friends, Hailey, smiles as she hugged you.

You initially stated that you would not attend a party because you were not in the mood to do anything this weekend other than sit at home and watch movies. However, once you found that Rafe was throwing a party and happened to live down the road from you, you had no choice but to come and make your presence known.

“Oh well you know me, gotta make my presence known” you chuckle, taking a sip of your drink, scanning the room.

“If you wanna find Rafe, I’m pretty sure he’s somewhere in the living room or doing coke out back with the guys” Hailey whispers in your ear, winking.

Hailey is very well aware that you enjoy annoying the crap out of the Cameron boy. She claims it's for her own entertainment. She's waiting for you two to crack because she knows you are into each other but won't confess it.

"Let's go on the dance floor?" You insist as you take her hand in yours and walk her past the crowd to the living room.

The two of you start dancing to the beat of the music. A few people you recognize from school come up, catching you off by surprise. You girls end up dancing with each other for half of the night alongside the crowd.

“I’m gonna head to the bathroom real quick” you whisper in her ear.

“Okay, be safe” she replies back, squeezing your hand before you start walking away.

You bump into a muscular body on your way to the bathroom, and you look up to Rafe, who is already glaring down at you with a stern expression, as if he's about to argue about the fact that you're at his party. You can sense the tension in his body building. You like it.

A smile forms on your lips, and your pointer finger grips and plays with his chain, "looks like someone isn't happy to see me, huh?" You sarcastically remark, waiting for him to snatch your hand away from his chain.

"My night was going great before I bumped into you, Y/N," he replies with a harsh tone with a slight hint sarcastic, rolling his eyes.

"Aw, are you not excited to see me?" you cynically pout.

Rafe is trying so hard to go off like he usually does with you. You know how to get under his skin unlike anyone else. He hates that you have that effect on him that just snaps.

"You really don't want to start it with me right now, Y/N," he says harshly and sternly. Looking in his eyes, you can see he's had coke and drank.

"Oh, but I really want to start, Rafe," you remark as you move closer, chests meeting.

You couldn’t help but feel the sexual tension growing between the both of you. This is the first time you are feeling it. You’ve always wondered why he never did anything about your behavior towards him. Actually, no one doesn’t know why, only Rafe does.

Hailey stood a few feet away, watching the whole thing unfold. She had to remove herself from the large crowd of people around her to watch her best friend.

Before Rafe can respond, Kelce walks up to tell Rafe to go in the backyard because there’s something he needs to show him.

"Oh, hey Y/N, it's good to see you and looking beautiful as always" Kelce smiles giving you a warm hug.

"It's to see you too Kelce and thank you" you reply while pulling away from the hug.

“Nice seeing you Rafe” you wave innocently, smiling, then flipping him off with a straight face.

You both know you’ll run into each other again tonight.

When you make your way back to Hailey, she’s laughing over the interaction she watched. You tell her to shut it before she says anything else. You drag her down the hall into the bathroom to pee and talk about what happened.

“I love seeing you do that to him” Hailey laughs, taking a sip of her drink, jumping on the bathroom sink.

In answer, you grin, lifting your finger and moving it back and forth, "The way he was ready to go off on me but cut off when Kelce told him to go in the backyard made me wanna laugh in his face."

After the bathroom, you both headed into the kitchen to get another drink from the coolers. The kitchen was occupied with people getting drinks or simply standing and talking.

Hailey began talking to this guy she'd been eyeing for a while.

You lean in to whisper in her ear, "I'm gonna let you be, call or text me if you need anything," and she smiles back, reassuring you she’ll be okay.

You scan the room, unsure of what or who you're looking for. Something inside you tells you to go find Rafe and annoy the living shit out of him. Topper and Kelce noticed you examining the room from afar and approached you.

The two wave as they approach you, you wave back smiling.

“Hello boys” you smile, “enjoying the party?” you ask, taking a sip of your drink.

The last time you saw Kelce he was drunk but not drunk enough. Now here he is half an hour later crossed.

“Fuck yeah, we are crossed” Kelce chuckles, throwing his head back.

Topper agrees with a nod.

“Oh, I can tell,” you reply.

Topper turns around when he sees Rafe making his way over. The two boys take a step back, revealing you. Rafe stops his tracks, rolling his eyes, tongue runs over his bottom lip, annoyed.

Perfect timing to annoy him.

The two boys let out a chuckle, shaking their heads from the look on Rafe’s furious look.

Something leads you to take Rafe's hand and lead him to the large crowd. You follow your gut and approach him gently. You gaze up to him, who is already staring at you with such intensity that it sends shivers down your spine. You grab his hand in yours and bring him towards the large crowd in the living room.

Topper and Kelce’s jaws dropped when they watched Rafe follow you into the crowd. For one, Rafe never does that with you, ever. They give each other the look of you just saw that too look.

"Please tell me Rafe just let her do that?" Topper blurts with confusion spread all over his face.

Kelce rubbed his eye to make sure he was seeing the same thing as Topper.

When you come to stop, turn around and face him. You can tell he's irritated that you dragged him to the center of the dance floor. But you're wondering why he let you do it.

"Why did you lead me here, Y/N?" Rafe questions.

"I wanna dance, Rafe, and you are gonna dance with me," you chuckle, grabbing both Rafe's hands and resting them on your waist while maintaining eye contact with him.

He shrugs his shoulders, turns your body around, making you gasp, catching you off guard. Now your back is against his front.

You tilt your head back, swaying your hips to the rhythm of the music while his hands rest themselves on your waist.

As you continue to dance to the music, Rafe leans down to your ear, “you are playing a dangerous game with me, Y/N” the thrill in your blood went through the roof by his comment.

With a smirk, you close your eyes and place your left hand on the back of his neck, drawing his head down so you could whisper in his ear. The sound of his steady breathing may be felt against your skin.

"What kind of game are you implying?" you asked, touching the ends of his hair behind his head.

"C'mon, you can't tell me you haven't been enjoying this, Y/N? You know what I mean," he says, knowing what he means as he’s directing both hands from your waist to the center of your stomach and back to your waist, attempting to catch you off guard, but you refuse to let it happen.

You know that he knows you love annoying the shit out of him but he can tell by the way your body reacts to his touch that has him a little intrigued.

In reaction, you back yourself into his front, drawing a sigh from his lips before spinning around, stepping on your tiptoes and putting your arms around his neck.

You feel something hard pressing against your stomach. In that moment you knew where the night was gonna take you both.

You two make eye contact.

You notice his eyes looking at your lips then your eyes, going back and forth.

“If you’re gonna look at my lips you should just kiss them” you remark with sass which didn’t make him quite happy but you didn’t care.

He leans closer, and your faces get inches closer and closer. At this time, both of your breaths are increasing, but no one is moving. You lean forward and extend the tip of your tongue, allowing it to touch Rafe's upper lip.

Rafe's demeanor shifted, which concerned you a little because you'd seen how aggressive he can be but he'd never hurt you. He grabs your wrist and brings you through the enormous home and upstairs to his bedroom, which is down a hallway and out of hearing.

As you passed past people, they were taken aback to find you holding hands with Rafe Cameron as you walked the stairs. You can imagine the amount of discussion and publishing on social media.

"You never know when to shut up and take a hint, little one," he says with his back to you, locking his bedroom door before turning around backing you up against the edge of his bed.

"I actually do know when to shut up, mister," you respond, still standing firm.

Rafe catches you off guard by pushing you onto his bed, opening your legs so he can stand between them, and smoothly moving his hands up and down your thighs.

"Oh, do you, Princess? Let's see how that goes while you're screaming my name beneath me.”

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holylulusworld · 2 months

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Valentine reloaded

Summary: Your fiancé breaks your heart on Valentine’s Day out of all days.

Pairing: Mafia!Bucky Barnes x fem!Reader, former!(any male character) x fem!Reader

Warnings: angst, break-up, mentions/implied cheating, fluff, Bucky being the best, flirting

A different kind of Valentine

Bucky pulled the chair for you and whispered soothing words in your ear. He tried to help you forget about what happened earlier that day. “That’s my favorite restaurant, doll. I hope you like it.”

“Oh, I wanted to try it out for so long. But—” You sighed deeply and shook your head. “I like it already. The ambiance is nice, and I like the cute aprons the waitresses are wearing.”

“You have a good eye for details,” Bucky smirked at your flustered state. “Relax, doll. I won’t bite or eat you alive.”

“Maybe I’m into biting,” you retorted and mirrored his smirk. “You never know about people’s kinks until you end up in bed with them.”

Bucky laughed at your attitude. “I like you already.” He said and sat down to have a look at the menu. “What do you like?”

“I like it spicy, wild but with lots of kissing and gentle touches,” you grinned at Bucky. “OH! You meant the food.”

“You are something else,” Bucky snickered and dropped his eyes to the menu. He’d love to hear more about your preferences in the bedroom but decided against it. You were still hurting and tried to hide the pain another man caused with your cockiness. “I’d love to know everything about you.”

“I think you’d get bored, just like him if you knew everything about me,” you whispered. The light in your eyes and the smirk gone you tried to keep yourself together. “Sorry, I didn’t want to ruin your mood.”

“Doll, you are hurting,” Bucky grabbed your hand and squeezed it. “The man you loved broke your heart and left you for some other girl. You can be sad about it.”

“I don’t want to be sad,” suddenly aware that you are at a fancy restaurant, with a very attractive and nice man you shook your head. “He doesn’t deserve a single tear. Whatever we had, he ruined it and I’m not going to let him win. Let’s eat.”

“Let’s eat, Y/N,” Bucky nodded and squeezed your hand before turning his attention back toward the menu. “I’ll go for meat tonight.”

“I knew you were into some meat,” you winked at Bucky and smirked again. “I’ll go for pasta.”

Bucky nodded and called for the waiter. You ordered your food and released one last sigh. This night should’ve been special for you and your now ex-fiancé. All you wanted was to make him happy. And now you realize, it should’ve been him trying to make you happy for once.

“What do you want for dessert?” Bucky asked, watching you with concern. You were lost in thoughts, and he tried to bring you out of your intrusive thoughts.

“Can you recommend anything?” You asked and looked at Bucky, taking your time to drink his features in. Just now you recognized his eyes, bluer than the ocean you longed to see again for the longest time.

“Doll, you can order whatever your heart desires. My treat,” he softly said. “What do you like? I like the awfully sweet stuff.”

“Sweet,” you giggled. “Really? I thought you were more into the manly kind of dessert.”

“I’m man enough to admit that I like sweet desserts and to caress a woman. All these testosterone-driven wanna-be men are fake. A real man can admit his feelings and make sweet love to a woman.”

“You are laying on thick, huh?” You smiled at Bucky. “I like a man who can manhandle me but make sweet love afterward. The perfect combination of roughness and softness.”

“Y/N, you are making it hard for me to be a gentleman,” Bucky cleared his throat and tried to ignore the desire growing in his pants. He’d love to get to know you better before devouring you.

“Well, you started this, Sir,” you pointed your finger at Bucky. “You cannot talk about your qualities and expect me to not fall for you.”

He chuckled at your words. “I’m warning you, Y/N. If you want me to, I’ll make you fall for me so hard you’ll not even recognize that I put a ring on your finger before you are walking down the aisle.”

“A shotgun wedding then?” You challenge. “I bet you look even better in a smoking. Let me just get a nice dress and we can drive into the sunset.”

“What will you do if I kidnap you and make you my wife?”

You shrugged. “What’s the worst thing that could happen to me? If you wanted to hurt me, you had more than one chance to do so.”

“You are tempting me, doll,” he laughed and tried to play it cool. Bucky was mesmerized by you the moment you slapped him with your clutch. No one ever dared to lay hands on James Buchanan Barnes. Everyone fears the ruthless mobster. “I can still kidnap you after dinner.”

“Good plan, Sir,” you winked at Bucky, feeling a weight get lifted off of your chest. Somehow being around this stranger, you just met helped you forget about your ex-fiancé and his betrayal. “I’m starving and can’t marry a man on an empty stomach.”

“A very good plan, Y/N,” he smiled at you. “Let’s make this dinner worth your time, sweetness.”

Dinner was pleasant. You ate, drank, and chatted with Bucky. Honestly, you didn’t have so much fun for the longest time.

You soon find out that Bucky is easy to talk to. He never judged you or made a face when you ordered the most expensive and delicious dessert you ever ate.

He simply enjoyed your presence and the fact that he made you smile more than once.

When it was time to pay, he refused to let you pay a single buck. It was his pleasure to invite you.

Bucky helped you into your jacket and held the door open for you. You walked next to him, feeling hope bloom in your chest when he suddenly grabbed your hand to hold it.

“That okay?” He murmured. “If not, just say it. I don’t want to overstep.”

“I overstepped by slapping you, Bucky,” you stopped in your tracks to look at him. “You didn’t deserve the slap, or to get yelled at. I’m sorry.”

“Doll, I’ll give you reason in the future to yell at me. Believe me, I’m no saint,” he grinned and wrapped you in a hug. “But I make up for it in the bedroom.”

“Bucky,” you slapped his chest and giggled. “Can we…do this again?” You asked. “I pay next time. I mean…can we go out together or have coffee?”

“We sure will, Y/N,” Bucky said and slung one arm around your shoulder. “Or we could just get married tonight.”

“You’re not funny,” you teased but leaned your head against his shoulder. “Thank you for tonight. You don’t even know me but tried to cheer me up.”

“All for a pretty and sweet dame like you,” he simply said and walked you toward his car. “I’ll drive you home, and make sure you sleep well. I won’t leave you alone tonight.”

Bucky kept his promise and settled on your couch. He knows how hard it is to get your heart broken by the person who should love you the most.

Even though he just met you, Bucky felt responsible for you. That his heart was beating a little too fast close to you didn’t help.

“Fuck,” you sniffled while walking back out of the bedroom, rubbing your tired eyes. “Sorry, I didn’t want to wake you.”

“Hey,” Bucky got up from the couch to wrap you in his arms when you started to cry again. “We agreed on not crying over that bastard. Didn’t we?”

You nodded against him. “Yeah.”

“What do you need me to do?”

“Can you hold me for a while?” You hid your face in his chest. “Please.”

“Of course, doll.” He softly replied. Bucky wanted to tell you that he would hold you for all your life if you allowed him to do so. “Let’s get you to bed. I won’t leave your side.”

Best Valentine ever

Tags in reblog.

#bucky barnes #bucky barnes x reader #mobster!bucky barnes #mafia au #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x female reader #bucky barnes x y/n #Valentine reloaded

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whumpy-bi · 7 months

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Rescuers/medics bringing in a more “emotionally aware” member of their crew to talk to a recently rescued Whumpee, who has spent the past few days lashing out and refusing any treatment.

They’re crouched behind their bed when Caretaker walks in, wide eyes watching them intently. They know Caretaker can see them—the bed is giving them a sense of security, Caretaker figures, a barrier between them and anyone else.

Caretaker keeps their voice soft, but loud enough that Whumpee can hear them. “Hey,” they start.

“You’re Whumpee, right?” They only nod to themself, knowing the answer. “I’m Caretaker…” They notice the apprehension in Whumpee’s stare.

“I’m not a medic, don’t worry. I just want to talk to you, would that be okay?”

Whumpee finally nods. Good, an acknowledgment.

Caretaker slowly lowers themselves to their knees, stopping at eye level with Whumpee. Notably, they hadn’t attempted to come any closer, nor attempted to move Whumpee from behind the bed.

“I heard you were a little upset this morning. Is that true?”

Finally, a verbal response.

“Yeah.”

“I heard you got pretty angry, with the medic. That true, too?”

“…Am I in trouble?”

Caretaker shakes their head, resting their hands on their knees. “No, not at all. I just want to understand what happened. Do you know why you were angry?”

“…No. I just didn’t want them near me.”

They hummed in thought. “Well…I’ve also heard you haven’t been able to sleep since we brought you here.”

Whumpee was silent, but frowned.

“I know I always feel pretty crappy when I can’t sleep. I get angrier than I mean to. Do you think maybe that’s why?”

“…Maybe.”

“Well, that’s alright. I can help you figure out how to get some sleep, we can talk about that too. But do you remember specifically why you lashed out at the medic today? What did—“

“He grabbed me. I don’t want people to grab me. He wouldn’t stop grabbing me.”

Caretaker nodded again, shifting their jaw as they listened. “That makes sense. I probably wouldn’t like that, either. What if he asked to touch you, before he did?”

Whumpee was silent again, but they quirked their head to the side. Considering.

“I’m sure we can all do that, asking to do things. We can tell you what we’re doing, before we do it. So you know how we’re helping you. Would that help? I think that’d be a lot less frustrating.”

Whumpee mumbled, now. They’d come closer to the other side of the bed.

“Maybe, yeah.”

Caretaker smiled warmly. “That’s good, I can tell them that. Now…I wanna help you get some sleep. I think that’ll help you feel a lot better, too.”

They watch Whumpee quietly as they climb back onto the bed, careful not to move too quickly themselves.

“Is it hard to sleep in here?”

No answer again. Caretaker glances over to the window.

“It’s pretty bright outside, isn’t it? Even with the parking lot lights at night. I can get some heavier curtains, if you’d—“

“It’s hot.” Whumpee’s voice is barely there, a hushed mumble.

Caretaker’s eyebrows raise, their expression a relieved smile. This was good.

“Yeah? I can’t sleep if it’s too warm, either. Here, I can…” They very slowly rise to stand, keeping eye contact with Whumpee as they do so. “I can lower the temperature, that’ll help a lot. I’ll just make it a little cooler in here…I can make sure you have water at night, too. Nice cold water.”

Whumpee watches them closely as they adjust the temperature, less apprehensive than before.

Caretaker suppresses a chuckle at Whumpee’s expression. “You look pretty tired, Whumpee. You wanna try sleeping again?”

“…Maybe.”

They let Caretaker help adjust them into a sleeping position, leaving the blanket by their ankles for now. As Caretaker goes for the light switch, Whumpee calls out one more time.

“Will you come back?”

“Sure I will, Whumpee. I’ll check on you a lot, you can ask for me whenever you want. Why?”

“I…liked talking to you.”

“I liked talking to you, too, Whumpee.”

Whumpee’s prolonged nap that day was the best sleep they’d had in months.

#whump #whumpee #whump writing #writing #caretaker #rescue #whump aftermath #medical whump #feral whumpee #gentle caretaker

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flowercitti · 8 months

Note

Hi, I read your one Astarion story "wanted to kiss your skin and your everything." First I would like to say it was so good it kinda made me wanna cry it was so sweet it's definitely one of my favorites I've read. :) But I saw at the bottom you said about a request so I was wondering if you would be willing to write a fic about Astarion and Asexual Tav/Reader. I honestly don't have any other specifics, but I haven't seen a lot of Ace content with BG3 which I understand but I would really love to see more. Please don't feel pressured or anything, thank you in the least. Have a great day or night :)

Wahh thank u sm I’m so glad you enjoyed that fic! 🤍☺️ and thank you sm for sending a request, I really love this idea! 🫶 here’s a little Drabble 🫶.

Fluff/Gender Neutral Reader/Ace Reader

🌸

You can’t say you’re surprised when Astarion propositions you. He’s open and flirtatious and he seems to now exactly what he’s doing, as well as being so wholly aware of the affect he has on people. He may not be able to see himself, but he’s learned well enough from the reactions his pretty face garners.

You agree with that assessment, he is rather beautiful, but when it comes to sex—

“What?” Astarion seems nearly speechless, his silver tongue gone heavy in his mouth as he blinks, coming damn close to outright stuttering, “I—I mean, surely you—I’ve seen how you look at me!” He huffs, looking frustrated and confused and completely thrown off.

It’s almost endearing, to see him grow so flustered, his suave persona melting through his shock. You can’t help but smile, “I’m just not really interested in sex. That’s all.” You shrug, and Astarion looks at you as if that tadpole in your head has finally started to transform you.

“You’re still very pretty and utterly charming, don’t worry.” You inform him, and Astarion chuckles, if only out of disbelief.

“Good to know I haven’t lost my touch.” He sniffs delicately, looking away from you, his full lips pursed in a slight pout.

You watch him shift from foot to foot nervously, ruby eyes regarding you warily, brows pinched as he seems to wager whether you’re lying to him or not.

“You don’t want me, then?” He says carefully, a faux sort of lightness infused in his tone. You see through it immediately. His eyes always give him away, glittering in the moonlight and fanned by dark lashes.

“I didn’t say that.” You manage a step closer, chewing on the inside of your lip, “It’s just the sex I don’t want. Everything else—I’m interested.”

“What else could you possibly want from me, then?” He seems to blurt, his mouth twisting out of confusion rather than anger, his gaze flickering away anxiously.

Something in your chest pangs, a painful churn behind your ribs. He looks like he believes it, like he thinks you’re teasing him or leading him on. You frown softly, holding your hand out between the two of you, leaving it open for him to take should he choose.

“I could show you, if you’d like.”

He stares at your hand like it’s a live trap, like it’s fit to spring its spikes into him the moment he reaches out. There’s a strange flicker of emotion that shifts across his face—relief, consideration, fear. His mouth parts, a quiet breath pressing past his lips as he considers you, seeming not to notice the long seconds that pass by. But he keeps his eyes steadily on you as he slowly slips his fingers over yours. His skin is unnaturally cool, perfectly smooth and untouched by calluses. You can nearly see him shudder from the simple contact, his face twitching in surprise, crimson eyes like pools of shining blood.

“I don’t see the point of this, surely there’s more I could do for you—”

You shush him, delighting in the scandalized look he rewards you with, “No. I like this more.” And you think he does to, more than he lets on, more than the sex he had been tempting you with.

His eyes are strangely glassy even as he huffs, looking down at your joined hands.

“You have better not be playing me.” He mutters, but he sounds nearly breathless as you thumb gently over his wrist. Your other hand comes up to hold his between both of yours, as if you could press heat into his lifeless flesh.

“You’ll just have to wait and see, then.” You say playfully, but your fingers are delicate as they trace the bones of his knuckles, finding the lines of his veins. You’re closer now than you were before, Astarion’s eyes just slightly widened as they regard you. His fingers shift in your hold, his thumb pressing experimentally into your palm.

He looks as if he’s never done this before, surprise and awe dancing over his face despite how hard he attempts to hide it.

“I suppose that I will.” He rasps, his head tilting to the side in wonder, and you meet him with small smile.

🌸

Astarion-flavored Requests are still open 🫶🤍 thank u sm for reading.

#astarion #baldur's gate iii #baldur's gate 3 #unsure where exactly this fits in his romance line but. use ur imagination.#x reader #astarion x you #astarion x reader #bg3 #bg3 astarion #gender neutral reader #ask me #my fanfiction

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azriels-shadowsinger · 2 months

Note

helloooo!!! i wanted to request #15 from the prompt list with Az? have a great day<33

“I’m sorry. I don’t feel the same way.” “Look me in the eyes and tell me that.”

Azriel x Reader

wc: 900

a/n: thank yall for 300 followers!!

prompt list

You pushed your dinner around on your plate with a fork, unable to ignore the nausea in your stomach that lingered whenever Azriel was gone on a mission. He was supposed to return this morning, and the more time that passed, the larger the pit in your stomach felt. What if he was hurt? Why is he still shielding his thoughts from Rhys? You can’t control the spiral of thoughts.

Just as you are about to stand to throw the food away, you hear a commotion in the other room. Abandoning your plate, you rush towards the living room. When you enter, you see Azriel standing there, reassuring Cassian and Rhys that he is fine. You immediately run, enveloping him in a bear hug. His shadows immediately circle around you and Azriel chuckles, wrapping his arms around you as well. You hear Cass and Rhys quietly leave the room and Azriel assures them that he will fill them in on the mission later.

“You aren’t allowed to leave for that long anymore.” You mumble into his chest. “I was worried something happened.”

“I’m fine, y/n/n. I got held up, but it wasn’t anything I couldn’t handle.” He reassures. “You worry too much.”

“How can I not? My best friend who I love dearly is gone for days at a time with no contact and-“ he cuts you off.

“You what?” He pulls away and stares at you.

“What?” You look at him confused, clearly unaware of what exactly you said, too focused on fussing over him.

“You said you love me.”

Well shit, you think. You have had a crush on Azriel for many years, the two of you constantly flirting and acting in ways beyond what most would consider appropriate for friends. However, it was only recently that you realized that you love him. And you were almost certain he loved you too, but you were always too scared to find out.

“Yeah. I do.” You say hesitantly, biting your bottom lip. Azriel pauses for a long moment before looking at the floor.

“I’m sorry. I…” he hesitates. “I don’t feel the same way.” Your heart sinks.

You knew what he was doing. Azriel’s insecurities run deeper than most people realize. But as his best friend, you were very aware of his habit of self-sabotaging when it came to dating, convinced that he was not good enough for them or that he would only cause them pain. In the past, you hadn’t tried too hard to stop him. Rather, you would selfishly relish in the fact that his time wasn’t being taken up by some other female anymore.

“Then look me in the eyes and tell me that.” You see his hand clench into a fist, and then flex. He was obviously fighting with his inner demons in his head, and if it went on for too long, the demons would win. Not this time, you thought. Not as you felt him slipping through your fingers. You place a gentle hand on his cheek and guide him to look at you.

“Y/n, I don’t-“ his shadows swarmed over his mouth, refusing to let the words leave. You smirked.

“See, even your shadows know you’re full of shit. Wanna try that again?” You said playfully, trying to lighten the mood. He reins the shadows in and takes a deep breath.

“Of course I love you.” You feel the tension ease from your shoulders. “But you deserve more. You deserve someone who doesn’t have a complicated past, who isn’t always leaving on missions, who doesn’t do such horrible things for their job.” His voice shakes slightly.

“I love you because of those things, not in spite of them. Yes, you have a complicated past, but it only proves your strength in overcoming it. Yes, you’re always gone on missions, but it’s because you are fiercely loyal to keeping your court safe. And yes, you may do some gruesome work on those missions, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s still work that helps the Night Court and keeps us safe.” You can see his eyes light up slightly as you explain the reasons you love him.

“You may think I deserve better, but that isn’t your decision. And I’ve decided that I only want you.” You state matter-of-factly, stepping closer and wrapping your arms around him again. “There’s nothing you can say to stop that. I’ve been your friend for centuries and those things have never bothered me before, why would they now?” He smiles at your words and returns your hug.

“I love your stubbornness.” He mumbles before pulling you into a kiss.

“Keep that in mind down the road when you start to hate it, okay?” You reply with a cheeky grin, pulling a laugh from Azriel.

this one was kinda tough bc personally i don't think azriel would ever be able to lie about loving someone, the poor guy craves to have someone to love who loves him too. But i also didnt wanna have reader the line, because anyone who knows azriel would never push him away like that if it wasn’t true because they know how badly he wants love. so idk how i feel about this one, lmk what yall think.

prompt list

tag list: @fxckmiup

#acotar #acotar fic #acotar fanfic #azriel #azriel acotar #azriel x reader #acotar x reader #my writing #a court of thorns and roses

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luvryeo · 9 months

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don't tease — jung wooyoung

0.1K MILESTONE EVENT ⟢ CLOSED fem!reader , afab!reader , smut but kinda not full on smut (still explicit sexual content tho , cw : pet names (baby, pretty girl) , wc: 0.9K , uhm here you go babe ! @jaehunnyy good luck ily <3 MINORS & AGELESS BLOGS DNI

parties aren’t necessarily your thing, but oftentimes, you still love what they bring; attention. and not just any attention, but attention from your boyfriend. it’s not that he neglects you by any stretch at other times, it’s just that the neon lights and fancy clothes are a guarantee that he wants you.

he’s never subtle about it either, his hands are always on you, slipping just far enough in certain places to make you flustered. he presses kisses to your neck and the soft spot behind your ear and makes his friends cringe at all the physical contact. but he doesn’t care; he loves it so much, and he knows that you do too.

and tonight he just looks so goddamn fine in that black tank top and the big chain necklace that sits right at the base of his neck, that you can’t hold back yourself. off in a corner with minimal eyes to pry, you press a quick kiss to his collarbone because he’s just far too irresistible.

“baby?” he sounds a touch surprised, which is warranted considering your usually shyer nature. there’s teasing in his voice as well, because he’s been very aware of the way you’ve been staring at him since the moment he picked you up in his car. and of course, when you look at his face with a lightly bashful gaze, there’s a cocky smirk planted on his lips.

“yeah?” you question innocently, as if you’re expecting him to have a real question for you. he huffs out a small laugh.

“just couldn’t help it, could you?” he asks, far too happy about this all. “is my baby being bold tonight?”

you fight the smile making its way onto your face. shaking your head and staring at his nice shoes, you’re suddenly shy again.

“oh, don’t go all shy on me now, baby. that’s not fair now, is it?” with gentle fingers, he lifts your chin up so you’re looking him in the eye. you’re not even sure what to say to that, tempted to let out a tiny whimper at the way he tilted your head up to show him just how much that action turned you on.

his hand shifts to the back of your neck as he pulls you closer by the waist and molds his lips over yours. he almost kisses you like you’re alone, but he pulls away far sooner than he would if you really weren’t surrounded by other people.

then both hands are on your hips, tugging you impossibly closer so that you’re flush against his body and you can feel his cock starting to harden. a small moan escapes your throat at the feeling, but the sound is swallowed up by the noise of your surroundings. your face feels even more flushed with heat than before, if that were even possible, and you’re still struggling to look him in the eyes, so you let your gaze continue to roam his exposed shoulders and collarbone.

“i’d do anything to have you alone right now,” he rumbles into your ear. “but i promised to stay all night.”

again, your flip switches, a touch of boldness and a wave of want overcoming your senses just long enough for you to say it. “if we were alone right now,” you begin, looking at him with pleading eyes, “what would you do to me?”

“fuck, baby, you’re gonna be the death of me,” he groans. “you really wanna know, sweet girl?”

“yes please,” you beg, your voice barely audible even to him.

“well,” he starts, dragging out the word unnecessarily long to tease you. his thumbs maneuver their way under the fabric of your shirt and drag against your bare skin in a way that makes you shiver. “i’m willing to bet that you’re already wet, am i right, baby? god, i wish i could check right now.” you just nod at his question, desperate for him to keep going. “so, if we were alone right now,” his eyes are alight with teasing and lust, “i’d pull down these stupid shorts of yours and rip off those cute white panties that i know you’re wearing right now and i’d suck on your clit and shove my fingers up your cunt until you're begging me to stop.”

“wooyoung,” you whine out, trying to keep yourself from grinding against him and feeling as though you’re already out of breath.

“yeah, baby? do you like hearing me talk like this?” he brushes his lips over the shell of your ear. “are you my dirty little girl, desperate to hear how i’m gonna fuck you tonight?”

“don’t tease,” you complain.

“i just can’t help it, baby. you’re too easy to tease.” he presses a kiss to your nose that almost makes you forget what you really want. you give him a sly smile and he quirks his eyebrow.

“aren’t you gonna keep going?” you giggle just a little bit. “or are you too shy?” he can’t even hold back the grin on his face as he shifts one of his hands to land right on your ass, making you gasp.

“i think that’s you, pretty girl,” he smirks. “but, if you insist.. then i’ll make you watch me while i fuck you dumb with my cock because i want to see your pretty face when i make you cum. does that sound good to you, baby?”

#will be writing a part two hehehehe #cromernet #wooyoung #ateez wooyoung #ateez smut #wooyoung smut #jung wooyoung #ateez scenarios #ateez x reader #ateez wooyoung smut #ateez wooyoung x reader #ateez x fem reader #ateez #ateez fic #ateez imagines #ateez drabbles #wooyoung drabble #kpop smut

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paper-starz · 9 months

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WELCOME HOME THEORY 2: The Theory Strikes Back

Good evening, gentlemen, gentleladies, and gentlethems,

Or Good night

Or even good morning,

Whenever you are, I humbly come to you all with another theory.

This time, its our favorite morally questionable sentient house, Home!

So strap in, buckle up, cause I have STUFF TO SAY.

THIS WILL BE VERY LONG AND IT WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS FOR THE UPDATE!!

Alright, so to begin, what the HECK is going on with Home?

They are one of the most mysterious characters in Welcome Home, we don't know much if not anything at all. And what we do know... wellllll......

Yeah definitely not menacing at all.....

The only thing that we do know of Home is well… ^ This and the fact that it and Wally are sentient.

Ok, let’s backtrack. HOMES SENTIENT???

Yep! While it was implied in the first update that it was aware of us, this handy-dandy audio clip confirms that Home (like Wally) is aware of “You” (Whoever this “You” person may be. Either literally us or the Question Answerer).

Now, what exactly Home is saying is still up for debate. Some say that it’s “Help Me” while others say it’s “Hello”. (It’s incredibly hard to know what’s exactly dots and dashes with Homes banging) but one thing is for sure, Home is communicating with us.

“AHHHH HOW SCARY! THE CREEPY DEMON HOUSE IS GONNA KILL US” D:

And that’s where you’re wrong, dear viewer. While Home is clearly morally dubious and incredibly suspicious, like Wally, I don’t think it’s necessarily evil.

Take for instance this link right here. It’s an honestly cute lil audio of Wally singing to Home. But while that is adorable, it’s the ending that I really wanna focus on.

Wally: …Do you like it? Home: *Creaks* (it’s Morse code again! Spells out IDO) Wally: Thats good… I think…

Ok why did I bring this old little clip up? Oh ya know… no reason… OTHER THAN THE FACT THAT WALLY CAN’T UNDERSTAND HOME ANYMORE!!!

Ok, I know whatcha thinkin’ “Why not anymore?”

Take a listen at another audio clip, this time it’s a secret one!!

The clip is about Barnaby and Home having a conversation with one another! But if you listen real closely… Home is not speaking in Morse code! It’s their own lil Home language, still consisting of creaks and bangs… yet Barnaby doesn’t seem to have any trouble understanding Home.

So how come Wally can’t understand Home and yet Barnaby can?

It’s because Wally’s sentient now. He’s getting more real. More human. Cartoon logic does not apply to Wally anymore! To us, Home is speaking in gibberish! Since it’s gibberish to us, then it’s gibberish to Wally!

And Home knows that, so it does the next best thing and tries using another language to hopefully communicate better. Now that I’m listening to the first audio clip again (so-below), it makes sense why Home is “speaking” slowly. It’s not used to communicating that way. It’s hard to tell their dots from their dashes, their bangs from their creaks, and it’s pauses are sometimes too long and too short at the same time! In a weird way, Home kinda has an accent when speaking in Morse code.

It’s kinda sweet just how hard Home is trying to communicate with Wally and us. Makes ya forget that Home has a weird portal and a flesh heart inside of them.

“WAIT WHAT?!?” (<- That’s you)

Yeah, remember when I said the more sentient something gets the more “real” they get?

Yeah, it’s also been happening with Home too. Go on any doodle audio file, and you can hear assumably Home’s heart beating away. You can hear it very clearly in this audio right here! I doubt the Playfellow Workshop made Home with a literal BEATING heart, but hey, Home is where the heart is I guess…

And now, the portal thing.

“Since when did Welcome Home ever had a portal??”

Oh since the very beginning actually!

First updated “portal” picture

Many people (including yours truly) theorized that this swirly spiral was a portal to the real world. It seems that we have more evidence to support this theory too!

First updated portal (shown left) and second updated portal (shown right)

Hey…. Wait a second…. Is it just me or it the portal getting…. Bigger?

The first update it was small, even the black goo wasn’t as bad… on the second picture, the spiral is INCREDIBLY large, and now the goo is coating the trees.

Well, isn’t that ominous.

"But wait. If Home has a portal... where is this portal even going?"

Both portals have the same black goo surrounding it, the same white eye in the center and the same swirl.

It's going to the Restoration team. And look at where the portal is placed. It's on the ceiling. "As above"

and the one in Welcome Home is "So below"

So perhaps the portal in Home is on the floor... This CANNOT be a coincidence I swear!!

With weird goo covering everything. And like, thats not all!

If you compare the items that the Restoration team uploaded onto the site in the first update and on the second update, you'll notice that the items have grown significantly larger.

At first, it was just envelopes with paper crammed inside of it. As if the person was trying to cram in as much information as possible. It isn't neat.

About us page: All of the paper materials tucked away inside the envelopes we have received are usually crammed together and covered in paint and ink.

Now, in the second update, the items have grown larger.

These items are much larger than mail, and I believe it also has something to do with how much bigger the portal has gotten.

Pretty soon, we might have full-grown puppets jumping in. But now that begs the question... Why is Home doing this?

Well, I think it's because Home really wants to help Wally.

As you inspect the website, there's a bunch of evidence that Wally is growing increasingly desperate for some other kind of sentient connection. It's been growing so much that it starts to get worrying...

Let's go back to the conversation between Home and Barnaby, notice anything weird? Not really? Well, I noticed that every bug audio file was in the perspective of Wally. Here, Wally is just staring at his half-finished painting, even Barnaby comments on this and finds it odd that Wally stopped painting.

It looks to me that Wally was dissociating. There, but not really there. He's been disconnected from reality because it feels unreal to him.

And Home sees that. As soon as the conversation turns to Wally, Home goes dead silent. When Wally still does not respond, Home releases a series of quick creaks and bangs to try and get Wally's attention. It doesn't work. Once Barnaby says Wally's name, it snaps him out of his dissociative state.

And Home is worried about Wally.

It gives a whole new look to the infamous "so-below" image.

Home isn't looking at Wally, it's looking straight at us. Eyes shaking as Wally seems like he's begging. Home doesn't look malicious here, Home looks like it's begging us to do something to calm Wally down because it physically can't anymore.

Home and Wally don't have a lot, if not any facial expressions at all. And shaky eyes in cartoons are a good indicator that someone is scared.

And if Home (in this link) is saying "Help Me", then no wonder! Heck, even the freaking disk is shaking!

Home is reaching out to us for help because it can't comfort Wally anymore and I don't know about you but that is SAD.

Two puppets that recently gained sentience can't even get the comfort out of each other because they can't communicate anymore :(

So, all Home can do is wait and watch Wally.

And if help won't come to you, well, having a handy-dandy portal is very helpful!

You can go to the help instead.

#welcome home #wally darling #welcome home wally #welcome home home #welcome home barnaby #barnaby b beagle #theory #HONESTLY #THIS GIVES ME SUCH A NEW PERSPECTIVE ON HOME #Honestly #The fandom (including myself) kinda used Home as a scapegoat for creepy shit! "AAA! Home is evil and wrong and bad >:(#And while Home is still morally dubious #I think (like Wally) it's desperate for help

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darkdemeter · 1 month

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ONE AND THE SAME, LONELY AND AFRAID

— BUCKY BARNES COLUMN (ONESHOT) #4

Bucky Barnes x Female Reader

—- not my gifs, found on pinterest, credit to original posters! -—

| A/N | DISCRETION |

I dunno what to really say about this piece, brain just switched into angsty, (kinda fluffy?) writing mode and I went with it.

Therapy — angst — hurt comfort? — (introverted) reader — insecurity warning — semi-established mutual pining/interest — strong language — socially awkward bean reader — basically reader has a lot of reservations about things that involve other people, more of a self isolated type — self sabotage — we got a mutual-semi happy ending — I think that's it?

| SUMMARY |

You've always opted to be alone. Recent visits to Dr Raynor, however, work to bring down those walls you hold up. Little are you aware that someone you're talking to is very much the same as you. Lonely and afraid.

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7.6K(words)

| M-LIST | TAGLIST:

@identity2212 @sebastianstansqueen @openup-yourmind @kandis-mom @calwitch @cjand10 @ashdoctor @missmarvelophilic @mostlymarvelgirl

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“Have you been keeping up with the exercises I gave you?”

Already she knows the answer. Not even three seconds can you maintain eye contact, eyes feeling glassy each time you near the braving point. It’s futile. People can hear what you’re saying right? Why the need to have your eyes glued to them?

Your shoulders shove up weakly and Dr Raynor rhythmically paces the pen’s butt against her notebook.

“That’s a no,” she sighs, “I gave you those exercises to help you. Eye contact, let’s start with that again: what do you find so intimidating about it?”

The air is so silent you could hear a pin drop. Your gaze is still glued to a random place on the wall behind her. That is the closest you can give her today.

Her lips push together and her eyes thin in that way you assumed all of these doctors do, a tactic to unnerve you into squeezing out the details. To weed out the problems. You don’t like it. Your fingers are crushed in the grip of your other hand sitting in your lap idly.

Again, you shrug. “Just that. Intimidating. It’s… a lot.”

“There’s more to it for you. And I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that, it terrifies you when someone looks at you. Focuses their attention on you.”

“Maybe it’s something like that…” You tilt your head slightly. “Maybe it’s not.”

I don’t like being here. I just wanna go. I still have fifteen minutes.

“Your family is worried about you. You have a tendency to be self isolating. Reserved. They’re concerned that you’ve been alone.” She’s spitting words at you. Family concerns have always been the bane of your lonely ways. Their constant insistence to put yourself out there, to go out on at least one date.

Try to talk you into meeting people they know, saying that they will be good for you. All because they’ve grown far too comfortable with being with someone, that they can’t stand to be alone themselves. And then, they have to project that onto you.

“It’s a choice.”

“What can you tell me about your intimate life? Partners, significant others.”

The jutting of your pouty lip is any indication that a cheeky remark is right on the edge of your tongue. She stops you right before you can say a word.

“Stuff toys and pets do not count.”

“But they’re companions. You wanna know about my companion life, right?”

“Just answer the question.”

It takes another five minutes. Pure and slow in time, each waver of the ticking hands beats another seconds off the appointment. But it’s not fast enough for your liking. Tongue tracing the curves of your gums and teeth, you contemplate.

Dr. Raynor says your name to draw your attention back - escaped into the cosmos - now forced right back into the couch in her office.

“Seeing someone? Talking to anyone?”

“Sure.”

“Anything else?” She raises a gesturing hand, a silent command for you to speak further. To give her further information. Personal information that’s yours. Safe in your head. There’s no point giving that out to others.

“Just talking to him is all.”

“So neither of you have met in person before?”

Lips rolling inward, thinning, you shake your head. “No.”

Your name is drawn from her lips as a low sigh. She scrawls something down in her notebook, albeit a little aggressively.

“Money is being wasted each and every time you come in here, sit on this couch and say nothing. Resolve nothing. Time is being wasted, time you could be spending out there, actually bonding with someone who you may call a friend or a significant other.”

“I never wanted to be here in the first place.”

Her eyes roll up to meet yours, the split second you manage to meet her eyes, you see the scrutiny. The disdaining judgement and patience that wanes thin for every drop of time in the remaining minutes left.

“That wasn’t even two proper seconds,” she notes, “and yet, you come to your sessions each time.”

“Because if I don’t, then that same concerned family chews my ear off about it.”

Another two minutes pass by. You count the ticking hands slowly. Far too slow. When will this fucking nightmare end? Dr. Raynor continues to pounce her pen on the pad’s paper, the sound a distant, drumming beat.

“From what I’ve gathered, your siblings all have partners of their own, some of them beginning to grow their families. Am I correct?”

You nod as your teeth sink into the inside of your lip. “Right in the ballpark.”

“And you are so comfortable with being alone because it’s all you know. You’re afraid of letting someone in. You rather keep your guard up than ever risk giving someone a chance to love and accept you. I have another patient just like that. Shut off from the world and distrusting.”

It’s like she read your mind. You almost applaud her for her scooby doo investigation. “Wow, way to keep the confidentiality, Doctor,” you breeze through a forced, tight smile, eyes still cast to somewhere else in the room. “It’s better to keep people at arms length. Easier to detach from.”

“And is that what you’re doing with this guy? Keeping him at arm’s length?”

“Sure. I guess.”

Three minutes remaining. You breathe a sigh of relief.

It’s almost over.

Then it lingers on your mind… “Tell me because I’m curious, but why are people obsessed with the idea that being alone is such a bad thing?”

It’s closing in on one minute. A single minute she has to deliver you an answer. Of course, usually she disregards questions like this. But today, she indulges. Maybe, just maybe, this is your way of breaking through to her. To finally and truly give her something to work with.

“I will tell you what I told another patient of mine. Being alone is the most quietest and personal hell someone can endure.”

The chiming of the appointment’s bell signifies its end. You’re eager to stand up from the couch but Dr. Raynor holds a hand up. “Before you go running off back to your lonely hell, I want you to perform at least one exercise.”

At first, you mean to brush her off, your eyes refuse to meet the piercing stare you know is burrowing into your soul, seeking you out in the darkness of your reservations. “Alright. Sure…”

“If you’re interested in this guy, I want you to make the first move and ask to meet up with him. Begin to lower your walls.”

You’ve done it. Just as she asked of you. In hindsight, you should have just ignored her. In honesty, it’s been a while since your heart has bruised your ribs with such intensity in its anxious rage. What if he said no? Neither of you had ever really flirted heavily or indicated that you were head over heels, eager to see each other.

As if you both just knew, you were each settled comfortably in this mutual exchange of words. No video, no voice messages or calls. Just words. Conversations about work, some random things happening during the week and other topics people chat about.

You were meant to feel brave in that moment. To feel invigorated as you take that daring leap of faith outside the comfort of your own space. A safety net you had taken great care to curate, to save yourself from ever falling to the ground with no will to get back up.

In your mind, you’ve seen your siblings go through enough failed relationships that it in some strange way, you’ve experienced it on some outside level. You’ve gained the knowledge that if you let someone - a stranger - in then they will find a way to hurt you one way or another.

But what about that lucky person? That destined soulmate everyone raves on about. Could you really stand going through failure after failure, after seeing the damage it caused your loved ones?

Why risk it? I’m just putting a target on my heart that says “hurt me, please!”.

However, with the following silence after, you believe you had your answer. He wasn’t interested in you. He just wants to remain mutuals. You understand that, you accept it wholeheartedly. It saves you from getting hurt, from him getting hurt and that’s all that matters.

Having your heart broken because you allowed love to blind you to rational thought isn’t something you’re wanting to bring to one of your appointments.

Around ten minutes later he responded. His answer leaves you in a state on the bathroom floor, on your arse, back pressed against the sink cabinets and your chest heaving for any amount of oxygen. The world’s closing in around you, it’s turning against you. Eyes watering until your waterline is drowning and blurry, your hands rake through your hair and grasp at the roots.

The olive branch you extended is received by him whilst your mind spirals into the pools of doubt and sabotage. He’s accepted your bold invitation.

How can I go on a date? I can’t keep eye contact, I don’t know how to act or what to say!

What do we talk about in person? How much is too much?

Maybe it was a mistake. Would it be rude if you pretended it was a joke? You think it over once, then twice. It plays on repeat what you plan to say to get out of this ordeal you’ve now thrown yourself into. You get another notification that lights up your phone screen.

Be nice to finally meet you 7 tomorrow night sound good? ┗

Sure! 7 sounds good heh ┗

there’s a place not far from where I live I like to go to.. unless there’s somewhere else you wanna go ┗

Ugh, why does that sound so… so… desperate? I should probably call it off right now before this gets out of hand.

I’ll see you there Doll just name it ┗

Your heart flutters at the nickname. It makes you feel childish and you cringe that you find yourself swooning over it, but every time he uses it, there’s something that makes you feel special. Like you’re the only one he calls that. After you text him the address, you pass the phone away, leaving it to sit on the sink’s edge. Hands cupping your face, the tears still seeping along the rim of your eyes with a fighting intent to be free. For so long you have kept them bottled up.

And now to be faced with this. You don’t feel ready to be doing this. Your fingers had been hovering over the keys, mind already texting that you had made a silly joke just to see how he’d react. But Dr. Raynor’s words from earlier that day crept into the forefront of your mind, stopping you in your tracks.

‘Being alone is the most quietest and personal hell someone can endure.’

“You haven’t been having nightmares lately. That’s good,” Dr. Raynor says, notebook sitting in absence on her folded leg, pen loose between her fingers. So far, she hasn’t had to write much. A few notes, a sentence or two. Overall, she sees a little more progress. Even if it’s just a little.

“And the girl you’re talking with. Have you two been communicating much lately? Do you think that, maybe, she could be a benefiting factor?”

“We’ve been talking,” Bucky answers with a nod, voice rumbly. “I don’t know.”

“Your nightmares stem from the decades of trauma that still need to be thinned out of your system. And there are outlets that can help with the healing process. Nurturing relationships is one of them.”

As if he hasn’t heard that line before. Being told to nurture his relationships.

“Tell me more about her. What’s been going on between you both?” For a moment, Bucky remains quiet. His teeth roll his bottom lip, biting down before his lips part. Gaze once settled elsewhere, his eyes find hers with firm contact.

The type of contact she wishes she can see from you.

“She’s asked to meet up. I’m seeing her tonight.”

“I understand you two have been talking for a while. Around three months now, correct?”

“Yeah.”

“And… How does that make you feel? You finally have a chance to meet someone face to face and take this relationship to the next stage.”

The question had come right out of the blue for Bucky. After a day out in the field with Sam, all he wanted to do was shower, have a beer and see if you had messaged him. And the conversation had carried out like normal with asking about each other’s day, followed by some playful banter. And then, Bucky was faced with the one topic that had been on his mind for the past few weeks, plaguing him with the idea of possibly meeting each other after all this time, to put a face to a name.

But to think that this could bridge into something further. Something far more intimate. Bucky’s shoulders push up with a heavy sigh.

“I dunno, Doc. I’ve been thinking about meeting her. But being by myself for so long now, it’s normal for me.”

Dr. Raynor squares her shoulders, eyes staring point blank like the barrel of a gun at her patient. “A hurdler doesn’t avoid the obstacles. You have to take that leap, James, and explore these new possibilities before they slip through your fingers. From what you’ve told me, she sounds similar to you.”

“And if things don’t go as I hope? If she pulls away?”

“Then pull her closer. And give her the chance to pull you closer. Start to trust in someone outside of those walls.”

You pace back and forth along the wide strip sidewalk, the night’s air chills you through your clothing. But at this point that could just be the nerves. Why did you have to be bold, why did you have to actually listen to Dr. Raynor? Arriving just a little before the agreed time, you took the time to rehearse things over. Maybe squeeze in a little practice before you make a complete idiotic display of yourself.

By now, you guess it’s just past 7. How the hell are you supposed to know who he is if you’ve never seen one another before? Man, now that you think about it, you really didn’t think this through.

Last time I do any of these fucking exercises…

Quickly stealing a glance down at your phone to get a read on the time, you see you’ve received no message yet.

Maybe he… changed his mind last minute?

Well that really makes you look like an idiot. Shit, you really could slap yourself into tomorrow for getting baited into your own doings. You barely register the thrumming heart of a motorcycle’s engine roaring down the street beside you, purring lowly to a stop.

You shrug to yourself suddenly, the leaping of your heart coaxing your anxiety to grow further, as doubt shrouds over. Your feet shuffle to carry you back in the direction of your favourite ice cream joint. Might as well pick up a little frosty snack on the way back home.

“Okay, I’m stupid. He’s not— oop–!” Someone is the poor victim of your distracted escape, their body is large and broad, arms circling around you to catch you from tripping onto the hard concrete.

“Oh, shit! Sorry!” you groan, eyes quick to seek out a face only to glimpse away as soon as you note the intensity of bright blue; gaze focused solely on you as if you were the only thing that existed.

“All good,” he says. His voice only brings to shake you, slightly husky and the oh so perfect pitch. You do your best to straighten yourself and from his hold, out of habit, you’d grown used to not being touched unless you were the one to initiate it. A skill - or rather lack thereof - you’re not very proud of. Not that members of your family made it any easier whenever they pointed it out.

Distant. Closed off. Stiff.

“You okay?” he asks.

“Yeah, yeah, I was… just uh, was meeting up with a guy.”

“Hmph, me too,” he breezes with a deep exhale. You try to ignore the way your peripheral picks up on his body’s outline moving. “She wanted to meet here.”

“Huh, good spot. One of my small hang out spots.” Your balled fists only curl tighter into the pockets of your jacket as another chilling wind attacks your body. Maybe you should settle on a hot beverage instead of some ice cream.

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. Really nice.”

You both stand idle by one another, the air beginning to lace heavily with the tension of your interaction, both awkward in your butting spaces. Bucky spares a more studying glance at you. A sleeveless, cropped turtleneck with a leather, hooded jacket layering over, you opted to keep the palette simple with your dark, skinny jeans and heeled boots.

You looked dressed up to be on some casual date. Whoever it was you were waiting on was a lucky guy, Bucky thought. In no disrespect to the girl he was messaging, but he figured he would have shot his shot with you had it not been for this mystery girl.

“You hang around here a lot?” he questions to come off as casual and laid back as possible.

“Oh, sure. Yeah… I like it here.”

Bucky finds himself smiling at your response. Strange, he figures, how you seem familiar. Still, he catches on that he hasn’t gotten a proper look at your face. It’s like you're purposefully avoiding looking at him. Did you know him? The aided curse of his sensitive hearing allows him to hear the rapid racing of your heartbeat, like a poor hamster terrified out of its mind.

You can feel him staring at you with the occasional glimpse down at his phone, held in his gloved hand.

“Goodluckwithyourdate. Bye.” You say it far too quickly, it takes Bucky a moment to decipher what you’ve said. His head snaps back and forth in a double take, catching you already walking down the sidewalk, huddled in close to shield yourself. How he knows that feeling internally.

Now you’ve gained his full attention. For Bucky, there was some missing piece to all this. He’s quick to type. Just a little experiment…

Here, Doll, just waiting on you ┗

His jaw tightens, teeth clenching in his observation. You stop when your phone buzzes to life in your pocket. Retrieving it, you read the message. Bucky only has to wait for about a minute before he sees the message.

Ha, I was here first. Where are you?? ┗

You tell me Doll… ┗

you don’t happen to be wearing knitted gloves, right? ┗

Your brows furrow for a moment. How could he know, you haven’t even–

Slowly, you lift your eyes from the blaring screen of your text messages. He now knew it and to think he’s the guy you were waiting on. If anything, this is some fortunate, golden strike.

As your gaze moves to fall over your half turned shoulder that faces back towards him, he manages to catch half of your visage and the radiant haven of your eyes, what little you allow to show.

“I take it you’re Y/N.” He smiles a toothy smile. With any luck, his attempt to charm will work.

“And you’re Bucky?”

He nods in response and you let yourself wander forwards, phone tucked away and your arms folded together.

“I–I, uh… wow, this is embarrassing ,” you all but mutter to yourself with a roll of your eyes.

“How so?”

“I suck at meeting people,” you utter a little louder. Your shoulders shrug with the motion of your confession. You only dread the look in those blue eyes that you can’t bring yourself to glance up into. What if you see something that gives away his intentions? What if you give away what’s going on in your own mind to him, for him to see all the fear right there like an open book to be read. Knowledge to be obtained and used against you.

“Maybe if you looked at people once and a while,” he chuckles.

Oh… he likes someone who can maintain eye contact.

“Yeah, what a shame. Oh well, nice meeting you.”

The abruptness cuts him. Wounds him like a dark chill that runs his spine. His shoulders straighten then and the bevel between his brows grows in depth, the puzzlement of his confusion evident on his face that you don’t take the time to read. Not when he can easily catch contact with your now glossy eyes.

Again, you’re making off in a hurry.

Pull her closer, it’s the only thought that crosses his mind.

“Wait, wait up!” he calls out quickly, voice sharp that he sees your entire body flinch at the command, but you carry on. He doesn’t want to scare you away. His gloved hand cups over your elbow.

“I didn’t mean it in a bad way,” he says with a sigh, “I’m bad at meeting people at times too.”

“Really?” You don’t mean to sound distrusting, if he interpreted it that way, each to their own at the end of the day.

“Yeah, that whole… dating scene is crazy these days.”

You cannot find yourself more inclined to agree with that. Seeing how much the world has changed around you, and you’re only in your twenties. Plenty of more room to change. Thinking about the future is what you consider an anxiety inducing pass time, one you try not to get carried away with.

“Tell me ‘bout it,’ you huff. You flex your ankle, the heel scuffing softly against the pavement, hopefully grinding some form of inspiration to make you less awkward. Though you fear the damage has been done.

He chuckles. “Glad we’re agreeable in person. C’mon, mind giving me a tour of your little hang out?”

“Sure,” you agree with a small smile, brushing aside a stray wisp of hair, “I know a little place up this way.”

“I like your gloves,” Bucky says, clicking his tongue, when spared a moment he glances off to the side in his miserable cringe, what the hell was that move?

But he didn’t expect for your chin to be raised a little higher and a much warmer smile to grace your lips. Wow, he still couldn’t get over it. A cute, beautiful girl like yourself happening to be the one he’s been communicating with all this time.

“Thanks.” You suppress a giggle, the sound small in your throat. “Look. Glove twins.”

Seeing you raise your gloved hand up, he saves you from any further embarrassment and meets yours almost immediately, palms straight and pressed together in a mockery to a high five.

“Well, look at that.” His lips tug into an amused grin.

For a second you meet his gaze, but as quick as anything, the connection is lost. As you drop your hand back to your side, you feel warmth creep into your cheeks. How your lack of eye contact can be a burden at times. All you want to do is look at this guy, get a read of him without the need to sneak fleeting glances whenever you could.

All you can settle on now is that he’s down right cute. Handsome.

No way this guy is single. How some chick could just give him a false number. My number.

You wander further down the street together, side by side, occasionally arms brushing against one another before you stop and jab a thumb at the small bar. “Here it is. Heh, quaint place. I, uh… like coming here. Obviously.”

While he’s distracted with his observation, you take a few seconds to actually look at him.

Casually dressed, so much like yourself. Chiselled features, intense yet stunning eyes you believe you’ve ever seen, and broad. Damn well towering high above you. Next to him, you feel like a gummy bear. Why that comparison, you have no idea, but you find it fitting.

Thus so far he doesn’t put himself as intentionally dangerous or harmful, not towards you anyway. You’d bet all that’s in your wallet he’d cause some serious damage if he wanted to.

“Nice little joint.” You hum softly and nod in agreement, eyes sinking low to instead scan the fabric of his jacket instead of his reaction when you know his gaze is on you.

You bob your head in the direction of the door, indicating him to follow you inside. But Bucky, if anything, was raised in the century of etiquette and manners. Especially in the company of a woman. Your smaller, gloved hand reaches for the door until his own comes forward, pulling the door open for you.

“After you, Doll.”

“Oh. Thanks.”

Again, that warm crimson settles in your cheeks, causing the rest of your body to heat up, soon enough you won’t need the gloves and jacket to keep you warm.

You lead him over to a window booth, sliding in over the overworn cushions and he takes the one opposite you. Not too soon after does the regular waitress greet you with a pearly smile, blonde hair tied back into a ponytail.

“Y/N!” she gasps widely, “So good to see you. What can I get you and your man tonight?” She flashes a wink down towards you both. Out of sheer interest, Bucky’s eyes drift to land on you, the corner of his lips turned up slightly into a smirk.

“Wh– he, oh no, he’s not– we’re not… just the regular, thanks.”

Tongue tied. You fucking hate situations that plant you on the spot, on your arse. Like an ungraceful landing after jumping the wagon. Fuck, you’re making yourself look even more weird in front of him. Why this sudden need to act like a normal human being around him is present, you find it confusing. But from trial and error, you’ve always somehow managed to mark yourself as a strange one.

It was better to keep things short between interactions. But with Bucky, something has come over you that makes you want to trust him. Be open with him. But you know you can’t. People can hide their true nature for lengths at a time that they deem necessary. You’re not about to give this guy a loaded gun to turn on you.

With a nod, the waitress nods and writes down in her notepad, she looks to Bucky expectantly.

“I’ll have what she’s having and can we get two beers with the order.”

“Can do. That will be with you both shortly.” With an affirmative nod, the waitress heads off to deliver the new order.

“If you just want to dip any time during… this, then I understand.” For the second time tonight, Bucky’s face contorts with deeply rooted confusion. His smile is the product of his being unsure whether you’re serious or joking. “Why would I do that?”

Your shoulders move up sharply with a shrug.

Because you don’t want to be around me.

“I’m not leaving you by yourself. You asked to meet up and I’m here.”

Touching words that you wish to believe in them wholeheartedly. Surely though, he’s only saying that out of courtesy.

“I tend to stay out pretty late towards the weekend.”

Now it’s his turn to shrug. “So do I.”

Once the food and beers arrived, you found it easier to distract yourself, able to roll the bottle between your hands, feeding off of your meal bit by bit throughout conversation.

“Like I said before, don’t feel obligated to stay out late. Don’t want to keep your girl waiting.” A small tactic, albeit you disbelieve that it’s very discreet, it’s an obvious tell that you want to know if he’s single or not. You’re no expert in the dating pool but that just has to be right up there in some top ten listed prompts.

“Not leaving you. I don’t have a girl waiting on me, don’t worry, Doll.” You almost choke on your next bite, drowning it down your throat with a gulp of beer. You almost meet his eyes, opting to focus just below them. There is absolutely no way in hell this guy is single.

Bucky figures he’d shoot his shot, now that the identity of mystery girl and you were one and the same.

“Hope your boyfriend doesn’t mind I’m stealing you for the night.”

Why did he word it like that?!

“Ha. Boyfriend,” you sigh, mouth pinching towards the side. Briefly, you notice the furrow in his brows.

Dammit, why is he so fucking cute?

“No boyfriend,” he drawls lowly over the rim of his bottle.

You shake your head. “Nope.”

He can tell by the way you roll the singular word, emphasising the p with a sharp popping sound. Bitterness.

“Why?” He watches you intently as he takes a drink of his beer, meanwhile, you're turning your bottle left and right, like trying to crack the code to some safe.

Didn’t want to risk getting hurt.

“Just…” You pause with a heavy sigh, heat covers your eyes that you now direct to stare down at the table. “Never made the effort, if I’m honest.”

“You like being alone.”

“Prefer it, actually. Easier that way.”

Of that, Bucky completely understands. After everything he’s been through, being alone has just made things simple. Lonely but simpler. He notices the many couples and maybe it would be nice to have someone there. But how can he find normalcy after everything he’s done? Is he deserving of it?

He wants peace. Dr. Raynor believes that’s bullshit but she can’t understand that he wants peace for himself. To feel comfortable. Accepted. Perhaps loved, if any deity or supernatural entity from above condones it.

But then, why are you so comfortable in your loneliness? He wonders about it.

“My doctor keeps telling me to try and engage with people. Open up. That sort of shit.”

“Mine too.”

Another funny coincidence you both find in each other. During your time talking over text, you both managed to find out you attended doctor appointments. Therapy and not by your own choice either. By some other force that dictated you needed help.

“People are so afraid of being alone these days. World’s dangerous, sure, but so are the people you thought you could trust. But people are desperate, I guess. They’ll risk it.”

Bucky cannot help the way the corner of his eyes curl slightly, lips stretching into a pursed smile to contain his amusement as much as possible.

“What?” you ask, head tilting slightly, your eyes having now settled on the booth’s texture right over his shoulder.

He shakes his head, chuckling to himself. “You often on the defensive when it comes to people?”

“Have to be. Don’t know their intentions. Could be anything.”

“And what about me?”

You shrug again, gaze torn between meeting his and keeping it far, far away. “Like you said before, if I looked at people once and a while. But I can’t. So I’ll never know, I guess.”

He frowns slightly at this. If your body language is telling him anything right now is that his question pushed you into a corner. You felt trapped when confronted by his curiosity. You didn’t answer him, not exactly, but if your response did anything it’s that you tend to avoid answering when you get pushed.

You don’t seem to be the overly aggressive type up front. But if backed into that corner, that is when you may very well lash out. A defensive tactic. A once victim tactic.

Both of you are pulled from the thicket of your scattered thoughts and silence when the waitress returns with the check. You begin to shuffle around in your pocket, obtaining your half of the meal when Bucky stops you.

“My treat,” he says and hands his money to the blonde worker.

“N-no, that’s okay. I’m fine with paying my side.”

He tuts you with a shake of his head, eyes penetrating your very soul for the moment you meet it.

Don’t look at me like that please… heart’s going too fast. Just let me pay for my food.

“I was born and raised in a time that I pay for the date. Let me cover it.”

Not that you have much choice to argue. He’d already handed off the money and the waitress took away your finished plates and beers.

Your bottom lip curls outwards into a pout. You feel bad that he felt like he had to do that. For him to pay out more than what was required.

In that regard, he leans back slightly, chin held higher a little more. He believes he’s won this round. But if anything, you’re adamant to pay him back.

“Here.” You slide the bill towards him, ignoring the way his eyes narrow slightly to your challenge. “Just accept it, please? I’ll feel better knowing I didn’t waste your money.”

Reluctantly, he nods and accepts the money and you mumble a soft thanks.

Time flew by as you both wandered together, giving him a general tour of the area. Small bouts of banter passed between you both, and general topics of discussion like work and time passers were made to fill the void of silence. Even still, you kept everything at surface level, never really exploring any deeper thoughts, much like him. But those very rare glimpses were only brief glimpses into one another’s life.

At least you both could report to your respective doctors that you tried, still in the dark that Dr. Raynor was the host of your separate appointments.

Coming through the way you came you reach your initial meeting spot, the sidewalk more open with people now on their way back home at the later hour.

“No, Sam just talks too much,” Bucky grumbles in his chuckle, an amused grin forming on your lips. He could just make out the rows of teeth.

“Sounds like a fun guy.”

“Definitely.” You hear the grumbling breathlessness in his tone. When he glimpses to his side he finds your eyes, quick to steal whatever he can get of those capturing colours that are far too swift to avert.

Fuck. Can’t even make it to five seconds. I’m getting nowhere with this eye contact exercise.

Following him, he leads you over to his bike and your eyes narrow curiously. So it was him that owned the motorcycle you heard earlier that evening.

“I guess this is where we part ways for the night.” You bounce your head in the direction of your place. “Was good finally meeting you, Bucky.”

That didn’t sit well with him. A lot can happen on the walk back to your place and he didn’t feel completely ready to let you go for the night. Eyes tearing between you and his bike with quick thinking, he blurts out the first thing that comes to his mind. He hoists a leg over his bike, straddling the seat and rolling his arm to beckon you closer.

“Why don’t we go for a quick ride? Then I’ll drop you home.”

“Nah, besides I’ve never… I-I’m good. I like the walk home.”

Bucky is quickly picking up a sort of pattern. Still, he can’t shake the need to just hang around you a little longer, nor the guilt he’d have for just leaving you. Chivalry at its finest, he shakes his head sternly, dismounting the bike, you see the way his body moves fluently with the action.

Fucking stop doing that!

Your mind is dancing two different dances. Rational thought and that bubbly, giddiness that often leads swooning victims into blinded trouble.

“Alright, we’ll walk together then.”

“Wait– you can’t just leave your–”

He begins to lead you off in the direction you’d motioned to before. “I’ll come back for it.”

“Bucky.” He sees the defiant pout and crossing of your arms. Indeed, a cute sight to behold.

He smirks, and shit, you couldn’t meet anything above the bridge of his nose then, but did you admire what you could.

“It’s your call. We can either walk or take the bike.”

He’s played a few rounds of this game already with you. Numerous times you’ve had to choose between one option or the other, a few of those being a tad embarrassing, but his assurance provided some semblance of comfort.

But what felt like a game before now feels like more than that now. Before it was fun, easy and not serious. This, however, was not a round you can simply forfeit from. It’s either option one or two.

Your chest expands with a large inhale. Blinking, you contemplate and weigh the options. “We’ll take the bike.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll make a rider out of you, Doll.” It didn’t help the flush that scorches and freezes your body simultaneously when he adds a wink to his witty flirtations.

You try to not let it get to you. Not to let goosebumps riddle your skin and send your nerves endings aflame. But he’s making it hard. He leads you back towards the bike and he grabs the helmet.

“Here, you can use this.”

You focus on the protective helm and though you mean to protest, worried about what he’d do about himself, he’s already tucking your head in.

You make a small noise as he wriggles it in place and through the visor, you can finally meet his eyes.

With the blacked out visor to shield your eyes, you finally and truly admire the - unfortunately muted - hue of blue that entrances you, intense as the hottest levelled flame. He’s smiling down at you.

“How’s it fit?”

“Good!” you call, giving him a thumbs up. He nods with that assurance and directs you to mount the bike behind him. But you’re going shy on him and he cocks his head slightly, brows knitted in their concern.

Even when you preferred to be the one to initiate contact, that didn’t mean you were used to or fond of it. What if you held him too tightly, or what if you touched him somewhere he wasn’t comfortable with.

Mounting the bike behind him, you at first put about an inch or two of space between you both. “Get on closer.”

You fail to hide the mousey squeak when his hands pull at your thighs, tugging them forward until they rest against him, your hands find purchase on the broad space of his shoulders.

He does it cautiously, he seeks out your wrists when they slide down the scape of his back, and you - warily - let him pull them around his torso. He exhales slowly, giving himself a second to comprehend having your hold around him. Why does he feel this way? Now that he has you like this, he can’t bear to think about losing it.

“Hold on tight now,” he instructs and with a heavy bob of your head, thanks to the helmet, he lets the engine purr to life and he feels your arms grow a little tighter.

Rolling the bike back a little, he lets a car pass by before he speeds off down the way, the bike’s roar pulses through your entire body until for sure you’ve gone numb and you only hold onto Bucky tighter.

The surge of adrenaline fills you until you’re on high, blood boiling hot in your veins as he flies through the traffic. For taking things usually at your own pace, it felt good to have a little speed kick in.

Taking a sudden turn to the left would have made you question your decision to take the bike - should have scared you - but it didn’t. Not with Bucky. For what feels like ages now, you feel that you can trust him.

“How you doing back there?” he asks, straining his voice to yell over the bike’s power. You doubt very much he’d be able to hear you, not when you only just managed to hear him, you opt to nod your head vigorously. He feels it against the muscles of his back and his lips tug upwards.

Accelerating slightly more, he feels your body grow giddy, jostling a little as you laugh behind him while he weaves through traffic. It really shows that you’ve never been on a bike before now. And since that’s the case, he’s determined to make it an unforgettable experience.

With any wishful thinking, you’ll want to go for another ride with him.

Bucky puts the now overwhelmed engine to rest for a little while, all thanks to his plan to impress you. “Here we are.” He lets his eyes rake over the few story building, a little settlement of apartments, currently parked round back that shows a short paved walkway to your backdoor. Going through the front door was usually hectic with your neighbours, good people honestly, but after a tiring day it could get a bit much.

This way, you could be left alone.

“This is me,” your voice says through the helmet. You dismount before him and unlike Bucky, your movements aren’t as well versed. But for him, that just adds to your charm.

You let him stand close to you as he retrieves his helmet, being gentle to pry it off.

Once that visor is gone, so too does your resolve to look into his eyes, the connection lost with the helmet’s absence.

“Thanks for driving me home. I… had a good time.”

“You’re welcome.” Bucky’s lips thin into a smile. This was it then, the end of your little outing together. He doesn’t want to come off strong but how can he be so sure that you’ll be so bold again? How long would he have to wait?

That’s why he’s pulling you closer again. It may be scary but at this point, he’s willing to risk it, if it means to have another meeting with you. To see you again.

“Well, goodnight Bucky. I’ll talk to you—” You’d only begun to turn towards the narrow walkway when you’re stopped. Pulled back until you’re practically flushed against Bucky’s front. He’s pressing something into the palm of your hand. Thin, like paper. Peering down, you see the bill you’d given him.

However, you don’t have any other choice when his other hand tilts your chin up.

Oh no.

“Give me five seconds,” he breathes out, voice hopeful. Your chin trembles, only just able to look at him through your lashes, but even then your focus dives downward, but his fingers remain to keep your head from bowing.

“I-I can’t…”

“You can. Take your time.”

Why he’s doing this, you have no clue, and why he’s willing to be patient; it’s just downright confusing. Who in their right mind would have time for this? At times, you barely have enough time to deal with your own shit.

To save himself from waiting for a literal eternity, you rip the bandaid, and you meet his eyes. No visor, no secretive glimpses here and there stolen. You stare straight up, right into those blues that can very well drown you.

Your lungs tighten and struggle to maintain a steady pattern, you feel the welling of tears glass over your eyes with each second you count. Slowly.

One… two…

His eyes remain gentle with you. Tender and kind. You’re not seeing anything… bad, like he wants to hurt you. he could be hiding it really well. But for yourself, you’re sure he can see every single rational and irrational fear, every painful memory in your teary eyes. Your vision begins to cloud, like the fight to stay above the crashing waves.

Three… four…

Buck’s hand lowers slowly but you don’t register it. You can’t. It’s something that occurs in the background, unattuned to it. You see in those wonderfully coloured hues that he's just as haunted as you are or even more.

He’s lonely as you are. Afraid as you are. Shadows of his own past, you can see them. Made him into the person he is in front of you. And you can’t blame him, no matter what it is that haunts him.

You see a once victim in him just as much as you see in the mirror every morning.

“Same time next Friday?” he asks, his voice is low, almost a whisper. His chest expands as he holds his breath.

“Sure.” You share a smile between you two, cheeks glowing warm and bright red.

“I’ll pick you up.”

Him leaving the proximity of your personal space leaves you gasping for air, blinking the tears in your eyes rapidly, you watch him retreat to his bike. Until next Friday, you’d wait to see him then.

“Talk soon, Doll,” he calls out with a wave once he’s atop his vehicle. Looking at it now, you can still feel the vibrations in your legs.

“Mhm. Until then.”

You take your leave then, entering your apartment and shutting the door behind you in tandem with him riding off into the night. Planting your back against the door to ground you does little to affect, still you’re floating.

This new feeling welling inside your chest, a flutter in your stomach… It scares you. Is this feeling why people are afraid to be alone? You don’t know what to think.

All you do know is that you gave him ten seconds.

#treehouse taglist #the dark demeter writing catalogue #bucky barnes x reader #female reader #bucky barnes #james buchanan barnes #bucky x reader #angst #james bucky buchanan barnes #bucky x you

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simp4wom3n · 1 year

Text

Live Celebrations

Pairing: Jenna Ortega x GN! Reader

Requested: Yes/No ~ request 1 ~ request 2

Summary: To celebrate Wednesday coming to Netflix, Jenna livestreams on Instagram in order to answer and questions and talk to her fans. The questions soon take a turn in the direction of her partner, Y/N L/N. ~ Word Count: 1.363k ~ Warnings: SO fluffy

A/N: Hi!! I merged two very similar requests and made it gender neutral so hopefully thats ok. I’m really trying to crank out these requests for you guys cause there is A LOT of them, but I don’t want to close my requests so just know if you submit one it may take a while <3 p.s i mention in this fic that the reader and Jenna are drinking. I’m aware that Jenna is 20 and in the states the legal age is 21, but where I’m from it’s 18 so just deal with it xx

With Jenna’s music playing softly through the speakers of the living room of your shared apartment, the two of you were preparing to stream her new show ‘Wednesday’ for the first time as it finally comes to Netflix. It was currently 30 minutes away from being released and you had decided to treat the moment as a small celebration, preparing various snacks as well as some celebratory cocktails. You wanted nothing more than to celebrate your girlfriend which is why you insisted on doing all the preparation, allowing Jenna to livestream on her instagram to interact with fans before the big release.

With Jenna sat on the couch setting up the livestream and you going back and forth from the kitchen preparing for the incoming marathon, there was an air of excitement within your home that filled you with nothing but pure joy. Jenna had set up her phone, held up by your empty cocktail glass, on your coffee table. “Y/N I’m going to start streaming in a minute. Are you sure you don’t want to be in it?” Jenna questions, turning around on the couch to look at you in the kitchen, offering you a small smile. “No that’s ok. They wanna see your gorgeous face not mine.” you jokingly flirt with a look of admiration on your face. “Besides I need to finish setting up for our little marathon. I’m excited to see you on screen for like… 6 hours?, which shouldn’t be too hard seeing I can never take my eyes off you anyway.” “Y/N!” Jenna shouts as she becomes increasingly flustered, her cheeks now painted red, making her look somehow more adorable. “Ok suit yourself but I’m going to start now. I love you” she says blowing you a kiss. “I love you too” you reply, looking at her with heart eyes as her focus returns to her phone as she starts the livestream.

“Hellooooo” Jenna greets as the viewers start pouring in, the comments instantly flooding with excitement. “God this is really exciting.” she starts, flashing her beautiful smile to the audience. “Wednesday is officially on Netflix in… 21 minutes so I thought I would come on here and we could just chill out and I’ll answer any of your questions”

As she talks to her fans and answers numerous questions about the show, you can’t help but just stare at her. One of the things you always admired about Jenna was her passion for the things, and people, she loves, so watching her genuinely enjoy herself whilst interacting with her fans makes you grin inwardly, a small smirk appearing on your face as you try to return your focus onto the drinks.

You were trying your best to not disturb her and remain as quiet as possible, but these cocktails weren’t going to make themselves, so you fill up your shaker with the ingredients and start mixing. Jenna immediately lifts her head, turning it in your direction as you shoot her an apologetic smile. Jenna looks back at her phone apologising for the noise as the topic of the comments suddenly change.

ilovejenna: what’s that noise??

jenna_fan: is someone else there? whoooo

wednesday4life: is that Y/N?? get them on here NOW

A smile immediately forms on Jenna’s face at the the mention of your name. “Sorry guys that’s just my partner Y/N.” she says through her giddy smile. “We are planning on watching the show together and they wanted to make some celebratory cocktails”

ortegareels: omg that’s so sweet of them

jenna.ortega.fanpage: THE Y/N L/N!! GET THEM ON RN!!

onlyjennaa: GIRL!! bring them here rn

Jenna giggles at the influx of comments begging for you to join her, eventually giving in and agreeing to get you to come say hi. “Y/N?”, she calls from the couch. “Yeh?” you reply, pouring out the two cocktails into separate glasses, adding a small garnish to make it extra fancy. “Can you come here please? Everyone wants you to say hi.” “Oh” you think out loud, not expecting them to take any interest in you. “Ok I’ll be there in a second hold on”. Grabbing the two drinks you walk towards your couch, entering the background of her live as her fans start to blow up at the site of you. As you round the couch, you place the two glasses down of your coffee table and take a seat next to Jenna, giving her a small kiss on the cheek. Shifting your focus to her phone you instantly notice the copious amounts of questions that continue to flood the comments.

“Hi” you say with a small chuckle. “Hi cutie.” Jenna says returning a kiss onto your cheek. “Ok so we have about 5 minutes before the shows live so fire away I guess” she smiles, facing her phone to read the comments as she slips her hand into yours.

jennaortegamyidol: how long have you guys been dating?? and where did you meet??

“We have been together for just over 2 years now” Jenna replies instantly glancing at you with a smile “Best two years of my life” you casually added, squeezing her hand and admiring her side profile as you see the familiar red return to her cheeks. “We met through mutual friends when we were like 16 or so and starting dating just after we both turned 18” you continued, taking your eyes off your girlfriend to address the audience.

jennaoutfits: who’s most likely to fall asleep whilst watching something together??

“Oh definitely Y/N” “What?!?” you retort incredulously, letting go of her hand playfully glaring at Jenna. “You have to be kidding me. It is so you, you legit always fall asleep on top of me when we watch something. I’d be shocked if you make it through Wednesday without falling asleep.” you fight back causing Jenna to just laugh before admitting defeat. “Yeahhh your right”. “Damn right.” you boast before adding, “I love it though it’s super cute” giving her a quick peck on the cheek.

jennaortegaswife: which one of you is most likely to get jealous?

As soon as Jenna read it out loud, a small teasing smile spread on her face as she slowly turned her head, resting it on her hand, and just looked at you. You looked at her for a second before accepting defeat. “Yeah that would be me” you chuckle looking slightly embarrassed. “I mean rightfully so though I mean look at you. Your gorgeous. I don’t know how I got you in the first place there is no way I’m letting anyone take you away from me.” you rant in an attempt to justify yourself as Jenna watches in pure amusement. “Love don’t worry your hot when your jealous.” she teases, placing a chaste kiss on your pouting lips, instantly causing you to smile.

“Oh guys it’s live in less than a minute.” Jenna suddenly announces realising the time. “I think that means we are going to leave this here and let you all go.” “All of you better go support my girlfriend or I swear I will find you” you jokingly threaten as Jenna flashes you an appreciative smile. “Thanks for being here guys. I love you all. Thank you guys so much for the support I hope you enjoy the show.” she finishes as she blows them a kiss, ending the stream.

As Jenna throws her phone to the other end of the couch, she grabs the two cocktails, handing one to you, and faces you. “Cheers. To my beautiful girlfriend and her unbelievable talent” you lift you glass staring at your girlfriend with nothing but pure adoration in your eyes as she attempts to hide her blush. The two of you toast glasses and take a drink, before placing them down on the coffee table and snuggling into each other with Netflix open and ready.

Jenna places her head on your chest and wraps her arms around you waist holding you tight. “You are really cute when you are flustered you know.” you whisper into her hair, lacing it with small and gentle kisses. “Shut up” she murmurs smiling, playfully hitting your stomach as you chuckle softly, picking up the remote and pressing play.

#jenna ortega x reader #jenna ortega #jenna ortega request #jenna ortega imagine #jenna ortega x fem reader #jenna ortega x fem!reader #wednesday netflix #wednesday premiere #wednesday #jenna ortega fluff #jenna ortega x gn! reader #jenna ortega x gn reader #simp4wom3n #wednesday addams x reader

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blushedfemme · 2 months

Note

Any advise on how to flirt as a femme?? I’m talking to someone rn and don’t know how flirt :(

okay i tried to warn you all that i’m NOT very good at flirting but i will attempt to offer some advice specific to femmes!! i assume you’re flirting with butches because as a femme4butch my blog is mainly oriented to that, so here goes:

compliment butch aspects of their appearance. it will stick out as more flirty than something generic. if you are complimenting a jacket or pin, reach out and touch it lightly, then pull your hand away after a couple seconds and gauge their reaction

give them opportunities to help you or perform butch chivalry for you. graciously accept any offers of assistance with “thank you, that would be lovely” and a warm smile. trying to not be a burden and pulling out the “oh no i got it, i don’t wanna bother you!” will come across as cold at best and mildly insulting at worst, and will not get you anywhere on the flirting front

take any excuse to touch them or get close to them, ideally asking first, “oh your collar is crooked, can i fix it?” (whether or not their collar is actually crooked 😉)

ask about what’s important to them and remember the little details! my memory is shit so if i’m in a talking stage with someone i will often write things down (their hobbies, interests, likes/dislikes) anything i can bring up later to make them feel seen and to convey my interest

also asking for “help” picking out outfits and sending them cute fit pics can be a fun way to flirt over text. it also shows you value their opinion! and it may encourage them to do the same, which gives you an opening to compliment them (see first point)

when getting to know someone you’re mostly getting to know how they see themselves. consciously or not people will talk about the aspects of themselves they like the most when flirting, and they also might apologetically/self-deprecatingly bring up the aspects they don’t like about themselves, too. this isn’t exactly advice it’s just something i like to be aware of, on both sides of a flirting scenario. i try to pay attention to the positive things they see in themselves and affirm those traits whenever it feels natural

i feel like it’s easy to think that flirting has to be a constant stream of witty banter like we see in movies and shows and while that can be fun for sure, most people are NOT good at that, and for some it could even be a turn off. (it certainly is for me.) maybe it’s the autism talking but i think showing genuine interest in their interests and telling them straight up what you like about them, both physical and personality traits, are perfectly legit flirting methods. i hope you find this helpful, anon, and i’m rooting for you!! 💕☺️

#clarke answers #ask a femme

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zaimta · 1 year

Note

Hiii! Are your requests open? I’ve been reading your OP stories and I loooove them!

So I was wondering if I can request a story where Ace and zoro are both interested in you, like hella interested and causes a lot of tension ? You can choose how it ends and who reader ends up with lol.

zai broadcasts - pre time skip zoro gotta love him man this idea was a serve anon, im gonna split this into 2 parts bc i actually love both of them and i can’t pick one and i have ideas for both that i wanna use so stay tuned for em!!

˗ˏˋzoro ver. ˗ˏˋace ver.

˗ˏˋ«────── « 𓆩♡𓆪 » ──────»

“nice to meet you everyone i’m ace, and thank you for taking care of my kid brother by the way i know he can be a bit much.”

“oh no he is the near death situations we’ve been in is insane…and you just got on the grand line??”

ace laughed at your snarkiness “that is true he has a tendency to not think!”

nami shrugged her shoulders “well if we’re being honest here i don’t get paid enough to die every five minutes.”

“agreed.” the remaining stawhats spoke in unison slightly annoying their captain.

“hey i’m an excellent captain thank you very much!”

after the reunion between brothers ace revealed he was looking for a man named blackbeard and since their paths collided he decided to travel along with luffy and his crew.

“so are you gonna stop staring at him or go talk to him?” nami nudged you with a grin becoming aware of your little crush on ace.

you nudged her back with burning cheeks “shut up! it’s not like that nami.”

she rolled her eyes and mimicked your voice while fluttering her eyelashes “oh ace you’re so handsome! oh ace you’re hotter than your devil fruit! oh ace the things i’d let you do to me-”

“nami!” you shouted in embarrassment your face growing warm at her horrible impressions and the fact that he might’ve heard.

“the logical thing here would be to just talk to him! it’s not everyday you see a catch like him on the grandline y/n.”

“yeah…” you sighed looking over to where the green haired swordsman was leaned the mast he was napping as per usual, but the way the sun hit his skin just right. you couldn’t help but to stare, accidentally zoning nami out in the process only hearing her again when he gently nudges you for your attention.

“oohhh zoro too huh” she smirked at you but then sighed “personally im team ace im pretty sure he can pay his debts on time…”

“oh speak of the devil here he comes~” nami’s eyes followed ace as he walked along the deck of the merry, she noticed how his eyes lit up once he spotted you and she smirked to herself.

you turned around making eye contact with ace and turned around immediately, which caused nami to laugh at you being to nervous. “ready or not here he comes” she giggled.

“hey y/n, how are you doing”

nami giggled “oh? so excited to see them you forgot all about me?” ace attempted to respond but nami cuts him off speaking with a devilish grin directed towards you “up bup up! i’ll leave you two love birds to talk okay?” she ways goodbye to the two of you and walks into the kitchen of the merry.

ace sighs and sits next to you on the deck, his shoulder softly brushing against yours “so what was that all about?” he chuckles while pointing in nami’s direction. you roll your eyes with a slight smile on your face “that’s just how nami is, y’a know sweet dependable, insufferable nami…so” you look him in the eyes “what’s life like for you on the seas mr. ‘fire fist’” ace smiles at you “oh you know sailing, meeting amazing people, can’t forget running from the navy.”

you chuckle a bit “you don’t say?”

he chuckles “yup, the best part has been meeting amazing people like you” he takes his hat off and places it on your head with a grin “you’re quite the catch y/n.”

from the kitchen sanji watched the two of you on the deck, and suddenly gasped loudly which got the attention of nami and zoro “that bastard?! taking my y/n like that?!?” he shouts angrily. nami raises a brow “what now?” sanji points at the window with tears welling up in his eyes “everyone knows that if a cowboy puts their hat on someone, they’re claiming that person, that bastard just claimed y/n!” he speaks through sobs “nami-swan hold meeeee” me leapt into her arm’s crying into her shirt so she had no choice but to comfort the cook “there there” nami rolls her eyes while patting his back lightly.

“so what you’re saying his y/n is his now?” zoro said suddenly grabbing the attention of nami and the weeping cook, nami smirks at the swordsman “what do you have a crush on y/n or something? y/n looks cozy with ace don’t you think, are you sure you can’t even make a dent in that?”

zoro sucks his teeth “what’s that supposed to mean?” nami’s smirk grew wider and there was a mischievous glint in her eyes “im saying that y/n seems pretty into ace, unless you’re into y/n and you want to change that.” zoro snaps at the ship’s navigator in frustration “of course i want to change that!”

zoro’s eyes grow wide at what he said and a brush quickly creeps up his neck and spreads across his face “i mean-”

sanji looks at zoro in shock while nami has a grin on her face, she points towards the deck where the two of you are sitting “so how about you go do something about it, swordsman.”

#one piece x reader #zoro x reader #ace x reader #portgas d ace x reader #roronoa zoro x reader #roronoa zoro x y/n #roronoa zoro x you #ace x you #ace x y/n #portgas d ace x y/n #portgas d ace x you #portgas ace x you #portgas ace x reader #one piece x y/n #one piece x you #one piece fluff #zoro fluff #ace fluff

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alexiswritingstuff · 1 year

Text

Is that... lipstick?

Pairing: Castiel x gn! reader.

Other appearances: Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester

Summary: While trying to have a morning like any other, the Winchester brothers notice a certain fact about the reader they apparently hadn’t themselves. Though once they did, it was something... very unexpected.

Content/Warnings: implied intimacy. nothing explicit unless you want it to be. implied alcohol consumption.

Also this has not been proofread again so be aware that there might be spelling mistakes and such.

A/N: okayokayokay I had this idea from that trend on tiktok where a person would show themselves fixing up their lipstick and then pan to the reason it was messed up in the first place (their partner) and immediately just came up with whatever this was.

Cas is like my go to when writing rn but If someone wants like a Dean x reader version of this... let me know...

Waking up always felt like the most difficult part of the day. A sort of sluggishness continuously pulling at every muscle within your body. A dull ache that pulsed across the temple as if in harmony with a heartbeat.

There was a list of things that begged you to stay in the comfort of a bed, but you found yourself up and about anyway, ending up in the kitchen with squinting eyes as soon as the harsh lighting consumed your vision.

You had a milk carton in one hand, while your other held onto a bowl of dry cereal, and you titled it to the side, watching the liquid pour over the bites of paradise until some began to float.

Sam was sat at the table to your right. His eyes were practically glued to the screen, his fingers typing away like he was doing a test for how fast he could do it. A sound that didn’t exactly help your head, even though there was the hood of a hoodie covering your ears.

“Yo, Sam, you’re the smart one,” you started after returning the milk to its cold home. The frantic pressing of keys ceased all at once, after at least 3 more words had been spelled out. “... What?”

“I’m not... I’m not repeating that-- How do you cure a headache?” you questioned instead, grabbing the spoon you had set down earlier. Sam’s chair squeaked lightly as he leaned back. “Um...”

“I’m pretty sure you could just take an ibuprofen. Or, you know, put a wet towel on your head? Something like that.”

The younger Winchester sort of looked at you for a minute, though he could only see your back. His eyes analysed your posture, the way that you moved, the way that you stood. And then they narrowed.

His chin slightly tilted up, “Did you drink a lot last night?”

A scoff passed through your lips immediately. “I honestly don’t have an answer to that.” The first mouthful of cereal had been brought to your lips and the second the food touched your tongue, your shoulders relaxed. A sigh seeped through your nose. “I wanna marry the person that made cereal.”

The bowl that really was utter paradise was now in your hands, your fingers gripping onto it for dear life as you finally turned yourself round so that you could lean against the metal island.

“You know that person is dead and has been for... many years, right?” Sam spoke with furrowed eyebrows, the laptop in front of him now long forgotten. “Never stopped me before.” was all you had said before another spoonful was shovelled into your mouth.

At this point a set of footsteps had started echoing through the hallway, and after Sam looked at you with either disgust or concern, or both, his eyes went to the doorway.

“Whoa.” Dean’s feet halted for a moment as he looked between his relieved looking brother and the gremlin thing that was practically hunched over a bowl. “What kind of meeting is this?”

You swallowed, “One where people stop asking questions first thing in the morning.” you responded lazily, gathering more of the contents into your spoon. Dean raised his eyebrows for a second, only to nod his head a second later when his brother sent him a shrug.

“Well,” He continued his previous movements and was now officially in the kitchen, beginning to make his way through the space between the island and the table. “As long as I get breakfast out of it, I---”

Dean stopped almost as fast as he had started. And soon enough, by the time your mouth was yet again full, it seemed that the man was now stood to your side.

It wasn’t until you looked up that you had actually noticed those green eyes of his were aimed right at you, even though you hadn’t uttered a word. You could only blink for a moment.

“What?” you finally questioned, the word barely audible through the mush.

But Dean still stared, mouth agape and eyes flickering over almost every inch of your face in a way that made you want to fold in on yourself. You swallowed again, “Wha-- What? What is it?”

The man before you took about a step backwards, allowing Sam to have you in his line of sight. And then he practically mirrored Dean’s expression, his eyebrows beginning to raise as if they were aiming for the ceiling. “... oh.”

“Oh.” Dean said himself.

Then suddenly, as if the final cog had turned in his head, the face that was once frozen in shock had morphed into this shit eating grin that curled in a beyond terrifying way.

He started laughing.

It wasn’t his usual huffed one, a giggle, or even those little ones he did when making fun of someone. This man was full on cackling in a way that had him bending at the knees.

Sam himself did a bit better at hiding his reaction to whatever it was they were seeing, though his lips sort of trembled as they tucked very tightly together.

You placed the bowl onto the island behind you, arms now crossed over your chest, as you looked between the boys like a disappointed teacher. “Am I going to have to wait a year for you to tell me what the hell is going on?”

“Oh-- Oh, man, this-- this is-- Oh, my god, this is great!” Dean strained out through even more hard laughs while you looked back and forth between the brothers, desperately trying to gage what had happened. “What?”

Finally, after asking the same question over and over again for what felt like the millionth time at this point, and after Sam managed to clear his throat without cracking, he spoke up. “Have you, uh...”

“Have you looked in a mirror at all this morning?”

You shook your head slowly, your eyebrows now very much furrowed if they weren’t before, “No... Why?”

Dean couldn’t even properly speak at this point, as every attempt to contain that urge of laughter ended in yet another fit. “You-- Man, I want-- Ha! I want a picture of this.” he managed out after a few tries, and even began to pat at his pockets as best as he could in his condition.

Though, the laugh and the lack of understand of what the hell was happening made you feel very self-conscious in that moment... You had to admit that it was very nice to see Dean like that, let alone hear that sort of laughter that hasn’t been heard in a very long time.

After staring at the man who was still in absolute hysterics for a second longer, your eyes travelled back over to Sam when he cleared his throat again, and even scrunched his nose in an attempt to calm himself down.

“Yeah,” he started through a slight hushed voice as he nodded his head, “I think it’s best if you go look, just-- No reason.”

It was literally first thing in the morning. Your energy levels didn’t even exist at this point, and all you really wanted to do was just eat your damn cereal in peace... but nevertheless.

You complied.

Your gaze flicked back and forth between the brothers one more time before you pushed yourself off of the island and moved towards the doorway, your feet dragging with every step.

Another round of laughter erupted as soon as you had left the room.

Various grumbles joined by the hum of electronic power were the only sounds that echoed through the annoyingly bright halls.

Though the air that circulated was cool, it never seemed to ease the warm rush of embarrassment that burned around your body, despite not even knowing the cause.

After walking through the maze like hallways within the bunker, that felt even longer when tired, you had found yourself in front of the large dark door that held the shower room behind it.

With all the strength you could muster in your state, you turned so that your shoulder could lean on the wood. Your hand grabbed at the handle that was so cold underneath your fingertips that you had almost immediately retracted. As if electrocuted.

The door swung open within the next second, but as soon as it had done so, instead of taking a step inside, your hands now jolted up to cover your eyes, “Jesus!” You blinked more times than anyone could count, your eyelids barely even making it halfway before they had to shut again.

The walls in the room were basically all white, meaning that the light emitted from the ceiling just purely bounced around every nook and cranny. “Might as well be looking at the damn sun.” you muttered to yourself, an irritated sigh following after.

Once you had at least mildly managed to get adjusted to the disgraceful lighting, you allowed yourself to shuffle into the equally cold room.

Soon enough, your heavy body ended up at the sink, your hands grasping along the rim of the bowl in an attempt to stabilise yourself when another ache had pulsed along your forehead.

You took in a deep breath through your nose and held it there for a few seconds. Your eyes landed on the mirror that sat before you, the blinking beginning all over again as the reflection being seen was only blurry.

But thus, after a good minute of being in that bathroom, your body allowed itself to adjust to everything that continuously attacked your senses.

One last blink was all it took before you could see yourself in the glass as clear as day... And everything that came with it.

“Oh... my god.”

Your face was brought closer to the mirror within an instant, your previously tired and heavy eyes becoming fully open in alarm as they were now the ones to search across the skin of your face.

On almost every single feature, that you could see in front of you, was an imprint from a certain cosmetic.

Most entirely followed the outline that very clearly resembled the shape of lips, but others were smudged, some even dragging to where another had been placed.

Lipstick.

There was an odd texture that you had felt tighten the indents of your face this morning, but never in your life would you have imagined that this was the reason. You thought your skin was just being weird.

Your body was frozen. No matter how hard you thought in that moment, there was absolutely no recollection of the previous night. Or who even owned lipstick.

The eyes that stared back at you were almost wild now, a sort of panic surging through your veins at the lack of any memory... Though, it faded into something else as fast as it had started.

Your hood had slipped off the back of your head after your sudden movement. And now, upon gazing at the new areas exposed to you, your eyes ended up travelling even lower. Which now left you realising yet another thing.

The marks weren’t only on your face.

Your heart was purely hammering in your chest, all of the previous confusion and disorientation from earlier fuelling the fire that was panic, as you slowly pushed yourself backwards to stand up straight.

There was a print of lips halfway under the neckline of your hoodie.

Your hands raised, almost frightened, to grip at the fabric. And soon you had it between your fingers, realising now that the texture of that too had been altered from stains that you were guessing happened during everything else.

With a slight shake to your breath, and a squeeze of the material in your grasp, you gingerly began to pull it away so that the skin of your torso was properly revealed in the light--

It was slammed back to your chest within the next second. An audible gasp had even spilled from your lips as you found your gaze in the mirror yet again. Eyes still wide, almost unblinking.

“Holy...”

Your feet took a stumbled step away from the sink, your fingers still tightly clutched to your hoodie, as if it was a set of pearls. But even that couldn’t hide the set prints that apparently travelled a lot further than you thought. The more parts that you looked at, the more stains you found.

Your body had been a canvas to a painter you couldn’t remember.

At this point, you were stood in the centre of the room. Every emotion felt morphing into one thing that spread from your head to your toes.

And then you turned, twisting slow on your feet until your hazed eyes landed on at least one of those large showers that seemed more appealing than they had ever in the morning.

How the hell did you get lipstick off?

To rid the skin of countless stains took longer than you had originally thought.

Most of your body felt raw. As if you had scrubbed it with sandpaper for hours on end, though it was just your hands. All was worth it, however, as the previous marks were no more.

For the first time throughout the entire morning, the air that engulfed you within the hallway relieved the warmth that clung as you walked through it, your fresh set of clothes slightly sticking to your body more and more with every step.

You ruffled your towel through your damp hair, the ache in your temple now caused by your eyebrows that were furrowed due to the multitude of thoughts that filtered both in and out of your mind.

An act that almost had you walking right past your own bedroom.

Another grumble murmured through your lips as you turned to the side, opening the door like you had done with the one for the shower room. And then you walked in, the fuzz in your mind apparently stopping you from noticing the light that illuminated its contents.

One that previously wasn’t on at all.

Your head shook, as if all the action going on in your mind would just let go.

Instead of getting closer to figuring out last night's mystery, you were getting further away... Or nowhere at all.

You went round the edge of your bed, taking your towel in both hands before stretching the material out completely so that you could drape it across the radiator along the wall.

A breath was brought slowly in and out of your lungs after taking a step back from the warmth. Your spine uncurled from it’s miserable slouch, your arms practically going limp by your sides while your eyes fell closed.

You reached backwards after a moment, hands patting through the air until you managed to locate the mattress that was screaming your name. But instead, you just sat yourself down. Attempting a final try to get to the bottom of everything. “Come on, man.”

At this point, your head was lowered onto your hands that had previously been clasped together moments before.

You tried everything. Thinking back to what you had done before the timeframe of the... event, who it could’ve been. I mean, Sam and Dean would surely have asked questions if it was someone they didn’t know, right?

Still, even after all of that, and the extra seconds you took to wrack through your brain for even the slightest memory from last night. Something that could just spark your brain and give you the answer. There was nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

“Dammit.” you breathed out, your body now falling limp against your lap as your shoulders deflated with it.

There was almost this feeling of shame that pierced through every other one.

It wasn’t so much so about the fact that you couldn’t remember if you had gone out, or brought someone back into your own home, as much as it was about the fact that you had shared such an intimate experience with a person. And you couldn’t remember a single thing.

Who the hell--

“Y/n?”

Your head snapped up within a second, your body following suit in a way that made it seem like you were about to go flying into the wall when you had managed to stand. “Jesus!”

The heel of your foot had twisted so quickly that it almost gave your skin carpet burn. Your arms were up and ready as you looked throughout the room to find the intruder...

And then your eyes landed on your bed. More importantly, those familiar set of blue eyes that stared right back at you.

Your shoulders eased back down as they had done earlier, your calloused hands raising before rubbing at the soft skin of your face, that felt even nicer after that shower.

“Okay, yeah-- I think Dean is right, man. You’ve gotta stop just appearing like that.” you practically groaned out as you pinched at the bridge of your nose.

“Well, I... I seem to have been here before you walked in.”

Your fingers dragged away from the warm skin beneath it so that you could allow your gaze to find the man, who was most definitely not helping your confusion. “Huh?”

Especially when you had actually located him.

Because of your previous glance, you had thought that Cas was just sat on your bed for whatever reason he desired.

Though now, as you properly stared back at him, finally registering that sort of grogginess that further emphasised the gravel to his voice when he had spoken, you had noticed that he was in fact under the covers.

Your covers.

His torso was practically twisted just so that he could meet your eyes while his own were narrowed, adjusting to the light, and almost looked puffy as if he had just woken up.

Your eyebrows were most definitely furrowed if they weren’t before. “I thought angels didn’t sleep.” You were about to say. Another mystery that you had to solve... but instead, just as the words were going to roll off of your tongue, your brain had fully taken in the appearance of the person before you.

Castiel’s hair was dishevelled, heavily contrasting the way it usually sat, which in itself was most unusual.

And then you saw it.

No words could even begin to pass through your lips in that moment. No matter how hard you tried. There wasn’t a sound, or even a vowel.

“Y/n?” Cas questioned before clearing his throat, slowly pushing himself upward until he could sit upright and even did his signature head tilt when he was properly facing you. “What’s wrong?” He fought with an urge to yawn.

You couldn’t move. Your eyes were just glued to his lips. A set that seemed to be layered with a sort of faded deep red which smudged severely over the skin surrounding his mouth, especially towards the corners. “Oh.”

Castiel’s eyebrows furrowed at the lack of fullness to your voice.

It appeared that your mystery was solved.

You had found your mystery painter.

“Oh.”

#castiel #castiel supernatural #castiel novak #Castiel SPN #castiel x reader #castiel x you #castiel x gender neutral reader #supernatural castiel #supernatural #Supernatural fanfic #supernatural x reader #supernatural x gender neutral reader #dean winchester #supernatural dean #Sam Winchester #supernatural sam

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ur-boyfiend · 7 months

Text

hai , here's some chan x reader fluffy domestic stuff, if anyone wants to see a continuation lemme know ^^

you’re lying in bed on your back, eyes closed and earbuds in. your skills at zoning out are strong, so you’re not very aware of your surroundings. you don’t have any plans for today, but your friends and boyfriend like to stop by unannounced, so you don’t particularly expect to be left alone all day.

that’s why you’re not that surprised when you feel someone's weight drop on top of you. you pause your music and pull out your earbuds, looking up slightly to see a mop of curly blond hair. laughing quietly, you gently run your fingers through your boyfriend’s hair, and he leans into your touch.

“what’s goin’ on channie?” he seems more tired than usual, which is saying something. he mumbles something in response, but his face is still buried in your chest so you can’t actually tell what he’s saying.

“love, i can’t hear you.”

he lifts his head up to look at you, and his expression almost reminds you of an upset puppy, “people don’t know how to do their jobs. i came in and nobody had finished their part of the project, you could tell they all expected me to finish it for them. so now i’m doing the entire project myself.”

you frown, knowing that being one of the best students in the music department meant people assumed chan would do their work for them if they asked. you’ve given plenty of students deadly side-eye when they tried to bother chan, but most of them just try again when you’re not there.

“can you tell your professor?”

chan just shakes his head, “i don’t wanna tell the professor because that’d give them the chance to get their shit together. i’ll just do the project myself and leave their names off of it, their loss.”

you laugh quietly, appreciating the pettiness. you were probably a bad influence, but because of chan’s default sweetheart personality, you were glad he wasn’t letting people take advantage of him anymore.

“if there’s any way i can help let me know, alright?”

“you have your own classes to work on, i don’t wanna use up your work time.”

you shake your head, “the biggest assignment i have right now is my end of semester project for my visual arts class, my team for the year end fashion show is actually ahead of where we need to be since we’re all prone to hyperfocusing on the work.”

chan grumbled slightly, “imagine having a team that do their work, what a concept.”

you gently scratch at his scalp, still running your fingers through his hair, “is there anyone else in your class you could team up with? maybe not for this project, but for future ones?”

chan shrugs, “i try not to interact with people unless they interact with me first, i don’t need to prompt people to bug me.”

you snort, knowing how he feels. people used to treat you the same way, the difference is you’re just a lot more intimidating than him, and people figured out pretty quickly that you weren’t gonna do their work for them.

“i think one of my friends was talking about his boyfriend needing a new team for his assignment, i’m pretty sure another one of our friends is in a similar situation… lemme ask real quick.”

he hums in confirmation and you grab your phone from where it sat abandoned on the low shelf next to your bed, quickly putting in your passcode and opening the ‘dance hoes’ groupchat. you know each other because of how often the performance and fashion departments work together, everyone in the chat had done modeling for you at some point.

you send a quick text, ‘hey can the catboys get online?’

quickly you get responses from two of the other chat members, both asking what was going on, one much more kindly than the other. you’re pretty sure chan has fallen asleep on you, but you keep playing with his hair as you ask the pair about what they’d mentioned earlier.

they both give quick confirmation, and you explain your idea. both disappear for a second, before confirming that their boyfriends were down to meet up with everyone. you decide to work out a meeting time later, so you set aside your phone and curl up with chan, tugging a blanket over both of you and closing your eyes, falling asleep in your boyfriend’s arms.

#boyfiend writes #skz #stray kids #stray kids imagines #stray kids x y/n #skz imagines #skz fluff #stray kids fluff #bang chan #bang chan x y/n #bang chan imagines #bang chan x reader #chan x reader #chan fluff #chan x y/n

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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 10 months

Text

Comet Donati [Chapter 3: Steal My Girl]

A/N: Hello lovely readers! Thank you so so so much for the love this fic has received. I wanted to give you a heads up that I will be co-leading a field trip to Japan from July 4th-14th and will therefore have much less time to write. HOPEFULLY I won’t have to skip a Sunday update, but I wanted to make you aware just in case. I hope you enjoy Chapter 3!!! 💜

Series Summary: Sex, drugs, boy bands. You are a kinda-therapist recruited (via nepotism) to help Comet Donati through a recent crisis. Things are casual with Aegon, very not-casual with Aemond. Loosely inspired by One Direction.

Chapter Warnings: Language, references to sexual content (18+), drugs, alcohol, smoking, mental health struggles, Aegon-induced chaos, ANGST, Iceland, you cannot escape the Cookie Monster pajama pants.

Selected Chapter Quote: “So what, you don’t like me anymore?”

Word count: 8.3k (wtf I need to chill).

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

Taglist: @doingfondue @catalina-howard @randomdragonfires @myspotofcraziness @arcielee @fan-goddess @talesofoldandnew @marvelescvpe @tinykryptonitewerewolf @mariahossain @chainsawsangel @darkenchantress @not-a-glad-gladiator @gemini-mama @trifoliumviridi @herfantasyworldd @babyblue711 @namelesslosers @thelittleswanao3 @daenysx @moonlightfoxx @libroparaiso @burningcoffeetimetravel-fics @mizfortuna @florent1s @heimtathurs @bhanclegane @poohxlove @narwhal-swimmingintheocean @heavenly1927 @mariahossain @echos-muses @padfooteyes @minttea07

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist! 💜

Athens, Madrid, Porto, Vienna, Stockholm, and now: descending into Reykjavik through clouds like iron. The North Atlantic is an endless sheen of cold overcast blue, a mirror of the sky. The earth is rocky and anemic. There are no jewel tones here, no sapphires or emeralds or aquamarines or fire opals or topazes. It is impossible to look down at Iceland, this dominion of impassionate jaggedness, and not think of how the Vikings had to reap their treasures from every other corner of Europe, silver and gold and glass and slaves piled into ships to be rowed back to the hostile earth they clung to, perhaps just to prove they could.

Across the aisle of the private jet—more like a penthouse than a plane, posh neutral colors and hand-stitched leather—Luke is showing Aemond his latest lyrics, loops of silver on matte black pages. They’re good, from what you’ve heard. They’re really good. And that tells you what kind of person Aemond truly is as he helps Luke polish rocks into gemstones. Anybody can soften the blow of mediocrity. It takes courage to build ladders for people who might one day outclimb you.

Daeron is playing his Nintendo 64, which is hooked up to a 98-inch flat screen tv; Mario is leaping through paintings into worlds of lava, ice, sentient ticking bombs. Criston is answering emails. Cregan is sprawled across a couch with his sunglasses on, presumably sound asleep. Jace is leering at you, dark hair hanging in his face and slurping a Vesper.

You ask him half-mocking: “What tattoo are you going to get for Reykjavik?”

He yanks off his sequined red blazer—nothing underneath, as usual—and twists around to show you the puffin on his left shoulder blade. Comet, at some point in time that preceded you, has already been to Iceland. “Cute, right? Wanna pet it?”

You roll your eyes. “I’m sorry I asked.”

He grins. “No you’re not.”

Aegon kicks the back of Jace’s chair. He’s scribbling some notes of his own, which is unusual. In place of a spiral notebook with onyx pages, Aegon is writing on crinkled Starbucks receipts with a Sharpie. He’s wearing his favorite aviator sunglasses, khaki cargo pants, an excessively bright cyan tank top, and matching Crocs.

Baela stares blankly out the window for a few seconds—like she’s buffering, a lagging connection—and then she looks to you hopefully. “Shopping when we land?”

“Does Iceland have shops…?”

“Probably more than Kansas,” Aemond says, then smiles mischieviously.

“Missouri,” you fling back. He returns his attention to Luke.

“They totally have shops in Iceland,” Baela assures you.

“Then I am amenable. I need more concert outfits.” You mostly wear your boy band t-shirts from home, which has become a joke: One Direction, Backstreet Boys, New Kids On The Block, NSYNC, the Jonas Brothers, Boyz II Men, 98 Degrees, BTS…but never Comet Donati. Anyone but them. Aegon calls you a traitor. Aemond teases, smirks, tries to hide how much he watches you the same way people contemplate art on museum walls, a little confounded, a little entranced.

“Rhaena?” Baela says. “Hello? Hello? Hola? Bonjour? Rhaena?”

Rhaena startles, peering up from her novel: Jurassic Park. Once upon a time, as you’ve learned, she had planned to study paleontology. She wants to be alone in the middle of a field someplace digging up bones. Well, no great tragedy there; one is never too old to be a paleontologist. She can take off five years, or ten years, or twenty, or thirty to see Luke through his touring days and then pick back up her own ambitions like keys left on a hook. But Baela gave up a ballet scholarship to follow Jace across the globe, puddle to puddle, land to land, and in your albeit limited understanding, ballerinas age in something like dog years. Their career is a brilliant, lightning-brief flash and then long, anonymous decades running out their mortal clock as choreographers, backup dancers, personal trainers, instructors for blue-blooded five-year-olds. Baela won’t be able to reclaim that dream for much longer. It might be too late already. She is out of practice; but she misses ballet. When Jace is being snide or oblivious, you’ve seen her gazing out windows—Escalades, hotels, jets—wondering if it was all worth it. You gut yourself for someone and they don’t even have the courtesy to put up a gravestone. It’s only natural to develop a propensity to haunt.

“What?” Rhaena asks.

“Shopping. This afternoon. Interested?”

Rhaena’s eyes go wide. She fidgets: closing and then opening her book, touching a hand to her earrings, delicate strings of small silver hearts. “Um…I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Oh, not this again,” Baela groans.

“Just go without me. Bring me back something, you know what I like.”

“What’s the problem?” You are investigative but not accusatory. The tone is essential.

“She’s scared of store employees,” Baela says.

“Well you don’t have to make it sound like that—!”

“What’s so scary about store employees?” you ask Rhaena, calm, cool, collected, nonjudgmental. Aemond glances over, as he often does when you’re working, like he can’t get enough of watching that switch flip, when you slink covertly into therapist mode like a water moccasin weaves through swamps, subtle ripples in the muddied water and vigilant eyes.

“I just hate it when people are watching me,” Rhaena says, twirling an earring. “They’re always waiting right by the door—especially at the posh places like the ones Baela goes to—and they want to know what I’m shopping for, and they want to make suggestions, and they follow me to the fitting room and ask what I like and what I don’t. And I can’t get rid of them! Even if I’m like ‘Just looking, thanks!’ they’ll circle back every five minutes to check on me. I can’t stand it. I get so frazzled I can’t decide how I really feel about a skirt or dress or whatever because I’m too busy trying to make conversation with someone I don’t want to talk to anyway. I end up with a headache and a shopping bag full of regrets. I’d rather click a button on my MacBook Air and save myself the suffering.”

You nod sagely. “What is it about talking to the employees that stresses you out so much?”

“I don’t want to say or do the wrong thing. I don’t want to cause problems.”

“But it’s not like you’re going to do anything they haven’t experienced before. They see hundreds, maybe even thousands of customers a month. And even if you did something ridiculously, dementedly embarrassing, like…um…hey, Aegon, what’s the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever done while clothes shopping?”

“I fell asleep in a fitting room. I pissed on the floor. I set something on fire. I vandalized One Direction merchandise.”

“No, there was that other time,” Daeron says. Mario is swimming through rings of underwater coins; they chime gleefully as he collects them.

“What other time?” Aegon says.

Daeron grins. “Come on. You know.”

Aegon remembers. “Oh yeah. Once I bit a girl’s feet until I accidentally ripped off part of a toenail and she bled everywhere. But that wasn’t my fault. She was begging for it. It was consensual.”

Criston, not looking away from his emails, says: “And that’s why Aegon is now banned from all Michael Kors locations for life.”

“Right.” You turn back to Rhaena. “So you would never do anything that deranged. But even if somehow you did, what’s the actual worst-case scenario? What, realistically, could happen as a result?”

Rhaena considers this. “The employees will think I’m weird, I guess.”

“So what you’re so concerned about is that the store employees—who are literally paid to be inconvenienced by you—might think you’re weird? Which they’ll remember for, what, maybe an hour before some other customer gives them a more memorable calamity to focus on? You don’t think they’re more annoyed by purse-dog-toting heiresses screeching at them or cokeheads pissing on their floors?”

“Rude,” Aegon says.

Rhaena smiles guiltily. “I mean, when you put it that way, it does sound stupid.”

“Not stupid,” you insist. “Just out of proportion.”

“Okay,” Rhaena says. She takes a deep breath, steeling herself. “Okay. I guess I’ll go shopping.”

“Yes!” Baela cheers, already scrolling through Reykjavik shops on her iPhone.

“Hey, Stargirl,” Aegon says, and then hurls something at you like a frisbee. It’s an Amex Black Card.

“Oh no.”

“Oh yes.”

You raise an eyebrow at him. “What’s my budget?”

“No budget. As long as it’s slutty.”

“I will buy nothing but cardigans and mom jeans.” You crane your neck to peek at his receipts. The black Sharpie squiggles aren’t words; they’re shapes, pictures. “What are you drawing?”

“New merch designs!” Aegon holds up the receipts so you can see.

“Circles…?”

He is somewhat wounded. “Donuts!”

You don’t even know where to begin. “Why donuts, Aegon?”

“Because that’s his code word for doing lines in the bathroom,” Criston says.

“No!” Aegon objects. “Because Donati sounds like donuts! So we could have all these mini donuts, print them on hats or shirts or whatever, and then in the frosting where the sprinkles would be we can put tiny stars, suns, moons, planets, galaxies…and comets, obviously.”

Jace scoffs. “I think you spend a little too much time thinking about donuts.”

Aegon goes quiet. So does everyone else. Gazes flit nervously around the cabin. The only sounds are the roar of the jet and Mario 64, although Daeron has turned his back on the cheerful Italian protagonist and is looking pensively over his shoulder at Jace. Aegon resumes sketching his cosmic Sharpie donuts, his lips pressed tightly together.

“Hey,” you say to Jace, and then once you have his attention, wicked dark eyes: “Shut the fuck up.”

“What?”

“It’s a great idea. It’s a really adorable idea, actually. Let’s see you come up with something better. Go on, whenever you’re ready. I’m waiting. I’m still waiting. But you’re not much of an ideas guy, are you, Jace? Fortunately, you’ve always had other people around to pull that weight.”

Jace opens his mouth to say something, then snaps it shut as Cregan stands up. He towers over you both, as tall as Aemond but more muscly all over, in the chest and the shoulders and the legs. He lowers his sunglasses to show his eyes: greyish, cold, flinty. He glares at Jace, and then at you, and then at Jace again. Jace holds up both hands, showing his palms. You bow your head in capitulation. Cregan lies back down on the couch and repositions his sunglasses just as the pilot turns on the fasten seatbelts signs. As you click yours into place, you exchange a glance with Aemond across the aisle. He is smiling, foxlike and approving, as if he can’t wait to see what else you have left to show him.

“So!” Baela says. “Guess who found a shop in Reykjavik that sells Gucci!”

The jet glides through mist and fog to make a rather bumpy landing at Keflavik International Airport, fighting against gusts of wind coming in off the North Atlantic Ocean, the same water that swallowed the Titanic, the Faucett Peru Boeing 727, the Free Life hot air balloon, whaling vessels and Viking longships, countless cruisers and destroyers and submarines that blasted holes into each other during the world wars. As the band prepares to disembark, Aemond reaches into the front pocket of his shirt—black, with white circling koi fish—and slides out a pair of sunglasses. He doesn’t like wearing them. They limit his vision even more than it already is. But he never walks into an airport without sunglasses on, you’ve discovered. Just in case paparazzi are there snapping photos.

“You don’t have to do that,” you tell Aemond.

He gestures to his scar and his blind eye, a pale cloudy blue. “I’ve thought about just getting it cut out. But then I’d have to worry about shoving in a fake one.”

“I think it’s kind of beautiful,” you say. “It reminds me of Neptune or something.”

And the look he gives you, the look, like he’s never heard anything like this before, like he didn’t know that words could fit together in that order. You hold out your hand to him. He lays the sunglasses in your palm. You put them on, grinning up at him.

“Now I’m the one who looks like a multi-millionaire popstar.”

“Hey, we match!” Aegon says as he follows you and Aemond out of the jet, massaging your shoulders and clopping noisily in his Crocs.

There are paparazzi at the airport, but only two of them, young men in black hoodies who dart around loosing flashes into the stuffy, aggressively heated air. Jace, Baela, Daeron, and Aegon beam and wave, radiant, magnetic, born celebrities. Rhaena smiles politely but hides behind Luke. Cregan saunters and smolders, knowing exactly what his devotees expect from him. Criston and the security guards are loaded up with suitcases like pack mules. The paparazzi don’t pay much attention to Aemond—a former heartthrob, a cracked relic, a fossil or a ruin—but one of them snaps a few pictures of him. Aemond turns his face so they’ll get his good side, his unmarred side…and then he grabs for your hand. You try not to reveal how ecstatic you are, how wildly, uncoolly, over-the-moon thrilled. Your expression might end up commemorated forever in a tabloid, after all.

Shopping in Reykjavik is mostly wool sweaters, hiking boots, and weather-proof jackets, but Baela leads you and Rhaena to a boutique that carries something more her speed: Gucci, Burberry, Balenciaga, Valentino, Saint Laurent. You and Baela try to distract the employees as much as possible; still, they find time to nettle Rhaena with those bothersome, predictable, unnecessary questions. She gets a little flustered, but she fights the instinct to run and hide, to allow herself to sink into a frenetic puddle of self-inquisition. You can almost see the words scrolling behind her dark gentle eyes like a news ticker: They get paid to help me. They aren’t going to remember any of this in a few hours. I’m not on a stage. I’m not being judged.

In the fitting room, you take two selfies to send to Aemond’s WhatsApp account: one in a flowing neon yellow gown, the other in a short, velvet, sparkly black dress embroidered with silver stars.

You ask: Day or night?

He answers before you’ve changed back into your jeans and pink Harry Styles hoodie. Night, obviously. And then he adds: Which constellation are you? Vulpecula the fox? Cygnus the swan?

“God, he’s such a dork,” you murmur to yourself, smiling. You have to think for a while before you reply. You don’t know many constellations; that makes it difficult to rattle off something witty. Then you are inspired. You type: Definitely not Virgo :)

He responds immediately: :)))))

“What does that mean?” you whisper to yourself in the solitude of the boxlike fitting room. “What the hell does that mean???” He spends nearly all of his time with you, but he rarely touches you. He’s never made a move. He’s never even kissed you. You wouldn’t mind if he did. No, fuck the coyness that women are supposed to cloak themselves in to preserve their worth. You’re waiting for him to kiss you like someone drowning waits for a gasp of air.

Despite Aemond’s vote, you can’t help yourself. You buy both dresses. You don’t look much like an Aegon Targaryen, but the cashier doesn’t seem too troubled by this. Baela and Rhaena are still trying on outfits, so you swing your bag around boredly and wander over to see what Criston is up to. At Aemond’s insistence, he accompanied you on this shopping expedition and left the rest of the security detail back at the Reykjavik EDITION, a luxury hotel overlooking the harbor. Criston is in the jewelry section and holding up a medallion necklace, rotating it to see how the light reflects off the speckling of tiny gemstones, the wise golden face. His own face is distant and melancholy.

“Oh, that’s lovely, Criston!” you say. “All those emeralds. Who’s pictured on it?”

“Saint Jude. Lost causes.”

Interesting. “Are you religious?”

“Not especially. But Alicent is.”

“Who…?”

Criston walks off to the cash register. You watch him go, curious and perplexed.

Back at the hotel, you enter your suite to find a blond Targaryen lounging in your bed…but perhaps not the right one. Aegon still has his Crocs on and is, for some reason, clutching a plushie puffin. He glances over at you, noting your shopping bag.

“Fashion show?” he says. “I hope it’s nothing but miniskirts and bikinis.”

“Don’t you have places to be? Substances to snort?”

“Cregan is currently trying to locate some.”

“That’s really not good for you. Physically or mentally. You might be addicted.”

He barks a laugh, like it’s absurd. “You can’t get addicted to coke, Stargirl.”

“You definitely can.”

He suddenly looks panicked, like he’s never considered this before.

“So.” You hesitate. “Aemond.”

“Yes, I’m familiar with the concept.”

“He’s insecure. Very insecure, though he’s learned how to hide it.”

Aegon throws and catches the puffin, bouncing it off the ceiling. “I wouldn’t disagree.”

“It goes deeper than the accident, I think. The scar, his eye, what happened with the band…that awakened it again. That freed something that he’d had locked away. But where did it start?”

Aegon stares up at the ceiling. He tosses the puffin a few more times, abusing it terribly. “Whoever you are when you’re in high school…that’s sort of who you are forever, you know? If you’re popular and beloved and understood, you carry a certain self-confidence into the rest of your life with you like a suitcase. It’s an assumption that people care about what you have to say. It’s a conviction of your own value. It’s a presupposition the world would have to wrestle away from you. But if you’re a loser in high school, that stays with you too. And it’s one hell of a heavy suitcase to lug around.”

You try to imagine seeing Aemond through eyes that aren’t awed, craving, quietly adoring. It’s simply not possible. “He was alone?” you ask softly, dreading the answer.

“I had friends. He had grudges.” Aegon’s mouth twists as he tries to stop it from trembling. “My father…”

“I know, Aegon.” Your voice is gentle. “You told me in Kansas City, that night at the bar. You don’t have to say it again.”

He is relieved. “Yeah. So people respond to that in different ways, right? I lived in the present. I talked to anybody who would listen to me, and I partied and I got high and I got laid, and I was the antithesis of the kind of son my father would have wanted just to spite him. Aemond escaped into the past. He read books, traced bloodlines, collected old obsolete things. Maybe that gave him hope that a better place was waiting for him out there somewhere, a better time. He got to be cool for three years. That’s it, and that’s all he’ll ever have. He was the one with vision. He said he was going to audition for The X Factor, and I only went with him to meet girls. Then he made it through the first round and I did too. And when they were going to cut us, he found Jace and Luke and Cregan and convinced everyone to start performing together. The show wanted to replace Luke, did you know that? They thought he was too boyish, too innocent. Aemond fought for him. And then Comet finished in second place, and all the sudden we were signed to a label, and we were selling millions of records and we were touring, and we were winning Grammys, and we were buying our parents and siblings houses…and two months after our third album came out, Aemond was maimed at the Budokan and it was time for him to get off the ride.”

You stare at Aegon, tremendously sad, not knowing what to say. Sometimes the right words don’t exist.

Aegon smirks. “He really likes you.”

“Maybe.” And then, with guileless vulnerability: “I hope so.”

“That’s dangerous.”

Your brow knits into fearful grooves. “Why?”

“I know how to enjoy something without owning it. I don’t think Aemond does.”

You don’t want to ask, but you have to. “What was Shelby like?”

Aegon considers this for a long time before he answers. “She was simultaneously too good for him and not good enough.”

Too gorgeous. Too cool. Too Pinterest-board perfect, airy like summer. But not deep. A river, a glimmer, but with no understanding of the abyss. You aren’t sure how you know that this is what Aegon means, but you do. You don’t want to think about Shelby anymore. You pivot. “So Aemond is the past and you’re the present. Who’s the future? Daeron?”

Aegon smiles, lazy and warm. “I think you’re the future.”

“Yeah right. Get your Crocs off my bed.”

He complies, groaning, flopping onto the floor gracelessly.

“Where’d you get the puffin?”

“Some Icelandic kid recognized me in the elevator. He wanted to give me a present. In return, I signed an autograph and got him and his dad front row seats to the show tomorrow. So I’d say it was a very favorable exchange for him.”

“You’re a saint,” you say, and then find yourself thinking randomly of Saint Jude again. Lost causes. Lost causes.

Aegon grins at you as he crawls to his feet and makes for the door. “Patron saint of mayhem.”

~~~~~~~~~~

You’re watching old Comet Donati performances on YouTube when the hotel fire alarm goes off. And it’s strange, because the unscarred, clear-eyed boy on the screen is Aemond but also isn’t him; he smiles more easily, he looks at people without suspicion, he is ebullient and confident and carefree like kids blowing bubbles on front porches. When you open your suite door, dressed in your favorite Cookie Monster pajama pants and an oversized New Kids On The Block t-shirt, Aemond is just arriving.

“Oh good,” he says. “You’re still awake.” And then he walks with you to the nearest stairwell.

Outside, the hotel guests are clustered together with their travel companions, shuddering under coats and sweaters and blankets clasped around their shoulders like capes. Even at the start of July, Iceland is cold: fifties during the day as Americans like you measure in Fahrenheit, forties at night, nearly always overcast. It’s 11 p.m., but the sun won’t set until midnight, and even then only for a few short hours; the sky is wearing the colors of dusk, lilac, rose pink, pale blue, fire and gold. You’re shivering, rubbing your bare forearms and feeling the goosebumps that have risen there like braille. Aemond tugs off his black and white Calvin Klein hoodie and offers it to you. As you pull it over your head, you breathe in the pieces of him that have snared in the fabric: smoke and cologne, gin and soap and the brine of the seaside air. Now wearing only his jeans and his koi fish shirt, Aemond lights a cigarette and gazes up at the hotel, postmodern angles and semi-transparent glass.

“No one’s going to give me a hoodie?” Aegon says, quaking in his cyan tank top. Criston reluctantly unzips his bomber jacket and hands it over.

“Did you do this?” Criston asks him, meaning the fire alarm.

“What?! No! No way, man! It wasn’t me!”

Criston turns to Cregan for confirmation. Cregan shrugs, ambiguous. “I knew it!” Criston exclaims. He is distraught.

Several fire engines arrive, red lights strobing, and firefighters enter the hotel to investigate. Baela and Jace are standing near each other but not speaking, arms crossed, faces tense. Luke, Rhaena, and Daeron are watching an episode of The Crown on Luke’s iPhone. Cregan lights a cigarette and manages to take two drags before Criston notices and lunges to bat it out of his hand.

“Stop it!” Criston orders. “You’ll ruin your voice!” Nobody tells Aemond not to smoke. His voice doesn’t matter anymore.

Aegon asks you, his hands buried in the pockets of Criston’s jacket: “Would you run into a burning building to save me?”

“Why would you be in a burning building?”

“That’s really not the point.”

“I’d think about it.”

Luke says, the glow of his iPhone dancing across his face: “Wow, Prince Charles is a bitch.”

“You’d think about it?” Aegon says to you. “You’d think about it?!”

“You have no excuse to be in a burning building. You have now experienced an evacuation, you know exactly how to leave a building successfully, if you’re still in it for some reason then that’s your problem.”

“You hear that, Criston?” Aegon says. “This is a good thing. Now everyone knows what to do if there’s a real fire! And we’re in hotels all the time, so this is super helpful!”

“Please shut up,” Criston begs.

“Hey Cregan, share with the class, what did you learn about fire safety from this fortuitous occasion?”

“I already knew what to do.”

Aegon is grinning. “Yeah? What’s that, Cregan?”

“Get in the shower and wait for the fire department to come rescue me.”

Everyone laughs—even Jace and Baela—and Cregan’s lips quirk up in one corner, the only hint that he is joking. A parade of firefighters exit the hotel. One of them is carrying a toaster. Black smoke pours out of the slits in the top.

She says something in Icelandic that you can’t understand, then repeats in English: “Who was trying to cook hotdogs in a toaster?”

The guests chatter incredulously among themselves: Who would do such a thing?

You, Aemond, Luke, Rhaena, Daeron, Cregan, Jace, Baela, and Criston are mindful to look anywhere except at Aegon. You gaze out at the horizon, the kaleidoscopic midnight sun. Aegon peers down at his Crocs, hair tangled and blue eyes wide.

“Very well,” the firefighter with the toaster says, a little smugly. “We will consult with the hotel staff and see which guest was registered to that room.”

“Goddammit!” Criston hisses, and shoves by the band to go meet the firefighters. You can’t hear what’s being said, but his hands move in exaggerated gestures of humiliation, apology, restitution. Fortunately, the Icelandic people seem to be forgiving.

Daeron turns to Aegon. All he says is: “Why?”

“I couldn’t figure out the buttons on the stove!”

Criston comes trudging back to the band. Guests are being admitted into the hotel to return to their drinks, their television shows and mystery novels, their families, their lovers, their beds. “Alright, it’s taken care of. Go to your rooms. All of you, right now, go.”

No one has the heart to argue with him; he looks half-broken already. Everybody disperses. You and Aemond end up alone together as the elevator zooms to the fifth floor. He takes his small, square metal lighter out of his jeans pocket and toys with it, repeatedly flicking the lid open and then shutting it again.

You point to it. “Vintage lighter. Vintage bike. And yet you write with glittery gel pens instead of quills and ink. Poser.”

“I like old things,” he says, smiling. “I think history is important.”

And you hear Aegon’s words like an echo: That’s dangerous. You start pulling off Aemond’s hoodie to give it back to him.

“No,” he says, sounding pleased. “You keep it.” So you do, finding excuses to bring the sleeves close to your face—touching your hair, your lips, your eyelashes—so you can inhale him.

Aemond leaves you at the door of your suite, but you don’t go inside. You wait for another five minutes until Criston steps out of an elevator and into the hallway, alone and agitated. Still, he has concern to spare for you.

“You okay? Locked yourself out?”

“No. I was just hoping to ask you something.”

“Go ahead.” Criston is tired, but his eyes, dark like fertile earth, are attentive.

“When Aemond was hurt…when the label yanked him out of Comet…no one fought for him?”

“Luke did,” Criston says.

And then he continues down the hall, shoulders low, a man troubled by both the past and the future.

~~~~~~~~~~

The Blue Lagoon is like Aemond’s sightless left eye: a milky blue, opaque, something you could drown in. The band spends several hours splashing and wading in water warmer than the blood in your veins. The white silica mud that forms the floor is soft beneath your bare feet, squishing between your toes; people spread it over their skin like a skin shedding its scales in reverse. Criston orders strawberry-banana smoothies from the in-water bar, trying to distract Aegon and Jace from the beer and the wine. Currently, Comet’s most worrisome performers are locked in combat: Daeron is on Aegon’s shoulders, Luke on Jace’s, entangled in a spirited chicken fight. This is much preferable to their first choice, Marco Polo, which led to Jace ‘accidentally’—and repeatedly—bumping into various early-twenties female tourists, whereupon he would inevitably profusely apologize, introduce himself, and pose for selfies, beads of turbid mineral water dripping from his curls. Cregan has drifted to the other side of the lagoon, floating on his back and basking beneath the overcast midday sun.

“I can’t believe they made everyone shower naked before getting in here,” Rhaena says, drinking her smoothie, submerged in rippling blue up to her collarbones. She had nearly refused to go through with it—I’ll wait in the car! I’ll be fine! I’ll just watch The Crown on my phone for three hours!—until you and Baela offered to hold up your towels to shield her from view and insisted that none of the other guests (all female, as the showers are sorted by gender) were paying attention. Nudity is not a big deal in Iceland. It’s quite a far cry from Missouri.

“You gotta honor the local culture, babe.” Baela flashes Rhaena a teasing grin. “Scandinavians are super progressive. No shame about bodies or relationships. Very sex-positive.”

“Well Jace is certainly blending in.”

Now Baela isn’t grinning anymore. She frowns broodingly out over the lagoon. Rhaena, regretting that she said it but knowing it can’t be taken back, noisily slurps at her smoothie even when it’s gone. You and Aemond exchange an uncomfortable glance. Baela has never broached the topic of her relationship with you, but you know it’s coming. You can sometimes see her working up the nerve like a bucket filling with water, drop by drop.

You change the subject. “See, Rhaena? The naked shower thing wasn’t even that bad. It was over in two minutes, and absolutely nobody was judging you. And if you hadn’t done it, you would have missed out on this amazing experience!”

“You weren’t nervous?” she asks you. “Not at all?”

“I little bit, yeah. Of course. I’m an American.” Everyone chuckles. “But logically, I knew no one would really be watching me. I’m not that interesting. And also…I wasn’t truly naked.”

“Huh…?”

You wiggle your eyebrows and, smiling radiantly, spin around and point to the black-ink tattoo between your shoulder blades, underscored by the straps of your swimsuit that cross just below it: a comet with a streaming tail, lyrics that Aemond dreamed up in a kinder world. Rhaena laughs.

“Oh, right, of course.”

“You are obsessed with that thing!” Baela says, but she sounds relatively happy again.

“It’s true. I am. I admit it.” Sometimes you find yourself staring at it in hotel bathroom mirrors still foggy with steam, wiping away condensation to marvel at the irrevocable ways in which Aemond has marked you, ways you are thankful cannot be erased. When you wear anything that reveals your upper back like a spilled secret, you often catch Aemond gazing at it too. Now he reaches over and skims a fingerprint along the circle that his lyrics form around the comet:

I’ll come back for you if it kills me

Comets clip by again after eons and so can I

There’s a jolt down your spine like lightning, but more eager than jarring. All other thoughts vanish from you. You look over at Aemond, and he looks back, his lips slightly parted, his right eye beckoning to you. And you know it will be good with him, if it happens, when it happens. It will be more than good. It will be laced with an intensity, with a dire breed of necessity that you’ve never tasted before. All at once, you and Aemond realize what you’ve done and drift away from each other again, weakening gravity, elliptical orbits.

“No shame, guys,” Baela quips, raising her smoothie glass in a toast. “Sex-positive, remember?”

After the 45-minute drive back to Reykjavik, and after the concert, the band coalesces in Jace’s suite. There aren’t many hangers-on for this stop of the tour; Reykjavik is isolated and peaceful and not particularly desirable for friends of convenience who are more interested in clubbing and drugs than camaraderie. You wouldn’t trade nights like this for anything in the world.

Aemond is reading off his latest notes, white ink on black paper, stars on the backdrop of the universe. A Benson & Hedges cigarette smolders between two fingers on his left hand. Smoke curls up around his face. “Aegon, you were three steps behind the choreography for basically the entire show.”

“Yeah, that was on purpose.”

“It wasn’t,” Aemond counters, but he can’t help but smile.

“Women love a tragic disaster of a man who is screaming to be fixed.”

“Daeron,” Aemond continues. “I really like that hair flip you’ve started doing…”

Aegon is knocking back dark glass bottles of Gædingur Stout and slurring, very drunk and sinking deeper by the minute. In the absence of coke, he has resorted to other crutches. You are squeezed between Aemond and Baela on one of the couches. And Aemond isn’t really touching you, but he also is: the delicious subtle pressure of his thigh against yours, occasional nudges of his elbow, ostensibly unintentional grazes of knuckles and palms. He’s drinking his usual, a Bramble, and so are you, swirls of slow-moving pink like drops of blood in open water. And you think in a hazy bliss like listening to ground-level conversations from the bottom of a swimming pool: Tonight, tonight, tonight, he’s going to come back to my room with me tonight.

“Oh great,” you mumble as you check your Facebook messages on your iPhone.

“What’s wrong?” Rhaena asks. She’s nestled against Luke on the opposite couch, twirling locks of his hair around her benign, delicate fingers. Jace is sitting beside Luke, drinking a Vesper and trying not to make eye contact with Baela. Daeron is in the fuzzy white sheepskin lounge chair, Cregan perched on a bar stool, Criston standing watchfully with a vivid green bottle of Perrier in one hand. When he briefly steps out onto the balcony to take a call from the label, you can hear only the most dim, indistinct murmurings through the thick tinted glass, sounds but not words. Aegon is sitting—and occasionally crawling around—on the floor. The Backstreet Boys’ I Want It That Way is playing.

“I’m subletting my apartment in Kansas City and there is a strict no pet policy. But my neighbors snitched on the new tenant and apparently she’s got a Flemish Giant rabbit living there with her.”

“Not even a normal rabbit,” Baela muses. “A giant rabbit.”

You sigh. “All the rugs are going to be chewed up by the time I get back.” And Aemond glances over anxiously, like he doesn’t want any reminders that you won’t always be around.

“What’s your apartment like?” he says.

“Old. Vintage. Most of it hasn’t been updated since the 1950s. You’d appreciate it, actually. It would match your aesthetic.”

“Maybe I’ll have to see it sometime.”

You smirk at him, flirtatious, baiting, the silver stars on your dress reflecting golden lamplight. “Maybe. If I invite you.”

He leans in to whisper so only you can hear: “You will.”

“I think I’d be a landlord if I wasn’t famous,” Jace says, nursing his Vesper meditatively like an aspiring philosopher. “I’d just sit back and collect the checks as they rolled in. And you get to raise the rent every year.”

“Yeah, that sounds like you,” Aegon says, grinning up at him saccharinely.

“What would you be, Stargirl?” Jace asks; and you realize you hate the sound of him using Aegon’s name for you.

“I mean, a therapist.” And everyone laughs, even Criston.

Jace flushes, brushing his curls back from his face with one hand. “Oh yeah. Clearly.”

You look to Aemond. “You’d be a historian or an archivist or something.”

“Or a writer,” Luke says.

“Maybe,” Aemond agrees, a tad uncomfortable with the attention. “Or an animal activist, maybe. I’d like to do some sort of good in the world.”

Aegon shouts, far more loudly than necessary: “What would you be, Criston?”

“Thousands of miles away from you.” More laughter, riotous; but Criston is smiling a little.

“What about you, Cregan?” Jace asks. “What would you want to be if Comet didn’t exist?”

Cregan downs a shot of Absolut Vodka. “A plastic surgeon.”

“What? Why?”

Cregan shrugs. “You get to see tits all the time.”

There are scandalized squeals and guffaws. Baela says: “I would not let you anywhere near my tits.”

“And not just tits!” Daeron adds brightly. “Don’t they do, what’s it called, vaginal rejuvenation?”

Cregan points at him with his empty shot glass. “Exactly.”

“Oh God, that sounds painful.” Rhaena hides her face behind a flute of champagne.

“Yeah,” you say. “I don’t think I’m interested.”

Aegon snorts, drips of Gaedingur Stout flying from his nose. “Like you’d ever need it. You’ve got a pornstar pussy, fucking gorgeous.”

A hush sweeps through the room like a dust storm. Baffled glances dart around wildly. Immediately, Aegon realizes his mistake. He gazes up at you from the floor with large, glazed, drunken blue eyes that glisten with apology. You gape back, half-furious and half-petrified.

“Wait, what?” Aemond says. Ashes build on his cigarette, forgotten.

“Oh, wow.” Jace gestures from you to Aegon. “You guys…you guys have…?”

“It was once, a long time ago,” you say quickly. “Like, a really long time ago. Over a year ago.”

Aegon is trying to help. “Ages ago. Ancient history.”

“Where? In Kansas City?!” Baela gasps, stunned.

Aegon tells her: “You remember that bar we all went to after the show, right? The one on the roof?”

Baela is blinking at you, not comprehending. “You hooked up with him? In a bar?! Aegon?!”

“Um, yeah.”

Jace brays out a laugh, shaking his head. “Damn, Stargirl. I thought you had better taste than that.”

You feel like you’re fighting for your life. You feel like you can’t breathe. “It really wasn’t serious…” Not the sex part, anyway.

“No, no, it totally wasn’t,” Aegon agrees gamely. “It was like, what? How long were we in that bathroom? Maybe ten minutes total?”

Daeron is giggling. “Bruh, stop roasting yourself!”

As the chatter flies, you hide your face in your hands; beneath your palms, your cheeks are hot. You can feel Aemond pulling away from you, spaces opening up between your thighs and shoulders and arms like the ever-expanding void of the universe. When you steal a glimpse of him through the cracks in your fingers, he is staring down at the floor. He is silent, but you can see the thoughts—the images—riddling him like bullets. You can see him filling up with them like a punctured ship fills with seawater. He smokes until his cigarette is gone, and then immediately lights another.

Luke is the one to mercifully intercede. “Hey, Criston, where are we going next?”

“Uh,” Criston says, trying not to gawk at you or Aegon. “Let me think. Uh. Oh, right. Paris.”

Jace cackles. “The city of love! How appropriate!”

Criston ignores him. “You have some press interviews and then you’re doing two shows at the Accor Arena on July 7th and 8th…”

Aemond gulps down the rest of his Bramble and then walks out onto the balcony, closing the sliding glass door behind him.

“Fuck,” Aegon sighs miserably, then guzzles his Gaedingur Stout.

You bolt off the couch and go after Aemond. The heavy sliding glass door growls as you roll it open and then shut it again. Outside, Reykjavik is cold and windswept. The midnight sun is aflame. It’s still too bright to see the Northern Lights; even if they were there, you would have no way of knowing. Aemond is smoking with his back to you. He’s looking out over the boats bobbing in the harbor, sunbeams glinting on the crests of waves. Flapping gulls swoop and scream.

You say cuttingly, like a surgeon slicing away malignancies: “So what, you don’t like me anymore?”

Aemond flicks ashes over the balcony railing. “I just think I understand you better.”

“What does that mean?”

He whirls to you and says pointedly: “Why are you here?”

A disorienting question. Too easy. “I followed you out onto the balcony.”

“No, here with the band, here in Reykjavik, why are you here?”

You know how the truth sounds, but you can’t rewrite it. “Because Aegon asked me to be.”

“Because he asked you to come fix me, right?” Aemond demands. “To crack open my skull and stir things around until I’m okay with the fact that my life ended seven months ago.”

“No!” you shout into the wind. “I mean, yes, he thought I’d be able to help you, to help Comet, but that’s not what this is about for me anymore—”

“Why would I believe you? You’re a liar, you’re a confirmed liar, why would I believe a single goddamn word of what you have to say?!”

“I didn’t lie to you!”

“Friends!” Aemond roars. He doesn’t touch you, but his rage is horrifying, ageless and deep like lava bubbling beneath tectonic plates. “You said you and Aegon were friends!”

“We are friends—”

“No, you’re not. You met him, you fucked him, and then when he invited you to join the tour you dropped everything to do it, why, because you still want him? And I’m the charity case? Or I was just next in line? Maybe you were planning to work your way through the whole band. Who’s next, Jace? I don’t think he’d object.”

“No—!”

“You and Aegon. And you didn’t even have the guts to tell me.”

“Because I didn’t want to have this conversation, the one where you eviscerate me for something that happened before I even met you!”

“You chose him,” Aemond says, venomous. “At the bar in Kansas City, you chose him.”

“What?! Aemond, I don’t even remember seeing you, I don’t think you were there at all—”

“I was there.” He glares at you, thunderstorms, tornadoes, the earth splitting in two. “Last June. Rooftop bar. String lights. View of the river. I remember it, I was there.”

“Well then you didn’t notice me either and you probably spent the whole night with Pilates princess, Malibu Barbie Shelby, so what’s the fucking point?!”

He glowers at the horizon. Iceland DOES have jewel tones, you think erratically. But they only come out at night, like owls or bats. “It’s different.”

“It’s not different! You’re so convinced people don’t like you that you do insane, irrational things that make people not like you! It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy! It’s a fucking circle, you idiot!”

“I’ve had enough psychoanalysis, thanks.”

“No, you could use some more of it, you could use a lot more, you have so many demons it’s like Paranormal Activity in your brain, they’re in there all day tearing things off the walls and kicking over chairs and sabotaging anything you dare to care about and you let them!”

He turns away from you. “Just go the fuck back to Kansas.”

“I’m from Missouri!”

Aemond pitches the end of his cigarette over the balcony. His good eye flicks to the sliding glass door. The curtains rustle as the faces that hovered there just seconds ago disappear back into the suite. Very muffled through the thick glass, you can hear Criston chastising people.

You ask Aemond, embers in your throat: “This is really something you consider unforgiveable?”

He shakes his head, mournful, violently disappointed. “You’re just a groupie. You’re just a slut.”

Slut. It’s not the word, it’s the way he said it, with dismissiveness, with condemnation, the same way men love to use it as a blade to carve off every other piece of you—kindness, coldness, ferocity, loyalty, wit, passion, talent, triumphs, failures, ghosts—until that one little word is all that’s left. You’re dismantled into a clutter of loose bolts and bent nails. You’re a beef cow that was led into the maze of a gnashing, metal-and-blood processing plant and came out the other side a brainless, raw-pink patty just the right size to fit in a Big Mac box, something to be consumed but not remembered. “What did you say to me?”

He’s staring out into the twilight sky, both hands on the balcony railing. “I can’t believe you. I can’t believe I…”

“Are you kidding me?! I can’t believe I got your lyrics tattooed on my fucking back, what am I supposed to do about that now, rip my own skin off?!”

“So get it covered up. I’m sure Aegon would be thrilled to help you choose a new design, or Jace, or Cregan, or Daeron, or whoever.”

“You know what I think?” you say, caustic like acid.

“Don’t say it,” he threatens, low and dark.

“I think you haven’t fucked anyone since the accident, and you’re terrified to. But you shouldn’t be, Aemond. Because there’s nothing wrong with you. There has never been anything wrong with you.”

But he doesn’t hear that part. He only hears the first thing, what you never should have said at all. It’s true, but that doesn’t mean you should have said it. “I hate you,” he says softly, and you can’t think of a reply. The space between you fills up with wind, cold, dying sunlight. Aemond looks at the sliding glass door. “I don’t want to go back in there.”

“Well, we’re five stories off the ground, so you’ll probably have to.”

He studies the series of balconies that run along this side of the hotel, each separated by perhaps three feet of open air. Then he starts climbing over the metal railing.

“Aemond, don’t!”

But it’s too late. Fortunately, he has long limbs. He scrambles onto the next balcony, and then the one after that, and then one more, until he reaches the balcony for his own suite. He tries the sliding glass door—locked—and then sits down to wait for someone to open it. You go back inside Jace’s suite, where everyone pretends to have been talking about something other than you.

“Where’s Aemond?” Criston says, alarmed.

“He’s on the balcony of his suite. You should go let him in.”

“What?!” Criston yells, and then sprints out into the hallway.

You flee too. Both Baela and Aegon try to stop you, try to talk to you. They’re asking what Aemond said. They’re asking if you’re okay. You tell them you’re fine and that you want to be left alone. They argue. You insist. You walk back to your own room and start packing.

Your suitcase fills up with crumpled clothes and souvenirs: a Colosseum pencil sharpener from Rome, a tiny alabaster Apollo from Athens, a Spanish fighting bull refrigerator magnet from Madrid, handmade soap from Porto, a bar of chocolate from Vienna, a moose snow globe from Stockholm, a silica mud mask from the Blue Lagoon, a tiny stuffed comet that Rhaena crocheted for you. You reach back to touch your fingertips to the comet tattooed over your spine, tears biting in your eyes. If I had told him from the start, would that have made a difference? If I had met him first, would we have had a chance? You are gathering up your makeup when you hear a knock on the doorframe.

Cregan lurks there. When he speaks, he sounds startled; he sounds afraid. “You can’t leave.”

“I’ve literally never had a conversation with you, so thanks for the input but I’m still going.”

“No,” he says, persistent. “You can’t leave.”

“Aemond doesn’t want me here.” Your voice is fragile, shattering. “I can’t help him anymore.”

“It’s not just about Aemond. It’s about everyone. They’re all fucked up. They all need you.”

You stare at Cregan, not understanding. “I really don’t think I’m equipped for this.”

He fixes his cool greyish eyes on you. He is harsh but somehow not unkind. “You would never be able to comprehend where I came from. I’m not going back to that. The band has given me everything. I’m not going to let anyone take that away from me. You have to stay. You have to fix Comet. You can’t leave.”

He watches you, and you watch him, and you aren’t sure who has the upper hand here, who is the predator and who is the prey. Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe everyone is a patchwork of strengths and deficits, fields of gold strewn with landmines.

At last, you relent. And Cregan doesn’t vanish until you’ve begun taking your souvenirs out of your suitcase and placing each of them—carefully, reverently—back on your nightstand where they were before.

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