#and had to end the stream really early because it triggered a breakdown | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

princessofprocrastination · 3 years

Text

She’s Creepy (Dream)

MASTERLIST

pairing : dream / clay x reader.

summary : apparently being a huge fan of a big youtuber is considered being a creep, according to minecraft gamer, dream. and ever since he called you mean things, your world turned upside down. (ANGST) (TRIGGER WARNING)

a/n : i’m aware i’ve been writing all angsts, i just enjoy a little heartbreak. this is a two part story!

you haven’t been on social media as a public figure for long, but that doesn’t mean you haven’t been on social media before this.

you knew people, you had people you look up to, as of many other social media influencers or content creators.

you grew pretty quick on youtube and instagram. your content mostly included room makeovers whenever you felt bored of your own home or your storytimes. you blew up from talking about your stalker.

since then, your subscibers stayed with you and supported you, saying that you have a charm, and that you exert good energy and vibes. and those type of comments have always made your day.

you always shared with your supporters about your life, not too personal but enough for them to feel included. of course, you’re not telling them your phone number or address, but you tried to share as many details you can legally in your story times.

that also meant that you would tell your supporters small details about you, such as what book you were currently reading or who you’ve been watching on youtube.

even before you stated posting on your channel, you’ve been watching a minecraft youtuber, dream and his friends.

some of your fans would tag them in some of your instagram posts, or tweets that brought no harm so you never really acknowledged it since it wasn’t hurting anyone.

you weren’t “fangirling” you’d say. it was more of you supported them and found them funny and entertaining.

coincidentally, you landed yourself on the dream team tiktok, which means that dream and his friends were all over you for you page.

and to show that you were active and not dead to your followers on instagram, you’d post a funny tiktok, usually included the dream team. you thought it was harmless. to you, it was just a way to show support.

but only a couple days later, hashtags about you and the dream team, more specifically, just dream, were trending.

when you saw this, opening your twitter app, you immediately went to find out what this was about. your heart jumped when you thought maybe dream acknowledged you.

in fact, it was worse.

what was trending was a short video clip during one of the dream teams chill streams on the dream smp.

the conversation between george, sapnap and dream went like this.

“you guys heard about that girl who kept reposting tiktoks about us on her instagram story?” george asked the other two boys.

“heard she watched us before she even started her channel” sapnap.

“i don’t know about you guys, but i think she’s being a little creepy.” dream said.

your heart sunk to your stomach. did your actions portray you to be a creep to other people?

“dream, you can’t just say that, especially on stream.” sapnap scolded him, george also mumbling something.

“why can’t i? i feel creeped out by her, a public figure posting me all over her socials.” dream replied, tone serious.

you clicked off the video, before it replayed again. you couldn’t get yourself to rewatch that, to hear those words again.

almost crying, you told yourself to suck it up, that this wasn’t worth you crying.

although they were who you looked up as minecraft gamers, this wasn’t worth your breakdowns.

that was until, you opened your direct messages.

you shouldn’t have. you knew the dream team stans would easily hunt you down, to ask you to back off from creeping their idol off.

but no, you still opened your dms. you expected a normal dm, ones that say they support you or some of your friends sending you memes through instagram.

what you didn’t expect was to see a flood of threats.

some said “kill yourself, you don’t deserve a spot on earth after what you did.” and “back off and leave my mans.”

it got worse from there. you thought maybe it’s just the dms, but you didn’t expect it to blow up more, with people tagging you with photos on instagram and twitter. people “cancelling” you.

you didn’t understand how this blew up like this. you were even more baffled to see some of your supporters sending you threats, too.

was this what you deserved?

you weren’t one to make rash decisions, nor were you a suicidal person.

you felt stupid. just because you supported big youtubers, you get this type of treatment?

the threats, the dm, never stopped. for three whole months, you had to deal with the never ending mean comments on your social media. you thought it would die down.

it came to the point of seeing your address and your phone number all over the internet. you never thought it would lead to this.

you didn’t know what to do anymore.

not long after, people started showing up to your apartment.

sure, your apartment didn’t have the best of security, which you blamed no one but yourself for being a public figure and living somewhere with little to no security.

they started with knocking on your door during ungodly hours. next was mailing weird stuff or sending stuff to your house. lastly, which tipped you off was that they would vandalize your apartment.

they would egg your front door, pee, or spray paint your walls of the outside.

you couldn’t handle it anymore.

soon enough, you knew you had to stand up for yourself. you had to call the police.

and that was exactly what you did. you called the authorities, which made the brave teenagers leave you alone.

while they were egging your house and making your life miserable, you knew this was the only time for you to make a rash decision. to leave the country, to somewhere no one else would fine you at. somewhere unpredictable, that no one would expect you to go.

it took a lot for you to book a plane ticket, box up your belongings and move to a completely different country, away from your hometown, florida.

you loved it in florida. though it was humid all the time, you enjoyed it. now that you had to leave, you only had a little while to cherish it before you leave it all behind.

and your family, your friends. the ones you’ve grown up with, ones you’ve grown to love and cherish. you had to leave that too. and without telling them too much information.

that hurt the most, needing to leave your loved ones behind, to start a new life, to start afresh.

DREAM’S POV

i didn’t know what was happening. one thing added onto another and soon it was out of control.

i didn’t say anything at the start, not thinking it would go this far. i didn’t know to what extent my fans would go.

sure, i saw all the things happening, but i didn’t do anything to stop it.

i saw her address and phone number all over social media, and did nothing about it.

george and sapnap said something, and pushed me to do something about it, but i didn’t. i was stubborn.

speaking of, it’s been months since i heard anything about her from her herself, everything i see is from my fans or hers, wondering where she is.

should i be worried?

YOUR POV

you left florida. the only people you told were your parents and your childhood friend, not trusting anyone else.

what you told them was vague, that you needed to leave, away from the US. specifically, you moved to Australia.

you made a decision to not live near the city, but the outskirts.

you were lucky that you weren’t a spender and you made more than enough money to make the decision to leave so suddenly.

lucky for you, you went to college and had a degree in law, so you didn’t need to worry about not having a job.

you never thought you’d make use of your degree this early in your life, thinking that youtube and being a content creator would last a little while longer.

you had to change you hairstyles, your fashion in general since you had to be in a more professional setting. although it was hard transitioning from a casual wear and having crazy coloured hair to wearing pant suits or formal dresses and going back your natural colour.

three years. it took you three full years for you to even think of visiting your parents in florida again. also, given the fact that you had a stable job and you couldn’t up and leave.

but recently, you were offered to work at another law firm in florida. you were happy to tell that to your family back home but at the same time, you were hesitant to go back to your nightmares.

but you braved yourself, since you missed your family dearly.

now, you were sitting on your desk in your cozy home, finalizing up the last of your move, like getting a house back in florida, this time with a better security just in case.

boxes of your clothes and belongings went first, to reach your new house there before you did so it was easier for you, not having to worry about your stuff.

you asked none of your family’s help, not wanting to burden them. instead you told them to just meet you at a restaurant you booked for you and your family and friends for dinner about three weeks after you landed.

although they protested, saying it was too long until they can see you again, you told them to not worry and that you were going to use those three weeks to start working at the new law firm.

you decided to take a straight flight from australia to florida, not wasting any time. although it was almost a twenty-two hour long flight, you sat throug and got to your hometown safely.

you didn’t know what was going on with the three boys you used to adore, since you didn’t have social media anymore.

but you didn’t mind it, it was peaceful.

two weeks since you’ve stepped foot in florida again. it felt amazing to breathe your hometown air again. it was refreshing.

you have fully settled in your new house, and workplace. you were glad to have met your co-workers. they were all super welcoming and made sure you weren’t left behind in anything.

so far, your transition from australia to florida has been smooth, and you weren’t worried about anything.

you got a car since you’ve arrived, so that you could travel easily from one place to another.

not to brag, but. you were making enough money to live a lavish lifestyle. a big house and a pretty expensive car, and that didn’t even make a dent in your bank account.

you were proud to see that you achieved all this yourself, and only within a couple of years.

you were just excited to meet your family in real life instead of facetime.

finally, the day of the dinner with your family came. unfortunately, you had to take a case in the afternoon, so you had to come to dinner in your work pant suit, with a turtleneck and a little late.

they understood it and told you not to worry about it, and that they would just seat themselves by your name instead of waiting for you. you promised you’d pay their dinners and apologized once again.

the sound of your heels comforted you as you walked from the valet to the restaurant. you were a little nervous to meet them again face to face after three years. but you couldn’t wait to catch up with them and tell them all about your work life that you could never tell them during the facetime calls.

you smiled to yourself, thinking nothing could go wrong. and nothing could really go wrong anyways, it was just a dinner after all.

but you hadn’t expected the three boys you used to idolize to be eating dinner at the same restaurant you and your family would be at, specifically, opposite your table.

you walked in the restaurant, telling the front of the house that you had a table reserved under your name and that you were pretty sure the rest of your family was already there.

she politely told you to walk alongside her, leading you to your family.

you weren’t paying attention to your surroundings. you were solely focused on seeing your family that you didn’t know that there were extra pair of eyes staring at you.

you smiled as your family saw you. your mum crying while standing up to hug you tightly, as she once did three years ago.

you could hear your friends shout your name loudly, as if to tell the whole world that you were finally here.

“don’t cry, i’m staying, no more going back to australia, i swear.” you told your mum, trying to reassure her that you were fine and that you were not going to leave her again, since she hadn’t stopped crying.

you moved to hug your dad, who had been patiently waiting for his turn after his wife. “you look great, kiddo.” you thanked him as he complimented your professional look.

you sat down, somewhere in the middle, between your family, opposite of your parents so that everyone could clearly see and talk to you easily.

with how noisy you family were, you were sure the entire restaurant knew your name and where you had just moved from.

they asked you about australia, what was it like to work there, away from your family. you caught up with every single one of them.

“don’t you live in that really expensive neighbourhood right now?” one of your childhood friends asked.

you winked at her, discreetly trying to answer her question. the whole table shouted and congratulated you for making it this far, in only a matter of short years.

you covered your face, shy, not wanting this part of your life to be told to everyone in the restaurant.

GEORGE’S POV

there she was. the person whose life we practically ruined. luckily, we didn’t ruin it all for her. i guess she made use of her brains and is working a normal job.

“dude.” i tried to attract the other two boys’ attention.

“i know.” both of them answered me.

“she’s rich rich, huh?” sapnap almost chuckled but was totally serious saying that.

“yup.” dream.

ah yes, clay. the man dream himself. sapnap and i tried to persuade him into making it right for her, for you.

sure, he had said those mean words, but he can take it back. three years ago, at least.

she disappeared three years ago. vanished. no one knew where you went. some say you moved out of the country, which deemed to be true. couple of years later people started to find out what you worked as, but i tried my best to help get rid of the information

but they just couldn’t pinpoint where. you basically uped and left everything.

and there was time to apologize, but it had been to late.

i thought she died, quite frankly. i didn’t want to be the cause of someone dying. well at least, not me, but my friend.

now us three were seated in a pretty formal and expensive restaurant to eat dinner. and we did not expect to see her here.

she came in a little late, wearing a very professional wear. seemed like you went to work before this.

i knew you were a lawyer, we three knew that since our fans found it out.

she looked completely different. hair not her usual crazy colours. just seeing her in heels baffled me. she was wearing something formal and that wasn’t what you usually wore, years ago.

DREAMS’S POV

she’s beautiful.

not that she wasn’t before.

but this version of her was different. her in her pant suit, in heels. a turtleneck under her blazer.

she looked elegant. classy. rich.

i mean, she is rich.

her family screamed when she told them where she lived. and man, that neighbourhood only had rich people. it had one of the best, if not the best security you could ask for.

it wasn’t easy to buy a house there. even if you had the money, you’d need a certain bank card to be allowed to even be shortlisted.

and if i saw it correctly, she drives a bentley that was just parked by a valet kid.

damn. she is one successful woman.

i know, how could i think this much of her, how dare i when i didn’t even apologized. i didn’t even try.

in fact. i did. even before she went MIA, fully on social media, i sent her direct messages everywhere. she never replied to any of them.

and i knew no one that had her phone number. and soon enough, no one had heard from her in three years.

and now she’s back. more beautiful than ever.

i needed to speak to her i couldn’t live with the guilt that stayed for these past three years.

my fans, my so called supporters made her life a living hell and i almost did nothing to stop it.

i’m sure she hates me. but i have to try somehow, right?

question is, she didn’t have a social media anymore, and i can’t just speak to her now that she was sitting opposite my table.

i kept on pondering as i heard a little bit of her conversation, about her life.

i guess she moved to australia, and worked in a lawfirm in the outskirts. so unpredictable of her. no one would’ve guessed that in a million years.

i watched as i see her smile as she listened to what her parents were saying.

i cherished the smile since i didn’t know when was the next time i’d see her.

she asked the waiter for the bill, covering the whole cost of her and her huge family’s meal.

damn, this girl is too rich for her own good.

she puts down the bill on the table, also leaving a generous tip for the waiter that served them. she stood up to walk after her family, needing to pass my table.

since she had been oblivious to her surroundings, i didn’t expect her to spot us, to notice us.

but i was wrong.

PART 2

#dream x reader #dream imagines #dreamwastaken #dream fanfic #dream imagine #dreamwastaken imagines #dream fanfiction

395 notes · View notes

escape-from-reality-fics · 3 years

Text

Blankets and Movies ❋ Kim Tae Hyung

↳ Pairing: Kim Tae Hyung (V)/Reader

↳ Word Count: 2,554

⁙ Summary: Taehyung wrapping a blanket around Y/N when they are sitting on the couch and watching a show/movie after she has a bad day and confides in him

⚠️ Warnings: Contains minor mentions of self esteem issues/depression. Please do not read if you are triggered by any of these!

Today just wasn't your day. Nothing particularly wrong had happened thankfully; however, you just woke up in a horrible mood and couldn't seem to shake it. Your boyfriend Taehyung hadn't given you a goodbye kiss, and you were upset. You being upset led to you snapping over the phone at your best friend, Kenzie. Which then led to a small fight, Kenzie refusing to talk to you.

Then, at work, your computer short-circuited and you had lost the 2-hour long progress you had made. When your lunch break came around, you ended up overcooking your lasagna in the work microwave, burning it beyond edibility. Coming home from work was no small feat, either. You had gotten stuck in a traffic jam for close to 2 hours.

Now here you were, finally home. Starving, cranky, and sleepy. You couldn't decide between wanting to eat a whole box of cereal or flopping in your bed and sleeping until you were old and wrinkly. After a brief moment of hesitation, you decide just to skip eating for now and instead have a nap, praying it would make a little bit of your lousy mood dissipate.

You shed your work clothes quickly, tossing them across the room and narrowly missing the clothes hamper. Waving it off, you promptly threw on one of Taehyung's shirts, practically diving into your shared bed and curling up under the plush duvet. Your hand blindly reached out in the bedroom's darkness, patting the bed around you until you found what you needed. Feeling the cool fabric under your fingertips, you snatched up the TaTa plushie, snuggling it close to your face and inhaling Taehyung's scent.

As you laid there, the day's events raged around your head like a tsunami. You couldn't help but let out a little whimper as you remembered everything terrible that had gone wrong. Bringing a hand up to rub at your eyes, you let out a pitiful sniffle. You were too overwhelmed lately, with work and stress and deadlines. However, you felt you couldn't confide in Taehyung. With his packed schedule and own stress, you wouldn't dare burden him with your meaningless problems.

So you did what you usually do, and cried it out as you clutched onto the TaTa plushie for dear life, burrowed under your nest of blankets. You let everything out, your poor pillow getting soaked with salty tears. After a while, your tears ran out, tear tracks sticky on your cheeks. Rolling over, you grabbed your phone off the nightstand, squinting as the bright light assaulted your eyes. It was almost time for Taehyung and the rest of the guys to get home. Throwing your phone down beside you, you tug the duvet up around your chin, shutting your eyes and letting yourself slip into a floating dream.

At this point, BTS was on the way back to the dorm after a day filled with photo shoots and dance practices. Everyone was sore and tired, ready to go home and finally relax for a couple of days. Taehyung groaned softly to himself as he stretched his neck, seated in the large van that was taking them home. He especially couldn't wait to get back and cuddle you. He knew you hadn't had the best wake-up this morning and felt extremely bad for leaving you without your usual morning kiss. He planned to cuddle with you as soon as he got back to the dorm.

"What are we gonna eat for dinner, Jin Hyung?" Jungkook asked as he yawned, tired from the early morning start they had. Everyone was in some state of sleep or alertness, ready to get back to the dorm to shower and eat. Some of the boys perked up at Jungkook's question, wondering the same thing but too tired to voice it.

"We might just order something. I'm too tired to cook," Jin responds from his seat at the front of the van, eyes still shut as he tries to rest. They all agree with his idea and start to argue over what food to order. Taehyung stays quiet as he stares out the window, ready to get home and cuddle with you.

After a short amount of time, the van finally pulled up to their apartment building, a gorgeous high rise looking out over the city. They arrived in the parking garage, members clambering out of the van as it finally parked. Taehyung noticed your car parked in its usual parking spot, meaning that you were home. He was pushed to get up to the apartment faster, some of the other boys protesting the fast pace, trying to catch up with him.

"Yah, Taehyung, slow down! Why are you in a rush?" Hoseok called as he tried to catch up to his younger band mate, the rest of the boys behind him. Taehyung turned around quickly and smiled his big boxy smile, radiating happiness.

"Hyung (Y/N) is home! I really can't wait to see her, so we have to hurry," Taehyung calls to them as he proceeds to make it to the elevator, impatiently pushing the button to call it to their floor. The rest of the boys finally catch up, some huffing as they try to catch their breath. The elevator finally arrives, and Taehyung waits impatiently for the rest of the members to clamber on as well, before pressing the button for their floor.

It takes less than 20 seconds to get to their floor, but for Taehyung, it feels like a lifetime. When they finally get to their stop, he is the first one out, rushing to the door of their apartment, hastily unlocking it with his key and stepping inside.

"Jeez Tae, you don't have to rush. (Y/N) is still going to be here even if we took an hour," Jimin comments, entering the apartment behind Taehyung, exchanging his shoes for slippers. Taehyung scowls a bit at Jimin's comment but takes off his shoes and slides on his slippers, instantly making a beeline for his room where he knew you would be. He approaches his room and opens the door, expecting you to be sitting in bed reading or watching some crazy theory video on Youtube. However, he was shocked when he saw the outline of your body underneath the bed's comforter, face buried in your pillow. Taehyung frowns to himself, already realizing that you weren't doing that well. He starts to make his way towards the bed but freezes when you groan and roll over, blinking at the soft light streaming in from the hallway.

"Tae? Is that you?" You slur as you try to blink the sleep out of your eyes, sitting up in bed and brushing your wild hair out of your face. Taehyung approaches the bed and sits down next to you, gently kissing your head and smiling.

"Hey, baby. How was your day today?" Taehyung asks as you snuggle into his arms, welcoming his embrace. He could feel you stiffen in his arms, the question bothering you. He was worried because he knew you weren't one to tell anyone about your worries or troubles.

"Babe? Did something happen?" He asks as you pull away from his arms, your gaze cast downwards. You don't answer for a minute or two; the room cloaked in awkward silence. When you looked back up at him, your eyes were glazed with tears and your bottom lip was trembling, a telltale sign that you were on the verge of a breakdown.

"Tae… It was so hard," You sobbed out, shoulders shaking with each trembling breath you took. Taehyung could feel his heart breaking, realizing that this wasn't just from events that happened today.

"Oh, sweetheart," he breathed as he pulled you back into his arms, laying you both down on the comfy bed. You snuggled into his chest, your salty tears soaking his expensive shirt, but he didn't care. He just wanted to comfort you.

"Tell me what happened, okay? Just let it all out."

The dam broke as you started talking (well sobbing) about everything that happened that day and then proceeded also to tell Taehyung about your earlier worries. His grip tightened on you as he gently rubbed your back to console you, occasionally planting a kiss on your head.

By the time you had finished your emotional rant, your chest felt lighter, and your mind felt clearer. Sitting up in the bed, you pulled away from Taehyung's grip and wiped your eyes, letting out a watery laugh.

"Sorry for springing this all on you, Tae. I didn't want to be dramatic," you admitted, watching as Taehyung sat up as well, a frown marring his handsome face.

"Baby, I want you to tell me these things. I want to know when you're feeling upset or insecure or angry. I want to hear about your day, whether it's good or bad. Don't hold back anymore, please," he pleaded, grabbing your face in his large hands and making you look him in the eyes.

"Okay, Tae," you forced out as he squished your cheeks lovingly. Taehyung gave you a radiant smile and brought your face close to his, giving you a deep, loving kiss. It lasted for all of 10 seconds before your stomach rumbled, breaking the warm atmosphere.

"Are you hungry, or are you hiding a bear in your stomach?" Taehyung jokingly asked, watching as your face turned scarlet with embarrassment. You sputtered out an apology as Taehyung laughed his deep laugh, standing up and bringing you with him.

"Come on love, let's get some food," Taehyung says as you both leave your shared room, your eyes squinting against the brightness of the hallway. You both end up traveling to the living room, finding that most of the group was lounging around.

"Hey (Y/N), how was work today?" Hoseok asks as he notices your and Taehyung's arrival. The rest of the boys look up and say their greetings; you give a small nod and wave in return.

"Uh, it was… eventful, to say the least," you scratch the back of your neck sheepishly. Hoseok takes the hint, not pushing any further. Taehyung takes this chance to speak up, looking to Jin, who was reading in the armchair.

"Hyung, are we going to order food soon? (Y/N) sounds like she hasn't eaten in 84 years," Taehyung asks him as the others laugh when your stomach rumbles, creating perfect timing.

"Well, we can always order from the chicken place around the corner? They're pretty fast and have good food," Jin suggests as Namjoon already pulls up the delivery service on his phone. Everyone quickly shouts what they want, and they order.

"Yah Jungkook scooch over you lump," Taehyung scolds as he notices the maknae taking one whole couch. Jungkook rolls his eyes but ends up sliding over to the one side, giving you and Taehyung enough room to sit down and snuggle.

You quietly chat with Jungkook, who was on your right, talking about the newest Overwatch update. After about 20 minutes of quiet chatter with Jungkook, Yoongi and Jimin occasionally joining, the food arrives.

"Alright, you heathens if I see anyone drop any of this on the floor or the furniture I am never letting you guys taste my cooking ever again," Jin threatens as he passes out the containers of fried chicken, everyone sitting around the coffee table and digging in.

"Yes, Jin Oppa," you smile as you grab a piece of chicken, popping it into your mouth. Jin smiles at you, always appreciating your dedication to cleanliness.

The chicken gets consumed relatively quickly; everyone quiets apart from the TV playing the newest Running Man episode. Jimin and Hoseok clean up the boxes, and everyone agrees to a movie before heading to bed.

Two movies get debated, Spirited Away or Parasite, and with a 5 to 3 vote, Spirited Away is chosen. You can feel yourself becoming sleepy again, your belly full and sated.

"Sweetheart, if you want to go to bed, you can," Taehyung whispers in your ear as he notices you jolt awake from where you were drifting off. You grumble something back at him, although he can't make out what you said, curling into his body for warmth.

"Hyung, can you pass me that blanket behind you?" He whispers to Yoongi, nodding at the fluffy throw blanket on the back of his loveseat. Yoongi blinks and throws it Taehyung's way, Taehyung giving him an unamused look when he gets smacked in the face with it.

You give an appreciative hum when Taehyung wraps the blanket around the two of you, providing more comfort. It takes less than a minute to fall asleep, the white noise of the movie helps.

Taehyung smiles down at your sleeping face, pressing a quick kiss to your temple and holding you closer to him. He looks up as he hears a quiet camera click, seeing all of his band mates and brothers looking towards the two of you with big smiles.

"You guys love each other, huh?" Jimin asks with a heartwarming smile. Taehyung glances back down at you, noting your peaceful expression and steady breathing.

"I love her more than I love living itself, Hyung. She was so upset today and felt like she couldn't tell me because of how busy we are with the comeback preparations," Taehyung murmured, frowning a bit as he remembered your earlier conversation.

"You know how (Y/N) is like Tae, even before the two of you started dating she was always so worried about causing stress to us just by being our friend," Hoseok reminds him, seeing how upset the younger was by how reserved you were with him.

"I know Hyung. I just want her to open up more. I love her so much, and I want her to be happy," Taehyung said, readjusting his grip on you as you wiggled into a more comfortable position.

"She is happy with you, Tae. Everyone can see that. You both just have to work on this moving forward. It's all going to be okay," Namjoon advises him, his wise words striking a chord in Taehyung.

"You're right, Hyung."

"I know I am. Anyways I think it's bedtime for everyone, it's getting late, and we have more things to do tomorrow," Namjoon states, everyone, groaning and stumbling off to their rooms.

"I'm gonna take (Y/N) to bed, I'll see you in the morning Hyungs," Taehyung whispers, lifting you with ease and tucking the blanket back around your sleeping body.

He enters your shared bedroom, gently tucking you into the bed as you rolled over and grumbled, kicking your legs a bit. Taehyung giggles, changing quickly into PJs before he slips into bed next to you, pulling the blankets up around you both.

"Hnnng? Tae?" You mumble as you wake up a bit from your sleep. Taehyung shushed you, gently stroking your hair to put you back to sleep.

"Go to sleep, baby. I love you so much," Taehyung whispers into the quiet of the night. You settle down and start to feel your eyes shut again.

"I love you too, Tae, so much."

What had started as a bad day had become a good one, Taehyung always brightening up your life. You wouldn't have it any other way.

#bts #fanfic #taehyung x reader #v x reader #kpop fluff #kpop angst #kpop scenarios #kpop imagines #kpop drabbles #bts fanfic #kpop writing #writing #bts members #bts x reader

69 notes · View notes

snapefiction · 3 years

Text

You are all I am still being for - Snapefiction

A/N: Thank you so much for this Request! ( @artisticreptilequeen ) I had a fun but also hard time writing it and by now I have read it like a thousand times and can't decide wether I like or dislike it anymore but still as always- I hope you love it! Happy Valentines day and don't forget to love yourself. 💓

❤️ Please remember that English isn’t my native language and that my Writings will include Mistakes and maybe weird formed sentences. ❤️

Word Count: 7338

Trigger Warnings: Breakup, Swearing, Angst

Y/N - Your Name

You are all I am still being for

It was always quite clear to you of how you imagined your Future. Since Severus entered your life or more likely stumbled into your life he was a part of your planned Future. And Despite everyones expectations the both of you connected quickly and stayed together even after you both graduated. It wasn’t easy to make things work all the time, it was rather tough and tricky. But it never had really bothered you. Not until now. You rarely spoke anymore. You lived together but past each other. You simply became strangers. So the both of you knew what would have to happen.

Looking in his eyes you couldn’t see the warmth they once gave you but shivers.Looking in his eyes you felt like you looked through them.

,,Is it because of me?“ He shook his head slowly but steady. Gasping for a bit of air he hesitated before answering.

,,We aren’t the same anymore. I feel like-“ ,,You don’t know me anymore?“ He closed his mouth. Blinked once and lowered his Glance. You knew that feeling and you also knew defeat. There was no difference anymore. Not in his words wether in his actions. You were defeated and it took over your relationship.

,,We have changed. We won’t work out anymore.“ The Words swept through the room as your Eyes looked into each others again. Now it was you. You gasped for air only to hold back a sob. As Always he hurried over to you, slung his arms around your bent figure and leaned his head on yours.The Tears were streaming- they didn’t even announce themselves but just flood out of your eyes as soon as the heartbreaking sob left your lips. There were so many Moments you knew that a relationship wouldn’t be able to last through this. Some things break under pressure and now as sad as it was - it was your time to break. Your greatest Vulnerability hit you and somehow you knew that you wouldn’t be able to fully recover from this.

„I´ll miss you.“ You said not really knowing how honest those words were meant to be.

- Four Months. It have been four Months since you and Severus have broken. Not only did you move out of your shared chambers but also quit your Job at Hogwarts.You were desperate to try something new for a long time now and maybe this would be your new start into a new adventure.

Thinking about it you almost smiled. You had a rough time lately, well, you literally just broke up with your ex boyfriend of more than just a few intense years. For Today was set a Celebration in honour of Hogwarts and the end of the School year. Also you counted it as your Goodbye to the castle and hoped it would made you feel anything more like a independent Person who was about to seek a new adventure. So you wore your prettiest Clothes, pinned up your hair and prep talked yourself ready for the Party. Remus, your best friend told you to meet him there. So you made your way there being excited and happy. There was almost no chance that Severus would be there too since he despised Parties and People in general . Perfect for you. Walking through the Room, grabbing a drink you were looking for your best friend. He was always late since he started dating Tonks which you actually didn’t mind. Soaking yourself in the Expectation that Remus would follow you any minute you looked around and greeted some guests. Until your eyes met her. She was like jewellery hanging on his arm decorating him. Severus was there with someone. Quickly turning to Filius who suddenly just stood next to you, you asked him everything about her.

,,Filius, who’s that girl?“ As he answered you didn’t even noticed how you stopped paying attention to him after he gave you enough information. All you saw were them.

Sky. She was literally named after the beautifulest creations of all and you couldn’t hold your thoughts back but compare yourself to her. To her beauty as she stood there in the dim candlelight. To her laughter as she laughed slightly at one of someones jokes. To her smile as she appreciated nice words from one of the other guests. To her whole being as she stood this close to the Man you still loved. She was perfect and like a avalanche self doubt, sorrow and even self pity swept you off the ground. At first you just stared over to her again and again, then you began to walk from the middle of the room to the edge only to crook your Posture and hoped to become invisible. She was so slim, so beautiful, so smart and interesting while you felt like a useless speck of dust. Even if you wouldn’t compare yourself to her you wouldn’t be able to not notice the way he looked at her. How Severus laid his Hand on her upper back. How he smiled and drank from his Glas. How he actually made people smile. Your stomach turned and you intended to leave the room. Enough is enough. Your feet carried you outwards the Room through the corridors to your Chambers. As if it wasn’t enough that you had to see her you also had to see him in a way that you weren’t able to make him - happy. Pressing your lips to a thin line you tried to swallow the sobs that pressured to be let out. The Tears were already flooding but you told yourself you would hold back as long as you can. The Halls seemed endless long and you tried to not think of every memory you had shared with him that drained you to a total breakdown.

It was too much for your dear heart to handle. Seeing him not noticing you was a lot but seeing him not noticing you because he was happy with someone else was summoning all your worst nightmares. Also it weren’t just your feelings. It was the physical Pain it caused you. The way your chest burned and heart was in pure pain. How your fingertips turned numb, your earlobes felt warm, your knees almost gave in and your face became puffy and red. It was the pain of it all. And by that it was clear. The both of you were officially broken up.

Hearing a knock you got out off bed. You pulled your Jacket over your arms and tiptoed to the door. Merlin, it was way to late for visitors. You have been falling asleep while crying earlier and would’ve wished it could’ve stayed this way. Opening the Door it was Remus standing in the middle of the frame waiting for you.

,,How are you?“ Shrugging your shoulders you stepped aside. As if your puffy face, the way you left the Party early and probably Filius confused reaction weren’t enough to tell.

,,How am I supposed to feel after that?“ Smiling emphatically with pity he accepted the silent invite and sat down at your sofa. Following him you started to babble. „Do you know her? Did you knew about this?“ The words you actually didn’t expected a answer but they left your mouth so quickly.

Sighing he nodded almost invisible. ,,I’ve met her at the Ministry before but I didn’t knew about their relationship or whatever it may be. Oddly he hasn’t told me when I picked up my Potions.“ A small ironic laughter escaped you. Severus would probably never get along with Remus.

,,Of course not. I´m sorry, it´s just.. I’m still..“

,,Hurt?“ He took the teapot from the desk and filled two cuppas for the both of you. Shrugging your shoulders which felt like you had to carry a enormous weight you didn’t answer any further and tried to sort your thoughts.

,,There are only three weeks left of school and i have talked to Sirius-´´He passed you your teacup. ,,And he’d glad to welcome you. Until you found a place of your own.“ Your eyes were locked with the cup in your Hands. You tried to forget this part. All your belongings were still at Severus House at Spinners End. You couldn’t stay there any longer and had to get them. You had to face the bare truth one last time before your past would be able to vanish behind all the barriers that you were trying to build.

,,Y/N?“ Looking up you just nodded. ,,Thank you, Remus. It’s tough finding something- those are tough times.“ Again he smiled. As always was Remus proving you that he’d always be there to help you out.

,,Do you think I can get my stuff this weekend and get it to the Grimmaulds Place? I don’t want to step on Severus toes and rely on him any longer than needed.“

,,Sirius told me that you’re welcome any time.“ Swallowing a lump from your throat you looked at him.

,,What would I do without you?“ Refilling his cup again he laughed.

,,No worries, dear. That’s what friends are for. Can I help you with something else?“

,,No.“ You sighed and tried to smile gratefully. ,,Can you just talk to me about something else?“ And after that he told you about anything that had happened at the Party besides Severus. About how Filch danced with Mrs. Norris, Hagrid and Filius sang together and Horace Slughorn himself broke his own Butterbeer Record.

The Weekend crept around rather quickly and as you were walking out of the cabin it was like a Suction. You took in everything at once. The smell of Severus that laid in the Air. The small Details hidden in his Bookshelves, the flair of the house itself. Everything.

This didn’t feel like leaving Severus, you thought, it feels like losing your Home. At first you weren’t daring to walk around so you just hurried upstairs. Grabbing your Bag you charmed it so you’d be able to make everything fit in there. You grabbed your clothes, your notebooks, a few of your books, personal belongings and last but not least you stopped at your Night shelf. Pulling it open you looked at the Necklace that Severus had gotten you as Teenagers. At the Letters you kept from him. The Newspaper Article of him and his favourite Book that he wanted to know safe in your Possession. Those were the last things connecting you to him. For a second you stopped. Looking at the content from above before only taking the Letters you once received from him. Those other things simply weren’t meant for you anymore.

Shoving them carefully into your Bag you closed it up and pulled it over your shoulder. This would be the last time that you’d visit this place. For a moment you thought about walking around one last time and soaking all the left memories in but as you heard noises from downstairs you apparated away. Standing in front of the Grimmaulds Place No. 12 you knew that this was your silent goodbye to Severus and the life you had connected to him.

,,Home, sweet Home. Or more like Room, sweet Room.“ Sirius joked while showing you your new accommodation.

,,I promise that I won’t bother you for too long.“ Shaking his Head he just laughed again.

,,You don’t bother me at all. Actually I’m pretty happy that I’m not alone in this house. Kreacher can be a dunderhead but I hope you’ll still like it here.“

,,It’s a beautiful House.“ A nod from both sides. ,,I´m glad you’re here, Y/N.“

,,Thank you, Sirius.“ Appreciating your friends benevolence you sat down on the bed.

By that he left the room and for the first time in your life you were truly alone.

Your Job at the Ministry started well. Your colleagues were warm hearted and welcomed you quickly. It was easy to fulfil every expectations and still have fun at work. So it came that you connected to your colleagues quickly too. Especially with Achilles Grey. A young blonde Man who was working in a office above you. He was offering to show you around and connected his intentions by also inviting you to dinner afterwards. At first you declined but after a few weeks you gave in to get his begging to an end.

Seeing Achilles was different. He was mindful. He pushed your chair back for you. He didn’t kiss your Lips but the back of your Hand as a greeting. He brought you Flowers every now and then and he cared. He cared for you. And when he kissed you on this night after he took you out for dinner everything was different. Your heart broke again. It broke in two. Because for once you were happy again but it wasn’t with the Person you planned your life out with. It was bittersweet.

Slowly, torturing slowly for him but for you furiously fast, you two grew closer together. And after five Months of meeting up for dinners regularly, talking within your breaks and having his full attention at all times you two entered a committed relationship.

It’s not like you asked him to give you presents all the time, focusing completely on you, having him always paying dinner and anything else but he practically begged you to let him do this for you. He wanted to spoil you rotten as his love language. It was a confusion trait of your relationship because you simply weren’t used to this. To love loudly and openly. It wasn’t balanced like with Severus. With Achilles it was all or nothing, he loved in extreme ways. Or at least that’s the way you felt like. Everyone around you was admiring your relationship calling it unique and meant to be.

You didn’t knew what your relationship really depended on. Was it Love? Trust? Or just the need of being with someone? Was it the fear of being alone? Whatever it was, it was a lot. And it was fast. So to relieve Sirius hospitality you even accepted to move in with Achilles after a short amount of being together. Things went on quickly but Achilles never mind. Actually sometimes he was already talking about a marriage or children as he couldn’t wait to finally achieve the Life he dreamed about so badly.

Sobbing you walked through the Grimmaulds Place. It was horrific. Another Fight within three days. Quickly you walked through the Corridor only to run up the Stairs where you almost crushed together with Remus. Wiping your eyes you tried to hide your pain.

,,Y/N..“ He didn’t asked what had happened since he already knew what had been going on. Without saying anything he embraced your hug. Sushing silently he patted your Back. ,,If you’d like to talk- then Sirius and I are always here for you.“

Nodding you carefully let go while trying not to cry for a few seconds. He was right. It wasn’t right of you to storm his house regularly without telling him what was going on at all. So a few Minutes later you found yourself sitting at the long table starting to talk about Achilles and yours Relationship.

„He wants it. He wants it all. A Family with children, a House to call our own, a Marriage, Me and if it’s possible everything by tomorrow. And he loves me so much. I can’t remember someone loving me so much. But I never felt so alone. So alone and lost. I’m not ready for this. I can’t give him all of this.“ You ended admitting while wiping your nose not daring to look up to the both of them. Your friends have never seen you like that. You never have talked to them about your relationship with Severus because except the part that you grew to live apart you never had issues like that. Only when it was too late they had to carry your sorrow and take care of you the way you’ve down for them a million times before.

,,It’s okay. You don’t have to do anything of that.“ Remus began shoving some chocolate over the Table.

,,He’s a Prick for always fighting with you.“ Sirius began and the Conversation just got lost in a discussion about what you truly deserved and some more and some less precious advices from them. The Conversation went along in front of your eyes but you weren’t a part of it. That’s how you have felt since a while now. Life went on in front of your eyes but you weren’t a part of it. You felt like a doll. Living up to everyone exceptions of a good girlfriend, friend, worker and human. But you didn’t notice how quickly you lost yourself.

You hated the Heat. You turned to hate the Summer. You’ve been together with Achilles something over a year yet which lead to certain events happening. Big Events happening and following. Nervous you sat down at one of the rather rare Meetings of the Order. After Voldemorts Death multiple Years ago you only met up a few times a year. That’s why everyone was greeting each other happily and waited for everyone to meet up.

,,It’s nice to see you again, Y/N.“ Albus spoke softly to you. ,,And congratulations on the Engagement.“ Nodding you tried to over hear it and somehow play it off. Engagement. What a irrational idea of itself, you thought.

,,Engagement?“ Molly quickly gasped and hurried over to look at the Ring on your Hand. ,,When did he ask you? How did he ask you?“ Quietly you started to talk while Molly held onto your Finger.

,,We went on a walk and at our favourite Place he dropped on one knee and asked me.“ Your mumbled. You felt so exposed and exploited and couldn’t feel the happiness that everyone was showing you. The whole Situation died down completely as Severus walked in. Molly let go of your hand and smilingly went to the Kitchen to get more tea. But Severus eyes immediately fell on you. On the Ring on your Hand. His reaction was important for you. You couldn’t tell why but you had to know how he reacts but when he showed you no emotion at all you felt disappointed. He only had to say one word and you’d change your mind on being with Achilles. Severus still owned your feelings but time made you change your Priorities. Why being with someone who can’t love me back? So why shouldn’t I be in a relationship with someone who was loving me to pieces and make him happy and fulfil his wishes. Even if it had cost you your happiness.

Slowly guiding the beautiful white dress over your curves you looked at yourself in the mirror. Pressing your lips to a thin line you tried to figure out who that in the mirror might be. It wasn’t the self vision you once owned by yourself anymore. It was a lonely human, a silent human. So much has changed in the last time and still you never found happiness in not even one thing. You simply became a version of yourself that you never knew laid within you. The silent version. The one that had no energy anymore. The one that forgot to laugh. But you have told yourself that you loved him, you loved Achilles so that’s why you were saying yes all those time ago and now willed to marry him.

Quietly almost inaudible you heard a small short knock. Was it a knock? Or just imagination? As you intended to call them in you heard a loud knock. A determined one.

,,Come in.“ You said while pulling the dress over your shoulders and putting the veil in your hair. Slow and silent Movements were now to be heard in the room.

,,Achilles, it’s bad luck that you see me before the ceremony.“ You whispered while turning away from the mirror now not being able to see him and sliding into your shoes. He never had high expectations when it was a bout rules or traditions. The Figure stood behind you but you just closed your eyes. Even if he hated traditions you wouldn’t ruin them. But as he said nothing you got confused. Wasn’t he supposed to already await you at the Aisle?

,,Please, don’t marry him.“ Your eyes shot open and your feet quickly made you spun around. You’d recognise his voice out of a million ones. Blinking you tried to hold back tears that quickly swelled up. Your Lips shivered but you weren’t able to form sentences besides a small: ,,What?“.

Severus was standing there in front of you, not Achilles. His tall Figure was enveloped in his formal black suit. He looked thinner and his face wasn’t just usually pale but almost grey. Damp hung his hair low covering a half of his face. He had gotten some brighter hairs between his black ones. Like you were caught in a dream you looked up to him. He also seemed to be taller which was probably just a fabrication of your fantasy. But in your mind he was almost towering you.

„Don´t marry him, Y/N.“ The onyx eyes became glossy as they connected to yours again. For a second you forgot what he meant or which Wedding he was indicating to. Until his desperate voice made you realise it quickly like they would hit you with a brick.

,,I can see that you’re not happy.“ His Hands rushed through his hair brushing strains behind his ear. ,,Please. We´re both not happy anymore, are we?“ Your Throat was like sealed. You were looking for words but there were no right words for you. Whatever you’d say now was decisive for someone else’s life.

,,Severus, I don’t know what to say. You know that- I can’t do this.“ Quickly he shook his head.

,,Why not?“ Your eyes scanned the room in hectic while avoiding him. Was this real? Your heart was blasting against your ribcage.,,Because it’s not fair. I can’t do this to him on our meant to be wedding day.“ Quickly Severus took your hands in his.

,,You know that that’s not true. It was never fair of him to force this Engagement on to you.“ Suddenly he stood so close. Your breathing slowed down and you closed your eyes only to feel his presence.

,,What do you want me to do? What am I supposed to say?“ One of his tall Hands wandered under your chin only to make you look up to him.

,,Tell him the Truth. That he isn’t good enough for you and never will be. That you despise everything about him.About this Life and that you’re way better off with-"

,,With you? Is that what you’re trying to say? If I may remind you-" You pulled your chin away and let go of his hand only to step back a few feet. ,,If I may remind you of the Fact that you didn’t want me either. That we weren’t good enough for each other as well.“ Pulling off your Gloves you sniffed. ,,You did a very good Job at proving it to me everyday.“ Tears started to smear your make up but you couldn't care less. This - whatever was happening right now - was more important than anything else to you. Now it was Severus who hesitated before he shook his head.

,,But I still love you. Everyday I wake up I realise it’s only you that I’m still living for. Without you I would’ve been dead by now a million times. Everyday I survived I dedicate to you. And I know that if you will marry this idiocy of a man I won’t be tomorrow. I will break into a thousand pieces and spend the rest of my life thinking about a life that could've been mine. I can't pretend that everything is fine when you're back at Hogwarts when I know you made a big mistake. You are all I am still being for. Are you even happy anymore? Please, don’t marry him. That’s all I’m asking for. Not any other chances or anything else but please don’t marry him.“

,,Now that I'm trying to do something right you show up and want me to give up everything I build up."

,,I ask you to do the right thing for yourself." He concluded before taking a step forward. Your Voices were now risen out of the heat just to turn down in the following second.

,,What about Sky? What about Achilles? What about me? What are we supposed to do?" Again he tried to reach out for your hand. Just to hold it carefully.

,,Sky? She never was important to me and Achilles has been engaged several times before which he always called off on his own. He will survive. But I want you to survive and to be able to become happy again. I saw your face when you announced the Engagement that wasn’t love you were talking about. I know your love.“

,,I spent my entire Life loving you and .. and now you ask me to do the unbearable for you. All the Reasons you named.. they were all dedicating to your own luck."

,,Because you are my Luck."

,,Severus, This is not a Game."

,,I know it's hard and I know that you're confused. But if you ever doubted this and want to run away I will be waiting for you in front of the Church."

He slightly pressed your hand carefully before taking a last deep look in your eyes only to vanish behind the white old wooden door.

The only thing left you could hear was your heartbeat. How loud your blood pressed through your veins and ended up in that burning point behind your ribs. Your mouth run dry and you didn't dare to move. Did this really happen? Was he really here? A mixture of every possible emotion was rushing through you.

Even though you knew the hurtful consequences you did the only right thing left to do. Time was rushing and your blood pressure was working up louder and louder in your ears like you woke up from a fever dream.

Your feet hurt from the high white shoes that you had been wearing all day long but now wasn’t the time to complain. And when you took the stairs, almost running you felt like you'd escape. Like you were breaking free. The Bells rung which was your sign to walk up the aisle. But instead of running to the chapel your feet carried you through the huge doors. Away from the few people that have been waiting for this Wedding. Away from Achilles, his Life and all his expectations that never suited you anyways.

And when you opened the door to the old blue shabby car you just grabbed your dress and left everything behind. As the Cardoor closed Severus didn't hesitated. He started the Motor and looked at you one last time.

,,Are you ready?“ Nodding you smiled. For the first time in years you really smiled which turned into a lough heartfelt laughter. And as soon as you crossed the corner Severus let the car fly towards a new destination that would now change your life for the better.

Two months later. To be exact two months, nine days and almost 9 Hours later you were nervously standing in front of Achilles and your Flats Door. Just Breathe- you told yourself which had a rather uncalming effect because you were already breathing, right? And it wasn't solving your problems just like that. Knocking twice he already opened the door. The Frown on his face was hurtful but you had no right to be hurt. You did this to him and you felt no regrets so you had to go through this.

,,Y/N." He greeted before walking down the Flat you just until the latest events have had shared.

,,Achilles, can we talk for a moment?" He stopped in his tracks standing in the middle of the small hallway.

,,I don't know what you want to talk about. I was just hoping that I finally found my significant other. For the first time in my life I was completely sure about something. It's just-" he turned around. ,,I'm not the one you want." His bright eyes grew glossy for a moment but then he turned back around. ,,I just hope that you're happier." And by that he lead the way for you to the bedroom. He already collected some things of yours and lined them up in the bed.

,,Thank you.“ He nodded firmly and tried not to look at you. He was dealing with it in his own strict ways. Quickly and carefully you collected your few Belongings before you turned to him one last time.

,,I'm sorry, I really am but.. I couldn't give you what you wanted so bad. You'll find them and will be the most happiest you ever were. You're a good Person." Again he just nodded and watched you leaving the Bedroom. As you held the Doorknob of the Entrance door in your hand you heard him one last time.

,,And i hope Severus will treat you right this time." Quickly you turned around. Your eyebrows were furrowed and you opened your mouth to say something but stopped quickly. You haven't though about getting back together with Severus until just now. He helped you move back to Hogwarts and that Thing at the Wedding. "That Thing". But getting back together? You ran away from a wedding, your wedding to be specific and now he thinks you rambled from one relationship to the next? Well, what else was he supposed to believe as you ran away with your Ex? You closed your Mouth, opened the door and left without further Words. This simply wasn’t your Home anymore.

Since the Wedding and after he helped you get back to Hogwarts Severus hasn’t had spoken to you. You hadn't intended a conversation either but also there was no possibility for it. You decided to get your thoughts straight back first.

When you were accepting the job a while back last school year which was around three months before your Wedding you weren't expecting your „comeback“ like that. Single again, running to your chambers only wearing your brides dress, your veil, white high heels and the prettiest underwear ever and starting a new chapter you knew nothing about.

It was a rare gift for you to be able to comeback to Hogwarts. After your and Severus Breakup you were quickly on your feet to practically flee from him. So as surprise as Dumbledore was as you left the school you were even more surprised that he asked you come back. The Job at the Ministry was alright. It was simple and the People were nice but it could never fulfil you as much as the Job as a Teacher did. Also it was no big secret that not only the Teaching at Hogwarts was special. The whole atmosphere took you back to a completely different Time. You didn’t only accept a Job but a different world of it’s own.

,,Y/N! I´m happy yer back! I think ye won’t need a Tour around, do ya?“ Hagrid joked at Dinner while shoving a whole steak into his mouth. Shaking your head you laughed only to answer:,,I don’t think so, but thank you.“ As your smile turned into a grin you noticed someone walking up to the Dinner Table as well. You didn’t had to take a look to know who it was. You’d recognise him everywhere. His steps almost echoed in the Hall and as quick as he walked he was sitting down next to you. It was weird at first, sitting next to him again after everything that had happened. The both of you haven’t talked about the wedding anymore. You haven’t talked in General and it was weird. The last time the two of you met he confessed all his feelings to you after not talking for almost a few years and now he sat there not even looking at you. It probably was his way of dealing with - with what exactly? Probably everything.

,,Good evening, Severus.“ You greeted silently before taking a bite of your favourite Food as well. Those three words costed you a lot of Courage which were quickly gifted by his response.

,,Evening.“ As Charming as always he didn’t hesitate you remain cold and as silent as possible. Continuing to eat you suddenly felt different. It didn’t feel like the new adventure anymore like you just had titled it. It was like a wave taking you over. For a second you stopped in your tracks until you realised that it was the feeling of feeling like yourself again. You grew back to the Person you aspired to be and the Person you were the most comfortable being. A great way to start your old new life you thought before finishing dinner and preparing you classes for tomorrow.

Stressed you grabbed your book and started to wander. Even though you loved teaching it could be difficult at times. Just like today you had a massive Headache. Everywhere you went was someone following and asking you questions. You knew how important the O.W.L´s are but sometimes the stressed students seem to forget how desperately you were already trying to help them reach the best Knowledge they can and how exhausted you got too after your first month back at Hogwarts. So with no other intention than finding some peace you ran up to the Astrology Tower. Holding the Book close so the last few Papers you had to grade wouldn’t slip you took a deep breath as you got there. To your surprise you weren’t alone. Severus sat there hunched over some papers looking up like a caught deer.

,,Oh, I´m sorry. I can leave if you want. I just needed a quiet Place.“

,,I did too.“ He cleared his throat. „Take a seat.“ Severus said before turning back to his book. Quietly to not disturb the silence and found peace you sat down on the floor leaning your back against the wall. You’ve been sitting on this hard chair in your office and classes all day and now you were glad to finally just lean against something and pull your knees close so you could lean your papers and book against your legs. Sometimes you heard Severus Feather scratching on the Paper or him huffing - probably because of some silly answers from one of his students. Back then the both of you used to chuckle at them together. But besides that it was silent. The Sun went slowly down and as you finally lightened some Candles he turned on his seat towards you.

,,Are you even comfortable down there?“ His pale face was turned worried but you just smiled and nodded.

,,Actually it’s way more comfortable than it may seem. You should give it a try.“ A short moment on you could see his thoughts debate but as you put your book aside and moved a little bit so he would have enough space he got up only to sit down on the floor next to you. Somehow he looked kind of lost alone there on the floor next to you. You saw that not the surface was uncomfortable for him but the Situation in general. Your smile left your lips as you began to wonder how the person you not only trusted but also loved the most could turn into a stranger.

„Isn’t it weird to-“ You took a deep breath only to pause a bit longer and continue as the words finally came to your mind. „Isn’t it weird to just sit here? After everything we’ve been through?“ His dark eyes looked over to you. He looked so tired and time had made him age years. „I do not only miss you.. I miss my Best Friend.“ His lips were sealed as he listened to your confession. As always he sorted his Thoughts first before saying anything. A nod followed and now he straightened his Back.

„We’ve been together our whole Life. It’s not easy to ignore it all and act like there has never been anything between the both of us.“ His eyes didn’t leave yours. He was paying full attention to all of you right now.

„Be honest.“ Your Heart raced like crazy as it was a important Question for you. „Don’t you miss me just a bit?“ Rolling his eyes he shook his head smiling vividly.

„You really think I wouldn’t miss you?“ Carefully his Hand crept closer to yours until he took it in his. „Why would I have made you changed your mind at the Wedding if I wasn’t missing you?“

„You make it look so easy.“ Your Body moved closer to him. This burning sensation came back until your faces were so close the tip of your noses touched and your lips could almost feel the warmth of his. The intensity of your feelings were almost overtaking you.

„You do too.“ His eyes were closed and he had to restrain as good as he could trying to give you the space you asked for so badly a few years ago. His heart was racing, screaming at him to move to fill the little gasp between you. But he didn’t do it.

„We both know we wouldn’t work out in a relationship.“ He mumbled and when his Lip accidentally stroked yours for a millisecond he almost broke down.

„We could.. just for the melancholy..“ Your eyes were closed by now too. Being this close was messing with your senses. His smell was filling your nose, his air filling your lungs and he at all made your blood boil.„Just a kiss.“ You whsipered.

„Just a kiss.“ Nodding, because you were unable to speak you felt him finally doing it. His Lips touched yours. Eagerly, hungry, loving. His Hands left yours and his cupped your cheeks only to deepen the kiss and make sure he wasn’t dreaming. Your Hands were grasped to his collar, he loved it whenever you did that to him. If he only knew what he still did to you. From a fast passionate kiss it slowed down to a loving desperate one. Gasping for air you had to let go of him. His eyes were widened and he was shocked.

„Just for the Melancholy.“ He now repeated while nodding quickly and Severus kissed you again. Again. Again. And again. You lost the track of time for a moment. Just a loud Noise made you tear apart. You accidentally pushed one of the Candleholders over. Flustered and blushing you woke up from the Trance that had overtaken you. The Wax had spilled on the Floor and as it splashed right next to your Papers you quickly got up to check up on those. As you flicked through the Pages you sighed in relief. Thankfully everything was till fine. In the Meantime was Severus already casting away the spilled Mess and made some distance between the both of you. He was still overwhelmed by the Situation, just as you were.

„Do you want me to walk you back to your chambers? It’s already very late.“ A smile widened on your face as you got up from the Floor. „Just for the Melancholy?“ Quickly he smiled and even though he tried to hide his cheeks behind his curtain of hair you saw him blushing. The walk was silent at first. You were still thinking about what had happened but as your chambers got closer and closer you just started to babble about the first thing that came into your mind until you did reach your door. Severus was listening carefully to every word you spoke. He always has been a good listener and you knew how much more he enjoyed to listen rather than to speak. Holding the Doorknob in your Hand you smiled vividly at him.

„Thank you.“ His Figure in this dim light made your knees weak. All the thoughts about him made you weak. He made you vulnerable again.

„Goodnight, Y/N.“ And as you walked into your chambers and saw those raw Walls again you knew you wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight. All your Thoughts this night would be dedicated to Severus, again. You were so thankful that he had been saving you from one of the worst decisions that you could’ve ever made.

It became a habitat of yours to finish your classes as fast as you could, eat some lunch and then finally almost run to the Astrology Tower every Afternoon. And as always as you saw him you two promised that there were no Feelings attached and it was just for the Melancholy. At first you thought it would be a clever idea. Hide all your Feelings behind this Barriers of Lies. But time proved you wrong. You felt this addiction again, you wanted more of him ,no- you needed more of him. Each one of the thousands of Kisses made you desperate for more. Things got more and more steamy. Hands started wandering more and further and every Night you walked back to your Rooms with him by your side only to drop you off to shorter Nights and needier and more desperate Thoughts than ever. The rest that was left of you now was just a mess. You needed to talk to him, get the collected Frustration that build up finally released. You needed clarification. After three Months of meeting him everyday you needed him to know about your emotions.

You even skipped Lunch to run to the Astronomy Tower. You couldn’t wait to talk to him. Of course you were afraid since the only thing that made this flirtation work was the pretext of doing it because anything else wouldn’t work out in other contexts. But for you it wasn’t just Melancholy anymore. It probably never was.

Opening the Door you saw the Room being left empty. Empty? Severus was always here. He never ate Lunch and just graded his Papers in peace. Where was he? Out of Fear you could miss him you sat down and waited. Time never passed this slow but today was every second punishing you. The Sun went down again and your patience broke down completely. Running like your life was depending on it you hurried down to the Dungeons. Your nervousness made your vision blurry and thoughts crazy. So when you finally reached Severus Door you knocked as loud as you could fearing it was almost too late to confess yourself to him since it was your turn to finally admit yourself towards him. And the both of you knew that.

He hasn´t fully opened his door yet but you were already talking. „Severus, I love you. I cannot act like this between us wouldn’t work out anymore. I know it would because I’m willing to do anything to make it work, okay? You’re the most important Person in my Life and-“

„Y/N!“ He now finally interrupted slightly taken by surprise. He took your Hand in his only to pull you inside his Rooms. Remus who was probably just picking up some Wolfsbane quickly hurried out of the room but not without grinning widely. You didn’t really pay any attention to him. You were just looking at the dark tall man in front of you which you adored so much. As the door was finally closed behind Lupin he let go of your Hand and pulled you into a tight Hug.

„Welcome Home, Love. I have missed you so much.“

Taglist: @deepperplexity , @monstreviolet , @wow-life-love4 , @lizlil , @once-upon-an-imagine , @darkthought15 , @elizabeth-baelish , @looseheartedlady , @ithinkweallsing , @simpforsnape , @meteoritewolf69 , @1975weasley , @morphineisouthoney

Let me know if you want to be added to my Taglist! :)

#severus snape #snape #snapefiction #my writing #severus snape x reader #snape x reader #snape x y/n #severus snape x y/n #prosnape

85 notes · View notes

bakubaewritings · 4 years

Text

Home

Bakugo x reader angst/fluff

warning - broken down Bakugo, mental breakdown, sleeping pills, trigger warning, and language

word count 2,541

Love is the feeling of being home when you're not.

That's how you felt when you and Bakugo started dating. Everything was great. You were head over heels in love with the explosive pro hero. After your school years at UA, you and Bakugo finally decided to make it official. Since the beginning, Bakugo had made it clear to you his ambitions, and you respected that his hero work came first. You supported him fully; you told your career was important to you as well. You were a hero, too, though you were a rescue hero. You worked in more in the day time; your quirk involved socking up rays of the sun to heal.

You broke all your walls for him, but Bakugo never did the same, despite you being together for a year. You got close to getting him to tell you that he loved you, but he couldn't say it, and you understood why. Bakugo was very reserved, and you respected that. The most intimate thing you two had ever done was move in together since his apartment was close to both your agencies. Since you were often home before Bakugo, your quirk not being very useful after sundown, you always made dinner for him to eat when he came home later from patrols. Sometimes you'd wake up to help him care for him. In the morning as well, you'd wake up extra early to make him breakfast and kiss him good morning before going to work.

However, the relationship began to become very strained. You were never demanding that Bakugo take a break from his hero work, never asked him to stay home with you. However, when Bakugo began trading breakfast for morning gym workouts was when you decided to tell him how you felt. You were never the confrontational type, but you only ever saw Bakugo when you woke up in the middle of the night to see him sleeping next to you. He had also been growing increasingly distant from you in the last few months. When you had found the time to talk, Bakugo just gave you the cold shoulder, telling you to stop nagging him. You sought out advice from Kirishima and Izuku, feeling like you had no one else to turn to.

"You have to talk to him Y/n, tell him how you miss him. Be honest, I've known Kacchan for years, and he may be mean, but he loves you if you tell him how you feel he'll listen." Midoriya's words of advice encouraged you.

"Bakugo's just really hard at getting close to people, but he does love you." Were Kirishima's words

The Alarm rang at 5 am, and Bakugo groggily stood from the bed. You woke up with after him grabbing his wrist before he could get up. The sun was barely even up yet, "Suki." You called out, tugging him towards you. He looked over his shoulder; his face was far from happy. A scowl formed on his face, eyebrows sunk over his vermillion eyes.

"What? I have to get to the gym." You rose from bed slowly, your eyes glossy at his harsh tone.

"Suki, I miss you, can we please talk." His face contorted as he let out a scoff. You looked at him confused, why was he acting so cold? You asked yourself.

"I wouldn't expect you to understand since your a C class hero, but I have to be at my best to beat that fucking Deku and Shoto and become number 1." He was now facing away from you; he pulled his wrist away roughly from your grasp.

"C- Class Hero?" You raised an eyebrow, your hands balled into fists, collecting the sheets over you.

"Yeah, a C- class hero! Unlike you, I'm important, I have a job to do, and I have to be in the best shape for it." He turned around his face so close to yours as he yelled in your face. Your lip quivered, how could he be so heartless. Tears began to stream down your face.

"I don't have time for this shit."

You looked at him"I can't believe you, I wanted to talk to you, to fix what was wrong in our relationship because I love you and I want to make us work, but you're just an asshole."

"You're what's wrong."

Your eyebrows arched in confusion, "excuse me?"

"You are what's wrong; you come into my life bringing all your shit feelings with you expecting me to fix your problems, you move in here filling my space with your shit. Then you fucking expect me to say I love you, well I don't, and I never will, you're a nuisance." Tears streamed down your face like waterfalls.

"Then I'm sorry for wasting your fucking time." You stood up, "I'm sorry I ever fell in love with you." You screamed at him. Bakugo jut stood up grabbed his gym bag and left, and when he came home, you and your things were gone.

That was two months ago, you had moved out and found yourself staying in your old apartment. You stayed away from Bakugo, who made no effort to contact you. After a year of being together, you couldn't believe it had ended this way. There were many times where you find yourself crying on Mina's couch or during girls night at Ochaco's, but after a while, you realized how strong you were strong, and no matter how much Bakugo hurt you, you knew how good it would feel to see him swallow his words when he saw you again. You were not going to let his words hurt you because you knew you were no C class hero. You spent those two months working on yourself because for the first time in a year you were putting your own needs first. Now you did miss Bakugo extremely, you had gotten so used to him. Sure the last few months were tough, but you missed the good times. "let's go out tonight, Y/N; we can go can you karaoke bar!" Mina's excitement was prominent in her voice. "Yeah, and wear your matching UA Sweater!" Sero's voice called from the background. You giggled. "Alright, I'll catch you guys later." You hung up the phone, placing it down on your kitchen counter. You bit your lip, trying to remember where the sweater was. You looked all over your small apartment, even searching the old boxes of stuff you had from UA you had stuffed into the back of the closet, but with no luck. Sighing you groaned, the sweater was probably at Bakugo's.

Bakugo wouldn't be home this early you sighed as you turned the key in the hole hearing the click. You opened the door gently, feeling the cold air. Bakugo always kept his ac on even in the winter. You placed your key on the coffee table after today. You wouldn't need it. You started to look around for your sweater, carful not to leave a trace. When you opened the bedroom door, you heard the running water of the bathtub.

'That's weird, Bakugo hates baths.' You didn't hear anything except the running water, so you began to get a little worried, you looked onto the dresser and found bottles of prescription sleeping pills. You jiggled the doorknob of the bathroom aggressively, the door flying open. Bakugo's head fell slowly into the water, and he was fully submerged.

"Bakugo!" You rushed towards the bathtub shutting on the water. You pulled Bakugo's head from under the water, and out of the bath, the floor was covered in water from the overflowing tub. He looked awful, deep dark purple bags under his sunken puffy eyes, stubble on his face. You grabbed pulled him close to your neck, your fingers feeling for a pulse. It was weak, but it was there. Bakugo started coughing up water; his eyes opened slowly. Everything was blurry at first, then he saw you, you held him in your arms the bathroom light above you made it look like a halo.

He saw your leaking from your eyes; they ran down your cheeks. "Y/n?" He whispered, bringing his hands to pull his hair. He wiggled out of your grasp, falling to his knees on the floor.

"Wake up, Katsuki! Wake up! You're not real, this just another hallucination; it's a fucking dream." Bakugo was now the one crying. His fist beat down on the wet bathroom tiles, the water splashing everywhere. You grabbed his wrists tightly, pulling his towards you. "Katsuki, stop." You pulled his chest to yours, not caring that your clothes were soaked. "It's me; I'm real." You whispered.

Bakugo broke down in your arms, letting out painful sobs as his body shook violently. His words were almost incoherent as he let out heart-wrenching practically screams of pain. He clung onto you his arms around your waist, face buried in your neck. Your hands tangled themselves in his hair; his heartbeat was pounding against his rib cage.

"Please don't leave." He whimpered, his breath was shakey. "Please, Y/N, I didn't mean anything of that shit that I said." His arms gripped you even tighter. He looked at you, his vermillion eyes wide, face red. "I won't Bakugo, I promise," Bakugo let out a wince, "No, I'm not Bakugo; I'm Katsuki, your Katsuki." He cried even more. You had never seen him like this, not in a million years would you have thought you would see Katsuki Bakugo so broken.

You helped him stand up slowly; he clutched onto you, afraid if he let go, you would disappear right before his eyes. You helped him onto the bedroom and laid him onto the bed. "I'm gonna clean up ok; I'll be back." You reassured him, but he didn't let go. "Please, Y/N, I need to know you're real." He swallowed, pulling you onto the bed. You laid in front of him, your arms around his broad shoulders.

"I missed you so much I-" Bakugo started stuttering, "Y/n, I'm so fucking sorry. I didn't mean anything of those awful things I said to you," He was crying hysterically, "I, I wanted to." You shushed him, gently playing with his hair. "Don't talk, for right now, just relax, ok." You felt his head nod against your neck. Several minutes passed, and you began to hear small little snores against your neck. The bed under you was soaked. You processed that Bakugo was fully bare clinging onto you, his eyes red and puffy from crying. You pulled away from Bakugo and covered him with the duvet covers, moving to the bathroom to clean up. You drained the tub and begun to mop up every couple of moments, checking up on Bakugo to see he was still sleeping. You were picking up all the scattered clothes and towels, throwing them into the washing machine along with your wet clothes. You were putting on one of Bakugo's shirts when you hear him start to thrash around in bed. You raced into the room to find him sitting up his head buried in his hands. You climbed onto the bed, moving towards him, in between his legs.

"Katsuki, I'm here, baby. I'm right here." Bakugo wrapped his arms around you, pulling you into his chest.

"It's always the same whenever I close my eyes." He breathed raggedly

"Months back, I was fighting this Villian, and I got hit with this quirk and, and I saw you. You died in my arms; I couldn't get to you in time." He closed his eyes tightly, and tears slipped out. "When I became distant, I was trying to get stronger, stronger to protect you. I would wake up early because every time I closed my eyes, I saw you in my arms bleeding out."

"Oh, Katsuki, why didn't you tell me?"

"Because I'm an asshole, I'm awful at expressing and sharing my feelings, I'm supposed to be your hero, but instead I became a villain to you. The dreams started getting worse, and I said that because I thought If you weren't with me, you would be safer. I'm so fucking sorry, Y/N; I should have just told you, I should have told you." Bakugo clutched his chest tightly, "After you left, they got so much worse, I can't sleep. Every time I close my eyes, I see you leaving again and again, and it always ends the same, you dead in my arms. I even tried taking those stupid sleeping pills to try and get some rest, but nothing worked. I even tried a bath, a fucking bath because I remembered how much you use to love them, how you said it made you so relaxed before bed, and when I did shit that you did, it felt like you were there., Like I could hear your voice giggling and laughing happily. I missed you. Is still miss you, Y/N I miss you." You looked into his eyes; he was so broken. The man you loved, you admired, was crying, completely broken in front of you. You cupped his wet cheeks connecting your lips. His hands caressed your naked waist pulling you towards him.

When you kissed him, it felt like nothing had changed. The butterflies fluttered in your stomach, and fireworks went off. Everything around you faded away, and it was only you and Bakugo. You felt like you were finally home again. Bakugo pulled away, looking into your gorgeous e/c eyes.

"Y/n I love you, I fucking love you. I've loved you since I met you in UA, but I was too dense to fucking say anything. I should have said it a long time ago; please forgive me."

"Of course I forgive you, Idiot," you cried, kissing him again.

"I said such horrible things, baby; I'm so sorry. You're the strongest woman I know, you're stronger than me, or fucking Deku or that half and half bastard. Stronger than any of us could ever be." His words were shaky, but you knew he meant every single word, he was just trying not to cry again.

"I love you, Katsuki, my katsuki."

"With you, Y/n, I feel safe. I feel like I'm home, and I promise I will always keep you safe, and I'll never let go.

bonus “Bakugo! You look like a shit dude.” Kaminari laughed as you and Bakugo walked in hand and hand into the bar. “You guys are back together?” Izuku smiled excitedly, his eyes sparkling. You and Bakugo shared a loving glance at one another. “You bet your ass we are Deku.” He smirked, sitting down inside the booth with your old classmates, pulling you down onto his lap. “For the long haul.” Your classmates erupted in cheers, Kirishima even states drinks were on him to celebrate.

#bakugou katsuki #bakugou imagine #katsuki bakugo imagine #bakugo angst #bakugou angst #bnha angst #bnha fluff #mha imagines #mha angst #mha fluff

425 notes · View notes

thestyleswritings · 4 years

Text

Restoration of Faith

REQUEST: (this may be triggering, so i'd understand if you chose not to write it). first-time consensual sex. Y/N lost her virginity in a sexual assault but has been to therapy. It took her a while to be comfortable with sex, but now she decides she's finally ready to have sex with Harry for the first time. He know what happened wants to make it a positive experience for her so he's super gentle and attentive.

"I'm... Nervous," she admits, biting her lower lip once again and truly testing his resolve. Her lips were always a key part in his fantasies. Contrary to her words, she rocks herself onto his growing length, making the pair of them shiver.

"You don't need to be nervous, princess. This is all you. We can do whatever you want and nothing more. The ball is in your court." Harry tells her softly, though now his voice has a gruffness to it that she's only heard early in the morning.

Harry meets a girl who’s been through something awful and falls deeply in love with her.

Warnings: Smut, TW // Mentions of abuse and self-harm

4k+

Therapy had saved her life. She was ready and willing to admit that. After her attack, she stopped texting, calling, going out. She wouldn't make contact with anyone for anything, even her professors had thought she'd dropped off the face of the planet. She wasn't eating, she wasn't sleeping, and she wasn't showering. She also had a very nasty habit of hurting herself, even if only a little bit, just to feel something. The sting of a cut, the scorch of a lighter. It took her somewhere close to 3 months to even get out of her head and call a therapist.

It had been another 6 months into therapy that she'd met Harry. Before he arrived in her life, she always kept the same routine to feel as if she had more control over her life, never failing to tick every box to the letter on her list of daily activities. It helped her feel like she was really in charge of her life, an exercise her therapist taught her, and consistently praised her for continuing on her own.

The day she met Harry, everything she had structured in place for herself shifted. It started when she missed the bus she normally took to her weekly appointment, kicking herself for snoozing her alarm one too many times. She typically didn't even take advantage of the function on her phone, only she'd been feeling hazy for a few days prior and figured a moments peace couldn't hurt anyone. With a scowl on her face, she decided she'd just hoof it there and apologise profusely for her tardiness once she arrived.

Only she never made it that day. One blasted thing after another got in her way, making it nearly impossible to get to her destination. Pavements were closed on one road, traffic being directed in a never-ending stream on another. It was maddening. She could almost feel herself unravelling towards a breakdown when a man spoke to her left, nearly causing her to jump from her skin.

"Sorry love, was only asking if you knew another way 'round this intersection. I've got an appointment at a quarter til, and it's just about half-past now. I didn't mean to give you such a scare," the man sounded sincere, honest, apologetic. She felt the very corner of her lips raise at the notion. An honest man? Unfathomable.

"S'alright, I'm just a bit caught up in my mind, innit?" She offered, tone teetering on cheekiness.

"I must be too, s'why I'm on my way to therapy. Though it seems like every bloody traffic cop in London would rather I didn't make it there." The man scoffed lightheartedly, dramatically rolling his eyes for her amusement.

"Oh, that's actually where I was headed." She offers, not exactly sure why. She didn't owe him any further explanation of her presence on the street, but here she was, still giving one. It felt nice. She hadn't so much as double taken a man since what had happened to her, but there was something so welcoming about him. So she dared to ask his name, creating an inevitable conversation. She made a note to let her therapist in on this major break in her recovery realisation.

"'M Harry. You?" He said, glittering eyes gazing into hers.

Another 6 months down the road, she felt her throat close up as her heart sank to her stomach. She and Harry had laid down a sturdy foundation together in the time leading up to then, strong as mountains. They'd quickly become the best of friends, laughing at all the same corny puns and jokes and learning every little quirk that made the other up. She knew things like how he took his coffee, and what kind of jam was his favourite. She knew where he'd grown up, who he was friends with in another life, strange dreams he had, what sort of dumb things he and his sister fought over when they were young. But she also had more intimate knowledge, things like his deepest fears regarding his family, his future, if he'll have a family of his own, his regrets. And he knew those same things about her. She trusted him by showing him what she'd done to herself when she needed to bring herself back to reality. She told him what she was ashamed of, both things she had done and what had been done to her. She spoke openly about how her purity had been snatched from her grasp, although kicking and screaming. She cried to him when she felt small. They had even told the other they were in love.

That's what scared her half to death. She knew she loved him with the entirety of her soul, but she was afraid, almost petrified, to take her clothes off in front of him. She had a few unwelcomed touch-memories when he'd come up behind her and laid a hand on her hip innocently, or when he'd spontaneously kissed her neck and she nearly lost her mind.

And he understood that. He couldn't imagine the kinds of trauma buried beneath her skin, the levels of paranoia that were bestowed upon her. From the nights she spent at his flat, he knew she sometimes would even jump in her sleep. It made him upset. Not because she was subconsciously jumping from his touch, but because someone made it that way. He would never forgive himself, even if the thought was beyond irrational, for not meeting her sooner. He wished more than anything to take that pain off her shoulders. To erase the searing memory she was still so harshly burdened with. Of course, he desired her physically, but he would never be able to live with himself if he made her feel pressured or uncomfortable. What kind of monster couldn't wait to be intimate with her? It kept him up some nights, but he'd never tell her that. She felt guilty enough as it was during their waking hours, he couldn't add to her burden by telling her he couldn't sleep sometimes while thinking of the horror she went through, cuddling her to his side deeper as she slept soundlessly.

So when she went to Harry and sat on his lap, curled up like a kitten, he was a bit taken aback. He loved a cuddle and was one of the snuggliest creatures she had ever had the pleasure of meeting, but they usually only cuddled once they were in bed, where she felt the safest. He didn't dare protest, silently complying and raising a hand to get lost in her hair, petting his fingers against her scalp lightly.

"What's on your mind, pet?" Harry rasped quietly, voice tired from the full day he'd had at work. She had been home all day, thinking of ways to break the conversation, fibbing and telling him she was skipping the day's class to stay at his flat and complete her essay, bringing her one step closer to her master's degree.

"Just thinking. I love you, I've just been thinking about you all day." She admits softly, pressing a kiss to his neck just below his ear.

He feels a blush run over his cheeks, feels himself inflate with affection and giddiness, much like a puppy getting its belly scratched. He couldn't help the goofy smirk adorning his lips, he just felt too good not to.

"Yeah, baby? I love you. I'm so crazy about you. You're always on my mind." He tells her, not caring how utterly lovesick he comes across at times.

She flushes, though it comes with a tingle that travels from the top of her head to the tips of her fingertips and toes. It's almost like she can physically feel his soul in hers and she feels alive. She truly can't help but give his neck another kiss, wetter this time, and joined by several others. He shudders and she feels it, making her blood sing in her veins. She couldn't remember a time where she felt so in love, so safe and so free. She felt like she and Harry could soar the greatest heights together, the pair of them unstoppable when they were together. It was an incredible feeling.

"What are you after, baby?" He questioned, not wanting her to stop but also wanting to see where her head was at. He didn't want her to make a rash decision if she would end up regretting it later down the line.

Instead of answering outright, she removes her face from his throat with one last kiss. Her eyes are doe-like and Harry's heart stutters. She'd never looked more radiant or confident than in that moment. Taking her lip between her teeth, she looks down between them to catch his big hand in her smaller ones. The air thickened instantly, the pair of them seemingly holding their breath.

"Just.. wanna be close to you. Wanna love on you, if you let me," she purrs, causing the hairs on Harry's neck to come to a stand and his tummy to flutter. She can't be implying what I think she is? He thinks to himself. It's not that she's never shown her attraction to him, he just can't believe today could be the day he's finally allowed to touch her. He's thought about it countless times, dreamt of it even, and it nearly brings a tear to his eye that she finally, finally feels comfortable and safe enough to physically show him love.

"Yeah? Show me how you wanna love on me, princess." Harry breathes, light filling his green eyes. He wants her to show him exactly what she wants, willing to go to the ends of the earth for his girl to be whatever she wanted.

She's back to feeling shy, not really knowing how to initiate this. She knows he'd take the ropes if she were to hand them over, but they both know how important it is that she takes control at this moment. This is her choice.

She looks into his eyes and her breath stalls at the look of love he's sending her. She dives back in, kissing Harry with a fervour he's never felt from her. He can practically taste the lust dripping from her tongue onto his. Gingerly, she presses herself against his lap where he's already sporting a mainly solidly stiff prick. As silly as she feels for it, the presence of it shocks her, ripping a gasp from her puffy lips. The feeling sends her into a frenzy, pulling back with wide eyes and a rapidly rising and falling chest to meet his gaze once more.

"Mhm, you feel it? 'S for you. Always is," Harry admits with a blush. He's no stranger to dirty talk, but he wants to take precautions with her. He doesn't know how filthy he can be without sending her back into her shell.

"I want you, in every way. Stayed home to pluck up the courage to do summat about it. And to take a very, very thorough shower that involved a lot of bending and twisting to get everything shaved." She tells him, a raspberry blush appearing beneath the skin of her cheeks. He's in awe again, of his darling girl.

"Cheeky thing. Lied to me about why you stayed home just so you could strategise how to jump m' bones?" Harry chuckles, grabbing her waist delicately before making the motion to stand.

"Gonna bring me to bed?" She asks breathlessly, nerves still getting the better of her. But she won't let her fears and self-doubt get in the way of another night she could've spent wrapped up in her love. Not anymore.

The moment she feels the plush mattress beneath her, she can breathe a bit steadier. Even if they hadn't used the bed for its extra-curricular purpose, it was still a major staple in their relationship. She knew this place, and she felt safe here.

"Take off your clothes." She instructs simply. If she were to get through to the rewarding bit of this, she had to hurry and get to it already. The build-up was the worst part. His lip curls at the command as he does what she asks. He leaves himself in nothing but his tight black boxer-briefs, kneeling on the bed before advancing. Watching and waiting to see if she would ask him to do something else.

"Come here, please," she begs of him, reaching an arm out to grasp the back of his neck. He's awfully careful as he crawls up the bed, hovering over her much smaller body, not putting an ounce of pressure on her.

"I love you. I love you so much. I-I wish you could've actually been my first," she begins, but he stops her.

"I will be." He assures her, "If you didn't say yes, it wasn't your first, princess. I know I've told y'that. This is what you'll think about when you think about your first. I promise you I won't let any other thought come up." His voice breaks as he cradles her face, finally dropping his body to rest against hers. The kiss he lands to her lips shatters her and mends her at once, feeling the love and healing he put into it.

"Please, I don't know what I'm doing yet," she mumbles against his lips, grazing her hand along his length. He draws back to look at her once before he's moving down the bed again, placing kisses to her neck and gripping the bottom of her shirt. She can faintly hear him asking to undress her through the blood rushing to her ears and she nods. She may be inexperienced, but she isn't naive. She knows exactly what he's headed down to do, and more than anything, she's excited.

"Aw, princess, s'this all for me?" Harry coos his rhetorical question softly upon seeing how incredibly aroused she'd become, kissing the softest and squidgiest bit of her thigh; right up top.

"You know it is," she whimpers, threading her fingers through his thick strands. Before she's even finished her sentence, her panties were pulled from her hips. She ignores the unpleasantly familiar sensation of someone that isn't her taking them off. Harry. It's Harry.

"God princess, might be down here a while..." Harry breathes, voice drunk. She peers up at him quickly enough to catch the strong drag of his tongue against her slippery lips. The noise she makes would've made him laugh in other circumstances, a squeak, instead he grunts and grinds his hips into the mattress. He might not even make it inside her before he's tapped out.

The movement of his tongue picks up each time she squeezes the handful of hair in her grasp, which is quite often, and he's loving it. He doesn't think he'll ever get enough of her sweet peach now that he's had his tongue inside her. She can't describe the feeling, she just knows that she would be asking him to replicate his actions often. She tenses up as her clit makes its way into his mouth, hearing the filthy slurps and moans coming from his lips. She could finish just from the sound of him. She thrashes when she feels a finger tease the rim of her opening, subconsciously kicking at Harry's shoulder before he grabs her ankle and kisses it.

"I's me, princess. S' just me. Let me make you feel good, sweet girl." His voice calms her immensely, shaking her head and focusing back on him. He's so good to her, it feels like karma's personal apology to her.

"Sorry," she says sheepishly. She knew it would happen, she just hoped she hadn't ruined the mood. As if she ever could.

No more words are spoken as she feels his finger back at her hole, lips leaving kisses to her lower tummy. He slides it in further than the rim this time, sucking her clit into his mouth to alleviate any discomfort she may have felt. He thrusts his finger in steadily, not too hard but definitely not as soft as he'd been at first. She appreciates him attempting to keep some normalcy.

"Wait- Oh! Feels good, really good. Wanna feel you now, please-Please!" She nearly surrenders to her pleasure when he adds another finger, curling them right up against her spongy wall.

"Gonna make you come first, princess." He tells her, not bothering to break away from her clit. The vibrations in combination with his unrelenting fingers send her spiralling over that edge she'd wanted to fall over with him. Her moans are strangled as she reaches her orgasm, the sound bringing Harry to a pile of mush below her, still working her through it.

"Mmm," she tries to form words as he hovers back over her, but she can't seem to find any. She's overcome with a multitude of emotions that she suddenly can't convey. She feels loved, she feels proud, she feels safe and she feels clean.

"Can pick this back up tomorrow, my love. You seem sedated." He jokes, kissing her lips and leaving behind a lingering taste of herself. She shakes her head, grabbing at his hips and pulling them down to her own.

"Want it now," she breathes, kissing his neck where she knows he's the most sensitive. And who is he to argue with that? He's about to stand to get an emergency condom he keeps in his closet before she clears her throat. His attention is back on her immediately, looking for any signs of hesitation.

"M' on the pill," she mutters shyly and Harry's jaw drops. He gets to have her and she'll be bare? This day could not get any better.

"God, you're perfect. I love you," he reminds her, peppering kisses to every inch of her face possible before reaching down to take her hands and guide them to his pants. "You do this bit. You've waited long enough," Harry encourages her, slipping both their fingers into the band before letting go of hers.

When she yanks them down, she's floored. That's what I've been missing? She thinks. It's thick and tall, standing between them with a certain strength and glory. He doesn't miss the look in her eye, but he doesn't call her out on it. He has all the time in the world to tease her about her awe of his cock another day.

"Sure you want to do this?" Harry checks for the hundredth time. She kisses his nose and nods before taking a deep breath.

"I'd never regret this. I'd regret if we didn't." She assures him, gripping his torso in one hand as to brace herself. He nods, knowing her word is final.

He's gentle as he strokes himself and even gentler as he lines his cock up with her delicate little hole. He cannot believe he's about to have sex with the love of his life. He can't believe how lucky he is to be her first. Her real first. The first lover to have her this way, the only man who gets to say she's his.

The initial push causes a sting to shoot through her lower half, throwing her mind to the last time she'd felt it, but she powers through. It's Harry. It's her lover. The man she trusts with her entire life. She hears his breath hitch instantly, only having pushed the tip and a bit more in. His eyes rolled to the back of his head, indulging in the feel of his girl before opening them to check on her.

"You okay, beloved?" He asks, voice beyond strained. When she gives him a nod, he pushes more of himself into her until she's hitting his side. His head snaps to the side, expecting a look of fear or pain, but to his utter surprise, he sees a look of pure bliss. He knows he's up against her spot, feeling the rough patch massage his tip. He uses this knowledge to his advantage, bottoming out at this angle, catching the spot the entire time he glides in and sending her into a frenzy of sorts. Her legs instantly locking onto his hips, giving him little leeway to do much else but fuck into her right onto her spot. She clenches around him as he pulls back, almost like she didn't want him to move his hips away from hers for even a moment.

"Feels, god! Feel so good, angel. My sweet baby, yeah? Feel good for you?" Harry rambles, nipping the skin of her neck to distract himself from blowing his load right then.

She's a mess, physically unable to stay put for more than one thrust. She never thought she'd be doing this, never thought she'd even make it through the year last year. The fact that it's her Harry just pushing her further and further into space.

"Mhm, so good. What, what are you doing? S' really nice. Does it always-?" She's a moaning mess as she replies, feeling a particularly solid strike at her beloved spot that she didn't know existed until now. He chuckles at the unintended compliment to his performance.

"Feel this good? Nah, s' because we're in love," Harry begins, but the feeling was too overwhelming, causing the word 'love' to come out as if he'd been hit in the stomach with a steel baseball bat. As if the spoken emotional intimacy turned him on to a point he couldn't stop himself from coming. He couldn't help it as the feeling travelled from deep in his belly, shooting out all the love he could produce, spilling into his princess.

"Mm, fuck Harry, I'm about to-" She moans at the feeling of his warmth spreading inside her and he cuts her off with the rapid movement of his nimble fingers down to her clit, still pistoning his hips into her, prick softening but still effective as she came.

Harry collapsed on top of her, wrapping an arm around her back to press their bodies even closer. He was still inside of her and she could feel the spurts still going as she came down.

"I'm so sorry... I literally couldn't stop myself from-" Harry begins, but she laughs. Laughs like she hadn't laughed in a year. A genuine laugh that drew tears from her eyes and an ache to form in her belly. His cheeks and ears grew red as she continued to laugh, thinking she was laughing at his premature end.

"Hey, it happens to a lot of guys! And I got you off again, don't make fun of me," he pouts, beginning to retract his arm from around her before she grabs a hold of it.

"Not laughing at you, doughnut. I love you so much, and you did get me off again. I'm laughing because I feel, I don't know. Clean." She admits, kissing his temple.

"After that? Should feel right sticky, I know I do," Harry gests, leaving her a kiss to her own temple before pulling out slowly. She gasps at the hollow feeling, but she has an inkling he may not mind filling her right back up whenever she wanted.

"You know what I mean." She rolls her eyes, allowing his arms to encompass her.

"I know, baby. I'm glad you found the strength in yourself to do this. And not just because you let me shag ya." Harry hums, kissing the crown of her head.

"You're an idiot," she teases. She couldn't be more in love if she tried.

"'M your idiot."

And yeah, maybe the idiot had a point.

Thank you for reading! This was a little difficult to write for personal reasons, but I hope this piece was alright! Please share your feedback/thoughts!

#Harry Styles #harry styles fic #harrystyles #harry smut #harry styles smut #harry x reader #harry styles x reader #harry styles au #writing #harry styles blurb #harry styles one shot #harrystyles oneshot #harry styles dirty #harry styles fluff #masterlist #mobile masterlist #1DFF #1d fic

368 notes · View notes

stars-are-just-ghosts · 3 years

Note

2. Harrisco

Absolutely. This got a weeee bit long. A warning: there are mentions of PTSD and a depiction of a panic attack. So if anyone has any triggers to those things, please don't read. Otherwise, I hope you enjoy! -QD

* * *

There were days when Cisco couldn't handle the sound.

It was settled there in his head, a low-grade hum that attached itself to every brain cell like velcro on steroids. It had started when his powers did, a background entity to the visions that became constant the more and more he had them. Till eventually the hum would break into his normal thoughts, his normal every day everything, resulting in panic attacks like he hadn't had since he was a kid. Except these were worse. So much worse. Because he couldn't stop them, he couldn't control them. And it usually ended in him passing out and lingering exhaustion. For the most part, he'd been able to have these panic attacks alone. He'd been through enough of them now to know when they'd hit, and could usually disappear before it happened. It seemed like everyone else knew he was going through something at regular intervals, too. They were smart enough to notice his shifts in mood, or that he'd leave work at an early hour when it happened. But he denied everything. 'I'm just beat.' He'd say. No one pushed it too far. Not because they didn't care, Cisco knew. But because Cisco wasn't making it easy.

He'd catch Harry watching him sometimes, expression unreadable and eyes glistening what he thought was agitation, like the man could tell that Cisco was keeping a secret. But he didn't say anything. In fact, he did the opposite. He kept being... well, Harry. And Harry was pretty much one of the only constants in Cisco's life that made the crazy tolerable. When the hum had first really started to affect him, it was Harry's presence that seemed to keep it in check the most. Cisco thought it was because Harry kept him focused, on track.

They worked so easily, side by side, completely at ease in each other's presence, whether they were joking or bickering or brainstorming. It was like that's exactly where they were supposed to be, and exactly what they were supposed to be doing.

Sometimes, it felt like Harry was more in tune with Cisco's own emotions than he was. He would reach out and grip Cisco's shoulder when Cisco was getting tense, or he'd nudge him gently when he was unfocused. Other times, Harry would just rest his hand there on the small of Cisco's back. No reason needed. And Cisco used each of those small touches like a grounding point. Whatever the reason, it worked. And he wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Caitlin was the only other one who had tried to get more out of him at one point, but he'd ended up snapping at her. He felt horrible about it the next day, after it all had passed. And he'd doted on her like a puppy for nearly a week because of it.

He made it his mission after that to work even harder to hide his unschooled emotions. And after awhile, he thought he'd gotten pretty good at it. People stopped pestering him. He got to have his crazy-ass panic attacks. And the hum continued being awful background noise in his head.

But today was different.

Today was... bad.

He hadn't had an overdose of the hum in nearly a month and a half. He was actually beginning to think maybe his brain had finally gotten used to it. Or maybe he'd just been too busy for it to register as much. But as soon as they all got back from taking on their latest meta problem, the hum was so loud and overpowering that he felt like his whole body was being crushed by it. The walls were caving in. The noise was too much. He couldn't see up from down. And he got out of the Cortex as fast as he could, peeling his uniform off in pieces as he went, desperate to breathe as he flattened himself to the wall of the nearest empty lab and let himself slide to the floor.

He squeezed his eyes shut, tears streaming out of his eyes as he fought the need to just scream and scream and scream. The hum was too much this time. Just too fucking much. He'd give anything for it to go away. Anything. He'd even sell his soul to the fucking devil to be rid of this.

But it wasn't the devil who tracked him down.

It was Harry.

At first, Cisco didn't even notice him. He couldn't hear anything beyond the hum and he knew if he opened his eyes, the world would be swimming in nauseating circles. So when he felt firm, warm and strangely familiar hands on his shoulders, it startled him so badly that he let out a strangled yell, hands flying away from the tangles he'd made of his hair and latching on to whoever it was.

Then there was pulling. He felt himself being moved. And for reasons he couldn't even fathom at that point, he didn't fight it. He just let this person, this tangible presence, reel him in. But his body was so tense, it was slow going. Or maybe it just felt slow. Eventually, he found himself sitting in... that was Harry. He was in Harry's lap. He knew it, now. He felt Harry's warmth, and that's why the hands had felt familiar because he would know those hands anywhere. And Harry was cradling his head with one of those hands, right up against his chest in a way that was all too comfortable and fragile.

"Ramon," his voice sounded like a whisper below the hum. But it was there. He felt it rumble through Harry's chest, mixing with something else. Something he desperately wanted to focus on. "Listen... just listen. Hear my heartbeat?" He felt Harry's fingers begin to card through his hair once it seemed he was certain Cisco wasn't going to pull away. "Just focus on that..."

Was that the-something-else he could hear, a steady and heavy octave somewhere below the register of the hum? It came to him then, the thud-thud-thudding of a heartbeat.

No, not just any heartbeat.

Harry's heartbeat. He focused on it, just like Harry had told him to. He let it become his intent, his only need. He let it push away that hum with every steady pound, every deliberate pump of the heart doing its damndest to keep Harry Wells alive. Slowly, other things began to come into focus. Little things. Like Harry's fingers so tenderly stroking Cisco's hair, or how Harry's other arm was curled firmly and safely around Cisco's back and hip. Or how his own hands were clinging to Harry like he was a life preserver.

He could hear the rushing swell of each of Harry's breaths. He could feel the cozy warmth that Harry's whole body emanated. He could smell the settled fragrance of Harry's aftershave and something else that was very distinctly Harry.

Slowly, minute by minute, the hum faded. It went back to its place of background noise and unimportance. And eventually, Cisco found himself opening his eyes. He wasn't sure how much time had passed. But he knew, without a doubt, that this was different. Normally, his panic attacks ended with his brain spectacularly overstimulated and eventually passing out. But this time...

Cisco relaxed his hands where they clung to Harry's shirt, and he lifted his head very slowly, a little afraid that moving or even not being able to hear Harry's heartbeat might make the hum come back full force. But that didn't happen. All he felt was calm and tired and... grateful. He caught Harry's gentle gaze as Harry dropped his hand away from his hair.

"You don't have to move if you're not ready to." Harry offered, his voice soft, his eyes lingering on Cisco's. He'd never seen Harry look at him like that before. Or maybe he had, to a lesser degree. Harry never completely outwardly showed his emotions, but for whatever reason he was very clearly showing Cisco everything.

There was worry there, and kindness, and affection. And it made Cisco sit up a little straighter, though he didn't dare move away. Because Harry was his focal point right now, and he couldn't lose that. Not yet.

"Harry," he managed. His voice sounded strained, like it did when he was yelling. But he hadn't yelled this time, had he? He blinked at the sound of it, cleared his throat lightly. "I'm sorry, man." He felt himself blush in embarrassment, the realization that Harry had just seen him pretty much have a mental breakdown made him tear his eyes away instantly. He should have been more careful, should have gotten back here sooner or even breached himself to another-

Then he felt Harry's hand back on him, but not in his hair this time. Harry's palm was on his cheek, fingers smoothing against his skin as his thumb stroked the wetness that still lingered beneath Cisco's eyes. He had no choice but to look at Harry.

"You have absolutely nothing to apologize for. Ever. You hear me?" Harry demanded. He sounded almost angry about it. But honestly, Cisco couldn't tell for a change. "None of this your fault." He smoothed his hand down Cisco's neck, to his shoulder and back to his side, till both arms were safely fit around Cisco's torso. "Ramon, how long have you been going through this?" He asked pointedly, brows knit slightly. Cisco swallowed and blinked.

"It's... kind of hard to explain." He nearly whispered. It was strange. After all this time trying to hide it from everyone, he actually found he wanted to explain it... to Harry. "It's been like this since... since I got my powers." Harry's brows raised in surprise and then his jaw clenched as he breathed out slowly through his nostrils. "You're mad." Cisco stated, "You look mad. Are you mad?!" He felt his chest tighten. He did not want Harry mad at him, not right now. He didn't think he'd be able to handle it. But Harry shook his head quickly and leaned forward, pressing his forehead to Cisco's.

It stilled everything in him instantly. Had Harry always been this touchy-feely? Did it matter? Why should it matter? Because Cisco admittedly really needed this right now. And honestly, he couldn't picture this with anyone else.

"I'm not mad at you, Cisco. I'm more... disappointed in myself. That I didn't do something sooner." Harry sighed lightly. "I thought I saw things... signs. I tried to be close when I thought you needed it. I should have pushed more. I should have asked. I'm the one who's sorry."

"You're sorry? Shit, Harry." Cisco shuttered out, some tears escaping at the sentiment. "You just saved me from an overload of panic and passing out ungracefully on the floor. You don't have to apologize for anything, either." Harry smiled lightly, lifting his head. He searched Cisco's gaze quietly, then nodded.

"Think you can stand?" Harry asked gently. Cisco looked down at himself, at the disheveled uniform and rumpled t-shirt, at the way he fit so perfectly in Harry's hold...

"I think so. But..." He looked back at Harry's knowing gaze and cracked a light smile, "I kinda like it right here." Harry chuckled. Then did something Cisco hadn't expected. Sure, he'd dreamed about it and maybe there had been times he'd come inches away from doing it himself. But it was still surprising... in a really good way.

Harry's lips pressed to his in a soft, tender sweep, lingering as Cisco instantly let his lips attach right back. It wasn't deep, and didn't last long. But there was a comfort in that. Because he wanted to keep kissing Harry. Seriously, who wouldn't? But he also wanted a much clearer head. And it seemed Harry didn't want to take advantage of the situation. Which was downright respectful and caring.

Harry urged Cisco off the floor, keeping himself in close proximity so Cisco had something to hold on to. He didn't pull his hands away till he seemed sure Cisco wouldn't topple over.

"Come on. Let's get you home. You need to sleep. And then maybe we can talk more about it all in the morning?" He offered, taking a side step toward the door. But Cisco was focused more on how Harry's hands had fallen away, how the warmth and steadiness had gone with him. He reached out quickly and slipped his palm into Harry's, entwining their fingers. Harry looked down at their conjoined hands, then back at Cisco.

"This is gonna sound... maybe kinda childish." Cisco tentatively began, looking back up at Harry's eyes. "But... would you mind staying with me? I don't... I just... okay, look..." he attempted to explain, unable to find the words. No one and nothing had ever pulled him out of his panic attack like Harry had only moments ago, and Cisco simply wasn't ready to let go of that. Or Harry.

"Ramon," One word. He'd always loved how his name sounded on Harry's lips. "I'll stay."

And he did.

He brought Cisco home, and held Cisco all night in the quiet of his room. And for a change, Cisco didn't have nightmares like he usually did after a panic attack. The hum barely registered. And Harry didn't ask questions or push for explanations or demand results. He just let Cisco exist in that in-between place that he usually fell in after the hum had exploded in his head.

When morning came, they shared coffee, they ate waffles, they sat in sweatpants and t-shirts on Cisco's lumpy couch and talked about lighter things, laughing till Cisco's face hurt. And when Cisco felt like he was ready, he told Harry all about the hum and what it did to him.

Harry didn't tell him he was crazy. He didn't shove possible answers in his face. He didn't try to make sense out of something that really didn't have any.

However, he did open up to Cisco right back, telling him about his own panic attacks. He had them about as frequently as Cisco did, which was surprising to hear. Harry had PTSD. He'd had it for years, long before he'd come to Earth-2. And it had only gotten worse after Zoom. He'd learned a thing or two about how to handle them on his own, but it had taken far too long, as far as Harry was concerned.

"I don't want that for you, Cisco." They were sitting face to face, one of Harry's arms draped along the back of the couch, "I couldn't really let anyone be there for me. Or at least... that's what I told myself." Harry explained, reaching his free hand up to curl some of Cisco's hair behind one ear. He smiled fondly. "I'm hoping you'll let me help you. You deserve better than suffering through it alone." Cisco smiled warmly, unable to really stop himself.

And without a word, he moved forward and kissed Harry. Soundly, this time. And twice more for good measure.

"You're the only one I want to let help me." Cisco assured, and the smile they shared after was exactly the medicine Cisco needed.

Harry had always been a good listener. A fantastic bickerer. A safe and steady presence. Cisco should have let himself open up to Harry much sooner. Hindsight was always 20/20. But they were here now. And he had a feeling when the hum tried to take over again, Harry would be right there helping him through it.

Cisco could hardly think of anything more comforting than that.

#writing prompt #anxiety #panic attack #harry wells #caitlin snow #cisco is having a really hard time #harry knows what to do #QuietDarkness #please enjoy

2 notes · View notes

whumpy-tales-and-thoughts · 3 years

Note

Hey from GroveGrocer’s main! I really love Leo and if ur still taking requests could we see either fainting or cry into chest for BTHB?

BTHB - Cry Into Chest

Thank you so much for the request! Hope you enjoy it! <3 @grovegrocer ^^

Words: 1870

TW: Manipulation, slapping, pet names, panic attack.

******

The first few days were… easy. Marcus uncuffed Leo off the wall, allowing him to roam around his room at first and around the house, later. Marcus didn’t hurt him, didn’t threaten him, he barely even touched him. Leo, on the other hand, was cautious. This is a serial killer we’re talking about, he kept reminding himself. He was fidgety and easily spooked, watching his captor’s every move closely. Marcus enjoyed teasing him about it, at first. After a certain point, his voice grew colder, and he insisted it was “getting irritating”. His behavior started swaying after that, from kind and caring to cold and scary, and Leo thought it best he stayed in his room. But that seemed to bother Marcus, as well.

“What are you doing?” Marcus asked, watching Leo curled up under his blanket.

“What does it look like?” he replied, the usual bit of irony coating his voice. He didn’t get an immediate answer, but felt a new weigh on the bed, assuming the larger man had sat next to him.

“You hurt me, you know”, he said, his tone emotionless.

“You hurt me, too”.

Those words seemed to have triggered something inside Marcus, who uncovered Leo, grabbing a fistful of his hair, bringing him close to his own face. “Listen here, Leo, and listen close. I didn’t bring you here to never see you, I didn’t bring you here for you to be hiding away all day. Either you play along or I dispose of you”, he growled, tossing him back onto the mattress. He climbed on the bed, standing on his knees on top of Leo, effectively trapping him. “I love you too much to kill you, baby, so you’d better do your part”.

Leo was shaking, his eyes nailed onto Marcus’. He wanted to sink into the bed and disappear. He thought of pushing Marcus off and running away, but he quickly discarded that plan. He couldn’t win, not to this man who was visibly much stronger than him. That was the worst part, the fact that he knew he couldn’t win. Every plan that raced through his terrified mind would end with him hurt or dead. So he didn’t move. He stayed still, only blinking, as he watched Marcus lean towards him. The man kissed his forehead and hopped off the bed.

“Get yourself together and join me for dinner, honey”, he smiled, moving towards the door. “You can take this as an order”, his heavy words stayed in the room even though he’d closed the door behind him.

It took Leo a few minutes to land back to reality. In his mind, Marcus was still pining him down. He slowly sat up once the vision of the man on top of him was gone. He put his arms to his chest and breathed. He tried to get up, his knees too unsteady. Ignoring them, he pressured himself to stand. He didn’t want to take long, just wanted to hurry and compose himself and head downstairs. He felt like bad things would happen, if he kept Marcus waiting.

It was the first time he’d felt like this. Truth be told, he was scared all the time, uneasy, anxious, but never terrified -never till now. Marcus didn’t act violently once since he abducted him, and Leo had actually believed that he was safe from physical attacks. How naïve, he scolded himself, trying to take in a shaky breath.

He washed his face, made sure he could properly breathe and walk and, even though he couldn’t, he left the room. He walked down the stairs carefully, as if he was afraid of making a wrong move, afraid of what would come after it. He made it to the dining table in one piece, surprising himself. Marcus had made chicken fried steak with rice as a side dish and had cheesecake in the back of the table as dessert. It was the same last Friday, too, he thought, sitting down at his assigned chair, even though his heart was threatening to jump out of his chest. Marcus put the plate before Leo, who just stared at it.

"Eat up, now”. His voice was coated in honey and silk, yet his eyes were serious, his look unamused.

Leo touched his spoon but felt bile climbing up his throat soon as he brought some rice near his mouth, so he put it back down.

“What, you’re refusing my food now, too?”

“No!” Leo hurried to say, “No, no, really, I just… I’m not very hungry is all. It’s a little early I think,”, he lied.

Marcus gave him a look. Raised his eyebrow. He turned to his plate again. “Okay, then. Wait for me to finish. I want you here with me today”. Leo nodded at his words, watching him as cut his steak into pieces, a little too violently.

His stomach churned and turned and he felt nauseous and he was shaking and god, he knew what this was. He knew, and he was so, so upset with this feeling’s return, he was sure he’d gotten over it. Then again, this is pretty stressful. I’m actually surprised it took this long. He pinched his finger as strongly as he could, focused his mind on the stinging and breathed in and out.

“You’re pale”. Marcus regarded and Leo almost jumped,

“What?" He asked, Marcus’ voice was kind of blurry to his ears the first time.

The question annoyed the man; it was obvious from how his face went from concerned to apathetic. "You're pale", he repeated, continuing his meal.

"Oh..." Leo muttered, returning to his pinching. He didn’t take notice of when Marcus finished eating, but he knew by now he was required to take the plates to the sink and wash them. Tonight, however, was not a good night for that.

Leo had worked as a server for several years, there was really nothing he was better at than that job. He didn’t know, didn’t realize his shaking had gotten so bad that it could cause him to drop his plate down, spilling the leftover food on the floor. He stayed very still, his breath caught in his throat, as he heard Marcus sigh.

"Leonard."

His name. Not cut short. No pet names. This was undoubtedly bad. He felt two large palms grabbing at his wrists and he closed his eyes tightly and took a breather in and-

He felt a slap burn his cheek.

"I'm sorry..." he whimpered. "I didn’t mean to I'm, I..." Marcus let go of him, taking a step back. He noticed Leo was biting his lip. Probably to not cry, he thought and smiled. Stupid boy.

"Leo,” his voice was now sweet again. “It's okay, love, I'm sorry. Leave it be, I'll clean the table up later. Come sit with me, we'll watch some tv".

Leo nodded slowly, blue bangs covering his eyes. Careful to not step on the broken plate, he trotted towards the couch. He sat away from Marcus, but a look signaled him to sit closer, and so he did. Marcus put his arm around him, making him visibly uncomfortable, and opened the tv. It was the first time in the two weeks he was there, that Marcus had opened the tv in front of him.

Even though he’d considered it as a form of comfort, Leo then found out it must have been some kind of punishment. The lady on the news was talking about a disappearance.

"The 23-year-old young man was last seen waiting in this bus stop, two weeks ago, but nobody has heard of him since. The police and some volunteers are grouped and searching through ditches and other nearby steep terrains. Because as per his mother's words, the young man enjoyed going on hikes. Let’s hear once again what his mother had to say, before moving on to our next story." The lady was cut off, and a panel appeared on the screen.

Leo audibly gasped. She looked years older than she did when he left her. Her long, chestnut hair was ruffled, her clothes were wrinkled, her eyes looked so, so tired. The knot in Leo’s throat was trying to choke him, now.

"Is there anyone who might have wanted to hurt your son?" The reporter asked her and she seemed irritated.

"For the millionth time, no. My son wouldn’t hurt a fly- I know that much. If someone knows where he is, please, please ask him to come back. Please, bring my baby back,", her last words were broken, as If she'd start sobbing soon.

"Now, on to our next story-"

Marcus lowered the volume all the way down and looked at Leo, who was looking at the screen in shock, silent tears streaming down his face. With a sudden movement, Leo had grabbed onto Marcus' shirt and buried his face in his chest. He was bawling, now.

All the fear and terror from today, all the pressure of the past weeks, and the shock of seeing his mother crying for him, came down to him all at once, and he couldn’t help but break down as well.

"Please! Please, Marcus, take me back! I'll do anything, I'll drop by, I won’t talk to the police just please! I need to go back!" He shouted between powerful sobs, but Marcus only caressed the younger man’s back with tender, circular motions.

"It’s okay, love. See, they don’t think you're dead yet, so at least she's got hope you're alive somewhere". Leo only cried harder at that, and Marcus tightened his embrace. "I'm so glad you came to cry to me! I really had started thinking we were drifting apart!"

Leo wanted nothing more than to be away from him, yet he was his only source of comfort right now, and he couldn’t help but sob into his chest. He needed the touch, needed the comfort. Not from Marcus, but he had no say in that matter.

The worst part was that Marcus' touch actually seemed to work on him, seemed to calm him down. He hated that; he hated that so much, it only caused him to cry harder. He was so exhausted by the end of his breakdown, half asleep in Marcus' hands, who picked him up bridal style with suspicious ease and carried him to his bed.

"I really wish you're not so difficult with me again, I'd hate to have you like this again".

The tiredness Leo felt clouded his thoughts and he couldn’t see just how carefully planned Marcus' manipulation was, just yet. Curled up in the warmth of his bed, he reached for the man as he was leaving. "Wait," he said, or at least he thought he did, because Marcus didn’t turn around, only locked him in his room.

He was alone, scared and exhausted, a trio that didn’t work too well, so he forced himself to sleep, already knowing he would wake up with his eyes glued shut because of the tears, and his mouth would be dry and his mind foggy. But that was okay. Anything was okay as long as he didn’t think right now, as long as he wasn’t conscious.

#bthb #tw manipulation #tw slapping #tw panic attack #i so hope you liked it!!!! thank you for requesting #feel free to do so again #!!! <3 #leo and marcus

9 notes · View notes

etherealwaifgoddess · 4 years

Text

A Good Night’s Sleep, Pt.1

Main Characters: Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Bucky has been plagued with nightmares since he left HYDRA and the Avengers all have been trying to help him overcome them. Bucky meets you by chance on a coffee run and finds that the solution he was avoiding might be exactly what he needs.

Warnings/ Content: brief mention of PTSD

Word Count: 3.6k

Author’s Note: Hello lovelies! So this little 3 part series came from an idea that @marinaaniseed had a few weeks ago. I absolutely couldn’t get the idea out of my head and so, while I should have been working on my many WIPs, this little fic was born. Parts two and three are going up immediately after this, it’s all done and I don’t feel like dragging it out. Hope you all enjoy it as much as I have. Especially you @marinaaniseed, thank you so much for the idea!!! XOXO- Ash

A Good Night’s Sleep, Part One

“Come on, Buck.” Steve calls out while banging on Bucky’s door, “You gotta wake up, pal.”

Bucky wakes with a jolt, his body rigid and his throat sore from screaming. He’s panting hard, trying to adjust to the world around him. He pulls himself out of bed on shaky legs, wobbling down the hall to open the door right as Steve goes to knock again. “Sorry. Again.” he rasps.

“Want to come get a cup of tea with me?” Steve offers with sympathetic eyes.

“Nah, I’m gonna grab a shower. Go back to sleep, Stevie.”

“You know you can talk to me about it if you want to.”

“I know. I’ll be okay.” Bucky insists, closing the door to end the discussion.

Under the burning hot spray of the shower Bucky lets himself breakdown.

After Wakanda Steve had convinced Tony to let him live at the tower with the rest of the team and everyone had been leery of the former assassin joining their ranks. As they slowly came to know him though, he became a welcome addition to their little family of Avengers. The only issue was the nightmares that woke not only Bucky, but everyone else on their floor. Bucky hadn’t slept through the night since he escaped HYDRA, plagued with visions of the destruction he’d wrought as the Winter Soldier. It was an endless stream of death and terror every night when he closed his eyes. When he was on his own in Romania he’d accepted it as his penance for what he’d done. After Shuri and her team pulled him out of Cryo in Wakanda he hadn’t been hopeful the nightmares were gone along with the trigger words. And he had been right - they persisted.

Bucky warned Steve when he invited him to live at the tower with the team. He told him he had nightmares and was prone to have low days where he just needed solitude to work through his own mind. Steve had promised he’d have his own living quarters and the team would understand. They all had their demons, afterall. The team was very understanding the first days but after that the concerned glances turned to long, worried looks and the team started speaking up.

Bruce had been the first to speak up, suggesting therapy to help him work through what was causing his nightmares. Bucky went and as much as he liked his therapist, nothing they tried stopped the nightmares. Even the meds blew through his system too fast to be of any use. She did give him some good tips for managing his PTSD and depression during the day though, so Bucky considered it a win and still went to see her once a week.

Nat gave him a spicy Russian tea she swore would knock him out enough that no dreams would come. Nat was wrong, all Bucky got out of the tea was heartburn. She grumbled something under her breath in Russian that sounded a lot like “cursed’ the next morning over breakfast.

Steve took him for a long run before bed one night, thinking the endorphin high and exhaustion would help Bucky sleep soundly. It helped Steve sometimes with his own dreams of war. It didn’t help with the nightmares, it only made him more exhausted the next day after getting little sleep.

Tony offered to get him drunk but it would take entirely too much alcohol to overcome the serum in his veins so he declined the offer.

Wanda suggested she try popping in his mind while he was having a nightmare to see if she could reshape it and try to correct whatever in his mind was causing him to have the dreams. Bucky threw up at the idea of someone meddling in his mind again.

The care and suggestions from the team were sweet, and Bucky knows they have the best intentions at heart, but it’s all still a little overwhelming. Bucky wants to stop having nightmares, he would do anything to sleep for more than three or four hours a night. A small part of him still thinks it’s punishment from some higher power for everything he’s done, but rationally he understands it’s just his PTSD.

After his shower, Bucky trudges out to the team kitchen for coffee. If he isn’t going to sleep he might as well start on his caffeine routine. Sam is already in the kitchen whipping up a smoothie for himself while Natasha stares at him over a cup of tea, the human embodiment of heart eyes on her face.

“Mornin’.” he rumbles as he crosses the kitchen, rummaging for his favorite cup in the dishwasher.

“Another bad one, huh.” Nat asks, but it really isn’t a question.

“Yeah, sorry.”

“You’ve got to figure these out, James.”

“I know it.”

“I know what you need.” Sam interjects causing both Bucky and Nat to whip around to stare at him. Sam just shrugs, “You need to get laid, man.”

Bucky chokes on his coffee. “What?”

“You. Need. To. Get. Laid.” Sam repeats slowly. “Seriously, man. Find yourself a nice girl, or a guy, and get some. You’ll be all happy and cosy and you’ll nod right off. No nightmares if you’re wrapped up in the arms of a good woman, or man.”

Bucky shakes his head, the last thing he needs is to terrorize some poor person trying to spend the night.

“It’s not a bad idea.” Nat agrees.

“Not happening.” Bucky says with a warning tone. He fills his cup and retreats to his bedroom, unwilling to continue the conversation. Adding another person to his mess of a life is not the solution.

Sam’s suggestion spreads through the team like wildfire. Everyone seems to have a friend they could set him up with. Tony even hacks into his smartphone and adds apps for Tinder, Grindr, and Match.com. Bucky deletes them quickly before chewing Tony out about privacy rights. It becomes a bit of a running joke within the group and Bucky is less than thrilled about it. Bucky hasn’t had a date since 1941 and he isn’t sure how to navigate dating in the 21st century. He knows the times have changed, people are more free with their sexualities and casual relationships are normal instead of taboo. Eventually, he thinks, eventually he’ll get back out there. But certainly not just for the sake of random sex.

Bucky has another particularly rough night. One where he doesn’t dare sleep because the second his eyes close the images start up like a motion picture. He’d spends the night alternating between pacing and reading, trying to not be disruptive while everyone else sleeps. Sam and Steve get up for their run just before dawn and find him pacing in the common room.

“Did you sleep at all?” Steve asks him.

“I will later. Probably.” Bucky grumbles.

Sam shakes his head, “Let’s go get coffee. You look like hell.”

Bucky can’t argue with that and instead goes to grab his shoes with a nod.

The city is bustling despite the early hour and the line at their favorite coffee shop is almost to the door. It’s worth the wait though and Bucky likes the thrumming energy of the shop, the blur of muted sounds around him oddly comforting. The woman in front of them is fidgeting with her leather bag, it must have something heavy in it the way she keeps adjusting the strap on her shoulder. Bucky tries not to let his gaze linger too long but the way her long hair falls in soft waves all the way down to the small of her back is distracting. The even softer looking rounded curves of her body are even more distracting, he admits to himself. She reminds him of the women in Renaissance paintings, when lush curves were still revered, before these modern stick thin bodies became the ideal. Bucky wishes the Winter Soldier could go back and pay a visit to whoever started the “thigh gap” craze.

The woman adjusts the leather strap again and a small white card flutters out onto the floor behind her. Bucky reaches down to pick it up, noticing the card has business information on it. Sam and Steve are chatting and distracted when Bucky taps the woman on the shoulder, “I think you dropped your business card.” he says hesitantly.

You’re cursing yourself for lugging everything along with you in your enormous bag when you feel a tap on your shoulder followed by a warm masculine voice. You absolutely do not have business cards, you’re a freelance writer and market yourself entirely online. It has to be another pick up line, probably from some smarmy Wall Street asshole who wants to slum it with an artsy girl for a change. You’ve been burned by that type enough times and won’t let yourself do it again, no matter how long it’s been since you’ve had a date. “Does that line work a lot for you?” you reply, turning around with an unamused expression.

Bucky’s face falls, upset he’s offended you when all he was trying to do was return what you’d dropped. “I wasn’t. I don’t. You. Um, you dropped this. It fell out of your bag.” Bucky fumbles for words, blushing brightly and drawing the attention of Sam and Steve who wear twin smirks of amusement watching him flounder.

Your irritation dissipates when you see the gorgeous, stuttering man in front of you. He’s tall, though not quite as tall as his companions, his dark hair falls around his shoulders in a way that is either true bedhead or carefully crafted styling to mimic it. His grey blue eyes are wide and honest, clearly not some smarmy pick up artist like you’d assumed. He’s wearing a black hoodie and dark grey sweatpants so it’s unlikely he was the business card type either. You force yourself to stop ogling the poor man and look at the tiny card in his outstretched hand. Recognizing it immediately, you realize you’re the asshole in this scenario. “Shit, that is mine.” you curse, “I’m so sorry. I don’t usually have business cards but my friend gave me this one yesterday for a new bakery that went in over on 2nd Avenue.”

Bucky looks at the card for a second before you take it from him. “So you’re not Beth Yardley?”

You raise an eyebrow at him, wondering if that’s now a ploy to get your name. You really need to be less suspicious but after living in the city for five years you’ve become jaded. He’s cute though. “Nope, Y/N. Nice to meet you…?”

“Bucky.” he offers quickly.

The name doesn’t ring a bell, but he looks familiar for some reason. “Nice you meet you, Bucky. Thanks for saving that card for me. I’m dying to try these cinnamon buns my friend keeps raving about.”

Bucky is smiling again, hoping his face doesn’t betray how eager he is to keep the conversation going. He wasn’t trying to hit on you a few minutes ago but now that he’s seen your face and heard your voice, he sure as hell is. “I love cinnamon buns.”

You stifle your laugh at the way his cheeks burn bright pink after his admission. He has to be flirting at this point. And he really is cute. Damnit. “We should go try them, then.” you decide, giving him a chance to make a move.

Bucky feels like he’s swallowed his tongue, “As in, together?”

“Yeah, sorry if I wasn’t clear. This is me hitting on you now.” you smirk at him as his blush spreads.

Sam is leaning on Steve as they fight for composure, trying not to erupt in laughter and ruin their friends moment. Bucky glares at their backs for a moment before realizing he still hasn’t answered, “Yeah. Yes. Let’s do that.”

Getting a better look at his companions you realize why he looks so familiar. Of all the people to meet in a coffee shop, you muse. You’re still interested though. “Are you free after this? I was going to get my coffee to go and then head straight there for breakfast.”

“I’m free. These idiots can find their own way home.”

“Great. Now, the deciding factor is: icing or no icing? Think hard Bucky, there are two camps of people and if you fall into the wrong one I’ll be forced to shame you for all eternity.”

Bucky’s eyes widen, worried he’s going to mess up two seconds into what could potentially be a date. “Icing?” he tries.

“Right answer!” you announce him happily. Then, in a conspiratorial tone, you whisper, “It wasn’t really a deal breaker but it’s good to know you’re not some sugar hating monster.”

Bucky’s grin widens, “No, I have a serious sweet tooth.”

“We’re gonna get along just fine.” you assure him.

After you order your coffee, quad shot latte with whole milk don’t judge me, and Bucky orders his, the biggest white mocha frapp you have please, you swipe your card before he has a chance to get his wallet out. Bucky balks at you paying but you tell him he can get it next time with a flirty smile that has his brain shutting off, unable to continue complaining.

Steve and Sam give Bucky small waves and thumbs up, not interfering when Bucky leaves with you. “Your friends seem nice.” you say kindly as you step out onto the busy city sidewalk.

“They’re the best.” Bucky agrees with a nod.

You make idle chit chat on your way to the bakery, keeping the topics light and superficial. Bucky tells you he grew up in Brooklyn, moved away for a bit, and recently moved to Manhattan with his friends. He seems hesitant as he explains it and you realize he’s trying to not be obvious about who he is. Like you couldn’t have already guessed.

You snort a laugh into your latte. “So what was Brooklyn like in the 30s?” you ask bluntly.

Bucky’s eyes practically bug out of his head, “How did you...?”

You give him a half smile and shrug, “The hand is a good clue, plus your face was everywhere for a while. It doesn’t help that your best friends are Captain America and the Falcon.”

Cringing, Bucky figures this will be the end of his almost date. “We don’t have to go get breakfast. I’ll understand if you don’t want to be seen with me.”

You stop in the middle of the sidewalk, shocked by his response. “Whoa, hold on. I knew who you were before I asked you to join me. I don’t care what other people think about you or your past. You seem like a nice guy and I want to get to know you. The real you.”

Bucky takes a moment to process your words, finding it hard to believe someone is willing to look beyond his past. He can't find a shred of deceit in your expression though, so he answers your question. “Well, there were less cars and it smelled worse if you can believe it.”

You huff out a laugh, resuming your walk to the bakery. “I can’t. Tell me more.”

Bucky tells you stories of the Brooklyn of his youth as you make your way across town. You aren’t in a hurry and Bucky is happy to spend extra time out in the warm sun with a beautiful woman.

The bakery is a little glass fronted shop sandwiched between two larger brick buildings. You would have walked right past it if you hadn’t been looking for it. Bucky opens the door for you and you smirk, amused by the old fashioned gesture. The scent of vanilla and caramelized sugar hit you the second you’re inside. “Oh my god.” you groan the amazing smell.

Bucky’s steps falter at the sound you made, trying desperately not to let his mind go where it was headed. “This place smells amazing.” he says, inhaling deeply.

“It had better taste as good as it smells or I’ll riot.” you joke.

The line is short and before you know it, Bucky is ordering two iced cinnamon buns plus an assortment of other pastries he picks at random out of the display case.

“Are we feeding an army?” you question as the tray piles higher and higher with plates of baked goods.

“Sorry,” he blushes, handing over his card to the waiting cashier, “Um, my metabolism is pretty high and I have to keep up with it or I get cranky.”

“Ah, okay. No hangry super soldiers on my watch.”

Bucky chuckles and nods.

There’s a sunny spot in the window of the bakery with an unoccupied cafe table, Bucky motions towards it and it’s your turn to nod, following him over to it. The tray takes up most of the table and you perch your coffees on your respective sides, eager to dig into the spread in front of you. You go for the cinnamon bun first, knowing one of them is yours and not wanting to presume you’ll be trying any of the other treats.

The taste of caramelized sugar and cinnamon explode on your tongue, eliciting yet another moan that makes Bucky fidget in his seat. “Okay, that’s it. I can die happy now.” you announce dramatically.

Bucky takes a swipe of the icing off the top of his cinnamon bun and his eyes widen slightly. “Oh wow.” he lifts the entire bun up to take a large bite and closes his eyes happily as he chews. “This is incredible.” he says once he’s swallowed, quickly taking another large bite. His cheeks puff out adorably and you grin around your own bite of cinnamon bun.

“I can’t believe you just bite it like that.” you tease.

“Well, what else am I supposed to do with it?”

You demonstrate the way you’ve been peeling yours apart from the outside in, “You uncoil it, like a normal human being.”

“Takes too long.” Bucky scoffs, “My way is faster.”

“But then it’s gone. My way you can enjoy it more.”

“Pfft. I enjoy it plenty, and I would have time for two of them while you eat just one.”

“Not all of us have super soldier metabolisms, one bun is enough.”

Bucky looks at the four other plates on the tray and shakes his head, “Then I guess it’s good to be me.”

You laugh at his antics as he takes another big bite, smiling while his cheeks chipmunk out again. The look you’re giving him almost makes him swallow wrong. He knows this look, he remembers it from the dance hall girls in the 30s. Attraction. Desire. You’re flirting with him in your own, unique, modern way. And Bucky is shocked to realize he’s been flirting back. He didn’t intend to get back out there so soon but here he is, enjoying breakfast with a beautiful woman. He wonders if you’re the type who would appreciate being asked out on a date, or if you’d rather exchange numbers and call him up when the mood strikes. A booty call, Sam had called it. Bucky still doesn’t get how there’s such a big difference between a booty call and a butt dial but thankfully Sam had corrected him when he got the reference wrong.

Bucky finishes his cinnamon bun and starts in on a vanilla bean scone, enjoying the way the light glaze crackles as it gives way to the soft, buttery dough. You’re still enjoying your bun, about half way through, so Bucky tears the other pointed corner of the scone off and deposits it on your plate. “It’s really good.” he insists, not wanting you to miss out.

You glance from the bite of scone up to Bucky who’s looking at you hesitantly like he’s waiting to see if he’s done something right or wrong. You pop the bite of scone into your mouth, chewing slowly before nodding, “Yeah it is. Thanks.”

Bucky practically beams. Maybe he can figure out 21st century flirting. He’s not sure if flirting via baked goods is a thing or not, but it absolutely should be. Bucky methodically works through all of the plates on the tray, offering you bits of each different item. You snag two bites of the cream puff but decline when he offers to buy you your own. The conversation shifts to the best meals you’ve had in the city. Food is an easy common ground for you both. You explain to Bucky that the small town you grew up in was pretty limited restaurant-wise and you’ve tried a lot of different places since moving to the city. You’re great in the kitchen but some days, after spending hours alone working at home, you like to get out and around other people for a while.

“There’s an Italian place, Sapori, near the tower you would love.” Bucky tells you, “I don’t know what the big deal about the place is but Stark always gets reservations when we’re celebrating something. They make everything from scratch and it’s damn good. There’s these little pillowy pasta things. Starts with a g but you don’t pronounce it. I don’t know, but they’re amazing.”

“Gnocchi,” you say, stifling a laugh.

“Yeah! Those. Best meal I’ve had in the city by far.”

“That’s only because you haven’t had the food at Xián Tián.”

“Well, you should let me take you to Sapori and then you’ll understand.”

“Did you just ask me out?” you raise your eyebrows at him in surprise.

Bucky blushes and nods, suddenly feeling more shy. “Yeah. I did. This is me hitting on you now.” he says, paroting your words from earlier.

“Well done, Barnes. When are we going?”

Read part two HERE!

#Bucky Barnes #bucky barnes x reader #Bucky Barnes feels #nightmares #PTSD #original female character #reader insert #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky barnes fanfiction #marvel #marvel fanfic #marvel fanfiction #marvel fandom #meet cute

26 notes · View notes

doom-dreaming · 4 years

Text

The Sacred Flock: General Info and How To Join

I've been meaning to write this up for a while and I'm finally getting around to it. This is the definitive "about" guide for joining and writing in the Sacred Flock 'Verse, otherwise known as the Twins' Pet 'Verse or The Menagerie. It has a lot of names. So! Here are the answers to (mostly) all your questions!

1) What is the Sacred Flock 'Verse? You may have seen mentions of this around the Calypso corner of Tumblr and wondered what it was. It's a collaborative, relatively-open AU in which the Calypso Twins acquire and keep human pets as trophies and status symbols to reinforce their godhood.

If this sounds like something you might be into, click the readmore!

What this AU includes:

collars (bells and leashes optional)

branding

microchip tracking

cannibalism; Troy’s got monster mouth mods and Tyreen likes to get in on the action too, sometimes

What this AU does NOT include:

incest or pedophilia

marrying the twins

having children with the twins (both of them have had sterilization surgeries in this AU)

2) Sounds interesting, how would I join? There are two levels of involvement. The first level is simply contributing to the 'Verse! Suggest ideas, write something, interact with our posts, and you're in! Further down in this post I’ve listed some of the established canon of this ‘Verse, along with some tags you can explore to get a basic understanding of what you’d be working with.

The second level is our Discord server. To get into that, you must be:

at least 18 years of age

willing to remain active and contribute ideas to the 'Verse

at least semi-interested in the ongoing narrative

In addition, you should interact with our members (most of whom are listed below) outside of the server enough for us to get a feel for what you're like and how well you'd vibe with the rest of us. This includes submitting an RP "audition" to @clockworkrobotic (Kat) so they can meet your character. We don't have a lot of hard-set rules about characters, but the main thing we ask is that they be canon-compliant. Borderlands canon is pretty crazy, but think about the type of people the twins would want to have as pets and keep it realistic (no crazy powers, etc.)

The actual auditioning process involves a character interview and questionnaire that we set up, so if you're interested in auditioning, send a DM to me or Kat and we can provide more info about the setup of the server, aside from what’s written below.

3) The Discord server sounds cool, if I ended up in it, what could I expect? First and foremost, it is a kink server. Our focus is on pet kink and ownership and obedience. If you act up or get into a big enough argument with our twins, they will punish you accordingly. That's not to say you're not allowed to be soft and mushy and have fun, but we have lots of highly-specific channels for other flavors of twin-loving, so heed where everything should go and you'll be fine.

It is a private kink server and we ask that you be respectful of what people are choosing to share.

(Further note: our twins are played by real people and they really do their best to stick to canon characterization, which means they can be pretty villainous sometimes. Go figure. If you're very sensitive to discipline or the occasional sibling shouting match, the main RP may not be the best place for you. We want everyone to have fun and we know that tolerance levels and triggers vary from person to person. The twins will get mean because we (the mods) told them to be, given the understanding that this is a server about being owned by two fairly awful individuals.)

4) You still haven't scared me away yet! Is there any established Flock canon I need to include when I contribute? Yes! Our canon is constantly evolving, and the structure of the narrative outside of the server is quite a bit looser, but we do have established aspects for this AU. A good tag to check out (included at the end of this post) is '#flock worldbuilding.' Some main points include:

the twins' powers are a little tweaked. The leech ability is paired with a healing ability, and the twins can trade these powers back and forth at will

the twins and their pets (us) live in a large building known as the Holy Inner Compound, located near the Cathedral, so it's part of the same Dahl refinery, but the twins have renovated to make themselves some comfortable living quarters

in the center of the Holy Inner Compound is a huge garden. The twins discovered early-on that their healing was just as strong and just as reckless as their leeching, and a burst of siren energy created a beautiful tree that bears a strange fruit. The garden has grown ever since, housing all kinds of vegetables, fruits, and flowers both native and foreign. A pond of fresh water feeds small streams that meander throughout the garden. A good tag to look at is '#tsf: the oasis' (tagged below)

there is a conditioning process that new pets go through. It varies from pet to pet depending on personality and comfort level around the twins (they want you to trust them, ideally) and ends with a collaring ceremony, a public, live-streamed ritual that involves an official collaring and a reminder to the cultists that the Flock is to be treated with the same reverence as the Twin Gods

we focus heavily on the more religious potential of the COV, leaning into ritualism and ceremony; the twins are still streamers with huge personalities, we just ramp up the religious undertones the game didn’t really explore

we have a huge collection of animal pets (affectionately referred to as petpets) and if you want to see them, @glowydruglord did some adorable illustrations for us. Just check out the '#pet pets' tag on my blog to find them

I've started posting some supplementary material and will continue to do so for the next month or so. This includes:

maps of the compound (sketched floor plans and screenshots of my accurate-as-possible Sims build)

detailed information on the progression of the conditioning process

breakdowns of the different areas of the compound

overviews of the ceremonies and rituals used to induct new pets into the Flock

I think I covered the most important stuff, and you can check out the tags below (check them from inside my blog to get relevant results) to take a look at what this 'Verse has to offer. Most importantly, please interact with us if you want to be a part of this! We're all very friendly and me and @clockworkrobotic especially want to get to know the people who are contributing. We'll be happy to answer any questions or just chat!

Here are some of our most active members!

@afterthedreamer @bettersafethandicks @circiva @vialandmortar @cacklefrendly @vaulttouched @constantfantasymind

If you would like to interact with and contribute to this AU, please respect our guidelines. We have a wide range of personalities and preferences and we would ask that you be mindful of what that can entail. One person’s kink can be someone else’s trigger. If you have a question or concern, please ask us!

#twins pet verse #the sacred flock #the menagerie #flock worldbuilding #tsf: about #tsf: how to join #tsf: origins #tsf: the oasis #tsf: lore #the calypso twins #borderlands au

23 notes · View notes

evien-stark · 4 years

Text

✧I Need You✧ Chapter 71 [Begin: Iron Man 3]

Friday night dates had been a good idea. Until they weren’t anymore. Until he was late a few times. And you were late a few times. And a couple of times the night had been ruined by the now seemingly endless stream of paparazzi that you were sure Christine Everhart was behind. Because if you’d just submit to an interview where you said everything she wanted you to say and none of the things that were actually true… she’d stop calling you. Stop calling Pepper. Stop calling Tony. Stop calling Stark Industries leaving incessant voicemails and emails. And she’d surely stop slandering you to all her fans on the internet- as you’d sadly noticed her show had been moved off primetime air.

But the internet was the way of the future, they say… so surely it couldn’t have been that terrible for her.

Still. She was insistent on ruining your lives. So she did. Until Friday night dates were no longer publicly accessible, as you spent them in your home. Safe. Sound. Some part of you knew Tony preferred this. He’d gone further down the rabbithole of being adamant about you not being bothered. About Happy sticking by you- even though you were fully capable of protecting yourself from would-be photographers and campers with microphones.

You were an Avenger, damn it. It didn’t make you feel that nice to be treated like a fragile piece of glass. Sure, more often these days you seemed to jump at every stray shadow and every surprise noise- scaring the bejesus out of Pepper more than once just by being startled by her suddenly appearing. Your gasps would trigger her own fright and then she’d chastise you for being so jumpy.

Sorry, you’d say. And mean it. But it didn’t fix anything. So it was nice to curl up with Tony in the fortress that was your home. It was nice to just have a dinner in, and then pretend to watch a cheesy movie on TV, while Dvahli climbed into one or both of your laps, often now lying with her tummy up, sprawled out over both of you.

It wasn’t a perfect home, but it was… mostly happy. As long as you and Tony were content ignoring all the other problems.

But sometime around the start of November- maybe it was the end of October, it was getting hard to keep track now, he started missing Friday date nights- the ones that were in your house. The ones that he should have been fully capable of making it to, seeing as, oh, he was only ever in the basement all the time.

He’s hurting, you reminded yourself, when he answered your call from the lab instead of walking up a flight of stairs. Telling you he just needed an hour to sort through an accident that had happened.

He’s grieving, you said over and over again. Grieving his sense of identity, grieving his sense of independence- and suddenly you found yourself grieving too. The loss of… life. Everything. Nothing was as it should have been.

He’s traumatized, you knew. So that made it okay, right? That made it okay- what he was doing, building all those suits. That made it okay that he stopped answering your calls in the middle of the day. That made it okay, that on the fourth Friday in November- the Friday that should have led into a three day weekend, seeing as how it was only your third anniversary that Sunday- he told you to leave the dinner you’d brought on the table by the door, and barely looked up at you.

...that made it okay, right?

A cloud loomed over you almost all the time after that. It wasn’t hard to take notice. Pepper asked if you were okay. Happy asked if you were okay. Random Stark Industries employees- ones that actually weren’t just trying to curry favor for once- asked you if you were okay. Because you looked a little gray. And down. And…

Sad.

The entire atmosphere at the office, every floor, started to shift. At first you just thought everyone else must be having a bad time with life, too. But it was the following Friday when Pepper looked at you for too long a time and then just burst into tears that you understood what was really going on.

And at that moment you wanted to lock yourself at home, too.

It became an awful reciprocal thing. She was out of her depths, apologizing endlessly, telling you she didn’t know what was wrong with her. And you were just barely hanging on. Just enough to tell her you were going home early, and that she didn’t have anything to be sorry about. Barely hanging on as you climbed into the back of Happy’s car.

Feeling like maybe you could breathe through this and not just break down- it wasn’t a real breakdown, you told yourself. It was just- you were amplifying everyone around you, and they were just mirroring you. So it wasn’t- it wasn’t real. These weren’t your real feelings.

Then the car pulled up in the driveway.

And there waiting for you was a giant- massive, bigger than the driveway- cream colored stuffed rabbit. The crew that had put it there, presumably, was just leaving. And Tony, standing in front of it, waved to you as you got out of the car. Happy pulled back out on the the curb, but stayed. Idling. Watching.

“Hey- I uh… I know I messed up. Big time.” He was talking to you, more like at you, simply because you were having trouble processing what was going on. What you were looking at. What was happening. He side stepped to wave his arm up at you. “Oh, this? Anniversary gift. Don’t tell me you love it yet. Just wait. It’s cotton with leather. For the uh- ...the uhm… second and third year is supposed to be-” His words were getting lost in a choked fog.

A wet sheen took over his eyes.

Raising his hand he almost violently wiped the back against the corner of his left eye. “Why am I-” As if he couldn’t make sense out of what was happening.

You were infecting him. Just like you’d infected everyone else.

“I have to go.” Go where? You had no idea. But you needed to get away from him. He was already suffering. You’d just make it worse.

But as you tried to rush by him to the house he grabbed your arm. “Hey- hey-” Commanding just a little as you felt both your threads start pulling loose. “I mean- just say you don’t like it and that’ll be that, but this-?”

“Tony I can’t do this. I can’t do this right now.” Begging him hard to just let you go. Let you leave.

It was the worst thing in the world when he did. When his fingers slipped away and he held his hands up in defeat, looking at you with such an open concerned gaze. You were broken. He could see it then. That one moment.

“Honey-”

In a mad dash you turned away from him and ran up the steps into the house. Breathe- Into the bedroom. Just breathe through it- Into the bathroom. Just hold on- Sliding down against the now locked door. I’m okay. I’m okay. I’m okay.

You were anything but. And after an hour had slipped by, his gentle knocking came at the door. Followed by a solemn, “Honey… talk to me…” You could hear him kneeling down, could almost feel him pressing his palms up against the door. Trying to feel you.

But that’s what you did. And you were just at the end of shutting down. Of putting those walls up so high you hoped they’d never come down again.

The lies started. “I just had a rough day at work- Pepper was completely emotional- I think maybe she broke up with a boyfriend or something- she started crying in my office and- you know how I am.” Lying. With a silent apology, sorry Pep, please forgive me. Not wanting to blame her, but it wasn’t like he’d double check with her.

He waited. For a moment you thought he knew you were lying so much it must have offended him and he’d got up and left. But, eventually, you heard a soft exhale. “So… you don’t hate the rabbit?”

Trying. Trying to make you feel anything but this. And to his credit, your lungs huffed out a forced laugh. “I don’t think I really get the rabbit, but I don’t hate it.”

“It’s an anniversary gift.”

“I heard that part.”

“Hey- can you come out? I don’t really like talking to the door. It’s kind of interloping on our conversation.”

You weren’t sure you were ready yet. But he was asking. And the more you did whatever the hell this was, the more you ran the risk of upsetting him more. He didn’t deserve that. He was already struggling. So you gathered the rest of your courage. A deep breath. Stood, and then opened the door.

He was standing right on the other side of it, with those soft, imploring eyes. So quick to threaten your hard work. He was going to ask what was wrong with you. You couldn’t let him do that. So instead you cut him off just as he opened his mouth to ask, “Can the rabbit actually fit in the house?”

“Uh-” He’d wanted to have a real conversation and got cut off by nonsense. But it was his own nonsense, so what could he do but pay it heed? “Good question. I’ve uh- actually got a team tomorrow to come answer that question.” Reaching out, he put an arm around your shoulder, drawing you out of the safe enclosed space that was the bathroom. “Probably gonna blow the front wall out.”

“Oh how nice.”

“My calculations might have been a little off.”

“That’s very unlike you.”

The two of you slipped into easy banter. Things you knew. Sass and sweetness. Ignoring everything. Ignoring absolutely all of it. “Too true- see, this is the part where I tell you JARVIS had the schematics. I think he misplaced a one somewhere.”

“Don’t blame me for your mistakes, sir.” His ever-present voice answering a question that had not been posed to him.

He clamped the fingers of his hand over your shoulder up and down, “Blahblahblah- he’s embarrassed. I would be, too. Anyway…”

Worried he was going to try asking again, you diverted. “I haven’t eaten today, are you hungry?” Rushing by anything he might have wanted to get into.

You’d officially turned into him. Putting everything off because you just didn’t want to talk about it. Couldn’t. And couldn’t deal with him caring for you over it. Because that would make it worse. And he had his own problems and-

...god, the two of you really were in trouble, weren’t you?

------

Yet you had no idea, truly, the scope of trouble you were in. There was no possible way for you know. To even come close to understanding. December came. And right at the beginning you dug yourself a hole about as big as Tony’s. Wanting to stay away from him for fear of causing more trouble. Not wanting to fall to pieces in front of him. But at the same time, he was failing at a balancing act of being just as deeply troubled as you were, yet trying to check up on you where you’d let him.

It couldn’t go on like this forever. The two of you couldn’t trade positions back and forth until- ...until what? Until one of you actually admitted you needed help? Said you were going to find someone to talk to? Maybe that really was the first step. Maybe you needed to be the one to make it.

It just seemed very impossible.

Even more so, when at the beginning of the third week of December, in the middle of a Board meeting, both LUNA and JARVIS pinged you simultaneously with a doubled up, “Ma’am,” in your ear. It got you to stand, and quieted the other voices in the room as you put a hand to your ear. They wouldn’t bother you- especially not in tandem unless something was wrong.

JARVIS took over. “The Ali Al Salem air base has reported a bombing. Lieutenant Colonel Rhodes is stationed there.”

Your heart stopped. “Casualties?”

One of the older, gruffer gentlemen in the room tapped his hand on the table. “Excuse me, Ms.-”

“Shut up.” You held your finger up to him, still pressing other hand to your ear. It didn’t matter what they thought of you in that moment. None of it mattered. None of this fucking mattered if Rhodey-

“The report only just went public, casualties listed at 39. No soldiers. Please direct your attention to the screen. An unauthorized broadcast is taking over all airwaves.”

JARVIS turned on one of the big monitors in the front of the room and every pair of eyes turned that way. A high pitched tone greeted the air, and a flat image of multi-colored bars. Like a long forgotten stand-by symbol. Except on top of it were ten rings, each one with a gun inside of it. And a pair of swords at the center.

You pressed your hand harder to your face, feeling a tremor come over you. “Tony…” Calling out for him, terrified, knowing one of your AIs would make the connect for you. “I’m here.”

“You seeing this?”

“Yeah.” His voice was tight.

The screen flickered to life. A man in long dark robes, his back to the screen, walked down a row of people on their knees. Men toting guns stood by in the background. The location was remote. In a desert somewhere. As the camera moved around him, his face appeared. He had long hair tied up in a top knot, a long scraggly beard- sporting sunglasses.

As he walked away from what you knew to be hostages, the camera focused on the men behind him hiking up their weapons and arming on the people kneeling. A voice hit the silence. “Some people call me a terrorist.” The men opened fire. You wanted to look away, but you forced yourself to watch. Because you knew this was your world coming undone. “But I consider myself a teacher.” The footage cut between idyllic images of people and scenery, and that man in some dark room. “America, ready for another lesson?” Images of Native Americans flickered in and out of the screen. “In 1864 in Sand Creek Colorado the U.S. military waited till the friendly Cheyenne braves all gone hunting, waited to attack and slaughter their families left behind, and claim their land.”

He removed his sunglasses, and intermingled with him talking to the camera, new images emerged. Buildings on fire. “Thirty-nine hours ago the Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait was attacked. I… I…” He appeared again, and a twisted smile greeted the camera. “I did that. A quaint military church filled with wives and children, of course. The soldiers were out on maneuvers, the braves were away.” The camera moved to an unflattering angle, and he looked right into the lens. Between his words more footage of explosions were happening, people chanting in the streets, guns, violence- “President Ellis, you continue to resist my attempts to educate you, sir. And now, you've missed me again. You know who I am, you don't know where I am. ... and you'll never see me coming.” The screen cut out, that high monotone noise accompanied with their logo on the screen before it went to black and a newscaster who looked ghastly pale sat in dead silence. Most likely trying to comprehend what had just happened.

You turned and walked out of the conference room. “JARVIS get me Rhodey- conference him. Now. Now.”

Tony spoke first, “Come home. Now.”

“I’m on my way.” As you jetted down the hall, you caught Happy sitting in a chair by your office and waved to him. He got up and followed on heel. “Tony-”

“I don’t wanna talk about it. JARVIS, you get an answer yet?”

Happy’s voice got mixed in with the onslaught, “You don’t even have your stuff!”

“Just one moment, sir.”

You answered Happy, “It’s fine, we just need to go.”

It made sense, that Rhodey was probably extremely busy. His current base of operations had been attacked. He hadn’t been there to witness it. People were dead- women and children. And now the President of the United States had just been threatened. Which made all the more sense as JARVIS spoke again-

“President Ellis on the line for you sir, ma’am.”

The both of you answered in sync. “Not now.”

Finally, Rhodey’s voice filled your ears. “Look guys, I’m busy- I appreciate the concern- I do- I’m flying home in forty-eight hours. We’ll talk then.” There was no dial tone or click to indicate he’d hung up, but you knew he was no longer with you immediately after finishing that last sentence.

You climbed into the back of the car and Happy looked up into the rear view mirror. “Home?”

“Yes, please…” You took a deep breath, trying to steady yourself. This was not your mess, right? Mandarin… Ten Rings or not… this was a military operation, right? You and Tony didn’t have to get involved… right? Yet you sensed that was impossible. “Tony… what are you thinking?” Leaning your head against the window as you waited patiently for his answer. “I’m uh… I’m in the middle of a project. What’d’you think? American military can handle this one?”

JARVIS spoke up. “You already have one voicemail from President Ellis. How many will he leave before either of you answer him?”

Your hands clenched in your lap. “We’re private citizens, right? This isn’t on us. This isn’t our job. This is… this is Rhodey’s job.” Trying to convince literally any of the four of you listening to you talk that that was the truth. That none of you were going to get involved.

What a liar you were. Unwillingly, albeit. No matter how much you didn’t want to get involved… there was just no way. There was no way you were going to be able to stay out of it.

Tony spoke again, much softer this time. “...you okay, honey?” Telling, that he could hear how rattled you were over the airwaves.

The last brush you’d had with terrorists had… not been a personal one. But it had touched upon your life in a very drastic way. Because it had warped Tony’s completely. For the better- you were mostly sure. But those same people now had a figurehead. And he’d bombed not only Rhodey’s airbase- but a few other places before then. Was this your fault? For not letting Tony get involved sooner, when Ellis and Rhodey had called those months ago? You’d told him to leave it alone-

“Honey?”

Why did everything always feel like it was your fault?

“Stop the car-”

Happy listened almost too literally, stopping on the side of the highway in a screech. “What? What is it?”

Tumbling out of the side by the guardrail, you pressed your back against the door as you crouched on the ground, trying to find your breath. Every part of you was shaking- and too soon you heard the roar of engines, of people zooming past- screaming- you put your hands to your ears-

You heard Happy’s car door open and slam shut, and he paced a yard up on the side of the road and then back. “It’s all over the radio- it’s all over the radio-”

People were panicking. Everyone in your vicinity was panicking.

The next sounds that broke through your broken gasps for air were the sounds of compact jets. Ones you were used to. And then a clank of metal on blacktop. The whir of motors as Tony approached and then knelt down, hands reaching up to take hold of your face. You tried to bat him back, “Get away- stop- go away-” What would happen if you infected Tony with nervous madness?

What would you be liable for then?

“You’re fine- look at me- honey- breathe-” His helmet slid back and you stopped fighting him, directing your panicked gaze his way. “I’m fine. I’m okay. You’re okay.”

You’re okay.

The sound of his voice echoed somewhere deep inside you, and in that same deep darkness, waves that had been drowning you started to die down. You reached up, clasping at his wrists. The frenzied traffic on the highway slowed. Happy’s heavy running footsteps slowed to a stop.

“I’m- I’m okay…” You breathed the words out in a shudder, eyes dropping closed as the energy collapsed out of you.

“Take your time.” Still calm and gentle. Still holding you. Keeping you grounded. Like an anchor.

As reality came back in slow drips, so too did your understanding of what had just happened. The same thing that had happened weeks ago. But instead of infecting your office building with weepiness, you’d now caused a small mass panic on a public road.

Blinking up at him, you knew one thing. And one thing for sure. “We’re in trouble, aren’t we?”

“You tell me.”

But you didn’t have to. He knew. Same as you.

You were in a lot of trouble.

#Tony Stark #Tony Stark x Reader #INY Chapter Seventy One

12 notes · View notes

aspoonofsugar · 4 years

Note

This is the writing anon from earlier (sorry for overstuffing your ask box). How do you balance introspection scenes with external action scenes? Any tips for integrating them? Especially since my character’s perspective is influenced by her bipolar moods and vivid imagination. How do you write introspection without stagnating the plot?

Hello anon!

Don’t worry, I enjoyed your asks and I am happy you shared your ideas with me! Sorry for the wait, I will try to answer as best as I can.

When it comes to mixing action-scenes with more introspective scenes I think much depends from the style you are adopting and also from the POV you are using.

In some books, it is given much space to introspection to the point that even reading of everyday and mundane things becomes interesting because they are filtered by the character’s point of view. This is similar to what happens in the following short:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9v5-Xtp8RZc

The techniques used may be different from the ones used in books because the media is different, but the point I am trying to highlight is that in the short the protagonist is actually trying to do a very mundane thing. She is simply trying to leave work early on in order to have her hair cut. However, the way her actions are framed convey the feeling she is in danger and she is doing something incredibly dangerous. Basically, the short conveys the emotions of the character and how she feels and in this way such a simple thing as having a hair-cut ends up changing in a spy-story.

At the same time, there are other stories in which the characters’ interiority is completely conveyed through their actions. They show their feelings by acting in a certain way. Of course in this case dialogues with other characters can help convey what they think and how they feel, but you never properly enter the character’s head how you would in a stream of consciousness. This last approach is often used in movies since the media uses visuals to convey meaning instead of only words.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZS5cgybKcI

For example, in this short the two characters’ emotions are conveyed only through visuals and through their actions, not even their words because they are both animals. Of course, one of the advantages of animations and movies is that the visuals can convey something in a much clearer way than with words. If someone were to write a short story about the kitty and the pit-bull they may need to use more words and to enter in the head of the kitty. In this case, the scene where he is in his box with the plushie is perfect to explore a little the kitty interiority. It doesn’t need to be long, but we can have a scene where the kitty thinks how much he loves this crampled box and how much he feels safe with the plushie to the point he doesn’t need anyone else. His reflections can very well be interrupted by the arrival of the dog which moves the plot.

Of course between the two extremes where everything is conveyed through a filtered stream of consciousness and everything is conveyed through a character’s actions there are many middle solutions where “show don’t tell” and stream-of-consciousness-like introspection are combined.

I would also highlight that sometimes you can use visuals to convey introspection as well. For example, in Psycho Pass Akane’s evolution is conveyed through a very long scene where she basically remembers important interactions she has had with other characters (her two friends, Kagari, Makishima). In all those interactions she had been questioned about herself and who she was and what she truly thought of the world. At the time she was made these questions she had no idea what to answer, but in her own mind she reaches the answers and so she answers her interlocutors. In this way we are basically shown an interior evolution of the character thanks to visuals and dialogues.

Apart from the specific example, one can convey a person’s interiority through flashbacks and dreams as well.

Generally speaking, I think that a good way to approach the balance between introspection and action may be to think structurally. Many stories can be divided in three major parts aka the beginning, the central part and the finale. The beginning must present the situation, hook the reader and explain the character’s objective. The beginning of a story often presents an equilibrium which changes after an accident, being it an external factor or the character’s own actions. The central part is the part where the conflict keeps growing until the climax is reached and after the climax there is a finale which is slower and presents a new equilibrium aka how things have changed after the main conflict.

Intuitively, it is common that many of the action scenes will be concentrated in the central parts, while the beginning and the conclusion might be slower and with more introspection to get to know the character and to tie things together thematically. That said, this doesn’t mean that you have to concentrate all the introspection at the beginning and at the end and all the action in the middle. After all, in the middle part the character has to change either internally or they have to change their approach to the problem in order to solve it. For example, a detective may have an introspective scene just before solving the mystery, so he can realize he has been going at things in a completely wrong way up until that moment. In this case, he doesn’t really change as a person, but his method to face the murder changes and this leads to the solution. The same can happen for a character who realizes they need to change as a person. For example, a selfish character might have an introspective scene where they realize their actions are damaging their loved ones and this will lead to their final change which will be conveyed through the final conflict and the final choice they make. For example, the selfish character, after having their realization, will choose to sacrifice themselves for their loved ones by confessing a crime they made and their loved one has been accused of. In this case the introspective scene is right before the resolutive scene of the plot.

What is important of the three part structure is that it can be used not only to divide a story into three parts, but also to divide a scene in three parts. As a matter of fact ideally a scene should be a conflictual unit meaning that it must have its own conflict which is introduced, reaches a climax and is solved in a way which makes the story progress and which links the scene to the one which comes after.

Let’s make an example using your OC and her intention of triggering her grandmother to see her reaction. I will be quoting from one of your other asks:

Similarly, she wonders the same about her grandmother, who hurt my OC’s father during a breakdown. My OC purposely triggers her grandmother to see if the latter would revert to violence.

As you said your OC at one point chooses to trigger her grandmother to see if she will answer with violence or not. Now, let’s focus on the scene she does it. I imagine she will have her reasons to make such an attempt. For example, let’s say in the scene before she has fought an opponent who taunted her and told her she will always be violent because of her mental illness and that recovery is impossible. Because of this, the scene might open with the character thinking back about this confrontation. The opponent reminded her of her own worst fears and so she wants to see if their words are true or not. Now, she might have to go to her grandmother’s house for a reason or another (she goes there weekly, she needs to borrow a book for plot reasons etc.) and she is thinking while she walks there. When she meets her grandmother she might feel anger even if she herself might not realize why (the readers would understand that it is because the grandmother reminds her of herself) and she decides to trigger her even if she had not planned it beforehand. Hence her manipulating her grandmother and her grandmother’s reaction. The interaction might solve in different ways. She could leave her granmother’s house both scared and angry or she might stay until the grandmother calms down and they can have a heartfelt discussion. As you can see these two different endings give different spins to the story and push it in different directions. In the first ending the character might be shocked of having her worst fears confimred and might spiral for a bit, while in the second case her dialogue with her grandmother might help her overcome her opponent’s words in the long run.

What I wanted to show is that in a single scene you managed to convey the character’s interiority and her feelings and to make the plot progress.

Let’s now briefly focus on the POV you are using.

For example, are you using a first person POV or a third person POV? A first person can be difficult to handle especially when the POV of your character is original and not objective in some instances. That said, the fact what your character says might not represent the truth could be used to create interesting effects. For example, Georgy Porgy is a short story by Roald Dahl which is told by a vicar’s point of view. The things narrated by the vicar becomes stranger and stranger until he says that he has been eaten by a woman. However, later details like a man in a white coat coming to visit him in the woman’s stomach make people understand he is in a psychiatric hospital. Another example is given by a novel by Natsuo Kirino where the story is told through letters and a manuscript. Thanks to this, the readers have a specific story told by the book written by a character and letters written by other characters which contradict and criticize the book. Because of this, in the end the reader is not sure about who is telling the truth and who is lying.

Generally speaking, a third person can be easier to handle because you can decide how much to focus it, so that it can perfectly overlap with your POV character, but also offer some kind of commentary to some of the character’s more contradictive actions. At the same time, a third person can make the use of more lyrical and poetic images justified, while it can be difficult to make them believable with a first person.

Another thing to consider is how many POV you are using.

A single POV can let you avoid too much fragmentation of the story and of the subplots, but of course it makes so that the readers’ knowledge is limited to the character’s perspective. This can actually help in the construction of interesting twists which are revealed to the character and to the reader at the same time.

More POVs can let the readers know more characters at the same time and they can in this way acquire more information, but the story might be slowed down by this and it can become confusing.

I think that it is better to have a limited number of POV characters and to choose them according to the plot. For example, if in the end the main POV character gets to know everything the reader needs to know you might just have one POV, while if the POV won’t discover everything and you need the reader to realize this and to know more you may have more POV characters or also change the POV just at the end to show that things did not end like the character thought.

All in all, the choice of more POV characters might also be about the themes of the story like in Baccano! where the fact of having a huge cast and not a proper MC is used to convey the themes about life and narrative the series explores.

Finally I think that when choosing a POV character one should consider that two different effects can be obtained according to the attributes of the character.

Either the character has very average attributes or the character has very specific and strange attributes.

In the first case, the POV will be as close as objective as it is, but the character will lose in characterization.

In the second case, the POV might not be much objective and a part of the story’s charm will be to convey the point of view of the character which is not common. In this case, the POV of the character might twist events, but also the perception of other characters and so it might be difficult to describe in an objective way characters as complex and as peculiar as the one of your POV character.

A solution might very well be to differentiate between POV character and main character. In this case the POV will tell the story of the MC (for example this is the idea behind Sherlock Holmes and Watson). The MC will be the character living the most important conflict and driving the story, while the POV will be the person through whom we will experience the story and will have a more passive role.

For example, in both Psycho Pass and Madoka respectively Akane and Madoka have for the first part of the series the role of POV characters. They are more passive than other characters and they know less about the worldbuilding than other characters. Because of this, they are the characters things are explained to and in this way things are explained to the readers as well. In Akane and Madoka’s case, their role of POV characters is handled very well imo because they both have an important development at the end of their respective series to the point that they take important parts of the plot in their own hands after having been passive for the majority of the story. Basically they do not remain passive until the end and they are given a proper arc.

I would also like to highlight how not being given the POV of a character since the beginning, but discovering that character little by little as the POV’s character gets to know them more and more doesn’t necessarily make the character less interesting or sympathetic, but can actually be very satisfying. For example, this is exactly what happens with Homura in Madoka since we discover more and more about her as the story progresses and we are shown different aspects of her character.

These are my thoughts on your question and I hope they were useful. I will answer to your other asks soon. Hopefully either tomorrow or on Tuesday.

Thank you for the ask!

#writing #writing anon #asksfullofsugar #anonymous

6 notes · View notes

eury--dice · 5 years

Text

Three Ghosts

Back at it with more Zoe angst because I love her and she deserves better but I’ll instead write some angst m’kay?

Trigger warnings: suicide, depression, anxiety, suicidal thoughts (please let me know if there’s anything else you want me to add a warning for) Please scream with me about Zoe Murphy

***

These days, sleep was impossible. Not that it was ever easy, with constant tension in the air so thick she sometimes felt as though she’d choke on it if she wasn’t careful enough.

(Of course, there were those months she’d slept well. But that was long gone, and to think of those now would be the source of more sleeplessness.)

Now, she’d toss and turn all night until eventually exhaustion took over, forcing the echoing voices inside of her head to silence. Ironically, that was her favorite time-when she was forced to have a clear mind as her body finally couldn’t handle any thoughts. The hours before, however, were the worst. With only dark and silence, she was forced to confront the angry, taunting voice in her mind, and the little boy that always looked so damn sad, and the anxious smile that seemed to be the image her brain most reverted to.

But in the early hours of morning, all of that would disappear, if only for a few minutes before the blaring alarm clock shook her out of her peaceful haze, and the cycle would begin again.

***

Sometimes, the taunting voice was the worst.

Oh, you’re feeling a little tired? Is it because you’re guilty? You’re guilty now? For what, Zoe? Why would you be fucking guilty, huh, Zoe? Is it because I’m dead? Or you prefer it that way, instead of wishing I was here? Or is it because you trusted someone else. Someone who hurt you, tore you down. Is that why you’re guilty, Zo? Not for little ol’ me. Never for me, Zo, is that right?

“Shut UP!” she’d scream, tearing at her hair, trying to do something, anything to quiet the voice.

How ironic to have your dead abusive brother’s voice haunt you at all hours, right? Connor’s voice was a backdrop to Zoe’s life. She shouldn’t have been surprised. Connor was the sun which the Murphy family orbited around. Her whole life had been controlled by his needs and his problems. Of course that wouldn’t change after he killed himself.

The worst part was that he said the things she knew, but hurt the most to acknowledge.

Oh, what’s wrong, little Zo? Can’t face the fact you loved a liar?

That night, she stole her mother’s sleeping pills.

***

School was just another obstacle.

Classes were okay. She mostly let the teacher’s voices take over her head and give her a short reprieve from Connor’s constant harassment. Sometimes, when her mind truly wandered, she’d begin to doodle stars on the cuffs of her jeans.

She always caught herself before she got too far.

Hallways between classes were the worst. Somehow, knowing that everyone in this crowd knew her as the dead kid’s sister made the crowd feel angrier, more violent.

Sometimes, she thought about which ones in it had turned on her when the ‘suicide note’ was released. Which one had called her a stuck up bitch? Which one had given away her phone number?

And there was Connor’s face, constantly staring her down from the Connor Project posters lining every wall. Even though his was the only face on the posters, she could silently feel another one, lurking beneath the surface, reminding her of her mistakes.

Can’t even look at your own brother, huh, Zo?

Or is it someone else you’re avoiding?

It wasn’t like she had any friends left, anyway, to walk the halls with. They’d all left her after the “suicide note” came out, the ones that were left after-after she made simultaneously the best and worst decision of her life. A few had stuck with her through it all, and they constantly tried to break down her walls. After enough trying, they’d learned that Zoe needed space. She didn’t do anything to refute this, although she desperately wanted human contact.

They couldn’t stay around her, even if they wanted to. She wouldn’t allow them. How could she, when she killed everything she touched?

So she mostly walked the halls a shell of her former self, sometimes with a mix of her favorite songs or some ‘80s rock blaring in her earbuds in the hope that it would drown out the constant torrent of voices beating her down. Sometimes it worked. Mostly it didn’t.

Jazz band helped a little. When she played the guitar, her problems slipped away a little, forced out the voices in her head. Sometimes she’d begin to smile, before a voice piped up in her head, reminding her of the time when someone had called that exact smile subtle and perfect and real. Like she was in on some secret that she was letting you into, just by smiling.

She didn’t enjoy being in on this secret.

***

Situated alone in her room, Zoe lapsed back into herself. Even though her mother had attempted to get Zoe to talk to her, she’d brushed Cynthia off quickly and cleanly, disconnecting herself immediately.

It was then her phone began to ring.

That’d happened for hours on end, she remembered, after the suicide note. She’d started off by replying with something quick and rude.

Have fun with your miserable life, bye.

But eventually, she’d just give up. She’d let the voices rant and scream about how she killed Connor, how she was the problem. She could have saved him if she’d tried.

She found it hard not to believe them.

Larry and Cynthia had insisted she get her number changed. Twice. On this line, she’d only gotten one phone call, one she didn’t even tell her parents about. It was easier to not tell them. If she told them, they would’ve freaked out again. All Zoe wanted was peace.

But something inside of her compelled her to pick up the phone with a standard “hello?”

Her own voice surprised her. She’d barely listened to it, recently. It was as though she was a stranger in her own body, her voice reverberating through her empty brain, startling her to listening.

And the person on the other line started immediately. They weren’t angry in tone. They were condescending.

They told her that she clearly had no idea what her brother was going through, how she hadn’t attempted to understand. That if she had gotten off of her ass and realized he was suffering, he would be here. That if she hadn’t been such an awful sister, he would be here.

Something in the last line made her snap.

She yelled like she couldn’t remember yelling before. Every emotion that she’d felt without really feeling was balled up in her chest, and the only thing she could think to do was scream it all out at this person who felt they had a right to berate her, to blame her for something they knew nothing about.

She started controlled. “I spent every goddamn night sleeping outside of Connor’s door for a year because he would fight with my mother and refuse to let me into his room. Until I turned twelve, I did this every night, begging him to let me in, to talk to me. He wouldn’t even deign me with a response. When I turned thirteen, I started staying up, waiting for him to come home, worrying to the point I’d almost throw up. All he’d do when he came in at three or four am was threaten to kill me if I told our parents.”

She could feel herself getting louder. She didn’t care.

“When I turned fourteen, he was already hooked on pot and whatever other shit he did! When I tried to intervene, he threw a burning joint at me!”

Years of trying. Years of pain.

“How much did you want me to put up with? How many years of abuse? How many days as his personal punching bag? How many days of holding my tounge, waiting for him to tire out? How many sleepless nights, how many panic attacks? How much was I supposed to do?”

She’s crying. She’s not sure when she started.

“How was I supposed to help him, when he wouldn’t help himself? How?”

Zoe choked a little.

When I couldn’t even help myself?

A little voice at the back of her head piped up. Maybe you should have done more. Been a better sister. Realized he was suffering inside of his own head.

“Does that mean he could make me suffer?” she shouted, suddenly addressing the person on the other line again, tears building up once again. “Was I responsible for his whole life, when he wouldn’t let me live?”

The voice has started speaking on the phone again. “Because he was the monster!” Or had the voice been inside of her own head? “He was the monster!”

It didn’t matter where the voice was, anymore. All that mattered was the fact that she was sliding, sliding, sliding to the ground.

“Or am I the monster?” Zoe whispered, feeling shards of glass prick her fingertips. She had shattered her phone, the broken glass catching light along the floor, creating odd patterns. Almost small rainbows finding their way across the ground, surrounding her in irony. Pain complimenting beauty.

That’s wasn’t always me, you know, Zo. The cruel voice of Connor morphed into a sweeter voice. A little boy.

Once, I was good. Maybe you changed that.

“Shut up,” she tried to shout, her hoarse voice only allowing a half hearted wheeze.

You could’ve fixed me, Zoe.

Zoe sat, shattered glass around her, tears streaming down her face and blood drawn from her finger.

I was too broken, anyway, she wanted to say. Far too broken to fix you.

***

Of course, Cynthia had heard the commotion. For once, no questions were asked, simply sympathetic, probing looks as she cleaned up the glass and bandaged Zoe’s fingers. She couldn’t enjoy getting off easy.

You find your only daughter having a mental breakdown amongst a shattered phone and this is how you fucking react?

For once, the voice wasn’t criticizing her.

Ask me questions! She wanted to shout. Take me to a thousand doctors! Actually show that you care about me, not just Connor, who’s dead!

Instead, Zoe did nothing, gingerly curling her fingers over in their bandages. She could hear her mother start behind her as she bounded back up the stairs.

“Zoe-“

Cynthia has missed that opportunity.

With an odd sense of detachment, Zoe slammed the door behind her and stopped dead in her tracks when she saw which room she was in.

AKA, most definitely not hers.

Or her parents’.

Or the guest room.

Can’t stand to be in my room, Zoe? Can’t face the fact that your monster lived in here?

Something inside of her shifted, just slightly, enough to uncover a sliver of a wound she’d hidden.

Hm, no. That’s what I thought. With all your care, that never extended to me, huh? Always another fucking person, not me. The golden child, forever and always. You’d care about Evan Hansen, who lied to your face for months, tore Mom and Dad apart, tore my memory apart, tore you apa-

Too late for that talk, isn’t it, hm, Connor?

***

she remembered the first time she really talked to him.

they were in his room-no, not his room, Connor’s room-and he really opened up for the first time, got past that anxious, stuttering façade. and something struck her, right there and then-

ohnonononodontfalldownthisrabbitholedontspiraldownthisdirectionstopstopstopstop-

and Connor was alive that day, truly alive, not in those times when he screamed and broke things-or got so high Zoe had to check his pulse to make sure he was alive-or decided to terrorize some random kids at school because they breathed funny-

and Zoe knew he was hurting, hurting so bad inside of his own head. and Zoe knew she was hurting, too. hurting but unable to show it.

because the Murphys were perfect, weren’t they? at least they were supposed to be. photo albums full of touched up photos, neatly trimmed hedges, white trimmed mini mansion. perfect children. perfect life. perfect... everything.

someone had to be that, right? when Connor became a pothead and Larry pulled away and Cynthia threw herself into any activity that provided a moment of distraction. someone had to smile through the pain in their own heads, smile even though they were falling apart at the seams. smile when med after med failed, when no one noticed the pain of his sister, assumed she could handle neglect for years as Connor imploded, assumed she was better off alone to be her perfect self. not popular, or the prettiest, or the smartest. but in some way perfect. the Murphy standard.

she tried to be perfect, because she could be nothing less.

welllookwherethatfuckinggotyounowyourejustagoddamnmess-

at first, he was a distraction. she didn’t know him; but he brought her brother back, and made her feel again, feel something other than pain and sorrow. but distraction morphed into genuine interest, and interest morphed into something else, as the days went on. something else when his deep brown eyes met hers, his laugh filled her ears, his lips grazed hers, his fingers ghosted over her skin. infatuation turned to love, and she began to heal from sixteen years of fear and pain.

it was stupid of her to think it could ever get better, it could ever last. she was stuck with her brokenness, cursed to carry it to the end of time. the only outs had already been stolen by Connor. doctors. drugs. death.

would she always get his hand-me-downs that could never fit?

***

In the end, she was left to pick up the pieces.

To mourn her brother and to never forgive him. To pull her parents together and set them to sink or swim. To heal the fissures in her mind, and to make sure they stayed sealed. To forgive and remember.

To carry on, with the three ghosts beside her.

***

well this ended as a downer. whoops.

I’m currently working on 3 requests, which will hopefully be a little more upbeat than this. I really gotta tone it down don’t I? Thanks for reading!

#deh #dear evan hansen #zoe murphy #evan hansen #MY LOVE #bandtrees #implied i guess #fanfic #my fanfic #my fanfiction #deh fanfiction #deh fanfic #connor murphy #cynthia murphy #suicide mention #anxiety mention #depression mention #larry murphy #implied hiding in your hands i guess

14 notes · View notes

prairiechzhead · 7 years

Text

It’s Time

For the first time in nearly 6 years, I’m ready to go back to work.

It’s been that long since I held a job because of my anxiety disorder. I have not had a major panic attack in 3 years.

I’m writing this with my fingers crossed that saying all of this “out loud” is not going to jinx me, because that’s happened in the past.

The last job I had lasted about 3 months. Before that, two weeks.

Before that, 10 years. It was work-related stress at that job that triggered my panic attacks and made my anxiety worse. I spent about 8 weeks on medical leave because that’s how long it took to find medication that worked. I also had to get a doctor to say that I was not allowed to work overtime. It was the mandatory OT and the work environment that triggered all of this.

It’s bad when you realize that you’ve been classically conditioned to panic at the sound of the bell that they used to call meetings.

When I had the first panic attack, I ended up in the ER in order to rule out having a heart attack. My parents, particularly my father, tried to convince me that I wasn’t experiencing severe anxiety, but it really was a heart condition. I ignored him. The day is still hazy, but I remember hyperventilating when faced with having to get up and get out of bed to go to work.

I remember sitting in my chair and trying to pull my hair out after having a meltdown.

Now, with all that I know about mental illness, I dissociated a lot that day. What I do remember feels like I was outside of myself.

Other than going to the doctor, I would not leave my house for two weeks. I was too terrified to do it. And when I did, I remember hanging onto my husband’s arm for dear life while I shuffled like an old woman and I was in a daze. I was on my way to get a prescription filled for Xanax.

At one point, in the time from then and now, I thought I had developed a phobia about going to work.

This phobia actually exists. It’s called ergophobia. I was desperately trying to find an answer and a reason why I was having this. And when you think you’re having a honest to God phobia about something that you need to do in order to survive, you feel like a freak, and then this feeling that you’re not normal just piles onto everything else.

Over the years, I’ve come to learn why I had these panic attacks.

It wasn’t ergophobia. It wasn’t work or the idea of having a job.

It was a few things.

One, it was about freedom and having control over my life. When I was working at the job where the stress triggered this, I felt like I had no control over my own life. I was miserable where I was, but felt trapped, because I carried the health insurance. My husband hated his job even more and he was sliding into a depression and not looking for a new one. I remember that I would start looking for something else when he found a different job because of all the obligations I had to this job.

The other part of the freedom and the control was the mandatory OT. I worked in different departments that, when having to declare mandatory OT, were flexible about when you did it, which was a blessing for me. They cared that you put in the hours, not when you put in the hours. If I needed a Saturday off, I could do all of my OT during the week. If I didn’t want to stay late, I could come in early. If I wanted to split things up, I’d do half during the week and then come in on Saturday. This is also how I avoided getting burned out.

The department I was in when I had the panic attacks was not flexible like this. I was getting burned out. I did not have the option to decide to stay late instead of coming in early.

The other thing that I learned was that this issue about control went back to my abusive childhood and unresolved issues that were in my subconscious.

This is how I ended up going back to college at the age of 44.

I was always very smart. But because I lived with psychological abuse, and I internalized the constant stream of messages that told me how worthless I was, how stupid I was, and how unwanted I was, I believed I deserve to go to college. So over the years, I settled for the past of least resistance.

And I was miserable.

The self has this way of reminding you that you are not living up to your potential. In my case, it took a nervous breakdown and a stay in a psychiatric hospital to basically kick me in the butt and tell me that I wasn’t getting any younger and that if I wanted to put the past in the past, I had to stop taking the path of least resistance. I had to put myself first for once.

So I enrolled in college. I will graduate in December 2018 with a bachelor’s degree in psychology.

For the first time in a long time, I don’t feel that dread or sense of panic when I think about going back to work. I feel ready. I feel ready to get back out into the world.

I also want to go to grad school and get a masters’ degree in counseling. My husband won’t admit it, but I can tell he resents this. Part of me feels that if he wants to go back to school, then he has to take the initiative and do it. I had to wait around for him while he got the chance to go back to school, but when he did it, he wasted the opportunity. He also doesn’t know what he wants to go to school for. While he tries to figure it out, I’m not going to sit and wait.

I know what I want to do and I want to do it. I’m getting my degree in spite of how I turned out. I want to get a masters’ degree for personal reasons, too.

This post is turning out to be rambling and stream of consciousness. But it’s something that I needed to say out loud.

#tw anxiety #tw panic attacks #text post

7 notes · View notes

appreciatedinretrospect · 6 years

Text

Track By Track #1 Jack White- Boarding House Reach

Here’s a gigantic middle finger to convention and greed. Jack reinvented himself and made his Yeezus. Enjoy!

Stream Boarding House Reach

youtube

Connected By Love-

Boarding House Reach’s introduction and lead single that continues the simplistic theme of love and mainly loss. We see a darker side of love on the blue trilogy of Jack White albums on Love Interruption and Would You Fight For My Love. Pleading to be released by the hold someone has on you but wanting to surrender to love naturally. Love is hell. Such as most of the oldies singles we love, they’re 9/10 approaching the song from a place of heartbreak. There’s something interesting about the energy of the song given that disposition and making it the first one on the album is as bold as it is a given. Jack almost sounds spent delivering his verses, almost as if he had just been through something. I think the past ten years of growing and understanding life and change did that.

What have I done? I have pushed away everyone

Help me forget, let's put it all to bed

Forgive me, and save me from myself

Don't forsake me, woman and go and choose somebody else

The first instrument you hear is a synthetic bass waving from the left and right channel with conga drums building throughout it. There’s no handholding, we don’t hear a guitar until the solo accompanied by an organ.

Why Walk A Dog?-

Keeping up the 808s waltz and funeral organs, White correlates the state humanity with the domestication of animals. Sparing use of guitar to hauntingly reiterate the vocal melody. Human beings live with a lot of constructs that I’m not sure any of us know why we’re living. Somebody challenging that is simultaneously disruptive and revolutionary. What makes a situation one way for someone and another way for somebody else based off of little to nothing? Why are men paid more than women? We do we force certain animals to be obedient in return of food and love while kill and eat others ruthlessly?

Corporation-

That beat though.This feels like the song Jack White has always wanted to make, especially in the theme of the mainly instrumental pieces on each album that really on the jam around a great riff an rhythm. This time around it felt a little Cowboy Bebop and Edgar Winter meets the Lost Episode of Spongebob. (Tell me that wouldn’t line up perfectly.) Then the vocals come in, and they’re eerie. One could say it’s just Jack being Jack and accept it as a broad statement. White asks “Who’s With Me?” It’s safe to assume most of audience happily volunteered themselves. Even in-between the howls. But if you read the words on paper, who or what does it sound like?

Yes, I'm thinking about buying all the empty cots

And making one giant army

Who's with me?

I'm gonna buy up all the empty lots and make one giant farm

Who's with me?

Yeah, you know what I'm talking about?

Who's with me?

Yeah, I'm thinking about starting a corporation

Who's with me?

And take it right to the top

Take it right to the top!

Abulia and Akrasia-

The first of many spoken word sections on the album. This one is performed by blues singer C.W Stoneking to expand your vocabulary. If anybody was wondering “Abulia refers to a lack of will or initiative and can be seen as a disorder of diminished motivation. And akrasia is described as a lack of self-control or the state of acting against one’s better judgment” (Genius)

Hypermisophoniac-

Children’s toys make dope loops. “Misophonia” is a proposed condition in which negative emotions, thoughts, and physical reactions are triggered by specific sounds. So White tried to create something beautiful out of ‘ugly sounds’ in a constant ascension of desperation. The song is in a constant Before that album came out White spoke to Gary Oldman describing the new material as “good gardening music or roofing music or, you know, back-alley stabbing music.”I thought that was vague until I heard the album. Specifically this song feels like back-alley stabbing music.

Ice Station Zebra-

Check my man’s flow.

youtube

Over and Over and Over-

Anybody waiting for the classic Jack White guitar riff thus far, look no further. Apparently the genius of this song was for an album White was working on with Jay Z years ago. It stacks up fine next to songs like Lazaretto and Sixteen Saltines as much as classic White Stripes songs.

Everything You Have Learned-

This could be the most genius moment on the album. White holds up a mirror to the listener with conga drums and synths as the alter White is preaching from. We have finally met Jack White: The Preacher, and it’s an angrier character. These are the angriest screams I’ve heard from him since the early White Stripes days and those were more youthful than angry. He asks seemingly simple questions with seemingly simple answers showing the cause and effect of duality in the choices we make based off of our systems of belief.

Do you want everything?

Then, you can have everything

But what is everything?

(Worth?)

Do you wish for nothing?

Then, you will have nothing

Now, that is something

Do you wanna see it all?

Well, you can just open your eyes

The one who is prepared, is never surprised

Do you wanna question everything?

Then, think of a good question

Do you wanna start a fire?

Well, you can watch it burn

Do you wanna learn?

Then, shut up and learn

Do you wanna learn?

Then, shut up

Shut up

Shut up and learn

Shut up

Shut up!

Respect Commander-

Another not so subtle nod to modern times and the conversations taking place right now. Plant your feet where you stand and uphold that. With a beat reminiscent of the beginning drum beat of Corporation, a shot of espresso brings the listener to a modern version of what The Clash did with experimenting with their sound in the 80s on albums like Sandinista! or even Daft Punk or Childish Gambino’s Because The Internet with the bluesy breakdown that serves as the body paragraphs in the song.

She has all my respect

And I cannot protect

My heart from her command

WORD UP. This is a scorcher that musically takes you all over the place and features one of the more prominent guitar solos on the album as well. It’s a modern perspective on a song that still features swagger and seduction.

Ezmeralda Steals The Show-

Spoken word interlude number two. This one is a story book interpretation of observing our communication breakdown as a society. This time performed by Mr. White double tracked with completely different timbres like in both sides of your headphones.

Stealing the show could be something happening out of the ordinary seeming as we’ve all become so disinterested in the ordinary.

Get In The Mindshaft-

Spoken word number three. We’re given a peak inside a small moment in the life of Jack White, finding a piano in an abandoned house and figuring out his first chord. Could it be the genius of a life of music? Or just a representation of the beginnings of that life? Maybe it’s representative of paths being taken in life and it starts with finding three notes that fit together. The Prince/Daft Punk dance party menses out of that synthesizer dream state introduction with White’s modulated crooning;

Can you hear me now?

Am I Invisible to you?

What’s Done Is Done-

Similarly to the album’s introduction, What’s Done is Done is the most traditional and traditionally Jack White song on the album, though it takes it’s liberties instrumentality with the blend of acoustic and electronic elements. As a duet with singer Esther Rose the broken waltz motif continues on a song that blends blending classic country music and 808s as Justin Timberlake once said. But actually.The juxtaposition of that fits a lot more naturally when it isn't contrived. White sounds even more defeated this time around alluding to his own demise at the end of the song.

Humoresque-

Back in 2017 an anonymous bidder at an auction bought sheet music handwritten by Al Capone in Alcatraz. The song was a classic piece that many people had attempted to write lyrics for including the world’s most notorious gangster. Jack White was revealed to to be the anonymous bidder. Just take a listen to the song and let it wash over you. Jack White doing a jazz song and singing primarily in his upper register in what one of his most vulnerable vocal takes is something to process in itself. Then take in the fact that this was put together by Al Capone. The intensity of each musician building the song until it’s peak could be the most compelling moment of the album. It’s a beautifully mournful ending that inevitably leaves a void.

Personally, I believe this is Jack White’s strongest solo album and strongest album in general since the first Dead Weather release. New life was breathed into the process of creating the songs maintaining juxtaposing the analog and the digital. White says this is the first album he mixed in Pro Tools but he still used the same analog equipment from his teenage years in an isolated apartment to write the songs. Boarding House Reach sounds and feels like liberation. I’ve been seeing him hold a lot of weight over his shoulders since Blunderbuss for various reasons. I think he’s found peace in himself by being able to look inward and allow change. That being said, anyone thinking this isn’t marketable or it’s too odd of a Jack White record, really take an honest listen to the songs. Boarding House Reach is a beautiful reminder to create freely. It could be considered a rebirth or an ending. Could the adding of the gold in the blue have any significance in that? Also check the White Stripes’ Get Behind Me Satan. It may not have had 808s on it but rock purists were pissed off then too. It’s 2018, these sounds have to integrate, and who better than Jack? Thank you for making dynamics the focus.

As always, I recommend buying vinyl. It really is the best listening experience. Support the artist and/or your local record store. Physical Copies of Boarding House Reach can be found on Third Man Record’s website.

Released: March 23, 2018

Label: Third Man/Columbia/XL

#jack white #third man records #new music #2018 #album review #music #music writing #nicomiles #421 #music blog #nashville #boarding house reach

0 notes

flauntpage · 6 years

Text

DGB Grab Bag: The Birth of Replay Review, Concussions, and Death to Panic Moves

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Taylor Hall – His slow-but-sure transformation into one of the league's better (and meaner) personalities continues.

The second star: Brad Marchand – He's tweeting out video games memes and pumping the tires of the next generation.

The first star: Kings vs. Karlsson – Anze Kopitar and Drew Doughty are good here, but the real star is Dustin Brown.

Wait. Do we... do we like Brad Marchand and Dustin Brown now? I know it's 2017 and nothing makes sense anymore, but that feels like a bridge too far.

Outrage of the Week

The issue: On Monday night in Toronto, Kings goalie Jonathan Quick was bumped in his crease and fell to the ice holding his head. That triggered a bizarre sequence of events in which he was allowed to stay in the game, then pulled, then put back in, then pulled again before finally returning—all without ever actually being checked for a concussion. The outrage: The NHL's concussion spotter program is a mess. Is it justified: The Monday night debacle got plenty of attention, partly because it happened in Toronto and the game was one of only two being played that night. But it sure seemed to highlight some glaring holes in the league's concussion protocol. How can a player get hit in the head, fall down clutching his head, be slow to get to his feet, and not immediately be pulled for further evaluation?

As it turns out, the league has an answer—sort of. And it all goes back to an issue we flagged back in the playoffs: The NHL's spotter policy is way too specific about what does and doesn't trigger a player's removal. In this case, there was a question over whether Quick was hit with a shoulder (which does trigger the policy) or a stick (which for some reason does not). That's why the back-and-forth played out, and why the Kings ultimately didn't actually need to take Quick back to the dressing room for an evaluation.

Clearly, that doesn't make any sense, especially when it comes to goaltenders. Under the current rules, a goalie could get hit in the mask with a point-blank Shea Weber slapshot and go down holding his head without needing to come out. The same is true if he's kneed in the face during a scramble, or clubbed over the back of the head with a stick. The lines of distinction here are a problem, just like they were with Sidney Crosby back in May.

For his part, Quick insists that he was fine all along, and the whole thing was a waste of time. Maybe he's right. It's quite possible that he was only momentarily shaken up, or maybe just trying that old goaltending trick of embellishing contact to try to draw a whistle. (If so, given how things played out, goalies around the league may want to rethink that strategy.)

But there's a bigger question here, and it's one that most of us probably don't want to acknowledge. A forward or defenseman can be pulled from the game and head to the room for an evaluation, and if all is well, they might miss a shift or two. But a goalie coming out of the game, leaving his backup to come in cold, is a much bigger deal. So should the concussion protocol rules even apply to goaltenders? Or at least, should they apply in the same way?

The easy answer here is yes, of course they should, since a goaltender's brain isn't somehow concussion-proof just because of the position he plays. If the rules are about player safety, then you apply them across the board, and if teams don't like it then too bad.

Except the concussion protocol rules aren't about player safety, at least not entirely. If they were, players would be pulled out of the game for evaluation every time they were involved in a collision of any kind, since we know that concussions can result from virtually any significant contact. If we were really focused on safety above all else, there'd be a constant stream of players heading in and out of the dressing room all game long.

But there isn't, because the protocol rules are trying to strike a balance between enhancing player safety and minimizing disruption. That why goalies are so tricky; they throw the equation out of whack. And it's why they seem to be treated differently when it comes to concussions—remember Golden Knights goalie Marc-Andre Fleury taking a knee to the head, finishing the game, and then being placed on injured reserve?

Again, maybe the answer here is to just enforce the same rules for everyone and live with the consequences, even if it means that goalies have to come out every now and then. Given what we know about the long-term impact of head injuries, that seems like a pretty reasonable position. Just remember that if that's the standard you want to apply to Jonathan Quick in the first period on Monday, it also applies to your favorite team's goalie in overtime of a game seven.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

It's almost Halloween, and you're probably in the mood for a scary story. If so, you'll appreciate this week's Obscure Player: early-90s winger Steven King.

King was a college star who spent four years shining at Brown, and was selected by the Rangers in 1991 as part of the (now defunct) supplemental draft. He was the best pick in that draft, which sounds impressive but isn't saying much; only three other players taken ever made the NHL, and they combined for just 19 games between them. King spent most of the next two years in the AHL, but got a shot with the Rangers in December, 1992. He started strong, scoring in each of his first four NHL games, including third-period winners in both ends of a home-and-home against the Lightning.

He cooled off from there, scoring just three times in 20 more games. But he apparently impressed the Mighty Ducks, who took him in that summer's expansion draft. He'd dress for 36 games in the Ducks inaugural season, including the opener, and scored a goal in the franchise's first-ever win. He ended up with eight goals before his season ended in misery when he suffered a serious shoulder injury.

That injury was about it for King in the NHL. He missed the following season, and played just seven more games for the Ducks in 1995-96. But he had success in the AHL and IHL, including a 40-goal season with the Baltimore Bandits and a triple-OT winner in the 1999 Calder Cup final. He retired in 2000, and later tried a short jaunt into coaching.

He has never been photographed with Canucks minor league goalie Richard Bachman.

Be It Resolved

The Montreal Canadiens are struggling. After coming into the season looking like a contender to win the Atlantic, the team face-planted out of the gate. They can't score, their star goalie is struggling, the captain is beating himself up, and the team has spent most of the season within a point or two of last place in the Eastern Conference. Their season is slipping away. And so this week, general manager Marc Bergevin stepped up and did what he had to do.

No, he didn't make a big move to turn his team's season around. Don't be silly. A trade? In the NHL? Is this your first day here?

No, instead Bergevin played the most well-worn card in a modern-day GM's deck: Bravely vowing not to make a "panic move".

That sound you hear is a million or so frustrated Canadiens fans all breathing a sigh of relief in unison. They were probably lying awake at night, worried their GM was going to sprint into the office, make a trade, pull the fire alarm and then jump out the window, all while flailing his arms like Beeker from the muppets. Luckily, Bergevin set them straight.

This is well-worn ground around these parts by now, where we've been pointing out (and making fun of) the timid excuse-making of risk averse GMs for years. And to be clear, this isn't meant as some sort of shot at Bergevin, who's merely reading straight from the pages of the modern GM's manual. This week, it happens to be him. Next week, it will probably be Jeff Gorton or John Chayka or someone else.

But since it seems like NHL GMs could use an early-season reminder, let's offer one here: There has literally never been a fan in the history of hockey who wants his team to make a panic move. That pressure doesn't exist. It's made up, just like the fans who want you to "make a trade just for the sake of making a trade."

When you get in front of a microphone and announce that you're not going to make a panic move, you're not telling us anything of value. You seem to think you are. You seem to think that you're projecting confidence, and that we'll be impressed by your steely resolve in the face of adversity. I can assure you that we are not. When we hear you start to mumble about panic moves, all we hear is some variation of I am all out of ideas and would really like it if everyone would just leave me alone.

As fans, we know that the salary cap complicates everything. We know that when things are bad, other GMs throw you anvils instead of lifejackets. We know that making midseason roster moves is hard. Our jobs are hard sometimes too. We still have to do them.

So be it resolved: NHL GMs, enough with the "no panic moves" nonsense. If you can't or won't make a move and feel the need to justify it, just say that you're looking at all avenues to improve the team but that nothing is imminent right now. Irons in the fire, that sort of thing. Even if it's not true, it will at least make it sound like you're trying. Fans tend to like that sort of thing.

But spare us the lectures about panic moves. They're not a thing, and never have been.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

The NHL found itself in an unusual position last week, when they had to admit that they screwed up an instant replay review. It turns out they misread their own rule, and took a goal off the board that should have counted.

As you can imagine, people weren't impressed. But let's give the league a break. After all, they've only had replay reviews for… uh, well over three decades.

It's the 1985-86 season, and the NHL is looking for ways to improve its officiating. They've got a half-million dollars to spend, and one of their ideas is instant replay review. But it's still experimental, because the league wants to get it right. After all, the worst thing you could do is bring in a new replay rule and find out everyone hates it.

I have no idea who this anchor is, but I like him. He seems earnest. And I like how he's going old school and just reading his intro off a piece of paper in front of him. He's no Sugar Joe Tilley, but he's alright.

I'm also enjoying the NHL logo, superimposed on a background of NHL logos. I think this story might be about the NHL, you guys.

We start off with a cool clip. It's a disputed Mike Gartner goal, and referee Dan Marouelli is wearing a mic so we get to hear the entire conversation between officials and captains as they try to sort out what happened. Special credit to veteran linesman Gord Broseker, who is clearly trying to tell Marouelli he messed up without using those specific words.

Marouelli is pretty confident the puck was in, even telling Brian Sutter he had "perfect vision." When Sutter keeps chirping, Marouelli hits him with "Why would I lie to you, I was in perfect position." Maybe don't oversell it here, Dan.

Hey, we all thought that Dan Marouelli kind of looked like David Bowie, right? That wasn't just me? Cool.

Our reporter is Brian MacFarlane, who must have caught up with John Davidson for most YouTube section appearances by now. He serves up a slow-motion replay of the Gartner goal, which shows that it wasn't a goal at all. It clearly rings off the crossbar, meaning Marouelli did lie to Sutter. But why?

NHL VP of Officiating Ian Morrison is here to outline some of the league's concerns, including camera positioning. He explains that it's crucial to have working cameras in every building in the league, before adding "Although I suppose we could probably get away with not having them in Buffalo during the Stanley Cup final, right?"

There are other concerns, including the time it would take to get the call right. I can't decide if it's reassuring or not to hear the same arguments being made in 1985 that we still have today. But we do get a neat look at hockey's first ever replay review, from an exhibition game between Team Canada and Michigan State. "The replay showed the referee's decision to be absolutely correct." Was that so hard, Marouelli?

We cut to an interview with Toronto captain Rick Vaive, who supports the idea. Then comes a fantastic clip of the Leafs getting screwed over by a goal judge in New York, which leads to goalie Don Edwards going over to bang on the glass and point at his eyes. Sadly, he does not break out this move.

Referee Kerry Fraser ends up counting the goal, one of three scored by Bob Brooke in a 7-3 Rangers win. Years later, the Leafs would get some payback against Brooke. Fraser, not so much.

MacFarlane ends his report with an extended sequence of furious players and coaches, highlighted by a leaping Chico Resch. I miss when guys would have full-on meltdowns during NHL games. I think every team should get one per game. And if you turn out to be right about the call, you get it back, just like your challenge.

Sadly, we never circle back to Marouelli. I really wanted to see what the final call was, and what kind of closure he got with Sutter. Even if it counted, it's still not the worst disputed goal call the Sutter boys will ever see.

And we end up with our earnest anchor, who informs us that a final decision on using replay is still to come. But he can assure us of one thing: The league will only ever use replay to determine if the puck has gone in the net. That makes sense. After all, if you started reviewing other calls, you might screw it up.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: The Birth of Replay Review, Concussions, and Death to Panic Moves published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

0 notes