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#and when i am not working i am at home working w/ a four legged toddler
hier--soir · 3 months
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a lover's pinch | seven
joel miller x f!reader
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pairing: professor!joel miller x f!reader rating: explicit, 18+ mdni summary: things get a little messy after returning home. a confrontation sparks the beginning of a new stage in your relationship with joel. warnings/tags: au, university professor joel, age gap [20 something years diff], ethically dubious relationship due to inherent power imbalance, angst, miscommunication trope, self-doubt, alcohol consumption/hangover, joel is 50 and he texts like it, les mis spoilers???, phantom of the opera spoilers???, jealous!joel, food/eating, hurt/comfort, professor DAD, professor COWBOY, soft emotional smut, unprotected piv sex, cream pie, oral [f!receiving], joel says dadgum cause i think it's so classic him and so cute. word count: 11.1k jesus series masterlist | main masterlist chapter moodboard a/n: merry christmas to all that celebrate. as always, thank you for your patience and kindness. the love for this series is nothing short of mind blowing, and i appreciate you all endlessly. i hope you enjoy this angst and potentially the most flowery + emotional ALP smut yet [if that's even possible]. also rachel i love you i'm sorry. without further ado, the beginning of our descent into The End Times x follow @hier--soirupdates if you'd like to be notified when i share my writing this is part seven of ALP. you can read the previous parts here: one, two, three, four, five, six.
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Tuesday.
It's nine thirty in the morning and you buy a Coke anyways.
It’s raining heavy outside; fat droplets of water that splatter against the windscreen of your car and dribble down, slipping through the crevice at the top of the bonnet, searching for the engine, for the oil gasket, for somewhere undercover to dry out.
You tuck your legs beneath yourself, sit criss-cross in the driver’s seat, and take small sips of fizzing black sugar. Allow it to moisten your lips, coat your tongue and your teeth in that sickening, viscous way soda always does, before it slips down your throat.
There’s something unearthly about the day, unnerving—it’s Tuesday morning and you’re hungover. A dull ache behind your left eye, a kink in your neck. You check your phone.
Thick, rolling clouds loom across the sky. Occasionally, a flash of lightning, a thrum of thunder. You tear open a packet of peanuts and pluck one out, and then another. Eat until your lips are dry and puckered, and then take another drink. More peanuts then. Salty, sweet, salty, sweet.
It’s all you can stomach as your liver pumps and spasms, still working to cleanse your blood of the night before, spent sprawled on the couch with Trin and Nora.
Wearing sweaters and thick socks, gripping full glasses of wine, and watching Les Misérables. Nora, tears on her cheeks, had sung along with Hugh Jackman—'This innocent who bears my face, who goes to judgement in my place, who am I?’—and you, bleary-eyed and tipsy, had discreetly checked your phone.
You didn’t cry during I Dreamed A Dream but you’re crying for this? Trin rolled her eyes.
He sacrifices his freedom to save that man, Nora whimpered.
You woke up starving and the traffic was slow. At every red light and stop sign your fingers itched against the wheel, desperate to press inside your bag and pull out this little packet. And now, safe in the campus parking lot, you feast. Salty, sweet, salty, sweet. You feel a fleeting moment of pity for people with peanut allergies, and then you check your phone.
Still nothing.
Since you left New York on Monday morning there’s been no sign of life from Joel. No get home safe, no see you on Tuesday; no acknowledgement at all.
You stare dejectedly at the messages you’ve sent him.
First from yesterday afternoon:
Home now. Enjoy your last day in the big apple x
And then from late last night, two bottles of wine deep:
It’s raining and miserable here
Wish I was still in new york
With you
Sitting in your car now, glowering at the blank space where his response should be, you reconcile with the thought that perhaps he wants what happened in New York to stay in New York. Stolen glances and all-too-brief touches in a conference hall, his hand on your wrist at the museum, skin against skin in his hotel room, and in yours—perhaps it was supposed to happen there, not here. The lowering of walls came with a change in location, and maybe that was his intention. But those thoughts don’t ease the sharp twist in your chest when you think of him. Doesn’t take away how much you wish he would give you something – a morsel of communication, even a single word of acknowledgement. For as hard as you try to understand, you can’t forget the look in his eyes when he touched you at the cloisters, the way he breathed your name into your mouth. Sewing the seed of JoelJoelJoel into in the soft folds of your brain, impossible to forget.
You don’t think about his dinner with Rachel. Don’t consider that something may have happened that night, something that changed his mind about you. Something that made him rethink the entire weekend as you slipped into the shower and out the door, leaving him alone in your hotel bed while you headed to the airport.
No. You don’t think about that at all.
When you make it inside, clothes wet and cool from the rain, you shake your hair out like a dog. Let droplets fly across the hall as you make your way into the lecture theatre; a drizzled trail left in your wake.
The room is full when you step inside, but there’s no sign of him yet. You collapse into an empty chair in the front row and wait. The final few students filter in through the door, shaking out umbrellas and wiping their feet. And for another ten minutes you, foolishly, still expect Joel to show up.
It’s only when the door creaks open and an old man walks through, that you let the hopeful feeling rest.
He lays a worn old satchel against the desk and turns to smile at the room.
“Hello,” the stranger smiles, and his jowls quiver as he speaks. “I’m Jerry Dorfman, a Professor from the literature department, and…”
You zone out for a second, eyes darting down to your phone screen. Nothing.
“Oh, and Professor Miller,” Dorfman says, as if he’s just remembered that he shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t be standing up there, in his spot. “Is tied up with a family matter. I trust he’ll be back with us later in the week.”
A family matter?
Slick with rain, staring at this stranger stood in Joel’s place, you feel like a kind of newborn. Some fresh lamb, soaked in the blood and amniotic fluids of her mother’s womb, staring through unseeing eyes, hoping to glean some understanding of this moment. This sudden burst of light, this shocking cold after so many weeks of warmth, of sweat and strong hands on your skin, holding you close. But this is Eros; the blacksmith, the limb-loosener, the crusher. A deviation from stoking the flame to the suddenly desperate, grasping loneliness of feeling as though you are standing by a lover’s window, staring helplessly through the glass, and watching them from the outside. Alone.
Dorfman tries and fails to connect his laptop to the projector.
Numb fingers type;
Are you okay? Where are you?
But no response comes.
No, not until later that night, not until you’re tucked beneath the covers of your bed, showered and sleepy, does he finally reach out.
The clock has just ticked past midnight when your phone vibrates.
Hey, I had to stay in the city another day. Just landed at PWM. See you on Thursday.
A hot, jagged feeling swims in your gut as you read the message, and then reread it. Twice, three more times, searching for some hint of familiarity. Some indication that he has been thinking about you as much as you’ve been thinking about him. That the past weekend meant something to him, like it meant to you.
Minutes pass, and when you don’t find what you’re looking for, you fall asleep without responding.
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Thursday.
Nora wakes up with a stuffy nose.
This always happens to me, she sniffs. I hate being sick.
The tiles in the kitchen are cold beneath your bare toes and rain smears heavily against the windowpane. You can hear fat blooms of thunder bellowing outside. Nora’s sullen, husky voice paired with the steam rising from your mug are all it takes to convince you to stay home with her.
The two of you spend the day curled on the sofa beneath blankets. You stare at your laptop, a document open on your screen with the title of an essay sitting pretty at the top. The cursor blinks and blinks at you, taunting you, daring you to write something, anything. But Sex and The City is playing on the tv, and Nora is snoring at the other end of the sofa, and you can’t help but watch the minutes tick by on the clock. Listen to Carrie and Miranda argue about Big, and wonder if Joel has even noticed your absence.
Trin gets home from class, and you follow her into the kitchen. Peel and slice oranges and apples and lemons while she tells you about her day. Boil them in sugar with cinnamon and star anise while she complains about an argument she had with her boyfriend. Add red wine and brandy while she tells you that her Dad sent her some money, and she’ll order take out for the three of you.
So together you huddle in the lounge and eat hot Indian food with your hands. Soak pieces of naan in tarka dal and saag paneer and top if off with mulled wine, unphased by the clashing of flavours in your mouths.
And you don’t check your phone, or look at the time, and you don’t complain when Nora asks, with glassy-eyes and spinach in her teeth, if she can put on another musical.
He’s a freak, Trin frowns at the TV.  
He loves her, Nora implores, staring doe-eyed at a masked Gerard Butler.
Nor, Trin scoffs, he put a wedding dress on a mannequin that looks just like her. In his fucking lair, no less. That’s freak behaviour.
He has amazing sideburns though, Nora grins. So he gets a pass.
Your phone vibrates as Erik strokes a passed-out Christine’s face, singing help me make the music of the night.
Careful that Nora won’t notice, you pull it from beneath your thigh.
Where were you today?
You stare at the words for a moment and feel your lips curl into an disbelieving sneer.
“Oh, fuck off,” you mutter, and shove your phone into the crevice between the sofa cushions.
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Wednesday.
A week goes by with no word from Joel.
No word from you either.
You stay home every day. Write and read and catch up on work and take Benadryl and sip soup and then you wake one morning, relieved to find that Nora’s cold has finally left your system.
So you tug on jeans, a sweater, and share a pot of coffee in the kitchen. Share quiet conversation with Pete in his shitty old Beamer as he gives you a ride to campus, and walk into Rachel’s lecture with zero expectation that today will be the day you finally see Joel again.
“We understand that Antigone is a victim of her father’s sins,” Rachel explains. “In the wake of patricide, of incest, every one of her actions is seen as a direct consequence.”
“Even her fate to be buried alive was sewn by her father’s unwitting actions,” she pauses, eyes searching the faces across the room, gauging reactions. “And, of course, this concept isn’t unique to Greek mythology. We see it plainly in the Bible, in Exodus; the sins of your father are to be laid upon the children… these themes of ancestral curses, of the inevitability of fate – they are integral to understand when looking at our tragic heroines. We saw it with Medea, we see it with Antigone, with Iphigenia, with Electra. Electra herself said, we are bound to acquiesce—”
An interrupting knock sounds against the door. Rachel’s head swivels around, eyebrows knitted in frustration as she calls for whoever it is to come in.
The door creaks open and her expression lifts. A saccharine smile spreads across her face, shoulders loosening.
“Joel,” she says warmly. “What can I do for you?”
A shiver wracks down your spine, toes curling in your sneakers.
The broad mass of him rests in the doorway. His head peeks past the wood, just a glimpse of his curls, his glasses, visible from where you sit. Your heart thunders in your chest, palms going damp at the prospect of this being the moment you finally see him again.
He speaks a few words in her direction, too quiet to catch, and then he’s taking a step into the room. His hand grips the edge of the door, keeping it open, and he casts a glance out towards the audience. Dark brown and searching, those eyes filter through countless faces until they finally land on yours.
And for a second, he doesn’t say a word. Just gazes out at you, eyebrows pulled together in the middle of his forehead, and then—and then he fucking looks back at Rachel. Your stomach goes hollow when you see the smile on her face. She lazes against the corner of her desk, and it feels like minutes go by as the two of you stare at him. And there’s something about waiting, you think, that feels like torture. That slow, painful build-up of pressure as you sit and stare and prepare yourself to discover who he’s here for. You or her.  
You’re reminded painfully of a Graham Greene quote. A passage from The End of the Affair – one you’d, perhaps foolishly, found romantic when you read it that first time. Chosen words that had warmed your chest and made you feel light, lighter than air; the way only words could do sometimes.
‘Yes, Henry?’ and then ‘You?’ She had always called me ‘you’. ‘Is that you?’ on the telephone, ‘Can you? Will you? Do you?’ so that I imagined, like a fool, for a few minutes at a time, there was only one ‘you’ in the world and that was me.
Now, as you stare at Joel in the mouth of the doorway and memory of that passage sinks its hooks in, you feel only contempt for Greene.
For you had always read that passage imagining yourself as Sarah. And someone else, some misfortunate Maurice Bendrix, had fallen into your lap, and he was the ‘you’. But not you, never you. And it’s that pride which deceives. That pride which lulls us into false senses of security.
Joel says your name then.
Says, “Can I speak with you?” You, you, you.
And it should feel like relief, to hear your name on his lips again. But you catch the way he spares another glance, soft and sympathetic, in Rachel’s direction, and that sickly hurt isn’t abated.
Her face falls, but she smiles at you. Nods her permission for you to leave the room, and only when you’re halfway across the lecture theatre, bag swung over your shoulder, does she continue speaking to the class.
Palm flat against the door, he holds it open for you, making you press against him as you slip out of the room. It clicks shut behind you and he begins to move down the hall, leaving you to follow behind with no explanation. You assume that he’s going to lead you to his office, or anywhere more private than this, but a metre from the door Joel pauses abruptly, turns, and you slam into his chest with a huff.
“Jesus,” you mutter, stumbling a few steps back.
“Where have you been?” he glowers, brows drawn tight and angry over his eyes.
“What?”
“I’ve been busy,” you grit, glaring back. “Where have you been?”
“Busy?” he scoffs, shaking his head. “Yeah, I’ve been busy too. Busy teachin’ the classes that you don’t even show up for.”
“I’ve been sick,” you roll your eyes, unable—or perhaps just unwilling—to stray from nastiness, from spite. “My apologies, Professor.” 
“Don’t—” Joel snaps, and flinches as quickly as the word comes out of his mouth, surprised by how harsh it sounds in the air between the two of you. He takes a step closer, voice low now—“Don’t call me that.”
“Fuck, what is your problem?” you huff, eyes widening, exasperated. “I missed two classes, it’s not a big deal.”
“And the silence?” Joel takes a step forward as he says it. Close enough now to see the smudges on the lens of his glasses. Close enough to see the muscle in his jaw twitch. Too close for public; too close for here. “Can’t even text me back, huh? What the hell is goin’ on with you?”
Your body pulls taut at that, hands balling into fists at your sides.
“Oh, you don’t like silence?” you hiss, matching his volume. “You can’t be serious. Joel, I didn’t hear from you for days after New York. Why would I waste my breath when it’s obvious you don’t want to fucking hear from me?”
“It was barely two days,” he shakes his head, shakes off the insinuation, shakes off whatever blame you’re trying to put on him.
“Two days,” you nod, smirking angrily. “Two days after we spent an entire weekend together. Two days after we kissed and fucked and practically went on a date.”
And the word date must elicit something in him. Some minute, man-brain trigger that snaps him to attention and helps him understand the hurt on your face, the tremble in your hands. Because he says your name, voice softening, posture loosening, every bit of his body language screaming out that he wants to step forward and touch you.
And he’s speaking again, voice low, but there’s people coming down the hall, heading your way. Two figures that you can’t make out through the haze of Joel in your immediate vision. So when he reaches out and touches your hand you flinch, jutting your chin over his shoulder. A warning. Don’t do this here.
One of them calls your name and you pause, mouth open. Drag your eyes away from Joel’s features to watch the figures get closer.
“Pete,” you force a smile. “Hey.”
You realise quickly how it must look; your sullen expression, Joel staring down at you with his shoulders hunched. He must understand at the same moment, because he takes a quick step away, folds his hands behind his back.
“Hey,” Pete takes a step closer. He glances warily between you and Joel, confusion colouring his face. “Everything cool?”
Stony faced, Joel looks between the two of you, posture stiffening the longer he stares at Pete. So much larger than him, taller and broader and far more intimidating. But a man with a secret to keep isn’t one to jump quickly at confrontation, so he keeps his mouth shut. Let’s you do the talking.
Ian catches your eye over Pete’s shoulder and offers a sleazy sort of smile. You swallow down a glare and hold Pete’s gaze.
“Everything’s fine,” you lie, taking a step towards them. A step away from Joel. “What’s up, what are you guys doing in this building?”
Pete’s eyebrows pull together, and he cocks his head at you. “Said you needed a ride home today. This morning, remember?”
“This morning,” you repeat, nodding slowly. You raise your hand and pinch the bridge of your nose, thinking quickly, mind a mess. “I, uh… right, look, Pete, I actually forgot I have a meeting with Professor Miller about my final essay this afternoon.”
“Your final…” Pete trails off, frowning. “Isn’t that due in like a month?”
“Yeah,” you say vaguely, and do not look at Joel. “I’ll find a way home later, okay?”
“I mean, sure. I guess,” Pete agrees reluctantly, reaching up to grip the strap of his satchel. “Call me if you need me okay?”
And Joel’s face turns to stone at the insinuation in those words. The idea that Pete could give you anything he couldn’t. That anyone would need to swoop in and save you from him.
The pair of you stand in silence for a moment, eyes trained on Pete and Ian’s retreating backs as they head down the hall. You watch and watch until they turn the corner, disappearing from sight, and only then do you exhale a breath of relief.
You contemplate leaving him there. Turning your back on him and returning to Rachel’s lecture, ignoring his texts and letting this all fade into some painful memory. But when you look at him again—at those big brown eyes that gaze back at you—you know you couldn’t if you tried.  
“You look tired,” he frowns, and it’s not angry anymore. A little sad, maybe.
“I am,” you admit, and wonder if your face betrays how much of a role he plays in that exhaustion.
“Are you hungry?”
You stare for a moment, blinking slow, and then say, “Yeah.”
Joel nods, attempts a crooked smile, and says, “Let me take you to get something to eat.”
It’s silent in Joel’s car, aside from the soft patter of rain against his windows and the dull squeak of his windscreen wipers sliding it away. The truck glides through the winding streets of Biddeford, cruising down the main road and into the left lane of a fast-food drive thru. Orders you a burger, fries, nothing for himself, passing the bag into your lap and then continuing to drive.
The bun is soft beneath your fingers. Grease soaks your skin, and you taste beef, taste onions so soft, so sweet. A crimson dot of ketchup spattered onto your pants; a bright shock of mustard on your tongue. A fry here and there. Joel’s hand, outstretched fingers, sneaking across the centre console to steal one. You shift the paper bag on your lap, tilt the opening so it faces him, easier to access, but he doesn’t take another.
He grips the wheel and asks, “Do you want me to take you home?”
You think about Pete waiting for you at the house. Think about if Ian and that filthy smirk on his face and whether or not he’ll be there too. Think about having to flesh out your excuse, your lie, and finally say, “No.”
Joel keeps driving. You eat until your pants feel tight and the greasy brown bag is crumpled in your fist and he’s pulling his truck off the road and into a short driveway.  
“Full?”
“Very.”
“Good.”
“Is this your house?”
“This is it.” He drags the keys out of the ignition and knocks the door open. It’s not long, barely a second, before he’s pulling yours open with a rough yank and a soft, “Door always sticks on this side.”
A vague sound spills from the back of your throat, and he guides you up a path towards the small home. Single storey, with a large brown door and windows decorating the outward façade. Your immediate thought is that it’s very Joel, but you stop the idea in its tracks. Remind yourself that maybe it isn’t your place to think things like that.
Inside it’s even more silent, even more tense. The two of you stand in the entry way, toeing off damp shoes. Your eyes flit around his front room, but it’s difficult to focus on anything. Too much to look at, too much you want to know, and you find it easier to just look at him.  
“Realised you’d never been here,” Joel murmurs after a while. He shifts awkwardly on his feet, decidedly unsure of what to say as he rests beneath the weight of your stare. “This is the, uh, the livin’ room. Kitchen’s over there.”
When you don’t respond, he clears his throat, ticks his head towards the hallway. “Bathroom is down the hall. Bedroom too.”
You feel your face shift. Deadpan stare turns to surprise, to incredulity, to blatant anger.
“Oh, the bedroom, huh?” you smile, sardonic, cutting. Your throat feels tight. “S’that seriously why you brought me here? Ice me out and then come crawling back when you want something to fuck again?”
“Woah, hey,” his eyebrows shoot up, hands drifting forward like he’s trying to calm a startled animal.
“Don’t,” you hold up a shaking hand, eyes wide and wet suddenly. “Just… don’t touch me right now, okay? What are we doing here, Joel? Seriously.”   
He says your name hard and fast, surprised by how quickly it’s all unravelling, spilling from you in a tidal wave.
And spill it does. The words are wet and watery, a tsunami of pent up emotions pouring from your mouth without permission, without forethought.
“I mean, we haven’t seen each other since New York. And I… I thought being there changed things between us. But maybe I was wrong… and then you pull me out of a lecture, bring me here and say my bedroom is down the hall? Am I just… do you just like having someone to fuck whenever you want? Is that it? Someone at your beck and call?”
Joel repeats your name, sharper this name. “Don’t put fuckin’ words in my mouth.” His face pinches in anger, hands dropping.
“When it’s not convenient you try to shake me off, but when it is—at a bar, or out of town—” you list them off on your fingers, eyes growing wider and wider. “Oh, you want me then?”
“That ain’t fuckin’ true and you know it—”
“Do I?” you scoff.
“I came that night when you texted,” he implores, voice raising, all wild-eyed and pleading. “You were drunk, and textin’ and you needed a ride.”
“I didn’t ask you to do that—”
“You didn’t ask me not too either,” he crosses his arms across his chest. “You wanted me to come. Don’t fuckin’ deny that now.”
You open your mouth but he’s too quick, matching your spill with his own now.
“And as if you’re any better?” he bares his teeth now, voice low. “As if you didn’t find out I was your teacher and keep fuckin’ me just for the thrill of it. As if you actually wanted me, and you weren’t just gettin’ off on chasin’ some forbidden fantasy.”
“I…” you gape at him, unafraid to let the hurt show on your face. “Is that really what you think of me?”
“What the fuck am I supposed to think?” he hisses, exhaustion evident in the way he runs a hand through his curls and sags against the door. “You tellin’ me I should believe that you just want me for what I am? A fifty-year-old teacher who spends his time giving fuckin’ speeches to people that are hardly listenin’? Who goes home to an empty bed? That’s what you want?”
And it deflates you, a little. The wounded expression on his face – the devastating truth in those words, splashed across his expression so plainly for you to see. Disbelief.
“Is that such a crime?” you ask quietly. “To want you… and have it be that simple?”
“You shouldn’t,” he shakes his head. Grimaces. “You shouldn’t want me, I’m—I’m no good for you.”
You swallow. Feel tears hot and sharp behind your eyes.
“Then why do you keep letting me?”
“Jesus,” he exhales, and his hand is on the hem of your shirt, pulling you closer, closer, until you’re pressed against his chest, hands coming up to grip his shoulders and steady yourself. “Because I can’t fuckin’ quit you, alright?”
“Because I don’t just want you when it’s convenient,” his lips curl around the word, disgusted by the insinuation. “Because I think about you all the god damn time and if I can only have you some of the time then I guess I’ll take it. Because if you want some fucked up fantasy, then I’ll play my part if it means I get you, I don’t care—”
You cut him off, lips firm and searing against his. He goes still for a moment, mouth parting with a surprised exhale, warm when you press inside with your tongue. And then warmer, salty; tears on his cheeks, on yours.
“That’s not what this is,” you whimper into his mouth, desperate for him to believe it. “It was never about that, it was about you, Joel. I want you.”
He kisses you again, slow. All of the anger and hurt and frustration pools out of the both of you, spilling from your mouths and into the air. His lips mould over yours and his hands are warm on your waist, your back, holding you tight against his chest. When you sniffle, he pulls back, forehead heavy against yours, and sighs.
“I’m sorry,” he rasps, eyes closed. “I missed you, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean for—"
“Where were you?” you interrupt. “What happened in New York?”
He hesitates for a moment, nervous and calculating as he stares you down.
You wilt a little; dejected all over again. Recoil from him and quietly ask, “Why won’t you let me know you?” 
Joel’s hand hovers in the air, as if contemplating reaching for you again, but then it drops and he says, “I was with my daughter.”  
You blink.
Daughter.
Daughter?
“She lives there now,” Joel sounds a little breathless, cheeks pink as the words spill from him. “In New York, with her girlfriend. I’d planned to spend an extra day there with her, and then Nina—Nina cut her hand open at the studio and we had to go to the ER, and she had to get stitches and—” He pauses, waiting for you to jump in, to interrupt, to say anything. When you don’t, he takes a breath and continues. “And I wasn’t gonna stay any longer but Ellie was worried, and she needed me. She needed me there, and—and I’m never fuckin’ there, because she never needs me anymore. So I stayed, and I’m sorry I went silent but I was… I was takin’ care of my kid.” 
You think it might be the longest—and the fastest—you’ve ever heard him speak outside of a lecture hall.
His eyes drift to something over your shoulder and his entire body seems to sag a little. But it isn’t sad. It’s a resigned, sort of relaxed thing that happens – the corners of his mouth tilt up and he smiles weakly.
You turn, follow his eyeline until you see them.
Pictures, so many pictures, lining the walls of his home. Ones you’d paid no attention to when you first stepped inside, but can now see clearly. Bright eyes and wide toothy grins.
Some of Joel younger, leaner, smiling beside a little girl with curly hair. Some of him as you know him now; scruffy and greying, beside a different girl. This one lanky and pale and grimacing toward the camera as if she were forced into being placed in front of it.
There’s one picture of the girls beside each other, teenagers maybe, sat on either end of a seesaw. The curly-haired girl is on the upper end, grinning madly at the lens, while the other sits with her feet planted firmly on the ground, laughing up at her. Two of them. Two daughters?
“Please say somethin’.”
There’s a picture of Joel and he’s holding a tiny little bundle in his arms, and he looks so young and so fucking afraid. Dark eyes wide and teary as he gazes down at chubby cheeks, his index fingers crooked around the edge of her swaddle. A warm feeling swells in your chest and your body softens the longer you look at it. He’s a father.
Joel says your name and when you turn his face is all twisted up, and he looks the smallest you’ve ever seen him. Almost curled in on himself.
“I should’ve told you,” he nods, brown eyes darting across your face in an attempt to decipher your silence. “I know that, and I—”
“I’m an asshole,” you interrupt softly, and the tears never left but now they feel heavier on your waterline. Begging to spill over again.
“Hey,” he frowns, hand coming up to cup your cheek. His thumb swipes at the soft skin beneath your eye, begging the wetness there to disappear. “Hey, hey, no—”
“I didn’t think…” you trail off, sniffling. A sickly cocktail of embarrassment and guilt and shame swirl in the pit of your stomach and you try to swallow it down, try to send it away, but it’s persistent. “I never stopped to think that something had actually happened, that you had… I feel selfish, Joel, I’m sorr—”
“You’re not,” he hushes, fingers curling into the hair behind your ear. “You didn’t know. I should’ve told you before, and I’m sorry.”
“I thought you were staying away because of me,” you offer a watery smile. “I thought maybe you and…” You can’t bring yourself to finish the sentence. Can’t make your lips form the name Rachel.
“No,” he shakes his head, jaw tight, as if reading your mind.
“Is she okay?”
“Ellie?”
“Ellie,” you roll the name around in your mouth. His daughter.  “Yeah.”
“She’s okay,” he smiles, nodding. “They’re both fine.”
“And…” You look back at the pictures. Two. “And the other girl?”
“Sarah,” Joel says softly, pointing at wild curls and brown eyes that look just like his. And he must see the questions swirling in your brain because he speaks again. “I was twenty. My, uh, my girlfriend at the time didn’t know what to do. Didn’t wanna be a Mom, but didn’t agree with abortion, and we were so young and… well, I asked her to marry me cause it felt like the right thing to do, but she didn’t…” he shakes his head a little, a faraway look in his eye as he remembers it. “She said no. She never wanted that… so, after Sarah was born, I told her that she didn’t have to.”
“Didn’t have to?” you repeat the words, eyebrows furrowing.
“Didn’t have to stay,” he clarifies. Your lips part, surprised. “So, she didn’t, and we ain’t seen her since Sarah was a few months old.”
“Shit,” you whisper, eyes widening as the information finally starts to sink in.
“And Ellie,” he laughs then, gazing at a picture of auburn locks and shock grey eyes. “Well, that one showed up on my door some time fifteen years later. Been in ‘n’ outta foster care for years, and just started followin’ Sarah home from school one day. We did this little dance for a while; dinners and sleepovers and me slipping money into her backpack so she could buy lunch at school. And then one day she just… begged me not to make her go back to her own house. So I didn’t.”
“Wow, I…” you blink. “You adopted her? Alone?”
“I…” Joel pauses. Wets his lips, frowning as he collects his thoughts. “Alone is… I don’t think that’s the right word for it. You see Ellie was… Sarah and me, we just knew. She was family so fast. It was the only thing that made sense, you know?”
And it does, you suppose. The image isn’t hard to conjure. Joel at the dinner table with two teenagers on either side of him. Arguing over homework, over curfews, over what movie to watch. You can see the fondness in his eyes as he talks about them – the emotion laced through his words; we just knew.
“Tell me what you’re thinkin’,” Joel says, and that line between his eyebrows is back and it’s so deep that you can’t help yourself from reaching up and smoothing it over with your thumb. He catches your hand and holds it against the centre of his chest. Lets you feel the way his heart thuds heavily beneath the skin, a sturdy rhythm against your palm.
“It’s… it’s a lot to take in,” you confess, and his hand tightens over yours. “But I’m glad you told me.”
Brown eyes search yours, gaze heavy. “You sure?”
“Yeah,” you nod. “Yeah, I’m sure.”
“Okay then.” 
You flex your palm against his chest. Dig your fingers into the flesh there a little.
“Can I…” he hesitates, eyes flickering down. “Do you… Can I kiss you?” You, you, you.
Your heart beats fast, and you feel his do the same, and Joel is a father, and two daughters, and I can’t fuckin’ quit you, and you’re breathing into his mouth yes, yes you can kiss me, please kiss me.
It’s warm and it’s gentle and it feels like such a kindness to kiss him now and feel less space between the two of you. Feels like a thousand apologies and explanations slipping off his tongue and you opening your arms to him, saying I understand, saying thank you for telling me.
And when you pull him closer, wrapping an arm around the back of his neck, he meets you in kind, pressing your back against the wall. He shifts his hips between yours and shows you how much he’s missed you, and only when his hand drifts beneath the hem of your shirt do you pause.
He stills, warm breaths drifting across your mouth as he looks into your eyes.
“Talk to me.”
“I’m exhausted,” you admit shyly, twisting a finger through a frizzy lock of hair at the nape of his neck. You tug at it, not meeting his eye, and watch it bounce back into a curl when you let go. He nods and kisses you again, closed lips soft and not asking for anything, never asking for more than you want to give, before he takes your hand and leads you through his house for the first time.
He runs you a bath. Makes you sit on the edge while he lays out a towel and checks the temperature every few minutes. Only when he’s satisfied that the water is perfectly warm does he help peel the clothing from your body. He grips your hand and helps you step into the tub, lowering you down into sudsy water. And when you’re settled, he pulls a stool nearby and sits, keeping you company as you soak.   
“S’nice,” you tell him quietly, dragging a foamy sponge across your arms. “Thank you, Joel.”
The weight of before hangs over you a little, pressing down against your shoulders as you watch him. Gauge him. But he doesn’t seem angry or upset anymore. He leans over the lip of the tub. Runs his hands through the water, over the skin of your calf, your knee. Feels the coarse hairs that have grown there over the past fortnight and smiles when they scratch against his palm.
“Said you were sick?”
“Mhm.”
“What kind?”
“Just a cold,” you whisper. He squeezes your knee, palm against your patella, fingers soft in the flesh around it. “M’fine. Past it now.”
In the soapy water, his skin feels like silk against yours.
“Changin’ of the season,” he muses with a nod. “Normally gets me too.” 
And you laugh a little at that, because it’s such a fatherly thing to say and you can’t believe how naïve you’d been to not see it before. Can suddenly picture him doing this a thousand times over; resting by the bath while one of his little girls floats in the water, nose all stuffy from the flu.
At the sound of your laughter he smiles, gaze dropping to your mouth, and the skin beside his eyes pinches. Little wrinkles, so soft and so beautiful that you want to reach out and brush your fingers across them.
“You’re so beautiful,” Joel murmurs, and his voice is hushed, so low in the small bathroom.
His fingers skirt against the inside of your thigh and you splay your legs open for him, knees knocking against the sides of the tub. He glances down through the water to where you’re spread open for him to see, shameless, and smiles.
“So fuckin’ beautiful,” he repeats.
“So are you, Joel.”
“Psh,” he rolls his eyes, offering a delicate little smile. So shy, so feeble, and so desperate to believe you. A little glimpse of that wary weight, still pressing down on him as well.
“Mean it,” you insist in a whisper. You lift a hand from the water, wet thumb grazing the corner of his mouth. Feel the bristles of his moustache, the hairs on his cheek, prickling against your skin.
“Swoony type,” you say, smiling when recognition flashes in his eyes. Stroke the fresh blush on his cheeks. “Long hair, bedroom eyes, cheeks like wine.”
“Hmm,” he murmurs, turning to press a kiss against your palm. “Can’t get away with plagiarisin’ Carson in this house, baby.”
“She just said it so well.”
“She did,” he agrees. “So did Tartt.”
“Tartt?” your mind wanes, the warm water lulling you into a sleepy sort of daze. You rest heavy against the side of the bath, gazing up at him
“Beauty is terror,” he quotes tenderly, eyes bold and earnest as he holds your stare. “Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it.”
You wrap an arm around his shoulders, water droplets staining his shirt where your fingers grip the material, and pull him forward to kiss you. Joel grips the inside of your leg and kisses you until your skin prunes and wrinkles. And when he notices he laughs with you, gripping your hand to press his lips against fingertips that look like raisins. Worships the soaked skin of your fingers until you pull his face back to yours; jealous of your own hands, fearful that they might come to know his kiss better than your lips.
And when the water goes lukewarm and you don’t know what time it is anymore, he dries you off with a soft towel and offers once more to take you home. But you say no, so he smiles and kisses you again—your lips, your cheeks, your eyelids—and leads you to his bedroom.
He drags a too-big shirt over your head, helps you loop your arms into the sleeves. Dark blue and warm, so warm, against your skin.
The two of you slip beneath the covers on his bed and he drags you against his side; lets you press your cold toes against his shins without so much as a flinch.
Facing each other on your sides, those hands slink beneath the shirt, rough palms cradling your ribs, your back, holding you tight against his chest until your breathing falls in sync. And those hands don’t stray, don’t move down, they just embrace you. A carefully held apology that promises I want this, to hold you, to be with you, too.
It stays like that, nothing more, until your eyelids are heavy, and his breathing has evened out. Stays like that until your hand drops from his back to the band of his boxers, sleepy little fingers plucking at the material, trying to slip underneath.
“You should rest.”
But you whine softly; needy and insistent as your fingers press harder.
“What do you need?” Joel rasps into your neck, helping you shift them down his legs.
“Need you,” you whisper back into the darkness of his bedroom. “Wanna feel you, I—”
His mouth is soft against yours, plucking those words from your mouth and swallowing them down. He sucks your bottom lip between his, prying your mouth open so he can slip his tongue inside.
His hand in on your knee, pulling your leg up until your thigh rests heavy around his hip and you can feel the hot weight of him against your core, still slick and warm and needy from when his hand rested on the inside of your leg in the bath.
And if you’d ever subscribed to the meaning behind words like sin you suppose that once this might have counted as one. An act worthy of being sent to reside in that second circle of hell, reserved solely for those overcome by lust; left to blow back and forth in the storm of their own desire. Two people who cannot touch, should not touch, who hold their hands out to feel anyways. A touch once spiteful, once desolate and removed, now so forthcoming. A touch that says this is the only way it could have ever been. And there can be nothing sinful about it anymore. No more shame or derision behind heavy eyelids, no more you shouldn’t or I’m no good for you. Here you rest comfortably in the hurricane of that second circle, and you welcome the breeze as a comfort.
Lips against yours, Joel feeds his cock to you in slow, careful passes.
Ensures you feel every ridge, every hard line of his body. And with each gentle press inside he murmurs against your mouth. Incessant, low nonsenses of so fuckin’ beautiful and god I missed you and that’s it, baby, I know, I know. His kiss smooth as an almond, tender as a fig. Ripe and wet and tremulous as his tongue finds a home against yours, over and over.
The comforter on his bed stays pulled high, up to your shoulders, and it traps the warmth of your bodies between you.
He coaxes rough, gasping sounds from you with every shift of his hips.
Long fingers grip the back of your thigh, using his hold there to rock your body into his over and over again, slowly, making sure you feel every second of it. Slick seeps out of you around his length, smearing against the inside of your thighs and his, and he groans at the wet sounds that slip from where the two of you are connected.
Joel says your name, low and gravelly, praising every syllable. He tells you how good it feels, how perfect you are, and every word is like an undressing of the flesh. Like you’re some tender butcher, peeling back layers of his skin to let the air hit hot, red, pulsating matter, flashes of thick, porcelain bone swimming amongst it all. He keeps you close, hardly an inch of your body not touching his, and yet you can see all of him. The whole surface and everything underneath it now too. And when you say his name in return and he moans, begs you to say it again, say my name again, it’s hearts on wings, thin fire racing beneath the skin, eyes unseeing, drumming filling your ears. It’s the cold sweat on his hands that hold you shaking, that feel the way you tremble and grip tighter. It’s wanting to take those bones of his and suck them clean; lick past the gristle and taste the marrow beyond it.
It's everything and it’s nothing and it’s that silly little four-letter word that you can’t bring yourself to say, let alone think, and it doesn’t even matter because he’s here and that’s enough.
His nose rests in the hollow above your collarbone and he inhales, smothering soft kisses to skin and bone there.
He says, “You smell like me,” and when he looks up and presses his forehead against yours, he almost looks wounded by it. He stills, holds himself deep inside and just stares, and his eyes are screaming I can’t fuckin’ quit you, so you lay your thumb over the dimple on his cheek and smile. “S’my clothes, my soap…”
Your body flutters and tightens around him, and your mouths fall open in soft moans, lips slotting together again.
“You like that?” you breathe into the kiss, and he tightens his fist around the back of the shirt, pressing inward until your back is arched, and your stomach is flush against his and he’s groaning yes.
“Want you in my clothes all the fuckin’ time,” he pants, and the tip of his cock presses so deep inside that you’re gasping, mouth hanging wide open. “And when you give ‘em back I’ll wear ‘em and smell like you, and then we’ll be even.”
“Even?” you laugh a little, nipping at his bottom lip. He smiles, eyes glinting in the darkness.
“Yeah, even,” he repeats it and presses forward in a sharp thrust to emphasise his point. You don’t need to hear it again to know exactly what he means.
“Tell me you’re mine,” you whisper, and he grunts, hips shifting a little faster against yours. You feel him pulse inside of you, his stomach tightening against yours.
“M’yours,” Joel murmurs, voice like velvet and honey, so soft as he leans forward to kiss you, licking the words into your mouth. You say it back, spell it out against his teeth, his lips, his jaw. Yours, yours, yours. 
He says something else then, lips soft against your chin, and you’re so close; can feel it hot and burning in your gut, almost at tipping point.
“Hmm?”
“Baby,” Joel nips at your jaw, sharpening your senses. “Tell me you’re on the pill or somethin’.”
“I am,” you whimper honestly, and his body seems to sag against yours, hips shifting in sluggish, tired movements.
Something snaps at the base of your spine, and you tremble against him, gripping the back of his neck. Soon enough he’s shuddering into you, arms going tight around your back, trapping you against his chest as his cock pumps inside your core. And it’s warm and wet and sticky and his seed drools out of you, down to your asshole, smearing against the inside of your thighs, his sheets. Your legs wrap around his waist, holding him to you, keeping him there as long as you possibly can. Riding out your highs, and then the trembling, stuttering aftershocks in each other’s arms. He pants into your mouth and all either of you can say is mine or yours, until the words mix together and become a meaningless blur of sound murmured between locked lips.
It could be minutes or an entire hour before you manage to separate from each other. All eager little kisses and whines as his soft cock slips from your hold, thick spend seeping out of you in his absence. And you just want to sleep, want to curl up in his arms and never leave, but you slink off to the bathroom first. Wet your face and drop down on his toilet. Urinate and feel his come drip out of you. And where once, with someone else, you might have cringed at the feeling, you only feel warmth; calm.
In the bright lighting of his bathroom, you can see yourself reflected in the mirror above his sink. Hair a wild mess, cheeks and lips swollen with warmth. This woman in the mirror stares back at you and she has bright eyes. She smiles at you, and you feel your lips peel back, teeth on show just like hers. You stare at her and think god, she looks happy. When you wipe between your thighs and stand, she does too. And with your finger on the light switch, a wet handtowel clutched in your other palm, you give her one last look before turning out the light, feeling lighter than you have in weeks.
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Thursday.
Joel sleeps on his stomach. At least, that’s how he ends up overnight.
Face buried deep in a pillow, one leg slung outside of the covers, with a heavy arm out to the side. When you wake, at first, you’re careful not to move. Not to breathe too heavily, not to cough or jostle him awake. He looks so peaceful like this. Heavy breaths puffing from chapped pouty lips, forehead smooth and devoid of the stress and exhaustion that often lines his face. A large hand rests close to you. Despite you drifting a part in the night, the body heat getting too much for you both, his fingers remain outstretched in your direction. The tips just grazing the skin of your stomach as you lie on your side and watch him.
A low murmur escapes from his mouth, face twitching a little, and then he’s relaxing again, humming in his sleep. You smile, and let your eyes wander.
There’s a pile of books on his bedside table, reading glasses dropped haphazardly atop them.
An Idiot’s Guide to Space, one of the weathered spines reads. Interesting.
A framed painting rests above a set of drawers on the side of his room. A vast landscape with a herd of horses galloping across it. Gorgeous hides of orange and brown and black splashed across green grass and blue sky. And on the back of his door… hangs a cowboy hat.
You move slowly, careful not to wake him as you rise and tip toe across the room. Coming to rest directly in front of the closed door, you slip it off the hook and admire it. You don’t even hear his breathing change as he wakes up.
Dark brown with a curved brim; the felt is soft beneath your fingers. The image of Joel wearing it, perhaps often, while living in Texas flits through your mind and you can’t help but smile. And then warm hands are on your hips, arms snaking around your waist to pull you back into a warm chest.
You gasp in quiet surprise, but your smile only broadens when Joel rests his chin on your shoulder, peering down at the hat in your hands.
“Mornin’,” he murmurs, voice gruff and deeper than usual. A pang of arousal swims in your core at the sound of it, but you ignore that, turning in his grasp.
“Good morning, cowboy.”
Joel groans, sleepy eyes drifting closed as he hugs you to his chest, swaying the two of you from side to side.
“Wanted to lie in,” he grumbles. “S’too early for this.”
“For what?” you blink in mock confusion, holding the hat against your chest.
“For you to see that.” He moves quick, tugging it from your grasp.
“Hey—” You gasp, wide eyed and ready to steal it back. But before you can Joel just lifts it onto his head with a heavy sigh. “Oh.”
“Oh?” he repeats, eyes narrowing.
Warmth simmers in your stomach and you smirk, stepping back to give him a quick once over.
“I could get used to this.”
“Jesus,” he rolls his eyes, moving to take it off but you grip his hand, shaking your head fiercely.
“Not so fast,” you coo. “I want the whole experience.”
“And what exactly is the whole experience?”
“You know—” You shimmy your hips a little. Imitate twirling a lasso in the air, wiggling your eyebrows. “Show me some tricks.”
Joel laughs at you, and you can see the desire in him to say no, to refute it, but the longer you stare him down, the more it cracks and fizzles away.  
“Go on, cowboy,” you try out your best Texan drawl, falling down to sit on the edge of his bed.  
He adjusts his legs, elbows bending as he waves two finger guns in your direction. You suck your lips into your mouth, swallowing down a laugh as he makes a small pchew pchew noise out the side of his mouth.
“Oh,” you smirk. “Is that all you got?”
“I’ll have you know,” Joel huffs, pretending to holster one of his guns. Hip cocked now, still dressed in nothing but his sleep shirt and boxers; he stares you down. “I’m startin’ to think this town ain’t big enough for the both of us.”
And that gets you. A sharp, barking laughs slips from your mouth, and Joel grins in return, the skin beside his eyes creasing as he adjusts the Stetson over his curls.
As your giggles calm, he just shakes his head, still smiling, and murmurs fondly, “Dadgum, you got a good laugh.”
Your face warms beneath his stare, and you just shake your head, bottom lip snagged between your teeth. Moving quick, Joel pinches the brim of the hat and places it onto your head. It’s a little big, and the brim falls down, obscuring your eyesight before he adjusts it for you. Then he takes a step back, hands on hips.
“How do I look?” You bat your eyelashes up at him, smiling shyly.
“I don’t know,” he fakes an air of contemplation, giving you a long look up and down. “Think you might be all hat ‘n’ no cattle.”
“Hey,” you pout. “I’d make a great cowboy; just need a pair of chaps.”
“Well, you can wear the hat and the chaps all you like,” Joel murmurs, gaze heavy. “But you ain’t a cowboy ‘til you prove you can ride like one.”
Your thighs tense and you arch an eyebrow, trying to remain nonchalant.
“Is that right?”
“S’right.”
“Mm,” you hum. You lick your bottom lip and watch the way his gaze darkens, eyes trained on the movement. “Gonna let me show you what I got?”
And so you end up back in bed, straddling Joel while he smirks up at you, long fingers twisting around the hem of your t-shirt. But when you slip a finger inside the hem of his boxers, the movement so reminiscent of last night, he laughs a little and gives you a look that says, really?
You pout, confused. “I thought you wante—”
“Uh uh,” Joel shakes his head. “Not what I meant.”
“Then what?”
“Get up here.” He lifts his chin upward.
Your eyes widen, stomach tensing a little.
Desire warms the inside of your thighs, and you murmur, “You want that?”
“Do I wa—?” he cuts himself off, eyes darkening a shade. “I said, get up here.”
Heart racing, you shimmy up his chest until your knees are planted on the mattress on either side of his shoulders. He smiles, encouraging, and you grip the hem of his shirt, prepared to pull it over your head, but he stops you.
“No,” he exhales, hand quickly gripping yours. “Leave it on for me.” And then he leans in and presses a kiss to the inside of your thigh, and you can only nod, holding your breath as you wait for him to reach where you want his mouth the most.
Face tucked in the cradle of your hips, Joel sighs your name. A rough exhalation, nose pressed into your skin. And it feels a little silly at first – your face is warm as you stare down at him, the wide brim of the cowboy hat tilting forward.
But then, breath hot and heavy against you, he mouths at the crease where your hip meets your thigh. Slow, drawn-out kisses that have your legs tensing over him, his hands slip beneath the shirt, tracing light patterns into the skin over your spine, all the way up to your shoulders. He keeps going until you’re shivering, a wet trembling mess in his hands, hips twitching forward with every touch of his mouth to your skin until he finally glides his tongue through your folds.
Your breathing hitches as he pants against you, chest vibrating with low sounds as he licks thick stripes up the entire length of your pussy. Eyes closed, he tastes all of you; tongue slipping over every piece of exposed skin that the position grants him. And with every broad stroke of his tongue, he dips inside your weeping hole and finishes with a gentle flick against your clit. So soft and so slow, building you up over and over until finally you break and begin rocking your hips into his face.  
Joel grunts at first, a little surprised maybe, but in a second his hands are dropping to grip your thighs, locking you in place against his face.
At first, he guides you. Helps you find a rhythm that works, that feels good. Flattens his tongue and uses his grip to rock you back and forth over his face, groaning as you roll your clit against him, huffing and panting quiet little pleas. But soon enough your fingers are carding through his hair, holding him tight against you as you grind down into his mouth. Sharpening his tongue, he dips it inside of you and then drags upward, pulling your clit into his mouth and sucking gently.
You gasp, vision going hazy as you try to keep your eyes on him, try to watch, but it’s too good. He knows exactly what you like, and it all moves far too quickly for your liking. You can already feel your hips winding faster and harder against him, breaths falling shorter, everything in your stomach pulling tight and hot.
Joel can tell – he can always fucking tell – and one of his hands drifts over your ass, fingers slipping between your thighs from behind until his middle finger is circling your entrance.
“Fuck,” you inhale sharply, jaw going slack as he prods at your cunt, tongue lapping lazily over your clit all the while. “Please, your fingers, yeah, ohhh—”
A long finger sinks inside and you moan, head falling back.
“You like that?” he murmurs, pulling back to graze his teeth along the inside of your thigh. A second finger presses inside, and he curls them against that soft spot, fucking you slow and steady until you acquiesce, whimpering yesyesyesfucksogood towards the ceiling.
“Good girl,” he hums, slick tongue finding its way back to your clit.
He eats at you so lovingly. So generous as he lathes firm circles around your nerves, only ever pausing to suck you into his mouth again or press wet, open-mouthed kisses against the entirety of your cunt. Nose buried in the short curls over your mound, he doesn’t let up until your moans turn high pitched; strained little whimpers of his name falling from your lips as you press down harder and harder.
“Oh fuck,” you cry, hips rocking back and forth, faster now. He breathes you in, jaw shifting from side to side, matching the intensity of your movements with sharp flicks of his tongue. And when you fall apart, shoulders sagging forward, he moans, taking and taking and taking every last drop of what you have to offer.
And what an image it must be – you, wearing a Stetson, riding Joel Miller’s face. You almost wish you’d filmed it, for posterity’s sake.
He presses a small kiss to one swollen lip of your pussy, and then the other, before his head is falling back into the pillows and he’s smiling up at you.
The lower half of his face shines, lips and facial hair slick with your come, and you can’t help but grin back, a tired snort of laughter slipping from your mouth.
“How’d I do?” You grip the brim of the hat, tipping it down at him.
Joel smirks, hands squeezing your thighs, helping to shift you up and onto the side of the bed so he can sit up.
“I’d say you more than proved yourself,” he hums, leaning in to steal a kiss. You sigh, whining against his warm wet mouth, and reach a hand down to press it against his abdomen. Shifting lower, you trail your fingers over where his cock strains against his boxers, but Joel just tuts, pulling away and slipping off the bed.  
“Hey,” you huff, gripping his shirt and trying to pull him back down, but he just shakes his head, laughing, and drags you to your feet.
“Gonna be late,” he tells you, squeezing your hips and pressing a kiss to your temple. “And you needa eat.”
Late. You’d almost forgotten that you had a lecture this morning. Joel’s lecture.
He turns, rifling in the chest of drawers, pulling out clothes, a pair of socks, while you stand behind him and watch, knees still shaking, with a fucking cowboy hat on your head. After a moment he turns, stares, and a rough laugh hits the air. Shaking his head, Joel grips the brim and tosses the hat back up on its hook before pointing towards the ensuite, telling you to shower.
“You coming?” you ask, and he just shakes his head, tugging on socks before padding towards the hallway.
“Cowboys don’t shower, baby,” he flashes a smile over his shoulder at you and winks. “They just dust off.” 
When you make your way out of the shower, Joel is in the kitchen. Ironed black trousers and a neat white shirt cover his frame, and from across the room you admire him. That strong back, the pert rounded muscles of his ass. Fuck.
He manages to over scramble the eggs and burn the bacon because he can’t stop looking over his shoulder at where you rest at his dining table. Head resting heavy in your palm, you smile back at him. And when he puts a plate of food in front of you, you don’t have a single complaint.
The two of you eat fast, plucking little pieces of eggshell out as you go, smiling and laughing shyly as your feet tangle beneath the table. He watches you; makes sure you clear your plate before he takes it to the sink, murmuring something about how he won’t make you sit through me talkin’ for hours on an empty stomach. Says he’s pretty sure that counts as torture somewhere, baby.
And when he turns, dirty dishes forgotten in the sink, you’re staring at him, heart on your sleeve, and he must see it in your eyes. You know that it has to be clear as day; that forbidden four-letter word blazing across your forehead in bold letters.
Joel clocks your gaze and moves to hover over where you sit, wordlessly cupping your face in two broad palms and slotting his mouth over yours. And as he licks into your mouth, tasting the remnants of eggs and bacon and every unsaid word, you start to believe that maybe confessing wouldn’t be so bad. That maybe forbidden is a word you’ve prescribed to this feeling all on your own – that he might just be feeling the exact same way.
But he pulls back, presses two more quick pecks to your mouth and tells you to get ready, says he’ll drive the two of you to school, and the moment slips from your grasp.  
Back in his car, you feel relieved to replace the memory of yesterday with this one. Windows down, the air is cool and calm against your skin as he drives you through town, sated, dopey smiles across both of your faces.
A Bob Dylan song drifts from the speakers and Joel sings along under his breath.
“We’ll meet again someday on the avenue. Tangled up in blue.” Voice low and breathy, left hand on the wheel, right hand on your thigh. You nod along to the lyrics, your fingers tracing the veins and tendons on the back of his hand all the way until he pulls over.
“Shouldn’t be seen walkin’ in together.”
“Yeah,” you agree, understanding. “Best not.”  
The truck idles on the side of the road, somewhere inconspicuous down the street from campus, and you slip out his passenger door. Close it with a thud and peer in at him through the open window, eyes devouring every part of his face as if you won’t be seeing him within the hour, stood up in front of the room giving a lecture.
The truck peels away from the curb, Tangled Up In Blue still whining from those speakers, and Joel sends a quick wink out the window at you, his face a blur as he drives off. And you just smile, chest warm despite the cool Spring air on your face, walking along in the same direction – because you know exactly what that wink means. And you love it.
Our little secret.
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a/n refs:
in Dante’s Inferno he said that those overcome with lust were doomed to the second circle of hell, wherein they would be buffeted back and forth by the terrible winds of a violent storm, without rest. slay.
the bacchae tr. by anne carson [read if you have mummy issues, a massive ego, or just like the idea of frolicking in the woods for a while...]
the secret history by donna tartt [read if you like unreliable narrators, strange professors and stranger students, and the nursery rhyme 'the farmer in the dell']
the end of the affair by graham greene [read if you like weird intense guys and angst and infidelity]
eros the bittersweet by anne carson [read if you're cool as fuck]
thank you for reading! x
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javarium · 4 months
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whipped cream apology | r. sukuna
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fights are uncommon between you and your fiancé, but there are times they do happen. you know you’ll never hear a verbal apology come from him, but you know he’s sorry; Sukuna’s apologies always come in the form of gifts, food, or acts of service. this time is no different :3
w — modern au, chef! sukuna (he owns and works in his own restaurant but that’s not elaborated on), itsy bitsy sprinkles of angst bc of a mentioned fight, fluff, this is super duper short haha, food and food descriptions bc I am a woman who loves her food so sue me :3 this is just a random lil fic I wrote in like a day so i won’t be surprised if this flops lmao
[ divider credit to @/inklore ]
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You don’t know how you go to sleep angry, but you do.
Last night had been awful. Maybe you’d blown everything a little out of proportion, maybe not. Your energy hadn’t been so great coming through the front door of your home. You’d just been stalked by a couple of guys that wouldn’t stop leering at you, and to top that off you had an old woman at the register of the store get ugly with you. All you wanted was the nice dinner you know would be awaiting you and to not be bothered for awhile after that.
Problem was, was that Sukuna was also in a bad mood. Someone at the kitchen of his restaurant had put him in a super bad mood by not following orders, and a food critic was to be coming by in a few days. And when you mixed his bad mood with yours, it led to you two going to bed on bad terms.
But now, you’re not even sure that Sukuna had come to bed.
Did that idiot sleep on the couch?
Just as you’re about to get out of bed, you see a note on the nightstand with your name on it. You grab it, unfold it and read: ‘Stay in bed and text me when you’re awake.’
Your sleepy brain goes blank for a moment, but you oblige your fiancé’s request anyway, texting him that you’re awake with a pink heart afterward, hoping he still wasn’t upset with you.
Sukuna’s answer is almost immediate.
Give me a few more minutes and I’ll be upstairs.
But you do need to pee really really bad. You make your bathroom trip as quick as possible and hop back in the bed, miraculously just as Sukuna comes through the door with a large tray of what you smell to be food.
“Morning, baby,” he greets you.
You can see the solemn look on his face, one of upset. He’s still bothered about last night.
“Morning, ‘kuna,” you reply, smiling at him. It seems to partially work, the corner of his mouth quirking up.
You flatten out the blanket as he sets the tray over your legs. Your eyes can’t help but blown open so wide in shock and excitement that you accidentally make them hurt. To your expression and blinking eyes, Sukuna chuckles.
“An apology, for my shitty behavior last night.”
There are several plates of food on the large tray. Perfectly cooked eggs, bacon, sausage; all of your favorite comfort foods all sit before you.
But right in the center is a heaping pile of one inch-thick, fluffy pancakes the size of your head, four stacked atop of another. Butter runs down underneath the sweet maple syrup. Neatly placed around the edges of the plate are bananas and strawberries. And on the very top is a generous pile of whipped cream in a fancy swirl.
You grin at his meticulousness of making such a wonderful plate that’s only just going to get messy.
“Sukuna—”
He scowls. “Don’t even bother me with apologizing back. I don’t wanna hear it. I’m the asshole. You did nothing wrong.”
Love swells in your heart and soul for the man you’re soon to marry. God, you love him.
“You’re sure?”
He tsks. “Positive.”
You smile brightly. “I love you.”
His cheeks and ears go pink. “Just eat.”
“Cheeseball,” you call him, cutting into the pancakes. “But don’t mind if I do.”
“If you can’t eat all of that, I’ll eat the rest.”
“Fuck off, it’s mine.”
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taglist: (no longer adding)
@vagabond-umlaut | @poe-daydreams | @heresan @thedovahqueen | @lotus-n-l0ve | @chiyoso | @miraclecherryblossomsblog | @unbreakableblueheaven | @marscatbutler | @vanillabloo | @wo-ming-bai | @visionsofmagic | @tohsri | @yuujispinkhair | @lilacliliess | @bub-ss
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jinkicake · 1 year
Text
~ ♡ Dear Lover ♡ ~ 
a tiny peek into your relationship
(( Day #3 )) Diluc, Kaeya, Tighnari, Xiao x Reader
A/N: all i know abt this is that when i wrote it i desperately wanted fluff.... as you all know im not good at writing it but here is my attempt.... i love love love these four T T why am i soooo obsessed w fluff rn i dont knowwwww
WC - 2,839
~~~
. . .
Diluc R. treasures his intimate time with you. 
The man has always enjoyed a quiet atmosphere, it brings him comfort that is akin to a warm blanket. Whenever he is in your presence, basking in the hushed ambiance of the winery, he feels the most at peace. 
For a second, Diluc lets his eyes leave the book in one of his hands in search of something more intriguing. His hard eyes stare at you while his fingers continue their light strokes against your calf, your legs currently draped over his lap. You’re reading your own book and biting on the inside of your cheek at whatever is happening within the novel. Diluc can’t tear his eyes away. 
There’s something about the way the afternoon sun is hitting your face and painting your body with a gorgeous golden hue, one so bright that Diluc thinks he needs to soon look away. He can’t, he’s always been selfish with you. His eyes find the subtle rise and fall of your chest and watch as you quietly breathe in and out, he’s certain he’s addicted to you. 
“How much longer are you going to stare at me?” Your lips quirked up as you continue to stare at your novel, you don’t even have to look at Diluc to tell that he is staring. Almost instantly, his eyes dart to a random spot in the room as if that will erase his piercing gaze. “You’re distracting me, my love,” 
Diluc’s breath almost hitches in his throat, he knows how much you despise being interrupted while reading. He almost starts to feel ashamed but then you close your book shut. 
“Good thing I need a distraction, I’m bored with this, it’s a shame.” You face him with a pout, a deep expression that Diluc just wants to kiss off and his fingers twitch at the opportunity to touch you. All he can do is wordlessly watch as you get up and shuffle your position on the couch. Now, your head is in his lap as you play with the ends of his long hair. 
Diluc’s book from earlier is now long gone. 
“(Y/N),” Diluc murmurs quietly as his gloved hand traces your jaw, his thumb rubbing your chin lightly. There’s something that shifts in his features, almost darkening, as you tilt your head back with a smile. Your throat, bare for him, has always been something of a weak spot for Diluc. 
He ignores the teasing glint in your eyes in favor of tracing one finger down the front of your neck. Before he knows it, his entire hand rests across the span of skin, his thumb now on one side of your throat with his other fingers resting on the opposite side. 
“How was work today?” You hum and Diluc starts to find it incredibly difficult to focus, he doesn’t understand how on earth you are managing to keep a decent conversation with him right now while his restraint is slipping through his fingers. 
“Work,” Diluc repeats, his low voice dragging the mumble out as he starts to gently squeeze his gloved hand around your throat. 
“You know, the thing that you do every day? What did you do today?” Your teasing is getting the better of him, not that he would ever admit to it. 
“What did I do today?” His words trail off as he lowers his face. Before he can stop himself, his lips find a home against your own without a second thought. 
. . .
No matter who he talks to, Kaeya A. always saves his gossip for you.
“That’s why Hertha left him.”
The time that you spend gossiping with Kaeya is time well spent, time that you deeply cherish. You can’t help but hang on to his every word, practically in his lap as you eat out of the palm of his hand. It’s a simple exchange really, priceless gossip for some sweet company. This time around, it’s Kaeya’s revelation that makes your jaw drop, and, despite his sultry voice, the rumors he shares are all you can focus on. 
“You’re kidding,” Gasps leave your lips as he continues to spill exactly what he knows and who told him. 
If only everyone loved hearing petty rumors and took them as if they came from the morning newspaper. Sadly, it can’t be the same for everyone. 
Diluc feels his eye twitch at the two familiar voices, hushed whispers that stand out amongst his crowded bar. He doesn’t even have to look over to see you and Kaeya with your bodies pressed incredibly close to one another. You’re nearly seating in his lap. The owner makes an exception, of course, because he’d do anything for his family. Family being you, not Kaeya. Diluc tries his best to stay on your good side, he’d hate for his brother’s partner to hate him. 
“Well, I heard from Donna that Hertha was the one who cheated-”
But if Diluc has to listen to the two of you gossip any longer, he might just rip his fiery hair out. Day in and day out, almost every night the two of you come here and talk for hours until he has to kick you both out. 
“Aren’t you a little busy bee? Did you find this out before coming here?” Kaeya softly coos into your ear, grinning at the embarrassed flush washing over you as you lean into his side. You place your chin in your hand as you lean over the bar, trying to wave down either Charles or Diluc for another drink. 
“If you want to hear my next story, you’re going to have to finish that,” You point at Kaeya’s drink, almost as if you’re offended by its presence. Your husband is pacing himself too much for your liking and you don’t want to be the only one off your ass.
Diluc notices Kaeya’s full glass too as he slowly pours you another, the owner isn’t a fool. He knows his brother better than anyone and knows that Kaeya is a gentleman through and through. You don’t often drink heavily when you spend time with either of them but, when you do, Kaeya is sure to keep his drinks lighter than usual. It is a show of affection that warms the redhead’s heart, not that he would ever admit it. Especially not to you and your loud mouth. 
You look so far gone that Diluc immediately scratches the idea of giving you another round. 
“Diluccc,” Your whine makes the older man sigh as he pulls back the wine bottle from your grasp. Despite your efforts to reach over and grab the liquid gold, you fail because of a certain someone. Someone with strong hands who tightly grip your waist to keep you from falling over and despite their cold touch, you start to feel incredibly hot. “Kaeya!” You’re drunk as shit.
“You’re cut off.” Diluc takes away both glasses of alcohol before moving on to another pair that is sitting at his bar. He ignores you despite all your cries. 
“No, but Diluc, you have to listen to this!”
. . .
Tighnari is an early riser and thoroughly enjoys getting you up in the mornings. 
This habit of his is not by choice but, is instead something that he can’t avoid. Every morning he wakes up just before the sun rises and stares at his ceiling before any existential dread kicks in. Even when he doesn’t need to be awake for patrol or for anything of importance, the man cannot sleep. 
Every morning, Tighnari gets a few seconds of peace before his entire body starts to ache. When his heart starts to feel a little too heavy, he simply rolls onto his side and looks at you. 
You’re always buried under the blanket, tugging on the material that is laid neatly across his lap. Each morning your face is pushed up against the many pillows you have so generously decorated his bed with and, Tighnari’s favorite aspect of your sleeping form, there’s always a little bit of drool spilling past the corner of your lips.
He lifts his bare hand to wipe away at your mouth, gently thumbing over the spot before catching it with his thumb. It’s cute how your nose twitches at the slightest touch, Tighnari almost coos. Once he finishes staring at you and tracing your features until his heart is content, the forest watcher will force himself to get up. 
His morning routine is very simple, get clean and ready for the day. Since Tighnari is the earlier riser of the two of you, he always does the favor of making breakfast. When he has the time, he’ll force you to eat a ka’ak or two before handing you your coffee. He’s not a fan of the smell but, he’ll do anything to see the excitement in your eyes upon the sight of your favorite mug in his hand. 
Tighnari doesn’t shy away from the fact that he adores you. Why would he?
Almost like a ritual, Tighnari fills up your cup with hot water, mixing in the coffee powder, before sprinkling in a natural enhancer. It makes the drink sweeter and easier to drink in his opinion. 
But sometimes, the sweetness gives him a toothache. He simply prefers not to drink it at all but that never stops him from bringing it back to your shared bed. 
With a light hand, he places the mug on your side table before sitting on the edge of the bed. Tighnari places his touch against your lower back before softly pressing his fingers into your skin. It wakes you up just enough that you start to squirm but, you are not fully awake yet. The smell of the coffee will inevitably wake you up, it always does. 
“(Y/N),” Tighnari and his soft voice call out to you like a light in a pitch-dark space. You instantly shift out of your slumber. “wake up.”
You swat at him with a groan and refuse to open your eyes. Every morning, it’s a battle with you. 
“Wake up.” Tighnari tries again and this time, it is firmer. You blink the sleep out of your eyes and force yourself to sit up in one go. Almost instantly, your facial expression morphs into one of a frown and Tighnari matches your glare. He’s not going to let you get off easy. “Come on,”
He gently tugs on your wrist and tries to help you up, to shake any lingering effects of sleep that still have a hold over you. You ultimately ignore him and choose to instead place a gentle kiss on his shoulder. 
Oh, how Tighnari loves his mornings with you. 
. . .
Xiao cherishes his shared evenings outdoors with you. For as long as he has known you, the yaksha has enjoyed being by your side and always finds comfort in your presence.
Today, the karmic debt that looms over him like an angry cloud doesn’t feel as demanding because of you. Sometimes when you touch him, it’s as if the pressure is gone and Xiao can finally breathe. But then, he has to protect Liyue all over again. 
And he’ll continue to give his life to it in order to keep you and the various others in his area safe. 
So incredibly safe that you can walk around at night with no worries, you’ve always admired the stars. 
“Are you ready?” You’re holding your hand out to him, a loose jacket hanging around your shoulders due to the night breeze. Xiao blinks and hesitantly places his hand in your own before you proceed to drag him around Dihua marsh. “Isn’t it nice out?” 
In his thin attire, Xiao wordlessly nods. The weather never matters much to him, he doesn’t feel too cold or too hot but, sometimes he gets uncomfortable. 
Right now, the air is perfect. The yaksha can admit it to himself and he almost closes his eyes to focus on the feeling. Whisps of wind fly past his ears and the feeling is too freeing, the burden on his shoulders feels lighter because of it. 
Under the delicate touch of your hand, the duty almost feels nonexistent. 
“What do you think?” 
Xiao almost forgets that you had been talking. You were explaining some situation about your coworker, how you think that she has a secret partner and refuses to tell you. Regardless of whether or not he was listening, Xiao has no idea what to say.
“Think?” He repeats and you can’t help the way that you start to laugh. You squeeze his hand (and by association, the strings of his heart) as you almost start to double over due to your laughter. Maybe it’s the clueless look on his face or the slight furrow of his brows that has you so amused. 
“You’re cute,” You gently wrap your arms around his bicep and press the muscle against your chest, both of your hands wrap around his own as you cuddle into his side. The new display of affection is nothing new, you always touch Xiao openly like this but, that doesn’t mean the yaksha is entirely used to it. Xiao nearly trips over his own two feet when he feels your cheek press into his arm. “well, do you think Yuhua has a boyfriend? You always know everything,”
Xiao bites on his own tongue to stop himself from admitting that he does not, in fact, know everything. Far from it but, he hates to let you down. In truth, he hasn’t been paying attention to the waitress closely. He has no idea what’s going on with her or her love life. 
“I’m not sure.” Slowly, he answers you as if he is gauging your reaction. To his surprise, you inevitably sigh before bringing your eyes up to the night sky. 
“That’s okay,” You comment and Xiao wants to ask if you really mean it. “I’ll let you know as soon as I find out. It will be soon!” He’s sure of it, with your determination, nothing stands in your way. The longer he stares at you and your soft features, the more Xiao feels something inside of him stir.
Under the bright light of the moon high in the sky, Xiao finds himself squeezing your hand back. 
. . .
2023/02/05 ♡
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hoeforhao · 8 months
Text
Chipmunk Cheeks 🍥🧁🍡🍧|| Joshua Oneshot ||
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ꔫ pairing: husband!joshua × wife!reader
ꔫ summary: your arranged husband takes care of you in your period pain.
ꔫ genre: pure fluff,mentions of blood and pain, reader sort of has body dysmorphia
ꔫ series: svt as boyfriends
ꔫ author's note: walking into the traffic if i don't find myself a joshua hong cuz am dying from period cramps atm!!
Masterlist
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Marriage was never on your book of life and wouldn't ever be your cup of ale. Did your parents know this since the very beginning? Yes! Yet they absolutely went out of their capacity to defy your choices and arrange your betrothal to none other than the Hong Joshua.
Mrs Hong was your mother's colleague, more specifically her best gossip buddy. They were literally known as the gadgets of their office. And when both the women saw that their little ones are getting old with no potential chance of finding their partners by themselves, they settled upon the dreaded agreement.
All your pleas about not wanting to get married to someone you have barely had three to four conversations with, someone whose entire personality, preferences literally everything was unknown to you, were completely left unheard by your parents. Apparently they wanted their daughter to have a "secured future". Literal BULLSHIT.
The most terrifying day of your life was just two weeks ago and here you lay whimpering in pain on the bed of someone you've barely spoken to or looked at since the wedding.
"What a nice time for you to pay your visit, you bastard" you internally curse at your periods.
Yes you're basically dying from period cramps. You didn't know where the nearby medical shop was around here neither did you've the energy to go downstairs and get yourself a hot pack. You were quite literally awaiting your death from organ crumbling pain in your ''husband's room". Too dramatic for just period cramps? Yes! But why react to anything normally when you've the option to absolutely lose your mind over it.
You were so damn lost in your nonsense rantings to the walls of your room, that you failed to register joshua being back from work already.
Finding the house engulfed in absolute silence made his nerves falter for a moment. Usually it would either be filled with loud tv noises of you watching cinnamoroll on the couch or clanking of the utensils as you baked yourself another new dessert recipe.
He quickly throws his coat over the armrest and hops towards your room with those little bunny legs of his ; only to find you completely curled up like a boba ball under the blankets as small painful moans echoed through the walls.
"Y/n, w-what's wrong?" you jolt up from your little coocon as Joshua's warm hands grazes against your forehead.
"Are you okay? You don't seem to have a fever. Did you've a bad day? Did anyone make you cry? Are you missing your parents? If so let's go to their place right now" he grabs your arm gently to pull you out of the bed.
"Would you let me answer or just assume things by yourself Josh!" you unwrap your hands from his while literally burning holes into his face.
"Y-yeah sorry. I was just wo- umm worried." his face hangs low from embarrassment or maybe even a bit of hurt? Not being able to understand what's bothering his wife.
"It's okay. I was j-just having really bad p-period cramps" your face now starts turning crimson, not because talking about periods with a man makes you uncomfortable but because it was h-him...your 'arranged husband'.
"Oh my god Y/n why didn't you call me!!!! I would've run back home from office immediately and brought you treats. Did you eat anything? Where is your hotbag!! Goddamn girl why aren't you taking care of yourself" you wonder if joshua participated in speed talking competitions earlier judging his ability to blurt out sentences without a single pause.
"Calm down Mr Bunny Teeth!!! It's nothing special. I've these every month. The pain will ease out gradually." you nod at him trying to reassure the man that you're infact, not dying.
"No no no way you can talk this so lightly!!! What if you burst from the pain huh! I can't clean up a bloody mess. Hell No" Joshua's last remarks ends up earning him a hard smack from you, making both you chuckle lightly. Dang your husband was even more dramatic than you!
"No seriously tho, you need to take care and pamper yourself during these days. Wait I'll get you some treats" he stands up from the end of your bed to leave towards the kitchen when your arms grabs his from the back.
"I-i don't e-eat sweets or rather I umm can't" your face droops low trying to fight the stray tear making its way onto your lap.
Joshua turns towards you in a swish and bends down to the floor, not caring about bruising his knees on the cold marble; both of his palms reaching to cup your cheeks.
"Why y/n?" a two word sentence was enough to make you break down into a crying mess.
"I - i was a-always told that I'm f-fat and s-so i stopped e-eating my favorite food w-which was s-sweets" you were talking like a five year old, words mixed up with your sobbing and face stained with snot and tears at the same time.
Joshua's firm hands gently grazed over your face as he wiped the mess off of it with his satin white shirt, while the other refused to leave your cheeks.
"You will eat as many sweets as you want love, as you buckets of ice cream you wanna feast on. And I'll be sitting right here infront of you so that each time you think about stopping yourself because of what the world thinks, your face will be planted with a kiss." you've turned completely red by the choice of his last word, the pain in your belly now mixed with a tingling sensation.
"You are perfect the way you're y/n! I can't even imagine a single milligram of you leaving this world. Like omg just think what a great loss will this universe face then!!! I want to see you eat to your heart's content, enjoy each and every meal. Do you even know how bright that smile of your glares when you munch on your food like a happy raccoon, cheeks stuffed up like a smol little chipmunk."
"S-shua you-"
"Sshh! No more words love. Sit here 'til I bring all the food from downstairs and then we'll sit together and watch sanrio, okay chipmunk?" Joshua's slender fingers draw against your lips, sending a flutter of butterflies all over your bones.
Sitting on the bed like an obedient wife you wait for him to arrange a literal feast of sweet treats infront of you, alongside tucking you into the duvet with the hot bag on your belly, making a literal cinnamon roll out of you ; wrapping his arms around your shoulders as your head now rests on his, taking in the sweet scent of his lilac cologne as you two draw yourselves into solace while watching tv together.
"Marriage isn't that scary afterall"
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simplyholl · 1 year
Text
New Year’s Eve
Summary: You have been in a situationship with Loki for a while, but he refuses to kiss you. 
Pairing: Avenger Loki x F Avenger Reader
Warnings: Smut. 18+ ONLY. Minors DNI. Orgasm denial. A little angst, but it has a happy ending. 
W/C: 2.3K
See my Masterlist here
I reluctantly pull Loki’s satin green sheets off me. We only have ten minutes before our weekly meeting. Loki is getting dressed. I stay in bed, not wanting to leave the warmth. I wish these meetings didn’t start so early, especially when we have been up all night. Round three quickly turned into round four, then our alarm woke us from our short slumber.
“Loki, why do you never kiss me?” I didn’t mean for the one question that haunts me to slip out. It must be my lack of sleep. He laces his boots slowly weaving the strings before answering. “If I’m not mistaken, I spent a large portion of the night kissing you.” He lifts an eyebrow smirking at me. “You know that’s not what I meant. Every time we hook up, you avoid it.”
“It’s not you. I never kiss the women I sleep with.” The question had been on my mind for some time. Loki was more than willing to do many, many things in bed, but I never even got a peck on the lips. We have a good thing right now, so I don’t want to make him uncomfortable and ruin it. We have been in a situationship for a while now.
We sleep together a few times a week to let off some steam from all the training and missions. The other days we are free to do whatever and whoever we want. It might be a little unconventional, but it works for us. We always give each other a heads up if we will be taking someone else home. Loki has been known to get jealous. If I have a guy over, the next time I’m with Loki, I won’t be able to walk right for a week.
I’m a glutton for punishment, so sometimes I will invite someone over to watch movies and insinuate more happened. My reward- I mean punishment- makes putting up with all these lame guys worth it. Tonight is our holiday party. Tony always throws a huge banger the week before Christmas to celebrate. Loki has already informed me that he will be taking the bleach blonde woman grinding all over him home tonight.
I’ve already searched the party for any potential men to bring home with me, but I come up short. I’ll just spend the night drinking with Natasha. She leans in lowering her voice so no one else will hear her. “Did you hear who Thor hooked up with last week?” I shake my head no, curious to learn the latest gossip. She knows everything about everyone. “That girl that works in the lab. You know, short hair and the longest legs you’ve ever seen?” “Oh yeah, she is so cute!” I take a sip of my drink looking around the party. “She has been obsessed with him. Tony told me she’s shown up at Thor’s room every night trying to sleep with him again, but he just wanted a one-night thing. Poor girl, those Asgardians must be something else in bed. Right Y/N, you would know?”
I stopped paying attention to her story. I’m too distracted by Loki. His hands fondle the blonde woman’s ass while she suggestively dances against him. He leans down, pressing his lips to hers. His hands tangle in her hair. It’s not a small kiss, there is some major saliva swapping happening. They continue groping each other and making out for what feels like an eternity. When they finally pull apart, I try not to look. But I’m drawn to them like a magnet.
Loki notices me staring. He doesn’t even look remorseful. He just grabs her face and goes in for more. Why am I so upset? We are just having fun, no strings. So why do I feel so jealous? Why won’t he kiss me like that?
I decide it’s not a good idea to bring it up. I’ve seen him with two other women since then, so he’s probably forgotten all about the kiss. I brought a guy home that I had every intention of sleeping with. But he talked about how hot Natasha is the whole time. He even asked me for her number. So, I made him leave. Loki saw him, so tonight should be fun for me.
Loki arrives promptly at ten, just like we agreed on. His lust filled eyes drink me in. I am wearing a silky forest green robe with gold trimming, nothing underneath. “Bed now.” He growls. “Take that robe off. You are unfit to wear my colors after you had that pathetic excuse for a man in here. Did he touch you?” I quickly remove my robe revealing my naked body to him.
“Do not make me ask again, pet.” His voice is low making me needy for him. I lay on the bed watching as he rids himself of his clothes. “Yes, I let him touch me.” I lie. Loki’s eyes darken as he climbs on the bed with me. He smiles wickedly as my arms are suddenly tied to my bed post. I pull on the silk ties magically holding me in place.
“You will not come until I give my permission. Do you understand?” I nod in agreement, but it’s not enough for him. “Use your words.” “Yes, I understand.” He kisses roughly down the curve of my neck. Sharp teeth scrape against my sensitive skin. He palms my breasts, lowering his head, he takes a pebbled nipple between his lips. I arch underneath him, wishing the restraints were gone. He tugs my other nipple roughly between his fingers. He licks and sucks his way down between my legs. My thighs are spread revealing all of me to him.
He bites my thigh hard. I cry out, while he lavishes gentle kisses to the wound. I can see his teeth marks on the reddened skin. I whimper. He’s usually not so cruel in the bedroom. He licks a stripe up my center. I squirm under his touch. His brutal actions are turning me on, more than I’d like to admit. His tongue explores me, swirling against my slick folds.
He inserts two fingers hooking upward. Soft lips close around my bundle of nerves. He suckles me while his fingers continue their vicious assault. “Loki, I’m so clo… can I c..” Before I can fall off the precipice, he removes himself from me. I whine his name. He lines himself up with my center, entering me swiftly. I moan loudly trying to reach for him, momentarily forgetting my tied hands.
“You let him touch what is mine.” He thrusts aggressively. “Mine. You forget who you belong to. Who this body belongs to.” I’m so close already. He reaches between us. His skilled fingers find my clit. “Tell me who owns you. Say you are mine.” I almost explode from his words alone. He can be possessive, but this is new, angry. “I’m yours, Loki. Only yours. I’m so close. Please let me come.” He removes his fingers from me, gripping my thigh. He thrusts harder. “No.” His rejection rings in my ears. It stings, he’s never refused to let me come before. “So good. Always perfect. Mine.” He murmurs against my neck as he spills inside me.
He pulls out, waving his hand releasing me from the ties. He rubs my arms in the places where I was restrained, placing gentle kisses to each wrist. He pulls me in his lap. I lay my head against his broad chest listening to his heart beat. I sigh loudly letting him hear my frustration. “Fret not, little one. I will allow your pleasure next time.” My eyes meet his. He is so handsome like this, flushed cheeks and wild hair. My gaze travels to his lips. How unfair that I will never feel them against my own.
Loki’s thumb grazes my bottom lip. His eyes flicker from his thumb on my lips to my eyes. I lean into him, but he pulls away. “I can’t. I am sorry.” I climb out of his lap, no longer wanting to be near him. I pull the sheet up covering myself. I feel exposed, used. He must feel the tension between us now. He stands up, grabbing his clothes. He dresses quickly. “I’ll take my leave now. Goodnight.” As soon as the door shuts, I throw all the blankets over me. I can’t help the tears spilling. My feelings are hurt. I was rejected, denied an orgasm, and I’ve realized I’m in love with him.
It's Avengers Game Night which usually includes playing board games until everyone is drunk. Then the activities quickly turn into Would You Rather and Truth or Dare. Those are always my favorites and there have been a few times the results have led to a hookup or three. Tonight is no different. Tony answers Natasha’s question inquiring how many people he’s slept with.
Loki chooses dare. Wanda places a finger to her chin, humming. “I dare you to kiss Y/N.” Laughter and oohs erupt amongst the group. My heart is going to beat out of my chest. I know she’s only trying to be a good friend and help me out. But I wish she wouldn’t. It’s no secret that Loki and I sleep together sometimes, but Wanda and Natasha are the only ones who know about his aversion to kissing me.
I look at Loki expectantly. He doesn’t move at all. “I will not.” he says defiantly, crossing his arms across his chest. Everyone is staring at me. I smile weakly pretending his words didn’t slice my heart in two. “Come on, Loki. You’ve bed her before. What is another kiss between you?” Thor defends me. Loki rolls his eyes at him. “Mind yourself, brother. I said no.”
I’m thinking of running out of this room, out of Avengers tower. I have to leave before I die of embarrassment. I rub my sweaty hands on my jeans, looking around for my phone before I take off. “If you won’t kiss her, I will.” Steve smiles sweetly at me. I know he is just being noble, saving the damsel in distress. He walks toward me, taking my hand in his. I stand up to face him. He places my stray hair behind my ear. His fingers rub my cheek while he leans in. He is a better kisser than I expected. His hands grab my waist pulling me closer as he deepens the kiss. “Okay Cap, that’s enough. We don’t want to see you humping her leg.” Tony jokes. I give Steve a quick hug and whisper thank you.
Natasha gets my attention pointing to thew hallway where Loki is stomping away from everyone. I run after him. “Hey Loki, wait up.” He doesn’t turn around. “Loki?” he continues walking. I follow him to his room. “I know you can hear me. What is wrong with you?” He finally acknowledges me. “Nothing is wrong with me. What’s the matter with you? The captain? That is who you want now?” He opens his door, strutting in with the intent to slam it in my face. I push my way through and enter his room.
“Are you seriously mad that Steve kissed me? This is ridiculous. You won’t kiss me! And I have tried. Your whole thing about ‘I never kiss women I sleep with’ is such shit. I saw you making out with that woman a few weeks ago. Everyone did! You were tongue fucking her face in front of everybody, but you won’t give me a quick kiss in private! You just turned me down in front of the whole team.
Do you know how embarrassing that was for me? Steve stepped up to help me out, and you’re mad at me? You have absolutely no right to be angry. I can’t do this anymore. I’m tired of it being okay for you to enjoy the company of others, but if I do, you’re insanely jealous. I’m sick of constantly wondering what is wrong with me. What is so bad, that you don’t want to kiss me?” “I have nothing to say to you.” Loki looks down at his feet. I gawk at him in disbelief. I can’t leave fast enough. I make sure to slam the door behind me.
It's New Year’s Eve, exactly four days since my fight with Loki. I’m at another party, wishing I would’ve stayed home. It’s almost midnight, all the couples are standing close waiting for the ball to drop. I decide I need to leave. I weave my way through the crowd when I bump into Loki. “Y/N, I was looking for you.” “Save it, Loki I don’t want to hear it. I’m still so mad at you. You could have given me a quick peck on the lips the other night. I wouldn’t have tried to make it more. You really hurt my feelings.” I try to push past him, but he grabs my wrist keeping me in place.
“That is precisely the problem. I would have wanted more. I always want more with you. You honestly think I don’t want to kiss you? It’s all I think about, you frustrating woman. I chose not to kiss you while I sleep with you because I thought it would be easier to not fall in love. I was wrong. I have fought it for so long. I have been trying to make you jealous, but you don’t seem to mind. Seeing you with Rogers struck a nerve. It made me realize I love you. It’s always been you.”
Big hands cradle my face. All around us, people are counting down ‘Three Two One Happy New Year!’ He tilts my chin up. His lips melt against mine. Hungry in a way I’ve never known, he deepens the kiss. His tongue explores my mouth, tangling with mine. He sucks my bottom lip before pulling away. “I love you too, Loki. You should have told me sooner.” His smile reaches his eyes. “Better late than never, darling.”
Tags
@fictive-sl0th @lokisgoodgirl @lokidbadguy @ozymdias @potter-puff007 @cakesandtom @cake-writes @eleniblue @trojanaurora @marygoddessofmischief @coldnique @lemonadygirl @chantsdemarins
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bartxnhood · 2 years
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3am | e.m
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| eli (hawk) moskowitz x reader
warnings: s4 spoilers lol, uh crying ? that’s abt it. angst & fluff !
summary: its late and eli had to see you. he felt so lost, but once he was able to hug you he finally felt like he was at home.
authors note: hi babes ! i’m so sorry for being away. my mental health has been at an all time low recently. i plan to slowly get back in the groove of writhing again. but ! this is my first cobra kai blurb. i decided to post something short and see how well it does. (plus i just love eli w my whole heart). enjoy !! feedback is appreciated ! 🤍
(requests open)
Copyright © 2022 bartxnhood. All rights reserved. This original work is not allowed to be reposted on any platform in any format.
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the constant tapping on your window was bound to wake you up, it was getting repetitive and annoying. with a quiet huff, you turned your phone on to check the time.
3:20 am
you ripped your blankets off your legs and walked to your window where the tapping continued. you opened the window carefully, then spotted eli. this wasn’t uncommon but he never came this late in the night. he stood there staring back at you with puffy eyes, which you hadn’t seen from him in a long time.
“eli? it’s three in the morning” you rubbed your eyes, still trying to wake up to make sense of the situation. “i know, can i come in?” his voice was quiet, just loud enough for you to make out what he said. you nodded, standing to the side allowing him in.
“what’s going on? you look disturbed.” you closed the window behind him, keeping all the cool air inside. he had sat on the edge of your bed, fidgeting with his fingers. “i can't sleep. tried everything” he shrugged your question off, avoiding confrontation. he averted his gaze, refusing to look at you. anything but you. “you can't lie to me. i’ve known you for years.” you took a few steps closer to him, “what’s really going on?” you hummed, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder.
he looked down contemplating his choice of words or if he should just rip the hoodie off. hesitantly, eli brought his hand up and removed the hood covering what once was his famous mohawk.
instantly you removed your hand from his shoulder to your mouth. a quiet gasp escaped your lips. “eli..my god” you whispered. “when…who..” you hesitated, putting your hand on his shoulder again.
“robby..” his voice breaking as he answered. you were quick to bend down and wrap your arms around him, which is exactly what he wanted. you.
“i’m so sorry.” you hummed softly, placing a gentle kiss on the top of his head. eli could feel tears threatening to fall, he hadn’t been this vulnerable in a very long time. way before he had met you. but now, he never felt more lost. “i just don’t know what to do. or who i am.the mohawk kept the attention away from my scar.” he sniffles, which caused you to pull away and bring a hand to his chin bring his face to meet yours. “eli. you’re eli, you’re hawk. you are the boy i fell in love with. a hairstyle doesn’t define you.” he nodded, wrapping his arms around you again. “just promise you won’t leave me?” he murmured, pressing his head against your stomach.
hearing that only made your heart shatter. “eli..i could never.” you replied. “nothing is gonna happen to us. i promise.” your chin rested on his head, rubbing his back. “can i stay with you tonight? i don’t want to be alone.”
you took a quick glance at the clock, it was now nearing four am. “my parents are out of town for the week. so it’ll be okay. ” he nodded, “if you don’t mind.” you shook your head, finally
“everything will be okay, eli. i promise.” you smiled, reassuring him. “it’ll work out, i’ll be in your corner no matter what.” now, eli was feeling better now that he was holding you. you made all of his worries fade away in an instant. “thank you, y/n. i can always count on you” he shared, pressing a kiss on your temple and drawing circles on your back.
it didn’t take long for the both of you to pass out cold. it had always been the two of you and it will always be the two of you. no matter what obstacles life throws at you.
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a/n: another little focus on dad drei! no worries, we’re moving on to some smut and the early years of the relationship with the next few fics lol. hahah i literally did not think this would be done today but work was quiet so i got to write and post and be the superstitious bitch that i am. so here we go, posting right before i watch the isles/caps game (on tv this time). i love love love the headcanon prompts and i will 100% be getting to all of them at some point, so be on the lookout 🥰
word count: 2.3k
tw: nothing really, a little innuendo
summary: andrei took care of all four kids while you were out and you come home to delightful chaos
“Hey, Nykki, I’m at the door, I have to go,” you wedge your phone in between your shoulder and cheek and juggle your bags. “I hope D’s awake because my boobs are ready to explode.”
Your friend laughs on the other end of the line, “oh my god, better get inside then. I’ll talk to you later about coordinating the kids for game day this week.”
“Perfect! I know I said I wasn’t going to, but I’ll probably bring D along, like it’s just easier to strap him to my chest and go,” you shrug as you push the front door open. “Fourth kid problems, just have to come along everywhere. Thank god he sleeps anywhere.”
Nykki wishes her own youngest would sleep anywhere and says good-bye, promising to text later about the plans. You slide your phone into the back pocket of your jeans and step inside the house, immediately hit with the soundtrack to The Little Mermaid. The movie is blaring, echoing around the house. You set your bags on the floor and kick off your sneakers and pad into the den, the source of the movie’s noise.
The movie’s playing on the big screen TV, Ariel singing about wanting to be where the people are, and your husband and kids are sitting on the floor in the middle of the room. You giggle, muffling the noise behind your hand, when you get a good look at Andrei and the kids. The girls are in full princess regalia - Evie as Sleeping Beauty, Alina as Belle, and Kira as Rapunzel - the costume dresses swishing around as they move. Andrei has two pairs of fairy wings strapped to his back, the elastic armholes stretched to their limits. Dimitri is in his arms, draped face down over one of Andrei’s forearms, his little cheek squished to the side against the crook of Andrei’s elbow. You can see that the three-month-old is awake, watching his crazy big sisters dance around.
“Looks like I missed quite the party,” you tease, drawing four pairs of eyes to you. Andrei grins and you can’t stop the laughter that escapes when you see the smears of kid make-up all over his face. There are butterfly clips in his hair, holding back the overgrown strands in a haphazard style.
“Mommy!” Three little voices combine into one as they rush you, hugging at your legs.
“Hi, my little loves,” you lift Kira onto your hip and kiss the two older girls on top of their heads. “Did you have fun with Daddy?”
“Daddy’s pretty,” Kira chips, smiling widely. Andrei laughs, adjusting Dimitri in his arms.
You smile a crinkle-eyed smile at Kira and agree, “Daddy’s really pretty.”
Evie pipes up, “he came to the salon today and got the works!” You smother a laugh because where did she even hear that?
“He needs to look pretty because he’s got a date tonight,” Alina chimes in and you lift an eyebrow at your husband and kids.
“Oh, a big date, huh?” You tease. “She must be someone special, for you to go to the salon for the works.”
Andrei nods, the glittery eyeshadow smeared across the top half of his face catching the light, “the most special. She’s the love of my life.”
Your stomach flutters with butterflies, still affected by this man after all these years. Just when you think you can’t love him more, you come home to this sight, Andrei with your babies surrounding him and being the best dad in the world. Tears well up in your eyes and you wonder if the postpartum hormones are still wreaking havoc. You wipe at your eyes with the side of your index finger and grin. “Well,” you pause, still emotional, “I think she’s just going to love what your stylists have done.”
“Mommy,” Evie whispers, looking at you like she feels bad that you’re so dumb, “Daddy’s date is you!”
“Oh!” You fake gasp, making Kira giggle. “Really? You guys got Daddy all fancied up for me?”
Alina cracks up, dancing around the couch cushions that have somehow ended up on the floor. “Daddy says that he’s takin’ you to dinner tonight and me an’ Evie said we needed to make him pretty ‘cause you get pretty before dinner. I did his yipstick!”
You love the way she mispronounces words and have basically forbidden anyone from correcting her. “I love his yipstick,” you tell her seriously. The hot pink smudged all around his lips is probably going to stain his face and beard, but he puckers his lips at you, making kissing noises.
“Tell Mommy that she should kiss me,” Andrei says. “I’ll share the yipstick with her.”
Alina’s mispronunciation in his accent makes you laugh and the girls tug at your hands, chanting “kiss Daddy! Kiss Daddy!” Unable to resist your kids and the prospect of an Andrei kiss, you lean down, holding Kira with one arm and cupping Andrei’s cheek with the other hand so you can kiss him chastely. One of his hands reaches out to curl around your thigh, squeezing gently. He laughs when you pull back, “hot pink is your color.”
“Mommy’s pretty now!” Kira giggles, patting your cheek. You press a smacking kiss to her cheek, blowing a little raspberry and she shrieks with laughter. There’s a hot pink smudge on her cheek now too.
Andrei looks between you and Kira and his eyes twinkle with mischief. “I think that Ev and Alya need some yipstick too,” he says and reaches out with his free hand to pull Evie in close. He kisses her cheeks and forehead, making her laugh, and getting kiss marks on her skin.
You do the same to Alina, who struggles and fights like she’s fighting for her life. Her laughter is the only sign that she’s enjoying the kiss attack. “No, Mommy! No more kisses!” She wiggles away from you, grinning her little gap-toothed smile. You love that little smile.
Dimitri babbles in Andrei’s arms and you feel bad because you had almost forgotten about him while you were teasing Andrei - that seems to be a negative of being the fourth kid. But now that he’s made his presence known, your overly-full boobs ache a little and you remember exactly what you needed to do when you came inside, before you were distracted by Andrei’s makeover. You settle Kira on the couch and she immediately slides off to run after her big sisters where they’re performing a little show in front of the TV, giving you and Andrei a minute to breathe.
“Give me my baby,” you say. Andrei hands him over and gets to his feet, shaking out the arm that Dimitri had been resting on. He struggles to get his arms out of the fairy wings, getting tangled in the two pairs for a second before finally freeing himself. He folds them carefully and sets the costume pieces on the couch. You cuddle the baby close and shift him to one arm so you can pull down the neck of your shoulder and pop one boob out of the top of your bra. Once Dimitri is comfortably latched, you head for the kitchen, needing just a little privacy because the girls are way too honest with what they see around the house. You’re not really looking for a commentary on your pancake boobs right now.
“Feeling a little more steady?” Andrei asks quietly, kissing the top of your head when you sit down on one of the counter stools. He moves around the kitchen easily, making you a turkey and cheese sandwich as you talk.
“Mhm,” you hum, watching him move. After an overwhelming few days with Andrei on the road, he’d noticed that you were short-tempered this morning and ushered you out the door, reassuring you that he would handle the kids for a few hours while you did whatever you wanted. “I needed to get out of the house without eight little hands attached to me.” You chuckle a little, but the sensation of being touched out is definitely a real thing.
“Good,” he says, licking the mustard off the butter knife when he’s done with it. You hate that habit of his - one day he’s going to slice his tongue off and then where will you both be? “You look calmer.”
You shrug a bit. “Looks like you had everything handled,” you say and it’s not even a tease, because the house has definitely looked worse when it’s just you and the kids.
Andrei sets the sandwich in front of you and you take a huge bite, starving. “I ran them around outside for a bit,” he says. “The play set got a lot of use and Alina tried to swing herself to the moon. Dimka was getting cranky out in the cold though, so we came inside, had some lunch. The girls wanted to watch a movie and Evie wanted me to paint her nails. Which turned into this,” he grins, gesturing vaguely at his face and hair with one hand.
“I really like that,” you reply, waving your free hand in front of his face in the same vague gesture. “And what’s that I heard about taking Mommy on a date, Mister Svechnikov?”
His eyes twinkle dangerously and he leans forward, palms flat on the counter, veins in his forearms bulging. The glittery makeup and hair clips really should ruin the image, but only add to his appeal. “Daddy,” his voice deepens and grows raspy, “wants to take care of Mommy and show her how much he appreciates everything she does for the family.”
Your thighs clench together instinctively, a rush of warmth filling your body. Your cheeks heat up and you chew on your lower lip. “I like the sound of that,” you whisper, casting a glance over your shoulder at the girls. They’re totally absorbed in the movie, little mouths hanging open and eyes wide and focused.
Andrei smirks at you, cradling your jaw in one hand and titling your chin up so he can lean down and kiss you. His tongue swipes over your bottom lip and your mouth falls open for him. His thumb and index finger tighten around your chin gently and you squirm in your seat, letting out a soft gasp. Dimitri stabs at your chest with those sharp baby fingernails and you yelp, pulling back. “Ow,” you grumble, squinting down at the baby. It’s not like he was getting squished in between the two of you.
“Spoilsport,” Andrei jokes, brushing the tip of his finger over the slope of the baby’s nose. Dimitri wrinkles his nose and his mouth falls off your breast with a little pop. “Whoops,” Andrei winces and you quickly shuffle around, switching him to the other boob before he can start to cry.
“Crisis averted,” you sigh at the relief of the baby eating. Your breasts already feel less achy. “So, where are we going on this date?”
Andrei helps you get your other breast back in your bra, taking an extra few seconds to fondle you, your sensitive nipples reacting to the touch of his fingers. “I thought the new Greek place downtown,” he says.
“That sounds like a fantastic plan,” you grin, already thinking of how delicious the food is going to be. A thought occurs to you. “Who’s watching the kids?”
“Marty and Nykki,” Andrei replies, a smug smile frown on your face when he sees the implication dawn on your face.
“You had this planned? Nykki didn’t say anything when I was talking to her earlier!” You laugh at the surprise. “They’re going to watch our four and their two?”
Andrei nods. “I asked them two days ago and they’re happy to chip in. Half the kids should be asleep by the time they get here anyway,” he leans in to kiss you sweetly. “I told you, solnyshka, I want to show you how much I appreciate the sacrifice you make during the season. A little planning ahead is nothing.”
“Drei,” your voice catches on emotion, “you’re the best husband. Honestly, what did I do to deserve you?”
“You’re just you,” he replies simply. “My best friend, love of my life, mother to the best kids in the world.”
“Stop it,” you cry, waving a hand at him. “I just stopped feeling like I’m going to cry at everything. Don’t be so sweet to me.”
He laughs and grabs your hand out of the air, squeezing your hand gently before kissing the tips of your fingers. “Would it help if I said I wanted to get you pregnant again soon?” His smile is cheeky and you know he’s not entirely joking.
You scoff, wiping at the last of your tears. “Yes, that does help, you lunatic neanderthal,” you deadpan.
“I’m not kidding,” he says. “I think the boys are outnumbered here, Dimka needs a brother.” He traces the tip of his index finger over the lines on your palm.
It is something you’ve wondered about, but not really discussed, whether Andrei would want to give your son a little brother. It’s not an entirely terrible thought. The Svechnikov Brothers, 2.0. Splitting time watching hockey in two different cities in another eighteen years. Following in Dad and Uncle Geno’s footsteps.
You shake your head. Nope, that has to be the baby hormones talking.
“Let’s see just how good dinner is and then we’ll talk,” you say faintly. Dimitri grumbles in your arms, done eating and ready to be burped. Andrei takes him while you fix yourself up and he knows exactly what he’s doing - displaying extreme paternal expertise and looking downright edible with the tiny baby in his arms. Damn him.
“Mommy! Alina said a bad word!”
“I did not! All I said was stupid head! That’s not a bad word! Evie’s a bad word!”
You look at Andrei with a raised eyebrow. “You want to add a fifth kid to this?”
“Why not?” He grins back, showing off his stupid dimple. “We make cute kids.”
“Alina,” you call back, shaking your head at Andrei and trying to tamp down a smile, “stupid head is not a nice word and it’s especially not nice to call your sisters stupid.”
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lavender-romancer · 1 year
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Crosses on my body
Part Four Tommy Shelby x Reader AN: new character inspired by Father Hughes but not him
You were a nun in Dublin but when you decided to take action against those in powerful positions in the church you had to escape. When you turn up in Birmingham and begin a relationship with Tommy Shelby will he be able to protect you from your past?
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”*°•.˜”*°•. ˜”*°•. ˜”*°••°*”˜.•°*”˜.•°*”˜.•°*”˜
previous chapter
"They found me, they've fucking found me," you said quietly to Tommy as he sat at the bar talking to you.
"What?" He raised an eyebrow and you handed him the unopened letter. "You haven't opened it?"
"I can't do it." You fidgeted with your fingers.
"You do that a lot…when you're anxious." Tommy observed and you rolled your eyes before twitching your leg as he opened it. "Shit," Tommy said under his breath and your eyes shot up.
"What? What the fuck is it?" You hissed, your eyes wide as Tommy pulled out a letter and a card, the ace of spades. "Is that supposed to mean something to me?"
"In the war when we had gained ground and there wasn't as much of a threat overground we would put this card on the bodies of dead Germans. As a way to…" he looked like he was struggling to form his words.
"Why? For what reason?" You said quietly, leaning over the bar before realising it was still sticky and recoiling.
"It was to make fun of their deaths. The ace of spades is the death card." He looked from the card to you before placing it down and opening the letter.
"So they're making fun of my theoretical death?"
"I don't know if it's so theoretical to them," he turned the letter around and all it said was "The wrath of God is coming".
"Those fucking bastards." Your eyes began to water and you ran into the back room, sinking down to the floor against a wall and sobbing.
Thank god the pub was loud enough to not hear it. The sobbing felt like your whole body was slowly dying, your chest couldn't breath, your head couldn't think, limbs unable to do anything aside from hugging yourself in some notion of comforting yourself but it wouldn't work.
"Y/n," you turned your head with terror and saw Tommy. "It's just me,"
"I-I can't w-where do I go!" You stuttered and he knelt down in front of you.
"You'll be with me. What can the church do against the Shelby's?" He smiled at you and placed his hands on your shoulders.
"I mean… I have n-no fucking clue about your family a-aside from fucking w-whispers," you tried to smile but you couldn't see through the tears.
"You're going home, come on." He went to pull you up but you began crying harder, shaking your head insistently.
"They know where I live!" You exclaimed in fear.
"Don't worry. We'll go there, you pack some things and then you can stay with me." Tommy helped you up to your feet and your legs began to shake.
"But you're not involved," you hung your head but he put a hand under your chin gently and lifted up your head.
"Well I am now. And I intend it to stay like that." He leaned forward and kissed your cheek before pulling you closer to his body.
You wrapped your arms around him and felt his comforting weight around you, feeling so overwhelmed the pressure from his arms seemed to somewhat calm you down. Your breath was hitching every so often but the longer he held you the longer you could hold deep breaths.
"Permit me to help you," Tommy whispered and you pulled away slightly to look up at him and nod.
"Tommy we need to talk," Polly walked into his office and shut the door.
"What's this referring to?" He asked, leaning forward on his chair.
"People are talking," she paused. "About the nun."
"Ex-nun." Tommy interjected and Polly groaned.
"For once just shut the fuck up, Thomas!" She exclaimed. "They're talking about what she's done and I've heard even more whispers in church. I'm not bothered but some people are sounding more malicious than others. Is she protected?"
"She's staying at the house, so yes." Tommy scratched his head and Polly rolled her eyes.
"So that's your real concern then, getting her into bed?" She asked.
"No, I feel…I don't know what it is but we haven't even had sex but I want to be around her all the time," Tommy sighed. "I know it could all go fucking wrong but what she knows, what she's done was for reasons you'd stand by."
"I hope she's worth it, Thomas. We're too vulnerable to lose someone else in all this Russian business." Polly sat down in front of his desk in the armchair.
"I know what I'm doing, Pol." Tommy tried to reassure her. In reality he wasn't sure if he was doing the right thing.
After Grace died Tommy wanted to swear off all marriages and all close relationships with anyone but you, he just couldn't leave your understanding as just being colleagues. He couldn't see you and not want to talk to you, tell you his darkest thoughts and exist with you for as long as the world would allow.
"Do you think it's safe to be here?" You asked Tommy as you sat on the pews and he nodded.
"I have people outside and I'm here. Considering I'd be collateral if you stay with me you're more likely to be safe. I doubt the Catholic church would want to piss us off." Tommy smirked and you nodded, still anxious.
"It's just the power they have globally. That's what scares me the most, they know what I have, what I know. People who left before didn't even take anything incriminating with them and they were chased down." You rested your elbows on your knees and hunched over, head bowed in defeat.
"They won't hurt you," Tommy reassured you.
"You and God can only protect me for so long and the Lord won't even show himself to me. I desperately need to go to confession but I can't, it would incriminate me." You groaned and closed your eyes, only opening them when Tommy started rubbing his hand on your back.
"I won't let them hurt you, regardless of what God decides. I can't fear something I don't believe in." He whispered.
"I'm surprised you'd belittle him whilst in here," you paused "Do you still believe yourself to be the Devil?"
"An incarnation of the devil perhaps," he raised an eyebrow and you smirked.
"I would be punished for my relationship with you if you were. I don't believe there is only evil in you, there can't be." You sat back up and looked at Tommy.
"What I believe, is nothing. But I like listening to you talk about it," he stared into your eyes and down to your lips that seemed to part as soon as his gaze wandered to them.
"How do you travel through life with no belief?" You asked.
"I believe religion is a foolish answer to increasingly foolish questions." His hand moved up to your hair.
"But what if you die? What will happen to you?" You furrowed your brow.
"I choose to live." He whispered before pulling you into a passionate kiss that carried all the tension that had built up over the past month.
His other hand gripped your waist and you moaned into the kiss, wrapping your arms around his neck and moving closer to him before you were on top of him. Tommy's hands rested on your backside and yours running along his shoulders before going to unbutton his shirt.
"Not here," Tommy whispered and you laughed.
"So now is when you find religion?" You asked.
"No, I know that you'll hate me eventually for doing this here." He pulled you towards him and touched your breast which made you close your eyes and bite the inside of your cheek.
"You're a fucking tease," you whispered close to his ear and he shook his head.
"You're the fucking tease. I miss being in a fucking room with you. The hold you have on me should be outlawed." You straightened your back and he pushed a hair away from your face.
"Are you regretting praying with the fucking nun?" You asked with a raised eyebrow and Tommy shook his head once again.
"I don't experience much peace or rest in this life, but I think I will in the next if I'm with you " his hand went behind your neck and pulled you close to him, wrapping his arms around you in the safest embrace you'd ever felt. Not to last long.
"So this is what you've been up to since you left us?" A voice called and your eyes shot up, you knew that voice.
"Father Fagan," your voice was so quiet as you stood up and Tommy followed, standing in front of you.
"Multiple cardinal sins and now lust to add to that list, not how we raised you was it?" He walked to the last line of pews a few meters in front of you both.
"Edward Fagan. Is it?" Tommy asked, putting a cigarette in his mouth, you looked up at him, perplexed.
"What of it g*psy scum?" He growled.
"How's your molestation case coming along these days?" Tommy lit his cigarette and Fagan sat down on the pews.
"The case was dropped, you cunt." His voice was filled with such malice.
"I've spoken to some of the mothers of those children. Appears it didn't impact your reputation but then, that could change with a crown court case against you." Tommy looked at him with dead eyes you hadn't seen before but it made you feel safer to be on the right side of them.
"You speak as if you have any power. A little drug and alcohol business won't survive you through the decade. We have politicians the police and-"
"And your faithful followers, yes. But what do you have here?" Tommy asked, there was a long pause in the conversation.
"Difficult little creatures aren't they?" He paused, smiling creepily. "Children are such a blessing for the church. You've got a boy yourself haven't you?"
"Leave him out of this ple-" you started.
"Shut it you mongrel fucking whore." Fagan spat out.
"The mongrel and the whore, eh?" Tommy said to you with a raised eyebrow and you hit his arm.
"Now I don't know why you would defend this slut Mr Shelby but, I can promise you we can make your life very difficult by ignoring the advice I'm going to give you," Fagan stood up and pulled out a cigarette for himself whilst Tommy stood strong.
"And what's that, heavenly father?" Tommy mocked.
"If you choose to save this corrupted soul before you, we can make you life very fucking difficult." He was still approaching the two of you slowly.
"The Lord will protect me, and Thomas can protect himself," you scowled at Fagan and he began laughing.
"You fucking- I'm wasting my breath. Give me what I want or we will blow up every single one of your establishments one by one or maybe all together." Fagan breathed smoke in your direction.
"And what are your demands?" Tommy asked.
"The whore and the papers." He looked you up and down. "There are some uses she could still have in the convent, even just as an example of what allowing the devil into your life can do "
"Right. So who and what army will be attacking me?" Tommy questioned.
"You don't need to fucking know," he growled as Tommy breathed out smoke before continuing.
"I heard it's the economic league or is it Section D?" Tommy pondered, this seemed to catch Fagan off guard a little.
"And you think that information makes you special do ya?" Fagan tutted. "Trust a fucking tinker to get bad intel."
"When do you demand, your demands that won't be met, be met by?" Tommy asked.
"Friday," he spread his legs out into a stronger base.
"Fuck off now," Tommy said and Fagan laughed in a hollow way.
"You should fuck off and leave me with that creature," Fagan licked his bottom lip and looked at your chest, it make you want to crawl outside of your body.
"Well unless you want a bullet in your fucking skull and a few others scattered around your body. Fuck. Off." Tommy announced.
"We'll be in touch, Mr Shelby. Don't you worry about that." Fagan looked him in the eyes before turning and leaving slowly.
next part Peaky blinders taglist: @queenofkings1212 @severewobblerlightdragon @cl5369 @fairypitou @stressedandbandobessed7771 @shadow-of-wonder @hipsternoionlylikeunicorns @curled-hair-red-lips @lucystivinsky1315 Series taglist: @juicyj28 @alessioayla @fmo166
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neverinadream · 1 year
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Y O U C A L M M E D O W N
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Summary: If you truly knew how stressful it would be to write a dissertation, you'd have never gone to university in the first place, but you have your safety net waiting to catch you if you fall off the path.
Pairing: Christian Pulisic x Fem!Reader
Requested: Yes
Song Inspo: Sleepy - Ashley Kutcher
Warnings: some angst, some fluff, childhood friends, talks of stress and the possibility of dropping out, not proofread
Notes: so the dissertation topic discussed in this is actually my own dissertation, it's boring, i know, but i personally loved it - but of course i would, i love history just as much as this nerd loves chess. this isn't my best work, so i apologise in advance for the awkwardness of some phrasing and the abrupt ending. anyway, feedback is always appreciated
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Collapsing back against your bedroom door, your book bag falls off your arm and lands on the floor with a hard thud. The carpet cushions so much of the blow, but the sound was sure to catch your roommate's attention. You're more careful as you remove your second bag, deciding that having a broken laptop in the middle of writing of your dissertation wasn't the brightest of ideas, hanging it up as you trek across your room to get changed.
Already, it felt like a huge weight had been lifted off your shoulders. Literally. You had about eight books stuffed into your book bag, filled to the brim with information on English War Poets and the First World War. But your head still felt heavy from studying all day, and your body was tired from a shocking sleep schedule and an abundance of stress.
With both your laptop and phone now charging and the contents of your book bag tipped out onto your desk, you escape the confinement of your bedroom for the much needed comfort of your roommate's embrace. This wouldn't be the first time the two of you had found yourselves tangled up together, and it surely wouldn't be the last either. He had this ability to calm you down like no one else could, which you just chalked it down to being because you had known each other since the dawn of time. Was that an overestimated statement? Sure. But you hadn't known anyone longer than you had known Christian, with the exception of your own family, of course.
Neither of you says a thing when you finally make an appearance. You don't need to. Instead, he just opens himself up to you, waiting for you to join him on the sofa, where he had spot on his chest saved only for your head. Both of your legs become a tangled mess, with one of yours wedged between his, half straddling his thigh as you lean over his body to rest your head on the centre of his chest. His hands drift slowly down your back, the tips of his fingers brushing over you, before following the same path back up your back.
You could lie like this for hours, listening to his steady heartbeat, basking in his calmness, breathing in the sweet smell of his cologne, and never get bored.
"What was that loud thudding noise?" Christian asks, breaking the silence after a few minutes. Curiosity had gotten the better of him. He removes one hand from your back and reaches above him, grabbing the TV remote to quickly turn the volume down. "You didn't drop your laptop again, did you?"
"No." Your hand drops to play with the drawstring on his shorts, wrapping it loosely around your finger. "Just my book bag," you mumble, unravelling the string and wrapping it the opposite way round your finger.
"That was your book bag? What did you do? Bring the whole library home with you?" He asks, a little in disbelief.
"No, just half of it."
A chuckle rumbles deep within him, vibrating his chest as it finally makes its escape past his lips. "All that just for an essay?" He stops tracing your back, letting his fingers drift lower to your waist. "Isn't that a bit much?"
"It's more than just an essay, Chris, it's the equivalent of about four of my essays all rolled into one big jumbled mess of information that I am not even ready to write," you stress, explaining to him the importance of your dissertation, "if I don't pass this, I can pretty much kiss goodbye to my entire degree." Running your hand tiredly down your face, you produce a sigh of defeat. You didn't know just how much more stress you could take. "Which, I'll be honest, I'm not entirely opposed to the idea."
"You don't mean that, do you?" You had never been known to back down from a challenge. Christian had witnessed you push past obstacles and find new solutions to any problem that got in your way. Hell, you had even helped him do the same on more than one occasion. So, naturally, he had a right to be concerned. "Y/N?"
"I don't know," you shrug your shoulders, now untangling yourself as you sat up, "maybe." You rub your hands into your tired eyes, though it does nothing to rid you of your sluggish state. You draw your knees up to your chest, pulling them tight against you so you could prop your head against them. "I-It feels like my head is just constantly on fire," you mumble, turning your head to face him. He was now sat at your side, one leg bent and tucked under the other as it hung over the edge. "And I just want it to stop."
Every little bit of new information you absorbed was like a new seed being planted inside your brain. A seed that would only grow if you kept absorbing more information. From a tiny seed grew a small bush bustling with fascinating facts and a timeline of events spanning across decades. And from there, more branches would sprout off, forming more bushes, until it felt like there was a whole garden of knowledge just waiting to burst out of your skull. But there was no off switch to how much you felt like you needed to learn, meaning you burnt yourself out as you constantly made your way through books and academic papers.
Christian reaches across and touches your face, soothing you as he rubs soft circles against your cheek. Instinctively, you close your eyes, humming as he continues to do so. Every single thing he did, even the littlest of actions, helped to calm you down. But it hurt him to see you like this, to only know a fraction of what you were feeling, and be unable to help you. It made him feel useless.
"You're not touching those books tonight," he orders, trying to encourage you into indulging yourself to a night of pure laziness. Your eyes snap open, and your head lifts away from your knees. "No," he shushes, shaking his head as you open your mouth to protest his request, "I don't want to hear some half-assed excuse about needing to study. Look at you, Y/N. You can barely keep your eyes open to look at me-"
"I'm looking at you right now, aren't I?" You interrupt him, not tired enough to dish out your usual dose of cockiness. He gives you a blank expression. There's no subtle rolling of the eyes or an amused chuckle to be heard. Just two honey dripped eyes staring blankly back at you. "Look, I need-"
"You don't need to be doing anything tonight, okay? All I need you to do is be lazy with me," he talks over you, ignoring you when you grumble a partial disagreement under your breath, "can you do that for me?" He twists and turns himself to face the TV and rests one arm on the back of the sofa as he reaches across with the other to grab the remote. "C'mon," he mumbles, beckoning you with his free hand to move closer to him, "you want the remote?"
Resting your head back onto his chest, you allow the steadiness of his heartbeat to gradually lull you back into a state of calmness. "No," you finally answer, letting your hand wander to resume playing with the drawstring on his shorts, "Just pick what you want."
"Gossip Girl, it is then."
You burying your face impossibly deeper into his chest, getting yourself lost in his natural warmth, "Gossip Girl, again?" You words are lost to his chest. "This is, what, your twentieth time rewatching it?" For a second, you tilt your head up, catching him already looking down at you. "You really need to get yourself a girlfriend."
"Wow! You're really gonna tell me what to do? Little Miss 'I Just Thought About Dropping Out'?" He fills his empty hand with your own, slotting his fingers between yours, and lifts your joined hand to his lips. "Besides, I don't need a girlfriend," he breaks it with some kiss to the back of your wrist, "I got my perfect girl right here, already in my arms."
"See, this is why you need a girlfriend," you tease, giving him the smallest smile that you could possibly conjure up. It wasn't much, but it had been the first time you had smiled all week. "That way, you can stop testing out these cheesy pick-up lines on me."
"Okay," he hums, resting his head upon yours as you switch to resting your hear on his shoulder. The episode continued to play out on the screen, but neither one of you was paying attention to the TV. You had both watched every season of Gossip Girl multiple types to know the opening episode like it was the back of your hand. "But if I got a girlfriend," Christian ponders, "who would be your cuddle buddy and listen to you ramble about people named Ivor Sassoon?"
"It's Ivor Gurney and Siegfried Sassoon - you just mashed two people together," you instantly correct him, the two names burned into your brain like they were your own, "and, yes, I think you might be correct. If you got a girlfriend, I'd lose my safety net."
Upon hearing your own words, a smile tugs on the corners of his lips, but he quickly bites it back as the TV screen fades to black and reflects the two of you cuddled together. "I'm your safety net?" He asks, often considering you as his own place of safety. Lifting his head, he kisses the top of your head, breathing in the smell of your strawberry scented shampoo; a scent he considered to remind him of home. "Good," he mumbles, his words muffled by your hair, "because I'll always be there to catch you when you fall. Always."
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F O O T B A L L E R T A G L I S T
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@shanoontje @maseandkepa @theblxefox @blueathens  @ofxinnocence @1-800-benji-chilwell @mrschilly @geek-and-proud @in-my-body-bag @laurasstufff1 @mountchilly @spicysainz @greykitkepa @thoseboysinblue @breakablehcaven
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306 notes · View notes
withahappyrefrain · 2 years
Note
overstim w mob!peter parker for bingo👀👀 he rlly liked planing games w his wife
YES HE DOES. 18+
A sharp sting was felt across your inner thigh.
"I said, keep your legs open. How else can I see which toy works best?" Peter whispered in your ear.
You tilted your head back, resting it against the crook of your husband's neck. Beads of sweat trickled down your face.
You didn't think much of it when you told Peter you never owned anything resembling a sex toy. The gleam in his amber eyes, along with how he cooed about needing to fix that, should have given you an idea of what to expect.
And yet, you were still surprised when Peter came home with a box, ordering you to go upstairs with him.
So really, it should be no surprise that you were currently on the floor, your legs spread apart in front of the mirror, as Peter tried out the various toys he had purchased.
"How else will we know what's worth keeping?" He said at the time, a wicked grin plastered on his face.
You assumed Peter had just gotten two, maybe three items. That was a stupid assumption. When did Peter ever do the bare minimum when it came to buying you things?
"What else am I going to spend it on?" He would remark, shrugging.
Your body felt like jelly, making it easy for Peter to keep your legs open. Your sensitivity to touch, no matter how light, was in overdrive.
Were you on orgasm number four or orgasm number twelve? Toy number three or ten? Great questions. You were unable to figure out the answers, as your body felt like it was on fire.
"P-Peter," a strangled cry from your throat cut you off as Peter increased the intensity on the vibrator currently being thrusted in and out of your soaked folds.
"This one's taking longer," Peter muttered, brow furrowed in concentration, "Don't think we're gonna keep it."
If your body hadn't been put through multiple orgasms, you would have asked about the ethics of returning a used vibrator.
And maybe you would have been able to get a somewhat coherent sentence about it, if Peter hadn't turned it up to the highest level.
So instead, you thrashed against his body while he just smirked at your withering form.
A large, ringed hand trailed up your chest, pinching your sensitive nipples before landing around your throat.
"I bet," his beard brushed against your cheek, "I can get you to squirt again."
His grip around your throat tightened. The metal from his rings added additional pressure, eliciting choked gasps from you.
You tried to shake your head, but it was no use. Peter angled the toy, it hitting that spot that sent you over the edge.
Your body felt like it was on fire, desperate for the pleasure but also desperate to get away. Your walls tightened around the toy as Peter tightened his grip around your throat. A gutteral cry escaped your lips as you came.
"Good girl," he praised, removing the vibrator from your slicked folds.
"N-No m-more," You barely got out, feeling yourself clenched around nothing.
Peter chuckled, "Not even my cock?"
You groaned, your body clenching at the idea.
"Five minutes?" You mumbled as Peter scooped you into his arms. You could barely keep your eyes open, the soft material of your pillow making you realize you were now on the bed.
"I'll give you until I'm done undressing," Peter said, removing his tie, "Don't worry, I'll go slow."
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jerzwriter · 1 year
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A Carrick Family Easter
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I'm going to stop saying, "This is it. This is the best one she's ever done," because each time I commission Ainna, I am just blown away again and again. But this, this just may be my new favorite! Artwork by @/artbyainna IG. For @tobias-carrick-appreciation-week Day 7 - The Future
Three scenes from Easter morning and one as the day ends can be found below.
Book: Open Heart
Pairing: Tobias and Casey Carrick
Featuring: The Carrick Girls, Vivian Carrick, & Jordan Carrick
Rating: Teen
Category: Fluff
Words: 1.4 K
Summary: A little peek at four scenes from the Carrick Family's Easter Day. Participating in @choicesflashfics and @aprilchallenge - Love
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Easter Morning:
“Honey!” Tobias shouted as Casey stepped our of the shower. She instinctively rolled her eyes. 
“Yes, dear….” She replied sweetly.
“Where is my tie? I’ve been looking all over, and it’s nowhere to be found.”
Casey entered the bedroom, still dripping wet, wrapped only in a plush towel. She didn’t say a word; the look on her face said it all. With three steps to the right, she opened the top drawer of Tobias’s dresser and, viola... his pink tie.
“You're still planning on wearing this one, right?” She teased. “Because where is it? Oh, look, exactly where I told you it was… in your tie drawer.”
Tobias bit his lower lip, amusement and embarrassment evident in his grin.
“You know you are so incredibly sexy,” he growled as his arms wrapped around her waist. “What do you say I tell Ma to take the girls to Church, and you and I stay home to do very… unholy things.”
“Tobias,” she giggled, pushing him away. “Stop trying to distract me. It won’t work.”
“The hell it won't,” he hummed.
“Mmmm, you’re right,” she acquiesced, “but it’s Easter… and we’re spending it with our girls, so let me get dressed.”
“If you must,” he grumbled. “I want to go check on the girls anyway. They’ve been quiet for over fifteen minutes, so I’m all but waiting for the fire alarm to go off.”
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“Where are your bunny ears?” Brooke squeaked.
“Who, me?” Tobias asked with a raised brow. 
“No, Daddy!” Brooke giggled. “Sammy’s!”
“I’m not wearing bunny ears,” Samantha explained. “I’m too mature now.”
“You’re not mature!” Brooke countered, then tugged at her father's sleeve so he would crouch down and she could whisper. “Daddy, what does mature mean?”
“It means Sammy is growing up, baby. So, she’s graduated from bunny ears to a bunny barrette. From what I understand, this is a natural progression, and you’ll get the bunny barrette one day too.”
Brooke flung around with her hands on her hips and a dramatic flair.  
“Is that why you got a jacket like Mommy’s? You think you're grown up?”
“Be quiet!” Sammy shot back.
“Sammy, Brooke… be nice! Why can’t you girls be more like Kayla.”
“Daddy… she can’t talk yet….” Samantha answered sarcastically.
“Oh! So that’s why she’s my favorite!”
“Daddy!” Brooke laughed, tickling his legs. “I’m your favorite!”
“No, I’m your favorite,” Samantha laughed, getting in on the tickling.
“You’re all my favorites!” he insisted as he corralled them. “Now, no more playing until after church. We can’t mess up our pretty outfits before pictures. Grammie would kill us.”
“Yeah, I wouldn’t want to deal with that,” Sammy agreed.
“Fine,” Brooke surrendered. “But I still think you should wear bunny ears!��
“Well, I’m not. And neither are you if you don’t get them fast.”
Tobias & Brooke turned around to find Kayla gleefully crawling across the floor to grab the bunny ears, and they were just about in her mouth when Tobias swooped in for the save.
“Kayla baby, those don’t taste good. Trust me.”
“Have you tried eating them?” Samantha winked.
Tobias looked at his daughter sternly, then bopped her in the nose. “What I do with my time after you go to sleep is none of your business, young lady.”
“Is everything all right down here?” Casey asked as she walked down the stairs.
“Whoa!” Tobias with a slow whistle. “Much better now. You look… wow.”
“Daddy,” Sammy scolded. “Gross!”
“Hey,” Casey laughed. “There is nothing wrong with your Daddy thinking I look pretty.”
“That’s right!” Tobias enthused.
Brooke tugged at Casey’s leg. “I think you look pretty, too. Mommy.”
“Well, thank you, sweetheart. And you look beautiful, all of you do.”
“OK, now let’s all look beautiful in the car. Because I may be in my mid-forties….”
“Late forties…” Casey playfully added.
“… MID-forties, but I still don’t want to hear my mom complain.”
“Daddy,” Brooke said, grabbing his hand.
“When I’m in my mid-forties, I won’t be afraid of you.”
“Of course, you won’t,” he chuckled. “You’re not even afraid of me now.”
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“Mmmm,” Casey beamed, closing her eyes to commit the moment to memory. “I’m so glad we’re early, and I’m glad there weren’t any parking spots close by. It’s a perfect day to stroll through the park.”
“It really is,” Tobias agreed, then he went silent. Clutching his wife’s hand tighter, he swallowed hard to hold back tears.
His mind flashed back to a much darker time; it was hard to believe it was less than a year ago. At Casey’s bedside, begging whatever greater power would listen to save her. Telling his oldest girls that their baby sister was coming home, but Mommy wasn’t… not yet, then lying and assuring them she would, when he had no way of knowing if that was true. He had never been a man that needed reminders of how blessed he was, but he appreciated every moment a thousand times more now.
“Hey,” Casey whispered, squeezing his hand. A look passed between them that didn’t require any words. “It’s OK,” she smiled. “I’m right here.”
His lips curled upward as he gazed lovingly into her eyes. “I love you,” he mouthed, and Casey did the same. Then with one loud click, the quiet moment was over.
“Uncle Jordan!” the older girls shrieked, running into their uncle’s waiting arms.
“Hey, easy… watch the camera!” He laughed as they tackled him.
“And watch his suit!” Tobias ordered.
“You really are still afraid of Mom, aren’t you?” Jordan laughed as he gave his big brother a hug.
“Like you’re not!”
“Well, I’m going to be on her good side when I show her the amazing candid picture I just took of you. The perfect Easter morning.”
“Every morning is perfect as long as I’m with my girls,” Tobias grinned.
“Amen to that,” Jordan smiled, wrapping his arm around Casey.
“And when you say ‘your girls,’ surely, that includes me,” an eloquent voice stated from behind.
“Grammie!!!!” The girls screeched, rushing over to shower her with hugs and kisses.
“Oh, hello! Hello, my little angels!” Vivian beamed.
Jordan tapped his brother on the shoulder, “She was never like that with us.”
“That’s because you weren’t this cute!” Vivian shot back before lovingly greeting her sons and Casey. “Kayla! Grammie’s baby girl!” She gushed, all but ripping her from Tobias’s arms. Fortunately, Kayla was all too happy to go.
“Mom, I got a great picture of them for you!”
“I’m sure you did, son. The camera loves these beautiful ladies.”
“And me, Ma,” Tobias inserted. “It loves me, too.”
Vivian smirked as she straightened her son's lapel with her free hand. “I suppose I made a couple handsome boys myself,” she agreed.
“Wow! No wise-ass reply,” Tobias exclaimed. “It’s an Easter miracle.”
Vivian turned to Casey, “I don’t know how you put up with him."
“Aww, but you're so glad I do!" Casey grinned. “You know how much I love him.”
“I do,” Vivian grinned. “And that's all I ever wanted for him. Now,” she said, fixing her gaze on Jordan. “when do you think you'll follow in your brother's footsteps."
“Oh, would you look at that,” Jordan sighed. “The church bell is ringing! Have to get inside.”
“Talk about saved by the bell,” Tobias simpered as the family entered the chapel.
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Easter Night:
Casey was exhausted, already unwinding under the covers when Tobias got out of the shower. He sat at the foot of the bed and lovingly gazed at her as she mindlessly scrolled through her phone.
“Whatcha looking at?” he asked from the foot of the bed.
“Just checking out everyone’s Easter pictures.”
“Jordan really got a great shot of us!”
“He sure did,” Casey sang.  “I am already asked him to have a portrait made so we can hang it over the mantle.”
“Beat me to it,” he chuckled.  “So, what’s the Insta feedback on our epic family photo? I'm sure everyone is green with envy."
“I don't know about that," she shrugged, "but our photo is getting rave reviews! Well, except for...."
“Except!?” Tobias exclaimed.  “Who dared to say anything negative?”
“Not negative,” she laughed.  “But some of your old Boston friends are still flummoxed that the Tobias Carrick is a bonafide family man!”
“Really,” he shook his head. “We’ve been together over a decade.  They need to get with the program. What are the morons saying?”
“Let’s see, Terrance said, ‘Tobias was always happiest surrounded by women, but I still remember when the photo would have looked a little different.”
“Do I need to log on?” He sighed.
“No,” Casey laughed, "it’s all good-natured… besides, your mother is already handling him.”
“Good!”
“But he has a point…” she yawned as she pulled Tobias next to her.  “Your life sure did change.  Any regrets, Dr. Carrick?”
Casey scrunched her nose with disapproval when he didn’t answer right away. He looked away as if deep in thought.
"Well?" she asked.
"Honestly, I do have one regret."
“Oh really? And what’s that?”
“That I didn’t meet you sooner.”
Casey playfully kissed his cheek.
“You just want post-Easter nookie.”
“Post meaning tomorrow,” he laughed.  “While you’re unbelievably cute when you’re tired. You need to get some rest.”
“Mmm,” she said, already dozing off, “will you hold me?”
Tobias pulled her closer, then tucked the comforter around them, placing a kiss on her forehead before holding her close.
"As if that was ever in question."
_____
Yep, guys, they went to sleep without having sex. It's an Easter miracle! 🤣🤣
Perma: @a-crepusculo @animesuck3r @annoyingmillenialnewbie @crazy-loca-blog @doriopenheart @differenttyphoonwerewolf @fayeswiftie @gryffindordaughterofathena @genevievemd @inlocusmads @jamespotterthefirst @jennieausten @kingliam2019 @liaromancewriter @lucy-268 @onikalover @openheartforeverinmyheart @potionsprefect @quixoticdreamer16 @rookiemartin @secretaryunpaid @socalwriterbee @sophxwithers @tessa-liam @trappedinfanfiction @jerzwriter-reblogs-asks @openheartfanfics @choicesficwriterscreations @openheartfanart
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Tobias Only: @icecoffee90 @kyra75
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tenderlyrenjun · 2 years
Text
Kinktober Fic Previews
includes … leather kink, pet play kink, roleplay kink, food play kink, grinding, heavy making out, petting, choking, daddy kink/doctor-nurse roleplay, penetration, fingering, + more (eventually, like, in the fics, not here)
note … the schedule is vaguely looking like … 00-Line reactions on 10/1, 10/30, and 10/31; renjun week one (10/2 to 10/8); jeno week two (10/9-10/15), haechan week three (10/16-10/22), jaemin week four (10/23-10/29), where there are 6 drabbles per member and then a full fic at the end of the week … and again, do not tell me that I am a bad writer or criticize my fics; not asking for it!! anon asks for this will be open for about 5 days and then closed again.
est. wc per preview: 350 words
network tag: @neohub
minors + bots do not interact
fic rec blogs w/o comments do not interact
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Darling
Renjun broke up with you a few months ago, and, exasperated, your best friend, Goeun, drags you out of bed, on Halloween, to a new club that you bought tickets for, last year; except, she forgot that you and Renjun bought tickets.
release date: 10/8
exes to lovers, angst, leather kink
mini-playlist: darling by svt; fallin’ flower by svt; on the way by nct dream
Renjun slides his leg between yours, the leather slowly brushing against each open diamond between your wide fishnets. He knows these leggings; he bought you these leggings, but he never expected to see you in them again; he didn’t even expect you to let him kiss you in the alley behind the club exit.
“I …” he exhales, shakily, mouth slightly ajar around your upper lip, hands frantically grabbing onto whatever cloth he can before it clings to your body again. He accidentally pulls your shirt from your mini skirt, thumb brushing the thong high on your pretty waist. “I …”
You fall forward, palms bracing on the brick wall behind him. “One more minute,” you whisper into his neck.
“I need more,” he admits, dipping his head into you again, dragging your hips up and down his thigh. He feels the crotch in your tights drool. Renjun yanks you closer, his back slamming against the wall. Your crawl onto his shoulders, above his jacket, gripping it upward, and he takes the opportunity to kiss you again, drawing out a whispered “Please,” until sliding his tongue between your lips, beginning his pleas inside your mouth. “I already regret –“ He swallows, preemptively chasing you before you can really leave him. “– every minute I haven’t spent with you.”
His arms relax, giving you an out. And you pull away, simultaneously darting your pupils across his eyes. Renjun retreats slightly, into his armor, slumping against the wall.
“I … meant the Uber,” you whisper. You bite your lip … then open your mouth … then close it again, quickly. And a beat passes.
Ping.
Your Uber has arrived, a notification says without you having to read it.
“You …” Your breath shakes through your chest, and he licks his lips inside his mouth. “Will you … come home with me?”
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Wait
“What do you normally do when I’m gone?” “Wait for you to come back.” Jeno misses you when you go to work. 
release date: 10/15
est. relationship, angst, puppy kink (breeding kink)
mini-playlist: puzzle piece by nct dream; 247 by seventeen; back to you by xiaojun and kun
Jeno scrubs his nose into your neck, his mint body wash covering both your perfume and natural aroma, since you took a shower at his apartment, having stayed over the last week. He squeezes his arms around your waist, cock flopping backward, hard, just left of your spot. You instinctively kick your legs up, your knee, no longer restricted after he pulled your pencil skirt up to access your panties, coming into contact with his desk.
“Shit!”
“Sorry,” he mumbles, breath raising the hair behind your ears. He trails his hand down your front, simultaneously rearranging the both of you (and your guts), spreading your legs between his, then rubbing your warm knee colder. “I didn’t mean it,” he pouts, lips jutting forward on your skin.
“It’s okay, pup.” You turn over your shoulder and pat his cheek. “I’m almost done with the meeting notes for tomorrow. Why don’t you tell me about your day, hmm? What did you do?”
Jeno mumbles something, compelling his feet not to pace around the floor. His muscles can force you out of the chair, but he also knows that you packed up early today to work from home because you are meant to spend the holiday weekend with him. 
“What was that?”
“I waited for you to come back,” he says quickly, fingers poking into your stomach. If he pushes hard enough, he can feel himself throb sporadically, or feel your clit harden. But he ignores it, tightening his biceps, accidentally bending you both forward, his hips forced to chase you, making you both groan again within the last ten minutes. His breathing labors, freezing inside his nostrils, barely escaping his mouth in wet pants. Jeno sits comfortably back on the chair, dragging you with him. “I … I missed you,” he mumbles again, lips vibrating on your neck too.
You stop typing and wiggle on his lap, your lace underwear gently scratching his inner thighs, rolling down your ass. He squeezes you again.
“Don’t you have to work?”
“I can finish this later,” you rush, spinning your hips faster. “I need you to show me how much you missed me.”
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Trick or Treat
The competition between rich kids in an international school bleeds into your relationship with the other third-grade teachers. Your students boast that you are the best teacher during geography, then change their minds by literature at the end of the day, after maths, after Lee Donghyuck’s class. It gets even worse when he ‘steals’ your idea for a Halloween themed lesson plan.
release date: 10/22
enemies/rivals to lovers, angst/fluff, food play kink
mini-playlist: candy by baekhyun; shall we? by chen; white by jeong sewoon
Haechan throws you onto his bed, his hands falling with you to keep you on your back, pushing your hips into the mattress, forcing them still as if you had not been grinding him against the door a second ago. He takes off his shirt first, and you lean on your elbows, admiring his stomach, still littered with bite marks from the morning; even the heart-shaped ones dipping toward his stomach, when you stole a body shot (or seven), both of you agreeing that it was five o’clock somewhere. Haechan throws his clothes at you, covering your eyes, like a temporary blindfold.
“Hey!”
But when you take it off, going to glare at him, he kneels into the bed, straddling over one of your legs, smirk driving you into the pillows. He chases after you, and wins, arm sliding behind your bed, crinkling with something. You feel around the blankets, rolling around tiny rectangular foils, and go to pick one up. Before you can bring it between you two, like another barrier, Haechan bunches your wrists together, pinning them to the headboard. You turn your cheek into the mattress, getting a better look.
“I’m laying … on mini chocolates?” You raise an eyebrow.
Haechan grinds down your chest, his jeans rubbing on yours. “I’ve got the full-sized bar for you to nibble in my pants,” he whispers, purposefully, teasingly missing your lips on a kiss.
“Yeah?” you half-smirk, half-fumble, wriggling your legs and nodding backward to make him chase you again. It works. You slide your thigh up his stomach, knee rubbing side-to-side on his hardening cock, his Calvin Klein waistband rising higher than his pants as his dick increases his size.
“Yeah,” he confirms, labored, pecking you just the once. “You gotta say ‘trick or treat’ first though.”
You peck him back, sitting forward with him on your lap. “How do I know you won’t choose tricks?”
“Baby, you act like you don’t know me.” Haechan flips you over, straddling behind your legs, and spanks your ass. “I’ve got a delicious treat for you.”
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Throat Treatment
You and Jaemin like to make fun of medical dramas, citing that they are not real (like dragging out a defibrilator every time a patient’s heart stops), but still, there is something so enticing and so sexy about those lab coats. 
release date: 10/29
est. relationship, med school/ish au, fluff roleplay kink (dom-sub themes too)
mini-playlist: gentleman by gallant; mine by bazzi; stuck with you by ariana grande & justin bieber
Jaemin barely tugs his pants low under his veiny abs when you enter his walk-in closet, the door creaking eerily.
“What are you doing, princess?” he laughs, tying the strings into a loose bow.
You sink to your knees, scratch your way down his bare torso, all the muscles memorized, even though the marks no longer exist on his body. He stops your hands on his waistband, and you curl your fingers inside, pressing a winded kiss to his hard crotch.
“Just like those on-call rooms,” you mumble over his pulsing cock – very much alive. “And my ‘uniform’ is back here too.”
Jaemin adds a matching teal shirt to his scrubs, biceps flexing around his pecs as he twists, strained by your hands keeping his cock within reach. You lift his shirt enough to dip your tongue in his bellybutton, licking away the remnants of a sugar experiment gone horribly wrong (or right). He groans and grabs your hair, and pulls. Your hand instantly claws around his cock, and Jaemin rocks his pelvis through your fingers, eyes rolling under closed lids.
“What if I had a surgery right now?” he asks. “You’re going to make me late? All for some cock?”
“Mmhmm,” you whine brokenly, teetering on your knees, thighs rubbing together, just missing where you need friction the most.
“Naughty,” he comments, patronizingly. “Cute. But I really do need to get to my next patient.” Jaemin helps you up, making you pout again tonight. He shoves you into a coat rack, a hand behind your head to protect you from the concrete wall, despite all the hoodies in your way. Jaemin shoves his tongue down your throat, yanking and tugging, pounding his cock on your covered cunt a few times. He walks close to your face, breath rasping deeply, dry, “Get dressed, and give me that show you wanted, princess. I’ll be waiting.”
144 notes · View notes
starrgaziinggg · 2 years
Text
BEGIN AGAIN | hwang hyunjin
CHAPTER SEVEN
Hwang Hyunjin messes with your head, unknowingly, for over a month. Until you can't take it anymore.
*✧・゚: *✧・゚:
Growing up with Chris Bang as your best friend had it's perks - a permanent bodyguard, a shoulder to cry on... and seven other boys who also became your best friends as you grew up together.
Week in, week out, your routine stayed the same. Study, go to class and patiently wait to attend your regular Friday evening home cooked meal with your friends. You just couldn't wait to graduate and start working, to rid yourself of exams and finally start earning some proper money like the boys.
Desperate to put some light back into your mundane, studious life, Chris forces you to start blind dating. Two miserable dates down and ready to murder the man, someone completely unexpected appears and makes a mess of your orderly life.
And a mess he does make.
|fake dating|friends to lovers|slow burn|non idol au|
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chapter seven
You woke up the next morning to a siren going off. You sat up, bashing your head off the top of your headboard and with wide, panicked eyes, wondered why they had brought the Purge to South Korea.
Okay, that was really over dramatic. It was just your phone alarm ringing over and over right beside your ear. You swore, looking at the caller name and answering the call.
"Jisung? It's so fucking early and it's Sunday. What could you possibly want," you answered the phone call by saying. Clearly you were the opposite of a morning person. You hated being woken up by anyone.
"What an excellent way to answer the phone! I'm doing great, Thankyou!" He said in his usual cheery voice. As you listened you heard someone talking in the background sounding stressed.
"Cut the crap, what's going on," you said, wanting him to get to the point. You waited for his response, but instead heard him should to whoever was with him.
"Yah! It will be fine! Sit down and shut up," he said to whoever he was with. "Sorry about that. Lino is freaking out. Basically, Da-Hye is on holiday, so they were already not coming in to work today, so Lino got Jeongin to cover for them. But now Bitna has food poisoning so she can't come in, and
In-Su caught a bug from those stupid feet fish that eat all your dead skin. So, Jeongin Minho and I are the only people available to run the restaurant because all his other useless workers are refusing to cover the shifts."
You rolled your eyes.
"What time do you want me to come in for?" You ask, and you can hear the glee in Jisung's voice.
"Ten am please! Thankyou, love you," he said. Then he directs his words to Minho. "See, I told you our friends would come in clutch. Quit your whining, okay!"
"Okay, okay, I'll be there. Bye, dumbass," you say as you hang up the phone.
You genuinely didn't mind covering shifts when Minho needed you too. After Changbin and Jisung started working for Minho's parents restaurant, you and Jeongin started to work there when you were needed a couple months later. You already ate there a lot anyway, and it was easy work since Minho and his parents were great bosses. There were four of Minho's parents restaurants across South Korea, and one of them was owned and run by Minho - the one closest to where you all lived. This was the one you had all worked at.
It was 9am, so you set an alarm for 9:30 and went back to sleep, getting as much rest as possible before your shift. When your alarm went off, you got up and started to get ready. You were lucky your uniform was still in tact and had been washed since the last time you wore it. All you had to wear was the company's polo shirt and a pair of leggings.
It was only a ten minute walk to the restaurant and you couldn't be bothered paying for an Uber so you just walked. You arrived bang on ten o'clock to Jisung cleaning the restaurant.
"Hey! Thanks for coming in, you saved me. Lino was driving me insane," he said to you, giving you a hug as you walked in.
"It's not a problem. Sorry I was such a bitch on the phone," you apologised.
"Don't worry, we all know what you're like when you get woken up abruptly. I expected nothing less," he laughed, finishing up wiping the tables. The restaurant didn't open until eleven but Minho liked to make sure everyone was ready before opening. At that moment he walked through and gave you a grin.
"Hi," he said, drawing out the last syllable. "Can you come through and taste this for me? Jisung is useless."
You laughed as Jising flipped Minho off and you walked through to the back, where the kitchen was. Minho had two chefs and they usually did the cooking, but he often helped. The restaurant wasn't huge - it only had around twenty tables - so he didn't have heaps of staff.
He had been making some sort of soup, and he took a spoon and held it up to your mouth. You took it in your mouth and tasted what he'd been making. It tasted delicious, as you were excepting.
"It's amazing, Minho! Personally I would add some more spice to it, but that's just my taste," you say to him, giving him a thumbs up.
"That's actually a good idea," he says, deliberating it. "You're annoying when you're right."
You rolled your eyes and jumped up to sit on the countertop. Minho used to scold you for it, but he'd given up after a while. You took a cloth and started cleaning the cutlery that had just come out the dishwasher. A minute later Jeongin arrived through the back door with a grin on his face. His work uniform was far too small for him now and clung to his body.
"Oh my god, Innie! You've been working out more haven't you," Jisung said, walking to the back through the swing door. He started feeling his biceps and Jeongin moved his arm away.
"Hey! Leave me alone," he said, coming over to stand beside you and helping with the cutlery.
"You're all grown up now! I remember in school when you would run to me because of the other kids but now you'd be fighting them all on your own," he continued. Jeongin faked punching the air and you laughed. You remembered how Jeongin was picked on and teased a lot in school. Kids could be really horrible, but it made Jeongin toughen up a lot and he would always tell you and the boys how grateful he was to have you all as friends.
You all got to working, cleaning up the restaurant and sorting out bookings for the day. Since you'd all helped out working there since you were kids, you knew how to do pretty much everything, so it was easy to just get stuck back in after you hadn't worked there for a while.
People started arriving dead on eleven, and you began to serve tables. There were a fair few regulars that you remembered who were excited to have you serving them again. You enjoyed the familiar atmosphere that came with working at the restaurant. Minho wasn't uptight by any means, and you, Jeongin and Jisung were good workers so it just flowed well. Your favourite part about working there was the friendly banter you had with the boys. Take now for instance; you'd been working for a couple hours and Jisung had taken your playlist off of the speaker system and put on his own songs, singing along to them with Jeongin.
"The customers don't want to hear you screech like a cat, Hannie," you said to him as you placed plates down for a table. "Sorry about him, he put too much sugar on his weetabix this morning."
"Oh don't be sorry, it's so fun watching you kids have fun together," one of your regulars laughed.
"You're just jealous because you don't have the voice of an angel," Jisung retorted.
"Yes?" Jeongin said towards Jisung, polishing a glass.
"What?"
"Sorry, I just heard you talking about my voice," Jeongin smiled cheekily. You laughed and Jisung stuck out his tongue. Jeongin actually did have a lovely voice, but he was far too shy to ever use it properly.
"I'm truly embarrassed for you both," you say as you go back into the kitchen. Minho was cleaning up, preparing to close the restaurant for lunch break before opening up again later. He always made you all lunch when you worked all day, and right now he was making noodles for everyone. You grabbed some chopsticks and sneakily took some from the pot.
"Hey! Wait until your break, it's only an hour away," he said, swatting your hand away. "Are they causing a ruckus out there?"
"Would you expect anything less from them?" You asked, your mouth full.
The last hour of your shift before lunch passed by really quickly and it wasn't long until the four of you were sitting at a table and eating lunch yourselves. Jisung sat beside you, with Jeongin across from you and Minho beside him.
"I feel like I've asked this a million times recently, but how was your date last night?" Jeongin asked, looking at you intently. The two other boys turned to look at you. You debated on what to say - you'd almost totally forgotten about your night last night. It almost felt like a fever dream.
"So, funny story about that. Chan decided it would be hilarious to set Hyunjin up as my blind date," you said and the boys eyes widened. "At first I was raging at him but then we just ended up having a nice dinner together. But after that, I met this guy at a bar and we got to talking and I think im going to start seeing him."
The lie just slipped out so easily, you surprised yourself. Minho did that upside down smile thing and nodded his head, whilst Jeongin and Jisung just smiled.
"Interesting," Minho said. "What's his name?"
"I'm not telling you anything about him yet," you said, quickly trying to cover up the fact that there just was no man. "I don't even know if it will work out, so no point in making him a household name for no reason yet."
You were relatively pleased with how you had navigated the conversation, and the boys seemed to drop the topic fairly quickly. They had started talking about something else when you saw you had received a text from Hyunjin.
CEO MR. HWANG
What's your plans for Saturday?
Princess
None atm. Why?
CEO MR. HWANG
Fancy watching that movie w me
You know the one we're
seeing on Sunday
The horror
I want to watch it before
we all go together
Princess
In preparation ?
I mean sure
Kinda smart
Means Seungmin won't make
fun of you again
CEO MR. HWANG
Exactly 🥲
I'll pick u up around 8 : )
You couldn't help but giggle at his texts. Despite his height, he was the biggest baby of the group. He couldn't handle horror or gore at all, and practically died every time he saw it. It was hilarious (and adorable, but you'd never admit that out loud). You'd all made a plan to see the latest horror in the cinema on Sunday, and clearly Hyunjin was shitting himself.
You looked up to see all three boys staring at you.
"What's hilarious and adorable?" Minho asked slyly. Fuck, you'd definitely just said that out loud.
"Nothing you'd be interested in. Anyway, shouldn't we be getting cleaned up for the evening shift?" You said, taking everyone's bowls and making your way to the kitchen. Conversation easily avoided.
The rest of your shift went by fine. Clumsy Yang Jeongin smashed only two glasses, and Jisung almost cut his hand trying to tidy it, but other than that it sailed by rather smoothly. But you honestly could not stop thinking of one thing.
Hwang Hyunjin.
Since he had been brought up in conversation, he had annoyingly occupied your mind. Why was he so eager to take you out? Why did he seem to act different than he ever had before? Did he only see you as a friend still?
You had a million questions running through your mind, but you knew one thing for certain. Every time you thought about that date last night, your heart beat a little faster and you could not stop the smile from forming on your face.
And it was killing you.
You and Hyunjin had been friends for a really long time. You knew so much about him, you'd seen him at his best and at his worst - so why were you starting to feel this way now? Was it just a stupid crush on your attractive friend? Or something more?
"You're daydreaming again, idiot," Jeongin said when you were locking up after your shift had ended. He had offered to give you a lift home, so it was just the two of you left to lock up. When you locked the door, you put the keys in the locked letterbox for Minho to use tomorrow.
"Sorry," you said, following behind him to his car. "I guess I'm just not really with it at the moment. Got too much to think about, and the incessant noise outside my apartment just does not help. I have a mock exam tomorrow, as well, which is what we fall back on if we fail the exam. I've studied so much for it I think I'll do well but if I get a shit sleep tonight I'll flunk it."
"You're more than welcome to stay with me and Seungmin tonight if you want to sleep well before your test," Jeongin said instantly, unlocking his car for the both of you to get in and set off home. "You can sleep in my room and I'll either share with Seungmin or sleep on the couch."
"I can't ask you to do that," you said, shaking your head with a pout. Your friends were far too kind to you.
"You're not asking, I'm offering. Don't say no, or you'll be more annoying than you already are," he said with a laugh. You huffed, but caved in and thanked him. You stopped at your apartment to grab some pajamas and your things for your mock exam tomorrow and, as expected, the workmen were back at it. Jeongin had gone up to your apartment with you and widened his eyes at the noise.
"Damn, I didn't think the noise was this bad," he said, waiting for you to get your belongings together. "I understand why you've been so grouchy recently, this sucks."
You stick your tongue out at him.
"See? Everyone's been like, 'stop whining, it's not that bad,' but it's literal hell. I've tried everything - ear buds, asmr, blaring music, but I literally need silence to have a good night of sleep."
He nodded in understand and you both went back out to his car once you'd got your stuff ready.
"You're lucky you have the bestest friend in the world," he said as you start driving towards his and Seungmin's shared apartment. "What would you do without me, hm?"
You smiled at your friend. Even with all the crap going through your head, Hyunjin filling your thoughts and the lies and the dating, you knew you could always count on Jeongin to keep your spirits light hearted. You were almost polar opposites; he hated physical affection, you loved it. He could be loud and boisterous, often acting like a child who'd eaten too much sugar, and you were shy and reserved, only being extroverted when surrounded by your best friends. He was very emotional and often took things to heart, whereas you had built a wall around your emotions long ago.
Yet, despite your difference, you worked well together as friends. It had always been extremely platonic between you both, though. Jeongin was closer to being your little brother more than anything. You arrived at the apartment a couple minutes later to find Seungmin watching tv on the couch.
"Hi baby bread," he said without looking towards the door, using Jeongin's childhood nickname. Then when he saw you. He smiled. "Oh hey, are you staying here tonight?"
"Yeah, if that's alright with you. Got a mock exam tomorrow and the workmen are in full force tonight."
"Not a problem. Except you will definitely need to sleep in Jeongin's bed, because I spilt tea all over my sheets earlier and I had to strip my bed, so I've only got a blanket and a soggy bed," Seungmin said and you couldn't help but laugh at him. Such a classic Seungmin thing to do.
"Yeah, I've already said she can sleep in my room so I'll just take the couch," Jeongin said. You gave him a pout but he just rolled his eyes at you. It was only around ten pm so you got changed into your pajamas and slippers and joined Seungmin on the couch to watch the show he was watching. Jeongin joined you both after a couple minutes. You snuggled into them both, and they accepted your physical touch without much thought. Those two were the absolute worst when it came to skinship, even with the boys, and it took them the longest to get used to your physical touch. But once you had all matured, they didn't mind it so much and didn't bother fighting you off. Well, most of the time.
You stayed like that for a while, sandwiched between the two boys, until it got late and you went through to Jeongin's room to sleep. You would never tell him, but you actually loved the vibe of his cosy room and his bed was ten times more comfortable than yours, and you ended up sleeping like a log that night.
CHAPTER EIGHT HERE!
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madronash · 1 year
Text
Meteorite Part 4
A fourth installment of my @b-and-w-holiday-gift-exchange gift for @righty-ho-then available. ICYMI, parts one, two, and three, or the whole thing on AO3! Myka has, like @mrsdaphnefielding and the rest of us, run out of patience...
Half a day down the trail and Myka is sure they are being followed. An hour longer and she is positive the person following them is Helena. She points it out to Pete, and he starts to catch them too, glimpses of dark hair, tasteful beige clothing that doesn't quite camouflage against the red sandstone, furtive movement when they turn to check their progress.
Pete, who finds this entire saga hilarious ("Who knew you'd find stalking such a turn on?" "I swear to God, Pete…") tries to make a game of it, rounding corners only to climb up behind a rock and wait for Helena to sneak around another bend.
Eventually, his antics make Myka laugh, "You know, you might be treating this with more maturity than she is, Pete."
Pete gets proud then, scrambles and misses a handhold, crashes back too hard on a fragile shelf and comes tumbling down to the trail below. Pete is still for one agonizing moment and then his eyes blink open. He shouts "I'm fine!" as he starts to sit up.
Sitting up doesn't work. He curls onto his side and stays there. "Uhh, mostly fine, I think."
Myka rushes over, checking for head injuries and signs of internal distress. He's bleeding, but not profusely, from a gash on his leg and the spot where he's holding his ribcage looks bruised.
"Ok, Pete. You're ok. Just stay there for a second, ok?" Myka sets her backpack down in front of her and helps Pete out of his. She looks into his eyes. "Do you know if you hit your head on the way down?"
His pupils are small in the afternoon sun, but track her movements just fine. "Oof, pretty sure I didn't. I rolled a bit but not that way."
Myka nods, reaches for his wrist. "That's what I saw too. And I don't think you hurt your back or neck too badly, did you?" She counts his pulse as he shakes his head. It's high but steady. Good. "And how does it feel to breathe?" She doesn't let go of his wrist, but draws it gently across his chest so that she can count breaths too.
"That–that's the million dollar question, isn't it?"
"It is. Right, Pete, I'm going to bandage up your leg here and then we are going to camp for the night, all right? If you didn't break a rib, we can find the lost rafters tomorrow. If you did, I'm packing you out, and maybe recruiting our stalker to help carry your bag. We can send in the Second A team."
"Ten four, captain. You know, this would be a good mission for that Starling kid."
Myka takes some alcohol wipes and starts to clean his wound. "It really would."
Later that afternoon, Pete is feeling well enough to sit in front of a camp stove and make some dinner in an aluminum pot while Myka sets up their tent. He’s cheerful enough and mobile enough that Myka is optimistic that he might be able to walk some tomorrow. The night will tell a lot, she suspects.
The sun is just getting close to setting when Myka finishes with the tent and goes to check on the cooking progress. “Look Mykes! I lift a can! I am, essentially, Heman!”
“Sure, Pete. Please don’t try to lift anything heavier than that pot, ok? Dr Calder is going to be angry enough that I didn’t immediately pack us home.”
“I know, but look at the sky, Mykes! It’s going to be a gorgeous night, and the Perseids are out! We never get to do this!”
“Yeah.” She smiles at Pete. It is a nice night. She is, she thinks, happy to be here. Grateful that Pete isn’t more seriously hurt and not nearly as worried about the case as she should be. She looks around and sees a few stars pop out in the east. The nights will get cold soon, back in South Dakota, but out here the wind is warm.
“I’m going to go get her. Is that ok?”
“HG?”
“Yeah. Will you be ok if I bring her to camp?”
Pete grins at her. “Did I bring my headphones, do you mean? You could just go over to *her* camp… I don’t mind.”
Myka sighs. “I’m not leaving you alone. And it’s not safe for her to be out by herself either. If you want to put your headphones in while we talk, that’s your prerogative.”
Pete waggles his eyebrows and then shoos her away from the stove. “Go. It’s about damn time.”
“You’re telling me.” Myka flashes him a half smile and walks back up the trail.
***
It really doesn’t take much for Myka to find her camp. About a quarter of a mile back, she sees boot prints leading uphill into the side of a box canyon. Myka turns around as she leaves the trail to mark her spot and finds that there is a clear view of Pete back at camp. It’s where she would have picked to leave the trail too, had she been inclined to stalk herself.
She considers trying to mask the sound of her approach, but as she climbs, she can see that there’s no point. Another five minutes and she sees tent fabric flapping in the breeze behind a juniper.
She stops a few yards away. “You know, you really aren’t supposed to camp off trail here without a permit.”
“What makes you think I don’t have a permit?” Helena ducks around the juniper. She’s been waiting, and she’s wearing… no. She’s not. She’s wearing her British archeologist outfit from Egypt. Are these actually the same clothes?
Myka raises her eyebrows but says nothing. This is fine, she will keep her cool.
“Fine. I do not have a permit. But I do not think the rangers will be checking tonight…” Helena winks, then turns serious. “How is Pete? That looked like a nasty fall.”
Myka’s eyebrows go up even higher. “He’s recovering. No major damage I suspect. But you can ask him yourself. Pack up your tent. You’re staying with us tonight.”
Helena folds her arms. “Have I no choice in the matter?”
Myka folds her arms right back. “It’s not safe, Helena. I am pretty sure you couldn’t have packed enough water out here, and in hiking alone you’re pulling a stunt only mildly less dangerous than Pete up on that rock this afternoon. And, quite frankly, I’m tired of being stalked. So, no. You have no choice. You’re going to come and eat some freeze dried dinner with me and Pete and watch the Perseids and if after all that you still don’t want to tell me what you are up to, I guess I can’t force you to. But I will not have anyone else get hurt on this trail out of stupidity. Don’t make me get out my tesla.”
Helena seems to consider pointing out that tesla-ing her would probably count as an injury on the trail, and then she seems to reconsider.
She turns back to her tent, only partially constructed, and starts folding up one of the poles. Myka watches her for a moment before going to the opposite end of the tent and removing the other pole, folding it up and placing it in the bag that Helena offers her. Wordlessly, they fold the tent together, with Myka holding the stuff sack and Helena shoving corners and ropes into the opening. Myka slings the tent over her shoulder as Helena puts the rest of her gear back in her backpack. There isn’t much to carry.
They start back down the trail, and Myka makes Helena go first. They walk in silence for a while; she can’t think of anything to say. She tries not to wonder whether Helena’s shorts are long enough to keep her protected from shrubs and trail snags. Is she cold?
Eventually, Helena turns back. She has that sad bambi look on her face. “Are you very angry with me?”
Myka stops in her tracks. “Am I mad at you? Helena, I am confused. I don’t know why you couldn’t have called and asked to get coffee. I don’t know why you haunt some of my cases but not others. I don’t know why you put a tracking device in my coat when you know what room I sleep in at the B and B. I don’t know why you pretended I was a wrong number when I texted. I really don’t know why you wanted to sweep me back up onto that roof in Cohoes with your grappler and then leave and give me flashbacks to before Yellowstone. I don’t know how you got your grappler back, and I really, finally, do not understand why you are cosplaying Lara Croft like you did back at Warehouse 2. Are you trying to make me angry? Is that a goal of yours?”
"No, I… I wanted to make an impression."
Myka blinks at Helena. An impression? Her eyes flicker down to Helena's ankles; there are scratches there after all. "Helena–"
"I know that you have every reason to be angry at me, and I would like very dearly to explain and to make everything up to you. But, if I were you I'd slam the door right in my face before I got a chance to say anything at all." She runs her hand through her hair and takes a breath.
Myka takes a steadying breath. Helena has been trying to impress her? This way?
"So, I decided to try what worked before. I know I made an impression on you then, Myka. I know too that it was under… well, somewhat false pretenses. I was trying to make the impression… anew.”
There must be something missing here. “So you didn’t pick up the phone when I called because…”
“Because I wasn’t sure what you were calling to say.”
Myka turns slightly and rubs at her eyes. There are far too many things she could say to this. “Ok, a couple of things. First, you have been planning to apologize, right?”
Helena nods.
“For what, exactly, I don’t know, but do I think it’s customary for an apology to involve hazarding some risk. Not managing the situation in advance so that you get the response you want… not knowing what I might say in response, but saying it anyway?”
Helena just stares at her.
“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about this a bit. Because there are things that I have wanted to apologize to you for as well. And I have no idea what you will say, and that is scaring the hell out of me, but I think that using the courage necessary to say those things despite all that might show that I mean them. Anyway. That’s only one thing I wanted to say.”
Helena nods, slowly. She looks a bit crushed. “And what is the other thing?”
“I think you misunderstand how much of an impression you make on me just by existing.”
“I—“ Helena opens her mouth to say more and falters. They spend several long seconds looking at each other.
This is the thing that brings the fury into Myka’s voice. She realizes as she says it that she’s shaking. “All I want. All I’ve ever wanted since I met you, was for you to stay near enough that I could keep talking to you. To try to understand what you’ve been going through. Which I have no doubt has been a lot. More than that… more than that seemed too much to hope for, I guess.”
Helena steps forward, still silent. She’s crying, she looks like she does sometimes in Myka’s dreams when the world goes dark and she wakes up to remind herself that the warehouse is still standing. Helena reaches for her face, pulls her hand down from her temple. “Myka, I always thought… well, far less seemed far too much to hope for. Far too much.”
They stand like that for a long while, Helena holding Myka’s hand against her chest, Myka just watching. Helena takes a deep, shuddering breath, and this breaks the spell. Myka steps forward and pulls Helena’s face towards her. She means to pause, just to make sure before they touch but Helena is already staring at her lips and Myka does not wait. Myka kisses her. Myka just presses into Helena and feels the way Helena melts against her, lips parting and hands pulling her closer.
It takes several minutes for Myka to remember that Pete is back at camp, and hurt, and supervising a camp stove. She probably should have been back by now, even though she’s pretty sure she would have heard an explosion if anything too dangerous had... She has no memory of dropping Helena’s tent either, but somehow it is propped between them on the trail.
“Come on, let’s see if Pete actually made dinner.”
“Myka…” Helena tries to pull her back.
“We really need to talk." She plays with the straps of Helena’s backpack and smiles with half her mouth. Helena's eyes follow that smile and Myka feels color rising to her cheeks, "But Pete’s got bruised ribs at the very least, and he’s made us dinner and I suspect he's been waiting all day for the moment I drag you back into camp so he can make inappropriate jokes about kissing and trees."
Myka turns and knows now that Helena will follow. "...And he knew from the first time he caught you following us that I was going to come get you tonight. So come on."
“Is this freeze dried dinner something that astronauts would consumed on a mission?”
“I can’t with 100% certainty confirm that astronauts eat rehydrated beef stroganoff, but I suspect it’s something similar.”
“Aces!”
They walk back down to camp, Helena following behind this time. Pete is still sitting by the camp stove and when they come around the last bend Myka shifts the tent to her left hand and reaches back for Helena. Helena squeezes her hand just as Pete shouts a welcome.
"I think I deserve a medal for how much I did not eat our dinner while you two were busy talking." He glances once at their joined hands and grins, and Myka wants to give him a medal for how little emphasis he put on the word 'talking.' "Anyway I made two packages so there's plenty but one of us is is going to have to eat out of the pan unless," he points to Helena's bag with a spoon, "you brought your own kit."
Helena perks up visibly at the word and proceeds to excitedly explain the research that went into the particular 'kit' she pulls out of her bag, how it is both lightweight and heat resistant AND easy to clean and how the kid working at the REI in Grand Junction had tried to offer her a job since she seemed to know more about it than he did.
Myka walks to the far side of their camp where some scrub oak and juniper have half hidden good sized a flat space not too far from the tent she and Pete set up earlier, but not to close either. So that they can talk more, later. She puts down Helena's tent and reaches out to lean, for a moment, on the juniper. Watches the setting sun just touch, then slip behind the top of the mesa.
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edupunkn00b · 11 months
Text
Everyone Leaves, Ch. 5: Patton
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Colorized version of Wolf-in-front-of-Moon, Clément Bucco-Lechat CC 3.0
Prev - Patton - Last - All - [ AO3 ] - Playlist
Can the Heart bring Logan back to his senses and get him to leave? Can he convince Remus to let him go?
CW: intrusive thoughts and brief violent imagery, swearing A continuation of @lost-in-thought-20's incredible story for the @tsspromptmonth 🌸 Spring Cleaning 🌸 event. ---
“Kiddos?” Patton’s voice shook them both, well, all four of them. Two pairs of wolf eyes snapped open from their spots on Logan’s lap, bellies up as he scratched the little tuft of fur at the top of their ribs. It was nice and thick, protective. Remus had spent more nights that he wanted to remember huddled in the corner, watching them fight over the scraps of his nightmares. They needed the protection.
“Kiddos? Let your old Pappy Patton in, m‘kay?” One of the wolves approached the door, not a growl but a rumble in the back of his throat. “Please?” Patton’s voice was weaker this time, a little shaky. Yeah, he knew how the wolves had grown.
“Seneca, come here,” Logan called and he immediately trotted over to him as the door creaked open.
“Oh, Logan, thank gosh you’re alright!” Patton tumbled into the room, hands fluttery and tugging at the paw sleeves of his dorky ass cardigan. Catigan. Remus should give it claws and they could come out whenever Pattycake gets angry or scared and he wouldn’t be able to fake it anymore.
“Of course I am alright,” Logan frowned and continued to pet Seneca and Hypatia. Zeno was under the bed, watching with those hungry eyes. “To think I would be otherwise is absurd.”
As if Remus would hurt the nerd. 
Patton’s mouth worked silently like the words would fall in his open mouth “W—well, I…” he finally stammered, slinking around Remus’ outstretched legs and crouched down in front of Logan. Hypatia flipped over and lay on her belly, ears up and muscles coiled. Deep brown-black eyes followed Patton as he frog-sat in front of them. “I—I didn’t mean it like that, K—Kiddo. I just meant it had been a while since Logan was… y’know… home where he belongs.”
“And I suppose you are the person in charge of determining where I belong?” Logan’s voice was a knife slicing through the air and Patton’s flesh. The Heart stands there, holding on to the ribbons of his skin and his shocked, sad eyes are wide like he can hardly believe Logic, Logan, his Logan didn’t just fall over and get in line and march out of his room with his tail between his legs.
“Well… yeah, Kiddo.” Patton’s face scrunched up like he couldn’t understand. “That’s my whole job, well a lot of it. I’m Thomas’ Morality and staying down here with—” His voice dropped to a whisper. “With Remus isn’t where you’re needed.”
Patton was still crouched in front of Logan, just staring at him with big eyes. “Nice, doggie,” he murmured and reached over Hypatia’s head to touch Logan’s hand. She growled a quiet warning and instead of taking Patton's hand, Logan pet the top of her head.
“Everything is okay,” he whispered to the wolf before looking up at Patton. “You do not need me, you do not listen to me.” 
“No, Kiddo, that’s—”
“And still you interrupt me!” He barely raised his voice but the new lights flickered in his room and all three wolves whined. His fingers flexed and tightened into a fist. The tendons scrape and snap over the bones, anger coiling and twisting in every knuckle. “You all have refused to listen to my concerns about the speed with which we were proceeding in our courtship with Nico. You have ignored my warnings that this is simply a palliative that in the end will be only to Thomas' detriment.”
Logan raised one finger and Remus snickered, hoping he changed which finger he held up. “You all have refused to do anything to help Thomas find a healthy way out of his obsession with Nico, waiting for him to text or call back while neglecting his health, his home, and his other friends.”
Remus pouted when, instead of switching fingers, Logan merely held two fingers up in a ‘V.’ Right away, Logan notices Remus’ frown, and flips his hand around, palm facing in and Remus claps and lays his head against Logan’s shoulder with a happy little cackle.
“And, finally, you, Patton, had become irrational, upset, even, that I was winning our argument and the others were disregarding your—“
“Even Jannie?” Remus grabbed his arm, willing his best friend’s transformation into a cartoon villain hadn’t become complete.
“No, Remus,” Logan’s voice was softer and he patted Remus’ hand. “No, Janus merely watched as though magical thinking would lead Thomas to make the right decision to slow down while Roman and Virgil planned their honeymoon.”
“It wasn’t that bad,” Patton muttered, looking down at his hands, fingers wrestling and twisting into knots in his lap. Remus almost felt bad for him. Then his hand throbbed and he remembered who brought the wolf pups into his room all those years ago. To keep him ‘company’ while he thought about what he should be doing to help Thomas.
Fuck him.
“Look, Logan, nobody’s that mad about what you did and we really need you to figure out what to do!” Logan rolled his eyes and Pattycake just got more upset, the little twitch at his left eye spasming and splotches of green spread across his skin. “The police are fingerprinting Thomas right now!” The wolf under the bed growled.
“Right now?” Remus grinned and closed his eyes. With Logan and Patton both in his room and his brother and Janus distracted by the dear old Emo’s panic attack, Remus had a straight—ha!—shot right into Tommy Gun’s mind.
The lights in the police station were blinding but left Thomas squinting, like nothing was bright enough. Screeching metal clanged, echoing against the dirty, cracked linoleum floor, followed by a wailing scream. Dried remnants of Nico’s blood filled the cracks in Thomas’ knuckles. He made a fist, then quickly released it when sharp needles shot up his fingers.
That’s something nobody warns you about. Breaking somebody’s nose doesn’t feel so good for you, either.
Thomas stared down at his hand, his fingers stained with foul-smelling black ink. It had been smeared from nail to nail, covering almost the entire inner surface of each finger. None of the cops seemed to be in a big rush to help him clean it off, either. 
“Have you ever imagined sucking ink off your fingers?”
Remus shivered when Janus stirred in the Mindscape, but as soon as Self-Protection tore his eyes away from Virgil, the Emo started hyperventilating again. “Look at it, Tommy, all black and gloopy at the edge of your nails? Did you know they’d do that? Cover the whole thing like that?”
“I bet Logan did. But Logan can’t come to the phone right now, can he? I bet Logan doesn’t know what it tastes like though. They had to use a lot on your middle finger, too. Is it bitter? Will it turn your tongue black? Will they take a tongue print then?”
“Oooh… maybe that’s a way to get out of this whole mess! ‘Officer! Help me get this ink off my tongue. Maybe you need to use your big—”
Janus was moving closer, abandoning Virgil’s side and anxiety rippled through the Mindscape. “Go on, Tommy,” Remus whispered. “Taste it taste it taste it taste it taste it taste it taste—”
“Eww!” Patton squealed. “Ugh," he gagged, and hacked. "That’s horrible!”
“That is most unpleasant,” Logan muttered. “And an ineffective cleaning technique.”
Remus opened his eyes. Back in his room now, both hands slapped over his mouth, barely muffling his cackle. Logan didn’t crack a smile. Instead, he sighed and took off his glasses, pinching the bridge of his nose like he could feel his own face break, little bone shards crackling under his fingers.
“Fine,” he sighed again. “Go on, Hypatia, to your corner,” Logan muttered. Remus watched, eyes growing wider and wider and he shook his head. He couldn’t move his hands, plastered over his mouth.
“Thomas needs Logan now.” The Heart patted Remus’ knee, gently pressing it back down when he tried to follow. The floor softened and grew sticky and viscous like molasses. Or tar.
Remus threw himself in their path. His body stretched and twisted, ass and thighs trapped stuck in the glue-like cement. Flypaper. Or a rat trap. Patton looked down at him like he might squish him, crushing his skull and putting him out of his misery. Instead, he left him railing in his prison and led Logan around him, nimbly side-stepping his flayed elbows and studiously avoiding his eyes.
The wolves trotted behind Logan and Patton, then turned to face Remus, saliva-soaked maws higher than his eye level. They licked their lips, yellowed teeth dripping. Hungry.
Remus shook and screamed and begged; muffled, dulled shouts and pleas covered by his own hands.
“I will not leave you here.” Logan promised. Tears sizzled in his eyes, blinding him and Remus couldn’t tell if Logan had even bothered to fucking look back. The room grew darker, too. “I will return for you, Remus.” The words burned in his ears.
“Bullshit!” Remus snarls and throws a brick at the lying nerd’s face. “‘Falsehood!’” he spat.
Or he would’ve if Janus wasn’t controlling his words and his hands with that slimy iron first.
“His scales are just smooth. To the best of my knowledge, he does not excrete slime.”
“Bullshit!” Fucker was slimy. Judas knew what he was really saying. 
Logan looked back over his shoulder then let his head fall and he left with Patton, the door clanging shut behind them just like the police station gates. It was quiet compared to the wolves’ growls and tears poured down Remus’ cheeks, finally loosening his hands, pools of hot, salty water dissolving the floor’s binding on his feet and backside.
Remus leapt off the floor and onto his bed and, hands free, but too late to beg Logan to stay, he yanked the covers up and over his head
Logan… left.
Everyone leaves.
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the-fiction-witch · 1 year
Text
The Newest Witch
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Media irl
Character Thomas Brodie Sangster
Couple Thomas X Reader
Rating sweet
Concept bride of the devil
(prequel to the last to leave me)
I ran as fast as my little legs could carry me through the tall grass, between tree and toadstool, past owl, crow and spiders. This woods was dark but there was nowhere left now to go. The village wanted nothing to do with me. My family burnt. I was all alone. With little hope to survive the night. I found a little spot close by a trees edge to hopefully huddle myself in to try and get some rest.
"Girl. What are you doing here?" A voice asked I looked up and saw the tall woman in a long black coat with a raven on her shoulder she was heavily pregnant and looked down on me with an evil look
"I'm sorry i-"
"What are you doing here?" She asks again
"I have nowhere else to go" I cried
"What's wrong?" She asks coming down to my level
"They burnt my family, our home. They banished me away. I can only run so far. I don't know where else to go"
"Come with me" she says
"You - you mean it?'
"Come. I may have a use for you" she says helping me to my feet.
She lead me through the woods to a small cottage full of dark items… I was fearful at first but overtime she showed me they meant no harm at least not to me. I cleaned, cooked, did lots of little things for her many of which she was unable to do as her stomach grew more and more. She allowed me to sleep In a small bed in the kitchen but I didn't mind a roof and food was more luck than I deserved often on full moons she would be gone for long periods of time but I didn't question her.
"Y/n. Come" she said getting her basket of things
"Yes miss" I nodded hurrying with her she lead me though the woods for what felt like hours til we arrived at a tall weeping willow tree
"Remain silent. And don't run" she demanded I nodded and follow her as she stepped inside beyond the leaves finding a small alter with a black candle burning a black flame she knelt there giving the alter offerings before returning to her feet. She waited staring at the tree I was confused about to speak when suddenly a hellish creature emerged from behind the tree skin as black as coal, wings like a harsh bat, and teeth of a wolf I wanted to scream but she meerly stood still. "I want to speak to him,"
"He's busy"
"I will not be fobbed off with those excuses Malawi. I demand to see him. Tonight"
He moved closer to her but still she stood strong licking his lips "you demand. Do ya? What makes you think you can demand anything of… the master"
"I must see him. I am his bride. If ever that meant anything to him he will see me tonight."
"Pass your message in the usual channels and get back to work"
"I will not tend the candle."
"What!'
"I will not tend the candle. Not a day more. Until he sees me."
The creature went back behind the tree dispersing as quickly as he came we waited in a hushed silence until a man emerged…
He was… admittedly handsome as soon as I saw him I felt butterflies in my stomach. He was tall. Thin. A head of blonde hair. In tight pants, boots and doing up a loose shirt buttoning it as he emerged. He leant on the tree running a hand thought his hair and sighing
"What do you want Elizabeth?"
"To see the husband I haven't seen in twenty years"
"I've been busy." He snapped "you only wanna see me when you want something. I've got enough work to do. I can't be at your beck and call all night Lizzy"
"And yet you expect me to fuel and guard your candle all moons?"
"That's your job isn't it!" He yelled but pulled back as he noticed me "who's she?"
"My assistant. Nothing more" she says "now can I give you my message or not"
"Fine. What do you have to say?"
"... I renounce my position" she said and as she did everything froze. The air. The grass. The candles flame stopped as of frozen in time his stern face melted before he spoke
"You don't mean that"
"I do." She says "I have been your bride Thomas. For sixty four years. I have seen you four times since our wedding. You never speak with me. Send your demons to do your dirty work"
"I can-"
"It's not just that. I've lived a long time Thomas… long enough." She says "I have found a man on this earth who wishes to spend his every moment with me it'll be a shorter life but a better one. I am already with child. My mind is made up"
"I understand." He nods "for what it's worth… I'm sorry. You were a fine witch. An a fine bride to me."
"Thank you" she smiled "I relinquish, the ring. The union and crown. To live a mortal life." She says
"I accept you departure" he nods and the moment he uttered those words wind began again the candle turned white still burning it's black flame but lower then before
"But… I will not leave your candle to extinguish"
"No?"
"Y/n" she says bringing me close "I leave my position to her if she wants it."
"Do you?"
"I… uhh" I stuttered unsure what was happening
"She's too young." He says "perhaps she'll accept in time." He says before coming to my level holding my hand as he did she left leaving us alone together "do you know… who I am?"
"I don't I'm sorry -"
"It's alright. My name is Thomas. I rule the world beyond this one. Master of magic. Darkness. Fear. And evil. King of all demons."
I gasped
"Does that frighten you?"
"... You don't frighten me"
"You're sweet. Brave. For such a little girl." He says "this tree is one of many. The wells of power for me in this world but also doors for those who's time has come. This candle must burn or my power will fade."
"But your power is evil"
"True. But I bring balance. All light needs a shadow little one. With or without me there will be evil. We just ensure its where it should be"
"What does that mean for me?"
"If you take up the reins of your predecessor you will gain her powers. And her responsibilities. Endless magic. Endless life. All for just a little bit of care for my candle that all I ask"
"That's all?"
"That's all. Keep my candle burning, be one of my witches"
"Do i-"
"No. You have time to decide my dear. My candle will burn without our intervention until your eighteenth birthday. I will need to know by then" he says "until then. If you can spare some flowers, a bit of bread that would be much appreciated" he says giving my head a kiss before he disappeared behind the tree
I wasn't sure how to feel so I left headed back to the cottage but I found it empty no sign of her things only a note
"The house is yours now. Use it well. Take your time to ponder his proposal. Being one of his witches isn't as glamorous as it sounds"
I kept up the little cottage and did as he asked of me bringing things to the tree whenever I could, until the day came when I had to decide even if I had known my answer for years. I walked across the woods to the tall tree leaving my offerings and caring for the candle when I saw him appear from behind the tree as last I saw him having not aged a day. He saw me and looked confused looking me up and down as I stood
"I… uhhh" he said very confused looking around a little "y/n?" He asks careful
"Yes" I blushed
"Y/n!" He said in shock "holy hell. I uhhh hi"
"Hi, I've been taking care of the candle as you asked. And I have made my decision honestly I made it quiet a while ago" o explained but he just stood leaning his elbow on the tree and his hand on his face looking at me with a wide smile
"Hum? Oh right." He nods shaking himself out of his head "sorry you uhhh you grew up"
"I did" I blushed
"You look beautiful" he smiled"but you were saying? About a decision?"
"Yes. I would like to care for the candle. And the tree. And the magic."
"You would? Truly?"
"Yes"
"You know what that entails?'
"I do"
"It would mean you are sworn to me. One of my witches. One of my brides"
"I understand that."
"And still?"
"Yes"
"I knew it" he smiled taking my hand
"You did?'
"I did. Are you ready?"
"I am" I smiled
"Then swear it" he smiled "or did she not tell you that?"
"No"
"Here" he says handing me a bit of paper from his pocket "say these words. Mean then truly."
I nodded and read over the paper trying to learn it so I didn't have to read directly
"I swear. Before the full moon light. That I will mind the candle as long as it burns. My life and it's flame are one in the same. I will be a guardian of this secret place for all of my time."
"I accept you as my newest witch" he nods and as he did the flame sparked up higher then I had ever seen it the wax turning blue "do you take me. In full knowledge of what I am. To be my bride. For now and all moons to come"
"I… I do"
"You swear to keep our magic and our… relationship a secret from the world for all of your life?"
"I will"
"If ever you want to leave me. You have only to renounce your magic. But it all goes, me, the magic, your immortal life, all of it. And you will mean nothing more to me then any other human when your time comes"
"I understand. And if I never renounce it"
"Then you'll be my bride forever. And if anything happens to you you'll come down there with me and be my queen"
"Okay,"
"Okay?"
"I accept" I nodded offering my hand he took it stroking my wrist running his hand across my own leaving a devilish mark on my skin
"Then may I kiss my bride?"
"You may" I blushed he smiled and leant down to gently kiss me I happily kissed him back leaving us nuzzled together kissing for quiet a while till he pulled back
"Whoa… your my new favorite" he Cooes
"How many brides do you have?" I asked tenderly
"Uhhh you're thirteen. I think. I need to see a couple actually I think they might be leaving me"
"Oh I'm sorry'
"It's fine happens. But so long as I still have you I don't mind" he smiled giving me another kiss "I won't mind at all" he smirked looking at my dress "I need to get back to work I'm afraid"
"That's okay, your busy"
"Not to busy for my little bride. I'll visit when I can I promise" he says "and as we're now married, I got you something, to keep you company while i'm gone" he says disappearing behind the tree but returning seconds later with a small black kitten in his arms "go on then, go to your new mummy" he smiled letting the little kitten wonder over to me so I picked him up
"Awwww he's adorable'
"He's all yours. I'm sure you'll take good care of him" he smiled
"Does he have a name?"
"Whatever you want to came him,"
"Hummm smokey"
"Perfect. You two look after each other" he says giving my head and the cats head a kiss "ohh and I almost forgot" he says clicking his fingers and suddenly appeared a dark old book "your spell book my little witch. Take care of it. It'll update itself as needed."
"Thank you"
"You're welcome. Now I'll see you soon. I promise" he smiled giving me one last kiss before heading behind the tree and disappearing.
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