#angst BUT HAPPY ENDING IM SORRY

[ca-8]

"Thank You, Angel..." (Part 1 of ???)

Silence screamed.

Drops of decay either echoed in the distance or fell inches from his withered nose. They aided in the cackles and chirps and growls that erupted from within each shadow. Each shadow that held home of the little critters with those little desperate, famished white eyes and wide toothless grins ready to devour anything with even a hint of a pulse. And when those critters couldn't stand the empty pits of their stomachs, those cackles and chirps and growls and drops of decay sang along with the tormenting squelches and tears of his miserly flesh ripping off and into those widened, toothless grins. And when they were done, after hours of slow, burning agony and screaming filling their stomachs, and the decay hushed to sleep as those horrible little critters scurried off toward their master -

silence screamed.

DogDay hated it all. He hated each sound of falling wood or concrete or spare intestine hitting the floor. He despised the critter's sounds as they drew near. But most of all, he hated the silence, because it was a constant reminder that his friends were gone and no hope gave a breath.

All alone. Always alone. With nothing but a wonder as to when he would finally draw his last breath.

Poppy's words once gave him back a lifelike glimmer. She speculated that someone had to come back here to save them all, an ex-worker, a total stranger -

an Angel, perhaps.

Just someone, anyone who can release them of this constant, lingering, rotting despair.

But so much time has passed. DogDay lost count at…he didn't even know, it's just been years and years and years, perhaps even decades. An eternity of this sickening silence since the day their revolutionary feast took place.

That glimmer was smothered out long ago.

.

.

.

.

.

Were those footsteps?

Not the little pitter-patter of those godforsaken critters, no - human footsteps. They were distant, but carefully drew near. As they closed the distance, a shriek from those little monsters echoed throughout the prison.

DogDay's head perked up, but only slightly. If he had a little more energy he'd call out for help, and more certainty too. Maybe he was finally going mad. Maybe what's left inside his head is feeding him false hope with these made up sounds hinting to a rescue.

No, not a rescue. Whatever he had left was drowned in the past.

His head slumped back down, and critter's shrieks halted. But the footsteps grew closer. DogDay didn't want to remove his gaze from the floor and risk disappointment, he knew it was nothing, that even if someone managed to sneak in here, there was no way they would survive this hell. He knew that thing was right, no one was coming to save-

"Oooooh nooo…"

His head sprung up, earning a little gasp from a

a human. An actual human, standing right there in front of him. It - They - couldn't be a hallucination, could it?

No. No hallucination. No human either. With how those lights beamed down on their glowing, moving skin and illuminating the life in those eyes, this was a blessing from Above. "Hello…?"

DogDay realized they were inching closer, but he was too stunned to flinch or tell them to get away. He could only voice his stagger.

"You…You're Poppy's Angel," he choked out through his voice box. "Come to save us…!"

The Angel blinked. "Uh, yeah…" Their eyes were widened; no surprise, anyone not too familiar with this decrepit place would be shocked to see him like this. A pathetic, filthy excuse of a dog wasting away. That's what they were thinking. They had to be. "Nothing left to save, not here…" He held his head back down.

"What're you talking about?" Their voice was as sweet as honey, so filled with life.

"You're in CatNap's home, Angel. Their home." Just saying that thing's name left a disgusting bittersweet taste in DogDay's mouth, but he was given a second chance at being useful, he had to take it.

"A million of pairs of eyes are on you right now," he continued. "Watching…waiting….hungry." A faint spark of terror flooded the (e/c) in those beautiful, breathing eyes. "They want nothing more than to crawl beneath your skin and eat away at you bit by little bit." He spat out the last word before heaving in a gasp. "…fill what feels empty inside themselves."

"I-Is that…what happened to you, DogDay….?" they asked, eyeing the bitter remains of his lower half.

They knew his name. He appreciated that, although couldn't express it too much. "I'm afraid so, Angel. Because of…that…that thing. CatNap. The Prototype is his god, and this is what he does to heretics."

The Angel snuck a glance at the darkened hallway outside their halo and quickly returned their gaze to DogDay. He continued.

"These little toys follow CatNap to avoid that very fate, and in return, they are fed." DogDay coughed. Black substance spewed out of his mouth and onto the floor. "We tried to fight it, the Prototype's control. I'm…the last of the smiling cri-"

His right arm fell to his side.

…Wait.

DogDay's ears bucked up and he turned to his side. His right arm dangled heavily right by his torso, and the belts that were supposed to be supporting it up to the ceiling were cut short. His gaze whirled to his left side and saw the Angel reaching up to cut off the other belts.

"Angel! Wh-Wh-What're you doing?" he frantically yelped, swinging his torso back and forth.

"Sorry to cut your speech-thing off so quickly, but I think we may have a problem!"

It was at that moment DogDay heard the heightening shrills and screeches from the critters. A sharp chill ran down him and his heart stopped. They were coming; so many were coming! Coming for him! He was about to die if they couldn't get away!

"Angel, please, go! Leave me! Save yourself!" he pleaded desperately. A growl erupted right next to his ear, and DogDay turned to come face-to-face with a miniature Bobby Bearhug. A scream almost escaped his throat until a small flare flew past his face and shot mini Bobby back into the darkness.

"I'm sorry, but could you stop moving so much? This is hard enough as it is!" As they said that, their knife (which he noticed was strangely colorfully patched together) cut through the first of the two left belts. His body darted right towards the floor, but not until Angel caught him with their arm.

"Angel PLEASE! I beg you!" Tears pricked his empty sockets. The shrills were so loud they might as well be on top of them.

But the Angel kept their gaze glued onto the last belt, and as soon as mini CraftyCorn entered the cell, he was finally free.

The Angel hopped down and kicked mini CraftyCorn back into DogDay's worst nightmare: a sea of predators mirroring his friend's appearances. The Angel spun around and ran the opposite direction.

"Don't worry, I got yo- OOOOOO-!!!" The floor collapsed beneath them, and they landed right onto the bottom floor. Well, more like the Angel fell right onto the floor with DogDay cushioned safely on top of them.

This couldn't possible get any worse.

DogDay tried turning his head. "Angel? Are you okay? I'm so sorry! I-I didn't mean it! I didn't mean for this to happen! I swear!" He wanted to get off of them to ease whatever pain they were in, but his arms were held up for so long, he could barely even feel anything in them anymore. 'Pathetic! I'm pathetic!'

"I'm fine…I think-!" The Angel got up and sprinted to the end of the hallway. "Just don't look back!"

They held DogDay in a position where his only option was to look back. Snuggled tightly underneath their arm, he watched as a tsunami of critters dashed towards them, snarling with hunger. Hunger for him and his Angel.

He whimpered loudly until they spun him around. "Sorry-! Sorry! I got you!" A flash of another critter was summoned to the right, then suddenly wished away by the bright flash of the Angel's flare. DogDay couldn't do anything, only let his heart squeeze and whimper at the sudden sight of painful reminders until they're blown away by the Angel. He looked up, their gaze was locked forward, doing what he should be doing.

But he couldn't. He was worthless. Just like that day.

The poor withered dog squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn't watch anymore. If it weren't for his weak arms, he would cover his ears as the screams of the damned drew ever so near, or maybe do something actually useful. He felt himself get heaved up and a sudden wind blew against his tattered face. Then, he was lowered, and the Angel gasped for air.

Where were they going? Was there even an exit? He couldn't look. He didn't want to look. If he opened his eyes he would only see the Angel get devoured and it would be all his fault.

It wasn't until they were both thrusted into the air that his eyes were finally forced open. Below them was a deep pit of darkness with the critters nearing the edge they hurled over. For a second, he thought they had jumped towards an everlasting sleep, until the Angel landed right onto a lift.

The door shut behind them, and devastating shrills and shrieks were muffled. They were….safe. DogDay was safe, and the Angel didn't die. He hadn't killed them after all.

The Angel gently lowered him onto the floor of the lift and pressed the button to lower them back into, if he could remember correctly….Playcare. They collapsed onto the floor, and the thud snapped him back to reality.

"Angel! Are you okay? Are you hurt? I'm so sorry!" DogDay tried to haul himself towards them until they let out a strange chuckle.

"That…holy shit. That was awesome! But also terrifying. And tiring. God, my legs, I'll be surprised if I can even walk once we get down there. What were those things? You called them critters? I kinda feel bad for thinking they were kinda cute now, SHEESH those little devils were relentless!"

The Angel went on and on and on and…not a hint of anger was on their face. DogDay only stared at them in disbelief. They hopped on their knees and leaned closer to him, making him flinch.

"Anyways, are you okay? I don't know why you're asking me, you're clearly the one who needs help here! How long have you been down here? Actually don't answer that. What happened to you-? Wait, wait, don't answer that either, sorry!"

"You…." He finally choked out something. "You…saved me."

"…Well yeah!" A big smile graced their lips. How were they glowing even brighter than before?

"You…You saved me…!"

"….Yeah! Go team!"

Something was building up in his throat. More tears streamed down his face, but there weren't any rivers of regret or disappointment or self-hatred… DogDay leaned into his Angel's chest.

"Oh, hello!" they said cheerfully.

DogDay sniffed and looked up, and for once, a big, genuine smile filled his face. "Thank you, Angel…! Thank you so much!"

They froze there for a second, and their stunned expression melted to that of warmth. He felt their hands wrap around him and gently caress his back. Nothing could ever feel more soothing.

Softly, they giggled. "Hey, call me (Y/n), alright? You're giving me too much credit." ͙۪۪̥ ͙ ♡𐡘 𐡘 𐡘 𐡘♡ ͙ ͙۪۪̥ ͙͙ ͙۪۪̥ ͙ ♡𐡘 𐡘 𐡘 𐡘♡ ͙ ͙۪۪̥ ͙͙ ͙۪۪̥ ͙ ♡𐡘 𐡘 𐡘 𐡘♡ ͙ ͙۪۪̥ ͙͙ ͙۪۪̥ ͙ ♡𐡘 𐡘 𐡘 𐡘♡ ͙ ͙۪۪̥ ͙͙ ͙۪۪̥ ͙

Hey guys! Like what ya saw? Well you can commission your own private piece now!! Read more about that here! Thanks so much for reading, and have a great day!~ 💜💜💜

#dogday #dogday x reader #poppy's playtime #catnap #poppy playtime chapter 3 #canon x reader #x reader #fanfiction #wholesome #my baby #baby boy #i love this boi so much #we should've gotten the option to save him #and Im doing dogday because people have been saying he's in his mid 20s #I am not comfortable with the (big bodies) catnap x dogday ship y'all im sorry lmao #smiling critters #gender neutral y/n #open commissions #angst with a happy ending

[writingsfromhome]

Dos and Don’ts IV

A/N: hello my loves this final part to this fic completes the birth of one of my favourite fics I’ve written. Thank you for reading and enjoying it just as much—every like, comment, and dm meant the world <3

Parts: 1 / 2 / 3 / 4

—————————————————

We have an extra day in Barcelona and the team is buzzing to enjoy their nightlife since we could sleep all day tomorrow. I’d visited here while I was a uni student so I give some suggestions.

Harry’s a little on edge the whole time. Earlier today some headline from a musician Harry worked with was taken out of context and thus took the internet by storm. Now he was being flooded with people wanting to know his thoughts and feelings. It was a hot topic.

With a joint effort of me, Jeff, and Graham, we tried to keep the spotlight on his Barcelona show. Well my role was mostly to screen Harry from seeing any further discourse online.

The show itself was one of the loudest I’d been to—I was glad I had my own ear protection. The tense Harry falls away and he’s electric on stage. Even coming backstage he’s on a high; he hugs the crew and thanks everyone like he usually did at the end of shows and disappears into his dressing room with Jeff. They look like they’re talking intensely.

“So,” Sarah slides in beside me. “We noticed you’re a bit different coming back. What’s happened?”

I try to play dumb but the girls keep pushing.

“Me and my fiancé ended things,” I confess. They gasp, Claire’s eyes actually fill with tears.

“Shh!” I shush them. “Keep it on the down low please I don’t want anyone to know.”

“But y/n why are you even here!? Is it because of tour! I’m sure Harry could have rearranged things-“

“No no,” I appreciated their support but I didn’t want to hash things out. “It’s just…I think it was a long time coming. God, I don’t wanna cry. I’m good. For now. And I want to be on tour I need the distraction.”

“I get it,” they sympathize. “We’re gonna make you forget so hard tonight.”

“Okay but don’t,” I look around us to make sure there was nobody else around. “Please don’t tell Harry. Seriously please. I don’t want him to know especially. I don’t want him to treat me differently or something.”

“Lips are sealed.” Sarah zips her mouth. “But we can all tell you’re off. It’s hard not to practically living together these last couple months. If he asks we’ll say…”

“Just say she’s on a break?” Charlie suggests.

“Yeah,” I shrug. “Things are complicated, I’m on a break, whatever that’s fine.”

The girls lean towards me and envelop me in a hug. It reminds me of my friends I’d said goodbye to.

“Thanks,” I say through tears.

And the girls hold me to their promise.

After we get dressed for the night—I chose a corset-style top and trousers—we head out. The sun dips below the horizon and the old city is cast in a warm orange glow that could inspire anyone who set eyes on it. String lights come on and music plays from various doors; the city is alive.

We tease each other about looking so glam as we wander the narrow cobblestone streets. Aside from the shows we all wore sweats and tees.

Every place we pass sets my senses alight. We grab tapas from a place that smells irresistible and chat over each other about tonight’s wicked show. I continue avoiding Harry by sitting as far away from him as I can get.

As we wander off in search of the club I can’t help but feel a twinge at how incredibly romantic the moonlit streets felt.

The club is loud and alive, the noise levels even feel normal after the roar of the last few of Harry’s shows. My mood starts shooting up steadily as I drink in the energy around me.

We join the crowd and I give away my worries and my annoyances to enjoy the music. I feel it in my chest and for a blissful moment I’m grateful for my whole damn life despite everything.

“Cute guy!” Someone shouts in my ear.

Charlie nudges me to one of the guys dancing nearby. “Get distracted!”

I shake my head no.

“Do it!” She cheers. It barely travels to me. She grabs Claire’s hand and tugs her, letting her in on the plan and they goad me into going for it.

I motion a drink. I’d need another shot for the courage.

We trail back to the bar and do a round of shots, and they grin with thumbs up as I hesitantly enter the crowd again.

The dude they pointed out is tall and beautiful. Like beautiful not even handsome. I get stuck looking up at him in awe, he wasn’t really my type. A tad too pretty boy but when he notices me looking he smiles and I’m won over. I couldn’t deny a good smile.

“Hey!” He turns his body to me. At least I think he say hey.

“Hey!” I shout back.

“Que pasa?”

“What?!” I couldn’t hear a single thing. What did I expect.

He smiles and takes my hand that had been anxiously playing with the edge of my top. The other has a hand splint that I’d received in Madrid. Apparently I sprained my fingers.

The stranger wriggles both my hands to loosen them, raising his brow at the splint. I laugh.

He asks in my ear but I don’t understand. It sounds like a question, something bylar. When I scrunch my brows he laughs, “Dance! We dance!?”

“Dance!” I laugh. He was cute! “Yes! I want to dance with you!”

“Vamos,” he pulls me in. I understood that at least.

I used to do this in uni, I think. I should be able to do it again.

He teases me a little because I’m so tense. His hands knead down my back to my waist to get me to relax. It feels nice, being touched by a man that looks like he was carved from marble but filled with music.

I begin to find my rhythm and sway with him, eventually letting go completely. He compliments me as I start to move with him and pretty soon I’ve channeled my 20-year-old self. It feels pretty spectacular.

When his lips ghost my cheek I don’t protest. Right now, I felt good. Everything was on the back burner’s back burner and I felt grounded in this nighclub with this random stranger who was paying attention to me, just me. And it’s just us. And it’s just temporary. And I feel good.

When I turn around, my back to his chest, he moves my hair to the side and kisses down my neck. It felt good.

I run my hand up into his hair and he moves lower murmuring foreign words on my skin, our bodies still dancing in the same language, his hands still gripping my waist and my hips. I feel blissed out.

It ends in a split second.

“What are you doing?” Harry’s suddenly tugging me towards him. His mouth makes the words I just fill them in with his annoyingly bossy voice.

“Hey man,” the guy I’m dancing with tries to get in between us.

“What are you doing!?” I snatch my hand away from Harry.

Harry puts his hand on my partner’s chest and says something to him, maybe in Spanish. He looks at me with puppy dog eyes and I look at Harry. What had he said.

“What did you say?” I ask. I try to call back my dancing partner but he just salutes me with a smile and fades into the crowd. No wait, I’m being dragged away.

“Y/n what are you doing out there?”

“What am I doing?” I shout. “What are you?! I was having a nice time with that guy what did you say to him?”

He walks away, further back into the edges of the club. There’s a few people milling about with a number of them involved in heavy makeout sessions.

Harry turns to face me finally. “You’re engaged y/n, Claire and Sarah said things are complicated at home is that why you’re doing this?”

“What!” I throw my hands up, tears prick my eyes. What the fuck was his problem! Since when did he care? “Why do you care?! Yes, things are complicated and I was getting my mind off of said things—what is your issue? You want to drag me back here and remind me of how shitty things have been?”

“This isn’t the way,” Harry insists. “You don’t even know that guy!”

“Whatever I’m over this convo.”

I turn to leave but Harry grabs my hand, the one in the splint, and pulls me back.

“Sorry,” he lets go of the splint. Then picks it up again. “Look. I’m worried about you. This isn’t you, you’re not the girl that goes home with another guy when your fiancé is back at home! I just don’t want you making any regrets.”

“Oh is that it,” I step towards him so my hand isn’t so outstretched. He stands still but on my second step he inches back. “Since when did you get a high horse huh? Don’t tell me who I am and who I’m not. You barely know me! If I want to make decisions I regret I can do that. They’re mine to make.”

“No. Y/n, as mad as you are don’t go home with a stranger.”

“As if you don’t!” I scoff. “What’s your real agenda here? What’s going on?”

“Nothing!” He insists.

“Why do you suddenly care so much about my chastity?”

“It’s for your own good!”

He’s lying. I know he’s lying and I don’t know why he pulled me away from my beautiful Spanish dance partner but I was actually relaxing and now he’s put me right back into this crazed and tense headspace I kept finding myself in.

Fine, I decide. I could make him regret it.

“Really? You care about my morality that much?” I ask.

With my hand flat on his chest I’ve pushed him further into the wall behind him. He watches me with a guarded look.

But I want him unguarded, vulnerable. The same way he’s made me feel. I lean in, “Are you really worried about the technicalities of me cheating on my fiancé?”

I hover a half foot from his lips. Finally his eyes flicker down to my lips and I know I’ve got him.

I slide my hand up his chest and when my hand inches up the skin of his throat his eyes grow unguarded and heady with lust. He doesn’t push me away. He doesn’t say no.

Hypocrite.

I drop my hand.

“That’s what I thought Mr. Styles.”

I watch for a wonderful moment as the lust clears from his eyes and he realizes what happened. Shame, embarrassment, resignation, and then anger.

I spin on my heel and head away from him. He could deal with the consequences of his actions all on his own.

I’m half-afraid he’ll come after me but luckily I make it out of the club alone.

“He’s such a dick,” I say more to myself. Just to get it out because I’m pissed. “Who the fuck does he think he is!?”

My night is over. I just want to take this all off and forget about it. Maybe I can lock myself in my room and raid the mini-fridge, get drunk and cry myself to sleep. Those seemed like the best options right now.

I take an uber to the hotel. As I walk up to it I notice a weird crowd outside. For nearly 2am I wasn’t expecting this and my instincts kick in that this wasn’t normal. Especially when I notice all the camera straps.

“Excuse me,” I ask the front desk. “Why are there a bunch of paparazzi outside?”

“Is there?” The man behind the counter asks. “Sorry we will tell them to leave. Are you staying with us?”

“That’s a privacy concern out there, and a concern with your staff because they’re here. How do they know who’s staying here?!”

It seems to dawn on him I wasn’t just asking out of curiosity. He promises me he’ll get management. In the meantime I call Jeff and explain the situation. He starts to panic the way I hated, looking for something to blame. He calls Graham who sounds like he’s driving in nascar. It’s a very noisy and over-stimulating conversation.

“Call Harry!” Jeff orders. “Tell him he cannot go back to the hotel no matter what! Fucking vultures man!”

“Y/N,” Graham says in a calmer voice. “You need to go back to where Harry is with some sort of disguise. A hat or sunglasses. That sort of thing-“

“It’s night.”

“Yes night. No glasses. Book the closest hotel you can find. Tell his band they can come back, but to go through the back. They might get spotted but they’re trained on dodging questions. That will keep the vultures there waiting for Harry and we can pick you two up back to the airport tomorrow morning. Where’s after this?”

“Glasgow,” I bite my nail as I think. I had to call Harry asap. What if he was on his way back. “I gotta go now to call him though. Talk later.”

I hang up and call Harry. He picks up the second time.

I explain the situation and he reacts the same way as Jeff, swearing and cursing the papps. I tell him what I was going to do and tell him to go right back into the club. To pass on the word to the team even though I was going to send them a text.

I head up to my room and grab what fits in my bag. I didn’t have Harry’s room key so I decide he’d have to wear my hat and head back out. The vultures stay waiting, now just a few feet further away from the entrance.

I speak briefly to management—I figured Jeff could talk to them and give his classic earful.

On the drive I find a nearby hotel to the club and collect Harry to get him there. We’re too tense to talk when we meet up. Once inside again, I tell him to sit in the lounge while I go up to the desk.

Act above it all, I channel a rich bitch. We needed privacy and we needed nobody to know Harry was here.

“Hi I need a room.” I say.

“Of course, how many night will you be staying with us.”

I glance back to see where Harry sits. He’s in a wingback chair that’s mostly turned away and with his hair stuffed in the baseball cap you can hardly tell it’s him.

“Just a night. I need your best room please.”

“Absolutely,” the woman smiles and I feel bad for only giving a tight-lipped smile back. I wait as she clicks away, finally looking back to me with a slight frown. “So miss unfortunately we are very booked tonight. There are a couple events going on in the city making things very popular.”

“The best room will do. Preferably large.”

“Well,” she hesitates. “A lot of our larger rooms are taken um. I can offer you a bed with one king, it is a bit smaller because it’s by the elevators. I also have one with a queen that is tucked away in the corner with a better view.”

I wanted to be as far away from Harry as possible but by an elevator was asking for trouble.

“Well, I’d rather stay far away from noise so we’ll take the queen.”

“Is that just you or…” she glances at Harry.

“Yes. Two. We’ve had a rough day of travel he’s just resting.”

I hand over ID and my card, trying not to balk at the total. At least I’ll get reimbursed.

“Do you have any bags?” The concierge swoops in as I get the key card.

“No! No. Like I said, bad travel day. We just need somewhere to sleep and we’ll reunite with the bags once they arrive tomorrow.”

They leave us alone after that. I hoped it was because I’d been standoffish enough and not plain weird.

The elevator ride up to the 8th floor is stony and I spend the spare second to text Jeff and Graham the hotel’s address.

The room itself is pretty sub-par and the adrenaline of getting Harry here safely wears off.

I drop my bag by the door and pull out my toiletry bag.

“I don’t have clothes for you to change into, I didn’t have your room key.”

“Yeah. S’fine. I’ll just sleep shirtless unless that bothers you.”

We stare at each other for a tense moment.

“I’m fine with that, you’re the one with the high horse.”

After doing all this for him I wasn’t going to be easy to deal with if he wasn’t going to be easy to deal with.

He chooses to ignore me.

“How the fuck did they know I was staying there? We were under a-“

His phone rings and he answers. Sounds like Jeff.

I use the time to go to the bathroom and finally take off the makeup. I realize I should have grabbed my pjs from my bag too. I take my hair down and massage my scalp with my fingers, letting myself calm down despite the aggressive voices outside.

“Yeah whatever. Keep me updated.” I hear. Great. That was done with.

I leave the bathroom and Harry’s still pacing the floor.

“You’re gonna wear the carpet down if you keep doing that.”

He stops and looks at me, his eyes trail down my body.

“You didn’t bring yourself a change of clothes either?”

“You wish,” I head for my bag again and grab the tee and shorts. “I just forgot them out here.”

“Do you always have to be so snarky?”

Oh, so he wanted to fight. Good news for him, so did I.

“Depends. With you? When you’re being a dick? Yeah. I do.”

“It’s really quite unbecoming.”

“Is it?” I mock his accent. “It’s not proper for a lady to be snarky?”

“I don’t sound like that. You just never let anything go.” He continues.

“I never let anything go?” I repeat.

“Yeah! Ever!”

“What do you want me to let go?” I ask.

“Everything. You’re bothered by everything just let it all fucking go.”

“No like specifically what should I let go?” I turn on him and with each question I stalk towards him. “Being treated like trash by you? Being told I’m replaceable and unnecessary? Getting bossed around about who I can and can’t dance with because you suddenly decide to be the morality police!?”

“Jesus take it down a notch y/n.” We’re fuming as we square off. “I’m not your bloody fiancé.”

“And thank fuck you’re not!” I throw the clothes in my hand on the bed. “You’re my employer Mr. Styles and I’ve been nothing but a good fucking employee for the last year! I try to keep my patience and do everything I can to do my best! You’re the one always trying to blur lines! You’re the one always getting in my damn business when I don’t pay you to!”

With every accusation I poke my finger into his chest and it’s like literally pushing buttons. His face gets stonier and stonier until I’m sure he’s going to crack.

“You wanna know what your fucking issue is?” He swipes my hand away.

“Oh sure tell me, wise Harry Styles who definitely has no issues at all. Tell me.”

“This. This is your fucking issue,” he spits. “You’ve always got such a temper on you! I’m not blurring any bloody lines I check up on you and you get all offended over nothing!”

“Over nothing?” I ask. I laugh sarcastically and walk away from him. I was seeing red. “Over nothing?”

“Yes! I don’t do shite and suddenly you’re trying to bite my dick off.”

“You fucking wish,” I turn on him. “It’s crazy you don’t realize what an absolute jackass you are! We should be refunding all those fans who’ve come out to see you because the man they’re paying for is a fake! You’ve treated me like nothing and embarrassed me countless time-“

“Embarrassed you,” he scoffs.

“Yes!” I go on. “What do you call what you said on our way to Paris huh? You can be so cruel! So if I have a temper it’s justified because you’re one of the worst people I’ve met!”

“What did I say?”

“Are you kidding? You’re going to make me repeat it?” He was crazy. He was depraved and absolutely insane. Or he just hated me.

“I’m not playing a game just tell me!”

“You said I could have skipped the whole tour and nobody would notice.” I say the words that had looped through my head. And of course, he has the audacity to look surprised. “Thanks. A lot! It makes it even worse that you were so casual with your cruelt-“

“You need to stop being so sensitive,” he has the nerve to say. “Then maybe you can manage your temper.”

“I can manage my temper any time but you’re moody like a pre-pubescent teen and that looks to be a lifetime fucking problem!”

“What’s your fucking problem Y/n! What is your problem with me!? Why do you still work for me if you are this angry all the time!”

“I’m not this angry all the time, you just makes me this angry! And I hate you for it!”

“Then quit!”

“Maybe I will!” I had to. After tonight and this blowout I had to. How could I work for Harry like this.

“Great! Then you can take your problems with you.”

“Don’t gaslight me,” how dare he. “You’re not innocent in this! You create my problems and blame me for being this way.”

“Whatever y/n.”

“No.” I wasn’t letting him off the hook. I get in his face again. “Why did you stop me tonight? Why did you keep me from doing what I wanted tonight?”

“What? I told you I was looking out-“

“Bullshit!” I cut him off. “That’s a bullshit excuse, I want to know why!?”

I feel like I’m made of flames and in desperate need of a lobotomy. How could one guy make me this crazy. How could it all revolve around him.

“I was doing it for your own good! But clearly I understand why it’s so fucking complicated with your partner-“

“Don’t you dare talk about him,” I seethe. I was mad. Fuming. I want to get physical, I wish I could throttle him or at the very least access one of the pillows from across the room and smash it to the floor. I want him to see how angry I am because my words are twisted with every angle Harry could find. I wanted him to admit to something he’s been skirting for a long time. “Tell me.”

Harry stares at me with hate in his eyes and I know I have the same look. I wasn’t going to let him get away.

“You don’t even have the balls to admit it,” I poke. “Is this why you’re so hard-headed to anything I say? Because you can’t even admit something like this to yourself?”

“Just shut the fuck up y/n and stop being so mental.”

“I refuse to shut up. I want you to talk.”

His breathing gets faster and I watch him flex his hand. He was as angry as I was. Good.

“You’re a fraud. And I hate you.” I step into his space. Our bodies are a hair’s breadth away from each other’s. I want to show him how mad he makes me. I want to do something. I want him to admit this thing he’s been dancing around. It makes me so mad!

When he starts to shake his head at me I lose it. Instinct takes over where I want to physically show him how angry he was making me. I grab his face in my hands and push my mouth against his. I meet teeth.

But it doesn’t take long for him to respond. To correct the unadulterated anger with purpose.

He pushes back, kissing me harder whilst pushing me against the wall. I feel sandwiched, my chest crushed against his and I bite down on his lip trying to get back some control.

My hands are all over him, grabbing his shirt, running through his hair, pushing under his shirt to touch skin. Harry does the same, pulling at my hair and lifting me onto him.

Our tongues clash together, his hand grabs my ass, squeezing and moving up. His hands feel hot on my skin, his metal rings an icy contrast. Neither of us want to give up control. We keep fighting, just now with our bodies.

“Why can’t you ever just let it go,” he traces his teeth over my collarbone. It all feels too much.

In response I push him back, he stares at me for a heated second before we crash into each other again. We don't care where we are. All that mattered was here and showing the other who was in control. Who hated who the most.

Harry pulls away, his mouth a deep pink from our fight. His eyes are half lidded, his pupils dilated. I can tell he wants this but a part of him hesitates.

"We're doing this," I commit, not taking my eyes off his lips.

"I’m doing this," he growls and lifts me up, any hesitancy washed away. I wrap my legs around him, not thinking about anything but what I was going to do.

He whirls me around and deposits me onto the bed, and his body covers mine while his mouth attack my neck.

He wasn't gentle or slow, but then again, I didn't want him to be. I pull off his shirt, not wanting anything between us, not caring that my nails would leave marks down his back. Leaving something permanent on him sounded exactly what I needed.

I tug on his hair as his teeth come down on my chest. I feel heated as he swears, “Teasing me with this top all night was a fucking sin y/n.”

“Fuck off,” I gasp as he figures out the row of clasps at the front and the icy rings of his fingers presses against my sternum. I grit my teeth, “I didn’t wear this for you.”

His abs contract as he pushes himself back up, his eyes dark as his hands find the clasp on my trousers, undoing them with ease and tugging them off. His other hand comes back up to tilt my chin up.

“D’you really hate me?” He asks.

“Yes,” I respond with zero hesitation.

He moves his body, covering mine with his own again. My breath catches in my throat as he presses his lips to my neck, slowly moving down. He drives me crazy with anticipation and I wriggle up to keep up the pace but he holds me in place. I let out a moan as he kisses my inner thighs, his fingers gripping the tops of them. I'm squirming under his hold, the heat pooling inside of me.

“Do you hate me?” He asks again.

“Yes,” I cry, not wanting to relent to him.

“Good,” he says and that’s the last thing I remember.

The rest is a tangle of limbs, an out-of-body sensation, and seismic wave after wave coursing through my body. It’s unlike anything I’ve experienced before; the fury we felt with each other fuzes to the passion of the moment and it blitzes every damn thought out of my head.

Hours later, or maybe the whole night later—I don’t know but all I do know was that my body was spent and I was barely hanging on.

“I can’t,” I plant my hands on his shoulders and nearly pitch forward just from pausing. His hand splays on my back, keeping me in place as he turns us around.

“Okay?” He asks low.

I nod, grateful that he was taking over.

And after riding out what I know would be my last wave he rolls off of me, and we lay there just trying to catch our breaths.

After a few minutes, I sense him tilting towards me, his eyes on my face. When he stares for so long it becomes obvious, I look back at him.

His eyes are not the same ones that started this mess, they’re breezy meadows of green compared to the icy sea glass from before. But it’s not surprising. With each round and each minute we spent with other tonight, things had grown softer. Not gentle, but softer.

And as we look at each other with the awareness that the anger had bled into the threads of these tangled sheets a long time ago, we’re left with something neither of us want to distinguish. At least I don’t.

His gaze holds something too real for a place like this and I quickly look away and back at the ceiling. I feel his eyes on me a moment longer before he himself turns away to stare at the same ceiling.

“Y/N,” someone suddenly calls my name, tapping my cheeks with a gentle pat. I have to pull myself from the depths of wherever the fuck I just went to open my eyes and look up, at Harry. He looks concerned and asks me a question that I don’t register—I was truly out of it. I must have dozed off.

I push his hand away and grab the closest piece of clothing to wrap around myself in which ends up being a sheet. I take myself to the bathroom to clean up.

I hardly recognize the girl in the mirror. My eyes are blown out and my neck looks like it was rammed by a bull. I can hardly look at the rest of me. I would need to buy something high necked before we got picked up tomorrow morning and use all the concealer I had. I know I marked every inch of him I could find too.

I had never felt that level of passion with anyone. It was unnerving.

My knees collapse under me as I sit on the toilet and try to count the tiles on the opposite wall, just to come back to earth. To my body.

I sense a shadow under the door after I’m in there for a while, I watch it move from one side to the other and then move away. I wait longer, nearly falling asleep there before going back out.

The bed looks a right mess and most of the duvet is twisted to the side. I don’t bother with it, I use the sheet I’m wrapped in and crawl right into bed. Harry seems to have fallen asleep too but as I near sleep I feel the bed dip and the heavy weight of the duvet drapes over me.

I don’t have enough clarity or energy tonight to think about what any of this meant but I know I was right about leaving.

***

We return to London on a Wednesday morning and nearly kiss the ground. Harry was still playing two shows here but getting to go back home instead of a hotel room was enough to make us weep.

I didn’t really have a home to go back to. I’d been thinking about that a lot as the tour took us closer and closer to London. I had texted Gray yesterday and we agreed I could crash there until this weekend to get my stuff together.

London had a metaphorical grey fog over it in my mind. Nothing felt appealing about it and the only thing on my mind these days was home—my childhood home.

I already knew I was going to give in my resignation letter to Harry after tour but I had a 3 week period under contract. I don’t think I could afford a hotel for three weeks and staying with any of my friends is out of the question.

These thoughts kept me preoccupied.

It helped me not to think about that night though. I avoided Harry unless it was for work, returning to the solitude of my first few months working for him. He does the same: curt and avoidant. I know others notice but nobody dares to ask.

It was the most intense thing I’d done in my whole life and that was saying something. There was a way that Harry got under my skin that nobody else could. And it was hard to find a balance after the scales had shifted so far in that direction.

I felt like I had to block it out until I could have space to process it. And yet memories still seeped through when I was quiet for a moment too long or when he’d walk past me with the same cologne as that night and I’d catch a whiff. I was doubly sure this chapter had to close.

When I get back to the flat on Wednesday Gray has vanished as he promised. He told me he’d drop by that evening to talk. Surprisingly, I felt calm about it. I don’t know if it was getting all of that ferocious energy out that had been churning for months, but I feel level-headed and I appreciate the space to myself.

Gray texts me before he arrives. Like this wasn’t the flat he was now paying for alone.

I know what he wanted to talk about—we were all supposed to go to Harry’s last show at the o2 since I had tickets for everyone. Josie was stoked and based on the way she’s been texting me leading up to the day I don’t think she knew. Gray confirms it.

“So,” he rubs the back of his neck. He looked nice in a beanie and corduroy jacket. I wonder if any of the effort was for me, then vanish the thought.

“So,” I echo.

We stand awkwardly across from each other—him propping himself up behind the couch and me leaning against the dining table. Like we needed to get as much furniture between us. Like we hadn’t shared a bed a few weeks ago.

“We should sit?”

“Yeah,” he attempts a laugh and sits on the sofa. I choose the closest chair and turn it to face him. “Yeah. Um, I don’t know how you feel about Saturday. But I haven’t told Josie yet. I haven’t really told anyone.”

I nod, “Me too. Not really. People at work think we’re on a break.”

“Right. Good.” He says. “I’m not tryna lie to people but I don’t really want to get into it…”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “So Josie?”

“I’ll let her know once…once you move out?”

Move out. Of this flat. It’s been home for nearly 3 years.

Gray had surprised me with it when he found it—I had been broke and only been able to pitch in for utilities and groceries but he’d been gracious. He’d been supportive once. But I guess his support had boundaries too. I didn’t entirely blame him for that.

“Sounds good. Or later, maybe when she’s done her exams.”

He leans back on the couch, arms spread over the back and sighs as he studies me. “Yeah of course. I should’ve thought of that. You’re always good at that stuff. She’s gonna be gutted.”

I nod. Not sure what to say to that.

“So you’ll be out on Saturday yeah?” He asks after a while. It seemed both of us had a lot on our minds. But his question stings a little.

“Yep. I’m off for most of the week so I’ll just pack things up. Uhm, with Josie and whatnot I guess we’re still acting like a couple? Will that be weird?”

“Yeah. It will be but we’ve got no other option.”

“Right.” I respond. His voice grows an edge I’m not a fan of. “Well. Thanks for letting me stay here. If you need anything else I guess you can grab it now.”

I want to ask how he’s doing, who he’s staying with, and just hold his face one last time to really remember. But his cold apathy grows like frostbite over the room and creeps into my heart. I always thought where there was love there would always be love but I’m not as sure tonight.

I stay busy and when I can’t sleep at night; I map out a dream, an exit plan home. I write up my resignation letter, I look at flights and rentals and talk things out with my family, I cancel wedding and couple shit, and grieve a fair bit.

On Friday afternoon, my only formal shift this week, I head to Harry’s with an anxious weight in my chest and a buzz in my head from the hope. Hope that this chapter of my life could end soon, and I can head home and recuperate and plan out what my life was going to look like.

Harry’s on a call when I get in. He spares me a glance but I head to the office with my stack of mail. Today was mostly for some housekeeping/admin but I hope to avoid Harry for the most part like I’ve done since that night. My letter sits like a bar of gold in my bag.

I hear him move about the flat. I restock some pantry items, and we speak as little as possible. Going with him to his meeting was my final task for today so I decide it’s a good time to hand in my letter.

I find him sitting in the studio, tapping a pen against the table.

“Mr. Styles?”

“Hm?” He drags his eyes away from his screen to look at me.

“So we’re heading to your meeting in 10. Before then I just wanted to hand this in.”

The envelope stays outstretched in my hand and he eyes it, not taking it.

“What is that?”

“Can you just take it?” I shake it a little, like a bag of treats for a puppy.

His muscles move one inch every ten seconds, that’s how slow he is to sit up in his seat and finally take the letter from my hands. I almost let out a big sigh of relief. The process was finally in place.

“What is it?” He asks again, tearing the corner and down the side like he usually did.

I wait for him to unfold the thirds before answering, “my resignation letter.”

His eyes scan the sheet left to right right to left and when he looks up at me it’s hard to say what he’s thinking.

“Is this a joke?”

“No? Obviously not? I’m handing in my 3 weeks. I’ll also email a copy to Jeff and you.”

“Why are you doing this?” He stands, his tall frame rigid.

“Why? Because I’m…I’m quitting? I think I’ve learned everything I could here a-and it’s time to move on.”

By here I don’t mean working for Harry Styles and co but just here as in London. I’ve learned a fuck ton of life lessons here, and it was time to process them elsewhere.

“Is this to get back at me somehow? I don’t understand,” the papers crinkle in his fist as he grips it tighter. “Do you want a raise? Can we talk about this?”

“No.” I say and even though there’s so much more I could say I think that sums up my answer.

He looks puzzled, then annoyed. Just then my phone buzzes. The car was downstairs.

I grab my laptop and we head down. I was coming along to take minutes and then head home. In the car I reassure Harry,

“I plan on wrapping things up in the next three weeks and making sure everything is set up for an easy transition. I’ll leave continuity notes and reach out to people I regularly communicate with to break the news. The next couple months are pretty easy anyway coming out of tour and going on holiday so there should be plenty of time for the new PA, whoever your hire, to catch up.”

He doesn’t say a word. It reminds me of our first drive to the studio together. How naïve I was. How things changed.

He continues staring out the window, resting his face on his fist. I remember my teeth dragging over that jaw. I blink the image away; this was why I had to go.

When we get to Graham’s office Harry tells Jeff, “we don’t need minutes.”

Jeff looks over at me for answers and I shrug. I guess I came here for no reason but at least I had my laptop to work.

“Uh y/n please come i-“

“She’s fine working out there,” Harry cuts Graham off. Graham looks offended, his gaze drawing between Harry and I. Again, I shrug. I wasn’t leaving today I don’t know why he was acting like it.

For the next hour or so I sit at a spare cubicle and do just as I said in the car. I type out lists for upcoming interviews and studio days. I send emails for information to note for whoever the poor person was to replace me.

I had been keeping the Dos and Don’ts updated over the last year and it feels like a baby the way it came together with so much thought. I was almost sad to part with it.

Nobody tells me the meeting is over. The door simply opens and Harry breezes past.

“I’ll be in the car.” He mutters. Any faster and I would have to hold down the papers around me.

When he’s gone beyond sight, I turn back to the open door.

“What’s the matter with him?” I hear Graham asking inside.

“You keep pushing him,” Jeff responds with irritation. “That’s not his brand Graham.”

“Well that’s a different tune. Prior to this you were singing my praises with these new ideas.”

“I don’t know. Something’s been up with him for…a while-“

“Since that article isn’t it?” Graham references the Harry Styles slander when we were in Spain. Little did they know other things had also happened.

“We dealt with that article.”

Shit, I think. Has he been any different? I think I was keeping too much distance from him to notice.

“Y/n,” my name snaps me out of my thoughts.

“Mhm?” I’m beckoned to the meeting room. “Yes?”

“Find out what’s wrong with him. Or better yet just convince him to be a bit more alive at his last show tomorrow with his usual charm? He hasn’t been his full capacity the last few shows has he?”

Shit. “Um. Burnout?”

The two men look at each other. They make a face like that couldn’t possibly be why. I tell the men what they want to hear, that I’d try to find out and get him back to his charming self (yuck) before joining Harry in the car.

“Jeff and Graham aren’t all that happy with you,” I say when we start driving. Harry was giving me a lift home. “They’re insisting you do it right at your final tomorrow. Be your charming self.”

He grunts in response, head facing the window again. Was he allergic to look forward in the car or something?

“Are you coming?” He asks after a good ten minutes of silence.

“Tomorrow?”

“Mhm.”

“Yeah. I gave my extra tickets to…my fiance,” my brain fumbles my words as it remembers what he was and now is. And the lie I had to keep up. “And his sister and her friend.”

He just nods in acknowledgement, somehow stonier.

When the car pulls up to my familiar building I thank his driver and begin my shimmy out but Harry puts a hand to my knee to stop me. His touch sears right through my stockings and he must feel it too because he slides his hand back.

“Answer this,” he looks at me for the first time tonight. Wow, this really did feel like my first week on the job.

“Sure,” I reply.

“Is it because of that night?”

It’s the first time it’s been mentioned, and his gaze burns brighter than a forest fire. It’s mesmerizing and I can’t look away.

Wait, he wanted an answer.

“It’s because of a lot of things,” I answer truthfully.

He clenches his jaw. Leans back in his seat. The seatbelt reverses to hold him in place again and he’s no longer looking at me. I take that as my cue to go.

***

Josie bursts into the flat dressed to the nines in a groovy floral jumpsuit and boas in her hand. “Don’t worry. I have one for each of us.”

Her friend trails behind her in an equally 70s inspired look.

“That’s what you’re wearing?” Josie judges her brother’s hoodie and jeans. “You’re lowering the vibe Gray do better. Y/n? Why didn’t you brief him?”

“I did!” I eye Gray. “Don’t blame me.”

This was way more awkward than I thought. Or I really was not as good of an actress as I wished.

“What am I supposed to wear?” Gray asks. “I’m not wearing a jumpsuit.”

Josie rolls her eyes. “Y/n please drag him back and find a decent tee or something?”

“Yes ma’am,” I take Gray by the arm and take him back.

“This is kinda weird hey?” I whisper when we close the door.

“I don’t really like it either,” Gray scratches his head. “But it’s for the best.”

I nod and then louder announce, “Well it’s Jo’s night so find something a tad more retro?”

We end up with a red tee and find a belt to tie the look. Josie hugs her brother with thanks when she sees it.

I had on a pair of black bellbottoms paired with a blank tank. My hair was in spacebuns and Josie plucks a few boa feathers to accessorize my hair. It’s cute.

We head off and I have to make a conscious effort to remember my mannerisms with Gray before all this. I feel woozy while I slide my hand into his on the ride there, as Josie snaps our pics on her disposable, as she tells us to get one of us where Gray’s kissing my cheek and she’ll save it to show our kids. It makes me sick.

He keeps an arm on my waist as we walk. I want this night to be over so bad but every time I look Josie’s way I perk back up a little. I wanted her to enjoy this.

And she does. I’m sure she’s lost her voice by the end of the concert. At one point we drift away a little and breathe easier to drop the act but when she’s back Gray wraps his arms around me from behind and we act like a happy couple. Again, I felt sick.

Being in Gray’s arms held none of the spark it used to. I just feel awkward and sad.

At one point Harry looks my way, I don’t know how he spotted me in such a big crowd. It’s between songs and he looks at the group I’m with. I give a pathetic wave and he nods ever so slightly, his gaze sliding off soon after. Gray’s arm tightens around my shoulder and my heart gives a squeeze in response. I’m reminded: this era was ending.

The band told me to meet them backstage at the end, to join in on the final-show celebration. Josie and Gray would wait at a local pub and with the way Josie’s Instagram stories were glowing I could imagine her sitting there uploading it all.

“I couldn’t have done it without any of you,” I catch Harry saying as I slip behind stage with my pass. “I know I’ve not been the easiest to be with but you all sit in my heart. This is our Euro tour, concluded.”

Somebody pops bubbly and I congratulate the whole team as they drink. They insist on going out for proper drinks and I’m denied not going. They tell me to invite my guests to party with them and I know, based on where we were going, Josie was going to flip.

Juniper, a club that gets us all in on Harry’s face card, is opulent and lively on the inside. Josie is buzzing about with her friend—Gray had opted to go home, claiming he had early morning sessions. Josie didn’t think twice about him, but we pretended to go back and forth with a final warning from Gray to Josie to behave.

“He’s a broody one,” Charlie comments on Gray as we chatter while we get drinks. “Sister?”

“Yeah. Doesn’t know yet though so,” I put my finger to my lip.

“So no Barcelona dancing tonight?” Sarah teases. I laugh and tell them to keep me tamed. “We gotta do some shots with the team though where is everyone?”

We gaze around the room and manage to get everyone together. After one round of shots and another that Harry forced on all of us I feel the tension I’ve been carrying with me most days slide away.

We end up sticking together as a group and dance together, laughing and cheering each other on. Even Harry’s in a cheery mood—I suspect the alcohol. I catch him watching me at one point and when I raise my brow he takes my hand and spins me in a friendly twirl. I trip on my wide-legged pants and he catches me from behind. With my back to his chest I have the urge to turn around and kiss him and feel the peculiar comfort I had received from him before. That thought drives me away from him again. Despite the tight knit group there’s too much between us to even attempt being close.

I call it quits when Josie finds me and announces she was going home. I hug the newfound family I had made over the last few months one final goodbye, knowing I might never see them together like this again.

***

Jeff’s reaction to my news surprises me the most. He’s visibly upset and tries to sell me anything to stay. I tell him there was nothing to keep me at my job but I would rely on him for a good reference. I think it’s the first time he’s ever reassured me.

Between Harry and I it remains curt. Sometimes even edgy. I post my own job replacement and Jeff keeps me updated on potential candidates. By the time my last week rolls around I’m host to a roil of emotions.

The first week homeless, Charlie had let me crash on her couch and promised not to say a word to anyone. I didn’t want to overstay my welcome and so I had checked into a hotel and called it home for now.

I’m on my way back home to the hotel after being at Gray’s. We’d invited Josie over for dinner now that her exams were over and she’d been suspicious from the start.

We had told her the truth and she refused to believe it, hurt and betrayal in her eyes as she looked at me and realized she had been kept in the dark for the last week. I felt worse then, than I did when Gray and I called it quits.

I promised her a lunch together this week to talk more. Just because I was out of Gray’s life didn’t mean I had to be out of hers. I thought I could also tell her then that I was leaving to go back home.

On my second last day at work, Harry sends me on an errand near the end of the day. When I get back there’s a small group of friendly and familiar faces waiting to surprise me. I’m touched by the gesture, and I try to corner Harry to say thank you but it feels he avoids me at every chance, always in a larger crowd.

I finally catch him while I’m heading out of the bathroom and he’s heading down the hall.

“Oh hey,” I step in his way. He looks cornered. “I just wanted to say thanks for throwing this.”

“Yeah,” he gestures it was nothing. “It was Jeff’s idea.”

Ouch. I hide the sting. “Well. Thanks regardless.”

He nods, staying mute, but his eyes speak a thousand words—just none that I can read. They stay trained on me, communicating whatever.

Slowly the furrow between his brows eases and the sharp edges of his face give way to a softened expression. I’m scared to move in case I break the trance and don’t get to hear whatever his racing thoughts spit out. Just when it looks like he’s about to say something, a guest turns the corner up the hall.

“Anyone in the toilet?” It was Mitch. Damnit.

“Nope,” I step out of the way, inadvertently brushing Harry. A shiver runs up my spine and I try to act casual but he stiffens beside me. Was it that awful being around me, jeez.

I give up. If he wanted to continue staying moody, so be it. I leave to go back to the party and don’t look back.

My final days in London are hard. The same way I arrived, I go: alone and unsure of what’s ahead.

I always thought here was where I would stay forever. And maybe one day I would return but there was a little too much friction between me and the Capital.

I finish work on an unremarkable note after going through processes with the new hire, and dotting all of my i’s. Harry is nowhere to be seen and I’m gone before he gets back. I’m frustrated that he’s behaving this way but there’s also too much between us for the simple goodbye I yearn for.

I visit all of my old favourites, have one last drink at my old local pub somewhere in between Gray’s flat and Harry’s. I shed a lot of tears on my pilgrimage through the city’s veins. I promise the paved and cobblestone roads I would be back one day.

The walls of my lungs ease open on the flight home. Still, tears cascade down my face silently as the plane sleeps. Eventually I do too. When I wake the sky is filled with bright blinding sunrise, and American soil peeks out below me: I was finally home.

••••••••••••••••••••

Present (2 years on):

My heart flutters seeing Harry here, I chalk it up to anxiety. But it annoys me that despite all the distance and the growth, he still had an effect on me.

Harry’s head turns and before I can be smart about it our eyes lock. His eyebrows raise ever so slightly before his face falls into a nonchalant facade again. I don’t even want to know what my face looked like.

Then he gets the nerve to smirk, hang his head, and then grab his drink and walk towards me.

“If I had a cross I would be holding it up right now.” I have to shout a little so he hears me before he gets to me. He was an emotional vampire feeding on all of mine.

“Now why’s that?” He continues towards me. My emotions swirl through me. “I thought time heals all wounds. Why the unfriendly welcome Mrs. Duran?”

I grit my teeth at the name, he was still filled with poison. “Right, the timeless wisdom of clichés.”

“I like to think I’m pretty timeless.” He smiles.

“I’ve found that time may heal wounds, but scars make sure you never forget.”

“Well, scars aside, you look good,” he moves on and I feel like an idiot the way I was used to feeling around him.

“Of course I do.”

“What are you doing in London? Last I checked I was getting a reference check from America.”

I debate not answering him but I was trying to straddle the line between indifference and confidence. It was like walking a tightrope.

“I’m in London for a little while,” I give vaguely.

“Ah,” he smiles and damnit I forgot how handsome he could be. How handsome could then turn into seductive so quickly. I had to remember: Still a devil. “Are you looking for a new employer? Because I could be hiri-“

“No.” I cut him off. “I finally have a job I love so I’m good.”

Something flickers in his eyes but surprisingly he stays quiet.

“What are you doing here?” I ask. I sort of wish I still had a drink in my hand, they feel awkward and clunky and I want to avoid playing with my hair. Gah. “Global star drinks alone at his local bar?”

He laughs but I can tell I hit a minor nerve. “Here I’m just a local. Always have been—it’s nice to be anonymous for a little bit.”

I roll my eyes. I didn’t believe that for a second. He loved his fame and everything that came with it.

Plus I used to come here all the time, I would’ve known if my employer was a local too. He was lying for some reason.

“Mr. Styles if there’s one thing I remember about you, you’d choose death over anonymity.”

“Firstly,” he leans in and I get a whiff of his usual cologne with a hint of malt. “A person can change a lot. So maybe you don’t know me as much as you think you do-“

“Oh I don’t think anyone can change that drastically in only a year-“

“You seemed to have.”

His words take mine out of my mouth. I hadn’t changed, not really. I’d always been this y/n but the further I got away from him the more reassured I had gotten being that y/n.

“And secondly,” he continues before I could think of a response. “You no longer work for me. Harry is fine.”

The smile he throws me is almost sweet if I didn’t know the cruelty that could hide underneath. I don’t return the smile, I only raise my brow and look back down at my phone. My cell service hasn’t gotten any better and I’d missed the wifi password.

I could connect to Harry’s wifi, ask him so that I could order an uber.

I’d rather van gogh my ear.

I weigh all my options and consider the last one again. I look up to see what Harry was doing in the silence and find him looking at me. A shiver runs up my spine as our eyes clash. So much history and words unspoken fall in between. A very specific night flashes through my mind. I wonder if it does him because he looks down first. Damn.

“So I’ve gotta get going,” I say.

“Let me buy you a drink.” He says at the same time.

He laughs awkwardly and repeats, “One drink?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“We’re not drinking buddies.” I pull my purse to my chest, wanting to hop off this stool and run home if I need to. Put as much distance between myself and this man that was put on this earth to confuse me.

“Then what are we y/n?” He asks, his voice silky smooth as he leans in. The voice that whispered sweet nothings into my ear in my worst nightmares, nightmares of cotton sheets and heated limbs, of passion and shame.

“Ex-employer,” I point to him. I point to myself, “Ex-employee.”

“Exes have drinks together,” he grins full well knowing the double meaning.

“Never ends well,” I eye the door.

“Just as stubborn as I remember.”

“And you were saying people change?” I raise my brow.

He drops the smile and sighs, “I’m not gonna be able to convince ya am I?”

I shake my head. He should know that by now.

“Can I walk you out at least?”

I shrug, couldn’t hurt.

“What is this?” I ask as he opens the door for me.

“What?”

“This? Why are you trying to be so friendly?”

“I thought we could be friendly exes.”

And when did he get so cheeky.

“Something weird is going on,” I watch him stay in step with me as I walk up. With no service I was going to take the tube. “And I don’t like it.”

“Nothing weird is going on don’t get all paranoid on me.”

“Don’t call me paranoid! You never call a woman paranoid.”

“I thought that was conspiracy theorists?”

“Nooo. You’re being weird.”

"Alright, no need to get all Freudian on me. Just trying to be a decent human here."

I shake my head, somehow in our exchange my face had decided it was okay to smile. To forget what he put me through and remember instead that when things were good between us we actually got along.

Damnit. The devil knew how to play tricks. I wipe the smile off my face while he continues walking with me.

“So…what have you been up to?” He asks.

“Working, you know me.” I say after trying to figure out what his angle was but unable to find one.

“Oretta Smith I hear, how did you manage that?”

“I’m just that good Harry,” I say. His name is weird in my mouth. Sure I called him that in my head but I usually used Mr. Styles. I can tell he feels the same with his quick glance my way.

“How do you like that?”

“Yeah, she’s a great employer like I said. Very professional. Lots of flexibility.” Each praise is a knock to his ego. But it was all true, plus with Winnie joining the team I had a friend my age that felt great.

But there was also a darker side called burnout that I barely admitted to myself. Ever since we landed in London and I had time to orient my new self in a city that molded my old self, I felt the familiar singe of purposeless. But I keep it to myself of course.

“Great.” Harry responds curtly. “What about yourself? How’s your life, are you finally married?”

My instinct is to raise my defences and chew him out, he must know Gray and I were done what with me living in the States.

And yet, when I peer past the defences and take a long hard look at him I realize he is asking earnestly and without another angle.

We’re nearing the tube now. I hesitate in lying or telling the truth.

“We broke up,” I choose to confess. I peek at him and he looks surprised, even sorry.

“I didn’t know. Sorry.”

“I’d hope not,” I reply. “Otherwise you’d be an asshole calling me Mrs. Duran.”

He huffs an awkward laugh.

“Anyway this is me—

“I can give you a ride home—wherever that is right now?” He asks.

We’re stood in front of the glass doors. There’s not a lot of people this time of night. And as tempting as his offer was, the way he looks at me right now sends poisonous butterflies to my stomach and I think it’s best I get home for the big day tomorrow and not make any regrets.

“I’m not too far,” I lie. I point a thumb to the doors behind me. “I’m just gonna…”

“Yeah. Yeah right.” He’s awkward, which is a first. He clears his throat and stuffs his hand into his pocket. I watch him with a removed sort of curiosity. Eventually he coughs out his question. “How long are you in London for?”

“A few weeks,” I reply.

He finally meets my eyes again—and there goes my stomach. He was supposed to have zero effect on me, I was supposed to stay mad at him. Why was my body betraying me? Why did it continue to loop memories from that night and remind me of the things he whispered in the dark?

“A few weeks,” he murmurs back.

His gaze travels over my face openly, no longer holding back the barely-hidden expressions from before. Because I told him Gray and I weren’t a thing? Because I was entertaining whatever bullshit this was?

“Yep,” I nod. Awkward. Nervous. Cautious.

“My number’s the same,” his eyes snap back to mine. “If you want to go for that drink later.”

“Harry,” I try to break it to him another way. I wish I could just say I never want that drink. “I don’t think-“

“Don’t think,” he cuts me off. He laughs when I furrow my brows. “I mean, I’m right here for most of the next few weeks. When you feel like you want to have that drink just give me a call. Or text.”

Why, I want to ask him. Why, after all this time, after everything that happened? And it’s like he reads my mind in the silence.

“I know you left on a pretty poor note.” He shuffles his feet. “I know a lot of that was my fault. I apologize for that. Um, but I did enjoy having you around. You were excellent at your job and…you are missed. Even Jeff remembers you fondly. Which is saying something.”

This was some sort of prank. Or Harry had gotten so famous he now had a doppelgänger roaming the streets as him. It couldn’t be that Harry, my Harry, would say something so sentimental and so…genuine.

“So uh yeah, I would love to see you again while you’re in town.” He says when I don’t respond.

“Right.” I choke out.

He shrugs when I can’t bring myself to say anything more. “We do change, whether you believe it or not y/n.”

I swallow, hoping to lubricate my vocal cords and find my voice. “I-I really do have to go.”

Crestfallen, he nods. His hand comes up to touch my elbow. “Yeah ‘course. Just…think about it?”

I look down at his hand and he lets go, we stay in another bubble of silence. His eyes flicker down to my lips and I feel a wave of warmth as I try not to do the same.

“Goodnight,” I blurt and get to the other side of the glass doors. He watches me go.

On the escalator down I risk a glance back and he’s still there, watching until I’m out of sight. That ended incredibly awkward.

Leave it up to Harry to confuse me in coming back into my life. Damn him, he could never be consistent.

***

Waking up super early to catch the train out to Cambridge is so worth it because I get to watch Josie walk the stage and graduate with distinction wearing her famous smile that beams over the vast room.

Despite what happened with Gray and I, Josie and I have kept in touch steadily over the last year. It started as weekly facetimes which reduced down to monthly calls and have now become a steady stream of texts and memes swapped back and forth.

When she found out I’d be in London around her graduation dates she gave me no choice but to show up, sending me a ticket without asking.

I knew I’d see Gray, and a part of me was nervous and curious how that was going to go. But mostly I was grateful to still be in Josie’s life and spend time with her in person. She was the part of this life I missed most.

I’m sat somewhere in the middle of the room and Josie was smart enough not to seat me with the rest of her guests. But I know I would see everyone during photos and the dinner we were having later on. I try keep my focus on the ceremony however.

“Y/N!” Josie rushes towards me when she sees me after the ceremony. The group she departs from I recognize is a mix of her girl friends, her family, and a few others.

“Josie!” I return the same energy and she leaps into my arms. I squeeze her tight to me. “I’m soo proud of you my girl.”

We sway side to side, until we get enough hug.

“Look at you!” She exclaims when she leans back. “Your hair looks amazing and you are glowing. Please tell me you have a boy in your life.”

“No,” I laugh.

“A girl?” She asks hesitantly.

“No! I’m just…happy where I am right now! How about you look at you! You look phenomenal as per.”

“Oh thanks,” she takes the compliment and giggles. “I asked my dad to grad gift me a salon and spa visit so I am rejuvenated and blown out.”

“Aren’t you ever,” I touch a lock of her hair. “Congratulations.”

“Eek!” She squeals. “Finally finished this hellscape! I can’t wait to never write an exam again—ooh wait I want you to meet my boy…”

“So that’s why we’re actually glowing,” I tease as she tugs me towards the group. That definitely has Gray. My stomach drops the closer we get, he doesn’t seem to notice. He looks busy talking to one of Josie’s friends.

“Anyway,” she deposits me in front of a 6 foot something guy made of angles. “This is Jax. My boyfriend. We met during a Friendsgiving Myles threw last year.”

“Nice to meet you,” Jax smiles. “Y/N right?”

“Yes!”

“I was supposed to get around to that,” Josie huffs.

“Sorry she talked about you a lot when she found out you were coming. She was really excited.”

“Ugh,” she turns to me like she was embarrassed but her face is glowing. Josie was in looove.

“You two are so cute,” I tease which just makes Josie blush a little harder. “So are we getting any pictures?”

“Oh yeah,” Jax swivels his head. “Liliya has the good camera if you want to get-“

“Oh we can use our phones,” Josie cuts him off.

“No get the high res one—Liliya, camera?” Jax motions a shuttering action to the friend Gray was talking to. He’s so tall above the crowd that both look up at him and comply.

“Y/N,” Josie drags my arms back and takes me on the outskirt of the crowd. “I’m so sorry I never mentioned because I thought you wouldn’t come if I did tell you but you-“

“Y/N?”

Josie’s rushed whispers are cut short when Gray notices me and calls my name. He looks stupefied. I spare a glance to Josie and she’s paled.

She didn’t tell him.

“Hey,” I force a friendly tone. I was going to kill that girl.

“Did you all want a photo?” Josie’s friend Liliya shoulders her way back into the circle with the camera on a strap. She turns to Gray, “Babe?”

It’s an odd sensation, like all oxygen has left my lungs and they’re being squeezed as if tightened in a vice. Gray’s eyes drag away from me to his…girlfriend? Definitely not Josie’s friend.

It shakes me in the moment how much I realize I still cared, still carried a shred of hope for…something. And not consciously knowing this makes this moment feel a little like a slap in the face.

What did I think? I was going to leave this country for a year and people were going to pause where I last left them? Of course Gray’s moved on. Aside from the end he was a great partner and anybody would want that.

These thoughts race through my head in the few seconds Gray responds to his girlfriend and I look at Josie. She looks guilty as charged.

“I tried to tell you just now?” She whispers.

Deep breaths, I remind myself. You’re not the hot-headed y/n these people knew last. This day is not about you. It’s about Josie.

“It’s cool. Let’s get some photos,” I smile. “Don’t want to miss having them with you.”

She sighs but keeps her eyes on my face as we walk farther out.

“I am really sorry,” she whispers.

“Hey it’s alright,” I lie. This was the worst of it—Gray had moved on, had a great girlfriend, and I was living the life I wanted. No harm and no foul. “Honestly Jo I get it, you wanted me here reallllly bad.”

“I did!” She says. “But I’m also gonna kill Jax.”

I laugh and we straighten up when we realize the camera was already pointed at us. Josie flashes her degree and a few of her friends join the pictures too. We hustle back to Gray to see them and flipping back on the first few makes my breath catch in my throat. There’s one in particular where Josie is turned to me talking and my mouth is in a big grin because I’m laughing.

I catch eyes with Gray in an uncomfortably intimate second.

“Send me that one for sure wow Gray that’s a really good shot.”

“Oh wow,” his girlfriend peers over. “That’s a great candid.”

“Yeah,” I agree. I’d love a copy too. And of course that’s when Gray’s girlfriend notices me and introduces herself.

“I don’t think we’ve met—is that an American accent I detect?”

“It is,” I smile. “I’m Y/N.”

“Oh!” Two spots of pink appear on her face. It seems she’s heard of me. “Well it’s nice to meet you—nice that Josie invited you! I’m Liliya but Lily works too.”

“C’mon!” Josie interrupts the awkward by grabbing her brother’s arm and pushes him in the direction of where her friends are posing for photos. He takes some shots but Josie hates the look of them and gives the camera to Lily instead.

With just Gray and I left behind it grows very awkward.

“I thought Josie told everyone I would be-“ I say just as he says, “I didn’t realize you would be-“

We stop and chuckle awkwardly.

“Sorry,” I shake my head.

“No,” he shrugs. “It’s cool. It’s cool you’re here actually.”

“Okay,” is all I can say. Until the awkward silence stretches. “So…Liliya?”

“Yeah. Yeah, Liliya. You?”

I want to lie, but I shake my head. “No. Sorta needed the year to breathe a little.”

“Fair. How’s America?”

“Oh y’know, still super-sized and politically a guessing game.”

“Have you turned on our news while you’ve been down at all?” He raises a brow. I laugh because he was right. It was all a shitshow everywhere.

He asks me about my family as Josie jogs up to us.

“Okay, tell me the truth is my hair going flat?”

“No,” I look behind her where her friends are hovering over Lily and the camera going over their photos.

“Good. Where’s mum and dad?” Josie asks Gray. “Dad was just here 10 minutes ago he said he’d come by for—oh there’s mum! Look!”

We turn to where she points. Michelle—what I’ve always called Gray’s mom, spots her daughter at the same time and waves. She starts to walk towards us.

It’s nice to see her but I also feel a bit nervous; going cold turkey on relationships you only had because of an ex are always weird to come back to. Especially ones you were fond of.

“Mum! You’re missing all the pictures!” Josie says. “Where’ve you been!?”

“I just saw somebody I knew back from my first job as a librarian can you believe that?” Michelle says as she joins the group.

“Crazy. Well mum look who got to show up today! Isn’t that crazy too?”

Michelle looks at me and the bright smile that was intended for her daughter dies like a flower in overnight frost. The look wipes the anticipation off my face.

“Who?”

That one word shades the sun from the sky and brings forth a gust of western winds through the group.

“Mum,” Josie look between me, her mum, and Gray. She’s confused. “Y/N?”

“Hey Michelle,” I croak. Maybe my hair was too different for her to recognize me, or maybe she had early onset alzheimers. Surely this woman who I’ve had a better relationship with than her own son has wouldn’t be treating me like your worst frenemy at your high school reunion.

But Michelle looks right through me. I can’t explain how it feels, not in the moment. I’m gutted, and feel an unexplainable wave of sadness.

“Mum…” Josie sounds hurt and Gray finally decides to swoop in.

“Mum let’s check out the photos we took already. We gotta get some of the three of us.”

They walk away and I feel seven inches tall but I turn to Josie with a brave face and face her teary one.

“That was kind of awkward,” I downplay.

“Y/N I’m honestly so sorry I-,” Josie blinks rapidly.

“No it’s ok!”

“I don’t know why she acted like that-“

“Hey It’s natural for her to feel that way I’m alright don’t get upset-“

“It’s not alright though! That was such a…she never acts like that.”

It was true. Michelle was a free-spirit as she called herself. That’s why Gray had such a hard relationship with her; in his words, she was too emotional and ungrounded for him.

Yet apparently, she was able to find enough ground to stand on when it came to treating me like a nobody. I wonder if it’s because she heard Gray’s biased side of the story or she was hurt herself—still, the way she’s always talked about herself never struck me as someone who would believe a one-sided story. Or be a bitch to someone they previously called their daughter. It hurt like a mofo.

I didn’t want Josie to find out this way, here of all places, that her mom was just human after all. She idolized that woman.

So even though it hurt, I comfort her instead.

“She probably just feels betrayed by me leaving and stuff since we were close too. Imagine if Jax broke up with you and she gave him the cold shoulder—wouldn’t you feel justified?”

Josie scrunches her brows to think about the simplified story I’ve just fed her to feel better. I can tell it still doesn’t sit well with her but she nods in acceptance, “I guess.”

“Yeah, just forget it Josie. Plus you’ve got pictures to take so dry those eyes.”

“Shit I know,” she blinks some more. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to invite you here and twist the knife at every bloody turn.”

“Jo I’m honoured to get to be here and see all your hard work pay off. Don’t worry about anything else.”

“It’s unfair,” she says before she drifts to her group of friends. “I feel like nobody understands how…how understanding you are. But I’m really glad we’re still in touch. And you came for me.”

Her words bring tears to my eyes and I nod, afraid that talking would bring them forward. I watch her crash her group and start instructing photo coordination. I help hold things for people while they take photos and feel like a stranger outside the crowd. If it weren’t for Josie, I think I would have regretted coming here. I feel homesick and unwanted. A tough combo.

I was supposed to crash on someone’s couch tonight and do brunch with Josie tomorrow before going back to London but from the last half hour alone I know I’m going back to the city no matter how late it gets tonight. I think of the hotel room that was home right now, of how lonely that was going to feel to go back to too.

Home right now was in America, in the same time zone as my family, and comfortable in my shared apartment with one of my high school best friends who I reconnected with after going back home. I miss it so bad. And I feel like I’ve bitten into an unripe fruit coming back to the UK before I was ready apparently. My experience feels soured.

I shake off the doom and gloom when the party breaks. We were all going to meet at the restaurant at 6–my plan was to explore the university city and find a place to kill some time in. Maybe go outside to a park with lunch. Josie tries to convince me to join her and her friends for their mid-day celebration but I lie and tell her I had some work to do.

I call Winnie on my stroll through the city. I insist she update me on last night first, and she has more to tell—the guy had a yacht and he was inviting her to a party tonight. She tells me to join if I came back early and we cross our fingers that Oretta wouldn’t need her before then.

I originally called her to rant about Michelle and Gray but I don’t, I didn’t want to kill her vibe. So I scroll through my other contacts but don’t want to worry my mom and it was too early back home to reach anyone else.

My eyes catch on Harry’s name, he was at the top of my texts currently because he sent me a link this afternoon asking me for thoughts on it. I hadn’t opened it yet, I wasn’t sure what to think about this new persona he was wearing or that he thought yesterday’s run-in went okay enough to casually message me for my thoughts.

I remember the weird electricity of yesterday and shove my phone back into my pocket.

He genuinely wanted to have a drink? And talk??

I did enjoy having you around. You were excellent at your job and you are missed.

Was he trying to make up for his cruel words? But he also seemed a lot more mellow than before. Maybe that was just because I didn’t work for him. What did he want? And was I twisted for believing the new schtick?

Most curious of all was him at the pub in the first place. He was not a local there—that was a big lie.

I try to conjure up my previous hatred, calling him the Devil in my head. But it’s harder to do. Seeing him yesterday, he was just a man standing in front of a woman with a head full of cautionary tales and bad experiences.

Without warning images from that night come back and I feel my heart flutter. I shut them down just as quick. Not all bad, my body tries to remind me. I tell it to shut up.

I’ve barely stepped foot in this country again and already my mind was running circles around my heart. How exhausting.

***

I’m early to the restaurant, before anyone else apparently. As the hostess finds my name on her floor plan Josie comes in behind me with Jax.

“Oh! Y/n you’re early!” She seems flustered.

“Yeah I didn’t think I would be,” it was only a few minutes to 6.

We make small talk while we’re led to the table, Josie’s eyes keep darting to where our table might be.

“Sorry I was hoping to do this before you came,” she says when we get there. There are name cards along the 7 seats and she picks the one in front of me. “I’m just gonna move mum to my other side so it doesn’t get weird. Which means she’ll be closer to dad but…I think he’s bailing since his girlfriend doesn’t want to do this.”

Josie shrugs, I know how she feels about her dad’s girlfriend. She begins explaining the plans she has to do dinner with her dad later this week and the more she talks the more I can tell that she feels awkward. And I hate that it’s because of me. At one point Jax and I catch eyes and pass an awkward smile.

“Josie,” I walk up to her fiddling with the name tags. She stops talking immediately. I grip her shoulders. “Thanks.”

“Sorry,” she whispers. I wrap my arms around her and she melts into me.

“Stop apologizing.”

“Sorry. I can’t help it. It’s a disease.”

We let go with a laugh and she seems more stable. “This is going to be fine.”

Famous last words.

It’s definitely not fine and very awkward. Jax ends up sitting in front of me, and even though Liliya’s name tag was beside mine it’s suddenly swapped as they slide in and Gray sits beside me. I guess it might be too awkward for her but not awkward enough to fit someone we both dated between us.

I can sense Michelle’s pinched face as she notices us sitting beside each other and I feel badly for Josie the most as she tries to play the gracious host. At one point I sense Jax laying a hand on her arm and taking over, asking Michelle questions about her yoga and getting her talking.

“Did you need more?” Gray turns to me with the wine bottle, it’s the second thing he’s said to me tonight. Otherwise he mostly just watches me talk and leans back enough when others are talking so I can be involved.

“I’m okay,” I whisper. I didn’t want to draw any attention while Michelle was talking. She hadn’t said a peep to me, even when Josie tried to involve us both in a shared memory. She continued acting like I was Casper the ghost.

I can feel Lily’s eyes on us as Gray offers wine, of course they would be. No wonder Gray barely spoke to me all night. Fuck me, what was I doing here.

Jax is a sweetheart, asking me about my job and encouraging conversation between the both of us. I’m so happy for Josie that she found a partner like him.

By the time dinner is over I mostly want to cry. I feel spent. But I also feel like I crashed an intimate dinner and everyone’s polite enough not to mention it. Despite Josie, I do actually regret coming.

As we pay the bill and shuffle out, Josie grabs my arm.

“So I have two friends where you can crash at their place or Jax can sleep over at mine and you can sleep at his or-“

“I think I’m gonna head back to the city.”

Her face falls. But it’s like she knew I was going to say that.

“Sorry Jo. I think you should come to the city next week—maybe visit your brother? And while you’re down we’ll do brunch then. I’m mostly free while I’m here. I’m just pretty tired and have to help Winnie with something tomorrow.”

“Really?” She says in the smallest voice I’ve heard out of her. Salt to my wounds.

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I know we were looking forward to getting time together.”

She juts out her lip and I’m reminded of the girl I met when I first started dating Gray. How she’d taken to me so quickly. How the whole family had. How things could end up like this.

And suddenly I see the future laid out in front of me. After tonight it would be hard to keep this relationship going—Josie and I. She’s just seen her mom be an unreasonable bitch for the first time, I can tell she’s been trying to compensate all night but the cracks won’t go away. It’ll always be a sitting duck between us.

We might try to stay in touch, maybe I’d reach out if I was ever in London or if she ever visited the west coast. But this would fizzle out.

She was still young and naive enough that her mom hung the moon and stars; mom’s beliefs were gospel, her opinions were rulings, and she’d just delivered my ultimate sentence: I was a black sheep to the family. How could sweet Josie walk through a mess like that?

“I’m so proud of you,” I tell her as I fight tears. “Congratulations again and thank you for inviting me.”

“Thanks. And you don’t have to be so nice. I know it was kind of a shitty invite.”

“No,” I insist. “I loved being here. I don’t regret showing up for you. I can’t wait to hear what you get up to.”

“I’m going to make sure to make it to the city next week,” she squeezes my arm. “We’ll see each other soon.”

“Exactly,” I look over at the rest of the group, where her boyfriend waits for her. Her family. “And I really like Jax, so good on you for that.”

“He…” she twists her lips, swallowing what she was going to say before vomiting it out. “I always aspired to have a relationship like yours and Gray’s. I never wanted to settle for anything less so that’s…that’s why Jax.”

“Hm I think you made us the bar and you leapt over it babe,” I wrap my arms around her again. I ache with the loss of what we used to be.

“See you soon,” she says before she drags herself back to the group.

I stand off to the side, awkwardly ordering an Uber. The group begins to walk the opposite way waving bye to me. I breathe easier without the weight of them around.

As I tap my foot in anticipation of the ride to the station arriving, I feel a hand tap my shoulder.

“Y/n,” it’s Gray. “Hey I…I just wanted to say something before you left.”

“Oh. Hey yeah. Shoot.”

What was it with everyone wanting to say something to me.

“Uh…ok give me a minute,” he laughs in the way I know to mean he was feeling nervous. “I just sort of jogged back impulsively.”

“Yeah well you have,” I glance at my phone. “4 or so minutes.”

“Damn,” he ruffles his hair. “Alright. I think I just wanna say sorry.”

“Oh.” That was it. Everyone had something to say to me and the something was apparently sorry.

“Yeah I’m sorry. I…when we broke up I was so upset and caught up in my own head. I blamed you for everything. I think it only hit me when you just up and moved out of the country how things actually went down.”

I hadn’t told anyone but Josie that I was leaving.

“Yeah you were just like gone.” He continues. “I guess a part of me thought we’d get some space, maybe circle back later…”

“You really betrayed me,” I remind him.

But even I know what he means. He hurt me bad and it might be crazy stupid but on some level we were both aware we were in an ugly place and maybe with some space we might come back to the place that was good for us again. Maybe bump into each other one day, strike up a conversation, find there might still be a small amount of love left. Enough to water and grow again.

“I know,” he sighs. “I know. I hate that I hurt you like that. I regret…I actually don’t really hang out with that group of friends as much anymore. I sorta have myself to blame but I didn’t like who I was with them.”

I listen, letting him speak. It hurt too, knowing this was the Grayson I had fallen in love with. Kind and supportive, and now apparently he’s learned to communicate. Maybe that was a Lily thing.

“I guess,” he blows the air out of his cheeks. “I want to say I’m really truly sorry. I missed you a lot after you left. Nothing was the same and life was fucking hard. I wish things didn’t end the way they did and I stayed mature but I was just jealous and angry.”

I nod to acknowledge what he’s saying and watch him take a breath to continue.

“And I always appreciated how you never let us shake your relationship with my sister because she bloody loves you—I don’t think how mum treated you was right today but I never really understood her in the first place. I’m sorry about that.”

“Yeah,” is all I can manage without making it obvious how emotional this was all making me. How one year could make me feel like a completely different person. How this man I loved, and still love in some way, could stand in front of me talking about us as something in the past. Because we were. Long past.

My phone dings with a notification that my ride would be here. We glance down and out into the street.

“Anyway,” he swallows. “I just wanna apologize. And say I genuinely hope you find love y/n. Love that’s as fierce and loyal as you are. I hope you can forgive me one day. And I hope you’re successful as hell in whatever you pour yourself into.”

“Thank you Gray,” I want to say I was sorry too. For what it was worth. But my car pulls to the curb.

I wave at the driver to let them know I’d ordered it and we walk the few feet to the back door.

I face Gray and open my mouth to say it. Say something more: how I appreciated his words, how I was sorry for how things ended too, how I hope he is happy. But nothing comes out of my mouth. I just stare at him, my eyes welling with tears instead.

Gray holds out his hand and I look down at it. I knew those hands well and it’s like walking into a place you used to frequent in the past and have memories rush towards you as you remember: those hands held me and wrapped around my own and comforted me, they made me food and stroked my hair, and carried my bags when they got too heavy. They once wore an engagement band I gifted, they once held a small box with a life-changing question I had said yes to.

Now it was just a hand.

I clasp it and he squeezes.

“I know,” he says, his eyes trained on my watery ones. He squeezes again and lets go.

I rush into the car, those two words nearly cracking me in half. I wave goodbye through the tinted window and feel a wave of despair that pulls me down into the depths of darkness.

Too much was happening at once.

My emotions spiral out of me and I feel alone in this foreign country; I needed comfort where none could be found.

I don’t mean to. Or maybe I do. But on the train back to London I text Harry: is it too early to cash in on the drink?

His response is immediate: no, I was waiting for this text last night

I smile, despite myself.

Can I come over? I text with shaking hands.

H: For drinks?

Y: For drinks

H: Ofc.

***

The taxi drops me in front of the familiar building. I feel an echo of anxiety pierce through me as I go through the familiar doors. I nod at the concierge, the night replacement was new and I’m grateful nobody can recognize me making this potentially stupid decision.

For a brief second I wonder if Harry had other plans tonight but decide not to overthink it. He’d invited me openly. And maybe I was making a decision based on sadness and loneliness and grief and needing to be wanted but I make it. And I would make it like a grown woman—ready to accept the consequences.

I didn’t want to go back to my lonely hotel room. I didn’t want to call anyone and talk about what just happened. I didn’t have words. My body was taking the beating, feeling everything under the sun and now bruised and battered for it. I just wanted my body to forget that. And there was only one person in this godforsaken city that could help.

I’m let up to the penthouse and I forgot it had a distinct smell, wood-like and something indescribable. Weird that it felt comforting.

“You made it,” Harry comes into view in a simple pair of shorts and a long-sleeved white tee pushed up to his elbows. It’s the sleeves that really do it.

“I did.”

I leave my bags beside the elevator next to the umbrella stand, keeping my eyes on him. He doesn’t take his off mine either. I’m glad he doesn’t. Now I know he knows we both said drinks but meant something more.

He reaches out for me before I even get to him, and I know I would think about that later. A lot. But right then in the middle of his entryway I wrap my arms around his neck and lean up on my toes to reach him too.

His lips are soft against mine and he tucks me into him, his hand splayed out on my lower back. It feels like a return to a lover, someone who knows you, like I would’ve thought seeing Gray again would feel. But it’s just Harry, and the thought of baseless familiarity freaks me out a little.

The next time I feel his lips they’re on my jaw and neck and down to the base of my throat. He murmurs my name as he makes his way down and my body reacts immediately. He takes me by the waist and backs me up against the nearest wall, and I have a feeling I might fall.

I had made the conscious decision to walk into the devil’s lair because it was the only place I could get what I needed.

My fingers dig into his shoulders. My body wants this. Every part of me wants to pull him close and hold him and never let go. I wanted all of it tonight.

But I am so tired.

I put a hand on his chest and press gently. I can feel the warmth of his skin, the firmness of his muscles and the beat of his heart as he pauses.

“Sorry, I should have started with a hello. That was too fast was it?” He whispers, looking me straight in the eyes.

I have a million answers, but nothing comes. He puts his hand over mine and I feel it as a shiver runs up my spine.

"Is this too fast?" he asks again, and I hear the worry in his voice.

I shake my head.

He gives a breathy laugh, "Then tell me."

"I think I-“

“Don’t,” he covers my mouth with a laugh. “Please please. Don’t think.”

I smile under his palm and he drops his hand, I can tell he’s proud of lightening the moment by the sheen in his eyes. The moment is tender in a way that takes me back.

He brushes back my hair and kisses my forehead. I close my eyes, breathing in his cologne.

“That’s not where I want to be kissed,” I tell him.

“Then where?” He plays along.

“Anywhere but there.”

He kisses my nose. “There?”

“Not there,” I open my eyes to look up at him. “I’ll have you know that was very snotty just an hour ago.”

He groans, “you really have a way of taking the desire out of a situation.”

But his brows furrow and he watches me even closer.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I respond to his unasked question.

With that statement he takes a painful step back and I nearly slide down the wall without his support.

“What?” I ask.

“We should take that drink first.”

I feel the loss of his body pressed against mine, I realize miserably.

“What do you mean? I thought the drinks were just an excuse?” I ask.

He laughs a little, “Maybe tonight, but I really did want to have a drink with you. And talk.”

“Harry,” I groan. “I’m all out of talking tonight. Truly.”

“As much as I want to say forget talking and take you to bed I need to do this…just follow me,” he leads me and my flushed body through to the main living area which I was well familiar with but it’d gotten a facelift. I make commentary on the changes and he tells me more about it as he pulls a wine he wants out for us.

“I changed things around a little after you left,” he says as he hands me the wine glass. “I needed it. The change.”

“Oh.” Is all I can muster. I follow him to the sofa, tonight he doesn’t leave as much space between us but it still feels like a weird parallel to the night I landed in the hospital; a confrontation with Gray leading me to wine with Harry. “Look Harry I don’t know if I can do this.”

“Why not?”

“I…I’m at minimal capacity right now I just-“

“Just let me talk then.”

“Why does everyone want to talk!”

“I need to tell you what I should have said a long time ago and I want to apologize-“

“You already did-“

“Properly.”

I cross my arms and sigh.

“Y/n bloody hell I forgot how quickly you can get under my skin.”

“So this isn’t a great thing then.”

“Y/N,” he says my name like a warning and I want to comply. I roll my eyes and knock back my glass of wine, the buzz from the glass at dinner has long since worn away.

“Part of me wants to top you up but another part remembers what happened last time.” Harry eyes me.

“No I’m okay with just one glass. Drinking when I’m upset doesn’t end well.”

“Yeah…I don’t want you concussed on my watch again.”

“No we don’t want that,” we smile at each other, a soft and sentimental smile that gets the anxious stuttering of my heart to calm down a little. He just wanted to talk, so what?

But the anxious voice runs through the scenarios he might want to—his recent text, or something I did as his PA he wants to take up now. Gah.

“I really have missed having you around,” he says softly.

“Didn’t feel like you would with how you treated me.” I raise my brow.

“I know.” He pauses then mumbles something before talking to me directly. “You must have heard about the PA before you? Maybe from Riley?”

“Kind of.”

“Kind of?”

“Hmmm this feels like a trick question.” I say but he tells me he just wants to know what I knew. So I rip the bandaid off. “You had a fling with her.”

He hangs his head back over the seat of the sofa and sighs. “I knew that piece of…Riley makes me really mad when I think about him sometimes.”

“Does he?” I raise my brow. “I can think of someone else who makes me madder.”

“I know that’s supposed to be me. And I don’t know what to do about that except come clean right now.”

“And why is that?” I ask. “Coming clean? I came here just to get distracted in bed with you. I never thought I’d live to see the day where a guy like you wants to talk instead.”

“Y/N,” he says with such an intense look my way my stomach flips. “Trust me. I want to have you in my bed more than you do. But I told myself if that day ever somehow happened it would be after this.”

I shrug, let him continue. In reality his words make me weak and I can’t speak. Which kind of annoys me—why did he have such a strong pull over me? How did he so easily admit he’s thought about me, about having me in his bed!?

My heart flutters amongst other things.

I remember a brief conversation I had with my mom last year when she asked me why I wasn’t putting myself out there and dating again and I told her I just didn’t have the heart for it. She had said it seems I left my heart in London—my passion and my heart. Sitting here with Harry stirs something inside of me, scares me, and I want to distract that with more wine. But I manage to control myself.

“I was fairly new to the industry when I hired Riley and it was his second proper job or something so we were both a bit young and we ended up being friendlier than we should have.” Harry starts. “But he was great at his job and never gave me any issues. I stayed naïve that people in this industry would look out for my best interest-“

“That’s really naïve,” I can’t help but comment but he throws me a look and I zip my lips. “Sorry.”

“I was lucky that the first few relationships I built as I got my foot in the door were genuine but I realized too late that it wasn’t a norm. Everyone wanted a piece of me and they all wanted me to be someone else. Some angle. Shit hit the fan pretty quickly. So when I needed more help I decided to create a new role for Riley and hire a PA. She was seasoned and came highly recommended.”

I nod along to his story.

“Long story short, she started out good but she kept trying to get me alone and get me talking. And back then after being friends with my old PA I didn’t have the wisdom of setting boundaries—don’t give me that look.”

“What!” I raise my hands. “I’m just listening.”

“You’re judging me.”

“Just continue,” I encourage. I was judging a little.

“Anyway, where I thought we were just friendly she thought I—I dunno I was falling for her or something. And one night she was working late so she had dinner here. She kept refilling my drink I didn’t realize she wasn’t drinking as much. It’s not much of an excuse but by the time she came onto me I was pissed and it didn’t take much.”

He continues the story like it was nothing but his voice catches a little and he doesn’t look me in the eye. My insides grow colder. I want to reach inside of him and hold the old Harry, the naive one who didn’t know better.

“Please don’t feel bad for me,” he cuts my sympathy short. “I didn’t turn into a great person after that. Especially with how I treated you.”

“That’s right.” I pretend to be unaffected by his story like he wanted me to be. But it’s near impossible.

“So that’s how I decided it was best for me to play the asshole. I couldn’t fire her after that—it would look awful and she could report me and screw me over. But I could make working for me a nightmare and so I did. A few months later she quit.”

He sighs and takes a swig of his wine, “Then you came along and I thought ‘I should play the asshole from the get go.’ I had gotten good by then at compartmentalizing my personality in the industry.”

“Hmph,” I raise a brow. He has the decency to look embarrassed but he continues.

“But the more time we spent together the worse I felt. You were nothing like the previous PA. You were genuine and down-to-earth. Pretty fiery but I wouldn’t find that out until later,” he grins. I roll my eyes. “I tried to ease up a little but things kept happening to push me back into the asshole box.”

“But you were so snappy, and a dick.”

“I know. I didn’t know how to tell you you worked too hard without dropping the asshole act and making you feel even shittier.”

“What do you mean?”

“I had to be the villain in your story-“

“What?” What was he talking about?

“Yeah like, you were working all the time even though there were some times I told you to wrap it up for the day.”

I remembered that, thinking he was kicking me out.

“But you took the job so seriously. I appreciated everything you did but you were dogged at making sure you did the best at any cost.”

“What do you mean? At any cost?” I ask, a cold sensation running down my back.

“For example take that one time a few months in when I asked you to call me because you forgot to order wine. You bloody came all the way back to hand deliver it-“

“Yeah because you said to call you and you were gonna be pissed if I-“

“No, y/n,” he lays a hand between us. “I just wanted you to call to know where you usually ordered from so I could order that for myself. You weren’t in any trouble! But I could only blame myself for playing the hard asshole too well.”

I think about that night, Josie’s birthday party. How I left early and upset Gray. How I didn’t need to but I had been following the Dos and Dont’s list.

Shit, the lists. They were added onto by the last PA who, now I know, was having her life made into hell just so she would quit. Some of those lists were on an extreme I didn’t even have to follow. Fuck. That was on me.

My face must be a painting of regret because Harry apologizes again.

“I’m sorry but I didn’t want you to…I just felt like I had to play the villain so you could do what you had to do. So you could continue hating me and we could establish the clear boundary.”

“Right.” I have a bitter taste in my mouth.

“But I genuinely liked you, I thought you were funny and sensitive-“

“You don’t like my sensitivity.”

“I do. I just hated how angry you were-“

“Because of you.”

“I know. I created a monster, I’m Frankenstein.”

“Damn straight.” I agree and we pause a beat before laughing.

“Anyway,” he continues. “You were funny and sensitive and resilient, passionate and smart, and you cared so deeply. It was rare meeting people like you in this field. I wanted to wrap you in bubble wrap but I think I shattered you instead. I’m sorry for the way I just let my past colour your time here. I feel like you left because of me-“

“It was really a lot of reasons.”

“I know but I was part of that and I felt no good. After you left I was a miserable son of a bitch for a while. I couldn’t even enjoy my holiday because I kept thinking of you. I was miserable so I barely even said goodbye—I didn’t realize you were going to run away so far. But I also didn’t want to say goodbye because I was scared I would convince you to stay by spilling my truth.”

His words sit on my chest and they slowly sink down to my stomach. I don’t know what it meant, what he wanted me to do with this confession. It’s too much.

“Mostly,” he continues, shifting closer to me on the sofa. He lowers his voice, “Mostly I’m sorry about Barcelona.”

I flush at the mention of it. At the heat and passion from that night. His eyes roam my face.

“I’m not that guy. I should have treated you nicer, should have been the one to keep my patience.”

“I didn’t make it easy,” I admit.

“No,” he chuckles. “You really fucking did not.”

We smile.

“But you’re so much more than anger y/n. I could barely sleep that night, I kept regretting giving into the anger and not being slow and soft with you the way you deserve. I regret it all the time.”

His confession pulls the veil off my eyes and I see a sharper image of my past. Of everything. It all comes at once and I can’t sort through it in the moment but I know what I want to do.

I shuffle over until I’m up against Harry, I hold his face in mine and he cups my face in his hand.

“You drove me crazy,” I tell him. “Made my life hell.”

“I know. But you drove me crazy too. Nobody got under my skin like you did.”

“Same.”

His hand snakes down to my thigh and he nudges it over his lap so that I’m straddling his body. I feel vulnerable and scared—not the first time these emotions have coursed through me in this very room. But today I don’t feel powerless.

His lips are soft against my cheek, my jaw, down my neck. Unlike the first time he’s slow and deliberate like someone who’s waited so long to unwrap a cherished gift and can’t stand ripping even the gift wrap. He pushes my hair out of the way and trails his fingertips down the back of my neck.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he whispers in my ear. The more he talked the more nervous he was making me. I turn my head to capture his lips, run my fingers through his hair which is too short to really grasp. I missed his old hair.

We break apart for a breath and I can feel the tension. The desire to have him near clashing with the need to go slow. To savour this. Somehow we both feel it.

“We don’t have to do anything tonight,” Harry promises me, his finger trailing down my arm. “Just having you here is enough.”

Oh god. How did he know just the things to say. This man was way too suave. He really was the devil.

But I needed him. It’s scary to admit but I did. I wanted to be here, I really did. I needed to be in this moment with him. Fulfill some shut-out desire that had grown dusty in the corner of my heart.

“I want to do this.”

With a gentle kiss he gets us up and takes my hand. I feel myself being pulled through the living room and towards the bedroom. The sheets are cool, but not cold and when he crawls in beside me I forget that I had ever been anywhere else.

He’s attentive and deliberate and I’m buzzing with anticipation. I decide to pick up the pace, propping myself up to take off my blouse. I watch his throat bob up and down like he’s never seen me like this before even though he has. It’s endearing.

The way his hands fit in the curve of my waist makes it harder to breathe. He moves his hands up my torso and to the straps of my bra. He pauses, as if asking permission, and when I nod, he kisses me. He unhooks it and slowly slides it off my shoulders, eyes fixed on mine.

The intensity of his gaze is overwhelming.

I pull him close to kiss him again, and he pulls me under him so I can feel the full weight of him against me. This is what I needed. To be physically present and not stuck in the after tremors of the earthquakes of my past. Not that he wasn’t part of my past but this is different. A non-verbal agreement to just be present. I knew his ways with women, it could be a one-night thing and that’s what I needed.

But that’s why the moments of tenderness and adoration nearly take my breath away. I don’t know where to put these things.

He kisses down my shoulder while his hand trails down to my trousers. He hooks his finger into the belt loop and tugs gently, looking up at me for consent.

I nod.

He slowly takes them off, and when his fingers brush against my bare legs, my breath hitches.

It happens again when he presses his lips against my hip bone.

He stops for a moment, and I can almost see the cogs in his brain whirring.

He moves up to press his forehead against mine.

"I don't know how to do this right," he says quietly, and his eyes search mine.

“What do you mean?”

“This is always how I should have treated you,” he whispers. “I want you to know-“

“Harry,” I smooth out the lines on his forehead.

"No," he grabs my hand and kisses it. "I don't want you to feel like I don't care because I do. I don’t want to hurt you. I'm not good at saying these things. But I want you to know how much I value you. That I like you as a person. I respect you. I want you to be okay.”

“I-“ who was this Harry, seriously!? “I get it. I’m okay. I am.”

He smiles at me tentatively and my heart does a somersault.

I grab the back of his neck and pull him down, pressing my lips against his. I could taste the sweetness of the words he had said.

I tug at his shirt and it flies into the darkness of his bedroom. His skin is heated against mine.

It feels like an eternity before he finally reaches the band of my panties, and my heart thumps wildly.

"May I?" he looks up.

"Please," I whisper.

For the first time since I’ve met him he doesn’t make it about himself or what he needs. It’s almost intimidating how intense he is as he looks after me and it’s hard to reconcile this man with the man in my head. We’re of one mind and it’s like he knows everything I’ve been through in the last 24 hours; he just attends to my every need reminding me that I was here, right here, in his arms and in this body.

And it doesn’t go unnoticed.

“Are you staying the night?” He asks later with a final kiss to my shoulder.

“If that’s alright?” I ask. I didn’t want to be alone in a cold hotel room.

“I’d love nothing more.” He says earnestly.

Love. I brush the word away.

He warns me that he was a slug if I stayed and he’s not exaggerating, with his arm draped over me and tucked up against him he’s like a child with a plush. He falls asleep just as quickly.

I should too but can’t. I feel so intensely about this body laying beside me, I want to crawl inside of him, understand him, understand us and how this worked.

Or maybe I wanted to just understand me, and why I felt a piece of myself sliding back into place tonight. I had to be the most fucked up person in this city.

Instead of sleeping I lay awake thinking about everything and I can’t help it. I go over this morning—god it felt like weeks ago. Josie’s graduation. Josie. Gray. Even Michelle.

I feel slightly paralyzed by everything that transpired today—it truly felt like peering through a glass window into a life I used to have. I try to break open the glass, sort it all out.

On one side is me and everything I’ve done this whole year to move on from the crumbs of my life here in London. I don’t know why but I really did think that coming back I would be 100% untouchable by my past. I was an idiot for thinking that because I was bothered that Gray seemed to have a steady girlfriend. Why did I think anything would rekindle between us?

I dig deeper, did I even want that to happen? Or did I just want to prove to myself that I was the one Gray let get away because I was too scared to face the possibility that I was the one who let Gray get away.

But clearly something didn’t work with us, I think bitterly. A few months with his new girl and he found the balls to open up with me and communicate his grievances and his apologies.

Love that’s as fierce and loyal as you are, he had said. Was I too much for Gray? Is that why we were made to burn out? It hurt too that he had damaged all my relationships I made in my life here in London only to cut those same people out of his life immediately after I left. The more I think about it the angrier I feel.

And his mom, I still feel bruised by her acting like she didn’t even know me. It stokes the anger higher. Her own son has called her crazy on multiple occasions, I was always nothing but kind to her. Gray was the one who put the final nail in our coffin yet the woman who called me her daughter and claimed to love me had been cruel. Even in the face of getting along for Josie’s sake she had put her petty feelings in the forefront.

These people made me so angry.

How did I ever think I could rekindle anything with Gray? As much as I was to blame, I realize, Gray couldn’t even be kind in the end. Just because the year apart was good to him didn’t mean he would still be good for me.

I think about the man laying beside me, in a hypothetical situation if things got ugly I instinctively want to say he would be cruel too. But I have to push past the persona he claimed to have put up and think about the glimpses of the man I saw underneath. Something tells me he would be just as fiery in letting me know how he was feeling. But with his recent apologies I’m not as convinced he would go out of his way to hurt me again.

Even in the bar last night, I just assumed he called me Mrs. Duran to be cruel but he hadn’t known. Or when I had assumed at Josie’s birthday party I would be fired for forgetting wine because he was an asshole when really he just acted like one so I wouldn’t feel worse.

How many times had I judged people because of how skewed my own lens was? It’s a sobering reminder.

Josie’s face flashes through my mind and I tear up at knowing we were going to cut each other out. No matter how much we loved each other staying in touch at this rate was no longer sustainable. For her best interest.

I think of my younger brother back home, my older sister, our family of 5. When I went back home there was so much to catch up on and eventually, apologize for. I had missed out on so much of my family’s life because I believed I needed to leave to grow. Well, life sure handed me a lot of lessons but I needed to go back home to plant them and let me grow.

Harry stirs beside me, nuzzling my neck in his sleep. I feel myself go teary eyed for no reason.

I wondered if this was just a one-night thing. If we would see each other again while I was in London. Did I want to see him? My heart sings yes immediately.

Damn.

What was it about him that pushed my emotions to the highest highs and lowest lows. How did he know every button to push and every bruise to kiss. This had to be toxic, we couldn’t just take our great big baggage of a past and see each other casually while I was in London. It couldn’t be that easy.

What if it was, hope whispers. I squirm. Could I forgive Harry for everything he’d done?

“Y’sleeping?” Harry mumbles to my left. Shit.

“Yeah,” I say which invokes a throaty chuckle from him. I check the time, it was nearly 4. Double shit.

“Liar,” he tugs on my hips and I turn to face him. “Talk to me.”

I couldn’t. Half of my thought were about him. And how could I tell him I was thinking about my ex after spending the night with him. So I just shake my head.

“Please?” He brushes my cheek with his thumb. “You need to sleep.”

“I-“ I try to say I can’t but the words get stuck in my throat. The emotions of everything I’d been thinking in the last couple hours threaten to dislodge the words from my throat so I close my mouth. But it doesn’t work.

A sob bursts out of me and before I can reel it all in the floodgates swing open and it carries all the pent-up sorrow and confusion, grief and anguish I had bottled up.

Harry freezes for a moment, probably very confused to wake up and have me reacting this way. But he recovers and pulls me into his warm chest.

“What is going on in that head of yours love,” Harry murmurs. Love. I sob even harder.

He murmurs reassuring words whilst stroking my back and I cry an embarrassing amount in the same bed where just hours ago I was blissed beyond comprehension. Life moves fast.

Finally when I gain enough composure I lean away, covering my face because crying into him was one thing but seeing my ugly cry face was another.

“Here,” I feel his body move and then tissues pressed into my hand. I’m grateful for them but I wasn’t going to blow my nose here. I sit up and try to dry my nose. His hand reaches out and the tips of his fingers rest on my spine like he was tethering my lost body to him. Somehow even that is reassuring.

“Don’t go trying to kiss my nose this early on again,” I try to joke through a stuffy voice.

“I wouldn’t dare,” he tugs my arm a little and I fall back beside him. He holds me in both his arms and I watch in horror and affection as he kisses the tip of my nose.

“Stop being so nice,” I laugh and cry a little too.

“You’re actually complaining about me being nice?”

“No I just—I’m not used to it,” I press the tissue to my eyes again.

“Well get used to it,” he peels the hair off of my face and pushes it back. “I don’t want to be the one hurting you. I swear to never ever be the reason you cry like this to anyone.”

“Don’t say those sorts of things if you don’t mean it.”

“I do,” he caresses my face. “You’re breaking my heart y/n, I don’t know who hurt you but I never want to see you like this. Especially not because of me alright? I’m sorry if I ever-“

“Stop,” I put my hand to his mouth. Which is kind of gross since I just blew my nose but I’m pretty sure him kissing my snotty nose means he didn’t care.

“But-“ he says behind my hand.

“I’m embarrassed right now,” I admit.

“You have seen me in every compromising situation,” Harry says. “And we have been through too much together to be embarrassed right now.”

“Fine,” I sigh. “It is tiring.”

“Maybe you can finally sleep now that it’s…almost 5?”

“Sorry,” I sigh. “I hope you don’t have something early?”

“Nope,” he kisses the top of my head. “And even if I did it wouldn’t matter.”

So we both try to go back to bed and I manage to fall asleep, all of those tiring racing thoughts washed away by a good cry. I feel warm and cared for and vulnerable and protected. A stark change from how Harry has made me feel before. Maybe this was temporary or maybe this was the start of something new. I’m just taking it minute by minute while all I can think is Do I or Don’t I?

***

It’s my final week in London and if you’d asked me a couple weeks ago if I was looking forward to going back home I would have said without hesitation yes.

But that night at Harry’s and putting my past to rest brushes away an old and tired film I had been viewing the city with since I landed.

We had seen each other a couple times a week since—I’ve been cautious despite my body saying otherwise. There were many days I had been free but I had made up some excuse not to see him, I was scared of getting too attached and having to leave.

But I can’t deny how nice it was to be with Harry without any labels. Most of the time I went over to his, it was tricky going out somewhere too public and risking getting papped. Together we just talk about life and work, my life back in America and my relationship with my family, his life growing up and his relationship with stardom. We watch movies and listen to music and make jokes and I open up a little about what had been weighing on my mind that night.

Winnie teases me that I was lighter than she’s ever seen me, that London looked good on me. I tell her she’s crazy. But even Oretta admits it when Winnie brings it up to her.

Harry makes the effort to make up for how he acted until it’s not just words. I believe what he was saying. And I admit to my faults too.

We still get under each other’s skin.

The thing we argue about the most is an opportunity Harry tries to get me to sign off on. The link he texted me when I was in Cambridge was an upcoming single one of his friends was releasing and he wanted to get me to bid on executing a music video for it. I tell him he was nuts and that I had no experience, plus I had a job. But he persists. He thinks I should explore putting my creative skills to use and not just my organizational skills. The arguing continues.

I have a date with him tonight, at the same bar we bumped into each other that first night. I have a question I’d been meaning to ask him.

“You aren’t actually a regular here are you?” I ask when we’ve settled.

“Of course I am,” he says but I know he’s lying. I raise my brow and he looks everywhere but at me. “Fine. I’m not.”

“So how the hell did you end up here that night?”

“Coincidence.”

“Liar.”

“I’m an honest man.”

“Truth please?”

“You’re embarrassing me here let’s move on.”

“Nuh-uh,” I’m enjoying his bright cheeks and darting eyes. “Did you stalk me or something?”

“I…I knew this was a local spot for you. Or was.”

“Really? How?”

“You mentioned it a few times? And I dropped you off here once after work.”

He might’ve. I’d met many friends and especially Gray here. I motion for him to continue.

“I might’ve known you were in town, might’ve found out you were here and…”

“So you did stalk me,” I gasp. “Oh my god ladies and gents he is obsessed.”

“That’s a strong word.” He argues.

“You. Stalked. Me.”

“Oh fine, I’ll confess: I’m used to the stalkers and I thought it was high time I did some stalking and see what the fun was all about,” he joins in on making fun of himself.

“Someone get me a restraining order,” I say just as someone approaches our table with drinks. As soon as they leave we burst out laughing.

“So have you given the music video any more thought?” Harry asks as the evening continues.

“Can we not talk about this right now?” I ask.

“I just think you should give it serious thought. I know you want to go into PR, be somebody’s Graham, but you have a really good eye for this thing. Before you pursue what you think you want, try this out.”

“You’re one dude,” I say again. “Who believes I can do this. You want me to throw away the career I’ve worked on for years to dabble in this and potentially waste time instead of getting to where I want?”

“Firstly, if you love doing something it’s not time wasted. And secondly you only ever need just one person to believe in you, angel.”

His fingers brush mine on the table, the familiar electricity courses through me just through the small touch. And of course, his use of pet names always turned me to putty. I hated how malleable he made me.

“Consider it. Just write a proposal y/n, it’s not betraying Oretta or anything. I can talk to her if you want if they choose your idea.”

It was scary putting myself out there for something I didn’t believe in myself for. But my echoes of burnout grow towards the idea of doing something less demanding than being an assistant just like a sunflower to the sun. It basks in letting my creativity flow.

“I’ll think about it.”

“Not for too long,” he taps my fingers again. We were cautious about being too touchy in public, even in a place like this where people genuinely didn’t care who he was. “Proposal’s due at the end of next week.”

When I would be back home in America. Away from here. Him.

We hadn’t talked about it, if we would try to keep in touch. I can’t really imagine a long-distance thing with Harry. Not at this stage. Mostly we enjoyed being in each other’s company and I was scared forcing labels just because we would be apart would ruin this fragile thing.

“Fine.” He’d worn me down and I submit. “Fine I’ll get something in for you.”

He pulls back with a shocked expression. “Did I just convince the stubborn y/n y/l/n to do something she didn’t want to do?”

I scowl. “Don’t get used to it.”

“I won’t,” he laughs, waving his hands around him like he was fanning in an aroma. “I’m soaking this in though.”

“Whatever,” I say with a smile.

“You make me work hard,” he smiles back. “For everything y/n. That’s one of the things I l-I-that I really like about you.”

We ignore the near slip of something far too serious for what we had going. We move past it but it sets my heart racing.

“So this friend of yours,” I change the subject. “With the music video. Didn’t you guys have like, beef when you were on tour? All that article stuff?”

“You of all people should know not to believe what you see online. It was all manipulated and put out of context.”

“I know but you were all moody for all your shows afterwards. I remember Jeff and Graham complaining. I assumed the articles had worn you down a bit.”

He raises a brow like he’s waiting on me to figure something out.

“What?”

“Really? You think it was the artcles?”

“Well what else happened that-“

Oh god. Was I that stupid?

Of course it wasn’t the articles, it was me! Us.

A smile stretches over the contours of his face as realization dawns on mine, “Twice in a row I’ve got you today, I should buy a lottery ticket.”

“I’m off my game today is all, don’t get used to it.”

I can’t believe it. Not that I didn’t believe Harry after the last few weeks but I—that night—really meant that much to him that his feelings over it had affected the rest of his tour? I had affected his tour?

“Why didn’t you say anything if it was weighing on you so much? If I recall I tried to talk to you a couple times.” I ask.

“What could I say,” he snorts. “You were engaged and my loss of control was why you cheated. Then you were quitting and I knew if I said anything you might have stayed. I didn’t want to keep you where you didn’t want to be.”

His words tug at my heart. He really had thought up a storm.

“Harry,” I lean back. “Gray and I broke up before I joined you guys on tour again. We weren’t cheating.”

His forehead creases, “What?! But you were together at my London show. I thought you two broke up after you moved back home?”

“No,” I guess in the last few weeks I’d just mentioned we broke up a long time ago. He didn’t know any specifics. “We were fake-together because he hadn’t broken the news to his sister then. But that’s why I was all…y’know in Barcelona-“

“Fuck me,” he groans. “No wonder you thought I was an ass for pulling you away-“

“Well you were-“

“Yeah alright-“

“Why did you really pull me away though?”

“I…I was feeling a bit possessive.”

“What?”

I wasn’t expecting that to come out of his mouth. He smiles sheepishly, “I thought we already came to terms with that.”

My stomach does a few somersaults. Until tonight I don’t think I’ve really focused on the magnitude of how Harry felt back then. Parts of my mind were still remembering him as a prick just because it was easier to remember my side of things. But this spins things in a brighter light.

“I was just your assistant though.”

“Y/N,” he tilts his head to the side. “Did I not already tell you what I thought about you that night in my flat?”

“Yeah but-“

“I’d never met anyone like you, I really liked you. I couldn’t have you though and I had to push you away constantly. And that drove me a bit crazy sometimes.”

I let out a noisy breath, wondering if how he felt about me was just as intense now as it was then. A part of me knows it must be. Feelings like that didn’t fade. But here I was, barely knowing what it was I felt for him. All I knew was that it was nice when we were together.

Why me, I want to ask. But I hold back. It wasn’t a question I could ask my ex-employer current-lover part-time-asshole.

“Sorry,” he apologizes. “Was that a bit strong?”

“No,” I sigh again and he laughs. “Fine. A little. But it’s fine, I’m okay.”

“Okay,” he believes me. “So you broke off your engagement and didn’t tell anyone?”

“Kinda, we weren’t in a place we could come back from. We decided that mutually after things blew up. He didn’t even know I was leaving the country actually.”

Harry whistles. “You ran out on all of us.”

I scratch the side of my head, “Maybe?”

“Well I’ve enjoyed having you again, here.” He says with sincerity. “I’m really relieved to be able to get to say everything I wanted to your face.”

I agree. Neither of us mention I was leaving later in the week.

Even by the night before I’m leaving London we still hadn’t discussed a thing. But there’s a heaviness to us as we have dinner at his, as we pretend to watch a movie only to cuddle on the couch. We lay there facing each other and I trace his eyes, his nose, his wonderful mouth. It’s so odd to me that this was the same Harry Styles performing in sold out venues and on the walls of teenage bedrooms. That I got to have him in these quiet moments and be present.

I feel so grateful for this. That I didn’t have to carry around these draining stories within me anymore, that it felt like it happened to someone else. In a way even if nothing came from all this, I got closure. I was able to move on now.

I imagine my heart and it feels like when you take a stroll mid-March and realize nature was healing from winter’s blues. Warm and blooming the earth was growing again—my heart was growing stronger. Now the idea of a date or a partner didn’t seem so daunting and exhausting. I would never have guessed that it would take the man who almost broke me to come into my life again for me to see how to fit those pieces back in place again.

“I don’t know what I’m gonna do not having you in town anymore,” his lashes flutter as I run my hand through his hair. It was still shorter than I was used to but it had grown in the last three weeks.

“Oh you’ll be fine,” I say. “I’ve worked on your schedule before: meetings and studio sessions and photoshoots and interviews.”

“A busy life isn’t always a full one,” he whispers. And it’s the closest thing to a confession we were going to get to. I cover his mouth with mine and we indulge in each other one final time.

There is a symphony of unexpected but undeniable intimacy woven between the beats of our entwined hearts. I know I would probably never feel this way with anyone and I don’t think I’d want to. Being with Harry was passion. It was losing myself and finding myself at the same time. It was being vulnerable and guarded and cherished and known.

My flight out tomorrow is around noon but I can’t stay the night as I’d have to help Oretta in the morning to make sure everything gets to the airport in time. Harry walks me down to his lobby and we stand there for a few, just holding each other tight. He doesn’t ask me to stay and I don’t ask him to come.

“This isn’t goodbye y/n,” Harry says when we part. His hand rests on his heart. I know the feeling, mine aches so hard I want to press my hand to it just to tell it everything would be fine.

“No,” I shake my head. My eyes had been teary ever since he squeezed me to him. “We’ll talk soon.”

“You’ll be directing music videos soon.”

I roll my eyes, “I’m still working on the proposal.”

“I have a good feeling about it.”

“That makes one of us. But…thanks for believing in me.”

“Thanks for believing in me,” he whispers. “Even when you didn’t have to.”

I’m glad I did. The only time in my life not paying attention to the warning bells had paid off.

“I’ve been working with this new producer and he wants me to come out to a studio in Cotati?” Harry mentions. “How far is that from where you are? Are you still in m Burbank?”

“Burbank’s where my parents are,” I shake my head. I look up what he’s talking about and feel a thrill when it’s less than a couple hours. Still, I try to maintain neutrality. “A little over an hour?”

“Well,” he brushes my hair over my shoulder and keeps his eyes looking just over it. “Depending on what you’re doing—maybe if you’re free…we can see each other again?”

I would love that. My heart is bursting just thinking of getting to have him in the place I called home. Of this meaning something. Of him wanting to see me again.

“Of course if you have a boyfriend by then and he doesn’t want you to see me that’s…I mean, live your life and if it works out we-“

“Yes,” I cut him off. “Yeah. Let’s see but that sounds good.”

He meets my gaze and I laugh a little, he was nervous and that was rare.

“Good,” he smiles with. “Until next time.”

“Until next time,” I step into his arms and it’s a quick affair before he steps away. I turn to head out the door, shielding my eyes from him. Not wanting him to see that this was stupidly hard to say goodbye.

He waves me off and I head back to my hotel with a heavy heart. But I think about him asking to see me again. Who knows when that would be. And I know this wasn’t the end of our story.

***

I’m happy to land in SFO the following evening, happy to busy myself with Oretta’s business, happy to have Winnie chattering away. I spent parts of the flight I wasn’t sleeping working on my MV proposal and it awakens a familiar passion inside of me I’d been afraid I’d lost.

I send out a silent thanks to Harry for knowing what was good for me.

I think of Harry often, Gray even less until I don’t think of him at all. I dream of London weekly; I missed it this time around. And as life resumes again I anticipate the change I sense on the horizon.

So when life gives me lemons I stop asking Do I or Don’t I. If one thing the last year has taught me was I had to listen to my gut and look at the signs. I had to start asking what I wanted and go after it. Even though Harry and I barely talk, I remember the lessons he’s taught me.

I stop looking to others to make decisions. There’s no guidebook or lists to help me make my decisions either. I take deep breaths and I believe in myself.

I build a new life on the remains of my old. I don’t let it dictate what I did anymore, I simply leave it as the foundation to elevate me even higher. I reach for the sky with my feet planted firmly on the ground. And I grow with reckless abandon.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

TAGLIST: @boomitsallie1 @indierockgirrl @ndunad @jerseygirlinca @sunshinemoonsposts @ninasw0rld @love-letters-to-uranus @mayamonroem @sassamanda77 @harryspirate

🤍

#writingsfromhome #harry styles x reader #harry styles fic #harry styles #harry styles fanfic #harry styles imagine #harry styles angst #harry styles fluff #musician!harry #harry styles series #harry stylesxreader #enemies to lovers #dos and don’ts #this is DONE #I HAD THE MOST FUN WRITING THIS I REALLY POURED MY HEART INTO IT #IM SO HAPPY ITS DONE #AHHH #I LOVED WRITING THESE CHARACTERS #EVEN THE FRUSTRATING ONES #fic #<3 #i considered an epilogue but firstly not enough space and secondly idk if this open-ish ending suited the series? #if you didn’t like the ending I’m sorry just consider the alternate ending to be right after the grad dinner #but listen distance and experience provides perspective so nobody stay mad #okk byee #love ya

[cheeseschess]

Scar being surrounded by love after SL is over. They’re stuck indefinitely in Limbo, unsure why. Normally, the winner shows up, and everyone wakes up home. Not this time. A snow storm comes in, and Grian makes a joke of ‘formally inviting’ everyone to a fortified community house to wait it out together. It’s big with accommodations for everyone. Everyone shows up bringing blankets and food. Scar gets extra love in all of this. Everyone’s safe, there, and happy. Except for one person. A pink-haired woman who’s still sitting in her house. Who’s been keeping to herself so much she didn’t hear talk of the storm. Whose house is in the middle of the woods. Who didn’t get an invite. Who’s curled up in thin, tattered blankets, shivering by a dying fire. A pink-haired lady who’s blocked in by snow and fallen trees. Lizzie, who just wants to see her friends again. Lizzie, who wants to joke around with Grian. Lizzie, who wants to gossip with BigB and Pearl. Lizzie, who wants to talk shit with Cleo. Lizzie, who wants to talk redstone with Mumbo. Lizzie, who wants to talk builds with Joel. Who wants to eat Jimmy and Tango’s cooking that warms your bones. Who wants to curl up around Gem, and the Scott’s as they talk music. Who wants to wrap up in one of Bdubs many fluffy blankets as Etho denies anything Joel related. Who wants to hear Skizz giving praises. Who wants to hear Martyn and Ren’s theatrics. Lizzie, who wants everything Scar has right now. But she’s stuck in her house, alone, curled up by a dying fire.

#I’m sorry #angst #ldshadowlady #trafficblr #goodtimeswithscar #im not tagging everybody #This is the watchers fault #Btw #she might get a happy ending #Maybe #secret life #grian #smallishbeans #solidaritygaming #skizzleman #impulsesv #geminitay #scott smajor #mumbo jumbo #tangotek #bigbst4tz #zombiecleo #pearlescentmoon #ethoslab #bdoubleo100 #martyn inthelittlewood #rendog #i lied #I went back and tagged everyone

[codfanficedits]

One more mission.

CW: ANGST. A lot of angst </3 no proofreading because i cried while reading it

Fem!reader x Simon 'Ghost' Riley.

One more mission.

That is what Ghost and you had agreed on. Just one more mission until the two of you would go on a little getaway. A nice, well deserved vacation. Something to relax at after countless missions, countless late nights, countless piles of paperwork. To celebrate your relationship, the five beautiful years that had flown by, to celebrate his stubbornness, to celebrate your kind nature. The best place to celebrate how you had gotten to be his sunshine.

The memories of planning the trip are as warm as the blood that drips through your fingers as you hold your chest. A guttural scream from Ghost is heard from the battlefield. The man sprinted towards you, the thuds of his boots being deafening. He drags you to safety, hiding behind a slab of concrete. Ghost drops on his knees, his hand over yours, pressing on the wound on your chest.

“I’m sorry.” You whisper.

“Don’t.”

“You are going to make it lovey, don’t worry.” You can tell that he wants to believe his own words, but you both know he’s lying. “I’m sorry.” You whisper once more, as your free hand reaches for your dog tags, taking them off and offering them to Ghost. “So you can keep me close to your heart.”

It was as if his soul came apart as he listened to your words. “No, no, no. Sweetheart. Don’t you say a word. I’m not losing you. You hear me? God damn it, I will tear this world apart for you.” His voice breaks into sobs when he speaks to you.

You had never seen Ghost crying, and all it took was for you to die.

The hand he has on yours tightens its grip on you, if God would’ve asked him what he wanted in exchange of his soul, it would’ve been you. More time with you. More cuddles with you, more kisses from you, more love making. More. More. More. But God had abandoned his best soldier in times of need.

Blood kept seeping through your fingers, it stained your hand, his hand, your uniform and his too. But Ghost didn’t mind, not at all. You had gotten dizzy from the amount of blood you had lost, a wave of nausea came over you. You were running out of time and the both of you knew it. “There is a picture book under my bed.” You say, a faint smile on your lips as you struggle to keep your eyes open. “I’ve captured our moments for the past five years. It was a gift for our vacation. But..” You don’t want to say the last part. If you don’t say it, it doesn’t have to feel real. “Look at it when you miss me.”

“Then it’s all I’ll ever see again.”

You want to tell him to move on after you, to continue with life, but the look in his eyes tells you enough. He always thought soulmates were stupid, after all, he loved you on purpose, but Ghost changed his mind, right there and then.

The skullmask gets lifted, the balaclava too, and his soft, warm lips pressed against your forehead.

“Let me see your face.” You murmur and he obeys.

It’s a sight that breaks your heart. A trembling lip, tear filled eyes and so much guilt on his face. “I can’t do this.” He whispers. “I can’t live when you’re gone.”

“But I won’t be gone.”

“What?”

“Look for me in the beauty of life, look for me in the sunrise, the moon, the stars. I’ll be the beauty of the auburn leaves in autumn, a soft breeze on a hot summer day. I’ll be with you through it all.”

His sobs are no longer silent, they’re raw, painful. His lips press kisses against your forehead, your nose, your cheeks, and finally your lips. As If he is trying to keep you alive through his love. And to be fair, if love would be enough to survive, you would’ve lived forever.

The both of you knew the risks of being in the military, but it never occurred to you that it would be the reason you would die, that it would be the reason you would never marry, grow old, get your own kids, or a few dogs for that matter. It was bittersweet. The army would cost you your life, but you had gained Ghost, you had gained Simon, and your life seemed like a fair price for the love he had given you.

You could feel that it was time, there was barely a pulse left. What you would’ve done for a little more time with him. “Flowers.” You whisper. “I want so much flowers on my funeral.”

“I’ll get you all the flowers I can find.” He answers with a choked voice.

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

You can close your eyes after his words, you’re tired, and while your mind isn’t ready to go, your body can’t hold on much longer.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

He holds you while your body goes limp. Holding your head against his chest as he cried, wailed and screamed as loud as he could, halfway through, he hoped you could hear him scream on your way to heaven, so you would turn around and come back to him.

One more mission. And the two of you would go on vacation. One more mission and Ghost would have some time off with the love of his life.

One more mission and you came home in a body bag instead of in his arms.

He kept his promise to you. Getting all the flowers the funeral home would allow him to and then a few extra he had snuck in through his suit. The two of you had jokingly discussed him wearing royal blue suit on your wedding day, and now he was wearing it to your funeral.

Ghost tried to speech on your funeral, he really did.

“I wish we had more time.” He started. “I miss you terribly. The world is too quiet without you nearby.”

His voice left him after those words, his eyes filling with hot tears as his vision got blurry. But they all understood. No one needed him to finish speaking to understand the love he had for you.

And so the hours after your passing turn into days, they turn into weeks. Ghost finally had the courage to look for the picture book you had described. The sight of all those pictures made him curl up into a ball and bawl his eyes out. He never knew you had taken so many pictures of him when he wasn’t looking, and he was thanking the Gods that he could see himself through your eyes.

The picture book is located in his bedroom, accompanied by a black, velvet box. An engagement ring that never made it to you.

One more mission, before he would propose to you.

The hours after your passing turn into days, they turn into weeks, into months.

And now Ghost can finally see your beauty in the world. You’re the soft blue sky filled with white clouds. You’re the eclipse he went to see with Soap. You’re all the flowers that bloom around him, the mushrooms he finds in autumn, the soft blanket of snow in winter. You’re it all and he is no longer afraid to open his heart for it.

The hours after your passing turn into days, they turn into weeks, into months, into years and Ghost opens the door to his balcony, watching over the sunrise you promised him you’d be.

“I miss you more than I remember you.”

#call of duty modern warfare 2 #cod mw2 #call of duty #cod mwii #cod x reader #angst #ghost x reader #ghost x you #angst without a happy ending #tw death #im sorry #not really #ghost angst #simon riley x reader #simon ghost x reader #simon ghost x you #simon riley x you #fanfiction #fanfic #cod fanfic

[impommyyawl]

The fact that we finally got to see a dorky Katsuki and then he died.

It’s just too cruel to be real

#what a dork #is this a sign #angst with a happy ending #??? maybe #please #cruel world #bnha #boku no hero academia #bakugou katsuki #bnha bakugo katsuki #midoriya izuku #bakudeku #bkdk #I FORGOT TO TAG SPOILERS #IM SO SORRY #bnha 362 #bnha spoilers #mha 362 #mha spoilers #bnha manga spoilers #i apologise for this #all the anime watchers are confused

[atlaswav]

ADDICTED TO THE RUSH ♢

INFO: 3k words, aiku oliver x fem! reader SYNOPSIS: strange things, a man did, when his knowledge of women was suddenly upturned by your very existence — the anomaly to his capricious heart, the addictive rush he'd been yearning for. WARNINGS: making out 16+ (shame.), hard drugs, hallucinogens, please don't do drugs kids, ESPECIALLY NOT FROM RANDOM STRANGERS LIKE OLIVER THIS BITCHASS, angst?? with happy ending. please be drug safe, not like this guy AUTHOR'S NOTE: not proof read and this is nothing except shame and delusion i'm ashamed and also simultaneously proud but i'll probably look back on this later and barf. listen to waiting for love by openside the title is inspired by that song. ++ if this is romanticising drugs in any way pls lmk idk what came over me. also likes and reblogs are really appreciated i'll give you a cookie 🫂

Contrary to what many would think, Oliver Aiku didn’t exactly consider himself one for parties. If anything, the thrumming bass that vibrated through the crowd, the alcohol stagnant in the air and the humidity of sweating bodies was an immediate line in the sand. He did have a reputation to keep, however, so what was one girl from the next when his name became a mantra on their lips?

Oliver wasn’t one for drinking, drugs or anything of the sort, either. Despite what his teammates may think, he would never have taken anything beyond a celebratory drink. Even though he’d been offered far worse on multiple occasions.

The professional soccer player couldn’t possibly risk any harm to his health, could he?

But he supposed, if he were to take the strangely glimmering, iridescent pill that was offered to him at the subway station in the dead of night, it’d be catastrophic. Strange things, a man did, when his heart was confused, brimming with reckless abandon. 

What was another wound to his soul than what already was?

He’d ingest it against the voice of reason, and his head would start to spin after a few moments. Were there two of those men standing in front of him? The lights would begin to flicker in his vision, and the ground would rise up to meet his face unceremoniously, while he dreamed of a faraway paradise. A paradise filled with gaudy colours, rippling images, and infinite traces of you. 

You, you you – your narcotic smell everywhere, your hypnotic laughter around each corner and bend, the hue of your irises flashing in the peripherals of his vision. He’d turn, aching to catch your evasive gaze, but you weren’t there. 

Slipping through his fingers like water, fading into the effervescent shoreline. Trying to bottle sunlight – preserve seafoam. 

He supposed that’s what loving you was like – would be like – not that he would know.  It was an addiction in its own sense; chasing something that wasn’t there, yet yearned to hold. 

He supposed that if he ingested that pill, and if all these things happened to him, then loving you was a drug. 

He got unbelievably high from your presence, the rapid beating of his heart, your quiet smiles, shared furtive glances, secret whispers, your feather light touch skimming across his skin, your voice’s melodic cadences. 

He’d give up anything to try again. To turn time on its head, watch the sand fall inversely through the hourglass and give rise to the words that were lodged in his throat. To stand his ground and not run away like the coward he became when it came to you. But of course, Oliver Aiku was not one for such things either. 

And he hated himself for it. 

The lights above shone a myriad of colours into his bleary gaze, the ground beneath him rumbling. What was that screeching noise? 

It hurt his ears. He wanted to curl into a ball to escape it, but his limbs betrayed him.

His annoyance only spiked as people started to pour onto the platform, the ground shaking with footsteps and indistinct voices. 

He told himself that he should move, but the iridescent lights above him were swirling into shapes, and he wanted to watch the bubbles float towards him, shining incandescently. 

Wait. Bubbles? 

“Oliver? Oh my god.”

He stirred, temples throbbing. Your voice started to haunt him too, it seemed. Lilting, soothing, lovely. He wished you’d speak again. He needed you to say his name again. It sounded like honey when it fell from your lips. 

“Oh my god, Oliver, wake up.”

He mumbled something, faintly aware of a face in front of him. Your face. Beautiful, but marked with worry. He willed himself to reach out, to hold your cheek, to brush your hair away from your face, but he couldn’t.

“He’s off. On a trip to another universe. What did that guy give him?” another voice, this one less lovely. A dissonant cadence that had him remembering training. He hated training. Only because his team mates wouldn’t stop pestering him about you, once they’d finally found out about you.

“Hang in there, Oliver. We’ll get you home.” 

Home? To him, home was wherever you were. He was entirely content to fall asleep in your arms, on the grimy platform floor. 

Arms tried to lift him, but the six foot man was liquid in their arms. 

“C’mon, can you move?” his teammate asked. “What did that guy even give you?”

He grumbled something. Tried to get his legs to move. Stumbled backwards, hitting his back on a wall. 

“He said “a ticket to heaven for a night”, whatever that means.” You supply.

“That’s not reassuring.”

“Sendo, let’s just carry him. It isn’t too far anyway.” you huffed, looping one of his arms around you. He tried to cling to you with both arms, but his limbs flailed uselessly by his sides. 

“Alright, fine. You’re buying me a drink after this, Aiku.” His teammate’s voice irked him, even in this state of bliss. 

The walk back to his apartment took far longer than it should’ve. It was quiet, occasionally broken by the heaving of breaths, clouding in the winter air. Wisps of colour followed them out of the subway station. Was that a whale swimming towards them? No, that was just the light. The stupid, colourful light. 

He creaked open his eyes, and the world started to swirl in his vision. Were they standing at his elevator? Is that why the wind had stopped blowing into his face? He leaned into your warmth, cheeks red from the cold. 

“You can go now, I got him from here.” 

“You sure?” His balance slips as Sendo removes himself from Oliver’s grip. 

“Yeah. ‘Night, Sendo.” 

“Yeah, yeah, message me if something happens. Goodnight.”

You stand there in silence with him, waiting for the elevator to arrive. His face presses into the crook of your neck, stubble grazing your skin as he mumbles something. 

“Oliver, what did you do?” you sigh. 

He frowns. 

“You okay?”

He huffs. 

“Silent treatment, or high out of your mind?”

He doesn’t respond. Spots start to appear all over the place. Spinning, spinning, spinning. Waves of dizziness wash over him, and his grip on your arm tightens. 

“Come on, let’s get you to bed.” you haul him into the elevator, leaning against the wall as the ascent starts. Oliver wobbles dangerously, threatening to collapse as his knees start to give out. 

“Why did you do this?” you mutter. “Is it because of what I said?”

His eyes snap open. As close to snapping open as his traitorous body would allow in this state of his. Your eyes meet his, and he feels himself wanting to drown in your gaze forever. His mind was just as traitorous as his body.

No, he wants to say. It could never be your fault. 

But he doesn’t. His tongue is lead in his mouth, so he just looks at you in a stupor before you sigh and shake your head. 

“You don’t have to reciprocate anything. We can still be friends.” 

Your confession only hours before had felt like a weight finally lifted from your chest, quickly replaced by another. Heavier, more suffocating. When he’d run from you, it took everything within you to not run after him and beg. 

He hated anything remotely permanent, he’d once confided to you. He found an appreciation for the fleeting moments of affection of one night stands and miscellaneous, faceless, nameless women – no strings attached, tying him down. Heaven forbid you become the object of his hatred, along with the object of his – disgust? You couldn’t tell, with Oliver. There was never any telling what he’d do. 

You drew the keys from his pocket, unlocking his front door as he stumbled forward, nearly face planting on the floors. 

“Come on, you big baby.” 

“...Stars.” 

“What?”

“Stars on the… ceiling.” me mumbled, eyes half closed.

Worry rushed through you as you seated him on the couch. Just how strong was the drug he took?

“What did you take?” you grasp his shoulders, shaking him lightly. He mumbles something close to ‘Don’t worry’. If anything, you begin to worry more as his head falls to one side. 

“Oliver.” Your voice is a song in his ears, drawing up images of the waves at sunrise, bleeding orange, pink and purple into the deep blue of the water. 

“Oliver, stay with me.”

“‘M fine.” he manages. “Dizzy.” 

“Let me get you some water.” your presence – the warmth of your touch – disappears, and his eyes open in alarm. 

He hears the sound of water being poured, then soft footsteps shuffling around. His apartment is dark, the only light drifting in from the balcony, illuminating the room with a pale glow. 

“Here, drink.” you lift the glass to his lips, and he begrudgingly takes a couple of sips. Some water spills from the corner of his lips, down his neck. His Adam's apple bobs. His trembling hand comes up weakly to lower the glass, but he doesn’t release his grip as he meets your eyes. Pupils blown out, hardly on this plane of existence. 

“I love you.”

You nearly drop the glass. 

“You’re high. Say that to me when you’re sober.” you pry free from his grip, setting the glass onto the low coffee table in front of you. “Want to go to bed?”

He shakes his head, the movement apparently as much as he can muster. “Here.”

“Huh?”

“Here. With you.” he mumbles. 

“What?”

Then you take a seat next to him, and his head falls onto your shoulder. His body seems to relax in your presence, wholly at peace. 

You sigh. If “heaven for one night” meant anything, he’d be fine by morning, but you debated calling an ambulance anyway. Should you call the ambulance? Was that crook at the subway trustworthy? You glance at the peacefully sleeping man beside you, chest evenly rising and falling. He seemed fine, but he had taken drugs from a stranger.  

You reach for your phone just as he grumbles, flopping his entire upper body onto your lap. 

Okay, no, then.

Oliver’s soft snoring is almost endearing as he nuzzles his face into your thighs. You heave a sigh, running a hand through his neon green edged hair. He seemed to lean into the touch. No, it was your imagination. You lean back against the leather sofa and close your eyes, hoping for the night to pass sooner. Hoping that he’d sober up by morning, and spare you a trip to the emergency room. 

Hoping to hear those three words in the lustre of clarity. 

—

His dreams were filled with phantoms; phantom hands, faces, touches. Phantom words spoken into the air, disappearing in smoke, and only spurring his guilt. Yet as he woke from his stupor, the world smelled like you. Coaxing him back to the dreamscape. Exhaustion hit him like a tsunami, meeting him with a thundering headache. 

His vision didn’t fare any better as he opened his eyes, the world a mess of swirls and blurring patterns. He groaned and flipped over, only to realise where he was. 

The disorientation of sleep melted away as he finally came to his senses. Sweat, thinly beaded across his skin, his clothes clinging to his body. He lay curled up on the couch, head nuzzled into the pillows – warm, soft –

“Oliver? You awake?” 

He snaps to attention, sitting up the moment he hears your voice.

The plight of his dreams, the palliative cadences that he wished he could despair in. 

His head throbbed from the blood rushing to his head, and he swore quietly, swaying as he adjusted. 

“How are you feeling? Are you alright?” your eyes are wide with concern, and something in his heart tugs. 

The night before is an empty slot in his reel of memory, a smudge of bright, neon lights and dancing shapes as he attempts to recall exactly what happened. How he ended up sleeping on your lap, how you’d ended up at his apartment. Did you sleep over? It looks like you didn’t sleep at all, with the dark circles under your red rimmed eyes. 

You abruptly get off the couch, heading into his kitchen. He hears the pouring of water, then you return, gingerly handing him the glass. He takes it, confusion slowly turning to realisation as he remembers. 

And the memory of his cowardliness, his recklessness, his awful string of decisions that led him to seeing stars rushes through him like ice cold water. 

“You okay?” you ask, voice soft. Treading on eggshells. 

He nods, downing the glass of water. 

Quiet, strung on a humming wire, envelops you as he attempts to find the words that kept escaping him. The words that he swore he’d never speak, even though you were right in front of him, still worried. Despite it all. You’d stayed, despite everything. 

Would he have been a coward for pushing you away? Sparing you from the inevitable heartbreak that he’d dole out like his meaningless plethora of apologies, incapable of anything prolonged more than one night?

“Oliver,” his gaze snaps to you. His name was like ambrosia on your lips. He wanted to hear it spoken again and again, a prayer, a worship, a plea. 

“Did we…” he trails off, sheepish. Oliver Aiku, bashful of his escapades. 

Your cheeks redden slightly as you shake your head, unwilling to meet his eyes. 

Silence, the capricious thing. Teetering on the edge of ruin, speared into disrepair with words that could shatter or mend your heart. Your heart, aching to be given away. Aching for the one that you couldn’t have. 

Your name echoes through his empty house. The early morning sunlight peers through the windows, casting warm light on your face. Rejuvenating, almost divine. 

“I’m sorry.” 

Your heart drops. 

“I don’t know how to–” he rubs his face with his hand, heterochromic eyes gazing at some point beyond. “I’ve never had a way with words.”

“You don’t have to say anything.” your bitter smile breaks his heart. Digs the blade in and twists, spilling burning acid into his veins. 

He can feel his world crumbling around him as you stand, turning around. Heading for the door, for the threshold beyond that would mean you were finally gone. Finally out of his life, finally gone from the dreams that you haunted, from the touch that he craved. 

He should be glad, but instead, like an addicted man, he reaches out, grabbing your arm. 

“Wait,” 

You turn to face him. Hope glimmers in your eyes and he can only feel guilty. His love wasn’t something that he could offer, his heart wasn’t one that could stay with yours for as long as he would wish, and it was another thing that he despised himself for. 

He despised himself for not being able to love you the way you should be. 

If only he could put it into words. 

“You don’t need to comfort me.” 

He sighs. “I’m not trying to comfort you, I just…”

You frown, stepping closer. “Then what, Oliver?”

If only you knew the effect you had. “I don’t have a way with words,” he starts. “But I’ve always believed that actions can speak louder.”

“What are you–”

Your words drown in his mouth as he pulls your mouth down to meet his. He drowns your gasp of shock, offers reassurance with the measured brush of his tongue on your lips. If Oliver had anything to show from his reputation as a womaniser, it was knowing how to treat a woman. 

The kiss burns with a fervour that you can only describe as hunger. He kisses like he’s been starved, addicted to your taste, your touch, shivering as your hands wander into his hair. His breath catches in his throat as your nails scrape his scalp, muffling a groan as you bite his lip. 

You pull away all too quickly for his liking. His starvation is in his eyes. Your breaths are quick, ragged, and he tries to kiss you again, but you press your index finger to his lips. 

“Are you still high?” you ask, voice carrying that hint of joy that he wanted to illuminate. 

“No.”

“Are you lying to me?” 

A smile breaks out on your face as he sighs heavily, catching your wrist in his hand. “I might be, but I can think straight.”

A laugh from you, and he thinks he’s doomed. Fated to be wrapped around your finger for the remainder of his sorry life, a jester for your amusement. How quickly the tables have turned on him. 

“We’ll see, Aiku.” you press a kiss to his forehead, smile luminescent in the dawn sun. Despite the sleepless night, watching over him in his state of oblivion, you were radiant. The object of  his secret desires, the hubris to his mercurial heart. 

“Wait, what?” As you turn to leave, he scrambles up from the couch, but his limbs won’t let him catch you. “Where are you going?”

“Home.” you cast him a coy smile. “If your actions speak true, come find me when you’re sober.”

Then the door opens and closes, before he can retort. Gone with the wind, scattered like seafoam on the shores of golden sand. 

He falls back onto the couch with a huff, the ceiling still swimming slightly in his vision. Never again, he’d take any drug from any sketchy man in a subway station. He didn’t need drugs, alcohol or women anymore, he could discard his reputation completely. He didn’t need such things anymore – not when he had you. 

You, you you, with your haunting presence, eluding his grasp like sunlight in a jar. He’d normally relent, turning to the next woman fawning over him, sweep her off her feet with his aloofness and casanova grin. 

But now he had you, and the chase was a thrill that no drug could replicate. 

You were his dopamine, he was hopelessly addicted. 

written by @atlaswav, published 4th of February, 2024

#blue lock #bllk #blue lock x reader #oliver aiku #aiku oliver #aiku x reader #oliver x reader #oliver aiku x reader #oliver aiku x you #blue lock anime #blue lock manga #blue lock oliver #i need sleep desperately #angst with a happy ending #tw drugs #be drug safe PLEASE #its not my fault if you decide to take drugs from a random stranger in a train station okay this is me warning you #if i romanticised drugs im so sorry i don't know what i'm doing #sigh #i hate this #i hate everything i write to be fair #yolo 😍😔 #MEOW #goodnight america #☁️. writing

[qwymarkii]

(in)dependent

wc: 1.4k

tw: angst, mentions of intercourse, hardships, mentions of self-harm, miscommunication, crying, boyfriend!mark x fem!reader

a/n: not proofread. sorryy

not everything works.

some things can't be salvaged.

that's what mark told himself. what he's felt for the past year of how this relationship of yours wasn't his fault neither yours, that it had to come to an end. mark missed you. the week break the students were given was getting closer to the day you'd all have to return.

mark knocked upon the wooden door, which was immediately met by a giddy you, engulfing your boyfriend. mark of course smiled as he breathed in your scent. mark stepped inside your dorm, removing his shoes and placing his bag down. "what's got you so happy today? we have to go back tomorrow?" he questioned.

you laughed pulling him by the wrist to sit him onto your bed. you climbed on top of his lap kissing against his neck and jawline, beginning to speak, "nothing, i just missed. . . you. i was thinking we could—" mark then cut you off.

"no, no yn i think. . . we – we need to talk." he stated trying to push you off of him. it's like you were obsessed. not that there's a problem with that, he's your boyfriend after all but you were too obsessed. overzealously craving him.

mark was serious, you attempted to nip at his neck more, whining softly. but mark only pushed you completely off of him now standing in front of you. "don't do this mark, don't—baby don't leave me." you cried pulling at his shirt. "i need you close to me."

frustrated, mark put his hands up to his face to block his emotions. if without context, it'd seem like you were a creepy, fanatical person over your lover. but deep down you were just someone who wasn't given attention as an adolescent and now had someone to cling to, to grasp that attention from. you felt as if you needed to please mark, he was your boyfriend if you wanted him to stay, that would get the job done.

you thought that sex could be the glue to all your problems, make it seem like you were more appealing to love, just to show how devoted you were to mark. you'd hope in that case, mark would reciprocate. "no. what do we need to talk about? are you hurt? is something wrong?" if there was something wrong with your boyfriend that'd only make it 10 times worse for you.

mark sat down next to you, placing his hands on your thighs to soothe you. "baby, im fine i just need you to talk to me in this moment. okay?" mark circled his thumb against your exposed skin, bringing himself closer to you. "i just wonder." he trailed off, hesitant to ask. "have you ever thought of other ways to display your affection?"

your heart skipped a beat. "what do you not like when we —" your words frantically spilling out.

"no, no, no that's not it yn. its just." mark sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose "i-i just need some space you know? there's just a lot of the time where we — i don't want to be pleased in that way?" he said, pressing his lips in a thin line to reject his emotions.

"so no more. . ." you quietly asked, voice breaking. mark let his head slightly fall, "no yn im not saying no more. but a break wouldn't hurt... you know." he finished, you wrapped your arms around him, placing your head into the crook of his neck.

"i just love you so much. i-i need you, you're so perfect and i don't want you to leave me. i just want to show you how much you mean to me." you confessed. mark sighed it didn't seem like you were one-hundredly getting the message.

"im not going to leave you yn, im not going anywhere." mark reassured you, rubbing your tears away with his thumbs. "you- we just need to find a healthier way to cope with your needs towards me. okay?" tears continued to fall down your cheeks as mark continued. though he didn't completely intend for it to come off as you were being obsessive, he needed you to know that.

you shook your head trying to prevent more tears from falling, but it only intensified. "it's just.. mark~ i can't help it. it makes my skin itch i just want to touch you, even if we're out with friends. i just hate standing there not being able to let everyone see how much i love you. how much i appreciate you. mark i love you. i really do." you pleaded, biting the dead skin off your lips. mark cupped your chin bringing your gaze towards his.

"babe i know. . i know you hate it, but sometimes it can be too much for me. you don't have to please me in sexual ways to show that you love me. . ." your tears flowed like a river, constantly pouring down your face as you tried to understand where your lover was coming from.

"but, but i don't get to see you that often, especially with our dorms being split by gender. and we don't have any classes together, so i just want to make you feel good. i feel closer to you when we do." you explained, hoping he'd get where you were coming from. you thought maybe he brought this up because you'd been two had been at your friends alot more recently due to something they'd been going through.

"we've been sleeping in the same bed for a few nights now at karina's. yn promise me we're close." mark placed a kiss upon your forehead.

you brought your face slightly back up, kissing mark's neck, but he jerked back. "yn, stop." he places his hands on your shoulders to restrain you. he hates that he had to be this stern with you, seeing how easily it broke you down. but the conversation you just had telling you not to do that exact thing. he needed to tell you.

"why?"

"because. because yn i just kindly asked for you to give me some space! i love you yn i really do but i need the space. im so fucking exhausted you don't get it..." mark finally raised his voice out you for the first time ever.

he didn't like what he'd done but it had to been done. of course he'd know it wouldn't end well, you were too sensitive to be spoken to in that tone, but the action you were partaking in had to be addressed sooner or later.

you sat up and immediately got off of your boyfriend, feeling nauseous. it might've seemed dramatic but you detested the way it felt when people raised their voice to you. especially, when this was the one person you loved and adored most.

mark ran after you, unfortunately not quick enough before he was met with a slammed door. he'd never seen you react this quick to a situation like this and it brought panic to himself. mark knocked at the door, "yn, don't do this. . ." all that could be heard was your soft cries on the opposite side.

"yn. please i didn't mean to upset you like this.."

"go away mark!" you yelled back.

"no. im not going away til you open this door."

"i thought. . . you wanted your space. well look now you've gotten it. all the fucking space you could ever want." you spewed out, through tears and a broken voice. "baby..." silence was returned. mark called once more but only was met with the same silence.

"don't hurt yourself. please don't tell me you're hurting yourself..." mark cried, this whole situation seemed completely fucked.

"im not. mark just leave me be please."

"yn don't do this again, i'm here for you, i love you. i love the affection you give me, it's a bit excessive but i still love you. and i will no matter what. it was wrong of me to shove you off me like that and raise my voice...please don't hurt yourself." he pleaded, the last thing he need was you hurting yourself in any way.

"i'm not."

"good. can you come out then?"

"no! i want you, i just don't want to talk" you slowly opened the door and as per usual you clung onto him right away. "just hold me, i'm sorry for pushing you to do things, but please let me be close."

mark guided you over to your bed and lied down with you still in his arms. "i can do that, it's alright"

"just please don't yell at me again" you mumbled.

although the problem was never resolved, it had it one step closer to being fixed. that being realization of the problem. mark could fix you. he would fix you.

#kpop x reader #kpop fanfic #kpop au #college au #kpop bg #nct angst #mark x reader #mark lee #mark nct #nct x reader #kpop x y/n #angst with a happy ending #depressing shit #im so so so sorry #nct 127 #nct dream

[elliewill]

A FOOL'S GAME | PT II

/ part i /

summary: ellie can't let you go. you meet again, nursing hopes of one day loving each other the way you used to. warnings: language, heartbreak/making up, more angst word count: 2.4k credits: divider, gif (cant find!), proofreaders (edie, saz) ♡ taglist: @kaorussgf @just-consume-it @elliesquerida @dyk3ification a/n: written w/self control by frank ocean (ellie)/ i want you by mitski (r) in mind

"Shit," she huffed as her eyes flew open, her heart hammering out of her chest. Ellie had been grasping at her sheets, helplessly reaching for you.  "Y/N?"

But you were never there.

It wasn't a nightmare about Joel this time. Or about Dina. It was about you. You were so close in her dream. Your lips, your skin, your voice. She had to savor it. It almost felt fucking real. But to Ellie’s disappointment, it never was. It was just another sleepless night, after you stormed out all those months ago. And it made her fucking sick to her stomach. What had it been, the fourth time? The fifth night in a row this month? She'd wake up so often in the night, praying somehow you'd be there, that she lost count.

A quiet guilt was eating her alive, the shame festering like roaches in her veins. Her nights were consumed with war, and she knelt to her defeat every time. She was no noble soldier; she surrendered herself to a punishment she felt that she deserved. Ellie chewed on the same, painful mistakes and memories until her jaw ached. And when she was done, she’d chew on them again. Watching Joel take his last breaths, ignoring Dina as she begged her to stay…and letting you, the only person she had left, walk away. She’d lay in bed and stare at the paneled ceiling as her mind carried her away, sometimes wondering if she was even really there.

After the dismal realization that you weren’t laying beside her, she shot up and threw her covers off, a rotten feeling seeping into the pit of her stomach. Was there a way to have kept you from leaving? Was there a way to keep herself from imploding? No. Nothing would’ve made you stay and Ellie knew it. You hadn’t spoken to her in months, there was no hope. Was there really much left unsaid? Ellie pushed herself off of her bed and donned her sweats, boots, and winter coat anyway.

The morning wind tossed around strands of her auburn hair as she stepped out into the biting cold. Little puffs of visible breath left her lips as she made her way to you, the snow crunching underneath her and her mind absolutely blank.

She didn't show face around Jackson anymore unless it was to eat or fulfill her duties. Even then, Maria knew well enough to not pair you both up for anything anymore. Apparently, the screaming from inside Ellie's house wasn't as contained as you both thought it was that night.

"Y'all are explosive and it ain't healthy. Leave that girl alone."

Ellie could already hear Maria's grating voice and southern drawl warning her to stay away from you, warning her to stop sneaking glances of you on stables or leaving for patrol on your horse. But that was the only way she could love you - from a distance. God knows it was half-way impossible to get you alone. You avoided her like the fuckin' plague, ironically enough. And the worst part was that she just couldn't blame you. She knew how badly she fucked up.

At some point, Ellie had gotten Maria to ease up to arrange an early morning patrol for the two of you. But aside from the "all clear"s and "infected on your 3"s, the trip was silent and cordial. You made sure to never make eye contact, lest you crumble under the overwhelming urge to ask her how she was. It seemed like every time Ellie mustered the courage to say something, her breath left her as she watched the moment slip through her fingers. She hated herself for it. So much so, that the dreams had gotten worse.

Not far along the dimly lit path, there was your door. She stepped up on your porch to knock before quickly tucking her pink and frozen hands into her jacket pockets. Only a few moments later, a warm glow flickered on through the windows. The door flew open with a balmy wave of heat that hit Ellie where she stood. There you were. Rubbing the sleep out of your eyes and catching your breath as the bitter winter wind hit you through the door left ajar.

Your freckle-faced girl stood before you, rings around her eyes and her hair, a bedheaded half-updo.

A subtle panic rushed across your expression and you suddenly didn’t know what to do with your hands. Your legs felt like beams of lead, gluing you to that spot on the wooden floor. And you ached to throw your arms around her. To hold her, to curse her out, to confess that your door had always been open. That you’d secretly always made sure her side of the bed was ready to be laid in.

She looked like she hadn't slept in days. If she hadn’t been sleeping well, she probably wasn’t eating well either. You could feel the guilt begin to eat at you. The shame pricked sweat along your neck and under your arms.  Maybe you should’ve never left. It was clear now, she always needed you. And you weren’t there.

But you remained frozen, the yellow light glowing around your silhouette, almost angelically.  "What are you doing here?" you hoarsely asked, furrowing your eyebrows and hopelessly trying to mask the shock that paralyzed you moments ago. “It’s 3am, Ellie."

For Ellie, there was something surreal about finally hearing your voice again. She’d wake up from dreams, aching for it to have been real. For you to have called her name.  Even if it was to curse her out again. She needed to keep this conversation going, even if to hear your voice for a little while.

"Sorry. I know it's late," Ellie muttered, avoiding the shock in your eyes. Something about catching your gaze made her feel transparent, naked. Almost like you could always see right through her. "There was so much I wanted to say when I saw you on patrol. But I never got to."

 Something sour jumped in your chest. You felt needed, wanted. Ellie was coming to you to open up, like she used to. Maybe this time she wouldn’t let you down. And could almost feel the world crumbling around you again. Part of you didn't want to see her again and she knew it. You couldn’t look at her without being reminded of what she had said to you. The things she had done in the bed you shared. As much as you fucking loved her.

"What else is there left to say?" you asked wistfully, pained by the hope that rose in your heart despite the harsh memory of her betrayal. You shook your head at her, as you warred against your thoughts. Were you willing to go through with this? All over again?

"There’s so much I need to explain," Ellie swallowed her pride, and finally caught your eyes, sending a shock through her spine. "I just couldn't get you alone, and I needed to-"

"You needed to what, El? There’s nothing left to explain. It’s done," you firmly reminded her. You might have sounded confident, but you had never felt more unsure in your life. Maybe this time could be different? Maybe Ellie had figured some things out while you had been apart? 

Ellie's ears burned up in the stinging cold, a pathetic, hopeless feeling filling her chest as you spoke. You spoke with finality, and it crushed her. In the months you had been apart, she had hoped this entire time that you had still been nursing your soft spot for her somehow. And she was right, you were. But you’d never embarrass yourself by foolishly wearing your heart so openly on your sleeve again.

You looked at her intently, waiting for her to say something else. Hoping, even. Maybe things had finally changed.

No dice. She looked back at you, speechless. 

Maybe it really was done, like you said. But Ellie had always championed the art of drawing you back in, just to push you away, so you began to wonder why you had ever expected anything more. You walked away before, and you weren’t afraid to do it again. So you picked up your legs, no longer feeling like lead, and turned to walk back into the comforting heat of your home. But before you could fully turn, you felt Ellie’s freezing cold hand find its way to your skin. 

"Please just hear me out? Please," she finally asked, catching your hand and gently tugging you back toward her. She had spent the last few months hating herself for letting you walk away. She couldn’t bring herself to watch you leave again.

God, you hadn't felt her touch for months. You might have hated her for what she did, but you couldn't deny how good it felt to have her fingertips graze your skin again.

You toyed with the idea in your mind. You'd hear her out and she'd get her word in. You'd get the closure and sincere apology you need and she'd learn from her mistakes. And then what? You'd be friends? Maybe strangers. But you were shit at convincing yourself that you’d be okay with never truly knowing her again. So you relented. One last time.

"Listen, I care about you. I do. I worry my ass off about you, even after what you did. But we can’t keep doing this. It fuckin’ hurts, Ellie," you uttered, your tough facade faltering. You stepped back from the threshold to allow her in. “So this is it.”

Ellie trailed inside, nervously wringing her cold hands as you closed the door behind her. As much as she had done you wrong, an urge to tell her to make herself comfortable bubbled up. But instead of asking her if she was hungry, you remained in an unfamiliar silence as you walked over to sit on your couch. Had you two already become strangers? No, you knew her too well. You had a feeling that you knew all the things she’d say and how the conversation would go. It was just a matter of getting it over with.

You patiently watched as Ellie unzipped and hung her winter jacket on the same hook she always used to. Second from the right. 

“Do you mind if I sit?”

Yes, of course she could. But you shrugged indifferently. You were sure it’d be a matter of time before all of this developed into an argument anyway. She wouldn’t be sitting for long.

She came over to your sofa and took the seat closest to you, leaving only a few inches of space between your criss-crossed legs and the side of her baggy hoodie. It seemed like she was looking everywhere but you again, while her hands fiddled with the fraying seams of your favorite grey sweater of hers. 

You quietly waited for her to speak, the silence beginning to make you anxious. She looked like she’d been working up the nerve to say something important, but you lowered your expectations. 

“You were my best friend, Y/N,” she said softly, slowly nodding as the inner corner of her eyebrows turned up. “You were my best friend, and I loved you. I still love you.”

And you loved her too. It felt so sweet to know. It was a familiar, warm feeling, too inviting if you weren’t careful. You never did stop loving her. And that had been the worst pain you had carried since walking out that night. 

You followed her wistful gaze to the dusty stack of DVDs against the dark wood of the coffee table. Those were movies you promised each other you’d watch together, but never got the chance to. You refused to touch them since. Strange how life works.

“That doesn’t change anything, Ellie,” you gently protested, shifting your eyes from the DVDs to Ellie’s distant gaze. You resisted the strongest urge to take her fidgety fingers and interlock them with yours. To tell her that it was okay. And that if she loved you hard enough maybe you’d be able to forget the past. You nearly gave in, almost hushing the nagging feeling that always asked you why you felt the need to comfort those who have hurt you.

“It doesn’t,” she somberly replied. She shook her head with a half-frown tight on her lips. “But that shit doesn’t just go away. And I want to fix this. I need to.”

She looked toward you, her eyes fixed on yours. Pleading with you.

“Then tell me what to do, El. Tell me. Cause I gave up a long time ago,” you admitted, your expression melancholy, little lines appearing between your eyebrows. “I used to try so fuckin’ hard. I don’t think I have anything left to give anymore.”

“Look, I want you to be happy, Y/N,” Ellie responded, running a hand along her thigh as her knee began to bounce anxiously. “And I’ve been trying so hard to be the person that wishes you well even if it's not with me. But the truth is that I’m not. I don’t think I’ll ever be. I will never be okay seeing you happy with someone else. And maybe considering what I did, that makes me selfish. I dunno anymore, I just…”

Her eyes ran over your features before she turned away. This time, while absentmindedly peering at the foggy window, her hand came up to rub the back of her neck sheepishly.

Sure, she was selfish. But you were too. For what other reason did you let her back in? Why were you stoking her hopes of this ever getting better? To feel wanted by her again? Loved? You choked on the words stuck in your throat and could only let a defeated sigh escape from your lips.

“I have dreams about it. About you. And I can’t fucking sleep,” Ellie whispered dejectedly, her brows low and pinched together. She glanced down at her wringing hands before meeting your eyes again. “Just… please don’t fucking give up on me.” 

“What if I say yes? And we try again? And you haven’t changed? Am I supposed to wait for it all to fall apart again?” You asked earnestly.

“I wouldn’t let that happen again.”

“I get it. Sometimes, I hold out hope too. That we’d be endgame. That someday I’d forget how it felt to convince myself that it was supposed to be you,” you lamented.“God, you have no idea how bad I wanted it to be you."

#yall i tried #agonized over this #pt3 is hate sex if yall want it #im SORRY #happy endings r hard with infidelity #ANYWAYS #ellie williams angst #ellie williams x reader #ellie williams x female reader #ellie williams x y/n #ellie x fem reader #ellie williams x you #i hope it lives up to expectationssss #running away now byeeee #writings

[catiuskaa]

pink in the night.

part of the “now playing: mitski!” series

he knows it means leaving you at night with your hoodie on, but minho has to say goodbye one last time, even if nothing is fair.

hurt. no comfort. (still, hope you can enjoy it!)

WC: 1.4k TW: mentions of unrequinted love and implied intentions of cheating(?) [not at minho, but with him]

[˚✧₊⁎☆🌙☆⁎₊✧ ˚]

It’s raining.

Minho hates getting wet.

Still, he can feel the small droplets fall on him. Over him. Running through his hair, stroking his forehead, his cheeks, the bridge of his nose, and he can feel the weight of the water on his sweater, as he turns colder and colder.

He’s shivering. He’s so cold.

Minho hates being cold.

There’s a slight pause on his slow breathing when he realises he can no longer see the steam coming out of his mouth.

How long has he been there?

“Minho.”

You would’ve frowned, but your features remain soft, slightly inexpressive under the doorframe at the entrance of your residency. Even if he can feel emotion bubbling in your eyes, he can’t figure out what it is exactly.

His body tells him he has missed you. Everything in him does. How you mutter his name, in a way that he wishes only you would say it for the rest of his life, in a way that makes his heart churn, in a way that makes him stare at your lips, plump and rosy, in a way that he wants to send everything and everyone to hell and beyond except for you two and kiss you to figure out exactly how each of your kisses taste like. And kiss you again, and again, and again.

But you won’t know that.

In a swift motion, you let him inside the building and quickly go up the stairs, entering back into your apartment number one A. You motion to him to sit in your living room, so he plops on the couch.

He’s not cold anymore. Just wet.

“Take your sweater off, Min,” you mention, coming from your room with a shirt and a hoodie you found after roaming in your closet for something he could use.

He does as you say, and you take his clothes to your radiator, hanging them on the rack in front of it so they’d dry faster.

Minho stares at your back, the scent of rain and your cologne mixing with each other, hiding his red nose under the collar of his borrowed clothes. They smell like flowers. You smell like flowers. He doesn’t know why, but they’re all pink. Your flowers. A soft, tender baby pink that warms his body.

He’s not cold anymore. Not inside.

But you won’t know that either.

You sit on the armchair at his side, the chimney’s fiery heat lingering in the room.

“Don’t.” He mutters, and you don’t understand him for a second, silence filling up the room again. “You- You’re picking on your nails. You’ll hurt yourself.”

It’s the first thing he has said since he came in. Since he came back inside. Back to you.

The first time Minho showed up in your apartment after he kissed you.

You sigh.

“Is that it?”

The tiredness in your voice makes him weak.

“What…” He begins, but trails off. He bites his lip. He can’t think of another time where he struggled so much finding the correct words in his mind.

“What time is it?” He shudders softly, further hiding his face in your hoodie. He’s not going to give it back.

You reach for your phone.

“Ten thirty.” Minho blinks.

He’s been outside since lunchtime. Waiting.

Waiting for a sign, a text, a call, a voice in his head. Heck, he was waiting for anything. Anything that could make his storyline different. Or yours. Anything that would change the fact that he knows he sucks. Anything that would make you different.

It’s not fair, he thinks. His cheeks burn when you smile. His stomach flutters when your touch lingers on his body for longer than expected. His breath quickens when you stare at him deeply, much like you’re doing now.

His eyes flutter close. Why do you have to be the uncanny combination of every single feature he has ever found attractive?

Why must it all be this hard?

“Where is him?” He says in a whisper.

Minho hates a lot of things. But the one he hates the most isn’t the rain or being cold.

“He’s having dinner with his brother. Something came up.” You say, almost reluctantly.

He hates that he can’t have you.

“How is he?” He says, still whispering.

Because someone else wants you.

“Minho.” You whine in a soft tone.

And you want them.

“Guess that means he’s ok.” He shudders once more.

You don’t want him.

“Minho.” You repeat yourself, and he can’t hold his gaze on you, staring at the crevices on the wooden floor, at his shoes, at how lovely your apartment looks and how devastating that feels because it’s not just yours.

“Will you tell him I was here?” He asks.

It’s not smug, like you would’ve expected from anyone else. Instead, it’s heartbreaking. It somehow shows how his insides are screaming inside his head to stop speaking and to never do so if it meant you would let him stay.

“Minho, this isn’t…”

He chuckles. It's dry and painful, and it makes him feel a sudden pressure on his cheeks and behind his eyes.

“Fair?” His voice breaks, and he chuckles again. The feeling worsens.

“Yeah. We can agree on that.”

He stands up in a sudden movement. Minho isn’t even that tall, but his silhouette seems to fill up the space in your living room.

You stand up right behind him.

It’s just the two of you, one in front of each other.

“I’m sorry, Min.”

He feels a stray tear fall down his face.

“How could you say that?” He gulps. His eyes are red, and he’s crying now. “You’re happy. You have a loving boyfriend coming back home in a bit. And I.” He stops himself. He wants to say it, he feels like he’ll burst if he doesn't. “I love you, but that doesn’t mean anything.” He huffs.

“Minho, did you drink?” You ask, to which he doesn’t answer. “How much have you had, Minho?”

Nothing. “I’ve had enough.” He isn’t talking about drinks. “What I really need to do is to leave.”

You grab his arm, and he glares at you like you just shot him.

“What.” He huffs, his voice broken.

But you’re frozen. You want to hear him again, you want to hear him saying he loves you so badly. And you shouldn’t.

You shouldn’t because you loved him long ago, and you are over him. You have to be.

You’re dating someone else.

“You- you can’t do this to me.”

Minho is crying again.

“But I think I lo…”

His eyes widen, and he moves his hand so fast it almost slaps against your face. But his touch is still tender when he covers your mouth.

“It would be a blatant lie if you say that. It’s time we stop lying to ourselves.” He’s crying now, and it’s not because of how his feelings hurt, and you know it. You should’ve stayed quiet. You shouldn’t have said that. You shouldn’t have tried.

But it’s too painful.

“He won’t come back until tomorrow.” You try again, and he winces, as if you hit him right in his face. “It’s still raining. Can’t you stay until it fades?”

He’s shaking his head sideways.

“Don’t make this more painful than it already is.” He sobs, and you have to hold back to not wipe the tears off his face. “I’m not good enough for you. I won’t ever be.”

“But Minho, that’s not-!”

He passes his hand over his face.

“This- you and me.” He breathes in slowly, trying to recompose himself. “There’s no us. This is wrong. I shouldn’t have kissed you.”

And it hurts so bad that you know the real mistake is letting him leave.

“No, Min, please, wait!”

He frowns.

“Don’t you raise your voice at me.” His sadness blurs. “Do you even realise what you’re making me choose?”

You’re crying too.

“Please don’t cry.” He whimpers.

He almost approaches you again, to hold your face, to kiss you, to kiss your tears away.

But it isn’t him who should do that.

“I don’t want you to leave.”

Before he makes another mistake, he takes his clothes from the drying rack even if they’re still wet and goes towards your door.

He opens it, and he looks at the stairs.

He’s doing it. He’s almost there.

He knows he’ll leave you at night with your hoodie on, the one that smells like pink flowers.

But if he moves inside again there won’t be another chance.

There is a lump in his throat, clugged with all of the things he wants to say.

I’m sorry.

I love you.

Goodbye.

But instead he turns his head over his shoulder, and he chuckles once more.

“You look beautiful tonight.”

[˚✧₊⁎☆🌙☆⁎₊✧ ˚]

~Kats, who is proud of herself because she wrote this after an intense pvp against writer’s block.

#lee know angst #so yeah #no happy ending #im sorry #stray kids x reader #angst #stray kids #stray kids scenarios #stray kids imagines #skz minho #skz scenarios #straykids angst #stray kids angst #minho angst #skz lee minho #lee minho angst #lee know stray kids #minho #stray kids lee know #skz angst #stray kids lee minho #straykids

[gregre369]

I have a Terrible head cannon that Steve’s parents were killed season 3 by the mind flayer.

But Steve doesn’t know this because they’re almost never home and he didn’t realize they had been in town when it happened.

#fanfiction #steddie #eddissy #stranger things #eddie munson #harringroveson #hellcheer #steve harringon #chrissy cunningham x eddie munson x steve harrington #platonic stobin #Stobin #headcanon #im sorry #but poor Steve just assume they have no time for him #and when he finds out he’s just absolutely gutted #but like angst with a happy ending #bc both me and Steve need this

[siliconforbrains]

Okay, it's like 10pm on a work night and I haven't had any coffee today so my thoughts are a little scrambled BUT. I WAS THINKING.

(About In Stars and Time of course I'm always thinking about that game)

A couple of years ago, at the height of Steddie -my sister was big into it and recced me some fics okay- I read this fic about Steve dealing with time loops ("The one in which a time loop is fucking exhausting" by badpancake) and there was this specific detail about the epilogue that stuck with me.

It was the idea that, once the time loops were done and over with, people would slowly start to remember bits and pieces of what happened in earlier loops. After being fractured for so long across dozens of timelines and experiences and outcomes, time was finally healing, and broken shards of lost memories would find their way back into people's minds.

And that got me thinking about a post-game what-if scenario where the same happens to the gang as they travel through Vaugarde.

Like they still don't remember everything -just bits and pieces. Experiences so emotionally charged that they found a way to cross the sands of time and reach them again.

The question is, what would those memories be? The first answer that comes to mind is some of Siffrin's deaths, of course. I can't imagine watching your friend get pancake-d by a boulder would be pleasant, nor witnessing them turning their own dagger to themselves. Or offering him a slice of your favorite snack only for him to go into anaphylactic shock in front of your very eyes, for that matter!

But there would be other instances too, wouldn't they? Death is not the only thing that shook them to their core. What about their first death to the King? Or Bonnie's fate at the end of Act 3? What about basking in the blissful feeling of victory against the tormentor of your land only to turn to look at your friend and know something is very, very wrong?

What about fighting through the House with a party of 4 instead of 5, bloodied, confused, staring in the face of the King knowing you're about to die and wondering why your friend left you all when you needed them most?

I honestly have no idea where I'm going with this, but I've been rotating this concept in my head since this morning and thought I'd get it out on here so y'all can suffer with me tehee

#maxisrambling #isat #isat spoilers #in stars and time #isat siffrin #i genuinely don't know if i'd ever write a fic about this concept #esp bc i already have like 3 wips im working on and i don't need another #but if i ever were to it would be like. a post-game fic where the party realizes just how bad the loops were #how they affected siffrin and how they mightve affected /them/ #(bc love this found family to death but siffrin probably downplays a lot of the loops stuff until confronted /lh) #and meanwhile sif has to deal with the knowledge that his family is remembering things he never wanted them to remember #seeing things they never shouldve seen #and is probably filled with a fuckton of guilt about that bc even now that the loops are broken they're hurting them #they all need a hug oh my god #OFC it would have a happy hopeful ending but NSDJKVNDJKFV angst hurt/comfort <3 #okay im done rambling hopefully this makes sense #im gonna go pass out now id say sorry but I'm not lmao xoxo

[fox-guardian]

thinking now and forever about jmart clinginess

in the safehouse, Jon is the clingy one. after a good old fashioned What Are We talk, Jon goes in hard with the physical affection. not to mention, Martin's fresh out of The Lonely so he needs that grounding at times, though he's rarely the one to initiate it himself. he's happy to cuddle, but he still feels strange asking for it after. everything in his life. meanwhile Jon is sick of everything in his life and Dangit He Wants To Hold His Boyfriend, so he does <3 often <3 he hugs him from the front and buries his face in his chest, he hugs him from the back and buries his face between his shoulder blades, he alternates between being the little spoon tucked in Martin's arms and the big spoon clutching Martin protectively in his own. Martin is more than happy to indulge. especially since Jon likes to have his hair played with.

maybe at Upton House things are a bit different. Jon's clingy, but maybe a bit less so if only because he's wary of Annabelle. Martin's a bit more used to their relationship now, so he can stand to hug Jon from behind and press a kiss to the top of his head without needing to ask, sure in the knowledge that Jon would like nothing more than for him to do that.

somewhere else, Martin gets clingier than ever. arguments are had, things are said, but Martin still can't leave his side. and once things quiet down again and forgiveness is given as it's due, he goes back to hugging Jon from behind, though much more carefully now. his fingertips ghost around the edges of that scar on his chest before pressing his palms down gently across Jon's front. Jon leans his head back against his chest and smiles as if the scar wasn't there. as if Martin hadn't caused it. they go to bed and Jon gets in the habit of stroking Martin's hair as he rests his head on his chest, carefully listening in case a heartbeat disappears. Martin is practically glued to his hip, those days, and Jon would only ever mind it if he could see the guilt in his eyes. And if he could, he'd have Martin lay his head in his lap and stroke his hair until he fell asleep with his nose buried in his stomach.

eventually Martin is able to just ask for the affection he wants without guilt or apprehension once more. and by then they're both evenly insufferable in their displays of affection <3.

#ramblings with major #the magnus archives #tma #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #jonmartin #jmart #its 2am so sorry if its incoherent im having so many thoughts. #tma angst #forgot that one. i mean it has a happy ending but still jic

[stormyoceans]

a vegaspete fic i would write if i could write is an AU where, after getting shot in episode 14, vegas gets yeeted back in time to when porsche first became a bodyguard and has to do everything over and over again until he gets it right, which mostly means 1) avoiding the conflict between the main and minor families while still exposing korn’s manipulation, 2) still getting pete, 3) not die

except finding the right choices isn’t easy at all: if he doesn’t drug porsche during the auction, for example, he learns that it triggers a series of consequences which leads to kinn getting kidnapped by himself and dying in the woods; if he doesn’t send tawan to kinn, he’s horrified to find out that tawan ends up killing pete because of jealousy; if he saves his father, korn dies and the minor family wins but he does not get pete, and that’s not an option

and he has to deal with all of this while also trying to get close to pete and feeling like he’s being torn apart every time pete looks at him like he doesn’t KNOW him or feel anything for him except mild discomfort

#im sorry for being a hoe for time travels and time loops but they’re just [chef’s kiss] #the angst would be delicious and vegas would be miserable but he’d still get his happy ending with pete and macau #anyway.. feeling absolutely normal in the office on this fine day how are y’all doing #vegaspete #m: txt

[ineffable-baker-street]

Merlin had been gone for five days. Arthur had been in bed for those five days. Well, technically he got out of bed on the first day, but then he'd tried to dress and bathe himself, had had to walk around the castle trying to find the kitchen to get food, and decided it wasn't worth it and climbed back into bed.

The crown prince had not spoken in Merlin's absence, and though he hadn't yet said a word, the kingdom, and certainly the royal household knew why. His servant was gone. Though servant was a word used lightly by most, just Merlin's formal title really. Anyone who had seen them together knew he was far, far more than that. Not just Arthur's friend, nor even his simple lover, but his soulmate. More than a soulmate in fact, Merlin was truly Arthur's other half. The two walked in step beside each other, them and only them, lost in the world they'd built to surround each other, a coin that flipped through the air, travelling from place to place, both sides always next to each other, never once straying apart.

But now, one side was gone, and a coin is not a coin with one side missing. A coin with one side is... well it's nothing. An unformed mass, doomed to being cast aside, with no use and not worth a second glance. And that was now Arthur. He had no purpose without Merlin, no future, no destiny. There was nothing more for him to achieve in this world, for Merlin was his destiny. From the day they had met, Arthur had known his life served no purpose without Merlin by his side. No matter what plan was formed, what decision was made, what path he walked, Merlin was beside him through it all, from today, and into the beautiful abyss of forever.

And so Arthur knew where he was next headed, where he had to go to find the other side of the coin. In the dead of night, as the sixth day was arriving, Arthur mounted his horse, wearing the cloak Merlin had once lent him, drawing it around him as tightly as possible, holding nothing but the Horn of Cathbhadh. It was all he needed, for it would take him home. He rode out of the gates, not sparing a glance back, his heart becoming more desperate the closer he got, his eyes fixated ahead of him, until the Great Stones of Nemeton finally come into view. And peace flooded him, over his skin and through his blood, knowing he was almost there, that he had very nearly escaped this grief, a torture he had never had to endure before. Arthur lifted the horn to his lips and blew, every second spent in this world without Merlin unbearable.

Once, all he had cared for was Camelot, and he had thought nothing would come between his duty and loyalty to the kingdom. How unbelievably wrong he had been, proven the day a young boy stood up to him, in a way no one ever had. And how he had been proven wrong every day since then, as he became intwined with Merlin, with every aspect of him, with his very being, until they were one, and finally he was whole. Every moment with Merlin came back to him, and he dropped to his knees an sobbed in agony. Because it hadn't worked. He was still here, and Merlin was still gone. And he reached the end of his memories, to the very last one where Merlin held his face and whispered,

"I love you."

But it was louder, louder than everything else, and then he felt arms around him, pulling him up and drawing him in, and finally, as the whiteness grew brighter and brighter, and the world behind him faded, finally Arthur was home.

#merlin #bbc merlin #bbc merthur #merthur #angst #im sorry guys #but it ends happy #techincally #merthur is canon #you cannot convince me otherwise #and this is exactly how merlins death would play out #merthur ficlet #first time publishing writing #im a bit scared #but this was fun to write #i love writing angsty merlin #so many tags im sorry #i love them so muuuuuch #actually sobbing #merthur is my lifeblood

[noajakah236482]

𝕌𝕟𝕣𝕖𝕢𝕦𝕚𝕥𝕖𝕕 𝕃𝕠𝕧𝕖

"As long as he's happy, I am too..."

Pairing/ Non Idol!Niki × Reader

Synopsis/ Reader likes Niki but...

Genre/ Angst with a happy ending? fluff

Warnings/ none

Pt.2

--------------------------------

♡𝔸 𝕃𝕠𝕟𝕖 𝕎𝕠𝕝𝕗, ℕ𝕠 𝕄𝕠𝕣𝕖

---------------------------------

Happy happy happyyy" i started singing out of the blue. Ever since Eunchae let me open up to her, I feel like I've rediscovered myself. She makes me feel special, important and accepted. Eunchae is the reason I stepped out of my little bubble and made so many new friends. My friend circle is quite nice. I like it.

*SMACK*

"Hey!" I shouted, "Get back here! I just entered the class?!" I said as I chased after Ni-ki, the guy who LOVES to annoy me and smack the back of my head for some reason.

"Class! Settle down!" said our home room teacher. Okay maybe I should pass the story for minute... introductions yk?

Eunchae is the persom because of whom I'm a part of this group.

Ni-ki is... The mood maker? He's a really supportive and nice friend... AND ANNOYING. He loves to tease me huhu, but it's fine... He always makes me smile on the gloomiest days.

Then there's Yuna, always there by my side when Eunchae is busy. Hanni is her sister, the quiet one, but we always make sure she's included in our conversations.

And last one- Harua... He's... Harua. He's unpredictable and undescribable. He's too random.

Anyways, back to the story!

We always sat together. Me and Eunchae, behind us Yuna and Hanni, and Ni-ki and Harua infront.

After the teacher left the classroom, the chaos that ensued was inevitable. "CHOCOLATES!!" Riki yelled, catching me off gaurd. "GIMMEEE" i told him.  "Let me sleeeeeep" harua groaned. Riki threw the chocolate AT MY FACE. "Riki, i swear to Zoos(Zeus)-" "Zoos? Juice?" "Juicee!!" "Lol sorry about the chocolate, BYEE-" "YOU-"

The girls just giggled at us bickering. "I ship!!" Yuna exclaimed. "WHAT?!" "NOTHING-" "Uh hu... Anyways-" i started, to brush off what Yuna said, "wanna come over to my place to watch the new Percy Jackson show? A... A sleepover...?" i asked.

"sure" they chimed

"yayyy!! Just gotta tell niki now, where the hell did he run of to?!"

Then harua asked "how does friday sound?"

"that works! Yayy"

------------------------------------------------------

ᴀ/ɴ > ⁱᵐ ⁿᵒᵗ ˢᵃᵗⁱˢᶠⁱᵉᵈ ʷⁱᵗʰ ᵗʰⁱˢ ᵖᵃʳᵗ ᵃᵗ ᵃˡˡ. ⁱ ʰᵃᵛᵉ ᵗʰᵉ ⁱᵈᵉᵃˢ ᵇᵘᵗ ⁱ ᶜᵃⁿ'ᵗ ˢᵉᵉᵐ ᵗᵒ ᶠʳᵃᵐᵉ ᵗʰᵉ ʳⁱᵍʰᵗ ˢᵉⁿᵗᵉⁿᶜᵉˢ ⁱ ʳᵘˢʰᵉᵈ ᵗʰⁱˢ ᵗᵒᵒ ᵐᵘᶜʰ. ᵉᵛᵉⁿ ⁱ ᶠⁱⁿᵈ ᵗʰⁱˢ ᵈⁱˢᵃᵖᵖᵒⁱⁿᵗⁱⁿᵍ,

ˢᵒʳʳʸ ᵍᵘʸˢ

 (｡•́︿•̀｡) 

ᴛʏ ғᴏʀ ʀᴇᴀᴅɪɴɢ ᴘᴀʀᴛ 2! ᴘᴀʀᴛ 3 ᴡɪʟʟ ʙᴇ ᴏᴜᴛ sᴏᴏɴ (ʜᴏᴘᴇғᴜʟʟʏ ᴍᴏʀᴇ ᴡᴇʟʟ-ᴡʀɪᴛᴛᴇɴ)

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#enhypen #enhypen x reader #niki x reader #Niki fluff #Niki angst #Angst with happy ending #Eunchae #Le sserafim #Yuna #Itzy #Hanni #Newjeans #Harua #&team #Im sorry for this #so dissapointed #writeblr #writers on tumblr #my writings #my writing #enhypen fanfiction

[happystarzarchive]

twomp wackass roadtrip episode . look at this post with yr eyes if you agree

#twomp #SORRY im just never fucjing geeting pver this ep #ITS SO FUXKING GOOD #THE WRITING . THE ACTING . THE ANGST WITH A HAPPY ENDING . THE FACT THAT ITS ONE OF THE LONGEST EPISODES #and the fact that it scratches the itch of me wanting 2 Have That Twink ((emotionally)) Obliterated #MY GOD . #CHRIIST ALMIGHTY #again sprry