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heich0e · 1 year

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BEG, BORROW, & STEAL - levi ackerman/f!reader (aot) NSFW 18+ MINORS AND AGELESS BLOGS DO NOT INTERACT wc: 13k tags: enemies to lovers, neighbours to begrudging friends to lovers, food and wine writer!Levi, catsitter!Levi, Pancakes is the Real Star of this show, frequent and gratuitous descriptions of food and drink, frequent mention and consumption of alcohol, singular mention of loud domestic argument, smut, oral (f!receiving), fingering, sensory deprivation play, blindfolds, hair pulling, no mention of condoms, honestly i'm not sure if fire escapes are actually safe to hang out on so tw for that too crossposted to ao3

Nestled in a quiet corner of Mitras’ budding east end, there’s a little five-storey building.

It’s stout, brick, and decorated with ivy that creeps up along the mortar and underneath its windows. Along the side of the building not facing the two lane street, running just above a narrow back alley, there’s a labyrinthine set of old metal fire escapes—rusted and weathered but still sturdy, a standing testament to bygone craftsmanship. It all comes together in stark juxtaposition to the design of the towering structures of concrete, steel, and glass that have been steadily cropping up in the neighbourhood as of late.

The architecture feels almost out of place among these new developments, understated and old among all the shiny and new, but it certainly has a lot of character.

The residents who inhabit the apartments inside are respectful, polite people, who mostly tend to keep to themselves—though they’re as a eclectic of a bunch as any, to be sure. Most have lived in their rent-controlled units for decades, made homes for themselves that they never plan to leave.

Since moving into the little brick building two years ago, you haven’t had any notable issues with any of your neighbours.

Well, except for one.

The miserable guy in apartment 304—one unit down and slightly to the left of your own, 405. He’d nearly chewed your god damn head off for using his trash can one time when you’d first moved in. His trash can of all things. It had been an honest mistake on your part, and you’d sincerely apologized for it when he all-but cornered you in the mail room off the lobby a few days after the fact. But after the unpleasant exchange, the curmudgeon bought himself a padlock for his trashcan and has sent withering glares your way ever since.

It’s been well over a year since then, but the chill has never quite broken between the two of you.

The dark haired man, who seems to be perpetually suit-clad—or at least he has been in all the times you’ve spotted him—is easy enough to avoid given the floor’s difference between your units. But sometimes ill-fated meetings are inevitable in such close quarters.

Your building (regrettably) only has one rickety old elevator. It’s an original feature from when the complex was first built, and it’s undergone minimal maintenance and sum total zero upgrades since it was installed decades prior.

All of which is to say: it merits nothing less than being called a complete and utter death trap.

And, as though the sluggardly descent from your apartment on the fourth floor down to the lobby isn’t harrowing enough, your ill-tempered neighbour standing less than a metre away from you in a tightly confined space surely makes it worse.

The elevator is old enough that it has two doors—an automatic door that opens on each floor, as well as a manual interior door that the passengers in the elevator are responsible for opening and closing themselves. Initially you’d found the antique system charming, quaint even, but after realizing that the interior door weighs about thirty pounds and only likes to open half of the time, it quickly lost its charm. You stare pointedly at the cursed iron grate of the aforementioned interior door as the elevator makes its slow downward journey to the lobby, cursing yourself for not just taking the fucking stairs.

The lights on the side panel tell you you’re only one single floor away from your destination. If you just hold your breath and pray hard enough maybe everything will be fi—

“If you and your boyfriend plan to continue going at it like animals until four in the morning without any consideration for your neighbours, you should at least have the basic human decency to close your bedroom window.”

The elevator makes it to the ground floor just as his eviscerating remark draws to a close, the car dipping slightly upon arrival and sending your stomach sinking with it. Without missing a beat, your sour-faced neighbour pulls the confounded metal door open like it weighs nothing. You, in contrast, are frozen stock-still in shock, reeling in the wake of his words with a singeing heat flooding your cheeks. He steps off in the lobby without so much as a momentary glance in your direction, and you watch his back (in a crisp navy blue suit jacket) as he walks away.

You’re so completely stunned that you almost forget to get out too.

Oh, you hate him.

You swear that you’ll forsake the cursed elevator entirely for the rest of your life, if only to avoid ever crossing paths with that bastard again.

Or, so you may have thought.

Weeks later, you find yourself on the fire escape outside your living room with tears drying on your cheeks. You sit quietly in the wake of a long, heated argument with your boyfriend. A loud argument. A relationship ending argument.

Things have been bad for a few months. Maybe even longer, if you’re being honest. He’s always been a bit mean, a little careless, a little wrong—and you knew he probably wasn’t the one. But that doesn’t make the sting of yet another relationship crumbling in your hands any more bearable.

And so, not for the first time, you find yourself drowning your sorrows in a bottle of cheap, overly saccharine white wine and hiccuping in breaths of the fresh air as you try to soothe the ache while the sting of alcohol sears down your throat.

“Your boyfriend sucks.”

You jump a little, looking down the stairs to your right only to see your most loathed neighbour on his own fire escape with a glass of red wine in his hand.

You’re not sure how long he’s been there, but you’re sure he heard most (if not all) of what had transpired in your living room if he had been home at the time. Your windows had been open, you realize too late to do anything about it.

“Yeah,” you scrub at your swollen eyes with the back of your knuckles, “he kinda does—”

You take a long, inelegant swig from the bottle of wine in your hand at the same time your neighbour lifts his own glass. This mouthful tastes more bitter than the last.

“—and he’s not my boyfriend anymore, in case it needs to be said.”

Your neighbour pauses with his glass at his lips. Based on the fact that your window had been open to the world at large, and your conversation with your now-ex had been less that even-toned, you doubt the point really stands to be highlighted.

“It doesn’t,” he replies, confirming your suspicions. “But sorry to hear that.”

You snort mirthlessly. “Are you really?”

The man tuts, a little click of his tongue behind his teeth. But it’s not a sound that implies that he cares, just one that says he’s been found out.

“No.”

You can’t help but laugh at his candour. It’s a nice reprieve from the tears.

And, strangely, things are almost… amicable after that.

Now in the evenings when both of you sit quietly on your fire escapes, where once you’d skitter back inside to avoid his cold glare and oppressive aura, neither of you moves to silently retreat.

Sometimes you even chat, as unlikely an occurrence as it once would have seemed to you. You talk about basically nothing—the weather, a new building that’s cropped up a few streets away, a noisy neighbour, the moon—and it’s usually just for a few minutes before you head to sleep. You tend to be early to bed and early to rise, but Apartment 304’s lights seem to be on at all hours.

Part of you wonders just how long he stays out on his balcony after you retire for the night. But, it’s sort of nice—this unlikely armistice you seem to have unspokenly signed.

You stick your head out the window one evening, a few months in to your ill-begotten amity, a little earlier than you normally would since you got home from work ahead of your usual return.

He’s already there.

“Hey—”

Your neighbour lifts his head to peer up from the pad of notebook paper he’s scribbling away on. He’s wearing glasses today. You’ve never seen those before.

“—what are you having for dinner?”

304 looks at you with a quirk of his brow.

“A 2001 Cabernet Sauvignon.”

You lean your elbows on the windowsill, angling yourself a little further out of it. “I just made a fuckload of food. If you split that red with me, I’ve got a plate for you.”

He eyes you, and seems to be considering your proposal.

“What is it?”

“Roast chicken, some vegetables. Nothing fancy.”

“This wine pairs better with red meat.”

“Yeah? Well my last bottle of wine cost me 8 dollars and a 2-day hangover. Do you want the food or not?” you ask him, rolling your eyes lightly at his comment.

There’s a long pause.

A sigh.

“Fine.”

You meet on the metal stairs halfway between your respective fire escape landings on the third and fourth floor; you're perched a few steps higher than your neighbour closer to your home, and he to his.

He pours you a serving of wine into a spotless glass that he must have retrieved while you were inside plating up the meal, having evidently tucked his eyeglasses away at the same time as they’re nowhere to be seen. He accepts the plate of food you offer him and hands you the drink in exchange. Your plates are mismatched, so is your cutlery, and they clash with the delicate wine glasses he’s brought to your unexpected soiree.

You watch cautiously as he takes his first bite, silently scrutinizing the way his brow furrows as he chews. After a moment the crease in his brow softens, and he seems content—or at the very least not repulsed. You almost laugh into the brim of your wine glass as you quietly read the expressions on his face.

You tip your glass back and take your first sip.

“Holy shit, this is great,” you say, the flavour of the wine lingering on your tongue even after you’ve swallowed it down. It’s neither too dry nor too sweet, evenly balanced, and it doesn’t have the lingering tannic bitterness of the reds that you’ve tried before. Theres something rich but not heavy in the notes that first touch your palate, fruity but on the right side of neutral. You reach a hand out for the bottle and he passes it to you—albeit hesitantly. Reading the label, all you’re able to surmise is that it’s french. “This must not be cheap.”

“It certainly cost more than eight dollars,” your third floor neighbour snorts. He catches the flat look you shoot him, and suddenly is very preoccupied with cutting into his next bite of chicken.

And so from that point on you continue your evening chats, and even eat dinner together on a semi-regular basis. Apartment 304 has yet to turn down your offer of a free meal—and he always supplies the wine.

You’re not friends per se, but you’re certainly no longer mortal nemeses either.

“Oi! 405!”

You hear your neighbour call to you late one afternoon, the sun rapidly slipping away along the city skyline outside, and rush towards your open window. You stick your head out onto the fire escape curiously.

Your neighbour is standing on his landing, staring up at you with a quirked brow.

“Did you lose something?”

That’s when you notice the bra dangling off his outstretched finger. Your eyes shoot to your laundry rack where that very bra had been previously pinned to dry, as though you really need to confirm where it had come from. There’s a clothespin resting on the grated metal deck of the fire escape beside the wire rack, having clearly blown off in the wind.

You swallow a mortified groan.

“How do you know that’s not Misses Miller’s from upstairs?” You sniff, unduly defensive. The argument is weak and you know it; Misses Miller occupies apartment 506, the unit at the top of the fire escape stairs connected to your own—she’s nearly 80 and likely requires a bit more support than what the dainty lace bra looped around your neighbour's index finger offers.

The dark-haired man’s lips quirk into something you might think vaguely reminiscent of a smirk if you believed him capable of it.

“I’m happy to go ask-“

“You’re a real jerk, y’know that, Third?” you cut him off before he can finish the thought, pulling yourself out through the window clumsily in your newfound haste.

He seems to be contemplating what you’ve said as you make your way down the fire escape stairs towards him, footfalls heavy with your indignation.

“Third?” he asks, peering up at you with his head titled inquisitively to the side.

“Third floor,” you explain, like it should be obvious.

“I don’t own the entire third floor.”

You lean down from your place on the stairs and snatch your bra from his hand. “Well you sure act like it.”

You turn and stomp your way back up the fire escape towards your own apartment, bra clutched in a tightly clenched fist.

“So, should I let Misses Miller know you’re returning that to her, or—“

You slam your window shut behind you before you can hear the end of his comment.

A few nights following The Bra Incident—or the deBRAcle as you’ve come to refer to it in your mortified inner monologue—you wake to the unpleasant sound of toppling aluminium in the back alley. Sleepily, you shuffle out into your living room and lift your window, peeking your head out into the cool night.

A quick glance to your right tells you that 304’s lights are off. It’s late, admittedly, and this should be normal—but you can’t recall a night you’ve peeked down towards his apartment and seen the window dark. It’s all a bit unusual.

What you hear next even more so.

“God fucking damn it—shit, fuck—mother of—“

“You alright down there?” You approach the railing of the fire escape and lean over the edge to peer down towards the ground.

Below you, beyond all odds or reasonable explanation, is your third floor neighbour. He’s dressed in a nice suit as usual, with his hair neatly slicked back, and he’s standing beside a knocked over garbage can with trash strewn about.

He blinks up at you owlishly.

It’s quiet for a moment as the two of you hold eye contact.

He speaks first.

“I forgot my house keys in my office.”

You raise a brow, propping your chin in your hand as you lean against the metal railing. “And so you picked a fight with an innocent trash can?”

304 narrows his eyes up at you, a resentful squint. The sharp line of his jaw becomes even more pronounced as he grits his teeth. “I’m trying to reach the fire escape.”

The ladder that connects the fire escape to the ground is retractable, and has to be pulled from the second floor. He’d clearly been trying to use the garbage cans as leverage to reach the lowest rung of the ladder and yank it down—a security measure that had clearly done its job.

You purse your lips, fighting back a laugh. “Are you drunk?”

Silence befalls the two of you once more, and your neighbours eyes only narrow further.

“A bit.” Reluctance weighs heavily in his monotonous words.

You push yourself off from the railing, heading back towards your window.

“Where are you going?” 304 calls indignantly after you, like now that you’ve spotted him you’re somehow obligated to come to his aid.

“I gotta grab something!” you chirp dismissively as you crawl back inside over the edge of the frame.

Something being your cellphone. Specifically to take a picture and commemorate the ordeal.

“You’re cruel,” your neighbour snarls from his place on the ground as you gleefully snap a few photos with flash, quickly turning his back to you in an attempt to preserve whatever remaining shred of pride he has left.

“And if you want me to drop this fire escape ladder then you’re at my mercy—so smile!” you cajole with a giggle as you lean precariously over the railing, pinching the screen of your cellphone to zoom in on his figure.

He flips you off over his suit-clad shoulder and it makes you laugh again.

Once you’ve had your fun, and taken (conservative estimate) 400 photos, you climb down the stairs all the way to the second floor balcony—creeping across the grated deck as to not startle your unsuspecting lower-level neighbours—and finally push down the fire escape ladder.

304 makes short work of clambering up the rungs, pulling himself onto the balcony with a heaving sigh. He stumbles slightly, and you grab him by the lapels of his suit to steady him.

“Take it easy, Third,” you say quietly, letting your hands unfurl from his suit jacket once you’re sure he’s regained his balance.

He rolls his eyes and pulls the creaky fire escape ladder up behind him once more. You both wait with bated breath, pulse spiking, to see if the lights inside the second floor apartment turn on. Mercifully the windows stay dark.

The two of you make your way back up to the third floor, and you’re just about to step onto the stairs towards your own apartment and return to the call of your bed as 304 move towards his window. He places both hands flat against the glass and pushes up.

Nothing happens.

It’s locked.

“Oh my god,” your neighbour groans miserably, letting his forehead rest against the fingerprint-smudged glass, his dark hair hanging around his eyes.

“Holy shit, did something just move in there?” You gasp in fright, spotting something streaking through the darkness of his apartment through the pane.

“Yes, the fucking beast that’s taken over my home.”

You tilt your head. “I’m lost.”

The man before you sighs, turning over so instead of resting with his forehead against the glass his shoulders are pressed to the brick just beside the window frame. He tilts his head back, and a strand of hair falls from his slicked back style and curls in front of his eyes. He breathes out frustratedly into the night. “I’m currently babysitting my acquaintance’s evil cat.”

“You have a cat?” you ask excitedly.

“No,”—he shoots you a pointed, irritated look—“it’s my acquaintance’s cat. And it’s the weirdest creature on earth. She can open windows and eats all of my bread.”

You press a hand to your mouth to try and hold back your giggles.

“Bread?” you ask him incredulously.

He nods solemnly.

“Well,”—you drag the toe of your fluffy slipper idly against the grating beneath your feet—“what’s her name?”

He stares at you blankly. Utterly unenthused. “Pancakes.”

And at that you have no choice but to openly and unreservedly laugh.

When you finally manage to get your giggles in check—exceedingly conscious of how the sound of your laughter seems to ricochet down the narrow, brick-lined alley you find yourself in—you manage to ask him a pertinent question.

“Does anyone have a spare key to your place?”

“My colleague, Erwin,” the man in front of you mumbles.

Acquaintance. Colleague. You’re starting to wonder if 304 has no friends, or just refuses to refer to them as such.

“Ok, so call him,” you encourage.

He shuts his eyes, his head still pressed back against the wall of brick behind him.

“…My phone is dead.”

You wince.

“Christ, third strike you’re out.”

Your neighbour looks ready to pitch himself clear off the edge of the fire escape.

“Get it? because you’re—“

“I got it.” 304 finally opens his eyes to shoot you a glare.

You do him the favour of not openly laughing in the face of his misfortune again, wracking your brain for something that may actually be helpful.

“Er, do you wanna come up to my place?” you ask. “I probably have a charger you can use for your phone, or you could just use mine to call. What kind do you have?”

The man in front of you rifles through the inside pocket of his suit jacket and hands you the dead device.

You survey it for a moment, turning the bottom of the phone up towards you to squint at the charging port in the dim night. It’s different from yours but all hope isn’t yet lost. “I think that ex of mine you liked so much had the same one, he left a charger up there. It’s all yours if you want it.”

It’s not like he really has any other choice.

As 304 follows you up the narrow fire-escape stairs towards your window on the fourth floor, you realize it’s the first time your neighbour has ever been to your apartment. Or even crossed the halfway point on the stairs, for that matter. You turn just before you get to the window, and suddenly realize how close you are on the narrow balcony outside of your home.

You pause.

“You know, I really shouldn’t be inviting a stranger into my apartment.”

Third tuts admonishingly. “We eat dinner together once or twice a week.”

“I don’t even know your na-“

“Levi.”

You’re a little taken aback in the wake of his offering, your eyes widening slightly.

“Levi,” you test the name over in your mouth like the wine the two of you so often share, and then you shrug. “Doesn’t quite have the same ring to it as Third, but I guess it’ll do.”

“You’re impossible, you know that?” he huffs.

You turn to crawl through your living room window when you feel a gentle touch on your hip calling for your attention. You look back, and Levi pulls his hand away quickly, like he’s realized what he’s done.

You can’t help but think he doesn’t need to seem so suddenly abashed.

He clears his throat a little as you look to him inquisitively.

“Your name?”

You smile a bit, your nose scrunching up at how shyly he poses the question, and you tell him.

He nods curtly, like he accepts it, and it almost makes you laugh.

You go about making two cups of tea while you wait for the phone to power back on once he’s plugged it into the charger—which you dug out of a box you keep shoved in the back of your coat closet full of things your various exes have left in your apartment over the years. Thankfully it is the right fit for the device.

A quick glance at the time on your stove clock as you’re boiling the kettle tells you it’s already well past two AM—far later than your usual bedtime, though you don’t feel particularly sleepy.

Once the tea has been prepared, you tote the steaming mugs into the living room where Levi is waiting. You sit curled in an armchair, while your unexpected guest rests perched on the very edge of your sofa closer to the outlet where his phone is plugged into the wall.

“So, what had you out so late tonight, Thir-Levi?” you ask, correcting yourself last minute from using the nickname you’re so used to. You blow over the surface of your very hot tea as you wait for his reply.

“Work thing,” he grunts dismissively, his knee jiggling impatiently while he cradles the still-dark cellphone in his hands. He picks up his own cup of tea and takes a sip. He seems pleasantly surprised by the taste.

“Okay,” you draw out the word, “and what exactly do you do for work?”

Levi looks at you over the brim of his mug, an almost skeptical expression on his face.

“I’m a writer.”

Your eyes widen. “No shit! Like a novelist?”

“Journalist,” he corrects you, his lips pursing forward like he’s contemplating whether or not to divulge any more. He decides to indulge you, evidently, when he further supplies: “I’m a food and wine writer.”

“Really?” You lean forward in your seat, suddenly very interested. “A critic?”

He looks like he wants to correct you, but doesn’t. “I write reviews among other things, yes.”

You slump back in your chair a little bit, kicking your legs up to loop over one armrest.

“Wow, a guy who writes about food and can’t even cook.”

“I can cook, I just choose not to,” Levi says defensively, his tone sharp.

“Sounds like something someone who can’t cook would say,” you say, punctuating the statement with a long sip of tea.

“I’ve eaten at some of the nicest restaurants in the world—there’s nothing I can make myself that could compare, so why try?”

“How fatalistic of you,” you say with a snuffle of a laugh against the edge of your mug. “You know, if I’d known you had such a refined palate I might have been a bit more self-conscious about serving you my cooking.”

Levi rolls his eyes. “You’re a decent cook.”

Your brows lift in surprise. A compliment?

“But you use too much salt.”

You bark out a defensive laugh. “I do not!”

You hear a subtle buzz of vibration and a soft chime as Levi’s phone, left momentarily forgotten on the arm rest of the couch, powers on. It seems to take you both by surprise.

“Well then, time to call your colleague in shining armour,” you say with an encouraging wave of your hand.

Levi leans forward to set his cup of tea down on the table in front of him.

“Coasters?” He pauses, looking around the room.

“I found this coffee table on the curb outside my dorm in college, I promise you it’s seen worse than a hot mug.”

Levi’s face pinches slightly before he sets the mug gently down atop the table’s edge.

You watch as he picks up his phone, tapping around the lit screen for a moment before holding the device up to his ear. He’s curved a little awkwardly towards the end of the sofa due to the power cord connecting the phone to the outlet, the material of his dress shirt pulling taught around his frame. His suit jacket hangs on the back of a chair at your kitchen counter, the knot of his tie is loosened at his throat.

It’s quiet for a moment, and then Levi pulls his phone away from his face and ends the call.

“He’s not answering,” he says with a frustrated huff, as though not answering a phone call in the dead of night is somehow unreasonable. He dials the number again.

“Well,” you say slowly, watching as the same series of events plays out once more, “it’s late. He’s probably asleep.”

“Oh, fuck,” he groans quietly, slumping back into your sofa.

“Do you think the building Super would be awake?” you ask. The Superintendent has keys to every unit, so he’s the next most viable option. He’s a nice, helpful man, and only lives down on the first floor, but you suspect a knock at the door in the dead of night would be worse than an impromptu phone call.

“No, but he’d probably wake up if I called him,” Levi mumbles. He clicks his tongue behind his teeth in irritation. “How humiliating.”

He looks miserable at the mere prospect, but still reaches for his phone.

And maybe it’s because of how late it is. Maybe it’s how warm and dozy and pliantly agreeable the tea that you’d prepared for the two of you has made you feel. Maybe it’s just because there’s something inexplicably comfortable about being around Levi that has your guard lowered.

“You could always crash on my couch,” you find yourself saying before you really think it through. He looks up at you, clearly taken aback by the offer. “Then you can call your coworker in the morning and get your spare key.”

Levi appears uncertain. “You’d let a stranger crash on your couch?”

“We eat dinner together once or twice a week, Levi,” you remind him with a little smirk, using his own words from earlier in your defence.

You bring out a pillow from your own bed covered in a fresh pillow case, and a blanket from your linen closet. You hand them to Levi, still seated in the same place on your sofa though a bit more at ease, and he dips his head in thanks while holding both items atop his lap.

“I have some clothes my ex left here that I would offer you, but he was a bit, uh…”—you make a vague gesture in roughly the same stature as your last boyfriend—“he had a different build than you.”

Levi looks at you flatly.

“You’ve already done enough,” he says, though not altogether unkindly.

“Alright, well… g’night,” you say with an awkward little wave, shuffling off in the direction of your bedroom.

Levi calls your name just as you step across the threshold, and you peek back through the doorway towards him. His face is illuminated only by the glow of the lamp atop the table next to the sofa, and he’s looking at you with an unexpectedly earnest expression as he undoes the top button of his dress shirt, his tie resting undone around his collar.

“Thank you.”

You smile, dipping your head in a little nod, and shut your bedroom door behind you.

When you wake the next morning, it takes a few languid blinks against the morning sunlight streaming in through the curtains and a couple moments more of proper consciousness to remember the events that had transpired the night before.

Well, that and the distant shuffling outside your bedroom door.

You pull on a sweatshirt, pat your hair down into something you think (hope) is a little less dishevelled, and amble sleepily out to your living room. It’s empty, but Levi’s suit jacket is still hanging on your counter stool, his tie neatly rolled up on the corner of your coffee table, and your window is open. You can see the edge of his back seated just beyond the open pane.

You poke your head out to see Levi on the fire escape. His button up shirt is undone to reveal the tight white t-shirt he wears underneath it, and his slacks are slightly creased from sleeping in them. His hair is messy—a hybrid between the loose hanging style you’re accustomed to, and the slicked back fashion he’d had it in the night before. He must hear you coming, because he turns to face you as you arrive. You look at him curiously as if to ask why he’s sitting outside.

“I didn’t want to bother you,” he explains without you even vocalizing the question on your mind. His voice is still a bit hoarse from sleep, deeper and rougher than its usual smooth tone.

You crawl through the window, yawning a little as you take a seat cross-legged on the little balcony behind him. Levi turns to face you properly, shifting his whole body in your direction where he sits at the top of the stairs leading down to his own apartment.

“Any word from your spare key courier?” You blink through the tears that sprang to your eyes in your yawn, rubbing them away with your fist.

“He’ll be here in half an hour,” Levi replies.

You nod, a little tug at the corner of your mouth. “Thank God. Pancakes must be so worried all alone in there.”

Levi’s lip curls in an unhappy sneer. “I watched her eat half a loaf of three-day-old brioche through the window this morning. I’m sure she’s having the time of her life.”

There’s no choice but to giggle at the image of a cat ransacking your excessively type-A neighbour’s home, even if he can’t see the humour in it.

“D’ya want some coffee?” you ask, pushing yourself up towards the window again.

“I’d take another cup of that tea from last night,” Levi replies, his tone almost hopeful, and you nod before pulling yourself back inside.

You return to your place on the fire escape a few minutes later, this time with two mugs in hand.

It’s quiet while you sip your drinks, listening to the building hum of the city waking up around you.

“You always up this early?” you finally shatter the stillness with a question, but it’s not intrusive—slipping easily into the comfortable air around you.

“Yeah, usually,” Levi says, peeking over at you. He holds his mug a little strangely, you can’t help put notice—fingertips gripping the brim rather than the handle. It seems unduly precarious. “You wake up early too, huh?”

You tilt your head, wondering how he might know that.

“You sing a lot in the morning,” he explains, looking away by turning his gaze back towards the alley. “You’ve got terrible pitch.”

“Hey!” You reach out and swat at his shoulder. He’s warm to the touch, and even though it’s so basically human it still feels almost unexpected.

He huffs a little, neither a laugh nor far enough from one to discredit it; the sound is smug and indulgent.

“Yeah well you stay up too late,” you counter his observation with one of your own.

This time it’s his turn to be curious, lifting a dark brow as he peeks back at you over his shoulder.

“Your light’s always on,”—you tilt your head in the direction of his apartment down the stairs he’s seated at the top of—“and I don’t really take you for the nightlight type.”

“I don’t sleep much,” he admits.

You scoff. “What do you to with all those extra hours in the day?”

“Writing, editing, researching, emailing my editor,” he explains with a shrug.

You roll your eyes a bit, taking a sip of your coffee. “So you’re a real workaholic, huh?”

Levi drains the last mouthful of his tea, setting the mug down with a little clink as the porcelain meets metal. “There are worse things to spend your time doing.”

“There are better things too,” you counter.

“Such as?”

“I don’t know, socializing? Relaxing? Going out on a date?” You gesticulate with the hand not holding your mug as though to say ‘so on and so forth.'

“You think dating in this day and age is a fun way to pass the time?” Levi remarks flatly.

“Fine,” you concede, a sudden memory of your last ex coming to mind unwelcomely. You can’t help but note he doesn’t make mention of any partners of his own. “Don’t you have hobbies?”

Levi purses his lips, and seems to be wracking his brain. It takes a while.

You stare at him, unimpressed. “When was the last time you went to a museum? An art gallery? A play? The movies? Anywhere that wasn’t work related?”

“I went to the National Gallery downtown a while ago,” he offers.

“Oh yeah?” you ask, disbelievingly. “When?”

“A class trip in ninth grade.”

Your laughter echoes through the alley as it spills from your lips.

“You know they’ve always got new exhibits on display,” you say, gathering your composure. You lean forward, knees pressing into your chest. “You should visit again, I’m sure something has changed in the past eighty years since you were there last.”

Levi watches you curiously, a little too intently to be considered casual.

His phone jingles.

He blinks, and there’s a brief delay before he looks down at the device in his hand.

“That’s my key,” he says quietly.

You nod, standing. Somewhere in the distance, a car horn blares. You hadn’t even noticed how noisy it’s gotten in the time the two of you have been sitting together, but the city is well and truly awake now.

One at a time, you both climb back in through the window—him letting you go first—and once you make it back into your living room you take Levi’s empty cup from his hand to take it to your kitchen sink and wash while he collects his belongings.

Levi steps towards your front door as you dry your hands off on a towel hanging from the handle of your oven. You watch as he buttons up his dress shirt—though he leaves it untucked from his wrinkled trousers.

“Thanks again for… y’know”—he stops buttoning once he gets about half-way up the row and gestures vaguely—“all of this.”

You lean your hip against your kitchen counter. “I’ll slip a bill under your door for room and board.”

He rolls his eyes, but there’s a soft sort of exasperation to his expression as he does it.

“You could just knock.”

You smile, and you feel a pinch in your cheeks from how wide it spreads. “Well, where’s the fun in that?”

You don’t see Levi again in the week that follows, as you’re stuck working late each night as you slog towards a project deadline.

You leave for the office in the morning when the sun has barely crested, and come home long after it’s set. You’ve been eating mainly takeout from restaurants near your work, and whatever happens to be hiding at the back of your pantry since you haven’t had the opportunity to grocery shop—all interspersed with whatever mediocre, half-stale baked goods your coworkers have brought in and left in the staff kitchen for everyone to share.

After one particularly brutal day, you shuffle in the door with nothing but a day-old donut and three coffees in your stomach, though the clock has ticked past eleven. You drop your belongings on your kitchen counter and wonder if you still have that old bag of microwave popcorn kicking around in the back of your cupboard. You ponder this question as you cross your living room to crack the window and let in a bit of fresh air.

Outside, perched unexpectedly just below the window frame on the fire escape, is a brown paper gift bag.

You glance to the right and see Levi’s lights are still on, as usual, but his window is closed.

Hm.

You pick up the bag and retreat inside, peeking at its contents as you go.

Inside you find a bottle of white wine—a nice bottle of white wine—along with a little piece of notebook paper, ripped along the edge and folded twice in half. You peel the edges of the page back to reveal neat scrawl in black ink.

This didn’t cost 8 dollars.

Thanks again for putting me up.

—3rd.

(Levi)

It’s been a while since you’ve seen him, what with all the late nights you’ve been pulling at the office, and you realize that your last encounter was the morning after he spent the night at your place.

You smile to yourself, shaking your head, and tuck the note back into the bag.

The next Saturday morning, mercifully freed from the project you've been slaving away at, you have every intention of sleeping in to makeup of the overtime you've been banking. Instead, you wake to a strange rustling sound.

It takes a moment for it to register to your hazy, barely conscious mind—a sound so gentle you hardly process that it’s unusual until it’s been going on for just a few minutes too long.

“Mrrrrphm!”

Your eyes shoot open.

Now that noise, you immediately know is out of the ordinary.

You creep out into your kitchen on your tiptoes, towards where the rustling seems to be originating from.

Perched atop your kitchen counter, you see the tail end of a four-legged, ginger-furred little creature—with its head tucked into the rumpled paper bag containing the croissant you’d been planning to eat for breakfast. Its long, bushy tail sways back and forth happily as it rustles around inside.

“Hey!”

The beast—soon revealed to be a cat once it pulls its head from the bag—has the remnants of your (now mostly-shredded) croissant hanging out of its little pink mouth. One of its ears is folded unnaturally, the fur around its neck is scruffy, and you realize upon closer inspection of your half-eaten breakfast that it has a snaggletooth.

The cat seems fairly sociable though, as it makes no move to run as you slowly approach.

“I’m guessing you’re the illustrious Pancakes, huh?” you say as you reach up to scratch gently behind her ears. “I’m a huge fan of your work.”

The cat lets out a cheerful little chirp, your ill-fated croissant still hanging from her maw, bumping her head against your wrist. You pluck the bit of bread from her mouth and quickly scoop her up in your arms, heading towards your door as she squirms unhappily—you don’t quite trust yourself to descend the fire escape with such precious cargo in-hand.

Down on the third floor, you rap sharply against a door.

It swings open moments later to reveal Levi’s perplexed face. Glasses on.

“Your demon cat ate my croissant,” you say, holding the offender out towards him.

She meows innocently.

“Not my cat,” he replies flatly, taking Pancakes from your hands and setting her down on the floor just behind him. She hits the ground on all fours with a little thump, and trots off happily into the apartment out of sight.

“But you two look so much alike.”

Levi responds only with a narrow-eyed glare.

Then he sighs.

“Sorry… she must have crawled out through the window when I wasn’t looking,”—Levi reaches up under the lenses of his glasses, pressing the tips of his fingers against his shut eyes as though they’re aching—“I’ll buy you another croissant.”

“It’s fine,” you assure him with a little laugh, and his fingers splay under the metal frames of his eyeglasses to peek at you through the gaps. You wave your hand dismissively. “It’s my own fault for leaving my window open last night.”

“That’s a good way to be home invaded,” the dark-haired man chides you sternly, a little furrow of disapproval making itself known between his brows. His hands drop from his face, only for his arms to cross over his t-shirt clad chest.

“Yeah, well they’d have to pass your window first—and it’s not like you wouldn’t spot them Mr. Sleep-When-I’m-Dead,” you say, shooting him a bemused look. “At least you’d have a description to give the cops.”

“All you care about is the killer being caught? Not avoiding being murdered in the first place?” Levi drawls.

“Well, at least I could end up on a true crime podcast, so long as you agree to be a good samaritan and assist the authorities in their investigation,” you joke. You peek over Levi’s shoulder to where his curtain is ruffling in the morning breeze. “Hey, do you mind if I just go out through the window?”

He shrugs, pulling his apartment door open a little wider to let you through. “Be my guest.”

Levi’s apartment is tidy and sparsely decorated, but it’s nearly identical to your own in terms of general construction. Your eyes can’t help flitter around the space as you shuffle through it towards the open window, your nosiness getting the best of you. There’s a steaming mug on the edge of his kitchen counter that he must have set aside when you came knocking at his door, a closed laptop resting on the edge of his coffee table next to a notebook, and there are bookcases lining the walls as you walk through the living room. You can’t resist pausing to take a closer look as you pass by one, and find a diverse variety of cookbooks and reference books on food, as well as beer, wine and spirits on the shelves.

Your fingertip traces the gold lettering adorning the thick spine of an immense tome—V I N.

“May I?” you ask, peeking over your shoulder as you pry the book from its place on the shelf.

“You already are,” Levi replies from the kitchen where he’s retrieved his mug, taking a sip. “But sure.”

You let out a little laugh, cracking open the inordinately heavy book.

“You speak french?” you ask, your tone lilting in surprise as your eyes trail over the language on the page in front of you—foreign, but distinguishable enough thanks to a few words you recognize from classes you took back in high school. The book seems old, antique possibly, and evidently well loved.

“Only a little,” Levi says noncommittally, but judging by the notes scribbled in the margins of the pages (in the same neat script scrawled on the scrap of notebook paper tucked into the gift bag on your kitchen counter) you suspect he’s underplaying his abilities.

You close the book and slot it back into its place on the shelf.

“Thanks for the wine by the way.”

“Did you enjoy it?” he asks.

“I haven’t cracked into it yet,” you admit, making the last few steps towards the open window. You tap your hand idly against the spotless frame, turning back to look at where Levi is leaning against his kitchen counter. “I had a big deadline this week at work so I’ve been staying late every day. By the time I got home it was all I could do to force myself to eat something before I’d pass out on my couch.”

Levi’s brows lift, though the rest of his body seems to untense a bit for reasons you can’t quite place.

“I’ll be sure to give you a full and comprehensive review of its bouquet—or whatever—once I finally get the chance to enjoy it,” you remark, half-teasing, and he rolls his eyes.

He takes another sip from his mug. He’s still holding it in that peculiar way he held your mug the morning after he slept on your couch. There’s something about it that you find almost endearing.

You lift your hand in a little wave, he nods in acknowledgement of the gesture, and then you crawl out through the window without another word.

You’re on the second step up the fire escape when Levi pokes his head out after you.

“Do you have breakfast plans?”

You pause, turning back to look at him.

You find him peeking up at you with an unexpectedly hopeful look on his face, if not a little guarded.

“Well, my plans are currently partially digested in your feline ward’s stomach, so... no.”

Levi blinks.

“Can I take you out for breakfast to make up for it, then?”

You tilt your head to the side, a flutter of something keen and eager tickling the pit of your empty stomach.

“Fine,” you concede, feigning as though you’re hard done by. “But I get to choose the place.”

Levi’s lips pull down in an unsubtle expression of his displeasure. “You know that it’s literally my job to—“

“I don’t care,” you interrupt him, waving your hand as though batting his interjection out of the very air into which he spoke it before it has the chance to reach your ears. “I don’t want some fancy micro-meal from whatever masters of gastronomy you write about. I want waffles. A lot of ‘em.”

Levi huffs, grumbling something unintelligible under his breath before replying a single, reluctant: “Fine.”

“Meet you in the lobby in 10 minutes?” you ask, your lips stretching in a grin.

His own lips purse, and you almost think it might be halfway to a smile. “Sure.”

The two of you wind up at an old greasy spoon diner two blocks away that you’ve been going to since college, where the staff always make sure to give you an extra perfectly golden-brown waffle. Levi sits across from you in a dark green knit sweater that looks incredibly cozy and, to your utter surprise, a pair of jeans. He looks more comfortable and casual than you’ve ever seen him.

“It’s good, huh?” you ask over the table as Levi bites into his own breakfast: 2 eggs, over easy, bacon and toast. You notice he’s carefully separated all three components of the meal on his plate so none of them are touching, and has liberally applied black pepper to the semi-firm yolks of his eggs.

He swallows the bite he has in his mouth, wiping the corners with his white paper napkin. “It’s food.”

You snort a little, shoving another piece of waffle into your mouth. “Are your reviews always so inspired?”

Levi shoots you an unamused look.

“C’mon, don’t tell me you only eat at fancy fine dining places?” you say, waving your fork around demonstrably. “This is what real food’s all about; little family run joints like this.”

Levi purses his lips.

“Have you ever even been to a fine dining restaurant?” he asks you skeptically.

“No,” you admit, drowning your plate in more of the cheap table syrup. Levi’s nose crinkles in disdain at the sight. The waffles are the same as always: just the right crispiness on the outside to not grow soggy too quickly under the river of syrup you douse them in, perfectly fluffy on the inside.

Fine dining, irrespective of being well outside your budget, has just never been your style.

“So who are you to judge?”

Now it’s your turn to purse your lips.

You stab your fork through a piece of waffle and syrup drips, slow and sticky, as you hold it up above your plate. You lift a brow challengingly as you stare him down across the table. “If you want to take me out to a fancy dinner so bad, all you have to do is ask.”

Levi’s expression doesn’t change.

“Fine.”

“Huh?” you nearly choke, though you haven’t yet put your next bite in your mouth.

“Go out to dinner with me,” he says.

“That’s not a question,” you remark, shoving your waiting forkful into your mouth just to give yourself something else to focus on.

Levi huffs exasperatedly. “Will you go out to dinner with me?”

You take your time to chew, the syrup making everything in your mouth indistinguishably cloying, and then swallow. “I’ll think about it.”

Levi’s jaw gapes, a look of betrayal flittering across his usually impassive features.

You laugh.

“Fine, fine. But only if we can go to the national gallery first,” you say, enjoying every moment of Levi’s palpable misery, setting your fork down and reaching for your mug and taking a sip of coffee. It’s tempered down to a drinkable heat, a little bitter and burnt tasting just like it always is, and there’s something nostalgic in that.

Levi fiddles with his fork, cutting into his egg so the sunny yellow yolk runs across his white ceramic plate. “…I already went.”

“Huh?” You place your cup back down atop the table, on the edge of your paper placemat.

“I went,” Levi repeats himself, though nothing is made clearer through the repetition.

“When?”

“A couple days after you mentioned it. I was reviewing a bistro down the road—terrible by the way—“ he interjects, though you didn’t ask, “and I had some time to kill afterwards.”

“So… what was your verdict?”

“Boring.”

“Oh, come on!” you say with a warm, pealing laugh, throwing yourself back in your seat. “You’re so uncultured! Didn’t you like their new installation on expressionism?”

“It was a mess.”

“That’s the point, it’s abstract!”

“If I wanted to see a disaster on canvas I’d look at those sneakers you’ve got on,” Levi says with a click of his tongue, but his eyes are bright and mirthful.

You peek under the table at your well-loved tennis shoes, gaping but still laughing. “You are so—!”

“Can I get you two some top-ups on those coffees?” The waitress who has been serving the two of you steps up to the table, coffee pot in hand, but she seems almost apologetic for interrupting.

It’s the first time you remember you’re in public, and you settle down a bit, covering your mouth to clear your throat bashfully.

“I’m alright, thank you,” Levi declines politely with a dip of his head.

“I’ll take a little extra please,” you say, and the waitress smiles and adds another bit of steaming, bitter coffee to your cup. It darkens the last few mouthfuls left from your already milk-and-sugared first drink; the deep brown of the fresh brew swirling into the tawny room-temperature remnants of the last.

Your eyes meet Levi’s over the table, and both of you quickly look away, fighting back your smiles.

The two of you walk back home once your meal has concluded and your bills have been paid—split at your insistence, though Levi seemed prepared to physically fight you on it.

Back at your building Levi gets out on the third floor after a brief goodbye, but before the door to the elevator can slide closed behind him, and you can close the steel grate of the interior door, his hand shoots out to keep them open.

You look up in surprise at the sudden gesture.

“I’m not kidding about dinner,” Levi says, standing just beyond the threshold to the ancient elevator, staring at you with an almost unnerving sincerity.

You blink, taken aback by how serious he is.

“What’s your cell number?” he asks when you can’t seem to find anything to reply.

You relay the digits to him and he scribbles them down into a little pocket sized, softcover notebook he produces from his jacket pocket. You’ve seen him scribbling in it before out on the fire escape, and realize he must take it with him everywhere he goes. Given the shape and size of it—only a little larger than the palm of his hand—you don’t doubt it’s the very book that the note he’d left with your bottle of wine had been torn from.

“I’ll send you a message and we can make a plan,” Levi says, tucking the notebook back into his pocket.

“Alright,” you agree and finally Levi lets his hand fall from where he’s keeping the doors open.

He steps away in the direction of his apartment.

“Be careful, Levi,” you say to his retreating back as you pull the grated metal door on the inside of the elevator car closed, “or I might think this is a date.”

He pauses, glancing at you over his shoulder. Your eyes meet through the gaps in the metal, and in spite of the distance you can see the mirth in his gaze. “That’s exactly what it is, and it’s what breakfast was too.”

And with that, the door slides shut between you.

One week to the day later, you find yourself sitting across from Levi in a restaurant that feels almost too nice for you to be patronizing. Levi is dressed in a nice suit, as ever, and you’re wearing in the only truly nice dress you own—one you’d bought for a friend’s wedding a few years prior and never had the occasion to wear again.

Until now.

It’s nothing like the meals you’ve shared on your fire escape, or the boisterous breakfast at the diner on that Saturday morning. There’s no bitter coffee or table syrup to be seen, no mismatched plates and cutlery. It’s quiet, ambient even. All hushed conversation and warm candle light.

But you still enjoy yourself all the same.

And the food is really fucking good.

“I’m devastated,” you breathe out miserably into the cool night air as the two of you walk side-by-side along the quiet sidewalk in the direction of your little brick building.

Levi had offered to flag the two of you down a cab, but the evening weather was actually quite nice and the restaurant wasn’t far from home so you’d instead suggested to walk. Your heels are starting to hurt your feet a little bit, a pinch in your toes and the early-makings of a blister forming at the back of your ankle where the strap of your shoe rubs against your skin, but you still can’t quite bring yourself to regret anything about the evening.

Not the walk, not the dinner, not the company.

“You didn’t like it?” Levi asks, a lilt of concern in his voice.

You shake your head emphatically, turning to look at him with a grave expression. “It was too good.”

“That’s a new complaint,” he muses, his mouth pulling at the corner in thinly-veiled triumph.

“How am I ever supposed to enjoy any food again now that I know it can taste like that?” you complain, tossing your head back to look up at the night sky and passing streetlights overhead. Your shoes click against the pavement with every step, but otherwise it’s refreshingly quiet.

Levi laughs into his closed fist. “Now you see my problem.”

“Hey,” you say suddenly, bringing your chin back down so you can look at him, “can you bring me home your leftovers when you go write your little reviews for places like that?”

“No,” Levi replies immediately, decisively shaking his head.

You pout, sucking in a sharp breath as you prepare to plead your case.

“But I’d like to take you out again, if you’ll let me.”

He’s not looking at you, his eyes fixed ahead on the pavement as the two of you walk side by side, but you can tell he’s anxiously awaiting your reply with the way his hand is flexing and unflexing at his side.

You feel heat climb in your cheeks.

“Well, if it’s the only way to keep access to that kind of food, I guess I’d be stupid to say no.”

Levi hums, his gaze sliding to meet yours from the corner of his eye.

“Yeah, I guess you would.”

The elevator ride up to the third floor is quiet but not uncomfortable, though you both seem to be keeping your distance in the confined space—relegated to opposite sides, not dissimilarly to so many months ago when he was calling you out for fucking your atrocious ex-boyfriend too loudly. You could almost laugh at how much things have changed since then.

He says goodnight as he pulls open the grated door, sending you a brief look as he steps out.

“Goodnight, Levi,” you return the sentiment, hesitating to close the inside door between the two of you once more. “Thank you for dinner.”

“You’re welcome,” he replies, and there’s an almost disappointing finality to his words, though you don’t dwell too long on it.

And then he’s gone.

Upstairs in your apartment, you kick off your heels as soon as you step through the door. You stretch your toes against the cool hardwood floor to let the blood flow back into them before padding into your kitchen. You drape your coat across the back of a barstool, and drop your purse on counter, pausing momentarily to eye the gift bag with the wine Levi had given you tucked away in the corner.

Maybe it’s time to crack it open—if for no other reason than to try and drown the niggling feeling of dissatisfaction you have squirming in your chest.

But first, you pad across your living room to open up your window.

At the very same time that Levi opens his, a floor away.

You pull yourself through without thinking, shivering a little bit against the cool breeze as it meets your exposed skin. Levi—his suit jacket shed, his tie loosened and collar unbuttoned—does the same.

You kneel at the top of the stairs, the metal of the fire-escape digging into your knees, and peer down at him.

“Y’know, I still haven’t opened that bottle of white wine.”

Your fingers fidget with the hem of your dress—it’s crept a bit further up your thighs thanks to the way you’re sitting. Levi’s eyes have caught the subtle rise, and through you see his gaze on your exposed skin, it soon flickers up to meet yours.

“It’s not really a nightcap,” he says quietly.

You huff, half frustrated and half amused, but the sound is entirely too fond.

“Are you coming up here or not?”

Levi climbs the stairs slowly towards where you’re seated at the top. That same feeling underneath your ribs that had once been dissatisfied blooms into something else entirely, crackling like a flame inside your chest as you catch his tie between your fingers.

You pull him down with your grip on the dark green silk—slowly, slowly, slowly—to press your mouths together.

The kiss is sweet. Unhurried. Decadent.

Levi cranes down a little further, his hands settling on the landing behind you, caging you underneath him. His proximity is more intoxicating than any of the wine you’ve ever shared. The feeling of his lips parting against yours and the gentle imploring sweep of his tongue is more satisfying than any food on earth could hope to be.

One of his hands trails up along your thigh, across that same skin you’d caught him eyeing moments prior. His touch is cold but still it burns. He gives your flesh a firm squeeze.

“Inside now,” he murmurs insistently against your mouth, “unless you want the neighbourhood to hear this.”

You pull away, peeking up at him through your lashes innocently.

“And what if I do?”

He swallows visibly, his tongue darting out to lave across his rosy lips before it disappears once more to click behind his teeth.

“Knew you were an exhibitionist.”

There’s a graceless, frenetic climb back through the window—with Levi’s hand cradling the top of your head all the while so you don’t knock it against the frame—and then the two of you are toppling down onto the soft cushions of your couch.

Levi’s body weight presses into yours as he hovers over you, mouths rapacious, your hips flush and hands greedy. You’re grabbing anything and everything that falls within your reaches: his hands on your waist, your thighs, your heaving chest; your own hands in his hair, cupping his jaw, fisting the fine cotton of his dress shirt. Your dress has rucked up around your waist in the excitement, and after a few moments of exploration Levi slowly breaks your kiss.

He sinks to the floor on his knees, and your thighs part for him without thinking.

His eyes trace the dark spot on the centre of the delicate lace over your aching cunt, his thumb soon stroking against it with the exact same eagerness as his eyes.

“Levi,” you say his name pleadingly as your hips wriggle to get closer to his touch, squirming further down the couch cushion towards him. “Please… more.”

Levi huffs a little; not a laugh, but something a little more chiding—a little more mocking. He leans forward so you feel every hot breath break against your skin on his exhales, his eyes still fixed to that little patch of wetness that’s caught his attention, the spot only growing larger the longer he toys with you. “Let me savour this.”

“Like a nightcap?” you ask him, aiming for levity but toeing the wrong side of breathless as his fingers follow the lace trim of your panties up along the curve of your thigh.

“An aperitif,” he rasps as he snaps the elasticated band against your hip, a sharp crack as it hits your tender skin, and his eyes flicker up to meet yours when you hiss. He smirks. “It makes you hungrier.”

Not once in all the time you’ve known him would you have denied the truth that Levi’s tongue is quick and vicious, but never would you have imagined its sedulity between your legs.

The flimsy material of your panties tugged swiftly down and kicked away, it’s as though the meal the two of you had shared that evening has been forgotten, a thing of the past.

Levi devours you like he’s been starved.

“Fuck, oh—“

Your hips jump on the sofa but his strong forearm slings across your lower abdomen to pin them down and keep you at his mercy. Levi glances up at you from his position on his knees, his head bracketed by your thighs, his eyelids hanging low over his hungry gaze. The tip of his tongue flicks against your twitching entrance, laving back up to your clit. The cycle repeats. It’s filthy and fascinating to watch.

“—Levi, nggh—oh my god.”

You grab for anything, borderline delirious. Your nails on one hand dig into the throw pillow at the end of your sofa while the other knots itself through Levi’s dark hair. You grip both with an equal roughness, but Levi doesn’t seem to mind—suckling with a renewed insistence at the swollen bundle of nerves between his lips.

He reaches up and pries your hand away from the strands of his hair, twining your fingers with his own as he pins it down to the sofa beside your hip. Levi pulls away from your pussy with a string of saliva keeping you connected, slick smeared along his mouth catching in the light of the lamp.

“Be gentle, would you?” he rasps, “I’d like to keep my hair for the foreseeable future.”

“Sorry,” you murmur, your chest heaving from the way your breaths come ragged. “It feels good.”

“Yeah?” he asks, slipping two fingers into his mouth. They shine with his spit when he pulls them from between his swollen lips. He leans back down towards your cunt. “How good?”

“So good,” you whine, his two saliva-slicked fingers slipping inside of you at the same time.

“God,” you toss your head back and gasp, those two fingers inside of you crooking in a way that makes you feel so good.

“You’re close,” Levi hums, not a question but rather a factual observation, before dragging his tongue up towards your clit again. His fingers keep curling against your walls with an almost unfair degree of skill, leaving you shaking and breathless.

“Y-yeah, gonna cum,” you whimper.

“You’re gonna cum for me?” he mumbles against your clit, goading you as he carefully watches the expressions on your face.

It's not as though you have any other choice with the way he’s playing you like an instrument he’s long-mastered.

“Yes, fuck Levi, there.”

One last gasp and the lewd, pointed suck with his lips wrapped around your clit has you melting, your thighs clamping against his ears as your back bows up off the sofa. A strangled, desperate little sound tears out of the back of your throat, and your fingers tighten around his own—still entwined beside you on the sofa.

As you come down from your high, you drag his hand up with yours to your chest, pressing his palm flat against your sternum so he can feel how fast your heart is knocking against your ribs underneath the fabric of your dress.

Your heart rate has nowhere near returned to normal when Levi stands from his place on the ground, wiping at his wet mouth with the back of his hand as he takes in your spent, trembling state. In one fell—impossibly deft—swoop, he picks you up and carries you off towards your bedroom.

“How the fuck are you so strong?” you gasp as you wriggle in his hold—but his grip is tight and he doesn’t waver.

He drops you down onto your bed, and you bounce lightly as you come in contact with the springy surface. You fall back, staring up at him as he peers at you with affront.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

You giggle a little as he crawls over your splayed form, his body warm as his lips find their way back to yours.

He kisses you again. And again. And again.

Your pretty dress comes off, finally—left discarded in a hapless puddle on your bedroom floor to be dealt with later. It's an end unbefitting of the nicest garment you own, though you can’t begin to bring yourself to care.

Levi’s fingers trace along the delicate lace of your newly revealed bra and you feel his lips curl up into a smirk against your own. He inches away, peeking down at your chest.

He dips down to mouth along the swell of your breast, his eyes still impossibly trained on yours, and your fingers tangle into the soft strands at his crown as you moan lightly at the gentle touch.

He sucks against the soft flesh, before pulling off with a little pop!

“Does poor Misses Miller know you kept her bra?”

You laugh in response to his teasing words, a reference to the early days of what you’d now call a friendship (if not something else entirely), tugging him away from your chest by your grip on his hair.

He quirks a brow at you with his head tilted back in your hold.

You pout playfully, slackening your grip on his hair and letting your hand slip down along the front of his dress shirt, petting over his chest. “You know, I think I liked you better with your mouth full.”

Levi clicks his tongue behind his teeth, watching raptly at the flash of pink as your own tongue peeks out to moisten your swollen lips. Something shifts behind his gaze, and he leans back on his haunches beside you, reaching up and fingering the loosened knot of his tie.

“Do you trust me?”

The question is a little bit out of the blue, and relatively unwarranted considering only moments prior he’d been three knuckles deep inside of you, but you entertain it nonetheless.

Your head lolls to the side on your bedspread as you look at him curiously. “I let you spend the night on my couch when we barely knew each other.”

He rolls his eyes at your intentionally indirect response, leaning forward until your entire field of vision is filled with nothing but him once more.

“Do you,”—Levi pauses with his lips ghosting over yours, soft as they brush—“trust me?”

A beat of tense silence stretches between you.

“Yeah.” You swallow lightly after murmuring the word. “I do.”

Levi pulls back again, and reaches up and tugs on the knot of his tie until it comes completely undone, hanging in two separated halves against his chest. Slowly he draws it out from under the fold of his collar.

“There was a trend in food criticism years ago,” he says, his grey eyes tracking up, up, up along your exposed body while you wait like eager prey beneath his gaze, “where critics used to think that you could taste better in the dark. Like the dulling of one sense would somehow improve the others.”

You swallow hard as he leans forward, moving slowly up the mattress towards you.

His tie is still in his hand.

He dips down and kisses you.

Brief. Teasing.

“They thought you could taste more…”

Levi loops his tie around your eyes, and your breath hitches. You feel the soft slip of silk against your skin, the pressure tightening (though not unpleasantly) as he knots it at the crown of your head to keep it in place. You see only darkness.

“…hear more…” Levi’s lips are right next to your ear; just a ghost of warm breath and his rich, deep voice that seems a little more strained than it had before.

You’re breathing heavier now, or maybe you’re just more painfully aware of the rhythm of your own respiration.

“…feel more.”

Warm fingers dance up along your ribs and you gasp aloud, not expecting the sensation. But as quickly as it appears, that feeling of his skin on yours, it’s gone again. You swallow. His touch continues in much the same way, fingers disappearing and then reappearing somewhere else, leaving you guessing. Leaving you wanting.

You feel goosebumps prickle up along your skin.

“Is that true?” you whisper as you push yourself upright and reach out blindly in search of Levi, though you aren’t quite sure where to find him.

“I don’t know—” Levi admits airily from somewhere before you, both nearer and further than you expect him to be. He takes your outstretched hand in his, pressing it to his cheek. It’s warm to the touch, and he turns his face towards your palm, pressing a barely there kiss to it.

Unexpectedly your bra falls forward, cool air kissing heated skin as the straps fall down your shoulders, thanks to a talented hand that had slipped behind your back unnoticed. You feel Levi’s lips curl into a smirk against your palm.

“—but let’s find out.”

Next is an obscured, indecipherable blur of hot, open mouthed kisses; of gentle grazes and rougher gropes; of moans, and groans, and needy whines that you aren’t sure are even yours anymore. Your pussy’s left a wet patch on the thigh of Levi’s slacks that you can’t see but that you can feel as the sticky fabric ruts against your clit, your hips grinding desperately against it as he consumes you and whatever senses he’s left you.

It’s infuriating.

It’s immolating.

It’s divine.

“Are you ready for me?” Levi pants against your stinging lips, his hand cupping your chin to keep your face tilted towards his even if you can’t see him.

“Yes,” you mewl debauchedly, rolling your hips against that same crease in his pant leg that’s been tantalizing you for what feels like hours. You should be ashamed—of your words, of your tone, of your actions—but you aren’t.

You feel every second of the stretch as the head of his cock presses inside.

You wonder what it looks like, what he must look like right now, but you’re left only to feel.

“Oh,” he groans, the deep sound sodden and drunk with pleasure. “Amazing. Fuck, you’re taking me so well. You’re perfect.”

The first proper thrust—the in and the out—almost pulls you under like the currents of a tide. You’re fighting a losing battle to keep your head above water, to keep air in your lungs.

The springs of your mattress creak as Levi picks up the pace and mercilessly fucks you down into it, your breaths coming in pants broken by moans. You feel your sheets against your sticky skin, his hands twining with yours, his breath against your lips.

“Is it good?” he asks, mouthing clumsily along your jaw as his hips rail down against yours.

“So good,” you babble in agreement, nodding dumbly as much as you can with such little control over your own body. “Feels so good.”

“I love hearing you say that,” Levi rasps, tucking his face into the crook of your neck and letting his teeth graze over your racing pulse. “I don’t think I could ever get tired of it."

He groans as you clamp down on him involuntarily.

You’re close, and think he must be too when you feel the way his cock throbs inside of you.

“Please,” you murmur, voice breaking pathetically as you beg. It sounds like you’re near tears but with the silk still covering your eyes it’s impossible to tell whether or not it’s true. “I wanna see you.”

“Make a deal with me,” Levi grunts, his pace suddenly slowing to a torturous grind. You’re sure that you must be crying now with how devastating the change in pace is—still deep, but just languid enough that the cresting pleasure in the pit of your stomach threatens to recede.

“A deal?” you ask, gasping as your nails drag along the musculature of his back.

“I’ll take it off,”—Levi’s touch trails up to your face, the tips of his fingers ghosting over your spit-slicked chin and searing cheeks—“but only if you let me take you out to breakfast.”

You’re in no position to be making counter-demands, or returning repartee.

“Anything,” you sob, clinging to him desperately. Your hips tilt up in a fruitless search for friction, your nails scrabble along his skin. “I’ll do anything. Please, Levi.”

He tugs the tie down, and your bleary eyes sting as they adjust to the light.

Finally, you see him.

Levi is practically glowing, bathed in a sheen of perspiration that you can feel when your skin slips against his own. His dark hair is pushed back, away from the lines of his devastatingly handsome face; his strong cheekbones and the sharp line of his tensed jaw. His abs flex as he carves his way inside of you in that impossibly slow grind, a little trail of dark, coarse hair spanning from his navel to his cock, where you see a glossy ring around the base from you.

He’s a feast to behold. To taste. To feel.

“S-so?” he stutters, half-hissing from how viciously your core has tightened around him. His eyes search yours, avaricious and wild. “How does it compare?”

“Better,” you moan, a tear tracking back towards your hairline as you throwing your head back into your pillows, fighting as much as you can to keep your eyes open, “this is better.”

Levi laughs, breathy and wanton as the sound might be, and his hands grip behind your knees before peeling them away from their vice against his waist and pressing them back into your chest.

He kisses you again—your mouths meeting desperately though they haven't long been parted—first chaste but then sloppily, bullying his way into your mouth like he wants to taste how sweet the words you’ve just said are off your own tongue.

He pulls back, a string of saliva stitching from his mouth to yours.

The corner of his lip ticks up in a smirk as his hips draw back, not in punishment but in preparation.

“Good.”

You wake the next morning with an ache humming in your bones and an effervescence sizzling in your chest. It takes you a moment to rouse, properly anyway, but when you do you feel the unmistakable weight of an arm curled around your bare waist, and a warm pressure perched atop your feet.

You open your eyes, blinking against the light that streams in through the curtains over your bedroom window—billowing gently in the morning breeze. You peek down towards the end of your bed, and see a little fluff of ginger fur sprawled out across your ankles. When you listen closely you can hear the little rumble of a purr.

Finally, you glance over to your side, and find Levi blinking back at you.

He looks sleepy and dishevelled, a sort of pleasant exhaustion in the rings beneath his eyes that you’re sure is mirrored in the shadows of your own skin. His hair is sticking up unkemptly at his temple, and there’s a line imprinted into his cheek from where it's been resting against your pillow. It’s a version of himself that you suspect Levi rarely shows to anyone, and right now it’s all deliriously, deliciously yours.

“Good morning,” your voice is so quiet when you finally risk shattering the stillness of your bedroom with a greeting.

“Good morning,” Levi rasps with a commensurate tenderness, even through the hoarseness of his groggy morning voice.

The city is waking up outside your window, the steady build of noise that will crescendo to a dull hum once the world gets underway. But for now it’s still quiet. For now you can still hear Pancakes’ slightly-wheezy purr.

Levi’s arm around your waist tightens, shifting you a little bit closer to him under the soft cover of your blankets. The gesture is hesitant. Half-committed. Like he’s still leaving himself open to be rebuked.

You smile, and close the rest of the distance yourself like crossing that final step along the fire escape. Traversing that halfway point. You curl into him and tuck your head underneath his chin as you rest your cheek against his chest.

Levi seems to soften slightly. To ease. To welcome your intrusion.

If it was ever that at all.

“So… breakfast?”

#levi ackerman #levi ackerman x reader #levi ackerman x you #levi x reader #levi x you #aot fic #aot writing

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kradogsrats · 6 months

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Thinking about the Jailer a while back and finally sat down to do the research that would let me articulate what exactly is going on with her design:

My brain initially glazed over the pattern at the edge of her cowl (and also on the lower edges of her coat, as we see in the other art) as standard gear or crenelation pattern that had parts frayed or worn down. In my defense, I think I was primarily thrown by the inclusion of the visible stitches on the cowl, which add a "worn out" appearance.

Interestingly, while I had thought there were more instances of crenelation motifs present in Harrow, Callum, and Ezran's designs, it actually only appears in the trim on Sarai's skirt:

Anyway, after looking more closely at the Jailer over time, I realized that... that's not accurate. The TDP artists aren't that lazy—those designs are geometric and uneven for a reason. Here's the reason:

It's a motif of (and here's where I had to do research) the bit of a warded key.

I found a really great post about faux-medieval locks and lockpicking vs. actual medieval locks and lockpicking (i.e. what's in ever Elder Scrolls game ever), but a quick summary: a ward or warded lock is a lock that is designed to allow only a specifically-patterned key to turn in the lock to open it. This is similar but subtly different from lever locks, which are still used in modern applications: lever locks use the pattern cut into the bit of the key to shift a series of levers into place that otherwise prevent the bolt from moving, similar to how pin tumbler locks raise a series of pins into alignment. Warded locks, on the other hand, don't actually have anything that prevents the bolt itself from being moved, but instead have a pattern of physical barriers inside the lock that prevent the key itself from being turned unless the pattern on the bit matches up with them. So you sometimes got stuff like this:

Anyway, most of the antique keys you see are probably for lever locks, since those were invented in 1778, are significantly more secure, and generally look a lot simpler in their bit shape.

The problem with the warded lock as a concept is that if you can get to the part that moves the bolt, there's nothing at all to stop you from moving it. Enter the skeleton key—which, contrary to popular belief, is not just any old-looking key. A skeleton key is capable of opening more than one lock, usually a warded lock, by essentially bypassing the wards. For example, the skeleton key on the right here would be able to open the warded locks for both keys on the left:

Something like this seems to be a pretty common skeleton key set for some kinds of modern padlocks:

hmmmmMMMMMmmmm

#the dragon prince #the jailer #something something key of aaravos #anyway thanks for coming to my ted talk on the topic i fell down a research hole about

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stlamb · 3 months

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for my birthday this year i want angel wings, heart shaped padlocks, vintage farmhouse pillow shams, dragon shaped candlesticks, antique mohair teddy bear, 90s gothic dress with angel sleeves, and... world peace

#i don't feel like i am asking for much...

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idesofrevolution · 1 year

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The Architect

It was supposed to be my magnum opus. Ravenswood- my last creation and my forever home. For years I had suffered and degraded myself in firms filled with peons who wouldn't know architectural integrity if it hit them on the nose, and when I finally finished that last project, it took all of fifteen minutes for me to type up my resignation and slap it on the boss' desk. I'd gotten the severance I'd worked nearly 31 years for, and had built up the name Drake Astramore to a prominent name in the business. Finally, I was free. Free to create unrestricted by the trivial boundaries set by those beneath me.

Work was slow in the beginning, my modern designs never seemed to convey the right mood or tone which I was seeking. Completely dejected, I resorted to corresponding with a peer of my own caliber who specialized in Eastlake-Tradition Victorian revival: James Lafreniere. The man was perhaps in his late 80's, far past his prime, but I did value his insight purely to help spur some sort of creative spark. He insisted on a large, rambling estate on a large plot just outside the city. He envisioned towers, stained glass, mahogany... some vacuous opulence that did not speak to my taste whatsoever. I was unconvinced, I saw Victorian architecture as tasteless fluff and ornamentation. Though, as old Mr. Lafreniere pushed, I suppose I did cave in quite a bit. His design was based on some sort of "sacred geometry" he'd studied while in Haiti some time ago. The man was a dog with a bone, frantically trying to persuade me into confirming his "spiritualist" idea for the house. The more he pressed, the less I firmly stood my ground. After all, I was happy with the layout he'd drafted and with my final additions and perfections to his concept, I was satisfied.

Thus, on that foggy winters day, a mere week or two since old Lafreniere was dead and buried, the house was nearing completion after nearly 13 months. I was coming in to do a final inspection, specifically confirming the four crystal chandeliers that were to be placed in the ballroom. Reynolds, the contractor I had hired, went radio silent two days prior, and I was eager to give him a modicum of advice on professionalism. As I pulled up to the antique wrought iron gates, I was perturbed to see them still chained tightly with a large padlock. I had no key, and had no response from Reynolds. Just as I prepared to go to the local hardware store to purchase a pair of bolt cutters, I saw a bulldozer slowly meandering up the gravel driveway through the dense fog. Perhaps Reynolds hadn't abandoned me as I'd thought. Exiting the car, I stood behind the iron gates as the machine came to a halt just on the other side. The door opened and instead of the middle aged potbelly which I had hired, a young man with a peculiar look in his eye exited the vehicle and sat on the steps of the machine.

"Who are you?" The young man glibly chided from his perch.

"What the hell do you mean who am I? I am the owner of this property. Who are you?" He sat idly staring me up and down, some flippant smirk forming slowly on his face. He hopped down, his massive rubber boots landing in a puddle, splashing muddy water up and down his clothes.

"Mr. Astramore, I was wondering if I'd ever get to meet you in person." He sauntered over to the gates, unlocking the heavy padlock as the gates creaked open on their own. I hadn't recalled requesting hydraulic automation on the main gate, but I assumed incorrectly that it was part of the system I'd purchased. "The name is Jimmy. Reynolds proved to be... unreliable on the job. So the company sent me as a replacement. I'm surprised you hadn't heard."

"I most certainly have not heard. I should like to have known about staffing changes. He has completely ignored me for days now." The man looked down, chuckling under his breath.

"Yeah. The guy just up and left one day. Never called the company or anything. Just poof. Vanished." Contractors. The bane of every architect. Unreliable thieves, the lot of them. This young man certainly mimicked that aura of untrustworthiness, but as the job was nearly complete, I preferred at the time to simply allow him to finish. "The house is ready for you, sir. Take this, please let me know if you need anything from me, I'll be finishing the landscaping for the raingardens today." He pulled off a two-way radio from his belt, handing it to me. I could smell the putrid scent of hard labor wafting from him as I snatched the muddy radio from his sweaty hands.

"That will be fine, James." I huffed as I got back into my car, beginning the two minute trek up the driveway toward the house. As I passed him, I could see the filthy worker smile at me. There was something off about his presence, though at the time I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Again, I believe it was his eyes. So familiar, as if I'd known them myself for a time. As I left him behind in the dust of the gravel, I promised myself I would launch a complaint against these unprofessional ruffians the moment I could.

After weaving past the carefully planned and restored bayous, the white tower proudly peeked from above the tree canopy. The woodlands cleared and before me stood the massive edifice that was Ravenswood. It was primed white, awaiting the final paint job in dark greens and black which I had demanded. Yet another setback I was not looking forward to enduring. The elaborate trim graced the balconies and verandas which were perfectly calculated to receive the ideal amount of sun and shade during the hot Louisiana summers. Each glazed window was placed to maximize natural light in the house's otherwise dark confines. Perhaps Lafreniere was right- this was my masterpiece.

I put the car in park, and exited the vehicle. I stood and marveled at the house. On paper, it was grand and idyllic. In person, however, it took on a very different aura. Dark clouds and fog seemed to hang around the house, giving it a distinct sense of foreboding which I had not intended. Knowing funds were scarce as is, it was too late to change anything. This was to be my forever home, shortcomings and perfections alike. Pressing against the front doors, I entered the main hall, then aglow from the stained glass window and edison-bulb-illuminated chandelier. Lafreniere assured me that the house would be sufficiently lit, and that no dark corners would find their way into it's winding halls. I was disappointed beyond words to see that it was not the case.

The house seemed to breathe with a cold draft that whipped around the walls, just strong enough to notice, but not enough to disturb. While it was certainly built to my specifications, Ravenswood took on an identity of it's own before my eyes as it stood before me. Grumbling under my breath, I began my inspection.

Room by room, I went about with my clipboard and checklist. Bronze lightplates, check. Mahogany waiscotting, check. Brass and crystal chandeliers, check. From the library to the conservatory, the drawing room to the gallery; each room was just as I designed it, yet it seemed inundated with some indescribable weight which I had anticipated from the beginning. My modern, airy, open concept home which I had originally envisioned slowly simmered into flames before my own eyes. It was magnificent, yes. The house dripped character and ethereal essence from every nook and cranny. But was it an Astramore home? Certainly not.

Looking back, I should have left. I should have tossed the clipboard onto the dark herringbone parquet floors and stomped back to my car- back to the safety and comfort of my car. I should have driven away like a bat out of hell from this place and never returned. Yet, in my arrogance, I believed I could salvage it somehow. Thus, it was in that moment, as I was checking the finials on the grand staircase that I heard it. Groaning. Ever so quiet, yet echoing throughout the cavernous halls. I looked above me, my eyes tracking the noise further and further up the staircase onto the third floor. I assumed that it was emanating from the observatory in the main tower, though how I could have possibly known that I still do not know. I ascended the steps, slowly at first, toward the sound. Every creaking floorboard perturbed me, a new construction shouldn't behave as if it had stood for over a hundred years. This growing rage at the destruction of my vision translated directly into a quickening pace. My body seemingly did the work for me as I climbed faster, eventually skipping steps on my way to the high observatory.

Blinded by anger, I could not see the various shapes and figures which I had blown past on the landings, the dark shadows waiting in the corners and cornices. Every ounce of my being was focused entirely on releasing this pent up aggression, built within myself over decades, on whatever pathetic creature dared to whine within my walls. Arriving on the final landing, I burst through the door with the last of my strength.

The shutters in the observatory were drawn and shut, the unfinished plaster and floorboards were illuminated only by the dull light from the stairwell behind me. There, in the center of the room and crouched like a devious little gremlin was some degenerate young man. Tattoos sprawled across his lean body, and his greasy mop of hair obscured his line of sight. The man shielded his face from the gleaming light, as if burned by it's glow. His pants and shoes were weathered and well worn; scuffed, torn, and stained from what I can only assume was some ill-begotten lifestyle of antisocial youths.

"Get out!" I shouted at the boy, as he cowered on the sawdust-laden floor. His hand slowly retracted from his face, revealing what he was trying to conceal. Upon his inked face were two fully black eyes, which seemed to suck the remnants of light straight out of the room. They were empty, cold, and devious. This thing was not of this world, it was not of God, it was not of nature. I stood there, frozen in place as he stood up, easily a height of over 6 feet tall. My hairs stood on end, as he smiled down at me. I turned to run, but as I did, I was confronted by the grinning visage of Jimmy.

"Going somewhere, Astramore?" His eyes were black as night, just like the creature behind me. I couldn't speak, any word I tried to mutter was caught in my throat and merely exited as gasping utterances. Two icy cold hands slowly wrapped around my gut. I could only let out a whimper as I was sharply pulled back into the room as Jimmy leaned against the doorframe, his arms and ankles crossed comfortably as if nothing was out of place.

Tossed down onto the ground, my extremities pulled in every which direction as if bound by invisible leather straps. My clothes were ripped from my body, leaving me vulnerable and cold in the nude. The thing circled me like a predator observing it's prey. I thrashed against my constraints, spitting insults and threats with the last of my energy. I should have realized the intent of their misdeeds then and there. Blinded yet again, and for the last time by my own rage, I could not see... they were exhausting me. My strength depleted, my nerves shot, I was a mere shell of myself. This was their moment.

The thing stood above me, straddling my bony torso, as he slowly lowered himself atop me. With his cold fingers, nails black and skin dirty, he gripped the bottom of my chin, prying my mouth open. With a momentum far beyond the order of nature, his hand plowed directly into my open maw. It seemed to contract in on itself, as if he were not solid, but rather in a plasmic state of matter. As it squirmed deeper into my throat, the second hand fed itself into the orifice with ease. It felt as if I were drowning, yet could still breathe. It flowed like slime inside of me, pooling into my expanding stomach. I could hear myself gurgling and choking on him as his head squeezed into my mouth, the miasmic odor of unwashed manscent wafting from his acrid form. He slithered his entire form within me, my gut protruding more and more with his writhing shape beneath my stretching skin. As his lower half finally slid past my tongue, I could feel the rough texture of his denim pants scratch against my esophagus, I could taste the sweaty leather of his musky battered sneakers brush on my tongue until the last of the rubber sole slipped into my mouth; disappearing into my body.

Within me, I could feel him breathing. Expanding and contracting from beneath my skin. I could just barely cock my head down enough to see my grotesquely inflated midsection wriggling and pulsating. There was no pain, only tightness and fullness inside. From the doorway, Jimmy had lowered his coveralls down to his boots, pulled his rancid jockstrap to his knees, and was pleasuring himself with manic fervor. Whatever was happening to me was nothing short of pornography for him, he savored every moment with bated breath. Though I had no time to dwell on such displays of vulgarity and immorality. As quickly as the thing had entered me, it began to spread.

I cocked my head toward my arm, as I watched the protruding outline of the thing's hand slowly snake towards my own from under my skin. I could see it's added mass inflate my musculature as it slid effortlessly past my elbow and up my forearm. It's fingers pushed into mine like a hollow latex glove. His stature considerably larger than mine, I could see my entire arm stretch outward, and his own muscles falling into place within mine. In just a few seconds, my arm had grown, large biceps and colorful tattoos seeping up through my dermis until it was unrecognizable. I observed it in horror as I felt my second arm endure the same process, though my gaze was thoroughly cemented at the strong, youthful, virile arm which once was mine.

My legs soon followed suit, my thighs ballooning outward with firm slabs of muscle as the outline of the thing's massive feet barreled down toward my own. Hairs sprung up like weeds across my inflating calves and quadriceps, until I could feel the slimy pressure of his foot sliding into mine. My body again stretched to accommodate his frame, feeling the soles of my massive sweating feet slide across the hardwood floor until it was finally fully in place. My toes wriggled against my will. A stirring in my groin, and my worn hands pawing at my privates signaled his insertion there as well. Every slick sweaty pump of my member seemed to thrust his into mine further and further. It was quickly engorged, thick and dripping with pre as my balls swelled with his thick, unholy seed. The foreskin tightened around my tip, slick and dripping, and there was then only one part of me left that was untouched.

I could feel him pressing up my throat. It's head firmly making it's way up my esophagus, his face protruding from beneath my sweating skin. There was no fight left in me, all I could do was close my eyes and pray that oblivion was not as empty as I had assumed. With the very last of my strength giving way, there was no resistance as it's head shot up into my skull. Everything went dark almost immediately, there was no light, and an atonal ringing in my ears distorted the squelching and cracking noises I could faintly hear as it adjusted my face atop his. Feeling his plasmic form beneath mine, integrating itself into every possible crevice, nook, and space; it was maddening. I felt myself begin to drift away... disconnected from my corporeal tether. The last thing I could see before I finally wasted away into the unknown was my blurred reflection in the mirror, a face no longer my own, merely a shadow of who I once was. I bitterly accepted this fate. I let him have that sweaty, smelly, vulgar body... it was all his. The lights went out, and all was silent.

----

New Orleans Tribune, December 20th, 2022:

Local Architect Declared Dead After Week Long Search Efforts

Recent attempts to locate Drake Astramore (69) of Thibodaux have been called off by New Orleans authorities after a week of searching through the architect's sprawling estate. Neighbors to the gated complex reported faint screams coming from within the mansion, even from a 1/4 mile away, which led investigators to deliver a search warrant to the residence.

Upon arrival, authorities were met with the groundskeeper of the premises, James Lafreniere (25), who explained Astramore had disappeared during a routine inspection of the mansion, which was at the time nearing completion:

"He was only in there for a few hours. I wish I knew what could have happened to the guy. But I am so glad that his son has decided to take up the torch on the house. It wasn't all for nothing, then."

While Astramore had no family to speak of, the few who knew him personally described him as "difficult" and "degrading," often going to far lengths to place himself above others. In fact, a number of former coworkers at architecture firm Guillory, Darensbourg, & Combs alluded to mysterious dealings with an unidentified elderly man during the design phase of his home, described as having a "dark energy" about him. While there is no evidence to support foul play at this time, investigators have not ruled out furthering their analysis into these claims.

As for Ravenswood Estate, it has now fallen into the hands of the missing architect's son, Drake Astramore II (27). A self-proclaimed "spiritualist," the young man plans to give tours of the sprawling mansion dedicated to the mysterious and unusual process of design of Ravenswood. Joining with his partner in business and in life, James Lafreniere, the duo intend on opening a bed and breakfast type model for the horror inclined.

"I didn't know my pop all that much, he never really acknowledged me or anything. But I'm happy to show the world what he created. This place is special, it was designed to be special. There's an magnetism here that gathers together the essences of many, many of the dearly departed. If you don't believe me, come take a look. I'm happy to show you around. I guarantee you'll leave a completely changed person."

#male possession #male transformation #ghost possession #badass transformation #architect #original #gay transformation #gay possession #body horror #musky #punkification #male tf

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everlythequestionabletomboy · 7 months

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UPDATE LOG 4.2.3 MASTERLIST

Beyond this is the things they added to the 4.2.3 upd of DoL

Please send me an ask if you want me to add something or I missed one

Images/stories I still need

SPRITES

PC SPRITE

Bodytypes

Masc., Fem., and Andro.

Chest/breast sprites

Made the breasts have better visibility

Flattest chest size looks flatter on combat sprite

Added breast sprites to lace nightgown, virgin killer, ball gown, evening gown, open shoulder sweater, pink nurse, plastic nurse, skimpy lolita outfits, open shoulder crop top

TATTOOS

Tattoo Parlour

Any unlocked bodywriting can be turned into a tattoo, even if it's not on the PC

Island

New Triangle, Square, and Circle tattoos [look at the Island page for more info]

HAIR

New

All down

Fishtail braid (left, right, twins)

Half-up

Ribbon tail sides

Low tail

Thick ponytail

Reworked

None

FRINGE

New

Short air vents

Side pinned

Dreadlocks bun

Emo/Emo Left/Emo Right

Reworked

Ruffled

CLOTHES

Outfits

Traditional Maid Dress

Victorian Maid Dress

Shrine Maiden Robes

Virgin Killer Dress

Halter Sundress

Leather Dress

Upper

Cat hoodie

Ao dai Top

School cardigan

School blouse

Polo shirt

Color block crop top

Band t-shirt

Boxy t-shirt

Remade Serafuku

Classic Serafuku

Gakuran

Lower

Ao dai trousers

Plaid school skirt

Plaid school trousers

Plaid school shorts

School pinafore

Plaid school pinafore

Wide leg trousers

Straight leg trousers

Yoga pants

Jean miniskirt

Dolphin shorts

Under outfits

Turtleneck Leotard

Under upper

None 😔

Under lower

Tie Side Bikini Bottoms

Highwaisted microkini bottoms

Legs

Sheer Leggings

Stripped kneesocks

Patterned dress socks

Polka dot socks

Sports socks

Rib-knit socks

Rib-knit ankle socks

Feet

Canvas Loafers

ACCESSORIES

Hats

Hairpins (butterfly + star)

Conical hat

Raccoon cap

Fur cap

Bat beanie

Mini pumpkin

Face

Gas Mask

Doggy Muzzle

Eyepatch

Medical Eyepatch

Monocle

Neck

Love Locket

Fur boa

Hands

Work gloves

ICONS ADDED

Locations

Temple garden, moor, farmlands, temp office, altar, secret path, the churchyard, the dilapidated shop, Eden's cabin, brothel stage [pt1]

Garden plots, stream, gloryhole, park fountain, asylum, sea rocks, waterfall, thicket, Great Hawk's nest, and perch [pt 2]

Rainwater pool, Eden's bed, lake campsite, fishing rock, archaeological field office, Remy's Estate, Great Hawk's tower, Ruins,

Animals

Black Dog

Actions

Riding a horse, question mark for inquires, searching for pots in lake, excersizing/hobbling in heels, gliding, entering town, searching for a mark, praying, and renting a stall [pt 1]

Getting in/out/refusing rides, trick or treating, sitting on the school stump, diving, descending/ascending in water, leaving water, and fixing Eden's cabin [pt 2]

Digging, showering, practise shooting, undo bindings, daydreaming, tilling, watching TV, chatting, singing, and plundering [pt 3]

Making tops/bottoms out of seaweed, meditating, relaxing

Events

Trial of purity

Clothes

Patient gown

Items

Milk, breast milk, chicken eggs, truffles, temple pew, dog treat, bronze key, library desk, soap [pt1]

Lichen, cosmetics, small/medium/large/huge exotic/huge decor fish tanks, auto feeder, tank decor, and sewer safe [pt 2]

Antique watch, grass, antique crystal, scrap, stimulants, torch, fertiliser, antique candlestick, rubble, and mud [pt 3]

Spiderwebs [pt 4]

Objects

Salves, sink, computer, rug, broom, dustpan, gift boxes, wolf chew toy, padlock [pt 1]

Cash register, Eden's valentine's day gift, Eden's coatstand, condom vending machine [pt 2]

Tending

Milk

Breast milk

Chicken eggs

Truffles

Ghostshrooms

"Take all"

Shop

Fetish collar icon is updated

LOCATION ART

Pirate ship

Island

Old Church

Sepulchre

Dilapidated Shop

Meadow

GAME MECHANICS

WORLD MECHANICS

Settings

"Split by Gender Apperance" changed to "Set/Ignore Sexual Orientation

Crime

Split into 10 categories; Assault, Coercion, Destruction of Property, Indecent Exposure, Obstruction of Justice, Prostitution, Resisting Arrest, Thievery, Petty Thievery, and Trespassing.

Crimes the PC has commited would be read out before punishment

Can adjust each crime in the cheat menu

Can view the crime stats in the stat menu

PARASITES

Ear Slime

Added an event that prevents PC to wear under lower garments, unless given directly to them

Sleeping event at Alex's farm

Sleeping event if you study at school naked

Alternate abduction event at the dog pound

At Remy's Farm, it would attempt to force you on all fours and eat grass

May force you to have sex with dolphins

Ear slime tasks are now in the Journal menu

Clit Parasite

Alternative masturbation options if PC has a clit parasite

MASTURBATION

Skip Button

Added a skip button that brings you to the next orgasm

PREGNANCY

Alex the Farmer

Avaliable pregnancy candidate [+more]

Crossdressing Fame

Can lower fame more if seen as a female are pregnant

Paternity Test

Option to do it at the Hospital

SHOPS

Hide Option

Can now choose to hide unavailable items in the shop

FEATS

New

Gilded Spear

Lost World

Face of a Guardian

Wild Monarch

Naturalised

Prehistoric Landscape

SOFT BAD ENDNG

The Island

How to enter, how to escape [+more]

Stats

Sensitivity values can be viewed in the "Extra Stats" tab under "Characteristics"

Options

Confirmation dialouge appears when you try to exit/refresh the page [is on by default in ironman mode]. Can toggle it in the Advanced tab

CHEAT MENU

Clothes

Destroy, repair, dry, and drench clothes at once is added

Visuals

Breast and Cum Values have been replaced with sliders

Pregnancy

More additional options for pregnancy cheats

Teleport

Farmland tp is added

ENCOUNTERS

Double Penetration

Unique cum images is added

Anal

Improved xray sprites

Lower Underwear

Able to pull it to the side during encounters

EVENTS

Hitchiking

"Driving Lesson"

Pillory

Rimming and Watersports outcomes

Whipping and buttplug outcomes

Blackjack

Rimming outcomes

Spa

Rimming outcomes

Car Sex

NPCs will ask if PC needs to be dropped off anywhere after

Chalet

Prostitution opt. added

WARDOBE

Wardrobe Outfit Editor

Added a random color option

Filters

Warmth filter is added

LOCATIONS

ORPHANAGE

Whitney can upgrade the Loft

SCHOOL

Mason

Repeatable scene where he unlocks the chastity belt Winter put on you

Untying your bonds before swim class generates slightly random dialouge

Changing Rooms

PCs thoughts of being in the wrong changing room are more diverse, changes based on Crossdressing Rep

PC is no longer rejected immediately when looking like the opposite gender and is given weird stares and comments

Crossdressing Fame/Rep

Chance to lower crossdressing fame after not

THE POUND

Dog Happiness

Added a description of the dogs happiness on the main screen

NPCS/ANIMALS

WOLVES

Wolf Pack

PC is more comfortable naked around the wolves in the wolf pack

Wolf Cave

You can submit to wolves that advance towards you in the cave

BAILEY

Punishment(?)

Will now deliver PC to the tutorial person if PC stays at the orphanage for the first whole week

ZEPHYR THE PIRATE

Named NPC that is found during the Disguised Escape option

ITEMS

SEX TOYS

Fleshy color option is added to sex toys and strap ons

Fleshy color sidebar renderer is added [no idea what that means]

PLANTS

Flowers/Seeds

Plumeria, tendable [view the Island page for more info]

EXTRAS/MISC

ABILITIES

Clothes

Can tie cardigan around waist

Able to lower suspenders

#degrees of lewdity #bailey the caretaker #zephyr the pirate #update log #dol spoilers #dol 4.2.3 update #eden the hunter #soooo many icons #and clothes #they put so much into this update fr

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beautflstranger · 6 months

Text

Antique padlock bracelet with working key.

These are usually from the Victorian or Edwardian eras.

The symbolism was that it was locked on a woman's wrist to show their "locked" relationship. He would keep the key.

A more modern version is the Cartier Love bracelet.

There's something dreamy romantic about being owned by your beloved.

- beautflstranger

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papasbaseball · 1 year

Text

Secondo x Reader (Mimicry)

+18 CONTENT NOT FOR MINORS. MINORS KEEP SCROLLING

Pairing: Secondo x F!Reader

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Knife Play and one cut/blood. Dubcon for aphrodisiacs. Bdsm and degradation.

Summary: Breaking into Papa Secondo's office to steal an artifact proves to be a heart pounding experience as the reader falls victim to a hungry chest with a need to breed. Papa Secondo finds the thieving mouse, trapped for his pleasure.

Word Count: 3,140

Notes: I wrote this a while ago for @astouract but never posted it here. Hope you all enjoy!

AO3 Link

The stolen key turned perfectly in the lock. Slipping quickly inside, you quietly shut the door behind you and shoved the key back into your habit pocket.

The carpet and walls of the second Emeritus brother puffed out the sweet tobacco scent as if they had smoked the cigars he preferred. Footfalls were softened by the smoked carpet as you crept quickly toward the credenza.

“The cabinet in the corner of the room,” you mumbled to yourself, remembering Frate Seth’s words. The midday light seeped through the closed curtains of the corner window, illuminating the side of the black-stained credenza. Wooden snakes wove and tangled themselves across the wood, fine craftsmanship that was undoubtedly from abroad. The knife you were looking for certainly was.

Looking around the office, different tchotchkes caught the eye: a red-lacquered katana resting on a cabinet behind his desk, a tribal mask hanging on the wall, a chair near the door upholstered in fine Turkish weaving. Secondo was rarely in his office and the mementos were evidence of that. The knife you were searching for had come from Bucharest, a cursed antique that supposedly granted a wish to whoever's blood it drew.

A creaking noise caused you to whip your head around. Nothing.

Crouching down, you made quick work of opening the credenza. You raised your eyebrows as the door opened without resistance. There were keyholes on the door handles, but they were not locked, baring their secrets for any who wished to see. You flipped through papers, finding nothing until you got to the lower shelf on the right side.

A golden filigree box was tucked into the corner under some old scrolls. Sliding the cold metal out you flipped it open to a purple velvet. Your heart sank as you found a burnished gold locket inside on top of a brass padlock key. You held your breath, ignoring your hammering pulse as you opened it. Framed in the metal was a picture of a nun, wearing a habit in fashion during the 80s of the church, with a double high peaked bandeau. Though the photo was worn with age, there was no mistaking how pretty she was. A soft smile graced her face and you almost felt bad for closing the locket back up and putting the box back where you found it.

There was nothing left in the cabinet, despite the second flip-through of the papers that you did. You huffed as you closed the serpentine cabinet doors. Where the fuck could it be? Your knees popped as you pushed against your thighs to hoist yourself back up. Eyes darting around the office you found many cabinets, but none were where they were supposed to be.

"That liar said it'd be in the corner of the room by the window. There's only one window, so what the-"

Turning, you took note of the chest on the other wall of the corner window. It was worn smooth and weathered, much older than anything else in the room, and as large as two steamer trunks.

"Not exactly a cabinet," you remarked. Approaching it, you picked up and inspected the padlock keeping it shut. "You'd think he'd at least be consistent." You cursed yourself for leaving your lock-picking set in your room. It would take forever to find the key, time you did not have.

Going back to the serpentine cabinet, you bit your lip fishing out the golden box again. Pushing the locket aside, you grabbed the key and headed back to the enormous chest. Sathanas, please work, I’m begging this works.

Click. The tell-tale mechanical sound and the full twist popped the lock open to your elation. Unthreading the lock from the latch, you set it aside to search for your treasure.

The lid was heavy, probably weighing at least 40 pounds. You sucked in a breath and heaved with all your might to open it. The inside looked like nothing and strangely you couldn’t even tell if there was a bottom to the chest. However, lining the top and bottom rim of it appeared to be animal teeth, maybe horrible souvenirs of big cats that had been fastened to the chest. Their encasements were nothing like you’d ever seen before, a deep purple that almost resembled gums as if it were alive. Putting forth a shaking finger, you touched the glossy flesh.

A deep growl emanated from the void maw. Black smoke rose from the chest causing you to jump back. The smoke moved with surprising speed and wrapped around your body. Much to your confusion, you could not walk through as you tried to go back for the padlock. You tried to move your arms but found them pinned to your sides. The chest hissed at this struggle and snatched you off the soft carpet and into its confines, slamming the lid shut.

The deprivation of light made you incredibly sensitive to how the smoke grabbed you and snaked around your body. Heavily breathing, you felt the tension decrease around your shoulders. It took all your strength, but you flailed your fists, finally landing a blow on the inside of the chest. It was the same fleshy texture as the chest’s gums but was noticeably slimier. You banged a few more times before it growled.

Smoke tendrils tore at the neck of your habit, quickly ripping the garment from your body. Kicking your legs in protest, you noticed that your legs and arms became weaker and weaker the harder you breathed in the sweet smoke. Thoughts slipped off your brain like silk as you relaxed into the embrace of the fog. The rest of your undergarments slid off like butter. The wisps were warm against your skin and ticklish, and you smirked with delight as they danced over your nipples. You gasped softly, a part of your brain urging you to let the box know what you liked and disliked. Something denser came up to flick slimily over the stiffened peaks, rolling back and forth across them in amusement.

“P-Please,” you moaned, “please just a little bit more.” Your cheeks grew hot at how wantonly the words rolled off your tongue like you were trying to seduce it into fucking you.

The chest obliged, the slimy tendrils curling around your nipples before enveloping them in some manner, sucking firmly against them. Not being able to see what was happening meant that every move the cursed object made was a surprise. “Fuck,” you gasped as you felt the sensations and teasing stoking the fire in your core, “so good…”

The chest purred at your words, adding a tendril to prod and lick at your clit. Your fingernails dug into your palm, desperate to grab onto anything to aid in the tension you were feeling building. They pushed in farther, scraping the soft skin, as the lower tendril latched on as well. “Sathanas, fuck that feels good. Just like th-”

The lid of the chest flipped open to reveal Secondo standing above you, lips tight, if not slightly turned up at the corners. “Mi è sembrato di aver sentito una topolina.”

A scream of surprise started in your throat but came out in shameless lust. Your gaze was torn away from him as the lower tendril unlatched to flick hard at your swollen clit. It stung as if the ooze that it secreted had made everything more sensitive, and you realized it was trying to admonish you for the scream.

“Non gli piace quando urli, topolina,” Secondo said, turning one of the chairs for guests by his desk to face the box. He hitched up his chasuble and alb before sitting down, legs spread wide in a commanding way. “I must admit I did not think that I would be getting a show today, or catching a mouse in my office.”

Whimpering in response you tried to find your words. “I- I’m not- I was only…”

“You know, topolina, I could free you, but I have a distaste for excuses… and thieves.”

You sneered at him snarling out, “Thief is such a - ah!” The tendril detached again, this time landing an audible smack across your clit that you were sure caused you to gush as your entire body recoiled in pain. “It’s a strong word, don’t you think?” you moaned, trying to keep your reactions in check so the chest wouldn’t punish you again.

“You are in my office and you have opened an unlocked chest, topolina. What were you planning on finding? My belongings?”

“No,” you said, “I wasn’t looking for anything, I swear.”

The appendages that were latched to your nipples constricted hard like clamps. You cried at this before the tendril between your legs gave you another firm smack for that. Your stomach sank as you felt a stream of slick slowly trickle down to your ass, evidence that you were enjoying its scoldings.

“Non gli piace neanche quando menti,” Secondo said. His hand was resting over his pants, waiting. “I will ask you again: what were you looking for, topolina?”

You held silent except for the moans that passed your lips as the tendrils worked away at your body, your juices slowly leaking out to cover more of your ass. The tension was so good, but you could feel that it wouldn’t be enough, the tendrils always pulling back when you wanted more.

“Da illi quod meruit,” Secondo spoke aloud. The chest responded to the ancient words, producing a fourth appendage. “If you do not want to cooperate, we can always fuck the answer out of you.” The new tendril licked and prodded at your asshole, testing the sensitive skin and tickling to tease.

“Please,” you moaned, “I need more. Please, tell it to fuck me.”

“Tarde,” he smirked, stroking himself through his pants. His mouth dropped open as he watched the tendril wriggle its way past the tight ring of muscle.

The appendage oozed more to aid itself as it torturously slid in and out at a slow pace. You groaned, feeling yourself slowly being stretched out more and more. It was delicious the way it plied you apart, but even more so through watching the second oldest Emeritus brother stroke himself to the sight of you being defiled. “I need my pussy fucked, please.”

“Why were you in my office?”

“K-Knife,” you slur out. There was no hope of getting it now, you were caught.

“A knife?” he said, standing up to undo his belt. “What kind of knife?”

“The Ouroboros Knife.”

He set the belt aside, getting up to go to the cabinet behind his desk. He pulled open the drawer and produced a dagger with a highly sculpted handle and pommel fashioned after a serpent eating its tail. The blade faintly glinted a dark green in the hazy afternoon light. “This knife?”

You nodded your head as a smoke tendril curled around your throat. The tendril fucking your ass picked up speed, causing you to barely notice the tendril that had left your clit red and swollen. “Yes, Papa.”

“You are a pretty sight, Sister.” He held up both thumbs and forefingers as if he were lining up a shot for a photograph, walking closer to you. When he reached the box, he bent down pinching your swollen clit between his gloved thumb and index finger. “How badly do you want that dripping cunt of yours filled?”

The pinch stung and caused your walls to twitch, your body begging you to comply. “So bad. I don’t want anything else. Please, tell it to fuck my pussy, Papa.”

He brought the knife to the top of your thigh, cutting deep enough for the blood to trickle down and join the wetness of the tendril and your own juices that covered your ass. The smile on those skull-painted lips was sickening. “It grants any wish. Go on, Sister: you know what to do.”

That asshole had tricked you into using your only wish. Gritting your teeth, you willed it to be so before he could do something else like close the lid on you and leave you to rot for eternity as a dripping pile of want. The box quickly obliged your wish, pushing a fat tentacle up against your entrance.

“Papa, it’s not going to fit!”

“Topolina, I am confident your whore cunt can take it. La frittata è fatta. Now, open your mouth. Da mihi os suum.” The tentacles of the chest obeyed his commands and moved you so your mouth was available to him. “Open, Topolina.”

You vowed to keep your mouth shut but it fell open in shock as the tentacle pushed into you, working with the other to stretch your two holes wide for their pleasure. Secondo in the meantime had freed his pierced cock from its confines and laid the tip of it on your tongue.

“Fai la brava ragazzina e succhia il cazzo del tuo papa.” He snatched the veil off your head, grabbing a fistful of hair.

The stretch of the chest filling you was so delicious that you obediently closed your lips around his thick cock, hollowing your cheeks and curling your tongue for his pleasure. The tentacle continued to push, stretching the muscles of your walls until it bumped up against your cervix. You bristled in surprise, but soon the tentacle was oozing the same substance that had made your clit and asshole feel so good.

Secondo slowly rocked his hips forward, guiding your mouth down his length. "Topolina, I am assuming you do not know what this is, or you would not have opened it. It is a mimic chest. It looks like any other ordinary chest, but it is a monster. I brought it back from a trip to Turkey once. You are the only sibling or ghoul foolish enough to try to open it. It has been 15 years since it was last opened, which is not good for you."

You looked up through your eyelashes, watching as his face creased in the pleasure he was taking from your mouth. A worry flushed your system only momentarily at his words, before the tendril from before resumed its latch on your clit, making you moan anew with a mouthful of cock.

“Mimic chests tend to lay dormant for two years before the need to breed takes over them. This one is 13 years overdue,” he grunted, pushing farther into your mouth. As the tip touched the back of your throat, you gagged. “Relax, topolina. Breathe.” A rough hand reached down and massaged the smooth column of your throat.

You focused your breathing through your nostrils as Secondo pushed down into your throat. Your eyes shut as you savored the feeling of being filled fully in all three holes like a slut. He gave a few short thrusts before pulling back, letting you breathe again. His piercings ran smoothly across your tongue, and you wondered how they would feel in place of the tentacle currently stuffing your pussy.

“I imagine it is getting close. I am not sure when you entered my office, but it usually fills its host quickly. Less time spent is less time to be caught and destroyed. Relax.”

You took a deep breath as he pushed down into your throat once more, groaning at the soft tightness. The appendages in your ass and pussy pumped in at a quicker pace and you knew they would be cumming soon. The tendrils on your clit and nipples rolled the bundles of nerves, encouraging you closer and closer to the edge with everything filling you. When Secondo pulled back again, you breathed out a heavy groan as you felt your climax approaching.

“Once more, topolina,” Secondo hissed as he pushed back down into your throat. A dozen of brutal thrusts later, and you felt his cock kick and spill his seed into your stomach. “È una brava puttana. Prendi tutto lo sborra di papa. Questo è quello che ti meriti, ladro: essere usato come un cassonetto di sborra.”

Satisfied, he pulled out, offering you the tip. “Sii una brava ragazza. Give it a kiss.” The wretched smile on his face made you want to bite it, but you remembered the chest’s dislike for loud harsh noises. You kissed the tip, taking the last drop of cum between your lips, flicking your tongue out to taste the saltiness. “Sei davvero una sgualdrina.” He slapped his cock on your cheek three times, before stuffing it back in his pants.

The appendages fucking your pussy and ass stuttered in their pace and soon you could feel the hot cum filling you inside. The fat tentacle that stretched your cunt pushed all the way against your cervix as the tendril on your clit sent you tumbling over the edge. The contractions were shorter, the muscles being so stretched out as they gripped the tentacle, trying to force it out. Instead, it pushed harder and you felt your womb flood with its seed. A different, thicker substance filled your cunt before it pulled out. Strangely you felt none of the seed spill down your legs when it pulled out. “What did it just do to me?”

“It has plugged you for optimal breeding chances. Usually, it wears off within a few hours, but because this one has laid dormant for so long, who is to say? It might take weeks.” He refastened his pants and threaded his belt back through them. “You do not have to worry about getting pregnant, our species is incompatible, but I suppose you will get to enjoy the feeling of it moving around in you.” He pulled you up from the box, closing and locking the lid once more.

“If you would like something to cover you, I have an alb in that closet over there,” he said, pointing to a pair of bi-folding doors. As you walked over to them, you could feel what he was talking about as the liquid sloshed within you with every step. You took a black alb, much too big, and threw it over your naked form. As you turned to face him, he slipped the knife back into the cabinet drawer.

“Aren’t you afraid that I’ll come back and steal it again?” you said, biting your lip.

Shutting the drawer, Secondo made his way back over to you, stopping so he towered over your shoulder. You looked up and saw the knowing look in his eyes as he brought his gloved hand to rest on your lower abdomen. You shifted under his gaze and felt it slosh once more. “Why would I be afraid of that when you already got your wish?” He patted your stomach a few times before heading toward the door. “Have a good rest of your day, topolina. You learned a hard but fulfilling lesson.”

Translations:

Mi è sembrato di aver sentito una topolina. - I thought I heard a little mouse.

Non gli piace quando urli, topolina, - It doesn't like it when you scream, little mouse,

Non gli piace neanche quando menti - It doesn't like it when you lie either

Da illi quod meruit - Give her what she deserves

Tarde - Slowly

La frittata è fatta- You’ve made your bed, now lie in it.

Da mihi os suum- Give me her mouth

Fai la brava ragazzina e succhia il cazzo del tuo papa - Be a good little girl and suck your Papa's dick

È una brava puttana. Prendi tutto lo sborra di Papa. Questo è quello che ti meriti, ladro: essere usato come un cassonetto di sborra - She's a good whore. Take all of Papa's cum. This is what you deserve, thief: to be used as a cum dumpster

Sii una brava ragazza - Be a good girl

Sei davvero una sgualdrina - You really are a slut

#the band ghost #the band ghost fanfiction #secondo x reader #papa emeritus ii x reader #secondo smut

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