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turnpage · 3 years

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send me a ✐ for a random sentence starter from my muse (1-1500) — tw: profanity, mild nsfw, long list

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❨1❩ ❛ They are dreams, but I’m too out of control, I lose myself in them, and I’ve already lost too much to let them take over. ❜  ❨2❩ ❛ Sometimes human places create inhuman monsters. ❜ ❨3❩ ❛ I'm not gonna hurt ya. I'm just going to bash your brains in. ❜ ❨4❩ ❛ Monsters are real. Ghosts are too. They live inside of us, and sometimes, they win. ❜ ❨5❩ ❛ The world's a hard place. It doesn't care. It doesn't hate you and me, but it doesn't love us, either. ❜ ❨6❩ ❛ The tears that heal are also the tears that scald and scourge. ❜ ❨7❩ ❛ Pull your act together and just go on. ❜ ❨8❩ ❛ I had never dreamed there could be so much pain in a life when there is nothing physically wrong. I hurt all the time. ❜ ❨9❩ ❛ Tough old world, baby. If you're not bolted together tightly, you're gonna shake, rattle, and roll before you turn thirty. ❜ ❨10❩ ❛ Are you sure self-pity is a luxury you can afford? ❜ ❨11❩ ❛ Truth comes out. In the end it always comes out. ❜ ❨12❩ ❛ Living by your wits is always knowing where the wasps are. ❜ ❨13❩ ❛ No matter where you go, the same asshole gets off the plane. ❜ ❨14❩ ❛ We sometimes need to create unreal monsters and bogies to stand in for all the things we fear in our real lives. ❜ ❨15❩ ❛ That’s your job in this hard world, to keep your love alive and see that you get on, no matter what. ❜ ❨16❩ ❛ Human nature, baby. Grab it and growl. ❜ ❨17❩ ❛ God wiped snot out of his nose and that was you. ❜ ❨18❩ ❛ Run away. Quick. And remember how much I love you. ❜ ❨19❩ ❛ How many times, over how many years, have I—a grown adult—asked for the mercy of another chance? ❜ ❨20❩ ❛ I was suddenly so sick of myself, so revolted. ❜ ❨21❩ ❛ You listen to me. I’m going to talk to you about it this once and never again this same way. ❜ ❨22❩ ❛ But those pieces, they’ll never fit just the same way again. Never in this world. ❜ ❨23❩ ❛ Dying is a part of living. You have to keep tuning in to that if you expect to be a whole person. ❜ ❨24❩ ❛ Officious little prick. ❜ ❨25❩ ❛ I’ve been sleepwalking again, my dear. — The plants are moving under the rug. ❜ ❨26❩ ❛ How I wish you were fear. ❜ ❨27❩ ❛ But it was a dreadful kind of curiosity, the kind that makes you peek through your fingers during the scariest parts of a scary movie. ❜ ❨28❩ ❛ All we have is time, you know. An eternity of time. Or shall we end it? Might as well. After all, we're missing the party. ❜ ❨29❩ ❛ We all remember our pleasant dreams more clearly than the scary ones. ❜ ❨30❩ ❛ The way things should be and the way things are hardly ever get together. ❜ ❨31❩ ❛ Got to be regular if you want to be happy. ❜ ❨32❩ ❛ But in a solitary life, there are rare moments when another soul dips near yours, as stars once a year brush the earth. ❜ ❨33❩ ❛ He showed me his scars, and in return he let me pretend that I had none. ❜ ❨34❩ ❛ Humbling women seems to me a chief pastime of poets. As if there can be no story unless we crawl and weep. ❜ ❨35❩ ❛ It is a common saying that women are delicate creatures, flowers, eggs, anything that may be crushed in a moment's carelessness. ❜ ❨36❩ ❛ If I had ever believed it, I no longer do. ❜ ❨37❩ ❛ I thought once that gods are the opposite of death, but I see now they are more dead than anything, for they are unchanging, and can hold nothing in their hands. ❜ ❨38❩ ❛ I cannot bear this world a moment longer. ❜ ❨39❩ ❛ I have a better idea. I will do as I please. ❜ ❨40❩ ❛ All my life has been murk and depths, but I am not a part of that dark water. I am a creature within it. ❜ ❨41❩ ❛ You cannot know how frightened gods are of pain. There is nothing more foreign to them, and so nothing they ache more deeply to see. ❜ ❨42❩ ❛ When we are young, we think ourselves the first to have each feeling in the world. ❜ ❨43❩ ❛ When I was born, the word for what I was did not exist. ❜ ❨44❩ ❛ But perhaps no parent can truly see their child. When we look we see only the mirror of our own faults. ❜ ❨45❩ ❛ I will not be like a bird bred in a cage, too dull to fly even when the door stands open. ❜ ❨46❩ ❛ This is what it means to swim in the tide, to walk the earth and feel it touch your feet. This is what it means to be alive. ❜ ❨47❩ ❛ You threw me to the crows, but it turns out I prefer them to you. ❜ ❨48❩ ❛ Yet because I knew nothing, nothing was beneath me. ❜ ❨49❩ ❛ If now I am wise, it is only because I have been fool enough for a hundred lifetimes. ❜ ❨50❩ ❛ You can teach a viper to eat from your hands, but you cannot take away how much it likes to bite. ❜ ❨51❩ ❛ Give me the blade. Some things are worth spilling blood for. ❜ ❨52❩ ❛ I have been old and stern for so long, carved with regrets and years like a monolith. But that is only a shape I’ve been poured into. I do not have to keep it. ❜ ❨53❩ ❛ I wake sometimes in the dark terrified by my life's precariousness, its thready breath. ❜ ❨54❩ ❛ Understanding the world is a matter of keeping very still and showing no emotions, leaving room for others to reveal themselves. ❜ ❨55❩ ❛ Beneath the smooth, familiar face of things is another that waits to tear the world in two. ❜ ❨56❩ ❛ The truth is, men make terrible pigs. ❜ ❨57❩ ❛ My father has never been able to imagine the world without himself in it. ❜ ❨58❩ ❛ This is the grief that makes our kind choose to be stones and trees rather than flesh. ❜ ❨59❩ ❛ Witches are not so delicate. ❜ ❨60❩ ❛ Those who fight against prophecy only draw it more tightly around their throats. ❜ ❨61❩ ❛ I learned that I could bend the world to my will, as a bow is bent for an arrow. I would have done that toil a thousand times to keep such power in my hands. ❜ ❨62❩ ❛ There's the story, then there's the real story, then there's the story of how the story came to be told. Then there's what you leave out of the story. Which is part of the story too. ❜ ❨63❩ ❛ The best way of being kind to bears is not to be very close to them. ❜ ❨64❩ ❛ Life is warped. I'm just in sync. ❜ ❨65❩ ❛ Now it's a whisper from the past. ❜ ❨66❩ ❛ But hatred and viciousness are addictive. You can get high on them. Once you've had a little, you start shaking if you don't get more. ❜ ❨67❩ ❛ Why is it always such a surprise? The moon. Even though we know it's coming. Every time we see it, it makes us pause, and hush. ❜ ❨68❩ ❛ Perfection exacts a price, but it's the imperfect who pay it. ❜ ❨69❩ ❛ What is 'belief' but a willingness to suspend the negatives? ❜ ❨70❩ ❛ I have scars, inside me. ❜ ❨71❩ ❛ The dead are not entirely dead but are alive in a different way; a paler way admittedly, and somewhat darker. ❜ ❨72❩ ❛ However dark, a darkness with voices in it is better than a silent void. ❜ ❨73❩ ❛ Amazing how quickly the past becomes idyllic. ❜ ❨74❩ ❛ It is another way of saying tough luck. To people you aren’t going to help out. ❜ ❨75❩ ❛ I'm waiting, far off in the future. ❜ ❨76❩ ❛ The only sure camouflage is unpredictability. ❜ ❨77❩ ❛ There are so many of them, and each one of them is doing part of the killing, whether they know it or not. ❜ ❨78❩ ❛ First rule: limit bloodshed by making sure that none of your own gets spilled. ❜ ❨79❩ ❛ I long to swim in liquid moonlight. ❜ ❨80❩ ❛ That's right, I don’t like to be summoned on trivial matters. ❜ ❨81❩ ❛ The part that really made me happy was that you wanted me to be happy. ❜ ❨82❩ ❛ Cut that part out of us: the grinning, elemental malice. Begin us anew. ❜ ❨83❩ ❛ Where there are wars, there will be crows, the carrion-fanciers. And ravens too, the warbirds, the eyeball gourmands. And vultures, the holy birds of yore, old connoisseurs of rot. ❜ ❨84❩ ❛ At last. It's you. ❜ ❨85❩ ❛ No, you will not be cooked on a fire when you die. Because you are not a fish. ❜ ❨86❩ ❛ Take what the moment offers. Don’t close doors. Be thankful. ❜ ❨87❩ ❛ How many others have stood in this place? Left behind, with all gone, all swept away. ❜ ❨88❩ ❛ Is it disapproval or extreme lust? With some men it’s hard to tell the difference. ❜ ❨89❩ ❛ My hair was driving me crazy, but then … I died. ❜ ❨90❩ ❛ Seek and ye shall find, eventually. And you found. You’re right, I don’t dispute that. Sorry. ❜ ❨91❩ ❛ Everything digests, and is digested. ❜ ❨92❩ ❛ My head was once a filing cabinet. Now it’s a flurry of papers, floating on a draft. ❜ ❨93❩ ❛ You cannot keep bumping your head against reality and saying it is not there. ❜ ❨94❩ ❛ I have a feeling that inside you somewhere, there’s something nobody knows about. ❜ ❨95❩ ❛ And if I don’t want to die, I’ve got to start living. ❜ ❨96❩ ❛ The world is a beautiful place. Don’t forget that. And don’t miss it. ❜ ❨97❩ ❛ I was fighting for my life. So I must not want to die. ❜ ❨98❩ ❛ Something’s happening to me, through me, something dangerous and new. ❜ ❨99❩ ❛ It’s taken root, a poison tree; it’s grown, fanning out, vines winding round my gut, my lungs, my heart. ❜ ❨100❩ ❛ We’re interpreters. We’re translators. ❜ ❨101❩ ❛ You’ll notice I’m not asking what made you this way. ❜ ❨102❩ ❛ No family, happy or unhappy, is quite like any other. Tolstoy was chock-fullo’shit. Remember that. ❜ ❨103❩ ❛ We lived in monochrome those nights. ❜ ❨104❩ ❛ You live in a dream. You’re a sleepwalker, blind. How do you know what the world is like? ❜ ❨105❩ ❛ Do you know, if you rip off the fronts of houses, you’d find swine? ❜ ❨106❩ ❛ I stand here in the dark: cold, utterly alone, full of fear and something that feels like longing. ❜ ❨107❩ ❛ The definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results. ❜ ❨108❩ ❛ Not to warm the flesh, but solely to please the eye. ❜ ❨109❩ ❛ Selective emotional detachment. ❜ ❨110❩ ❛ Not for me, or at least not today. ❜ ❨111❩ ❛ Dead but not gone, watching life surge forward around me, powerless to intervene. ❜ ❨112❩ ❛ Do I sound like a hillbilly saying that? ❜ ❨113❩ ❛ Remember, you’ve got your secret weapon. ❜ ❨114❩ ❛ The dream drains away like water. The memory, really. I try to scoop it up in my palms, but it’s gone. ❜ ❨115❩ ❛ My shadow stretches along the carpet, as though trying to detach itself from me. ❜ ❨116❩ ❛ It curls away from me, like blood in water. ❜ ❨117❩ ❛ It’s been so long since I felt the rain. Or wind—the caress of wind. ❜ ❨118❩ ❛ But snow I never want to feel again. ❜ ❨119❩ ❛ Through adversity to the stars. ❜ ❨120❩ ❛ No hero. No sleuth. I am locked in. I am locked out. ❜ ❨121❩ ❛ Thinking hasn't gotten me anywhere so far. ❜ ❨122❩ ❛ The face you give the world tells the world how to treat you. ❜ ❨123❩ ❛ Sometimes I think illness sits inside every woman, waiting for the right moment to bloom. ❜ ❨124❩ ❛ Women get consumed. ❜ ❨125❩ ❛ Sometimes if you let people do things to you, you're really doing it to them. ❜ ❨126❩ ❛ A child weaned on poison considers harm a comfort. ❜ ❨127❩ ❛ Safer to be feared than loved. ❜ ❨128❩ ❛ I ached once, hard, like a period typed at the end of a sentence. ❜ ❨129❩ ❛ It's impossible to compete with the dead. I wish I could stop trying. ❜ ❨130❩ ❛ I always feel sad for the girl that I was. ❜ ❨131❩ ❛ Every time people said I was pretty, I thought of everything ugly swarming beneath my clothes. ❜ ❨132❩ ❛ How do you keep safe when your whole day is as wide and empty as the sky? Anything could happen. ❜ ❨133❩ ❛ See, there I am. I told you I lived. I told you I was. ❜ ❨134❩ ❛ Sometimes I think I won't ever feel safe until I can count my last days on one hand. ❜ ❨135❩ ❛ To refuse has so many more consequences than submitting. ❜ ❨136❩ ❛ I'm here. I don't usually feel that I am. ❜ ❨137❩ ❛ I'm tired of dying. ❜ ❨138❩ ❛ What if you hurt because it feels so good? ❜ ❨139❩ ❛ How confusing to live in the shadow of a shadow. ❜ ❨140❩ ❛ Do you ever feel like bad things are going to happen, and you can’t stop them? You can’t do anything, you just have to wait? ❜ ❨141❩ ❛ Sometimes my scars have a mind of their own. ❜ ❨142❩ ❛ Everyone has their own version of a memory. ❜ ❨143❩ ❛ Isn’t a smile a girl’s best weapon? ❜ ❨144❩ ❛ My sense of weightlessness, I think, comes from the fact that I know so little about my past. ❜ ❨145❩ ❛ Do what I want; I might like you. ❜ ❨146❩ ❛ I feel sorry for Persephone because even when she’s back with the living, people are afraid of her because of where’s she’s been. ❜ ❨147❩ ❛ She has never told me she loved me, and I never assumed she did. ❜ ❨148❩ ❛ The sight of it actually does something to you, makes you less human. ❜ ❨149❩ ❛ It infects you. It ruined me. ❜ ❨150❩ ❛ Your health is not a debt you just cancel. The body collects. ❜ ❨151❩ ❛ Men love to put things inside women, don’t they? ❜ ❨152❩ ❛ We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom. ❜ ❨153❩ ❛ Nothing is so necessary for a young man as the company of intelligent women. ❜ ❨154❩ ❛ The strongest of all warriors are these two — time and patience. ❜ ❨155❩ ❛ If everyone fought for their own convictions there would be no war. ❜ ❨156❩ ❛ There is no greatness where there is not simplicity, goodness, and truth. ❜ ❨157❩ ❛ The whole world is divided for me into two parts: one is she, and there is all happiness, hope, light; the other is where she is not, and there is dejection and darkness. ❜ ❨158❩ ❛ Let the dead bury the dead, but while I'm alive, I must live and be happy. ❜ ❨159❩ ❛ It's not given to people to judge what's right or wrong. People have eternally been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more than in what they consider right and wrong. ❜ ❨160❩ ❛ You can love a person dear to you with a human love, but an enemy can only be loved with divine love. ❜ ❨161❩ ❛ If we admit that human life can be ruled by reason, then all possibility of life is destroyed. ❜ ❨162❩ ❛ We are asleep until we fall in love! ❜ ❨163❩ ❛ I simply want to live; to cause no evil to anyone but myself. ❜ ❨164❩ ❛ Everything I know, I know because of love. ❜ ❨165❩ ❛ Man cannot possess anything as long as he fears death. But to him who does not fear it, everything belongs. ❜ ❨166❩ ❛ If there was no suffering, man would not know his limits, would not know himself. ❜ ❨167❩ ❛ Yes, love, but not the love that loves for something, to gain something, or because of something, but that love that I felt for the first time, when dying, I saw my enemy and yet loved him. ❜ ❨168❩ ❛ How can one be well...when one suffers morally? ❜ ❨169❩ ❛ Kings are the slaves of history. ❜ ❨170❩ ❛ God is the same everywhere. ❜ ❨171❩ ❛ Pure and complete sorrow is as impossible as pure and complete joy. ❜ ❨172❩ ❛ One must be cunning and wicked in this world. ❜ ❨173❩ ❛ We love people not so much for the good they've done us, as for the good we've done them. ❜ ❨174❩ ❛ When one's head is gone one doesn't weep over one's hair! ❜ ❨175❩ ❛ For what, for whom, must I kill and be killed? ❜ ❨176❩ ❛ He did what heroes do after their work is accomplished; he died. ❜ ❨177❩ ❛ Life is too long to say anything definitely; always say perhaps. ❜ ❨178❩ ❛ Everything ends in death, everything. Death is terrible. ❜ ❨179❩ ❛ The distant and impossible suddenly became near, possible, and inevitable. ❜ ❨180❩ ❛ How often we sin, how much we deceive, and all for what? ❜ ❨181❩ ❛ The wolves should be fed and the sheep kept safe. ❜ ❨182❩ ❛ When I was a child, adults would tell me not to make things up, warning me of what would happen if I did. ❜ ❨183❩ ❛ My memory is a patchwork of occurrences, of discontinuous events roughly sewn together: the parts I remember, I remember precisely, whilst other sections seem to have vanished completely. ❜ ❨184❩ ❛ Would it be worse to love someone who is no longer there, or not to love someone who is? ❜ ❨185❩ ❛ Like mirrors stories prepare us for the day to come. They distract us from the things in darkness. ❜ ❨186❩ ❛ It is not that I was credulous, simply that I believed in all things dark and dangerous. ❜ ❨187❩ ❛ Sometimes you do things you regret, but there's nothing you can do about them. Times change. Doors close behind you. You move on. ❜ ❨188❩ ❛ Love will be an impulse that will inspire and ruin in equal measure. ❜ ❨189❩ ❛ He died alone. It don't matter a rat's ass whether there was anyone with him or not. He died alone. ❜ ❨190❩ ❛ It was love, I knew, and it tasted like champagne in my mind. ❜ ❨191❩ ❛ The end of the world is a strange concept. The world is always ending, and the end is always being averted, by love or foolishness or just plain old dumb luck. ❜ ❨192❩ ❛ She was my dream; and if you touch a dream it vanishes, like a soap bubble. ❜ ❨193❩ ❛ Daylight is always safe. ❜ ❨194❩ ❛ If not for death, they'd be content to simply exist, but with death, well, their lives will have meaning. ❜ ❨195❩ ❛ You want to know the future, love? Then wait. ❜ ❨196❩ ❛ There are things in the darkness beneath us that wish us harm. ❜ ❨197❩ ❛ Fairy tales are more than true. Not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be defeated ❜ ❨198❩ ❛ But sometimes you leave blood on your instruments. ❜ ❨199❩ ❛ I'd like to be a wolf. Not all the time. Just sometimes. In the dark. I would run through the forests. ❜ ❨200❩ ❛ You've seen them. They have mouths that twitch, and eyes that stare, and they babble and they mewl and they whimper. ❜ ❨201❩ ❛ They are not mad, or rather, the loss of their sanity is the lesser of their problems. ❜ ❨202❩ ❛ Good a reason for writing as I know: releasing demons, letting them fly. ❜ ❨203❩ ❛ That miserable state in which everything seems flat and of equal importance; when nothing matters, and in which reality seems scraped thin and threadbare. ❜ ❨204❩ ❛ Someone had scrawled graffiti in black marker on the metal: JUST DIE, it said. Like it is easy. ❜ ❨205❩ ❛ Winter started today. The sky turned grey and the snow began to fall and it did not stop falling until well after dark. ❜ ❨206❩ ❛ Memory is the great deceiver. ❜ ❨207❩ ❛ Silly things do cease to be silly if they are done by sensible people in an impudent way. ❜ ❨208❩ ❛ I may have lost my heart, but not my self-control. ❜ ❨209❩ ❛ If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more. ❜ ❨210❩ ❛ I always deserve the best treatment because I never put up with any other. ❜ ❨211❩ ❛ But you know what I am. You hear nothing but truth from me. ❜ ❨212❩ ❛ I have blamed you, and lectured you, and you have borne it as no other would have borne it. ❜ ❨213❩ ❛ There are people, who the more you do for them, the less they will do for themselves. ❜ ❨214❩ ❛ One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other. ❜ ❨215❩ ❛ Better be without sense than misapply it as you do. ❜ ❨216❩ ❛ You must be the best judge of your own happiness. ❜ ❨217❩ ❛ Were I to fall in love, indeed, it would be a different thing ; but I have never been in love ; it is not my way, or my nature ; and I do not think I ever shall. ❜ ❨218❩ ❛ Indeed, I am very sorry to be right in this instance. I would much rather have been merry than wise. ❜ ❨219❩ ❛ If I have not spoken, it is because I am afraid I will awaken myself from this dream. ❜ ❨220❩ ❛ If a woman doubts as to whether she should accept a man or not, she certainly ought to refuse him. ❜ ❨221❩ ❛ Faultless in spite of all her faults. ❜ ❨222❩ ❛ A heroine whom no one but myself will much like. ❜ ❨223❩ ❛ There is no charm equal to tenderness of heart. ❜ ❨224❩ ❛ Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, and waste its fragrance on the desert air. ❜ ❨225❩ ❛ I pity you. I thought you cleverer. ❜ ❨226❩ ❛ Evil to some is always good to others. ❜ ❨227❩ ❛ I certainly will not persuade myself to feel more than I do. ❜ ❨228❩ ❛ She is loveliness itself. ❜ ❨229❩ ❛ Time does not compose me. ❜ ❨230❩ ❛ A man always imagines a woman to be ready for anybody who asks her. ❜ ❨231❩ ❛ I do not find myself making any use of the word sacrifice. ❜ ❨232❩ ❛ I am quite enough in love. I should be sorry to be any more. ❜ ❨233❩ ❛ I must tell you what you will not ask, though I may wish it unsaid the next moment. ❜ ❨234❩ ❛ I examined my own heart. And there you were. Never, I fear, to be removed. ❜ ❨235❩ ❛ With all your little faults, you are an excellent creature. ❜ ❨236❩ ❛ You have another long walk before you. ❜ ❨237❩ ❛ The child's laughter is pure until he first laughs at a clown. ❜ ❨238❩ ❛ What is marriage but prostitution to one man instead of many? ❜ ❨239❩ ❛ Out of the frying pan into the fire! ❜ ❨240❩ ❛ We must all make do with the rags of love we find flapping on the scarecrow of humanity. ❜ ❨241❩ ❛ She sleeps. And now she wakes each day a little less. ❜ ❨242❩ ❛ And, oh, God . . . how frequently I weep! ❜ ❨243❩ ❛ From the coffin of your madness there is no escape. ❜ ❨244❩ ❛ I am feeling supernatural tonight. I want to eat diamonds. ❜ ❨245❩ ❛ All the same there is a chance that if we keep on shaking our chains, one day, some day, the clasps upon the shackles will part. ❜ ❨246❩ ❛ It was sad music fit to make you cut your throat. ❜ ❨247❩ ❛ Nothing is more boring than being forced to play. ❜ ❨248❩ ❛ Amongst the monsters, I am well hidden; who looks for a leaf in a forest? ❜ ❨249❩ ❛ Wherein does a woman’s honour reside? In her vagina or in her spirit? ❜ ❨250❩ ❛ Perhaps...I could not be content with mere contentment! ❜ ❨251❩ ❛ Have you ever stared stark failure in the face? The trick is to outstare it. ❜ ❨252❩ ❛ Sometimes it seems that the faces exist of themselves, in a disembodied somewhere, waiting for the one who will wear them, who will bring them to life. ❜ ❨253❩ ❛ I have the febrile gaiety of a being without a past, without a present, yet I exist. ❜ ❨254❩ ❛ I felt myself turning, willy-nilly, from a woman into an idea. ❜ ❨255❩ ❛ She looks wonderful, but she doesn't look right. ❜ ❨256❩ ❛ The one-eyed man will be King in the country of the blind. ❜ ❨257❩ ❛ I raised you up to fly to the heavens, not to brood over a clutch of eggs! ❜ ❨258❩ ❛ I love to hear my bones rattle. That’s how I know I’m alive. ❜ ❨259❩ ❛ I learnt, first, as the birds do, from the birds. ❜ ❨260❩ ❛ Inside and outside match exactly, but both are badly wrong. ❜ ❨261❩ ❛ During the less-than-blink of time it took the last chime to die, there came a vertiginous sensation. ❜ ❨262❩ ❛ I fear a wound not of the body but the soul, an irreconcilable division between myself and the rest of humankind. ❜ ❨263❩ ❛ I fear the proof of my own singularity. ❜ ❨264❩ ❛ Still nothing could calm the fearful storm in my erupting skin. ❜ ❨265❩ ❛ Petersburg, loveliest of all hallucinations. ❜ ❨266❩ ❛ A breathless second between black forest and the frozen sea. ❜ ❨267❩ ❛ I'm beginning to feel totally cut off from the world. ❜ ❨268❩ ❛ What does this all mean? Where are we? ❜ ❨269❩ ❛ Sometimes I bleed. ❜ ❨270❩ ❛ If you see a ghost, you say "hello". ❜ ❨271❩ ❛ The war is not over. ❜ ❨272❩ ❛ You're not going. You left us once already. ❜ ❨273❩ ❛ You can’t go! ❜ ❨274❩ ❛ I loved you, but that wasn't enough, was it? ❜ ❨275❩ ❛ If you're dead, then leave me in peace. ❜ ❨276❩ ❛ The only thing that moves here is the light, but it changes everything. ❜ ❨277❩ ❛ I won't ask for forgiveness for something I didn't do! ❜ ❨278❩ ❛ Sometimes the world of the living gets mixed up with the world of the dead. ❜ ❨279❩ ❛ Death of a loved one can lead people to do the strangest things. ❜ ❨280❩ ❛ Sooner or later, they will find you. ❜ ❨281❩ ❛ They're everywhere - they say this house is theirs. ❜ ❨282❩ ❛ You're always teasing me, and telling lies. I'm sick of it. ❜ ❨283❩ ❛ Others will come. Sometimes we'll sense them. Other times, we won't. ❜ ❨284❩ ❛ No crying now. No crying. Stop that. Here. Look what an awful face you've got when you cry. ❜ ❨285❩ ❛ You listen to me. I've seen them too. ❜ ❨286❩ ❛ You'll see. There are going to be some big surprises. There are going to be... changes. ❜ ❨287❩ ❛ Why did you go and fight that stupid war that had nothing to do with us? Why didn't you stay like the others did? ❜ ❨288❩ ❛ Your place was here with your family. ❜ ❨289❩ ❛ So you say you know this house well? ❜ ❨290❩ ❛ I wasn't expecting you so soon. ❜ ❨291❩ ❛ What's the matter? Has the cat got your tongue? ❜ ❨292❩ ❛ You mean they just vanished? Into thin air? ❜ ❨293❩ ❛ No door must be opened without the previous one being closed first. ❜ ❨294❩ ❛ Here, most of the time, you can hardly see your way. ❜ ❨295❩ ❛ Whatever you do, don't open the curtains. ❜ ❨296❩ ❛ Now, come on. Eyes closed. ❜ ❨297❩ ❛ We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. We realise that we’re all going to die, without really finding out the big answers. ❜ ❨298❩ ❛ By definition, you have to live until you die. Better to make that life as complete and enjoyable an experience as possible, in case death is shite, which I suspect it will be. ❜ ❨299❩ ❛ I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin’ else. ❜ ❨300❩ ❛ And the reasons? There are no reasons. ❜ ❨301❩ ❛ Love does not exist, it's like religion, made to control you. ❜ ❨302❩ ❛ After all, we're not fucking stupid. At least, we're not that fucking stupid. ❜ ❨303❩ ❛ You fucking knew that fucking cunt would fuck some cunt. ❜ ❨304❩ ❛ Everything in the street today seems soft focus. ❜ ❨305❩ ❛ What does that make us? The lowest of the low. ❜ ❨306❩ ❛ Take your best orgasm, multiply the feeling by twenty, and you're still fuckin’ miles off the pace. ❜ ❨307❩ ❛ It’s as if everything is a copy of what you knew before, similar, yet somehow lacking in its usual qualities, a bit like the way things are in a dream. ❜ ❨308❩ ❛ It’s all okay, it’s all beautiful; but I fear that this internal sea is going to subside soon, leaving this poisonous shite washed up, stranded up in my body. ❜ ❨309❩ ❛ It cuts me up. It confuses me. ❜ ❨310❩ ❛ It's not funny laughter. This is lynch mob laughter. ❜ ❨311❩ ❛ Protect me from those who wish to help us. ❜ ❨312❩ ❛ They mean well, and they mean well to me, but there's no way under the sun that they can appreciate what I feel, what I need. ❜ ❨313❩ ❛ The pit of melancholy is a bottomless one, and I am descending fast. ❜ ❨314❩ ❛ Living like this is a full-time business. ❜ ❨315❩ ❛ I’ll stand or fall alone. ❜ ❨316❩ ❛ We are no wiser now than at the start. ❜ ❨317❩ ❛ This is pathetic, and fucking boring. ❜ ❨318❩ ❛ Death is usually a process, rather than an event. ❜ ❨319❩ ❛ We're ruled by effete arseholes. What does that make us? ❜ ❨320❩ ❛ We are all acquaintances now. ❜ ❨321❩ ❛ The problem is that this beautiful ocean carries with it loads of poisonous flotsam and jetsam. ❜ ❨322❩ ❛ Life is beautiful. I'm going to enjoy it, and I'm going to have a long life. ❜ ❨323❩ ❛ The grim reality of impending death can be talked away by trying to invest in the present reality of life. ❜ ❨324❩ ❛ There must be more to life than this. ❜ ❨325❩ ❛ We all see what we want to see. ❜ ❨326❩ ❛ Statistically speaking, you're more likely to be killed by a member of your own family or a close friend, than by anyone else. ❜ ❨327❩ ❛ What am I living for and what am I dying for are the same question. ❜ ❨328❩ ❛ Maybe that's what love is: it's being pissed off. ❜ ❨329❩ ❛ You can forget who you are if you're alone too much. ❜ ❨330❩ ❛ Any religion is a shadow of God. But the shadows of God are not God. ❜ ❨331❩ ❛ Human understanding is fallible, and we see through a glass, darkly. ❜ ❨332❩ ❛ We must be a beacon of hope, because if you tell people there's nothing they can do, they will do worse than nothing. ❜ ❨333❩ ❛ Everyone wants to feel like a princess, and princesses are selfish and overbearing. ❜ ❨334❩ ❛ We shouldn't have been so scornful; we should have had compassion. But compassion takes work, and we were young. ❜ ❨335❩ ❛ How easy it is, treachery. You just slide into it. ❜ ❨336❩ ❛ Amazing how the heart clutches at anything familiar, whimpering: Mine! Mine! ❜ ❨337❩ ❛ All creatures know that some must die ; that all the rest may take and eat. ❜ ❨338❩ ❛ Is this the image of a god? My tooth for yours, your eye for mine? ❜ ❨339❩ ❛ Without the light, no chance; without the dark, no dance. ❜ ❨340❩ ❛ Why are we designed to see the world as supremely beautiful just as we're about to be snuffed? Do rabbits feel the same as the fox teeth bite down on their necks? Is it mercy? ❜ ❨341❩ ❛ Love is useless, it leads you into dumb exchanges in which you give too much away, and then you get bitter and mean. ❜ ❨342❩ ❛ Maybe sadness is a kind of hunger. Maybe the two go together. ❜ ❨343❩ ❛ Now I can see how that can happen. You can fall in love with anybody -- a fool, a criminal, a nothing. There are no good rules. ❜ ❨344❩ ❛ If you really want to stay the same age you are now forever and ever, try jumping off the roof: death's a sure-fire method for stopping time. ❜ ❨345❩ ❛ You couldn’t leave words lying around where our enemies might find them. ❜ ❨346❩ ❛ I'm fine, for the moment. And the moment is the only time we can be fine in. ❜ ❨347❩ ❛ Because if you can't wish, why bother? ❜ ❨348❩ ❛ It's better to hope than mope! ❜ ❨349❩ ❛ Reality has too much darkness in it. Too many crows. ❜ ❨350❩ ❛ In any case, time is not a thing that passes, it’s a sea on which you float. ❜ ❨351❩ ❛ I know I’m deceiving myself, but I prefer to deceive myself. I desperately need to believe such pure joy is still possible. ❜ ❨352❩ ❛ Too much God and you overdose. God needs to be filtered. ❜ ❨353❩ ❛ Behind my eyelids I saw an animal. It was golden colour, with gentle green eyes and canine teeth, and curly wool instead of fur. It opened its mouth, but it did not speak. Instead, it yawned. ❜ ❨354❩ ❛ ‘Why can't I believe?’ I asked the darkness. ❜ ❨355❩ ❛ Everyone’s too sad for everything. ❜ ❨356❩ ❛ If you can’t stop the waves, go sailing. ❜ ❨357❩ ❛ I would like to be the air that inhabits you for a moment only. I would like to be that unnoticed and that necessary. ❜ ❨358❩ ❛ Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them. ❜ ❨359❩ ❛ In the end, we'll all become stories. ❜ ❨360❩ ❛ I am inadequate and stupid, without worth. I might as well be dead. ❜ ❨361❩ ❛ If you knew what was going to happen, if you knew everything that was going to happen next—if you knew in advance the consequences of your own actions—you'd be doomed. You'd be ruined as God. ❜ ❨362❩ ❛ If you can't go through an obstacle, go around it. ❜ ❨363❩ ❛ Stupidity is the same as evil if you judge by the results. ❜ ❨364❩ ❛ Time in dreams is frozen. You can never get away from where you've been. ❜ ❨365❩ ❛ Male fantasies, male fantasies, is everything run by male fantasies? ❜ ❨366❩ ❛ We still think of a powerful man as a born leader and a powerful woman as an anomaly. ❜ ❨367❩ ❛ If I love you, is that a fact or a weapon? ❜ ❨368❩ ❛ You fit into me like a hook into an eye. ❜ ❨369❩ ❛ Knowing too much about other people puts you in their power, they have a claim on you, you are forced to understand their reasons for doing things and then you are weakened. ❜ ❨370❩ ❛ Farewells can be shattering, but returns are surely worse. ❜ ❨371❩ ❛ Women have curious ways of hurting someone else. ❜ ❨372❩ ❛ This is the one song everyone would like to learn: the song that is irresistible: the song that forces men to leap overboard in squadrons. ❜ ❨373❩ ❛ Get rid of death. Make it be spring. ❜ ❨374❩ ❛ You are innocent as a bathtub full of bullets. ❜ ❨375❩ ❛ I am the space you desecrate as you pass through. ❜ ❨376❩ ❛ Favour me and give me riches, destroy my enemies. Save me from death. ❜ ❨377❩ ❛ She is a raw voice loose in the rooms beneath me. ❜ ❨378❩ ❛ Isn't the moon warm enough for you, why do you need the blanket of another body? ❜ ❨379❩ ❛ This is a torch song. Touch me and you'll burn. ❜ ❨380❩ ❛ If you look long enough eventually you will see me. ❜ ❨381❩ ❛ I would like to sleep with you, to enter your sleep as its smooth dark wave slides over my head. ❜ ❨382❩ ❛ I would like to give you the silver branch, the small white flower, the one word that will protect you from the grief. ❜ ❨383❩ ❛ But some people can't tell where it hurts. They can't calm down. They can't ever stop howling. ❜ ❨384❩ ❛ How else can we live, these days, except in the midst of ruin? ❜ ❨385❩ ❛ What am I living for and what am I dying for are the same question. ❜ ❨386❩ ❛ Gods always come in handy, they justify almost anything. ❜ ❨387❩ ❛ We loved with a love that was more than love. ❜ ❨388❩ ❛ Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ❜ ❨389❩ ❛ The boundaries which divide life from death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins? ❜ ❨390❩ ❛ There is no exquisite beauty without some strangeness in the proportion. ❜ ❨391❩ ❛ Never to suffer would never to have been blessed. ❜ ❨392❩ ❛ Believe only half of what you see and nothing that you hear. ❜ ❨393❩ ❛ And all I loved, I loved alone. ❜ ❨394❩ ❛ Years of love have been forgot, in the hatred of a minute. ❜ ❨395❩ ❛ The best things in life make you sweaty. ❜ ❨396❩ ❛ There are some secrets which do not permit themselves to be told. ❜ ❨397❩ ❛ Anything is better than this agony. ❜ ❨398❩ ❛ You fancy me mad. ❜ ❨399❩ ❛ I hear all things in the heaven and in the earth. ❜ ❨400❩ ❛ Who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery? ❜ ❨401❩ ❛ Leave my loneliness unbroken! ❜ ❨402❩ ❛ A more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrills every fibre of my frame. ❜ ❨403❩ ❛ The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. ❜ ❨404❩ ❛ Let my heart be still a moment. ❜ ❨405❩ ❛ You call it hope — It is but agony of desire. ❜ ❨406❩ ❛ Who has not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or silly action for no other reason than because he knows he should not? ❜ ❨407❩ ❛ To die laughing must be the most glorious of all glorious deaths! ❜ ❨408❩ ❛ The beating of a drum stimulates the soldier into courage. ❜ ❨409❩ ❛ Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive. ❜ ❨410❩ ❛ I have been happy, though in a dream. ❜ ❨411❩ ❛ Nevermore. ❜ ❨412❩ ❛ The truth is, I am heartily sick of this life. ❜ ❨413❩ ❛ I am convinced that every thing is going wrong. ❜ ❨414❩ ❛ The scariest monsters are the ones that lurk within our souls. ❜ ❨415❩ ❛ And if I died, at least I will have died for you! ❜ ❨416❩ ❛ It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but once conceived, it haunted me day and night. ❜ ❨417❩ ❛ Hurt and humiliation — But this, I can not take. ❜ ❨418❩ ❛ The walls in there have ears. ❜ ❨419❩ ❛ This is for your ears only. ❜ ❨420❩ ❛ What is it? You have me scared. ❜ ❨421❩ ❛ Whoever isn’t for us, is against us. ❜ ❨422❩ ❛ You are just a body; to be dumped, disposed of like a carcass, left out for the birds to feed on. ❜ ❨423❩ ❛ The dead will have to forgive me. ❜ ❨424❩ ❛ From now on and no matter how your mind may I change, I will not accept your help. ❜ ❨425❩ ❛ If death comes, so be it. There will be glory in it. ❜ ❨426❩ ❛ Live, then; and live with your choice. ❜ ❨427❩ ❛ I am doing what has to be done. ❜ ❨428❩ ❛ Nothing is going to stop the ones that love you from keeping on loving you. ❜ ❨429❩ ❛ Worst is the man who has all the good advice, and then because his nerve fails, fails to act in accordance with it, as a leader should. ❜ ❨430❩ ❛ Only a loony would walk himself into this. ❜ ❨431❩ ❛ Why do you need such fences and defences? ❜ ❨432❩ ❛ Enough. Do not anger me. ❜ ❨433❩ ❛ The gods, you think, will side with the likes of him? ❜ ❨434❩ ❛ Watch it. You are over stepping. ❜ ❨435❩ ❛ I warn you. You should keep a civil tongue. ❜ ❨436❩ ❛ There is no such thing as an oath the can not be broken. ❜ ❨437❩ ❛ Every now and then, the things you’d hardly let yourself imagine, actually happen. ❜ ❨438❩ ❛ And you stand over this? This is the truth? ❜ ❨439❩ ❛ The bigger the resistance, the bigger the collapse. ❜ ❨440❩ ❛ Iron that’s forged the hardest, snaps the quickest. ❜ ❨441❩ ❛ Even the wildest horses come to heel when they are reined & bitted right. ❜ ❨442❩ ❛ That’s how guilt affects some people. They break and everything comes out. ❜ ❨443❩ ❛ Will it be enough for you? To see me executed? ❜ ❨444❩ ❛ So you know something no one else knows? ❜ ❨445❩ ❛ They know it too. They are just too afraid to say it. ❜ ❨446❩ ❛ If you die, how will I keep on living? ❜ ❨447❩ ❛ There was a star riding through clouds one night, & I said to the star, 'Consume me'. ❜ ❨448❩ ❛ How much better to sit by myself like the solitary sea-bird that opens its wings on the stake. ❜ ❨449❩ ❛ Alone, I often fall down into nothingness. I have to bang my head against some hard door to call myself back to the body. ❜ ❨450❩ ❛ I am made and remade continually. Different people draw different words from me. ❜ ❨451❩ ❛ For this moment, this one moment, we are together. ❜ ❨452❩ ❛ Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder. ❜ ❨453❩ ❛ I am as neat as a cat in my habits. ❜ ❨454❩ ❛ Everything falls in a tremendous shower, dissolving me. ❜ ❨455❩ ❛ I am the foam that sweeps and fills the uttermost rims of the rocks with whiteness; I am also a girl, here in this room. ❜ ❨456❩ ❛ We are cut, we are fallen. We are become part of that unfeeling universe ❨457❩ that sleeps when we are at our quickest and burns red when we lie ❨458❩ asleep. ❜ ❨459❩ ❛ These moments of escape are not to be despised. They come too seldom. ❜ ❨460❩ ❛ Up here my eyes are green leaves, unseeing. ❜ ❨461❩ ❛ The moment is all; the moment is enough. ❜ ❨462❩ ❛ I do not want to be admired. I want to give, to be given. ❜ ❨463❩ ❛ I am not one and simple, but complex and many. ❜ ❨464❩ ❛ And if you are dead, I shall weep. ❜ ❨465❩ ❛ But beauty must be broken daily to remain beautiful. ❜ ❨466❩ ❛ But our hatred is almost indistinguishable from our love. ❜ ❨467❩ ❛ I desired always to stretch the night and fill it fuller and fuller with dreams. ❜ ❨468❩ ❛ Life is a dream surely. ❜ ❨469❩ ❛ I think sometimes I am not a woman, but the light that falls on this gate, on this ground. I am the seasons, I think sometimes, January, May, November; the mud, the mist, the dawn. ❜ ❨470❩ ❛ Oh, I am in love with life! ❜ ❨471❩ ❛ I have been knotted; I have been torn apart. ❜ ❨472❩ ❛ There was no freedom in life, and certainly there was none in death. ❜ ❨473❩ ❛ I do not know. I do not know myself sometimes, or how to measure and name and count out the grains that make me what I am. ❜ ❨474❩ ❛ I ride rough waters, and shall sink with no one to save me. ❜ ❨475❩ ❛ I am above the earth now. I am no longer upright, to be knocked against and damaged. ❜ ❨476❩ ❛ I see it all. I feel it all. ❜ ❨477❩ ❛ Death is woven in with the violets. Death and again death. ❜ ❨478❩ ❛ We have been walking for hours it seems. But where? I cannot remember. ❜ ❨479❩ ❛ If we were all on trial for our thoughts, we would all be hanged. ❜ ❨480❩ ❛ When you are in the middle of a story it isn't a story at all, but only a confusion; a dark roaring, a blindness, a wreckage of shattered glass. ❜ ❨481❩ ❛ Murderess is a strong word to have attached to you. It has a smell to it, that word; - musky and oppressive, like dead flowers in a vase. ❜ ❨482❩ ❛ Sometimes at night I whisper it over to myself: Murderess, murderess. It rustles, like a taffeta skirt across the floor. ❜ ❨483❩ ❛ If the world treats you well, you come to believe you are deserving of it. ❜ ❨484❩ ❛ If I am good enough and quiet enough, perhaps after all they will let me go. ❜ ❨485❩ ❛ It’s not easy being quiet and good, it’s like hanging on to the edge of a bridge when you’ve already fallen over; you don’t seem to be moving, just dangling there, and yet it is taking all your strength. ❜ ❨486❩ ❛ There is no fool like an educated fool. ❜ ❨487❩ ❛ There are many dangerous things that may take place in a bed. ❜ ❨488❩ ❛ I am afraid of falling into hopeless despair, over my wasted life, and I am still not sure how it happened. ❜ ❨489❩ ❛ Underneath it all is another feeling, a feeling of being wide-eyed awake and watchful. ❜ ❨490❩ ❛ And underneath all that is another feeling still, a feeling like being torn open; not like a body of flesh, it is not painful as such, but like a peach; and not even torn open, but ripe and splitting open of its own accord. ❜ ❨491❩ ❛ The small details of life often hide a great significance. ❜ ❨492❩ ❛ Guilt comes to you not from the things you've done, but from the things that others have done to you. ❜ ❨493❩ ❛ I wonder, how can I be all of these different things at once? ❜ ❨494❩ ❛ It is always a mistake to curse back openly at those who are stronger than you unless there is a fence between. ❜ ❨495❩ ❛ Some call this "Eve's curse," but I think that is stupid because the real curse of Eve was having to put up with the nonsense of Adam. ❜ ❨496❩ ❛ I don't know why they are all so eager to be remembered. What good will it do them? There are some things that should be forgotten by everyone, and never spoken of again. ❜ ❨497❩ ❛ I would never blame a human creature for feeling lonely. ❜ ❨498❩ ❛ If they want a monster so badly they ought to be provided by one. ❜ ❨499❩ ❛ It’s as if I never existed, because no trace of me remains, I have left no marks. And that way I cannot be followed. It is almost the same as being innocent. ❜ ❨500❩ ❛ Today you wear your habitual expression of strained anxiety; you smell of violets. ❜ ❨501❩ ❛ Of course you have always been an idealist, and filled with your optimistic dreams; but reality must at some time obtrude. ❜ ❨502❩ ❛ I wonder what would become of me, and comfort myself that in a hundred years I will be dead and at peace. ❜ ❨503❩ ❛ For it is not always the one that strikes the blow that is the actual murderer. ❜ ❨504❩ ❛ There is a “do this” or “do that” with God, but not any “because”. ❜ ❨505❩ ❛ If you have a need and they find it out, they will use it against you. The best way is to stop from wanting anything. ❜ ❨506❩ ❛ They say, why don’t you ever smile or laugh, we never see you smiling, and I say I suppose I have gotten out of the way of it, my face won’t bend in that direction any more. ❜ ❨507❩ ❛ I was shut up inside that doll of myself, and my true voice could not get out. ❜ ❨508❩ ❛ I see what you’re after. You are a collector. You think all you have to do is give me an apple, and then you can collect me. ❜ ❨509❩ ❛ If you want to be an asshole, it's a free country. Millions before you have made the same life choice. ❜ ❨510❩ ❛ Then there's the future. Sheer vertigo. ❜ ❨511❩ ❛ Nature is to zoos as God is to churches. ❜ ❨512❩ ❛ After everything that's happened, how can the world still be so beautiful? ❜ ❨513❩ ❛ There's something to be said for hunger: at least it lets you know you're still alive. ❜ ❨514❩ ❛ These things sneak up on me for no reason, these flashes of irrational happiness. It's probably a vitamin deficiency. ❜ ❨515❩ ❛ Toast cannot be explained by any rational means. Toast is me. I am toast. ❜ ❨516❩ ❛ You can’t buy it, but it has a price. Everything has a price. ❜ ❨517❩ ❛ As a species were doomed by hope, then? You could call it hope. That, or desperation. ❜ ❨518❩ ❛ I am not my childhood. ❜ ❨519❩ ❛ Human beings hope they can stick their souls into someone else and live on forever. ❜ ❨520❩ ❛ “I'll make you mine”, lovers said in old books. They never said, “I'll make you me.” ❜ ❨521❩ ❛ How much is too much, how far is too far? ❜ ❨522❩ ❛ Expectation isn't the same as desire. ❜ ❨523❩ ❛ Why not cut to the chase? ❜ ❨524❩ ❛ Maybe there aren't any solutions. Human society, corpses and rubble. ❜ ❨525❩ ❛ I thought you didn’t believe in God. ❜ ❨526❩ ❛ I need at least the illusion of being understood. ❜ ❨527❩ ❛ What change would have altered the course of events? In the big picture, nothing. In the small picture, so much. ❜ ❨528❩ ❛ You are only looking at the dirt under your feet. It's not good for you. ❜ ❨529❩ ❛ I like to keep only the bright side of myself turned towards you. ❜ ❨530❩ ❛ Grief in the face of inevitable death. The wish to stop time. The human condition. ❜ ❨531❩ ❛ So many crucial events take place behind people’s backs, when they aren’t in a position to watch: birth and death, for instance. ❜ ❨532❩ ❛ Would you kill someone you loved to spare them pain? ❜ ❨533❩ ❛ When the water’s moving faster than the boat, you can’t control a thing. ❜ ❨534❩ ❛ Don't be so fucking sentimental. ❜ ❨535❩ ❛ Wrong, as usual. ❜ ❨536❩ ❛ Why do you want to talk about ugly things? ❜ ❨537❩ ❛ I understand why serial killers send helpful clues to the police. ❜ ❨538❩ ❛ Take your time, leave mine alone. ❜ ❨539❩ ❛ You will hear thunder and remember me. ❜ ❨540❩ ❛ If you were music, I would listen to you ceaselessly. ❜ ❨541❩ ❛ I seem to myself an accidental guest in this dreadful body. ❜ ❨542❩ ❛ Call me a sinner, mock me maliciously. ❜ ❨543❩ ❛ I, from the very beginning, seemed to myself like someone's dream or delirium. Or a reflection in someone else's mirror. Without flesh, without meaning, without a name. ❜ ❨544❩ ❛ I knew the list of crimes that I was destined to commit. ❜ ❨545❩ ❛ The future ripens in the past, so the past rots in the future. ❜ ❨546❩ ❛ You are untranslatable into any one tongue. ❜ ❨547❩ ❛ I was hoping my silence would fit yours. ❜ ❨548❩ ❛ See, we were never about butterflies. All about us is unearthly and radiant. ❜ ❨549❩ ❛ You do not know just what you've been forgiven. ❜ ❨550❩ ❛ I need to slaughter my memory. ❜ ❨551❩ ❛ Forgive me that I appeared to you in waking dreams. ❜ ❨552❩ ❛ I will condemn, I will forget, I will give comfort to the enemy. ❜ ❨553❩ ❛ I know beginnings, I know endings too, and life-in-death. ❜ ❨554❩ ❛ Wild honey smells of freedom. But gold smells of nothing. ❜ ❨555❩ ❛ You are three times more beautiful than angels. ❜ ❨556❩ ❛ I will kill you without spilling your blood on the ground, not touching you with my hand, not giving you one glance. ❜ ❨557❩ ❛ You invented me. There is no such earthly being. ❜ ❨558❩ ❛ You’re late. Way too late. I’m glad to see you, nonetheless. ❜ ❨559❩ ❛ Forgive me that I felt forsaken. Forgive me that I kept mistaking too many others for you. ❜ ❨560❩ ❛ Real tenderness can’t be confused, it’s quiet and can’t be heard. ❜ ❨561❩ ❛ What else lived in that house besides us? ❜ ❨562❩ ❛ How unhappy we are together! ❜ ❨563❩ ❛ I defend not my voice, but my silence. ❜ ❨564❩ ❛ Without love, I'm more at ease, I'm sure. ❜ ❨565❩ ❛ I've got no more tears or explanations. ❜ ❨566❩ ❛ I’m not complaining. Happiness is not for me. ❜ ❨567❩ ❛ Are you not the only tie between good and evil, earthly pits and paradise? ❜ ❨568❩ ❛ In the morning we shall find out who has died in the night. ❜ ❨569❩ ❛ I was not a lovable child, and I've grown into a deeply unlovable adult. ❜ ❨570❩ ❛ The truly frightening flaw in humanity is our capacity for cruelty - we all have it. ❜ ❨571❩ ❛ I have a meanness inside me, real as an organ. Slit me at my belly and it might slide out, meaty and dark. ❜ ❨572❩ ❛ I am not angry or sad or happy to see you. I could not give a shit. You don't even ripple. ❜ ❨573❩ ❛ I was raised feral, and I mostly stayed that way. ❜ ❨574❩ ❛ I can feel a better version of me somewhere in there - hidden behind a liver or attached to a bit of spleen. But the meanness usually wins out. ❜ ❨575❩ ❛ I felt something loosen in me, that shouldn't have loosened. A stitch come undone. ❜ ❨576❩ ❛ Everyone who keeps a secret, itches to tell it. ❜ ❨577❩ ❛ Coffee goes great with sudden death. ❜ ❨578❩ ❛ I should just listen to my gut and then do the opposite. ❜ ❨579❩ ❛ “Smile, it can't be that bad!” Yeah, actually, it can, jackwad. ❜ ❨580❩ ❛ Everything bad in the world already did happen. ❜ ❨581❩ ❛ You’re going to find peace? Like knowing is somehow going to fix you? ❜ ❨582❩ ❛ Instead of asking yourself what happened, just accept that it happened. ❜ ❨583❩ ❛ Homesick for a place I've never been. ❜ ❨584❩ ❛ Worries find you easily enough without inviting them. ❜ ❨585❩ ❛ It is always consoling to think of suicide. It's what gets one through many a bad night. ❜ ❨586❩ ❛ Do you understand this is serious? ❜ ❨587❩ ❛ Sometimes it feels good to fuck with something. Instead of always being fucked with. ❜ ❨588❩ ❛ How could you kill something you cared enough to name? ❜ ❨589❩ ❛ Draw a picture of my soul, and it’d be a scribble with fangs. ❜ ❨590❩ ❛ We have the same chemicals in our blood: shame, anger, greed. Unjustified nostalgia. ❜ ❨591❩ ❛ I appreciate a straightforward apology the way a tone-deaf person enjoys a fine piece of music. ❜ ❨592❩ ❛ The phrase fuck you may not rest on the tip of my tongue, but it’s near. Midtongue. ❜ ❨593❩ ❛ Nothing to it but to do it. ❜ ❨594❩ ❛ There are a lot of people who deserve a lesson, deserve to really understand, that nothing comes easy, that most things are going to go sour. ❜ ❨595❩ ❛ If ifs and buts were candies and nuts we’d all have a very Merry Christmas. ❜ ❨596❩ ❛ Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. ❜ ❨597❩ ❛ What does it do to a girl who knows her mother is a murderer? ❜ ❨598❩ ❛ That mean old bitch across the street bit it. ❜ ❨599❩ ❛ Survival is a talent. ❜ ❨600❩ ❛ Crazy isn't being broken or swallowing a dark secret. It’s you or me amplified. If you ever told a lie and enjoyed it. If you ever wished you could be a child forever. ❜ ❨601❩ ❛ Who has the courage to burn themselves? ❜ ❨602❩ ❛ Is insanity just a matter of dropping the act? ❜ ❨603❩ ❛ Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you have the cash? Have you ever been blue? Or thought your train moving while sitting still? ❜ ❨604❩ ❛ You need to be well fed, clothed, and housed to have time for this much self-pity. ❜ ❨605❩ ❛ When I am supposed to be awake, I am asleep; when I am supposed to speak, I am silent. When a pleasure offers itself to me, I avoid it. ❜ ❨606❩ ❛ There is thought, and then there is thinking about thoughts, and they don't feel the same. ❜ ❨607❩ ❛ In a strange way we are free. We've reached the end of the line. We have nothing more to lose. ❜ ❨608❩ ❛ The world won’t stop because we aren’t in it anymore. ❜ ❨609❩ ❛ I can't answer the real question. All I can tell you is, it's easy. ❜ ❨610❩ ❛ I am lighter, airier than I’ve been in years. ❜ ❨611❩ ❛ I am not dead, yet something in me definitely is. ❜ ❨612❩ ❛ You meant that as an insult but I am taking it as a compliment. ❜ ❨613❩ ❛ What life can recover from that? ❜ ❨614❩ ❛ It's a fairly accurate portrait of me. It's accurate but it isn't profound. ❜ ❨615❩ ❛ Pull yourself together! There's nothing wrong with you. ❜ ❨616❩ ❛ It's quiet. It's like― I don't know. It's like falling off a cliff. ❜ ❨617❩ ❛ Once you start parsing a face, it's a peculiar item: squishy, pointy, with lots of air vents and wet spots. ❜ ❨618❩ ❛ I lost him. I did it on purpose. ❜ ❨619❩ ❛ It’s a mean world. There’s nobody to take care of you out there. ❜ ❨620❩ ❛ Reality is getting too dense. ❜ ❨621❩ ❛ I'm ambivalent. In fact that's my new favourite word. ❜ ❨622❩ ❛ I can't come up with reassuring answers to the terrible questions you raise. ❜ ❨623❩ ❛ A spring day, the sort that gives people hope: all soft winds and delicate smells of warm earth. Suicide weather. ❜ ❨624❩ ❛ Twenty-five chocolate chip cookies would be the perfect dinner. ❜ ❨625❩ ❛ A thought is a hard thing to control. ❜ ❨626❩ ❛ Life demands skills I don’t have. ❜ ❨627❩ ❛ Light like this does not exist, but we wish it did. We wish the sun could make us young and beautiful. Most of all, we wish that everyone we knew could be brightened simply by our looking at them. ❜ ❨628❩ ❛ It never stops, even at night, it’s my lullaby. ❜ ❨629❩ ❛ Love blurs your vision; but after it recedes, you can see more clearly than ever. ❜ ❨630❩ ❛ This is the kind of thing you see if you sit in the darkness with open eyes. ❜ ❨631❩ ❛ I have done something wrong, something so huge I can't even see it, something that's drowning me. ❜ ❨632❩ ❛ Whatever is happening to me is my own fault. ❜ ❨633❩ ❛ Hatred is easier. Hatred is clear, metallic, one-handed, unwavering; unlike love. ❜ ❨634❩ ❛ Potential has a shelf life. ❜ ❨635❩ ❛ Don’t move. Stay like that, let me have that. ❜ ❨636❩ ❛ I have come to the edge, of the land. I could get pushed over. ❜ ❨637❩ ❛ Never pray for justice, because you might get some. ❜ ❨638❩ ❛ It disturbs me to learn I have hurt someone unintentionally. I want all my hurts to be intentional. ❜ ❨639❩ ❛ We have been shark to one another, but also lifeboat. That counts for something. ❜ ❨640❩ ❛ This is what I miss, not something that’s gone, but something that will never happen. ❜ ❨641❩ ❛ I am not good. I know too much to be good. I know myself. I know myself to be vengeful, greedy, secretive and sly. ❜ ❨642❩ ❛ You are amazing. Amazing and agonising and almost lethal. ❜ ❨643❩ ❛ In my dreams of this city I am always lost. ❜ ❨644❩ ❛ I don't know where these feelings have come from, I don’t know what I've done. ❜ ❨645❩ ❛ I am not the centre of your story, you are. ❜ ❨646❩ ❛ I’m mad because you’re an asshole. ❜ ❨647❩ ❛ It's enormously pleasing to me, walking away. It's like being able to make people appear and vanish, at will. ❜ ❨648❩ ❛ There is never only one of anyone. ❜ ❨649❩ ❛ I can't do this without feeling I'm acting. ❜ ❨650❩ ❛ I am prepared for almost anything; except absence, except silence. ❜ ❨651❩ ❛ I’m losing my appetite for strangers. ❜ ❨652❩ ❛ You wear your cravings on the outside, like the suckers on a squid. You want it all. ❜ ❨653❩ ❛ Knowing too much about other people weakens you. You are forced to understand their reasons for doing things. ❜ ❨654❩ ❛ I have lost confidence: perhaps all I will ever be is what I am now. ❜ ❨655❩ ❛ Echoes of light, shining out of the midst of nothing. It's old light, and there's not much of it. But it's enough to see by. ❜ ❨656❩ ❛ Whoever cares the most will lose. ❜ ❨657❩ ❛ Young women need unfairness, it’s one of their few defences. ❜ ❨658❩ ❛ Time has gone on without you. ❜ ❨659❩ ❛ Don't let the bastards grind you down. ❜ ❨660❩ ❛ Who can remember pain, once it’s over? Pain marks you, but too deep to see. Out of sight, out of mind. ❜ ❨661❩ ❛ Better never means better for everyone. It always means worse, for some. ❜ ❨662❩ ❛ There is more than one kind of freedom. Freedom to and freedom from. ❜ ❨663❩ ❛ Remember that forgiveness too is a power. ❜ ❨664❩ ❛ I am not your justification for existence. ❜ ❨665❩ ❛ I want to be valued, in ways that I am not; I want to be more than valuable. ❜ ❨666❩ ❛ If it's a story I'm telling, then I have control over the ending. ❜ ❨667❩ ❛ All you have to do is keep your mouth shut and look stupid. It shouldn't be that hard. ❜ ❨668❩ ❛ Truly amazing, what people can get used to, as long as there are a few compensations. ❜ ❨669❩ ❛ I want everything back, the way it was. ❜ ❨670❩ ❛ You can't help what you feel, but you can help how you behave. ❜ ❨671❩ ❛ Nothing changes instantaneously: in a gradually heating bathtub you'd be boiled to death before you knew it. ❜ ❨672❩ ❛ To want is to have a weakness. ❜ ❨673❩ ❛ There isn't even an enemy you could put your finger on. ❜ ❨674❩ ❛ The past is a great darkness, filled with echoes. ❜ ❨675❩ ❛ Ordinary is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary. ❜ ❨676❩ ❛ I wish this story were different. I wish it were more civilised. I wish it showed me in a better light. ❜ ❨677❩ ❛ The night is mine, my own time, to do with it as I will, as long as I am quiet. As long as I don't move. As long as I lie still. ❜ ❨678❩ ❛ By telling you anything at all I'm at least believing in you. ❜ ❨679❩ ❛ Whatever is silenced will clamour to be heard. ❜ ❨680❩ ❛ Don't worry about forgiving me right now. There are more important things. ❜ ❨681❩ ❛ Keep the others safe. Don't let them suffer too much. If they have to die, let it be fast. ❜ ❨682❩ ❛ The body is so easily damaged, so easily disposed of, water and chemicals is all it is, hardly more to it than a jellyfish, drying on sand. ❜ ❨683❩ ❛ The world is full of weapons if you're looking for them. ❜ ❨684❩ ❛ Nobody's heart is perfect. ❜ ❨685❩ ❛ One false move and I'm dead. ❜ ❨686❩ ❛ Watch out. I've got my eye on you. ❜ ❨687❩ ❛ Fear is a powerful stimulant. ❜ ❨688❩ ❛ I couldn't afford to lose you. ❜ ❨689❩ ❛ Name one hero who was happy. ---- You can’t. ❜ ❨690❩ ❛ I feel like I could eat the world raw. ❜ ❨691❩ ❛ We are like gods at the dawning of the world. ❜ ❨692❩ ❛ I could recognise him by touch alone, by smell; I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world. ❜ ❨693❩ ❛ There are no bargains between lion and men. I will kill you and eat you raw. ❜ ❨694❩ ❛ You can use a spear as a walking stick, but that will not change its nature. ❜ ❨695❩ ❛ He is a weapon, a killer. Do not forget it. ❜ ❨696❩ ❛ Some men gain glory after they die, others fade. ❜ ❨697❩ ❛ I am made of memories. ❜ ❨698❩ ❛ Will you come with me? ❜ ❨699❩ ❛ I wish I had let you all die. ❜ ❨700❩ ❛ It is right to seek peace for the dead. You and I both know there is no peace for those who live after. ❜ ❨701❩ ❛ Bury us. Let us be free. ❜ ❨702❩ ❛ Go. He waits for you. ❜ ❨703❩ ❛ Nothing could eclipse the stain of this dirty, mortal mediocrity. ❜ ❨704❩ ❛ I know I have told you of this. ❜ ❨705❩ ❛ I don't know how you remember them all. I swear they look the same to me. ❜ ❨706❩ ❛ Perhaps you should get some new stories, so I don’t fucking kill myself of boredom. ❜ ❨707❩ ❛ I yearn for the darkness and silence of the underworld, where I can rest. ❜ ❨708❩ ❛ There is no honour in betraying your friends. ❜ ❨709❩ ❛ There is no answer. Whichever you choose, you are wrong. ❜ ❨710❩ ❛ Divine blood flows differently. ❜ ❨711❩ ❛ How is there glory in taking life? We die so easily. ❜ ❨712❩ ❛ This is what I will miss, I think. I will kill myself rather than miss it. ❜ ❨713❩ ❛ How long do we have? ❜ ❨714❩ ❛ Do you think we fight hopeless wars? ❜ ❨715❩ ❛ There is no law that gods must be fair. ❜ ❨716❩ ❛ I do not fear ridicule. I never have. ❜ ❨717❩ ❛ You were always better with words than I. ❜ ❨718❩ ❛ Who can be ashamed to lose to such beauty? ❜ ❨719❩ ❛ When you see beauty in desolation it changes something inside you. ❜ ❨720❩ ❛ That's how the madness of the world tries to colonise you: from the outside in, forcing you to live in its reality. ❜ ❨721❩ ❛ The shadows of the abyss are like the petals of a monstrous flower that shall blossom within the skull and expand the mind beyond what any man can bear. ❜ ❨722❩ ❛ Silence creates violence. ❜ ❨723❩ ❛ Some questions will ruin you if you are denied the answer long enough. ❜ ❨724❩ ❛ There are certain kinds of connections that are so deep that when broken you feel the snap of it inside you. ❜ ❨725❩ ❛ Nothing that ever lived and breathed was truly objective—even in a vacuum, even if all that possessed the brain was a self-immolating desire for the truth. ❜ ❨726❩ ❛ We all live in a kind of continuous dream. ❜ ❨727❩ ❛ You can either waste time worrying about a death that might not come or concentrate on what’s left to you. ❜ ❨728❩ ❛ What can you do when your five senses are not enough? ❜ ❨729❩ ❛ We will neither be what we had been nor what we would become once we reach our destination. ❜ ❨730❩ ❛ Perhaps my only real expertise, my only talent, is to endure beyond the endurable. ❜ ❨731❩ ❛ When you are too close to the centre of a mystery there is no way to pull back. ❜ ❨732❩ ❛ I long ago stopped believing in promises. Biological imperatives, yes. Environmental factors, yes. Promises, no. ❜ ❨733❩ ❛ I look not for shooting stars but for fixed ones, and I try to imagine what kind of life lives in those celestial tidal pools so far from us. ❜ ❨734❩ ❛ I hesitated for just a moment. Some part of me wanted to see the creature, I think. If so, it was a very small part. I ran. ❜ ❨735❩ ❛ I don’t require any of this to have a deeper meaning. ❜ ❨736❩ ❛ All of this speculation is incomplete, inexact, inaccurate, useless. ❜ ❨737❩ ❛ We don’t have real answers, because we still don’t know what questions to ask. Our instruments are useless, our methodology broken, our motivations selfish. ❜ ❨738❩ ❛ This part I will do alone. Don’t follow. ❜ ❨739❩ ❛ People my entire life have told me I am too much in control, but that has never been the case. I have never truly been in control. ❜ ❨740❩ ❛ Has there always been someone like me to bury the bodies, to have regrets, to carry on after everyone else was dead? ❜ ❨741❩ ❛ I loved them, but I didn’t need them, and I thought that was the way it was supposed to be. ❜ ❨742❩ ❛ Places can impress themselves upon me, and I can become part of them with ease. ❜ ❨743❩ ❛ There is no one with me. I am all by myself. ❜ ❨744❩ ❛ Pretending often leads to becoming a reasonable facsimile of what you mimic. ❜ ❨745❩ ❛ I think you're confusing suicide with self-destruction, and they're very different. Almost none of us commit suicide, whereas almost all of us self-destruct. ❜ ❨746❩ ❛ What did you eat? You had rations for only two weeks. You were there for nearly four months. ❜ ❨747❩ ❛ Something here is making giant waves in the gene pool. ❜ ❨748❩ ❛ I need to know what’s inside. ❜ ❨749❩ ❛ These aren't decisions. They're impulses ❜ ❨750❩ ❛ What do you think I do when you’re away? Do you think I’m out in the garden pinning, looking up at the sky? ❜ ❨751❩ ❛ If I know what’s happened I can save their life. ❜ ❨752❩ ❛ They either went crazy or something in here killed them. ❜ ❨753❩ ❛ Something is coming through the fence! ❜ ❨754❩ ❛ Nothing is written in the stars. Not these stars, nor any others. No one controls your destiny. ❜ ❨755❩ ❛ People who claim that they're evil are usually no worse than the rest of us. ❜ ❨756❩ ❛ Happy endings are still endings. ❜ ❨757❩ ❛ We believe in all sorts of things that aren't true; -- we call it history. ❜ ❨758❩ ❛ Does the devil ever struggle to be good again, or if so is he not a devil? ❜ ❨759❩ ❛ In the lives of children, pumpkins turn into coaches, mice and rats turn into men. When we grow up, we realise it is far more common for men to turn into rats. ❜ ❨760❩ ❛ Girls need cold anger. They need the cold simmer, the ceaseless grudge, the talent to avoid forgiveness, the side stepping of compromise. ❜ ❨761❩ ❛ Love makes hunters of us all. ❜ ❨762❩ ❛ There is much to hate in this world and way too much to love. ❜ ❨763❩ ❛ You confuse not speaking with not listening. ❜ ❨764❩ ❛ As long as people are going to call you a lunatic anyway, why not get the benefit of it? It liberates you from convention. ❜ ❨765❩ ❛ The eye is always caught by light, but shadows have more to say. ❜ ❨766❩ ❛ Not everyone is born a witch or a saint. Not everyone is born talented, or crooked, or blessed; some are born definite in no particular at all. ❜ ❨767❩ ❛ We are a fountain of shimmering contradictions, most of us. ❜ ❨768❩ ❛ The wickedness of men is that their power breeds stupidity and blindness. ❜ ❨769❩ ❛ I know you don't want to hear this but someone has to say it! You are out of control! ❜ ❨770❩ ❛ Even at the very worst - there is always choice. ❜ ❨771❩ ❛ Maybe the definition of home is the place where you are never forgiven. So you may always belong there, bound by guilt. And maybe the cost of belonging is worth it. ❜ ❨772❩ ❛ Cross a man and you struggle, one of you wins, you adjust and go on -- or you lie there dead. Cross a woman and the entire universe is changed. ❜ ❨773❩ ❛ That was such a wonderful time, even in its strangeness and sadness. Life isn't the same now. It's wonderful, but it isn't the same. ❜ ❨774❩ ❛ I don't care for approval, and I don't mind doing without. ❜ ❨775❩ ❛ It's where I live. A permanent state of bereavement. This is nothing new. ❜ ❨776❩ ❛ Always the bridesmaid, never the bride. Always the godfather, never the god. ❜ ❨777❩ ❛ The world unwraps itself to you, again and again as soon as you are ready to see it anew. ❜ ❨778❩ ❛ Evil is an act, not an appetite. Everyone has the appetite. If you give in to it, that act is evil. The appetite is normal. ❜ ❨779❩ ❛ How many haven't wanted to slash the throat of some boor across the dining room table? ❜ ❨780❩ ❛ Even God used silence as a strategy. ❜ ❨781❩ ❛ I learned failure early and mastered it. ❜ ❨782❩ ❛ It isn't whether you do it well or ill, it's that you do it all. ❜ ❨783❩ ❛ This is why you shouldn't fall in love, it blinds you. Love is a very wicked distraction. ❜ ❨784❩ ❛ Wisdom is not the understanding of mystery. Wisdom is accepting that mystery is beyond understanding. That's what makes it mystery. ❜ ❨785❩ ❛ Wrong takes an awful long time to be proven, in my experience. ❜ ❨786❩ ❛ Such brightness, as you know, decays brilliantly. ❜ ❨787❩ ❛ I take responsibility only for the future, not the past. The past can't hurt you the way the future can. ❜ ❨788❩ ❛ Tell me to mind my own business, tell me to go fuck myself, to piss off, go on, say it, but don’t tell me nothing’s wrong. ❜ ❨789❩ ❛ The truth isn't a thing of fact or reason. It is simply what everyone agrees on. ❜ ❨790❩ ❛ One can't make peace with another by force. ❜ ❨791❩ ❛ I am a forgettable leaf on a tree. ❜ ❨792❩ ❛ That's all I want; --- to do no harm. ❜ ❨793❩ ❛ I only believe in the opposite of luck, whatever that is. ❜ ❨794❩ ❛ Human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves. ❜ ❨795❩ ❛ You’re too young to know that the heart's memory eliminates the bad and magnifies the good, and thanks to that we manage to endure the burden of the past. ❜ ❨796❩ ❛ Love, no matter what else it might be, is a natural talent. You are either born knowing how, or you never know. ❜ ❨797❩ ❛ Whatever you do, you will be sorry all the rest of your life. ❜ ��798❩ ❛ There is no God worth worrying about. ❜ ❨799❩ ❛ The only regret I will have in dying is if it is not for love. ❜ ❨800❩ ❛ Wisdom comes to us when it can no longer do any good. ❜ ❨801❩ ❛ Think of love as a state of grace, not the means to anything, but the very end in itself. ❜ ❨802❩ ❛ Only God knows how much I love you. ❜ ❨803❩ ❛ There is no greater glory than to die for love. ❜ ❨804❩ ❛ Nothing resembles a person as much as the way he dies. ❜ ❨805❩ ❛ Take advantage of it now, while you are young, and suffer all you can, because these things don't last your whole life. ❜ ❨806❩ ❛ Today, when I saw you, I realised that what is between us is nothing more than an illusion. ❜ ❨807❩ ❛ I have waited for this opportunity for more than half a century. ❜ ❨808❩ ❛ I want to be myself again, to recover all that I was obliged to give up. ❜ ❨809❩ ❛ The only thing worse than bad health is a bad name. ❜ ❨810❩ ❛ This soup tastes like windows. ❜ ❨811❩ ❛ Why do you insist on talking about what does not exist? ❜ ❨812❩ ❛ One has to live a long time to know a man's true nature. ❜ ❨813❩ ❛ No, not rich, I am a poor man with money, which is not the same thing. ❜ ❨814❩ ❛ My heart has more rooms than a whorehouse. ❜ ❨815❩ ❛ That may be the reason he does so many things, so that he will not have to think. ❜ ❨816❩ ❛ Love if it exists, is something separate: another life. ❜ ❨817❩ ❛ Things did not go as badly for me as they would for you. ❜ ❨818❩ ❛ There are things you do only for love. ❜ ❨819❩ ❛ I’ll have plenty of time to rest when I die. ❜ ❨820❩ ❛ There is no innocence more dangerous than the innocence of age. ❜ ❨821❩ ❛ You treat me as if I were just anybody. ❜ ❨822❩ ❛ The symptoms of love are the same as those of cholera. ❜ ❨823❩ ❛ There is no law, human or divine, that you have not ignored. ❜ ❨824❩ ❛ Why is it that I feel I've known you so many years? ❜ ❨825❩ ❛ Stuff your eyes with wonder, live as if you'd drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It's more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories. ❜ ❨826❩ ❛ It doesn't matter what you do, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away. ❜ ❨827❩ ❛ We need to be really bothered once in a while. How long is it since you were really bothered? About something important, about something real? ❜ ❨828❩ ❛ There must be something, something we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing. ❜ ❨829❩ ❛ If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you'll never learn. ❜ ❨830❩ ❛ If you drown, at least die knowing you were heading for shore. ❜ ❨831❩ ❛ You can't make people listen. They have to come round in their own time, wondering what happened and why the world blew up around them. ❜ ❨832❩ ❛ It was a pleasure to burn. ❜ ❨833❩ ❛ I'm antisocial, they say. I don't mix. It's so strange. I'm very social indeed. It all depends on what you mean by social, doesn't it? ❜ ❨834❩ ❛ Being with people is nice. But I don't think it's social to get a bunch of people together and then not let them talk, do you? ❜ ❨835❩ ❛ Do you notice how people hurt each other nowadays? ❜ ❨836❩ ❛ Who knows who might be the target of the well-read man? ❜ ❨837❩ ❛ I don't talk things. I talk the meaning of things. ❜ ❨838❩ ❛ I'll hold on to the world tight some day. I've got one finger on it now; that's a beginning. ❜ ❨839❩ ❛ I just want someone to hear what I have to say. And maybe if I talk long enough it'll make sense. ❜ ❨840❩ ❛ That's the good part of dying; when you've nothing to lose, you run any risk you want. ❜ ❨841❩ ❛ Someday we'll build the biggest goddamn steamshovel in history and dig the biggest grave of all time and shove war in it and cover it up. ❜ ❨842❩ ❛ You're not like the others. I've seen a few; I know. When I talk, you look at me. ❜ ❨843❩ ❛ You're afraid of making mistakes. Don't be. Mistakes can be profited by. ❜ ❨844❩ ❛ When they give you lined paper, write the other way. ❜ ❨845❩ ❛ The sun burnt every day. It burnt time. ❜ ❨846❩ ❛ We have everything we need to be happy but we aren't happy. Something is missing. ❜ ❨847❩ ❛ I feel I'm doing what I should've done a lifetime ago. ❜ ❨848❩ ❛ I'm not afraid. Maybe it's because I'm doing the right thing at last. Maybe it's because I've done a rash thing and don't want to look the coward to you. ❜ ❨849❩ ❛ Good God, who were those men? I never saw them before in my life! ❜ ❨850❩ ❛ How do you get so empty? Who takes it out of you? ❜ ❨851❩ ❛ It must be right. It seems so right. ❜ ❨852❩ ❛ To everything there is a season. Yes. A time to break down, and a time to build up. A time to keep silence and a time to speak. ❜ ❨853❩ ❛ It's my game. And no one can help me. Not even you. ❜ ❨854❩ ❛ What makes earth feel like hell is our expectation that it should feel like heaven. Earth is earth. Dead is dead. You’ll find out for yourself soon enough. ❜ ❨855❩ ❛ Death is a long process. Your body is just the first part of you that croaks. Beyond that, your dreams have to die. Then your expectations. Your anger and memories must die. Your ego. Your pride and shame and ambition and hope. ❜ ❨856❩ ❛ Help me give up my addiction to hope. ❜ ❨857❩ ❛ Life is short, death is forever. ❜ ❨858❩ ❛ Hope is something really tough and tenacious you have to give up. It’s an addiction to break. ❜ ❨859❩ ❛ If the living are haunted by the dead, then the dead are haunted by their own mistakes. ❜ ❨860❩ ❛ We all wish to be pursued. We all long to be desired. ❜ ❨861❩ ❛ All the demons of hell formerly reigned as gods in previous cultures. No it's not fair, but one man's god is another man's devil. ❜ ❨862❩ ❛ I can become someone else, not out of pressure and desperation, but merely because a new life sounds fun or interesting or joyful. ❜ ❨863❩ ❛ It's my petty fear of personal rejection that allows so many true evils to exist. My cowardice enables atrocities. ❜ ❨864❩ ❛ You fucked up. Game over. So just relax. ❜ ❨865❩ ❛ The greatest weapon any warrior can carry into battle is absolute certainty of her eternal soul. ❜ ❨866❩ ❛ If killing you will end my existence as well, be it. Small loss. Such a life, as your puppet, is not worth living. ❜ ❨867❩ ❛ I might be a touch of a sadist and a little bit jejune but at least I'm not a victim, not any longer. I hope. ❜ ❨868❩ ❛ Dying seems like the greatest weakness, and in a world where people say you're lazy for not shaving your legs, then being dead seems like the ultimate character flaw. ❜ ❨869❩ ❛ Any concept of right versus wrong, is merely a cultural construct relative to one specific time and place. ❜ ❨870❩ ❛ To prove that I exist I must kill you. ❜ ❨871❩ ❛ I'd say that my life has been a way-too-long case history of chasing rainbows. ❜ ❨872❩ ❛ The world is a battle for attention, a war to be heard. ❜ ❨873❩ ❛ Every garden looks beautiful in May. ❜ ❨874❩ ❛ When we neglect to fear such brittle monstrosity, we render it powerless. ❜ ❨875❩ ❛ My taste for power continues to grow, as does my ability to accrue it. ❜ ❨876❩ ❛ Such language! Why don't you just take a dump in my ears? ❜ ❨877❩ ❛ You’d be foolish to count on people displaying high standards of honesty. ❜ ❨878❩ ❛ Depending on her mood, she can be more frightening than any demon or devil you might ever run across. ❜ ❨879❩ ❛ Cross your fingers! Maybe death won't happen to you. ❜ ❨880❩ ❛ Do not die while wearing cheap shoes. ❜ ❨881❩ ❛ Old habits die hard. ❜ ❨882❩ ❛ It's our attachments to a fixed identity that torture us. ❜ ❨883❩ ❛ What do I think I am? In a thousand words; I don't have a clue. ❨884❩ ❛ If I am to be saved it is because your love redeems me. ❜ ❨885❩ ❛ All I wanted was to be loved for myself. ❜ ❨886❩ ❛ I have tasted all the happiness the world can offer. ❜ ❨887❩ ❛ Shall we pity him? Shall we curse him? ❜ ❨888❩ ❛ You have a heart that can hold the entire empire of the world. ❜ ❨889❩ ❛ Look, I am not laughing now, crying, crying for you. ❜ ❨890❩ ❛ Tonight I gave you my soul, and I am dead. ❜ ❨891❩ ❛ You are afraid of me! And yet I am not really wicked. Love me and you shall see! ❜ ❨892❩ ❛ Are people so unhappy when they love? --- Yes, when they love and are not sure of being loved. ❜ ❨893❩ ❛ Your soul is a beautiful thing. No emperor received so fair a gift. The angels wept tonight. ❜ ❨894❩ ❛ Blood!...Blood!... That's a good thing! ❜ ❨895❩ ❛ Now I want to live like everybody else. I want to have a life like everybody else. ❜ ❨896❩ ❛ You will be the happiest of women. And we will sing, all by ourselves, till we swoon away with delight. ❜ ❨897❩ ❛ I should be as gentle as a lamb; and you could do anything with me that you pleased. ❜ ❨898❩ ❛ I am going to die of love, I am dying of love. That's how it is. I loved you so. I still love you so. ❜ ❨899❩ ❛ I am dying of love for her, I tell you! If only you knew how beautiful she was when she let me kiss her. ❜ ❨900❩ ❛ He fills me with horror but I do not hate him. How can I hate him? ❜ ❨901❩ ❛ Holy angel, in Heaven blessed, my spirit longs with thee to rest. ❜ ❨902❩ ❛ Nothing is colder or more dead than my heart. ❜ ❨903❩ ❛ I had loved an angel and now I despise a woman. ❜ ❨904❩ ❛ Our lives are one masked ball. ❜ ❨905❩ ❛ Why do you condemn a man whom you have never met, whom no one knows and about whom even you yourself know nothing? ❜ ❨906❩ ❛ He would commit murder for me. ❜ ❨907❩ ❛ If I don't save her from the hands of that humbug, she is lost. But I shall save her. ❜ ❨908❩ ❛ We will go from here together or die together. ❜ ❨909❩ ❛ Your fear, your terror, all of that is just love and love of the most exquisite kind, the kind which people do not admit even to themselves. The kind that gives you a thrill, when you think of it. ❜ ❨910❩ ❛ Destiny has chained you to me forever. ❜ ❨911❩ ❛ You must never ask me that. ❜ ❨912❩ ❛ Are you afraid that you will change your mind? ❜ ❨913❩ ❛ You must come and fetch me in my dressing room at midnight exactly. ❜ ❨914❩ ❛ The holes in your life are permanent. You have to grow around them, like tree roots around concrete; you mould yourself through the gaps. ❜ ❨915❩ ❛ I have never understood how people can blithely disregard the damage they do by following their hearts. ❜ ❨916❩ ❛ There’s something comforting about the sight of strangers safe at home. ❜ ❨917❩ ❛ I have lost control over everything, even the places in my head. ❜ ❨918❩ ❛ It’s possible to miss what you’ve never had, to even mourn for it. ❜ ❨919❩ ❛ There’s nothing so painful, so corrosive, as suspicion. ❜ ❨920❩ ❛ When did you become so weak? ❜ ❨921❩ ❛ I don’t know where that strength went, I don’t remember losing it. I think that over time it got chipped away, bit by bit, by life, by the living of it. ❜ ❨922❩ ❛ Let’s be honest: women are still only really valued for two things—their looks and their role as mothers. ❜ ❨923❩ ❛ Sadness gets boring after a while, for the sad person and for everyone around them. ❜ ❨924❩ ❛ I’m playing at real life instead of actually living it. ❜ ❨925❩ ❛ I’ve just got to let myself feel the pain, because if I don’t, if I keep numbing it, it’ll never really go away. ❜ ❨926❩ ❛ I am not the girl I used to be. I am no longer desirable, I’m off-putting in some way. It’s as if people can see the damage written all over me, can see it in my face, the way I hold myself, the way I move. ❜ ❨927❩ ❛ Who was it that said following your heart is a good thing? It is pure egotism, a selfishness to conquer all. ❜ ❨928❩ ❛ It’s impossible to resist the kindness of strangers. ❜ ❨929❩ ❛ Sometimes I catch myself trying to remember the last time I had meaningful physical contact with another person, just a hug or a heartfelt squeeze of my hand, and my heart twitches. ❜ ❨930❩ ❛ I have to find a way of making myself happy, I have to stop looking for happiness elsewhere. ❜ ❨931❩ ❛ How did I find myself here? I wonder where it started, my decline; I wonder at what point I could have halted it. Where did I take the wrong turn? ❜ ❨932❩ ❛ Now look -- Now look what you made me do. ❜ ❨933❩ ❛ It’s okay, whatever you did, whatever you’ve done: you suffered, you hurt, you deserve forgiveness. ❜ ❨934❩ ❛ They’re what I lost, they’re everything I want to be. ❜ ❨935❩ ❛ You broke me and I broke us. ❜ ❨936❩ ❛ I’ve been the fool. If he does it with you, he’ll do it to you. ❜ ❨937❩ ❛ I’d never realised, not until now, how shameful it is to be pitied. ❜ ❨938❩ ❛ Sometimes, I don’t want to go anywhere, I think I’ll be happy if I never have to set foot outside the house again. ❜ ❨939❩ ❛ I don’t believe in soul mates, but there’s an understanding between us that I just haven’t felt before, or at least, not for a long time. ❜ ❨940❩ ❛ There can be no greater agony, nothing can be more painful than the not knowing, which will never end. ❜ ❨941❩ ❛ Being the other woman is a huge turn-on, there’s no point in denying it: you’re the one he can’t help but betray his wife for, even though he loves her. That’s just how irresistible you are. ❜ ❨942❩ ❛ I feel a rush of gratitude so strong, it feels almost like love. ❜ ❨943❩ ❛ You don’t know how determined I can be. Once I’ve made my mind up, I’m a force to be reckoned with. ❜ ❨944❩ ❛ The more I want to be oblivious, the less I can be. Life and light will not let me be. ❜ ❨945❩ ❛ You don’t have to be afraid of being alone. It’s not the worst thing, is it? ❜ ❨946❩ ❛ I have felt this way before. On a larger scale, to a more intense degree, of course, but I remember the quality of the pain. You don’t forget it. ❜ ❨947❩ ❛ If he thinks I’m going to sit around crying, he’s got another thing coming. ❜ ❨948❩ ❛ I don’t like to lose. It’s not like me. None of this is like me. I don’t get rejected. I’m the one who walks away. ❜ ❨949❩ ❛ I don’t remember anger, raging fury. I remember fear. ❜ ❨950❩ ❛ I can’t sleep. I haven’t slept in days. I hate it, hate insomnia more than anything, just lying there, brain going round, tick, tick, tick, tick. ❜ ❨951❩ ❛ Maybe the courage I need has nothing to do with telling the truth and everything to do with walking away. ❜ ❨952❩ ❛ I’m not beautiful, and I can’t have kids, so what does that make me? Worthless. ❜ ❨953❩ ❛ Failure cloaked me like a mantle, it overwhelmed me, dragged me under and I gave up hope. ❜ ❨954❩ ❛ It’s an odd thing to say, but I think this all the time; I don’t feel bad enough. ❜ ❨955❩ ❛ Some battles aren’t worth fighting. ❜ ❨956❩ ❛ I never felt guilty. I pretended I did. I had to. ❜ ❨957❩ ❛ I never meant for any of this to happen, we fell in love, what could we do? ❜ ❨958❩ ❛ What bothers me most is that I haven’t got to the end of my story, and I can’t start over with someone else, it’s too hard. ❜ ❨959❩ ❛ A person is, among all else, a material thing, easily torn and not easily mended. ❜ ❨960❩ ❛ It isn’t only wickedness and scheming that make people unhappy, it is confusion and misunderstanding. ❜ ❨961❩ ❛ Falling in love can be achieved in a single word—a glance. ❜ ❨962❩ ❛ Though you think the world is at your feet, it can rise up and tread on you. ❜ ❨963❩ ❛ I’ve never had a moment’s doubt. I love you. I believe in you completely. You are my dearest one. My reason for life. ❜ ❨964❩ ❛ It might hurt, it is horribly inconvenient, no good might come of it, but it is what it is to be in love. ❜ ❨965❩ ❛ It was always an impossible task, and that was precisely the point. ❜ ❨966❩ ❛ Come back, come back to me. ❜ ❨967❩ ❛ In my thoughts I make love to you all day long. ❜ ❨968❩ ❛ The truth is I feel rather light headed and foolish in your presence and I don’t think I can blame the heat. ❜ ❨969❩ ❛ Beauty occupies a narrow band. Ugliness, on the other hand, has infinite variation. ❜ ❨970❩ ❛ Is there any meaning in my life that the inevitable death awaiting me does not destroy? ❜ ❨971❩ ❛ However, withered, I still feel myself to be exactly the same person I’ve always been. ❜ ❨972❩ ❛ Hate is a feeling as pure as love, but dispassionate and icily rational. ❜ ❨973❩ ❛ I’m going mad. Let me not be mad. ❜ ❨974❩ ❛ Is everyone really as alive as I am? ❜ ❨975❩ ❛ Every now and then, quite unintentionally, someone teaches you something about yourself. ❜ ❨976❩ ❛ Something has happened, hasn’t it? ❜ ❨977❩ ❛ I like to think that it isn’t weakness or evasion, but a final act of kindness. ❜ ❨978❩ ❛ Is it possible that I am, in the modern term, in denial? ❜ ❨979❩ ❛ How could anyone presume to know the world through the eyes of an insect? ❜ ❨980❩ ❛ Not everything has a cause. Some things are simply so. ❜ ❨981❩ ❛ I’ll be quite honest with you. I’m torn between breaking your neck here and throwing you down the stairs. ❜ ❨982❩ ❛ How old do you have to be before you know the difference between right and wrong? ❜ ❨983❩ ❛ It was never meant to be read. ❜ ❨984❩ ❛ If I fell in the river, would you save me? ❜ ❨985❩ ❛ That was an incredibly bloody stupid thing to do. ❜ ❨986❩ ❛ I want to thank you for saving my life. I’ll be eternally grateful to you. ❜ ❨987❩ ❛ I’m very, very sorry for the terrible distress that I have caused. I’m very, very sorry. ❜ ❨988❩ ❛ Don’t call me that! – Please don’t call me that. ❜ ❨989❩ ❛ It may be the wrong decision, but fuck it, it’s mine. ❜ ❨990❩ ❛ Like patience, passion comes from the same Latin root: pati. It does not mean to flow with exuberance. It means to suffer. ❜ ❨991❩ ❛ No one ever really gets used to nightmares. ❜ ❨992❩ ❛ I still get nightmares. In fact, I get them so often I should be used to them by now. I’m not. ❜ ❨993❩ ❛ Sublime is something you choke on after a shot of tequila. ❜ ❨994❩ ❛ Some people reflect light, some deflect it, you by some miracle, seem to collect it. ❜ ❨995❩ ❛ Beautiful women are always drawn to men they think will keep them beautiful. ❜ ❨996❩ ❛ The ruminations are mine, let the world be yours. ❜ ❨997❩ ❛ You will fulfil a promise I made years ago but failed to keep. ❜ ❨998❩ ❛ Darkness never satisfies. Especially if it takes something away which it almost always invariably does. ❜ ❨999❩ ❛ I want something else. I’m not even sure what to call it anymore. ❜ ❨1000❩ ❛ What can I say, I’m a sucker for abandoned stuff, misplaced stuff, forgotten stuff, any old stuff. ❜ ❨1001❩ ❛ Is it possible to love something so much, you imagine it wants to destroy you only because it has denied you? ❜ ❨1002❩ ❛ It’s just silent, no sound at all. It’s like something’s waiting. ❜ ❨1003❩ ❛ I guess I’m hoping the weapons will make me feel better, grant me some kind of fucking control. ❜ ❨1004❩ ❛ Oh and something else: – Fuck you. ❜ ❨1005❩ ❛ God I’ve never been afraid like this. ❜ ❨1006❩ ❛ I miss you. I love you. There’s no second I’ve lived that you can’t call your own. ❜ ❨1007❩ ❛ I’m so tired. Sleep’s been stalking me for too long to remember. Inevitable I suppose. ❜ ❨1008❩ ❛ Not seeing the rip doesn’t mean you automatically get to keep clear of the Hey-I’m-Bleeding part. ❜ ❨1009❩ ❛ These days fantasies flourish and die like summer flies. ❜ ❨1010❩ ❛ Yeah I know, I know. This shit’s getting ridiculous. ❜ ❨1011❩ ❛ ‘Fuck’ and 'fall for’ have very different meanings. The first one you do as much as you can. The second one you never ever, ever do. ❜ ❨1012❩ ❛ It’s a nice idea but it reeks of hope. False hope. ❜ ❨1013❩ ❛ It’s, well…one thing in two words: fucked up…very fucked up. Okay three words, four words, who the hell cares…very very fucked up. ❜ ❨1014❩ ❛ Do you think I could spend the night at your place? ❜ ❨1015❩ ❛ Any fool can pray. ❜ ❨1016❩ ❛ I feel like I haven’t slept in months. My neighbours are scared of me. ❜ ❨1017❩ ❛ I’ve lost my mind? Maybe, maybe, maybe. Maybe I’m just really drunk. ❜ ❨1018❩ ❛ Perhaps by cleaning out my system I’ll come to a clearing where I can ease myself into peace. ❜ ❨1019❩ ❛ I should be dead. Why am I still here? ❜ ❨1020❩ ❛ Fuck if I know. Your guess is as good as mine. ❜ ❨1021❩ ❛ You are my flesh. You are my bones. I know you too well. I read you too perfectly. ❜ ❨1022❩ ❛ Not all complex problems have easy solutions. ❜ ❨1023❩ ❛ Do you believe in God? I don’t think I ever asked you that one. ❜ ❨1024❩ ❛ We all create stories to protect ourselves. ❜ ❨1025❩ ❛ Are you kidding me? This place is scary. ❜ ❨1026❩ ❛ These days the only thing that gets me outside is when I say: Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck you. Fuck me. Fuck this. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. ❜ ❨1027❩ ❛ You like that crap because it reminds you of you. ❜ ❨1028❩ ❛ You may suddenly realise things are not how you perceived them to be at all. ❜ ❨1029❩ ❛ The two hardest tests are the patience to wait for the right moment and the courage not to be disappointed with what we encounter. ❜ ❨1030❩ ❛ People never learn anything by being told, they have to find out for themselves. ❜ ❨1031❩ ❛ Be crazy! But learn how to be crazy without being the center of attention. Be brave enough to live different. ❜ ❨1032❩ ❛ You are someone who is different, but who wants to be the same as everyone else. And that in my view is a serious illness. ❜ ❨1033❩ ❛ God chose you to be different. ❜ ❨1034❩ ❛ Why are you disappointing God with this kind of attitude? ❜ ❨1035❩ ❛ You have two choices, to control your mind or to let your mind control you. ❜ ❨1036❩ ❛ Everyone is indeed crazy, but the craziest are the ones who don't know they're crazy; they just keep repeating what others tell them to. ❜ ❨1037❩ ❛ Haven't you learned anything, not even with the approach of death? ❜ ❨1038❩ ❛ If people don't like it, they can complain. And if they don't have the courage to complain, that's their problem. ❜ ❨1039❩ ❛ Nothing in this world happens by chance. ❜ ❨1040❩ ❛ I want to continue living my life the way I dream it, and not the way the other people want it to be. ❜ ❨1041❩ ❛ Be like the fountain that overflows, not like the cistern that merely contains. ❜ ❨1042❩ ❛ Collective madness is called sanity. ❜ ❨1043❩ ❛ Consider each day a miracle - which indeed it is, when you consider the number of unexpected things that could happen in each second of our fragile existences. ❜ ❨1044❩ ❛ You say they create their own reality, but what is reality? ❜ ❨1045❩ ❛ Many people don't allow themselves to love because there are a lot of things at risk. A lot of future and a lot of past. ❜ ❨1046❩ ❛ Death frees from the fear of dying. ❜ ❨1047❩ ❛ The danger of an adventure is worth a thousand days of ease and comfort. ❜ ❨1048❩ ❛ The happier people can be, the unhappier they are. ❜ ❨1049❩ ❛ Life is always a matter of waiting for the right moment to act. ❜ ❨1050❩ ❛ It's best to accept life as it really is and not as you imagined it to be. ❜ ❨1051❩ ❛ You don't seem mad at all. ❜ ❨1052❩ ❛ We’re allowed to make a lot of mistakes in our lives, except the mistake that destroys us. ❜ ❨1053❩ ❛ You’re what you are, not what others make of you. ❜ ❨1054❩ ❛ Am I cured? ❜ ❨1055❩ ❛ Real love changes and grows with time and discovers new ways of expressing itself. ❜ ❨1056❩ ❛ A lot of people think something is right, and so that thing becomes right. Is that it? ❜ ❨1057❩ ❛ They think they're normal, because they all do the same thing. ❜ ❨1058❩ ❛ I didn't know that other ‘me’s existed inside me, ‘Me’s that I could love. ❜ ❨1059❩ ❛ I have no idea what's awaiting me. ❜ ❨1060❩ ❛ What will happen when this all ends? ❜ ❨1061❩ ❛ I know that you are capable of great deeds. ❜ ❨1062❩ ❛ A loveless world is a dead world, and always there comes an hour when one is weary of prisons, of one's work, and of devotion to duty, and all one craves for is a loved face, the warmth and wonder of a loving heart. ❜ ❨1063❩ ❛ The truth is that everyone is bored. ❜ ❨1064❩ ❛ I feel more fellowship with the defeated than with saints. Heroism and sanctity don't really appeal to me, I imagine. ❜ ❨1065❩ ❛ If there is one thing one can always yearn for, and sometimes attain, it is human love. ❜ ❨1066❩ ❛ Who would dare to assert that eternal happiness can compensate for even a single moment's suffering? ❜ ❨1067❩ ❛ It's not easy. I've been thinking it over for years. ❜ ❨1068❩ ❛ While we loved each other we didn't need words to make ourselves understood. ❜ ❨1069❩ ❛ People are more often bad than good. ❜ ❨1070❩ ❛ I don't believe in heroism; I know it's easy and I've learned that it can be murderous. ❜ ❨1071❩ ❛ What interests me is living and dying for what one loves. ❜ ❨1072❩ ❛ In fact, nobody is capable of really thinking about anyone, even in the worst calamity. ❜ ❨1073❩ ❛ Nothing in the world is worth turning one's back on what one loves. ❜ ❨1074❩ ❛ Again and again there comes a time in history when the man who dares to say that two and two make four is punished with death. ❜ ❨1075❩ ❛ There are more things to admire in men then to despise. ❜ ❨1076❩ ❛ It is in the thick of calamity that one gets hardened to the truth - in other words, to silence. ❜ ❨1077❩ ❛ What on earth prompted you to take a hand in this? ❜ ❨1078❩ ❛ Your code of morals? What code, if I may ask? ❜ ❨1079❩ ❛ I'm fumbling in the dark, struggling to make something out. But I've long ceased finding anything. ❜ ❨1080❩ ❛ No doubt our love is still there, but quite simply it is unusable, heavy to carry, inert inside of us, sterile as crime or condemnation. ❜ ❨1081❩ ❛ I’m not happy to go, but one needn't be happy to make another start. ❜ ❨1082❩ ❛ I am incapable of suffering for a long time, or being happy for a long time. Which means that I am incapable of anything really worth while. ❜ ❨1083❩ ❛ I should have found the words to keep her with me. ❜ ❨1084❩ ❛ We can't stir a finger in this world without the risk of bringing death to somebody. ❜ ❨1085❩ ❛ The evil that is in the world comes out of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. ❜ ❨1086❩ ❛ There are always flies and itches. That’s why life is difficult to live. ❜ ❨1087❩ ❛ The best protection against anything is a good bottle of wine. ❜ ❨1088❩ ❛ There is no peace without hope. ❜ ❨1089❩ ❛ It's enough for me to be sure that you and I exist at this moment. ❜ ❨1090❩ ❛ There is always something left to love. ❜ ❨1091❩ ❛ A person doesn’t die when he should but when he can. ❜ ❨1092❩ ❛ Things have a life of their own. It's simply a matter of waking up their souls. ❜ ❨1093❩ ❛ Tell me something: why are you fighting? ❜ ❨1094❩ ❛ I've come to realise only just now that I'm fighting because of pride. ❜ ❨1095❩ ❛ One minute of reconciliation is worth more than a whole life of friendship. ❜ ❨1096❩ ❛ It's better than not knowing why you're fighting. Or fighting, like you, for something that doesn't have any meaning for anyone. ❜ ❨1097❩ ❛ Holy Mother of God! ❜ ❨1098❩ ❛ A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground. ❜ ❨1099❩ ❛ I was born a son of a bitch and I'm going to die a son of a bitch. ❜ ❨1100❩ ❛ Bad luck doesn't have any chinks in it. ❜ ❨1101❩ ❛ I plead youth as a mitigating circumstance. ❜ ❨1102❩ ❛ Get those bad thoughts out of your head. You're going to be happy. ❜ ❨1103❩ ❛ Children inherit their parents' madness. ❜ ❨1104❩ ❛ I'll turn to ashes in here but I won't give this miserable town the pleasure of seeing me weep. ❜ ❨1105❩ ❛ You would be good in a war. Where you put your eye, you put your bullet. ❜ ❨1106❩ ❛ Men demand much more than you think. ❜ ❨1107❩ ❛ Even the craziest and most persistent love is just a temporary truth. ❜ ❨1108❩ ❛ If we’re alone you can whisper in my ear any crap you can think of. ❜ ❨1109❩ ❛ You have taken this horrible game very seriously and you have done well because you are doing your duty. ❜ ❨1110❩ ❛ We have the right to pull down your pants and give you a whipping at the first sign of disrespect. ❜ ❨1111❩ ❛ What worries me is not your shooting me, because after all, for people like us it's a natural death. ❜ ❨1112❩ ❛ What worries me is that you've ended up as bad as they are. ❜ ❨1113❩ ❛ It is characteristic of men to deny hunger once their appetites are satisfied. ❜ ❨1114❩ ❛ Dying is much more difficult than one imagines. ❜ ❨1115❩ ❛ If you have to go crazy, please go crazy all by yourself! ❜ ❨1116❩ ❛ We have still not had a death. ❜ ❨1117❩ ❛ How awful, the way time passes. ❜ ❨1118❩ ❛ You may be in command of your war, but I'm in command of my house. ❜ ❨1119❩ ❛ I missed you every hour. ❜ ❨1120❩ ❛ You know what the worst part was? It caught me completely by surprise. ❜ ❨1121❩ ❛ I’ve risked my life for you. ❜ ❨1122❩ ❛ The problem with wanting is that it makes us weak. ❜ ❨1123❩ ❛ I love you, even the part of you that loved him. ❜ ❨1124❩ ❛ I’m sorry it took me so long to see you. ❜ ❨1125❩ ❛ I never really belonged anywhere. ❜ ❨1126❩ ❛ Thanks for being my best friend and making my life bearable. ❜ ❨1127❩ ❛ Thanks for finding me. ❜ ❨1128❩ ❛ You and I are going to change the world. ❜ ❨1129❩ ❛ I’ve been waiting for you a long time. ❜ ❨1130❩ ❛ I’m not used to people trying to kill me. ❜ ❨1131❩ ❛ You’re shaking. ❜ ❨1132❩ ❛ There's nothing wrong with being a lizard. Unless you were born to be a hawk. ❜ ❨1133❩ ❛ Make me your villain. ❜ ❨1134❩ ❛ Just you and me. It’s always just you and me. ❜ ❨1135❩ ❛ Do you blame me for every mistake I made? For every dumb thing I’ve said? ❜ ❨1136❩ ❛ Well, if it gets too bad, give me a signal. ❜ ❨1137❩ ❛ Did you tell him what I showed you in the dark? ❜ ❨1138❩ ❛ Did you miss me when you were gone? ❜ ❨1139❩ ❛ What is infinite? The universe and the greed of men. ❜ ❨1140❩ ❛ You’re interfering with my plan. ❜ ❨1141❩ ❛ Too much champagne? ❜ ❨1142❩ ❛ I hope you don’t expect fairness from me. It isn’t one of my specialties. ❜ ❨1143❩ ❛ There is something more powerful than any army. Something strong enough to topple kings. Faith. ❜ ❨1144❩ ❛ All you said was that I had to kill you. You didn’t say how. ❜ ❨1145❩ ❛ What is she? She’s everything, you dumb son of a bitch. ❜ ❨1146❩ ❛ She’s an ugly little thing. No child should look like that. Pale and sour, like a glass of milk that’s turned. ❜ ❨1147❩ ❛ I wouldn’t make that mistake again. ❜ ❨1148❩ ❛ It’s a great honor, to save a life. You saved many. ❜ ❨1149❩ ❛ In this world, there are things you can only do alone. ❜ ❨1150❩ ❛ What seems like a reasonable distance to one person might feel too far to somebody else. ❜ ❨1151❩ ❛ If you really want to know something, you have to be willing to pay the price. ❜ ❨1152❩ ❛ Why should you be interested in me? ❜ ❨1153❩ ❛ I have been told I've got a darkish personality. A few times. ❜ ❨1154❩ ❛ It's not as if our lives are divided simply into light and dark. There's shadowy middle ground. ❜ ❨1155❩ ❛ I'll write to you. A super-long letter, like in an old-fashioned novel. ❜ ❨1156❩ ❛ The spotlight doesn't suit me. I'm more of a side dish. ❜ ❨1157❩ ❛ The ground we stand on looks solid enough, but if something happens it can drop right out from under you. ❜ ❨1158❩ ❛ So once you're dead there's just nothing? ❜ ❨1159❩ ❛ If only I could fall sound asleep and wake up in my old reality. ❜ ❨1160❩ ❛ Is action merely the incidental product of thought, or is thought the consequential product of action? ❜ ❨1161❩ ❛ Nobody can shake off their own shadow. ❜ ❨1162❩ ❛ The silence is so deep it hurts. ❜ ❨1163❩ ❛ I may not look it, but I can be a very patient guy. ❜ ❨1164❩ ❛ Killing time is one of my specialities. ❜ ❨1165❩ ❛ You can't fight it. ❜ ❨1166❩ ❛ Tell me something,—do you believe in reincarnation? ❜ ❨1167❩ ❛ I can’t understand nothingness. I can’t understand it and I can’t imagine it. ❜ ❨1168❩ ❛ I can hardly breathe, and my whole body wants to shrink into a corner. ❜ ❨1169❩ ❛ I do have a few things wrong with me, but those are strictly problems I keep inside. ❜ ❨1170❩ ❛ I can't take it any more, I can't go on any more. ❜ ❨1171❩ ❛ You don't really have it together. ❜ ❨1172❩ ❛ Is it against the law for me to know it? ❜ ❨1173❩ ❛ I keep having the same dream. ❜ ❨1174❩ ❛ Are you asking because you really want an answer? ❜ ❨1175❩ ❛ I hate this! I don't want to be changed this way! ❜ ❨1176❩ ❛ No contradictions, no irony. They do everything according to numerical formulas. ❜ ❨1177❩ ❛ Want to hear the rest? If you’re not interested, I can stop. ❜ ❨1178❩ ❛ If I didn’t have these memories inside me, I would’ve snapped a long time ago. I would’ve curled up in a ditch somewhere and died. ❜ ❨1179❩ ❛ I don’t know what you’re feeling. I won’t even pretend. ❜ ❨1180❩ ❛ What are you doing here, honey? ❜ ❨1181❩ ❛ You're not even old enough to know how bad life gets. ❜ ❨1182❩ ❛ You don't understand me. ❜ ❨1183❩ ❛ All wisdom ends in paradox. ❜ ❨1184❩ ❛ It is love that overthrows empire. Love that binds two hearts together, come hellfire & brimstone. ❜ ❨1185❩ ❛ I have lost my gift. ❜ ❨1186❩ ❛ Winter is the season of alcoholism and despair. ❜ ❨1187❩ ❛ The seeds of death get lost in the mess that God made us. ❜ ❨1188❩ ❛ They're just memories now. It’s time to forget. ❜ ❨1189❩ ❛ The time has to be right and the heart willing. ❜ ❨1190❩ ❛ The world, a tired performer, offers us another half-assed season. ❜ ❨1191❩ ❛ Capitalism has resulted in material well-being but spiritual bankruptcy. ❜ ❨1192❩ ❛ Grief is natural, overcoming it is a matter of choice. ❜ ❨1193❩ ❛ I want out of that decorating scheme. ❜ ❨1194❩ ❛ With most people suicide is like Russian roulette. Only one chamber has a bullet. ❜ ❨1195❩ ❛ You never get over it but you get where it doesn't bother you so much. ❜ ❨1196❩ ❛ Don't waste your time on life. ❜ ❨1197❩ ❛ I'm a teenager. I've got problems! ❜ ❨1198❩ ❛ Adolescents tend to seek love where they can find it. ❜ ❨1199❩ ❛ Obviously, you've never been a thirteen-year-old girl. ❜ ❨1200❩ ❛ It was a mistake. ❜ ❨1201❩ ❛ It seemed like we were supposed to feel sorry for everything that ever happened, ever. ❜ ❨1202❩ ❛ Buffeted but not broken. ❜ ❨1203❩ ❛ Shit. What have kids got to be worried about now? ❜ ❨1204❩ ❛ If they want trouble, they should go live in Bangladesh. ❜ ❨1205❩ ❛ I can't wait until I get out of here. ❜ ❨1206❩ ❛ When she jumped she probably thought she’d fly. ❜ ❨1207❩ ❛ I do not think the patient truly meant to end her life. Her act was a cry for help. ❜ ❨1208❩ ❛ You're a stone fox. ❜ ❨1209❩ ❛ It was love at first sight, at last sight, at ever and ever sight. ❜ ❨1210❩ ❛ Light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. ❜ ❨1211❩ ❛ He broke my heart. You merely broke my life. ❜ ❨1212❩ ❛ I'm sorry to have deceived you so much, but that's how life is. ❜ ❨1213❩ ❛ Words without experience are meaningless. ❜ ❨1214❩ ❛ I loved you. I was a monster, but I loved you. ❜ ❨1215❩ ❛ Come just as you are. ❜ ❨1216❩ ❛ If a violin string could ache, i would be that string. ❜ ❨1217❩ ❛ Perhaps, somewhere, some day, at a less miserable time, we may see each other again. ❜ ❨1218❩ ❛ What's so dreadful about dying is that you are completely on your own. ❜ ❨1219❩ ❛ Don't touch me; I'll die if you touch me. ❜ ❨1220❩ ❛ You took advantage of my disadvantage. ❜ ❨1221❩ ❛ I walk in a maze I cannot get out of. ❜ ❨1222❩ ❛ Life is just one small piece of light between two eternal darknesses. ❜ ❨1223❩ ❛ Imagine me; I shall not exist if you do not imagine me. ❜ ❨1224❩ ❛ There is no harm in smiling. ❜ ❨1225❩ ❛ There is no point in staying here. There is no point in staying anywhere. ❜ ❨1226❩ ❛ There is nothing more atrociously cruel than an adored child. ❜ ❨1227❩ ❛ I am so tired of being cynical. ❜ ❨1228❩ ❛ Come to live with me, and die with me, and everything with me. ❜ ❨1229❩ ❛ This is the only immortality that you and I may share. ❜ ❨1230❩ ❛ I loved her more than anything I had ever seen or imagined on earth, or hoped for anywhere else. ❜ ❨1231❩ ❛ I was despicable and brutal, and turpid, and everything, mais je t’aimais, je t’aimais! ❜ ❨1232❩ ❛ Years of secret suffering has taught me superhuman self-control. ❜ ❨1233❩ ❛ Solitude is corrupting me. I need company and care. ❜ ❨1234❩ ❛ I've missed you terribly. ❜ ❨1235❩ ❛ I've been revoltingly unfaithful to you. ❜ ❨1236❩ ❛ It doesn't matter a bit, because you've stopped caring anyway. ❜ ❨1237❩ ❛ What makes you say I've stopped caring for you? ❜ ❨1238❩ ❛ Nowadays you have to be a scientist if you want to be a killer. ❜ ❨1239❩ ❛ The sun climbs high in the sky, then starts down. People come, then go. ❜ ❨1240❩ ❛ Tell me, have you ever thought of killing me? ❜ ❨1241❩ ❛ I can not believe you are the same human being. ❜ ❨1242❩ ❛ Just how urgent is it? ❜ ❨1243❩ ❛ It is time for you to be going. ❜ ❨1244❩ ❛ How is it you know something like that? ❜ ❨1245❩ ❛ I don’t mind. Your mess is my mess. ❜ ❨1246❩ ❛ Everybody has one thing they do not want to lose. ❜ ❨1247❩ ❛ I’ll be late tonight, so don’t wait up for me. ❜ ❨1248❩ ❛ Nothing I’ve tried to do by myself has ever come off. ❜ ❨1249❩ ❛ I am not catching you in the middle of anything important, am I? ❜ ❨1250❩ ❛ Some things are forgotten, some things disappear, some things die. ❜ ❨1251❩ ❛ My biggest fault is that the faults I was born with grow bigger each year. ❜ ❨1252❩ ❛ To get irritated is to lose our way in life. ❜ ❨1253❩ ❛ A friend to kill time is a friend sublime. ❜ ❨1254❩ ❛ I don't really know if it's the right thing to do. ❜ ❨1255❩ ❛ Faster cars and more cats run over? Who needs it? ❜ ❨1256❩ ❛ Most of everything you think you know about me is nothing more than memories. ❜ ❨1257❩ ❛ Your fate is and will always be the fate of a dreamer. ❜ ❨1258❩ ❛ You’re loads better than you think you are. ❜ ❨1259❩ ❛ You’re only half-living, the other half is still untapped somewhere. ❜ ❨1260❩ ❛ The song is over. But the melody lingers on. ❜ ❨1261❩ ❛ You are extraordinary. ❜ ❨1262❩ ❛ We tend to fool ourselves into thinking that time is our size, but it really goes on and on. ❜ ❨1263❩ ❛ It could be five years or ten years or one month. It's all the same. ❜ ❨1264❩ ❛ I’m forever realising things too late. ❜ ❨1265❩ ❛ I’m not complaining when I say my life is boring. ❜ ❨1266❩ ❛ Weakness is something that rots in the body. ❜ ❨1267❩ ❛ Coming from your mouth, it has the ring of truth, but I doubt anyone would believe me if I told them. ❜ ❨1268❩ ❛ You can't expect something unreal to last anyway, can you? ❜ ❨1269❩ ❛ A wise man does not step betwixt the beast and his meat. ❜ ❨1270❩ ❛ So, kill me. Tell the others I attacked you so you killed me. ❜ ❨1271❩ ❛ Should never have come here. ❜ ❨1272❩ ❛ Hard to guess my tastes. ❜ ❨1273❩ ❛ Can’t it wait until the morning? ❜ ❨1274❩ ❛ You’ll find temper tantrums won’t help you here. ❜ ❨1275❩ ❛ It must have taken courage to return. ❜ ❨1276❩ ❛ It all sounds grimly dystopian. ❜ ❨1277❩ ❛ I am not afraid of you! ❜ ❨1278❩ ❛ All this could be avoided! ❜ ❨1279❩ ❛ You consider me a murderer? ❜ ❨1280❩ ❛ Gross way to die. ❜ ❨1281❩ ❛ What sparks wars? The will to power, the backbone of human nature. ❜ ❨1282❩ ❛ My life amounts to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean. Yet what is any ocean, but a multitude of drops? ❜ ❨1283❩ ❛ Our lives are not our own. We are bound to others. ❜ ❨1284❩ ❛ I believe there is another world waiting for us. A better world. And I'll be waiting for you there. ❜ ❨1285❩ ❛ You are allowed to feel messed up and inside out. It doesn't mean you're defective - it just means you're human. ❜ ❨1286❩ ❛ Power, time, gravity, love. The forces that really kick ass are all invisible. ❜ ❨1287❩ ❛ Unlimited power in the hands of limited people always leads to cruelty. ❜ ❨1288❩ ❛ Truth is singular. Its 'versions' are mistruths. ❜ ❨1289❩ ❛ Dreams are all I have ever truly owned. ❜ ❨1290❩ ❛ Your version of the truth is the only thing that matters. ❜ ❨1291❩ ❛ I believe death is only a door. One closes, and another opens. ❜ ❨1292❩ ❛ By each crime and every kindness, we birth our future. ❜ ❨1293❩ ❛ The healthy can't understand the emptied, the broken. ❜ ❨1294❩ ❛ Lying's wrong, but when the world spins backwards, a small wrong may be a big right. ❜ ❨1295❩ ❛ The weak are meat the strong do eat. ❜ ❨1296❩ ❛ Do whatever you can't not do. ❜ ❨1297❩ ❛ What precipitates outcomes? Vicious acts & virtuous acts. ❜ ❨1298❩ ❛ I remain thankful to God for all his mercies. ❜ ❨1299❩ ❛ You can maintain power over people, as long as you give them something. Rob a man of everything, and that man will no longer be in your power. ❜ ❨1300❩ ❛ Power. The ability to determine another man's luck. ❜ ❨1301❩ ❛ Pain is strong, aye - but friends' eyes, more strong. ❜ ❨1302❩ ❛ Perhaps those deprived of beauty perceive it most instinctively. ❜ ❨1303❩ ❛ Why ask a question whose answer would demand ten more questions? ❜ ❨1304❩ ❛ You can’t lie to your soul. ❜ ❨1305❩ ❛ Why would I want to do a thing like that? ❜ ❨1306❩ ❛ We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. ❜ ❨1307❩ ❛ Better to make life as complete and enjoyable an experience as possible, in case death is shite, which I suspect it will be. ❜ ❨1308❩ ❛ I’m not running away, I’m moving on. ❜ ❨1309❩ ❛ The reasons? There are no reasons. ❜ ❨1310❩ ❛ Some people are easier to love when you don’t have to be around them. ❜ ❨1311❩ ❛ Love does not exist. ❜ ❨1312❩ ❛ Fuck that ‘regrets’ bullshit. ❜ ❨1313❩ ❛ How does it make you feel? ❜ ❨1314❩ ❛ It’s horrible how we always die alone, but no worse than living alone. ❜ ❨1315❩ ❛ Choose us. Choose life. ❜ ❨1316❩ ❛ You fucking knew that fucking cunt would fuck some cunt. ❜ ❨1317❩ ❛ I’m more of a warrior than you’ll ever be. ❜ ❨1318❩ ❛ What does that make us? The lowest of the low, the scum of the earth. ❜ ❨1319❩ ❛ You don’t have to run away. ❜ ❨1320❩ ❛ I tried to stop because it was only causing pain. I couldn’t. ❜ ❨1321❩ ❛ I’m not going to get crushed. ❜ ❨1322❩ ❛ I love doubt in a woman. It’s nearly as sexy as determination. ❜ ❨1323❩ ❛ Take your best orgasm, multiply the feeling by twenty. ❜ ❨1324❩ ❛ You’re a mess. ❜ ❨1325❩ ❛ I know that it’s never left you alone. ❜ ❨1326❩ ❛ Are you asking me or telling me? ❜ ❨1327❩ ❛ You just get used to all the shit. ❜ ❨1328❩ ❛ You can’t afford a conscience in this life. ❜ ❨1329❩ ❛ None of us are saints and scapegoats are always handy. ❜ ❨1330❩ ❛ Doing things doesn’t hurt you; you get hurt by avoiding them. ❜ ❨1331❩ ❛ What was that? ❜ ❨1332❩ ❛ Protect me from those who wish to help us. ❜ ❨1333❩ ❛ You can’t love yourself if you want to hurt things like that. ❜ ❨1334❩ ❛ What happens when people open their hearts? ❜ ❨1335❩ ❛ Nobody likes being alone that much. ❜ ❨1336❩ ❛ I don’t go out of my way to make friends, that’s all. It just leads to disappointment.” ❨1337❩ ❛ Don’t feel sorry for yourself. Only assholes do that. ❜ ❨1338❩ ❛ You need to grab whatever chance you have of happiness where you find it, and not worry about other people too much. ❜ ❨1339❩ ❛ I want you always to remember me. ❜ ❨1340❩ ❛ Despite your best efforts, people are going to be hurt when it’s time for them to be hurt. ❜ ❨1341❩ ❛ What stays in your heart will stay; keep them, and what vanishes will vanish. ❜ ❨1342❩ ❛ All I want in this world is you. ❜ ❨1343❩ ❛ I want the two of us to begin everything from the beginning. ❜ ❨1344❩ ❛ No truth can cure the sorrow we feel from losing a loved one. ❜ ❨1345❩ ❛ What a terrible thing it is to wound someone you really care for and to do it so unconsciously. ❜ ❨1346❩ ❛ If you’re in pitch blackness, all you can do is sit tight until your eyes get used to the dark. ❜ ❨1347❩ ❛ I’ve had enough hurt already in my life. More than enough. Now I want to be happy. ❜ ❨1348❩ ❛ People leave strange little memories of themselves behind when they die. ❜ ❨1349❩ ❛ Stop eating yourself up alive. Things will go where they’re supposed to go if you just let them take their natural course. ❜ ❨1350❩ ❛ When your feelings build up and harden and die inside, then you’re in big trouble. ❜ ❨1351❩ ❛ When you fall in love, the natural thing to do is give yourself to it. ❜ ❨1352❩ ❛ If I have left a wound inside you, it is not just your wound but mine as well. ❜ ❨1353❩ ❛ Hey, what is it with you? Why are you so spaced out? You still haven’t answered me. ❜ ❨1354❩ ❛ People are strange when you’re a stranger. ❜ ❨1355❩ ❛ The dead will always be dead, but we have to go on living. ❜ ❨1356❩ ❛ You don’t get it, do you? ❜ ❨1357❩ ❛ I am a flawed human being - a far more flawed human being than you ❨1358❩ realise. ❜ ❨1359❩ ❛ At least let me know whether or not I hurt you. ❜ ❨1360❩ ❛ All of us are imperfect human beings living in an imperfect world. ❜ ❨1361❩ ❛ I’ve never once thought about how I was going to die. ❜ ❨1362❩ ❛ So I’m not crazy after all! ❜ ❨1363❩ ❛ I miss you terribly sometimes, but in general I go on living with all the energy I can muster. ❜ ❨1364❩ ❛ Will you wait for me forever? ❜ ❨1365❩ ❛ I don’t want our relationship to end like this. ❜ ❨1366❩ ❛ When am I going to be able to talk to you? I want you to tell me that much, at least. ❜ ❨1367❩ ❛ It hurts not being able to see you. ❜ ❨1368❩ ❛ I’m not totally mad at you. I’m just sad. ❜ ❨1369❩ ❛ The world is an inherently unfair place. ❜ ❨1370❩ ❛ Life frightens me sometimes. I don’t happen to take that as the premise for everything else though. ❜ ❨1371❩ ❛ I’m a real bargain, don’t you think? If you don’t take me, I’ll end up going somewhere else. ❜ ❨1372❩ ❛ We’re all kind of weird and twisted and drowning. ❜ ❨1373❩ ❛ Don’t you think it would be wonderful to get rid of everything and everybody and just go some place where you don’t know a soul? ❜ ❨1374❩ ❛ You’re not telling me anything I don’t know already. ❜ ❨1375❩ ❛ He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past. ❜ ❨1376❩ ❛ If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself. ❜ ❨1377❩ ❛ We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness. ❜ ❨1378❩ ❛ Until they become conscious they will never rebel. ❜ ❨1379❩ ❛ Power is not a means; it is an end. ❜ ❨1380❩ ❛ They are not interested in the good of others; they are interested solely in power, pure power. ❜ ❨1381❩ ❛ Now you begin to understand me. ❜ ❨1382❩ ❛ In the face of pain there are no heroes. ❜ ❨1383❩ ❛ Big Brother is watching you. ❜ ❨1384❩ ❛ Power is tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing. ❜ ❨1385❩ ❛ It’s a beautiful thing, the destruction of words. ❜ ❨1386❩ ❛ The choice for mankind lies between freedom and happiness and for the great bulk of mankind, happiness is better. ❜ ❨1387❩ ❛ Your mind appeals to me. It resembles my own mind. ❜ ❨1388❩ ❛ Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else. ❜ ❨1389❩ ❛ We do not merely destroy our enemies; we change them. ❜ ❨1390❩ ❛ How can I help it? How can I help but see what is in front of my eyes? ❜ ❨1391❩ ❛ You must try harder. ❜ ❨1392❩ ❛ Confession is not betrayal. ❜ ❨1393❩ ❛ What you say or do doesn’t matter; only feelings matter. ❜ ❨1394❩ ❛ If they could make me stop loving you —- that would be the real betrayal. ❜ ❨1395❩ ❛ Of pain you can wish only one thing: that it should stop. ❜ ❨1396❩ ❛ To die hating them, that will be freedom. ❜ ❨1397❩ ❛ No one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. ❜ ❨1398❩ ❛ What can you do against the lunatic who is more intelligent than yourself? ❜ ❨1399❩ ❛ To keep them in control is not difficult. ❜ ❨1400❩ ❛ So long as they are not permitted to have standards of comparison, they never even become aware that they are oppressed. ❜ ❨1401❩ ❛ The consequences of every act are included in the act itself. ❜ ❨1402❩ ❛ The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labour. ❜ ❨1403❩ ❛ Stupidity is as necessary as intelligence, and as difficult to attain. ❜ ❨1404❩ ❛ I hate purity, I hate goodness! I don’t want virtue to exist anywhere. I want everyone to be corrupt to the bones. ❜ ❨1405❩ ❛ The past is dead, the future is unimaginable. ❜ ❨1406❩ ❛ You know the answer already. Everyone knows it. ❜ ❨1407❩ ❛ You don’t give a damn what they suffer. All you care is yourself. ❜ ❨1408❩ ❛ It is not easy to become sane. ❜ ❨1409❩ ❛ No emotion is pure anymore, because everything is mixed up with fear and hatred. ❜ ❨1410❩ ❛ They say that time heals all things —- they say you can always forget. ❜ ❨1411❩ ❛ The object of waging a war is always to be in a better position in which to wage another war. ❜ ❨1412❩ ❛ I sold you and you sold me. ❜ ❨1413❩ ❛ You do not exist. ❜ ❨1414❩ ❛ How does one man assert his power over another? By making him suffer. ❜ ❨1415❩ ❛ Obedience is not enough. Unless he is suffering, how can you be sure that he is obeying your will and not his own? ❜ ❨1416❩ ❛ Everything else we shall destroy – everything. ❜ ❨1417❩ ❛ Two and two makes five. ❜ ❨1418❩ ❛ Facts, at any rate, can not be kept hidden. ❜ ❨1419❩ ❛ The past is whatever the records and the memories agree upon. ❜ ❨1420❩ ❛ So long as human beings stay human, death and life are the same thing. ❜ ❨1421❩ ❛ If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable—what then? ❜ ❨1422❩ ❛ The lie became the truth. ❜ ❨1423❩ ❛ It is like swimming against a current that sweeps you backwards however hard you struggle. ❜ ❨1424❩ ❛ Turn round and go with the current instead of opposing it. ❜ ❨1425❩ ❛ It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything. ❜ ❨1426❩ ❛ I don’t want to die without any scars. ❜ ❨1427❩ ❛ This is your life and it’s ending one moment at a time. ❜ ❨1428❩ ❛ You know how they say you only hurt the ones you love? Well, it works both ways. ❜ ❨1429❩ ❛ You are not your job, you’re not how much money you have in the bank. You are not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet. ❜ ❨1430❩ ❛ You are not special. ❜ ❨1431❩ ❛ You’re not a beautiful and unique snowflake. You’re the same decaying organic matter as everything else. ❜ ❨1432❩ ❛ The things you used to own, now they own you. ❜ ❨1433❩ ❛ Today is the sort of day where the sun only comes up to humiliate you. ❜ ❨1434❩ ❛ Maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves. ❜ ❨1435❩ ❛ Only after disaster can we be resurrected. ❜ ❨1436❩ ❛ Everything is evolving, everything is falling apart. ❜ ❨1437❩ ❛ We’ve all been raised believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. ❜ ❨1438❩ ❛ Don’t you have other things to do? ❜ ❨1439❩ ❛ Prove you’re alive. If you don’t claim your humanity you will become a statistic. ❜ ❨1440❩ ❛ You have been warned. ❜ ❨1441❩ ❛ If you don’t know what you want, you end up with a lot you don’t. ❜ ❨1442❩ ❛ It’s not love or anything, but I think I like you, too. ❜ ❨1443❩ ❛ If I could wake up in a different place, at a different time, could I wake up as a different person? ❜ ❨1444❩ ❛ Why did I cause so much pain? ❜ ❨1445❩ ❛ The lower you fall, the higher you’ll fly. ❜ ❨1446❩ ❛ Maybe self-improvement isn’t the answer, maybe self-destruction is the answer. ❜ ❨1447❩ ❛ May I never be complete. May I never be content. May I never be perfect. ❜ ❨1448❩ ❛ Everyone smiles with that invisible gun to their head. ❜ ❨1449❩ ❛ We are not special. We are not crap or trash, either. We just are. We just are, and what happens just happens. ❜ ❨1450❩ ❛ The girl is infectious human waste. ❜ ❨1451❩ ❛ I want to destroy everything beautiful I’ll never have. ❜ ❨1452❩ ❛ On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero. ❜ ❨1453❩ ❛ If you could be either God’s worst enemy or nothing, which would you choose? ❜ ❨1454❩ ❛ It is like you’re never really awake; but you’re never really asleep. ❜ ❨1455❩ ❛ Worker bees can leave. Even drones can fly away. The Queen is their slave. ❜ ❨1456❩ ❛ A moment is the most you could ever expect from perfection. ❜ ❨1457❩ ❛ The people you’re trying to step on, we’re everyone you depend on. ❜ ❨1458❩ ❛ You have to give up! ❜ ❨1459❩ ❛ Reject the basic assumptions of civilisation, especially the importance of material possessions. ❜ ❨1460❩ ❛ Without pain, without sacrifice we would have nothing. ❜ ❨1461❩ ❛ You have to realise that someday you will die, Until you know that, you are useless. ❜ ❨1462❩ ❛ A tiger can smile. A snake will say it loves you. ❜ ❨1463❩ ❛ Lies make us evil. ❜ ❨1464❩ ❛ If you died right now, how would you feel about your life? ❜ ❨1465❩ ❛ You always kill the one you love. ❜ ❨1466❩ ❛ Maybe we should always assume the worst. ❜ ❨1467❩ ❛ Put a gun to my head and paint the wall with my brains. ❜ ❨1468❩ ❛ Which is worse? Hell or nothing? ❜ ❨1469❩ ❛ A minute of perfection is worth the effort. ❜ ❨1470❩ ❛ You’re going to die, tonight. You might die in one second or in one hour, you decide. ❜ ❨1471❩ ❛ Lie to me. Tell me the first thing off the top of your head. Make something up. ❜ ❨1472❩ ❛ I don’t give a shit. I have a gun. ❜ ❨1473❩ ❛ I know who you are. I know where you live. ❜ ❨1474❩ ❛ Tomorrow will be the most beautiful day of your life. ❜ ❨1475❩ ❛ My philosophy of life is that I can die at any moment. And the tragedy of my life is that I do not. ❜ ❨1476❩ ❛ Everything is so far away, a copy of a copy of a copy. You can’t touch anything and nothing can touch you. ❜ ❨1477❩ ❛ There are a lot of things we don’t want to know about the people we love. ❜ ❨1478❩ ❛ We just had a near-life experience. ❜ ❨1479❩ ❛ If people think you are dying, they give you their full attention. They listen instead of just waiting for their turn to speak. ❜ ❨1480❩ ❛ I am nothing, and not even that. ❜ ❨1481❩ ❛ This isn’t really death. —- We’ll be legends. We won’t grow old. ❜ ❨1482❩ ❛ Stop trying to control everything and just let go. Let go. ❜ ❨1483❩ ❛ The amazing miracle of death, when one second you’re walking and talking, and the next second you’re an object. ❜ ❨1484❩ ❛ Only if we’re caught and punished can we be saved. ❜ ❨1485❩ ❛ I never thought about how important the sky was until I didn't have one. ❜ ❨1486❩ ❛ Dreams are like that: they go in and out of memories and scenes, but they're never real. They're never real, and I hate them because they aren't. ❜ ❨1487❩ ❛ Power isn’t control at all — power is strength, and giving that strength to others. ❜ ❨1488❩ ❛ A leader isn’t someone who forces others to make him stronger. ❜ ❨1489❩ ❛ A leader is someone willing to give his strength to others that they may have the strength to stand on their own. ❜ ❨1490❩ ❛ In the end, we are alone. ❜ ❨1491❩ ❛ It is like a piece of my soul is lost, empty. ❜ ❨1492❩ ❛ If my life on Earth must end, let it end with a promise. Let it end with hope. ❜ ❨1493❩ ❛ Sorry? Sorry isn't enough. ❜ ❨1494❩ ❛ Every single thing I ever loved is beyond my reach now. Everything I ever wanted. Everything I ever was. ❜ ❨1495❩ ❛ Will you stay with me? ❜ ❨1496❩ ❛ A leader doesn't make pawns - he makes people. ❜ ❨1497❩ ❛ Do you hear that? The pulse of life from your heart, the slow in-and-out from your lungs? Even when you are silent, even when you block out all noise, your body is still a cacophony of life. Mine is not. ❜ ❨1498❩ ❛ It is the silence that drives me mad. The silence that drives the nightmares to me. ❜ ❨1499❩ ❛ There is nothing between us but rain. There is nothing between us at all. ❜ ❨1500❩ ❛ I like a little chaos. ❜

#sentence starters #generate sentence prompts #rp meme #roleplay prompt #roleplay meme #prompt for writing #rp prompt #send emoji meme #long tw

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ahundredtimesover · 3 years

Text

Hold Me Close | JJK

Pairing: Jungkook x (f.) Reader, ex Namjoon x Reader (ft. brother Jimin)

Genre/Tags: brother’s best friends au; (dash of) angst, fluff (sort of), smut

Warnings: foul language, feelings of insecurity, minor accident caused by inebriation, getting drunk, sexual content (oral, unprotected sex but be safe please!), JK has a hip tattoo and at some point has grey hair (18+)

Word count: 22k

Summary: When Jimin hits a crisis, he enlists the help of his older sister - you - and his best friend, Jungkook, to put the pieces back again. That proves to be difficult when 1) Jimin’s a brat and a certified pain in the ass, and 2) Jungkook has grown and suddenly, you can’t keep your eyes off him.

A/N: I wanted to write something fun for a change and saw @ladyartemesia‘s brother’s best friend list and thought it would be a nice trope to explore because if there would be an ideal bratty younger brother, it would be Jimin. This was sooo much fun to write but also reminded me again of why I love my baby sister more than anyone in this world. Hope you all enjoy!

Three - the number of missed calls you probably now have just in the last 5 minutes, the vibrations piercing through your pocket and onto your thigh. It might be important, but so is keeping your attention on the department Director to your right, who is complimenting the man to your left, over a proposal that you spent weeks working on.

You force a smile because in front of your entire department isn’t really the time and place to refute and complain. It doesn’t help that Chul accepts the credit because anything to get ahead, right?

Just another reason why you dislike this job. Perhaps your boss telling you that you’re too emotional or too soft to be in this industry has gotten to you, but then again, there’s not a bone in you that’s ambitious and competition-craved, unlike your parents. But you try, at least. It’s the least you can do for something that’s expected of their eldest child.

The Director flips a page and turns to you. “Glad you could contribute to this, Ms. Park.”

He did assign it to you but you suppose your name just flew off his head, but you remind him anyway.

“Thank you for the opportunity to work on it, Mr. Yoon. I’m truly learning a lot,” you fake a smile and wish for this to end.

Soon enough it does and you bow towards the managers present, one of them giving you the compliment you needed to hear, and excuse yourself before another call comes in.

Best brother ever, the screen announces, and you curse yourself for still not changing his contact name and for having an easy-enough password to guess.

“I swear to god, Jimin, this better be an emergency,” you cuss to the person on the other end, already boiling at the thought of him possibly calling to ask how to fix a broken toilet or what kind of oil he’s supposed to buy for frying because he’d done both too many times for you to count.

“___!” The sound of a relieved huff is what greets you, the voice familiar.

“Jungkook?”

“Yeah, hi,” he says. “Uh, we’re at the hospital.”

Your eyes widen and you scold yourself for missing the calls, but then again, you wouldn’t have known because Jimin’s wolf cries precede this moment of an actual emergency.

“What? Why! Is my brother okay?” You cry out, hands already working on collecting your files and feet rushing towards your desk to pack up.

“Yeah,” Jungkook affirms. “He’s fine. He just—“

“I AM NOT FINE!” You hear your brother shriek in the background, sound a little soft due to distance but you don’t miss the farcical tone of his statement.

“Dude, it’s just a sprained ankle. You’ll live,” Jungkook tells him calmly, away from the phone.

You sigh in relief because Jungkook is definitely the person to believe in times like this.

“From 1 to Jimin, how dramatic is he?” You ask.

“Jimin. Times two.”

“Damn, okay. That actually seems worse than the injury itself huh?”

Jungkook laughs in agreement.

“I’m just packing. I’ll go to you guys right after.”

“Alright. General Hospital, emergency room. Just follow the tone of the weeping man-child.”

“I feel so empty. What am I gonna do with my life now!” You hear in the background.

You laugh at your brother’s antics because you’ve heard that exact line not long ago after his building owner told him again that he can’t have a pet in the apartment. But who knows with Jimin this time around?

“Got it. See you in a bit,” you say, then head out to hail a cab.

You arrive in the emergency room and follow the sound of the weeping man-child and true enough, you see your baby brother lying on the bed with his right leg nestled on pillows, ice taped on the swollen ankle.

You rush to his side and assess if there’s any other part that’s being treated. “What the hell happened to you?” You worriedly ask. “Is this because of work? God, Jimin. I told you that company overworks you! You don’t even get enough rest.”

Behind you, you could hear muffled laughter, and paired with your brother’s sheepish smile, you could already tell he got it over something silly. He’s avoiding your gaze, causing your worry to turn to frustration.

You cross your arms and you give him a stern look. “Park Jimin, look at me and tell me what happened.”

He plays with the hem of the blanket draped over him and with a sickly sweet smile, the one he uses on you to get himself out of trouble, he says, “I may have drank and perhaps had my foot stuck in a gutter and I may also have moved about when Jungkook told me to stay still and well…” Arms laid out before him as if in presentation, “here I am!”

He’s beaming, as if it’s something to be proud of. You know it’s his tactic but still, your brother’s ability to go from one reaction to another astounds you.

You turn to Jungkook for confirmation and he nods at the accuracy and absurdity of the situation, causing a worried feeling in the pit of your stomach because how the hell are you going to explain this to your parents?

“You forgot the part about you screaming that you hate men and you don’t want to love anymore,” Jungkook adds. It’s classic Jimin that it actually makes you laugh.

You, as his older sister and Jungkook, as his best friend of 15 years, should be used to this already but your brother is plucked from a classic romcom as the hot mess character and that carries with it amusement and predictability.

You're about to ask for an elaboration to put more context in the scene that’s playing in your head of a crying Jimin flailing his arms and a bemused but laughing Jungkook trying to shut him up, when the doctor comes in.

She checks the clipboard then on Jimin.

“Thankfully, there’s nothing broken,” she says, jotting down on a pad. She starts instructing how to properly wrap the ankle, prompting Jungkook to stand next to you and Jimin to nip at his fingernails because the brat won’t even pay attention to how to care for his own injured foot.

After handing you the prescription, the doctor tells Jimin, “We’ll just wrap you up with a cast and give you the crutches then you can head home.”

“So I’m not staying?” He asks.

“No need,” the doctor clarifies. “It’s just sprained but it will take several weeks to properly heal and it will be sore for a while,” she states, then calls a nurse and instructs him to prepare the supplies.

“You said you’re a dance instructor? The injury was aggravated by previous mild sprains so I require complete rest. You absolutely cannot move. Just stay in bed and follow the instructions I’ve written down.”

You and Jungkook release a sigh of relief, thankful that it’s nothing serious, the concern over what prompted his outburst temporarily at the back of your mind, until Jimin speaks up.

“But, something else feels broken.”

“What is it?” The doctor asks, suddenly worried and checks the board for anything she might’ve missed.

“My heart.”

“Yah!” You smack Jimin’s arm in embarrassment, which he returns with a smack on yours, a common sight for you both and Jungkook who’s bared witness to the violence you and your brother inflicted upon each other growing up.

The doctor rolls her eyes. “She’ll come back,” she says, then heads towards the door.

Jimin scrunches his nose in annoyance. “She’s a he, by the way!” He shouts, causing the others present to turn to him, as if such a situation is scandalous.

“Do… you have a boyfriend I don’t know about?” You nervously ask.

While your 3-year gap sibling relationship is rooted in violence that’s caused bruises, buckets of tears, timeouts, and your parents almost giving up on making you two get along at many points of your lives, you and Jimin have somehow grown up and have found the right balance of telling each other important things while also staying out of each other’s business.

The “growing up” only happened midway through his college life, when he realized that even with his best friend next to him, you were still his lifeline in the big city of Seoul and the only other reminder of home.

Because even with him knowing what it takes to make it in the competitive entertainment industry as a choreographer, in his heart, he’s still the younger child who’s used to being taken care of. That meant regularly demanding your presence in his dorm when he was still studying and then crashing your place when he’d started working. For food, mostly. The ranting about things just came naturally after.

“It’s Tae,” he shyly reveals, meeting your eyes for the first time and suddenly, he’s your little brother again, the one whose snacks you used to prepare or whose wounds you used to treat when your parents weren’t home or were too tired from work.

“Your roommate?”

“Yeah. He left today because he got this photography gig where he gets to travel the world.”

“I didn’t know you had a thing,” you say.

“We didn’t,” he huffs out in frustration. “I didn’t know I liked him until he said he booked a one-way ticket and didn’t know when he'd be coming back. And he was so excited and I was really happy for him but also felt like it was too late. Like should I have said anything? What if he felt the same way? Would he have stayed?” He sighs, looking sullen this time.

“He may have, or he would still be taking the trip. Regardless, no one should be giving up on dreams for anybody, Chim. That’s not how it’s supposed to work,” you say, not meaning to sound as if you’re reprimanding him, but the look he gives is enough to tell you that he understands. He’s heard variations of that same sentiment before, anyway.

Jungkook feels the tension in the air and breaks it by stating that he’ll be driving everybody home.

“I’ll be staying with my sister,” Jimin announces, his annoying smile now back, and he knows you can’t say no; by obligation or by choice, you won’t tell.

“There goes my weekend,” you gripe.

“I won’t be a nuisance, I promise,” he says then crosses his heart, like it actually means anything.

“You’re a nuisance even when you’re not injured, what more now?”

“I’m not that bad,” he defends.

“Oh, but you are.” You turn to Jungkook. “You know, I actually tried to push him back in our mom’s vagina but even her uterus didn’t want him anymore.”

“Ouch okay, I will pretend I didn’t hear that,” and you all laugh as Jimin is transferred to the wheel chair and pushed by the nurse, signaling Jungkook to go ahead and retrieve his car.

You arrive at your apartment with a Jimin-clad Jungkook in tow, the worry of not having cleaned up quickly dissipating because this is your brother, and he shouldn’t complain.

Jungkook assists Jimin in the bathroom while you set up your bed by piling up pillows for his foot.

“I don’t have clean sheets for the sofa bed in the other room,” you say, “and it’s not cleaned up, as I didn’t expect to house an injured child this weekend. Just sleep on my bed first.”

Jungkook guides Jimin to your bed and helps him settle in, with your brother looking all smug with the treatment he’s getting because he knows you don’t give up your bed that easily.

“What about you?” Jungkook asks, seemingly more worried about your inconvenience than the actual cause of it.

“I’m fine with the couch. Wouldn’t wanna sleep here with him and accidentally hit his foot. He might murder me or something.”

“Thanks, Sis. I’m very comfortable here. I think I’ll be sleeping well tonight,” Jimin states, then yawns, drowsiness kicking in from the medication.

You roll your eyes and close the door. You lead Jungkook to your kitchen and offer him a drink.

“I’m sorry for him, Kook. Did he drag you out of work?” You ask.

“Just had to call the tattoo parlor and reschedule my Friday appointments,” he says, downing the glass of water. “He was pretty emotional over the phone and wanted to drink at 4PM and well, you know the rest.”

“Ugh, such a pain in the ass,” you mutter, massaging your temples. “But was he serious about the whole Tae thing?”

“Seemed like it. I think it just took an abrupt change for him to realize what he felt,” he explains. “But you know him - falls fast, moves on faster. He’ll be okay. You’re here,” he continues, flashing you his bunny smile, the one that used to cause you to pinch his puffy cheeks out of cuteness.

But that’s when he was a lanky 10-year old with his awkward front bangs. The man in front of you now sports long dark locks and a sharp jawline, tattooed arms and probably a built figure, if the way he carried your brother as if he’s a feather is any indication of his strength. His bambi eyes, usually scrunched large nose, and child-like smile are the only things that remain from that memory of him.

“You know I can’t stand my brother for long periods of time, Kook,” you pout, earning you an amused laugh.

“He actually already invited me over the weekend, asked me to bring my PS4 so we could play.”

“That bitch has to rest, what is he talking about?”

“Same thing I told him. I’ll just make up some reason that my player caught fire or that I dropped it while running or something.”

You give him a straight face. “The hell would he buy that? You can just not bring it.”

“I’m just gonna match his drama,” Jungkook shrugs, earning him your laugh, which for him is all tones of sweet and soothing.

A smile forms on his face at the thought of making you laugh like this, something he secretly enjoys. This particular sound would most likely be etched in his mind, among the several others that he caused.

There was that time when you caught him doing chubby bunny as a consequence and seeing him stuffed with marshmallows made you secretly giggle because 15-year old you didn’t want to indulge in their silly antics; Jungkook heard it though.

There was that other time during Jimin’s 14th birthday at an arcade, Jungkook went over the basketball game’s railing to get the highest score and you alternated between scolding him and laughing your butt off. He snuck the tickets he won in your pile though so you would have enough to get the Tinkerbell tea set because he knew your obsession with fairies.

When you visited home for their high school graduation, you all cooked dinner and he overdid the glazed sweet potatoes, causing them to get stuck on the plate. You tried to hold your laugh but gave up once he started dancing; he was so embarrassed but that’s when he knew he’d willingly make a fool of himself to hear you laugh like that.

And 3 years ago, your large group of friends went on a ski trip. He was attempting to run up the slope but kept sliding, and even from a distance, he could pick out which laughter was yours; it was probably the only remedy to an otherwise heartbreaking weekend, considering that you were there with your then-boyfriend, Namjoon.

Reminiscing those causes his heart to feel like floating, like always, then the words “nobody dates my sister” pulls that heart down to crash into reality, like always, too, the reality being that you’re his best friend’s older sibling.

You’ve been off-limits since Jimin threatened Jungkook and their other friends about cutting off their dicks if anybody tried to date you when they were 16, but you were probably off-limits even before that. Jungkook mentally shakes his head.

He doesn’t like being told what to do but then again, Jimin is his best friend, the tiny feisty 10-year old who fought off the bullies who tried to take Jungkook’s snacks. It had been them against the world since then, and so far, the only person he thinks who’d ever come between them is you.

Jungkook is pulled out of his thoughts at your call of his name, prompting you to repeat what you just said.

“I said, thanks again for being there for my brother like, ever since. If it was just me I would’ve disowned him a long time ago.”

Jungkook giggles, already used to the drama that is your sibling relationship. He’d witnessed too many wrestling matches, scream fests, and pulled pranks in the last 15 years. While you’ve both gone past those, your complaints about each other is something you haven’t really outgrown yet.

“Well, I’m glad you didn’t disown him,” Jungkook chuckles, the words ‘he’s the only link I have to you’ quickly dissipating in his mind.

“You know he just craves your attention and riling you up is the way he does it, younger sibling and all. I would’ve done that if my brother wasn’t 7 years older. Jimin tends to be immature around you but he’s the best person I know. I wouldn’t have survived anything if it weren’t for him.”

This brings a smile to your face, their origin story warming your heart more than you care to admit. Your brother is fierce and a fighter, you’d give him that.

“Well, he’s just as lucky to have you, Kook.”

It’s the tenderness in your voice that makes him feel like he’d just won a prize, and he wishes you don’t notice the flush of his cheeks. If you do, you don’t mention it, because not long after, you say that you’ll wash up, signaling him that it’s time to go.

Jungkook drives home that night feeling like his pre-adolescent self, the giddy feeling of when you first pinched his cheeks the same one he feels right now. It’s when he first developed his crush on you - you’d been arguing with Jimin and said you wished he was as behaved and as adorable as Jungkook, prompting your brother to point out Jungkook’s large nose, which you responded with by saying it adds to his charm.

Petty fights, like always, but it’s when you told him to not listen to what other people say if they’re out to put him down did Jungkook realize that you and Jimin were cut from the same cloth.

Soon after, every little moment with you, every glimpse of your life outside of being his best friend’s sister became more and more enthralling to him. The fact that you were getting prettier each year just served to solidify his affection for you. And also made it difficult to hide his hard-on every time you’d show up for breakfast in your cloth shorts when he’d sleep over your parents’ house, or when he’d see you in your pretty outfits in the bars you all frequented once he was in Seoul for college.

He’d let himself think of you during the times he wasn’t in a relationship, and he’d slowly let go of the bit of hope he’d have every time you were in one, partly because your relationships were usually long-term, compared to his, and also because your ex-boyfriends were nothing like him, which is safe to say that he wasn’t your type.

Maybe it was the age, the level of maturity, maybe it was the sense of security, maybe he’s just not the kind of guy who could give you what you want, although honestly he doesn’t know exactly what that is.

But if Namjoon - your intelligent, upstanding, businessman ex-boyfriend who was also really handsome and kind - and your subsequent heartbreak are anything to go by, then Jungkook is clearly reaching for the stars with you. Not that you’re out of his league, but he’s more like in the outskirts, just lying in the edges, the border between what’s possible and what isn’t, but definitely far from the center of action. Even tonight, the most time you’d spent together in years that wasn’t in a party, was because Jimin had been hurt.

If anything, though, his long standing admiration for you hadn’t really gone away. And he doesn’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

The weekend with Jimin staying with you wasn’t that unbearable, primarily because he was rendered immobile on your bed and was usually sleepy. You were thankful that Jungkook dropped by to keep your brother company while you caught up on errands and chores.

With another work week coming filled with meetings and events, you had Jimin stay with Jungkook first. He insisted it wasn’t a bother; his work as a freelance artist and a part-time tattooist gives him control of his time.

It’s the weekend after the incident when you hear a knock on the door, not expecting to see Jimin with his casted ankle and crunches; behind him are 3 large luggages and a few boxes.

You’re just about to process the sight before you when he says, “I got sacked from the company when I said I couldn’t get back to work next week. And I can’t afford to pay rent anymore, even if I get a roommate and I…” he turns to you, almost shameful, “I have nowhere else to go.”

You sigh because really, your relationship with your brother is hinged on fights you don’t really mean, pettiness that drives you crazy, and an unconditional love that you both deny but undeniably share. So you open the door wider and laugh at his “you’re the best sister in the world” claim and your usual response of “you only have one.”

Jungkook arrives with the last box and you help bring in all the stuff that seems never-ending, making you wonder how these fit in his car and how he managed to bring everything, including your brother.

“Park Jimin, you have so much stuff! You might as well have hired a mover,” you cry out.

“Oh I did,” Jimin answers, pointing to Jungkook.

You cock an eyebrow because obviously, movers get paid.

“I told him you said you’re gonna make us dinner.”

“Except I didn’t,” you scrunch your eyebrows and turn to Jungkook, amused at his sudden change of expression, bambi eyes widening at his innocence.

“I swear, he seemed so convincing,” Jungkook claims, hands held up as if in surrender. He bites his lips and looks at the ground. “I can just go, really. I’ll just force him to treat me to lunch when he’s healed and I can wrestle him if he doesn’t.”

“Don’t be silly, Kook. Stay for dinner,” you crack a smile. You walk to your kitchen and take out the pork belly to thaw. “I won’t make you steak though. That’s reserved for my wine nights when I want to bask in my singleness,” you call out.

“Also,” you turn to Jimin, “you don’t deserve my steak.”

Your brother laughs, knowing that it’s your way to mask the kindness you’re showing.

Later that night, with dinner out of the way and your spare bedroom set up for Jimin to stay, you guide him to the sofa bed and make sure his foot is elevated, bell just within his reach that you instructed him to ring when he needs you.

“Thanks, ___. You—”

“Are the best sister in the world, I know,” you cut him off.

“I was gonna say you should get some rest and to not worry about me. I’ll be fine,” he smiles.

You nod and head out the room, the worried look on your face not going unnoticed by Jungkook, who’d just finished wiping the dishes.

“Everything okay, ___?”

You heave out a sigh.

“What the fuck am I gonna do with him, Kook?” You ask, the reality of your injured and now unemployed brother dawning on you. “What am I gonna tell my parents?”

Oddly enough, it’s when you and Jimin were finally adults did your parents think to check up on you both. Perhaps living under the same roof didn’t warrant that, but with both children now living independently hundreds of miles away from them, they’ve ensured to call every week. Your conversations mostly revolve around Jimin, though, the words “take care of your brother” not having an expiration date, apparently.

You know the weight of the words - it’s not just because you’re older but because by your parents’ standards, you’re also the more stable and financially secure one by nature of your 9-5 corporate job in a fancy building that requires you to wear corporate attires, in contrast to Jimin’s late-nights in a dance studio busting moves in sweats.

Your parents are partial to your kind of work, given that they’ve spent more than half their lives in the same field and always wished you’d both do the same, even if you promised yourself you wouldn’t give in to the world that took so much of your parents’ time from you.

Much as you want to believe you’re just doing your job as the older child by entering the industry, you were too much of a people-pleaser who just wanted to make her parents proud.

Jimin, on the other hand, was smart enough to only apply to the performing arts programs of prestigious universities in Seoul and was good enough to actually land a scholarship in the same school as you; your parents were backed in a corner and couldn’t do anything.

You’d never tell Jimin but you always admired him for that; it takes a lot to stand up to your parents without actually standing up to them. You’re just glad that between the both of you, someone was brave enough to go for what they genuinely wanted.

“Tell them the truth?” Jungkook shrugs. “I mean, what’s the worst that could happen?”

“You act like you don’t know what my parents are like.”

True, Jungkook thinks, but he also knows things have improved on their end. “Well, if anything, they’re more receptive now. They would congratulate Jimin on the choreographies they’d see those idol groups dance. They ask him about work, too.”

You smile at the thought, something your brother never mentioned, but you can imagine how happy that might’ve made him. Jimin, as you’ve found out, is a sweetheart to his friends - affectionate in all ways and very expressive - something he isn’t to you and your parents. The same can be said about you, and you soften at the thought that you and Jimin really aren’t that much different from each other.

Jungkook picks up on the thoughts going through your head. “He probably didn’t tell you because you know him, he’d go all soft if he does, and Jimin has this persona when it comes to you. And it isn’t the soft one.”

“Goes both ways, I guess.”

“It’s not the end of the world, and he doesn’t seem to think so. He’s going to be fine.”

Jimin, in all sense of the word, is not fine. It took a few days until he cracked. He went from being an obedient patient who followed the doctor’s order of staying in bed, to one who constantly walked around and complained that he had nothing to do.

Going on dating apps makes him sad, looking at job openings makes him sad, not being able to move and dance makes him sad. And your heart breaks for him, knowing what it’s like to lose your sense of direction and motivation at the loss of something or someone important. You allow him to let out his frustrations, though, listen to him when he rants, feed him his favorite food, and call Jungkook over with his PS4 that isn’t actually broken.

In fact, calling Jungkook has been your go-to, especially when you’re running out of things to say to comfort Jimin. Most times it’s really just so they could play PS4 together, prompting Jungkook to leave it at your place so Jimin could stay preoccupied and not feel too down when the job lists come up empty. He tires easily though, and it’s after he’s been tucked in bed that you usually settle for a cup of tea in the kitchen, Jungkook now the one listening to you talk.

It usually starts with the topic of Jimin, followed by some memory from your childhood that you and Jungkook get hysterical over, followed by a story about your work, and then a story about his. His stories are more interesting though. He shows you the paintings and digital pieces he makes for clients, and tells you amusing bits about his tattooing gig like amusing patterns and memorable customers.

Hearing all this sends warmth through you because of how much he’s grown. While you’re only 3 years older, you met Jungkook when he was a shy 10 year-old, a complete opposite to you and Jimin’s naturally sociable selves. He went from smiling sheepishly to joking around and giving you high-fives in the 5 years before you went to Seoul to study.

Of course he’s grown when he followed your brother to the same university, having seen him with different girls, going to the same parties because your friends had taken a liking to him, and attending his art exhibitions. He went from greeting you under his breath to calling out to you at a bar while he’s surrounded by his peers.

This was the kid who used to follow your brother around - even joined the dance club in high school - and would dunk his head in water if you asked him to, but now he’s forged his own path, doing what he loves, and enjoying every bit of his time that he controls.

Personally, you’re also just happy that he can be available for your brother and for you, too, seeing that the nights you used to spend forcing yourself to sleep are now spent in good conversation with him.

He’s also gotten way more attractive in the past few years, something you’ve only noticed now. Perhaps it has much to do with the physical closeness when you talk - your kitchen bar isn’t that long, anyway - where you’re able to pay more attention to his defined jawline, his dark eyes that anybody could get lost in, the curve of his nose, and the perfectly-placed beauty marks on his face. Come to think of it, maybe Jungkook has always been handsome, but you stop your thoughts before they go anywhere restricted.

It’s one Saturday night when you arrive home, after having drinks with your friends, to a very drunk Jimin and a tipsy Jungkook, gorging on fried chicken. Just thinking of cleaning up is already giving you a headache, which is aggravated by your brother’s drunk singing of classic yet cringey sad love songs.

“Yah! Look at the mess you’ve made,” you smack Jimin’s arm, pointing to the chicken crumbs on the floor. “And alcohol, seriously? You can barely walk properly and now you’re drinking?”

“I’m injured, unemployed, homeless, and heartbroken. Leave me alone,” is all he says, then proceeds to belt out an insanely high note that pierces your ears and which causes Jungkook to laugh, used to this already and may have been enduring this the past hour or so.

“He’s been like this for the past 4 hours,” Jungkook says.

“And you let him?”

At the final high note, Jimin passes out on the couch, body limp over the empty space to his left.

“He wanted to drink his frustrations away, thought it might help,” Jungkook responds.

You sigh in annoyance but think he’s right, too. Jimin was out drinking his frustrations the night he got injured but at least now he’s doing it in the safety of your home.

“I guess,” you shrug. “Can you take him to his room before he severs his neck?”

Jungkook laughs but follows. He carries Jimin over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and you pretend to not look hot and bothered at how easily he could carry your dead-weight brother.

You follow to the room shortly and place an aspirin and orange juice on the side table, knowing it’s Jimin’s hangover drink. You remove the strands of hair that have stuck to his forehead and tuck him under the covers.

Jungkook looks at you fondly; for someone who always claims you should’ve disowned her brother, you sure have a very affectionate way of showing it.

You step out of the room and take in Jungkook’s tipsy state, red cheeks and glassy eyes giving him away.

“You should stay,” you tell him. “You drank and I doubt you’d sober up anytime soon, but try anyway.”

He nervously accepts but not for the reasons you think. He’s nervous because aside from those sleepovers at your house when you were younger, this is the first time he’s sleeping under the same roof as you, and that makes him giddy but anxious at the same time. He hopes you don’t catch him mid-dream saying your name; that would be too awkward to explain.

He goes back to the living room post-shower, a blanket and large pillow on the couch and you, tucked in the corner with a glass of juice.

“Did you want to sleep already? I can go to my room if you are.”

“No, it’s okay. I’m not that sleepy yet, you can stay.”

He refuses your offer of a drink. Unsure of the appropriate distance from you now that there’s space to go around, he settles on the other end of the couch. You smile at him as he sinks on the corner and he smiles back as you take baby sips from the glass. You both settle in comfortable silence, appreciating the quiet as a reprieve from the mind-numbing noise from earlier.

You take a big gulp and he couldn’t hold the chuckle at your wide eyes hidden behind the glass.

“So I’m guessing your hangover drink is apple juice?” He asks, not missing the similarity with your brother.

“Yeah. Jimin hates it so I’m sure he’ll never take it. He used to finish all the orange juice at home and I was mad because I wanted orange juice, too,” you say with a pout. Jungkook’s heart skips a beat at how adorable you look and goes for an ah, that’s why face because he remembers you fighting Jimin over it before.

“So you just switched to apple juice?”

“Yeah, pretty much. It’s really good. I thought he’d switch too just to annoy me but he said he really doesn’t like it.”

“Look at you two, being all civilized for once,” Jungkook teases. You throw a pillow at him and laugh at his comment, but you don’t disagree.

“Yah! We’ve always been civilized, okay?”

“Now that is a lie. May I remind you of the time you two wrestled in front of me over a piece of pop tart. How you tackled him to the ground and he pulled your hair and the innocent treat was crushed in the process.”

“Hey, I was 15 and I called dibs on the strawberry!”

“Or that time you both wanted to watch different movies and had me choose and I felt like I was signing a death sentence either way? But it didn’t matter because you still got into a pillow fight?”

“His choices were always so boring!”

“Or that time when…” You throw him another pillow.

“Yeah, yeah. I get it. We weren’t always civilized,” you give up, laughing so hard with him at the memories. “You witnessed the worst parts of us, huh?”

“I didn’t really have a choice, did I?” Jungkook cocks an eyebrow.

“Well, you were the only one who stayed. The rest of your friends would run out once Jimin and I started going at it.”

He laughs at this because if only you knew why he always stayed. He actually liked that you’d let him referee you two, he felt wanted.

“Hmm, it takes a lot to handle the Park siblings, I don’t blame them.”

“Wow, Jeon Jungkook. Calling out your elder. Where is this bravery coming from?” You tease.

“I drank, remember?”

“Not much though.”

He shrugs. He doesn’t know, too, but he likes seeing you look flustered. “Enough liquid courage, I guess.”

You deem his answer satisfactory but it does make you recall all those petty fights growing up.

“Sorry you had to witness all that,” you say, giving him a shy smile. “Our personalities were always just clashing and it was harder not to fight each other.”

“I think you two are just so similar, that’s why.”

You look at Jungkook, eyes wide at the statement you’d only ever thought to yourself.

“He thinks the world of you, you know?” He continues, sensing your now serious demeanor. “He used to tell the mean older kids that you’re his sister and you’ll fight them if they hurt him because he just knows you’d protect him no matter what.”

You laugh and roll your eyes but Jungkook knows you agree.

“For schoolwork, he would always write about you as his role model or the person he looks up to.” Jungkook doesn’t miss how your eyes soften at this. “He never found out that I knew but I’ve read parts, how he wanted to be strong and kind like you, to be independent and smart and hardworking like you.”

Maybe it’s the remnants of alcohol, or this apple juice is just fucking delicious but you’re getting emotional.

“And honestly, I don’t think that’s changed. He’ll always look up to you, whether he’ll say it or not.”

And there goes the water works, causing panic in Jungkook and he immediately goes to you. Noticing your non-movement, he uses the edges of his hoodie to wipe the tears that have begun flowing from your eyes. He stills for a moment but seeing how you haven’t pushed him away, he continues.

You look up at him with watery eyes and quivering lips. Somehow you should be embarrassed but something about Jungkook having seen the worst of you and being nothing but a huge help these past few weeks, you feel safe. No judgment whatsoever, just an air of understanding and care.

“Why are you telling me this?” You ask, and Jungkook feels weak at how you look. He didn’t mean to make you sad but all he wants to do now is hug you until you feel better.

“Because you’ve been so worried and so hard on yourself, as if it’s only your burden to carry.”

You try to object but he cuts you. “Jimin’s an adult. He’s crying and drinking and sulking but that’s normal. He’ll be fine and get himself together. I know that. Even he knows that. You know why? Because it’s what he’s seen you do.” Jungkook wipes another stray tear.

“Whether it’s a breakup or a work thing, he’s seen you take hits but never back down, never let anybody walk all over you, never let them take away the best parts of you. He’s struggled before, too, but he always got back up.”

“He’s good and strong that way,” you reply softly.

“Like I said, he has a good role model,” he smiles, nudging your shoulder.

It’s meant to be playful but it’s comforting for you, and you’re leaning on his shoulder before you know it, ignoring the way he briefly stills at your action.

“You’re a good person, Kook. We’re lucky to have you.”

You’re so close to him and he can feel the heat radiate from you. It’s too quiet that he’s afraid you’d hear the thrumming of his heart, from your words and the affection behind your still head on his shoulder. The situation calls for it, he thinks, so he lays his hand on your back and rubs circles on it.

He’ll chalk it up to liquid courage again if you ask, but you don’t. Instead you snuggle closer, chasing his warmth. He swears he could pass out with just this, but he tortures himself more by holding you even closer and he swears, even with his thick hoodie, he could feel your smile.

Over a month since the gutter incident - as you like to call it - you, Jimin, and Jungkook have found a pattern of cohabitation, and yes, that includes Jungkook, seeing as how he’s become a staple in your household and your life.

At some point, Jimin had sulked less and would spend his time watching dance videos to remind himself of the feeling, even if it was just virtual. He’d even expanded his choice of employment by checking job openings as a fitness instructor and a ballet teacher for children.

He’d also done his regular foot exercise once the pain became bearable. Still unemployed and heartbroken though, he’s been shameless in making your place his own home, with most of his belongings now removed from their boxes, and inviting Jungkook over any time, any day. Not that you minded though, since he’s been nothing but a literal angel.

Living in a studio on his own, Jungkook usually has ramen or street food as dinner, which is why Jimin used to invite him over his shared apartment with Taehyung so that Jungkook could at least have home cooked meals every once in a while.

It’s why he’s often over your place on weeknights he doesn’t have a shift at the tattoo parlor. That and because Jimin still wants him over to play video games. Jungkook brings food over or pays for delivery though, and you welcome the initiative.

On weekends, you’re all busy doing your own thing in the living room together, which carries over to movie nights. The young ones pass up on their friends’ invites to a party while you, well, your friends would rather spend their weeknights with their partners instead. So your night of basking in your singleness now means doing so with your brat of a brother and his dependable best friend.

It’s a Saturday afternoon when you get home from doing errands and you find both men in your living room, with Jimin reading a book on some dancer’s biography and Jungkook busy on his laptop. Your brother’s face pops on the screen and you decide it’s not a personal matter so you plop next to Jungkook on the floor and softly rest your chin on his shoulder, something you’ve maybe done once or twice before.

“What you up to?” You ask, an impressed look on your face at the snippets of Jimin dancing, some of which you’ve never seen before.

“I’m working on his application video,” he says, pointing to your brother. “Since he’s not able to dance when he tries for jobs, he thinks sending them a video to show his skills will help.”

“Oh, like a visual CV of some sort?”

“Yes!” Jimin states. “Want them to know what they’re missing out on, and that’s a lot.”

You roll your eyes but mentally agree; your brother is the most talented person you know.

“Kookie’s been kind enough to work on it for me although he’s been on it for hours,” he continues, a playful smile on his face.

“Give him a break, Chim. He’s done so much for you already,” you say, getting your own laptop and setting it up on the table.

“Nah, it’s the least I can do. He’s helped me so much, ___.”

“He fought off your bullies 15 years ago…” You cock an eyebrow.

Jungkook chuckles. “Yes. And more. Helped me with school work, my confidence, my social skills…”

“Gave him tips to woo girls because he was too shy to ask them on dates,” Jimin adds.

“Hmm,” you mumble. “What you gotta be shy for? Just flash them your smile or show them your toned arms, they’ll probably jump on you right there,” you say nonchalantly, unaware of the way Jungkook’s heart stills at your comment.

“He doesn’t want them to jump on him, ___. He wants them to actually like him, or love, whatever. He’s a romantic, you know,” Jimin teases. “Would travel to the ends of the earth or fight to the death for the woman he loves, whoever she is,” he says matter-of-factly, unaware of the way Jungkook’s breath hitches because if Jimin only knew.

“Aww, Kook. That’s cute,” is all you say, smile genuine though, he wishes he could see it everyday. But cute, really? That’s it?

He chooses not to dwell on it and instead asks you what you’re up to, to which you respond that it’s a presentation you have to work on. You’re frustrated at your lack of design eye and it looks so bare; you want it to look professional but still eye-catching.

“Maybe I can help!” Jungkook states.

But of course, you think. You’ve been accommodating an actual graphic designer in your home, surely it’s fair that he help you out, right?

“Yes please, Kook. I need to blow these people away with my smarts and my non-existent creativity,” you laugh.

Jungkook sets aside his laptop, adoringly quick to prioritize helping you, and works on your presentation. He knows just the right color and font combo, even helping out on which details to include, what visuals to add, and how to make it exactly how you want.

You’re amused at how easily he works on it. He's meticulous, working on the size of the texts and the angles of the patterns. Jimin chides him for his perfectionism but unbeknownst to both of you, Jungkook’s laser focus is a means of distraction with how physically close you’ve been to him the past hour, eyes flicking from him to the screen.

He wants this to last but also can’t wait for it to be over because of how nervous he is, especially with your constant praises for something really basic, but which he finds so charming all the same.

Pretty soon he finishes and returns your laptop to you and retrieves his, quick to get back to work and focus on something else, which still proves futile once you remove your sweater to reveal a camisole underneath, and tie your hair on a high bun, thus exposing more of your shoulders and neck.

He shakes off the tingles he feels, pretends to be completely unbothered by his attraction towards you that seems to intensify day-by-day. He looks forward to seeing you, and when he doesn’t, he yearns to. He’d been used to admiring you from afar but these past weeks showed that he has all the reasons to admire you even up close.

You’re just as brilliant, feisty, and funny; sassy too like Jimin but in a captivating way, yet so kind-hearted just the same.

The three of you settle in a comfortable silence, each busy with your own task at hand. With your knees touching Jungkook’s, your questions on any additions you make on the presentation, and him asking for your approval on the video (which he seeks, oddly enough from you and not from Jimin), your eventual quick agreement on dinner and your teamwork in preparing it, it all feels so familiar, like it’s home.

The next evening, you find yourself sandwiched between Jungkook to your right and Jimin to your left, who moved from his center seat to lie down, with half of his tiny body settled comfortably on top of you and Jungkook. Your brother insisted on watching “How to Be Single” tonight, like a slap to all your faces.

It’s during one of the scenes with the protagonist’s ex when Jimin randomly asks, “___, do you regret breaking up with Namjoon?”

It may seem like a question out of left field, but with everything that’s happened, Jimin has been quite reflective lately, particularly about love. He’s had his fair share of partners but unlike you, is more a feeler than a thinker; gets out of relationships as fast as he gets into them; takes it one day at a time whereas you always have to consider the future.

You don’t need to ponder on the question; you’ve gone through this multiple times with your best friends but never really with your brother.

“Sometimes. But there was too much on the line and it was unfair to both of us if we carried on.” You sigh, recalling the moment you both decided it wouldn’t work. “It was something we had to do but doesn’t mean it hurt any less.”

Jimin hums, thinking back to the days he’d barge in your apartment and ask for leftovers when really, he just wanted to be near you so you had someone to cry to, just in case. That was over 2 years ago and it took you a year to finally say that you were over the relationship. He used to note your choice of words - “I’m over us,” never “I’m over him.”

Next to you, Jungkook is picking on his nails, unsure if he should be part of the conversation. He’d heard about the break up since you had common friends. It was quite the shock, knowing how you and Namjoon were.

You pick up this nervous habit, aware that he might not know what really happened. It wasn’t a secret but there was more to the story.

“We just wanted different things,” you say then turning to both of them, “so you two better make sure you’re on the same page with the person you date, talk about what lies ahead, what you want, what you’re willing to compromise and what you aren’t.”

“That’s good advice, yeah Kookie?” Jimin says.

“Why you focusing on me?” Jungkook asks.

“You’re the one focused on the dating, not the settling. You avoid those conversations.”

“You don’t want to settle?” You ask, now curious. You’ve seen him with girlfriends but thinking back now, his relationships never really lasted.

“It’s not that,” he glares at Jimin. “I’m more of a live-in-the-moment kind of guy. Thinking about the future is great, I mean, any mature individual does that, it’s just…”

He heaves out a sigh, hoping he’s not shooting himself in the foot with his statement. “What good is the future if you don’t take care of what you have right now? Isn’t the present more important because it’s what’s assured? The future is literally dependent on that, so the now is what I want to focus on.”

He rests his head on the couch, nervous of your reaction. He knows you’re a planner, needs to see things far ahead to know what to do.

There’s no one way to go about life, he acknowledges that. He just doesn’t want you to think he’s not a serious guy. With his developing feelings for you, not seeing him as a potential partner is literally the worst thing that could happen.

Jimin continues with the movie he paused but in your mind, all you could think about was what Jungkook said. If you and Namjoon hadn’t obsessed about the future, would things have been different? Would you still be together?

The sinking feeling comes at the realization that maybe they still wouldn’t. What if your ‘present’ with him then wasn’t good enough in the first place? That the “could be” was more exciting than the “what is”? Suddenly there’s clarity, you just don’t know if it’s the good kind.

Still, it doesn’t keep you from sinking further down the couch until you’re leaning on Jungkook’s shoulder. And like the few times that you have, there’s a comforting feeling in the act.

“You must’ve made your ex-girlfriends really happy, huh Kook?” You ask, head shuffling near his upper arm. “Focusing on the present and the moments and all that.”

You wish it was something you did, but Namjoon was just like you.

“I guess you could say that,” he answers shyly.

“But that was just it though, right Kook?” Jimin says. “Made them happy but not enough to fall in love.”

This prompts you to look at him, wide eyes full of questions. “How come?”

He turns to you and if he tried enough, Jimin right behind you would blur and there’s just you, overhead light illuminating the best parts of your face which is, well, everything. You’re absolutely breathtaking.

And at your question - how come he never fell in love - comes his own realization. For all of his talk of living in the moment, tucked in the corner of his mind is the thought of the future he’s only ever dreamed about, the one that he’s always wanted, well, with you.

“I - I actually don’t know.”

Adopting your brother, and by extension Jungkook, isn’t as bad as you expected. Sure, Jimin is still a diva and annoys you just because he wants to, but he makes you laugh more, compliments your cooking more, and encourages you to go out and have fun. Most times you do, but if you’re being honest, you’ve been enjoying time spent with him and Jungkook more.

Your movie and PS4 nights are chaotic and only egos are harmed. You and Jungkook help Jimin with job hunting, monitor his practice dancing, and watch dance videos with him. Two months since the gutter incident, you’ve gone to the park, the beach, and the river, perfected making choco-walnut cookies, and built fairy houses.

Your days are more tiring yet satisfying, as if your apartment actually feels like a sanctuary, save for Jimin’s provocation leading to your bickering, but even that has become a welcome addition in your daily life as well.

Jungkook though is altogether a different story. You two have gone grocery shopping together more than once, had spent some mornings on a run, and some weeknights he even picks you up from work then you both grab some of Jimin’s favorite food for dinner. Those are on top of the many nights you’ve spent drinking whatever in the living room, bidding him goodnight either out the door or on your couch. You’re not exactly sure what to make of the giddiness but you shut down whatever unusual feeling there is before they start to mean anything more.

It started with a missed deadline, then an oversight of a risk, then your workmate Chul getting the last laugh. Sometimes, no matter how good you think things are going, all it takes is an extremely bad week, made up of extremely bad moments, to make you doubt yourself. You think some more, then you end up doubting everything else.

Am I good enough for this job? Can I really make a career here? Is this what I really want? Is this going to make me happy? Why the fuck am I still single? It’s the sudden feeling of uncertainty that overwhelms you, makes you second-guess, and suddenly you’re not as stable and secure as you thought you were.

It’s this feeling that you carry over the day after at your friend Jin’s and his wife’s baby shower. Between their growing family, Yoongi’s hit-making record label, Hoseok’s renewed contract as a travel show host, Yuri’s PhD, and Na-eun’s engagement to her college boyfriend, you feel so… lost. Like you’re just getting by, just letting time pass until there’s something big and meaningful to look forward to again, whatever that is.

Of course your friends would never make you feel any less; that’s really on you, which is probably worse.

The party is on full swing; gifts have been given and time has come for full-on socializing where you all get to talk about how great your individual lives are. Except for you. And maybe Eun-ha on the corner who doesn’t seem to be happy being here, but that’s not your problem.

Somewhere near the bar is Jungkook, beer in hand and clearly enjoying himself. He’s a staple in events like this and he fits right in with everyone else - self-assured, content, in control, and may be on his way to a date, seeing as how that pretty girl hasn’t left his side all afternoon. Not that you were monitoring, though.

For once, you’re actually hoping Jimin was here so you can whine together, but the group he used to choreograph for invited him to their concert, so there’s that.

You’re on your third glass of champagne when you head inside Jin’s enormous house, away from the laughter and obvious put-together lives of your friends, when you see him, the man who was once your embodiment of stability, of a “good and secure life,” as your parents had said.

He sees you, flashes his dimple-bearing smile, and walks towards you, looking extremely good in a white polo and denim jacket, brown hair slicked back.

“___!” He greets, his arms immediately engulfing you in a tight hug, providing you the physical warmth that you haven’t felt in a while. You sigh into him, your head on his firm chest, his now sturdier frame but a reminder of the time that's passed.

You linger, prompting him to gently stroke your back like he used to after a long day at work.

“You needed this, huh?” He observes, voice low and comforting.

You release yourself from his hold and look up at him, his sweet smile a contrast to his commanding presence.

“Unfortunately,” you sigh.

“Boss still not giving you due credit? Colleagues still not making it any easier? Stress still at an all-time high?” He asks, and it’s either he still reads you so well or your problems - or you - haven’t changed one bit.

“You’re just not your usual energetic self,” he continues. “I mean, I haven’t seen your genuine smile since you arrived.”

He’s been watching you? Somehow that sends heat to your cheeks and quickens your heartbeat.

“Just tired, is all. Plus, Jimin’s been living at home after a little accident,” you finally respond.

His face makes this charming worried expression. “House already a makeshift wrestling ring?” He laughs.

“You’d be surprised at how little damage there is in my apartment. Safe to say we’ve grown up,” you say, wide smile finally adorning your face, which he returns. You haven’t felt this light the whole week.

“It’s nice to see you again, Joonie.”

You and Namjoon find a spot in the large living room, with the 2-seater couch being the only one available, the physical closeness making it difficult not to be mesmerized by his gorgeous face. His laugh is still the same, the feel of his hand under yours is still the same; the attention he gives, his thoughtful and wise words, and ability to make you feel cared for haven’t changed.

You’re smiling more, eyes sparkling for sure, and you can’t help the way your body reacts the way it does - knees chasing his, hand tucking your hair behind your ear, voice going a key higher.

He’s still the same confident and self-assured man that you fell in love with, that you once saw a life with. It’s almost intoxicating, the way he speaks, sees the world, sees himself. You could easily fall into this again, into the ideal, the safe and secure, the expected, the could be. You think of the reasons why it didn’t work out, of what you chose when you decided to call it quits. His phone rings. He excuses himself but you still hear him. And you’re reminded why.

“I’m sure the gown looks beautiful, love. I’ll leave the party soon and meet you and our parents at the wedding planners’ office. See you in a bit.”

Your heart should be breaking but it’s just your pride that does.

“I’m sorry, it was my uh—“ he says, unsure.

“Your fiancé,” you smile, as if reminding him.

“Yeah it’s… it’s pretty recent and we uh… we’re planning to have it in 3 months,” he explains, eyes turning sullen, lips curling into an apologetic smile.

“Congratulations, Namjoon. I’m so glad you’re happy,” you say, hoping he picks up the sincerity in your voice.

He sits across from you again, hand on top of yours, his smile hopeful, and for the first time, you see him struggle with what to say. So you don’t give him a chance to.

“What are you still doing here?” You playfully nudge him. “You have somewhere else to be.”

“You’ll be okay?”

“Of course. Don’t worry about me.”

He lingers this time. Maybe in another life you would’ve worked out, you would’ve loved each other better, you would’ve fought for each other. But not in this.

He leans forward and places a soft kiss on your forehead and you shut your eyes, absorbing all the words he wishes he could say. I’m sorry. I will always care about you. I hope you find your happiness, too.

Your eyes follow him as he walks out the door, out to the woman who could definitely give him what you couldn’t. From across the room, a pair of eyes follows your movement too, the way it has since you entered the party four hours ago.

Whatever worry you initially had about getting drunk at your friend’s baby shower is out the window. You don’t mind anymore, not with your 5th glass of champagne and your 3 shots of vodka because of course, it’s Jin. You laugh along with your friends although you’re too dazed to process what they’re saying.

Your jaw is sore from laughing over things you don’t understand so you decide to head inside, maybe call it a night and take the drinking back to your place; at least you’d be in your pjs and not in a tight dress and heels.

You’re pulling open a door that just won’t budge and you exert what little energy you have, causing you to trip on yourself only to be held steady by strong hands on your waist.

“That’s a sliding door, ___,” the familiar voice says, tone low but still teasing.

You turn around and meet chocolate eyes looking down at you and you stare back even in your embarrassment.

“I… I think I’m drunk,” you stutter.

You’re met with laughter. “No shit, ___. Think I didn’t notice that?”

“I…” You say, looking down at the hands still holding onto you.

He quickly removes them, worry painting his face and you wave him off before he could apologize.

“Let’s go to a bar, Jungkook.”

You reasoned your decreased alcohol tolerance to your friends, which they didn’t buy but waved you off without much fanfare. They probably sensed you were out of it for a while. Or probably saw the exchange with Namjoon, who knows.

But you’re now at a bar eating chicken wings and fries like you’re about to run out of food, the guy next to you chuckling and reminding you to breathe every once in a while.

You finish your meal quickly and pout when you realize he’s barely touched his food.

“You’re not eating,” you state the obvious.

“Sorry, too entertained,” he laughs, the child-like sound now so familiar, you’d recognize it anywhere.

He’s just smiling at you and you feel so small under his gaze. He saw you talking with Namjoon, taking shots, and almost tripping earlier. He’s probably wondering who this person is; definitely not the one who’s been semi-housing him the past few months.

You bury your face in your hands. “I’m so embarrassed,” you cry out.

“Hey now,” he says, hands gently removing yours from your face. He stops the one tear before it falls off.

“God, how many times have I cried in front of you, Kook? This is humiliating.”

“No one’s counting though,” he states. “It’s your drinks I’m counting and I’m thinking maybe you’ve had enough.”

You nod and he orders a can of soda and a glass of water. With light chatter and glasses clinking in the background, you two fall in comfortable silence. He’s quietly picking on his food, eyes roaming the bar while yours flit from him to the space between you, somehow wishing it isn’t as wide as it is right now.

“I had a bad week,” you finally say. He nods.

“My friends are all accomplishing so many things, achieving their dreams and I’ve been stuck in the same company for 5 years.”

He nods again.

“I’m a 28 year-old who got drunk at a baby shower and flirted with her ex only to find out he’s engaged.”

Jungkook pretends not to be affected at the confirmation that you were indeed flirting with Namjoon but he nods just the same.

“And?” He asks.

“And? I’m in a bar with you, and I cried, and I’m acting like a baby because I had a terrible week and ended up doubting everything and now think I can’t get my life together. I mean, between my brother I can’t properly help, a job I can’t seem to stand out in no matter how hard I try…” You release a deep breath. “And a relationship I couldn’t keep because I wasn’t enough and I…”

“Hey, don’t say that,” he says angrily. “You’re none of those things.”

“I wasn’t sure if I wanted to have kids. And Namjoon always wanted to be a father,” you blurt, the words not stinging as they used to.

This stuns Jungkook. Jimin had always mentioned it was a mutual breakup but never said anything more. Jungkook didn’t think it was because of this.

“I thought I wanted a family, too. It was so easy to fall into the idea of that kind of life with him because he was the perfect person to have it with. But then one day I just started doubting it,” you sigh, recalling how hard you used to be on yourself for suddenly wanting something different.

“Sometimes I think, what if I gave myself more time, what if eventually I’d be sure?” You take a long breath. “But the uncertainty was too much and it wasn’t fair to him,” you huff. There was no blame game; you both knew it wasn’t anyone’s fault.

“Quite the dealbreaker, huh?” Jungkook wonders.

“Yeah but looking back, the other issues were just bubbling under the surface. The future was so enticing and we talked about it all the time, it seemed much more important than well, us,” you explain.

“It was Jimin who made me realize that I hung onto Namjoon for the relationship, the potential, what it meant. He was the epitome of stability and I was the same for him but at some point, even that wasn’t enough.”

“So, earlier. Why did you, uhm,” he starts, hoping it doesn’t come out wrong.

“Flirt with him?”

Jungkook nods.

“Being with him used to make me feel like I had it together, you know? Like I had it figured out because he did and it was silly but I don’t know, maybe I wanted to trick myself into thinking that by being close to him in any way, I had it together.”

“You don’t need to have it together all the time. You just need to have it together enough.” His whole body turns to you.

“You had one bad week, we all do. But it’s over now, isn’t it? Your friends doing well in their careers? So are you. You know what not to compromise on, what to stand up for, which battles to fight. I’ve heard enough of your stories to know that there are people at work who respect you, look up to you. The way your friends, your brother, and I look up to you.”

Your lips are quivering, forcing yourself not to cry again tonight. He just always knows what to say. “That’s really sweet, Jungkook.”

“Thanks, but I wasn’t trying to be sweet. I was just being honest. You’re a lot of good things to people, ___. Isn’t that what matters? Being a little off at work and drinking then flirting with an ex don’t make you any less of a person. Okay? You’re allowed to slip up every once in a while.”

You let this sink in.

“Look at you, Jeon Jungkook. When did you get this wise? It’s like I just blinked then you’re all of a sudden so grown up.” You tease to keep yourself from breaking down.

“Like I told you, much of what I know, I got from Jimin. And what he knows, he got from you. Maybe try listening to yourself, yeah?” He smirks.

You nod, smile creeping on your face the same way all the heat is rushing to your cheeks. You feel comfortable like this, being vulnerable and sad and doubtful but he’s holding you close without touching you, making you feel safe with just his presence. In the now noisy bar, your bodies angling towards each other, and with his tender smile, you feel a type of intimacy you’ve never felt before. It’s reassuring yet enticing at the same time. And this scares you.

You both stay for another hour until you decide it’s time to head home. Jungkook had taken a cab, too in anticipation of drinking so you both decided to walk back to your apartment, knowing the couple of blocks would be enough to sober you up.

The streets are still alive with the nightlife just starting but the noise starts to tone down once you reach your neighborhood. The long walk is soothing, as Jungkook leaves you to your thoughts, except for the times he has to steady you because, well, your vodka shots are still in your system and a walk isn’t enough to flush them down. Still, you’re calm, a feeling of acceptance overtaking you.

“Thanks for tonight, Jungkook. I hope I didn’t ruin any potential date or anything just because I couldn’t get the door open,” you laugh.

He raises an eyebrow.

“That, uh, girl seemed really into you,” you stammer.

He chuckles, hands in his pockets and cheeks flushed at the implication of your observation.

“That wasn't much, we were just chatting.” He turns to you. “I could see your scrunched eyebrows from where I was and thought you needed help,” he shrugs.

You sigh. He was always helpful, ever since he was a kid.

“You know, you were always the good guy. Jimin’s other friends were so rowdy and immature. Yugyeom was always sprawled on the couch with his feet up like he owned the place; Sejun was always finishing our ice cream, and Sunghoon was such a flirt.”

Jungkook laughs, recalling the times you were scolding all of them for messing up the house and being so annoyingly noisy and eating your snacks.

“You were always the well-behaved and mature one. Like, you barely engaged in their pranks and stupid boy talk. You’d rather watch it all unfold until it was too much and you’d help me in the kitchen always. I remember your glazed potatoes. God, that was so hilarious.”

“That was embarrassing.”

“It was funny! And adorable. You were always so kind.”

“Thanks but uh, I wasn’t trying to be kind. Well, sort of. I wanted to impress you. And I—” He doesn’t know where this is coming from but it’s like word vomit, especially now that you’ve started to walk more slowly and are looking at him.

“It was an opportunity to be near you. Kinda wanted a lot of that back then. Even now, actually.”

You gulp, unsure of what to feel or how to react. You thought you were imagining his lingering looks, or how his eyes shone a tad brighter and his smile was a bit wider when you were around. But he’s not saying what he’s saying, right?

“I, uh. Well, maybe you look up to me like an older—“

“Don’t say sister because I never saw you as one,” he interrupts you, frustration laced in his voice as if the word is venom. “Not when I was a teenager, not in the years after, and especially not now.”

You hesitantly turn to him, his nervous face a contrast to the offended tone of his voice just seconds ago. He nibbles on his lips, a mannerism you noticed when he was a teenager who always seemed shy around you and would only relax after you talked to him.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles. I didn’t mean to sound angry. I just—“

“That was your angry tone?” You tease, your laugh affirming him that you’re not upset one bit, just… unsure. You’re flattered, definitely; he is a very attractive man. Still your brother’s best friend, though.

This eases him, but prompts him to test the waters.

“I’m a gentle boy, what can I say? Most times, at least,” he says, and you don’t miss the playful tone of this voice, his eyes peering down at you, making your breath hitch and your hands clammy.

You wrap yourself with your arms - really to wipe the sweat off because you’re feeling nervous - but Jungkook takes this differently, as anyone would, and immediately unzips his jacket and puts it on you.

You slow on your tracks and you feel even warmer. He follows your pace but urges you to speed up once he feels a droplet on his cheek. You’re glad you opted to wear low heels today, tiring your calves only a little but allowing you to walk fast enough until you’re on the steps of your apartment in time to miss the sudden downpour.

Well, Jungkook doesn’t because as he enters, a portion of his torso is wet, his black shirt sticking on his skin to tease you of his toned abs that you definitely will be thinking about tonight. Between that, his damp hair, and soaked veiny arm, you curse your mind for the images it’s currently making up.

All he did was indirectly tell you he has a crush on you, right? Or did he? He doesn’t seem as bothered as you expected him to be if that was the case so maybe you misinterpreted?

You can’t stand this wet version of him so you say you’ll get him a towel but are too flustered so you hit the wall as you turn towards the bathroom, eliciting a loud “ow!”

“You okay?” He asks worriedly.

“Yeah, still drunk I guess,” you lie. He smirks and probably knows you’re lying.

“I’ll take care of myself, don’t worry. Go wash up and get ready for bed.”

“Are you ordering me around?” You ask, trying your best to reestablish yourself as the one in authority because you can’t take how this man is making you feel nervous and unsettled and not in control.

“Do you want me to?” He simpers, flustering you even more. What is with him?

You roll your eyes and trudge to your bathroom. You’re technically sober but with Jungkook’s looks, the sudden flirty tone of his voice, and his innuendos, you might as well be drunk again.

You open the door and seconds later he’s by your bedroom, a glass of water in one hand and apple juice in the other. The bottle of aspirin is tucked under his arm by his rib and he asks you to get it and you think he's evil for testing you but you take it, acting unbothered. He follows you to your room and you don’t stop him.

Glasses now on your bedside, you tuck yourself in. “Thank you, Jungkook.”

“For what?”

“For staying with me? Listening to me?” You test the waters, too. “For caring for me?” And his smugness disappears. Before you is a man, all strong and tough yet his smile is the tiniest, softest you’ve ever seen on him, and even from where you are, you could see the tips of his ears turn red.

“I really appreciate everything,” you conclude, and you mean it.

He gathers himself before he looks you in the eyes. “Don’t worry about it. Anything you need, just tell me.” You nod.

“Sleep well, ___.”

You don’t sleep well. In fact, even with the rain pouring outside, you feel so hot, you end up shedding your shorts.

The closeness with Jungkook has been gradual and if anything, it’s been comfortable. You convince yourself what he has is probably just a little crush; convincing your heart to still is a different story.

Jungkook, on the other hand, can’t stop smiling. He was testing the waters tonight, gauging how you would react to his flirtation and teasing. It was partly the alcohol but then you’d gone all shy and flustered; he thought it was worth a shot.

He was half expecting you to scold him like you used to do with Sunghoon, or berate him like those guys at work but you did neither. You don’t seem to hate him, even with his indirect confession to you, and that’s really better than what he’d hoped.

You wake up dissatisfied with your sleep and take your hangover necessities; dealing with Jungkook last night did add to your inebriation.

You head out to the kitchen to prepare some beef bone soup to help with the headache, hands trying to remove the sleep from your eyes. You move like you’re on autopilot like most post-night out mornings and then you hear someone gasp.

“Shit, woman. Learn your manners and put some clothes on,” Jimin shouts.

It wouldn’t have been bothersome had Jungkook not been here but of course, he is. Next to your brother, eyes wide and definitely trying not to look at your bare legs. It dawns on you that you indeed removed your shorts because of that very man and your face contorts in shock and embarrassment.

“Fuck. Jimin! Grab me my shorts on my bed, please!!!” You cry out and stand behind the counter.

He’s too scandalized to complain so he rushes to your room and you feel so hot all over. You avoid Jungkook’s face at all costs, which apparently is what he’s also doing.

Jimin throws your shorts on your face. “Get yourself together, jeez,” he scowls.

“You’re the one invading my space, okay, both of you,” you bite back.

Jimin’s making faces like he always does when you scold him and Jungkook sits next to him, chuckling.

“I shouldn’t have welcomed you, you brats. I’m used to walking around my apartment in my underwear so this is a lifestyle change.”

“Oh god, shut it. Nobody wants to imagine you without clothes on,” he cringes.

For some reason, your eyes find Jungkook, who visibly gulps. You glare at both men, and Jimin responds with an evil smile.

You return to what you were meant to do and start getting ingredients. Jungkook starts to feel bad and approaches you, mumbles to Jimin that he’ll just help.

Jungkook appears next to you. “Did you mean that?”

You sigh. “I didn’t. Of course you two are welcome here.”

“I was referring to the other one,” he says with a low voice.

Your eyes widen and you smack his arm. “What is wrong with you? Stop teasing,” you loud-whisper, but he doesn’t miss the way you try to hide your laugh.

“You’re cute when you’re flustered,” he smirks, and you get flustered even more.

You’re a 28-year old getting scandalized over playful comments by this ridiculously good-looking man and you feel so pathetic but you can’t deny that it’s exciting you. It’s been a while since you’ve had someone flirt with you and pay attention to you like this, make you all giddy and entranced as if you’re an adolescent getting her first love letter or being told by her crush that she’s pretty.

There’s playfulness there but affection, too. You see it in the way he stops the teasing and smiles to himself, then proceeds to help you cook, looks at you with fondness while you eat, then forces Jimin to clean up with him.

This continues for the next few weeks. His lingering looks on you are more flirty now and he smirks when you look away and try to hide your flushed face. His tone of voice when Jimin is nearby is lower, as if he’s telling you a secret.

He no longer stiffens when Jimin moves to the corner of the couch and kicks you closer to Jungkook so that your brother can make space for himself. In fact, it’s the opposite now, with Jungkook finding ways to be near you - when the three of you are on a grocery run, when you’re all on the couch for movie night, and especially when Jimin opts to sit on the floor - shuffling closer, knees grazing each other’s.

You’ve kept your head to yourself, fighting the urge to rest it on his shoulder and he definitely noticed this, so he’s started to edge you, in a way. The once lingering finger touches when he hands you something are no more, so are the “accidental” elbow brushes.

He stands close to you just enough for you to feel the heat off him but not enough to feel him. His arm over your chair leaves his hand thisclose to your shoulder and you swear you can feel the sensation even then.

You’d stopped smacking him after this one time he flexed his bicep and you started to imagine how good those arms must look.

You found out shortly after when he and Jimin convinced you to join them in the gym because Jungkook had a voucher to a free yoga class since a client of his is a teacher; safe to say she wasn’t happy when he popped in the studio to say you were taking his slot. Jungkook and Jimin did a workout, your brother now in a better condition.

After the session, they made you wait as they finished and Jungkook really had to remove his red jacket to reveal his stupidly gorgeous toned and tattooed arms in a black fit sleeveless top. He caught you ogling and the devil crossed his arms to fucking flex and smirk when the conversation he was having with one of the trainers didn’t even seem that amusing.

Of course, his outfit just sent your mind into another dimension with the images of what could be underneath that black top and again, you find out one morning exactly how glorious it is.

It’s one of those post-bar night mornings - you’ve allowed Jimin to enjoy the nightlife again as long as he had chaperones, which essentially were you and Jungkook. You’d woken up and stopped by the hallway at the sound of someone gasping and you look up from the hallway, slack jawed as you watch Jungkook pull his shirt off from the back of his neck with one hand, coffee-stained clothing lying on the counter.

His black sweatpants are hanging low on his hips and does he not have any boxers on?? His tiny waist spreads out to his muscular back, and when he turns, his sculpted chest almost blinds you; pecs just the right perk and torso so taut but not intimidating at all. It’s... beautiful. It looks so smooth and captivating; your eyes can’t help but trail down south and is that black ink that’s peeking underneath the waistband? You gulp at the thought of Jungkook having a hip tattoo because what the fuck? Is he trying to kill you? And his…

“Do you have a shirt I can borrow?” He asks, and you jerk from where you’re standing.

Your eyes turn to the appropriate body part they should be focused on and he’s smiling like he’s an angel, as if he literally didn’t just try to murder you with his exquisite bare body.

His smile is so sweet and you know he’s playing you because he totally caught you drooling at the sight of him. Your throat is dry and suddenly you can’t speak, which really isn’t surprising by now because he’s also taken away your ability to form coherent sentences.

“I, uhm. I’ll get one of Jimin’s.”

“I don’t fit in his clothes. Don’t you have large ones?”

He knows you do, and you nod, unclench the thighs you didn’t even realize had betrayed you, and retrieve one of your oversized Disney t-shirts and approach him. You stay at a safe distance because any closer you might fall into temptation and you throw him the shirt.

He chuckles and turns to his side to slowly put it on because of course there’s a fucking dent down there that he wants to show off.

You turn and trip on your foot because god knows how dizzy you feel from the show he just put on.

“Careful,” he calls out and even with your back turned, you just know he’s smirking.

He beats you to the bathroom shortly after and he took his time.

You decide to wait with your brother who’d been so ecstatic over an audition he landed for a fairly new and small entertainment company as a choreographer for a hip-hop group.

They told him his contemporary dance background and versatility are just what they need and you soften at his joyful face; he says he feels like a new person again. You listen to him excitedly and give encouragement.

You perk at the sound of the bathroom door opening because you really need to clean the wetness down there and you trudge out of the room so you could finally shower, slightly upset at Jungkook’s clothed form.

You groan. “Ugh that was so long,” you mindlessly say.

“Oh it is.” His smirk is back and you are pissed. You bang the door and pull your hair out of frustration.

He doesn’t even need to touch you for you to be a whimpering mess. He knows it. And you’re in trouble.

Jungkook is busy for the next two weeks, having shared that he has a couple of on-site art installations outside of the city and a tattoo piece that will need more than one 5-hour shift. You tried not to seem affected when Jimin teased him since it was going to be on a woman’s breast this time.

“This the same one who had her vagina tattooed? The one who asked you out after?” Jimin asked.

Your eyes were burning your phone screen because you absolutely cannot be affected.

“Yeah,” Jungkook laughed. “That was fun.”

Jin calling you was your saving grace and you spent the next half hour in your room, talking to him over nursery room ideas because Hoseok couldn’t make up his mind over a neon green or a fuschia pink wall and Yoongi wanted dark grey because “babies can’t even identify colors,” which is true but Jin needed you as the one with a more palatable taste.

Jungkook had knocked to say goodbye, which is more than his usual yelling, and you noticed him linger before you heard the steps away from your door.

It was day 5 when you realized why you’d been so grumpy and you hated the moment you did - you miss Jungkook. You’d gotten so used to seeing him every few days - picking you up from work, playing rock-paper-scissors to determine who’ll choose dinner, laughing at his high-pitched child-like laughter, talking to him about work and other things… you even miss his flirting and teasing.

He’d been such a staple in your life the past months, and not just to referee between you and Jimin. Jungkook, with his listening ear, his heartwarming passion for his work, and ability to soothe and comfort you in the silence, just feels so stable. And not in the way you used to think. He’s so laid-back and just there, always dependable, like you’re sure whatever it is you’re feeling, he’ll know what to do and say.

Jimin used to say that Jungkook was always the person he needed for anything and now you understand why. He emits a certain calmness, joy, and consistency, like whether you’re flying or drowning, he’s the pillar grounding you or keeping you afloat.

You’re always tempted to send him a message but you two don’t text and it’d be weird to just start now, although it doesn’t help that he doesn’t text you, too. You shrug it off and convince yourself that it really might just be a silly crush, one he acts on when he’s around you but probably forgets when he isn’t. Or maybe he went out with that girl, who knows?

On the day that he arrives, he's set to drive Jimin to the audition and watch him, too, while you’re just happy to be able to do errands and clean the house on your own.

The doorbell rings and Jimin, whom you’ve reminded to shower so he won’t be late, answers the door and you try not to look intrigued when you hear him rambling about how good Jungkook apparently looks because how else can he look better?

With ash-grey hair, that’s how. You couldn’t help it. You peeked and turned your head before he could turn to look at you.

You’re currently by the kitchen counter, tiptoeing to try to get the cereal box on the top shelf to check if you need to buy another or if it would suffice. Or if it’s even still edible. You’ll be off for a quick grocery run if only you can get this stupid box out.

Then a large hand is touching your lower back and the fresh scent of detergent fills your nose. You stiffen as an arm is raised to easily grab the cereal box you’ve spent the past 5 minutes trying to get and fuck do you miss his touch, his scent that you realize is just as comforting as his soft sweatshirts, and the way you feel a jolt of electricity even at the slightest brush of his body on yours.

He places the box on the counter. “You should’ve asked,” he says, voice low.

“I can do it,” you respond, gaining the courage to look at him and your lips betray you at how they part because he looks so good with his new hair.

“I know. I just like it when you ask.” He tries to keep his eyes on you but they keep falling to your lips, the one he’d been imagining the feel and taste of. But your eyes lock on his, letting yourself be hypnotized.

You feel his touch drift away from you and you stop him, as your hand finds his and keeps it on your waist, and it signals him to grip tighter and pull you closer. And you let him. You angle yourself so you’re standing chest to chest, you could almost feel his heart beat just as fast as yours.

“What else?” You indulge yourself because you just wanna know. You've missed him and you can’t reconcile the flirting with his recent silence.

Jungkook bites his lip, knowing it’s his signal to tell you how he feels.

“I like it when you say my name, when you listen to me talk and take me seriously. When you don’t make me feel bad about the things I do, the things I choose.”

His hand that isn’t on your waist glides through your arm, leaving goosebumps in its wake. It settles on your cheek and you hope he doesn’t notice just how hot it is.

“I like it when you pout and when you smile with your eyes,” he continues. “And I like it when you need me because then I know I’m not the only one, because fuck do I need you,” he continues, both hands pulling you closer to him until his breath grazes your mouth.

“Want you so much,” he mumbles, before he eliminates the distance and you feel his soft lips on yours, moving tenderly, carefully, as if the purpose is to seek validation that you feel the same way, to ask your acceptance of the overwhelming affection he has for you.

Your lips move gently like his, languid yet electrifying and euphoric and you hold onto him for support, just so you won’t lose yourself even more than you already are.

This now feels surreal. You’re not thinking about anything else - not the before or the after - just the feel of him at this very moment and how it’s making you feel alive, carefree, unbound. And you wonder if all your other kisses had felt this good before. Or maybe just different.

You and Jungkook keep your steady pace, focusing on the soothing feel of each other’s lips, of the sensation of something sensuous and tender.

The aggressive pull of the bathroom door jolts you awake from a dream it seems, and you’re ducking down and crouching on the floor behind the counter before your brother notices anything amiss. Jungkook’s surprised but holds his laugh at how scared you look, the first time he’d seen you be afraid of your brother.

“Kook, has my sister left for the grocery?” He calls out from his open room, probably dressing as he speaks.

Jungkook looks up to check on Jimin. “Yeah, she just left,” he answers after deciphering your hand gestures from underneath him.

“Ugh, I forgot to tell her to buy my cereal. I think the one on the top shelf isn’t edible anymore.”

Jungkook smirks, thanking the heavens that Jimin didn’t tell you, otherwise Jungkook wouldn’t have had the best kiss of his life. He felt you; you moved with him, you felt him. And he can’t be happier.

He has a chance with you. He really has a chance with you, and even at the risk of being caught, he’d do this with you over and over again.

“Let’s go,” Jimin calls out. “I’ll just text her.”

“I’m sure she knows,” Jungkook smirks then heads out, leaving you with a dazed feeling and a heart that won’t slow its beating.

Your time alone with your thoughts only served to confuse you even more. It felt nice. He felt nice. You’d never really considered Jungkook as anything more than, well, your brother’s best friend, even if he’d been the one you preferred out of all of Jimin’s friends dating back to middle school.

His well-behaved nature and boyish charms were always endearing to you and even when he grew up, his confidence and compassion just amazed you. But it was always from afar. You think it’s the same with him; his affection may just be a little infatuation borne out of his idea of you growing up. You’ve learned enough that the idea of a person, of a relationship, of a could be isn’t always enough.

Another thing you think about is that Jimin is very protective of his friendships. You know that more than anyone, when you dated Taemin in high school.

You were both seniors and had gotten close because he was Jimin’s dance captain and mentor, someone whom your brother looked up to and admired. Your relationship ended during your first year of college, with both of you saying things you eventually regretted. Safe to say it was your first heartbreak, one that resulted to Jimin’s as well, as his friendship with your ex was also affected.

You and Jimin barely talked about it, seeing his own disappointment because of the resulting strained relationship with Taemin. You thought that the elder would at least maintain a friendship, but he didn’t.

The most Jimin said about it was when he told you, eyes downcast but tone quite angry, to “keep off my friends and don’t date any of them, please.” You were home for a break and he stormed out of your room before you could apologize. You realized later on that his heartbreak was worse than yours; you told yourself you don’t want to be the cause of that pained look on his face ever again.

His friends are off-limits, he made it pretty clear. Taemin was a mentor but one Jimin eventually did without. But Jungkook is his best friend, his brother. They’ve looked out for each other for more than half of their lives; you can’t even imagine what would happen if you and Jungkook get together and then fight, or break up.

You wouldn’t want Jimin to have to give up a friendship that means more to him than anything. Or more accurately, you wouldn’t want to lose Jimin over something that might not mean as much anyway.

You stick to the latter thought, especially when both men arrive home and Jimin is beaming, his smile something you’d never admit actually makes your heart feel all sorts of fuzziness and pride. He’s so excited and you feel it, too, moreso because he informs you that he got the job.

“They really liked me! They said I can really mentor the group and their team is so creative and passionate…” Jimin goes on, narrating every single thing that happened right as he entered the studio. You’ve never seen him this elated, not even with his previous company that was at the top of their game.

“And they said I don’t have to work right away! They’ll wait for my doctor’s clearance but I can go to work to observe and get to know them more.”

Your eyes moisten because not long ago, you saw the joy in your brother wither away, his passion deteriorate, and his plans go on a standstill. But now, it’s like he didn’t go through a slump or moments of weakness, like he didn’t go through a depressive mode when he thought he’d lost everything. He’s really a fighter, and you truly look up to him.

“I wouldn’t have made it if it wasn’t for you two,” Jimin continues, pulling both of you in a three-way hug because of course your brother wouldn’t hug just you.

This prompts Jungkook to wrap his arm around you, hand gripping your waist while yours settles for mere pats on his lower back. He tries not to dwell on this minimal contact, or on the way you purposely avoid his gaze. He tries not to think too much when you actively lean towards your brother more during your dinner out, or how you jerk away when any of Jungkook’s body parts comes in close contact with yours.

He’s thinking maybe you’re not in the mood for his playful antics or maybe, he really pushed too far with the kiss from earlier, and it sends him in an internal panic mode because just as his hope of starting something more with you was blooming, it quickly gets shot down just like that.

It’s when you pass up on games and drinks in your living room when you get back so you could just stay in your room did Jungkook think that he may really have blown his chance.

You try to be subtle in your avoidance of Jungkook but it’s harder than expected, especially since Jimin still invites him over. With the excitement of the new job now steadying, Jimin announces his checklist for getting through a crisis - healed foot, check; new job, check. That’s pretty much it, really. “But I still need you two,” he says.

Jungkook comes over and at the start, you notice how he still tries. He attempts to catch your gaze, goes near you, engages you in conversation, makes jokes, lingers before leaving… only to be met with eyes that don’t seek him, short answers, forced laughter, and cold goodbyes. And you absolutely hate it.

He’s around yet you miss him even more than when he was away, but you can’t fall into the things that made you feel something for him in the first place.

Living with Jimin made you appreciate him so much more, and you’re glad you get to be this close with him for the first time, and you don’t want to jeopardize that.

Jungkook had much to do with the newfound attachment with your brother, yet it’s exactly why you’re hesitant to give Jungkook a chance. Their relationship is sacred, similar to how yours with Jimin is. What you and Jungkook have is a by-product of those, and it’s not the priority. Somehow you think all three can’t coexist; you can’t have it all, really.

Whenever Jungkook makes an effort, Jimin’s plea to keep off his friends rings in your head. You know, too, that Jimin gave his friends an ultimatum - date my sister or keep your dicks, something like that. It was funny when you heard of it, but it’s definitely not a laughing matter now.

Those words were said years ago yet they still hang above your head. You wish Jungkook would just make it easier for you, but why is it that when he stopped trying did you feel your heart break, as if you’re losing something you never had in the first place?

It’s easy to reason you feel sick and tired; you’ve been spending later hours at work so spending more time in your room and asking the boys to make dinner instead seem reasonable. But tonight, Jimin isn’t having it.

“We’re celebrating, stay here,” he says, pulling you to the couch next to him. Jungkook is on his right, his once tendency to stiffen around you back again, and you sadden at the thought because he looks so uncomfortable.

“Celebrating what?” You ask, grabbing the beer being handed to you.

“I’ve been working for 2 weeks and I haven’t reinjured my foot,” he says, his smile blinding you.

Normally you’d roll your eyes at his shallowness but you just agree and mindlessly sip the beer, eyes veering off in the distance.

“Is it a guy?” Jimin asks out of nowhere and you try not to choke. “You only ever get this sulky when it’s about a guy. Is it someone from work?” Jimin states with furrowed eyebrows.

“Oh! Is it one of the managers who’s been trying to ask you out but he’s the ex of your close friend?”

You try to remember when you told him that but it was definitely a months-ago issue.

“Or did you have an epiphany and realized you actually like Yoongi? Or Hoseok? Or maybe Jin but he’s married?”

“What the hell, Jimin!” You say, smacking his arm. Your eyes flit to Jungkook who’s focused on the TV.

“The first one,” you lie to satisfy your brother.

“It’s kind of a code, you know? He’s Yuri’s ex and she really loved him and I don’t want to ruin my friendship over something I’m not sure is worth it anyway.” And with that, you see Jungkook’s jaw clench. He knows about Yuri and the manager; they were merely a fling, so he knows you’re lying.

“How do you know it’s not worth it if you haven’t even tried?” Jimin asks, incredulous.

“I don’t know, it’s just… Yuri’s my friend and I don’t wanna mess up a friendship.”

“Seems like you don’t trust your friendship with Yuri enough, then,” Jimin states like it’s a fact. This hits your more than it should. Do you really not trust in your relationship with your own brother? Surely you have a basis to be hesitant, but if it only it were that simple.

Jimin picks up on your silence and asks again. “How are you and the guy like? Do you have moments with him?”

“Lots of them,” you say, your eyes finding Jungkook just on the other side of the couch and he’s never felt farther away.

“And for the first time it’s like I get to savor them. Whether it’s something sweet that he does, or if we’re just together in silence, or when he’s being flirty,” and you don’t see it but Jungkook catches you smiling at the thought and god does he wish you’re lying about this one unless it’s about him. He wishes it is.

“Sounds like a keeper if he gets you to enjoy moments, don’t you think? For someone like you?” Jimin says, cocking an eyebrow.

“Like me?”

“You think too much, you know? You plan, you analyze, you manage risks… I mean, yeah sure they help I guess but this isn’t a job, ___. There’s no profit to be earned here, no losses,” he points out.

“The only loss is you missing out on something good because you’re too focused on what could happen, and not what’s actually happening, right now.” He's told you a variation of this before, but somehow this hits differently, and more than it should.

“Did you teach that to Jungkook, too?” You ask, a smile creeping up and you digress because you need anything to stop you from walking to Jungkook and holding him close to you.

“No, he taught me that,” Jimin states. “I know it seems like I teach him a lot - well, all I really told him was to never let anybody dictate what he wants and deserves in life, and I stand by that, but to be clear,” Jimin turns to you, “I learn just as much from him. He’s his own self; nobody tells him what to do.”

It’s all meant to be assuring, comforting even, if only Jimin knew. And if only it were that simple. The tension is suffocating but your brother breathes easy. You love him more than you can ever say and his happiness has meant more to you than you ever imagined. You just wish your own didn’t come at a cost.

A few days later, Jungkook is back at your place and you had quite the reflective week and opted to stay in your room.

Some days you just want to bask in your own thoughts; absorbing yourself in your own emotions helps in figuring out what to do, you’ve realized. You’re still a thinker and a planner - that’s probably never gonna change - but you’re starting to at least let yourself feel and enjoy the now, or something like it. You just wish the person you want to spend your now with hasn’t changed his mind.

It’s almost midnight when you decide to head out, your early dinner long digested and you feel hunger creeping in.

You exit your room and stop in your tracks at the sight of Jungkook in your kitchen, all alone. You definitely weren’t ready for this.

“Oh, I didn’t know you were still here,” and you regret it immediately, not wanting to sound disappointed.

He looks up, alarmed at your presence because he wasn’t expecting this, too.

“Jimin fell asleep on me but don’t worry, I was just about to leave,” he responds, eyes not meeting yours.

“He’s also gonna be coming over my place now since he’s able. Don’t want you to feel like a prisoner in your own home,” he says, motioning to your room where you’ve been hiding recently.

“Since you’re avoiding me and all,” he continues, and you don’t miss the hurt look on his face.

You mentally give yourself a pep talk because you definitely want him to still come around and you’re definitely being stupid.

“I… I wasn’t avoiding you,” you say, blocking his way by the couch as he’s about to reach for his jacket.

He stops in front of you, ensuring some distance. “Yeah, I guess. I mean, you were just not minding me and making sure you stayed as far away from me as possible.” He’s trying to sound bitter but you’re his weakness and he will always go soft on you because his tender eyes are definitely not a match to his bitter words.

“I just didn’t know what to do. You didn’t exactly say what you felt and—“

“I kissed you, ___,” he says, tone suppressing frustration.

“I told you I needed you, wanted you. And you kissed me back. The way you looked at me that day, the way you held me… it meant more, I could feel it. So I don’t know how you could just act like none of that happened, like it didn’t matter,” he continues.

“Jungkook… you’re my brother’s bestest friend. And he’s very protective of his friends, of you.”

And it’s ironic, Jungkook thinks, how Jimin is the reason why you two had met, got close; how Jimin’s what got you together but is also who’s keeping you apart.

“He’s also the one who constantly reminds me to go for what I want, to never let anybody tell me what to do,” Jungkook says.

“Yeah but this is different. I don’t want anything to come in between you two, the same way I don’t want anything to come in between him and me.”

“So it’s okay for him to come in between us? You really think he’d be okay with that? That he’d keep the two people he loves the most from being together? From being happy?”

And you hate that he’s right.

“What Jimin is to us is out of our control,” he states. “But that shouldn’t be why we can’t try, right? Because god I’ve wanted you since I was 15 and and I’ve waited too long for this and I’d either fight for us or keep us a secret, I don’t care. Just don’t lie to me, please.”

By now he’s standing in front of you and he could pin you against the armrest if he wanted to but he’s keeping his hands to himself, fists clenched at the control he’s trying to maintain because of his intense feelings for you. He’d make you feel it all too, if you just let him.

You can move away if you wanted; there’s space for it. But you don’t. Jungkook bared everything to you, braving through just to be with you; the least you could do is be honest. So with your own strength, you look up at him.

“You made me fall for the moments, Jungkook. You made me fall for you, and there were so many things to consider and I—“

Your rear hits the armrest, as you’d reflexively walked back as he started to move towards you, slowly eliminating the distance. His arms, sandwiching you, are propped on the couch to support his spread out frame, his face now level with yours. You’re burning with how he’s looking at you with so much hope and yearning.

“Go on,” he says, voice low, his eyes wandering all over your face and you feel your heat dampen with just his gaze.

“I didn’t know what to do with what I’d started to feel for you because you were off-limits but that didn’t keep me from wanting you and—“

His lips graze the side of your neck and with your breath hitching, he proceeds. Open-mouth kisses trail your neck, with just enough wetness and just enough heat to leave you wanting more. You angle your neck for more access and he smirks at this.

“And what?” He urges you, mouth focusing on the other side of your neck now, head nudging yours to adjust.

“And I avoided you because—“

You grip the couch for support, as you unravel with his hot breath on your skin.

“That seemed easier than to keep at what we were doing knowing that—“

He licks a sensitive part by your ear and your strangled moan spurs him on.

“I couldn’t have you the way I wanted to.”

At this, he stops.

He focuses his gaze on you again. Jungkook holds onto the tiniest shred of self-control he has left just so he can savor you like this, emotions unraveling and your body falling apart before him.

“How exactly do you want me?”

You steady your breath and as much as you want to give in to your carnal desire and attack his lips, you want him to know how much this means to you. You’re still scared but being with Jungkook steadies you, makes it all feel worth it.

You’re crossing this line now, and you’ll stick with him whether you’ll both come clean or keep it a secret. He wants you enough right now; you’ll figure out what to do eventually.

Your hand finds his face and fingers trace the scar on his cheek. You let yourself drown in his beautiful eyes, knowing on clear nights you could see galaxies like this.

“I want you close, Jungkook. I want you to hold me, when I’m sad, happy, confused. I want to hold you that way, too. I want to savor every moment, let you know everyday what you mean to me.”

Your featherlight touches on his jaw send shivers all over his body and he hums at the sensation. You caress his lips before he could bite them again, palming him with your thumb and feeling its softness.

“I want you to fall apart under my touch, want to make you feel good, kiss you like it’s always the last time.”

Jungkook thinks he deserves a prize for how well he’s keeping himself together and not yet taking you on this couch like his dick is telling him to. But he needed to hear all that, needed to look in your eyes while you said them.

Then you smile at him, eyes filled with desire, and that’s all it takes for him to lose his resolve and plunge into you, your plush lips against his soft ones, melding together again like a literal dream. He straightens his stance so his hands can cup your face and he feels you smile in the kiss, relishing in the care and attention he’s giving.

It starts tenderly then quickly turns heated, his eager hands trailing down your arms and waist, and your own entangling his hair, pulling the strands as he nips your lips, prompting them to open.

Your tongues explore each other’s mouths, his lingering taste of rootbeer somehow making him more addictive. You swallow each other’s sounds, both of you still having half a mind to tone down, knowing that only a wall separates your wanton moans and your sleeping brother.

His grip around you tightens and you pull him closer, your hands now around his neck, fingers thumbing his cheeks and you’re losing yourself to him, as the past few months of undeniable attraction and sexual tension climaxing at this moment where you finally give in to what you’ve been trying to suppress.

Jungkook, on the other hand, feels a sense of calm even with his hard dick and his thumping heart because he’s dreamed of this, dreamed of you, and you’re here wanting him, too. All the memories of watching you from afar, blushing at how beautiful you are, missing you when you were away, heart breaking at how happy you were with someone else, fly by him like a movie because he’s got his ending - you.

He’s lived for moments most of his life and always knew to savor them, to bask in them because he doesn’t know when he’ll get to have those again. But nothing comes close to right now with you and he decides to make sure he’ll have you like this everyday.

Both your actions continue, hands stationary but mouths eagerly moving against each other, stopping momentarily for air but smiling, laughing in the kiss.

You give in first, fingers slowly trailing down to graze at his chest and he shivers, curses mid-kiss and you giggle, and he’s on cloud 9 again, realizing he can hear the beautiful sound that is your laughter everyday.

Suddenly it’s all thoughts of what’s ahead for both of you, imagining what that would be like - feeling, holding, touching each other. You’re both so lost in your little world, minds traveling from now to tomorrow and it’s exciting, so incredibly alluring to be savoring this moment but also thinking about the next.

You’re light-headed now because kissing him is like a drug, soothing yet exhilarating at the same time and you’re aching to feel him. “Jungkook…” You whine.

And then.

“HOLY SHIT,” you hear a gasp.

Your eyes burst open and you feel Jungkook stiffen before you try to push him away. You both stull, looking at each other, some distance now between you, and you can hear a pin drop with how quiet it is, the tension so thick that you’re afraid to move.

You knew at one point you’re gonna have to tell Jimin but not now and definitely not in the middle of a fucking make-out session.

“Is this a hookup or are you both finally out of your asses and would actually like to properly date because god knows it’s about time?”

You and Jungkook slowly turn to the side, eyes wide at your brother who’s leaning by the wall, checking his nails as if he didn’t just give you a heart attack.

“WHAT?” You ask.

“Jungkook’s been into you since forever but never had the fucking guts to do anything.” Jimin sighs and rolls his eyes at the man. “You’re not exactly subtle with your staring.”

Jungkook can’t seem to wrap his head around what's happening because his mouth keeps moving but no sound comes out.

“Neither are you,” Jimin eyes you this time. “You forget I’m good with reading people. And also, I’m friends with Yuri. She doesn’t even remember that guy,” he laughs because of course they’re friends. You feel so stupid; you should’ve known he was trying to catch you in a lie when he asked if your sulking was because of a “guy.”

“So you’ve always known?” Jungkook finally finds his voice.

“About you, duh. She’s recent,” Jimin points to you. “It’s like, one moment you’re friendly then you’re flirty then it’s like you can’t stand each other. Get your shit together, people. I’m literally right here.”

God, you and Jungkook were definitely not subtle. And underestimated your brother, too.

“So you’re not mad?” You confirm.

“No.”

“But… you said you were gonna cut my dick off,” Jungkook stammers.

“And you told me to keep off your friends because of Taemin,” you add. “You stopped being friends because of me,” you remind him, voice almost a whisper.

Jimin takes a deep breath because now he has to come clean.

“We stopped being friends because of him. He hurt you, ___, and you didn’t deserve that,” he admits, avoiding your questioning gaze. “I heard you crying to Jin about what happened and I got angry and wanted you to stay away from my friends because they were all assholes.” He continues, jaw clenched at the memory. “Well, except for him,” he cocks his head towards Jungkook.

“He was the only good guy. I never really minded if he went for you because... iknowhe’lltreatyouwellandyoudeservethat,” Jimin says.

And you’re not gonna lie, you feel like crying. Jimin’s been trying to protect you all this time.

Jungkook, on the other hand, isn’t taking this all too well.

“You said you were gonna cut my dick off…” He says again, tone low and unbelieving.

“That didn’t stop you, did it?” Jimin counters, earning him a sigh of defeat because he has a point.

“I just wanted it to happen naturally,” he explains. “I mean, I didn’t plan on getting heartbroken, injured, unemployed, then homeless all at once but it happened and you both helped me and that unintentionally brought you together and I…”

He turns to you both. “I realized how good you are together. Not just in taking care of me but in taking care of each other, too.”

By this time, Jungkook has found his feet and is back to standing in front of you, his hand intertwining with yours. You let out a laugh because this whole time, Jimin wasn’t in the dark. But then again, he’s a smart ass too and would’ve figured it out.

And would also push it. “I actually got over Taehyung months ago so like, I’ve been okay for a while,” he shrugs.

And just like that, he gets on your nerves again because that’s how he’s been getting his way, by reminding you of his “broken heart that’s still hurting.”

“You little bitch! Do you also have a new apartment now and you’re not telling me?!” You shriek, and Jungkook next to you is finally laughing.

“Oh no,” Jimin responds. “I’m really still homeless.”

And he smiles his sickly sweet smile and you can’t help but mirror it. Your brother is really something, and you don’t know what you’d do without him.

Some seconds pass and you’re just all basking in this moment because for the first time in months, it really feels like things are looking out for all of you.

“So in that case,” Jungkook turns to you. “Would you like to go on a date with me?” Hopeful eyes staring at you, a weight off his shoulder now that he doesn’t need to hide anything from his best friend. He can just focus on falling in love with you and making you do the same.

“Yes,” you excitedly reply, hand trailing down his chest again. “And in that case, would you like to continue this in my bedroom?”

Jungkook feels his dick twitch. “Fuck, yes.”

“Guess I’m gonna have to sleep on the couch now,” Jimin groans, but you don’t miss his playful tone. “You’re both welcome, idiots.”

You’re pushed to the wall right as the door closes and Jungkook’s lips meet yours immediately. It tastes much sweeter knowing there’s no need to hide, to be careful. It’s liberating and it’s making you feel more.

He kisses you harshly as his hands make quick work of your shirt, pulling them off then slowly kneeling down in tandem with his mouth sucking, licking, and kissing down to your breasts, then your torso, causing your chest to heave at the pleasure from just his mouth.

His hands aggressively pull down your bottoms and his tongue finds your clit before you can even process his action. He’s nibbling your bud and laving at your lips and pumping his fingers in you all at once, you don’t know where to focus.

You feel the desperation and intensity with every move, the sensation overwhelming and eliciting lewd sounds from you. He alternates between moaning and cursing on your cunt and that just adds to the pleasure.

“Eager, aren’t we?” You ask with a smirk.

“You have no idea,” he responds, head buried between your thighs, one of which is currently resting on his shoulder. “Some of my wet dreams may have been because of you.”

“What the fuck Jungkook!”

“I was a growing boy with raging teen hormones!” He says in between breaths. But he doesn’t relent. Fingers curling in your hole, tongue swirling on your clit, and hand squeezing your ass, he’s determined to make you cum now, and with a hard suck, you do.

You jerk away at the oversensitivity with his mouth still on you and you pull him up to give him a kiss, tasting yourself on him.

At the sight of you bare, eyes half-lidded and steadying breath, he stills.

“Is everything okay?” You ask.

“Yeah I just…” He starts, stepping back a bit, and his eyes roam your body, smile creeping up his face. “I never thought I’d get to have you like this. I always admired you from afar and you always felt so out of reach and I…”

“Jungkook,” you stop him.

“I’m here with you right now, barely any distance. I’m not your best friend’s sister, okay?” Your hand reaches out to him and he takes it, let’s you pull him closer. “I’m the girl you like whom you’ll take out on a date after you fuck her senseless. Got it?”

“Y-yeah,” he stammers, a shy laugh escaping him.

You kiss him softly. “No need to admire me from a distance anymore. You have me, right here.”

“Okay.”

And before he can attack you again, you lead him towards your bed. Your fingers pull the waistband of his sweats as you sit on the edge and look up at him, wide eyes eager for something.

“Shirt off,” you say, and he follows.

Your eyes meet your hands that are slowly ridding him of his remaining clothing and you swear you could come again at the sight of the tiger lily tattoo resting on his hip. It curves with his semi-defined v-line, the stem trailing downward, like some pathway to his throbbing dick that’s leaking with some pre-cum.

You take him in your hands and he bucks at the feel of your soft skin around his length that’s aching to be inside you. Your eyes stay on the tattoo; something about it is so hot and you kiss it, lips then exploring the expanse of his hip and up to the part of his torso that you can reach, feeling the ridges of his definitely smooth abs, now tensing at the sensation.

All the while, your hand is stroking his member, up and down as you continue kissing and licking his pelvis and just like this, he already tastes so good. He grunts with your ministrations, head falling back at the intense pleasure. His hands fall to your hair as you take him in, tongue traversing his dick and your heat clenches at the salty taste of cum and the feel of his veins as his shaft twitches in your mouth.

At the vibration caused by your moan, he stops you, removes himself from you and then lays half your body down on the edge of the bed.

“My turn,” he says smugly.

You’re about to protest but he swirls his tongue all over your cunt again, the pad of his thumb flicking your nub and you moan his name instead. You haven’t fully recovered from your first orgasm yet but he seems determined to give you another one. He’s eating you like a man starved, as if he plans to slurp you dry.

“More, Jungkook,” you breathe out, then he’s pumping his dick and thrusting into you, the stretch just a tad bit painful but so, so good.

He quickly adjusts, spreads your legs open for his easy access and the view, and he growls at the supple flesh that's taking him so well. It’s so erotic, watching himself go in and out of you like this, then hearing your deliciously hypnotic moans louden as his hands start kneading your breasts like it’s some dough he’s molding to his liking, his fingers flicking the hardened nipples.

“You feel so fucking heavenly, ___,” he pants. “Fuck, fuck. Can’t believe you’re mine.”

“All yours, Kook,” you respond, delirious now because his movements are really sending you to another dimension. “Fuck me harder,” you beg, and he follows.

He adjusts again, flushing your legs against you and the angle in which his dick hits your sweet spot causes your eyes to roll to the back of your head.

You’re screaming expletives and it’s just urging him to go harder, deeper, faster, his sweat trickling down his temples and forming on his chest.

“Cum for me, baby. I need to feel you,” he huffs.

He’s in a frenzied state and he’s losing himself in you, his mouth now parted and he joins your filthy wails, which are in tune with the sound of skin slapping on skin.

You feel your body spasm and you call out his name before you give in, heart stopping for a moment and he feels the stream of your cum coat his dick that’s just savoring this a bit more.

But you clench and it’s all it takes, his own seed spurting in you and your back arches as he comes down from his high by languidly kissing your breasts, one hand around your lifted waist and the other, intertwining your hand.

“Fuck, you feel so good. So much better than I imagined,” he utters, sounding so winded at the intensity of his orgasm.

He’s too tired to even move, body now resting on top of you, chest heaving and bated breaths escaping him. You massage his head and he moans even at that and you laugh but soften at the intimacy of it all.

He finally gets himself off you and you chuckle as he sneakily opens the door and tiptoes to the bathroom, careful not to be caught naked by your brother. He returns with a wet towel, wipes you, then lays next to you, his arm secured around your waist.

He’s smiling so fondly, lips now peppering kisses all over your face. “You’re stuck with me,” he states.

“Nowhere I'd rather be,” you reply, your own soft kiss now turning greedy again, and you think it’s gonna be a long night.

You wake up tired but you’re not complaining. It was quite the evening, after all, and you’re reminded by the fluff of grey hair adorning your chest. Jungkook likes to cuddle, you’ve learned, and he couldn’t sleep without a part of his body touching you.

You release from his hold and head to the kitchen after washing up, not expecting your brother to already be eating his cereal.

“Oh my god, can you wear shorts?” He huffs.

“Bitch, you’re in my apartment,” you bite back, laughing at the face he makes.

Your front is to the counter when Jungkook approaches and unlike before, heads to you, arms wrapped around your waist from behind and places a kiss on your cheek. “Good morning.”

His voice is hoarse and you hold back a moan because it just brings you back to last night when after you came the second time, he fucked you softly for your third, then fucked you hard for your fourth, then softly again this morning for your (extended) fifth. God, this man will be the death of you.

He nuzzles your neck and you giggle.

“Manners, you two. You’re like teenagers,” Jimin scowls.

“Well, I am living my teenage dream,” Jungkook announces.

Jimin grimaces but softens at the look of his two favorite people looking so happy. “Okay, this is gonna take some getting used to.”

You and Jungkook playfully nod in agreement.

“Also,” he turns to Jungkook who’s now managed to tear away from you. “Are you gonna be here again tonight because you know, I kinda wanna sleep on a bed and all. Couch is great but like, no.”

“You better find your own place soon if you don’t want to keep sleeping there every night,” you reply smugly.

“Okay, now gross!” Jimin, dramatic as always, pretend-gags at the implication. “I’m gonna look for places. Jungkook, you’re still my best friend. We’re going apartment hunting tomorrow.”

“But…” You start.

“No. Nuh-uh. You had him last night and you’re going out on a date today. You need to share my best friend.”

And you all laugh at him throwing a tantrum. He and Jungkook start to bicker and you walk towards your room to grab shorts because it really is awkward when your brother is there.

The doorbell rings as you’re about to walk back and you open the door, a surprised look on your face.

“Hi, is Jimin there?” The person asks.

You head back to the kitchen, your guest in tow and you call out to your brother.

“Chim, someone’s looking for you.”

Jimin looks up and almost falls off the chair.

“Taehyung?” He says, trying to mask the nervous tone of his voice. “I…”

“I have something to confess,” Taehyung cuts him off, eyes nervous but hopeful. “Can we, uhm, maybe talk somewhere else?”

Jimin nods and quickly follows him out.

You walk back to Jungkook and he tugs you close, hands back to your waist. “What’s that about?”

You bite back an excited squeal as you think back to what Taehyung told you at the door.

“Let’s just say, you might not need to help Jimin look for an apartment anymore,” you respond.

Jungkook smiles and pulls you in for a hug, reveling in this absolutely perfect moment.

“You Park siblings drive me crazy, you know that? And you two make me so damn happy.”

masterlist

#jungkook #jungkook fic #jungkook x reader #jungkook smut #jungkook fluff #jungkook angst #brother's best friend #hold me close #oneshot #mine

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elffriend612 · 2 years

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Severitus Fics for the Soul Part 2

Hi ya'll long time no see. Since ya'll seemed to like my first post like this and I am still getting reblogs on it today, I decided to create another one. Maybe there will be another one in the future we will see.

Thank you so much for interacting with me and I am happy to share my love of fanfiction with ya'll. If possible could some of ya'll just say hi or something in the comments? The HP fandom community on tumblr is so nice, but since I still am a newer user and never used it in its hayday its a little bit harder to interact with others. Thank you all again and happy reading!

1. The Smallest Slytherin by amandadbose88

Is a really good fic. I have not read it in a bit, but it was good of what I did read. I have read most chapters, but I can't remember if I am up to date with it or not. The fic is not complete yet and currently has 39 chapters in it.

Author's Summary: "Everything the wizarding world believed about The-Boy-Who-Lived was all lies. Harry’s life has been hell, ever since Dumbledore dumped him on the Dursleys doorstep. The wizarding world thought they could trust Dumbledore; they were wrong. Harry is careful of whom he will trust; but one thing is for certain; Dumbledore will never be one he trusts. What will happen when truths are revealed, and the so-called light is more dark than anyone had imagined? What will happen when Harry has people who care about and protect him from Dumbledore’s manipulations?"

2. Namesake Necklace by WicaBe

A sweet and interesting Severitus fic. It is completed and has 25 chapters.

Author's Summary: "Harry and Dudley are attacked one evening, and Snape is called to fix it. A child sized Harry, who looks much more like Lily than James at this age, was not what he was expecting."

3. How the Potions Master Got His Happy Ending by banana567

I cannot remember the full premisis of this fic, but it was a sweet and fluffy fic, that is completed and is in my bookmarked folder so here you guys go. It is 15 chapters total.

Author's Summary: Just your normal everyday run of the mill Snape rescues smol Harry from the Dursley’s and cuteness ensues. Hopefully with a lot of feels because I love baby Harry.

4. Weeping Willow by MellarkandArt

This is a sweet and fluffy one-shot of Severus and Harry (and a bit of ron in the background) interacting after the flying car incident in their 2nd year. Some secrets are discovered about Harry by Severus, I wonder what? Lol

Author's Summary: "When Harry and Ron crash Mr. Weasley's flying Ford Anglia into the Whomping Willow, Ron broke more than just his wand. As he and Harry argue whether Ron should go to the hospital wing, a certain potion's professor makes the decision for them. Taking the opportunity to scold Harry before Minerva can simply slap his wrist in response to his misdeeds, Severus doesn't expect to cause the child to have a flat-out panic attack... or to notice just how thin he has gotten over the summer."

5. While I Was Fearing It, It Came by willowscribe

This is a one-shot where Harry and Severus come to and understanding in the potions classroom. It is not as fluffy as some of the other fics on this list, but it is still good. I am giving this fic its own TW because even though it is only rated teen, there is some discussion of self harm in it.

Author's Summary: "Snape rolled his eyes. "You're not scared of blood, Potter. For one, you're a Gryffindor. For another, you seem to face down the Dark Lord with alarming regularity. If you were afraid of blood, you wouldn't have made it past your first year in this castle."

"What do you want me to say?" Harry shouted, suddenly filled with the same irrational anger that'd been so hard to shake since Cedric's death. He jumped to his feet, unable to sit any longer. "What would you have me do? I couldn't make myself break skin, okay? Is that so hard to believe?"

Or: a potion requires blood as an ingredient. Harry's afraid of a relapse. Snape just wants to know why Harry Vanished a perfectly decent brew. They come to an understanding."

TW: Most if not all of these fics talk about some type of abuse in varying degrees, so just a heads up.

#fanfic rec #harry potter fic list #severitus #snape fandom #harry potter fandom #ao3fic #fanfiction

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fruitcoops · 3 years

Note

hiii i've just spent the last 36-48 hours reading your works and oh dear do i lOVE your writing and this universe :') . i dont know if you are taking requests but i think it would be kinda interesting (and low key hilarious) if you would write the lions reacting/reading thirst tweets? idk if this is a dumb idea or not but just like some of them reacting to them and going "well i'm actually gay/married so.. no!.. but thank you!"

Part two of the six-month celebration, everyone! Thank you thank you THANK YOU to everyone who submitted comments--I had over 60 come in, and while I couldn’t include them all, reading them was a true joy. The Lion Pride channel was something I started writing on a whim; I never expected it to grow like this <3 Much love to all of you!

TW for alcohol mentions and thirst tweets (nothing explicit)

“Why do I always fear for my life around you?” Sirius asked as Marlene settled into a cushy chair to the side of their table.

She smiled, catlike, and crossed her legs primly. “Because only Finn appreciates me.”

“That’s just the Aries connection, Cap,” Finn said with a smug grin.

“We’re both Leos, Harzy.”

“Eh, close enough.”

Remus raised an eyebrow at her. “You should probably start asking questions before this devolves further, Marley. He’s gonna keep digging himself a hole and we won’t get anything done.”

Marlene’s smile returned with a vengeance. “That’s where you’re wrong, Loops! We’re not doing any questions at all today.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Read it and weep.” She tossed a small posterboard at him like a frisbee; he caught it, barely, though both Talker and Sirius had to duck out of the way. Marlene faced the camera and winked. “Welcome back to Lion Pride, everyone! Today I’m here with Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, James Potter, Thomas Walker, and our wonderful cubs to react to your comments on our videos!”

“Bet you thought we’d never see ‘em, huh?” James asked.

“The comments fall into four categories: thirsty, funny, mean, and sweet. I will be reading two of those groups, and my lovely fiancée will be reading the others because she is the human embodiment of sunshine.”

“If you make Dorcas read the mean ones, I’ll be sad,” Leo laughed.

Marlene gave him a look of disbelief. “You think I’m passing up a chance to roast you guys? Puh-lease. We’re starting off strong with some thirsty, thirsty comments! Loops, you’re up first.”

“This is going to be fun,” Sirius said, leaning back in his chair.

She cleared her throat, then turned a smoldering look on their table. “I didn’t know I had a freckle kink, but then Remus Lupin appeared and now here we are.”

“Oh, shit,” Remus muttered, covering his face with his hands as the others howled with laughter.

“Lupin has been looking sexy as hell on the bench for years now. I'm so glad people are simping over him like he deserves,” Marlene read. “And there’s a little heart emoji, just for you.”

“This is every one of my nightmares come to life,” Remus said, though his voice was muffled by his forearms.

James lifted his glasses to swipe away the tears of mirth that had gathered in his eyes. “Are you kidding? This is everything I have ever wanted.”

“Y’know, it is so good to see people drooling over this hot piece of ass at last,” Finn sighed, reaching over to ruffle Remus’ hair as his face turned bright red.

“One more, and it’s a good one,” Marlene warned. She licked her lips, then had to take a moment to laugh before speaking. “I feel like Remus Lupin is the type of guy to bake you muffins—”

“Accurate,” Leo said.

“—but is also a kinky motherfucker.”

Remus’ mouth dropped open as the table erupted into cheering. Logan pumped both fists in the air and Sirius was laughing so hard no sound came out; Talker sank so low in his chair that only his head and shoulders were visible as he applauded.

“Why do people comment these things?” Remus asked, barely above a whisper. “Holy fuck, I’m engaged!”

“Speaking of…” Marlene raised her eyebrows and Sirius smile drooped.

“Oh, no.”

“Oh, yes. Buckle up, Cap!” She rolled her shoulders out. “Get someone who looks at you the way Sirius Black looks at a hockey puck.”

Remus snorted; James’ laugh was so short and sharp that it set everyone else off as well. “That sounds like I have a hockey puck fetish!” Sirius complained. “Which is so, so not true!”

Finn made an ‘ehh’ noise, and he leaned around Remus to smack the back of his head. “Hey!”

“Next one!” Marlene announced. “Sirius Black was my bi awakening.”

A beat of silence passed. “Is that it?” Sirius ventured, looking nervous.

“Yep.”

“Aw, man, that one’s lame,” Talker said, shaking his head. “Everyone thinks Cap is a little hot.”

Remus shot him a look. “A little?”

“Fair. Marley, I dare you to find one person who wouldn’t tap that.”

She rolled her eyes. “Me, though that dovetails nicely into the last one for our lovely captain. Ahem. I understand why Remus is with Sirius: he's hot as hell and rich, I'd hit that too.”

“Oh, fuck, you’re right,” Leo gasped. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

Finn and Logan turned to him in unison with a mix of disbelief and offense written all over their faces. “Dude.”

“First of all, Leo, you found yourself two hot rich boys,” Remus interrupted. “Second, that comment is forgetting that he’s funny, and smart, and nice, and—”

Seconds after the initial cover, Sirius took his hand off Remus’ mouth as if he’d been burned. “Did you just lick me?”

“Moving on! This is in all caps, so be prepared.” Marlene shuffled through her posterboards and turned to Leo with an ominous smile. He glanced toward the camera in mild fear. “What does a person have to do to get some hockey player ass?! Like why is Leo Knut so fine?!”

“Amen!” Logan called as Leo blushed.

“According to six of the seven people at this table, the answer to that first question is to be a hockey player,” Talker laughed. “The world may never know the answer to the second, sadly.”

“Lily could play hockey,” James said, resting his chin on his hand. Every single one of the others rolled their eyes. “She could! She’d be so good at it, too.”

“We know,” Finn groaned. “You only mention it every other day.”

“Speaking of the lovely Mrs. Potter,” Marlene began with a sly look as she held up a new card. “Do James and Lily Potter need a third? Asking for me specifically.”

James paused, dumbstruck, while the others drummed their hands on the table. “…no?”

A general sigh of disappointment went up. “I was really hoping he’d say yes,” Leo said.

“Ask Lily next time,” Remus recommended.

James turned to him and blinked slowly. “What are you insinuating, Loops?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“Don’t worry, James, you’ll like this one,” Marlene assured him. “James Potter is the ultimate dilf.”

“You’re damn right I am!” James whooped. “Vindication, bitches!”

“Marley, what have you done?” Talker whispered. “He’ll never shut up about that, now.”

“Oh, never,” James all but cackled. “I’m officially a dilf, you guys!”

“I hate you,” Sirius groaned.

“Tremzy, are you ready? We’ve got a couple very special ones for you,” Marlene said.

“Anything to get us out of this hell,” Logan begged.

“In that case: Logan Tremblay’s ass is better than Sidney Crosby’s. I said what I said.”

A pleased flush rose to his cheeks as Finn and Leo high-fived over his head. “Really? Thank you!”

“And they would be correct!” Finn announced. “Best ass in the league.”

“Come on,” Remus scoffed, though he was smiling.

Marlene cleared her throat to get their attention. “I don’t think I can legally read this on air without being censored or getting the video taken down, but…”

She turned the board around; all seven of them leaned forward to read it, then slowly looked at Logan, who turned vivid red. “Mon dieu. Is that—someone commented that on a video? Like, for people to see?”

“I feel like I need to bleach my eyes,” Sirius said just as Finn began shaking with silent laughter.

Leo’s face fell. “You wrote that, didn’t you?”

“I did,” Finn wheezed, scooting forward to fist-bump Marlene. “We wanted to see what you guys would say. Fuckin’ hell, your faces.”

“Alright, Talkie, are you ready?” Marlene asked around her laughter. “Seeing Thomas Walker with a baby makes me want to have his babies…please hit me up.”

He held up his index finger and took a second to laugh before responding. “If that’s Noelle, yes. If that’s anyone else, I’m flattered, but absolutely not.”

Logan made a face. “Ew.”

“We have two more,” Marlene warned. “For some very special people that aren’t here today, but I think you’ll like them anyway.”

Sirius narrowed his eyes. “I don’t trust the look on your face.”

“Daddy Dumo makes me swoon.”

A muddle of horrified noises echoed through the studio as all seven of them cringed. “Oh, my god, that’s my dad!” Logan yelped, covering his ears. Sirius looked vaguely ill and Remus’ shoulders crept toward his ears; James shuddered.

“The worst part is, we all know he can get it,” Finn said with a grimace. “God, I feel like I just heard someone talking about my parents having sex.”

“I’m sure he’ll love to hear that,” Marlene laughed. “Last one, from one of our truth or drinks.”

Remus went pale half a second too late. “N—”

“Hope Lupin is a milf.”

A broken noise escaped his mouth and he clamped his hand over it while Talker rubbed his back in sympathy. Sirius shook his head. “Somehow, that’s worse than Dumo’s.”

“Whoever sent that in, show some respect!” Leo said indignantly as Remus bonked his forehead against the table. “Hope Lupin is a lovely woman!”

“I think they noticed that particular fact,” Marlene pointed out, earning herself several scandalized shouts of her name and a whine from Remus. “That’s all we have for thirst comments! Are you ready for some funny ones?”

“Anything,” Remus pleaded. “I am begging you, anything else.”

Marlene shook her head as she stood, still smiling, and kissed Dorcas on the cheek when she entered the frame. “Go for it, love.”

“Dorcas!” they all cheered, lighting up immediately.

“Hey, guys, it’s been a while!” She curled up in Marlene’s vacant spot and took her own posterboards out from underneath the seat. “Alright, let’s rock and roll. Pascal Dumais is the team dad and nothing will change my mind, and Tremzy is the annoying youngest child.”

“That is so accurate,” Sirius laughed, leaning just out of range of Logan’s playful punch. “Whoever commented that has no idea how right they are.”

“We’ve got a whole sibling dynamic thing going on,” Talker agreed. “Tremzy’s the baby of the family, Cap is the quietly chaotic middle child, and Pots is the older brother that starts shit and inevitably gets blamed for however out-of-control it gets.”

Dorcas nodded. “You are one hundred percent correct. In a similar vein: Pots was the dad jokes friend before he was even a dad.”

“Painfully so,” Leo confirmed, shaking his head as they all groaned in agreement. James looked rather smug about the whole thing. “So many puns.”

“Oh, you’ll like this one,” Dorcas mused as she drew a new card. “If Tremzy looked directly into my eyes for even two seconds, all of my problems would be solved. I am sure of it.”

“Yes,” Finn and Leo said in unison.

“It’s something about the eyes, I think,” James added. “They just stand out so much that it’s a little startling straight-on.”

Logan looked to the camera and stared at it, unblinking; it zoomed in slightly on his face. “Everything will be fine,” he said with mock solemnity. “Your problems are solved.”

“Well, that was terrifying,” Sirius said drily. “Got any more for us, Ms. Meadowes?”

“Of course I do! We’ve got quite a few for Loops and Leo.” She took a sip of her water before getting comfortable again. “My favorite thing about these videos is that we can all see Loops get steadily buffer as the season goes on. Good for you, king!”

“Flex! Flex! Flex!” the six of them chanted; Remus rolled his eyes, but slid his sweater sleeve to his elbow and flexed his forearm, resulting in enough hoots and hollers that they could probably be heard a block away. Talker fake-swooned into Leo’s arms and Remus lightly whacked him on the shoulder.

“Remus Lupin looks like he has squishable cheeks,” Dorcas read aloud.

“He does!” James cooed, scooting over and reaching out.

Remus narrowed his eyes. “I swear to god I’ll bite you.”

Sirius cupped his face between his palms and kissed his nose, then pinched both his cheeks gently. “Ta-da!”

“How many of these do we have?” Remus asked, though his voice was a bit muffled by Sirius’ hands.

“Just one more for you, and it’s my personal favorite.” Dorcas assured him. “I love how the team probably had no impulse control until Loops joined.”

Sirius let go of his face and dissolved into laughter as Finn nearly fell on the floor. “Oh my—you think he has impulse control?” Talker slapped the edge of the table as he shook his head. “Absolutely not. Hell no, Loops is the first person to do stupid shit with us.”

“Yeah, I just don’t get caught,” Remus added around his own laughter. “Everyone thinks I’m such a hardass goody-two-shoes and it lets me get away with so much more than you delinquents.”

“Speaking of delinquents,” Dorcas continued. “This one is from our ‘Taste Testing Sexy Alcohol’ video: ah, yes, now I know how to do a body shot. 10/10, very educational video.”

“Do not take educational advice from us,” Finn blurted instantly. “I know this is a joke, but please exercise caution. That video was a ton of fun but a nightmare to recover from.”

Sirius winced at the memory. “I took two naps and then wished for death for a full day.”

“On a lighter note, who’s ready for some Knutty appreciation?” Dorcas smiled at her cards. “I've only had Leo Knut for a season and half, but if anything happened to him, I would kill everyone in this room and then myself.”

“Big mood,” four of them said simultaneously.

Leo turned to the camera with a concerned look on his face. “That’s a meme reference, but are y’all okay?”

“No,” Dorcas answered. “Especially not this next person: Sometimes I do something productive and then I remember @LeoKnut is a 19 year old professional athlete who radiates happiness and with two of the hottest boyfriends the good lord has made, and then my bowl of packaged ramen seems less impressive.”

“I’m proud of your ramen,” Leo said, even as the corners of his mouth twitched in a smile. “And I appreciate the note about my boyfriends, because they are definitely the hottest people the good lord has made.”

Talker stuck his lip out in a pout. “Rude.”

“Sorry, Talkie, I’m biased.”

“Last one before Marlene comes back, so you’d better enjoy it!” Dorcas announced. “Did the Lions effectively utilize girl power when they wrecked toxic masculinity, yes or yes?”

“Can we utilize girl power?” Remus wondered, resting his shin on his hand. “Isn’t that exclusively for, y’know, women?”

“We can utilize himbo power,” Finn suggested.

James gave him an offended look. “Not all of us are himbos!”

“Okay, but you definitely are.”

“I am not!” James held up his fingers to count. “There are only, like, three qualifications, right? I might be strong, hot, and respectful, but I’m not dumb so it doesn’t count!”

“Pots,” Remus said quietly, hiding his smile for half a second. “Buddy, that was four things.”

James paused, then sighed in resignation. “Ah, fuck, I’m a himbo.”

“You really are.”

“At least we don’t promote toxic masculinity.”

They raised their waterbottles in a ‘cheers’ motion as Marlene and Dorcas switched spots; Marlene stretched her arms over her head and grabbed the new boards. “I’m back, beloved himbos. Talker, Leo, you are beloved by the people and have no mean comments. Cap, we’re starting with you.”

“Are they actually mean mean?” he asked.

“Sirius Black seems like a little bitch. Not in a bad way, necessarily. He just. Seems like he'd be a little bitch."

Sirius raised his eyebrows. “Oh, okay. That answers one question.”

“He’s not a little bitch,” Leo said. “Pouty on occasion, but not a little bitch.”

Remus gave him a long look, then shook his head. “Yeah, I mean, you teared up a little when Hattie got a splinter in her paw but didn’t even yell when you almost sliced your finger off while making dinner.”

“Duality of man,” Finn said sagely.

Marlene cocked an eyebrow. “Finn O’Hara’s hair kind of reminds me of Garfield the Cat.”

“Alright, that’s just rude.”

“It does not!” Logan gasped at the same time Leo made a noise of agreement.

Finn turned to him in utter betrayal. “Nutter Butter, I thought you liked my hair!”

“I do!” Leo defended. “But they’re not entirely wrong. It’s very orange in the sun.”

“I’m never going to forget that,” Finn muttered, staring at the floor.

“Ugh, it bothers me so much that Lupin just objectifies Black all the time!” Marlene read in a high-pitched, nasal voice. “No respect in that relationship!”

Sirius raised his eyebrows. “Pardon?”

Marlene stared at it for a moment, then shrugged. “Yeah, I have no idea what videos they were watching. Do you feel objectified in your relationship, Cap? I know the opinion of total strangers really bothers you a lot.”

“I’m really glad you picked up on that,” he said with false gravity. “Yeah, it’s such a bummer when my hot fiancé says I look nice. Such a blow to my self-esteem.”

“That was supposed to be a roast against me,” Remus said, looking amused. “Talk about backfiring.”

“Are you ready, Pots? This one’s pretty brutal,” Marlene warned. James nodded and Finn linked their hands for moral support. “James Potter is a swiftie and you cannot tell me otherwise.”

He furrowed his eyebrows. “…yeah? That’s true? T Swift is a regular occurrence on the locker room playlist.”

“Also, James Potter looks like someone who would think black pepper was spicy.”

“Now that one is mean,” he complained as the others burst out laughing. “It’s not my fault I have sensitive taste buds!”

“Oh, honey,” she said under her breath as she took a new card. “Get ready, Tremzy. This first one is short and sweet: Logan Tremblay looks like a lesbian.”

“That is not an insult,” Logan laughed. “Every lesbian I know is rad as fuck. I wish I looked that good in a leather jacket.”

“I just realized Logan doesn’t look short cause he’s next to bunch of hockey players, he’s short cause he’s 5’9.”

The smile slipped off his face in a millisecond as the others roared with laughter. “Quoi?”

“Oh, she got you good,” Sirius gasped, patting his shoulder clumsily. “Holy fuck, can I frame that?”

“That’s not what it says.” An edge of distress appeared in Logan’s voice. “Marley, that’s not what it says.”

James sat on the floor with the heels of his palms pressed against his eyes. “You’re fucking—whoever sent that in, you are my new favorite person. Jesus.”

“Do you need a second to recover before we move on?” Dorcas asked as she draped her arms over the back of Marlene’s chair. “The next one is our biggest section by far.”

“It’s the sweet ones, yeah?” Leo asked.

“Right.”

“It might be a good idea to do those before Lo spontaneously combusts.”

“Agreed!” She swapped with Marlene and hauled a short stack of posterboards out from their hiding place with a smile. “A hug from Dumo can probably solve any issue.”

“Facts,” Logan said. “I could really use one right about now, too.”

“Has anyone noticed how blue Leo Knut’s eyes are?”

“Yes,” the six of them chorused.

Finn gave him a dreamy look. “Every single day.”

“When I first read this one, I thought I wrote it,” Dorcas said with a snort. “Someone give Marlene a raise. No reason why, I just love her.”

“Can we do that?” Sirius asked, looking toward the camera crew. “Can we lobby to give you guys raises? Because you definitely deserve it after all the bullshit you deal with to make these videos watchable, and Marlene, you’ve drawn the short end of the stick ninety percent of the time.”

“How?” she called off-screen.

“You have to actually talk to us and try to get answers.”

“Fair.”

Dorcas finished scribbling something down on her notepad. “Just making a note of this conversation for future reference. Moving on! Sirius Black and James Potter are a prime example of hockey husbands, and I adore them.”

“The ironic part of that is that we’re both in committed relationships, but we’re basically married,” James mused.

Remus shook his head. “You guys are so married. Lily wanted to get you matching rings for your birthday, Pots.”

“That would be so cool!” they said in perfect unison. Remus turned to the camera and spread his hands in a case in point motion.

Dorcas stifled her laughter before moving on. “This one is cute. Give Remus Lupin all the hugs! I feel like I could tell him he’s an inspiration and he’d be so nice about it—” She paused to glance up at them. “—this next bit is in parentheses: all the LGBT Lions give me that vibe, but Cap and Knutty are super intimidating so I wouldn’t have the guts.”

Leo’s face fell and Sirius’ eyebrows pitched. “I’m not intimidating!” Leo protested. “I thought we already went over that! Loops gives fantastic hugs, but I want some, too.”

“He definitely deserves all the hugs in the world, but I promise I’m nice,” Sirius said, a bit softer than usual. “Is it because we’re tall?”

Dorcas half-shrugged. “Probably. It’s a little startling at first. Oh, I could’ve written this one, too: The Venn diagram of men I trust and the Gryffindor Lions is a full circle.”

Talker beamed at the camera. “Thank you!”

“So many hockey guys are such douchebags,” Logan said with a shake of his head. “I’m really glad we don’t do that shit.”

“Me, too.” Dorcas slid her old card under her chair. “Sirius Black’s hair looks so soft and I just want to touch it so bad.”

“It is so soft,” Remus agreed immediately. “You have no idea.”

“Everyone wants to touch Cap’s hair,” Finn said, sighing. “It’s so majestic.”

“I need a haircut.”

“No, you don’t,” Remus said as he tugged a stray curl. Sirius hummed.

“This one is from the interview some you did with Jules and Katie: these hockey boys being so soft with kids is my aesthetic! Like, it’s just so adorable to see these big, intimidating dudes be so, so sweet! Love them all!” She turned the card for them to see. “And then they added a heart at the end.”

“It’s impossible to be around those kids and not be happy,” James said. “They’re just too cute and wonderful.”

“Yeah, I love kids.” Finn nodded. “Especially the Dumais and Jules. They’re a hoot.”

“Jules would die if he heard you say that,” Remus laughed. “The hero worship is still going strong with most of you.”

“This one made me laugh when I first read it, but it’s really sweet,” Dorcas informed them. “Anyone else feel like we were deceived these past five years into thinking Cap was this hard-ass man, when in reality he's a cuddle bug who definitely captures and releases spiders instead of squishing them?”

“You weren’t deceived, I was just closeted,” Sirius said. “Also, I absolutely squish spiders.”

Remus gave him a look. “No, you do not. That’s my job. I’m the catch and release person if I can get away with it.”

James shook his head. “The third week of practices you saw a spider and threw me at it.”

“You did what?” Finn asked.

“There was a spider in my stall,” Sirius sighed, looking as if he would rather be anywhere else. “And Pots and I were talking so I didn’t see it until I almost sat on it, and my brain decided the only logical thing to do would be to grab him and shove him toward the spider.”

“That was after you shrieked,” Talker added. “Like, literally shrieked. I’ve never heard anyone make a noise like that.”

“Alright, alright,” Sirius grumbled. “We get it, I don’t like spiders.”

Remus shrugged. “But you are a cuddle bug. They got that part right.”

“We’re in the final two!” Dorcas announced. “This one has some pictures to go with it, so it’s on my phone. Fuck Romeo and Juliet, I want what these bitches have.”

“It’s us!” Leo cooed as the phone made its way down the line. In the upper corner of the screen, the photo appeared—it had been taken in New York, and Logan’s whole face was alight with happiness as Leo and Finn each pressed a kiss to his cheek. The camera caught him mid-laugh, so his eyes were closed and his chin was tucked slightly into Finn’s Strand hoodie.

“That’s my screensaver,” Finn said with a grin, pulling his phone out and turning it toward the camera without moving away from Leo. “One of my favorites.”

“I forgot you took that one,” Logan murmured. He hooked his chin over Leo’s shoulder and kissed his cheek; the four others at the table gave soft are you seeing this? looks to the camera and Dorcas smiled.

“Pots, I think yours is next. I hate to break it to you, Talkie, but they didn’t get any of you and Noelle.”

“We don’t take a ton of pictures together,” Talker said as James took the phone. “I mean, we take a bunch of selfies, but we don’t live close enough to each other to actually post that often. What picture is it, J?”

James was staring down at the picture with an unbearably sweet expression. “It’s our wedding. That’s my favorite one, actually.”

Like Logan, they had been captured while laughing—Lily was bent slightly at the waist as James clapped, his glasses just as askew as the flower crown on her head. It was impossible to tell who had told the joke originally, but they were both radiant in the sunset.

“That’s a really good one,” Sirius said with an unreadable look on his face.

“Well, well, well, fancypants, you two got a video.” James wiggled his eyebrows and Remus leaned in to see.

“What kind of video? One of our tikt—oh. Oh, this is so cute.” He shifted his chair over as the short edit began to play. “D, who made this?”

“A fan.”

“It’s really impressive,” Sirius said without taking his eyes off the screen. The edit was a series of photos, both on and off the ice; Sirius knocking their helmets together, then Remus looking back over his shoulder, then both of them in the water playing chicken in the sun. It was a slideshow of their life and their love.

“Can you send that to me?” Remus asked when it was over. “Cause that’s super cool.”

“Sure thing. Are you guys ready for the last one?” When they all nodded, she drummed her fingers on the posterboard and cleared her throat. “Arthur appreciation hours. He deserves it after managing to control the team.”

A cheer went up—all seven stood and applauded, half-laughing and half-whooping. “Miracle worker!” Sirius called.

“Best coach in the league!” Finn added.

“Most tolerant man to ever walk the earth!” Remus raised his water in a toast and they tapped the plastic edges together, nearly spilling all over the table.

Dorcas’ eyes crinkled in a smile as she turned to the camera. “That’s it for today, Lions! Tune in next time for more content of our boys, and thank you for such wonderful comments!”

288 notes · View notes

morgansunflower · 3 years

Text

I Miss You 3/3

Jason Todd X Reader

Batfam x Batsis! Reader

Warnings:suggestive content, showering together

Words:1548

All the fears and worries can melt in one day

Hours after Dami and I looked at the open house, I step out of my doctor's appointment. My little brother Damian in the car waiting for me. I step out of the building and walk to my car. I come to a halting stop seeing a different Wayne.

"B-Bruce" I stammer, shit! I look for, Damian "w-where is Dami?"

"he's home" he answered bluntly

What do I say? Pretty sure he as figured out I'm pregnant "I looked at a open house today.. I love you guys but I think it's--" I stammer as I force the tears back. I don't want to cry.

"we will discuss this further over dinner" he directly said

"I don't want to go home right now" I admitted, I don't want to face the rest of my family right now

"I have something else in mind" he answered

My words stuck in my throat. I was expecting anger but he was calm, though nervous maybe? He steps to the passenger door of the car and opens it. I step into the car, sitting on the passenger seat. Bruce, shuts the door. I take a shaky breath. I really hope I don't start crying. I just am hoping for his approval. The car drive was quiet. We sat in a room with only a few tables. It was just the two of us, Bruce likely not wanting any reporters in a personal family business. I sat on the chair in front of the round table. Bruce sitting next to me.

"is Jay aware of this?" he asked with a stern tone

I roll my eyes irritated with my love "no, I haven't been able to get ahold of him.. I am really sorry that I didn't tell you. No offense but you're kinda hard to read dad" I sigh deeply with a tear falling. So scared of rejection. I dry my tears looking straight at the ground. I don't want to disappoint him.

"Y/N" Bruce said softly I lift my head to face my adopted dad "I'd advise you, to not think I am ashamed of you for any absurd reason. I intend on not allowing you to leave. You are in a delicate state. When we return I'd advise you to sleep" he firmly said seeing that I am lacking sleep no thanks to Jason "I'll see what information I can find on, Jay" he assured

I began to cry of joy. I reach to Bruce and hug him. He carefully wraps his arms around me.

"thank you! Thank you! Thank you, dad!"

"before I forget you are to not leave the Manor without someone to accompany you"

I chuckled with falling tears, he's so protective. Hour's later in the family room at Wayne Manor. I stood in front of my family as my siblings sat on the couches and Alfred stood beside the left couch. Cassandra, softly smiles to me. She didn't have to use words, I knew. She was telling me not to worry. I cleared my throat. Every eye on me. I take a shaky breath. Damn I hope I don't cry. I'm just glad my sister's and Damian aren't rating me out.

"there's something I need to tell you all. I don't know.. If you will be.." I take a shaky breath unable to form any other words, just say it! "I'm pregnant" I blurted out

Alfred's eyes instantly swell and shake. Dammit if he crys I'm gonna cry. Tim, softly chuckled in response. Did he know? Steph probably couldn't keep her mouth shut. I look at my oldest brother with a heavy heart.

"is that why Jay isn't in, Gotham? That asshole!" Dick appalled with a enraged look on his face

Tim, face planted knowing this will not end well. Barbara scolded her boyfriend by hitting his head. Thank you Babs.

"you fool" Damian muttered

Offended I abruptly kick Grayson's shin "OUCH!!" he yelled bending his knee upward in pain

"you jerk! He doesn't even know I'm pregnant, and you're lucky you even know, asshole!" I exclaimed with a broken voice on the verge of tears

I step to leave

"congratulations Ms Y/N. I am delighted to hear the beautiful news" Alfred softly said

My heart melts. I softly smile to him and step out of the room through the hallway to the staircase. I go to my room taking Bruce's advice. That evening after a, small nap I hear my door knocking.

"who is it?" I asked

"your favorite brother!" Grayson said

"you kinda lost that title" I said irritated

"c'mon Y/N I'm sorry... Would you please open the door so I can make things right with you" he begged

"I don't know.. I'm still pretty angry about what you said about, Jason" I said annoyed

"I have a present for your baby" he said in bribing tone

I open the door seeing Grayson holding a small stuffed toy elephant. I lightly shake my head. I hold it and see Tim smiling as he walks up with my favorite bowl of fruits. I feel my hormones getting the best of me. This is probably one of the sweetest things they've done for me.

"Aww you two are gonna make me cry" I said with a brittle voice

"that mean you forgive me?" Dick asked with a hopeful tone and smile

"hmm, fine"

"ha! Told you it'd work!" Grayson exclaimed gratefully

"please" Tim rolled his eyes "just cause she forgave your stupid ass, doesn't mean you are the 'favorite" he smiles to me "I'll be the favorite don't worry Y/N" Tim kindly said

Moments later in my bathroom alone. I strip down to nothing so I can take a shower. I gasp as the door opens I turn seeing, Jason!! Before he could say or do anything I ran and captured him into a passionate kiss. He parts with a smirk. My arms around his neck and his on my face

"well hello to you to sexy" he smirks realizing I'm entirely exposed

"dammit, Jason" I lay my forehead on his, my lips tremble as I grip his collar "I was so scared"

His face drops "I know. I'm so fucking sorry. Roy, didn't tell me it was going to be so dangerous" he apologized "my fucking phone couldn't pick up signal" he growled to himself

"it's OK I was, just was so worried about you" I began to cry "I m-missed you so much!"

"I know" he kisses my cheek "I missed you to beautiful"

He holds my arms Jason gazes me up and down my body. TELL HIM!! My breath hitches with my needed word's trapped in my throat as his eyes stop at my swollen abdomen. My muscles tense up and my heart races. He takes a deep breath and shakes his head. He remains silent. I take a shaky breath.

"J-Jason" I softly said my words stuck in my throat, as I cried. Please don't be mad

"I'm a fucking dumbass for leaving" he said with a brittle voice

I shake my head still unable to form words as I cry. Jason, strips down. We both step into the shower, together. He turns the water on. His hand within inches of bump. Jason, carefully ran his knuckles up and down my bump. Jason, began to stutter

"hey, look at me" I told him, he lifts his head to me his eyes swelling "don't you dare start to blame yourself for anything.." I began sobbing that made him frown, I can't believe he's really home! "the b-baby is going to love you"

He kissed me deeply. I part from his lips. He began to weep my heart sinks. He kisses my cheek. Afterwards Jason and I wearing our pajamas. Both of us in my bed the soft covers laid on our legs. My head resting on his arm. He had his large hand on my bump gently rubbing it with his thumb. I am so sleepy, Jason's soothing touch is nearly too much.

"so besides the obvious. Anything else happen while I was gone" he whispered with a yawn

"well, I hope you don't mind I told Dami he could come have quality time with the baby, whenever he wants to"

"fine by me love" he softly smiled

"oh! I almost forgot I went to a open house. I want you to look tomorrow" I said running my fingers through his hair

He chuckled softly warming my heart "wouldn't happen to be the disease infected and haunted house"

"how did you..." I was surprised

"my damn phone blew up when I finally got signal. Damian was hellbent on telling me that any house you told me about was horrifically unsafe and a bunch of shit, that I needed to come home right away" he rolls his eyes at himself "but before you have another reason to kill my stupid ass. I didn't call or text you because I wanted to surprise you" he fondly looks at my bump "but I guess you surprised me"

I smile softly placing my hand above his own "believe me it was a surprise to me to" then for the first time, I feel a gentle kick from our child

#batfamily #bruce wayne #batfam #Jason Todd X Reader #Jason Todd #Pregnancy #Unplanned pregnancy #Sweet Bruce Wayne #Good dad Bruce Wayne #Fluff #Comfort #Humor #Batsis! Reader #Batsis!#Batfamily

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swiss-cheeze · 4 years

Text

Please || Matthew Gray Gubler

Requested, YES/NO: Can I please request a female reader where she is chubby and by about her appearance and she and Matthew are in a relationship but she is scared he is going to leave her for someone more pretty. So he gets into an argument about why she is acting weird and she confesses and basically it ends with him showing her how beautiful she is and smut and after care?

Gender: she/her, female.

Warnings: body worship, talk of food and weight gaining due to food (unhealthy mindset from the reader i guess?), reader calls themself a ‘troll’, self-abuse/hurtful words to oneself, sex.

-------

“You ready pumpkin?” Matthew asked as he walked into the shared bedroom; only to see you in your underwear squishing your stomach with a sad frown, “oh baby” Matthew pouted as he came up behind you, his arms wrapped around your stomach and pulled you into his back, “just not a good day?” you shrugged, it was hard to speak without crying, “we don't have to go out,” his voice was small as he peppered kisses down your neck while thumbing at your stomach. Your breath shuddered as you walked to your closet and picked out your comfort outfit and sniffled, “sweetie i promise we don't have to go” Matthew stood still in the middle of the room while you stood in front of the closet trying your hardest not to break down, “you can stay here, i'll go alone bubby”

“I'll be okay,” your voice was scratchy and barely a whisper but Matthew somehow heard it.

“I don't want you to go somewhere where you’re not comfortable,” Matthew retorted, god you loved this man.

“Please,” it was a whimper.

Please just drop it.

Please just let me do this.

Please hold me.

Please tell me if I'm enough.

Please don't touch me.

Please help me.

The thing that brought you back to earth was the kiss Matthew gave to the crown of your head before exiting the room; leaving you with the click of the door and the screams of your inner demons and voices. You shook your head to try and rid yourself of the voices before grabbing your comfort outfit and getting dressed; it was a red carpet event after all, you couldn't be late, or look bad.

-----

“Oh my god it's Jennifer Aniston!” Matthew whispered with a grin as said model and actor stepped out of her car and started making her way onto the carpet. Matthew hugged your sides - your chubby sides - and squeezed you into him as cameras flashed.

“Matthew over here!”

“Gubler this way!”

“Oi, look at me! Perfect!”

God it was so loud even in this open venue. You tried to keep your smile light and happy but anyone who was anyone could see exactly what was going on in your head; you were only brought back to earth for the second time today by the pull of Matthew. You're leaving! Finally! After a-

“Hello! I am here with Matthew Gray Gubler and girlfriend (Y/n) (L/n)!” a voice called.

Fuck.

Interview.

Smile and wave boys, just smile and wave.

“How are you enjoying the place so far Matthew?” the interviewer asked as you finally got a good look at her; long blonde hair, perfectly chiseled face, tight waist, small stomach, skin tight dress, long legs, perfect pedicure and manicure…

“(Y/n)?” Matthew jolted you slightly as you stared at the interviewer.

“Yes?” you questioned.

“How do you feel tonight? You've got many models and actors around you, is it a bit overwhelming being with an actor?” god even her voice was sexy.

“Um, no, no it's good!” you gave a fake small and jolted yourself to a fake happy, “it's great being around those i admire and watch in shows and movies; Chris Evans, Simon Pegg; i think even Ben Hardy and a few others i admire are here too” you gave a grin and looked around while talking to give the impression you were looking for the people you were talking about.

“Well that sounds good!” The interviewer gave a forced laugh, almost like she was bored, “are you wearing anything special or is this just the sunday look?” her giggle was what caught you on the insult.

“Excuse me?” Matthews hand on your waist tightened as you spoke.

“Darling-”

“Your outfit is a bit old…” the interviewer paused, “a bit outdated?” this made you go quiet; now your comfort outfit is ruined.

“Excuse us,” Matthew mumbled as he guided you away from the interviewer and into a quiet corner.

“What-”

“Did you want to go home?” Matthew cut you off, he was stern and to the point.

“What? No of course not-”

“Your comfort outfit has just been insulted, I know how much you love this outfit and I know how amazing it makes you look every single time you wear it,” Matthew waited a moment as he looked at you with all the love in the world.

“But what about-”

“It's just a party” Matthew reminded you, he always had a habit of making bad situations into good ones.

“No, no I promise I'm okay baby,” you gave the most convincing smile you could, Matthew was hesitant but eventually gave in as you continued the red carpet and did another 3 interviews...all while being surrounded by lovely size 6 women who have flat stomachs, nice legs and nice breasts. While you were on the heavier side of the spectrum you couldn't help but thank yourself for your breasts; they were not huge but they weren't small like some actresses were because their body was small in comparison. And Matthew adored your breasts; always held them and stuffed his face in them to make you laugh, always leaving marks and bruises in the perfect places that only you know about...so you just kept that same mentality through the rest of the night.

He loves me.

That's all I need.

He loves all of me.

He could go for better.

But he chose me.

God he could totally go for better.

Look there’s Aniston and her perfect body-

No stop!

God and now A.J., and Paget; even Kirsten looks better in any outfit than i do.

No matter how much you tried you just couldn't stop thinking how much better Matthew would be with someone smaller than you; someone who could give him lap dances and not have rolls, someone he could throw over his shoulder easy, someone he could pick up from behind, someone who could sit on his face and not crush him...this is gonna be a long night.

------

When you got home that night all you wanted to do was law down in bed and weep, but of course you had a boyfriend whom you lived with.

“Did you like the movie (Y/n)?” Matthew asked as he hung his coat, a big dopey grin plastered on his face. You shrugged.

“Was a movie,” was your only response before walking into the bedroom and striping to your underwear.

“Okay…” Matthew mumbled, he knew something was up but he didn't want to push it, “want to order in or something then?” he called through the house, “maccas? Thai? Ooo I could go for some good sushi or honey soy chicken; oh my god AND NOODLES!” he sounded too excited for what seemed to be a weight gaining meal. Matthew bounded into the bedroom with a grin before stopping short.

There you were.

Head in your hands.

Shoulders shaking.

Silently sobbing.

“Baby?”

“Please leave me alone,”

“Please tell me what's wrong...you’ve never been like this; you've always loved yourself,”

You sniffled before going silent for a moment.

“I've always been like this; i'm just good at hiding it from everyone,”

And it suddenly made sense.

When you get a smaller plate than you normally would in restaurants, a salad instead of a cupcake, a healthy shake rather than milkshake, exercising more, covering yourself with layers when you go out together.

“Oh sweetheart,”

Matthew sat down next to you, he was about to reach a hand out to touch you but cowered back when he realised you most likely wouldn't like it.

“You know you're...you’re a lot like Spencer Reid even if he's only fictional,” this seemed to make you smile as you thought of the times you got to spend on set with your second family, “you give great advice, you’re smart in places others aren't, you ramble...but then again you're so different: you’re warm, inviting, open hearted, head full, eccentric, extravagant-”

“Well i wouldn't say extravagant-”

“Well I do,” you finally looked at Matthew; his face faltered when he saw how tear stained and red splotched you where. But god you were still the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

“I know i'm probably a troll by now-”

“No, no no baby; never,” Matthew raised his hands and cupped your jaw to keep you looking at him, “you’re always the most beautiful thing i ever had the pleasure of meeting,” you wanted to smile, and you did, but that was only your face.

“Yeah? Then what about the rest of me-”

“Dont” Matthew was quick to cut you off, “you are beautiful, all of you is beautiful,”

“But I've got, I've got rolls! A-and marks! Hair! I-i smell, I'm flabby, I jiggle…”

“I have rolls too and you love them,” your eyes darted to Spencers stomach where you knew his soft rolls where, “i have marks,” your eyes traveled to his hips were you knew some stretch marks looked like bolts of lightning from Zeus and Thor themselves, “i have hair,” you probably shouldn't have but you looked to his pant-covered crotch where you knew there was a recently trimmed patch of dark hair, “i smell,” you giggled at this as you both did kind of smell due to the day out in the hot movie theater, “im flabby and i jiggle,” he wasn't wrong, his arms sometimes jiggled when you moved them the same as his tummy whenever he danced weirdly.

“But youre skinny-”

“No buts,”

“I eat too much”

“So do I”

“You don't gain weight from it”

“Because i couldn't swallow for 26 days and have a fast metabolism”

“You have cheekbones”

“So do you”

“You cant see mine”

“I was a model; I had to bite the inside of my cheeks”

“Chiseled jaw,”

“Jaw exercises because i was a model; plus eating you o-”

“OKAY SHUSH,” you waved Matthew off with a laugh before standing up quickly.

“Can we please just go to bed? I just want this day to end,” you asked as your hands unconsciously covered your naked stomach; Matthew only now realised you had stripped from your dress before he came into the room. The look in his eyes when he scanned you from top to bottom included a range of emotions, from love and lust, to anger; anger being that you couldn't see what he sees and saw every day of his life.

“Can you at least let me show you how amazing your body is? And how much I adore you, your body and your mind?” a red flush went over your whole body as you realised what he was asking. Of course he asked. Consent is sexy.

That’s when it all fell into place; as soon as you nodded Matthew was all over you.

The plush bed moved under you as Matthew guided you down to the pillows and left feather-like kisses along your neck while muttering praises under his breath.

“Beautiful”

“Goddess”

“Princess”

“Elegant”

“One of a kind”

“Plush”

“Perfect”

“Impenetrable”

“Lovely”

“Divine”

“Angelic”

“Captivating”

“Foxy”

Each kiss left a word, each word left a purple bruise, each bruise lit a fire inside you you never knew you had. Nibbles trailed from your neck to your panty line before dispersing around your stomach in red and splotchy hickies and bites. Matthews hands went under you to unclasp your bra before leaving it somewhere on the bed or the floor; you couldn't really care less. His rough hands were the first to touch you and play with your nipples before his tongue, mouth and teeth followed; nipping and biting your nipples, pulling them slightly, twisting and licking. It felt like a dream.

“Sh-shit Matthew,” you let out a breathy whine while your body twitched under Matthews hands and mouth, one hand went down to your waist to hold you still while the other stayed playing with the plush flesh.

“Always loved these,” Matthew mumbled into your breast, he took a moment to plunge his face in your cleavage causing you to laugh, “just gimme a sec lovely,” Matthews voice came out muffled as he sat still; your arms coming up to play with his hair. His hands gripped both of your breasts softly before pushing them into the sides of his face, again, causing you to laugh.

“Is this your way of showing me how much you love me?” you questioned, Matthew stayed silent before a nod came from him, again, causing you to laugh harder before the man brought his face back to the real world with a harsh intake of breath.

“Couldn't breath,” Matthew said breathlessly, obviously. You both laughed for a moment before Matthew dove in for a kiss; heated, breathless, full of love and admiration for you. It honestly caught you off guard and made you forget what all of this was really for; until Matthews hands started pawing at your stomach.

“Gube-”

“Please”

And suddenly you were brought back to this morning; except this was different.

Please let me.

Please let me love you.

Please let me show you how amazing you are.

Please let me show you how beautiful you are.

Please let me show you how perfect you are.

Please allow me to be with you.

Please let me hold you.

Please.

And that was all it took.

“Okay,” you smiled a teary smile, as Matthew kissed your cheek and then trailed down to your stomach, peppering kisses, nibbles and licks all over your tummy.

“I love your stomach,” Matthew mumbled, “it holds your intestines together, it holds your food in, it keeps you together,” his nibbles soon went lower; leaving marks on the apex of your thighs as well as your inner thighs.

“Babe please…” your fingers threaded through Matthews hair as you tried to guide him to the place you really wanted but he stayed at your thighs.

“Darling just let me love you,” Matthew requested.

“Love me between my legs Gube” you whined while tugging at the mop on Matthews head until finally, finally! Matthew started to pull down your underwear before spreading your legs and...staring, “Gube…” you started to feel uncomfortable and closed your legs.

“Sunshine im sorry,” Matthew finally looked to you rather than your sex, “you’re just beautiful everywhere,”

“I know, i just haven't shaved and-”

“No, stop,” Matthew kissed your panty line, “this is about loving all of you; when have I ever cared if you’ve shaved or not?” the man gave you an unanswerable question, “answer me baby,”

“Never…”

“Never. Exactly,” he smiled before crawling back up to you and kissing your nose for a moment before going back down and licking a stripe up your slit causing you to moan from the suddenness, “god and you taste perfect,”

“Please don't say I taste like strawberry or something,” you giggled, Matthew laughed softly before shaking his head with his tongue on your clit; giving you pleasure while saying ‘no’. You tugged on his hair some more while the pleasure lasted. Matthew swiftly tore off his pants, boxers and shirt before lifting your legs and positioning himself at your entrance.

“You ready sweetheart?” Matthew mumbled, his hair was tousled with sex hair, his eyes bore into you with love, he was breathing heavily, a slight sheen of sweat was on his forehead he was like-

“A god,” you mumbled, hands finding Matthews cheeks and holding him softly.

“What…?”

“You’re like an actual god,” you spoke again, your voice was quiet as your eyes started to tear up.

“Oh darling,” Matthew mumbled, his hands coming up to wipe the tears away, “then you’re my goddess,” you nodded before bringing Matthew down for a kiss the same time he entered you; a low moan rumbling from the both of you as Matthew stilled, “you feel so good around me darling; wet and tight,” that's when he started thrusting; it felt like nothing you’d dot together before.

“H-holy shit,” your moans mixed together as Matthew held you tightly, his head buried itself in your neck and started sucking on the skin he could make contact with as his thrusts sped up; your legs encased Matthew as he hit that perfect spot in you.

“God you’re so beautiful,” Matthew mumbled softly through laboured breaths, “you’re so amazing; always there for me, helping me with everything, being perfect,”

“I love you so much,” you whimpered, Matthews hand snaked down between your thighs and started rubbing your clit expertly like he always did causing your moans to become louder as well as your approaching orgasm.

“I love you so much too doll,” Matthew whispered, “you gonna come sweetheart?”, you nodded while a large moan escaped you, “you’re beautiful in every way,” you nodded as your hips met Matthews; eyes scrunched and brows knitted you placed your forehead on Matthews as his hands encased your hips and sped up yet again. You’re sure bruises would be forming on your hips later tonight but that just made everything better; it just made you want to love yourself even more with every bruise, bump, lump, mark, scratch and roll. The image of Matthew kissing every inch of your body was what set you off. A silent moan left you as your mouth formed an ‘o’ and your tongue went dry due to the intakes of breath, you keened as Matthew thrusted for a first, second, third time and came with you. The warmth spread through you as Matthew held you close; encasing you with his arms as your legs wrapped around him.

It took a moment for the two of you to come back down to earth, but when you did it felt like everything was new. Matthew flopped beside you breathing heavily as a smile grew on both of your faces, a few moments passed before the lanky man himself stood up and walked to the bathroom before coming back with a washcloth and cleaning you up.

“Thank you,” you mumbled as Matthew finally cozzied back up to you under the covers, bringing you into his chest and kissing the top of your head.

“Anything for you,”

“Yeah? Anything?”

“Yeah,” Matthew looked at you with a smile, “anything,” and it was a promise.

#criminal minds #spencer reid #derek morgan #david rossi #emily prentiss #jj #aaron hotchner #Penelope garcia #Spencer reid x reader #Spencer reid x female!reader #Spencer reid x AFAB reader #Reid x reader #matthew gray gubler fic #matthew gray gubler x reader #matthew gray gubler #mgg #mgg x reader

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jaskiersbrokenlute · 3 years

Text

Lute’s 200 follower prompt list

(All based on song lyrics by Keaton Henson, amalgamated by yours truly)

Angst

1. Sweetheart, what have you done to us? 2. I’m sorry I broke it, never forgive me. 3. Tire of me if you will my dear, but I will not tire of you. 4. She broke my head, it’s been four years and this does not end. 5. If you must die, die knowing your life was my life’s best part. 6. I’m just as damn disappointed as you only I just do better to hide it. 7. I’m truly alone and I like it. 8. How can you sleep knowing, that you’d be much better off there with him. 9. This has been the best of me, I hope you end up missing me. 10. They’ll die or leave you either way. 11. ‘Did you love me like the way you wrote?’ ‘I’m afraid so.’ 12. How could I have known you were the air I breathe if I don’t believe in love? 13. What is good lust but love without trust? 14. I’m amazed that you ever loved me.

15. She left him and he left everything. 16. Teach me how to love you like I wrote and say it like I mean it when I don’t 17. I’m a tough luck friend and I reckon she’ll stay with me ‘til the end. It means more than I pretend. 18. Is it love you regret? 19. Darling, your eyes are so still when you speak. Do they weep? 20. Please don’t cry or say goodbye. 21. Now that you’re all I have, is it fair to love me too? 22. Do you wake up lonely everyday? 23. Let’s just have this fight today, say I’m worthless and I feel betrayed. 24. Don’t leave I’ve got more to say. 25. You know one day there’ll be hell to pay. 26. Please don’t be home late. 27. I’ll be right here if you need a failure, my love. 28. And I’ll be the place you hate. 29. How can you fail me now that I’m here on the ground? 30. Tell me I’m worthy of something. Love at least. 31. I still don’t cry, I’ve been meaning to. 32. I’m hoping I don’t die after you. 33. I still need to be loved. 34. You’re enough. 35. I’m frightened to death you’ll forget. Don’t forget me. 36. She seems disappointed, when I say that I’m not happy yet. 37. When I say do you love me, say you don’t know. 38. Just don’t leave me, baby stay here. 39. I just can’t bear to be apart. 40. Be near me lover, and be another that I can’t please, 41. I’ve been so lonely. 42. How could you allow me to love you? How cruel a thing. 43. If you’d only come back now, I’d not let you down again. 44. I guess I could have been, a better man. 45. I seek comfort in being alone. 46. Does he know, not to talk about your dad? 47. Do you notice when you’re sad? 48. I don’t feel well, can’t you tell? 49. Please forget me, you were right dear. 50. Though I’ll miss you lover, I am weak and therefore fold. 51. This is love, this is hell, this sweet plague that follows me. 52. I feel love, I feel alone. 53. I just wish you would come home. 54. There’s no one else. I loved you more than I love myself. 55. I see pictures now of you two and it makes me sick. 56. Teach me how to hold you in my arms, without squeezing too damn tight and causing harm. 57. Give me lessons in your ways, but don’t expect me to change. 58. I never loved you enough. 59. Please do not hurt me love, I am a fragile one. 60. As we lie in bed I feel lonely. 61. I some ways I feel I do love you, babe I’m not in love with you. 62. I found her but now she is gone. 63. I was better where, I was miserable why didn’t you leave me there? 64. I love you, please don’t go. 65. Is this all that you can give me back? 66. If you’ve no more to say than that, oh well I’ll be leaving and I won’t come back. 67. You think you’re better than them, but they don’t have to pretend. 68. Believe me, this loneliness won’t go away. 69. I’m just getting started let me offend. 70. All I want is to be left alone. 71. Can you see, they feed you lies thus keeping you weak. 72. Leave me, my heart is dead for all to see. 73. Please just come here, don’t fight with me. 74. Don’t call me lover, it’s not enough. 75. After all you’ve put me through, this one’s for you. 76. I’m in bad love. Don’t feel sad love. 77. I love you, but I worry about letting you leave. 78. It leaves me pretty good at pretending I’m fine. 79. I’m saving you up, all for the day you leave. 80. I know it’s ending. 81. Speak up, I’m losing you. 82. Hate me to death if you must. 83. Am I waiting to lose you? 84. I’m just so fucking sorry that you’re afraid. 85. I’ve tried so long not to cry that I don’t know if I can when you die, But I’m sure as damn hell gonna try. 86. I’m afraid to let myself be frightened. 87. I’ll play until my fingers bleed just to get you out of me. 88. I’m afraid. 89. One day you’ll thank the lord I didn’t stay. 90. Bury it all down underneath, it’s unhealthy but it sure keeps all the pain out. 91. I’m so damn scared of dying without you. 92. I see the dark things you all try to hide. 93. I won’t give up, not until I’m holding you. 94. Don’t let go of my hand. 95. Your love’s leaving me loveless. 96. I won’t leave here until I’m back with you. 97. Please don’t let me sleep. 98. We can’t pretend that I’m just like him. 99. Lead me on, I just something to stop me from jumping the gun. 100. I’m not coming back without you. 101. I’d write you a song if you’d just break my heart. 102. I’m a sick kind of lover and I’m cruel to myself. 103. I’m a writer who’s nothing if he’s not in hell. 104. Mistreat me and put me through hell. 105. If I die before I reach you, please know I meant to love you until I did. 106. Tell my friends goodbye. 107. I loved her, and left her too soon. 108. I’m scared that you’ll know what to do if I die before you. 109. I didn’t dare earn their respect. 110. If I’m to die before I hold you, know my arms were the worse off for it. 111. I’m tired of feeling alone. 112. Please tell me how to let go. 113. Your book will end just fine, but I’m a different story. 114. When I get tired and eventually leave, I’ll get back on the road and leave you in peace. 115. I’m just hoping I wont miss you today. 116. It hurts more with every breath. 117. I’m all used, so there’ll be nothing left for you. 118. I am alone and I need you to be kind. 119. Do you have time to tell me pretty lies? 120. Maybe I didn’t treat you quite as good as I could have. 121.I didn’t love you as often as I could. 122. There are things I should have said and done, I just never took the time. 123. I made you feel second best. 124. I’m so sorry, I was blind. 125. Please don’t walk away.

Fluff

126. You love is the thing that I need to remind me I’m living. 127. I know that it’s hard for you to tell me the truth, but while we are doing so (name) I love you. 128. Miss you terribly already. 129. I still worry more about you. 130. You are infinitely interesting to me. 131. It was so unexpected, my heart’s unprotected. 132. I’m so thankful for the way you look at me. 133. You don’t like to be touched, let alone kissed. Does he know where your lips begin. 134. I wish I had the guts to say, you look the best today. 135. I’ll love you, if I don’t have to. 136. Why did she finally leave? Cause all you think of is me. 137. Despite the bad moods she never goes away. 138. I know every mark on your hand. 139. Come on baby, make me fall in love with you. 140. Would it be so bad? 141. I woke to find your tired arms around me. 142. I’ve still got songs in me yet. 143. Love, take it easy on me. I’m older now and I long to be twenty-three. 144. I’ll allow, my heart to get over you now. 145. I’ll be fine, and you’ll be alright. 146. You know me, I worry. 147. Can I get lost in you? 148. I haven’t many words to say, I thought about you everyday. 149. I’ll be yours and you’ll be mine. 150. I’ll be your brother, I’ll be your lover. What do you need? 151. You’re the one that I love the most. 152. Love, I feel you know me better than most. 153. In spite of real distance we’ll always be close. 154. Something my soul needs, is you lying next to me. 155. Damn, I love you. 156. I’d kill just to watch as you’re sleeping. 157. Damn it, I’m calling you mine. 158. Work to leave some part of you on this earth. 159. Just live. 160. You’re kind and you’re beautiful too. 161. You seem to look through me, I wonder what you see. 162. I figure you love to read, don’t look for the fault, like me. 163. I wish I could wake at dawn, to see you without makeup on. 164. I feel I know your smile, like I saw it when I was a child. 165. I’d give you all I have. 166. I got addicted to us. 167. I wanna love you while I can. 168. I want to live with you until I die. 169. We’ll miss you to death when you go. 170. It seems like yesterday, you took my breath away. 171. Must you be leaving so soon? 172. I know you’re sad, sweetheart, but it will pass. 173. She was dear to you, so you cannot be blamed for feeling low. 174. If I could fix it then I would. 175. Come here, give me time to let you in. 176. I’m hoping you fall into me. 177. Here’s to us. 178. I would walk all the miles if you’d play your part. 179. Just love me and hold me, and then let me be. 180. I would love you forever. 181. Would you love me and leave me with something to write? 182. I would love you with all of my heart if I could. 183. I hope to be holding you soon. 184. I feel like I’m just what you need. 185. I don’t let anyone in, but I can’t help but let this begin. 186. You seem happy. I can tell. 187. Love, I know you’ll be alright. 188. I know I’m a mess and I love most people less. 189. They don’t love you like I love you. 190. Hold me tight in your arms. 191. Give me glimmers of hope. 192. Let me lay in your bed, talk of things you don’t know. 193. Just don’t fall for me. 194. I’m born everyday just to love you. 195. I was as far as I could be when I fell. 196. I’m looking for a lover who doesn’t need truth. 197. I need you. 198. Like the thickest moss, you grew on me. 199. It’s the worst parts of you I admire. 200. I have fought battles with nothing but words. 201. Tell me you’ll be mine. 203. How hard I’ve tried, love. 204. You were always on my mind. 205. I’m so happy that you’re mine. 206. Tell me that your sweet love hasn’t died. 207. Give me one more chance to keep you. 208. Visit me everyday.

Hurt/Comfort

209. I think I love you, please don’t be afraid of me. 210. I won’t sing ‘til you know me 211. Here’s to you you miserable fuck. 212. I’ve been thinking of leaving, 213. I’m gonna fuck all my plans. 214. I’m hoping I don’t die after you. 215. It is love, but I fear it won’t do. 216. Tell me what you want from me. 217. Was it really that worth writing about? 218. It’s a goddamn shame that you’re not here with me. 219. It won’t be long ‘til you know my songs, then you’ll know and you’ll come back. 220. How am I expected to behave, when I’m alone with myself everyday. 221. There’s a whole lot of nothing to me. 222. Please don’t wait up for me. 223. I’m afraid that’s lost on me. 224. I’ll write until there’s nothing left of me. 225. I’ll cry for help when I need it, thanks. 226. Are you still listening? 227. It may not just be tomorrow, it may be the rest of your life. 228. I’m deep undercover, i don’t look like me. 229. I win when you lose. 230. Darling, you’ve been my greatest defeat. 231. We cling with desperate fingers onto life. 232. I was starting on hoping you’d stay. 233. I don’t want to be the best. 234. I’m going to live if it kills me. 235. The world is unfair and it will not change. 236. I won't be the damndest bit fucking surprised. 237. The distance won’t comfort me for long.�� 238. Please don’t look at me. 239. How is the sex, love? I hope it’s the best part of him. 240. I struggle with stages and can’t take bad reviews. 241. I didn’t hold you all those long and lonely times. 242. I guess I never told you.

---------------

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hoe-doroki · 3 years

Text

ana reads bnha ch285

previous chapter here first chapter here next chapter here

Manga spoilers

Okay, folks. We’re here. We’ve made it to the more or less end all be all, the more or less whole point I’m reading this stinking manga, more or less the one big granddaddy spoiler that has pushed me to read this stinking thing instead of doing job applications so I don’t end up on the street. By my calculations, I won’t be posting this for about a month and a half (it’s 6.17 today) so I’ll edit and let you now if I’m on the street. [edit: I am not on the street for the same reason it’s been 3 months instead of a month and a half: I got a job. Yay me!]

Katsuki is the person who knows Deku best. He knows all about the quirk, yes, but he also knows Deku to a T. He knows exactly that Deku is willing to turn this into a suicide mission. He knows what Deku is capable of as well as Deku does. And he’s clearheaded, fully focused on rescuing his love friend.

Okay, I’m glad SOMEONE’S keeping us grounded in the reality here. And look, this (and Rocklock’s next frame) GETS ME. He’s a daddy. He’s a papa. Of a little baby.. And look, I know Endeavor’s a dad too but…………you know. And seeing these kids…seeing that his baby is going to be like them in no time at all…knowing that this is the world that his baby was born into…ouch, ouch, ouch. Look, I like Rocklock a lot. Does he still feel a little racist to me?…yes, but not because he’s a bad character; it’s because he’s basically holding the mantle of Blackness all by himself in this series and if there were other Black characters he’d be fine, but I digress. Him being a dad in a way that we don’t see from ANY of the other characters. Even good dads like Jirou’s. It’s sweet and potent. Obvi, we only get to see, like, 2 panels of him with his family, but it’s thick in his character. And it gets me.

And here we are. Granddaddy spoiler. Oof, everything from the big ‘No. 285’ to the ‘Katsuki Bakugou Rising’ to the freaking throwback dialogue from the freaking very first chapter with the sludge villain role reversal making me WEEP nonsense oh my freaking god. Who woulda thought that a panel full of Katsu’s ass would make me wanna freaking weep, but here we are.

Okay. Obviously I knew about this panel. Once again, y’all have not been subtle with your spoilers. Gosh, I wish I could say at all what my thoughts upon seeing the picture and the fanart and stuff was beyond ‘oh frick’. But I think it was just a lot of that, lol. When I first saw this panel, I didn’t even ship bkdk yet, because it was quite early on after making this account. So now it means a heck of a lot more to me.

But wow. What good storytelling. The lines about his body moving on his own. Look, that’s not about, like, a desperate need to save Deku’s life—despite what my thoughts on the previous chapter are trying to tell me. This is showing us that Bakugou has become a true hero. That that true hero potential that All Might saw in Deku in chapter one is now fully realized in Katsuki too. And yes, I do think that all my analysis about Katsuki’s thoughts towards Deku in the previous chapter do have an impact on this moment, but the larger story meaning is about Katsuki’s arc as a hero.

Why am I even saying all this. It’s freaking obvious. Look, it’s good storytelling, but it’s definitely not subtle storytelling.

Although, I am taken by this little mosaic of bkdk moments that we see on the previous page

First of all, this comes off as a ‘your life flashes before your eyes’ before death kind of moment. As though Bakugou’s life flashing before his eyes—and of course, yes, because he sees that Deku is about to die, it’s all about him and Deku—and this is what he sees. But I’m taken by the fact that it’s not just the big moments here. We have the ‘Why was I the one to end All Might’ and the sludge villain…but we also have them in house arrest together. Vacuuming. So mundane. But it’s the moment where Katsuki became okay with Deku. Where that hatred that he felt for Deku all but vanished. To me, the inclusion of that panel MEANS something. It’s not just about Deku having the heroic nature that Katsuki needed to find, but it’s also about their relationship.

God, this final panel is saying EVERYTHING so LOUDLY. Shippy or not, (and I believe it’s not) it means EVERYTHING about their relationship and EVERYTHING about Katsuki as a hero. God, I wish I were a crier, because I’d be weeping.

Overall: Is there even an overall to give? I don’t think so. Bkdk 4 lyfe. I’m framing. This fucking volume.

I am. Terrified. Of what happens next.

#ana reads the manga #bnha manga spoilers #mha manga spoilers #manga spoilers

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aphrodites-law · 4 years

Photo

A Bit of Clarity 🍂 (12/?) The visions had started last autumn, a year ago now. It had caused a bit of chaos for some, a bit of clarity for others. Two days ago, Clarke Griffin had been perfectly fine managing both her Café and her stress. But now she was curious - so deeply curious about the vision of herself entwined with the aloof Lexa Woods that it was leading her to complete distraction. (ao3)

[part 1] [part 2] [part 3] [part 4] [part 5] [part 6] [part 7] [part 8] [part 9] [part 10] [part 11]

A few minutes before closing time the next day, Clarke was waiting at the end of the counter for surprise customers. Gaia was already wrapping her scarf around her neck and Wells was pulling out ingredients for the next day. He had stayed much later today, going over resumes for their interviews tomorrow, but also reorganizing the kitchen.

After giving Gustus a call to offer him the job, Wells had realized that things would get crowded quite quickly. Gustus was a big man and the kitchen was on the smaller side, but it was workable with a different layout. Clarke thanked her lucky stars for her best friend's ability to adapt to situations, as she herself disliked big changes. Regardless of the possible growing pains ahead, it was an exciting time for the café.

Right after Gaia left with a tired wave, Wells found Clarke absentmindedly drawing the branches of the weeping fig. The last customers had left as well and the sun had already set. The mugs were clean, the plates drying, and the day's crumbs swept from the floor. It hadn't rained at all today; a small mercy given that Clarke couldn't stop thinking about her date with Lexa. She wasn't sure where they were headed, but heavy rain might've halted Lexa's plans and she didn't have the patience to wait another day.

Wells peeked at her drawing pad and sighed. "God, she's a beauty," he said dreamily.

Clarke snorted. His fondness for their Ficus was a running joke between them. "Weirdo."

Wells gave her a tired grin as he buttoned up his wool peacoat. He always looked so sharp in winter wear, whereas Clarke always felt like a bulky bear. She'd dressed up a little today - fitted dark pants and a knitted sweater with a nice scoop neck. Her boots were clean and if her hair's curls had loosened over the day, she had still clearly made an effort to look presentable.

“So, you had your vision," said Wells.

Clarke dropped her pencil. "Wh- I- what?"

"It was a few weeks ago, wasn't it? When you came in looking like you hadn’t slept a wink."

Shame gripped her. "Wells, I-"

“You’re looking more crimson than cranberry juice,” he pointed out with a laugh.

“I’m sorry, I just didn’t know how to bring it up," she said. She'd always felt guilty for keeping it from him, but it wasn't the easiest topic either. "Did Raven tell you?"

"Nah, she even deflected when I wondered aloud. You just started acting weird whenever someone mentioned visions. You hate lying, so I figured you didn't want to be asked if you'd had one."

Clarke closed her notepad. She should have known he'd catch on. "I didn't mean to be secretive. You know I would've told you the minute it happened, it just wasn't… family friendly."

"Yeah, I figured. It's good though? I mean, you're happy, right?"

It was a surprising question, though it shouldn't have been. Clarke hadn't really thought about it. It wasn't something she asked herself or even expected. For so long happiness had just revolved around the café. Finding the right name; the right building; the right theme. She'd judged her days based on their achieved goals and for a while it had been a thrill. And it still was - her work made her proud and it made her happy too - but it wasn't everything. She'd come to face that recently, and though the wake up call had been… unconventional, certainly, she was grateful for it.

"I am. I'm seeing her, actually. The woman from my vision. You'd recognize her - she's a regular."

Wells nodded as if he'd already put two and two together. “At Octavia and Lincoln's party I saw you talking to her. Then it clicked she wrote that article on Finn - I remembered checking her profile on the Gazette when it dropped."

"Yeah, she works there. She's writing a piece on the visions actually."

"So it's getting serious?" He asked hesitantly.

And really, Clarke couldn't fault his curiosity. She'd been so wrapped up in Lexa that she'd neglected their relationship and now he was unsure if he should gently prod or wait.

“It’s new and we’re taking things slow, but yeah, I'm hoping it'll work out. I really like her."

Wells looked over her shoulder toward the entrance and smiled. "Seems like she really likes you too."

Clarke turned around and saw that Lexa had parked her car and was just crossing the street toward the café.

"Are you coming in tomorrow?" He asked her.

Clarke whipped around, her cheeks flushed. "What? Of course I am. Why wouldn't I?"

"Dunno, you tell me." He laughed as he checked for his keys in his pocket. "Gaia and Harper have the early shift, in case you forgot. We just have those three interviews in the afternoon, but you already know that."

"I do know," she replied with a frown. "There's no reason I wouldn't be here earlier. I'm always here. What are you saying?"

He shrugged, entirely too proud of himself, and walked toward the back exit. "No one will fault you if you take a break. Enjoy your date!"

"I will! And I'll see you in the morning!" Clarke replied stubbornly.

"I'm sure you will!" he retorted, still snickering, before closing the door behind him.

A hand touched Clarke's shoulder and she startled.

"Sorry," Lexa said with a gentle smile. She'd put on her black coat today, the top buttons undone to reveal her sweater - a reddish brown this time, perfect for the fall. Her hair was down and her eyeliner perhaps more pronounced than usual. Clarke wondered if she'd applied it in her car. She looked beautiful.

"Hi, baby," she softened, forgetting all about Well's teasing. He didn't know what he was talking about. Tonight was just going to be a nice date. Some food, wine - whatever Lexa had planned. They were still going slow. Clarke didn't have any expectations other than enjoying their time together. She liked their pace. It was… frustrating at times, sure, but it was working. They had both opened up to each other.

"Hi," Lexa whispered before she inched forward so that she could kiss her over the counter. Clarke sighed into it, having imagined such sweetness all day long.

"Am I too early?" Lexa asked. "Do you need help cleaning up?"

Clarke brushed her thumb over Lexa's jaw. "No, I'm done. I just need to grab my coat and close up."

"Was that Wells who went out back?"

"Yes, he was being ridiculous."

"I thought he usually left earlier?"

"He does, but he's been rearranging the kitchen. I think he's worried Gustus will find it too small."

"Gus has an entire farm and acres of land at his disposal, but he sleeps in his shed because it's warm," Lexa said. "He won't mind."

Clarke beamed, delighted to hear it. "I'm going to give you Wells' number and you're going to text him just that. "

While Clarke left to grab her coat, Lexa worried her lip. "Oh but he doesn't really know me…"

"He will."

Clarke came out from the back with her coat and scarf on. She pulled out her set of keys. "He's my best friend and you're my-" she stopped herself. "I think you'd get along great. He loves theater, devours literature, and he already thinks you're amazing for taking Finn down. So don't worry about it."

"Well, that reminds me: Collins went ahead with suing the Gazette."

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

They made their way to the front, where Lexa opened the door for Clarke. "No. It'll never stand, but he aims to waste our time and money."

"Waste of time and money - that's been his motto since birth."

Lexa wrinkled her nose. "Let's talk about something else."

"Please. So where's my carriage?"

Lexa laughed.

* * *

Lexa may not have found a pumpkin to turn into a carriage after all, but her car smelled like apples and she drove so smoothly Clarke could've closed her eyes and imagined they weren't moving at all. She had never thought 'great driver' would do it for her, but here she was eyeing Lexa's hands on the steering wheel and feeling hot.

"How's the writing going?" Clarke asked, clearing her throat when her voice started off slightly rough.

Lexa took a left, which would've surprised Clarke if she'd paid any attention to the road. But all she could think about was Lexa's razor-sharp focus and how she yearned to be the reason for it.

"Good, I finished a first draft. My writing partner is looking at it for now. I need it out of my sight for a few days."

"Partner, huh?"

Lexa smiled as she kept her eyes on the road. "Echo. She wrote most of the FC&B article."

"Did you write for other newspapers before?"

Lexa nodded. "Two. I've been lucky, professionally. Smaller papers have always been more interesting to me, so I stayed away from national ones. I was able to climb the ladder a lot faster than some of my old classmates."

"The Gazette must've been a change of pace. New city, new job - I don't think I could handle it."

"When they hired me I was so happy to be working I just threw myself into it," Lexa admitted. "I got the idea on the Mountain Men soon after, just from reading old archives about them. That kept me busy, so I didn't have time to worry about fitting in. It was nice. Exciting. It felt like falling in love with my job again. Then one day Echo invited me to grab drinks with other colleagues and… I realized things had fallen into place already."

"Costial is pretty magical like that," Clarke said with a smile. She loved it when Lexa talked about her time here. Sometimes it was easy to forget she hadn't even been here a year yet. Clarke remembered her first year in the city - how she'd felt like she'd always belonged here. How she couldn't wait to build her life here. And college had been fun, and sometimes she walked by the campus just for the nostalgia of it, but it was the years after that had really shaped her life into what it was today. There had been many tears and failures before the café, but she'd never once thought of leaving. She hoped Lexa felt the same.

One glance outside the window and Clarke finally had an idea where they were headed. They were quite far from the center of the city now, just a few miles away from Busy Moose Park and its lake on the outskirts. Lexa took the road that led to the park, but she didn't make the turn Clarke had expected and instead continued straight.

"Are we going to the factory?" Clarke asked.

The chocolate factory and its surroundings were certainly a sight to behold, and popular with teens because of its smells and aesthetic quality, but there wasn't much to do unless you brought a picnic. Which was unlikely to be comfortable anyway in this cold.

"Not quite," Lexa answered with a secretive smile.

A few minutes later she finally pulled over into a small parking lot, checking for Clarke's reaction as soon as they got out of the car.

“I know I said I’d take you somewhere more upscale, but I thought you might really like this place."

Because the factory was just a ways down the road and it was windy tonight, the bold smell of chocolate permeated the air. They had stopped in front of a rustic restaurant surrounded by a garden. Small lights glowed softly against the brick walls, complimented by the dancing shadows from a few lanterns. There was a patio with beams covered in twining vines, the plants and wisteria also covering the top like a ceiling. Powerful heaters kept the biting cold at bay, no doubt, making the entire place look like a winter fairytale.

It was the kind of romantic setting Clarke would have made fun of in front of friends while secretly hoping to experience it one day.

“How the hell have I never been here before?” She asked in astonishment.

With a hand on her back, Lexa led her toward the entrance.

“Did you know Icicle? Italian restaurant?”

“Yeah, that rings a bell.”

“This is it. The owner retired and her son took over - revamped the whole place from top to bottom and gave it a mountain lodge theme. He figured they should capitalize on the location more, especially the constant sweetness in the air. It just reopened a few weeks ago. Featured in the Gazette and everything.”

“Oh, that might’ve been when I was a bit angry at you," Clarke remembered and gave Lexa a teasing grin. "Deleted the app like it was some kind of statement."

Lexa scrunched up her nose, not too eager to remember that time. The hostess seated them inside at a secluded table for two. The light was dimmed and there was a candle between them; and even two squares of chocolate wrapped in gold foil.

After they took off their coats and sat, Lexa bit her lip. “It's not too much, is it?"

"Are you kidding? It's gorgeous." Clarke reached for her hand. "You're always surprising me."

A waiter gave them a menu and a basket of bread. They looked like mini baguettes and Clarke was temped to steal one for Wells.

“God, I almost forgot about this smell," she said, taking a deep breath. The chocolate from the factory still wafted faintly in the air, and mixed with the smell of food it had Clarke already salivating for dinner. "In college we used to hang out by the lake a lot. If the wind was on our side we’d always get a whiff from the factory. Not even edibles could beat that.”

Lexa arched a brow. “Edibles, huh?”

“Please, I know you’ve dabbled," Clarke scoffed.

“What makes you think that?”

“You have the vibe.”

“The pothead vibe? I thought I was unreadable.”

“Oh you have that vibe too," Clarke laughed. "But then there’s the tattoos, the plants, the way you write about nature. You’re curious, open minded, andyou went to a liberal arts college. You must’ve tried it at least once. I think that’s how you approach most things: don’t knock ‘till you try it. Am I close?”

Lexa looked away, slightly flummoxed. “It sounds like I’m more of an open book then.”

"Maybe that's a good thing…" Clarke offered with a hopeful smile, thumb caressing the back of her hand.

"Maybe it is," Lexa agreed.

They both picked the apricot glazed chicken with roasted potatoes, pairing it with a white wine. Throughout dinner Clarke felt such pleasant warmth, both because of the wine and Lexa's steady gaze on her. She was relaxed and unfairly charming; a great listener by all accounts, but also coming out of her shell when it came to her own past. Clarke knew it wasn't easy for her, which made it all the more special.

"In retrospect I should've figured politics weren’t for me when I started screaming at my television every time the news came on."

Clarke grinned, knowing the sentiment all too well. "Good thing you don't work for a newspaper or anything…"

Swallowing the last of her wine, Lexa gave her a playful smirk. "Local news. I can take the city hall drama. I actually enjoy it with my morning pastry."

"That I can believe. You always look so deep in thought when you read. Harper dropped a cup once and you didn't even flinch."

"Really?" Lexa asked. "Is there anything else I do that I should know about?"

The waiter stopped by with their desserts: molten chocolate cake for Lexa and a slice of pear tart for Clarke.

"It's not like I stare or anything," Clarke clarified as she grabbed her spoon. "Your seat just happens to be in my vicinity."

"Mm." Lexa smirked. "I guess I just pop up sometimes…" she trailed off, her tone heavy with implication.

She did this occasionally, but more boldly recently. Alluding to Clarke's vision seemed to greatly entertain Lexa.

"Ha, you're funny," Clarke deadpanned.

"Did I also crack jokes while I was kissing you - and I quote - everywhere?" Lexa goaded.

Clarke shrugged as she chewed on her tart. "Actually you were a lot more suave than you are now. Pity."

Lexa laughed. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

"Please, you're very proud of yourself. And it's not fair all I have to go on is your distaste for coffee." Clarke remembered how frantic she had been after her vision, her mind firing questions every second. “Did you know I went to a vision reader right after?”

It had been an impulse and she'd regretted it, but she figured Lexa was familiar with them.

"Really?" Lexa asked, surprised.

“Yeah, the one by the market. Becca’s Reading or something. I bailed at the last minute.”

“I actually haven’t spoken to one. I was toying with the idea, but it might be an entirely different article.”

Clarke grimaced. “They’re just opportunistic money grabbers.”

Lexa offered a spoonful of her cake, which Clarke took before plopping a bit of pear on top of it. The warm chocolate melted the pear in her mouth and she sighed at the taste. Lexa smiled.

“It’s a different point of view. Besides, listening to so many stories might’ve given them some valuable insight even if they opened a shop for the wrong reasons. If my job’s taught me anything it’s to not judge a book by its cover.”

"Hmm you're good at it - your job. And I'm not just saying that because you're wining and dining me."

Lexa looked bashful. "You know, I remember when you yelled at me to get over myself."

"Not our finest moment…"

"No," Lexa agreed. "But it was needed. Before that there was so much I wanted to tell you, but… couldn't."

"I know." Clarke remembered that feeling as well. After the vision she'd look at Lexa and be so certain there was so much left unsaid between them, yet neither of them knew where to start, or if it was reciprocated. "I should've let you interview me - just ripped off the Band-Aid. It would've explained a lot."

"I would've never made it past the first question," Lexa said. "Can you share what you saw, Clarke?"

Clarke smiled cheekily around a mouthful of her tart. "Well, I would hope that kind of confession would score me a date at least."

"Oh I would have asked you out on the spot," Lexa replied with a smirk.

Clarke gasped. "How very unprofessional of you."

"If you hadn't noticed, my professionalism hangs by a thread whenever I'm near you."

Clarke let out a small laugh. "Well, that's one thing I'm glad for."

* * *

After their dinner, Lexa suggested they walk in the park before it closed. It was cold but their coats were thick and the wind was minimal. Clarke had no desire to part just yet, and so took Lexa's hand in hers as soon as they left the car by the park's entrance.

They had a little less than thirty minutes before it closed, but enjoyed every second as they strolled by the lake. The half-moon was reflected on the quiet surface, and though there were a few other people, Clarke felt like they had just stepped into a world of their own.

Clarke nudged Lexa toward one of the Beech trees, its autumn leaves still clinging bravely to its thick branches. They settled beneath it, lying down on the soft ground where leaves piled atop the grass. Between the branches they could see some stars, and Clarke wondered if maybe the park could close and leave them be. There was nowhere else she wanted to be.

She heard some rustling and then saw Lexa look down at her, her face framed by her wavy hair and the stars above. She took Clarke's breath away.

"You're so beautiful," Lexa murmured, struck by a similar thought it seemed. "You have the kindest eyes and the warmest smile. It's the first thing I ever noticed about you."

Clarke reached up to kiss her, parting only when she felt Lexa's hand on her stomach. Even atop her coat and thick clothing, she could feel its warmth.

"I think you're drunk on wine and chocolate."

"Then you'll be relived to hear I'm a very sincere drunk."

Clarke giggled, which made Lexa's smile stretch in such a fond way. She pressed closer to her, the tip of her nose brushing against her neck. She kissed the small spot, as if to apologize for her cold nose.

"I wonder so much about you, Clarke."

Clarke hummed. "What do you wonder about?"

“I’ve spoken with a lot of people. Heard the visions about reuniting with loved ones, getting over addictions, graduating. There’s been some romance of course,” Lexa said. “Aden’s first kiss, though he couldn’t see his boyfriend’s face. Echo celebrating a wedding anniversary with her husband. But so few - even online in anonymous circles - so few like yours.”

Now Clarke felt warm again, mostly from the blush on her cheeks. “I don’t believe that.”

Lexa lifted her head from her shoulder. “Have you personally heard of any?”

“Raven saw Wells naked.”

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

“Okay, so I'm a pervert, what can I say?”

“No,” Lexa replied, tickled by Clarke's little huff. “You’re a mystery. You intrigue me.”

Clarke cleared her throat. “Well I’ve had a bit of a dry spell. I had flings, but… I didn't allow myself anything more. The café was taking up all my thoughts and for a while it worked for me. Then the days got long again, and lonelier… Raven said it was probably just my body wanting me to snap out of it.”

“And what do you think?”

Clarke did wonder about it then, or at least differently than she had in the past. It wasn't so long ago she'd asked these questions herself. She'd been so frustrated she couldn't discuss them with the person she'd shared it with, and here she was, lying right next to her in a bed of leaves.

She touched Lexa's hand on her stomach, lacing and unlacing their fingers, gently playing with them as she tried to make sense of everything.

“Have you never fantasized about a stranger?" She asked quietly, catching Lexa's eyes. "Someone who knows nothing about you and yet knows exactly how to make your body soar?"

“That’s not what you saw though, is it?” Lexa murmured. “I wasn’t a stranger in your bed. I knew you and you knew me."

Clarke felt her heart beat faster. She wanted so badly to kiss Lexa again; to feel her body against hers like the night on her couch.

"Lex…"

Their lips were just a hair's breadth apart now. To anyone else, they would've looked like they were kissing.

"How was it different, Clarke?"

Clarke swallowed, trying to find the words. “How? The way you handled me - needy and possessive, but tender and attentive too. Like you were in charge of my pleasure and you had to remind me."

She saw Lexa swallow and so continued, eager to share everything this time: "You said my name and it almost sounded like a prayer - like you couldn’t believe we were together. I never heard my name like that before. I never thought I could make someone feel lucky."

"God, Clarke, you have no idea." Lexa exhaled before closing the gap and kissing her. It wasn't like any other kiss they'd shared tonight. It felt like a promise, almost. Lexa tasted so sweet on her tongue and Clarke could only wonder if all of her was just as heavenly.

She cupped the back of her neck and felt herself throb with desire, her mind filled with both the reality of Lexa and the last of her vision.

"I can even remember the smell of us," Clarke sighed between kisses. "How sticky my skin felt, like we'd been in bed for hours."

"Clarke - fuck."

Clarke pushed Lexa on her back and cupped her cheeks, claiming her lips quite quickly again. She licked into her mouth and moaned at the silky feel of Lexa's tongue.

"Sometimes I'd try to picture us again but you'd disappear," Clarke continued, eyes closing when Lexa started kissing down her neck. "I wasn't sure if it was you anymore. But then you'd come back. I'd feel your hands, your mouth on me… lower, and lower…"

Lexa let out a groan and pinched the bridge of her nose before falling back on the ground, the leaves rustling beneath her. Something in the way she set her jaw made Clarke frown.

"Baby…" she said, tracing a finger over her cheekbone.

"Did you call her that?" Lexa asked without thinking.

Clarke retracted her hand and paused. A grin spread on her face. “What? Are you jealous… of yourself?”

Lexa glared petulantly. “No.”

“You are."

Lexa remained quiet, so after a moment Clarke poked her arm. “Well what about yours?”

"Mine?"

"I wasn't even in it - how do you think that makes me feel?"

Lexa shook her head. "You were in it."

"You said you were just standing in a random kitchen making coffee."

"Yes."

"So?"

They heard the echo of a bicycle's bell on the pathway and turned to the sound, but the couple soon rode away. Clarke looked at Lexa again, finding her staring at the sky.

“What are you keeping from me?”

A small smile grew on Lexa's face - but she remained tightlipped.

"How was I there?" Clarke asked again, deeply curious.

"The doodles," Lexa simply replied.

Clarke remembered that she'd found that to be a strange detail before. She didn't put up her doodles on walls and she didn't frame them. These had to be important. Something that made her identity unmistakable in Lexa's eyes. Sure it could be that her style was recognizable, but Lexa made it sound as if it was something else.

“Lex…"

She lifted Lexa's chin to catch her gaze.

“If I tell you, I worry it might not happen," Lexa admitted.

Clarke bit her lip, finally understanding. It was almost like saying a wish out loud - fearing it might not come true if you broke that single rule.

“You want it to happen?” She asked instead.

A breeze passed as Lexa looked at her intently, leaving no room for doubt. “Yes.”

There was no waver in her voice. Not even an ounce of hesitation. The sheer confidence set Clarke alight. She’d forgotten how it felt to feel so wanted. Whatever it was in that frame… Lexa clearly hoped for it in their future. The fact that she wanted it with her, and no one else, made her desire swell.

She leaned down and kissed her right against the grass and by the slumbering tree, forgetting all about the doodles. Lexa believed it was her - that was all that mattered. After weeks of being unsure of where they stood, if her feelings were even shared, she didn't need anything more.

Lexa wound her arm around her waist, her mouth still as hungry against Clarke's. When they pulled away, she pressed their foreheads together.

“I wish I could see us like you did," she murmured wistfully.

"What would it change?"

“Maybe… maybe if I knew I was good enough for you… If I was sure that I wouldn’t- that I wouldn’t hurt you-"

Clarke shook her head. "Don’t fill your head with thoughts like that. Let's just be here, together, and worry about the rest when it comes. I know it's hard for you, but this - us - right now… it's good, isn't it?"

Lexa nodded. "It's the best thing that's happened to me in a long time."

Relieved, Clarke tucked her head beneath Lexa's chin. "Then just be with me. You can be happy, baby. You have a right to it. Don't let anyone or anything tell you otherwise."

Eventually they made their way back to Lexa's car, neither of them interested in picking up their leisurely pace.

"I'm sorry we ended up walking so much," Lexa said.

"You fed me beforehand, so it's forgiven."

Lexa smiled. "Good to know."

Before they reached the parking lot, Clarke decided to ask what had been on her mind: "I know you said Costial feels like home to you; that you found your place here, but… do you see your future here? Because this is it for me. And I'm… I like you, Lex. I like you a lot. I don't want to be an interlude. I don't think I could take it."

"Clarke," Lexa stepped closer to her. "You're not an interlude, you're - God, you've been in every act of my life here. I don't want to go anywhere. I- I want to be with you. That's what I know for certain. Is that alright for now?"

"It is."

Lexa kissed her softly and then smirked. "I may not have had erotic visions of myself entwined with a hot local, but I still want to stay here."

Clarke shoved her playfully. "I don't even like you anymore."

They laughed the whole way to the car.

* * *

It seemed like a tradition already; Lexa walking her to her door while Clarke racked her mind for a way to linger. When they finally arrived she leaned against her door and sighed.

"Tonight was amazing."

Lexa hummed. "I'm glad."

"I'm definitely taking you out this weekend," Clarke said.

"You are?" Lexa asked, tilting her head to kiss her again.

Clarke closed the gap as she wrapped her arms around her neck. The kiss was slow; amatory, but as always it could not go on for too long before hands wandered.

"I hope you have sweet dreams," Lexa said, her eyes hooded and her lips slightly redder.

"Oh I will."

Lexa glanced at her mouth. "If I pay you a visit again maybe you could keep a journal close by. I'd love some notes on my performance."

Clarke rolled her eyes. "Remind me why I ever told you?"

"What? That we lasted hours?" Lexa husked.

Right. Clarke narrowed her eyes and let her hands slowly drag down Lexa's arms. Now, Clarke wasn't innocent. She knew fully what made her look good, even when her coat was buttoned up. She had let Lexa tease her and goad her about the vision all night, and she had kept her retort to herself. But no more.

She pressed her body closer to Lexa's, unmistakably provocative with the way their breasts touched.

“Make fun all you want, Lexa, but remember this: I’ve seen all of you while you haven’t seen an inch of me.” She felt Lexa’s hand tighten on her waist. “I’ve felt your body against mine. Your mouth on my thighs. I’ve felt your tongue inside me.” She glanced down at Lexa's lips and then back up, proud of the gobsmacked look on her face. “So you can tease me. You can push my buttons. I can take it. But you? You only have your imagination." She stepped back and gave her sultriest smile, "And trust me, it’s got nothing on reality.”

She turned around and quickly unlocked her door, then looked over her shoulder. "Thanks for the date, baby."

As soon as she stepped inside and closed the door behind her, Clarke knew she'd just played a dirty hand. But Lexa had teased her at all night and all was fair in lust.

With a wicked grin, too pleased by the night's events, Clarke took off her coat and slipped out of her shoes and socks. And because she just couldn't resist one last look, she walked to her window and waited. Finally she saw Lexa walk out of the building. She seemed unfocused, going right and then left, forgetting where she'd parked.

But then she stopped and turned around.

Clarke's smile fell. Just watching Lexa like this, seeing the effect she had on her… it changed something. She had closed the door in the spur of the moment - because they were good at testing each other. Because she had thought tonight should end there, on another game of theirs.

But she didn’t want to play anymore.

And maybe Lexa realized it too. She looked up and found her apartment's window.

Their eyes met.

Clarke reached out for the curtain, gripping it so tight her knuckles went white. She couldn't look away from those eyes in the moonlight if she tried. Even if the ground started shaking beneath their feet.

"Lexa-" she started before stopping herself. It had to be Lexa's decision. Clarke had already made hers. She couldn't call out to her. Not for this. Lexa had to choose.

Clarke held her breath, unsure she'd even be able to leave this spot if Lexa did walk away after all. Until-

Lexa bolted back toward the building.

Clarke watched her disappear from view and then heard her intercom. She rushed toward it and pressed the buzzer, her heart in her throat. Still barefoot, she pulled the door open and waited. Footsteps thundered up the flights of stairs, closer and closer.

Tonight had not ended. Not yet.

#clarke x lexa #clexa #clexa fic #f: a bit of clarity #w

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