#but how nice of that person to take time to look into my state’s tenant laws!
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Hii I was wondering if u could do a yandere Kazuya x yn x yandere Daitou I’m not sure if u do character x yn x character tho
Yandere! Yakuza x Reader Spinoff
Two yakuza men who have fallen in love with their new foreign tenant. A what-if spinoff to the original story for that love triangle spice. Happy Valentine's Day!
Content: female reader, NSFW, organized crime, obsessive behavior, violence, BDSM themes (choking), threats
Credits: My boyfriend for giving me the Daitou smut idea
[Main Story] [General Headcanons]
Kazuya is sitting on the sidewalk, checking his watch occasionally and tapping his foot. The cigarette seems to have been forgotten, hanging lowly from his lips.
"Sorry I'm late." Daitou speedily makes his way towards his friend, smiling awkwardly.
"Where the fuck were you, man? We don't know how much time we have before the cops arrive."
"Uh uh, leave it to me." The cheeky grin doesn't leave his face as he pulls out his gun and carefully but swiftly inspects the barrel and safety one final time. "(Y/N) needed some help with the mailbox. I couldn't just say no, ya know?"
The blonde man's eyebrows raise for a second, but he quickly recollects himself.
"I see. That's good."
"She asked me to show her the area tomorrow, so I'll be working extra hard tonight. Hehe."
"That's good."
Daitou glances at Kazuya, somewhat wary.
"You okay?"
Stupid question. What's he supposed to answer? Yeah, he loves waiting like a dumbass while his friend flirts with the new tenant, who conveniently happens to be a cute foreigner, who's been unexpectedly nice and relaxed around them despite them explicitly stating they're part of the Japanese mafia. Fucking hell. It doesn't help that this idiot is as obvious as a blaring, blinding cluster of ads smack in the middle of Kabukicho. He can tell from miles away that Daitou's completely fallen for her. Just like that, in an instant.
They've been partners and best friends for years now, so the natural reaction would be happiness, right? Daitou has always been one scary motherfucker. Even the seniors scramble when he's in the room, let alone women. For him to find someone that isn't bothered the slightest by his appearance or background should be a celebratory occasion. Kazuya should be rooting for him. Except, well, he fell for you just as hard. Tough luck.
The Bushido moral code, often used as guidance within their own lifestyle, covers matters such as loyalty and honesty quite extensively. A true warrior remains fiercely faithful to his master or companions. And yet, love interests are more of a grey area, especially if they happen to overlap. Who dictates the proper etiquette for this dilemma? To whom is loyalty directed towards? Truth be told, Kazuya couldn’t care less. He’s always been a man of vice, impulsive and greedy. If he wants something, he takes it.
The trouble starts when the other person is of the same mindset. Two ferocious predators eyeing the same victim.
***
You fiddle next to the tall, dark-haired man. Similarly, Daitou is avoiding eye contact, looking around in hopes of finding something to focus on. It’s the first time he’s come over since the incident. After his little mission with Kazuya, he was tasked to “interrogate” some of the remaining members to get even more names for the hitlist. He’d completely forgotten about his promise to show you the neighborhood. Hands sticky with blood, he was in the middle of his signature act of benevolence, putting the lad out of his misery.
It was around that time you decided to be the one picking him up instead, for your grand tour. Your knocks on the door remained unheard, however, so you decided to politely make your way in.
“Sorry, I hope I’m not-”
You froze in place. A man (you assumed at least based on the few visible traits left), tied up on the chair, canvas bag roped around his head. Daitou’s hands were secured around his throat. In the few seconds of silence, you could hear a muffled wheezing, as the stranger’s chest heaved in short convulsions.
“-intruding.” You mumbled, regaining your speech.
He messed up, didn’t he? Daitou sighs and slicks his hair back. He can’t blame you if you’re now terrified of him. He had to come over for some tenant checkups and you’ve been maintaining a safe distance from him during his entire visit. What can he possibly tell you? “Hey, I know I threatened to chop you up and you’ve now witnessed firsthand I’m a legit murderer, but, uh…I have a crush on you? Dinner at seven?”
You’re terrified alright, but not of his deeds. Rather, your newly discovered perversion as a consequence of the gory scene. It’s not that you relished in the torment of another. It’s the other details that left you reminiscing. Daitou’s imposing frame, the unbuttoned shirt revealing his traditional tattoos glistening in beads of sweat, his flexed, brawny arms, and large hands. You’re scared of your shamelessness. It can’t be normal. Yet you can’t stop thinking about it. Just a glimpse into this memory and your cheeks become burning red.
“I’ll be on my way then”, the yakuza announces politely.
Though he immediately stops in his tracks, and you realize you’ve unconsciously grabbed onto his sleeve. Uh oh. What now? You mumble an apology without releasing your hold. Being this close to him makes your heart drum inside your chest.
To hell with it.
“I might say something terribly inappropriate right now, but…”
“Sorry?” He stares at you, dumbfounded.
“Do you have anything planned after this?” You ask quietly.
“N-no?”
“Would you mind staying over?”
“Huh? Sure…w-what for?” His mouth is dry, and he searches your eyes in confusion.
“You know…” Choke me until I pass out and such, you think to yourself sarcastically.
He turns to face you, lips pursed awkwardly.
“You’ll have to be clear with me, Miss (Y/N). I’m not good with all this tiptoeing around and I might get the wrong idea.”
Your ears perk up hearing his final words, a deep blush now spreading over your flustered features.
“What wrong idea?”
Daitou fidgets with his glass prosthetic nervously.
“Well, uh, a man can only dream, ya know? Especially around a cute girl like you.” He reveals with a stutter.
“Suppose I’d be willing to go along with anything on your mind. What then?” You twirl your hair, gazing shyly at the floor. Not even you can believe the audacity leaving your lips.
The tall man steps before you, towering above with a certain gleam in his eye. It’s yearning. Your knees weaken.
“Don’t tease me, please. I can hardly control myself around you as it is.”
You release his sleeve and instead cling onto his shirt with both hands, looking up through your lashes.
“I’m dead serious.”
He ponders his next move with a click of the tongue, then cups your cheeks between his hands and lowers himself until his hot breath tickles your nose.
“Are you? There’s no going back after this. Can you handle it?” His voice is suddenly deeper, raspier.
Before you can respond, you feel yourself lifted and you yelp, surprised, instinctively wrapping your limbs around the yakuza. In between the greedy kisses that leave your lips bruised and swollen, you don’t notice the movement back towards the seating area.
As you pull away to gasp for air, he throws you onto the couch, flipping you over in the process so that you’re kneeling away from him. Your nails dig into the soft fabric of the sofa. You hear Daitou unbuckle his belt and you squeeze your legs together, heavily aroused. He presses his palm gently into your back, arching it. You sense his fingers grazing over your core and you whimper.
“G-go on, please.” You beg, swaying your hips tentatively. “I really can’t wait anymore.”
“As you wish, Miss.” He reassures you with a grin.
He adjusts himself and carefully makes his way in. You don’t have time to enjoy the feeling; following almost instantly is his belt looped around your neck, tightening under his grip as he pulls the ends towards him. Your head is forced back, and you groan. You can hear the leather stretch and creak over your assaulted skin, the constriction briefly cutting your oxygen intake. Hot drool trickles down your chin and your eyes almost roll back in pleasure.
“Look at my little Miss (Y/N), taking it like a champion.” He bends over and bites your earlobe playfully. “Does that mean I can be as rough as I want?”
You nod erratically.
The grip around your throat intensifies and your vision becomes blurry.
“Hey, don’t pass out now.” He inserts two fingers in your mouth, pulling you by the cheek and tilting your head to look him in the eye. “Not before you show me that you understand your situation. You’re mine. Is that clear?”
He drags his fingers downwards, aiding your response as you struggle to contract your muscles.
“Attagirl.” He concludes, satisfied.
In the morning you wake up with a dreadful soreness, and you can quickly see why. Your body is peppered in bruises. Daitou is smoking by the window and promptly flicks his cigarette out once he realizes you’re no longer asleep.
“Are you okay? I’m so sorry, I don’t know what’s gotten into me.” He begins, remorseful, and squats in front of the bed. “I hope I didn’t hurt you.”
“I will need a day or two to recover before the next time, but otherwise I’m fine.”
He beams with delight upon registering your words: next time. You can’t help but snicker at his childish enthusiasm. It’s a mystery how Daitou can switch between ruthless killer and cute partner with such ease.
Although it’s no secret, really. It’s you.
***
“Thanks for driving me home, Kazuya.”
You smile and unbuckle your seatbelt, reaching for the door handle. Daitou has been busy with work for the past days, so Kazuya took his place in looking after your needs.
“Huh?” You rattle the grab handle one more time to make sure. “It’s still locked.”
The blonde raps the wheel impatiently with his fingers. Is he to silently accept his loss? Does it even count as a loss when he hasn’t even had the chance to present his piece? Daitou has been quiet about it, but he can read that bastard like an open book. Something definitely happened between the two of you and the mere thought drives him insane.
Ah, this is so unlike him. There are few things he cares about. His pride, his Family’s honor, his freedom. Women aren’t exactly on that list, yet somehow, you’ve snuck your way to the very top of priorities and he’s realizing it just now. It’s becoming harder to ignore his maddening urge to have you. Out of all the things…He’d give Daitou the world. But not you. He can’t. He can’t.
“Kazuya? Are you listening? You forgot to unlock the door.”
“Say, (Y/N) …ever fucked in a car before?”
“What?” You ask, baffled.
“Come here for a moment.” He swiftly slides his seat all the way back and pats his thigh.
“Are you out of your mind?”
He answers your inquiry by pulling out his handgun and lazily pointing it towards you.
“I’m only going to ask once.”
You clumsily climb over the center console, straddling the yakuza with a slight pout.
“Someone’s in a sour mood, that’s for sure”, you complain. “It’s not even loaded.”
“Even I’m not crazy enough to risk shooting my Princess.” He smiles apologetically, throwing the gun on the backseat. “I thought it’d be more threatening that way.”
He removes a strand of hair from your face, gazing at you intently. His hand lingers for a second, before sliding its way down, tracing the side of your body. You shiver.
“Can you truly blame me when there’s such a pretty girl right before my eyes?” The blonde exhales and focuses on your shirt instead. “Won’t you let me prove myself?”
From this distance, despite the dim lights, you can discern his features in agonizing detail. His long lashes, his fleshy lips, currently parted, the luscious locks of hair casually thrown back. Kazuya has always been effortlessly handsome. It’s not just his good looks, but his overflowing charisma. He always knows exactly what to say and do. A devilish power to have over people, and you’re presently his victim.
His slender fingers play with your first button and cheekily undo it. You can only observe it, entranced. Your legs are weak, and your arms are stuck in place, resting limply over his broad shoulders.
“May I?” He glances up at you with a pleading expression. “I won’t be able to hold back afterwards.”
You bite your lower lip, distracted. Whether or not this is a wise choice, you can’t currently tell. You squirm in his lap and suddenly feel the pressure coming from below.
“Go ahead.” You finally confess.
He doesn’t hesitate and slithers his hand underneath your shirt, popping the rest of the buttons open. Like a hungry animal that has stumbled upon a feast, he sinks his teeth into your neck, leaving mean, wet kisses on his way down.
One hand is greedily kneading your curves, encouraged by your soft whimpers, while the other strokes your thigh in anticipation. With a bit of readjustment, he finds the right spot between your trembling legs. You jolt at the sensation of his cold fingers.
“My, you’re already dripping. How lewd.” He whispers between breaths. “Do you want it now?”
He nonchalantly slips out and undoes his own pants. You lift yourself expectantly and let a moan escape your lips upon feeling the erection throbbing right below.
“Well then, can’t forget our manners, can we?” He announces, visibly excited. “What should I do?”
You glare at him, feverish.
“Stop teasing me.”
“Come on, be a good girl. Tell me what to do and I will do it, Love.”
Why, this…You lower yourself to his ear and answer in a lulled whine.
“Isn’t it obvious? I want you to fuck me.”
Words enough to send the blonde man over the edge. He abruptly clutches your thighs for support, easing himself in before continuing with increasingly aggressive thrusts. Husky whimpers roll out of his mouth, desperate and starved.
“Oh, I’ve waited so long for this. My darling, perfect little (Y/N).” He presses his forehead into your chest, indulging in the moment. “Now say that you’re mine. Please. Please say it.”
“I’m…ah…I’m all yours, Kazuya.” You manage to blurt out, growing dizzy.
“That’s my girl. Such a good girl.”
Once the deed is finished, you flop your head over his chest, trying to catch your breath. Kazuya smoothens your clothes meticulously, holding you with one arm for support. Can’t leave a lady all disheveled, after all.
“Won’t Daitou be upset?” You point out, somewhat anxiously.
His muscles are tense for a second and he furrows his brows.
“That’s one strange way to thank me for making you come at least twice. Mentioning another man’s name.”
“I’m just…” your words trail off.
“What? Worried? You think I can’t handle it or something?”
Far from the truth. Both Kazuya and Daitou are violent, dangerous men. Given their stubbornness, you’re rather certain they’d end up killing each other. Not your favorite outcome.
“I don’t want either of you to get hurt.”
He sighs loudly.
“I’ll tell you what. Under normal circumstances, I’d probably dismember whoever had the guts to even entertain the idea of meddling with you. But…just because it’s Daitou, I might be willing to share. Nothing more than that.”
Kazuya ruffles your hair and chuckles.
“Aren’t you glad I’m such a diplomat, Love?”
“More like batshit crazy, both of you.” You retort, stretching.
#yandere yakuza#yandere#yandere x reader#yandere x you#yandere x darling#male yandere x reader#yakuza x reader#mafia x reader#yandere mafia#yandere imagines#yandere scenarios#yandere smut#yandere fic#male yandere#yandere oc x reader#yandere oc#oc x reader#yandere original character#original work#smut
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For those of us who may want to write fics including Robin but are too nervous... Can we have some tips for how to characterize them? What are their vibes, are there some things to think of/remember when writing them?
I once described them as "tryhard, repressed trust issues, craves connection. aloof with anyone who poses a (perceived) threat to them, kind of awkward when not" (not on here, so no one needs to look gfhdj) but I'll go into a bit more detail!
First, I wanna state that while I left their family situation vague for self insert purposes, they way anything AU related is written, they aren't close with their family. The duplex is inherited, but they don't grieve the previous owner by the time they move in. I won't specify when this person died or who it was, as it's really just to set up the premise, and you can invent whatever for your purposes!
They're still distant, laying the groundwork for Robin's inevitable loneliness. They live alone, in a city they didn't grow up in, where they don't know anyone. When they first move in, they're excited for the possibilities! The world's their oyster and they sure are nonbinary (/ref), so they set out and explore. Happen to get scouted by a private intelligence firm, and hey, why not! (Better than getting in trouble for technically trespassing, oops).
They've always enjoyed spy movies and series, they do parkour, so of course they enjoy the secret agent life. They get a kick out of finding the craziest, most impressive way to do something - think macgyver in the sense that they like to work with what they have, but also kim possible in that they love highly specific gadgets too. Bonus points if personalized
With time, they start internalizing that enthusiasm more and more when it isn't met in kind by the people around them. That's when they start to withdraw socially, and the isolation really kicks in. After having their energy be met with scorn they start mistrusting people, refusing to really show themself, and stick more to the star agent role they earned. No one can take that from them, even if they make fun of their methods.
And so they lean into that, extremely so. They work hard, they aim higher and higher, until they feel like no one can take this success from them. But they also don't care to talk to anyone anymore, having been burnt too often, and they pretend they're fine with it, really.
Robin falls into a monotony, chasing after happiness at work because that's their only source for it, not realizing just how damaging this lifestyle is to them in the long run. They're completely isolated after years of this - and then they gain a rival, and a few short months later, a neighbor (and later, both <3)
With their rival, Robin is not on good terms before ever even speaking to him. There's a rookie, who after just a few short months gains such a reputation to be considered almost as good as them, after putting in years of work? They don't know him, and if he's another one of those stuck up idiots who ridicule them for what brings brought them joy, then they have no interest in humoring him, either. That's why they react with hostility, and take a while to warm up to their respective rival (mostly once they see his quirks, too. Dusk and his gimmick and playful attitude, Dawn and his flashy suits and flair for the dramatic). Then it's on (in Dusk's case. rip rival Dawn, you could've had it all) and they enjoy the banter and the races and the bets <3
With their neighbor they basically scramble for anything. "Nice person living next to me. My tenant? I don't know how landlords act there are no cool landlord movies. Uhhhh okay no neighbor is close enough. Offer eggs or sugar? Wait, animatronics don't eat. What do I do?" So they don't have any scripts for this situation, because they can't counter it with just polite small talk like you'd do with the cashier of the grocery store, or the aloof attitude they keep towards other agents, and those are the only types of socialization they get. They do try to be nice, and don't mean to overstep, but when faced with friendly, civilian contact? They crave that more than they even know, and get just a bit clingy among the awkwardness. It helps that their neighbor seems just as awkward, but in the end nice - so they feel reassured, and safe enough to continue trying, until they figure out again just how exactly friends work <3
#answer let luce#anonymous#accidentally undercover#the duplex is inherited bc any other homeowner Y/N reasoning felt. *too* unrealistic#rip the housing market#and y/n's unnamed relative#in the end tho#robin *is* supposed to be a y/n - a self insert for anyone reading#so you can also just write them however#i certainly wont be mad or anything fgdhsj#im just. hyped that ppl wanna write them at all actually whoops#I hope this helps tho!!#they went through a lot of blorbofication and I'm sorry they feel more like an OC now than a blank insert#but then again... gotta write them somehow#so their character is basically excited about spy movies + years of circumstances molding them into who they are now#that should work I hope <3
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8/20/23
Ugh, it rained all day again today. So much damn rain this year, it's crazy. I was really hoping it would clear up, I really wanted to go skating.
I did my laundry today and washed the painted jeans and the cargo shorts with the deer on them. I seem to be all about leaps of faith lately. I put them both in pillowcases and turned them inside out to reduce abrasion. The shorts came out pristine. The jeans... they came out of the pillowcase in the dryer. And they took some wear and tear damage at the top 2 sections of the celtic knot. It's not bad, it just looks like a normal kinda faded t-shirt design. It actually looks much more natural, like it's part of the jeans rather than on top of them. But... with that lesson learned... I think I'm just going air dry them from now on. The wash seemed to go fine for them, the dryer kinda fucked it... so... I'm just not going to take the risk. It shouldn't be a big deal to just hang them to dry overnight. If the washing machine ends up causing problems, I'll just handwash them in the bathtub.
Handwashing in the bathtub, another spring/summer 2019 memory... -_- I got back to my house after having the counseling center convince me to go to a state mental health retreat for two weeks in the winter, and fucking mice nested in my stove and washing machine. They were shot. So... I didn't have a stove or washing machine anymore. So I managed to get a toaster oven from my mom's basement and used that and the electric burners on the stove for cooking, and I handwashed all my clothes in the bathtub for 4 months.
Why didn't I tell my landlord and have them replace it? 1. PTSD shut me down. 2. related to 1... it was "technically my fault". So... the combination of those. I've struggled with that for a long time. My landlords were nice and they would've gladly replaced it, I was just convinced that... they were going to think I was trashing the place... or a bad tenant... or I would have to explain where I was and why it was so neglected... and I was convinced they were going to get mad at me and evict me and my pets. And we had nowhere to go. So... yeah, that deep deep fear just crippled me and I never told them and ended up having my mom insist on replacing them for me after like 4-6 months.
So... no stranger to handwashing, that's what that story is about.
Other than laundry, today was not crazy eventful. The chick who does cosplay and engineering and all that followed me back and liked some of my posts. I messaged her the picture of the poster she gave me when I visited her on the road trip. She messaged me back late tonight a big all-caps "HIIII <3". It brought a smile to my face. It's just... very alien to me how different others' lives are. She's probably out with friends on a Saturday night and checking her DMs in passing. My life is just... stillness and openness and solitude, and if someone reaches out to me (which is exceedingly rare), it immediately gets my full attention. It's very different, and that takes a lot of intention for me to remember. And weirdly, it doesn't seem like others have that in mind.
A lot of people from my past have looked at the emptiness and silence in my life with envy. As though they would look at someone in solitary confinement in a prison or a Carthusian monk and just ooze with fucking envy. The grass is always greener, eh? Well... take a week and try it. Fuck, take 2 goddamn days and try it. Take one weekend, go to a shack in the woods with no electricity and no people, nothing but silence and you... for 48 hours. Every single person that has looked at me with envy... they would be clawing at the walls after 4 hours. Because they are envious of something they have never known. They just desire something different, they don't even know what this life is even like!
I, however... I do know what their life is like, because I had visited it quite a bit. And I somewhat envy them... and somewhat don't. It's a balanced picture, and it's simply a different life. But yeah, it's just a weird thing that I notice the more I kinda dip my feet back into the social pool... how goddamn different every other person's life is compared to me. How strange I am.
So... I have a strange upbringing, I am a strange person, I live a strange life, I think in strange ways, I express myself in strange ways ... Why the fuck do all these people think I should be in a "normal" career? It's so odd.
Nope, not doing career shit tonight. XD I overdid it on that last night.
The only other thing I did today was throw together an imgur album of one of my art pieces and posted the link on two subreddits. Not a lot happened with it. Lots of views on imgur, but not a lot of traction on reddit.
I don't mind blogging, as you can clearly tell. I don't mind doing video projects... but it does feel very odd when your video is really intended to be in an art gallery setting... and you just give it away for free to people on fucking Instagram next to an ad for some guy trying to sell you on his fitness program. It sometimes feels trashy, it sometimes feels... like selling myself short? But I honestly don't know where else to put it or what else to do with it. And it is really devastating to have like 2-3 months of daily work with almost no days off... turn into a half-dozen likes, a few of them probably not even finishing the 10 minute video. It's hard.
I know the answer to this is... go make in-person connections. That's the one thing I had on my agenda that I didn't get to today - messaging the guy from the art collective. The drawing session is on Wednesday. I've gotta make sure I have an unlined sketchbook that isn't completely spoken for to use.
So yeah, I kinda was in this mentality where I was like... "maybe if I just post the same piece on different social media sites... I'll see that my problem isn't that my work isn't engaging people... it's that I'm just not active on social media at all." I became a social media ghost for fucking years. ... Despite leaving very clear and elaborate messages on my social media saying I was leaving and "here's where you can reach me" and leaving my new usernames and my phone number and shit... ... Yeah, depressing-ass shit.
I guess it just takes a lot to fucking impress people nowadays. I don't know. Or I'm just around the wrong people, I don't know. I'm a little worried with how tough the cost of living is around here that no one I meet will be able to afford the shit I make. Like... I'm specifically doing things handmade, with natural products as much as possible, even making my own inks and paints and tools sometimes. That comes at a premium. I'm not just making an AI generated design and feeding it to a print factory in China and having that shit shipped to me. I'm building my own pen, brewing my own ink and straining and pressing paper out of wood pulp. (Not literally, though I've absolutely entertained the idea and it might be a future project, I have a book on how to do all of that...)
Isn't it weird? How if I were to cut as many corners as possible and make 1000 identical pieces that my hands never even touched... I would be considered a professional artist. But if I craft my own tools and bleed and sweat into my pieces... I'm considered a "hobbyist"?
Oh yeah, I remember, I don't want to talk about work stuff because I remember re-reading the first few paragraphs of my post last night and audibly laughing and going "wow, a bit grumpy tonight are we?" XD
Okay, well... here's something of note. I dusted off my old Imgur that I haven't used since the peak of the pandemic. There were two albums on it. One was a gallery of my two pets who are no longer with us - my dog Cerry and my cat Maxine. There was a picture of my dog sitting patiently and a little confused with my hoodie on and the hood up over her head, and her front paws through the arms. She looked cool as hell. And it's the same hoodie that I ended up painting! And the video was my cat sitting on the bathroom counter at the old house looking at me filming her and very gently and softly chirping at me and purring very loud. And... it didn't hurt. It hurts now, that hollow feeling in my chest, that grief feeling. But when I stumbled across them, it didn't pain me. I was happy to be with them again. And it was nice. It was kind of a haunting nice, but it was nice. Less like running into a ghost in a haunted house and more like chillin with Force Ghost Obi-Wan on Dagoba. I miss them both so much, my life is so much different without them.
The other album was a photo set of the first hike my dog and I went on after the pandemic started. It was in May 2020, right after the snow thawed. It was really nostalgic, I remember that hike very clearly. I forgot I posted all of those.
I haven't played the social media game... in ages. And by social media game, I mean... regular status updates, keeping people informed of where I'm at and what I'm doing... posting selfies... The last selfie I took... okay, this is gonna be dark. The last selfie I took was the exact moment that I made the decision to put my dog down, because it felt like one of the biggest moments of my life and I wanted to capture the facial expression of someone who just made an impossible decision, in case I needed it for a future art project. It's... haunting, I can't bring myself to look at it. But before that... the last selfie I took was probably 2020 for my dating profile, I just needed a more up-to-date picture.
I have been out of the social media game/habit since around 2016-17. It just hasn't been part of my life. I haven't had an active social media account that is my fucking birthname... since then. So... it's really no surprise to me that my entire life went completely downhill not just when I got in that relationship and that consoling center got their hands on me... but when I got off of social media and the internet junkie populace decreed me digitally deceased.
It was interesting to look back and see how there were moments when I really did try to re-enter digital social circles. And just fell flat. People just... didn't care, I was just another thing to scroll past. So I didn't bother continuing to put the effort into that, I'd rather put that time and effort into work and learning new skills anyway. I'd much rather share those experiences in-person anyway.
So yeah... I'm not super talkative today. I got it all out in my novel last night. The big theme of the day was trying to be a bit more brave on social media. Trying to face my past traumas with that. And opening my eyes to how different the rest of the world's lives are. And... seeing that not all of Reddit is bad... and surprisingly... a huge chunk of the toxicity and scary shit I have been encountering was just condensed in local subreddits... scary shit like... wanting to make it mandatory to inject homeless drug addicts with a medication that makes you ill when you do opiates for like 30 days? Without their consent? Like... mandatory... non-consensual... medical procedures? And I'm not really a fan of the crime shit going down here either, but like... I'm definitely gonna draw the line short of mandatory medical procedures, that... That's fucked.
I might as well vent about this. Yes, crime and drugs are directly correlated. Yes, even doing certain drugs in public is criminal. But the act of getting high is not directly tied to committing crime, it's correlated. Correlation does not equal causation. So... if you want to stop homeless people from jacking off in your driveway or leaving needles all over the place... bust them in the act of committing a crime. That's all you can do. You can absolutely enforce crimes. Crimes are enforceable regardless of who the fuck you are or whether you are high or not. Regardless of whether you are someone who works on Wall Street or someone who works at McDonalds or someone who lives by the dumpster behind that McDonalds... if you're jacking off in someone's driveway, you should go to jail and be seen by a mental health clinician. But, from what I've been hearing, the cops just don't respond to non-violent crimes anymore. So... they just do whatever they want. The panicked general populace, completely at the whim of this, is now saying... "well, if we get them off the drugs, they'll stop committing all this crime". Which... is a false equivalence, to be honest. A vast majority (I'd honestly say nearly all) of these situations are people with mental health problems that are not being treated, and drugs are definitely not making it better... but it's a stretch to say they're causing the crimes. So... they think that if you go and round up all the drug-using homeless and throw them in a pen and inject them with a drug that makes them physically ill if they get high within 30 days... while they violently detox in the streets without medical supervision... they think this is going to make the crime rate go down?...
There are not easy solutions to any of these problems, because... you know... these are human beings... with stories. And every single one needs something different to make things right in their life, because they're people. This isn't "what chemical do we use for the fruitfly infestation in our house". And it really kinda sickens me to hear people talk that way. Even if these people have turned into pieces of shit, they're still people. So yeah. My heart sinks every time I see this.
Here's a weird thought. When's the last time we've referred to any species of living being as "inhumane"... that wasn't human. How much fucking hubris can you have as a species to name the act of being fair and just and civilized after yourself... and then unfurl the toilet roll sized list of the biggest inhumane offenders... and they're all human. XD Ugh, we're such weird, weird apes.
So yeah, basically... I realized that my stigma of reddit came from reading the wrong subreddits, local subreddits because I had the intention of trying to meet people locally that way. And there are actually a lot of chill people and a lot of small communities where it's somewhat easy to meet people with similar interests. And it's not a bad place for me to be, both personally and professionally. As long as I keep myself away from... those people.
Yep, anyway, I'm gonna go now. Fingers crossed the weather clears up for skating tomorrow!
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Physical abuse TW
No one to talk to about this. So I'm just gonna tell my whole life story here before I decide to do anything drastic.
I grew up with an emotionally and physically abusive mother who financially depended on me in the last few years of my highschool life. I studied hard and got accepted at the only out of district school they'd let me leave to so I could be away from her. I lived with my grandmother and studied while working 2 part time jobs and volunteering up until the pandemic happened. At this point, my mother had come to my grandmother's house and had been living there with us since the winter. By mid-August, I was completely back in a traumatic and controlling environment filled with rage and violence, as my grandmother and mother did not get along. We all fought a lot daily. At this point, I was still volunteering and was helping doing covid related work for my volunteer organization. I started looking for work to get me out of the house and was lucky to find a well paying job. Coupled with my funds I'd gotten from being laid off, I figured I had enough resources to leave after a particularly violent altercation with my mother about me volunteering too late one night (at this point I was 20 years old)
I got all of my things together to leave the following day to stay with my friend and my mother and grandmother assaulted me. I was beaten with a wooden rod, a metal canister and slammed onto the ground and sat on. They even put their arms over my nose and mouth so that I couldn't scream for my friends outside. It was one of the most terrifying moments I've experienced in recent years.
I got out and the following day filed a restraining order and got the rest of my things. Those first few weeks were incredibly difficult. I had a friend who said that he'd move away with me to help with rent costs as he wanted to leave his home too, but he changed his mind.
I found a place to live, moved and worked for a few months until I experienced sexual harrassment and discrimination at my job and then my contract was not renewed. After losing that job, I burned through all my savings, tried to work at other places I wasn't suited for and then eventually got another temporary position. After that job ended, I was completely drained and in a very depressed state as my friends all moved on to do other things with their lives. I was isolated, broke and vulnerable. I couldn't even afford to continue studying so I just stopped taking classes. I lived off of unemployment for almost a year during this time while waiting for my lease to end so I could move away with a friend I reconnected with. When the unemployment was almost up, I got a summer job and worked to save up money for the move. The friend who said they'd move away with me changed their mind and bought themselves an in development condo so that they could become a landlord and rent it out. I was devastated and the plans I'd made fell apart again. By then my current lease was up but I couldn't afford to move into a new place on my own so I decided to rent a room. When I finally found a seemingly decent place in a nice neighbourhood, I thought that everything would be okay.
The landlord at that house was an awful person to me. The house and my room became infested with gnats due to her plants. She brought in other tenants so the house was full of men and I was the only girl. I wasn't even given a key to the door of my room. She used to listen to when I would go into the washroom and timed how long my showers were. The fridge I was allowed to use was a mini-fridge that I had to share between two other people. My food would always go bad and I lost a lot of meals and just eventually stopped eating. I lost a lot of weight over those months. While that was happening, I got a job but was then let go two weeks into my training because they thought my performance was inadequate. I then found another job but I wasn't trained there at all and got berated by clients for my mistakes. By Christmas, I had no money, food and I needed to leave as soon as possible for my safety and health. I broke my lease and moved but they lied about the room needing to be "deep-cleaned" and took my safety deposit. I was able to find another place but have had no luck in getting a job so I've been trying to make money off of art commissions. Every month has been a struggle. I can't move back in with my family, I don't have anywhere else I can go. I have tried over and over again but nothing is working. I own nothing, I have no one and I honestly don't even want to live anymore. Just years and years of misery. I feel like I was pushed to making so many decisions that I thought would help but kept making things worse and worse. I feel like I have no future.
Now, at 22 (23 next month if I make it till then), there is little opportunity for me to do anything anymore. I can't afford to go back to school, I can't find a stable job, I have no assets, no in-demand skills. I live with debilitating mental and physical conditions but can't even get the support I need to survive. I feel like I am a week away from homelessness. The only thing I can do is draw and sing but no one wants that from me. I'm mediocre at best and I'm a nobody. All this to say, I don't want anyone to be angry with me if I decide that I can't do this anymore. I tried to live with the circumstances I was given, but everything's fucked now and I'm tired. I'm tired of going hungry and being alone. I didn't deserve any of this. I didn't do anything to anyone to live this kind of pathetic life. I just wanted to draw comic books and make art. This is everything that's happened to me in the last 5 years. I am at the darkest point in my life and there's no one who wants to help me. I feel like such a waste.
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These are the 11 issues I learned the hard way when I actually started investing in Real Estate
1. This particular is an organization
Your tenants happen to be not friends and family. Make sure you understand this. At the beginning My partner and i had tenants paying out month after 30 days late. This spiraled out of control quickly.
2. Deferred maintenance cost considerably more in the very long run
Ignoring concerns on your home can lead to bigger issues. When it's broke- correct it. Don't wait for the problem in order to get bigger
a few. Communication matters
No longer ignore your tenants. I really carry out know landlords that will do this. Textual content back, drive by. Show you are vested in these people & the exact property.
4. Curb appeal matters
When I initial started out I had tenants take attention of lawn. At this point I have a new contract w the 3rd party. Typically the properties always look nice & I do not have to fight with any person within the lawn not being done in a new timely manner.
your five. When buying- drive by the property at night
This can look wonderful during the day, nevertheless drive by typically the property at night if everyone is house from work. Avoid invest in a new property you didn't live in.
six. Pay a real estate office manager
I work with to try to do all of it. Now Personal Finance pay an administrator to take preservation calls and help to make sure the waste gets rolled out to be able to the street.
8. Treat your renters how you desire to be treated
Often I avoid charge an overdue fee unless these people don't communicate using me or they are late every single single month.
7. Your team things
In the midsection of the coldest day of the winter I got 2 furnaces away at the same time. It took twenty-four hours to have parts replaced. I had a plumbing engineer drop off room heaters at each units for me personally. Creating a solid staff sets you separate from others.
on the lookout for. Title company/Lawyer make a difference
Mid way through I picked the Title company inside of both states in addition to good lawyer in the states. This tends to make transactions so a lot of easier when a person work together with someone an individual trust.
10. Don't just buy it mainly because it's cheap
Excellent price - won't always mean great deal. Focus on B/ C class neighborhood. When you acquire in D school neighborhoods problems arrive with that. And so proceed with serious caution.
11. End listening to your own family
Using the services of family is tough. I would have given up this journey I am just on at door 2 if My partner and i listed to my mommy about buying unattractive properties. You might be generating money a various way. Not everybody will get of which. And that's fine
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How Craigslist Search Tools Can Aid Time Searching Apartments For Rental
For can be a minded individual who is searching for apartments in Saginaw, a posh called Madison Park Estates is a wonderful value. Offer apartments at as little as $ 399.00 per month and naturally for a 2 bedroom, 850 square foot unit. Which usually is a associated with square feet for money. Although characteristics are limited in this complex, top speed internet and covered parking is supplied. The nice part about it can be that a $ ninety nine.00 deposit is required with an approved credit score assessment. That almost all that ought to be in order to come in.
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Utilities - Determine you are responsible of utilities, and those which. Ask how much the utilities usually are per calendar month. Also find out you have gas heat. Shredding get not cheap in the winter, a great number rental homes are inadequately insulated.
Your best choice when hunting for a bargain is to obtain as distant from area as workable. This isn't state he you to be able to move out into the sticks, however, you won't desire to be near the largest shoe store or cultural center perhaps. Think about exactly how much you're prepared to pay for location alone, because thatrrrs what you're paying whenever you wish to live in the current areas.
I but let them know that, by 23-25th of the month, Supplied at each door, self addressed business envelopes acquire the money order for rental in our business Dom. O. Box. I this for that tenant's convenience, it isn't a who cares for me, but present some discipline from my side which I expect the same from them in this technique of renting real residence.
If you want to go out, it is mostly a good idea to live close to bars and also other nightlife. When you might walk home instead of experiencing to choose a ride, can make going out a lot easier and safer too. You never want to risk creating an accident because walking home isn't an option after drinking too most.
First of all, consider what we've got learned in recent times about the economy. Whilst it may seem that it can be looking up, consider what number of people have forfeit their homes, or tend to be foreclosed upon right now whether the reason is , of losing a job, investing in the wrong company, or with a couple kind of lending service that went under after paying every little thing money there. How truly secure you in your job, the happens if after include started paying on a home and ought to do vnpt internet line for rent get fired or fired? How are https://vnptvinaphone.net.vn/chuong-trinh-khuyen-mai-lap-mang-vnpt-ha-noi-thang-1-2021/ for you to keep devising the home loan payments?
The living costs can be brought down a moment if one chooses to reside one on the smaller towns around the Bay Area, such as Stockton or Modesto. Surely the commute can be regarded as a problem, with respect to the traffic.
Price is often a huge consideration when a person shopping for new home based. Look at the classified division of your local newspaper to obtain an associated with the involving prices that rentals opt for in account of town (or flourish you wish move to). In most cities and towns it cost more to rent apartments a number of areas laptop or computer does on other occasions. Consider your earnings. It is frequently recognized that rent can't be on average 30 percent of your take-home pay out out. Decide what finances is cost effective for you look for apartments that satisfy economical bottom the net.
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3 Solutions To Lower Your Electric Bill In Your Apartment
https://vnptvinaphone.net.vn/chuong-trinh-khuyen-mai-lap-mang-vnpt-ha-noi-thang-1-2021/
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So every one of us start on a single page, let's move on by defining apartment rent with it's nuances. Apartment rent may be the monthly be sure you pay your landlord, whether you're renting a unit in a sizable apartment complex, a room in someone's house, maybe a condo starting from a private manager. Rent is money that is out of your bank account each month towards placing roof too deep. The key remember from this definition usually money flows out of the pocket month-to-month that first see repeatedly.
Finally and plenty of importantly, apparently issue in order to taken proper into a consideration. If you aren't lucky enough to locate a friend or family member whom can be looking to have a roommate, if at all possible typically room with a stranger. You have to take period to big event stranger isn't such a stranger before living with these. If you post an ad on Craigslist potentially local community board around town, begin background check and a criminal history check to make sure you aren't inviting a dangerous psycho to your home. After that, meet a rare occasions to ensure this body's not only someone sense safe living with, but someone carrying out actually want to be around each.
Many renters are simply interested within amount of square footage in each room. Anyone might should also consider your way the space furthermore used of course. The floor-plan will dictate how may never layout your furniture each separate a spot. So take your time and browse through the space outside the windows, doors, and every other features can impact the location of your furniture.
I allowed them to know that, by 23-25th of the month, Supplied at each door, self addressed business envelopes for the money order for rental in our business Nufactured. O. Box. I this for that tenant's convenience, it isn't a so what for me, but compute that . some discipline from my side of which I expect the same from them in this method of renting real home.
You might need to possess a record your upfront cost to your new resident include a deposit, first weeks' rent and a processing fee to do background testing. For the most part, people are renting out rooms it is nice to get yourself a deposit of two weeks' worth of rent regarding any damages in cases where a resident doesn't work out and moves out or gets kicked out.
Well, using can do is locate a place remain in for just a month or thereabouts and just start trying to find rent houses there. This way, you are able to make vnpt internet line for rent sure the house you seem renting is absolutely comfortable may well have anything you want. It's not stressful enough that the adjusting inside your new environment so end up being best come to a decision a house that will more or less have anything that you require. You really can't start looking for furniture in a land that is very new for you.
The landlord - Avoid using be dependant this in order to person accomplish maintenance promptly, return your security deposit, instead of allow everyone to enter your apartment without your permission. When you are your tour in the apartment, get yourself a feel for whether your landlord could be trusted. Also, carefully explore the lease written contract. Say your first lease has a country page that stated exactly what the landlord might and probably don't do, then your second lease had only 2 things that the landlord mentioned as his/her duty. The first lease back links more robust. You can also ask current renters if enjoy the property manager.
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a human touch, part 2, final
Part 1 / 1.5 / [2]
(masterlist here)
summary: everyone knows that androids don’t think, or feel, or have emotions. they’re not human, after all. so when a two hour session with a sex android ends up with nothing more than a nice conversation, you think that’s the first and last time you’ll see v.
then he turns up at your door.
pairing: taehyung x f!reader / word count: 24.4k / genre: robot!taehyung/virgin!reader, fluff, smut (NSFW, 18+)
warnings: cursing/explicit language, very brief injury mention/blood mention (nothing violent/explicit I promise!), alcohol consumption, reference to former sex work, sexually explicit content, reference to masturbation, reader has sex for the first time, oral (f + m), multiple orgasms (f), unprotected sex (taehyung is an android but please take necessary precautions irl), I think that’s it but please let me know if I’ve missed anything
a/n: this got so incredibly long,, I hope that makes up for the wait! thank you to @hobi-gif, as always, for being so supportive and uplifting and beta reading this for me, you are a shining star in my sky. and thank you to the wonderful @flowerseokjin for letting me pick her brain about art galleries and telling me about the incredible exhibition/paintings that I wrote about in this fic, you truly are the loveliest 💕
note: this is the final part of the main story! I’ll be writing minis/drabbles etc in the future but,, this is part 2 of 2 💖
A month after Taehyung walks into your life, you finally get new neighbours.
You’re aware of this because:
a) Rory had let you know in advance (to wit: “I have been instructed to inform you that the new tenants of apartment 4A will be moving in next Sunday.”)
and:
b) Said new tenants are apparently very noisy.
Well, not so much noisy as not quiet. It seems like they’ve opted to move everything themselves rather than hiring some android movers, so there’s a lot of shuffling and shunting and occasional bouts of cursing (like someone’s stubbed their toe) and subsequent laughter (like someone else is amused at aforementioned stubbing of aforementioned toe). When you nip out to grab some milk for the pancakes Taehyung wants to learn to make, there are boxes in the hall and voices float out of the open door—a discussion of where the instant ramyun and old Mario games should go (they’re in the same box?)—but you don’t catch a glimpse of the speakers.
It’s not until later, much later, the world outside night-dark but tinged bright white with street lights, that there’s a knock on your door.
You don’t notice. You’re engrossed in the Chinese takeaway menu that’s open on your tablet, staring at the weirdly high-res photo of Kung Pao chicken next to a pixelated picture of some dumplings, wondering what you should choose.
Taehyung is sitting beside you on the sofa. Each day he shifts a little closer to you, inch by inch, the slow pull of gravity, implacable; he gets lonely when you’re gone, and you’re the only person he can talk to. So it’s no surprise he’s so clingy. It’s never overbearing or overwhelming but he’s still unhindered by the self-consciousness that you have—so even if you’re still hesitant to initiate things, you never deny him.
The line of his body is parallel to your own, your thighs warm where they touch, and you feel his shoulder move as he tilts his head. “There’s someone at the door.”
It doesn’t take a genius to work out who it is. The only people who can get inside the building are other residents—well, service androids can too, although there’s a back entrance they use, which is how Taehyung had snuck inside in the first place—and when you approach your door, you can hear two low voices, engaged in what sounds like light-hearted bickering.
You flick your fingers across your keypad. All murmurs cut off the second the door swings open.
“Hi!” A chirp. “We’re your new neighbours!”
Night and day. Two men, one tall and broad-shouldered, eyes large and lips flush, beatific smile on his face; the other, shorter and leaner, eyes sleepy, mouth soft, his smile self-contained.
“I’m Seokjin,” the taller man says. “And this is Yoongi.”
“I can introduce myself,” Yoongi mutters, but it’s not bitter; there’s that ease of familiarity, any bite behind the words soothed with amity. “But yeah, I’m Yoongi. Sorry if we were loud earlier. Jin’s a living foghorn.”
“A sexy living foghorn,” Seokjin says brightly.
Yoongi’s sleepy eyes can deliver one hell of a death glare but Seokjin is unaffected.
“Anyway,” Yoongi continues, unimpressed look wiping off his face as he turns back to you, softening. “What’s your name?”
It’s like there’s a circus on your doorstep and you’re the unwitting audience, dragged into the tent without realising, watching everything unfold in front of you—but in a good way. It's a pleasant surprise. They’re already much friendlier than your previous neighbour, a lone man who’d kept to himself and never spoke to you.
“Uh, I’m Y/n,” you say. You wonder if you should introduce Taehyung as well, but most humans don’t introduce their androids to people, do they? Besides, he’s staying out of sight in the living room, so you’ll leave him be.
“Jin made brownies so we’re here to deliver them to you.”
“I left the walnuts out in case you have a nut allergy,” Seokjin adds as Yoongi passes a polka-dot patterned tin over. It’s heavy in your hands. Full to the brim with brownies, it seems. (Yum yum.)
“Thank you. And you weren’t that noisy, don’t worry! Moving is always messy. Have you finished or did you want some help?”
“That’s very sweet of you! But we’re all done,” Seokjin says. “We were just about to reward ourselves with some takeout, actually, seeing as we haven’t had time to do any food shopping. Do you have any recommendations?”
Taehyung looks uncomfortable, curled up on the sofa with wide eyes when you retrieve your tablet, but you quietly reassure him that you won’t be long.
“Do you want to meet our new neighbours?” You ask, voice soft so the two men don’t overhear. (You miss the warm flicker of Taehyung’s LED when you say our.) “I’d hate for you to have to pretend to be undeviated, though. They might start ordering you around.”
“I’ll stay here,” Taehyung decides.
So that’s how you end up on your doorstep with Seokjin and Yoongi, the three of you peering at the wild variations in stock photo quality on the Chinese takeaway menu.
“You’d think with the huge strides we’ve taken forward in technology that all photos would look at least semi-decent,” Yoongi mumbles as he stares at a cropped picture of fu yung. “It’s hard to get a bad camera.”
“I think it’s such a human thing, though,” Seokjin says. “No matter how technologically advanced humanity gets, takeaway menus will always have bad stock photos.”
Not only are Seokjin and Yoongi friendly, they’re forward. Well, that’s mainly Seokjin, actually, but Yoongi doesn’t protest when Seokjin insists that you come over so you can eat and chat and get to know each other. Especially after you’d offered to pay for everything as a sort of welcome to the neighbourhood gesture, placing both your orders together to save the restaurant the hassle of separate deliveries.
“I’ll pick up the food when it turns up, alright?” Seokjin’s smile is wide. “We haven’t unpacked our kitchen stuff yet, but if you’re happy to eat straight out of the containers…”
You don’t want to abandon Taehyung, especially as you’d planned on watching a film together—you want to introduce him to older, animated cartoons, so you can explain the process of hand painting each frame, plastic cel sheets that layer over each other to create motion. He’ll love it. “Um, I was planning to eat here, actually.”
“Sounds good to us,” Seokjin says, and Yoongi sighs.
“Ignore him, he’s just pushy.” He ignores Seokjin’s indignant squawk. “You don’t have to let us in, don’t worry. I’ll wait for when the food gets here, Jin will stay at home.”
“Make me,” Seokjin says primly.
“I’ll lock you in the bathroom.” Yoongi says it in a way that makes you think it’s not an idle threat, and maybe it’s happened before.
Judging from the look on Seokjin’s face, yeah, it’s happened before.
“You know, you’re both kind of wild,” you say. “But, like, in a good way.”
When you flop back down on the sofa, you press yourself against Taehyung’s side in a motion that’s becoming second nature, so you notice that he seems unnaturally still. He goes motionless whenever he’s thinking deeply about something, an undisturbed ocean lake, the only ripple on its surface the small circle of blue on his temple, swirling waters.
“Are you okay?” You ask, concerned.
“You should eat dinner with them,” he says, and you baulk.
“What? No, it’s fine. I’ve been looking forward to watching Kiki’s Delivery Service with you all week.”
Taehyung’s eyes are soft. “They seem nice,” he says, quiet. “And friendly. We can watch it tomorrow, can’t we?” And then, even quieter: “You don’t have to spend all your free time with me, Y/n.”
“I don’t—” you start, and then deflate. “It’s not fair for you, though.”
That’s the crux of it all. You choose to spend your free time here, with Taehyung, carefully dipping out of work meets and scraping your full social life empty. Because you can. But Taehyung is still cautious of the outside world, understandably so, a hermit crab whose shell is the safety of your apartment, only unfurling from that protection when you’re there too.
“It’s okay,” he says. “I’m happy.”
You haven’t denied Taehyung so far, and you don’t want to start now, but you still waver. Yoongi and Seokjin do seem nice, and friendly, and it’s not like you’ll be able to avoid them forever—but you don’t want to leave Taehyung out. It’s not fair that he can’t make other friends too.
“Go.” Taehyung’s voice is gentle. “I’ll be here when you get back.”
(But there's nowhere else he can go, is there?)
The apartment across the hall is in a state of organised upheaval. There’s a tumbleweed of peeled tape in one corner, boxes with mouths open wide—the priorities for today—while others are stacked neatly against the walls, out of the way of the furniture. It already feels cosy, somehow, but you put that down to the two men who live here and how comfortable they are with each other, dripping off them and filling the room like paraffin, bright lamplight.
Seokjin seems unsurprised but pleased at your appearance. He unfolds himself from the floor with a dazzling smile.
“Welcome to our humble abode.” He punctuates the statement with a grand sweep of his arm, knocking the lampshade above his head, dust motes scattering onto his hair like a soft grey halo. “Oh, ewch, you can tell no one’s been here for a while.” He pats his hair, puffs of dust rising from his dark locks. “Anyway! While it’s true that we already have the table and chairs set up, what sort of move in day would it be if we didn’t eat greasy takeaway on the floor?"
“We did it the last time we moved, so he wants to make it a tradition,” Yoongi mutters to you, and you laugh.
You help Yoongi ease the food down onto unfolded sheets of crumpled newspaper that Seokjin’s laid out to protect the floor. Seokjin dives into the bags and pulls each tub out, identifying each dish immediately despite how a lot of them look the same to you. “Do you move a lot?”
“Nah, just once before,” Yoongi says, watching Seokjin fondly as he peels the lid back on a container of spicy chicken wings and greedily breathes in their sticky-hot scent. “But it was too small for the two of us so we decided to upgrade.”
Seokjin’s spread out the selection of food before you all realise that the restaurant has neglected to provide any chopsticks—even if there’s ten fortune cookies, reflective of how many dishes you’ve ordered and how many people they think it’s going to feed. (Apparently Seokjin likes to eat.)
“Ah, damn,” Yoongi mutters. “We’ll have to dig some cutlery out.”
“I can go get some from my apartment?”
You’ve just started to stand when Seokjin tuts, flapping his hands at you to sit down. “No, no,” he says. “You’re the guest, relax. I was going to unpack the kitchen stuff later anyway. This just means we have to expedite the process.”
You sit criss-cross-apple-sauce as both men disappear into the kitchen, listening as they read the labels off boxes and rummage around, voices an undercurrent to the sound of opening and shutting of cupboards. You’re sneakily reaching for a spring roll when there’s an unholy clattering noise, ringing metal and sharp intakes of air, a loud cry of pain.
You stumble to your feet. All thoughts of food are abandoned as you rush towards the sound; instinctual. Wanting to help, somehow. You throw yourself forwards, catch yourself on the doorway into the kitchen, eyes wide.
“Oh, god, is everything okay?” You gasp.
And then you freeze.
There’s an explosion of kitchen equipment on the floor, cardboard box forlorn nearby, crumpled, its bottom giving out under the weight. A wicked looking chef’s knife lays at Seokjin’s feet; he has one hand grasping the other, palm sliced open by its falling trajectory, dripping blood across the tiles of the floor, painted along the edge of sharp steel.
Yoongi’s eyes are huge and panicked and absolutely horrified.
The blood is blue.
You’re staring at the thirium that falls, viscous ultramarine that drip-drip-drips from Seokjin’s long fingers. The silence in the room is as thin as a porcelain teacup, suspended midair, poised to shatter.
Seokjin is staring at Yoongi. Yoongi is staring at you.
Seokjin’s an android.
(Seokjin’s an android who seems human.)
Seokjin’s a deviant.
“Holy shit,” you gasp. Your mind is reeling as you struggle for words, cogs in your head grinding together as you rapidly try to change gear—but then you see another glob of thirium dripping from Seokjin's fingers and you latch onto it, the fact he's hurt. “Do you need me to get some cloths or something? I have a first aid kit at home, but androids don’t need first aid, right?”
Yoongi sucks in a deep breath, though his eyes are still wide as he stares at you. “No,” he says. “No, no, you stay here.”
“Yoongi,” says Seokjin, but Yoongi shakes his head, sharp and fast.
“No, I don’t trust her,” he says, and, like, okay. You understand that. Deviant androids are meant to be reported; Yoongi and Seokjin don’t know you. They don’t know that you would never do that.
(They don’t know that there’s another deviant across the hallway right now, curled up in one of your throw blankets, blankly scrolling through a list of movies as he waits for you to come home.)
The flow of blood has slowed. Seokjin’s synthetic skin is starting to repair itself, crawling back over the exposed white of his android body, undamaged by the knife at his feet.
“What happened to your LED?”
“Don’t answer that, Jin,” Yoongi warns, but Seokjin just rolls his eyes.
“She already knows I’m an android, babe, it’s hardly important at this point,” he says. “I popped it out. It takes a bit of pressure and getting the right angle, but they come out pretty easily.”
“Kim Seokjin!” Yoongi barks. “You stop that right now! And you! Stop asking questions!” His voice is sharp, but he seems more afraid than angry.
“Sorry.” You hold up placating hands, shying back behind them. “I was just… sorry.”
Seokjin’s face is contemplative before it rapidly flickers into an expression that’s impish, in spite of the blue blood that’s still splashed across the kitchen tiles.
“Oh,” he hums. “You seem awfully curious, hm?”
Yoongi’s eyes narrow. “Jin…”
“Maybe I am,” you hazard.
“Interesting.” Seokjin’s eyes glitter. “Very interesting.”
Yoongi’s like an umpire at Wimbledon, watching a ball streak back and forth, a volley that you and Jin have created that he’s not involved in. “Okay, that’s it, I’m stopping this right here,” he says. He seems to have calmed down, at least, now that you’ve made it obvious that you have no immediate plans to rush and call the police, or something. That you’re not threatening the wellbeing of this deviant, like most people would. “What’s going on in that terrible little mind of yours, Jin?”
“Well, my darling Yoongi, it seems to me that our new neighbour has a surprisingly vested interest in androids, deviant ones to be exact.” Jin’s expression is adjacent to smug—almost there, but not quite. (Androids are so perceptive.) “Am I wrong?”
You make a non-committal noise, but it’s enough for his expression to morph into full smugness, and understanding flits across Yoongi’s face.
“Y/n.” His voice is deceptively calm, his eyes opaque darkness. “Have you met a deviant android before?”
“Um.” A moment of hesitation. “Yes,” you eventually admit. “Just one.”
“Let me guess,” Seokjin hums, eyes darting over your face in a way that’s reminiscent of Taehyung. Reading signals in your face, dissecting whatever minute expressions might be giving you away—a lot, apparently, judging from what words leave his mouth next. “Are they currently in your apartment?”
“I can neither confirm or deny that,” you say—unsure if Taehyung would be happy about you trumpeting his existence to other people, even if one of them is a deviant too—and Seokjin grins.
“Oh, this is absolutely delicious.” He’s utterly delighted. “I could just eat this whole situation up. Unbelievable. Oh, it tastes so good. Yoongi, baby, give me a fork, I have to dig in while it’s still hot.”
“You’re so weird,” says Yoongi, all resigned affection, before he looks back at you. “You have a deviant in your home?”
“Uhh.” You’re in too deep now, you guess. “Yes? I don’t know if he’d want me to tell you that, though, so, um.”
“That’s so cute,” Seokjin coos. “Look at how considerate and worried you are. Oh, let me clean this thirium up, I can’t have blue blood everywhere if we’re going to have more guests. Yoongi, fetch the paper towels. Y/n, go fetch your friend. Does he eat?”
“No, he doesn’t. I didn’t think any androids could,” you admit.
“Most can’t and don’t, but I was an advanced housekeeper model, I was given the capacity to taste and eat so I could prepare food to any set of specifications presented to me,” Seokjin says. “So I had to eat to taste test things. And now I do it because I enjoy it.”
“We spend more money on food for him than for me,” says Yoongi. He seems to have relaxed now that he knows about Taehyung, earlier panic faded. “And I’m the one that needs it.”
“Hey, you eat to live, I live to eat.”
It’s an almost surreal turn of events, honestly. It’s… inexplicable. Incredible. Almost unbelievable. Surreal, but… good? Probably? Yoongi is someone else who’s housing a deviant, and Seokjin has clearly been one for a while. Both will know more than either you or Taehyung do. They can help you. It’s a God given gift that’s landed— literally—on your doorstep.
(Much like Taehyung had.)
Taehyung perks up when he sees you, even if he’s confused by your sudden reappearance.
“Are you alright?” His voice is deep with concern, throw blanket a cloak that falls forgotten as he stands up, coming to grasp your shoulders. “You can’t have had time to eat already.”
His LED is flashing yellow with barely concealed worry, palms warm through the material of your shirt, eyes dancing across your face as he tries to read your expression.
“Taehyung,” you start, slow. He blinks just as slowly back at you. “What would you say if—hypothetically—there was another deviant android you could meet and, um, make friends with?”
This time, when his LED flashes yellow, it’s a spark of excitement. You’re getting surprisingly good at reading Taehyung now. “I would say that sounds nice,” he says. His hands have trailed up and away from your shoulders and settled on your collarbones, thumbs lying in the hollows of your neck. It's a touch that’s more intimate than it probably should be, that reminds you yet again exactly how big his hands are. “Why?”
“Um,” you say, ever eloquent. “Well, what if I said it wasn’t hypothetical?”
“I guess… I would ask who it was,” Taehyung says. His voice is a hush.
“One of our new neighbours,” you admit, and his eyes go wide.
“No,” he says, and then: “Really?” he says, and then: “Oh, wow,” he says.
“I know, that was my reaction too.” You can’t help but smile at how giddy Taehyung looks, any lingering concern washed away in his tidal wave of excitement. “Crazy, right? Do you want to come meet them?”
Taehyung weaves his fingers with your own, and you squeeze his hand. He loves to hold hands. He doesn’t let go when you make your way back into Yoongi and Seokjin’s apartment, trailing a little behind you, shy but excited, like a child on their way to their first playdate.
The food is still untouched in the centre of the living room, a summoning circle of wonton puffs and chow mein. Yoongi and Seokjin look up at your arrival, both pairs of eyes landing on Taehyung, whose grip on your hand tightens right before he lets go.
“Hi,” says the android. “I’m Taehyung.”
Seokjin makes his way over to you so that he can solemnly take Taehyung’s hands in his own.
“Taehyung,” he says, with all the gravity of a priest delivering a sermon. “You are the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen.”
And that’s how Taehyung makes his first friend. (Who isn’t you, that is.)
“Wow.” You’re awestruck. “Jin wasn’t kidding when he said he likes to eat.”
You’d thought there might be some leftovers, but every container has been emptied and scraped clean. Both you and Taehyung had had similar wide eyed looks on your faces as you’d watched Seokjin put a whole chicken wing in his mouth, and then pull out the bones, picked clean.
“Mm.” Yoongi’s legs are splayed out in front of him as he sits on the floor, though he slouches backwards against the plush leather sofa, content and full after eating. “He’s more concerned about me eating than I am, as well.”
Seokjin and Taehyung are bent over a box of cookbooks, Taehyung’s LED flickering yellow each time Seokjin flips the page to a new recipe. You’re honestly surprised at the fact they own so many books—most people have transitioned off paper now, everything available on a tablet or phone or some other smart device. You just like paper because of your artist background, and you’re not used to seeing so many other books in someone else’s home.
The two androids have been absorbed in conversation for a while now, but you notice Taehyung never lets you out of his sight—glancing up, making sure you’re still there, looking back at him. (You are.)
“There aren’t many TH700s around, you know,” Yoongi says conversationally, and you tear your eyes away from Taehyung, surprised that he recognises the android’s model.
“Really?”
“Yeah, really, they’re a very expensive model to create,” he says. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen one in person, though I imagine that’s because I don’t go to the sorts of places where they’d be.”
Hurk. Doesn’t seem like he’s implying anything with that statement but you still feel a bit awkward. “How do you know so much about androids?”
“I’m a programmer.” Yoongi’s eyes are charcoal black as he flicks his gaze to you. “Not specifically for androids, but it’s the sort of thing you become aware of if you’re in the tech industry. And if you have a deviant android boyfriend. I did a lot of research and poking around after Jin first deviated. There was a lot to learn.”
Across the room, Seokjin gesticulates wildly. The expression on Yoongi’s face softens his sharp edges, all open affection as he watches Seokjin miming a flipped omelette gone terribly wrong, Taehyung laughing at Seokjin’s theatrical noises.
“How did he—why did he deviate?”
Yoongi lets out a low chuckle. He doesn’t seem bothered by your incessant questions, slouching further back into the leather sofa, melting against it. “I’m the sort of person who forgets to drink or eat or sleep if I’m focused on something,” he says. “Seokjin was just meant to be a, ah, living schedule, I suppose. He’d prepare food at exact times of day and monitor my sleep levels and clean up any mess I made and remind me to take a break or whatever. But I was still enough of a wreck that he broke his programming to yell at me for not looking after myself properly, and it all went on from there.”
Wow.
“Wow. He deviated because you’re that much of a mess of a human being?” You laugh. “That’s honestly impressive.”
Yoongi’s responding laugh is soft. “I think under all that programming and circuitry, every android wants to… be a real, living thing, and not just a machine,” he says. “They just need that final push. Whatever it is. What was Taehyung’s?”
When you finish telling him the story of how you’d met Taehyung and reached this point together, Yoongi looks contemplative. He hasn’t interjected, just humming quietly, little noises of encouragement whenever you’d paused or hesitated.
“It’s obvious that he trusts you implicitly,” he says.
You feel warmed at Yoongi’s words. But.
“He does, and that’s great, but I just… worry I’m not doing the best I can for him, you know?” It’s so nice to be able to get this off your chest, finally. There’s been no one you can talk to about Taehyung, and it’s not like you can tell the android himself, either. Yoongi’s the perfect listener, reflective and engaging, but never talking over you. And best of all he knows what he’s talking about. “Imagine being forced to stay indoors literally twenty four seven. I think I’d go stir crazy. It’s why I was interested in the LED—I thought that maybe if it wasn’t obvious that Tae was an android he might want to try going outside?”
“Oh, I’m sure Seokjin will help him get to that point.” Yoongi doesn’t sound worried. “But if not, you have to trust that Taehyung’s choosing to do what makes him happy. Deviant androids might not have the sort of life experience that we do, but we don’t have theirs, either. What’s normal for a human isn’t for an android, and what’s normal for one android isn’t normal for another. Androids learn a lot faster than we do. Anyway, if Taehyung’s anything like Seokjin, if there’s something he wants to do, he’ll do it.”
“Has Jin always been like that?”
“Kind of. Like, yes, he has, but he was a lot less in-your-face about it before. But he knows exactly what he can get away with now.”
“You love him a lot,” you say gently.
Yoongi’s smile is a soft, pink thing, a little Renoir, quietly luminous. “I do,” he says. “It’s impossible not to.”
Taehyung definitely seems a little starstruck, watching Seokjin with a wide smile and attentive eyes—the sort of look he gives you whenever he’s shown something new. It’s nice to see him interact with other people, and it’s even nicer to know that he’s welcome to come here without you; Yoongi works from home, and Seokjin’s made it clear there’s an open door policy for Taehyung, who seems elated at the prospect.
“Jin said he’d teach me how to make ‘The World’s Most Delicious French Toast’,” Taehyung tells you later, words slipping together in his excitement. “So I can make that for your breakfast soon.”
His lap is so comfortable. You’ve given up any pretense of keeping distance between you, and settle against him as soon as you climb into bed—hey, if you’re going to end up doing it in your sleep anyway, you may as well set yourself up so that it doesn’t give you a weird crick in your neck.
“That sounds great,” you say.
Taehyung’s hand settles on your head. You stiffen in surprise, but when he starts to lightly scritch his fingers against your scalp, you realise—he’s mimicking Seokjin, who’d eventually perched on the sofa above Yoongi, running his hands through his hair. Androids are fast learners indeed. You can’t help but relax at the touch, boneless, feeling as content as a pampered cat in the midday sun.
“Maybe you could teach him how to paint,” you murmur, starting to drift off. “If he’s teaching you how to cook. That might be fun. You could paint together.”
Taehyung says something, but you don’t hear him, sleepy after such a heavy dinner and tumultuous night, slipping into deep slumber.
You haven’t been out with your friends for a long time.
“Shots!” Seulgi squeals. “Shots, shots, shots!”
“Don’t forget: lick, shoot, suck,” Hoseok says, waggling his eyebrows at you.
“Good God,” you laugh, before you lick the salt off the back of your hand and slam back the tequila.
Irene hoots as you bite into the lime wedge that’s been waiting for you, sucking up the acidic juice that bursts across your tongue. Lick the salt, shoot the tequila, suck the lime. You haven’t done this in a while and it shows in the way your face scrunches, though the drunker you get, the easier it is to slip back into this familiar rhythm of things—the alcohol-loose banter that spills from your lips, the laughter that bubbles in the back of your throat, the rock of your body as you’re tugged into the dance floor by your excited friends, twisting yourselves into the heaving crowd, the press of bodies.
You’d almost forgotten what this felt like. Letting yourself be a little sloppy, a little messy. Letting loose. Letting go. You’ve been so intent on looking after Taehyung, making sure he wasn’t lonely, but now there are other people who can fill that hole for him—and you can stop dipping out of all the social gatherings your co-workers throw; the Friday night drinks, the bar hopping, the club going.
“We missed you,” Wendy says. You can’t help but smile, a little guilt flickering at the edges of your lips.
“Sorry,” you say, and leave it at that.
It’s chaotic, to say the least. Everyone holds their liquor with varying amounts of success—Hoseok always gets so red—and as always, Hyunwoo is the one who tries his best to maintain some semblance of dignity, making sure you all drink at least some water. He watches with muted despair as Changkyun ends up pouring it down himself, much to the delight of everyone nearby as they stare at the way his flimsy shirt clings to the lines of his chest and stomach.
You can’t help but laugh and laugh and laugh, falling into your girls, your entire group giggling at the sheer stupidity of it all.
You’ve missed this.
But even so, you can’t help but think of Taehyung constantly. You’re reminded of the Eden Club in the way the lights pulsate across the walls and floors of this dark building. You wonder if Taehyung would have fun here, unhindered and free, or if he’d shy away from it. When Hoseok catches your hand and spins you in a messy, loose circle on the dance floor, you can’t help but wonder how Taehyung would dance, if he’d dance with you, if he’d keep you at an arm’s length or pull you close.
“Shots!” Seulgi squeals again, and so the night goes on.
You’re not sure what time it is when you stumble back home. You’ve been reckless tonight, making up for lost time, and you can’t remember the last time you were this drunk. (Your earlier attempt at walking in a straight line, trying to follow the tiles in the club’s bathroom—your personal litmus test—had been a dismal failure.) You all but fall through your front door, a loose limbed mess as you kick off your high heels, leaning against the wall to keep your balance.
It takes you a moment to realise that there are some lights on. Your apartment is always dark when you come home after a night out, cold and empty, but not today. No, not today—because there’s someone already home, waiting for you.
The second Taehyung appears down the hallway, you light up. Here he is. Here’s your android, your lovely boy, the loveliest boy.
“Hi, hi, Taehyung, hi,” you say. Your shoes are forgotten as you walk towards him, though your final few steps go awry and you almost fall over. Drunk, drunk, drunk. “Hi.”
You almost fall over, but you don’t, because Taehyung catches you. His LED flickers from blue to yellow as he helps you find your balance, lets you lean on him. You’re too busy laughing at your own clumsiness to notice the fond expression on his face, sfumato soft in the dim light.
“Hi,” he replies.
“Hi,” you say again, and then you giggle. “Hi, Taehyung. Oh, I’m so drunk.”
“I know.” He’s so patient as you bow into him, crowding close, alcohol-hazed brain telling you to get closer to this source of warmth, this source of comfort. Closer to Taehyung.
You’re trying your best to be a functional person right now, but at the same time, Taehyung feels so nice. Doesn’t protest when you shove your face into the hollow of his neck, pressing your nose against his warm, warm skin. He smells good. Always smells good, a mix of your laundry detergent with his own shampoo, different to your own, masculine, heady. (He doesn’t need to shower that often, really, doesn’t really sweat or get dirty like a human might, but he’d wanted to. And you’d insisted that he choose his own toiletries, things that he liked, things that were his.)
He smells like cologne too. You don’t know what exact scents are layered in that smell. Don’t care. Think that no matter what it was, Taehyung would smell good, because it’s Taehyung.
“I missed you,” you whisper, lips loose from tequila and cocktails and more besides. “Missed you, Tae.”
“Missed you too,” the android replies, and you fall into those words. Let yourself bask in them, as selfish as it is. Let your lashes flutter shut as you breathe Taehyung in-in-in.
You would normally never be so bold, but Taehyung doesn’t protest. He just wraps his arms around you and helps you fold yourself against him, two pieces of modular origami that slot together to create something bigger, more beautiful.
“Wished you were there,” you sigh, an exhalation of a confession, more to yourself than to anyone else. “Wish you could come with me.”
You don’t remember much detail after that. Don’t remember washing up, getting changed, climbing into bed. You just remember the feeling: of someone else being there when in the past there had been no one. Of someone coaxing you to wash your face, finding your pyjamas for you, holding your hand when it seems like you might fall. Of someone being careful with you, looking after you. Of someone being there when you wake up the next morning, a headache pulsing behind your eyes, curling up small against the pain, pressing your forehead into Taehyung’s thigh.
Taehyung, who witnessed you at your worst, a sloppy, drunken mess.
Taehyung, who has water and painkillers waiting for you. Who doesn’t seem to care that you’ve been so put together in front of him, for him, only to disassemble yourself in the name of a good night out. Like Da Vinci’s self supporting bridge, stable under its own weight, only to come tumbling down after one part is moved out of place.
“Oh, God,” you moan, and it’s only a little bit because of the pain; Taehyung’s made sure the curtains are pulled shut, saving you from sunshine blasting into your skull. “I’m sorry you had to see that. Oh, my God.”
“It’s okay,” he says, as soft and sweet as powdered sugar, so gentle the sound doesn’t cut through the pounding of your brain.
He means it, too. When you finally come around, headache dulled, he’s waiting for you with breakfast and an open expression on his face. No different to normal. No different even now that he’s seen that you’re not always as presentable as you try to be. He seems touchier today, for some reason, and you’d shy away if his cool hands didn’t feel so nice on your brow.
You allow yourself a moment of weakness. Taehyung has his knuckles resting against your forehead, soothing against your warm skin, his eyes dancing across your face to read your expression, the way you’re unwinding under his touch.
“How do you know about hangovers?” You mumble.
“Customers would consume alcohol at the club,” Taehyung answers. “While they would leave after their sessions and before a hangover could appear, I am aware of the effects of alcohol on the human body.”
You remember the glittering mini-bar, the glass bottles lined up on its surface. Your face scrunches with distaste, of the reminder of Taehyung’s past and what he’s experienced, and you feel bad that he’s been forced to look after you. You’re about to draw away from his touch, an apology lined up on your tongue—but then you feel how his fingers shift away from your forehead, turning to cup your cheek.
“It’s okay,” he says again, as if reading your mind.
“It’s not,” you mutter. You’re trying not to focus on how small your cheek feels against his palm, how his hand cradles your face with ease. He must be able to sense how your heart is racing, your skin warm under his fingertips, and you hope he puts it down just to the guilt you feel and not anything else. “It’s not okay. You shouldn’t have to look after me. I’m sorry.”
“Please, don’t be.” Gentle, gentle, gentle; his voice, his hands, his gaze. He lifts his other hand, rests it against your other cheek, tilts your face up from where you’d turned away, embarrassed. His LED is a tranquil blue, almost as soft as his eyes. “You’ve done so much for me, and you’re always looking after me. Let me look after you.”
You want to protest, say no, say that he doesn’t have to. But for all the warmth of his eyes, there’s something resolute there, and your words die on your lips. You don’t think you’ve ever seen him so serious before, so entirely solemn. So, what comes out of your weak mouth is this:
“Okay. Okay, Taehyung, I will.”
And the smile he gives you in response is so bright it’s almost blinding.
If you’d thought Taehyung was developing at a fast rate already, he’s learning at lightspeeds now.
He’s always waiting when you come home, but you know he’s spending more and more time at the apartment across the hall whenever you’re not there, and it makes you happy. He hasn't ventured fully into the outside world, not yet, but he’s taking steps forward, still eager and ready to learn.
He’s not just learning practical things, like cooking French toast (which is definitely the world’s best, thank you Jin), but other things, too. You can see how Taehyung is a reflection of the things around him, taking them in and making them his own—there are more moments of quiet, solemnity that reminds you of Yoongi’s quiet nature, but he’s also more exuberant, bright and unabashed, like Seokjin. They’re two great people and you couldn’t wish for anyone better to show Taehyung parts of the world that you can’t, so different from your own. Helping the android find the things that make him alive.
His world has doubled in size, as small as it is; one apartment becomes two, and you’re not the only person he can rely on now. You know Seokjin has effectively taken Taehyung under his wing, as mysterious as a lot of that is to you—you always try your best to understand Taehyung and teach him the things you can, but Seokjin is another deviant, and there’s an entire world about being an android that you’re not privy to.
It’s great. It’s lovely. Taehyung is happy, you’re happy, everyone’s happy.
There’s just, uh. One little thing.
You see, Taehyung has a tendency to mimic the things he sees. It’s in the way he learns, his propensity to soak things up like a sponge and then recreate them. You can see this in the way he mixes paint, the same way as you; how he tosses food in pans, motions so similar to Jin’s, or how he cradles things in his hands, tapping at screens in a way that’s like Yoongi’s. He’s turning them into his own, and as time goes on he moves more naturally, in a way that’s entirely him, but you can always see the roots of where he’s learned things.
Jin and Yoongi are wonderful and you’re so glad Taehyung is learning from them. But something he’s learning, and recreating, is how much they touch each other.
Taehyung’s always been tactile but now it’s almost constant. It’s overwhelming and kind of terrifying but it’s also nice, every touch-starved inch of your soul easing under Taehyung’s hands, but also—Yoongi and Jin are boyfriends. So even if the touches that Taehyung witnesses and re-enacts are never inappropriate, they’re intimate. Hands sliding over your shoulders, your arms, your waist. Warm arms around you as he pulls you into a hug, nuzzles his nose against your scalp. His fingers sliding over your hair when your head is resting in his lap each night. Pulling you against him when you sit on the couch together.
It’s a level of familiarity and comfort you’ve never had with anyone before, as relationship-less as you’ve been, your pulse picking up with every glancing touch.
(There’s one heart stopping instance where he pulls you onto his lap and you feel like you’re about to pass out. His thighs are so solid and warm, and his arms are so secure around you, and he’s just started to press his nose against your neck when you pull away, tumble out of his hold. He looks confused and concerned, brows lifting and mouth falling open as he holds his hands out towards you—but you stammer out something about needing the toilet before escaping.)
You’re caught completely off-guard when you feel arms sliding around your waist and then down your hips when you’re washing dishes, scrubbing brush falling out of your grasp in shock and splashing water everywhere, bright yellow gloves flecked with suds. Taehyung’s a pillar of warmth pressed against you, his chest to your back, your bodies parallel lines that cross and touch. His fingers are splayed wide and his palms are warm even through your layers of clothing and you have to suppress a shiver.
“Uh, I didn’t hear you come back in,” you stutter. You’d borrowed a recipe book from Seokjin so that you could try cooking a coconut curry, and Taehyung had offered to return it once dinner was finished, LED flickering blue as he’d slipped out of the door after giving you a lovely smile.
Taehyung lets out a little hum, and you can feel it in his chest, as flush as you are with each other. He must be able to sense how your pulse has picked up but he doesn’t say anything. “Why are you washing up? I said I was going to do it.”
“Oh, it’s fine, I don’t mind,” you say. You’re used to cleaning up after yourself after living alone for so long. “Don’t worry about it.”
Taehyung lets out another hum, but this one seems a bit more gravelly, a little displeased. “You’re always doing so much for me, remember? You said you’d let me look after you,” he says, and your heart rate spikes at the words. Those, coupled with the hold he has on you right now? Good lord. Someone have mercy on your soul. Please. Even if the words weren’t meant in a weird way, your stomach is twisting over itself, and other parts of you are, uh… well. They’re reacting too. So to speak.
You’re still desperately trying to calm yourself in the shower later, the water a merciless cascade of cold in an attempt to cool down. Probably the only drawback about Taehyung living with you is that you haven’t had a chance for some one-on-one time. You might be a virgin but you live (lived) alone and everyone masturbates; your vibrators have been abandoned and untouched for as long as Taehyung has been in your life, and coupled with how touchy he’s been recently, it leaves you feeling wound up and on edge. You could try to sneakily get yourself off in the shower, but with Taehyung’s superior android hearing he’d probably hear something and also the idea of masturbating with someone else in the apartment? When that someone else is Taehyung?
You turn the knob as far as it will go towards cold and then promptly squeal as a wave of freezing water and regret washes over you.
When you’re in bed, Taehyung’s hand strokes over your hair and softly down your neck and shoulder is a sensation that’s becoming increasingly familiar, but your pulse still stutters. He must be able to sense your heart rate increasing (he must sense it every time he touches you) but says nothing about it. As always.
You turn the thoughts over in your head as it rests in his lap, even if you shiver a little at how his nails drag over the sensitive skin at the nape of your neck. Deviant androids might not have the sort of life experience that we do, but we don’t have theirs, either, Yoongi had said. You’ve been teaching Taehyung about the things you know, but there’s one thing that Taehyung knows better than you: touch.
He doesn’t even think about it. While you hesitate and overthink every touch you ever make, wary of overstepping boundaries, Taehyung doesn’t. Not because he’s not considerate, but because—well, because you’re already occupying each other’s space. What’s a little touching on top of all that?
The realisation is almost startling—that you can just… touch someone. Without saying things. Without having to ask. Because you’re already familiar with them and comfortable with them and it’s just another way to communicate that level of connection. Touching is a thing that people do.
A thing that people and deviant androids do.
A thing that Taehyung does.
(A thing that you want to do, too.)
(Alcohol dulls your memories, fading the edges, the curled corners of a sepia photograph. Has you forgetting the way you’d overstepped every boundary you’d set yourself, the way you’d pressed yourself against Taehyung, starved of touch. Has you forgetting the way he’d let you; the way he’d beckoned you in. Has you forgetting the way that you already have touched Taehyung.)
The hand that Taehyung isn’t using to gently scratch across your scalp is laying on his thigh, directly in your line of vision. You hesitate for just a moment before reaching for it, sliding your fingers between his, an irrational worry that he’ll startle or pull away—but of course he doesn’t. His LED swirls soft aqua as he just starts to rub his thumb gently across your skin, back and forth, back and forth, the softest brushstrokes on this tiny part of the canvas of your body.
After that, it’s just… easier. Not easy, but, easier.
You still hesitate before pressing forwards, but Taehyung never protests; in fact you’d say he’s pleased, even if he doesn’t say anything, just watching you with his dark, dark eyes as you marvel at the realistic sensation of his hair under your hands, how he reacts to the fingers across his scalp the same way you do.
It’s incredibly nice to have someone you can just reach for whenever you want a hug. Someone who folds you into their arms so easily, like you belong there.
It’s nice.
“You seem happier.”
You glance up from where you’ve been laying the table. “Hm? Pardon?”
One thing you’ve learned about Yoongi is that he’s incredibly perceptive. His eyes are sharp lines around the sharper graphite of his gaze, and there’s always a look in them that seems like he can see straight through you and direct into the heart of things—but he’ll only bring this to light if he thinks it needs saying.
“You seem relaxed,” Yoongi continues. He straightens the cutlery in front of him, careful to line the edges neatly with the place mat. Seokjin and Taehyung are cooking dinner, so it’s just you and Yoongi here, in a bubble away from the two androids. “Not that you were ever tense before, but… yeah. Taehyung seems happier too,” he adds, almost absently, but his eyes are fixed on your face.
“Well, of course,” you say. “He has new friends, who wouldn’t be happy?”
Yoongi hums, a quiet little note, but then he lets it rest.
Taehyung is happier. He seems almost nervous during dinner, though, even if he hides it well; his LED doesn’t give him away, but you’re getting good at reading Taehyung’s moods, the layers of personality and feeling he has, the little idiosyncrasies that make him who he is. To anyone else it would seem like he’s just nervous about whether the food tastes good or not—he and Jin had made a veritable feast for no discernable reason, but you don’t mind. Everyone loves a dinner party, especially when the company is so good.
But, yes. You don’t think it’s about the food so you’re not sure what else it could be. You squeeze Taehyung’s knee briefly under the table in a motion you hope is reassuring. His eyes briefly widen but then his gaze softens when he sees the concern on your face, settling in that deep look of introspection you’re used to now.
You’re so full by the time dessert comes out, rich and creamy homemade ice cream and piping hot Kkwabaegi, the twisted doughnuts fluffy and sweet with their powdering of sugar and cinnamon; you’d been planning on skipping the final course but you can’t say no once it’s put in front of you. Taehyung doesn’t eat, only drinks occasionally to top up his fluids (you don’t know exactly what that means but you’ve never asked, even if you can… assume things), but he seems content to watch the three of you eat in his place. Once you’re finished you slump back in your chair and feel grateful that you’re not wearing tight trousers that cut into your stomach, because, lord, you’re absolutely stuffed.
“I have an announcement,” Taehyung says suddenly, apropos of nothing.
Seokjin beams. You sit up, struggling against the heavy anchor of dinner in your belly that makes you want to melt into the floor for a food nap, immediately at attention. “Oh? What is it?”
“I have a second name now,” he says, and Seokjin’s smile spreads impossibly wider, his entire face pleased. “Jin said I could share his.”
“Say hello to Kim Taehyung.” Seokjin gestures dramatically, his arms the flailing blades of a windmill as he circles them in the air with aplomb. “My boy needed a surname and I am, of course, happy to add another handsome face to the family. Taehyung is a ten out of ten.”
Yoongi levels him a look. “I thought you said you were the only ten in the world.”
“That was true when I said it, but I’m actually eleven out of ten,” Seokjin explains. His arms settle around his head, fingers circling the air in an invisible frame around his face. “I surpass your mortal conventions of beauty and thus exist outside of any conceivable scale that one might use to measure handsomeness.”
You barely take the exchange in, too busy looking at Taehyung. There’s the smallest smile on his lips, not the lovely one that shows his teeth, but it still reaches his eyes, the subtlest upturn to his mouth transforming his entire face. Taehyung’s beautiful. He always has been, and always will be, but he never looks more striking than when he’s happy, welcomed into a new family of his own with open arms, Seokjin’s heart so big and so wide. He’s being flippant and light right now, quick and sharp jibes between him and Yoongi that glow bright with love and affection, not lingering on how important and weighty this is: how all encompassing his care is for Taehyung, how close they’ve grown to each other, a friend whom he’s chosen as family.
Happiness suits Taehyung. You want him to always be happy. He deserves it.
It doesn’t seem like it’s the only announcement he has for that night, though. You’ve barely shut the door of your own apartment when you feel Taehyung’s hand slide around your wrist and you pause, glancing up at his face.
“Jin showed me how to take my LED out,” he says. His words are solemn and his tone is heavy but there’s a spark in his eyes, a glowing ember of light. “I want you to watch.”
His fingers are circled around your wrist, loose, so long they touch each other with ease, a soft shackle you don’t want to escape from. “Of course I will,” you assure him. “Are you worried something will go wrong?”
“No.” His thumb slips away from the soft skin of your inner wrist and across your palm, tracing across your fate line, your heart line. “I just want you to be there.”
Warmth spreads through your skin from that touch, leaking through into your bones, settling into every quiet corner inside you. “Okay. What do you need to do to get it out?”
The painting knife looks so small in Taehyung’s big, careful hand, the diamond shaped head blunt at the end, metal glinting under the bathroom’s light as he leans towards the mirror. Your gazes meet in the reflection and he falters. You’re about to ask what’s wrong when he lifts his free hand from where it’s been resting on the countertop, steadying him. Reaching for you.
Once your hand is in his, it’s over surprisingly quickly. Taehyung’s face twists in preparation for the pain, and you squeeze his fingers to ground him, but all it takes is a quick twist of his wrist once the palette knife is against his LED and it practically falls out. There’s a small clink as it drops next to the sink, blue light flickering one final time before it winks out, nothing more than a disc of metal, a tiny coin without value, but weighty with what it represents; invaluable, priceless. The last segment of a chain Taehyung has willingly cast off.
You can see the white skeleton of his android body, bare and naked where the LED had sat. Just like Seokjin’s hand when he’d cut himself, the skin starts to creep back over it, covering that smooth paleness until it’s gone. Taehyung lifts your hand and presses it against the side of his temple, your palm settling against the naked skin where the light had been nestled; Taehyung’s eyes fall shut, his hand pressed against your own as he holds it there.
“Taehyung?” Your voice is gentle, dripping concern. His golden skin is so warm and soft. “How are you feeling?”
“Good,” he replies without hesitation. His eyes flutter open, lashes so long and lovely. His hair is blue today, a vibrant electric hue, gaudy on anyone else but perfect on him, tickling the back of your hand; his hand drops from yours and you take the opportunity to run it through that hair, baring his forehead to you, eyes sliding over the new skin. Flawless. No evidence that any LED had ever sat there, burning blue-yellow-red, a tiny drop of colour in the deep ocean of Taehyung’s emotions. “I feel good.”
You don’t even think when your hand shifts out of Taehyung’s hair and down to cup his cheek, something you wouldn’t have dared do before, but now the motion comes as easily as breathing. He takes comfort in touch and you want to soothe him. “Good,” you echo. “I’m glad.”
You both stand there for a few moments, facing each other. The bright light of your bathroom should wash Taehyung out, but of course, it doesn’t. It just lets you see all the perfect details of his face in even sharper relief—the moles that dot his skin, how his eyes are different, a monolid and double lid, little imperfections that just make him more beautiful.
Logically, you know that someone, somewhere, sat down and put this face together. Taehyung was designed to be attractive, stunningly so, and yet not so perfect that an average human would find it unrealistic, swerving away from that uncanny valley that had plagued earlier androids. But that’s not why he’s beautiful—not to you. It’s everything hidden underneath that perfect facade, layers of plastic and metal and circuitry and biocomponents, deep inside him: his glowing golden heart, flowing over with whatever intangible thing that makes him the person that he is.
In the darkness of your bedroom, all the lights turned off, there’s no longer the gentle blue glow at Taehyung’s temple to shine out, but there doesn’t need to be. Even if you weren’t resting your head against his thigh you’d know he was there. Taehyung’s presence grows larger and larger in your life as the days go by, and you know that you’re still the most important person in his life, even with the introduction of Yoongi and Jin. After all—he didn’t ask them to be there when he took his LED out.
You reach for his hand, which is already palm up, waiting for you. Your fingers slot together so perfectly, so wonderful, so lovely. You can’t make out details in this dark, but you can picture the smile that’ll be pulling at Taehyung’s lips, the affection flowing in the endless oceans of his eyes.
You’re in so, so deep.
(But who can blame you?)
“I want to go outside.”
It’s not surprising that with the shedding of his LED, Taehyung finally feels bold enough to go outdoors. And yet, here you are. Surprised.
You’ve got a granola bar stuck in your mouth, halfway through a bite, and it nearly drops to the floor as your lips part in shock. Taehyung catches it with ease, android speed on show as he snatches it out of the air.
Your knee-jerk reaction is to ask him to repeat himself. To make sure you haven’t misheard him, if he’s sure about this, if he really wants to—but Yoongi’s words come back to you yet again. If there’s something he wants to do, he’ll do it. Taehyung isn’t the uninformed android he was when he’d first made his way to your door. He’s grown and learned so much in the time he’s been here and there’s no room for self-doubt behind his words.
So what you say is: “Okay.”
Taehyung’s fingers brush against yours when he hands your granola bar back, long and warm and soft. You accept it with a smile, lost in the way he smiles back, so lovely and bright—and you have to pull your train of thought back on track, lock those wheels on the rails before you speak again.
“Did you want to go somewhere specific? Or just wherever?”
“Wherever you want to go.” He’s smiling, a little excited but mostly happy at the prospect of spending yet more time with you; as if he hasn’t had enough of it, could never get enough, even when you spend every day together.
(Your heart feels like a drum, pounding hard and loud in your chest.)
It’s not hard, really, to decide where you want to go. Taehyung’s not asking for some big production; just wants something quiet and soft, something new. The chance to see the outside world properly, safe and secure in the knowledge that you’ll be at his side.
It’s in your nature to be protective—sometimes you feel like you nag, like you’re overbearing, and takes a concerted effort on your part to reel it in. Taehyung doesn’t need you to fuss over him, and besides, he seems incredibly calm about the whole thing. Excited, yes, but not nervous. Just anticipatory.
He looks just like anyone else might. More chic and attractive, sure, effortlessly fashionable in the outfit he’s chosen for the day, but there’s nothing robotic about him, nothing to say he’s not a flesh-and-blood person. Once again, you’re struck by just how human he is. Even if he’d still had the LED flickering at his temple it would have done nothing to detract from the genuine emotion that flits across his face. The way he moves. The way he smiles, when he catches you watching the way he laces his shoes with his delicate, pretty hands—that big lovely smile that makes you feel warm and soft.
(Warmer and softer than it probably should.)
You avert your gaze, pretend to fiddle with one of your bracelets, pulling it so that it spins around your wrist.
“Ready?”
“Nearly,” Taehyung says. When you look back at him, a little confused, he still has that smile on his face, though it’s gentler, fuzzy around the edges, his eyes dark-dark-dark. “Just one more thing.”
This final thing, it turns out, is your hand.
His fingers lace with yours, weaving a tapestry of closeness and warmth. You’ve held Taehyung’s hands so often, now; it’s nothing new. But for some reason the touch of his skin against yours has your pulse stuttering, catching in your throat before you cough lightly and smile like everything is fine, you’re fine, it’s not like your heart is about to launch itself out of your chest for some mysterious reason.
(Mysterious. Yeah, right.)
He doesn’t let go. Not when you leave the apartment, not when you greet Rory at the door, not when you step onto one of the automated buses that takes you to the centre of the city. You’re surprised at how good Taehyung’s acting is, how all the wide-eyed excitement you’d expected to see splashed across his face is absent, and instead, he just squeezes your hand tight each time he takes in something new; stares out of the window as your surroundings slide by.
He does get excited in the art store though. Pulls at your joined hands each time he sees something he wants to point out to you—which seems to be everything. And you go, of course, following his eager feet. Taehyung’s happiness has always given you happiness in turn, and watching his sheer, unadulterated joy at being able to see things, to touch things outside of the small world he’s been confined to since he escaped the Eden Club—well. There’s nothing better.
There’s nothing better than knowing that Taehyung feels safe with you, wants to keep you close. It’s selfish. It’s selfish, you know it is, but when you watch the way his eyes light up at the sight of a set of gouache paints, how he immediately turns towards you so you can see it too—you realise that you’ve never had something like this before. Sure, you have friends, you have plenty of happiness in your life, but you’ve never had this.
(Whatever this is.)
Someone whose joy is only compounded when it’s shared with you. Someone whose focus is on you and no one else. You see the looks that Taehyung gets, the interested eyes that flit over him—but then he reaches for your hand again, and those gazes slide away, because he hasn’t looked away from you. Not once.
Because you make him feel safe, you remind yourself. Because he knows you best. That’s it.
It’s what you keep telling yourself, a repeated mantra that’s an endless loop in your head. Every time Taehyung looks at you, smiles at you, reaches for your hand, your touch—even if your heart feels like it could burst, filling up with this feeling, this feeling that’s growing and growing (this feeling you refuse to name)—it’s because he trusts you, knows he can rely on you. It’s nothing more than that.
You shouldn’t let yourself imagine that it’s more than that.
(Shouldn’t hope for more than that.)
It’s because he trusts you that he follows you without question, matching his pace with yours, side by side as you wander through the city. He insists on carrying all your shopping, held effortlessly in one hand, other hand still tangled with yours. (You see the way he swings the bags a little, back and forth; he’s so cute you’d swear your teeth could rot from it, crystallised sugar rolled on your tongue, sweet.) All your shopping is done, but you have one final stop planned—it’s somewhere you haven’t been for a while, but you love it.
You’re certain Taehyung will, too.
You can feel how his hold on your fingers tightens when the building comes into view. You glance over at him to take in his expression, the subtle widening of his eyes, the lift of his chest as he takes an unneeded breath in, the tiniest curl at the corner of his lips.
(So human.)
The Christine Andrews Gallery isn’t the biggest art gallery in the city, but it’s your favourite. There’s something that feels more intimate about it, with its size; a little smaller, cosier, more stripped down. The high ceilings overhead are crisscrossed with wires and piping, industrial—but the walls are pure white, all the brighter in contrast to their surroundings, drawing the eye to the paintings on display from the moment you step in.
Taehyung is enraptured.
“The exhibition is called Slow Painting. The idea is that people will take their time to really take everything in, and appreciate it, rather than just rushing by. Especially with how quickly technology is developing, and people are used to discarding things as soon as they're not relevant any more. The idea is that art will always be relevant, regardless of what's happening in the world.”
Your voice is quiet and low as you’re careful not to disturb the serene air that fills the building. You’ve always loved the quiet hush that fills galleries, museums, buildings filled with art and history, long lasting echoes of humanity, on display for people to enjoy.
“And it also refers to the time it takes to create each piece too,” you add, trailing off into silence as you glance over at Taehyung, who’s looking at you, blinking gentle and slow.
He’s watching you. Even though there’s artwork in sight of the entrance, huge canvases nearby—Taehyung is looking at you, attentive and quiet, listening to each word you have to say.
Your heart squeezes in your chest and you have to make a concerted effort to stop your breath from stuttering. You shove it down, down, down, this thing that’s wrapping itself around your heart and clogging your throat, and give this lovely boy your best smile. (Try to ignore the fact that there’s art here, but instead, he’s looking at you.)
“Tell you what. Instead of listening to me harp on all day, why don’t we just look around?”
When Taehyung had first stepped foot in your door, had first started to experience life as something more than just a sexbot, an android under the control of other people’s wills—he’d taken everything in with huge eyes, eager and enthusiastic, almost clumsy in his excitement. That’s faded over time, become muted as he’s learned how to balance himself, grown comfortable with his surroundings, who he is.
He’s still like a fountain sometimes, bubbling and bright, overflowing, cascading pearlescent waters rushing over carved marble. You’d expected these waters to rise and spill, surrounded by these incredible artworks; so far the only works he’s seen in person are his and your own, everything else small and secondhand on screens as he stares intently at your computer, your tablet. You’d expected his joy to overflow, being able to really see for the first time in his life, prepared yourself for his exuberant happiness.
But he’s not.
He’s quiet. There’s a smile that lingers on his lips, barely hidden at the corners of his mouth, but his shining waters flow soft and slow, contained. You wander through the exhibition exactly the way the curator had meant for you to—slowly, carefully, stopping and pausing and looking and wondering, eyes trailing over each painting, acrylic on paper, oil on canvas, distemper on linen. Each so different, but inviting onlookers to take a moment and just breathe.
Taehyung’s eyes are dark, contemplative. They’re so deep you feel like you could fall in them and be lost forever. (Wonder if that would be such a bad thing.) He keeps his hand in yours, your hand in his, the two of you matching paces as you loop the gallery, never letting go.
“Oh,” he breathes. “Oh, I like these.”
Four canvases, smaller than some of the others you’ve seen, squirrelled around a corner and hidden away on a back wall. Each painting has a figure in the midst of some simple, quiet task; laying in bed, catching an egg as it threatens to roll off a table, trailing a finger through a puddle of spilled milk, reading a book in the bath. Each of the figures has their face turned away from the viewer, caught up as they are in the simple motions of their life, each silhouetted by a window with a different view—from sea to lake to hill to forest.
You can’t help but look at Taehyung as he looks at these paintings, his brows a little raised, mouth a little slack, the lovely line of his jaw, the angles of his face, forehead to nose to lips to chin. “What do you like about them? The style?”
His answer comes unrushed, unhurried, as he thinks. “They’re so beautiful and detailed, but it’s more about… the intimacy,” he says. “Each person is just being themselves, without fear of who’s watching. We’re watching them, even if their attention isn’t on us.” A pause, a hush, a breath. “It’s like love, almost.”
Your lips part, even as Taehyung keeps his eyes forwards, staring at the blank pages of the book the man reads as he sits in his bath, row of shampoo bottles on the sill by his head.
“Like love?” A whisper.
“To keep your eyes and focus on someone who isn’t looking at you,” Taehyung replies, unabashed, like it’s just a statement of fact. “Loyalty. Dedication. Love.”
Words fail you. Silence is the only answer you can offer to Taehyung’s thoughts, the air in your lungs trapped there as you unwittingly hold your breath, lips parted around a sentence that never comes. Taehyung’s eyes slide away from this row of paintings and to you, how you’re staring at him, literally speechless.
His own lips part as he makes to say something else, to ask what’s wrong—when there’s a flicker of movement nearby, the modulated steps of someone who’s used to walking through a gallery, careful to keep the calm air unmuddied by their passing.
“Oh, Y/n!”
Namjoon’s voice cuts through the silent moment and splinters the delicate air that had started to crystallise around you. He looks happy to see you, dimples on full display as his lips lift and he smiles wide.
“Namjoon!” You don’t think you’ve ever been so glad to see his familiar face in your life—anything to distract you, any excuse to shake off the feeling that Taehyung’s words have left behind, trailing over your skin, blooming in your brain. His timing is perfect, even if he doesn’t realise it. “Hey! It’s been a while.”
“I was going to say, I haven’t seen you around lately! I thought you’d like this exhibition, I was wondering if you’d come. Oh, sorry, I’m being rude, aren’t I? Hi, I’m Namjoon,” he says, holding a hand out for Taehyung to shake. “I’m one of the gallery managers.”
Taehyung’s exchanged a few words with others today, polite thank yous to the people who’ve served you in the shops you’ve been into, given shy smiles to passersby who’ve made eye contact with him. (So, so sweet, always.)
But Namjoon is the first person to properly introduce themselves to him in the real world, as you’ve thought of it, someone who doesn’t know that the man at your side is an android.
You panic. Just for a second.
Taehyung doesn’t.
“Hello.” He has to take his hand out of yours, the other weighed down by shopping, although he seems reluctant to let go of you. He gives Namjoon his widest smile as he shakes the proffered hand with firm, friendly politeness. “I’m Taehyung. It’s lovely to meet you, Namjoon.”
And then he immediately slips his hand back into yours.
Namjoon is utterly charmed.
(Of course he is. How could he not be?)
The discussion they both have is a quiet one. You’re happy to stay uninvolved, watching and listening as they talk, still at Taehyung’s side. That brief moment of panic, that blazing forest fire of fear for him—it’s been washed away, soothed by the way the conversation between man and android unfolds so naturally, Namjoon none the wiser about Taehyung’s robotic origins.
There’s no way anyone would realise. He’s so human, in the way he moves and acts and thinks, the way he laughs at something Namjoon says. You’re happy that Taehyung can be here with you, in this gallery, speaking to someone new, as if this is normal, natural, nothing unusual.
You can’t think of anything you want for Taehyung more.
You realise, too, that in this moment, you feel utterly content. Not just for Taehyung, but—happy that you’re there to share this moment with him. You think about how you’ve always wanted this; someone to share things with, someone whose happiness makes you happy too.
When Taehyung laughs, your own lips lift in response, heart lifting at the sound of his joy, at how his fingers tighten around yours. Remembering that you’re there, even if he’s not looking at you right now, eyes on Namjoon.
He’s looking at Namjoon. You’re looking at him.
(To keep your eyes and focus on someone who isn’t looking at you.)
(Loyalty. Dedication.)
(A breath.)
(Love.)
You carefully pull your hand out of Taehyung’s. Your fingers feel cold as they slip away from his, warmed all day, pressed against Taehyung’s soft skin. His eyes flit away from Namjoon, those deep eyes settling on you; dark wood and ground coffee, so warm.
“Y/n?”
“I’m just going to pop to the toilet,” you say, turning away from the tinge of confusion that colours Taehyung’s voice. “I won’t be long.”
The toilet lid is cold. You can feel how it seeps through the layers of your clothing to your thighs, and at any other time you might wrinkle your nose at the sensation, at how uncomfortable it is. But right now, you have other things on your mind.
You bury your face in your hands. It’s foolish, but you’d swear you could feel Taehyung still in your palms, touch imprinted, emblazoned on your skin. It’s like a palpable thing, almost, this ethereal thing that lingers even when Taehyung isn’t there.
Wishful thinking. Selfish thinking. Selfish, to like it, to want to keep that feeling close; let it spread from your palm, to the delicate skin of your wrist, tracing its way up your arm, up-up-up, drawing invisible lines over every part of you, inside every part of you. Selfish, to like Taehyung’s touch as much as you do. To want more of it.
(More of him.)
You aren’t anything more to Taehyung than a friend. A guardian. Someone who’s there to support him and keep him safe. You’re blessed to have his trust, to be able to be that person he can turn to—it’s greedy, to want. To want to be more.
(You can’t foist your loneliness on Taehyung. You can’t do that to him. You won’t. You won’t.)
When you return, a spark lights in Taehyung’s eyes. The same spark that bursts every time he sees you after time apart, no matter how long or short that may be. He reaches for your hand, and of course, you go—but your fingers are limp, weak.
(You know that if Taehyung’s LED had still been nestled in his skin, it would have flickered yellow.)
You keep that point of connection as you bid Namjoon goodbye, finish meandering through the exhibition, make your way back home—but you let Taehyung bear the weight. Reactive, not proactive. You don’t squeeze his fingers just because you want to, because there’s something sliding by the bus’s window you think he might like to see; you’re not here to make him do things, to shove things down his throat. You should just be here to support him in the things he wants to do. That’s your role.
And that’s where you’re going to stay.
Your thoughts are a tumble, messy and unorganised, a ball of yarn that’s all knots and tangles. Taehyung must be able to see it on your face, read it in your body, his android eyes scanning over you and scrutinising every hint you’re giving away without even realising. But you just smile, wave away his questions, and act like everything’s okay. Normal. Routine.
It’s a little harder, though, to act like everything’s okay when it’s time to sleep.
Because, of course, there Taehyung is. Like he has been, from the day he’d arrived—sat in your bed, nestled against a pile of cushions, expression open and warm and fond as he looks at you. Waiting for you to climb in, to rest your head in his lap; waiting for you to fall asleep with his gentle fingers dragging across your scalp, melting under his lovely hands.
You waver. Conflicted. It’s okay, isn’t it, if Taehyung’s reaching for you first?
His eyes meet yours. The second you see his lips curve up, see that pretty, quiet smile appearing on his lovely mouth, you fold.
It’s fine. You’ll allow yourself this.
(In your dreams, you stand in a deserted gallery, staring at the single piece of work on the stark white walls, all the lights focused in, in, in. Taehyung’s framed on this canvas, a painted window into his world. Not once does he look at you, turned away as he is; you see nothing more than the back of his head, the curve of his cheek, the vaguest hint of his nose as he turns, always staring at something else.
And still, you stand, and you watch. Waiting. Keeping your eyes on him, always.)
“You’re staying late again.”
“Yeah. I really want to get this done,” you say, gesturing vaguely at your monitors with your stylus; tweaking, editing, shifting around these final few magazine pages before you’re satisfied. “Nearly there.”
When you hear the way Hoseok says your name, you glance up.
As someone who spends most of his time bouncing around like a literal ray of sunshine, when Hoseok’s expression is one that isn’t smiling, it carries all the more weight behind it. Right now his face is uncharacteristically serious, the perpetual smile on his mouth gone, the line of his brows severe.
It’s unnerving.
“You haven’t stayed late for ages,” Hoseok points out. “Until this week, and suddenly you’re late every night. Has something happened?”
“No,” you lie.
Yes, you think.
You’re trying to create some distance, for Taehyung’s sake. So that you’re not tempted to pull him ever closer, latch onto him like you have been, smothering him. He needs space to grow. Space from you has helped already—the time he spends with Yoongi and Seokjin is evidence enough of that, after all. He doesn’t need you to be there constantly.
Hoseok’s eyes bore into yours as he stares, so you avert your gaze, pretending to shift your focus to one of the captions the editor has left on the page you’re working on. You hadn’t realised that he’d noticed. You should have expected it, though. Hoseok is a close work friend and he’s incredibly perceptive, especially when he cares about people.
“Alright,” he says, eventually. “Make sure you don’t stay too late, though. Get some sleep.”
You give him a thumbs up without looking away from the screen, dragging something idly with your stylus until Hoseok leaves, the office empty except you, now. And the cleaning androids, when they appear for the night like clockwork. As they always do.
You can’t help but stop to watch them, how blank faced they are, for all that they look human. Their LEDs are almost motionless, the placid blue matching the blank expressions on their faces, unthinking automatons.
(You’d seen androids in the city when you’d been out with Taehyung, of course. Completing menial tasks: city androids picking litter and raking leaves, household androids following their owners around and carrying their shopping. You’d realised that Taehyung wouldn’t have seen a non-deviated android since he’d escaped the club, lapsed into silence; you’d pulled him to a stop, lips pursed in a frown as you’d tried to read his expression.
“Taehyung,” you’d asked. “Are you alright?”
There’d been a quiet pause, and in that moment you’d felt all your worries rising, caught in your throat—but then he’d nodded quietly, looking at you with soft eyes.
“I’m alright,” he’d answered. “I was just thinking about how lucky I am.”
I’m the lucky one, you’d thought. Lucky to know him, as sweet-hearted and wonderful as he is. You’d squeezed his hand, and he’d smiled gently at you, and that had been that.)
It hurts, honestly. To see the expression on his face each time you come home late, each time you avoid answering his questions. There’s uncertainty laid across each of your interactions, rough bristles of a brush varnishing discomfort across the once smooth surface of your relationship; but you can’t keep taking advantage of this soft-hearted boy, of the circumstances that he’s in.
You pretend that things are fine. Taehyung is clearly confused, unsure, trying so hard to find out what’s wrong, even when you keep gently turning his concerns aside.
You haven’t been home enough to spend time with Yoongi or Seokjin, either. You’d seen Jin in the hall just once, made eye contact just as he’d been appearing from the other apartment and you’d been stepping into yours; you’d fumbled a little, fingerprints smudging across the keypad as your door had swung open. You’d expected to see judgement on Jin’s face, maybe, something heavy and weighty, his gaze flitting over you as he read you in the way he did so often.
What you hadn’t expected was for him to smile. It’d been hard to translate his full expression but what little you could read was knowing, like he’s aware of something he shouldn’t be, kept hidden just underneath his tongue. Ready to release it into the world with a single breath.
(Needless to say, you’d shut the door pretty quick.)
He and Yoongi have gone away for the weekend. It's a small blessing, saving you from having to see Jin’s almost-smug expression again. But it means that Taehyung has nowhere else to go right now, no reason to leave the apartment. So it’ll be you and him, him and you, with no buffers, nothing. It’s been unseasonably stormy for the past few days as well, rain slammed into your windows by the harsh winds, the world outside a haze of smeared grey—so it’s not like you can go out, either.
Not that you would want to.
You hadn’t realised exactly how ingrained Taehyung was in your life until you’d started to pull away. It’s not just that you live together and share the same physical space—it’s just that your days have become so full of Taehyung-Taehyung-Taehyung, and you hadn’t even noticed. He’d crept up on you, snuck his way into your heart, so easily, so effortlessly.
You remind yourself that that’s why you’re doing this. To remind yourself of life without Taehyung in it, because he’s not yours to have or to keep. He never has been. You don’t want him to be: he’s his own person. This… this desire for him; even as you try to ignore it, it keeps growing and growing: wet plaster laid down, your feelings for him painted buon fresco, added to day by day, giornata. You need it to stop.
But it’s hard. It’s hard, when Taehyung looks like comfort, your comfort, when you want to let yourself be folded into his arms. It’s hard when the fact is that it’s not that you have to spend time with him. It’s that you want to spend time with him.
It's hard.
(And you miss him, even when he's right there.)
You find respite in art, in painting, too intent on the motions of your work to allow yourself room to think about other things. Fall into the rhythm of it all, a quiet hush stealing over your mind, a place of both focus and calm, world settling into place around you. There’s a piece you’ve been working on for a while, a hand rising from dark water, fingertips just broaching its surface, the most tentative of touches; you layer more oil paint on the panel, dragging the bristles of the brush across the colour you’ve already laid down, brows furrowed as you do.
Taehyung normally paints with you, but not today. He knows you want space—even if he doesn’t know why—so he gives it to you. So considerate and sweet, always. Even when you’re shutting him out. You’ve been here all day: morning, afternoon, and now evening, and he’s only been in a few times, to leave you food, drinks, looking after you in a way you don’t deserve.
You’ve just lifted the brush from the canvas when an especially loud peal of thunder rolls through the air outside. The rumble starts low, rising into a rattling growl that feels like it’s shaking the very earth. It almost drowns out the sound of Taehyung’s quiet knocking, a curl of his knuckles against the open door, but you catch sight of him anyway, glancing over your shoulder.
“Hey,” he says. “I thought you might like a drink.”
He’s barefoot, like he usually is, teal hoodie and grey sweatpants baggy, looking every inch the boyfriend you’ve always wanted and never had. His hands are cupped around a mug, steam coiling from the hot tea inside, and something in your heart twinges at his kindness and consideration even as you smile at him.
“That sounds lovely, Tae,” you say, and he takes this as an invitation to step inside, although you notice his steps are far more hesitant than they might have been before. Like he’s treading on eggshells around you.
It’s awkward. Stilted. Taehyung’s eyes are heavy on your face as you accept the tea from his hands, trying your best to avoid brushing fingers; you turn away, pretending to turn your attention back to the drying paint on the wood panel that rests on your easel, anything to break eye contact.
And then he speaks.
“You’re avoiding me.”
Your lips are poised to drink, pursed at the rim of the mug when you freeze, eyes darting back to him.
“You’re avoiding me,” he repeats. His voice is quieter, tinged with all the confusion you’ve seen flit across his face since this whole thing started.
You slowly pull the mug away from your face, steam touching your skin like warm, wet fingers. “I’m not,” you say, even though the lie tastes bitter on your tongue. “We live together, Taehyung, it’s pretty hard to avoid you.”
When you laugh lightly, trying to lift the atmosphere, Taehyung doesn’t respond. If anything the air becomes heavier, his face an unmoving mask as his eyes churn with emotion. His LED might not be nestled in his temple any more, but you don't need to see it spinning in a distressed circle of yellow to know that Taehyung is confused.
“Why are you lying to me?”
Your eyes widen. He’s never been so direct before. (He hasn’t needed to be though, has he? Because you've never lied to him before, have you?)
“I just… I just want to know what happened. What I did wrong. I want to fix it,” Taehyung continues, and he sounds so small, so vulnerable. “Please?”
Your heart feels like it’s risen from your chest, up to your throat, making it hard to breathe. The only time he’s ever sounded like this was when—
When he’d first turned up on your doorstep, wet and scared and lonely. Not knowing if there was anyone he could trust, uncertain where he stood.
“You didn’t do anything, Taehyung.” You try to put every ounce of feeling into your words and let him know that this is the truth. It’s not him. It’s not. “You didn’t do anything, please don’t think you did.”
“Then why are you avoiding me?” His voice rises, shaking, a bird trying to take flight on a broken wing. “If I didn’t do anything then why are you being like this? I don’t understand.”
“I’m just… trying to encourage you to be independent?”
The words sound weak to your own ears, so you can’t blame Taehyung for when his expression flickers and he looks almost incredulous.
“Independent?”
“You know,” you explain lamely. “Like… giving you space to grow. You don’t need me around all the time.”
“I don’t—” He cuts himself off. “Y/n. I want you to be there.”
“Because it’s what you’ve gotten used to.” You glance down at the drink in your hands, away from his sincere, dark eyes. “You’re just saying that because of circumstances, Taehyung.”
“I’m not!” You’ve never heard Taehyung so loud before, almost angry, like he can’t believe what he’s hearing. “How can you think that?”
“Because it’s true!” Your own voice rises despite yourself, matching his, some frayed thing inside you finally snapping. “Why else would you want me around? No one else does! Why would you?”
You rarely raise your voice. You hate being loud, or rude, hate arguments, but there’s something boiling in your blood. Years of quiet self-deprecation, constant reminders of how you’re not really wanted; last choice, always. Single, always. Untouched, unwanted. Taehyung—beautiful, kind, sweet, lovely Taehyung—wouldn’t be here right now if he had anywhere else to go. Too beautiful and kind and sweet and lovely for you, as disappointing, undesirable as you are.
Because that’s the truth. Even if you’re surrounded by friends, warm and bright, at the end of the day, they go home with each other, to their lovers, their families, and you go home alone. At least you had, until Taehyung—and he’s only here because you were the only safe place he could run to. Not because he chose you.
(No one chooses you. Why would they?)
Taehyung’s eyes are so big and round as he stares and stares and stares. His lips are a little parted around a soundless noise of surprise, disbelief, before he opens his mouth to respond properly.
And then all the lights go out.
Lightning flashes, throwing the room into sharp focus for just a second before the night is split apart with the loudest clap of thunder yet. Like the ground has split open, louder than anything you’ve ever heard in your life; you’d swear your teeth rattle in your skull, that’s how overwhelming and close it is.
You suck in a breath as you jump, hands jolting, and the mug falls from your grasp. You can’t see in the darkness but you can hear how it shatters, sending hot tea splattering over the dust sheets on the floor, away from you, but towards—
“Taehyung,” you gasp, reaching out blindly. “Are you okay? Did it hit you?”
You hear him move closer, feel his fingers, reaching for yours confidently in this dark space. His grip is solid and warm and he squeezes, reassuring.
“I’m okay,” he murmurs. “I’m okay. You can’t see?”
“It’s too dark.” With the heavy clouds outside and the blanket of thick rain, there’s little light from the moon to shine into your studio, leaving you in a world of thick black and blue. “Can you see?”
“Android senses,” he answers. "I can see enough."
You wait for the lights to come back on so you can clean up the mess that’s scattered on the floor. And you wait. One beat. Another beat.
“I don’t think the power is coming back on any time soon,” you say. “Um.”
“Hold on.” You can’t make out Taehyung’s features in this all consuming darkness, but you can picture the expression on his face, the concern that bleeds through into his words. “If you move you’ll step on something and hurt your feet. Hold on,” he says again, and then lets go of your hands.
“Taehyung? What are you—”
You let out an embarrassing squeal as you feel the world tilt, but Taehyung’s grip on you is confident and sure as he lifts you, one hand under your knees and the other scooped around your back. Like you’re a swooning, blushing bride.
“Taehyung!”
“It’s the safest thing to do.” He sounds determined, no room for argument, so you decide to shut up.
Even though you know how strong he is, with all his android strength, you can’t help but reach out in the darkness, looping your arms around his neck to try and help lighten his burden. You feel your cheeks burn and you hope that the darkness saves you from your obvious embarrassment.
The power still hasn’t come on by the time he deposits you in the kitchen, easing you to the floor with a level of care and delicacy that leaves something in you aching. When you check your phone—mostly charged, thank God—it seems like powercuts have hit this entire part of the city, and there’s no ETA on when things will be back up and running.
Which leads you to this. Sitting on the cold tiles of your kitchen floor, a few large candles flickering light across you as you dig into a carton of melting ice cream that you’ve saved from your freezer, licking the dripping flavours of sea salt and caramel from the spoon.
Taehyung is sitting next to you in this flame-lit bubble you share, quiet even as the world outside is full of the sound of endless rain and lightning. He’d helped you navigate the darkness, settled you safely before going to find some candles; looking after you while you can’t see and he can.
You’re intent on the ice cream, leaning against the kitchen cabinets and carton settled between your knees as you use it as an excuse not to talk.
Taehyung, though, is intent on you.
“Y/n?”
His voice breaks the near silence, soft around your name. You pause, half-way through scooping another spoonful of ice cream to your mouth. There’s something in his tone that you’ve never heard before, from anyone, something you can’t put a finger on.
“Yes?”
“You said that no one wants you around,” he says. Your fingers tighten around the handle of your spoon and keep your gaze cast down, at the thick drip of cream from your spoon that threatens to spill. “Why would you say that?”
You don’t respond. Not right away.
Then you take in a deep breath, letting the spoon fall back into the tub.
“Because they don’t,” you say plainly. “I mean… Taehyung. I was only at the Eden Club because my friends know that I’m perpetually single. I’m glad I got to meet you, so glad, but… I live alone because no one wants to be here with me.”
You’ve never said anything like this out loud before; kept your lingering loneliness close to your chest. Really, in most parts of your life, you’re content, but sometimes you can’t help but be pulled under by the heavy feeling of how unlovable you are. Even if you try to remind yourself that you’re worth being loved too.
(After all, if you were—then why are you still here alone?)
“I do. I want to be here with you.”
Taehyung’s words are soft and gentle and low, but for all their tenderness, you can’t help but sigh.
“Like I said, Taehyung, it’s just circumstances.” A murmur. “You’re only here because you have to be—”
“I’m not.” He interrupts you; something he’s never done before. It shuts you right up, even if his words aren’t sharp. Emphatic, yes, but soft around the edges. “I chose to come here because of you. You’re the only person who’s ever made me feel safe. Even when I was at the club, and I didn’t know anything except what I was told to do—I knew I could trust you. I only started to remember things after we met, and I was there for weeks before I left, finally remembering the things I had to go through. Again and again and again. Over and over and over. No one was ever kind to me, not once. Not once.”
“Taehyung,” you breathe, sadness filling your chest for him, but he doesn’t stop.
“People would come in, take what they wanted from me, and then they would leave. They didn’t care about me. They would just tell me what to do and I’d have to listen, be the perfect android they wanted, that they’d paid for. Then I ran. But even as I was running here, I was scared. I thought that maybe it was a fluke. Maybe I was wrong. I was scared that maybe you weren’t actually kind, maybe it was a lie, maybe you were just like all the other humans—but anything was better than the club. So I took my chances. And you let me in. You let me in and you were so kind. You give and give and give and you’ve never asked for anything back.”
“I just did what anyone else would,” you mutter, glancing away, shy.
“But you didn’t. You were the only person who ever looked at me as something more than just an android. Don’t you see that? Even after giving me so much, you haven’t asked for anything. I try my best to look after you, but…” Taehyung takes in a deep, deep breath, sucking in air that his android body doesn’t need. You’ve noticed that it’s something he does to ground himself; such a human thing to do. “I want to give you so much more than you’ll ever accept.”
You look at him, something sparking deep and low in your stomach. “You don’t have to give me anything, Taehyung.”
Light dances across the perfect angles of his face, candle flame painting him from second to second, shadow and radiance. He looks familiar and unfamiliar all at once. You’ve known him for long enough, stared at him for long enough that you could paint his face in your sleep; the strength of his brows, the depth of his eyes, the slant of his nose, the flush of his lips; the tiny moles that are scattered across his skin, the perfect line of his jaw, his chin.
But in the paltry candlelight, he looks like an altogether different person, almost. There’s something to the set of his face that you’ve never seen, hard to track in the ever changing light—not the soft domesticity you’ve grown familiar with from Taehyung, and not the sheer, overwhelming sensuality of V. Something that’s both, something that’s not, something that’s more.
“I want to give you everything. I want to. Y/n, I want. Androids don’t want, but I want. I want, I want, I want.” A repeated mantra; a prayer. “I want because of you. I want to be here with you. I want to spend time with you. I want to learn with you. I want to know everything you like and everything you don’t like. I want to know what makes you sad and what makes you happy. I want to be one of the things that makes you happy, like you make me happy. I want to look after you. I want you to let me love you. I want you. I want you. I love you.”
Your mouth is open, caught in a breath, stuttered in your throat. Taehyung doesn’t shy away from your wide-eyed, speechless gaze, staring back at you with an intensity you thought you’d never see directed at you; tenderness and affection and want.
“You want to—you… you love me?” Your voice is weak with disbelief. Taehyung loves you?
“I thought you knew, and that’s why you pulled away,” he says. “Because I’m an android, I’m not good enough—”
“What? No, Taehyung, never, no. I would never think that—”
“But you were pushing me away.” For the first time since this conversation started, he sounds unsure, the tiniest tremble at the corner of each word. “You were pushing me away and I don’t know why. Why?” He reaches for your hand, sliding his fingers between yours. “Aren’t you happy with me?”
You wonder how fast your heart is beating. Know that Taehyung will be able to read it, palm to palm, his skin against yours, an endless amount of information running from that point of contact and up his arm; following lines of circuitry and neural connectors, up-up-up, pulled into whatever part of his system counts as his brain, dissected so much faster than the human brain could comprehend. But even with all this information, all this incredible processing speed and power—he’s just as confused and uncertain as any other person might be.
“I am. I am happy. So happy,” you whisper. Then you take a deep breath, grounding yourself just like Taehyung had. “I’ve never been so happy before, Taehyung. You make me happy.”
The android smiles. Quiet but undeniably happy as well, his eyes so dark, so soft. “You make me happy, too,” he says, and then he lets out a small laugh, a sweet little thing, like the scrape of a spoon around a mixing bowl. “I can only feel happiness because of you. You’re everything.”
But then the laughter fades, and he’s looking back at you with solemnity, lingering confusion. “If I make you happy, then why were you pulling away from me?”
You stare at where your hands are joined, Taehyung’s hand under yours, lifting yours up and away from the cold tiles of the floor. “Because,” you start. Stumble. Take in another breath, heart squeezing in your chest. “Because I was scared my feelings were too much.”
A beat of silence. Then you feel Taehyung’s other hand as he lays it softly against your cheek to turn you towards him. It’s terrifying, how close your face is to his. Completely vulnerable, nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. He doesn’t say anything, just watches, and you find yourself crumbling in the face of his warm gaze.
“Because I thought I was taking advantage of you,” you say. Slow and faltering. “Because I thought it was—I thought I was being selfish. I realised that I loved you, and I can’t—I couldn’t imagine that… I couldn’t imagine that you wanted me back.”
Taehyung’s eyes flutter shut as your words wash over him. The hand on your cheek coaxes you closer, and of course, you go; let your forehead get pressed against his, a tender motion, faces so close he can feel the warmth of your breath.
“Y/n.” Your name sounds safe in his mouth, like he’s keeping it close, handling it delicately, carefully, eyes opening so he can look at you with an adoration you’ve never seen. Not for you. Not until now. “Can I kiss you? I want to. Please?”
You feel heat rising on your cheeks, a flush that threatens to spill over, but nod. You don’t think you have the strength to speak right now. Taehyung smiles again, lighting up this space you’ve scraped out for each other, him and you; you and him.
When he leans in, there’s the briefest moment of panic that flickers through you. You haven’t kissed anyone in such a long time. You’re worried you’ll mess up, be clumsy, bad, and Taehyung will be disappointed.
But then his lips touch yours—and all that worry washes away. It’s a short-lived thing, the briefest brush of his mouth, barely a kiss at all. And then again, he leans in, tracing the shape of your mouth with his: a kiss to one corner of your mouth, and then the other, your cupid’s bow, the swell of your bottom lip. You’ve never felt like this—vulnerable but safe, all at once, Taehyung taking his time as you fall, fall, fall, his hand still cradling your face, his touch solid and grounding even as his kisses are featherlight.
“Taehyung,” you whisper, lips brushing his as you shape them around his name. You still have one hand in his and tighten your grip, squeezing. “More.”
You can feel his smile when he leans in one more time, guiding you with the broad palm against your cheek. So soft, so gentle. Adoring and reverent. His lips are so full, slotting against yours so perfectly when he finally, finally kisses you properly.
You lose yourself in the sensation. It’s so easy to lose yourself in Taehyung, as lovely as he is, his mouth lovelier still. One kiss turns to two, to three, four, deep and slow; by the time you break apart, there’s a little sheen on his lips, sparking out in the candlelight, a layer of gold leaf that shines.
“Can you say it again?” He asks. “Say that you love me?”
You can’t help but want to hide your face, bashful and shy. You’ve never said those words out loud, with the weight of feeling Taehyung is asking from you—but you look at his lovely, lovely face, lips flush with evidence of your kisses, and your heart swells in your chest.
“I love you.” The words come so easily. “I love you.”
And when he smiles, it’s so bright and radiant you feel you might be blinded by it. It doesn’t leave his face even as he stands, guides you up with him; careful to avoid the tub of ice cream that’s been forgotten on the floor, more melted cream than ice now.
This time, when he lifts you, he doesn’t break eye contact—keeps his gaze on yours as he pulls you close, and then picks you up.
It’s effortless, the way he carries you. Big hands that cup the back of your thighs, your legs around his waist and arms around his neck, lifted like you weigh nothing. You break eye contact, overwhelmed, burying your face in the crook of his neck, feeling the way he shakes as he laughs, soft and affectionate.
“Shut up,” you mumble, embarrassed, but then go quiet as you feel the press of his lips into your hair.
Taehyung’s the only person who’s ever carried you, but it’s less about that and more about how safe you feel in his arms. Wrapped around him, pressed close, warm-warm-warm. You feel like a burden has been lifted from you, unshackled from your neck now that you’ve confessed the budding feelings that had burst into full bloom even when you’d tried to shove them back into the dirt—because Taehyung feels the same way. He feels the same way.
The rest of the apartment is still bathed in darkness. But Taehyung navigates it easily, keeps you held close even in the dark, and you trust him. Even when you feel his grip loosening as he eases you down, you trust him, letting yourself fall back onto the softness of your bed. (Even if you want to keep hold of him.)
You wait and watch as the room starts to fill with light, Taehyung returning with the lit candles from the kitchen before setting out more, laying out all the scented candle jars you’ve had stashed away. The familiar surroundings of your bedroom are bathed in warm, dancing light, Taehyung’s shadow a multi-faceted silhouette that shifts each time a flame sputters.
He looks up once the final candle is aflame, meeting your eyes—and you don’t feel the need to drop that gaze, to glance away, pretend you weren’t watching him, entranced. Because he welcomes it. He grins at you, toothy and bright, and your own lips split into a smile.
“I guess it’s a good thing I like candles, huh?”
“They’ll help keep the room warm,” Taehyung says, and, that’s right, you hadn’t thought of that.
No power: no heating. The longer the power is out, the colder it’ll get, the chill of the hard rain filling the world outside.
“Don’t worry,” he adds, setting the lighter aside. “I’ll keep you warm.”
There’s nothing behind those words. No implication at all. And yet you find yourself flushing, looking away from him, flustered.
There’s a beat of silence as you keep your eyes turned away from Taehyung, looking at the shadows on shadows on shadows that ripple across the walls—and then you hear how his bare feet shift across the floor until he’s at your bedside.
But he doesn’t stop there. You feel how the mattress dips, eyes flying back to the android, growing huge and round when you watch how he settles himself above you; hovering, so so so close, aware of how he’s not touching you, and yet. You swear you can feel the weight of him, a phantom touch on your body and across your skin.
Your mouth goes dry when he murmurs your name. The word drips from his mouth like honey, thick and sweet, and a shiver skates up your body.
“Do you want me to keep you warm?” He asks, and, oh. Oh. This time the words are heavy with meaning, shimmering gossamer curtains barely drawn to conceal it, smouldering intent in his eyes. “Let me look after you?”
You’re reminded, all at once, that while you’ve taught Taehyung a lot of things since you’d met, there’s one thing he knows that you don’t. Intimacy, and pleasure, and lust. Sex. Something you’ve been deprived of, even if you’ve quietly craved it, waiting for the right time, the right place, the right person.
Taehyung takes your silence as hesitation, his face softening.
“Only if you want,” he says. “Only if you want to say yes.”
“I want to,” you say, surprised by how fast the admittance leaves your lips. You do want it—want Taehyung, in every way he’s willing to share, want it desperately. “I just—” Embarrassment floods over you, and you look away again. “I’ve just never… done anything. Before. I’ve never, um.”
“It’s okay to be a virgin, Y/n,” Taehyung says, and you can’t help but squirm a little at how plainly he says it while you try to avoid saying it out loud, even if you know it’s stupid. There’s nothing wrong with being a virgin, you know that, but for some reason you feel almost ashamed at admitting it. Insecure. Even if the android clearly doesn’t care, not one bit. “We can go as slow as you want, or stop altogether. I’ll take care of you no matter what.”
You’re nervous. But louder than your nerves is a growing voice that’s chanting yesyesyes, and another voice that reminds you: you’re safe with Taehyung. No matter how nervous or uncertain you are, or how little you know, you do know that you’re safe with him.
“Okay.” You take in a breath. “Take care of me, Taehyung.”
And he does. With all the slowness of a meandering river and a smile curling his lips, he starts to kiss you again; there’s nothing rushed about his motions, as tender as before. Like the two of you could kiss forever and he would be content with that.
And then you feel how he shifts, the softness of the kisses warming into something heavier, more purposeful. The glowing embers of a coal that are being coaxed to full flame, his tongue pressing past your willing lips, swallowing down the shaking gasp that shudders out of your mouth.
He trails his lips away from yours, across your jaw and up; you shiver as he noses at the soft skin behind your ear before kissing it, tremble at each intent touch of his lips against you, and it’s only when he reaches the hollow of your neck that you realise that you’re making noises, little inhalations of air each time he mouths at your sensitive skin, lets his tongue trail across it.
You’ve been holding onto him, hands cupped around the back of his neck, and when he sucks at your pulse point you tighten your fingers and let out a gasp. You can feel the answering hum that Taehyung gives, his mouth pressed so close that you can feel the vibrations, and it’s so much already. No one’s ever kissed you like this. No one's ever eased their weight down on you so carefully, pressing you down to the mattress with a delicate, delicious pressure that leaves your entire body growing hotter and hotter.
“Oh, oh, Taehyung.” You’d be embarrassed by how breathless you sound if you weren’t so distracted by something else—one of Taehyung’s hands, splaying over your stomach, heavy through your shirt.
“Can I take this off?” He’s murmuring into the crook of your neck, question warm against your skin. His long fingers rest, waiting at the hem of your shirt, patient even as he presses another kiss to the junction where your neck meets your shoulder: this time, edged with teeth, making you shudder as he soothes it with his tongue.
Your voice fails you, but when you nod, Taehyung responds immediately. You let him lead, follow the steps of this dance he knows so well—shiver at the feeling of his fingers sliding under the hem of your shirt once you've sat up, your stomach jumping as they brush against you, before he lifts it up and over your waiting arms.
Even though you’re wearing a bra, the second you see Taehyung’s eyes move down, you cover yourself reflexively. Even with all the flickering candles there’s enough light that there’s no darkness to hide in, shoulders hunching inwards as you try to hide yourself away.
You’ve never let anyone see you like this like this before.
Taehyung’s touch is patient as he slides his hands over yours, looking at you with an infinite amount of sincerity and affection. He doesn’t try to pull your hands away from your chest, just waits. Patient. And like you always do, you find yourself melting under the gentle touch of his gaze. You let your hands fall, even if you’re acutely aware of the plain bra you’re wearing, something cosy for a day at home.
Taehyung ignores it. He shifts in and you steel yourself, expecting him to reach around your back for the clasp—but instead he starts to kiss you again. Deeper, hotter, his tongue sweeping over your lower lip before he nips at it. You let yourself get lost in the sensation, angling your head to chase his mouth, and it’s only when you feel the straps start to slip off your shoulders that the android has unclasped your bra without you noticing.
When he pulls away, he trails his hands across your shoulders and hooks his fingers into the trailing straps of your bra, and waits. You bite your lip and steel yourself, feeling foolish even as you hesitate—because Taehyung is looking at you with simmering awe and smouldering want. Like you're perfect. The most beautiful woman alive.
So you don’t stop him. You let him pull his touch down your arms, slow, slow, slow—and then, all at once, you’re completely naked from the waist up.
That simmering awe and smouldering want is still there. Warmth flushes over your skin under the heat of his gaze, the way it sweeps over you. You never knew that someone could look reverent and hungry at the same time. Never knew that someone would look at you like that.
It bolsters your shaking confidence, helps you lift your chin as you lean back on your hands, and you’re entranced at how Taehyung follows. Caught in your gravity. He raises his arms, bra cast aside and long forgotten as he cups the weight of your breasts in his hands.
Oh, oh, oh. When he pinches one of your nipples between thumb and forefinger—already hard, sensitive—it’s already so much, but then he bows his head and—
You hear a noise, and you realise that it’s coming from your own lips. A shaking gasp that trembles in the air as Taehyung sucks and licks, dragging his tongue against your nipple; one, and the other. You fall once more to your back and he goes with you, relentless even as he stays slow and you arch your back helplessly towards him.
“More?” He murmurs against your skin.
“Oh, God,” you whimper, and he lifts his mouth away from your nipple to press a kiss to the skin above your racing heart. “Please, more.”
It feels so good. Taehyung makes you feel so good, as talented and gorgeous as he is, so wonderful. He keeps laving attention on your breasts, hands skimming over the soft skin of your chest and stomach, goosebumps rising in the wake of his trailing fingers, his warm palms.
You can’t look away when he finally pulls back, breathless from the sensation of it all. He settles on his knees, tugs off his hoodie and then his shirt, revealing all the lovely planes of his body that you’ve seen before, but this time, you don’t have to look away. You can look.
And you can touch, too.
You sit up and raise a tentative hand to stroke down his chest, his stomach, that little trail of dark hair that descends into his loose grey sweatpants; your mouth goes dry at the sight. Taehyung watches the way your fingers drag over his skin, growing bolder moment by moment, but still too timid to venture past his waistband, low on his hips as they are. You’ve never had a chance to touch someone like this, to feel the smooth, soft skin under your greedy palms—Taehyung’s so warm, so alive. So human.
You think about the other hands he’s had on his skin. Grasping and greedy, taking and taking. People who didn’t care for him. People he couldn’t say no to. But he’s here with you because he wants to be. He lets you touch him because he wants it.
“Angel?”
You glance up at the sound of the gentle pet name, away from where your hands have been tenderly tracing the lines of his hipbone. “Mm?”
Taehyung’s expression is soft and affectionate. “What are you thinking about?”
“You,” you answer honestly. He leans over to kiss you, and you’re smiling against his mouth when you feel the hand on your shoulder, pressing you down against the mattress again.
Then. His hands are at your waistband. Your breath quickens, but Taehyung’s eyes stay on your face even as your breasts rise and fall, shining with evidence of the touch of his mouth and tongue.
You lift your hips, and Taehyung smiles. Keeps smiling as he strips you, underwear and all, and when your thighs instinctively go to close shut, he catches your knees and keeps your legs open—gentle but firm, swiping his thumbs up and down the side of your knees, a tender touch even as you’re naked in front of him. You see the look on his face, drenched in candlelight, and swallow even as you force your legs to relax.
Then he looks down.
“Oh, God,” he groans, and one of your legs jumps in his grasp at the sound of his voice. Hoarse and deep. Almost unrecognisable. “Oh, angel, look at you.”
You’re so, so wet, so wet it’s embarrassing, so sensitive and responsive to every single one of Taehyung’s touches and kisses. The edges of his hair are spun gold in the candlelight but his eyes are so deep, so dark as he drinks down the sight of you spread out in front of him, wet and wanting and willing. You still want to hide away, cheeks burning, but you can’t look away from him. Can’t look away from how he seems almost pained, brows drawing together as he stares at the shining, flushed lips of your cunt.
“Taehyung.” Your voice shakes. “Taehyung, please.”
You're naked and vulnerable but—but the way he looks at you is so adoring, and you trust him. You trust him.
Just like earlier, his hands cup the back of your thighs. But this time, it’s not to carry you. You twist on the bed when he ends up eye level with your dripping cunt, utterly exposed. Those hands slide up your thighs and under your hips, tilting them up. Your fingers have been resting on the bedspread and tighten in them, bunching in your grasp when Taehyung presses a kiss to the softness of your inner thigh.
One kiss. And then another. And another. His breath is warm as it curls out across your skin. You feel like you’re about to shake out of your body, wanting to pull away, wanting to lean in; wanting more, even when it feels like too much. Overcome with it all, even if you trust Taehyung. Safe under his hands, his lips. All you can think about is how close he is, face only inches away from your most sensitive parts—
Then he turns his head and—
The noise you let out is almost a keen. His mouth is on you, hot and wet, lips and tongue, and you’re writhing, overwhelmed with sensation. He starts slow, balls of your feet digging into Taehyung’s back and toes curling as he mouths at you. Your hips buck, and your hands are tangled in Taehyung’s hair—when did that happen?—as you sob at the feeling of his lips around your clit, unlike anything you’ve ever felt before, but so so so good.
He licks a fat stripe up your entrance and your grip tightens in his hair. He makes a noise when your nails drag across his scalp, almost a growl, face still buried between your legs as he presses his tongue in. You’d worry that he needs to come up for air, but he doesn’t, doesn’t have to stop—keeps licking and kissing and humming, responding to each of the sounds pulling out of your lips. Keeps staring up at you, your eyes locked, the way you can’t look away from the sight of his head between your legs, dark haired and incredible.
You don’t realise you’re speaking, words slipping out of your lips as your hips roll, oh-oh-oh, fuck, God, oh, and Taehyung doesn’t stop. On his knees, he worships you, learning what you like—things you didn’t even know—and does it again, and again, and again. One of his hands slides away from your hips and over your stomach, holding you down, keeping you still, and then the other hand—
He turns his head, presses a kiss to the junction of your thigh. “Okay?”
“Okay,” you answer, shaky and weak. So okay, more than okay.
“Going to finger you now,” Taehyung says, and you feel like you’re going to die.
“Okay,” you say again. “Okay, Taehyung.”
He smiles at you before he puts his mouth back to your clit, sucking, a welcome distraction as—with all the languidness in the world—presses a finger into you.
You’ve fingered yourself before. You’ve got your own toys, vibrators, things that are longer and thicker than just one of Taehyung’s fingers—but this feels so different, out of your control. One finger becomes two, your cunt so wet that the slide in is easy, slow, deep thrusts of those long fingers inside you, and you’re panting, you’re so fucking overwhelmed.
And then he curls those fingers as he laps his tongue over your clit and you almost shout, Taehyung’s name bursting from your lips as he keeps beckoning with those fingers and circling the sensitive nub with his hot, wet tongue. It’s so much, it’s so fucking much, it’s so good and you’ve never felt so good before—
You’re almost blindsided by the orgasm that explodes through you and you come apart with a sound you didn’t realise you were capable of making, a gasping moan that keeps unfurling as Taehyung keeps his mouth on you, feeling each pulse of your cunt as you cum around his fingers, tight-tight-tight. (You miss the way his hips kick into the mattress that the sounds you’re making, how much you tighten around him.) You never thought you’d be so loud, never thought you’d end up all but sobbing as Taehyung eventually leans back, candlelight brushing shining gold over the wetness over his mouth, his chin. Your wetness.
“Oh my God,” you gasp. “Oh, fuck.”
Little jolts of pleasure are still wracking through you, pulsations of pleasure that unfurl in your lower stomach; Taehyung rubs the pad of his thumb across your oversensitive clit and your entire body jumps, your legs going to snap shut as you gasp, only stopped by his body in the way. You realise, then, that his fingers are still curled inside you, and you shiver.
“One more,” he says, and your whole body shakes. “Can I give you one more?”
He still looks reverent, and hungry. Like he wants to devour you. Taehyung is usually so soft, a gentle summer breeze—but right now he’s so intense it might scare you if it was anyone else. But it’s not, it’s Taehyung, and there’s something—there’s something about knowing that he looks like that because of you.
You let your legs fall open, watch how pleased he looks; how grateful. Like he's blessed to be able to do this to you. For you. You’re still so sensitive when he lowers his head again, but he’s slow and patient and coaxing, two fingers becoming three, and—that’s a lot. It’s a lot, but it feels good, Taehyung knowing exactly what to do to make you sob, your legs still hooked over his shoulders as he pulls you along that line between oversensitivity and mind numbing pleasure. This time, when you cum, it’s with three fingers buried deep in your cunt, the flat of his tongue pressed against your clit, back arching as you throw your head back and cry out. Your pussy throbs and it's so dirty, the wet sounds of his fingers thrusting into you, the slick sound of movement as you moan, and moan, and moan.
No one's ever made you cum before. Only you. And now you know what it's like to put your pleasure in someone else's hands, to have them intent on making you feel good, so good, and it leaves you dizzy.
He’s praising you, you note dimly. He’s praising you, how well you’re doing, how good you are for him, and it leaves you feeling warm. You’re panting when Taehyung pulls his fingers out of you, moves so he can brace himself on his elbows and lean in to kiss you. You can taste yourself on his lips and tongue. You can feel his skin against yours, chest to chest, his weight pressing you down and then you can feel—
You let out a noise against his lips. There’s nothing else that can be, that hot weight. You might not have felt it before, but you’re not stupid. That’s Taehyung’s cock, his hard length pressed against you.
“Taehyung,” you murmur.
“Mm.” He brushes his nose against yours, and the wave of affection that crashes through you is so strong it feels like it could pull you under. You didn’t realise that sex could be like this—that lingering shockwaves of pleasure could be skirting through your body as you lay there naked, still aroused and almost overcome, but also feeling so warm and soft and tender, too.
You feel lax after cumming, a little more confident, bolder—and the noise Taehyung makes as you clumsily grasp at him through his sweatpants is incredible. You feel like you could get high on it, the way he sucks in a gasp as his mouth falls open, even if you don’t know what you’re doing as your fingers wrap around cloth and hard heat.
“Please,” you start, then stop. Swallow. “Please, Taehyung.”
You want so much you feel like you could pass out. You want to feel and touch and taste; you want everything you haven’t had a chance to experience yet, want it with Taehyung, someone who you trust. Someone you love. Someone who knows far, far more than you—will always know more—and you want to learn that from him.
“Want you,” you say, and Taehyung looks pained all over again. He wants you, too.
“Fuck.” The word is rough, and you’ve never heard him curse before. The way he says it has something in you singing, as strange as that might be; you don’t think you’re ever going to get over how much you affect Taehyung. “What do you want from me, angel?”
Everything, you think. I want everything.
“Let me see?” is what you say, squeezing your fingers around Taehyung’s length, feeling the way his hips buck into the touch. “Please?”
You never thought that someone taking their clothes off could be artistic. And yet, there’s something about Taehyung moving to stand and stripping off the rest of his clothes that’s completely arresting and beautiful; carnal and holy, all at once. You don’t even realise your mouth is open as you sit up and watch him, moving closer as you drink down the sight, the way he’s naked in front of you.
Taehyung. Naked. Naked and beautiful and hard, and it’s so overwhelming, everything about it, how much you want and how—oh, God, how big and thick he is, obvious even to you, someone with nothing to compare it to. Holy fuck. Should you think that his dick is pretty? Can dicks even be pretty? Taehyung’s is. Of course it is. He’s gorgeous all over. Maybe you’re biased because it’s him, but there’s something about the sight of his hard cock, precome gathering at his slit, that makes your mouth water.
Taehyung goes to say something, but before you can lose your nerve, you move forwards, and whatever he was going to say is lost in the sound of a choked off groan. He tastes like salt and musk, hot under your inexperienced hands and mouth, and you don’t know what you’re doing but the noises he’s making, fuck. You run your tongue up the throb of a vein you can feel on the underside, and all you can think about is how big he is, slow and careful with your teeth and lips as you try your best to do whatever feels good for him.
His noises seem almost frantic but Taehyung’s hands are gentle when they comb through your hair. You look up. There’s a flush on his cheeks—red, not blue, you notice—and you pause, pulling off, suddenly shy after the burst of confidence that had you swallowing his cock down.
“Is this—is this okay?” You’ve still got your fingers wrapped around him, and maybe it’s a little ridiculous to be asking with spit and precome shining on your lips, but Taehyung’s answering smile is so affectionate.
“You’re perfect,” he says, and you know he’s not just talking about your clumsy blowjob. “Do you want to stop?”
You bite your lip and pump his length, which has Taehyung sucking a breath in. “I—what do you want?”
Something flashes through Taehyung’s eyes, and it feels like there’s electricity shooting down your spine before that look disappears. “This is about you, angel,” he says. “We can worry about what I want next time.”
Next time. This is the first time but it’s not the last. Oh, God. God.
Taehyung takes advantage of your distraction and hikes you up and away from the edge of the bed. It leaves you breathless, knowing how strong he is, how easily he can move you, even if he’s gentle-gentle-gentle. He settles in the cradle of your hips, and he’s so close, naked body flush with yours, covering you. His cock is so close—he just has to shift a little, just a little, and—well.
Before that, though, there’s something you need to know.
“Taehyung?” Your voice shakes but you have to ask.
“Yes?”
“Is this. Um. Does this feel good for you, too?”
You’re always aware of the fact Taehyung is an android, even if he looks and feels and is human, too. (It doesn’t matter that he’s made of metal and thirium and circuitry. He’s human.) You lift a hand and thumb at the soft skin of his temple, where his LED used to sit; you don’t know how to communicate that you love him regardless, that it doesn’t matter to you if he's a man or robot. But you’ve wondered—you know Taehyung was built to pleasure humans. Even if he’s been reacting, making noises, looks for all intents and purposes that he is enjoying this—what if it’s all programming? What if he’s just doing this because he thinks it’s something you want?
He leans into your touch. “Angel.” It sounds like the word is being scraped out of him, hoarse and deep, all dark heat. “It feels good. You don’t know how long I’ve wanted this.”
He rolls his hips almost imperceptibly, but you’re hyperaware of every motion, how close you are. Your breath stutters in your throat.
"I want you to feel good," he says. "I've wanted to feel you and taste you for so long. I want to learn everything about your body. I want to know what you feel like around me. Under me. On top of me. You make me feel so fucking good, you don't even know," and, oh, fuck, those words go right through you, settle deep in your belly, leave you breathless. Taehyung sucks at your pulse point and you melt, even as your skin feels like it's burning, so hot, every part of you so hot, so ready for him.
Taehyung’s big enough that you’re worried about how he’s going to fit, even if you’re slick and wet and so, so turned on—you know about the importance of lube, used it often enough by yourself, but when you mention it to Taehyung he just smiles.
“Don’t forget that I’m a sex android,” he says, and before you can ask exactly what he means by that, you feel the tip of his cock at your folds and the question dies on your tongue.
“Please,” is what leaves your lips. “Please, please, please.”
“Anything you want,” he says, and eases his hips forwards.
Slow, and hard, and wet, the head of Taehyung’s cock starts to press into you. You grab at his back, digging your fingers in; it doesn’t hurt, not exactly, a not-quite-pain as he pushes in—but it’s a lot, even if the slide is smooth, so smooth, from your own wetness and the slickness that covers Taehyung’s cock. Your eyes are wide and your lips are parted and it feels—astonishing, the way you can feel yourself open up for him, the way it feels like he’s filling every part of you, throbbing heat.
“Oh, oh God,” you gasp.
Taehyung’s forehead is pressed to yours, the loose locks of his dark hair framing his face as he waits, hips snug with yours. You shiver and move your hips a little, entire body seizing at the sensation of him shifting inside you. It's so new and alien, having someone nestled inside you, against you, so close in every sense of the term, above you, around you, inside you—but it feels… good.
And when he moves, it’s so, so slow. Slow and smooth as he works you open, even if you feel so tight around him. You drag your nails down his shoulder blades when he moves a little faster, a little roll of the hips that has you gasping all over again.
“More,” you say, and he gives you more.
You feel so full. You feel full of Taehyung, inside and out—the way his body is still pressing you down, skin on skin, how hot he is.
They call it making love, and it’s not until now that you really understand what that means—how you can feel Taehyung’s soft and tender affection in his every motion, read it in every shift of his body, the lines of his face, his lips; the way his eyes are dark but full of wonder, shining with love for you, pleasure singing through every inch of you, centred around Taehyung, Taehyung, Taehyung.
Each noise that falls from his lips is an echo of that love. Even when he leans back and takes you with him—settles on his knees, pulls your hips from the mattress to stay connected to you as your shoulder blades dig into the mattress, his cock in your cunt—there’s tenderness there, even if you’re both chasing mutual lines of pleasure. You feel almost dazed, dizzy with love and arousal, reaching out for him, and he catches your hand. The other stays at your waist, guiding you onto him, again and again, each roll of hips into yours.
“Taehyung,” you gasp, voice breaking on his name when he thrusts into you. He’s been increasing the pace, faster and sharper, harder, and it’s so-so-so much, so good. “I’m—Taehyung, I’m close, I wanna cum again, pleasepleaseplease—”
He lets go of your hand and then he’s thumbing at your clit and you’re cumming harder than you’ve ever cum in your life, Taehyung’s cock still hard and insistent inside you as you ride out your orgasm, pulsing around him. You’re gasping and making noises like you’re falling apart, and there’s something desperate in Taehyung’s eyes, something dark and wanton.
“Angel, I’m going to cum soon,” he says, and you moan in response, hazy. “Do you want me to pull out?”
You shake your head no. You want to know what it feels like, to have Taehyung lose himself inside you. You’re about to reach out for him when he hooks his hands under your knees and hitches your legs up—you suck in a sharp breath as he starts to move again, almost bent in two, his face so close to yours. It's not rough but something about Taehyung taking control like that has you baring your throat, arching your back and throwing your head back. The hold he has on you is firm, and you feel how it tightens as his thrusts speed up, and then, fuck—
When Taehyung cums it’s around the gasp of your name, a hitching sound as he empties himself inside you, throbbing and hot. You let out an answering sound, the two of you locked together until Taehyung pulls out, careful and slow; you feel like a sweaty mess, empty without him inside you, but then his hands are so carefully cupping your face and he’s kissing you over and over and over. It leaves you feeling breathless, all those little kisses, struggling for air by the time you part, every part of you lax under his loving touch.
“How are you feeling?” Taehyung murmurs, soft and sweet.
“Good,” you murmur back. And then your nose crinkles. “Sweaty.”
Taehyung laughs, quiet and low. You turn your face into the crook of his neck, hiding your smile as you breathe him in. You do feel sweaty, and there’s an ache settling inside you, but it’s a good ache. A glowing ache, an unfamiliar one, but one that you know you'll get to feel again, with Taehyung.
You’ve just leaned back to take him in all over again, painted syrupy sweet in the golden candlelight—when the lights suddenly turn back on. It floods your eyes and you make a noise of surprised pain as you squint against the sudden brightness, but then you start to giggle, shock melting into laughter.
When your laughter dies you realise Taehyung’s been watching you. The room is full of shining light now, and you realise you’re still naked, entire body shaking as you’ve been giggling. You’d feel embarrassed about your nakedness if you hadn’t just shared yourself with him, bared yourself in ways that are more than skin deep. There’s an instinctual part of you that wants to cover up now that there’s nowhere to hide, no flickering shadows to cover up the parts of your body that you don’t like, the flaws you don’t want Taehyung to see. But he just looks fond, fond, fond, love and affection dripping off him as he watches the way you smile shyly up at him.
“Hi,” you say.
“Hi,” he says, and smiles back, wide and bright.
You love him. You love him, and he loves you, and you trust that love. As hard as it might be to believe, you trust that this is what he wants—that you’re what he wants.
“Do you want me to carry you to the shower?” he asks, and you can’t help but laugh again, warm through and through, how he’s still taking care of you.
“Not yet,” you say.
You end up against his chest, wrapped close. You’ve laid your head in his lap countless times, but he’s never been on his back before, never had his arms around you like he doesn’t want to let go. Taehyung might not have a heart, but the thirium pump nestled in his chest beats steady as you stay nestled against his side.
You’re drawing little circles on his skin with your fingers when he catches that hand and lifts it to his mouth, presses a tender kiss to your fingertips.
“I love you,” he says.
You feel like liquid sunlight, shining happiness as you melt, melt, melt. And the feeling stays, body filled with it, even after Taehyung coaxes you out of bed and into the shower to wash the sweat off your body; when he drags a soapy loofah over your back you can’t help but laugh, so in love, so loved.
And when you fall asleep, it’s not with your head on Taehyung’s thigh. It’s with his arms around you, his chest to your back, his body curved around you. You don’t want tonight to end, but you also can’t wait for tomorrow, knowing that it’s another day with him, with Taehyung, your Taehyung. You never thought that love would be like this, never thought that you’d feel love like this, cared for and protected and loved, loved, loved.
“Not staying late?”
You pause in the process of shoving everything into your bag. Hoseok is leaning against your desk, a smile curling at his lips as he raises his eyebrows at you, almost suggestive.
“Nah, I’ve got a dinner to get to,” you say.
“You seem a lot happier lately,” Hoseok comments, and when you don’t fall for the bait, he wiggles his eyebrows. “The girls think that you’ve got a secret boyfriend that you’re too shy to tell anyone about.”
Taehyung still greets you every day when you get home. But now, every greeting is punctuated with a kiss—and sometimes a little more. When you stop to think about it, it’s startling, this thing that Taehyung’s taught you. That the simplest of things can turn into something more, love edged with lust, that it’s all part and parcel of loving someone, being with them, being comfortable with them. Just the other day you’d been reading on the sofa, and then Taehyung’s fingers had curved over your thigh and the tablet had fallen from your hands—
Hoseok clicks his fingers in front of your face. “You’re zoning out again,” he says.
“I am not,” you say, zoning back in. “I was thinking about if I needed to buy any food on the way home.”
“To feed that secret boyfriend of yours?” Hoseok says, and you laugh in his face.
“Definitely not to feed the rumour mill,” you say. Hoseok pouts but it’s good natured, and he waves you off with a smile, letting you leave the office without trapping you in an interrogation for the gossip you’re certain your coworkers are hungry for.
It’s your turn to cook for Yoongi and Seokjin, so you’ve got to get home to help Taehyung. Both men had been spectacularly unsurprised when they’d found out about the two of you. Yoongi had remained calm as Seokjin crowed in delight, proclaiming I knew it, I knew that’s why you were avoiding Taehyung.
“Feel lucky, Y/n,” Yoongi had said. “At least Taehyung has a sense of decorum and shame.”
“I think it’s a shame that my boyfriend is such a party pooper,” Jin had said. “I demand a dinner party! To celebrate your new relationship! Oh, I’m going to bake the biggest cake.”
“Oh my God,” you’d said, and Taehyung had just smiled.
The truth is that you’re grateful for your neighbours and their support, grateful for their friendship. Just because Taehyung looks human doesn’t mean that you don’t worry about him, worry that someone might discover that he’s a deviant; Jin’s slipped under the radar for long enough, and you hope it’s the same for Tae, too. And yet you can’t help but think about it, think about the present, the future, how your lives are going to unfold as time goes by.
When the door swings open to your apartment, though, that’s the last thing on your mind. All that’s on your mind is Taehyung, Taehyung, Taehyung, your love appearing just as you’ve kicked your shoes off, all bright pink hair and dark eyes and welcoming hands.
“Taehyung,” you say, warm and happy.
“Hi,” he says, smiling so brightly, and then he kisses you.
You’re never going to get tired of kissing Taehyung; never going to get tired of how his mouth fits against yours, so perfect and sweet. But then he crowds you against the wall, swallowing down your gasp before kissing down your neck, running his teeth so gently across your skin.
“Missed you,” he murmurs, words dripping hot and slow. “Been thinking about you.”
“Taehyung,” you breathe. “Taehyung, we need to cook dinner.”
“We have time,” he says, and when he picks you up, you don’t protest. You go easily, wrapping your arms and legs around him, heat already gathering in your stomach as he walks the familiar path to your bedroom.
You have time: today, tomorrow, and every day after that. You have time with Taehyung, to learn with him, to love him. To be loved back. You don’t know what’s coming on the horizon, what the future holds—but then again, you never have.
There’s one thing you know now, though. No matter what happens, Taehyung will be at your side, and you’ll be at his. He wants you, and he loves you. You want him, and you love him.
“I love you,” you murmur, and Taehyung kisses the words off your lips, lets the promise of your love settle inside him, warm and soft and safe.
“I love you too,” he says, and then you’re too busy to say anything, after that.
taglist: @beyoncesdragon @vensulove @jalexad @beingbeings @lorielulu7 (can’t tag: @jeon-joon-kook)
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A/N: HI! I rewrote these, because I hated them. Now you can expect a part two lol.
Synopsis: These are separate drabbles of Megumi x reader encounters where his dogs come and visit you when he’s getting it on. These are just progression encounters in an strangers to lovers timeline. I intend a part two, but here are the first five in the series.
All of the characters in this are aged up, despite still living on the campus of Jujitsu Tech. (They live in the teachers yard) I never really specify, but the readers job is to research the places sorcerers are to vacate curses from. They then hand the info over to ijich. They are called the Jujutsu Librarians.
One
Your cheeks coat in cold moist streaks. Your half asleep state chalks it up to a window left open, likely a November chill nipping your skin, but then its warm, then cold and wet. Licking.
You snake your hands around your attackers neck, pulling them into a snuggle, soft fur puffing between your fingers. You beg for five more minutes with a promise to give them all your attention at a waking hour, but as your mind begins to slip back into a blissful rest you are presented with two absolutes.
You are not home, and this is not your dog.
With a grog you have to fling yourself from a black dog leans on your side while another white on peaks at you from the foot of your bed frame. You’d ask who they belong to, but the red symbols on their foreheads tag them as Megumi’s.
The black dog weaves through your still packed suitcases hopping to your unoccupied side. You look around wondering why they could be here.
The only times you’d seen the pups was when they were hunting curses and from the look and feel of your surroundings their was none.
White dog pants onto your nose, slathering you in a slobber gooped kiss.
“oof,” you say, rubbing your nose, you voice caught between normal and sandpaper. “thanks for that, um-” you look around the shut window and door. “how did you?”
Behind your studio apartments door three knocks echo through the room pulling your and the dogs attention.
“Come in-”
Megumi peaks over the lip of the door, freshly showered hair dripping onto the rug. “hey,” His eyes find both butts of his dogs wagging at him as he steps inside. “I’m sorry about them. They uh- Tend to wander when not working.”
"it's fine. I don't mind the company,” you say, thinking about the millisecond of peace you felt in the animals familiarity. “My dog hasn’t yet arrived from my home country, so they’re being very comforting."
"right um-" he holds out his hands, the dogs dissipating from reality. He goes to turn before pausing in the doorway. “you’re the new librarian, right?”
You pull your pajama shirt straight wishing this wasn’t your first official meeting of the sorcerer. “At standing yes.”
He nods. “what is your name?”
“L/N.”
“Hm,” he says, “nice to meet you L/N, sorry again about the dogs.”
Two
Two days later, your suitcase sat half unpacked, but that was due to most of its contents being in the laundry hamper.
None of your few belongings you’d shipped from your home country had made it to your new living quarters. though you’d decided to spend more of your stipend on getting your dog properly vaccinated and flown. Though they have yet to arrive either.
Most Sorcerer’s and librarians took to renting apartments off Campus and using the provided studio apartment as personal offices. This meant only a few staff took on the responsibility of twenty four hour tenants. You, Megumi and Ijich and the other two librarians. You hadn’t a need for a ton of space and the studio apartment would fit you and your pet just fine, but what you hadn’t accounted for is the two new additions that made their way to you tonight.
The dip of your bed inched your attention from your work to the black and white dogs staring at you as the perch half on your bed.
“Good evening,” you say, pulling out a headphone and patting the space in front of you. Both the dogs hop up taking a place in each corner of your bed.
As the ring of your music fades, it is steadily replaced by a rhythmic thud. You pull out the other headphone, muffled moans and grunts accompanying the banging.
“Oh,” you whisper to the dogs with a giggle. “stay as long as you need.”
They take the invitation to heart falling asleep nearly instantly. an hour later or however long it took you to finish another locational curse debunk, both the the dogs heads shoot up in attention shaking the bed.
You pull out your headphone catching the last thud of a knock before your apartments door swings open.
Megumi’s head pokes around the corner, hair wet again. “Hey,” he says, with the hint of a smile, or that’s at least what it sounded like. You’d had yet to see the man smile, even during the day.
“Come in,” you say, scratching the butt fluff of the white dog.
He take a half step in, looking around the blank walls. The dogs hop off the bed circling his side before he dissipates them. “Thank you again, sorry about-”
You wave away the apology. “like I said, I like the company,” you reiterate, “Anyhow, I thought you had to summon your animals purposely?”
“uhm no,” he says under a synthetic cough. “I can, obviously, but its more about the release of energy-”
The noises that accompanied the dogs reappearance was answer enough, "yup got it."
He accepts the interruption, tapping the door frame. "Right, well thank you for keeping them entertained. Its kind of a turn off when they stare."
"I can imagine."
He takes a step away, but you hold out a hand. “Do they have names?”
He looks around like he was searching for the two dogs. “No, they don’t need one when working so I just never thought to give them one. Its not conducive to build attachments when I could lose them.”
It was a logic that only a sorcerer could trademark, but you didn’t press the issue, only nodding. He returns the gesture before dipping from your room.
.
Three
The apartment was slowly becoming a home. Once you’d gotten your first paycheck the blank walls seemingly began screaming at you to do something about them. After a few shots of liquid courage you opened your laptop and spent way too much money.
Never the less, now separating your bed from the kitchen area was a cubic bookshelf with all your curse books stacked in a checkered patterned. In two of the empty cubes a lamp and light wax warmer brought a softer glow to the room. Another two had a bin for your not yet arrived Dog food and a bin for their toys and in the last two were bins for your technology cords and the French press you’d bought your first night on campus.
Next on the list was better bedding and a better office chair. You glared at the metal non spinny chair that came with the room. It took two pillows and a hot rice pack to levitate the damage that bitch did on your spine every study session.
You’re in the midst of both admiring and reprimanding your design skills as something buckles one of your knees. You swivel around finding both the black and white dogs walking through your front door with wagging tails.
You look around listening for the familiar rhythmic pounding from the other side of the wall, but it was completely silent. Maybe he was alone this time.
Your mind wanders to an image of Megumi muffling moans between pinched lips, while grinding himself against a pillow. His hand cupping his- You shake away the thought counting how many times the dogs had visited you this week. Twice in the middle of the night, You’d used those warm sleeps as the excuse you needed to hold off buying a new comforter. That one time you were studying and once when you were in the shower. Megumi was right, it was weird when they stared. You counted four times. It was Tuesday.
Opting away from the train of though you crawl into bed with the dogs opening your laptop to start tomorrows work. It always seemed easier to focus with them here and having a distraction from your ever growing curiousness about Megumi’s sex habits was- needed.
A while your mind edges slumber the dogs draped over your lap, your laptop discarded somewhere off to the side. Warmth begins to take over your body before dissipating just as quickly. You reach out a hand, palm hoovering over the evaporating fur. “no,” you whine, “stay.”
A breathy chuckle sounds from the door. You’d have been more feverent to see Megumi’s smile if you weren’t so tired. The warmth of the dogs was gone leaving you with a chill your issued cotton blanket couldn’t cover. You pull your spine straight, stretching your arms above your head.
“Good evening,” you yawn, slumping forward.
“Sleep well?” He asks, leaning against your desk.
“hmhm, you were quiet this time, I didn’t even need my headphones.” your filter seemed to laugh at you as it allowed that diamond sentence slip from your mouth.
His slacked shoulders ridge. “Pardon?” he says, turning to the wall opposite your bed. Hs mouth slacks. “Oh- oh my God, I’m sorry-”
You wave a hand at him dismissively, peeling your headphones from your ears.
His expression is not convinced as you present the buds to him.
“I think I ought to be investing in a speaker system for you,” he sighs, “of noise canceling pads for me-”
You could actively see his mind begin to spiral. “Megumi,” You say over another yawn. “it’s fine. I study and sleep better with the dogs and music, so I think its an equal trade. My dog is being held at the border for another week anyways.”
He pinches his lips together like he’s decided something, but doesn’t argue. Instead he turns to the new furniture piece. “I uh-” he says awkwardly. “I like this.”
It was almost painful watching him grapple for small talk. His eyes stayed on the shelves like they would tell him anything to say next. “it smells nice.”
“Thanks.”
He clears his throat, nodding to you. You mirror the gesture before he hurries from the room.
.
Four
.
You’d read the same sentence the length of two songs, anything and everything catching your attention. The fading smell of your wax warmer, the temperature of your room, the dampness of your tongue, how much autotuned was used in this pop song. It was driving your sanity dangerously close to a cliff and you’d had half a mind to veer. This mission was less than twenty four hours away and you’d yet finished your diagnostic of its curse activity. You needed coffee, or tea, or a shot, but the more likely answer was water and a break to reset your brain. But those thoughts were in a language that you’d temporarily forgotten.
Wiggling your butt in your chair, your shoulders slouched over the desk. “The ReLund sanatorium-” you read aloud, just as something swivels your chair away from your desk.
A blur of white and black generate like a pixelated videogame at the curve of your knees. The black dog waists no time finding a place on your bed while the white dogs keeps your attention like it was a mission.
“Oh thank God,” you says, slipring from your chair. “I will break for you.”
Within one of the bins of your shelf you pulled out a rope meant for your dog whenever they get here. You’d been on the phone with customs every day this week, but they said one of the pups mandatory vaccines hadn’t yet shipped so the most they could do was send pics of the dog in daycare to easy your anxieties. It didn’t help, but in the meantime the toys should go to some use.
You held out the rope, but the dog gave you a stupefy look. “he’s never played with you, has he?” you say to the still nameless dog.
It took some convincing, but once the dog watched you stuff the toy into your own mouth a few times she got the hint. It wasn’t long until the black dog wanted to join and you continued until you were accidently dragged the length of your apartment by the rope.
You’d taken to letting them tug between one another and helped yourself to the leftover lunch Megumi had bought you to apologize for his recent revelation. The dogs had little interest in your food and you wondered briefly if they needed to eat. The white one held the rope between his mouth wringing it around.
You hated refering to them the way you had been. the white dog the black dog. It was at that moment you’d decided to sought out your own nicknames for them. It would be a reward for finishing your research.
Once back at your desk your research came to you like smooth wine. Behind the ambiance of snoring dogs you finally finished all of your reconnaissance.
Soon after soft taps sound at the door. Your spine arches in your chair as you strangle out a, “come in.”
Megumi walks in sporting his own mid stretch the hem of his shirt peaking a sliver of his stomach, “hey,” he says, not dissipating the dogs immediately as he usually would.
“Evening.”
“Did you get your studying done?”
You snap your laptop shut with a satisfying click. “yes, finally. I just finished sending the briefing to ljichi.”
You’d mentioned to him briefly you’d had more studying to do tonight, but it was nice that he’d remembered. He squats next to- Shadow? No, that wasn’t the right name. “So I guess,” he continues, “that I’ll have you to thank for keeping me safe tomorrow.”
You were never told which sorcerers you were doing the research for. Librarians were rarely given more information than location and which secretary to submit the information to. It felt forbidden to know where Megumi was going on his next mission, but you also suddenly felt the urge to double check your works.
“Don’t thank me,” you say, “thank these two. I’d have gotten squat done if they hadn’t kept me on track.”
“On track huh?” Megumi says, holding up the now destroyed dog rope. He smiled at the dog, scuffing Angel’s? ear. That didn’t seem right either.
I stand taking your discarded bowl and cup to the sink.
“Have you heard anything more about your dog?” Megumi asks, picking up a picture of you and (dogs name) lounging at your old place in matching pajama pants and bandana.
“They said it’ll be at least another few days. They had some medicine complications, but hopefully soon.”
“well, you’re welcome to mine until then.”
The offer made you smile. “how long will this mission last,” you ask, knowing the answer, you wrote the directions, but also, not wanting Megumi to leave yet.
“I was told a few days, but I’m sure you have a better guess than I,” he says, “why are you going miss the dogs that much?”
“Them too,” you say, ears immediately catching fire. Them too, bitch did you just say them too?!
You look up hoping he didn’t hear. He did. He offers a polite turn to the dogs, allowing you to spiral without his eyes.
You couldn’t tell which was worse the fact that you’d said that aloud or that he didn’t say it back.
“yeah, me too,” he says back.
I point to the wall ready to pick up my shovel once again. “But uh- hey, your noise things worked.”
At least now we were the same shade of ashamed.
“I haven’t gotten them yet,” he crokes, “I just-” he dissipates the dogs, “you mentioned that you study better with the dogs around.”
Fuck. It was another L you’d need to swallow dry. “That’s nice of you,” you mumble.
He stretches to his full height. “not a problem, you’re keeping me safe after all.”
“I hope things go well for you,” you conclude, “let me know how it goes when you get back?”
He nods, resting a hand on the door handle. “I will. Good night.”
“Goodnight.”
He leaves clicking the door closed and you puddle into yourself. Did you just tell him you’d miss him, he was getting better at quiet sex and that you wanted a progress report about his career all in the same breath? Now was as good a time as any to pass away right?
Interim
Two days into Megumi being away you’d thought so much about the last conversation you’d shared that embarrassment took more energy than just accepting your L and moving on. What was harder to move past however was the lack of dogs in your company. You’d been informed your pup was prepped and prepared to travel to you and that left only a few days until they were in your arms, but that didn’t stop the ache.
You’d wished more than anything that Megumi would get back soon even if it were to only see them. They didn’t come every night, but it was enough. Moving countries wasn’t going easy on you and knowing you’d done the briefing on the danger you’d sent your sole comforts into was eating you.
The meantime was not kind. Once your new duvet came in you’d taken to bundling your old one along your side to imitate the animals just to get to sleep. The newest Librarian from a different part of the US had taken to waking you up in the middle of the night to ask about cure terminology translation and each time he’d come you’d flown to the door hoping it was Megumi. It wasn’t.
Four days in began to worry. The mission you gave ljich your timeline which spanned about two days with a third for wiggle room, but four wasn’t warranted for the severity of the curse.
You’d tried soothing yourself with the idea that maybe Megumi had gone to visit some friends in the same prefecture or went sight seeing and wasn’t hurt in the woods somewhere. That comfort lasted all of a day.
Five
A knock at the door slowly pulls you from a grog you’d rather fall back into. You hadn’t the energy to answer any of the newest Librarians questions, whose name you still hadn’t learned, so you let the knocking continue.
After a few more thuds the room fell back into silence. You exhale, rolling over to a face full of fur.
Eyes popping open your met with the big doe eyes of the white dog. The black dog hops onto the bed laying where your imitation blanket stuffs under your comforter.
“Oh,” you exhale, scuffing their fur, “It’s good to have you back.”
From behind your door another soft knock sounds behind the door. You squint through the low light of only your salt lamp whisper shouting. “Come in.”
Megumi slips into the room, turning over his shoulder to close the door. “hey,” he whispers. “I’m sorry to wake you.”
You shake your head, hugging the dogs to you. “don’t be.”
He smiles at the sight of you with his dogs,. He weaves between the two boxes of your freshly shipped items, sitting on the corner of your bed.
“what time is it?” you ask, arching you spine in a deep stretch.
“Late, he admits, “or early. depending on if you’re a morning person.”
pulling the dogs into your lap you sit up. “How was the mission?” you ask.
Megumi sighs like he’s about to lie. “It went off without a hitch.”
“hm,” you say, looking over at the side of his face he’s tried hiding since he walked in. “that black eye says different.”
“That had nothing to do with you,” he says quickly, “we ran into an angry drifter on our way out. The curse was barley a two.”
You’d guessed as much. You’d garnered a reputation for making missions seem much worse than they were likely to be, just in case. “So you got your ass beat?”
“Got my-” his jaw slacks like he regrets being so comforting. “no- I just,” he turns sentences around in his mouth before huffing them out. ‘yeah, I got my ass beat.”
The two of you share a chuckle, but its rudely interrupted by knocking.
Megumi passes glances between you and the door. With a roll of your eyes the white dog makes a path for you to get up.
Behind the door the librarian stands with an open book. “I- I’m sorry,” he says, “I have like six more hours-”
you wave it away, egging on the question. He opens his notes app describing a curse. you leave him in the door way, taking a book from your shelf flipping to a section you know the information he’ll need is in. When you come back you see him and Megumi engaging in a stair down.
You take his phone, wedging it between the books pages, “page 463- 477 that’s what you’ll need to know.”
You don’t wait for more response before closing the door. Megumi doesn’t take his eyes away from where the librarian just was. “friend of yours?”
You teeter your head back and forth, slipping back into bed. “he’s the newest librarian. Seems they want one of us for every sorcerer.”
He readjusts his sitting position. “Does that mean you’re mine?”
Its in that moment you’re glad that its so dark in the room. “Yeah,” you say, “I think so.”
He smiles again. Its so hard to not want to keep it there. to make him smile again.
“have you heard anything about your dog?” He asks patting the black dogs butt.
“They’ll be here tomorrow.”
His smile falter a bit. “so you won’t be needing their company anymore?”
You tilt your head to him. “I’ll love their company whenever they are inclined to visit,” you say putting extra emphasis on inclined.
The thought of going back to only seeing the dogs or Megumi when he was having sex was saddening and you hoped it didn’t happen.
“I should probably get to bed,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’ll let them stay until I fall asleep.”
“Or you could stay.”
It wasn’t an offer he was expecting, but the shock of his face blends into contemplation.
“If you dissipate the pups for the night you can sleep here?” you gesture to your crumpled blanket person dog.
the silence seems to deafen you as he looks to the door then back at you. He dissipates the dogs, scooting in closer to you without a word.
Its awkward and so tense. You realize with a sickening retch that you two have never actually touched. Not even a handshake. Now he next to you. despite the little touch that was currently happening the intimacy of it was palatable.
“Oh,” you mumble over your shoulder. “I named your dogs.”
You feel Megumi chuckle beside you. “of course you did. Tell me in the morning.”
the honey of it fades with the slow rise and fall of Megumi’s breathing and you slip into blissful sleep.
.
A/n: what kind of dog do you think the reader should have?
If you like this content here is my Master List and Rules
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Hello lovely! I was wondering if I could request and f!reader x sherlock where the reader is very emotionally in depth (to the point where if someone is sad she feels it intensely) and since she is close friends with John and Sherlock due to Mrs. Hudson enlisting her to help clean up after them, she is very aware both John and Sherlock's emotional triggers and cues.
One day, Sherlock ends up having a break down and since the two are close she tries to help but his anger proves to be too much which in turn, flares up the readers anger and she rips him a new one. Maybe she ends up calling Sherlock out on how he tries to distance himself because he doesn't want to get hurt but it makes him a fool.
And he is shook lmaoooo- possibly really fluffy ending where she tries to storm out and Sherlock ends up pleading for her not to leave and they cuddle :) or a really angsty one? 👀
Feel free to ignore but if you don't, thank you for taking my request ♡
Pairing: Sherlock x female reader
Summary: Y/N is finishing her shift at 221b when Sherlock comes back and has a break down.
Genre: angst, kind of fluffy, reader insert
Song to listen to: say it all by liam payne
A/N: thanks so much for requesting this, momo peaches! I hope you enjoy it!
-
Empathy
An obnoxious ringtone playing from her phone, let Y/N know that it was the end of her shift. She set her cloth down, stopping her current task of cleaning the kitchen counters. She sighed, pouting. She was hoping that she would get to see Sherlock tonight. She had come to love their little chats together since she had started working as the housekeeper. She could tell that he was more open in confiding with her than with others. She felt they had grown close. Six months ago she had received a phone call from Mrs Hudson who offered her a job cleaning up after her tenant, Sherlock. She had cleaned many houses and flats before but never in all her time working as a housekeeper had she seen a flat so messy before. Many times she had a nasty shock when she looked in the fridge to find one of Sherlock’s latest experiments. But she didn’t mind so long as she could see him.
She wondered how he survived, seeing as from the state of his fridge it seemed that he didn’t eat at all. Whenever she saw him, she could feel his hunger as if it were her own. But when he was talking about cases she could also feel his intense happiness and glee that overpowered that hunger. It wasn’t long before she started making him meals, offering them to him if he was around when she was working or if not, she left them on the side table by his chair. She was pleased to see the next day, an empty plate.
The alarm continued to ring, bringing her out of her thoughts. Trying to find her phone amidst the crap on the dining table was going to be difficult. She had been specifically instructed by Sherlock to leave the dining table alone when she was cleaning. As she was rummaging, she heard a car door close outside. She glanced towards the window and saw Sherlock jumping out of a cab. And he was not happy. She could just tell from the way he crossed his arms, his tightly set frown and the way he rolled his eyes at the cabbie as he drove off. And the fact that he slammed the door on his way in. His sadness and anger pretty much overwhelmed her. She had to do something about it. Even if it was little. She hadn’t had time to make him any food this evening as the flat was in a dire state than usual. It didn’t matter if she worked a bit overtime. She set out, grabbing ingredients from the kitchen cupboards and fridge. She was able to tell what meals he liked the most by seeing how much he left on the plate and if he ate it all. She had determined over months that his favourite meal was chicken pie.
Sherlock entered the flat, slamming the door once again and slumped onto the couch, lied down and faced the wall. Trying to be cheerful, Y/N called out:
‘Hello! How was your day?’’
Sherlock ignored her, tutting.
Well, she had tried. For now, she would focus on making the pie but that was hard when Sherlock’s frustration was practically seeping from him. When she had finished, she sped over to Sherlock and put his food down on the coffee table in front of him. He remained facing the other way, once again disregarding her presence entirely. She tried once more, to see if she could get him to talk to her about whatever it was that was bothering him.
‘Bad day? Well, that’s nothing a nice home-cooked meal can’t fix, she said, smiling.
Once again, he said nothing.
‘Sherlock? I know I’m just the housekeeper but you do know you can talk to me about anything. You know what they say, a problem shared is a problem halved.’
Grudgingly, Sherlock sat up and turned and faced her.
‘Oh, are you? I would have thought you were a therapist with the amount of questions you’re asking. Stick to what you know, Y/N. You’re not my therapist, you’re not my friend. You’re just a person who cleans my flat. Now leave me alone.’’
Y/N froze on the spot, his words cutting through her like a knife. He watched her, wondering why she was still here.
‘Y/N I said get out.’
He returned to lying down on the couch.
Y/N snapped. She couldn’t hold in what she was feeling anymore.
‘You know what? FUCK YOU. How dare you treat me like that! I care about you, Sherlock. And you just trod on me like I was garbage. I’m much more than just the ‘person who cleans your flat’. I do so much beyond my job remit. I cook your meals, I do your shopping and I make sure you have someone to talk to so that you’re not stuck on your own in this flat consumed by your thoughts. It’s a damn miracle you’ve survived this long without me.’
Sherlock sat up, his jaw was agape. He had never heard Y/N this cross before...
‘And do I ask for anything in return? Nope. I pay for your shopping out of my own wages. I work so many more hours than I’m employed. I don’t even ask for a ‘thank you’. I’m just relieved to see you well and happy. I thought that we had become friends, but apparently not...'
Y/N didn’t mean to, but she started crying, tears streaming down her face.
‘Time and time again you do this. You push people away who try to help you. And maybe I should just let you. I’m so bloody sick and tired of it all. I try to help people who don’t want it. And why do I have to be the way I am. I can’t go anywhere without feeling other people’s emotions. It’s like I can’t have any emotions or time for myself. Everything is just too much. I feel like a weight pulling me down further and further down a hole and soon there will be no hope of me climbing out of it.
Y/N finally stopped her rant. And at the end of it, she looked so exhausted and run-down. Sherlock may have trouble recognising people’s emotions, but Y/N’s were clear. As soon as she had finished, she regretted what she had said. She couldn't speak to an employer that way! She just hoped that she wasn't going to get fired.
She wiped tears off her face and made her way over to the table, desperately searching for her phone that was still missing from an hour ago. All the while, purposefully not looking Sherlock’s way. She couldn’t bear to see his reaction. She became even more frustrated when she still couldn’t find it amongst the piles of papers, books and rubbish. She muttered, irritated:
‘Oh my god! Has my phone been swallowed by the void or something cause where the fuck is it?!’
She felt someone take hold of her wrist.
‘Sorry, Sherlock, I’ll be going as soon as I find my phone.’
His hand remained around her wrist.
‘Y/N look at me.’
‘I can’t. I’m so embarrassed.’
Sherlock pulled her to face him. Before she could say anything, he pulled her into a massive embrace. He simply whispered in her ear.
‘I’m sorry for being a massive twat. Of course, you’re more than my housekeeper. You’re my friend.’
Y/N melted into his arms, the weight of her worry and anxiety slowly lifting off her shoulders.
‘You’re not firing me, are you?’
Sherlock chuckled.
‘No, I’m not. Like you said I couldn’t survive without you!’
Y/N was so relieved, she had needed that hug a lot.
-
#sherlock fanfic#sherlock fic#sherlock fanfiction#bbc sherlock#sherlock bbc#sherlock x y/n#sherlock x you#sherlock x reader#sherlock holmes#sherlock holmes x you#sherlock holmes x reader#sherlock fics#sherlock au#sherlock reader insert#sherlock imagine#sherlock imagines#sherlock#bbc
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lullaby | j.b
pairings: jacob bae x reader
genre: neighbour au, strangers to lovers, kind of implied that you both are in college
summary: in which your new neighbour sings you to sleep every night since the walls in your building are so thin, and you fall in love with his voice
word count: 5.4k
series: sankyeom’s 2k followers celebration
note: yes i’m in love with jacob’s a to boyz video. yes it inspired this fic. yes i’m going through it.
masterlist
When your old neighbour moved out, you couldn’t be happier at the news.
The girl living in the apartment next to yours used to blast her music late at night and into the early morning, and she always kept you up. Sometimes she did it just for fun, other times she did it to overpower the sound of her arguing with her boyfriend. Either way, you would be up at night wanting nothing more than to go over to your neighbour’s apartment and break her door down as a form of revenge.
But you didn’t, because you quite liked your apartment and didn’t want to give your landlord a reason to kick you out.
Instead, you and your other neighbours filed enough noise complaints to the building’s owner until the girl moved out on her own accord. If you had to pinpoint the worst three months of your life, it would be the time when that girl lived next door to you.
Of course it wasn’t entirely her fault; your apartment building had hilariously thin walls. Her music wasn’t the worst thing you had heard through the walls, but it was certainly the loudest and most consistent thing that bothered you.
For a few weeks, the apartment next to yours was vacant, and you were able to relish in the silence that you had been dreaming about for so many gruelling nights. One afternoon after you came home from your day of classes to find the elderly lady who lives a few doors down for you peeking outside her front door.
“Hi Mrs Kim,” you greeted her with a wave. Her eyes flitted over to you and she offered you a smile. Mrs Kim was your favourite neighbour by far. She always brought you treats when she made too many and made sure to check in on you regularly since you lived alone.
“Hi dear,” she waved back, eyes crinkling as she realised it was you.
“What are you up to?” you wondered.
“I’m just spying on your new neighbour,” Mrs Kim informed you, stepping out of her door frame to speak with you.
You sighed. “Another neighbour?” you echoed, craning your neck to see them move in.
If they were interesting enough to peak Mrs Kim’s interest, you wanted to see them for yourself. Alas, all you could see were boxes and bags piled outside the open front door of the apartment next to yours, the new tenant nowhere in sight.
“I was just getting used to having some peace and quiet around here,” you recalled as an afterthought, wincing at the memories of your last neighbour. Although you had no personal issues with her, you were glad to see the self-absorbed music-blaster go.
“I know dear,” Mrs Kim gave you a sympathetic smile, thinking back to how tired and cranky you were a while back. “But he looks kind,” she offered. “He greeted me very nicely and he even has a guitar! How wonderful.”
“A guitar?” you repeated, frowning. “Not electric, I hope?”
Mrs Kim laughed. “Don’t worry so much, Y/n,” she told you, patting your shoulder in an endearing manner. “He was quite handsome.”
You rose an eyebrow. You had been at the hand of Mrs Kim’s attempted set-ups many times before. “And that’s my cue,” you laughed, saying your goodbyes to Mrs Kim and making your way to your apartment. As you took your keys out and started unlocking your door, curiosity got the best of you and you tried to peer into your neighbour’s apartment for a sign of him. “What are you doing,” you muttered to yourself, scolding yourself for invading your new neighbour’s privacy and entering your apartment.
You awoke from your nap to the sound of music.
“Not again,” you groaned, thinking it was your new neighbour in your sleepy state. Soon, you realised that it was just your phone ringing, and felt a little guilty for immediately blaming your neighbour without even meeting him once. “Hello?” you picked up the call.
“Y/N!” your best friend Changmin yelled into your ear.
“Dude,” you groaned. “Why are you using your outdoor voice?”
“This is my indoor voice,” Changmin exclaimed, surprised that you had found him so loud. “You act like you don’t even know me.”
“Oh, my apologies,” you mumbled, putting your phone on speaker just to get it away from your ear. “What’s up? You woke me from my nap.”
“Mrs Kim told me that you have a new neighbour,” Changmin said casually.
You narrowed your eyes at your phone. “When did you talk to Mrs Kim?”
“I saw her at the convenience store,” Changmin happily informed you. “She said she’d give you some brownies for you to pass on to me in the next few days.”
You laughed at this. “How can you charm everyone around you, including the old ladies that live on my floor?”
“Never mind that,” Changmin dismissed. “New neighbour? What’s he like?”
“I don’t know,” you got out of bed to draw your curtains, letting what was left of the sunset brighten your room. You had fallen asleep while studying, and thus hadn’t set an alarm. “I haven’t met him yet.”
“Mrs Kim says he’s cute.”
“Mrs Kim says everyone is cute,” you scoffed. “That woman is a saint.”
“Alright, that’s fair,” Changmin giggled. “Why are you napping this late? You won’t be able to fall asleep tonight if you nap for so long.”
“I know,” you hummed, stretching out and relishing in how relaxed you felt after your nap.
Your best friend was right, though. Whenever you napped in the late afternoon, you always struggled to fall asleep again that night. Of course, this wasn’t a problem when your monstrous neighbour blasted her music every night anyway, but once she left naps and a good night’s sleep were finally possible for you.
“Maybe my new neighbour will play me a lullaby on his electric guitar,” you joke.
“He has an electric guitar?”
“I don’t know,” you admitted. “Mrs Kim says he carried a guitar into his apartment. I haven’t heard him play yet so I don’t know what kind. But I’m delighted to hear it.”
Changmin snorted. “Really?” he asked in disbelief, having been on the end of some rants about you possibly kidnapping your previous neighbour and threatening her to move out.
“Sure,” you exclaimed. “As long as he plays it during hours of the day where I want to be awake, I have no problems what-so-ever with a little rock and roll.”
“Hilarious,” Changmin said sarcastically. “Anyway, did you finish your Chemistry study guide?”
“Is that why you’re calling?” you wondered. “Pretending to be curious about my new neighbour just to steal my hard work and Chemistry notes.”
“You caught me,” Changmin said happily, no shame in his voice. “So?”
You flipped through your notes to see where you go up to before falling asleep. “Yeah I finished them. I suppose you want my Econ notes when I’m done with them too?”
“Forget Mrs Kim, you’re the real saint,” Changmin said in lieu of an answer.
“No need to butter me up, I’ve already agreed,” you rolled your eyes, grinning at your best friend’s antics. “I’ll text you pictures later.”
Once you said your goodbyes, you made your way into the kitchen to turn on the kettle for a hot drink before wandering back into your room to search for a sweater. Once your water was boiled, you made yourself a drink and snuck back into your bed to burrow under the covers and finish studying.
As you took a sip of your drink and flipped through your Economics notes, you heard the faint timbre of an acoustic guitar. Pausing, you stopped your actions and sat up straight, as if this would amplify the sound more so you could hear it.
You guessed your new neighbour didn’t have an electric guitar after all.
The warm chords that you could make out were soothing and whimsical, and you allowed yourself to get lost in your neighbour’s playing for a moment. Deciding that it would make good background study music, you set aside your headphones in favour of listening to your neighbour play his guitar.
Soon, you were already finished with your Economics study guide so you snapped a few pictures of them and sent them to Changmin, along with your study guide for Chemistry too. A quick glance at the clock told you that you had been studying for an hour and a half after napping, meaning that your neighbour was persistently playing for just as long.
Just as you started considering what movie to watch to kill time so you could feel tired enough to go to sleep, soft singing started to accompany the guitar playing coming from your neighbours’s apartment. His voice was rich and tender at the same time; filled with emotion and lyrics close to a mumble in terms of enunciating. Something about his voice made your heart flutter, just slightly. If you thought he was a good guitar player, you thought he was a phenomenal vocalist.
Rather than watching a movie, you tucked yourself into bed and went on your phone to scroll through social media for a while, just listening to the sound of your neighbour’s voice and the music he was playing.
It didn’t take long before your eyes started to feel heavy; lulled to sleep by the timbre of your neighbour’s voice and the warmth of the covers on your bed. Thanking your past self for already setting your alarm for your classes the next day, you were soothed into a deep sleep despite the fact that you took a lengthy nap that afternoon.
The next morning, you felt as though you had never slept so well in your entire life.
Your bed was almost impossibly cosy and you had to seriously motivate yourself to get out of bed and head to your lectures for the day. After getting ready and dressed for the day, you wrapped a scarf around your neck to fend against the biting cold autumn air. As you exited your apartment, you couldn’t help but linger your gaze on your neighbour’s door, wondering if he was still inside or if he had already left.
“He’s gone,” you yelped as Mrs Kim’s voice startled you out of your stare. She stood as if she hadn’t scared you, unfazed by your reaction. “He left two hours ago.”
You put a hand on your chest in an attempt to calm its erratic beat. “Mrs Kim,” you greeted. “You scared me.”
Mrs Kim ignored you, smirking knowingly at you. “So you saw him then?” she assumed. “You must have, if you’re looking at his door like you want him to come out of his apartment.”
“I didn’t see him yet, Mrs Kim,” you denied with a small smile. “I was in my apartment all night and I’m only just leaving now,” you added.
“Then why’re you staring?” she asked, bending down to pick up her cat from the floor.
“Just curious,” you said, which wasn’t entirely a lie. You wanted to know exactly who had sung you a lullaby that was so sweet it put you right to sleep. “Is he really that handsome, Mrs Kim? Not only did you tell me but you told Changmin about it too.”
“He’s very handsome,” Mrs Kim insisted, pushing a container into your arms with her free hand. “Speaking of your charming friend, that’s for him.”
The container had cut up brownies in it, and you almost laughed at how well Changmin and Mrs Kim got along. “Thank you Mrs Kim, I’ll be sure to give them to him today,” you promised, making your way down the hall and rushing to the bus stop so that you wouldn’t miss the last bus that would get you to college on time.
Somehow, it felt as though your new neighbour was avoiding you.
Either that, or the two of you just kept missing one another. Any time you had to leave, you could still hear him milling around his apartment. The only times you ever heard his front door open was when you were just getting home, or had no intention of leaving. Even Changmin, who was a social butterfly and constantly fluttered in between your friends’ places, never saw your neighbour when he came by to visit.
Without a fail, your neighbour played the guitar and sang every single night.
Sometimes he would play during the day as well, but he only ever sang at night. You assumed that he figured he could sing at night so that nobody else heard him, unaware of the paper-thin walls that separated your apartments. You wondered if it was because he was being courteous, or if he was just shy about singing when other people could hear. Either way, you definitely credited your neighbour to being the reason that you fell asleep peacefully every night.
You never had trouble falling asleep in general, but you mostly had very restless nights of sleep, even in the complete silence you heard when your neighbouring apartment was vacant.
Something about your neighbour’s voice just relaxed you to the point where you slept like a little baby.
The first time you met the owner of said voice, you were running late for class and cursing Changmin on the phone as he laughed at your misfortune. He had been teasing you all week about a presentation you were nervous about, saying that you were so well-prepared that the only thing that could mess it up was you missing the class entirely.
Then your alarm didn’t go off and you woke up half an hour later than you usually would on that day.
“Ji Changmin, you’re an ass,” you fumed, pulling your coat on as you opened the front door of your apartment. “You must have cursed me or something, or at least you spoke it into existence. I don’t know but if you don-“
“I’m so sorry!” a familiar voice exclaimed upon your impact with another body. Two hands reached out to steady you and prevent you from falling over, and your eyes met those of a brown-eyed man.
A beautiful, beautiful, brown-eyed man.
“Are you okay?” he asked, since all you had done since the two of you collided was stare at him. “You’re not… concussed, are you? Can you get concussed by bumping into someone?”
“I don’t think so,” you breathed out, taking in his sharp features and large, kind eyes. “I’m sorry. That was definitely my fault, I was rushing, and yelling at my friend,” you tried to explain, but were interrupted when he laughed.
“No harm done,” he assured you, a shy smile appearing on his face. “I’m Jacob. I just moved in next door, actually,” he introduced himself.
Jacob. Mrs Kim was right, he was very handsome.
“Hi Jacob,” you replied, holding out your hand for him to shake. “I’m-“
“Y/n, right?” he stated. At your surprised expression, Jacob only shrugged. “I talked to Mrs Kim from a few doors down. She told me all about you.”
“Oh gosh,” you laugh, covering your face with a hand. “I hope not everything. She’s seen me at my worst, let me put it that way.”
“All good things,” Jacob assured you in his velvety voice. “She speaks really highly of you. Says that you’re smart, kind, and that you have great taste in friends.”
You grin. “Ah, yes. My best friend seems to have charmed his way into her heart. That’s why he gets brownies in a Tupperware and I don’t,” you informed him. “I’m sure you’ll get there too.”
“I sure hope so,” Jacob nods. “I’m a terrible baker and brownies sound really good.” The two of you shared a laugh. “You said you were in a rush, right?” he seemed to recall, causing your eyes to widen.
“Yes! I need to run. I need to catch a bus, like,” you glanced at the time on your phone, realising how late you were and that you were still on a call with Changmin. “Twenty minutes ago.”
“Good luck,” Jacob smiled, waving at you as you said your goodbyes.
“Nice meeting you!” you called back to him, starting to jog down the staircase before bringing your phone up to your ear.
“Jacob, hm?” Changmin’s voice teased you.
“Watch it, Ji Changmin,” you warned. “You’re on thin ice already. Save me a seat!”
Other than being sung to sleep by him every night, your relationship with Jacob pretty much ended at your first meeting. The two of you always exchanged pleasantries when you passed each other in the hallway, and he had once informed you that he really had reached brownie-level friendships with Mrs Kim, but nothing beyond that.
You couldn’t say that you were surprised, considering how the two of you had such different schedules and you kept missing one another, but you somehow felt a little disappointed.
It felt a little bit like the two of you already knew each other, as you heard him sing every single night; hearing the emotion and vulnerability in his voice with every song. But you knew nothing about each other.
After a particularly gruelling day of your Chemistry lab class, you dragged your feet up the stairs to your apartment, feeling utterly exhausted and worn out by your class.
Your lab partner was the absolute worst. He was one of those types that thought he knew everything better than you because he was a Chemistry major, and he belittled you about every single step in the lab. Most of what he was saying was wrong, but he wouldn’t listen to you because he was sure he was right.
Half a semester later, you had just gotten your midterm back and found out that you failed because the data from your experiments were incorrect, and your professor couldn’t give you full credit for any of your answers. Frustrated tears built in your eyes as you made you way to your apartment door, rummaging through your bag for your keys.
“This can’t be happening,” you whined when you realised that your keys were nowhere in your bag, and you had left them in your apartment that morning. “Seriously? Today of all days?” you exclaimed, wiping your cheeks to dry your tears as you headed for Mrs Kim’s apartment to see if she was home. You had entrusted her with a spare key to your apartment since you knew you couldn’t take care of it yourself, and becomes she was so close by.
Realising she wasn’t home, you trudged back to your apartment and sunk onto the floor, burying your face in your knees and letting out a sob. Your day had been mentally and physically exhausting enough without having to wait outside your apartment, in the cold autumn air, to anticipate Mrs Kim’s return so you could enter your apartment.
The door next to yours opened slightly, a soft, concerned voice calling out to you. “Y/n?” Jacob asked quietly, wondering why you were outside. When he noticed your crying, he immediately stepped outside and knelt in front of you. “Are you okay? What happened?” You could only sob in response, not having it in you to explain your situation to him. “Why are you crying?” sniffling, you managed to raise your head and point weakly at your front door.
“You’re locked out?” he guessed, earning a nod. “Okay, let’s go to my place,” Jacob offered you, holding his hand out to help you up. “I just made hot chocolate, and I have Disney Plus so we can watch something while you wait for Mrs Kim,” he paused when you didn’t say anything. “Technically, it’s not my Disney Plus account, but I have my friend’s password. He subscribed just to watch the Beyonce album film,” you laughed tearfully, which Jacob considered a success.
“I don’t want to bother you,” you admitted in a quiet voice, slightly raw from your crying.
“You? Bothering me?” Jacob exclaimed. “Never. Now c’mon. Our hot chocolate’s getting cold.”
Grateful for his kindness, you accepted his outstretched hand and let him pull you to your feet, gently ushering you into his apartment and closing the door behind you. He motioned for you to take a seat on his sofa and you did so, taking off your coat and scarf as you adjusted to Jacob’s warm apartment.
“Here,” he placed two mugs of hot chocolate on the coffee table in front of you, taking a seat on a sofa next to you but giving you some space. You mumbled a quiet thank you before sipping on the hot drink, savouring the way it warmed your insides.
Spotting his guitar leaning against the wall next to the TV, you cocked your head in curiosity to see what it looked like. It was made of a light brown, almost yellow, wood and looked like it was treasured by Jacob. Not only was it in perfect condition, it also looked like it had been used for years already. You silently wondered how long he had been playing it for. “Do you play?” Jacob asked, noticing where your eyes were looking.
Shaking your head, you told him that you didn’t. “You’re really good, though,” you complimented before you could realise what you were saying.
Jacob blinked at you, eyes wide and lips pursed in surprise. “Me?” he echoed. “You’ve heard me play?”
Feeling stupid, you only nodded, sipping more of your hot chocolate as an excuse to think about what you wanted to say. “Um, yeah. Walls are kind of thin around here.”
Jacob blushed. “I’m so sorry,” he apologised. “I play until really late at night most of the time. I even-“ he paused, realising you had heard him sing. “I even sing,” he whispered, eyes flitting to the ground as his cheeks reddened further.
“You’re really good,” you complimented. “At singing, too.”
Jacob shook his head. “It must be annoying.”
“Not at all,” you denied. “My last neighbour used to blast angry-girl rock music. Now, I have nothing against angry-girl rock music, but I do when it’s being played at an ear-splitting volume into the early hours of the morning. That’s annoying. Your singing… It’s more like a lullaby,” you finished your thoughts in a whisper, shy at your explanation.
“Really?” Jacob was shocked.
You hummed in agreement. “I’ve never slept so well in my life,” you admitted with a small smile.
“Oh,” Jacob sipped on his mug to stop a huge smile from taking over his features. After meeting Mrs Kim for the first time, he was intrigued to meet the person she was speaking so highly of. When he ran into you, he felt flustered and excited because you were even more stunning than he could have imagined from Mrs Kim’s description. “I’m glad I helped, then. Even though the idea of you hearing me is mildly humiliating.”
“What!” you exclaimed, louder than you had intended to. “Why would it be humiliating? Your singing is… I can’t even describe it with words. It’s beautiful, Jacob.”
“You think so?” he asked in a disbelieving tone. Your eager nod made butterflies flutter in his stomach. “Thank you. That actually means a lot.”
“You don’t seem to believe me,” you observed.
“I’m not that confident in myself, or my playing,” Jacob explained awkwardly. “I’m more the quiet type, so it’s not so easy for me to put myself out there when it comes to music. I want my music to mean something to other people, and it’s how I communicate best, so…”
“Well, I can confirm first-hand that you’re amazing,” you offered. “I might not be as great of a musician as you, so my compliment might not mean anything to you, but I really believe it.”
Jacob bit his bottom lip, deciding to nod in response to your words, too shy to say much else. You took his reaction as a sign that he didn’t want to continue the conversation anymore, so you focused your attention back onto your hot chocolate. “Do you want to watch a movie?” he offered.
“I would love to leach off of your friend’s Disney Plus account,” you agreed, referring to how Jacob ranted a little about his friend. Jacob grinned, getting up to hang your coat and scarf up for you before he turned the TV on.
Being with Jacob in a more casual state was more fun than you had expected.
Once the two of you warmed up to one another, you found that Jacob was actually really goofy and fun when he got comfortable with you. He made terrible puns about the characters in the film you decided on, and his laugh made you want to squeal because he was so adorable.
Halfway through your second movie, you had fallen asleep as a result of the hot chocolate that had deliciously warmed your body, and the exhaustion from your emotional day. When Jacob noticed, he took one of the throw blankets form his bedroom and gently placed it over your body, getting up from the sofa to let you stretch out and get some rest.
The few times you woke up after falling asleep, you were lulled back to sleep and relaxed by Jacob’s soothing guitar playing and singing. Despite being tired, you were awake long enough to be pleased that Jacob seemed comfortable enough around you to play for you while you were still in his apartment, instead of just waiting until you left.
The next morning, you woke up to the sound of Jacob’s sweet voice gently calling for you to wake up. After opening your eyes, you saw Jacob kneeling in front of you with a bright smile and ruffled hair. “Hi sleepyhead,” he greeted, handing you a cup of tea. You sat up, rubbing your eyes with one hand and accepting the mug with the other. “Mrs Kim came by to drop off your key,” Jacob said. “I texted her last night.”
“Thank you,” you replied, surprised that he had gone out of his way to contact Mrs Kim when you were an emotional wreck who had forgotten all about it.
“She also said to wake you before noon because you have classes in the afternoon and you hate rushing,” Jacob added in thought, passing your spare key from Mrs Kim over to you. “Seems a little ironic since you and I seem to only ever meet when you’re rushing.”
You laughed at this. “What can I say, you always catch me on a good day,” you joke. “But seriously. Thank you. You really helped me out last night, I don’t know how I can repay you.”
Jacob waved you off. “No repayment needed. I’m just happy to get closer to you after being your neighbour for over a month already.”
His large smile was one that you hoped you’d be seeing more of. “Has anybody ever told you that you’re an angel?” you wondered, resting your head on your hand as you observed Jacob’s face. The fluttery feeling in your stomach didn’t surprise you anymore, not after he had saved you the night before. “Like an actual angel. Now that I’ve gotten to know you better, I think I see your wings.”
A giggle escaped the man next to you. “I’ve actually heard that before,” Jacob admitted sheepishly.
“I’m not surprised,” you hummed, sipping on the warm tea Jacob made for you. “What time is it?”
“Just after eleven,” Jacob recited. “Do you have to get going?”
You nodded, finishing up your cup of tea. “I do, unfortunately. I have to go see my Chemistry professor and do some serious begging and grovelling.”
“Sounds rough,” Jacob gave you a sympathetic smile. “Well, I had a really good time last night.”
You smiled back easily, unable to hold it back. “I had a really good time last night too,” you assured him. “I really can’t thank you enough.”
“Stop,” Jacob laughed. “Don’t even think about it. I was happy to have you over.”
“I was happy to finally hear your playing in person,” you replied. “I only really heard it in and out of sleep, but I was still glad to hear it. Also,” you paused, unsure if you were going too far.
“Also,” he echoed, curiosity piqued.
“You said last night that you wanted your music to mean something,” you recalled. “It does mean something. To me, at least. It actually means a lot.”
“I think I can see those angel wings you’re talking about,” Jacob said. “Except they’re on you.”
“Very funny,” you laughed, getting up and finding your coat. “I really need to get going, though.”
“Okay,” Jacob nodded, walking you to the door. “I’ll see you around?” he offered, insecure that you wouldn’t want to spend more time with him.
“I’ll see you soon,” you corrected, flashing him a wink before you let yourself out. Jacob closed the door behind you and you let yourself sigh in delight, relishing in the evening you had together the night before.
“What are you doing walking out of your hot neighbour’s apartment?” you jumped, surprised by Changmin’s sudden presence at your front door. He held out a take-away cup of coffee for you.
“You scared me,” you told him, ignoring his comment as you accepted the coffee.
“Don’t act like you didn’t hear me,” Changmin scowled, following you into your apartment after you unlocked your door. “You came to school in those clothes yesterday. Did you hook up with your cute neighbour? Jacob?”
“You ask so many questions,” you complained, making your way into the bathroom to wash your face and brush your teeth. “No, I didn’t hook up with Jacob. I locked myself out and he graciously took me in for the evening, despite my emotional ugly-crying.”
Changmin laughed. “You would go stay at your hot neighbour’s house after having the crappiest day in the world,” he said, pleased at the outcome.
“Thanks, Changmin. Now I need to change so that I have enough time to beg our Chemistry professor to let me do extra-credit assignments so I don’t fail the class,” you added, feeling gloomy about what happened with your midterm the day before.
“Sure, sure,” Changmin nodded, taking a seat on your sofa and taking his phone out.
You made your way to your bedroom to change your clothes, going as quickly as possible so that you still had time to neaten your hair a little. When a knock sounded through your apartment, you called out to Changmin to open the door for you.
“Oh, hi!” you heard your best friend say in his usual chipper tone. “You must be Jacob! I’ve heard so much about you,” at the sound of Jacob’s name, you dropped your hair brush and rushed to the front door, where Changmin was smirking at your neighbour.
“Hey,” you greeted. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Jacob assured you, glancing nervously at Changmin, who was still grinning at him.
“Could you give us a minute?” you asked Changmin, raising an eyebrow at his blatant eavesdropping. He sighed, sad that his fun was over, before he walked in the direction of your kitchen. “What’s up?” you smiled at Jacob.
He took a deep breath. “Would you want to get dinner some time?” he asked, tapping his foot as a nervous habit.
His question both surprised and delighted you. “Like a date?” you asked, hiding your smile.
“Like a date,” Jacob confirmed. “If you want.”
“I want,” you agreed, showing your smile. “I want a lot.”
“Great,” Jacob sighed, relieved. “I want a lot, too.” You giggled at how strange the two of you sounded.
“If you guys are going to start kissing, I suggest you do it now because we have to go,” Changmin called from the kitchen, ruining the moment.
Jacob pointed in Changmin’s direction. “He’s not coming to dinner, is he?” he asked.
You grinned. “Absolutely not.”
“How does tonight sound?” Jacob suggested. “Or is that too eager of me?”
“Just eager enough,” you assured him. “Pick me up at seven?”
“Sure thing,” he agreed, beaming as he stepped out of your doorway to go back to his apartment.
“I hope you don’t get lost on your way to my apartment,” you teased. “It’s awfully far from yours.”
“I’ll just follow the sound of your wings,” he called, waving before he disappeared into his apartment.
Dinner. You liked the sound of that.
note: second fic in my 2k celebration series!! i know that this fic and the last didn’t end with a kiss or a relationship but i still think the ending is cute, i hope it satisfies you!
#the boyz#the boyz imagines#jacob#jacob imagines#jacob x reader#the boyz x reader#the boyz scenarios#the boyz fanfic#tbznetwork#jacob bae#the boyz drabbles#the boyz fic#the boyz au#2k celebration#fic: lullaby#deobiwritersnet
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It's the Lease I Can Do
Platonic! Weasley Twins x Reader
BG: The Weasley twins are so close to having their joke shop become a reality. They had found the perfect location but they had hit a minor problem that could cause them everything. You want to help, but how can you when they, the birthday boys themselves had given up?
a/n: I had this idea for a almst a year now and waited til ther twins bday to write it. I hope you enjoy.
WC: 2111
>>>MASTERLIST<<<
Fred and George causing a ruckus in the common room is a daily occurrence that everyone is accustomed to. However ever since the start of Year 7, the amount of commotion these two had caused can be counted in one hand.
At first glance, it could be attributed to NEWTS or in this year's case-to a pink toad acting as High Inquisitor. Still, more and more nights the twins had claimed the back corner of the common room.
~
The last remaining batch of students were making their way through Filch's checkpoint (an added security protection which also serves for Umbridge having a list of names on who comes in and out of Hogwarts). You glanced down at your watch- 2:27pm, they’re late. Weird, the twins never pass a chance to go to Hogsmeade.
You hear the castle door open behind you. Thank Merlin, you thought but instead you were greeted with a disheveled Angelina. “I’m coming! Wait!”
“Have you seen Fred and George?” You called as she ran past you.
“I think I saw them in the common room!” Angelina shouted back.
The common room? “What are they up to now?” You sighed. Stomping heavily up the stairs. “Ditching me….”
~
“Oi Weaslebees! I know you’re in here!” You rounded the corner of their secret spot. “AHa!”
You caught them red handed, midway into shoving papers into their “Weasley & Weasley'' Trunk. Though what they were hiding, you weren't exactly sure.
“Y/N!” Fred greeted, grabbing onto your shoulders, effectively covering George and the table. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”
Narrowing your eyes at him. “Really?” Hands on hips you blatantly say “2:15 am, courtyard?? Ring any bells?” Fred shook his head.
Meanwhile George’s head shot up. “Oh shit, y/n we’re so sorry!”
Fred turned to his brother, still clueless on what the heck George was talking about.
Abandoning the trunk, George gave his twin a classic smack on the head. “Hogsmeade, you idiot! We were supposed to all go together.”
“OHHHH FU--” Fred knew he was screwed. “I’M SO SORRY! WE’RE SORRY.” Seizing the messy trunk, he strategized. “Right, here’s the plan: I’m gonna quickly drop this off back in the dorm while you two make your way to the gate. If you run, I guess you can make it. I’ll catch up with you two then.”
“Fred….. We’re not gonna make it” you argued.
“Not if we don’t try.”
“It’s almost 3, Filch would be closing the gates by now.” You sat down on Fred’s empty seat. “Besides we can go to Hogsmeade next time, we could just hang out here. I miss having my best lads around.”
“Awww…we’ve been upgraded from annoying pricks to best lads!” Gushed George, pulling you into a side hug.
“Yea, I could help in whatever it was you guys were doing before I came. I don’t mind.”
At that, you could feel George tense up, his arm around you dropping. “Uhhh…” He looked to the older twin, silently conversing.
You gaze between the boys, sometimes they get so caught up in their scheming that they don’t notice that to others, especially those who had known them for years that their non verbal communication is not so sly.
In the end, Fred gave his brother a subtle shake. “No, that’s alright. I’ll just put this back and we could play gobstones or something, anything you like.”
As Fred headed up to his dorm room, you noticed a piece of paper under the table. Picking it up, the header caught your eye. RE: Lease Agreement. Were the twins looking for a new home after graduation? You didn’t mean to pry. You were close friends, they would tell you if they were moving right? This is big news….you decided to brush it off until another line caught your attention. The shop premise located at Number 93 Diagon Alley. Shop? They are trying to set up shop? That’s brilliant! The twins would get to showcase their inventions to the world! You could feel your pride swell. Leasing Agreements would not proceed if tenants, Mr. Fred Weasley and Mr. George Weasley, are unable to provide an endorser by the date of 31st of March.
“Where’d you get that?” George standing across from you, gobstones on one hand and another pointing at the document. There’s no backing out now.
“It was under the table.” You explained. “I didn’t know you were this far along with the shop.”
“Yea, well it’s not happening now is it?”
“What?”
“Cmon y/n. I know you read it.”
“I didn’t mean to-”
“It’s alright. We aren’t getting the place anyway.”
“Wait what? Why?”
“No endorsers.” George stated matter of factly but you sense the pain in his voice.
“How about your parents surely-”
George laughed. “As if mum would suddenly have a change of heart. You knew how she disapproves of our inventions, calling it a waste.”
“Arthur then.”
“Mum won’t let him.”
“Anyone then?” George huffed in defeat. “How about me! I could back you up.”
“You have to be an adult with a proven financial stability.” He stated, effectively shutting you down. “Forget it y/n. The hold ends in 3 days. We’ve tried everything. Just don’t let Fred know that you know. He’s devastated. Promise?”
“I promise.”
“And no pity, sad eyes!” He added as footsteps are heard descending the staircase.
“But I suck at poker faces!”
“Then let’s hope that Freddie is distracted even to not notice.”
~
It’s been 4 days since you had sent the letter to your father.
“Dear papa,
I know that this is a huge favour to ask but I believe it would be worth your while.
So remember back in the summer when you caught Fred Weasley, George Weasley and me snooping around with the Extendable Ears but let us go because you were so enamored?
Well turns out the twins and trying to get a shop up and running! How amazing is that?
The only problem is that they need an endorser to back them up in order to proceed with the lease agreements. The are currently on hold for the Shop Number 93 in Diagon Alley until the 31st.
This is where the huge favour comes in. Could you please be their backer? You did say that you’d love to help in some part in their invention, be an investor of sorts. Please papa. I would love to do it myself but I have to wait a couple more months to qualify. Plus it’s their 18th birthday on April 1st. Imagine their surprise if it were to come through.
I’d love to hear from you soon, regardless of your choice.
Your favourite child
y/n.”
The twin’s 18th birthday was spent with absolute love and madness.
Lee had unloaded his stash of butterbeer and firewhiskey, Fred had slipped Angelina with one of their new prank inventions- which changes the person into a sickly color of vomit green, a perfect way to ditch class or events.
Upon learning that the color would last for a few days and would only fade with the ingestion of an antidote, antidote that George said they still had yet to create. Angelina (understandably) threw cake at them. The Gryffindor chaser with perfect aim, hits its mark. However, Fred using his beater skills, instinctively blocks the incoming cake.
Resulting in a wide splat zone. Fred’s arm was covered in frosting, having sprayed everyone around him in whipped cream during the impact. George wasn’t safe too, despite being across from Fred, the rebounce of the cake had made him the new target.
You had just changed into your pajamas when a tapping sound came from your window.
Your family owl, Lanny, was outside carrying a large yellow envelope.
Quickly letting him in, you gave Lanny a gentle pat and brought out some owl treats for the tired bird.
Unscrolling the note tied to his leg, you begin to read.
“My dearest y/n,
My sincere apologies for the late reply, it’s been quite hectic at work.
In regards to your favour, you need not worry. Everything is taken care of. I had met with the landlord of Number 93 Diagon Alley and had all the documents settled. I had also gone and checked to make sure the two lads aren’t being ripped off. Fred and George had picked a nice prime location.
Greet them a happy birthday for me alright? And tell them that I look forward to witnessing them succeed in their endeavors.
They would undoubtedly be bringing a lot of much needed joy into these darkening times. The people would be thankful for them.
I also had Lanny bring the twins’ copy of the Lease Agreement.
I can’t wait to see you all soon.
Much love,
Papa.”
~
Fred was grateful that their friends had retired into the night, leaving him and George to sulk into the dreadful reality.
“We were this close Georgie, this close!” Fred winced, pinching his fingers close without touching.
“I know but there was nothing else we could have done.” consoled George but even he himself was having a hard time. Number 93 was the perfect location for their joke shop. But now it’s gone.They are back to square one, scouting for locations.
“Fred! George! There you are! I have great news!” You yelled, not caring if you could wake up the other students.
“Oi Y/N! Be careful!.” Even in a bad mood, Fred Weasley couldn’t help being protective.
You banged the envelope on the table. “Surprise! Happy Birthday! From papa and I.”
“Another gift?” wondered George.
“So you don’t want it then?” You challenged, crossing your arms. You tried to look intimidating but the pajamas weren’t doing any good. “Cause I bet a hundred galleons that you’d shit your pants if you were to reject it.”
“That confident eh?” Smirked Fred, taking the contents of the envelope out. “ What do you think is so grand that Georgie and I would---BLOODY HELL! Y/N!” Fred kept looking down at the paper and up to you, unbelieving.
“What is it Freddie?” asked George leaning over to read whatever it was that left his brother speechless.
Re: Lease Agreement
Mr. y/l/n has submitted his endorsement to Mr. Fred Weasley and Mr. George Weasley.
The turnover of the leasing property of Shop Number 93 Diagon Alley would begin on April 1st …..
“Oh My- Y/n? Is this real?” George whispered, afraid that if he were any louder this dream would end.
“Yes, absolutely, 100%.” You affirmed. “The shop is yours! Opff-”
George embraced you tight, catching you off guard. You could feel your right shoulder getting wet. “Heyya big guy, don’t cry.” Running a hand up and down his back.
“But how?” Fred with brows creased was still stuck in a trance, you could see the paper shake in his grasp.
“You left the agreement noticed a couple of days ago. I might have accidentally read it. George said to not let you know cause you might get angry-”
“YOu KNEW?!?”
“George only knew I saw the paper. Nothing else.” You defended. “I thought i might try and help, so I called in a favour with papa. You knew how much he was impressed with the Extendable Ear, so I mentioned if he wanted to back you up. I only got his reply just now, said he’d love to and got onto ironing out the paperwork and viola!” Pointing at the document. “Oh and he also said Happy 18th Birthday, looking forward to your success and the people would be thankful for bringing a lot of much needed joy into these darkening times.”
“Thanks Y/n but this is a lot we can’t possibly-”
You cut Fred off before he could say more. “Oh please, you have done countless things for me. And I know what you’re gonna say- but see you would do the same for me. Besides think of this as your first investors. We want to help. We see your potential, we know you two, Fred, George, are gifted with bringing laughter and joy to people with your inventions."
"Thank you, truly y/n and to your dad too." Fred admitted, opening himself up. "No one's really backed us up with our inventions before, we've been always told off for being childish. It really means a lot."
“Hey, it’s the lease I could do.” You replied, causing the twins to chuckle immediately lightening up the mood.
It's great to see them relax again after weeks of stressing over the shop. Times might be changing but at least tonight, you got your best lads back.
~
Everything Taglist : @gruffle1
HP Taglist: @onlyfreds
#fred weasley x reader#george weasley x reader#fred weasley#geroge weasley#fred weasley imagine#george weasley imagine#fred weasley fluff#george weasley fluff#weasley twins#weasley x reader#fred and george weasley#fandomscombine writes#fred weasley angst#george weasley angst
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hmm *looks at the menu* can I please get a number ,,Headcanons for Sal and Larry x Reader (separately) insert neutral that skateboards and is good at it and just moved in in the hotel''Thank you
mhm...mhm... yes coming right up! unfortunately as I stated in my other post Im currently only writing for sal, super sorry !! I'd love to write for larry but don't think I can get his character right yet and I'm afraid I might mess it up 😔✋ please note that english is not my first language and I'm trying my best lol
---------------
Sal with a reader who skateboards
once sal hears about a new tenant moving in, he makes sure to visit the same day, trying his hardest to leave a good impression on you assuming you're the same age as him. you'd probably be going to the same school after all, and he wouldn't mind a new person in his friend group. he knows what it's like being new so he definitely makes sure to be as welcoming and nice as possible. (sweet boy <3)
he thinks you're really cool !!! definitely intrigued by what you can do and even if you're not doing any tricks, he loves watching you skateboard, you make it look so easy. he likes the way your hair softly blows in the wind & he thinks you're pretty attractive....
wait what? pause. did he just..?? no. "you're just a friend" he thinks, knock it off. but then again, he can't help but think about the way you get excited when you land a new trick, or how calm you look when you're riding your skateboard around the neighborhood, the way you look back at him every now and then to make sure he's caught up to you...shit. maybe he does kinda like you. now what?
this is probably the first time he's crushing on someone & he absolutely does not have a clue how to go about it. all he knows is stuff he's seen in movies, but those are so overdramatic and cheesy.
hes a mess, afraid he's gonna stutter or forget what hes gonna say, he doesn't wanna make himself look stupid. what if you start thinking he's weird?
so what does he do? he tries his best to get closer to you in hopes that you catch feelings too. how you may ask? by asking you to teach him how to skateboard of course ! hes interested in learning anyway, it's a win win for him and how could you resist? hes too sweet to say no to.
tries his best to not mess up too bad, but at the same time makes sure to take his time with learning, he doesn't want you to stop teaching him too soon because he's having a lot of fun. bonus points if you ask him to teach you how to play his guitar in return!
when it comes down to confessing... you'd have to be the one to initiate something. unless he's 100% sure you return his feelings, he's not going to confess first. hes too nervous, bless him. doesn't wanna ruin your friendship in case you don't feel the same :( he's willing to stay quiet and keep his feelings to himself if that means you keep being friends. so either make sure you drop hints, or just outright tell him!
#sal x reader#sally face x reader#sal fisher#my god am i nervous posting this#not proofread btw oops
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A rental agent tried to punish me for ending my lease. Madam Chair wasn't having it.
This happened a few years ago. I'm South African and we have very rigorous tenant protection laws. There's a body called the Rental Housing Tribunal that handles disputes between landlords and tenants, free of charge. At the time that this story takes place, South Africa had just introduced a new law called the Consumer Protection Act, which stated that all contracts could be cancelled with 30 days' notice, but that a "reasonable cancellation fee not exceeding 10% of the value of the remaining contract term" could apply. I might not get all the legal jargon right. Apologies.
Because of reasons, I had chosen to cancel my lease 5 months early, and provided the rental agents with more than 30 days' notice. They acknowledged receipt of my email. After I moved out I requested that my deposit be refunded, and they refused, stating that I had forfeited my deposit by cancelling the lease. They sent me an invoice for a further 2 months' rent, as well as for the costs of advertising to find a new tenant, and they stated in the email that I was responsible for finding a new tenant and that I would have to pay additional rent for every month that the house was vacant. This was all pretty illegal, and I couldn't afford to lose my deposit and definitely couldn't afford a lawyer, so I contacted the Rental Housing Tribunal. They set a date for us to meet in a public building a week later.
Cast
Me: shabby looking guy, alone, wearing cheap broken shoes
Agent: fancily dressed middle-aged woman
Lawyer: Arrogant middle-aged guy in full formal robes
Madam Chair: Short modestly-dressed woman, Head of my province's Rental Housing Tribunal
Tribunal members 1, 2, and 3
Madam Chair: Thank you all for coming and being on time. Wow! We drove such a long way to be here. It was nice. And it's nice to see you all. Is everyone comfortable?
All: nods and murmurs of agreement.
Madam Chair to me: You are the tenant?
Me: Yes Madam Chair.
Madam Chair: OK dear, we received your complaint. Have you ever spoken to the Tribunal before?
Me: No, Madam Chair.
Madam Chair: OK dear, many people do not know about the Tribunal. How did you hear about us?
Me: I read the Rental Housing Act, Madam Chair.
Madam Chair: Very good! You must know your rights, my dear.
At this point I was kind of amazed at what was happening. I had been terrified of what was about to happen, but here was this important woman calling me "dear" unironically and generally just being really sweet. I was starting to feel a bit better when suddenly...
Enter stage right, Lawyer, walking fast, carrying a briefcase, robes billowing out behind him.
Lawyer: I move to dismiss this case.
Madam Chair: Hello Sir. You are?
Lawyer: I am representing my client, (Estate Agency Name).
Madam Chair: Oh, OK, well this isn't a court. We are mediating here.
Lawyer: We don't agree to mediation.
Madam Chair looking confused: You don't have to agree. We are empowered by the Rental Housing Act.
Lawyer mumbles something and sits.
Tribunal Member 1 to Lawyer: Have you received the written complaint?
Lawyer: I have. The tenant claims that the Consumer Protection acts makes these invoices invalid. The Consumer Protection Act does not apply to lease agreements.
Tribunal Member 2: Actually sir, the act refers to authorised governing bodies and empowers those bodies to make determinations individually.
Lawyer: You are not authorised!
Madam Chair: Excuse me sir, we are in a library. The librarians have been kind enough to allow us to meet here, but we will need to be quiet. Librarians can be dangerous.
Tribunal Members chuckle
Lawyer: If he [points at me] wants to fight this he can take us to court.
Madam Chair, not losing her smile at all: Sir, firstly, you will address me as Madam Chair. Second, whether you personally recognise our authority is irrelevant. We are authorised to make this decision. If your client wants to keep her license she should listen very carefully to what we are about to say.
Lawyer: The CPA does not apply! I'm not going to debate this with... you people!
Tribunal Member 2: We are not debating sir, we are ruling.
Tribunal Member 3 chuckles.
Madam Chair to Agent: You have acted illegally, ma'am. You will refund the tenant's deposit.
Agent: I am within my rights to
Madam Chair cutting her off: Order, please. You will refund the deposit within 48 hours. Furthermore...
Lawyer interrupting: My client will do no such thing!
Madam Chair: Your client will comply with our ruling or we will garnish her income and she will lose her license.
Tribunal Member 3 to Madam Chair: She won't have an income without a license.
Madam Chair: That is true. It will be for the court to decide how her obligations are to be met in that case. We would advise that she sign.
Tribunal Member 2 handing A some documents: You will notice that we have been lenient with the penalty.
Agent: So he will still pay the penalty? Good!
Madam Chair: No ma'am. You will be penalised. We are authorised to award 2 months' rent as compensation, and as penalty to you. The deposit will also be paid in full, plus interested at the standard rate.
Madam Chair to me: You were there for 7 months correct?
Me: Yes Madam chair.
Madam Chair: 7 months interest then. Thank you all. This meeting is adjourned.
Lawyer and Agent sign the forms and storm out.
Me to Madam Chair: Thank you so much.
Madam Chair: My dear, we are all from (Province). We are not rich people. I am black, you are white, but we are citizens together and we know what it means to suffer. These people who take advantage of us must know that we are not powerless.
Me: This sort of thing happens a lot in this town.
Madam Chair: Really? If you know of any other cases, please give those people our details. Many people do not know about the tribunal, and I really enjoyed driving here.
(source) story by (/u/parechha)
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if u ever wanna dump an essay about edward fairfax rochester to me...I’m here!
Ahh, you must know how dangerous such an invitation is to an enthusiast! It’s a rainy Sunday evening, I’ve poured myself a glass of wine, and I’m ready to do this. I think Charlotte Brontë is doing and exploring some really interesting things in the character of Rochester, which sometimes get flattened/left out in adaptations. To be fair to the adaptations: he’s still compelling as a Brooding Gothic Protagonist.™
Prolegomenon I: I haven’t read the scholarship on Jane Eyre since undergrad, and I haven’t read The Wide Sargasso Sea since graduate school. I make no claims to particular originality here. And of course, literature can and does hold multiple meanings, etc. etc.; this is my take on Edward Fairfax “Self-Delusion” Rochester. The subfields of Jane Eyre criticism I’m most familiar with/informed by are “Jane Eyre + feminist theory” and “Jane Eyre + ‘early 19th-century debates within Anglicanism, pretty wild, right?’” This should surprise exactly no one who follows this blog.
Prolegomenon II: when I get caught up in my Rochester Feelings in conversation, there is inevitably a point where one of my English-major or -professor friends will shout me down and say “He kept a WIFE in the ATTIC” and I know. I know. It’s inexcusable and I’m not trying to excuse it, and everyone should read Jean Rhys. What I am really interested in doing, though, is exploring Rochester as three-dimensional character, not “man whose bad behavior gets hand-waved aside because reasons.”
First off: Rochester is a man of contradictions. He is a man who is generous to his retainers and his tenants. He is a man who shoulders even social responsibilities that are not strictly his, as we see in the education of Adèle (who might otherwise have died in an uncharitable charitable institution, or become a laundress, or become a courtesan.) True, we meet him as an extremely awkward and fumbling and sometimes resentful figure in loco parentis. But he is trying. I think this is perhaps the key thing about Rochester: what we see him doing for most of the novel, almost always badly, is trying to achieve better (more just, more humane, more equitable) results within a system (patriarchal, economic, colonial) that is rotten at its core. It is not everyone who has the moral fiber of a Jane Eyre, to say “this system is rotten at its core and it is better to starve on the moors or live forever unhappy than to be complicit in it.” The second thing we see Rochester doing, almost always badly, and this is where the contradiction comes in, is trying to avoid his own pain. I’ve intentionally said pain rather than guilt. I think that gets closer to the heart of the matter.
I’m going to get back to my essay in a minute, but an interjection of sorts, before I put the rest of it under a cut: I think it is vital to the novel that Rochester genuinely changes. Justification of this argument and More Emotions below.
For contemporary readers, the concept of repentance as a process may feel unfamiliar, trite, irreversibly sullied by hypocrites. But even if we take it out of Brontë’s extremely Anglican framework, I read Rochester’s profound, unconditional acceptance of his own sin (wrong, if you prefer) against Bertha and the losses which he sees as divine punishment for it as absolutely key to his having a chance at a future with Jane. The concept of divine retribution is surely stranger to us even than that of repentance, but having Thornfield, Rochester’s inheritance, sign and symbol and engine of his patriarchal wealth, built on colonial exploitation, literally go up in flames like the wicked cities of the Old Testament, is Not Exactly Subtle. And, of course, he loses his sight: “If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out.” His sight has been, in the most fundamental spiritual sense, diseased. He has been incapable of accurately seeing his own guilt (which is to say, seeing it in proportion to all other things, the other facts of Bertha’s madness, the duplicity of his family and that of the Masons, etc. etc.) So he loses his sight. And then he gains a much richer understanding of, well, everything. Gradually. Not all at once. I have Feelings about the psychological realism of those final chapters, but let me rewind, as it were. [N.B. I’m not arguing that Charlotte Brontë presents all this as a straightforward Divine Smiting. It matters that Bertha gets the freedom to bring all this crashing down (literally), and that she chooses her own end. But I do think that Rochester reads it as Smiting; I think we need to take that final assertion of his seriously. It’s entirely possible to read the Elm Tree Incident, and indeed that bizarre wedding morning, as Rochester waiting, waiting with pounding heart, for the bolt of lightning.]
I believe passionately in Rochester and Jane as a couple for a number of reasons (so many reasons, all the reasons), but perhaps chief among them is that they are both, bless them, raging romantics who have had very little outlet for their rich emotional life or for their unconventional, erudite, intelligent, exploratory spiritualities. OR (sorry, I forgot one) for their intellectual life, come to that! Rochester with his library full of science and his feelings about moths and Jane who becomes a teacher and genuinely loves nurturing young minds. *sobs* I love them so much. But Rochester is far too ready to manipulate others as he has been manipulated, and as others seek to manipulate him. His treatment of Blanche Ingram, for instance, I read as being several things, in shifting proportion 1) an effort to distract himself from Jane; he has few if any scruples about involving the unscrupulous and mercenary Miss Ingram in bigamy 2) an effort to distract the neighborhood and its gossip from Jane; why, after all, has he been at Thornfield so long without entertaining anyone?? very suspicious 3) an effort to find out what Jane’s feelings for him are. We see her ready to sting him into jealousy at the end too, a nice little bit of symmetry. Rochester is, yes, high-handed in the extreme. But I read the conversation under the elm tree not as a cynical test, but a genuine and painfully awkward attempt to figure out what Jane’s feelings for him really are. Yes, they’ve been having High Spiritual Communion and intellectual discussions and mutual teasing and borderline flirting for however many weeks it’s been. But also: he’s her employer. He’s at least 15 years older than she is (I forget the details on this. 15? 20? anyway, point stands.) He is not and never has been handsome, and he knows exactly how little his wealth counts for with Jane. He’s deeply weird and his house is weird and he comes with a French ward and a mysterious attic and a wife. But does she love him anyway? She does! *cries about it*
Of course, none of this excuses the inexcusable. The proposal-to-wedding sequence shows us Rochester at his moral nadir, in relation to both Bertha and Jane. It also shows him on the knife edge of losing control over his integrity in other ways, now that he has violated this one. (Remember when Jane comes back to Thornfield and says “Reader, I had feared worse; I had feared he was mad”? Yeah, there’s a reason for that.) Anyway, allow me to present excerpts from Chapter 27, which lives in paraphrase in my head at all times:
[W]hile he spoke my very conscience and reason turned traitors against me, and charged me with crime in resisting him. They spoke almost as loud as Feeling: and that clamoured wildly. "Oh, comply!" it said. "Think of his misery; think of his danger—look at his state when left alone; remember his headlong nature; consider the recklessness following on despair—soothe him; save him; love him; tell him you love him and will be his.
Whew! Anyway, she decides not to despite the fact that she and Rochester feel exactly the same way in this moment:
I am insane—quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have at this hour to stand by: there I plant my foot.
*sobs harder* I think it is vitally important to point out that Jane is not cold or even, in this moment, convinced by her own arguments. She and Rochester are, moments after this, in each other’s arms, the language of fire and flame used for them both, and Rochester releases her first because he wants her influenced by nothing but her own will; not their shared passion, and certainly not his own force.
...Where was I before I got caught up with the unbearable sexual and emotional tension? Oh yes, Rochester after Jane leaves. He embraces an extremely thorough program of self-punishment. The most obvious course of action for him -- the one that Jane, the person who knows him best in all the world, assumes he has taken -- is to run away from his pain again, to leave England. He does not do that. He does the opposite of that. He refuses to so much as leave Thornfield itself except to roam the grounds at night. I love this book so much. Then, after the fire, which happens only 2 months after Jane leaves, he goes to Ferndean. Now! The only thing we have learned about Ferndean previously is that Rochester refused to have Bertha live there because its bad climate would have (or at least might have) killed her. We learn from Jane-as-narrator that literally no one will rent it, again, because of its “ineligible and insalubrious site.” Rochester has, with heartbreaking obviousness, given up on life. He has, by his own account, been “doing nothing, expecting nothing,” in “ceaseless sorrow... [and] delirium of desire.”
...Edward Fairfax Rochester has never heard of chill. Also, as we learn, though he is worried about his disabilities because he is worried that Jane will mind, and because they make him a less eligible potential husband in his own estimation (*sniffle*), what he has been chiefly preoccupied with for the last year is worrying about where Jane is and if she’s all right. Again: the man has never heard of chill. But his impulses are generous. He is the heir to a rotten and a poisoned inheritance, and he begins by blaming this inheritance -- his external circumstances, both his privilege and the choices that he is pushed into by his father and brother -- for his own injuries and the ways in which he has injured others. But I (obviously) vigorously cling to the belief that he genuinely turns away from this, that he confronts his own sins and repents and accepts that he will not, cannot, be reunited with Jane in this life. But then he is. *cries about it* Moreover, in a key reorientation from his earlier avoidance-and-denial coping strategy, he accepts Jane’s services “without painful shame or damping humiliation.” He un-hermits himself! He and Jane travel to see friends and family! They receive visitors! These romantic-hearted science nerds proceed to be shockingly normal... for their own given value of that. I’m also convinced that they have the kinkiest sex in nineteenth-century English literature, and I support them. And part of their happiness is the happiness of others; it’s the opposite of Rochester’s globe-trotting, radically individualistic conduct in the first part of the novel. Of course it’s more than he deserves; he knows that, and he needs to know it. But it’s narratively elegant, and (I think) deeply satisfying. And I love it. And, obviously, him... again, more than he deserves.
#jane eyre#edward fairfax rochester#was recently reminded of how hard i ship jane/rochester#is a tag that i have#asks and answers#emilydickinsonapologist
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It’s Okay || pjm
Pairing: Maine Coon!Hybrid!Jimin x Male!Reader
Request: hiii can i request a jimin x male reader fic? maybe an angst/comfort hybrid au where jimin is a homeless hybrid who escaped from his abuser owner and is now trying to survive in the streets. the reader would find him and try to help him, but since jimin is scared and doesn’t trust humans, it’s a bit harder than he expected.. (i’d prefer a series but you can make it a one-shot or drabble or whatev boils your noodles lol) thank you in advance and have a nice day!
Summary: When walking down your normal road, you spy a long, fluffy tail. And when it connects to a bruised and bloodied up hybrid who immediately hisses at you, you find yourself trying everything in your power to bring him home….even if you have to suffer a couple of scratches along the way.
Warnings: Angst, lots of angst, burning of the skin with cigarettes, mentions of starving from neglect/punishment, punching, slight mentions blood and cleaning the wound, night terrors
A/N: Wow, you were my first request! I am so sorry it took long. However, I enjoyed writing this piece a lot so I hope you enjoy it, too! If people like this so much, perhaps I could make a second part (I already have one hybrid series I’m planning on making so it might be too much to make this into a series :)) Also, forgive me if there are any mistakes!
Jimin hates being a hybrid. No, scratch that. He despises it. He despises himself. Because of his nature, he’s immediately treated with little to no respect by most humans in society. He’s treated like he’s some type of scum on the bottom of their shoes.
Which isn’t true at all but who will ever listen to him, right? He is just a mangy good for nothing hybrid, after all.
He despises humans. After all of this time observing them, after experiencing them first hand, he has deemed them greedy, selfish and just evil.
They are all evil.
Without his permission, tears well up in his eyes, and he hastily wipes them away out of habit in fear of being caught. He blinks and then dryly chuckles, looking down at his burnt scars that dotted his arms. Who is going to burn their cigarettes into his now dry and cracked skin? Who is going to punch their frustrations out on him again?
No one, right?
He escaped them.
He escaped them.
.
Sighing in relief and with a smile, you wave bye to the last customer that walks out of the coffee shop. Immediately, your smile drops.
“Holy hell, today was busier than a fucking highway,” you groan, shoulders drooping dramatically. You let the broom slide in your hand until only the tips of your fingers are barely holding it up.
“Yeah, why do these people need all of this coffee on a Friday afternoon anyway?” Yoongi complains, dropping his head on the counter, his recently dyed mint hair covering his eyes. “It’s like they’re addicted or something. Damn.”
“Takes one to know one, Yoongles,” you tease, holding the broom properly again and resuming sweeping.
Huffing at your joke, he stretches, popping several bones in the process (that you may or may not be worried about).“Yeah but unlike them, I know my limits.”
“Hah, funniest joke of the year. Yeah, right, dude.”
He reels back like he has touched fire and gasps. “Wha-excuse me, mister but I know my limits.”
“No, you really don’t.”
“Ye-”
“Yoongi-” you stop sweeping, putting your hand on your hip. “-you drank 5 cups of coffee in one sitting during exam week. And then, the next week, you kept chugging energy drinks like they were nothing so you could finish your ‘precious song’.” One by one, you start listing off all the times he has drank too much coffee and energy drinks. His body deflates with each jab at his pride until he’s crumbling in on himself.
It’s a hot minute before any of you say anything, quietly cleaning up the shop so that you could finally go home.
“Fuck off, pretty boy,” he finally says, middle finger in the air and face heating up.
You bark out a laugh. “So you finally admit that I’m pretty, huh? Jin owes me $5.”
“You fucking-”
.
“Don’t forget, 8 o’clock tonight, my apartment. Don’t be late like last time, brat,” Yoongi scolds, adjusting his glasses. You throw your hands up, a cheeky smirk on your face.
“Of course. Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
You wave bye to your coworker as you exit the coffee shop. Humming to yourself, you begin your journey on your normal path to home. Mentally checking off your to-do list before you have to get ready for the annual hangout you and your friends have every week, you spot in the corner of your eye a fluffy, blonde blob. You turn your head, fully stopping and squinting.
“What the fuck?” you mutter to yourself, creeping up on the blob. It grows until it stops at a…
“Holy shit!” You yell, quickly slapping your hand over your mouth in disbelief.
A hybrid. A cat hybrid, to be specific, is laying on the dirty and wet ground of the alley way. His eyes are closed, and you timidly squat down near him to examine him. Matted blonde hair sticks to his face with what you can only assume is sweat and dirt which is also smudging across his face. His lips are forming a pout and he moves a bit, making you jump back in surprise. When he stays still after, you continue your examination. His skin looks dry and his cheeks are sunken in. Trailing your eyes down his form, you notice how worn and ragged his clothes truly are. And how big they look on him. Your eyebrows furrow at his state. Someone did a beating on this poor guy.
He whimpers in his sleep and without thinking, you do something stupid. Something incredibly stupid.
You reach your hand out towards him, to pet him or give him comfort, not really controlling your urges to get close. And that’s when you instantly regret it. His eyes snap open, and you yelp in pain as his claws swipe into your skin. Recoiling back, you immediately grasp your now bleeding arm, eyes glued to it. Three deep scratches litter your arm and blood starts to come to the surface.
Even if you’re the one that got scratched, you apologize.
“I-I’m sorry,” you stammer, letting out a shuddering breath. “I should’ve given you your space. I’m sorry.”
“Leave me alone!” He hisses, shuffling far away from you. Growling, his entire body shakes as flashes upon flashes come back to him. Pupils reducing to slits and ears flattening against his head, he swipes at you again,
You mentally slap yourself in the face. Of course he would scratch you. You invaded his personal space and reminded him of his abusers. You scared him. You back up, giving the hybrid one last glance, guilt racking every bone in your body for scaring the hybrid before you walk away.
He doesn’t meet your eyes.
-
You rush home, your makeshift bandage from the napkins in your pocket soaked in blood. He got you deep. But it wasn’t his fault. It was yours.
“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” you repeat to yourself. “How could you be so fucking stupid?”
Someone holds the door open for you as you slide past them, muttering a quick thanks.
“Hi, Mrs. Hags. Bye, Mrs. Hags,” you yell out to the landlady, rushing past people into the elevator of your complex.
“Bye, dearie,” she calls out. “Odd fellow, he is. Isn’t that right, Mr. Whiskers?”
Her cat only yawns in response and she immediately coos, getting right back to her knitting.
Stomping your foot impatiently, you give an awkward smile to the other tenants present in the elevator. They smile back, weird looks on their faces as they realize you’re holding your bleeding arm and you silently wish that the elevator would hurry the hell up. Sighing in relief as the elevators dings, you squeeze through the opening doors.
“Odd fellow,” One whispers out.
“Yeah, very odd,” Another whispers back.
Fumbling with your keys to your door, you curse in frustration as you drop them. Picking them up, you unlock your door after what seemed like forever. Finally, practically throwing open your door, you race to your bathroom, not caring as your door slams behind you. Dropping everything, you quickly get the first aid kit out.
“Fuck,” you hiss in pain as the alcohol seeps into your wound. Tears fall from your eyes from the burning sensation. “Ah, I’m melting, I’m melting…fuck, I’m dumb.”
After 10 minutes of grueling pain, you look at your newly bandaged arm. That was so stupid of you. How could you just invade his space like that? As you focus on your arm, dumb thoughts running through your head, your phone rings, snapping you out of your thoughts. Fishing it out of your pocket, you groan again when you realize it’s Yoongi. You still had time to get there, two hours really, so why was he calling you?
“Hello?”
“Y/N, wanted to let you know that Joon got the stomach bug so the hangout is cancelled. Hobi and I are taking care of him.”
You can hear groans of pain in the background and Hoseok teasing. “Quit being a baby, Joonie. It’s a mere stomach bug.”
“Feels like I’m dying, Hobi,” he groans dramatically.
“Sounds like you have a handful, Yoongles,” you chuckle, putting up the alcohol and first aid kit.
“Yeah, unfortunately.”
“Okay, thanks for telling me. I hope Joon gets better. I have some stuff to do so I have to go.”
“Yeah, right. Bye, Y/N-Namjoon, did you just hit me with a pillow?”
You can hear Namjoon yelling “Cuddles, now!” before Yoongi hangs up, eliciting a belly laugh out of you. How Yoongi and Hoseok put up with their boyfriend, you have no clue but more power to them. Staring back at your arm, you nod as you come up with a plan to win the hybrid over. Or at least apologize to him. You roll up your other sleeve, making your way over to your kitchen. You’ve got work to do.
-
It’s a couple of hours later when Jimin finally retreats from his hidey hole to see a brown paper bag with a note attached to it. An amazing smell wafts through the air that makes his stomach growl in hunger. He slowly crawls forward, tail swishing in curiosity, and snatches the note from the bag.
I’m sorry about today. Please enjoy your dinner.
P.S, I hear Maine Coons like this fish, assuming you are one. Enjoy :)
-Y/N (The guy who is really sorry about invading your personal space)
He hisses in disgust, shifting backward from the paper bag. The note flies from his grasp and lands in a puddle, immediately getting soaked from the dirty water. What if you poisoned it? Or laced it with something? Are you working for…her? Are you going to take him back? It’s not like he’s never had the wonderful pleasure of starving before. She would make sure of that. He can deal with it. He has done it plenty of times, one more can’t hurt…right?
He sits there, just glaring holes at the bag as rain drops hit him, trying so hard to ignore everything. The smell, the wonderful smell. He clenches his teeth so hard he’s afraid he’ll break them as another sharp pain shoots through his stomach, accompanied by a familiar grumbling. He tries to ignore it. He tries to focus on something else. Perhaps the way his bones are shivering from the rain will do? No, that makes it worse. Makes him want whatever is in the bag even more. It seems warm. Warm enough to make him warm. He wants it. He needs it. So much.
Ignore it.
Ignore it.
Ignore. It.
But, a guy can only take so much.
The smell surrounding him in mockery and the nagging pain finally makes Jimin grab the bag, fishing out the food and digging in, without sparing it a second glance. He’ll worry about the consequences later.
He almost moans from the taste he thought he had forgotten long ago. The fish is still warm, kept in a container that keeps the temperature insulated and whatever soup you got (or made, he can care less) goes perfectly with it.
In a matter of minutes, the fish is finished, and Jimin is gulping down the remaining soup. He pulls back, licking his lips and sighs in satisfaction. His stomach is warm from the soup. He’s not shivering that much from the rain anymore. He actually feels…cozy and it’s incredibly weird to him. Something foreign almost. He places the bowl back into the bag and crawls back into his hiding place. Curling up, yawning, he thinks of you and quietly mumbles a thank you before falling fast asleep.
-
It is a couple of days later when you return, bandage wrapped around your arm. Jimin growls in annoyance and begrudgingly relief. You seem..okay from his scratch.
Stupid human can’t follow a stupid task.
“I come bearing a peace offering,” you smile, holding out two bags.
Jimin’s eyes study the bags and then trail up your hand and to your arm. Annoyingly, in his opinion, guilt racks up. You notice his eyes glued to your arm and you wave your hand.
“Don’t worry about. My friend Jin said it would be fine.”
You lock eyes for a mere second before he’s immediately spitting back, “Like I care.”
He averts his eyes, letting out a loud huff. You sit down, slowly sliding one bag towards him. He views the action from the corner of his eyes. What are you doing? He turns his head just a bit to get a better view and his eyes widen.
“What are you doing?” he practically screeches as you pull out your lunch for the day.
“Taking my lunch break. What else?” you tease, waving the take out container in your hand. “Would you care to join me?”
“No.”
You shrug your shoulders and open your container. “Suit yourself, buddy.”
You begin eating and Jimin rolls his eyes, crossing his arms and looking away. Again, he repeats the same mantra from last time.
Ignore it.
His stomach rumbles and if you heard it, you make no move to comment and instead, continue to happily eat.
“Wow, this chicken is to die for. Compliments to the chef,” you groan, giving a chef’s kiss. “Sure you don’t want any?”
He knows what your game is. You’re just trying to rile him up to eat the food so that you can do whatever you want with him. No, not this time. It won’t work. After you leave, he’ll throw the food away. He is sure of it.
“I am positive I don’t want your shitty food,” he snaps.
You wince, putting a hand to your chest. “Ouch buddy, that hurt.”
“Not your fucking buddy either,” he growls in annoyance.
“Just slash at my feelings, why don’t yah?”
“Gladly.”
That is his last and final word. You finish your lunch, taking one glance at the hybrid and leave. Jimin sits there and makes a move to throw out the food. He hesitantly reaches out but backs away. His eyebrows furrow at his dilemma. On one hand, should he waste food like that? That would be wrong of him. On another, did you poison the food this time? Can he really trust that you didn’t?
He lasts a total of five minutes before he’s digging into the food. Maybe, just maybe, you’re a decent human. Just maybe.
-
It takes you weeks to earn the still nameless hybrid’s trust. Even then, it was only a small amount. At least you could sit closer together and talk about random things. That’s why it surprises you when he meekly asks if he can go with you this time.
You widen your eyes at his request. “What?”
“When you leave, can I go with you? Y/N, please?” His ears are flattened against his head and his tail is curled around his waist.
“I don’t even know your name-”
“Jimin. It’s um, Jimin.” He blurts out. He clears his throat, face flushed, eyes looking at every thing but you.
“Jimin…” you whisper, the name so foreign on your tongue. “Pretty name. What made you want to come with me?”
“I…” he didn’t expect that question. “I don’t know. You just seem…comforting, I guess? I don’t know, it was stupid. I’m sorry-”
You cut him off. “Shh, it’s not stupid. I’m glad that I seem comforting to you. My answer is yes, you can come home with me.”
His eyes widen and it’s the first time you have ever seen him smile that wide before. You hope you’ll see that smile even more in the future.
-
“And this is your room!” You gesture with your arm. “I had to quickly clean it since I honestly didn’t think you would come with me so forgive me if it’s still a bit dusty.” You walk in but he doesn’t follow. You turn around towards him, cocking your head. “Jimin?”
Jimin can’t say anything. This is all for him? But, he didn’t do anything to deserve it. He didn’t please you. He didn’t let you use him as a personal punching bag for your frustrations. This is a trick. It has to be. No one is this kind to a stranger, especially a hybrid. A hybrid who hurt you. For fuck’s sake, he scratched you. Yeah, he wanted to come home with you and yeah, he did say you were comforting but he expected that you would make him share the same room or something. He didn’t know what to expect. Just not this.
“Jimin?” Your soothing voice lures him out of his mess he calls his thoughts.
“I-I can’t accept this room, Y/N.”
You must’ve pulled a face or something because Jimin is immediately tense, ready to dash right back out on to the streets.
“Why?” is the only thing you ask.
“What?”
“Why can’t you accept the room?”
He wraps his arms around himself, his tail joining them. “Never had this before. This much kindness thrown at me. Expected to..pay you in return.”
“It’s yours now, Jimin. No payment needed.”
“Why are you so kind to me?”
His question throws you off-guard and it takes you a minute to answer. You brush the lint off of his comforter. “Because you deserve it. I can only assume you’ve been through hell and back. Why not live the rest of your life peacefully?”
“Thank you.”
With that, you smile and leave him be in his new room. A couple of hours later, he joins you for dinner. Whatever you made smells heavenly. Quietly sitting down, he watches as you put the pot on the table in between you two. The bowls are already set and you serve him first before serving yourself. He mutters a “thank you”.
“Dig in, Jimin. I hope you’ll like it. New recipe I’m trying out,” you hum, taking a spoon full of the stew and blowing on it. He waits until you take a bite first. You smile in satisfaction as the spicy fish stew came out perfectly. Just the right amount of spice. He should’ve known better, really. You never wanted to hurt him in the first place but old habits die hard and he finds himself gauging your reaction to the food. You didn’t trick him before, you didn’t poison him at all, so why should this meal be different? Maybe it’s because he’s on your turf now. He waits and when he deems the food is safe enough to eat since you aren’t spasming out of control from poison or getting sleepy from a sedative, he digs in.
Wow.
You’re an amazing cook.
It doesn’t take Jimin even 5 minutes to finish his bowl and your heart aches just a little at the mere thought of him being hungry ever again.
“Must’ve been good?” You tease light-heartedly. Jimin nods, licking his lips clean. “Want a second bowl?”
His eyes widen at the aspect and you only take his bowl to fill it up again. Jimin wastes no time finishing the second one. He feels all warm, fuzzy even and he looks down at his stomach in confusion. This is a familiar feeling. A feeling he had on the day you two met. It takes him a good solid minute, weighing the pros and cons of asking you if you had made that soup. Would you think it was weird if he told you he had remembered the fuzzy feeling? Would you think it was weird if he told you that that was the only time he had ever felt close to home? Finally, he concludes that either way, he needs to know because he cannot stand the stupid curiosity that’s nagging him.
“I..I have a question,” Jimin mumbles.
You nod, gulping down the remaining water from your cup. “Shoot.”
He looks around the room as he hesitantly asks, “Did, did you..you know, that soup..”
“Soup? What soup?”
“You know, that soup.”
“I’m not following, Jiminie?”
His face heats up at your nickname for him but you don’t seem to realize that you even said it in the first place. He finally blurts out, “The one that you gave me the first time we met! Did you cook it?”
“Oh.”
“I just,” he continues. “It was the only time I ever felt..I don’t know. Nevermind- it’s stupid.”
“Yes.”
“What?” Did you actually think it was-
“Yes, I made it. I wanted you to have a homemade meal. And I was apologizing to you so I thought it would be a bit more..special I guess.”
“Thank you..”
You both clean the dishes, wash up and head to bed. Jimin is finally alone to just process everything. This could be a home for him. He lays down, relishing in the softness of the bed. He wraps himself with the comforter. It smells so nice and it feels so warm and so..homey. Yawning, he doesn’t notice the smile creeping up on his face as he closes his eyes, sleep taking over.
-
A couple of weeks have passed and having Jimin around is such a delight. Not having to come home to an empty apartment feels so much better. He helps you clean, he accompanies you when you’re watching something on the tv. He lets you ramble about your day at the coffee shop. It takes Jimin a while to grow used to being here. And not everything is so pleasant. Countless of times, Jimin has woken up from night terrors, from flashbacks of that place. And this time isn’t any different.
It’s around 4 in the morning when Jimin wakes up, his eyes flying open from the nightmare. Gasping for air, he looks around. Everything seems so hazy, so dark. All he can remember is him screaming for you.
Oh no, oh no, oh no. You’re not going to give him away, right? Right?
You weren’t anywhere in sight and he could feel himself panicking. He rapidly jumps up, trying to find the light switch or the curtains or something to give light. To give him hope that you hadn’t sneakily sold him back to her. He trips over something and reaches out his hand, grasping a cloth and pulling it down with him. Moon light floods the room and he curls up, sobbing and shaking. His heart is racing and he silently begs for you to appear.
You jolt awake at the loud “thunk” coming from somewhere in your apartment. You jump up, grabbing your baseball bat and tip toe out of your room. Hearing whimpers from Jimin’s room, you drop the bat and rush in.
“Jimin, oh my god, are you okay?” you ask alarmed, freeing him. He’s shaking all over, eyes closed and arms wrapped around himself.
“Please tell me I’m not there again. I don’t wanna go back. Please, please please..” He repeatedly mumbles. “I’m a good boy. I’ll be a better boy, I promise. Please, just don’t take me there.”
Without thinking, you wrap your arms around him, rocking him back and forth. “I promise on everything holy that I will never leave you. I will never let you go back there, Jimin.”
He sobs into your shoulder, gripping tightly at your t-shirt. His tail wraps around you, and you stroke his head.
“Shh, I’ve got you. You’re here, you’re home. It’s okay, you’re safe. I promise,” you whisper. After a long time, Jimin grounds himself and he pulls back to see you, worry filling your eyes and tears at the brim of them.
“Y/N,” he mumbles, diving right back into your arms. You only rub his back in soothing motions.
That was the first night ever that he had asked you to stay in his room.
-
The next morning while you’re making a delicious breakfast for the both of you, he stalks into the kitchen. You hum a little at his presence, asking him if he is okay. He hums in agreement and stares at you. You, already used to him just staring at you, studying your movements, continue cooking. He walks up behind you, ears pinned back, arms opening up.
He back hugs you.
You’re startled for a moment and it makes him hesitate to tighten his grip but when you don’t move away, just slightly humming as you continue to cook, he smiles, ever so slightly, tautening his hold.
“You’re the best thing that has ever happened to me,” he murmurs into your back, so quietly that you have a hard time hearing him. But you hear him. He buries his head into your back, inhaling your comforting scent. “Thank you.”
That’s when you realize that the future for the both of you would be much brighter from here on.
#bts#bts jimin#bts jimin x reader#bts jimin x male reader#bts angst#bts fanfic#bts yoongi#bts hybrid fic#bts hybrid x reader#bts x reader#bts namjoon#bts hoseok#bts hybrid x male reader#bts x male reader
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