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saetoru · 8 months

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✩ ‧₊˚ ✩ i’m afraid that’s just the way the world works (but i think that it could work for you and me)

synopsis. suguru stumbles across two girls that need a home. somehow, one step at a time, you both find yourselves navigating parenthood

word count. 5.4k (sigh...this was supposed to be a drabble)

contents. not canon compliant at all—there are still curses, but it's literally an au where everything turns out happy LMAO, teacher! suguru, husband! suguru, fem! reader, reader is referred to as "wife" and "mommy," hints at child neglect/abuse (nanako and mimiko's backstory), yuji, nobara and megumi are the ones that save nanako and mimiko—the timeline is inaccurate bc the twins are still kids when megumi and co. are teens, single dad! satoru who raised megs and tsumiki (tsumiki is ALIVE and NOT CURSED) <3, it's just fluff tbh, it's overall healing and happy i promise

notes. yeah i am telling u i literally shoved every fix-it fic idea for jjk into one fic okay and u will all nod along and agree with it. this was supposed to be a drabble but i literally just could not shut up so now its a fic

“there are these two girls,” suguru says quietly at dinner one night, pulling you from the comfortable silence. you look up as you swallow, eyeing him as you nod carefully—nothing is ever a normal conversation when your husband is a jujutsu teacher. nothing is ever a normal conversation when you’re capable of jujutsu in general, you’ve learned that well by now.

“okay…” you say slowly, “and are they your students?”

they must be new, if they are. you know all of suguru’s students; you know them well enough to pick birthday presents and bring what they each like from the bakery. you don’t think you know of these two—they must be new.

“no,” he breathes, “no, they’re too young for that. maybe someday,” he adds hopefully.

“maybe someday,” you agree thoughtfully.

suguru loves teaching. it’s not something he ever saw himself doing—but life is dark at one point, a constant cloud looming over his head as it screams it’s over! your youth is over.

sometimes it hits him all at once—no one was there to protect suguru’s youth, no one was there for satoru’s or nanami’s, and certainly not haibara’s. no one was there to make sure they could be kids, that the sun could still shine and chase the clouds away.

so suguru becomes a teacher. he’s fond of the kids—and they like him too. geto sensei, they call, geto sensei, look! and then he pauses in the hall, holds back an amused chuckle before turning to face an overly enthusiastic yuji and nobara. megumi is not far behind, that disgruntled look on his face as always, but if you look closely, his eyes are soft and laced with something close to fondness.

geto sensei is a favorite—much more of a favorite than gojo sensei is, to satoru’s utter dismay. you can’t help but watch proudly sometimes, can’t help but watch how much suguru has grown as he interacts with those kids, how much he’s allowed himself to grow, how much he’s let himself try to chase the sun instead of letting the clouds convince him the light no longer exists.

“they’re five,” suguru continues, poking the soba in front of him as he doesn’t meet your gaze. “the kids found them on a mission. in a cage.”

you know what that means instantly. you look at suguru, watching as his eyes stare numbly at the food in front of him—sometimes, you worry that suguru will once more fall victim to those bone-chilling thoughts he shares with you one night. sometimes you worry he’ll slip and fall once more and you won’t notice this time, won’t reach your fingers and grasp him at the last second.

but he blinks, looks up and meets your eyes this time, stares into them and searches them for what he needs. he finds it, you think, because there’s light returning to them once more.

maybe it’s hope, maybe it’s acceptance. maybe it’s neither, and he’s just happy to have you to come back to when the world gets too burdensome. you’re not sure, but you do know you’ll always be there, right where he needs you.

“what happened to them?” you ask gently, “was it their parents?”

“no,” he shakes his head, “the villagers. their parents are dead.”

it’s not new—you’ve seen it before too. children tend to notice their techniques at this age. it’s not new to hear about children with no family history of sorcerers being labeled as some type of other in the family, in the community, or in the village.

suguru is lucky in that way—his mother and father see him as something special, something worth celebrating, something greater than they could ever hope to be. you meet them once every year, just for a few days. they love you, greeting you with kind smiles and warm hugs, pulling you inside as they get dinner ready. you visit his old room and smile as you rake your fingers over the figures on his desk and the cd’s he used to collect. his mother keeps his room in perfect condition, even after all these years.

you remind him to call more. sometimes, he tries—just for you, he tries. it’s hard for him, you realize. sometimes suguru is guilty; sometimes, he’s haunted by what he almost did but thankfully didn’t. it’s hard to face his parents ever since, even if they’re blissfully unaware. it’s easier to love them from afar, he thinks. but you insist he calls more, so he does. sometimes hearing his mother’s voice is what he needs, even if he doesn’t like to admit it.

“so…what’ll happen to them?” you ask quietly.

“they’re at the school for tonight,” he mumbles, “there’s enough bedrooms, anyway. but…”

but they can’t stay there forever, is what he wants to say, you know that. staying at jujutsu high is hardly enough for children so young. they need a proper home, a proper family. you can’t help but stare down at your own bowl of soba. it’s hard to watch children suffer like this. it’s especially hard on suguru—he chose to teach to help those kids, to be there. somethings, however, cannot be fixed by simply being there.

“and then what will happen after?”

“they need a home,” he says quietly, “and…listen, i know we never really…we’ve never discussed something like this. but…maybe for a while, just until something better is decided, we could…”

you know what he’s trying to say before he can even say it—you and suguru have never discussed children. you don’t think you ever really want to, and you’re fairly certain he feels the same. it’s hard to lose haibara when you’re just a young kid, hard to live with the fact that someone so young and hopeful about the world is here one second and then gone the next. you see nanami sometimes—he’s kind to you, greets you politely, and asks how you are. but nothing about him has ever been the same since that day.

will your children meet the same fate? will you have them one second and lose them the next? will you patiently wait for them to come to visit the next chance they get from school, only to get a phone call no parent deserves to hear? they’re common in the jujutsu world. it’s a risk every parent has to take. some are selfish—rightfully so. some don’t care to let their children master their techniques, arguing it’s better to have a child that’s incapable and alive than gifted and dead. what if your children end up like nanami? the one who manages to live but can never accept the fact, not when someone else is dead. how will you be a pillar of strength? how can you tell them it’s okay to live as long as it’s not them who’s dead? how can you help them grieve when you are always grieving yourself?

you don’t think you ever want children, and you think you’re right in your assumption that suguru agrees.

but those girls need a home, and you know the look on suguru’s face means options are limited—scarily so. you look at him for a while, look at him and see the way he’s got his heart set on these two girls—suguru has lost more than you ever could, and if this is something he thinks he should do, you think it might be worth a chance.

“bring them for dinner tomorrow,” you say finally, bringing soba to your lips, “i’d like to meet them.”

it’s not a straight answer, but it’s a start. suguru nods, smiling gently at you before he continues with his own dinner. it’s silent after that, but it’s not uncomfortable. he still steals your last bite of soba at the end, and you still roll your eyes and let him. you wash the dishes together after that, argue over whose turn it is to rinse and whose turn it is to dry—it’s routine, and you’re grateful you have something to look forward to in this cruel world, something you can count on regularly.

—————

hasaba nanako and hasaba mimiko.

those are their names. megumi says so when he first brings them to suguru. nanako is blonde, a bit bolder than mimiko, who’s brunette. nanako is older by five minutes, and she likes to remind everyone when she can. mimiko holds nanako’s hand when she’s nervous, and nanako squeezes tightly with a smile. they’re a mellow pair, despite it all. a little distrusting and a little nervous when too many people are in a room at once.

they take a liking to suguru, however. satoru is a bit too loud and boisterous for them, but suguru is kind and soft and gives them gentle head pats when they cooperate and answer his questions. on the way home, he asks them if they’d like something from the bakery.

it leaves them a bit quiet, right until he looks over his shoulder with a raised eyebrow as he awaits their answer.

“we’ve never been to one,” nanako answers quietly, the first to speak between the two, as always.

“is that so?” suguru asks gently. they nod, still holding hands.

children of five summers, and they have never picked out a cake for even a birthday—he wonders why that is. they shouldn't have shown signs of having cursed techniques so young, there should be no reason to mistreat them so early on—the conclusion he comes to makes him even unhappier. parents should never have children if they aren’t willing to love them, he thinks bitterly.

“it’s alright,” mimiko says finally, “we don’t need—”

“come on then,” suguru grabs nanako’s free hand, gently pulling them both along the busy streets of tokyo, “my wife’s favorite bakery is around the corner. we’ve tried everything they have by now, so you’ll have to tell us what’s your favorite, yeah?”

it’s nanako who answers again first, nodding slowly before she smiles hopefully. “okay,” she murmurs.

from the corner of his eyes, suguru notices mimiko gently pull her hand from her sister’s, quickly taking a few steps as she walks across in front of him before promptly finding herself on his other side. her hand reaches for his—it’s slow, a bit unsure, so he grabs it delicately, giving a small squeeze as he grins down at her.

“wait until you try the strawberry cake,” he hums, “that’s my favorite.”

—————

suguru comes home with two small girls on either side of him and more bags than you can count from the bakery just five minutes from your apartment. you blink before rushing over and taking a few bags from his hands.

“did you just buy one of everything or something?” you ask incredulously, staring at all the boxes of goods within the bags.

he grins that closed-eye smile of his, crinkles forming in the corners as he says, “well, of course,” like it’s the most normal thing ever to buy one of every item in a large bakery in the heart of tokyo. “the girls have never been to a bakery before so i thought we could let them try everything and rank them.”

you look down at the girls, who stare at you nervously as they cling to each other. instantly, as soon as you meet their eyes, you can’t help but drop down to your knees to meet their level as you smile softly.

“why hello there,” you murmur, ruffling each head gently. they like that—suguru texted you that earlier, that they seem to brighten considerably when he offers them a gentle pat on the head in affection. “what are your names?”

“i’m nanako,” the blonde one answers instantly—suguru is equal parts shocked and equal parts pleased by her new air of confidence. he wonders if she’d be a bright and energetic child right about now, if the world hadn’t crushed her under and forced her to live meekly. “and i’m older by five minutes.”

“hello nanako, the eldest by five minutes,” you answer seriously, nodding as though it’s a crucial fact to her identity, “it’s a pleasure to meet you. and what about you?”

the brunette clutches her sister’s hand a little tighter—but nanako seems to have deemed you as safe. anyone geto sensei (as the other kids seem to call him) trusts is someone they don’t have to be on guard around. she nudges mimiko gently, encouraging her to tell you her name.

“i’m mimiko,” she says quietly. she seems to be holding a small, pink stuffed toy. it’s seen better days, you think, but a nice wash and a few stitches to the top of its head should have it looking quite a lot better.

“and hello to you too, mimiko,” you smile, “are you younger by five minutes, then?”

she giggles a little at that before nodding, “i am,” she assures, “but i’m smarter.”

“are not!” nanako says instantly, gasping. you and suguru share a look, amused and fond and relieved all at once.

“what a lovely toy,” you murmur, tracing the eyes with your finger. she droops a little at that—like being reminded of its condition is something that breaks her spirit.

“it’s ripped,” she mumbles, “it wasn’t before.”

“i can fix it,” you offer, “suguru is always ripping his uniforms, but lucky for him, his sweet little wife here is a fixer-upper.”

“really?” she brightens. you nod, chuckling as you ruffle her hair, doing the same to nanako, too, when she eyes you hopefully from the side.

“that sounds great,” suguru interrupts, “but i believe i have cakes that need to be tried and mouths that are not trying.”

you rise, rolling your eyes and standing next to him, and his hand gently grabs yours. thank you, he squeezes. always, you squeeze back.

“well, come on, girls,” you usher. mimiko grabs your free hand, and suguru grabs nanako’s—you all make your way to the dinner table. it feels oddly natural, you think. “we have desserts to try. the chocolate one will definitely be your favorite, i can feel it.”

“it’ll be strawberry,” suguru says confidently.

you meet his gaze, grinning at him as he stares at you hopelessly in love. it’s always been enough, you and suguru—it’s always been more than enough with just the two of you. so enough, that you never wanted more. but this is nice too, you think. this is something you could get used to, even if it breaks the routine you’ve learned to love just a bit.

—————

nanako and mimiko stay at your house that night, and somehow, that turns into a week. sometimes, suguru takes them with him to school, just to handle a few things that are still to be taken care of regarding their case. you find you miss three instead of one while you’re home alone for the day.

they return cheery each time, bags of deserts in hand and a newfound glow in their eyes. mimiko’s toy is much cleaner now, and the small rips have been carefully sewn shut by you from the first night they spend. she clutches it everywhere she goes, hugs it in her sleep too. it’s hopelessly endearing.

nanako takes a liking to suguru’s phone—he’s a bit too giving with her, you think. she’s managed to figure out his passcode rather quickly, and he lets her get away with it, watching her small fingers work the buttons of whatever game she's downloaded with a gentle look of affection over his features.

on the days that suguru goes to school alone, the girls are left in your care for the day—you don’t usually have someone to keep you company while you’re at home. you’ve quit being a sorcerer long ago, deciding that it’s not worth the constant back-and-forth tug of war with life and death.

perhaps it's selfish—people are dying every day, and you sit and let it happen, but you can’t help it. it’s too much, sometimes. suguru has always supported it, though, has always murmured that you’re doing the right thing and that sorcerers deserve quiet, peaceful lives, too, if they wish. so you do just that, stay home and learn a new dish or two through the day, watch a few shitty sitcoms on the television, leave and do some grocery shopping for the week, and return home to your quiet little apartment (as quiet as an apartment can get in tokyo, that is) and wait for your husband to come home.

suguru comes home by seven pm every day and gives you a soft kiss on your forehead as he says, hello, wife, to which you giggle and murmur, hi there, husband. you have dinner after that and share details about your days with each other. yuji and nobara are arguing again, suguru will tell you sometimes, i think nobara will cave and talk first this time, though. i brought fresh strawberries from the season’s harvest, you murmur behind a glass of water to your lips, got them just for you, sugu.

it’s been a routine like that ever since your marriage. you marry suguru quietly when you barely turn twenty, just a room full of the few people you dare let yourself love and the two of you as you sign the papers and share a kiss. there’s an extravagant meal waiting for you after, though, courtesy of gojo satoru, a man with more money than he could hope to use on himself. satoru is happy that day—happier than you’ve ever seen him in a long, long while. he takes his bandages off, sits and watches everything, and takes it all in even if it’ll bite him back in the ass later with a long, pounding migraine.

today, however, is a saturday—school is out, and anyone who doesn’t have a mission is free to have the day to themselves. suguru hasn’t taken a large mission in ages, years, even. he accepts small ones here and there, and if it really calls for it, he joins a tough one with his students—but it’s for their sake more than anything. but the big ones are too much for him to handle regularly anymore. the higher-ups aren’t happy—special-grade sorcerers are hard to come by, and it’s unfair that the lower-grade ones are busting their necks out there more than he is. but suguru deserves a semblance of control over his well-being, and with satoru on his side, there isn’t much of anything the higher-ups can really do.

he sits on the couch, scrolling through his phone as you click the remote, finding something to watch.

“you know, we should really talk about this,” suguru mumbles from the side. it’s early, still. barely eight am, and the girls are still sleeping. they’ll be up soon—and with that, will be gone any moment for you and suguru to share a private moment.

they didn’t warn you about that part of kids—you knew it was a busy job, watching over them, but you figured leaving them to play for a bit would grant you some peace. you and suguru quickly learn that children, no matter how well-behaved and disciplined, always need a watchful eye on them.

“talk about what?” you yawn, “it’s too early for you to speak in codes.”

“the girls,” he says, unimpressed. oh. right.

“what about them?” you say, dancing around the edge of the real issue. he sees right through you—you know he will. still, you’re petulant enough to try and dodge the topic anyway.

“it’s been a week,” he says seriously, “those kids think this is their new home. it’s cruel to make them think that any longer if we don’t…”

keep them. let them stay. let them become a part of this home and, by extension, this family that has always just been you and suguru. raise them. take them in. take responsibility over them. love them.

can you love? like that, at least? are you meant to be a mother? you’re too selfish, you think—you couldn’t even stay fighting curses for long, too weak to care about those who need you, and too focused on needing yourself. can you handle two children? if you do this, you can’t do anything else but do it right—it’s what they deserve. but you don’t know if you can give them what they deserve.

but there aren’t many better options either, you remind yourself.

suguru seems to know what you’re thinking because he murmurs, “i think it’s easier to raise children than be a sorcerer,” he says quietly.

you raise an eyebrow skeptically. “you can walk away from being a sorcerer, suguru. being a parent is for life.”

“being a parent means you get to love,” he reasons, “unconditionally. without regrets. without a contract, you know? loving a sorcerer is just betting how long someone has left to live, at the end of the day.”

“how morbid of you,” you snort.

“they’re good kids,” he says quietly, “great, even.”

“they’re lovely,” you agree. and then, quieter this time, “i…i would miss them. more than i care to admit.”

“me too,” he nods.

your head falls to his chest, and he presses a kiss to your head, wrapping his arms around you. suguru has always loved you—when the world was not worth loving, and the people were not worth saving, suguru had loved you. he still does. and the way you love him is enough to make all of those things change. the world has a little more hope, and the people are a little less ugly when you’re there to prove not everything is bad. that even where the bad exists, the good can follow. as long as he has you, suguru is complete—but he thinks more is not always so bad.

“suguru?” you ask gently. he hums, rubbing a thumb over your knuckles as he squeezes your hand, “we won’t force them,” you say firmly, “to do anything. they should exist as themselves if they want to. cursed techniques or not.”

he smiles. you don’t see it, and you don’t have to. you know it’s that deep, eye-crinkling smile that’s heartfelt and real.

“no, we won’t force them,” he agrees, “they’re perfect as is.”

—————

the girls are given the option to each get the two spare rooms you and suguru have in your apartment. that leaves ultimately no guest room, but you think they deserve to have their own space and be their own people after everything. but, as you and he had expected, they choose to share a room and stay together.

you’ll never forget the looks on their faces when they realize they’re staying here permanently, the look of pure excitement and the slightest hints of shock—you never realized how fulfilling it could be to make two children smile like that.

“we can’t paint the walls,” you hum, “we don’t own this place. but we can still decorate,” you offer.

they don’t seem all that disappointed about not being able to paint their walls—instead, they’re too excited about their beds, giggling as they jump on the mattress. suguru wants to tell them that jumping on mattresses is bad for the springs, but you stop him—they deserve to be kids for a bit. after that, you’ll teach them. but for now, they deserve to just be kids.

“can we get lights?” nanako asks—now that you and suguru are guardians to two children (parents seems…a bit too overwhelming to use right now), spontaneous dates don’t happen one on one anymore. evidently, it’s hard to find babysitters on the spot, and leaving them home alone is not an option, so you decide to simply bring them along on your weekly sunday afternoon cafe visit. nanako takes a liking to the lights on the walls, and mimiko eats three slices of cake.

you can’t wait to bring them next week, too.

“you sure can,” suguru hums, chuckling.

“and a mirror?”

“of course,” you nod, “you’ll certainly need one to make sure the beauty sleep works.”

nanako giggles, flopping onto the bed, and mimiko sits not long after, still hugging that toy to her chest as she looks around the room in wonder. they’ve been sleeping in it for over a week now, but now that they can officially call it their own, they seem to be much more attached.

“i want pink sheets,” nanako hums.

“i want blue,” mimiko mumbles, looking at you shyly.

“well,” suguru murmurs so that only you can hear, “maybe we can get them two beds. smaller one—they’ll fit on either side.”

“and what do we do with this one, then?” you raise a brow.

“we…sell it?”

“suguru, are you trying to drain every last bit of our savings?”

“we have plenty,” he chuckles, “we don’t ever do anything.”

that much is true—you and suguru hardly leave tokyo let alone japan, and though you let yourselves splurge on nice things, there isn’t much to spend on between two people. but the last few days have really put into perspective how…expensive raising children can be. clothing and school supplies (they’ll attend a normal school) and room decor and snacks, and anything else children require to be children is quite denting to bank accounts.

but you and suguru can’t say you mind—and if nanako and mimiko want pink and blue sheets, well…you think you can make that happen.

“i think we’re spoiling them,” you mumble, “should we be doing that?”

he wraps an arm around you and pulls you against his chest as his nose presses to the top of your head when he kisses it. he’s warm, just like he always is—maybe warmer now, in fact.

“nah,” he grins, “i think we’re doing great.”

—————

the girls take their time to warm up to satoru, but when they finally do, he seems to be a favorite. satoru is very proud of this fact—he’s not a lot of children’s favorite…well, maybe yuji’s perhaps, but you don’t think yuji has a single bone in his body that could really dislike anyone. or rank them, to be quite honest—you don’t think he prefers satoru or suguru over the other.

“oh, kids,” satoru calls, stepping into your apartment and letting himself in. you and suguru are in the middle of making dinner, looking back in shock from the kitchen as satoru waves enthusiastically at you both.

“satoru, how did you even get in?” you ask, raising an eyebrow. he grins, practically giggling as he points to your husband.

“suguru gave me a key.”

“what?” suguru sputters, “no, i didn’t!”

“you let me borrow them,” satoru concedes—that’s still not even anywhere near the truth.

“i left them at your place and kindly asked you to bring them to me at work the next day,” suguru corrects, crossing his arms and looking thoroughly unimpressed.

“yes, and i did what you should have done a long time ago and made myself a copy,” satoru huffs, “i’m the best friend! i deserve a key—”

“gojo sensei!” the girls call.

as most kids do, they pick up what they hear around them. everyone seems to refer to satoru and suguru as gojo sensei and geto sensei. they’re not students, but nanako and mimiko both pick up on the habit too—and it’s helplessly adorable, you can’t deny.

sometimes, you want to correct them, but they seem excited to see satoru, so you let the moment pass.

“there they are!” satoru beams, taking his blindfold off and crouching down to meet them in the eye—nanako and mimiko seem to find satoru infinitely more approachable when his eyes are out and easy to look into. you can’t imagine why—he looks like a creep. “i brought dessert! because what’s life without something sweet, right? are these two feeding you girls the sugar you need to grow into tall, healthy young women?”

“this is why you should never be allowed near children,” you say flatly.

satoru looks at you with a pointed look, “i practically raised megumi and tsumiki, y’know. saving young siblings and giving them a nice home life is old news, i already did that. be more original, please.”

what a jackass—you scowl at him, throwing the wooden spoon in your hand at his head and watching as it doesn’t even touch him and falls to the floor. curse his infinity.

“okay, now,” suguru chuckles, “i don’t want to spend the evening looking after four children instead of two—”

“geto sensei! thanks for having us over for dinner,” yuji interrupts, stepping through the door that satoru took such great care not to close, “fushiguro was a bit of a hassle to convince, though.”

suguru throws a sharp glare at satoru as soon as three of their students step into your home—you’re going to have to forget the dinner you’re making and order takeout, you think. satoru will pay.

“this is why you didn’t get a key,” suguru hisses, “because then you act like you own the place.”

“i wanted a family gathering,” satoru gasps, “tsumiki is coming too! wait for her.”

despite the way suguru grabs satoru’s hair—and satoru, for some reason, turns off his infinity and lets him—you notice the corners of your husband’s mouth twitching into a gentle smile, and you know he’s thinking the same thing as you. family—nanako and mimiko are here, and so are yuji, and nobara, and megumi, and satoru (the biggest headache), and soon, tsumiki too.

family—yes, this is family, you think.

—————

“daddy, i’m hungry,” mimiko tugs on suguru’s sleeve.

“i know, pumpkin, just give me a second and—”

“daddy, look! i beat the high score on my game and—”

“daddy is looking, sweetie, just give me one minute, nanako, yeah? daddy will look and—”

“wow,” satoru chuckles, grinning amused, “you’re really worn thin.”

“satoru,” suguru grumbles, “if you’re not going to help, then please leave.”

nanako and mimiko are seven now. in two years, their personalities have really blossomed—something which you and suguru are very grateful for. the world should not crush children so young that they don’t get to be the children they are meant to be. you and suguru take great care to make sure they know they can be kids.

and they are—they whine about bedtime and pick at their vegetables and point at everything in the store and plead for something new. they’re children—your children, and you can’t help but love them unconditionally so.

“well, welcome to fatherhood,” suguru snaps, trying his best to make lunch and entertain the two girls waiting for his attention.

suguru is a good father—a gentle one, in fact. he comes home every day from work and grins, asking in that smooth voice of his, where are my ladies? and just like that, you and your two girls meet him with excited grins. you peck his lips before he crouches down and pulls two small bodies against his chest, letting their tiny arms wrap around his neck as he hoists them up.

it’s a perfect little routine, one you cherish greatly. but the girls are getting older, and soon, they’ll be too heavy to carry like this. it makes you a little sad to think about—but if there’s one thing you’ve learned, breaking routine isn’t always so bad. soon there will be a new one, and when you outgrow that, another new one, and so on.

what won’t ever change is the way you love suguru, and he loves you, and you both love your daughters, and they love you both too.

“daddy,” nanako calls, “where’s mommy?”

“at the store, nanako,” he says patiently, sighing. this is the fifth time she’s asked.

“when will she be back?”

“soon, nanako,” he smiles assuringly, “at least, i hope so,” he adds quietly, under his breath.

satoru hears, though—and he cackles, heinously loud, too, as he watches the scene unfold in amusement. but satoru is suguru’s best friend, and yours too. and the girls love him. he’s family—and so are their students.

it’s nice, suguru thinks, it’s nice to have something worth smiling for.

“i’m home!” you call, “is satoru here? because the door was unlocked—”

“mommy!” the girls call, cutting you off with the pitter-patter of small, excited little feet hitting the ground and greeting you.

“why hello,” you gasp excitedly, laughing as they tackle you in a hug.

you and suguru share a smile as he looks back—family, it’s what you’ve both built here. it’s slow at first, and sometimes it wasn’t easy. at one point, it was just the two of you, just you and suguru, and that was okay. you didn’t think you would ever be capable of letting it be more—but it’s nice when it grows, you think. maybe one day, you can dare to hope to grow it some more.

the scene were they got 2 beds—that was me and my sister when we first moved into our weeeee lil apartment back when i was in middle school !! we were bummed bc we couldn't paint the walls but our parents let us have 2 beds so we could pick our sheets !! it was a fond memory LOL but now i DO have a room where i painted the color except i HATE the color now bc i was still in middle school when we moved into our house and got to pick colors and middle school me and adult me are soooo different so now i have a teal bedroom that haunts me

#teepods.writings #fics.#geto x reader #geto x you #geto fluff #jjk x reader #jjk x you #jjk fluff #geto suguru x reader #geto suguru x you #geto suguru fluff #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jujutsu kaisen fluff #jujutsu kaisen x you

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wh0reforcoriolanussnow · 5 months

Note

WHAT IF... Tom and reader being sweet during behind the scene like you can see them hugging and just spreading love around the set lovebirds

Lovebirds || Tom Blyth x Actress!reader

A/n: thank you for this request anon :)

Warnings: swearing (literally once lol)

Wc:

actress!reader au masterlist

Divider by @pommecita

“I’ve always done what’s best for you, you have to understand that!” His grip on your wrist was painful as you wince. “You’re hurting me Coryo,” You struggle as a single tear drops from your eyes. Coriolanus smiles in satisfaction, wiping away the tear with the pad of his thumb.

“Now get fucking dressed,” He throws your clothes as you as you flinch and scramble. “Hurry up!” Coriolanus yells as your hands frantically pull your clothes onto your half naked body. “AND CUT!” The director calls out.

Tom immediately grabs a robe and rushes over to you on the bed, covering your slightly naked body as you thank him. “Are you okay? I didn’t hurt you too much did I?” He asks, worried that his grip on you was too harsh.

“No, of course not. And I’m okay,” You chuckle, your hand on the side of his face as he looks relieved. His arms latch around your waist as he picks you up bridal style. “Tom!” You let out a hearty laugh as he carries you out of set and into your shared trailer.

You two chose to ate lunch in the comfort of each other’s arms as you talk about everything and anything. Soon enough, hair and makeup stylists come knocking in as they get you two ready for the next scene.

Your makeup and hair took the longest but Tom entertained you the entire time, sometimes even making you cry out in laughter which probably annoyed the makeup artist who was doing your eye makeup.

Eventually you two were done and you still had an hour spare. You crawled onto Tom’s lap as his arms securely wrapped around themselves around you, your face in the crook of his neck. Exhaustion from the couple of days of filming caught up to you as you fall into slumber in Tom’s arms.

Tom’s assistant chuckles and snaps a few pictures of you fast asleep in his arms as he poses. Then, a knock came from the door and in walked Josh and Rachel. “Hey-“ Rachel pauses when seeing you asleep. A filming camera in her hand pointed at the two of you.

Tom raises an eyebrow at her, wondering what she was doing with the camera. “I’m filming a tour of the set,” Rachel giggles as she comes closer to the two. “And here we have the two lovebirds of the set, y/n fast asleep in her lovers arms.” Rachel whispers, directing the camera to your curled up body Tom’s lap.

You had no idea that Rachel had recorded you while you were dozed off until you found out at one of the interviews in London. “Who in the cast was most sleepiest?” The interviewer asks. You think about it, making your decision as you settle on writing Rachel’s name.

“In 3, 2, 1.” You all flipped your boards as your mouth drops open. “Me?” You gasp as Tom, Rachel, Hunter, and Josh all wrote your name. They all burst out laughing as you look at them disbelief. “We actually have proof,” Rachel says with a snicker as you raise an eyebrow at her. “Proof? Are we able to see it?” The interviewer chuckles as you look at Rachel.

“Yeah, Rachel I’d really like to see this proof” You cross a leg over your knee as they start playing a video that you weren’t familiar with. Your eyes widen as the camera comes up to you and Tom, you were fast asleep in his lap. Photos were also shown of Tom posing and you asleep.

Everyone starts laughing as you cover your mouth, refraining yourself from laughing aswell. “Y/n also sleeps a lot while getting her hair and makeup done, honestly she sleeps everywhere and anywhere!” Tom chuckles, rubbing your thigh as you look at him with a smile on your face.

“Yeah I can sleep anywhere honestly, I remember this one time we were in the zoo cage and I literally dozed off on one of the rocks.” You reminisce, “You actually slept on one of the rocks?” Hunter says in disbelief as she places her hand on your shoulder. “Yup. I did.” You nod your head with a wide grin as the others laugh.

“Tom, Y/n, what was the most least glamorous day on set?” The two of you were asked as you look to Tom, thinking about an answer. “We had a few. We had a few gnarly days,” “Yeah, there were a few rainy days-“ “Y/n drowned me,” Tom interrupts, looking at you as you break into laughter. “I did.”

“You drowned me one day,” He continues as you throw your head back in laughter, “I was clinging to Tom for dear life in that lake,” You chuckle. “Oh right, there’s a bit where your properly on Tom’s shoulders!” The interviewer points out. “Yeah and they made it look romantic in the movie,”

“In reality, I was choking for my life cause Y/n isn’t the strongest swimmer in the relationship,” You lean your head against his shoulder in embarrassment as you laugh. “No- I can swim, only if somebody is chasing me,” You sheepishly say as Tom throws his arm around your shoulder, laughing as you could feel your whole body vibrate from his laughter.

“Oh and it was absolutely freezing in that water!” You shake your head as Tom agrees. “There’s actually footage of me wrapped in like three blankets after getting out, Tom included as a blanket” You remember as your mind goes back to that day where you were shooting at the lake.

“I’m so cold,” You squeak as you quickly walk out of the lake, Tom behind you ready to wrap you his arms around your frame “C’mere”. The filming team give you two blankets as you wrap it around your frame, your wet hair sticking to your forehead.

Tom’s body added to the warmth as he rocked you side to side. “Tom, Y/n, smile!” Rachel says, holding her film camera as you pull an awkward face as Tom does the same. You both laugh at the face expressions you made finding it hilarious.

“What was the most memorable day that you remember while on set?” The interviewer asks as you ponder. “My most memorable day was probably the day we finished shooting. Not many people know this but I originally turned down this role because it was back to back with my other project that I was working on.”

“And you know I had just arrived back in London from filming it for about 8 months I think?” You look to Tom as he nods, “Yeah 8 months hardly being able to see family and friends. But when Tom got the role as Coriolanus he sort of convinced me to take this role on and I’m so glad I listened to him.” You grip his hands in yours.

“That last day on set was quite emotional for me in many ways. I was of course sad that filming with these incredible people were over and also I think just remembering that I’ve gone so so long without my family really hit hard that day.” Tom nods and smiles as he admires your side profile as you talk.

“And Tom was there on set with me and I was just so relieved seeing him after finishing that when I gave him a hug I started crying.” You conclude make eye contact with Tom. “Speaking about you and Tom, can you tell us how you two met?” A smile immediately made it your lips as Tom chuckles, scratching his neck.

“You can tell them this one,” You nudge him with a cheeky smile. “I met Y/n on the set of Billy the Kid late 2021 when we started filming. Y/n’s dad was the producer of the film and I was introduced to her by him and then yeah,” He says giddily as you smile.

You still remember that day like it was yesterday. “I came to set on the second week Tom started filming and let me tell you, he looked really good in his outfit. Like really good,” You shyly say as Tom and interviewer laugh.

“I don’t think you’ve ever told me this,” Your boyfriend looks down at you with a slight smirk, “didn’t want you to think I was head over heels for you,” You wink playfully at him as he chuckles and kisses the back of your hand.

tomblyth

Liked by y/n_y/l/n, rachelzegler, lionsgate, y/nxtom4life and 4,938,038 others

Do not be fooled by the second and third picture. I was choking for my life!

tagged: @y/n_y/l/n

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—————————————————————————————

y/n_y/l/n: 😐

↘️ tomblyth: love u babe x

rachelzegler: first picture proves our point that y/n can sleep everywhere and anywhere 😭

↘️ hunterschaffer: @y/n_y/l/n is your neck okay?

y/n_y/l/n

Liked by tomblyth, joshandresrivera, oliviarodrigo, rachelzegler and 5,947,309 others

Tboas dump coming soon 👀

tagged: @tomblyth

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—————————————————————————————

tomblyth: gonna miss the salads on set 💔

↘️ y/n_y/l/n: so will I :’(

y/nxtom4life: my parents are so cute I can’t 😭

Liked by y/n_y/l/n

#tom blyth x reader #tom blyth #coriolanus snow #coriolanus snow fanfiction #coriolanus x you #the hunger games #the hunger games ballad of songbirds and snakes #coriolanusimagine #rachel zegler #josh andres rivera #tom blyth x actress!reader #social media au #social media

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twilghtkoo · 12 days

Text

pairings. jungkook x bookworm!reader (f)

genres/aus. fluff, established relationship

warnings. jk loves calling reader ‘sweetheart’, mentions of reader’s anxiety, and a short kiss(makeout?) scene, not proofread!

notes. i actually loved writing the first drabble of jungkook x bookworm!reader and i can’t sleep and currently rewatching the twilight movies as im writing this so here’s this :D likes and reblogs are appreciated <33

[ masterlist ]

—

you can’t remember when you had told yourself, one more chapter. but apparently it’s been long considering it’s almost three in the morning. the ice in your coffee has melted into a smaller ice cube, so you take a big sip. not wanting the ice to water down the sweet, creamy taste.

coffee late at this hour doesn’t affect you no more. you drink it now for the taste more than anything. you can thank school and those tiring days of studying hunched over a table. the amount of energy drinks and coffee you’ve consumed should be concerning but you gotta do what you gotta do.

if jungkook was here, he would’ve had a fit and told you drinking caffeine at this hour is bad for you.

but he’s not. he’s at a late night practice and he told you he’s not sure he’ll be able to come over.

you have your two pillows propped up against your headboard, your book nuzzled against your thighs and your stuffed animal under your arm. your bedside lamp creating the perfect lighting for you to see and the perfect atmosphere.

you’re deep into your book, too engrossed in the plot between the love interests that you don’t hear keys jingle and a door softly shut and echo in the quiet night of your home.

you still don’t hear the soft feet padding towards your bedroom until your door opens, revealing your boyfriend.

he looks as if he’s freshly showered, the ends of his hair are damp and stringy, and his face is bare and cheeks a soft red. that’s how it looks after he finishes his skincare routine, he must have rushed over here.

he grins when he sees you’re awake and so do you when you see him, placing your bookmark inside and setting it down next to you. you sit up on your knees, eager to touch him and kiss him, realizing again how much you miss him despite seeing him this morning. that was almost 24 hours ago.

but his eyes maneuver to the coffee that’s condensing, making a puddle on the coaster.

he squints his eyes at you. and it feels almost as if you’ve been caught as a child. you lower yourself to sit on the back of your shins.

“hi kookie,” you smile, acting innocent.

“don’t kookie me. how many times have i told you to stop drinking coffee so late, it’s almost three. you’re not gonna sleep.” he tells you again, sternly. reaching behind his neck to take off his crewneck in one swift movement, the shirt underneath scrunches up with the sweater, revealing his abs. and you can’t help but ogle while you’re being scolded. you can’t blame me.

you frown, “i know, i know. but you know reading and drinking coffee goes hand in hand. i wanted to enjoy reading my book and–“

he moves towards you, placing his knee on the foot of the bed, crawling shortly til he reaches you. his nose brushing yours and his eyes half-lidded. the soft scent of his shampoo and brief smell of mint swallows you, bringing that familiar comfort.

“sweetheart, i know. but caffeine also doesn’t mesh well with your anxiety. you know that. it’s fine to drink it once or twice during the day but late at night is a no.” he softly warns, tilting his chin upwards to catch your lips with his.

it was meant to be a quick kiss but your fingers reach to hold his face, tugging him closer to you until you’re lying on your back and he’s on top. his hands placed on both sides of your head, caging you in, straddling you. both your hands trail its way down from his neck down to his chest, stomach and then they find its home at his waist. pulling him down til his front weighs pressure on your sensitive spot.

both of you moan into the kiss, and your sweet sound sends an alert to jungkook. before you both get carried away, he pulls back, kissing you once more before pulling away.

he hums, deliciously. “though coffee does taste best coming from you.” he gazed at you, eyes shining and lips slightly red. no doubt, you look the same.

“i thought you weren’t coming tonight.” you say questioningly, watching him move your book next to your coffee so he can lie underneath the covers with you. once he’s settled in, he has an arm resting behind his head and the other resting around you.

“i wasn’t, but i really wanted to sleep with you and i wanna make you breakfast in the morning. i saw a recipe i wanna try.” you hum in response, trying to nuzzle your head deeper into his warmth but his t-shirt is blocking what you want.

you tug at his shirt without saying anything and he understands. he sits up quickly to shrug off the fabric, tossing it across the room to land beside his bag before lying back down, holding you.

he lets out a dramatic sigh, “ahh, this is my favorite thing in the world.” turning on his side, you following so you’re both facing each other, legs tangled together.

“i missed you too.” you whispered. he didn’t say it but he didn’t have to, his answer was enough.

your head nestled underneath his chin and against his chest, you kiss the skin.

“what chapter are you on?” he asks, his voice deeper than it was, slumber almost taking over him.

“twenty-eight, i’m almost done with it.”

he hums. “did you start the book today?”

he feels you nod. “my little bookworm.” he coos, scratching your back softly with the tips of his fingers. “go to sleep, sweetheart.”

and you do.

#twilghtkoo #jeon jungkook #jungkook #jungkook drabble #jungkook scenarios #jungkook fic #jungkook fluff #jungkook x reader #boyfriend!jungkook #bts fluff #bts drabble #bts jungkook #bts scenarios

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vanilladove · 6 months

Text

~ get free (1/3)

pic creds luvpngs | gif creds akashi-tetsuki

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳❥ pairing: asylum patient!nikolai x asylum attendant!fem!reader

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳❥ genre: v suggestive w/ plot (yasssss); read at your own discretion

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳❥ content warnings: unhealthy relationships, infidelity, slightly yandere(?) nikolai, dubious consent, nikolai himself is a warning lol, also sorry if the asylum! au is inaccurate

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳❥ summary: reader is an asylum attendant and is assigned to their newest admit nikolai gogol. ALSO this fic is heavily inspired by @/cherikolya's fic she's the one i'm running with- pls check it out and support her! also i'm splitting this up into 2 parts bc watching the aot anime has been breaking me and consuming all my thoughts, but i still want to post:( ˚₊‧꒰ა read pt 2 & pt 3 here ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳❥ word count: 5.7k (oops...what can i say nikolai makes me delulu)

"Nikolai Gogol. Age 26. Male. Charged with terrorism, first-degree murder, and treason among other things, but he got off with an insanity plea. Look over his file before he comes in later." The man behind the desk tossed the neat file carelessly onto the acrylic surface, exhaling boredly after giving his monotone rundown.

"I'm being assigned to him? But I already have other patients to take care of!" You inquired, fists forming at your sides as you already imagined the overtime and exhaustion you were going to rack up.

"Attendants don't grow on trees, do they? Don't assume I'll give you special treatment. Besides, I'm handing your other patients off to the new girls, so you'll be able to focus on Gogol. He's high priority." The man butted back.

Tch. You sighed and grabbed the file, mumbling a "fine" and turning to leave his office.

"Goodbye, dear." He spat it out like venom with a forced smile. You glanced back once more at the man: your boss--or rather husband--before heading out the door. You two were simply a marriage of convenience--a business transaction. In exchange for funding to build a new asylum on par with Mersault to rehabilitate criminals, your father had offered your hand in marriage to his business partner's son, who had become entranced by your beauty after seeing you once in your father's office. He wasn't too bad of a man at first, and you both related over your occupation together, but your marriage started to go sour after he realized you weren't just a pretty face or obedient wife, and it worsened after his narcissism and egocentricity started to show. He was too traditional and trapped you in his cage of rules and regulations. Even sharing the same bed and having dinner together couldn't reignite the nonexistent spark between you.

You walked back to your office and closed the door behind you before making yourself some herbal tea to calm your nerves. Laying down on the plush couch in the middle of your room, you looked through your new patient's file, trying to memorize all the details.

Nikolai Gogol, huh? What kind of person are you? You shivered reading the list of his crimes, which seemed endless and cruel.

An hour or so had passed before you heard a soft knock at your door. "Miss?" Another attendant had come to fetch you. "Your patient is waiting for you in the white ward." The white ward was where "high priority" or more dangerous patients were kept.

"I'll be out in a moment!" You called out, getting up from the couch and tidying up the space before fixing your hair and pulling down your uniform. It was a black flowy dress with puffy bell sleeves and a white rounded collar. The dress itself was a bit too short, being designed and chosen by your gross and perverted lovely husband. You walked out the comfort of your office and followed the attendant to the white ward.

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

"Miss, this is your patient Nikolai Gogol". The attendant gestured to the tall man standing in the hallway outside of his room. He was strapped and held by two guards, with several others surrounding him holding special guns. He had a neutral smile on his face that turned upwards upon seeing you. You couldn't help but be momentarily mesmerized by the man in front of you. He wore a loose white button up and white linen pants--the standard male patient uniform--and his white hair was messily layered with a long, neat braid on his shoulder. His eyes were the most captivating to you, one emerald and full of life and the other a dull blue with a scar. Without the jester attire donned in his file pictures, he actually looked quite...handsome and prince-like?

You snapped yourself back to reality after remembering who you were dealing with and bowed slightly, just enough to stop your dress from riding up.

Observing the situation, you could sense the belligerence seething from everyone else. Not that you could blame them, the new patient was a dangerous anarchist. Your personal philosophy was always to treat the patient as humanely as possible in order to build trust and security, so you tried to not think about your new patient's file information. Just focus on diffusing the energy of the space and getting the jester to somewhat like you.

"Hello, Nikolai. I'm your attendant and will be taking care of you for the duration of your stay here," You looked back up and smiled gently at him, starkly contrasting the hostile glares from the other attendant and guards. "Let's get along, okay?"

Nikolai's eyes widened immediately and he tried to move closer to you. "Whaaaa! Nice to meet you, pretty miss! I can't believe such a beautiful girl is taking care of me!" The two guards forcibly stopped him from taking another step and the others pointed their guns at him.

Nikolai frowned and stopped squirming. "Hey! All I did was talk! Put those scary things away!" He giggled as the guards retracted their guns slowly and stuck his tongue out at the other attendant, who looked disgusted yet scared. He wasn't intimidated or scared at all. The guards then opened the door to Nikolai's room and placed him sitting down on his bed. Before you could follow to begin debriefing, the other attendant tugged on your arm lightly.

You turned back at looked at her. She had a fluffy blonde bob, light green eyes, and freckles. Lacey, one of the young new hires your husband mentioned earlier. "Um Miss, aren't we supposed to follow the script when interacting with patients? I thought smiling at them and speaking casually promoted unwanted feelings and was unprofessional?" You cringed, loathing that she sounded just like your husband when he was lecturing.

You shot her a fake sugary smile, "Oh, yes, I usually just take a softer approach with more unstable patients. Don't want them to stab you in the back immediately, do you?" You tried to answer lightheartedly, but your efforts clearly failed by the way Lacey had a horrified look on her face from your little joke, like it was the worst answer you could've said. You awkwardly coughed and put your hand on her shoulder.

"Right, thanks for reminding me, Lacey. It's great that you remembered the boss's words." Rolling your eyes once your back was turned to her, you stepped into Nikolai's room. You already dreaded Lacey telling your husband about you deviating from protocol and the long talk he would have with you at home.

"Four of us will be staying here to observe the debrief, Miss. This man is dangerous." You nodded as each of the four the guards stood in a corner of the room and the rest filed out of the room. You pulled up a stool and sat down, giving your new patient a run down of his daily schedule and how the asylum operated. The whole time, his eyes watched you excitedly like a puppy and he giggled and nodded frequently in between your sentences. It was strange and unsettling, but you were slightly relieved you didn't have to deal with an aggressive patient.

Scooting closer to Nikolai, you pulled out a small water bottle and a case of different pills. "These are your daily meds, Nikolai. I'll come to give these to you every morning at six before breakfast. I'll monitor your progress and adjust your dosage as time goes on." He nodded as you stood up and placed the water bottle on the stool, putting on a white latex glove and pouring the pills out into your hand. "I'm going to be administering them to you just for today. Open your mouth and don't close it until I'm done, okay?"

"Okay, missy! I'll be a good boy and try not to bite your pretty fingers off!" Nikolai perked up and giggled like a child getting candy. You mentally cringed and prepared yourself for the worst as you stepped towards him. What could you expect? This man was dangerous and had no reason to listen to you. The guards tensed up as you moved closer and pointed their guns at the jester's face. You swallowed as Nikolai opened his mouth, obnoxiously saying "ahhhhhhhh" and bouncing in his spot lightly.

Heartbeat increasing, you placed your free hand under Nikolai's jaw, thumb supporting his chin and lifted his face up slightly to you as you dropped the pills into his mouth. Mind racing and anxiousness clouding your vision, you missed the way he gaze softened. He closed his mouth and leaned into your touch more, nuzzling your delicate fingers. You swiftly pulled away, turning your head back to grab the water bottle behind you, attempting to hide the light rose that dusted your cheeks, unsure of whether it was from fear or embarrassment. Nikolai's eyes were still intently on you, so you secretly hoped he had missed that.

As you opened up the water bottle and stepped back towards Nikolai again, he shook his head. "I already swallowed them, I don't need any water, miss attendant." He opened his mouth again to show you proof before you sighed out an "okay" and tightened the cap back on. You grabbed the empty pill case before gesturing to the guards to put their guns down. They complied and two came over to slowly undo the restraints on his upper body, making sure to hold him back immediately after.

"Well, Nikolai, that's all for today. Thank you, and I--"

"Whoa, missy, you have a ring! Too bad you're already married!" Nikolai interrupted, his head poking up but quickly being pushed down by one of the guards. You cursed yourself silently as you froze in place. Since you had to move around a lot and constantly clean, you wore your wedding ring on a simple gold chain as a necklace instead. It was usually tucked under your uniform, but it must have slipped out when you were laying on your couch earlier. You cleared your throat awkwardly, tucking your necklace back into your uniform and trying to get rid of the instinctive frown on your face that appeared anytime your partner was mentioned.

"Yes, I'm married. Anyways--"

“But you held my face so lovingly just now. Won't your husband get mad? You're supposed to do that to him, not your new captive, right?"

You tightened your fists at that.

"That man…does he treat you well, pryntsesa?" Even though his head was held down, his dark gaze still cut into you, now not as innocent as it was before. You were sure the cheeky man was smirking too, taunting you with an otherwise harmless question.

You let out a fake laugh and an even faker wide smile in response, just eager to leave and go home now. Whatever charm you had your patient initially under had clearly faded away. "I'll see you tomorrow at six, Mr. Gogol." Nikolai's smirk turned down after hearing the name change, but quickly turned back up again followed by loud hysterical laughs--unbeknownst to you, who had already left his room.

"So the little ptashka wants to play games, does she?"

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

"Thanks for dinner, dear." Your husband said, wiping his mouth with a neatly folded handkerchief.

Shocking. Is he being...nice?

"Of course, I've already packed your lunch for tomorrow, too." You replied, occupied washing dishes and organizing the kitchen again.

"So, how was your first encounter with Gogol?" He inquired, walking over to you to put his dishes into the sink and lean against the counter beside you. You stopped for a moment, surprised he was making conversation with you today, as he usually retreated back to your shared bedroom or went to the living room to watch the news.

You were about to start until you noticed his brows furrowed and his arms crossed. You took your rubber gloves off and placed them next to you.

Oh boy, he's about to lecture me, isn't he?

"What are you really trying to say?"

He exhaled. "Well, Lacey--"

That snitch. You couldn't believe her.

"Ahhh, Lacey. The sweet young new girl you hired as extra help. What about her?" Your spouse's eyes narrowed.

"Respect your coworkers, dear. Lacey told me about your unprofessional interaction with Gogol. Smiling at a murderer and treating patients as friends doesn't exactly align with the asylum's values, now does it?" He said sternly.

"I was just trying to immobilize him. You can't exactly make a patient trust you when everyone's just shooting daggers at them, y'know?" He didn't look convinced. "Besides, this has always been my approach since I started in this field, and it's never failed me. You more than anyone should know I have the most successful recoveries among all the staff."

"Fine. Just make sure your unorthodox tendencies don't rub off on the other staff." He looked down at your neck. "And don't tuck your necklace under your uniform anymore. Don't want all the delinquents getting the wrong idea. You're off the market now" He lifted the chain of your necklace and traced the outline of the ring before letting go and walking to grab his coat and a pack of cigarettes.

"Going outside for a smoke break. You should get to bed and get some sleep for the long day tomorrow" He replied before walking out the door, your eyes following him.

You didn't miss the way he swiftly grabbed the keys and fixed his hair before leaving.

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

"Good morning, dove!" Nikolai chirped upon you entering his room.

"Good morning, Nikolai. Did you sleep well?" You asked softly, taking his medication out and handing it to him, along with some Ukrainian candy.

"Mmhmm, yes I did! I had a sweet dream, too, doll, but I can't tell you what it was about!" He said excitedly. Used to his antics, you only laughed in response and watched as he took his pills--still without water for whatever reason and unwrapped the minky binky candy, popping it into his mouth.

Five weeks. That was how long it'd been since Nikolai was admitted to the asylum.

Despite your initial worries of dealing with a monster, you and Nikolai had gotten along quite well. He seemed to only listen to you, though, much to the dismay of the other attendants. It was beneficial for you though, since it meant you didn't have to work overtime seeing to other patients.

Nikolai had developed a habit of calling you by anything but your name, bestowing several different pet names on you--a new upgrade from "miss" and "missy".

He also became increasingly touchy with you as well: constantly holding your hand--intertwining his fingers with yours, braiding your hair, and hugging you when he felt "cold". Perhaps you were desensitized to it or just touch starved, but you rarely complained about it. You would rather keep him happy and easy to deal with, anyways.

"Look, pretty girl, I finished all my meds!" Nikolai exclaimed as he opened his mouth to show you proof that he swallowed them all.

You gave him a friendly smile. "You aren't having any bad side effects from your meds, are you?" You found it a bit odd that Nikolai's dosage never changed, since no one could pinpoint his exact condition. It made your job easy, though, so you tried not to think much about it.

"No ma'am. I had some trouble sleeping at first, but it's all gone now!" He stood up from his bed and watched as you straightened it up--simultaneously checking for anything suspicious. There never was anything somehow.

His hands loosely wrapped around your waist as he pressed himself against your bent back and rested his chin on your shoulder, causing you to push your hands into the sheets and wrinkle the thin blanket. You let out a surprised squeal when you felt his warm breath on your ear.

"Love, can we eat breakfast in the courtyard today?" He whispered softly, nuzzling into the crook of your neck. You felt yourself blushing as you turned around and pushed him away, his hands still remaining on your waist.

"Y-Yes, N-Nikolai, we can go to the courtyard today." You said, finally stepping away to be free of his touch just for him to hold your hand. He flashed a happy smile at you while skipping out the door, tugging you along with him.

"Yayyyy! Me and ptashka are going on a date~"

"...It's not a date, silly." You replied back, blush still faintly across your cheeks.

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

You inhaled the fresh courtyard air, still holding hands with Nikolai as you walked on the cobblestone path. His breakfast to-go box and your lunchbox were on the nearby bench; you both already ate, but Nikolai basically ate most of your food, claiming the dining hall food was "stale and dry" compared to the pillowy cream puffs you'd brought.

"Wahhhh! Look at the fishies, dove!" Nikolai exclaimed, waving his finger at the koi fish swimming in the fountain. They eagerly swam towards him, probably thinking he was going to feed them. He giggled, eyes focusing in on two of the fish.

"Don't those two look like us, love?" You were snapped out of your previous trance and looked down to see a black koi fish and a larger white koi fish together cuddling into each other.

"Oh, I guess they do. Because of our uniforms, right?" You looked back up to Nikolai to see him frowning and still staring at the fish.

"No, dove, because they're in love..." He said lowly, to the point where you almost couldn't hear him. His gaze softened as he looked back down at you and cupped your face gently.

In love? Us?

Eyes widened, you felt confused as you looked away, not sure how to respond or think. The sudden action caused Nikolai's hands to drop away from your face. You closed your eyes, not wanting to see his disappointed face as you stammered, "We're not in lo--"

Your eyes flew open again as you felt something hard in your hand.

A bouquet of lavender roses was in your hand, with Nikolai giving you a big grin with his hands behind his back. "Pretty flowers for my pretty girl." You blushed, forgetting about what had just happened. You had always loved roses and their romantic charm.

When was the last time your husband brought you flowers?

"Lavender roses symbolize delight and love at first sight. They remind me of you." Your eyes widened again as you looked up, Nikolai turning serious and gazing at you affectionately, like you were really lovers.

You found yourself getting lost in his heterochromatic eyes. Somehow, you felt peaceful like this. Even though he was a dangerous criminal. Even though your heart was already sworn to another man.

"Thank you, Nikolai. They're beautiful." You said smiling at him, this time being genuine and not passive. You were falling into a serene state, only able to focus on him. His action had somehow touched your conflicted heart and put you in a good mood.

He laughed happily in response, pleased by your reaction. "You look lovely when you smile like that, sweetheart." He pulled your other hand back to the bench so you could sit.

"Also, you should give me a nickname, too. I have so many, but you only call me Nikolai~" He pouted, scooting next to you on the bench.

"Hmmmm...What should I call you then? Niko? 'Lai? Nikolas...?" You pondered, both of you slightly cringing at all of the options, each one sounding worse than the previous one.

"I know!" Nikolai exclaimed, grabbing your hands--still holding the flower bouquet--and clasping them together, "Kolya. Call me Kolya. That's what my close friends and family would call me!"

Family? You mean the ones you murdered? You tried to shake the thought.

"Kol--Ahh!" You cried out as you felt a deep prick on your left ring finger. You pulled your hand away from Nikolai's and dropped the bouquet, watching the blood drip down your finger and down to your thigh.

Nikolai's eyes filled with concern, "Love! You're hurt!" He rushedly rummaged through his breakfast box and his pockets, trying to find a napkin to stop the bleeding. You tried to calm him down, telling him you were fine, but he wouldn't listen.

Suddenly, he seized your left hand and brought it to his mouth, closing his lips around your ring finger. Shivers ran down your spine as you felt him running his tongue over your finger, getting every last drop of blood and kissing the spot slowly when he finished.

Heat rushed into your cheeks as the air felt thick, no longer serene and peaceful. Nikolai's eyes darkened, and an unreadable expression fell on his face.

"There's still some there, dove." He gazed down at the blood that had dripped onto your thigh. Your stomach churned at the thought of what he would do next as he pushed you down onto the bench and brought his lips to your inner thigh, leaving soft kitten licks all over the spot and lightly groaning.

"Niko--Kolya, s-stop--" You tried suppressing the moan threatening to spill out from the contact on your sensitive skin. You tried to push him away softly, but he wouldn't stop, now pressing light kisses that travelled up your thigh to your sweet spot. He was getting close. Too close.

You pushed his head away, not trying to be soft anymore, and sat up again, moving to the far side of the bench. You pulled down your dress again to cover your now reddened thigh.

"W-We can't do this. It's wrong. You're my patient, and I'm your attendant. And..." You hesitated, regaining your composure, "...And I'm married." You said, biting your tongue. The gold necklace suddenly felt heavy around your neck, like it was pulling you down.

Nikolai laughed bitterly, "You don't love him though, myla. He's kept you trapped in a cage. Is that what you want, dove? Do you want to be trapped in his cage?"

"I--"

"Miss! Mr. Gogol! There you two are! We've been looking everywhere for you both. There's a group wellness activity starting for all the patients, and they're waiting on you." You turned around to hear a familiar high-pitched voice.

Lacey. The snitch new girl.

You put on a fake smile. "My apologies, I completely lost track of time. Lacey, you can escort Nikolai to the group's meeting spot. I'll be retiring to my office for the rest of the day." She nodded as you grabbed the bouquet and your lunchbox and took one last look at Nikolai before standing up from the bench and turning away, "I'll see you tomorrow, Nikolai." You didn't wait for a response back.

It felt too awkward. Everything felt confusing; you knew your place but you also wanted to be free. You liked Nikolai but you didn't know if those feelings could be considered love. You surely didn't love your husband...

All you could do was hold onto the roses and gaze up at a dove flying across the sky. For a moment, you wished to be like that dove. To be elegant, at peace, and loved.

You wished to be free.

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

Taking a deep breath, you forced yourself to scan your access card and enter Nikolai's room. Today was a special day, after all.

"Good morn--"

"Love! You're finally here! I was waiting for you~" Nikolai exclaimed as he lunged towards you, burying his face into your neck. He wasn't wrong; The extra time you spent collecting your thoughts and debating going in or not made you two minutes late.

You lightly pushed Nikolai away--not before he caught your hands and intertwined them with his again--and tried to put a neutral smile on your face. "Nikolai, I have good news for you."

His face lit up as he clasped your hands and brought them towards his chest, "What is it, dove? Are you divorcing your husband and leaving him for me?" He shook your hands excitedly as you eyed him disappointingly. He really wasn't going to drop this lovesick act, was he?

You shook your head and cleared your throat, "No, as a reward for good behavior, you can choose a special place to visit and an item to keep in your room. Your options are the courtyard, the gy--"

"The library. I want a book to read." Nikolai stated, suddenly turning serious, taking you slightly aback; you didn't take him as the type to be able to sit still and read for a long time.

"Alright, the library it is then. Take your meds first, and then we can go, 'kay?" He nodded excitedly as you turned away from him to make his bed and do the usual check. Nothing suspicious, as usual.

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

The guard greeted you both as you approached the grand library doors. It was an old wooden room with tall glass windows that contrasted the relatively short bookshelves. It wasn't exactly a popular destination for patients, so the books were mostly dated and collecting dust. The natural light inside made it one of your favorite break spots during your trainee days, so it was a bit nostalgic for you.

"There are security cameras around the library, but radio in if anything happens." The guard explained sternly, looking over at Nikolai and then you, "Do you need assistance with your patient, or will you two be fine alone?"

You shifted your gaze over to Nikolai, who had a slightly mischievous smile on his face but maintained a serious expression. "We'll be fine alone. He'll behave." The guard nodded at you before opening the door and letting you two in. The door shut firmly and you tried to grab Nikolai's hand, but he dashed away from you towards the large stained glass window before turning to face you.

"It's so big in here, ptashka. I haven't been in a library in sooooooo long. I actually love to read, y'know?" He said, smiling and motioning for you to join him. The colorful stained glass reflected on his face, casting multicolored kaleidoscopes on his face.

You joined him, admiring his beauty momentarily before leaning against the window and crossing your arms. "I didn't know that, no. To be honest, I didn't think you were much of a reader.." You said lightly with a giggle.

Nikolai grinned back, "Heh. There's a lot you don't know about me, dove." He looked away, lowering his voice a bit, "But that's fine. You'll have plenty of time to learn everything later~" You looked at him confusedly, not quite catching what he said, but you remembered the reason you came and grabbed his hand again.

"Anyways, was there a particular book you were looking for? I know this place pretty well." He laughed in response.

"Ah, is that so? Well, I'm looking for The Overcoat. It's my favorite book." Nikolai said proudly, like he was trying to impress you with his literature selection.

"The books are sorted by last name. Do you know the author?" You asked, leading him towards the bookshelves. Nikolai just squeezed your hand and started skipping forward at a fast pace, practically dragging you behind him as he started giggling hysterically.

"Nope! Not a clue, hehe~" You paused and frowned at him. Who didn't even know the author of their "favorite" book? "The genre's fiction, though, if it helps~" Nikolai said giddily, turning towards you and swinging your arms from side to side. You sighed and slowly headed over to the fiction section. There were about 1,000 books to go through, so you weren't exactly too excited. Not that it bummed you out too much, though, since your husband had asked you to help the new girls clean if you finished early with patient duties. You supposed you'd rather spend your time with Nikolai finding his book.

You both agreed to search the shelves simultaneously, Nikolai looking on the higher shelves and you on the shorter ones. The space between shelves was quite narrow, making his chest rub against your back several times. He wasn't shy either, grabbing your hips to maneuver past you, causing you to jolt when he pressed himself behind you.

Starting to lose count of how many books and shelves you'd checked, you were falling into a tired daze until Nikolai's sudden shout woke you up. "I found it, dove! I'm the winner! Me, me, me!" You looked over to Nikolai, who now had his book in his hands, and shot him a relieved smile.

He hurriedly headed towards you as you gave him some congratulatory praise. "Guess our work's done here, then. Let's get some lunch and call it a da--"

He hugged you suddenly, making you yelp as he giggled and wrapped his arms around your waist, pulling your back against him. He leaned in by your ear, squeezing you tighter, inhaling your scent, "Say, dove, do you still have the roses I gave you from the courtyard?" You perked up toward him as he smiled, awaiting your response.

You did. You'd placed them in a small glass vase--trimming the thorns off--and put it on your dresser. Somehow, the sickly sweet smell was stronger in your room than it was in the courtyard. "Yeah," you smiled, "They're in a vase by my dresser. I couldn't bring myself to get rid of them because of how beautiful they were." Nikolai snickered at that, delighted that you'd cherished his little gift.

He slowly smirked, "Your husband doesn't give you flowers, does he?" You tensed up a bit under his arms but relaxed again, frowning and looking down.

"No, he doesn't. I think the last time was during our honeymoon." Nikolai cuddled into your neck after that, rubbing your sides like he was trying to comfort you.

"What a shame, love. You should leave him for me. He doesn't deserve you." Nikolai said, his teeth barely grazing your ear, sending shivers down your spine. Was the space always this narrow?

"I can't. It doesn't work like tha--"

"Why not, though? Leave him for me. I'm actually perfectly sane, y'know? I know how to make you happy, how to free you from his cage..." He paused, "How to touch you..." His hands on your waist trailed down, pushing your skirt up higher.

"H-hey!" You stammered, stopping his hands from going further with your own, "We can't do this. There are cameras here." You anxiously looked around, trying to find them, but Nikolai's hand grabbed your face and pulled it back down to him.

"Shhhhhh. Stop worrying, myla. This is a blind spot. It's covered by the light, see?" He tilted your face up slowly again toward the camera, which was in fact covered by a big, dusty lantern. How convenient.

He pushed your skirt up again and grinded himself on you, and you swore you could feel his bulge pressing up against you. "You've been driving me crazy, dove, since yesterday I've only been able to think about you," he grunted, slipping his hands into your loosened dress and under your lacy bra to palm and squeeze your breasts. "The sounds you made...I wanna hear them again."

Your head was screaming at you to run away and get the guard, but you couldn't ignore the wet spots on your matching lace panties from your arousal. To be honest, you didn't remember the last time you'd been this intimate with anyone, and your body was clearly craving touch. Your breath hitched as Nikolai kissed below your ear, working his way down to the crook of your neck. You were starting to feel lightheaded.

Becoming more desperate for a reaction, Nikolai suddenly pinched your sensitive nipples and bit down on your neck, causing you to yelp in pleasure. "A-ahh K-Kolya--" The sudden impact caused you to push back against his clothed member and grip onto the sturdy shelf in front of you for support. You could feel him grinning in satisfaction, letting out a low groan.

"Mmm there's the pretty noise I wanted to hear~" Nikolai replaced his lips with his tongue, trailing slowly up and down your neck as you kept bucking against him, needing more friction. "Dove," he heaved as you mewled upon feeling his tip brush against your clit through eachother's clothes. He couldn't handle seeing you start to lose yourself. "F-fuck, kiss me".

Nikolai grabbed your hips suddenly and turned you around, so your back was against the wooden shelf. You looked up at his face; he was panting heavily, eyes filled with lust, and a few strands loose from his usual kept braid. The sight of him made your cheeks flush and your panties even wetter. You wrapped your arms around his neck and pulled him in, bringing one hand to his lips and tracing his bottom lip with your thumb. You gazed intently at his lips. Just one kiss will be fine, right?

Both of your noses were practically rubbing against each other as Nikolai started to dip down. "Kolya, I--"

BAM!

You instinctively pulled away as you recognized the sound of the old library door being kicked down. As the stomping of the guards' boots grew closer, you pushed Nikolai off your body and fixed your dress. Nikolai shot you a surprised glance as the guards knocked down the heavy bookshelves to open up the space around the two of you, eliminating the narrow confines. You couldn't process what was happening as five guards circled around Nikolai, drawing their guns and pointing them at him as he put his hands up. Another guard was slowly approaching you, lifting the walkie talkie up to his mouth.

"06, copy. Patient Gogol has been surrounded and apprehended successfully. We're on our way to the interrogation room," He glanced over to you, still sitting down in shock, "His attendant's here, too. We'll bring her to you, Boss."

Boss? Your husband? Shit, had you been caught?

You were so lost in your thoughts that you didn't even notice Nikolai being handcuffed and pushed out the door--or the way he looked back at you--until the guard put his hand on your shoulder and called out your name. "Miss, we need to get going. We'll explain everything once we're with the boss again." He helped you up as you trailed slowly behind him with a churning stomach and The Overcoat clutched tightly in your arms.

˚₊‧꒰ა part 2 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

˚₊‧꒰ა part 3 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

#vanilladove #vanilladovebsd #bungo stray dogs #nikolai x reader #nikolai gogol x reader #nikolai smut #bsd smut #bungou stray dogs #bsd #nikolai gogol x reader smut #nikolai gogol #nikolai gogol smut #nikolai x reader smut #bsd x reader #bungo stray dogs x reader #not me having to rewrite this twice bc tumblr didnt save properly #way too many words lol #splitting this up into 3 parts bc aot has been breaking me

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godslino · 3 months

Text

IN CONTROL | jeongin established relationship. college au. smut. minors dni.

pairing: jeongin x fem!reader word count: 4.7k warnings: explicit content, swearing, soft!dom jeongin, unprotected sex, sex toys (vibrator), public humiliation (kinda), fingering, piv, spanking, creampie summary: jeongin buys a new toy and decides to test it out in the library

· · · ♡ masterlist · · · ♡ taglist · · · ♡

“This is the best idea I’ve ever had.” Jeongin mumbles, his eyes dark, trained on your every move.

Jeongin is a menace, insatiable, constantly finding different ways to turn your sex lives up a notch or two when he has the time. And tonight, he’s trying something new.

Well, you both are.

The library is unusually busy for a Friday night, you realize, as you squeeze your thighs together and pull your bottom lip tight between your teeth. Jeongin’s still watching, probably has spit pooling in his mouth at the sight of you squirming in your chair. He does little to hide the slight upturn of his mouth, and it only serves to turn you on more.

There wasn’t much that could have prepared you for what he had waiting the minute you strolled into his apartment earlier, his eyes sparkling when you planted an innocent, unknowing kiss on his cheek.

“What’s that look for?” You had asked, raising an eyebrow when his smile only grew.

“We’re still going to the library tonight, right?” He asked, hand on your waist as he caged you in against the counter of his kitchenette. His fingers flexed atop the fabric of your jeans, already excited, itching to touch.

“That’s the plan. Unless you don’t want to, but I really need to study for my philosophy debate next week and—wait. What is that?”

“Surprise.” He said, pulling a small box out from behind his back. You let your eyes dart between him and the gift, something like anticipation swimming around in your gut. It wasn’t a holiday, or an anniversary, and Jeongin really only ever got that look in his eye when he—

You pulled the lid off, eyes going wide at the site of a pair of lace underwear sitting in a bed of tissue paper. Beside it, a small remote.

“Is this…”

“Mmhm,” Jeongin hummed, placing the box on the counter so he could pull you in by your hips for a kiss.

Painfully slow, his tongue worked your mouth open with force, cock already pathetically hard beneath his sweatpants at the mere thought of having you at his full disposal.

“You put these on before we leave, and if you show me that you can handle it,” he paused, dropping his voice an octave lower, the resulting growl enough to send a shiver down your spine, “I’ll bring you back to my place and reward you.”

That’s how you found yourself here, seated at a table towards the back of the library, the soft lull of a vibrator against your core as Jeongin controls it with a remote hidden in the pocket of his sweatshirt.

“You seem to be—mmnf—enjoying this.”

Jeongin smirks, wets his lips. Even with the way his hair falls into his eyes, it’s hard to miss the hunger in them.

“You have no idea.”

Despite his outward facing, saccharine sweet demeanor, Jeongin harbors an almost animalistic desire beneath toothy grins and shy rubs to the back of his neck.

When you first met, you found him cute and quiet, too reserved to even spare a glance in your direction for the most part. Not that you were any better, but to say you were shocked the moment you and Jeongin finally fell into bed together is an understatement.

Of course, it took a few times for him to let loose, to feel comfortable enough to let go and have you take him fully, but once he did he couldn’t stop.

Jeongin is all rough hands and filthy words, guttural moans and spit stained sheets from when he gets too drunk on the taste of you that he can’t be bothered to clean it up. The worst part? You love it. You love the praises he whispers and the secret touches he gives when no one is looking, love the way his eyes will find you from across the room and undress you inside and out, your stomach twisting and turning from just a single upturn of his lip. Jeongin throws your world on its head, satisfies you in ways you never thought possible.

“Jeongin—ah.” His name comes out as a broken moan, the vibrator pressed tight between your legs. He must be cranking it higher, the sensation getting more and more intense, the squeezing of your thighs barely enough to contain it.

“What was that?” He asks innocently.

Jeongin leans back in his chair, far enough for you to see the way his hand twitches in the pocket of his sweatshirt, a stronger vibration following immediately after. “I didn’t quite catch what you were trying to say.”

Torture. That’s the best way to describe this. Jeongin’s been edging you for the past fifteen minutes, waiting until the last second, when you look like you’re about to come undone, only to lower the setting and leave you whining behind the screen of your laptop as you hide your face. It was more bearable when he had it set to a constant speed, but now, you’re barely managing to hold it together

You’ve waited too long, pretended to be taking notes for what feels like forever, when you finally decide to beg him for relief. “Jeongin, please, can we—”

“Hey lovebirds!”

The world, seemingly against you, decides that now is the best time to send a crescent-eyed Hyunjin waltzing up to your table. He’s got one hand wrapped around the strap of his bag, hair tied back into a ponytail, and he looks an awful lot like he has enough free time to make small talk. How cruel.

Unsurprisingly, Jeongin’s smile grows. The vibration increases between your legs. Fucking hell, he looks like a kid in a candy store, teeth on full display. “Hey Hyune! What are you doing here?”

“Oh Innie, I ask myself that every time Old Yeller over there tries to sweet talk me into taking her granddaughter on a date.” He jerks his head in the direction of the help desk where Mrs. Jung is already staring at him over the top of her glasses.

Hyunjin rolls his eyes before turning his attention to you, “Long time no see, y/n. Tell Yang to start bringing you along to hangouts so we can talk about him behind his back.” His eyes disappear into his smile, and you do your best to reciprocate.

“She would never.” Jeongin says, eyes narrowing in your direction at the exact moment the vibrator begins whirring with more intensity.

You take a deep breath, white-knuckling around your pen as you fight to suppress a moan, “Mmhm. Sure thing. Sounds fun. I’ll make sure to be there next time.” You pause after every few words, giving yourself just enough time to collect your bearings as Jeongin continues to wreak havoc against your throbbing core.

Hyunjin, bless his heart, doesn’t seem to notice. He smiles—beams even—before his eyes fall to the open philosophy book next to your laptop. “Oh, shit, you’re in that class too? Must be a different section than mine, but I haven’t even started reviewing anything. Seungmin’s going to beat my ass before the debate.” Jeongin’s thumb brings the vibrator up one notch. “Do you mind if I take a peek at your notes for a sec?”

Yes, you want to say. But you can’t, you know you can’t. And, more importantly, Jeongin knows you can’t.

“Yeah sure, I—hah—it’s uh, it’s all in here.” You say quickly, turning your laptop a bit so he can see the screen.

“Fucking bless. You’re a lifesaver.” Hyunjin says in relief, oblivious to your little slip up.

Jeongin saw it though, heard the way the moan almost fell from your lips. He’s been painfully hard the entire time, straining against his underwear, cock swollen from how badly he’s turned on. Hyunjin showing up doesn’t do much to help, only adds to the thrill of it all. You look so pitiful trying to hold it together, trying to hide how good you feel. To hide the way Jeongin is controlling how good you feel.

You’re being good for him. So good. He could bend you over the table right now if he wanted, fuck you so the whole student body can see for all he cares.

You visibly relax when Jeongin brings the intensity down, your legs shaking as you slowly relieve some of the tension off of your aching thighs. The knot in your stomach is still there, sitting on the precipice of release as the dull hum of the vibrator continues. You’re so close it’s almost terrifying, unable to predict what you'll do when Jeongin finally gives you the satisfaction of letting go.

As if he can read your mind, Jeongin’s foot knocks against your shin under the table. You shift your gaze up to him, cock an eyebrow as if asking What? Done for now? to which he replies with a wink. Challenging. You lick your lips. Jeongin’s dick twitches in his pants.

“I don’t know why,” Hyunjin says, squinting at the screen, “But I have this feeling that Professor Kang is going to give our class the question about free will. Like, whether or not we have it. So if I was going to argue from the standpoint of compatibilism, that means I’m only speaking for instances where external constraints are absent, right?”

“Well, yes,” you begin, leaning in closer, “But you have to remember that compatibilism doesn’t mean that humans are free, though. Always make sure that—” Jeongin’s foot starts sliding up your leg, stopping right at the inside of your knee, “—that, uh, you don’t confuse your stance with one of the other three perspectives.”

Hyunjin furrows his eyebrows. “Yes, but, if there’s an absence of external constraint shouldn’t that mean they’re free in a way? The constraints are what’s stopping them, no?”

You blink hard, eyes fixed on the screen as you try to refocus your attention on what Hyunjin is saying. “Y-Yeah, but, sometimes you—” Jeongin’s foot slowly pushes your knees apart until your legs are spread wide beneath the table, enough so that your folds are no longer separating the flat side of the vibrator from your clit. He gives no warning, no time to process what’s happening until your entire body jolts forward from the force of the vibration against your now exposed clit.

“Woah, are you okay?” Hyunjin asks, eyes wide. You let out a few hesitant breaths as you straighten back out. Jeongin’s foot is firm against your left knee, forcing it open as he innocently fiddles with the corner of his notebook.

He’s playing a dangerous game, tiptoeing the line between teasing and just being downright cruel. Jeongin supposes that the ideal situation would not be for you to come undone right here at the table, Hyunjin’s eyes on you as he waits for a response, lips parted in confusion and concern.

“I’m fine I’m just—”

“Actually, we have to go.” Jeongin cuts in, glancing at his watch. “I forgot that we have a dinner reservation at seven. Must’ve slipped my mind. You can email him the notes, yeah babe?”

You blink at him in surprise, swallowing when his foot trails the length of your leg until it’s resting back on the ground. The vibrator turns off, and Jeongin lifts his eyebrows in a silent signal.

“Y-yeah! Of course,” you turn to Hyunjin, “Sorry, I don’t mean to cut it short. You can definitely text me if you have any more questions though.” Your voice is strained, throat tight with anticipation. Jeongin is looking at you like he could eat you alive, and it takes everything in you to not moan right then and there even without the sensation of the vibrator against you.

“Oh, yeah! Yeah totally. I don’t want to keep you guys any longer,” Hyunjin says happily, his eyes taking on that familiar shape, “Have fun you two! Also, Yang, I’m watching you. You’d better invite her out with us next time!” He calls out, pointing two fingers at his eyes before turning them in Jeongin’s direction as he walks backwards towards one of the study rooms. Jeongin gives him a lazy wave before focusing his attention back to you.

“All of a sudden?” you ask, not bothering to lead in with anything else.

Jeongin doesn’t say anything, just starts shoving his things into his bag. You watch him for a few moments, eyeing him carefully. Is he…mad? No, right? There’s nothing you could have possibly done to piss him off. If anything, you're the one who should be mad at him for making you look like a fool in front of Hyunjin.

When it’s clear that Jeongin isn’t in the mood to talk, you slowly start packing up your own things. Your legs feel like jelly once you stand, aching from the knot of arousal that’s still sitting low in the pit of your stomach. Jeongin lets his eyes trail your body before he pushes away from the table.

“Come on, let’s go.” He mumbles, eyes dark. You open your mouth to say something but he pays no mind, just grabs your hand and heads straight for the door.

The walk is silent. Jeongin only grunts in greeting at the person behind the front desk of his apartment building, hurriedly making his way to the elevators as you struggle to keep up, his grip on your wrist the only thing making sure you’re close behind. Jeongin doesn’t say anything during the ride up to his floor, either. He doesn’t look at you, doesn’t react.

You’re at your limit when he punches his code into the keypad of his apartment, flinging the door open and ushering you inside. You’re about to confront him, about to turn and ask what you did wrong and apologize for whatever it might’ve been when he slams the door shut and yanks you by the wrist, pulling you with enough force to have your back against the wood in a matter of seconds.

One hand above your head, palm flat against the door, Jeongin uses his other to cradle your jaw and slam his lips against yours in a bruising kiss. Your hands fly to his hair immediately, tangling themselves in the softness of it, pulling slightly to elicit a groan out of him just the way you know he likes.

“Did so fucking good,” he mumbles against your lips as he drops both of his hands to press your hips further into the door. “Gonna reward you now, yeah? Gonna make you feel good. Give you what you want.”

You clench around nothing as his words shoot straight through you, nothing but heat spreading throughout your entire body as his mouth works hot against your neck. You squeeze your thighs together for something, anything to relieve your want for more.

“Jeong—fuck, please.” You whine when his hand slips into your pants, and you feel him smile against your neck.

“Look at you begging. Always so good for me, so needy.” His fingers grip the end of the vibrator as he slips it out of the pocket of the underwear and tosses it somewhere on the floor.

You gasp, your eyes flying open. “You’re going to break it.”

Jeongin chuckles, “I’ll buy another one.”

“You can’t just waste money on that.” You groan and pull his head back by his hair, “I bet it was expensive too, wasn’t it?”

“I’d spend any amount of money if it meant I’d be able to see you look that fucked out in public again, baby, trust me.” Jeongin smirks. “Now, can you ride my face or are we gonna continue to argue about my financial responsibility?”

You pull your bottom lip between your teeth, smirking when Jeongin’s eyes flicker to them. He takes it as the okay, drops to his knees, and smiles in satisfaction at the hiss that leaves your mouth once he pulls your jeans down to your ankles and the air hits the wet fabric of your panties.

“Fuck, look at you,” he sighs, leaning forward and pressing a kiss to each of your thighs. Your legs start shaking almost immediately. “Can’t believe you’re mine.” He mumbles as he hooks his thumbs into the waistband and pulls them down your legs, helping you step out of it.

Jeongin cups his hands under your thighs, thumbs pressed to the inside of them, and then spares one last look up at you through thick lashes before he’s leaning in and licking a stripe up your folds. You nearly collapse then and there, but his hands hold you up, grip firm.

“Holy fuck,” you groan. Jeongin hums against you, licking and sucking at your clit like his life depends on it. He feels like it does. He can’t help but pull back and admire how red and swollen you are, sensitive as hell from all the edging, your wetness practically leaking all over his chin. He lets you fist at his hair as incoherent words tumble from your lips, lets you grind your hips into his face as he stiffens his tongue so you can fuck yourself on it, his nose brushing your clit every so often and sending your eyes rolling to the back of your head.

It’s good, so fucking good, Jeongin’s always known how to push your limits in a way that has you trembling and craving more.

“Right there,” you gasp, your thighs clenching as you shake in his hold, your peak reaching faster than you expected it to. “Fuck. Fuck.”

Jeongin flattens his tongue and begins lapping at you pathetically, bringing a hand up to start pumping two fingers in and out of you at just the right angle. You cum all over his fingers, hot white flashes clouding your vision as your hips stutter, his left arm keeping you firm against the door. He lets you ride it out, sucks lazily at your clit until you’re jerking with every touch of his mouth to your core, too sensitive for him to continue.

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand before standing up, hair completely ruined and pupils blown wide with desire. He leans in to kiss you, more gentle this time, and he laughs into your mouth when you all but melt into his arms and he has to tighten his grip to hold you up. You moan when he tilts your head back and licks your bottom lip, to which you open for him, and he kisses your own arousal into your mouth.

“Think you can keep going?” He asks.

You don’t answer, just snake your hand in between your bodies and cup him through his sweats. He’s hard, practically straining against his underwear.

“Your turn.” You whisper, walking him backwards until the backs of his knees hit the couch and he falls on to it. He spreads his legs wide, watches with heavy eyelids as you stand before him and remove your shirt, leaving yourself fully exposed for him to see.

“God you are…” he trails off when you move towards him and climb onto his lap, grinding your hips down against him and no doubt leaving a wet spot on the outside of his sweats, “…fuck.” He groans, throwing his head back as he presses his thumbs into your hips to help you press down harder.

“I’m what?” You ask when you begin trailing kisses down his jaw, loving the way his stubble scratches against your lips. You suck at the spot just below his ear, still grinding against him.

“Everything I’ve ever fucking dreamed of.” He sighs.

You pull back until your noses are barely brushing and stare into his eyes for a moment. “What?” he asks as he starts rubbing circles into your hip bone with his thumb.

“Nothing I just…” you trail off, eyes still searching his as he stares back at you with an overwhelming amount of adoration.

“…I just really want to suck your dick right now.”

Jeongin barks out a laugh, loud and punctuated, before his head falls forward onto your shoulder and the remaining giggles are nothing but choppy breaths that ghost your nipples.

“What?” You laugh, hitting his shoulder. “I’m serious!”

He picks his head back up to look at you, eyes disappearing into the smile that’s on his face, and leans forward to press a quick kiss to your cheek. “I know, I know, I just—I love you, that’s all. I. Love. You.” He punctuates every word with a kiss, but you chase the last one until his lips are slotted against yours hungrily once again, his hands dropping to cup you from behind.

You inhale deeply before sliding off his lap, dropping to your knees on the floor in front of him. Jeongin lifts his hips just enough for you to help him slide his sweats and underwear off in one fluid motion and then yanks his sweatshirt over his head, leaving him fully naked and sinking back into the couch cushions. With his legs spread wide, cock hard and swollen pink against his stomach, messy hair and wide eyes, you think about just how lucky you are to call him yours, to be able to have him in every way possible.

Without wasting too much time, you rest your hands on his thighs and lick along the underside of him, tracing the vein there with your tongue and then sucking off the precum at the tip. “Shiiiiit,” Jeongin moans, throwing his head back.

You grab at the base of his cock and take him fully without warning, sinking down until he hits the back of your throat. He’s big enough that he fills your mouth completely, spit dribbling out of the sides as you work the bottom half of him with your hand, moving in time with your lips as you bob your head up and down.

“Holy fuck, shit, fuck,” the words tumble from his lips as he keeps a steady hand on the back of your head. You look up at him, a single tear spilling from the corner of your eye. He watches with parted lips for a second before pulling you off of him, a string connected to where spit is pooling on your chin.

“I am not,” he says, out of breath, “Cumming unless I’ve got you around my cock.”

You smile as you scramble up and onto his lap, planting your legs on either side of him. He raises an eyebrow in question, “Aren’t your legs tired?”

“Not for you they’re not,” you say as you reach behind, your hand using your leftover spit to pump him a few times. “Now shut up.”

Jeongin laughs and puts both hands behind his head, arms on full display as he leans back, “Yes ma’am.”

The moans you both let out the minute you sink down on him is so pornographic you’re almost embarrassed. If his neighbors didn’t already know what you were doing, then they definitely do now. Jeongin’s shoulders are firm where you anchor yourself to him, using his body as leverage while you ride him to high hell.

“Jesus Christ,” he gasps, his hands finding your breasts immediately. Sometimes you forget how big Jeongin’s hands are, both of them cupping you completely, only your nipples peeking out between his fingers as he kneads your chest.

“Bet you liked knowing how wet I was for you while I was talking to Hyunjin, huh?”

Jeongin won’t admit it, but he loves it when you talk to him like this during sex. He likes to feel in control, likes to have his way with you, but on the flip side he loves when you take initiative too. You can feel him twitch inside you at your words, his hips jerking upwards to meet your movements.

“You liked knowing you were in control, that you could make me cum at any second and I’d have to hide it, maybe squeeze my legs to stop myself. And the poor guy, he wouldn’t have a clue. He wouldn’t know what to do with himself if I started whimpering and shaking, would he? And it would all be because of you.”

Jeongin responds by bringing a hand down on your ass with a loud smack, your body jolting forward into him from the force. It only spurs you further, your knees on fire from exertion.

You can feel the mark blooming, a big red handprint sure to be visible by the time you wake up tomorrow morning. Part of you wants to get it tattooed there, to have a permanent reminder of Jeongin on your body, to always know what it feels like to be wholly and unconditionally his.

“God you’re so fucking nasty,” he all but growls into your ear, his mouth hot as he connects his lips with yours, tongue licking eagerly into your mouth. “Close.” He grunts.

Jeongin sees stars when you lean back and prop yourself up on his knees, planting your heels into the couch on either side of him so you can fuck yourself onto his cock at a better angle. He brings his thumb to your clit, rubbing mercilessly while he bucks his hips up to meet your movements halfway.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, I’m gonna—”

“Jeongin—!”

The sensation of you clenching around him as you cum makes Jeongin’s own release follow shortly after, both of you moaning and swearing as you ride it out together. He lets you fall into his chest, rubs a soothing hand up and down your back as you both attempt to calm your breathing and reel yourselves back to reality. His skin is sticky with a sheen of sweat, your own forehead damp and legs shaking.

Jeongin sighs and brings a hand up to tangle in your hair while his fingers massage your scalp. You pull back, staring at him in confusion.

“What?”

Jeongin blinks a few times before he tucks a strand of hair behind your ear, “I think you’ve definitely ruined me for anyone else.”

Although he meant it in a sweet, endearing way, you narrow your eyes and poke a finger into his chest. “Why are you saying that as if ‘anyone else’ is even an option?”

He throws an arm over his face, “You know what I meant.”

“No, actually, I don’t think I do—”

“You literally just rode me into oblivion. I bought you vibrating panties just so I could—”

“—I can’t believe that after I just broke my knees for you that’s the first thing you say!”

Jeongin bursts into a fit of giggles when you dig your fingers into his ribs, squealing when he tosses you off of him and you roll on to the side of the couch. “Okay, okay! Let me make it up to you, just stay there.” He says before disappearing into the bathroom. When he reamerges, he’s got a wet washcloth, which he uses to wipe you down before kissing the pout off of your face.

Not long later, when you’re both showered and he’s got you draped across his lap in a pair of his sweats and one of his hoodies, Jeongin chances a tap on your shoulder.

“Hmm?” You hum sleepily.

“So, you never explicitly said it, but on a scale of one to ten…if you were to rate my gift…”

You huff out a laugh, turning so that you’re on your back in order to look at him. “Definitely a ten. Could do without the borderline public humiliation next time, though.”

Jeongin leans down to press a kiss to your lips, smiling when you wrap your arms around his head to hold him there for a while longer. “Noted. As long as you never say one of my friends’ names during sex ever again.”

“Why? You sounded like you liked it.”

“Shut up.” Jeongin groans, resting his forehead against yours. It has to be an uncomfortable position, his entire body hunched over at nearly a ninety degree angle to even reach you. “I was balls deep inside of you when it happened. Completely out of my mind. But then, when I was in the bathroom taking a piss five minutes ago I was like, what the fuck? So yeah. No public humiliation as long as I never have to hear Hyun—”

Jeongin’s phone vibrates a total of three times on the couch next to him, cutting him off. He eyes it for a moment, confused as to why anyone would even be messaging this late, and then laughs when he finally picks it up to read what was sent.

“Speak of the devil,” he scoffs before turning the screen towards you.

hyunjin

yo yang

sorry to bother

you think y/n could email me those notes now?

702 notes · View notes

netherfeildren · 3 months

Text

Honey, Stomach, Mine ; 2. More Intelligent Than a Face

Series Masterlist ; Part 1. ; Part 3.

Pairing: Joel Miller x F!Reader

Rating: Explicit 18+

Content Warnings: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics; Dystopian Society; Outbreak not Cordyceps AU; Angst & Yearning™️; Slow Burn; Sexual Inexperience; Cock Riding; Size Difference; Size Kink; Sex Ed for Omega’s 101; Power Dynamics; Creampie; Discussions of Heats and Knots and Slick, Oh My!; Virginity; Emotional Hurt/Comfort; Young and Needy Omega; Possessive Behavior; Age Gap

A/N: FYI I do mention that she has small breasts in this one only because I usually write big boobs and thought it was time for some itty bitty titty committee representation.

Word Count: 13.9K

Read on AO3

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2. More Intelligent Than a Face

Existence is a strange thing, a needful thing. Something to be sated, filled, satisfied, this ordeal of being a living, breathing person. And to be an unusual sort of person, someone with needs extra to what the regular sort would require, doubly strange.

You had always thought, in different ways, that the mating program, although a choice thief, a freedom thief, was also benevolent in its control in some ways. After all, it gave those of you who were of the not usual sort, alphas and omegas, that such thing that you needed so badly.

Each other.

A bad, terrible, devastating thing that in turn gives you something necessary, life changing, life fulfilling, even, perhaps.

When your aunt had died and you’d been taken away and then put away and then shut away for what seemed would be forever, it had not, at first, in your child’s mind, seemed so terrible. But with the years, that existence you bore that needed, it began to hurt. It eventually became a very terrible thing that in turn, had taken away your ability to recognize yourself, as well. The reality that you’d been caged because of what you were, perhaps not particularly who, but certainly, what, was, at first, difficult to see. And then, when you did see it, even more difficult to look at.

A thing caged because of what it is. And again, existence is a strange and needful thing. Caged because of what you exist as; caged because of what you need because of what you are. Caged because they can give you what will sate you.

You open your eyes slowly, the bright, waning golden light of dusk shooting over the edge of the end of the world; bleeding pinks and violets feeding the fire. And he’s there, in a deeply set arm chair pulled up by the hearth, staring into the flames, and you realize, like you’d never truly considered before, that the cage was in part also his fault. That in ways, you’d been put away also because of what he is. You wonder if this should make you angry, resentful. If it should mean you should not want to be here, langoring so comfortably in his home that he’d brought you to. This man who you do not know, who does not so much even look like he wants to know you. In ways, your caging is his fault. And certainly, concretely, the prolonging of that caging was entirely of his doing. So why is there no resentment?

Once, one of the other omegas had said that they were brainwashing all of you. Preparing you, ripening you for slaughter. He’d come in later than the rest of you, when he was more grown, more mature, when he’d seen more things in his before life. He had lots of opinions, lots of thoughts, said that your before life, those ten years of living with your aunt, of only being a child like all the rest of them and not an omega, did not count. He said you’d been too young to understand all you’d lost. A boy named Leo. He was kind, but he was angry. And his anger frightened you. It was something you did know, in the sense that you could recognize it, for you’d seen anger before, but you could not understand it. For some reason, maybe you were built wrongly, and Leo was right, and you should have been angry like him, but you could never find it within yourself to muster it. Maybe there was nothing wrong about it. Maybe everyone was simply built and made and felt differently and that was fine too. But you knew that he was wrong on some accounts, particularly, that your before life had counted, that your aunt, who you remembered with so much love, had counted. And most of all, what he was most painfully wrong about, was that you did, and deeply, understand all you had lost.

After all, you could only see the sky for one hour a day, every other day, now, and that one hour made your understanding of everything around you, everything happening to you, keen and painful and humiliating in a very clear way.

The last rays of the sun wash Joel in vibrant orange reds now. A slash of glowing vermillion across his face, something almost violent about the streak of light, something possessive, and you focus your eyes intently on the sight of his face. This man, this alpha, who for all intents and purposes would or could own you as declared by the government or nature or even Leo and all he’d said would happen once you’d been claimed.

But there was one last thing he’d been wrong about, that young, angry boy, and what you felt was the greatest chasm between the way the two of you had existed within your new designations, which was that, at one very recent point in Leo’s memory, he had belonged to someone, to somewhere. He’d had a place and a home and a family, and he had belonged, and you had never had that. Your aunt, despite her love for you, had been too old and tired to want you, truly want you. You had never been wanted in any soft, true way by anyone before. And looking at him now, you don’t think Joel could ever be capable of wanting anything in a soft way, but you do think he could want something in a true way, and you’re certain that could be more than enough for you.

“Why didn’t you come for me?” Your voice, scratchy and small from sleep, floating away from you towards him. He jerks, the twitching returned, head snapping towards you, eyes wide, moving forward in his seat as if he’d spring out of it and towards you without thought. His scent seems to be heightened somehow now. As if your sleep had awakened your senses in new, keener ways. You can feel him tickling the back of your throat, threading his way through your hair, beneath your clothes, between your legs.

“Are you hungry?” He asks, ignoring your question. “When was the last time you ate? You need to eat.” And again that frown, too many fast words.

“Why didn't you come for me?” You press. “They told me you didn’t know if you wanted to come, that you wouldn't answer. I want to know why.”

He sighs a heavy, heaving thing, falling back in the chair, and turns back to the fire, and you want to whine and cry until he puts his attention back on you. You feel so… so– you don’t know. Little, unmade, with a need to be big, to grow and grow and grow so that all the things you feel and want might fit inside of you, so that he might fit inside of you. You feel hungry as if your gums ache and sting with a desire you’ve never tasted before. But also, and despite all of these conflicting, churning things, you also feel so inexplicably at ease. He’s just there, and you are just here, and you’ll make him answer, you know you have it in you to make him do the things you want, and you can’t say how, you don’t know how, but you understand that you do.

There’s power in that – even as you are, all you are not, you can see it – the ability something small possesses to make something big move, do, be. There’s power in that.

You whine low in your throat, and he turns back to you, something dark and tumultuous in his eyes, brow crooked sternly, but he opens his mouth. “I was going to leave you there,” he says, and you immediately wish he’d shut it. Never mind, you want to tell him, you say all the wrong things.

“But why? I was waiting for you.” Whine, whine, whine.

“I didn’t want this. I never have.”

“Me?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t want me?” You ask again, just to be absolutely certain you’re understanding that you’ve once again found yourself in a place where you are not wanted for, or despite of, the thing that you are. The logistics, the intricacies of it don’t seem to matter as much anymore, after everything, the before life, the not life, all that matters now is the yes or no.

But he goes silent again, attention back toward the fire, the sun set, no more glowing vermillion slash, very little hope now too.

He ignores your question again. “Tell me about the place they kept you,” he says instead.

“There’s nothing to tell.” You want to cry now, for the first time, besides the tears of initial happiness when he’d finally walked into your white box, you want to cry. You dig stubby nails into the round of your knee, hard as you can, trying to make it hurt and distract. “It was very calm and very quiet.”

“Did you have friends?” He won’t turn back to look at you, and it makes you feel very lacking. Very much like the nothing they tried to make you feel you were before.

“No. They wouldn’t let us.”

“They wouldn’t let you have friends?”

“No. They said it would agitate us – too much socialization. Really, they just didn’t want us realizing, becoming angry and aware”

This makes him turn, makes you feel, within yourself, the anger you’re telling him of, like oh, now, when I’ve been shocking and honest, you look at me – after I waited all that time for you. There is no resentment about the cage, only for the waiting. You should stick your tongue out at him, make him an ugly face, turn over and go back to sleep and ignore him the way he’d ignore you. But no, you think, let him see that you do understand, and you do know some things, that you are angry, and Leo was right.

“What did you do then?” He asks.

“I read. I learned about myself, about you. About what we are.”

His gaze is so intense now, a ricochet, a scream, something very persistently sad. “And what are we?”

“People just like all the rest of them. But with more necessity.”

“How do you mean?”

You tip your head side to side, bright fire eyed gaze to bright fire eyed gaze. Your cheeks feel molten, sweltering, sweat at your nape, the fire in the hearth so bright, but not as bright as you; your belly glows. This is what you are, this is what you’d been made into. “There is so much necessity in existing, don’t you think?”

He tips his chin, he doesn’t understand.

“We need so many things. We require so much to be alive, to be what we are, to be satisfied and content.”

“Do we?”

“The things we are, yes. I think so.”

“You don’t seem like you spent years in that place,” he says, voice slow, molasses in the notes. There’s something hypnotized slumbering in him that forces something satisfied to swell within you. Your belly glows.

“I had a before life. People forget that.”

“I read in your file — you lived with an aunt.”

You wait for the: only for ten years, but the diminishing does not come. “Yes. She was kind, and I remember all of it, even if the rest of the world forgets it happened.”

“Did they ever mistreat you? At the facility–”

“No. Never. There was nothing.” You’re the one to turn away now. The sun has entirely gone away, a single glowing sliver just at the drop off of the end of the world. You stick your hand out straight ahead of you, fingertip following that line of fading light through air and space and sea.

He watches you unblinkingly, and asks, “What do you mean?” The far off light glows through your skin, through your fingernail; he follows the path of your hand.

You can pretend in your mind that you feel the warmth of it against your fingertip, that it scorches the way it glows, heats the length of your limb, feeds the same glow in your belly, but there’s no more possessive streak of light to wrap around you; now, the heat only lives within you. This is what you are, this is what they said would happen, and now it’s finally happening. You let your arm fall back to your lap, limp, and turn to look at him again. He looks so angry, and you feel so incredibly sad for him. This cold perch, this cage that is not white like your box, but dark and struck right on the edge of peril, this place he chose to exile himself to. They were honest, in the things they'd told you all, the truth of the way alphas exist out in the world. Lonely and ostracized and feared, brainwashed to your reality maybe, sure, the way Leo claimed. But in certain things, they’d been honest, and you’re glad for it, that you have the ability to understand him now from this vantage point. The reality of how he exists, the reason for that look in his eyes, it all makes sense to you.

“I suppose that can be a kind of bad thing… a mistreatment. Making nothing of us, of our lives, taking the whole world away until someone chooses to come and give it back to us.”

He flinches, the look shutters, clicks and flashes, a camera capturing the truth of what the two of you have already done to each other without even really knowing one another at all. “I’m sorry I waited. I’m sorry I took so long.” The words cost him something the way all truths cost something. “That I wasn’t there for you as soon as I should have been.”

“Why weren’t you?” You ask, although you know.

“I couldn’t. I can’t. I’m not– I’m not right. I’m not well.” And this costs him more than the rest, you can see. The thump, thump, beat of his heart in his throat. You should tell him to stop, mercy is power, but you think, feel, that this pound of flesh you’re demanding via his truths is what you’re owed for your life and a year of waiting. And anyways, you’ll pay your own pound of flesh in kind eventually, and it’ll cost, even if it’s freely given, it’ll still cost. Everything is equal here, it’s only that it takes a certain kind of eye to realize the truth of that.

“What’s wrong with you?”

“Everything, what I am, the whole thing of it and this. It’s all wrong.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You don’t know.” And he looks suddenly angry, aged, wearing all his years and all his very obvious loneliness, teeth bared but on the verge of falling out.

“No…” you say slowly, thinking, rationalizing, a rolodex of truths in your mind. What you are, what I am, what we all are and all the honesties that compromise us. “I don’t, but I understand anyway. They make you all nothing, as well, don’t they? They take it all away, all nothing until you have one of us. It’s a terrible way to live.” And you don’t ask him, it’s not a question, only a very obvious thing.

Your words upset him, put him right at the mouth of madness, all those shakes and jitters returned, but you only lay your head back down on the soft pillow he’d tucked beneath you, hands folded undercheek to wait for the explosion that does not come. There’s something in you that wants to see him angry, angry like Leo, like the boy who’d said you didn't have to be what they told you to be, that reminded you that you could choose for yourself. One of the few things you’d agreed on, despite and inspite of the friendship that they would not let you have but that would have blossomed anyways if they’d given you the time. They wanted to make you nothing, but you didn’t want to be nothing. You wanted very much to be alive and to belong.

You realize, watching Joel muzzle his nature before your very eyes, wondering if the truth of him would have him springing up out of the chair to smother you with his weight and temper you with his knot, subdued with his teeth sunken into the gland at the back of your neck, that you want to see him angry. You realize that you want to see him break, that you want to hear that truth no matter what it costs the either of you. You want to see him honest.

He struggles, a dog fight right before your eyes, but when he wins, it changes the game, turns the truth chimeral. Makes you see him in a different way, and all at the same time, makes you aware and even more comfortable than you’d already been. You’re safe here. He is safe. Most importantly, you want to be here.

“Let me show you your room,” he says after a deep breath.

“My room?” A little seedling of dread and sadness and disappointment.

He shows you to a bedroom hued in soft blues. The sea when it is gentle, the sky when it’s joyous. Everything comfortable, nothing white, like he’d known already.

He stands awkwardly at the mouth of the entry, as if scared to step foot into this serene pool of azure and marr it’s peace. You watch him out of the corner of your eye as you move around, no shoes, no socks, slowly running your fingers over all the soft surfaces, sweaty little toes sunken into the deep pile of the rug underfoot.

“I wanted you to have somewhere to adjust– where you’d have privacy. I’m sure this– that I– that it’s all a shock…” he stutters.

One of his boots inches forward, snaps back, like he wants to follow, like he needs to follow, like nature is right here in the room with the two of you, but he wins that dog fight again, holds back. Frustrating.

“I’m not shocked. But I– I won’t stay with you?”

“No,” he says with a finality that makes that seedling bloom in full. “I also got you clothes. And– and soft things. I know your sort–”

You give a soft huff of air through your nose, my sort… our sort.

“Like things like that. And I also… I also put some of my own things in the drawers,” he nods towards a dark mahogany dresser shoved up against the wall; shy and boyish and hesitant all wrapped into a package that would seem to be none of those things. “They say that helps.”

“Okay… thank you.”

“Went into town to get it,” he says of the robin's eggshell blue duvet, a more dove gray blue wash for the silk soft sheets beneath. It’s all beautiful and delicate and lace trimmed and looking at him, huge and rough and something like a lonely mountain, you can’t believe he’d chosen this for you. “Lady at the store said you’d like it when I picked it out.” And that makes satisfaction smother the seedling, yes, he’d chosen it for you. A good sign.

“You went into town to get me things?”

“I told you I want you to be comfortable while you’re here.” Something about the sentence tickles your mind, but then you’re lowering yourself onto the cloud soft bed, cool silk and cotton beneath your skin, sliding against his clothes, your belly glows bright. You’re full of distractions and truth. “There’re a couple of young women that live down aways.” Young women? You perk up at the thought. Friends? “Ellie and Dina. Two young alphas, and they’re good people. I’ll take you down to meet them soon, when you’re ready.”

“Two alphas?”

“They’re a couple.”

“Like– like in love?”

He hovers at the edge of the rug with that strange look in his eyes again, the one from before – I’m only an omega, you don’t have to be afraid of me – and a palpable desperation to cross the border you don’t think he’s even aware he’s letting you in on, but that you can see nonetheless. Two fingers tucked into the line of his belt, twisted there as if grasping for restraint.

“Yeah, they’re together.”

“I didn’t know alphas could do that… that they’d let you.”

“Reckon it’s why they came all the way out here, to be honest, for freedom. But ‘course they can – be together, that is. We can do what we please, despite what they’d have us believe.” And Leo’s words ring in your mind again. Perhaps everyone sees the truth of what you are except for you. The seedling grows vines, suffocates. All the hope you’d thought would live here seems to have never even existed at all. You feel, for the first time, heavy with all the things you do not know, all the things you lack, all the inexperience and naivety like ignorance thick and cloying in your blood. “From what I understand, Dina presented late, after they’d already gotten together. And by that time it was a done deal, they were in love, no going back. And anyway, they make it work, make it look easy as nothin’, to be frank.” He runs a big hand over the back of his skull, and the way he lifts his arm has the thick of his bicep bunching, fat ball of muscle just there for your teeth to sink into. You shift restlessly on the bed.

“Easy as nothin’,” you say slowly, trying to imitate the dip and pitch of his drawl. Your fingertip follows the line of stitching in the duvet, petting at the seams holding it together. “Is that how we’ll be too?” And although you mean the words, intend the question, you’re suddenly awash with shy regret for asking, even though you can’t say exactly why. Probably for the look on his face, which goes immediately dark and serious, and even yet, you persist. “Will it be easy for us too?” And you’re sure your voice must sound like you’re begging.

“No. It won’t. It won’t be like that between us. You’ll stay here as long as it takes for you to acclimatize to being out of that place,” that place, he says like a curse, and it makes you angry, “To bein’ out in the world, and then we’ll find somewhere for you. Somewhere that’s safe and comfortable where you’ll be able to make your own life.”

“I don’t– I don’t understand,” you tell him, but it’s a lie. You do understand, you see, and very clearly, that all you’d waited for during your life, the before, the not life, the extra year, it had all been in vain, for nothing. It would not be given to you here.

“What don’t you understand?” And his tone is cruel and spitting, making you flinch. “I’m sending you away soon. This is what I’m saying.”

“But I don’t– No–” You’d waited so long. He’s being so mean, and you tell him so.

“Yes. You need to be with people your own age. You need to see the world and grow up,” and what a horrible thing to say, you think – to grow up. As if it were not a thing you’d been forced to do already all on your own, without anyone to help you.

“Well then what do you care about what I need? You make no sense!” And you bare your teeth at him. “If you don’t want me–”

But he cuts you off, broad palm held up in a staying gesture, and it’s so incongruous with all the rest of it, that you want to laugh in his face. “Didn’t say I don’t want’cha.” And that frown again, he makes no sense, the tip of his boot makes landfall in the high piled rug, halfway in, hypnotized and compelled in full. You settle on the bed and feel very calm despite the too fast beat of the thing that moves and lives within you, despite your anger and confusion.

And through the beat and the heat and the sweat on your neck, despite the shyness you’ve forgotten is shyness right at this moment, but that you’re sure will return later because this is what you are and this is what you were made for: him. You ask, “Then are you going to knot me now?” Because if he’s going to send you away, then surely he’ll give you that before you go, surely he’ll still want that from you.

He splutters, going all red in the face as if the notion of a young omega asking the experienced alpha she’s been presented with to do that most basic thing his nature demands, is something out of the ordinary. “What? No– no.” But despite his supposed refusal, he takes two steps forward towards you. Venturing further onto the soft piled rug, leaving large crushing footprints in his wake.

“Later then?” You ask very pragmatically.

“No. Absolutely not. There will be no knotting.”

You shake your head at him, small frown between your brows, but still feeling calm despite the tragedy. Forcing that horrible seedling down into submission, the vines smothering all your hope. “But what do you mean?” And you feel like a child.

“I’m not going to fuck you. We aren’t doin’ any of that. You’re too– you’re too young, practically a girl.” A child. He has an accent that thickens with agitation, the ends of his words sluicing off between his tongue and teeth and anger while he hurts you.

“You don’t want me,” you say, and it isn’t a question anymore, only an obvious thing.

His eyes go very dark, and you want to turn away, look back at the edge of the world and the bright glow of the sun being swallowed by it. “I don’t want that.” And the way he spits the words hurts, making you a thing impossible to desire.

“You don’t want me,” again, repeated, so the both of you can bask in the truth of it.

But it snaps something in the room, or in him, or amidst the honesty being brought out here and now. He takes two ground-eating steps forward to loom over you aggressively, forcing you to fall back on your elbows, looking up at him wide eyed but still inexplicably not afraid, only a greater thing than what can be called merely disappointed. And yet, not disappointed enough to not notice the way one of his knees presses against the inside of one of yours. “I should get to have a fucking choice too, shouldn’t I? Like you, locked away in that horrible place–”

“It wasn’t horrible,” you try and say, but you don’t think he hears.

“The way you had all your choices and freedoms stripped. Shouldn’t I also be allowed to have one single goddamn thing?” Where else would I have gone if not there? “A choice – to say, no, stop, I don’t want this.” He’s so angry, and it is all suddenly so clear, and he finally grabs you, pulling you up by the bend of your elbow, the small joint almost crushed in his massive fist to pull you halfway up off the bed and towards him, getting in your face with all his anger.

Leo’s voice again, you don’t have to be what they tell you to be, you can choose for yourself. This is what Joel wants too.

“You can’t end up stuck out here at the end of the world with some washed up old alpha who can’t give you a quarter of what you need and deserve. I won’t let you. I won’t,” he snarls.

But despite your greenness, your naivety or your ignorance or your youth, you think: how dare he? “And what about what I want? What about my choices? Or are you going to be just like all the rest of them? Like the whole world telling me I’m too insignificant and too stupid to decide for myself? Just locked away in another cage–” You spit at him, trying to claw and shove at him, stubby nails digging at the sun pebbled skin of his throat, yanking at his too long hair and patchy beard, inadvertently pulling yourself closer to him. He grunts, struggling to take you in hand, slippery thing you can make yourself into when you really want, and you, trying your mightiest to hurt him any way you can as he’s already decided he’s going to hurt you with his rejection. “Is that what you are? Just like all the rest of them?” You cry amidst your struggle, choked with tears and being too little to be effective but too big for your own skin.

You shove at his jaw, trying to scratch at his cheek, but he grips you full around either arm, locking you in place and gives you a swift but measured jerk, jostling you into submission, trapping your hands bent as they are up by his neck so that one small palm is sliding to the back of his nape, over the gland behind his ear, at that soft vulnerable hollow, and coming to rest at the one in back, at the base of his neck beneath his collar. Both of you go still as stone, frozen by the truth of what you both are and how inescapable it all is, reality held in the palm of your hand.

Obvious: a designation is not a thing you can ever hide. Alphas and omegas wear it on their bodies like markers. Glands scattered at different places: behind the ears, at the base of the neck, inside the wrists and ankles; vulnerabilities that when acknowledged, bitten, seal a mating bond. Places that if handled properly, turn you into nothing but what you are at your basest nature. And you can’t help yourself – at the feel the spongy patch of skin, slightly raised and slightly rougher than the rest of him, a place that when in rut or in heat, would become, will become, extra sensitive, extra swollen, extra ripe – when you slowly slide your fingers against it, feeling the texture of it, the way it’s even hotter than the already sweltering rest of him.

He growls low and rumbling in his chest, that sound again, and he’s so angry, it’s painted all over his face in shades of defiance; coming off of him like radiation, angry at you, angry at the truth of what you both are, angry at himself and the world and all of it, but he pulls you closer anyways, tugging your forward by his grip on your arms which is starting to mimic the ache you’re suffering at that place between your legs you long to show him, pulling you in so that the tips of your breasts, covered beneath his thick sweater and the too thin, soft bra they gave all the omegas who needed them, brush against the thick of his chest, pulling a soft breath of a moan from your tongue.

“You’re being so mean to me,” you whisper. “And I don’t deserve it. And I waited so long for you and you never came for me, and now this is how you’re treating me,” you say with a hiccup and a tear, and you feel little and big and that place that calls for him pulses and hurts and leaks. He’s so mean and you’re so sad and you want him and you can’t understand why he’s being this way when you were made for him and he for you, and if nothing else was right in this world, then this was the thing that was supposed to be.

His eyes shift quickly back and forth between both of yours, that frown, mouth turned down, his mustache that connects to the patchiness of his beard showing how contrary he finds you. You frown back at him, trying to pull away, whining when he tightens, pulls you closer, right up to his face as if he needs to inspect you even more closely. Your toes aren’t touching the rug anymore, scraping against the thick round of his boots, and you won’t have it. You’ll give him a piece of your mind, you’ll show him. “You think that because I’m little and young and easily bruised that I’m not in control.” It’s not a question. If you could grow fangs, you would. If you could rip him to shreds, you would. “That I can’t control you. But I made you come for me, didn’t I?” Now you laugh at him, now you show him. “I knew if I wrote to you, you’d come, and you did. I made you come. I made you.” And saying it feels like victory, so you don’t care that it makes his face crack, you don’t care that he pushes away from you, letting you fall back onto the bed with a limp bounce, storming out of the room, the door slamming shut behind him. You don’t give a thistle for choices. You want to be selfish, you want to be alive, you want to see the sky. You have the sea now, and you want to be this thing you are because this is already you, this is what you were made into, and you have no choice but to bask in it, and you won’t bend to him or give it up for him only because he can’t accept the same of himself, only because he’s still trapped in his own white box.

He knows, as soon as you make whatever stupid decision it is that you’re making, that something’s off. A shift in the air in the house, his heart beating funny, his scent changing because his body knows you’re not in its immediate vicinity anymore, something that tells him off, off, off, be vigilant, she needs you so much, you can’t fail again. He reminds himself of all the decisions he’s already made, of what he knows he wants and does not want, of what he is and what he is not.

After he’d stormed out of your room – I made you – he’d retreated to hide in his own bedroom, to the other big chair by the fireplace in here, cowering like a dog with its tail tucked between its legs, forcing himself to listen to you cry for hours, the whine and whimper of an omega in need of something he was made to give, and yet will not. As if a little thing like you could make him do anything. Him. He grits his teeth, chews on his own tongue, digs his fingers into the arms of the chair to force himself to remain seated in place, to not return to you, to not give you all the things he knows you need and want to be soothed by.

He can smell your scent changing already, reacting to him, reducing him to nothing, entirely effective in your conquering. And he’d stupidly thought that perhaps the heat, and the rut that it would yield, would wait, give him a moment of reprieve or compassion before it came for him. A moment to think. He thought he’d have more time, a chance to escape the thing he so desperately wants but cannot and will not let himself have, refuses to give in to. His body stirs and smolders, and like he’d done for eleven years and then one, he ignores it. He ignores the truth of who and what he really is.

He sits in his chair, head propped up against the back, and listens to your cries and mewls ebb and quiet until finally, he thinks you might have sobbed yourself to sleep. He doesn’t want to hurt you, he doesn’t mean to hurt you. It’s the absolute last thing he could ever, ever want. Everything, not only in his nature, but in his character, in the things that make him up as a man who’d want a woman like you, is clamoring within him to go to you, to give you what you want, to sooth you with his voice and his scent and his cock. To fuck you into your heat until you’re soft and slick and fevered enough to take his knot, to let him breed you, to let him mate you. His cock stirs and thickens beneath the rough confines of his jeans, that thicket of skin at the base where his knot waits in ready for you, simmering with heat and tightness. He digs his knuckles into his temple until it hurts.

You don’t want me… Of course he fucking wants you. He’d have taken your cunt for himself right there in that white box room, on your rickety little iron cot for all the surrounding omegas and witless betas to hear without giving a single shit what anyone said or thought if he had any sort of right or will or choice. If he had anything more to give you. And then watching you go right to sleep when he’d brought you into his home, the sight of you feeling so immediately safe and content, ready to nest amongst his things and his scent – that feeling of having within himself the things that he needs to be what he is – indescribable.

Pretty little omega – and truly, you’re so pretty. All he’d never let himself imagine or desire or hope for. He’s too old, past his prime and forgotten by the world, but he’s still a man with a working cock, still an alpha, even if only in the simplest of ways. Of course he wants you.

He lets himself languish miserably before the fire, eyes going hazy with exhaustion, the comedown of adrenaline, the presence of warm omega all around him, the taste of your pre-heat scent coating his tongue and throat. He pulls his socks off and lets the heat of the fire warm his feet and thinks he should’ve given you his room instead, let you sleep in his bed, near the fireplace, between his sheets and amongst his scent. He can sleep out in the dirt for all he matters as long as you’re comfortable. And the rational part of his brain wants to laugh at the thought, sitting here alone, realizing that despite his battling, his nature will always win out in the end, that all this fight really means shit. His cock gives a faint throb, his deflated knot rhythmically pulsing in time with his heart, ready to swell and claim what everyone including nature, but excluding Joel, has said belongs to him. Of course he wants you. And if he’s honest, or a fucking liar, he can’t really say which, all his truths and deceptions have become so muddled within his own mind, his past and his present and this future he’s never thought he wanted or had a right to, the year of waiting was more a form of self punishment, restraint as proof of fear, than anything to do with you.

Anger, yes, that everything had been decided for him for so long. That he isn’t even allowed to decide what he is, what he wants. But fear, more than anything, that interminable curse of failure he’s so haunted by and so afraid of. How could nature ever look at him and think him strong enough to take on the role of caretaker, protector, alpha – whatever it is that you need him to be, the whole world in the eye of a young and untried omega – when he can hardly stand the sight of his own face in the mirror? There’s nothing but tragedy setting the stage the two of you stand posed on.

Finally, your cries fade to soft hiccups, and then a peculiar silence he doesn't trust. He waits, ears peeled, his head turned slightly towards the cracked open door of his bedroom, sensing the shift in scent and after a few beats of too loud silence, a thud and a huff, the music of a little mind thinking too loudly and mischievously for its own good. Even the wind seems to blow differently as if it knows you’re scampering about amidst it now, vulnerable to its lashings, and he’s shooting up out of his chair and charging through the house. By the door, he realizes his boots are gone, stolen from where he’d dropped them discarded after he’d left you in your room to cry your salt tears. He forgoes a coat and his flannel, braving the icy wind in nothing but his white undershirt, stepping silent but no less frantic out onto the deck. The truck is dark and quiet, still in its usual spot, and this quells his fear minutely. It occurs to him that you likely don’t even know how to drive.

But when he comes around the western facing corner of the house, it’s worse than he could’ve imagined, and the scar slashed across his right temple suddenly zings like copper, burns like fire at the sight of you. You are, for some inexplicable reason, crawling on all fours, towards the edge of the cliffside. And he’s frozen solid for a second, shocked and terrified, and then moving forward like lightning, tripping over his own two feet and breath before he realizes you’re right at the very edge now, and he needs to move very fucking carefully to ensure he doesnt send you spilling in fright over the edge.

He alters his movements, continues forward slowly, his bare feet over the freezing ground and sharp bric-a-brac of the forest floor, the slabs of stone turning to ice as he nears the edge, and he watches the uncoordinated wallop of your movements, banging your knee with a small yelp, as you crawl like a slow and drunken spider in his too big clothes, dragging his too big boots around your ankles, to the very edge of the cliff side, slowly lowering yourself to plop down with your head and arms hanging over the edge.

He pauses about ten feet away from you and waits for your next move, but you lie still, quarter part of you draped over the edge of the cliff, and he realizes that you’re watching the water far below crash against the rocks.

“Sweetheart,” he calls slow and gentle, crouching down low so that his voice travels along the ground where you lay. “Sweetheart, what’re you doin’?” You start, turning back towards him, one palm coming to the edge of the rock to shove yourself up to peer back at him, rock pebble spraying out over the void with your movement, and his heart and stomach lurch to his throat, almost gagging at the terror. Your eyes are hazy and bright, and he recognizes the beginnings of the fever, it’s tendrils wrapping themselves around you, making you a little confused, a lot needy, and he’s so fucking stupid, he should’ve never left you alone. But he hadn’t thought it’d come on this fast, that you’d affect each other so.

“I wanna go down there,” you call over the small hill of your shoulder, turning back to peer down at the beach. You point down at the shoreline with your other hand, wagging your finger as to emphasize what it is you want.

Jesus fucking Christ, he’s going to have a goddamn heart attack. “Alright, baby. Come back here, I’ll take you down. Let’s go together.” You mumble something, arm flopping out, waving him away. “Please, sweetheart, come back here with me,” he begs, and there must be something in his tone, he’s sure, because you turn full back at that, looking at him suspiciously like you remember his earlier words of rejection and no longer trust him now.

“I’m glowing, sir. I need to feel the sea and the cold.” Your voice sounds not your own, like it comes surfing off the wind to his ears.

“Not, sir. Joel. Only Joel, remember?”

You push yourself up, moving to sit back on your knees, but still right at the edge, still too close. Sweat slides slick and frigid down his spine, the complete opposite of what you must be feeling right now. Only Joel. Only Joel, he hears you mutter at the sea. “There isn’t anything only about you. Leave me alone. Go away–”

“Please, baby. Come back here. Let’s go inside, I’ll give you the sea, I promise. Just come over here – with me.” You turn back at that, shifting on your knees to face him. If you lose your balance, stumble, you’ll topple back over the edge. He just needs to be good enough for you to want to come to him, convincing enough. He puts his palm out towards you, all supplication now. “Come here, sweet thing. I’ll show you the sea, I promise I will.” You start your slow spider crawl back towards him and his scar burns, a sharp pain through his brain, piercing behind his eye, heart beat to death between his ribs. As soon as he gets his hands on you, he’s going to fucking throttle you, he promises. But he’s almost got you, and he dares not move, barely even breathes, his hand is shaking so badly it interrupts his view of you on every other painful heartbeat, and he realizes his eyes are blurry with terrified tears, and suddenly, that anger doesn’t matter even half an ounce as much anymore because then you’re here and crawling into his arms, up into his lap so that he’s falling back onto his ass on the cold, hard ground. He pulls you into himself, clumsy little spider legs wrapping around his waist, your arms going around his neck so that you’re clinging to him.

One of his boots lies lost and discarded back by the edge of the cliff.

“Please, don’t ever fucking do that to me again.”

“I’m glowing,” you sigh into his neck.

“I know you are, baby. It’s okay, we’ll fix it.” He feels you nuzzle at his collarbone, his neck, the gland, already sensitive and swollen behind his ear, already, already, already, God help me, and his heart feels like it’s beating so hard he can feel it move through your chest cavity and reverberate against his hand on your back. Christ, it wasn't supposed to happen this quickly, it wasn’t supposed to be like this. He was supposed to have more time, more choices, more control. The wet of your lips mouthing at his skin, and then the peek of your tongue tasting his gland, and he rumbles deep in his chest, his mind going loose and slacken like an old rubber band, and then snapping back to clarity at your surroundings. Cold wind and now the beginning sprinkling of needle freezing rain, your shivers jittering into his chest.

“We gotta go inside – let’s get up,” he murmurs into your ear, unable to resist nosing at your hair, the small, freezing cold seashell hidden within.

Wait, wait– and then the scrape of small, blunt edged teeth just there at the vulnerable patch of skin. He swallows a scream, and the caged thing rattles and howls inside his chest, his arms going iron and binding around your back, pressing you to him, chest melded to chest. “Wait, please,” again, and now a tiny kiss. “If you don’t want me,” and he never should’ve even insinuated it, it’s the worst thing he’s ever done in his entire miserable fucking life. “Then will you please–” another soft press of lips to his jaw, the corner of his mouth. His hand slides down your spine, he can’t help himself, presses down on the base of your vertebrae, the heat of your cunt along the pulse of his cock, through cotton and denim and cold, just there, just there, he’s so fucking close. “Will you at least kiss me–” but you’re not waiting for another rejection, you’re just licking clean across the slash of his mouth, taking his bottom lip between both of yours for a shy little suck, unsure and inexperienced with desperation. And then there’s nothing caged about any of it, no more white box, no more perch at the end of the world, he squeezes you to himself so that it hurts, and he kisses you.

Hand twisted too tightly in your dampening hair, he pulls your head back, and with a rumbling grunt sends you deep and languid into easy submission, the steady deep timber of the sound wringing the desired effect on you. You twitch once, as if he’d tugged on your strings, his pretty puppet, and then go soft and open and easily penetrated, jaw hinging open so that he can lick inside of you, tasting all you have to offer which he refuses to accept he’s actually taking and which you’re all too desperately eager to give.

He takes it all regardless.

Slick mouth against slick mouth, out there in the cold rain and wind, rolling around in the dirt, he tastes you the way the two of you were made for. Pulling your hips closer, rolling his up to meet all the heat you have to offer which will only get hotter and hotter the more he continues down this path. You claw at his hair, the gland at your wrist rubbing against the one at his ear, marking him with your scent and pheromones, marking him as yours. And he swears he can almost feel that glow in your belly too, a little wriggling comet in his hands, set to burst. The crescendo of your whining climbs higher, your mouth hungrier, and Joel feels insane for a second, entirely outside of himself, lost to his senses. All he is, is what you need him to be, something hard and strong and solid for you to mold yourself around, and it’s so right it’s wrong. Not what he’d planned, not what he’d decided.

He rips his mouth away from yours, panting, forgetting his name and his sense and everything else he is besides a hard cock and a now equally smoldering belly. “Wait– wait,” he begs, burning comet, too willful to tame without teeth, surging in his arms. You rub yourself against his face, your hair sluicing through his, your soft tits against his chest, his neck, bumping his chin while you try to climb him perched in his lap like you are. “Wait, please–” he tries to sooth over your huffing whines, and then a sharp stinging little bite to his jaw line.

No, no.

“Stop. We have to stop, please. This isn't what’s supposed to happen. This isn’t what I want.” And you hear that.

The comet burns out, you go still in his arms, and it feels worse than anything. He wishes he could swallow the words back immediately because then you’re pushing back and away from him. Scrambling out of his lap, escaping his arms as fast as you can.

“You’re horrible! Get away–” He dodges a small, kicking foot – the bootless one. And you’re stumbling to your feet, tripping over the too big shoe wrapped around your too small foot. He pushes to stand, as well, gripping you about the elbow, avoiding a weakly punching little fist now. This is truly getting too ridiculous. The two of you need to come to terms with each other, meet in the middle, forgo the theatrics you seem all too desperate for. He ducks away from another ineffectual punch, grips you by the scruff of the neck, unruly kitten that you are, and pushing you forward, hooks you under his arm, lifting you clear off the ground and rendering you entirely captured, bent in half, a wilted flower over the strong of his forearm.

You squawk indignantly, kicking your feet against the back of his leg as he stomps over to his abandoned boot, slowly filling with rain now, fuck this shit, and trudges through the mud back to the house, ice cold droplets dripping off the tip of his nose. The two of you are well on your way to soaked, but he thinks it might not be such a bad thing, considering the ball of heat radiating from your belly, the one in his own mimicking you. It seems to pool in the palm of his hand, where he’s got you hooked and caught over his arm, honey collection of magma.

Let me go! You’re screeching. “Leave me alone! You don’t even care about me and I hate you and I want to see the water!” More kicking and clawing.

When he finally dumps you back onto your rumpled bed, undignified yelps and pathetic little growls, he’s at his wits end. Taking you firmly in hand, heavy hand back at the nape of your neck, thickly calloused palm scraping against the quickly swelling gland there, other pushing at your hip to drape you over the edge of the bed like a rag doll, he folds himself over you, smothering you with his weight and heat, forcing you into calm. You go shocked frozen, wracked with shivers and then finally, blessedly still and quiet. This was all you needed, for Joel to follow his instincts.

He presses you into the bed with his too heavy weight, thick arms caged around your head, pert little ass tucked up against his pelvis, and he breathes you in, lets you settle.

“You need to behave,” he rumbles, and all you do is sigh bleary eyed and exhausted by your own willfulness. “You’re not to go outside all alone at night like that again, do you understand me? And you are especially, never, ever, to go that close to the cliff edge again.”

“But the sea–” you whine and shift, rubbing your little cunt against his now fully hard cock, perfect position that he’s got you in, presented to him like this. He presses tighter against you, growling deep in his chest to shut you up.

“Promise me.” But you whine, shifting, starting to cry a little, too far gone to the start of the fever he’s done nothing to really sate. There’s still time yet, for your full heat, but these beginning symptoms, they need to be soothed just as well, tempered just as diligently as the full blown heat would be. If for nothing else, than for the sake of the omegas' comfort and happiness. He bends his knees, shoving the thick of his erection up against the apex of your thighs, pressing you further up onto the bed and tighter beneath him, and nosing through the mantle of your hair, he finds the gland at the back of your neck beneath the collar of his sweater and bites down gently. Not breaking skin, only giving you teeth to feel, to be soothed by, that blunt clasp that’ll dull your own sharp edges for now.

He laves his tongue along the scorching patch of skin, the texture different to the rest of you, different, even, to his own glands, like silk, like water, something liquid about the feel of you here beneath his tongue and teeth. You let out a terrible little sound that has the threads of his control snapping, providing cause for concern, and he growls softly, pleased, in response. It’s a sound of submission and acceptance and praise, from the both of you equally, all at the same time. He lets you settle like this, petting at you with his tongue, giving you the scraping edge of his teeth like a threat, every so often. Grinding, because honestly he can’t even fucking help it, against that scorching little cunt he knows would already, even now, be so soft for him. Perhaps, not soft enough yet, not ripe enough yet, to take his knot and everything else he wants to force on it, but soft enough for him to teach you how to take a good fucking.

A virgin, never even had a heat before, and trapped here between his teeth and beneath his cock. It would all be so easy, it would all feel so right.

But that is, Joel thinks, just the thing of it. It would feel right – but would it be right? He can’t yet tell.

You cloud his judgment, seduce his nature into wanting to give you everything and anything you could ever even think to ask for, and he can’t yet tell if it’s just you, that sparkle and that light and that heat like a comet that lives inside of you that he’s coming to suspect is wholly yours, nothing to do with biology or designations or markers that tell of what you should and should not be, that’s got him so desperate to please you. Or if it’s only nature, trying to force him into another choice he’s not made for himself.

You wake slowly, disturbed out of your sleep the way one feels when they’re being spied on by something too large and too scary to look at right in the eye.

You shift in the blue bed, cool and calm now, all that glowing heat from before that’d forced you out into the cold and the wind, hungry to throw yourself through space and time out into the sea, reckless and free, gone away now. All you feel as your eyes blink open slowly, is a shivery, damp cold rattling down the line of your spine. The room around you is dark, the glow of the slumbering fire out in the living room peeking in through the slightly left ajar door of your bedroom.

He’d stayed until you’d gone boneless and calm, trapped beneath his weight and between his thick strong arms, letting you suck on the gland inside his wrist as you’d pleased. And when finally, you’d been just on this side of awake, he’d changed your clothes and slid you beneath the soft sheets and weighted duvet, and sat in the cozy sofa chair by the window until you’d been too exhausted by the embers in your tummy and the tight want between your legs to fight sleep any longer.

The chair sits cold and empty now, and above it, the wide window, the pitch black of the world beyond is bright with unknown terrors, and you huddle into your nest of pillows and blankets, hiding beneath the edge of the duvet.

You’d never had a window in your bunk, had not experienced the night in years and years, and looking at it now, put on display as it is through the clear pane of glass separating you from all of that unknown, you feel suddenly terrified, nothing but little. It feels as if you were to look away from it, it’d reach through the glass and pluck you out of your bed, whisk you far enough away that he’d never be able to find you, come for you again, and also, like if you don’t stop looking, it’ll eventually begin to look back. You wiggle backwards, bum finding the edge of the bed, and then sliding out, feet first, gaze still peeled on the window and the night, walking backwards out of your room and pulling the door shut on your way. At the very last moment, you peek through the sliver of the door edge and frame, nothing but your nose remaining in the blue room, and you swear the night stares back now.

You shut the door with a snick, and turn to rush on tipped toes in search of his room.

He’s sleeping on his back, one thick arm thrown over his head, the other laying across his belly, and you peer over the edge of the bed, hands clasped beneath your chin, watching the up and down of his breathing, the flicker of his eyes beneath his lids. He has long eyelashes and funny whiskers and hair everywhere. Under his arms, and across his chest and his belly, leading down below the sheet covering him, to the thick lump there, that place you don’t know yet, but do understand. He’s hairy, and he’s big, and the aching place you want to show him comes awake in response to all this man you have before you. And although the house is warm, the fires stoked diligently to keep you as toasty as you need, another shiver runs its way down your back. So taking hold of one of his thighs, you hoist yourself up onto his too tall bed, knobby knee stabbing him in the side as you climb on top of him, planting yourself right in the middle of his broad expanse. He gives a rough grunt, shocked awake by the little creature climbing its way all over him, hands shooting out to steady you by the hips as he jerks startled.

“What in the Sam Hell–” You ignore his spluttering, rubbing your bottom against his stomach, finding a comfortable position to drape yourself over him, wilting like a felled weed snuggled up against his chest, tucked just below his chin, giving an entirely contented sigh when you settle. “What the fuck’re you doin’?” He has such a nasty mouth. Someone should wash it with soap for him.

He tries to roll over, but you cling, bearing your sharp little teeth to latch at his collarbone, holding tight, refusing to be shoved away again. “M’cold–” you fuss, chewing and slobbering all over him as you pull yourself closer, hitching a knee over his hip, burrowing your foot between the bed and his back.

“You have t’go back to your bed. You can’t sleep here.”

You whine, chewing harder, and he grumbles, but his hands slide from your hips to your back in a soothing pass and you slick your tongue against the flavors of his skin. He tastes so good, and he smells so good, and in a tiny voice you know will get you what you want, you say, “The window is too big and it’s so dark. I’m scared, alpha.”

He groans, grip going tight and strangling around you, fists bunching in the oversized clothes he’d swaddled you in after he’d dried the rain and outdoor chill off of you before putting you to bed. “Can’t I just stay here? I promise I’ll be good like you told me to,” and you nuzzle against him, making sure to thoroughly cover him in the headiness of your scent. Everything is so warm and right, and he’s so thick and comfortable and strong everywhere, perfect for laying on top of like this. The hair on his chest is prickly, tickling your face where you rub yourself against it, and he rumbles low, a deep sort of purring sound that you feel vibrate in your tummy, big wolfish man that he is, but his grip goes loose and soft after a while, stroking and soothing and petting along your slopes and planes. Convinced. Ha.

You hold very still, breathe very slow, make sure not to spook the beast while he accepts the fact of you here atop him until he finally says, already sleepy and relaxed again, “Alright… but you’ll behave like I said.” And eventually he rolls the two of you over, little omega barnacle that you’ve turned yourself into, and tucks you into his warm side.

The third time you wake to him, there’s fire everywhere. And an ache in your womb so sharp it sends shivers through your whole body. You cling and grind and tremble; forget your name, where you are, nothing more than that sticky throb in that place that you want to give to him so, so badly.

He’s draped atop you, heavy arm caging you in, thick chest covering your back, smothering you between incredible strength and, soft, Joel smelling sheets. You cup the ball of his bicep, it’s big and hard and hot, and drag your palm along the thick slope. He’s so strong, he could crush you, hurt you, make you into anything he wanted, and you want all those things, you think. You want him to do whatever he wants if only he’ll make the ache go away. Fire and glowing bright heat everywhere, most of all your belly, your heart, somewhere so deep inside you’d never known it existed until he’d come and made you aware of it.

Your fingers slide along his wide forearm, hairy here too, thick wrist, hard, strong bone beneath, and then the soft spot on the inside that belongs to you now. You stick your tongue out, tasting the spongy patch, scraping your teeth along it. If you bite him, you’ll be able to keep him forever, he won’t be able to send you away, but there still remains – even if just for a little bit longer, before the heat you’ve been waiting your whole life and a year for to finally take you – a part of you that’s still rational, head only halfway gone to the clouds. That part which reminds you that more than anything, you want him to choose you. Without the bite as a deal breaker, bond sealer, only because he wants you, only because he likes you.

But you can taste him, it doesn’t mean you have to bite him, and you the tip of run your tongue along the inside of his wrist, gently suckling at his gland, the flavor of him so much stronger here, as if his essence is more concentrated at this small place. And the ache between your legs, in your tummy, deepens, spreads and blooms and ravages. The inside of you feels sensitive and swollen and big and little all at once, and you shift your bottom, trying to rub yourself back up against him, your sucking mouth pulling sharper, a whine bubbling in your throat because you need something, something more, and you think you know, and you know you understand, but you’re not sure, and if he could just wake up and show you it would all be so much better.

You press back harder, arching so that the aching place feels the heat of him behind you, that hard ridge there that makes your heart pound all through your body. You’d shucked off your leggings and the sweater he’d put you in through the night, too hot and sweaty with the big beast smothering you as he’d been, so now you’re left in nothing but one of his too big t-shirts and the soft, cotton white panties all the omegas always wore. You whine again, gnawing on his wrist for real now, and a big paw of a hand comes up to wrap around your hip, stilling your wriggling. You feel him lean closer, burying his face in the back of your hair, groaning, hot bullish breath fanning across your nape. He rumbles deep and it only makes you feel worse, more desperate, more hungry for that thing you don’t know how to ask for. You want to cry his name, beg him, but your tongue feels fat and swollen inside your mouth, too full of blazing heat to form actual words. He just has to know, he just has to be able to tell.

“I know,” he mumbles against your nape, nosing around to your ear where he presses his mouth. “I know, it’s alright.” You gurgle again, pulling his wide palm to cover your face completely, nuzzling against his rough palm, muffling your pathetic animal sounds of supplication. It’s okay, it’s okay, you can hear him murmuring and you’re not sure who the words are for, but you feel certain they’re not for you. He’s scared, you know this. Between all the things you’re so uncertain of, this you’re sure of. He’s afraid, and it’s your job to reassure him, to show him how well it will all be once the two of you come together.

You push your face harder into his palm, and you feel him hook his fingers into the elastic of your panties, tugging the soft fabric wide, tugging them down your legs, and there’s that same need, yes, that comet bright glowing heat, but also, and something you can recognize as more your usual self, a desperate sort of shyness. Something coming unraveled and unspooled for the whole world, him, to see. You can feel the slick uncoveredness at the apex of your thighs, running down your legs, a blossom of heat and vulnerability there at that place, the core of you, and it doesn’t feel shameful, necessarily, but painfully exposed. Your softest place bared for him to see. And yet, alongside that, the knowledge that this soft place is only for him, that you only ever want it to be for him, and so this can, again, be nothing but right.

“Look at all this slick you’ve made for me, what a sweet girl you are.” There’s such reassurance in the timber of his voice, it makes the heat change, something swirling but steady, constant. You spread your own palm against the back of his hand covering your face, line your fingers along the backs of his, little and big, matched alongside each other, and you press his fingers against your forehead, squishing your nose against his palm, Hiding there in the cup of his hand from the whole world and him, waiting for this truth of yourself to finally be revealed to you.

His palm strokes along your bare thigh, I know, I know, he keeps saying, and they’d told you all that your alphas would know, that they’d show you, and there’s reassurance in this, that some part of what’s happening is unfolding as they said it would. It makes you feel not so small, not so untried and naive. You try and lay as still as possible, willing the flames into patience, breathing in your own hot breath from the cup of his palm. I know it hurts, we’ll make it better, I promise. He shifts behind you, the rustling of fabric, and then his hand on your bottom again, moving in a slow circular motion, steady and reassuring. He moves to your leg again, lifts it and then something hot and hard and big, coming to rest on your inner thigh, and he lets your leg down, starts the soothing rub of your bottom again.

“We’re gonna go so slow, alright. Only a little at a time and not the whole thing today. We gotta wait for your heat to settle in all the way, time it all right so that my rut doesn’t start before you’re ready to take me. How does that sound, sweetheart?” But your tongue is still fat, your words still jumbled and missing, and all you really want to ask is if he’s changed his mind now, if he’s finally decided he wants you, and you think you’re crying, sipping salt water from the palm of his hand. “I know I wasn’t how you needed me yesterday, and I’m sorry for that.” He presses his forehead against the back of your shoulder, hand sliding up your hip to your waist, dragging his shirt along as he goes, uncovering you for himself. And you feel so intensely, that you belong to him, and you can’t understand how he could have ever not felt the same way.

You hitch an agonized little sob, muffled by his hand, and he rolls slightly so you’re half draped atop his chest, his palm rubbing soothing circles low on your belly now. And forcing you out of your hiding place, he pulls your face back to look at him, gripped around your jaw. His face is very serene, and this settles you, makes the words he’s saying clearer, more meaningful. “Can you hear me silly thing, or can all you think about is taking a cock right now?” You scrunch your nose at him, you know that word, it’s his hard thing between your legs.

“It’s so heavy, alpha,” you sniffle, feeling the weight of it pressing against you there.

He nods, warm look in his eyes that crease at the edges. “That’s how it’s going to feel inside you, baby.”

“The knot?” A seedling blooms again, this one very different now, full of hope once more. You realize you’ve found your missing words.

He shakes his head, not yet, and drags his palm up the inside of your thigh, squeezing and kneading as he goes, and you want to complain that he moves so slow, that he needs to do something else, you don’t know what, but something. You want to click your teeth at him, bite him again, anything to make him go.

And then: “Drippy little girl,” and he’s finally there and a moan that’s almost a scream because he’s cupping a place that is so unbearably sensitive and raw and full of heat and wet like you’d never known was possible.

Oh, oh, ah, ah, ah. “It’s alright,” he says, rubbing gently back and forth, a slick sound that is loud and embarrassing coming from between your legs. “It’s alright. This’ll help for now. We won’t go inside.” And he grips the heavy thing, his cock, in his own palm that’s all slick from your leaking and presses it against you. He rolls over completely now, shifting higher in the bed so that you’re sitting full on top of him, back to chest, bum to belly, and he spreads your thighs wide with his other hand, pulling your shirt up to bare all your nakedness for him to see. You wonder if he can also see all that burning shyness you’re suddenly so chock full of.

“Look at these pretty little tits,” he murmurs, cupping one small morsel in his palm, squeezing so that you’re arching against him, mouth agape like a fish, trying to find sounds that seem to have suddenly gone missing once again. “That’s right, I know.” He moves to the other one, squeezes and pinches and shakes it so that it jiggles in the cup of his hand. All the while he strokes his cock between your legs, pulling his hips back every so often so that it slides against you, coating it in all that wet slick you’re spilling for him.

You look down at the place where it juts out between your thighs, and it’s so big. Dark and angry looking at the end, thick and covered in veins that make it look even angrier and about to burst. You ask him if it hurts him, and he laughs a little and says it isn’t anything you can’t fix which makes you seven different shades of pleased.

The hand at your breasts moves up to your face again, and he turns your head, searching for your eyes. “We started off badly yesterday, yes? But we’re gonna do better today. I promise.” He slides his hips back again and this time he presses harder against you, his hand flat against the underside of his cock so that the top is slicking all along you. Sensitive little cunt, he says when you tremble and shiver and keen, and that’s when you know that’s what it's called. Your cunt. That place that belongs to him, that you want to give him so badly, that you want him to want so badly but that you barely even know yourself. No more experience than the greedy, frantic digging at the soft, hot flesh beneath your hand in moments when everything had felt too tight and needy to do anything else.

“Gonna break you in so well, baby. Gonna teach you how to come, how to fuck, how to take a knot.” And now the wide head presses against you, against a place that is so, so incredibly sensitive it almost hurts. You suck in a sharp gasp, trying to jerk away from the hurt, but he holds you in place against him, presses again, yeah, I know, yeah I know, like he’s trying to put it inside you, and yes, you think that’s what it is, that’s what you need, even if it might hurt. “You’re gonna get everything you need jus’ from me,” and his words are slurred and dripping slacken from his tongue.

He starts to move faster, you think he’s swallowed the same stone of desperation you did, rough grunts and huffing pants, and “So fucking small, it’ll never fit.” Jesus fucking Christ. And on every slick slide forward that wide angry head of it, his cock, bumps the crest of your sex, catches at your hole. You watch it in shock as it presses in just a little, and it hurts and feels like you’re full of bubbles and everything is sticky and your tummy glows with heat.

“Your little cunt needs this,” he grunts, the head catches, he presses, presses, pulls away, you want to bite and scratch and demand he go all the way, and you’re nothing but a pounding heart and a clenching cunt and you want more, and when he slides again it notches full on at the tiny opening, he pauses, lets it rest there before he presses not even half a centimeter further, only giving you the wide stretch of it, letting your cunt flutter and grip around the very head.

“Look at that–” And he peers over your shoulder to look at what he’s doing to you. “Look at your tiny cunt stretching for me.”

You cry, trying to pull away, trying to shove yourself deeper, to take the whole of it like the greedy thing you are, but he holds you in place and lets you flutter and flutter and cry until something in your womb pulls tight, and with his fingers swirling at the apex of your sex, the little nub that is so sensitive it pulls a warbled, baying moan from your tongue, an ah, ah, ah, he gives you your first orgasm with him. A desperate thing, too much and not enough, and with his other hand he’s squeezing, shoving his fist along the rest of the length of his cock, pressing it hard where you meet, and then he’s feeding you a blazing heat, filling you with it, stirring your insides to flutter and shiver harder. Forcing you to cry and beg for more, “Please, please, please,” more.

“You’re not ready yet.”

And although you’re not entirely certain for what, you promise, “I am, I am, I can take it.” You know he’s supposed to put it all the way inside, that then, the knot will come. And although you’re unsure what it will specifically be like, what will become of you during or after, you know you’re ready to discover it all.

“Not yet.” And he’s grunting it through clenched teeth, his hips churning, spitting tip grinding at your hole, something hot and thick sliding wetly all over and between the two of you. “You’ll do as I say. Your little cunt needs this, needs me to be patient with her.”

He lets the slick weight of himself fall away from you, leaving you feeling stretched and bruised and all shivery on the inside, yet still hungry for more. And he pulls his hands along the slopes of you, leaving trails of sticky wet along your skin. The proof of all you are, invisible but tangible, with a taste and a smell and a feel.

You lay your head back on his shoulder, the heat swirls and simmers for now, and your cunt, your cunt, your cunt, you want to give it to him in full, it throbs and trembles against his slick cock. “I’ve never had a heat before,” you tell him although you know he knows. He probably knows everything there is to know about you, which, admittedly, is not much.

“That's alright.”

“It will come soon, yes?” You peer over your shoulder to look up at him, and he nods down at you, that warm, eye creased look on his face again. You like the sight of it so much.

“Will I go away from myself?”

“No,” he says gentle, “I won’t let you. I’ll keep you here with me. You have nothing to be anxious about.”

He rolls the two of you over, keeping you in the comfort of his embrace, and he’s huge and steaming and naked behind you. His hairy chest, his hairy legs all along the smooth and sensitive curves of you. And his thing, it’s still trapped between your thighs, heavy and sticky with your wet, and still kind of hard but not as much as before. You reach between your legs to touch it, and he jerks and hisses but lets you do as you please. Curious fingertips gently along the thick round end of it, down the long length to find two heavy and hot weights hanging lower.

“Where is the knot?” You ask uncertainly, shy with all the things you don’t know.

“Here,” and he grabs your hand, moving your fingers to the base of it where there’s an area of skin, of a different sort of texture, rougher, thicker, around the circumference of it. You prod gently at it, not understanding. “See, it’ll swell when it’s inside of you, and then we’ll stay connected for a time, and I’ll fill you, and that’ll help your heat. And after a while it’ll go down, until you need it again. Did they explain to you how it’ll happen?” His cock is thick between your thighs again, beneath your exploring fingers. A little harder and bigger than it was before. His body, something like a wonderful miracle you need to know everything there is to know about it.

“Yes, but not– not all the way, I don’t think. They said you’d show me.” You turn back to look at him, searching for confirmation, reassurance, but instead ask: “Why did you change your mind?” And finally, of his own choosing, he grips you by the throat, and presses a small kiss to your mouth. The greatest victory of the day, and it’s only just begun.

“It’s exhausting, not letting yourself have what you need.” Need, not want. He shifts over you, coming up on his elbow and rolling you so that you’re on your back and looking up at him. You bring your fingers up to explore along his face: the hooked nose, soft mouth, heart brandished beard. He sighs that bull sigh, and you giggle as it tickles your throat and cheeks. Need, not want. That stings. “Fighting against what you are constantly– and you reminded me that we still have control in what we are. That there’s still choice in this, decidin’ to be what we are without resenting it. And we need each other, after all.” Need, not want.

“I don’t think you need me.”

“No?”

“No.” The truth that you very much feel like you need him, you keep to yourself. And anyways, he knows. You know he knows.

“M’thinkin’ I didn’t know I did. Or couldn’t say it out loud.” And he mimics your exploring fingers: thumb against the fan of your lashes, up the slope of your cheekbone, prying your mouth open to catch the edge of your bottom teeth and look inside. There’s a warm look in his eyes, like he’s pleased with you, like you’ve done a good job. “Think I’m realizin’ how wrong I was. How I want this all too.”

Want, not need.

He bends his head and kisses your mouth, kisses your breast, shows you how much he wants it.

3. I Was a Child Once, I’m Not Any Longer

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ahhhwomen · 2 months

Text

I don’t know why I bite.

Vampire Empire

Part 1

Pairing: DarkVamp!Wanda Maximoff x DarkVamp!Natasha Romanoff x Fem!Reader

A/N: We are going to ignore how long I disappeared, okay thank you. Also, y/n will not be in a proper relationship with the girls, she will very much be viewed and treated like a pet not a partner, but she will obvi still get the love.

Disclaimer: English is not my first language. All mistakes are my own.

AU Warnings: Human pets, abuse, violence, possessiveness, probably incorrect vampire lore, angst, panic attacks, hurt/comfort, kitten play (?), also this is not a Carol positive fic (I have nothing against her, but I needed a villain), death (later on)Minors DNI 18+

Summary: Your Master is a cruel woman, but you would never stand a chance against her, but what if they can?

Word Count: 3.5k

The keys jingle in a pattern.

With each step, the clash of metal calls out. It changes tune, depending on the day. If she’s tired, she drags her feet, it’s a slower melody. When she’s angry, there is a harshness to the smashing of the chain against her belt and a thud to her heavy boots.

You don’t know what her happy steps are, you think the sound would be smooth. Maybe, like she´s floating?

You wonder if you are ever going to hear it? If you are being honest with yourself, you don’t really know if you want to. At least her other behaviors are predictable, you can handle predictable, uncertainty however, that is an entirely different game. Not one you are very keen on playing.

Today, her steps boom like thunder, and her keys shriek like lighting.

Chills run down your spine; you press against the cold concrete wall. It scratches your skin. You press harder and cower closer.

You are shaking as she sweeps around the corner of your prison; she’s frowning today.

But…?

It hurts.

From yesterday. It still hurts.

She always gives you a day.

It still hurts.

You need a day.

It doesn't matter. You know you can’t stop it.

You close your eyes and submerge yourself in the void. You don’t like the dark, but she doesn't like it when you see.

Your cage opens with a shriek. You flinch as she touches your face, she is breathing down your neck and you feel yourself panic as she struggles with your collar.

It's never good when she takes away your collar.

Before you do something stupid, like fight back, a soothing voice guides you. It’s a whisper, that only you can hear. Drag in slow breaths, in for four, hold for seven, out for eight. Rinse and repeat. You do as they tell you.

You're in a sunflower field.

The heavy feeling in your stomach is from the big dinner you had, half an hour earlier.

The sun is setting, and you are smiling and laughing as you run through the field of flowers. They're ginormous, almost bigger than you. There is a weight to them as you push past. They scratch and irritate, but it's only temporary, so you keep laughing to yourself.

There is a whip to the wind, the sound loud and frightening. The flowers are louder, so you pretend not to hear. They rustle and dance in the harsh wind.

It's dark, but the yellow glow of plant life guides you. You don’t know where you are running to, maybe home, maybe the ocean. It matters not. You are happy, just you and the flowers.

When the wind calms and the sun peaks over the horizon you know it’s time to leave.

You trek through the soil and ignore the sharp stones that prick your pale skin, you wish you could stay, but it’s time to return.

You open your eyes when she leaves. She almost killed you today.

It's okay.

You deserved it.

Tomorrow, you rest.

Maybe.

Natasha smirks over the rim of her whisky glass. One would think the blonde would be professional after almost a century of doing business, yet she still stomps around like a child throwing a tantrum when she doesn't get it her way. The redhead almost feels bad for the poor pet that was going to be at the end of Carol's rath tonight, almost.

“Knock, knock.” Wanda stands in the doorway, her knuckles lightly tapping against the dark oak.

She’s dressed modern today. Her suit is fitted to perfection, it hugs her waist and expands her hips. She also went for a smokey makeup look, her eyeshadow a mix of dark brown and black, her lips a deep amber, just like her suit.

If attraction could kill Natasha would be one dead woman.

She smiles at her wife before signaling her in with a wave. She’s surprised to see Wanda, her wife comes by occasionally, and she has always dressed nicely, but this is new. Due to her desk stealing her view, Natasha can't see, but she can hear her wife's high heels as she passes through the threshold. Same color as the suit she imagines.

“What brings you here?” Natasha questions as she pours her wife a drink.

Wanda settles herself in the plush chair in front of her wife before bothering to answer. “Do I need a reason lovely? Maybe I just want to see my beautiful wife in her place of work.” Wanda grins while the other redhead hands her a glass of whiskey. Neat, just how she likes it.

Natasha scans her wife with suspicion, she wants something. She can tell by the way Wanda leans her body slightly to the left while her lips lift into a flirtatious half-smirk.

The shorter redhead lifts her eyebrow. “As nice as that may be, why are you really here?”

Wanda deflates slightly at her wife’s accusatory tone. She is right, of course, but Wanda was hoping she could butter her up a little before getting to that. Wanda will have to ask her out on a date soon and make herself a little less predictable.

She is ashamed to say it's been a while since their last dinner date, or movie night for that matter. However, it's hard to find the time when you have been married since the eighteen hundreds, and you both work more than any human would be capable of.

Which brings her to her point.

Wanda pulls in a breath, “I want a pet.”

Before Natasha can get a word in Wanda continues to ramble all in the same breath, “And I know, I know, we have already gone over this. But I'm lonely. The business has been slow since the Stark clan agreed to our peace offering. And while you are busy here, I want someone to come home too.” Wanda keeps her tone open and light.

She wasn’t here to accuse her wife of not giving her enough attention, they both knew that their different work would keep them apart, but while Wanda would spend long nights in her home office, Natasha would spend them in her company office on the other side of the city.

Natasha drums her fingers sharply against her desk, she wants to shut the idea down immediately.

Having a frail human pet would mean having a weakness. Natasha knows her wife well. She knows her wife will get attached, and she knows it will never end well for either of them.

On the other hand, she understands her wife's needs. Natasha spends most of her days in the office, working to uphold their cover, while Wanda spends her days all over the city settling their other business. Their schedules never align either, Natasha works days, Wanda nights. She has to admit, it doesn't sound half bad to have someone to come home to the few nights she can afford it.

Wanda is waiting with bated breath as her wife concludes.

“You have already set up the meet, haven’t you?”

Wanda gapes slightly but conceals it before her wife sees. She knows her too well indeed.

She slumps into her chair, “Yes.” She lifts her finger to stop Natasha from commenting, “In my defense, I was coming here to get your approval.” Natasha chuckles to herself.

“And if you didn’t get it your way?”

Wanda smiles bashfully, “Then I would go without you.” Natasha has to blink away tears from how hard she laughs, she is gripping her stomach, wheezing while answering, “I would expect nothing less my love.” She rights her posture and wipes a tear from the corner of her eye. She glances at her wife hiding her blush behind luscious red locks.

She can never say no to her.

Clapping her hands together, she responds. “Fine, you win.”

Wanda practically shines with mirth and joy, “But,” her companion eyes her carefully, nodding to confirm she´s listening. “I get to pick the name that goes on her collar.”

The other redhead huffs, “Fine, but it better not be something stupid.”

Natasha shrugs and her wife leans over the table to slap her shoulder in warning. Natasha smiles all the same and shakes her head, “Yeah, yeah, nothing dumb.” As much fun as she is having with this, she is a busy woman.

She runs her hands down her black suit, thinks of what paperwork to finish, and mumbles a question about when they need to leave while sorting through the latest update about their progress on Project X. Wanda, without missing a beat, states a simple, “Now.”

Nat drops her pen and pinches the skin between her eyebrows. Wanda shrugs half apologetically as Natasha fixes her with a hard glare.

Rolling her eyes, Natasha grumbles a short, “Right, we better get going then.”

It's been almost a decade since she has set foot in one of these shitholes. Nothing has changed, the cages are just as small, and the odor stinks the same, alcohol, blood, and fear.

Wanda shifts uncomfortably as they wait for the salesman to get his spreadsheet, Natasha silently watches from the sideline as he sorts through a mess of paper and fast-food containers to find what he is looking for. She chastises Wanda for not finding a better establishment. Back in their time, this was the usual, but nowadays they have far better alternatives.

Wanda leans against Natasha to whisper, “It was the only place by a few miles Tash, and it’s the only place we have time for.” Natasha stays unimpressed. Wanda smirks at her wife and tucks a strand of loose hair behind the other redhead's ear before discreetly licking the shell of it and whispering sweetly, “I will make it up to you.” Natasha shivers under the attention and the salesman grunts a weak, “found it” before leading them into the main hall.

The ocean swishes in the background as you lie on your blue, shark-themed blanket in your modern bikini. The sun gleams over your head. Your skin stings and you shift onto your stomach, you must have forgotten sunscreen again.

Nonetheless, you purr under the shine of good weather; you wish you had taken a book with you. Maybe next time. For now, you stretch out and lay your bare arms against the warm sand. It will be stuck in every crevice, but it's nice.

A light breeze passes you.

You suck in a big breath, it burns, but you ignore it. It smells of salt and….. salt… and….?

Ice-cream.

It smells of salt and ice cream.

You think you may stay for a while today. You might visit tomorrow, but you would rather not.

If it doesn't burn too much, you hope to sleep tomorrow through. After all, if you are really lucky, you may not wake up again.

This place is even more depressing than Wanda had anticipated.

She and the other redhead had been to a similar place a few decades ago, but this was just sad. Not even the potent scent of blood can get her to ignore the uncomfortable sound of churning, empty, stomachs.

If they lived in a different city she would have taken her wife to a more humane operation, but with limited time comes limited opportunity.

The male and female sections are separate, in the left hall she can smell the odor of young men eager to please, while in this hall she can see the curious and smell the fearful. The gruff man showing them around had introduced them to a few pets by now, but she had to admit they were not what she was hoping for.

There had been one pet she took a slight liking to; a young woman, in her mid-twenties, she was in the puppy section, an enthusiastic little thing. But in the end, she was a little too pushy for Wanda’s liking, Natasha hadn’t seemed too keen either, so they left it there.

The kitten section wasn’t too bad, but every time she thought she was building a connection, Natasha would step into the pet's line of sight and they would cower away one by one. She knows her wife is putting on a stern face to test the poor little things, but it was starting to piss her off big time.

Wanda rolls her eyes as the feeble man struggles with yet another lock, she lifts her suit jacket and checks the expensive gold watch ticking away, fifteen more minutes or they will have to come back another time. Given that this was the only available time she and Nat had had in a few weeks the dire truth of not getting a pet today was settling in.

“Here she is, now she's not much to look at, but since you wanted to see them all,” the man shrugs and Wanda has half the mind to bite his head off. Before she can do anything of the sort Natasha takes her by surprise by stepping into the cage before her.

Nat ignores her wife as she steps into your cage, she has seen you before.

You were Carol's pet, or at least she thought you were. But it seems you were a less permanent part of the blonde’s life. Your cage was different, it was slightly bigger, the poorly dressed man had said something earlier about you being a leased pet.

You look horrible. She is studying you from a few feet away and she can still see the horrors you must have been through.

She knows Carol is violent, it's why she has spent so long trying to negotiate with blondie. Their clans were never on the same page and yes, threats were constantly made, but this was something else. Natasha would never think the pathetic woman would do this just because she could.

She hears Wanda step in and gasp at the sight of you.

You are lying on the hard floor with your back turned to them, a rag the size of a hand towel barely covering your bottom. Your hands are stretched out under the lamp, the only heat source you have, you have been beaten to a pulp. There are deep lacerations covering you, your entire body is one big bruise, and dried blood covers every crevice of both your skin and even part of the walls. But that was not what caught either of their attention, no, it was the lack of life they could sense from you.

Natasha kneels a few feet away from you and studies you carefully. Her hand rests against her cheek as she tries to focus on your heartbeat. It beats, but there was something off about it. It's slow like you are asleep, but she can hear in your breathing that you are still conscious.

She tilts her head and talks off-handedly at the man behind her.

“Is she sick?” She hears him scoff but ignores it in favor of closing her eyes and trying to feel you.

“Of course not-“ He waves his hand, “all that,” he gestures at your body, “was her own fault.”

Before Natasha has time to reprimand the pig, she hears a crunch behind her followed by a heavy thud.

She huffs and raises herself slowly before opening her eyes and looking at her wife with her peripheral vision. “I thought we agreed to not kill anyone today.”

Wanda stares at her with empty eyes. “No. We agreed on not killing any innocent people tonight. As far as I am concerned, I am just following his logic, after all this was all his fault.” Wanda gestures at the dead man's body.

Natasha turns to her wife while rolling her eyes.

Wanda ignores her wife's sass and looks past her to take you in once more. “Who is she?”

Natasha shrugs and gazes at you over her shoulder. “She was Carol´s plaything, but I guess Carol never owned her like I thought.” Wanda raised her eyebrows in surprise and stared at Nat, “That’s y/n?”. Her eyes move down to you again, “last time I saw her she sure as hell didn’t look like that.”

Natasha nods and crosses her arms in thought, “well it seems Carol is an even worse owner than she is a negotiator.”

The last time Wanda had seen you was when she joined one of Natasha’s meetings a few months ago, you were a new thing back then. You had scars, but they were pink and healed, you were a skittish little thing, but you ate, you had some color to you, and you sure as hell didn’t feel like this.

You could feel their eyes all over your body. You hated it, you never liked it when people looked too hard or thought too long, it always meant the same thing. They were assessing whether or not you are a feasible option as a pet. You know you aren’t, you know they will scoff and turn their backs to you as if you disgust them, like you don’t deserve to breathe the same air as them.

You get it though, they are probably right.

Usually, such a thing wouldn’t bother you, you are used to it by now, but there was something about their scents that put you off, you felt out of place even more than usual, and you hated it.

You were too focused on pretending to be asleep to assess what the heavy thud against the concrete could have been.

Whatever it was, must have had something breakable inside of it as you could hear a clear crack as something bounced off the floor. You decided you didn’t care, you only cared about the sudden voice that took over all the space of your enclosure. Powerful enough to command any and every room, you know this voice. It belongs to one Natasha Romanoff, and suddenly the voice behind her made sense too. You had only seen the redhead once, but you would remember her anywhere, just as commanding as her wife, and even more scary, Wanda Maximoff.

If you weren’t scared before, you were positively shitting your nonexistent pants now.

You try to keep your breathing even so as to not show any hint of awareness, you have no idea what they could be doing here. Had Master sent them? Were these the last moments you would have, were you going to die in this tiny, claustrophobic hellhole?

You were panicking, and you know they can sense it. Feel it. No matter how many times Master called you such, you weren’t an idiot. You know what they are, you know what they can do, what they will do.

As you hear one of them take a step closer you turn into a stiff board. You stay completely still as you feel your lungs start resisting the air you desperately try to force into them, you have this sudden need to flee or to bear your neck and beg for them to finish it quickly. Right after the thought passes your mind you shrink in shame, Master will kill you for ever thinking of bearing your neck to another.

You can hear them pause for a moment as you feel their eyes on you again. You have been made.

You don’t know what comes over you, you don’t know where you suddenly find the strength, but before you even know what you are doing you are leaping towards the women, your hands ready to claw out their eyes if need be.

You know they are stronger, faster, and smarter than you could ever wish to be, but this is a survival instinct, nothing makes sense, nothing matters. And as you collide into a warm body and start ripping into it, to the best of your ability, you realize, you have no idea what you are doing.

Natasha knew what you were about to do, possibly before you, and as you crashed into her and started scratching and ripping at anything you could get your hands on, she realized that maybe you still have a chance at this life. For the first time during their little visit, she can feel something in you, it’s small, scared, abused, but there is a will there, a will to live, a will to fight. That is more than most in this bleak city.

She holds you gently as you rip apart her coat, tear at her skin, and bite her hands. She hears Wanda take an uncertain step toward the both of you, unsure of what to do. But Natasha waves her hands nonchalantly and asks Wanda with a calm voice to stay back.

Natasha understands that to her wife you must look positively rabid. You were in the kitten class, but you were fighting Natasha as if you were a fighter dog. All teeth and claws. However, compared to Natasha, you might as well have been a mite.

No matter how hard you try, you can’t pierce her skin, can’t topple her balance, you can’t win.

Your fingers dig into the soft skin, your nails gripping and tearing, but nothing happens. There is no skin underneath your nails, no blood, no sight of damage against pale skin. You bite the hands that hold you, and you can hear your jaw creek as you strain your weak body, but the skin doesn't break, the only blood you taste is your own.

You are scared, you don’t know what to do, there is no sunflower field to hide behind, no sea to drown in, you feel powerless, even more so than she makes you feel.

You don’t know what they want, you don’t want to die like this.

Even after all your effort goes to waste you can’t give up, you have to keep trying, you have to-

“Stop.”

Wanda looks at you with an unreadable expression, you look up in terror as you realize you can’t move your body. One simple word, in one simple tone, has made you paralyzed.

#dark!wanda maximoff #wanda maximoff x reader #dark!natasha romanoff #natasha romanoff x reader #vampire!natasha romanoff #vampire!wanda maximoff #wanda maximoff x natasha romanoff x reader #wandanat x reader

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keisins · 2 months

Text

gojo satoru x reader. fwb!au. angst to comfort/fluff

kind of a sequel to this

You’ve been ghosted.

To be fair, you had kind of expected this. Key work: kind of. You try to not let your heart constrict itself into an organ of loathe, depression and hatred for the past 3 weeks.

Unfortunately, the agony still sits on your granite kitchen counter three weeks later. It’s in the box of his stuff he had the nerve to leave behind, along with all the thread-like semblance of hope you had for your future together. (How foolish of you, really.)

The kitchen itself, however, is empty. The living room you’re standing in — also empty. Your family and friends who came to help you move your stuff to your new apartment left a few minutes ago. They’re on their way there first to pick up some food before all of you move more heavy boxes into the place. And you’re grateful.

Grateful that you have people in your life that don’t ghost you, even if you can count them on a hand. People that care. That are consistent in your life. That aren’t curse-bound.

God, you hated him for the first week. Hated how even though you tried to make his habitual appearances not a part of your routine, you find yourself missing the white hair that tickles your neck when you search for a fresh set of pajamas, the clingy hands that harbor not-so-innocent touches as you put on skin care, and even sometimes, in the morning when you didn’t have the heart to kick him out the last night, the most amateur brewing of coffee you’ve ever had because who needs coffee when you have Gojo Satoru to keep you energized.

You shake your head to rid your thoughts. You take a deep breath in, ready to say goodbye to the place, goodbye to the memories, ready to let the box be discarded away just like he has done to you.

And just as you almost let go, you feel it.

You feel him. You don’t turn. You can’t. Because it cannot be real. You know what’s real and it’s not tender kisses and hands intertwined, it’s a job in a new city, in a new position. Life is not Gojo Satoru, it’s a new apartment.

Yet, there in your old apartment, you come to life upon hearing his voice.

“I see you’ve changed the place.”

His joke comes soft and light, as if to not scare you. Because he has to know that you are livid. He keeps his distance. Though, everything in Satoru is compelled to hold you. He thinks your name must be carved into his bones, with the way it urges his joints to reach for you, always always drawn to you.

You still haven’t turned. Still in shock, because this has to be a hallucination. Some sick joke from the universe, maybe. He calls your name, but before he can close his mouth, you turn around and ask harshly, “What are you doing here?”

Tears are already brimming at your eyes. You find yourself looking at him for the first time in a long time and it makes your heart ache. You could hear him out, but there is something in you that doesn’t want to. You had been raised with impatient needs, always in a rush to satisfy the ones who claimed to love you. Love is patient, love is kind, and you want it so bad to not be love.

A moment of silence passes by as Gojo bores into you, until his heart caves and takes a big step toward you, tests the water by taking your hand in his.

And you cry, weakly shrugging away, before he’s pulling you into the warmest embrace of your life.

“I’m sorry.” He catches sight of the box on the counter and can only guess what it could be. He’s been so selfish with his love for you, that he had forgotten about the treachery that so greatly tries to seep through his infinity. Gojo hadn’t accounted for it, didn’t ever in his life think he could feel afford to be humbled. But, as he stands there with you falling apart in his arms, he feels intimidated. “I’m so sorry.”

“I hate you.” Are you okay? How have you been? Where did you go? He hums softly, still caging you with his arms. You dare to ask, because to love is to be vulnerable, “Where were you?”

He holds you tighter, his eyes threatening to drop some tears of their own. He laughs and you can hear how watery it is when he tells you, “A box.”

You pull away, brows furrowed as you look up at him. He wipes away a falling tear on your cheek before pulling you into him again, desperate for you to not see him cry.

“I’ll explain later… Just let me hold you right now.”

#i started this when he got unsealed but never finished to post</3 #jjk x reader #gojo satoru x reader #gojo angst #gojo fluff #gojo x y/n #jjk gojo #jjk angst #jjk fluff #jjk x you #gojo satoru #gojo x you #gojo x reader #fwb!gojo #gojo comfort #jujutsu kaisen x you #jujustsu kaisen x reader

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comfortless · 4 months

Text

In Our Angelhood

König x fem!reader

content/warnings: 18+. minors do not interact. silly & odd strangers -> lovers au, loner/loner dynamic. canon divergent. mentions of physical and emotional abuse, violence, hurt + comfort, mentions of religion & religious imagery (Catholicism), light horror/unease, sexism (from a minor, non-canon character), reader and König are both in their 20s. virgin!König -> smut, unprotected piv.

notes: listen…. I was raised catholic but simply do not remember most of my life in the church. take this as a silly fairytale instead of simmering on the religion bits. <3 reader is implied to be a virgin too but we’re not harping on that who cares.

wc: 10k.

You haven’t had it easy, but seeing the angel wander into the cathedral with purple and yellow stains painting his cheeks, his throat, is safe harbor. Oil on canvas to burrow in like booklice. You like the way he takes the front pew, doesn’t hide himself despite the horror that’s been made of his face; tempts god by raising a hand up to press on the bruises, shivers from the pain. His brow pinches when his gaze drifts upwards, as if to think: You allowed this, look at it!

Most days, he doesn’t pay attention to the sermon, his hands consistently prod at his face or twitch someplace bedded down in the fleece lining of the pocket of his hoodie, always dark green or black. You’re not paying attention, either. You could fall into that absent stare easily, find yourself lost in whichever world bathed in static and hellfire that he’s dreaming up.

The Father is wary of him, no doubt. The man fidgets constantly in his place, toying with the unseen thing in his pocket whilst the priest prattles on about the Holy Mother and the blood of a son she watched led away to slaughter. The angel seems to only display intrigue when preaching shifts to mentions of the wrath of god, of sin, of Hell, as if he knows he’s bound for all of it. Heaven’s not spotless, either, full of cobwebs where God exonerates his wrath.

Sitting beside him is unheard of, the other parishioners stay away, whispering behind upheld palms that ‘there’s just something wrong with him’, but you choose to move from your pew to place yourself at his side, crossing the rows of curious gossips with careful strides as you approach his seat. The wooden bench creaks when he tenses, and you can feel his eyes dart to your form while you remain facing forward, but not a word is spoken during service nor after.

You make a habit of sitting next to him each time he wanders into the church with his fresh bruises. A few weeks of this and he comes back with a gash striped down from below his right eye to his jaw, an ugly maroon trail. He makes a point to sit on the opposite end of the bench that day, and you’re left to stew in the rejection that your attempts at providing your comfort and your friendship have failed.

“What happened to you?” Your voice comes out as a mere squeak, staring up at that horrid cut once the sermon has concluded. You’ve got him cornered between the floral dress cloaking you and the wooden bench brushing against the backs of his knees. It’s almost endearing how the sight of a woman speaking to him, caging him in like this makes him panic, his lips part and his eyes dart.

His chest heaves as a sigh leaves him once his head is angled away, eyes staring at the stained glass just over your shoulder.

“Accident.”

It’s said so simply that one wouldn’t believe it to be a lie if he were simply a voice, rather than a fully grown man cowering in your presence. For half a moment, you wonder his age before a response comes to mind. Assuredly he must be like you, mid-twenties and despondent, he comes here all alone, but you never see him around town. It dawns on you then, that the man probably still lives with his parents, maybe they force their fallen angel to attend church just to be rid of him for a few hours.

“Looks bad.” The response isn’t an insult, but you can hear the way his breath is hissed through his teeth, see the way his jaw tightens as though he took it as one.

“Es tut mer leid,” is all he says in reply.

You take a step back, keeping your eyes on him as you fold your arms behind your dress innocently. The other parishioners have long since fled by now, dusted off their sins like crumbs from their hands and passed the doors of the cathedral with sideways glances at the mismatched two still stood before the altar. You get the sense that maybe you’re the only sinner left in this place when König nervously meanders a step away, but when he walks several stunted strides away, stops to give you a glance over the shoulder, that weight rapidly disappears.

His expression shifts, somber and yearning for something that he can’t bring himself to say before he turns away and leaves you to mull in the disaster of your first conversation.

You begin to worry when he stops showing up for homilies, several weeks of sitting alone on their shared pew. Mass is no different, he remains a distant phantom. The cause for his accident could have very well been the cause for a life ended too soon and you worry yourself sick, shifting in your seat until the courage to ask if anyone knows his address is ripped from your tongue. The answer comes relatively easy, coupled with a flighty look from an older woman who claimed to have seen him seated in the front yard of some decaying home, shooting at a barrel with some gun you almost dare to wonder if he entirely, legally owned.

Despite your better judgement you find yourself staring blankly at his front door an hour later, clutching a brown, paper bag full of goodies from the local bakery for him. The muffled shouting from within keeps you from knocking, the voices of two men in some uproarious vocal war seeping out in whispers through layers of insulation and wall. You feel like a terrified animal, rooted in place as you try to make out the cause for such anger within. The dull thud of flesh meeting flesh pulls you back to reality in such a rapid fall, your knuckles wrap at the door immediately. It all falls silent inside, and a part of you is left fearing for your own safety there, as if those words and furious blows would be focused on you for even daring to bring this angelic stranger a slice of raspberry danish and a blue velvet cupcake.

The door swings open with the whine of hinges that likely have never been oiled, and König has never looked worse. His face looks sickly from bruising, the gash partially healed yet split from a fresh blow readily seeping blood against his thick fingers pressed to his cheek. Your chest fills with a rage you’ve never known and you feels your fingernails curl into the bag like claws, ready to push past this weathered angel and beat the Devil himself with your bare hands.

Instead, you smile at him.

“I brought you something.” You hold up the bag to him, and you’re grateful that he accepts it without asking why you bothered at all or how you even found this accursed pocket of Hell.

“Danke.”

He shifts a little in place as he opens the gift, and though he could not bring himself to smile, the way his larimar eyes seem to swim a little displays his gratitude where words fail him.

A part of you might even pay the smallest bit of gratitude to the fact that he doesn’t mention just went on inside there. Though your eyes search his with blatant curiosity, he turns away each time, allowing the words to remain unsaid. You don’t pry, it’s not your place. You know treading here was not your place either. Angels don’t haunt you like stalking predators, they haunt you with a call, a silent song. Fate seemed a ridiculous concept, but you’re drawn to his very presence as you have been since the moment you first laid eyes on him.

You know you’ve finally won his friendship when you find yourself across from him at a picnic table with a coffee he purchased for you in hand. It’s not how you would have ordered it, some overly sugary thing nearly spilling out with whipped cream and caramel, but it suits what you’re feeling. You ignore the taste, sated enough by a conversation that comes so easily between the two of you that you feel you’ve known him for far longer.

König is actually rather teasing and boastful when he isn’t being questioned about his appearance or what goes on in his family home. He tells you of his dream of becoming a recon sniper with ease, and how the Austrian military denied him despite how ‘perfekt’ he was for the role.

You listen intently as he carries the conversation forward, tells you about his rifle, right down to explaining the anatomy of such a thing.

“Scheisse, you don’t care.” He breathes a laugh too soft for a man his stature after he speaks, wiping away a bit of icing from his bottom lip with the knuckle of his index.

“Yes, I do!”

“Nein, nein, girls don’t play with guns.”

So, maybe he’s a little old fashioned and odd, but his voice is sweet like spiced honey, and you couldn’t fathom any place you would rather spend a gloomy afternoon than seated across from him.

“I bet I could be a better sniper than you,” you jest, taking a sip from your coffee with a little grin on your face when you note the slight furrow of his dark brows and the challenging flicker in his eyes.

His face softens as quickly as that surge of determination had come, taking to look you over with a newfound appreciation in his stare instead.

“I could teach you.”

You spend a moment explaining that you were simply kidding, and his eyes light up as a tinge of red seeps into the mottled colors of a sky in the midst of a storm across his pale cheeks. Like the first break of sun when the deafening rain finally falls to a calming drizzle.

“Shouldn’t you know how to protect yourself, though?” He asks, sheepishly turning his head away, focusing his gaze on fallen leaves instead of you. Extinguishing your own steadfast gaze is difficult, when you find yourself further captivated by the man in front of you. Everything about him is enigmatic; even the sparse glimpses into his life he’s offered to you leave more questions than answers.

“Maybe.” You shrug absently as you lower the styrofoam cup back to the table, hands curled around it.

He turns back to you then, slipping a hand into his pocket to fish out a butterfly knife, latch closed around the shiny handle. It’s the very same color of his eyes, barely a quiet blue, though the blade itself is wicked steel, expertly sharpened. You ogle it in your hands for a moment, flicking it open before he swiftly takes your wrist and firmly shakes his head.

“Careful,” he gruffs as he retrieves it, brushing over your fingertips as the blade is taken back into his large hand. He dutifully shows you how to twirl it, performing a series of little tricks without even having to look at the weapon in his hands. The blade’s dance is swift and graceful, not one cut sullies his fingers. His chest puffs in pride when he notices the way your eyes try to keep up with the steel, and the tricks become more elaborate.

“Can I try?”

“Nein… let me show you how to use it first. Bitte.”

With a nod, you find yourself being led away deeper into the park, leaves crunching under the toe of the man’s boots just in front of you. Assuredly, you shouldn’t be so trusting of a titan with a weapon, especially after hearing the violence going on within his own dwelling, yet you don’t question yourself. He fills lapses of silence with a soft hum, likely some song he knows from his homeland, it’s a pretty tune coming from him. The cadence of his voice is something that sets your mind at ease when he does speak— always a rasp with a nearly giddy lilt to it. It’s pretty.

The trail leads you both down to a fallen tree, the trunk is thick and deteriorating, bark springing up with succulent, golden folds of what he tells you to be laetiporus. König guides you down to your knees with a gentle press against the back of your neck, the large hand is shaking when his calloused fingers meet your flesh. He descends next to you and places the blade in your hands once more, guiding you with a patient nudges to your wrist. The base of the fungus is gingerly cut with each metered motion from you both, and eventually a large clump of it falls free right into the lap of your dress.

“Not the best for foraging, but…”

“I like it,” you chime with a smile, marveling at the little blade in your hand before your gaze settles to the cluster resting on your lap. “What do we do with this though?”

König shrugs, lifting the cluster of mushrooms to your face, clutching it as though it were a bouquet of flowers with a wolfish grin on his face.

“Eat it.”

“It’s dirty, you eat it.”

Those broad shoulders shrug again as he peels a bit of it off and shoves it between his lips, chewing the filthy things several times before swallowing it down. Your nose scrunches in feigned disgust, before a laugh leaves your lips at the crooked grin he gives you in answer.

“That’s so gross, König!”

It’s possible that he’s been yearning for someone’s focus to shift upon him like this, not in anger or disgust, but something far more gentle. He lets you keep his knife, and the rest of the afternoon is spent filled with comfortable conversation as you wander around the forest together. When the sun begins to set, you actually find yourself a bit disappointed that he doesn’t suggest a bout of stargazing or something more.

It’s all felt too natural to let go of so soon, and you’ve no idea when you’ll see him again. A seed of warmth takes root in your chest when he walks you back to your home. The friendship is something you’ve both needed it seems, because his smile doesn’t even falter when he leaves you at the door to retreat back to the horrible place that he calls home.

— ཐིཋྀ —

You’re sick the next Sunday. A small cold, nothing worthy of fretting too much over. Over the counter medicine does the trick to keep you somewhat comfortable as you lie back against the sofa, ample pillows and blankets surrounding you. There are chores begging for your attention: the dishes stacked in the sink, a laundry basket full to the brim, and you can’t recall when the last time that you vacuumed was. A few days of forgetting and these things overlap into a miserable, tedious pile.

You wish you weren’t so quick to call blame to one particular reason.

Spending time with the angel has left you carrying a weight you’re not certain you can continue to bare. In fact, your cold may have come from fearing for his safety. Whatever ghouls he keeps locked up in that house, tormenting him endlessly… it’s difficult to keep yourself together when you haven’t seen him in days. He could very well be dead. There’s some comfort in knowing that he knew how to protect himself; he had shown you, and his stature was undeniable evidence of such. It just doesn’t feel enough without the physical proof.

He allowed himself to be hurt anyway. It was strange. Some people were simply difficult to comprehend, and you didn’t even begin to know how to unravel the strange spool that’s rolled into your life now.

Especially not when realization hits and you come to terms with one simple fact: You miss König. His eyes, his strange interests, even the overly-sweet drink he purchased for you— you find yourself missing all of it; the light and the darkness. He knows where you live; he walked you home, and yet, he hasn’t stopped by. You imagine it must be that you merely misread the supposed closeness. It didn’t matter. König was just an acquaintance, after all.

You take your mind off of him by turning on the television, a hand rested over your aching head and the other thumbing at the remote in search for anything that could hold your attention longer than a few seconds. The town is small and the news is never interesting; a traffic jam on a road you’ve never traveled, a safe at the grocery store, the sorts of things that come as nothing more than a buzzing to fill the empty air. Focusing on a movie sounded far too tedious, too. Eventually you give up, turning the television off and tilting your head back to stare up at the ceiling, all white and empty.

The bell tolls again, it’s ringing far softer now from within the walls of your home, drawing your attention back to the woods— to König. Gentle chiming is a strange thing to remind you of the bloodied titan. It exudes a sense of peace, like the safety of church bells. You feel your conscious slipping, curled into yourself there as your eyes flutter shut.

Only, the calm is short lived. A knock comes only minutes later, the soft graze of knuckles against your door as though whoever lurks outside didn’t actually want to disturb you too terribly. After a fifth knock, you notice they’re not leaving. It was probably best to answer sooner rather than later so you might be left to your sulky slumber.

It takes a moment to gather your bearings and straighten yourself out enough for company. Your head is still aching terribly, brain fogged by the weight of your sickness. When the latch of the lock clicks and you haphazardly swing your door open, you’re met with the view of a broad chest covered in black.

“König?” You murmur, raising your head to look up at him. It’s not the sight of his face that you’re met with, only his eyes visible beneath the black fabric concealing him. The remains of an old t-shirt, and you had your doubts that whatever he had hidden beneath it could be any more intimidating than he looks now.

“Es tut mer leid,” he huffs, his voice a bit tight as he stares down at you, pupils slightly dilated and irises flicking from your face to the room just behind you. He looks a total contrast to you, unable to help the slight upturn of your lips from just the sight of him. Perhaps he had missed you, too. “Can I come in?”

Again, you should be apprehensive, but in the end you step aside and gesture for him to enter. He readily obliges, stepping past you as he ducks beneath the door frame and walks a bit stiffly to the center of the room.

“You alright?” You manage, shutting the door behind you and leaning against the wood. The flutter in your chest makes it difficult not to break into a more obvious smile— you’re happy he’s here, even in such a sorry state.

“Ja, just…” König pauses for a moment before taking to the sofa, seeming so much smaller than he truly is when he finally seats himself. “You know Lukas?”

Lukas, a parishioner. The man with the ever-present smirk on his face. You had seen him before, spoken to him in passing a time or two. He wasn’t particularly pleasant. You had even heard him join in with the others, commenting on König’s appearance— a bully and a gossip, no different from most of the others. The man couldn’t have been any younger than you or König, still, he had all of the maturity of a teenager.

“Yes?”

“They kicked me out because of him.”

You tilt your head, furrowing your brow in confusion. It wasn’t like the church to turn anyone away, especially not one who had been a part of the congregation for as long as König had. Your bewilderment spurs him to continue.

“At the cathedral.”

“I got that,” you hum out a bit hoarsely as you pad over to sit on the couch, opposite of him. The pitiful look he shoots you then, through the holes in his makeshift mask makes him look like little more than a pleading puppy, begging for comfort that he would never actually request. “It’s alright, König.”

“Nein… I will not get to see you as much.”

If König were not a grown man wearing an ominous veil over his face, you would almost dare to think he was pouting. It’s ridiculous, but it warms your heart that he cares; he enjoys the time spent with you just as much as you did. Perhaps more, if what you’ve gathered about him supplied any hints. He didn’t seem to have anyone at all— only you.

What the church won't tell you is that angels hurt sometimes, too. The Father will tell you that they're The Lord's army, just as impervious to bullets as they are to temptations. With an abundance of wings and eyes, they are such fragile things… how could they truly be invincible? Unlike the seraphim thriving in a heaven far beyond your reach, or the battered angel seated beside you, you won't deny yourself a reprieve or a request for comfort.

“We could just make our Sundays for us, yeah?” You don’t think to stop yourself when you extend the offer to him. The way his eyes seem to light up then is nothing short of a burning ember. Missing tedious sermons couldn’t be that sinful. God could turn the other cheek for now, you thought.

“I would like that.”

You hum in response, reaching for the little bottle of ibuprofen on the coffee table as that ache in your head begins to throb again. König’s eyes track you the entire time, shoulders slumping and eyes narrowing when he pieces it together.

“You don’t feel well..,” he says sternly, already rising to his feet to explore your home before a protest can even leave your lips. You hear the sounds of cabinets being flung open in the kitchen, the refrigerator flung open before he returns to kneel at your side with a glass of water. You weakly fumble with the lid of the bottle, offering him your thanks as he holds the cup out for you. Childproof lids are a pain, clicking incessantly rather than just opening when you need them to; each second feels like an hour passing as he stares at you like the strangest little creature he’s ever laid eyes on.

You feel your face warm in embarrassment when he sets the glass aside and pries the bottle from your hands, opening it up with ease before slipping two of the pills in your waiting palm. You down the medicine with a sip of water, nearly choking on it when he raises his hand to your forehead and gently presses against it to check your temperature.

“I’m fine, König,” you huff out, playfully batting at his hand. He remains insistent, not drawing away until you assume he’s convinced you aren’t feverish. “It’s just a cold.”

Your angel has never seemed sweeter than now, with worry painted clear in his blue eyes. He remains quiet, lost in thought for a moment before gently pressing you back against the couch with the press of his fingertips against your shoulder. The throw blanket is tucked over you in an instant. If the thought had occurred to you before, you imagined he would likely be rather clumsy when caring for another, and yet this all feels practiced. He’s told you he’s killed, in the military, yet you couldn’t imagine such gentle hands doing anything of the sort now as you curl up with a mumbled, “Thank you.”

“Sleep.”

You didn’t want him to leave. Impulsivity is enough of an excuse to take his hand, intertwine your fingers. He doesn’t pull away, not until your eyes close and sleep takes you once more. Only then does he leave your side and your home, locking the door behind him.

— ཐིཋྀ —

“Yeah… he said he saw a demon in there. All shadow.”

“Come on… that’s a lie. You know he was just scared!”

“I don’t know, man. I don’t think he would lie about something like that!”

You’re not trying to eavesdrop. It’s just that teenagers are never keen on keeping their voices down, at least not around here, it seemed. You’re already ten minutes late, having promised König you would meet him at the coffee shop at noon. You don’t have time to be standing around listening to children chittering about town myths. Especially not ones that make you feel so uneasy.

When you had heard them, they were always about the haunted church tucked far away from prying eyes, hidden somewhere in the forest circling the town. No one knew where it was for certain, but many claimed to have wandered there. None of those stories really held any weight; there were no pictures or other fragments of evidence, just voices. The only thing that made those tales seem believable was the bell. You had heard stories about it since you were a child. They ranged from seeing specters, to smelling perfume wafting about in the small graveyard supposedly next to it with no one else around, and even a strange one about finding a corpse there.

Seeing a demon was a new one.

You supposed that someone or something had to be ringing that bell at the odd hours during the day and throughout the night. It was never on time, always several minutes after the beginning of an hour had begun. The thought was a little eerie, and if you thought too hard about it— a little sad. Picturing some poor lost soul stuck there for an eternity, damned to ring a cursed bell only for no one to ever come. In retrospect, it really was no wonder why it reminded you just a bit of him; damned to haunt this town and return time and time again to his own personal Hell.

When the bell chimes again, the children take off towards the noise, leaving you alone on an empty street. Their shouts about how they were going to find that demon and chase it out echo until they’re too far away to make sense of the rest of the conversation.

Your heart feels a bit torn. It was best to leave things like that alone, but… the poor thing must have been lonely, lonely like him.

Maybe it’s a sign from God, as if to remind you of how you’re treading deeper into the dark with every passing Sunday.

You haven’t attended mass since you and König started hanging out. You consider that it’s your own guilt spurring you to fear this unknown thing lurking out in the woods, if it even existed at all. There was something about forsaking a religion you had grown up with for a man you had only just met that was both exciting and heartbreaking.

The walk to the coffee shop feels almost unbearable, your steps sluggish, yet the second you make it inside with the little bell chiming above your head you’re put at ease. König hadn’t taken your tardiness as initiative to leave. The man was tucked in the far corner of the shop, seated at a table too small with his own drink and yours before him.

“No hood today?” You ask as you approach, staring at his scarred face in reverie. The cut below his eye had mostly healed, and you don’t note any new bruising.

He shakes his head with a little smile, gesturing for you to take a seat— not across from him but at his side.

“Do you want me to wear it?” He asks once you’ve taken your seat.

“No, I like seeing you.”

König is handsome. The realization dawns on you, sharp and searing like a bolt of thunder when he flashes you a lazy smile, propping his elbow up on the table to rest his cheek against his open palm.

To quell your sudden embarrassment, calm the warmth pooling along your cheeks, you tell König about what you had heard on your way here. He listens in silence as you prattle on about the haunted church that no one has ever truly found, about the demon lurking in its depths. It sounds silly, even to your own ears as you recount the ridiculous myth you had heard in passing, but König looks a bit more rigid with each word you breathe out.

When you finish, he slowly shakes his head, eyes focused on the door as you take a sip of your coffee.

“You don’t really believe that,” he says.

“‘Course not. I just thought it was interesting...”

“Do you want to see it?”

You pause for a moment, considering the offer. Perhaps with König there you would feel safe, sate your curiosity and enjoy a little adventure as well. You still had the butterfly knife he had given to you, too. Your own little token of protection, and if that failed you would still have an angel at your side. Maybe he would teach you those intricate little dances on the trek there, hold your hand when you found yourself too afraid to brave whatever may come. If you couldn’t find the place at all then that would be nothing more than a nice memory to look back on.

“I think so.” The thought of feeling his warm hand in your own again is enough to spur you on. That feeling may have been more terrifying than any demon at all.

“We will go tonight then. I know where it is.”

“Oh… that soon?”

König gives your shoulder a playful, gentle nudge.

“Ja. I’ll take you.”

— ཐིཋྀ —

It’s not a date.

It’s a misadventure.

Still, you find yourself preparing for it as though it were a date. You bother with a stick of mascara and a bit of lip oil, a dress just slightly more revealing than the ones you wore to service. You tell yourself that you’re dressing up for the memory, not for the angel. That doesn’t stop you from ogling yourself in the mirror, tugging down your dress just a bit so it fits over your cleavage in a way that seems appealing.

You imagine the Holy Mother would probably chide you well if she were to step down from Heaven and see you now, tell you to remain chaste and pure until your wedding night. Oddly enough, it doesn’t tear you up with guilt— it only makes you giggle a bit as you lift the hem of your dress and twirl in place.

It isn’t a date, it’s the least romantic thing you could think of, but he’s coming to whisk you away into the night and it feels like one.

König, gentleman that he seems to be, doesn’t keep you waiting either. You both had settled on going right as the sun began to set after you had finished your coffee and informed him that you needed to finish a few chores and get ready before going on a night long endeavor. Just as the light outside began to turn to a pumpkin glow you hear the knock at the door. It’s louder than the last time he came by— he’s excited too, you can feel it without even gazing upon him.

You take your jacket, patting the pocket to ensure the knife is in its proper place before bounding toward the door, a skip in each step. Tonight would be special, sweet, and tender; it would be all of the things you had repressed since you first saw him.

As you turn the knob and pull it inward, the man hardly has the courtesy to hide his eagerness either. His face visibly flushes when he sees you, all dressed up just for him. You wished you could read his thoughts, have just one moment where you truly had some sort of telepathic ability as you once believed was possible when you were a child.

Graciously, as the two of you begin to venture out towards the woods, with you trying to match his lengthy strides as you walk side-by-side, you don’t need any telepathy.

“You are so pretty,” König mumbles, facing forward rather than looking directly at you. His voice is the quietest you had ever heard it now, barely above a whisper.

If you had the courage to kiss him right then, you would have reached for his scarred face and peppered a dozen over every mark, held him like that until his cheeks went up in flames.

“So are you,” you huff out instead.

Though he doesn’t outright call you a liar, something tells you that he doesn’t believe the words you’ve spoken. The angel falls silent, doesn’t turn to you and merely continues to lead you further out as the sky swells with a brilliant purple, the silhouette of a crescent moon peaking out from high up above. You would tell him a million times if it would make him believe you, then. He doesn’t fiddle with a concealed blade in his pocket around you, and together, he seems so much less lonesome and battered. You know that he’s comfortable with you; his discomfort stems from somewhere within, something you couldn’t reach to pry away from him.

You believe that you’re patient. You could bear anything he had to offer, good or bad; you would accept the burdens just as readily as the gifts— knives and the taste of sugar on your tongue.

The streets of the town aren’t as quiet tonight, and though there are no children with their silly stories idling about, you recognize the voice of a man a few meters off. When you look away from the tree line in the distance, your gaze settles on Lukas leaned up against the wall of the old antique shop. The place hadn’t been touched in ages, yet baubles and little porcelain dolls all covered in a generous layer of dust still lined the shelves in the window. His cell phone is propped between his shoulder and his cheek as he speaks, until his green eyes settle on König who halts in place at your side.

You know that your fantasy of a perfect evening is ruined the moment Lukas rushes a goodbye to whoever was on the receiving end of that call and slips his phone into the pocket of his coat.

“What’s going on here?”

The man is no demon, but he’s arrogant and cruel like one; he sounds enough like one when he laughs in your direction— looks enough like one when he makes a cupping motion before his chest as if to signify your breasts.

König doesn’t respond, but he steps in front of you, shielding you behind him as though you’re a little lamb in need of a snarling maw to keep you protected. You don’t need him to protect you, not truly. You aren’t a little girl, nor are you the one that shows their face covered in a mask of pain.

You’re finally getting a glimpse, a little look at what he must face every time he dares to cross paths with another person.

“We’re just taking a walk,” you say confidently, as you raise your hand to give König’s sleeve a little tug.

Let’s just go.

König doesn’t budge, unmoving like a gargoyle as he stares down at the smaller man before the both of you. His large hands clench at his sides and you see the flames of Hell flaring up in his blue eyes.

“Skipping mass to fuck the freak, is that right?” Lukas tuts with a roll of his eyes.

You’re amazed how Lukas displays not an ounce of fear— even you’re afraid. König wouldn’t hurt you, a part of you was certain, but the way he looked now was so unlike the passive, lost angel you had taken him to be. You take a step back, realizing that whatever comes to pass next is not something that you could stop even if you cling to König and plead for him to clear his mind and let this go.

They’re just words, despite the way they claw at your heart.

“Didn’t think you were such a slut.”

König is no longer much of an angel in your eyes when he leaps at the other man and lands a blow directly to his unsuspecting, smirking face. The sound is a loud, a horrible crack. It’s not like the soft thunder of sudden emotion, but one of a tooth being dislodged from the smaller man’s jaw. Lukas falls back, directly onto his backside against the hard sidewalk with a low groan of pain. His hands reach up to clutch at his face, bright blood trickling from his mouth like a stream.

It’s not enough. Not to König.

Your eyes squeeze shut the moment you hear another thud, and the third sends your running without so much as a thought in your head. The sounds of your own shallow breaths deafen the world around you, drowning out the violence taking place behind. You don’t consider where you’re headed, your eyes remain closed until the sounds of pavement against your soles dissipates and you’re left only with the thumps of your shoes hitting soil.

It’s dark when you stop to gather your bearings. The canopy of tree limbs, crooked and curved above you, blocking out any glimpse of even the moon. You can’t even see your hands when you hold them up in front of your face. When the adrenaline begins to subside, you feel foolish for running away— especially now that you find yourself horribly lost in an unfamiliar area. You turn back to look for the way that you had came, but see no lights from the town piercing through the dark.

You’re alone here, bathed in inky black, in perfect silence.

There are no footsteps chasing after you— König isn’t coming, not to save you. Not when you saw him for what he truly was, you imagined he read the accusation across your face when you ran away from him. It hurts you, too, to think of your lonely angel turned devil. How he saw the word ‘monster’ written in your eyes, wide with fear as you left him. You wondered if he could cry at all, if he was now.

You didn’t even care if Lukas was okay.

You doubted the man was even conscious anymore, lying limp in a puddle of his own blood. Whether he deserved it or not wasn’t for you to decide, but a part of you considers that he certainly did.

Trying to retrace the steps you took in flight proves futile, if anything you think you’ve only sunken further into the woods. Terribly lost and vulnerable, you reach for the knife in your pocket to try and regain some courage only to find it’s no longer there; you must have dropped it somewhere.

The walk feels aimless and fear creeps up on you from every small thing. A snap of a twig off in the distance sends you running once more despite the aching in your chest and limbs. The thought of being utterly helpless with no one in sight to lend their aid brings the sting of tears to your eyes.

Worst of all, however, is the bell.

Closer, it sounds dreadful. A haunting cacophony of noise roars above you, not far off. The bell is rung softly at first, a gentle pull of the rope held fast within it before it begins to grow more desperate, louder still. You swear you’ve turned in the opposite direction when you make it into a clearing, only to find yourself faced with the chapel of myth. The tower housing the dreadful bell is shrouded in shadow, and the damned thing actually has the courtesy to fall silent when you step past the last tufts of shrubbery to make it out into the open area.

The air feels colder here, suffocating almost, as though you’ve been doused in ice water. The silence is more dreadful than the pain emitted from Lukas’ bloody mouth, worse than the ringing of a bell or the droning of another dull sermon.

You don’t fall to pieces, but you do drop to your knees, sullying the ends of your dress with dirt as you stare up at the ominous, white building before you. No demons poke their heads from the windows, no whispering fills your ears from the graveyard mere paces away. It’s void and empty, and that feels somehow worse.

It would be a long night, but you knew wholeheartedly you were not going to find your way home without the sun to guide you. Catching a glimpse of your flesh in the dim light reveals a menagerie of small cuts and bruises, flesh marred from scraping tree limbs and slamming into broad trunks in the darkness.

There was no way that you were sleeping, despite the way you ached for rest. Even blinking made you feel vulnerable and exposed here. This was not an unholy place, but perhaps the most sacred you had ever lain eyes on. It was untouched and wild, even the descriptions of angels written in scripture seemed less so.

You find your footing for long enough to seat yourself at the side of the small building, your head rested against the wall as you draw your knees up to your chest. The sound of your own breath fills the silence in the air, but you don’t feel alone anymore. It’s paranoia and you know it, there’s no way such a humble place could be haunted. Still, the feeling of being watched causes your skin to prickle, and you long more than ever for König’s knife to be fitted between your fingers.

It’s when the sounds of footsteps draw near that you lose all composure. Somewhere off to your right, something was walking towards you— too quick and heavy to be a curious animal.

You rise to your feet in haste and go to the only place you can think of to find sanctuary— directly into the old church, slamming the heavy wooden door behind you. It’s empty inside, apart from an overturned desk and a few chairs you can make out from the dim light leaking through the window. Everything is bathed in dust and it smells nauseatingly sweet and sour, like cobwebs and musk, a combination that does little to set you at ease.

Though the room is small and empty, several doors and a small hallway are off to the back and you imagine the demon leering at you from one of them, just out of sight as you stumble to crouch behind the altar.

You don’t remember when last you prayed, and you don’t bother with it now, either. A prayer wouldn’t save you from whatever horrid thing come crawling out of the woods hunting for you. As if sensing your defeat, the door begins to creak open, the hinges whining as the godforsaken beast began to lumber inside, just as the bell strikes up again.

You swear you can hear the rapid beating of your heart above all other noise, and though you wish for nothing more than to squeeze your eyelids shut and bathe out the sight in nothing but dark, you can’t look away.

The demon is impossibly tall, shrouded entirely in shadow just as the children had said. Its eyes don’t glow and you can’t catch sight of fangs or claws, but it’s ominous enough as it slowly wanders inside, turning its head to look around the room— to look for you.

Your palm rests over your mouth to muffle your breathing, but to no avail. Panic swells within you, its grip tighter than any corset, any vise.

Until your eyes adjust to the dark figure properly. The damned thing is nothing but familiar, comforting even. No demon could ever make you feel as warm as an angel. Your vision fills with unshed tears, relief and regret overpowering any lingering dread.

The demon is not some screeching beast that clawed its way from Hell at all, only…

“König…” You breathe out quietly as you drop your hands to the wooden floor below you and slowly crawl forward. His shrouded head cocks in your direction, and if not for his stature it may have been even cute the way he rushes toward you; thundering steps as the angel no longer walks, but runs in your direction with his arms outstretched.

You lack the time to flinch back from the suddenness, because the moment he reaches you, you’re pulled into a pair of thick arms, shaking as they curl around you tightly. Your face presses into his chest as you circle your arms around his middle in turn.

“Let’s not do that again,” he rasps, pulling you somehow closer as his veiled chin rests against the top of you head. “I am sorry that I scared you… He just…”

“Stop apologizing,” you whisper as your fingers dig into the fabric of the dark hoodie. You didn’t want to hear another apology, not from him; English or German it mattered not, all that concerned you was the fact that the two of you were safe. Heaven and Hell all the same.

König sucks in a breath above you as he carefully pulls you to your feet. The bell and the darkness surrounding no longer brought you fear, only calm in such a protective hold.

He brings you back home, carrying your weight with ease as the forest disappears behind you. The hood over his face remains in place, and a part of you wonders why he even bothered to wear it at all. Perhaps not to scare you further if Lukas managed to open up that wound, or more likely so you wouldn’t have to see the face of a man so easily moved to violence at all.

König drops you off at the door without another word. The butterfly knife you had left behind someplace in the forest is slipped into your hand, the blue handle clasped shut. The weight no longer feels like that of a developing bond, but of parting.

The sting burrows into your heart instantly as he turns away from you. With his first step you find yourself grabbing at his arm, pulling him back with a desperation you had never known prior.

“Please stay,” you voice hoarsely, digging your fingernails into his sleeve. “We were supposed to… to spend tonight together.”

Not here, of course, but out there shivering in fear of the unknown. This doesn’t feel unfamiliar, you know what you’re doing when you offer to let a beast into your home, to lead him to your bedside and hold him throughout the night, and not a word of it slips out carrying the burdens of apprehension.

He turns toward you as his long fingers circle your wrist, thumb brushing against the back of your hand. If you could see his eyes now, you would find the creep of longing buried in a sea of blue.

“You want that?”

“Of course.”

Your bedroom seems even smaller with König inside of it, your bed even more so. The tumble beneath sheets is clumsy, and he has to bend his knees in a way that digs against your own flesh just to fit properly. The veil is cast off with only a muttered complaint in his mother tongue, something you could decipher without even knowing the words. You shush him with a kiss, sweet and gentle when his face is bared. A silent apology for your momentary fear, for your desperate sprint away, for making him wander into that cursed place to bring you home.

He reciprocates clumsily, all too eagerly searching beneath the sheet to grip at your waist as his tongue pries apart your lips. You break apart with a sigh, looking all the part of an adoring devotee as you melt against him, head tucked in the divide between his shoulder and the column of his neck.

“I thought you were afraid.” König sounds a bit dazed, fingers gently prodding against the fabric of your dress as his hand drifts lower to hold your hip. “I was worried.”

“I just don’t understand,” you answer in a soft murmur. “Why you…”

Your voice trails off as he pulls you closer again, his mouth pressed firmly against the crown of your head as he presses a kiss there. There’s a vulnerability to his touch, soft and tentative as his hand trails along your spine, resting just above your rear.

You could ask him anything now and you know that he would supply an answer, tell you any secret you would like to hear, but you don’t. In due time. Right now all that you craved was his closeness as you both drift off to sleep.

— ཐིཋྀ —

The haunted chapel is less so during the day. You haven’t heard the bell toll since last night, any lapse of conversation is filled with the chirping of birds or your own shy laughter each time you marvel up at the man seated next to you, his hand petting your hair, your cheek, anywhere he can touch. There’s nothing ominous about the place anymore, all filled with the bright colors from the stained glass windows as sunlight drifts through, painting the room of broken furniture and cobwebs with softness and warmth.

You’re lying on your back over a soft blanket you had thought to take along, the picnic basket König had pried from your hands on the walk here, once filled with pastries and fruit, now empty discarded at your side.

He tells you of why he stays in that house, deals with his father’s abuse— all for an ailing mother that’s never loved him, not as she should. König takes care of her, demonstrates love the best he knows how despite the absence of it during his childhood. You hadn’t asked, but he speaks more freely with each moment that’s passed since the kiss. It makes you somber, angry almost, that someone you saw such beauty in could be treated this way. You’re no savior, you can’t pull him free from it all, but to offer the angel a reprieve at all is enough. At least, to him.

He even assured you that Lukas, or ‘the arschloch’, was absolutely fine. A few loose teeth and a broken nose wouldn’t kill him, but maybe it would teach him to keep his gossiping mouth shut.

In turn, you tell him more about yourself. He kisses you after each description of hurt, cherishes you endlessly with that adoring gaze, gives you the cutest laugh in response to you telling him that in truth, you wouldn’t have cared if he had punched a hole straight through Lukas. You just hadn’t wanted him to get into trouble, to leave your side.

“You’re like an angel to me,” you murmur softly, your eyes closed as he lays next to you after the innumerable kisses you’ve shared this morning alone.

The words stifle him momentarily, and your eyelids open only to see the man staring back at you with a look of utter devotion. It’s torture for him, maybe, the way you supply him with every spoonful of sweetness he hadn’t tasted prior. He remains silent when his hand grazes the hem of your dress, and you nod to him in silent consent before the delicate fabric is swept up over your head and brought to rest on top of the basket forgotten.

Kisses are sweet like the coffee he gifts to you, but the ones he supplies now are far more urgent, warm like the steel of his knives after being caressed by rays of the sun for too long. It’s worship in a sense, the way he tastes the salt of your flesh from your neck to collarbone, and further to the space between your breasts. Your bra is pushed down, blue lace resting just below your sternum before your mind catches up to you.

“Should we..?” You ask, though it’s not the wrath of God that you fear, only that his clumsy kisses and bereft demeanor all signal that perhaps he didn’t have much, or any experience at all.

His pupils are dilated, eyes nearly black when he seizes the plush skin of your tit in a hand, the pad of his thumb brushing over your stiffened nipple.

“Ja… I want to..,” he mutters quietly, chin resting against your tummy as he gazes up at you. “Can I..?”

König looks cute like this— breathless and pleading, an unhinged sort of desire bared plainly in each word he breathes. Two decades and then some of never having this… and now you’re in his grasp, beneath the roof of this holy place.

“Yes,” you whisper to him, reaching lower to ghost your fingertips over his face, already flushing in color. He leans into your touch pressing a kiss to your palm before rearing back enough to slot his fingers along the hem of your white panties. His breath is almost ragged when he tugs them down enough, to reveal your soft mound and a grin creeps across his lips when he finds you already wet.

Your back arches when the back of his cold hand meets your core, petting you appreciatively there, pulling a shiver from you that only spurs him to carry on. The underwear is discarded in almost record time and the rip of the delicate lace tearing from your body echoes throughout the little chapel. A sulking protest nearly leaves your lips before a long finger is slipped into your slit. König probes at your entrance, gathering your slick onto his fingers with a soft groan that leaves you breathing shallowly. For all his inexperience, he’s eager; eager to prod at you until the digit finds that spongy, sweet spot that brings you to moan. His thumb toys with your clit with each mewl of encouragement spilling from your lips, gently flicking before circling over you until you’re tightening around his finger and soaking the blanket below.

“Are you close?,” he asks through a desperate pant, free hand pawing at the bulge in his trousers.

You shake your head weakly, thighs trembling as he thrusts his finger into you again. “Just feels good.”

That only spurs him to make you come, a second finger thrust into you so quickly you feel your mind go fuzzy. The sounds are obscene enough without the quickened pace of his hand. You’re teetering on the edge within mere moments, crying out his name only to be left entirely empty.

“Hah..” He gives you a little laugh when he realizes what he’s done, torn you away from a near perfect bliss. You stare at him dumbly, eyes half-lidded and lips parted as he deftly unbuckles his belt and pries his cock from his pants, flushed red and leaking headily. “I want to feel it…”

To his credit, he’s done well to prepare you for the girth of him, and you’re already too far gone to whine over the loss of relief. “Then feel it. Please.”

There’s no hesitation when he grinds his tip through the mess of slick painting your sex. When he finds that pressing himself against your clit wills you to grind your hips back against him he practically growls. He continues the motion several times before his patience entirely dissipates and the head of his thick cock is thrust into your entrance. König’s head drops against your chest at the sensation of your walls enveloping him, but he doesn’t growl or groan as you anticipated— he hisses, a gruff inhale of breath through gritted teeth.

You’ve fallen into rapture with the first thrust, filled entirely by the length and weight of his cock slowly spearing into you. He’s careful, forcing himself to continue languidly rather than taking you like you know he wished to, a starved man deprived for far, far too long.

König pulls back, grasping at your hips to tilt them upward, looking down at where your bodies connect. You know he’s in that dangerous state of pure euphoria, you feel it too as his cock twitches inside of you, tip hitting your cervix in a way that’s both nearly painful and causing you to leak further.

“You have.. an engel’s pussy,” he grits out.

It’s… embarrassing and ridiculous, his attempt at dirty talk, but despite your shame you pivot your hips forward, grinding against the mess you’re both making on the patch of dark hair above the heavy cock impaling you.

“König… please keep going.” Your voice a mere whine.

He obliges without a second wasted, pulling himself out to slam back into you. There’s no rhythm to his thrusts, not for a while, but each still manages to hit that spot inside of you that screams for his attention. König isn’t trying to be rough or selfish with you, keeping one hand grasping desperately to your hip as he plays with your clit with the other— pinching softly, deftly rolling his thumb over the sensitive bud; continuing his motions until you’re spasming beneath him, clutching him like a vise and weaving your fingers into his shirt to pull him down to you.

You moan into his mouth as he pushes his tongue past your lips, rolling it against your own in time with every rapidly faltering thrust. Your climax hits like a flash of blinding light with a mere circle of his thumb, accidentally in time with the head of his length brushing against that sweet spot. It’s not a hiss that König emits then, but a loud groan as you milk him entirely. He comes with you, cock throbbing as he stills entirely, every muscle in his body pulled taut as he floods your cunt with his seed. You hold him close to your breasts as his gasps soft, riding out the fleeting waves of pleasure until he wills himself to pull out and lie at your side.

“Mein Gott..,” he huffs, curling an arm over your waist. You giggle as you relax against him again, turning on your side to bury your face against his chest. Everything feels like the summer despite the chill outside, the winter doesn’t touch you here, nothing could. The stress of yesterdays melt away, the longing finally subsiding, too.

The world fades away there in that old church, cradling you both within its walls until the sun begins to set, golden light filtering into a hazy gray, before you both have to force yourselves to tear apart from the other and carry on home.

“Will you come by tomorrow?” You ask him quietly, as you stand at your doorstep, a hand lingering on the knob.

König nods, hugging you tightly from behind as he leans over to press a kiss to your cheek, another against your jaw as you smile sweetly at him.

“I will come every day, if you want me to.” He murmurs, drawing back just enough to search your expression for any signs of doubt, fear. You don’t feel either of those things, only love; as though being bonded to him like this is something hallow and sacred in its entirety. Nothing clandestine— you would run to the church right now with his hand in your own and make a mockery of all who have used their words to harm him if it would prove anything at all.

“I do want you to.”

He presses a kiss to your temple as he turns you around to face him, squeezing you a bit tighter when his hands find your hips. You kiss him in turn, leaving a trail of demure little kisses along the chest of his dark shirt.

In time, he wouldn’t have to leave at all. For now, the light the two of you share seems just enough.

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