#edit: okay great now im worrying about this post over and over too

[lovelytsunoda]

lucky people // mick schumacher

summary: the adventures of bookworm-youtuber y/n and her adorable f1 driver boyfriend mick

(shameless little plug for my own underused and somewhat forgotten about book-blr @/ cheerful-chamomile-pages)

dedicated to @flannel-cures and @paddockbunny who helped me make the final decision on whether this would be about mick or charles : )

i can see them meeting through gina (best friends brother trope anybody)

she was already decently popular on the bookworm side of youtube without mick, but once she was spotted attending a few events on the german's arm, she instantly became more interesting to a whole different crowd

obviously she's trying to keep her hobby (and almost possibly maybe side hustle) and her love life apart, but they truly are the cutest couple on the internet

she's sitting in her cute little library corner , streaming her new video live for some of her subscribers before she edits it and posts it properly to youtube.

"so i hate calling it a tbr because that just adds so much pressure and the way college is going for me right now guys, i genuinely have no idea if i will make it through all of these."

"so the first one is 'as good as dead' by holly jackson. i've been working my way through this series for a while and i finally bought this one a few months ago but life got busy and i just didn't get around to it but im really excited. this one is the grand conclusion to the good girls guide to murder trilogy and i can't wait to read about pip and ravi one last time."

and cue angie bounding into the room, cutting in front of the camera and knocking the book out of her hands as she pounces on y/n

mick is laughing in the background, super self conscious about appearing on the camera.

the chat goes MENTAL

"is that angie? does this mean mick is home?" "show mick!"

"mick," she says with a laugh, scratching angie behind the ears and looking up at the driver. "the fans want to see you."

"is that okay?" mick asks before moving further into the room, passing her the mug of hot chocolate that he had been planning on just leaving on the IKEA end table

"of course." she moves over on the carpet to make more room. "you can hold my stack of books."

"oh, great." he jokes as she passes him the stack, pressing a kiss to his cheek

"this is my boyfriend, mick. he's an angel on earth and he's going to help me film the rest of this."

cue mick shyly waving at the camera as y/n grabs one of the books from the top of the stack

"you already know that i will read anything that lauren asher writes. i have one book left in the dirty air series that i still need to finish, and this one is all about santiago, who was introduced as noah's teammate and mayas brother in the beginning of the series. i truly don't want this series to end, but this book includes grumpy x sunshine and fake dating, so im very excited to see what santi and chloe bring to the dirty air universe."

and mick is just watching her with this completely lovestruck expression

the chat goes MENTAL talking about how cute the couple is and how they all wish they had a mick (me too besties)

he's definitely present in the next video, entitled "my boyfriend and i go book shopping"

which is more like y/n just dragging mick around barnes and noble while she prepares to buy more books than she could afford (especially since she already has so many books at home)

mick is helping her look, trying to pick up books he thinks she'd like or has heard her talk about before

"babe, this book is basically porn. there's literally a half dressed cop on the front cover."

"i would have thought that the fact that it's called 'frisk me' would have given it away. the second one is worse, it's called 'cuff me'."

"i worry for your mental state sometimes, schatzi."

"what else am i supposed to do while you're gone, baby?"

that line was edited out of the final version

like the gentleman that he is, mick pays for all of the books

*cue the entire comment section swooning*

they do one video called "my boyfriend guesses the plot of my books based solely on the contents of the front cover"

"uhm im gonna take a wild guess and say that one's about death of some kind. maybe a murder?"

"that one's porn. one hundred percent. there's a fully shirtless man with a smolder and bad tattoos on the front cover. wait, there's a formula one car as well? oh dear god, this isn't what your version looks like!"

"because i bought the special editions with the pretty covers, baby. and this one does have a plot. this one made me cry, and you had to hold me for like an hour and a half while i recovered."

he definitely bought her a copy of her favorite romance book for their anniversary and went through and annotated it

paying special attention to all of the smutty parts that he wants to recreate

buddy reads with mick where they read the same book and then film a video where they both review it

the cutest couple on bookstagram

BONUS MATERIAL:

#mick schumacher x reader #mick schumacher #f1 headcanons #f1 x reader #formula one x reader #mick schumacher headcanons #f1 x you #lucky people

[1moremilgram-enjoyer]

>Oh, don’t worry, I love receiving asks! Cool cool ! Prepare for me to never shut up ! Was originally gonna ask about Mahiru next cause she's the only one in my quintet of favorites (minus Amane) who I haven't asked about yet, but since you've mentioned Mikoto twice now, I am very interested to hear your thoughts on him

… Are you going to keep asking until I cover the whole cast, or…? Eh, I don’t care. The more asks the better!

Yeah so the reason I’ve mentioned Mikoto a bunch is that I’m currently writing a MeMe analysis in preparation for when his Trial 2 MV drops (I know it’s still a ways away but since I want to do one on all MVs I might as well go with him), which means he is occupying all of my waking thoughts until I can figure it all out. And there’s a lot to figure out with the guy. Hence why he is one my favorites, up there with the other one I’ve thought a lot about (Amane).

CW: Murder.

EDIT: My previous opinions on Mikoto were pretty stupid/uninformed, so I’ve deleted them. Im only leaving this post up for the initial Mahiru impression.

And since you brought her up, I might as well talk about Mahiru too. And, frankly... well, I think she's a cool character and an interesting spin on the yandere trope (I think that's what's going on), but I don't have many strong feelings towards her. See, I'm aro/ace with absolutely zero romantic/sexual attraction, so I usually have issues connecting to characters who have romantic love as such a core concept to their storyline, and Mahiru is no exception. I just don't get it, you know? I understand why she does the things she does it in a purely neutral sense, but I can't really empathize much with her because the concept of being so head over heels for someone is completely foreign to me. I still think she's great, she's just not for me.

Obviously there's a bit more to her than "girl in love", but it's still one of the most integral parts of her character. It's hard for me to find things to relate with her. And, well, she doesn't exactly make it easy for me to like her.

(T1) Q16: What is the definition of happiness?

M: Having a romantic heart.

... Okay well then fuck me I guess, right Mahiru? /lh

So yeah. While I think she's interesting and I'm sure I'll appreciate her more when I really sit down and look over her MVs more deeply, at the moment... she might be my least favorite character I am so sorry. I don't dislike her, but I find her a lot less interesting than all the other sillies. I actually may have ended up voting her Guilty if I'd been in the fandom at the time. Probably I would have gone inno, but I'm not 100% sure.

Anyways, hope that answered your questions! And I hope you're not too disappointed in my opionions on Mahiru. Anyways, take care!

#mikoto kayano #mahiru shiina

[theloveinc]

this is v v random and you dont have to answer if you dont want to bc it IS personal, but i wanted to ask abt ur experience on wellbutrin? in terms of like, getting energy or feeling tired, sleepy? im worried about it making me sleepy/tired/brain fog (im 26 n BUSY as heck) again, dont have to answer at all, just asking bc i know youre quite open n honest on stuff so i thought id give it a shot and ask about your experience n like. ur pros & cons if thats okay. anyways thank u lub u legend bye <3

🥺Legend, of course u can ask!! I'm probably not the best choice, given I've only been on it since early June (and some people, much longer)... but honestly, in terms of brain fog and sleep... I have had almost literally NO issues and am all positive reviews here (...kinda).

One of the reasons I was prescribed it actually was for excessive sleepiness and brain fog (I get horrible, horrible brain fog normally and I have for years.)... and even though the results have been somewhat inconsistent since I've switched dosages like three times (and was off for a bit), literally it's helped SOOOOO much.

Obviously, people's reactions are going to be different, a moot (who I can tag but don't want to like... expose)(edit: @ace-of-books in the replies of this post!!!) on here told me Wellbutrin actually keeps her awake to the point where she needs mild sedatives to sleep... but I've honestly found I have no trouble actually going to sleep once I actually decide to (I like to use my phone in bed so I partially blame some sleep issues on that, but... you know) and waking up has gotten way, WAY easier.

(Also, with my new dosage, I take it twice a day and it's the NON-time release pills, and I've noticed that actually I haven't been as tired getting into bed usually... but someone told me this would go away once I fully adjusted AND I didn't have that problem on the time released capsules I took initially. Also it could just be that I've been taking a lot of naps at 8pm LMAOOO AND it doesn't actually bother me since the brain fog has been very reduced! *skips and jumps and claps feet together like a little leprechaun*🤩🤩🤩)

So yeah. More issues with... not being able to sleep than with being sleepy in the daytime. Thought when I was taking my more concentrated dose, if I had caffeine with it, things would get a little WoOoOooooOOOOooo funny🤡!!! at first.

As for cons... it's so funny because when I switched dosages the first time, I was like "omg these pills suck they stopped working after like, a month..." THAT WAS NOT TRUE LMAOOO. I HAD JUST GOTTEN USED TO THEM, and when I moved on to a higher dosage (150mg once a day to 150 TWICE a day🥶😨😱), I literally went insane (crying over mild inconveniences IN PUBLIC. I could think too hard and I would cry. Keep me awake over anxiety literally non-stop type insane).

And then, when I subsequently stopped taking them and it faded(?) from my system, it became very clear I actually was... worse off without them and I was extremely happy to go back on

I could always get used to it again, but right now I feel GREAT and literally kind of spring out of bed when I need to be up. No more lazing about waiting for my mind to work, it just does for the most part.

(Though I do get tired in the day because my schedule is awful, and also still crave sleeping a lot when I am in bed, it's just when I do wake + get up the adjustment period from sleepy time to being awake is almost... instant. So that, I would say, is fantastic).

ANYWHOOOO, this is kind of a long-winded answer that I answered sort of... backwards (talking about lack of sleep vs. excessive sleep), but... my experience has been so positive, even despite the dosage changes and the fact that it obviously hasn't cured my depression entirely. I just haven't had any issues with it making me tired at all, and it's FIXED my brainfog, which I guess is the answer to your question!

BUT, and I'm just gonna say this for legal reasons cuz I'm sure you already know, talk to your doctor/a medical professional first before making any decisions! Don't base taking it entirely off of ME because I also know people who experienced nothing positive on Wellbutrin at all. Not me, tho. But that can be common.

Thanks for reading this all (and being sooo sweet I lub you too + am kissing you), if you did! And no worries if you didn't, but good luck with whatever ends up happening!💕💕💕

#me and wellbutrin are besties #except if theres too much of her... #(i had a very public breakdown) #then i need a break. but me and small doses?? THAT'S MY HOMEGIRL #would literally make out with my pills if i could (thats gross sorry) #and ig some other things to consider: #i really experience nothing negative from birth control pills either so... idk if that changes anything #but it could be i'm just okay with medicine #and also i tried uhhh prozac and even tho nothing bad happened really... actually my grades tanked BUT... #it really just didnt work #so those are my other experiences with medication and idk if add or take away from this #but yeah!! i'd really recommend it for issues like preexisting brainfog and tiredness #not sure if it will ... make things revert for you #but yeah! #i'm super super busy too and it really didn't affect me much except positively #like when i started taking it i was on a break.. BUT when i started it a second time ... i had no problems adjusting with my schedule #which was nice #anyway i'll go now and im hoping this is helpful!!! #and not confusing #BYE. #<3333 #caitie answers #anon

[bluesandboos]

HI THAT ANON WAS ME i have no idea why i sent it on anon actually 😭

I LOVE the long posts so this will probably be long as well <3 waking up to muchachos sounds like the best thing ever omg DONT APOLOGIZE FOR YOUR SCREAMING I WAS DOING THE SAME AT HOME OMG i kept seeing videos of people at those screens, i cant imagine what it was like to actually be there 😭 the baby in front of you sleeping through the whole thing 😭❤️

i have no memories period of di maria's goal i was literally floating my way through that match and i will NEVER sit through it fully again (except certain parts obv)

that song's this one! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTnRlJTusME it's prob my favorite tbh it's just so catchy!!

I literally don't remember that save either, everyone was talking about it afterwards but my hands were literally still shaking from the match in general, i saw it on instagram. i don't even remember most of the shootout but SOMOS TODOS MONTIEL I DIDNT EVEN KNOW WHAT IT MEANT AND IT STILL GAVE ME CHILLS THE FIRST TIME I HEARD IT

going to gardens and getting only honking sounds about right and a very specific, but no less valid vibe of its own 👍 literally every time i see pictures or videos of the celebrations, even now, i am in actual awe over the amount of people that turned out and celebrated (obviously lol) before the parade even and even more during it!! someone told me the dibu burger is actually super good, im genuinely dying to try it it looks great 😭 that image is so funny though, argentina won the wc and people are lining up to buy the dibu's burger as they should!! the store owners were either worried about crowds or they shut down to go celebrate themselves lbr 💀

the newspaper!!! gloria eterna thats beautiful stuff!!!! and the goat chips omg, pls dont apologize i am loving the visual aspect of this i've been watching celebration videos non-stop bc i watched so many after they won that its all my instagram recommendations show me anymore. https://mobile.twitter.com/PLF_2008/status/1606926273833467905 this is my favorite <3

i'm so glad you had fun it seems like such a surreal experience and thank you so much for these answers and videos!!!!❤️

OMG HI HI HI thank you for enjoying my rambles <3333 it was so nice to go through it all again, ugh i miss it so much

the baby was built different. i KNOW he's gonna hear it when he gets older about how he fell asleep during the 2022 wc final when argentina became campion del mundo. literally the greatest match of all time and he knocked.

di maria's goal, once i re-watched the highlights and actually registered what was happening, is literally the sexiest thing i've ever seen. the loss of possession, the build up, the quick passes. A TEAM GOAL FR. but whenever i re-watch highlights i can only watch argentina's goals. i have to fast-forward through the penalties that france gets and mbappe's goal; it upsets me too much lmao

also after di maria's goal, people were chanting his name and the camera's were showing how he was crying after he scored and i was just so happy for him <333 also afterwards, I read this article (https://www.theplayerstribune.com/articles/angel-di-maria-argentina-english) and it just made me even more happy that he got a goal in a wc final + won the wc.

ole ole ola is a BANGER omg argentines only coming up with bangers confirmed ty for the link :))

i ended up getting a dibu burger at the airport!!! 10/10 would eat again, my man dibu only comes out with quality content, on and off the pitch.

ppl were wasted af lmao one drunk man came up to my dad (who does not speak a lick of spanish) and was literally in tears trying to hug him and my dad was just like "sir, it's okay, you won, it's okay" (in english, mind you)

for real though, i legit think about how lucky i was to be there and experience it all every single day. and i get a nice reminder every day because my social media is ALSO ALL FOOTBALL now. my tiktok for you page still shows me edits ("the little boy from rosario" lives rent free in my head) and i obviously have to watch every time. although i can't re-watch the 120' minute save because it literally gives me anxiety that it's going to go in this time (even though it's literally over).

that tweet omg :))) im just so happy not only for the players but for the PEOPLE, the way that they loved that team and suffered through all the finals and losses. no one else deserved it more. i love seeing the abuelas dancing in the street and the songs about them- makes me so happy :)

it was so surreal. top memory of life. thank you again for asking and sitting through my rambles and content dump <3

#mailtime

[enamourous]

why am i so like afraid of being disliked by strangers

#like recently i was invited to a server but like #everyone there is already friends lol #and im so anxious that ill make the wrong impression?? #like everytime i come online #which is rarely now bc of my anxiety #i have to like triple check if the tone of my messages come off right or if i said smt wrong and its like.. #exhausting i guess... #i really want to live in the motto of like. idc what others think of me but i rly dont know how to get there.. #and idk how people do it #edit: okay great now im worrying about this post over and over too

[pies-writes-and-more]

Hii how about an Ushijima x GN Reader where they're married and then got into a fight which stretches into days of the reader ignoring Ushiwaka and he'll get reminded of what happened with his parents and all that, angst to fluff btw. (You could also changed anything you want in the plot, just please make it an angst to fluff, I can't handle angst endings ;-;) that's all thamk you vmuch!

word count: 3,613

pairing: ushijima wakatōshi x gn!reader (as usual, pls let me know if you find something gendered!)

warnings: sad angsty vibes at the beginning, a lot of worry but it's all fluffy at the end!

a/n: bare with me yall, this might not be that great lol i feel like im losing my touch with writing so im sorry if it shows. thanks so much @mistomu for requesting this though! (i also can't handle angsty endings so i hope this was good enough!!!) this idea is v based on my own feelings so i hope it reads nicely! EDIT: the original post says “she seemed...empty” when Ushi talks to Tendō, which is totally my bad. Thank you to the anon who let me know! I’ve corrected it now :)

haikyuu masterlist

This fight was not like other fights you had had with Ushijima. You loved your husband and all of his quirks, and yet, when you showed up at home with a duffle bag packed, asking your mom to just stay over for a few days, you had cried for hours, wondering if Ushijima was slowly falling out of love with you. Was he really just too busy? Or was Ushijima Wakatōshi falling out of love with you?

Tournament season was always really difficult for the two of you - you never got to see him as much, but with how busy your own work was getting, the two of you thought maybe it would be okay this time around. Especially after you two had gotten married and moved in together - maybe things would be okay.

As you leaned back in your seat, staring at the wedding ring on your finger, you wondered if it was ever going to be okay again. Or maybe this was just the new normal. You had told your mom you'd just be going out for some fresh air, and yet you didn't feel like you were in a good state to be driving. So here you were, in some random parking lot, staring out the window like all the energy had been drained from your body as you replayed that night over and over again in your head.

You could remember almost every word that was said in that first argument. It hadn't helped that Ushijima was exhausted from training - all he had wanted to do was come home, and flop onto the bed for some much needed sleep. But that's what he wanted to do every night and you were struggling at work and needed any level of comfort. You just wanted him to hug you, to hold you and tell you things were going to be okay.

But when you had tried to tell him you needed him, Ushijima had held up his hand tiredly, barely even looking at you as he commented, "Not tonight, Y/N, I'm tired."

His legs had dragged themselves into your shared room, a dismissive air left behind him. Your brow furrowed as it sank in - why did everyone dismiss you so easily? You told your boss you had needed more time to get the project done, and even though he told you you could take your time, he ended up throwing you under the bus to upper management. Your coworkers all seemed to be taking their sweet time on their own portions, no one was helping, and you wanted to pull your hair out in clumps.

You felt like time was slipping past you too quickly, like your whole days were consumed by work, and yet all you wanted was to be comforted by your partner. A hug that told you that you were doing just enough.

But instead what you got was a husband who clearly wanted sleep. And maybe you should've given it to him. But why did his needs always seem to trump yours? He needed a certain diet so you went out to buy all of his new ingredients, helped make new dishes for him to try. He needed to get up in the mornings and always seemed to do so so loudly, so you had to give up on precious moments of sleep. He had a game this year on your anniversary, so you planned a different date and he just came along for the ride. Now he was too tired, and you just had to sit here and pretend like everything was fine.

Maybe I should have just sat there, maybe I should have pretended things were fine, you thought to yourself as you slunk further into your seat. Maybe we could've talked about it the morning after, maybe I could've just crawled into bed with him and cuddled him then. Maybe then we wouldn't be arguing.

Your phone rang for the 5th time since you had sat yourself here in this parking lot. You knew it was Ushijima, calling again to make sure you were okay, to ask where you were, to nag about your whereabouts. But no, you decided in your petty attitude, this time he could wait for you.

Ushijima and you had been far from the world's most perfect couple. You had known the two of you had vast differences in the ways you loved and the ways you communicated. And yet, there was something so attractive about the way he existed when you first met him. He was honest, determined, and knew exactly what he wanted from life. Sure, he wasn't the most informed when it came to how to talk to parnters or how to communicate his thoughts regarding relationships, but the two of you used to laugh about it, you used to treat every little disagreement as something that you could both work on. So when did it start becoming things that only you were working on? He used to at least spend some time with you - or try to - when things got busy... but this season felt different.

You were not a perfect partner, and you knew that. You kept things buried inside of you, you let things boil up, you didn't communicate, as Ushijima loved to point out to you, but was it so bad to want him to understand that sometimes you wanted him to initiate things? He knew you liked to be hugged some days when it was hard at work, so why had he never come to you and hugged you without you asking? Why hadn't he ever thought about doing anything other than coming home and sleeping?

Your mom's words rang through your mind yet again as you stared off into the clouds - could you be losing the man you once considered your soulmate?

Ushijima's heart fell once more as he heard the beginning of your voicemail once again. Every time he would wait for that little beep letting him know he could leave a voicemail if he wanted, and every time he would hang up right before he had to say anything. Because what was he supposed to say?

He stared at the empty couch in front of him as he stood in the living room, as if you would magically pop out of the cushions to let him know this was all just a trick. A prank. A joke.

That's what this had to be right? It was just a joke right?

Ushijima gripped his phone a bit tighter as he scolded himself internally for thinking that. Sure, maybe after the first night, it could've been a prank. But this was the 3rd night in a row that you had been gone when he came home. He had glanced at your closet, noting that some clothes had disappeared, some of your shoes too.

A pain tugged at his heart as he remembered the yelling match the two of you had gotten yourselves into - he strained his memory, trying to remember just what the climax of it had been. He hadn't hugged you... hadn't consoled you, even when you were crying while the two of you were arguing, this time he hadn't reached out to you to hold your hand, wipe away your tears.

This time he had been so tired from training, he just stood there, staring at you with that blank face he always reverted to. You told him he was always too busy to think of you, and he had told you he was trying to be the best. Because the best is what makes him worthy, the best is what keeps money coming in. He was doing this for himself, sure, but he was doing it for you too - he wanted you to be happy in your future. And yet, you seemed so unhappy with him now.

Ushijima took his phone back out, fingers typing out another text to send your way:

Please Y/N, please just let me know you're okay. We can talk this out. Please come home.

Ushijima stared at the text as it joined the many others he had sent you. Three days and he hadn't heard so much of a peep from you. He had Tendō check in on you sometime yesterday, just to make sure you were alive and not murdered somewhere. You had told Tendō you were alive, but refused to say anything more than that.

"Must be some big argument, huh?" Tendō had hummed when he called Ushijima to update him. "They seemed... empty." And that had made Ushijima feel even worse.

He waited a few minutes, watching eagerly as if waiting for you to respond but no response ever came. Why wouldn't you just talk to him? Why did you always have to hide everything inside? How was he supposed to make things better if you didn't say anything? How was he supposed to know you were upset with just your tone of voice?

The volleyball player winced a bit as he thought back to how hurt you had sounded when you first begged him to just hold you. Why hadn't he just reached out and hugged you? Had he been so exhausted he couldn't just hear about your day?

As if on cue, Ushijima felt another pang in his chest as he thought back to how similar the argument you two had sounded to the ones his parents used to have. Yelling and crying, both of them always sounding angry and hurt.

He had sworn off relationships at first, reminding himself that volleyball was all that really mattered. He wanted to be the best, wanted to reach the pinnacle of volleyball and he didn't need a relationship to get there. He didn't want to get hurt - he had watched his parents both cry quietly in different rooms, watched as one parent would always ignore the other and disappear, until one day his dad was packing his bags and leaving.

Is that what you had done? Ushijima's eyes whirled around the apartment, looking for any sign that you would be coming back. Your clothes weren't all gone so you had to come back right? Your favourite foods were still in the pantry, the accessories you had received from friends were still on the bedside table so... you had to come back right?

Volleyball had been all that mattered to him... until he met you. Ushijima met you and suddenly it didn't matter if he could get hurt - he wanted to be with you. Every moment of free time he had, he wanted to be with you. When did that stop? Ushijima stretched his mind, trying to think of why he hadn't hugged you, why didn't he just console you, comfort you, after what was obviously a long day for you too? He had promised before that he would get better at reading your body languages, keep you in mind even during his busy days... hell he even promised you that he would actually start planning dates together... and yet the last time the two of you had actually done something together was maybe 4 months ago.

Ushijima bit his inner cheek, staring at his phone again - letting you go wasn't an option. If you were going to leave, he wouldn't let you go without showing you he wanted you there. If you wanted to leave, he would make damn sure it wasn't because you thought he didn't want you anymore.

Your phone rang again, but this time, when the vibrations stopped, you received a notification that a voicemail had been left. After all this time, you had wondered why he never just said something after the call. You finally picked up your phone, listening to the voice message he left you:

"Y/N?... I'm not... not good at these things. But I know that's the problem isn't it? I've promised you so many times before that I'd get better at this stuff... and instead of hearing how hurt you were, all I could think about was how tired I was. I'm sorry, Y/N... I'm sorry for all of it. But please, please don't just get up and leave. None of this matters if you aren't around for me to share it with - volleyball, the tournaments, the sponsors, none of it would be here without you always supporting me so please, please just pick up. Or just come home. You don't have to stay if you don't want to... but please come back just to talk... I don't... I don't want what happened to my parents to happen to us. I won't let our differences separate us because everything that you are is everything I love. I fucked up - I can't promise I'll be perfect but if you're willing to just give me one more shot, and I know you've given me countless times to fix my shit, but if you give me one more chance, I promise I'll work harder. I'll do better."

You could hear the hurt in his voice and it took all your willpower not to crumble and hang up right there, call him back and cry. You hated hearing that sound in his voice - knowing he was probably tearing up, knowing he was probably sulking around the apartment. But... why should you run to him when he still hasn't solved anything? What was he saying now that was any different than what he usually said?

"I called my trainer... he agrees that I should be able to have a few rest days. So for the foreseeable future, I'll be taking Thursdays off, or at least I'll be coming home earlier every day if I need to be there for Thursdays. I know one day isn't a lot, and I know it's not much until I can actually act on it, but if you're okay with it, I'd like to spend some of those days off with you... I want to be someone you want to be with for the rest of your life, Y/N... I know I haven't been that in a long time. But if you let me, I want to make up for everything I've messed up on... There's food here waiting for you... I ordered your favourite. I don't even know if you've eaten yet or if you want to see me... but it's here for you if you want it. I'm sorry... and I love you, Y/N, I know I don't always act like it, but I do."

You didn't realize until the message ended that you were crying. Tears were streaming down your face as you tried to weigh the options laid out in front of you. Maybe it was just you being hopeful, but you could've sworn that the man you had fallen in love with, there was just a glimmer of him in that message.

You listened to it over and over again, letting yourself cry and sob into tissues you had stashed away in your car. Why couldn't he have said all of this before? Why couldn't you have just let him sleep? Why did everything have to blow up so fast?

Maybe it was time to try and fix things, you decided after you turned off your phone. You swallowed hard as you turned your car on, desperately wanting for all these awful feelings to go away. If Ushijima was genuine in person, maybe... just maybe the two of you could work things through.

Ushijima had jumped at the sound of someone opening the front door, eyes glistening with tears he had refused to let fall as you came in. The two of you shared a glance, your face showing the awkwardness you felt as you entered the once tense environment.

"Hi," was all you said, your eyes flickering over your favourite food spread out over the dining table.

"Go ahead," Ushijima nodded quickly, rushing to your side to get you a plate and put your favourites on it. He picked the biggest pieces of each dish, setting the plate down at your usual spot and gesturing to you to feel free to dig in.

But you just stared at him, the hurt in your eyes not disappearing even though Ushijima wished it would. You shifted on your feet, wishing you could pretend like nothing had happened, that there wasn't this uncomfortable feeling sitting in your stomach, that Ushijima was just doing a nice thing for you because he was a good husband and not because he was trying to apologize.

"Ushi-" you started uncomfortably, playing with your fingers in front of you.

"No, me first," he interrupted quickly, swallowing hard. Your eyes gazed over him, noting that the normally put together volleyball player suddenly seemed so small, his hair unkept like he had been running his hands through it over and over again, still wearing the shirt he had probably woken up in. "I sorely messed up, Y/N... I'm sorry for getting upset with you when you were just asking for comfort. You've told me countless times before that you appreciate talking when I come home, a hug... some time alone... and I always seem to forget that. But I promise if you come back home, I'll be better. I was thinking we could get tickets to that movie you wanted to see, or... maybe take a trip somewhere," he continued desperately. Ushijima's hand shot out and grabbed yours gently, clasping his own hands around yours. "I'm sorry, Y/N... I'm so sorry. But please... I don't want to go about my life without you around. I don't want to be one of those kids of divorce that are never happy with their own marriages so I promise... I promise I'll work on it."

You hesitated, watching the desperation in his eyes. Funny how Ushijima always seemed to talk more when you were upset, you thought to yourself, chewing on your inner cheek. "Let me eat something and then you can continue apologizing," you teased gently, attempting to lift some of the tension.

Ushijima's eyes lightened slightly as he nodded quickly and pulled out your chair for you. You smiled to yourself, wondering if maybe there was hope for you two after all.

"I'm serious about Thursdays," he told you as you started to eat. The moment the food had touched your lips, you realized just how hungry you were, stuffing your face quickly with the dishes. "We could have a standing date... watch movies or maybe go out to dinner. Try to cook something together maybe?"

You let out a choked laugh, shaking your head, "Ushi, last time we tried to cook together, we almost set the apartment on fire."

"I'll just hand you the stuff you need, I won't touch, promise," Ushijima insisted, but you could see the little smile at the corner of his lips.

You sighed after you after a few bites, looking up at him as if calculating just how ready you were to fix things, "I need to know that we're both giving and compromising equally... I feel like I'm always doing what you need me to do..."

Ushijima nodded, mulling over this for a moment, "You have done a lot for me, and I'm very grateful for it. But you're right, I need to do more."

You gave a small smile, playing with your food for a moment, "I'm sorry I didn't just tell you what was wrong... I know I blew up. In my head, I had been thinking about everything for so long, but I know that to you, it wouldn't make sense why I got angry so fast. I know a hug really isn't that big of a deal but-"

Ushijima shook his head, taking your hand and pressing a kiss to your fingers, "If it matters to you, it's a big deal. You deserve to be comforted, to find solace in our relationship...If you'll give me a warning when you're upset, I'll do my best to hug your emotions away." You nodded and Ushijima seemed to hesitate for a moment, "Can I hug you now?" He asked quietly and you let out a little laugh because Ushijima rarely asked if he could hug you, normally you would just find yourself wrapped in a bear hug.

You nodded and Ushijima wasted no time, pulling you away from your seat and tugging you into a tight hug - it had been a long 3 days after all. He pulled away for a moment, cupping your face in his hands as he just looked at you, silently promising to himself that he would do everything in his power to never be without you again.

Maybe some couples just weren't meant to be together, maybe it had been for the best that his parents had split up. But you and him? You two were a couple destined to be together, it was fate, and there was no way he would be letting any of his dumb mistakes every mess that up again.

You silently thanked any and all of the gods that had led you to this man - arguments or not, you did love him and it was nice to be reminded that he loved you too. And Ushijima worked on it - continuing to remind you over and over again as the evening passed, even as the week ahead went by. So sure, you guys weren't a perfect couple - but sometimes, when Ushijima just held you, pressed that kiss to your lips, made your heart skip beats... sometimes it felt like you guys were as close to perfection as mere mortals could get.

haikyuu taglist (let me know if you'd like to be added or removed!)

@sgue0s @aurumk @neko-chii1 @thisnoodlewritesao3 @satan-ruler-of-hells @trashy-simp @jeppiet @tobi-momo @darkvadeeer @haikyuutothetop @livy384 @babyshoyo @jesssobs @b-bakana @tsukkimoonbyeol @moonlightaangel @crystal-lilac @random-734 @sophiemess @bbyhaji @pansexualproblemchild @mystic-poteto @kaleidoscopekai @cuddlysoftbear @cheeseriz @ur-local-reality-shifter @kawaii-angelanne @ushijimacentral @elkawholeek @ur-local-anti-hero @tirzamisu

#ushijima x reader #ushijima wakatoshi x reader #ushijima wakatoshi #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu!! #haikyuu #hihqnetwork

[shotorozu]

hellolololo!¡! so i recently saw this video where their

s/o goes on to omegle and the other person from omegle like goes “hi ur cute” or “u have snap?” and then their boyfriend just enters the frame,, can u do that to todobakudeku separately :3

if u dont understand u can check this out 😭 https://vt.tiktok.com/ZSJdEqc7V/ tyy ❤️❤️

“ur kinda cute” on omegle

(tiktok prank)

character(s) : todoroki shouto, bakugou katsuki, midoriya izuku (bnha)

part two — part three

legend : [Y/N = your name] they/them pronouns used, quirk not mentioned

headcanon type : fluff, crack — ‘x reader’

note(s) : i love these types of requests 🤩 so i plan on making 3 parts with this (oh and don’t worry, i’ll finish the other tiktok prank series i have going on at the moment)

also, there’s no proofread on this so if there’s any typos or mistakes, sorry! i’ll be editing them in the morning

┈ ✁✃✁✃✁✃✁✃✁ ┈

todoroki shouto

okay so, the entire tiktok idea was planned— but the part where shouto came in surely wasn’t staged

so, being a curious young person— you wanted to make a tiktok, where you went on omegle just to speak to people for fun

and inside of your head, you’re kinda thinking that “this is dumb, omg im going to get flashed on there.” also while you were setting up your laptop

but you just used the appropriate tags and !! you were set off for an adventure

you set your phone aside, and you filmed most of the experience— cutting out the not so interesting encounters out of your tiktok

and then came on a dude, who had a,, unique reaction. he didn’t seem all that fishy— until he asked you for your snap (your social medias, essentially)

“you’re kinda cute, y’know. how did i not see you before?”

you shake your head, “oh no no! i appreciate your compliment, but i’m very much taken!” your mind immediately flashing back to the image of your icyhot boyfriend

“nahh you’re lying! i don’t see any dude back there”

oh,, and that was because shouto was out getting snacks 🧎 “no really dude, i appreciate it! i’m very much taken and being disloyal is out of the question!”

this dude just kept insisting and insisting, and due to the struggle— you weren’t able to hear the door knob jiggle

it seemed to be that his advances came to an end, and your lover made an entrance— a mop of red and white peaked out from the door frame

and the dude literally got scared and ended the conversation 💀 because you really weren’t lying!

you also figured that it was time to end your omegle shenanigans, and finish the tiktok— because your boyfriend was already there “hi love, who were you talking to?”

you closed your laptop, and offered him a smile “i was on omegle for a tiktok! i’m glad you’re back.” you discard your phone, wrapping your arms around his torso (and also making sure you don’t delete the draft)

shouto doesn’t say a lot, but he immediately accepts your touch, setting the groceries aside.

he doesn’t question the fact that you were on omegle because well,, he had to get used to your shenanigans on tiktok SOMEHOW

a few hours later, you posted the tiktok— and almost immediately, the tiktok gains a lot of attention

“i love how your boyfriend drove the last dude away 💀💀” “man the last dude didn’t take the hint 🗿” “your boyfriend indirectly protected you! we need more guys like him.”

you snicker at the comments, which ultimately gathered shouto’s attention “what’s up, love?”

you show him the tiktok, “the tiktok did well.” he’ll comment calmly, but shouto’s lowkey MAD ?? that a dude had the audacity. but he’s just glad that you’re happy just maybe,, don’t go on omegle anymore 💀

“love— next time, let me in on your tiktoks.” he says, running a thumb along your cheek lightly. because he was actually quite entertained, putting everything aside

bakugou katsuki

as if bakugou katsuki would let you go on OMEGLE, a place that’s known for having the sketchiest people to ever exist— but make it virtual

but being with you made him realize that well,, if you want to do something, you’ll go through lengths just to do it.

even the great bakugou katsuki can’t really stop you. whatever makes you happy— but oh, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t highly discourage it

which lead you to go on omegle for a tiktok in the other room, while bakugou exercised in the very next room.

when you told him that you wanted to film a tiktok, bakugou only shrugged— “don’t do overly dumb shit.” was what he only told you and he left the door open too

you then set up your phone and laptop, applied the appropriate tags— and went off to make your tiktok

you only filmed the interesting encounters, and the people you met on there were very diverse in personality and just,, in general.

after the 4th encounter, then came a rather interesting dude. he didn’t seem all that ordinary but he wasn’t spectacular. he was just nice

and the conversation was rather normal— until he started asking for your socials “putting everything aside, do you have social media? you’re really cute.”

you reject immediately, “oh no, i appreciate your words but— i already have a boyfriend.”

you just have to hope that he noticed bakugou walking back and forth with equipment, but with his next words— that doesn’t seem to be the case

“i didn’t see anyone back there, a simple no would’ve been sufficient instead.” uh oh

“no really, i—” and before things escalated, katsuki’s head peaked through the door frame, freshly out of the shower “are you almost done, idiot?”

the dude literally looked behind you, and thought “oh shit, their boyfriend is bakugou fucking katsuki.” because bakugou is famous for,, multiple different reasons

the dude’s camera shakes in terror, “oh uhm,, it was nice meeting you!” not long before he dips from of the conversation, never to be seen again.

closing your laptop— you end the tiktok while bursting into laughter, and this action just confused katsuki ever further. he heard you speaking to someone, and when he looked, the person was nowhere to be seen

“what are you laughing at??”

“nothing katsuki, i was laughing at the tiktok i just made.”

then— you figured that it would be best to tell katsuki now that you were on omegle (long story short, he wasn’t pleased)

he scolded you that you shouldn’t be on omegle, but let’s be honest, he couldn’t stay mad at you— so he just cuddles the frustration away

when you upload the tiktok the following hours, it blows up pretty quickly—with comments like “LOL IS THAT BAKUGOU KATSUKI??” “he had guts until he saw bakugou katsuki 💀” “tbh i’d be scared too”

and when you report the news the katsuki, he smirks— “as he should be.”

midoriya izuku

at this point, izuku is very much used to your shenanigans on tiktok. he’s very supportive of whatever you do all in all

but, about omegle,,, yeah,, as much as he trusts you— he does not trust omegle. he’s aware that it’s a shady place, and he doesn’t advise that you do go on that website bc he cares

so when you brought up the tiktok idea, he proposed that he’d be there, right beside you just to monitor if anyone’s being weird :)

and that’s great! because you also wanted to ask if he wanted to be a reoccuring guest in your tiktok— and of course, what kind of boyfriend would he be if he opposed?

he helps you set up your laptop and phone— all of that sort of stuff, and then you guys were off to make an interesting tiktok

oh, but izuku did apply the appropriate tags because he didn’t want you to see odd things he was secretly nervous but,, you were very ethusiastic, so he was too.

the first several people were interesting in their own way— especially with their reactions to your boyfriend appearing on screen

usually, they’d back off with, and comment on how cute your boyfriend is— wishing the both of you well before calmly leaving to meet new people,

that was how it was, until you met this person in particular.

he sounded very,, egotistical— i wouldn’t say that because you’ve just met the dude, but he acted like everyone wanted him or it sounded like that

then he says, “you definitely have a phone number, right? you’re cute, just my type.” wkdksmd this is awkward since izuku’s right beside you, but he’s just outside of the frame

then, izuku pops out of the frame— in all his cute ass glory, he gives a small wave to the not so pleased stranger

“please, that’s your boyfriend?” he scoffs, “with those arms, he looks like he could be your little brother! now let me ask again—”

it’s really weird?? because have you seen izuku’s gainz?? and this dude’s audacity is extraordinary.

but little did this guy know, he’s looking at midoriya izuku— and,, you’ve seen his performance in the sports festival.

the dude takes another glance at your boyfriend, who’s sitting there right beside you— and he realizes who he was talking to

“oh shit, you’re—” and before the both of you could realize it, he nopes out of the conversation.

after that encounter, you burst into a fit of laughter— the look on izuku’s face being priceless. “you should’ve seen your reaction!”

“haha, i guess he knew who i was,” he says bashfully, cheeks warming up. because it registered in his mind that people actually knew who he was. “can you,, upload the tiktok later? i want to hug you— i mean! if that’s fine.”

of course it’s fine! you oblige, and give him all the hugs he could ever need

after cuddling with izuku, you do upload the tiktok— and an hour later, your tiktok notifications blow up

the tiktok all in all gathered 1M views, 780K likes, and over 1,500 comments— most of them saying stuff like

“your boyfriend’s reaction was so cute?? i know he looked like he was going to punch him through the screen but 👀” “last dude was just not it.” “LMAO HE REALLY TRIED IT” “is your boyfriend IZUKU MIDORIYA??”

when you excitingly showed him the tiktok’s results, he was certainly pleased— because most of the comments were positive, and also because the tiktok’s results made you happy

“i’m glad that it did well!” he’ll sigh in relief, pressing a kiss against your temple, let’s just not go on there ever again

┈ ✁✃✁✃✁✃✁✃✁ ┈

likes and reblogs are appreciated, thanks for reading!

i do not own bnha/mha and it’s characters. boku no hero academia/my hero academia belongs to horikoshi kohei, i only own the writing and i do not profit off of my hobby

do not plagiarize, reupload, translate, or use my works for audio readings without permission

#bnha imagines #bnha x reader #mha x reader #mha imagines #bnha x y/n #bnha fluff #todoroki shouto x reader #todoroki x reader #todoroki imagines #todoroki x y/n #bakugou katsuki x reader #bakugou imagines #bakugou x reader #bakugou katsuki x y/n #todoroki shouto x y/n #bakugou x y/n #midoriya x you #midoriya izuku x reader #midoriya imagines #midoriya x y/n #midoriya x reader #midoriya headcanons #todoroki headcanons #bakugou headcanons #todoroki x you #bakugou x you

[gb-patch]

Ask Answers: May 15th Part 1

It’s been longer than usual since our last answer session, so I’m answering a ton of questions today! It’s so big I split it into two parts. Thank you for the patience on getting a response to these.

Thanks for reaching out to us with your questions and kind words ^^!

Sorry if this has been asked before or isn't something you can say but is there anyway for Cove to confess in step 4? I wanted him to confess in step 3 and followed all the steps to make him do it but ended up texting my family instead of Cove at the end.

Yeah, Cove can confess in Step 4!

Hello! I heard that Cove is on the spectrum, albeit undiagnosed. As someone who is ND, this makes me UNBELIEVABLY happy. I literally was brought to tears! Thank you for that!

Out of curiosity, will Cove be diagnosed in Step 4? I have a strong feeling y’all won’t make it a HUGE deal/make it out to be negative, so I’m not worried about that whatsoever! I’m just curious just he’ll off handedly mention it? Or will it just not be touched upon at all (which is ok!)?

Either way is ok, I’m just curious!

I’m happy it made you happy! Admittedly, Cove simply being someone with autism that grew up not being diagnosed was something I included for myself. I didn’t really think anyone would notice or ask about it, aha. But players did start to have questions about his traits, so I started to talk about it outside of the game. It’s great to see it get such a positive response and now I do feel like having it be a non-topic may have been the wrong choice and bringing it up would’ve been good in terms of having positive representation for that. I don’t know if I’ll find a way to mention it in Step 4 now, with how far along the game is, but I am at least thinking about it when originally it wasn’t something I really even considered.

Hey!  Just wanted to say thank you for Our Life.  It's been a bright spot and a needed escape in what's otherwise been a crummy year.  I know you just did a Q&A post but I figured I'd ask anyway.  Was just curious about Step 4.  Will it be similar to the other Steps in that it consists of several different moments or will it just be one long sequence?

Step 4 is shorter than the prior Steps because it’s just an epilogue rather than a full arc of a story. It’ll consist of scenes that all happen in a set row one after the other. There won’t be a collection of Moments to choose from. But it’ll still be very sweet and fun.

¡hola!, you see, first I want to say that I love Our Life! (°◡°♡) and I have 2 important questions, would Cove cry watching titanic? and what is the saddest part according to him? (sorry for my english) 

Titanic would make him cry. He’d probably think the parts showing people who aren’t able to make it to the life boats/are choosing to stay and go down with the ship were the saddest.

Hello, I wanted to ask how much you earn with creating games? Like is it possible to make a living? Thank you >< <3 

How much I earn varies a lot month to month based on Steam sales, Patreon backers, and how many projects are in full production at the time. It’s also hard to say how much I make historically, since that also changes dramatically year by year. But I do earn enough to work on these games full time! I really appreciate all the support that allows me to do that.

Hey!! I was wondering for the 18+ Our Life moment, will there be an emphasis on safety/comfort for all involved? I feel like there  would be just going off of what the rest of the game is like, but I wanted to ask 

Yes! Cove is a nervous boy himself and also super cautious about doing anything the MC doesn’t like, so clear consent from both is absolutely needed for anything to happen. It’s a conversational sexy times Moment with stops/starts so the two can talk about how they’re feeling, rather than a heat of the moment just going for it kind of thing.

Hey!! I was wondering how long the wedding dlc would be? Will it be broken up into moments, or just one big event? 

It’s one long series of scenes all in a row rather than a collection of Moments to pick from. It’s the shortest and the least expensive of all the DLCs. It’s not super crucial to get and those who aren’t into big weddings can totally skip it without worry.

HELLO AMAZING DEVS 👋 i am hopelessly in love with the worst guy ever (jeremy king) and because of this i have a really stupid question: does he really hate people who are nice to him? TvT he’s too cute to be mean to istg it’s a miracle JB held the urge to be consistently nice to him bc just look at his FACE he is so cute! thank you for jeremy’s route it’s so lovely (and awful bc he’s scum 11/10) it gave me so much laughs LMAO i hope you guys have a good day!! 

Haha, thank you. He doesn’t hate them but he’s certainly not pleased with them. Jeremy is either uncomfortable with or annoyed by people being sweet on him, depending on how they approach it. He’s far more comfortable with jerkiness. It lets him relax and he can be himself without it being a problem, since he’s also a jerk. He feels a level of guilt being such a little punk to kind people, not enough to be a better person but still.

Has Cove dated or been interested in someone other than MC? 

Nope! He stays single over the course of the game if he’s not with the MC.

Is Step 4 more mature? Or it's gonna be set in similar atmosphere as Step 3? 

Step 4 is a similar atmosphere as Step 3. Though, it’s actually kind of less mature-topic heavy than Step 3 since it’s just a ‘hey, let’s check in on the gang to see what they’re up to’ style epilogue rather than a story arc with serious issues.

will there be new music for now and forever?? or will the old our life music be reused? 

It’s gonna be a brand new soundtrack. We’ll be opening up a job position for that soon.

Hi, is it okay if we use the assets in Our Life (like the sprites) for fanworks or fan content content, like edits? 

Sure! Just as long as you don’t use the assets made by those artists to make money.

Quick clarification on Step 3 choices: I hope I didn't come off rude (because I LOVE the game, really!!), I was just curious because the intro threw me off at times. For example, you could choose how you felt about Elizabeth in Step 2 (Dinner), but during the Step 3 intro, it says that you got closer to Liz and I didn't get a choice in it. 

For the example, it can’t be helped that you’re closer to Liz in Step 3 than you were in Step 2 because she’s inherently closer to the MC regardless of whether you liked her or not in Step 2. Her feelings are out of your control and the game isn’t so dramatic that you can push her affection away and not let her bond with you, haha. But ‘being closer’ can still be relative. For some people maybe that means you’re best buds now and for others it might just mean you’re not fighting all the time any more. If there’s other parts you want to mention, feel free to let us know.

Did the illustrator for Our Life change? 

We have many OL artists! The main artists who set the game’s style haven’t changed, but there’s multiple other artists who help finish assets.

So Miranda's type is confident and outgoing, huh? So...does that mean Terri's her type?? 👀 

Haha, sorry for the late reply on this. As you might’ve seen in our post yesterday- yeah that is her type.

Hey! First, I just want to say I've really enjoyed how detailed OL got with gender identity and sexuality and how respectful the topics were handled! It's been so wonderful to play since the experiences could be close to my own (I'd be lying if I said I didn't tear up at parts). Second, I was wondering, would future games explore the topic of polyamory? I'd love to see more visual novels allow room for that and I saw you've explored the topic before.

Keep up the amazing work! ♡

Thank you! We do want to include polyamory in at least some of our future projects. Floret Bond, which might be what you’re referring to when mentioning how we’ve explored the topic before, is on hold unfortunately. So right now I’m not sure when something might release or what will be the first game of ours to come out with poly relationships (we might do something else before FB is done). We’ll have see how things ends up coming together.

Hey um. I feel like im not allowed to ask this on the private discord cuz people will yell at me but why is there so much focus on OL2 and not finishing OL1 stuff? I like the new people but i kind of want to finish cove's story and get derek and baxter stuff first. didn't people pay for it? 

I’m sorry, I don’t understand entirely what’s making that situation a concern. There’s a channel in the discord for critique where no one is allowed to comment back. People can voice things they’re worried about without any way for others to push back on it. And the two teams working on the OL games are different. We try to post pretty often about how we’re hiring brand new people to start on Our Life: Now & Forever. The OL1 team is all still working on OL1 like normal. There’s only more updates on the Patreon for OL2 because the expansions to the first game are mostly script-based at this point while OL2 is just starting to get all its art, which means there’s a lot more to show off as previews.

Also, there was a Kickstarter for the first Our Life, if that’s what you mean by people paying for it. But one of the stretch goals was to start Our Life 2 early, before fully completing Our Life 1, so that the new game could be out sooner. It wouldn’t make sense to stop doing OL2 work because that would be going against what backers were promised. Maybe you didn’t get the full story before and hopefully this clears it up!

Hello! I know it's up to every player but.. What is your recommendation for playing order? Did you ever had any timeline  events planned? 

I didn’t make the events with a planned timeline. The events got made simply as I had ideas for them and then I just kind of organized them from left to right on the screen in an order to space out more dramatic ones between more lighthearted ones. Any order the player wants to go with is totally valid!

Hi! It's Step 4 a paid dlc or update? And how long it's planned to be? Ps. Love the game! 

The Step 4 epilogue is free! The Cove Wedding DLC does cost money, though. Those are planned to be shorter than the usual Steps/DLCs.

Will we have options for what sort of job the MC might have by the time step 4 takes place? 

Yeah, you can. It’s not super exact or detailed, but there are options about it.

Is there a pandemic in Our Life world, or is it just in a better timeline with no pestilence? 

Our Life is pandemic-free! That didn’t exist when we began working on the project and it’s not something we’d like to feature in this story now that it has unfortunately come along, aha.

Hi, you said that you can play tic-tac-toe or hangman with Cove in Boating if you're sick/scared but I keep getting tic-tac-toe. Am I doing something wrong?

After being sick/scared you have to continue to be upset/unwell. If you calm down and decide to just chill you’ll end up playing tic-tac-toe.

Hi, GB Patch! Since Lee was initially commissioned to only appear in two Steps does this mean she won't appear in the Wedding DLC? I really like her character so it'll be a little weird to not have our cousin at our wedding, aha.

She is gonna be in Step 4/the wedding DLC after all! We’re still working with her creator to make sure it fits with what they wanted.

Is Sunset Bird based on a real place? Asking for a friend, not trying to move there or anything. 👀

It’s based on small beach towns in So-Cal, but not one specific town you could go see in real life, I’m afraid. It’d be nice if it was real, though.

—– —– —– —–

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#our life #Our Life Beginnings & Always #Our Life: Now & Forever #ask #gb patch #gb patch games #xoxo droplets

[flamehairedwritings]

Chocolates

Characters: Chief Jim Hopper x Reader

Words: 1k

Rating: M

A/N: Hello! Welcome to the fourth day of my 7 Days of Valentine’s Drabbles, the 2021 edition!

This story once again contains swearing and two idiots in love, and is inspired by When Harry Met Sally, because if the D*ffer Brothers can rip off 80s movies then so can I. Enjoy!

Please don’t copy or steal my work, and please don’t post it on any other sites; credit does not count.

—

Chocolates

The slamming shut of the Blazer door echoes across the quiet cul-de-sac, followed swiftly by keys jangling as they are shoved into a pocket and the pounding of boots on wooden steps as they are taken two at a time.

Reaching the top, Jim Hopper clears his throat, takes a breath, and then knocks sharply on the olive-green front door three times.

Quiet.

He's about to knock again when, through the small frosted glass, he spies a blurry shape shuffling closer. The door is yanked open, and he comes face to face with your weeping, crumbling features.

“Hi,” you greet shakily, voice cracking.

“Hey,” he answers quietly, frozen to the spot because suddenly I don’t know what the hell to do here.

Sniffing good and hard, you wave a hand behind you as you step to the side. “Come in.”

He steps through the door immediately, standing awkwardly with his bulky ‘Chief’ jacket on, the first one he happened to grab on his way out, and a huge, purple box of chocolates in his hands. Hopper watches you as you close the door, your hand retreating back into the huge sleeve of your fluffy, pale blue dressing gown before you turn to him.

He feels so stupid and lost as you look at him, your chin wobbling slightly, and then he remembers his life-line.

“Brought you chocolate,” he mumbles, holding the box out slightly.

Your gaze drops to it and you sniff again. “That’s... That’s s-so s-sweet, Hop’.”

It’s horrible, actually, he thinks, because he watches in horror as you suddenly dissolve into tears, barely able to take a breath. Before he can stop himself, though, he’s reaching out and placing a hand on your shoulder, squeezing gently.

“Hey, hey, what happened?”

You’d called fifteen minutes before, barely able to get your words out just as you try to now, and all he’d managed to decipher was, “...c-come over?” He’d headed for the door instantly.

“... H-He... G-God...”

His hand falls from your shoulder as you turn, shuffling under the archway into your living room. Following, he hovers by the fireplace as you plop down onto the couch amongst a pile of crumpled tissues. Dragging another one out of a box, you wipe at your face and nose as he stands there, still clutching the box of chocolates.

“... H-He’s getting married, the liar.” Your voice cracks on the insult, and it softens some of the rage that instantly builds inside him, before he realises he has no idea who you’re talking about.

“... Who?”

“D-Darren,” you hiccup, sniffing. “H-Him and A-Alison. He called me earlier a-and invited me to the wedding. B-But he always said he never w-wanted to g-get married...” You take in a shuddering breath as you shrug, looking so utterly helpless that his heart twists. “... I should’ve known. I should’ve known. H-He just didn’t want to m-marry me, God, I’m such a-an i-idiot...”

“Hey, hey, woah...” All awkwardness and uncertainty leaves his body and mind as he moves towards you, setting the chocolates down on the coffee table and sitting at your side. A large hand settles over both of yours gripping at a tissue, his lips pressing together as your watery eyes lift to meet his. “... You’re not an idiot, okay?”

“I am,” you sniff, “I t-trust people t-too much.”

“You want to see the good in people,” he counters, squeezing your hands lightly.

You scoff, the sound coming out more like a sob as you sit back, head leaning against the back of the couch. His hand remains on yours as he leans back, too, still facing you.

“I p-pressured him,” you mumble, sniffing.

“You told him what you wanted.”

“I talked to h-his friends too much.”

“You wanted to get to know them.”

“I made h-him do something e-every weekend.”

“You wanted to spend time with him.”

“I-I came on t-too s-strong.”

He doesn’t realise his thumb has started stroking back and forth across your knuckles. “You love people with all your heart.”

Your head has turned towards his, cheeks wet, teeth biting at your lower lip as you sniff. “Well, I hate it.”

“Don’t,” he murmurs instantly, his other hand resting on top of your head lightly, his thumb stroking gently. “It’s one of your best qualities.”

You scoff again, a tear dripping down your cheek. “Even though I’m stubborn—”

“In a good way.”

“— and d-difficult—”

“Assertive.”

“— and irritate you?”

His eyebrows raise slightly, thumbs continuing to stroke lightly, and a corner of his mouth lifts. “You don’t irritate me. Well, you do, but I can put up with it.”

You hiccup a laugh and his smile widens. Moving his hand from yours, he gently wipes the tears from your cheeks with his thumb, watching you as you blow out a breath.

“You’ll be okay,” he murmurs, and you nod.

“I know. It’s just... shitty,” you mumble.

“I know.”

His hand returns to yours, giving them a pat. “You want me to open up that box of chocolates?”

“Hell yes.”

Chuckling, his hand moves from your head and he makes to reach over when you catch his hand, lacing your fingers together. Meeting your gaze again, he holds it as you squeeze his hand.

“Thanks, Hop’, for this.”

Hopper returns the squeeze, a corner of his mouth lifting higher.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Your hand drops from his as he gestures at the TV that you didn’t bother to turn off when the doorbell rang.

“What’re you watchin’?”

You sniff. “Some action film that doesn’t make sense.”

“Perfect.”

As he pulls his jacket off and grabs the chocolate, you turn the volume of the TV up before settling your feet on the coffee table. Unwrapping the chocolates, Hopper settles the box against one arm so you can both dive into it, eyes now glued to the nonsensical action occurring on the screen. He’s just starting to get into the paper-thin plot when he suddenly feels your head rest against his shoulder.

He doesn’t move as you get comfortable, sniffles a thing of the past now, your hand gently resting on his arm, just above the box. Biting at the inside of his lower lip, he manages to stop the smile that desperately wants to break out across his features.

Instead, he just sits quietly with you, watching the film. And after a few minutes, he gently rests his head against yours.

—

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Apologies to those Tumblr won’t let me tag!

#scheduled #jim hopper x reader #chief jim hopper x reader #jim hopper #chief jim hopper #my writing #flamehairedwritings

[professional-benaddict]

@starkiller-queen wrote me a wHole oneshot and sent it in an ask so I edited it into a post bc it’s a whole ass aMAZING SWEET THING🥺🥺💗💗

«Hi Rafni! I wrote you a lil something to help you feel better 💙 fandom therapy is best therapy! Now don’t eat this ask tumblr …»

“Daddy’s so sorry he can’t make it home tonight, baby. I know I promised, but I’ll be there when you wake up tomorrow and we’ll have a great big breakfast of pancakes!”

Peter gazed into the camera of his phone with big doe eyes. He was trying to be a big boy - honest! He swallowed the lump in his throat and put on his brave face. Daddy would want him to be brave.

“An’ I can have chock-late chips?”

“Mmhmm.”

“Whipped cream too!”

“Sure baby, just this once,” Stephen concedes. It was the least he could do to make up for Peter spending the night alone.

“Did you brush your teeth?”

Peter nodded and brought the phone even closer to his face to show off his pearly whites.

“Good job sweetie! They look super shiny clean. Did you wash your face?”

Peter nodded again, afraid that his anxious little voice would give him away.

“That’s a good boy! Daddy is so proud of you,” Stephen praised and blew him a kiss through the phone.

Peter giggled, but it was only half-hearted.

“Okay baby, it’s way past your bedtime. Daddy’s going to get off the phone so you can go to sleep, alright? Did you pick out jammies?”

“Nuh-uh!” Peter said, realization dawning on him.

Stephen couldn’t help but chuckle. “That’s okay Petey pie. Why don’t we say goodnight and then you can snuggle down, okay? Daddy loves you so much. Sweet dreams baby boy, I can’t wait to see you tomorrow.”

“Love you too Daddy, ni-night,” Peter replied before blowing a kiss back.

Stephen smiled one last time before ending the call. Peter sniffled as he looked down at the blank screen. Being brave was so hard without Daddy around! He scrubbed the tears away from his eyes before hopping off of the big bed and over to Stephen’s closet. He opened the door and grabbed the first cozy hoodie he saw. It was grey and had a big word on it that Peter couldn’t read, but he knew it had something to do with where Daddy learned to be a doctor.

He slipped the sweatshirt on over his head and flapped his arms around in the too-long sleeves. It was funny to wear oversized clothes sometimes! He laughed and did a little dance around the bedroom, pretending he was going to fancy doctor school too.

But what kind of doctor went to school without pants?! Peter ran back to the dresser and took out a pair of comfy blue sweatpants. They were Daddy’s favorite lounge clothes, and they smelled the most like him. Peter slipped the pants on over his pull-up and went to lay on Stephen’s side of the big bed.

He held Baby Seal in his arms, but the bed felt too big for just him and his little friend. When he rolled over to face the empty side of the bed, he couldn’t stop the tears from flowing. Even with the lamp on, being home alone at night was scary! It seemed like it would be forever until Stephen got home, and Peter felt as if their special pancake breakfast wouldn’t happen for days.

He wiped his face with the too-long sleeves of Stephen’s sweatshirt and cried into the soft, worn fabric. If Daddy couldn’t be there himself, the next best thing was wearing his clothes. Peter squeezed his eyes shut and breathed in the comforting scents. Maybe if he tried hard enough, it would be like being wrapped up in Daddy’s arms! He fell into a light, restless sleep, overtired from worry and still missing Daddy.

~

When Stephen arrived home, it was almost five in the morning. He was exhausted from a full day and night of travel, but his heart melted when he stepped into the bedroom and saw Peter curled up in his university sweatshirt.

“Baby boy, I’m home,” Stephen spoke quietly as he touched his hand to Peter’s shoulder.

“Dada?” Peter mumbled, voice groggy with sleep.

“Yes sweetie, it’s me. Daddy’s home,” he said and kissed Peter’s forehead. “You just go back to sleep, okay? It’s veeery early. Daddy just wanted to say hello.”

Stephen moved to put on his pajamas, but Peter caught his hand with a surprisingly strong grip.

“Daddy!”

Stephen turned around and wondered if it had really been such a good idea to wake the baby. He was about to tell Peter to go back to sleep when he saw his red and watery eyes.

“Oh baby,” he said and scooped Peter into his arms. “You really missed me, huh?”

“Uh-huh! Missed you lots!” Peter said through sobs.

Stephen carded his hand through Peter’s soft curls and gently rocked him back and forth. The way Peter clung to him made his heart ache.

“Shh, it’s okay sweetie, Daddy’s here now, Daddy’s here,” he reassured and rubbed soothing circles on Peter’s back. “You were so good and brave for me, I’m sooo proud of you!”

“Was scary!”

“I know baby, shh … I’m sorry I wasn’t here for you, sweet boy.”

“You’re not leavin’ ‘gain?”

“No Petey pie, Daddy’s so happy to be home with you.”

Once his cries quieted to hiccups, Peter lifted his head from Stephen’s shoulder and looked at him through watery eyes.

“And I see you chose the Columbia sweatshirt?” Stephen asked, hoping to lighten the mood.

“Mmhmm,” Peter said shyly, suddenly unable to meet Stephen’s eyes.

“It’s okay baby, I only asked because you look so cute in it.”

“Is where you did doctor school?” Peter asked. He loved when Stephen told him funny stories from his university days.

“Yep, that’s where Daddy learned to be a doctor. It’s called Columbia University.”

“Co-lum-i-ah …” Peter said, rolling the word around in his mouth.

Stephen smiled warmly and sat back against the pillows on the bed, Peter still in his arms.

“Here baby, let’s get you all nice and comfy and Daddy will tell you a story, okay?”

Peter shifted so his head was on Stephen’s chest and nodded with sleepy eyes. He was already starting to drift off, but he couldn’t miss out on the story!

“My best friend from uni is Christine. We work together really well, but it wasn’t always that way,” Stephen said and paused to chuckle. “When we first met, Daddy was kind of a little bit of a know-it-all, and she did not like it. To get back at me, she hid my stethoscope in the chemistry lab and I couldn’t find it for a week!”

Peter gave a sleepy giggle and fell asleep smiling with the knowledge that Daddy was here to stay.

~

thAnk you thank you so so much for this darling im like deAd and re read it twice already🥺🥺💗💗 i liiive for peter curling up in stephen’s columbia hoodie ahhhh🥰🥰🥰🥰

#little!peter #daddy!stephen #spiderstrange #strangespider #stephen strange #peter parker

[hematomes]

Just saw your post about editing characters to be black, and just want to say that i totally agree and it's been bothering me a lot lately. The attitude the fandom have toward things like race and LGBT is... Really. Really. Toxic.

People attack artists for drawing keaya "too white" and even saying stuff like "he is not black enough".

Attacking other people over "straight ships" and claiming that everyone that ships them is homophobe (and pointedly looking away when other point out that the characters can be bi).

It's... Disgusting. It's the reason i don't want to interact with most of the fandom and i am also SCARED for the release of sumeru, if it's going to be based somewhat on Egypt/middle east. I can already see the angry posts of " the characters don't look black enough, mihoyo is racists!" when in reality... People here aren't as dark as other thinks. :/

(I do want to ask something if it's okay - even if a character is white, not asian or poc, and someone edits them to be black - it makes me super uncomfortable. Am i the only one?)

ALSO, IM SO SORRY FOR THE LONG RANT , IT'S OKAY IF YOU DONT POST IT, JUST WANTED TO SAY THAT I LOVE YOU AND YOUR BLOG, AND HAVE A GREAT DAY

ya ya ya i agree! tho i also want to point out something that is extremely obvious but not saying it could backfire and i don't want that: the opposite happens just as often. that goes for all the toxicity; people invalidating a ship bc 'they're straight!!!' or 'they're gay, don't be homophobic' is the same kind of stupid and pointlessly mean. let people headcanon what they want as long as it's all legal and consensual and shit smh

also, YEAH, BISEXUALS BRO. the bi/pan/omni erasure is so fucking strong in some fandoms, like a character has to be either gay or straight but god forbid they're attracted to multiple genders. but sadly it also reflects the biphobia etc irl, lots of people (both in and out of the lgbtq+ community) are sooo biphobic lmao i cannot understand why

as far as sumeru is concerned, im kinda worried too. especially since all the npc we've seen from sumeru for now are light-skinned lmao. at least cyno exists, and he's gorgeous <3 i hope people also remember that we'll get natlan in a few years, and i think this is where we'll get the dark-skinned characters!

as for white people being edited, for me it can be the same thing if we're talking about poorly edited features, over someone else's work. it's still wrong, but not as much bc for asian and other poc characters there's also the underlying notion that black poc > other poc, which is not really the case for white ppl bc they're sufficiently represented for it to matter... less? it's poorly worded im sorry but it's like 8am and im brain dead. at least in my opinion, but yeah i get what you mean. i wish there would be more genshin ocs rather than fucking edits tbh

don't worry about the long post <3 i can understand how it weighs on one's mind bc it's literally what happened to me (sounds a bit dramatic but yk racism pisses me off so), so feel free to rant about it it's all good! also thank you bby i love you too, have a great day 🤍🤍🤍

#anon! 🤍

[firefly464]

The Gilded Cage - Chapter 3

I felt like you guys could use some nice fluff after yesterday, so we zoomed to get this chapter out. Also, oh my god i have so many ideas im so excited ahahahahah

ALSO!! IMPORTANT NOTICE!!! The first section of Chapter 5 of The Real World has been edited slightly. I recommend you go back and reread it :)

Written in collaboration with @i-have-this-now :D

Thank you @rivys for beta reading, editing, and writing :D

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~~~

“Alright then, Eret. Talk to me.”

He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair, trying to calm himself. “George, it’s all…” he trailed off, unable to explain exactly what he was thinking. “What… what happened to me?” he asked, trying to change the subject.

George scoffed. “Did you not hear me when I said you got shot? Did you miss that bit?”

Bad hit him lightly on the arm. “George! That’s not how you support a friend through a trying time!”

“What?! I’m not wrong, am I?”

“Eret, here.” Bad moved himself over on the bed to sit right next to Eret. “We found you passed out in the woods with an arrow sticking out of your arm, so we brought you back here and patched you up.”

“You also were nearly frozen to death. Honestly, I think the reason you didn’t bleed out sooner is because the blood froze over or… something.” George shrugged, a little too nonchalant for Eret’s tastes. “I dunno, I’m not a doctor.”

Bad frowned. “That reminds me… Why were you even out there without a coat? It’s the middle of winter!” 

“I- what?” Eret asked, caught off guard by the question. Hadn’t it just been mid summer? He shook his head. He was in some sort of fucked up world, why was he surprised by a change in seasons? 

Even so, it made sense. It explained why he had passed out in the first place. After all, running through the woods in the dead of winter without anything to protect him from the cold was a surefire way to give himself hypothermia. Thinking back on it, it was surprising that he managed to last as long as he did. Any longer, and he very likely would have died. 

George cleared his throat, dragging Eret back to the present. He realized that his friends were looking at him expectantly, waiting for an answer. “I uh…” He stammered, trying to come up with a decent excuse. “I didn’t exactly have time to grab a jacket. They were kinda chasing me out…” 

George’s eyes narrowed. “Who?”

Bad’s let out a small gasp of surprise as he realized what Eret meant. He quickly stood, trying to take the heat off his friend. “Well, you don’t need to worry about them now!” he exclaimed, trying to hint to George that now wasn’t the time. “Here, how about we get you situated? Do you want something to drink?”

Eret stared numbly up at him. “Why are you being so… nice to me?”

“Because we’re friends,” Bad stated as though it were fact. “And you deserve it. Come on, I’ll make some cookies, and you can rest while I do that, okay? George, give him your jacket.”

“What?!” He sputtered. “Bad, I’m not giving him my--”

“Give it.” Something in Bad’s eyes must have made George decide to change his mind right then. The man nodded and grabbed a coat from a nearby hanger and chucked it over to Eret. 

Almost instinctively, Eret tried to raise his arm to swat away the incoming coat. Pain tore through him, causing him to let out a small gasp. 

“Hey, careful! You don’t want to tear your stitches,” Bad said quickly, rushing to check that the stitches were undamaged. “You’re still healing.”

Eret only watched as his friend undid the bandages that wrapped around his bicep, trying not to wince. His eyes widened when he saw the torn skin, slightly swollen around the places where string held it together. It wasn’t red or bloody, in fact, it looked like it was at least a few days old. He frowned. 

“How long was I out?” He asked. 

“A day, maybe?” Bad held out his hand towards George, not looking away from the wound. “Could you grab some of the gauze I just prepped? I might as well replace it.” 

Eret frowned as he watched George walk out of the small, curtained room. He could hear the sounds of shuffling in what he assumed to be the kitchen. 

“A day…?” He asked, glancing down at the scar on his arm. The faint, red line looked several days old, with only a minimal amount of swelling around it. There was no way it had only been a day. Injuries just didn’t heal that quickly. “How is it healing so fast?” 

“We tried our best to close the wound as quickly as possible. It would have been better if we had been able to get to you sooner, but I guess beggars can’t be choosers,” Bad sighed. “It didn’t help that you were half frozen to death, so we needed to take care of that first before we could even begin thinking about your arm -- hey George! Grab some regen pots while you’re out there please!”

“Splash potions or normal?” George called from beyond the curtains.

“Normal. We’ve already taken care of most of the outer damage. Now it’s just a matter of getting back all that blood he lost” 

Eret sat in confusion, his gaze darting back and forth between the shadow creature in front of him, and the curtain. “That uh… That doesn’t explain how this looks a week old.” 

“Well, your buddy Bad knows a thing or two about healing people,” the demon chuckled. “I soaked the bandages in healing potions so that your wound would close up safely.”

Eret stared at the scar on his arm in wonder. “Holy shit, Bad, that’s genius.”

“Language!”

He looked down, having the courtesy to at least look somewhat ashamed “Sorry…” 

“It’s alright, you muffin,” Bad laughed. “Didn’t I tell you guys to use this technique already? You know it’s really not healthy to just drink health potions, right? Have you not been taking care of yourself?”

Eret grimaced. “Well, it wasn’t exactly… common in L’Manberg, per se?”

Bad’s face fell. “Don’t tell me. Did Wilbur forget? I know I told him how to!”

“I honestly have no clue,” Eret shrugged. It wasn’t technically a lie, he really didn’t know, but the reason why was entirely different than the implication.

Bad nodded, pride shining on his face. “Well, Eret, I can guarantee you that as long as you stay here with us, we’ll take good care of you.”

~~~

Eret woke slowly and peacefully, a surprise to everyone in the community house. His eyes fluttered open at the sound of a knocking in the doorway, and was startled to see Bad tapping his knuckle against the wall, a plate in his other hand.

“Heya, sleepy-head!”

“What are you--” Eret sat up and rearranged his pillows to support his aching back. “What are you doing?”

The demon grinned. “I’m bringing you cookies, what does it look like?” He sat the plate he was holding down on Eret’s nightstand with a clink.

Eret stared, dumbfounded. “Why?”

“Lots of reasons!” Bad replied, smoothing out the wrinkles in his jacket. “I figured you weren’t feeling too great, so I wanted to do something nice for you to cheer you up!”

“Oh.”

“Plus, cookies taste better than potions, so I figured I could kill two birds with one stone and put the regeneration potion into the cookies.”

“Oh.”

“You have to make sure you eat all of them, okay? Doctor’s orders! I made sure to keep it a small batch so you wouldn’t get stuffed.”

“Oh...” Eret could only stare at the six perfectly round cookies sitting on the plate next to him. This was real, physical proof that somebody here cared about him -- really cared.

Why?

Eret couldn’t think of a good reason why anyone here should care about him. He had betrayed L’Manburg, or so everyone in this world thought. He was untrustworthy. He could turn on his friends at any moment. It would have been in Bad’s best interest to leave him freezing out in the snow, to leave him to die, but he hadn’t. Bad had done the opposite. So--

“Why?” he muttered.

The demon furrowed his brow. “Why what? What do you mean?”

“Why do you…” Eret stared down at his hands, unsure of what exactly he felt. “Why do you care? You have no reason to, I-- I’m a traitor. For all you know, I could turn on you, I could stab you in the back, I could...” he trailed off, not daring to finish his sentence.

A small scoff sounded from the open curtain. “Please, you wouldn’t do that.” 

Eret glanced up. George was once more standing in the makeshift doorway, his arms crossed in front of him. “You’ve already invested way too much into this, you wouldn’t just throw it away. Besides, I like to think of it as a double agent. Sounds much cooler than being a traitor.” 

Bad turned and faced George with a disappointed frown. “George.”

“What?” The man glanced around nervously. “I’m not wrong.”

Bad sighed and faced Eret once more. “Well, I guess…” He trailed off, seemingly deciding what words fit his answer best. “I think that everyone deserves to have someone that cares about them. And I already cared about you before I found you in the snow.”

“Besides, we all knew what would happen once you pressed that button,” George added, a soft smile on his face. “We all accepted it, and we knew what would happen. You weren’t the only one in the final control room. We’re in this together.” 

He could only watch as Bad took a seat on the side of his bed.“You’re our friend, Eret. You still deserve love, and a warm bed, and some nice cookies, no matter what you’ve done. And I want to be able to give that to you, for as long as you’ll let me.”

Eret blinked hard, trying to clear away the tears that threatened to spill over. “Do you mean that?”

A warm smile crossed his face. “Of course! Besides, I may have not approved of your plan, but I still vowed to stay neutral. I knew that this was going to happen, and I’m here to help you through it.” 

Eret gave up. The dams he had put up broke, and tears began to stream down his face. He tackled his friend and held him in a tight hug, not daring to let him go. It was slightly strange, considering the fact that his friend was some sort of shadowy-demon monster, but it didn’t matter. The hug was still filled with warmth and love.

It was enough to make a traitor cry.

He could feel a second pair of arms wrap around them as George nestled his head in the space between the other two’s bodies and let out a content sigh. Their tangle of limbs was slightly awkward, but none of them cared. Both George and Bad were too focused on trying to support their friend, and Eret wasn’t focused at all. 

Bad rubbed Eret’s back, trying to comfort him as much as he possibly could. Eret’s throat was too tight for him to say what he meant just then, but he hoped that this embrace said it for him.

Thank you.

~~~

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#this chapter is so self-indulgent #i just wanted fluff #thats it #thats the only reason this chapter exists #eret #the_eret #badboyhalo #georgenotfound #dreamsmp #dream smp #dream team #dreamteam #bbh #mcyt #The Gilded Cage #Split Realities #mcyt au #my writing #the real world

[oikawasass]

IM A BAKUHOE CAN U PLS DO 74 OR 76 WITH BLASTY ASS 🥺🥺🥺 - midoriya anon

hi I did both cause they were cute.

also new posting format baby lets goooo 😎

its also like almost 3am and this is half-ass edited so forgive me but I hope its alright

prompt 74 : “You’ve shown me what love can feel like.”

prompt 76 : “I wouldn’t change a thing about you.”

reassurance.

‣ pairing : bakugo x fem reader.

‣ oneshot.

‣ synopsis : bakugo finally confronts his girlfriend on why she’s been so distant.

‣ wordcount : 2.1k

‣ warnings : swearing, angst if you squint.

a series of heavy knocks could be heard on the other side of her door, immediately alerting her of who exactly it was. there was only one boy in the u.a dorms who could knock like he was about to punch straight through the wooden panel, and that was, of course, bakugo katsuki.

(name) shut off her phone and pulled her pillow over her head, dreading the conversation she knew would come about if she let him inside. so naturally, she ignored the knocks in hopes that the blonde who was about to start throwing down with her door would go away.

but we all know katsuki is far too stubborn for that.

another series of much louder knocks erupted from the doorway, as bakugo grew more and more impatient from the lack of response.

“oi, open up already dumbass, I know you’re in there.”

truth is, (name) had found herself in a bit of a rut, and had been feeling rather insecure for the past few weeks. the first little while she’d been begun feeling that way, she was able to bite the bullet and keep going about her life, pushing most of her negative thoughts aside as best she could. but now, for the past 5 or so days she’s been completely cut off.

talking to her boyfriend about things wasn’t hard for her. she trusted him and didn’t find it too difficult to open up when something was bothering her, but this was different.

insecurity was something bakugo typically didn’t acknowledge and quite frankly, looked down on most of the time. (name) didn’t wanna find herself bothering him with something she knew he most likely would think is annoying, hence the multiple weeks she had kept quiet about it, hoping it would go away on its own or she’d be able to figure it out herself.

unfortunately for her, things didn’t go quite according to plan when she continued to spiral downwards.

she’d been quiet in her classes, noticeably dodging bakugo and her friends, not sticking around for lunch or after training like she normally would, and everyone noticed she was off. everyone including katsuki.

he wanted to give her space to ‘sort her shit out’ before he began pestering and questioning her, as normally he’d want the same thing, but now it was coming up on a week and they’d hardly spoken. a few mutters of (name) saying “cant, homework.” or “sorry, I’m tired.” was all that had been said that week.

so naturally, bakugo got tired of all the silence and went to do what he did best. confront her. he wanted to know what the hell was going on, he was tired of pulling his hair out trying to figure out what he did wrong.

(name) didn’t answer the door once more. she knew she had fucked up pretty bad by ignoring him, but she didn’t know what else to do. and now she had to confront whatever problem she may have caused, which only made her want to curl up and hide more.

alas, when she heard a much softer, much quieter,

“please?”

coming from the hallway, she broke.

standing up with a heavy sigh, the (colour) haired girl stood up from her bed, rubbing her eyes and walking over to unlock the door, immediately going and flopping down into her mattress afterwards.

katsuki walked inside, shutting the door behind him and shoving his hands into the pockets of his black sweats. scanning over her figure, he took note of her tired eye bags, messy thrown up hair, and these fuzzy black penguin patterned pyjama pants which he knew she only wore when she was upset. paired with one of his hoodies she had stolen, of course.

“you look like shit.” bakugo grumbled, going and sitting down on the end of her bed, sinking into the soft (colour) duvet on top.

“good to see you too, babe.” (name) replied sarcastically, turning and shoving her face into a pile of her pillows.

there was an uncomfortable silence hanging over the room for a moment as katsuki figured out what he wanted to say, and it was obvious that (name) wasn’t gonna say anything first. with a heavy sigh, the blonde ran a hand through his thick, spiky hair and spoke up.

“did I- did I do something or whatever the fuck?” he asked, his words a bit harsh but his much quieter tone helping to deliver them much easier.

(name) bit the inside of her cheek gently, keeping her face hidden in the pile of sheets and freshly washed pillows.

“what makes you think that?” her response was mumbled by the fabric practically eating her face.

“don’t play dumb, shithead. you’ve been dodging me all week. you’re normally all- all clingy and shit and you never cancel plans.”

clingy. that one stung a bit.

“so if I did something to piss you off just- just fucking tell me already cause I’m getting really damn tired of-“

“you didn’t do anything, alright? chill out.” (name) cut him off, rolling onto her back so now the couple was making eye contact once more.

bakugo tsked, throwing his hands in the air a bit and letting them fall onto his lap.

“so then why the hell have you been blowing me off all week, huh?”

(name) sighed heavily, rubbing her eyes and sliding her hands down her face as she struggled with how exactly to articulate that she’d been feeling incredibly insecure and didn’t wanna be a nuisance to him without sounding like an absolute moron.

“I just- I’ve just been feeling shitty lately and I didn’t wanna bug you with it while I sort things out, okay?” she explained vaguely, nervously fidgeting with her fingers while she avoided his gaze.

when she mentioned she hadn’t been feeling well, bakugo softened up a little bit. he knew sometimes she got like this, having periods of time where she just wasn’t herself, but normally she came to him herself and told him what was up. so he couldn’t quite understand why this time was different.

bakugo sighed and stood up to go lay beside her, propping himself up on his elbow while resting his cheek in the palm of his hand.

“well why did you just say that in the first place, dumbass?”

he wasn’t a great advice giver, and he wasn’t great at comforting, but when it came to things like this he was a pretty good listener, so he always offered up his ears when (name) was feeling down.

“what’s got you down, huh? talk to me already.”

the girl beside him continued to fidget and play with her fingers, debating on whether she actually wanted to explain to him her feelings, or just shrug him off and do her best to convince the blonde it was something else.

she was ping-ponging back and forth. lie and most likely not get away with it but still not sound stupid, or tell the truth and have your boyfriend think you’re an idiot. a wide variety of lovely choices she had to choose from.

yet, in the end, she decided it would be best to be honest with him. oftentimes, nothing good came out of lying in these types of scenarios, and she surely didn’t want to fuck up more than she already might have. sure, katsuki wasn’t mad for the time being, but that boy’s temper can switch on and off like a light sometimes. so she still approached the situation cautiously.

“I feel just- annoying and like I’m a bother to you with this shit all the time so I didn’t wanna throw all my problems or whatever into you again, alright?

you’re practically this idol student who’s so damn cocky and confident in himself, so when….”

she sighed, trying to find the words once more.

“when I start feeling gross and insecure, or when I’m starting to completely flop in some of my classes, I just- i feel like I just become this huge weight on your back and..” she swallowed, slowing herself down as she felt herself begin to rant.

“…and it’s embarrassing! you shouldn’t have to deal with me feeling like an idiot, you have enough on your plate as it is and- and I should be able to deal with this kind of shit on my own, not immediately run to you whenever I feel-”

(name’s) midoriya-muttering speed ranting was cut off when a familiar pair of plush lips were pressed up against her own, immediately shoving all her worries into the back of her mind. she hadn’t realized how much she missed something as simple as a kiss from her boyfriend in the week she’d been distancing herself from him.

after a moment or so, when bakugo was sure she would be shut up enough for him to speak, he pulled away.

rolling onto his back, bakugo waved her over to him, using his other hand to prop up his head from behind.

“come here, just be quiet and listen for a sec will ya?”

(name) was not hesitant to cuddle right up into his side, tangling her legs in with his and resting her head atop his toned chest. after wrapping an arm tightly around her shoulders, rubbing her back slowly, the boy began to speak.

“it’s my job to be here for you, okay idiot? as sappy as it sounds, when you’re upset, I’m upset too. I don’t like seeing you down, it makes me feel like a shitty boyfriend for not bein’ able to help.” he leaned down to kiss the top of her head.

“you shouldn’t be embarrassed to tell me shit, doesn’t matter how stupid you think it is.

nobody’s perfect, alright? get that through your head.” bakugo said, flicking her forehead gently. (name) chuckled quietly.

“even you?”

“only sometimes, but that doesn’t leave this room.” bakugo answered, smirking to himself.

“listen, I know you’re a badass, and you can get through shit on your own. you’re strong as hell.

but that doesn’t mean you can’t take it. speaking from experience, sometimes it’s better to just bite your tongue and accept the help from people that care about you.”

(name) listened to every word that he said very carefully, letting them sink in as she processed them. it was rare that bakugo got like this, but when he did, it was rather impressive how easy he was able to make her feel better. his advice sucked half the time, sure, considering “blasting the fuckers to hell” isn’t always an option, but this kind of advice was something she’d keep with her always.

“you’re damn special, you know that? you’ve done somethin’ even better than getting a decent grade on your stupid chemistry test.”

bakugo stated, leaning his head back so his gaze was fixated on the ceiling, closing his eyes with a sigh. (name) furrowed her eyebrows together slightly, tilting her head up to look at her boyfriend.

“wait, but what did I do exactly?” she asked, curiosity lacing her tone. bakugo placed a hand on top of her head, ruffling her hair a bit.

“you’ve shown me what love can feel like. somethin’ I thought i’d never know or go through. so to do that, you’ve gotta be pretty fuckin’ incredible.”

(name) smiled up at him and leaned up a bit more to kiss his jaw, returning to her comfy spot on his chest right after.

“I’m sorry that I get like this. I’ll work on it, ‘kay?” (name) said quietly, still feeling a bit bad that bakugo had to go and tell her all this, though she can’t deny that it made her extremely happy to hear.

“shut up with that already, will you? you know I wouldn’t change a damn thing about you.”

and that was enough to reassure (name) almost completely, that her negative feelings and emotions weren’t as bad as she had been painting them out to be.

with a soft smile, and a slow close of her eyes, (name) nuzzled closer up into bakugo, her cheek squished up against his chest.

“I love you, you big softie.”

“yeah yeah, whatever. I love you too.”

#bakugo x reader #bakugo fluff #bakugo katsuki #bakugo oneshot #bakugo imagine #bakugo x you #bakugo x oc #bakugo x y/n #boku no hero academia #bnha x reader #bnha #bnha fanfiction #bakugo headcanons #bakugou katsuki #my hero academia #mha x reader #bnha oneshots #mha oneshots #bnha fluff #mha fluff #bakugo katsuki x reader #bnha imagines #bnha x y/n #mha imagines #mha x y/n #bnha bakugou #bnha bakugo katsuki #mha bakugou #mha bakugo katsuki

[palmett-hoes]

what's your take on the foxes mbti?

oh buddy ur never gonna believe this but i wrote a foxes MBTI post YEARS ago

im also not into mbti anymore and haven't been for many years so that post is probably still more accurate and in-depth than what i could give you now. i’m just gonna copy the whole thing but i read it over and it still totally vibes w how i understand the characters, like way more than i was expecting it to. i only made one edit (it’s marked) and it was to add a detail not change anything

i hope you’re really really into mbti otherwise this’ll probably be gobbeldegook

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i used to be obessively into mbti so here’s an analysis based on cognitive functions mostly.

SKIP IF YOU WANT. for anyone with no idea how it works, here’s a quick rundown: cognitive functions are about the way people think, process, and prioritize information, not necessarily how they act, though people who think the same way often act the same. the 8 letters that make up a type represent how people process and prioritize internal and external stimuli. every letter actually has an ‘internal’ and 'external’ form so there’s Thinking (internal(ti) and external(te)), Feeling (internal(fi) and external(fe)), Sensing (internal(si) and external(se)), and iNtuition(internal(ni) and external(ne)) t’s always go with a corresponding and opposite f (like ti and fe always go together), same with s’s and n’s (ex: si and ne always go together). a set of  t, f, s, and n in a specific order makes an mbti type.

neil: intp (ti ne si fe)

neil has incredible analytical ability although it’s very programmed for survival but he’s also a fast thinker and very quick to adapt to new environments. he also approaches things from original angles that other people dont consider, all that sounds like high ti/ne. the lower functions fit well too. in times of stress, he returns to old habits and falls back on what’s familiar, that’s classic low si. his emotions are also very exterior. he’s bad with other people from lack of exposure, but he’s committed to harmony between those close to him and has an impeccable ability to read the emotional states of others while being completely oblivious of his own, and his sense of self is tied to exterior things like exy, friends, keys, and legal documents (lol) that’s fe

andrew: intj (ni te fi se)

ni is really hard to describe but it has to do with being able to draw conclusions from scattered input, which fits with andrew’s uncanny ability to spot lies and obsession with finding out the truth, especially with high te, which is about spatial order and logic, think of how prioritized he is with the physical order of things: who sits where, who wears what, etc. a lot of people want to make andrew infj i bet as like a “subversive reading” but he’s definitely not. i used to be really close to an infj and they have hyper-empathy, as in she would describe not just caring about other people and being able to read their emotional states but literally feeling the things the people around her felt. this is a common result of the ni/fe combo, and the reason why andrew is definitely not infj. tertiary fi fits very well instead because andrew is deeply attuned to his own inner emotional state. he’s self-confident and doesn’t care about other people’s perception of him, but he’s also very concerned with his own feelings and understanding them, even if they’re repressed. he’s also very aware of his physical surroundings, which plays into his deductive ability, although it’s not his focus. that’s low se

kevin: estj (te si ne fi)

kevin is a classic estj. he’s controlling, demanding, and driven. he tries to control the actions of those around him and gets very distressed when things dont run smoothly, as well as having strong feelings about improving efficiency. high te people make great managers. kevin’s whole story arc is about breaking old habits, which is a very si problem. it has to do with trusting and craving memory and familiarity, and explains kevins need for endless repetition. he’s innovative, though, coming up with new strategies and drills (ne), it’s just based on what’s already familiar, and you can see him spiral into creating all possible worst-case scenarios when he’s stressed (low ne stress reaction, they like to be prepared). finally, he’s a dick, but he cares about other people and wants to improve their lives, as well as being very reliant on other people’s perceptions of him to define his own self-image (low fe)

dan: esfj (fe si ne ti)

dan’s top priority, over everything else, is her team. she wants her team to improve, she wants her team to win, she wants her team to work together. it’s all about the collective. we also see that she’s very open with others and makes a lot of effort to both make new ties and maintain old ones, that’s high fe. she’s sentimental and attached to the past too (si)  esp the photo wall, but we also see her very unwilling to let go of the past ie the monsters but eventually willing to change and grow to mend team cohesion (ne). we also see the fight in underlying logic (low ti) with her: she knows the team needs the monsters to cooperate but she cant figure out how to do it

matt: enfj (fe ni se ti)

so enfj’s experience infj hyper-empathy too, but to a slightly lesser extent (primary fe is more group cohesion, secondary fe is more understanding others), and through this we see matt’s easy-going open friendliness and ability to befriend even prickly little neil, because he has an extremely good sense of what other people are feeling and need, it also explains why he doesn’t hold a grudge against the cousins in the same way dan does, because he understands where they were coming from. se is associated with a general boisterousness for life, as it’s about experiencing the world around you, which explains matt’s happy-go-lucky disposition and puppydog behavior. the ti aspects mostly go into supporting fe/ni empathic senses

allison: entj (te ni se fi)

i mean, allison’s controlling, both in that she orders other people around and in that her physical being and space are very planned and organized (her clothes, her hair, her makeup, etc) but at the same time there isn’t much sentimentality to her, like how she doesn’t care when her car was destroyed. she easily replaces things because she cares about the object’s purpose, not its history and that all smacks of high te/ni. and i mean, the se definitely contributes to her love of designer things and killer looks, because she cares about the world immediately around her, and why live if not in luxury? and fi? is there any character more aggressively self-confident than allison reynolds?? going against her parents’ wishes for her takes a really strong, independent sense of self, but we also see the problems that can come from not worrying about other people, in how she starts fights and can be abrasive and catty

renee: infp (fi ne si te)

okay this one was really hard tbh. a list of other considerations: isfp, istp, and infj. it’s very easy to read renee as high fe because she’s kind, but i think it’s a mischaracteration of why she’s kind. it’s not because it comes naturally to her, it’s because it’s a conscious choice that makes her feel better about herself. high fi people often read as fe because they’re so comfortable with themselves and in tune with their own needs that they can then go and provide for others. i associate her religion with ne, because contemplation and acceptance of the divine later in life is a very metaphysical undertaking that undoubtedly requires a lot of abstract thought. renee’s storyline also revolves a lot around using things from her past and putting a conscious effort into leaving things from her past behind (how she still uses the skills she learned from her past in new ways ie sparring with andrew and protecting the upperclassmen v/s how she held on to her knives even when she knew it was detrimental to her moving on) this sounds like si. her protective instincts also feed into the te need for order, but it’s a looser leash than say andrew, as it’s lower on her function stack but still present

nicky: esfp (se fi te ni)

godd nicky is like a prototypical esfp. i mean nicholas “sex, drugs, and parties” hemmick cant be anything but se dominant. nicky is all about living it up and living in the moment. like he’s sporadic and ive seen it lead people to think he could be enfp but he doesn’t think enough about the meaning of things to be ne dominant (like how he makes somewhat predatory jokes and such, he’s all about the here-and-now while ne is about the past and future simultaneously). also he of all characters has incredibly prominent fi, as his whole character is about living unashamedly as himself as a gay man and the immense self-awareness and inner strength it takes not only to come out to unaccepting parents but also to leave and start a new life when they rejected him. however, fi is also indicative of his communication problems with his family, as he’s unable to tell that the cousins are fundamentally different from him in their needs and boundaries, leading him to pushing them, making them uncomfortable, and being unable to help them, because he’s unable to understand them. the rest are much more hidden, but a party boy shopaholic like nicky would probably need some amount of te order in like an organized chaos fashion (and he’s often headcanoned as liking to throw parties) and you do see him become somewhat pushy, even controlling in those scenarios. ni is the hardest but could maybe be seen in how he’s attuned to the cousins reactions for all that he cant predict them/doesn’t do anything on his own part to prevent them (the way he handles andrew is like if someone poked a rattlesnake knowing damn well what it would do and then freaked out when he got bit)

aaron: istj (si te fi ne)

im a little iffy on this one and worry it might be an analysis based on his trauma instead of complimentary to it, but aaron’s arc is about breaking out of his habit of holding on to the past. he refuses to work towards moving on from his mother’s death, refuses to listen to things that contradict his preconceived notions, and refuses to make changes in his life that could improve it. that’s unhealthy si. he’s really a very unhealthy istj, and most of his traits manifest through his unhappiness with his life. take his te. that would imply that he needs control over his surroundings, but aaron is incredibly bitter and unhappy BECAUSE he doesn’t have control of his surroundings. he doesn’t get to make his own choices, he doesn’t get to control his space, and he hates it. his relationship with katelyn is also indicative of being an istj. it’s stable, not a passionate fling, but aaron is mocked for wanting that white picket fence, married with kids in the suburbs kind of life, and his relationship, which is his primary source of happiness, is built on stability, which is a very si thing to do. in terms of fi, it is aaron that ultimately forces change between himself and andrew. he may have been pushed but he ultimately came down to him knowing what made him happy and what made him miserable and acting on that. also, he’s an ornery asshole who clearly doesn’t care what other people think of him. fi. i dont really have anything to say in terms of ne, probably because he’s so unhealthy but also because he’s not too explored. heyy istj’s make great doctors

wymack: isfj (si fe ti ne)

okay this one was genuinely the hardest to decide on but ultimately i came to the conclusion that wymack, much like renee, is such a developed person that he loses many defining traits of the functions, and can be read in many different ways. so: wymack’s primary goal is the safety and betterment of other people (ie his team). he wants to help people overcome their pasts, which is a very atypical approach to si, but is si nonetheless. on a personal level, too, he’s never able to move on from people, and specifically never moved on from kayleigh,  continuing their shared dream of an exy team for abused kids long after her death. as ive said before, fe in a secondary position is about deep understanding of other people, and wymack’s ability to understand what other people are struggling through is legendary. the ti mostly serves as support to the fe, serving as the analytical backup in allowing him to understand others. as for ne: he is most definitely an innovator with unusual ideas, or the foxes wouldn’t exist

riko: estp (se ti fe ni)

riko is basically what happens when an estp goes bad down to the core. he’s obsessed with personal glory and immediate self-fulfillment (se) he has no impulse control or fear of consequences. interestingly, high se is often associated with athleticism, because high se people are intensly focused on their surroundings (exy). his ti is also super unhealthy as he gets obsessed with ideas that dont really work with objective reality, like his obsession with ownership and power dynamics despite them not actually being efficient, even backwards. the tertiary fe he uses to manipulate. he doesn’t empathize with others, but he can tell their emotional state and what’s important to them, and uses it to coerce them and destroy their sense of self, like how he knew he could get neil to the nest by threatening andrew. EDIT: /additionally, fe people especially in the lower half of the function stack tend to derive their sense of self from the perceptions of others around them, which riko very much shows in how he needs to be acknowledged as the best and won’t allow any competition for his title, as well as his desperation for acknowledgement from his family/. finally, that ni allowed him to keep multiple plans in place focused on one ultimate goal: getting kevin back. the sheer amount of schemes he sets up in order to fool and push people the way he wants is honestly kinda impressive, but he’s a toxic shithead and im glad he’s rotting. definitely not representative of all estp’s

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this is honestly SO funny to read back a few years later bc HOOOOO boy was i way too into this stuff. and this was written a couple years after my Peak MBTI Obsession, which was honestly scary

#txt #the foxes #dan wilds #kevin day #andrew minyard #matt boyd #aaron minyard #allison reynolds #nicky hemmick #renee walker #neil josten #wymack #riko moriyama #my posts #im talkin #ask #anon #anonymous

[latetaektalk]

in love with you | bbh

“you have been in love with byun baekhyun ever since you were children, but to him you were only his best friend. you were fine with that, fine with being nothing more than friends with baekhyun, but when he starts his search for true love and doesn’t look at you to find it, you weren’t sure anymore if you were truly fine with just being friends.”

“or the four times you try to dye baekhyun’s hair.”

genre: best friends with to lovers! AU, semi college! AU, angst, fluff

pairing: baekhyun x reader

word count: 19.021 (i dont know how i did this in six days)

warnings: cursing, bad singing and dancing

playlist: ifly - bazzi, break my heart again - finneas, love story - taylor swift, claudia - finneas

a/n: okay, i wanted to finish this before baekhyun’s bday, but i only realised it was his bday like six days ago. so i basically wrote this all in six-ish days and i haven’t even edited it. but im posting it because its his birthday! this was meant to be pure fluff, but somehow turned out much more angsty than i wanted it to? anyway, happy bday to baekhyun! 

masterlist

You two were sitting on your couch, watching ‘Community’ for the hundredth time when Baekhyun turned his head to you and looked at you.

“I want to dye my hair.”

Your eyes tore away from the TV screen and instead travelled to Baekhyun. You furrowed your brows at him. Baekhyun knew the moment he had said the words that he really wanted to dye his hair and that he didn’t just say it because he was bored.

“What?” you said, confused. Your attention was now completely on Baekhyun and your TV faded into the background, serving as background noise than anything else.

“I want to dye my hair,” Baekhyun repeated before smiling at you. He watched the knit between your brows deepen and he knew you weren’t completely convinced of the idea.

“Okay,” you said, voice wavering a little with worry as you eyed his healthy and luscious and beautiful and full hair, “You mean like dye it brown?”

“No,” Baekhyun said without missing a beat even though he hadn’t actually thought much about it. Instead he decided in the moment. “I want red hair.”

“Red?” you blurted out and sat up straighter, eyes growing bigger at Baekhyun’s words. His lips split into a grin and he gave you a nod, a nod that had you shaking your head.

“Bright red.”

“You sure?” you asked before you reached over to run your fingers through his hair, “Your hair won’t be the same after dyeing it.”

Baekhyun shrugged and gave you a grin that had your heart beating a little too fast. It was sad how easy it was for you to ignore it, for you to push it away because you had gotten so used to Baekhyun having such a big effect on you.

It didn’t take you long to realise that you were in love with Baekhyun. In fact, you knew it the first time he had smiled at you when you two were measly 6 years old. You felt stupid, stupid for being still in love with him after so many years, but his name was just written on your heart. It belonged to him and you had accepted that you couldn’t change anything about it, couldn’t change anything even if you tried your hardest.

Instead of attempting to erase Baekhyun’s name with another over and over again, instead of attempting to burn away Baekhyun’s name, you locked your heart into a cage. You threw away the key to it, scared that if you didn’t, certain words were going to slip off your tongue one day and ruin the friendship Baekhyun and you had built.

“Who cares?” Baekhyun continued and you scrunched up your face, “It’s just hair and you only live once, right?”

You hummed, still very much unconvinced. You kept threading your fingers through Baekhyun’s hair and he let you. For a moment, you thought he was leaning into your touch, but you quickly dismissed that thought. There was no way, no way because to Baekhyun you were nothing more than just a friend.

“You really sure?” you asked and Baekhyun laughed at how you contourted your face, the worry and uncertainty written all across your face. 

“Yes, I really want bright red hair,” Baekhyun said and you tilted your head to the side, pursing your lips into a thin line.

“You sure you thought about this or are you just saying you wanna do it without even thinking about it?” you said and Baekhyun reached for your hand, fingers wrapping around your wrist to pull your hand from his hair. He put his other hand on yours and gave your hand a squeeze.

It wasn’t fair how easy your hand melted into his, wasn’t fair because it was like the universe was laughing at you, mocking you because your hands just fit perfectly, but it was the only way you two fit together. You would never hold his hand, never hold his hand because you were more than friends because, again, you weren’t, not to Baekhyun at least.

“I’m sure,” Baekhyun smiled and nodded to confirm his words. You sighed and you knew there was no convincing Baekhyung otherwise.

“I guess you’re old enough, right?” you just said and Baekhyun grin grew a little bigger at your words, causing your heart to skip a beat, rattling its cage a little. You paid it no more mind anymore. Your heart always just did that whenever Baekhyun grinned at you like that. It was normal, expected now.

“Okay, great,” Baekhyun cheered before squeezing your hand again, “Will you dye my hair for me?”

You pulled your hand out of Baekhyun’s grasp and shook your head, horror settling in your chest because deep down you knew Baekhyun was going to force you to do it and you just didn’t want to. You would never be able to sleep if Baekhyun blamed you for ruining his hair. Too much responsibility.

“Please,” Baekhyun started and both of you knew you were going to give in eventually. You could never actually say no to him, not to Baekhyun, not to your Baekhyun.

“No, Baek, I don’t know how to dye-”

“There are so many YouTube videos and tutorials,” Baekhyun started and inched closer. You kept shaking your head and shuffled away, being too close was dangerous. “It’s easy. I’m sure.”

“Then do it yourself,” you said, but Baekhyun frowned at your suggestion.

“How? Do I have eyes at the back of my head-”

“Use a mirror,” you cut in and Baekhyun frowned even more, knit deepening between his brows. 

“Can’t you just help me?” Baekhyun whined and took a hold of your hands, wrapping both of them into his now, “Be a good friend?”

He looked at you with his big brown eyes and it was then that you knew you couldn’t resist any longer, knew you couldn’t keep saying no anymore. The pout Baekhyun added, did nothing but make it more difficult for you and you hated yourself for being so weak, for being so weak for Baekhyun.

The fact that your heart tightened painfully at Baekhyun calling you a friend barely registered in your mind anymore. You had gotten so used to the pain, had gotten so used to being nothing more than a friend to Baekhyun that it barely affected you anymore. At least that was what you told yourself.

“Fine.”

“Okay, so, looks like I gotta bleach my hair a bunch of times before we can actually dye it,” Baekhyun informed you and put down his phone. You looked up from your laptop and raised your brows, still very much unconvinced.

Baekhyun hadn’t mentioned something about dyeing his hair for a whole week and a part of you had hoped that he had forgotten about it, but, of course, he hadn’t. You tucked a strand behind your ear and your back cracked when you straightened up. 

You had been studying for way too long now and it was taking a toll on you. The uncomfortable chairs in the library certainly didn’t make it any easier for you to stay focused.

“Maybe we shouldn’t do it,” you said, not really feeling like bleaching Baekhyun’s hair over and over again, “I mean bleaching your hair a bunch of times. Won’t it fall out, then?”

Baekhyun scrunched up his face at your words, obviously sad that you were trying to convince him again not to dye his hair. He leaned forward and rested his arms against the table, hands folding together.

“But I wanna dye my hair,” Baekhyun whined and you cringed a little, asking yourself how he could be older than you and how he could be a functioning adult if he cried like a baby every time things didn’t quite go his way.

“I’m just saying, Baek,” you shrugged and Baekhyun pushed out his lower lip as he batted his eyelashes at you. 

“But I want red hair,” Baekhyun repeated and you sighed, folding your arms in front of your chest.

“Maybe just go to a professional-”

“You think I’ve got the money?” Baekhyun said and you pressed your lips together, knowing exactly that he didn’t have enough money, remembering the amount of ramen he consumed in a month just simply because it was cheaper and he had to cut corners everywhere he could.

“I don’t want you to blame me if it turns out shitty or if you lose all of your hair or something,” you explained and tightened your arms around your chest. Baekhyun rolled his eyes at you and you were about to kick him in the shin for it when he spoke up.

“It won’t. It’ll be fine, I’m sure,” Baekhyun said and you were about to voice your complaints and worries when he continued on, “And if anything I won’t blame you. It’d be my fault because I’m essentially forcing you to dye my hair.”

“How can you be so sure?” you asked, unable to understand how Baekhyun could talk with such confidence when neither of you had any experience in dyeing hair before.

“I trust you.”

Your heart rattled its cage and for a moment, you thought it was going to knock it over and free itself and you were going to scream out the three words that had been dancing on your tongue since Baekhyun and you were children, but it wasn’t enough. The rattle wasn’t enough and a part of you thanked the universe it wasn’t and another wished it had been enough because then maybe Baekhyun and you could be something.

You hated yourself, hated yourself for being so fucking pathetic, for getting your hopes worked up every time Baekhyun was being somewhat affectionate with you and you wished you could get over it, stop obsessing over his every word, but your heart didn’t allow you to stop.

When it clicked in your mind that you had been silent for maybe a little too long, you snapped out of your thoughts and focused on the present right now.

“How about Chaeyoung? She has experience in dyeing hair. She did it on herself a bunch of times,” you said, voice wavering just the slightest. A part of you was still shaken up about the possibility of the three words spilling out.

 Baekhyun scrunched up his face when you said ‘Chaeyoung’. The second her name fell from your lips, he disliked the idea, no, in fact, he hated it.

“What’s wrong with Chaeyoung?” you asked, puzzled because Chaeyoung was nothing but nice and cute and sweet. Baekhyun shrugged before his head landed in his hands, his low grunt muffled by the table. Your eyes scanned the people around you and you let out a relieved breath when nobody was looking at you.

“Hello? I asked you a question, Baek. What’s wrong with Chaeyoung?” you said and took one of your pens to throw it against Baekhyun’s head when he wouldn’t respond. It bounced against his hair before falling to the side. 

“Ow.”

Baekhyun looked up and rubbed his head as he sat up straight. His eyes locked with yours and for once, the pout was gone from his lips. 

“What’s wrong with Chaeyoung?” you repeated your question and Baekhyun scowled at you, obviously unhappy about the fact that you had just thrown a pen at him.

“That hurt, you know?” Baekhyun said before he dropped his hand and took your pen into his hand, twirling it around as he leaned into his chair. You rolled your eyes at him and you had to bite away the smile that tugged on the corners of your lips.

“What’s wrong with Chaeyoung?” you asked for a third time and Baekhyun sighed, scowl melting away as he stared at you in complete seriousness. Your heart started to pound in your chest, but you were quick to tell it to shut up, to stop being like that, to stop because Baekhyun and you were only friends, nothing more. You were about to put another lock on it, another lock to the hundred locks you had already put on it in a vain attempt to get it under control when Baekhyun answered.

“She isn’t you.”

Fuck.

“Fine,” you said after a beat, your mind made up. Baekhuyn beamed at you and you could only smile back at him too, seeing him so happy made you happy as well.

“Love you,” Baekhyun grinned and your smile almost faltered. Words almost slipped off your tongue, words that you could never let out. You wanted to tell Baekhyun that he didn’t, that he didn’t love, that he didn’t love you the way you did, that he didn’t love you the way you wanted him to.

“Love you too, Baek.”

You hated that those three words, that sentence ‘She isn’t you’, was all it took for Baekhyun to break the hundred locks you had put on the cage. And almost, almost, your heart had spilled out, but somehow you held the cage shut, somehow held it shut long enough to put a new, better, stronger lock on it. And you followed that lock with thousand more, determined to keep your heart silent and locked away forever.

Those three words were also all it took for you to completely give in, to quench your worries and doubts about dyeing Baekhyun’s hair. From that day on, you were completely convinced, looking up various articles to ensure the health of Baekhyun’s hair and scalp.

At first, Baekhyun was excited that you were so committed to dyeing his hair now, but after the tenth text about the measures he and you had to take before dyeing his hair, he wasn’t sure if he wanted you to be this on board anymore. 

“It’s gonna be fine.”

He had to say those words over and over again until they lost all their meaning to him. Baekhyun started to repeat them like a robot, saying them before you could get a word out.

“Why don’t you tell her she’s lowkey annoying you?” Sehun asked and shoved his hands into his pockets as he and Baekhyun made their way down the street to the coffee shop to grab a coffee before class. Baekhyun frowned at Sehun’s suggestion and immediately shook his head at him.

“She isn’t annoying me,” Baekhyun said with a slight edge swinging in his voice and Sehun immediately put up his hands, obviously noticing the way Baekhyun had said the words.

“Hey, I’m just saying,” Sehun said and Baekhyun’s frown slipped away, realising himself that he had maybe reacted a little too harsh, “I mean you’re complaining to me about her, aren’t you?”

Baekhyun stopped and thought to himself. Sehun was right, he had turned to him to talk about how he and you had just texted for ten minutes to figure out when to dye his hair because you didn’t want to bleach his hair more than once during a day, but you weren’t annoying. You couldn’t be.

You were just worried and Baekhyun was just sometimes a little impatient. If anything, it was his fault for being so impatient. You were just being a great friend.

“She doesn’t annoy me,” Baekhyun said and Sehun looked at him, “She could never.”

Sehun eyed Baekhyun for a moment before snorting and shaking his head at him. Baekhyun raised his brows, not quite catching up with Sehun. They turned the corner and Sehun opened the door to the coffee shop, the bell above the door ringing to announce their entrance.

Immediately the scent of coffee and pastries made their way to Baekhyun and it was considerably warmer inside the shop than outside. It wasn’t that it was very cold outside, spring starting to replace the winter, but the air outside was still somewhat fresh and biting.

“Are you in love with her, dude?” Sehun chortled and a grin pulled on his lips, both of them stopping in front of the line. Baekhyun pressed his lips into a thin line before he let a few scoffs slip, head shaking from left to right almost in an instant, almost like he had trained himself to.

“No,” Baekhyun said and he cringed because he had said it a little too loud. Maybe Sehun was being a good friend because it was obvious that Baekhyun didn’t really want to talk about it or maybe it was because Sehun didn’t notice, but he didn’t mention it, mention the slight raise in Baekhyun’s voice.

Even as Sehun started to talk about what he should order, Baekhyun wasn’t quite there, wasn’t quite listening anymore. Instead his mind was still repeating Sehun’s question over and over again. 

There was no way, right?

Before Baekhyun could shake the thought out of his head and decide to ignore it, a familiar voice cut in.

“Byun Baekhyun?”

It was truly remarkable, remarkable how Baekhyun and you could just decide to ignore things, ignore the questions repeating in your minds over and over again. Maybe that was why Baekhyun and you were best friends, maybe that was why he and you got along so well.

Because the next time Baekhyun and you saw each other, he had the most excited smile plastered on his lips, ready to do this.

“Let’s go,” Baekhyun grinned and held up the plastic bag, containing everything you had told him to buy to make sure Baekhyun’s hair wouldn’t fall out the second the bleach touched his hair.

You pointed at the chair next to your biggest window, papers laying on your floor around it in a circle already to make sure that none of the bleach or dye would fall onto your floor and cost you your deposit. In front of the chair you had put up a small mirror to give Baekhyun the chance to look at himself whenever he wanted.

Baekhyun skipped to your chair and you just shook your head at him. Unlike him you weren’t excited or giddy or happy. Instead you were still worried, worried that you were going to fuck this up even though you have read every online article out there on how to dye hair and even though you have watched every hairdresser reacts to and hair dyeing video on YouTube. In fact, you had done more research on how to dye hair and how to do it well and whatnot that on any other topic.

“We really have to spread this process out into weeks?” Baekhyun asked, shrugging off his hoodie to reveal a simple white tee. 

“Look, you said you didn’t want to lose your hair and that you didn’t mind being blonde for a while. We’ve gotta bleach your hair at least twice to get the red you want at the end. So, unless you want to lose all of your hair, we can do it all in one day,” you said and shut Baekhyun up.

You made your way over to him, picking up the plastic bag Baekhyun had put next to him to sift through the things he had bought. You pulled out the bleach and the mixing bowl with the brush. 

“Can you take out the scale?” you asked and nodded to the plastic bag. Baekhyun picked it up and searched for the scale he had brought from home before following you to your couch and placing it on your coffee table.

“What are you doing?” Baekhyun asked and you turned on the scale, putting the mixing bowl and brush on top of it.

“Making the bleach,” you said and poured the baby blue bleach powder into the bowl before pulling the top off the developer, making sure that you were keeping the mixture in a two to one ratio.

Baekhyun eyed you carefully as he watched you mix together the powder with the development, amazement sparkling in his eyes.

“You’re so good at this,” Baekhyun mumbled and you just rolled your eyes at him, but you couldn’t quite hide away the grin that pulled on his lips.

“Yeah, can you put on some music and get a towel from the bathroom?” you asked and Baekhyun nodded, sitting and watching you for another second before doing as he was told. Your eyes followed Baekhyun as he stood up and walked away and you sighed to yourself.

As Bazzi filled up your flat, you finished up mixing the bleach together. The powder and developer had turned into a baby blue paste and Baekhyun was standing with a towel wrapped around his shoulders, smiling at you.

This my baby This my Look

“Sit,” you said to Baekhyun and gestured to the chair. He wrapped the towel tighter around his shoulders and he couldn’t hide the grin adorning his lips. 

“Hold.” You handed Baekhyun the mixing bowl to put on gloves, not really up to bleaching your skin before ruffling through the plastic bag again. You split Baekhyun’s hair into four same sized sections, clipping the pieces of hair together with hair barrettes.

Touchin' you slowly, love how you hold me I was a player, that was the old me I sent a prayer for something holy Got naked and show me

“Okay, you’re really ready?” you said after you had taken back the mixing bowl from Baekhyun and stood behind him. Your eyes looked with Baekhyun’s in the mirror in front of you.

“Yeah,” Baekhyun breathed out, lips splitting apart into an even bigger grin.

Girl, summer's been lonely, yeah At first, I was hesitant (Spooky) Like a skeleton You 20, but intelligent

You waited for another moment, giving him the last chance to change his mind, but when Baekhyun just nodded again, you shrugged and put on the first bit of bleach. Almost immediately Baekhyun let out a tiny gasp.

“Okay, no turning back,” Baekhyun laughed as you distributed the bleach in his hair, still unsure what you were doing because even after watching every hair dyeing tutorial out there, you didn’t feel very comfortable or skilled in doing this.

Now all them other bitches so irrelevant, ah-ah, yeah Tan lines and some memories (Woo) Guess summer got the best of me (Woo)

You started out with the length of Baekhyun’s hair, not wanting for the roots to bleach quicker than the rest of his hands. You scrunched up your nose when you got the first whiff of the bleach, the smell of it really not sitting that well with you.

Chef B with the recipe, yeah With you, it's a better me

“Who would have thought that one day I’d be dyeing my hair?” Baekhyun said and smiled at you through the mirror. You just shook your head at him and kept your eyes trained on his hair, making sure that you evenly distributed the bleach.

“I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin' is, I-I fuckin' love you,” Baekhyun started singing and took the words out of Bazzi’s mouth. Your eyes flickered to Baekhyun’s face and you smiled, smiled as you looked at every centimetre of his face.

His eyes were fluttered shut, words slipping off his tongue with such easy and grace that it was truly admirable. His voice was angelic and you wanted to hear more, wanted for him to never stop singing. 

For a moment, you just focused on Baekhyun, on how beautiful he was, on how much your heart wanted him to say those words to you. Your heart rattled in its cage, fought against the metal bars, banged on them in a vain attempt to get out, but you didn’t allow it, didn’t allow it to win.

You started bleaching Baekhyun’s hair when you realised just how quick it was lifting. Baekhyun kept singing, kept taking the words out of Bazzi’s mouth and you silently hummed along to the melody. The song soon started to play on repeat.

The barrettes landed on the floor with a little bleach on them as you worked your way through Baekhyun’s hair, starting to get the hang of it. And you were completely focused on that, on dyeing Baekhyun’s hair, but when he poked you into your waist, your eyes shot to him.

“Sing with me,” Baekhyun said and you raised your brows at him. Baekhyun kept going, kept singing, but he never looked away from you. You knew he was waiting for you to join in, for you to start singing as well, but you weren’t quite sure.

“Please.”

And it was all it took for you to join Baekhyun, for you to sing along and the grin that spread across Baekhyun’s lips had your heart beating a little too fast for your own liking.

I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin' I guess what I'm sayin' is, I I fuckin' love you (I do)

Your eyes locked with Baekhyun’s as he and you sung the words and you wished they hadn’t, wished that he had been looking somewhere else, wished he had his eyes closed or something because in an instant you could feel this seed of hope plant itself into your chest, watered by every word and look Baekhyun gave you. Your heart reacted immediately and you made sure to put on extra locks. 

This wasn’t your first jam out session with Baekhyun, wasn’t your first time singing with Baekhyun, wasn’t your first time belting out love songs at the top of your lungs with Baekhyun - ‘Love Story’ by Taylor Swift was the song that started it. 

You knew by now that it was stupid, that it meant nothing, that you were nothing more to Baekhyun than a friend, but you could never not get your hopes up. You could never tell your heart not to, not even as it hurt so bad when your hopes and expectations were quenched later on.

“I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin', I guess what I'm sayin' is, I-I fuckin' love-” 

“Skip,” you said, almost commanding Baekhyun to and cut in before he could finish the lyric. The words died on Baekhyun’s tongue and he furrowed his brows at you. “Skip the song.”

“Why?”

You couldn’t quite take the way Baekhyun was looking at you and instead started working on the back of Baekhyun’s head, forcing him out of your view.

“We’ve listened to it long enough,” you lied and swallowed the truth, not wanting to admit that you couldn’t take it, couldn’t take Baekhyun saying that he ‘fucking loved you’ whilst he looked at you and actually didn’t.

Baekhyun hummed before shrugging and pulling out his phone to skip the song. But to your dismay, the next song was even worse.

Hey, you I'm just now leaving Can I come around later on this evening? Or do you need time? Yes, of course, that's fine

Finneas’ voice filled up the air around you and you wanted to tell Baekhyun to skip the song again, but when he started humming along to the melody - his brows pinched together and his eyes fluttered shut - you couldn’t bring yourself to. Not when he looked like that, not when he looked so incredibly beautiful.

Soon enough Baekhyun started singing along, started to make the song his own and soon enough your heart jumped to your ears and pounded so loud in them that it was deafening, so loud in them that it hurt.

So go ahead and break my heart again Leave me wonderin' why the hell I ever let you in Are you the definition of insanity? Or am I? Oh, it must be nice To love someone who lets you break them twice

Baekhyun continued on singing with the song accompanying his beautiful vocals and you slowed down your movements, too busy listening to Baekhyun’s voice to focus on bleaching his hair. Your heart fluttered every time in your chest whenever Baekhyun sang the chorus and you wanted to record him, record him so you could have him sing to you every time you needed him to, so you could imagine a world in which Baekhyun would sing for you because you were more than just friends.

You thought the song was going to repeat again like Bazzi’s ‘IFLY’ did, but instead Baekhyun peeled his eyes open and unlocked his phone, swiping across the screen and typing something into it. And a second later, Taylor Swift’s ‘Love Story’ started playing.

Nostalgia hit you an instant and your eyes locked with Baekhyun’s in the mirror as the guitar filled the air around you.

“Oh my God,” you whispered quietly, remembering the many times you had forced Baekhyun to put on the second when it had first been released. 

“Baek,” you said as the intro started to come to an end. Baekhyun had the biggest grin on his lips and it was so contagious that you could only grin yourself. Memories flooded you and before you could control yourself the first words slipped off your tongue, your voice filling up your tiny living room.

“We were both young when I first saw you, I close my eyes, and the flashback starts, I'm standing there,” you started and pointed at Baekhyun at the latter part of the first lyric, eliciting a laugh from Baekhyun.

You were pretty sure that this song would make you just as sad as Bazzi’s ‘IFLY’ and Finneas ‘Break My Heart Again’ if Taylor Swift’s ‘Love Story’ had such a different meaning to Baekhyun and you. The lyrics didn’t mean anything to you anymore, instead they were just there to be screamed at the top of your lungs, gained their new purpose ever since he and you were young.

Baekhyun started joining you, singing dramatically the lyrics like he was truly feeling all of the emotions, telling his own story.

On a balcony in summer air See the lights, see the party, the ball gowns See you make your way through the crowd And say, "hello" Little did I know

Baekhyun and you kept looking at each other, never breaking eye contact once as the words rolled off your tongues. You forgot about bleaching Baekhyun’s hair and instead started giving your all to sing out the song that was connected with so many memories.

When the song got closer to the chorus, Baekhyun turned to you and just took the mixing bowl out of your hand and put it on the coffee table behind you. You let him and when you realised what Baekhyun was doing, it was already too late.

Baekhyun grabbed you by your hands and started to dance, leading you through your living room as both of you belted out the lyrics. Pure bliss and joy filled up both of you and it was like there was only Baekhyun and you in the world and no one else.

You were jumping around and just singing, enjoying yourselves when the bridge started and Baekhyun let go off your hands to caress your face with the back of his hand.

I got tired of waiting Wondering if you were ever coming around My faith in you was fading When I met you on the outskirts of town, and I said

You had to try your hardest not to laugh, Baekhyun struggling just as much as the song calmed down and the guitar almost slipped away completely. Both of you looked at each other, grins adorning your lips as you acted sad.

When the melody started to pick up again, ramp up to the last chorus, Baekhyun and you prepared for the finale, both of you stopping for a moment as you waited for your cue.

And said: "Marry me Juliet You'll never have to be alone I love you and that's all I really know I talked to your dad, go pick out a white dress It's a love story baby just say 'yes'"

Baekhyun and you were practically screaming at this point and it took the end of the song for both of you to calm down, for you to snap into reality again.

“Your hair, Baek!” you yelled out and grabbed Baekhyun by his hand to practically throw him onto the chair. The bleach was starting to drop down the side of his hair and you quickly picked up the mixing bowl to make sure Baekhyun’s hair wouldn’t turn out completely patchy and ugly.

“It’s just hair, Y/N,” Baekhyun laughed, a grin still very much on his lips.

“You won’t be saying that when it turns out ugly,” you said and Baekhyun laughed again. A new song came on, but you didn’t recognise it. 

“That was fun,” Baekhyun said and your eyes wandered to the mirror for a moment. Baekhyun was already looking at you and he was giving you this look, expecting you to agree with him and you couldn’t help yourself but to just do so. A smile split onto your lips and you could see the pride glinting in Baekhyun’s eyes.

“We haven’t listened to that song in such a long time,” you realised, starting to work on the sides of Baekhyun’s hair. The top was done and now it was really just bleaching the sides of his head.

“I know,” Baekhyun grinned, “Why did you think I put it on? Remember how often we used to listen to that song?”

You could only nod at that memory. Of course, you remembered, remembered so clearly because that song encapsulated all you wanted. Your heart yearned for that kind of love, yeared for Baekhyun to love you like that, but you knew just how unrealistic that was now.

“We’re so old now,” you sighed and tilted Baekhyun’s head to the side, “Can you fold your ear really quickly?”

Baekhyun looked somewhat confused before he did as you told him and you applied the bleach on his hair around his hair.

“Yeah, we’re really fucking old now, huh?” Baekhyun said and you could only nod, “But I’m not only talking about our age. In general I just feel so much older now.”

“General I just feel so much older now.”

“General I just feel so much older now.”

Baekhyun and you saluted and spoke at the same time, eyes locking with each other before bursting out into laughter. It was an inside joke between him and you to mock salute whenever someone somehow mentioned a military rank.

“Oh, we haven’t done that in a long time,” Baekhyun chuckled and you nodded.

“Why not?” you mused and Baekhyun just shrugged with a grin plastered on his lips.

“I don’t know, we should do it more often,” Baekhyun said and you could only agree, nodding your head before going back to applying the bleach. “But as I was saying, I do feel like we’ve aged a lot more the past years than even before.”

“We’re definitely different now.”

“Better,” Baekhyun corrected you and you raised your brows at him, not sure if you would agree “Well, I’d definitely say that I’m a better person than I used to be.”

You frowned because you couldn’t remember a time where you thought that Baekhyun wasn’t a good person. ”How so?”

Baekhyun grinned at you and pulled the towel tighter around him before answering. “Remember how I used to date all of these girls in middle and high school? I could never say no to them even though I didn’t like any of them.”

You remembered, of course, you remembered, you remembered very clearly and you remembered even more clearly the pain pulling in your chest. Every other month Baekhyun would have a new ‘girlfriend’ or something and it hurt, it hurt because it was never you.

You knew then that he only dated those girls because they asked him out and Baekhyun was just too nice to say no to them, but that didn’t make it any less painful for you to witness it all. It hurt even more to see him share kisses with them in front of you and that it was according to him the only benefit of having a ‘girlfriend’ he actually didn’t like, the fact he got to kiss them.

“Yeah, you’re right,” you said and tapped on Baekhyun’s hand to signal to him that he didn’t need to keep folding his ear over. You moved to the back.

“No, that was truly awful of me,” Baekhyun said and you only hummed, “Why didn’t you tell me? I mean I kissed those girls and really strung them along. God, I was a dick.”

You just shrugged and tucked a strand behind your ear. “Not saying that it was their fault, but it wasn’t really a secret at one point that you would date pretty much any girl because you couldn’t say no. So, I feel like most of them knew what they were getting themselves into.”

Baekhyun scrunched up his face at your words before crossing his arms in front of his chest, obviously not very proud of his younger self.

“Yeah, but I was still the dick,” Baekhyun said and you smiled at his words, eyes meeting Baekhyun’s in the mirror.

“You still are,” you grinned, earning you a gasp from Baekhyun, “I’m not saying I disagree, but I do believe that some of the girls thought that they could change you or something when they asked you out.”

Baekhyun hummed and thought about your words for a second, music switching to another song you, again, didn’t know. 

“Yeah, but I do feel like I hurt a lot of people. Unnecessarily,” Baekhyun sighed and you stopped applying the beach on him to look at him.

“No, yeah, you did,” you said and tucked a strand behind your ear, “But I don’t feel like it’s fair that you blame yourself. It’s been, what, six years now? It was literally middle and high school. We all did stupid shit.”

“Okay, true,” Baekhyun sighed and you knew that he still wanted to say something, “But I still remember the way Minji cried when I broke up with her.”

You paused and stayed silent for a few seconds. Of all the girls’ hearts Baekhyun would inevitably break, Minji stood out from all of the girls. Because, for some reason, Baekhyun decided to deliver the bad news right before class and, well, Minji didn’t take it very well. Long story short, Minji started yelling and crying in the middle of the hallway and their breakup was a much discussed topic for the rest of the year. In fact, it was named the ‘Minji Baekhyun Gate’ and everybody knew about it.

“Well, on the flip side no more girls asked you out after her,” you said and Baekhyun frowned a little at your words. 

“I guess,” Baekhyun sighed and you continued applying bleach onto his hair before you paused again and looked up to him.

“I wonder what she’s doing now,” you hummed before you worked through Baekhyun’s hair again. If you had looked at him a second longer, you would have seen the blush spread across his cheeks, would have seen the way his eyes grew in size, but you didn’t.

“Actually,” Baekhyun cleared his throat and you raised your brows at him, brush still mid air as your gaze wandered to him, “I actually, uh, ran into her a few days ago.”

“Shut the fuck up,” you blurted out and you couldn’t stop the grin from spreading across your lips, “Did she slap you? Yell at you? Cry?”

“What? No!” Baekhyun shook his head and you shrugged. After all she had done two of the three things you had listed when Baekhyun and she broke up in high school. “She did none of that.”

“Where’d you run into her?” you asked and finished applying the bleach on the back of Baekhyun’s head. 

“Coffee shop. I was with Sehun grabbing a cup when she came in, too,” Baekhyun recalled and you nodded.

“What does she do now?” you kept asking, genuinely curious about Minji’s life right now. Sure, it hurt to see Baekhyun with all those girls, but you never blamed them for it. If anything, you admired them for being so brave and confessing their feelings. Something you could never do.

“Oh, she’s a graphic design student or something like that,” Baekhyun said and you nodded, finding it not surprising at all that Minji became a graphic design student. It fit her well.

“That’s cool,” you said and pointed at Baekhyun’s ear with the end of the brush, “Fold.”

Baekhyun folded over his ear and you started applying the bleach. The music was still very much playing, but for the first time, it was quiet, silent between Baekhyun and you.

And it was then that you knew that he was going to say something, that he was thinking about how to word it, that he was struggling to find the right way to say it.

“Spit it out,” you said and Baekhyun looked like a deer caught in headlights when his gaze met yours in the mirror. His cheeks reddened and right away, you knew you weren’t going to like it.

“I may or may not be going on a date with Minji in a couple days.”

Your chest tightened painfully and your throat constricted into a tight knot at Baekhyun’s words. Your heart, for once, didn’t attempt to break out of its cage and instead stepped away from the locks and the door. It fell to the floor and hugged itself as the tears threatened to spill.

You pressed your lips together and swallowed the actual words that wanted to roll off your tongues. Instead you said what you knew was the right thing to say right now, the right thing to say right now as Baekhyun’s friend.

“Tell me you’re not going on a date with Minji because you can’t say no to her. We really don’t need a ‘Minji Baekhyun Gate’ in college, too,” you said and as bad and awful and heartless and selfish as it was, you wanted Baekhyun to tell you just that, tell you that he was going on a date with Minji because he couldn’t say no to her and not because he actually liked her or something.

You prayed to the universe that Baekhyun was only going on a date with Minji because he couldn’t say no because you weren’t sure what you were going to do if he was going on a date because he actually liked her. Baekhyun had never voiced any interest in actual relationships or love or whatever in his life before and it made it easier, easier for you to be fine with just being friends with Baekhyun, but you weren’t sure if this was going to be the case if he started to date, seriously date.

“Actually I asked her out.”

Your heart shattered in your chest and the knot in your throat tightened so much that it was suffocating you and for a moment, you thought you weren’t going to survive the pain tearing through you, but you never fell to the ground. Instead you kept looking at Baekhyun as he eyed you carefully.

“And before you say something about me asking her out too early because I feel guilty, I didn’t. I’ve actually been texting with her for the past week and I think I’m really starting to like Minij.”

The seed of hope that had planted itself into your chest went up in flames and you almost laughed, laughed because, of course, it did. There was no way it could ever grow, grow bigger, grow into an actual flower.

With your best effort you put on a smile, a smile that hid away all the pain and tears and frustration and sadness inside of you right now.

“I’m so happy to hear that, Baek.”

The plan Baekyhun and you had agreed upon to achieve the red he wanted was that you would bleach his hair for a second time a week after and dye it red then the week following. But Baekhyun cancelled a few days after the first time you had bleached his hair. 

“Minji wants to watch this film that comes out on that day and I don’t wanna say no.”

You didn’t ask how Baekhyun’s date went, you didn’t hate yourself enough to ask. You couldn’t do that to yourself and you weren’t going to, but when you ran into Baekhyun in between classes, you could see how happy he was. His eyes were sparkling, lit up like a city and you knew why, knew it was because of Minji. It broke you, broke you to see him like that. Because not once had you elicited the same light in his eyes before and the ashes of the seed of hope crumbled further into dust.

[Baekhyun - 14:06] :

does tmr work for you? i cant walk around with a baseball cap for another day

You wanted to text Baekhyun that today would work, that you would do his hair at two in the morning, but you didn’t tell him, didn’t because it was just a little too much.

[You - 14:06] :

yeah, after class?

Baekhyun didn’t answer until the next morning.

“God, you look fucking stupid,” you said when Baekhyun took off the baseball cap. His hair was a disgusting and brassy blonde colour and you pointed at the chair.

“I know. I thought for a while that it was fine, but I just couldn’t keep lying to myself,” Baekhyun laughed and shrugged off his jacket, hanging it up before he let himself fall into your chair.

Baekhyun had left his plastic bag with everything inside at yours the last time and you had already mixed the bleach and put out a towel for Baekhyun.

“Thanks,” Baekhyun said and wrapped said towel around his shoulder. You just smiled at him and put on the gloves before stirring the bleach again as it had thickened a little over the past minutes, but it was still perfectly fine to use.

“You know the only good thing about my hair is that I at least know that Minji isn’t with me for my looks only,” Baekhyun joked and you forced yourself to smile a little bigger. 

“Hold,” you said and shoved the mixing bowl into Baekhyun’s hands. The brush fell out of the bowl, but luckily you had put out the papers again and Baekhyun bent down to pick it up again.

“Smart,” Baekhyun said and gestured at the papers and you just silently took the compliment before you started to thread your fingers through Baekhyun’s hair.

“I didn’t really get to look at your finished hair,” you said, recalling how late it had been when Baekhyun and you were finally done with the first round of bleaching, “You literally bolted out before your hair had dried.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry,” Baekhyun grinned and you looked at the small parts that were still black. As handsome and pretty as Baekhyun was, even he looked ridiculous with the black patches in between the brassy blonde.

“Can we get started?” Baekhyun said and your eyes locked with his, not really understanding the hurry, “I promised to go over to Minji’s later. She really wants to see my hair.”

“Oh.”

You nodded and held in the sigh that wanted to escape. Instead, you just grabbed the barrettes you had laid out on the coffee table behind you and started to divide Baekhyun’s hair into four parts.

“Don’t forget the roots at the front,” Baekhyun reminded you and you internally cringed at the black streaks at the front between the blonde strands, “Don’t want you forgetting those again.”

“Yeah, I won’t,” you said and clipped the last barrette into Baekhyun’s hair before turning to the mirror to look. A smile spread across your lips at the sight of it because Baekhyun truly looked adorable with those barrettes in his hair.

“Stop,” Baekhyun simply said and rolled his eyes at you. You just grinned and shrugged before taking the mixing bowl out of his hand and starting to work on his hair. Soon enough Baekhyun put on music and both of you started jamming out again, time flying past in a blink.

“Front, front, front,” Baekhyun said and poked your leg after you had just said you were done. You rolled your eyes and walked around him, scraping the last bits of bleach out of the bowl to apply it to the roots at the front of Baekhyun’s hair again.

“Yeah, I get it,” you exhaled and bent over to carefully apply the bleach.

“Sorry,” Baekhyun smiled and you watched his lips split into a grin, eyes fluttering shut to not get any bleach into his eyes, “I just want it to turn out good.”

“Again, Chaeyoung is probably willing-”

“And again, I only really trust you,” Baekhyun cut in and you pressed your lips into a thin line to hide the smiling pulling on the corners of your mouth. It was stupid, considering that Baekhyun had his eyes closed.

You hummed quietly to the music, applying the leftover bleach onto Baekhyun’s hair. The thought of pressing your lips against Baekhyun’s crossed your mind and you hated yourself for it, hated that you would even go there. But you couldn’t quite help yourself.

Your face was literally centimetres away from Baekhyun’s and you could feel every single one of his breaths fan against your skin, tickle it. Your eyes travelled across Baekhyun’s face and you remembered every mole, every freckle, every scar you would see, making a note to yourself mentally. You wanted nothing more than to press your lips against them, place soft kisses on the curve of his cheek, breathe feathery kisses against each of his eyelids, trail down with your lips to his, connect them with his like you had always dreamt of doing.

But those wishes, thoughts, wants were quickly dismissed, dismissed because Baekhyun and you were just friends and that was fine, that was enough. 

And for a moment, you thought everything was peaceful.

“Do you not like Minji?”

Your hand stopped midair as your gaze travelled to Baekhyun and he peeled his eyes open. He looked into your pupils, searching in them desperately for the answer to his question, but he turned up with nothing. Instead, Baekhyun watched you slowly furrow your brows and tilt your head to the side.

A lump grew in your throat and the music faded away, silence growing between Baekhyun and you as he kept staring at you, waiting for an answer to his question. Your back started to ache and you straightened up, not wanting to be so close to Baekhyun anymore. The proximity grew dangerous again.

“Why would you ask that?”

Baekhyun sighed and almost ran his hand through his hair but you quickly stopped him, hand wrapping around his wrist to pull his hand away. He sighed again - to himself though this time - and you just kept looking at him, noting the way Baekhyun’s face etched into ambivalence as your hand slipped from his.

“I- I don’t know,” Baekhyun mused and his eyes landed on the floor, flickering back and forth as the wheels turned in his brain. There were a few seconds of silence until Baekhyun continued again and in those your heart stopped beating. 

“You didn’t ask how my date with Minji was.”

You probably would have groaned, rolled your eyes and told Baekhyun he was being incredibly dramatic and stupid right now if there wasn’t some truth to Baekhyun’s words.

“And, I don’t- You just don’t seem very thrilled?” Baekhyun continued, hands tightening into fists, “And like, you don’t have to be much because I’m just dating.”

You wanted to cut in and say that Baekhyun wasn’t ‘just dating’, that it was so much more because if he was truly ‘just dating’, it wouldn’t hurt so much. You wouldn’t be spending your nights crying, wouldn’t be spending your days thinking when Baekhyun would inevitably leave you for Minji.

“But- I just thought you were gonna be more excited and interested because, I don’t know- you usually are for like things about, well, I guess, me. I mean you text me every morning before an exam and after it to ask how it went. I don’t know- you’re just always so invested and it was kinda odd when you didn’t text me when I went on my date with Minji.”

It was sad, sad and laughable and pathetic that Baekhyun was never going to connect the dots, never going to understand why you were so invested in his exams, never going to realise why you didn’t text him on the day of his date with Minji.

“And, of course, you don’t have to do any of these things, but I just asked myself if maybe you didn’t like Minji,” Baekhyun finished and glanced up to you, his eyes big and doe like. 

“Baek,” you sighed and shook your head, unsure for a second what to say, “I like Minji.”

“You do?” Baekhyun asked and looked up to you. Your chest tightened and you swallowed the knot in your throat before putting more locks on your heart, scared that you would accidentally tell him how you truly felt about him.

“Yeah, of course,” you continued and let your gaze wander, swallowing before continuing, “How could I not? Minji is incredibly nice,” you busied yourself with the mixing bowl because while you weren’t lying, it hurt to admit all of this, “And talented and pretty and kind. She’s great.”

“Okay,” Baekhyun exhaled and in an instant a grin flashed across his lips, relief washing across his face. When you saw it, you wanted to tell him not to do that, not to grin at you like that because it did things to your heart, things you didn’t want for your heart to do.

“Because,” Baekhyun started and gnawed on his lip, rubbing his hands together as he struggled to finish the sentence. His cheeks reddened and you knew right away his words were only going to hurt more, rip you apart, tear you to shreds.

“Because I really, really like Minji. Like, genuinely. I like her in a way I’ve never liked somebody before.”

Baekhyun glanced up to you and you had to force yourself to keep the eye contact, force yourself not to tear away your gaze. You let a smile spread across your lips, but it didn’t reach your eyes, but Baekhyun didn’t notice, didn’t notice because he was too busy talking about Minji.

You felt like somebody was pushing a knife through your heart, every syllable, every word driving it deeper into it, carving a hole into Baekhyun’s name. It was stupid that it hurt so much, pained you so much because you already knew that, knew that Baekhyun had never liked somebody so much, knew that Baekhyun had never and will never like you so much.

“And I just want you to like her too, because she’s really great and amazing and so incredibly funny and smart at the same time too,” Baekhyun continued and you couldn’t help but note that it only took one date for Baekhyun to be head over heels for Minji. Baekhyun would never talk about you like that, not even after 16 years of friendship.

“Because I really think she and I could be something, you know? And I know it sounds stupid and ridiculous because we’ve only been on one real date. I mean the ones we had when we were teenagers definitely don’t count,” Baekhyun laughed and you could see the city light up in his eyes in a way you wanted them to when he talked about you, when he looked at you, but you knew that was ridiculous, everybody did.

“And I don’t know. I’ve never been interested in relationships and whatnot before, but I do kind of want one now. God, this is cheesy, but I really think that Minji could be it. I mean she’s known me ever since we were young and she has kind of seen me grow up, you know? And she was there for me during high school and I was just a dick then. And she doesn’t care about my looks either because, well, look at my hair right now. I looked fucking stupid on our first date, but she didn’t care. She’s literally the best girl- no person I’ve ever met.”

A part of you wanted to scream at Baekhyun, cry, yell because, fuck, you had done all of that. You had known Baekhyun ever since he was young, had seen him grow up, had been there for him during high school, hell, you had done so much more than Minji had ever done. You had pretended to like his cooking when he first started out, had carried him up ten flights of stairs after he had gotten a little too drunk, had given up your bed for him when he had been too drunk even though your back complained to you for the next week about it, had made him chicken soup when he was sick. And yet, Baekhyun didn’t feel the same way about you, didn’t like you nearly as much as he liked Minji.

It wasn’t fair.

You were the best person Baekhyun had ever met, but he would never realise that, would never because he was too busy calling you his friend.

And your heart felt taunted, laughed at, ridiculed, mocked. It cowered in its cage, begging for it to be let out, but not to tell Baekhyun just how you felt, but to escape the taunt, the laughter, the ridicule, the mockery. 

“I really feel like she’s all I’ve been looking and waiting for.”

You turned your back to Baekhyun, unable to blink away the tears any longer that had been threatening to spill any second. They ran down your cheeks, leaving hot scorching trails behind them, marking where they had touched, burned your skin.

Baekhyun usually would have taken notice of your silence, taken notice of body language, but this time he didn’t. A part of you was thankful because you knew you would break, knew you would spill everything that had been weighing on your chest if he asked you what was wrong, but another wanted to scream at Baekhyun. Was this how it was going to be? Was his life just going to be consumed by Minji and no one else? Were you going to be cut out of it?

You pressed your lips together and put down the mixing bowl, ripping the gloves off your hands as you wiped across your cheeks. Baekhyun continued on, continued on talking about Minji and how great she was and you continued listening, but his words stopped registering in your mind. You just needed to protect yourself like that.

You sat down on your couch, elbowls digging into your knees as you kept nodding your head to every single one of Baekhyun’s words. He had turned around, eyes focused behind you as he rambled on, kept on telling you just how fucking amazing Minji was, how she had been the one he had been looking for, that she really showed him how great relationships could be, that she was the one that had him excited for a relationship for the first time. And whilst you listened to every word, listened to Baekhyun’s rambling about Minji, you realised one very important thing.

You could never be Minji.

You could never elicit the same feelings, same thoughts, same urges in Baekhyun Minji could after just one single date. You could never and you will never. If after 16 years of friendship, close friendship, Baekhyun couldn’t see you more than as a friend, then he wasn’t going to start soon. 

[You - 01:42] :

i know we said we were gonna do your hair tomorrow, but i really just dont feel well. maybe ask chaeyoung to do it? i know your hair somehow turned out worse and youre bothered by it and i do wanna do your hair but i just dont feel fit for it. im sorry :(

You were watching ‘Community’ once again, sprawled on your couch as you looked for a specific episode. You were in need of a laugh and you knew just what episode to watch, but you were quickly interrupted by your front door unlocking.

For a second, you were just frozen, confused and a second later you sat up and turned your head around. You were about to ask who it was when they announced their entrance themselves.

“Hey, Y/N, it’s me Baek, your best friend,” Baekhyun said and you cursed yourself for giving him a key when you had first moved in. At first, it had seemed smart for him to have a spare key in case you got locked out or something, but now you wanted to turn back time and slap it out of his hands. 

“Baek?” you called out and soon enough he turned the corner and you were met with a grinning Baekhyun, baseball cap hiding his truly awful hair. He held up a plastic container and you scrunched up your face, about to ask him what he was doing here when someone else stepped into your view.

“Minij?”

She smiled at you and gave you a wave, the excitement plastered on her face. You barely matched her smile, still too confused about this whole situation. Your eyes kept wandering between Minji and Baekhyun and you wanted to say something, but you couldn’t quite.

“Hey, Y/N,” Minji said and it was odd how little she had changed over the years. 

“What’s happening right now?” you ended up just blurting out, still too confused to really wrap your mind around whatever was going on.

“We came over because you said you weren’t feeling well,” Baekhyun explained and walked over to you, placing the plastic container right in front of you on your coffee table, “I made you chicken soup. It’s still warm.”

“Oh,” you said and slowly started to understand the purpose of this visit. You looked at the chicken soup and you could see it still steam inside the plastic container. 

“I didn’t expect that,” you cleared your throat, cheeks reddening because, god, you had to look awful, but Baekhyun and Minji thankfully didn’t comment on it. Your eyes slowly travelled back to them and you rubbed your hands together, trying to find something to say. “Uh, you guys want something to drink? I’ve got tea.”

Minji looked over to Baekhyun, obviously also a little flustered about this whole situation. He locked eyes with her, giving her the kind of smile you wished you could receive before turning to you and nodding.

Your heart was literally burying itself into the ground of its cage, attempting so desperately to just escape this, to not have to see this and you wished it was this easy. You wanted for it to be this easy, for you to unsee Minji and Baekhyun together.

“Yeah, tea sounds great,” Baekhyun said, “I’ll help you with the soup.”

It was obvious to all of you that you didn’t need help with the soup, obvious to all of you that you could very much just eat it out of the plastic container, obvious to all of you that Baekhyun only said that to get a chance to talk to you in private and all of you played along.

“Okay, I’ll just be here,” Minji smiled before turning to look at you, asking you for permission and you nodded.

“Yeah, just make yourself feel at home,” you said and put the remote on the coffee table for her, grabbing the plastic container and handing it over to Baekhyun when he walked over as you straightened up, “The bathroom is just down the hall, second door on the left. In case you need it or something.”

You pointed into the hallway, incredibly glad that even if Minji was to go to the bathroom, it would be in the opposite direction of your kitchen. Minji nodded and thanked you before Baekhyun and you headed for your kitchen, acting like you were going to do something in there except talk.

“Are you mad?” Baekhyun asked when he closed the door behind him and you poured water into your water kettle. You turned it on and waited a few seconds, listening to the water start to boil before turning around to face Baekhyun, hands folding over your stomach.

“No,” you said and you honestly weren’t sure if you were lying or not. You were still too confused to figure out. “I wouldn’t say I’m mad, but- I’m definitely not thrilled.”

Baekhyun put down the plastic container on your countertop and rubbed his hands together.

“I thought you liked Minji,” Baekhyun whispered into the silence and you groaned, shaking your head at him.

“Baek, this has nothing to do with whether or not I like Minji or not. For the record, I do,” you started, growing annoyed because, fuck, how could Baekhyun be this inconsiderate at times? “This is about the fact that you just showed up with her without asking me beforehand.”

“But I do that like, all the time. Isn’t that why you gave me a key?” Baekhyun asked and recalled the many times he had paid you a surprise visit. Your arms tightened around your stomach, the water behind you starting to boil, whistle. 

“No,” you sighed and licked your lips, “I gave you a key for emergencies and just because you’ve been showing up out of nowhere doesn’t mean I’m fine with it or fine with you just bringing someone along.”

“Okay, but you never said anything before that about that,” Baekhyun argued and you threw your head back, eyes screwing shut as you felt yourself start to get too worked up about this, “And Minji isn’t just ‘someone’. You know her. Don’t act like I picked up a stranger-”

“Baek,” you cut in and turned your head to him, eyes locking with his, “how about you own up to the fact that it’s not okay to just show up at other people’s flat with other people? And, again, this isn’t about Minji. I’d be equally mad if you showed up with Sehun or Chanyeol.”

Baekhyun pressed his lips into a thin line and you could see the frustration build up in his eyes, build up inside him. A part of your heart just wanted to close the distance, pull him into your arms and tell him it was fine, but you shut off that part. This wasn’t okay and you weren’t going to act like it was.

Silence settled and you only turned around when you heard the water kettle switch off behind you. You pulled out three mugs, grabbing a bag of green tea and two bags of chamomile tea. You put both of them respectively into the mugs, pouring the hot water into them until it reached the brim of the mugs.

You could hear Baekhyun shuffle behind you and soon enough he was standing next to you, leaned against the countertop as he watched you stare at the tea bags. You knew he was waiting for you to look at him, face him, but you didn’t feel like it.

Baekhyun sighed softly next to you before reaching over to tuck a strand behind your ear, fingers lingering behind your ear and you wanted to swat away his hand. It was laughable, pathetic how that simple gesture had your heart looking up, skipping and jumping around in its cage when it should stay beaten down, on the floor, there where it belonged.

“I’m sorry,” Baekhyun started and his voice was a quiet whisper, barely loud enough to reach your ears, “You’re right, of course, you’re right.”

You just let out a small breath, letting Baekhyun continue without interruption.

“I didn’t plan this or something. I just let it slip that I was gonna drop by at yours and Minji had seemed so excited to see you again,” Baekhyun continued, fingers skimming the top of your ear, “And she also told me in secret that she always admired you, thought you were cool or something. So I suggested that she come with me.”

Your gaze travelled to him and any frustration had dissipated the second Baekhyun had apologised. You weren’t surprised, you could never be mad at him for long.

You turned to him, hand wrapping around his wrist to remove his hand from your ear, scared that your heart might just combust if you let his fingertips linger a little longer, scared that Minji might walk in and get the wrong impression.

“It’s fine, I get it,” you hummed softly, shuffling a little away from Baekhyun, needing distance to breathe, “Just don’t bring someone over like that again. Check with me first.”

Baekhyun nodded and a smile started pulling on the corners of his lips, eliciting a smile from you. Both of you just did that for a while, smiled at each other and it was all fine for a moment before you remembered something, remembered Minji sitting in your living room.

“You also shouldn’t touch me like that anymore,” you started, voice wavering a little and gestured around when Baekhyun knitted his brows together, “You know tuck my hair away or something like that. You wouldn’t want Minji to get the wrong impression, right?”

Baekhyun pressed his lips together before he nodded, seeming to understand what you were trying to say. You could see in his eyes that he wanted to protest, probably argue that you two were just friends and that Minji understood and whatnot and you were incredibly thankful he didn’t. You couldn’t stand listening to Baekhyun just call you a friend and nothing more any longer.

“So, you said you weren’t feeling well?” Baekhyun started and you just rolled your eyes, completely forgetting before that you had to act sick or something.

“Yeah,” you lied through your teeth and Baekhyun laughed at your simple answer before shaking his head at you.

“Lying is bad,” Baekhyun said and you just tsked him, turning your head away from him to stare at your wall like you had never seen it before.

“I didn’t feel great this morning,” you said and cringed a little because even you barely sounded convinced, but it wasn’t like you were trying very hard if at all.

“But now that I’m here, you’re all better, huh? I’m all the medicine you need, right?” Baekhyun grinned and stepped into your view. His hand brushed against your arm instinctively and goosebumps travelled down your skin. 

Baekhyun had this smirk on his face and you knew he wanted to tease, challenge you a little and you wanted to play along so badly, but you couldn’t. Unlike Baekhyun you were very much aware now that he was dating and that such behaviour between a girl and a guy never sat well with the other person. You weren’t going to risk Minji and Baekhyun breaking up just because he was a little too dumb to get it. 

“Anyway, I’m gonna take these with me and you can-” you stopped to grab the plastic container and shove it into Baekhyun’s hands, “do something with this.”

Baekhyun was about to get another word out, but you quickly grabbed the mug of green tea and the mug of chamomile tea. You made your way out of your kitchen and into your living room, leaving the other mug of chamomile tea for Baekhyun.

“Hey,” Minji greeted you when you turned the corner and put away her phone. For the first time, you could mirror the smile on her lips and you handed her her green tea.

“Hi, is green tea fine or do you prefer chamomile or something else?” you asked, remembering just then that you had just thrown in tea bags without asking what Minji wanted.

“Oh, green tea is just fine. Thank you,” Minji smiled and you sat down next to her, your mug landing on your coffee table. Your eyes wandered up and down her form for the first time properly.

Her hair was now cut in a stylish bob and it was insane how well it suited her. There was still something very youthful about her and you were glad to see that she didn’t lose that spark, that fire burning in her pupils. Her lips were glossy with chapstick and a perfect winged eyeliner adorned her eyes.

Minji hadn’t changed much, hadn’t changed much appearance wise, hadn’t changed much voice wise, hadn’t changed much personality wise and you were happy, happy because you had always liked her. You hadn’t been lying to Baekhyun when you had said all those nice things about her. 

Minji was truly an angel, considerate, kind, nice, perfect.

“Uh, can I hug you?” Minji asked and put down her mug of green tea, next to yours, turning fully to you. Her cheeks turned rosy and you were a little taken aback by her question. Minji and you became friends when she dated Baekhyun, but the second they broke up, you two were back to being classmates.

“It’s just been such a long time, but if you don’t want to it’s completely fine and I mean you’re also sick. Not like I mind, but if you-”

Your arms wrapped around Minji’s shoulder and she immediately reciprocated your hug, hands settling on your shoulder blades like yours had. 

“It’s so nice to see you again, Minji,” you said when you two pulled away. You were seated a lot closer to her now and both of you smiled at the other, obviously genuinely happy to see the other. “I’m sorry if I was a little cold just-”

“No, please don’t apologise,” Minji quickly cut in and shook her head at you, “If anything I should apologise. Baekhyun had just said that it would be fine and I mean I did want to see you again.”

Minji’s cheeks reddened even more at her confession and you could just chuckle, feeling this urge in your chest to wrap your arms around her and never let her go. She had always been so cute and sweet.

“Well, I’m very happy you’re here,” you said and Minji’s whole face turned red at your words, eliciting only a chuckle from you. It was now that you realised, realised why Baekhyun liked Minji so much. She was truly deserving of everything and you didn’t blame him for starting to like Minji. 

It still hurt, there was no denying in it and there was definitely still a part of you that was bitter and angry and frustrated about the fact that Baekhyun liked Minji and not you, but it had gotten a little smaller and was securely hidden away now.

“Can I just say how amazing and great I think it is that Baek and you are still friends?” Minji said and you reached for your mug, gaze turning to her before you blew over the surface of your tea. 

“I guess thanks?” you laughed, a little unsure how to respond. You had to be honest, you didn’t think it was an amazing feat, after all Baekhyun and you had been friends with each other for the past 16 years.

“No, I mean most people grow apart, but you guys have always stayed strong,” Minji explained, eyes glazing over as she started to recall high school, “I always admired you guys. I’ve always wanted such a strong bond and friendship. It was- sorry, is truly amazing.”

“I guess it’s childhood friends for a reason, right?” you mused, taking a sip from your tea. 

“Yeah, but I remember girls being so freaking jealous of you,” Minji continued and your eyes grew a little bigger at her words. That was news to you.

“Were you?” you asked carefully and raised a brow at Minji. You weren’t sure what answer you were hoping for and what you were expecting, but you were curious.

Minji’s eyes jumped to yours and she smiled at you before shaking her head and you knew she meant it.

“No, at least not in the way the others were,” Minji said and you nodded, a little sad that you couldn’t elicit the same jealousy in her like she could in you.

“I was definitely jealous of your friendship, but never the way the others were.” Minji shrugged and you took another sip from your tea and this time the liquid burned on its way down, but you didn’t flinch.

“I just hate the cliche of the girlfriend hating and being jealous of their boyfriend’s female friend. It’s just so stupid,” Minji continued and you hummed, agreeing that the cliche should die in TV and films, “Jealousy is just so spiteful.”

You thought about Minji’s words for a few seconds before letting out an unsure noise. Minji leaned forward, genuinely curious about your thoughts.

“You don’t think?”

You shook your head and put down your tea, scared you would spill some of it on you if you had it in your hand any longer.

“I don’t feel like jealousy is inherently spiteful. Sure, there is definitely this ugly kind of jealousy. You know the kind we see on TV and whatnot, but I also feel like there’s a different kind. The kind that, I don’t know, shows you care. The kind you don’t really want to feel because jealousy isn’t the nicest feeling, but you can’t help yourself but to feel just that, feel just jealous.”

You sounded unsure, uncertain, confused and you were about to dismiss all of your words, tell Minji how they didn’t make any sense whatsoever when she cut in.

“I really didn’t think about it this way,” Minji started, humming lowly as she brood over your words for another second, “But I think you’re right.”

“Wow, philosophical much?” 

You turned your head around to see Baekhyun standing in the doorway with a bowl of chicken soup in his one hand and mug in his other. He smiled at both of you before walking over to you, putting the bowl right in front of you. You looked into it and you were about to thank him when you watched Baekhyun walk around your coffee table to sit down next to Minji, but not without pressing a kiss against her temple.

You ignored your heart, refusing to acknowledge it in its cage and instead started to take a sip from the chicken soup Baekhyun had made for you.

“Thanks,” you smiled and Baekhyun nodded, grinning at Minji and you.

“We weren’t being philosophical,” Minji laughed and softly ran her fingers across Baekhyun’s jaw, “We were just talking a little bit.”

You hummed in agreement, but you had this feeling the noise got lost and didn't meet Baekhyun’s ears. He put down his mug and wrapped an arm around Minji’s waist. She leaned into him and you felt your heart tighten and ache, but you shut it up, refusing to pay it any attention.

“Sure, but like deep talking, right?” Baekhyun said and looked at you for confirmation, but his gaze didn’t linger long enough on you. Instead, it wandered to Minji and stayed there and you could feel your chest tighten painfully.

“We weren’t talking about anything major or worth nothing.”

Your hand twitched next to you and almost instinctively you wanted to do your mock salute, repeat Minji’s words after ‘major’, but you halted. Your gaze shot to Baekhyun, but it was either because he didn’t notice it or because he was staring too deeply into Minji’s eyes because he didn’t even react. His hand didn’t flinch and the words didn’t even start to slip out.

“I’m sure it was interesting,” Baekhyun hummed and pressed another kiss against Minji’s temple. Your grip around your spoon tightened and your jaw locked up at the sight of it all. You kept your head low, gaze downcasted as you swallowed the chicken soup, every sip edging you closer to throw up.

“It really wasn’t,” Minji giggled and placed her hand on Baekhyun’s knee. You wanted nothing more than to yell, jump up and lock yourself into your bathroom, but you feared neither would notice and you didn’t want to have your fear confirmed.

Baekhyun grinned at Minji, arms tightening around her waist and you just shuffled away, inching closer to the edge of your couch.

“Well, I still think it was. You are so smart you can only talk about deep stuff,” Baekhyun said and you wished you could shut off your brain, wished you couldn’t see their every movement even though your head was literally inside the bowl already. 

“You’re literally so smart, babe.”

You thought your heart was going to pierce through your chest and throw itself out of your window when you heard the pet name. Your skin started crawling and your grip around your spoon tightened so much that your knuckles turned white, turned white so much they almost teared through your skin. A lump lodged itself into your throat and you thought you were going to choke on the chicken soup.

“Oh, Baek.”

Minji giggled in a way you could never, in a way that it sounded pleasant, soothing. Her giggle was heartfluttering and you didn’t fault Baekhyun for liking her so fucking much because there was truly nothing about her that you could ever dislike, not even if you tried your hardest to find something.

And that fact made it just so much more difficult, so much more difficult for you to smile, laugh, nod, agree, talk, act fine, act fine when you were dying inside, when your heart was digging its one grave to rest, sleep in.

It was then that you realised it, realised that you needed distance, realised that you needed distance to heal, realised that you needed distance to move on, realised that you needed distance from Baekhyun.

[Baekhyun - 20:42] :

for clarification, can i still pay you surprise visits?

You didn’t respond and Baekhyun didn’t notice.

“I can’t do your hair this weekend. I’ve gotta study.”

“I’m sorry, I promised Sooyoung I’d go shopping with her.”

“Sorry, I just saw your message. Let’s take a rain check on your hair, yeah?”

“I’ve been very busy this week and I wanted to take the weekend just for myself to relax a little.”

You thought it was going to get easier, easier to type out the messages, easier to lie to Baekhyun, easier to avoid Baekhyun, but you could feel your heart die a little inside you with every message, could feel your chest tighten painfully with every lie, could feel yourself missing Baekhyun more and more with every day you spent without hanging out with him, talking, texting or simply seeing him.

Every time you saw him on campus, you made sure to run into the opposite direction and for once, you were thankful that your campus was as big as it was. Avoiding Baekhyun was also a lot easier because you knew his routine, knew his schedule, knew his way to class. 

In the 16 years of friendship he and you had never spent more than three days without contact with each other. He and you had been attached to the hip ever since you had met Baekhyun and both of you had fallen into a routine of being with each other every day ever since. He and you even talked when Baekhyun had been on the other side of the globe when his family went on holiday. The time difference didn’t stop either of you from talking, from calling the other, from texting.

So every morning you woke up wanting to grab your phone and call him up, wanting to jump out of your bed and bang on his front door, wanting to wrap your arms around him and tell him you were sorry for avoiding him, but every morning you stopped yourself, controlled yourself, but you could feel yourself slip more and more with each day without Baekhyun.

You went to sleep earlier in an attempt to forget for a little and today was no exception. Surprisingly, it was easy for you to fall asleep, easy for you to sleep through the night, but this time you couldn’t.

“What the fuck?”

You jerked up and you hit your head on the back of your bed, hands gripping around your blanket when you had felt a hand on your shoulder, ripping you out of your sleep. It took your eyes a few seconds to adjust to the darkness, to realise just who had touched you.

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” Baekhyun whispered even though you weren’t sleeping anymore. He held up his hands and had taken a step back, scared you were going to punch him or something when you had suddenly woken up.

“What the fuck, Baekhyun?” you yelled and took one of your pillows to hurl it at him. He caught it and held it in front of him, for protection.

“I’m so so sorry, Y/N-”

“What the fuck are you doing in my bedroom?” you said and turned to your clock to check the time, “It’s fucking one in the morning. What are you doing here?”

You hadn’t thought that was how your first time seeing Baekhyun in a month was going to go and for a moment, you had completely forgotten that things were awkward between him and you.

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” Baekhyun apologised for the third time now and slowly inched forward. You let out long breaths, your heart still pounding in your chest and for the first time, it wasn’t because Baekhyun had smiled at you.

“What are you doing here?” you hissed, but nevertheless moved away to give Baekhyun some space to sit down, “I thought I told you it wasn’t cool to just show up unannounced.”

“No, yeah, I know,” Baekhyun started and sat down on the edge of your bed, your mattress dipping underneath his weight, your pillow landing in Baekhyun’s lap, “And I’ve been trying not to come, but-”

Baekhyun stopped and you could hear the quiver in his voice. He let his head drop and it clicked in your mind that something was wrong, clicked in your mind that something had happened. And you softened, softened immediately.

You could see Baekhyun swallow heavily in the darkness and you placed your hand on his, scowl melting away to allow for worry to etch into your features.

“What happened?” you asked softly and it was like your question had turned a switch in Baekhyun’s head because the tears spilled, the sobs teared through his throat. Baekhyun broke down in front of you and you were quick to wrap your arms around him, pull him close to you.

“It’s fine,” you whispered into Baekhyun’s ear as the tears continued to spill from his eyes, as the sobs continued to rip through his chest, leaving him empty and heaving for air, “I’m here. It’s fine. Just let it out, it’s okay.”

Baekhyun’s hands grabbed your T-shirt, gripping it so tightly that you knew the knit was never going to straighten out of it, but you let him, let him hold onto you like his life depended on it. You didn’t care that his tears stained your shirt, didn’t care that you spent the hour just holding Baekhyun close to you. 

Baekhyun and you had moved further into your bed at one point and he was now laying in your lap, arms wrapped around your pillow, knees drawn to his chest as you continued to whisper assuring words into his ear, continued to wipe away the tears whenever they dared to spill from his eyes, continued to comb your fingers through his hair.

The silence between you two was never interrupted during the hour safe for your words and Baekhyun’s sobs and hiccups, but he never spoke a single word. You wanted to know what had happened and you knew it was Minji, but you didn’t ask, didn’t push Baekhyun to speak and tell you because you knew he wasn’t ready. And if he never was going to be, you were fine with that too.

So you were surprised when Baekhyun decided to speak up after an hour of crying.

“It’s not easy.”

The words came out broken through Baekhyun’s lips and you stopped for just a moment to comb through his hair before continuing again. You watched Baekhyun swallow heavily, struggling to find the words to capture the emotions and sadness ripping through his entire body.

“It’s not easy with Minji,” Baekhyun said and you wiped away the tears, “I talk to her and we can talk, but we don’t- we don’t really talk. We just say stuff to each other, but it never- It just doesn’t feel quite-”

Baekhyun shook his head and you just let out a low hum, wanting to show him you were listening, but not wanting to interrupt him in any way. It took Baekhyun minutes to speak up again and you didn’t mind.

“It just doesn’t feel quite right, natural,” Baekhyun sobbed and you knew these thoughts had been on his mind for a long time now, laying and weighing down on his chest, “easy.”

“You talked to her about it?”

When Baekhyun peered at you, strands sticking to his forehead and eyes red from all of the crying, you knew the answer, knew he hadn’t. It was Baekhyun after all.

“You should,” you whispered, heart breaking to see Baekhyun like that. You wanted to give him everything, wanted to fix it for him, wanted to heal him, but you knew there was nothing you could do. Baekhyun had to do it himself and he knew that.

A part of you blamed yourself for all of this, blamed yourself for Baekhyun’s state right now. You cursed yourself for not being there for him during this month, cursed yourself for not being there when things started to crumble, cursed yourself for not being there to pick up the pieces and you would turn back time if you could. You would stay by Baekhyun’s side even if that meant listening to him gush about Minji on and on, even if that meant seeing him press kisses against her lips, her temple, her nose, her forehead, even if that meant hearing him call her ‘babe’ as long as it meant that you would catch Baekhyun before the fall.

“I don’t know how,” Baekhyun cried and his face contorted into pain and sadness. You could feel your own tears brim your eyes and you squeezed your lips shut, head turning away to silently drag your hand underneath your eyes.

“Why isn’t it easy, Y/N?” Baekhyun asked you and you wanted to have the answer, but you didn’t know.

“I thought Minji was it, thought Minji and I could be something,” Baekhyun continued and you could feel new tears forming again. You could barely swipe away Baekhyun’s before new ones spilled, not to mention wipe away your own. So you let yours spill, let yours tears just fall, run down your cheek, burn your skin.

“I just want to love someone, Y/N.”

Your teeth sank into your bottom lip and you wanted to tell Baekhyun to love you, to choose you, but you swallowed the words and locked them away like you had done with your own feelings, your own heart.

“Why can’t I find someone to love, Y/N?”

Your vision continued to blur and you hugged Baekhyun tighter to you, wanting so desperately for him to feel all the love you were giving him.

“Why can’t I find someone to love me, Y/N?”

You shook your head, begging silently for Baekhyun to stop asking you because you did, you fucking did. You loved Baekhyun as much as the stars loved the moon, as much as Romeo loved Julia, as much as the Earth loved the Sun.

But it wasn’t enough.

It wasn’t enough for Baekhyun to notice and you wanted to give him more, bleed him more, but you were at your wits’ end. You didn’t have anything more inside you, anything more to offer and you wished you did.

“I’m sorry, Baek.”

“Thank you.”

Your eyes travelled to the mirror and locked with Baekhyun’s in it. You stopped applying the bleach and tilted your head to the side.

“For what?”

You stopped avoiding Baekhyun after that night and just two days later he and you were sitting in your flat again. You were bleaching his hair for a third time because the second time had somehow turned out more patchy and since it would only translate patchy if you slapped the red on, Baekhyun and you decided to bleach his hair for a third time. Hopefully the last time.

Baekhyun smiled at you and you started brushing the bleach alongside the back of Baekhyun’s head again.

“For everything.”

You just looked at Baekhyun and gave him a simple nod, both of you communicating by just looking at each other. It was enough for you both, all you needed.

Baekhyun had ended up staying the night the other day and you hadn’t minded at all. In the morning, it had been admittedly awkward and weird, but luckily both of you had classes to attend. During the day you had arranged lunch with him and it had been quietly established during it that you two would just ignore and not talk about what had happened. 

“Anyway, Sooyoung just noped out of there and went home,” you finished telling your story and Baekhyun laughed along, grins adorning your lips, “But, again, don’t ask her about it. She’s gonna fucking kill me.”

“Yeah, I got it.” Baekhyun rolled his eyes at your hundredth reminder not to talk to Sooyoung about her recent date and you just shrugged. Baekhyun folded his ear over when you got to it and you carefully applied the bleach around it.

You were so busy focusing on applying the bleach that you couldn’t bring yourself to tell another story. And for the first minute, you didn’t even notice the silence lingering between you two, the music playing quietly serving as enough background noise for you.

You moved to Baekhyun’s front, leaning down to make sure you had evenly applied the bleach to his root. And it was then that he decided to speak up, when there was no escaping him because he was directly staring into your eyes and you were directly staring into his eyes.

“Why did you avoid me?”

You froze and your eyes travelled to Baekhyun’s, locking with them in an instant. Your heart started hiding in its cage and you wished you could too.

Baekhyun’s gaze was unwavering and you swallowed, not sure what to say. Your throat felt dry, scratchy and the lump lodged inside of it certainly didn’t make it easier for you.

“And please don’t say you weren’t because we both know it’s a lie,” Baekhyun said quietly and you wanted to give in, let out the truth, but you knew you couldn’t, “Please, don’t lie to me.”

You really wanted not to lie to him because it hurt you just as much as it hurt him when you lied to him. No, in fact, it hurt you even more than it hurt him when you lied to him. Every time you had to, had to think of some bullshit excuse and present it to him, you felt like dying, felt like your heart was withering, rotting away in its cage.

“It was just,” you started, shrugging and right away Baekhyun and you knew you were lying, “It was just not a good month.”

You thought Baekhyun was going to call you out on it, demand for the truth because he had just asked for it, but instead he looked at you and nodded. His lips were pressed into a thin line like he was holding back so many words and you hoped, prayed they would stay sealed shut.

“Okay.”

And that was it. You finished applying the rest of the bleach and Baekhyun thanked you with a smile, a smile that almost reached his eyes and you assured him there was no need to thank you with a smile too, a smile that also almost reached your eyes.

“Tea?” you turned to Baekhyun after he had just finished setting the timer for his hair to process. He looked up from his phone and nodded.

You moved into your kitchen, pouring the water into your water kettle and turning it on before opening the cabinet to your mugs. You almost missed Baekhyun’s steps, the water starting to boil and whistle so loud that the noise was almost drowned out.

I think you're gonna change my plans With those emerald eyes But you don't even understand How much they're on my mind

‘Claudia’ by Finneas started playing throughout your flat and you turned around. Baekhyun approached you with a smile on his lips and this time it was genuine. His hands reached for yours and before you knew it, he was twirling you in your own kitchen.

Baekhyun started singing almost in an instant and you could only smile, could only enjoy his singing. He and you started dancing, but he led, holding your hands and encouraging you to do various spins.

You spun into Baekhyun’s chest and almost lost your balance, but Baekhyun was there to hold you, steady you at your waist, fingers digging into your skin as he sung the chorus.

Oh, I'm in trouble now Come kiss me black and blue Might last another round But I'm bound to fall for you

Your eyes locked with Baekhyun’s and your lungs were left aching for air, oxygen because staring into Baekhyun’s eyes stole your breath away. The words slipped off Baekhyun’s lips with such ease and grace that your heart almost believed them, that your heart started rattling its cage, but you quickly realised it was a song and this meant nothing to Baekhyun.

You turned on your heel, spinning out of Baekhyun’s arms. For a moment, you thought Baekhyun looked sad, but then he continued singing and you joined him. Your heart, however, wasn’t in it as much as it was before, the possibility that Baekhyun maybe meant his words haunting you and taking up too much space in your mind.

We're undercover now I don't know what you do Just know I love it now I'm bound to fall for you

You were making yourself dinner when you heard your front door unlock, but unlike before you didn’t whip your head around and ask who it was. You knew who it was because it could only be him.

Baekhyun had started to come over to your place more often than not, started to abuse the power of the key you had given to him and you stopped minding, stopped minding after he had come to you that night and cried into your chest.

“What’s up?” you asked and turned around when Baekhyun entered your kitchen, turning off your stove because you had just finished your chicken. Baekhyun raised a take out plastic bag into your view and you let out a sigh.

“You already made dinner, huh?” Baekhyun hummed and you could only nod, “Fuck, I wanted to surprise you with Chinese.”

“But you know I always make dinner at 7,” you said and Baekhyun placed the bag on your counter, unpacking all of the food he had bought. You helped him.

“Yeah, I know,” Baekhyun sighed and ran a hand through his beautiful blond hair. It had reached a point where it was truly beautiful, the brassy tone was now completely gone and every strand matched with each other. You had to say, you were proud of what you had done.

 “I just thought that maybe today was gonna be different,” Baekhyun sighed, shrugging before bunching up the plastic bag and throwing it to the side, “What now?”

You hummed and looked at your dinner before turning back to the take out food. “I guess I’ve already made my dinner for tomorrow.”

Baekhyun grinned at you and you just mirrored it, heart fluttering in your chest because of how happy he looked. Your chicken and rice and broccoli was quickly wrapped up in tupperware and soon enough Baekhyun and you were sitting in front of your TV, enjoying Chinese together as you watched ‘Community’.

Both of you were just eating and focusing on the TV when Baekhyun turned his head to you, similarly how he had when he told you that he wanted to dye his hair.

“I’m going to Minji’s later.”

Your eyes travelled to Baekhyun and your spring roll landed back on your plate. You stared at Baekhyun, trying to see how he was feeling, but you couldn’t quite read him. His eyes were almost void of emotion and you really didn’t know what he wanted you to say.

Baekhyun and you continued to date and if you weren’t completely wrong, they had been for a little over two months now. Two weeks had passed since Baekhyun had come over to you, crying his eyes out because things weren’t working the way he wanted them to between Minji and him. 

And you knew for a fact that he hadn’t talked to her about his worries, knew for a fact that he hadn’t because Baekhyun could never. Baekhyun also stopped mentioning her in front of you, probably in fear that you would urge him to talk to her. You wouldn’t, but you were fine with him not talking to you about her.

“Okay,” you said and waited a moment, still unsure what to say, “You can do it.”

“Yeah, no, I know I can,” Baekhyun said and put down his plate, hands rubbing over the top of his legs. You paused the TV and waited quietly for Baekhyun to continue.

“I mean I’ve still been seeing her,” Baekhyun said and his gaze landed on his hands. His voice was shaky, breathy and it was like he just didn’t know what to say, like he just didn’t know what he wanted to say.

“But?” you quickly asked when Baekhyun stayed silent a little too long.

Baekhyun shuffled and folded his hands together. For a moment, it looked like he was going to say something, but then he shook his head and closed his mouth again.

“No, nothing,” Baekhyun breathed out, picking up his chopsticks again, “Just eat. It’s fine.”

You knew for a fact it wasn’t, wasn’t just fine, but you didn’t push it, knowing all too well that if Baekhyun didn’t want to talk about it ,he wasn’t going to.

You shrugged and turned on the TV again, picking up your plate like Baekhyun had.

“Okay.”

You were, once again, sleeping when you felt a hand on your shoulder.

“What?”

You jerked up again and it took your eyes to get used to the darkness. Everything felt very similar and you knew it was because Baekhyun had done this just two weeks ago, woken you up in the middle of the night.

Your heart was beating out of your chest and you ran a hand through your hair, still too sleepy to properly process what was happening.

“I’m sorry, Y/N,” Baekhyun said and you looked at him, blinking a few times.

“Are you okay, Baek? Is everything fine?” you asked and were up on your knees in an instant. Your hands landed on Baekhyun’s shoulders, ready to pull him close to your chest if he broke down again, but this time there was a small smile spread across his lips.

“Yeah, everything’s fine,” Baekhyun assured you and slowly your hands slipped down his arms. You sat down again and your fingers lightly laced with Baekhyun’s.

“What’s up then?” you asked and the sleep was evident in your voice. Baekhyun’s smile grew into a grin, a grin you didn’t quite like because it was different. You squinted your eyes and Baekhyun settled on the edge of your bed, hands intertwining with yours as he squeezed your hands lightly.

“Will you dye my hair black?”

There was a beat of silence, a beat of silence because it took you that long to realise what Baekhyun had just asked you to do. 

“What?” you spat out, annoyance and frustration growing in your voice. Baekhyun held onto you a little tighter like he was scared you would push him out of your bed and tell him to fuck off. His grin grew bigger and you hated it.

“I’m sorry, but can you please?” Baekhyun pleaded and you wanted to shove him out of your bed, but he held onto your hands a little too tight.

“Now?” you asked, turning to look at your clock, “It’s fucking two in the morning, Baek. You are kidding me, aren’t you?”

Baekhyun continued grinning at you and you groaned, throwing your head in your neck.

“I thought you were trying to not come to my flat unannounced,” you said, recalling how the last time Baekhyun had said he had been trying to not pay you surprise visits anymore.

“Oh, please, you love it when I come over,” Baekhyun laughed quietly, “If I don’t, you’d miss me too much.”

Baekhyun was right. You did kind of start to love it whenever he would come around and you would definitely miss him a little too much if he didn’t come over, but you wouldn’t admit that.

“I thought you were going to Minji’s or something. What’re you doing here?” you whined, craving the sweet sleep you had just been in.

Baekhyun let go off your hand and tipped your head back, fingers brushing a strand behind your ear and lingering on your ear again.

“I was at Minji’s.”

You furrowed your brows and rubbed your eyes, not quite understanding what ghost had possessed Baekhyun and prompted him to come over and ask you to dye his hair fucking black. Your brain was still half asleep and you were definitely not ready to have this conversation.

“We broke up.”

Now, you were wide awake. Your gaze shot to Baekhyun’s and you stared at him in the darkness, waiting for him to break out in tears or tell you he was joking or something, but he just continued to look at you with this smile on your face, this peaceful smile.

“Before you ask, I’m fine,” Baekhyun whispered quietly and his fingers wandered down the length of your hair, wrapping said strand around his finger as he continued to speak, “I broke it off and Minji was really understanding.”

You just stared at him, still too shocked to say something.

“And now, I really want black hair.”

You pressed your lips together and you weren’t sure if you believed him, believed Baekhyun that he was fine. It was then that it clicked in your mind that this was what Baekhyun had wanted to talk to you about when you were eating, that he had been trying to tell you he was going to break up with Minji.

“You’ve got dye?”

Baekhyun grinned at you and, of course, he nodded at you. He pulled you out of bed and when you walked into your living room, you were surprised to see that he had already set everything up. Baekhyun had somehow managed to lay out the papers, open all of the windows and prepare the dye in the mixing bowl without you hearing a single sound.

“What would you have done if I had said no?” you asked, putting on the gloves that were next to the mixing bowl. Baekhyun wrapped the towel around his shoulder and smirked at you.

“You wouldn’t have.”

And you really wouldn't have.

“How could you be so sure?” you laughed and Baekhyun’s smirk grew a little bigger when you handed him the mixing bowl to divide his hair.

“Because you love me.”

Your heart froze in its cage and panic almost flushed through your whole system, but you were quick to get it together. Your eyes wandered to Baekhyun and you knew right away that he didn’t mean it the way you first thought he did.

“Whatever,” you exhaled, voice slightly pitchy as you clipped in the barrettes. Baekhyun just chuckled, shrugging to himself before putting on music.

And both of you did that for a while. You dyed Baekhyun’s hair at two in the morning and Baekhyun just sang along to the music every now and then.

“Why black so suddenly?” you said and took up some of the black dye on your brush. Baekhyun hummed and scratched his arm. “I thought you really wanted red.”

“Yeah, I thought so too,” Baekhyun hummed, “But I just realised that sometimes that you truly don’t want something, you just think you do.”

You paused for just a second before you just ignored Baekhyun’s words and continued. But this time, Baekhyun didn’t feel like ignoring things, he felt like talking, opening up, being brave.

“She was really understanding, Y/N,” Baekhyun said and you knew who he was talking about. You moved in front of Baekhyun and just let him continue as you dyed his roots at the front. “I told her how I’ve been feeling and she understood, said she could feel that something wasn’t quite right.” 

“Well, I’m happy that it wasn’t another ‘Minji Baekhyun Gate’ this time,” you grinned, recalling the memory of their breakup in high school. Baekhyun, however, didn’t laugh at your words and just fixed you with a stare, a very intense gaze.

You could feel the tension thicken between you two and you stopped applying the dye, brush landing in your mixing bowl.

“You know I thought about Minji and me a lot the past weeks and I asked myself over and over again what was wrong, why we just didn’t feel quite right,” Baekhyun said and you held in your breath, eyes glued to Baekhyun’s.

“I really wanted for Minji and me to work, but it didn’t and I was really upset and sad about it,” Baehyun continued and you didn’t know what he was trying to tell you, “But then I realised that there was no reason to. Sometimes things just don’t work out.”

“And Minji agreed with me, told me that she had learned after our first breakup that it’s stupid and useless to force a connection, a bond when there wasn’t one. In fact, she joked that maybe that was why she and I got together again. So, I could learn what she had learned after our initial breakup.”

Baekhyun stopped for a few seconds like he was thinking about how to word the next things and you could only continue to stare at him and let him talk

“And, you know what? Minji is right. I’ve been looking for someone to love and when I stumbled across her again, I just thought that was the universe’s way of telling me that Minji is the one I’ve been looking for, but, well, she isn’t.”

Baekhyun stopped again, taking a longer pause this time. He drew in a very long breath, eyes glancing up into yours and you could feel your heart stop when he did.

“You are, Y/N.”

You thought your brain was playing tricks on you, that you had misheard, but Baekhyun continued and quenched all of your doubts.

“I’ve been blind this whole time, Y/N, and I’m sorry that I’ve been,” Baekhyun whispered and his hand laced with yours, “I wanted to find someone to love and someone to love me and I feel so stupid because you’ve been there all this time. You’ve been by my side, seen my worst and you are still with me, tolerate me even though-”

You pressed your lips against Baekhyun’s and it took Baekhyun a second to realise what had happened, but quickly his hands found your waist and he pressed you flush against his chest. Baekhyun straightened up, pulling you closer to him as he continued moving his lips against yours.

The mixing bowl fell out of your hand without you thinking about it as you cupped Baekhyun’s face, but when it landed at your feet and the dye splashed up your legs, you had to pull away.

“Fuck,” you laughed, bliss still filling up your chest as you looked down. The dye had landed all over your floor, but luckily it wasn’t much. However, you were still scared that the black was going to stick.

“Yeah, fuck, big time,” Baekhyun said and you looked at him. You almost bursted out into laughter again when you saw him. Black dye stained his cheeks and it was then that you remembered that you had cupped Baekhyun’s face with your gloves on.

“I’m so sorry, Baek,” you said and quickly took off your gloves, letting them fall to the floor as you started to attempt to rub away the dye. Baekhyun just laughed and took a hold of your hands, shaking his head.

“It’s fine,” Baekhyun said and you shook your head at him this time.

“No, we gotta wash it out,” you said and Baekhyun just grinned at you. You turned on your heel, wanting to lead Baekhyun into your bathroom, but he stopped you. He turned you around to him again and you stared at him, cheeks flushing red the longer the silence lingered on.

“I’m major in love with you.”

All of the locks on your heart broke away and your heart pushed the door to its cage open, spilling out of it to reveal itself. 

“Major in love with you.”

“Major in love with you.”

Baekhyun and you both saluted and spoke at the same time, eyes wrinkling when you bursted out into laughter. You cut the laughter short though when you pressed another kiss against Baekhyun’s lips.

“But I am, Baek,” you breathed against his lips and he grinned at you, “I’m major in love with you.”

���I’m major in love with you, too, Y/N.”

Baekhyun and you saluted again.

masterlist

#baekhyun #exo #baekhyun angst #baehyun fluff #exo angst #exo fluff #baekhyun x reader #exo x reader #baekhyun au #exo au #best friends to lovers #bff2l #baekhyun fanfiction #baekhyun fanfic #exo fanfiction #exo fanfic #baekhyun scenario #baekhyun imagine #exo imagine #exo scenario #baekhyun one shot #exo one shot #in love with you #linh.fic

[ellovett]

list of people that made this year pretty neat :)

Hi all

Ok so 2020's almost ending (it just ended i started writing this post like....5 days ago??) and i just wanted to do this thing where i have a message towards everyone who supported me/who i think are just very cool and very epic, i only really got into the twst fandom just at the beginning of the year and im just gonna get straight to the point now messages are under the cut :)

@permanentlyexhaustedowl - AYAAAA ;;;;; bro you're literally one of my first long time friends here in the twst community and i just want to thank you for everything, our convos in either public servers or in pms, your love and support for my content,,or whenever i vent to you,,,,,just- your love and support man i appreciate it so much and i cannot thank you enough, you're just so sweet and caring and supportive and friendly just aghhhhhh ;;;;; even your reblogs make me smile uncontrollably and i explode, also all the brainrots i have about my interests ;;; thanks for listening to all of them,,even tho you really didnt have to ;;;;;; I love how we make our twst ocs interact and the little brainrots we have with them ;;; You've helped me so so so much and in so many ways, I am beyond glad that we're bestfriends, you're one of the nicest most caring people ive ever met and i love you so so so much, beyond belief ;; 💕 pls never stop being you?????? You quacking amazing person??????? 😎🤙💖💕💖💕💖💕💖💕💖💕💖💕💖💕💖💕

@shoujoqueensstuff - AYYYY SHOUJOOOO!!! 😎🤙🤙 hhhh you're also one of the first people ive ever had a long time friendship with here in the twst community, and seriously bitch i love you so much ;;; so so much..i cant go a day without talking to you about literally anything and just vibing, the support and love you've given me over these months is insane i cannot thank you enough for that, all of our rps, convos or just pure brainrot have been so much fun, and i fucking love it that we built our own little world outside of canon,,all the aus we built with our ocs???? I love them. I love them all to death, including your amazing ocs, and even tho we live on literally opposite sides of the world you're always there for me whenever i vent or when im feeling extremely down or insecure ;; ,,im just so so so happy and glad that i met you and that we're bestfriends, i care about you so so so so so much- hhhh i cant put it into words my brain is dying i just- i LOVE YOU BIITCH, I AINT NEVER GONNA STOP LOVING YOU, BITCH.😎💖💕💖🤙🤙💕💕💖💕 TAKE MY LOVE BITCH 💕💕💕💕💕 thank you so much for sticking around ;; i love you and support you in everything you do so much I could never ever thank you enough for the friendship you've given me..

I can literally go forever on how much i love and appreciate the both of you, i can just scream into the void for all eternity,,but i cant put it into words anymore. You both made my year so great and so epic ;;; i love you guys so much

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Now the chaddams 😌

@thetwstwildcard - hi ma :D you're just so cool and so epic lizz ;;; i cant- all of our conversations and brainrots have been super fun and i enjoy your company very much;;; you are just so nice and friendly,, and your ocs (especially staff ocs) are god tier amazing, i will love the nrc mom squad to death. I am honored to be ur child and i love you and father claude (and my four (?) other dads you married) very much 💕💕💕

@alpyssketch - bringer of father claude,,,,i owe you my life alpy,,,,,,but no seriously you're also a very epic person and you're honestly so nice and sweet!!! You never fail to make me feel welcome in any conversation and you're just so damn friendly!!! We may not talk that often but I very much enjoy your company ;;; ily!!! 💖💖💖

@multi-ankin - another very cool and epic person!!!! you're very fun to talk to and you're also pretty funny in the vc fjfjfj, your ocs are all so amazing too! (djdjjd although my staff oc bias makes me go for kas) we should totally talk and make our ocs interact more in the future tho!!!!!! 💖💖

@just-patchy - pATCHYYY!!!! :D hi!!!! you're also a very cool person!! our interactions have been so much fun and i hope we can have more in the future ;;; the ideas you have for your ocs and how you put them into writing is so good!!! like really good!!! And your art has been greatly improving too!!! Never ever think that i dont see you as a friend because i do!! 😤😤💖💖 i care about you bro!! Never forget that!!

@bakujho - :D hi jho!! you're a lot of fun! And I THINK YOU ARE SO DAMN COOL AND BADASS it's unbelievable,,i look up to you jho i wish i could be almost as cool as you when i grow up ;;; the things you've done for this fandom are also very admirable! like the whole gravedigging (jellyfish) situation! But we're not gonna talk about it now- hhhhh you're just so epic jho ;;; seriously 💗💗

@Kurui - hhhhh you're probably not gonna see this ;;; and i cant find your tumblr (if any of the other chaddams could possibly show this to her thatd be so great ;;;) but nonetheless i still think you're just so fun and cursed ;;; and you give so many amazing ideas!!! Your ocs are all also so cool too! Your art is just so detailed you clearly put a lot of thought into them i just admire that sm ;; (also your edits are extremely cursed and epic i love them dearly-)

@twst-the-royals - JULIE :))) HELLO,,,you were actually the first ever person i spoke/interacted with in the fandom! And you were just so nice and friendly and patient with me ;;; im glad that i got to talk to you,,and we dont really talk that much now but pls pls PLEASE know that i care about you so much and that i support you in everything you do ;;; 💖💖💗💖 ill do my best to make you proud!!

@girl-in-the-tower - hey Az!!! ;;;; you're so epic and cool,,honestly i admire you so much, the lore/writing you have for your ocs/fanschools are just so well thought out and so well written ;;; i hope to become a better writer like you in the future, but for now ill just take notes and learn from you ;; you're super encouraging and supportive too!!! I know we dont talk much but i could never thank you enough for all those little yet meaningful moments ;;; 💖💖

@rikanoctrix and @mirrored-pomefiore - hi!!! i know we arent that close but just know that you two are huge inspirations for me when it comes to art, the both of you draw your styles so incredibly well and i admire that so so so much ;;; 💖

@ocean-water-tea - FATHER TEAAAAA QAQ okay so first of all,,,,how can you draw so well using ibispaint, i ask for tips, specifically on how to draw hair and tits 🤲 but seriously though you are so fun to talk to!!! So cursed!!! So ☊⊑⏃⍜⏁⟟☊!!! You encourage me to my true cryptid self (despite aya's protests 👀) and i thank you kindly,,,you are also very funny 😌 a funny little clown simp, and you're super friendly and cheerful too! I almost never feel nervous when reaching out to you ;;; I hope we can have more wacky adventures in the future 💖💖

@zonamemoryverse - HEYYY ZONAAA!!! you're a fairly new person and you've already come so far ;;; you're a very chaotic person to talk to and i enjoy all of our conversations!!! Also our interactions with our ocs were super fun too, and i love hearing any shred of content i can get from ur epic ocs,,,dont stop being epic!!! 💖💖

@namelessfish - Hi fish!!! :DD you've been a very supportive friend to me over these past few months,,and im happy i have someone i can relate my not-so-great experiences with ;;; please know that i care about you dearly and that ily ;; 💖💖💖💖

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@wondersbeyondcompare - JFFJJF BRO DONT THINK I DONT SEE YOU WHENEVER YOU REBLOG MY CRINGY ASS POSTS 👁👁 I SEE THEM AND I CHERISH THEM ALL I REREAD THEM ON SAD DAYS. All the little tags and comments you put on them always make me smile so hard ;;; im just very happy to know that you like whatever the hell im doing and it pushes me to do more!! You're incredibly sweet, dont worry!!! Ill be sure to make you proud!!!! 😭💖💖💖

@circuscarnage - Anna!!!! We dont talk that often but whenever we do it's always so much fun ;;; you're so sweet and i appreciate you so much ;; all the stuff you drew for my ocs are all so incredibly cute and i really have to give back- jUST YOU WAIT ANNA. IM GONNA MAKE FANART OF YOUR LOVELY OCS AND YOU CANT STOP ME- 💖💖💖💖

@twistedapple - hi crow!! :DD again we dont really talk that much but i support you greatly in everything you do!!! You're another epic and cool writer ;;; your writings for your ocs are just sooooo well written and are just so good!! You're also super good at art too!! And i hope to see more from you in the future!!! ;;; 💖💖💖💖

@not-twst-enough - Ellie!!!! ;;; bro you've been supporting me from the very start, from lillet's old ass bio to now, and i very much appreciate it!!!! You're also super friendly in the twst server too ;;; and all the content you have for your ocs is just so exciting! Good luck with the fandorm and all future stuff ;;; ily!!!! 💖💖💖

@fumikomiyasaki - FUMI. DONT THINK I DIDNT FORGET YOU DKDKDK,,,Another cool and amazing person!!! All our brainrots and conversations have been really fun ;;;; thank u for that,, You are very fun person to interact ocs with tho!!! Especially with ships!! MadScientist² will forever hold a place in my heart.,,,💖💖💖

@oiseaunoir11 - hey Al!! :) you were one of the many people i admired and looked up to when i first joined the fandom, your art is something im deeply inspired by and your shitposts at like...4 am in the morning always give me the big funny,,one thing i really admire about ur art tho is how you'd draw backgrounds :0 you've gotten so good at them!! And your poses look super natural and effortless, i hope to be almost of a better artist like you 🙇‍♀️🙇‍♂️ also i cant wait to see ur animatics 👀 they look dope- hope we can talk or maybe even interact ocs more! 💖💖

@leonasbitties - luuuu :))) hiiii,,,we dont usually talk on servers that often but that doesnt mean that i dont consider you as a friend! You have a lot of super cool ideas for ocs and your art is just getting better and better and better with each piece!!!! i look forward to seeing more from you ;;; 💖💖💖

@peteza-mozzarella - PETEEE :DDD another very cool and friendly person, you're literally the sweetest person ive ever talked to and i love our little chats!!! Hhhh you're just super nice and your ocs are super cute,,please never stop being you you epic bean ;;;; 💖💖💖💖

@the27th - Hi Andhra!!!!! You've been quite the long time mutual,,and your reblogs always make my day ;;; you're just so sweet and kind and i always feel at ease when talking to you, the hunger games sessions you host are always super fun even though im often asleep to even participate 😂 thank you sm for the love and support ;;; ill be sure to give them all back to you 💖💖 starting now 💗💗💗💗💗

@mamushroomoracorn - MAMUSH :DD we've only really started talking recently but you're just so nice and friendly ;;;; all of our talks have been so wholesome and great and im so happy about that, and your art is really really really good!! Ur art style is just so unique and so cool!!! ;;;; and dw mamush,, ill show the froggies like i promised soon 😔💖💖💖

@rookvonhunt - HEYYYY 👉😎👉 hi hello i would die for your ocs. If theyd ask me to perish then i will 200%,,ur so epic and cool and all of your ocs are just god-tier, i cant wait for what else you have to offer!!!! 💖💖

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@lawlessofdusk - lawless ;;;; aaaaa honestly you're just so kind and sweet, i couldnt thank you enough for all the love and support you've given me!!! And i desperately need more content of ur ocs bc they're all so cool and interesting 😤😤😤💖💖💖 i hope to talk to you more soon!!!!

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Fkfjfjfj i think that's all!! Id like to thank you all for sticking around with me with my first year in the fandom ;;; you guys make all the bullshit and drama here worth it 💖💖💖

If i forgot to include you in here then PLEASE DM ME I AM SO SORRY-!!!! I dont want to leave anyone behind!!! So please feel free to confront me about it ;;; happy new year everyone!!!!

#admin post #oooo also feel free to tag any of ur mutuals in ur reblog too!!! make them feel loved yeah?