#every time i get brought back to last year i have a panic attack | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

foundheavenly · 3 days

Note

Hello I wanted to ask about a fic with a dying SO in the arms of Geto,Gojo and Nanami?

If that's too much characters then I choose Gojo.

Thank you in advance

Slipping through my fingers

Disclaimer: English is not my mother tongue so please be nice

Words:

Pairing: gojo x reader, geto x reader, nanami x reader

Theme: heavy angst

Masterlist

Thank you for this requet but who hurt you??? I guessed I'm relieved that I like writing angst because I would have been a complete mess right now. <3

Nanami -

You were weak and battered, every breath feeling like a struggle against an invisible force. Kento held you in his arms, his eyes glistening with unshed tears.

"You can't leave me" Kento pleaded, his voice breaking. "I can't do this without you."

His heart was heavy with fear.

Right at that moment, his mind brought him back years ago. He saw himself back when he lost his only friend, the only person who had ever been his solace. He saw himself back when he lost Haibara. And right after this tragedy, he promised himself to protect those around him. He promised himself to protect you, to prevent anything from happening to you.

Yet here he was. His hands shaking and covered in fresh blood.

Your blood.

You reached up, cupping his cheek with a trembling hand. "You're strong, Kento. Stronger than you know. You'll carry on, and you'll make the world a safer place, just like we always dreamed."

Tears welled in Kento's eyes as he pressed his forehead against yours, your breaths mingling in the cold air of the room. "I can't imagine a world without you in it" he admitted, his voice barely audible over the sound of his own heart breaking.

"Remember when we first met?" you whispered, a faint smile tugging at your quiver and cold lips. "You were so determined to save the world from curses, and I was just a stubborn girl with too much curiosity for her own good."

Kento chuckled softly, the memory of your first meeting flooding back to him. "You were always getting yourself into trouble" he recalled fondly. "But you had a heart of gold, and I knew from that moment that I couldn't let you face the dangers of this world alone."

Your tired and dull eyes met his and you took a sharp breath. "Kento.." you whispered, your voice barely a whisper. "I'm sorry."

"Don't talk." He said firmly and choked back tears, his hands trembling a bit as they pressed against the wounds, trying to staunch the flow of blood.

You managed a weak smile, feeling a surge of warmth from his voice.

His thick fingers gently moved to your face and brushed against your cheek, his touch tender yet laden with sorrow. "You're going to be okay. You have to be."

You shook your head faintly and a faint chuckle escaped your lips, knowing the truth even as you clung to the last vestiges of hope. You weren't ready yet. You didn't want to leave him, not right now. Not when you were close to get married.

"You always were the optimist." You said, your voice barely a whisper. "But even you can't deny the truth forever, my love."

Your words got him.

Simply.

Quickly.

Terribly.

Tears spilled over his lashes, trailing down his cheeks in shimmering rivulets. "Nonsense." Kento insisted even though he was in pure panic, his voice cracking with anguish. "We will find a way. We always do."

It was the very first time his stern mask was breaking.

Your eyes fluttered open, the light within them dimming with each passing moment. "I don't want you to blame yourself." You murmured, voice slurred with deep pain. "This was my choice, my burden to bear."

You acted wtihout thinking. Wave of curses was attacking you over and over. Not sparring you nor him. You just shielded him with your body as he was getting exhausted.

"You are not leaving me." He said, desperation lacing his words. "I won't let you."

Your hand suddenly lost its grip on his cheek, the touch growing weaker with each passing second. "Remember me" You whispered, labored breathing. "Remember us."

"Always." Kento promised. "I will never forget you."

Gojo -

In the dimly lit room of an abandoned warehouse, the air was thick with tension and the scent of blood. Satoru, his normally blue vibrant eyes covered by his blindfold were now filled with worry, cradled you, his best friend, whose life was slipping away with each passing moment. The mission against the curses had taken a disastrous turn, leaving both of them battered and broken.

He was repeating himself that he couldn't lose you. No, he couldn't. Not you. Not after losing his best friend a few months ago.

With trembling hands, Satoru pressed down on the wound, trying desperately to stem the flow of blood. "Hang in there," he whispered. His voice choked with emotion. He was trying hard to keep in control. "We will get you to Shoko."

You managed a weak smile, the effort visibly draining you. "I'm not sure I can hold on much longer, Toru" You rasped, each breath a struggle.

"Don't talk like that" The white haired man pleaded, his heart clenching at the sight of your pain. "You're stronger than this. You've survived worse. Way worse."

A faint chuckle escaped the your quiver lips, tinged with bitter irony. "Guess I used up all my luck on those past missions, huh?"

Tears welled up in his eyes as he shook his head. "No, you're not allowed to give up. I won't let you."

In the distance, the sound of approaching footsteps echoed through the empty warehouse. Satoru's grip tightened around you, a mixture of fear and determination etched on his face.

"I wish I could have protected you better. I let my guard down." Satoru murmured, his voice barely a whisper. "I'm sorry."

You reached out, weak fingers brushing against his cheek. "You've always been there for me. That's more than enough."

Your conversation was interrupted by the arrival of Shoko, rushing to your side. Satoru watched helplessly as she worked frantically to stabilize you, her efforts a blur against the backdrop of your fading consciousness.

Shoko looked at Satoru and he understood.

Darkness closed in around him, he leaned closer, his lips brushing against your ear. "I won't leave your side" he vowed, his voice trembling with unspoken emotions. "I promise."

And in that heartbreaking moment, amidst the chaos and uncertainty, Satoru whispered words of love to the one person who had always meant everything to him, even if he had never found the courage to say it aloud before.

Geto -

"I'm sorry, my love" whispered Geto, his voice trembling with sorrow as he pressed his lips to your forehead. "I never should have let you take that risk."

Lying on the cold stone floor, gasping for breath, a weak smile graced your lips as you struggled to speak. "It was our job, Suguru. Our job to protect the world from the darkness that lurks in the shadows."

Tears welled in his eyes as he held you tighter, as if trying to defy the inevitable. "But at what cost, my love? At what cost?"

He couldn't lose you. Oh, he could be selfish and cursed you so you could stay by his side. But he won't do this. Not to you.

Your breaths grew shallow, each one a painful reminder of your condition "Some sacrifices are necessary. For the greater good."

His heart clenched at the words, a mixture of pride and despair flooding his soul. "I cannot bear to lose you," he whispered, his voice cracking with emotion.

"I'm sorry. I don't think I have much time left." You said.

"Don't say that.” He murmured, his hands trembling as he tried to stop the blood. "We will get you out of here."

"It might be too late for that." You whispered, your voice barely above a whisper. "The pain...is too powerful. It's consuming me from the inside."

Geto's heart clenched with despair as he realized the gravity of the situation. They had embarked on this mission together, determined to rid the world of the malevolent curses that threatened to engulf it. But now, faced with the prospect of losing you, his resolve wavered.

He was going to lose his mind.

He won't be able to live without you.

He can't lose you.

"We should never have taken this mission." Suguru murmured, his voice choked with regret. "I should have protected you."

You winced and reached out, grasping his hand with a strength born of sheer willpower. "Don't blame yourself. We knew the risks when we got to this school. And besides, we've met each other and I am happy I got to spend time with the love of my life."

His eyes glistened with unshed tears as he gazed down at you, his heart heavy with sorrow. "I love you. I can't bear to lose you."

"I love you too, my love" You replied with a genuine smile, her voice barely audible now. You were close to the end. "But you have to promise me something."

"Anything," Suguru vowed, his voice breaking with emotion.

"Promise me that you'll keep going." You whispered, your grip on his hand weakening with each passing moment. "Promise me that you'll never give up and lose yourself, no matter what."

Suguru gulped and nodded.

"I promise" He vowed, his voice filled with determination.

You smiled faintly, your strength fading with each heartbeat.

Your eyes fluttered closed, Geto pressed his lips to your forehead, whispering a silent prayer to whatever gods he didn't really believe in might be listening.

#jjk #jujutsu kaisen #jjk x reader #gojo #geto #nanami #gojo x reader #nanami x reader #geto x reader

137 notes · View notes

chainzzzzsaw · 2 days

Text

help i wrote something but its so bad and makes no sense i need someone to read it and help me 💀💀💀

(its soukoku angst:3)

(also tw for suicide)

. . .

He was having a panic attack, he couldn't breathe. He felt like he was drowning in the air that was far too humid to ever be comfortable in. His head was buried between his knees as he took harsh breaths through his nose and out through his mouth. In and out. He repeated to himself silently in his head. As he began hyperventilating, he felt cold water droplets fall down on his head, soaking his hair and the nature around him.

He was sitting in the grove of a dying tree in a place where only he and Chuuya knew about. They had gone here together years ago before Dazai had left the Port Mafia. He hasn’t been here in 4 years, so why was he here now?

He heard a crunch of dead leaves down the path he had come down. His eyes filled up with his own water droplets as he heard his name being called by the one boy he truly felt something for. “Dazai..?” It sounded muffled, like he was listening through a low quality video. He wasn't actually there. He felt dissociative. He wasn't there, but he was, and this was happening. He heard his name again, “Dazai!” followed by a tap on the shoulder. He couldn’t answer. Dazai lifted his head up and stared into Chuuya’s cold azure eyes. The longer he stared, the longer he felt his eyes and heart betray himself.

His heart felt like it was going to burst out of his chest. It had been 4 whole years since he had last seen Chuuya, 4 whole years of his love stored inside him, did Chuuya feel the same about Dazai all this time? Why was Chuuya here now?

These were the thoughts that dashed from the left side of Dazai’s brain to the right side.

The tears that had been daring to leak out of Dazai’s eyes, had already started to come out, yet he didn't realize. The water drained out of his eyes, competing in a race to the end of Dazai’s face. Chuuya pulled Dazai up off the, now wet, dirt and said something. He didn't seem to hear it though. The rain began spilling over both of their faces now, mingling with Dazai’s tears that were still flowing.

As he felt himself slowly come back to reality, he realized Chuuya’s arm was holding his wrist, right on his bandages. He looked down, and Chuuya dropped it. “Why are you here? Why right now?” Dazai said with a whine, his voice feeling shaky, which was something that never happened to Dazai. “I always come here. I always come here and I wait for the day that you come back.” Chuuya responded almost as if he was breathless.

He felt every memory he had with Chuuya come directly back to him, stabbing him in the heart relentlessly. “Huh…” It almost came out in a whisper. Did Chuuya want Dazai to come back?

“Dazai. I- I can't just pretend like I haven't been thinking about you every day since you left… I was in love with you. That isn't something that just goes away with time.” Chuuya rambled on, but Dazai just stood there. He couldn't process what Chuuya was saying when he was talking so fast, he was going over every word in his head, but he was stuck on that word he heard.

Love.

I was in love with you.

Chuuya’s words replayed in his mind like a horrible song you can't get out of your head. It flew into his ear, and then through his mind, stabbing into his heart, and back out again, over and over.

He loved Chuuya too, he just couldn't say it. The words wouldn't come out of his mouth. Like an answer you know but you just can’t remember.

“Me? Why me? I’m not good.” Dazai didn’t even know what he was saying, better yet, he didn’t even know he was talking.

“Because you're Dazai.”

Dazai’s hands slowly brought themselves to the sides of Chuuya’s face. Chuuya flinched at the touch. He hesitated to speak, he couldn’t show vulnerability, even with Chuuya. What was wrong with Dazai? Couldn’t he let go of his pride for one second and just say that he loved him back?

Chuuya’s hands now rested upon Dazai’s, which were lazily placed on his face. He didn’t know when either of them started to lean in, but they did, and their lips touched briefly. Dazai felt his tears roll down his face even as they shared a kiss. They both pulled away from each other, wide eyed, and Dazai dropped his hands.

“…Woah.” Chuuya whispered. “Um… Uh… I’m sorry.” Dazai had guilt lingering in his voice. They hadn't even talked about how they felt for each other and here they were, kissing, after not seeing each other for 4 years?!

Dazai had a gut feeling that this wouldn’t go how he wanted it to. He wanted them to be together, stuck like glue as they once were years ago. But he knew that wouldn’t happen, not after everything he’s done, not with his current mental state.

The silence was unbearable, it consumed them both. Eating all the words they wanted to say until there was nothing left at all.

Dazai is scared to love Chuuya, he knows he brings pain to all of those around him. The misfortune and pain he has following him like a cloud is not something he wishes to push onto the one person he has learned to love. He doesn’t wish to burden him with the pressure of his feelings.

“I'm sorry…”

And with that, Dazai quickly pushed past him and jogged down the path and back to his apartment. Chuuya chased after him, not knowing what else to do, but he lost him along the way. He at least knew where Dazai lived because, as one does, he did some light stalking over the years they were apart.

. . .

Dazai had finally made it home after 10 long minutes of looking behind him to see if Chuuya had followed. Spoiler, he hadn’t. Dazai didn’t know if he was happy or disappointed about that, but right now it didn't matter to him.

His thoughts progressively got worse as he unlocked the door, stepping in quickly and dragging himself to his room. He bent down to his drawer, he felt his legs burn.

His fingers rummaged through the random items he had thrown in it, obviously searching for something. He pulled out his blade, sighing deeply, and then his eyes met the bottle of Prozac laying on the corner of his dresser, quickly snatching it up.

He didnt know which to use, but if he couldn’t choose between them, why not just use both?

And so he did. Dazai grasped both the blade and the pills, preparing himself for yet another suicide attempt. It wasn’t a foreign concept to him, as he constantly planned new methods to end his life and courageously attempted them. Dazai held a desperate hope, a wish, that one day, one of his attempts would succeed, granting him freedom from the burdensome chains of existence. He knew his attempts were always futile, yet he clung to a glimmer of hope, praying that this time, just maybe, it would be different.

He picked up the bottle of prozac and held it in his left hand, the blade in his right. His thoughts were flooding his mind and battling with each other. He felt so much regret filling his heart of all the things he didn’t do with Chuuya, the things he couldn’t do.

Dazai flung the blade and the bottle of pills onto his bed before making his way to the kitchen. He retrieved a glass and filled it to the brim with tap water. Returning to his bedroom, he carelessly dropped the cup onto his dresser. With a hesitant hand, he opened the bottle of Prozac, pouring an excess of pills into his palm. He hesitated, his hand hovering near his mouth, reluctant to ingest them.

Dazai wanted to die, he always has, it's what he's known for. So why was he hesitating? Was it because of Chuuya?

Dazai liked being in control, he hated that his mind was a slave to his heart.

He tried his best to ignore his thoughts and dropped the handful of pills into his mouth and swallowed them quickly, using the water as a chaser to get them down his throat.

He was a bit more dizzy than he had been before. He picked up the blade and held it vertically on his wrist. He took a deep breath and pressed down hard into his wrist, wincing as he dragged the blade down his forearm. He repeated the same action on his other arm, blood was now dripping down onto the floor in puddles.

He sat down on the floor with his back against his bed, using the rest of the energy he had left to cut anywhere else that would contribute to a successful attempt because he knew well that there was always a way to survive any suicide attempt.

His neck?

Dazai’s neck was leaking like a waterfall, spilling all over his shirt. He felt himself drifting in and out of consciousness. His eyes felt heavy. He knew this would be the attempt that brought him to that oh so peaceful deep sleep that is death.

What Dazai didn’t know is that Chuuya was on his way right now, passing through numerous red lights just to get to him. The first thing that Chuuya would see when he came into Dazai’s room, is Dazai’s body being drained of the life that was left inside of him. That thought alone gave his heart a squeeze.

He thinks he heard banging at his front door, maybe he's just delirious. Was Dazai dissociating again? The banging got even louder and then it stopped and a louder bang came shortly after with a crash following. The door was knocked down, Ha, it’s Chuuya.

Dazai heard his name being called along with heavy footsteps, but there was nothing he could do to answer. His skin was as pale as paper and his clothes were drenched in his own blood.

Chuuya kicked into Dazai’s room and saw his body, bleeding out. Dazai felt himself smile.

“I- wh — Dazai-” He fumbled on his words. Chuuya felt like he couldn’t move, he felt stuck. He was tearing up, his eyes now cloudy. He forced his body to move and brought his hands around Dazai.

Chuuya looked into Dazai’s empty brown eyes and felt sick, his hands trembling. Their eyes locked and Dazai’s smile immediately faded and his face turned into something akin to frantic.

Dazai had just realized that maybe he didn’t want to die. At least, not now.

Something about looking into eyes that were burning with life while he was about to run out of his own did something to him. Dazai felt his body slowly slipping away with each faint breath he tried to take in. Water began piling up on his lash line once again.

His lungs were begging for air and he felt lightheaded. Dazai was going to die now. He had slit his wrists, neck, and took way more prozac than any doctor would ever recommend.

Chuuya’s hands were holding onto Dazai, he was saying something but Dazai couldn’t hear it. A black veil began clouding over his vision and Dazai knew what that meant. He wanted to open his eyes, stop dying for a second so he could tell Chuuya what he’s been wanting to say since the day they met.

The last thing he heard was muffled yelling and a phone ringing.

. . .

Dazai’s eyes finally opened, but he wasn’t with Chuuya and he wasn’t in a hospital. He had finally succeeded at something, but death was something he no longer craved.

Whenever Dazai was with Chuuya, all his thoughts of suicide seemed to float away. When Dazai was with Chuuya, he didn’t have to worry about anything. When Dazai was with Chuuya, he wanted to try living. Chuuya was the lightbulb in Dazai’s dark room.

Dazai's life had always seemed bleak in Chuuya's absence. The fleeting moments of genuine happiness he experienced were intertwined with memories of Oda and Chuuya. With Oda gone and now Dazai's own passing, those moments felt even more distant.

Dazai now found himself overwhelmed by his emotions, their intensity hitting him like crashing waves. These waves, reminiscent of water, stirred memories of the cold blue hue of Chuuya's eyes.

help idk if im done with this but idk what to add.. i just hate this but i need input from others it feels so rushed to me

17 notes · View notes

spiltcandycoatedpunkblood · 11 months

Text

What breaks my heart and makes me incandescent with rage is that I was getting help and feeling better last year in dealing with my trauma and CPTSD. Things were fucking looking up.

And then worldwide, god knows how many people decided it would be funny to harass and mock an abuse victim and survivor. And now I have extra long lasting trauma from that that I also have to deal with. Especially from people I thought were friends. And it's a disgusting insult that people were saying it was helping the same people it was fucking destroying simultaneously.

It was bad enough I lost my sister to tantrum throwing and TERFdom. It was bad enough I lost several people I loved to illness, old age and terrible incidents over about 10 years. It was bad enough that my family was torn apart by abusive family members who left messes and scars in their wake by how it disrupted us, even those who weren't directly involved.

And you go on to act like you helped people who had survived abuse when you did the complete opposite. I was already trying hard enough to have friends and be happy after so goddamn much. And it all got spat back in my face. This is why I don't trust properly now. Or try and make friends. You pretended to fucking care, and now the extra trauma haunts me every fucking day. You didn't help anyone but yourselves. And those you attacked have to live with that now, because you made a violent abusive man a poster for the real male abuse victims and survivors.

You selfish cowardly pricks. I hope the guilt and shame haunts you every fucking day until you finally drop dead, and you get to wonder why no one wants to be around you except the same pathetic nobodies. You didn't do shit to help anyone after that trial, because it was never about people like us you acted like you gave a shit about in the first place.

1 note · View note

rad-batson · 8 months

Text

Batlantern Headcanons Because I Found My New Brainrot and I Cannot Contain Myself (Platonic or Romantic, You Decide <3)

Hal is the only one who gets away with calling Bruce nicknames. Oliver tried calling Bruce “Spooky” once. He still has nightmares.

Several long-winded missions combined with Hal’s couch-surfing escapades have resulted in Hal having his own official Wayne guest room.

Alfred has smacked Hal with a dish towel several times. Reasons include: trying to wash the dishes, using a mini vac that he brought from home, and spitting gum into the garbage without wrapping it in a tissue first.

Tim gave Hal all of their streaming passwords to piss Bruce off. Hal proceeded to make his own profiles because he fears nothing, so Bruce changed all of his profile names to “Parasite.” Since then, it’s turned into an all-out war of renaming Hal’s profile every time they’re using it.

Highlights so far have included Sugar Baby, Freeloader, Ring Pop, Green Abomination, Magical Girl, Noisemaker, The Better Side Piece, and This is Your Official Eviction Notice Hal. (Bruce still hasn’t changed the passwords.)

Hal: You need to let go of your fear, Bats. Let’s do a simple breathing exercise. Bruce: I am breathing. Hal: No, like calming breaths. Follow my lead, okay? In- no, not that fast. Maybe close your eyes first. In…and out-No. No. Are you having a panic attack? Do I need to call someone?

For one mission, a few other JL members had to go undercover as couples. Bruce and Hal were the spares and paired up out of necessity. To everyone’s surprise, however, they were the most convincing duo because they “bickered like an old married couple.”

Bruce: I’m growing soft, Clark. I’m weak now. Clark: You told Hal ‘Good job.’ What’s wrong with that? Bruce: It’s unprofessional! *in the other room* Hal: I think Batman just confessed his undying love to me.

They have each other’s coffee orders memorized and regularly prepare the other’s coffee for them out of habit when they’re together.

After a while, Hal stops playfully flirting with everyone and reserves it only for Bruce because he gives the best reactions.

At a ‘Thank You, Justice League’ party hosted by Bruce Wayne, Hal slips up and flirts with Bruce in his civvies, only for Brucie Wayne to flirt back without missing a beat.

Hal had to go cool down in the bathroom for a few minutes. He was not ready for that. (Bruce is so fucking smug too. He’s been waiting FOREVER to give Hal a taste of his own medicine.)

Hal, introducing Bruce to the Lantern Corp: This is my pet bat. Careful, he bites.

Bruce, introducing Hal to new JL members: This is my partner. He’s been in training for ten years.

During an important strategy meeting, Hal waves his hand around, and Bruce just sighs. “What now, Lantern?” “Your plan of attack has like four holes in it.” “Where?” Hal gestures to the areas and suggests different strategies, and suddenly Bruce is like Does anyone else think it’s hot in here?

He lies in bed that night contemplating every single life event that’s lead up to Hal Fucking Jordan turning him on with his impeccable battle strategy.

Barry: I think Batman’s mad at me. He didn’t even react when I told him about the great rescue mission from last week. Hal: What do you mean? He was smiling the whole time. Barry: His face didn’t move an inch. Hal: You didn’t notice the lip twitch?

Batman has blackmail material on every single Justice League member, but only Hal has blackmail material on Bruce and the guts to use it. (Hal knows Bruce gets pedicures for fun. And he gets little designs on his toes too.)

Arthur: So when did you and Green Lantern start….you know. Bruce: No, I do not. What did we start? Arthur: You know what?! I think I forgot to walk my fish. Bye!

*Barry sees Hal with a hickey while they’re drinking coffee* Barry, jokingly: Did Bruce give you that? Hal: Yes, actually. How’d you know? Barry, backing away frantically: Oh okay, cool! Okay okay. Cool. Cool cool cool. Okay. Bruce, entering: What’s with him? Hal: I don’t know. He doesn’t seem to like the mug you bought me, though.

The JL has a betting pool called “BatLantern FMK” where they bet on which will happen first: will they fuck, marry, or kill each other?

Only Clark, Diana, and J’onn know that one of them happened already

2K notes · View notes

cutielando · 2 months

Text

happy ~ lando norris

Summary: After 5 years together, having made it through thick and thin, it was finally time for the long awaited wedding between Y/N and Lando.

Words: 1.2k+

Other works: my masterlist

♡♡♡♡♡

"Why am I so nervous?" you asked Cisca and your mother, both of them helping you get the last things ready on your dress while simultaneously trying to calm you down.

"Darling, you're going to give yourself a panic attack if you don't stop stressing" Cisca said, your mother agreeing with her.

You sighed, staring at your reflection in the mirror while the 2 mothers worked around you.

Your wedding day has been something you have waited for your entire life. The day Lando proposed, you felt one step closer to living your dream. Seeing yourself in your wedding dress all glammed up made tears well up in your eyes, but you kept them at bay.

It was supposed to be a perfect day, after all. You were marrying the love of your life in front of all of your families.

A knock on your door made you look anxiously towards the closed doors, your nerves worse than ever.

Adam, Lando's father, poked his head inside, his eyes landing on all three of you.

"Are you ready?" he asked, eyeing you up and smiling.

"I'm nervous" you admitted, making him chuckle and enter the room, closing the door behind him.

Due to the fact that your father had passed away when you were young, Adam decided to step up and be the one walking you down the aisle.

Something that brought tears to your mother's eyes when he had first suggested it.

"Trust me, you can't be more nervous than the groom himself. He's been stressing about ever since he woke up" Adam reassured you, hoping it would make you feel slightly better.

It did, in all honesty. It made you chuckle as well, already imagining Lando stressing over every single small thing that you could possibly think of. His shoes weren't right, his tie was crooked, his curls weren't on point, you name it.

He was a perfectionist at heart, especially on this day since he wanted everything to be perfect. You deserved a perfect wedding day.

"Honey" your mother took your hands and smiled. "You remind me of myself on my wedding day to your father. I was a nervous wreck the entire we were planning the wedding, but when I saw your father waiting for me at the alter, nothing else mattered in that moment. You and Lando love each other dearly and you're going to have an amazing life together. Go out there and get your boy, leave the nerves at the door"

You nodded and hugged her tightly, burying your face in her neck.

"I'm ready" you told Adam once you pulled away, taking his arm.

"Let's get you married"

♡♡♡♡♡

As the music started playing and the big oak doors opened, your eyes immediately landed on your soon-to-be husband waiting for you, Max and his brother by his side.

Adam and you slowly walked towards him, smiling at the guests all around you.

Once you reached Lando, Adam took your hand and clasped it in his, smiling at you with tears in his eyes.

"Take care of him for us" he said, making everyone in the room swallow down a giggle.

"I will" you whispered back, squeezing his hands before turning towards Lando.

Your eyes were locked on each other, a silent conversation taking place. He looked dashingly handsome, his tux amazing on his fit physique. You really hit the jackpot with him.

"Hello, everyone" the reverend began speaking. "We are gathered here today to celebrate the marriage between these two exceptional young people, Y/N and Lando. I can see how excited the bride and the groom are, so I won't make this any longer than it should be. Y/N, Lando, have you prepared your vows?" you both nodded, and then the reverend motioned for you to go first.

You let out a deep breath, taking Lando's hands in yours.

"Way to make me break the ice, reverend" you joked, making everyone laugh including Lando. "Lando, you're my best friend, my partner in crime, my gaming buddy, the absolute love of my life, the man I want to spend the rest of my life with. When we met all those years ago, I could only dream of reaching this day, the day that would make you officially mine forever. I'm grateful for everything that you do for me, for being who you are and for loving me despite my flaws. You always know what to say, you always know how to make me feel loved and appreciated. I'm proud of everything that you do, of how successful your career is and how much potential you're always showing. I love you, and I cannot wait to spend the rest of my days loving you and enjoying life by your side"

Everyone in the room was crying, your mothers holding onto each other as they silently cried in their tissues.

"Y/N, light of my life, I'm so proud of us for being here today. Ever since I laid my eyes on you when we first met, I knew you would be the woman that I would marry. You bring a light and stability in my life that I've been lacking for as long as I can remember. I can be myself when I'm around you, I can escape the fame and pressure when it's just the two of us, just how I want it to be. You have been nothing short of supportive in my career, coming to my races and cheering me on, believing in me when I didn't believe in myself. I cannot thank you enough. I promise to always love you and care for you, keep you safe and show you just how grateful I am to have you in my life. I love you so damn much and I cannot wait for you to finally become a Norris"

You smiled, tears threatening to fall from your eyes and ruin your perfect makeup, but you didn't care in that moment. The only thing you cared about was Lando.

"Do you have the rings?" the reverend asked, and Max quickly got the velvet box out of his pocked and gave it to Lando.

He took out the rings, giving you his while he took yours.

"Y/N Y/L/N, do you take Lando Norris to be your lawfully wedded husband, to live together in holy matrimony, to love him, to honor him, to comfort him, and to keep him in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, for as long as you both shall live?"

"I do" you almost yelled out, making everyone chuckle due to how eager you were.

"Lando, do you take Y/N Y/L/N to be your lawfully wedded wife, to live together in holy matrimony, to love her, to honor her, to comfort her, and to keep her in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, for as long as you both shall live?"

"I do" Lando smiled.

You both put your rings on each other's fingers, smiling like two idiots in love while waiting for the part of the ceremony that you had been looking forward to.

"By the power invested in me, I pronounce you husband and wife. Lando, you may kiss your bride" the reverend hadn't even finished what he was saying before Lando wrapped his arms around your waist and kissed you.

Everyone cheered for you, clapping and whistling for the two newlyweds.

As you pulled away, you didn't acknowledge anything around you except for Lando, your husband.

Finally, your husband.

comments and re-blogs help us grow!!

much appreciated!!

JOIN MY TAG LIST HERE

REQUEST HERE

♡♡♡♡♡

Tag list: @outerudeth @f1ln4dr3cl16mv33 @dardouni @saturnssunflower @moony-artemis @blissfulsunsetstuff @samantha-chicago @nikfigueiredo @therealcap @iloveyou3000morgan @daemyratwst @rqlstefanny @bwormie @hangmandruigandmav @kagome45 @enidsinclairaddamsthesecond @tallrock35 @sesamepancakes @boywondrgrayson @evlkking @evie-119 @ijustwanttoreadlols @cixrosie @poppyflower-22 @hiireadstuff @ellouisa17 @paintedbypoetry @hellowgoodbye @lpab @xlinxdax0704 @decafmickey @teti-menchon0604 @ctrlyomomma @sya-skies @likedbygaslyy @booksandflowrs @acidburnsthings @dhanihamidi @mynameisangeloflife @5starl1ght @teamnovalak @ferrarisfailedstrats @basicuniter @jxnellat

472 notes · View notes

imaginesmai · 7 months

Text

Right around the corner (4) - Azriel

I didn't mean to make it this long, but I hope you liked it! There will be a fifth and final part, I think. You guys wanted to forgive Azriel so I needed to show you what happened. Be careful with the tags!

(1), (2), (3), (4), (5)

Plot: after the damage has been done, Azriel finds his brothers ready to pick up the pieces.

Warnings: prepare a second tissue box. Also, mental health issues - our boy has been through a lot and doesn't talk kindly about himself.

Cassian only remembered a few big arguments between Azriel and him. While Rhysand had headbutted with the general at the beginning, Cassian and Azriel’s relationship had been natural. The first one was loud, abundant and had a deep, burning need of someone understanding his pain. The shadowsinger was the complete opposite, and they had instantly connected.

Their biggest argument so far, that had brought them apart for almost ten years, had been when Rhys disappeared under the mountain. Cassian had gathered an army and was ready to march on Amarantha when Azriel stopped him. At the moment, he had felt betrayed by his brother, frustrated and furious.

But even if it had taken him ten years, they had worked their way around it.

Before Rhysand winnowed them away, Cassian was ready to start the second, biggest argument of their relationship. Even if he tried to hide it, the general still had abandonment and trust issues, and that his brother had hid something so important from him, that hadn’t trusted him with something so precious for an Illyrian male, broke his heart.

He was ready for the argument, but wasn’t ready for Azriel’s cries.

The cabin was filled with shadows, that moved frantically around. The shadowsinger had lost control of his powers a very, very few occasions, never relying on his emotions. But when Rhysand and Cassian appeared in the cabin, the high lord had to create a barrier between them and the shadows to protect themselves.

“Brother” Cassian whispered when the shadows started to let go, enough to see Azriel curled in the couch.

“Azriel, what’s wrong?” Rhysand was by his side the second he was let through, a hand on his shoulder. The shadowsinger barely acknowledge them. “Damn it. You’re freezing”

“I’ll turn on the fire”

“And bring a blanket” Rhysand called out as Cassian started moving.

It was muscle memory, after so long. After so many nights where either of them came battered to the cabin and Rhysand’s mother would take care of them. In silence, Cassian moved around the familiar space, turning on candles and searching for clothes.

Meanwhile, Rhysand used his powers to get into Azriel’s mind. Instead of prying into his memories, to rip away whatever was causing him pain, his friend helped him to rebuild his mental wards.

The high lord managed to make him sit up, enough so he could fall back against Rhysand’s shoulder and the male could hug his friend. The sobs quieted down and the shadows disappeared, apparently happy someone was taking care of their master for now.

Cassian stared at them for a moment, torn between the need to comfort and to hurt. To comfort Azriel as he had comforted him so many times in the past, to be there for him and apologize to any feelings he had felt during the last hours. But also, to search for the source of that pain and tear it down to pieces.

Years of living with him had taught him to be patient, so he ended up sitting on the other side of Azriel, tossing a pair of trousers and a sweater on his lap.

“Come on, try to stand up”

In silence, between Cassian and Rhysand, they managed to put some clothes on the shadowsinger. Azriel was quiet all the time, with his gaze lost in the fire. Every now and then, his knees would buck down and he would hitch a sob. But each time, there were his two friends, ready to catch him and steady him.

It felt as if nothing had changed for a moment, as if it was Cassian beaten to a pulp after a bad fight or Azriel having panic attacks when the lights came off. So many times in the past had they been in that situation.

When they finished, they ended up sitting in the couch. Now, they were bigger, wider, and nothing similar to the scrawny boys that huddled together when no one else wanted them. The couch felt ridiculously small, yet they managed to fit just fine.

It took Azriel a while to talk, and they didn’t pressure him.

“I have a mate” he admitted.

Through the haze of sorrow and sadness, of not knowing if the bond would hold on for much longer now that you had realized what had been going on, Azriel didn’t feel any different. He had imagined himself saying it a lot of times, presenting you to his family – with good and bad outcomes. And it had made him nervous, wary, enough that he had decided against it.

As he confessed it to his brothers, his family, he felt no different.

And hated himself just a little bit more.

“Did they… do this?” Cassian asked carefully, feeling how Azriel’s body tensed under his arm. “They hurt you?”

“No”

Rhysand willed himself to stay calm and respect his privacy, but he wanted nothing more than to answer Cassian’s silent call to barge in his mind and solve whatever was happening.

“Her name is Y/N” he added, his eyes filling with tears once more. “She… The bond snapped six years ago. I’ve fucked up. I’ve fucked up so bad”

“Y/N” Rhysand repeated, trying to remember if he had heard your name before.

“Six years?” Cassian looked between Rhysand and Azriel. “That… can’t be. Six years?”

“I fucked up”

Azriel’s voice broke once more, and between sobs and hitched breaths, he managed to explain what had happened. He let it free from his chest, hoping it would make him feel better, but it didn’t. It only made him realize, once more, how fucked up he was.

Without interrupting, Cassian and Rhysand listened to the story of that pointless mission that took him right to your door, where he was supposed to ask you about a male’s disappearance. About the moment he felt the bond in chest, in his soul, and how he had run away and avoided you.

They listened as he broke when he talked about that day you had invited him over, ready to accept the bond, and how he had faked to be confident. He didn’t mean to disappoint you, so when you had asked with so much hope if that was what he wanted, he had said yes, even if part of him knew he wasn’t ready.

Azriel described how, during the following weeks, he had confused the happiness from finally being together, with no interruptions, with the usual high of mates accepting the bond. How he had realized later that it wasn’t normal the fear and anguish he felt after he left your apartment, and how without meaning to or knowing how, he hadn’t accepted your imprint on him.

“That’s why we haven’t noticed” the high lord said, taking it all in. His brother’s story, his hurt and pain.

“What were you afraid of?” Cassian almost cut him off, bursting out the question both of them wondered about. “We are your family, Az. You should know we will accept you no matter what. And a mate… that’s something wonderful”

“Because I don’t deserve her” Azriel finally looked up to Cassian, and his friend was taken aback at the emotions in his eyes. “She’s soft, and beautiful, and the worst thing she can do is squish a spider without wanting to”

“Azriel, that’s not – “

“It is. You should see her, Rhys” he cut him off, turning to look at him. “Y/N is… different. The Cauldron must have made a mistake, because she’s everything I’m not. And I don’t deserve her”

Azriel tried to let Rhysand know why he didn’t deserve you. Why, every time he thought about bringing you into his life and letting you know the spy master, it broke his heart a little. He wanted to keep you safe, away from anything that could stain you the way he was stained. And he had thought, apparently, that he could get away with it.

Feyre poked at his mental barriers softly, wondering what was happening. After sending a comforting message through the bond, Rhysand returned Azriel’s look with a different type of conviction.

“I don’t know her, and I would love to” Rhysand told him, giving him a soft smile. “But brother, I know that whoever gets to be your mate, to share their life with you, has been blessed by the Cauldron. Your family didn’t see you the way we do, the way she does. And what they did – that isn’t what you have to expect any time someone gets close to you”

“My family isn’t the problem here” he tried to excuse himself, but the high lord could see the truth in his eyes.

“It is. You’re afraid to committing yourself to the bond because you fear she will break it. Because your family broke your trust. And then you thought you had that with Mor, and – “

“Don’t go there” Azriel warned him. “Don’t read me”

“I don’t have to read you. I know you”

“Az, you… deserve a mating bond” Cassian spoke finally. “Everything you have been through isn’t your excuse to reject it, it’s the reason you finally have something good”

Azriel wasn’t ready to talk about it. He had never been ready to talk about how he had felt when his brothers, the people he looked up to, tortured him as a game. He hadn’t shared with them yet how hard had it been to know he was a mere observer of his family life, locked away in a dungeon and treated like a dog.

And the feeling of not belonging, of having a safe place sabotaged, had only grown each time he watched Mor from the distance with someone else.

He wasn’t ready to talk about it, but he understood, that he had to.

“I feel like it’s all a dream. As if I’m watching my own life unfold from the distance, like a good movie. Whenever I’m not with her, I have this… thing” he explained, opening his broken heart to his brothers. “Like I’m a fraud”

“You’re not a fraud” Cassian corrected him quickly, barely standing his brother’s self-depreciating speech.

“I am. I pretend I have it all together but I’m so afraid” he swallowed hard at the end, skipping a breath. Azriel ran a shaky hand through his hair, and his brothers only held him stronger. “Sometimes I think about… our future, about her with me, and I feel like drowning because what if she – what if she stops loving me? I can’t handle – She’s all I have, all I want. I love her so, so much. I can’t – “

That time, both males were ready when Azriel tried to fold into himself again, shadows shifting anxiously and turning off a few candles. They were ready to keep him up straight and, somehow, holding him together as he broke apart once more.

Azriel needed help, and his family was more than ready to finally walk him through it.

You didn’t know what breaking a mating bond meant, or if that was even possible. If the feeling of your chest at any hour was the void of Azriel’s bond or if it was just your imagination. Either way, you had never experienced such a pain.

Barely able to leave the bed, you had been forced to close the bakery. Not permanently, you told yourself, just until you had it all together once more. Even if you didn’t know what that meant.

The day after Azriel left was spent grieving, and thankfully, you had his shadows to help you around. You managed to make it to the bed, to slide the curtains shuts and cry in peace without breaking your back along with your heart.

A day turned into two, then into three. Before you knew it, it had been a week and you weren’t any better.

You had tried to find an explanation, to comfort yourself in the happy memories or forget the past events. But your mind brought you back to the horrible realization that he didn’t want you. That Azriel didn’t love you the way you did.

You were understanding, you had always been. A smile on your face, gentle hands and loving words. That was what you were, a kind soul, your friends told you. Never through a tragedy other than losing your wings, always loved and taken care of.

Azriel had taken it all away in just one night.

The first note came from Feyre, although it wasn’t the last one. Even if you ignored them, you received those same notes that had uncovered the truth during the whole week.

Hello, Y/N. It’s Feyre, do you remember me? I have my art studio in front of your bakery. I’ve noticed that the bakery is closed, some of your usual customers even came to ask me about it. Everything alright?

Hi, Feyre here. Should have told you in the previous note that I’ve heard about you and Azriel from Rhysand. I’m here if you want to talk.

It’s Feyre again. I’ve seen the new sign about you taking a few days off. I hope everything is fine.

I hope it doesn’t bother you, but my friend Mor has been begging me for days to let her write you a message.

Hey, it’s Morrighan. We don’t know each other, but I fixed your necklace once. We heard about your thing with Azriel. Just wanted to say that part of it it’s my fault, that I haven’t treated him right in a long time, and many of his insecurities are because of me. So, I guess I’m partly the one to blame and I’m sorry. And you should know how miserable he is without you.

Y/N. I’m Cassian. Hi. How are you?

Dear Y/N, we were wondering if you would like to join us for dinner on Friday night. Greetings, Rhysand.

You ignored each and every note they sent you, even the ones carefully delivered by Azriel’s shadows. You expected them to leave, and part of you wanted them to do so and forget everything that reminded you of him. But they stayed for the whole week, bringing you food and taking care of your wellbeing. And the other part of you, the irrational one, liked the pain of the familiarity they brough.

They even helped you prepare a bath when you decided to be functional again. On Saturday’s morning, you changed the sheets, prepared the laundry and ventilated the room. You tossed out every dirty tissue and food container you had accumulated as if something had possessed you to do so. Then, you took a bath and cleaned carefully every part of your body.

It reminded you of cleaning Azriel’s wings and hair, of taking baths together, and you ended up crying naked in the bathtub until the water was cold. It took you half of the day to be decent enough to even wonder if you were ready to open the bakery once more.

Not that you were able, because there was a knock on your door and you just knew who was outside.

“It’s Azriel”

His voice was muffled because of the distance, but you heard the roughness. You froze on the kitchen, where you had been having your silent debate, and your heart sped up.

None of the notes were his, not even a casual flick through the bond that kept you communicated through long missions. If it wasn’t for the range of emotions you had felt during the last days, some of them similar to yours but not quite, you would have thought he had disappeared.

But there he was, just behind your door. Some shadows slipped through the bottom, tangling between your legs. The cold feeling was different from the one the usuals left, and you realized they were panicked shadows.

Azriel had mentioned you that his emotions controlled his powers if he wasn’t careful, and that the shadows went and came with them.

The new shadows tried to push you to the door, and like a rag doll, you let them complete the small path. They disappeared once more under the door, only to appear again when you didn’t open it.

“Hi” Azriel croaked out, only the wood in between. “I’m sorry. They appeared a week ago and I can’t control them yet. I’m sorry”

“They’re colder”

Your sore throat matched the tone of his voice. It wasn’t more than a whisper, a useless fact that you knew Azriel already noticed. But still, you felt the need to mention it. There was no anger left, no deception. Just the feeling of the new shadows caressing your skin frantically.

You couldn’t bring yourself to open the door and face him again, because you knew you wouldn’t forgive him. There was a pending talk between the two of you, missing explanations. You wanted to understand what had happened during the last six years, and he deserved to know what he had put you through.

Instead of asking you to open the door, you heard him shift on his feet and flap his wings.

“Yeah. And smaller” he agreed. “Um, I tried to get rid of them. Are they… bothering you?”

Am I bothering you?

“No. Not yet”

No, you aren’t. Not yet.

“Right”

It was almost comical to watch the shadows move around you. You hadn’t noticed the single tear that escaped, but they did – and in a moment you were blinded as they all tried to wipe it out at the same time. They made you take a step backward and almost stumble to the ground.

You had never seen too much of Azriel’s shadows, of his power. Apart from the single ones that danced around you and kept you company, you had never met the real shadowsinger. All the stories around him felt strange, property of someone else rather than your mate.

Azriel must have heard you move, or gasp, or maybe the shadows told him. He placed a hand on the door.

“Are you okay? I should go back. I’m sorry. I can’t make them – “

“They feel different too” you comment, enchanted by the shadows moving in your line of sight.

They were dark, and you shouldn’t have been able to see anything. But in the darkness, you could somehow guess their shapes. Some of them were smaller, bigger, thinner and wider. They weren’t like the formal, perfect ones Azriel usually wielded around you. They felt raw.

It took him a while to answer, and you waited patiently for his answer. You didn’t expect anything from that conversation, weren’t even sure what the conversation was about. Just hearing his voice felt at the same time as a punishment and a reward.

Still, he surprised you.

“Madja says they are the original shadows, the ones that should have been around since the begging” Azriel confessed, his nails scratching the door. “The ones… She says I was so scared of my own power that I locked it in a cage as a child and created just a shadow of the real one. Which I could control and… understand.”

“Madja the healer?” you blinked, still surrounded by his shadows. “Why are you – are you hurt? What happened?”

“No, I’m fine. I mean, unharmed. I’m not hurt” he chuckled humorlessly. “She’s been helping me with other things”

“Like what?”

You didn’t know where it came from, but there was an urgent edge on your voice that kept you alert. You knew Madja, had seen her help Azriel after any nasty mission. He had even told you about getting rid of your scars with her help.

Her name brought the already familiar pain – that you knew about her because she was important for Azriel, but she didn’t know about you because you weren’t that important for him. You waited in silence until he decided to talk again. When he did, you could tell he was close to tears.

“I’m not okay. It has taken me too long to figure it out, and it has costed me what I love the most in the world, but I’m not. I… am afraid, all the time” he started. “I am afraid that you will see my true self, what I am in the dark, and hate me the way I hate it. I’m afraid that you will figure out what made my family despite me, toss me aside, and decide to do the same. Or that you realize that I’m not a good mate, and be too kind to tell me and live trapped in a lie”

Feelings wasn’t something you usually shared with Azriel. You were the sensible one, the emotional mate. Who talked about something that made you happy or sad, that expressed your fears knowing he would be there for you no matter what. But not once in your six years you had heard about his.

Each word dug a hole in your chest, from your own feelings or his. The shadows eased enough to let you take a step forward. As if there was an invisible hand printed out, you put your hand where his was on the other side of the door.

“I am terrified to hurt you without meaning to, or to not be what you need. All the time. I’ve… created a routine, apparently, to give myself a sense of false confidence. To build a reality” Azriel stopped to catch his breath. “You’ve shaken that reality where I just… survived, and I thought I could continue pretending everything was fine. It’s not. It’s all so fucking wrong in my head”

Your own eyes were filled with tears by then, ready to fall on your knees. Because, what were you supposed to do now? You wished you could just forget about the past week, about his words – because you had just accepted that he was okay, had missed any signal that he was struggling.

And that made you feel almost as bad as him not accepting the bond.

“So I’m gonna get right, I’ve been getting help” your mate finished, taking a deep breath. “And then we… I love you, Y/N. I don’t have much to offer, but everything I am and have, is yours. When I’m okay, I promise, I will make things right. I promise”

Before you could answer, his shadows disappeared and Azriel winnowed away.

Want to read more? Check out my side blog @imaginesmaimasterlists, where I keep all the masterlists! Feedback is always appreciated

Right around the corner taglist:

@lesliemurillo @impossibelle @polli05927 @florencemtrash @going-through-shit @minakay @setayeshmohseni @torchbearerkyle @esposadomd @amysangel @kennedy-brooke @originalcrusadetrash @luvmoo @historygeekqueen @marriedtolike18fictionalmen @wallacewillow0773638 @tothestarsandwhateverend @kristalhi @knmendiola @nikt-wazny-y @dream-alittlebiggerdarling @wallacewillow0773638 @clara-geekhime @kalulakunundrum @saltedcoffeescotch @originalcrusadetrash @mel-wcst @ailyr92 @bubybubsters @chickensrock3

812 notes · View notes

toomanystoriessolittletime · 9 days

Text

Rain Confessions

Summary: A dance in the rain at Jackson's last day of the summer celebration leads to you and Joel finding out something surprising about the both of you after you sneaked off to have some alone time.

Pairing: Joel Miller x fem. reader

Rating: E

Wordcount: 3.5k

Warnings: falling in love, a whole lot of backstory nobody asked for, implied past SA, age gap (around 15-20 years), fluff, baby fever, smut (semi public sex, unprotected sex) accidental breeding kink (?), pregnancy surprise at the end

A/N: This is my entry for @undercoverpena April showers challenge! I had so many ideas for this challenge, but this is it (for now lol)

follow @toomanystoriessolittletime-fics and turn on notifications to get notified when I post new fics

If you had learned anything about the community of Jackson since arriving here almost two years ago, it was that the people would always find a reason to have a town celebration.

It was foreign to you at first, celebrating the first summer harvest a week after you arrived. Seeing everyone in the middle of town, celebrating while music was played by some towns people on their instruments. Children playing with wide smiles, safe from all the horrors that laid behind the walls of this tiny town. So much food everyone wouldn’t have to cook for days.

Dancing.

Happy people.

You had a full blown panic attack the first time you had attended a town celebration, overwhelmed from how… normal everything seemed now. Almost like it had been before the outbreak happened.

You only had little memory of how it was before. You had just turned 20, moved to another state, far away from all of your family for a job you were excited for, but would never get to work in.

You had been shot on outbreak day, waking up almost a month later in a make shift hospital in what would later become the Dallas QZ. You remembered being told how lucky you were that an officer had brought you in in all that chaos. There would be many times after you had healed and been released, that you asked yourself if you really had been that lucky. The question about why you survived, being a constant thought inside your head.

Whatever had happened to you had fucked with your memory, leaving you with big gaps about your life before you woke up in the hospital.

You had stayed in Dallas until the QZ fell, leaving with a group of what you thought back then were friends. You had worked with those people, those men, for many years at the QZ. They had never given any indication about not being decent people. You trusted them.

Trust that you clearly had misplaced.

You would learn in the following years that they had only taken you with them so they had something to offer to whomever could help them survive.

It would take years for you to finally escape from them, kill all of them, leaving you with nothing but the clothes on your body stumbling through the deserted lands of what you would learn was Wyoming until a group of people found you.

You had asked them to kill you, tired of life.

But they had taken you in. Maria saw something in you that day.

You became a part of Jackson. Working in the greenhouse every day because as it turned out, you had a green thump.

Yet you were still keeping to yourself.

The years of abuse you had endured, did not make it easy to trust new people. You only had little friends. Lauren, who worked with you at the greenhouse, and Tommy who made it close to impossible not to be friends with. Maria who became like a big sister to you.

You weren’t looking to meet more people, let alone find something more than just friendship until Joel Miller stepped into your life.

You had been pared with him on your monthly patrol, something every citizen of Jackson had been tasked at least once per month, not even knowing he had joined the community, or knowing that he was Tommy’s brother.

He was quiet, reserved, cold, but only to the people who were to scared to look past the facade he put on.

It was like you could see right through him, the way he was masking the pain he carried with him all day. Maybe because you had been doing the same thing.

The first patrol you went on together left you drenched to your bones, surprised by rainfall, making you sick for a whole week after with Joel being the only one who would check on you.

Something you didn’t understand at that time, because you did not know the man.

You still weren’t sure who made the first move of spending some more time together. It seemed to just… happen. Eating together at the Tipsy Bison after he came back from his job at Patrol. Him visiting you in the greenhouse when he found himself lonely, telling you about his complicated relationship with Ellie at the moment.

You spending time at his place to teach Ellie how to bake, because she had been nagging you for weeks to do so.

He never pushed, always listened to whatever you had to say, both of you opening up to each other about what you had went through before getting to Jackson.

He had held you after you talked about the years you had been in captivity, vowing to never let anyone ever lay a hand on you.

It was after the first baking lesson, Ellie long gone to bed, that you found yourself in Joel’s arms for the first time, his body on top of yours, his cock filling you slowly, while he whispered words of praise against your ear.

Yet it would take another couple of months for the two of you to admit that you had feelings for one another, oblivious to what everyone around you saw with their eyes closed.

There hadn’t been some grand gesture like in the movies.

It had been a normal night where you felt a little restless and decided to walk towards the stables to wait for Joel to come back from patrol. The way his face lit up when he saw you as he rode through the gates, taking you by surprise even though your face was a mirror image of his. He had wrapped his arms around you and whispered how much he missed you before he kissed you softly, the world around you disappearing when he admitted to you that he’s been in love with you for a while now.

You had moved into his house the week after.

And now you were in your shared bedroom, getting into clean clothes while Joel sat on the bed, looking at you with warm eyes.

„We could just stay in? Have some time for ourselves while everyone is busy celebrating the last day of summer?“ He asked and you smiled softly, putting your pants on, while his eyes continued to undress you.

„And do what?“ You asked.

„I can think of a thing or two. I’d start with getting you out of this jeans again,“ he winked and you smiled shyly at the way he looked at you.

You hope he would forever look at you like that.

„You know your brother would come looking for us. We promised we would be there. And Ellie asked you to come too,“ you reminded him and he sighed.

Things between him and Ellie were still hard, but she was slowly coming around. There would be a small art installation from the school at the town square and Ellie had drawn a couple of paintings she was excited to show off.

Joel got up from the bed and walked over to you, his hands coming to rest on your hips.

„You gonna let me dance with you?“ He asked and you sighed, pulling your arms up and crossing your hands behind his neck, looking up at him. He was smiling softly at you and you were pretty sure you would never be able to love another person like you loved Joel Miller.

„Always,“ you smiled before you got on your tiptoes to kiss him softly.

You were watching Joel and Ellie from afar, both of them standing in front of a painting she did from a landscape across town square that was currently filled with people. Ellie had told you that it was the mountain view she had woken up to for an entire week while she was sick on the road, Joel taking care of her until she felt better to continue their travels on their way to find Tommy here in Jackson.

Joel was visibly struggling to keep the tears at bay as you saw Ellie explain it to him before they hesitantly hugged each other.

You were sitting under one of the tents that had been put up earlier today, the sky not looking like it would be dry outside much longer. Yet it was warm enough to only wear a T-shirt.

„You think they gonna be okay?“ Tommy asked, sitting down next to you, little Elijah in his arms. Maria had given birth not too long ago to a mini version of Tommy much to her delight. She waved at you from next to the grill, and you waved back before you reached your hand out to Elijah who took your finger with a squeal.

„I think so. She’s beginning to understand why he did what he did. And he’s understanding why she’s so upset. They miss each other,“ you said and Tommy nodded.

„I would have done the same if it was my kid,“ Tommy said and you nodded.

„Yeah. Me too,“ you smiled at Elijah who now was trying to suck on your finger, making you chuckle.

„Are your parents not feeding you enough, little man?“ You said with a grin.

Without answering he proceeded to pull your finger in his mouth, making you giggle.

„Maria just fed him twenty minutes ago. He’s just ravenous,“ Tommy rolled his eyes.

He turned his head when he heard Maria call for him.

„Can you take him for a moment? My wife calls,“ he asked. With a smile you nodded, opening your arms for the little boy to be placed against your chest, kissing his forehead while he still sucked on your finger.

„Aren’t you just the cutest little thing?“ You hummed with a small smile as he snuggled against you. When you looked up you found Joel’s eyes locked on you from across the little square and you felt your cheeks warming at the look he was giving you.

In the past couple of weeks you had the recurring dream about having a baby on your own, a mini version of Joel. You dreamed of watching him with a tiny baby on his chest. You dreamed of your own little family.

Elijah used this moment to nibble on your knuckles, making your eyes widen before you looked down at the little guy again.

„You really are hungry huh?“ You laughed.

„He’s teething,“ Maria said, smiling down at you with a plate of food in her hands, Tommy following behind her.

„You gonna eat some spare rips next summer, huh?“ You teased, tickling the babies side, making him giggle.

„He sure will be,“ Tommy said proudly, before he took Elijah back.

Music started to play from the band that had formed earlier this year from the town and you could see Tommy smirk.

„I think you had an admirer,“ he winked before you turned around and found Joel walking towards you. When he was close he held one hand out which you took.

„You promised me a dance,“ he said and you couldn’t help but smile.

„I did, didn’t I?“ You said before you let him guide you towards the middle of the square were people had already gathered to dance.

The band was playing a song you did not recognise. It was a slow song for a change, Joel and you having danced to two songs before laughing loudly at the way you just could not manage to not stumble over your own feet.

But now you were in his arms, your cheek against his chest as he slowly swayed you to the beat, his lips against the top of your head while he murmured the words to the song.

You took a deep breath of his familiar earthy scent that always felt like coming home.

It was then that you felt the first drops of rain. Feeling his arms tighten around you he cursed quietly as it began to rain, the sky opening up, drenching you within seconds, your clothes clinging to your body.

The normal reaction would be to seek shelter from the rain, just like the people around you who quickly ran towards the tents that had been put up.

But you looked up at Joel who was already looking at you, his hair clinging to his face, drops of water falling from his nose down on you.

The band was still playing, the song changing to a distinct version of Purple Rain, making the people who were now in the tents laugh, but you just smiled, letting Joel twirl you on the improvised dance floor before you came to rest against his chest again, both of you laughing.

You danced for a couple more minutes, before he kissed you deeply, holding you close against him.

„Get a room!“ You heard Tommy yell and you smiled against Joel’s lips, before you took his hand and led him away from the town square.

He had you crowded against the wall outside of the greenhouse as soon as you rounded the building, his lips on yours, his hands rounding your face.

The greenhouse was closer, your house being on the other side of town.

It was still raining, the both of you under the small and apparently leaking roof that was above the outside work station, just out of view from the building. You could still hear the people down the street celebrating when he picked you up to sit you down on the work table, your legs parting so he could step between them.

„We should get out of these clothes,“ you mumbled against his lips, your fingers working on opening his shirt, pushing it off his shoulders. He sucked your bottom lip between his.

„We should,“ he agreed, before he pulled your shirt over your head, growling softly before his head lowered between your tits, pushing your bra down, sucking your nipple into his mouth.

„Shit….“ You moaned, your hands pushing into his hair, your eyes dropping close.

There was a tiny part of you, that knew it would be a better idea to get back home and out of these clothes, but you wanted Joel so badly, right now.

„Love these perfect tits,“ he hummed, playfully biting into the soft skin above your left breast.

„Joel please… Just….“ You pulled his head up so he was looking at you, your eyes wide and needy.

„You want me to fuck you? Right here? Again?“ He asked and you nodded, memories of all the times he had you right here while the people were working inside, filling your mind, a shudder running down your spine.

„Sure is gonna be fun to get you out of these drenched jeans,“ he joked and you chuckled before you jumped from the table.

It was a little struggle, the wet denim clinging to your legs like a second skin, but after a little bit of Joel’s help, you had them down to your ankles and Joel kissed you softly.

„Turn around,“ he hummed and you did, your hands on the edge of the table while you heard Joel’s belt unbuckle, followed from an annoyed huff that let you turn your head over your shoulder to find him too struggling to get his jeans off, making you smile to yourself until you saw him free his cock, his pants just so pushed down to get it out.

He looked at you with a bashful smile, before he took a step closer, his big hands moving over your ass.

„Gotta make this quick so I can get you home and out of those clothes,“ he said, before he wrapped one hand around his cock and lined himself up.

„This okay?“ He asked. He always did, every single time, needing to hear you consent after you told him about how you had been treated in the past.

„Yes,“ you nodded and he winked at you before slowly sinking into you, inch after inch of his cock filling you, stretching you, until he was nestled deep inside of you, his hips flush against your ass.

You turned your head back forward, letting it fall down, your eyes closing.

„Baby…“ he sighed, letting his head fall against your back. He kissed your spine before he began to move, finding a slow rhythm that had you positively losing your mind.

The rain was still falling hard, dripping down Joel’s back as he fucked into you.

„Need it harder,“ you whined, finding your back pushed against his chest the next moment, one of his hands across your chest, holding one of your tits as his thrusts got deeper. Faster. Harder.

You brought your hands up, both holding Joel’s arm that was across your chest as he fucked into you.

His lips found your neck, licking up the rain that was still dripping down your body and you whimpered.

He took a couple of steps back, pulling you with him until you were back outside in the rain, the warm drops hitting your flushed skin. You leaned your head back against Joel’s shoulder, your eyes opening to find the sun coming out just when Joel’s other hand slipped down between your legs, his hands covering your pussy, his fingers parted to feel how his cock entered you before he moved it in slow circles, stimulating your clit.

It was too much.

The rain, his cock fucking you, his hands all over you, his mouth sucking softly at your neck, in the middle of the garden you were working in every single day.

You came with a soft cry of his name, clenching around his cock, struggling to keep yourself on your feet as he continued to fuck into you.

„Good girl,“ he hummed against your ear, his hand on your breast tightening, groping, and you gasped.

„Wish you could cum inside me,“ you hummed and he cursed.

„Wish I could….“ You stopped yourself, not wanting him to know your deepest secret. Not before you had an actual talk about it.

„Wish you could what?“ He asked, his thrusts getting slower. He turned your head so you were looking at him and you were sucking your bottom lip in.

„Wish I could have your baby,“ you whispered, whimpering when you felt him twitch inside of you immediately, his eyes darkening.

„You want that?“ He asked and you nodded.

„Fuck,“ he groaned, beginning to fuck you again, somehow ever harder than before, both of his hands now on your tits as he pumped into you.

„You wanna have my baby?“ He asked.

„Want me to fuck you so full of me, until it takes?“ He grunted and you moaned.

„God yes. Yes please Joel. Fuck a baby into me,“ you whimpered and he groaned, his thrusts getting sloppier and you could feel him pulse inside of you before he pulled out, coming against your thigh, his head falling against your shoulder.

You were both panting, trying to fill your lungs with air while the rain around you seemed to finally slow down.

Suddenly nervous about what you said you were trying to form an excuse about it, when Joel spoke up.

„You really meant that?“ He asked, his voice soft.

Gulping you turned around in his arms, avoiding his eyes until he tilted your head up to him, so you had to look at him.

„I don’t… I guess I do? I… At first I thought it was just the fantasy about it, but the longer I thought about it….“ You mumbled.

„How long have you been thinking about it, sweetheart?“ He asked softly.

„Since I moved in?“ You said and he huffed before he shook his head with a soft smile on his lips.

„How about we get home and out of these wet clothes and talk about it?“ He asked.

Slowly you nodded and he kissed you, before he helped you get dressed, which was almost more complicated than getting out of the wet clothes before.

The rain had almost completely stopped as you made your way towards your shared house, Joel holding your hand, stealing glances at you as you looked towards the ground.

He would be lying if he said he hasn’t been thinking about it.

And yeah, maybe it was reckless, he wasn’t the youngest anymore. This world was not the best place to bring new life into.

And maybe it wouldn’t even work, having a baby.

But as he looked at you, with your shy smile on your lips, he knew he would give you everything you wanted to make you happy.

Both of you not knowing that that one time almost two months ago when you were out for patrol together and he had fucked you against a tree, the second he had pulled out to late was enough to already have you pregnant.

But you would found that out a month later.

#my fic #UndercoverAprilShowersChallenge #Joel Miller #Joel Miller x fem. reader #joel miller fanfiction #Pedro pascal #pedro pascal characters #fanfiction #fanfic #fan fiction #fan fic #tlou #tlou fanfiction

385 notes · View notes

satellitespinner · 27 days

Text

✼ mommy issues .. (two)

a/n: PLEASE READ CONTENT WARNINGS ! holy gyat i just ate good chilli and it made me wanna get pregnant ANYWAYS.. i was gonna add spice but i found out the girl i like had a crush on a dude so you get more angst:) enjoy

content warnings: ANGST readers child is described to have curly hair, reader is of spanish speaking descent. (or atleast speaks it.) we on some white people shit lowk… ellie is good with kids😍😍😍😍😍 reader works in a hospital! you kids lowk an ass.. ellie has another panic attack. ellie still sad. CANADA MENTIONED RAAAHHHHHHHH cat brought up!!!! we almost get a kith…. this bitch is not proofread

wc: 4.4k

taglist @flowersforvi @ellslvr @saturnsdrafts @3lli3l0v3r @williamssgirl @liasxeatt @adelaide013 @a-little-bit-of-everybody @elliessweetheart @pedropascalsbbg @ellies2missingfingers @nelzooo @r3starttt @jaeminpookie @onlinelesbo @tphmnv @p4ison1vy @pascals-doll @snowy-vee @diddiqueen @littlegingerperson5 @ellieslob @elliessluutt @macaroni676

a few days later ellie finds herself sitting in a booth at her work with her two colleagues. tonight was the first time she was going to babysit your son, and she was terrified

she found that in this moment was the first time her thoughts weren’t plagued of joel since he died.

“i swear! not even light years could dim such a woman.” ellie describes you as if you were a goddess. well, to her you were.

“can you shut the fuck up with that weird space shit and talk like a normal person?”

jesse scolds jokingly. he winces in pain as dina’s foot meets his shin under the table.

“whatever, dude. it’s true.” the girl sulks.

“hey! speaking of space nerd shit. how’s school going, el?” dina asks with a smile on her face.

little did she know the mere mention of school caused gut plummeting anxiety for ellie.

“uhh, it’s good. it’s- school, you know?.” ellie mutters, there isn’t much to say. besides the fact that she’s gonna fail if she doesn’t scrape together a thousand dollars for fucking textbooks.

sometimes ellie wondered if dina struggled with money. she works this shitty waitressing job for twenty bucks an hour, and she has a son. but then again, she didn’t have the burden of school on top of all her other responsibilities.

the table goes quiet after ellie’s response. she’s not one to open up about her personal life. she only told dina about joel dying a few weeks ago.

joel. joel.

ellies mind clouds over. like a switch that clicked, making her go from happy to sad in a matter of seconds. she was always like that.

“ellie?” she hears a feminine voice break her out of her trance. a sympathetic expression on dina’s face when ellie looks up at her.

“sorry. what did you say?” she throws in a fake smile to distract from the fact that she was on the brink of another panic attack.

the last time she had a panic attack at work she was so embarrassed she didn’t come in for a week.

“i asked if you needed a ride tonight. y’know cause of the baby sitting.” dina offers, again.

ellie thinks about arguing with the girl, but she decides against it. knowing she’ll just end up in dina’s passenger seat anyway.

“yeah that would be awesome. thanks.” ellie couldn’t help but feel even more guilty every time dina offered. she felt like she was taking advantage of her. even though she knew she wasn’t.

ellie huffs out of her cheeks before standing up from the booth. “time to get back to work.” she jokingly frowns. causing jesse to laugh.

“it was time to get back to work 10 minutes ago.” he corrects in a ‘told you so’ tone as they start walking back to their designated areas.

“fuck off.” she peers, stopping so dina can catch up to them. she sticks her tongue out at jesse when dina places a hand on her shoulder.

“what a gentlewoman, she’s gonna love you.” she whispers and shoots ellie a wink. leaving ellie flustered yet rolling her eyes.

6:45

you had to be at work in an hour and your son was not cooperating.

“felix!” you shriek, the child was running around with a cheeto you gave him 3 hours ago. you fight the urge to laugh at his un styled curls and grimey face, but your stern mom facade over rode.

“¡vuelve aquí niño sucio!”

(“come back here dirty boy”)

he continued to run wild like a chicken with no head. you start to get sick of his behavior and put your foot down.

“felix. now.”

he stops in his tracks at your stern tone. he sulks as he makes his way to you. you smile at his obedience.

you take his gross cheeto and toss it into the trash. he pouts at your action which causes you to scoff. “put that lip away, chiquito.” you tease him.

he lightens up fast. his sad attitude being replaced with a toothy smile. it was infectious. whenever he was happy, you were happy.

“there we go!” you laugh as you zip up his sweater. he scrambles away before you could wipe the dirt off of his face. you sigh.

you picked your battles with him.

you decided to shoot ellie a quick text, hoping to prepare her for your crazy kid.

ellie’s running around the house in hopes to baby-proof the place when she gets a text from you.

sexy neighbor: hey ellie! he’s almost ready, and please excuse the dirt on his face. i promise i’m not a bad mom lol.

she smiles and begins to type back.

ellie: all good haha, is there any specific allergies or things you need done tonight?

she shuts off her phone and continues to clean up, moving the whiskey on the counter into the high parts of her cupboard.

she runs to her room and changes into a pair of gray sweats and a clean hoodie.

sexy neighbor: nope no allergies! could you make him dinner? if it’s to big of an ask i can totally send something! just say the word.

ellie: oh absolutely. i already planned to make him dinner anyway.

sexy neighbor: oh wow thank you so much, you’re going to be a great babysitter i’m sure 😉

ellie’s cheeks heat up at the text. you were such a mom. she thought to herself. she was just going to like the message when another comes through.

sexy neighbor: he is insisting to bring his coloring supplies. i hope that’s okay..?

ellie: oh wow were going to get along well. that’s totally fine :)

sexy neighbor: thanks sweetheart

a few minutes ellie’s front door is being knocked on by a small hand. when she opens the door she’s met with a backpack clad felix and you. in scrubs.

“hi!” she exclaimed as soon as she opened the door, her words mostly directed at the young boy.

“hello!” your son replies quickly. “i brought toys for us to play with!” she tells her, like he’s known her forever.

“oh thank god.” she puts a hand over her heart as she crouches down to his level.

“toys r’ scarce around here..” she warns. felix looks at her confused, but you laugh.

ellie stands up and puts out her hand for the boy to take, which he does. you smile at the interaction before crouching down to him.

“te amo, cariño” you gently whispered into his ear as you give him a small peck.

you stand up quickly and pull ellie in for a quick hug as well.

“thank you, again.” you sighed into the hug as you expressed your gratitude. ellie smiled at you. she really wanted to kiss you right now.

“don’t sweat it, now get going mom. you’re gonna be late!” she jokes as she looks down at your son.

“you’re right. i should go.” you make your way to the car and get in. you roll down your window and blew kisses at your son, who was now in ellie’s arms. you shoot ellie a wink before taking off.

ellie puts your son down, keeping his hand interlocked with hers as she takes him inside.

“hey kid, does your mom speak spanish?”

—————————————————————-

you found yourself immediately trusting ellie when you first met her. her green eyes reminded you of your own sons.

you saw yourself in her quite a bit, you could tell she was hurting. when she opened up to you that night in your kitchen about her father you could tell.

she told you she had grown up without a mother and all you could think about was nurturing and comforting her like she deserved.

you also saw the way she looked at you.

ellie found great comfort in your sons presence. he distracted her from her usual routine, which wasn’t the healthiest..

currently, felix had ellie drawing each one of his toy cars.

“like this?” she asks, flipping the paper to show him her drawing of a red car.

“no!” he denies before showing his own. a paper full of scribbles with his name poorly printed at the top.

“ohhh.. i see.” she says before flipping the paper back to herself and scribbling atop her original drawing.

“like this?” she asks once again.

“yes!” he confirms. ellie laughs at his childish antics.

the boy had requested a grilled cheese sandwich for dinner around 8:30.

“yeah i could go for a grilled cheese right now.” ellie agrees as she pats his head.

ellie had mastered the art of cooking before she was 14. when joel started fostering her the first thing she asked him was if she could use the kitchen.

although she would do anything to do that for her career, in this economy there was no chance. so she settled on astrophysics. and boy was it expensive.

she just hoped that everything would work out and she could make joel proud.

your shift was fucking exhausting. first, some random psych patient spit in your face. then, you spilt coffee all over yourself not even halfway through the night.

you were ready to go home and see your baby.

you had texted ellie a few times throughout the night for updates and she replied with something positive every time.

ellie next door: yeah he’s fine don’t worry! hes coloring right now.

you: awh that’s my boy. i hope he’s not being to much.

ellie next door: nope not too much at all

ellie next door: *one attachment*

he says hi mama !

you: oh my god aweeeeeee you two are so cute.

you smiled and saved the image to your camera roll without hesitation. it was a picture of your son at ellie’s kitchen table, markers and paper littered her table.

the reflection of her on the black television caught her smiling widely as he waved at the camera.

you: did he eat anything yet?

ellie next door: yep! he requested a grilled cheese. he also had some snacks earlier.

you: perfectttt you’re a life saver!

ellie contemplates how she should respond to your message. she could start flirting or she could img fucking chill and be normal.

she chose the latter.

ellie next door: haha! it’s really no problem :)

ellie had put your son to bed in her bedroom rather than the couch. the kid had toddled in there before ellie could reach him.

she tried to chase him down but his curiosity made him fast and sneaky.

“get back here lil’ man!” she giggles as his tiny feet smack against the hardwood floors.

he giggles as he ran away from her, running into the first open door he sees, that being ellie’s room.

he was awestruck by the many comic book posters and the guitar in the corner of the room was where he was headed.

before ellie grabbed him, that is.

“i don’t think so.” she laughs as she picks him up with ease. gently tossing him onto the bed.

“you have a boys room. but you’re a girl.” the boy points out, not in a bad way. ellie could tell he was just stating what he saw.

“yeah thanks for telling me i didn’t know.”

by the time you arrived home the sun was about to come up, and you were fucking exhausted. you contemplated asking ellie to keep him the rest of the night, but you didn’t.

your kid, your responsibility. you reminded yourself. as you knocked on ellie’s door.

pajama clad ellie opens the door with a smile, welcoming you in immediately.

“hey ellie, how was it?” you ask with a yawn. she guides you over to her kitchen island. her house layout almost identical to yours.

ellie smiles and describes her night with your son in great detail. your heart melts at the way her face lights up during certain points of her story. she recalls how she chased him around after dinner and he insisted on sleeping in her room.

your reach into your purse and searched your wallet, you spoke as your hands fumbled in your bag.

“i really cannot thank you enough,” you begin, finally pulling out your wallet and pulling out a few twenties for ellie. she looks confused as you try to pass them to her, putting her hands out to decline.

“you already paid me, remember?” you nod - urging her to take the extra cash.

“i just wanted to give you a little extra.” you smile and ellie almost cries. she held it together though, she probably told you thank you about forty times before you laughed and told her it wasnt a problem.

ellie lead you to her bedroom to retrieve your son, who was dead asleep underneath her planet print bedsheets. ellies cheeks turned pink when you giggled and said; “nice sheets, el.”

you tried to gently wake your son but he wasn't having it. you grabbed his arm to pull him out of the bed. he groans and slides himself underneath the covers. you are fully on your knees at this point. “i swear, if you embarrass me.” you threaten in a whisper so ellie didn't hear, she still did.

ellie chuckled lowly. “he can sleep here, its pretty late anyways.” she smiled.

you slightly bit your lip. “are you sure?” it wasn't ellie that you didn't trust, it was your kid. ellie wasn't hearing it.

“positive.”

sleepovers at ellies became a recurring thing after that. your son was so excited everytime she babysat and it made your heart so full.

this time in particular your son was extra excited. ellie had promised him ice cream for not putting up a fight to leave the previous time.

usually she greeted you at the door with a smile and a hug. but this time she didn’t answer at all..

“mama where’s ellie?” your son asked. “i don’t know baby.” you reply with a raise of your eyebrow.

you saw her arrive home, you two even spoke briefly before she went in to unwind. she seemed dull today.

you knew something wasn’t right so you decided to go in. your son followed you close behind. you sat him on the couch and advised him not to move.

the house was dark. you slowly stepped down the hallway.

“ellie? honey?” you called out, to your surprise there was no reply. a shiver crept up your spine.

you walked until you were faced with her bedroom door. it was slightly open. so you knocked before you stepped inside.

“ellie?”

the door cracked open as you entered. you didn’t know what to expect but it definitely wasn’t that.

ellie was laying in her bed, fetal position. sobbing her brains out. you were surprised you didn’t hear her when you were walking down the hall.

she gasped for air as you rushed to her. you sit down and sit her up so her back is against the headboard.

“shh, you’re okay. i’m here.” those words, although comforting triggered even more tears to fall. she didn’t know what she was doing.

the girl screamed in your arms for what felt like forever and you just sat there and held her. you whispered sweet words into her ears and rubbed circles on her back.

eventually your son had run through the door. a little gasp leaving his lips at the sight of ellie.

“ellie are you okay!?” he practically screamed in her face. you took your free hand and tried to shove him out the door.

ellie’s loud cries turned into soft sniffles as he wouldn’t leave. your son practically jumped onto her to try and make her feel better. your heart drops but ellie just laughs and pulls him into a deep hug.

ellie looks to you as your son babbles absolute nonsense into her shoulder.

“i’m really sorr-“ she starts, but you instantly cut her off.

“absolutely none of that.” you say, in your mom voice. her eyes widen at your tone.

“can you stay with els while i make a quick phone call?” you ask your son. he stands up tall. “yes!” he nods as if he were superman. you and ellie both laugh.

ellie knew exactly what put her in that position. her entire day was fucked from the beginning.

she should've called out of work when she woke up from a dream nightmare about joel.

she couldn’t stop thinking about the dream while doing her morning routine, or skating to work. which ended with her on the ground and her board in half.

if that wasn’t enough, while she was on her shift her ex walks in.

“you’ve got to be kidding me.” she whisper-yells as she watches the black haired, tattoo ridden girl takes a seat. with a new girl.

there was no way in hell she was going to serve them. she couldn’t ask dina, her table kept sending back the food. ellie was ready to go over there and rip them a new one. she refrained.

jesse couldn’t, obviously. she wasn’t going to ask sam. she looked like she was also on the verge of tears. i guess everyone’s having a shitty day. she thought to herself as she walked over to cats table. except you.

“ellie! hey!” cat smiled, she wasn’t happy to see ellie, it was an evil smile. she was happy to terrorize ellie.

“i forgot you worked here!” she continues, earning an eye roll from ellie. sure you did, bitch.

ellie keeps it short and sweet. oh how badly she wanted to ask if this was her new girlfriend. but she didn’t.

“what can i get for you?” she asks, she didn’t even bother plastering a fake smile on her face.

cat and her whatever she is tell ellie there orders and she’s out of there. she doesn’t even give out her scripted response of.

“great choices! that’ll be right out for you!”

she just leaves.

when ellie returns with the two plates the pair look to be in deep conversation.

perfect ellie thought. she could just put down the food and get the fuck out of there-

“so how’s joel?!” cat asks, her lips pursed and her hands intertwined underneath her chin. ellie takes a deep breath. she should’ve docked cat in the face. she didn’t.

the fucking nerve that this bitch has.

ellie doesn’t reply. she turns around and speed walks back to the kitchen where she breaks down for the first time that day. dina ended up finding her and bringing her home early.

to top off her picture perfect fucking day. ellie gets home and finds a new email from her prof. she quickly skims through. as soon as she read the words “cost” and a four digit number, she was done.

her wobbly legs about to give out underneath her as she lays down on her bed. she takes a few deep breaths but it doesn’t help.

she didn’t even hear you come in. but soon enough you were rubbing her back and telling her that it was going to be okay.

she couldn’t help but cry more because the last person to comfort her like that was him.

eventually you calmed her down. you left for a few minutes and came back with a glass of water and a few pain killers.

“take these, your head must be killing you.” you sit down next to her and rub her back as she throws the pills back.

god. ellie felt like such a child.

“good girl.” you whisper as she takes a few more deep breaths. eventually calming completely. the comment didn’t pass hee though. her cheeks (among other things.) were suddenly hot and sticky from tears.

she turned to make eye contact with you, her eyes blood shot. you wondered how long she had been crying for.

the first words that left ellie’s mouth were simple. “did you still want that ice cream, lil man?” your son jumped up and down before grabbing her hand and pulling her off into the kitchen.

ellie had sat him down with a kind portion of chocolate ice cream before she walked up to you.

“hes more than welcome to sleep here tonight. if you don’t feel like picking him up.” she clarifies. her hands on her hips.

“oh ellie, i called out of work. we’re both staying.” ellie’s jaw drops. she instantly starts shaking her head in denial.

“no no you didn’t need to do that trust me, i’m really fine-” you pull her in for a hug to shut her up. you hold her tightly as she sighs into your shoulder.

“i’m sorry.” she whispers. you could only imagine how embarrassed she must’ve been.

“don’t be. you’re human.” you reassure her. you wanted to cry now too. you knew she was going through a bit of money trouble but how broken was this girl?

that night after your son went to bed you listened to ellie rant about her life for hours.

for the most part she held back tears but when she brought up joel you could tell it was hard.

you didn’t pry, or ask questions. you just listened. you listened to the good and the bad.

you two laughed when she told you about when she kissed her best friend riley, and then cried when she told you that riley had moved to canada and that they haven’t talked since.

you had told ellie about how you discovered you were a lesbian during your marriage.

you were bruh shocked to find your now ex-husband very cool with it.

she found out that you guys shared custody and he owned a house in a different part of the city. ellie was a bit envious of your seemingly normal life. you didn’t have to worry about money. atleast, not as much as she did.

you were nodding along as ellie told you about joel. joel had fostered ellie since she was twelve, he adopted her officially when she was sixteen.

she told you how he taught her the guitar, and let her get a tattoo before she turned eighteen.

ellie and joel’s relationship was rocky before he passed. ellie was going through that age where she needed a mother when she started acting out.

“i was always angry.” she confessed. “i would say the cruelest things to him and he would just,” she paused, looking for the right word. “he just took it.”

you frowned at this.

if you had known about any of this you would have never thrown your kid at her for half the week.

among the bad, you also learned a few interesting things about ellie.

she really liked to cook, and she was fucking good at it. you discovered that when she pulled out leftover pasta and served it to you like you were a member of the royal family.

eventually it was your turn to talk her ear off. however, there wasn’t much to tell, you thought.

“uhm- my favorite movie is tangled.” you laughed. ellie blew a raspberry.

“oh c’mon mama, you didn’t have like - a crazy childhood?” she asked. mama, huh?

you shrugged and spoke “not much to tell.” ellie rolls her eyes.

“alrighty then.” she ponders for a moment before speaking “you wanna watch a movie?” she asked, smiling like a fox. you felt your core tighten.

you accepted her offer and she reached out and helped you off her bar stool.

“what a gentle woman.”

“so i’ve been told.”

you and ellie didn’t settle on a movie. she sat you down and told you that you were watching tangled.

you put your hands up in defense. “if you insist.”

“i do insist.” she lays a soft pink blanket over the two of you as the movie begins.

“didn't picture you as much of a pink girl.” you state, covering your arms up with the blanket.

“m’ not, it’s just for you.” she says, her eyes only leaving the television to meet your own.

“just for me?” you ask, putting a hand over your chest in flattery.

“mhm” she replies with a wink and turns her focus back to the tv. it was your turn to feel flustered at her actions. she was quite the flirt apparently.

rapunzel was currently interrogating eugene when you turned to ellie.

“this is also his favorite movie.” ellie smiled at the fact. “is it really?” she laughed. not a condescending laugh, but more of a ‘that’s the cutest thing i’ve ever heard’ laugh.

“it is! he loves it so much, it’s adorable.” you tell her.

“you’re adorable” ellie accidentally admits. her face flushing when she’s noticed what she said.

she’s about to profusely apologize and possibly crawl in a hole and die when you giggle.

“i could say the same about you.” you whisper, shifting your body a little closer to her own. you were already close, but now your thighs were touching.

you tuck a piece of hair behind her ear, her eyes still on the screen. you burn holes in the side of her face. she doesn’t budge.

“ellie?” you whisper, you see her swallow before turning to look at you.

“y-yeah?” her pupils had dilated just a bit and you swore her freckles were more prominent. maybe you were a bit too close-

“you’re very pretty.” you tell her, your eyes darting from her eyes to her lips. then back to her eyes again.

ellie didn’t respond, instead she smirked and licked her lips. “yeah, you think so?” she asks, mostly rhetorically but you answer anyway. “i know so.”

ellie’s lips are dangerously close to your own when she slips her hand under your chin.

“i think you’re the prettiest.” she whispers. you almost didn’t hear her.

you're closing the gap between you two when you hear your sons sleepy voice come out of nowhere. you and ellie both quickly pull away from each other and she clears her throat.

“‘punzel!” he cheers, one of his pant legs riding up his leg, his hair all frizzled. you both light-heartedly laugh at the boys appearance.

“c’mere, baby.” you bring your arms out from underneath the blanket. open for him to crawl into. he obliged and crakes into your lap. you couldn’t even be mad at him for being up so late at this point.

ellie reached up and strokes his hair gently.

fucking cockblock

#˚ ༘♡ ⋆ mommy issues¡fic #ellie williams x reader #ellie tlou #ellie williams #tlou #tlou fanfiction #tlou2 #₊˚ʚ ᗢ₊˚✧ ﾟizzie writes!?#ellie x reader #ellie williams fluff #ellie williams x female reader #ellie williams x you #ellie williams fanfic #ellie x fem reader #ellie smut #ellie the last of us #ellie x you #ellie x y/n #ellie x mom reader

271 notes · View notes

cordeliawhohung · 8 months

Text

The Emptiness had Always Been There

Simon "Ghost" Riley x fem!Reader part 3 of "soft spot"

You dig the knife in deep. Simon isn't scared. Why isn't he scared?

Warnings: Alcohol, talk of sex, descriptions of an anxiety/panic attack, a little bit of PTSD, allusions to past dubcon, reader is a little traumatized, Ghost is a natural caretaker.

wc: 6.4k

“Are you sure you should be having another one?”

The half-raised glass of the fruity drink you had ordered at the bar stopped short of your lips at your co-workers question. She stared at you with that question heavy in her eyes as she glanced back and forth between you and your drink.

“Huh?” you asked, setting it down on the table.

“That’s almost your third, maybe fourth one of the hour. You’re gonna get pissed before we even get tipsy,” the other woman at the table teased.

Cheryl and Méabh. They were two of the girls at the bank who you were closest with, and they had both managed to rope you into a night out drinking. Or, at least you were drinking. They were still on the first drinks they had ordered nearly forty minutes ago.

Méabh was a sweet girl with bright eyes. He had only been working at the bank for about a year by that point. She worked there part time in the morning before her afternoon classes at university, but she always baked sweet pastries and made cute cards for everyone on their birthdays. Cheryl was a bit older than you, and gushed about her two children whenever she got the chance. She was as much of a motherly figure as you were going to get while living in London, and the concern in her eyes only reminded you of that fact.

“Yeah, of course. Probably should hold off a bit,” you said with a chuckle.

Truth was, by that point in the evening, you were already starting to feel the effects of the alcohol. Fruity drinks were the bane of your existence. They tasted too good, yet were full nearly to the brim with alcohol that would knock you on your ass by the end of the night. Every time you looked around, it was as if your head kept moving long after you had told it to stop.

Neither of the women in front of you were very covert in their glance at one another. The concern was practically seeping through their pores by that point, and it didn’t go unnoticed by you.

“Cheryl invited you out because she’s worried about you,” Méabh suddenly admitted, eyes landing back on you once more. “She thinks you’ve been more distracted than normal.”

“Jesus Christ, Méabh, you can’t just blurt that out,” Cheryl chastised the girl as if she were her own child.

“Don’t look at me like that. We’ve been here for almost an hour and you haven’t even brought it up yet,” Méabh retorted. “It’s getting late, and I’ve got my tutoring job in the morning.”

Really, you hadn’t expected something like that from Méabh. She was always so reserved, despite her cheerfulness, and though she didn’t sound angry, she was certainly assertive.

“Distracted?” you repeated, your hand reaching out to absentmindedly grab your near empty glass. “As in like, at work, or…?”

Cheryl turned her attention back to you, her gaze softening at the concern in your voice. “Well, not necessarily. It’s just… you’ve been acting like you’ve got something on your mind lately.”

You could feel heat begin to rise to your cheeks, and you weren’t quite sure if it was because of the slight embarrassment or the alcohol. Either way, you lifted the glass off the table and took a quick sip before setting it back down.

“Oh. Well, I guess, maybe a little?” you said, unsure.

Both of the women hummed and nodded their heads in understanding, but their eyes still held something else behind them. More questions they wanted to ask. The silence that stretched between the three of you made you want to down the remainder of your drink.

“How are things with you and Simon?” Méabh asked, her soft smile radiating the corner of the bar you found yourselves in.

Simon. Simon Riley. Over the last few months that the two of you had been together, you learned quite a lot about that man. Earl Grey tea was his favorite, and so painfully stereotypical of him (not that you could blame him, as you fancied yourself a vanilla tea misto on particularly cold days). He would shiver every time you kissed the scar on his cheek. He hated Christmas, but whenever you asked him why he told you he always thought it was tacky (this was a lie, and you knew it, but you refused to push him on it). If he had family, he didn’t talk about them, but would mention small details about the members of the task force he was a part of.

Despite how quiet he could be at times, he was absolutely charming, albeit a bit cocky in a way. He was confident, and showered you with as much love and affection he could offer you whenever he wasn’t off on the other side of the world. On Valentines day, he sent you flowers at work (unsigned, of course, but you knew who they were from), and when you had gotten sick with the flu he provided you with all the medicine you would need (despite the fact you told him not to worry about it).

He was tall, and towered over every other person you ever knew, and he always came back with some sort of wound from his missions. In a way, he should have terrified you. Yet he was so soft with you, so sweet. He nearly shattered someone's jaw only to walk you home afterwards. He was everything you could have ever wanted, and maybe more than what you deserved.

And yet, there was still something in the back of your mind. This terrible, burning feeling that whispered to you day and night. That seed of doubt had been planted in you long ago. Someone had come in and taken their trowel, cutting you straight to the core where they shoved that terrible, decaying feeling deep inside you before patting it over, leaving it to fester.

But you weren’t about to spill that to your co-workers.

“They’re great. Yeah, things are good,” you answered, mustering a tight lipped smile.

“It’s the sex, isn’t it?”

Horrified, Méabh looked at Cheryl with wide eyes and mouth agape. “Bloody hell,” she breathed. “You yell at me for blurting out that we’re concerned about her, but you casually ask if she’s getting shagged?”

“Well, I certainly worded it more tactfully than that.”

Well, now the heat in your face was for sure from embarrassment. Your hand once more grasped around your drink and you shook your head before quickly taking a few large gulps. The sight of it only made Cheryl grin, and she leaned her elbows on the table.

“But I’m right, aren’t I?” the woman pushed. “I’ve been on this earth long enough to know that sex can make or break a relationship. So, what is it? Your needs not being met, or what?”

You averted your gaze from them and instead turned your attention to the table. It was made of some sort of faux wood that had deep gashes in it from god knows what. The multicolored lights that were strung up around the ceiling of the bar reflected slightly off of the dull plastic, and they started to blend together in a shade that made your stomach feel queasy.

Maybe you really should have laid off the drinks.

“We haven’t… we haven’t had sex,” you admitted softly, biting the corner of your lip.

“Oh,” Cheryl said, surprised. “How long have the two of you been dating?”

“Since the end of January, so… four? Five months?” you threw out a guess, unable to think straight between the pressure of the conversation and the alcohol rotting your stomach.

The woman nodded her head as she reached up and shoved some of her greying hair behind her ear. “Well, that should be plenty of time. Just nervous or what?”

“God, wouldn’t you be?” Méabh interjected. “You’ve seen the size of that guy. He’d probably break the bed and your goddamn hips with it.”

Cheryl threw the girl a look of warning as your face fell into your hands. A groan huffed from your chest as you heavily rubbed at your eyes.

“God, I don’t wanna think about that,” you slurred.

Leaning over the table, Cheryl gave your shoulder a firm, motherly squeeze while offering a sympathetic smile. “What’s the matter then, darling?”

Your hands fell from your face, and you stared at the table once more as you thought. It felt like that’s all you ever did those days; think. Think and think and think and god, it was getting annoying. Worms infested your brain, whispering terrible lies and sickening worries so much so that their thoughts had replaced your own.

“I just, I don’t know. After everything with Eric I guess I’m maybe a little apprehensive? Or something?” you rambled. “Which is, like, stupid because they're nothing alike. Like, I know Simon looks scary and he’s in the military and he’s quiet but… fuck he’s… he’s so good to me, you guys.”

Eric, your ex, was… less than perfect. It was impossible to expect anyone to be perfect, but between the arguing, and the fighting, and the bruises and the degrading… Even before all that had started, back in the honeymoon phase, back before everything started going wrong, he had always put his needs above your own. It was almost as if the man had never heard of aftercare before in his life at all. Once he was finished, then so were you, and you were left behind to clean up the mess he made of you, and everything else.

But Simon was different. He had to be different. Because in reality, you were terrified of getting that close with someone again. Of being used and tossed aside. And yet you panicked and told yourself that if you didn’t give in soon, maybe he would get bored of you, and you would end up all alone in that big city in your big apartment that you were struggling to afford.

Fuck, were you going to cry?

Once more the rim of the glass cup came to your lips and you took another thick gulp to distract yourself before quickly blinking the moisture out of your eyes. Whatever horror that had been painted onto Méabh’s face was replaced with the same concern Cheryl wore. Even though it felt nice to have someone worry about you, the last thing you wanted was their pity.

“Hey, it’s alright to be anxious,” Méabh assured you. “Eric was a prick. You’ve every right to be worried.”

Cheryl nodded her head in agreement. “But at the same time, don’t let that hold you back if it’s what you want. Keyword, what you want. Take all the time you need, but you can’t let that arsehole control you forever.” She took a moment to pause and look you over, and a small smirk appeared on her face. “Or, just dive headfirst into it. I think you’ve got enough liquid courage coursing through you for that.”

It was a joke, and a poor one at that, but you were thankful for it nonetheless. You laughed a silly, unfiltered laugh and the two women beamed at you. Whatever concern they had for you previously seemed to melt away as they changed the spotlight of the conversation away from you. Cheryl told a story about how her first marriage ended, and though the events weren’t funny, the way she told the story was. Perhaps in an attempt to make you feel better, Méabh indulged in her countless failed relationships with both the men and women she had met while at university.

Eventually, the three of you had stayed there so long the bartender was beginning to grow a little impatient, giving you eyes that screamed for you all to just let him go home already. So you downed the rest of your drink and began to get some cash out of your bag, but as you went to stand up it felt like the floor was moving from underneath you.

“Whoa,” Méabh warned, gently pushing you back into your chair. “Take it easy, babe. I’ll take the cash up for you.”

Huffing, you obliged, and sat back at the table like a child as they helped you pay for the drinks you had indulged in too greatly that night. When they returned, they started to grab their own bags as they fumbled for their car keys.

“Need a ride?” Méabh asked.

You shook your head. “Nah, I walked here.”

Both of them froze, and after sharing glances with one another, Cheryl looked at you and crossed your arms. “You’re taking the piss outta me if you think we’re going to let you walk yourself home. Now you either come with one of us, or you call that boy of yours to come get you.”

A small scoff escaped your lips as you rummaged through your bag in search of your phone. “Boy…” you muttered, pulling your phone out and scrolling until you found Simon’s contact. “Six foot, four inches, and you’re calling him a boy.”

Simon picked up on the third ring. Even after the few months the two of you had been together, you couldn’t get over the sound of his voice. The shitty audio quality of the phone didn’t do him full justice, but just hearing the lilt of his Manchester accent had you nearly falling out of your seat.

“Yeah, sweetheart?”

You swallowed hard. “Hey, uhm… I went out with a few friends from work and uh… I know it’s late, and I’m sorry but-”

“Need a ride?” he interjected, cutting you off in the middle of your drunken ramble. Not in a rude way, but in a way that was more finishing your thought process. Or maybe he could just tell what you were working up towards asking by the slur of your words.

“Yes,” you said with a breathy laugh. “Yes, please.”

He hummed, dark and low and in a way that the phone hardly picked it up, but it was there. “The one on twenty-first?”

You nodded your head and stayed silent for a short moment. When he hadn’t responded, you blinked a few times to try and clear your mind, trying to remind yourself that you were, afterall, on the phone. “Sorry, yes, yes. Twenty-first.”

“I’ll be right there,” he assured you.

When you two said your goodbyes, you looked up at your co-workers with a toothy grin. Once they were certain you would be alright, you said your goodbyes before they left to go back to their own homes and families and lives. As you sat waiting for Simon, your eyes couldn’t help but wander back to your empty glass.

What had that been? Was it really your fourth? Or had it been your fifth? You couldn’t remember, but it must have been. And you must have drank it quickly too, because even though you had stopped drinking maybe thirty minutes ago, it was as if the backlog of all the liquid you had chugged was finally hitting you. Your stomach was starting to spin as fast as your head was, and you had to take a deep breath to try and steady your frayed nerves.

Or, just dive headfirst into it. I think you’ve got enough liquid courage coursing through you for that.

“Fuck…”

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

You didn’t have to wait long for Simon to come pick you up, and he practically had to carry you to his car. It wasn’t a secret that he was concerned for your wellbeing, as the moment his eyes landed on you he almost looked a little scared, and so you did your best to ease his nerves by doing the only thing you knew best; talk. So you talked and giggled over everything and nothing the entire drive back to your apartment. You weren’t quite sure if he even responded to half of the things you said, but you weren’t talking to entertain him, anyways.

Things weren’t much different by the time you actually arrived home. Stairs proved to be a challenge for you, and you found your breath being stolen by the way Simon rested his hand on your lower back to keep you steady. He walked a few steps behind you, watching you carefully in case you should fall. By the time you made it to the landing, he had to be the one to put the keys in the lock for you as you kept missing and scraping it along the side of it.

The very moment the door was open, you tossed your bag somewhere on the floor before making a beeline to the couch. If you stayed on your feet any longer, you felt like you really were going to fall over, and you weren’t trying to embarrass yourself that much in front of Simon that night.

“Thanks for the ride,” you sighed as you sunk back into your, frankly, uncomfortably sofa. “Sorry it’s so late.”

“Don’t be,” he said, adjusting the straps of his mask. “I don’t want you to ever hesitate to call me if you need me.”

A soft hum rumbled in your chest as you watched Simon walk further into the living room after ensuring the deadbolt was locked. God, just the sight of him sent your mind spinning, and the alcohol wasn’t helping. His mussed hair, those broad shoulders that could engulf you in a simple squeeze, and that damn tattoo peeking out from underneath the sleeve of his sweater.

You smiled softly as he knelt in front of you, his eyes glancing to your feet. Even with him knelt down he was hardly much shorter than from where you were sitting on the couch.

“Gonna muck up the floors,” he muttered softly.

You watched him as he carefully reached for your shoes where he undid the laces, only struggling a little bit with the double knots. His hand gently grabbed your ankle, lifting your leg up just enough to slide the shoe off before carefully setting it back on the ground. Your heart pounded so violently in your chest you swore you felt it palpitate. How could he be so soft with you?

“It’s fine. I can always clean them,” you said as he set your shoe to the side.

“You’re not going to want to,” he retorted.

Once he started on your second shoe, you found yourself enamored by his face. Or what you could make of it through that mask he always wore. With it nearing summer, he wasn’t wearing the balaclava as much, and opted for the surgical style cloth mask that was a bit more accepted. You liked it more because it showed his hair. But what you really wanted to see was his face. All of it. The slight stubble on his face, the cheeks that you loved to pepper with kisses and caress with your thumbs…

Before you knew it, your finger was hooked underneath the fabric of his mask, which caused him to pause midway through taking your shoe off. Yet he then continued as if nothing happened, and your shoe slid off with ease. When your feet were finally free from the confines of your shoes, and the floor no longer being assaulted by the dirt from outside, Simon looked up at you, his eyes shining as your finger stayed hooked under his mask.

Reading your mind wasn’t difficult, as you were practically asking out loud for it. Simon reached his hands up and in one smooth motion pulled his mask off before setting it on the arm of the couch next to you. A grin broke out on your face as your hand instantly made its home against the flesh of his cheek.

“You’re so handsome,” you said, nearly cooing.

He didn’t break eye contact with you as his hands slowly reached for your shoes, taking them in his hands before he slowly stood up. “I know.”

You huffed as he shot you a playful smirk before walking towards the entryway and placing your shoes against the wall next to his boots. You watched him carefully; how small your shoes looked in his hands, how the fabric of his sweater stretched against his back as he leaned forward, the way his hands rubbed at the back of his neck as he disappeared into the kitchen.

“You’re awfully modest, you know that?” you called out to him in a teasing tone.

Simon let out his own small huff before it was smothered by the sound of running water. “Haven’t been called that in a while,” he mused. Moments later he returned back through the doorway, a cup of water in hand, which he held out to you the moment he was near the couch. “Drink.”

When you reached for the cup the first time, you nearly missed. Giggling your blunder away, you held out both of your hands instead, trying to keep as steady as possible as you then brought the glass to your lips. It was refreshing to have the cool taste of water wash over your tongue rather than the sugary, and somewhat biting taste of alcohol. It didn’t do much to wash away the aftertaste of everything you had drank at the bar, but it was enough.

While you sipped away, Simon slowly lowered himself into the spot next to you on the sofa. It was the usual thing the two of you did whenever you were craving a night in. Slight cuddling on the sofa, watching something on the television, trying not to fall asleep. But this time you couldn’t look away from him. The way he placed his arm along the back of the couch, resting behind your head; the way his shirt stretched over the expanse of his chest; all of it drew you in.

“See something you like?” Simon asked, brow raised slightly as he continued to tease you as usual.

Why did you feel so… queasy? That twisting feeling in your stomach, and that spinning feeling in your head. Vision constantly rotating so fast your body couldn’t keep up. Was it the alcohol? No, alcohol never made your heart lurch like that. Never made it beat so fast that it felt like it was going to tear itself to shreds. Was it Simon?

Just dive headfirst into it.

You took your eyes off of Simon long enough to set your cup on the side table next to you, and then in an instant you were swinging your leg over to straddle his hips. He looked up at you with his mouth slightly parted in surprise as he watched you settle yourself onto his lap. Instinctively his hands came to rest on your waist, helping to steady your slight swaying as you put your arms on his shoulders.

“Easy, sweetheart,” he said, his voice low as his eyes scanned your face.

Something in his eyes softened as he looked at you. Whatever playfulness or cockiness that had been there before melted away as his grip on you became more firm. His eyes were beautiful, and honestly, they were probably your favorite thing about him. Sometimes, when the sunlight hit them just right, the dark brown color would brighten to that of sweet honey. In a way, it was ironic that a man of his nature could hold so much softness to him. But you found you also liked it when the color of his eyes were dark. So dark that they looked endless, as if his irises were some void inviting you in.

But everything started to fall apart after that. You could feel it in your trembling legs and the pressure building behind your eyes. Everything was too fuzzy. Too bright. Too soft. Too loud. God, it was loud. Deafening. It was too much. Too everything. It was everything all at once. Except for Simon. He was beautiful. So beautiful, so soft, so careful.

How you wanted to fall into him. To fall and fall and let his arms catch you. To hold you. To pin you. Pin you and pin you. Feel his teeth graze against you and take. And take and take and take. Would it… hurt? Did you want it to hurt? Did you like it when it did? Like it did when you were with him? Him? With Eric? Face into the mattress, palm of his hand pushing you down. He was always so greedy. And greedy and greedy and greedy.

You can’t let that arsehole control you forever.

In a last ditch attempt to get your nerves under control, you gripped the collar of his shirt with both of your hands before descending on him with your eyes shut tight. Flesh collided with your lips but it felt empty. It felt cold. It wasn’t like the kisses Simon normally gave you. It was wrong.

When you opened your eyes, you found that you hadn’t even made it halfway to Simon’s lips before something stopped you. His hand. It pressed firmly against your mouth, holding you back away from him. He wasn’t pushing you away, he had only created a barrier. A line. And he wasn’t going to let you cross it.

“You’re drunk,” he said. It sounded so funny to hear him say it. Like it wasn’t obvious. But that’s not what he meant when he said it, and you knew it. It was an answer. It was him saying no.

His hand lingered on your mouth for a moment and he didn’t pull it away until you nodded your head. A part of you felt ashamed. No, all of you felt ashamed. What were you thinking? Had you even been thinking at all? Was he going to see you as some idiot? Some stupid girl?

You fucking minx.

“Sorry,” you stuttered out, your voice trembling. “I, uhm… I didn’t mean…”

Simon hushed you. Not to interrupt you (as there wasn’t much to interrupt to begin with,) but to soothe you. It wasn’t until he did this that you felt the moisture starting to stain your cheeks, and his hand returned to your face once more to wipe at the tears there.

“Come here,” he urged as his hand slowly pulled you closer.

Before you knew it you were against his chest where his hand held the back of your head, keeping you firmly tucked underneath his chin. While his hand rubbed soothing circles into your scalp, his other arm stayed wrapped firmly around your waist, making you feel secure against him despite the fact that everything still felt like it was rotating and trying to drag you along with it.

You didn’t want to cry, but you did. An embarrassing amount, at that. It was mostly silent with sniffles here and there as the proof of your sorrow soaked into the fabric of his shirt. He didn’t say anything, and you were honestly glad he didn’t. You didn’t need to be questioned at that moment, or talked through anything. All you needed was the firm reminder that you were there with him.

Once your sniffling and hiccuping stopped, Simon’s hands slowly began to move down your body. His touch ran down your spine in smooth, solid motions, and you felt your body begin to go limp. The drowsiness of the alcohol began to shut down your nerves in a rolling blackout, and eventually it felt like every part of you was fried.

Never had you felt so empty before. No, the emptiness had always been there, looming in the dark chasm of your chest. You had just filled it with so much junk, so much nonsense so that for some fleeting moment you could forget about the gaping hole left where your stomach was supposed to be. But Simon had torn out that unnecessary waste and stared straight into that emptiness inside of you.

For some reason, he didn’t seem scared.

Why wasn’t he scared?

And so the two of you stayed like that with your legs still straddling his hips but the side of your face pressed against his newly damp shirt. Eventually the movement of his hands stopped and he just held you, still not saying anything. There was nothing but you, him, and the silence. Of course there was still the festering wound in your stomach, eating you alive from the inside out, but for that moment, that short, fleeting moment, you pretended that it wasn’t there.

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

When the morning sun hit your face, you thought it wasn’t real. It was warm, and felt like liquid gold against your eyelids, just like in the way poets always described it. However, all its softness and grace did nothing to wash away the terrible ache that smothered your body. Your head was the apex of the pain, but it quickly radiated in waves down your neck, your spine, seeping into the very fiber of your bones.

For a moment you laid there, head on the pillow, splayed on your back, staring up at the ceiling. The window was open, which was strange because you didn’t remember opening it before bed. In fact, you didn’t remember going to bed at all. Birds chirped in some tree, and you could make out the vague sounds of people shuffling about, enjoying their weekend.

Then there was the rustling of paper bags. Brows furrowing, you propped yourself up on your elbows, trying to restrain the groan threatening to leave your throat at the movement. The door to your room was closed, muffling the sound coming from your kitchen, but it was still distinct nonetheless.

In several slow and painful movements, you slid out of bed where your feet landed on the wooden floor. You were still wearing socks for some reason, which you found odd. In fact, you were still wearing every bit of clothing that you had worn the previous day. They felt heavy with sweat and with every emotion you drowned in.

You turned your attention back towards your bedroom door where you carefully walked to it. The rustling of the paper bags grew louder once you opened it, and you quietly trudged down the hallway until you reached the kitchen.

Simon stood in front of your fridge, bent over slightly as he shoved items into the shelving on the side of the door. Several bags were sprawled out on your counter where some grocery items laid between them like some odd mosaic. It didn’t take long for Simon to realize you were standing in the doorway, and he turned to you for a moment, mask obscuring his face.

“How’re you feeling?” he asked as he went straight back to putting away those groceries.

“Not great but… better than last night,” you admitted.

Your attention turned back to the groceries, confused. You certainly didn’t buy them, as the gods knew you couldn’t afford that much food.

“Did… did you buy these yourself?” you questioned.

Without turning to you, Simon opened up your breadbox where he quickly shoved a loaf of wheat bread inside. “Went to try and make breakfast for you, but when I was going through your pantry I realized there was fuck all for ingredients,” he answered nonchalantly.

A pit formed in your stomach at that realization. He really did go out and buy you food. With his own money. Not only had you made a fool of yourself that previous night, but now he had gone and filled up your pantry for you.

“You didn’t have to do that,” you mumbled as your feet finally carried you fully into the room.

Without wasting time, you started to rummage through the bags, pulling out items and searching for a new home for them. But you didn’t make it very far before Simon hummed and grabbed the item from your hands.

“Nuh uh,” he said softly as he placed the item back down. He then motioned towards a small bag on the edge of the counter. A cute emblem of some sort of pastry was printed on the front of the bag. “Don’t worry about this. I need you to eat.”

Arguing with him was useless, and you knew it, so you did as he asked. You grabbed the bag and moved towards the stove where you leaned against the side of it as you dug into the bag. A still warm strawberry danish laid inside, and you wasted little time biting into it while Simon continued to work.

It felt… oddly domestic. As if the two of you had done this a million times before. But there was some sort of stench in the air. A tension that threatened to drown you, and you knew exactly what was causing it.

Swallowing the bite of pastry you took, you softly prompted the conversation; “I’m sorry about last night.”

Completely unphased by your words, Simon continued to work, having nearly finished finding a place for everything in your once empty cupboards. “Nothing to be sorry about.”

What a lie. There was so much to be sorry about, so much you felt sorry for. Or if not sorry, then at least ashamed about. Even your nights worth of sleep couldn’t get rid of that taste in your mouth.

“Did you go home?” you questioned.

He shook his head. “Camped out on your sofa after putting you to bed. Thought it would be best that you weren’t alone.”

While the image of Simon trying to scrunch himself into a comfortable position on your tiny, two seater sofa would have made you laugh any other day, you found yourself another reason to feel guilty again. His neck probably ached from it, and you knew he couldn’t have gotten decent sleep because of it.

“Why did you stop me?” you then asked.

The last bag of groceries had been put away, and Simon stopped his pacing around the kitchen to lean against the counter on the other side of the room from you. His hands rested flat against the surface of the counter, torso leaning forward some so that his head would hit the cabinet behind his head.

“You were drunk,” he said simply.

He wasn’t wrong, but then again, it never exactly stopped others before him. But he wasn’t like them. Like him. A part of you felt guilty for even expecting something like that from him. No, you hadn’t been expecting it; it’s just what you had gotten used to.

“Don’t… don’t you want to have sex with me?” you then asked softly.

Simon’s expression changed only a little, but it spoke volumes. His eyes softened while the muscles in his arms tensed. He continued to look at you for a moment, the silence enveloping the both of you, before he reached up and pulled his mask off of his face, tossing it onto the counter.

It wasn’t until he started walking up to you that you realized just how tense your body had become, too. The poor pastry in your hands had almost crumbled into dust by the time he stopped in front of you. You had never seen him so serious before. But he wasn’t angry, or upset, just sincere. And maybe a little sad.

“If we ever have sex, it’s not going to be like that,” he said, speaking it as if it was a fact. “Not with you drunk. Not with you looking at me like that.”

A lump formed in your throat, and when you tried to swallow it you almost choked. “Like what?” you pressed, forcing yourself to hear his answer.

“Like you’re terrified.”

God, if you didn’t feel gutted before, you definitely did then, and you couldn’t look at him any longer. In an excuse to look away, you turned slightly and set your half-eaten pastry back in the wax paper it had come out of. Was this the part where you bared yourself? Stripped yourself down so he could count up all the scars? Ripped off your skin just to show him how deep they went?

“I’m sorry.” The words came sputtering out of your mouth like a rusty faucet. Overused. Well known. Repeated too often. “I don’t know what came over me, or why I was trying to… I don’t know…”

Simon shook his head and a hand came up to brush against your arm. Once your eyes met his, he shook his head again as his eyes carefully scanned your face.

“You don’t have to explain yourself,” he said while his thumb carefully traced the side of your bicep. “Not to me. Not to anyone.”

How did you end up there? In the kitchen, leaning against the stove, fresh bags of groceries put away by a man who wasn’t mumbling about the annoyance of it? What did you do to find yourself standing so close to the person you loved and not be terrified at the same time? It was new, and it felt nice. So nice, and so scary at the same time.

Your arms made their home around his torso, and Simon was quick to return the gesture. He pulled you into him, trying to take the weight of it all off of you. You breathed in the scent of him and realized he was beginning to smell like home. The place where you ran to when everything else was too loud. You could be petrified in his arms for all of eternity and be perfectly satisfied.

“Thank you,” you choked out.

As he held you in that kitchen, the one with the freshly stocked cupboards, the one that stood just next to the entryway with the freshly patched hole in the wall, you kept replaying his words. They echoed over and over in your head.

If we ever have sex, it’s not going to be like that.

If we ever have sex. If. It was a promise to be different, but not a promise that it would ever happen at all. There was no pressure, no ulterior motives, it just was.

For the first time in your life, you found comfort in the uncertainty of it all.

#fanfiction #simon riley x reader #ghost x reader #mw2 x you #mw2 x reader #ghost mw2 #simon riley x you #simon ghost riley x you #mw2 fanfic

448 notes · View notes

jessybarnes · 9 months

Text

Bunker Nights

Fandom: Supernatural

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Reader

Rating: 18+ Only! Minors DNI!

Tags: Angst, mentions of past physical and emotional abuse, nightmares, panic attacks, eventual fluffy smut, and protective!Dean

Betas: @winecatsandpizza

Word Count: 4,667

Fic Aesthetic: Yours Truly

A/N: This is a repost from my old Tumblr account. I am in the process of transferring all of my fics over to this one. I hope you enjoy :)

One year.

It had been exactly one year since you ended it with Tyler and you still suffered from the aftershocks of the abuse. Even though your body and mind weren't subject to his fists or harsh words, you still felt worthless. Every day the memories of the torture you went through filled your mind.

The moment you met Sam and Dean in the shitty hole-in-the-wall bar, your personalities clicked. You needed a distraction and somewhere to live, and they needed help in their line of work. So when they offered to let you stay and help them hunt you agreed without hesitation.

Finally, things seemed to be looking up for you, or so you thought. Two weeks after moving into the Bunker, the nightmares started.

These weren't just any run-of-the-mill bad dreams either. No, in these dreams, Tyler was torturing and trying to kill you. The vividness left you screaming and crying in your sleep almost nightly. The nightmares plagued your mind every time you went to sleep.

Neither of the brothers said anything to you about it, so you tried to pretend everything was fine. It was one of the hardest things you've had to do if you were being honest with yourself. The physical training alone sometimes brought on a panic attack. Even though you knew Sam and Dean weren't trying to harm you, your mind was starting to become your biggest enemy.

You could tell they wanted to ask you about it, but they also knew that you weren’t one to talk about your past. The only thing you told them was that you and Tyler had a rough breakup. The thought made you laugh. Calling it a rough breakup was putting it very mildly.

The day before your first hunt went surprisingly well. You went the entire day without any panic attacks or a questioning glance from either of the Winchesters. Even though you couldn’t remember the last time you slept, it didn’t stop you from humming in the kitchen while you cooked everyone dinner. Not to mention, the copious amounts of makeup you used to make yourself look less like a zombie. You made a mental note to get some more of the coverup you hid your dark circles with.

Sam rounded the corner as you filled everyone’s plates, one of his eyebrows rising quizzically.

“You’re extra happy tonight, Y/N.”

You shrugged and continued to hum as Dean joined you both at the table.

“Yeah, what’s gotten into you? You win the lotto or somethin’?”

You gave them both your signature eyeroll and took a pull of your beer.

“What? I can’t be in a good mood now?”

Sam cleared his throat and looked over at his brother before staring back at you, concern evident in his eyes.

“Of course you can, Y/N. Dean and I … well, we’ve noticed that you’ve been having nightmares.”

Your eyes narrowed to thin slits. If this was their attempt to keep you from going on tomorrow’s hunt, then they had better think again.

“I’m. Fine."

You enunciated your words, making sure to look at both of them sternly. Sam scoffed and set his drink down.

“I don’t call it fine when you wake up almost every night screaming, Y/N”

All you wanted was one day, one day where you could just forget about the grim night that awaited you.

“They’re just dreams, and I’m going tomorrow no matter what. I’ve been training for this day for months, and a stupid nightmare isn’t going to bench me.”

The hostility in your voice caught them off guard, and you suddenly weren’t hungry anymore. You pushed the contents of your plate around with your fork, the awkward silence becoming more deafening by the second. Dean was the first to break it, his soothing tone of voice practically making you sick to your stomach. You knew they wanted you to stay home, and it pissed you off even more that your brain somewhat agreed with them.

“Look, Y/N, we just wa-”

You slammed your fists on the table cutting him off mid-sentence.

“ENOUGH! I’m not here to be your charity case! I came here to hunt, not for you to feel sorry for me!”

Before either of them could say anything you had stormed down the hallway to your room. Slamming the door for good measure, you finally let yourself unleash the angry tears you’d held back. You knew they were only trying to help, but being pitied didn’t sit with you well. You’d grown accustomed to it after being with Tyler for so many years, and it made you feel like everyone was hypersensitive to your feelings.

Once the tears stopped, you were left exhausted and feeling numb. Falling asleep right after an outburst would definitely bring on a nightmare, so you opted for a long hot shower instead. The moment the water cascaded over your skin you felt the stiffness in your muscles leave your body. You spent extra time massaging your scalp and even used your lavender soothing body wash to help calm your nerves.

Finally, in your pajamas, you slid beneath your covers and sighed deeply. Couldn’t you just have one day where you didn’t have someone worrying about you? Deciding not to dwell on it any longer, you turned the bedside light off and let yourself fall asleep.

Fear, raw fear coursed through your body as you ran. You’d just told Tyler you wanted to see other people and he’d tried to force himself on you so you’d stay. He pinned you against the wall, his breath reeked of stale beer as he kissed down your neck. The feeling of his lips made you shiver with disgust. When he reached for the hem of your shirt, you raised your knee hard and fast hitting him right where it counted.

Tyler yelled in pain as you broke free, running as fast as you could to the door.

“Ow, FUCK! God Dammit, Y/N! Come back here you fucking bitch!”

Cold air hit your face as you ran barefoot into the woods behind your home. Branches hit your exposed skin leaving little cuts in their wake. You could hear Tyler shouting after you as you found refuge behind a big tree trunk. Your chest heaved and you shivered as you tried to stay still and quiet.

Tyler’s footfalls and yelling became louder by the second, and you were sure he could hear the thundering of your heart. Just as you thought you were in the clear, strong arms boxed you in, the bark of the tree cut into your back as Tyler stared menacingly down at you.

“There you are… you pathetic little slut. You shouldn’t have done this, Y/N. You should have just come home like the good little bitch you are and kept that pretty, little mouth shut.”

His fingers grazed your cheek briefly before his mouth was on your own, the taste of his tongue made you almost vomit.

“Now, we could have done it back at the house, but seeing as how you made a scene, I think I’ll just take you right here.”

You tried to push, shove, kick, anything to get him off you, but it was of no use. He began to forcefully rid you of your clothes, and all you could do was scream. Scream for anyone to help you.

“Stop! Please, Tyler!”

Sobs racked your body as he pawed roughly at your skin. You could feel him now, shaking you, calling your name.

“No! Just leave me alone!”

You bolted upright in your bed, a cool sheen of sweat covered your skin and the sheets. Dean knelt in front of you, concern etched in his features.

“Y/N! It’s okay! It’s me… it’s Dean.”

You blinked a few times before covering your face with your hands, tears of relief streaming down your cheeks.

“D-Dean… I’m… I’m s-sorry for waking you up. I… It was just another d-dream.”

You tried to sound confident between your sobs, but you knew he wouldn’t buy it. Hell, even you knew how pathetic you sounded. Ever so slowly Dean sat on the foot of your bed, his hand coming to rest gently on your knee. You couldn’t see his face, but you knew he was looking at you with worry in his eyes.

“C’mon now, Y/N. Don’t bullshit me. You and I both know that this is past the point of being 'just dreams'. I want to help you, but you’re going to have to work with me here.”

Using the back of your hands to wipe the loose tears away, you finally got the courage to look at him. His eyes were soft, kind even. The lopsided smile he gave you was the moment you finally let your walls down. Dean was here to help you, not judge you.

“O-Okay… so umm… what do we do now? How do I stop dreaming of these… these horrible things?”

Dean started to move his thumb across your kneecap. In any other situation you’d be in a fit of laughter, but at a time like this, it was soothing.

“Do you trust me?”

Those four words made you swallow thickly. Trust wasn’t something you took lightly, and Dean knew that. Sam understood this too, but Dean was different. He could count on one hand the people he had full trust in.

“Yes, of course, I trust you, Dean. Believe me, I want these nightmares to stop just as much as you do if not more.”

He stood and held his hand out to you. Your eyebrows knit in confusion, but you took it anyway and let him lead you to his room. The Bunker was eerily quiet at night, but you knew you were safe. You stood at the threshold, watching him as he padded across the floor to his bed. Your cheeks flushed as he rid himself of his t-shirt, leaving him only in his low-hanging grey sweats. You never let yourself think about Sam or Dean this way before, but you weren’t a prude. Every woman who came in contact with them knew how attractive they were.

Dean cleared his throat bringing you back to reality.

“You comin’ sweetheart? I don’t bite...much.”

He winked, and you knew he was trying to lighten the mood, but who were you kidding? You couldn’t share a bed with Dean. That would make things weird, and that’s the last thing you wanted to do. Nightmares or not, you weren’t going to jeopardize your friendship.

“Dean...I-I don’t think I can do this… I’m pretty worn out from crying so let’s just say we forget about this night and I’ll go back to my own bed… I’m sorry for being a burden. I’ll just.. I’m gonna go…”

You turned to leave, but not before Dean caught your arm.

“Whoa whoa slow down, Y/N. What’s wrong? Is it because I took my shirt off? ‘Cause I can put it back on. I’m just used to sleeping without it on is all.”

You sighed and shook your head.

“No, it-It’s not that. I just… I don’t want this to ruin our friendship ya know? I don’t want things to get weird or anything.”

Dean shook his head and chuckled.

“So, don’t let it get weird.”

His look went back to firm before he continued.

“Y/N, be honest with me. How long has it been since you slept, and I mean really slept?”

Your eyes went to your feet, your toe rubbing across a rough spot on the old floor.

“I umm… I haven’t slept in four days…”

A flash of concern laced his features as he pulled you back into his room.

“C’mon, sweetheart.”

He pulled back his covers and got under them before patting the other side of the mattress invitingly.

“Come here, Y/N. You need sleep just as much as I do. I promise I won’t try anything with you. I mean, I’m a cuddler so, I might do that, but nothing else, I swear.”

You lowered your head in defeat and crossed the room before climbing into bed next to him. He carefully wrapped his arm around your waist, feeling you tense a little, before relaxing. Neither of you talked, but there really wasn’t any need to. You already felt more at ease in Dean’s arms. The smell of his shampoo and pheromones calmed you. Mere minutes later, his breathing evened out, and his light snoring filled your ears. Moments later, you were asleep.

It became a routine that none of you spoke about. Every night, you would get ready for bed in your room and slip into Dean’s, silently climbing into bed beside him. True to his word, he was a cuddler but instead of the apprehension you’d expected at his touch, you only felt warmth and safety.

He was never inappropriate either. His hands stayed firmly in the safe zones, holding you around your middle if you decided that spooning was the position for you; his lower half was always carefully angled away when you woke up. If you slept curled into his side, he kept his hand on your shoulder or waist, never anywhere else.

The nightmares weren’t dispelled so easily. But being with Dean, they were normally stopped before they were over - he was a naturally light sleeper and the slightest twitch in your slumber had him waking you with gentle reassuring murmurs.

It was three weeks before your first night with no memories assaulting you. You woke with your face against Dean’s bare chest - you’d fallen asleep there the night before. His skin was warm under your cheek and you sighed, closing your eyes and allowing the haze of sleep to keep you still for a little longer.

“You slept well,” he muttered without opening his eyes and you smiled.

“No nightmares,” you whispered.

“Good.” Dean yawned, stretching his arms up. “I think I slept pretty well too.”

The covers slipped down with his movement and you couldn’t help it; your eyes went south to the straining erection that was fighting against the elastic of his pajama pants.

His hand wasn’t fast enough to snatch the covers back up and when you raised your head to look at him, his face was beet red.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, “s’morning and everything… y’know.”

“It’s okay,” you assured him, patting his chest.

“It’s not,” Dean grunted, clutching the covers over his lap, “you didn’t want this to get weird.”

“You having a…” you swallowed, unsure how to phrase it, “an erection, isn’t weird. It’s perfectly natural.” With a shrug, you slid your eyes away from his, feeling your cheeks heat up. “I’d say it’s a compliment.”

He blinked, processing what you’d said before his mouth set in a thin smile. “Can’t help what happens when I sleep next to a beautiful woman.”

You were sure your face was about to burst into flames and you giggled. “Now you’re making it weird.”

Dean smirked - not one of those sarcastic expressions, more playful, devilish. The way you expected he’d look at a woman he wanted to -

“Besides,” you added hurriedly, shifting a little way away from him, “I’m not your type.”

“Who says?” he challenged and you pulled back, frowning.

Dean moved, pushing himself up with his arm. “You say you don’t wanna ruin our friendship but I can’t keep spending the night with you warm next to me and pretending I’m not craving you in every way possible.”

His declaration left you speechless - what were you supposed to even say to that?

Thank you?

Dean chuckled, leaning in a little closer. “Can I kiss you?” he whispered and you were struck by the thought that no man should ever look that pretty when asking that question. With scruffy bed hair and sleep lines on his face, Dean managed to look like he’d fallen out of a GQ photoshoot.

Your reply, when you finally forced it out, was barely a squeak.

His lips were soft when they pressed against yours but you couldn’t relax. Your entire body was stiff with trepidation; you felt hot and cold all at once and it took only seconds for Dean to notice your tense posture.

Breaking away, he cupped your cheek, dragging his thumb down to rest on your chin, making your eyes meet his.

“Talk to me,” he urged softly.

The temptation to shut off, to not tell him anything, warred with the need to spill your illogical shame for what had happened. You knew Dean would never blame you but seeing the pity in his eyes would be unbearable.

But he deserved to know what he’d been protecting you from. At least, in part.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve,” you took a shuddering breath, dropping your chin away from his hand, “since I’ve been with anyone. And the last time wasn’t…” Your eyes closed and you tried to forget the rough touch on your skin.

Dean’s hand moved, resting on your hip and the warmth of his touch seeped into you, forcing you to look at him again, letting his gentle touch replace the horror from before.

“You know I wouldn’t hurt you,” he coaxed, smiling softly. “I could never hurt you.”

What you feared most was nowhere to be found in his face. His sincere green gaze focused on you, filled with nothing but lust and affection.

You moved closer, startling him with a chaste kiss, your little moan swept away by his hum of appreciation and when he tugged you closer, you moved with him easily, losing yourself in the warmth of his skin.

Dean didn’t push, letting you set the pace and you were content with kissing, feeling his hands roam your body. You licked into his mouth, breaking only for air; you weren’t paying much attention to the way you pinned him back onto the bed, straddling his lap so you could kiss him and run your hands over his solid chest and stomach.

He laughed, arching when your fingers caught a ticklish spot, which only prompted you to do it again.

“Quit it,” he chuckled, grabbing at your hands but keeping his touch light.

Dragging your right hand to his lips, you sucked in a breath as he kissed each fingertip, his eyes locked on yours the entire time.

He continued down over the palm of your hand, tracing the throb of your heartbeat to your wrist. By the time his soft lips reached the inside of your elbow, you were practically mush - before he could continue, you used your free hand to cup his face.

“Later,” you promised.

Dean’s eyes sparkled as you rolled your hips, reminding him of the erection straining at his pants. “Fuck,” he groaned, letting his head fall back, “don’t do that.”

“Why?”

The tone of your voice had him narrowing his eyes at you. “Because if you do, I might not be able to help myself.”

“What if I don’t want you to?”

Dean pushed himself up onto one hand, abruptly enough that you squeaked and giggled, smiling when he used the other hand to cup the back of your neck and draw you in for a deep kiss.

“Do you want me as much as I want you, princess?”

You nodded, feeling the heat in your cheeks rise, his nose squished against yours.

“You know you can tell me to stop at any time, right?”

“I know,” you whispered, initiating another kiss, dragging your tongue over his.

Shifting his weight so his back was straight, Dean’s hands landed on your hips, grinding you down harder against his cock. His fingers trailed up underneath the thin tank top you’d worn to bed; he groaned when his thumbs brushed the underside of your bare breasts.

You lifted your arms, letting him pull the top up over your head, giving him full access to your breasts and Dean leaned in, brushing his nose across the top of one.

“You’ve got no idea how beautiful you are,” he murmured and you smiled, folding your hands around the back of his head as he started to worship your tits with his tongue.

His cock was twitching against your core and Dean grunted, pushing one hand underneath the covers to shove his pants down.

“Sorry, it’s getting a little uncomfortable down there,” he joked, resuming his attention to your nipples and you gasped when his teeth grazed one solid peak teasingly.

The sudden desire to feel his skin on yours was a full-body craving; you shifted and pushed at your shorts, managing to drag them down without dislodging him.

The sound Dean made when you were finally perched nude in his lap was only amplified when you pushed him back, using your feet to shove the covers down. His cock was warm and throbbing against your bare slit and you whimpered, grinding against him and he broke away from your breast, groaning loudly.

“Fuck, Y/N -”

“Sssh,” you ordered, sliding down his body until you were straddling his thighs, wrapping one hand around his shaft before you could stop and think about it.

Dean’s chin tilted up and the veins on his neck popped with the strained angle of his neck, a low moan accompanying the bob of his Adam’s apple when you licked the tip of his cock.

He kept his hands at his sides, clenching them in the sheets, giving you all the room you needed. It wasn’t something you had an entirety of experience in but Dean seemed happy enough to let you explore, finding the sensitive spots at the base of his length. When you cupped his balls with your other hand and fondled them gently, Dean emitted a noise of pure lust and warmth swelled in your core in response.

Stroking him slowly, you watched a bead of precum seeping from his slit; the urge to taste it was more than you could ignore. The salty tang was worth the way Dean’s entire body twitched and he looked down at you, tucking his chin into his chest.

“You know there are limits to torture, right?” he muttered, raising an eyebrow and you giggled, continuing to stroke him as he moaned under his breath. “Jeez, Y/N, you’re gonna… fuck…”

“You’ve got a dirty mouth,” you chided, your gaze fixed on the way his cock fit in your hand. Your fingers didn’t quite touch either side, not until you reached the slightly flared head and you suddenly wanted to know what it felt like to have him buried inside you.

The thought was enough to provoke a sudden rush of wetness between your thighs and Dean groaned as you rutted against him, barely acknowledging your own movement.

A tiny voice in the back of your head stilled your movements, doubt settling in the pit of your belly. Shouldn’t you be frightened of this? After… after him, there hadn’t been anyone and this felt like something that should be shaking you to the core.

But all you could feel was pure adrenaline and desire pumping through your veins; everything was focused on the way Dean felt underneath you, the warm weight of his cock as you stroked him, and the sounds of pleasure he was making.

“Dean,” you whispered, meeting his eyes, “I wanna fuck you.”

He muttered a curse, biting his bottom lip when you released his cock and crawled further up his body. There was no objection - Dean continued to let you set the pace. You lifted yourself, slipping two fingers between your thighs, sinking them into your body.

“Y/N…” Dean muttered, covering your hand with his own, “let me.”

You nodded, letting him take over, whining when he pushed a single digit into you. Just one of his fingers felt bigger than your two, more calloused and filling. He pumped them a few times, smirking when you closed your eyes and tilted your head back, enjoying his slow touch.

All too soon, you grew impatient for more but before Dean could add a second finger, you tugged on his wrist. “Want you,” you pouted, leaning over to kiss away any protest he could make. Lifting your hips, you pinned his hands beside his head, smiling against his lips. “Stay.”

Dean obeyed, groaning when you slipped one hand down to grasp him again, lining his tip up with your soaked entrance. Lowering down onto him, you whined, lifting again when your body struggled to accept the intrusion. With a few more thrusts, you had him halfway inside and his body was shaking with the effort of holding back.

Lifting up once more, you pushed down, taking him to the hilt. The shock of being so full made you yelp and Dean’s hands were on your hips, holding you steady so you could adjust.

“Gah,” you moaned, resting against his chest, “you’re… fuck.”

“Now who has a dirty mouth?” Dean teased and you pulled back, smiling. “Want me to put my hands back?”

You nodded, waiting for him to return his hands to the pillow before sliding your fingers up to lace them with his.

When you started to move, rocking gently on him, Dean closed his eyes, a low rumble in his chest letting you know that it felt good. The way he reacted made you a little bolder and you lifted yourself, letting him withdraw a few inches before taking him to the hilt again.

“Y/N…”

“What?” you asked, worried you’d done something wrong with the way he moaned your name.

His cheeks were a little red when he answered. “I’m close and you haven’t -”

“Oh,” you blinked, ceasing your movements, unsure what to do, “do you want me to stop?”

“God, no,” Dean chuckled. “I just wanna make sure you cum too.” The way he said it, his low throaty voice almost catching on the words, made you shudder and clench around him. “Sit up straight,” he instructed - you obeyed, a little puzzled until you felt how much deeper it let him be.

You moaned, circling your hips as Dean’s jaw clenched. Your lips parted in a little “o” when he responded with a slight thrust, one hand untangling from yours to hover over your mound, his thumb settling just above where his cock was inside you.

“That okay?” he asked and you nodded, squirming needily. Intense pleasure was on the edge of your senses, teasing you with the promise of climax but you craved more. Dean’s thumb traced your clit and a spark made your hips jerk. “That’s it,” he coaxed, “keep moving for me, baby.”

Your teeth sank into your bottom lip as you started to rock, much like how you had started. The throbbing inside you increased with each glide of his thumb over the sensitive bundle of nerves. Electricity ran through your veins prompting your head to fall back as you whimpered into orgasm.

“Cum for me, Y/N,” Dean murmured his other hand on your hip now, guiding your rocking motion when you fell over the edge.

It was calmer than any orgasm you’d ever experience but possibly one of the best. Dean’s climax followed yours within seconds and he stopped touching you, letting you fall forward onto his chest, panting heavily.

Although you’d barely moved, you were sweating, exhausted and more sated than you’d ever felt. An overwhelming sense of calm swept through you; even though your legs were shaking with the effort of simply existing, you felt peaceful.

Eventually, Dean had to move, helping you clean up before he slipped back into bed with you. Neither of you spoke as he wrapped an arm around your shoulders and drew you back against his chest, letting you curl into his side.

“Get some more sleep,” he whispered, kissing the top of your head.

You nodded, closing your eyes without a reply and letting the last ebbing waves of bliss carry you off.

#j snow writes #dean winchester x reader #dean x reader #dean winchester x you #dean x you #dean winchester x y/n #dean x y/n #dean winchester smut #dean winchester angst #dean winchester fluff #dean smut #dean angst #dean fluff #supernatural smut #supernatural angst #supernatural fluff

834 notes · View notes

libbyfandom · 4 months

Text

Modern!Mizu and The Moment Mikio Betrayed Her

(((So I was writing this moment for something else when it got way too long and so I decide to make it an independent piece. This is set before Mizu meets Ringo/Akemi/Taigen.)))

When they got into the worst fight of their relationship at Mikio's apartment, it escalated to physical attack.

Maybe Mikio assumed she could take it since she was strong. Maybe there was something more brewing under that blank look he got when they worked out together and she was faster, lifted more than he expected, etc. etc.

He had slammed her into the wall, and years of training went autopilot and made her leg kick out to hook him behind the knee and yank him off his feet. Mikio slammed onto his back with a strangled cry. She pulled her pocket knife out of her back pocket so he would be forced to stay back and they could both just...calm down. Her hand had shaken the tiniest bit.

She didn’t step closer to him, she held the blade out so that she could back away herself. She tried to calm her racing heart, she tried to start speaking to deescalate the situation but the abhorrent look in his eyes as he stared up at her from the ground pierced her heart. He called her some choice things that brought tears to her eyes despite resistance.

And then he left the bedroom and slammed the door shut. She tried to follow him but he held it closed so she couldn’t get out no matter how much she started banging or trying to throw her weight into it in panic.

She heard him calling the police on the other side. Her heart sunk into her stomach as she sagged against the door. He knew she had a record from when she was a teenager, the darkest years of her life. If they came there, she was without a doubt going to be arrested and booked. She would lose her scholarship, she’d lose everything she was building at college toward her future. The image of Eiji's disappointed face as he has to bail her out was enough to have her heart jump back up into her throat.

So she frantically grabbed everything that was hers in Mikio’s bedroom, shoved it into her backpack, and proceeded to climb out the window and scale down the side of his fourth floor apartment.

Her hands and knees got scratched up to a bleeding state from the bricks, and on top of that she landed on her ankle badly. There may have been a popping noise, followed by cussing through a tear choked throat. Heart pounding, she limped as fast as she could away from the sight line of the apartment before he could realize she’s gone and chase her.

She wiped the blood from her hands off on the bottom of her shirt.

The familiar burn of anguished rage spread quickly in her chest with the tears coming down faster and faster. She sniffled wetly, and rubbed the underside of her nose with her sleeve.

Passing by the last row of parked cars in the apartment complex she did a double take. Right there in the middle is Mikio’s stupid 1998 Crown Vic’s car. A flash of him giving her her first kiss in the front seats warped through her tears, his warm hand wrapped around the back of her neck as he pulled her in. With clenched teeth her knife flashed out and stabbed the front left tire. There was a hiss, air rapidly leaking out.

The car started to slowly lilt to the side, and it wasn't enough. So she swung her arm back and put her elbow through his driver side window with a shatter that hurt her ears and set off the car alarm.

She cradled her injured elbow, violently being slammed between waves of intense grief and intense rage (and a touch of bitter fear that sat on her tongue despite how hard she tried to swallow it past her closed up throat). For the first time in her life she felt so much younger than she really was as she hurried down the road back to campus, wiping her eyes on her shoulders and flinching every time she set her left foot down wrong.

The next morning was filled with endless (unanswered) calls and texts apologizing and pleading for them to talk. Mizu stared numbly at her phone, before just letting it slip from her fingers into a trash can as she walked to class. She'll just tell the phone company it was stolen so she can get a new phone, and a new number. It's fine. She had Eiji's number memorized.

There's nothing important on that phone anyway.

#mizu #mizu x reader #blueeyesamurai #blue eye samurai x reader #mizu blue eye samurai #modern mizu #fuckyouMikio #fragile fucking masculinity

290 notes · View notes

cupcakeslushie · 8 months

Note

Hello,

HOLLY SH*T (about the last update)

When Leo gets his memories back does he also remember those (f*cking)400 days?

How would Leo have grown up to be like, if his memories weren't taken from him? (would he have become kind of like Donnie?)

will he ever open up to someone about this?

Does he have some kind of triggers left from the experience, even though his memories wee taken from it?

I adore your work and Have a great week 😁

1. 🤗

2. So, Leo’s issues are like a leak in a dam constantly trying to be held back. Kitsune’s magic can suppress or manipulate his memories, but a lot still manage to get through. Hence the need for the repeated sessions, and then later the Empyrean, to act as a booster to her magic—as Leo has built up a tolerance over the years, making it less and less effective. Leo does remember some things. Unfortunately, every time he starts to ask questions, he’s been so conditioned to seek out Kitsune to ‘fix’ his mind and suppress his emotions. But some of his memories were impossible to erase completely. They followed him around like little shadows, haunting him, and his choices. Leo is not stupid. He more discerning than he let’s on, and like Saki said, fear can be a powerful motivator. By the time Leo’s managed to claw his way up to a better position, he’s been fed so many lies that he doesn’t even trust his own reasoning. It’s just easier, and less painful to follow orders, no matter what his brain is constantly trying to tell him.

3. Tbh Leo probably wouldn’t have been very different from how he is. Shredder is a lot more…calculating in his abuse of Leo, than Draxum was for Donnie. Draxum was so unpredictable and volatile in his abuse. Everything that Donnie tried to do better, never seemed to help lessen his torture. It was just pain for the sake of pain. Shredder may be a monster, but his abuse had a goal—to make a warrior he could puppet into killing Yoshi. Saki didn’t just provide constant trauma, he gave positive reinforcement when Leo did something right, and used careful manipulation to bend Leo over to his side. All Kitsune’s spell did was make it easier and faster. If Shredder hadn’t had magic at his disposal, then it would’ve just taken more time and effort to break Leo and remold him, or Shredder might’ve just cut his losses and killed him.

4. Leo doesn’t want to burden his brothers with things that have already passed, and that feeling only gets stronger after he’s been saved from the Dark Armor. He’s constantly insisting that he doesn’t feel one way or the other from those days. It happened, but he says he feels so disconnected from it all. Leo’s earlier return to his family had already been filled with so much fighting, thanks to his withdrawals when he was first brought home causing him to act so erratic. Leo thinks as long as he’s not shouting at his brothers, or trying to attack Splinter, that he’s dealing with everything pretty well. Obviously that’s bullshit. But he’s gonna do a lot of healing during his trip with Usagi.

5. Leo’s worst triggers are when his family is in danger. Those times are when he falls back into either total bloodlust, or a more ruthless mentality, in order to protect them. Leo getting recaptured and thrown back into a cell will be like a wave of memories and trauma hitting him at full force. Like I’ve mention in point 1. He never totally forgot certain things, but the months spent free of Kitsune’s influence makes his second capture so much worse. He’ll be feeling all that fear and panic unfiltered, for the first time in years, and he’ll be able to recall the true horror of it—not the watered down, warped simulacrum Shredder wanted him to remember. Which loops back to point 4 about Leo’s lack of admitting his feelings being a coping mechanism. Once he gets rescued, unconsciously, he’s trying to mimic the dampening effect of Kitsune’s spell, by insisting through sheer force of will, that everything is fine. He can only convince himself that he’s unaffected by everything he’s experienced for so long.

6. Thank you!!! I hope you have an amazing week as well!

I’m sorry if this is kinda rambling, all these ideas be more clearly implemented in the comic, (at least I hope lol).

I also can’t remember how long ago I’ve even talked about Leo’s memory problems in one of these replies. I might be totally backtracking cause I think I’ve said before his memory was wiped completely, but I’ve been thinking it would give more complexity to his choices, if it was revealed his memory was actually more intact than Mikey’s this whole time. Mikey brain just needed a little boost from Raph, because his issue came more from him being so young that things faded over time. With Leo, it’s like a battle where his brain is trying to latch on to what it can to fight the effects of Kitsune’s spell. So his memory may be full of holes and beaten with a stick over and over, but it’s still knocking around in Leo’s head.

#rottmnt #ask slushie #rise of the tmnt #rise leo #Sep!au infodump #rottmnt separated au #separated au #rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #ew au #empyrean weeping au

259 notes · View notes

firsttimewriter92 · 1 year

Note

Joel miller x f!reader, angst, reader jealous of Joel's time being taken up by another woman. Reader and Joel have known each other since before the cordyceps so.... Hidden feelings? Eg reader is basically in love w Joel and then gets angry that he is getting all his time taken away. She ignores him for months until he finally talks to her. Big argument blah blah but then at the end fluff again 💞

Puuuhhh, nonny that was a rollercoaster to write but boy, was it fun ;) Thanks for the ask. I hope you like it.

Wordcount: 4.009

Warnings: Heavy angst, loss, jealousy, arguments, panic attack, crying Joel, don´t worry, there is fluff at the end.

5 years after the breakout

Panting, you clutched your rifle to your chest, eyes nervously jumping from left to right. Damn those newly infected. Ugly, little motherfuckers really had no better idea than to jump you out of nowhere. Joel and you had been taken up residency at the Boston QZ. How exactly you had ended up there, you couldn´t remember. The world was in chaos. The shock of how quickly everything had changed still embedded in everybody’s bones. None more so than Joel.

After what happened to Sarah, he became cold, bitter. You understood of course and mourned the sweet young girl still. What you also mourned were the evenings filled with cheesy movies, bad microwave popcorn and laughter until yours and Joels stomachs hurt. Joel used to be your favourite neighbour. Always at the ready to help you out with a leaking sink or a loose floorboard. He was an angel in disguise and you had let him know so multiple times. He always just shook his head, grinning. So, when telling him didn´t do the trick you opted on making him and Sarah dinner a few times a week. It started with a simple casserole you brought over after witnessing Joels poor cooking skills just the day before, when he ran into his back yard with a smoking pan. It all became so natural after a few weeks. And so became the feelings you developed for the handsome, brown eyed man.

And then, one evening, you bolted out your front door towards Joels house in a panic. Where was his truck? Was Sarah still inside? When you called her name frantically, you saw her sprinting out of the Adlers house. Just when you caught up to her, wrapping the shaking girl into your arms, the headlights of Joels truck blinded you. “Get in the Truck!!” he shouted panicked. “Get in, now!”

______________________________________________________________

Shaking your head angrily, you walked onwards towards the small hole in the wall, well knowing that it would lead you back into the QZ. Five years. It had been five years and you still couldn´t wrap your head around what had happened to the both of you. Joel kept you close, kept his eyes on you at all times for the first couple of months. He had night terrors and sometimes even violent outbreaks. None ever directed at you but now, you knew what he was capable of. He told you he saw you as his last connection to sanity and he would keep you safe for as long as he was able to. You think it would be something to swoon over. But the look in his eyes when he said it was so haunting, empty and guilt ridden, it made you feel sick. Leaving him was not an option. He saved your life so many times over, the debt you owed him could never be repaid. So you stayed. You stayed and watched him become more hollow every day. More violent but also more brilliant in surviving. Hard but occasionally still caring. Like this morning, when you left your shared apartment and he made sure you had more rounds on you than he did. Or when he would pass the sofa and tuck the blanket more securely around your body before making his way heavily over to his own bed.

Still, you never would have thought you would end up a smuggler. Well, smuggler of sorts. Gathering information and selling said information wasn´t as lucrative as one might think, but you got by. Leaving the QZ to make sure your information were solid was your least favourite part of the whole thing tough. You were brilliant at negotiations, which Joel was not. He was the enforcer of what you promised…or threatened. Still, letting you walk back to the QZ all on your own because he just had to meet this smuggler he met, before nightfall made your blood boil. Yes, you weren´t a complete idiot and you could stand your own but just rushing away like that…It was dark now. You stood in front of your building and took a deep breath. You could see that Joel was home.

Slowly you made your way upstairs. You were not looking forward to the conversation ahead. When you opened the door and looked ahead, your mood instantly dropped into the minus zero area. Sitting on the table was Joel, scowling in your direction and next to him sat Tess. Her hand on Joels forearm you felt your blood boil within the fraction of a second. It´s the literal apocalypse and you were jealous and angry at a woman you barely knew. Why? Because she was casually touching the man you still had feelings for. Because he left you on your own to go meet her. You just about had it. And so apparently, did Joel. He stood slowly, looking at you with pinched eyebrows, breathing heavy. You steeled yourself. “Where the fuck have you been?” it was almost a whisper of pure fury. Your stomach knotted when you heard the question. His deep voice and accent rumbling through you and you didn´t know if you liked it or not. You let your bag drop to the floor, never breaking eye contact. “Where you left me” you said coldly. Joel froze. “You knew this was a possibility when we left this morning. I told you our time out there was limited, that I had to get back!” His voice rose with every word and by the time he stood only inches from you, his voice was booming. You didn´t move, looking up at him. Trying so hard to see the man you knew. And you knew he was still there. Joel was hardened, not cold.

“Doesn´t mean you can leave me outside the QZ, in an area we both don´t know yet if it´s crawling with infected or not. And for what?! I shoot my way back while you are in here, making some more fucking plans without me knowing about them and holding hands?! Are you absolutely shitting me, Joel?!?!?!” Needless to say your voice was just as loud as his at this point. All your frustration and yes, fear also bubbling up your throat, making it tight. “If your little smuggling weapons and drugs business gets you what you want, fine. But it´s very easy to see that you don´t intend on making me a part of it.” You tried to move around him but his hand shot out and grabbed your wrist. “The fuck do you mean? Shoot your way back? Where you attacked?!” His eyes went wide when he quickly checked you out. You yanked your wrist from his grip. “Why the hell do you care now?! You didn´t think for one second about that when you sprinted off.” A frustrated groan came from his throat as he pushed both hands down his face.

“I-I think I should probably go” you heard Tess say lowly. Your back turned to them both you only heard some more mumbling from them and then the door shutting. “Are you hurt?” you heard him say. Not turning around you shook your head. Again you heard a long breath escape his nose and you knew he was standing only a few feet behind you. “You are right,” he said next. Ice seemed to fill your insides as you waited for the blow. “I don´t want you around our plans!”

5 years earlier you would have probably shown more of a reaction to something like this. A break up of sorts. You and Joel were not anything more than….friends? Partners? Well, whatever it was, there it goes. Out the window and your body hardened. Schooling your features you turned and looked him in the face. His head was slightly bowed and his shoulders hung. “Look at me” you said. He did and looked like he was trying to stay cold and distant. The lack of emotion on your face or in your voice seemed to piss him off though. “You know, there´s better ways to get rid of me than leaving me alone in an infected area.” That set him off. “Are you kidding me, ___?! You think I want you fucking attacked!? Butchered?!” He stared at you furiously. “Did you think for only one second that maybe, the plans Tess and I have are basically suicide?”

“Then why the FUCK would you-“ you started with a raised voice when he interrupted you. “Because it needs to be done! Don´t you get that? In order to survive, barely so, we need to do things we never thought we had to. And you…You can´t be near that, do you understand?” You looked at him incredulously. “So you just decided that. You. Decided. That. And then left me out there.” He held up his hands in defeat. “That was wrong and I apologize. I shouldn´t have…You could´ve…” his demeanour changed again. Running his fingers through his hair in frustration he sat down on the sofa and kept his head in his hands. You didn´t know what to feel. Fury, disappointment, fear, abandonment and sadness to name only a few. Silently you walked around the apartment gathering some of your clothes all the while wishing nothing more than for Joel to snap out of it and tell you he wanted you with him. But he didn´t. He sat in silence, twitching from time to time and just looking like he was barely hanging on. When you had your essentials together, you looked at him one more time. “I´ll be at your brothers.” He nodded so you knew he heard you. “Joel?” you asked, your voice finally vibrating with sadness and a little pleading. “You know I would have sticked to your side, right? I experienced these past five years as well, I am not naïve. At least I had you.” By the time the door closed behind you and you only took a couple of steps, did the tears roll down your face. The same moment you heard glass shattering in the apartment you just left.

6 weeks later

“Tommy, I swear to god, one more word about the fireflies and I will fucking end you” you groaned when you plopped down on the chair, leaning heavily onto the table. Tommy smirked and nodded his head. “Alright, alright. Don´t bite my head off. I used to enjoy this side of you when it was directed at Joel.” He understood his mistake immediately. “Sorry”, he murmured setting down the canned Ravioli in front of you. Your stomach twisted painfully at the mention of Joels name. Almost every night tears would stain your cheeks, your dreams were haunted by an injured Joel or worse. Tommy had listened to the parts of the story you wanted to tell, thankfully staying neutral, not saying much. He provided you with a roof over your head and some rations until you figured out what to do or where to go. You felt lost, like you finally started to find a purpose in this cursed world, beside someone you cared about, loved even and then, it was ripped away from you. He didn´t want you with him. It´s what he said. That truth was harder to swallow than anything you ever experienced. He decided that you couldn´t make it beside him anymore. He decided you were too fragile for this world. Why was he risking his life? For what? A couple more food rations? Ammunition for guns that were more necessary than ever.

Poking your ravioli and musing about your situation, you jumped several inches in the air when three loud bangs rattled the rusty door. “Tommy!” Your heart nearly gave out when you heard Joels muffled voice from behind the door. It sounded strangely strained. Tommy immediately jumped to his feet, as did you. When he unlocked the door and pulled it open, Joel stumbled inside, clutching his left shoulder. Panic flooded your system when you saw the blood pouring from between his fingers.

“Joel, what the fuck happened?” Tommy put his arm around his waist and guided him towards the couch. “Get tweezers or something” Joel grit out through his teeth. “It´s still lodged in there.” You were already hurrying over to them with the make shift first aid kit. Only now, Joel seemed to realise where exactly he stumbled in. With a white face he stared at you like he had never seen you before. “___”, he whispered. You barely held back your panicked expression or the lump in your throat when you began to rummage through the first aid kit for the tweezers. When you found them you knelt in front of him and looked him square in the face. You really hoped your expression was blank, void of any emotion. But you knew better. For six weeks you pined over a man that didn´t want you. You cried yourself to sleep, worried yourself sick. Of course there was no way your face said nothing. Especially when seeing him hurt. “Take your shirt off” you simply said. Joel hissed when he awkwardly and with Tommys help removed his checked shirt first, then his T-shirt. It wasn´t the first time you saw his torso but like all the other times your heart began to race and you were once again remined of your immense attraction to him. Worst moment possible. When you disinfected the tweezers and took a first look at his wound, Joel didn´t seem to be able to look away from you. “___, I´m sorry” he whispered almost inaudibly. “Don´t” you said quickly, trying not to cry. “Not now…later.” He nodded and tried to stay still as you got to work.

Half an hour later the bullet was out and Joel patched up. He still sat on the sofa when you packed everything up and went to wash your hands. Tommy left to get some more supplies when he saw that you needed all the gauze he had. Standing over the sink you started to scrub at your hands. When they started to shake you knew the inevitable was coming. This hadn´t happened for quite a while. The attacks started after your first encounter with an infected. The first time you had to shoot to kill. You could feel the sweat gathering on your temple, you heart thumping uncontrollably. Why was it to cold in here? Silent tears fell onto your hands when you tried to scrub them harder, more manically. You didn´t hear Joel get up or moving closer to you. So when he said your name in a worried tone only a few steps behind you, you spun around with a yelp. Stumbling backwards a sob wrecked your whole body. “Woa woa woa,___!” Joel hurried over to you. His big hand grasping your shoulder he bent his head to look into your eyes. His expression was one of pure regret and self-loathing. Being within his vicinity again your sobs came out more violently. Joel just surged forward and hugged you to his chest as hard as he could and dared. Pressing his lips to the top of your head he whispered apology after apology to you while you let out all your pent up sadness, anger and confusion. After a couple of moments your anger took over and you started to push him away. Wiping at your face angrily you stared him down. He was standing up as best he could, no doubt bracing himself. “What the shit happened to you, Joel? Why are you here of all places?!”

“It was the only place I could think of” he said quietly. “Not your own? Or Tess´?” you snarked. He hung his head and shook it. “Tess doesn´t know. We weren´t together.” “Oh! Perfect! First, she get´s you into this shit business and then she doesn´t even make sure you´re not hurt?! Are you shitting me?” You grumbled that last part more to yourself than him. “She´s not supposed to look after me. I asked for a batterie and she told me how to get it. That´s all. I´m…I´m the one continuing what she taught me.” “Why?” you asked him in a whispered, pleading tone. “Why would you risk your life like this?”

“___”, he said a bit louder. “You see what happened to people once everything fell apart. There´s people out there doing worse things than what an infected would do. Doing what I´m doing makes sure I know what´s going on. Gives us supplies.” That did it. “Us?” you said calmly. “ Well, I´m very glad you and Tess have enough supplies while your brother-“

“I´m not talking about Tess an´ me , god damn it!” He huffed out an annoyed breath and started pacing. “Why are you so hung up on her? She didn´t do anything to you.”

“She puts you in danger, Joel. She makes you reckless and by introducing you to that world she took you from me!” Your hand slapped itself across your mouth the moment you said it. Joel stared at you, unblinking. “Take me from you? ___, you were the one who left! I´m sorry I went and met up with Tess. I´m sorry! When you didn´t come home by the time I thought you would I was losing my mind! Tess stayed and made sure I wasn´t going crazy. That is it!”

He looked at you pleadingly, like he was trying to force the truth of his words right into your brain. And it worked. You calmed down somewhat and suddenly felt bad. “You…” you started and swallowed hard. “You said you didn´t want me around anymore.” He came closer again and you let him. Tentatively he reached his uninjured arm out to you and held your face. “You misunderstood me, sweetheart” he said lowly. His face changed into a raw and open expression. One you hadn´t seen since before the breakout. Tears gathered in your eyes again. There he was. Your Joel. Saying what you had wished for to be the truth.

“I said, I didn´t want you anywhere near our plans because they are dangerous. I don´t worry about Tess out there,___. She´s been doing this for a very long time.” He came even closer until he stood only a breath away from you. You closed your eyes and waited. His forehead made contact with yours when he spoke again. “What I am worried about is your wellbeing, your safety, your happiness.” A quiet tear made it´s way down your cheek and he immediately wiped it away. “I wouldn´t be able to look out for you. And quite frankly, that scares the fuck out of me.” You nodded your head gently and grasped his shirt with both hands. “The last six weeks…” he heaved a sigh. “I wasn´t myself. One job after another got my mind occupied at least somewhat. But at night-“ at that his voice broke and you just grasped his shirt even harder. “I need you to understand that I didn´t want you to leave. Or think I didn´t want you around me. That´s not the case…never the case.”

“Then why didn´t you explain it to me? Why´d you let me leave?” you asked pleadingly. He shook his head and with a hushed voice he said, his lips whispering against your forehead “I don´t know, honey. I don´t know, I´m so so sorry. Maybe I saw it as an opportunity to keep you away from all this. I thought….at least she´s safe.” You needed him closer. With still wet cheeks you closed the distance and wound your arms around his neck and burying your face in his neck. His good arm around your waist he pulled you into him as much as he could. “I´m so sorry” you whimpered. “I´m sorry I left. I´m sorry you always have to look out for me”.

“No, no no no no, sweetheart. Don´t do that. I know you can take care of yourself. It´s my own ambition to keep you safe. Keep you with me. I can´t lose you too, I can´t.” You strengthened the grip around his neck for a moment before you leaned back at bit to look at him. “Don´t send me away and I´ll be right next to you for as long as I live, Joel.” You tried to smile at him but it was a grimace at best. His eyes went wide and you could see a definite wetness in them. “You remember before it all happened?” he asked. You nodded. “Of course”, you whispered.

He was still holding you to him, his forehead returning to yours. “Let´s pretend for a moment”, he whispered. “Let me pretend it´s 2003. We´re having a Barbeque in my back garden. You are wearing that perfect blue dress, preparing veggies for…for Sarah.” You saw the wetness in his eyes spill over. He was crying. “We eat, we laugh, we drink and when it´s late and Sarah is in bed…” he choked on his voice. “Let me pretend I finally have the guts to ask you out on a real date. Let me pretend you´d say yes.” Your heart almost gave out. “Yes.” You immediately whispered. “Joel, yes. Any day. Apocalypse or not, I say yes.” Through his tears he exhaled sharply, smiling. “Joel, I´ve been infatuated with you since the beginning. I´ve been staying with you because I´m in love with you.” His head snapped up quickly. Staring at you as if you had grown another head and you found the strength to chuckle. Your hands went to his face, framing it. “Sorry for being so forward” you said sweetly. “But I thought it´s now or never. No misunderstandings anymore. I can´t handle another.” He nodded, still staring at you. “You don´t have to say any-Hmmmpf”.

His lips were on yours the next moment. Your mind blank you rested your hands at the back of his neck and pulled him further into you. His hand at the side of your waist balled up into a fist then relaxed again. Moving his mouth over yours gently but with purpose he let out a little groan. Your head seemed to be filled with air and the blood in your ears was rushing. You had no idea how long you stood there, just giving each other long, open mouthed kisses, touching each other gently. When you finally separated you looked into Joels eyes. They were dry now and shone happily and with so much affection, your throat went dry.

“I´m in love with you,___” Joel said with a gravelly voice, smiling timidly at you. You couldn´t help the grin that split your face. “For five years I wondered what kind of relationship we had. I knew I couldn´t leave you”, he said. “But year after year, relationship worries seemed to become so unimportant and I lost sight of how I felt before everything went to shit. I´m sorry.” You shook your head. “Don´t apologise. I know what you mean.” He smiled. “Nevertheless, I fell for you hard, from casserole number one. Over the years, seeing you adjust to every situation we were in…sticking with me…I really should have more faith in you.” You looked at him softly and kissed him again. “Joel, it´s okey. I understand what you mean. I…I also can´t bear the thought of you being in danger. So, please. Let me stay with you.” This time his hand went to your cheek when he pulled you in and kissed you hard. Almost desperately he held onto you, carefully licking your lower lip. Your heart jumped into your throat as you opened up to him. Gliding his tongue across yours gently he let out a satisfied hum. He pulled back. “Never lettin´ you go again. I swear” he breathed against your lips.

Smiling, you looked him deep in the eyes. “I love you, Joel” you said. The corner of his eyes crinkled in the way you loved so much. “I love you” he repeated. “I´ll protect you. So stay with me.”

____________________________________________________________

If you liked this fic, please consider interacting with this post so it reaches more people who are interessted in these kind of writings :) Thank you very much

#tlou fic #joel miller #x reader #pedro pascal edit #pedro pascal fic #fluff #the last of us fic #joel miller x reader #joel miller fanfiction #anonymous ask #writing joel miller #tlou edit #tlou hbo #tlouedit #joel miller x y/n #joel miller x you

906 notes · View notes

mmelionsblog · 5 months

Text

Shh, Shh, I’m right here [Dean Winchester x Reader]

warnings⚠️: panic attack

You smiled brightly at the all too familiar home of your parents. You were what the hunters called, lucky. Your whole family was untouched by the supernatural, excluding you. You got into the business because you and your friends at the age of 14, decided to play the infamous game of ‘Bloody Mary’. Bobby singer and an old friend of his saved you— the last friend standing, from Mary who was out to get you as he used you as bait after explaining everything.

Dean got out of the Impala, closing the loud creaking door. “Let’s go meet your parents,” you haven’t seen your parents in about a year or two (you don’t recall the last time meeting them), due to the important job you had and wanting your family to stay safe away from the monsters that you brought into your life. Of course, Castiel always checked up on them from far away.

You and Dean had gotten an iMessage from your sister, Alessa, saying that she got married and at least wanted to see the two of you in the after party.

So there the two of you were, standing at your aunt’s house where every holiday was spent in your family. Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, Birthdays, you name it.

Your family has never met Dean, except through your iPhone FaceTime calls whenever you got the chance with them. He’d pop in with Sam, saying hello then dipping. Anytime the two brothers did that, questions from your family was always after they left the room.

You knocked on the brown wooden door in front of you. The house looked brand new, even though it’s been in the family for decades.

Looks like they remolded, again. You knocked and knocked again, sighing in annoyance. “It’s open!” You hear your cousin’s voice yell from the other side of the door, and you rolled your eyes. “Of course it’s open,” you mumble. You opened the door, placed a smile on and greeted your family members.

“Congratulations little sister.” You spoke to Alessa, giving her a big gigantic hug and spinning her around. Dean said the same thing. “Oohoho, is this the hunk of a man you’re always with on the phone?” Your grandmother looked at you, then looked at Dean with a look.

“Cougar much?” You laughed, “yes. This is Dean, my boyfriend.” Gasps could be heard through the house. You have never brought a boyfriend home with you in any holiday event, or just in general. “WOW you must be a lucky one,” your uncle spoke.

Your aunt chipped in, “she’s never brought guys over. So Dean, tell us about yourself.” And so Dean spoke about himself, not mentioning what type of job he does, ignoring the comments your family brought up about his parents, and going full detail with his little brother that he’s so proud of. “I’m so telling Sam that you’re gushing about him.” You spoke, he rolled his eyes. “You wouldn’t dare,” you shrugged with a smile.

“Where is Sam? By the way.” Your mother asked. “He’s on this job with two of our other friends right now. We would’ve gone, but we needed a break.” You told her. “Two other friends?” Your cousin, Sofia, asked. “Jack and Castiel. Yall would love to meet them. They’re super sweet, but sometimes… they don’t really understand much.” You hummed. Dean chuckled, “we had to teach—” you shook your head at Dean with your eyes wide open.

“Don’t just embarrass Cass like that. So rude,” you playfully slap his shoulder.

Everything was going so fine, until one moment somebody asked a question that made you stop working like clock work. The voices seemed so far away as your eyes teared up, you backed up from the crowded room, unbalanced, as you stumbled out.

. “Oh god. Sorry— uh I should’ve mentioned about that. We don’t ask that question, ever.” You could barely hear what Dean was talking about. “Is there a quiet place somewhere around here?” He asked, holding you close to his chest. Your aunt pointed down the hallway and he nodded, helping you move your feet as he opened a door to one of the rooms and closed it.

“Hey,” Dean’s voice got muffled into your ears. “Hey, hey. You in there?” He brushed your hair with his hands, giving you a kiss on the forehead. “Shh, shh. It’s okay. I’m right here. I got you baby.” He brought you close to his chest, your face getting squished with his gray tshirt he had on.

Dark water spots on the center of his chest just because of your tears falling down onto him. “Sorry,” you hiccuped, wiping off your tears. “It’s okay babe. M so sorry, I should’ve mentioned it before it got to that question.” His hands rested carefully on the side of your cheek, his thumb softly rubbing off the dry tears.

You leaned into his touched, all warmed up by him. “It’s fine, they didn’t know. It.. it just threw me off guard.” You whispered. He kissed your forehead once more, “I know I know. But still I should’ve given them a look or something, could’ve stopped—”

you place your index finger onto his lips, “all I need right now is you. And you’re doing just that, a great job at that. The past is the past- no matter how painful it is. I have you by my side right now comforting me and that’s all I need.” You spoke.

Dean smiled, hugging you as he brought you up to his chest. “I love you,” he whispered, kissing your cheek. “I love you too.”

“Now let’s go enjoy ourselves okay?”

“Okay.”

#dean winchester #dean winchester x reader #deancas #dean x castiel #sam and dean #dean x reader #sam winchester #sam winchester x reader #sam winchester x you #dean winchester x you #bobby singer #jack kline #castiel #supernatural fandom #supernatural #supernatural x reader #supernatural x you

139 notes · View notes

faefictions · 8 months

Text

Hospital Meet Cute | Pt 2

Eddie Munson x Reader

3k words

Warnings: depiction of a panic attack, mentions of parent death and incarceration

“Just in here,” Eddie spoke as he helped you cross the threshold into his trailer. He was gentle as he led you to the couch.

Your appearance and demeanor had shifted since the night he met you, almost a week prior now. Your arm was now in a cast, the bags under your eyes were 10 shades darker, and it was much harder to get you to crack a smile.

It wasn’t a sudden switch. When he came back to your hospital room that first night, The Lord of the Rings in hand, you were giggling at every new voice he pulled out of his back pocket. You had been exhausted, but you did your best to stay awake, just to soak up every second you could with him by your side.

Eddie could barely sense the shift in your mood until it was the complete opposite from when he met you. There were moments here and there, but it wasn’t until the last night in the hospital that he saw a more vulnerable side of you. It was the side he saw in front of Hopper that first night, the side of you that he desperately wanted to protect.

A nurse had come into the room around 6pm to bring you dinner, and with what she deemed to be great news.

“You’ll be discharged first thing in the morning.”

Eddie lit up at the phrase, excited to finally get you out of the dreary hospital room and away from the drab food that you had been choking down. As the nurse left the room, his gaze switched to you, and he caught the look of terror in your eye before you faked a smile back at him. He wasn’t sure if he should mention it, but after an hour of you being unable to so much as look at your food, he decided to try.

“You don’t seem too chipper about getting out of your lovely little prison cell tomorrow,” he began, studying every inch of your face in hopes of understanding you the best he could.

“No, it’s not that I…” you began to make an excuse, but you couldn’t even think of a lie. Eddie could see your discomfort, so he scooted closer to you in his chair. He brought his hand up next to yours, as an offering in case you needed it.

“Can I be real with you?” you spoke again, finally turning your head to really look at Eddie. You knew his answer before he spoke, because the moment your eyes met, his entire body visibly melted.

“Of course,” he smiled and moved his hand the last few inches to join with yours.

“Everything I owned was in that car,” you tried to start by stating the obvious, hoping he would catch the issue before you had to say the hard parts, “And the place I left was barely even a home years before I left it.”

“What a perfect time to start over.”

“I don’t have a penny to my name. And I barely had a place in mind when I started driving. I don’t know where to go from here.”

Your voice began to pick up speed, and he could hear your breath doing the same.

“You don’t have to worry that far. You can stay with me for as long as you need, and that’s all you need to worry about for now. Right now, you just need to focus on healing. I’ll take care of everything else until you’re back on your feet.”

“I met you less than a week ago. I can’t ask you to-”

“Freaks need to stick together. I’m helping you whether you like it or not.”

His voice wasn’t harsh, though his words almost felt like a threat. It was with pure intention though, and you knew that.

You remained mostly quiet for the rest of the night, still refusing to eat your food. You barely spoke a word the next morning on the way to Eddie’s trailer. The absurdity of your circumstances were really starting to soak in.

Every single thing you had ever loved, ever held dearly, had been turned to ash less than 10 miles from where you stood. You hadn’t grown fond of many things, hadn’t wanted to hold on to many memories, but that didn’t make this any easier.

You were currently sitting in an oversized pair of sweats and an unflattering t-shirt. The only clothing you owned that had not been burned to a crisp were now covered in dried blood from the crash. These were the only things the nurses could find for you to wear home from the hospital, and you weren’t going to complain.

But Eddie wanted you as comfortable as possible, so the second he got you seated on the couch, bag with bloodied clothes in hand, he rushed off to his room to find you something to change into. He could always give you the tour later.

Half an hour later, now wearing Eddie’s favorite Dio shirt and an old pair of gym shorts, you were struggling to focus on anything he said.

Hospitality still wasn't something you were used to, and it felt burdensome to put on someone else. Even when that person was forcing it upon you. You couldn't help but dwell on the self pity as he told you about Hawkins, and every word was in one ear, out the other.

Eddie could tell you weren't listening, but he would have hated the silence just as much as you if he stopped his rant, so he continued until he ran into the rare occurrence where he ran out of things to say, at which point, he turned on the TV.

That same dead look in your eye remained for the rest of the night. Eddie had made you dinner and forced you to eat every last bite, although the nausea you were feeling had only gotten worse since leaving the hospital.

It pained him to leave you, but Eddie knew that you needed sleep shortly after you finished eating. You looked tired, but not in a way that sleep would heal. He knew that resting would help, but he feared that leaving you alone would only pull you deeper into the hole he sensed you were falling into.

That was why he didn't hesitate when you asked him if you could both sleep in the living room for the night. You were embarrassed to ask at first, unsure what he was planning on for sleeping arrangements. But you knew there was only one bedroom, and you were barely willing to even think about being alone in an unfamiliar room right now.

You been here before. Not physically, of course, but mentally. The night after your dad died. You were fresh in a foster home, temporarily until they could locate any relative they could find. You knew that their search would return fruitless, that you were doomed to be passed from one temporary home to another.

That feeling, the dread you felt that night, was the same feeling you felt now. You couldn't remember how long it had lasted the first time, or how many times you'd felt it since. What you did know was that it hadn't been this bad since that night, and you were worried it would get worse.

As Eddie returned with what you assumed was every single blanket and pillow he owned, you looked up at him, trying to will yourself to speak. He glanced at you as you raised your head to speak, and he was met with a little more life behind your eyes than he had seen all night. However, that life was in the form of tears brimming your lower lids. You inhaled sharply, and closed your mouth as you began to panic, not knowing what you were supposed to say to him.

"Hey, what's going on," he quickly dropped the remaining pillows and dove onto the cushion next to you.

Out of pure instinct, he grabbed you and gently brought your head to his chest. If he had been thinking clearly, he might have asked what you needed from him, or had tried to get to the bottom of the tears first. But after seeing that state you had been in all day, your breaking point was his too.

Feeling the warmth of his arms around you, the rising and fall of his chest picking up in worry for you, and the soft fiddling of his fingers on the ends of your hair was all too much. You hated to do it, but you burst into sobs against his body. Your crying only grew louder and more desperate as you considered the fact that you had worked yourself up so much about being a burden that you had made yourself even more of one.

“It’s ok, you’re alright,” he whispered as he held you. He was about ready to cry himself, hearing your sobs nearly turn to screams. He refused to stop holding you, and luckily you weren’t putting up a fight. In fact, your fists began to pull at his shirt, bringing him even closer. He would have let you stay just like that, but as you pulled, he could hear you start to hyperventilate, and he knew you needed more help than he was providing.

“Hey sweetheart, I need you to sit up a little for me,” he winced as he pulled you away from him, eliciting a yelp from you that nearly made him cave.

“It’s ok, I’m still right here, we just need you to calm down a little, ok?”

“I’m so sorry,” you choked out, struggling to catch your breath.

“No, no apologies. There’s nothing you need to say sorry for, ok? Can you look at me?”

Eddie waited for your eyes to slowly meet his before he continued.

“Good job, can you sit up just a little more? I’ll still be right here.”

Your breathing didn’t slow as you sat up, but you trusted Eddie enough to do whatever he said in the moment.

“Good, now put your hand right here,” he grasped your wrist and guided you to rest your fingers against his chest, “Is it ok if I put mine here?” he asked as he slowly brought his own to a spot higher on your chest. You nodded quickly, still staring directly in his eyes as you awaited his next instructions.

“I need you to try to breathe with me, ok? When I breathe in, you do the same, and let it out when I do. Do you think you can do that?”

You nodded once again in reply, so he began to take slow, deep breaths. It only took a couple tries for your breathing to start regulating, and the embarrassment you had felt started to rise as a blush in your cheeks.

“I’m so sorry, Eddie,” you said, no longer through tears.

“I said no apologies,” he smiled at you.

You wanted to fight him on it, but you were winded. So instead, you removed your hand from his chest, prompting him to do the same. You both leaned back against your respective arm rests on the couch, but as you avoided Eddie's gaze, he refused to look away from you.

“Wanna talk about it?” he asked, cautiously. He knew how easy it would be to scare you off. How easy it had been for anyone to scare him off in high school. He knew how risky it was to even ask, but there was no way in Hell he was about to let you think you were alone in this.

You glanced up at him, barely making eye contact before you shot your eyes away. Of course, you didn’t want to talk to him, or anyone else for that matter, but you weren’t sure what else to do. How else to feel better. To feel safer.

“How did you know how to do that?”

“I’ve had my fair share of panic attacks. My uncle used to have to calm me down the same way after I came to live with him.”

“You lived with your uncle?”

“Yeah, I got dropped off with him after my dad got locked up.”

“How old were you?”

“12.”

You were left speechless at that confession. You were the same age when your father died. There was something almost comforting about thinking that while you were going through one of the hardest moments of your life, little Eddie was somewhere out there doing the same.

“Did I say something?” Eddie grew nervous at your sudden silence and incredulous look.

“No, I… we’re just more alike than I thought.”

There was a pause as he calculated his response, which came after he began to fidget with the cloth of your shorts, right where they ended at your knee.

“You lose your parents too?”

You nodded,”Mom left when I was 5 and Dad died when I was 12.”

“I’m guessing you didn’t have an Uncle Wayne to be dropped off with?”

“No. I was in a couple different foster placements until I turned 18. Then I had my own apartment until I decided to pack everything up and lose it all in a car fire.”

“Were they good to you?”

“What?”

“The foster parents. Were they good to you?”

“Relatively. I mean they gave me a place to sleep, fed me everyday. I wasn’t asking for much more than that. And it’s not like they were obligated to give me more anyway.”

“But you deserved it.”

“I was a shithead teenager at the time. Some of those people were practically saints for not kicking me out after the meltdowns I had.”

“You were a child. Dealing with the loss of both of your parents, and I don’t imagine you had very many people outside of your home helping you process your grief. You deserved more.”

Everything he said was so matter of fact, but as he continued he grew more insistent. He needed you to believe every word he was saying.

“You deserved someone that loved you. Someone that you could go to after something like this, and someone that could prove to you that you were not just a shithead teenager. You were a human being, dealing with shit tougher than half of the actual shitheads that made your life a living hell will ever have to deal with.”

“Thanks Eddie, but it’s fine. Made me who I am today.”

“Calloused and unaccepting of help?” “Exactly,” you smiled, and Eddie couldn’t help but let out a breath of tension.

“Maybe I was wrong, maybe you are a shithead,” he chuckled and grabbed the nearest blanket to throw at you.

You both giggled as you uncovered yourself from his projectile, finally feeling the weight lift from the atmosphere.

“Ok, which couch do you want to sleep on? We’ll get you all settled in.”

“Whichever one you don’t want to sleep on,” you replied genuinely, but Eddie was not having it.

“No, from here on out, you are being treated the way that 12 year old you should have been. So you choose your couch, I’ll get you a glass of water, and you’ll go to sleep so you’re well rested for our shopping trip tomorrow.”

“Shopping trip?”

“You think 12 year old you deserved my sweaty old gym shorts to live in? Absolutely not. We’re going to get you your own clothes, your own food, your own pillow and blanket, and anything else 12 year old you would have wanted.”

“I was 12, I probably wanted a pony at that age.”

“Well 12 year old you might have to wait a little longer for that one. My trailer isn’t going to make a great stable,” he laughed.

“You really don’t have to do that though. You letting me sleep here is more than enough.”

“I said you deserved more than a meal and a place to sleep and I meant it. Now, which couch do you want.”

You hesitated for a second, but ultimately replied that you would stay on the couch you were already on. You tried not to smile at his pleased expression as he tucked you in and got you a glass of water, as promised.

“TV on or off? And don’t you dare say ‘whatever you want’”, he mocked your voice in a way that made you giggle.

“Can we turn it on low? I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep in silence.”

“That’s more like it,” he smiled and turned to grab the remote. He turned it to a pleasant home shopping channel, and turned the volume down low.

After he grabbed the rest of the blankets to put on the other couch for himself, he returned to crouch in front of you.

“Do you need anything else?” he asked, mischief now replaced with the same concern from earlier.

“I don’t think so. And no, I’m not just saying that,” you smirked.

“Good,” he smiled, “I’ll be 2 feet away if you need anything. Please don’t be afraid to wake me up, ok?”

“Ok,” you smiled back. He began to get up, but you stopped him before he could turn around. “Eddie?”

“Yeah?” he asked, crouching back down.

“Thank you.”

“You don’t have to…”

“No, please. Whether I deserve all this or not, it didn’t have to come from you.”

“Well I’m glad it is me,” he smiled in a way that sent a shiver up your spine, but before he could see your blush, he leaned in and kissed your forehead. You were grateful that the light was off when he pulled away so he couldn't see how beet red your face had become.

“Goodnight,” he whispered before making his way to the other couch.

“Goodnight,” you whispered back, heart beating a mile a minute.

Tags: @emma77645 @eli-flower @vivalasv3gan @beeblisss @tiny-bird-of-sunshine @helloheyhihowdyheya @r-a-d-i-0-n-0-w-h-e-r-e @yujyujjj @pettydonuts @peachysink @sophal22 @eddielives1986 @eddieswifu @chickpeadumpsterfire @fluffybunnyu @panagiasikelia @canthavetoomuchchaos @g0thdraculaura @celestcies

There may be a part 3 coming your way in the coming months, so please add yourself to my tag list if you would like to be tagged!!

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson fluff #eddie munson angst #eddie munson hurt/comfort #stranger things #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson fanfiction #eddie munson imagine

236 notes · View notes

horseshoegirl · 11 days

Text

Set Me Alight: Part 8 - Salt and The Sea

📜Everyone has been on a Bob kick lately (I think), so this is coming right when it should! Let's see how Grace and Bob feel about all this. Shall we? 👀

‼️ - +18, Minors DNI, Strong Language, Original Female Character (s), Bradley Bradshaw x Natasha Trace, Bob Floyd x Original Female Character (This is all in their perspective), Angst, mentions of bullying, hurt, overheard fights, preventing a panic attack, frustration, and Grace being sad and done with Bullshit.

#4.6k

Part 7 | Masterlist | Part 9

Present Day

Sixteen hours.

That's how long Bob's carefully guarded, carefully constructed walls took to crumble after all these years.

There was an inkling the night before as he settled into his tent, a feeling that knocked once or twice from the inside of his chest. It wasn't there when he woke up this morning or during the trek here to the falls.

But the second Grace raced up behind him, everyone watching Veronica climb out of the water, that feeling returned. It seemed no longer content to sit around and wait for Bob to figure out why it had.

Grace grasped his hand, pulling herself to hide behind his body so she could stifle her giggles into the back of his shoulder. Bob couldn't help the few snorts that shook through his body either. However, he pitied Javy, watching as he tried to console his girlfriend, who was stomping her foot like a three-year-old child over the fact that her makeup had been ruined.

The both of them couldn't say it wasn't an unwelcome sight. They knew what you had done, catching you hooking something onto the loop of Veronica's jeans, knowing it was damn well meant for Jake. Though the pair knew better than to act on it, they imagined themselves holding up a fist to the air, like in the Breakfast Club, silently praising the act of Karma on your behalf.

Maybe even quietly counting tallies next to your name in Bob's traveller's journal.

You needed a win. A big win against one of those two. They weren't going to say shit about it. They only wished, deep down, they could have helped.

But when Bradley took you by the arm, leading you way, another knock, this time harder, thumped in his chest. Another followed it. And another, until that feeling morphed into what Bob could only describe as a white-hot pain, burning every nerve in the pit of his stomach.

Bob knew what was about to happen.

While there hadn't been much to discuss, Bradley had pulled all the guys together after you went to bed last night to discuss his proposal. Standing in that circle, Bob realized it had been more of a pep talk than anything else.

Everyone already had a predetermined role—some part to play in helping Nat get to the right spot. Bob and Grace merely had to act surprised, with the rest of the group save Jake, you, and Rueben, when they eventually emerged from the bush, a shiny new ring hopefully on her finger.

It was a horrible plan, he had thought then. He knew—more so than most—that involving Jake and you in such an event would only result in disaster. He even had said as much to Grace when he turned in for the night, climbing into their shared tent.

Grace merely highlighted Nat's inconsiderate behaviour regarding your feelings, turning her back to him as she settled into her sleeping bag. The action was so absolute, so final, they said nothing else about it the rest of the night.

But laying awake, staring at Grace's back, Bob couldn't help but think about it. Grace was right. With all the shit Jake and you threw at each other since the moment you two met, Nat would have to be completely stupid not to realize just how fucked up it was not to tell you Jake would be coming on this trip.

It wasn't the first time Grace brought it up, either. Bob knew how his girlfriend felt about Nat, you, the entire group, their inability to stand up for you, and their failure to separate themselves from Nat.

He'd be lying if he hadn't felt the same at one point or another.

But Bob knew why everyone didn't, why he didn't, and why, even to some extent, Jake didn't either, even if he was more verbal about it than anyone else.

From behind the scenes, everyone tried to protect you and themselves from a fallout with Natasha. Not the fallout itself but the aftermath. At that point, he had rolled on his back, trying to figure it all out from the safety and privacy of his tent.

But who was he kidding? There was nothing to figure out.

Nat's scandal was an anvil, and her history and behaviour were hanging over every person in the group by a single thread. Even in the years since it happened, since they had all left school and Grace and Cora joined the group, it still had everyone in a chokehold.

And you were oblivious to it all.

Bob wasn't sure when it happened, but it became an unspoken agreement to protect you from that truth. So they were burying it to keep the peace—at least, everyone but Bradley. Bob couldn't say what was happening inside his friend's head, nor would he ask him.

But nobody would go out of their way to upset the group's 'supposed' hierarchy—not when real friendships and relationships, whether made with Nat's influence or not, were at stake.

You had to deal with the brunt of it, and Bob would regret it every day for the rest of his life.

No kind words or assurances could help the cluster of nerves swimming in Bob's stomach when Grace hooked her arm through his. Leading him to a section of the pond free from tourists, she wanted to avoid the temper tantrum Javy and Rueben, to an extent, would have to deal with. Seeing fish in the water earlier and knowing Bob would get a kick out of trying to identify them, she welcomed the distraction.

But as the pair searched through their books to match the first fish they saw, the first shout vibrated through the air, and Bob felt like he was going to hurl.

There was no mistaking it for what it was. Nat was, for lack of a better word, shitting on you and Jake. It was loud. It was scary. And no matter where anyone went, it was impossible to block out the noise.

They stood there, staring down at the words and diagrams in their books, no longer interested in the fish, scared any movement or action would have them on a chopping block. Though her eyes blurred, Grace was sure there were no more fish to look at anyway, for they, too, would have felt the noise vibrate against the water and would have been scared away.

At least they felt like they were able to.

When it finally fell silent, Grace nervously reached for Bob's hand. She led them away from the water through a tiny gap in the bush, deep into the forest. She didn't dare stop, walking blindly for minutes until she saw a little nook encased by a massive tree.

Its branches hung low, as did those of the surrounding trees. Each covered the space in a vibrant green shade, offering a safe place from the events leading up to this moment. A giant, thick tree root rested above the ground, and Grace pulled Bob down as she sat upon it.

Neither one spoke, nervous to say anything. Birds, the wind and bugs filled this space instead. It could have been hours, though Grace started to play with Bob's fingers only minutes later. He let her slide her fingertips over his skin and grasp around each finger until she smoothly threaded each together. Over and over, she did this, never once altering her pattern or rhythm.

Grace was trying to ground herself. And for Bob, it made everything that much worse.

It had been sixteen hours to the dot since that first knock in his chest. And while Bob had admitted last night and perhaps now that the trip, the excuses, the group dynamic, Nat's behaviour—was hopelessly warped—the truth was he had known for days, months, maybe even years.

He'd simply shoved it all deep down under lock and key, partly for selfish reasons. Sixteen hours was merely all the time it took for that lock to break and for everything to come rushing back to the surface. Because while the person he loved was hurting on behalf of someone else, it was too silent in this forest, even at this distance.

It was the lack of you and Jake tearing each other apart.

"I think something happened to Jake and Maeve," Bob said in a rough voice, finally finding the courage to speak.

Grace's hands froze, not moving an inch. She lifted her head, eyebrows knitting together. Bob didn't meet her gaze, too nervous to look away from their joined hands.

"It's too quiet," he offered softly. "Especially after that."

Grace also dropped her eyes to their hands, biting the inside of her cheek hard. "She'd be tearing into him right now. Forget Nat. Maeve would clear out the whole damn park with a single shout."

Bob nodded absentmindedly, turning his hand to mock Grace's earlier pattern, a silent gesture to let her know he had been paying attention.

"Or she'd be running off to apologize to Nat, and Jake would be seeking us out, tail between his legs."

"Nat should be the one apologizing to her."

Grace's statement was so blunt and sharp that Bob feathered his jaw. And something in that quick movement made a thread in Grace's gentle heart snap.

She tore her hand from Bob's grip and shuffled away from him further down the log. She swallowed hard, refusing to turn back and look at him as she fiddled with a ring on her finger. When Bob went to follow, naturally reaching for her like it was second nature, she shuffled again.

"No," she mumbled lowly, shying away from his touch. Bob frowned, sliding closer once again, softly calling her name. But Grace only pushed herself up from the log, her fists balled and clenched tight. "No!"

She stomped forward a few steps, not wanting to leave the found safety of their little nook. Threading her fingers through her hair, she paced back and forth, trying to count her breath.

"Grace..."

She spun wildly, her eyes narrowing, her lips pressing into a thin line, and her jaw clenching. "Don't 'Grace' me," she gritted out behind her teeth.

Bob dropped his forehead into the palm of his hand, his elbow digging hard into his knee. "Don't..."

"Don't what, exactly?" she seethed. "Don't talk about 'it'?

Bob dug his nails into the denim of his jeans - enough to feel a pinch through the fabric on his thigh.

The laugh Grace let out was bitter, morphing into a harsh shout. "Come on, Bob! Cora and I might have been the last ones to join whatever fucked up friend group this is, but Nat couldn't give two shits about Maeve! And it's this unspoken thing nobody talks about. Why?!"

"Grace..."

"Don't!" she snapped, stomping her foot, making clumps of dirt fly out in all directions. "I don't care about some fucked up unspoken agreement! I care about Maeve! Don't tell me you don't, Robert?!"

Bob finally lifted his head, though he focused on the way they came, not once meeting his girlfriend's angry stare.

"Bob, so help me... If you say no..."

"You know I do!" he rushed out, shaking his head.

"Then why don't you fucking say something?!" she cried out. "Why doesn't anyone say something?! She's suffering, and nobody does anything!"

She didn't even know she was crying hot, angry tears until she felt one fall off her cheek, a slight cool breeze marking a path on her skin.

"I wanted to. I wanted to, so badly, the first time I noticed it. And you told me not to."

Bob did, and he always wondered if Grace resented him for it.

She sighed, wiping the tears from her face. She paced back and forth a little bit, trying to calm herself down. Because Bob didn't deserve her anger, it was unfair of her to even yell at him in the first place.

Instead, she walked up to the tree, pressing her forehead into the bark, once again trying to count her inhales and exhales.

"When Bradley told me about Nat when he was going to school, I thought she was just a phase. Whenever he called to talk to Dad, I just sat back and wondered. I wondered how long it would take and what the reason behind the break between those two would be."

Grace lifted her head, fixing her eyes on a ladybug climbing the trunk. "You could imagine my surprise when he brought her home for spring break."

She placed her hand on the wood, twisting back to look at her boyfriend. "I never told you this, but I didn't like her the second I met her."

Bob lifted his head to meet her gaze. "Why..?"

"Because she thought I was a threat. That I harboured a crush on Bradley, and I would steal him from her," she shrugged.

Bob's eyes shot up his skull. "... I mean, you two grew up together... did you... ever?"

Grace audibly gagged, adding a few choking noises for a dramatic effect. "He's like my brother, Bob. What the hell?"

He held his hands up in surrender. "I had to ask."

Grace didn't address the remark when she continued, "She treated me horribly that entire week. She sweet-talked my dad and only was nice to me when he was around. Thank God he saw right through her. The second he left, he said that Carole, Bradley's mom, wouldn't have approved. I agreed."

With a narrowed forehead, Bob's mouth gaped open, bobbing like a fish. "Wait... then why did she..."

"Why did she suddenly start inviting me to stuff? It's cause I was dating you. I was no longer a threat. And she acted like she had never done what she did in the first place."

While Bob might have met Grace through work, he was surprised to learn she had grown up with Bradley. How she acted around Bradley, bore no resemblance to a long-lasting, familiar childhood friendship. However, the longer he thought about it, the more it made sense—her closed-off and quiet nature when she was around them.

That the first time they saw each other again, all Bradley could manage was a slight nod.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Grace only offered causally, "You'd be surprised at all the stuff that doesn't require your input. Sometimes you gotta leave people to do the lame shit they do and watch them fuck it up on their own."

A ball formed in her throat. "But Maeve... when I met Maeve and saw what was happening, my heart broke. And she is the only exception to what I just said."

Bob knew what was coming next. Like a coward, he braced himself hard.

"You told me not to say anything when I first brought it up. But now? I can't keep doing it. Not after what she just did to them. Not after that."

"Grace... Don't..."

"Maeve is drowning, Bob! Drowning!" she shouted angrily, startling a nearby bird on a branch. "And I can't stand it any longer. We need to find her, grab her, and take her home. Take her away from all this. From Nat, from those two bitches... God, if they gaslight anything else, they could practically set the whole fucking forest on fire."

"You don't believe in swearing, Grace," he deadpanned.

"Maybe I do now!" she cried. "I feel guilty. Guilty Bob! Cause I bit my lip like a good girl when Nat just what? Uses her? Ignores her? Disregard her feelings? Like hell, why didn't she try harder to figure the fuck out why Jake and Meave are at each other's throats?! Or how those two bully the fuck out of her?"

"Maeve wouldn't tell us about Jake when we asked."

"And you don't find it strange she wouldn't?" she challenged him. "Out of everyone in the group, she didn't tell a soul. Why? Why didn't she? Why wouldn't she?!"

Grace's heart was hurting, and she knew Bob truly knew why. He had been around them longer than she had, so there must have been a reason he told her not to. There had to be.

"At first, I thought it was something everyone accepted, you know? That everyone was trying to figure out what had happened between her and Jake. I thought tensions were high because of that.

She blew out a shaky breath, Bob not once interrupting her.

"Maybe it was a fucking game they were playing with each other until they finally worked up the courage to admit they like each other enough to get into each other's pants. Cause whatever the cause, Maeve wouldn't be so goddamn hurt if she didn't care!"

Bob closed his eyes, a huff of a laugh escaping his mouth.

"But last to join the group, right? You have to be quiet. Read the room. Get a sense of how to act and what you can say. Cause learning to fit in with new people, you have to pick up these things. The best way to get along with everyone else. Like how Maeve runs the second Jake walks into the room? How she avoids conversations about him if she can help it?"

Grace blew a raspberry out of pure frustration. "Jake was never the real issue, though. Everyone just made it out to be. Everyone should have noticed how Maeve bit her tongue as Nat walked over her opinions. How Nat derails conversations, not just where Maeve is concerned, but practically with everyone to make it about her."

Grace laughed, shaking her head. "She got the brunt of all of it, and we just... watched."

Grace finally approached Bob, standing before him, though he didn't lift his head from where it hung low on his shoulders. Had he chosen to look up, he would have noticed how the sun finally peeked through the leaves, beams of light breaking the shade, leaving Grace in their spotlight.

"I meant, she invites us all on this trip so we can watch her get proposed to? And she doesn't bother to tell her that Jake is coming along, too? I mean... how selfish can she get?!"

"Grace, this isn't going to solve..."

"WHAT ELSE CAN I DO?!" she yelled, throwing her hands at the sky. "That ship left the fucking dock ages ago."

Bob's eyes fixed on a leaf stuck under a fallen branch at her words. Grace knew from that reaction alone that she had resonated with something within his kind, caring soul.

"I just... can't... I can't anymore, Bob. If I'm the first to take the leap and break up this group, then good fucking riddance. It needs to be done so we all can get some peace."

She slid to her knees in the dirt in front of him, her hands resting firmly on the sides of his thighs.

"How many years have Nat and Maeve known each other, and not once did Nat realize how hard her supposed best friend had been falling? How could she not recognize that, Bob? And how could she continue to force Jake and Maeve together when Maeve just wanted to escape?"

She reached forward to cup his cheek, guiding his gaze to meet hers. While silent rage resonated within them, Bob knew it wasn't meant for him.

"Why did you tell me to be quiet that first time I brought this up? Why do you still tell me, too?"

Bob gulped, forcing his eyes away. Grace stroked her thumb under his eye, encouraging him on. "I don't know what happened, baby, but I don't think it will be all sunshine and rainbows when we return to the group. Not this time. Just tell me, please."

Bob blew out a shakey breath and shook his head. "Because I wanted you to stay."

"Stay?"

He had contemplated all the reasons, stacking them up brick by brick last night, refusing to acknowledge the leverage Natasha could have used against him. But Bob had damned himself with that one word.

Stay—He wanted Grace to stay. Because if he brought this up, if he told her, there was a chance she wouldn't—at least, there was a possibility.

He lifted his chin, staring into her eyes.

Nat's so-called leverage was kneeling in front of him, begging him to tell her the truth. Her eyes were desperate, so much so that Bob knew he was possibly damned if he did and undoubtedly damned if he did not. Grace had chosen her path, and he would steadfastly follow her wherever she decided to go.

There was no ever questioning that.

Bob reached for her sides, pulling Grace close between his spread legs. She let him, hands landing softly on his biceps before they slid down to his forearms. Bob traded his grip on her jacket to hold her hands, only to trace the same pattern she had a few minutes before.

He braced himself and took several sharp breaths before asking, "Did anyone ever tell you about Natasha's so-called scandal? Back in school?"

Grace cocked an eyebrow. "Only what Maeve's told me. Bradley and I weren't on speaking terms, and he'd never tell Dad if she had one. Though, Maeve didn't even know the complete story."

She let Bob turn her hand over and trace the lines on the palm of her hand. "But she shut me down hard after that. Saying Nat worked to put it behind her and move on, so we all should, too."

Bob scoffed. "Always protecting her."

"Bob?"

Bob hesitated, his gaze flickering away from Grace's expectant eyes. He swallowed hard, the reluctance clear in his tight jaw. Then he closed his eyes, leaning over to whisper in her ear, his voice cautious but a whisper.

Grace's eyes widened, and a gasp slipped through her parted lips at his words. She could hardly breathe as he told her the story. And when he was finished, she tilted so far back on her heels in shock that she almost fell onto her butt.

"Bob! What the hell? After everything I just told you?!"

Bob still hadn't opened his eyes, his head hung low in shame.

"I would have never left you over that! Over complete and utter bullshit? Who do you think I'd believe more? Her or my boyfriend?"

"I didn't know. I didn't want to risk losing you."

"You listen here, Bob Floyd," Grace urged, grabbing his face with both hands and forcing him to look at her. "I'm in a relationship with you. I love you. I would have never believed her if she had done that to us."

He kissed the inside of Grace's wrist, a deep weight lifting off his chest.

"God, I want to throttle her."

"I think that's why everyone doesn't call her out. Cause they don't want it to happen to them. Or at least, deep down, I never did 'cause I didn't want Maeve or Bradley to be alone with..."

Grace nodded, letting Bob know he did not need to continue explaining.

"We should try to find her, Bob. Let her know we love her and that we'd follow her. I have no idea if anyone else would besides Mickey and Cora. Hell, I'd even offer to leave with her and get drunk on her Aunt's apple cider 'cause this whole damn trip was a bad idea."

Bob huffed a sad laugh. "It is apple picking season. I bet she'd love it if we went with her."

Grace snorted. "You just want free apples so I can make my apple crisp."

With the tension from before gone and the weight of Bob's chest finally disappearing with his confession, he joked comedically, "Ssshh, don't jinx it."

Grace rolled her eyes, letting the moment pass before offering quietly, "Where do you think she is? Maeve?"

Bob regarded her for a moment before letting out a long sigh. "Considering the lack of voices, Maeve's probably tried to separate herself. Or she made a rash decision and decided to leave alone."

Grace gasped. "What about Jake?"

"Jake ... I bet 50 bucks Jake ran after her regardless."

Her face contorted into one of disgust. "What? Why? Can he not leave her alone for once in his life?"

Bob stood, wiping his hands on his jeans, before extending a hand to Grace. She took it without another word and allowed him to guide her up and off the tree. He revealed yet another truth as he helped her step over the massive root.

"Remember when I went with Bradley and Jake before Maeve hurt her wrist? Jake wanted to show us a fishing spot...?"

Grace winced. When Bob told her what happened, she instantly regretted not being out there with you. Hold up in her tent, she had been working on plans for a museum exhibit. Even if she had to do a little work, she could have at least done it in the company of a friend.

"I found out Bradley's been trying to coach Jake into mending things with Maeve. We might have been giving him some... advice."

Grace froze with her two feet atop the curved piece of wood.

"What!!?" she shrieked, making Bob wince. "Please tell me you weren't the one who encouraged him to keep up the prank thing. Bob, if you told him to scream 'there's a Bear..'."

"It wasn't me! Nor was it Bradley! We just told him to try to talk to her without anyone around. Cause things seem to go to shit when everyone else is there. He just needed to incite her to stay. Make her laugh. Talk to her like a human being!"

"Men," she scoffed, jumping down off the root. "Never go to a group of idiots to do a woman's job."

Bob froze, eyeing her carefully. "Are you calling me an idiot?"

Grace smiled, reaching up to stroke across his cheek. She kissed his lips with a quick peck and leaned back. "Hmm... my idiot, though."

She took several steps back towards the falls when she called out over her shoulder to a befuddled Bob. "You realize if we locked them in a room or trapped them in an elevator, with nobody else around, they'd probably figure it out?"

"How so?" he called back, finally following her.

"Jake obviously wants to fix it. Maeve runs. All you need to do is stop her from running. She'll give in if you provoke her enough, which Jake already does."

Bob paused, reflecting for a moment. "He doesn't think when it comes to her, does he?"

"Does she?"

When they emerged from the bush, Bob and Grace ran to the first person they saw, hoping at least someone saw either you or Jake. Nobody had. Not until a few minutes later did a couple mention seeing someone bearing your resemblance climbing the waterfall. They also mentioned seeing someone who looked like Nat go up, but she had already come back down.

Grace stared at them in horror. "I'll go get Mickey and Cora," she rushed out quickly, leaving Bob alone to start the trek up the rocky slope. As he did, a million thoughts crossed his mind.

Finding you and Jake tearing each other apart, hoping Mickey and Cora's skills weren't needed. Or the more stupidly optimistic thought - either of you was trying to find a few moments of peace.

As if.

Or perhaps it was none of those things. Maybe what awaited him above was something far worse than he could ever fathom.

But when he reached the top of the falls, neither you nor Jake were there, and Bob didn't spare the effort to take in the view. Instead, he searched the ground, kneeling when he spied several tracks in the mud.

Two sets, both inherently female, were marked along the river bank in the mud. Bob's eyes followed them until he saw a separate path of them walking back. Then he noticed another pair of tracks, the boot tread clearly belonging to a man. They followed one of the other tracks, veering quickly off into the bushes. They were noticeably disturbed, leaves and branches bent unnaturally, and the longer he followed the underbrush and mud, the more he understood what happened to the two of you.

Bob set off, knowing just exactly where he needed to go.

Can I just say I love Bob and Grace?

Tag List:

@desert-fern @startrekfangirl2233 @sarahsmi13s @kmc1989 @fanficfandomlove @hookslove1592 @dakotakazansky

@teacupsandtopgun @lynnevanss @dizzybee03 @keyrani

@shanimallina87 @wildxwidow @dempy @stargazer-88 @alldaysdreamer @the-dark-and-mystery @bookchik15

@atarmychick007 @trickphotography2 @tinytotontheoversizedpony @buckysteveloki-me @wretchedmo

@redbarn1995 @a-court-of-roscoe-and-baby @yuckosworld @wren5650 @mrsevans90 @bellaireland1981 @tgmreader

@halibshepherd @essie1876 @formulafun @memoriesat30 @vicsnook @memoriesat30 @eclecticfashionbookszipper @boisewaffles @eloquentdreamer @jessicab1991

And for those who've been following along:

@i-wanna-be-your-muse @djs8891 @gigisimsonmars @blue-aconite @wildlyfreemoon @eli2447 @rascallyrascalreads @djs8891

92 notes · View notes