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bowieandqueen11 · 6 months

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Dylan Lenivy With A Protective S/O Would Include...

Request: Dylan from the quarry with an s/o who’s like really strong. Like wrestle bears strong (or in the quarry case wrestle werewolves strong) and is very protective. Like i mean picking Dylan up and running or taking hits for him.

I genuinely love Dylan so much time to work through my writer's block for him bby!! :)

Warning: Strong language, mentions of blood/ injury, mentions of guns and werewolf attacks!

(I do not own the Quarry or its characters, all rights go to creators. Gif credit goes to @moafleco.)

☆.。.:・°☆.。.:・°

Dylan Lenivy: darling boy, absolute light of my life!! I full on expected to come into this game and have Max be my favourite because I loved Skyler Gisondo in Booksmart and Night at the Museum 3 but Dylan really side swept my ass here and stole my heart I've got to be honest.

You can bet your ass during the whole Werewolf Attack night at Hackett's Quarry, Dylan will use whatever battery is left on his phone sending you cheesy texts just to check in and make sure you're okay. Be ready for your phone to ding about a thousand times a minute, until Kaitlyn finally cracks and shoves it, still vibrating, into one of the cubbies in the nurse's office.

'Hey sweet... baby-heart! Wait that sounds weird let me start again. Hellooo there sweetheart!❤️🥰 just wanted to make sure ❓that you’re still alive! 💘😖 and not ripped apart! 🤞❌ anyway love you please don’t get eaten by a swarm of bears!! 🐻😘'

Ryan had the joy of reading that one over his shoulder in the radio shack, and the groan he emitted was so loud they both ended up having to pitch over each other and duck under the table because it drew Caleb back up onto the roof.

The poor guy keeps peering out between the slats of the radio shack window like a scared meerkat popping up from behind towering rocks, thinking he can see you float past in a mist of lucent white, weaving through the treeline. He keeps pacing back and forth, back and forth sweating buckets because he's so terrified, and so ashamed that he's cowering in here while you may be in danger out there. Even Ryan's awkward offer to let Dylan borrow his earphones for a while: to sit with his knees drawn up to his chest in the corner and just breathe for a minute while Ryan kept watch, was met with an uncharacteristic sharp intake of breath and manic shake of the head.

So when you come bursting through the rickety door: drenched from head to toe in Nick's metallic reeking blood and propping Chris Hackett's shotgun in your arms, neither of the two men know what to do. But when a crash of lightning makes the full moon glowing behind your head shudder, making the pulsating umbra shrouding your head seem all the more monstrous, Dylan suddenly does.

The man starts screaming in a key that only dogs had a chance of hearing.

When he finally realises that it's you and not - you know - the 'Hag of Hackett's Quarry', and he's spent enough time bent over with his hands resting on his knees trying to catch his breath, the nervous butterflies in the pit of his stomach suddenly turn into somersaults. You came back for him. You came to save him. You care for him that much: love him that much, that you were willing to risk your own life just to try and save his.

Even though he's known you since you were seven years old: even though the two of you had met all those years ago during your first week at this very same camp, catching each other's eyes and waving as he bundled up to Chris' office with a brand new tape player he had restored in his arms, and you helped one of the younger girls pull her luggage out from the back of her parent's van, the true extent of how much he could fucking love someone hits him like air freshener to the face.

Even though the two of you used to sneak out of your bunks and meet up at midnight in the Shady Glade, bumping down beside each other on the dewy grass, constantly craving each other’s company. You made him blush one night, when you suddenly grabbed his hand and intertwined his growing fingers over your smaller ones, pointing up at the moon, and the glowing stars, not realising the little side eye, euphoric look he would give you.

Even though his heart had flipped over there and then: greedily gorging and festering in his chest, even though he had spent years stifling the feeling until he learnt that he was lucky enough to have it returned, it still shocked him to realise you didn't see him as a waste of space. As a spent joke.

And then his hand gets bit, and everything changes. It must have looked at least a little bit funny when it happened, considering there was not a chance in hell you were about to let any mystical creature drag off your poor boyfriend. As soon as Dylan got swung up to the roof: screaming and begging for you and Ryan to get him down, you jumped onto the desk and latched yourself on Dylan's back like koala bear. Your legs are quick to wrap around his waist until your heels kick up onto the slats, your arms wrapping around his waist until you manage to reach past and grab onto thick handfuls of warm... oozing fur.

With a swift punch to the snout, the two of you fall unceremoniously to the floor in a resounding crash. You managed to cover most of Dylan's moans during your fall by cradling him into your stomach, taking most of the brunt of the force. The poor guy for a moment just curls up on top of you in a state of wide-eyed shock, the side of his cheek heavy as he smooshed it against the side of your jaw. It's almost domestic: almost sweet, as he tugs his legs up between your knees and hides his eyes by turning his head into the curve of your neck. It's the same manner in which he wakes up every morning, hiding himself by nestling himself into you every time the sunrise comes falling through the dusty cracks of the Quarry's alpine blinds and makes him jolt awake.

This time, though. This time is far worse. Because then he starts laughing: a hoarse, shaking, unnerving noise that seems to seep through your throat and make you choke on your tongue. You do your best to grab onto his biceps as he starts shaking, his hands beginning to ball into your shirt as the reality of what's just happened to him settles in.

This man has seen enough horror movies in his life. If he's going to die, he wants to do it lying here in your arms.

Before he knew what was happening, he's being lifted up into your arms bridle style and rushed out towards the pool house. The whole way there, despite the agonising pain he's in, he keeps pressing his lips into your collar bone and giggling like a school boy caught head over heels by his crush. Even when your hands finally slip off from underneath his knees and you gently perch him on the edge of a sink, he's still cradling the side of his head on his neck and looking down at you as if you hung every star in that unbridled sky. It doesn't matter if you're trying to use a cloth to clear some of the blood from underneath his eyebags, or using some bandage Abi found in one of the pool lockers, this man is too busy trying to spend every second he has left as him enraptured by you. That means you have to work with him biting his bottom lip and smiling wonkily as he dodges the cloth and instead grabs onto your fingers, pulling them to his lips so he can kiss your knuckles one by one languidly. He looks so soft - so goddamn soft as he nudges his cheek against your intertwined hands, letting them rest against the side of his face.

He gets really fidgety, and it's then that you suddenly understand he's asking for a reassurance kiss: for the knowledge that you're not going to leave him. He’ll never say it outright, because deep down he’s too embarrassed and touch starved to admit it, but you can always tell. He has so many give away signs: he starts looking down at the floor, taps his feet against the tiles and fidgets his hips back against the porcelain, plays with his fingers by threading them through each other until you lean up to kiss the tip of his nose, and then he just beams with pure, unbridled happiness.

'You're so beautiful, you know that?' Even with the tendrils beginning to twist up his forearm, even half delirious with the stress of what had been happening that night, even thinking he's about to die he's still thinking of you. Worried about you. Desperate for you to know, that it's always been you. That it's all you.

'Dylan... I love you too, but if you keep putting yourself in danger to save everyone else I'm going to kick you into Lake Septimus ass first, okay?'

'Look, I've never met the guy, and although I'm sure he's lovely you're the only person I want to fall ass first onto', he replies, trying his best to hide how his eyes were starting to burn: how his eyes were beginning to crinkle with the effort of stopping his face contorting in pain by cupping your cheeks with his large palms and pressing a lingering, needy kiss against the side of your mouth.

'Ew. Gross, guys.' You turn your head to raise an amused eyebrow at Kaitlyn, but she only shakes her head and turns her attention back to the knitting gash on Nick's leg.

He seems to spend half of the time hiding behind your back! Like, you can just feel the slight tremble as his slender fingers touch your shoulder, and then the growing shadow against the lodge chimney as he jolts behind you. He's trying his best, bless his heart, even though the way he tucks the jut of his chin into your shoulder blade and grabs onto your biceps restricts you from shooting off Caleb when he comes clambering up the stairs towards the two of you.

But also even though he knows you're super bad ass he is 100% ready to launch himself, full-body starfish jump, in harm's way at the first sign of danger. Such as when Emma comes jumping out of the minivan, and Dylan straight away launches you away from him and nearly bearhugs her to the stony ground. Thankfully, you manage to tear off a branch from one of the encircling pine trees and strike the werewolf off Dylan; a near home run hit had her scrambling off into the woodland again as fast as her four legs could carry her. For a moment, your boyfriend just lounges against the dirt, shaky breath only interrupted by the sound of his wincing as he begins to flick pebbles off the deep scratches lining his elbow. Then, before you can even blink, he comes scrambling on his hands and knees towards you like a prowling predator, before melting into you. His arms are quick to lock behind your hamstrings; Dylan doesn't even bother to get up off his knees, he just shoves his head into your bellybutton and refuses to move until he can feel your fingers card through his scalp.

'Oh my god!', he finally starts, once you begin to unlatch his rusted fingers from around his legs by pulling at them one by one. 'I can't believe you never told me!'

'Told you what?'

'That you're secretly the sports coach! I knew Jacob was too much of a butthead - I just knew he was too busy playing hookup to look after the kids. That's the real tea from this summer.'

For real though - it doesn't matter where you are: turn around and Dylan's on your heels like your own personal walking, talking, screeching shadow. You have a bet with Kaitlin on whether he's managed to build a teleporting machine during his free time in the radio shack, because you could be down scouting the kitchen and he could be up looking at the weird family pictures in the lodge's attic, but at the first sound of any kind of howl he's there. You barely have time to duck down behind the counter before your boyfriend has made you jump out of your skin; he's standing right by the freezer (how tf did he manage to get all the way there without you hearing him??), completely out of breath and holding a cast iron skillet in his hands like a baseball bat.

'What?', he shrugs down at you with a tired smirk, putting his free hand on his hip and wiggling them a little. 'My mom always told me that it's better to be prepared than to catch anything unexpected. And I'm not letting you get bit too.'

'I'm... not quite sure that's what she meant. But thanks, sweetie.'

The nickname has his face burning a deep-set roseate for the next thirty minutes.

And then the two of you meet Laura, and this man's world just turns upside down. You turn down her offer to join her in trying to find Chris Hackett and end all of this for good, but from where Dylan was sitting on the bench next to the rattling window, he missed out on your reasoning why. He missed out on how you'd admitted that your sole focus: your one care now was to make sure that Dylan was safe. That you cared about him more than anything, and Mr. H could go to hell as far as you're concerned. You had to make sure Dylan survived the night.

Dylan's eyebrows crumpled when you came, cross armed, to unsteadily take a seat next to him again. He was too nervous to ask what the two of you had agreed, so he just fiddled with his thumbs and let the idea that he was holding you back darken his thoughts.

That he was a hinderance. That he was an annoyance.

He doesn't know what else to do, so as the two of you head out to the Hackett scrapyard in search of a new rotor arm, he takes up every silent moment by cracking wise. It starts to worry you - the way he can barely touch you. How he holds his hands in near claws against the meat of his biceps: how he barely lets his leg brush against yours before he jolts away again as if electrified. He even seems anxious when you reach out and grip onto his hand, his hold limp and loose as he lets it sway uneasily in the growing gap between your bodies.

He's just so afraid that if he lets go now, you'll be letting go of him forever. So he doesn't want to hold on at all. He feels it will be easier this way: kinder to you, to feel as if he's just drifting off with the breeze, a fond memory of long summers spent at some strange, long forgotten Quarry.

But you know him far too well not to register the full-blown panic behind his eyes as he dares to take a glance over at you. So please, shove this guy up against the nearest trunk of a tree, hold him up by shoving your knee in-between the seams of his thighs, and kiss him silly until all he can do is saunter off with a dopey smile and a brain so far up in the clouds all he can do is laugh rather than string together a sentence!!!

Literally I feel like this would heal him. Give this poor bby the love he's so desperately craving.

Straight up hefting him over your shoulder and carrying him away from Caleb in the scrapyard. The confused look on Kaitlyn's face as her head slowly turns to follow the set of you sprinting past with a screaming Dylan folded over your back like a snapped ruler is mfcking hilarious I'm not going to lie.

You refuse to leave him in the crane. Not even when he's gouging into the balls of your shoulders, crying and yelling and begging you to leave. To run. To get the hell away from him while you still can. Between his tormented yelps, you do your best to grab onto his face despite how forcefully his body's contorting. Despite how his fingernails are starting to cut into your skin and send blood blooming out in wispy tendrils across your shirt. You just place your thumbs up against the darkness obscuring the sides of his eyes and try to keep Dylan looking at you. To try and make him understand, to try and make sure the last thing he saw before he turned was you not leaving him. Not Ever.

#the quarry #the quarry imagine #dylan lenivy #dylan lenivy imagine #dylan lenivy x reader #dylan lenivy headcanons #dylan the quarry #dylan the quarry imagine #dylan the quarry x reader #dylan the quarry headcanons

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pigeontheoneandonly · 4 months

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exit criteria

ETA: Now with AO3 link! Link

For once, I was actually feeling writerly, so I did a little time loop fic tonight about the run to the beam at the end of ME3:

The mortar struck the tank, flipped it, and in one single motion smeared Kaidan and Garrus into paste.

Shock took Shepard first, and the bullet took her second.

* * *

This time, Shepard threw her arm out and kept Kaidan from running ahead. So the bullet got him instead.

* * *

She had figured out far more complex problems than this, many times over. Failing twice was annoying. A blemish on her record, even if nobody else would ever know. So Shepard took half a beat before charging down the London rubble once again, used it to draw her own heavy weapon, and simply blasted the tank out of the way.

Garrus spared a moment none of them had to toss her a confused glance. Her answering smirk had just reached peak smugness when the airborne reaper unit, alerted by the explosion, sighted and fired, briefly illuminating each of their three outlines in its plasma beam before they atomized.

* * *

Her squad balked at running down the right side of the field when the center was clearly optimal. But they’d followed her to hell, and there was no time to argue.

Kaidan didn’t say I told you so when the banshee lifted him by his hair to her fetid mouth. He was too preoccupied with screaming, suddenly cut off.

* * *

Think, Shepard. She stared across the battlefield. Twenty seconds, then a minute, then five—an eternity in these conditions. The profligate waste didn’t concern her. Clearly, she’d have as many attempts as necessary to get this right.

(You hope, whispered a poisonous thought. You assume. You need.)

Beyond the beam that led to the Citadel, Harbinger crouched.

“I need to go further back,” she said aloud, abrupt, just before the reaper’s cherry red beam shot out through the dark with unerring precision.

* * *

“I’m sorry,” Hackett told her, on the med evac shuttle more than a day after she left Garrus and Liara dead under the tank. “The Crucible firing disabled most of the fleet, but stopped short of outright destroying it. Cerberus put too much reaper technology into the Normandy’s redesign. We found no survivors.”

* * *

“I’m sorry,” Shepard said, as Kaidan broke their goodbye kiss, eyes wide. A hypodermic needle was small but still noticeable when it pricked the delicate skin of the neck. “I need you to live.”

Her arms caught him as he folded up, gentle. Forgive me.

A bombed-out building had few good or secure hiding spots the size of an adult human male. Someone found him and brought him back to the Normandy. To the impromptu field hospital. To the personal care of an inexperienced and self-trained civilian medic whose misdiagnosis led to organ failure.

After the fourth attempt, Shepard abandoned the approach in exasperation.

* * *

Her squad charged down the left side. Killing a brute wasn’t unprecedented at this point in the war, but doing so with barely twenty feet of maneuvering room proved impossible. She should know. She tried ten times.

* * *

Shepard sat down at the top of hill, wrapping her arms around her knees and staring down the beam with real anger.

“Shouldn’t we charge?” Kaidan asked.

“You’d think so,” she grumbled.

* * *

The tank flipped.

The tank flipped—

* * *

Once, she went to the hill alone and screamed with every last ounce of frustration in her body. “What do you want from me?!”

Harbinger did not deign to reply. It did not even deign to slap her aside itself. Instead, it left her to be overrun, eventually, by various husks.

* * *

It merited further consideration, however: What did Harbinger (or the universe, or fate, or or or) want from her?

Her eyes narrowed over the London apocalypse. The galaxy can burn. There is no version of this mission where I let Kaidan die.

* * *

I won’t, she said, as a marauder broke through his armor.

I won’t, she said, while Kaidan flew thirty feet into the air and hit the ground with terrible finality.

I won’t, she said, as the tank flipped over him.

* * *

Kaidan found her in starboard observation, Earth growing ever larger in the port. Her hand pushed against the glass as if she could, by force, prevent it coming any closer.

She knew his footsteps. She knew the way the air stirred around his shape, the faint rustle of his clothes and the even fainter whiff of soap. Every line, tick, and habit.

Her shoulders hunched.

He asked her what was wrong, because he knew her, too, every mood and every flinch.

So Shepard did something she’d never done before, in any iteration: she told him.

It took a bit of time, and then they were both quiet for a long while. Kaidan held her curled in his arms. His breath in her hair. Her fingers digging into his forearm.

“I need you to do something for me,” he said, at last, sounding as tired as she felt.

Shepard knew Kaidan. Her grip tightens another fraction. “Don’t you dare say it.”

Quietly, inexorably, gently. “You need to let me go.”

The only answer she could bear was to shake her head, her throat stopped up.

* * *

Shepard never made that mistake again. But yet.

He kissed her in London, his hand lingering, cupped around her cheek. You need to let me go.

His gloved hand scooped up hers, just for a few paces, a stolen moment on a quiet street between packs of roaming reaper forces on their way to the beam, an ounce of warmth amid terror and despair. You need to let me go.

His breath woofed out, relief and new tension all at once, as they crested the hill and stared down at the frighteningly open terrain teeming with endless enemies, glowing with gunfire, the last stand, the last fight. You need to let me go.

* * *

She sat beside the tank a long while. Kaidan, his meat, was somewhere under it. In point of fact, this was the longest she’d ever lasted, any time she’d paused during the run to the beam. Nothing cared about her. Not here in the shadow of a ruined vehicle, no gun drawn, no fight left in the lines of her body. They all saw instinctively that she was no true threat.

There wasn’t a name for this sort of grief. How could anyone grieve a person who was dead thirty or forty or a hundred times over? He’d been dead the first time the mortar struck the tank and he was still dead now and there was absolutely nothing, nothing, to be done about it.

After a time, other reapers landed, legions of them making mountains on the horizon with their long, raised thoraxes. Systemically, they scoured London clean in a shower of particle beams and sonorous booms.

Shepard fell asleep not long after dawn and died without knowing it.

* * *

Kaidan tore his gaze away from the beam when he felt the pressure of Shepard looking at him. He cocked his head. “What are you doing?”

She took him in. Not long, not nearly long enough, but she took what she could get of him, always. Almost too quiet to hear, she sighed out, “Letting go.”

His brow creased. Then Garrus yelled, as the first of the enemy took notice of them, and they were flying down the field, Shepard chasing Kaidan chasing Garrus.

The mortar arced downward.

The tank flipped up into the air.

Shepard ran. The bullet whizzed past her shoulder, where she stood not a fraction of a second earlier.

The airborne reaper, passing overhead, took note of the human, and fired a plasma beam. The angle was not optimal. Even perfect machines bow to physics.

The beam flashed by her at near light-speed, hot enough to scorch her cheek.

It met the tank in the midair.

The tank glowed, and then exploded, knocking Kaidan and Garrus to the ground under a hot shrapnel rain.

The stab in her chest never lost its edge, no matter how many dozens of times he died. But her step didn’t falter. Her arms pumped, her legs flying, moving so fast, in fact, that the tears leaking out of her eyes flowed back into her hair—

Until, as she flashed by the tank’s remains, something new:

Kaidan sat up.

#mass effect #kaidan alenko #commander shepard #shenko #this is like...barely edited but it felt SO GOOD to be able to write something #i don't even care lol

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queenofbaws · 2 years

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wip meme!!!

Rules: Post the last line you wrote (from any WIP) and tag the same number of people as there are words

well hey there folks! i was lucky enough to get tagged by BOTH @love-fireflysong AND @nick-furcillo for this, so i figured hey, why not. now...here’s...here’s the thing, my friends. i need you all to know sharing this snippet is very hard for me.

emotionally.

because ONCE A-FUCKING-GAIN, i’ve let myself down. “i’m def not gonna start writing this new thing,” i said to myself, “i’m only gonna outline it and nothing else,” i said to myself. aaaaaand now i’m writing it. so, welcome, i suppose, to the first peek into the fic i am still jokingly calling the (hackett)s for now ;P

"Pickin’ on you,” Jack repeated as he regained his footing, moving slowly, thoughtfully, a snake preparing to lash out and strike; “You are fifty-six goddamn years old - there are retirement homes that would take you in if you turned up on their doorstep - you do not get picked on at fifty-six, you slimy piece of shit, you get insulted.”

aaaaaand i definitely do not know that many writers. SO. please take this as an open invitation to share a wip of yours if you got one you’d like to share, and just SAY i tagged you ;P cuz i did. sort of. in theory.

#ask game #queenie writes supermassive #i promise the plan is not actually to call it the (hackett)s lmfao #and i am 100% NOT posting even a single fucking chap until i finish some other shit i stg #i have. so much creep stuff. i NEED to get out there aklsdjfaksdjf i have a whole fic written for it but i need to finish mummy men skldfjak #but I WOULD BE LYING if i said the past few nights weren't me madly writing scenes for this skdlfjksdfjksjfd #supermassive gave me a fucked up appalachian family - /i/ am from a fucked up appalachian family #how did they expect me to NOT GET HOOKED

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basicinstnct · 2 years

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arrangement / jacob custos

word count: 2967

tags: size kink, love bites, hurt/comfort, angst, morning wood (more accurately nap wood), referenced masturbation, pining, insecurity, creampies, slight breeding kink, transfer of affection (sorta), savior complex

a/n: personally, i found this guy pretty endearing, especially if you look at his insecurities which are more apparent in some routes than they are in others. i know that isn't exactly a popular opinion (it's certainly a bit frustrating that the writers set him up by making him largely "responsible" for the events to follow), but hopefully there are enough like-minded people to give this some attention.

It’s often said that what you fear, you attract. You’re a little more receptive to that type of loose philosophy than you should be, so you aren’t exactly surprised when one day, the words come true.

Jacob’s voice calls out your name, soft, unlike him. “Are you awake?”

You’re glad you’re facing the wall. It gives you a chance against him, to not let him into your arms again. Other than pretending you’re asleep, there’s really no way out. Now that all the kids are gone, and the counselor you were supposed to share it with never showed up, you have the cabin all to yourself. Thinking about him had already kept you up all night, so you really just want to take a nap before you have to load the van up, not… this.

Seeing his face, those sad eyes, will end your resistance where it stands.

What the two of you have isn’t good. Against your intentions you’ve become at best a therapist, and at worst a replacement. Who you're taking the place of is unclear. At first you thought it was Emma. It wasn’t far-fetched to believe that you were covering for something that clearly wasn’t working. You were so sure, but more time with Jacob has left you doubting that. It has to be something in his past, something that happened a long time ago, inflicted by someone that you remind him of in one way or another. Being a proxy probably hurts him as much as it helps him, and you’re not exactly sure what it does to you.

What have you become? You’re not exactly the other woman. As far as you know, nothing’s really happened between Jacob and Emma in a long time, enough time that there’s a chance those flames have been swept out. You can see how Jacob’s affections burn hard against the cool of Emma’s practically nonexistent feelings.

You’ve let him, at least half a dozen times, come to be consoled by you. It began when he ran into you as you were heading down to the lake, one night when you couldn’t catch a wink of rest. When you later asked why he thought he could trust you, he didn’t have much to say.

You’ve let Jacob speak to you, cry to you. He mostly talks about nothing in particular, but if he nods off against your shoulder, he’ll mumble troubled, troubled words that make your heart pang. Lost thoughts about being alone, unwanted.

He has a lot of problems.

Around everyone else he can pretend he’s fine. You can learn as much from the truth as you can from a lie, but only if you’re looking.

He says your name again, in the midst of you faking a breath. You snuggle deeper into the thin fleece that Mr. Hackett gave you, trying to give the appearance of being slightly disturbed but not awoken. Something about the situation is giving you a feeling. You shouldn’t do this!

You can hardly think of anything at all when you hear his footsteps. He approaches your bunk cautiously, before you hear the creak in the floorboards and the movement of fingers. He tosses his shoes to the corner of the room. Then his sweats and shirt go too. You’re squeezing your eyes shut even though you desperately want to look at him. If not to admire his looks than to read the expression on his face.

When he lifts the blanket from your body. You’re so shocked by the action that you can’t even fight it, the way you shiver all over. Jacob climbs into bed and wraps his arm around you. You can feel the warmth of his body, his furnace-like chest against your back as his head rests against your shoulder.

Without him, you run cold naturally, especially when you sleep. Now that he’s in bed with you, you’re worried the temperature of his body will make you sweat.

“I know you’re awake. You can tell me to go,” he says weakly. “I’ll go.”

“I never want you to go, Jacob, even if I feel like you should.” You can’t hold back the reply. Logic fails you around him, at least when you’re alone.

If your words are vague, he still knows what you mean. He rewards you, you think, by gripping you tighter, murmuring thank you before pressing the lightest of kisses against your neck. You get the sense that he’s used to it, getting affection through transactions. He can’t give you much out here except his body heat, and he has more than enough of that for the both of you.

You’re expecting the regular dialogue when he takes a deep breath, like he usually does, but that’s not what you hear at all.

“I feel totally useless today,” Jacob says, “all I can think about is how nothing ever goes right. I feel like everyone is just tolerating me. I’d just wanted the day to end so I could come here and be with you. Even if you wouldn’t be caught dead speaking to me when the others are around. Then I remembered that we were leaving today…”

Maybe that is how things appear to him. With all the complications between the group, the crushes and the grievances, you’ve always thought you’re better off not adding whatever’s going on between the two of you to the mix. You’ve always acted like nothing had changed around the others, and he’d followed your lead. You didn’t think he had any problem with it.

All at once you realize how deep your concern for him goes. Has he wanted for something he felt you weren’t prepared to offer? You wonder how he’s felt every time you’ve paired up with someone else, if there’s ever been a hurt glance you missed. A jealous glance.

You still can’t look at him, but your hand searches for his, and when you find it you squeeze gently. It’s not natural for you, but it’s worth it to hear the way he gasps, like he really can’t believe it.

“It’s never been like that,” you tell him, “I just don’t want things to be awkward. Even if we aren’t usually… I don’t want things to change. I never knew how you felt either.”

He huffs, long and hard (listening for once) and you shake lightly as you feel it on your skin.

“I hope I haven’t been making you feel bad.” You sigh, “I wasn’t even thinking about it like that. Sometimes,” you were worried this would be a blow to his already lacking confidence, rather than anything constructive, “I don’t like the way you act around everyone. Like you have something to prove.”

“I… I feel like I do.”

“I think you think you do, but I think everyone else just feels like you aren’t being yourself. Some people,” you don’t want to say her name, “they can smell the blood in the water.”

“You haven’t been making me feel bad,” he murmurs, mouth close to your ear, “I love the way I feel. Around you, right now.”

You know there’s a chance he doesn’t mean anything by it, that he’s emotional and vulnerable and confused. Desire and confusion could sometimes be the same thing. But when he says things like this, as he has before, you can’t help but think about what it would be like.

You’ve certainly done more than just think. One hand down your shorts and your face buried in the fleece, the scent of him still on it, the smell of his cologne and his sweat. You’d put your palm to clit as you slid a finger inside, thinking of the outline of his cock the one chance you’d had to see him in it.

Down at the lake, a day of swimming, he’d had a swimsuit you swore hadn’t fit him since middle school. It was the definition of tight in all the right places.

Fat, was really all you were able to process. You’d blushed incredibly hard, swimming in the opposite direction before anyone had a chance to notice. The image filed away for later use.

Him, holding you down, slipping inside. The sting of it, of him making you take him. The sounds he would make when he was all the way in, balls against your clit. Teeth on your skin to muffle his moans.

It’d seemed like a pipe dream. Now you weren’t sure. In any case you hadn’t wanted to be fucked so bad, by anybody, in your life.

You flip over to face Jacob, staring deep into his eyes for the first time today. They’re misty, red, and they seem very sad. The whole thing makes you feel like a bad person, like a pervert. You wonder if he can see how black your eyes are with want for him. Can he feel how wet you are, right here next to him?

“Let’s go to sleep…” You venture, not meaning it at all, still glad that he agrees when he shifts to get comfortable and you feel his breathing even out. It’s far too long before you fall asleep yourself, too lost in visions of everything you want.

You know you’ll regret it later, that you’ll be nodding off when you shouldn’t be, but you can’t stop thinking.

. . .

You wake up thinking something troubling. You wish you could make Jacob understand. You don’t always need to get your happiness from people, but you know you only really mean other people. You’d have no problem being a rock for him. You want to give him a way out of the feelings that drown him every day. It’s what he so desperately seems to need.

But it can’t keep going on this way.

He must wake up moments after you do. Possibly aware of the change in your breathing, or maybe the way your heart rate has increased tenfold. He sighs, before chuckling in your ear, “what’s got you so worked up?”

“I just wanted to make sure I hadn’t overslept,” you look at the clock on your dresser. It’s only been half an hour. “Didn’t want to hold everyone up.”

It’s him, of course, but you can’t exactly say that. At least he seems in higher spirits than before, you consider.

The meaning becomes too literal when you feel his cock against you. Morning wood, probably. As much as it makes you wish the sheets would swallow you, it also sends your mind to other places.

Jacob tries to freeze, but his arm is still over your hips, caging you with his body, so there’s little you can do other than ignore it. But that already seems impossible, you can start to feel desire, burning in your pussy. You want him

It’s easy to feel him moving, attempting to be discreet but failing entirely. Every inch moves you with him because he’s unwilling to let go of you, whether he realizes it or not.

“I don’t mind,” you whisper, “or care. I mean I don’t care.”

“I care,” he bites back, seeming insulted. “I know you see that, so stop pretending like you don’t.”

You try to turn in his arms, but Jacob holds you still with little effort. He’s stronger, you think, obviously. You’re never able to escape him, mentally or physically.

“You think my problem is being insecure, fine. Your problem is that you’re always thinking, you never just feel.”

You know he’s right, but what can you say to that?

What was once a tight grip on your wrist turns into a comforting gesture, his thumb rubbing gently over the skin of your hand.

“L-let me make you feel something,” he sighs, “for once.”

You sigh, defeated in the best way possible.

Jacob's hard against you still, and he starts grinding into your ass gently. A gasp leaves you before your head is turned and you feel him on your cheek, a sweet kiss, before Jacob’s lips are on yours and he gives you a nasty one.

It’s your first kiss with him, but it doesn’t feel that way. You learn that Jacob likes to be close to you. He knows just how to get you to sigh, open your mouth up so he can press his tongue inside. It gets sloppy fast. You both moan, unable to part until you need to breathe. There’s spit connecting the two of you.

He moves your body beneath his, palm on the back of your neck an oddly comforting pressure. “Should’ve been kissing you this whole time,” he sighs.

“Doesn’t matter,” you tell him, putting your own hand to his cheek, “you have me now. Do whatever you want.”

Jacob makes quick work of your clothes, rids you of your bra, then tugs his trunks down to free his dick.

You want to blush at the sound it makes, the weight smacking against your stomach, lined exactly up with where he’ll be inside. Almost to your naval.

There’s a moment of just breathing, and when you look you see that he’s eyeing the same thing you are.

“I’ll fit,” he groans when he sees your expression. “Promise.”

You lick your lips. “Just prove it.”

Your panties are pulled to the side before you can hear him lick his thumb, once, twice. He must think it’s enough spit because he begins to use it to touch your clit, only to groan so loud you want to muffle him.

“Oh, oh. Fuck you’re already wet.”

“Yes,” you hiss, “I want you.”

“Yeah,” he mumbles. The words seem to make him shake. “Tell me again.”

You walk your hands up his back, and he moans when your nails drag lightly over his muscles, “I want you. Give it to me, Jacob, please.”

He kisses you again. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll give it to you.” It’s mumbled against your mouth as he preps you. Sliding his cock through the folds of you, gathering enough pre from you and him to just get the head inside.

You shudder, and he moans. It’s loud, scaring you enough to slap your hand over his mouth.

“‘’M sorry,” he grunts, removing your hand. His chest lowers down to touch yours, his face in your neck. “I didn’t mean to. Your pussy’s so good,” he shifts his hips to feel more of you. “I’ll be q-quiet, won’t make a sound. I don’t want to stop.”

You wrap your legs around Jacob, practically humping yourself onto him, “c’mon.”

His cock feels bigger than you should be taking. You want to wheeze when he bottoms out, leaving you stuffed. You can feel his tongue on your neck, hear vague moans as your cunt clenches on him.

Jacob starts to rock his hips, keeping his mouth busy with your skin in an effort to keep the noise down. But none of that matters when he’s fucking you into the mattress. Deep thrusts that make the frame of the bed groan.

You can feel how wet you’ve gotten, how wet he’s made you. You wouldn’t be able to take him otherwise. It’s surely all over your thighs, probably dripping down to his balls. You can feel everything, his skin, his mouth, a hint of teeth, the way his dick is burning you up inside.

You shock yourself when you come, hard. You bite into Jacob’s shoulder to muffle your scream, wrapping every limb you have around him to keep him deep inside.

“Fuuck,” he’s trembling. “Fuck it, I need- I wanna come inside. Tell me you’re on the pill. I want it.” You can feel him throbbing in your pussy. It’s a good thing you are; he probably wouldn’t be able to pull out in time anyway.

You hum out an affirmation, teeth still between his flesh because you can’t stop moaning, and it’s only half a second more before you feel him cum, and if you weren’t wet before you are now. You can feel it, hot, inside, and even leaking out of you.

Jacob’s whole body tenses, before every muscle in his body seems to relax, like he’s been needing this for a long, long time. His arms falter, but he catches himself before he crushes you.

The both of you wince when he pulls out, and you’re thankful that he doesn’t mind the obscene amount of cum that you both will surely have to deal with eventually. The clock tells you It’s still early, there’s still time.

He’s gone to cuddling you again, tucking you into the side of his body. He’s certainly much more open to touching you now that he’s fucked you. His hands explore whatever skin they can reach.

You make an attempt to do the same, but when you touch his shoulder you can feel the slight indent of teeth. Not terribly deep, but there.

“I’m sorry, Jacob. I shouldn’t have done that.”

“Don’t say that,” he scoffs, totally nonchalant. “Your neck isn’t looking too hot either.”

“I know,” you sigh, “but some guys are really weird about stuff like that.”

“Ha,” he laughs it off, checking it out before giving you his typical grin. “I don’t mind it. It’s like you claimed me.”

You wonder if that’s something to think about.

Laying there, both of you lightly doused with sweat, the smell of sex absolutely unavoidable, your first thought is that your sheets are ruined. It’s a good thing that you’re leaving today, at least for that reason.

Whatever you’ve just done, you know now that you can’t shut Jacob out. How that will work out isn’t something you need to figure out now, or even today.

Despite Jacob’s epiphany concerning you, you’ve got dibs on a great seat in the van, and that should give you enough time to do all the thinking you need.

#the quarry smut #the quarry x reader #the quarry #jacob custos x reader #jacob custos smut #jacob smut #smut #my writing #jacob the quarry #1k

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evan-collins90 · 1 year

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The Red Spot club & restaurant - Staten Island, NY (1987)

“A musician with Mack Hackett and the Tacky Jackets and Jimmy James and the Jumping Flames, Steve Cottone had been performing in various Greenwich Village nightclubs when his life's work was abruptly curtailed: He broke his hand. This sudden bit of bad luck, in an otherwise promising career, prompted his decision to open an antiques store. And, as a result, Blast From The Past was born. This newfound opportunity in the world of furniture heightened Cottone's appreciation for the craft, and became the catalyst for his next, new venture: An illegal nightclub with an ice cream parlor facade. Shortly thereafter, a customer and recent million-dollar winner in the New York State Lottery asked Cottone if he would consider joining him in a partnership. The two subsequently moved to Staten Island and began work on the conversion of a funeral parlor into Red Spot. Red Spot (name derived in part from a Kandinsky painting and the gangster hangout in the original Dragnet television series) is an extension, in Cottone's words, of his own "adolescent psyche of surrealism, 1950s lines and forms, and, believe it or not, George Jetson"; Or a subterranean dream: The designer has exploited color to full pitch and made unnatural use of angles in executing archways, railings and the `Jetsonian' television set. Artifacts from modern-day American culture (the Cadillac, hairdryer and garden hose) have been playfully enlisted to serve as the not-so-anonymous background.

As the evidence suggests, this is no ordinary installation; Consequently it would be foolhardy to expect a routine explanation of how it was built. (Cottone wouldn't give you one anyway.) He did say, however, that he retained the shape of the 2,500-sq.-ft. room—with the small exception of adding a false wall that is lit from behind for dramatic effect. He approached the walls as if they were huge canvases and painted abstract image upon image on them. The ‘‘Cadillacbar,’’ a concept Cottone dreamed in his sleep, involved rebuilding the shell of the car around a fully-operating bar. Because of Cottone’s highly imaginative use of New York's junkyards, the project cost (containing all materials) was amere $105,000.

Scanned from a 1987 issue of Interior Design Magazine

One of the most exuberant examples of the Googie-Kitsch & Diner-Kitsch styles I’ve seen

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thetudorslovers · 7 months

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"The pageants that greeted Anne as she processed through the City to her coronation included three with neoclassical themes. The first of these, at “gracious churche corner” – the turn from Fenchurch Street into Gracechurch Street – showed “mounte pernasus with the founteyne of helicon.” Figures of Apollo and the Muses were accompanied by epigrams and posies written in gold at their feet, praising Anne. The pageant was provided by the merchants of the Hanse, the resident community of North German merchants, and was almost certainly designed by Hans Holbein. The second neoclassical pageant, at the Conduit in Cornhill, showed the Three Graces; while the third, at the Little Conduit in Cheapside, depicted the Judgement of Paris. Other pageants continued the medieval tradition of identifying a queen consort with the Virgin Mary and other biblical heroines and saints; part of their function, in the wake of the King’s divorce, the schism from Rome, and extensive political upheaval, was to assert continuities with the past. However at the same time the introduction of neoclassicism was a significant innovation, identifying Anne’s elevation with the creation of a new, independent England requiring a new language of symbolism." - Anne Boleyn’s legacy to Elizabeth I: Neoclassicism and the iconography of Protestant Queenship, Helen Hackett

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lucifers-horror-harem · 1 year

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Cheering You Up Headcanons

Hey all! I decided to write some soft headcanons this time around! Plus, I added a new boy, Travis Hackett from The Quarry! I know hes not exactly the same as my usual roster of horror slashers and villains, but I love him and this is my blog soooooooo I don’t care lol Also thank you to the people who voted for the 3rd character, Otis! I really like using the poll option to see what people are interested in seeing, I might have to use it some more when I’m stuck between choices :)

Freddy Krueger:

As much of an asshole Freddy can be, he’s fully capable of toning himself down if you’re looking upset. But if he’s in a particularly antagonistic mood, the signs you’re upset will fly past him entirely until you go off on him, whether it’s crying or yelling at him for being such a dick.

Freddy isn’t the kind to comfort you with his words, his love language tends to trend towards acts of service rather than sappy throw-away lines. He’ll never admit it, but ultimately he feels a smidge guilty for causing you more upset. So he’ll begin his scheming on a way to make it up to you.

Luckily for you, Freddy has his dream world, and he can make anything possible in your dreams. Freddy will hit you with just about everything he’s learned about you since knowing you. Do you like fancy romantic dinners? You’ve got the best seat in the house. Want to travel to places you wish you could afford? He’s got a first-class ticket to get you there. Just want a simple night in? He’s got you covered.

In all honesty, it would be a shock to see him put this much work in. Especially when half of the time you weren’t even sure he listened to what you were saying. Freddy not only listens to you, but he remembers everything. He just doesn’t like you knowing how much he truly cares. He thinks it makes him look too soft.

He’d get truly cocky as he soaks up the praise and affection you give him for such a sweet surprise. Freddy acts like it’s not a huge deal at all, and it wasn’t like he had to put much thought into it. You’re just so easy to please, he insists. But deep down even his cold black heart can feel a little something just from seeing your smile. As he lets you have your fun, he can’t help but smile to himself while watching you.

Travis Hackett:

While Travis might be awkward about expressing his emotions too freely, he’s more observant than he lets on. He’ll listen to everything you have to say, and figure out what you need based on that. He’ll let you rant and rave if you're venting until you finally let it out of your system, or he’ll hold you tightly if you’re an emotional wreck in need of comfort. And if it’s something he can take care of, well, he’s not above solving the issue himself.

Above all else, Travis makes sure you’re safe and comfortable. You mean more to him than he could ever put into words, and he’d do anything to see your smile. Even if he has a hard time expressing it, you can tell just how much he cares by the way he looks at you with adoration and softness you rarely see from him. He’s a brick wall to damn near everyone, but once you crack inside you’ll find he’s a bit of a sap.

The next day, he’d tell you to cancel any plans you have for that night. If you ask, he’ll simply grunt and ask you if you trust him. Obviously, you do, so you let him continue his planning.

That evening, he’ll drive you to a secluded area of the Hackett property where no one will bother the two of you. When you get there, you’ll find he’s already set up camp, and you can’t help but feel a smile pull on your face. Don’t make too big a production out of it, or Travis might get too flustered. As it is he’ll keep fidgeting and rubbing the back of his neck as he insists it’s no big deal, that he uses this campsite so often that he just keeps these things here. Suuuuuure.

He finds the outdoors peaceful and relaxing, much of his best memories took place in the vast expanse of wilderness that fell in the Hackett property, and he hopes that perhaps you’ll feel just as calm surrounded by nature. Maybe create some new memories too.

You’ll have a front-row seat to the sunset falling below the trees, reflecting over everything in sight and giving the forest a soft orange hue. And as night begins to fall, you sit by the campfire that Travis had kept up past dinner time, looking up at the stars as they shone more brightly here than anywhere else you had seen before.

When the fire finally dies down, Travis will have you pulled to him on a blanket as you look up at the stars together and speak softly to each other as you begin to feel sleep pulling at you. Before you both fall asleep and get bit by all the mosquitos, Travis will make sure he carries you to the tent before finally settling down for the night, his arms wrapped protectively around you.

Otis Driftwood:

Otis isn't exactly the best choice if you're wanting a traditional cheering-up session. In fact, he might even complain if you pester him too much. "Can'tcha go bitch to Baby or something, I'm doing some important fucking shit here!" He'd probably shoo you along without so much as another glance your way.

After a while though, Otis will come around to the fact you need him. It's way easier for him to provide sexual affection, but genuine kindness is a bit out of his repertoire. But, after mulling it over for a while (as well as getting ripped a new one from Baby), Otis will try his best to be whatever you need.

He likes it best when all you need is for him to just exist in the same space, not needing him to provide a solution or answers. It's easy for him to just be a shoulder to cry on, that way he can't say all the wrong things like he tends to do.

Otis also loves it when you need to have a good vent session. He'll hype you up, telling you that yeah, that guy was a motherfucker and maybe someone should do something about it. Maybe it's good if you don't let that get too far because Otis gets an itching for revenge at the drop of a hat just to make you happy.

He also likes taking you on drives to calm you down. While he doesn't like to drive if he's too worked up because he's prone to road rage, he finds drives to be something that eases his mind when his thoughts are too scattered. And he's happy to share them with you, just so long as you don't become a backseat driver. Hell, if you ask nicely, he'll stop at whatever roadside spots you see. He’d even stop for ice cream if you’re being good.

#freddy krueger x reader #travis hackett x reader #otis driftwood x reader #slasher x reader

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drylan · 1 month

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some more random rylan headcanons

few things make dylan gasp and tremble as quickly as ryan kissing his fingertips

likewise, touch or kiss the back of ryan's neck and his knees instantly start to shake

why yes, dylan does like to start as many mornings as possible kissing each of ryan's moles. ryan usually stops him halfway through because he's still sleepy and needs his coffee, but he definitely loves it more than he lets on

ryan does become an animator, working freelance for commission or contracted out for companies. he does both traditional and 3d animation

i can't decide with dylan fully, but i think he ends up being a physics professor that does research, so while he does teach a small number of classes, he does a lot grant-funded research into quantum physics, too. but he 100%, totally, runs an online radio station on the side.

ryan shoulders a lot of guilt early on about cutting off dylan's hand. dylan reassures him it's okay, but lets ryan do a lot of things early on in their relationship to make him feel better. eventually, he becomes fully independent and adjusted and ryan learns to process the guilt and see dylan and their relationship holistically, including that tragic event, but not letting it fully consume them

they both have very sensitive nipples. yes, i said what i said.

ryan's the hairier of the two and dylan absolutely loves the fluff and fuzz, from his chest and swimmer's abs to his happy trail to everywhere. dylan's not completely bare, mind you, but he only gets a few hairs between his pecs and a light happy trail.

dylan does teach ryan a bit about audio engineering and mixing, especially early on in ryan's career when he's making his own animations solo and building a portfolio. and yes, it does lead to some 'roleplaying' of a certain variety because those two just cannot help themselves

ryan drives a truck, dylan rides a sedan for a while until it craps out and then he gets a used jeep that lasts for fucking ever. they obviously carpool pretty much everywhere together but end up becoming the duo to call when you need help hauling things/moving

dylan isn't that good at swimming, but ryan patiently teaches him. it totally leads to them skinny dipping at some random lake late at night while on a road trip one time and making out on the beach after. and...get the cops called on them. they manage to make it out of there before the police arrive, though.

dylan is a bit more spiritual of the two. after they've experienced hackett's quarry, they both believe in the supernatural to some extent. but dylan believes a bit in things like past lives and reincarnation and intertwined destinies and no he doesn't believe that spirituality and science are mutually exclusive, thank you very much. ryan doesn't have strong opinions one way or another, but he doesn't belittle or deny dylan's beliefs. and he will sit patently with him when they get tarot card readings done. neither of them belong to or are part of an organized religion, but they do accompany ryan's grandparents (and sara) to some church festivities

ryan grows out a beard after a little while and oh, oh boy does dylan love it. constantly nuzzling it and running his hand through it. he just loves loves loves it so much, the texture tickling that sweet spot in his brain. he loves the beard burns he gets on his thighs sometimes, too.

they adopt another kitty after living together for a couple years. ryan names it, and, completely unprompted, names it schrodinger jr. schrodinger absolutely loves junior, much to their relief and surprise.

dylan makes music on the side pretty often. most he uploads on soundcloud, but some he makes specifically and only for ryan's ears. sometimes dylan will come home and hear ryan playing those special tunes throughout the house. it always makes something warm and bubbly fill up dylan's heart.

when the hacketters have a movie night, they are absolutely almost always in each other's laps

#my stuff #the quarry #ryan erzahler #dylan lenivy #drylan #rylan #radioheads #headcanons

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bubblesreplies · 1 year

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The Middle

Max Brinly X Female Reader

Oneshot

APPARENTLY IF YOU’RE READING THIS IN ANY DARK COLORED FORMAT ON TUMBLR (LIKE NIGHT MODE) IT LOOKS FUCKING WEIRD AND IDK HOW TO FIX IT I’M SO SORRY.

A/N: No, I'm not neglecting my other fics to write a random oneshot? Why would you even suggest---fuck it here it is besties. Anyways, this product of procrastination is dedicated and written for my bestie @house-of-kolchek, who loves Max as much as I do.

WARNINGS AND TAGS: NSFW 18+ ONLY, this is unedited and might be awful, Reader is Jacob's cousin, manipulative!Emma but like in a good way, BFF!Emma, Emma/Jacob, Abi/Nick, making Emma cooler than she is, sweetheart!Max, unrequited love (assumably), forced proximity, sex jokes, unsafe seating situations while driving DO NOT DO THIS PLEASE, lap-sitting, erections, staring down your shirt, teasing, love confessions, very very cheesy and idc anymore

Word Count: 8k

Main Masterlist

“EMMA, that is the stupidest idea in seriously the entire world.”

You meant it, too; you already thought that this little impromptu camping trip was an awful idea; the last time that the group of you were out in the woods, it ended with werewolves, so, could anybody really be blamed for not wanting to tempt fate? And now hearing Emma’s latest plan, you couldn’t help but say fuck this whole entire trip and its mom, too.

“Oh—come on!” Emma insisted with a pout across her face, leaning across her oversized suitcase—who in the world needed all of that space for a weekend camping trip? “Babes, you are my wing-woman here—my ultimate girl. Come on, please—Jacob won’t even look at me when we hang out. I really need your help with this!”

You sighed; a year ago, when the ten of you—eight, if you considered the fact that you hadn’t actually met two of the camp counselors until the end of the summer—worked at Hackett’s Quarry and endured that shitshow of a summer, you hadn’t even liked Emma. You didn’t like how she had your cousin, Jacob, mooning all over her like she owned the whole fucking Earth. You didn’t like the way that the nicest girl you’d ever met seemed to think she walked on water, too, and you did not appreciate the fact that she thought she was entitled to tell you all the ways that you were doing your makeup all wrong.

But then, that night happened. The night of the full moon, when your idiot cousin sabotaged the van just to get another night with the woman he’d fallen in love with who couldn’t give a rat’s ass about him. The night where the ten of you had miraculously survived werewolves, and a crazy-ass family trying to kill you all night. That night was what changed everything.

You’d gotten stranded with Emma running through the woods, and somehow landed yourself in a heated battle with Jacob—who had apparently been bitten by one of those things because he was now one of those things. He, obviously, tried to kill the two of you and Emma thought fast, using a piece of silver jewelry to save both of your lives and buy you enough time to get the hell out of there.

And then, you’d been locked in a room with her and Abi, the three of you not knowing if you would survive the night, and something just…changed. You began to see her differently, and from that point on, throughout this entire past year, the three of you had been best friends.

More you and Emma, if you were being honest, because Abi and Nick had just gotten engaged three months ago and most of her free time went to him.

Not that it hurt your feelings. If you somehow managed to bag the man of your dreams, you’d be spending every free moment with him, too.

“Jacob just…needs time,” you informed her with a groan, throwing your tennis shoes across the room as you frantically looked for your favorite pair of leggings. “He’s still hurt, you know? You can’t just tell him you didn’t mean any of it and then expect him to forgive you and jump back into your arms, Emma.”

“Which is why I need you to get me into his cabin this weekend,” Emma pleaded, getting up from her place on your bed and digging through your drawers as she pulled out the very clothes you were looking for. You swore that sometimes, it was literally like she could read your mind. “All we have to do is fake a fight; I will refuse to sleep in the same cabin as you, and then the boys will offer to switch with us. I’ll get a whole night—and a whole, isolated cabin—with Jacob; and you? Well, let’s not pretend that you aren’t benefitting from my little plan.”

You snorted, shimmying out of your jeans and pulling your leggings up over your legs, smiling as Emma nodded towards your ass in approval. If she thought that you looked good, you could rest assured that you damn well did.

“And how will I benefit from getting into a fake fight with you and causing a scene?” You questioned, your head cocked as Emma passed you your shoes and you eagerly slipped them on. The rest of your group would be here at any minute, and you didn’t want to keep them waiting.

“Because if I end up in Jacob’s cabin, you know who ends up in yours? Max.”

You whipped around and shot Emma a glare, shaking your head like you couldn’t believe that she would just mention his name all casually like that. You’d made her swear to never bring up your pathetic, unrequited crush on Max Brinly ever again, since the day she’d first found out that it even existed in the first place.

You first met Max when the sun came up after that hellish night at Hackett’s Quarry. You and Emma had run back to the island to see if Jacob was there and if he was alive, and you ended up running into Max instead. After lots of screaming and confusion, the two of you finally allowed him to explain just how in the fuck he had gotten there and who he was, which is when you learned that your one night of hell had lasted two months for him and his girlfriend.

Emma had found Jacob and ran after him, but you stayed behind with Max, talking and laughing at his jokes, attempting not to swoon at the adorableness that was his laugh. You had hoped, at the beginning of the summer, to find somebody just like him and have a summer romance. Somebody who was cute, who could make you laugh, and seemed to understand you instantly.

It didn’t work out that way, obviously—seeing as the summer had been over and Max Brinly had a girlfriend.

Laura eventually came back for him and you parted ways, assuming that this would be the last time that you would ever see Max Brinly, attributing your budding feelings for him as some sort of trauma response to the night that you had just been through.

Imagine your surprise when, a month after Hackett’s Quarry, the new co-worker that you were assigned to train at the coffee shop was none other than Max Brinly. You assumed right away that he wouldn’t even remember you—why would he?---but you were wrong. He knew exactly and immediately who you were, and the two of you hit it off just as well as you did the first time you had ever spoken to him. It wasn’t long before you were hanging out with him every single day, and he had slowly become your best friend.

You went to movies together, you got dinner, he came to all of the track and field competitions you ran in at your local university, you helped him study hard enough to get into a new graduate school—literally, anything that you could think of, the two of you did it together. You even stayed the night at each other’s apartments on occasion, both of you knowing what the other’s couch felt like pretty intimately.

In fact, the only time the two of you weren’t together was when Laura came to town to visit her boyfriend. Before she dumped him, at least.

It was nearly a month and a half ago now, that you had sat on this very bed with Max as he sobbed, asking you just to hold him and not ask any questions when he told you that he and Laura had broken up.

“Max isn’t into me, so that really doesn’t help your case,” you grumbled, your pissy mood only continuing to sour the more that you thought about it. After Max and Laura, you thought that you might actually stand a chance with him. After all, he spent all of his free time with you, and you knew that nobody in this world knew him as well as you did—and vice versa. But after the night that he’d sobbed with you, fallen asleep in your bed, and told you how he felt like years of his life were wasted with Laura, nothing ever happened.

He just went right on back to being the same old Max, your friend.

“Do you seriously still think that that boy has no feelings for you whatsoever?” Emma shrieked, watching as Jacob’s car pulled up from the window, hurriedly throwing her hair up into a sexily-tossed messy bun. “‘Cause, if you do, you’re so wrong that it isn’t even funny anymore.”

“Em, if he had feelings for me, then why didn’t anything change after he and Laura broke up?!” You interjected, a frown pulling at your lips as you grabbed your tiny duffel bag and hiked it up over your shoulder. “And also, why would he date Laura for so long if he actually, secretly liked me instead? Your logic isn’t logic-ing,” you insisted, and Emma smirked.

“You are so naive that it’s actually kind of cute,” she responded, rolling her eyes as Jacob opted to honk instead of being a gentleman and coming to the door. Emma sauntered over to you, playing with the ends of your hoodie and eyeing it suspiciously. “Look, just—help me with this plan, and you’ll see, okay? And change into that sexy little top I bought you last month for the car ride.”

“Emma!”

“Just trust me!” Emma insisted, pulling the hoodie up and over your head for you and tossing you the lacey black crop top she’d bought you last month. “Put it on—good, yes, I would so bang you—oh, and just in case you find out that Max also wants to bang you, I snuck condoms into your bag.”

“You have got to be kidding me, Emma!” You shrieked, although it was with a large smile on your face as you were, once again, blown away by the antics of your friend.

Emma only laughed as the two of you rushed down to the car, you having to help Emma with one half of her bag since she’d brought such a gigantic one. You’d barely made it to the door before there was a knock on it—apparently Jacob had decided to be a gentleman after all. Or he’d simply gotten impatient, which was the better bet of the two options.

“Keep your pants on cuz, we’re coming,” you hissed out, lowering your end of Emma’s bag to the ground as you ripped open the door to your apartment. Your annoyed glare dropped and your mouth fell open as you saw Max standing there, his cheeks red and running a hand through his freshly-cut red hair. “Max! I, uh, thought you were Jacob?”

Fuck, why did you sound so fucking awkward?! Your conversation with Emma had you paranoid and upset, and if you kept acting this way, Max would definitely notice. The two of you had crossed the awkward barrier a long time ago.

“Ah, nah,” Max answered, his signature smile flashing across his face and warming you up from the inside out. “Jake’s too possessive over that steering wheel to get his ass over to the door honestly.”

“That and he doesn’t want to have to speak to me,” Emma sighed, lugging her bag forward and hitting Max in the chest with it. You suppressed a giggle as he let out an “Oomph!”, but he caught your smile and playfully sneered at you. “Oh, what a gentleman! And damn, Max, I’ve never noticed how strong you are. Have you, Y/n?! Have you ever noticed those biceps?”

“Cut it out, Emma,” you hissed under your breath, grateful that Max had already turned around and was heaving her oversized bag to the trunk of the car. “I know what you’re doing, and it isn’t going to work on me.”

“What am I doing?” Emma asked with faux innocence, batting her eyelashes heavily down at you before she winked. “Just use it as fuel for our fake fire, if you want, babes. Besides—would it really kill you to admit in front of him that he looks good?! Give the boy a win, Y/n!”

“He does not think of me that way—”

“Hey, um, Emma?” Max called out as you were locking your front door behind you, and you turned and ran over to where he was pursing his lips behind the trunk. “Maybe we should’ve brought a bigger car, but, your bag is not going to fit back here.”

Emma turned to look and her lips, too, were pursed.

“Well, where’s everyone sitting?” She asked, peering her head into the car to check out the situation.

“Well, uh, Jacob’s driving—obviously—Abi and Nick are in the row of two seats behind him, and then he wants you to sit back in the last row with me while Y/n takes the passenger seat,” Max explained, using his hands to gesture to each person. Abi turned around to look at you from her place in the car, Nick’s head in her lap as he slept, and she waved. You waved back, grimacing at the large bag that was seated at your feet.

“Hmm, no, that won’t do,” Emma insisted with a wave of her hand, using all of her strength to heave her bag up and over the full trunk of the car and into the last row of seats. “It’s going to have to go here—and oh, I really didn’t sleep well last night, so if I don’t sit in the passenger seat, I’ll get sick.”

Max’s jaw dropped and he scoffed lightly, looking between the two of you as you held in a large groan.

“I don’t really see how that makes any sense?” He questioned.

“So Y/n will have to sit in the back, with you!” Emma finished with a gleeful squeal, hurrying to shut the trunk and turning to make her way to the passenger seat of the car.

“Um—hold on a minute, just where the fuck in the back will I sit?!” You barked out, gesturing incredulously to the monstrosity that was her luggage all over the back seat of the car. “Your bag is taking up the entire row—all but one seat, Em! And it’s way too fucking big to go down at our feet!”

Emma put a daintly little finger to her chin, and you could tell that she was only pretending to think about the predicament.

“Well, it’s only about a forty-five minute drive,” she informed you, a wicked smile pushing its way onto her lips. “It’s not that long, so, just sit on Max’s lap?”

Your eyes widened and you felt sweat beading on the back of your neck, your heart beating at an intensely quick pace just at the mere thought of having to sit on Max. One look at Max’s face showed he heard her suggestion, too, because it was unnaturally blank and pale.

You walked closer to Emma, pulling her into you as you said, “You better be fucking for real with your next suggestion, or we will get in an actual fight, Emma,” you warned her, your voice low enough that Max couldn’t hear it. You noticed that he was already ushering Nick and Abi out of the car, hurrying to his seat in the back, and the three of them were just waiting on you.

“Oh my g—will you just trust me, for once in your life?!” Emma begged dramatically, clinging onto your arm and giving you a little push towards Max. “Thank me later, hoe.”

Oh no, I will not be thanking you later, you sneaky little she-devil, you thought to yourself, climbing over Abi’s seat and landing ungracefully into Max’s lap. He caught you much more elegantly than you fell, luckily, and he helped you right yourself so that your back was facing his chest.

You turned your face towards him despite the fact that it was burning, and you brushed a strand of hair back behind your ear.

“You know, I could always just sit on her bag instead of on you,” you offered, geturing weakly over to the big problem that Emma had handed over to the two of you with a private sneer at her back. “That way I won’t crush your legs into tiny pieces of ash.”

Max actually laughed out loud at that and your heart swelled with a feeling of accomplishment; Max was funny, he had probably always been funny, and anytime that you had gotten him to laugh, you took it as a personal achievement.

“Please sweetheart, as if you could,” Max retorted, winding an arm around your waist as he pulled your back flush against his chest, leaving his arm to rest across your stomach and his fingers splayed across your hipbone. You closed your eyes, holding in a sigh as you prayed that he couldn’t see the way that your face had reddened from this angle. “Besides, this is probably the…safer option of the two.”

You heartily disagreed with that.

Still, you positioned yourself against him, awkwardly playing with your fingers on your lap as you had no idea where to rest your hands. You and Max were close, yes, but you had never physically been close, aside from a few silly moments of teasing tickles, accidentally falling asleep on his shoulder, or him resting his legs on your lap as the two of you watched a movie together. This was entirely new territory, and you had no idea what to do with it, and you knew that if Emma hadn’t forced this to happen, that Max wouldn’t have chosen to even be in this situation with you. Probably.

“Jacob, the drive is forty-five minutes?” You called up to him, wincing as you watched your cousin’s teeth grit in the rearview mirror as he attempted to ignore Emma completely.

“An hour, if traffic’s bad,” Jacob called back and you groaned, your leg shaking furiously in your nervousness. As if Max could sense that you were on edge—fuck, with the way that you were bouncing around he probably could feel it—his other hand landed on your thigh, rubbing calming circles around as he successfully got it to stop shaking.

“Sorry, I don’t know why I’m so anxious today,” you sighed, rubbing a hand down your face and leaning back into Max. You could hear his groan and you winced, assuming you had hurt him, as you instantly tried to reposition yourself to take some of the weight off of him.

After a few minutes of frantic wiggling, Max’s hands harshly gripped onto your waist, his fingernails digging into you as he held you tightly into place and you froze, your eyes wide and breath held.

“Y/n, please—stop.” Max’s voice was incredibly hoarse, coming out in a groan and you winced again, mortified that you had hurt him enough to elicit this sort of response.

“Oh shit, Max! I am so sorry—I was trying not to hurt you and then I did hurt you and—”

“Y/n!” Max interrupted, clearing his throat so that his voice sounded a lot more normal and less husky. “Honey, you’re not hurting me, just—don’t wiggle around right—there.”

Your eyebrows raised in confusion at his words and your brain couldn’t process what the hell he was saying, so you just opted to nod, leaning forward as far as you could and beginning a conversation with Abi as you tried with every ounce of your being to not put much weight on Max. It took every ounce of concentration that you had to not think about the fact that you were touching the love of your life and focus on Abi’s words about wedding planning, but somehow, you did it.

“Hey, uh, Jake?” Max suddenly called out, and you noticed that his voice had gone hoarse again and that his tone was tight and clipped. Higher than normal. You frowned; in your conversation with Abi, you had slipped a little further backwards than you’d realized, back into his lap. “How much longer?”

“Thirty minutes,” Jacob growled, and you noticed Emma looking a little offput herself. “It’s looking closer to an hour total at this point.”

“Alright then, we need to stop,” Max insisted and you stifled a pathetic whine, embarrassed that you were this hard to bear just sitting on his lap. It probably didn’t help that you were still actively avoiding any and all contact with him, practically leaving him here in the backseat to talk to himself as you ignored him, anxious and letting Emma’s words get to your head.

You needed to stop. You and Max were friends. Good friends, and you were being absolutely ridiculous about this whole thing.

Three minutes later, Jacob pulled off at a reststop and you lifted off of Max instantly, watching him scamper out of the car after Abi and Nick and hurrying into the men’s restroom. With everyone out of the car but you and Emma, you climbed over the seats and sat between her seat and the driver’s seat, staring at her with wide eyes.

“So,” you started out, pointedly ignoring the tears in her eyes, knowing she wouldn’t want to talk about it right now. “Your plan to make me sit on Max is not working; I can barely say two words to the guy, and his poor legs are getting crushed by me. He probably can’t think of anything but leg cramps!”

“Oh, please,” Emma scoffed, dabbing at her eyes with a tissued and waving your worries away with a flick of her hand. “Look at him, and look at you; there must be some other reason he needs a break.”

“Oh yeah?” You fought back, crossing your arms over your chest as you frowned at your friend. “Like what, exactly? It’s not working Emma, you’re miserable up here, and I am back there; we should just switch places. You’re smaller than me.”

“I am not,” Emma sighed.

“All I know is one minute, I can’t sit still, and the next minute, he’s grabbing my hips and telling me to stop wiggling around,” you continued on, as if Emma hadn’t even interjected. “What else could it be if not that I was—”

You instantly stopped talking as Emma looked over to you, mouth opened and eyes glinting with excitement.

“You poor naive little thing!” She giggled, pulling your arms so that you were practically sitting on her lap. “Y/n, you aren’t hurting him—you’re turning him on and he doesn’t want you to feel it!”

You felt pinpricks across your face as the entire thing turned white, and you were suddenly feeling a little nauseous.

“What?” You questioned, shaking your head lutching nervously at your hair. “What? I—no, Max isn’t—he wasn’t—”

“Oh, yes, yes he was,” Emma argued, and there was a light in her eyes that replaced whatever sadness she had been feeling before you came up there to talk to her. “Okay, do exactly as I say; when Max comes back out to the car, sit back on him just like you were that first time. Wiggle around a bit again—”

“What? No!”

“Just trust me—wiggle around a little bit again, then ask him if he wants to watch something with you on your phone. When you turn it on, lean back against him so that your back is arched and he gets a good, full view down your—”

“Okay, and this is where I officially stop you, you are crazy,” you intoned, shaking your head and leaning away from your friend. “Max is not into me—in case you managed to forget about that, babes—and besides, I can’t just show him my boobs, Emma! They’re my—boobs. They’re, like, private.”

“Holy fuck, how are you not a virgin,” Emma groaned, shoving you back towards your seat as she pointed eagerly out of the car. “Okay, babes, here he comes—just trust me, okay?! Do it!”

You opened your mouth to argue again, but the words fell from your lips as the car door opened and Max poked his head inside, grinning over at you as his eyes darted back and forth between you and Emma.

“What, uh, what’s going on here?” He asked, and you shot a glare at Emma as she giggled, hiding her face in her shirt and sending an ominous wink your way. You tried as well as you could to tell her to shut up with your eyes, but she ignored you in typical Emma fashion.

“Nothing,” you replied, shaking your head and sending him a smile. “I was just feeling nervous about getting away this weekend and Emma was talking me down. That’s it.”

“Ah,” Max yawned, heading back to his seat and patting his lap for you to join him. You blushed. “Is that why you’re acting so weird? You haven’t spoken to me for the last, like twenty-five minutes.”

“Yeah, sorry, just nervous,” you insisted, climbing back over Abi’s seat and settling yourself on top of Max’s lap. As you looked up after readjusting, your eyes met Emma’s in the rearview mirror and she nodded, looking from you to Max’s…well…yeah.

You cleared your throat, feeling the burn of your phone in your pocket as you stared widely back at her, conveying that she was being way too obvious, here. Regardless, a part of you was…curious, now, and with Laura out of the picture and Max completely single, it’s not like a little testing of the waters was inappropriate anymore. What could it hurt, really? Max was too nice to reject you, so if he wasn’t into it, he just wouldn’t say anything and you’d let it go forever. But, if he really was into it—

Well that was the best-case scenario, wasn’t it?

So, you shifted; nothing crazy and nowhere close to grinding—just a small, flick of the hips that brushed right up against his crotch. Max’s breath hitched and you froze, wondering if you’d truly heard that right, completely distracted from the fact that Abi and Nick were re-entering the car and that Jacob was starting it again, getting ready to head on the road once more.

A hitch of a breath wasn’t enough of a confirmation for you, so you shifted once again, and then again and then again, and this time Max’s hands lifted back up to your hips, grasping for dear life as you settled your ass back down to his crotch, turning your head to watch as his eyes shut tight and he bit his lip.

“Y/n—”

“Do you want to watch part of a movie with me?” You interrupted, watching as Max’s eyes flashed open, a glint of pain underneath them that had you second-guessing what had just happened. Max smiled down at you, though—that brilliant smile that God had blessed him with—and nodded.

You had no idea what you were going to watch, but your fingers worked anyway, hurriedly typing some stupid TikTok compilation that you hoped he wouldn’t get too distracted by. Max laid his chin on your shoulder, his hands that were gripping your waist winding around your front and interlocking as he held you, his face snuggling slightly into your neck.

Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, your mind reiterated as you slowly breathed out, your heart pounding wildly in your chest as you silently prayed that Max couldn’t hear it, and that he couldn’t feel the way that your skin had suddenly heated up and become sweaty. It wasn’t even that cuddling with Max was anything new—as a person, he was a fucking lapdog—but it was the fact that you had never sat on his fucking lap before while cuddling. Never had intentions to turn him on, never gave him this much of a glance down your lowcut shirt—

Y/n, don’t be a pussy, your inner Emma chastised and you shut your eyes tight and sucked in a breath, desperately trying to convince yourself not to go through with this. But damn it—you sort of wanted to and, so far, Max hadn’t shown a single sign that he’d wanted you to sit anywhere else.

It was halfway through the video that you forgot the rest of the people in the car and arched backward without a minute to second guess yourself, pretending to stretch your arms above your head as you knew you were, successfully, letting Max have a perfect show of your black lacy bra underneath your shirt, and under that, the perfectly rounded mounds of breasts that it pushed up.

You heard a sharp inhale and dared a look at his face; he was as white as a ghost, and even his perfectly placed freckles had gone impossibly paler—and yet his eyes, those gorgeously sea-colored orbs, were still staring down your shirt, transfixed, as he studied your figure.

“Alright, everybody out!” Jacob suddenly called out, and the two of you jumped, Max’s eyes meeting yours as he was brought back to reality. His eyes, no longer clouded over with lust, widened and a blush spread unevenly across his face as he realized that he’d been caught watching you. “We’re here!”

“Y/n,” Max breathed out, whipping his arms away from you and running nervous hands through his newly cut hair. “Shit, Y/n, I’m so sorry, I—I wasn’t—I mean I was but…” You smiled as he stuttered along, a giggle framing your mouth and escaping out of your lip, causing Max’s gaze to whip back onto you. You couldn’t help it; he was always so damn cute when he was flustered.

“Does it make it any less creepy if I’m aware that staring down your shirt is creepy?” Max asked, equal parts timid and teasing. You laughed aloud at that, the two of you lingering in the backseat of the car while the rest of the party headed out.

“It’s fine, Max,” you insisted with a shrug and a wink, conveying in every way possible that you weren’t completely innocent here either. “No one wears a bra like this for it not to be seen, sweetheart.”

The words coming out of your mouth shocked even you, and Max’s entire jaw fell open as he stared at you in complete and utter disbelief.

“Whoa, Y/n,” he reared away from you, just to get a better look at your face, testing to see if you were saying what he thought that you were saying. His hands found their way to your waist again and he touched you softly, his thumbs running up and down the curves of your hipbones as he stared in wonder down at you. “Are you saying that you wanted me to—”

“Are you two gonna get out of the car, or do you plan on freezing your little asses off all night?!” Jacob called out as he forced open the trunk of the car, staring in disbelief at the two of you still sitting there. You both jumped, eyes turning to Jacob with guilty blushes, and you didn’t waste another second climbing off of Max and over the seats, pushing your way past Jacob and onto the dirt-clodded driveway.

Taking your bag from your cousin and asking a hurried, “Where’s our cabin again?” You received directions and hurried off in the direction of the cabin that you and Emma were supposed to share, attempting to outrun Max so that he couldn’t question you any further.

What the hell had you been thinking?! You hadn’t, obviously, and you’d let Emma’s skewed opinion get to you. Now, you had to come up with a solution for some serious damage control before Max got to you with his, What’s gotten into you today? And his, Look, I know you must have been kidding, or his I’m sorry Y/n, I’m just not attracted to you that way—

“Fuck,” you muttered to yourself, throwing open the door to the cabin and chucking your suitcase onto the empty bed. Emma was standing on the other side of the room, facing the bathrooms, but she jumped and turned around when she heard the slam of the front door. “Fuck this whole plan, Emma, and fuck my stupid self too. I can’t believe that I actually let myself believe that Max was really into me and I—holy shit, are you crying?!?”

Emma’s pretty hazel eyes were red-rimmed, but the telltale giveaway that she’d been sobbing was the tear tracks of black mascara spreading down her cheeks and clumping up near her pointy chin.

Once her mind had registered your question, she began sobbing once again, her hands coming up to cover her eyes and you ran to her, throwing your arms around her neck and feeling her own arms go around your waist as she sobbed into your neck heartily.

“Honey, what happened?” You asked, but your voice was muffled by your much taller friend’s collarbone. You pulled away from her and sat her down on her bed, sitting down next to her and taking her hand in yours. “Emma, what did my idiot cousin say to you? You know that big dummy acts completely on emotions, so whatever he said, I’m sure it was just in the heat of the—”

“He meant it,” Emma interrupted you, pulling her hand out of yours and using it to wipe her eyes. “But I don’t even want to talk about it right now, so—tell me what happened with Max.” You opened your mouth to protest but she shot you her “Emma” look—the look that told you that arguing would quite literally be pointless. So, you sighed, letting yourself fall backward onto the bed and groaning as your head hit the awfully lumpy mattress she’d been provided tonight.

“I don’t know what happened, Emma,” you admitted with a whine, feeling her lay down beside you and cuddle her head into yours comfortingly. “It was like I had this sudden, insane boost of confidence and I was like…grinding on him and giving him a full show of my boobs—”

“You do have great boobs—”

“And then when he noticed that I caught him staring at my breasts, I kindofsortofmaybe insinuated that I wanted him to look down my shirt and then he was about to ask me if I really meant that I wanted him to see me naked and then Jacob interrupted us and I freaked out and ran away.”

Emma just stared back at you, blinking occasionally, as if she were really confused.

“Why?” She finally asked, staring down at you in confusion. You blinked back at her, shaking your head bewilderedly.

“Wait, why what?”

“Why did you run away, you fucking dumbass!” Emma insulted, but it was loving and the two of you laughed as she pushed you off the bed and you squealed. “Seriously, Y/n, what the fuck? You ran away? After doing all of that you just ran?”

“I was scared!” You defend your actions with a hiss, pulling yourself up off of the floor and planting down next to her again. “Fuck, Emma, Max is my best friend. I cannot risk freaking him out and losing him, okay? I just…can’t, okay, he means…he means everything to me, Emma, he’s the most important person in the whole world. He’s my best friend.”

“Ouch,” Emma responded, but there was a fond smile on her face and a happy gleam in her eyes as she gazed down at you. “Babes, you know that you’re the most important thing in the world to him too, right? Even if he didn’t feel the same way about you, he wouldn’t let this ruin your friendship. You know that, right?”

You shrugged and looked away from her, playing with your hands as you avoided the question. Did you know that? No, not really. Yeah, the two of you were really close, and yeah, he spent most of his free time with you, but that didn’t mean that this wasn’t something that would freak him out enough to ghost you.

“Shit, if I was going to do something as fucking ridiculous as this, I should have just bit the and told him how I felt,” you finally responded with a sigh, pushing yourself off of the bed and shuffling your feet over the cold, hardwood floor. “But you know, maybe this way, there’s some way that I can play it off?”

“Okay babes, I’m just going to say this once and I’m going to say it outright,” Emma cut you off, standing in front of you and forcing your chin up to look your much taller friend in the eyes. “I know why they broke up, Y/n. The real reason, and if you just fucking ask me I will tell you right here, right now.”

The offer was, obviously, tempting; and two or three years ago you’d probably be a lesser person and taken that offer. As it was, though, you valued Max and his privacy, and if he’d wanted you to know, he would have told you himself.

“No, I don’t want to know,” you insisted, pursing your lips and pulling away from Emma. “It isn’t any of my business, and Max made that abundantly clear by not telling me inthe first place.”

“Of fucking course,” Emma groaned with a shake of her head, rolling her eyes at you and then fixing you with a glare. “The two of you are both so stupid.”

“Gee, thanks Em.” Your words fell flat as you shot her your own sharp look and she gulped, having the common decency to at least look like she felt bad for saying what she did. “Besides, why do you even know the reason Laura dumped him?”

“Laura didn’t dump Max—Max dumped Laura,” Emma clarified and your heart dropped into your stomach. The piece of news, realistically, probably should have made you feel better, but it didn’t. It only made you feel worse, like your heart had been stomped on and used up. Because—if that was true—if Max had dumped Laura—then why had he been so upset that night when he came over to your house? And why the fuck had he lied to you about it?

“What?” You asked, your voice tiny and fragile, and Emma looked back at you, confused.

“Max broke up with Laura,” Emma repeated, and was somehow completely missing the broken, wounded look that was written all over your face. “He dumped her, because he wasn’t in love with her, Y/n, he realized that he was—”

“Emma.”

Jacob’s voice pierced through the air, and the two of you jumped towards the sound, to where your cousin was currently glaring daggers towards your best friend. Emma immediately shut up, shooting you a guilty look as she moved farther away from you and towards Jacob.

“Y/n, can you please give us a moment?” Jacob asked, his throat froggy and having to clear it as he continued staring at Emma. When you saw the raw, heated look pass between them you excused yourself quickly, knowing that whatever feud they were having was about to be made up in tenfold. You forgot to bring your suitcase with you—not even thinking that you’d effectively be kicked out of your cabin for the night—as you ran outside, outside to the nothingness that awaited you.

No, seriously.

There was not a soul out here, Abi and Nick notably missing and Max even nowhere to be seen—not that you even wanted to see him right now anyways. Your heart was barely beating in your chest at the revelation that he’d lied to you—you, supposedly his closest friend—about something that was so huge. Then again, maybe he had no idea how huge it was to you. He didn’t at all, actually, because he had no idea that you were so annoyingly and stupidly in love with him.

“Fuck this day, and fuck everyone else,” you groaned to yourself as you plopped down on a metal bench under a canopy, covering your eyes with your hands as you whined.

“That an invitation?”

Max’s voice sent your blood running cold and you jumped, shocked, turning yourself towards him as he stood slightly behind you, watching you warily. His face was red, but he was smiling at you, and he made his way over and sat at the bench opposite you slowly.

The two of you stared at each other for a while—one of you, optimistically nervous, and the other of you having had your heart shattered into a million little pieces just ten minutes ago. Neither of you said anything, unsure of what exactly you should say, for a long time until finally, Max broke the silence.

“Y/n,” Max spoke, clearing his throat from the nervousness that threatened to choke and overtake him. “About what you said in the car—”

“You lied to me.”

You hadn’t intended for it to come out like that, but there it was, and there was no taking it back now.

Max reared back, astonishment registering across his perfect features.

“I—what?” He shook his head back and forth, as if he couldn’t quite comprehend what you were saying. “I lied about—about the car?”

“No Max, not about the fucking car!” You swore, rising from your seat in your anger. Max followed quickly, a gentle hand on your elbow that you quickly ripped out of his grasp. “You lied to me about—about Laura! You told me that she—that she broke up with you, Max! You were heartbroken, you were crying, you lied!”

You thought that there were tears streaming down your face but you couldn’t really tell at the moment. All you could feel was the adrenaline that was being fueled by your anger, and all you could see was the shock that hadn’t left Max’s face since you’d first spoken.

“Who told you that?” Max questioned, and the fact that he wasn’t denying it made you even more upset and you huffed, turning around on one heel and heading towards—fuck, you had absolutely nowhere to go.

“Does it matter?” You answered, turning back around and accepting the fact that the only way you were going to get to be alone was if Max went back to his cabin and left you here and, knowing him, that wasn’t likely to happen. “You lied, Max. And I’m pissed about it. That’s the only thing that you should care about.”

You still hadn’t turned around to face him, so he made his way in front of you instead, placing tentative hands on both of your arms and levelling his face with yours.

“Sweetheart, please look at me.” Fuck; you were weak anytime that Max called you sweetheart and you knew that he knew it, too. Hating yourself just a little bit more for it, you looked up at him, unaware of how your big, sad eyes caused every cell in his body to melt.

“Why did you lie to me?” The question slipped through your lips without your consent and Max sighed, releasing your arms and pressing a hand into your hip so that you couldn’t get away again.

“I didn’t want to hurt you,” Max answered simply and you reared back, out of his touch, away from his hold, as you scoffed in response.

“You didn’t want to hurt me?” You shrieked, pulling farther away from him and pushing your hands out in front of you to stop him when he tried to reach out for you again. “What the fuck—how the fuck would that have hurt me, Max?”

Max winced, running a nervous hand through his hair, and inspected his surroundings, as if he wished somebody else would come out any minute now.

“Y/n, you are my best friend,” Max pleaded, and you could see the desperation in his eyes but you had no idea why he was so upset. “You know me better than anybody else in this entire world, honey, please—can you give me the benefit of the doubt on this one? Can you let me tell you when I’m ready?”

“No, Max, obviously I cannot do that because obviously it has something to do with me!” You retorted sharply, angry tears burning hot at the corners of your eyes, hotter than normal, devastated tears. “Like—what is going on, Max? I hae this feeling that everybody’s in on this secret, everybody but me—and I should know it, I should know what’s going on with you—”

“Y/n, sweetheart!” Max interrupted again, and this time, he successfully gathered your hands into his. “Look, I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry that I lied—really I am, but—why is it so important to you?” You glared back at him, pulling your hands out of his grasp and beginning to walk away from him. “Why is it such a big deal that I didn’t tell you the whole truth?”

“Because I’m in love with you, you idiot!” You screamed back at him, your body turning back around on its own accord as the screech left your mouth. You both heard the words echo against a canyon somewhere, and you blanched, unaware of what you’d actually said and the weight of them until they hit you in the chest on the reverb.

Max’s mouth had dropped open and he stepped away from you in shock, his hands coming up to frame his cheeks, never making actual physical contact with his face. He stared back at you, his eyes wide and full of wonder, as if he were seeing you for the first time, all over again.

“You’re—” Max gulped, but he took a step closer to you, a smile adorning his freckled cheeks. “You’re in love with me? Really?”

Your heart sunk again when he spoke and you shook your head, backing away from him and pressing two fingers to the bridge of your nose as you suddenly felt an oncoming migraine.

“I’m sorry Max,” you apologized, feeling a bout of nausea spring up in your stomach as you realized that you’d just past the point of no return. “Shit, I’m so sorry, I should have never even said anything—I should have let it go—”

“I broke up with Laura because I’m in love with you.”

The words came out quickly, like Max was afraid that if he hadn’t said them as quickly as he did that he wouldn’t say them at all. You reaction was surprisingly slow compared to everything else you’d done in haste tonight, and you dropped your hands from your face and gazed up at the man in front of you, who was staring back at you with awe.

“W—what?”

“I love you,” Max repeated, taking another step towards you with his light, airy chuckle that you loved so damn much. “And I didn’t tell you that night I broke up with Laura because I thought that you’d think I was lying, or that you were a rebound, and you’re not, Y/n. You’re absolutely not—I’ve loved you for a long enough time that I’m a total asshole for letting it go on with Laura for as long as I did.”

“Then why—why did you—”

“I lied because I didn’t want you to think that any of this was your fault,” Max continued, and he was so close now that his arms were winding around your waist and his forehead was pressed to yours. “I just—I knew, the second I saw you again in that coffee shop, that it was fate. And I lied to myself, hoping that my relationship would just fizzle out on its own and that I wouldn’t have to hurt anyone but—fuck, I would break Laura’s heart a thousand times over if it meant that I might get to be with you in the end,” Max finished, and you were stunned silent, unaware of how to speak anymore.

“Do I—” Max took a sharp inhale of breath and a step back to assess your face. “Do I get you in the end?”

You smiled back at him before pressing your lips so tightly to his, wrapping your body so hard around his own, that the two of you could barely breathe in anything that wasn’t lingering on each other’s bodies.

“You had me,” you answered in between breathless kisses, in between promises, in between hopeful smiles. “You had me at the beginning.”

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